Quote of the day—Norbert Michel

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For those unfamiliar, Choke Point consisted of bureaucrats in several independent federal agencies taking it upon themselves to shut legal businesses – such as payday lenders and firearms dealers – out of the banking system. Given the nature of the U.S. regulatory framework, this operation was easy to pull off.

Officials at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), for instance, simply had to inform the banks they were overseeing that the government considered certain types of their customers “high risk.” The mere implication of a threat was enough to pressure banks into closing accounts, because no U.S. bank wants anything to do with extra audits or investigations from their regulator, much less additional operating restrictions or civil and criminal charges.

…

It is now clear that these unelected government officials set out to harm law-abiding citizens. Yet many of the government officials named in these documents are still employed by the same government agency. Most of these folks work at the FDIC, and one has even moved up from a regional director position to FDIC Ombudsman.

Norbert Michel
November 5, 2018
Newly Unsealed Documents Show Top FDIC Officials Running Operation Choke Point
[That these people aren’t currently in prison making little rocks out of big rocks shows you “the swamp” still needs to be drained.—Joe]

SAF, NRA FILE FEDERAL LAWSUIT CHALLENGING INITIATIVE 1639

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It’s nice to see the NRA and SAF working together.

From the Second Amendment Foundation web site:

SAF, NRA FILE FEDERAL LAWSUIT CHALLENGING INITIATIVE 1639

BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation and National Rifle Association have filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging gun control Initiative 1639 in Washington State, on several grounds.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. In addition to SAF and NRA, plaintiffs include gun dealers and young adults in the affected age group.

The lawsuit challenges the measure on the grounds that it violates the commerce clause by banning sales of rifles to non-residents, and that it unconstitutionally impairs the rights guaranteed by the First, Second and Fourteenth Amendments, and Article I Section 24 of the Washington State constitution by preventing the sale to otherwise qualified adults under age 21 of certain rifles.

“We are also considering additional legal challenges,” SAF Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb confirmed. “We are disappointed that too many Evergreen State voters were fooled into supporting this 30-page gun control scheme, despite overwhelming law enforcement opposition. This initiative is an affront to the constitutional rights enshrined in the Second Amendment and the Washington state constitution, especially for young adults.

“We’re determined to fight this egregious measure because constitutionally-protected rights should never be subject to a popularity vote,” he stated. “The wealthy elitists behind I-1639 want to turn a right into a regulated privilege. This measure was only designed to have a chilling effect on the exercise of a constitutional right by honest citizens while having no impact at all on criminals, and we cannot let it go unchallenged.”

“The NRA is committed to restoring the Second Amendment rights of every law-abiding Washingtonian,” said Chris W. Cox, executive director of NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action. “I-1639 violates the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens and puts people at risk. This lawsuit is the first step in the fight to ensure that Washingtonians are free to exercise their fundamental right to self-defense.

“The NRA will fight to overturn this unconstitutional initiative. We will not sit idly by while elitist anti-gun activists attempt to deny everyday Americans their fundamental right to self-defense,” concluded Cox.

“While a handful of billionaires spending millions of dollars were able to buy votes, it is our hope they can’t buy the judges,” Gottlieb said.

I find this very interesting. I don’t think anyone has challenged it on the grounds of the initiative violating Washington state law such things as being limited to only one subject, the font was too small to read, the strikeout and other formatting of deleted versus new text was incorrect. It’s possible this was deliberate and we won’t be seeing such a lawsuit for many years and only if this lawsuit fails.

If they can defeat it in Federal court on constitutional grounds it is gone for good so we won’t have to fight it at the ballot or legislature again and it protects other states. But if it is defeated on the basis of ballot procedures and formatting then we won’t be able to fight it on a constitutional until it is passed again. The biggest downside to this is that we will have to live with it until the Federal Courts rule on it. If the district court doesn’t rule in our favor it probably will have to go all the way to SCOTUS because it is unlikely the Ninth Circuit court of appeals is going to rule in our favor on all the aspects of this law.

Quote of the day—Jen Zamzow

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Anyone serious about building consensus on gun policy needs to be slower to judge and quicker to listen to those who disagree. I understand why gun-safety advocates might not want to listen to those who are skeptical of gun-safety laws. People are being killed in their places of worship and kids gunned down at school; this kind of crisis can make people feel they don’t have time for dialogue.

However, listening to those who are resistant to gun-control laws is more than just a sign of respect. Understanding what motivates people can help us come up with better solutions that are more likely to stick. Instead of focusing on what motivates us, we need to ask what motivates them. We don’t all need to take the same path to get to the same destination. We can get more people to the destination if we can find a path they’re willing to take.

Jen Zamzow
November 14, 2018
Why we can’t agree on gun control
[Great advice! The truth cannot be learned if people do not listen. Listen to others on the condition they listen to you and then see where you both end up. To see if both sides are really listening try a role reversal in your second session. If you can’t argue your opponents side then you probably aren’t listening.

Numerous studies have shown that conservatives understand progressives far better than the other way around. So this actually something of a “trap” for progressives. —Joe]

Something to keep in mind

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Washington state law has some interesting things to keep in mind:

State law defines malicious harassment — a felony commonly referred to as a “hate crime” — as intentionally injuring, damaging property or threatening someone “because of his or her perception of the victim’s race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, or mental, physical or sensory handicap.”

In Seattle a misdemeanor malicious harassment law extends those protections to include gender identity, homelessness, marital status, political ideology, age and parental status.

Detective Beth Wareing investigates bias crimes for the Seattle Police Department and coordinates its response.

She said the department tracks three types of bias:

• Malicious harassment;
• Crimes that have a bias element, such as when hatred toward a protected group or class is a secondary motivation;
• Bias incidents, in which “someone shares their nasty opinion about someone’s membership in these groups.”

Although bias incidents are not crimes, Wareing said tracking them helps SPD understand how people are being treated in a particular area or neighborhood and ensures that someone who feels threatened is heard.

Emphasis added.

So… if you are in Seattle you can’t insult the communists (in some areas you can just close your eyes and point in a random direction to find them) without being at risk of being reported to the police. But perhaps just as important is that if you go for a walk downtown wearing your NRA jacket and/or hat and people express their hatred those haters can be reported as well. Open carry is legal in the state too, but that probably would be considered hunting over bait and the fish and game department generally frowns on that.

Quote of the day—Jeff Snyder

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If resistance to gun-control laws is based on guns, or the enjoyment of guns, rather than our inalienable right to life and the sovereignty of the people, if we are consistently perceived as concerned only that we be left undisturbed to enjoy target shooting, hunting or collecting fine firearms, if, in fact, that is all that we do care about the resistance by an angry few will likely prove futile, and we will lose — not secure — the right to keep and bear arms.

Jeff Snyder
2001
Nation of Cowards, The Line in the Sand, page 161
[This book should be required reading in school. And since it is not every gun owner must be strongly encouraged to read it.

I can open the book to any page and easily find something worthy of a QOTD. Sometimes there three or four QOTD are clearly available on a single page and even the titles of the essays alone can qualify as a QOTD. It is an amazing book.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Ralph Fascitelli

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The major gun safety groups like Brady have done very little to promote a technology approach. … This we “believe” is because of a small group of naïve well-heeled idealists on the left don’t want a safer gun to be the solution to gun violence. The idealists on the left, who supported the New Jersey mandate, and right have prevented a pragmatic solution for a long time.

Ralph Fascitelli
October 31, 2018
A Former Remington Exec Takes On A Challenge: Building A Smart Gun That Can’t Be Hacked
[I don’t think I would be likely to purchase a “smart gun”. I don’t think they will be an good solution to most, or even many, firearms needs and should never be mandated. But I do have a sense of loss that the technology has been indirectly prevented because of crazy politics.

Fascitelli has been president of Washington Ceasefire and I don’t think I have ever said anything nice about him in public before. And that goes back at least nine years.

But recently I listened to a podcast where he was interviewed and claimed that murder of a gun control advocate was unlikely to have been committed by a gun rights advocate. Paraphrasing, he said, “They have a code. They respect and obey the law. I don’t think this was done by one of them.” This is a recognition of what we have been saying for decades, “If gun owners were as bad as the political left claims anti-gun activists would have all been shot years ago.”

And now, here, we have Fascitelli saying “smart gun technology” has been prevented, in part, by anti-gun activists. That is an insightful and almost certainly correct observation about a failure of “his people”. I think I could almost sit down with him over lunch and chat without either of us feeling the other was evil incarnate.—Joe]

Democrats, sex, and violence

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Justin Lehmiller wrote a book, Tell Me What You Want: The Science of Sexual Desire and How It Can Help You Improve Your Sex Life. I participated in his research survey but haven’t read the book the book yet. He has been writing a few articles about his research and I found this one particularly interesting:

Republicans and Democrats Don’t Just Disagree About Politics. They Have Different Sexual Fantasies.

…

While self-identified Republicans and self-identified Democrats reported fantasizing with the same average frequency—several times per week—I found that Republicans were more likely than Democrats to fantasize about a range of activities that involve sex outside of marriage. Think things like infidelity, orgies and partner swapping, from 1970s-style “key parties” to modern-day forms of swinging. Republicans also reported more fantasies with voyeuristic themes, including visiting strip clubs and practicing something known as “cuckolding,” which involves watching one’s partner have sex with someone else.

By contrast, self-identified Democrats were more likely than Republicans to fantasize about almost the entire spectrum of BDSM activities, from bondage to spanking to dominance-submission play. The largest Democrat-Republican divide on the BDSM spectrum was in masochism, which involves deriving pleasure from the experience of pain.

The BDSM thing is consistent with the Democrat goals of acquiring complete power. And, as we fear, inflicting pain, suffering, and submission. This claim is further exemplified by Karin Jones on Twitter who, after reading Lehmiller’s article said:

A fun read by @JustinLehmiller. He’s right! As a Democrat I often fantasize about BDSM activity – like crushing Donald Trump’s balls in my bare hands until he falls to his knees and begs me to impeach him.

In contrast, my most far out political fantasies involve the government obeying the constraints imposed upon it by the constitution and politicians who violate the law being prosecuted.

Never give up your guns. If you do what follows will be the wildest fantasies of the Democrats and it will be extremely unpleasant.

Quote of the day—Thomas J. McAvoy

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When Defendants’ statements and alleged conduct is examined in its totality, there are sufficient allegations to state plausible freedom-of-speech claims.

Thomas J. McAvoy
Senior United States District Judge
United States District Court Northern District of New York
November 6, 2018
NATIONAL RIFLE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA

Plaintiff

-against- 1:18-CV-0566

ANDREW CUOMO, both individually and in his official capacity;  MARIA T. VULLO, both individually and in her official capacity;  and THE NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF FINANCIAL SERVICES, Defendants.
[The case is about the defendants putting pressure on the insurance and banking industry to not do business with the NRA. Reading the entire ruling it’s interesting to see how it boiled down to, so far, mostly, a freedom of speech issue. It is also an example of Ayn Rand’s observation about laws being needed to create criminals. It turns out that the insurance companies violated a law which was only enforced in the case where the NRA was their customer.

See also Jacob Sullum blog post:

Federal Judge Says It’s Plausible That Andrew Cuomo Violated the First Amendment by Pressuring Banks and Insurers to Shun the NRA

The organization’s lawsuit against New York’s governor survives a motion to dismiss.

As I explained in my column today, and as McAvoy describes in his decision, there is strong evidence that Cuomo and Maria Vullo, superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services (DFS), are in fact threatening banks and insurers that dare to do business with organizations that oppose the governor’s gun control agenda.

The bottom line is that case survived a motion to dismiss and will proceed. I wish the NRA the best of luck and I have pleasant fantasies of Governor Cuomo having to pay the damages out of his own pocket.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Alan Gottlieb

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It’s written in a way that puts a chilling effect on gun ownership, but quite frankly, it’s unenforceable. There’s a giant loophole in this law. If they go to Oregon or Idaho, they can bring [a rifle] back. It’s totally legal. They just can’t buy it in Washington state.

Alan Gottlieb
Founder, Second Amendment Foundation
November 7, 2018
Second Amendment Foundation: Loopholes aplenty with I-1639
[There are other loopholes as well. I was at a gun store recently and suggested a loophole they might use. The clerk behind the counter said, paraphrasing, “That should work. But most of the time I expect we will just do it like….” and he explained a simpler approach. I had considered his suggestion weeks ago but figured it was clearly violating the spirit of the law even though it was complying with the letter of the law and that might be too risky. But, he didn’t seem bothered by it so I’m not going to worry about it. I make so many trips to Idaho I will just buy my guns there and not subject myself to the risk.

I’m a bit torn between keeping loopholes like this quiet and openly mocking the ignorance and stupidity of the people that write these laws. On the one hand we get more time to get more guns into the hands of more people. On the other we embarrass the anti-gun activists and cause them to lose face and status in the eyes of those who donate millions of dollars.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Jeffrey Guterman @JeffreyGuterman

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Anyone who is paranoid that their guns will be taken away should have their guns taken away.

Jeffrey Guterman @JeffreyGuterman
Tweeted on November 8, 2018
[Implementing a Catch-22 scenario. Nice try.

Apply this to other specific enumerated rights such as the right to trial by jury, right to representation by a lawyer, free speech, free association, freedom of religion, and in Mr. Guterman’s case I would like the local National Guard unit to knock on his door every day and his Third Amendment rights treated in such a manner.—Joe]

Quote of the day—On licensing a right

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I was going to make the content of this image my quote of the day because of the application to I-1639:

LicensingLiberty

“No state shall convert a liberty into a license, and charge a fee therefore.”

(Murdock v. Pennsylvania, 319 U.S. 105)

“If the state converts a right (liberty) into a privilege, the citizen can ignore the license and fee and engage in the right (liberty) with impunity.”

(Shuttlesworth v. City of Birmingham, Alabama 373 U.S. 262)

Unfortunately, as near as I can tell, neither ruling contains the word “convert”. There are some phrases that one might extrapolate to what is seen above, but they are extrapolations.

Here is the phrase in MURDOCK v. PENNSYLVANIA (CITY OF JEANNETTE) which I found to be the best fit:

A state may not impose a charge for the enjoyment of a right granted by the Federal Constitution.

And in SHUTTLESWORTH v. BIRMINGHAM, (1969) No. 42:

“It is settled by a long line of recent decisions of this Court that an ordinance which, like this one, makes the peaceful enjoyment of freedoms which the Constitution guarantees contingent upon the uncontrolled will of an official – as by requiring a permit or license which may be granted or withheld in the discretion of such official – is an unconstitutional censorship or prior restraint upon the enjoyment of those freedoms.” Staub v. Baxley, 355 U.S. 313, 322 . And our decisions have made clear that a person faced with such an unconstitutional licensing law may ignore it and engage with impunity in the exercise of the right of free expression for which the law purports to require a license.

Hence, I would like to suggest people not use the “quote” which has been circulating for some time now. Use an exact quote from the actual cases so you won’t get drawn into a debate over the meaning of the words you used versus what the courts actually said.

The actual words should be strong enough to make the case for our rights to be free of licensing restrictions. This practice should actually be far more effective since it avoids the deflection made possible by using words not actually found in case law.

Quote of the day—Kris Brown

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Just getting a vote in the House on background checks, which hasn’t happened in more than a decade, would be “monumental.”

We’ll know by Nov. 7 whether it really has changed or not and I think we’ll wake up and find that it has.

Kris Brown
October 25, 2018
Co-president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence
Gun control, once a third rail, now a key issue as Democrats seek to control House
[See also this QOTD by Brown as well.

I queued up this post on October 26th for publication on November 8th. So… how well did Ms. Brown predict the future? Did she get it right or, as usually is the case, are the anti-gun people routinely waking up in an alternate reality?—Joe]

Rounds in the last month

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I reloaded 4,069 rounds of .40 S&W last month. 406 rounds were 180 grain Hornady Action Pistol (HAP) bullets. 505 rounds were from Eggleston Munitions. These were 180 grain polymer coated bullets loaded really light for steel matches. 504 were blue and one was purple (it somehow found it’s way into the container of blue bullets). 1,567 rounds were loaded with red bullets from Acme Bullets. These were also loaded for steel matches. 1,591 of those rounds were 180 grain Montana Gold JHP to be used for practice at indoor ranges.

This is the most rounds I have reloaded since the first month I started reloading back in October 1996 when I reloaded 10,944 rounds. The Dillon XL650 made the difference. Ignoring the time running the cases through the case gauge after assembling it more doubles my rate of production I was getting with the Dillon 550B. If I don’t have many malfunctions with a messed up piece of used brass or something I can reload 800 rounds in an hour.

This month will not be so productive. I reloaded a few .40 S&W rounds but am switching back to the 550B to reload .223. Back in 2016 I purchased a bunch of components in preparation for a Hillary Clinton presidency and with the passage of I-1639 I now feel a need to do something to support the AR.

This brings my lifetime reloaded ammunition totals to:

223: 4,813 rounds.
30.06: 756 rounds.
300 WIN: 1,591 rounds.
40 S&W: 94,462 rounds.
45 ACP: 2,007 rounds.
9 mm: 21,641 rounds.
Total: 125,270 rounds

Quote of the day—John Schussler

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No, the difference is that the Republicans controlled the Senate in both cases and thus could both prevent Garland from getting a hearing and force a hearing and vote for Kavanaugh, forcing the Democrats to get as dirty as possible to have any chance at influence.

And the assertion that these are empty accusations is just wishful thinking on the part of Republicans. There’s no conspiracy here, the guy’s pretty clearly an infantile little douchebag — and hanging on to him was a big mistake. Women in both parties are now incandescent with rage and will make what was a likely moderate turnover of Congress into a landslide. After which point they’ll impeach Kavanaugh for perjury (his lies are now well documented…that testimony the other day will be the rope they hang him with) and the Republicans will have both lost Congress and the SOTUS seat they want so badly.

John Schussler
September 29, 2018
Comment to Quote of the day—Matt Walsh‏ @MattWalshBlog
[My response in the comments:

It’s interesting to read your viewpoint on the situation. It is quite different from some others. I talked to a big Trump supporter (best president EVER!!) last week who saw the fallout from the Kavanaugh confirmation process to be a huge win for Republicans in the elections next month.

As Scott Adams puts it (paraphrasing), “People are watching the same screen and seeing different movies.” My QOTD post for tomorrow has a lot more related information but I think you probably get the idea.

To determine who is “watching” the movie which most closely matches reality we only have to wait a month until the elections and see which is the better match. I’m going to make your comment my QOTD post for the day after the elections to remind us to review the predictions. This will also allow us to explore the predictions made by the book “When Prophecy Fails“. Either my Trump supporter will have their “prophecy” fail or you will have your prophecy fail. It will be a great test! I’m really looking forward to it.

Today is the day we evaluate the test results.

So…. which person has the better grasp on reality?—Joe]

It looks like #I1639 will pass

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At 8:30 PM with 63.45% of the precincts reporting I-1639 is passing 60.69% to 39.31%. Unless eastern Washington hasn’t sent in any results yet and they voted something like 90% against it means the next step is to take it to court.

The last time I talked to someone in the office of the Second Amendment Foundation they expected to win in court but I’m not quite as confident as they appeared to be.

Vote No on #I1639

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Via a tweet:

DoPBlVWVYAA3Rtr

Donate your time and money to fund efforts (as I have also done) to defeat I-1639.

Quote of the day—Vote Blue November 6‏ @AlvardoMitchell

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The answer is simple.

Ban civilian firearms and make illegal possession a capital crime.

The public execution of a few hundred thousand illegal gun owners and dealers will curtail the problem quite nicely.

Vote Blue November 6‏ @AlvardoMitchell
Tweeted October 6, 2018.
[See what Miguel has to say about this guy and Say Uncle as well.

Vote like your life depends on the right to keep and bear arms. Because it does.—Joe]

Vote No on #I1639

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Via a tweet:

DoM-ZdAU8AANQWl

Donate your time and money to fund efforts (as I have also done) to defeat I-1639.

Quote of the day—L. Mac from Melmac‏ @SlaveToTheAxe

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It says you support the 2nd Amendment….

Can you please explain why you don’t support the other 26?

It’s almost as if you are a full of shit or something….You must have an awfully small penis to require an extension like a gun.

L. Mac from Melmac‏ @SlaveToTheAxe
Tweeted on October 30, 2018
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]

Vote No on #I1639

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Via a tweet:

DnXNb3OUAAAvT-V

Donate your time and money to fund efforts (as I have also done) to defeat I-1639.