Fire Hydrant of Freedom
Politics, Religion, Science, Culture and Humanities => Politics & Religion => Topic started by: Crafty_Dog on July 14, 2003, 06:24:21 AM
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Tuhon Bill McGrath found this interesting piece.
7/25: I've renamed this thread so that it may serve as the vehicle for related posts
Crafty Dog
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Raging Against Self Defense
Permission is granted to distribute this article in its entirety, so long as full copyright information and full contact information is given for JPFO.
Copyright ? 2000 Sarah Thompson, MD
Published by
Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership, Inc.
P.O. Box 270143
Hartford, WI 53027
Phone (262) 673-9745
www.jpfo.org
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Raging Against Self Defense:
A Psychiatrist Examines The Anti-Gun Mentality
By Sarah Thompson, M.D.
righter@therighter.com
"You don't need to have a gun; the police will protect you."
"If people carry guns, there will be murders over parking spaces and neighborhood basketball games."
"I'm a pacifist. Enlightened, spiritually aware people shouldn't own guns."
"I'd rather be raped than have some redneck militia type try to rescue me."
How often have you heard these statements from misguided advocates of victim disarmament, or even woefully uninformed relatives and neighbors? Why do people cling so tightly to these beliefs, in the face of incontrovertible evidence that they are wrong? Why do they get so furiously angry when gun owners point out that their arguments are factually and logically incorrect?
How can you communicate with these people who seem to be out of touch with reality and rational thought?
One approach to help you deal with anti-gun people is to understand their psychological processes. Once you understand why these people behave so irrationally, you can communicate more effectively with them.
Defense Mechanisms
Projection
About a year ago I received an e-mail from a member of a local Jewish organization. The author, who chose to remain anonymous, insisted that people have no right to carry firearms because he didn't want to be murdered if one of his neighbors had a "bad day". (I don't know that this person is a "he", but I'm assuming so for the sake of simplicity.) I responded by asking him why he thought his neighbors wanted to murder him, and, of course, got no response. The truth is that he's statistically more likely to be murdered by a neighbor who doesn't legally carry a firearm1 and more likely to be shot accidentally by a law enforcement officer.1
How does my correspondent "know" that his neighbors would murder him if they had guns? He doesn't. What he was really saying was that if he had a gun, he might murder his neighbors if he had a bad day, or if they took his parking space, or played their stereos too loud. This is an example of what mental health professionals call projection ? unconsciously projecting one's own unacceptable feelings onto other people, so that one doesn't have to own them.3 In some cases, the intolerable feelings are projected not onto a person, but onto an inanimate object, such as a gun,4 so that the projector believes the gun itself will murder him.
Projection is a defense mechanism. Defense mechanisms are unconscious psychological mechanisms that protect us from feelings that we cannot consciously accept.5 They operate without our awareness, so that we don't have to deal consciously with "forbidden" feelings and impulses. Thus, if you asked my e-mail correspondent if he really wanted to murder his neighbors, he would vehemently deny it, and insist that other people want to kill him.
Projection is a particularly insidious defense mechanism, because it not only prevents a person from dealing with his own feelings, it also creates a world where he perceives everyone else as directing his own hostile feelings back at him.6
All people have violent, and even homicidal, impulses. For example, it's common to hear people say "I'd like to kill my boss", or "If you do that one more time I'm going to kill you." They don't actually mean that they're going to, or even would, kill anyone; they're simply acknowledging anger and frustration. All of us suffer from fear and feelings of helplessness and vulnerability. Most people can acknowledge feelings of rage, fear, frustration, jealousy, etc. without having to act on them in inappropriate and destructive ways.
Some people, however, are unable consciously to admit that they have such "unacceptable" emotions. They may have higher than average levels of rage, frustration, or fear. Perhaps they fear that if they acknowledge the hostile feelings, they will lose control and really will hurt someone. They may believe that "good people" never have such feelings, when in fact all people have them.
This is especially true now that education "experts" commonly prohibit children from expressing negative emotions or aggression. Instead of learning that such emotions are normal, but that destructive behavior needs to be controlled, children now learn that feelings of anger are evil, dangerous and subject to severe punishment.7To protect themselves from "being bad", they are forced to use defense mechanisms to avoid owning their own normal emotions. Unfortunately, using such defense mechanisms inappropriately can endanger their mental health; children need to learn how to deal appropriately with reality, not how to avoid it.8
(This discussion of psychological mechanisms applies to the average person who is uninformed, or misinformed, about firearms and self-defense. It does not apply to the anti- gun ideologue. Fanatics like Charles Schumer know the facts about firearms, and advocate victim disarmament consciously and willfully in order to gain political power. This psychological analysis does not apply to them.)
Denial
Another defense mechanism commonly utilized by supporters of gun control is denial. Denial is simply refusing to accept the reality of a given situation.9 For example, consider a woman whose husband starts coming home late, has strange perfume on his clothes, and starts charging flowers and jewelry on his credit card. She may get extremely angry at a well-meaning friend who suggests that her husband is having an affair. The reality is obvious, but the wronged wife is so threatened by her husband's infidelity that she is unable to accept it, and so denies its existence.
Anti-gun people do the same thing. It's obvious that we live in a dangerous society, where criminals attack innocent people. Just about everyone has been, or knows someone who has been, victimized. It's equally obvious that law enforcement can't protect everyone everywhere 24 hours a day. Extensive scholarly research demonstrates that the police have no legal duty to protect you10 and that firearm ownership is the most effective way to protect yourself and your family.11 There is irrefutable evidence that victim disarmament nearly always precedes genocide.12 Nonetheless, the anti-gun folks insist, despite all evidence to the contrary, that "the police will protect you", "this is a safe neighborhood" and "it can't happen here", where "it" is everything from mugging to mass murder.
Anti-gun people who refuse to accept the reality of the proven and very serious dangers of civilian disarmament are using denial to protect themselves from the anxiety of feeling helpless and vulnerable. Likewise, gun owners who insist that "the government will never confiscate my guns" are also using denial to protect themselves from the anxiety of contemplating being forcibly disarmed and rendered helpless and vulnerable.
Reaction Formation
Reaction formation is yet another defense mechanism common among the anti-gun folks. Reaction formation occurs when a person's mind turns an unacceptable feeling or desire into its complete opposite.13 For example, a child who is jealous of a sibling may exhibit excessive love and devotion for the hated brother or sister.
Likewise, a person who harbors murderous rage toward his fellow humans may claim to be a devoted pacifist and refuse to eat meat or even kill a cockroach.14 Often such people take refuge in various spiritual disciplines and believe that they are "superior" to "less civilized" folks who engage in "violent behavior" such as hunting, or even target shooting. They may devote themselves to "animal welfare" organizations that proclaim that the rights of animals take precedence over the rights of people.15 This not only allows the angry person to avoid dealing with his rage, it allows him actually to harm the people he hates without having to know he hates them.
This is not meant to disparage the many wonderful people who are pacifists, spiritually inclined, vegetarian, or who support animal welfare. The key issue is not the belief itself, but rather the way in which the person experiences and lives his beliefs. Sincere practitioners seek to improve themselves, or to be helpful in a gentle, respectful fashion. They work to persuade others peacefully by setting an example of what they believe to be correct behavior. Sincere pacifists generally exhibit good will towards others, even towards persons with whom they might disagree on various issues.
Contrast the sincere pacifist or animal lover with the strident, angry person who wants to ban meat and who believes murdering hunters is justified in order to "save the animals" ? or the person who wants to outlaw self- defense and believes innocent people have the obligation to be raped and murdered for the good of society. For example, noted feminist Betty Friedan said "that lethal violence even in self defense only engenders more violence."16 The truly spiritual, pacifist person refrains from forcing others to do what he believes, and is generally driven by positive emotions, while the angry person finds "socially acceptable" ways to harm, abuse, or even kill, his fellow man.
In the case of anti-gun people, reaction formation keeps any knowledge of their hatred for their fellow humans out of consciousness, while allowing them to feel superior to "violent gun owners". At the same time, it also allows them to cause serious harm, and even loss of life, to others by denying them the tools necessary to defend themselves. This makes reaction formation very attractive from a psychological point of view, and therefore very difficult to counteract.
Defense Mechanisms Are Not Mental Illnesses
Defense mechanisms are normal. All of us use them to some extent, and their use does not imply mental illness. Advocates of victim disarmament may be misguided or uninformed, they may be stupid, or they may be consciously intent on evil, but that doesn't necessarily mean they are "mentally ill".
Some defense mechanisms, however, are healthier than others. A safe general rule is that a defense is healthy if it helps you to function better in your personal and professional life, and unhealthy if it interferes with your life, your relationships, or the well-being of others. Young children utilize projection and denial much more commonly than do healthy adults. On the other hand, "if projection is used as a defense mechanism to a very great extent in adult life, the user's perception of external reality will be seriously distorted."17
Defense mechanisms are also frequently combined, so that an anti-gun person may use several defense mechanisms simultaneously. For example, my unfortunate correspondent uses projection to create a world in which all his neighbors want to murder him. As a result, he becomes more angry and fearful, and needs to employ even more defense mechanisms to cope. So he uses projection to attribute his own rage to others, he uses denial that there is any danger to protect himself from a world where he believes he is helpless and everyone wants to murder him, and he uses reaction formation to try to control everyone else's life because his own is so horribly out of control.
Also, it's important to remember that not all anti-gun beliefs are the result of defense mechanisms. Some people suffer from gun phobia18, an excessive and completely irrational fear of firearms, usually caused by the anti-gun conditioning they've been subjected to by the media, politicians, so-called "educators," and others. In some cases, gun phobia is caused by an authentic bad experience associated with a firearm. But with all due respect to Col. Jeff Cooper, who coined the term "hoplophobia" to describe anti-gun people, most anti-gun people do not have true phobias. Interestingly, a person with a true phobia of guns realizes his fear is excessive or unreasonable,19 something most anti-gun folks will never admit.
Defense mechanisms distort reality
Because defense mechanisms distort reality in order to avoid unpleasant emotions, the person who uses them has an impaired ability to recognize and accept reality. This explains why my e-mail correspondent and many other anti-gun people persist in believing that their neighbors and co- workers will become mass murderers if allowed to own firearms.
People who legally carry concealed firearms are actually less violent and less prone to criminal activity of all kinds than is the general population.20 A person who has a clean record, has passed an FBI background check, undergone firearms training, and spent several hundred dollars to get a permit and a firearm, is highly unlikely to choose to murder a neighbor. Doing so would result in his facing a police manhunt, a trial, prison, possibly capital punishment, and the destruction of his family, job, and reputation. Obviously it would make no sense for such a person to shoot a neighbor - except in self-defense. Equally obviously, the anti-gun person who believes that malicious shootings by ordinary gun owners are likely to occur is not in touch with reality.21
The Common Thread: Rage
In my experience, the common thread in anti-gun people is rage. Either anti-gun people harbor more rage than others, or they're less able to cope with it appropriately. Because they can't handle their own feelings of rage, they are forced to use defense mechanisms in an unhealthy manner. Because they wrongly perceive others as seeking to harm them, they advocate the disarmament of ordinary people who have no desire to harm anyone. So why do anti-gun people have so much rage and why are they unable to deal with it in appropriate ways? Consider for a moment that the largest and most hysterical anti-gun groups include disproportionately large numbers of women, African- Americans and Jews. And virtually all of the organizations that claim to speak for these "oppressed people" are stridently anti-gun. Not coincidentally, among Jews, Blacks and women there are many "professional victims" who have little sense of identity outside of their victimhood.
Identity as Victim
If I were to summarize this article in three sentences, they would be:
(1) People who identify themselves as "victims" harbor excessive amounts of rage at other people, whom they perceive as "not victims."
(2) In order psychologically to deal with this rage, these "victims" utilize defense mechanisms that enable them to harm others in socially acceptable ways, without accepting responsibility or suffering guilt, and without having to give up their status as "victims."
(3) Gun owners are frequently the targets of professional victims because gun owners are willing and able to prevent their own victimization.
Thus the concept of "identity as victim" is essential. How and why do members of some groups choose to identify themselves as victims and teach their children to do the same? While it's true that women, Jews, and African- Americans have historically been victimized, they now participate in American society on an equal basis. And other groups, most notably Asian-Americans, have been equally victimized, and yet have transcended the "eternal victim" mentality.
Why, for example, would a 6'10" NBA player who makes $10 million a year see himself as a "victim"? Why would a successful, respected, wealthy, Jewish physician regard himself as a "victim"? Conversely, why might a wheelchair bound woman who lives on government disability NOT regard herself as a victim?
I would argue it's because the basketball player and the physician believe that their identities are dependent on being victims ? not because they have actually been victimized, but because they're members of groups that claim victim status. Conversely, the disabled woman was probably raised to believe that she is responsible for her own success or failure.
In fact, many people who have been victims of actual violent crime, or who have survived war or civil strife, support the right of self-defense. The old saying is often correct: "a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged."
Special Treatment and Misleading Leaders
Two reasons for these groups to insist on "victim" status seem likely. First, by claiming victim status, members of these groups can demand (and get) special treatment through quotas, affirmative action, reparations, and other preferential treatment programs.
Second, these people have been indoctrinated to believe that there is no alternative to remaining a victim forever. Their leaders remind them constantly that they are mistreated in every imaginable way (most of them imaginary!), attribute every one of life's misfortunes to "racism" or "sexism" or "hate crimes", and dream up ever more complex schemes for special treatment and favors.22 These leaders are the ones who preach that the entire Black experience is slavery and racism, or that Jewish history before and after the Holocaust is irrelevant,23 or that happily married women are really victims of sexual slavery.24
Likewise, the NAACP is suing firearms manufacturers to put them out of business,25 and is especially opposed to the inexpensive pistols that enable the poor to defend themselves in gang-ridden inner cities. The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) proposed evicting anyone who dares to keep a tool of self-defense in any of its crime-infested housing projects. Jewish leaders, especially those in the politically correct "Reform" branch, preach that gun control is "a solemn religious obligation",26 contrary to the teachings of their sacred scriptures and their own history.27 Law enforcement agencies falsely teach women that they are safest if they don't resist rapists and robbers,28 while women's organizations advocate gun control, thus rendering women and their children defenseless.
Victimhood is good business for organizations that foster victim status. As victims, the members depend upon the organization to protect them, and the organization in turn relies on members for funding and political power. In the interest of self-preservation, these organizations work hard at preserving hatred and bigotry and at keeping their members defenseless ? and therefore dependent.
Anti-gun groups love victims!
From my observations, pro-victimhood is a feature of all of the anti-gun special interest groups, not just the ones mentioned here. Every organization that supports gun control apparently wants its members to be helpless, terrified and totally dependent on someone else to control every aspect of their lives. It doesn't matter whether it's a religious, racial, ethnic, political, social, or charitable group. From Handgun Control, Inc. to the Anti- Defamation League to the Million Mom March, they all want you to live in fear. In this scheme, soccer moms are "victims" just as much as are inner-city minorities.
If these organizations truly cared about the people for whom they claim to speak, they would encourage safe and responsible firearms ownership. They would help people to learn how to defend themselves and their families so that they wouldn't have to live in fear. They would tell everyone that one of the wonderful things about being an American is that you have the right to keep and bear arms, the right to defend yourself, and how these rights preserve the right to be free.
The psychological price of being a victim
In our current society, victimhood has many perceived benefits, but there are some serious drawbacks. Victims tend to see the world as a scary and threatening place. They believe that others treat them differently, unfairly, and even maliciously ? and that they are helpless to do anything about it. This belief, that they are being mistreated and are helpless to resist, generates tremendous rage, and often, serious depression.
But for victims to show rage openly can be dangerous, if not outright suicidal. For example, a battered woman who screams at or hits her attacker may provoke worse beatings or even her own murder. And a person who successfully defends himself loses his status as "victim." For someone whose entire identity is dependent on being a victim, the loss of victim status is just as threatening as loss of life.
So, unable psychologically to cope with such rage, people who view themselves as victims: (1) use defense mechanisms to displace it into irrational beliefs about neighbors killing each other, and the infallibility of police protection, and (2) attempt to regain control by controlling gun owners, whom they wrongly perceive as "the enemy".
Say NO to being a victim!
But no one needs to be a victim! Quite simply, it's not very easy to victimize a person who owns and knows how to use a firearm. If most women owned and carried firearms, rapes and beating would decrease.29 Thugs who target the elderly and disabled would find honest work once they realized they were likely to be looking down the barrel of a pistol or shotgun. It's nearly impossible to enslave, or herd into concentration camps, large numbers of armed people.
Communicating with anti-gun people
How can you communicate more effectively with an anti-gun person who is using unhealthy defense mechanisms? There are no quick and easy answers. But there are a few things you should keep in mind.
Anger and attacks do not work
Most gun owners, when confronted by an anti-gun person, become angry and hostile. This is understandable, because gun owners increasingly face ridicule, persecution and discrimination. (If you don't believe this, ask yourself if anyone would seriously introduce legislation to ban African- Americans, women, or Jews from post offices, schools, and churches. Even convicted felons aren't banned from such places ? but peaceful armed citizens are!) But an angry response is counterproductive.
It's not helpful to attack the person you're trying to persuade. Anything that makes him feel more fearful or angry will only intensify his defenses. Your goal is to help the person feel safe, and then to provide experiences and information that will help him to make informed decisions.
Be Gentle
You should never try to break down a defense mechanism by force. Remember that defense mechanisms protect people from feelings they cannot handle, and if you take that protection away, you can cause serious psychological harm. And because defense mechanisms operate unconsciously, it won't do any good to show an anti-gun person this article or to point out that he's using defense mechanisms. Your goal is gently and gradually to help the person to have a more realistic and rational view of the world. This cannot be done in one hour or one day.
As you reach out to people in this way, you need to deal with both the illogical thought processes involved and the emotional reactions that anti-gun people have to firearms. When dealing with illogical thought processes, you are attempting to use reason and logic to convince the anti-gun person that his perception of other people and his perception of firearms are seriously inaccurate. The goal is to help him to understand that armed citizens and firearms are not threats, and may even save his life.
Reversing Irrational thoughts
The Mirror Technique
One approach that can be helpful is simply to feed back what the anti-gun person is telling you, in a neutral, inquisitive way. So, when replying to my anonymous e-mail correspondent (above), I might respond, "So you fear if your neighbors had guns, they would use them to murder you. What makes you think that?" When you simply repeat what the person has said, and ask questions, you are not directly challenging his defenses. You are holding up a mirror to let him see his own views. If he has very strong defenses, he can continue to insist that his neighbors want to murder him. However, if his defenses are less rigid, he may start to question his position.
Another example might be, "Why do you think that your children's schoolteachers would shoot them?" You might follow this up with something like, "Why do you entrust your precious children to someone you believe would murder them?" Again, you are merely asking questions, and not directly attacking the person or his defenses.
Of course the anti-gun person might continue to insist that the teachers really would harm children, but prohibiting them from owning guns would prevent it. So you might ask how using a gun to murder innocent children is different from stabbing children with scissors, assaulting them with baseball bats, or poisoning the milk and cookies.
It's important to ask "open-ended" questions that require a response other than "yes" or "no". Such questions require the anti-gun person actually to think about what he is saying. This will help him to re-examine his beliefs. It may also encourage him to ask you questions about firearms use and ownership.
The "What Would You Do?" Technique
Once you have a dialogue going with an anti-gun person, you might want to insert him into a hypothetical scenario, although doing so is a greater threat to his defenses, and is therefore more risky. You might ask how he would deal with a difficult or annoying co-worker. He will likely respond that he would never resort to violence, but "other people" would, especially if they had guns. (Projection again.) You can then ask him who these "other people" are, why they would shoot a co-worker, and what the shooter would gain by doing so.
Don't try to "win" the argument. Don't try to embarrass the person you're trying to educate. Remember that no one likes to admit that his deeply held beliefs are wrong. No one likes to hear "I told you so!" Be patient and gentle. If you are arrogant, condescending, hurtful or rude to the anti-gun person, you will only convince him that gun owners are arrogant, hurtful people ? who should not be trusted with guns!
Defusing Emotional reactions
The "You Are There" Technique
Rational arguments alone are not likely to be successful, especially since many people "feel" rather than "think". You also need to deal with the emotional responses of the anti-gun person. Remember that most people have been conditioned to associate firearms with dead toddlers. So you need to change the person's emotional responses along with his thoughts.
One way to do this is to put the anti-gun person (or his family) at a hypothetical crime scene and ask what he would like to have happen. For example, "Imagine your wife is in the parking lot at the supermarket and two men grab her. One holds a knife to her throat while the other tears her clothes off. If I see this happening and have a gun, what should I do? What would happen next? What if after five minutes, the police still haven't arrived?"
Just let him answer the questions and mentally walk through the scenario. Don't argue with his answers. You are planting seeds in his mind than can help change his emotional responses.
The Power of Empathy
Another emotion-based approach that is often more successful is to respond sympathetically to the plight of the anti-gun person.
Imagine for a moment how you would feel if you believed your neighbors and co-workers wanted to kill you and your family, and you could do nothing at all about it except to wait for the inevitable to occur.
Not very pleasant, is it?
This is the world in which opponents of armed self-defense live. All of us have had times in our lives when we felt "different" and had to contend with hostile schoolmates, co- workers, etc. So we need to invoke our own compassion for these terrified people. Say something like, "It must be awful to live in fear of being assaulted by your own neighbors. I remember what it was like when I was the only (Jew, Mormon, African-American, Republican) in my (class, football team, workplace) ? and even then I didn't think anyone was going to kill me." It's essential that you sincerely feel some compassion and empathy; if you're glib or sarcastic, this won't work.
Using empathy works in several ways. First, it defuses a potentially hostile interaction. Anti-gun people are used to being attacked, not understood, by advocates of gun rights. Instead of an "evil, gun-toting, extremist", you are now a sympathetic, fellow human being. This may also open the door for a friendly conversation, in which you can each discover that your "opponent" is a person with whom you have some things in common. You may even create an opportunity to dispel some of the misinformation about firearms and self-defense that is so prevalent.
This empathy technique is also useful for redirecting, or ending, a heated argument that has become hostile and unproductive. It allows you to escape from the dead end of "guns save lives" vs. "the only reason to have a gun is to murder children." With empathy you can reframe the argument entirely. Instead of arguing about whether more lives are saved or lost as a result of gun ownership, you can comment on how terrifying it must be to live in a country where 80 million people own guns "solely for the purpose of murdering children".
You should not expect any of these approaches to work immediately; they won't. With rare exceptions, the anti-gun person is simply not going to "see the light," thank you profusely, and beg you to take him shooting. What you are doing is putting tiny chinks into the armor of the person's defenses, or planting seeds that may someday develop into a more open mind or a more rational analysis. This process can take months or years. But it does work!
Corrective Experiences
Perhaps the most effective way to dissolve defense mechanisms, however, is by providing corrective experiences30. Corrective experiences are experiences that allow a person to learn that his ideas about gun owners and guns are incorrect in a safe and non-threatening way. To provide a corrective experience, you first allow the person to attempt to project his incorrect ideas onto you. Then, you demonstrate that he is wrong by your behavior, not by arguing.
For example, the anti-gun person will unconsciously attempt to provoke you by claiming that gun owners are uneducated "rednecks," or by treating you as if you are an uneducated "redneck." If you get angry and respond by calling him a "stupid, liberal, socialist", you will prove his point. However, if you casually talk about your M.B.A., your trip to the Shakespeare festival, your vegetable garden, or your daughter's ballet recital, you will provide him with the opportunity to correct his misconceptions.
If you have used the above techniques, then you have already provided one corrective experience. You have demonstrated to the frightened, anti-gun person that gun owners are not abusive, scary, dangerous and sub-human monsters, but normal, everyday people who care about their families, friends and even strangers.
As many gun owners have already discovered, the most important corrective experiences involve actually exposing the fearful person to a firearm. It is almost never advisable to tell someone that you carry a concealed firearm, but there are ways to use your own experience favorably.
For example, if you're dealing with an anti-gun person with whom you interact regularly and have a generally good relationship ? a coworker, neighbor, church member, etc. ? you might indirectly refer to concealed carry. You should never say anything like "I'm carrying a gun right now and you can't even tell," especially because in some states that would be considered illegal, "threatening" behavior. But you might consider saying something like, "I sometimes carry a firearm, and you've never seemed to be uncomfortable around me." Whether to disclose this information is an individual decision, and you should consider carefully other consequences before using this approach.
First-hand experience
Ultimately, your goal is to take the anti-gun person shooting. Some people will accept an invitation to accompany you to the range, but others are too frightened to do so, and will need some preliminary experience.
First, you want to encourage the anti-gun person to have some contact with a firearm in whatever way feels most comfortable to him. Many people seem to believe that firearms have minds of their own and shoot people of their own volition. So you might want to start by inviting him simply to look at and then handle an unloaded firearm. This also provides you the opportunity to show the inexperienced person how to tell whether a firearm is loaded and to teach him the basic rules of firearms safety.
Encourage the newcomer to ask questions and remember that your role is to present accurate information in a friendly, responsible and non-threatening way. This is a good time to offer some reading material on the benefits of firearms ownership. But be careful not to provide so much information that it's overwhelming. And remember this is not the time to launch into anti-government rants, the New World Order, conspiracy theories, or any kind of political talk!
Next, you can invite your friend to accompany you to the shooting range. (And if you're going to trust each other with loaded guns, you should consider yourselves friends!) Assure him that no one will force him to shoot a gun and he's free just to watch. Let him know in advance what he will experience and what will be expected of him. This includes such things as the need for eye and ear protection, a cap, appropriate clothing, etc. Make sure you have a firearm appropriate for your guest should s/he decide to try shooting. This means a lower caliber firearm that doesn't have too much recoil. If your guest is a woman, make sure the firearm will fit her appropriately. Many rifles have stocks that are too long for small women, and double-stack semi-autos are usually too large for a woman's hand.
Remember that just visiting the range can be a corrective experience. Your guest will learn that gun owners are disciplined, responsible, safety-conscious, courteous, considerate, and follow the rules. He will see people of all ages, from children to the elderly, male and female, enjoying an activity together. He will not see a single "beer-swilling redneck" waving a firearm in people's faces.
In my experience, most people who visit a range will decide they do want to try shooting. Remember to make sure your guest understands all the safety rules and range rules before allowing him to handle a firearm. If you don't feel competent to teach a newcomer to shoot, ask an instructor or range master to assist. Remember to provide lots of positive feedback and encouragement. If you're lucky, you'll recruit a new firearms enthusiast.
But even if your guest decides that shooting is "not for him", he will have learned many valuable lessons. He will know basic rules of firearms safety, and how to clear a firearm should he need to do so. This may well save his life someday. He will know that guns do not fire unless a person pulls the trigger. He will know that gun owners are friendly, responsible people, not very different from him. Even if he chooses not to fire a gun ever again, he will be less likely to fear and persecute gun owners. And who knows ? a few months or years later he may decide to become a gun owner.
Why these techniques do not always work
You should remember that you will not be successful with all anti-gun people. Some people are so terrified and have such strong defenses, that it's not possible for someone without professional training to get through. Some people have their minds made up and refuse to consider opening them. Others may concede that what you say "makes sense," but are unwilling to challenge the forces of political correctness. A few may have had traumatic experiences with firearms from which they have not recovered.
You will also not be successful with the anti-gun ideologues, people like Charles Schumer and Dianne Feinstein. These people have made a conscious choice to oppose firearms ownership and self-defense. They almost always gain power, prestige, and money from their anti-gun politics. They are not interested in the facts or in saving lives. They know the facts and understand the consequences of their actions, and will happily sacrifice innocent people if it furthers their selfish agenda. Do not use these techniques on such people. They only respond to fears of losing the power, prestige and money that they covet.31
Conclusion
By better understanding advocates of civilian disarmament, and by learning and practicing some simple techniques to deal with their psychological defenses, you will be much more effective in your efforts to communicate with anti-gun people. This will enable you to be more successful at educating them about the realities of firearms and self- defense, and their importance to our liberty and safety.
Educating others about firearms is hard work. It's not glamorous, and it generally needs to be done one person at a time. But it's a very necessary and important task. The average American supports freedom of speech and freedom of religion, whether or not he chooses to exercise them. He supports fair trials, whether or not he's ever been in a courtroom. He likewise needs to understand that self- defense is an essential right, whether or not he chooses to own or carry a gun.
? 2000, Sarah Thompson.
Dr. Thompson is Executive Director of Utah Gun Owners Alliance, www.utgoa.org and also writes The Righter, www.therighter.com, a monthly column on individual rights.
Notes
1 Lott, John R., Jr. 1998. More Guns, Less Crime. University of Chicago Press. Pp. 11-12; Proposition B: More Security Or Greater Danger?, St. Louis Post-Dispatch. March 21, 1999.
2 Lott 1998, Pp. 1-2.
3 Kaplan, Harold M. and Sadock, Benjamin J. 1990. Pocket Handbook of Clinical Psychiatry. Williams & Wilkins. P. 20.
4Brenner, Charles. 1973. An Elementary Textbook of Psychoanalysis (rev. ed.). Anchor Books. Pp. 91-93; Lefton, Lester A. 1994. Psychology (5th edition). Allyn & Bacon. Pp. 432-433.
5 Brenner 1973. P. 91.
6 Kaplan and Sadock 1990, p. 20; Lefton 1994, p. 432.
7 Talbott, John A., Robert E. Hales and Stuart C. Yudofsky, eds. 1988. Textbook of Psychiatry. American Psychiatric Press. P.137.
8 "Kids Suspended for Playground Game." Associated Press. April 6, 2000.
9 Lightfoot, Liz. "Gun Return to the Nursery School Toy Chest." The London Telegraph. May 22, 2000. Kaplan and Sadock 1990, p. 20; Lefton 1994, p. 433.
10 Stevens, Richard W. 1999. Dial 911 and Die. Mazel Freedom Press. [Analyzes the law in 54 U.S. jurisdictions]; see, e.g., Bowers v. DeVito, 686 F.2d 616, 618 (7th Cir. 1982) [no federal constitutional right to police protection.]
11 Kleck, Gary and Gertz, Marc. 1995. Armed Resistance to Crime: The Prevalence and Nature of Self- Defense with a Gun. Journal of Criminal Law & Criminology. Vol. 86 (Fall), pp. 150-187.
12 Simkin, Jay, Zelman, Aaron, and Rice, Alan M. 1994. Lethal Laws. Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership.
13 Kaplan and Sadock 1990, p. 20; Lefton 1994, p. 433.
14 Brenner 1973, p. 85.
15 Veith, Gene Edward, Jr. 1993. Modern Fascism: Liquidating the Judeo-Christian Worldview. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing. Pp. 39-40 [fascism exalts nature, animals and environment].
16 Japenga, A. 1994. Would I Be Safer with a Gun? Health. March/April, p. 54.
17 Brenner 1973, p. 92.
18 Kaplan and Sadock 1990, p. 219.
19 American Psychiatric Association. 1994. Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition. P. 410.
20 Lott 1998, pp. 11-12.
21 Most American gun owners are not violent criminals and will not be potential killers. "The vast majority of persons involved in life-threatening violence have a long criminal record and many prior contacts with the justice system." Elliott, Delbert S. 1998. Life Threatening Violence is Primarily a Crime Problem: A Focus on Prevention. University of Colorado Law Review. Vol. 69 (Fall), pp. 1081-1098, at 1093.
22 Sowell, Thomas. 2000. Blacks and bootstraps. Jewish World Review (Aug.14). http://www.jewishworldreview.com
23x Wein, Rabbi Berel. 2000. The return of a Torah scroll and confronting painful memories. Jewish World Review (July 12).
24 Dworkin, Andrea. "Terror, Torture and Resistance". http://www.igc.org/Womensnet/dworkin/TerrorTortureandResistance.html
25 Mfume, Kweisi, speech at the 90th annual NAACP meeting, July 12, 1999. http://www.naacp.org/president/speeches/90th%20Annual%20Meeting.htm
26 Yoffie, Rabbi Eric H. Speech supporting the Million Mom March, May 14, 2000. http://uahc.org/yoffie/mmm.html
27 "If someone comes to kill you, arise quickly and kill him." The Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin. 1994. The Schottenstein Edition. New York: Mesorah Publications. Vol. 2, 72a.
28 Rape and Sexual Assault, Dean of Students Office for Women's Resources and Services McKinley Health Education Dept., University Police, University of Illinois; Hazelwood, R. R. & Harpold, J. 1986. Rape: The Dangers of Providing Confrontational Advice, FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin. Vol. 55, pp. 1-5.
29 Lott 1998, pp. 78, 134-37.
30 Frank, Jerome D. 1961. Persuasion and Healing. The Johns Hopkins Press. Pp. 216-217.
31 Richardson, H. L. 1998. Confrontational Politics. Gun Owners Foundation. 1
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we all are victims! and hate guns and self defense.
no we all are cowboys! who had the right
too protect ourselves and our families -and love guns.
i dont know, i cant write good english and are not american.....
maybe to far away too have a picture from the hole situation......
but: i think the article is pretty black and white (and pretty long .-))
i`m sure its easy possible too write a similar psychological
article about "gun-mans"......
much anti-gun people had simple fear from they irresponsible
neighbours ?and thats right and normal !!!!! o.k. .... i`m on the victim-side. :?
greetings logan
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Woof Logan:
I think I understand your meaning.
What can you tell us about the Swiss approach to all of this?
Woof,
Crafty Dog
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Walking a Thin Blue Line
*The 11-member Oregon Rangers say they help keep order in the forests. Officials don't want the armed group's assist but can't stop it.
*By Tomas Alex Tizon, Times Staff Writer
JUNCTION CITY, Ore. ? He looks just like a cop, standing there in his blue uniform, the silver badge on his chest glinting in the sunlight. There's the gun too, a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol that he keeps holstered on a thick black belt.
Paul Ehrhardt, pausing in his driveway, identifies all the doodads on his belt: the extra bullet magazines, the pepper spray, the handcuffs ? almost everything a cop needs in the field. Only Ehrhardt isn't a cop. And neither are the 10 other members of his group, which organized a year ago and has since roused alarm among the locals.
The group ? a motley collection of gun hobbyists, volunteer firefighters, outdoorsmen and ex-military men and their wives ? calls itself the Oregon Rangers Assn. Their self-appointed mission is to help keep law and order in the forests.
Eventually they plan to recruit more members and to encourage other citizen groups around the state to start patrolling their own regions.
Never mind that no government agency officially recognizes them, that neighbors call them vigilantes. Twice a week, the rangers conduct armed patrols, usually in pairs, driving and hiking on back-country roads in the lush mountains on either side of town.
"You're either part of the solution," Ehrhardt says, as he loads his truck in preparation for a patrol, "or part of the problem."
The problem, in the words of fellow ranger Bryon Barnes, is there's "a whole lot of woods and not a whole lot of people patrolling them." The rangers say Oregon's forests are being desecrated by vandals and garbage dumpers, pot growers and poachers, and there aren't enough police to stop them.
The rangers' goal is to deter the bad guys by simply being present in the forests and, when appropriate, to report crimes and criminals to authorities. Nothing remarkable has happened in this first year, but if things should get ugly, they're prepared. The group's arsenal includes two AR-15 rifles (the civilian version of the military M-16), six pump-action shotguns and numerous hunting rifles and handguns.
"They have no authorization to be doing what they're doing," says Doug Huntington, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Land Management, which manages most of the public land patrolled by Ehrhardt's group. "They give the impression they're law enforcement and they're not. When people arm themselves and go into the woods to enforce the law without any real authority, we can't condone it. We don't condone it."
But they can't stop it, either.
This Side of the Law
Oregon law allows people to carry firearms on public lands, and every member of the group has a concealed weapons permit and is certified to be an armed security officer. Oregon State Police investigated the rangers on suspicion of impersonating police officers but found their uniforms and badges just different enough to escape prosecution. The state police badge, for example, is a five-point star; the rangers' star has seven points.
Some wonder whether the group represents a new kind of post-9/11 militia. Unlike the militias of the late 1980s and 1990s, which were anti-government and often white-separatist in ideology, the rangers and a number of other isolated groups seem intent on making up for what they perceive as government's failure to enforce the law. These groups see themselves as aiding government.
"We have a rather comprehensive invitation to be preoccupied with patriotism and domestic security right now," says Richard Mitchell, a sociologist at Oregon State University who published a book last year on militia and survivalist groups. "It shouldn't surprise us if some people take matters into their own hands. They'll see it as a form of community service."
Typically, these groups figure out what skills and tools they have to offer and then come up with a "trouble scenario" in which they would be useful, Mitchell says.
There's also the element of trying to transcend everyday life, says James William Gibson, a militia expert at Cal State Long Beach. Being part of such a group "helps some people get out of the routines of their ordinary lives and have a modest adventure," Gibson says.
In New York last summer, a rabbi called for citizen patrols to protect Jewish neighborhoods in Brooklyn from terrorists. A group of 50, armed with handguns, shotguns and baseball bats, conducted a few patrols before protests forced its disbandment.
In Baytown, Texas, armed citizen volunteers last year took part in twice-a-week police ride-alongs to help local law enforcement. The volunteers had concealed weapons permits and took part in arrests. City officials recently banned volunteers from carrying weapons in the police cars, but the ride-alongs continue.
In Arizona, a number of citizen militias have formed near the Mexican border to help stop the flow of illegal immigrants from Latin America. The groups, under the wary eye of the U.S. Border Patrol, claim to have hundreds of members.
As with the Oregon Rangers, the stated goal for each group is not to oppose or replace law enforcement, but to be an unofficial adjunct; to be, in a phrase that Paul Ehrhardt repeats like a mantra, "part of the solution."
"They're walking a thin line," says Lane County Sheriff Jan Clements, who along with the Oregon State Police has kept a close watch on the rangers. Clements says the group so far has not crossed the line.
The Volunteers
Ehrhardt is 55, compact and raven-haired, amiable with a deferential way of talking, as if every sentence comes with an implied "sir" or "ma'am." He exudes earnestness.
"I'd rather be doing this than win the lottery!" he says.
The formal leader of the rangers, Ehrhardt twice tried to become a police officer, once with the Lane County Sheriff's Office and again with the Junction City Police Department. He changed his mind on the first and failed the agility test on the second. Now he says he's glad about not making it, because he can do his own kind of civic service "without all the paperwork."
Ehrhardt says he doesn't mind the grousing from local police. Having been a volunteer firefighter for the last 10 years, he says he's seen a lot of it. Police and fire agencies tend to be very territorial and complain about each other all the time, he says. The scrutiny on his group, he believes, is just part of that.
On this day, he's patrolling with his wife, Robin, 44, a nurse and co-founder of the group. The other members ? six men and three women ? are busy with other things. All have day jobs: There is a rancher, a hairdresser, a freelance photographer and a truck driver. Two work at a local tire shop. One works for a cellphone company. Another is in the Navy in Guam, and her husband, also a ranger, works at a scuba-diving shop. The couple in Guam manage the group's Web site and help with patrols when they're home.
The Ehrhardts make their living by running two adult foster-care homes on their seven-acre property, which is also headquarters for the Oregon Rangers Assn.
In the back of what appears to be a quaint country homestead is a gun range, which up until April was used by the rangers to hone their shooting skills. Neighbors complained to police about bullets flying through their property, and officials shut down the range as a training ground, citing zoning laws. The law, however, allows the Ehrhardts to shoot on their property, so bullets have kept flying and the neighbors have kept complaining.
"We're under siege here," says Michelle Palodichuk, who has lived on the adjacent lot for 26 years. Palodichuk calls the Ehrhardts vigilantes. Other neighbors call them worse names, and one is talking of having a neighborhood meeting to figure out what to do.
Wallace Keeler, 92, born and raised in the area, echoes the concern felt by many locals: "They're out there patrolling without any authority but acting like they have authority. Most of us here like the outdoors. What's going to happen when we run into them out there?"
The Ehrhardts, though annoyed by the complaints, say that as long as they're not breaking the law, they don't have to change.
The whole idea of the rangers started quietly enough, with just Paul and Robin Ehrhardt taking treks into the woods. Paul, an army veteran, had a zeal for guns and weaponry; Robin, with nursing and helping the sick. The couple's first date 10 years ago was at an emergency medical technician class at a local fire department.
They both caught the volunteer bug in a big way. They signed up at local fire departments. They married and became regular volunteers for the BLM and the U.S. Forest Service, clearing trails, cleaning dumps, repairing signs and equipment. In some ways, Robin Ehrhardt says, they've been patrolling the woods for the last decade.
It was during these stints that the couple saw the extent of lawlessness and lack of law enforcement in the woods. The BLM, for example, employs only two law-enforcement officers in the Lane County region.
For years, the couple talked about creating a citizens group to fill the void, and they finally did it after recruiting some like-minded friends. Like the Ehrhardts, most of the other rangers are ruralites native to the region.
Barnes, one of the original members, says he's a ranger purely "for the personal satisfaction thing." It has nothing to do with money or "getting my name in the paper," but with "making an iota of difference" in keeping the woods and mountains safe and pristine. "That's all that really matters to us," Barnes says.
'We Don't Go to Movies'
Lane County is mostly farmland and forest. It stretches from Oregon's central coast to the Cascade mountains, a space twice the size of Delaware, and 90% of it forestland. The rangers generally limit their patrols to places they can drive to in a couple of hours.
Within 15 minutes of leaving their home outside Junction City, the couple, in their silver Jeep Cherokee with its own dashboard-attached shotgun at the ready, are already deep in the woods, on an old logging road that winds like a gray ribbon between the lush, green foothills of the Coast Range.
"Paul and I, we don't go to movies," says Robin Ehrhardt. "We do this."
Along the way, Paul Ehrhardt, with a slight movement of his arm, gestures toward every passing road sign. Nearly every one has been shot up. Most mangled are the signs that read "No Discharging of Firearms."
At one point, he stops the truck and the couple listen.
"There's someone up there shooting," he says. The sound of gunfire cracks in the distant air, and for a moment, Ehrhardt considers his options, then drives away. The gunfire was coming from land owned by a timber company. He points to a small sign that says so. "If it was on public land, we would have gone up that road."
And who knows what they would have encountered. The couple brim with stories of close calls and tense encounters. There was one time, on a volunteer stint, when Robin Ehrhardt and a Forest Service worker drove into a grove where a drunken party was taking place. Most of the revelers appeared to be underage, and a large man approached their vehicle wielding a baseball bat.
"That bat was intended to hurt," Robin Ehrhardt says. She and her companion sped off before trouble started. It all happened very quickly, but she clearly remembers her fear. She says such parties, often involving teenagers, take place in the woods every weekend, and often result in some misbehavior, from littering to shooting up signs, trees and even animals.
Every few miles, the Ehrhardts point to garbage dumps, spots where somebody unloaded a truckload of refuse, everything from discarded pictures and books to refrigerators and car parts. Sometimes entire cars. The Ehrhardts groan at each sighting.
"What I'd like to do is reunite that garbage with its rightful owner," Paul Ehrhardt says while surveying one site.
Instead, the couple use their global positioning system to determine the coordinates of every new dumpsite, and then turn the information in to the BLM. This kind of pedestrian work makes up a large part of what the rangers do, they say, along with locating marijuana patches. Sometimes the patches are small plantations, with dozens of plants 10 feet high.
Looking for Trouble
At three different spots, Paul Ehrhardt climbs out of the truck and tromps deep into the forest, a forager seeking treasure, to look into several marijuana patches he found last year. As far as he knows, the growers harvested the marijuana, and he wants to see whether they have replanted. None has, but he says he'll keep checking.
The Ehrhardts say they have found eight plots of marijuana in the region, but police so far credit them with not a single case-solving lead. What worries law-enforcement officials the most is what might happen if the rangers ever run into the growers.
"Anytime you go into an area where there's drug-growing or drug labs, there's the potential for violent confrontations," says Sheriff Clements. "Those people will go to great lengths to protect their enterprise. The rangers might find themselves over their heads."
The Ehrhardts and the other rangers say they would much rather report criminals than confront them. Firearms, they say, would be used only as a last resort. But if things get ugly, they say they are capable of taking charge.
"If I'm going through a park and a guy is just beating his wife, I mean really beating her, I can't just leave," Paul Ehrhardt says. "I'm going to have to do something. I'm going to have to protect the public We don't want to use them, but if we need to, if we get into something spooky, we have the weapons at our disposal."
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WEAPONS OF CHOICE
Concealed guns now legal in Missouri
Lawmakers override governor who sought to 'protect children'
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted: September 12, 2003
3:20 p.m. Eastern
By Jon Dougherty
? 2003 WorldNetDaily.com
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. ? Missouri became the 45th state in the nation to allow most of its citizens the right to carry a concealed handgun after state lawmakers overrode Gov. Bob Holden's veto of an earlier bill.
The House voted Wednesday 115-45 to override, with the Senate narrowly following suit Thursday. The upper chamber's 23-10 vote barely cleared the two-thirds majority necessary to override gubernatorial vetoes.
The deciding Senate vote was cast by Sen. John Dolan, an Army public affairs officer, after he received special leave from his post at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. He was granted the last-minute request so he could attend the veto session here.
Holden, a Democrat, voiced disappointment in the vote, calling it an "unfortunate day" for Missourians who had worked hard to protect their children from gun violence.
"I stood for the things I believe in, and I'll stand for them every day," he said.
Republicans countered that the vetoes show Holden is out of touch with ordinary Missourians.
"It's been a historic day. It's a reassertion of the vast middle mainstream of Missouri against this governor who has adopted a series of extremist positions," said Senate President Pro Tem Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau.
Under the new law, persons 23 years of age and older can apply to their local sheriff's department for a concealed carry permit. Before being licensed, applicants must complete firearms marksmanship and safety training, among other requirements. Holders will not be permitted to carry guns into churches, schools, day care centers or police stations.
In 1999 voters narrowly rejected a ballot initiative to allow concealed carry of handguns. Most of those voting against the measure lived in urban centers, but the overwhelming majority of the state's rural enclaves voted for the measure.
In another gun-related issue, the Senate voted 23-10 Thursday to override Holden's veto of a bill that forbids Missouri governments from suing gun manufacturers. That bill went yesterday to the House, which is also expected to vote to override.
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I can't tell Americans how to live, but speaking in reference to my other thread about the guy who menaced me with a hammer (sorry I don't know how to link it), there's no way I would have intervened in that situation if I had had the slightest suspicion that the guy might have a gun.
There seems to be a lot of internet discussion about rising crime in the UK being due to tighter gun controls, but I for one feel a lot safer knowing that firearms are not generally available here, and in any kind of encounter, you're very unlikely to ever see one.
I don't personally know of anyone who's been in any kind of gun related incident, not any of my friends, nor friends of friends, and if anything that kind of thing would definately get talked about.
There was recently (about a year ago) a shooting in Nando's Chicken, Sheperd's Bush W/London, (some kind of gang thing), and a shooting in Chiswick, where a wife killed her husbands lover with a shotgun. The press for those 2 events was massive because in general its pretty unheard of.
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What can you tell us about the Swiss approach to all of this?
hi!
it's a older thread but you did'nt get an answer.
what i know about the us-american and the swiss law is that it is possible to possess a firearm as a "normal" citizen.
i'm sad i only know exactly about the swiss laws, afaik all states in the usa have their own gun-laws. (like in switzerland before 1999)
it is allowed for swiss citzens to sell non-automatic firearms (handweapons, rifles) of any caliber to every swiss citizen if you set up a contract (with data like buyer, date of birth, serial number of the weapons etc.) without any registration. though both parties have to keep the contract for at lest 10 years and the seller is authorized to demand a up-to-date summary of the buyers police record and to cancel the deal if he can not agree with the buyers r?sum?.
for buying a firearm at a professional dealer you need a "weapon buying licence" that you will only get if you have no bad reputation and not certain police records.
you do not have to prove any reason to buy a weapon as in most (possibly all) countries of the european union. (this is a very important point for me because it shows a citizen is not precondemned as criminal but is intelligent and able to understand that he's personally responsible for everything that happens in relation to that gun.)
important: the swiss have the right to own a gun but not everyone get's the licence to carry a gun. you need very good reasons to get a weapon carry licence.
got raped or got robbed is none because of the factor of random.
additionally i'd like to mention that the swiss have a very long tradition of, in earlier times, engaging in foreign armies as mercenary soldiers (in a nowadays more cultural but also serious way at the vatikan as the popes personal bodyguards and guards of the vatican, the so called "schweizer garde") as well as a defensive force to protect the swiss democracy and the federation of the (now) 26 cantons (states).
it is possible for the swiss youngsters to join the "jungsch?tzen" at the age of 14. it's an association that is originated to provide the traditional precision shooting, to prepare the young men for the common military service and to teach them how to handle their personal firearm (that is their future personal, military firearm, the SIG 550, cal 5.6mm, full-auto)
the swiss have a militia army with a total sum of about 450'000 soldiers (reserve incl., soon the amount will be reduced to about 250'000)
most of them are equipped with the SIG550 and they keep it at home all the time with ammo included. they (we ;)) have to do a mandatory shooting exercise every year as long as we are part of the army. (it's done in a half hour and nothing really difficult)
sadly i cannot present a national statistic about the accidents and or criminal acts done with the legally owned private/military firearms but i can assure you that there are very few news in the media about any incidents of this kind. otherwise, i'm sure you all know, the newspapers/newsshows would be full of reports.
personally i think there is so few incidents with firearms in switzerland mostly because of the army duty for every male citizen. eventually there are more psychological, demographical or other *-ical reasons i do not see. :wink:
if there are parts or sentences you don't understand, please don't blame me for being a gun-fetishist or mad-man, maybe it's just because of the lack of english skills. :oops:
i'd like to know about restricitons pertaining to guns in the u.s.a.
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sorry, i was not logged in.
:oops:
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Woof Burnsson:
Thank you very much for that informative reply.
Staying with the European theme, the cover story on this month's NRA magazine "America's First Freedom" is on the notorious Tony Martin case in England. I tried finding it online at the NRA site without luck, but emailed them to see if I could get in electronically. Until then, this from the NRA site. The excerpts are from the Brit newspaper online "Daily Telegraph". I couldn't get the complete articles without signing up.
Woof,
Crafty Dog
===========
Martin is refused parole as 'danger to burglars'
By David Sapsted
(Filed: 17/01/2003) (That's January 17 written the Euro way folks-Crafty)
Tony Martin, the farmer jailed for shooting dead a teenage burglar, had his application for parole rejected yesterday.
The three members of the Parole Board, who met in London to review his case, gave no reason for turning him down.
A friend of Martin's claimed that it was because a probation report branded the 58-year-old "a danger to burglars".
Others suggested that a primary reason was Martin's refusal to express remorse for shooting 16-year-old Fred Barras when he and another burglar raided his remote Norfolk house at night in August, 1999.
Martin, who will automatically qualify for release on licence in July after serving two-thirds of his five-year sentence for manslaughter, was said to have been resigned to the decision.
Malcom Starr, a friend and leading supporter who visited Martin in Highpoint Prison, Suffolk, called the decision "an absolute disgrace".
He said: "These people on the Parole Board are completely out of touch with public opinion. "All right-thinking people agree that Mr Martin should be released immediately."
Mr Starr, a Cambridgeshire businessman, said Martin told him a Probation Service report to the board criticised the farmer for "not being up to speed with the 21st century and of thinking things were better 40 years ago".
Mr Starr added: "A lot of prisoners lie and say they are sorry about something when they are not. He was not prepared to lie. It is not a question of 'does he feel sorry'. He feels he should never have been intruded on and he acted in self defence."
Richard Portham, another friend, said: "He told me that the Norfolk probation service was recommending that he should not get parole because they considered him a danger to burglars.
"I suppose the attitude came across in this report that he would do it again."
The shotgun Martin used on Barras, from Newark, Nottinghamshire, was illegally held. He had lost his licence after an incident when he fired on a car trespassing on his farm.
=================
Feb 2003
A thief shot by the farmer Tony Martin during an attempted burglary was jailed for 18 months on drugs charges yesterday. Brendon Fearon, 32, tried to burgle Martin's Norfolk farmhouse in 1999, was convicted at Nottingham Crown Court of supplying heroin.
===========
May 6, 2003
British Government Says Burglars Need Protection
Government lawyers trying to keep the Norfolk farmer Tony Martin behind bars will tell a High Court judge that burglars are members of the public who must be protected from violent householders. The case could help hundreds of criminals bring claims for damages for injury suffered while committing offences. In legal papers seen by The Independent, Home Office lawyers dispute Martin's contention that he poses no risk to the public, because he only represents a threat to burglars and other criminals who trespass on his property.
============
May 8
Home Office Suppressed Tony Martin Report
The British Home Office suppressed a report that showed the jailed farmer Tony Martin was suitable for early release, a High Court judge was told May 6.
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June 16, 2003
Tony Martin To Be Sued By Burglar He Shot
The burglar Brendon Fearon, who was shot and injured by Tony Martin, won the right yesterday to sue the jailed farmer for damages. A judge at Nottingham County Court overturned an earlier decision that had thrown out his claim.
========================================
Woof,
Crafty
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And for a slightly... "different" approach:
==================
Article published Oct 3, 2003
Victim tries to befriend home invader (http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20031003/NEWS/310030375/1060)
The woman offers beer and her purse to a robber who threatened to kill her.
SARASOTA COUNTY -- Verne Williams says his mother knew from watching crime shows on television that she should try to befriend the robber who broke into her home Thursday morning.
After the man blindfolded her, she told him they should "stick together" because they're both poor. She then led the robber to her purse in the kitchen, and offered him beer from the refrigerator.
"The guy apparently took the cans with him," Williams said.
He said his mother told him the man reeked of liquor. It was still dark outside when the robber entered the house, but he spent quite some time inside with her and even evaluated her jewelry, calling one of her rings "too cheap" and throwing it back at her, according to her son. The sun was up when he left, deputies said.
Williams' mother, who lives in the 2800 block of Hawthorne Street, was unharmed except for light bruises from a headlock, her son said. The robber made off with jewelry and cash.
Her eventful morning started after 6 a.m., when she heard a loud noise coming from her grandson's bedroom.
Not knowing that her grandson had spent the night away from home, she went to the room to check on him.
Instead, she discovered the robber, who had entered the room through an unlocked window.
"She wasn't even thinking about somebody breaking in," Verne Williams said. "She had no suspicion."
According to Williams, the robber told his mother he'd kill her unless she looked away, but she did get a glimpse of him. She told the robber her grandson would be returning soon, but the man told her "well, I'll kill both of you" and took her to her bedroom, where he threw her on the bed and asked for her valuables.
The robber is described as a thin, white male in his 20s, about 5 foot, 7 inches tall and weighing 140 pounds, with blond hair and brown eyes. He was wearing brown pants and had a white T-shirt tied on his head. Anyone with information is asked to contact Detective Toby Davis of the Sheriff's Office at 861-4922, or Crime Stoppers at 366-TIPS.
Sgt. Chuck Lesaltato, a spokesman, said Williams' mother apparently did the right thing by talking to the robber, but that depends on each individual case. "It's one of those things where the victim has to identify whether it's working or not," Lesaltato said. "If (the perpetrator) becomes more violent, obviously it's not working and you need to rethink what you're doing."
Lesaltato said this was the first such incident reported recently in the county.
"As far as we're concerned, at this point it's isolated," he said.
Verne Williams said there had been no break-in at the house in the 50 years his family owned it.
Cars in the driveway were vandalized twice, he said, but that was decades ago.
"There's no violent crime, no nothing" here, he said.
The Salvation Army owns a church a few houses down, and has recently purchased nearby houses for future growth. Betsy Newell of the Salvation Army said she checks those properties regularly and hasn't noticed any signs of break-ins.
Neighbors Tasha and Allen Tanner, who have lived in the block for about a year, agreed that neighborhood is quiet, except for occasional incidents at the trailer park at the end of the street.
Verne Williams sees a silver lining in Thursday's robbery.
He said the Salvation Army purchased his mother's house and gave her two years to move out, but she's been dragging out the move for two months, arguing that her cat is used to the old place. Family members whisked the cat out shortly after the incident.
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A quick question re: the Tony Martin case. Would what he did have been legal in America?
My understanding of the reason for his conviction was that he wasn't directly defending himself: the "victim" (hmmmm) was shot in the back as he was fleeing the property.
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Woof Alex:
Fair questions both, but at the moment I may be leaving unexpectedly a day early for Rome and all is chaos here.
So, changing subject completely:
Crafty
----------------------
October 22, 2003, 9:11 a.m.
A Light Goes on at the CDC
No escaping gun-control reality.
By Timothy Wheeler
In a marvelous moment of candor, a federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC) committee has reported that it cannot find any evidence that gun-control laws reduce violent crime. American gun owners spent most of the 1990s telling the CDC that gun control is ineffective at best and harmful at worst. So it's gratifying that the lesson is finally sinking in.
A task force convened by the CDC issued its report after two years of poring over 51 scientific studies of gun laws. The group considered only research papers that met strict criteria for scientific soundness. The CDC distances itself with a disclaimer, but it's pretty clear that it supports the task force's conclusions. The report contains no dissenting position or minority view from CDC managers.
Covered in the review were gun-ban laws, restrictions on acquiring a gun, waiting periods for buying a gun, firearm-registration laws, firearm-owner licensing laws, concealed-carry permit laws, zero-tolerance laws, and various combinations of firearm laws. Most Americans who haven't tried to buy a gun lately are blissfully unaware of just how many laws there are. In Washington, D.C., for example, it's impossible for a regular citizen to legally own a firearm (although criminals seem to have no problem getting one). In other cities the legal hoops a gun buyer must jump through are almost as much a barrier to ownership as an outright ban.
One would think that at least some good would come from all these laws. Researchers should be able to prove that the laws prevent at least a few murders, rapes, and robberies. Amazingly, they can't. And even more amazingly, they have admitted that they can't.
But what about the violent crimes that gun-control laws have allowed by preventing victims from defending themselves? This well-known downside to gun-control laws keeps showing itself over and over again. For example, during the 1992 Los Angeles riots, frantic Angelenos rushed to gun stores to arm themselves against marauding thugs. Many were outraged to discover California's 15-day waiting period for buying a gun.
A woman stalked by a homicidal ex-husband is left completely vulnerable by waiting-period laws. These supposedly provide a "cooling off" period for impulsive people who would buy a gun and in the heat of passion, commit a crime with it. Such a patronizing law cruelly imperils a stalked woman, who desperately needs the protection that only a firearm can give her.
And looking at Washington, D.C.'s reputation as the violent-crime capital, how could we think that its gun ban law was ever worth anything? Does anyone really believe that justice is served by disarming good citizens when violent criminals so obviously ignore the ban? Barring gun ownership by good people is worse than useless. It perverts justice by enabling violent felons while turning into outlaws people who dare to own a gun for legitimate self-protection.
America has laws that ban handguns. We have laws that ban big, expensive guns and other laws that ban small, cheap guns. We have laws that condemn some guns as illegal simply on the basis of their appearance. Other laws force average people to be fingerprinted to carry a firearm for self-protection, even though years of experience show such demeaning measures to be unnecessary.
The laws are so numerous and so dauntingly complex that in some cases even law enforcement authorities can't figure out what they mean. Such a confusing web of legal traps can easily ensnare an honest citizen.
In all, America has 20,000 laws that endanger, humiliate, criminalize, or otherwise burden good citizens who exercise their constitutional right to own a gun. Now the CDC, a government agency not known for its friendliness to gun owners, reports that it cannot find any evidence that the laws are effective.
We should take warning from the closing comments of the CDC task force's report. They are reminiscent of the agency's glory days of gun-control advocacy. America is described as an "outlier" in gun-crime rates among industrialized nations. The report insists "research should continue on the effectiveness of firearms laws as one approach to the prevention or reduction of firearms violence and firearms injury." In other words, keep researching until we find the conclusion we prefer ? guns are bad and they should be banned.
Liberal reformers who would curb the freedom of others are obliged to prove the efficacy of gun-control laws. They have failed to do so. Gun owners have always known that gun-control laws aimed at them instead of criminals are futile and unjust. Now that everybody else is finally getting it, perhaps it's time for a moratorium on new gun laws.
? Timothy Wheeler, M.D. is director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, a project of the Claremont Institute.
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Someone quoted this me. This was a question they had for somebody who was a Liberal and a pacifist. When they asked him if he believed in gun control this is what he had to say. He said, "No". When asked why he said, "Why should the cops and military have all the guns?" Something definitely to think about.
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Woof Guest:
In a simlar vein, gun control may be defined as hitting one's intended target.
yip!
Crafty Dog
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Woof Guest:
In a simlar vein, gun control may be defined as hitting one's intended target.
yip!
Crafty Dog
Touche'! *applause*
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Someone quoted this me. This was a question they had for somebody who was a Liberal and a pacifist. When they asked him if he believed in gun control this is what he had to say. He said, "No". When asked why he said, "Why should the cops and military have all the guns?" Something definitely to think about.
So this guy owns guns just in case he has to take on the cops or military?
Please!
-milt
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Well, in addition to the valid point about a population not being unarmed in front of its government, there is also the matter of being able to defend oneself without having to rely upon the government to be there in a timely and capable manner, , , ,
yip,
Crafty
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Raging Against Self Defense:
A Psychiatrist Examines The Anti-Gun Mentality
By Sarah Thompson, M.D.
righter@therighter.com
"You don't need to have a gun; the police will protect you."
"If people carry guns, there will be murders over parking spaces and neighborhood basketball games."
"I'm a pacifist. Enlightened, spiritually aware people shouldn't own guns."
"I'd rather be raped than have some redneck militia type try to rescue me."
How often have you heard these statements from misguided advocates of victim disarmament, or even woefully uninformed relatives and neighbors? Why do people cling so tightly to these beliefs, in the face of incontrovertible evidence that they are wrong? Why do they get so furiously angry when gun owners point out that their arguments are factually and logically incorrect?
How can you communicate with these people who seem to be out of touch with reality and rational thought?
One approach to help you deal with anti-gun people is to understand their psychological processes. Once you understand why these people behave so irrationally, you can communicate more effectively with them.
Something about this "analysis" has been bugging me for a while. Can Ms.Thompson not argue the merits of gun ownership or whatever based on the facts? The dismissal of opposing viewpoints by attempting to characterize "anti-gun" people as irrational or suffering for some sort of mental disorder is insulting and amounts to nothing more than an ad hominem attack.
It wouldn't be too difficult for someone to write an equivalent piece about how "gun-nuts" are mostly a bunch of weak, out of shape pussies who are unable to defend themselves without firearms. They've seen too many "Death Wish" movies and suffer from paranoia and fear that they could be attacked by criminals and/or government black helicopters at any time. To communicate with these people you must be careful not to bruise their fragile egos due to their small dicks which they compensate for by purchasing ever more and larger guns...
I don't neccessarily believe any of this, but you see my point. That said, what sort of weapons restrictions are reasonable? None?
Should anyone be able to buy rocket launchers, tanks, nukes, etc.? Just where do you draw the line?
-milt
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Buz Grover, a fellow contributor to the Eskrima Digest, got this letter published in Letters to the Editor of the meta-liberal Washington Post:
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The Democrats and Gun Control
Monday, November 3, 2003; Page A18
Democratic presidential candidates are distancing themselves from gun control issues for political reasons, an Oct. 26 article suggests ["Democratic Hopefuls Play Down Gun Control," front page]. Citing the party's past embrace of gun control as a factor in numerous electoral losses, the story notes there are large numbers of gun owners in many 2004 swing states. The fear seems to be that sticking to one's political guns, so to speak, would lead to further losses at the polls.
Perhaps the more moderate position most Democratic candidates have adopted is indeed inspired by political calculus and little more. It would be nice to think, however, that facts and principle had something to do with it. Maybe the candidates became aware of the estimated annual 2.5 million instances of defensive firearms use in the United States, or perhaps they read the Centers for Disease Control report that found gun control laws had little effect on crime, or maybe they researched the growing body of constitutional scholarship that demonstrates the country's founders sought to preserve an individual right to keep and bear arms. Possibly the candidates came to see that abrogating the second tenth of the Bill of Rights by extraconstitutional means threatens every right enshrined in the document, or perhaps they realized the way gun control adherents and many media outlets frame the debate is fundamentally unfair.
Regardless of whether raw politics or facts and ideals motivate this more moderate tone, the prospect of a presidential election season without shrill calls for further gun control is certainly something to savor.
BUZ GROVER
Arlington
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http://volokh.com/2003_11_09_volokh_archive.html#106875771986904670
Big News on the Commerce Clause: United States v. Stewart
(Decision written by Kozinski-- Crafty)
The new Commerce Clause jurisprudence (Lopez and Morrison) comes home to roost in the Ninth Circuit's pathbreaking decision today that holds that the federal government may not ban a homemade machine gun. Here is a link to the PDF file. (Via Volokh.) Here are the two key paragraphs of the opinion:
We start by considering the first and fourth prongs of the Morrison test, as we have deemed them the most important. See McCoy, 323 F.3d at 1119. The first prong is not satisfied here. Possession of a machinegun is not, without more, economic in nature. Just like the statute struck down in Lopez, section 922(o) ?is a criminal statute that by its terms has nothing to do with ?commerce? or any sort of economic enterprise, however broadly one might define those terms.? Lopez, 514 U.S at 561. Unlike in Wickard v. Filburn, 317 U.S. 111 (1942), where growing wheat in one?s backyard could be seen as a means of saving money that would otherwise have been spent in the open market, a homemade machinegun may be part of a gun collection or may be crafted as a hobby. Or it may be used for illegal purposes. Whatever its intended use, without some evidence that it will be sold or transferred?and there is none here?its relationship to interstate commerce is highly attenuated.
Moreover, the regulation itself does not have an economic purpose: whereas the statute in Wickard was enacted primarily to control the market price of wheat, id. at 115, there is no evidence that section 922(o) was enacted to regulate commercial aspects of the machinegun business. More likely, section 922(o) was intended to keep machineguns out of the hands of criminals?an admirable goal, but not a commercial one.
And one more important paragraph from later in the opinion:
This case fails Morrison?s other requirements as well.
As we stated earlier, section 922(o) contains no jurisdictional element anchoring the prohibited activity to interstate commerce. Congress also failed to make any legislative findings when it enacted the statute. While neither Lopez nor Morrison requires Congress to make findings every time it passes a law under its Commerce Clause power, the Supreme Court did note the importance of findings where?as here?such findings would ?enable [a court] to evaluate the legislative judgment that the activity in question substantially affected interstate commerce, even though no such substantial effect was visible to the naked eye.? Lopez, 514 U.S. at 563.
The implications are staggering. Here is one: Homegrown marijuana would seem directly analagous to hommade machineguns. And in fact, the Ninth Circuit has a homegrown medical marijuana case pending now.
Wow!
posted by Lawrence at 11/13/2003 02:05:20 PM
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COMMENTARY
Skeptic Gives Guns a Shot
The firearms issue looks a little different from behind the trigger.
By Diana Wagman
Guns are bad. All my life, it's been that simple. At my son's preschool, if a child pointed a banana and said "bang," he was admonished to "use the banana in a happier way." As far as I was concerned, the 2nd Amendment gave us the right to protect ourselves against invading armies, not the right to buy a gun and keep it under our beds.
So what would make someone like me change my mind? I met this gun enthusiast. As research for my new novel, I asked him many questions, all the while voicing my disgust. My character might use a gun, but I never would. "Come to the range," the gun guy said. "I'll teach you to shoot."
I expected a dungeon full of men missing teeth and wearing T-shirts decorated with Confederate flags. Instead, I found a sunny, wood-paneled lobby and guys who looked like lawyers on their lunch break.
The man behind the counter was as pleasant as a grandfather from Central Casting. "What would it take for me to buy a gun?" I asked him. He explained the California laws, some of the most stringent in the country. I would have to wait 10 days ? the "cooling off" period. There would be federal and local background checks. I'd have to take a safety class. I'd have to buy a childproof lock. I couldn't purchase an assault weapon. I couldn't buy more than one handgun per month. Of course, he said, if I didn't want to wait, I could drive 10 minutes and buy an Uzi illegally out of someone's car.
When my guide arrived, he gave me a choice of handguns. I went with the .357 magnum ? I recognized the name ? and a traditional target with a red bull's-eye. I couldn't imagine shooting at one shaped like a man.
First lesson, respect your firearm. I got a little talk about how powerful it was. I learned how to hold it. To load it. And finally to fire it. It was terrifying. The gun was so heavy, I couldn't keep it steady. It took both index fingers to pull the trigger, and then there was a flash of flame, a loud crack, a substantial kick. It was much harder than it looked in the movies. I occasionally hit the target, but I also managed to obliterate the metal hanger that held it.
I have to admit: I loved it. I had a fantastic time. The power of that gun for me, a 5-foot, 3-inch woman, was immediately, shockingly seductive. The thrill when I hit the bull's-eye (once) was as great as making a perfect tennis shot. I felt like I was playing a careful game of darts in a small, alcohol-free bar.
Later, I was surprised to discover that some of my closest friends owned guns. People I never would have suspected confessed that their guns made them feel protected. Still, most of my friends thought handguns should be outlawed, completely, in every circumstance.
I no longer was so sure. I did some research ? there are countless testimonials about guns saving someone's life. I looked into shooting as a sport. I spoke to a woman who had found a wounded deer and shot it, ending its agony. I changed my mind: Guns aren't bad.
Which leaves gun violence. At least in California, we don't need more laws ? we just need to enforce the ones we have. What else?
The answer has to be education: teaching people to deal with anger, to solve problems, offering them brighter futures, but also Gun 101. Maybe if teenagers were given computer-generated pictures of their own bodies, post-gunshot wounds, it would help them understand the enormity of firing a weapon. Maybe if everyone spent an afternoon at the shooting range, forced to follow the rules, they would respect the power of a gun.
I confess, I don't know exactly how to solve the problem, but at least now I know I don't know. Firing guns as a sport is great fun. Having a gun because it makes you feel safer seems understandable. Changing the way people behave? If you thought gun control was a distant dream ? it could take centuries.
Meanwhile, my 15-year-old has asked me to take him shooting. And I've agreed.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Novelist and screenwriter Diana Wagman is the author of "Bump" (Carroll & Graf, 2003) and "Skin Deep" (University of Mississippi Press reprint, 2001).
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Gun-Shy Democrats Are Giving the NRA Room to Maneuver
Some of the politicians who helped toughen weapons laws are now helping to soften regulations. Fear is called the motivator.
By Richard Simon and Mary Curtius, Times Staff Writers
WASHINGTON ? These are tough times for the gun control crowd.
After 13 people were shot to death in 1999 at Columbine High School in Colorado, Democrats led a stampede in Congress to pass tougher gun laws. Now some of those same politicians are lining up with the National Rifle Assn. to soften gun regulations.
Congress has voted this year to require speedier destruction of gun purchase records; the renewal of a 1994 law banning assault weapons faces an uphill battle; and on Wednesday, the Senate debated a measure shielding gun makers and sellers from lawsuits by gunshot victims.
Why the shift?
"Fear," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), lead author of the assault weapons ban. "When I came to Washington, everybody said: 'You've got to watch out for Big Business and Big Oil. They're the big lobbies.' Wrong. It's Big Guns."
Sens. John F. Kerry of Massachusetts and John Edwards of North Carolina, the leading contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, have supported gun control in the past. But they are not raising the issue on the campaign trail this year.
Many Democrats think Al Gore, the Democratic nominee in 2000, lost support in some pivotal rural states because he supported tough gun control. After the 2000 election, "common wisdom in the Democratic Party was that you had better not talk about guns," said Deborah Barron, spokeswoman for Americans for Gun Safety.
So Kerry, to connect with the gun lobby, frequently talks about his experience as a hunter. Edwards, when asked about gun issues, always begins his answer by saying that he supports the 2nd Amendment and that he believes in the right to bear arms.
Meanwhile, the NRA has moved from defense to offense.
It is supporting the gun liability bill ? which already has passed the House and is backed not only by President Bush and most Senate Republicans, but also by at least 10 Democrats, including Democratic Leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota.
"You can't deny that there has been a shift" by Democrats, said Kristen Rand, legislative director for the Violence Policy Center, a nonprofit organization that advocates gun control. "We can't deny the fact that a lot of [lawmakers] don't think being out front on gun issues is helpful to them. The NRA is very effective at their grass-roots organizing."
Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's executive vice president, said Daschle's support of the gun liability measure reflected his party's new stance. The Democratic leadership, LaPierre said, "decided the gun control issue was a dead end."
Daschle is also facing a potentially tough reelection race in his home state, where gun control could become an issue.
Sarah Brady ? whose husband, James, was disabled in the 1981 assassination attempt on President Reagan ? said she thought that Democrats were "misguided" in taking a more moderate approach on guns. The issue, in her opinion, did not hurt the party in 2000.
But a shift by Democrats may not be a bad thing for gun control advocates, said Robert Ricker, a former NRA official who now consults with gun control groups.
"Some of the tactics that have been used in the past by the gun control groups have come back to hurt them in areas like the South," Ricker said. "The idea of really seizing that middle ground, of not going to the extremes on the issue," is being followed by the party now.
Opponents of the gun liability measure hope to attach amendments that would strengthen gun laws. One would extend the nearly decade-old federal ban on assault weapons, due to expire in September; another would require background checks for purchases at gun shows.
The bill, dubbed the "Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act," has drawn opposition from the families of gunshot victims, as well as police chiefs and the mayors of Los Angeles, Chicago, New York and other big cities. Feinstein said the bill would "essentially give the gun industry blanket immunity from civil liability cases ? an immunity that no other industry has."
"We find ourselves today on the cusp of yet another NRA victory," Feinstein added. "And let me be clear ? not a victory for NRA members, most of whom are law-abiding gun owners who might someday benefit from the ability to sue a manufacturer that sold them a defective or dangerous gun. No, this will be a victory only for the cynical leaders of the NRA that have steadfastly turned their organization into a political powerhouse, unconcerned with the true needs of its members."
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Just bringing this thread to the top--
Yip,
Crafty
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Raging Against Self Defense:
A Psychiatrist Examines The Anti-Gun Mentality
By Sarah Thompson, M.D.
righter@therighter.com
"You don't need to have a gun; the police will protect you."
"If people carry guns, there will be murders over parking spaces and neighborhood basketball games."
"I'm a pacifist. Enlightened, spiritually aware people shouldn't own guns."
"I'd rather be raped than have some redneck militia type try to rescue me."
How often have you heard these statements from misguided advocates of victim disarmament, or even woefully uninformed relatives and neighbors? Why do people cling so tightly to these beliefs, in the face of incontrovertible evidence that they are wrong? Why do they get so furiously angry when gun owners point out that their arguments are factually and logically incorrect?
How can you communicate with these people who seem to be out of touch with reality and rational thought?
One approach to help you deal with anti-gun people is to understand their psychological processes. Once you understand why these people behave so irrationally, you can communicate more effectively with them.
Something about this "analysis" has been bugging me for a while. Can Ms.Thompson not argue the merits of gun ownership or whatever based on the facts? The dismissal of opposing viewpoints by attempting to characterize "anti-gun" people as irrational or suffering for some sort of mental disorder is insulting and amounts to nothing more than an ad hominem attack.
It wouldn't be too difficult for someone to write an equivalent piece about how "gun-nuts" are mostly a bunch of weak, out of shape pussies who are unable to defend themselves without firearms. They've seen too many "Death Wish" movies and suffer from paranoia and fear that they could be attacked by criminals and/or government black helicopters at any time. To communicate with these people you must be careful not to bruise their fragile egos due to their small dicks which they compensate for by purchasing ever more and larger guns...
I don't neccessarily believe any of this, but you see my point. That said, what sort of weapons restrictions are reasonable? None?
Should anyone be able to buy rocket launchers, tanks, nukes, etc.? Just where do you draw the line?
-milt
I agree with Milt. When I read this article a while ago on another forum it seemed very unlikely that this was a genuine attempt to psychoanalyse a group, rather that it was intended to support the author's position on gun control.
So, having read some of the author's other articles several things became apparent.
1. She is a staunch campaigner against gun control, not an unbiased psychiatrist offering an expert opinion.
2. She never practised psychiatry at all, in fact retired soon after qualifying for unspecified reasons to do with differences with the Psychiatric establishment.
3. Her stance and motivations on several gun control issues are, to me, highly questionable:
She believes gun deregulation is a prime concern because of a genuine risk of the next Anti-Semitic Holocaust occuring in America.
She believes firmly that the 2nd Amendment should protect ALL weapons including fully automatic machine guns, artillery and WMDs.
She boycotted Glock for 'giving in' to gun control by providing free trigger locks with their handguns.
4. Bear this in mind: If you don't agree with any of the positions above it is YOU she is applying her 'analysis' to: Whatever reasons you might give for not thinking what she believes is rational, YOU are the one using those defense mechanisms she is talking about, not just anti gun lobbyists. When someone believes a gun manufacturer isn't doing enough to oppose gun control I really have to question their "professional opinion" on a group that opposes them.
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Several aspects of Alex?s post resist analysis. Let me see if I get this straight:
?1. She is a staunch campaigner against gun control, not an unbiased psychiatrist offering an expert opinion.?
Uhm, okay, she has an opinion and a professional degree. Supporting one with the tools of the other is wrong for what reason? If you have a professional degree the only statements you?re allowed to make are ones deemed unbiased? Who makes that call?
?2. She never practised (sic) psychiatry at all, in fact retired soon after qualifying for unspecified reasons to do with differences with the Psychiatric establishment.?
No foolin?? I hear there was once this Washington lawyer who, for unspecified reasons, abandoned his vocation and started teaching people how to whomp each other better with sticks as an avenue towards higher consciousness. The gall of some people, eh?
?3. Her stance and motivations on several gun control issues are, to me, highly questionable:?
I don?t have access to the source material that inspire the next several charges, and don?t wish to rebut them in a blanket manner, though I do have my quibbles.
?She believes gun deregulation is a prime concern because of a genuine risk of the next Anti-Semitic Holocaust occuring (sic) in America.?
Don?t know about the next holocaust, but there have been an awful lot of unarmed or under-armed people in America and elsewhere who have had to deal with all sorts of awful stuff because of their inability to defend themselves. There have also been many instances of armed communities resisting sundry forms of tyranny. Given the choice I?d just as soon have the ability to cause the bad guys to think twice, and can?t think of any reason to surrender that ability willingly, regardless of faith or circumstance.
?She believes firmly that the 2nd Amendment should protect ALL weapons including fully automatic machine guns, artillery and WMDs.?
WMDs and artillery, eh? Is this reductio ad absurdum or is she really willing to issue battlefield nukes to all Americans? As that may be, ?fully automatic machine guns? is a redundancy, albeit one that may be necessitated by all the ?assault weapon? twaddle currently circulating. BTW, isn?t the position that the Second Amendment protects all weapons about as absurd as the argument that it protects none?
?She boycotted Glock for 'giving in' to gun control by providing free trigger locks with their handguns.?
Well TANSTAAFL, or perhaps TANSTAASFTL: There Ain?t No Such Thing As A Free Trigger Lock. Someone paid for it. There?s not a lick of evidence trigger locks do any good, regardless of how the costs are shifted, see the Center for Disease Control report. Trigger locks are a feel good measure, one with no demonstrated utility. Perhaps her protest is similarly silly, but I don?t see how you can point out the folly of one without acknowledging the folly of the other.
?4. Bear this in mind: If you don't agree with any of the positions above it is YOU she is applying her 'analysis' to: Whatever reasons you might give for not thinking what she believes is rational, YOU are the one using those defense mechanisms she is talking about, not just anti gun lobbyists. When someone believes a gun manufacturer isn't doing enough to oppose gun control I really have to question their "professional opinion" on a group that opposes them.?
I?m not much inclined to untangle this circumlocution. Suffice to say I think Dr. Thompson?s thesis is fairly straightforward. As both a gun owner and a martial arts practitioner I?ve encountered plenty of people who feel developing martial competencies is an awful thing, preferring to instead surrender their ability to defend themselves and their families. Dr. Thompson seeks to examine the fears these folks profess and provide gun owners the tools to address them. Think her perspective is straight forward, her agenda anything but concealed, and her prose pretty clear.
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Good reply Buz. Allow me to clarify a few things.
?3. Her stance and motivations on several gun control issues are, to me, highly questionable:?
I don?t have access to the source material that inspire the next several charges, and don?t wish to rebut them in a blanket manner, though I do have my quibbles.
Unfortunately her website therighter.com doesn't seem to exist anymore. It means firstly I'll have to try to remember her statements, and secondly you'll have to take my word for it that I'm accurately quoting what she said in her other articles. Thirdly it makes coherent rebuttal an almost impossible task for you as you can't refer to the articles.
Hmmmm. I know that's spectacularly unhelpful on an Internet Forum but there you go.
[my speling corrected :)]
?She believes gun deregulation is a prime concern because of a genuine risk of the next Anti-Semitic Holocaust occurring in America.?
Don?t know about the next holocaust, but there have been an awful lot of unarmed or under-armed people in America and elsewhere who have had to deal with all sorts of awful stuff because of their inability to defend themselves. There have also been many instances of armed communities resisting sundry forms of tyranny. Given the choice I?d just as soon have the ability to cause the bad guys to think twice, and can?t think of any reason to surrender that ability willingly, regardless of faith or circumstance.
I'm familiar with the arguments about self defence in general, especially with regard to making criminals think twice and so on, but that wasn't the purpose of her article in this case: The whole thing was a very specific warning to American Jews that the next Holocaust was coming, and they had better be prepared to meet it with force.
?She believes firmly that the 2nd Amendment should protect ALL weapons including fully automatic machine guns, artillery and WMDs.?
WMDs and artillery, eh? Is this reductio ad absurdum or is she really willing to issue battlefield nukes to all Americans?
Again you'll have to take my word for it (*sigh*) but her statement was very explicit. It ran something like "For the 2nd Ammendment to have any meaning whatsoever, it must be applied to all arms, including fully automatic weapons and Weapons of Mass Destruction."
My problem with her "Psychological" article posted earlier is that she really does believe that anyone who doesn't support total deregulation is in denial about the facts.
I've seen several "middle of the road" gun supporters (i.e. anyone who thinks any weapon regulation at all is in order) use this article to attack those who are more "anti gun" than they are. The key point is that as far as the author is concerned, she is talking about anyone who opposes TOTAL deregulation.
I really wish I still had her articles, because she really does think there should be no I.D. or background checks for purchasing ANY weapon. In her world, you've got the cash, it's yours, and basically anyone who doesn't believe like she does is a tool of the fascist oppressor.
I'll keep searching because I'm sure someone else will have her articles archived.
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Ok there is still some of her stuff out there
Here's her letter to the NRA, rather interestingly attacking them from the far-right rather than the left:
Nearly three years ago, I wrote the following Letter to the
NRA :
When you decide to stop selling our birthright,
When you decide to stop supporting permits,
When you proclaim that each and every one of us is innocent until proven
guilty; that we need not subject ourselves to "background checks",
registration or bureaucracy,
When you refuse to tolerate evil,
When you are willing to call evil by its rightful name,
When you are willing to call genocide by its rightful name,
When you stop distracting yourselves and others with peripheral issues,
When you learn that a compromise with the devil is no compromise at all,
Then, and only then, will you have my support.
From the same article:
The NRA's business is gun control. Without gun control, the NRA would be
reduced to teaching firearms safety and use, hunter education, and
sponsoring sporting events. These are important and necessary functions, and
the NRA does a good job with these non-political tasks. But the big money,
the media attention and the glamor are in gun control. No gun control means
no million dollar contracts, no dinners with celebrities, no lavish expense
accounts, and no TV appearances.
The NRA needs gun control. So the NRA perpetuates gun control. They support
anti-gun politicians, and when those anti-gun politicians propose more gun
control, the NRA sends out more letters screaming for help, and another few
million dollars roll in. What a scam!
So the NRA is conspiring to covertly support gun control in order to perpetuate their own existence.
http://www.mail-archive.com/cypherpunks@algebra.com/msg02091.html
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Alex:
Thanks for the response, and sorry for coming on so strong. I'm fairly libertarian and have engaged a lot of folks in sundry Second Amendment debates over the years. No doubt my frustrations over the tenor of general "gun control" discussions bled over into my response.
I'm certainly willing to take your word re Dr. Thompson's other opinion pieces and have no desire to defend the more outlandish. I've met a lot of zealots over the years; can't think of one who did their cause any favors with their extreme warblings. Didn't catch that zeal in her original post, but am willing to accept that it reared its head elsewhere.
Again, sorry for mounting my high horse.
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No problem mate, by internet standards you weren't at all over the top
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Several years ago all firearms were effectively banned in the UK. Since that time crime in general, and violent crime in particular has risen dramatically. The following BBC article states rates are still rising. My take is that banning law-abiding citizens from owning firearms does nothing but create criminal enterprise zones.
Article follows:
Gun crime figures show fresh rise
The number of firearms offences in England and Wales has risen in the last year, according to Home Office figures released on Thursday.
There has been a 3% climb in gun crime, following a 2% rise the previous year, the figures show.
The statistics also show a 35% rise in crimes involving imitation weapons.
But the figures, which cover the 12 months to June this year, also show a 15% drop in the number of shooting-related deaths.
Home Secretary David Blunkett said police and the government would target particular areas affected by violent crime linked to drugs.
They would tackle the problem in London, the West Midlands, Greater Manchester and Nottinghamshire, Mr Blunkett told a news conference in London.
"We have a situation where crack and guns go together and because crack is a dangerous drug, that stimulates violence," he said.
Training needs
Shadow Home Secretary David Davis said the government had let gun crime get out of hand.
"No amount of government spin will hide the fact that violent crime is out of control," he said. "We now have record levels of gun crime, rocketing sex offences, a further 14% increase in violent crime and overall crime is nearly 750,000 higher than 1998."
Jan Berry, chairman of the Police Federation, called for more and better trained armed police to counter gun crime.
She said: "We urgently need more trained armed police officers throughout England and Wales to tackle the growing menace of gun crime, otherwise lives will increasingly be put at risk."
BBC home affairs correspondent Andy Tighe said the government was interpreting the 3% rise in gun crime as "acceptable and predictable".
But he said the rise came on top of a "quite substantial increase" in firearms offences in recent years.
"Main cities such as Manchester, London, Birmingham and Nottingham do have special units targeting gun crime and the drugs trade, and they are having a significant amount of success."
Reassurance
Separate quarterly crime figures compiled for the Home Office in the British Crime Survey on Thursday showed that general crime was down by 7%, according to householders interviewed for the study. Crime figures recorded by police also showed a 5% fall.
The government was keen to stress that the risk of being a victim of violent crime is at its lowest for nearly 25 years.
The recent murder in Nottingham of 14-year-old Danielle Beccan has stirred fresh concerns about levels of gun crime.
She was killed in a drive-by shooting on her way home from a funfair almost a fortnight ago.
A 20-year-old Nottingham man, Mark Kelly, has been charged with her murder, while a second man aged 23 has also been charged with murder. He was due to appear in court on Thursday.
A gun amnesty is being planned for the city and a campaign to reassure the public is being brought forward.
Earlier in the month, six people were shot in the space of an hour during incidents in London and Bristol. Two people were killed in the London incident.
Smaller rises
But the Home Office figures show firearms-related deaths are comparatively rare.
Last year the number fell to 81 from 97 in the previous 12 months.
The small rises in gun crime for the last two years compare with a 34% increase recorded in 2002.
In 2003, the Home Office introduced a mandatory five-year minimum prison sentence for anyone caught in possession of an illegal firearm.
Government officials claimed there was anecdotal evidence from the police that the move is having a deterrent effect, but that it was too early for this to be reflected in Thursday's figures.
The statistics on imitation weapons come a day after figures emerged from a survey by police in Manchester which showed that more than 70% of callouts from the city's armed response units dealt with fake guns.
The government has previously ruled out a wholesale ban on imitation firearms, saying it was too difficult to find a legal definition for replicas.
GUN CRIME: YEAR TO JUNE 04
Fatalities: 70 (-15%)
Serious injuries: 430 (no change)
Total firearms offences: 10,590 (+3%)
With replica/ imitation gun: 1,350 (+35%)
With handgun: 4,910 (-10%)
Source: Home Office recorded crime figures. Comparisons are with year to June 03
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/3761626.stm
Published: 2004/10/21 15:10:05 GMT
? BBC MMIV
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I believe there are other reasons for increasing crime in the UK. It should first be noted that crime rates were rising long before the firearms ban.
Secondly, and in my experience this is an strange concept for Americans given the gun culture that exists in the USA: People just don't carry guns for self defence over here. The gun ban had zero effect on the self defence capabilities of the average law abiding citizen, because even before the ban it would be unheard of for someone to carry a firearm in public.
It should also be noted that the firearms ban was clearly a knee-jerk reaction to a specific incident - name the Dunblane Massacre, in which around 20 schoolchildren were shot by a gun nut with a selection of legally owned weapons.
Personally I don't believe such exceptional events should be the basis for any legislation, rather than the general crime trends, but I do understand the thought process which led to that happening - If the perpetrator of the Dunblane Massacre hadn't been allowed to buy guns, those 20 kids would still be alive.
Just food for thought.
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I've some quibbles over the way some of these facts are framed.
"I believe there are other reasons for increasing crime in the UK. It should first be noted that crime rates were rising long before the firearms ban."
The right to own firearms has been under serious attack in the UK for decades now, and there has been a parallel effort to criminalize self-defense, witness Tony Martin?s ordeal. Though there are doubtless other factors, it's not like someone threw a switch ending legal access to firearms for most Brits. Rather, it's been an evolutionary process. I don't know of any study that has correlated that evolution with rising crime, but I'd be surprised is there wasn't some sort of high positive relationship.
"Secondly, and in my experience this is an strange concept for Americans given the gun culture that exists in the USA: People just don't carry guns for self defence over here. The gun ban had zero effect on the self defence capabilities of the average law abiding citizen, because even before the ban it would be unheard of for someone to carry a firearm in public."
I think the relevant bit of data here is the rise in so called "hot burglaries" in the UK. "Hot burglaries" are ones where a dwelling is robbed with the occupants at home. As the likelihood of encountering an armed victim decreased, and the penalties for defending one's home with lethal force increased, the incidence of "hot burglaries," unsurprisingly, rose. Self-defense does not only occur outside the home, hence I'd argue there has been something more than a "zero effect."
I think the availability of firearms for defensive purposes should be viewed as a continuum, rather than an all or nothing proposition. The UK indeed has little history of concealed handgun carry, though there was a time when many households owned shotguns and rifles. At one time criminals had no way of knowing if a shotgun would poke out the door of a house they were committing a crime in front of. These days they know full well that is no longer a concern, and the crime rate reflects it.
"It should also be noted that the firearms ban was clearly a knee-jerk reaction to a specific incident - name the Dunblane Massacre, in which around 20 schoolchildren were shot by a gun nut with a selection of legally owned weapons."
No debate here, this was certainly a tragedy of the first order. I can't help but note, though, that the costs of private firearm ownership are invariably trumpeted, while the benefits are rarely noted. In the US, for instance, concealed carry states see a significant drop in crime that corresponds directly with the number of permits issued; far fewer mass shootings occur in "shall issue" states, and so on.
"Personally I don't believe such exceptional events should be the basis for any legislation, rather than the general crime trends, but I do understand the thought process which led to that happening - If the perpetrator of the Dunblane Massacre hadn't been allowed to buy guns, those 20 kids would still be alive."
True enough. Any idea how many have been murdered because the bad guys have the guns the law-abiding are denied?
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I've been examining the crime stats on nationmaster.com (which is a great website by the way).
Firstly I noted the burglary rate for the UK is twice that of the US. http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_bur_cap
It's easy to find an explanation for that (in the context of this discussion): Burglaries are being prevented in the US by the criminals fear of (or actual contact with) a well armed population. (I have some other explanations with regard to the UK rate, but they aren't really relevant for now so let's keep it to guns vs. crime)
However the murder rate in the US is 4 times that in the UK. http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_mur_cap
My question is, what is it about the murders that the arming of the population doesn't prevent them in the same way that the burglaries are prevented?
This ISN'T supposed to be a "HAHA! I proved joo rong!!!" or anything like that. I ask the question because we all know the stats don't tell the whole story and since you guys all live there you have a much better understanding of the full picture behind the stats.
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Alex asks:
"My question is, what is it about the murders that the arming of the population doesn't prevent them in the same way that the burglaries are prevented?"
The short answer is that there are a lot of variables, far more than I could coherently address. Let me note first, however, that the highest murder rates in the US are in areas with the strictest gun control. Chicago, District of Columbia, New York, Los Angeles, and so on all have higher murder rates than better armed sections of the US.
There are so many variables that it's hard to compare countries--some nations like Switzerland and Israel have a greater percentage of their population armed, but lower murder rate while other countries have draconian gun laws and very high murder rates.
Be that as it may, I think there are some variables that can be isolated, such as:
Geographical. The UK is comprised of islands, while the US shares thousands of miles of borders. Immigration, legal. There is a lot less homogeneity in the US. Immigration, illegal. There are a lot more shady characters entering the US. Economic. There is a lot more economic foment, hence economic conflict, in the US. Police. As I understand it, police have a much greater day-to-day presence in citizen?s lives in the UK than in the US. Drugs. US drug policy creates more drug crime than the corresponding UK policies.
Doubtless I'm missing many things, and I could certainly elaborate on the ones I've listed. Bottom line is it's pretty hard to compare apples and oranges. I think it's more productive to compare regions of the US to others. For instance, the US counties contiguous to the District of Columbia suffer very different murder and crime rates. DC is a murder and crime capitol. Neighboring Virginia counties have a far lower crime rate, while neighboring Maryland counties have crime rates higher than Virginia's, but lower than DC's. Virginia has fairly unrestrictive firearm laws; Maryland's are fairly restrictive; while DC's are the most restrictive in the country.
Sorry I couldn't get more specific, but I think doing so would quickly turn into a doctoral dissertation.
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The following article is from the a Scottish paper, the Evening Times (http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/hi/news/5032285.html). I think the term "assault knives" is noteworthy.
Article follows:
New laws aim to ban shops from selling knives
NEW laws banning high street shops from selling assault knives, machetes and other weapons could be introduced by the end of next year.
Sales of replica guns will also be banned because they can be converted into useable firearms.
First Minister Jack McConnell has been in talks with chief constables on how to combat the rising level of knife crime, which is at its highest level for 10 years.
There will also be tougher sentencing powers for knife assaults, and a proposal to give police random stop and search powers is being considered.
The age at which young people can buy household knives and axes may also rise from 16 to 18.
A commitment to review the law and enforcement on knife crimes was part of the Executive's Partnership Agreement.
An Executive spokesperson said: "We are looking at existing legislation to determine whether it is sufficiently robust and flexible to respond to the illegal use and carriage of knives.
"Related to that work, we also plan to consult on proposals to increase the powers of our record number of police officers to deal with knife and violent crime."
Details of the new proposals are expected to be revealed in a parliamentary Bill early next year.
Over the past four years the number of incidents involving knives has risen by 350%, and in Glasgow alone 7500 people were victims of knife crime last year.
Under current legislation, councils can ban market traders from selling non-household knives but have no power to prevent their sale in high street shops.
The Evening Times was praised in the Scottish Parliament for campaigning for a crackdown on knife attacks and violence on the streets.
Glasgow's growing problem was highlighted in the Scottish Parliament by Shettleston MSP Frank McAveety after four men were killed in his constituency in a weekend of violence last month.
During First Minister's Questions he produced photographs of makeshift weapons, including scissor blades taped to a broom handle, to demonstrate the extent of the problem.
Mr McConnell said then that ministers were looking at strengthening laws on the sale and carrying of knives, increasing police powers and strengthening sentences as soon as possible.
Among the shops affected by the new law would be Victor Morris whose owner Martin Morris describes his stock as "sporting and collectable" items.
He said the new measures would be pointless and that most knife crime involved kitchen knives.
Mr McAveety said today: "The quicker we strengthen the law the better.
"Many attacks are carried out using domestic knives but a belt and braces approach with rigorous controls over shops which sell dangerous weapons is needed."
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In Oklahoma, a Ban
On Guns Pits State
Against Big Firms
Weyerhaeuser Fired Workers
Who Had Weapons in Cars,
And Legal Dispute Unfolds
By SUSAN WARREN
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
November 26, 2004; Page A1
VALLIANT, Okla. -- In late summer of 2002, Steve Bastible put three bullets into a dying cow at his ranch, threw the emptied rifle behind the seat of his pickup and forgot about it.
A few weeks later, the rifle cost him his job of 23 years.
That Oct. 1, in a surprise search, Weyerhaeuser Co. sent gun-sniffing dogs into the parking lot of its paper mill here. Mr. Bastible and 11 other workers were fired after guns were found in their vehicles. The timber company said the weapons violated a new company policy that extended a longtime workplace gun ban to the parking area. The fired workers said they knew nothing of the new rule.
The firings outraged many in this wooded community in the foothills of the Ouachita Mountains. In rural Oklahoma, carrying a firearm in one's car is commonplace. "In Oklahoma, gun control is when you hit what you shoot at," says Jerry Ellis, a member of the state legislature.
Now, the dispute is reverberating beyond the borders of tiny Valliant, located in the southeast corner of the state. In response, the state legislature overwhelmingly passed a law giving Oklahomans the right to keep guns locked in their cars in parking lots. But just days before the law was to go into effect this month, several prominent companies with Oklahoma operations, including Whirlpool Corp. and ConocoPhillips sued to stop it. A federal judge put the law on hold pending a hearing.
Meanwhile, several of the paper-mill workers have filed wrongful-discharge lawsuits against Weyerhaeuser and its subcontractors, which employed the workers. "This is a heck of an injustice that needs to be fixed," says their Tulsa lawyer, Larry Johnson, 72 years old, who has spent a lifetime studying the second amendment.
On one side, companies are trying to keep guns away from the workplace, driven by real-life horror stories of disgruntled employees on the rampage, stalking the hallways and shooting down bosses and co-workers. On the other side are employees who argue that guns help keep law-abiding workers safer.
The debate transcends partisan politics. Nearly 90% of voters in the county are registered Democrats, and yet 66% of county voters cast ballots for George Bush for president, in part because they viewed him as more pro-gun.
The new law was sponsored by Mr. Ellis, a Democrat from McCurtain County. It passed unanimously in the Oklahoma Senate, and on a 92-4 vote in the House. "I just didn't think the state should be dictating weapons policy to property owners," says J. Mike Wilt, a Republican from Bartlesville who was among the four voting against the law.
Mr. Ellis, a former mill worker himself, counters: "These are good, hardworking, tax-paying, law-abiding citizens. I just wish these big companies could understand that these people are not a threat to anybody."
Guns are part of everyday life in McCurtain County, where many residents hunt and ranch, and houses are miles apart. In the local gun and pawn shop in the county seat of Idabel, worker David Brakebill spreads out a map on the counter and points to the green blotches representing vast expanses of tree-covered wilderness. "When you call the police," says Vicki Luna, an owner of the gun store, "they don't get there for 30 minutes -- if they can find your house."
The Weyerhaeuser paper mill has been the largest employer in town for more than 30 years, providing about 2,500 jobs in the area and contributing more than $55 million annually to the local economy in taxes, payroll and community donations, according to the company. The whole gun flap actually started with an apparent drug overdose at the plant. Plant manager Randy Nebel hired a security company to bring in four dogs to search for drugs and guns in the parking lot. The dogs didn't find any drugs but zeroed in on several vehicles containing firearms.
The company then ordered the workers to open the suspect cars so that they could be hand-searched. A dozen workers, four Weyerhaeuser employees and eight who worked for subcontractors, were suspended for having rifles, shotguns or handguns. A couple of days later, they were fired as part of Weyerhaeuser and its subcontractors' zero-tolerance policy for major safety violations, the companies say.
Jimmy "Red" Wyatt, a 45-year-old father of five who worked his way up from the factory floor to supervisor in his 22 years at the mill, says he often carried his rifle to scare off coyotes threatening the cattle he raises in his spare time. A shotgun also found was left over from bird hunting with his sons the day before.
Mr. Nebel says that firing Mr. Wyatt, a model worker, was difficult. But after clearing the parking lot of guns, "I believe the plant is safer," he said.
The plant manager said the new gun rule had been in place since January 2002 after reversing a previous policy that had allowed workers to leave their guns locked in their cars. The company says it told workers in writing and during "team meetings" of the new policy. "It was well known this would be dealt with severely," said Mr. Nebel. Mr. Wyatt and the other fired workers say they never were told of the changed rule.
Hearing of the case, the National Rifle Association referred the workers to Mr. Johnson, a longtime gun-rights advocate. Mr. Johnson contacted Mr. Ellis, and together they crafted what was to become the new law. In a recent brief supporting the law, Mr. Johnson sprinkled his legal arguments with historic quotes from poets and philosophers. "I even quoted Christ," he says, reciting a snippet from the Book of Luke in which Jesus admonishes his followers, "Let him who has no sword sell his mantle and buy one."
In fighting the law, Oklahoma companies are walking through a community-relations minefield in what is known as an NRA stronghold. The Oklahoma State Chamber of Commerce normally supports the NRA. But it says it joined the lawsuit opposing the law because it believes companies should be able to exclude weapons from their premises.
"Things happen at work that make people mad: They don't get a raise," explains attorney David Strecker, who is representing the chamber. "If a gun is handy, someone might use it, and that's just something employers don't want to risk."
In a surprise move at a hearing on the law in U.S. Chief District Judge Sven Erik Holmes's Tulsa court Tuesday, Whirlpool withdrew from the case, leaving ConocoPhillips and Williams Cos. to lead the lawsuit. Mr. Johnson, who has joined Rep. Ellis in calling for a boycott of Whirlpool and the other companies involved in the lawsuit, said he believes Whirlpool succumbed to worries it might be punished by pro-gun rights consumers. "People are taking it very, very seriously," he said. "Look at how politicians have suffered when they get on the wrong side of this issue."
Whirlpool responds that it had only been seeking clarification on the law, and that it believes a recent brief by the Oklahoma attorney general gives them the green light to maintain their no-gun policy, resolving their concern. A spokesman for Attorney General Drew Edmonson, however, said he didn't agree with that interpretation. Neither did Steven Broussard, the Tulsa attorney for Conoco and Williams. "We feel that nothing has changed and it's very important for us to get a resolution of this," Mr. Broussard said.
The law remains on hold as the legal dispute unfolds in court.
Write to Susan Warren at susan.warren@wsj.com
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This article from a Scottish publication asks the question "what do you do when your home is burgled?" Roll over and play dead or face legal consequences appears to be the answer. The blithe way this advice is stated strikes me as particularly spooky.
The Scotsman
Wed 1 Dec 2004
So what do you do when your home is burgled?
DR IAN STEPHEN
THE murder of John Monckton and the attack on his wife, Homeyra, during an apparent burglary in their London home has once again highlighted the true dangers and indeed the legal and moral dilemma members of the public face when they are confronted with intruders on their own property.
From a police perspective, the advice to potential victims of burglaries is unequivocal and clear-cut and you should never "have a go", so to speak, but for the victims of crime this is a very difficult thing to put into practice, especially when your natural instincts are to defend yourself, your family and your own property - the very pillars of your life that are being violated and potentially destroyed by criminals.
As a law-abiding individual confronted by an intruder in your home you face a catch-22. If you attack the burglar, or react in an "over the top" manner, as was recently illustrated in the case of Tony Martin who shot intruders in his Norfolk farmhouse, you will inevitably end up on the receiving end of a prison sentence that will far outstrip that imposed on the intruder in your own home. This situation has resulted in a lack of belief in the law among the public or rather a belief that the law isn?t exactly on your side when your home is broken into.
To this end it is perhaps important not to dwell on the situation involving Mr Martin because, regardless of the appeal procedure he successfully went through to secure his freedom, in many ways the law still points to his particular attack on the intruders who entered his home as a pre-meditated assault. He had previously been the victim of a number of burglaries within his home and as a result of this he was effectively prepared for further intrusion and reacted as such when his farmhouse was broken into again.
But what the Martin case does reflect is the general fear felt by the public over rising crime rates and the extent to which they will go to protect themselves. As the case involving Mr and Mrs Monckton shows those most at risk from aggravated burglary are the wealthy, individuals identified by criminals as prosperous professionals. However, at the other end of the scale, people living in inner cities and on council estates face a similar level of risk.
When individuals are confronted by intruders there are some actions they should follow. Direct contact should be avoided whenever possible. If unavoidable, the victim should adopt a state of active passivity. In most cases the best form of defence is always avoidance. If this isn?t possible, act passively, be careful what you say or do and give up valuables without a struggle. This allows the victim to take charge of the situation, without the intruder?s awareness, through subtle and non-confrontational means. People can cooperate but initiate nothing. By doing nothing there is no chance of inadvertently initiating violence by saying something such as "Please don?t hurt me".
In a situation involving housebreaking it is also important to remember that many common burglars are adolescents, most likely starting out on the first rung of the criminal ladder, and they are therefore prone to lashing out if confronted and in the worst case scenarios killing out of panic and fear.
Sometimes the perpetrator of a burglary is even more terrified than the victim and in many cases when things go wrong it is the perpetrator of the crime who panics. Although they sometimes go equipped with weapons, in most cases they probably don?t intend to use them but in the heat of the moment, and the fear of either getting caught or attacked themselves, they use them. They don?t expect the person they are trying to hold up to retaliate or react. Mostly the knife is there simply for intimidation rather than intent to use it and they finish up killing somebody by accident rather than design.
This, of course, does not excuse their actions, but it is certainly worth taking on-board when you consider confronting an intruder. While saying this, in my own experience counselling victims of crime in recent years, there has also recently been a marked increase in the use or the threatened use of dangerous weapons in burglaries and common assaults. This, in itself, is a deeply worrying trend and, although not entirely excusing over-retaliation from homeowners, creates an understandable degree of sympathy for members of the public who lash out at intruders in their home. In truth it is an incredibly difficult situation to assess.
What is perhaps most important is dealing with the victims of the crime and helping them through the aftermath. As someone with wide experience of counselling the victims of violent robberies in their homes it is essential to remember the post-traumatic stress associated with such incidents.
The truth is aggravated burglary causes enormous stress as the victim?s home has been violated. This situation is magnified when the victims and their family have been threatened or assaulted and can lead to a whole range of post-traumatic stress disorders. Like the victims of rape and violent assault, members of the public who experience criminal intrusion in their home experience episodes and often show all the classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress like panic attacks, sleep disorders, flashbacks and social withdrawal.
Like other serious crimes the aftermath of a burglary can be the start of a process that continues to destroy the victim?s self-esteem and even relationships with their loved ones and more often than not reinforces their feelings of guilt and self-blame over the situation. The damage to the victim from the original crime can also be magnified by the court experience and, more likely in today?s society, the lack of support from local authorities and the police.
The trauma can be dealt with in a number of ways with professional help, counselling to develop effective coping strategies and taking time off from stressful professional activities. People who fail to seek help often develop further psychological problems. Men especially are not good at accepting support, but some simple counselling immediately after an attack can substantially reduce the risk of long-term psychological problems.
? Dr Ian Stephen is an Honorary Lecturer (Forensic Psychology) at Glasgow Caledonian University and has worked in a number of prisons with long-term prisoners and young offenders. He was a consultant to forensic psychology television series Cracker.
This article:
??http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=1377062004
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Buz:
:shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock: :shock:
And here's the article about the referenced murder
Crafty
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Financier killed as he confronts burglars
KAREN MCVEIGH
A WEALTHY and highly respected City of London financier was stabbed to death and his wife was left seriously injured after two knife-wielding intruders burst into their multi-million pound townhouse in Chelsea.
John Monckton?s family were "profoundly shocked" by the murder and described him as an "incredibly gentle and thoughtful man".
The couple?s nine-year-old daughter, Isobel, alerted emergency services after finding her parents fighting for their lives after the incident on Monday night. Detectives believe it could have been an attempted burglary, but were keeping an open mind on the motive for the attack.
Yesterday, shocked residents of the exclusive and close-knit area, where actors, rock stars and the aristocracy live next to leading lawyers and businessmen, spoke of a spate of burglaries, robberies and assaults in recent years.
Mr Monckton, 49, died in hospital shortly after the attack. His wife, Homeyra, 45, who was also stabbed, was in a stable condition at St Thomas? Hospital last night after undergoing "significant surgery" for her injuries. She is not expected to be discharged for a week. The couple?s other daughter, Sabrina, 12, was at her boarding school, St Mary?s Ascot, at the time of the murder. She travelled to be with her mother and sister yesterday.
A respected director with financial giant Legal and General and a leading City authority on the corporate bond market, Mr Monckton was also well-known for his deeply held religious beliefs and charitable work. The cousin of Rosa Monckton, a close friend of the late Princess Diana and wife of Dominic Lawson, the Sunday Telegraph editor, Mr Monckton came from a well-established Catholic family and was active in the Knights of Malta charity, which helps the poor.
Police were called to the Moncktons? home, in Upper Cheyne Row, near Albert Bridge, at around 7:35pm on Monday.
Detective Superintendent Mark Jackson said it was too early to establish a motive, but Mr Monckton?s business affairs and the possibility of burglary were "key lines of inquiry".
He added: "The early indications are that two males forced entry into the premises and that is when the offences occurred, and they then decamped from the scene. A murder inquiry has now commenced."
Police are looking at CCTV footage as well as doing forensic tests at the scene and making door-to-door inquiries. Several witnesses have come forward; the suspects were seen fleeing down Glebe Place and on towards the King?s Road.
Yesterday, many residents of Upper Cheyne Row, a tranquil, residential street full of Grade II listed homes, now sealed off by police tape, said they were "saddened and shocked" by the news. The Moncktons? close neighbours include Rolling Stones bass player Bill Wyman, the Marquess of Blandford and several leading financiers.
Canon Michael Brockie, of Our Most Holy Redeemer of Saint Thomas More Church opposite the Moncktons? home, was with Mr Monckton when he died and comforted his wife yesterday. He said she was recovering well.
Canon Brockie described the family as "very close-knit, very dedicated to one another, very private." He said that Mr Monckton, who was on the church?s finance committee, was a "wonderful father and husband" and his death was a "great personal loss, both to me and the parish".
The Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O?Connor, also paid tribute to Mr Monckton, a relative of Lord Monckton, the late owner of Catholic newspaper, the Universe. He said he was horrified by news of the murder of "an exceptional and faithful man".
Canon Brockie, who was in the church at the time of the murder, said he heard a burglar alarm, followed by a banging door, before he went outside to see ambulances. He spoke of a series of recent crimes, including one in the church opposite the Moncktons? house, which left an officer of the church brain-damaged after an attack by an intruder. The priest said he knew of at least three violent burglaries in Chelsea in the past six weeks.
One resident said yesterday that it was the third time in two years that the street had been sealed off with police tape after a major crime. Another spoke of a burglary nearby, where intruders had barged in after a resident opened the door.
A spokesman for Scotland Yard confirmed the attack at the church, in January, and a car hijack, in April, in Cheyne Row, which resulted in two convictions. The Metropolitan Police?s website shows that while Kensington and Chelsea has relatively low crime figures compared for London, it has seen a 66 per cent increase in robberies over the past year, with 87 incidents in 2004. Burglary is also up 16 per cent, from 224 to 240, while violence against the person has seen a 12 per cent increase, from 237 to 266. The borough has also seen the highest percentage rise in knife crime in London in the past two years, with 236 offences in the ten months to March, 35 per cent up on a year earlier.
In 1999, Robert Robinson, former TV presenter for Call My Bluff, and his wife, Josephine, were robbed of ?2,000 of jewellery 100 yards from the Monckton property.
PILLAR OF THE ESTABLISHMENT
AS WELL as being a respected figure in the City, John Monckton came from a family whose achievements straddled politics, finance and the law. He was a cousin of Rosa Monckton, one of the best friends of Diana, Princess of Wales and the wife of Dominic Lawson, the editor of the Sunday Telegraph.
Among his forebears was Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, confidant to Edward VIII during the abdication, who went on to serve in a Tory government as paymaster-general.
Mr Monckton, 49, was a highly respected and senior City fund manager who had been with Legal and General?s investment management division for eight years.
He specialised in the bond markets and was a leading authority on the subject. He headed the bond investment team at L&G.
Born into a distinguished legal family, he was educated at Lincoln College, Oxford, and was called to the Bar as a member of Lincoln?s Inn in 1979. He went to the City in that year, joining the broker Barclays de Zoete Wedd. He later went on to fund managers Foreign & Colonial.
He was also known for his charity work and was a trustee of the Orders of St John which runs St John Ambulance.
It was the 1st Viscount Monckton who achieved the greatest prominence in recent years. The viscount - born Walter Monckton - was the MP for Bristol West from 1951-57 and served in the ministries of defence and labour before becoming paymaster-general.
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Though the headline is over the top, this article from the Daily Telegraph reports that a senior British police official acknowledges at least in passing that self defence is a human right. I think it's worth noting Sir Stevens is about to step down from his position; I wonder if the political climate is such that a tacit mea culpa can only be delivered on the way out the door.
Article follows:
Time to let people kill burglars in their homes, says Met chief
By John Steele, Home Affairs Correspondent
(Filed: 04/12/2004)
Householders should be able to use whatever force is necessary to defend their homes against criminals, even if it involves killing the intruder, the country's most senior police officer said yesterday.
Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, said those who defended their families and property should only face prosecution over injuries to intruders in "extreme circumstances", where they could be shown to have used gratuitous violence.
Speaking exclusively to the Telegraph, days after John Monckton, a financier, was stabbed to death in an attempted robbery at his home in Chelsea, Sir John said: "My own view is that people should be allowed to use what force is necessary and that they should be allowed to do so without any risk of prosecution.
"There's a definite feeling around when I go out on the beat with officers and talk to members of the public that we need clarity in the law."
He said the current legal test of "reasonable force", which has evolved in common law, seemed to be weighted against householders and left the public confused about their rights.
Sir John suggested replacing it with legislation that put a statutory duty on police, prosecutors and the courts to presume that the force someone used in their home against a violent intruder was within the law, unless the facts clearly disproved this.
Other police chiefs shared his view - the strongest assertion of a home owner's right to self-defence issued by a senior officer in recent times - that there was too much doubt about what people could do, he said. The issue should be resolved by Parliament as "a matter of urgency."
Sir John, who will step down in January after five years as commissioner, said: "There is a real difficulty in people understanding what force they can use to defend themselves, their loved ones, their families and their homes. In years gone by I think there was a broad understanding of what it meant.
"The test at the moment is that you use reasonable force in the circumstances. You do not use excessiveness. I think the test of reasonableness needs to be looked at and clarified within statute.
"The thing is too imprecise at the moment for people when they are in extremis. You should be absolutely clear about what your legal rights are to defend yourself."
He suggested that the case of Tony Martin, the Norfolk farmer jailed for shooting dead a 16-year-old burglar, Fred Barras, in August 1999, was exceptional one which had distorted the issue of self-defence.
Martin, he pointed out, "did shoot the burglar as he was running away. He did use a gun that was illegal. The Martin case skewed everything and it was the wrong case to concentrate on".
Speaking at Scotland Yard, Sir John said: "Now is the time, specifically with these two cases we have had recently - in Chiswick and Chelsea - for the law to be clarified." The Chiswick case involved a teacher stabbed to death in his home in west London. A man has been charged with his murder.
"It's all very well for the lawyers to say the law is clear, but I'm afraid people on the street don't feel that, and on occasions neither do the police," said Sir John.
"Of course you don't want to have gratuitous or excessive violence? but you have to be given the power to use what is necessary.
"I'm not talking about guns but people being allowed to defend themselves and use whatever is necessary to defend themselves against someone who may well be armed with a knife."
There should be a presumption in law "that the person using the force to defend themselves is acting within the law, rather than the other way round".
Even if a struggle led to the death of an intruder, Sir John added, the law would presume that the person in that house had acted lawfully "and let the law change that presumption because of fact in evidence".
He said: "The message it sends to the would-be attacker is, `Do not think you can come into people's homes and people will not defend themselves with the right type of force that's necessary.' At the moment it seems it's the other way round."
http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=I14UFWHN5LJ5VQFIQMGSNAGAVCBQWJVC?xml=/news/2004/12/04/nmet04.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/12/04/ixportal.html
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Though the headline is over the top, this article from the Daily Telegraph reports that a senior British police official acknowledges at least in passing that self defence is a human right. I think it's worth noting Sir Stevens is about to step down from his position; I wonder if the political climate is such that a tacit mea culpa can only be delivered on the way out the door.
Tony Blair just backed what Sir Stevens said
08 December 2004 - 14:23
Blair backs burglary law changes
Tony Blair has said that the government will be conducting a review into whether the law needs changing on the level of force an individual can use against an intruder.
Speaking at prime minister's question time, Mr Blair told MPs that in the light of public concern the issue would be re-examined.
The Conservatives have been championing a private members' bill that would seek to amend the existing law so that householders would only be prosecuted if they used "grossly disproportionate" force against an intruder. Currently the law allows a householder to use "reasonable force".
He's basically stolen the Conservatives' stance on the issue which I rather admire him for. It is pretty much what the majority of people want anyway.
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It appears the British Attorney General is at odds with the Prime Minister and head of Scotland Yards. Out of the Telegraph:
Burglars have rights too, says Attorney General
By Melissa Kite and Andrew Alderson
(Filed: 12/12/2004)
A fresh row broke out last night about the rights of householders to fight back against intruders after the Government's most senior lawyer defended the rights of burglars.
Lord Goldsmith, the attorney-general, flew in the face of the Prime Minister's pledge to look again at the law with a view to giving homeowners more rights when he said that existing legislation was adequate.
He said that criminals must also have the right to protection from violence, prompting David Davis, the shadow home secretary, to accuse the government of being dangerously split on the issue.
Lord Goldsmith's intervention came as Sir John Stevens, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, dismissed fears that giving homeowners greater freedom when tackling burglars would lead to an "arms race" that would put them in greater danger.
He denied that a change in the law, which currently gives homeowners the right to use "reasonable force" when tackling intruders, would encourage burglars to become more aggressive.
In an interview with The Telegraph, Sir John - who last weekend came out in favour of the Right to Fight Back campaign, launched by this newspaper two months ago - said: "I am convinced that enabling householders to use whatever force is necessary will discourage burglars.
"The fact that a would-be intruder knows a householder can respond without the fear of being prosecuted will undoubtedly deter criminal acts." Sir John, who will step down next month after five years as commissioner, said fellow police officers were confident that it would act as a deterrent.
"We are on the ground," he said. "We smell it, we see it, we hear it. We know what we are talking about."
Last week, Tony Blair told the House of Commons that he would look at strengthening the law and a Tory MP has introduced a private member's bill to do so.
Lord Goldsmith, however, appeared to take issue with the Prime Minister's pledge to act. "We must protect victims and law abiding citizens," he said.
"But we have to recognise that others have some rights as well. They don't lose all rights because they're engaged in criminal conduct."
Mr Davis said: "They certainly do lose quite a lot of rights. The Government ought to make up its mind. The Prime Minister says one thing and the Attorney General says another.
"Of course all human beings have rights, but when somebody enters your home to commit a crime they give up a large portion of them."
Some critics of a change in the law have voiced concerns that burglars will feel they have to carry guns, knives and other weapons to protect themselves from householders.
Sir John, however, did not see this as a problem. "I have confidence in the good judgement and common sense of the public in knowing how far they should go."
He said that householders should be able to use whatever force is necessary even if - in exceptional circumstances - it involved killing the intruder.
He spoke of his regret about the repercussions over the verdict on Tony Martin, the farmer who shot dead one burglar and seriously injured another during a break-in at his farm in August 1999.
There was a public outcry when Martin was found guilty at Norwich Crown Court and sentenced to life in prison. The charge and sentence were later reduced to five years for manslaughter.
Sir John did not suggest that the jury had reached the wrong verdict, but added: "The Tony Martin case is unfortunate because it has skewed the debate [on the public's right to protect their home]. But it is a fact that burglars have acted with greater confidence since the Tony Martin verdict and that has to be a matter of regret."
Lord Goldsmith, however, warned of the dangers of using the Martin case to make bad law: "There are very few cases that have given rise to this problem. Besides Tony Martin, there's only one I know about.
"It's always possible to extrapolate from one case and think that something is happening across the country when it isn't."
Mr Blair's announcement of a review of the law came three days after the Conservative Party threw its weight behind a new parliamentary attempt to win more rights for householders to protect them from burglars.
The Telegraph revealed last weekend how Patrick Mercer, the Tory MP, would introduce a Private Member's Bill to change the law in favour of homeowners.
In an article in this newspaper today, Mr Mercer described Mr Blair's promise to consult before taking action as a "classic delaying tactic".
Michael Howard, the Tory leader, yesterday praised this newspaper's campaign. "I pay tribute to the highly effective campaign run over so many months by The Sunday Telegraph. It was the first newspaper to highlight this crucial issue and its persistence has been a key factor in winning this change to the law and in forcing Tony Blair's U-turn," he said. "We now need to ensure that Patrick Mercer's bill gets through parliament. The Sunday Telegraph's continued vigilance will be crucial in ensuring this."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;sessionid=0L00PD041E3SFQFIQMFCM5WAVCBQYJVC?xml=/news/2004/12/12/nfight12.xml&sSheet=/news/2004/12/12/ixnewstop.html
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This thread's title notwithstanding, here's one an armed LEO:
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Police Arrest Deputy U.S. Marshal
Marshal Being Held Without Bond
POSTED: 10:51 AM EST November 2, 2004
ROCKVILLE, Md. -- Montgomery County police say a deputy U.S. Marshal has been charged with murder in the shooting death of 20-year-old Ryan Stowers last Thursday in Rockville, Md. Police said 53-year-old Arthur Lloyd was taken into custody about 8:30 a.m., at his Montgomery County home.
They said Stowers and Lloyd argued at the Mid Pike Shopping Plaza on Rockville Pike, shortly after having a traffic altercation on Rockville Pike.
Police said the verbal dispute escalated into a physical altercation and at some point, Lloyd drew his service handgun and fired one round , striking Stowers in his lower right leg.
Detectives said Stowers called 911 using his cell phone, and then got back into his car and began to drive away. Lloyd then fired multiple times, with one round hitting Stowers in the back near his left shoulder, detectives said.
Stowers was taken to Suburban Hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Lloyd was taken to a local hospital and treated and released for a broken thumb and other injuries he sustained during the altercation.
Police said Lloyd was off duty at the time and had his family in the car when the incident happened.
Authorities said Lloyd has been charged with first-degree murder, use of a handgun in the commission of a crime of violence, and reckless endangerment and is being held without bond.
According to the U.S. Marshals Service, Lloyd has been suspended without pay.
Copyright 2004 by nbc4.com. All rights reserved.
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That story has been making fairly big news out this way in the metro DC area. Looks like a case of road rage where the LEO let his anger get out of hand. I was among those fairly scandalized by the fact that it took over a week, if memory serves, for the officer to be arrested. There were a lot of witnesses to the incident and the accounts published are all quite consistent.
I've run into a lot of LEOs over the years at the range and while training martial arts. Though the experience is by no means universal, I've met more than my share who couldn't check their ego at the door. Sundry sorts of folly ensued, of which I suspect this is an extreme example. I'm curious if others have had training experience with ego-driven LEOs.
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I recently ran across this article. Scary, but interesting.
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The Battle of Athens, Tennessee
As Recently As 1946, American Citizens Were
Forced To Take Up Arms As A Last Resort
Against Corrupt Government Officials.
Published in Guns & Ammo October 1995, pp. 50-51
On August 1-2, 1946, some Americans, brutalized by their county government, used armed force as a last resort to overturn it. These Americans wanted honest open elections. For years they had asked for state or federal election monitors to prevent vote fraud (forged ballots, secret ballot counts and intimidation by armed sheriff's deputies) by the local political boss. They got no help.
These Americans' absolute refusal to knuckle under had been hardened by service in World War II. Having fought to free other countries from murderous regimes, they rejected vicious abuse by their county government.
These Americans had a choice. Their state's Constitution -- Article 1, Section 26 -- recorded their right to keep and bear arms for the common defense. Few "gun control" laws had been enacted.
These Americans were residents of McMinn County, which is located between Chattanooga and Knoxville in Eastern Tennessee. The two main towns were Athens and Etowah. McMinn County residents had long been independent political thinkers. For a long time they also had: accepted bribe-taking by politicians and/or the sheriff to overlook illicit whiskey-making and gambling; financed the sheriff's department from fines-usually for speeding or public drunkenness which promoted false arrests; and put up with voting fraud by both Democrats and Republicans.
The wealthy Cantrell family, of Etowah, backed Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1932 election, hoping New Deal programs would revive the local economy and help Democrats to replace Republicans in the county government. So it proved.
Paul Cantrell was elected sheriff in the 1936,1938 and 1940 elections, but by slim margins. The sheriff was the key county official. Cantrell was elected to the state senate in 1942 and 1944; his chief deputy, Pat Mansfield, was elected sheriff. In 1946 Paul Cantrell again sought the sheriff's office.
At the end of 1945, some 3,000 battle-hardened veterans returned to McMinn County; the GIs held Cantrell politically responsible for Mansfield's doings. Early in 1946, some newly returned ex-GIs decided to challenge Cantrell politically by offering an all-ex-GI, non-partisan ticket. They promised a fraud-free election, stating in ads and speeches that there would be an honest ballot count and reform of county government.
At a rally, a GI speaker said, "The principles that we fought for in this past war do not exist in McMinn County. We fought for democracy because we believe in democracy but not the form we live under in this county" (Daily Post-Athenian, 17 June 1946, p.1 ). At the end of July 1946, 159 McMinn County GIs petitioned the FBI to send election monitors. There was no response. The Department of Justice had not responded to McMinn County residents' complaints of election fraud in 1940, 1942 and 1944.
FROM BALLOTS TO BULLETS
The primary election was held on August 1. To intimidate voters, Mansfield brought in some 200 armed "deputies." GI poll-watchers were beaten almost at once. At about 3 p.m., Tom Gillespie, an African- American voter was told by a sheriff's deputy that he could not vote. Despite being beaten, Gillespie persisted. The enraged deputy shot him. The gunshot drew a crowd. Rumors spread that Gillespie had been shot in the back; he later recovered (C. Stephen Byrum, The Battle of Athens, Paidia Productions, Chattanooga, TN, 1987; pp. 155-57).
Other deputies detained ex-GI poll-watchers in a polling place, as that made the ballot counting "Public" A crowd gathered. Sheriff Mansfield told his deputies to disperse the crowd. When the two ex-GIs smashed a big window and escaped, the crowd surged forward. The deputies, with guns drawn, formed a tight half-circle around the front of the polling place. One deputy, "his gun raised high...shouted: 'If you sons of bitches cross this street I'll kill you!'" (Byrum, p.165).
Mansfield took the ballot boxes to the jail for counting. The deputies seemed to fear immediate attack by the "people who had just liberated Europe and the South Pacific from two of the most powerful war machines in human history" (Byrum, pp. 168-69).
Short of firearms and ammunition, the GIs scoured the county to find them. By borrowing keys to the National Guard and State Guard armories, they got three M-1 rifles, five .45 semi-automatic pistols and 24 British Enfield rifles. The armories were nearly empty after the war's end. By 8 p.m. a group of GIs and "local boys" headed for the jail but left the back door unguarded to give the jail's defenders an easy way out.
Three GIs alerting passersby to danger were fired on from the jail. Two GIs were wounded. Other GIs returned fire.
Firing subsided after 30 minutes; ammunition ran low and night had fallen. Thick brick walls shielded those inside the jail. Absent radios, the GIs' rifle fire was uncoordinated. "From the hillside fire rose and fell in disorganized cascades. More than anything else, people were simply shooting at the jail" (Byrum, p.189).
Several who ventured into the street in front of the jail were wounded. One man inside the jail was badly hurt; he recovered. Most sheriff's deputies wanted to hunker down and await rescue. Governor McCord mobilized the State Guard, perhaps to scare the GIs into withdrawing. The State Guard never went to Athens. McCord may have feared that Guard units filled with ex-GIs might not fire on other ex-GIs.
At about 2 a.m. on August 2, the GIs forced the issue. Men from Meigs County threw dynamite sticks and damaged the jail's porch. The panicked deputies surrendered. GIs quickly secured the building. Paul Cantrell faded into the night, having almost been shot by a GI who knew him, but whose .45 pistol had jammed. Mansfield's deputies were kept overnight in jail for their own safety. Calm soon returned. The GIs posted guards. The rifles borrowed from the armory were cleaned and returned before sunup.
THE AFTERMATH: RESTORING DEMOCRACY
In five precincts free of vote fraud, the GI candidate for sheriff, Knox Henry, won 1,168 votes to Cantrell's 789. Other GI candidates won by similar margins.
The GI's did not hate Cantrell. They only wanted honest government. On August 2, a town meeting set up a three-man governing committee. The regular police having fled, six men were chosen to police Etowah. In addition, "Individual citizens were called upon to form patrols or guard groups, often led by a GI... To their credit, however, there is not a single mention of an abuse of power on their behalf" (Byrum, p. 220).
Once the GI candidates' victory had been certified, they cleaned up county government, the jail was fixed, newly elected officials accepted a $5,000 pay limit and Mansfield supporters who resigned were replaced.
The general election on November 5 passed quietly. McMinn County residents, having restored the rule of law, returned to their daily lives. Pat Mansfield moved back to Georgia. Paul Cantrell set up an auto dealership in Etowah. "Almost everyone who knew Cantrell in the years after the Battle' agree that he was not bitter about what had happened" (Byrum pp. 232-33; see also New York Times, 9 August 1946, p. 8).
The 79th Congress adjourned on August 2, 1946, when the Battle of Athens ended. However, Representative John Jennings Jr. from Tennessee decried McMinn County's sorry situation under Cantrell and Mansfield and the Justice Department's repeated failures to help the McMinn County residents. Jennings was delighted that "...at long last, decency and honesty, liberty and law have returned to the fine county of McMinn.. " (Congressional Record, House; U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1946; Appendix, Volume 92, Part 13, p. A4870).
THE LESSONS OF ATHENS
Those who took up arms in Athens, Tennessee, wanted honest elections, a cornerstone of our constitutional order. They had repeatedly tried to get federal or state election monitors and had used armed force so as to minimize harm to the law-breakers, showing little malice to the defeated law-breakers. They restored lawful government.
The Battle of Athens clearly shows how Americans can and should lawfully use armed force and also shows why the rule of law requires unrestricted access to firearms and how civilians with military-type firearms can beat the forces of government gone bad.
Dictators believe that public order is more important than the rule of law. However, Americans reject this idea. Brutal political repression is lethal to many. An individual criminal can harm a handful of people. Governments alone can brutalize thousands, or millions.
Law-abiding McMinn County residents won the Battle of Athens because they were not hamstrung by "gun control " They showed us when citizens can and should use armed force to support the rule of law.
This is a bare-bones summary of a major report in JPFO's Firearms Sentinel (January 1995). To learn how the gutsy people of Athens, Tennessee, did the Framers of the Constitution proud, send $5 to:
JPFO, Dept. GA
PO Box 270143
Hartford, WI 53027 and request the January 1995 Firearms Sentinel
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The impact of a well-armed population with martial competencies emergec throughout this piece.
From ReasonOnline
The First Free State Project
The brief, tumultuous history of Franklin.
Jackson Kuhl
Never heard of the state of Franklin? Its existence was brief, from 1784 to about 1788, though as with such still-existing post-Revolution states as Maine and Vermont, self-rule had been the norm there for years beforehand. In 1769 Virginians began settling the Watauga River in what is now the northeastern tip of Tennessee. Three years later the Articles of the Watauga Association bound these settlements together for mutual defense and negotiation with the surrounding Cherokee. When a survey revealed Watauga Association lands to be within North Carolina?s claim west of the Appalachian Mountains, the settlers petitioned to join the state, pledging to assist in the Revolutionary effort.
Republicanism was all the rage in the dusty days after the war. Citizens who weren?t gentry demanded the titles Mr. and Mrs., servants refused to address their employers as superiors, and independence, both as a person and as a people, was seen as the highest virtue. The inhabitants of North Carolina?s western Greene, Sullivan, and Washington counties (the last having been created expressly out of Watauga Association lands) craved self-government.
Settlers refused to pay taxes when North Carolina failed to build roads or appoint judges and militia to protect them from hostile Indians. Their land was taxed at the same rate as that east of the Blue Ridge, they complained, even though it was valued only a quarter as much. Yet it was impossible for the bankrupt state to build infrastructure without tax money, which couldn?t be collected in the western counties where shooting tax collectors was seen as simple Christian charity. Meanwhile, the settlers were building on lands promised to the Cherokee and Choctaw in their treaties with North Carolina. These incursions sparked Indian attacks.
North Carolina had other money problems. Article 8 of the pre-constitutional Articles of Confederation specified that each of the 13 states would pick up the war tab by paying a tax proportional to an assessment on its land-?essentially, a real estate tax on the states. The bad news for North Carolinians was that not only were they broke, they also had a lot of land (their claim stretched to the Mississippi River) and hence a higher tax bill. In response, the North Carolina delegates to Philadelphia wanted to cede the state?s western counties to Congress, thereby reducing their assessment.
The North Carolina legislature was wary?it knew and resented the discontent of the state?s western citizens?but passed a bill in May 1784 giving away the truculent western counties, though stipulating that they would remain part of the state if Congress declined to accept them. Not only would this maneuver lower the state?s tax assessment, it would rid it of the troublesome westerners without giving them the victory of independence. But this game of hot potato infuriated the westerners. Delegates from the counties met at a Jonesborough convention in August and said, essentially, ?Screw them. We?re our own state.?
North Carolina responded in October by repealing the cession act. In December the western delegates met again to reaffirm their independence. John Sevier, a chief proponent of separate statehood and an indefatigable Indian fighter, was elected governor. The new state was named Franklin. Its namesake, Benjamin Franklin, was invited to move to the area from Philadelphia. He declined, but his epistolary advice was sought throughout the state?s lifetime.
The mother state?s mood toward Franklin vacillated between wrath and reconciliation. The North Carolina legislature wanted to send in troops, but cooler heads knew a campaign against former Revolutionary guerrillas would be messy. Letters flew back and forth. Meanwhile, Sevier negotiated fresh treaties with the Cherokee, and the Franklin legislature granted new settlers a tax-free grace period of two years to encourage immigration.
In May and June 1785, Franklin petitioned Congress to accept North Carolina?s cession?ignoring the revocation?and to admit Franklin to the Union. Congress agreed that a cession, once offered, couldn?t be taken back, but Franklin failed to achieve the two-thirds majority (nine states) needed under the Articles of Confederation to pass any law. All of the Southern states except Georgia voted against admittance; they had vast land claims themselves and worried that the division between North Carolina and Franklin (and, more amicably, between Virginia and its Kentucky District) would encourage additional breakaway states, to their detriment. Massachusetts and Delaware abstained, believing the issue merited further discussion.
That Franklin won the support it did was a victory in itself, and during the following years its government set about shoring up relations with the other states, though attempts at rapprochement were met coolly by North Carolina. Courts were established in Franklin, new counties added, coins minted. The new state adopted a constitution modeled on that of its parent.
The Franklin government had a difficult time preventing newcomers from squatting on Indian land, and by the fall of 1787 an all-out Indian war was imminent. Davidson County, one of the fastest-growing areas of the frontier, originally refused to join the Franklin cause, since the area?s remoteness precluded bother from North Carolina tax collectors and (more important) its land grants were issued from across the mountains. Then Indian raids intensified. Col. James Robertson, founder of the city of Nashville (in Davidson County), sent out an SOS. North Carolina hesitated, but Franklin didn?t: Sevier led 2,000 men westward through the woods to Nashville, and the show of force was enough to disband the Indians without a fight. Disillusioned with the North Carolina government, Davidson County threw in with Franklin.
A brief insurrection in February 1788 by North Carolina loyalist Col. John Tipton, pitting settler against settler, inspired the Indians to strike. By March, the wilderness was on fire, and the situation was so grim that the North Carolina militia marched forth to battle alongside the Franklinmen.
The Americans prevailed, but the war exhausted Franklin and the other frontier colonies. In June 1789, the new federal Constitution was ratified and North Carolina?whether from the esprit de corps of fighting beside the rebels or from a desire to wash its hands of Indian troubles?stopped blocking the cession of its western lands. Franklin, Nashville, and the surrounding areas became a U.S. territory, and in 1796 what was once North Carolina between the Mississippi and the Appalachians became the state of Tennessee. John Sevier was elected its first governor.?
Jackson Kuhl writes about archaeology, history, and travel.
http://www.reason.com/0412/fe.jk.the.shtml
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In this piece the authors examine what could occur if all guns were banned. The resulting picture is pretty grim.
A World Without Guns
Be forewarned: It?s not a pretty picture
By Dave Kopel, Paul Gallant, and Joanne Eisen of the Independence Institute
December 5, 2001 9:40 a.m.
magine the world without guns" was a bumper sticker that began making the rounds after the murder of ex-Beatle John Lennon on December 18, 1980. Last year, Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, followed up on that sentiment by announcing she would become a spokeswoman for Handgun Control, Inc. (which later changed its name to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, and which was previously named the National Council to Control Handguns).
So let's try hard to imagine what a world without guns would look like. It isn't hard to do. But be forewarned: It's not a pretty picture.
The way to get to a gun-free world, the gun-prohibition groups tell us, is to pass laws banning them. We can begin by imagining the enactment of laws which ban all non-government possession of firearms.
It's not likely that local bans will do the job. Take, for example, New York's 1911 Sullivan Law, which imposed an exceedingly restrictive handgun-licensing scheme on New York City. In recent decades, administrative abuses have turned the licensing statute into what amounts to prohibition, except for tenacious people who navigate a deliberately obstructive licensing system.
Laws affect mainly those willing to obey them. And where there's an unfulfilled need ? and money to be made ? there's usually a way around the law. Enter the black market, which flourishes all the more vigorously with ever-increasing restrictions and prohibitions. In TV commercials that aired last August, New York City Republican (sort of) mayoral candidate Mike Bloomberg informed voters that "in 1993, there were as many as 2 million illegal guns on the street." The insinuation was that all those guns were in the hands of criminals, and the implication was that confiscating the guns would make the city a safer place. What Bloomberg never explained was how he planned to shut down the black market.
So let's imagine, instead, a nationwide gun ban, or maybe even a worldwide ban.
Then again, heroin and cocaine have been illegal in the United States, and most of the world, for nearly a century. Huge resources have been devoted to suppressing their production, sale, and use, and many innocent people have been sacrificed in the crossfire of the "drug war." Yet heroin and cocaine are readily available on the streets of almost all large American cities, and at prices that today are lower than in previous decades.
Perhaps a global prohibition law isn't good enough. Maybe imposing the harshest penalty possible for violation of such a law will give it real teeth: mandatory life in prison for possession of a gun, or even for possession of a single bullet. (We won't imagine the death penalty, since the Yoko crowd doesn't like the death penalty.)
On second thought, Jamaica's Gun Court Act of 1974 contained just such a penalty, and even that wasn't sufficient. On August 18, 2001, Jamaican Melville Cooke observed that today, "the only people who do not have an illegal firearm [in this country], are those who do not want one." Violent crime in Jamaica is worse than ever, as gangsters and trigger-happy police commit homicides with impunity, and only the law-abiding are disarmed.
Yet the Jamaican government wants to globalize its failed policy. In July 2001, Burchell Whiteman, Jamaica's Minister of Education, Youth and Culture spoke at the U.N. Disarmament Conference to demand the "implementation of measures that would limit the production of weapons to levels that meet the needs for defence and national security."
And as long as governments are allowed to have guns, there will be gun factories to steal from. Some of these factories might have adequate security measures to prevent theft, including theft by employees. But in a world with about 200 nations, most of them governed by kleptocracies, it's preposterous to imagine that some of those "government-only" factories won't become suppliers for the black market. Alternatively, corrupt military and police could supply firearms to the black market.
We'd better revise our strategy. Rather than wishing for laws (which cannot, even imaginably, create a gun-free world), let's be more ambitious, and imagine that all guns vanish. Even guns possessed by government agents. And let's close all the gun factories, too. That ought to put the black market out of business.
Voil?! Instant peace!
Back to the Drawing Board
Then again.....it's not very difficult to make a workable firearm. As J. David Truby points out in his book Zips, Pipes, and Pens: Arsenal of Improvised Weapons, "Today, all of the improvised/modified designs [of firearms] remain well within the accomplishment of the mechanically unskilled citizen who does not have access to firearms through other means."
In the article "Gun-Making as a Cottage Industry," Charles Chandler observed that Americans "have a reputation as ardent hobbyists and do-it-yourselfers, building everything from ship models to home improvements." The one area they have not been very active in is that of firearm construction. And that, Chandler explained, is only because "well-designed and well-made firearms are generally available as items of commerce."
A complete gun ban, or highly restrictive licensing amounting to near-ban, would create a real incentive for gun making to become a "cottage industry".
It's already happening in Great Britain, a consequence of the complete ban on civilian possession of handguns imposed by the Firearms Act of 1997. Not only are the Brits swamped today with illegally imported firearms, but local, makeshift gun factories have sprung up to compete.
British police already know about some of them. Officers from Scotland Yard's Metropolitan Police Serious Crime Group South recently recovered 12 handgun replicas which were converted to working models. An auto repair shop in London served as the front for the novel illegal gun factory. Police even found some enterprising gun-makers turning screwdrivers into workable firearms, and producing firearms disguised as ordinary key rings.
In short, closing the Winchester Repeating Arms factory ? and all the others ? will not spell the end of the firearm business.
Just take the case of Bougainville, the largest island in the South Pacific's Solomon Islands chain. Bougainville was the site of a bloody, decade-long secessionist uprising against domination by the government of Papua New Guinea, aided and abetted by the Australian government. The conflict there was the longest-running confrontation in the Pacific since the end of World War II, and caused the deaths of 15,000 to 20,000 islanders.
During the hostilities, which included a military blockade of the island, one of the goals was to deprive the Bougainville Revolutionary Army (BRA) of its supply of arms. The tactic failed: the BRA simply learned how to make its own guns using materiel and ammunition left over from the War.
In fact, at the United Nations Asia Pacific Regional Disarmament Conference held in Spring 2001, it was quietly admitted that the BRA, within ten years of its formation, had managed to manufacture a production copy of the M16 automatic rifle and other machine guns. (That makes one question the real intent behind the U.N. Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All its Aspects, which followed several months later: the U.N. leadership can't be so daft as to fail to recognize the implications for world disarmament after learning of the success of the Bougainville Revolutionary Army.)
If this single island of Bougainville can produce its own weapons, the Philippine Islands have long had a thriving cottage industry to manufacture firearms ? despite very restrictive gun laws imposed by the Marcos dictatorship and some other regimes.
It looks like we'll need to revisit our fantasy, yet again.
Okay. By proclamation of Kopel, Gallant, and Eisen, not only do all firearms ? every last one of them ? vanish instantly, but there shall be no further remanufacturing.
That last part's a bit tricky. Auto repair shops, hobbyists, revolutionaries ? everyone with decent machine shop skills ? can make a gun from something. This takes us down the same road as drug prohibition: With primary anti-drug laws having proven themselves unenforceable, secondary laws have been added to prohibit possession of items which could be used to manufacture drugs. Even making suspicious purchases at a gardening store can earn one a "dynamic entry" visit from the local SWAT team.
But laws proscribing the possession of gun-manufacturing items would have to be even broader than laws against possession of drug-manufacturing items, because there are so many tools which can be used to make guns, or be made into guns. What we'd really have to do is carefully control every possible step in the gun-making process. That means the registration of all machine tools, and the federal licensing of plumbers (similar to current federal licensure of pharmacies), auto mechanics, and all those handymen with their screwdrivers. And we'd need to stamp a serial number on pipes (potential gun barrels) in every bathroom and automobile ? and everywhere else one finds pipes ? and place all the serial numbers in a federal registry.
Today, the antigun lobbies who claim they don't want to ban all guns still insist that registration of every single gun and licensing of every gun owner is essential to keep guns from falling into the wrong hands. If so, it's hard to argue that licensing and registration of gun manufacturing items would not be essential to prevent illicit production of guns.
Thus, we would have to control every part of the manufacturing process. That would add up to a very expensive, complicated proposition. Even a 1% noncompliance rate with the "Firearms Precursors Control Act" would leave an immense supply of materials available for black-market gun making.
In order to ensure total conformity with the act, it's difficult to imagine leaving most existing constitutional protections in place. The mind boggles at the kinds of search and seizure laws required to make certain that people do not possess unregistered metal pipes or screwdrivers!
For example, just to enforce a ban on actual guns (not gun precursors), the Jamaican government needed to wipe out many common law controls on police searches, and many common law guarantees of fair trials. We'd have to trash the Constitution in order to completely prevent a black market in gun precursors from taking hold. Still, as the gun-prohibition lobby always says, if it saves just one life, it would be worth it.
But, what if, despite these extreme measures, the black market still functioned ? as it almost always does, when there is sufficient demand?
It's time to seriously revisit our strategy for a gun-free world. Maybe there's a shortcut around all of this.
Okay. We're going to make a truly radical, no-holds-barred proposal this time, take a quantum leap in science, and go where no man has gone before. There may be those who scoff at our proposal, but it can succeed where all other strategies have failed.
We, Kopel, Gallant, and Eisen, hereby imagine that, from this day forth, the laws of chemical combustion are revoked. We hereby imagine that gunpowder ? and all similar compounds ? no longer have the capacity to burn and release the gases necessary to propel a bullet.
Peace for Our Time
Finally, for the first time, a gun-free world is truly within our grasp ? and it's time to see what man hath wrought. And for that, all we have to do is take a look back at the kind of world our ancestors lived in.
To say that life in the pre-gunpowder world was violent would be an understatement. Land travel, especially over long distances, was fraught with danger from murderers, robbers, and other criminals. Most women couldn't protect themselves from rape, except by granting unlimited sexual access to one male in exchange for protection from other males.
Back then, weapons depended on muscle power. Advances in weaponry primarily magnified the effect of muscle power. The stronger one is, the better one's prospects for fighting up close with an edged weapon like a sword or a knife, or at a distance with a bow or a javelin (both of which require strong arms). The superb ability of such "old-fashioned" edged weapons to inflict carnage on innocents was graphically demonstrated by the stabbing deaths of eight second graders on June 8, 2001, by former school clerk Mamoru Takuma in gun-free Osaka, Japan.
When it comes to muscle power, young men usually win over women, children, and the elderly. It was warriors who dominated society in gun-free feudal Europe, and a weak man usually had to resign himself to settle on a life of toil and obedience in exchange for a place within the castle walls when evil was afoot.
And what of the women? According to the custom of jus primae noctis, a lord had the right to sleep with the bride of a newly married serf on the first night ? a necessary price for the serf to pay ? in exchange for the promise of safety and security (does that ring a bell?). Not uncommonly, this arrangement didn't end with the wedding night, since one's lord had the practical power to take any woman, any time. Regardless of whether jus primae noctis was formally observed in a region, rich, strong men had little besides their conscience to stop them from having their way with women who weren't protected by another wealthy strongman.
But there's yet another problem with imagining gunpowder out of existence: We get rid of firearms, but we don't get rid of guns. With the advent of the blow gun some 40,000 years ago, man discovered the efficacy of a tube for concentrating air power and aiming a missile, making the eventual appearance of airguns inevitable. So gunpowder or no gunpowder, all we've been doing, thus far, amounts to quibbling over the means for propelling something out of a tube.
Airguns date back to somewhere around the beginning of the 17th century. And we don't mean airguns like the puny Daisy Red Ryder BB Gun with a compass in the stock, longed for by Ralphie in Jean Shepard's 1984 classic A Christmas Story ("No, Ralphie, you can't have a BB gun ? you'll shoot your eye out!").
No, we're talking serious lethality here. The kind of powder-free gun that can hurl a 7.4 oz. projectile with a muzzle energy of 1,082 foot-pounds. Compare that to the 500 foot-pounds of muzzle energy from a typical .357 Magnum round! Even greater projectile energies are achievable using gases like nitrogen or helium, which create higher pressures than air does.
Before the advent of self-contained powder cartridge guns, airguns were considered serious weapons. In fact, three hundred years ago, air-powered guns were among the most powerful and accurate large-bore rifles around. While their biggest disadvantages were cost and intricacy of manufacture, they were more dependable and could be fired more rapidly than firearms of the same period. A butt-reservoir .31 airgun was carried by Lewis and Clark on their historic expedition, and used successfully for taking game. [See Robert D. Beeman, "Proceeding On to the Lewis & Clark Airgun," Airgun Revue 6 (2000): 13-33.] Airguns even saw duty in military engagements more than 200 years ago.
Today, fully automatic M-16-style airguns are a reality. It was only because of greater cost relative to powder guns, and the greater convenience afforded by powder arms, that airgun technology was never pushed to its lethal limits.
Other non-powder weapon systems have competed for man's attention, as well. The 20th century was the bloodiest century in the history of mankind. And while firearms were used for killing (for example, with machine guns arranged to create interlocking fields of fire in the trench warfare of World War I), they were hardly essential. By far, the greatest number of deliberate killings occurred during the genocides and democides perpetrated by governments against disarmed populations. The instruments of death ranged from Zyklon B gas to machetes to starvation.
Imagine No Claws
To imagine a world with no guns is to imagine a world in which the strong rule the weak, in which women are dominated by men, and in which minorities are easily abused or mass-murdered by majorities. Practically speaking, a firearm is the only weapon that allows a weaker person to defend himself from a larger, stronger group of attackers, and to do so at a distance. As George Orwell observed, a weapon like a rifle "gives claws to the weak."
The failure of imagination among people who yearn for a gun-free world is their naive assumption that getting rid of claws will get rid of the desire to dominate and kill. They fail to acknowledge the undeniable fact that when the weak are deprived of claws (or firearms), the strong will have access to other weapons, including sheer muscle power. A gun-free world would be much more dangerous for women, and much safer for brutes and tyrants.
The one society in history that successfully gave up firearms was Japan in the 17th century, as detailed in Noel Perrin's superb book Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Reversion to the Sword 1543-1879. An isolated island with a totalitarian dictatorship, Japan was able to get rid of the guns. Historian Stephen Turnbull summarizes the result:
[The dictator] Hid?yoshi's resources were such that the edict was carried out to the letter. The growing social mobility of peasants was thus flung suddenly into reverse. The ikki, the warrior-monks, became figures of the past . . . Hid?yoshi had deprived the peasants of their weapons. I?yasu [the next ruler] now began to deprive them of their self respect. If a peasant offended a samurai he might be cut down on the spot by the samurai's sword. [The Samurai: A Military History (New York: Macmillan, 1977).]
The inferior status of the peasantry having been affirmed by civil disarmament, the Samurai enjoyed kiri-sute gomen, permission to kill and depart. Any disrespectful member of the lower class could be executed by a Samurai's sword.
The Japanese disarmament laws helped mold the culture of submission to authority which facilitated Japan's domination by an imperialist military dictatorship in the 1930s, which led the nation into a disastrous world war.
In short, the one country that created a truly gun-free society created a society of harsh class oppression, in which the strongmen of the upper class could kill the lower classes with impunity. When a racist, militarist, imperialist government took power, there was no effective means of resistance. The gun-free world of Japan turned into just the opposite of the gentle, egalitarian utopia of John Lennon's song "Imagine."
Instead of imagining a world without a particular technology, what about imagining a world in which the human heart grows gentler, and people treat each other decently? This is part of the vision of many of the world's great religions. Although we have a long way to go, there is no denying that hundreds of millions of lives have changed for the better because people came to believe what these religions teach.
If a truly peaceful world is attainable ? or, even if unattainable, worth striving for ? there is nothing to be gained from the futile attempt to eliminate all guns. A more worthwhile result can flow from the changing of human hearts, one soul at a time.
http://www.nationalreview.com/kopel/kopel120501.shtml
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Shopkeeper Who Killed Rapist: 'I Guess We Were Lucky'
POSTED: 8:22 am EST January 6, 2005
UPDATED: 2:37 pm EST January 7, 2005
CAMDEN, N.J. -- The owner of a small city store had not heard about the rapist terrorizing downtown Camden before he used a single bullet to end the man's life.
When Ngoc Le saw a masked man holding his wife at knifepoint, the shopkeeper shot the man in the head, killing him instantly. Five days later, DNA tests showed Antonio Diaz Reyes was responsible for three sexual assaults in November and December.
On Thursday, Ngoc Le and his wife, Kelly, sat in the room where the shooting happened and described their ordeal, which they said lasted only a minute or two. They described themselves as fortunate, not heroic.
"When I shot him, he went right down in maybe two or three seconds, he went down," Ngoc Le said. "I guess we were lucky."
Ngoc Le, 28, and Kelly, 22, opened Camden City Wireless and Fishing Supply about three years ago in the city where she grew up.
He always kept a a legally registered gun there, just in case. But the pistol made her nervous.
"I never saw a gun, I never held a gun," Kelly Le said. "I got used to it. I just kept in my mind, 'We don't know what's going to happen next."'
Nothing bad did happen. Before last week, Ngoc Le had never even brandished the weapon to run off a would-be robber. And the rough neighborhood became like home. After late nights of working, he would stay in the back of the store rather than drive back to their home in nearby Philadelphia. Kelly Le said customers and neighbors were so friendly, they figured they'd always keep their store there. Their views changed on the final afternoon of 2004.
Camden, with about 80,000 residents, already had suffered 53 homicides -- close to an annual record for the city. Based on statistics from the year before, the city recently had been named by one crime analyst as the most dangerous in America.
Ngoc Le was in the bathroom and Kelly was alone behind the counter when Reyes, with a ski mask on his face, entered the shop. Kelly Le said she was on guard because neighbors had been telling her about robberies committed at knifepoint in shops nearby. Police are trying to determine whether Reyes was also responsible for those crimes.
She said the man did not speak much and what he said was so soft she had trouble understanding him. He pointed to his belt to indicate he wanted a clip for his cell phone. She turned her back to get one off the wall. When she heard the man jump over the counter, Le screamed for her husband and Ngoc Le emerged with the pistol.
Reyes pushed Kelly Le into the office and into the entrance to the tidy living room behind it. Ngoc kept backing up with them. The couple's daughter and son, ages 6 and 4, often play in that room, but were elsewhere that day.
"When he saw my husband with the gun, I said this guy probably doesn't want no money," Kelly Le said. "He probably wants something other than money."
"My husband keeps telling him, 'Just take whatever you want and go,"' Kelly Le said. "He (Reyes) keeps saying, 'I'm going to kill you, I'm going to kill you."'
Kelly was shaking.
The man with the knife had moved into the living room as far as the dinette set.
Ngoc Le, a slight man, stayed about five feet away, afraid the man might take his gun if he got any closer.
"I saw an open space and I just had to pull the trigger on him," Ngoc Le said.
The stranger in the mask collapsed. Blood gushed.
Ngoc said he didn't know what part of the Reyes' face he hit. His aim had more to do with luck than training, he said.
"If it didn't turn out this way, it would probably have turned out the opposite way and we're not sitting here talking, I guess," Kelly Le said.
Both called police. While they waited, the dead man's cell phone rang constantly.
Police arrived within a few minutes and took Ngoc Le to the police station, but they did not put him in handcuffs. Because he used deadly force to protect his wife's life, rather than his property, Ngoc Le was not charged with a crime. (!!!!)
It was only that afternoon the businessman heard about the three rapes that had taken place a few miles away in a safer area of the city. The victims in those daytime, knifepoint attacks were a high school student, a college student and an employee at a shop. All three were close in age to Kelly Le.
Authorities told Ngoc Le they would compare Reyes' DNA to the samples from the three rapes. He bought a newspaper to learn more about what they were talking about. For a few days, the couple stayed away from their store.
"Sometimes when I come back here, it feels like it's still happening a few minutes ago. It's scaring me," said Kelly Le.
The store reopened Thursday with a new plastic wall above the counter.
"Now, I spend a lot of money to put up security," Ngoc Le said.
Besides the barrier, one other thing has changed for the couple: their plans.
"We'll try to make some money and move away to a safer place," Kelly Le said.
? 2005 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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High Court Clears Way for Gun Suit
Families of victims shot by racist Buford Furrow in 1999 can sue the makers of his weapons.
By Henry Weinstein, Times Staff Writer
The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for victims of the 1999 shooting rampage by white supremacist Buford O. Furrow Jr. to sue the companies that made his guns.
Without comment, the justices let stand a decision by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals that said the mother of a Los Angeles letter carrier killed by Furrow and the families of several children wounded by him could sue Glock Inc. and China North Industries, the gun manufacturers.
The companies ? and eight dissenting judges of the 9th Circuit ? had argued that the appeals court's decision would open the way for manufacturers, at least in California, to be hauled into court simply because their products had been used improperly.
Gun control groups hailed Monday's development. "We look forward to these victims having their day in court," said Joshua Horwitz, executive director of the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, which is based in Washington, D.C.
On Aug. 10, 1999, Furrow ? a follower of the racist Aryan Nations ? sprayed a Jewish community center in Granada Hills with gunfire, wounding five people. Later that day, he killed Joseph S. Ileto. After being arrested, Furrow told FBI agents that he had shot the letter carrier because Ileto looked "Asian or Latino" and worked for the government. Ileto was Filipino American.
The families of three children who were wounded by Furrow at the Jewish Community Center joined Ileto's mother, Lillian Ileto, in suing the companies.
In March 2001, U.S. District Judge Nora M. Manella sentenced Furrow to five life terms in prison after he pleaded guilty to avoid the death penalty.
In their civil suit, the victims' families said that the companies had produced and distributed many more guns than possibly could have been purchased by law-abiding customers.
Their suit also alleged that many of the weapons were sold at guns shows and through "kitchen table dealers," who may be licensed but are loosely regulated. The manufacturers often advertised their wares with the illicit market in mind, the suit alleged.
Plaintiffs' lawyers Peter Nordberg and Sayre Weaver cited Glock's marketing of its 9-millimeter "pocket rocket" concealable handgun, which Furrow used that day.
In October 2003, a 9th Circuit panel ruled that allowing the suit to go to trial could encourage gun manufacturers to be more cautious in overseeing how their products are sold.
"The social value of manufacturing and distributing guns without taking basic steps to prevent these guns from reaching illegal purchasers and possessors cannot outweigh the public interest in keeping the guns out of the hands of ? [those] who in turn use them in crimes," Judge Richard Paez wrote.
The gun makers then asked the full 9th Circuit to review the case. The court declined in May, but eight dissenting judges predicted dire consequences if the suit went forward.
"The potential impact of the ? decision is staggering," they said.
Nordberg noted that the avalanche of litigation predicted by the dissenting judges had not occurred. He also said that Monday's development was not surprising "because ? the 9th Circuit decision turned on issues of California law, which the Supreme Court normally would not get involved in."
"We are pleased that there is a rule of liability that holds gun manufacturers to the same standards of reasonable care that everyone else is subject to," Nordberg said.
He said he now would have to prove that the gun makers had acted negligently or created a public nuisance by using an unreasonable pattern in distributing their products.
Colin Murray, a lawyer for China North Industries, said he was disappointed that the Supreme Court had not taken up the case. A lawyer for Glock did not return a call seeking comment.
The case will return to the court of U.S. District Judge Audrey Collins. The two sides said they anticipate that the discovery process will start soon. Ultimately, the Supreme Court could review the case after a trial.
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A National Academy of Science committee appointed during the Clinton administration recently released a report stating that it could find no correlation between myriad "gun control" laws and any reduction in crime. It's worth noting that most of the members on the committee (8 or 9 of them, if memory serves) favored further gun regulation, while 1 was known to have pro-second amendment leanings.
Though many media outlets reported on this lack of correlation--in pretty mild terms, to my way of thinking--quite of few of them paid major attention to a section of the report claiming there is no relationship between concealed carry laws and crime. Implicitly attacking the findings of John Lott, a researcher who has delved deeply into the subject, the report was seen by many as repudiating Lott's research, and was widely reported as having done so.
What follows is Lott's response to the report's finding. Though much of it examines statistical formula way beyond my ken, Lott addresses the NAS committee findings in an adroit manner.
John Lott Responds to some posts that criticize his work in light of the National Academy of Science report on gun control laws:
Last month, the National Academy of Sciences issued a 328-page report on gun control laws. The big news that has been ignored on all the blog sites is that the academy's panel couldn't identify any benefits of the decades-long effort to reduce crime and injury by restricting gun ownership. The only conclusion it could draw was: Let's study the question some more.
The panel has left us with two choices: Either academia and the government have wasted tens of millions of dollars and countless man-hours on useless research (and the panel would like us to spend more in the same worthless pursuit), or the National Academy is so completely unable to separate politics from its analyses that it simply can't accept the results for what they are.
Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.
From the assault weapons ban to the Brady Act to one-gun-a-month restrictions to gun locks, nothing worked. (Something that I have been the first person to investigate empirically for many of these laws, and I also had been unable to find evidence that they reduced violent crime.)
The study was not the work of gun-control opponents. The panel was set up during the Clinton administration, and of its members whose views on guns were publicly known before their appointments all but one had favored gun control. Something that I wrote up about the panel three years ago is still relevant.
While the panel dealt with a broad range of gun control issues, only one issue has received attention on different blogs: right-to-carry laws. In fact, the panel apparently originated with the desire from some to respond to the debate on that issue and to respond specifically to my research that concludes that allowing law abiding citizens to carry concealed weapons reduces crime. I originally overheard Phil Cook and Dan Nagin discussing the need for a panel to "deal with" me in the same way that an earlier panel had "dealt with Isaac" Ehrlich's work showing that the death penalty deterred murder. They agreed and Nagin said that he would talk to Al Blumstein about setting up such a panel. Needless to say, that is what ended up happening.
1. James Q. Wilson's very unusual dissent is very interesting (only two out of the last 236 reports over the last 10 years have carried a dissent). Wilson states that all the research provided "confirmation of the findings that shall-issue laws drive down the murder rate . . . " Wilson has been on four of these panels and never previously thought that it was necessary to write a dissent, including the previous panel that attacked Isaac Ehrlich's work showing that the death penalty represented a deterrent.
Wilson said that that panel's conclusion raises concerns given that "virtually every reanalysis done by the committee" confirmed right-to-carry laws reduced crime. He found the committee's only results that didn't confirm the drop in crime "quite puzzling." They accounted for "no control variables" - nothing on any of the social, demographic, and public policies that might affect crime. Furthermore, he didn't understand how evidence that was not publishabled in a peer-reviewed journal would be given such weight.
The non-results are basically due to dropping all the control variables (particularly the arrest rate which is not defined when the crime rate is zero). When that happens a lot of observations with zero crime rates are introduced. The problem with using OLS when you have all these zero crime rates is that if a crime rate is already zero, no matter how good the law is, it can't lower the crime rate any further. There is thus a positive bias in these results. Plassmann's two papers (his piece in the Journal of Law and Economics with Nic Tideman and his paper with Whitley in the Stanford Law Review) show how you can address this as a count data problem. Although his research consistently shows statistically significant results that shall issue laws reduce crime, the National Academy report ignores the research.
The panel's discussion of Duggan's results focuses on the regressions without any control variables and that use the OLS estimates when they have a large number of zero values for the crime rates.
2. As an interesting aside, there are a number of factual mistakes in the NAS report and those mistakes work against my findings. For example, Figure 6.1 makes a mistake where it shows the increase in violent crime of 7 percent in year one, when the amount is 5 percent (7-2, where 2 is from the trend). (Of course, the overall problem with the hybrid approach is discussed below.) There are significant drops in crime in Table 6-3 that are statistically significant, but they are not properly marked to indicate that is so. Even something trivial as the number of states currently with right-to-carry laws is wrong, 36 (not 34) (and if Minnesota is included the number is 37).
3. Last year there was a debate over the use of clustering between Ayres and Donohue and me, but the statements of the NAS panel corresponds extremely closely to what was written in my original paper with David Mustard.
4. p. 127: "We focus on the conflicting results . . ." No attempt is made to give readers an idea of the frequency or importance of unusual results. Take the results in Table 6-3. For Plassmann and Whitley, the panel doesn't mention that Plassmann and Whitley say that there are "major problems" with the particular regressions that the panel decides to report and more importantly that the effects in those regressions are biased towards zero (see point 2 above). For Moody's results, they show only two specifications of all the results that he reports and don't mention that the one weird result that he got was from a specification that he flagged as problematic and not controlling for other factors.
Even with the very selective sample of regressions that they pick, there is not one statistically significant bad effect of right-to-carry laws on murder. Only one case for robbery and that is one problematic specification from Ayres and Donohue.
5. Hybrid model. The so-called hybrid model used by Ayres and Donohue finds that the law dummy variable is positive while the trend variable indicates that crime rates decline over time. While Plassmann and Whitley do a good job explaining why the "hybrid" model produces misleading results and the panel never discusses their critique (looking at the crime rates on a year by year basis show no initial increase in crime), it still would have been useful for the panel to at least say whether the "hybrid" results produced a statistically significant temporary bad effect. The problem with determining statistical significance is that when both the dummy and trend variables are on at the same time, we are concerned about the net effect not just the dummy variable by itself as Ayres and Donohue argue. The answer for all those results in the panel's Table 6-4 is "no."
6. Reset tests. Professor Horowitz's discussion of the reset tests seem too strong since I provided the panel with the reset tests done for a wide range of estimates. Even accepting that the Reset test is appropriate (and no one else on the panel also uses this test in their work), there are many estimates where the results pass this test and he should thus conclude that those indicate a drop in violent crime.
7. Using too many control variables. Bartley and Cohen and I report all possible combinations of the control variables and show a great deal of consistency in the results. The only difference between these and those discussed in the NAS report is that these regressions included the arrest rate because of the zero crime rate problem.
8. Process. While the NAS is in name an academic organization, the process was hardly an academic one. Members of the panel were forbidden to talk to me about the issues being examined by the panel. Despite promises to get my input on the panels' review as it went forward, that never occurred. In particular, Charles Wellford promised me that I would be able to look at the tables and figures in the report. If I had been involved, I could have helped catch some of their mistakes. When the report was finally released to the public, I was promised that I would get a copy at the beginning of the presentation and that I would be allowed to ask questions. I was told that they preferred that I not attend the presentation, but there would be no problem with me asking questions. Instead even though the presentation ended a half hour earlier than scheduled because there were supposedly no more questions, my questions were never asked. (I had one main question: Professor Wellford mentions all the research that has been done on right-to-carry laws, but if he is correct that right-to-carry laws are just as likely to increase as decrease crime, can he point to one refereed journal article that claims to find a bad effect from the law?) Despite promises to the contrary, I did not receive a copy of the study until well into the afternoon and then only after a reporter from USA Today sent me a copy.
Minor notes: Despite claims to the contrary, I responded to the Ayres and Donohue study in January of 2004. (Simultaneously, it goes unnoticed that Ayres and Donohue themselves ignored virtually all of Plassmann and Whitley's points.)
In commenting on the report, others have raised additional issues that the NAS study did not find relevant. As to the claims raised again in these posts reguarding Jim Lindgren's investigation of the "phantom survey," many are apparently unaware that David Gross, David Mustard, and I have said that Lindgren has grossly mischaracterized what we said to him. For comments by Gross and Mustard, please see statements 3 and 4 in this link.
For a general response to the charges on the survey and other issues you raise see this link. False claims have been made with regard to these issues and the pseudonym.
Claims have also been made by Jim Lindgren regarding the demographic control variables, but he fails to note that it is only for the state level regressions and not the county level regressions where some of the significant results are affected. Given all the combinations of control variables that have been examined, even in that case, one wants some theory for why you selectively include what appears to be a weird combination of demographic controls. I think that Lindgren is a biased observer. He was upset after a critical piece that I published on his work in 2003 and his attacks started shortly after that. Further his attacks are untrue.
Final comments.
It is hard to look through the NAS panel's tables on right-to-carry laws and not find overwhelming evidence that right-to-carry laws reduce violent crime. The results that don't are based upon the inclusion of zero values noted in point 1 above. Overall, the panel's own evidence from the latest data up through 2000 shows significant benefits and no costs from these laws.
My impression is that Gary Kleck also has a very similar reaction to the panels' findings regarding surveys on self defense.
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2005_01_07.shtml#1105644864
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Michael Moore's Bodyguard Arrested on Airport Gun Charge
Thursday, January 20, 2005
NEW YORK ? Filmmaker Michael Moore's (search) bodyguard was arrested for carrying an unlicensed weapon in New York's JFK airport Wednesday night.
Police took Patrick Burke, who says Moore employs him, into custody after he declared he was carrying a firearm at a ticket counter. Burke is licensed to carry a firearm in Florida and California, but not in New York. Burke was taken to Queens central booking and could potentially be charged with a felony for the incident.
Moore's 2003 Oscar-winning film "Bowling for Columbine" criticizes what Moore calls America's "culture of fear" and its obsession with guns.
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Mr. Moore, Ms. O'Donnell, and various other Hollywood luminaries would keep their bodyguards and disarm everyone else. Charlton Heston had some pretty amusing stories about Hollywood types calling him up during the riots occurring in the wake of the Rodney King verdict. These left liberal folks, upon discovering that gun stores couldn't sell them firearms until after the three day waiting period they had all lobbied for, called Heston to see if he'd lend 'em a gun in the interim. Nothing like a little raw reality to test the strength of one's convictions.
Encountered the following article today and confess it inspires a degree of cognitive dissonance. Posing naked with farm animals I could see causing this result. Posing with guns? Perhaps someone can explain the outcome to me.
Gun photo' candidate dismissed
A Conservative parliamentary candidate has been dismissed after he was pictured on the internet with a range of guns, rifles and a hunting knife.
Robert Oulds, the prospective MP for Slough in Berkshire, appeared with the weapons in the camera phone images.
Tory deputy chairman Andrew Mackay said the party had faced no choice but to remove him from its candidates' list.
"This was a serious error of judgement which was unacceptable in a parliamentary candidate," he added.
'All licensed'
A national newspaper reported there were 11 images of Mr Oulds, 28, a councillor in Chiswick, west London, with the weaponry.
The weapons included an AK 47 assault rifle and a shotgun.
Mr Oulds told The Sun: "Those photos were taken at the home of a member of the Conservative association.
"I went round to this friend's house and he is a member of a licensed gun club and he showed me his firearms and that is it.
"They are all licensed and all legal. They are not mine."
'Nothing illegal'
After being removed from the candidates list, Mr Oulds said in a statement: "I have not tendered my resignation as PPC (prospective parliamentary candidate) for Slough.
"I have apologised to the deputy chairman of the Conservative Party for any embarrassment caused.
"However, contrary to various reports I have not done anything illegal and will continue to represent my constituents as a councillor.
"I am taking legal advice on various issues."
Labour campaign spokesman Fraser Kemp tried to capitalise on the news.
"Robert Oulds is just the tip of the iceberg," he said.
Mr Kemp said the councillor was also director of the Bruges Group, whose speakers had included Tory leader Michael Howard and Iain Duncan Smith.
"There is no evidence to suggest that any of these people knew about Robert Oulds' behaviour, but clearly they were happy, as senior Tories, to associate themselves with someone with Mr Oulds' well-known hard right outlook," added the MP.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/england/berkshire/4186841.stm
Published: 2005/01/20 08:35:53 GMT
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Having scanned countless stories out of the UK where firearms have been demonized to one degree or another, this is a refreshing read.
There's only one way to protect ourselves ? and here's the proof
By Richard Munday
(Filed: 23/01/2005)
Today, 96 years ago, London was rocked by a terrorist outrage. Two Latvian anarchists, who had crossed the Channel after trying to blow up the president of France, attempted an armed wages robbery in Tottenham. Foiled at the outset when the intended victims fought back, the anarchists attempted to shoot their way out.
A dramatic pursuit ensued involving horses and carts, bicycles, cars and a hijacked tram. The fleeing anarchists fired some 400 shots, leaving a policeman and a child dead, and some two dozen other casualties, before they were ultimately brought to bay. They had been chased by an extraordinary posse of policemen and local people, armed and unarmed. Along the way, the police (whose gun cupboard had been locked, and the key mislaid) had borrowed at least four pistols from passers-by in the street, while other armed citizens joined the chase in person.
Today, when we are inured to the idea of armed robbery and drive-by shootings, the aspect of the "Tottenham Outrage" that is most likely to shock is the fact that so many ordinary members of the public at that time should have been carrying guns in the street. Bombarded with headlines about an emergent "gun culture" in Britain now, we are apt to forget that the real novelty is the notion that the general populace in this country should be disarmed.
In a material sense, Britain today has much less of a "gun culture" than at any time in its recent history. A century ago, the possession and carrying of firearms was perfectly normal here. Firearms were sold without licence in gunshops and ironmongers in virtually every town in the country, and grand department stores such as Selfridge's even offered customers an in-house range. The market was not just for sporting guns: there was a thriving domestic industry producing pocket pistols and revolvers, and an extensive import trade in the cheap handguns that today would be called "Saturday Night Specials". Conan Doyle's Dr Watson, dropping a revolver in his pocket before going out about town, illustrates a real commonplace of that time. Beatrix Potter's journal records a discussion at a small country hotel in Yorkshire, where it turned out that only one of the eight or nine guests was not carrying a revolver.
We should not fool ourselves, however, that such things were possible then because society was more peaceful. Those years were ones of much more social and political turbulence than our own: with violent and incendiary suffrage protests, massive industrial strikes where the Army was called in and people were killed, where there was the menace of a revolutionary General Strike, and where the country was riven by the imminent prospect of a civil war in Ireland. It was in such a society that, as late as 1914, the right even of an Irishman to carry a loaded revolver in the streets was upheld in the courts (Rex v. Smith, KB 1914) as a manifestation simply of the guarantees provided by our Bill of Rights.
In such troubled times, why did the commonplace carrying of firearms not result in mayhem? How could it be that in the years before the First World War, armed crime in London amounted to less than 2 per cent of what we see today? One answer that might have been taken as self-evident then, but which has become political anathema now, is that the prevalence of firearms had a stabilising influence and a deterrent effect upon crime. Such deterrent potential was indeed acknowledged in part in Britain's first Firearms Act, which was introduced as an emergency measure in response to fears of a Bolshevik upheaval in 1920. Home Office guidance on the implementation of the Act recognised "good reason for having a revolver if a person lives in a solitary house, where protection from thieves and burglars is essential". The Home Office issued more restrictive guidance in 1937, but it was only in 1946 that the new Labour Home Secretary announced that self-defence would no longer generally be accepted as a good reason for acquiring a pistol (and as late as 1951 this reason was still being proffered in three-quarters of all applications for pistol licences, and upheld in the courts). Between 1946 and 1951, we might note, armed robbery, the most significant index of serious armed crime, averaged under two dozen incidents a year in London; today, that number is exceeded every week.
The Sunday Telegraph's Right to Fight Back campaign is both welcome and a necessity. However, an abstract right that leaves the weaker members of society ? particularly the elderly ? without the means to defend themselves, has only a token value. As the 19th-century jurist James Paterson remarked in his Commentaries on the Liberty of the Subject and the Laws of England Relating to the Security of the Person: "In all countries where personal freedom is valued, however much each individual may rely on legal redress, the right of each to carry arms ? and these the best and the sharpest ? for his own protection in case of extremity, is a right of nature indelible and irrepressible, and the more it is sought to be repressed the more it will recur."
Restrictive "gun control" in Britain is a recent experiment, in which the progressive "toughening" of the regulation of legal gun ownership has been followed by an increasingly dramatic rise in violent armed crime. Eighty-four years after the legal availability of pistols was restricted to Firearm Certificate holders, and seven years after their private possession was generally prohibited, they still figure in 58 per cent of armed crimes. Home Office evidence to the Dunblane Inquiry prior to the handgun ban indicated that there was an annual average of just two incidents in which licensed pistols appeared in crime. If, as the Home Office still asserts, "there are links between firearms licensing and armed crime", the past century of Britain's experience has shown the link to be a sharply negative one.
If Britain was a safer country without our present system of denying firearms to the law-abiding, is deregulation an option? That is precisely the course that has been pursued, with conspicuous success in combating violent crime, in the United States.
For a long time it has been possible to draw a map of the United States showing the inverse relationship between liberal gun laws and violent crime. At one end of the scale are the "murder capitals" of Washington, Chicago and New York, with their gun bans (New York City has had a theoretical general prohibition of handguns since 1911); at the other extreme, the state of Vermont, without gun laws, and with the lowest rate of violent crime in the Union (a 13th that of Britain). From the late Eighties, however, the relative proportions on the map have changed radically. Prior to that time it was illegal in much of the United States to bear arms away from the home or workplace, but Florida set a new legislative trend in 1987, with the introduction of "right-to-carry" permits for concealed firearms.
Issue of the new permits to law-abiding citizens was non-discretionary, and of course aroused a furore among gun control advocates, who predicted that blood would flow in the streets. The prediction proved false; Florida's homicide rate dropped, and firearms abuse by permit holders was virtually non-existent. State after state followed Florida's suit, and mandatory right-to-carry policies are now in place in 35 of the United States.
In a nationwide survey of the impact of the legislation, John Lott and David Mustard of the University of Chicago found that by 1992, right-to-carry states had already seen an 8 per cent reduction in murders, 7 per cent reduction in aggravated assaults, and 5 per cent reduction in rapes. Extrapolating from the 10 states that had then implemented the policy, Lott and Mustard calculated that had right-to-carry legislation been nationwide, an annual average of some 1,400 murders, 4,200 rapes and more than 60,000 aggravated assaults might have been averted. The survey has lent further support to the research of Professor Kleck, of Florida State University, who found that firearms in America serve to deter crime at least three times as often as they appear in its commission.
Over the last 25 years the number of firearms in private hands in the United States has more than doubled. At the same time the violent crime rate has dropped dramatically, with the significant downswing following the spread of right-to-carry legislation. The US Bureau of Justice observes that "firearms-related crime has plummeted since 1993", and it has declined also as a proportion of overall violent offences. Violent crime in total has declined so much since 1994 that it has now reached, the bureau states, "the lowest level ever recorded". While American "gun culture" is still regularly the sensational subject of media demonisation in Britain, the grim fact is that in this country we now suffer three times the level of violent crime committed in the United States.
Today, on this anniversary of the "Tottenham Outrage", it is appropriate that we reflect upon how the objects of outrage in Britain have changed within a lifetime. If we now find the notion of an armed citizenry anathema, what might the Londoners of 1909 have made of our own violent, disarmed society?
?Richard Munday is the author of Most Armed & Most Free? and co-author of Guns & Violence: The Debate Before Lord Cullen
http://www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2005/01/23/do2302.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2005/01/23/ixopinion.html
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By SAEED AHMED
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 01/26/05
The cash register at Shoat's Grocery and Package Store in Oglethorpe County held just $300 Monday when the two teenagers walked in.
If they had been patient, the would-be robbers could have had it.
But, deciding the shopkeepers were too slow in complying with their demands, one of the young men pulled out a gun, igniting a gunbattle with the 62-year-old owner and his wife.
Both teens wound up dead.
"I'd have given it to them. Our insurance would have covered it," said Gloria Turner, who has owned the store for eight years with her husband.
Turner, 56, was rearranging the store, in the tiny community of Hutchins, when the teenagers walked in Monday evening.
One was wearing a wig that partly covered his eyes, prompting Turner to quip, "Can you see to walk with that thing on?"
The teen mumbled something, she recalled. He ran past Turner and shoved her husband, Bobby "Shoats" Doster, against the bakery counter.
The second teen pulled a white skullcap over his face, pushed Turner to the cash register and demanded money.
"I was about to give it to them . . . when the first guy says, 'You're not moving fast enough,' and pulls out a gun," Turner said Tuesday.
The teen aimed the gun at her husband and fired. The bullet missed. His gun jammed.
That was enough for Doster, who pulled out a .380 from his pocket. At the same time, his wife grabbed the 9 mm she kept under under the counter.
Both began firing at the teenagers, who ran to the back of the store for cover. A full-fledged gunbattle erupted.
The teens crouched behind a meat counter. The one with the gun popped up every few seconds to fire another round.
The unarmed teen kept shouting, "Shoot them! Shoot them!" while tossing at the couple whatever items he could get his hands on, Turner said.
The exchange of gunfire lasted less than five minutes "but it felt like hours," Turner said.
She remembered firing with one hand and dialing 911 with the other.
Deputies arrived four minutes later to find the store littered with shell casings. Both teenagers lay sprawled on the floor ? one shot several times, the other with a bullet in his chest, said Sheriff Mike Smith.
The teens were identified Wednesday as Michael Dewand Hill, 19, and 17-year-old Calvin Dantrell Ballard. Both were from Athens, according to the sheriff.
Turner and her husband will not be charged, Smith said.
"People have a right to protect their lives and their property," Smith said.
"We don't encourage them to take the law in their hands, but sometimes they are left with no other choice."
Turner and her husband moved to Hutchins, an unincorporated community in Oglethorpe County about 80 miles east of Atlanta, to get away from the encroaching development in Winder.
The attempted robbery Tuesday was the first holdup at their little store, which sells everything from alcohol to fishing supplies to sandwiches.
It also was the first robbery in Oglethorpe County in 30 years in which someone was killed, Sheriff Smith said.
"Shoats is a little shaken up by it all, but it hasn't hit me yet," Turner said, cleaning up the store Tuesday.
"I know it will, when I sit down to rest for a minute. They were humans' lives, after all."
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from Guns and Ammo
The Numbers Speak For Themselves
Despite anti-gun propaganda, the U.S. murder rate is nowhere near that of many other countries.
By John Hay Rabb
Here's a pop quiz for you: Which country in the world has the highest murder rate? If you said the United States, you would be wrong, but your error would certainly be excusable. The incessant drumbeat from the mainstream media and anti-gun groups serves to perpetuate the canard that the U.S. is the bloodiest free-fire zone on earth. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In his article "America: The Most Violent Nation?" researcher David C. Stolinsky shows conclusively that there are a number of countries with higher murder rates than the U.S. This information comes from the United Nations report "The 1996 Demographic Yearbook." The report lists the murder rates in some 86 countries. There are more than 200 countries in the world, and more than 100 did not provide murder-rate data to the U.N. Even so, the Yearbook opens a fascinating window on the failure of gun-control laws around the world.
The connection between murder rates and gun control is quite clear. The vast majority of murders are committed with firearms. Therefore, it is possible to determine if there is any sort of correlation between gun laws and murder rates in selected countries.
Gun laws, like all laws, should be evaluated to determine if they meet accepted measures of success. Gun-control advocates contend that gun laws reduce murders as well as other gun crimes. An examination of this proposition shows conclusively that gun laws fail to reduce murder rates in many countries. Therefore, they fail to meet the fundamental measure of success and should be amended or repealed.
A 1997 Justice Department report on murders in the U.S. shows that our country has a murder rate of seven victims per 100,000 population per year. There are a number of well-known examples of countries with more liberal gun laws and lower murder rates than the U.S. One is Finland, with a murder rate of 2.9. Israel is another example; although its population is heavily armed, Israel's murder rate is only 1.4. In Switzerland, gun ownership is a way of life. Its murder rate is 2.7.
By contrast, consider Brazil. All firearms in Brazil must be registered with the government. This registration process can take anywhere from 30 days to three months. All civilian handguns are limited in caliber to no more than 9mm. All rifles must fire handgun ammunition only. Brazilians may only buy one gun per year. At any one time, they may only have in their possession a maximum of six guns: two handguns, two rifles and two shotguns. To transport their guns, citizens must obtain a special police permit. CCW permits are available but are rarely issued.
Therefore, it should not be a revelation to anyone that Brazil has a thriving black market in guns. Virtually any type of gun is available, for a price. Incidentally, Brazil's murder rate is 19 victims per 100,000 population per year.
In Cuba, Fidel Castro controls every aspect of life with an iron hand, including gun ownership. Castro remembers well how he and his rag-tag armed Communist rebels overthrew the government of Fulgencio Batista and set up a Communist dictatorship. An armed populace is threatening to a repressive government. Still, somebody in Cuba is obtaining guns and using them to murder fellow citizens. Cuba's murder rate is 7.8.
The former Soviet state of Lithuania is now an independent democratic country. But it still retains some vestiges of Stalinism. Lithuania's citizens must obtain a police permit to buy a gun. All guns are registered with the government. Somehow these restrictions are not deterring the criminal element; Lithuania has an unenviable murder rate of 11.7.
Gun control in Mexico is a fascinating case study. Mexican gun laws are simply draconian. No civilian may own a gun larger than .22 caliber, and a permit is required to buy one. All guns in Mexico are registered with the Ministry Of Defense. Guns may not be carried in public, either openly or concealed.
Mexican authorities seem to take a particular delight in arresting and imprisoning unwitting Americans who are not familiar with Mexican gun laws. Americans may not bring legal guns or ammunition into Mexico. Possession of even one bullet can get you thrown in a medieval Mexican prison. The State Department says that at any one time there are about 80 Americans imprisoned in Mexico for minor gun crimes. The State Department even went so far as to issue a special notice to U.S. gun owners, warning about harsh Mexican gun laws. Americans are allowed to hunt in Mexico, but they must first obtain a permit from the Mexican Embassy or a Mexican Consulate before taking their hunting rifles south of the border.
Mexico's murder rate is an eye-popping 17.5. Mexican authorities are fond of blaming the high murder rate on firearms smuggled across the border from the United States. Nonsense. The U.S. has many more personal guns than Mexico, yet our murder rate is far lower than Mexico's. It is Mexico's absurd gun laws that prevent law-abiding citizens from protecting themselves against illegally armed criminals.
Guns are effectively outlawed in Russia. Private handgun ownership is totally prohibited. A permit is required to purchase a long gun. All guns are registered with authorities. When transporting a long gun, it must be disassembled. Long guns may only be used for self-defense when the gun owner is on his own property. By the way, Russia's murder rate is a staggering 30.6.
It is surprising to learn that there is gun trouble in the tropical paradises of Trinidad and Tobago. Here a permit is required to purchase a gun. All guns are registered with the police. In spite of (or perhaps because of) these restrictions, Trinidad and Tobago together have a murder rate of 11.7.
In all fairness, it must be noted that many of the countries with high murder rates have governments and cultures very different from our own. Even so, the fundamental measure of gun-control success still applies. The countries I have discussed, along with many others, have gun laws that are more restrictive than U.S. laws, yet their murder rates exceed the U.S. murder rate. These laws clearly do not meet the fundamental measure of success, which is ultimately to save lives.
What anti-gunners all over the world fail to understand is that people everywhere are basically the same in one important respect. They are determined to protect themselves and their families. If their governments will not allow them to have firearms for self-defense, then they may obtain guns illegally, even at the risk of harsh punishment. It is a natural human response to danger.
Try as they might, Sarah Brady and her bunch will never be able to defeat man's primal instinct to protect himself and his family through whatever means necessary. This fundamental human truth may offer some small measure of comfort to law-abiding gun owners around the world.
Find this article at:
http://www.gunsandammomag.com/second_amendment/rk0405
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All the murder rate comparisons in that article are with more or less 3rd World countries, so it's not really surprising they have high murder rates. Why not compare with countries like Canada and the UK, which have murder rates around one quarter that of the US?
As you said earlier in the thread, Buz, it's better to compare regions that at have at least comparable social factors.
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All the murder rate comparisons in that article are with more or less 3rd World countries, so it's not really surprising they have high murder rates.
Finland, Switzerland, Israel, Russia, and the US are all cited; they're hardly third world, though I 'spose you could argue the point where Russia is concerned. My guess is that the citizens of Brazil would also object to the third world label.
The thesis of this piece is that strict gun regulation does not assure a low crime rate, nor does limited gun regulation assure a high crime rate. I'm not sure how you would explore this thesis without examining nations with strict and limited regulations. What would you have had the author do?
As mentioned before, the equation is a multivariable one, and if the imputation is that factors other than access to firearms need to be considered, I'd certainly agree. If, however, the claim is that disparate murder rates in three Western democracies are primarily driven by the rate of gun ownership in the US, then I'd strongly disagree. As also mentioned before, the areas of the US with the highest murder rate are those that most restrict private firearm ownership.
Most murder, and crime in general, occur in areas of the US with the most draconian gun laws. Subtract those areas and my strong suspicion is the remaining sections of the US would compare well to the other countries you cite. I note, moreover, that crime, murder included, is falling in the US, most quickly in those areas with the least amount of gun regulation. I'm not sure about Canada, but crime in general, murder included, is rising in the UK.
There is a lot of room to debate the cause of these disparate, nuanced, and changing crime rates, and there is certainly plenty of fodder here for further discussion. I remain convinced, however, that criminal enterprise is first and foremost an enterprise: perceived risk figures prominently in all criminal cost benefit analysis. First world or third, allowing law abiding citizens to provide for there own defense is the simplest, surest way to moderate criminal behavior?one of many benefits conferred by an armed citizenry.
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All the murder rate comparisons in that article are with more or less 3rd World countries, so it's not really surprising they have high murder rates.
Finland, Switzerland, Israel, Russia, and the US are all cited; they're hardly third world, though I 'spose you could argue the point where Russia is concerned. My guess is that the citizens of Brazil would also object to the third world label.
Yes, in this context I consider Russia and Brazil third world, in that they have a high percentage of very poor people leading to high crime rates.
As for Finland, Switzerland, and Israel, you've missed the point: They are referenced in the article as having low murder rates, which you would expect them to have anyway given their social and economic situation.
We already debated this point on page 3 of this thread, where you cautioned me about comparing apples with oranges because I pointed out the UK murder rate is one quarter of the US rate. There are many significant social differences between the high- and low- murder rate countries in the article.
Saying that, I actually don't believe the US needs more restrictive gun laws, I'm just pointing out a flaw in this particular article.
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I 'spose we could devolve and deconstruct, though those sorts of circular locutions rarely prove interesting. Thought the ?all? in the "all the murder rate comparisons" clause was pretty comprehensive; if I missed some nuance I apologize.
If I only posted things I agreed with 100 percent I'd be doing a lot less cutting and pasting. There's a common perception that guns cause gun crime, a perception the article in question directly addressed. If I was writing a public policy piece I probably wouldn't cite this article as the comparisons within are indeed a pretty blunt instrument. If I was trying to demonstrate instead that lotsa guns don't mean lotsa gun crime, I?d use the piece without a second thought.
Be that as it may I'm pretty eclectic and eccentric so if you're looking to set your watch by my meanderings you'll most likely arrive early or late. Thumbing one?s nose at consistency and convention is one of the perks of being a contrarian and iconoclast; count on me to avail myself upon that perk frequently.
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Be that as it may I'm pretty eclectic and eccentric so if you're looking to set your watch by my meanderings you'll most likely arrive early or late. Thumbing one?s nose at consistency and convention is one of the perks of being a contrarian and iconoclast; count on me to avail myself upon that perk frequently.
LOL!
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Mas Ayoob is widely acknowledged as a lethal force expert. More than a little of the Dog Brothers' ethos can be scented in the following interview.
An interview with a lethal man
By Peter and Helen Evans
web posted February 14, 2005
Massad Ayoob is arguably one of the most lethal men around, in
fact he even trains others in the use of deadly force. Many
people cannot distinguish the difference between 'dangerous' and
'lethal.' When they hear that someone is an expert in handgun
combat, urban rifle, knife/counter-knife, close-quarters battle
and stressfire shotgun, they automatically think of someone to be
feared. However, after reading the following we believe you'll
recognize a good guy who balances lethal force and compassion.
Only the bad guys need fear him.
Mr. Ayoob has had stories about him and interviews in various
publications and news shows such as the Los Angeles Times,
Boston Globe, New York Post, ABC's "Turning Point",
National Enquirer, PBS "Frontline", ABC's "20/20" and the
BBC News Magazine and we are privileged to interview him
here.
Q: In your book, "The Truth About Self Protection," you say we
have the right to protect ourselves. How do you respond to
those who say it only promotes the "cycle of violence"?
A: I refer them to Biology 101. When the predator chases down,
destroys, and consumes its prey without intervention, the cycle of
its violence continues. When the given predator is taken out of
circulation, then by definition, its cycle of violence is ended for
the duration. The criminal is the actor, his prey merely the
reactor, and the cycle is dependent on the action of the predator.
Q: You also say, "sympathizing with a criminal in the prison
visiting room is like sympathizing with the timber wolf caged
inside its bars at the Bronx Zoo. It's safe enough there, but you
don't want to meet either of them in their natural habitat?These
predatory people are not like you. They aren't people like you.
They are a different breed." How do you respond to those who
say we should just reason with them, or try to rehabilitate them?
Or that we should not be threatening to them, as in dis-arming
security and prison guards?
A: You can only reason with the reasonable.
You do not reason with your food; you eat it. A violent attacker
can be expected to respond the same way.
Your violent criminal tends to be a sociopath or even
occasionally a psychopath. You can only reason with such an
entity by giving it a better deal. Throwing the baby from the
sleigh is one approach to bargaining with the predator, but as
the Europeans discovered along about World War II, it's a
temporary and unsatisfactory solution. The way to reason with a
predator is to make it aware that it can live in a cage, or it can
die, but it can no longer prey upon us.
Unarmed prison guards survive because the structure of the
prison environment, and the certainty of retribution for violence
committed upon the corrections officer, acts (most of the time)
as a deterrent to attack. The citizen abroad in the land and going
about his business has no such protection from human predators,
because the public environment lacks the element of control that
pervades the penal environment.
Q: You've also said in your book, "I no longer believe that there
is no such thing as a bad boy. I changed my mind after I met and
interacted with and interviewed, human beings who were evil.
There's no other word for it -- evil. I never lost my sense of
compassion for them or for their loss of human dignity -- I never
arrested a person I didn't feel sorry for -- but that compassion
has been tempered with control. "I'm sorry for you and the things
you felt you had to do, but you won't be allowed to do those
things to me or anyone under the mantle of my protection, and
that's why my gun is pointed at you, and that's why you will be
docile as we put these handcuffs on you." We also wanted our
readers to see this side of you, just in case they don't follow our
recommendation to read your book. It's clear you've examined
your soul about the use of deadly force. Where did you find the
compassion for someone who harms others?
A: I have never arrested a criminal, or interviewed a convict in
prison, for whom I could not feel sorry in at least some small
way. Broken homes. Molestation in childhood. Poverty.
Discrimination. Something twisted in their brain. Something that
kept them from being a normal human being.
The key is not allowing your compassion to seduce you into
sacrificing yourself or a victim you have the power to protect, in
the name of your sympathy for the long-lost child who is now a
dangerous adult criminal. Watch the old Disney movie "Old
Yeller" as an adult with adult eyes. In the end, when the dog has
become rabid, the boy does the right thing by shooting him. The
situation has reached the point where further compassion would
endanger the innocent.
Q: You said you ran with criminals as a kid, but broke out of the
mold. How did you break out of the mold?
A: In my teens, I ran with a rough crowd, what the other high
schoolers called "hoods." Not evil kids, but wild kids, and
occasionally laws were broken. None of them harmed innocent
human victims. But it was getting out of control. It reached the
point in my senior year when out of perhaps twenty in a loose-
knit clique, there were only two of us who had not been
arrested. I could see what the arrests did to the families, and to
the kids. Confidentiality laws regarding juveniles in the criminal
justice system notwithstanding, the gossip in a small community
marks a kid and puts a brand on his head. Soon, the bad kids
are the only ones who'll hang out with him. Criminality then
becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
That other kid and I saw the handwriting on the wall. We knew
what it would do to our parents if we got arrest records, and
more for that reason than anything else, we separated from the
group. He went on to become an executive in a Fortune 500
company, and I went where I went. Neither of us would have
been able to do those things with our lives if we hadn't changed
our lives and lifestyles when we did.
Among the others, not one achieved what he should have with
the rest of his life. Some were successful, but not as successful as
they would have been without criminal records. One committed
suicide in his late teens. Several struggled with alcohol and drugs.
The answer is not something the Government can give. In the
same sense that this society has made drunk driving and cigarette
smoking unacceptable as social norms, kids need to be reminded
that there are people counting on them to be there the next day,
the next year, the next decade. Kids think about their futures
more than adults remember or realize. In 30 years of carrying a
badge, I've been able to help some young people turn their lives
around. It's one of the most satisfying parts of the job. But the
decision to change, to do the right thing, ultimately comes from
within.
In his studies of men under fire, General S.L.A. Marshall noted
that the soldier bonded to his peer group would fight valiantly on
their behalf when he might have given up if he was alone on the
battlefield. I remind my students that those who fight to come
back to their loved ones will fight harder and more successfully
than those whose only motivation is themselves. I've taken the
same approach to this particular issue, and it seems to be equally
successful.
Q: Do you see a significant difference between a "terrorist" and a
"criminal"? Do we protect ourselves from them differently?
A: Yes and yes. The difference is in the motivation. The one is
often disguised as the other.
You can reason with a criminal ? particularly a professional
criminal, who is the ultimate pragmatist. The implicit statement
when a criminal is taken at gunpoint is, "Cease your assaultive
behavior or die." This generally works. It is why, police and
armed citizen alike, the overwhelming majority of incidents where
good people take bad people at gunpoint end in surrender or
flight of the subject, as opposed to bloodshed on either side.
This does not work for the religiously as opposed to politically
motivated terrorist. With the politically motivated, there is still
something to reason with: you are offering him a chance to live to
enjoy his martyrdom in the spotlight, and to perhaps later be
traded for a prisoner or hostage from the other side. The
religious fanatic who practices terrorism cannot be reasoned
with, because there is nothing you can threaten him with, and no
alternative you can offer him that is more palatable than his
genuine belief that if he dies fighting you, he will be greatly
rewarded in afterlife. Only swift and extreme force can stop him.
Q: You write about Threat Management and that the average
citizen might not like to confront the idea of crime in their lives.
You liken it to the trade-off between having cancer or having the
treatment. When we read your book we found ourselves getting
resentful of the "bad guy" because we have to change our lives
because of his anti-social actions. Why do you think people do
not want to acknowledge that ?it's dangerous out there'?
A: It is the nature of the civilized human in a comfort-centered
society and environment to avoid discomfort. In a word, the
answer is 'denial'. The morbidly obese patient who refuses to
diet or exercise is in denial. The individual who refuses to wear a
seat belt or learn rudimentary first aid is in denial. Similarly, the
person who pretends that he can't possibly be a victim of violent
crime is in denial.
Q: Being both a Captain on a Police Force and of Arabic
descent, what do you think of profiling?
A: I think profiling is one of those terms like "street justice" that
can be misunderstood because the thing itself can be abused.
When a cop catches a kid vandalizing property and instead of
running him through the criminal justice machine and giving him a
record, he makes him apologize to the victim and repair the
vandalism, that's street justice at its traditional best. When
"street justice" is administered with the non-illuminating end of a
large black flashlight, it's no "justice" at all.
Similarly, if "profiling" is taken to mean stopping a motorist
because he is an African-American in a Caucasian
neighborhood, it's wrong. Victims call it "DWB": "Driving While
Black" or "Driving While Brown." That sort of profiling is,
obviously, unacceptable.
At the same time, if the profile of committed al-Qaida members
is Arabic, with little or accented English, late teens to mid-forties,
then it is understandable that good people who unfortunately fit
this profile come in for additional scrutiny, but the scrutiny is
logical and reasonable given the prevailing circumstances. In my
case, as a frequent flyer with an Arabic name who has to declare
firearms at airport check-in counters, life has become more
interesting the last few years, but I shrug it off because I
understand where it comes from.
Let's say that you are driving a white Audi with Virginia plates
through the community I serve, and an hour ago there has been a
vicious murder perpetrated by a suspect driving a white Audi
with Virginia plates. You can expect that I, or one of my brother
or sister officers, will pull you over. Some would call it profiling,
but under the circumstances, we would call it common sense and
fulfillment of duty.
Peter and Helen Evans (http://peterandhelenevans.com), a
husband and wife team - are international teachers, freelance
writers and speakers and teach a philosophical approach to
conservatism. They are also real estate agents in the Washington,
DC area.
http://www.enterstageright.com/archive/articles/0205/0205ayoobinterview.htm
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Similarly, if "profiling" is taken to mean stopping a motorist
because he is an African-American in a Caucasian
neighborhood, it's wrong. Victims call it "DWB": "Driving While
Black" or "Driving While Brown." That sort of profiling is,
obviously, unacceptable.
At the same time, if the profile of committed al-Qaida members
is Arabic, with little or accented English, late teens to mid-forties,
then it is understandable that good people who unfortunately fit
this profile come in for additional scrutiny, but the scrutiny is
logical and reasonable given the prevailing circumstances.
Why is the former 'obviously unacceptable' while the latter is 'logical and reasonable'?
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Alex asks:
?Why is the former 'obviously unacceptable' while the latter is 'logical and reasonable'??
Hmm, sounds like you?re holding me answerable for another person?s beliefs. Had stated in an earlier exchange that I don?t necessarily agree in total with everything I post. ?Spose I?d best also mention I?m not particularly inclined to deconstruct or otherwise ferret out an author?s deeper meanings. Seems I left my Ouija board at home today, and besides Crafty doesn?t pay me enough to apply the tools of biblical scholarship to every wan post.
Perhaps a better way to phrase the question would be: ?Why do you think the author believes the former is ?obviously acceptable? while the latter is ?logical and reasonable??? Phrased in that manner speculation is implicit, I won?t feel that I?m being backed into some authoritative corner, and perhaps we can avoid the rhetorical vortices we often find ourselves in.
-
Why do you think the author believes the former is ?obviously unacceptable? while the latter is ?logical and reasonable??
-
Alex asks:
"Why do you think the author believes the former is ?obviously unacceptable? while the latter is ?logical and reasonable?'"
Funny you should ask. In a nutshell, all I think you can ask of an officer is to make an informed choice with the data at hand. If that choice is based solely or primarily on race then I don't think it's an informed one. If the choice is based on context, experience, training, specific threat profiles, and so on, I think it's what officers are paid to do.
Somewhere between the extremes of questioning everyone for anything, and questioning no one for nothing, there has to be a place for informed choice based on multivariable considerations. My read is that Mr. Ayoob favors informed choice based on overlapping factors and is against choice that is dependent on monolithic criteria. But hey, like I said, I left my Ouija board at home.
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If that choice is based solely or primarily on race then I don't think it's an informed one. If the choice is based on context, experience, training, specific threat profiles, and so on, I think it's what officers are paid to do.
This is what he said:
if the profile of committed al-Qaida members
is Arabic, with little or accented English, late teens to mid-forties,
then it is understandable that good people who unfortunately fit
this profile come in for additional scrutiny
That is a profile based primarily on race.
But hey, like I said, I left my Ouija board at home.
You obviously felt some connection with this article or you wouldn't have posted it. If you didn't want to discuss the issues raised why post it in the first place?
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Alex states:
"You obviously felt some connection with this article or you wouldn't have posted it. If you didn't want to discuss the issues raised why post it in the first place [?]"
As mentioned before, posting something doesn't mean I'm obligated to defend it, agree with it in total, deconstruct it to your liking, or involve myself in unproductive arguments. You have latched on to an element of an article and now want to play a game of "gotcha." Well hey, go nuts, have at it, and pat yourself on the back when you?re done.
If I had any desire to further this conversation I'd posit Ayoob's criteria contain implicitly contextual elements, but what's the point? I think you're interested in heat instead of illumination and hence derive nothing of value from our exchanges. As such snipe away. I've got better things to do.
In closing I'll mention that, though I'm not much of a martial artist, sometimes I train with people less skilled than me. I don't use the occasion to lord my superiority, preferring instead to do what I can to maximize the training value for both my partner and me.
In a similar vein, I post to this list for reasons of growth I feel no obligation to explain to you. I derive nothing of value from tit for tat exchanges with the rhetorically challenged and so choose, for the most part, not to participate in them. There are folks on this list whose opinions I respect; I trust they?ll understand that my unwillingness to engage does not connote an inability to do so.
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Homicide justified according to police
Tired of having his home broken into, Bob Birtwhistle was prepared and police say this was a justifiable shooting
Posted: 02/16/2005 03:35 pm
Last Updated: 02/16/2005 03:41 pm
Story filed by NewsCenter16 Reporter
Robert Borrelli
Mishawaka, IN - An intruder was shot and killed Wednesday morning by the 84-year-old homeowner.
Over the past several years, the home of Bob Birtwhistle has been broken-into before.? The intruder was never caught but on Wednesday, Birtwhistle says he took care of the problem himself.
"And I hear that dude just a raisin' hell trying to get in here, and I got this pretty dang well protected," said Birtwhistle.
Having his house on Third Street in Mishawaka broken into before and been beaten, Bob grabbed his gun when he heard the intruder.
"I fired that shot to let him know I was armed and it didn't make a bit of difference, he still kept coming in," explained Birtwhistle.
Birtwhistle fired again but 40-year-old James Rosebush kept coming, and wrestled the elderly man to the floor.
"My gun was in my hand, down in under.? He grabbed that gun out of my hand and was trying to get it in position to shoot me.? And, I was ready to give up.? But before he could do that, he just relaxed," said Birtwhistle.
Investigators with the St. Joseph County Metro Homicide Unit and the County Prosecutor's Office say the shooting was justified.
"He just didn't want to get hurt anymore. He'd been beaten up several times and he just got tired of it," said Daniel Keiling.
After being beaten and robbed several times before, the senior citizen, who doesn't like guns, took care of himself.
"I done what I had to do, that's all.? And I don't feel guilty about it, spiritually."
Birtwhistle says what happened early Wednesday morning was, "the hardest thing he's done in his life," but the retired electrician says he doesn't feel guilty about defending himself.
http://www.wndu.com/news/022005/news_40371.php
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Birtwhistle fired again but 40-year-old James Rosebush kept coming, and wrestled the elderly man to the floor.
"My gun was in my hand, down in under. He grabbed that gun out of my hand and was trying to get it in position to shoot me. And, I was ready to give up. But before he could do that, he just relaxed," said Birtwhistle.
Investigators with the St. Joseph County Metro Homicide Unit and the County Prosecutor's Office say the shooting was justified.
I don't get it. Why doesn't the article say anything about what happened when Rosebush relaxed or how Birtwhistle got the gun back?
-milt
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In a similar vein, I post to this list for reasons of growth I feel no obligation to explain to you. I derive nothing of value from tit for tat exchanges with the rhetorically challenged and so choose, for the most part, not to participate in them. There are folks on this list whose opinions I respect; I trust they?ll understand that my unwillingness to engage does not connote an inability to do so.
I'm not looking for a fight Buz, I just rather foolishly assumed that you post was for public consumption since you posted it in a public place. If you didn't want to defend that aspect of the article you only had to say "Actually I don't fully agree with what he said there" rather than acting like I'm behaving inappropriately by wanting to discuss parts of something you posted.
-
Like the saying goes: God created man, Mr. Colt made them equal:
911 Call Reveals Woman's Struggle With Purse Thief
Woman Held Suspect At Gunpoint Until Police Arrived
POSTED: 1:52 pm CST February 17, 2005
UPDATED: 5:22 pm CST February 17, 2005
OKLAHOMA CITY -- Oklahoma City police released a 911 recording Thursday that reveals a dramatic struggle following an attempted purse-snatching in south Oklahoma City.
Barbara Gesell, 83, had just pulled into her garage when a man ran inside her garage and grabbed her purse, which has hanging across her shoulder. A suspect, Robert Campbell, was arrested shortly afterward on suspicion of attempted robbery.
Police said the story might have ended differently if Gesell's daughter, Theresa Gesell, had not taken action.
According to police, Theresa Gesell ran behind Campbell and tried to catch him when he ran from the scene. While she was chasing the suspect, she called 911.
"A man has attacked us in our house, and we are fighting him in the yard," Theresa Gesell said to the 911 dispatcher.
As the struggle moved down the street, a neighbor -- whom Theresa Gesell identified as "Hershall" -- stopped to help. Theresa then grabbed her .45-caliber pistol and continued running after Campbell -- despite the dispatcher's plea for her to drop the handgun.
"I am going to go get my .45 ... you all are too slow," she said.
As the call continues, the dispatcher asks Theresa to get rid of the weapon. However, after the suspect tried to escape along a creek bed, Theresa and Hershall used the pistol to make sure he didn't leave.
"You can go put that gun up now," the dispatcher said.
"No sir," Theresa replied. "We have the gun pointed at him ... he must have been a city fellow because he didn't know anything about the woods."
Seconds later, police arrived and arrested Campbell. With Hershall's help, the Gesells retrieved Barbara's purse.
Campbell is currently housed in the Oklahoma County Jail. He is expected to be charged with assault and attempted robbery
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Taking Down the Outlaws
By Amy Doolittle
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Published February 22, 2005
In Hollywood, outlaws are either gunned down by lawmen, like Gary Cooper's character in "High Noon," or are portrayed as anti-heroes, like Robert Redford and Paul Newman's characters in "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid." But in the real world, the bad guys are truly wicked, say brothers John and Robert Waters, and the sheriff isn't always around to stop them. In fact, some of the most notorious outlaws in history were killed or captured by ordinary citizens.
????"You see all these movies and stuff about the heroic sheriff who runs the outlaws out of town, but you don't see a lot about the ordinary citizen defending themselves in their towns," said Robert Waters. "I wondered what really happened, so I began researching it and found in American history there were numerous accounts of [such] stories. I thought it was important [to tell them] because they had not been told."
????In their new book, "Outgunned: True Stories of Citizens Who Stood Up to Outlaws and Won," the Waters brothers collected accounts of ordinary people taking down the bad men. Among the stories related in the book:
??????Notorious outlaw Henry Starr was captured after a bank robbery in Stroud, Okla., after being shot by 17-year-old Paul Curry, using the sawed-off .30-.30 rifle the Curry family kept for slaughtering hogs.
??????"Black Jack" Ketchum, a killer, robber and cattle rustler who once hid out with Butch Cassidy's gang, was captured after trying to rob a train in New Mexico. Frank Harrington, the conductor on the train, foiled Ketchum's plan by shooting him with a 10-gauge shotgun.
?????After a botched robbery attempt in Midland, Mich., the robbers' escape was thwarted by a dentist. Dr. Frank Hardy, an avid hunter who kept a .35-caliber rifle in his office above the bank, shot and wounded robber Anthony Chebatoris as he drove away, causing him to wreck the getaway car. Chebatoris' partner, Jack Gracy, then attempted to escape by hijacking a truck but was shot through the head by Dr. Hardy at a range of nearly 200 yards.
?????George Birdwell, a member of the "Pretty Boy" Floyd gang, thought the Farmers & Merchants Bank in the all-black town of Boley, Okla., would be easy pickings. But Birdwell and two partners made the mistake of trying to rob the bank on the opening day of hunting season in 1932, when the town was filled with armed black farmers. Birdwell was fatally shot by the bank's bookkeeper, and dozens of townsmen opened fire on his accomplices as they tried to escape, killing one and wounding and capturing the other.
????Most Americans aren't aware of these stories, Robert Waters said, because of political correctness: We have been taught that guns are evil and used so often for wrong, he said, we forget that they can also be used for right.
????But now there is a growing awareness of the positive value of firearms, he said.
????"In the past few years, stories of people defending themselves with firearms have come out over the Internet and talk radio and occasionally in the mainstream media," he said. "The perspective of Americans has changed and people realize that guns are basically a tool. They can be used for evil and can be used for good."
????This shift was evidenced, he said, in the 2004 presidential election. Democrats, who traditionally support firearm restrictions, "would not touch the anti-gun issue with a 10-foot pole," he said. "Even [Democratic candidate Sen.] John Kerry pretended to be a hunter in order to get the people who were in favor of guns to vote for him."
????One problem with Americans' perspective on crime and guns, Mr. Waters said, is that popular culture sometimes celebrates criminals as heroic " a view that has a long history.
????"A deep populist strain has always existed in middle America, an ingrained suspicion of those in authority and those who control vast amounts of wealth," he and his brother explain in their book.
????"Instilled in this mentality is an inclination to root for the underdog. Those who looked on criminals as heroes admired the outlaw as an individualist who followed his own path."
????The sympathetic portrayal of criminals as underdogs is very widespread in contemporary Hollywood, said Ted Baehr, chairman of the Christian Film and Television Commission.
????"For many years during the golden age of Hollywood when Mr. Smith went to Washington, you had positive heroes and good guys who wore white hats," he said, but that changed in the late 1960s, a period that "produced the anti-hero."
????But that doesn't mean that there are no real heroes in theaters, Mr. Baehr said.
????"The good news is that since 1985 there has been an increase in the good guys who wear white hats," he said.
????But, Mr. Baehr warns, the anti-hero will always have some residence in the artistic community. Robert Waters said this is probably because Americans find criminals interesting and different " a perspective he said that overlooks the heroism of law-abiding citizens.
????"Criminals are fascinating, but on the other hand, I find the ordinary citizen to be very fascinating," Mr. Waters said. "What would draw someone to pick up a gun and defend another citizen and defend their town when the bank is being robbed? Maybe they're not heroic in the eyes of Hollywood, but I think they are heroes."
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MAN SHOOTS EX-WIFE, BYSTANDER AT
COURTHOUSE, KILLED BY POLICE AFTER CHASE
By: MARK COLLETTE, JACQUE HILBURN & KENNETH DEAN, Staff Writers February 24, 2005
BYSTANDER KILLED: Tyler police investigate the scene of a gunshot victim on Spring Street in Tyler, Texas Thursday. (Staff Photo By Herb Nygren Jr.)
A Tyler man embroiled in a bitter child support dispute opened fire Thursday on his ex-wife and son with a high-powered rifle, killing the woman and a bystander who attempted to intervene. Several people, including three lawmen, were wounded in the exchange, which began about 1:25 p.m. outside the Smith County Courthouse. Police ultimately shot and killed David Hernandez Arroyo Sr. after he fired repeatedly at officers during a two-mile chase that ended off U.S. Highway 271.
The 43-year-old suspect, who was wearing multiple layers of body armor, died in a hail of police gunfire after authorities rammed his pickup and he emerged, gun raised and firing.
The scene around the normally quiet courthouse turned into chaos as people dove for cover to escape the gunman. Office workers scrambled to lock doors and crawl to safety.
Authorities said it was the bloodiest day in recent memory.
The dead, both of Tyler, have been identified as Maribel Estrada, 41, and Mark Allen Wilson, 52, a personal trainer and gun enthusiast. The wounded include David Arroyo Jr., 23, the suspect's son, five law enforcement officers and two bystanders.
Authorities surmised afterward the deceased never had a chance.
Details continue to emerge, but preliminary evidence suggests Arroyo planned the ambush to the minutest detail. He was armed with an AK-47, two types of body armor and hundreds of rounds of ammunition, said Tyler Police Chief Gary Swindle. Authorities were still trying to determine how Arroyo obtained the weapon and body armor, and officers were searching his home in Tyler Thursday evening.
Within a span of about two minutes, the downtown square in Tyler was transformed to a landscape of shell casings, broken glass and stunned witnesses.
"I saw people lying everywhere that had been shot," said a dazed Nathan Hoffman, an attorney working directly across the street from the courthouse when shots rang out.
"I saw a guy walking down the street with a high-powered rifle shooting at the courthouse," Hoffman said. "I said, 'Everyone move to the back of the office!'" By then, the scene erupted in chaos.
The gunman, Hoffman said, was "just running down the street shooting."
Witnesses said Arroyo ambushed his ex-wife and son outside the courthouse and started firing. Ms. Estrada was struck multiple times and died on the lower steps on the east side of the courthouse, officials said.
Smith County Sheriff's Deputy Sherman Dollison, 28, who was serving as a substitute bailiff for the day, was shot multiple times while standing on the landing of the courthouse steps.
He is listed in critical condition at East Texas Medical Center with injuries to the lungs and liver. SCSO Lt. Marlin Suell, 38, and Tyler Police Det. Clay Perrett, 54, were injured by stray gunfire - Suell in the back of the neck and Perrett to the side of the face.
Repeated shots fired by the suspect shattered glass and sent bystanders scurrying for cover, behind benches, bushes and vehicles. Several people were wounded by flying glass and one man fell unconscious after suffering a seizure, a hospital spokeswoman said.
The noise prompted Mark Wilson, a gun enthusiast, to intervene as Arroyo continued to fire on his wounded son.
"They traded shots, missing each other, and then the gunman hit Wilson and Wilson went down," said Nelson Clyde III, publisher of the Tyler Morning Telegraph, recalling the shooting as he watched from Don Juan's.
"The gunman walked up to Wilson and shot him while he was on the ground," Clyde said. "I couldn't believe what I was seeing ... it was sickening."
"He was either wounded or dead, but the guy (Arroyo) shot him again to make sure he wouldn't get up," said witness Brandon Malone, a Tyler builder who was lunching inside Don Juan's.
Witnesses said Arroyo calmly walked to his truck, still trading shots with an unidentified man lying beside a Chevrolet, and climbed inside.
"He slowly backed up a bit, and drove away at normal speed, right past a patrol car," Clyde said.
Wilson approached the suspect and fired several times, but the shots appeared useless due to the multiple layers of body armor, witnesses said. He was wearing both a bulletproof vest and a military flak jacket.
Arroyo turned and fired on Wilson, killing him just a few feet outside the front door of Levine's clothing store. The suspect climbed into his maroon Chevrolet stepside pickup and sped away.
Witness Ron Martell, a military veteran who watched the killing spree, trailed the fleeing suspect and pointed him out to police.
"At first, I couldn't believe it," he said. "I watched the suspect shoot that guy at least seven times. Then he got into his truck and casually drove away. I followed him."
City, county, state and federal law enforcement officers rushed to chase down the suspect and tend to the wounded.
Sirens wailing, authorities began chasing Arroyo, who fired at officers and the courthouse as he sped away from the killing scene.
The caravan of officers pursued the suspect to North Spring Avenue and onto East Gentry Parkway, trailing him to the area of U.S. 271 and Duncan Street.
Witnesses up and down the corridor rushed for cover from stray gunfire as Arroyo continued firing at officers.
"When they came through, there were a lot of shots flying around," said Henry Lee, manager of Rayson Automotive, 2021 E. Gentry Parkway. "I ducked."
A deputy rammed the man's vehicle, prompting him to emerge firing.
Officers returned fire, striking the man several times, at least once in the head. Sobbing relatives rushed to the location, but were held at bay by authorities. Authorities spent hours searching the highway for spent casings. Dozens of tiny markers documented the number of shots fired.
"Obviously he came prepared because he came with a bulletproof flak jacket," said Chief Swindle. "Witnesses reported seeing him reload."
Swindle said of the law officers on the scene, "They were simply outgunned. They were armed with handguns and he (Arroyo) was armed with an AK-47."
Arroyo had previously told his wife he would kill her if she pressed the issue of child support, authorities said.
"He came here with one thing in mind," Swindle said. "He had the act set in his mind to murder his ex-wife. He has a history of assaulting his ex-wife and several weapons offenses."
Authorities credited Wilson with possibly saving the life of Arroyo's son, who was reported to be in fair condition.
Swindle said the armor worn by Arroyo was designed to withstand not just bullets, but also landmine explosions.
Staff writers Patrick Butler and Roy Maynard contributed to this report.
Mark Collette covers Smith County. He can be reached
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Good Samaritan Gun Use
Thursday, March 03, 2005
By John Lott, Jr.
A multiple victim public shooting last week outside the court house in Tyler, Texas, stemming from a custody dispute, resulted in the murder of two people and the wounding of four others.
Killings like this frequently make the news, and this story was carried by all the television networks and most major newspapers. ABC and NBC evening news coverage was fairly typical; they noted, respectively, that ?David Hernandez Arroyo (search) fired off more than 50 rounds. He killed two people before police shot him dead? and ?A gunman killed his ex-wife and a bystander and wounded four others between--before being shot to death by police.?
Of the 71 unique news stories found by a computerized Nexis search of stories in the four days after the attack, 38 percent mention that an AK-47 (search) or high-powered rifle was used by the attacker. As usual, gun control groups called for more gun control.
Eric Howard, with the Brady Campaign to End Gun Violence (search), said ?These are military-style weapons that pose a significant risk to civilians and the police officers trying to protect the public.?
Only two stories mentioned that the AK-47 was a semi-automatic, not a machine gun, and, while it is understandable, none of the articles provided context by explaining that Arroyo?s weapon functioned the same as deer hunting rifles, firing the same caliber bullets, at the same rapidity, and doing the same damage.
Seems like pretty standard media coverage. But what makes this case different is that 21 percent of the news stories actually mentioned that a citizen licensed to carry a concealed weapon used his gun to try and help stop the attack.
The citizen, 50 year old Mark Wilson, was one of the two people murdered. As CNN reported, ?Everyone here agrees, Wilson saved lives.? Fox News' website quoted the sheriff as saying "if it hadn't been for Mr. Wilson, [Arroyo's son] would be dead."
Wilson, a licensed concealed handgun permit holder, heard Arroyo?s shots and saw the commotion from his apartment window. He grabbed a handgun and headed toward the attacker. Arroyo had already wounded several police officers and there was no one left to prevent his rampage.
Arroyo had also shot his 22-year-old son and was about ready to shoot him again from very close range when Wilson fired his gun, hitting Arroyo several times in the chest. Arroyo was wearing a bullet resistant vest and flak jacket and Wilson's shots did not seriously wound him. Yet, Wilson?s shots forced Arroyo to come after him, and it used up a couple of minutes of his time. Unfortunately, in the exchange of gunfire, Arroyo eventually fatally shot Wilson. With police arriving, Arroyo fled the scene and was later shot to death by police as they pursued him.
Neighbors described Wilson as ?one of the nicest, sweetest guys I've ever known.? Others pointed out that ?He's not going to sit back and -- when he could do something about it, and just let it happen? and called him a hero.
It is not remarkable that someone such as Mark Wilson was there at the scene to stop the attack before police arrived. For example, in about 30 percent of the multiple victim public school shootings that have captivated Americans? attention starting in 1997, people used guns to stop the attacks before uniformed police were able to arrive on the scene. Few people know about these cases because only about one percent of the news stories on these cases mention how the attacks were stopped.
What is remarkable is that this heroism--an act of defensive gun use (search)--did receive some national attention. Undoubtedly, much of the coverage came from the fact that Mark Wilson was killed by Arroyo, but it still doesn?t take away from the fact that many stories admitted that he had saved at least one life and a few stories quoted police saying that he had probably saved multiple lives.
Of course, gun control advocates draw their usual conclusion from all this. Kristen Rand, legislative director for the pro-gun control Violence Policy Center (search) in Washington, D.C., claims the Tyler shooting last Thursday shows that criminals are undeterred by people potentially carrying concealed weapons. But, in fact, more nearly the opposite is true. When Arroyo faced the choice of continuing to shoot others or defending himself, he was forced to defend himself. Making Arroyo's attacks more risky caused him to change his behavior.
More generally, though, it is strange that Rand points to one case as evidence that deterrence doesn't work. In the book, The Bias Against Guns, Bill Landes of the University of Chicago Law School and I examine multiple-victim public shootings in the United States from 1977 to 1999 and find that when states passed right-to-carry laws, these attacks fell by 60 percent. Deaths and injuries from multiple-victim public shootings fell on average by 78 percent.
Many people find it hard to believe that 18 national surveys by academics as well as national polling organizations show that there are 2 million defensive gun uses each year. After all, if these events were really happening, wouldn't we hear about them on the news? Yet when was the last time you saw a story on the national evening news (or even the local news) about a citizen using a gun to stop a crime? ABC?s and NBC?s news coverage continued this pattern, but at least some CBS and CNN news reports provided some balance and Fox News? website also gave the full story.
This misreporting actually endangers people's lives. By selectively reporting the news and turning a defensive gun use story into one that merely says "police shot him dead," the media give misleading impressions of what actions saved the lives of people confronted by violence. As Wilson's case demonstrates, defensive gun use is not a guns-rights myth. Guns have been and are used by law abiding citizens to protect and save their own lives and the lives of others.
John Lott is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of The Bias Against Guns (Regnery 2003) and More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago Press 2000).
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Buz et al:
Lott is always excellent.
In a lighter vein, here's this:
Crafty
===============
DOCTORS
A) The number of physicians in the U.S. is 700,000.
B) Accidental deaths caused by Physicians per year are 120,000.
C) Accidental deaths per physician is 0.171.
Statistics courtesy of U.S. Dept of Health Human services and is a
conservative number.
Now think about this:
GUNS:
A) The number of gun owners in the U.S. is 80,000,000.
Yes, that is 80 million.
B) The number of accidental gun deaths per year, all age groups is
1,500.
C) The number of accidental deaths per gun owner is 0.0000188.
Statistically, doctors are approximately 9,000 times more
dangerous than gun owners.
Remember, "Guns don't kill people, doctors do."
FACT: NOT EVERYONE HAS A GUN, BUT ALMOST EVERYONE HAS AT LEAST ONE
DOCTOR.
Please alert your friends to this alarming threat.
We must ban doctors before this gets completely out of hand!!!!!
Out of concern for the public at large, I have withheld the
statistics on lawyers for fear the shock would cause people to
panic and seek medical attention.
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WOW! DOJ says right to bear arms is individual, not group!
http://www.usdoj.gov/olc/secondamendment2.htm
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http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/news/20050307p2a00m0dm003000c.html
Judo throw deals thief a blow
KASHIHARA, Nara -- A powerful judo throw from an elderly Kashihara farmer has thwarted a wannabe armed robber's plans to steal from him, police said.
The 66-year-old farmer disarmed the man demanding money from him at knifepoint and forced him to flee. He repelled the would-be robber while sustaining only minor injuries to his hands.
The elderly farmer had belonged to a judo club at high school and remains physically fit, having completed five full marathons while in his 40s.
"It was all just a reflex action," the farmer said.
Police are looking for his assailant, describing him as being in his 50s or 60s and wearing a gray uniform.
Police said the mugger had rang the farmer's doorbell early on Sunday morning, telling the farmer's wife he was a newspaper deliveryman and waiting outside the front gate of their home.
Suspecting something was amiss, the farmer went out to greet the man and was confronted by him brandishing a knife. The farmer grabbed the man and hurled him over his shoulder, slamming him into the ground.
The knife clattered out of the man's hands. He got up and ran away and the farmer returned to his home and alerted the police. (Mainichi Shimbun, March 7, 2005)
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http://www.ogrish.com/archives/cop_accidently_shoots_himself_in_foot_during_safety_lecture_Mar_09_2005.html
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The martial spirit in action:
"We are safe in port of Aden. It?s been 3 days repairing the damage. 30 bullets holes in deck, cabin house, dodger, and alas, newly varnished mast. Our bow shows evidence of a satisfying crunch. Our new paint job was not meant to be. Dinghy on deck was seriously wounded but in stable condition, much repatched. No wine was hurt.
This is the "official" report filed with the Yemen Coast Guard, Yemen Navy, Aden Port Control, US Coalition 5th Fleet, US Embassy and State Department? but not Carol?s mother. Unfortunately, the poor guy that shoots has to write up the paper work. The one that rams does not engender any paper-work, except sand paper work.
March 11, 2005, written by Rodney J. Nowlin, USN Retired
Pirate Attack off Yemen Coast
On Tuesday, March 8, 2005 at position 13 Degrees 28 North / 49 Degrees 07 East, in the infamous Pirate Alley of the Gulf of Aden, two sailing yachts, Madhi and Gandalf, were moving SW 30 miles off the coast of Yemen proceeding to the port of Aden from Salalah, Oman.
At about 0900 local, two outboard powered fiberglass longboats, about 20 feet long, each containing 3 men, passed off our sterns moving south at about 25 knots into the open Gulf between Yemen and Somalia. An hour later they returned, one coming quite close and looking us over carefully. The second boat passed off our bows but quite a ways away. These boats were obviously not engaged in a normal activity like fishing. At that time we were south of Al Mukalla, Yemen. The area around Al Mukalla is well documented as being a piracy, drug & people smuggling problem area and we maintained a careful watch for anything out of the ordinary.
At about 1600 we observed two different boats approaching us head on from the west with the glare of the sunset in our eyes. These were 25-30 feet long, had inboard diesel engines and higher freeboard. We immediately motored closer together. As soon as they saw us close ranks they started coming very fast directly at us. There were 4 men in each boat. They separated at about 200 yards with one boat coming down Madhi?s port side, shouting and firing into the cockpit. The other boat, firing automatic weapons came at Gandalf. There were no warning shots. Carol on Gandalf began sending Maydays on every frequency.
The first boat swung around behind Mahdi?s stern to come up and board us. At that point, I , Rod Nowlin aboard Mahdi and armed with a 12 gauge shotgun loaded with 00 buckshot, started shooting into their boat. I forced them to keep their heads down so they could not shoot at us. I am not sure I hit anyone at that point. I could see the driver of the boat crouched down behind the steering console. After firing three shots at them, their engine started to smoke and I swung around to try to shoot at the second boat ahead. At that point I saw Jay Barry on Gandalf ram the second boat amidships almost cutting it in two and turning it almost completely over. I turned back around to shoot at the boat still behind Mahdi. That was when they turned away from Mahdi and headed toward the stern of Gandalf. Gandalf was beside us about 100 feet away. The bow of the pirate boat came right up against Gandalf?s stern and two men stood up on the bow with guns to board Gandalf. That was a serious and probably fateful error on their part. I shot both of them. That boat then veered away and I shot the driver, although I am not sure of the outcome because they were farther away and I didn?t knock him down like the other two trying to board Gandalf.
Mahdi & Gandalf kept going at full speed to put as much distance between the pirates and us as possible. As soon as we were out of rifle range, we looked back and both attack boats were drifting and seemed to be disabled.
A merchant ship nearby finally answered our Mayday and diverted course to position itself between the floundering pirates and the fleeing yachts. They said they would contact the authorities? by Sat phone and then sailed alongside us for 4 hours after dark to make sure we would be all right. Best speed was made to the Port of Aden 180 miles away.
If Jay on Gandalf had not had the presence of mind to veer over into one boat and ram it, the outcome of this attack would have been totally different. All the guys needed to do was stand off a ways and shoot us to pieces with automatic weapons. We were extremely lucky. We broadcast Mayday calls on VHF 16 and all HF radio frequencies, including two HF frequencies that were supplied by the US Coast Guard near Oman only a few days before. Frequencies which the Coalition Forces Warships in this area were supposed to be monitoring. There was no response. The pirates were well organized and well armed. There were at least 4 boats involved. They had set up a picket line out from the Yemen coast probably covering 75 miles out, so if you transited the area during the day they would not miss seeing you. The two attack boats appeared to have come from the south before positioning themselves ahead of us in the sunset.
There has been speculation in the past that this ongoing piracy problem off Yemen?s coast was being carried out by Somali pirates. Given the number, the types of boats involved, and the direction the supposed spotter boats were coming from, this does not appear to be the case. The men in the attack boats looked both African and Arab.
There was no evidence that this was a people smuggling operation. There were no men, women or children cowering in the boats. These were not fishing boats with nets or overhead sun protection. They appeared to be purpose-built boats, 25-30 feet long, with wooden splines or poles fashioned above the gunwales to which a plastic tarp or shield was hung chest high for the men to hide behind after shooting. The problem is getting worse and the pirate attacks are getting deadly. One could only expect that the Yemen Government will take more direct action At very least, allow yachts to group in Salalah, Oman and at some point along the NW Yemen coast request an escort until Aden or the Straits.
Rodney J. Nowlin, USN Retire
March 11, 2005
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Fighting Crime the 11th Century Way....
By Peter Apps
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Tighter gun ownership laws are pushing South Africans to buy crossbows, spears, swords, knives and pepper sprays to protect themselves from violent crime.
"We've had to build an entirely new shop because the demand from people is so great," Justin Willmers, owner of Durban Guns and Ammo, told Reuters. "It can be anything from a Zulu fighting spear, battle axes, swords, crossbows."
New gun controls came into force last year under South Africa's Firearms Control Act, but some weapons shop owners say high crime rates are pushing law abiding citizens to look for alternative means of defending themselves.
Despite official figures showing the murder rate falling 10 percent in the year to March 2004, South Africa's Arms and Ammunition Dealers Association says individuals face a one in 60 chance of being the victim of a violent crime in any given year.
Many houses are surrounded by razor wire and electric fences, but with police turning down 80 percent of firearms license requests after an 18-month application process, Association spokesman Alex Holmes said people were forced to look at other options.
"It's not really a matter of choice," Holmes said. "Licensed firearms are not used in crime at any great rate."
Estimates of the number of illegal firearms in South Africa vary between 1 and 4 million, he said, but the real problem is from some 30-40,000 hardcore criminals using a small number of illegal guns.
SILENT CROSSBOW
South Africa began a firearms amnesty on Jan. 1 that to date has netted some 13,000 weapons, officials told Reuters, but critics say most of the weapons handed in are old and would never have been used for crime.
"It's mostly been grannies and grandpas that are handing in weapons that are probably unusable anyhow," Willmers said. In the meantime, people from all walks of life are acquiring weapons not restricted by law.
"The guys have just had enough," Willmers said.
Men are buying machetes to fight off hijackers or crossbows to shoot people breaking into their property, while women are more likely to buy a pepper spray, he said.
One customer successfully fought off three hijackers with a machete, slashing one, he said. A beggar had bought a pepper spray so he could fight off those who tried to steal his shoes as he slept on the street.
With some homeowners worried about prosecution if they kill intruders, the crossbow is particularly popular because of its silence and the difficulty of tracing the firer from forensic evidence, he said.
With no legal restrictions on sales, weapons shop staff had to exercise judgment in who they sold to, Willmers said.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=sto...ca_crossbows_dc
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March 23, 2005, 7:44 a.m.
Disarming Facts
The road to bad laws is paved with good intentions.
By John R. Lott Jr.
The last ten days have seen three horrific multiple-victim public shootings: the Atlanta courthouse attack that left four murdered; the Wisconsin church shooting, where seven were murdered, and Monday's high-school shooting in Minnesota, where nine were murdered. What can be learned from these attacks? Some take the attacks as confirmation that guns should be completely banned from even courthouses, let alone schools and churches.
The lessons from the courthouse shooting are likely to be different from the other two attacks in that there were armed sheriff's deputies present. Even if civilian gun possession were banned at the courthouse, the officers still had guns. Not only did they fail to stop the attack, they even facilitated it, because the 200-pound former football linebacker who was facing trial for rape was able to take the gun.
Guns are most useful in stopping criminals at a distance. The threat of using the gun against a criminal can allow one to capture him, or at least can cause the criminal to break off his attack. Police have a much more difficult job than civilians. While civilians can use a gun to maximize the distance between themselves and criminals, police can be satisfied with simply brandishing a gun and watching the criminal run away. Their job requires physical contact, and when that happens, things can go badly wrong.
My own published research on criminals assaulting police shows that the more likely that an assault will be successful, the more likely criminals will be to make it. The major factor determining success is the relative strengths and sizes of the criminal and officer. In particular, when officer strength and size requirements are reduced because of affirmative action, each one-percent increase in the number of female officers increases the number of assaults on police by 15 to 19 percent. The Atlanta-courthouse shooting simply arose from such a case.
There is a broader lesson to learn from these attacks. All three attacks took place in areas where gun possession by those who did the attack as well as civilians generally was already banned ? so-called "gun-free safe zones." Suppose you or your family are being stalked by a criminal who intends on harming you. Would you feel safer putting a sign in front of your home saying "This Home is a Gun-Free Zone"?
It is pretty obvious why we don't put these signs up. As with many other gun laws, law-abiding citizens, not would-be criminals, would obey the sign. Instead of creating a safe zone for victims, it leaves victims defenseless and creates a safe zone for those intent on causing harm.
A three-year prison term for violating a gun-free zone represents a real penalty for a law-abiding citizen. Adding three years to a criminal?s sentence when he is probably already going to face multiple death penalties or life sentences for a murderous rampage is probably not going to be the penalty that stops the criminal from committing his crime.
Many Americans have learned this lesson the hard way. In 1985, just eight states had the most liberal right-to-carry laws ? laws that automatically grant permits once applicants pass a criminal background check, pay their fees and, when required, complete a training class. Today the total is 37 states. Bill Landes and I have examined all the multiple-victim public shootings with two or more victims in the United States from 1977 to 1999 and found that when states passed right-to-carry laws, these attacks fell by 60 percent. Deaths and injuries from multiple-victim public shootings fell on average by 78 percent.
No other gun-control law had any beneficial effect. Indeed, right-to-carry laws were the only policy that consistently reduced these attacks.
To the extent attacks still occurred in right-to-carry states, they overwhelmingly happened in the special places within those states where concealed handguns were banned. The impact of right-to-carry laws on multiple-victim public shootings is much larger than on other crimes, for a simple reason. Increasing the probability that someone will be able to protect themselves, increases deterrence. Even when any single person might have a small probability of having a concealed handgun, the probability that at least someone will is very high.
Unfortunately, the restrictive concealed-handgun law now in effect in Minnesota bans concealed handguns around schools and Wisconsin is one of four states that completely ban concealed handguns, let alone not allowing them in churches. (There was a guard at the Minnesota school and he was apparently the first person killed, but he was also apparently unarmed.) While permitted concealed handguns by civilians are banned in Georgia courthouses, it is not clear that the benefit is anywhere near as large as other places simply because you usually have armed law enforcement nearby. One possibility is to encourage prosecutors and others to carry concealed guns around courthouses.
These restrictions on guns in schools weren't always in place. Prior to the end of 1995 when the Safe School Zone Act was enacted, virtually all the states that allowed citizens, whether they be teacher or principles or parents, to carry concealed handguns let them carry them on school grounds. Even Minnesota used to allow this.
Some have expressed fears over letting concealed permit holders carry guns on school campuses, but over all the years that permitted guns were allowed on school property there is no evidence that these guns were used improperly or caused any accidents.
People's reaction to the horrific events displayed on TV such as the Minnesota attack are understandable, but the more than two million times each year that Americans use guns defensively are never discussed ? even though this is five times as often as the 450,000 times that guns are used to commit crimes over the last couple of years. Seldom do cases make the news where public shootings are stopped or mothers use guns to prevent their children from being kidnapped. Few would know that a third of the public-school shootings were stopped by citizens with guns before uniformed police could arrive.
In an analysis that I did during 2001 of media coverage of guns, the morning and evening national-news broadcasts on the three main television networks carried almost 200,000 words on contemporaneous gun-crime stories. By comparison, not one segment featured a civilian using a gun to stop a crime. Newspapers are not much better.
Police are extremely important in deterring crime, but they almost always arrive after the crime has been committed. Annual surveys of crime victims in the United States continually show that, when confronted by a criminal, people are safest if they have a gun. Just as the threat of arrest and prison can deter criminals from committing a crime, so can the fact that victims can defend themselves.
Gun-control advocates conveniently ignore that the nations with the highest homicide rates have gun bans. Studies, such as one conducted recently by Jeff Miron at Boston University, which examined 44 countries, find that stricter gun-control laws tend to lead to higher homicide rates. Russia, which has banned guns since the Communist revolution, has had murder rates several times higher than that of the United States; even under the Communists, the Soviet Union's rate was much higher.
Good intentions don't necessarily make good laws. What counts is whether the laws ultimately save lives. Unfortunately, too many gun laws primarily disarm law-abiding citizens, not criminals.
? John Lott, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of The Bias Against Guns and More Guns, Less Crime.
http://www.nationalreview.com/comme...00503230744.asp
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Note: Needless to say this is very good news for us. John Bolton was the dominant force at the 2001 UN Conference on Small arms.
Bush Selects Bolton As New U.N. Ambassador
By BARRY SCHWEID, AP
WASHINGTON (March 7) - Undersecretary of State John R. Bolton, a controversial Bush administration figure whose strong statements on North Korea's nuclear program irked the leaders in Pyongyang, is President Bush's choice to be the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, three government officials said Monday.
Bush, already viewed suspiciously in some sectors of the United Nations for his pre-emptive attack in 2003 on Iraq, reached out to a tough lawyer and arms control expert who rarely muffles his views in diplomatic nuance.
Last month, for instance, in a strongly worded speech in Tokyo, Bolton lashed out at China before an international audience for not stopping its munitions companies from selling missile technology to Iran and other nations the United States considers rogue states.
He also took the lead in strongly opposing plans of European allies to lift an 15-year embargo and sell weapons to Beijing.
In his current post as undersecretary for arms control and international security, Bolton, 56, has traveled the world several times over in the past four years, mostly to try to halt the spread of dangerous technology.
Before the 1991 Persian Gulf war, as an assistant secretary of state for international organizations, Bolton collaborated with then-Secretary of State James A. Baker III in organizing an alliance with European and Arab countries for the war with Iraq that liberated Kuwait.
Bolton, who has served as Washington's top arms control official, would succeed former Sen. John Danforth, who retired in January.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice informed the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., and the senior Democrat, Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, of the selection. She also notified U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, said a government official knowledgeable about the situation.
Bolton must be confirmed for the post, which is being filled temporarily by Anne Patterson, a career foreign service officer, who took over for Danforth.
North Korea was so incensed by his public denunciations of their nuclear weapons program that it refused to negotiate with him and he was removed from the U.S. delegation to the now-dormant talks.
An attorney, Bolton has been under secretary of state for arms control and international security since May 11 and earlier held a variety of high-level government jobs at the departments of Justice and State under Republican administrations.
Bolton has been a sharp critic of autocratic regimes, such as the one in Pyongyang, and of many proposed international agreements.
Danforth, a former U.S. senator from Missouri, served on the job for just six months. He left on Jan. 20, at the end of Bush's first term, saying he wanted to return to his home in St. Louis and spend time with his ailing wife.
Bolton was born in Baltimore and graduated from Yale University and Yale Law School
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Woof All:
FC, would you care to flesh out Bolton's role at the Small Arms Conference?
And now, here's this:
Crafty Dog
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"The great object is that every man be armed. ... Everyone who is able may have a gun." Patrick Henry during Virginia's ratification convention (1788) in "The Debates of the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution" at 386, Jonathan Elliot (New York, Burt Franklin: 1888).
Could Patrick Henry be more specific? After all, he was directly involved in the process of adopting the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.
"That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms." Samuel Adams during Massachusetts' U.S. Constitution ratification convention (1788), "Debates and Proceedings in the Convention of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts," at 86-87 (Pierce & Hale, eds., Boston, 1850).
Could Samuel Adams, an American Revolutionary leader who was actually there during the process, as was Patrick Henry, have been more clear about an individual's right to private gun ownership?
"The Constitution preserves the advantage of being armed, which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... (where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." ? The Federalist, No. 46 ? James Madison, America's fourth president, known as the father and author of the U.S. Constitution.
"The people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them." Zachariah Johnson Elliot's Debates, vol. 3, "The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution."
"? the people are confirmed by the next article in their right to keep and bear their private arms." Philadelphia Federal Gazette June 18, 1789, page 2, column 2, article on the Bill of Rights.
"Firearms stand next in importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people's liberty teeth and keystone under independence. ? From the hour the Pilgrims landed to the present day, events, occurrences and tendencies prove that to ensure peace security and happiness, the rifle and pistol are equally indispensable. ? The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere restrains evil interference ? they deserve a place of honor with all that's good." George Washington, America's first president, known as the father of our nation.
"The constitutions of most of our states assert that all power is inherent in the people; that ? it is their right and duty to be at all times armed. ? " Thomas Jefferson, America's third president in a letter to Justice John Cartwright, June 5, 1824. ME 16:45.
"The best we can help for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-8. Hamilton was a lawyer and delegate to the Continental Congress.
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Stephen Hallbrook's book That Every Man Be Armed, the Evolution of a Constitutional Right does the best job I've seen of comprehensively examining the genesis of the second amendment. Many of the quotes cited above are examined in context. Well worth a read, IMO.
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Hi all,
as the one that gave me the info didn't explained exactly what role J. Bolton took at the Small Arms Conference, I made a search recently, here's what I've found:
In mid-2001 Bolton announced at the UN Conference on Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons that Washington opposed any initiative to regulate trade in small arms or in non-military rifles--or any effort that would 'abrogate the constitutional right to bear arms.'
Accompanying Bolton to the conference were members of the National Rifle Association (NRA). 'It is precisely those weapons that Bolton would exclude from the purview of this conference that are actually killing people and endangering communities around the world,' said Tamar Gabelnick, director of the Arms Sales Monitoring Project at the Federation of American Scientists.
She charged that the U.S. delegation, led by Arms Control Secretary Bolton, single-handedly destroyed any possibility of consensus around the Small Arms Action Plan.
many of the sites that refers to J. Bolton are mainly hoplophobic ones, I will made another search and if I find something more precise or interesting, I'll edit my post
besides, I've found an article on the Guns&Ammo 's site about this conference, quite interesting even if that's not surprising:
Global Gun Ban A Bust
In the words of a firearms prohibitionist, here's why the U.N.'s push to disarm American citizens doesn't hold water.
By Dr. Paul Gallant & Dr. Joanne Eisen
The conference did more harm than good to those fighting against the spread of small arms. Small arms proliferation must be addressed with incremental measures, not bold policy initiatives. --Laudable Failure, Aaron Karp, SAIS Review, Winter-Spring 2002
The "laudable failure" referred to by Aaron Karp was the U.N.'s "Conference On The Illegal Trade In Small Arms And Light Weapons In All its Aspects." Held in New York City in July 2001, the conference was touted as "the crowning event of a decade of political activism."
Many gun owners know that the U.S. put a temporary halt to the U.N.'s plans for global civilian disarmament. But media fanfare that accompanied the conference has camouflaged the depths of the failure Karp described.
"[T]he outcome could hardly have been worse for those who believe that small arms proliferation is a serious challenge for international peace and security. . . It is no exaggeration to say that efforts to deal with the issue would be more aggressive today if the conference had never taken place.
"Even worse than the underwhelming final document," Karp lamented, "was the climate of hopelessness it left behind."
The most palpable aspect of the debacle was Under-Secretary of State John Bolton, who vigorously represented the U.S. at the conference and refused to accede to the "visionary proposals" that would eventually strip us of our firearms. But according to Karp, "[e]ven without Bolton's fireworks," the conference was doomed, and "the outcome would have been much the same."
Aaron Karp is Senior Consultant to the Small Arms Survey, a Geneva-based research project that maintains that small arms "are made to maim and kill" and "have imperiled [sic] human security in every way." Karp's political allies are in dire straits. His insightful assessment of the state of the global anti-gun community should give U.S. gun owners refreshing encouragement in the never-ending fight to secure a safer world for our children.
The hidden goal of the conference was to create long-term international pressure for severe restrictions to be placed on the possession and use of firearms by the world's civilians, but especially by American gun owners. Controlling our firearms is crucial to the U.N.'s agenda. Of a total estimated 638 million firearms on this planet, about 375 million firearms are in private hands. Of the 250 million guns in America, 98 percent of these--245 million--are privately owned. Looking at it a different way, about 65 percent of the world's stockpile of privately held firearms are in the hands of U.S. civilians. If the Bush administration had caved, that would have gone a long way toward furthering the U.N. goal of global civilian disarmament. But Bush and Bolton stood firm.
The Conference presented the global gun-banners with insurmountable hurdles. For one thing, many countries have become justifiably leery of the U.N.'s propensity for filching bits and pieces of their sovereignty; Bolton was only "joining in the global tidal wave of sovereign reassertion."
Add to that the growing admission and acceptance by firearm prohibitionists that the black market is intractable, wishes and dreams can never control it, and that human nature itself will ensure its survival--the best-laid plans of lawmakers notwithstanding.
Consequently, "There was no agreement [at the Conference] on whose guns were culpable or how to restrain their use."
But what had become irrefutable is that past social policies premised on civilian disarmament have proven disastrous. "The small arms issue rose from a broad desire to do something to ease the carnage of global crime, ethnic strife and secessionist warfare," and that philosophy has failed spectacularly. Where the U.N. has been in control, and where disarmament has been attempted, increased violence has often been the result, contrary to all promises.
For example, the U.N. sent peacekeeping troops to northwestern Cambodia in 1992 to disarm warring factions. The operation was deemed to have achieved only "limited success." Nevertheless, between 25 to 50 percent of the combatants were believed to have been disarmed. A study conducted after the departure of the U.N. peacekeeping force found that firearm-related injuries increased, relative to the level existing prior to U.N. intervention.
In Bosnia in 1995 more than 7,500 men and boys were massacred in the border town of Srebrenica following a U.N. embargo on arms into the region and peacekeeping efforts based on demilitarized "safe areas." The massacre has been called the worst in post-World War II Europe.
Civilian disarmament has never achieved its stated goal. It's difficult for those who would ban firearms to accept that, in the U.K., what started out as a glorious moral policy of arms reduction turned into a less-than-glorious social disaster for all to see.
With all semblance of a moral underpinning gone from the philosophy of civilian disarmament, what remains is the ugly reality that disarmament doesn't make for a safer world. Instead, it renders innocent people victims.
What has replaced the optimism of the global gun-banners is the fear that they may well have "triggered a response from gun advocates. . . [and] small-arms activists [read: prohibitionists] must contend with organized opposition."
Is this the death knell of the global disarmament crowd? Not by a long shot, for even when forced to confront the failure of their philosophy, they persist in their lethal agenda. "Progress toward this goal will come exclusively through incremental steps. . .it has to include those small arms already in public hands. . ."
The global firearm prohibitionists will simply not let go of their warped "vision of society in which small arms have a progressively less visible role. . ." As Karp noted, "the issue was permanently logged on the global agenda," and "the small arms community must bide its time..." He continued, gun-banning "small arms activists will have to reinvent their work, adapting to an environment requiring enormous dedication and determination while accepting slow results. . ."
Finally, Karp let the cat out of the bag when he stated, "Gun advocates have long spoken as if there were an international conspiracy to get rid of their guns. Perhaps it is time for advocates of restraint to become more as they are described."
We are forewarned: "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance."
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I wish this was an April fools joke, but it appears there is a NJ Assemblyman who wants to confiscate homes where an "illegal" gun is found. Maybe we can quarter British troops in these confiscated homes and thus violate the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th, 9th, and probably the 14th amendments in one fell swoop.
Manzo favors house seizure in gun cases
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
By Michaelangelo Conte
Journal staff writer
The spate of slayings over the first three months of the year has prompted Assemblyman Louis Manzo, D-Jersey City, to introduce a bill which would make it possible to confiscate a home or car in which an illegal firearm is found - even if the gun doesn't belong to the owner.
"Simply put, we cannot afford to lose another life, at a time when it has become a daily routine to read about another life lost in our neighborhoods as a result of gun violence," Manzo says in a letter asking state Assembly Speaker Albio Sires, D-West New York, to expedite a vote on the bill.
"Now is the time to send a message that the consequences for harboring an illegal firearm are severe and will not be tolerated by our law-makers, communities or families," Manzo says in the letter.
Manzo said the bill will make the stakes so high that people will "think twice about driving a friend (they) know carries a gun, and about allowing a family member to harbor an illegal gun in the home."
Even if the bill were passed, however, it would likely be challenged as unconstitutional, said Frank Askin, director of the Constitutional Clinic at Rutgers University in Newark.
"I'm skeptical the New Jersey Supreme Court would uphold it under the state constitution," Askin said yesterday. "I think under the state constitution there would at least have to be a innocent owner exception.
"The New Jersey Supreme Court has been much more protective of private property rights than the Supreme Court has been in recent years," Askin said.
Askin said confiscating a person's house, especially in a case where the gun found did not belong to the owner, would likely be seen by the court as excessive.
"Taking the house is so disproportionate to the crime, I think it would constitute cruel and unusual punishment," Askin said. "I would certainly say the American Civil Liberties Union would challenge that."
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http://news.tbo.com/news/MGBJH2L177E.html
House Passes Public Self-Defense Legislation
By DAVID ROYSE The Associated Press
Published: Apr 6, 2005
TALLAHASSEE - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said Tuesday he intends to sign a bill that would allow people who feel threatened on the street, in a bar, at a ball game - or just about anywhere - to ``meet force with force'' to defend themselves without fear of being prosecuted. The measure, the top priority of the National Rifle Association in Florida this year, passed 94-20 in the House. It had already passed the Senate.
The bill essentially extends and codifies a right Floridians already have in their homes or cars, saying that there's no need to retreat before fighting back. People attacked in their homes generally don't have to back off. But in public spaces, deadly force can only be used after trying to retreat.
``I'm sorry people, but if I'm attacked I shouldn't have a duty to retreat,'' said the bill's sponsor, Rep. Dennis Baxley, R-Ocala. ``That's a good way to get shot in the back.''
Baxley said that if people have the clear right to defend themselves without having to worry about the legal consequences, criminals will think twice.
``Some violent rape will not occur because somebody will feel empowered by this bill,'' Baxley said. ``Somebody's child will not be abducted ... you're going to prevent a murder.''
Opponents said the idea will legalize shootouts in the streets.
``This bill creates a wild, wild west out there,'' said Rep. Eleanor Sobel, D-Hollywood.
Bush, who has championed tougher penalties for people convicted of using guns in crimes, said he believed the measure was a good idea.
``I'm comfortable that the bill is a bill that relates to self- defense,'' Bush said. ``It's a good, commonsense, anti- crime issue.''
The measure makes it clear in state law what courts have generally ruled in Florida - that there's no duty to retreat before fighting back if you're in your home, workplace or car.
But it also extends the right outside the home, saying that ``a person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked in any other place where he or she has a right to be, has no duty to retreat.''
The bill says that person has ``the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so, to prevent death or great bodily harm to himself or herself or another.''
The sponsor, Baxley, also led the failed legislative effort to keep Terri Schiavo alive by blocking the removal of her feeding tube - and decried a growing ``culture of death.''
``For a House that talks about the culture of life, it's ironic that we would be devaluing life in this bill,'' said Rep. Dan Gelber, D-Miami Beach. ``You are telling people when they are in the midst of an emotional moment ... you can stand your ground until death happens.''
Baxley and other supporters, however, said the measure brings Florida in line with the law of much of the land. Alan Korwin, an author of several books on gun laws and papers defending gun ownership, said the right to use a gun for self-defense in most situations is ``longstanding law that's well established.''
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Great, Great Grandmother Shoots Robbery Suspect
POSTED: 1:32 pm EDT April 14, 2005
UPDATED: 5:47 pm EDT April 14, 2005
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- A 64-year-old great, great grandmother behind the counter at a Westside convenience store knew when to do when an masked robber came in Thursday afternoon and fired two shots: she grabbed her gun and shot back.
"It scared the hell out of me. It really did," Janet Grammar said. "He shot twice at the back, past behind my head and he was getting ready to shoot me in my head. I had a gun under the counter, and I pulled it out and shot him in the chest."
Grammar told investigators she was pretty sure she hit him twice, and police found a blood trail and a gun in the Apple Gate Food Store. The suspect managed to run from the scene, prompting an intense search that included a helicopter and K-9 units and caused a brief lockdown of Wesconnett Elementary School, just across the street.
The search was cancelled with the suspect showed up less than an hour later at the emergency room of Orange Park Medical Center, police said. The suspect, who police have not named, was stabilized and flown by air ambulance to Shands-Jacksonville Medical Center.
The Apple Gate's owner said the store has been robbed three time in the last two weeks, and he think this suspect is the same man who's robbed him before.
"She was just defending herself, that was all," customer Charles Schoff said. "I'd probably do the same thing."
Grammar's twin sister, Denise Overstreet, told Channel 4's Dan Leveton she's not surprised her sister wasn't intimidated by an armed, masked man.
"She's not scared of her own shadow, let's put it that way," Overstreet said. "Maybe this will wake people up and maybe not come to this little store -- a mean lady works there."
There's no word on the condition of the suspect or what charges he'll be facing.
http://www.news4jax.com/news/4379897/detail.html
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Hi all,
here's more information about John Bolton's role at the Small Arms Conference (and about this conference itself) that I've found recently:
US v UN
Tuesday, August 7, 2001
Bypassing U.S. Voters
Rejected by the American electorate, antigun groups find themselves at home at the U.N.
Read about it: National Review
Mr. Kopel is research director at the Independence Institute.
August 3, 2001 9:10 a.m.
Editor?s note: This is the third installment in an NRO series on the United Nations Conference on Small Arms (the previous installment: #2).
Rejected by the electorate last November, American gun prohibition found the United Nations Conference on Small Arms to be the friendliest of venues.
Appalled by the Bush administration's insistence that the U.N. conference not become a springboard for the destruction of Second Amendment rights, a coalition of antigun groups organized a demonstration outside the U.N. during the conference. In conjunction the demonstration, the groups released a joint letter stating that the conference proved the necessity of additional antigun laws in the U.S. The groups included the Children's Defense Fund (an anti-welfare reform group), the Brady Campaign (formerly known as Handgun Control, Inc., formerly known as the National Council to Control Handguns), Physicians for Social Responsibility, "Million" Mom March chapters, and various other local groups. The letter read: "The Cold War is over, but the international community is suffering from a new source of terror: the glut of small arms and 'civilian' weapons that are seeping from many industrialized nations, through channels both legal and illegal, to virtually all four corners of the globe."
Note that the very idea of "civilians" owning weapons had to be put in quotation marks.
The "Million" Mom March, hadn't been doing very well before the UN met. The group had trouble getting attendance into three digits at its last Washington rally, turned out to be a political liability for Al Gore and many other candidates, had to lay off 30 of its 35 staff, was kicked out of its free office space in San Francisco General Hospital when it was discovered that the space was obtained by fraud, and finally ended up being absorbed into the Brady Campaign, unable to exist as a viable separate organization. But at the U.N., the group's leader, pretending that she represented and strong, independent grassroots organization, won a standing ovation from the delegates.
And if the group could claim that 850,000 people showed up at its Washington rally in May 2000 (when the true size, based on D.C. transit figures and crowd photos, was 100,000 or less) why not increase the mathematical fiction? So the "Million" Mom March now claims to be an organization representing a "Billion" mothers worldwide. As if a billion women have even heard of this failed US group.
But the U.N. made its support for the "Billion" prohibitionist movement clear. The press conference announcing the new group was run by U.N. Under-Secretary-General Jayantha Dhanapala, head of the U.N. Department of Disarmament. Dhanapala called the group "vital" to global disarmament, and urged the billion/million members to act "through their legislatures and governments to ensure that the program of action is in fact implemented."
The anti-Bush demonstration featured five huge ugly puppets representing the United Kingdom, US, Russia, China, and France, created by the U.S. gun-prohibition group Silent March. (Apparently the fact that the U.K. and France were working hard for Silent March's agenda wasn't enough to get in the way of some mean-spirited street theater.) The U.S. puppet, resembling President Bush, wore a gaudy Uncle Sam hat and a necklace of bullets, and was smoking a cigar that on closer inspection was also a bullet. The puppet sported an "NRA" sticker, and the sign worn by the person holding this puppet read: "US: Puppet of Gun Lobby?"
Silent March revealed a lot about its overall political orientation when it decided that dressing somebody up like Uncle Sam was an insult.
The conference provided an opportunity for several international groups have come out of the closet on their antigun stance. For years Amnesty International has organized and coordinated international antigun work, but has insisted that it is doing nothing to promote gun control. But at the Conference, Amnesty International USA Executive Director William F. Schulz said, "Gun trafficking is a critical human rights issue around the world, but the problem begins at home." He blamed "Loose gun regulation ? in [countries such as] the USA, Russia or Liberia."
"Should human rights abusers be given arms?" asked Amnesty International, although the group had nothing to say about arms for people resisting human-rights abuses.
The International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) is the global consortium of antigun non-government organizations (NGOs). The IANSA site happens to be hosted on the website of Oxfam, a world hunger group with wide-ranging hard left agenda. Save the Children and World Vision also complained about the U.S. position at the conference ? revealing the strong leftist tilt that careful observers have seen in these organizations in recent years ? but which has, discretely, not been publicized to the organizations' American donor base.
July 16 of the conference featured two hours of speeches by anti-gun groups, plus a half-hour for pro-rights organizations. The gun prohibition forces claimed to be motivated by saving innocent lives, but their rhetoric showed much more interest in stopping guns than in saving lives. In case of a conflict, they clearly preferred the former to the latter.
Neil Arya of Physicians for Global Survival in Canada asserted that physicians don't care where a shooting was the result of a suicide, accident or homicide, or whether the shooter was a gangster, a soldier, or a law-abiding gun owner. In other words, his group sees no distinction between a gangster murdering a robbery victim, a victim saving her life by shooting the gangster, a Nazi soldier shooting a Jew, and an American soldier shooting a Nazi soldier.
A press release from Silent March complained that the U.S. had "rejected a call for states to stop arming guerrillas in other countries." The press release came after Undersecretary Bolton had explained that the U.S. objected to the provision because it would prevent aid to groups which were resisting genocide. Silent March promotes itself as a humanitarian group concerned about gun death, but this concern apparently vanishes when the victims are being murdered by governments.
This is the moral upside-down world of the United Nations culture, in which victims who resist genocide, and governments which help the victims resist, are condemned as immoral.
The gun prohibition groups also talked a lot about the need to keep guns out of the hands of "children." These demands who not limited to keep guns out of the hands of child soldiers. Rather, the groups were following Hillary Clinton's position that children and guns shouldn't even be in the same sentence. U.S. gun-prohibition groups have been long at work to frighten parents into not allowing children to participate in the shooting sports, and to enact gun licensing laws that prohibit young people from hunting or target shooting, even under immediate parental supervision. (For example, in New Jersey, it's a felony to take your ten-year-old to a target range and let the child use a Red Ryder BB gun while you supervise.)
Stymied in free elections in the United States, the gun-prohibition lobbies in 1998 turned to the courts, filing meritless suits against gun manufacturers, with the hope of imposing de facto prohibition through bankruptcy. As the lawsuit strategy falls apart, gun-prohibition groups now seek their victory through international law. The further that the locus of decision moves from democratic, American control, the better the chances for success of the prohibition movement.
US v UN
Monday, July 30, 2001
Score One For Bush
The United Nations "small arms" conference has concluded, with no immediate damage done to individual rights - thanks to the "hard-line position" of the Bush Administration.
Read about it: National Review
The United Nations "small arms" conference has concluded, with no immediate damage done to individual rights ? thanks to the magnificent performance of the Bush administration. But the conference will be back five years hence, and the next five years will see continued efforts by the United Nations to find ways to undermine the right to keep and bear arms.
The beginning of the conference on July 9 was commemorated with the celebration of the U.N.'s "Small Arms and Light Weapons Destruction Day." Around the world, governments made huge piles of firearms ? not firearms owned by the government, but rather firearms seized by the government from other people.
Even more enthusiastic promotion of Destruction Day could be found at the website of the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA), a collection of antigun non-governmental organizations (NGOs) ? and also the best web source of documents relating to the Conference.
Of course guns meant for destruction could simply be crushed ? but mere crushing would not excite the special symbolism of destruction by burning. Destruction by burning provides the spectators the joy of watching the burning take place slowly. That is one reason why heretics were often burned at the stake rather than executed in a less time-consuming way.
July 9 was not the first time that governments had lit bonfires to destroy resistance to the power of the government. Germany's Josef Goebbels ordered all Jewish books to be burned in public on May 10, 1933.
University towns were centers of Jewish Books Destruction Day.
As the V?lkischer Beobachter ("Populist Observer") reported on May 12, 1933, "The German student body of the Berlin universities assembled yesterday for a torchlight procession on Hegel Platz. They formed up, accompanied by a truckload of 25,000 books and writings harmful to the people. The procession ended at Opera Platz, where as a symbolic act, these Un-German writings were set aflame on a pile of logs."
The burning of Jewish and un-German books was followed within a few years by the burning of Jews and other un-German people. Jewish Books Destruction Day helped change popular consciousness so as to pave the way for genocide. Likewise paving the way for genocide was the systematic disarmament of Jews and all other opposition elements, in Nazi Germany itself and in conquered territories.
How long until a U.N.-declared official day of hate is celebrated with governments actually killing people?
That day has already come. The U.N.'s Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention (UNDCP) has declared that every June 26 shall be celebrated as United Nations's International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Drug Trafficking. June 26 is the anniversary of the signing of the declaration at 1987 International Conference on Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. The declaration is the basis for the U.N.'s 1988 Convention Against the Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychoactive Substances.
This treaty commits its signatories, including the United States, to maintaining a policy of domestic prohibition.
As I'll detail in upcoming columns, the long-term objective of many at the Small Arms Conference was to replicate the success of their predecessors at the Drugs and Psychoactive Substances Conference ? creating an international regime of prohibition, enforced not only by individual governments, but by transnational power ? and explicitly designed to destroy the freedom of individual governments to choose to change their prohibition laws in the future.
So China celebrated U.N. drug hate day by executing 59 drug criminals. Although the Chinese Communist government asserts that all the executed are "drug traffickers," Amnesty International has shown otherwise. In one case, a young woman was returning to her home province from her honeymoon in January 1996. An acquaintance offered to pay her to carry a package for him, as is common in China. On the train, she became suspicious, and attempted to open the package, but could not. A ticket checker noticed her agitation, and notified the police. The Guangxi High People's Court sentenced her to death on June 26, 1996, in honor of U.N. Anti-Drug Day.
At a 2001 press conference, U.N. deputy spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva was asked about China's execution festival. While acknowledging that "as far as I am aware the convention does not provide for the application of the death penalty," the U.N. spokesman did not criticize the Chinese executions.
According to Harry Wu's Laogai Research Foundation, Chinese doctors are required to promptly harvest organs whenever a group of anti-drug executions is scheduled. Kidneys, other organs, and even skin are sold for as much as $15,000.
Colombia, Afghanistan, and other nations held events in conjunction with the U.N. which did not involve any executions, but instead dedicated the day to fireworks and various forms of anti-drug propaganda.
What does the future hold as "Small Arms and Light Weapons Destruction Day" on July 9 works its way onto the U.N. holiday calendar? Will the mass burning of weapons help set the stage for mass executions of "gun traffickers"? Will the U.N. sponsor events around the world designed to reinforce fears about small arms, and to forestall dissent about small-arms prohibition? Regardless of whether one likes or dislikes the U.N. anti-drug program, it provides the tested blueprint for a long-term U.N. program against guns.
Already, the public-relations effort to equate guns and drugs has begun. The U.N. Development Program announced that drugs are the largest illicit business in the world, and arms trafficking is second. At the Small Arms Conference, Durga P. Bhattarai of Nepal expressed the commonly held view that (non-government) guns were as pernicious as drugs, as he asserted that guns turn children into "addicted killers."
Back in the U.S., Second Amendment activists declared July 9 to be National Firearms Purchase Day, urging citizens to buy small arms or small-arms ammunition.
As July 9 approached, hundreds of American sent the U.N. angry e-mails, protesting the upcoming small-arms conference. The U.N. adopted a two-fold approach: 1. Turning many of the e-mails over to its security office, apparently under the theory that anyone who holds strong opinions on Second Amendment rights must be dangerous ? even though not one of the letters made a threat.
2. Producing a press release claiming that the conference posed no threat to law-abiding gun owners. The last claim was a patent falsehood, although of much the American media took the U.N.'s public-relations arm at its word, and failed to observe the massive evidence that restricting domestic-gun ownership was very much an intended purpose of the conference.
The two-week conference was the result of General Assembly Resolution 54/54, adopted Dec. 15, 1999. According to the U.N. itself, the conference "was convened to address the increasing threat to human security from the spread of small arms and light weapons and their illegal trade." Note that "illegal trade" is only one part of the threat. "The spread of small arms" is considered a threat in itself.
At the conference, speaker after speaker made it clear that "excessive" quantities of guns (i.e., any guns in civilian hands) was a problem in itself, separate from the issue of illegal trade. Rey Pagtakhan, the Canadian secretary of state, condemned "The excessive and destabilizing accumulation and uncontrolled spread of small arms."
Ireland's U.N. delegate declared, "States must stop exporting of small arms and light weapons to all except other governments. All states must suppress private ownership of small arms and light weapons."
Yemen's Abdalla Saleh Al-Ashtal explained: "The goal is to prevent any further increase in the traffic in small arms. It is a problem which relates not only to the illicit trade, but to all issues connected with the legal trade." He touted the situation in Yemen, where "individuals voluntarily surrender their weapons. The media is used to convince people to hand over their weapons."
Burchell Whiteman, Minister of Education, Youth and Culture of Jamaica called guns and drugs "a double-barreled force of evil and mayhem." Since the imposition of Jamaican gun prohibition in the 1970s, the Jamaican government has used gun and drug prohibition as justifications for eliminating almost all privacy and due-process elements of the common-law legal tradition.
"The time has come," Jamaica's minister continued, "for the international community, particularly States which manufacture arms, to consider the implementation of measures that would limit the production of such weapons to levels that meet the needs for defence and national security." In other words, Jamaica's ban on gun possession by citizens should spread worldwide.
Proposed language required signatory governments to "seriously consider" banning civilian ownership of small arms "designed for military purposes" ? a proposal that would outlaw the M1 carbine, M1 Garand (designed for World War II), many antique firearms (designed for the Civil War), and scores of bolt-action rifles (designed for World War I). Since almost all guns are derivative of military designs (with a few obscure exceptions such as biathlon trainers), the language would have been a wedge for near-total gun prohibition. The U.N.'s January 9, 2001 " Draft Programme of Action" mandated that: "Where appropriate, moratoria on the production, export and import of small arms and light weapons will be developed and implemented on a regional and subregional basis."
The opening of the conference was marked by the unveiling of The Art of Peacemaking, a five-ton sculpture created by Canadians Sandra Bromley and Wallis Kendal with a subsidy from the Canadian War Museum. The sculpture consists of 7,000 firearms welded together into a giant cube, designed to remind viewers of a tomb or a prison. This sculpture perfectly symbolized the U.N. philosophy of guns: violence comes not from the human heart, but from bad objects, and the duty of the U.N. is to destroy those objects.
The American media blazed with fury that the National Rifle Association was impeding U.N. efforts to control rocket launchers. But the U.N. definition of small arms plainly did include ordinary firearms, and encompassed revolvers, self-loading pistols, ordinary rifles, "assault" rifles, submachine guns, and light machine guns. The "Light weapons" category included heavy machine guns, mortars, hand grenades, grenade launchers, portable anti-aircraft or anti-tank guns, and portable missile launchers.
Notably, Small Arms Destruction Day and the "Art of Peacemaking" sculpture weren't about grenades or rocket launchers; they celebrated the destruction of firearms.
The U.N.'s draft protocol for the conference called for "tighter control over their [firearms and ammunition] legal transfer," for "strengthening current laws and regulation?concerning their use and civilian possession," and for "enhancing accountability, transparency and the exchange of information at the national, regional and global levels." This latter goal (a euphemism for universal gun registration in U.N.-run databases) was to be achieved by "systematic tracking of firearms and, where possible, their parts and components and ammunition from manufacturer to purchaser."
Government-owned firearms were to be explicitly exempted from these controls.
The "European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control, affiliated with the United Nations" was somewhat more explicit:
>Bringing the diffusion of firearms under control is not merely a legal act, it requires to overcome the latent gun culture whose 'virus' is more firmly established in some societies than in others. Unfortunately the propagation of the gun culture is presently well entrenched in the global electronic media. Some non-governmental organisations like the US-based National Rifle Association strategically sponsor the gun culture.
The European Institute called for "obligatory liability insurance" for gun owners, plus an "ammunition tax" and "firearm recycling deposit" ? whose proposed benefits including making guns less affordable. Further, ammunition calibers "5.56 (223), 7.62 (.308), and 9mm would be reserved for the military and police." So "In a period of less than ten years compulsory changes of the calibers of weapons in private possession could be implemented." An ammunition ban "should be acceptable to all nations because it does not directly interfere with national regulations of private ownership of guns."
Likewise pushing for
severe domestic restrictions was the " Eminent Persons Group" (no kidding) consisting of 23 anti-gun busybodies. American members included U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein and Robert McNamara, who followed his tenure as the worst defense secretary (leading the U.S. into what he knew was an unwinnable war in Vietnam) with an even more destructive, albeit quieter, tenure as president of the World Bank, in which he shoveled aid and loans at third-world kleptocracies which used the money to oppress their subject peoples. The indigenous victims of the World Bank/kleptocracy alliance are the kind of people whom the Eminent Persons Group does not want to have guns.
Formally, the conference was only supposed to lead to a nonbinding protocol. But Norway called for a legally binding document. And gun-prohibition advocates insisted that even a nonbinding document have led to a mandatory review of national responses.
In short, the U.N.'s protestations that the conference had nothing to do with American gun possession was true only in the hypertechnical sense that Bill Clinton's claim that he "did not have sex" (meaning sexual intercourse) with Monica Lewinsky was technically true. The point of the conference was to create long-term international pressure for severe restrictions on American gun rights, even though the conference itself would not directly impose those restrictions.
U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan equated small arms to nuclear weapons or chemical warfare weapons ? thus demonizing them, and implying that they should never be in civilian hands. He said that small arms are "'weapons of mass destruction' in terms of the carnage they cause." Annan compared the current campaign against small arms to the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) ? whose objective, of course, is total prohibition. The ICBL, by the way, proclaims that it is about "much more than the eventual elimination of landmines", and is furious at the Bush administration's stance at the U.N. Small Arms Conference.
On July 9, the opening day of the conference, U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton ruined the mood of Small Arms Destruction Day. Bolton's opening statement warned that "the United States will not join consensus on a final document that contains measures abrogating the constitutional right to bear arms."
Bolton added: "The United States believes that the responsible use of firearms is a legitimate aspect of national life ? Like many countries, the United States has a cultural tradition of hunting and sport shooting." He laid down the U.S. position: "We do not support measures that would constrain legal trade and legal manufacturing of small arms and light weapons." Bolton stood against "the promotion of international advocacy activity by international or non-governmental organizations" and against "measures that prohibit civilian possession of small arms."
At a news conference, Bolton explained that the U.S. was eager to deal with actual problems of misuse: "If the conference can concentrate on the central issue of the flow of illicit weapons into agreement. But if it drifts off into areas that are properly the area of national level decision-making, then I think there will be difficulties."
Rep. Bob Barr, a Georgia Republican who also serves on the board of the National Rifle Association, was the only legislator who was an official member of the U.S. delegation. Since the U.S. has the world's strictest controls on arms-broker exports, Barr pointed out that "the U.N. Conference is an effort by its many liberal members to accomplish through the international arena what they and other gun-control advocates have been unable to achieve domestically expanded registration and control of lawful, non-military firearms. If these nations are serious about combating illegal firearms trafficking, they should strengthen their export laws to parallel those of the United States, instead of attacking our nation's Second Amendment rights."
As a measure of how much the 2000 election mattered, consider that when the draft protocol was prepared in December 2000, it was the Colombian and Mexican delegations (!), not the American delegation, which offered optional language recognizing that some countries have legitimate traditions of sporting and other gun use.
Much of the U.S. and world media reacted with horror at the U.S. position. But the Chicago Tribune and Denver Post, newspapers which generally support gun control, did criticize the U.N. Conference for attempting to invade the rights of American citizens.
That Bolton could be criticized so severely for stating that the U.N. should not promote civilian gun prohibition is rather clear proof that that the U.N. agenda really is about gun prohibition.
The United States was denounced by the Toronto Globe & Mail (July 12), asserting that "the purpose of the U.N. initiative is not to take hunting rifles away from American good old boys. It is to stop the international trafficking of machine guns, rocket launchers and other lethal weapons."
To the contrary, the U.N. definition of "small arms" encompasses rifles and pistols. And if the U.N. conference were just about rocket launchers, the conference never would have attracted the support of the U.S. and international gun-prohibition groups or opposition of the U.S. and international gun-rights groups. Bolton in fact argued for a narrower definition, encompassing only military arms.
Besides blasting the U.S. stance, the media trotted out various factoids invented by the United Nations, such as that "small arms" kill a thousand people a day, mostly women and children. (Meaning 300,000 in war, and 200,000 from murder, suicide, and accidents.) Claims were made that half the small arms in the world today are illegally held.
Garnering far less attention were the gun-ownership facts contained in the Small Arms Survey 2001, published by the Graduate Institute of International Studies, and released for the conference. While the study was laden with pro-control advocacy, it reported that almost all small arms killing of civilians is perpetrated by organized crime, pirates/bandits, and rebel groups. Collectively, these groups possess about 900,000 guns ? only two-tenths of one percent of all the small arms in the world. Fifty-six percent of the world's 551 million small arms are held by private citizens, 41% by armies, and 3% by police forces.
In other words, in the world, as in the United States, over 99% of firearms are in the right hands. Firearms misuse is perpetrated almost exclusively by criminals who own a fraction of one percent of all the guns.
If the real objective were to reduce misuse, then nations would follow the lead of the United States, which has extremely strict laws on the export of small arms, including firearms. All firearms made or sold in the U.S. must have registration marks, allowing for tracing. The American export controls are far more rigorous than the controls of the hypocritical nations like the U.K. and Sweden, which impose near-prohibition on their own people, while turning a blind eye towards exports to terrorists and gangsters.
And as in the United States, the misuse of 2/10th of one percent is a pretext for prohibitionists to outlaw everything.
Tony Brown, Executive Director of the pro-rights Canadian Institute for Legislative Action, detailed the obvious falsity of the Kofi Annan's claim that small arms "exacerbate conflict, spark refugee flows, undermine the rule of law, and spawn a culture of violence and impunity. In short, small arms are a threat to peace and development, to democracy and human rights." Brown pointed out:
Canadians citizens own as many as 15 million small arms, one of the highest rates of private firearms ownership in the world?If the simple presence of privately owned small arms sparked violence amongst the citizenry, Canada would be bathed in blood. But it's not. Canada enjoys one of the lowest murder and violent crime rates in the world. Do firearms create international conflict? No. Canadians are privileged to share the longest undefended border in the world with our friend and partner, the United States. . . . Do the presence of so many small arms create poverty? Once again, no. The United Nations has consistently rated Canada, along with Norway and the United States, one of the best places in the world to live. Interestingly, all three countries have very high rates of civilian firearms ownership.
The conference's rhetoric about protecting "women and children" was a pretext for its dominant objective of protecting governments by disarming the governed ? as I'll detail in an upcoming column. The United Nations burns guns in giant bonfires for the same reason that the Nazis burned books in giant bonfires: because people who vigorously exercise the fundamental human rights which are recognized by First and Second Amendment are the kind of people who are difficult to for tyrants ? including a tyranny of the majority ? to control.
Read about it: Washington Times Online
July 6, 2001
Gun rights activists protest arms talks
By Betsy Pisik
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
NEW YORK ?
An outcry by American gun enthusiasts, who fear the United Nations will trample their Second Amendment rights at an upcoming gun conference, has prompted the world body to issue a statement saying it isn't so.
At least 100 letters and e-mails have been received at the U.N. headquarters in recent months, expressing "irate and strongly worded" fears over next week's international conference on small arms.
"The United Nations Charter (Article II, paragraph 7) specifically forbids the U.N. from intervening in matters that are within a member state's domestic jurisdiction," says the fact sheet.
The U.N. fact sheet also stresses that pro-hunting and firearms-safety groups such as the National Rifle Association will be participating in next week's conference, dubbed the U.N. Conference on Small Arms and Light Weapons.
None of the missives received thus far appear threatening to the United Nations or any of its officers, said U.N. Undersecretary General of Disarmament Affairs Jayantha Dhanapala.
Nevertheless, since guns are involved, Mr. Dhanapala said he was taking no chances and had turned over the correspondence to U.N. security for a threat assessment.
"We have had in the weeks leading up to the conference a flow of letters and e-mails from essentially gun rights activists," Mr. Dhanapala told reporters yesterday.
He said that gun owners of other nations were apparently not concerned. "This is an American phenomenon."
Mr. Dhanapala, a disarmament expert from Sri Lanka, carefully refuted the allegations, saying, "we are not looking at the question of domestic gun control as far as crime prevention concerned. ... The legal ownership of guns is not being interfered with."
Representatives from 120 nations and 177 non-governmental organizations will gather in New York starting Monday for the two-week conference to battle the illicit trade in small arms.
The American delegation will include John Bolton, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, who is slated to deliver the U.S. speech from the General Assembly podium.
American gun owners have long regarded the U.N. conference on small arms with suspicion, concerned that foreign diplomats might try to write treaties that would infringe on the U.S. constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
An Internet search of "United Nations" and "Second Amendment" turned up scores of Web sites, most of them framing the discussion as a potential assault on American sovereignty, or an attack on the right to defend self and family.
The letter and e-mail writers were apparently not part of an organized campaign, said U.N. officials, who noted that the missives appeared to be written individually.
Most of them came though a U.N. Web site that features the upcoming conference, www.un.org/events.
July 29, 2001
A stand for principle at the U.N.
Bob Barr
Read about it: Washington Times
The United Nations just concluded a conference on small arms. This conference never should have taken place; but thank goodness it took place under President Bush rather than President Clinton.
In recent weeks, the Bush administration has demonstrated a clear and welcome break from the eroding disrespect shown the Constitution during the Clinton administration. Through a series of statements and policy decisions, and in the face of left-wing criticism from the national media and international community, the new administration has stood in strong defense of law-abiding Americans' Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The new respect for and loyalty to our constitutional freedoms by President Bush comes at an important time; a time when strong leadership is needed to defend the Second Amendment against increasing attacks by the left.
Recently, I had the opportunity to attend the U.N. Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons, as an observer member of the U.S. delegation. The disdain which many in the international community held for America's constitutional freedoms was evident immediately.
Proposals under consideration at the outset of this conference and the speeches that accompanied them sought an internationally enforced system of gun registration, the limitation of personal firearms ownership in member countries, including the United States, and an unprecedented level of power over the way America would be allowed to conduct its foreign affairs.
I firmly believe if this conference had been held just one year ago, the Second Amendment would have been subverted and the U.S. delegation would have caved, in favor of international appeasement or to curry favor with our erstwhile allies intent on diminishing freedom in their countries and whose leaders resent the freedoms enjoyed by our citizens.
Fortunately, to the surprise of many in the international community, who for the last eight years had come to expect appeasement over principle by the United States, the U.S. delegation, led by Undersecretary of State John Bolton, stood firm; refusing to bend America's constitutional principles to further the U.N.'s anti-gun agenda.
The Bush administration told the United Nations it shared the important goal of limiting violence in Third World nations, but instead of infringing on our Constitution, it would be better served encouraging these countries to adopt the same strong export controls already employed by the United States. Rather than working with us on this important, common-sense goal, the international delegates instead reacted with astonishment as to why the U.S. did not recognize, "the need to establish and retain controls on private ownership of these deadly weapons, and the need for preventing sales of such arms to non-state groups." I say to them it is because we finally have an administration that follows principle, rather than appeasement; an administration committed to a representative government, and national freedom, not a one-world government.
The repair needed to restore our Second Amendment principles is extensive, and it is a fight far from over; but thus far it has been met with a consistent and principled commitment by the Bush administration.
The Justice Department, led by Attorney General John Ashcroft, recently reasserted a very basic, common-sense principle that all law-abiding citizens have the right to keep and bear arms; a principle dismissed by the Clinton-Reno Justice Department. Attorney General Ashcroft also broke from Miss Reno in supporting our right to privacy, by moving to destroy the personal records of lawful gun owners after they passed an instant background check. The House of Representatives recently supported this measure, by rejecting a proposal by Democrats to retain personal records on file in government offices for up to 90 days, after it is determined a citizen is not disqualified from purchasing a firearm.
These small, but very important measures should not go unnoticed by those who cherish our constitutional principles. The strong defense of the Second Amendment by the Bush administration is a stark contrast from the last eight years of the Clinton presidency. I commend President Bush and those in his administration for standing firm and hope this principled commitment continues in the coming years. The alternative is to relinquish our constitutional rights to delegates at the United Nations; sacrificing principle over appeasement.
While the document adopted at the U.N. Small Arms Conference should never have come up in the first place, at least it did so during the Bush presidency. Our task now is to keep sufficient light shining on the U.N. to ensure its future actions do not move us backward.
Bob Barr, Georgia Republican, is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives and serves on the House Financial Services, Judiciary, and Government Reform Committees, and is a former federal prosecutor.
I take advantage of the occasion so as to warn that I'll certainly not be present anymore from now on as I will enlist myself in the French Foreign Legion on Monday, as the basic training session last 4 monthes it will be impossible for me to have Internet access during this period.
I made this "announcement" just for a matter of politeness :)
French Cat
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Well, this is one of those raging debates with no clear answers. Should guns be banned? What is gun control? Who gets to decide? Should citizens have the same equilizing force as the police? Should guns be limited to homes and not for carry? And so on and so on...
I remember as a child there was this T.V. movie (Icant remember the name) in which this guy (I think his wife was killed in a supermarket robbery) lobbied and got this town to allow people to carry guns. Its interesting as it covered a few different sides of the spectrum.
And last but not least,
I was once told by a senior LEO (law enforcement officer) that most gunfights take place with the opponents usually/roughly 8 ft from each other. I dont know how true it is.
Im taking this from a post at another site that I thought made an interesting point.
Where to begin?
Ever heard of the Tueller drill?
If you're ever at a range that is outdoor and allows holster draws or are in the field away from people in a safe area to shoot, try this:
Stand facing downrange, pistol in holster.
Have a friend stand behind you facing a clear direction, either right or left of you.
As the friend taps your shoulder and starts to run...draw your pistol and fire a shot at the target downrange.
Your friend stops running as soon as he hears the shot.
Measure off how far he's run...if he is in decent shape it can be as much as 30 feet!
Action is faster than reaction.
Armed with a pistol in a holster, an attacker with a knife can pose a threat as far away as 30'
Some police departments have adopted an 18' rule or a 10' rule...I'm of the opinion it could and should be 30' . tueller advocated 21'.
Keep this in mind whenever you hear someone talk about "equal force".
There was a Police Department in the mid-1980's that involved a deranged homeless guy armed with a Buck 110 and a policeman who shot him...the "equal force" argument was used, his own chief hung him out to dry stating, "None of our police officers should use a firearm to stop a man with a knife."
The name of the department and officer escapes me, but a demonstration of the Tueller drill in the courtroom was instrumental in exonerating him and in changing department policy.
Sgt. Dennis Tueller, Salt Lake City Police published an article "How Close Is Too Close" in SWAT magazine (Survival Weapons and Tactics) 1983.
In this article, he discussed the results of a series of tests he had run.
His tests showed that, with people of various ages, weights, and heights,
they could on average close a distance of 21 feet in about 1.05 seconds.
That time: 1.05 seconds was the "drill time" taught by Col. Jeff
Cooper at GunSite for drawing a handgun and firing two aimed shots. Knowing
that people who have been shot do not always or perhaps even often fall down instantly, or otherwise stop dead in their tracks; Tueller
concluded that a person armed with a knife or club at the so called
"intermediate range" of 21 feet was a potentially lethal threat. The
"Tueller drill" is a standard part of my Personal Protection Course, along with a similar drill I can't tell you about because it only works once.
Mike searson post
So for the Anti-gun people, with the above said, will you now ban any sharp object like knives, screwdrivers, toothpicks? Then what next will you ban. Boots? Will we all have to walk around in linen sandals? Anything sticklike? Brooms, mops, plungers? Hardcover books?
Of course thats a little extreme but I think that there could be a middle ground between the two groups. But then again, most people just like to to disagree and argue about anything. Lol.
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Jayceblk relays:
Sgt. Dennis Tueller, Salt Lake City Police published an article "How Close Is Too Close" in SWAT magazine (Survival Weapons and Tactics) 1983. In this article, he discussed the results of a series of tests he had run. His tests showed that, with people of various ages, weights, and heights, they could on average close a distance of 21 feet in about 1.05 seconds.
That time: 1.05 seconds was the "drill time" taught by Col. Jeff
Cooper at GunSite for drawing a handgun and firing two aimed shots. Knowing that people who have been shot do not always or perhaps even often fall down instantly, or otherwise stop dead in their tracks; Tueller
concluded that a person armed with a knife or club at the so called
"intermediate range" of 21 feet was a potentially lethal threat. The
"Tueller drill" is a standard part of my Personal Protection Course, along with a similar drill I can't tell you about because it only works once.
IMO this is why cross training with a variety of weapons at a variety of ranges is so important. Think the foot jab is a great tool when being rushed, but shooters don't practice it, nor do MA practitioners train it while drawing a practice gun. Think those of us who are accustomed to drifting across curriculums and snagging what works have a leg up, so to speak, on those whose training is more compartmentalized.
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French Cat:
Thank you for that post-- and all the best to you! Happy & healthy hunting.
Crafty Dog
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Well, this is one of those raging debates with no clear answers. Should guns be banned? What is gun control? Who gets to decide? Should citizens have the same equilizing force as the police? Should guns be limited to homes and not for carry? And so on and so on...
IMO guns shouldn't be banned. independant criminologists have made a lot of studies concerning the role of guns about increasing people's safety by dissuading criminals, besides, as the police oftenly need at least between 30 mins/ 1 hour so as to arrive, it becomes obvious that the person who has the most of chances to defend herself efficiently is yourself...
my reaction about people that don't like guns is simple: if they don't like guns, that's ok, if they don't want to carry one, that's ok, but if they want to prevent me to be able to defend myself by banning guns, no.
why those that want to live in a state where guns are banned don't regroup themeselves in a state in which they'll ban guns or make their own laws about weapons, letting those who don't agree with them to live in a state that allow people to own and carry weapons ? that's the best solution I've found...
Crafty Dog:
that's ok for my last post, it gave me the opportunity to inform myself at the same time :)
thanks for your wishes, as we say in France: "bonne continuation !"
that could be translated by "good continuation" but I don't know if this has any meaning in English... anyway, all the best to you too !
French Cat
PS: if someone is curious about what is the French Foreign Legion:
=> http://www.br-legion.com/ang/index.html ;)
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On this day (April 19 ) , , ,
--------------------------------------
This morning in two small towns just outside of Boston government forces
attacked bands of gun owners in an attempt to disarm them and restore public safety. The citizen bands disobeyed lawful orders to surrender their weapons and go back to the safety of their own homes where the government could better protect them.
As expected with so many hotheaded gun owners in one place shots were fired and people were hurt and killed. All of this could have been avoided if the citizens had only surrendered their arms and allowed the government to protect them.
The date was April 19, 1775, and the two small towns were Lexington and
Concord.
====================
On this date in Warsaw, Poland, Nazi authorities decided to finish what they had started in the summer of 1942: the annihilation of all Jews in the
ghetto. Only about 37,000 of the Jewish population's almost 450,000
remained, the rest having been removed to Treblinka and other labor and
death camps. The diseased and starved out population decided that if they were going to die, it might as well be on their feet.
The resistance, armed at first with clubs and Molotov cocktails and small
arms purchased clandestinely from the Polish army, held off the destruction of the ghetto for almost a month. Even then, some of the Z.O.B. (the Jewish Fighting Organization) escaped through the sewers before the Nazis flooded them. They joined other partisan groups and continued their guerilla war.
Today, let's all take a moment to ponder and remember these brave men, women, and children. Imagine how much more effective they might have been if they had not waited until they were starved, diseased, and more than 90% exterminated to resist? Trapped within their prison, they still held the most modern and ruthless military in the world for almost a month.
We should never take the Second Amendment for granted. We must never give up our arms. Every time you see or hear anti self-defense propaganda, remember young Mordecai Anielewicz and his 750 brave fighters. Remember April 19, 1943.
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It's kind of hard to imagine this UK "fad" catching on in a concealed carry state. When criminals know 100 percent of the potential victim pool is disarmed this kind of petty thuggery becomes fairly risk free.
Concern over rise of 'happy slapping' craze
Fad of filming violent attacks on mobile phones spreads
Mark Honigsbaum
Tuesday April 26, 2005
The Guardian
In one video clip, labelled B*tch Slap, a youth approaches a woman at a bus stop and punches her in the face. In another, Knockout Punch, a group of boys wearing uniforms are shown leading another boy across an unidentified school playground before flooring him with a single blow to the head.
In a third, Bank Job, a teenager is seen assaulting a hole-in-the-wall customer while another youth grabs the money he has just withdrawn from the cash machine.
Welcome to the disturbing world of the "happy slappers" - a youth craze in which groups of teenagers armed with camera phones slap or mug unsuspecting children or passersby while capturing the attacks on 3g technology.
According to police and anti-bullying organisations, the fad, which began as a craze on the UK garage music scene before catching on in school playgrounds across the capital last autumn, is now a nationwide phenomenon.
And as the craze has spread from London to the home counties to the north of England, so the attacks have become more menacing, with increasing numbers of violent assaults and adult victims.
In London, British Transport police have investigated 200 happy slapping incidents in the past six months, with eight people charged with attacks at south London stations and bus stops in January alone.
The Metropolitan police have no overall figures but recorded a number of attacks in London boroughs earlier this year.
Following a spate of random attacks last December on pupils at Godolphin and Latymer girls' school in Hammersmith, west London, police posted extra officers in the area as a deterrent.
But as police have become more vigilant, so the gangs have become more sophisticated, seeking victims in parks or public areas where their crimes are unlikely to be spotted by the authorities or captured on CCTV.
Liz Carnell, the director of Bullying Online, a Yorkshire-based charity set up to combat bullying in schools, said that since the start of the year she has heard of increasing attacks both on children and on adults. But she fears many incidents are not reported.
"In most cases the worst that happens is a minor scratch or a bruised ego," she said.
"What the people behind these attacks have to understand is that technically they are committing an assault. And if they then upload the images on to the internet or a phone system they could be prosecuted for harassment."
What makes the attacks all the more bewildering is that many victims do not realise they have been happy slapped until after the event.
Earlier this month James Silver, 34, a freelance journalist, was attacked while jogging on the South Bank in London. While one youth blocked his path, another hit him with a rolled-up magazine.
When he spun around another teenager - who had been hiding behind nearby scaffolding - leapt out and hit him hard in the head. When he staggered to his feet he noticed the rest of the gang were jeering and pointing their mobile phones at him.
Silver admits that while the attack left his "ego smarting" he did not think it worth reporting. "At the end of the day I was unharmed but it was pretty shocking at the time," he said. "The worry is that while the bulk of the attacks are trivial, some of these youths could be carrying knives."
Earlier this year, schools in Lewisham, south London, and St Albans banned camera phones because of worries that the fad was leading to an increase in playground bullying.
In a comment recently posted on a London community web forum, "Happyslapper2" described the craze as a "joke", writing: "If you feel bored wen ur about an u got a video phone den b*tch slap sum norman, innit."
However, in a sign of a gathering backlash, other forum members disagreed. "It's hardly a joke ... it's f*ckin rude and pea-brained," wrote "slappersidiots".
"If this happy slapping fad continues it will only be a matter of time before someone is seriously hurt," predicted another.
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A subtle point made in this piece has to do with the folly of making concealed carry permitees (CCP) repeatedly unholster and reholster their weapon. Many accidental discharges (AD) are caused by un- and re-holstering, but as a feel good measure CCPs often have to remove their firearms, potentially resulting in ADs far more dangerous than keeping the firearm holstered in the first place.
Armed pilots
Posted by David Hardy ? 28 April 2005 12:28 PM
Times magazine has an interesting article on armed airline pilots, noting that they are now making more flights than are air marshals!
In his state of the union address, President Bush singled out federal air marshals?undercover armed agents who fly on U.S. airlines?for helping make "our homeland safer." But he neglected to mention a flying security force that has quietly grown even larger than the marshals: the nation's pilots. Two years ago, the Federal Flight Deck Officer program began training pilots who wanted to carry guns on flights to protect the cockpit.
Aviation sources tell Time that more than 4,000 pilots are authorized to carry guns, and each day they fly armed on more flights than do air marshals. The gun-toting pilots, who fly unidentified, now constitute the fourth-largest federal law-enforcement group in the U.S. Pilots in the program, as well as the Transportation Security Administration (tsa), which runs it, claim it has been a big success.
Rather humorous, considering the massive TSA resistance to the idea when it first came up. Here's a recent (yesterday's Congressional Quarterly) story on how it's still resisting....
Guns in Cockpits Program Still Half Cocked, Some Say
By Caitlin Harrington
CQ Homeland Security Daily
April 27. 2005
Two years after the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) launched a program to train pilots to carry guns in the cockpit, critics say lingering problems with the Federal Flight Deck Officer (FFDO) program still discourage pilots from participating.
Since the program's inception in 2003, pilots groups have expressed frustration with TSA policies on gun storage and identification. The policies, they say, put the safety of deputized pilots at risk and run contrary to the intent of Congress, which wanted as many pilots as possible to participate.
"They've created a program that is so unfriendly that tens of thousands of pilots have changed their mind about volunteering," said David Mackett, president of the Airline Pilots Security Alliance (APSA), a group formed after the Sept. 11 attacks to lobby for the arming of pilots.
The Department of Homeland Security's inspector general is investigating the program.
APSA estimates that only about 4,000 pilots have been trained and deputized - a fraction of the approximately 95,000 commercial pilots in the country. APSA estimates about 50,000 pilots who were initially interested in the program changed their minds after learning about certain TSA policies.
TSA defends the program, which has been widely praised by both Democrats and Republicans as a cost-effective deterrent to hijackings. The agency continues to deputize more pilots every week, said TSA spokeswoman Amy Von Walter.
But critics say participation would be greater if TSA changed some of its policies.
One of the most controversial requires pilots to store their guns in boxes whenever they are not in the cockpit. Both APSA and the Air Line Pilots Association, the nation's largest pilots union, say it is far safer to carry the gun in a holster at all times than to frequently transfer it to and from a box.
As it stands, a pilot might have to handle a loaded gun up to 10 times a day, APSA says.
Pilots have also raised concerns about the plastic cards that identify them as federal flight deck officers. They say they need to be able to hold up a shiny badge to prove their credibility if an incident occurs on an airplane. They also say they sometimes run into problems carrying guns at the security checkpoints because they do not have a badge.
TSA chief David M. Stone told The Washington Post earlier this month that "one or two" pilots authorized to carry guns have been put on the TSA's selectee list in the past year. Selectees are singled out for additional screening at checkpoints.
DeFazio Goes Forward
Rep. Peter A. DeFazio, D-Ore., was expected to offer a package of aviation security amendments to the first homeland security authorization bill on Thursday evening, including a provision designed to fix some of the problems with the FFDO program.
"We need to enhance their ability to [protect passengers] by removing any obstacle that discourages otherwise willing pilots from being trained and armed," he said.
"The FFDO program has been successful, but I believe it would see more participation if improvements were made," DeFazio said.
His bill would require DHS to issue badges to deputized pilots; set up a program to allow pilots to carry guns in holsters rather than in a lockbox; and make it easier for pilots to get the training required to become deputized.
Pilots groups have also voiced concern that federal flight deck officers are not allowed to carry guns on international flights, and say that there need to be more training facilities in the event more pilots decide to join. Today, all federal flight deck officers are trained in Artesia, N.M.
DHS' inspector general is investigating the training procedures and efficacy of the program, and is expected to release a report in June.
"TSA dropped the ball in a big way, and that's basically why we have the shell of the program that we should have," Mackett said.
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About the happy slapping thing.
Nothing new about that. When I was in my 20's the thugs/gangs of the neighborhood used to play knockout (theyd pick a memeber of the group and hed have to punch some innocent passerby as hard as he could in an attempt to knock him out) in the area. They also traveled in groups of 10 and up.
I knew alot of them from the neighborhood so it never happend to me but Ive seen them and others at a distance doing it. I used to tell them all "Someday your going to hit the wrong person who will not only not go down but will probably pull out and blow a hole in you one by one." which they then went through a round of what they would do to said person.
My only point is literally this, most of these kids are punks. They attack lone travelers or those who they consider the weak. However being thatthye travel in large groups they will occasionaly dare someone to take on a harder looking target and goad them into it. That could be anybody here. All the martial arts in the world might not help you against 15 to 20 drug crazed teenage punks bent on hurting you. Whetehr you carry or not, sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.
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Hi all,
as you can see I'm back... I've eventually decided to quit, those who are curious can ask me why if they want, no problem
a friend of mine sent me more informations about John Bolton and the UN Conference, so I post it here as usual ;)
U.N. Out of North America
The Small Arms Conference and the Second Amendment.
Mr. Kopel is research director at the Independence Institute.
August 9, 2001 10:00 a.m.
Editor?s note: This is the fifth installment in an NRO series on the United Nations Conference on Small Arms (the previous installment: #4).
This is not the end. This is the opening skirmish of a war," announced retired Rep. Charles Pashayan (R., Calif., 1979-91), a U.S. delegate to the July 2001 U.N. Small Arms Conference. Pashayan warned that issues of restricting private ownership of firearms, and of banning gun sales to persons not authorized by a government (e.g., freedom fighters), would return, even though they were defeated at the conference.
As he explained: "All of this has to be understood as part of a process leading ultimately to a treaty that will give an international body power over our domestic laws."
U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) didn't like the conference's results either. But she did agree with Pashayan that the battle was just beginning: "[T]he Conference is the first step, not the last, in the international community`s efforts to control the spread of small arms and light weapons."
The U.S.'s biggest loss came when it acceded to demands for a follow-up conference within five years. John Bolton, head of the American delegation, noted that the mandatory follow-up "serves only to institutionalize and bureaucratize this process" ? which is precisely what the gun prohibitionists wanted. At the next round, there will be pressure to replace this year's non-binding Programme of Action with a legally binding Convention. And the European Union has already begun pushing for legal strictures.
In the meantime, the U.N. and related institutions will continue their propaganda campaign against gun owners. The Canadian antigun lobby, for example, is using a recent UNICEF report to demand a tightening of Canada's already severe gun-storage laws. (Canadian law now requires that firearms stored anywhere near a child must be kept unloaded and locked. Prohibitionists are further demanding that all guns be stored at police stations, to be checked out when needed for sport.) The Coalition for Gun Control touts a requirement that all guns be sold with a trigger lock.
Small Arms Destruction Day, on July 9, is just one gun-hate celebration to emerge from the Conference. The antigun NGOs have declared July 11 to be Children and Small Arms Day. Pro-rights activists responded by declaring July 9 to be Buy a Gun Day ? July 11 ought to become Take a Child Shooting Day.
One function of the propaganda war is to portray guns as germs, and gun owners as disease carriers. The World Health Organization, a U.N. body, will play a major role in promoting intolerance against gun owners. Speaking at the Small Arms Conference, Etienne Krug, Director of WHO's Department for Injuries and Violence Prevention, claimed: "The ready availability of small arms has been associated with higher small arms-related mortality rates."
But this is just plain false. In both the United States and the United Kingdom, for example, the regions with the highest gun ownership rates tend to have the lowest gun homicide rates. And, more generally, Krug's focus on "small arms-related mortality rates" cleverly ignores total death rates. In this century, genocide by government is the overwhelming cause of violent death ? far ahead even of deaths from war. Genocide is perpetrated almost exclusively against groups that have first been disarmed. Therefore, it is the absence of firearms that bears a strong association with astronomical rates of violent death ? as detailed in the new book Death by Gun Control, by Aaron Zelman and Richard Stevens (forthcoming this fall from Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership). Moreover, cross-national research by Jeffrey Miron of Boston University finds that prohibition of handguns, or of all guns, has a statistically significant relation to higher homicide rates.
Nevertheless, Krug made it clear that WHO is just beginning its antigun work. New reports will gather data to marshal the case against small arms, and the WHO has already funded a "Weapons for Development" program to pay individuals (but not governments) to surrender their firearms. The Solomon Islands have been one target of this program; Niger is next.
Also joining the campaign is the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), based in Cambridge, Mass. Their antigun "medical" conference is slated for Sept. 28-30 in Helsinki. Among the speakers will be Mr. Jo?o Honwana ? chief of the Conventional Weapons Branch of the U.N. Department for Disarmament Affairs.
Opponents of American sovereignty complain that the United States "isolated" itself by stopping the Small Arms Conference from becoming a springboard for disarming freedom fighters (and everyone else not on a government payroll). It's true that the United States took a lonely position by defending the fundamental human right to keep and bear arms. (Although there was tacit support ? for economic rather than ideological reasons ? from Russia, China, and Arab countries, all of which export arms.) But such isolation is a sign of courage, not bad diplomacy.
Under the Reagan administration, for instance, the U.S. often stood alone at the U.N. when supporting democratic Israel, or when condemning Communist human-rights abuses. So long as America stands for the principle behind the Declaration of Independence ? that the only legitimate governments are created by the people to protect God-given human rights ? we will never be popular at a United Nations where dictatorships are the majority, and to which even democratic governments go to evade public accountability.
As detailed by the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute the U.N. has become a haven for radical social planners seeking to impose their will, free of public scrutiny.
For instance: Days before the Small Arms Conference opened, newspapers reported on the public discussions at a U.N. Conference on HIV/AIDS. More significantly, however, was the "intense debate . . . taking place in basement conference rooms about the very nature of human sexuality, and whether or not the U.N. should promote the complete transformation of sexual norms."
Guidelines created in 1998 by the U.N. High Commissioner on Human Rights favor "penalties for vilification of people who engage in same-sex relationships." Such a provision would make priests, ministers, or rabbis into criminals, simply for reading aloud what the Bible says about homosexuality.
The Sixth Amendment guarantees that any person accused of a crime has the right "to be confronted with the witnesses against him." But the U.N. Guidelines would allow people to "bring cases under pseudonym."
Americans almost unanimously oppose forcing children to view pornography ? but the U.N. Guidelines demand mandatory homosexual education for children, with the proviso that the education be so explicit that it be exempted from "censorship or obscenity laws." The U.N. Guidelines also require the legalization of homosexual marriage.
Strong objections ? especially from Islamic nations ? prevented the Conference agreement from including the U.N. Guidelines in the Draft Declaration of Commitment. Ireland, through its membership in the European Union, argued in favor of adopting the Guidelines ? which would have allowed European courts to impose them as binding law within Ireland.
Section 41 of the Irish Constitution requires the Irish government to "to guard with special care the institution of Marriage." But, at the U.N., Ireland could promote a radical transformation of marriage. The weekly Irish Catholic newspaper exposed the delegation's activities, only to be met with implausible denials from the Irish government.
As C-FAM's report on the incident concludes, there are "worries that this pattern will be repeated in many of the other states now seeking membership in the EU, states including Malta, Poland, and the Czech Republic. The EU will provide an opportunity for these countries' elites, who are usually more liberal than average citizens, to change their own constitutions without the consent of their own people."
As the Irish case illustrates, the U.N. is an ideal forum for governments to surreptitiously impose policies they could never impose through national, representative institutions. This is one reason why U.S. gun- prohibition groups reacted with such fury to the Bush administration's stance at the U.N. Small Arms Conference.
The U.S. delegation consistently rejected efforts at "compromise," which would have kept some antigun language in the treaty, but made it softer and ambiguous. An American delegation that was terrified of being "isolated" would have accepted the ambiguous language ? on the theory that Americans could later apply a pro-rights interpretation to the ambiguities. The Bush delegation was wiser: It recognized that, at the U.N., a conference final document is just a starting point. From there, U.N. bureaucrats will "monitor" how a country "complies" with such documents, and the bureaucrats resolving the ambiguities will favor their own radical agendas. The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, for example, is being reinterpreted by U.N. bureaucrats in ways never agreed to by the governments that signed the convention.
The U.N.'s assault on Second Amendment rights is merely one aspect of a far-reaching attack on nearly every aspect of the American Bill of Rights. Consider, for example, the U.N. World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, scheduled for Aug. 31-Sept. 7 in Durban, South Africa. A U.N.-convened "expert seminar" on anti-racism remedies came up with the following standards for acceptable anti-racism laws:
First, "the highest priority should be given" to "reparations" for "descendants of slaves." (Don't expect that this clause will lead to African governments ? successors to those governments which profited most from the slave trade, by supplying captured enemies for sale to European traders ? to send money to African Americans.)
Additionally, the premise of "innocent until proven guilty" is not acceptable to the United Nations. The U.N. seminar insists that "In allegations of racial discrimination, the onus of proof must rest with the respondent to rebut the allegation made by the victim of racism."
Commendably, the Bush administration is considering boycotting the conference, or downgrading its delegation, in part because of Arab efforts to have Zionism proclaimed a form of racism.
The Small Arms Conference helped alert Americans to the nature of the U.N. threat. Yet while dangers to gun rights, property rights, and family rights are becoming well known among pro-freedom activists, the U.N.'s campaigns against due process and free speech have remained more obscure. La Verkin, Utah, recently declared itself a U.N.-free zone ? forbidding U.N. symbols on city property, stating that U.N. orders are invalid in La Verkin, and banning city contracts with businesses that work with the U.N. The "U.N.-free zone" movement is backed by a group called U.N. Watch, which provides cities with model language.
U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard responded: "I would just hope that the people of La Verkin would see the United Nations for what it really is ? an intergovernmental organization working for the betterment of humankind, and not a threat to the people of La Verkin." He's right ? if you consider the Bill of Rights to be an impediment to the betterment of mankind.
American grassroots groups are just beginning to educate the American people about the efforts of foreign tyrants to disarm them. The Tyranny Response Team, in conjunction with the Second Amendment Sisters, Gun Owners of America, and other groups, staged a protest at the U.N. on July 14. The Heritage Foundation's U.N. Assessment Project ? concerned with U.N. attacks on American sovereignty, and on the Bill of Rights ? plans to seek official NGO status at the U.N., to obtain a better platform to speak for liberty, and to warn Americans about U.N. activities. A Heritage Foundation conference on the U.N. is scheduled for September, in Washington. In Congress, H.R. 1146, the American Sovereignty Restoration Act, would end U.S. membership in the United Nations.
George Washington never saw a United Nations conference, but he knew enough about human nature to see the dangers of all that the U.N. represents. Washington's Farewell Address urged: "Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government."
U.N. Gives Tyranny a Hand
Dictatorships are using the U.N. to promote the firearms policies of Hitler.
Mr. Kopel is research director at the Independence Institute.
August 6, 2001 2:25 p.m.
Editor?s note: This is the fourth installment in an NRO series on the United Nations Conference on Small Arms (the previous installment: #3).
At the U.N. Small Arms Conference, Iran took the lead in promoting a ban on weapons supplies to non-states. The "non-state actors" clause would require vendors "to supply small arms and light weapons only to governments, or to entities duly authorized by government." This would make it illegal, for example, to supply weapons to the Kurds or religious minorities in Iran, in case Iranian persecution or genocide drove them to rebellion. Had the provision been in effect in 1776, the sale of firearms to the American Patriots would have been prohibited.
Had the clause been in effect during World War II, the transfer of Liberator pistols to the French Resistance, and to many other resistance groups, would have been illegal.
The United States stood firm against this clause, rejecting "compromise" efforts to revise the language, or to insert it into the preamble of the Program of Action. Although Canada pushed hard on this point, the U.S. delegation would not relent. U.S. Undersecretary of State John Bolton pointed out that the proposal "would preclude assistance to an oppressed non-state group defending itself from a genocidal government."
Bolton's statement, by the way, reflects the enormous contribution that Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership has made to gun debate, through historical research demonstrating the victim disarmament is the sine qua non of genocide.
More recent research by constitutional attorney Stephen Halbrook has detailed how the Nazi regime used firearms-control laws, enacted by the democratic Weimar Republic, to disarm potential opponents of the regime, and to facilitate the persecution of Jews.
U.N. Deputy Secretary General Louise Frechette (of Canada) explained that in some parts of the world, an AK-47 could be obtained for $15 or a bag of grain. Small-arms "proliferation erodes the authority of legitimate but weak governments,'' she complained.
U.S. delegate Faith Whittlesey (ambassador to Switzerland, under Reagan) replied that the U.N. "non-state actors" provision "freezes the last coup. It favors established governments, while taking away rights from individuals. It does not recognize any value higher than peace, such as liberty."
According to the U.N., any government with a U.N. delegation is a "legitimate" government. This U.N. standard directly conflicts with the Declaration of Independence, which states that the only legitimate governments are those "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed."
In a letter to the New York Times, answering a Times editorial criticizing the U.S. for not allowing the conference to be used as a tool to disarm civilians, Whittlesey elaborated:
The highest priority of freedom-loving people is liberty, even more than peace. The small arms you demonize often protect men, women and children from tyranny, brutality and even the genocide too frequently perpetrated by governments and police forces. The world's numerous dictators would be delighted to stem the flow of small arms to indigenous freedom fighters and civilians alike to minimize any resistance.. . .
The right of individual self-defense in the face of criminal intimidation and government aggression is a deeply held belief of the American people dating back to 1776, when small arms in the hands of private individuals were the means used to secure liberty and independence.
The United Nations Conference on Small Arms was held in a room where a large poster proclaimed: "SMALL ARMS KILL WOMEN & CHILDREN." (Meanwhile, the U.N. propaganda office and its accomplices in the U.S. media claimed that there was no antigun agenda at the conference.) The U.N. says that small arms kill 500,000 people a year: 300,000 in war, and another 200,000 from murder, suicide, and accidents. Put aside, the fact that most war deaths are caused by governments, which wouldn't be disarmed under the U.N. program. Also put aside questions about whether the U.N. antigun program would really disarm murderers. And forget the topic of whether antigun laws might reduce gun suicides or gun accidents, but would save few, if any, lives ? since self-destructive people have many potential tools available.
Let us assume that the U.N. antigun program ? which, as I detailed in a previous column, is a program for slow-motion disarmament of everyone except the government ? would save every single one of those 500,000 lives.
Now, compare those half-million annual deaths with the 170 million civilians (not soldiers) who were murdered by governments in the first nine decades of the last century, as detailed by University of Hawaii political scientist Rudy Rummel.
Given that democide ? Rummel's term for mass murders by government ? appears to be confined almost exclusively to regimes which have attempted to disarm their victims, it is reasonable to conclude that if every man and woman on this planet had owned a working firearm and ammunition, many ? perhaps nearly all ? of those 179 million lives might have been saved.
If small arms are really as destructive as the U.N. claims, it would still take 340 years for small arms to kill as many people as died from 1900 to 1990 due to the lack of small arms. Stated another way, even if we accept every one of the premises of the antigun advocates at the U.N., gun prohibition appears to be about four times deadlier than gun proliferation.
Gun "proliferation" begins with "pro" and "life." Gun prohibition begins with registration, and ends with genocide.
Besides serving as the sine qua non of genocide, civilian disarmament helps dictatorships maintain their power ? as demonstrated by the string of dictatorships that rose to support U.N. efforts to disarm everyone except the government.
Djbrina Moumouni, secretary general of the cabinet of the president of the Niger called illicit weapons "a scourge" which cause "drug trafficking, mass displacement, slow economic development and recovery, and the exacerbation of conflicts. The Niger has not escaped that fallout, and has suffered armed rebellion for some years now."
The Niger delegate's speech was a euphemistic reference to the fact that the pastoral Tuareg people of northern Niger, in the Sahara, spent much of the 1990s fighting for their independence from Niger. The Tuareg objected to uranium being extracted from their region, while profits went to people connected to the far-away central government.
To stay in Niger, the Tuareg wanted federalism and some regional autonomy. Their desire to leave was greatly intensified when they starved en masse in 1984-85 thanks to the Niger government's venality and incompetence. And the central government of Niger, which tends to alternate between military dictatorships and one-party civilian dictatorships, hasn't exactly been a good place for people to work within the system.
A report from the European Centre for Conflict Prevention, a pro-disarmament group, describes these problems in Niger quite straightforwardly, and explains that the UN's solution is to disarm the Tuareg:
The United Nations have not been directly involved in managing the conflict, but the organisation is dealing with a closely related issue: the proliferation of small arms in the region. In 1993, it set up an Advisory Mission on the issue, at the request of President Konar? of Mali. The mission produced its findings to the Secretary-General in 1996. It identified a variety of causes for the unfettered flow of arms, including political instability, poverty, unemployment, ethnic and religious differences and the spill-over of intra-state conflicts into other states. This was said to apply to most of the states visited during the mission, including Niger.
What the European Centre and the U.N. (and their prohibitionist allies in private organizations) fail to understand is that in places like Niger, small arms are part of the solution, not the problem. The Niger government only began to make small steps towards treating the Tuareg better when the Tuareg were able to initiate an armed rebellion. One of the reasons that the Niger government never had the choice of following the policy of the Rwanda government (perpetrating genocide against a disaffected ethnic group) was that the Tuareg were armed.
Likewise presenting an articulate defense of the pro-dictatorship position was Gaspar Santos Rufino, Vice-Minister for Defenze of Angola: "African leaders, in analyzing the causes of the proliferation and illicit trafficking of small arms, suggest that Member States and the suppliers should be more transparent in their conduct and go beyond national interests. This means, so far as possible, to impose limits on the legal production of certain basic goods, to exercise rigorous control of their circulation, and even to destroy surplus production of goods.
"It should be possible to do this with small arms and light weapons, as they are not basic goods and will not be missed by our people."
Mr. Rufino, of course, is the Defense Minister of a Communist dictatorship which was installed by the Cuban army's small arms and light weapons in 1975-76, and which has permitted exactly one election (criticized by some as fraudulent) in the last quarter-century.
Rufino complained: "In Angola, men with guns in their hands have opposed the legitimate Government for many years. It should be clear that it is imperative to destroy surplus arms, regulate their production in the legislation of manufacturing countries, and sell them to legally constituted and authorized entities."
The "men with guns in their hands" are the men of UNITA, one of the groups that (along with Rufino's Communist organization) fought against the Portuguese colonial regime until Portugal surrendered in 1975. Rufino's side would have lost the civil war which followed, but for Fidel Castro's modern-day Hessians.
What makes Rufino's dictatorship ? created by Cuban "men with guns in their hands" ? legitimate? As Rufino shows, beneath the veneer of humanitarian rhetoric, the objective of small arms prohibition is to ensure that unpopular dictatorships enjoy a monopoly of force.
Yasir Arafat's U.N. delegate charged that Israel arms its settlers illegally, thus turning them into a militia. She demanded that Israel to disarm the settlers.
Nguyen Thanh Chau of Viet Nam, a communist dictatorship which shot its way into power, called for "a comprehensive approach to the prevention, reduction and eradication of the illicit trade in small arms and light weapons at all levels."
Sar Kheng, Minister of the Interior of Cambodia, represented a nation which, under its previous rulers, had taken care to confiscate guns before slaughtering a third of the population.
Cambodian gun control had been a legacy of French colonialism. A series of Royal Ordinances, decreed by a monarchy subservient to the French, appears to have been enacted out of fear of the Communist and anti-colonial insurgencies that were taking place in the 1920s and 1930s in Southeast Asia, although not in Cambodia. The first law, in 1920, dealt with the carrying of guns, while the last law, in 1938, imposed a strict licensing system. Only hunters could have guns, and they were allowed to own only a single firearm. These colonial laws appear to have stayed in place after Cambodia was granted independence. The Khmer Rouge enacted no new gun control laws, for they enacted no laws at all other than a Constitution.
As detailed in the book Lethal Laws, the moment the Khmer Rouge took power, they set out to disarm the populace. One Cambodian recalls that
Eang [a woman] watched soldiers stride onto the porches of the houses and knock on the doors and ask the people who answered if they had any weapons. "We are here now to protect you," the soldiers said, "and no one has a need for a weapon any more." People who said that they kept no weapons were forced to stand aside and allow the soldiers to look for themselves. . . . The round-up of weapons took nine or ten days, and once the soldiers had concluded the villagers were no longer armed, they dropped their pretense of friendliness. . . . The soldiers said everyone would have to leave the village for a while, so that the troops could search for weapons; when the search was finished, they could return.
People being forced out of villages and cities were searched thoroughly, and weapons and foreign currency were confiscated. To the limited extent that Cambodians owned guns through the government licensing system, the names of registered gun owners were of course available to the new government.
The current (non-genocidal) Communist dictatorship in Cambodia does not trust its people with arms any more than its predecessor did. The UN delegate called "illegally held arms" (e.g., all civilian arms) major obstacles to efforts to reconstruct and rehabilitate the country and to the building of democracy and respect for human rights."
He explained:
The Government of Cambodia has designated management of all arms and explosives as its major task, and has instituted several measures, such as collecting and confiscating all arms, explosives and ammunition left by the war; instituting practical measures to reduce the reckless use of arms; and strengthening the management of weapons registration.
Those who possessed weapons during the civil war wish to continue possessing them for self-protection. On the other hand, criminals have no intention of giving up their weapons, because they need them to carry out their criminal offences. However, with assistance from the European Union and from non-governmental organizations (NGOs), there has been some success in raising the awareness of the problem among a majority of Camobodians.
To date, more than 112,000 light weapons, together with several tons of arms, explosives and ammunition, have been collected. More than 50 per cent of those weapons and some 4,000 landmines have been crushed and burned in public ceremonies under the slogan "Flames for Peace."
Like Cambodia, Pakistan has a dictatorship determined to possess a monopoly of force. According to Human Rights Watch, the military dictatorship perpetrates torture and many other human rights abuses.
Moin-Ud-Din Haider, Minister of the Interior, said, "Pakistan has become a victim of the proliferation of small arms and light weapons?" "It has threatened our political stability," he explained, meaning that arms held by the civilians threatened the power of Mr. Haider's military dictatorship.
"Since February of last year," he boasted, "we have not issued a single license for any weapon" ? demonstrating how a licensing system can be easily converted to a prohibition system.
He continued: "We have also prohibited the public display of weapons" ? a parallel to his dictatorship's ban on public rallies and demonstrations.
"We have started a weapons collection programme composed of two phases. In Phase I, the Government announced general amnesty from 5 to 20 June for voluntary surrender of illicit weapons" ? similar to the gun surrender program run by President Clinton's Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, and recently terminated by the Bush administration. Under both the Clinton and the Pakistani program, the targeted weapons firearms owned by civilians, regardless of criminality.
Pakistan's delegate turned to the gun licensing system: "At present, the campaign to recover illicit weapons from those who did not surrender their weapons during the amnesty period is in full swing. During the amnesty period, we acquired a total of 86,757 weapons. In Phase II, we plan to cancel all automatic weapons licenses, which were loosely issued in the thousands by previous governments. Revalidation of existing arms licenses will be handled with great care."
In other words, the gun licenses which were issued by the democratic government would be eliminated by the dictatorship. As in Weimar/Nazi Germany, the licensing law created by the democracy proves to be a useful prohibition tool for the dictatorship.
Finally, the Pakistani Interior Minister made a brief pretense of pretending to respect Pakistan's traditional culture of gun ownership, before announcing the government's plan to obliterate it:
It must be emphasized that in segments of our society, possessing and carrying arms has been a proud cultural legacy. However, to their credit, many such people voluntarily surrendered their weapons. Thus, while the Government has sought to implement sound strategies, the real winners are the people of Pakistan, whose concern, cooperation and willingness to make ours a weapon-free society went a long way in launching our campaign on a promising note.
The wretched dictatorships endorsing the U.N.'s antigun program wouldn't have surprised the federalist Noah Webster. Arguing in 1787 for adoption of the proposed American Constitution, Webster urged Americans not to worry that the new federal government could become a military dictatorship, for "Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed." (An Examination of the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution (Philadelphia 1787)."
The "United Nations" was originally a name for the coalition that defeated the Axis in World War II. But today, gun prohibitionists and dictatorships are using the United Nations to promote the firearms policies of Hitler and Hirohito: First, preventing aid to victims to genocide and tyranny. And second, obliterating the moral distinction between free governments, which are founded on the consent of the governed, and dictatorships, whose victims have the God-given right to remove them by force of arms.
about happy-slapping
However being thatthye travel in large groups they will occasionaly dare someone to take on a harder looking target and goad them into it. That could be anybody here. All the martial arts in the world might not help you against 15 to 20 drug crazed teenage punks bent on hurting you. Whetehr you carry or not, sometimes discretion is the better part of valor.
that's why I carry everyday an OC Spray... creating a "cloud" can always be usefull so as to help you to escape IMO
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Over on the Eskrima Digest (ED) a discussion arose about the impact of concealed carry on crime, among other related tangents. The EDs moderator, Ray Terry, prefers to keep things focused on Eskrima, so I thought I?d move the discussion to Crafty?s forum. What follows is my response to a post by PD, an escrimador in the UK.
PD avers:
y the reference to an increase in the attacks on tourists, its obvious that the crime is simply being displaced. Now while it may not register on people being shot, where is the crime being displaced to as i dare say the demand is still there to satisfy drug habits and the other motivations for terrorising people into handing over their property.
There is a choice here that is being utterly overlooked: rather than risk encountering a piece of lead moving at 1000 feet per second plus, criminals may choose instead not to commit crime. Can?t speak for the UK where, as I understand it, various nanny state policies have created a rather permanent rate of high unemployment, but here in the US it?s not too hard to find a job flipping burgers, an avocation folks with a criminal penchant may view with increased favor if one of the alternatives is intimate acquaintance with 230 grain hollow point moving at high speed.
Indeed, my guess is that most crimes are ones of opportunity; when the opportunity fails to present itself, so does the crime. There?s a saying that locked doors keep honest people out, which I take to mean that a prudent measure can provide people with reason to make the proper choice. I think concealed carry takes this notion to the next level; those predisposed to criminal behavior never really know if they are looking at an opportunity or a locked, dangerous, vault. The bottom line is the notion that a criminal who can?t commit the crime he originally intended automatically moves on to another crime is a false dichotomy in my estimation. Some crime may be displaced, but overall crime rates drop in US concealed carry states.
For me (dare i even suggest others) to be impressed with the argument that arming people works as well as playing devils advocate, until the people perpetuating this claim can prove where the displacement is showing up only leaves a shallow argument, not worthy of the intellect clearly abundant here on this list.
Clearly abundant intellects aside, there is plenty of evidence out there for those who care to look, with most sources cited in various ED and Dogbrothers threads if you are indeed interested in finding them. I?m not much inclined to recapitulate what can easily be found if you are truly interested in investigating the question, though I will cite a survey of the relevant literature that can point you the right direction, John Lott?s The Bias against Guns. One of the nice things about Lott?s work is that he cites the opposition in a well-annotated manner as he demonstrates the specious nature of their arguments. All sides of the question, in short, are well sourced and represented in his book.
An aside here: one of the dirty little secrets of this argument and many others is that both government and media have made it difficult to wage an informed debate. I know someone, for instance, whose job more or less is to write term papers for the US Congress. When the congress critter that requested a report doesn?t like the conclusion supported by the data, the report is often quashed or otherwise messed with. On many occasions my acquaintance has said cavalierly something along the line of ?the requester didn?t like our findings so we?re recasting the question,? which to my ear sounds like they?re cooking the data, though the practice is so common in Washington that most don?t bat an eye at it.
Similar practices are common in the media: most second amendment scholarship confirming the right goes unreported, though when a researcher claiming to have found that 18th century probate records demonstrated few guns were owned in the colonial US, various MSM organs trumpeted the finding as it suggested seminal colonial second amendment practices are a myth. When this researcher was shown to have faked the data, however, few members of the MSM found call to pay that turn of events commensurate attention. Similarly, when a Center for Disease Control report found numerous ?gun control? measures had no impact on crime, few members of the MSM felt compelled to relay the information at length, preferring instead to focus on an anecdotal, and to my mind demonstrably spurious, claim regarding concealed carry.
Be all that as it may, since I maintain that any expectation of crime ?displacement? amounts to a false dichotomy and that there is plenty of peer reviewed material out there for people inclined to find it, I suppose the ball is in your court. What beyond outlining the arguments and pointing you toward the source material is required to establish the available depths? Are you indeed seeking to be impressed or instead setting an expectation for proof that can?t be met without some work on your end?
n the UK, after years of finding your car stereo missing amongst the broken window glass, the car manufacturers made great improvements in the design and security of the said item. Since this is no longer an easy way for someone to generate the quick funds for bag of scag, we have seen a dramatic rise - at least in my city - of handbags being snatched from women and youngsters held up for mobile phones, mp3 players and bikes.
Train, license, and arm law abiding citizens and I?d be quite willing to bet, and give long odds, that women, kids, phones, mp3 players, bikes, et al could walk the streets unscathed. Don?t see that happening, alas, in the UK where every policy failure seems to result in calls for more policies doomed to failure, witness efforts to ban knives in Scotland.
[N]ow to me it would seem that while treating the symptoms, we should also deal with the cause. For the drug trade, in the war on terror for example we have seen the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan restored and the poppy fields blossom. A fair question would be to ask if the people who are profiting off selling the military armour might be the same people who are also profiting from the increase in sales of civilian weaponry. Perhaps to those people, the war on drugs doesn't make good business sense?
Hmm, never had a greedy-corporate-combines-conspiring-with-an-evil-government exchange do anything but devolve into further non-sequitur and gibberish so I?m not much inclined to engage here. Will say that the few times I have tried to sort through this kind of amorphous mess it became clear that not only is everything the US doing wrong, but also everything it isn?t doing is wrong, too. Bottom line is this stuff is good for working up a self-righteous froth, but of limited utility otherwise, IMO.
With that said, I do have some strong opinions about aspects of what?s mentioned above. I think US drug policy is a counterproductive abomination, for instance, that does little more than create an immense profit motive while assuring poor quality control. Alas, think much of the relevant information isn?t disseminated in a useful manner thus assuring jingoistic gibberish instead of informed policy choices.
Where i live, the crime is a result of poverty or drugs. I agree with empowering people to be able to defend themselves but i also think we need to deal with the root of the issue otherwise we bring up our children in a far less secure society.
And what causes poverty and drug problems? My political bent is pretty Libertarian; I?d argue an intrusive and reactionary government is a root cause. Governments rarely create wealth, but they?re great at siphoning it off; poverty is often a result. The drug policies of most Western democracies exacerbate the associated pathologies instead of addressing them. Any ?solution? that requires more government meddling it tantamount to ordering additional ice for the Titanic, IMO. I?m all for attacking root causes, let?s just make sure it?s the right root and not some tinfoil hat circumlocution.
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http://www.reason.com/0505/fe.ak.straight.shtml
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Wow, an MSM story that casts the Second Amendment in a positive light. Who'd a thunk it?
Rice: Gun Rights Important As Free Speech
By BARRY SCHWEID, AP Diplomatic Writer
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, recalling how her father took up arms to defend fellow blacks from racist whites in the segregated South, said Wednesday the constitutional right of Americans to own guns is as important as their rights to free speech and religion.
In an interview on CNN's "Larry King Live," Rice said she came to that view from personal experience. She said her father, a black minister, and his friends armed themselves to defended the black community in Birmingham, Ala., against the White Knight Riders in 1962 and 1963. She said if local authorities had had lists of registered weapons, she did not think her father and other blacks would have been able to defend themselves.
Birmingham, where Rice was born in 1954, was a focal point of racial tension. Four black girls were killed when a bomb exploded at a Birmingham church in 1963, a galvanizing moment in the fight for civil rights.
Rice said she favored background checks and controls at gun shows. However, she added, "we have to be very careful when we start abridging rights that the Founding Fathers thought very important."
Rice said the Founding Fathers understood "there might be circumstances that people like my father experienced in Birmingham, Ala., when, in fact, the police weren't going to protect you."
"I also don't think we get to pick and choose from the Constitution," she said in the interview, which was taped for airing Wednesday night. "The Second Amendment is as important as the First Amendment."
The First Amendment protects religious, press and speech freedoms as well as the rights to assemble and petition the government. The Second Amendment guarantees "a well-regulated militia" and "the right of the people to keep and bear arms." Gun-rights supporters and those who favor gun control disagree over whether the amendment guarantees individual gun ownership.
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http://www.blackwaterusa.com/btw2005/articles/051605help.html
Barking Up the Wrong Tree:
Who Will Help the Helpless?
David Nissen Kahn, M. D.
?2004 All rights reserved.
In a recent article (Myths of the Gun?ght-2, Tactical Operator Newsletter, 8, 2; Nov/Dec 2004), combatives/shooting instructor Gabe Suarez observes, "First of all, Grossman's On Killing to the contrary, it is NOT unnatural for humans to kill each other. Historically, we've been doing it with skill and gusto for ages." And he goes on to explain:
The problem with this facet of the [Grossman's] study is that much of it is based on the study of police actions. [Actually, the work is based on historical analyses of military combat, but the conclusions are still valid.] In case you don't realize, police are NEVER trained to be gunfighters, or trained to call up their level of violence in "official" schools. In fact, most "offcial" schools, as provided by the state, are pure garbage. The officers that DO get further education generally do so on their own (a very small percentage at best). And of those who will have their minds right in a fight (because they are warriors at heart and they've decided beforehand to do so), are an even smaller percentage of that (sic).
As our lawyer friends have it, res ipsa loquitur, the thing speaks for itself. But we-the people who teach and support self-defense and personal security-aren't listening.
The unnaturalness Grossman talks about, the hardwired resistance to killing within one's species, appears real, and he makes a careful, logical case for it. Gabe really doesn't contradict it; in fact, he solidifies Grossman's argument. Untrained-or improperly or inadequately trained-people are much more likely to fail, to freeze or to hesitate when they are confronted with physical force. Grossman's whole point is that proper conditioning, not only physical but mental, is essential to getting desired responses to stimuli. Most people don't fight, much less kill, without conditioning. And that's the key. While we do pretty well with the people we train, we don't attract nearly enough of them. And that's our failure.
Most of the citizens who study any sort of fighting-knife, stick, gun, empty hand, whatever-have already decided that "it" might happen to them. They've confronted themselves and decided that they can hit back, or think they can, and want to. Even so, some people come to the event, whether in training or in real life, and wilt. Mas Ayoob thinks that, sometimes, it's a failure of technique. Maybe so, sometimes; but clearly sometimes it's not. Then it's a failure of will. And that's a failure of attitude and worldview.
Well, then, if supposedly well trained people can fail, what about the "average" person, sliding through daily life without a constructive thought about it. He or she's already given up before the fact. Who's helping him or her? Because they can be helped.
We all recognize that "having a gun just makes you a gun owner." But even having a gun-or any other tool-is a step ahead of most folks. As a bumper sticker reads, "When you buy a drill, you don't want a drill. You want a hole." The great majority of the population isn't able to use the tool, never mind to get the requisite skills, because they don't have the mindset to do it. And they don't have the mindset because they don't see that they need it . . . or, worse and more blameworthy, no one's shown them that getting it is an achievable goal. Or an appropriate one.
That's our fault. We smugly preach to the choir, educating, training and explaining ourselves to each other: we're isolated from the larger community. And, bewilderingly, we're not displeased with that. We've looked at Dave Grossman's well-argued, solid work and taken only part of the message. And we're guilty of failing to squeeze all the juice from what we have taken.
Gabe makes the point again that attitude is everything. Who among us doubts that? Sun Tzu said, "Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win." Well, of course. That's the whole point of all our exercises. But if we continue to keep the knowledge among ourselves, we disserve ourselves as professionals-and we disserve our society as well. We're in a situation akin to scientific investigation: unpublished, unused discoveries are trivial beyond puffng up egos. Especially in this unhealthy 21st Century environment, in which everyone is called to the battle-even though with silly, meaningless, colored coded "threat levels"-it is singularly important for people who know to evangelize people who don't.
Personal security, self-defense, safety must be demystified and made commonplace, acceptable and expected. Knowledgeable people realize that those things may be complex in practice, but they're simple in theory-and that that theory is the foundation of attitude, and that attitude and mental lifestyle are the keys to individual and group well being and survival.
If the face we present to the larger world is only that of the warrior-hard-bitten, grim, cold, disdainful of everyone else-then we surely lose our credibility with the very people we can help. Must help. True enough, much of what there is to be taught is bleak, and the great majority of people will never be joyous, exalted fighters. But so what? If they do the right thing and then spew up their breakfasts, defecate in their underwear and weep, who cares? The good guy isn't dead. The terrorist attack didn't kill awful numbers of people. And we've done a sufficient, professional job. Not every solution is elegant or precise or on script.
We must discard our reassuringly superior, self-congratulatory, dismissive attitude toward the "sheep people" and replace it with studied, sympathetic compassion. Most combatives instructors are busy-especially now-and they simply don't have time to preach to the unbelievers. Or, often, want to. So, some of their disciples must "get out there" and talk to and teach ordinary, everyday people how to think about their world and their security. Some of those people will be converted fully to the faith. And those folks will study the arts and expand the base. That'll be wonderful, and good for them.
But that's not the primary goal. The goal is to make everyone able to see problems and know how to decide what to do. When to run. When to call for help. And, for some, when to fight. Relatively few people will ever be armed citizens; fewer will become warriors; fewer still will be masters of any discipline, and even fewer will study more than one. But such niceties don't matter. We can be satisfied with ourselves and proud of our work if more people just understand and live in Condition Yellow-because most of the time, unglamorous though it is, that's enough. It's enough for warriors; it's enough for everyone else.
If we can achieve that-no matter how partially-we'll have fulfilled our professional obligation, and our moral one, too. Fewer bad things will happen to good people. Fewer people will be afraid of the world. And, eventually, the world will be a nicer, better place to live. That's a reachable goal. But we have to begin. No one else can do it. And no one else will try.
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Article published May 15, 2005
In praise of not being a good victim
Ever notice that even courage is subject to a double standard? We honor those who overcome the innate fear of death to act in defense of our country. Yet, those who do likewise in defense of life and property are frequently admonished for not being good victims. People like Tony Nader must find this hard to take.
Nader was working one April evening at Bella Variety, a convenience store on Chestnut Street in Nashua. Customers present knew Nader carried a sidearm, but there?s always some doofus who doesn?t get the word.
Sure enough, a would-be robber wielding a revolver and wearing a bandana charged through the door. He threw a bag on the counter and yelled at Nader to fill it with cash.
While threatening to kill everybody, the robber stuck his gun in Nader?s face. To motivate Nader, the gunman punctuated his threats with profanity and cocked the revolver.
Nader picked up the bag as though he were going to comply with the demand. Instead, he dropped it. This distracted the gunman for an instant. That?s all Nader needed to grab the robber?s pistol with one hand and pull the semiautomatic from his belt with the other.
When faced with resistance, the robber?s tough-guy facade wilted like an over-watered petunia. He pulled away and ran. Nader gave chase, but called it quits.
Not so for the robber. He went where victims are more cooperative and held up another market.
One might be forgiven for thinking Nader?s bravery would at least be mentioned by someone. Not in today?s society. What Nader did was politically incorrect.
Nashua police implied Nader should have been a good victim and freely given his property to the criminal. The spokesman said, ?The more weapons become involved, the more chance somebody could get hurt.?
Obviously, the spokesman was regurgitating department policy, but is insisting that people always be good, defenseless victims sound advice? An Internet search on convenience store robberies raises serious doubts. Numerous incidents are documented in which robbers murdered helpless and compliant victims for reasons known only to those robbers.
In Westland, Mich., Michael Lamont Schofield robbed a convenience store. In the process he killed four people and wounded two others. His girlfriend, Leslie Gordon, acted as lookout while Schofield methodically fired one shot into each of the two unarmed clerks and four customers. That they were all good victims while they waited to die was irrelevant to the killers.
In another instance, two men killed an unarmed convenience store clerk in Houston, Texas. Neighbors told investigators the clerk was a nervous person in fear of the local crime rate. They said he?d have given no resistance and would have given his money over freely. Once again, being a good victim didn?t matter to the criminals.
These and other such stories lead to an ominous conclusion: criminals are incapable of feeling sympathy for their victims. Hence, posing no threat holds little promise of avoiding harm. And that?s not all. In many cases, the absence of a threat actually attracts criminals.
John Lott is a former economics and law professor at the University of Chicago. In his book, ?More Guns, Less Crime,? he argues that very point. It was exemplified when Minnesota?s recently adopted concealed carry law went into effect.
Most businesspeople quickly armed themselves, but a minority who equated guns with evil were appalled. To protest their armed colleagues, they put up signs proclaiming their businesses ?gun free.? Guess where the criminals went.
After several armed robberies in gun-free stores the intellectual light went on. Anti-gun proprietors quietly stopped advertising the fact they were not armed.
However, this change of heart pales beside that of the nationally acclaimed Charleston, S.C., Police Chief Reuben Greenberg. He had always viewed citizens defending themselves with firearms negatively.
That changed when Greenberg encountered evidence contrary to his views. A good example is the record of one downtown business in a high-crime area. Despite its location, it hadn?t been held up in 20 years. Greenberg found criminals avoided it because they were aware the owner and the employees all packed pistols.
The radical, UC-Berkely educated Greenberg reassessed his self-defense position. Now, he no longer discourages those who wish to protect themselves. This inflames some people and impresses others. Regardless, it shows that Charleston?s first black police chief is not a prisoner of ideology. If only this were true of more law enforcement people.
It certainly wasn?t true of the Nashua police spokesman, who said of Nader?s action, ?Not only do we not encourage it, we seriously frown on it.? In making that remark he not only showed contempt for Nader?s courage, but he also conveyed a veiled threat to others who might someday be faced with the choice of defending their lives or becoming good victims.
That?s just more grief for people in crime-risky occupations to worry about, but for Tony Nader it shouldn?t be a concern. He?s already established that Bella Variety is not a good place to rob.
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It's interesting to note that the devices people are carrying are held responsible for this surge in crime. Maybe the fact the law abiding are denied the tools and the legal structure to resist these attacks has something to do with this surge.
iPods fuel rise in robberies
By Justin Davenport Crime Correspondent, Evening Standard
The iPod generation is helping to fuel a surge in street crime, Britain's top policeman claimed today.
Met Commissioner Sir Ian Blair said the latest generation of mobile phones and iPods with their distinctive white leads were partly behind a shock 26 per cent jump in street robbery last month.
New figures published today show gun crime also leapt by 35 per cent in April compared with the same month last year and the number of violent offences increased by 13 per cent.
In a report to the Metropolitan Police Authority, the Commissioner said the Met had suffered "a bad few weeks" but that crime in the capital was still falling.
He said urgent measures had been put in place to tackle the increases and he believed they were now under control.
The rise in some offences last month was partly due to the early Easter break, which meant the traditionally quiet period fell in March rather than April.
Senior officers admitted the battle against street crime had also suffered because of the loss of a ?12 million government grant which funded anti-robbery task forces in London.
Assistant Commissioner Tim Godwin said there had been a rise in opportunistic robberies, mainly by schoolchildren. Many involved the "happy slapping" craze in which children use mobile phones to film assaults.
The leap in robbery is a serious setback to the government-driven campaign against street crime. It is driven mainly by gangs, some of whom are as young as 10. One group on BMX-type bikes robbed 100 people in two months outside a Tottenham Tube station, concentrating on the latest phones which can be sold on for ?30-?40.
More than half of all street crime in London involves the theft of a mobile and it is believed more than 700,000 phones are stolen each year.
MPA member Cindy Butts said she was concerned about an unprecedented 35 per cent increase in gun crime in London. She hit out at Home Secretary Charles Clarke for failing to take gun crime in the black community seriously.
Find this story at http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/londonnews/articles/18888921?version=1
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Widow uses gun, instincts to fend off burgler
By Pedro Ruz Gutierrez
Sentinel Staff Writer
May 31, 2005
Judith Kuntz, 64, hunkered down in her darkened bedroom late Sunday evening, arming herself with a revolver.
A burglar had just broken into her Indialantic home and, fearing for her life, she said she let her instincts take over.
When the burglar, who had a flashlight, entered the room, Kuntz fired one round from her .38-caliber handgun.
Hit squarely in the chest, the unidentified intruder ran outside, where he collapsed and died.
On Monday, Kuntz was still shaken, but she briefly recalled her ordeal.
"I'm doing fine under the circumstances," she said. "I don't take any joy in somebody being dead. My self-preservation instinct took over."
She would not discuss the incident further.
"I don't feel real safe," said Kuntz, who has lived alone since her husband died nearly five years ago. "This has been a horrifying experience."
The Brevard County Sheriff's Office said she was justified in defending herself and will not face charges. The revolver was hers, inherited through her family, investigators said.
Agent Lou Heyn of the Sheriff's Office said the unidentified man entered Kuntz's home on Avenida del Mar by pulling the window off a back door.
"Occupied burglaries are rare, and this underscores that it is dangerous for the burglar and the homeowner," Heyn said. "Crime can be a tough career."
The intruder, who was not carrying identification, was described as a white male 35 to 45 years old, with dark-brown hair and a dark-brown mustache. He was wearing light-blue swim shorts, tennis shoes and a blue T-shirt.
Investigators are hoping to identify him through his tattoos. He has a cross on his right hand between his index finger and thumb and a Harley-Davidson motorcycle on his upper left arm. There also are the names of at least four women tattooed on his upper right arm.
Anyone with information about the man is encouraged to call the Sheriff's Office at 321-633-7162 or Central Florida Crimeline at 1-800-423-TIPS.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/orl-locwidow31053105may31,0,6453419.story?coll=orl-news-headlines
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I hadn't run into the Odin argument before , , , :)
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http://www.runestone.org/gunctrl.html
What would Odin say about GUN CONTROL?
Stephen A. McNallen
The right to keep and bear arms is one of the most passionately debated issues on the American political stage. Patriots, gun owners, liberals, the media, hunters - a dozen different factions are wrangling back and forth to determine what the role of firearms will be in the future of this country.
We who follow the way of the warrior have an interest in this debate. Guns represent the weapons technology of our era, and, however much we might hearken back to the gleaming blades of an earlier century, we owe it to ourselves to follow the back-and-forth of this controversy.
The Second Amendment to the Constitution is the main line of defense against gun-grabbers, of course. But our involvement with weapons, and their essential role in preserving freedom and honor, goes back far into the dim mists of history - to a time when the Constitution and the nation it came to represent was undreamed of.
In ancient Europe, weapons had a religious character. Odin, father of the Gods in the Norse myths, carried a great spear named Gungnir. He wandered around the world, disguised in his floppy hat and long cloak, giving magical swords to his favored heroes. With these, they were expected to perform great deeds on the battlefield and, when their lives were done, to join Odin in Valhalla. There, with other great souls, the hero would prepare for the ultimate conflict of Ragnarok.
There is some evidence that the fallen warrior's weapon would accompany him into the afterlife. He was buried with it, of course, but that's not all - in some graves, the sword has been heated and twisted out of shape, as though it was being "killed" so that its spirit could accompany that of its owner into the Otherworld. Besides, he would no doubt need it as he walked the dangerous, ordeal-ridden "Hel-road" that leads to the realm of the Gods.
In Germanic society, however, weapons weren't just present at the end of life. They played a role in its beginning, as well. A new-born infant would be offered a taste of salt from the tip of a sword as its welcome into the world. Later, when he grew into manhood, the youth would be given his first shield and blade (whether sword, or axe, or spear) on the day he was initiated into the tribal assembly. This panoply represented his duty to defend his kin, as well as his rights as a freeman - even then, the link between weapons and freedom was understood. This folkway carried over into the Middle Ages, when a man about to be knighted stood prayerful vigil over his arms and armor throughout the night.
Oaths were sworn on weapons, and the steel might be called upon to turn against its owner if the words which were spoken over it were not true.
In the lore of the Vikings, Odin himself tells his followers to be armed. As the poem called the Havamal warns us,
A wayfarer should not walk unarmed,
But have his weapons to hand:
He never knows when he may need a spear,
Or what menace meet on the road.
But it wasn't just the Norsemen who idolized their weaponry; the ancient Celts shared this sentiment. The Iceni, as a typical British tribe, possessed certain weapons which were held to be particularly sacred. The Romans decided to confiscate them to prevent an uprising - thereby bringing about the very thing they were hoping to avert. Under their fiery queen, the red-haired Boudicca, the Iceni rose in revolt and almost ended the Roman occupation of the British Isles.
Such a preoccupation with instruments of destruction, some might say, is now out of date. After all, we live in a kinder, gentler world than that of the ancient Teutonic and Celtic tribes. We're civilized now. Death doesn't threaten our daily lives, and if danger does appear, we call the police.
One problem with this viewpoint is that the police often don't come, or they don't come in time to do any good. You could get killed many times over, with a gratuitous rape thrown in for good measure, between the time your fingers dial 911 and the time a squad car pulls up in front of your house. The cops are outnumbered, outgunned, and generally out of the scenario. In real life, you're on your own.
While we're at it, let's look at the idea that our world is less violent than that of, say, the Vikings. According to M.I. Steblin-Kamenskij in his book The Saga Mind, we have a record of acts of violence in Iceland over a period of several centuries. At the height of the heroic age in that Viking colony, when every freeman carried a sword or axe or spear, the per capita murder rate was a lot less than in most urban areas in America today! We live in an extremely violent time, and the prognosis is for more of the same.
Advocates of gun control might argue reluctantly that even if times haven't changed, technology has. Guns are not swords. Any religious or cultural arguments made for edged weapons are irrelevant in an age of semi-automatic rifles and pistols. In putting forth this idea, however, they forget several facts.
For one thing, the role of the individual weapon has remained unchanged. It ultimately does not matter if the device that deters attack on an innocent person is a knife, a battle-axe, a 9mm Browning pistol, or one of the dreaded "assault rifles." The goal is to keep the would-be mugger, rapist, or murderer at bay. Since the assailant may be equipped with modern arms, the potential victim must be likewise prepared. Secondly, from the days of King Olaf to the present, weapons in the hands of individuals have been a safeguard against tyrannical rulers. This is just as true for us as it was for the farmers who defended freedom in old Norway. However, the sharpest sword is no match for the guns of even a very third-rate army at the close of the twentieth century; logic and common sense compels free citizens to have firearms - and not muzzle loaders, either! Finally, there is precedent for declaring guns to be the spiritual equivalent of ancient blades; the Japanese acknowledged rifles as the successors to the samurai swords of old, during the Second World War.
When you take a good look at history, you see that the right to possess arms is not something that appeared miraculously in colonial America. This is a folkway with its roots lost in European prehistory, and those roots are as much spiritual as they are governmental. Ultimately, bearing arms is a religious right, and thus cannot be abrogated by any state.
To make this really clear, think back to that old movie, The Vikings. In this epic, Ragnar (Ernest Borgnine) is about to be fed to the wolves. He asks for the right to die "like a Viking," with a sword in his hand, lest he not be admitted to Valhalla. Now, there's a bit of modern myth-making here; the rules for entrance to Odin's hall are not laid out nearly so exactly in any of the sources that scholars know. But the spirit of Ragnar's request remains valid. We do know that Valhalla was not for the lowly or common. The early Danish hero Biarki, speaking of Odin, says that
War springs from the nobly born; famous pedigrees are the makers of war. For the perilous deeds which chiefs attempt are not to be done by the ventures of common men...No dim and lowly race, no low-born dead, no base souls are Pluto's [Read: Odin's] prey, but he weaves the dooms of the mighty, and fills Phlegethon [Valhalla] with noble shapes.
Slaves shall never sit at Odin's table, or quaff the mead poured by valkyrie's hands. And throughout history, one trait more than any other has been the hallmark of slaves: They are forbidden weapons.
The conceit of the twentieth century is that we have done away with slavery. But make no mistake, anyone disarmed by the state is a slave, no matter how free he is to frequent the shopping malls, or how new the car that sits in his garage. I cannot speak for Odin, but I believe that no man or woman who turns in his or her gun to the government will ever look on the faces of the blest in Valhalla. Surrender your "assault rifle," and be doomed to the cold and murk of Hel's home; you have no place among heroes.
Outmoded philosophy? I think not. The nature of tyranny has not changed in a thousand years, nor has the liberty-loving heart that resists it. And I am confident that admittance standards for Valhalla have not been "dumbed down."
All of this would be theoretical if the heroic religion of the Vikings and their European cousins was extinct. But that religion, called Asatru, survives today and still speaks uncompromisingly for the spirit of our ancestors. Would-be dictators will meet the opposition of dedicated men and women who will not give up their rights in the face of either fashion or force.
As this article shows, the right to arms is far older than the American Constitution. It is planted deep in the bedrock of ancient European culture and religion. Will we let today's slave masters hew down the Teutonic oak of freedom with an axe stolen from a freeman's hands? Will we allow them to shoot it in half with guns pried from the fingers of dead heroes? Never! For we of Asatru, the bearing of arms is not just custom, not just a legal right, but a matter of the troth that binds us to our Gods. Tyrants, beware!
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Good thing Chicago has some of the strictest "gun control" laws in the nation. . . .
Nearly 24 people shot in less than 12 hours
June 27, 2005
BY ANNIE SWEENEY Crime Reporter
Shots rang out across the city Saturday night and Sunday morning -- from the Far North Side to the Far South Side -- with preliminary reports of nearly two dozen people shot.
The overnight tally -- which is unofficial -- included two shootings on the same corner, a fatal shooting near the Taste of Chicago and several on the West Side, where detectives were swamped.
"We're just spinning up here,'' one detective said.
Numerous incidents of gunfire and related injuries were reported overnight Saturday. Among them:
*At 9:45 p.m. Saturday, 20-year-old Christopher Sanders of Chicago was fatally shot during a fight one block from the Taste of Chicago.
*At 6:06 a.m. Sunday near Damen and 38th, a man was shot in the shoulder, police said.
In between:
*A man was shot in the head at 11:52 p.m. at 4129 W. Van Buren.
*A 38-year-old man was shot and killed at 3:15 a.m. in the street in the 1400 block of West Carmen.
*And a man was left in critical condition after a drive-by shooting at 5:30 a.m. at 12434 S. Wentworth, police said.
There were two shootings at the corner of 52nd and Mozart.
*The first came at 9:47 p.m. when a man was shot in the foot.
*Hours later, at 1:38 a.m., two men sitting on a porch at the corner were shot by someone who pulled up in a dark Ford Escort wagon, police said.
Fest shooting under review
Several other incidents involved multiple victims, and there were reports of more than 20 people wounded, police said.
First Deputy Chicago Police Supt. Dana Starks was on patrol near the Taste of Chicago late Sunday. Starks would be reviewing that fatal shooting and other incidents.
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-bloody27.html
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Folks, note that Buz posted today immediately prior to this post.
The following case I think makes a powerful argument for looking to yourself for self-defense. Crafty
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Witnesses said yesterday that two men who killed each other in a gun battle in Fairmount Heights on Saturday afternoon had been feuding since their pit bull dogs got in a fight several weeks ago.
Prince George's County police are investigating the killings, which took place around 4:15 p.m. in the 1300 block of Early Oaks Lane, the Chapel Oaks area. Police have not identified the men.
Neither of the men lived in the neighborhood, but they had close ties to it, according to three residents who knew them and witnessed portions of the gun fight. The residents spoke on the condition of anonymity.
According to the witnesses, the shooting began shortly after one of the men arrived in the neighborhood and traded words with the other. Neighbors who knew them said the two had had several exchanges over the past three months after their pit bulls fought. This time, though, tempers escalated and each went after guns, according to the witnesses.
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New laws unveiled in crackdown on blades
CATHY JAMIESON
TOUGH new laws on knives and swords were unveiled today in a crackdown on weapons crime in Scotland.
Justice Minister Cathy Jamieson revealed a raft of measures, including banning the purchase of non-domestic knives, except from licensed sellers, and a ban on the sale of swords.
She said she was committed to reducing violent crime and tackling the weapons-carrying culture, particularly among young men.
Knives were used in 323 - almost half - of the 667 murders in Scotland in 1998-2003.
In the same period, there were 14,463 convictions for handling an offensive weapon.
The proposed new laws are listed in a consultation paper published by Ms Jamieson today.
It would be a criminal offence for anyone to buy a non-domestic knife from an unlicensed shop, and sellers would have to record the buyer's name, address and age.
Ms Jamieson also proposed a ban on swords, with possible exceptions for those used for ceremonial, religious, sporting or cultural purposes.
The alternative would be a licensing scheme for the sale of swords, with retailers only allowed to sell them to members of approved organisations.
Ms Jamieson said: "Making it more difficult to purchase a non-domestic knife will further deter those without a legitimate reason to possess a knife.
"And it will compel the small minority of unscrupulous traders to sell non-domestic knives more responsibly.
"Alongside other measures we are taking, we believe this will contribute to a reduction in knife crime."
Ministers have already consulted, as part of the Police Bill, on doubling the maximum sentence for carrying a knife, giving the police unconditional powers of arrest when they suspect someone of carrying a knife or offensive weapon, and increasing the age for buying a non-domestic knife from 16 to 18.
Other options in today's consultation include banning the sale of samurai swords, including replicas and swords of a similar design, and licensing the purchase of swords on an individual basis.
Under this proposal, individuals would need to apply for a licence similar to a firearms permit.
The consultation defines a non-domestic knife as a knife which has a blade or sharp point and which is not designed only for domestic use, or only for use in the processing, preparation or consumption of food.
Ms Jamieson said: "Nobody living in a normal house or flat needs a sword as part of day-to-day life.
"Those with a legitimate reason for needing a non-domestic knife or sword should not, however, be put at a disadvantage by these proposals."
The consultation will run until the end of September.
http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/print/news/5040503.shtml
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The real reason behind the push for gun control:
Quote:
And yet Democrats do believe in gun control, even though playground gunshot injuries are a proven vote-getter. This is because Democrats believe that gun owners want to keep their guns mostly in case they need to shoot Democrats. It happened in 1861 and it could happen again.? PJ O?Rourke
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A bit of common sense wafting in from across the pond. . . .
August 09, 2005
Let us spray . . . it's the way to deal with these violent punks
Robbie Millen
?SPRAY TO disable to protect.? Now that?s a motto to live by. The police have a spanking new slogan for the war on terror ? ?shoot to kill to protect? ? so why can?t we civvies in the war on hoodies have one too?
?Spray to disable to protect? swam into my mind as I watched the Fantastic Four battle against villainy because a fight broke out in the cinema. A huge man with dread-inducing dreadlocks was raining punches down on a man who had had the temerity to tell him to stop talking.
Naturally, everyone turned into a superhero: ?Pow! I am Mighty Englishman, be amazed by my awesome selective deafness and tunnel vision. With the power of my mind I don?t see or hear anything unpleasant. Marvel at my hyper-inactivity Wooosh!?
The fight fizzled out when the aggressor?s posse of trackie-clad girlfriends dragged him away, screeching ?Michael, be the bigger man. ?E?s not worf it?. Michael then had his final flourish in front of the rabbit-like audience: ?I want ?im. Outside you t***!? (What did thugs, and their admirers, say before they learnt their lines from The Bill? Perhaps they spoke 1920s gangsterese after watching too many Al Capone movies?) And that was it, another nasty little example of the underclass creeping out from the cracks in our society. All that was left hanging in the air was that unsettling atmosphere of violence and guilt. Guilt that in an audience of strapping young men, none had the guts to intervene.
Most of us are public-spirited, want to do the right thing and prove we?re made of the right stuff. But most of us flunk it when the call for courage comes. We are rational creatures and calculate the risks. Why wade in, why resist, why make a stand when you don?t know what the aggressor is capable of and whether he has a knife or worse?
That?s the nub. The law-abiding citizen when confronted with a snarling example of criminality is at a disadvantage. One is armed, the other not. That?s why the words ?spray to disable to protect? came to mind. A burst of pepper spray in Michael?s face would have stopped his violence and been a small victory for civil society. No doubt, with our super powers we could have blanked his cries of agony and enjoyed the rest of the movie But carrying CS gas canisters, or Mace teargas, or pepper spray, is against the law. A woman with a self-defence spray in her handbag is deemed to be carrying an offensive weapon. This is a nonsense.
We have a moral right to defend our life, liberty and property. We also have a legal right to self-defence so long as we use ?reasonable force?. But the law makes it impossible for people to make sensible preparations for their own protection on the streets.
Pepper spray, for example, causes no permanent damage; surely then it should be ?reasonable force? to use it in self-defence? It is an irritant that causes severe pain when it makes contact with the skin. It inflames the mucous membranes of the eyes, nose, throat and lungs, and it causes the eyes to swell shut, loss of balance and breathing difficulties. It is nasty, but the effects last just 30 to 45 minutes; enough time to get the help of the police, our professional law-enforcers.
It should not be beyond the wit of our lawmakers ? men who legislate on the right height for hedges and how powerful a toilet flush can be ? to give us legal grounds for such sprays: which types can be used, who can carry them, where they can be used, who can sell them and so on. If the politicians don?t feel up to the task, they could set up OffSpray.
But, I hear you say, what?s to stop criminals from using CS gas against innocent people? Nothing, but then crooks have a habit of using offensive weapons, regardless of their legal status, against blameless citizens. And misusing a spray or using it offensively could still count as a crime.
Others object that if people fight back, more incidents might escalate into violence. Instead, we should follow the Met?s advice of flight, not fight. But the result of this advice is not virtuous; it means that neighbourhoods are ceded to hoodlums, making the streets ever more vicious.
There is more wisdom on a National Rifle Association bumper sticker, that bogey figure for US liberal-lefties. It reads: ?An armed society is a polite society.? A person with malign intentions is less likely to abuse people or treat them roughly because of the simple, brute fact that they may carry a concealed weapon. The fear of righteous retaliation restrains those who have no self-restraint.
Clint Eastwood, in Dirty Harry, says: ?You?ve got to ask yourself a question: ?Do I feel lucky?? Well, do ya punk?? We must change the odds so our ?punks? don?t feel so lucky
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1072-1726713,00.html
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Victim strikes back
Forced at gunpoint to bank, man kills back-seat suspect
By Sherri Drake
Contact
August 10, 2005
He said they'd gotten him two weeks ago in his front yard, forcing him to the ground with a gun and stealing $400.
But this time, 59-year-old Jacob Evans was ready.
Tuesday, the same two robbers returned, telling him to withdraw $10,000 from his bank, or die, he said. Instead, Evans deposited six bullets in one of them.
"I got prepared for them," Evans said, standing outside the Criminal Justice Center Tuesday night. "Today they acted a damn fool and came back."
Shortly after 2 p.m., Memphis police arrived at First Tennessee, at 1200 S. Third, and found one of the robbers shot to death, lying face down in the back seat of Evans's Lincoln Towncar.
About 20 minutes earlier, Evans was pulling up to his home in the 300 block of Edsel in South Memphis, when the two 20-something men came out from behind some hedges with guns, forced a friend of his out of the car and jumped in. Evans was in the driver's seat, one robber was in the front seat and another in the back.
Evans had just gotten off work at Hershey Foods, where he's a sanitation worker. He was wearing his uniform and a blue hairnet.
With guns pointed at Evans, the robbers told him to drive to a nearby bank to get some money. He told him he didn't bank there, but said he had an account at First Tennessee.
"If I didn't withdraw $10,000, they said they were going to kill me," he said.
As he was driving, Evans said he looked for police but didn't see any and tried to work out a plan. The bank's about two miles from his house.
He pulled up to the teller window and told the men he would need a withdrawal slip to get the money. The front-seat robber handed his 9mm pistol to the back-seat robber -- who already had a .22-caliber rifle -- and went inside to get the slip.
Evans noticed a security guard leaning against the bank's wall and mouthed to him: "Call police, I'm being robbed."
The robber, sitting directly behind the driver's seat, asked him what he said and Evans told him, "I didn't say a damn thing."
The man kept turning around nervously to look at the security guard, Evans said. That's when Evans reached under his seat and pulled out a .357 Magnum.
"When he turned around, I unloaded six rounds in him," Evans said. "He didn't have a chance."
Evans bought the gun in the parking lot of a gas station the day after he was robbed two weeks ago. He'd cleaned it up, putting baby oil in the revolver, so it'd be ready if he needed it.
Evans said he got out of the car and started to reload when the other suspect came out of the bank. "He took off running."
He tried to shoot that suspect too, but his gun wouldn't fire.
Someone inside the bank called 911. When employees heard the gunshots, the bank was immediately locked down and remained closed Tuesday, said spokesman Walter Dawson.
Late Tuesday, investigators were looking for the man who ran away and were working to identify the man who died, said Lt. Toney Armstrong.
After being questioned by police, Evans said they told him he was free to go.
Police said late Tuesday their investigation will be turned over to the Shelby County District Attorney General's Office, as a matter of routine.
Evans said he has only one regret. "I didn't kill the one that got away."
Tuesday night, his family drove up from Mississippi to be with Evans, who said he was happy to be alive.
"It's really not something to be proud of," he said. "But I'm happy it was them and not me."
http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/local_news/article/0,1426,MCA_437_3990677,00.html
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As I've said before, the BATFE often seems like a police agency in search of a police state.
VA-ALERT: BATFE sinks to a new low in Richmond
Virginia Citizens Defense League, Inc.
Thu 8/18/2005 12:21 AM
Philip Van Cleave,VCDL President
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATFE), who seem to go out of their way to alienate gun owners with their heavy-handedness, behaved in a shameful manner this last weekend at the Showmasters' gun show in Richmond.
I had reports from members of police going to their houses while the member was waiting for their approval to purchase a gun at the show! The police asked the spouse and other family members questions about the purchases and filled in a survey! "Did you know your husband was going to a gun show today?" "Did you know your husband was going to buy a gun today?" and many other such questions.
If no one was home at the gun purchaser's house, the police went to the neighbors! "Did you know that your neighbor was buying a gun today? How do you feel about him doing so?"
One member, who was carrying a personal gun to sell, was approached by BATFE and taken to a car while they checked him out. The officer said in front of Showmasters' management, "Did you know you need a business license to sell a gun at this show? I have seen you at a lot of shows - are you in the business of selling guns? I think you are." That's called a fishing expedition and intimidation. In the end they let the VCDL member go because their fish hooks came up empty.
They had over 17 BATFE agents at that show. Richmond and Henrico had a large number of officers running to the homes of anyone purchasing a handgun to ask questions.
I guess Mayor Wilder is flush with cash all of a sudden. Too bad he didn't use that money to put all those cops into the rougher neighborhoods of Richmond, instead of harassing the decent citizens who buy guns at a gun show.
And, if you are sitting down, the main BATFE agent at the show told Showmasters' management that Richmond was going to be the model for this kind of behavior across the nation!!!
BUT, THERE IS GOOD NEWS.
Steve Elliott, who heads up C&E Gun Shows and is affiliated with Showmasters, along with Annette Gelles, who heads up Showmasters, went to Washington with some lawyers to get this straightened out on Monday. (BTW, Steve told me that he has spent in excess of $10,000 this year on legal fees fighting this kind of abuse.)
Steve and Annette were told by the BATFE in DC that BATFE would no longer be sending officers to people's houses who were purchasing a firearm and that what happened in Richmond should not have happened.
We will be watching carefully to see if BATFE keeps its word or not. Report any such abuse immediately to VCDL, along with the officer's name, badge number, and department.
*************************************************************************** VA-ALERT is a project of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, Inc. (VCDL). VCDL is an all-volunteer, non-partisan grassroots organization dedicated to defending the human rights of all Virginians. The membership considers the Right to Keep and Bear Arms to be an essential human right.
VCDL web page: http://www.vcdl.org
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August 19, 2005, 8:17 a.m.
Canada Blames Us
Gun-control folly here, up north, across the pond...
By John R. Lott Jr.
If you have a problem, it's often easier to blame someone else rather than deal with it. And with Canada's murder rate rising 12 percent last year and a recent rash of murders by gangs in Toronto and other cities, it's understandable that Canadian politicians want a scapegoat. That at least was the strategy Canada's premiers took when they met last Thursday with the new U.S. ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins, and spent much of their time blaming their crime problems on guns smuggled in from the United States.
Of course, there is a minor problem with the attacks on the U.S. Canadians really don't know what the facts are, and the reason is simple: Despite billions of dollars spent on the Canada's gun-registration program and the program's inability to solve crime, the government does not how many crime-guns were seized in Canada, let alone where those guns came from. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police reported in late July that they "cannot know if [the guns] were traceable or where they might have been traced." Thus, even if smuggled guns were an important problem, the Canadian government doesn't know if it is worse now than in the past.
Even in Toronto, which keeps loose track of these numbers, Paul Culver, a senior Toronto Crown Attorney, claims that guns from the U.S. are a "small part" of the problem.
There is another more serious difficulty: You don't have to live next to the United States to see how hard it is to stop criminals from getting guns. The easy part is getting law-abiding citizens to disarm; the hard part is getting the guns from criminals. Drug gangs that are firing guns in places like Toronto seem to have little trouble getting the drugs that they sell and it should not be surprising that they can get the weapons they need as well.
The experiences in the U.K. and Australia, two island nations whose borders are much easier to monitor, should also give Canadian gun controllers some pause. The British government banned handguns in 1997 but recently reported that gun crime in England and Wales nearly doubled in the four years from 1998-99 to 2002-03.
Crime was not supposed to rise after handguns were banned. Yet, since 1996 the serious-violent-crime rate has soared by 69 percent; robbery is up 45 percent, and murders up 54 percent. Before the law, armed robberies had fallen 50 percent from 1993 to 1997, but as soon as handguns were banned the robbery rate shot back up, almost to its 1993 level.
The 2000 International Crime Victimization Survey, the last survey completed, shows the violent-crime rate in England and Wales was twice the rate of that in the U.S. When the new survey for 2004 comes out later this year, that gap will undoubtedly have widened even further as crimes reported to British police have since soared by 35 percent, while those in the U.S. have declined 6 percent.
Australia has also seen its violent-crime rates soar immediately after its 1996 Port Arthur gun-control measures. Violent crime rates averaged 32-percent higher in the six years after the law was passed (from 1997 to 2002) than they did in 1995. The same comparisons for armed-robbery rates showed increases of 74 percent.
During the 1990s, just as Britain and Australia were more severely regulating guns, the U.S. was greatly liberalizing individuals' abilities to carry firearms. Thirty seven of the fifty states now have so-called right-to-carry laws that let law-abiding adults carry concealed handguns after passing a criminal background check and paying a fee. Only half the states require some training, usually around three to five hours. Yet crime has fallen even faster in these states than the national average. Overall, the states in the U.S. that have experienced the fastest growth rates in gun ownership during the 1990s have experienced the biggest drops in murders and other violent crimes.
Many things affect crime: The rise of drug-gang violence in Canada and Britain is an important part of the story, just as it has long been important in explaining the U.S.'s rates. (Few Canadians appreciate that 70 percent of American murders take place in just 3.5 percent of our counties, and that a large percentage of those are drug-gang related.) Just as these gangs can smuggle drugs into the country, they can smuggle in weapons to defend their turf.
With Canada's reported violent-crime rate of 963 per 100,000 in 2003, a rate about twice the U.S.'s (which is 475), Canada's politicians are understandably nervous.
While it is always easier to blame another for your problems, the solution to crime is often homegrown.
? John Lott, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago Press, 2000) and The Bias Against Guns" (Regnery 2003).
http://nationalreview.com/comment/lott200508190817.asp
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How often do Americans use guns for defensive purposes
Larry Elder
September 1, 2005
Forty-six-year-old Joyce Cordoba stood behind the deli counter while working at a Wal-Mart in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Suddenly, her ex-husband -- against whom Ms. Cordoba had a restraining order -- showed up, jumped over the deli counter, and began stabbing Ms. Cordoba. Due Moore, a 72-year-old Wal-Mart customer, witnessed the violent attack. Moore, legally permitted to carry a concealed weapon, pulled out his gun, and shot and killed the ex-husband. Ms. Cordoba survived the brutal attack and is recovering from her wounds.
This raises a question. How often do Americans use guns for defensive purposes? We know that in 2003, 12,548 people died through non-suicide gun violence, including homicides, accidents and cases of undetermined intent.
UCLA professor emeritus James Q. Wilson, a respected expert on crime, police practices and guns, says, "We know from Census Bureau surveys that something beyond a hundred thousand uses of guns for self-defense occur every year. We know from smaller surveys of a commercial nature that the number may be as high as two-and-a-half or three million. We don't know what the right number is, but whatever the right number is, it's not a trivial number."
Criminologist and researcher Gary Kleck, using his own commissioned phone surveys and number extrapolation, estimates that 2.5 million Americans use guns for defensive purposes each year. He further found that of those who had used guns defensively, one in six believed someone would have been dead if they had not resorted to their defensive use of firearms. That corresponds to approximately 400,000 of Kleck's estimated 2.5 million defensive gun uses. Kleck points out that if only one-tenth of the people were right about saving a life, the number of people saved annually by guns would still be at least 40,000.
The Department of Justice's own National Institute of Justice (NIJ) study titled "Guns in America: National Survey on Private Ownership and Use of Firearms," estimated that 1.5 million Americans use guns for defensive purposes every year. Although the government's figure estimated a million fewer people defensively using guns, the NIJ called their figure "directly comparable" to Kleck's, noting that "it is statistically plausible that the difference is due to sampling error." Furthermore, the NIJ reported that half of their respondents who said they used a gun defensively also admitted having done so multiple times a year -- making the number of estimated uses of self-defense with a gun 4.7 million times annually.
Former assistant district attorney and firearms expert David Kopel writes, ". . . [W]hen a robbery victim does not defend himself, the robber succeeds 88 percent of the time, and the victim is injured 25 percent of the time. When a victim resists with a gun, the robbery success rate falls to 30 percent, and the victim injury rate falls to 17 percent. No other response to a robbery -- from drawing a knife to shouting for help to fleeing -- produces such low rates of victim injury and robbery success."
What do "gun control activists" say?
The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence's website displays this oft-quoted "fact": "The risk of homicide in the home is three times greater in households with guns." Their web site fails to mention that Dr. Arthur Kellermann, the "expert" who came up with that figure, later backpedaled after others discredited his studies for failing to follow standard scientific procedures. According to The Wall Street Journal, Dr. Kellermann now concedes, "A gun can be used to scare away an intruder without a shot being fired," admitting that he failed to include such events in his original study. "Simply keeping a gun in the home," Kellermann says, "may deter some criminals who fear confronting an armed homeowner." He adds, "It is possible that reverse causation accounted for some of the association we observed between gun ownership and homicide -- i.e., in a limited number of cases, people may have acquired a gun in response to a specific threat."
"More Guns, Less Crime" author John Lott points out that, in general, our mainstream media fails to inform the public about defensive uses of guns. "Hardly a day seems to go by," writes Lott, "without national news coverage of yet another shooting. Yet when was the last time you heard a story on the national evening news about a citizen saving a life with a gun? . . . An innocent person's murder is more newsworthy than when a victim brandishes a gun and an attacker runs away with no crime committed. . . . ad events provide emotionally gripping pictures. Yet covering only the bad events creates the impression that guns only cost lives."
Americans, in part due to mainstream media's anti-gun bias, dramatically underestimate the defensive uses of guns. Some, after using a gun for self-defense, fear that the police may charge them for violating some law or ordinance about firearm possession and use. So many Americans simply do not tell the authorities.
A gunned-down bleeding guy creates news. A man who spared his family by brandishing a handgun, well, that's just water-cooler chat.
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/larryelder/le20050901.shtml
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Woof All:
I am in Switzerland at the moment and have imperfect access to my usual sources-- I have been reading about there being a lot of crime, disorder etc in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina.
It would seem that this sort of situation is highly relevant to the right rto bear arms. Any one with interesting reports, comments, thoughts?
Woof,
Crafty Dog
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Crafty:
I think it's too soon to say anything definitive--not much info is getting out of the areas most likely to have a shredded social contract. My guess is that privately held firearms are being used far more frequently as defensive tools rather than in a criminal context, much as it stands in "normal" contexts.
With that said, I'm noticing that the MSM usually speaks in pejorative terms of anyone seen sporting a firearm in anything other than an official capacity. It seems like the only labels they are able to apply in these situations is "victim" or "vigilante," with no armed citizens protecting their lives, family, and property allowed. It will be interesting to see what stories emerge well after the fact.
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Canoe and a gun get duo to safety
By Stephen DeFerrari as told to Jessica Fargen
Friday, September 2, 2005 - Updated: 11:23 AM EST
Stephen DeFerrari, a Dedham native whose sister-in-law lives in Hanover, and his wife, Pam, escaped from their New Orleans home yesterday, brandishing a shotgun, in a canoe with their seven cats. Stephen spoke to the Herald last night after they arrived at a Baton Rouge hotel.
It was so dark last night. Pitch black. That was the scary part.
I was standing on the front porch with a shotgun keeping an eye on things. I could hear people breaking into houses right around the corner. We knew. We knew we had to get out. There was no police presence. The people are just going crazy. There doesn't seem to be any authority at all.
It took a canoe trip of about an hour and a mile long. It started to rain. More water. Just the thing we didn't need. It kind of felt good because we were so hot, so filthy. It felt good to have cool, clean water.
We had to make two trips in the canoe to get the cats and the dogs and the people we were with to get to higher ground. We saw fires and looting going on. If we didn't keep on moving and stay away from some people I feel like we would have been in trouble.
Earlier today, a man came up to me. I think he wanted the canoe. He saw I was armed and gave up.
We happened to pass this mall and people were looting it.
People told us the police went in there so they started shooting at the police. So the police left. They (looters) just set the place on fire. We saw it burning and we saw the fire department not even going near the place because the looters were going nuts.
We made it to dry land. We got into an Explorer rented by one of our friend's daughters. There weren't too many people on the roads in the beginning. As we got closer to Baton Rouge there started to be more people. There are people with their bags, looking lost. It's so eerie and strange. People are just lost. I guess most of them probably lost everything they got.
We are lucky, very lucky. Our house didn't get destroyed. We are still alive. The first thing my wife did after she and her sisters hugged and cried at the hotel, she took a shower. I'm about to do the same.
http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=100716
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Wow, the New York Times portraying armed citizens in a positive light, and I lived to see it.
Police and Owners Begin to Challenge Looters
By FELICITY BARRINGER and JERE LONGMAN
Published: September 1, 2005
NEW ORLEANS, Aug. 31 - In a city shut down for business, the Rite Aid at Oak and South Carrollton was wide open on Wednesday. Someone had stolen a forklift, driven it four blocks, peeled up the security gate and smashed through the front door.
Louisiana State Police officers ride toward the French Quarter in New Orleans. One officer described an atmosphere of "nervous energy."
The young and the old walked in empty-handed and walked out with armfuls of candy, sunglasses, notebooks, soda and whatever else they could need or find. No one tried to stop them.
Across New Orleans, the rule of law, like the city's levees, could not hold out after Hurricane Katrina. The desperate and the opportunistic took advantage of an overwhelmed police force and helped themselves to anything that could be carried, wheeled or floated away, including food, water, shoes, television sets, sporting goods and firearms.
Many people with property brought out their own shotguns and sidearms. Many without brought out shopping carts. The two groups have moved warily in and out of each other's paths for the last three days, and the rising danger has kept even some rescue efforts from proceeding.
Because the New Orleans police were preoccupied with search and rescue missions, sheriff's deputies and state police from around Louisiana began to patrol the city, some holding rifles as they rolled through the streets in an armored vehicle.
But on Wednesday night, the mayor ordered about 1,500 city police officers, nearly the entire force, back to their traditional roles.
The looters "are starting to get closer to heavily populated areas," Mayor C. Ray Nagin told The Associated Press, "hotels, hospitals, and we're going to stop it right now."
Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco said she was "furious" about the looting.
"What angers me the most is disasters tend to bring out the best in everybody, and that's what we expected to see," Ms. Blanco said at a news conference. "Instead, it brought out the worst."
All sizes and types of stores, from Wal-Mart to the Rite Aid to the St. Vincent de Paul thrift shop, turned into bazaars of free merchandise.
Some frightened homeowners took security into their own hands.
John Carolan was sitting on his porch in the thick, humid darkness just before midnight Tuesday when three or four young men, one with a knife and another with a machete, stopped in front of his fence and pointed to the generator humming in the front yard, he said.
One said, "We want that generator," he recalled.
"I fired a couple of rounds over their heads with a .357 Magnum," Mr. Carolan recounted Wednesday. "They scattered."
He smiled and added, "You've heard of law west of the Pecos. This is law west of Canal Street."
Though no one excused the stealing, many officials were careful not to depict every looter as a petty thief.
"Had New York been closed off on 9/11, who can say what they would have done?" said Cynthia Hedge-Morrell, vice president of the New Orleans City Council. "When there's no food, no water, no sanitation, who can say what you'd do? People were trying to protect their children. I don't condone lawlessness, but this doesn't represent the generous people of New Orleans."
One woman outside a Sav-a-Center on Tchoupitoulas Street was loading food, soda, water, bread, peanut butter and canned food into the trunk of a gray Oldsmobile.
"Yes, in a sense it's wrong, but survival is the name of the game," said the woman, who would not identify herself. "I've got six grandchildren. We didn't know this was going to happen. The water is off. We're trying to get supplies we need."
Jimmy Field, one of the state's five public service commissioners, said supply and repair trucks were being slowed down by people looking for food and water. Some would not go on without police escorts.
"Right now we're hoping for more federal assistance to get the level of civil disturbance down," Mr. Field said.
One police officer was shot Tuesday trying to stop looting, but he was expected to survive.
An emergency medical vehicle that was taking a Baton Rouge police officer who had been shot last month from a hospital back to his hometown was shot at on the way out of New Orleans on Tuesday.
East Baton Rouge Parish officials agreed to send 20 buses with special weapons and tactics officers to help evacuate New Orleanians, but only if a state trooper was also placed on each bus. The plan was scuttled.
"I told them I don't mind committing drivers and vehicles, but I wasn't going to put our people in harm's way," said Walter Monsour, the chief administrative officer of the parish.
Besides the strain of having to rescue survivors, the police are bereft of much of their equipment, buildings and essential communications. The Police Department was scheduled to receive new radios on Wednesday night to coordinate its activities, said Lt. Col. Mark S. Oxley, a spokesman for the state police.
Charles C. Foti Jr., the Louisiana attorney general, said a temporary detention center and courthouse would be established somewhere outside New Orleans. "We will be ready to accept you in our system, and teach you about rules and order," Mr. Foti warned looters.
On Tuesday, the state police sent in 200 troopers trained in riot control, said Lt. Lawrence J. McLeary, a spokesman for the state police.
He said that the "nervous energy" in New Orleans reminded him of the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago. "I've never seen anything like that in Louisiana," Lieutenant McLeary said.
With no officers in sight, people carried empty bags, shopping carts and backpacks through the door of the Rite Aid on Wednesday and left with them full. The forklift was still in the doorway. As they came and went, the looters nodded companionably to one another.
Paul Cosma, 47, who owns a nearby auto shop, stood outside it along with a reporter and photographer he was taking around the neighborhood. He had pistols on both hips.
Suddenly, he stepped forward toward a trio of young men and grabbed a pair of rusty bolt cutters out of the hands of one of them. The young man pulled back, glaring.
Mr. Cosma, never claiming any official status, eventually jerked the bolt cutters away, saying, "You don't need these."
The young man and his friends left, continuing the glare. A few minutes later, they returned and mouthed quiet oaths at Mr. Cosma, and his friend Art DePodesta, an Army veteran, who was carrying a shotgun and a pistol.
Mr. Cosma stared back, saying nothing. Between the two sides, a steady trickle of looters came and went, barely giving any of them a look.
Felicity Barringer reported from New Orleans for this article, and Jere Longman from Baton Rouge, La. Susan Saulny contributed reporting from Baton Rouge, and Joseph B. Treaster from New Orleans.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/01/national/nationalspecial/01lawless.html
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Now the Washington Post has published a story that portrays armed citizens in a positive light. Only need The Nation to do so to make the trifecta.
Neighbors Team Up To Provide Security
By Allison Klein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 5, 2005; A23
BILOXI, Miss., Sept. 4 -- Jeffrey Powell yanked the cushions off his living room sofa and arranged them on the bed of his truck. Then he got his shotgun, made himself comfortable, and spent the night in his driveway, protecting his hurricane-ravaged home and enjoying whatever breeze he could catch on a steamy night.
Powell is part of the Popps Ferry Landing neighborhood watch, a group of citizens trying to restore order and peace in their middle-class community a week after Hurricane Katrina brought her chaos.
"We're not going to have any looters out here," said Dan Shearin, 56, Powell's next-door neighbor. "We have some burly men who are sleeping outside with guns. If the looters come, we'll take care of them."
They haven't shot anyone, but they had to scare off a few groups of people they didn't know in the middle of the night, Shearin said.
As stories of violent and desperate looters have made their way across Mississippi, people in communities where law enforcement has been overwhelmed are reaching for their guns to police their streets.
In Popps Ferry Landing, many neighbors had lived near each other for years but had never spoken. The realization that their safety and homes were vulnerable and police presence was scarce brought them together quickly. The Dollar Store up the road was looted and vandalized pretty badly.
"We haven't exactly seen organized law enforcement out here," said Hugh Worden, 53, who lives on the other side of Powell. "The first day after the storm, we saw law enforcement out here. After that, there's not been much patrol. I suppose police are protecting the main streets."
Worden, a manager at Treasure Bay Casino before it was destroyed, said he has talked to everyone within three blocks of his home.
"The good thing is, now we all know each other," he said.
Popps Ferry Landing is tucked away in an enclave of western Biloxi, not far from Pass Road, the main east-west thoroughfare through town. Most of the houses here are two-story Colonials built in the early 1990s, and valued between $100,000 and $175,000. Many lost all or part of their roofs in the storm, and on some the entire front was torn away, as well. Piles of wood and aluminum siding stand in yards. So many trees are down, the road is an obstacle course.
Shearin said he did not sleep outside with a gun, but like most of his neighbors, he owns one. He has a Smith & Wesson .38.
"If I see somebody who's not supposed to be here, I'd shoot over their head," he said. "I wouldn't shoot anyone. I'm not a violent person -- not yet, anyway."
Shearin, a retired phone salesman, said he has been disappointed that police don't have the manpower to deal with looters.
"What good is the federal government?" he asked. "You've got to take care of yourself."
Sitting on his porch drinking a bottle of Aquafina, Shearin said he'd never seen as much destruction as Katrina brought.
"The terrorists couldn't do this much damage," he said.
He and his wife, Dottie, said they'd like to get out of Biloxi for a while, but they, like their neighbors, have to stay and wait for insurance claim agents to come by and assess the damage. The Shearins lost half their roof and most of their back yard, including a new hot tub.
"We are waiting on the insurance agents," Dottie Shearin said. "They have to come by and make a visual inspection."
Around the corner, Marti McKay, 30, said she and other neighbors have scattered their cars around the street to make it look as if everyone is home. It was scariest before they got their power back Saturday.
"It's nerve-racking at night around here because it's so dark," McKay said. "It's so quiet. We're used to the sound of air conditioning, and lights."
Her housemate Robin Frey helped organize some spotlights in the neighborhood powered by generators. And neighbor Oliver Fayard, 49, walked the streets with a flashlight to check on everyone.
"You didn't have a choice but to get out there and network," Frey said. "We saw some cars we didn't know that came through the neighborhood. We gave them a look to kill. We made it known these are not vacant houses."
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A friend posts on another forum:
========================
Did anybody ever answer that question about whether Louisiana law allowed or prohibited such? I know the U.S. Supreme Court has already weighed in on several firearms cases at a national level, and the Supreme Court never took the Morton Grove, IL gun ban case, thus allowing the decision of the 7th Circuit to stand:
U.S. v. Cruikshank (1876) involved members of the Ku Klux Klan depriving black victims of their basic rights such as freedom of assembly and to bear arms. The court decided that neither the First nor Second Amendments applied to the states, but were limitations on Congress. Thus the federal government had no power to correct these violations, rather the citizens had to rely on the police power of the states for their protection from private individuals.
Presser v. Illinois (1886) ruled that the states had the right to strictly regulate private military groups and associations. It also reaffirmed the Cruikshank decision that the Second Amendment acts as a limitation upon the federal government and not the states.
QUILICI vs. VILLAGE OF MORTON GROVE (1982): None of these arguments has merit. First, appellants offer no authority, other than their own opinions, to support their arguments that Presser is no longer good law or would have been decided differently today. Indeed, the fact that the Supreme Court continues to cite Presser leads to the opposite conclusion. Second, regardless of whether appellants agree with the Presser analysis, it is the law of the land and we are bound by it. Their assertion that Presser is illogical is a policy matter for the Supreme Court to address...The Supreme Court has specifically rejected the proposition that the entire Bill of Rights applies to the states through the fourteenth amendment. Since we hold that the second amendment does not apply to the states, we need not consider the scope of its guarantee of the right to bear arms. For the sake of completeness, however, and because appellants devote a large portion of their briefs to this issue, we briefly comment on what we believe to be the scope of the second amendment. Because the second amendment is not applicable to Morton Grove and because possession of handguns by individuals is not part of the right to keep and bear arms, Ordinance No. 81-11 does not violate the second amendment.
So it seems that the legal answer lies with state law???...
__________________
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Constitutions and Emergencies:
The New York Times reports:
Waters were receding across this flood-beaten city today as police officers began confiscating weapons, including legally registered firearms, from civilians in preparation for a mass forced evacuation of the residents still living here.
No civilians in New Orleans will be allowed to carry pistols, shotguns, or other firearms, said P. Edwin Compass, the superintendent of police. "Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons," he said.
But that order apparently does not apply to the hundreds of security guards whom businesses and some wealthy individuals have hired to protect their property. The guards, who are civilians working for private security firms like Blackwater, are openly carrying M-16's and other assault rifles. Mr. Compass said he was aware of the private guards, but that the police had no plans to make them give up their weapons.
Note, though, that the Louisiana Constitution, art. I, sec. 11 (enacted 1974), provides that
"The right of each citizen to keep and bear arms shall not be abridged, but this provision shall not prevent the passage of laws to prohibit the carrying of weapons concealed on the person."
Is there some implicit emergency exception to the right to bear arms here? On the other hand, doesn't the emergency make the right especially valuable to the rightsholders? Should it matter that the government seems willing to let "businesses and some wealthy individuals" hire to people use arms "to protect their property," but isn't willing to let less wealthy individuals use themselves and their friends and relatives to protect their property (and their bodies and their lives)?
http://volokh.com/posts/1126215739.shtml
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In New Orleans
Troops Escalate Urgency of Evacuation
By Timothy Dwyer and Ann Scott Tyson
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, September 9, 2005; Page A01
NEW ORLEANS, Sept. 8 -- Outside Kajun's Pub, between the relatively dry French Quarter and the heavily flooded Ninth Ward, bar owner JoAnn Guidos loaded up her 1991 Ford Econoline van with clothing, liquor and other necessities Thursday morning. After holding out for 10 days, Guidos and her friends were finally leaving New Orleans and heading to high ground.
The beer was still cold, thanks to a working generator, and hopes for customers were strong as the flood-ravaged city fills with thirsty soldiers and emergency workers.
Miles Smith is moved to a wheelchair after rescuers brought him to the convention center. Officials are trying to avoid force but want the city emptied of residents. (By Carol Guzy -- The Washington Post)
Graphic
Pumps and Levees
Engineers are working to get five operational pump stations up to full capacity and to repair remaining breaches on two major canals.
Friday, Sept. 9, at noon ET
President Faces Series of Challenges
Washington Post associate editor Robert G. Kaiser discusses the current issues challenging President Bush, from the Supreme Court to Hurricane Katrina to the war in Iraq.
INTERACTIVE MAP:
Katrina's Aftermath in the Gulf Coast
FULL COVERAGE:
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Katrina Photos and Video
Hurricane Katrina brought unprecedented destruction to the Gulf Coast. View the Post's multimedia coverage of the disaster. (Shannon Stapleton - Reuters)
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Blog: The Impact on Washington
As the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina continues to unfold, this Web log will track the ways that the Washington community is touched by the tragedy.
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But on Wednesday night, Guidos said, armed federal agents identifying themselves as U.S. marshals confiscated her weapons and ordered her and six friends to leave by noon Thursday.
"When you get 15 M-16s pointed at you and they line you up against the wall, it's kind of scary," said Guidos, 55.
With floodwaters continuing to recede and cleanup efforts beginning in earnest, police and the military set out on an aggressive door-to-door campaign here Thursday, urging remaining residents to leave or be removed by force.
The former Big Easy took on the air of a military encampment, as thousands of reserve and active-duty troops began patrolling the city and assisting police in search-and-rescue missions. Houses were marked with codes indicating whether any residents -- living or dead -- were found inside. Emergency workers intensified efforts to divide the city into grids in order to methodically retrieve an unknown number of corpses still in the floodwaters or entombed in ruined homes and businesses.
Although the mayor issued a forcible evacuation order, Louisiana and federal officials said they remained hopeful that most stragglers will leave voluntarily when faced with urgent warnings about dwindling supplies and hazardous floodwaters.
"We need everybody out so we can continue with the work of restoring this city," Vice Admiral Thad W. Allen, the U.S. Coast Guard chief of staff who has taken over the federal response in New Orleans, said early in the day on CBS.
P. Edwin Compass, the superintendent of police, said there are thousands of people remaining in the city but that authorities are determined to get everyone out. He said as little force as necessary would be used but that staying is not an option. Anyone with a weapon, even one legally registered, will have it confiscated, he said.
"No one will be able to be armed," Compass said. "Guns will be taken. Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns."
The evacuation effort, however, appeared haphazard at best. Affluent areas that were not flooded, such as parts of the Garden District and Uptown, appear to be a low priority for mandatory evacuations.
In the dry neighborhood of Marigny Triangle, residents lounged in lawn chairs while listening to music blaring from "Radio Marigny," an impromptu outdoor music station. The area remained largely untouched by floodwaters, and residents say they see little reason to leave.
Page 2 of 3 < BackBack NextNext >
Troops Escalate Urgency of Evacuation
Peter and Amy Bas, who have four children ages 5 to 14, noted that they had already cleaned debris from their street. As the couple relaxed in their front yard, a Louisiana state trooper cruised by and asked if they needed diapers.
"Where are we going to go?" Peter Bas asked. "They're going to take us and put us somewhere with 5,000 other people? We're going to stay."
Miles Smith is moved to a wheelchair after rescuers brought him to the convention center. Officials are trying to avoid force but want the city emptied of residents. (By Carol Guzy -- The Washington Post)
Graphic
Pumps and Levees
Engineers are working to get five operational pump stations up to full capacity and to repair remaining breaches on two major canals.
Friday, Sept. 9, at noon ET
President Faces Series of Challenges
Washington Post associate editor Robert G. Kaiser discusses the current issues challenging President Bush, from the Supreme Court to Hurricane Katrina to the war in Iraq.
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Katrina's Aftermath in the Gulf Coast
FULL COVERAGE:
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Katrina Photos and Video
Hurricane Katrina brought unprecedented destruction to the Gulf Coast. View the Post's multimedia coverage of the disaster. (Shannon Stapleton - Reuters)
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Tuesday, Sept. 6, 3 p.m. ET:Hurricane Katrina: First Person
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Amy Bas added: "It could happen, but you think you're living in America and nobody is going to make you leave your home."
Police and the National Guard were aided by hundreds of paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division, who canvassed the French Quarter and neighborhoods surrounding the convention center and Superdome.
Active-duty U.S. troops such as the 82nd Airborne lack law enforcement authority in a domestic city such as New Orleans, and therefore must avoid direct involvement in forcibly evicting people. Local police warned that they expected friction with residents as they moved forcefully to pull them out, 82nd Airborne commanders said.
The paratroopers, along with other U.S. soldiers, patrolled parts of the city section by section in boats, trucks and on foot, looking to persuade more stragglers to leave.
"Hey! Evacuation!" Sgt. Geriah McAvin, 27, of Detroit yelled toward a block of red brick apartments as his 82nd Airborne platoon rolled into a flooded housing project in two lumbering, five-ton trucks. "Hey! We're here to take you out of here."
One man on crutches waved to the passing trucks from his front stoop. But when the five-ton circled around to get him, he hesitated.
"You're not taking me to the Superdome?" asked Alfred Jones, 43.
"No Superdome!" Dennison said.
Eventually, Jones gave in, wincing and moaning in pain as the soldiers lifted him onto the truck. Jones, who lived alone, has severe arthritis in his legs and said he had survived with the help of a friend who brought him food. But his friend left a few days ago, and Jones had not eaten for at least a day and he ran out of water on Wednesday. Given his leg condition, waving down a helicopter was out of the question, he said.
With major levee breaks patched earlier this week, and a growing number of pumps sending water into nearby Lake Pontchartrain, the floodwaters appeared to be dropping quickly on Thursday. Drier conditions in many areas allowed crews to step up efforts clearing branches, lumber, bricks and other debris, piling the rubble along roadsides and trolley tracks on St. Charles Avenue and other once-picturesque boulevards.
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Mom, suspect killed in carjacking, shooting
By DON PLUMMER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 09/13/05
Kimberly D. Boyd took her son to preschool Monday morning, then dropped by a bank before heading to her office in north Cobb County.
Minutes later, her routine was shattered, and sometime before 9:30 a.m. she was struggling for her life with a carjacker as her Toyota Sequoia raced south on U.S. 41. The kidnapping ended with the 30-year-old Acworth woman dead and the carjacker fatally shot by a passer-by.
Boyd died instantly when her SUV was broadsided by a cement truck, police said. Within seconds, the man driving Boyd's car was also dead ? shot by Shawn Roberts, 31, who had seen Boyd fighting the man and followed the car, police said.
"She was fighting for her life," Roberts, who lives in Acworth, told WAGA-TV.
Roberts told police he was driving north on U.S. 41 about 9:30 a.m. when he saw a man beating a woman outside the SUV, just south of the Lake Allatoona bridge. He stopped and turned around on the four-lane road to help the woman, said Cobb Police Cpl. Dana Pierce.
The carjacker pushed the woman back into the SUV and took off, with the doors still open. Roberts followed about two miles to Lake Acworth Drive, where the crash occurred, Pierce said.
As Boyd's car turned east on Lake Acworth Drive it was struck by the cement truck.
Witness Bobby Williams said the truck had just started away from a traffic light and was traveling no more than 10 mph when it hit the SUV.
Williams, owner of A2Z Auto Service at 4356 North Cobb Parkway, said he saw Roberts get out of his 2004 black Dodge Ram pickup and run toward the accident scene wearing a leather shoulder holster.
"He looked official," Williams said, explaining that he thought Roberts might be a plain-clothes police officer. "He hollered at [the carjacker], 'Stay where you are. Stay where you are.'"
The carjacker ran toward a Raceway gas station on the corner and Roberts chased him. He told police the man turned a gun toward him, and he had to do something.
"I shot and killed a man today," Roberts told WAGA-TV. "I don't feel good about it, but if I hadn't have done something somebody else would have died."
Williams said he heard at least four, perhaps five, gunshots.
"He [the carjacker] was five feet in front of me when he got hit," Williams said. "On TV, all that flailing around that goes on is not what happened. He dropped like a sack of potatoes."
Monday night Cobb police identified the dead man as Brian Clark, 25, who has family in Acworth. Police did not say whether Clark lived in the area.
No charges were filed against the cement truck driver, who was not identified.
Police questioned Roberts, who they said was not an off-duty officer, before releasing him without filing charges.
"All I can say right now is to offer my condolences of the family of the woman," Roberts said when reached at his home Monday night in Acworth. "I'm postponing any comments just for a few days," he added, saying he was acting on legal advice.
Boyd's family could not be reached Monday.
Police are still unsure where the carjacking began, Pierce said. They are tracing possible routes from Allatoona Truck Rental, the business Boyd operated on Cherokee Street in Acworth, according to public records. Police said she left her office shortly after arriving there Monday morning. The first 911 call on the crash and shooting came in about 9:30 a.m.
Police also were investigating the possibility that the carjacker's gun had been taken in a robbery, rape and carjacking in Acworth last Tuesday, said Cobb robbery squad Lt. Tom Arnold.
"We're looking into that and whether the suspect in this assault is the same as in last week's attack in Acworth," Arnold said.
Acworth police spokesman Wayne Dennard said his department also is investigating the possibility that the man killed Monday morning was the suspect in a rape last Tuesday.
In last week's attack a woman was assaulted as she left home and was forced inside, where she was beaten and raped before being forced to drive to a nearby bank to get money from an ATM, Dennard said. The woman instead ran inside the bank and her assailant drove away in her car, which was later found abandoned, he said.
Late Monday, Boyd's SUV was driven on a flatbed into the Cobb crime lab impound building next to the medical examiner's office where the bodies of Boyd and her assailant were taken, Arnold said.
Fingerprints were taken from the dead man Monday, Arnold said. Autopsies on Boyd and the man are to be conducted today. Police will compare the dead man's fingerprints and DNA to evidence recovered from last week's attack, he said.
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/cobb/0905/13carjacking.html
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Nick Coleman: He knows the streets and he knows trouble
Star Tribune
September 14, 2005
A guy in a white shirt almost became a historical footnote about 4:30 last Sunday morning. He almost was the first guy to get himself shot by a candidate for mayor of Minneapolis.
"I'm in the dark, holding a gun on him and telling him to get on the ground, but he keeps backing away from me," Mark Koscielski was saying. "Then the guy points at his shirt and says, 'I have a white shirt on, and it'll get dirty if I get in the mud.' And I say, 'It's going to get red if you don't get on the [expletive] ground.' "
In the end, the guy got muddy, and he got arrested, too, charged with attempting to break into Koscielski's Guns & Ammo, at 2926 Chicago Av. S. That was just one of three attempted break-ins at the store in the past two weeks, during which time there has been a rash of burglaries near the corner of Chicago and Lake Street.
Koscielski, 51, was a distant also-ran in Tuesday's mayoral primary. His campaign to keep open his heavily secured gun shop, watched over by electronic surveillance and a pair of raucous parrots called Toto and Cleo, may be running out of ammo, too: The Minnesota Court of Appeals is scheduled next month to decide whether the city has acted illegally in trying to zone Koscielski into oblivion.
He's a political gadfly, a thorn in the side and an affably goofy gunsmith (he teaches a training course for those who want to apply for permits to carry handguns) who has been fighting to keep his gun store alive for 10 years. Despite his loss (again) at the polls, if you want to discuss the shape of Minneapolis, you can do worse than talk to Koscielski. He may never be mayor (thankfully), but he knows the streets. And he knows trouble.
For months, the area around Lake and Chicago has looked like a disaster zone: the streets torn up, with concrete barricades and debris everywhere, while work proceeds on turning the old Sears building into offices, condos and a hotel.
City planners promise upscale lofts, white-collar office workers and boutiques. Those who try to make a living on the disrupted streets, which are deserted at night, just hope to be able to see that bright future.
"We have tried to steel ourselves," says Mark Simon, owner of Robert's Shoes, which has suffered four break-ins in the past two weeks as thieves have used road construction debris to smash store windows and grab shoes. "Every day, it's a different brick," he says with a game smile. "But when the new developments start to open, the hope is there will be too many decent people around for the bad guys."
Koscielski scoffs at that vision, saying new sidewalks and new trash cans won't deter prostitutes and gangsters. He relies on his trusty .38- caliber Colt revolver, which he bought in 1972 at a Holiday Stationstore in the city and which he trained at the would-be burglar until the cops arrived. (Two accomplices got away, one jumping from the gun shop roof onto Koscielski's Ford Explorer, leaving a footprint on the hood not far from the "Terrorist Hunting Permit" bumper sticker.)
Following his own training advice, Koscielski, who had dialed 911, secured his weapon at the first sign of the police and raised his hands, hollering, "Help! Police!" That, he says, helps the cops tell the bad guy from the honest citizen. With all his hollering, first at the suspect, then for the cops, Koscielski lost his voice. But it came back Tuesday, even as he was losing his quixotic bid for mayor, with its cheesy campaign signs topped with blood-red words that dripped, "Stop! Murderapolis!"
"If that guy had something in his hand -- a pry bar, a screwdriver, an ice pick, anything -- he probably would have died," Koscielski says, shaking at the memory of the confrontation.
Fortunately, no one was shot, and the future for Lake and Chicago is still bright. But the guy in the white shirt might want to ponder how close he came to losing his future.
On election day, the erstwhile mayor of Minneapolis was dressed in sandals, camouflage shorts and an old T-shirt. The shirt said, "Some People Are Alive Simply Because It Is Illegal To Kill Them."
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Katrina Educates World On Need For Owning Guns
by Erich Pratt
"All our operators are busy right now. Please remain on the line and an operator will be with you shortly. Your call is important to us."
Can you imagine any words more horrifying after dialing 9-1-1? Your life's in danger, but there's no one available to help you.
For several days in September, life was absolutely terrifying for many New Orleans residents who got stranded in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. There were no operators... there were no phone calls being handled.
Heck, there was no 9-1-1. Even if the phone lines had been working, there were no police officers waiting to be dispatched.
Hundreds of New Orleans police officers had fled the city. Some took their badges and threw them out the windows of their cars as they sped away. Others participated in the looting of the city.
While there were many officers who acted honorably -- even apprehending dangerous thugs while grieving the loss of their own family members -- most residents were forced to fend for themselves.
Many did so successfully, using their own firearms, until New Orleans Police Commissioner Edwin Compass III issued the order to confiscate their guns.
Anti-gun zealots confiscate firearms from law-abiding citizens
On September 8, several news outlets began reporting that officials in New Orleans were confiscating firearms... not from looters, but from law-abiding citizens who legally owned firearms!
"No one will be able to be armed," said Deputy Chief Warren Riley. "We are going to take all the weapons."
It was like a scene out of the former Soviet Union or Communist China.
The Associated Press quoted Compass, the police commissioner, as saying, "Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons."
Well, there you have it. Given the chance, gun control advocates will always implement their real agenda -- confiscation of firearms from everyone... except the police!
ABC News video on September 8 showed National Guard troops going house-to-house, smashing down doors, searching for residents, and confiscating guns. Every victim of disarmament was clearly not a thug or looter, but a decent resident wanting to defend his or her home.
Many of the troops were clearly conflicted by their orders. "It is surreal," said one member of the Oklahoma National Guard who was going door-to-door in New Orleans. "You never expect to do this in your own country."
Many never would have expected it -- confiscating firearms from decent people who were relying on those firearms to protect themselves from the looters.
It was an outrageous order -- one that should not have been obeyed. There was no constitutional authority for the directive, and it ignored the fact that many good people had already used firearms to successfully defend their lives and property.
Guns were saving lives and protecting property prior to the confiscation order
As flood waters started rising in New Orleans, a wave of violence rolled through the city.
"It was pandemonium for a couple of nights," said Charlie Hackett, a New Orleans resident. "We just felt that when [looters] got done with the stores, they?d come to the homes."
Hackett was right... which is why he and his neighbor, John Carolan, stood guard over their homes to ward off looters who, rummaging through the neighborhoods, were smashing windows and ransacking stores.
Armed looters did eventually come to Carolan's house and demanded his generator. But Carolan showed them his gun and they left.
No wonder then that gun stores, which weren't under water, were selling firearms at a record pace to people looking to defend themselves. "I've got people like you wouldn't believe, lots of people, coming in and buying handguns," said Briley Reed, the assistant manager of the E-Z Pawn store in Baton Rouge.
"I've even had soldiers coming in here buying guns," Reed said.
Makeshift militias patrol neighborhoods
In the Algiers neighborhood of New Orleans, dozens of neighbors banded together to protect their neighborhood.
"There's about 20 or 30 guys in addition to us. We know all of them and where they are," Gregg Harris said. "People armed themselves so quickly, rallying together. I think it's why [our] neighborhood survived."
Harris isn't joking about the armaments. A gun battle erupted one afternoon between armed neighbors and looters. Two of the thugs were shot.
Since then, no more looters have bothered the neighborhood. But the neighbors aren't letting their guard down. They all take their turn keeping watch.
Gareth Stubbs sits in a rocking chair on his front porch, holding his shotgun and a bottle of bug spray.
In another home, a 74-year old mother keeps the following near the bed: her rosary, a shotgun and a 38-caliber pistol.
Vinnie Pervel and two other volunteers man a balcony-turned-watchtower with five borrowed shotguns, a pistol, a flare gun, and old AK-47 and loads of ammunition.
To be sure, many of the weapons were borrowed from neighbors who fled before the storm hit. Pervel and Harris did not have any working firearms themselves in the aftermath of the storm. But because Pervel had been keeping in contact (via phone) with neighbors who had already evacuated, he got permission to go into the vacant homes and get his neighbors' weapons.
"I never thought I'd be going into my neighbor's house and taking their guns," Pervel said. "We wrote down what gun came from what house so we can return them when they get back."
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Firearms were a hot commodity
It would be an understatement to say that firearms were the hottest commodity in the days following the massive destruction. In Gulf Port, Mississippi, Ron Roland, 51, lost everything -- three homes, four cars, a bait-and-tackle shop and a boat. It was all destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.
Nevertheless, Roland was determined to salvage what he could amidst the rubble -- with or without police protection. And it's a good thing, too, because there would be no such thing as "police protection" in the days following the storm.
Standing guard over one of his homes with a handgun in his waistband, Roland used his firearm to stop looters from rummaging through his storm-damaged property.
Roland and his son even performed a citizen's arrest on one plunderer and then warned future thieves by posting the following message in his yard: "NO TRESPASSERS! ARMED HOMEOWNERS."
Signs like this were common throughout the Gulf Coast region in the days following Katrina.
Unfortunately, some people had to learn the hard way about the utility of keeping firearms for protection.
Water, food... but what about guns?
The managers at the Covenant Home nursing center in New Orleans were more than prepared to ride out the hurricane. They had food and supplies to last the 80 residents for more than ten days.
They had planned for every contingency... or so they thought.
"We had excellent plans. We had enough food for 10 days," said Peggy Hoffman, the home's Executive Director.
But they had no firearms. So when carjackers hijacked the home's bus and drove by the center shouting "Get out!" to the residents, they were completely helpless.
All of the residents, most of them in wheelchairs, were evacuated to other nursing homes in the state.
Hoffman says she has now learned her lesson.
Next time, "We'll have to equip our department heads with guns and teach them how to shoot," she said.
Thank goodness someone is learning from their mistakes.
Does anyone remember Los Angeles?
We should have learned this lesson more than ten years ago when the entire country saw horrifying images coming out of Los Angeles.
If the riots of 1992 taught us anything, it is that the police can't always be there to protect us.
For several days, that city was in complete turmoil as stores were looted and burned. Motorists were dragged from their cars and beaten.
Further aggravating the situation, police were very slow in responding to the crisis. Many Guardsmen, after being mobilized to the affected areas, sat by and watched the violence because their rifles were low on ammunition.
But not everybody in Los Angeles suffered. In some of the hot spots, Korean merchants were able to successfully protect their stores with semi-automatic firearms.
In areas where armed citizens banded together for self-protection, their businesses were spared while others (which were left unprotected) burned to the ground.
The pictures of Korean merchants defending their stores left quite an impression on one group of people living in Los Angeles: those who had previously identified themselves as gun control advocates.
Press reports described how life-long gun control supporters were even running to gun stores to buy an item they never thought they would need -- a gun. Tragically, they were surprised (and outraged!) to learn there was a 15-day waiting period upon firearms.
Confiscating guns puts people at risk
Fast forward more than a decade, it seems that many folks still haven't learned the lessons from previous tragedies. If the Mayor and his cronies really wanted to help the decent citizens of New Orleans, they would have been issuing people firearms instead of taking them away.
These guns were the only thing that prevented many good folks from becoming victims in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Now that residents are disarmed, will the Mayor provide 24-hour, round-the-clock protection for each of these disarmed families? Will he make himself personally liable for anyone who is injured or killed as a result of being prevented from defending himself or his family?
When your life is in danger, you don't want to rely on a police force that is stretched way too thin. And the last thing you want to hear when you call 9-1-1 is, "All our operators are busy right now...."
That might just be the last thing you ever hear.
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Perhaps a little dense, but a lot of interesting ramifications here. Sounds like the kind of issue that will eventually percolate to the top of the legal system.
Insurer Not Required to Defend Homeowner Who Shot Intruder
John Caher
New York Law Journal
09-16-2005
A man who killed an intruder in his home in self-defense is not entitled to insurance defense in a wrongful death action, a divided Albany appellate panel ruled Thursday in a case of first impression.
The split by New York's Appellate Division, 3rd Department, in Automobile Co. of Hartford v. Cook, 97160, illustrates a debate that has divided courts across the country. The question is whether a homeowner's insurance policy provides coverage when an insured is sued for wrongful death stemming from a killing in self-defense. That question was apparently addressed for the first time Thursday by a New York appellate court.
Justice John A. Lahtinen and three of his four colleagues strictly construed the insurance policy language in holding that an occurrence of justifiable homicide results from an intentional rather than accidental act. Here, the defendant shot the decedent at close range with a 12-gauge shotgun. The action thus triggers the exception for incidents that are "expected or intended" by the insured, the panel found.
But Presiding Justice Anthony V. Cardona dissented, distinguishing "defend" from "indemnify" and arguing that an insurance company has an obligation to provide a defense, at least until the point where it is determined that the allegedly wrongful death resulted from intentional rather than negligent conduct.
"The cases across the country are split right down the middle," said Albany appellate attorney Michael J. Hutter, who represented the insurance company. "But this is the first time it has ever been raised in New York. The Third Department took a very strict approach."
At the heart of the case is a money dispute between acquaintances Alfred S. Cook and Richard A. Barber. In 2002, Barber barged into Cook's home. Cook shot and killed Barber, and was charged with murder.
After an Albany County jury acquitted Cook, the Barber's estate sued for wrongful death. Then, the Automobile Insurance Co. of Hartford, which provided Cook with homeowner's insurance, sought a declaration that it had no duty to defend or indemnify.
Albany Supreme Court Justice Edward Sheridan said the insurance company had a duty to provide Cook's defense.
Thursday, the 4-1 Third Department panel reversed.
"The jury apparently concluded in the criminal case that the prosecution failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the 120-pound Cook did not have legal justification for shooting the 360-pound decedent -- who had previously attacked and injured Cook -- after he refused to leave Cook's home and approached Cook in a menacing way," Lahtinen observed. Regardless, the majority held as a matter of law that Cook's actions were not covered by the homeowner's policy.
"While he allegedly did not anticipate that the injury inflicted would result in death, the facts (and his admission) establish that he intended the result of a bodily injury," Lahtinen wrote in an opinion joined by Justices D. Bruce Crew III, Edward O. Spain and Anthony T. Kane.
In dissent, Cardona noted that "an insurer's duty to defend its insured in pending litigation is exceptionally broad and far surpasses the insurer's duty to ultimately indemnify in the event that the insured is found liable."
He said that duty should be alleviated only when "no plausible reading" of the allegations could "bring the contested events within the purview of the insurance policy at issue." Here, Cardona said, Barber's death could be viewed as an act of negligence rather than intentional conduct.
"[A]lthough it might ultimately be determined that Cook's liability to decedent's estate, if any, is based upon his intentional conduct, thereby obviating plaintiff's duty to indemnify Cook, I cannot conclude that this is the only possible outcome considering the allegations in the underlying complaint," Cardona wrote.
His reasoning follows that of state courts in West Virginia and Arizona. Courts in Michigan and Vermont have held that insurers are not obligated to defend or indemnify in self-defense cases.
Robert P. Roche of Roche, Corrigan, McCoy & Bush in Albany argued for Cook. Benjamin F. Neidl of Tabner, Ryan & Keniry appeared for the estate.
Roche said the ruling establishes a nonsensical distinction between holders of commercial policies and homeowner's policies. He said that as a result of this decision, a shopkeeper who shoots a thief is covered because he helped prevent a crime on the property. But a homeowner, Roche said, is not similarly covered.
"A commercial policy allows the holder to protect either his employees from being assault or to prevent the commission of a crime upon his property by using force up to and including deathly physical force, and he is covered," Roche said. "But a homeowner is not. Here is a man who stood trial and 12 of his peers said 'not guilty.' He acted properly and in a manner dictated by circumstances over which he had no control."
Roche said he will seek leave to appeal to the state Court of Appeals.
http://www.law.com/jsp/article.jsp?id=1126775114950
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http://www.reason.com/hod/cartoon.cb091605.shtml
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NRA-ILA Grassroots Alert Vol. 12, No. 37 9/16/05
NRA ON THE GROUND IN LOUISIANA
As was reported last week, in the wake of unspeakable crimes perpetrated by roving, armed gangs and individuals, authorities in New Orleans seized legal firearms from lawful residents, effectively disarming the very citizenry they are sworn to protect.
On Monday, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, and NRA-ILA Executive Director Chris W. Cox slammed New Orleans authorities for this incredible action.
"What we've seen in Louisiana--the breakdown of law and order in the aftermath of disaster--is exactly the kind of situation where the Second Amendment was intended to allow citizens to protect themselves, " LaPierre said. "For state, local, or federal government to disarm these good people in their own homes using the threat of imminent deadly force, is unthinkable."
"The NRA will not stand by while guns are confiscated from law-abiding people who're trying to defend themselves," Cox said. "We're exploring every legal option available to protect the rights of lawful people in New Orleans."
To that end, NRA has put professional investigators to work on the ground in New Orleans and surrounding areas. News stories and members' detailed accounts have been followed up on, but we need more information. Some of our best leads have come from rank and file law enforcement, but we need to hear from all directly affected citizens.
If you have personally had a gun confiscated in Louisiana since Hurricane Katrina hit, please call (888) 414-6333. Be prepared to leave only your name and immediate contact information so we can get back to you. Once again, we are seeking contact information from actual victims of gun confiscation in Louisiana only.
For additional information, please visit www.NRAILA.org, or e-mail us at ila-contact@nrahq.org.
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Also see: http://www.gunowners.org/notb.htm
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Try this without the period on the end.
www.NRAILA.ORG
WOOF P.C.
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Given the role of gun/self-defense rights to this thread, the following seems pertinent to me:
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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/articl...1786945,00.html
September 19, 2005
Scotland tops list of world's most violent countries
By Katrina Tweedie
A UNITED Nations report has labelled Scotland the most violent country in the developed world, with people three times more likely to be assaulted than in America.
England and Wales recorded the second highest number of violent assaults while Northern Ireland recorded the fewest.
The study, based on telephone interviews with victims of crime in 21 countries, found that more than 2,000 Scots were attacked every week, almost ten times the official police figures. They include non-sexual crimes of violence and serious assaults.
Violent crime has doubled in Scotland over the past 20 years and levels, per head of population, are now comparable with cities such as Rio de Janeiro, Johannesburg and Tbilisi.
The attacks have been fuelled by a ?booze and blades? culture in the west of Scotland which has claimed more than 160 lives over the past five years. Since January there have been 13 murders, 145 attempted murders and 1,100 serious assaults involving knives in the west of Scotland. The problem is made worse by sectarian violence, with hospitals reporting higher admissions following Old Firm matches.
David Ritchie, an accident and emergency consultant at Glasgow?s Victoria Infirmary, said that the figures were a national disgrace. ?I am embarrassed as a Scot that we are seeing this level of violence. Politicians must do something about this problem. This is a serious public health issue. Violence is a cancer in this part of the world,? he said.
Detective Chief Superintendent John Carnochan, head of the Strathclyde Police?s violence reduction unit, said the problem was chronic and restricting access to drink and limiting the sale of knives would at least reduce the problem.
The study, by the UN?s crime research institute, found that 3 per cent of Scots had been victims of assault compared with 1.2 per cent in America and just 0.1 per cent in Japan, 0.2 per cent in Italy and 0.8 per cent in Austria. In England and Wales the figure was 2.8 per cent.
Scotland was eighth for total crime, 13th for property crime, 12th for robbery and 14th for sexual assault. New Zealand had the most property crimes and sexual assaults, while Poland had the most robberies.
Chief Constable Peter Wilson, president of the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland, questioned the figures. ?It must be near impossible to compare assault figures from one country to the next based on phone calls,? he said.
?We have been doing extensive research into violent crime in Scotland for some years now and this has shown that in the vast majority of cases, victims of violent crime are known to each other. We do accept, however, that, despite your chances of being a victim of assault being low in Scotland, a problem does exist.?
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Hey Craftydog,
Being one from a Scottish clan, I can tell you first hand that if you take away a Scottsman guns as they did, then he will use his knife. You take away his knife and he will beat you with a club you take that away and he'll throw rocks at you ect. When will these governments learn that it's not how many or what kinds of weapons a person has that causes violence and that the only way to stop it or reduce it is to have law abiding citizens who are capable of protecting themselves. It's pretty damn obvious the government can't protect them. If your neighbor hates you but knows your armed, he might not stop hating you but he'll think twice before doing anything to you even if he's drunk!
Woof P.C.
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NRA Files Suit To Stop Firearm Seizures In New Orleans
Help support NRA's efforts in New Orleans. Click here to make a contribution.
(Fairfax, VA) - Today, the National Rifle Association (NRA) filed a motion in United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana seeking a temporary restraining order to block authorities from confiscating law-abiding citizens' firearms in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
"New Orleans is the first city in the United States to forcibly disarm peaceable law-abiding citizens and it must be the last. Victims are dealing with a complete breakdown of government. At a time when 911 is non-operational and law enforcement cannot respond immediately to calls for help, people have only the Second Amendment to protect themselves, their loved ones and their property," said NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre.
"The NRA stands with law-abiding Americans, who agree that at their most vulnerable moment, their right to defend themselves and their families should not be taken away," said Chris W. Cox, NRA's chief lobbyist.
According to The New York Times, the New Orleans superintendent of police directed that no civilians in New Orleans will be allowed to have guns and that "only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons." ABC News quoted New Orleans' deputy police chief, saying, "No one will be able to be armed. We are going to take all the weapons."
"The NRA is determined to stop this blatant abuse of power by local politicians. It is disgraceful that any government official would further endanger the lives of innocent victims by issuing this ridiculous order. We are very grateful to the many rank and file police officers who have come forward and assisted NRA in exposing these violations of constitutional freedoms. We are also pleased that the Second Amendment Foundation is joining us in this effort," added Cox.
"The actions of the New Orleans government have destroyed the one levee that stands between law-abiding citizens and anarchy - the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. The NRA will not rest until this injustice is resolved," concluded LaPierre.
--nra--
Established in 1871, the National Rifle Association is America's oldest civil rights and sportsmen's group. Four million members strong, NRA continues its mission to uphold Second Amendment rights and to advocate enforcement of existing laws against violent offenders to reduce crime. The Association remains the nation's leader in firearm education and training for law-abiding gun owners, law enforcement and the armed services.
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11250 Waples Mill Road ?Fairfax, Virginia 22030 ?800-392-8683
www.NRAILA.org
Major Victory For Firearms Owners And Freedom In Louisiana
Friday, September 23, 2005
(Fairfax, VA) -- The United States District Court for the Eastern District in Louisiana today sided with the National Rifle Association (NRA) and issued a restraining order to bar further gun confiscations from peaceable and law-abiding victims of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.
?This is a significant victory for freedom and for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The court?s ruling is instant relief for the victims who now have an effective means of defending themselves from the robbers and rapists that seek to further exploit the remnants of their shattered lives,? said NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre.
Joining LaPierre in hailing the U.S. District Court decision was NRA chief lobbyist Chris W. Cox. ?This is an important victory. But the battle is not over. The NRA will remedy state emergency statutes in all 50 states, if needed, to ensure that this injustice does not happen again."
The controversy erupted when The New York Times reported, the New Orleans superintendent of police directed that no civilians in New Orleans will be allowed to have guns and that ?only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons.? ABC News quoted New Orleans? deputy police chief, saying, ?No one will be able to be armed. We are going to take all the weapons.?
The NRA also pledged that it will continue its work to ensure that every single firearm arbitrarily and unlawfully seized under this directive is returned to the rightful law-abiding owner.
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Hey Guys,
The afternoon before Rita hit, Fox New's John Gibson ran a segment on Texas gun laws. During this segment he called laws that allowed homeowners to use deadly force to protect themselves and family, draconian. He further warn everyone evacuating to watchout for gun toteing citizens who would shoot them on sight.
This was a blatant attack on law-abideing citizens right to keep and bear arms as well as an attack on a persons right to self-defense. He missed a chance to warn looters, rapist and murders not to take advantage of the storm, just to take a swipe at gun owners.
I have asked everyone I know to e-mail Mr. Gibson at myword@foxnews.com and him what they think about his comments. Keep it clean, and no threats O.K.
We need to start responding to these attacks on our rights. Otherwise we won't have them for much longer.
Woof P.C.
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Interesting pro-Second Amendment site that seeks to convert the uninitiated:
http://www.a-human-right.com/
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Corpus Christi, Texas
Police arrested a suspected burglar on Thursday after the 21year-old man sought treatment for gunshot wounds officials believe occurred when a resident heard noises in his garage and fired at an intruder.
Daniel Dunn, 50, told police it was just before 6 a.m. Thursday that he heard a noise in the garage of his home in the 2200 block of Gershwin Lane. Dunn told police he found a young man in his garage who began swinging a knife at him, cutting Dunn across the neck and a hand. Dunn said that after he was cut, he ran in his house and grabbed a .22caliber rifle and fired at the intruder.
Dunn told police he started screaming for help as the intruder ran, following him for as long as Dunn could. Dunn was taken to Bay Area Medical Center where he received stitches.
Police discovered the suspect after officials at Christus Spohn Hospital Memorial notified them of a gunshot victim.
Police said the 21-year-old suspect has bullet wounds in one of his legs, his arm and his pelvis.
The suspect, who hasn't seen a magistrate judge, was placed under guard at the hospital after officers learned he had unrelated warrants for his arrest.
The investigation is continuing.
*****
Link to page with video (http://www.kristv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3917916&nav=menu192_2)....be sure to watch the second story that some how made it as part of the footage.
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Actually the fighting for American Revolution started when the British went to Concord to take control of the powder. The liberal biased history books sort of overlook this little fact. Those men risked their lives defending their powder. The British would allow them to have guns, just not the powder. Sound like a slick Willy move to me. The Colonials stood their ground and won. Actually in New England, the Brits wouldn't engage out of range of their naval guns because they always lost. Fighting in the woods was a very expensive proposition for them.
Subject: Gun Refresher Course
GUN REFRESHER COURSE
A.. An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a victim.
B.. A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
C.. Smith & Wesson: The original point and click interface.
D.. Gun control is not about guns; it's about control.
E.. If guns are outlawed, can we use swords?
F.. If guns cause crime, then pencils cause misspelled words.
G.. Free men do not ask permission to bear arms.
H.. If you don't know your rights you don't have any.
I... Those who trade liberty for security have neither.
J.. The United States Constitution (c) 1791. All Rights Reserved.
K.. What part of "shall not be infringed" do you not understand?
L. .The Second Amendment is in place in case they ignore the others.
M.. 64,999,987 firearms owners killed no one yesterday.
N.. Guns only have two enemies: Rust and Politicians.
O.. Know guns, know peace and safety. No guns, no peace nor safety.
P.. You don't shoot to kill; you shoot to stay alive.
Q.. 911 - government sponsored Dial a Prayer.
R.. Assault is a behavior, not a device.
S.. Criminals love gun control - it makes their jobs safer.
T.. If Guns cause Crime, then Matches cause Arson.
U.. A government that's afraid of it's citizens tries to control them.
V. You only have the rights you are willing to fight for.
W.. Enforce the "gun control laws" in place, don't make more.
X ..If you remove the people's right to bear arms, you create slaves.
Y.. The American Revolution wouldn't have happened with Gun Control.
Z. ."...a government by the people, for the people..."
PLEASE PASS THIS 'REFRESHER' ON TO OTHER
FREE CITIZENS BEFORE WE LOOSE OUR FREEDOM
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Something else that liberal/socialist/anti-constitution/anti-American/ anti-gun control freaks overlook is the fact that every time the word "People" is used in the admendments, it is always referring to individual citizens. I would like to point out that the second admendment reads: the right of the "people" to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. The rest of the admendment was to confirm that not only was it nessasary for the individual to be armed for his own protection but that it was a national need as well.
WOOF P.C.
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In my last post I intentionally left out a comma between anti-gun and control freaks. In context it would read , anti-gun, control freaks. Anyone paying attention to context woud have corrected the missing comma in their mind. The reason I did this is because in the second admendment between the word militia and the right of the people is a comma. Even if this comma was missing anyone who was paying attention to context would still be able to tell the writer was talking about two different ideas. One about an individual right and the other about how this right is also important to maintain a strong militia.
Even with the comma in it's proper place the gun-control folks still ignore the context.
WoofP.C.
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Please note: the article as posted at nationalreview.com is heavily annotated, with much of the text linking to primary sources.
October 20, 2005, 9:13 a.m.
Suiting Down
Congress guns for fairness?
By John R. Lott Jr. & Jack Soltysik
Almost all products have illegitimate uses and undesirable consequences. In 2002, 45,380 people died in car accidents, 838 children drowned, 474 children died in house fires, and 130 children died in bicycle accidents. Luckily, local governments haven't started recouping medical costs or police salaries by suing car manufacturers, pool builders, makers of home heaters, or bike companies.
Many items, including cars and computers, are also used in the commission of crimes. But again, no one seriously proposes that these companies be held liable.
People understand that what makes a car useful for getting to work also makes it useful for escaping a crime. They also understand that the penalty should be on the person who uses the product for ill.
This logic is ignored when cities sue gun makers for costs incurred from improper firearm use, and the House of Representatives looks poised to end the practice today. Multibillionaire George Soros, via the Brady Campaign, has funded most of these suits. Last year the "Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act," to rein in these suits, was defeated when Democrats added amendments to extend the so-called assault-weapons ban.
Generally, with the exception of some short-term victories, suits against gun makers haven't had any more legally success than if similar suits had been brought against car companies. The legislation would limit civil suits to cases where the sellers or manufacturer has broken any law. In practice, this will make the selling of guns similar to other products. Car dealers are not sued simply because their cars are used in a crime, but they can be if they knowingly provide a car to facilitate a crime.
While gun-control advocates can dream about more such victories, the Brady Campaign had more practical goals: imposing large legal costs on gun makers. Even the largest gun companies make only a few million dollars in a good year. Those below the top ten make just a few thousand guns a year and are usually family operations.
The Bad and the Good
Obviously, bad things happen with guns. But the suits ignore that guns also prevent bad things by making it easier for victims to defend themselves. Unlike the tobacco suits, gun makers have powerful arguments about the benefits of gun ownership.
More than 450,000 crimes, including 10,800 murders, were committed with guns in 2002. But Americans also used guns defensively more than two million times that year, and more than 90 percent of the time merely brandishing the weapon was sufficient to stop an attack.
Police are important in reducing crime rates, but they virtually always arrive after a crime has been committed. When criminals confront people, resistance with a gun is by far the safest course of action. A 2004 survey found that 94 percent of 22,600 chiefs and sheriffs questioned thought that law-abiding citizens should be able to buy guns for self-defense.
John Lott's own research has shown Increased gun-ownership rates are associated with lower crime rates. Poor people in the highest crime areas benefit the most from owning guns. Lawsuits against gun makers will raise the price of firearms, which will most severely reduce gun ownership among the law-abiding, much-victimized poor.
Advocates for these suits claim that the gun makers make their weapons attractive to criminals through low price, easy concealability, corrosion resistance, accurate firing and high firepower. Lightweight, concealable guns may help criminals, but they also have helped protect law-abiding citizens and lower crime rates in the 46 states that to varying degrees allow concealed handguns.
Women benefit most and also find it easier to use smaller, lightweight guns. Poor victims benefit more than wealthier ones from the ability to protect themselves simply because they are more likely to be victims.
Some suits have sought to hold gun makers liable because accidental deaths are "foreseeable" and not enough was done to make guns safe. Nationally, the Centers for Disease Control shows that 26 children under 10 and 60 under 15 died from accidental gun deaths in 2002. Yet with 90 some million people owning more than 260 million guns, accidental deaths from guns are far less "foreseeable" than from many other products. Most gun owners must be very responsible or such gun accidents would be much more frequent.
Data collected from doing a Nexis search on all accidental gun shot cases for children under age ten show that accidental shooters overwhelmingly are adults with long histories of arrests for violent crimes, alcoholism, suspended or revoked driver's licenses, and involvement in car crashes. Meanwhile, the annual number of accidental gun deaths involving children under ten ? most of these being cases where someone older shoots the child ? is consistently a single digit number. It is a kind of media archetype story to report on "naturally curious" children shooting themselves or other children ? though in the five years from 1997 to 2001 the entire United States averaged only ten cases a year where a child under ten accidentally shot himself or another child.
In contrast, in 2001 bicycles were much more likely to result in accidental deaths than guns. Ninety-three children under the age of ten drowned accidentally in bathtubs.
And, Yet, Still...
Yet, despite all this the vote might in the House might depend on requirements on a Senate provision that required gunlocks to be included with any guns sold. As mentioned, the number of accidental gun deaths are many fewer than most suspect, but the real problem is that convincing people to lock up guns actually leads to more deaths. When people lock up their guns, they are less able to defend themselves from criminal attacks and criminals become more emboldened to attack people in their homes. Providing gunlocks with guns is just one additional way to exaggerate in people's minds the risk of owning guns in the home. Including this provision may be the political price to pass the legislation, but it distracts from the overall benefits of the bill.
Attempts to have the court system ignore a product's benefits to society are bad enough. Even worse is the cynical attempt to file bogus lawsuits simply to impose massive legal costs to eventually try bankrupting legitimate companies.
Passing the "Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act" today would still allow suits but would put gun makers on the same legal footing as other American manufacturers.
? John Lott, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of More Guns, Less Crime and The Bias Against Guns. Soltysik was an AEI summer intern and is currently a student at the University of Missouri.
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/lott_soltysik200510200913.asp
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The British government banned handguns in 1997 to put an end to gun related crimes. The UK now reports that gun crime nearly doubled in the four years from 1998-99 to 2002-03. The serious violent crime rate has soared 69%, robbery is up 45% and murders up 54%. Before the ban from 1993 to 1997 armed robberies had fallen 50% but since the ban the rate has shot back up to pre 1993 levels.
Austaralia has had its crime rate soar immediately after its 1996 gun control measures were enacted. Violent crime averaged 32 percent higher and armed robbery rates increased 74% in the six years since the bans.
Canada also has seen growing crime rates after its gun bans were enacted. Canada had a crime rate of 963 per 100,000 in 2003; a rate twice that of the U.S.
As Britain and other countries were putting limits on gun ownership the U.S. was greatly liberalizing the right of citizens to carry concealed handguns. Thirty-eight states have right to carry laws in place. Crime has fallen faster in these states than the national average. Yes, the U.S. still has gun crimes, but 70% of American murders take place in just 3.5% of our states counties and most were gang and drug related.
San Fran. don't go down that road of gun bans.
TAKEN IN PART: From a commentary by John R Lott in the NRA journal America's Freedom 1ST Nov issue
WOOF P.C.
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Article Last Updated: 10/24/2005 09:30 PM
ed quillen
Shooting straight on guns
By Ed Quillen
Denver Post Columnist
DenverPost.com
If he has not done so already, President George W. Bush will soon sign a bill which passed the Senate in July and the House last week. It shields gun makers and sellers from lawsuits that might arise from misuse of their weapons, and it could produce an honest discussion of guns in America.
The new federal law does not protect gun makers from ordinary product-liability litigation. That is, if the industry still produced revolvers like one my father once owned but never used - one he described as "kill behind and maim in front" because the cylinder would not align properly with the barrel so that lead sprayed every which way when it was fired - then the maker could still be sued for making a defective product.
But if some thug acquires a firearm and commits murder and mayhem, then under the new law, the gun industry is immune to litigation from the victims. They can sue the shooter, but not the gun maker or seller, so long as they were obeying the law in the production and distribution of the weapon.
On the surface, this seems quite fair. We have a Second Amendment to the federal constitution, which guarantees the right of the people "to keep and bear arms." That right would be rather meaningless if gun and ammunition makers were put out of business by product liability lawsuits.
If people want to agitate for repeal of the Second Amendment by electing senators and representatives and state legislators who will appropriately amend the federal constitution, that's their right. But it should be done as an open political process, not in a sneaky way through product-liability litigation.
Further, we don't hold knife makers liable in stabbings, or hammer makers liable in gruesome clubbings. I've followed many libel suits, and was hit by one in 1980 (it was dismissed before trial by the district court, but the plaintiff appealed the dismissals up the ladder clear to the U.S. Supreme Court), but never have I seen the company that manufactured the typesetting machinery or printing press named among the defendants.
Every year, land-management agencies like the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management cite hundreds of drivers for taking their vehicles off the designated routes and onto fragile tundra and wetlands. But they don't go after the makers of four-wheel-drive vehicles, even though that sort of anti-social destruction is often encouraged by their commercials.
We generally assume that tools and technology are morally neutral, and that we humans are responsible for how we use them. The same tool I use for the happy task of opening envelopes with checks in them could also be used to stab someone in the heart - it's what I do with it, not the tool itself, which matters.
But this doesn't fully hold all the time, at least before the U.S. Supreme Court. In its ruling on the Grokster case last summer, the court held that a technology company can be held responsible for illegal acts committed, not by the company, but by users of the software.
At issue were computer programs which made file-sharing fast and simple. The court found that the software companies - Grokster and StreamCast Networks - encouraged the sharing of copyrighted materials, which of course had the movie and music studios up in arms and going to court to fight piracy.
But even in this case, the Supreme Court did not say that peer-to-peer file- sharing software should be illegal because it could be used to violate copyright laws. Instead, it said Grokster and StreamCast were promoting their technologies for illegal purposes, and thus the companies were liable.
With the new protections, the gun industry won't have to worry about that. It will be able to dispense with pretense in its marketing. We might actually see some truthful gun ads, perhaps one that quotes William Barclay "Bat" Masterson: "Always remember that a six-shooter is made to kill the other fellow with and for no other reason on earth."
Honesty in advertising - won't it be wonderful? And that might inspire the anti-gun crowd to go about its crusade honestly, pursuing a constitutional amendment, rather than back-door approaches through product-liability suits. And then there could be an honest discussion about guns in America.
http://denverpost.com/opinion/ci_3147757
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My quick, personal view of gun control. Criminals, by definition, do not follow the law. That's why they are criminals. The laws that are being pushed for gun control will only affect those who are prone to following the law anyway (i.e. honest, law-abiding citizens). I personally do not own a gun, but I feel that if you are not a criminal, you should be able to own a gun, period. However, I am against people that feel that they should be able to have enough guns to supply a small army. Use some common sense as well. Do you really need that anti-aircraft missle launcher to hunt deer? Do you really need that M60 to go turkey shooting? Is that AK47 really going to help you hit more ducks? And no, you really don't need to shoot your shotgun in the air to celebrate the New Year. Remember, the pellets will land somewhere.
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AlDurr writes:
Do you really need that anti-aircraft missle launcher to hunt deer? Do you really need that M60 to go turkey shooting? Is that AK47 really going to help you hit more ducks?
Please note that the BATFE classifies M60s and AK 47s as Class III firearms, which basically means anyone legally owning one has: a) paid for an expensive license, b) undergone an extensive background check, and c) likely paid several thousand dollars for the firearm. Folks laying out that kind of cash are unlikely to use the firearm to blast bunnies or whatever, and indeed, last I heard, not a single registered Class III firearm has ever been found to have been used in a crime. A pretty good track record seeing as the law that set up this system has been on the books since the 1930s.
As for anti-aircraft missle launchers, if you got one you'd best expect SWAT to show up some day and haul your carcass off.
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I would add to list of arms that the media likes to say all gun owners have such as the fully automatic weapons listed by AlDurr. The highly touted cop killer bullet, which no cop has ever been killed by.
As for rockets, I've fired them before and think they are over rated, of course I was in the Marines at the time and full auto is just a huge waste of ammo. I'd rather use a shotgun.
WOOF P.C.
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Guys,
My rambling quote:
Do you really need that anti-aircraft missle launcher to hunt deer? Do you really need that M60 to go turkey shooting? Is that AK47 really going to help you hit more ducks? And no, you really don't need to shoot your shotgun in the air to celebrate the New Year. Remember, the pellets will land somewhere.
was my attempt at humor. :lol: Obviously it didn't translate well. My point at the attempt at humor is that there are some law-abiding people that go too far and then make others nervous and stupid. When that happens, then the good people get treated like criminals and the criminals continue on anyway. I am serious about responsible gun ownership, though. If you are not a criminal, and can afford to legally obtain a gun, more power to you. Don't penalize good, law-abiding people for things that criminals do anyway.
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Sorry if I came on too strong. I've encountered similar straw men in other circumstances where a tongue wasn't planted in cheek. It always galls me when someone pretends to explore the limits of a right that they don't believe exists in the first place. Didn't mean to lump you in that category.
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Ditto. :lol:
Woof P.C.
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"Our main agenda is to have all guns banned. We must use whatever means possible. It doesn't matter if you have to distort the facts or even lie. Our task of creating a socialist America can only succeed when those who would resist us have been totally disarmed."
-Sara Brady, Chairman, Handgun Control Inc, to Senator Howard Metzenbaum. The National Educator, January 1994, Page 3.
"We can't be so fixed on our desire to preserve the rights of ordinary Americans."
-President William Jefferson Clinton, March 1, 1993 during a press conference in Piscataway, NJ. Source: Boston Globe, 3/2/93, page 3.
"My general counsel tells me that while firearms are exempted from our jurisdiction under the Consumer Product Safety Act, we could possibly ban bullets under the Hazardous Substances Act."
-Richard O. Simpson, Chairman, U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission. 1973
"We must do whatever we can to regulate how guns are used. I've been the victim of a stabbing."
-Al Sharpton, May 3, 2003
"Waiting periods are only a step. Registration is only a step. The prohibition of private firearms is the goal."
-Janet Reno
"Gun violence won't be cured by one set of laws. It will require years of partial measures that will gradually tighten the requirements for gun ownership, and incrementally change expectations about the firepower that should be available to ordinary citizens."
-New York Times, December 21, 1993
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Rush- A member of the Kentucky Turkey Hunters Hall of Fame shot an alleged intruder in his home early yesterday, Kentucky State police said. Roland Burns, 65, of Rush, told investigators that he awoke shortly before 12:30 am. to find the man in his home in rural Boyd County, Trooper Ed Ginter said. Shannon Scott Conley, 32, of Rush, was pronounced dead at the scene. No charges have been filed in the case. State Police are investigating. Ginter said Burns told investigators that he was awakened by a vehicle in his driveway. He said he went to investigate and found the alleged intruder in his house. Burns told police he returned to his bedroom for his gun. "Mr. Burns ordered the man to leave the home." Ginter said in a press release. "A struggle ensued, and Mr. Conley was fatally wounded." Burns who was intoduced into the Turkey Federation, Hall of Fame was not injured, Ginter said. ( Lexington Herald-Leader )
Woof P.C.
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87-year-old woman fatally shoots man in her home
By Doug Moore
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
02/07/2006
An 87-year-old East St. Louis woman fatally shot a man early this morning as he was trying to break into her house.
Police said they found the man, Larry D. Tillman, 49, of East St. Louis on the enclosed front porch of the woman?s house in the 2100 block of Gaty Avenue. He had pulled the telephone wires from the side of the house, then removed security bars from a porch window.
As the man was breaking through a storm door that leads into the house itself, the woman fired several shots through her front door, striking Tillman once in the chest.
Police said the shots were fired from a pistol, most likely a gun that her daughter had given her after a man broke into the elderly woman?s house in December, battered her and stole some items.
The man may have been dead for as long as four hours before police arrived. Police said that the woman was not sure that she had hit Tillman when she fired the shots about 2 a.m. However, she was too afraid to go outside to check and could not call for help because the telephone lines were dead.
When the woman?s daughter arrived about 6 a.m. to bring her mother breakfast, she found the dead man on the porch, police said.
Illinois State Police Master Sgt. Jim Morrisey said evidence taken from the December home invasion would be compared to the break-in today to see if Tillman was responsible for both crimes.
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Gun control's unlikely new enemy
National Post
Mon 13 Feb 2006
Page: A14, Section: Editorials
Byline: Lorne Gunter
Two weeks ago, the very anti-gun, pro-gun-registry Toronto Star probably did more than any other media outlet to undermine the recent call by the Ontario provincial government for a ban on all handguns in the province.
On Jan. 28, the Star ran a map of southern Ontario and cottage country showing the number of legal firearms per district.
Using statistics obtained from the federal firearms registry, the paper showed its readers that in the areas around the town of Orillia, there have been up to 47 firearms licences issued for every 100 households -- the highest rate in the province. Large numbers of licences also have been granted around Durham and Orangeville, Cambridge and Peterborough.
Indeed, that swath of Ontario from Lake Huron in the west to Georgian Bay in the north, around Lake Simcoe through Hastings to Prince Edward County, is veritably bristling with guns.
Niagara County, too, and Simcoe, Oxford and Wellington -- guns everywhere.
Most districts nearer Toronto have between four and 12 registered gun owners per 100 homes. Much of the 905 area has between two and six.
But right down in the centre of Toronto, standing out like a strobe light, were several neighbourhoods with two or fewer firearms licences per 100 households. From Pearson International Airport to the Don Valley Parkway, and between the 407 and the Lake, Ontario is nearly gun-free, according to the Star.
But of course, that is exactly where most gun crimes take place. The conclusion to be drawn from the Star's graphic is obvious: The most sensational shootings and highest number of gun murders in Ontario occur within the area that already has by far the lowest levels of legal firearm ownership.
With this one map, the Star unwittingly proved correct those who argue that a ban on all legal handguns will do nothing to reduce gun crime in Toronto. It also debunked all those, such as the Ontario government, the Liberal Party of Canada and the Star itself, who have made a ban the lynchpin of their crime-reduction strategies.
The simple, inescapable truth is that most firearms crimes being committed in Ontario are not being committed with legal guns, so no ban on legal guns -- whether handguns or shotguns and rifles -- is going to have any impact on crime rates.
Most gun crimes are not being committed by gun owners licensed under Ottawa's registry scheme. So no campaign to make licensed owners surrender their firearms in a mass confiscation is going to have any impact either.
Indeed, from a statistical point of view, a ban on handguns would be the least likely ban to have any appreciable effect.
Canada's law-abiding gun owners, collectors, hunters and sport shooters own approximately nine "long guns" -- hunting rifles or shotguns -- for every one handgun. In Ontario, the federal registry knows of 1,839,155 long guns, but just 215,372 handguns, and most of both types of these legal guns are not in Toronto.
If fewer than two in 100 Toronto households contain registered guns, then likely fewer than two in 1,000 contain registered handguns. The Ontario government could send the police to every home in T.O. to collect every pistol and revolver identified by Ottawa's databanks and still seize only a tiny number of handguns.
And those wouldn't be the handguns being used on the streets anyway.
After the shooting of more than a dozen pupils at Scotland's Dunblane Primary School in March, 1996, the British government banned private ownership of all handguns.
The judge who investigated the causes of the massacre recommended against such a ban, but because mass murderer Thomas Hamilton had used several pistols in the commission of his crime, the government in London bulled ahead anyway. It wanted to send a message that it was doing something.
In the decade before the ban, gun violence in Britain rose 12%. In the decade since, it has risen 64%.
Handguns are technically banned from New York, Washington D.C. and Chicago, too. But not until those cities ramped up police patrols and began getting tough on criminals did any of them experience drops in gun crime.
Banning legal handguns is nothing more than a victory for symbolism over substance, for activity over achievement.
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Sex and Guns
Posted on Thursday, February 23 @ 00:10:00 EST
By Gerard Valentino
When abstinence is floated as a way to keep teenagers from having unwanted pregnancies, the left is openly scornful of the idea. Liberals claim that sex-education and familiarity with contraception are the only viable way to teach teenagers to practice safe sex. They argue that kids are going to have sex so it is important to teach them how to avoid the pitfalls involved with irresponsible behavior.
Liberals preach education as the answer for a host of other social ills as well, including discrimination, sexism and environmental issues.
Funny, however, that the only problem liberals refuse to attack with so-called education are accidental gun deaths among children. When it comes to guns, liberals and anti-gun groups, are unwilling to discuss how educating children can lead to a decrease in the very type of accident they use to justify their existence.
Currently, Ohio is considering a bill that would offer gun safety training as part of the high school curriculum. While pro-gun groups are quick to praise such a move as a way to decrease gun accidents through education, anti-gun leftists are already using their tired propaganda in opposition of the bill.
They claim that teaching gun-safety in schools will push a pro-gun culture on unsuspecting students. Yet, at the same time liberals claim that teaching sex-education with mentioning abstinence won?t teach a culture of promiscuity among high-school students.
The question at hand isn?t whether people agree with how sex-education is being taught in schools. It is simply a useful example of how the liberal anti-gun movement continues to fight their losing battle against guns with blinders on, completely unaware that they are becoming a political laughing-stock.
Pro-gun advocates have for years claimed that groups like the Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence are not interested in pushing gun-safety and decreasing gun accidents, but instead have only one goal ? total gun confiscation.
Their decision to oppose a current proposal to teach gun-safety in high schools proves that pro-gun advocates are correct.
Liberal anti-gun groups, and their cohorts in the establishment media, are blinded by an emotional hatred of guns to such an extent that they would oppose a program designed to achieve their claimed goal of making kids safer. They won?t admit that if gun accidents are reduced it takes away their biggest public relations bonanza.
The liberal anti-gun reaction to such programs is actually a public relations win for the pro-gun movement because the American public is smart enough to see that anyone who truly wants a decrease in accidental gun deaths should support teaching gun-safety in schools.
Only the help of the establishment media keeps the anti-gun movement afloat by giving credence to the otherwise discredited studies and statistics bandied about by groups determined to confiscate guns. The establishment media also fails to point out the hypocrisy of how liberals recommend sex-education as a way to stop teen pregnancy, but refuse to accept gun-safety education as a way to stop teens from accidentally shooting each other.
The anti-gun movement has seen its power and credibility wane as gun-control laws have failed to bring about a violence free nirvana as promised. Legal concealed-carry put more guns on the street without a corresponding increase in crime which further damaged the argument that guns are at the root of crime. Now, in desperation they steadfastly refuse to accept that properly educating children on the dangers of guns is just another example of how far they will go further tragedy - and then exploit it.
They are terrified because they know that as people become educated about guns, and the gun issue, it will further expose their duplicity. A great example is how the anti-gunners use the absurd assertion that the definition of children includes anyone to the age of 25 when it comes to statistics on gun deaths, including suicides. But they are unwilling to care for children when it would really matter due to the fact that it would hurt their message.
Gun-safety programs in schools will save lives, and to steal a line from the anti-gun movement, if only one life is saved by such a program they are worth implementing.
Gerard Valentino is the Buckeye Firearms Association Central Ohio Chair, BuckeyeFirearms.org, and writes for the ValentinoChronicle.com
http://www.buckeyefirearms.org/article2989.html
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SUPPORT NATIONAL RIGHT-TO-CARRY RECIPROCITY BILL
U.S. Representative Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) recently introduced H.R. 4547-a national Right-to-Carry (RTC) reciprocity bill that would honor state carry licensees nationwide. The bill would allow any person with a valid carry permit or license issued by a state to carry a concealed firearm in any other state if they meet certain criteria. The bill would not create a federal licensing system; it would simply require the states to recognize each other's carry permits, just as they recognize drivers' licenses.
For more information on the bill, please visit www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?ID=189.
Please be sure to contact your U.S. Representative at (202) 225-3121, and urge him or her to cosponsor and support H.R. 4547!
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Not sure if this the right tread to post but I though you all would find this interesting. This is from the globe and mail a national newspaper in canada. A kirpan looks like a kerambit without the ring.
Supreme Court rules kirpans okay in school
RICHARD BLACKWELL
Globe and Mail Update
The Supreme Court of Canada has ruled that Sikh students can carry ceremonial daggers to class and that doing so does not pose a undue danger to others in the schools.
The top court overturned Thursday morning a Quebec Court of Appeals ruling that had barred the kirpan from schools in the province. The Quebec court had said a limit on religious freedom was reasonable, given the safety concerns from carrying the daggers to school.
"Religious tolerance is a very important value of Canadian society," the top court judges wrote in their decision.
"A total prohibition against wearing a kirpan to school undermines the value of this religious symbol and sends students the message that some religious practices do not merit the same protection as others."
If the kirpan is sealed inside clothing the risk of it being used for violent purposes, or being taken away by other students is very low, the judges said. "There are many objects in schools that could be used to commit violent acts and that are much more easily obtained by students, such as scissors, pencils and baseball bats."
Several other provinces have long ago reached compromises with the Sikh community, allowing the carrying of the kirpan ? a requirement for baptized followers of the Sikh religion ? as long as it is safely sheathed and concealed.
The 2004 ruling from the Quebec appeal court, however, dismissed any possibility of a compromise in that province.
The specific case that went to the Supreme Court involves Gurbaj Singh Multani, now 17. Five years ago, he accidentally dropped his kirpan in the schoolyard of a Montreal elementary school.
Parents of other children pressured the local school board to ban the dagger, because of a zero-tolerance policy concerning weapons.
Gurbaj's parents sued, and the case wound its way through the courts for several years.
When the Supreme Court heard the arguments last April, several organizations ? including the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, the Ontario Human Rights Commission, and the World Sikh Organization of Canada ? intervened to support the family.
They noted that there have been no examples of any violent acts in schools as a result of wearing of the kirpan.
The youth transferred to a private school soon after the controversy erupted in 2001, and some of the intervenors were concerned that there would be a mass exodus by Sikh students from public schools across the country if the Supreme Court ruled in favour of the ban.
In its intervention, the Quebec government supported the ban, arguing that any potential weapon can cause a unnecessary risk in the schools.
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Attempted rapist learns a hard lesson
The girl wrestled free, grabbed a pen and stabbed the man in the groin; she then kneed him in the face.
An attempted rapist is sure to be a little sore after his most recent attempt.
It was a brazen attack. The 16-year-old said the man followed her from the bus stop at Wilson High Friday morning, then he tried to pin her hands behind her back and unbutton her pants.
Neighbors are shocked. "There's people continually here, and to have that happen in the middle of the day, I just can't believe it," said Greg Sherwood.
However, the perpetrator paid for his attempt. The girl wrestled free, grabbed a pen and stabbed the man in the groin. Then, while he was doubled over from the pain, she kneed him in the face.
Barb Higgins uses the school's track and said she'll think twice before going out for a run.
The suspect is Latino, in his mid 30's, about 5'4" tall with a stocky build. He was dressed in all dark clothing.
If you have any information, contact police
http://www.kxl.com/ArDisplay.aspx?SecID=13&ID=48589
Best regards,
Argyll
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Defenseless Decision: Why were guns taken from law-abiding citizens in New Orleans?
John R. Lott Jr.*
In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans? residents got an idea of what life is like without the rule of law. They had no telephones, no way to call 911. Even if they had, the police who reported for duty were busy with rescue missions, not fighting crime. Citizens had to protect themselves. This was made rather difficult by the city?s confiscation of guns, even from law-abiding citizens.
After five months of denial in federal district court, the city last week made an embarrassing admission: in the aftermath of the hurricane, the severely overworked police apparently had the time to confiscate thousands of guns from law-abiding citizens.
Numerous media stories have shown how useful guns were to the ordinary citizens of New Orleans who weren?t forcibly disarmed. Fox News reported several defensive gun uses. One city resident, John Carolan, was taking care of many family members, including his three-year-old granddaughter, when three men came to his house asking about his generator, threatening him with a machete. Carolan showed them his gun and they left. Another resident, Finis Shelnutt, recounts a similar story that the gangs left him alone after seeing ?I have a very large gun.?
Signs painted on boarded up windows in various parts of town warned criminals in advance not to try: the owner had shotguns inside.
Last September 8, a little more than a week after the hurricane, New Orleans? police superintendent, Eddie Compass announced: ?No one will be able to be armed. Guns will be taken. Only law enforcement will be allowed to have guns.? Even legally registered firearms were seized, though exceptions were made for select businesses and for some wealthy individuals to hire guards.
Undoubtedly, selected businesses and well-connected wealthy individuals had good reason to want protection, but so did others without the same political pull. One mother saw the need for a gun after she and her two children (ages 9 and 12) saw someone killed in New Orleans after the hurricane. The mother said: ?I was a card-carrying, anti-gun liberal ? not anymore.?
John C. Guidos was successfully guarding his tavern on St. Claude Ave on September 7, when police took his shotgun and pistol; indeed, it was the only time that he saw any cops. Soon afterwards robbers looted the tavern. Wishing for a gun during disasters isn?t anything new. Just a little over a decade ago, police stood by, largely helpless, during the Los Angeles riots after the Rodney King verdict. Yet, not all the victims were defenseless. Korean merchants stood out as one group that banded together and used their guns to protect their stores from looting.
A similar lesson hasn?t been lost on New Orleans? citizens. As one resident, Art DePodesta, told the New York Daily News shortly after the storm hit, ?The cops are busy as it is. If more citizens took security and matters into their own hands, we won?t be in this situation.?
Not only do law-abiding citizens with guns deter many criminals from committing a crime to begin with: Possessing a gun is the safest way to confront a criminal if you are forced to.
Deterrence works. The United States has one of the world's lowest ?hot? burglary rates (burglaries committed while people are in the building) at 13 percent, compared to the ?gun-free? British rate of 59 percent. Surveys of convicted burglars indicate American burglars spend at least twice as long as their British counterparts casing a house before breaking in. That explains why American burglars rarely break into homes when the residents are there. The reason most American burglars give for taking so much time is that they?re afraid of getting shot.
Even without a catastrophe like Katrina, it would have been a poor strategy for would-be victims in New Orleans merely to call 911 and wait for help. The average response time of police in New Orleans before the hurricane was eleven minutes. The Justice Department?s National Crime Victimization Survey has shown for decades that having a gun is the safest course of action when a criminal confronts you, far safer than behaving passively.
It would be nice if the police were always there to protect us, but we don?t live in a utopia and the police understand that they almost always arrive on the scene after the crime has been committed. What does New Orleans? Mayor Nagin recommend that people such as John Carolan and his granddaughter do the next time that have to fend for themselves? The city must know that there isn?t much of a defense for taking citizens? guns; after all, it took them five months to admit to it.
? Mr. Lott, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of "More Guns, Less Crime" (University of Chicago Presss, 2000) and "The Bias Against Guns" (Regnery 2003).
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Originally posted by Buzwardo on another thread which I feel is better located here.
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Firearms Fight?
When does customization of a firearm become manufacturing? That seemingly simple question is occupying the near undivided attention of the firearms industry. Observers say it is a question with the potential to become a firestorm that could put custom gunsmiths out of business; if not behind bars.
The controversy began with a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms inspection of Competitive Edge Gunworks in Bogard, Missouri. BATF and tax agents appeared and began examining the company's records. When they finished, owner Larry Crow was told he potentially faced felony charges for manufacturing firearms without a license.
Crow says he was stunned.
Agents went on to tell him that his manufacturing status would mean liability for federal excise taxes - and penalties - from the beginning of his business. There is, they told the thunderstruck Crow, no statute of limitations for failing to file Federal Excise Taxes, but there were serious penalties.
"I'm confused, " an obviously shaken Crow told The Outdoor Wire during a telephone conversation last Thursday, "and more than a little concerned."
Since the BATF visit, Crow hasn't done any gunsmithing, but has initiated the licensure process necessary to change his classification from gunsmith to manufacturer. He also says he's agreed with the BATF to settle the whole matter as quickly as possible. In the meantime, Crow says he's struggling financially, but despite the costs of waiting for his licensure process to be completed, he told The Outdoor Wire "I'm not doing any more work until the manufacturing paperwork's complete."
Whether Crow's is a single case brought by an overzealous agent or the opening shot of a BATF campaign against gunsmiths has the entire firearms industry abuzz.
If it proves to be the first shot of another fight, the stakes are very high. The fallout would be felt by virtually any company or individual involved in the gunsmithing business; from individual gunsmiths and educators teaching firearms repair to companies like Brownells or Midway USA. Those companies primarily supply componentry to gunsmiths, but also produce instructional material. The firearms they produce in the course of those instructional pieces are apparently enough to qualify them as manufacturers in this very narrow interpretation. Likewise, custom gunsmiths' samples are also apparently under scrutiny.
Consequently, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the Second Amendment Foundation, the National Rifle Association and others are looking for clarification of a single question: at what point does gunsmithing become manufacturing?
BATF regulations appear to offer a solid definition of manufacturing. It would appear, says experts, that a new, and considerably narrower definition is being used against Crow. A definition that has the potential to make virtually any change, from changing parts inside the lockworks to re-barreling or changing firearm calibers enough to constitute manufacturing. Enough, for example, to make any gunsmith's show samples or writers' samples "manufactured" and subject to taxes and penalties.
Should that become the new working definition for ATF and IRS enforcement agents, gunsmiths we've contacted the effect would be immediate and would bankrupt what they consider "one of America's remaining cottage industries."
Hamilton Bowen, of Bowen Custom Arms in Louisville, Tennessee, is a longtime gunsmith and member of the prestigious gunsmiths' guilds. He feels the narrow definition "won't stick" should it come to a fight. He also says the fight itself might be sufficient to put gunsmiths out of business.
"We might win the fight," Bowen said, "but the loss of business along with the associated legal fees for the fight would more than put most of us out of business."
"If the ATF came in and told me that I was liable for federal excise taxes and penalties for all the years I've been in business, I'd just hand them the keys and head to the unemployment office," he said. "ATF is charged with writing regulations to enforce Congressional statutes. They have the ability to clarify statutes, but this one's anything but clear."
San Antonio, Texas gunsmith Alex Hamilton agrees. "I'm essentially a sole proprietor," he says, "if the ATF came in here and started an in-depth investigation, I couldn't work for a couple of reasons. First, I'd be afraid not to be with them the whole time they were here. Secondly, the anxiety their even being here would cause would keep me from doing my job anyway."
The issue isn't licensure; manufacturing licenses are relatively inexpensive, although they add another layer of paperwork and compliance to a small business group that says it already spends a disproportionate amount of working time on compliance paperwork. A retroactivity tax liability could spell significant enough economic damage to shut most gunsmiths down.
Off the record, industry officials say they're starting to receive reports of other gunsmiths being "visited" by BATF officers. Despite those unconfirmed reports, they remain confident the situation can be clarified and a confrontation avoided.
That might be the equivalent of whistling in a graveyard.
Battles between the firearms industry and the BATF have historically been bitter, protracted affairs. Passage of recently-introduced legislation giving gunsmiths a 50-firearm annual tax exemption passed late in the prior Congressional session. The battle to get the legislation introduced, however, took 15 years. It still lacked the support to win the retroactivity gunsmiths had hoped for.
Although they unwilling to say so on the record, some gunsmiths feel the BATF may be getting a little "payback" for the passage of legislation they so vehemently opposed.
In the meantime, the National Rifle Association is attempting to mediate what may have the potential to blossom from a skirmish into a bitter war.
Eric Schwartz, clerk to the NRA's Chief Legislative Counsel, told The Outdoor Wire, "we believe there are inconsistencies by ATF and the IRS that make it difficult, if not impossible, for a law-abiding gunsmith to practice their trade."
"We'd like to see, if necessary, steps taken to address any inconsistencies and make it crystal-clear what acts are manufacturing acts and which are gunsmithing acts so our members can ply their trade in a law-abiding manner."
That might be easier said than done.
One obstacle in the way of "crystal clarity" is a multitude of statutes, regulatory language and opinions; many of which appear to contradict each other. Another; the simple fact that the question lies squarely at an intersection of IRS and BATF regulatory and enforcement areas.
Both agencies have reputations as ferocious opponents to any perceived weakening of their enforcement powers.
The Federal Excise Tax itself may prove to be a bone of litigation should a gunsmith be deemed to be a manufacturer. As observers have pointed out, a Federal Excise Tax on the firearm had already been paid - by the original manufacturer.
Deeming a firearm to have been "manufactured" in the course of customization and subject to FET appears to be a BATF attempt at "double dipping" the firearms industry.
Further, in customization and gunsmithing, labor is the major cost. The gunsmith would have already paid federal income tax on that labor. Again, this creates an apparent attempt at double-taxation.
And what about record keeping? For income tax purposes, businesses are required to maintain their records for a clearly-defined period. BATF has implied no statute of limitations on the potential FET liability for gunsmiths that find themselves declared manufacturers. Consequently, there would be a requirement that records be kept in perpetuity. That creates what legal experts call a "practical impossibility" - a situation where one federal agency creates a requirement that's "practically impossible" to satisfy. Small businesses normally operate in small spaces, i.e., tax records outside the IRS maintenance requirements are routinely destroyed as each year's taxes are filed.
Whether the BATF visit to Competitive Edge was a single agent operating under a personal interpretation of regulations or the first shot in another war between the firearms industry and the BATF is, at this point, irrelevant.
Another genie has been released from another bottle.
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Permitted to conceal arms
Debbie Kavanaugh and husband Bill, who holds a concealed-carry permit, practice at the Wake County Firearms Education and Training Center.
Staff Photos by Chris Seward
http://www.newsobserver.com/105/story/426887.html
Jim Nesbitt, Staff Writer
Every day, Bill Kavanaugh carries a stubby, stainless-steel .45-caliber semiautomatic -- at the grocery store or mall, in a booze-free restaurant, on a short stroll around the block, in the car for a quick jaunt or a cross-country journey.
Tucked in a well-worn, zip-up leather daybook, this gun goes where Kavanaugh does -- everywhere except the places prohibited by law, a list that includes schools, churches, courthouses, post offices and anywhere alcohol is served.
"I believe I have a responsibility to make sure my family is safe, that I'm safe, that my neighbors are safe," says Kavanaugh, 52, a telecommunications engineer. "It's a personal decision I've made to refuse to be a victim."
Kavanaugh is a street-legal pistolero, one of almost 76,000 North Carolinians who hold a permit that allows them to carry a concealed handgun under a state law enacted in 1995. Far from being a teenage gangbanger or predator in neighborhoods where weapons are illegal and crime is rampant, he fits the demographic of a typical Tar Heel permit holder -- a white, middle-age man.
Short, bald and bespectacled, Kavanaugh keeps his pistol within easy reach for that moment he hopes never happens.
Until that day, he and his wife, Debbie, who also shoots but doesn't have a concealed-carry permit, live what could be called a "tactical" lifestyle from their modest, brick-trimmed ranch home in southern Durham County.
They've worked out how they'd fight a home invasion. They keep their car doors locked and are careful about where they park at the mall or grocery store. One never goes to a drive-up ATM without the other as a backup, sitting in the car, gun at the ready.
Like an Old West gunfighter, Kavanaugh tries never to sit in a public place with his back to the door -- unless he's covered by another gun-toting friend.
People who hate guns or aren't familiar with them may find his stance distasteful or paranoid, particularly in the face of North Carolina's falling crime rate.
To them, all guns are bad. They see America's firearms fetish -- rooted in frontier myth and a latent Southern celebration of violence -- as a fearsome cultural telltale, a Neanderthal instinct they wish would just become extinct.
To them, people like Bill Kavanaugh are wild-eyed pistol wavers, paranoids who are cocked and locked to spray lead at the barest of provocations.
But if you listen to Kavanaugh explain why he carries a gun -- and does so legally -- you hear a a marked willingness to shoulder this deadly weight responsibly. He isn't content just to punch holes in paper targets at the gun range; he has taken combat pistol courses, learning how to move and look for cover during a gun fight.
You also hear a tightly knit rationale, the product of a deliberate progression. The main threads in this weave are a strong credo of personal responsibility bolstered by religious conviction and a conservative political stand.
"The good Lord requires you to defend your life," said Kavanaugh. "He gave you the power and wherewithal to take care of that life and expects you to do so."
Bill Kavanaugh also believes strongly that legally armed citizens can foil criminals. And a dollop of common sense tells him a little guy in a dangerous world needs a high-powered equalizer.
Born of experience
This last thread is powerful, laced with fear-laden memories of working late at night in the deserted office towers of New Orleans' central business district, at the height of the crack epidemic.
In a recurring, acid-etched image, he also sees the would-be carjacker who jammed a gun barrel against his wife's rib cage at a Union 76 truck stop near Meridian, Miss.
That after-midnight moment is still vivid almost 30 years after it took place during a bathroom break as the couple, their infant son and a woman friend drove from Texas back to Wilmington, the Kavanaughs' hometown.
Kavanaugh can still see the barrel of that gun as it arced from Debbie's midsection to his face and back again. He can see the calm, road-weary and clueless faces of diners in the truck stop's brightly lit cafe just a few yards from the front bumper of his car. And he can still taste the helpless bile he swallowed that night, when all he could do was reach for his wallet and pray the man would take it and run.
"I was extremely upset I could do nothing to defend my wife, my son and my wife's friend," he said. "I was not going to let myself be in that position ever again."
That Mississippi night caused Kavanaugh, an Air Force veteran, to reach for a gun.
His first pistol? A clone of that quintessentially American gun, the Colt 1911 Government Model, the .45 caliber semiautomatic designed by the legendary John Browning and carried by American soldiers and sailors through two world wars, through Korea and Vietnam.
He rarely carries anything else.
"For whatever reason, a 1911 fit my hand when I picked it up," he said. "It's like I carried one in a past life."
Where the permits are
Guns are as American as Wyatt Earp and Al Capone.
And ever since a Republican majority swept into Congress in 1994 and started taking over state legislatures, more and more states have passed concealed-carry permit laws.
North Carolina is one of 38 states with relaxed concealed-carry laws or no permit requirements for someone who wants to tote a pistol. Most of these states, including North Carolina, have "shall-issue" laws that require a sheriff or other authority to grant a permit provided the applicant doesn't have a criminal record or other disqualifying mark, pays a fee and -- if required -- submits to a criminal background check and takes a training course.
State records show there are 75,818 valid concealed-carry permits in North Carolina.
Could be the petite woman waiting to get her nails done at the local salon has a snub-nosed Smith & Wesson .38 Special five-shot revolver tucked into her fanny pack.
Maybe the well-tailored lawyer striding through the marbled lobby of a Raleigh office tower has a .40 caliber Glock semiautomatic nestled in his briefcase.
And could be the long-haul trucker sipping coffee at a Wilco truck stop has a Beretta 9mm semiautomatic -- the civilian version of the pistol American troops carry in Iraq and Afghanistan -- riding beneath his Carhartt canvas coat.
Chances are more than one in 100 they do.
And then there's Kavanaugh, sitting in his car, calmly watching Debbie step up to an ATM, his daybook open and his Para-Ordnance .45 within easy reach.
"I don't want to freak anybody out. I don't want people paranoid when I walk by," he said. "But I'm not going to be a victim again if I can help it."
Like abortion, prayer in schools and the death penalty, guns have defined one of the primary battle lines in America's cultural and political wars.
Back when the concealed-carry law was a subject of debate in the North Carolina legislature, the gunsmoke from both sides of this contentious divide got mighty thick.
Opponents sounded dire warnings of Dodge City-style shootouts. Proponents argued legally armed citizens would reduce North Carolina's crime rate and allow people to protect themselves and their families until cops could arrive.
More than 10 years later, neither the fear of blood in the streets nor the predicted crime-rate reduction have become reality, police officers and prosecutors say.
"They both were wrong," said Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong. "It's been a non-factor as far as I can see."
Triangle law enforcement officials running programs to reduce gun violence say they don't worry about the pistol-centered life of Kavanaugh or North Carolina's relatively thin cadre of concealed-carry permit holders.
Instead, their focus is riveted on the primary cause of this chronic and oft-times deadly problem -- criminals packing illegal firearms.
In the eyes of Johnston County Sheriff Steve Bizzell, there are two distinct gun universes -- one features the pistol-packing outlaw he tries to arrest; the other is a smaller world of concealed-carry permit holders.
In reality, there's a third gun universe, a gray world peopled by firearms owners who steer clear of serious illegal activity, but don't bother with a carry permit for the handgun they routinely carry in car or pickup.
Bizzell keeps his focus on the blatantly lawless and the patently law-abiding.
"The individuals who apply for a permit are the good citizens of our county who get up and go to work every day, go to church, are family people," Bizzell said.
This accepting attitude is based on the lawman's belief that few permit holders commit a criminal act -- either by reckless use of a handgun or otherwise.
However, the state doesn't compile a list of criminal violations by permit holders, nor is there a breakdown on the reasons for denials and revocations. Instead, the state justice department just tallies permit applications, approvals, denials and revocations -- numbers that originate with the county sheriffs responsible for issuing the permits.
Why they carry
Most Triangle area sheriffs and prosecutors say they haven't had a violent crime committed by a concealed-carry permit holder in their jurisdictions.
Chatham County Sheriff Richard Webster says permit holders haven't shot up the streets or stopped crime.
"I think it's a gray line right down the middle that hasn't veered one way or the other," he said.
On the surface, there isn't a single, lock-step reason for North Carolinians who decide to get a concealed-carry permit.
Some are small-business owners who regularly carry a lot of cash. Others are lifelong shooters who see the permit as a convenience that keeps them from unintentionally violating the law when carrying a pistol, said Ken Dodd, a former Wake County Sheriff's Department captain from Garner who teaches a state-approved handgun course.
But deep down, Dodd says, most students are motivated by a fear about their vulnerability to criminal violence. Fear makes them reach for a gun, a reflex tempered by the desire to do so within the lines of the law.
When Stephanie Bennett was found murdered in her Lake Lynn apartment in May 2002, Dodd said, he saw a sudden spike in the number of students -- young, single women in particular.
"When it hits close to home, a specific crime, you'll see more people taking the class," said Dodd, whose students include judges, prosecutors and plumbers.
Polite side effect
For Kavanaugh's friends, Cindi and Gregg Swensen, the 9/11 terrorist attacks shattered their sense of safety and security.
Born in Brooklyn and raised in New Jersey, Gregg Swensen felt a bloodline jolt from the fall of the Twin Towers. Gregg's father, Sonny, was an ironworker who helped build the World Trade Center; Swensen is a former ironworker who helped erect some of the office buildings that surround the now-sacred turf known as Ground Zero.
He now sees a high-risk world where terrorists, gangbangers and criminals are on the prowl and the cops always arrive after a violent deal has already gone down.
"The criminals have gotten so brazen -- home invasions where people are sitting at home, watching TV when the door busts open and criminals rob and rape and kill," said Swensen, 40. "You know what? There is an element in this world whose intent is to kill as many of us as possible -- Americans, Westerners."
The Swensens already had a shotgun in their house for self-defense. When they decided they needed a pistol, Gregg Swensen looked to his co-worker, Bill Kavanaugh, for advice.
"I never thought in my whole life I'd own a gun," said Cindi Swensen, 52, a petite retired administrative assistant who was born and raised in New Jersey. "It never entered my realm of consciousness. I wasn't afraid of them; they just weren't relevant to me."
She and her husband both got concealed-carry permits two years ago. She carries a .38-caliber revolver in a fanny pack; he carries a .45-caliber semiautomatic pistol.
"Let me tell you about carrying a gun -- it makes you more polite," said Cindi Swensen, who describes herself as feisty and confrontational. "You don't want to do something stupid, and provoking a confrontation while carrying would be stupid. The idea that people with a permit are wild-eyed and full of road rage -- nothing could be further from the truth."
Bill Kavanaugh first got his permit in 1997 after passing a criminal background check and taking the state-mandated course on firearm safety and on the strict regimen of laws that dictate where it's legal to carry a handgun and when it's legal to pull a pistol in self-defense.
The permit marks a major turning point in his evolution into an armed private citizen who will take a day off to bend the ear of a state legislator about Second Amendment issues. He's a member of Grass Roots North Carolina, a pro-gun group, but takes pains to point out he isn't an officer or a lobbyist.
He's a true believer in the deterring power of a concealed hand gun, his faith in firepower shaped by that late-night brush with a would-be carjacker at a Mississippi truck stop.
Sitting on his living room couch, he hefts his .45-caliber pistol.
"This helps me not live in fear -- with it or without it on me," he said.
(News researchers David Raynor and Denise Jones contributed to this report.)
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dd
Interview With Jeff Snyder
by Carlo Stagnaro
Very often, anti-gun activists claim guns do kill people, while their opposers assure that guns, on the contrary, do save lives. Actually, real statistics and crude numbers seems to agree with the latter, as ? among other ? John Lott showed in his well known More Guns, Less Crime. Anyway, stats and numbers cannot answer the entire question; rights cannot lie on data books. One should also make a moral argument. Do people have the right to be free? In that case, do they have the right to protect themselves? Finally, do they have the right to use arms for self-defence? If so, it shouldn?t matter whether, according statistics, guns wither kill or save lives. The fact that one should be allowed to defend himself simply excludes that government disarm him.
We have talked of this, and much more, with Jeff Snyder, whose last book, Nation of Cowards (Accurate Press, 2001) is a strong case in defence of the individual right to keep and bear arms.
On September 11, 2001, the worst terrorist act in history was committed without any guns. The terrorists were armed only with knives and box-cutters. Some say that the hijackers found it quite easy to realize their plans; airplane passengers, in fact, can?t carry firearms. Even pilots and cabin stewards are unarmed. What about gun-free airplanes and airports?
The track record of gun-free zones is, how shall we say this, less than impressive: post offices, schools, and now, airplanes. The events of September 11 could not have occurred but for the fact that air travelers are disarmed, and airplanes are a Second Amendment free zone. In no other way could the terrorists have commandeered the planes with box cutters and pocket knives, turned them into flying bombs, and wrought such massive destruction of life, property, and our economy. This is not because the terrorists would have been afraid of being shot and killed by passengers, since they were obviously prepared to die. Instead, they would have known that they would not succeed in carrying out their mission against the World Trade Center and Pentagon, and so there would have been no point in trying that.
So it turns out that depriving people of freedom has its costs. It is hard to conceive of a more graphic illustration.
People imagine that curbing liberty will prevent those with evil intentions from carrying them out, by depriving them of the ability to act in a dangerous or deadly fashion. However, liberty is not just the necessary condition for bad people to act, it is also the necessary condition for good people to act. Unless the act prohibited is mala in se (wrong in itself), like murder, then restricting liberty in hopes of rendering bad people harmless comes at the price of incapacitating good people and rendering them helpless.
This is a Faustian bargain that would not appear desirable to the good unless the good believed that it was not their responsibility to act. It appeals to those who think of themselves as consumers of public safety, who believe, with the State?s encouragement, that government can and will control external reality to deliver a safe world to them. So they choose to trust in government control, which expressly promises to deal with the problem, rather than relying on the unpredictable chance that their fellow citizens have the moral capacity and willingness to do the right thing when circumstances call upon them to do so. They know that they do not intend to act, but expect government officials to save them. How, then, can they believe that other citizens will do so? Fundamentally, then, this concept of the "gun-free zone" reveals a very profound failure or inability to trust in one another. Of course, we are encouraged by the State to trust in it, in lieu of or in preference to trusting in one another.
Do you still believe that America is "a nation of cowards"?
No. Actually I think that Americans are, by and large, encamped in a mental state that precedes cowardice. Cowardice implies that a person knows what he ought to do, but shrinks or flies from it in fear or self-interest. The bulk of Americans, it seems to me, are in one or two states that precede awareness and acceptance of the notion that they should defend themselves: (1) denial that anything will happen to them, or belief that their risk is adequately controlled by insuring that they work and live and travel only in what they perceive to be "safe" neighborhoods, i.e., relatively crime free zones; or (2) belief that it is not really their responsibility to protect themselves or others, but the state?s, and that the state will protect them. I suspect that most Americans do not acknowledge that they have any responsibility to protect themselves from a violent assault, or have not realized or accepted the reality of what that entails, or believe that avoidance of "dangerous areas" is adequate. I might be wrong, because there is a third possibility, namely, that they are fully cognizant of the risks and accept them, but do not wish to become "the kind of person" that carries a gun everywhere, or cannot be bothered with the nuisance of it all. If that position is adopted with full awareness of the implications, it is not cowardice.
Your book is a strong case against utility. You state every individual has the right to keep and bear arms and, more generally, certain rights, no matter whether or not it leads to a more prosperous and peaceful society. Why?
I do not believe that rights are founded on prudential grounds, nor do I believe that individuals are entitled by society or their government to possess or exercise rights only so long as society or the state judges (whether rightly or wrongly) that the rights confer an aggregate net benefit upon society or the state as a whole. I have been concerned in many of my writings to demonstrate this, as well as the corollary proposition, that rights cannot be defended or justified on utilitarian grounds, since to undertake such a defense is to imply that rights require a utilitarian justification, and are therefore contingent on positive aggregate outcomes. By the way, I speak of social utilitarianism, normally expressed as "the greatest good for the greatest number," not of individual utilitarianism, that is, the notion that each individual acts to maximize his individual welfare.
Utilitarianism is a result-driven ethic, that is, it is driven by a desire to secure a specified result, a particular "greatest good," desired by the greatest number. Utilitarianism thus concerns itself with gaming the outcome of the exercise of man?s freedom. By definition, all matters are necessarily subordinate to the acquisition of the "greatest good" for the "greatest number," a particular aggregate net benefit. As a result, particular individuals simply don?t count and, in fact, the philosophy sanctions the use of individuals solely as a means to an end, that is, it sanctions human sacrifice, so long as those to be sacrificed are not so numerous that it eliminates rather than contributes to the overall aggregate benefit.
This is very evident in Handgun Control Inc.?s writings in favor of gun control. They do not deny that some people successfully use guns to defend themselves, and they freely site Department of Justice Statistics that report that this happens about 65,000 times a year. But they argue that this benefit is small in comparison to the number of homicides, suicides and crimes committed with guns each year, and that it would result in a greater benefit to society to eliminate or severely restrict access to handguns. Thus, tacitly, by their own admission, the 65,000 persons a year who would otherwise benefit from having a gun are to be sacrificed in favor of the hundreds of thousands a year who will benefit from elimination of guns.
Because utilitarianism is concerned with securing a desired aggregate outcome, whether the individual is permitted liberty to act depends on whether his fellow citizens are, in the aggregate, using their liberty to achieve the desired good. If not, the individual?s liberty may be curbed or re-directed. Thus, the individual?s freedom depends on how others behave, and is defined and circumscribed with reference to the results that others achieve. In other words, you cannot carry a gun, because too many others are using them to commit crimes. Thus the scope of your freedom depends not on how you act, but on how others act.
By contrast, classically, individual rights are founded on the notion, as expressed by Kant, that each individual is "an end in himself," that all are entitled to be treated as having equal dignity, and that it is therefore wrong to treat others solely as a means to a desired end. A philosophy of individual right is not results-driven, and therefore does not sanction human sacrifice in favor of the highest good desired by the greatest number. An approach that rests on man?s freedom cannot, by definition, be driven by outcome or result: if men are left free, the outcome will be left variable! Of necessity, then, an approach that rests on freedom cannot possibly guaranty a specified, favorable outcome, either individually or in the aggregate. It cannot, therefore, promise safety, security, a reduction in violent crime, etc. Such concerns are blissfully beside the point, for the point is precisely to respect each individual as an end in himself.
However, individual autonomy and dignity are thin reeds to hang anything on these days! It?s just not enough, you understand! And I often think that that would be a pretty good epitaph for the whole wretched 20th Century: "Dignity Was Not Enough." People seem to believe they are more secure on the seemingly "scientific" grounds found in the results uncovered by social scientists. For example, in the gun control debate, you find people who are immensely comforted and bolstered by the findings of John Lott, that concealed carry laws are associated with measurable, significant decreases in violent crimes. They feel that this, truly, establishes legitimacy for their right to carry arms. Who needs ethics when you have numbers? Amazing.
Many people agree with you, that anyone should be able to own and carry a handgun for personal defense. But what about military weapons? Don?t you think it would be dangerous to let people be so strongly armed?
I do not wish to alarm you, but we already freely permit people to have military weapons and, what?s worse, the people we permit to have these weapons are clearly the most dangerous people on the planet. I mean, of course, those in government. Do I take your question, then, to mean, that while we manage to live in the world with this state of affairs, the incremental danger of letting anyone else (who is so inclined) have these weapons would be simply too dangerous and intolerable, so that it is better to protect the monopolies enjoyed by those now in power?
I am sorry to be a little glib, but really I don?t know how to answer your question. It is a sometimes unfortunate fact that we generally take the familiar, the status quo, as the proper baseline for judging all matters and see any change productive of uncertainty as an intolerable threat to our current comfort level. This is illustrated in the gun control debate all the time. People are concerned that, if concealed weapons permit laws are passed that allow any sane, law-abiding adult to carry a handgun for self-defense, these unknown strangers will be a danger to their community. You see, what do we really know about these people, and what training do these people really have? Yet ask them how much they really know about the police who are carrying not only handguns but also who have shotguns and, sometimes, semiautomatic rifles in their cars. What do they really know about the temper, character and personality of these people? What do they really know about their training? Basically, they know nothing about that. They know they wear uniforms that make them look "official" and that they work for a respected organization that is supposed to protect them, and this is enough. It is familiar; it is part of the ordinary fabric of life, so it is part of the baseline or background against which risks are measured, rather than part of the risk assessment itself. If you try to point out to them that they already live, quite comfortably and with scarcely a thought, with the risk they are supposedly worried about, they look at you like you are a madman. It is a failure of imagination. They cannot step off the baseline, cannot see the world apart from the baseline.
Really, would we any better or worse off if the individual right to keep and bear arms clearly encompassed the right to own tanks, fighter jet aircraft, stinger missiles, and suitcase nukes? I have no idea, but I think that the question is unanswerable except as a general indication of our beliefs about the nature of people. However, I will say that, at least here in the United States, historically, at least prior to the 1960s, except for the 1934 tax imposed on machine guns (which had the merit of doubling their cost to help keep them out of the hands of the disgruntled poor), I believe that there were no legal prohibitions against owning most military weapons. I am not aware of any instances during this period in which the absence of these legal prohibitions led to societal horrors. Perhaps almost all who are inclined to use these weapons against their fellow man are attracted to service in government, where it is socially acceptable?
You say that the Second Amendment affirms an individual right, which exists before any organized government, so that it cannot be repealed any more than we could repeal the right to life or any other natural or God-given right. But don?t you think, as some say, that it is an anachronistic legacy of the Revolutionary War?
Okay, you?re baiting me now! First, I hope that I do not say this, but that I simply state what was once believed or elucidate the implications of the now largely forgotten theory of natural rights. I try to demonstrate how far we have fallen away from this understanding and, correspondingly, how illegitimate our government has become judged by reference to its founding principles. I do this mostly for my own edification but also in hopes that others will pick up the thread and re-examine the whole question of the nature of the state and its legitimacy.
I?m not going to take the bait and argue that the right is just as relevant today as it was at the time of the Revolutionary War, nor address the claim that, since small arms are insufficient to defeat a modern army, with its helicopter gun-ships, laser-guided bombs and satellite surveillance, the right is quite anachronistic, at least in terms of protecting against government tyranny, because I?m not really interested in that. You?re still judging the right?s right to exist by whether or not the right works. The question implies a utilitarian standard. If it isn?t productive of desired or useful results in the present age, it has no raison d?e?tre. The question in this case is, rather, why you think you have a right to deprive a peaceable individual of this liberty because it doesn?t produce any discernible benefits for you or others. Is Carlo?s idea of utility the measure of all things, is Carlo the center of the universe which, himself unmoved, moves all he surveys? Or do others have equal autonomy and dignity? For if so, then there is no single measure of a common utility held in common, and, all being equal, no one has a right to impose his will on others. Or to say the same thing a bit differently, a common or shared utility exists, if at all, only to the extent of what people do entirely by voluntary association and cooperation.
Or perhaps your question really inquires into the status of natural rights, namely, whether or not what we call "natural" rights are really simply historical in nature, or creatures of custom, and can therefore come into and go out of existence. If they can be made by custom, why can?t they also be unmade by custom? Or, if they are made by custom, why can?t they be unmade by positive law?
The theory is that such rights are in some sense "God-given," or necessarily presupposed in individual autonomy or dignity and in the tacit requirement of mutual respect among persons of equal inherent dignity. Or some would argue that they are the necessary logical conditions of a government by consent of the people, and are in that sense prior to government. As such, government cannot legitimately change them, without government ceasing to be a "servant" of the people.
Yet the fact remains that what we call individual rights achieve recognition of that status at some particular point or era in history, and reflect the temper of that time. For example, in 1689, the English Bill of Rights took formal recognition of the right of English Protestants to keep arms, after a Catholic King endeavored to disarm them. However, the "right" reflects a long-standing custom of leaving people free ? largely undisturbed ? to own and bear arms for self-defense. So because the right is manifested in human affairs at particular times and places and not universally among all peoples at all times and places, it appears a matter of custom, "arbitrary" in the sense that it does not express the necessity of a physical law. Then here is the leap: therefore we can change it, or refuse to recognize it as a legitimate ethical principal. This debate has been going on since the Greeks. In Ethics, Aristotle distinguishes between what we call positive or man-made laws and natural laws and notes that some say that even so-called "natural" laws are just based in human custom. Aristotle concedes that there is some merit to this view, in the sense that so-called "natural" laws are not "natural" in the sense of physical laws, but cautions that the distinction is a legitimate one and not to presume that because such laws are "customary," that natural laws are subject to ready political manipulation. The implication is that human nature is not infinitely or readily malleable, least of all by fiat.
What about Christians and guns? Some of them say that people should not resist aggressions, because violence is never justified. Some others believe that life is a gift from God, which should be defended by every necessary means. What of this?
Frankly this is not as clear as I would like, although I will certainly not blame God for my confusion! The position that the Christian does not offer violence against violence, or resist, even in self-defense, is rooted both in the commandment, "Thou shalt not kill," and in the Sermon on the Mount, where Christ counsels not to resist evil, to turn the other cheek and to love one?s enemies (Matthew 5: 38 ? 45). On this basis, the use of all force, even to fight for or establish what is right or just, is wrong, and the counsel implicitly condemns all governments, which are founded on coercion. Few have written as forcefully on this issue as Leo Tolstoy. If you are interested in this I recommend The Law of Violence and the Law of Love and The Kingdom of God is Within You. However, there are those who, examining the nuances of the original, untranslated words, argue that Christ?s counsel is against retribution, revenge or punishment, and does not prohibit self-defense in the moment of assault. This seems also to be Aquinas? position, who essentially argues that self-defense is legitimate as long as there is no hatred or retribution in your heart, and the current Pope has also written that self-defense is legitimate in the eyes of God. Frankly, I am not sure where the truth lies, because I find it difficult to accept the notion that loving one?s enemies is consistent with striking them down or killing them, and further, non-resistance is consistent with Christ?s own life as revealed in the Gospels. So I suspect that Tolstoy is correct. But even the alternative view implies a severely limited domain for the exercise of force and, I believe, essentially prohibits the use of force to render justice.
You write, "self-government, not war." What does it mean?
This is from an article I wrote titled, "The Line in the Sand," which addresses the question of when it is appropriate for people to take up arms against their government. Basically it means, don?t wage war trying to reform the government, or to institute a new form of legitimate government; instead, ignore the state, accept and handle your responsibilities without trying to pass them off onto others, and govern yourselves through voluntary arrangements. That warrants some elaboration. First, I think it necessary to recognize and admit that perhaps the most important fact of the American experiment in limited government, with its Bill of Rights and express reservation of rights to the People, is that it did not work. I don?t think any new, supposedly better institutional or structural elements of a reformed government will work either. Fundamentally, it is a problem of the nature of man, and his ready desire to use force to compel others to secure benefits to himself; fundamentally, this is a religious problem. If you create an institution with the sole legitimate power to compel others, nominally only for certain limited purposes, the power will eventually be used for any purpose. It?s like building a car that can go 120 miles per hour, telling the driver he can only ever drive 10 miles per hour and expecting that he won?t exceed the self-imposed speed limit.
Second, its pretty clear from de Jouvenel?s examination of the growth of power of states that government grows by offering to relieve individuals from burdensome social obligations that they have (such as educating their children or taking care of one?s parents in their old age) or intervening on their behalf where they are the weaker party (such as in employer-employee relations), thereby creating fealty to the government in return for empowerment against others or a release from obligations. This process ultimately creates an individual who is free from all social ties, a solitary figure who relates to everyone else only by and through the state. This theory makes sense of the seemingly incongruous expansion of personal, sexual or reproductive rights following the radical curtailment or destruction of individual property and contract rights and all encompassing expansion of the Federal government?s power via a creative interpretation of the commerce clause during the New Deal. Whatever may be your opinion of sexual freedom or marriage, the fact is that the Supreme Court?s "discovery" that the use of contraceptives and abortion are fundamental individual rights, coupled with the growth of no-fault divorce, high taxation that drives women to work, subsidized day-care and increasingly, children?s rights, are gambits by the state to break down what most would consider to be the final and most basic structure of society: the family. It is an indication that the process of freeing the individual from all obligations to others in favor of one, all encompassing obligation to the state, is nearly complete.
In this light, the state is best resisted by ignoring it and refusing it?s offers and assistance and, since the state seeks to isolate, by forging voluntary social relationships with one another to provide for our mutual needs and wants. A good and so far successful example of this is the growth of home-schooling.
If America is a nation of cowards, what about other nations? For example, European countries have no Second Amendment (and no Bill of Rights) to stand for. What do you believe those people should do?
Okay, from de Jouvenel to popular culture. In The Empire Strikes Back, when Luke is about to enter the cave that "is strong with the dark side of the Force," Yoda says to him, "Your weapons, you will not need them." I would like people to understand, "Your rights, you will not need them." Rights do not make you free; only by acting free can you become free. The knowledge of the prior existence of rights is useful, as reminders of what men once were, what they fought for, where they drew a line against compulsion by their King or government; it helps us perceive that men one time conceived themselves as possessing a core dignity and autonomy that they would not permit others to lay hands on ? it helps us to perceive our baseline, which we would otherwise be blind to.
But to fight for the establishment of rights or for recognition of rights by one?s government involves tacit subordination to the state. The struggle to make a government recognize a right works in favor of the state, because it implicitly sets up government as the arbiter of the existence of the right. If one will not act within the scope of freedom delineated by the right unless or until the state concedes it lawful to do so, why of course then there is no right and the state controls your conduct. Thus, the passage of concealed carry permit laws in the United States is an admission that the right to keep and bear arms no longer exists in this country.
But there is more to it than that. The whole notion of individual rights is fundamentally a bankrupt notion, and not because of the problem I spoke of before concerning whether or not the rights were really "God-given" but merely customary and subject to change. The notion of "fundamental rights" is correlative to the notion of legitimate coercion; it implies, and tacitly depends upon acceptance of subjection to a domain of coercive authority. You can be governed, except that government must leave you alone in such and such spheres of activity: free speech, free exercise of religion, bearing arms, etc. The "rights" analysis pictures envelopment in a sphere of coercive authority, with specified, limited pockets of freedom. It?s the baseline problem! Why are just those areas of my behavior "protected" and not others? The fundamental question is not what rights do I have, but why may anyone exercise coercive authority over me in the first place? It is coercion, not freedom, which must be justified. If coercion is not legitimate, there is no need for "rights." Arguing "rights" is arguing from an acknowledged and accepted subordinate ? unfree ? position.
So, your rights, you do not need them! They cannot and will not help you, because no government wishes to recognize them (although it may make a show of doing so as long as it thinks it necessary, until most people can be brought around), and it is fine with the state if you spend your life attempting to compel the state to acknowledge and respect their existence. The question is whether you will act free or how you will use your freedom. But take care that you do not throw yourself away cheaply or needlessly, for such a one as the state; choose well how to create good in the world. Seek and speak the truth about what you know about the nature of the state, ignore the state as best you can, refuse its assistance, accept and fulfill your responsibilities instead of seeking ways to shift your burdens to others, and forge the social relationships you want or need to live as you would like without the state?s tender mercies.
February 8, 2001
Carlo Stagnaro [send him mail] co-edits the libertarian magazine "Enclave" and edited the book "Waco. Una strage di stato americana." Here's his website.
Copyright ? 2002 LewRockwell.com
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Wow. Amazing piece posted above. Reminds me a lot of "Rational Anarchy," a philosophy for dealing with the vagaries of a given state. Here's one treatsie describing it:
IN DEFENSE OF RATIONAL ANARCHISM
Copyright George H. Smith (november 1997)
Anarchism is a theory of the good society, in which justice and social order are maintained without the State (or government). Many anarchists in the libertarian movement (including myself) were heavily influenced by the epistemological and moral theories of Ayn Rand. According to these anarchists, Rand's principles, if consistently applied, lead necessarily to a repudiation of government on moral grounds.
I call this rational anarchism, because it is grounded in the belief that we are fully capable, through reason, of discerning the principles of justice; and that we are capable, through rational persuasion and voluntary agreement, of establishing whatever institutions are necessary for the preservation and enforcement of justice. It is precisely because no government can be established by means of reason and mutual consent that all Objectivists should reject that institution as unjust in both theory and practice.
Although it is sometime useful to distinguish between the meanings of "State" and "government," such distinctions are irrelevant to the present discussion, so I shall use the terms interchangeably. Following the classic discussion of the sociologist and historian Max Weber, I shall define the "State" as a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory."
The State is vested with the exclusive power to enact legislation, adjudicate legal disputes, enforce laws, etc., while forcibly preventing other individuals and associations from engaging in the same activities. The State, in other words, exercises a coercive monopoly in the enforcement of justice. This ultimate power of decision-making is known in political theory as "sovereignty." In the words of the historian A. P. d'Entreves, "the problem of the birth of the modern State is no other than the problem of the rise and final acceptance of the concept of sovereignty."
The concept of sovereignty is the focal point of the current debate between anarchists and minarchists (a label coined by Sam Konkin for the advocates of minimal, or "limited," government). The fundamental problem is this: Where does the right of sovereignty come from, and how can it be justified? This is an especially difficult problem for those in the Lockeian tradition of minarchism - which, in this context, includes the followers of Ayn Rand.
John Locke (like Ayn Rand) believed that all rights belong to individuals. There are no special "group rights" that exist in addition to individual rights. The rights of all groups (including the group that calls itself a "government") must be based on, and in some way derived from, the rights of individuals.
I call this approach political reductionism, because it maintains that the sovereign rights of a (legitimate) government are reducible to the rights of individuals. Political reductionism stands in opposition to political emergence theory, which argues that at least one right (usually the right to enforce the precepts of justice) does not originally belong to individuals, but emerges only in civil societies under government.
Now, having presented this background material, I will address several key issues in the minarchist/anarchist controversy.
AYN RAND AND THE SOCIAL CONTRACT TRADITION
According to John Locke, every person in an anarchistic state of nature would possess the "executive power" to enforce his own rights against the aggressive actions of others. But owing to various "inconveniences" (such as the likelihood of personal bias when acting as judge in one's own case), Locke argued that rational people would unanimously agree to leave this state of nature and join a "civil society," which would thereafter use majority rule to decide upon a particular form of government, such as constitutional monarchy, democracy, and so forth.
This "social contract" was Locke's way of accounting for our obligation to obey the political sovereign. Beginning with the rights of individuals, Locke tried to show how the executive power to enforce these natural rights would be delegated, through a process of consent, to government. Eighteenth-century Americans were chiefly indebted to John Locke for their belief in government by consent.
Ayn Rand defends a consent doctrine in several of her essays, but she never explains how this consent should manifest itself - whether, for example, it must be explicit or merely tacit (as Locke believed). Nor does she explain precisely which rights are delegated to government and how they are transferred. Therefore, although Rand appears to fall within the social contract tradition (at least in a general way), it is unclear where she would stand on the nature and method of political consent. I sincerely hope that some of her minarchist followers can shed some light on this problem.
CONSENT THEORY VS. GOVERNMENT
Many of John Locke's critics - such as David Hume, Josiah Tucker, Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, and Jeremy Bentham - argued that the inner logic of consent theory, if consistently applied, will land us in anarchy. As these critics pointed out, no government has ever originated in consent, and there is no reason to suppose that individuals, in full possession of their natural rights, would ever subordinate themselves voluntarily to a government.
I agree with these critics. If we accept the premise that individuals (and only individuals) possess equal and reciprocal rights, and if we insist that these individuals must consent to be ruled by a government, and if we condemn as illegitimate all governments that rule without consent - then all governments, past and present, have been illegitimate.
Furthermore, I maintain that Objectivists, if they are to remain true to the consent doctrine, must embrace this kind of "practical anarchism" and condemn all historical governments as unjust. True, Objectivists insist that government can be justified in theory - though none (that I know of) has ever spelled out the necessary criteria - but this theoretically legitimate government has never existed anywhere on this earth. Nor can it exist anywhere except in what Edmund Burke called "the fairyland of philosophy." As Josiah Tucker (a contemporary of Burke) put it, the consent theory of government is "the universal demolisher of all governments, but not the builder of any."
John Locke identified two fundamental problems that must be addressed by the political philosopher. First, what is the justification of the State? Second, assuming that we can justify the State in theory, what are the standards by which we can judge the legitimacy of a particular government? Too often minarchists deal only with the first question, while ignoring the second.
Suppose I am asked what could conceivably change my mind and cause me to endorse government, and suppose I give the following reply: "If I believed in the God of Christianity, and if I believed that God had dispatched a squad of angels to communicate with me personally, and if these angels told me that the State is a divine institution, ordained by God for the protection of human rights, and if these angels further informed me that anarchism would lead to widespread death and destruction - then, under these circumstances, I would abandon my anarchism in favor of minarchism."
But consider an important feature that would be missing from my newfound justification of the State. While believing that the State is justified, qua institution, I would not possess specific standards by which to judge whether a self-professed "government" is in fact a legitimate State at all, or whether it is merely a gang of usurpers and oppressors who claim to act on behalf of that divine institution.
As a remedy for this problem, suppose the angels provide me with a clear and unmistakable standard, to wit: "You will know legitimate rulers by the visible halos over their heads. This sign, and this sign alone, will mark the agents who are authorized by God to act on behalf of the State." Well, after looking around at the functionaries of existing governments, and after seeing no such halos, I would conclude that no one who presently claims to represent the State is morally authorized to do so. On the contrary, I would surmise that America is currently in a state of anarchy, since it contains no legitimate government - so, devoted minarchist that I am, I would dedicate my life to abolishing our wicked "government" and to exposing those Satanic politicians who fraudulently pose as functionaries of that divine institution, the State.
This is a species of the "practical anarchism" that Objectivists must logically endorse. For halos, they have substituted consent as the discernible sign of a legitimate government - and, like halos, consent is nowhere to be found in real-life governments. Hence, while defending the State in theory, these consent-minarchists should oppose all existing governments in practice. And this, I dare say, is a kind of minarchism that I can live with quite well - for we are more likely to be visited by angels than to find a government based on consent.
AYN RAND, ANARCHIST
My next point will probably cause me to be branded as a psycho-epistemological pervert, but here it is: I am convinced that Ayn Rand was essentially an anarchist in substance, if not in name. She was at most a nominal governmentalist. If the conventional meaning of a word is to count for anything at all (and it should), then Rand's ideal "government" is in fact no government at all, but is merely a sheep in wolf's clothing.
How can I make this outrageous claim? I base it on Rand's moral opposition to coercive taxation. The power of coercive taxation, as Alexander Hamilton said in The Federalist Papers is the very life-blood of government. Indeed, the great debate over ratification of the United States Constitution centered on whether or not the federal government should have the power to tax. The Articles of Confederation had withheld this power from Congress, reserving it exclusively for the states. Many Anti-Federalists opposed the Constitution because they realized that the federal government, if granted the power to lay and collect taxes directly from the people, would strip the states of their sovereign authority.
If the defenders of either side in the ratification debate had encountered Rand's argument for "voluntary taxation," they would have assailed it, first, as a veritable contradiction in terms (which it is), and, secondly, as a rejection of sovereign government altogether (which it also is). Virtually every defender of government - from John Locke to Thomas Jefferson to Ludwig von Mises - has recognized coercive taxation to be an essential component of sovereignty, a power without which no true government can exist.
The principle of "voluntary taxation" reduces Rand's "government" to a free-market protection agency, which, like every business, must either satisfy its customers or close up shop. What is to prevent a dissatisfied customer from withholding his money from a Randian "government," while subscribing instead to the services of another agency? Why cannot a landowner (or combination of landowners) refuse to pay for the services of their Randian "government," which they regard as inefficient, and take their business elsewhere?
The right to pay for services or not, according to one's own judgment, is a characteristic of the free market; it has no relationship, either theoretically or historically, to the institution of government. There is no way a government can retain its sovereign power - its monopoly on the use of legitimate force - if it does not possess the power of compulsory taxation.
When the nineteenth-century minarchist Auberon Herbert advanced his theory of "voluntary taxation," he was widely praised by anarchists, such as Benjamin Tucker, who embraced him as one of their own. But he was assailed by fellow minarchists, such as Herbert Spencer, who correctly pointed out that Herbert's position was indistinguishable from anarchism. Likewise, Rand's position on taxation places her squarely in the anarchist camp - her idiosyncratic use of the word "government" notwithstanding. We should focus in this debate on the concept of government and its essential characteristics, not on the word usage of a particular writer.
OBJECTIVE JUSTICE VS. LEGAL MONOPOLISM
I defend anarchism, or society without the State, because I believe that innocent people cannot be forced to surrender any of their natural rights. Those who wish to delegate some of their rights to a government are free to do so, provided they do not violate the rights of dissenters who choose not to endorse their government.
As Ayn Rand has said, the lives of other people are not yours to dispose of. Yet this is precisely what every government attempts to do. A government initiates physical force (or the threat of force) to prohibit other people from exercising their right to enforce the rules of justice. (Either every person has this executive power, or no one does, according to the principle of political reductionism.) A government, while engaging in certain activities which it claims are just, coercively prevents other people from engaging in those selfsame activities.
By what moral means, I ask, does a government come to possess this exclusive right? A government cannot bestow justice on an action that would be unjust if undertaken by someone else. Nor can a government, through force or arbitrary decree, render an action unjust when undertaken by someone else, if that same action is just when undertaken by government. The principles of justice are objective and therefore universal; they apply equally and without exception to every human being, as does every rational precept and procedure. A mathematical computation, for example, cannot be correct when computed by a government, and incorrect when computed by someone else. A deductive syllogism, if valid for those in government, is equally valid for those outside of government. Murder, if wrong when committed by an individual, is equally wrong when committed by a government.
Likewise, an activity, if moral when pursued by a government, is equally moral when pursued by someone else. All this should be obvious to those who agree with the principles put forth by Ayn Rand. If, therefore, the principles of justice are objective (i.e., knowable to human reason), then a government can no more claim a monopoly on the legitimate use of force than it can claim a monopoly on reason.
Those minarchists who claim that justice can prevail only under government must implicitly defend the view that justice is either subjective or intrinsic. If justice is subjective, if it varies from one person to the next, then government can be defended as necessary to establish objective rules. Likewise, if justice is intrinsic to government itself, if whatever a government decrees is necessarily just, then government is justified automatically.
If, however, justice is neither subjective nor intrinsic, but instead is objective - i.e., if it can be derived by rational methods from the facts of man's nature and the requirements of social existence - then the principles of justice are knowable to every rational person. This means that no person, group of persons, association, or institution whether known as "government," "State," or by any other name - can rightfully claim a legal monopoly in matters pertaining to justice.
Rational anarchism, in short, is simply the application of Ayn Rand's theory of objective knowledge to the realm of justice.
STATE-SOVEREIGNTY VS. SELF-SOVEREIGNTY
As far as I know, the first sustained attack on legal pluralism came from Marsilius of Padua in the fourteenth century. In his Defender of the Peace, Marsilius attacked the legal pluralism of his day - especially as it pertained to the political authority of the Church and he maintained that one authority, and one alone, should have sovereign power in a given territory.
In defense of this view, Marsilius argued that to deny the right of sovereignty leads ultimately to a logical contradiction. Someone - some person, association or institution - must have the authority to render a final verdict in order for a legal system to operate. One of Marsilius's more interesting examples went something like this:
Suppose two "competing governments" (to use the misleading terminology of Ayn Rand) claim jurisdiction over the same territory, and suppose both have the right to issue compulsory subpoenas that require a person to appear in court on a given day. Furthermore, suppose I receive subpoenas from both agencies demanding that I appear in court at exactly the same time. Since it is impossible for me to be in two places at once, it is impossible for me to obey both governments simultaneously.
Yet this conflicts with our initial premise - that both agencies have a rightful authority to issue subpoenas - because I am logically required to disobey at least one of these governments.
I don't know the official Objectivist position on subpoenas, but the logic of the foregoing argument can easily accommodate other examples. The important point here is the reasoning behind this "logic of sovereignty argument," as it is sometimes called. This argument exerted considerable influence after 1576, when Jean Bodin used it to defend absolute monarchy. It was also used for the same purpose in the seventeenth century by Sir Robert Filmer (Locke's dead adversary) and Thomas Hobbes.
It is scarcely accidental that the logic of sovereignty argument was a favorite among the defenders of absolutism, and was vigorously opposed by John Locke and other champions of limited government. For consider: If the sovereign (whether one man or group of men) is the final arbiter in all matters pertaining to justice, then how can the sovereign himself be held accountable for committing acts of injustice? The absolutists insisted that he cannot be so judged by any human authority; the sovereign was accountable to "none but God."
Sovereign power, in this view, must be absolute (i.e., unconditional), because by definition there is no higher authority than the sovereign himself. The sovereign is therefore above the law, not under it, which means that there can exist no rights of resistance and revolution by the people. To advocate a "divided sovereignty," according to Filmer, Hobbes and other absolutists, is to advocate anarchy.
I cannot go into the various ways that Locke and other minarchists tried to get around this logic of sovereignty argument, but I think the absolutists had the stronger philosophical case. Either a government has sovereign power, or it doesn't. Either a government has the final authority to render and execute legal decisions, or it doesn't. Sovereignty is an all-or-nothing affair. And if this is true, then no person has a right to resist the sovereign, however unjust his actions may appear. For who is to decide whether a law is unjust, if not the sovereign himself? Who is to decide whether a right has been violated, if not a sovereign government in its role as final arbiter?
In any dispute between a sovereign government and its subjects, the government itself must decide who is right; and, as Locke suggested, the sovereign, like everyone else, is likely to be biased in his own favor.. I would therefore like to know how those Objectivists who use the logic of sovereignty argument as a weapon against anarchism can avoid sliding down the slippery slope into absolutism.
If I am arrested for smoking pot or for reading a prohibited book (say, Atlas Shrugged) do I have a right forcibly to resist my incarceration?
If you say "no," then you are defending absolutism. If you say "yes," then what happened to the sovereign power of government to render final decisions in matters of law? - for in resisting the government I am clearly acting as judge in my own case.
Ayn Rand somewhere says that a government becomes tyrannical when it attempts to suppress freedom of speech and press, but who is to decide when this line has been crossed, if not the sovereign government? Surely we can't have crazy people like Ayn Rand running around condemning some laws as unjust and calling for disobedience, because this will lead to anarchy. We cannot preach sovereignty when it suits our purpose, and then oppose it when we don't like particular laws, for this undermines the rationale of sovereignty itself - i.e., that legal matters cannot be left to the discretion of individuals. The doctrine of natural rights, as foes of consent theory repeatedly pointed out, is inherently anarchistic. Burke called natural rights "a digest of anarchy," while Bentham castigated them as "anarchical fallacies."
If at any point Objectivists are willing to admit that individuals have the right to resist an unjust law or overthrow a despotic government, then they are conceding the basic premise of anarchism: namely, that true sovereignty resides in each individual, who has the right to assess the justice of a particular law, procedure or government.
There can be no (logically consistent) middle ground between state-sovereignty and self-sovereignty, between absolutism and anarchism. I defend the self-sovereignty of anarchism. If Objectivists do not understand how I can defend the individual as the "final authority in ethics," I recommend they read Ayn Rand's essay on that topic.
THE LOGIC OF STATE-SOVEREIGNTY VS. OBJECTIVE JUSTICE
In over twenty-five years of arguing with Randian minarchists, I have encountered few who seem even remotely aware that the logic of sovereignty argument has been a central theme in political theory for over four centuries. Those familiar with its long history will understand that it has everywhere and always been used to defend and expand the absolute power of government.
In The Federalist Papers, for example, both Madison and Hamilton repeatedly use the logic of sovereignty argument to defend extensive discretionary powers in the federal government, and to prove that no limit can logically be imposed on the taxing power of Congress. Indeed, Hamilton insists that an "unqualified" (i.e., absolute) power to tax is logically deducible from the axiom of sovereignty, and Madison defends a similar position.
As the saying goes, if you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas. The minarchists who lie down with the logic of sovereignty argument are infested with the fleas of absolutism, but apparently they haven't noticed or don't care.
Our primary concern should be with the justice of a legal system - i.e., with what laws are enforced, not with who enforces them. This justice can be ascertained by objective standards of right.
If the legal system of an agency (whether governmental or private) is truly just as evaluated by objective standards - and if, by "competition," we mean any attempt forcibly to overturn this legal system, replacing it with an unjust system - then our agency may forcibly resist and overthrow the outlaw agency, owing to its effort to violate individual rights.
As I said, however, the right to suppress the outlaw agency has nothing to do with the alleged necessity for a final arbiter. Rather, it is simply an application of the right of every individual, whether by himself or in combination with others, to resist and repel despotism, whatever the source of that despotism may be. The pertinent issue, therefore, is not whether we need a coercive monopoly to enforce justice; but whether we can determine the justice of legal system by objective methods, and whether, having objectively condemned a given system as unjust, we can then forcibly resist any individual or agency which seeks to impose that system.
This has everything to do with the individual right of self-defense, as manifested in the libertarian rights of resistance and revolution, and has nothing whatever to do with the supposed need for a final arbiter.
Objectivists, if they are to remain true to the theory of rights defended by Ayn Rand, must agree with anarchists that the moral legitimacy of a particular government depends, not on the subjective claims of that government, but on true measure of justice in its legal system, as evaluated by objective criteria.
If a legal system is objectively just, then its enforcement agency (whether governmental or private) may properly restrain the "competition" of an unjust legal system, whether implemented by a government or by a private agency. If, however, the competitor also works within the framework of a just legal system (perhaps differing from the other agency in optional matters of procedure), then that competitor may not be forcibly restrained from entering into contractual relationships with willing customers.
The logic of sovereignty argument is valid only within a subjective theory of justice, where a coercive arbiter must prevail in the absence of reason. In an objective theory of justice, however, what appears to minarchists (mistakenly) as the logic of sovereignty - i.e., the right forcibly to eliminate unjust agencies - has in fact nothing to do with the supposed need for a final arbiter, but is instead the application of an individual's right of self-defense.
Minarchists, after noting that an objective theory of justice can generate the right to exclude competing agencies in some cases (i.e., when the agency is unjust), erroneously conclude that this right flows from political sovereignty. But sovereignty demands the exclusion of competing agencies in all cases, even if the competitor is far more just than the sovereign itself. Sovereignty, based as it is on subjectivism, cannot logically discriminate between just and unjust legal systems, so it transforms the de facto power of an existing government into de jure sovereignty - operating, in effect, from the maxim of Alexander Pope, "Whatever is, is right." This is why the theory of sovereignty and its attendant absolutism have always denied the rights of resistance and revolution.
A system of objective justice, on the other hand, enables us to discriminate between the initiation of force and the retaliatory use of force, thereby providing a rational method of assessing any person, agency or government which claims to use legitimate violence. Furthermore, a system of objective justice defines and sanctions the use of defensive violence, which has traditionally been expressed in libertarian theory as the rights of resistance and revolution.
These rights, which stem from the individual right of self-defense, can justify the suppression of any agency or government that seeks to impose an unjust legal system. And though this suppression of "competition" may sometimes bear a superficial resemblance to the sovereign suppression of all competition (whether just or unjust), this should not mislead Objectivists and libertarians into supposing that these two actions - one by a sovereign government, the other by a private justice agency - are based on the same mode of justification.
One (suppression by a sovereign government) is rooted in political subjectivism (or relativism), and has no relationship to the justice or injustice of the victimized agency. The other (suppression by a justice agency) is rooted in political objectivism, and is confined solely the suppression of unjust agencies and governments. The former power is justified by political sovereignty, a right that cannot be reduced to the rights of individuals. The latter power is justified by the right of self-defense, a right that is possessed equally by every individual and can be delegated (or not) to a specialized agency. The former theory leads necessarily to absolutism and cannot be reconciled with consent. The latter theory generates agencies whose power is specifically limited by the consensual delegation of rights by individuals.
As I have said before, we must ultimately choose between state-sovereignty and self-sovereignty, between absolutism and anarchy, between subjective decree and objective justice. There is no middle ground in logic. The chickens of the Law of the Excluded Middle have come home to roost. And they are fouling the minarchist nest.
LEGAL PLURALISM VS. STATE-SOVEREIGNTY IN HISTORY
The lesson here is that power is always dangerous, regardless of who wields it - be it a private protection agency or a sovereign government.
As Acton said, "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." Even the rulers in an ideal Objectivist society would be likely to abuse their power, and would therefore require constant monitoring. (I ask you, who is more likely to seek power in an Objectivist society - the Howard Roarks or the Ellsworth Tooheys?) It was this concern about the abuse of power that led Thomas Jefferson and others in his tradition to favor decentralization, a system in which power is checked by other external powers.
This was the original idea behind "limited government." A "limited government" was a government whose power was limited, or checked, by another power external to itself. Ultimately, according to Locke, Jefferson, and other minarchists, the only effective check on sovereign power is the right of the people to resist unjust laws and overthrow despotic governments. This sovereign right of the people was the external check that imposed real limits on a "limited government."
There are very good reasons to suppose that legal pluralism would be more effective in preserving justice than legal monism. The Western legal tradition, as many historians have pointed out, was rooted in legal pluralism. Legal pluralism existed in Europe for many centuries, until it was finally destroyed by rapacious and violent monarchs. Medieval Europe had a complex network of political authorities, legal systems and overlapping jurisdictions. There existed customary law, the king's law, feudal law, municipal law, canon law, and so forth. What some minarchists claim cannot exist, therefore, did in fact exist for many centuries.
Moreover, as Voltaire, Lord Acton and other liberal historians have argued, the Western World owes its liberty to the conflict among these competing authorities. Neither the spiritual nor the temporal authorities had libertarian intentions, but the ongoing competition between these institutions gradually led to the development of "intermediate" institutions (such as municipalities), as Pope and Prince conceded various "liberties" and "immunities" in an effort to win allies to their side. And it was these intermediate institutions, not governments, which were largely responsible for the freedom that is unique to the Western World.
A remarkable system of competing governments also existed in America for many decades prior to the War for Independence. The colonials came to regard their provincial governments as independent and autonomous institutions that were necessary to check British power. And the British government, in its turn, restrained the power of the colonial assemblies. This situation resulted in a paralysis of power (since neither government could do much) and in a great deal of personal liberty.
Later, after the countervailing power of Britain had been eliminated by a successful Revolution, the Constitution established a powerful national government - which, as Madison proudly announced during the Philadelphia Convention, was vested with greater powers than even the British Parliament against which Americans "have so lately rebelled."
This sentiment was seconded in The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton, who criticized the fundamental principles of the American Revolution, called for their repudiation by the American people, and advocated instead a Constitution and monopolistic government that were based on a newer and more sophisticated "science" of political sovereignty.
In just a few short years the decentralized legal pluralism of pre-Revolutionary America had succumbed to the logic of sovereignty and a powerful central government - those evil Siamese-twins that are largely responsible for our present unhappy condition.
Consider two of the most powerful and influential ideas in twentieth century politics: the notion of an all-powerful State that is the sole arbiter of justice, and the notion of an infallible general will that can force people to be free. The former was the brainchild of Thomas Hobbes, the latter of J.J. Rousseau. Consider also that it was these two philosophers of sovereignty who, more than anyone else, separated sovereignty from its religious roots in the divine right of kings, gave it a secular foundation, and unleashed the "mortal god" of Leviathan on the Western World.
I don't defend anarchism because I ever expect to see an anarchist society. (An anarchist America is almost as unlikely as an Objectivist America.) But I do think we can effectively combat statism with the right intellectual ammunition, and this includes the total repudiation of political sovereignty in favor of individual rights and voluntary institutions.
The address of this document:
http://www.ifi.uio.no/~thomas/po/rational-anarchism.html
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The Washington Post published an exhaustive anti-gun piece that managed to get some important facts quite wrong. Here is John Lott's take:
A Fair Shot
New legislation aims to ease the unfair burden on gun-store operators.
By John R. Lott Jr.
It is tough operating a gun shop under harassment from the federal government and unjustified media attacks. But the harassment might soon get a little better, as today the House Judiciary Committee starts marking up a bill by Representatives Howard Coble and Bobby Scott to ease the burden on gun merchants.
According to Justice Department numbers, since Bill Clinton was elected president in 1992, the number of federally licensed firearms dealers in the United States has plummeted by 80 percent. Kmart no longer sells guns, Wal-Mart just recently stopped selling guns at a third of its stores, and tens of thousands of other gun shops have gone out of business. With all the talk of the recent legislative success by gun owners, they have been winning some battles but possibly losing the war. Gun-control advocates may be the ones winning where it really counts.
Part of the drop in licensees has been due to fees imposed by the federal government. Many license recipients were in the business of selling only a small number of guns, and the fees made that practice unprofitable.
The constant breakdowns of the ?instant? background-check system during the Clinton administration halted guns sales for hours or even days at a time, costing stores untold sales and raising their costs. Even by the end of the Clinton administration, from September 1999 to December 2000, the system was down about one hour for every 16.7 hours of operation. The breakdowns often came in big blocks of time, the worst during a period covering 60 hours during two weeks in the middle of May 2000. Try running a business where neither customers nor sellers are ever informed on how long outages are expected to last.
Fortunately, the background-check problems are now fixed. And there are no new fees. So why are gun shops still going out of business? There were about 100,000 license holders at the end of Clinton?s last term. By today that has been cut almost in half.
The Washington Post?s front page on Sunday illustrated the problems with both the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives abuses as well as the media?s out-of-control attacks. The piece examined the supposed abuses of Sandy Abrams?s gun shop in Baltimore, a shop he took over from his father in 1996.
The second paragraph scarily points out that ?there were 422 firearms missing ? more than a quarter of his inventory.? The count listed guns as missing if there were simple paperwork mistakes (e.g., two digits in a number transposed). Taking all these mistakes since Sandy Abrams took over the story in 1996 and comparing them to his current inventory, not the 25,000 guns that he has sold over the last decade, borders on journalistic malpractice. It surely doesn?t provide readers with an accurate understanding of what is happening.
So what is the right number of missing guns? Abrams claims it is 19. Nineteen out of 25,000 isn?t great, but .076 percent is a lot less scary than 25 percent, a difference of 329-fold. More importantly, the government has apparently never found any of those guns to have been used in a crime. As Abrams notes, ?we have had the paperwork and successfully traced every gun whenever [the government] asked.?
Is this the type of gun dealer who should lose his license? The BATFE thinks he is a prime candidate. Nine hundred rules violations over ten years certainly sounds impressive. That is until you realize that violations include writing ?Balt.? instead of ?Baltimore,? or that the government-approved ledger was apparently missing a column. Of course, the information the column was supposed to record was redundant anyway.
Part of the problem may simply be a government agency that manipulates numbers to make the problem seem a lot worse than it is so that it can get more funding. But Coble and Scott?s legislation would reduce the discretion currently available to the BATFE and allow licensees who face revocation to be heard before a neutral administrative judge.
This legislation may not entirely reverse the massive decline in licensed firearms dealers, but it would be a promising a start.
? John R. Lott is the author of More Guns, Less Crime and The Bias Against Guns (Regnery 2003).
National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZTM2YjJhNTY1MmZmZmUzZjFhZGEwNjgwYTBlZTA1NDg=
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SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1110AP_Battle_of_Athens.html
Tuesday, August 1, 2006 ? Last updated 12:10 a.m. PT
60 years ago, vets took up arms in Tenn.
By BILL POOVEY
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
ATHENS, Tenn. -- Harold Powers was only 20 when he watched a frightening sight unfold here 60 years ago: Battle-hardened World War II veterans in a shootout with armed sheriff's deputies.
The so-called "Battle of Athens" began Aug. 1, 1946, when veterans opened fire on the local jail to stop corrupt local officials from stealing an election.
"It was scary," said Powers, a retired elementary school principal who was right in the middle of the fighting and was sprayed with pellets from a shotgun blast.
Felix Harrod, 84, was a 25-year-old poll watcher at the courthouse during the shootout and said it was common for incumbents in the county about 45 miles northeast of Chattanooga to take ballot boxes to the jail and stuff them with pre-marked ballots.
That was a practice the former soldiers hoped to stop. They offered an all-ex-GI, nonpartisan ticket that promised a fraud-free election and reform. Their rallying cry: "Why fight overseas for freedom and come home and be denied the right to have your ballot counted?"
The shooting continued until the pre-dawn of Aug. 2 when the former soldiers tossed dynamite at the jail, prompting deputies and a sheriff candidate holed up with ballot boxes to surrender.
The uprising left one man with a bullet wound and sent a deputy to prison.
On the 60th anniversary of the uprising, Powers and others who can recall the 1946 violence shake their head as state election officials predict only about 35 percent of voters will cast ballots in Thursday's primaries in Tennessee.
"The lesson is that people ought to take voting a whole lot more seriously than they do and not let things get out of hand," Powers said. "Don't let the politicians just take over."
The insurrection prompted a drastic change in the makeup of McMinn County government. McMinn County historian Joe Guy, now an assistant to the county mayor, said it amounted to the start of the county manager form of government.
Former Tusculum College historian Jennifer E. Brooks described the battle as "the most violent manifestation of a regional phenomenon of the post-World War II era" in the Tennessee Encyclopedia.
"Seasoned veterans of the European and Pacific theaters returned in 1945 and 1946 to Southern communities riddled with vice, economic stagnation and deteriorating schools," wrote Brooks, now a professor at Auburn University.
"Across the South, veterans launched insurgent campaigns to oust local political machines they regarded as impediments to economic 'progress.'"
Guy said it remains unclear exactly how many veterans took up arms for the Battle of Athens.
"Estimates have ranged between 50 to 250," he said. "No one really knows. It wasn't any organized military type of assault. They only wanted the ballot boxes."
The former soldiers raided National Guard and State Guard armories for weapons, and the governor mobilized the Guard, although troops never went to Athens.
The veterans shielded themselves behind overturned cars as they fired shots at the jail from across the street. Sympathizers even served them refreshments.
"It almost got to be like a party-type atmosphere," Guy said.
Guy said that after the fighting, the GIs recovered several ballot boxes that hadn't been manipulated and counted the votes. The veteran-backed candidates were declared the winners and sworn into office.
"The McMinn County veterans had won the day in a hail of gunfire, dynamite, and esprit de corps," Brooks wrote.
The local government had been part of a statewide political machine run by Memphis Mayor Ed "Boss" Crump.
"That's just the way things were all over the South, machines everywhere," Guy said. Outdated state laws and overly powerful sheriffs who had the power to arrest and collect fines and fees contributed to the frustration.
"Unfortunately Athens sort of got to be the tinder point of a great many social problems," Guy said.
Powers said the violence was motivated by disgust about corruption. "Some folks just had had all they could take. They just lost it," Powers said.
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On The Net:
Battle of Athens: http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryIDA043
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http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=131873
It was just are 3:30 Wednesday morning when a Minneapolis apartment dweller was forced to defend himself and his property with a sword.
Police say they got a call from residents of the 3100 block of Lyndale Avenue South that four people had forced their way into a residence.
According to police, once the burglars were inside, they got into a fight with one of the residents who grabbed his roommates sword and started slashing the intruders. His feisty attack send the invaders running, but not before he wounded several.
Shortly after Minneapolis police arrived, they were called by doctors at HCMC about the arrival of three people to the ER with severed fingers and lacerations.
One had minor injuries and was treated and arrested. The other two were more seriously injured and were treated at HCMC. They'll be transported to the Hennepin County Jail when they are released by the hospital.
The apartment resident was slightly injured in the attack.
Police continue investigating the incident.
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Lengthy piece with its share of coarse language:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8490506794163083426
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Some of we the well-armed people are idiots:
http://video.google.de/videoplay?docid=7279049101024789666&q=genre%3Acomedy
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"Some of we the well-armed people are idiots"
Doh! I hate being near these kinds of boneheads at the range. . . .
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Yup...
http://video.google.de/videoplay?docid=-8948845801083863802&q=shoots+himself
http://video.google.de/videoplay?docid=1183904817279114761&q=shoots+himself
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"If people carry guns, there will be murders over parking spaces and neighborhood basketball games."
Well it sounds like he hit the nail on the head with this one. Is the author a DC native?
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Words from a man I greatly admired, whose clear thinking and ability to cut through the B.S. will surely be missed.
"The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
?Jeff Cooper 10 May 1920 - 25 September 2006 R.I.P.
Woof, DD
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When you get right down to it, we drunkards are a pretty easy-going bunch.
Our needs are not excessive. Give us a glass of whiskey and a comfy place to drink it and we?re happy. Good drinks, good friends, good times?these are keys to a good life. Every once in a while, though, teetotalers and bureaucrats get it into their heads that we are easy to push around, or even worse, that we are so inebriated so much of the time that we won?t notice when they step on our toes. They hardly ever recall their anti-alcohol actions with fondness.
Case in point: The Whiskey Rebellion.
In 1791, Alexander Hamilton, Treasury Secretary for the newly-minted United States of America, woke up one morning with what he thought was a very good idea. The country was in a small financial bind. Nothing major, but it could certainly become so if the budget was suddenly faced with a major expense, such as another war with the increasingly angry Natives or another lengthy set-to with the still-smarting Brits. A prudent man, Hamilton was loath to go any further into debt to the French. He wanted a robust source of local income?American money put to use defending American interests. Which seems a perfectly swell idea, until you discover that Hamilton thought to collect his loot by imposing a huge tax on whiskey. Not on all intoxicating beverages, mind you, just whiskey, the nation?s favorite drink, bar none.
For Hamilton, taxing whiskey served multiple good purposes. First, it would cement the needed defense monies, and second, it would force his countrymen to drink something other than whiskey, which he considered a blight on the nation?s health and morals. Drinking wine and beer was fine by Hamilton. He enjoyed both himself. Whiskey, on the other hand, made people crazy and caused them to behave too much like Irishmen. A heavy tax would deter such unseemly excesses.
Much to Hamilton?s chagrin, many people reacted badly to the idea. Thomas Jefferson, who already thought Hamilton was an ass, called the tax ?infernal.? Other people rightly pointed out that the country had only recently finished a bloody war to extricate itself from the claws of a government that had oppressively taxed its people without their consent. Pennsylvania assemblyman Albert Gallatin lambasted the proposal, saying it would put an undue burden on farmers in his state, where, incidentally, an estimated 25 percent of all American stills were located.
Despite these voices of reason and outrage, the tax bill wafted through Congress as easily as a leaf on a warm summer breeze. At the beginning, the levy was set at seven-and-a-half cents per gallon, but was quickly increased, first to nine cents, then to 11 cents. Then, to make matters worse, an additional yearly charge was leveled at farmers; sixty cents for each gallon to the full capacity of his still. It didn?t matter if the farmer distilled only five gallons of whiskey from a ten-gallon-capacity still. He was taxed for all ten gallons.
Needless to say, the nation?s farmers (who were also the nation?s whiskey distillers) were outraged, and none more so than the Pennsylvanians. The Pennsylvanians went berserk.
With assistance from assemblyman Gallatin, an association of Pennsylvanian farmers wrote to Congress, protesting the ridiculous law:
[The law] appears unequal in its operation and immoral in its effects. Unequal in its operation, as a duty laid on the common drink of a nation, instead of taxing the citizens in proportion to their property, falls as heavy on the poorest class as on the rich; immoral in its effects, because the amount of duty resting on the oath of the payer, offers, at the expense of the honest part of the community, a premium to perjury fraud.
One aspect of the law that particularly annoyed the protestors was that it allowed tax collectors to ?snoop in barns, closets and cellars looking for hidden untaxed spirits.? The potential was high for abuse by authorities in their zeal to enforce the law. Plus, to allow such intrusions upon a free person?s private land would be the same as inviting the hated British back to run things.
Congress listened patiently to the complaints from Pennsylvania, smiled benignly, and totally ignored them. The whiskey tax became law.
Enforcing it became a whole other kettle of ale.
Federal tax collectors descended upon Pennsylvania like a cloud of bugs. Right from the outset, though, local farmers let it be known in no uncertain terms that the tax men were not welcome, and if they chose to show up anyway they could count on repercussions. The farmers meant it, too. Tax men were routinely harassed. Angry whiskeymen attacked them with pitchforks or lured them down lonely roads, where they were waylaid and beaten bloody. If the revenue collectors remained tenacious, midnight raiders would learn where they lived and burn down their houses. But by far the most popular way of dealing with unwelcome tax officials was to capture them and spend a few free-wheeling hours having them tarred and feathered. Oppressed farmers kept a ready supply of both ingredients, and many revenuers stumbled home looking more like poultry than men, and in a great deal of pain?ridding one?s self of a coating of tar and feathers was both excruciating and time-consuming. When finally cleansed of their new plumage, victims looked as if they had been vigorously boiled. These and numerous other tactics were used against the odious tax collectors.
Back in Virginia, Alexander Hamilton was livid. He issued decrees in which he demanded that the farmers obey the law, cease terrorizing government inspectors, and pony up the money they owed without further complaint. The farmers listened and then, not to put too fine a point on it, told Hamilton and his congressional cronies to go pound sand. To illustrate their resolve, Pennsylvania whiskey makers formed themselves into an army, some six thousand strong. They sent word to Hamilton that they would sooner secede from the Union than pay the hated tax.
President George Washington now found himself in a truly rotten position. He wanted to uphold the law, no matter how stupid he might have found it, but he was horrified at the prospect of dispatching American soldiers to battle American citizens. Eventually, in 1794, his envoys arrived at a compromise with the Pennsylvania distillers. The tax would be reduced to a tolerable level and, in return, Washington?s army would depart. Additionally, anyone who had been arrested for violating the law would receive a presidential pardon and be allowed to return home.
Most distillers began paying the tax, but remained angry. Some refused outright. The tax was unfair and oppressive, facts that remained unchanged regardless of George Washington?s involvement. Those who refused to pay, as well as their children and grandchildren, invented methods of dodging the tax that would remain useful right up until today. They were America?s original moonshiners. Today, in dry counties all over the south and west, right-thinking whiskeymen continue to dodge the revenue man.
Our country almost had a civil war over whiskey. It?s a worst-case scenario, but indicative of what you can expect when you awaken the drunken giant.?
?Richard English
(Note: the Author is indebted to the works of Eric Burns, Mark Edward Lender & James Kirby Martin, and Sharon V. Salinger.)
http://www.moderndrunkardmagazine.com/issues/06_06/06_06_whiskey_rebellion.html
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November 08, 2006, 9:40 a.m.
Arms-Bearing Can Bear the Defeat
The Second Amendment emerges from the election relatively unscathed.
By Dave Kopel
The Second Amendment has emerged from the biggest Democratic victory since 1974 with relatively little damage. One reason is that in races all over the country, Democrats returned to their Jefferson-Jackson roots by running candidates who trust the people to bear arms.
I do not disagree that the Democratic gains in Congress will, on the whole, be harmful for the economy, and extremely dangerous for the war against Islamofascism.
Nevertheless, the class of pro-gun Democrats who will be joining the House and the Senate includes some who will eventually become party leaders, and who will help move the Democratic party back towards its traditional position of respect for the civil liberties of the American people. A very constructive development, in the long run.
The information below is based on the results as of early Wednesday morning. The ratings cited below are from the National Rifle Association.
Governors: In a year in which Democrats gained a half-dozen governorships, only one pro-gun incumbent governor was defeated. Pro-gun Republican incumbents who repelled anti-gun challenges included Schwarzenegger (Calif.), Carcieri (R.I.), and Douglas (Vt.). After trailing for months, Tim Pawlenty won a very close re-election in Minnesota, while Jim Gibbons survived a last-minute scare in Nevada.
Democrats Janet Napolitano of Arizona and Jennifer Granholm of Michigan were not considered friendly to the Second Amendment when they were elected, but they helped ensure their re-election by generally supporting Second Amendment rights during their first terms. Bill Richardson of New Mexico, Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, Brad Henry of Oklahoma, and Dave Freudenthal of Wyoming won their first terms by promising to protect Second Amendment rights, and they won easy re-election in part because they kept their promises.
In open seats, winners were pro-gun Democrat Culver (Iowa), and pro-gun Republicans Palin (Alaska), Crist (Fla.), and Otter (Idaho). All of the Republicans defeated candidates with weaker records on the Second Amendment.
Second Amendment activists did not achieve their goals of unseating Jim Doyle (Wisconsin) or Ted Kulongoski (Ore.).
In Maryland, incumbent Governor Bob Ehrlich was rhetorically pro-gun, but did very little to help gun owners. He was defeated by the ?F?-rated Martin O?Malley. Next year, the gun-prohibition lobby in Maryland will make a major push to ban self-loading firearms.
The other major Second Amendment loss was in Colorado, where strongly anti-gun Democrat Bill Ritter will replace retiring Governor Bill Owens. In addition, moderately anti-gun George Pataki of New York will be replaced by vehemently anti-gun Democrat Elliot Spitzer.
Retiring anti-gun Republican Governor Bob Taft of Ohio will give way to solidly pro-gun Democrat Ted Strickland. Preliminary results suggest that the Ohio legislature still has a pro-gun majority, so prospects for constructive reform of Ohio laws ? particularly pre-emption of local gun bans ? appear good.
Net gubernatorial results: -1.5.
Gains: Ohio.
Losses: Colorado, Maryland, and half of one in New York.
Senate: With McCaskill taking Talent?s seat, we lose one seat for Second Amendment rights. In Vermont, Bernie Sander (?C-? rating) will take the place of retiring Jim Jeffords (?B? rated in his last election, but performed worse in his final term), so let?s call that a wash. In all other states, incumbents won, or were replaced by candidates who had nearly identical ratings on gun issues.
Net Senate results: -1.
Of the new pro-gun Democrats, Casey does not appear very deep intellectually, but Webb may emerge as an articulate, well-informed spokesman for America?s traditional culture of gun ownership. Jon Tester of Montana has Second Amendment views that are consistent with his state?s.
Assuming that Tester and Webb win, Majority Leader Reid will be one of a half-dozen generally pro-gun Democrats, along with Baucus, Ben Nelson, and Casey. The number of Democratic Senators who will vote against guns under all circumstances appears to be less then 20 (based on the number who voted in favor of allowing federal funds to be spent on gun confiscation during emergencies, even when the confiscation is not authorized by any law).
House: Pro-gun losses were about half the size of Republican losses ? which is another way of saying that many of the Democrats who made the 2006 takeover possible are pro-gun. These include FL 16 (Mahoney), Indiana (Donnelly, Ellsworth, Hill), MN 1 (Walz), NC 11 (Shuler), Ohio (Wilson, Space), PA 4 (Altmire), TX 22 (Lampson), and VT (Welch).
Party control changed in the following races where pro-gun candidates were defeated by gun-control supporters: AZ 5 (Hayworth), CA 11 (Pombo), CO 7 (open), CT 2 (Simmons), IA 1 (open), KS 2 (Ryun), KY 3 (Northrup), NH (Shea, Bass), PA (Weldon, Fitzpatrick, Sherwood), NY 20 (Sweeney), WI 8 (open).
Net House results: -14, which would drop to -15 if Reichert (WA 8) loses his lead.
Several other districts had changes that were only a matter of degree: In NY 24 (open) an ?F? rated Democrat took the seat of retiring ?D+? rated Sherwood Boehlert. In FL 16, Shaw (?C+? rated) was replaced by an ?F? challenger. The Illinois seat of retiring, and inconsistent, Henry Hyde was won by ?A? rated Republican Peter Roskama. Democrat Peter Welch (?A? rated) of Vermont will take over the at-large seat vacated by Socialist Sanders (?C-? rated). The sum of the results in these four races is no net change.
There were, of course, many other tough races where pro-rights activists provided the volunteer work and votes that helped keep seats in pro-gun hands. Among these are AZ 1 (Renzi), CA 4 (Doolittle), CO 4 (Musgrave), CO 5 (open, Lamborn), Florida (Buchanan, Keller, Bilirakis), IN 3 (Souder), MN 6 (Bachmann), NM 1 (Wilson), Ohio (Chabot, Schmidt, Tiberi, Pryce), VA10 (Wolf), and WY (Cubin).
Many Democrats are now saying that 2006 is their 1994. Arguably so. The number of 2006 losses by pro-gun candidates, however, is very small compared to the number of 1994 losses by anti-gun candidates. Democratic victories are no longer synonymous with gun control victories.
? Dave Kopel is research director at the Independence Institute.
National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZjViZDZlMTkwNDBkZDU0ZDE3MGFkYTE0Y2RiYWE4MjU=
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a piece on mindset from Gabe @ WT
Good Morning,
Many have used my writing as an example for mind set development. Thank you. I'll say that it is made up many issues. It is part self-searching, part faith, part physical roughness, and part experience.
A man must come to the self-agreement that he will fight. That although he will seek to avoid UNNECESSARY conflicts, he will not cower and submit when it cannot be avoided. That takes precedence over any legal issues. One problem, particularly from the court-fearing police is that we develop an attitude of "do-nothing so you won't get arrested and sued".
I'd rather be arrested and sued than watch my wife abused, or my children beaten. I once investigated a case of a man who ran from an axe wierlding thug, leaving his wife and children behind for him to hack up. There are times when even death is preferable.....a death with honor over a life as a coward.
For a sound warrior mind set, one must accept his own death. Its easy for a young tough guy to claim he's not afraid to die until he has his death set in front of him. It is essential to understand that we do not grasp for death like the kamikaze, but rather we accept the possibility of it, take up that cross when we must and move on. A warrior may not wish to die, but he cannot fear it either.
A man must be tough. Do you stop lifting when you feel a little resistance? Do you stop running when you break a sweat? Are you a sissified american? If so, CHANGE. All of history's warriors - from Joshua to Jesus were men of physical strength. They could live and fight through hunger, cold, thirst, pain, and harrowing odds. BE TOUGH!! You need not become an olympic powerlifter or a Jackie Chan, but some physical ruggedness is essential. Develop it.
A man must also understand about killing. Oh this is the stuff that all gun writers avoid. I embrace it in my Truth In Training concept. Picture this - a man is standing in front of you. He's an evil man and looks the part. He is tough, and coming to rape your wife, kill your children, and after he's done with them, he's coming for you. What do you need to do with him?
Spray him with OC?
Flash a 3" Delica and snipe his hands?
Draw your gun and warn him?
No grasshopper. Such a man needs to be killed. That is the only thing that will stop him. If you are not comfortable with that eventuality, then everything you've trained is a lie. There are ways to become comfortable in this realm. If you are not certain about your soft heart, the way to develop some inner strength here is to hunt large animals. Unpopular perhaps in some circles. You know what you need. If those around you take exception, surround yourself with others. Life is too short to surround yourself with sissified men or domaneering women who disagree with your views of life.
Experience is important too. I've been in lots of fights (lethal and otherwise). I think I know when its time to back off, and when its time to attack. I'm comfortable with killing when its necessary, and with the possibility of dying. This is based on life experience. It cannot be duplicated in totality without lots of blood, and some tears. I can be duplicated to a degree by training with the right people in the right things.
SUch a topic can fill pages....and it does. Perhaps this thread will become one of those keepers. Feel free to add to it brothers.
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Concealed weapons a threat - to ignorance
By Steve Chapman
November 29, 2006
CHICAGO -- Lots of kids, when very young, worry about monsters under the bed. Even when Mom or Dad comes in to reassure them, the kids may still worry. But as they get older, they begin to check under the bed themselves. And eventually, after many monster-free nights, they figure out that the danger is purely imaginary and they stop worrying.
You would think by now that gun-control supporters would have made the same progress on one of their most fearsome demons: the licensing of citizens to carry concealed firearms. But they seem to be trapped in a recurring nightmare that exists only in their minds.
So imagine their alarm at a bill recently introduced in Congress that would allow people with concealed-carry permits to take weapons into their home state national parks. The indefatigably anti-gun New York Times warned that the measure is a step toward "nationalizing the armed paranoia that the National Rifle Association and its cohorts stand for" and "can only endanger the public."
Such fears may have been plausible once upon a time - when Americans were generally not allowed to carry firearms. But since 1987, when Florida decided to let law-abiding citizens get concealed-carry permits, that has changed. Today, about 40 states have such "shall-issue" laws. They've become the norm, and the fears they inspired have proved unfounded.
As it happens, serious crime has waned in the intervening years. Murders are now at their lowest level since the 1960s. Violent crime has been cut by nearly 60 percent since the peak year of 1994. Gun crimes have plunged as well.
At the outset of this experiment, gun opponents forecast that hot-tempered pistoleros would spray bullets at the slightest provocation. In fact, one of the most conspicuous facts about handgun licensees is their mild temper. It's rare for them to commit crimes, and even rarer for them to use their firearms to commit crimes.
A report by the Texas Department of Public Safety found that in a state with more than 200,000 people licensed to carry guns, only 180 were convicted of crimes in 2001, and most of those didn't involve firearms. Only one licensee was convicted of murder.
This record should not be surprising. As a rule, concealed-carry licenses are off-limits to anyone with a history of crime, substance abuse, drunken driving or serious mental illness, and most states require safety training. In any case, people who are inclined to commit mayhem generally don't seek state licenses to carry guns, any more than they ask permission to break into houses or beat up girlfriends. It's the law-abiding folks who apply for licenses.
Why would these peaceable souls want to take their guns when hiking or camping in a national park? Same reason they might take them other places: a desire to protect themselves. Though federal lands are mostly safe, they sometimes play host to crime. In fact, park rangers are far more likely to be assaulted or killed than FBI agents.
The Times says, "If Americans want to feel safer in their national parks, the proper solution is to increase park funding, which has decayed steadily since the Bush administration took office." Maybe that would help, but we can't put a park ranger at every bend in the trail. And if you run into a thug in the backcountry, you can't expect the police or anyone else to come to the rescue.
For some people - solitary women in particular - having the means of self-defense in the woods can be not only a comfort but a lifesaver.
Judging from a wealth of experience, adopting this new policy would be a non-event with no unwanted repercussions. The only danger it poses is to criminals, who would lose some easy prey, and anti-gun zealots, who would once again be proved wrong.
Steve Chapman is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune. His column appears Mondays and Wednesdays. His e-mail is schapman@tribune.com.
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A debate between the UN and the NRA. Shows just how extreme and uninformed the UN/anti-gun position is.
In four parts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmg_zMuQEDk
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SOURCE: http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pb...=2007703050350
March 5, 2007
A death averted
Passer-by uses gun to halt attack
By Nicklaus Lovelady
nicklaus.lovelady@jackson.gannett.com
As customers watched in horror Sunday afternoon, a man stabbed a woman and attempted to set her on fire in the parking lot of a Jackson store, witnesses said.
The attack was stopped by a passer-by, who held the man at gunpoint until police arrived, witnesses said.
The suspect, Henry Watson, 42, was arrested and is expected to face aggravated assault charges, Jackson Police Department Cmdr. Lee Vance said. Watson's wife, Gracie Watson, 42, was transported to the University of Mississippi Medical center, where she was listed in good condition.
"It wasn't five minutes from when she had left my line when I heard a scream outside," said Theresa Stuckey, a cashier at the Family Dollar at 516 Nakoma Drive in Jackson. "I looked out, and (the attacker) was on top of her stabbing her, and stabbing her and stabbing her.
"She was screaming, 'Help, he's trying to kill me!' She was rolling on the ground, trying to get out of the way, but he kept stabbing her. He stabbed her about 20 times in the neck, back and arms."
As the attack continued, people were yelling at the man to stop and honking their horns, Stuckey said. She said she called 911.
"He was just standing over her hacking away," said Dolly Baker, who had just left the Save-A-Lot store next door when she saw the attack.
Baker said she watched the man pour gasoline on the victim then try to strike a match.
"He was literally trying to kill that lady in broad daylight," she said.
Baker said a passer-by stopped the attack.
"He told the man, 'Stop, or I'm going to shoot. And if you run, I'm going to kill you,' " Baker said.
The man held Watson at bay until police arrived at the scene.
"Right now, all we know is that (Watson) attacked his wife. For what reason, we don't know," Jackson Police Department Sgt. Eric Smith said.
Police said they are looking for the passer-by who stopped the attack and would like to talk to him but don't know who he is or where he went. [NOTE: They have found the rescuer, but didn't release his name. He might have had a "history" with the police, but despite this, he acted.]
The incident occurred about 3:50 p.m.
Smith said he did not know exactly how many times Gracie Watson was stabbed but said it was more than 10 times.
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http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB117384168237936437-lMyQjAxMDE3NzEzNDgxNDQxWj.html
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COMMENTARY
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Second Amendment Showdown
By TED CRUZ
March 14, 2007; Page A14
Last week's decision, striking down the District of Columbia's ban on guns as unconstitutional under the Second Amendment, flowed directly from the text, history and original understanding of the Constitution. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit's decision rejected the Ninth Circuit's "collective rights" theory and embraced instead the Fifth Circuit's holding that the Second Amendment protects individual rights. In so doing, the D.C. Circuit took a major step forward in protecting the rights of gun owners throughout the country.
In some ways, the decision should not be at all noteworthy or surprising. After all, the text of the Second Amendment explicitly protects "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms," and the D.C. gun ban amounted to a complete and total prohibition on citizens owning operational firearms in the District of Columbia. The challenged city ordinances prohibit the private possession of all handguns and also require that all long guns (i.e., rifles and shotguns) be disassembled or have trigger locks in place at all times. This latter requirement has no exceptions -- so that even if a violent crime is underway in your home, removing the trigger lock in self-defense or in defense of your family constitutes a crime.
No state in the union has a prohibition as draconian. Indeed, the constitutions of 44 states, like the federal Constitution, explicitly protect the individual right to keep and bear arms, and the legislatures of all 50 states are united in their rejection of bans on private handgun ownership. Forty-five states go even further, allowing private citizens to carry concealed handguns for self-defense.
So how is it that the District of Columbia could be so out of step with the rest of the nation and nonetheless arguably comply with the requirements of the Second Amendment? The answer that the federal district court seized upon -- like an earlier ruling from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in California -- is a theory popularized recently by several law professors and gun-control advocates: Because the Second Amendment refers to "a well regulated Militia," the Constitution protects only the "collective right" of the militia and not the individual right of any citizen.
This creative theory, useful for advancing the policy goals of its advocates, runs contrary to the text of the Constitution, to the debates and original understanding of the Framers, to Supreme Court precedent, and to the widespread understanding of state courts and legislatures for the first 150 years of our nation's history. At the time of the founding, the "militia" was understood to consist of all able-bodied males armed with their own weapons; indeed, the Militia Act of 1792 not only permitted individual gun ownership, it required every man to "provide himself with a good musket or firelock . . . or with a good rifle."
If the "collective rights" theory were to prevail, the result would be that no individual in the U.S. could ever claim any right under the Second Amendment, but rather that inchoate right would exist only collectively and amorphously for state militias. Such an outcome effectively reads out of the Constitution what respected law professor Sanford Levinson famously described as, from the perspective of anti-gun advocates, that "embarrassing Second Amendment."
Because the "collective rights" theory is unfaithful to the Constitution and undermines the individual rights of all Americans, Texas took the lead among the states in supporting the plaintiffs in the D.C. gun suit. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott assembled a collation of 13 states (Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Utah and Wyoming) who together supported the Second Amendment, and the amici states presented oral argument in the D.C. Circuit in the companion case to this one defending the individual right to keep and bear arms.
Notably, every state, including Texas, believes that some regulations on firearms are both permissible and advisable; for example, the states are united in supporting restrictions on violent felons owning guns. But all of the amici states are likewise united in the belief that the Second Amendment means what it says, that the individual right to keep and bear arms cannot be completely abrogated as under the D.C. gun ban.
The District of Columbia has pledged to appeal, and this case could well find its way before the U.S. Supreme Court. If so, Texas and the rest of the amici states stand ready once again to support the Second Amendment, and we are confident that the Court will in turn faithfully uphold the individual constitutional rights of all Americans.
Mr. Cruz is the solicitor general of Texas. He authored two briefs and presented oral argument for the amici states supporting the Second Amendment in the D.C. Circuit.
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http://www.nbc10.com/news/11212222/detail.html
NBC10.com
Diner Owner Tells All After Killing Would-Be Robber
POSTED: 10:41 am EST March 9, 2007
A Philadelphia diner owner told all after he shot and killed a would-be robber and wounded another one on Thursday afternoon.
Jason Lee, 45, owner of Sunrise Breakfast in West Oak Lane, said he was not a hero, just a man trying to protect himself and those around him.
On Thursday morning, he shot and killed 20-year-old Cornell Toombs after he and 24-year-old Gary Williams pointed a gun at a diner employee, authorities said. The men demanded cash and threatened to open fire during the attempted robbery, Lee explained.
As the owner's wife stepped to action and started opening the cash drawer because the cashier was shaking too badly to do it, the store owner grabbed his registered gun and prepared himself for the worst.
One of the robbers fired at Lee, but missed. Lee shot Toombs in the head and pumped two bullets into Williams -- one in the face and another in the back, according to police.
Williams was listed in critical but stable condition on Friday morning, authorities said.
This wasn't the first time Lee was targeted. He was robbed twice in two others stores he owned. One of those times, he shot and killed a robber.
After shots were fired in his store on Thursday, a nearby witness grabbed his daughter's cell phone and captured the aftermath on the device's video recorder.
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Nice, lucid presentation by a qualified LEO on "assault weapons"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ysf8x477c30&mode=related&search=
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Second post of the day:
(Manchester-WTNH) _ A chaotic scene at a Manchester auto parts shop Thursday night. Police say a man tried to thwart a theft by pulling out his gun, but he's now facing charges.
It happened around 7:00 at the Pep Boys on Spencer Street in the K-Mart mall.
Police say it started when someone went into the store to steal a generator.
"Guys have been stealing generators from us off the shelves," Pep boys worker Dave Sciaudone said. "We knew who they were, what their license plate was because they've been hitting all our stores. And my boss saw him grab a generator tonight, walk out the door and throw it into the truck. And he pulled his gun to stop him."
While the manager did have a permit for the gun, he was arrested.
"There's a line you can not cross when you're running through the parking lot chasing after a suspect brandishing a gun," Sgt. Christopher Cross said.
There was no evidence any shots were fired. The gunfire sounds people say they heard was likely backfire from the getaway truck.
"The truck was backfiring like crazy, so if there were shots I didn't hear anything like that. I heard backfiring a lot," Tracey Wilkerson of East Hartford said.
The manager, whose name was not available, may be charged with breech of peace and reckless endangerment.
"Right now my boss is in jail, but he didn't do anything," Sciaudone said.
Police are looking for an older model maroon Chevy truck that they believe was used by the thieves.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1805494/posts
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Words from a man I greatly admired, whose clear thinking and ability to cut through the B.S. will surely be missed.
"The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
?Jeff Cooper 10 May 1920 - 25 September 2006 R.I.P.
Woof, DD
Col. Cooper was a true scholar and philosopher.
"One cannot legislate the maniacs off the street... these maniacs can only be shut down by an armed citizenry. Indeed bad things can happen in nations where the citizenry is armed, but not as bad as those which seem to be threatening our disarmed citizenry in this country at this time." Jeff Cooper
"Pick up a rifle and you change instantly from a subject to a citizen." Jeff Cooper
Liberty cannot be given by a 'benevolent government'....it was must be won FROM a 'benevolent government'. The faith of Europeans in 'benevolent governments' never ceases to amaze me. I suppose if you live as a subject long enough, you don't know the difference between a subject and a citizen.
When talking with people who come from places where the liberties I enjoy don't exist, they talk about how fearful they are of an armed public....precisely because their 'benevolent government' has taught them to be fearful of an armed public. But it is the 'benevolent government' that is fearful of such things. To quote a recent movie 'Governments should fear their people, people should not fear their governments'.
Personal defense has always been a secondary consideration of firearms ownership. Primarily, the guns of armed citizens stand as a warning to all powers, foreign and domestic, that we are not subjects to be ordered around...but citizens to be respected. This nations mission statement, the Declaration of Independence, made it abundantly clear.
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness."
I hear people talk about being happy they don't have to worry about street violence turning in to a shooting in a disarmed society. Those people, however, are usually very tough men who can handle themselves against physical violence. They could care less about the 80 year old man who has no defense against the gang of young toughs who attempt to rob him. Throughout history, bandits and thugs have not needed guns to terrorize the populace....young criminal toughs always have an advantage in such affairs.
The gun, however, is an equalizer. It places everyone on equal footing. A well trained and motivated woman who is armed is MORE than a match against an unarmed rapist. Guns grant the individual true power against thuggery. The answer has always been more guns in the hands of the right people. Outlaw guns in the hands of the thug, place him in prison for possessing a gun, and allow his potential victims to be as armed as they want to be AND to use lethal force against the thug when the thug tries to victimize them. THAT is the answer to violent crime.
Yet, our increasingly socialized 'benevolent governments' want to convince us of two contradictory things at once.....that they have control on violent crime....AND that guns have created a violent society to the point we need to be ban guns. The truth is that the most violent parts of my society are the areas the government has attempted to ban guns from. The most legally armed parts of my society are the safest.
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ABC's "20/20" Seeking "Armed Citizen" Stories
Friday, April 06, 2007
Gun ban groups often claim that private citizens rarely, if ever, use guns
in self-defense. ABC News' "20/20" is now putting that claim to the test,
asking viewers to submit their own real-life "Armed Citizen" stories.
ABC's website asks:
Have you ever defended yourself from a crime in your home, in your business,
or in public by using a gun? Perhaps you warded off a potential attacker by
simply showing a gun?
If you've personally used a gun in a legitimate act of self-protection
against a criminal attacker, we encourage you to tell your story to ABC News.
To tell your story, go to http://www.abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=3015150
and complete the web form.
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Knowing the type of editing and manipulation that most of these news shows use, I wouldn't be surprised if their "unbiased" look at armed citizens turns the tables on its participants...
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Hopefully this is something John Stossel is working on. He's a breath of fresh air in the MSM.
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Stossel/
He recently pointed out that swimming pools in the home are much more dangerous than guns in the home.
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Hopefully this is something John Stossel is working on. He's a breath of fresh air in the MSM.
http://abcnews.go.com/2020/Stossel/
He recently pointed out that swimming pools in the home are much more dangerous than guns in the home.
To children under the age of 10, swimming pools are vastly more dangerous. Approximately 110 children under the age of 10 are killed a year by handguns in the home in the US....each of them a tragedy, but an exceedingly rare tragedy given the nearly 300 million people in the US.
In 1997 alone (the last year for which data are available), 742 children under age 10 drowned in the United States. About 550 of those--about 75 percent of the total--drowned in residential swimming pools. According to the most recent statistics, there are about 6 million residential pools, meaning that one child drowns annually for every 11,000 pools.
About 100 children under 10 died in 1998 as a result of guns. About two-thirds of those deaths were homicides. There are an estimated 200 million guns in the United States. Doing the math, there is roughly one child killed by guns for every 1 million guns. Thus, on average, if you own a gun and have a swimming pool in the yard, the swimming pool is almost 100 times more likely to kill a child than the gun is.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4155/is_20010728/ai_n13920419
Backyard swimming pools are 100 times more dangerous to children under 10 than loaded firearms in the homes.....yet, I haven't seen a push for swimming pool registration, waiting periods, mandatory swimming pool locks, or outright swimming pool bans.
Anti-gun groups recommend that parents ask other parents if they own a gun before letting their children come over to play.....maybe they should be asking if they own a swimming pool.
Hopolophobia strikes again.
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In the aftermath of VT, here's an interesting development:
Dingell, NRA Working on Bill to Strengthen Background Checks
By Jonathan Weisman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 20, 2007; A10
With the Virginia Tech shootings resurrecting calls for tighter gun controls, the National Rifle Association has begun negotiations with senior Democrats over legislation to bolster the national background-check system and potentially block gun purchases by the mentally ill.
Rep. John D. Dingell (Mich.), a gun-rights Democrat who once served on the NRA's board of directors, is leading talks with the powerful gun lobby in hopes of producing a deal by early next week, Democratic aides and lawmakers said.
Under the bill, states would be given money to help them supply the federal government with information on mental-illness adjudications and other run-ins with the law that are supposed to disqualify individuals from firearms purchases. For the first time, states would face penalties for not keeping the National Instant Criminal Background Check System current.
The legislation, drafted several years ago by Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-N.Y.), has twice passed the House, only to die in the Senate. But Cho Seung Hui's rampage Monday has given it new life.
Since 1968, individuals deemed mentally ill by the legal system are not supposed to be able to buy guns. A court's ordering Cho into treatment in late 2005 should have been reported to the federal background check system, congressional aides said. Instead, his background check came up clean, and he legally bought the two handguns used to kill 32 students and teachers before he committed suicide.
"The states are not putting records into the system," McCarthy said yesterday.
The measure could be the first gun control law to pass Congress since enactment of the now-lapsed assault weapons ban 13 years ago. But, McCarthy said, the deaths at Virginia Tech are not enough to propel the bill to passage. That is why the NRA is being brought into the process.
Multiple gun control measures were introduced after the Columbine High School shootings eight years ago, but the NRA helped thwart them all, then helped defeat Vice President Al Gore's 2000 bid for the White House. With that in mind, Democratic leaders are anxious to bring the NRA aboard as they try to respond to this week's shootings.
The gun lobby stayed relatively neutral during past efforts to pass the measure, but this time Dingell is pushing for an endorsement, or even for the NRA to make it a "key vote" for its supporters.
McCarthy, whose husband was killed during a gunman's rampage on the Long Island Rail Road, admits her crusades for far more stringent gun control measures have made her toxic in gun circles.
So Dingell is handling negotiations with the NRA, said an aide participating in those talks. Dingell is also in talks with Sens. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) and Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner (Wis.), the senior Republican on the House Judiciary Committee.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has asked Dingell to broker a deal by Tuesday. But the aide said Dingell and NRA negotiators are skeptical they can reach an accord that quickly.
"We'd rather get a good bill than a quick bill," he said.
But pitfalls remain. The NRA must balance its desire to respond to the worst mass shooting by a lone gunman in the nation's history with its competition with the more strident Gun Owners of America, which opposes any restrictions on gun purchases.
An NRA lobbyist said last night that the group would not comment on the effort.
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I think that's a good idea. Ensure state level psych commitments get into the federal database and pre-empt stupid legislation.
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Nugent: Gun-free zones are recipe for disaster
POSTED: 5:26 p.m. EDT, April 20, 2007
More on CNN TV: Ted Nugent participates in a roundtable discussion on gun control tonight on "Glenn Beck," Headline Prime, 7 p.m. ET.
By Ted Nugent
Special to CNN
Adjust font size:
Editor's note: Rock guitarist Ted Nugent has sold more than 30 million albums. He's also a gun rights activist and serves on the board of directors of the National Rifle Association. His program, "Ted Nugent Spirit of the Wild," can be seen on the Outdoor Channel.
Read an opposing take on gun control from journalist Tom Plate: Let's lay down our right to bear arms
WACO, Texas (CNN) -- Zero tolerance, huh? Gun-free zones, huh? Try this on for size: Columbine gun-free zone, New York City pizza shop gun-free zone, Luby's Cafeteria gun-free zone, Amish school in Pennsylvania gun-free zone and now Virginia Tech gun-free zone.
Anybody see what the evil Brady Campaign and other anti-gun cults have created? I personally have zero tolerance for evil and denial. And America had best wake up real fast that the brain-dead celebration of unarmed helplessness will get you killed every time, and I've about had enough of it.
Nearly a decade ago, a Springfield, Oregon, high schooler, a hunter familiar with firearms, was able to bring an unfolding rampage to an abrupt end when he identified a gunman attempting to reload his .22-caliber rifle, made the tactical decision to make a move and tackled the shooter.
A few years back, an assistant principal at Pearl High School in Mississippi, which was a gun-free zone, retrieved his legally owned Colt .45 from his car and stopped a Columbine wannabe from continuing his massacre at another school after he had killed two and wounded more at Pearl.
At an eighth-grade school dance in Pennsylvania, a boy fatally shot a teacher and wounded two students before the owner of the dance hall brought the killing to a halt with his own gun.
More recently, just a few miles up the road from Virginia Tech, two law school students ran to fetch their legally owned firearm to stop a madman from slaughtering anybody and everybody he pleased. These brave, average, armed citizens neutralized him pronto.
My hero, Dr. Suzanne Gratia Hupp, was not allowed by Texas law to carry her handgun into Luby's Cafeteria that fateful day in 1991, when due to bureaucrat-forced unarmed helplessness she could do nothing to stop satanic George Hennard from killing 23 people and wounding more than 20 others before he shot himself. Hupp was unarmed for no other reason than denial-ridden "feel good" politics.
She has since led the charge for concealed weapon upgrade in Texas, where we can now stop evil. Yet, there are still the mindless puppets of the Brady Campaign and other anti-gun organizations insisting on continuing the gun-free zone insanity by which innocents are forced into unarmed helplessness. Shame on them. Shame on America. Shame on the anti-gunners all.
No one was foolish enough to debate Ryder truck regulations or ammonia nitrate restrictions or a "cult of agriculture fertilizer" following the unabashed evil of Timothy McVeigh's heinous crime against America on that fateful day in Oklahoma City. No one faulted kitchen utensils or other hardware of choice after Jeffrey Dahmer was caught drugging, mutilating, raping, murdering and cannibalizing his victims. Nobody wanted "steak knife control" as they autopsied the dead nurses in Chicago, Illinois, as Richard Speck went on trial for mass murder.
Evil is as evil does, and laws disarming guaranteed victims make evil people very, very happy. Shame on us.
Already spineless gun control advocates are squawking like chickens with their tiny-brained heads chopped off, making political hay over this most recent, devastating Virginia Tech massacre, when in fact it is their own forced gun-free zone policy that enabled the unchallenged methodical murder of 32 people.
Thirty-two people dead on a U.S. college campus pursuing their American Dream, mowed-down over an extended period of time by a lone, non-American gunman in possession of a firearm on campus in defiance of a zero-tolerance gun ban. Feel better yet? Didn't think so.
Who doesn't get this? Who has the audacity to demand unarmed helplessness? Who likes dead good guys?
I'll tell you who. People who tramp on the Second Amendment, that's who. People who refuse to accept the self-evident truth that free people have the God-given right to keep and bear arms, to defend themselves and their loved ones. People who are so desperate in their drive to control others, so mindless in their denial that they pretend access to gas causes arson, Ryder trucks and fertilizer cause terrorism, water causes drowning, forks and spoons cause obesity, dialing 911 will somehow save your life, and that their greedy clamoring to "feel good" is more important than admitting that armed citizens are much better equipped to stop evil than unarmed, helpless ones.
Pray for the families of victims everywhere, America. Study the methodology of evil. It has a profile, a system, a preferred environment where victims cannot fight back. Embrace the facts, demand upgrade and be certain that your children's school has a better plan than Virginia Tech or Columbine. Eliminate the insanity of gun-free zones, which will never, ever be gun-free zones. They will only be good guy gun-free zones, and that is a recipe for disaster written in blood on the altar of denial. I, for one, refuse to genuflect there.
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****And now the spineless coward....I mean anti-gun point of view****
Plate: Let's lay down our right to bear arms
POSTED: 3:31 p.m. EDT, April 20, 2007
By Tom Plate
Special to CNN
Adjust font size:
Editor's note: Tom Plate, former editor of the editorial pages of the Los Angeles Times, is a professor of communication and policy studies at UCLA. He is author of a new book, "Confessions of an American Media Man."
Read an opposing take on gun control from Ted Nugent: Gun-free zones are recipe for disaster
LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- Most days, it is not at all hard to feel proud to be an American. But on days such as this, it is very difficult.
The pain that the parents of the slain students feel hits deep into everyone's hearts. At the University of California, Los Angeles, students are talking about little else. It is not that they feel especially vulnerable because they are students at a major university, as is Virginia Tech, but because they are (to be blunt) citizens of High Noon America.
"High Noon" is a famous film. The 1952 Western told the story of a town marshal (played by the superstar actor Gary Cooper) who is forced to eliminate a gang of killers by himself. They are eventually gunned down.
The use of guns is often the American technique of choice for all kinds of conflict resolution. Our famous Constitution, about which many of us are generally so proud, enshrines -- along with the right to freedom of speech, press, religion and assembly -- the right to own guns. That's an apples and oranges list if there ever was one.
Not all of us are so proud and triumphant about the gun-guarantee clause. The right to free speech, press, religion and assembly and so on seem to be working well, but the gun part, not so much.
Let me explain. Some misguided people will focus on the fact that the 23-year-old student who killed his classmates and others at Virginia Tech was ethnically Korean. This is one of those observations that's 99.99 percent irrelevant. What are we to make of the fact that he is Korean? Ban Ki-moon is also Korean! Our brilliant new United Nations secretary general has not only never fired a gun, it looks like he may have just put together a peace formula for civil war-wracked Sudan -- a formula that escaped his predecessor.
So let's just disregard all the hoopla about the race of the student responsible for the slayings. These students were not killed by a Korean, they were killed by a 9 mm handgun and a .22-caliber handgun.
In the nineties, the Los Angeles Times courageously endorsed an all-but-complete ban on privately owned guns, in an effort to greatly reduce their availability. By the time the series of editorials had concluded, the newspaper had received more angry letters and fiery faxes from the well-armed U.S. gun lobby than on any other issue during my privileged six-year tenure as the newspaper's editorial page editor.
But the paper, by the way, also received more supportive letters than on any other issue about which it editorialized during that era. The common sense of ordinary citizens told them that whatever Americans were and are good for, carrying around guns like costume jewelry was not on our Mature List of Notable Cultural Accomplishments.
"Guns don't kill people," goes the gun lobby's absurd mantra. Far fewer guns in America would logically result in far fewer deaths from people pulling the trigger. The probability of the Virginia Tech gun massacre happening would have been greatly reduced if guns weren't so easily available to ordinary citizens.
Foreigners sometimes believe that celebrities in America are more often the targets of gun violence than the rest of us. Not true. Celebrity shootings just make better news stories, so perhaps they seem common. They're not. All of us are targets because with so many guns swishing around our culture, no one is immune -- not even us non-celebrities.
When the great pop composer and legendary member of the Beatles John Lennon was shot in 1980 in New York, many in the foreign press tabbed it a war on celebrities. Now, some in the media will declare a war on students or some-such. This is all misplaced. The correct target of our concern needs to be guns. America has more than it can possibly handle. How many can our society handle? My opinion is: as close to zero as possible.
Last month, I was robbed at 10 in the evening in the alley behind my home. As I was carrying groceries inside, a man with a gun approached me where my car was parked. The gun he carried featured one of those red-dot laser beams, which he pointed right at my head.
Because I'm anything but a James Bond type, I quickly complied with all of his requests. Perhaps because of my rapid response (it is called surrender), he chose not to shoot me; but he just as easily could have. What was to stop him?
This occurred in Beverly Hills, a low-crime area dotted with upscale boutiques, restaurants and businesses -- a city best known perhaps for its glamour and celebrity sightings.
Oh, and police tell me the armed robber definitely was not Korean. Not that I would have known one way or the other: Basically the only thing I saw or can remember was the gun, with the red dot, pointed right at my head.
A near-death experience does focus the mind. We need to get rid of our guns.
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Some comments on a separate point follow.
==============
82-Year-Old Ex-Beauty Queen Stops Intruder by Shooting Out Tires
Friday , April 20, 2007
A
WAYNESBURG, Ky. —
Miss America 1944 has a talent that likely has never appeared on a beauty pageant stage: She fired a handgun to shoot out a vehicle's tires and stop an intruder.
Venus Ramey, 82, confronted a man on her farm in south-central Kentucky last week after she saw her dog run into a storage building where thieves had previously made off with old farm equipment.
Ramey said the man told her he would leave. "I said, 'Oh, no you won't,' and I shot their tires so they couldn't leave," Ramey said.
She had to balance on her walker as she pulled out a snub-nosed .38-caliber handgun.
"I didn't even think twice. I just went and did it," she said. "If they'd even dared come close to me, they'd be 6 feet under by now."
Ramey then flagged down a passing motorist, who called 911.
Curtis Parrish of Ohio was charged with misdemeanor trespassing, Deputy Dan Gilliam said. The man's hometown wasn't immediately available. Three other people were questioned but were not arrested.
After winning the pageant with her singing, dancing and comedic talents, Ramey sold war bonds and her picture was adorned on a B-17 that made missions over Germany in World War II, according to the Miss America Web site.
Ramey lived in Cincinnati for several years and was instrumental in helping rejuvenate Over-the-Rhine historic buildings. She returned to Kentucky in 1990 to live on her farm.
"I'm trying to live a quiet, peaceful life and stay out of trouble, and all it is, is one thing after another," she said.
=========
Also, in all the hoopla in the wake of VT, one point that I have not seen made and which makes sense to me is the point that our homeland is in danger from Islamo-fascism. Unilateral disarmament is always a bad idea, but particularly so in such a moment.
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This actually the time for the Israelification of America. We need to adopt the ethic that every citizen is a frontline soldier for freedom.
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The "Israelification of America". I like the sound of that.
Here's this from the WSJ:
Guns, Politics and the Law
The Second Amendment may finally get its day in court.
Saturday, April 21, 2007 12:01 a.m. EDT
That the Virginia Tech massacre did not occasion a widespread round of political hand-wringing over gun control is, as one newspaper put it, a silent testimony to how far the gun-control debate has shifted in the past decade and a half.
Yes, the usual suspects have attempted to use the murder spree on campus as evidence of the danger of guns in America. But as unlikely a combination of leaders from Harry Reid to George Bush has been as one in warning we should avoid a "rush to judgment" in the wake of the killings.
That's progress of a sort, even if the Democrats' abandonment of the issue flows more from political calculation than principle. Political calculation, after all, is based on something beyond mere politics. The Democratic Party may have decided that gun control became a political liability in the 1994 and 2000 elections, but that doesn't go far toward explaining why that is so.
First, as we noted earlier this week, what happened in Blacksburg was evidence more than anything of the fact that there are sick and evil people in the world willing to do harm to others for no earthly reason. Pushing much beyond that point is political opportunism.
But over the past decade and a half, evidence of another sort has been accumulating. Violent-crime rates peaked in 1991, according to the Justice Department, and have fallen steeply since. Over the same period, gun-control laws in many states have been relaxed. Correlation does not equal causation, but it does make it difficult to argue that greater legal access to guns drives up levels of violent crime.
Whether concealed-carry laws and the like have held down crime rates remains a hotly debated subject. Certainly, more aggressive and effective policing, especially in big cities, has been a major force in driving down crime. One irony of this is that law-enforcement types have long been a major pro-gun-control force, even though it would seem that how their job is defined and performed has much more to do with crime levels than whether guns are available legally.
When violent-crime rates were rising, as they did steadily from the mid-1960s through the 1980s, it was easy to get political traction with calls to "do something" about gun control. This was true whether legally available guns had anything to do with those crime rates. But with crime rates falling even as legal gun access expanded, the argument has lost much of its plausibility, and so its force.
Which isn't to say no one makes the argument any more. The nearly uniform reaction in Europe to the Virginia Tech shootings has been to pin it on America's gun culture. Related to this is the charge that America is prevented from taking sensible steps to prevent gun violence by the invidious influence of groups such as the National Rifle Association. Quite apart from the fact that this implies American politicians and voters alike are dupes of the "gun lobby," it ignores the evidence, noted above, that violent crime and legal gun access either have nothing to do with one another or are, if anything, inversely correlated.
As this political debate evolves, it appears that the Supreme Court may finally get a case in which to weigh in on the Constitutional question of the right to bear arms. Last month, Judge Laurence Silberman on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of plaintiffs who claimed that their Second Amendment rights were violated by Washington's strict gun-control laws. The Supreme Court has not heard a Second Amendment case in decades, but federal appeals courts have generally taken a very restricted view of citizens' rights under the Second Amendment. The D.C. Circuit's 2-1 decision sets up a direct conflict with other circuits, and could wind up at the Supreme Court.
This could be a defining moment for gun control, as Judge Silberman's ruling unequivocally declares that "the right to keep and bear arms" under the Second Amendment belongs to individuals and not, as some have argued, only to National Guardsmen or members of government-organized "militias." "The phrase 'the right of the people,'" Judge Silberman wrote, ". . . leads us to conclude that the right in question is individual." He added: "The wording . . . also indicates that the right to keep and bear arms was not created by government, but rather preserved by it." In all, the decision is as clear a statement of the right to keep and bear arms as one could want. The mayor of D.C. has requested a rehearing of the case by the full D.C. Circuit. If that is denied, or if the full court sides with Judge Silberman, the next stop would be the Supremes.
A Supreme Court decision on what the Second Amendment means could transform the gun-control debate in this country. For now, the relatively muted political response to the Virginia Tech killings may be taken as a sign that, on this issue at least, our politics have become a little less reactive and a little more rational.
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****And now the spineless coward....I mean anti-gun point of view****
Plate: Let's lay down our right to bear arms
POSTED: 3:31 p.m. EDT, April 20, 2007
By Tom Plate
Special to CNN
Adjust font size:
Editor's note: Tom Plate, former editor of the editorial pages of the Los Angeles Times, is a professor of communication and policy studies at UCLA. He is author of a new book, "Confessions of an American Media Man."
Read an opposing take on gun control from Ted Nugent: Gun-free zones are recipe for disaster
LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- Most days, it is not at all hard to feel proud to be an American. But on days such as this, it is very difficult.
The pain that the parents of the slain students feel hits deep into everyone's hearts. At the University of California, Los Angeles, students are talking about little else. It is not that they feel especially vulnerable because they are students at a major university, as is Virginia Tech, but because they are (to be blunt) citizens of High Noon America.
"High Noon" is a famous film. The 1952 Western told the story of a town marshal (played by the superstar actor Gary Cooper) who is forced to eliminate a gang of killers by himself. They are eventually gunned down.
The use of guns is often the American technique of choice for all kinds of conflict resolution. Our famous Constitution, about which many of us are generally so proud, enshrines -- along with the right to freedom of speech, press, religion and assembly -- the right to own guns. That's an apples and oranges list if there ever was one.
Not all of us are so proud and triumphant about the gun-guarantee clause. The right to free speech, press, religion and assembly and so on seem to be working well, but the gun part, not so much.
Let me explain. Some misguided people will focus on the fact that the 23-year-old student who killed his classmates and others at Virginia Tech was ethnically Korean. This is one of those observations that's 99.99 percent irrelevant. What are we to make of the fact that he is Korean? Ban Ki-moon is also Korean! Our brilliant new United Nations secretary general has not only never fired a gun, it looks like he may have just put together a peace formula for civil war-wracked Sudan -- a formula that escaped his predecessor.
So let's just disregard all the hoopla about the race of the student responsible for the slayings. These students were not killed by a Korean, they were killed by a 9 mm handgun and a .22-caliber handgun.
In the nineties, the Los Angeles Times courageously endorsed an all-but-complete ban on privately owned guns, in an effort to greatly reduce their availability. By the time the series of editorials had concluded, the newspaper had received more angry letters and fiery faxes from the well-armed U.S. gun lobby than on any other issue during my privileged six-year tenure as the newspaper's editorial page editor.
But the paper, by the way, also received more supportive letters than on any other issue about which it editorialized during that era. The common sense of ordinary citizens told them that whatever Americans were and are good for, carrying around guns like costume jewelry was not on our Mature List of Notable Cultural Accomplishments.
"Guns don't kill people," goes the gun lobby's absurd mantra. Far fewer guns in America would logically result in far fewer deaths from people pulling the trigger. The probability of the Virginia Tech gun massacre happening would have been greatly reduced if guns weren't so easily available to ordinary citizens.
Foreigners sometimes believe that celebrities in America are more often the targets of gun violence than the rest of us. Not true. Celebrity shootings just make better news stories, so perhaps they seem common. They're not. All of us are targets because with so many guns swishing around our culture, no one is immune -- not even us non-celebrities.
When the great pop composer and legendary member of the Beatles John Lennon was shot in 1980 in New York, many in the foreign press tabbed it a war on celebrities. Now, some in the media will declare a war on students or some-such. This is all misplaced. The correct target of our concern needs to be guns. America has more than it can possibly handle. How many can our society handle? My opinion is: as close to zero as possible.
Last month, I was robbed at 10 in the evening in the alley behind my home. As I was carrying groceries inside, a man with a gun approached me where my car was parked. The gun he carried featured one of those red-dot laser beams, which he pointed right at my head.
Because I'm anything but a James Bond type, I quickly complied with all of his requests. Perhaps because of my rapid response (it is called surrender), he chose not to shoot me; but he just as easily could have. What was to stop him?
This occurred in Beverly Hills, a low-crime area dotted with upscale boutiques, restaurants and businesses -- a city best known perhaps for its glamour and celebrity sightings.
Oh, and police tell me the armed robber definitely was not Korean. Not that I would have known one way or the other: Basically the only thing I saw or can remember was the gun, with the red dot, pointed right at my head.
A near-death experience does focus the mind. We need to get rid of our guns.
I'm amazed by his attempt to turn cowadice in to virtue...then convince us that we should endorse it as our national motto. Funny how where I live, where most folks own and carry guns legally, we don't get mugged in alleyways. His 'logic' tells him that if he makes guns illegal, there won't be any crime. That tells me his logic is broken, and painted by his irrational fear of inanimate objects.
Freedom of Speech, Press, Religion and the Right to Bear Arms are not apples and oranges issues.......they are apples and the apple tree issue. All of those rights, government itself, springs from the barrell of a loaded gun. In America, we decided those guns should be in the hands of the populace.
This Tom Plate wants to buy himself the illusion of security by selling some Liberty back to the government....assuming, of course, that the benevolent government will keep all his other rights exactly in place. What Tom Plate fails to realize is that the other freedoms he takes for granted, have been protected by the blood and arms of better men than him. Only a society where good men sacrificed, would a base coward like Tom Plate have the liberty to pen such a diatribe against liberty itself. You're welcome, Tom.
Liberty is for the brave. Cowards will always sell liberty to anyone who will promise security and make the trains run on time. Bread and Circus
Keep in mind that Liberty dies in this country when this man's opinion becomes that of the majority.
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The Patriot Post
Founders' Quote Daily
"[W]hereas, to preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole
body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike,
especially when young, how to use them; nor does it follow from
this, that all promiscuously must go into actual service on
every occasion. The mind that aims at a select militia, must be
influenced by a truly anti-republican principle; and when we see
many men disposed to practice upon it, whenever they can prevail,
no wonder true republicans are for carefully guarding against it."
-- Federal Farmer (Antifederalist Letter, No.18, 25 January 1778)
Reference: The Complete Anti-Federalist, Storing,
ed., vol. 2 (342) The Founders Constitution
<http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/docu
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Gun Confiscation after Katrina
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-taU9d26wT4
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I posted this on the Race thread in the SCH forum, but frankly SCH has lower readership than R&P here and the closing line of this piece which I find funny in the extreme I think merits it being posted on this thread as well.
=================================
EEOC Is Moving On; Fast Food and a Dicey Neighborhood Await
By Al Kamen
Friday, April 27, 2007; A21
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is in an uproar over a decision by Chair Naomi C. Earp to move its 500-employee headquarters from fine offices in downtown to a "developing" -- but not quite arrived -- area in desolate Northeast near the old Woodie's warehouse on New York Avenue.
At a hostile meeting yesterday to quell a growing rebellion, Earp told several hundred employees -- and others viewing on closed-circuit television -- that "the determining factor is price" in her decision and that employees "should not overreact to concerns about safety."
The agency has been at 18th and L streets NW since then-Chairman Clarence Thomas blocked Reagan administration efforts in 1989 to ship it to the suburbs. The downtown location also houses the Washington field office, which is where people go to file discrimination complaints.
But the current landlord didn't renew the lease, and Earp said she did not want to "pick a fight with" the General Services Administration over the location. So the employees -- mostly civil rights lawyers -- are out by July 2008.
Some employees surveyed the new neighborhood. They found, according to an e-mail Monday about their field trip, that across from the proposed headquarters there's a seven-acre empty lot with "lots of garbage, empty wine and liquor bottles, broken glass, and condoms ringing the perimeter of the (chain link) fence." The nearest business is a "dilapidated liquor store two blocks away."
There are also warehouses in the area and self-storage buildings and, across from the employee parking lot, another big vacant lot. There are a few small dilapidated buildings and a building under construction, the surveyors reported.
For lunch, instead of Luigi's, the Palm or several excellent Asian bistros near the current headquarters, there'll be only a McDonald's 3 1/2 blocks away and a Wendy's a block beyond that. For a change of pace, there's the upscale Chez Roi, also known as Roy Rogers, just four blocks away.
Some employees are disabled, opponents of the move note, and on dark winter evenings they would be especially vulnerable to criminals. The McDonald's parking lot, next door to the city's largest methadone clinic, was named in 2002 "as being one of the largest open-air drug markets in the region." "It is unclear whether this has improved," the employees said.
Still, the area is clearly changing. And the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives headquarters is nearby, and those employees don't seem to be worried about crime.
"Give me a handgun and a bulletproof vest and an ATF windbreaker, and I wouldn't worry either," an unhappy EEOC official told us.
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Second post of the morning:
========================
Scotland: A Model for the Rest of Us
by Rob Blackstock
After the terrible tragedy at Virginia Tech, it is time that we turned to an older, more civilized country as a role-model. I speak, of course, of Scotland. Scotland has long since evolved beyond such displays of violence as we saw in Blacksburg this past week.
A United Nations report has labeledScotland the most violent country in the developed world, with people three times more likely to be assaulted than in America. England and Wales recorded the second highest number of violent assaults while Northern Ireland recorded the fewest.
The reason why is obvious: on March 13, 1996, a lone gunman entered the Dunblane, Scotland school gym and killed 16 children and their teacher. Within the next year handguns were made illegal in Britain bringing an end to gun violence in that ancient land.
The ban has had no discernible effect on gun crime, which has continued a steady rise dating back more than 25 years and which accounted for some 4,000 injuries in the UK last year [2006]. Immediately after the ban, the number of shootings actually went up and has stayed up, though the homicide rate, which is relatively low, has been almost unaffected. In Scotland, for instance, the rate of about eight killings a year by guns has remained the same despite the Dunblane ban.
Bravo for the Brits! Without guns, people are now safe to walk the streets.
[Dr. Ian] Holland and his colleagues operate on someone in Glasgow an average of every six hours, every day of the year. They try to fix the damage done by knives, razors, bats, fists, kicks and, very occasionally, innocent accidents. More than a thousand patients are sent to maxillofacial surgery every year as a result of violence in Glasgow alone – and the figure is rising. Only a fraction is reported to the police.
When will we Americans realize that the only way to make law-abiding people safe is to take away everyone’s guns?
Early indications, in the west [of Scotland] at least, suggest [crime statistics] will be up again in 2006-07, at least for murder – the easiest violent crime to count. There were 60 murders in Strathclyde between April and December 2006, 19 more than in the last nine months of 2005. Officially, reported attempted murders were up too – to nearly 300.
Without the guns, criminals are no longer able to hurt the innocent. Gang violence will come to an end.
[In Scotland, a] crackdown on the sale of swords has been launched as part of a campaign to tackle knife crime and violence….
The measures are the latest steps from the Scottish Executive to curb the problem of knife crime….
[Justice Minister Cathy] Jamieson said: "Knife-carrying is all too prevalent in some communities, particularly in the west of Scotland, and has cut short and scarred too many young lives.
"In these areas police, doctors and law-abiding citizens have seen the damaging effects of swords, including samurai swords, being wielded on the streets. "It is simply far too easy at present for these weapons to be bought and sold."
Other parts of the plan brought in under the Police, Public Order and Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act doubled the maximum penalty for carrying a knife to four years, gave police the unconditional power to search someone they suspect of carrying a weapon and increased the minimum age for buying a knife from 16 to 18.
[Detective Chief Superintendent] John Carnochan, head of the police's violence reduction unit, hailed the measures as "another major step forward in the fight against knife crime and violence". More than half the murders in Scotland each year are carried out with knives or other sharp weapons.
True, law-abiding people including women and the elderly will no longer have the means to defend themselves from the young, violent criminal once all guns are confiscated, but those people will no longer have a need for self-defense. Without the guns, there will be no violence from which to be protected.
3 per cent of Scots had been victims of assault compared with 1.2 per cent in America and just 0.1 per cent in Japan, 0.2 per cent in Italy and 0.8 per cent in Austria. In England and Wales the figure was 2.8 per cent.
Scotland has shown us all, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that removing guns solves the underlying problem. Today, Scotland is once more a picturesque land where you and your mates can gather for a peaceful pint at the local pub.
Glasses and bottles face being banned from Edinburgh's pubs and clubs under plans to tackle the soaring number of violent attacks fuelled by drink….
The move comes after the number of glass and bottle attacks in the city soared by 40 per cent last year….
A similar ban is about to be rolled out across Glasgow….
So allow me to raise a glass to my ancestral people, the Scots, and to say thank you. Thank you for showing us the result of outlawing guns. Peace, serenity and culture.
The machetes are worst. As heavy as they are sharp, they cleave cheeks and split jaws – mash faces. Victims never look the same again, their twisted smiles revealing the true scale of Scotland's toll of violent crime.
April 27, 2007
Rob Blackstock [send him mail] teaches economics at Louisiana Tech University and is the Senior Economist for American Economic Services.
Copyright © 2007 LewRockwell.com
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http://hotair.com/archives/2007/04/27/gun-grabber-lets-turn-america-into-a-full-blown-police-state-to-get-guns-off-the-streets/
Well, it worked for Hitler and Mao....
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KALAMAZOO (AP) - Two would-be bandits got more than they expected when they tried to rob a Kalamazoo County man early Friday morning.
Deputies say two men approached 32-year Brian Smith as he tried to enter his Oshtemo Township home. One man asked for directions to Kalamazoo Valley Community College, while the other pulled out a revolver.
Smith pulled out his own gun to defend himself. Deputies say Smith fired twice, hitting one man in the hand. Both suspects took off.
The wounded man was arrested a short time later when he sought medical attention. He's in jail. The other suspect remains at large.
http://www.wwmt.com/news/kalamazoo_36023___article.html/smith_say.html
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"Compromise" bill represents the most far-reaching gun ban in
years
Gun Owners of America E-Mail Alert
8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151
Phone: 703-321-8585 / FAX: 703-321-8408
http://www.gunowners.org
Monday, June 18, 2007
The Associated Press got it right last week when it stated that, "The
House Wednesday passed what could become the first major federal gun
control law in over a decade."
It's true. The McCarthy bill that passed will DRAMATICALLY expand
the dragnet that is currently used to disqualify law-abiding gun
buyers. So much so, that hundreds of thousands of honest citizens
who want to buy a gun will one day walk into a gun store and be
shocked when they're told they're a prohibited purchaser, having been
lumped into the same category as murderers and rapists.
This underscores the problems that have existed all along with the
Brady Law. At the time it was passed, some people foolishly thought,
"No big deal. I'm not a bad guy. This law won't affect me."
But what happens when good guys' names get thrown into the bad guys'
list? That is exactly what has happened, and no one should think
that the attempts to expand the gun control noose are going to end
with the McCarthy bill (HR 2640).
Speaking to the CNN audience on June 13, head of the Brady Campaign,
Paul Helmke, stated that, "We're hopeful that now that the NRA has
come around to our point of view in terms of strengthening the Brady
background checks, that now we can take the next step after this bill
passes [to impose additional gun control]."
Get it? The McCarthy bill is just a first step.
The remainder of this alert will explain, in layman's terms, the
problems with what passed on Wednesday. Please understand that GOA's
legal department has spent hours analyzing the McCarthy bill, in
addition to looking at existing federal regulations and BATFE
interpretations. (If you want the lawyerly perspective, then please
go to http://www.gunowners.org/netb.htm for an extensive analysis.)
So what does HR 2640 do? Well, as stated already, this is one of the
most far-reaching gun bans in years. For the first time in history,
this bill takes a giant step towards banning one-fourth of returning
military veterans from ever owning a gun again.
In 2000, President Clinton added between 80,000 - 90,000 names of
military veterans -- who were suffering from Post Traumatic Stress
(PTS) -- into the NICS background check system. These were vets who
were having nightmares; they had the shakes. So Clinton disqualified
them from buying or owning guns.
For seven years, GOA has been arguing that what Clinton did was
illegitimate. But if this McCarthy bill gets enacted into law, a
future Hillary Clinton administration would actually have the law on
her side to ban a quarter of all military veterans (that's the number
of veterans who have Post Traumatic Stress) from owning guns.
Now, the supporters of the McCarthy bill claim that military veterans
-- who have been denied their Second Amendment rights -- could get
their rights restored. But this is a very nebulous promise.
The reason is that Section 101(c)(1)(C) of the bill provides
explicitly that a psychiatrist or psychologist diagnosis is enough to
ban a person for ever owning a gun as long as it's predicated on a
microscopic risk that a person could be a danger to himself or
others. (Please be sure to read the NOTE below for more details on
this.)
How many psychiatrists are going to deny that a veteran suffering
from PTS doesn't possess a MICROSCOPIC RISK that he could be a danger
to himself or others?
And even if they can clear the psychiatrist hurdle, we're still
looking at thousands of dollars for lawyers, court fees, etc. And
then, when veterans have done everything they can possibly do to
clear their name, there is still the Schumer amendment in federal law
which prevents the BATFE from restoring the rights of individuals who
are barred from purchasing firearms. If that amendment is not
repealed, then it doesn't matter if your state stops sending your
name for inclusion in the FBI's NICS system... you are still going to
be a disqualified purchaser when you try to buy a gun.
So get the irony. Senator Schumer is the one who is leading the
charge in the Senate to pass the McCarthy bill, and he is
"generously" offering military veterans the opportunity to clear
their names, even though it's been HIS AMENDMENT that has prevented
honest gun owners from getting their rights back under a similar
procedure created in 1986!
But there's still another irony. Before this bill, it was very
debatable (in legal terms) whether the military vets with PTS should
have been added into the NICS system... and yet many of them were --
even though there was NO statutory authority to do so. Before this
bill, there were provisions in the law to get one's name cleared, and
yet Schumer made it impossible for these military vets to do so.
Now, the McCarthy bill (combined with federal regulations) makes it
unmistakably clear that military vets with Post Traumatic Stress
SHOULD BE ADDED as prohibited persons on the basis of a
"diagnosis."
Are these vets now going to find it any easier to get their names
cleared (when the law says they should be on the list) if they were
finding it difficult to do so before (when the law said they
shouldn't)?
Add to this the Schumer amendment (mentioned above). The McCarthy
bill does nothing to repeal the Schumer amendment, which means that
military veterans with PTS are going to find it impossible to get
their rights restored!
Do you see how Congress is slowly (and quietly) sweeping more and
more innocent people into the same category as murderers and rapists?
First, anti-gun politicians get a toe hold by getting innocuous
sounding language into the federal code. Then they come back years
later to twist those words into the most contorted way possible.
Consider the facts. In 1968, Congress laid out several criteria for
banning Americans from owning guns -- a person can't be a felon, a
drug user, an illegal alien, etc. Well, one of the criteria which
will disqualify you from owning or buying a gun is if you are
"adjudicated as a mental defective." Now, in 1968, that term
referred to a person who was judged not guilty of a crime by reason
of insanity.
Well, that was 1968. By 2000, President Bill Clinton had stretched
that definition to mean a military veteran who has had a lawful
authority (like a shrink) decree that a person has PTS. Can you see
how politicians love to stretch the meaning of words in the law...
especially when it comes to banning guns?
After all, who would have thought when the original Brady law was
passed in 1993, that it would be used to keep people with outstanding
traffic tickets from buying guns; or couples with marriage problems
from buying guns; or military vets with nightmares from buying guns?
(See footnotes below.)
So if you thought the Brady Law would never affect you because you're
a "good guy," then think again. Military vets are in trouble,
and so
are your kids who are battling Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD).
Everything that has been mentioned above regarding military veterans,
could also apply to these kids.
Do you have a child in the IDEA program -- a.k.a., Individuals with
Disability Education Act -- who has been diagnosed with ADD and
thought to be susceptible to playground fights? Guess what? That
child can be banned for life from ever owning a gun as an adult. The
key to understanding this new gun ban expansion centers on a shrink's
determination that a person is a risk to himself or others.
You see, legislators claim they want to specifically prevent a future
Seung-Hui Cho from ever buying a gun and shooting up a school. And
since Cho had been deemed as a potential danger to himself or others,
that has become the new standard for banning guns.
But realize what this does. In the name of stopping an infinitesimal
fraction of potential bad apples from owning firearms, legislators
are expanding the dragnet to sweep ALL KINDS of good guys into a
permanent ban. It also ignores the fact that bad guys get illegal
guns ALL THE TIME, despite the gun laws!
So back to your kid who might have ADD. The BATFE, in an open letter
(dated May 9, 2007), said the diagnosis that a person is a potential
risk doesn't have to be based on the fact that the person poses a
"substantial" risk. It just has to be "ANY" risk.
Just any risk, no matter how slight to the other kids on the
playground, is all that is needed to qualify the kid on Ritalin -- or
a vet suffering PTS, or a husband (going through a divorce) who's
been ordered to go through an anger management program, etc. -- for a
LIFETIME gun ban.
This is the slippery slope that gun control poses. And this is the
reason HR 2640 must be defeated. Even as we debate this bill, the
Frank Lautenbergs in Congress are trying to expand the NICS system
with the names of people who are on a so-called "government watch
list" (S. 1237).
While this "government watch list" supposedly applies to suspected
terrorists, the fact is that government bureaucrats can add ANY gun
owner's name to this list without due process, without any hearing,
or trial by jury, etc. That's where the background check system is
headed... if we don't rise up together and cut off the monster's head
right now.
NOTE: Please realize that a cursory reading of this bill is not
sufficient to grasp the full threat that it poses. To read this bill
properly, you have to not only read it thoroughly, but look at
federal regulations and BATF interpretations as well. For example,
where we cite Section 101(c)(1)(C) above as making it explicitly
clear that the diagnosis from a psychologist or psychiatrist is
enough to ban a person from owning a gun, realize that you have to
look at Section 101, while also going to federal regulations via
Section 3 of the bill.
Section 3(2) of the bill states that every interpretation that the
BATFE has made in respect to mental capacity would become statutory
law. And so what does the federal code say? Well, at 27 CFR 478.11,
it explicitly states that a person can be deemed to be "adjudicated
as a mental defective" by a court or by any "OTHER LAWFUL
AUTHORITY"
(like a shrink), as long as the individual poses a risk to self or
others (or can't manage his own affairs). And in its open letter of
May 9, 2007, BATFE makes it clear that this "danger" doesn't
have to
be "imminent" or "substantial," but can include
"any danger" at all.
How many shrinks are going to say that a veteran suffering from PTS
doesn't pose at least an infinitesimal risk of hurting someone else?
FOOTNOTES:
(1) The Brady law has been used to illegitimately deny firearms to
people who have outstanding traffic tickets (see
http://www.gunowners.org/ne0706.pdf).
(2) Because of the Lautenberg gun ban, couples with marriage problems
or parents who have used corporal punishment to discipline their
children have been prohibited from owning guns for life (see
http://www.gunowners.org/news/nws9806.htm).
(3) Several articles have pointed to the fact that military vets with
PTS have been added to the NICS system (see http://tinyurl.com/ytalxl
or http://tinyurl.com/23cgqn).
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Man bites Dog
Harvard Law Review on guns
http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf
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Subway customer lauded as hero for gunning down robbers in Plantation
By Akilah Johnson, Andrew Tran and Juan C. Ortega
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
June 29, 2007
Some are calling a former U.S. Marine a hero for shooting two men — killing one — during the botched robbery of a sandwich shop in Plantation. But the men's friends and family want to know how he could gun them down and not be charged.
John Lovell had just finished dinner at about 11: 15 p.m. Wednesday when, Plantation police say, two men armed with guns rushed inside a Subway shop and demanded cash. After robbing the store, the men turned to Lovell. They wanted his money, police said.
But like his attackers, Lovell was armed.
The retired military man opened fire, shooting dead Donicio Arrindell, 22, of North Lauderdale, and critically injuring Fredrick Gadson, 21, of Fort Lauderdale.
Lovell, 71, of Plantation, has a valid concealed weapons permit and is not expected to be charged in the shooting, said police spokesman Detective Robert Rettig. Gadson, however, faces multiple felony charges that could include murder, he said. Under Florida law, anyone who commits a felony such as armed robbery resulting in a death can be held accountable for the capital offense.
"He feared for his life," Rettig said of Lovell. "And if he's in fear for his life, then he has a right to defend himself, even if it means severe bodily injury or death."
Florida law gives people the right of "self-defense without the duty to retreat." That means individuals can use deadly force virtually anywhere to prevent death or serious injury.
Lovell could not be reached for comment despite calls and visits to his home.
His attorney, Wesley White, of Yulee, near Jacksonville, said he has known Lovell for 19 years and described him as a "quiet Clint Eastwood-type you don't want to mess with." He is a former Marine who was a member of the helicopter detail that transported Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, White said.
Lovell, a retired Pan-Am and Delta Airline pilot, has held a concealed weapons permit since September 1990. Three months earlier, Plantation police had arrested him for having a loaded .9 mm and three extra clips behind the driver's seat of a Corvette without proper permits for the gun. The Broward State's Attorney's Office declined to file charges in that case.
According to a police statement, Arrindell ordered Lovell to hand over his wallet. He intentionally dropped it on the floor and refused to pick it up, saying he was afraid. That's when Arrindell ordered him into the women's restroom.
"The victim believed he would be executed and when he noticed [Arrindell] distracted ... reached behind his back, removed his loaded .45 caliber handgun from his holster and fired seven rounds," the statement said.
Arrindell was struck twice — once in the head and once in the stomach — and collapsed. Officers found him face down, wearing sunglasses and a bandanna, with a gun near his left hand. Gadson was hit in the chest and ran from the store. Police dogs found him in the hedges of a nearby office building and bank.
Both men were taken to Broward General Medical Center, where Arrindell died and Gadson was in critical condition Thursday.
Sebastian Shakespeare, 23, of Lauderhill, was going to buy a sandwich at the Subway at 1949 N. Pine Island Road when he saw Lovell, gun in hand, standing over Arrindell. A former employee, Shakespeare worked the night shift and often worried about getting robbed.
He said Lovell did a good deed. "A civilian was a hero."
Lovell's neighbor agreed.
"If I was in the same situation ... I hope I could've done the same thing," said Bryan Sklar, 45.
But Gadson's grandmother, Rosa Jones, said: "He ain't no hero. He is a murderer and God will serve justice."
She and her husband, Ivory Jones, pastor of a Fort Lauderdale church, sat on their front porch in Fort Lauderdale on Thursday wondering how a man could shoot two people and not go to jail.
They said their grandson sometimes hung with the wrong crowd but never got into legal trouble. According to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, he has no arrest record. They said Gadson, who never finished high school, got tired of low-wage jobs and was pursuing his GED.
Arrindell, friends said, found himself in a similar situation: no high school diploma and working odd jobs. So he went back to school. He was a man with past troubles, including a 2004 arrest for carrying a concealed weapon, but he was improving his life, they said. He recently bought a car and had a girlfriend.
Kathy East, 54, whose son went to school with Arrindell, said she took him in two years ago when he and his mother had a falling out.
"I'm absolutely stunned," she said Thursday.
Staff Researchers Barbara Hijek and William Lucey contributed to this report.
Copyright © 2007, South Florida Sun-Sentinel
http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/broward/sfl-flbsubway0629nbjun29,0,1772093.story
Best regards,
Argyll
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Fort Worth police praise man who shot at Albertsons robber
FW: Suspect in crime at store left at hospital; 2 others sought in case
12:00 AM CDT on Thursday, July 5, 2007
By MARISSA ALANIS / The Dallas Morning News
malanis@dallasnews.com A Fort Worth man who only wanted to protect his wife stuck in an Albertsons store during a robbery is being hailed for his heroics by police.
The retired man may have shot one of the robbers early Wednesday at the store in the 3500 block of Sycamore School Road.
Three men armed with guns robbed the store shortly after midnight and stole wallets and purses belonging to customers, said Lt. Dean Sullivan, a Fort Worth police spokesman.
The man, whom police didn't identify because he is a witness, saw two of the men walking around nervously before they entered the store. The witness said he called 911 when one of the men pulled out a gun and fired as he walked into the store.
About 20 seconds later, the witness's wife tried to call him from her cellphone inside the store. But he never got to talk to her.
"I just heard her saying, 'There is nothing in my purse,' " he recalled. "And there was a 'pow.' The phone went dead."
The man, who has a concealed handgun license, sprang into action. He walked into the store with his .45-caliber pistol under his shirt.
"I really thought I'd find her in the store shopping and get her out the back door," he said. "That was my intention. ... I had no intention of confronting these armed bandits."
But in the store, one of the robbers pointed the gun at the man. The man then fired twice. The robber ran away, and it's unknown whether he returned fire, Lt. Sullivan said. Outside the store, the retired man fired again.
Lt. Sullivan said Rayshaun Johnson was possibly hit during the robbery. Mr. Johnson, 17, was injured on his backside and foot. He was dropped off in the parking lot of Huguley Memorial Medical Center in Fort Worth.
Lt. Sullivan said Mr. Johnson faces a charge of aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon once he's released from the hospital. Police continue to search for the other two robbers. Descriptions were unavailable.
The man said he does not feel like a hero.
"I don't feel good at all that there is an 18-year-old guy who's been injured and is going to go to some terrible place because it was a horrible mistake that somebody talked him into," he said. "I was worried about my wife. I just wanted to get her out of there."
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Second post of the AM
Proposed OSHA Regulation Threatens
Firearm and Ammunition Industry
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), the government agency charged with assuring the safety and health of America's workers, is proposing a regulatory rule affecting the manufacturing, transportation and storage of small arms ammunition, primers and smokeless propellants.
As written, the proposed rule would force the closure of nearly all ammunition manufacturers and force the cost of small arms ammunition to skyrocket beyond what the market could bear—essentially collapsing our industry. This is not an exaggeration. The cost to comply with the proposed rule for the ammunition industry, including manufacturer, wholesale distributors and retailers, will be massive and easily exceed $100 million. For example, ammunition and smokeless propellant manufacturers would have to shut down and evacuate a factory when a thunderstorm approached and customers would not be allowed within 50 feet of any ammunition (displayed or otherwise stored) without first being searched for matches or lighters.
NSSF and SAAMI have already had a preliminary meeting with OSHA officials to begin the process of explaining to them the major problems this proposed rule presents for all levels of the firearms and ammunition industry. Furthermore, NSSF and SAAMI are each seeking a 60 day extension of the public comment period (currently scheduled to expire July 12).
NSSF is urging all retailers to contact OSHA directly and request a 60-day extension of the public comment period. Retailers should inform OSHA that the proposed rule constitutes a "significant regulatory action" as defined in Executive Order 12866 (1993) Section 3(f)(1) in that it will clearly "adversely affect in a material way" the retail sector of the firearms and ammunition industry, productivity, competition and jobs and that the annual compliance cost for all retailers of ammunition will far exceed $100 million dollars.
Click here for a template letter. If you choose to draft your own letter, the reference line must read as follows:
RE: Docket No. OSHA–2007–0032
Request to Extend Public Comment Period and Request for Hearing on
"Significant Regulatory Action" as Defined in Executive Order 12866
Please fax the letter to: 202-693-1648 (include the docket number and Department of Labor/OSHA on the cover sheet and in the reference section of your letter).
Please e-mail the letter by visiting: http://www.regulations.gov and following the submission instructions.
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Lawyers, Guns and Money
This time, the Supreme Court may have to decide what the Second Amendment means. But how much will really change?
By Elaine McArdle
Michelle Thompson
“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
U.S. Constitution, Amendment II
This time, the Supreme Court may have to decide what the Second Amendment means. But how much will really change?
“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” U.S. Constitution, Amendment II
Earlier this year, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit struck down the District of Columbia’s stringent gun-control regulations, ruling squarely that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to bear arms.
In the cultural and legal battle over gun control, the decision was the proverbial shot heard ’round the world.
The ruling—in Parker v. District of Columbia—marked the first time a gun law has been found unconstitutional based on the Second Amendment, and it set up a direct conflict among the circuits. Nine federal appeals courts around the nation have adopted the view that the amendment guarantees only the collective right of organized state militias to bear arms, not an individual’s right. (A 5th Circuit panel found that individuals have gun rights but upheld the regulation in question, so both sides claim that ruling as a victory.)
In May, when the full D.C. Circuit Court refused to grant a rehearing en banc, the stage seemed set for a showdown in the Supreme Court, which has thus far managed to dodge the question of whether the Second Amendment guarantees an individual’s right to bear arms.
According to HLS Professor Mark Tushnet, author of “Out of Range: Why the Constitution Can’t End the Battle Over Guns” (Oxford University Press, 2007), earlier petitions were cluttered by issues that allowed the Court to decline review or avoid the Second Amendment question. But Parker “is more straightforward,” Tushnet says, and the Court will have a tougher time avoiding the issue.
If Parker is the long-awaited “clean” case, one reason may be that lawyers for the National Rifle Association—who helped steer the legal strategy of the plaintiffs and backed them financially—have learned from earlier defeats, and crafted the case to maximize the chances of Supreme Court review. For one thing, it is a civil case, not a criminal one, and the six plaintiffs, in the words of NRA President Sandra Froman ’74, are “ordinary people whose lives are impacted by not having the right to protect themselves.” They include a woman who lives in a high-crime area and has been threatened by drug dealers, a gay man assaulted because of his sexual orientation and a special police officer for the Federal Judicial Center.
In addition, the laws challenged in Parker are among the most stringent in the nation: Handguns cannot be registered in the district; those registered before a 1976 ban cannot be carried from one room to another without a license; and any firearm in a home must be kept unloaded and either locked or disassembled.
Also important, says Tushnet, is the fact that because Parker emanates from the District of Columbia, where only federal law applies, it doesn’t involve the overlaying question of whether the Second Amendment applies to a state by way of the 14th Amendment—a question that clouded an earlier case involving one city’s complete ban on handgun possession. He adds that a number of states urged the Court not to take that case, and the solicitor general did the same in another one.
Pro-gun activists like Froman are confident that the Court will hear an appeal by the district in Parker, and they say that they couldn’t have gotten this far without help from an unlikely quarter: liberal law professors. In the past 20 years, several prominent legal scholars known for liberal views, including Professor Laurence Tribe ’66, have come to believe that the Second Amendment supports the individual-rights view. In the 2000 edition of his treatise “American Constitutional Law,” Tribe broke from the 1978 and 1988 editions by endorsing that view. Other liberal professors, including Akhil Reed Amar at Yale Law School and Sanford Levinson at the University of Texas at Austin, agree.
“My conclusion came as something of a surprise to me, and an unwelcome surprise,” Tribe said in a recent New York Times interview. “I have always supported as a matter of policy very comprehensive gun control.”
Froman says the fact that Tribe and others reversed their interpretation in recent years has had enormous influence. Indeed, the majority opinion in Parker, written by Judge Laurence H. Silberman ’61, referred specifically to Tribe’s revised conclusion.
The 27 words of the Second Amendment may be the most hotly contested in the Constitution. Gun-control advocates and opponents read its tortured syntax entirely differently. Each side resorts to what Tushnet calls “a simplified version of constitutional analysis” to support its viewpoint, looking solely at the wording of the amendment and what the language meant in 1791 rather than at whether society has changed in the meantime and what judicial precedents offer guidance. In “virtually no other area in constitutional law” is analysis done that way, he says, although he’s not sure why.
“There’s very little guidance on what the actual meaning of the Second Amendment is,” says Froman, a Tucson lawyer who was interviewed by the Bulletin when she returned to HLS in early April to speak on a panel. “The courts have talked a lot about the Second Amendment but have always been nibbling around the periphery. There’s never really been ‘Let’s explain and elaborate on what it means.’”
For Anthony A. Williams ’87, who served as mayor of the District of Columbia from 1999 until earlier this year and vigorously enforced the district’s gun laws during his tenure, the meaning of the amendment is unambiguous, no matter what interpretive theory is used. “Let’s take [Justice Antonin] Scalia’s approach,” he says. “I think the framers’ intent was to see to it that [through] militias, states as sovereign entities had a right to arm themselves. To me, it’s not about individuals—it’s about groups.”
But Froman firmly reaches the opposite conclusion: “A lot of people say that the prefatory clause of the Second Amendment—the words ‘A well regulated militia …’— limits the active clause pertaining to bearing arms. They want to say that means you can only exercise the right to keep and bear arms as part of a militia, meaning as part of the National Guard, forgetting that the National Guard didn’t exist then.”
“Remember,” Froman adds, “the Second Amendment guarantees a right—it does not confer a right. It’s God-given. It’s natural. The right of self-survival is a basic instinct of any organism.” The Constitution “acknowledges that.”
Tushnet believes that if the Court grants certiorari, it will ultimately overturn the decision of the D.C. panel. “My gut feeling is that there are not five votes to say the individual-rights position is correct,” he says. “[Justice Anthony] Kennedy comes from a segment of the Republican Party that is not rabidly pro-gun rights and indeed probably is sympathetic to hunters but not terribly sympathetic to handgun owners. Then the standard liberals will probably say ‘collective rights.’”
But Tribe is less confident of that prediction. Should the case reach the Supreme Court, he told The New York Times, “there’s a really quite decent chance that it will be affirmed.”
If that happens, Tushnet says, it is unlikely to end all gun regulation, because the Court would probably tailor its decision narrowly to reach consensus. The three-judge panel in Parker struck down only D.C.’s tight laws. “Once you recognize [gun ownership] as an individual right, then the work shifts to figuring out what type of regulation is permissible,” he says.
Tushnet says the gun-control debate is an intractable one in which neither side will move, and a constitutional “answer” from the Supreme Court will be something of a nonstarter. Like the arguments over abortion and stem-cell research, he says, the argument over guns is in truth another battle in the culture wars and cannot be solved by constitutional analysis because neither side can be persuaded.
No gun-control strategy with any chance of surviving the political process would have a significant effect on overall gun violence or crime, Tushnet believes. To say so publicly would be the boldest and most honest stand that a major politician or candidate could take, he adds.
The tragic shootings on the campus of Virginia Tech seem to have changed no one’s position: “People responded to it in exactly the way you would expect,” Tushnet says. Supporters of gun control sought stricter laws and better enforcement, and the NRA advocated that teachers and others be armed to protect themselves.
Activists on both sides bear out that observation. Williams believes that the district’s gun laws were having a demonstrable effect on gun-related violence. “When I started as mayor, we had well over 200 homicides a year,” he says. “We brought that down to below 160, so we made serious inroads in reducing violent crime; but still, in many neighborhoods, the situation is horrific.”
Says Froman: “Statistically, the parts of the country with the greatest number of firearms have the lowest rates of violent crime with guns. It’s easy to understand why. Let’s say there were 30 people in this room, and this was a state that allowed people to carry concealed weapons for self-defense, and a criminal walked in. At least half the people in the room would draw down on the criminal. That would be the end of it.”
Froman had nothing to do with guns until, some 25 years ago, someone tried to break into her Los Angeles home. “I was terrified,” she says. “It was a real epiphany for me, for someone who had never been a victim of crime, who never thought I needed to protect myself.” The next day, she walked into a gun shop to purchase a weapon. She has been a staunch gun advocate ever since.
Does Froman ever worry about repercussions, given that she’s at the center of such a heated issue? “I live in a very rural area, at the end of a long driveway,” she says. “People ask me, ‘Don’t you get scared?’ I say, ‘Are you kidding? I have a clear shot all the way to the road.'
http://www.law.harvard.edu/alumni/bulletin/2007/summer/feature_3.php
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Amendment 2 - Right to Bear Arms. Ratified 12/15/1791. Note
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
****If the above is to be interpreted as a collective right of the state and not of the individual, then below is only a collective right as well.****
Amendment 4 - Search and Seizure. Ratified 12/15/1791.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
****So this only matters when the federal gov't is searching a state gov't? **** :wink:
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Buz, GM et al:
The Parker case out of the DC circuit is highly significant and looks like to go to the SCt. Nice point about the same phrase in the 4th GM! I had not seen it made before and will be using it. Thank you!
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Texas State Lawmaker Opposing Deadly Force Bill Shoots Would-Be Thief
Monday , July 09, 2007
HOUSTON —
A state lawmaker who opposed a bill giving Texans stronger right to defend themselves with deadly force pulled a gun and shot a man he says was trying to steal copper wiring from a construction site, police said Monday.
Rep. Borris Miles told police he was fixing a leak on the second floor of the Houston house he's building Sunday night when he heard a noise downstairs and saw two men trying to steal the copper. After Miles confronted the pair, one of the men threw a pocketknife at him, Houston Police spokesman Victor Senties.
Miles, a former law enforcement officer, shot the man in the left leg, police said. The wounded suspect was being treated at a Houston hospital. Police were trying to identify the other suspect.
Charges of aggravated robbery are pending against the wounded suspect, Senties said.
Police said Miles, who is in his freshman term, is licensed to carry a concealed weapon. No charges have been filed against Miles, Senties said.
Miles, a Democrat, voted against a bill that gives Texans stronger legal right to defend themselves with deadly force in their homes, vehicles, and workplaces. The so-called "castle doctrine," passed by the Legislature this year, states that a person has no duty to retreat from an intruder before using deadly force. The law goes into effect Sept. 1.
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"The whole of that Bill [of Rights] is a declaration of the
right of the people at large or considered as individuals...t
establishes some rights of the individual as unalienable and
which consequently, no majority has a right to deprive them of."
-- Albert Gallatin (letter to Alexander Addison, 7 October 1789)
Reference: That Every Man Be Armed: The Evolution
of a Constitutional Right, Halbrook; original MS. in
N.Y. Hist. Soc.-A.G. Papers, 2
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Crafty:
Glad you found Halbrook. About as comprehensive look at the 2nd Amendment as can be found. Dimes to dollars he's being consulted on Parker.
Reason Online has a cartoon up on the subject I found amusing:
http://reason.com/news/show/121979.html
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http://www.usconcealedcarry.com:80/public/903.cfm
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Article published Sep 7, 2007
D.C.'s flawed reasoning
September 7, 2007
By John R. Lott Jr. - In asking the Supreme Court to let the District of Columbia ban handguns, the city has a simple argument: Whatever one thinks of the Second Amendment, banning handguns is a "reasonable regulation" to protect public safety. The problem for the city is that anyone who can look up the crime numbers will see that D.C.'s violent crime rate went up, not down, after the ban.
D.C. notes that criminals like to use handguns to commit crimes. We all want to disarm criminals, but, as long as one recognizes the possibility of self defense, at best the city's claim can only be part of the story. As with all gun-control laws, the question is ultimately whether it is the law-abiding citizens or criminals who are most likely to obey the law. If law-abiding citizens are the ones who turn in their guns and not the criminals, crime rates can go up, not down.
The city's brief focuses only on murder rates in discussing crime in D.C. Yet, in the five years before Washington's ban in 1976, the murder rate fell from 37 to 27 per 100,000. In the five years after it went into effect, the murder rate rose back up to 35. But there is one fact that seems particularly hard to ignore. D.C.'s murder rate fluctuated after 1976 but has only once fallen below what it was in 1976 (that happened years later, in 1985). Does D.C. really want to argue that the gun ban reduced the murder rate?
Similarly for violent crime, from 1977 to 2003, there were only two years when D.C.'s violent crime rate fell below the rate in 1976. These drops and subsequent increases were much larger than any changes in neighboring Maryland and Virginia. For example, D.C.'s murder rate fell 3.5 to 3 times more than in the neighboring states during the five years before the ban and rose back 3.8 times more in the five years after it. D.C.'s murder rate also rose relative to that in other similarly sized cities.
Surely D.C. has had many problems that contribute to crime, but even cities with far better police departments have seen crime soar in the wake of handgun bans. Chicago has banned all handguns since 1982. Indeed, D.C. points to Chicago's ban to support its own ban. But the gun ban didn't work at all when it came to reducing violence. Chicago's murder rate fell from 27 to 22 per 100,000 in the five years before the law and then rose slightly to 23. The change is even more dramatic when compared to five neighboring Illinois counties: Chicago's murder rate fell from being 8.1 times greater than its neighbors in 1977 to 5.5 times in 1982, and then went way up to 12 times greater in 1987.
Taking a page from recent Supreme Court cases, D.C. points to gun bans in other countries as evidence that others think that gun bans are desirable. But the experience in other countries, even island nations that have gone so far as banning guns and where borders are easy to monitor, should give D.C. and its supporters some pause. Not only didn't violent crime and homicide decline as promised, but they actually increased.
D.C.'s brief specifically points to Great Britain's handgun ban in January 1997. But the number of deaths and injuries from gun crime in England and Wales increased 340 percent in the seven years from 1998 to 2005. The rates of serious violent crime, armed robberies, rapes and homicide have also soared.
The Republic of Ireland banned and confiscated all handguns and all center fire rifles in 1972, but murder rates rose fivefold by 1974 and in the 20 years after the ban has averaged 114 percent higher than the pre-ban rate (never falling below at least 31 percent higher).
Jamaica banned all guns in 1974, but murder rates almost doubled from 11.5 per 100,000 in 1973 to 19.5 in 1977, and soared further to 41.7 in 1980.
Evidence is also available for other countries. For example, it is hard to think of a much more draconian police state than the former Soviet Union. Yet despite a ban on guns that dated back to the Communist revolution, its murder rates were high. During the entire decade from 1976 to 1985 the Soviet Union's homicide rate was between 21 and 41 percent higher than that of the United States. By 1989, two years before the collapse of the Soviet Union, it had risen to 48 percent above the U.S. rate.
Even if D.C.'s politicians want to keep arguing for a ban based on public safety, hard facts must eventually matter. If they can't see that gun-control laws have failed to deliver as promised, may be the Supreme Court can point it out for them.
John R. Lott Jr., author of "More Guns, Less Crime" and "Freedomnomics," is a senior research scientist at the University of Maryland.
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"Those who hammer their guns into plows will plow for those who do not."
~ Thomas Jefferson
(This is why Ted Kennedy, Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton wants gun
control so badly! )
FIREARMS REFRESHER COURSE
1. An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject.
2. A gun in the hand is better than a cop on the phone.
3. Colt: The original point and click interface.
4. Gun control is not about guns; it's about control.
5. If guns are outlawed, can we use swords?
6. If guns cause crime, then pencils cause misspelled words.
7. Free men do not ask permission to bear arms.
8. If you don't know your rights, you don't have any.
9. Those who trade liberty for security have neither.
10. The United States Constitution (c)1791. All Rights Reserved.
11. What part of "shall not be infringed" do you not understand?
12. The Second Amendment is in place in case the politicians ignore
the others.
13. 64,999,987 firearms owners killed no one yesterday.
14. Guns only have two enemies; rust and politicians.
15. Know guns, know peace, know safety. No guns, no peace, no
safety.
16. You don't shoot to kill; you shoot to stay alive.
17. 911: Government sponsored Dial-a-Prayer.
18. Assault is a behavior, not a device.
19. Criminals love gun control; it makes their jobs safer.
20. If guns cause crime, then matches cause arson.
21. Only a government that is afraid of its citizens tries to
control them.
22. You have only the rights you are willing to fight for.
23. Enforce the gun control laws we ALREADY have; don't make more.
24. When you remove the people's right to bear arms, you create
slaves.
25. The American Revolution would never have happened with gun
control.
IF YOU AGREE, PASS THIS "REFRESHER" ON TO TEN FREE CITIZENS.
"Calling an illegal alien an "undocumented immigrant" is like calling a
drug dealer an "unlicensed pharmacist."
IF YOU DON'T STAND BEHIND OUR TROOPS, PLEASE, FEEL FREE TO STAND IN
FRONT OF THEM !!!
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HELP CA DEFEAT THE MICROSTAMP BILL - See the EASY CALL Instructions!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Please call the governor's office re: that Microstamp Bill. I just did this!
EASY TO DO - Please give $.10 and 1 minute of your TIME!
And if you are out of state, remember, there are other states looking to impose similar state (and federal) legislation, so feel free to call in and post your opinions too
CALL Gov's Sac number (916-445-2841)
Press 1 - for English
Press 2 - for Voice your opinion on Assembly Bills
Press 1 - for Micro Stamping Bill (AB1471)
Press 2 to OPPOSE the gun control bill.
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Originally Posted by Lott
John R. Lott Jr.: D.C. Handgun Ban
Friday , September 14, 2007
By John R. Lott Jr.
Is banning handguns a "reasonable regulation"? The District of Columbia certainly hopes that the Supreme Court thinks so.
D.C. filed a brief last week asking the U.S. Supreme Court to let it keep its 1976 handgun ban, but how the city argued its case was what was most surprising. Instead of spending a lot of time arguing over what the constitution means, the city largely made a public policy argument. D.C. argues that whatever one thinks about the Second Amendment guaranteeing people a right to own guns, banning handguns should be allowed for public safety reasons.
Claiming that the Second Amendment doesn't protect individual rights might be a tough sell, but the city's public safety argument will be at least as tough. After the ban, D.C.'s murder rate only once fell below what it was in 1976. From 1977 to 2003, there were only two years when D.C.'s violent crime rate fell below the rate in 1976. After the ban, DC’s murder and violent rates rose relative to Maryland and Virginia as well as relative to other cities with more than 500,000 people.
But it is not just D.C. that has experienced increases in murder and violent crime after guns are banned. Chicago also experienced an increase after its ban in 1982. Island nations supposedly present ideal environments for gun control because it is relatively easy for them to control their borders, but countries such as Great Britain, Ireland, and Jamaica have experienced large increases in murder and violent crime after gun bans. For example, after handguns were banned in 1997, the number of deaths and injuries from gun crime in England and Wales increased 340 percent in the seven years from 1998 to 2005.
Passing a gun ban simply doesn't mean that we are going to get guns away from criminals. The real problem is that if it is the law-abiding good citizens who obey these laws and not the criminals, criminals have less to fear and crime can go up.
D.C.’s brief makes a number of other claims:
The ban comes "nowhere close to disarmament of residents. The District's overwhelming interest in reducing death and injury caused by handguns outweighs respondent's asserted need . . . ." The obvious key here is that DC says people can use rifles and shotguns for self-defense. D.C. also adds that they don't believe that the regulations that lock up and require the disassembling of guns does not "prevent the use of a lawful firearm in self-defense."
But locked guns are simply not as readily accessible for defensive gun uses. In the U.S., states that require guns be locked up and unloaded face a 5 percent increase in murder and a 12 percent increase in rapes. Criminals are more likely to attack people in their homes and those attacks are more likely to be successful.
Since potentially armed victims deter criminals, storing a gun locked and unloaded actually encourages increased crime.
— "All too often, handguns in the heat of anger turn domestic violence into murder."
To put it bluntly, criminals are not your typical citizens. Few people should be fearful of those who they are in relationshipswith. Almost 90 percent of adult murders already have a criminal record as an adult. As is well known, young males from their mid-teens to mid-thirties commit more than their share of crime, but even this is categorization can be substantially narrowed. We know that criminals tend to have low IQ’s as well as atypical personalities. For example, delinquents generally tended to be more “assertive, unafraid, aggressive, unconventional, extroverted, and poorly socialized,” while non-delinquents are “self-controlled, concerned about their relations with others, willing to be guided by social standards, and rich in internal feelings like insecurity, helplessness, love (or its lack), and anxiety.” Other evidence indicates that criminals tend to be more impulsive and put relatively little weight on future events. Finally, we cannot ignore the unfortunate fact that crime (particularly violent crime even more so murder) is disproportionately committed against blacks and by blacks.
— "handguns cause accidents, frequently involving children. The smaller the weapon, the more likely a child can use it, and children as young as three years old are strong enough to fire today's handguns."
Accidental gun deaths among children are, fortunately, much rarer than most people believe. With 40 million children in the United States under the age of 10, the Centers for Disease Control indicates that there were just 20 accidental gun deaths in 2003. 56 children under the age of 15. While guns get most of the attention, children are 41 times more likely to die from accidental suffocation, 32 times more likely to accidentally drown and 20 times more likely to die as a result of accidental fires. Looking at all children under 15, there were 56 accidental gun deaths in 2003— still a fraction of the deaths resulting from these other accidents for only the younger children.
Despite the image of children firing these guns and killing themselves or other children, the typical person who accidentally fires a gun is an adult male, usually in his 20s. Accidental shooters overwhelmingly have problems with alcoholism and long criminal histories, particularly arrests for violent acts. They are also disproportionately involved in automobile crashes and are much more likely to have had their driver's licenses suspended or revoked. Even if gun locks could stop children from using guns, gun locks are simply not designed to stop adult males from firing their own guns — even if they were to use the gun locks.
Of course, D.C. makes other claims as well, but the city’s crime problems and the fact that they began after the gun ban are hardly a secret. After the ban, D.C. regularly ranked number one in murder rates for cities over 500,000 people. That wasn’t even close to being true before the ban. The fact that D.C. must argue that the gun ban reduced the murder rate shows how incredibly weak the city's case really is.
*John Lott is the author of the book "Freedomnomics," and is a Senior Research Scientist at the University of Maryland.
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Wisconsin Circuit Court Sides With Gun Owners
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9/24/07 - Today, the 31st Circuit Court of Milwaukee County ruled that the Concealed Carry Weapons (CCW) statute was unconstitutional as applied to a particular defendant -- in this case, a pizza delivery driver who carried a gun for self-defense on the job, after being robbed repeatedly in a high crime area.
Andres Vegas is a pizza delivery driver and has been robbed and mugged while attempting to deliver a pizza on four different occasions. The first time was in March of 2005. The second time was July 14, 2006, when Vegas was attacked and threatened at gunpoint. Vegas, armed with a firearm, exercised his constitutional right of self-defense and shot one of the assailants. Vegas was not charged with the crime of carrying concealed and was ruled as acting in self defense. Not only was his firearm confiscated at the time of arrest, but it was never returned. He was subsequently told by the prosecuting District Attorney that if he were to use a firearm in self-defense again he would be prosecuted.
On September 13, 2006, an unarmed Vegas -- acting under the orders of the District Attorney to avoid prosecution -- was robbed, beaten, and sprayed with pepper spray by three assailants. Consequently Vegas went out and purchased another firearm. On January 4, 2007, Vegas was again attempting to deliver a pizza when two men approached him and pointed a gun in his face. This time, he responded by again exercising his right to self-defense and shot his assailant in the hip. Vegas then secured his assailant' s firearm along with his, placed them both on the roof of his car, dialed 911, and waited for the police to arrive. The DA determined that he acted in self defense, but he was subsequently charged with CCW for the moments before he was assaulted and defended.
Even though this charge was brought forward by the DA's office, the court has ruled in favor of Vegas, saying:
“Defendant Vegas has demonstrated the requisite extraordinary circumstances that warrant his concealed weapon…Vegas legally purchased his firearm for the purpose of security and protection. There is a strong inference that Vegas' concealed firearm has saved his life during these violent assaults…Vegas has a substantial interest in being secure and protecting himself by carrying a concealed weapon.”
“This Court is not convinced that there are any reasonable alternatives that would have secured Vegas' safety. Vegas' concealed weapon has most likely saved his life on several occasions; this the State cannot ignore. The State has conceded that Vegas did not have an unlawful purpose for concealing a weapon. Given the totality of the circumstances, this Court is satisfied that the Defendant has affirmatively answered the two-prong analysis as outlined in Hamdan and Fisher and thus grants the Defendant's motion to dismiss.”
This is a giant step forward in the battle for Right-to-Carry in Wisconsin. This court ruling will likely lead to future citizens exercising their right to self-defense by carrying concealed firearms. Unfortunately this will likely lead to subsequent prosecutions, but this circuit court ruling will become a perfect example of law-abiding citizens' need for concealed firearms for protection against crime, especially in high crime areas such as Milwaukee.
__________________
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I applaud the Wisconsin concealed carry decision but mainly I am struck by the facts - the poor man being mugged so many times. It's puzzling that he stayed in Milwaukee and kept delivering pizzas in a high crime area. What's wrong with this town that they allow crime to run out of control? Looks like a good part of the answer is in the case: they took away the right of citizens to defend themselves.
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Doug & Crafty,
I was also "struck" by how many times this man was attacked. I wonder if he qulifies for the Guiness Book!
Anyway Wikepedia's lastest national standing of concealed weapons by state:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concealed_weapon
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No URL came to me with this.
===========================
Veterans Disarmament Act To Bar Vets From Owning Guns
Larry Pratt | September 23, 2007
Hundreds of thousands of veterans -- from Vietnam through Operation Iraqi Freedom -- are at risk of being banned from buying firearms if legislation that is pending in Congress gets enacted.
How? The Veterans Disarmament Act -- which has already passed the House -- would place any veteran who has ever been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) on the federal gun ban list.
This is exactly what President Bill Clinton did over seven years ago when his administration illegitimately added some 83,000 veterans into the National Criminal Information System (NICS system) -- prohibiting them from purchasing firearms, simply because of afflictions like PTSD.
The proposed ban is actually broader. Anyone who is diagnosed as being a tiny danger to himself or others would have his gun rights taken away ... forever. It is section 102((1)©(iv) in HR 2640 that provides for dumping raw medical records into the system. Those names -- like the 83,000 records mentioned above -- will then, by law, serve as the basis for gun banning.
No wonder the Military Order of the Purple Heart is opposed to this legislation.
The House bill, HR 2640, is being sponsored by one of the most flaming anti-Second Amendment Representatives in Congress: Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY). Another liberal anti-gunner, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), is sponsoring the bill in the Senate.
Proponents of the bill say that helpful amendments have been made so that any veteran who gets his name on the NICS list can seek an expungement.
But whenever you talk about expunging names from the Brady NICS system, you're talking about a procedure that has always been a long shot. Right now, there are NO EXPUNGEMENTS of law-abiding Americans' names that are taking place under federal level. Why? Because the expungement process which already exists has been blocked for over a decade by a "funds cut-off" engineered by another anti-gunner, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY).
So how will this bill make things even worse? Well, two legal terms are radically redefined in the Veterans Disarmament Act to carry out this vicious attack on veterans' gun rights.
One term relates to who is classified a "mental defective." Forty years ago that term meant one was adjudicated "not guilty" in a court of law by reason of insanity. But under the Veterans Disarmament Act, "mental defective" has been stretched to include anyone whom a psychiatrist determines might be a tiny danger to self or others.
The second term is "adjudicate." In the past, one could only lose one's gun rights through an adjudication by a judge, magistrate or court -- meaning conviction after a trial. Adjudication could only occur in a court with all the protections of due process, including the right to face one's accuser. Now, adjudication in HR 2640 would include a finding by "a court, commission, committee or other authorized person" (namely, a psychiatrist).
Forget the fact that people with PTSD have the same violent crime rate as the rest of us. Vietnam vets with PTSD have had careers and obtained permits to carry firearms concealed. It will now be enough for a psychiatric diagnosis (a "determination" in the language of the bill) to get a veteran barred ­for life ­ from owning guns.
Think of what this bill would do to veterans. If a robber grabs your wallet and takes everything in it, but gives you back $5 to take the bus home, would you call that a financial enhancement? If not, then we should not let HR 2640 supporters call the permission to seek an expungement an enhancement, when prior to this bill, veterans could not legitimately be denied their gun rights after being diagnosed with PTSD.
Veterans with PTSD should not be put in a position to seek an expungement. They have not been convicted (after a trial with due process) of doing anything wrong. If a veteran is thought to be a threat to self or others, there should be a real trial, not an opinion (called a diagnosis) by a psychiatrist.
If members of Congress do not hear from soldiers (active duty and retired) in large numbers, along with the rest of the public, the Veterans Disarmament Act -- misleadingly titled by Rep. McCarthy as the NICS Improvement Amendments Act -- will send this message to veterans: "No good deed goes unpunished."
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Second post of the morning:
The D.C. Gun Ban: Supreme Court Preview
by Robert A. Levy
Robert A. Levy is senior fellow in constitutional studies at the Cato Institute, and co-counsel to the plaintiffs in Parker v. District of Columbia.
On September 4, the District of Columbia government asked the Supreme Court to reverse a federal appellate decision in Parker v. District of Columbia, 478 F.3d 370 (D.C. Cir. 2007), which upheld a Second Amendment challenge to D.C.'s ban on all functional firearms. The six D.C. residents who brought the lawsuit — although they won in the lower court — agree with the city that the Supreme Court should revisit the Second Amendment for the first time since 1939. A four-square pronouncement from the High Court is long overdue. The entire nation, not just Washington, D.C., needs to know how courts will interpret "the right of the people to keep and bear arms." Sometime before yearend, the justices will decide whether to review the case. If the Supreme Court chooses to intervene, a final decision will probably be issued by June 30, 2008.
D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and attorney general Linda Singer, in their petition to the Supreme Court and in a Washington Post op-ed ("Fighting for Our Handgun Ban," September 4), raise four arguments in support of the city's ban. Their first argument is that the Second Amendment ensures only that members of state militias are properly armed, not that private citizens can have guns for self-defense and other personal uses. That contentious question has been debated at length on these pages. See Dennis Henigan, "The Mythic Second," March 26, 2007; and Robert A. Levy, "Thanks to the Second Amendment," April 16, 2007.
The city's remaining three arguments — two legal claims and one policy claim — have received comparatively less attention. First, declares the mayor, even if the Second Amendment protects private ownership of firearms for non-militia purposes, a ban on all handguns is reasonable because D.C. allows possession of rifles and shotguns in the home. Second, the Amendment restricts the actions of the federal government, but not the states, and D.C. should be treated the same as a state for Second Amendment purposes. And third, "handgun bans work"; the streets of the Nation's Capital are safer as a result. Let's consider each argument in turn.
It's okay to ban handguns as long as rifles and shotguns are permitted.
The D.C. Circuit, for good reason, called that argument "frivolous." "It could be similarly contended," wrote Senior Judge Laurence Silberman, "that all firearms may be banned so long as sabers were permitted." After all, D.C. does not ban home possession of knives or hatchets. Does that justify the city's handgun ban? Could publication of cookbooks be barred under the First Amendment as long as restaurant guides were allowed?
Moreover, the D.C. Code bans not just handguns, but all functioning firearms. Rifles and shotguns in the home must be unloaded and either disassembled or bound by a trigger lock. That's why one of the Parker plaintiffs, who owns a shotgun, had to sue in order to render the weapon usable in an emergency.
Not to worry, says the mayor. "The District does not … construe this provision [regarding rifles and shotguns] to prevent the use of a lawful firearm in self-defense." That assurance might be heartening were it not disingenuous. Once a rifle or shotgun is loaded, it is no longer a "lawful firearm." Accordingly, D.C.'s pledge, limited to lawful weapons, is an empty one. A gun must be operative before it can be used in self-defense. Any owner who waits to load and assemble a gun until it's needed for self-defense has waited too long. If the mayor means what he says, he should have no problem repealing the city's ban on home possession of functional rifles and shotguns, as the Parker plaintiffs have demanded.
D.C. is like a state, and the Second Amendment doesn't apply to states.
The District relies on an 1886 case, Presser v. Illinois, for the proposition that the Second Amendment applies only to the federal government, not to the states. Admittedly, D.C. is not a state. But, says the mayor, the city should be treated the same as a state when courts review its gun control regulations. Therefore, so the argument goes, the city is immune from a Second Amendment challenge.
That argument fails on two counts. First, none of the amendments in the Bill of Rights originally applied to the states. Beginning in 1897, however, 11 years after Presser, the Supreme Court decided that the post-Civil War enactment of the 14th Amendment was intended to "incorporate" most of the Bill of Rights in order to hold state governments accountable for violations. To be sure, the Court never formally ruled that the Second Amendment was incorporated, but even ultra-liberal Ninth Circuit judge Stephen Reinhardt has conceded that "Presser rest on a principle that is now thoroughly discredited."
Second, even if states are exempt from the Second Amendment, the Constitution expressly grants to Congress, not a state, plenary legislative power over all matters whatsoever in the Nation's Capital. Because the Second Amendment indisputably applies to the federal government, it therefore applies to the District, a federal enclave. D.C.'s assertion that its city council, a creature of Congress, should enjoy an exemption from the Second Amendment that binds Congress itself, is quite simply bizarre. If it were true, then the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial in civil cases — which also hasn't been incorporated — would not apply to D.C. But the courts have held otherwise. See, e.g., Pernell v. Southall Realty (U.S. 1974).
The city responds that the Second Amendment is different because, unlike the Seventh, the Second is a limitation on federal power over the states. In effect, that's the collectivist or states' rights view of the Second Amendment. Thus, the District's claim of exemption merges with, and depends on, its collectivist interpretation of the Second Amendment. If D.C. is wrong about the Second Amendment, then its "no-incorporation" argument collapses as well.
"Handgun bans work"; they've "saved countless lives."
Before the District banned handguns in 1976, the murder rate had been declining. But soon afterward, the rate climbed to the highest of all large U.S. cities. It also rose relative to nearby Maryland and Virginia as well as relative to other cities with more than 500,000 people. During the 31-year life of the ban, with the exception of a few years during which the city's murder rate ranked second or third, there have been more killings per capita in Washington, D.C. than in any other major city.
In 12 of the years between 1980 and 1997, including all nine years from 1989 through 1997, the violent crime rate in D.C. exceeded 2,000 per 100,000, reaching a high of 2,922 in 1993, versus 1,481 in 1976 — a 97 percent increase in violent crime, 17 years after citizens were forbidden from defending themselves with firearms. Moreover, the murder rate climbed as high as 81 per 100,000 inhabitants in 1991 — triple the pre-ban levels. As of 2005, the last year for which I have data, the murder rate is still 32 percent above the 1976 level.
Two non-partisan, respected federal government agencies recently examined gun controls and found no statistically significant evidence to support their effectiveness. In 2004, the National Academy of Sciences reviewed 253 journal articles, 99 books, and 43 government publications evaluating 80 gun-control measures. The researchers could not identify a single gun-control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide, or accidents. A year earlier, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on an independent evaluation of firearms and ammunition bans, restrictions on acquisition, waiting periods, registration, licensing, child access prevention laws, and zero tolerance laws. Conclusion: none of the laws had a meaningful impact on gun violence.
Based on those statistics, there's a compelling argument that Americans deserve an opportunity to defend themselves by possessing suitable firearms. But even if the data were to cut the other way — even if it could be demonstrated (which it emphatically cannot) that more gun laws lead to less crime — gun laws are not just about public policy. They're about the meaning of the Constitution. Hopefully, the U.S. Supreme Court, at long last, will answer this vital question: Does the right to keep and bear arms belong to us as individuals, or does the Constitution merely recognize the collective right of states to arm the members of their militias?
This article appeared in Legal Times on September 24, 2007.
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By KIMBERLY DURNAN and STEVE THOMPSON / The Dallas Morning News
Dennis Baker's home security system includes three cameras that feed video to 42-inch screens in his living room and bedroom. But it was his pet parrot, he says, that alerted him to a burglar he shot and killed early Tuesday.
Also Online
Video: Homeowner Dennis Baker, accompanied by his parrots, talks about shooting the intruder
"Hello, hello," the parrot said, waking Mr. Baker from what he says was a deep sleep.
The 59-year-old locksmith keeps several pet birds in his northwest Dallas home, including a Mexican Red-headed parrot named Salvador. The bird says "hello" whenever he sees someone. When someone passed by a window about 2 a.m., Salvador squawked the greeting.
"It woke me up," Mr. Baker said. "I guess you could call him a stool pigeon."
Police say it appears that Mr. Baker was within his rights to shoot the burglar, but as is routine in such cases, they will turn the facts to a grand jury for review.
Mr. Baker killed 46-year-old John Woodson, whose criminal record includes charges of burglary, theft and possession of a controlled substance.
Tuesday's burglary, police say, was the fourth on Mr. Baker's property within a month. Investigators say preliminary information indicates Mr. Woodson may have been responsible for some or all of them.
Mr. Baker puts the number at five.
"I got hit five times this month. I have tools in my garage, my house and my van," Mr. Baker said. "They were coming here like they owned the place. I hate what happened, but somebody has to do what's necessary."
Mr. Baker runs a locksmith shop at the home in the 3600 block of Cortez Drive. A large safe sits on the porch. The door of the detached garage is off its hinges. He plans to fix the doors soon but has to replace some of the wood first.
Mr. Baker said he installed a video surveillance system after burglars targeted his home repeatedly. Thieves have taken $20,000 worth of locksmith equipment, saws and lawn gear, he said.
After the parrot woke him, Mr. Baker said, he got up and walked to the garage.
North of Love Field
"He was in the very back of the garage," Mr. Baker said of Mr. Woodson. "There were no lights on. The only thing I could do was see a silhouette, and as you saw in the video, he had his hands in his pockets when he came through here. I had no idea what he had."
The security video shows a man – presumably Mr. Woodson – with his hands in his pant pockets, casually walking around the perimeter of the garage and then inside.
Neither police nor Mr. Baker would give a detailed account of the confrontation that followed, and the cameras don't capture it. But police said Mr. Woodson didn't try to flee and that Mr. Baker shot him in his midsection.
The case is one of several in recent weeks in which a home or business owner has shot an intruder.
A West Dallas business owner fatally shot a suspected burglar on Sunday, the second time in three weeks that he has killed a prowler, police say.
Last week, the owner of Joe's Cleaners in Far East Dallas shot a man who tried to rob him at gunpoint.
Last month, a Mesquite business owner shot and wounded a suspected burglar after finding him with bolt cutters and copper cable taken from the building.
Musician Carter Albrecht was shot to death Sept. 3 after he tried to kick in a neighbor's back door during a drunken rage. The neighbor reportedly thought Mr. Albrecht was a burglar and fired a pistol high through the door as a warning, but struck 6-foot-4 Mr. Albrecht in the head.
Earlier this year, Texas lawmakers approved the Castle Law, which removes any obligation for a crime victim to retreat before responding with deadly force when faced with an intruder in his or her home, vehicle or business.
Despite the new law and the recent series of intruder shootings, Dallas police homicide Sgt. Larry Lewis said he would not describe them as a growing trend.
"We get them over the year from time to time," Sgt. Lewis said.
When police officers arrived at his home after the shooting, Mr. Baker said, Salvador began greeting them with his signature "hello."
"Sometimes he says 'hi,' but you can't get him to speak on cue," Mr. Baker said. "He has a mind of his own."
Mr. Baker said police officers are doing their jobs, but are overworked and understaffed. Dallas police recorded more than 14,400 residential burglaries last year.
"I will protect my property and my life," Mr. Baker said. "The fifth time is enough. It's not something you want to do, but you have to do."
kdurnan@dallasnews.com; stevethompson@dallasnews.com
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http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,303417,00.html
Gun Safety
A student at Hamline University in Minnesota has been suspended and ordered to undergo a mental health evaluation for advocating the carrying of legal concealed weapons on campus.
TownHall.com reports Troy Scheffler made the case in an e-mail to a school official that licensed gun owners could stop or prevent the kind of violence that struck Virginia Tech earlier this year. He pointed out that research has indicated the possibility of armed resistance discourages potential criminals. And he noted that many Virginia Tech students have said the massacre there would not have happened if the school had not banned concealed weapons.
But even though the school has a policy that guarantees students will be free to discuss all questions of interest and express their opinions openly, the dean of students says Scheffler's e-mail was deemed to be threatening. Scheffler was placed on interim suspension, which will only be lifted after he agrees to a psychological evaluation.
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I did not know that Charles Krauthammer is VERY anti-gun. Here's what he wrote in an op-ed piece entitled "Disarm The Citizenry", in 1996:
Ultimately, a civilized society must disarm its citizenry if it is to have a modicum of domestic tranquility of the kind enjoyed by sister democracies such as Canada and Britain. Given the frontier history and individualist ideology of the United States, however, this will not come easily. It certainly cannot be done radically. It will probably take one, maybe two generations. It might be 50 years before the United States gets to where Britain is today. Passing a law like the assault weapons ban is a symbolic - purely symbolic - move in that direction. Its only real justification is not to reduce crime but to desensitize the public to the regulation of weapons in preparation for their ultimate confiscation.
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Ex-marine store owner overcomes gun in face and shoots
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0DoG_zcWpc&NR=1
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“The Constitution shall never be construed... to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.” —Samuel Adams
PATRIOT PERSPECTIVE
“The right of the people to keep and bear arms”
By Mark Alexander
There is yet another ideological contest brewing in our nation’s capitol, this one between two distinctively different groups in the federal judiciary: constitutional constructionists, who render decisions based on the “original intent” of our nation’s founding document, and judicial despots, who endorse the dangerously errant notion of a “Living Constitution.”
This is no trivial contest, however, and the outcome will have significant consequences across the nation.
The subject of this dispute is Washington, DC’s “Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975,” which prohibits residents from owning handguns, ostensibly to deter so-called “gun violence.”
Of course, suggesting that violence is a “gun problem” ignores the real problem—that of socio-pathology and the culture which nurtures it. (See the Congressional Testimony of Darrell Scott, father of Rachel Scott, one of the children murdered at Columbine High School in 1999.)
In 1960 the frequency of violent crime in the District was 554/100,000 residents, and the murder rate was 10/100,000. In 2006, the frequency of violent crime in the District was 1,512/100,000 residents, and the murder rate was 29/100,000. That is a 200 percent increase, and according to the latest data from Washington Metro Police, violent crime is up 12 percent thus far this year.
Fact is, firearm restrictions on law-abiding citizens in Washington, and other urban centers, have created more victims while protecting offenders. There is nothing new about this correlation. As Thomas Jefferson noted in his Commonplace Book (quoting Cesare Beccaria), “Laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.”
Simply put, violent predators prefer victims who have no means of self defense.
Most pro and con arguments about firearms are constructed around the crime debate, including excellent research by John Lott, whose book More Guns, Less Crime, clearly establishes that restrictive gun policies lead to higher crime rates.
The arguments from both sides in the current case in Washington are also constructed around the crime issue. However, the Second Amendment debate is not about crime, but about the rule of law—constitutional law. Fortunately, the appellate court for DC is making this distinction.
In March of this year, the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia struck down that federal jurisdiction’s restrictions on gun ownership, finding that the District is violating the Second Amendment’s prohibition on government infringement of “the right of the people to keep and bear arms.” The case has been appealed to the Supreme Court, and should the High Court accept the case, its ruling would be the first substantial decision on the scope of the Second Amendment since 1939.
At issue: Does the Second Amendment prohibit the government from infringing on the individual rights of citizens to keep and bear arms, or does it restrict the central government from infringing on the rights of the several states to maintain well-armed militias?
The intent of the Second Amendment, however, was abundantly clear to our Founders.
Indeed, in the most authoritative explication of our Constitution, The Federalist Papers, its principal author, James Madison, wrote in No. 46, “The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any...”
Alexander Hamilton was equally unambiguous on the importance of arms to a republic, writing in Federalist No. 28, “If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no recourse left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense...”
Justice Joseph Story, appointed to the Supreme Court by James Madison, wrote, “The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them.”
In other words, the right of the people to bear arms is the most essential of the rights enumerated in our Constitution, because it ensures the preservation of all other rights.
Accordingly, the appellate court, in a 2-1 decision, ruled, “The Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. That right existed prior to the formation of the new government under the Constitution and was premised on the private use of arms for activities such as hunting and self-defense, the latter being understood as resistance to either private lawlessness or the depredations of a tyrannical government... The individual right facilitated militia service by ensuring that citizens would not be barred from keeping the arms they would need when called forth for militia duty.”
Additionally, the majority opinion notes, “The activities [the amendment] protects are not limited to militia service, nor is an individual’s enjoyment of the right contingent upon his or her continued or intermittent enrollment in the militia.”
The dissenting judge’s conclusion did not dispute the plain language of the Second Amendment’s prohibition on government, but he insists that the District is not a state, and is, thus, not subject to the prohibition.
This is ridiculous, of course, since such a conclusion would imply, by extension, that District residents are not subject to any protection under the Constitution.
The real contest here is one between activist judges, those who amend the Constitution by judicial diktat rather than its clearly prescribed method stipulated in Article V, and constructionist judges, those who properly render legal interpretation based on the Constitution’s “original intent.”
As Hamilton wrote in Federalist No. 81, “[T]here is not a syllable in the [Constitution] under consideration which directly empowers the national courts to construe the laws according to the spirit of the Constitution...” In other words, nothing in the Constitution gives judges the right to declare the Constitution means anything beyond the scope of its plain language.
However, activist judges, including those among generations of High Court justices, have historically construed the Second Amendment through a pinhole, while viewing the First Amendment through a wide-angle lens.
For example, though the First Amendment plainly says, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” judicial activists interpret this plain language to mean a public school coach can’t offer a simple prayer before a game.
Equally absurd, they argue that the First Amendment’s “freedom of speech” clause means burning the American flag, exploiting women for “adult entertainment,” or using taxpayer dollars to fund works of “art” such as a crucifix immersed in a glass of human waste.
If these same judicial despots misconstrued the Second Amendment as broadly as they do the first, Americans would have nukes to defend themselves from noisy neighbors.
The appeals case regarding the constitutionality of DC’s Firearms Control Regulations Act of 1975 is not about crime prevention, or whether the District is subject to prohibitions in the Bill of Rights. It is about the essence of our Constitution’s most important assurance that all Americans have the right to defend themselves against both predatory criminals and tyrannical governments. It is about the need for the High Court to reaffirm this right and stop the incremental encroachment of said right by infringements like that in the District, or more egregious encroachments like those found within the Feinstein-Schumer gun-control act.
Of self-government’s “important principles,” Thomas Jefferson wrote, “It is [the peoples’] right and duty to be at all times armed.” Indeed, the right of the people to keep and bear arms should not be infringed.
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AT LAW
Second Amendment Showdown
The Supreme Court has a historic opportunity to affirm the individual right to keep and bear arms.
BY MIKE COX
Friday, November 23, 2007 12:01 a.m. EST
The Supreme Court has agreed to take up a case that will affect millions of Americans and could also have an impact on the 2008 elections. That case, Parker v. D.C., should settle the decades-old argument whether the right "to keep and bear arms" of the Constitution's Second Amendment is an individual right--that all Americans enjoy--or only a collective right that states may regulate freely. Legal, historical and even empirical reasons all command a decision that recognizes the Second Amendment guarantee as an individual right.
The amendment reads: "A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." If "the right of the people" to keep and bear arms was merely an incident of, or subordinate to, a governmental (i.e., a collective) purpose--that of ensuring an efficient or "well regulated" militia--it would be logical to conclude, as does the District of Columbia--that government can outlaw the individual ownership of guns. But this collective interpretation is incorrect.
To analyze what "the right of the people" means, look elsewhere within the Bill of Rights for guidance. The First Amendment speaks of "the right of the people peaceably to assemble . . ." No one seriously argues that the right to assemble or associate with your fellow citizens is predicated on the number of citizens or the assent of a government. It is an individual right.
The Fourth Amendment says, "the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated . . ." The "people" here does not refer to a collectivity, either.
The rights guaranteed in the Bill of Right are individual. The Third and Fifth Amendments protect individual property owners; the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth Amendments protect potential individual criminal defendants from unreasonable searches, involuntary incrimination, appearing in court without an attorney, excessive bail, and cruel and unusual punishments.
The Ninth Amendment protects individual rights not otherwise enumerated in the Bill of Rights. The 10th Amendment states, "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people." Here, "the people" are separate from "the states"; thus, the Second Amendment must be about more than simply a "state" militia when it uses the term "the people."
Consider the grammar. The Second Amendment is about the right to "keep and bear arms." Before the conjunction "and" there is a right to "keep," meaning to possess. This word would be superfluous if the Second Amendment were only about bearing arms as part of the state militia. Reading these words to restrict the right to possess arms strains common rules of composition.
Colonial history and politics are also instructive. James Madison wrote the Bill of Rights to provide a political compromise between the Federalists, who favored a strong central government, and the Anti-Federalists, who feared a strong central government as an inherent danger to individual rights. In June 1789, then-Rep. Madison introduced 12 amendments, a "bill of rights," to the Constitution to convince the remaining two of the original 13 colonies to ratify the document.
Madison's draft borrowed liberally from the English Bill of Rights of 1689 and Virginia's Declaration of Rights. Both granted individual rights, not collective rights. As a result, Madison proposed a bill of rights that reflected, as Stanford University historian Jack Rakove notes, his belief that the "greatest dangers to liberty would continue to arise within the states, rather than from a reconstituted national government." Accordingly, Mr. Rakove writes that "Madison justified all of these proposals (Bill of Rights) in terms of the protection they would extend to individual and minority rights."
One of the earliest scholars of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, Justice Joseph Story, confirmed this focus on individuals in his famous "Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States" in 1833. "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms," Story wrote, "has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of republics, since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers . . ."
It is also important to consider the social context at the time of the drafting and adoption of the Bill of Rights. Our Founding Fathers lived in an era where there were arms in virtually every household. Most of America was rural or, even more accurately, frontier. The idea that in the 1780s the common man, living in the remote woods of the Allegheny Mountains of western Pennsylvania and Virginia, would depend on the indulgence of his individual state or colony--not to mention the new federal government--to possess and use arms in order to defend himself is ludicrous. From the Minutemen of Concord and Lexington to the irregulars at Yorktown, members of the militias marched into battle with privately-owned weapons.
Lastly, consider the empirical arguments. The three D.C. ordinances at issue are of the broadest possible nature. According to the statute, a person is not legally able to own a handgun in D.C. at all and may have a long-gun--even in one's home--only if it is kept unloaded and disassembled (or bound with a trigger lock). The statute was passed in 1976. What have been the results?
Illegal guns continue to be widely available in the district; criminals have easy access to guns while law-abiding citizens do not. Cathy L. Lanier, Acting Chief of Police, Metropolitan Police Department, was quoted as follows: "Last year [2006], more than 2,600 illegal firearms were recovered in D.C., a 13% increase over 2005." Crime rose significantly after the gun ban went into effect. In the five years before the 1976 ban, the murder rate fell to 27 from 37 per 100,000. In the five years after it went into effect, the murder rate rose to 35. In fact, while murder rates have varied over time, during the 30 years since the ban, the murder rate has only once fallen below what it was in 1976.
This comports with my own personal experience. In almost 14 years as prosecutor and as head of the Homicide Unit of the Wayne County (Detroit) Prosecutor's Office, I never saw anyone charged with murder who had a license to legally carry a concealed weapon. Most people who want to possess guns are law-abiding and present no threat to others. Rather than the availability of weapons, my experience is that gun violence is driven by culture, police presence (or lack of same), and failures in the supervision of parolees and probationers.
Not only does history demonstrate that the Second Amendment is an individual right, but experience demonstrates that the broad ban on gun ownership in the District of Columbia has led to precisely the opposite effect from what was intended. For legal and historical reasons, and for the safety of the residents of our nation's capital, the Supreme Court should affirm an individual right to keep and bear arms.
Mr. Cox is the attorney general of Michigan.
WSJ
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Who says God is without a sense of humor?
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl.../BAOSU71JB.DTL
Richmond police have found the car that was carjacked at gunpoint from State Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata in North Oakland, authorities said today.
The red 2006 Dodge Charger was found near the corner of Wiswall and Colette drives near the Hilltop Mall in Richmond at about 11 p.m. Saturday, nine hours after the carjacking, police said. The car will be processed for evidence.
Told about the recovery of the car, Perata, 62, said today that he was heartened that no one was hurt. "The car is immaterial to me," said the Oakland Democrat, whose home was guarded by the California Highway Patrol and police overnight.
He joked, "At least it was found in my district."
Perata was unharmed after he was accosted by a gunman at 51st Street and Shattuck Avenue in North Oakland at about 1:45 p.m. Saturday.
Perata said he was waiting for the light to change when, out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a man walking up to him. The senator, who has campaigned against assault weapons and crime, said he mistook the man for a panhandler or window washer at first.
But then the man began pulling a mask over his nose and pointed an automatic handgun at him "gangster style" - holding it sideways - before tapping it on his window and bellowing at him, "Get out of the m- car."
Perata said he told the man, "I'm outta here" and jumped out of the car, which police say may have been targeted for its 22-inch rims. The man got inside and took off in the car, which also had Perata's cell phone in it. The carjacker was followed by an accomplice in a gold 2000 Chevrolet Camaro that was stolen in San Leandro on Friday in an incident in which shots were fired, authorities said.
Oakland police Lt. Lawrence Green said police do not believe the assailants had recognized Perata on Saturday. The senator told officers that he believed he saw the men at a Union 76 gas station minutes earlier on Broadway Terrace, so it was possible that they followed him to 51st and Shattuck before carjacking him, Green said.
Perata said he was preparing to get onto the freeway when he was carjacked while he was the third car waiting at the red light. The gunman was no more than 3 feet away, and at one point, Perata said, he feared that if the assailant panicked and fired a round while fumbling to get his mask over his face, "that would have been the end of me."
Perata said today that he no longer carries a concealed-weapons permit and there was no gun in his state car.
Perata said he never had the permit renewed when it expired two years ago because he "just never had the opportunity to re-qualify" at a gun range. Perata obtained the permit out of security concerns stemming from his work regulating firearms.
__________________
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We finish the year on a happy note:
Gun-packing man, 65, fights off 5 thugs
WKMG LOCAL 6 NEWS
ORLANDO, Fla. -- A Central Florida man who collects cash for parking at a church fought off five armed men who had ambushed him and demanded cash. The 65-year-old victim, who did not want to be identified, said he was collecting cash in the Parramore area before an Orlando Magic basketball game when someone put a gun to his head. He noticed that that he was surrounded by four other men as well. The man said he pretended to reach into his jacket for cash but instead pulled out his hidden gun and opened fire. The men fled during the shooting and it was not known if any of them were hit by bullets. The victim said he had a permit for the concealed weapon.
He said he has been a victim of crime before.
"A couple of years ago, eight teens attacked me with a pipe trying to rob me," the man said.
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The DC's brief in the case going to the Supreme Court on whether the Second Amendment is an individual right:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...rief010408.pdf
Its long. If you are in a hurry, start at page 22.
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Here's an AP article on the brief:
D.C.: 2nd Amendment Does Not Apply Here
January 4, 2008 - 7:28pm
By MATTHEW BARAKAT
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - The Second Amendment's provisions protecting the right to keep and bear arms apply only to the federal government, not the 50 states and the District of Columbia, lawyers for the nation's capital argued Friday in a written brief to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The district is seeking to preserve its three-decade ban on handgun possession after a federal appeals court ruled in March that the ban is an unconstitutional infringement on an individual's right to keep and bear arms.
The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to take the case, setting up what could be a landmark ruling on the scope of the Second Amendment. The court has not addressed the issue in a significant way for nearly 70 years.
"We are going to argue not just the most significant legal case in the history of the District of Columbia, but one of the most significant legal challenges in the history of the country," Mayor Adrian Fenty said at a press conference Friday in which he introduced former U.S. Solicitor General Walter Dellinger as the lead attorney representing the district.
The primary issue is whether the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right or a collective right belonging to state militias. A majority of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled that the founding fathers intended the right apply to individuals and struck down the D.C. law, though it remains in effect while the case is on appeal.
The district argues that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms only in the context of an organized militia.
In the brief, the district makes an additional argument: That the founding fathers' concern in drafting the Second Amendment was to protect states from an overbearing federal government that might restrict access to firearms as a means of crippling state militias.
As such, the Second Amendment only restricts Congress, they argue.
"The primary goal of those who demanded (the Bill of Rights) as a condition of ratification to the Constitution was to control the federal government," the lawyers wrote. "That is especially true with respect to the inclusion of the Second Amendment."
Alan Gura, the lawyer representing the D.C. resident who challenged the law, called the district's argument "very creative but wrong."
The fundamental flaw, he said, is that the district is a creation of Congress and the federal government, so the D.C. Council would be subject to the same restrictions as Congress in passing gun-control laws.
Randy Barnett, law professor at Georgetown University, agreed that the argument is strained, and said that if the high court accepts the notion that the right to bear arms is an individual right, it would be hard pressed to turn around and allow the district and the states to violate that right.
The district's interpretation "is at odds with the text and the original meaning of the Second Amendment and the rest of the Bill of Rights as well," Barnett said.
The Supreme Court may hear arguments in the case in March.
Because the case addresses not only the Second Amendment but also the peculiar status of the District of Columbia as a federal enclave, it is unclear whether the Supreme Court ruling will have a direct impact on the national gun-control issue.
(Copyright 2008 The Associated Press
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:x :x :x
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Woof Guro C.
Don't worry Crafty, it's only wishful thinking on the part the press, media and anti-gun left that this case isn't going to settle once and for all that the second amendment is an individual right. So keep your chin up! :-D
P.C.
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Woof,
The D.C. gun ban has already been struck down by a lower Federal Court and a appellate court panel ruled to uphold that decision on the grounds that the ban against owning a handgun and possesing a functional long-gun in a home, was a violation of the Second Amendment. This left D.C. with no choice but to appeal to the Supreme Court, otherwise their gun ban would have been immediately lifted.
The Brady Campaign has said for years that the most settled point in American law is that the Second Amendment is not an individual right for citizens to own guns. Yet, after D.C. lost its case, Paul Helmke, the head of the Brady Champaign, begged D.C. not to file an appeal with the high court but simply rewrite its gun laws. You see the lower court ruling would only apply to the District of Columbia law and no other. The prospect of the Supreme Court making a ruling on the Second Amendment terrifies the anti gun left because in one fell swoop, years of carefully laid misinformation, lies, and intellectually dishonest interpretations of the Second Amendment that fill our libraries and are repeated daily in the press and preached religiously in our universities, will be wiped away! And the ruling will apply nationwide.
The D.C. argument that the Second Amendment doesn't apply to D.C. or the States, if upheld by the high court, would mean that the entire Bill of Rights would not apply to D.C. or the States. And thus a State could deny religious freedom, freedom of the press, the right to assemble. The States could search your home without a warrant etc; of course this is total nonsense but it shows just how far they are willing to go to continue the fairytale that the Second is not an individual right that they are forbidden to infringe upon.
In a very rare move the Supreme Court chose to write its own Question Presented. The Question Presented is the narrow area of the case that the high court will hold up to the light of the Constitution. The question that the court crafted is: "Whether the following provisions- D.C. Code sections 7-2502.02 (a) (4), 22-4504 (a) and 7-2507.02 violate the Second Amendment rights of individuals who are not affiliated with any state militia, but who wish to keep handguns and other firearms for private use in their homes."
When the court comes down on the side of individual freedoms we can expect the left to start crying "Activist court! Activist court!" And then they'll start all over again putting out their propaganda to brainwash citizens into believing that we have no individual rights.
On the other hand if the high court finds in favor of the D.C. ban, then it will be time for the second revolution to begin. :evil:
P.C.
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PC:
I didn't know that the SCOTUS wrote its own question presented. VERY interesting!
Here's this discouraging piece from John Lott on the DOJ's intervention in the case. How do I call/email the White House?
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http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZmIyM2ZlMDhkOTFkMTc5ZGZhMjU0ZDE4N2QzN2U2YzM=
Bad Brief
The Bush DOJ shoots at the Second Amendment.
By John R. Lott Jr.
A lot of Americans who believe in the right to own guns were very disappointed this weekend. On Friday, the Bush administration’s Justice Department entered into the fray over the District of Columbia’s 1976 handgun ban by filing a brief to the Supreme Court that effectively supports the ban. The administration pays lip service to the notion that the Second Amendment protects gun ownership as an “individual right,” but their brief leaves the term essentially meaningless.
Quotes by the two sides’ lawyers say it all. The District’s acting attorney general, Peter Nickles, happily noted that the Justice Department’s brief was a “somewhat surprising and very favorable development.” Alan Gura, the attorney who will be representing those challenging the ban before the Supreme Court, accused the Bush administration of “basically siding with the District of Columbia” and said that “This is definitely hostile to our position.” As the lead to an article in the Los Angeles Times said Sunday, “gun-control advocates never expected to get a boost from the Bush administration.”
As probably the most prominent Second Amendment law professor in the country privately confided in me, “If the Supreme Court accepts the solicitor general’s interpretation, the chances of getting the D.C. gun ban struck down are bleak.”
The Department of Justice argument can be boiled down pretty easily. Its lawyers claim that since the government bans machine guns, it should also be able to ban handguns. After all, they reason, people can still own rifles and shotguns for protection, even if they have to be stored locked up. The Justice Department even seems to accept that trigger locks are not really that much of a burden, and that the locks “can properly be interpreted” as not interfering with using guns for self-protection. Yet, even if gun locks do interfere with self-defense, DOJ believes the regulations should be allowed, as long as the District of Columbia government thinks it has a good reason.
Factually, there are many mistakes in the DOJ’s reasoning: As soon as a rifle or shotgun is unlocked, it becomes illegal in D.C., and there has never been a federal ban on machine guns. But these are relatively minor points. Nor does it really matter that the only academic research on the impact of trigger locks on crime finds that states that require guns be locked up and unloaded face a five-percent increase in murder and a 12 percent increase in rape. Criminals are more likely to attack people in their homes, and those attacks are more likely to be successful. Since the potential of armed victims deters criminals, storing a gun locked and unloaded actually encourages crime.
The biggest problem is the standard used for evaluating the constitutionality of regulations. The DOJ is asking that a different, much weaker standard be used for the Second Amendment than the courts demands for other “individual rights” such as speech, unreasonable searches and seizures, imprisonment without trial, and drawing and quartering people.
If one accepts the notion that gun ownership is an individual right, what does “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” mean? What would the drafters of the Bill of Rights have had to write if they really meant the right “shall not be infringed”? Does the phrase “the right of the people” provide a different level of protection in the Second Amendment than in the First and Fourth?
But the total elimination of gun control is not under consideration by the Supreme Court. The question is what constitutes “reasonable” regulation. The DOJ brief argues that if the DC government says gun control is important for public safety, it should be allowed by the courts. What the appeals court argued is that gun regulations not only need to be reasonable, they need to withstand “strict scrutiny” — a test that ensures the regulations are narrowly tailored to achieve the desired goal.
Perhaps the Justice Department’s position isn’t too surprising. Like any other government agency, it has a hard time giving up its authority. The Justice Department’s bias can been seen in that it finds it necessary to raise the specter of machine guns 10 times when evaluating a law that bans handguns. Nor does the brief even acknowledge that after the ban, D.C.’s murder rate only once fell below what it was in 1976.
Worried about the possibility that a Supreme Court decision supporting the Second Amendment as an individual right could “cast doubt on the constitutionality of existing federal legislation,” the Department of Justice felt it necessary to head off any restrictions on government power right at the beginning.
But all is not lost. The Supreme Court can of course ignore the Bush administration’s advice, but the brief does carry significant weight. President Bush has the power to fix this by ordering that the solicitor general brief be withdrawn or significantly amended. Unfortunately, it may take an uprising by voters to rein in the Justice Department.
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Thank you Leo Daher-- here's how to let the White House know what you think:
comments@whitehouse.gov
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Woof,
I'll add to the list: White House switchboard 202-456-1414
FAX 202-456-2461
comments line 202-456-1111
and: vice_president@whitehouse.gov
and for snail mail: The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Then for the Department of Justice: Main switchboard 202-514-2000
Office of the Attorney General 202-353-1555
Office of the Solicitor General 202-514-2201
Office of Legal Policy 202-514-4601
and for snail mail: U.S. Depatment of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
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Woof,
The DOJ is obviously unaware of the facts regarding fully automatic machineguns. Full auto guns are not out and out banned but they are regulated by the ATF. To lawfully own, possess and sell a fully automatic firearm you must either be an authorized law enforcement officer or member of the U.S. Military or as a private citizen be issued a class three firearms license by the BATF.
Prior to 1933 a private citizen did not need a license to own a machinegun. Today thousands of people own tens of thousands of full auto weapons with this license. Check out www.machinegunshoot.com
Since 1933 only two license holders have committed crimes and neither of these involved a fully automatic weapon.
P.C.
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Whats all the hype about owning a fully auto machine gun? Alot of people I know want to own a assult rifle incase we are invaded or America becomes a poilce state..My responce is that if America becomes a police state or Military state you are not about to fight off the oppression with a ak-47..Then I also state For about 300.00 you can by a 30/30 or 30-o6 with a mag scope and do far more damage a mile away then owning a assult rifle..I own a complete set of the new Smith and Wesson .357 Magum 8 round rev. , A mossberg Shotgun and 30-o6 with a mag scope..But trying to ban all guns is just not gonna happen...
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Woof,
I'll add to the list: White House switchboard 202-456-1414
FAX 202-456-2461
comments line 202-456-1111
and: vice_president@whitehouse.gov
and for snail mail: The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Then for the Department of Justice: Main switchboard 202-514-2000
Office of the Attorney General 202-353-1555
Office of the Solicitor General 202-514-2201
Office of Legal Policy 202-514-4601
and for snail mail: U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001
Woof,
This is the email I sent out:
Dear Sir,
The U.S. Department of Justice, filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court, that basically agrees with the District's position that their gun ban law is not an infringement on the Second Amendment rights of individual citizens. This is an outrage! The D.O.J. is obviously confused as to the difference between [Federal regulations, that allow private citizens with a Class Three firearms license, to posess functioning, fully automatic weapons] and [the D.C. law that bans the possession of any kind of functioning firearm in their home.]
There has never been a danger that a government body would send a state militia member into battle, unarmed. The states ratified the Second Amendment because they feared that a tyrannical government body would disarm its citizens, leaving them defenseless and powerless. This is exactly what the D.C. ban does!
I ask that you direct the D.O.J. to withdraw this ill advised brief immediately.
And this is the email address for the U.S. D.O.J. you can address it to the Attorney General: askdoj@usdoj.gov
P.C.
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Excerpt from article: http://www.icadp.org/page236.html from Chicago Tribune writer published in 2004:
"Obama, however, called for a host of new gun-control measures: strengthening the assault-weapons ban to include high-capacity clips made prior to 1994; holding parents criminally responsible for children who injure someone with a gun found in the home; placing trigger locks on all guns; and allowing gun buyers to purchase only one weapon per month.
Hynes advocated increasing penalties for crimes committed with a gun, and Hull would increase funding to update technology that provides instant background checks on gun buyers.
All of the candidates, except Hynes, said they opposed allowing citizens to carry concealed weapons. Hynes and Chico said states, not the federal government, should regulate the matter.
"I consider this an issue for the states to decide, not the federal government," Chico said.
Obama disagreed. He backed federal legislation that would ban citizens from carrying weapons, except for law enforcement. He cited Texas as an example of a place where a law allowing people to carry weapons has "malfunctioned" because hundreds of people granted licenses had prior convictions.
"National legislation will prevent other states' flawed concealed-weapons laws from threatening the safety of Illinois residents," Obama said."
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Sanity and the Second Amendment
By LAURENCE H. TRIBE
March 4, 2008; Page A16
The Supreme Court is set to hear oral argument later this month in a politically charged gun-control case from the District of Columbia. The case involves a city resident who contends that the District is violating his rights under the Second Amendment with a citywide ban on handguns.
Gun enthusiasts on the right are all but daring justices who protect a woman's right to choose, nowhere mentioned in the Constitution, to trash the "right of the people to keep and bear arms," enshrined in the text of the Second Amendment. If the Supreme Court does what they fear and reduces the gun right to a relic of the days when all "able-bodied men" constituted each state's "militia," they will use that defeat to suggest that we need a president who will bring us a truly "conservative" Supreme Court.
Those on the left have at the same time challenged a court that they see as already leaning hard right to live up to its conservative principles, follow precedent, and limit the Second Amendment -- as the text of its preamble seems to invite -- to the preservation of each state's "well-regulated militia," ending once and for all the idea that the Constitution enshrines a personal right to wield firearms.
The court would be foolhardy to accept either side's invitation that it plunge headlong into the culture wars by accepting these extreme ways of framing the issue. It is true that some liberal scholars like me, having studied the text and history closely, have concluded, against our political instincts, that the Second Amendment protects more than a collective right to own and use guns in the service of state militias and national guard units. Opponents of the District's flat ban on handgun possession have cited my words to the court and in newspaper editorials in their support.
But nothing I have discovered or written supports an absolute right to possess the weapons of one's choice. The lower court's decision in this case -- the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals found the District's ban on concealable handguns in a densely populated area to be unconstitutional -- went overboard. Under any plausible standard of review, a legislature's choice to limit the citizenry to rifles, shotguns and other weapons less likely to augment urban violence need not, and should not, be viewed as an unconstitutional abridgment of the right of the people to keep or bear arms.
For the Supreme Court to go any further than this in overturning the lower court's decision -- for it to hold, for instance, that no firearms ban could violate the Second Amendment unless it were to prevent states from organizing militias in their collective self-defense, as the District appears to urge -- would gratuitously fan the flames of doubt about the court's commitment to core constitutional principles, and would save no lives in the process.
Equally foolish would be a decision tilting to the other extreme and upholding the lower court's decision simply because the right to bear arms is, judicial precedent to the contrary notwithstanding, a right that belongs to citizens as individuals. Such a holding would confuse the right to bear arms with a right to own and brandish the firearms of one's choosing.
Worse than that, it would transform a constitutional provision clearly intended and designed to protect the people of the several states from an all-powerful national government into a restriction on the national government's uniquely powerful role as governor of the nation's capital, over which Congress, acting through municipal authorities of the District, exercises the same kind of plenary authority that it exercises over Fort Knox.
Using a case about national legislative power over gun-toting in the capital city as a vehicle for deciding how far Congress or the state of California can go in regulating guns in Los Angeles would be a silly stretch.
Chief Justice John Roberts, ever since his days as a judge on the court of appeals, has virtually defined judicial modesty by opining that if it is not necessary for the court to decide an issue, then it is necessary for the court not to decide that issue. For this reason, and for the further reason that the scholarship on the reach of the Second Amendment and its implementation is still in its infancy, the court should take the smallest feasible step in resolving the case before it.
Issuing a narrow decision would disappoint partisans on both sides and leave many questions unresolved. But to do anything else would ill-suit a court that flies the flag of judicial restraint.
Mr. Tribe, a professor of constitutional law at Harvard Law School, is the author of the forthcoming book "The Invisible Constitution" (Oxford Press).
WSJ
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WEAPONS OF CHOICE
Press 'ignore' terrorist stopped by armed student
'Yitzak Dadon's apparently well-placed bullets interrupted a rampage'
Posted: March 07, 2008
9:33 pm Eastern
© 2008 WorldNetDaily
A gun rights organization in the United States is accusing
the media of trying to conceal the fact that a gunman who
attacked students at Jerusalem's Mercaz Harav seminary
was stopped by an armed student at the school.
Authorities report that Ytizhak Dadon, 40, was a "private
citizen who had a gun license and was able to shoot the
gunman with his pistol," according to a statement released
today by the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
In its earlier reporting on the tragedy, WND confirmed, "One
terrorist reportedly was shot to death by a student who was
armed…"
However, the gun rights organization said "the American press
is downplaying his heroism because it proves that armed
students can stop campus gunmen."
"Yitzhak Dadon is a hero," said Alan Gottlieb, the chairman of
CCRKBA, "and he is living proof that armed students have a
place on college campuses. Thankfully, his quick action was
reported by the international press … so unlike incidents here in
the United States where the press was able to completely ignore
the actions of armed students or teachers, the truth about this
incident will not be suppressed."
He continued, "Mr. Dadon is not going to become a victim of this
conspiracy of silence. Elitist American college administrators, the
national press, nor anti-gun politicians can sweep this incident
under their rug."
The gun rights group said international reports credit Dadon, who
studies at the school, had his pistol available when the shooting
erupted. "When the gunman emerged from a library, Dadon reportedly
shot him twice in the head. The gunman was subsequently shot by
the off-duty soldier," the group said.
"Yitzhak Dadon's apparently well-placed bullets interrupted a rampage,"
Gottlieb said. "What a pity that someone like Mr. Dadon was not in
class last April at Virginia Tech. What a tragedy that anti-gun extremism
would keep him from attending class at Northern Illinois University. He
would never be allowed to teach at Columbine High School, hold a job
at Trolley Square in Salt Lake City, or go shopping at Omaha's Westroads Mall.
"America's acquiescence to anti-gun hysteria has led to one tragedy
after another," Gottlieb stated. "This disastrous policy has given us nothing
but broken hearts and body counts, and it's got to end. The heroism of an
armed Israeli seminary student halfway across the world sends a message
that we needn't submit to murder in victim disarmament zones. That's why
his actions are getting such short shrift from America's press. It's a story they
are loathe to report because it affirms a philosophy of self-reliance that they despise."
The organization boasts more than 650,000 members and supporters nationwide,
and is dedicated to preserving firearms freedoms through active lobbying of elected
officials and facilitating grass-roots organization of gun rights activists in local
communities throughout the United States.
WND had reported just days earlier on plans in Arizona, where lawmakers are
considering a way to stem the wave of unarmed students killed in campus
slayings by allowing adults to carry firearms onto the grounds of state universities.
"The police got to both the Virginia Tech murder scene and the New Life Church
[in Colorado] in about six minutes," noted Larry Pratt, the chief of Gun Owners of America.
"At Virginia Tech, 30 people died. At New Life, two died in the parking lot and once
the bad guy got inside the building he was engaged by (armed) security team
volunteers and nobody else died. In fact, he was finished in about 30 seconds."
Pratt noted the circumstances of the two attacks. After killing two people at a Christian
training center in Arvada, Colo., last December, 24-year-old Matthew Murray went to
Colorado Springs intending more murder and mayhem.
Murray shot and killed two girls in the New Life Church's parking lot, then headed inside
the building where thousands of worshippers were concluding a service.
A volunteer security guard, Jeanne Assam, confronted him almost immediately and
fired at him. He fell, and an autopsy later said he had shot himself.
But at Virginia Tech, Cho Seung-Hui, 23, armed himself and went to a classroom
building on a campus where guns were banned. He fatally shot a total of 32.
The latest attack on unarmed teachers and students happened on Valentine's Day,
when Stephen Kazmierczak, 27, walked into a Northern Illinois University auditorium
and shot and killed five people, and wounded 16 others.
The gunman then shot himself.
In Jerusalem, reports said one or possibly two gunmen infiltrated the Mercaz Harav
Yeshiva, located near the entrance to Jerusalem, and fired hundreds of rounds of bullets
at students. One terrorist, who may have been armed with an explosive device, made
his way to the yeshiva's main study room, where about 80 students were reportedly gathered.
Israeli police said eight were killed and nearly a dozen were wounded, some seriously.
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Elderly Man Shoots, Kills Near-Naked Intruder
POSTED: 5:41 pm EDT March 20, 2008
UPDATED: 6:33 pm EDT March 20, 2008
TUCKER, Ga. -- An 81-year-old man who shot and killed an intruder said Thursday he would do it again if he's ever faced with the same situation. Robert Jenkins is recovering from injuries he suffered during a struggle with a man who had broken into his DeKalb County home Tuesday about 11 p.m.
Jenkins and his wife said they were in bed when they heard noises in the house. "I said 'Bob they're in the house, how did they get in the house?' and with that Bob hopped out of the bed went to the closet, got his gun,'" said Peggy Jenkins.
When Jenkins got to the kitchen he found Jynad Marshall, 25, stripped down to his underwear. "He said 'give me that gun' and started at me, so I put a round in him right then,'" Jenkins told WSB-TV Channel 2 reporter Eric Philips.
Meanwhile he wife was dialing 911. "I heard pow, and I told the operator and she said 'stay on the line', and I said 'no, I can't stay on the line,'" Peggy Jenkins explained. "Then I heard another pow."
The 6 foot 225 pound Marshall fell on top of Jenkins. Marshall continued attacking Jenkins until he died. "I don't feel good about killing anybody, but I'm glad I did because it was us or him," said Jenkins.
Police said Jenkins won't face charges since the shooting was self-defense.
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Guns and Legal Ammo
March 22, 2008
As shoot-outs go, the Supreme Court had a famous one Tuesday during oral arguments over the constitutionality of Washington D.C.'s handgun ban. The smoke won't clear until the High Court issues its decision, but the debate this week augurs well for a conclusion that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms.
District of Columbia v. Heller has become the test case for a question that has animated legal scholars, politicians and lower courts for much of our modern history: Is the Second Amendment guarantee a collective right, which is to say it is reserved only for state militias, or is it an individual right?
Judge Laurence Silberman's landmark opinion last year for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down D.C.'s ban on handguns, rejecting the militia argument and scouring the historical and legal record to show that the Founders clearly intended to protect an individual's right to defend himself and family. The District appealed, and so the Supremes will issue the most important Second Amendment ruling in decades.
Judging by Tuesday argument, the High Court has a majority in support of the circuit court opinion. Chief Justice John Roberts asked why the Framers included the word "people" if the Amendment only applied to militias. Justice Antonin Scalia discussed the importance the Framers attached to providing citizens the means to protect against tyrannical government. Justice Anthony Kennedy, often the Court's swing vote, informed all in attendance that "In my view, there's a general right to bear arms quite without reference to the militia either way."
The debate also focused on what restrictions, if any, government could impose on such an individual right. Several Justices had particular fun with Solicitor General Paul Clement, who was charged with defending his (and thus the Bush Administration's) odd split-the-baby amicus brief arguing that while the Second Amendment is an individual right, the D.C. Circuit opinion would bar governments from banning even such heavy weapons as machine guns.
In fact, that opinion leaves ample room for a government to regulate machine guns, bazookas and the like -- much as even the First Amendment protects speech as an individual right but not as a right to shout "fire" in a crowded theater. We hope the Supreme Court agrees with Judge Silberman that the Second Amendment does protect the right to own pistols, rifles and other guns of the kind the American Founders believed were needed to protect liberty.
See all of today's editorials and op-eds, plus
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GORDON DILLOW
Register columnist
GLDillow@aol.com
Comments 4 | Recommend 6
It was the sort of incident that never makes it into the official crime statistics – that is, an incident in which a crime may have been prevented by a firearm.
It happened earlier this month in Irvine. Police were looking for a man suspected of raping an 18-year-old woman in her home. As the cops searched, the fleeing suspect, a 27-year-old L.A. gang member, tried to hide by breaking into another home. Inside, the homeowner, a man who had recently undergone defensive firearms training, heard the commotion, grabbed a handgun and confronted the suspect.
The homeowner didn't shoot the alleged rapist, although legally he almost certainly could have. If someone breaks into your home, and you have a justifiable fear that he might kill or harm you or someone else, you have a right to defend yourself with lethal force.
But as I said, the homeowner – for security reasons, he declined to be interviewed or identified by name – didn't shoot. Instead, he shouted at the suspect to stop, at which point the guy ran out of the house. Shortly thereafter he was caught and arrested by the police.
"The homeowner took the appropriate safety steps," Irvine Police Lt. Rick Handfield told me. "And he had had some firearms training, which is an important part of gun ownership."
But did the homeowner's use of a gun prevent another crime from occurring – perhaps an assault on the homeowner or his family? Or would the suspect, who turned out to be unarmed, have fled when confronted by the homeowner, gun or no gun? The police can't definitively say.
So how will that incident be reflected in the crime statistics?
Yes, the rape will be added to the grim numbers of that despicable crime, and the successful arrest will appear in the Irvine Police Department's annual statistics. And ironically, if the homeowner had justifiably shot and killed the intruder it still would have been listed in the overall statistics as a gun-related homicide – the same statistics that anti-gun activists use to promote stricter so-called "gun control" laws to keep firearms out of the hands of law-abiding citizens.
But police departments and other government agencies don't collect hard numbers on crimes that may have been prevented by armed citizens – because, as in the Irvine case, they're difficult and sometimes impossible to quantify.
And that's unfortunate. Because crimes prevented by firearms are as important in the debate over guns as crimes committed with firearms.
As you probably know, last week the U.S. Supreme Court took up the 2nd Amendment question. The case could finally decide whether the U.S. Constitution gives individuals the "right to keep and bear arms," as opposed to a collective right afforded only to organized state "militias" such as the National Guard.
(By the way, California law defines our state's "militia" as "all able-bodied male citizens … between the ages of eighteen and forty-five" – which, at age 57, I find somewhat insulting and discriminatory. And in any modern application I guess we would have to include the gals in the militia, too.)
Well, I don't have enough space to go into all the 2nd Amendment arguments. But to me it's obvious that a homeowner in Irvine – or any other law-abiding citizen – has a constitutional right to have a firearm.
Of course, whenever gun ownership rights are debated, anti-gun activists like to point out that about 30,000 people are killed by guns in America every year -- although they seldom note that about 60 percent of those deaths are suicides, or that the firearm murder rate has dropped by 40 percent in the past 15 years, or that far more people are killed by motor vehicles or medical malpractice every year than are killed by guns.
And they never mention how many crimes have been prevented by citizens bearing arms.
Once again, that's a hard thing to quantify. One U.S. government survey in the 1990s estimated that more than 80,000 Americans a year used guns in an effort to protect themselves or their property against crime. Other estimates put the number far higher, at more than 2 million crimes prevented each year by the presence of privately-owned firearms.
But those are estimates and extrapolations – which means we can argue about the numbers all day long.
Still, this much is clear. When faced with a violent criminal in his house in the middle of the night, it would be hard to argue that that homeowner in Irvine would have been better off without a gun.
714-796-7953 or GLDillow@aol.com
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/g...-police-irvine
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The Democrats and Gun Control
By DAVID KOPEL
April 17, 2008; Page A19
Imagine an election race of Pat Robertson versus James Dobson, each of them appearing at organic grocery stores and Starbucks throughout Massachusetts, with each candidate insisting that he alone deserves the vote of gay-marriage advocates. An equally silly spectacle is taking place these days in Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Indiana, West Virginia and Kentucky, as Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama compete for the pro-gun vote.
Mr. Obama supports the Second Amendment – or so his surrogates have been claiming all over Pennsylvania, the state with the highest per-capita membership in the National Rifle Association. The effort was set back last weekend with the publication of Mr. Obama's remarks claiming that people in small towns in Pennsylvania and other Midwestern states "cling" to guns because they are "bitter" that the government has not solved their economic problems.
Mrs. Clinton shot back with an excellent speech in Valparaiso, Ind., recounting that her father had taught her how to shoot when she was a little girl. "People enjoy hunting and shooting because it's an important part of who they are," she said. "Not because they are bitter."
Surely she is right. The shooting sports culture in Pennsylvania was thriving long before the domestic manufacture of steel began to decline. Indeed, that culture was thriving before steel was invented. Pennsylvania's 1776 state constitution declared "That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state . . ." A separate provision guaranteed "the liberty to fowl and hunt in seasonable times."
However, having the right to arms and the liberty to hunt is worthless if you can't buy a gun. In 1999, Mr. Obama urged enactment of a federal law prohibiting the operation of any gun store within five miles of a school or park. This would eliminate gun stores from almost the entire inhabited portion of the United States.
As a state senate candidate in 1996, Mr. Obama endorsed a complete ban on all handguns in a questionnaire. The Obama campaign has claimed he "never saw or approved the questionnaire," and that an aide filled it out incorrectly. But a few weeks ago, Politico.com found an amended version of the questionnaire. It included material added in Mr. Obama's handwriting.
When the U.S. Supreme Court voted last year to hear a case on the constitutionality of the Washington, D.C., handgun ban, Mr. Obama's campaign told the Chicago Tribune: "Obama believes the D.C. handgun law is constitutional" and that "local communities" should have the ability "to enact common sense laws." Other than Washington, D.C., the only American cities with handgun bans are Chicago and four of its suburbs. As a state senator, Mr. Obama voted against a 2004 bill (which passed overwhelmingly) to give citizens a legal defense against prosecution for violating a local handgun ban if they actually used the firearm for lawful self-defense on their own property.
Mr. Obama's campaign Web site touts his belief in the Second Amendment rights to have guns "for the purposes of hunting and target shooting." Conspicuously absent is the right to have firearms to defend one's self, home and family. In 2001, as a state senator, Mr. Obama voted against allowing the beneficiaries of domestic violence protective orders to carry handguns for protection.
Yet, as Mr. Obama has mockingly pointed out, Mrs. Clinton is not exactly a modern-day Annie Oakley wiling away weekends in a duck blind. As first lady, she helped organize the Million Mom March for "sensible gun laws" in 2000. It was led by the shrill gun prohibitionist Rosie O'Donnell.
Mrs. Clinton has repeatedly voted for antigun proposals, and co-sponsored many of them. After Hurricane Katrina, the New Orleans and St. Tammany police confiscated guns from law-abiding citizens, violating an explicit Louisiana law. In some cases, the confiscation was carried out with the assistance of federal agents, and was perpetrated via warrantless break-ins into homes.
The next year, the U.S. Senate voted 84-16 for a homeland security appropriations rider stating: "None of the funds appropriated by this Act shall be used for the seizure of a firearm based on the existence of a declaration or state of emergency." Mrs. Clinton was one of the 16 who voted "no." Mr. Obama commendably voted with the majority.
Forty states currently allow most law-abiding adult citizens to carry concealed handguns for lawful protection, after a background check and (in almost all such states) a safety class. Of course those laws only apply to carrying within the relevant state. Mr. Obama told the Chicago Tribune in 2004 that he favored a national ban on concealed carry, to "prevent other states' laws from threatening the safety of Illinois residents." Mrs. Clinton campaigned against a licensed carry referendum in Missouri.
Both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama voted against legislation to stop mayors from suing gun manufacturers and gun stores because of gun crime. That legislation banned lawsuits only if businesses had complied with all laws regarding firearms manufacture and sales.
A presidential candidate could of course swear devotion to the First Amendment, while declaring that the amendment's purpose is to protect sports reporting and book collecting. And that candidate could still support government lawsuits against publishers, local bans on newspapers, and draconian restrictions on political commentary.
Civil libertarians who supported such a candidate because of his alleged love for the First Amendment would be foolish. Civil libertarians who support Mr. Obama or Mrs. Clinton because of their purported fealty to the Second Amendment may be bitterly disappointed.
Mr. Kopel is research director of the Independence Institute and co-author of the law school textbook, "Gun Control and Gun Rights" (NYU Press, 2002).
WSJ
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/an-illustrated-guide-to-obamas-gun-grabbing/
Not a right, says the Obamessiah.
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Have only skimmed it, but this appears to be an excellent resource:
http://www.gunfacts.info/pdfs/gun-facts/5.0/GunFacts5-0-screen.pdf
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Finally, a good ruling from the SCOTUS!!!!!!
:-D :-D :-D
http://michellemalkin.com/2008/06/26/gun-battle-heller-time/
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http://www.gallup.com/poll/108394/Americans-Agreement-Supreme-Court-Gun-Rights.aspx
73% agree.
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Silver Bullet
June 27, 2008; Page A12
The 2008 Supreme Court term ended with a bang yesterday as the Justices issued their most important ruling ever in upholding an individual right to bear arms. The dismaying surprise is that the Second Amendment came within a single vote of becoming a dead Constitutional letter.
That's the larger meaning of yesterday's landmark 5-4 ruling in D.C. v. Heller, the first gun control case to come before the Court in 70 years. Richard Heller brought his case after the Washington, D.C. government refused to grant him a permit to keep a handgun in his home. The District has some of the most restrictive handgun laws in the country – essentially a total ban. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 2-1 decision by Judge Laurence Silberman, overturned the ban in an opinion that set up yesterday's ruling by taking a panoramic view of gun rights and American legal history.
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In a First, High Court
Affirms Gun Rights
By JESS BRAVIN and SUSAN DAVIS
June 27, 2008; Page A1
WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution guarantees individuals the right to keep handguns in the home, ending a debate about the Second Amendment's 18th-century language while opening new battles over the politically charged issues of guns, crime and violence.
See how justices have split in cases this term
In a 5-4 opinion by Justice Antonin Scalia, the court struck down perhaps the nation's toughest gun law, a 1976 District of Columbia ordinance that effectively bans handguns and required that rifles be disassembled or disabled by trigger locks in the home.
The decision stopped short of invalidating other local, state and federal gun regulations. The court also declined to hand legislators a blueprint for permissible gun regulations, acknowledging that the contours of the Second Amendment right, like other constitutional rights, will have to be mapped in litigation over the years to come.
Gun-rights advocates said their efforts will now swing toward challenging handgun bans in other cities, licensing laws and other statutes, such as zoning laws that ban gun stores. Among the issues that the court left to future litigation: whether the government can restrict other kinds of firearms besides handguns, specifically assault weapons, which have been the focus of numerous legislative battles at the state and federal level.
The U.S. Supreme Court strikes down one of the nation's strictest gun bans, ruling that individuals have the right to own guns for personal use. Video courtesy of Reuters. (June 26)
Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Handgun Violence, one of the NRA's chief opponents, said there could be a silver lining. Because the decision eliminates the specter of gun confiscation, advocates will be more willing to come to the table and discuss other gun-control issues.
Reflecting the passion and political importance of gun owners in an election that could be decided by independent voters, both presidential candidates immediately embraced the opinion -- while shading their comments to emphasize different portions of the decision that appealed to their varying bases.
Candidates React
"Unlike the elitist view that believes Americans cling to guns out of bitterness, today's ruling recognizes that gun ownership is a fundamental right -- sacred, just as the right to free speech and assembly," said Republican John McCain, seeking to join the gun enthusiasts' celebration while warning that the decision still left open the chance that lawmakers could enact firearms regulations that stopped short of an outright ban. "This ruling does not mark the end of our struggle."
His Democratic opponent, Barack Obama, was more restrained, saying that he "always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms." He emphasized that while the ruling protects a core right and "the D.C. gun ban went too far," the protection "is not absolute and subject to reasonable regulations enacted by local communities to keep their streets safe."
Getty Images
Three activists from Virginia cheered the U.S. Supreme Court's decision on the District of Columbia's gun ban Thursday.
The Bush administration sought simultaneously to endorse the decision while assuring the public that existing federal gun regulations would remain intact.
"As a longstanding advocate of the rights of gun owners in America, I applaud the Supreme Court's historic decision today confirming what has always been clear in the Constitution: the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear firearms," the president said in a statement. He urged the District of Columbia to "swiftly move" to protect residents' Second Amendment rights.
In its own statement, however, the Justice Department noted that the court said some restrictions on gun possession were permissible. The Justice Department said it "will continue to defend vigorously the constitutionality, under the Second Amendment, of all existing federal firearms laws."
The court's decision appears to strike a balance on gun ownership that reflects the views of the general public. A majority of Americans, 59%, said they oppose laws that ban the sale of handguns, according to an April poll conducted by the Pew Research Center. Yet a similar number, 58%, said it is more important to place controls on gun ownership versus the 37% that said it is more important to protect the right to own a gun.
Despite the opinion's broad language, it was unclear if it would apply beyond the District of Columbia, the federal enclave whose unique status as the seat of government makes it part of no state. Although the district's elected City Council operates autonomously under home-rule legislation approved by Congress, Washington's municipal government is, as a constitutional matter, part of the federal government.
In a footnote, Justice Scalia noted that the issue known as "incorporation" -- whether federal rights also are binding on state governments -- wasn't before the court, and observed that prior cases "reaffirmed that the Second Amendment applies only to the Federal Government." In a 1997 book, he suggested views even more ominous for gun enthusiasts, writing that "properly understood, [the amendment] is no limitation upon arms control by the states."
For Dick Heller, the security officer who challenged the ordinance, the court's 5-4 ruling means district officials must issue him a license to keep a handgun in his Washington home. But it doesn't necessarily allow him to buy another one in the district -- or require the city to allow gun stores to operate within its boundaries. District officials, noting that the decades-old gun ban was widely popular within their city, pledged to do all they can to limit firearms in their jurisdiction.
Elsewhere, cities with tough gun laws seized on the decision's focus on Washington. Because it only concerns the District of Columbia, the ruling "does not apply to state and local governments," said Benna Solomon, a deputy corporation counsel for Chicago. Chicago has one of the strictest gun regulations. City officials said they are expecting a challenge but would continue to enforce its handgun ban until ordered by a court to cease.
Associated Press
Pro-gun advocates and supporters of the District of Columbia's firearms ban demonstrated outside the Supreme Court in March.
States with assault-weapons bans or licensing requirements for gun owners said that they felt confident their laws wouldn't have to change as a result of the ruling. "The decision affirms the right of states to regulate gun ownership in order to preserve public safety," said David Wald, a spokesman for New Jersey's attorney general.
The village president of Morton Grove, Richard Krier, said that lawyers were reviewing the community's ordinance following the decision and that he had "every intention" of complying with it.
Morton Grove has banned the possession of handguns in the homes of its 22,000 residents since 1981, as well as other dangerous weapons.
Delivered on the last day of the Supreme Court's term, the 5-4 decision underscored the central place the court plays in the nation's politics and culture as well as its law. For the third time this month, a major constitutional issue was decided by a single vote -- that of Justice Anthony Kennedy, the maverick conservative who earlier sided with the court's liberals to extend habeas corpus rights to Guantanamo detainees and bar the execution of child rapists. Today, he lined up on the right to hold that each household in Washington may arm itself with deadly weapons to fend off intruders.
Gun-Right Origins
Justice Scalia's opinion was a 64-page tour from the obscure origins of gun rights in the fratricidal wars of 17th-century England through the violent struggles that defined America in its colonial revolt against the British crown, its division over slavery and the subsequent repression of freed blacks. It continued through to the modern era, where battles against foreign invasion and between internal factions have given way to urban crime.
"By the time of the founding, the right to have arms had become fundamental for English subjects," Justice Scalia wrote, in an opinion joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Kennedy, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. "The Second Amendment, like the First and Fourth Amendments, codified a pre-existing right."
The Second Amendment, in its entirety, reads: "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
That phrasing has led to countless debates over what precisely is being protected -- a right of states and their citizens to organize militias, obviating the need for a standing army; a right of individuals to arm themselves, in case they may someday need to form a militia; or some other construction involving either or both personal and collective rights.
The Supreme Court last heard a Second Amendment case in 1939, when it upheld a federal ban on interstate transport of short-barreled shotguns. Since sawed-off shotguns had no "reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument," the court found then. Ever since, most courts have seen the amendment as providing for weapons possession in connection with service in a militia, or its modern descendant, the state-run National Guard.
Justice Scalia, however, wrote that his opinion was consistent with the 1939 ruling, which he saw as holding only that not all guns were covered by the Second Amendment. Otherwise, he wrote, why would the court focus on "the character of the weapon rather than simply note that the two crooks were not militiamen?"
Gamut of Restrictions
The court's liberal wing strenuously disagreed, offering its own historical construction that emphasized a gamut of restrictions on firearms over the same swath of time and asserting that the 1939 case, which itself examined precedents on weapons possession dating to colonial times, had settled the matter.
Yet the lead dissent, by Justice John Paul Stevens, did not dispute that the Second Amendment protects an individual right. Rather, he wrote, the question was the "scope of that right," which protected militia service but left additional regulation to the judgment of the legislature. The Second Amendment's drafting history revealed the founders' "concern about the potential threat to state sovereignty that a federal standing army would pose," something that could be checked by state militias, he wrote, joined by Justices David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
--Gary Fields and Louise Radnofsky contributed to this article.
Write to Jess Bravin at jess.bravin@wsj.com and Susan Davis at susan.davis@wsj.com
In writing for the majority, Justice Antonin Scalia follows the Silberman Constitutional roadmap in finding that the "right of the people to keep and bear arms" is an individual right. The alternative view – argued by the District of Columbia – is that the Second Amendment is merely a collective right for individuals who belong to a government militia.
Justice Scalia shreds the collective interpretation as a matter of both common law and Constitutional history. He writes that the Founders, as well as nearly all Constitutional scholars over the decades, believed in the individual right. Many Supreme Court opinions invoke the Founders, but this one is refreshing in its resort to first American principles and its affirmation of a basic liberty. It's not too much to say that Heller is every bit as important to the Second Amendment as Near v. Minnesota (prior restraint) or N.Y. Times v. Sullivan (libel) are to the First Amendment.
Which makes it all the more troubling that no less than four Justices were willing to explain this right away. These are the same four liberal Justices who routinely invoke the "right to privacy" – which is nowhere in the text of the Constitution – as a justification for asserting various social rights. Yet in his dissent, Justice John Paul Stevens argues that a right to bear arms that is plainly in the text adheres to an individual only if he is sanctioned by government.
Justice Breyer, who wrote a companion dissent, takes a more devious tack. He wants to establish an "interest-balancing test" to weigh the Constitutionality of particular restrictions on gun ownership. This balancing test is best understood as a roadmap for vitiating the practical effects of Heller going forward.
Using Justice Breyer's "test," judges could accept the existence of an individual right to bear arms in theory, while whittling it down to nothing by weighing that right against the interests of the government in preventing gun-related violence. Having set forth this supposedly neutral standard, Justice Breyer shows his policy hand by arguing that under this standard the interests of the District of Columbia would outweigh Mr. Heller's interest in defending himself, and the ban should thus be upheld.
But as Justice Scalia writes, no other Constitutional right is subjected to this sort of interest-balancing. "The very enumeration of the right takes [it] out of the hands of government" – even the hands of Olympian judges like Stephen Breyer. "Like the First, [the Second Amendment] is the very product of an interest-balancing by the people – which Justice Breyer would now conduct for them anew."
In that one sentence, Justice Scalia illuminates a main fault line on this current Supreme Court. The four liberals are far more willing to empower the government and judges to restrict individual liberty, save on matters of personal lifestyle (abortion, gay rights) or perhaps crime. The four conservatives are far more willing to defend individuals against government power – for example, in owning firearms, or private property (the 2005 Kelo case on eminent domain). Justice Anthony Kennedy swings both ways, and in Heller he sided with the people.
Heller leaves many questions unanswered. Contrary to the worries expressed by the Bush Administration in its embarrassing amicus brief, the ruling does not bar the government from regulating machine guns or other heavy weapons; or from limiting gun ownership by felons or the mentally ill. Any broad restriction on handguns or hunting rifles will be Constitutionally suspect, but legislatures will still have room to protect public safety.
Heller reveals the High Court at its best, upholding individual liberty as the Founders intended. Yet it is also precarious because the switch of a single Justice would have rendered the Second Amendment a nullity. With the next President likely to appoint as many as three Justices, the right to bear arms has been affirmed but still isn't safe.
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Alan Gura
How a Young Lawyer Saved the Second Amendment
By JAMES TARANTO
July 19, 2008; Page A7
Alexandria, Va.
For decades the Second Amendment might as well have been called the Second-Class Amendment. The U.S. Supreme Court spent the late 20th century expansively interpreting the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth amendments, not to mention unenumerated rights ranging from travel to sexual privacy. But not until last month did the court hold that the Second Amendment means what it says: that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
What took so long? I put the question to Alan Gura, the 37-year-old wunderkind lawyer who represented the plaintiffs in District of Columbia v. Heller.
Ismael Roldan
A native of Israel, he grew up in Los Angeles and never owned a firearm until after that city's riots in 1992. That summer, before he enrolled at the Georgetown University Law Center, "I bought a gun in Los Angeles. I did not have it with me in law school, of course -- that was illegal."
After law school, he worked for California's attorney general and the Senate Judiciary Committee before settling into private practice in this gun-friendly Washington suburb. As we talked last week, we exercised our rights under the 21st Amendment, sipping cocktails at a speakeasy-style bar across the street from his office.
The meaning of the Second Amendment had long been disputed because of its prefatory clause, "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state . . . ." Opponents of gun rights argued that the Founders meant to establish only a "collective right" -- authorization for states to raise militias. The Supreme Court had not addressed the question since 1939, when it held, in U.S. v. Miller, that sawed-off shotguns were not appropriate for use in a militia and therefore could be banned.
The Miller decision "was agreed by everybody to be somewhat murky and inconclusive," Mr. Gura says. "We read the case, like a lot of people, to mean that it's an individual right." But firearm foes claimed that the court had endorsed the collective-rights theory.
By the beginning of this century, notes Mr. Gura, that theory had fallen into disfavor among legal academics. "Many scholars, including very well-known left-of-center or liberal scholars, had come to concede that the Second Amendment, whatever its scope, guarantees some sort of an individual right to own and carry firearms, not connected to military service."
But the judiciary lagged behind the academy, owing to a dearth of Second Amendment litigation. Traditional civil-liberties groups like the ACLU largely backed the collective-rights theory, and gun-rights groups like the National Rifle Association focused their efforts on lobbying, in the belief that litigation was too risky.
"Virtually all the decisions that addressed the Second Amendment were styled United States v. Somebody," says Mr. Gura. "'Somebody' was a crack dealer, a bank robber -- some lowlife who had made a spurious Second Amendment claim as part of a package of desperate appeals." Faced with these sorts of cases, almost every federal appeals court had desultorily endorsed the collective rights view.
That changed in 2001 with the case of Emerson v. U.S. A federal grand jury had indicted a Texas man for possessing a pistol while under a restraining order not to threaten his estranged wife. The trial judge dismissed the charges on Second Amendment grounds. The Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the indictment, but held that the Second Amendment does protect an individual right.
"For the first time ever," says Mr. Gura, "we had a clear, concise, intelligent examination of the Second Amendment with a true analysis of the document, and the conclusion was that it secured an individual right." What's more, "with Emerson we had, for the first time, a circuit split" -- a disagreement among appellate courts over how to interpret the amendment.
The government was not about to appeal Emerson, for it had prevailed in reinstating the indictment. But the circuit split made it likely that the high court would take up the Second Amendment question sooner or later. The danger, Mr. Gura says, was that the argument would be made by "some pro se lunatic criminal" or a defense lawyer focused on exonerating his client rather than vindicating the Constitution.
The case that became D.C. v. Heller was the brainchild of three lawyers at a pair of libertarian organizations, the Cato Institute and the Institute for Justice. All were busy with other matters, so they hired Mr. Gura. "Alan was willing to work for subsistence wages," Cato's Robert Levy tells me, "in return for which he got a commitment from me that if the case went anywhere, it would be his baby. It turned out that that commitment was very important."
Mr. Gura says he set out "to do a careful, strategic litigation on the issue." One court that had not yet taken a position on the Second Amendment's meaning was the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. As it happened, the nation's capital had the most restrictive gun law in the country: a total ban on handguns, and a requirement that shotguns and rifles be kept disassembled or locked within the home.
To challenge the law, Mr. Gura says, "it was very important for us to pick decent, law-abiding people . . . . We consciously wanted to have plaintiffs from across the demographic spectrum in Washington, D.C. We wanted all manner of diversity, because it's important -- people want to see that you are arguing for a right that is held by ordinary people."
Mr. Gura tells me his clients' stories: "Shelly Parker . . . is an African-American lady who moved to a part of Capitol Hill that was improving, but apparently not fast enough. [She] would call the police, get the neighbors involved, to try to get the drug dealers off the street. The drug dealers figured out fairly quickly what the source of their problem was and started harassing her, subjecting her to all kinds of threats, vandalism and so on. . . .
"Dick Heller is a special police officer of the District of Columbia . . . . When we started this suit, he was guarding -- with a gun -- the Federal Judicial Center on Capitol Hill . . . . But Mr. Heller was not allowed to have a gun in his own home for self-defense. . . .
"Tom Palmer is a Cato scholar, a gay man who had previously, in California, fended off a hate crime using a firearm that he happened to have on him. He is alive today, or at least avoided serious injury, because he was able to have access to a gun when he needed it. . . .
"Gillian St. Lawrence is a mortgage broker in Georgetown. . . . [She had] a lawfully registered shotgun, but . . . had to always keep that shotgun unloaded and disassembled, or bound by trigger lock. There was no exception for home self-defense. . . . Of course, she asserted the right to have a functional firearm. If you're allowed to have guns, you're allowed to have guns that actually work as such. We're gratified that both the D.C. Circuit and the Supreme Court agreed with us on that proposition." They did -- but it was close. The circuit-court panel that ruled in his clients' favor split 2-1.
When the case reached the Supreme Court, Mr. Levy says he came under pressure to replace the young Mr. Gura, who had never argued a case before the high court, with a veteran litigator like Ted Olson, Ken Starr or Miguel Estrada. No dice, Mr. Levy replied. He had a commitment, and besides, Mr. Gura "had been immersed in this issue for 5½ years . . . so he knew the material cold."
The results speak for themselves. All nine justices agreed that the Second Amendment established an individual right. But four dissenters offered an interpretation of that right so cramped as to render it a nullity.
"My biggest surprise is that it was 5-4," Mr. Gura says. "I thought the case was much stronger than 5-4. . . . However, I'll take the five and be very happy with that."
The court's close division meant that Mr. Gura needed the vote of Anthony Kennedy. Most court-watchers consider him the least predictable justice, but not Mr. Gura: "I received a lot of grief from people about Justice Kennedy going into the argument. We were told that we were not responsible, gambling on the views of this one justice who might be completely inscrutable and unpredictable. . . .
"Justice Kennedy did not trouble me all that much. The fact is that if you look at Justice Kennedy's voting pattern, the cases where he tends to disappoint the so-called conservative bloc -- in almost all those cases, Justice Kennedy sides with a claim of an individual right being held by a person against the government, whether that is in the abortion context, or whether that's in the context of intimate sexual relations, whether it's the habeas case in Guantanamo Bay."
One key unresolved question in D.C. v. Heller is whether it limits the states as well as the federal government. The Bill of Rights originally restrained only Congress, but under the "incorporation" doctrine, the Supreme Court has held that the 14th Amendment protects most constitutional rights against state encroachment. Because the capital is a federal district, its local government is a creation of the U.S. Congress. Heller gave no reason to think incorporation doesn't apply, but further litigation will be necessary to settle the question.
Nor does Heller settle which restrictions are constitutional and which are not. Justice Scalia wrote that "nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt" on laws against possession of firearms by felons or the mentally ill or in "sensitive places" like schools or government buildings, or laws regulating commerce in firearms. That's fine with Mr. Gura, but many laws currently on the books fall somewhere between these uncontroversial provisions and D.C.'s onerous restrictions.
These questions will be sorted out in litigation to come. Mr. Gura's first stop: Chicago, which has a handgun ban identical to Washington's and burdensome registration requirements for long guns.
The Chicago lawsuit was "ready to go" when the Supreme Court decided Heller on June 26. "I looked at the opinion," Mr. Gura says, "and I called my counsel in Chicago and said, 'Yeah, looks good.'" The next day another lawsuit was filed, challenging the ban on handguns in San Francisco's public housing projects. Among the plaintiffs: the National Rifle Association. Thanks to Mr. Gura's efforts, the NRA is no longer gun-shy about going to court.
Mr. Taranto, a member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board, writes the Best of the Web Today column for OpinionJournal.com.
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http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2008/0...our-guns-away/
September 5, 2008, 2:38 pm
Obama: ‘I’m Not Going to Take Your Guns Away’
Christopher Cooper reports from Duryea, Pa., on the presidential race.
The Obama campaign talks a lot about new ideas and expanding the political map, but in the swing state of Pennsylvania, which the campaign has focused on almost exclusively since the Democratic convention, old-school issues still rise to the fore.
The latest example came Friday during a small political event at SCHOTT North America Inc., a glass factory in Duryea, Pa., where even a hand-picked crowd threw Barack Obama a curve ball.
A woman in the crowd told Obama she had “heard a rumor” that he might be planning some sort of gun ban upon being elected president. Obama trotted out his standard policy stance, that he had a deep respect for the “traditions of gun ownership” but favored measures in big cities to keep guns out of the hands of “gang bangers and drug dealers’’ in big cities “who already have them and are shooting people.”
“If you’ve got a gun in your house, I’m not taking it,’’ Obama said. But the Illinois senator could still see skeptics in the crowd, particularly on the faces of several men at the back of the room.
So he tried again. “Even if I want to take them away, I don’t have the votes in Congress,’’ he said. “This can’t be the reason not to vote for me. Can everyone hear me in the back? I see a couple of sportsmen back there. I’m not going to take away your guns.’’
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When seconds count, the cops are just minutes away.
I carry a gun because a cop is too heavy.
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Much of the case against private firearm ownership is made via loaded terms with little empiric meaning. "Assault weapons," "junk guns," "Saturday night specials," and recently "disposable AK 47s," are all terms that defy meaningful definition. "Gun show loophole" is one of the more recent terms that fit this pattern; a new study suggests that this boogeyman also is little evident when the evidence is examined.
Article follows:
Gun shows do not increase homicides or suicides
BY JARED WADLEY
October 1, 2008
EMAIL | PRINT | RESPOND
A new study finds no evidence that gun shows lead to substantial increases in either gun-related homicides or suicides.
The University of Michigan and University of Maryland study also shows that tighter regulation of gun shows does not appear to reduce the number of firearms-related deaths.
"We believe that this analysis makes an important contribution to understanding the influence of gun shows, the regulation of which is arguably the most active area of federal, state, and local firearms policy," said Brian Jacob, a professor at the University of Michigan's Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy.
"To our knowledge, this is the first study that directly examines the impact of gun shows on gun-related deaths."
Jacob wrote the study with co-authors Mark Duggan and Randi Hjalmarsson from the University of Maryland.
The researchers analyzed data from Texas and California, chosen because they are the nation's two most populated states, have large numbers of gun shows, and are at opposite ends of the spectrum regarding gun show regulation. California has some of the most aggressive gun show regulations, including background checks for all gun show purchasers and a 10-day waiting period to obtain the firearm. Texas has no similar regulations.
Data came from the dates and locations of more than 3,400 gun shows, and firearm-related deaths from 1994 to 2004. More than 105,000 homicides and suicides were reported in the two states during the 11-year period.
To determine the impact of gun shows, the authors traced the number of gun-related deaths in ZIP codes close to where gun shows took place, looking at how the number of deaths changed leading up to and following the shows. Researchers looked at the gun-related deaths in the weeks immediately after gun shows and actually found a small decline in the number of homicides following shows in Texas.
"The absence of gun show regulations does not increase the number of gun-related deaths as proponents of these regulations suggest," said Jacob, director of its Center for Local, State, and Urban Policy (CLOSUP).
The researchers offered two caveats to their analyses. The study focused on the geographic areas surrounding the gun shows, and would not capture the effect when weapons were transported more than 25 miles away. In addition, the data tracked the effects only up to four weeks after the gun shows, which would exclude later gun-related deaths.
Jared Wadley is a writer for the University of Michigan News Service
http://michigantoday.umich.edu/2008/10/gunshow.php?tr=y&auid=4120554
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A new study for the most part confirms John Lott's "more guns, less crime" thesis, and calls into serious question the only intervening study that found otherwise. The piece is very statistically dense; abstract and conclusion follow:
Carlisle e. Moody and Thomas B. Marvell
abstract
“Shall issue” right-to-carry concealed weapons laws require authorities to
issue concealed-weapons permits, allowing the permit holder to carry a concealed
handgun, to anyone who applies, unless the applicant has a criminal record or a
history of mental illness. The shall-issue laws are state laws, applicable to all coun-
ties within the state.3 In contrast, states with “may issue” laws allow considerable
discretion to the authorities. In may-issue states, authorities typically require that
the applicant demonstrate a particular need for a concealed weapons permit, and
self-defense usually is not deemed sufficient. Consequently, shall-issue states are
much more permissive of individual freedom to carry concealed handguns.
In 1997 John Lott and David Mustard published, “Crime, Deterrence and
Right-to-Carry Concealed Handguns” in the Journal of Legal Studies. They found that
shall-issue states had lower violent crime rates, presumably because the laws result
in more people carrying concealed weapons. Criminals might be deterred by the
greater likelihood of others being armed, and of arms being concealed. Lott and
Mustard’s article created a furor and the debate continues. Much of this debate takes
place in op-ed columns, letters to editors, internet chat rooms, and web logs. In this
article we concentrate on the academic debate. We review the main threads of the
discussion in the literature and extend the debate with our own statistical analyses. In
particular, we extend the investigation of influential work in Stanford Law Review by
Ian Ayres and John J. Donohue III (2003a, 2003b), who, contrary to Lott and Mus-
tard, claim to find that shall-issue laws actually lead to an overall increase in crime.
The new statistical analysis contained in the present article finds that shall issue laws
are generally beneficial. Purists in statistical analysis object with some cause to some
of methods employed both by Ayres and Donohue, by us, and by the literature in
general. But the new investigation presented here upgrades Ayres and Donohue in
a few significant ways, so, at least until the next study comes along, our paper should
neutralize Ayres and Donohue’s “more guns, more crime” conclusion.
are generally beneficial. Purists in statistical analysis object with some cause to some
of methods employed both by Ayres and Donohue, by us, and by the literature in
general. But the new investigation presented here upgrades Ayres and Donohue in
a few significant ways, so, at least until the next study comes along, our paper should
neutralize Ayres and Donohue’s “more guns, more crime” conclusion.
suMMary and ConClusion
Many articles have been published finding that shall-issue laws reduce crime.
Only one article, by Ayres and Donohue who employ a model that combines a
dummy variable with a post-law trend, claims to find that shall-issue laws increase
crime. However, the only way that they can produce the result that shall-issue laws
increase crime is to confine the span of analysis to five years. We show, using their
own estimates, that if they had extended their analysis by one more year, they
would have concluded that these laws reduce crime. Since most states with shall-
issue laws have had these laws on the books for more than five years, and the law
will presumably remain on the books for some time, the only relevant analysis
extends beyond five years. We extend their analysis by adding three more years
of data, control for the effects of crack cocaine, control for dynamic effects, and
correct the standard errors for clustering. We find that there is an initial increase
in crime due to passage of the shall-issue law that is dwarfed over time by the
decrease in crime associated with the post-law trend. These results are very similar
to those of Ayres and Donohue, properly interpreted.
The modified Ayres and Donohue model finds that shall-issue laws
significantly reduce murder and burglary across all the adopting states. These laws
appear to significantly increase assault, and have no net effect on rape, robbery,
larceny, or auto theft. However, in the long run only the trend coefficients matter.
We estimate a net benefit of $450 million per year as a result of the passage of
these laws. We also estimate that, up through 2000, there was a cumulative overall
net benefit of these laws of $28 billion since their passage. We think that there
is credible statistical evidence that these laws lower the costs of crime. But at
the very least, the present study should neutralize any “more guns, more crime”
thinking based on Ayres and Donohue’s work in the Stanford Law Review.
We acknowledge that, especially in light of the methodological issues of
the literature in general, the magnitudes derived from our analysis of crime statistics
and the supposed costs of crime might be dwarfed by other considerations in
judging the policy issue. Some might contend that allowing individuals to carry a
concealed weapon is a moral or cultural bad. Others might contend that greater
liberty is a moral or cultural good. All we are confident in saying is that the evidence,
such as it is, seems to support the hypothesis that the shall-issue law is generally
beneficial with respect to its overall long run effect on crime.
http://www.econjournalwatch.org/pdf/MoodyMarvellCommentSeptember2008.pdf
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Putting the toothpaste back in the tube is difficult:
http://transsylvaniaphoenix.blogspot.com/2008/05/british-called-they-want-their-guns.html
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http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Read.aspx?ID=4227
"Yes We Can . . . Ban Guns"--Obama Announces Gun Ban Agenda Before The Final Vote Count Is In
Friday, November 07, 2008
Senator Barack Obama's presidential campaign slogan, "the audacity of hope," should have instead been "the audacity of deceit." After months of telling the American people that he supports the Second Amendment, and only hours after being declared the president-elect, the Obama transition team website announced an agenda taken straight from the anti-gun lobby--four initiatives designed to ban guns and drive law-abiding firearm manufacturers and dealers out of business:
"Making the expired federal assault weapons ban permanent." Perhaps no other firearm issue has been more dishonestly portrayed by gun prohibitionists. Notwithstanding their predictions that the ban's expiration in 2004 would bring about the end of civilization, for the last four years the nation's murder rate has been lower than anytime since the mid-1960s. Studies for Congress, the Congressional Research Service, the National Institute of Justice, the National Academy of Sciences, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have found no evidence that gun prohibition or gun control reduces crime. Guns that were affected by the ban are used in only a tiny fraction of violent crime-about 35 times as many people are murdered without any sort of firearm (knives, bare hands, etc.), as with "assault weapons." Obama says that "assault weapons" are machine guns that "belong on foreig n battlefields," but that is a lie; the guns are only semi-automatic, and they are not used by a military force anywhere on the planet.
"Repeal the Tiahrt Amendment." The amendment--endorsed by the Fraternal Order of Police--prohibits the release of federal firearm tracing information to anyone other than a law enforcement agency conducting a bona fide criminal investigation. Anti-gun activists oppose the restriction, because it prevents them from obtaining tracing information and using it in frivolous lawsuits against law-abiding firearm manufacturers. Their lawsuits seek to obtain huge financial judgments against firearm manufacturers when a criminal uses a gun to inflict harm, even though the manufacturers have complied with all applicable laws.
"Closing the gun show loophole." There is no "loophole." Under federal law, a firearm dealer must conduct a background check on anyone to whom he sells a gun, regardless of where the sale takes place. A person who is not a dealer may sell a gun from his personal collection without conducting a check. Gun prohibitionists claim that many criminals obtain guns from gun shows, though the most recent federal survey of convicted felons put the figure at only 0.7 percent. They also claim that non-dealers should be required to conduct checks when selling guns at shows, but the legislation they support goes far beyond imposing that lone requirement. In fact, anti-gun members of Congress voted against that limited measure, holding out for a broader bill intended to drive shows out of business.
"Making guns in this country childproof." "Childproof" is a codeword for a variety of schemes designed to prevent the sale of firearms by imposing impossible or highly expensive design requirements, such as biometric shooter-identification systems. While no one opposes keeping children safe, the fact is that accidental firearm-related deaths among children have decreased 86 percent since 1975, even as the numbers of children and guns have risen dramatically. Today, the chances of a child being killed in a firearm accident are less than one in a million.
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How the Second Amendment Was Restored
The inside story of how a gang of libertarian lawyers made constitutional history
Brian Doherty | Decemember 2008 Print Edition
On the last date of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2008 spring session, justices declared by a 5-4 decision in D.C. v. Heller that, yes, the Second Amendment does secure an individual right to keep and bear arms. With that, the high court voided the District of Columbia’s extreme regulations on gun ownership, which had amounted in practice to a complete ban on any usable weapon for self-protection, even in the home.
In retrospect, D.C. v. Heller seems almost inevitable, because of shifting public and academic attitudes toward gun rights. But victory came only after a protracted struggle, with many pitfalls along the way. It was pulled off by a small gang of philosophically dedicated lawyers—not “gun nuts” in any stereotypical sense, but thoughtful libertarians who believe Second Amendment liberties are a vital part of our free republic. Together they consciously crafted a solid, clean civil rights case to overturn the most onerous and restrictive set of gun regulations in the country. In the process, they set the stage for further legal challenges to other firearms restrictions from coast to coast.
Someone was going to reach the Supreme Court with a challenge to firearms regulation. In the 2001 Fifth Circuit case U.S. v. Emerson, a federal appeals court for the first time declared unequivocally that the Second Amendment, despite containing the word “militia” in its preamble, did indeed protect an individual right to bear arms. Though groundbreaking in the judicial system, that individual rights interpretation was already dominant within the legal academy, after decades of scholarship chipped away at the once-preeminent “collective rights” view that the amendment only protected either a state’s right to maintain a militia, or an individual’s rights within the context of militia service.
The Emerson decision rippled beyond the courts. On November 9, 2001, then–Attorney General John Ashcroft sent a memo to all U.S. attorneys praising the case for how it “undertook a scholarly and comprehensive review of the pertinent legal materials and specifically affirmed that the Second Amendment ‘protects the right of individuals, including those not then actually a member of any militia or engaged in active military service or training, to privately possess and bear their own firearms.’ ”
Gun rights were on the rise politically as well. Democrats lost Congress in 1994, and the White House in 2000, in part because of a backlash against the 1994 assault weapon ban. In the 21st century, the party no longer makes gun control a major issue. On the state level, laws making it easier for citizens to carry weapons have also been proliferating over the past two decades; the number of states with concealed-weapon “shall issue” standards (objective criteria with little or no bureaucratic discretion) now stands at a de facto 37, up from just eight in 1986.
That was the legal, political, and social environment in which Heller was launched in 2003. “The timing was ripe,” says attorney Robert Levy, then a senior fellow at the libertarian Cato Institute (and now its chairman) and the man who financed and spearheaded the case.
Yet Heller was almost derailed on a series of occasions, sometimes by the very people who cherish gun rights and constitutional protections the most, including the National Rifle Association (NRA). Many lacked confidence that the Court was ready to catch up with the legal academy. In the hour of opportunity, many blinked. Victory over these self-doubts provide a powerful reminder that, as Barry Goldwater reminded us, sometimes an overly fearful moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue, and that even decades of bad policy and bad political philosophy can turn around with smart, tenacious efforts.
Parker Becomes Heller
The inevitable post-Emerson challenge to gun restrictions could well have come from a radically different point of view. Various Washington, D.C., public defenders, for example, were trying to apply Emerson to reduce the prison sentences of their clients—street criminals who typically had a whole host of charges hanging over their heads, not otherwise law-abiding citizens seeking to arm themselves in their home.
So, prodded on by suggestions from a young lawyer named Clark Neily from the libertarian public interest law firm the Institute for Justice, Robert Levy assembled a team that included his Cato colleague Gene Healy (who dropped out before the case reached the Supreme Court), Neily himself, and the private-practice attorney who eventually argued the case in front of the Court, a Virginia libertarian named Alan Gura. Levy’s team then went searching for the ideal clients.
D.C. was the best place to start litigating the Second Amendment. The district is not a state but a federal enclave under direct control of Congress (though it has its own government with home-rule leeway), so lawyers could sidestep the contentious and still-unsolved issue of whether the Second Amendment applied to the states via the Fourteenth Amendment, which stipulates that “No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.…nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” That amendment has for the past half-century or so been interpreted to apply the provisions of most of the Bill of Rights to state and local government actions.
Besides, the city had the most ridiculously severe gun laws in the country. According to D.C. Codes 7-2502.01, 7-2502.02, 7-2507.02, and 22-4504 and 4515, it was illegal to have a handgun without registering it, and you couldn’t register it if you didn’t already own it before the law was passed in 1976; it was illegal to have your long gun in the home in any condition other than unloaded and disassembled or trigger-locked; and if you had a registered handgun, even carrying it around your house could net you a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
After much searching by Levy’s team, six plaintiffs were selected. They filed the case on February 10, 2003. Back then, it wasn’t the Heller case, but the Parker case, named after original lead plaintiff Shelly Parker.
Parker, a black woman, had the potential to become a new kind of civil rights icon, standing up not just for the right to be treated fairly by other people but to take control over her own life and safety. She had a dramatic story of the type that should make everyone this side of Sarah Brady want to
overnight her an out-of-state mail-order handgun.
In February 2002, Parker, a former nurse now working in software design, moved to a neighborhood on the northeastern edge of Capitol Hill rife with tenacious drug gangs. She wanted her neighborhood to be a safer and more comfortable place for law-abiding citizens, and so made a nuisance of herself to local drug dealers, walking the streets as a one-woman citizen patrol, calling cops when she saw illegal activity, and installing a security camera for her yard.
By June of that year, Parker’s car window had been broken, her security camera had been stolen, and a gang lookout rammed a car into her back fence. When the first news stories about the case appeared, one young drug dealer, physically imposing at over seven feet tall, allegedly shook her gate one night, shouting, “Bitch, I’ll kill you! I live on this block, too.” Parker thought it would be a good thing for her to have a firearm to protect herself in her home; D.C. law forbade her from doing so.
But, like four of the other original six plaintiffs, Parker was found by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the D.C.Circuit to lack legal “standing”—that is, actually suffering a direct injury under the law legitimate enough for her to legally challenge it. By March 2007, Dick Heller was the only plaintiff left. As many involved with the case would admit without wanting to stress it too much, Heller was probably the plaintiff they wanted least as a Second Amendment poster boy.
Heller isn’t a sweet lady trying to turn around a dodgy neighborhood; he’s an outspoken ideological activist seeking to push the federal government back within its constitutional bounds, and therefore (his lawyers fretted) potentially off-putting to judges, media, and citizens alike. One of his best friends, a thick, intense, walrus-mustachioed man named Dane vonBreichenruchardt, runs a small-scale political action group called the Bill of Rights Foundation, appears with Heller at most press conferences and events.
The best hook about Heller was his day job, as a trained and licensed special police officer contracted by a private firm to provide security services for the District of Columbia. For years, he carried a gun every day at the Thurgood Marshall Federal Judicial Center, yet he still had to turn over his sidearm and bullets at the end of each workday and go home, defenseless.
The city could hardly maintain that it was inherently unsafe for Dick Heller to possess or handle a weapon, since he does it every day as part of his job, and is deputized to do so by the city itself, background checks and all.
Heller knew his lawyers weren’t comfortable with him openly discussing many of his anti-government enthusiasms. When the cameras or notepads were in front of him, he wanted to talk about “the insanity of it, the overreach of government relegating all of us to second-class citizenship. The government grants us a gun then takes it away, says your life is not worth spit, but says ‘take care of us 9-5.’ That’s where I developed the idea that we truly are second-class citizens. How is that any different than Moscow?”
And that, he acknowledges, “is when the lawyers would go like this.” He makes a pained and annoyed face. “ ‘Moscow’ and ‘communist’—they didn’t want to hear that yet—until June! They said after the decision comes down, go for it. They almost wrote it down for me: ‘I just want to defend my own life in my own home.’ ”
The NRA v. Heller
The Heller case quickly found a powerful opponent in the National Rifle Association. This surprises nearly every layman I discuss the case with, most of whom assume the NRA was behind the lawsuit in the first place. The Parker lawyers received backroom visits from allies of the NRA before their case was filed, discouraging them from going forward. The Supreme Court (which still had Sandra Day O’Conner back then) would not reliably deliver a victory, they argued, and an authoritative statement from the Supremes that the Second Amendment did not protect an individual right could prove devastating to the long-term cause.
This was an intellectually respectable objection, the Levy team thought, but ultimately too fearful. If no one would fight for the Second Amendment qua Second Amendment in a relevant case, then its supposed paladins were as complicit in its irrelevance as were the most rabid partisans for the idea that the Second Amendment only applied to militias and is thus a dead letter.
“The second problem the NRA had with our case was territorial,” Gura says. “They didn’t want something like this going on that they didn’t have their hands in.” In fact, in April 2003, less than two months from Parker’s filing in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, a new lawsuit challenging D.C.’s gun laws, Seegars v. Ashcroft, was filed with the backing of the NRA and its longtime Second Amendment legal eagle Stephen Halbrook in charge.
As per then-standard NRA practice, Halbrook offered the court a menu of options to choose from to overthrow D.C. gun laws, hoping one of them might work even if a direct Second Amendment challenge did not. Among them were claims that Congress had only empowered D.C. to create for itself regulations that were “usual and reasonable,” and that D.C.’s gun laws, being the most severe ones in the nation, were therefore unusual and unreasonable.
Unlike the Levy team, Halbrook and the NRA chose to sue not only Washington, D.C., but the U.S. Department of Justice. The DOJ is a significantly more formidable opponent than the District of Columbia. To add insult to injury, because of their unease with Levy and his comparatively inexperienced crew, the NRA team used Seegars as an excuse to try to scuttle Parker altogether by taking over the case, through the legal gambit of “consolidation.” That’s when two cases that are asking courts to decide on essentially the same matter can be combined, whether or not one of the parties really wants it—a hostile takeover of the litigation, as it were. The consolidation request, made to the court in April 2003, was denied.
Then in January 2004, at the D.C. District Court, all but one Seegars plaintiff—a woman with a registered shotgun contesting the trigger-lock aspect of D.C.’s laws—were denied standing. The last remaining plaintiff lost the case on a basic “doesn’t belong to a militia” argument. The Seegars team appealed, bringing their case into the appeals process before Parker had even been considered at the District Court. It wasn’t until March 31, 2004 that that court dismissed Parker, basically on the grounds that those plaintiffs weren’t in a militia, either. The Levy team expected this initial loss, but appealed, determined to fight the case all the way through the appeals process.
Because the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decided that the issues in both cases were essentially the same, they halted the appeals progress of Parker, at D.C.’s request, pending resolution of Seegars. Then in a February 2005 decision, Seegars was wrecked on the rock of standing, for D.C. Circuit-specific peculiarities explained further below.
The NRA also harmed Parker through its decision to bring DOJ into the case. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, in coming down with its Parker decision on March 9, 2007, booted five of the original plaintiffs off the case, for the same reason of standing that the five Seegars plaintiffs were all tossed away. The standing argument had been introduced to the case by the Justice Department; D.C. hadn’t thought of it on its own.
Sure, Parker and her compatriots might think that a core, fundamental constitutional right was being denied them. But by the D.C. Circuit’s standard, they had suffered no specific injury such that they had standing to sue.
The D.C. Circuit has a peculiar position on standing, more stringent than in any other circuit. The 1997 case Navegar v. U.S., coincidentally involving a gun manufacturer, established that plaintiffs must, in the language of D.C.’s filing to dismiss the plaintiffs in Parker, “demonstrate a threat of prosecution that is ‘credible and immediate,’ or imminent, and ‘not merely abstract or speculative.’ ” More or less, D.C. said that since the plaintiffs might be able to get away with breaking the gun laws, they had no standing to challenge those laws.
How is it that Heller alone survived the standing challenge? Even before the Parker case was officially filed, his friend Dane vonBreichenruchardt knew Heller was involved and intending to be a plaintiff—it was vonBreichenruchardt, who already knew Levy, who had introduced Heller to Levy.
VonBreichenruchardt had been a plaintiff in a previous case against certain regulations affecting the operations of nonprofits, rules that he felt amounted to a prior restraint on his First Amendment rights. He saw his case dismissed for lack of standing, for various reasons, one of which was that since he had not actually been punished for violating the law, it could be said that his claim that the regulations in question violated his rights was merely speculative.
So vonBreichenruchardt encouraged Heller to fill out a form to register one of the handguns Heller owned (apparently stored outside the district), even though he knew there was no way the city would actually accept the illegal pistol.
“It makes all the difference in the world that this one guy went down and filled out an absolutely meaningless piece of paper which you knew in advance was a futile act,” Neily says. “It was not intentional on the part of Alan, Bob, and myself, but it was intentional on the part of Dick and Dane, and it was very important that Dane had that insight and did that.” Heller slid in because he had a permit denied: a clear injury with a paper trail.
Standing wasn’t the only issue the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decided on March 9, 2007. The other action judges took that day proved to be better news for the Parker team. In a two-one vote, the three-judge panel sent the case back to District Court with an order: Grant summary judgment to Heller. Translation: Heller wins.
The decision was a glorious victory for the Levy team and for the Second Amendment. Judge Laurence H. Silberman, in his majority opinion, hit all the right points. He decided that the “people” referred to in the Amendment meant the people, that is, all of us as individuals. He decided that “bear arms” had more than just a military meaning in the idiom of the Founding era.
Silberman’s decision interpreted the 1939 Supreme Court case U.S. v. Miller, the dominant precedent regarding the Second Amendment, to say that cases hinged on the type of weapon the right affected, and whether the weapon had potential militia use, not on whether persons claiming the right were themselves in a militia. The judge did not accept D.C.’s claim that any constitutional infringement was mitigated because the city might not punish a long-gun owner for loading and using his weapon in self-defense in defiance of the letter of the law. “Judicial leniency,” he wrote, “cannot make up for the unreasonable restriction of a right.”
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Heller at the Supreme Court
After some hesitation—causing it to miss the initial filing deadline—the District of Columbia appealed to the Supreme Court. The NRA was simultaneously pushing a new federal law that would have mooted the newly renamed Heller case by overturning the city’s anti-gun laws. Levy lobbied against the measure, arguing that a Supreme Court victory would be more permanent and more important to the whole country than just overturning D.C.’s restrictions. That bill did not pass in 2007, and the Heller case was taken up by the Supreme Court in November of that year. Only at that point, after years of obstruction, did the NRA became highly cooperative, putting together a significant amicus brief endorsed by the majority of both houses of Congress and by Vice President Dick Cheney.
Chris Cox, head of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, is happy with how his organization’s relationship to Heller turned out. Sure, he admits, there was conflict along the way. “In my experience, you get a bunch of lawyers in the room and you’ll probably not have agreement,” he says. “There was concern prior to [ John] Roberts and [Samuel] Alito even being on the Court as to whether or not the timing was right. It all worked out. Was it lucky? Was it strategy? I’ll let other people answer that. But I applaud Alan [Gura] and his team. The victory was ultimately due to a lot of hard work by a lot of people for decades, certainly including the NRA, and in the end the Second Amendment is stronger.”
At the oral arguments before the Supreme Court, decades of intellectual debate about the meaning of the Second Amendment came springing to life. D.C.’s lawyer Walter Dellinger started off by proposing a version of the Second Amendment which, while claiming it protects an individual right, but only if that individual is participating in the common defense in the form of a militia, in essence means that, no, the Second Amendment really doesn’t mean a thing in practical terms to Americans today in terms of home defense.
Chief Justice John Roberts prodded him on why the Framers said “the people” if they meant “the militia.” Dellinger said, well, the terms were really congruent, so the right applied to all the people but only for a militia purpose. For example, Dellinger offered, a private citizen might have a cause of action under the Second Amendment if the federal government interfered with his state’s right to form a militia.
Dellinger was only a few minutes into his presentation when Justice Anthony Kennedy—considered to be the swing vote, in this case as in many others—buoyed the Levy team by suggesting the Second Amendment “supplemented” the militia “by saying there’s a general right to bear arms quite without reference to the militia either way,” and talking of how the Founding Fathers’ attitudes about guns were born from a frontier experience, with worries about personal, not merely civil and political, defense from hostile crooks, Indians, wolves, and grizzly bears.
At the same time, Kennedy made it clear that he believed the Second Amendment right to bear arms was, like other rights in the Constitution, subject to regulation. Even with the historical examples from early America and England, he saw that by some of those laws, “You couldn’t conceal a gun and you also couldn’t carry it, but yet you had a right to have it.”
Dellinger argued that the legal right in D.C. to own (yet not, by the letter of the law, ever use in the home) long guns obviated any constitutional difficulties that might exist in the handgun ban. Chief Justice Roberts, straight out of the Heller team’s playbook, made the First Amendment analogy, asking Dellinger: Would it be constitutionally acceptable for a municipality to ban books as long as newspapers—a viable substitute source of expression—were still legal?
When it was Gura’s turn, he was asked to explain the meaning of the militia reference. He said it was to describe a purpose of the right of the people that the Amendment protected. He angered some in the hardcore gun rights movement when he concluded that the weapons protected by the Amendment should be ones that combined a militia purpose and a normal civilian purpose, since people were expected to supply them from their own everyday collection of weapons they typically used. Gura did not want to be pressed into arguing that machine guns should have unlimited Second Amendment protection.
He did ably defend the idea that personal self-defense was built into weapons rights during the Founding era. He granted that reasonable licensing doesn’t necessarily violate the Second Amendment. He also granted that empirical considerations about such matters as murder rates could play into policymakers’ decisions about what made for a reasonable gun regulation—but added that the very purpose of a constitutional right is to make sure that not everything is up for grabs just because a legislature thinks regulations are “reasonable.”
Many Internet gun-rights activists accused Gura of selling out on the machine gun issue. “We wanted to win,” Gura responds. “And you win constitutional litigation by framing issues in as narrow a manner as possible. I could not tell the justices honestly that I hadn’t thought about machine guns. ‘Gee, I don’t know, maybe…’ That’s a bunch of crap. I would have lost credibility, it would have been obviously a lie and I’m not going to lie to the Court, and I would have lost the case.”
Heller Wins
Justice Antonin Scalia’s majority opinion said everything that Gura said, and that a generation of Second Amendment scholars had been saying for decades. The Second Amendment protected an individual right. The prefatory clause did not restrict the operative one; the protected right went beyond militia service. The relevant contemporaneous debates and state constitutions at the time of the Founding supported this interpretation. The Miller precedent was about the type of weapon, not the people to whom the right accrued.
Still, the decision wasn’t everything devotees of gun rights might have hoped for. Scalia also wrote: “The Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.”
Heller, then, by no means settled the entire gun control debate. It did instantly generate a series of lawsuits, many sponsored by the NRA, against jurisdictions with gun bans similar to D.C.’s, including Chicago (hit with two suits) and three of its suburbs. Some Illinois towns have already rescinded their handgun restrictions. Washington, D.C., after months of foot-dragging that prompted Dick Heller to file another lawsuit against the city, has finally allowed its citizens to register, own, and keep loaded in the home both revolvers and semiautomatic handguns.
Still, most gun laws short of total bans will likely survive under the Heller standard, even if it is authoritatively established that the Second Amendment ruling in the case applies to state and local actions. In the near term at least, Heller will heat up the gun debate instead of ending it.
But the case was vitally important to American public policy. One, it normalized within constitutional law the notion that self-defense is a right. Guns can kill, to be sure. But the principle that Heller vindicated was one at the core of Western liberalism, that of self-defense, which is for life. Those who believe in a strong activist government generally do so because they fear the potential savagery of human social life. They just don’t seem to want, with gun control, to allow the individual to do anything about it.
The Heller case was a prime example of how calm, dedicated, and strategic thinking on the part of crusaders for smaller government can achieve real and (probably) lasting victories. Fighting against even those who should have been their staunchest allies, Levy and his team of libertarian lawyers watched the zeitgeist, crafted a smart (though risky) strategy, and won.
Our legal system and our Constitution allowed them to do something about D.C.’s gun laws, even as D.C.’s gun laws did not allow its citizens to do much about their own safety. Because this group of people acted to preserve the right to self-defense, the rest of America has seen affirmed at least the basics of that right. The contours of that right to self defense remain to be defined by others who choose to follow in Levy and his crew’s footsteps.
Senior Editor Brian Doherty is the author of Gun Control on Trial: Inside the Supreme Court Battle Over the Second Amendment, from which this is excerpted.
http://www.reason.com/news/show/129991.html
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[David Kopel, November 20, 2008 at 7:41pm] Trackbacks
Eric Holder on firearms policy:
Earlier this year, Eric Holder--along with Janet Reno and several other former officials from the Clinton Department of Justice--co-signed an amicus brief in District of Columbia v. Heller. The brief was filed in support of DC's ban on all handguns, and ban on the use of any firearm for self-defense in the home. The brief argued that the Second Amendment is a "collective" right, not an individual one, and asserted that belief in the collective right had been the consistent policy of the U.S. Department of Justice since the FDR administration. A brief filed by some other former DOJ officials (including several Attorneys General, and Stuart Gerson, who was Acting Attorney General until Janet Reno was confirmed)took issue with the Reno-Holder brief's characterization of DOJ's viewpoint.
But at the least, the Reno-Holder brief accurately expressed the position of the Department of Justice when Janet Reno was Attorney General and Eric Holder was Deputy Attorney General. At the oral argument before the Fifth Circuit in United States v. Emerson, the Assistant U.S. Attorney told the panel that the Second Amendment was no barrier to gun confiscation, not even of the confiscation of guns from on-duty National Guardsmen.
As Deputy Attorney General, Holder was a strong supporter of restrictive gun control. He advocated federal licensing of handgun owners, a three day waiting period on handgun sales, rationing handgun sales to no more than one per month, banning possession of handguns and so-called "assault weapons" (cosmetically incorrect guns) by anyone under age of 21, a gun show restriction bill that would have given the federal government the power to shut down all gun shows, national gun registration, and mandatory prison sentences for trivial offenses (e.g., giving your son an heirloom handgun for Christmas, if he were two weeks shy of his 21st birthday). He also promoted the factoid that "Every day that goes by, about 12, 13 more children in this country die from gun violence"--a statistic is true only if one counts 18-year-old gangsters who shoot each other as "children."(Sources: Holder testimony before House Judiciary Committee, Subcommitee on Crime, May 27,1999; Holder Weekly Briefing, May 20, 2000. One of the bills that Holder endorsed is detailed in my 1999 Issue Paper "Unfair and Unconstitutional.")
After 9/11, he penned a Washington Post op-ed, "Keeping Guns Away From Terrorists" arguing that a new law should give "the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms a record of every firearm sale." He also stated that prospective gun buyers should be checked against the secret "watch lists" compiled by various government entities. (In an Issue Paper on the watch list proposal, I quote a FBI spokesman stating that there is no cause to deny gun ownership to someone simply because she is on the FBI list.)
After the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the D.C. handgun ban and self-defense ban were unconstitutional in 2007, Holder complained that the decision "opens the door to more people having more access to guns and putting guns on the streets."
Holder played a key role in the gunpoint, night-time kidnapping of Elian Gonzalez. The pretext for the paramilitary invasion of the six-year-old's home was that someone in his family might have been licensed to carry a handgun under Florida law. Although a Pulitzer Prize-winning photo showed a federal agent dressed like a soldier and pointing a machine gun at the man who was holding the terrified child, Holder claimed that Gonzalez "was not taken at the point of a gun" and that the federal agents whom Holder had sent to capture Gonzalez had acted "very sensitively." If Mr. Holder believes that breaking down a door with a battering ram, pointing guns at children (not just Elian), and yelling "Get down, get down, we'll shoot" is example of acting "very sensitively," his judgment about the responsible use of firearms is not as acute as would be desirable for a cabinet officer who would be in charge of thousands and thousands of armed federal agents, many of them paramilitary agents with machine guns.
http://volokh.com/posts/1227228105.shtml
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One of my ongoing major annoyances is that few in the MSM and few in various legislatures know squat about firearms. Indeed, one of the reasons I think the MSM and politicians are held in sure low esteem is that just about everyone can think of some local gun guru they can call and get accurate firearm information from, a guru that the MSM and politicos, however, are unable to find. This leads to all sorts of assault weapon, Black Rhino bullet, disposable machine guns damnfoolishness appearing in what claim to be reputable sources of information.
In this instance, Obamaniacs appear to be trolling for dirt related to a constitutionally protected behavior, apparently utterly unaware that most firearms in the US are unregistered. Methinks they need to get out of DC and Chicago more often:
Is Owning a Gun More or Less Embarrassing Than Hiring an Illegal Alien?
Jacob Sullum | November 24, 2008, 3:29pm
Is it significant that the 63 questions would-be Obama appointees have to answer include a query about gun ownership? Question 59, which comes right after one about "any websites that feature you in either a personal or professional capacity" and right before one about the applicant's medical condition, reads:
Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also described how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.
Some Second Amendment advocates have taken offense at this question, which appears to be unprecedented and which they think reflects Obama's lack of enthusiasm for gun rights. But an Obama aide told Politico "the intent of the gun question is to determine legal permitting." In other words, just as the questions about "domestic help" do not imply that anyone who has ever paid someone to clean his house can forget about working in the Obama administration, the question about firearms does not mean gun owners are automatically disqualified. Obama's transition team just wants to make sure all legal niceties have been observed, so there aren't any embarrassing surprises.
Although that sounds plausible, there are many other things an applicant might possess that raise issues of legal compliance and of damages to others but are not specifically mentioned in the questionnaire, including cars, boats, pets, swimming pools, and trampolines. The selection of guns out of all the dangerous and/or regulated things people own is telling, I think, and suggests that gun ownership itself might be deemed an embarrassment, at least past a certain threshold. Note that the question assumes no one applying for a job in the Obama administration would own more than one gun. It also assumes gun-owning job candidates would be subject to registration requirements, which apply in only a small fraction of the country.
http://www.reason.com/blog/show/130241.html
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Misfiled, I suspect, but it does give one pause: there are a lotta civilians in my sphere far better equipped and far better trained than India's constabulary.
Cops just had 577 rifles, hadn't fired in 10 yrs
2 Dec 2008, 1203 hrs IST, Prafulla Marpakwar, TNN
MUMBAI: The state constabulary was grossly unprepared to deal with the worst-ever terror attacks on the metropolis because of an acute shortage of weapons and ammunition.
Official records show that for a force of well over 1.8 lakh, the home department procured a meagre 2,221 weapons — 577 for Mumbai, and 1,644 for the rest of Maharashtra.
‘‘Under the centrally sponsored modernisation programme, we purchased almost all types of weapons, but for a state like Maharashtra, the number of weapons was grossly inadequate ,’’ a senior official told TOI on Monday.
In the absence of a firing range and of ammunition for practice, members of the law enforcement agencies have not opened fire in the last ten years. ‘‘I’ve been in the police force for a long time, but I had no occasion to open fire for practice,’’ a senior inspector of police said.
As per the police manual, officials ranking from constable to assistant inspector get rifles with 30 rounds each, and those with the rank of police sub-inspector and above get revolvers, also with 30 rounds each.
Jawans with the State Reserve Police Force are given SLRs or self-loading rifles. In addition, AK-47 rifles have been given to officials posted in areas where there is Naxal activity, while officials on VIP security duty are armed with either revolvers or carbines.
The manual also prescribes mandatory training for all officials, especially shooting practice at the firing range. According to a senior IPS official, the norms prescribed in the manual now exist only on paper because of the acute shortage of ammunition for practice and the non-availability of a firing range.
As per the rules, every district should have a firing range exclusively for the police. But official records indicate that more than half the state’s districts have no independent firing range.
‘‘We have constables who have not opened fire even for practice ever since their recruitment,’’ the official said.
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Author Barrett Tillman has come up with some excellent additions to the Liberty Poll (http://www.gunlaws.com/the%20liberty%20poll.htm), aimed at those who would seek to take away our guns:
"Tell me why you think a woman should 'lie back and enjoy being raped' instead of shooting a rapist dead with the handgun in her handbag."
"Tell me why black Americans should submit to being lynched instead of shooting the lynch mob dead."
"Tell me why homophobes should be free to beat up homosexuals without the risk of being shot."
"Watch Schindler's List and tell me again why only the police and military should have guns."
"Tell me why you think police should be able to shoot an attacker to save their lives but I shouldn't."
"Tell me why I shouldn't have the best means of defending myself -- a semiauto firearm with a standard capacity magazine."
"Tell me why a woman's right to choose should not include weapon, mag size and ammunition."
"Tell me why you think I shouldn't be able to defend my life or my freedom."
"More than that, tell me why you should not have that right!
--
"A government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take away everything you have" -- Thomas Jefferson
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Nordyke (http://wiki.calgunsfoundation.org/in...ordyke_v._King) has been scheduled for oral arguments on 15 Jan 2009 before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in S.F., CA. Due to Heller, this case should incorporate the 2nd A to the states in the 9th circuit (incl CA and HI). This is a critically important case that, if it goes our way and many in the know believe it will, will be used to shoot down many anti-gun laws in CA and will be used to either loosen up our "May Issue" CCW system or force it to be replaced w/a "Shall Issue" CCW system. The next 5 years should be very exciting and good for CA gunnies!
Hopefully, pro-2nd A people in HI are also organizing to exploit this opportunity.
We expect the opinion to be published probably between April and Aug '09.
http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/s...d.php?t=135918
Be sure to regularly stop by:
http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/f...splay.php?f=71
for the latest info on CA gun laws/politics.
===============
To give others (incl Gabe), who may think CA is a lost cause, some idea of what we'll be going after Nordyke incorporation, the below is copied from (bold-ing added):
http://www.calguns.net/calgunforum/s...19#post1726119
Gene Hoffman is one of the alpha-dogs at Calguns.net and Calguns Foundation.
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Lots of confusion in this thread.
1. California is pretty unique in that it does not have a right to keep and bear arms in the State constitution. As such, the only thing (other than politicians getting unelected) that keeps California from seizing firearms is the Federal Second Amendment.
2. Heller states that the keeping of all non NFA firearms are protected by the Federal 2A and that bearing arms means to carry them loaded for confrontation, but that States are still free to regulate CCW. Heller made no ruling on whether the Federal 2A applies to the states but hinted that all the rulings that would say it doesn't aren't valid anymore.
3. Nordyke will be a 3-0 or 2-1 victory for the Alameda Gun Show at the 9th Circuit court of appeals. It will establish that there is a right to possess firearms to be able to sell them at otherwise state regulated gun shows on public property that isn't one of the classic prohibited areas (courts, prisons, city hall.) It will also be the first case in the US to find that there is a right of undefined scope to participate in the lawful commerce of firearms under the 2A. However, most importantly, it will rule that all State and local laws will be reviewed by the Federal Courts as potentially violating the 2A at intermediate or strict scrutiny.
After Nordyke, all California laws will be challengeable. Some are quicker and easier to file a new suit against and beat back than others. Here is the list of things that we're going to be able to get overturned in the order I bet we'll choose to attack them:
1. [CCW Reform.] CA Sheriffs denying a clean applicant because their CCW good cause isn't good enough. The logic is that even though states can regulate CCW, they can't make CCW may issue while banning loaded open carry as the combination of laws violates the right of the people to bear arms.
2. Subsequent waiting periods. A 10 day wait to acquire a firearm after one can show that one already owns a firearm has no rational basis. If I'm mad, suicidal, or homicidal, what good does a cooling off period do when I can just use the gun I already own?
3. Not Unsafe Roster. This is a bit harder as we need to let the facts that the new requirements (LCI, Mag Disco) are a defacto ban on new handguns coming into the state.
4. SB-23 Feature Ban. This one is unconstitutional in so many ways but we need to play the politics on it well. The rest of the nation will care deeply about this one as a win here ends all future Federal AWB speculation. I may also have this ranked too low in priority order but some things that are afoot may make overturning this moot in the short term - hence my downgrade.
5. Large-capacity magazine import ban. There are potentially interesting commerce clause issues with "offer for sale" in the export context. However, it's not clear that the rationing ammo argument can survive intermediate scrutiny - especially as we start to push for the "patrol officer" equivalent analysis under 2A/14A. The basic premise is that if a "patrol officer" is issued something by the State, then its very hard for the State to argue that that something is "dangerous and uncommon."
Each one of those is a case or legislation or both to get it fixed. The major difference is that we'll win all of them.
-Gene
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If you don't get the "CAl-erts" from CalNRA, you'll want to. http://calnra.com/
Also, if you don't know about www.calccw.com, you'll want to check them out. Most of them are based in OC and are VERY active in reigning in the new sheriff.
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Expect defeat at the trial court level, then the case moving the appellate levels for decissions that actually matter.
This is the dog & poly show right now. The Court that matters is in D.C.
http://www.chicagoguncase.com/
In October, shortly after we filed our Rule 16 motion (see Oct. 24 post below), the NRA filed similar motions in their companion case challenging Chicago’s handgun ban, as well as its case challenging Oak Park’s handgun ban. Although our cases do not perfectly overlap, the goal of all three Rule 16 motions in each case was the same: to seek an opinion from the Court that, as a matter of law, state and local governments are bound by the Second Amendment.
On Thursday, the District Court issued an opinion and order in the NRA cases, denying the motions. A similar opinion and order, adopting the Court’s rationale in the NRA cases, was entered in our case. The District Court ruled, essentially, that whatever the merits of our claims, it is bound by existing precedent holding that the Second Amendment does not apply to state and local governments. The order in our case denied not only our Rule 16 motion, but also our previously unresolved motion for summary judgment. A hearing is set in all three cases for December 9, to see where the matters now stand.
Although we would have preferred that the Court had ruled in our favor, we are not disappointed. From Day One, it was clear that this case would be decided conclusively on appeal. This development takes us one step closer toward the elimination of Chicago’s failed and unconstitutional gun ban, and for that, we are grateful.
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CULTURE & POLICY
Around the nation: Concealed carry in national parks
Last week, the Department of Interior adopted a new regulation that allows concealed weapons permit holders to carry their weapons into national parks if the state in which the park is located allows concealed carry. This is a significant change from the previous regulations, which prohibited the possession of loaded firearms in national parks. Indeed, the new recognition that there is a Second Amendment even in national parks is a step in the right direction. There is also a Tenth Amendment issue here -- that the laws of states prevail, even on federal land.
Although the NRA and sensible gun owners across the country welcomed this change, gun-control advocates reacted with their usual hysteria. Using the same apocalyptic exaggerations they trotted out (unsuccessfully) to oppose state concealed carry laws, the gun grabbers issued warnings of bedlam. Of course, their predictions of carnage never came true in states that have enacted concealed carry laws. To the contrary, crime dropped in these states. For the same reasons, national parks will not become the free-fire zones that the gun grabbers predict. Instead, law-abiding citizens now can defend themselves and their families against hostile predators -- human and animal -- that might threaten their lives.
Although the regulation takes effect before Obama takes office, his record shows his support of radical gun-control laws, and we expect an executive order undoing the regulation. During his tenure in the Illinois Senate and again in the U.S. Senate, Obama rarely saw a gun-control measure that he didn't support. He supported a ban on handguns; he voted in favor of a ban on virtually all semiautomatic rifles, pistols and shotguns; he favors registration and licensing; he opposes concealed carry. Yet he promises, "I believe in common-sense gun safety laws, and I believe in the Second Amendment. Lawful gun owners have nothing to fear. I said that throughout the campaign. I haven't indicated anything different during the transition. I think people can take me at my word." But a simple check of his "Change" Web site (under Crime and Law Enforcement) puts the lie to this promise.
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George Jonas: Guns don't kill people, terrorists do
Posted: December 13, 2008, 11:00 AM by Kelly McParland
George Jonas, Full Comment
The terrorist attacks in Mumbai last month claimed some 500 casualties, dead and injured. Among the many questions raised by the outrage, there was a purely practical one: Why was the attack so successful? How could so few terrorists claim so many victims?
One obvious answer is firepower. Guns were illegal in the hands of both the terrorists and the victims. The victims obeyed the laws, the terrorists didn’t. The police had guns, of course, but instead of protecting people, they stayed away until the massacre was practically over. Gun laws -- surprise, surprise! -- weren’t strong enough to defend victims, only strong enough to keep victims from defending themselves.
India’s gun control, one of the strictest in the world, goes back to the 19th century when Britain introduced it to forestall a repetition of the Indian Mutiny. “The guns used in last week’s Bombay massacre were all ‘prohibited weapons’ under Indian law,” wrote Richard Munday in the Times Online, “just as they are in Britain.” The terrorists were successful because they didn’t obey the gun control law rooted in the Raj, while their victims did.
India isn’t alone. Many countries, including Canada, have gone out of their way to make criminals as invincible and victims as vulnerable as possible. This isn’t the aim, of course, only the result.
“Guns don’t kill, people do.” The gun lobby’s old slogan is true enough, but it’s also true that guns make people more efficient killers. That’s why gun control would be such a splendid idea if someone could find a way to make criminals and lunatics obey it. Since only law-abiding citizens obey it, it’s not such a hot idea. It’s more like
trying to control stray dogs by neutering veterinarians.
The police carry guns for a reason: They’re great tools for law-enforcement. No doubt, guns make criminals more efficient, but they make crime-fighters more efficient, too. Letting firearms become the monopoly of lawbreakers, far from enhancing public safety, is detrimental to it. What you want is more armed people, not fewer, on the side of the law. It would be hard to imagine a Mumbai-type atrocity in Dodge City -- or in Edwardian Europe, for that matter, where gentlemen routinely carried handguns for protection.
Some regard carrying guns uncivilized. I’d hesitate to call an era of legal guns in the hands of Edwardian gentlemen less civilized -- or less safe -- than our own era of illegal guns in the hands of drug dealers and terrorists. The civilized place was turn-of-the century London, where citizens carried guns and the police didn’t. In any event, a constitutional guarantee to one’s “security of person” shouldn’t depend on how fast a 911 operator can pick up the phone.
Society needs crime control, not gun control. Munday writes that “violent crime in America has plummeted” in the past two decades after the majority of states enacted “right to carry” legislation and issued permits to carry concealed weapons to citizens of good repute. I think there were many reasons for the decline, but “right to carry” certainly wasn’t detrimental to it.
There are Second Amendment absolutists in America, and libertarians elsewhere, who regard a person’s birthright to own/carry a firearm beyond the state’s power to regulate. I’m not one of them. I think it’s reasonable for communities to set thresholds of age, proficiency, legal status, etc., for the possession of lethal weapons, just as they set standards for the operation of motor vehicles, airplanes and ham radios. But it seems to me that, within common sense perimeters, you’d want to enhance, not diminish, the defensive capacity of the good guys, and increase rather than decrease the number of auxiliary crime-fighters who are available to be deputized when the bad guys start climbing over the fence.
Munday quotes no less an advocate of non-violence than Mahatma Gandhi on the imperial decree of the Indian Arms Act of 1878 that laid the foundation for the defenselessness of the victims of the Mumbai massacre 130 years later. “Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India,” said the Mahatma, “history will look upon the act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest.”
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/12/13/george-jonas-guns-don-t-kill-people-terrorists-do.aspx
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St. George Tucker, Saul Cornell, and Justice Stevens: The Lecture Notes of St. George Tucker: A Framing Era View of the Bill of Rights has just been published by the Northwestern University Law Review Colloquy. The article, by David Hardy, will also appear in the printed edition of the N.W.U.L. Rev.
St. George Tucker is perhaps the preeminent source of the original public meaning of the Constitution. His 5-volume American edition of Blackstone's Commentaries was the by far the leading legal treatise in the Early Republic. Tucker included extensive analysis, in footnotes and in an appendix, explaining how the English common law of Blackstone had been changed in America. Tucker's analysis of the Second Amendment plainly described it as an individual right, encompassing the keeping and bear of arms for personal self-defense, for hunting, and for militia service. Justice Scalia's majority opinion in Heller quoted from Tucker's American Blackstone.
Justice Stevens' dissent in Heller cited a 2006 article by historian Saul Cornell. That article stated that Tucker's 1791-92 lecture notes described the Second Amendment as relating only to the militia.
David Hardy's article reviews Tucker's lecture notes, as they involve various freedoms enumerated in the Bill of Rights. Hardy finds that Tucker's view of the Constitution was far more libertarian (regarding issues such as free speech and press, or warrantless searches) than either modern Supreme Court doctrine, or the views sometimes ascribed to the Founders.
As for the Second Amendment, Hardy finds that Cornell's article, and therefore Justice Stevens' opinion, contains a major factual error: the militia language which Cornell quoted was not from Tucker's description of the Second Amendment. The language was from Tucker's explanation of Article I's grant of militia powers to Congress. Tucker's description of the Second Amendment comes 20 pages later in the 1791-92 lecture notes, and is nearly a verbatim match with the text Tucker's 1803 book, unambiguously describing the Second Amendment as encompassing a personal right for a variety of purposes, not just for militia service.
The Cornell article is St. George Tucker and the Second Amendment: Original Understandings and Modern Misunderstandings, 47 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 1123 (2006). Perhaps the error in article, and the derivative error in a Supreme Court opinion, could have been averted with bettter cite-checking.
Readers interested in Tucker may also be interested in my article The Second Amendment in the Nineteenth Century (BYU L. Rev.)(also discussing the scholarship of Tucker's son Henry St. George Tucker, and his grandson John Randolph Tucker), and in Stephen Halbrook's response to Cornell, St. George Tucker’s Second Amendment: Deconstructing "The True Palladium of Liberty" (Tenn. J.L. & Pol’y).
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2008_12_21-2008_12_27.shtml#1229984079
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Nice find!!! A logical knock out!!! Now if only the world was a logical place we could put our 2nd amendment worries to rest. Keep up the good fight!!
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Nice find!!! A logical knock out!!! Now if only the world was a logical place we could put our 2nd amendment worries to rest. Keep up the good fight!!
Unfortunately we live in a world that is peopled by folks who would gladly sell individual liberty to the most charming strongman in exchange for charming declarations that he'll endeavor to ensure that they are secure, and that their yoke is no tighter than he deems 'necessary'.
The desire to sell individual freedom, for the illusions that someone else will worry about their problems for them, is too strong for too many people.
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So the standard leftist anti-second amendment gibberish is already up on the whitehouse.gov web site, according to NRO. I wish one of these fools was able to tell me what an assault weapon is. . . .
Christ, this feels like a rerun:
Now Obama Debuts Pledge to Make Guns 'Childproof'
Surprising very few of us, we see that once in office, Obama is more open about his gun control efforts at WhiteHouse.gov:
Address Gun Violence in Cities: Obama and Biden would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment, which restricts the ability of local law enforcement to access important gun trace information, and give police officers across the nation the tools they need to solve gun crimes and fight the illegal arms trade. Obama and Biden also favor commonsense measures that respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals. They support closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof. They also support making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent.
How, precisely, does the Obama Administration plan on "making guns in this country childproof"? Mandatory trigger locks?
http://campaignspot.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OWNiNjhjYTUxZTNhMjNlZTQ1OTcwNWJhZjMxZDM4Njg=
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A recent very long, comprehensive, well annotated discussion of the problems associated with "supply side" firearm regulation, whose conclusion reads as follows:
CONCLUSION
Without a commitment to or capacity for eliminating the
existing inventory of private guns, the supply-side ideal and
regulations based on it cannot be taken seriously. It is best to
acknowledge the blocking power of the remainder and adjust our
gun control regulations and goals to that reality. Policymakers who
continue to press legislation grounded on the supply-side ideal while
disclaiming the goal of prohibition are deluded or pandering.
http://lawreview.law.wfu.edu/documents/issue.43.837.pdf
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THE FOUNDATION
"A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed." --Second Amendment, United States Constitution
PATRIOT PERSPECTIVE
Sixty million armed Patriots ... and counting
By Mark Alexander
By now, you've probably heard that large sectors of the U.S. economy have collapsed, consumer confidence is at a historic low, Democrats control the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government, and they're poised to print "bailout and infrastructure" money on the theory of "trickle up poverty" -- risking a prolonged recession followed by hyperinflation.
If there is an economic recovery any time soon, it will be the result of private sector initiatives and a consumer confidence recovery, not the redistribution of a few trillion dollars among friends. Never fear, there is a "community organizer" at the helm.
And that's the good news.
The bad news is that Barack Hussein Obama and his congressional cadre may well use the current crisis as cover to further undermine our constitutional rule of law.
Yes, Obama and his Demo colleagues in the Senate and House have taken a sacred oath to "support and defend" our Constitution, but they have no history of honoring their oaths.
So where does that leave "The People"? Well, if the politicians don't honor their oath, why should we honor their office? That is a question for another day.
At no time in our history has the future of American liberty been secure without a vigorous defense of the plain language of our Constitution, opposed to the adulterated interpretation of the so-called "Living Constitution" promoted by Barack Obama and his gang of judicial activists.
And there is no more important place to start at this moment in our history than with the Second Amendment to our Constitution.
In 1833, Justice Joseph Story, appointed to the Supreme Court by our Constitution's principal author, James Madison, wrote the following in his "Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States": "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of the republic; since it offers a strong moral check against usurpation and arbitrary power of the rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
That was never more true than today.
Obama claims: "I believe in the Second Amendment. Lawful gun owners have nothing to fear. I said that throughout the campaign. I haven't indicated anything different during the transition. ... We can have reasonable, thoughtful gun control measures that I think respect the Second Amendment and people's traditions. I think there's a lot of room before bumping against a constitutional barrier."
However, Obama's nominee for attorney general, Eric Holder (formerly Janet Reno's Deputy Attorney General), who faces Senate confirmation next week, reaffirmed in the recent DC v. Heller Supreme Court case his long-held position that the Second Amendment affirms no right of individual gun possession by private citizens.
Holder insists that the Second Amendment "does not protect firearms possession or use that is unrelated to participation in a well-regulated militia," which he interprets as a military unit. Of course, our Founders understood "militia" to be synonymous with "the people," but Holder must have skipped his law school's elective on "original intent."
Holder's remarks seem to conflict with his boss's statements about gun ownership, but Obama is not referring to the rights assured by the Second Amendment: "I'm a strong believer in the rights of hunters and sportsmen to have firearms." That's the same subterfuge his mentor John Kerry propagated back in '04.
Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso understands what's at stake: "Given Holder's career of attacks on the Second Amendment, his nomination continues to be of great concern to me. ... Our nation's highest law enforcement officer must be committed to protecting and defending our individual rights to keep and bear arms."
Other conservatives also get it, like Louisiana Sen. David Vitter: "[Holder has] clearly advocated near-universal licensing and registration, and he joined and filed an amicus brief in the District of Columbia v. Heller U.S. Supreme Court case arguing that the Second Amendment was not an individual right. That's deeply disturbing."
Statistically, those who are not "deeply disturbed" by the implications of Holder's appointment are likely residing in one of those blue urban centers which typically elect liberals to national office.
I came across an essay from one such misguided urbanite this week -- Fred Lebrun, who writes for the Albany (NY) Times-Union.
Fred wrote of the unprecedented number of gun sales since Obama's election: "Otherwise sensible people seem to completely lose their marbles when it comes to the loaded question of handgun ownership, and what rules ought to apply. I'm not sure why that is. The latest example of mass paranoia at work for no discernable reason is a rush to gun shops across the country to buy sidearms. The rationale, or vague impetus, is that with the election of Barack Obama as president, we're heading for the confiscation of our guns, for sure. ... Well, if it's true, why in the world would you go out and buy something the government is going to take away from you anyway?"
Fred, those of us who still uphold our Constitution and honor our oaths, as have generations of Patriots before, understand that, in the words of James Madison, "The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition."
Madison's words are truer today than when he wrote them in 1787. (Our adversaries at the time of that writing, the British, are learning that gun confiscation leaves one defenseless against tyranny -- and they are now protesting ... with cardboard placards.)
As for why some folks "go out and buy something the government is going to take away from you anyway," well, the only guns that will ever be taken from my hands, or those of tens of millions of like-minded gun owners, will be seized posthumously, and with empty magazines -- which is the only reason Obama and his congressional Leftists have not completely discarded that venerable old Constitution.
Fred concludes: "For the first time since 1935, with an all-Democratic national government, we are in a position to finally institute some meaningful and sensible gun control measures that will help mightily in regaining our cities from gun terror, street by street. Gun control doesn't have to be a dirty word."
What Fred doesn't seem to understand is that there are already some 20,000 -- TWENTY THOUSAND -- gun laws on the books. The argument that more laws will make America safer is ludicrous at every level, and to suggest that somehow such laws justify undermining the Second Amendment's clear intent is to undermine the strongest pillar of our Constitution.
Y'know, Fred, old Ben Franklin had a word of advice for folks like you: "They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
And to those for whom such a struggle proves too much an encroachment on their comfort zone, Sam Adams said, "If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go from us in peace. May your chains sit lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"
Currently, some 80 million Americans are gun owners, and it is estimated that 60 million of them own guns for purposes other than hunting. If you are not among them, you might thank God for the ranks of us who are, because as our Founders knew, we are the vanguard between liberty and tyranny.
(Visit PatriotShop.US for 2A products, and take a stand.)
Quote of the week
"No freeman shall ever be debarred the use of arms." --Thomas Jefferson
On cross-examination
"It ought to be a law that people must have a gun in their homes. I know many fine police officers. But we can't depend on the police to protect us anymore. The value of human life means nothing to [criminals]. If it had been my house [this thug] came in on, he would have wound up at Coulter Funeral Home." --General Sessions Court Judge Bob Moon (Chattanooga, TN) advising a female victim of a home invasion to buy a gun
When seconds count, the police are only minutes away...
Open query
"What is a left-wing socialist but a Marxist without a gun?"â?¨--Don Feder
The BIG lie
"I am not in favor of concealed weapons. There has not been any evidence that allowing people to carry a concealed weapon is going to make anybody safer." --Barack Obama
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Left democrat, gun control and $%^&*. All synonymous one might think. :-) But there are a few of us;
Kirsten Gillibrand the new Democratic Senator from the State of New York;
• Endorsed by the National Rifle Association, from which she has a 100% rating.
who believe in the right to bear arms. We just need a few more...
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Canada's Conservative PM is about to take another shot at killing off atleast part of our gun registry. A couple years ago he killed off all user fees for us and refunded any money a gun owner had spent due to the registry system.
I got a check back for just under $500, which i used to buy a new gun. I think Canada has the only federal govt right now taking steps towards improving the rights of gun owners. If the registry is killed off, even for a week there will be alot of "canoe accidents" up here.............
Harper says gun registry debate near
Posted By THE CANADIAN PRESS
The Miramichi region of New Brunswick will not lose a single federal job if and when the government does away with the long gun registry, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Friday.
Harper told reporters during a whirlwind visit to Miramichi that local gun registry jobs are safe, despite his goal of eliminating the program.
More than 200 people work at the Miramichi firearms registry where the main processing centre is located.
Harper said a debate on the registry will happen in the near future, but jobs will not be lost.
"The Conservative party for a long time now has been committed to the abolition of the long gun registry, we are very clear about that," Harper said while visiting a hockey rink.
"At the same time, you can be absolutely clear that we understand the economic challenges of this region, and there will be no loss of federal employment in the Miramichi area as a cost of (cutting the program)."
Introduced by the Liberals a decade ago, the long gun registry was supposed to cost $2 million a year but has ended up costing more than $1 billion so far.
The Conservatives introduced a bill in 2006 to abolish the registry, but it had no support from the other parties. Unable to do away with the registry altogether, the government instead announced a series of fee waivers and amnesties to take away the program's punch.
Rifle and shotgun owners who are legally licensed to own guns do not have to comply with registration requirements until May.
"The firearms centre here (in Miramichi) does more than just the long gun registry," Harper said. "There are other aspects of gun control that this government has every aspect of maintaining."
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http://www.powerlineblog.com/archive.../02/022814.php
The latest case in point is Kirsten Gillibrand. Remember how, when she was appointed to Hillary Clinton's Senate seat, she was widely described as a "conservative Democrat?" In particular, her 100% rating by the National Rifle Association was widely touted. But that was then, and this is now: Gillibrand is a convert to the cause of gun control. She has met with the parents of a 17-year-old girl who was killed by a stray bullet fired by a gang member and undergone a conversion:
It clearly touched her. "I care deeply. I am very upset about the horror and the tragedies that so many families experience," Gillibrand said. ...
On Monday she said Nyasia's story convinced her to introduce gun trafficking legislation. "I will be a fighter to make sure we keep these illegal guns off the streets," Gillibrand said.
Gillibrand is so intent on changing her image on gun violence that she's even asking for a meeting with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, one of the leading anti-gun advocates in the nation.
Gillibrand on Monday established two internships in her New York and Washington offices in honor of Nyasia.
Apparently Ms. Gillibrand had never realized, until now, that it is possible to use a firearm to commit a crime. Be that as it may, now that she will be running for re-election statewide she has no more need for an endorsement from the NRA; on the contrary, such an endorsement would be a liability--a liability that Ms. Gillibrand lost no time in jettisoning.
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It has already started…
Ammunition Accountability Legislation
Remember that criminals, by definition, do not obey the law. Therefore anti-freedom (anti-gun) legislation does not one damn thing to limit criminals. It only affects those who abide by the law.
Obama said that he wasn't going to take your guns! Well, it seems that he and his allies in the anti-gun world have no problem with taking your ammo!
The bill that is currently being pushed in 18 states requires all ammunition to be coded by the manufacture and a database maintained of all ammunition sales. They will know how much you buy and what calibers.
Nobody can sell any ammunition after June 30, 2009 unless the ammunition is coded.
Any privately held uncoded ammunition must be destroyed by July 1, 2011. (Including hand loaded ammo.)
They will also charge a .05 cent tax on every round so every box of ammo you buy will go up at least $2.50 or more!
If they can deprive you of ammo they do not need to take your gun!
This legislation is currently pending in 18 states: Alabama, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Mississippi, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Washington.
Send to your friends in these states AND fight to dissolve this BILL!!
To find more about the anti-gun group that is sponsoring this legislation and the specific legislation for each state, go to:
http://ammunitionaccountability.org/Legislation.htm
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Why I Have A Gun
My old grandpa said to me, "Son, there comes a time in every man's life when he stops bustin' knuckles and starts bustin' caps and usually it's when he becomes too old to take an ass whoopin'."
I don't have a gun to kill people. I have a gun to keep from being killed.
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I don't have a gun to scare people. I have a gun because sometimes this world can be a scary place.
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I don't have a gun because I'm paranoid. I have a gun because there are real threats in the world.
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I don't have a gun because I'm evil. I have a gun because I have lived long enough to see the evil in the world.
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I don't have a gun because I hate the government. I have a gun because I understand the limitations of government.
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I don't have a gun because I'm angry. I have a gun so that I don't have to spend the rest of my life hating myself for failing to be prepared.
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I don't have a gun because I want to shoot someone. I have a gun because I want to die at a ripe old age in my bed, and not on a sidewalk somewhere tomorrow afternoon.
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I don't have a gun because I'm a cowboy. I have a gun because, when I die and go to Heaven, I want to be a cowboy.
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I don't have a gun to make me feel like a man. I have a gun because men know how to take care of themselves and the ones they love.
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I don't have a gun because I feel inadequate. I have a gun because unarmed and facing three armed thugs, I am inadequate.
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I don't have a gun because I love it. I have a gun because I love life and the people who make it meaningful to me.
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Personally, I carry a gun because I'm too young to die and too old to take an ass whoopin'.
-- Author Unknown
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Blair Holt, Other Gun-control Efforts, on Horizon
Written by Alan Scholl
Monday, 19 January 2009 18:02
No sane person wants innocent people victimized, maimed, or murdered, nor to see the perpetrators escape justice. This is true, whether the perpetrators use their hands or objects — like baseball bats, rocks, knives, vehicles, or a host of other readily available inanimate objects of endless variety — or a firearm. It is the intent and the will of the criminals, and not the inanimate objects they use, that are responsible for the criminal acts and the harm done to victims.
From the dawn of man, violent acts have been a sad aspect of life in nearly every civilization and culture. The violence in prisons shows how ineffective even close confinement, total control, and total surveillance can be in preventing this.
Many heavily restrictive governments have failed to prevent violence. In fact, history has shown that powerful, unrestrained governments commit murder and other acts of violence against their own citizens. According to careful statistical analysis by Professor R. J. Rummel of the University of Hawaii, in his detailed work Death By Government, "The more power a government has, the more it can act arbitrarily according to the whims and desires of the elite, and the more it will make war on others and murder its foreign and domestic subjects." On the other hand, "The more constrained the power of governments, the more power is diffused, checked, and balanced, the less it will aggress on others."
Regardless of who commits the crimes, brutality and murder are moral issues, and the means or equipment used is really immaterial to the root problem, which is the condition of the human heart and mind. In our system of government, an important check against immoral acts of violence — whether committed by individuals acting alone, gangs, or unrestrained government — is the Second Amendment, which guarantees "the right of the people to keep and bear arms."
Yet today in America, the proponents of civilian disarmament often insist that inflicting a grievous wrong on all citizens — removing their most effective means of defense against the violence, in contradiction of the Second Amendment — will somehow correct the underlying moral problem.
Many Americans fear that despite the evidence, we are about to witness a broad array of gun-control efforts to limit or completely disenfranchise Americans' right to keep and bear arms.
After last November's elections changed the political climate at the national level and in a number of states, a huge surge in gun sales has been reported among retailers and dealers. FOX News' Catherine Herridge reported that the month Barack Obama was elected, the number of background checks was 42 percent greater than in November 2007. "It's not a hard tea leaf to read," said Jim Shepherd, publisher of the news service Outdoor Wire, which claims Obama's election has "frightened consumers into action."
Obama has repeatedly stated that he supports Second Amendment rights and will not crack down on gun owners, and in June he said he agreed with the Supreme Court when it overturned the District of Columbia handgun ban. But gun owners are not convinced. Obama's legislative record in support of gun control, and his offhand remark during the primaries that small-town Americans are "bitter" and "cling to their guns," suggest a very different approach to firearms regulation during his presidency. A December poll from Southwick Associates found that 80 percent of hunters and shooters expect the new administration and a Democratic Congress will make purchasing firearms more difficult.
An electronic news service that covers outdoor news has even named Obama its "Gun Salesman of the Year." "It's clear that gun owners and prospective gun owners are concerned about the incoming Obama administration and Congress," said Ted Novin, spokesman for the National Shooting Sports Foundation.
As a sentaor, incoming Vice President Joe Biden was a strong supporter of the assault-weapons ban, which was signed into law by President Clinton in 1994. As a state legislator in Illinois, Barack Obama backed a ban on semiautomatic weapons.
Obama will likely use the heavily liberal legislative bodies in Washington and in statehouses across the nation to help them accomplish this disenfranchisement of Americans piecemeal over the next few years. Unwittingly, or intentionally, many of our elected leaders are working hard to remove the ability of Americans to effectively defend themselves corporately — as our forefathers did — or individually against crime.
Touted as measures to prevent crime or capture criminals, they completely ignore the concept of individual rights on several levels. Nearly all will insert state or federal government very powerfully and dangerously deep into the personal and property rights and daily activities of law-abiding American people.
Nearly every one of these efforts will instead either disarm or make criminals of a wide spectrum of law-abiding citizens by means of a dizzying array of new regulations, laws, taxes, and rules.
The Obama administration will almost certainly lead the charge. A federal bill, H.R. 45, also known as "Blair Holt's Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009," is a good example of an Obama-endorsed bill that threatens all of the ill effects mentioned above.
This bill was named after teenaged Blair Holt, a Julian High School student killed on a city bus in Chicago.
The bill requires a "Blair Holt" license, involving a detailed application including photo, thumb print, written test, release of mental health records, and new fees. Firearms owners would also be required to report all gun transfers (even those to other family members) to the attorney general's database. It would also be illegal for a licensed gun owner to fail to record a gun loss or theft within 72 hours or fail to report a change of address within 60 days. H.R. 45 is a relaunch of H.R. 2666 in 2007, co-sponsored by 15 other representatives including Barack Obama's new chief of staff, Rahm Emmanuel.
The Northeast, a major battleground in this fight over the right to keep and bear arms, is home to monuments dedicated to men who two centuries ago fought and died to keep British soldiers from removing cannon, powder, and shot from storehouses in Lexington and Concord. They knew tyranny would follow disarmament.
As a nation our elected leaders and many in law enforcement have lost sight of the significance of that series of events and their purpose and the importance of arms to preserving liberty. In efforts supposedly intended to stem the moral problems that spawn the violence, they have turned to restricting liberty and denying law-abiding Americans a means of self-defense.
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OrigamiAK Offline
Freshman Join Date: Dec 2006
Posts: 10
H.R. 45, sample letter, and fax numbers
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Hi all,
H.R. 45 has been introduced to the U.S. House Judiciary Committee. H.R. 45 is really bad. See the whole thing here: http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.45:
Here is the letter I wrote to all the US House Judiciary Committee members. Getting this bill stopped while in committee is vastly better than it going to the House floor for debate and a vote. We need to get this stopped early.
Begin Letter:
January 27, 2009
Re: Vote NO on HR45
Dear House Judiciary Member,
I urge you to vote NO on HR45, the "Blair Holt's Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009."
Constitutionally protected rights are not subject to licensing, taxes, applications, fees, requirements, or any other subversion at the hands of federal, state, or local government. HR45 is just as immoral and unconstitutional as any poll tax or literacy test requirement for voting.
In addition, HR45 will not be effective for its stated purpose, and will put an undue burden on those of our citizens who have fewer financial resources. Instead, I ask you to focus on the enforcement of existing laws against violent crime, which will be vastly more effective than curbing the Civil Rights of all private citizens in the United States.
This is not a gun issue; this is a Civil Rights issue.
If you vote for HR45, you will not receive my vote or financial support at any time in the future.
Sincerely,
End Letter
Anyone who wishes to sign their own name to my letter and send it is welcome to do so.
In sending this to the various House Judiciary Committee members yesterday, I discovered that many of them do not accept emails from outside their district. I found it much more convenient to fax all of them. Below are the fax numbers to the Washington D.C. offices of most of the House Judiciary Committee members (not all of them.) I didn't attach the Representatives' names to the fax numbers.
Here they are:
202-225-1512
202-225-3303
202-225-3317
202-226-1170
202-225-7854
202-225-3193
202-225-5658
202-225-6328
202-225-5974
202-226-1230
202-225-5663
202-226-0577
202-226-0691
202-225-5547
202-225-2154
202-225-5629
202-225-7810
202-225-3132
202-225-5879
202-226-5799
202-225-6942
202-225-1915
202-225-5828
202-226-1012
202-226-2052
202-225-4042
202-225-0072
202-225-8628
202-225-3196
202-225-0442
202-225-8611
202-225-1100
202-225-8354
202-225-9681
Happy faxing!!!
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Subject: Gun Law Update by Alan Korwin, Democrats have already leaked a gun-ban list. Forward or send to every gun owner you know....
Gun Law Update by Alan Korwin, Author Gun Laws of America Jan. 5, 2008 &g t; > Gun-ban list proposed.
Slipping below the radar (or under the short-term memory cap), the Democrats have already leaked a gun-ban list, even under the Bush
administration when they knew full well it had no chance of passage (HR 1022, 110th Congress) It serves as a framework for the new list the Brady's plan to introduce shortly.
I have an outline of the Brady's current plans and targets of opportunity, It's horrific. They're going after the courts, regulatory agencies,
firearms dealers and statutes in an all out effort to restrict we the people. They've made little mention of criminals.
Now more than ever, attention to the entire Bill of Rights is critical. Gun bans will impact our freedoms under search and seizure, due process,
confiscated property, states' rights, free speech, right to assemble and more, in addition to the Second Amendment.
The Democrats current gun-ban-list proposal (final list will be worse):
Rifles (or copies or duplicates):
M1 Carbine, Sturm Ruger Mini-14, AR-15, Bushmaster XM15, Armalite M15, AR-10, Thompson 1927, Thompson M1; AK, AKM, AKS, AK-47, AK-74, ARM, MAK90, NHM 90, NHM 91, SA 85, SA 93, VEPR; Olympic Arms PCR; AR70, Calico Liberty, Dragunov SVD Sniper Rifle or Dragunov SVU, Fabrique National FN/FAL, FN/LAR,or FNC, Hi-Point20Carbine, HK-91, HK-93, HK-94, HK-PSG-1, Thompson 1927 Commando, Kel-Tec Sub Rifle; Saiga, SAR-8, SAR-4800, SKS with detachable magazine, SLG 95, SLR 95 or 96, Steyr AU, Tavor, Uzi, Galil and Uzi Sporter, Galil Sporter, or Galil Sniper Rifle ( Galatz ).
Pistols (or copies or duplicates):
Calico M-110, MAC-10, MAC-11, or MPA3, Olympic Arms OA, TEC-9, TEC-DC9, TEC-22 Scorpion, or AB-10, Uzi.
Shotguns (or copies or duplicates):
Armscor 30 BG, SPAS 12 or LAW 12, Striker 12, Streetsweeper.
Catch-all category (for anything missed or new designs):
A semiautomatic rifle that accepts a detachable magazine and has:
(i) a folding or telescoping stock,
(ii) a threaded barrel,
(iii) a pistol grip (which includes ANYTHING that can serve as a
grip, see below),
(iv) a forward grip; or a barrel shroud.
Any semiautomatic rifle with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds (except tubular magazine .22 rimfire
rifles).
A semiautomatic pistol that has the ability to accept a detachable
magazine, and has:
(i) a second pistol grip,
(ii) a threaded barrel,
(iii) a barrel shroud or
(iv) can accept a detachable magazine outside of the pistol grip, and
(v) a semiautomatic pistol with a fixed magazine that can accept more
than 10 rounds.
A semiautomatic shotgun with:
(i) a folding or telescoping stock,
(ii) a pistol grip (see definition below),
(iii) the ability to accept a detachable magazine or a fixed magazine capacity of more than 5 rounds, and (iv) a shotgun with a revolving cylinder.
Frames or receivers for the above are included, along with conversion kits
Attorney General gets carte blanche to ban guns at will:
Under the proposal, the U.S. Attorney General can add any semiautomaticrifle or>&g t; shotgun originally designed for military or law enforcement use, or a firearm based on the design of such a firearm, that is not particularly suitable for sporting purposes, as determined by the Attorney General."
Note that Obama's pick for this office (Eric Holder, confirmation hearing set for Jan. 15) wrote a brief in the Heller case supporting the position that you have no right to have a working firearm in your own home.
In making this determination, the bill says, "thereshall be a rebuttable presumption that a firearm procured for use by the United States military or any
federal law enforcement agency is not particularly suitable for sporting purposes, and a firearm shall not be determined to be
particularly suitable for sporting purposes solely because the firearm is suitable for use in a sporting event."
In plain English this means that ANY firearm ever obtained by federalofficers or the military is not suitable for the public.
The last part is particularly clever, stating that a firearm doesn't have a sportin g purpose just because
it can be used for sporting purpose -- is that devious or what? And of course, "sporting purpose" is a
rights infringement with no constitutional or historical support whatsoever, invented by domestic enemies of the right to keep and
bear arms to further their cause of disarming the innocent.
Respectfully submitted,
Alan Korwin,
Author Gun Laws of America
http://www.gunlaws.com/gloa.htm
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What are your thoughts on this? Looks like the U.S is going to have a registration system more restrictive then Canada's.
Text of H.R.45 as Introduced in House
Blair Holt's Firearm Licensing and Record of Sale Act of 2009
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h45/text
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http://www.carrollspaper.com/main.as...SectionID=&S=1
Guardsmen to conduct urban training at Arcadia in April
By BUTCH HEMAN
Staff Writer
The Carroll National Guard unit will train on urban military operations by holding a four-day exercise at Arcadia.
The purpose of the April 2-5 drill will be to gather intelligence, then search for and apprehend a suspected weapons dealer, according to Sgt. Mike Kots, readiness NCO for Alpha Company.
Citizens, law enforcement, media and other supporters will participate.
Troops will spend Thursday, April 2, staging at a forward operations base at Carroll. The next day company leaders will conduct reconnaissance and begin patrolling the streets of Arcadia to identify possible locations of the weapons dealer.
The primary phase will be done Saturday, April 4, when convoys will be deployed from Carroll to Arcadia. Pictures of the arms dealer will be shown in Arcadia, and soldiers will go door to door asking if residents have seen the suspect.
Soldiers will knock only at households that have agreed to participate in the drill, Kots noted.
"Once credible intelligence has been gathered," said Kots, "portions of the town will be road-blocked and more in-depth searches of homes and vehicles will be conducted in accordance with the residents' wishes.
"One of the techniques we use in today's political environment is cordon and knock," Kots explained. "We ask for the head of the household, get permission to search, then have them open doors and cupboards. The homeowner maintains control. We peer over their shoulder, and the soldier uses the homeowner's body language and position to protect him."
During this phase of the operation, troops will interact with residents and media while implementing crowd-control measures and possibly treating and evacuating injured persons.
The unit will use a Blackhawk helicopter for overhead command and control, and to simulate medevacs.
The drill will culminate in the apprehension of the suspected arms dealer.
Alpha Company will conduct a review of the drill on Sunday, April 5.
A meeting to give residents more information and accept volunteers will be held 7 p.m. Monday, March 2, in the Arcadia American Legion hall.
Kots said the exercise will replace Alpha Company's weekend drill for April.
"We have a lot of extended drills this coming year," he added.
In addition to surveillance, searching and apprehension, the exercise will also give the troops valuable experience in stability, support, patrol, traffic control, vehicle searches and other skills needed for deployment in an urban environment.
"This exercise will improve the real-life operational skills of the unit," said Kots. "And it will hopefully improve the public's understanding of military operations."
The pre-drill work with residents is as important at the drill itself.
"It will be important for us to gain the trust and confidence of the residents of Arcadia," said Kots. "We will need to identify individuals that are willing to assist us in training by allowing us to search their homes and vehicles and to participate in role-playing."
"We really want to get as much information out there as possible, because this operation could be pretty intrusive to the people of Arcadia."
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Huss:
See entry number 275 above.
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Swiss soldiers face loss of right to store guns at home
Story Highlights
Swiss soldiers could lose their famous right to store their weapons at home
Coalition of groups get enough signatures for referendum on gun laws
They want weapons stored on bases and a national register
Next Article in World »
(CNN) -- Switzerland's part-time soldiers could lose their famous right to store their weapons at home.
Switzerland's part-time soldiers could lose the right to store their weapons at home.
A coalition led by the country's Social Democrat party and the Greens has collected nearly 120,000 signatures to force a national referendum on whether the weapons should be stored at military bases.
The coalition of 74 groups says the weapons are involved in too many suicides and murders in the country and tighter controls are needed.
Switzerland's armed forces consist of just a few thousand permanent full-time staff, with the rest essentially a militia.
Service in the militia is compulsory for men aged between 19 and 31 and in between call-ups they store their weapons at home. There are currently around 220,000 conscripts.
However, a 2007 law change banned the storage of ammunition in homes. The coalition is looking to extend this, control the purchase of military weapons and set up a national gun register.
Green lawmaker Josef Lang said more than 1.5 million unused weapons were kept in Swiss homes.
Lang said their presence "at the heart" of the population could not be justified.
He said a national register had to be created to keep track of the weapons, something police had long been seeking.
Lang said the weapons had to be "banished" from homes.
Barbara Weil, of the Swiss Medical Association, said it had been scientifically proven that if the guns were less freely available the number of suicides would drop.
The studies had also shown that other methods of suicide did not increase in countries who had brought in stricter gun controls.
The coalition estimates that 300 deaths annually are connected to gun use.
http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/02/24/switzerland.gun.army.referendum/index.html?eref=rss_latest
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U.S. Is Arms Bazaar for Mexican Cartels
McKINLEY Jr.
NYT
Published: February 25, 2009
PHOENIX — The Mexican agents who moved in on a safe house full of drug dealers last May were not prepared for the fire power that greeted them.
Skip to next paragraph
When the shooting was over, eight agents were dead. Among the guns the police recovered was an assault rifle traced back across the border to a dingy gun store here called X-Caliber Guns.
Now, the owner, George Iknadosian, will go on trial on charges he sold hundreds of weapons, mostly AK-47 rifles, to smugglers, knowing they would send them to a drug cartel in the western state of Sinaloa. The guns helped fuel the gang warfare in which more than 6,000 Mexicans died last year.
Mexican authorities have long complained that American gun dealers are arming the cartels. This case is the most prominent prosecution of an American gun dealer since the United States promised Mexico two years ago it would clamp down on the smuggling of weapons across the border. It also offers a rare glimpse of how weapons delivered to American gun dealers are being moved into Mexico and wielded in horrific crimes.
“We had a direct pipeline from Iknadosian to the Sinaloa cartel,” said Thomas G. Mangan, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in Phoenix.
Drug gangs seek out guns in the United States because the gun-control laws are far tougher in Mexico. Mexican civilians must get approval from the military to buy guns and they cannot own large-caliber rifles or high-powered pistols, which are considered military weapons.
The ease with which Mr. Iknadosian and two other men transported weapons to Mexico over a two-year period illustrates just how difficult it is to stop the illicit trade, law enforcement officials here say.
The gun laws in the United States allow the sale of multiple military-style rifles to American citizens without reporting the sales to the government, and the Mexicans search relatively few cars and trucks going south across their border.
What is more, the sheer volume of licensed dealers — more than 6,600 along the border alone, many of them operating out of their houses — makes policing them a tall order. Currently the A.T.F. has about 200 agents assigned to the task.
Smugglers routinely enlist Americans with clean criminal records to buy two or three rifles at a time, often from different shops, then transport them across the border in cars and trucks, often secreting them in door panels or under the hood, law enforcement officials here say. Some of the smuggled weapons are also bought from private individuals at gun shows, and the law requires no notification of the authorities in those cases.
“We can move against the most outrageous purveyors of arms to Mexico, but the characteristic of the arms trade is it’s a ‘parade of ants’ — it’s not any one big dealer, it’s lots of individuals,” said Arizona’s attorney general, Terry Goddard, who is prosecuting Mr. Iknadosian. “That makes it very hard to detect because it’s often below the radar.”
The Mexican government began to clamp down on drug cartels in late 2006, unleashing a war that daily deposits dozens of bodies — often gruesomely tortured — on Mexico’s streets. President Felipe Calderón has characterized the stream of smuggled weapons as one of the most significant threats to security in his country. The Mexican authorities say they seized 20,000 weapons from drug gangs in 2008, the majority bought in the United States.
The authorities in the United States say they do not know how many firearms are transported across the border each year, in part because the federal government does not track gun sales and traces only weapons used in crimes. But A.T.F. officials estimate 90 percent of the weapons recovered in Mexico come from dealers north of the border.
In 2007, the firearms agency traced 2,400 weapons seized in Mexico back to dealers in the United States, and 1,800 of those came from dealers operating in the four states along the border, with Texas first, followed by California, Arizona and New Mexico.
Mr. Iknadosian is accused of being one of those dealers. So brazen was his operation that the smugglers paid him in advance for the guns and the straw buyers merely filled out the required paperwork and carried the weapons off, according to A.T.F. investigative reports. The agency said Mr. Iknadosian also sold several guns to undercover agents who had explicitly informed him that they intended to resell them in Mexico.
Mr. Iknadosian, 47, will face trial on March 3 on charges including fraud, conspiracy and assisting a criminal syndicate. His lawyer, Thomas M. Baker, declined to comment on the charges, but said Mr. Iknadosian maintained his innocence. No one answered the telephone at Mr. Iknadosian’s home in Glendale, Ariz.
A native of Egypt who spent much of his life in California, Mr. Iknadosian moved his gun-selling operation to Arizona in 2004, because the gun laws were more lenient, prosecutors said.
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Page 2 of 2)
Over the two years leading up to his arrest last May, he sold more than 700 weapons of the kind currently sought by drug dealers in Mexico, including 515 AK-47 rifles and one .50 caliber rifle that can penetrate an engine block or bulletproof glass, the A.T.F. said.
The authorities say weapons from X-Caliber Guns in Phoenix fueled gang warfare in Mexico. Officials say weapons from George Iknadosian’s store in Phoenix ended up in the hands of a cartel that included Alfredo Beltrán Leyva.
Based on the store’s records and the statements of some defendants, investigators estimate at least 600 of those weapons were smuggled to Mexico. So far, the Mexican authorities have seized seven of the Kalashnikov-style rifles from gunmen for the Beltrán Leyva cartel who had battled with the police.
The store was also said to be the source for a Colt .38-caliber pistol stuck in the belt of a reputed drug kingpin, Alfredo Beltrán Leyva, when he was arrested a year ago in the Sinaloan town of Culiacán. Also linked to the store was a diamond-studded handgun carried by another reputed mobster, Hugo David Castro, known as El Once, who was arrested in November on charges he took part in killing a state police chief in Sonora.
According to reports by A.T.F. investigators, Mr. Iknadosian sold more than 60 assault rifles in late 2007 and early 2008 to straw buyers working for two brothers — Hugo Miguel Gamez, 26, and Cesar Bojorguez Gamez, 27 — who then smuggled them into Mexico.
The brothers instructed the buyers to show up at X-Caliber Guns and to tell Mr. Iknadosian they were there to pick up guns for “Cesar” or “C,” the A.T.F. said. Mr. Iknadosian then helped the buyers fill out the required federal form, called the F.B.I. to check their records and handed over the rifles. The straw buyers would then meet one of the brothers to deliver the merchandise. They were paid $100 a gun.
The Gamez brothers have pleaded guilty to a count of attempted fraud. Seven of the buyers arrested last May have pleaded guilty to lesser charges and have agreed to testify against Mr. Iknadosian, prosecutors said.
In one transaction, Mr. Iknadosian gave advice about how to buy weapons and smuggle them to a person who turned out to be an informant who was recording him, according to a transcript. He told the informant to break the sales up into batches and never to carry more than two weapons in a car.
“If you got pulled over, two is no biggie,” Mr. Iknadosian is quoted as saying in the transcript. “Four is a question. Fifteen is, ‘What are you doing?’ ”
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Maybe Mexico should consider securing it's border with the US?
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Pelosi tosses cold water on assault-weapon ban
Pelosi tosses cold water on assault-weapon ban
By Mike Soraghan
Posted: 02/26/09 11:59 AM [ET]
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tossed cold water on the prospect of reinstating the assault weapons ban, highlighting Democrats’ reluctance to take on gun issues.
Attorney General Eric Holder raised the prospect Wednesday that the administration would push to bring back the ban. But Pelosi (D-Calif.) indicated on Thursday that he never talked to her. The Speaker gave a flat “no” when asked if she had talked to administration officials about the ban.
“On that score, I think we need to enforce the laws we have right now,” Pelosi said at her weekly news conference. “I think it's clear the Bush administration didn’t do that.”
Outside of the dig at the recent Republican president, that phrase is the stock line of those who don’t want to pass new gun control laws, such as the National Rifle Association.
The White House declined to comment on Holder's remarks, referring reporters to the Department of Justice. The DoJ did not respond to The Hill's request for comment.
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This piece at the Cato web site links to some pretty good sources.
Holder’s “Assault Weapons” Folly
Posted by David Rittgers
Attorney General Eric Holder recently announced that the Obama administration will seek a new federal “assault weapons” ban. This is an ill-advised policy that defies common sense.
The ban would be a revival of a law passed in the early years of the Clinton administration that expired in 2004. The law prohibited the sale of newly-manufactured magazines holding more than ten rounds of ammunition and having two of five cosmetic features on semi-automatic rifles. If you had a pistol grip and a detachable magazine, you couldn’t have a bayonet lug. More recent proposals have attempted to ban “barrel shrouds,” which the rest of the world calls “handguards” - the place you put your hand (instead of on a hot barrel) to prevent burning it while firing.
The emphasis here is on the cosmetic - any rational discussion of the issue ought to note that an “assault weapon” is any object you use to assault someone with - and banning the presence of a bayonet lug on the barrel of a rifle is senseless. Knives, tire irons, and bricks can all serve as “assault weapons.” This is an instance where quotation marks are not just appropriate, they are required.
Much of the public support for the law was based on a warping of the issue by gun control proponents to make the public believe that these firearms are machine guns. The fully automatic weapons that gun controllers use to push this agenda have been heavily regulated by the federal government since 1934 and not produced for civilian sale since 1986. Don’t take my word for it - here’s Josh Sugarmann of the Violence Policy Center: “The weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons-anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun-can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.”
This intentional distortion has moved from advocacy groups to the attorney general’s office. Attorney General Eric Holder claims that the law is needed to counter Mexican Drug War violence, that American gun laws support “cartels employing automatic weapons and grenades.” Again, these devices are already illegal. It is far more likely that these weapons of war are from Mexican Army troops who deserted their posts for the higher pay that drug kingpins offer. The drug cartels have even taken the brazen step of setting up billboards meant to draw soldiers and police officers from their government jobs and into the drug trade. My colleague Ted Galen Carpenter wrote the book on how to deal with this issue. Holder’s War on Everything is not it.
It defies reason to think that multi-billion dollar criminal syndicates will not be able to get their hands on guns because of an American law banning cosmetic features and dictating lower magazine capacity. If the Mexican government gets better control of its own armaments, the cartels will simply go to the black market and buy the guns. Or make them. Guns are hand-crafted in the frontier provinces of Pakistan, and there is no reason that the cartels could not do the same in a country with far more industrial know-how. Three minutes of internet research will reveal plans to make fully automatic sub-machine guns, so enough capital to set up a machine shop and buy some sheet metal is all it would take.
The expired ban did not demonstrably impact crime anyway. The Centers for Disease Control conducted a study in 2003 that found no reduction of crime attributable to the law. This should come as no surprise, since most criminals’ weapons of choice are cheap, small caliber pistols. They traditionally dominate the ATF’s top crime gun list. There are some bad apples out there selling guns to people they know to be “straw buyers,” people who have clean records and re-sell the guns to those who don’t. Prosecute them. Enforce the existing laws before deciding to restrict the freedom of law-abiding citizens.
Predictably, both Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi have temporarily quashed the issue. Let’s hope they keep it out of the halls of Congress, and focus instead on a sensible drug policy that impacts the demand created by an illicit drug market.
Pelosi and Reid realize that this proposal will do is come back to haunt Democrats in the 2010 mid-term elections, which historically trend against the president’s party anyway. Many Democrats attributed the flip of the House of Representatives to Republican hands in 1994 to the first “assault weapons” ban. Numerous experts believe that the reason Al Gore could not carry his home state of Tennessee in the 2000 election was his push for broader gun control. Blue Dog Democrats that ran on pro-gun platforms in conservative districts must be rolling their eyes. The rest of the country should do so as well, and send this proposal to the dustbin.
UPDATE: Since I started writing this, the “ban guns for Mexico’s sake” narrative has taken on a drumbeat’s tempo. 60 Minutes did this piece echoing the gun ban crusade, and the Wall Street Journal published this. Expect more of this nonsense.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/03/03/holders-assault-weapons-folly/
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Second Amendment incorporated via 'chucks?
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
[Randy Barnett, March 4, 2009 at 5:53pm] Trackbacks
Holodeck 2009: Here is an updated variation of the virtual reality holodeck concept that was such an entertaining feature of Star Trek: The Next Generation. The video, entitled World Builder, took one day of filming and two years of post-production by Bruce Branit. (Hat tip: Gizmodo)
World Builder from Bruce Branit on Vimeo.
[Orin Kerr, March 4, 2009 at 4:23pm] Trackbacks
John Yoo:
"Now that I'm not in the government, part of my role, because I have a certain amount of expertise, is to try to keep the government honest."
-- From an interview with the Orange County Register.
On the other hand, back when he was in government....
33 Comments
[Dale Carpenter, March 4, 2009 at 1:12pm] Trackbacks
California Supreme Court hears Prop 8 challenge tomorrow: The oral argument will be three hours long, from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. You can watch it at this site. If in the state you can also watch the oral argument on the California Channel, a cable public-affairs station. At its website, the court has a page devoted to the Prop 8 challenge, including links to all of the briefs filed on either side.
The main argument is that Prop 8 was a "revision" (not an "amendment") to the state constitution requiring prior legislative approval and not simply a majority vote of the people. The state attorney general, Jerry Brown, makes the different and, shall we say, more creative, argument that same-sex marriage is among the "inalienable" rights protected by the state constitution that simply cannot be taken away. Ken Starr has been making the primary case for upholding Prop 8 as a valid "amendment" requiring only a simple majority vote.
On the revision vs. amendment question, the text and history of the initiative process created in 1911 tell us little. The initiative process was a Progressive reform designed to circumvent a state legislature thought to be dominated by wealthy business interests. Whatever else can be said of them, the contending sides in the SSM debate are not robber barons.
The state court precedents don't provide a clear answer, either. As usual, both sides can point to decisions (and to isolated passages in decisions) that support their positions. One side argues that California has a long history of direct democracy, which the state courts have generally honored by liberally allowing constitutional changes as "amendments." The other argues that in light of last May's marriage decision, In re Marriage Cases, Prop 8 is unprecedented in form: it strips a fundamental right from a vulnerable minority. Starr's briefs in the case are lively and excellent in many ways, but they never really come to grips with the California marriage decision and its potentially game-changing significance for the Prop 8 challenge. That doesn't mean Prop 8 will lose. I've previously written that I think the petitioners have a good argument, but I still doubt it will be a winning one.
The other important question raised by the case is the status of the 18,000 same-sex marriages entered between June and November 2008. The plain text of Prop 8 supports an argument that these marriages are invalid, in my view ("Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California.") So the main issue is whether an explicit statement about retroactive effect must be included when legislation or constitutional change produces an important alteration in a citizen's status and rights.
Tomorrow, throughout California and across the country, there will be "viewing parties" to watch lawyers and judges thrust and parry over Prop 8. It's the Super Bowl for SSM, though we won't know the winner for weeks (the court has 90 days to issue an opinion). It'll be the final word, until the next final word.
128 Comments
[Eugene Volokh, March 4, 2009 at 1:07pm] Trackbacks
Does Senator Kennedy Need Congressional Permission for His Knighthood? The New York Times Caucus blog reports (quoting Prime Minister Gordon Brown) that the Queen of England "has awarded an honorary Knighthood for Sir Edward Kennedy." A couple of people have asked: Does this require Congressional approval, under article I, § 9 of the Constitution, "no Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under [the United States], shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State"?
I'm no expert on the subject (though I'm not sure whether anyone is), but my tentative thinking is that membership in the Senate or the House is not an "Office of Profit or Trust under [the United States]." Three pieces of evidence for this:
Article II, § 1 provides that "no Senator or Representative, or Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit under the United States, shall be appointed an Elector." This strongly suggests that "Senator or Representative" and "Person holding an Office of Trust or Profit" are two different things.
Article I, § 6, provides that "no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office." This likewise suggests that "Office under the United States" doesn't include membership in Congress.
There's 1790s Senate precedent for the proposition that a Senator is not a "Civil Officer[] of the United States" for purpose of impeachment, though the question is not free of controversy.
Note that the situation with Alcee Hastings, an impeached and removed federal judge who became a Representative, doesn't shed light on the subject. Article I, § 3 does allow the Senate to include "disqualification to hold and enjoy any Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States" as part of the "Judgment in Cases of Impeachment"; the Hastings situation might thus have tested whether membership in Congress is an "Office of honor, Trust or Profit under the United States" -- but it didn't, because the Senate didn't include such a disqualification within its judgment (a decision that was for the Senate to make).
If any of you have more information on this, please do pass it along, since this post is the result of only a bit of quick research on my part.
69 Comments
[Eugene Volokh, March 4, 2009 at 12:55pm] Trackbacks
Kirkland & Ellis Will Ask Supreme Court To Consider Incorporation of Second Amendment, in the Second Circuit's Nunchaku Case: Benjamin Wolf (The Elliot Schlissel New York Law Blog) has a guest-post from the petitioner in Maloney v. Cuomo that reports this.
Kirkland & Ellis (which is doing this case pro bono) is a top-notch law firm, with a top-notch Supreme Court practice. My guess is that the Supreme Court would prefer to consider the incorporation question in a case that involves more common facts, and that doesn't raise the additional legal question of whether nunchakus qualify as "arms" for Second Amendment purposes. But it's hard to tell for sure: It's possible for the Justices to use the case to decide the purely legal question of whether the Fourteenth Amendment incorporates the Second Amendment and thus constrains the states to respect an individual right to keep and bear arms. The Justices must be aware that the question is out there in lots of cases.
Moreover, the main criterion for choosing whether to decide a case -- whether there's a split among federal circuit courts or state supreme courts on the subject -- may well not arise on this issue: The existence of late 1800s Supreme Court precedent against applying the Second Amendment to the states (in a case that also held the same as to the First Amendment, a view that the Court has long since rejected) may keep a split from developing in the first place, as lower courts conclude that they're bound by the precedent despite the Court's relatively broad embrace of incorporation throughout the 1900s. So it's possible that the Court might conclude that there's no time like the present to decide the issue, though I'd still guess the odds are against it, even with Kirkland involved.
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_03_01-2009_03_07.shtml#1236189359
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Wow, CNN actually gets something on guns right:
Good Coverage of AG Holder’s War on Guns
Posted by David Rittgers
As I said earlier this week, Eric Holder’s push for an “assault weapons” ban is a misguided policy that will not have any serious impact on Mexican drug cartels. It really ought to be called a “ban on semi-automatic firearms with politically incorrect cosmetic features,” but that doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue. I am pleased to see that CNN is providing coverage of this that notes (1) the difference between semi-automatic sporting arms and machine guns and (2) that Mexican authorities are not releasing the serial numbers of firearms seized from the gangsters. This is probably because many of these guns are coming from the Mexican government, not American gun stores. The drug cartels are putting up billboards to recruit soldiers and policemen as hired muscle. Don’t be surprised when they walk off the job with the guns you issued them, and don’t shift the blame to the Second Amendment.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/03/05/good-coverage-of-ag-holders-war-on-guns/
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Woof,
Well here we go; over the past week we've had three suicidal psycho's go on rampages, two in this country and one overseas, this of course pleases the anti-gun crowd and makes for good ratings, so that makes it all the more sweeter for the Left leaning Press and Media. It also makes the maniacs happy because they can go out in a blaze of sick glory, not only taking a few with them but also making sure society at large is effected by their insanity. This is the, "Well, I'll show'em!", five year old mentality that most wacko's have.
The Press and Media seems to be obsessed with how many guns and how many bullets these guys had. The guy that shot the preacher had 30 rounds on him, that's about a half a box of shells; the news reported that he had enough bullets to kill 30 people. The police chief down in Alabama said that the murderer sprayed them with automactic fire from an AK47 then said, "I don't know what kind of gun he had for sure." The 17 yearold in Germany was reported to have used a automatic high caliber pistol and that his father was a gun club member and owned 14 weapons.
They didn't say anything about the lack of mental heathcare or look at the pressures of family life and at work or school. And they certainly didn't mention that when one of these incidences happen and the Press and Media go on their 24/7 gore feast, sloshing through the blood of victims to stick microphones into the crying faces of their loved ones, that there are almost always copycat events staged by other empty brained, on the edge nut jobs more than willing to take the stage that's all setup just for them.
Of course the Press and Media claim they're innocent of any wrong doing and they hide behind their right to freedom of the press. On the other hand, they have no problem with pushing for more gun control and infringing on the right to keep and bear arms. They do this by trying to make the guns, the culprits and they try to influence the public and lawmakers by putting the emphasis on the guns and often use misleading information to do it. When someone uses a knife, they don't report that he could have killed an unlimited number of people, after all a knife never runs out of ammo. And they don't call it a cop killer knife, even though a bullet proof vest won't stop a knife. Oh and just to point this out, no cop has ever been killed by a so called, cop killer bullet! And even though the anti-gun folks want to ban 50 cal rifles and the Media are constantly running stories on how powerful and dangerous these are, no one in the US has ever been murdered by one. Not many guns you can say that about. Of course they always say automatic weapon, when it is usually a semiautomatic. A semiauto is just like a revolver, one bullet fired for each pull of the trigger and they alway fail to mention that fully automatic weapons have been banned since the 1930's.
If you want to keep your rights, the next time you read this crap in the paper or hear it on the news, would you please write them, email them, or call them and let them know that they should be held liable for these copycat masacres and to stop exploiting them for ratings and using them to push their Leftwing agenda.
Thanks, P.C.
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Interesting take Prentice. "They didn't say anything about the lack of mental heathcare or look at the pressures of family life and at work or school."
I haven't looked into these cases at all but in general would add that the tools to force treatment or confinement for the suicidal have been dropped in our society. Their freedom comes with these risks.
Just like the terrorists, fear of administrative penalty on equipment violations isn't a motivator for those intent on ending their own life. Only a giant government magnet can make certain that criminals and wackos comply with each new law change.
I hope that I am with one of my concealed carry friends if ever caught up in one of these rampages.
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Woof,
The large news networks and major papers, are located in what are for the most part, big liberal cities. Most of their editors and reporters grew up in these cities and went to liberal colleges. Even the few that claim to be Conservative are Left leaning on social issues. Most have never served in the military, have never been hunting before, and have never even shot a gun before, much less owned one. They've never exercised their right to keep and bear arms, so the thought of banning guns or infringing on rights with idiotic gun control laws, doesn't bother them at all.
This is why it is so important that We the People, let these ivory tower a hole's know that they are not the only citizens that count. If they don't want to exercise their rights, fine, but they need to be reminded that rights are not something that can be given up, even when you don't use your right, you still have it and just because they think they know what's best for them, it doesn't mean that they have some kind of right to take everybody else's choice away. We are born with the right to keep and bear arms, it's not a privilege given to us by the government. We have numerous gun laws in this country plus it's against the law to murder people by any means.(Well, any means other than hyping killing spree's for profit and political gain; then you can get away with murder.) News flash, criminals don't obey the law! All that these so called reasonable new gun laws do, is make it harder for law abiding citizens to protect themselves and their families.
I don't care if people vote or belong to a political party; I think you should but that's your business; but if we continue to let our rights be eroded, pretty soon someone may hold a gun to your head and tell you who to vote for; that's the way it's done in many nations. So even if you are not interested in politics you still need to stand up for your rights and tell the Press and Media to stop this madness or one day we're going to wake up and not have any rights and no guns to fight with to get them back.
P.C.
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Woof,
Tell them to stop exploiting these suicide masacres for profit and to stop encourageing copycats and other people on the edge to do the same thing by showing them how it's done and how much publicity they'll get if they kill more people than the last guy.
www.cnn.com
www.nbcnews.com
www.abcnews.com
www.foxnews.com
www.newyorktimes.com
www.chicagotribune.com
www.bbc.com
P.C.
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Woof,
Here is an up date on the Alabama shooter; you will notice they correct the types of weapons he had, none of them fully automactic and they address his state of mind. Of course this time they have another target in their agenda to disarm the public, those deadly DVD's that teach people how to defend themselves! www.news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090313/ap_on_re_us/south_alabama_shootings
P.C.
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Woof,
Just in case anyone thinks that guns are the only dangerous things out there and only they can cause accidental deaths or be used as a way to kill large numbers of victims, check this out. I wonder if they did a background check on this lady before she bought this dangerous weapon? www.news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090313/ap_on_re_us/windshield_fluid_sickness
P.C.
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U.S. and Texas Law on Independent Militias
Our duty as citizens
Most American citizens are aware that the U.S. Constitution guarantees
certain rights and limits the powers of government. However, it also imposes
certain duties, not only on organs of government, but on each citizen. One
of these duties is to function as members of the Militia, and the state has
the duty to organize and train citizens to so serve.
The U.S. Constitution provides for this in Article I, Section 8:
Congress shall have power ...
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union,
suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for
governing such Part of them as may be employed in the service of the United
States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the
Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the
discipline prescribed by Congress;
The Framers contemplated that the citizens who compose the Militia would
provide their own weapons, which is reflected in the Second Amendment:
A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,
the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
It is important to understand that the prevailing practice at the time the
Constitution was adopted was for people in each locality to organize as
independent local militias and to train themselves. The only change the
Framers sought to make was to make this organization and training more
systematic, along the model of Switzerland. They never imagined that future
governments might try to restrict the local organization and training of
independent militias by contending that people had the right to assemble and
the right to keep and bear arms, but not to combine the two rights. To them
that would have seemed absurd.
U.S. legislation on the Militia
In 1792 President Washington tried to get Congress to fully implement the
constitutional requirement for organizing and training the Militia, but
Congress, wanting to avoid the expense imposed on the states, only agreed to
pass a law that required every able-bodied [free] male to keep a "musket or
firelock". This was the Militia Act of 1792. By failing to require
organization and training, it laid the basis for the decline of the Militia
tradition.
In 1903, the Militia Act of 1792 was superseded by the Dick Act, which
established the National Guard system, and made a distinction between the
"organized" and "unorganized" Militia, reflecting the attitude that the
Powers that Be didn't want most of the people to get organized as
independent militias, despite the support for universal military training
from most U.S. Presidents up to the administration of Harry Truman.
The Dick Act is encoded in 10 USC:
United Stated Code (USC)
TITLE 10--ARMED FORCES
Section 311. Militia: composition and classes (a) The militia of the United
States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and,
except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who
are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the
United States and of female citizens of the United States who are
commissioned officers of the National Guard. (b) The classes of the militia
are-- (1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and
the Naval Militia; and (2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the
members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the
Naval Militia.Section 312. Militia duty: exemptions (a) The following
persons are exempt from militia duty: (1) The Vice President. (2) The
judicial and executive officers of the United States, the several States and
Territories, Puerto Rico, and the Canal Zone. (3) Members of the armed
forces, except members who are not on active duty. (4) Customhouse clerks.
(5) Persons employed by the United States in the transmission of mail. (6)
Workers employed in armories, arsenals, and naval shipyards of the United
States. (7) Pilots on navigable waters. (8) Mariners in the sea service of a
citizen of, or a merchant in, the United States.(b) A person who claims
exemption because of religious belief is exempt from militia duty in a
combatant capacity, if the conscientious holding of that belief is
established under such regulations as the President may prescribe. However,
such a person is not exempt from militia duty that the President determines
to be noncombatant.TITLE 32--NATIONAL GUARD
Section 313. Appointments and enlistments: age limitations (a) To be
eligible for original enlistment in the National Guard, a person must be at
least 17 years of age and under 45, or under 64 years of age and a former
member of the Regular Army, Regular Navy, Regular Air Force, or Regular
Marine Corps. To be eligible for reenlistment, a person must be under 64
years of age. (b) To be eligible for appointment as an officer of the
National Guard, a person must-- (1) be a citizen of the United States; and
(2) be at least 18 years of age and under 64.It should be understood that
these definitions apply only to the Militia that is subject to call-up by
the federal government, and states may require other people to perform
militia duty, with different age ranges and exemptions.
__________________
Texas law on the Militia
The Texas Constitution once had a strong provision regarding militias:
Article 16. Section 46.
The Legislature shall provide by law for organizing and disciplining
the militia of the State, in such manner as they shall deem expedient, not
incompatible with the Constitution and Laws of the United States.
This section was deleted. The effect of this is that such authority
reverts back to local communities.
Present statutes are encoded in Texas Government Code Chapter 431:
Subchapter A. General Provisions
431.001. Definitions
In this chapter:
(1) "Reserve militia" means the persons liable to serve, but not
serving, in the state military forces.
(2) "State militia" means the state military forces and the reserve
militia.
(3) "State military forces" means the Texas National Guard, the
Texas State Guard, and any other active militia or military force organized
under state law.
(4) "Texas National Guard" means the Texas Army National Guard and
the Texas Air National Guard.
431.010. Organization Prohibited
(a) Except as provided by Subsection (b), a body of persons other
than the regularly organized state military forces or the troops of the
United States may not associate as a military company or organization or
parade in public with firearms in a municipality of the state.
(b) With the consent of the governor, students in an educational
institution at which military science is a prescribed part of the course of
instruction and soldiers honorably discharged from the service of the United
States may drill and parade with firearms in public.
(c) This section does not prevent a parade by the active militia of
another state as provided by law.
Subchapter D. Texas State Guard
431.051. Supplemental Militia
To provide militia strength for use by the state as a supplement to
the Texas National Guard, the Texas State Guard exists as part of the state
militia under the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution and a
defense force under 32 U.S.C. Section 109.
Subchapter F. Service and Duties
431.081. Persons Subject to Military Duty; Persons Not Eligible to
Enlist
(a) A person is subject to military duty if the person is: (1)
able-bodied; (2) a citizen or a person of foreign birth who has declared an
intent to become a citizen; (3) a resident of the state; (4) at least 18 and
not more than 60 years of age; and (5) not exempt under Subsection (b) or
(c) or United States law.(b) A person is exempt from military duty, except
in case of war, insurrection, invasion, or imminent danger of war,
insurrection, or invasion if the person is: (1) the lieutenant governor; (2)
a member or officer of the legislature; (3) a judge or clerk of a court of
record; (4) a head of a state agency; (5) a sheriff, district attorney,
county attorney, county tax assessor-collector, or county commissioner; (6)
a mayor, council member, alderman, or assessor and collector of a
municipality; (7) an officer or employee of the Texas Department of
Corrections, a state hospital or special school, a public or private
hospital, or a nursing home; (8) a member of a regularly organized and paid
fire or police department in a municipality, except that a person is not
relieved of military duty by joining such a department; (9) a minister of
the gospel exclusively engaged in that calling; or (10) a person who
conscientiously scruples against bearing arms.(c) A mentally disabled
person, vagabond, confirmed alcoholic, narcotics addict, or a person
convicted of an infamous crime is exempt from military duty regardless of
circumstances.
Now, what about that Section 431.010 prohibiting military companies or
organizations or parades within municipalities? It clearly expresses
hostility to independent local militias within municipalities, but it has no
penalties, and does not apply to rural areas. It's main intent seems to be
to discourage local officials from calling up the militia.
The only statutes which local officials might invoke against a militia
muster within a municipality would be those against exhibiting a firearm in
a way that "alarms" the public. However, centuries of common law makes it
clear that merely carrying firearms is not to be considered "alarming". The
arms must actually be brandished toward someone in a threatening manner.
This would not prevent arrests on this ground, of course, but successful
prosecution is unlikely if the courts follow the law and the Constitution.
Some of these points are more fully discussed in 29 Tex. Jur.,
Sections 4 and 5, and in 12 Tex. Jur. 3d., Sections 12-28.
The only significant case law involving this statute is a federal
case, Vietnamese Fishermen's Ass'n v. Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (D.C.
1982) 543 F.Supp. 198, in which the plaintiff invoked the state statute in a
federal suit for injunction against the defendant. The injunction was
granted, and the judge took advantage of the case to write an opinion on the
interpretation of the state statute. However, that opinion has no stare
decisis effect, because this was not an appeal, nor was the judgement
appealed. The injunction was properly granted under common law against
intimidation, but a federal judge had no real business interpreting state
law. However, it is indicative of how that judge might decide the
constitutional issues in other cases. The case does, however, underscore the
importance of distinguishing between private associations and public
militias, and of making sure that any constitutional militias that may be
organized take care not to take on the attributes of a private group. Too
many people, including authorities, have examples in mind like the KKK, and
we must always make sure to distance ourselves from such partisan
organizations, and, indeed, indicate that the suppression of such groups is
one of the things that a real militia might be called up to do.
There is another statute that arguably involves the Militia, the Texas
Disaster Act of 1975, which has among its purposes, "providing an emergency
management system embodying all aspects of predisaster preparedness and
postdisaster response. See 12 Tex. Jur. 3d. Sections 51-53. If fully
implemented, the organization of local militia units seems to be required
under this Act.
Conclusions
Present U.S. and Texas law clearly fail to implement the requirements
for organizing and training the Militia established by the Framers. However,
we must also recognize that this failure goes all the way back to 1792, and
that such organizing and training are, therefore, left to the people
themselves, in the form of independent local militias, which they have a
constitutional duty to maintain in a high state of preparedness, even if
they get little support from the authorities, and indeed, especially if they
get opposition from the authorities.
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**I read this yesterday, and i'm still pissed off. WTF??????**
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/13/AR2009011302840_pf.html
Marine Amputee Acquitted On Gun Possession Charges
By Keith L. Alexander
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 14, 2009; B01
After being deadlocked twice, a D.C. Superior Court jury yesterday acquitted a Marine amputee on felony charges of gun possession stemming from an arrest while he was on the way to Walter Reed Army Medical Center.
In the 2006 incident, Cpl. Melroy H. Cort, 24, and his wife, Samantha, were en route from their home in Columbus, Ohio, to Walter Reed. Cort's legs had been amputated above the knees when he was wounded by a makeshift bomb in Ramadi during his third tour of duty in Iraq.
The couple's car got a flat tire, forcing them to pull over at a car repair shop in the 5000 block of Georgia Avenue NW. While there, Cort said, he reached into the glove compartment, removed a 9mm pistol and put it in his jacket pocket.
A witness who noticed Cort handling the gun called police, who arrested and handcuffed Cort while he was sitting in his wheelchair. He was charged with three counts of carrying a pistol without a license, possession of an unregistered firearm and possession of ammunition. He spent the night in the D.C. jail before returning to Walter Reed.
He was assigned a public defender, who encouraged him to plead guilty. But Cort refused, because a felony on his record could cost him his military benefits. So he decided to represent himself.
"I had to fight for myself," he said yesterday. "I wasn't going to plead guilty and lose everything."
During his trial, which began Friday before Judge Lynn Leibovitz, the two arresting officers testified that Cort had thrown up his hands and told them he had a gun in his pocket when they approached him.
Taking the stand in his defense, Cort tried to tell his personal story: How he enlisted in the Marines in 2004 after graduating from Ohio's Wright State University with a business degree. How he went to Iraq in 2004 and 2005, when he was was critically injured. How he was fitted with prosthetic legs and honorably discharged in 2007.
But Leibovitz ordered him to discuss only the case at hand.
Cort, who said he had a permit to carry the gun in Ohio, said he had it with him because he had moved out of his house in anticipation of an extended stay at Walter Reed.
He said his commanding officer had advised him to take the gun to the armory on Walter Reed's base as soon as he arrived.
Cort said 12 rounds of ammunition were in his car trunk, but police said the ammunition was in the gun's clip.
Although acquitting him of the gun charges, the jury found Cort guilty of possessing ammunition, a misdemeanor. He was sentenced to time already spent in the D.C. jail.
Cort, his wife and their 3-month-old daughter, Charlott, now plan to drive home to Columbus, where Samantha Cort is in real estate. Cort said he plans to appeal the verdict and tend to his family.
"I just plan to take care of my daughter," Cort said.
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Hell yes, GM, that is wrong on so many levels I don't know where to start. An injured hero unable to defend his family while seek treatment for his wounds in the hellhole that is DC? UnFreakingBelievable.
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It's so tragic in so many ways. I can't believe any working cop would do this.
The proper response to this call:
1. Once the gun is in your possession, you run the gun, verify the Ohio CCW, verify the military ID and orders. Once it comes back clear and valid. You load the Marine and his wife and their baggage into your patrol car.
2. You take them to Walter Reed.
3. You thank the Marine for his service, shake his hand and give him your business card with your personal cell number is he or his wife need anything while in DC.
4. Clear from the call and go back into service.
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EXACTLY SO!!! :x
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California Assemblyman introduces Shall Issue CCW bill.
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/09-10/...introduced.pdf
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Dems opposed to BO-Holder's AWB!!!
http://www.nraila.org/media/PDFs/AWBLettertoHolder309.pdf
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Woof,
They remember what happened to their Majority the last time they voted for a ban under Wet Willy. :-D
P.C.
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By JOEL MILLMAN
An Arizona court on Wednesday dismissed the case against a gun-store owner accused of looking the other way while front men purchased weapons to deliver to Mexico's drug cartels.
The trial, which began earlier this month, had been heralded as an example of U.S. authorities working to stanch the flow of weapons to Mexico, where a recent war among drug gangs is believed to have killed more than 6,000 people.
At the heart of the case was the X-Caliber gun store, where prosecutors alleged more than 700 high-powered rifles were sold to purchasers whom the owner, 47-year-old George Iknadosian, should have known were acting as so-called straw buyers for Mexican customers. Sales of most weapons to non-U.S. citizens north of the border are severely constrained, as is gun possession by civilians in Mexico.
To get around those restrictions, Arizona officials alleged, Mr. Iknadosian allowed Arizonans with clean criminal records to buy weapons they would resell in Mexico, first by falsifying forms attesting that the firearms were for the purchasers' personal use. Witnesses in the case included several of these alleged straw buyers, who have pleaded guilty to charges that bring a penalty of up to 10 years imprisonment.
Yet in dismissing the 21 counts against Mr. Iknadosian, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Robert Gottsfield ruled that the evidence prosecutors presented wasn't "material," and therefore didn't support charges against the defendant.
"The state's case is based upon testimony of individuals who [alleged]...that they were the actual purchaser of the firearms when they were not," Judge Gottsfield wrote. He then indicated that such testimony, by itself, failed to establish that any additional unlawful conduct transpired.
"There is no proof whatsoever that any prohibited possessor ended up with the firearm," the judge said.
To be considered "material," he explained, testimony about falsifying government forms must further demonstrate that the act "resulted in an unlawful person ending up with the guns, which has not been proven."
View Full Image
Associated Press
George Iknadosian's closed shop, X-Caliber Guns in Phoenix, was deserted in January.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, briefing reporters at the agency's Washington headquarters Wednesday, declined to comment on the ruling.
State and federal authorities, including a task force supervised by the Phoenix office of the U.S. Department of Justice's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, worked for 11 months with local police building a case against X-Caliber. According to law-enforcement officials in Phoenix, the investigation included sending undercover agents posing as buyers to Mr. Iknadosian's shop, where agents not only purchased weapons, but boasted of plans to resell them in Mexico.
Authorities also relentlessly publicized the link between X-Caliber and Mexican drug cartels by claiming weapons purchased in Mr. Iknadosian's store had been recovered at Mexican crime scenes. One special weapon -- a handgun inlaid with $35,000 worth of diamonds -- purportedly was captured late last year after the assassination of a top Mexican policeman.
"We are all taking this pretty hard," said Anne Hilby, spokeswoman for Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard. Mr. Goddard released a statement disagreeing with Judge Gottsfield's analysis of the case, adding, "We are reviewing the ruling to determine how best to respond."
Messages left for Mr. Iknadosian's attorney and at the defendant's home weren't returned.
Write to Joel Millman at joel.millman@wsj.com
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Woof,
Man... I tell ya, I don't even know what to think about that. The government can't enforce or won't enforce the laws we already have in place to keep guns from going to Mexico or getting into criminals hands but they still want to pass more laws that will infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens. WTF? :x
P.C.
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Gen. McCaffrey in 1996 -
Gen. Barry McCaffrey, the White House drug policy director, traveled to Mexico in March 1996 smoothing the way for an agreement between the two governments which has resulted in Mexican soldiers beginning to train at Ft. Bragg and other American bases, and in the gift of 73 "surplus" helicopters, four C-26 surveillance planes, night vision goggles, radios and other military equipment. In addition, the White House has requested $9 million in military aid for Mexico for fiscal year 1998 (up from $3 million in fiscal year 1996) for the purchase of new weapons from U.S. arms manufacturers. - http://www.fas.org/asmp/profiles/mexico.htm
Gen McCaffrey 2009 -
The outgunned Mexican law enforcement authorities face armed criminal attacks from platoon-sized units employing night vision goggles, electronic intercept collection, encrypted communications, fairly sophisticated information operations, sea-going submersibles, helicopters and modern transport aviation, automatic weapons, RPG’s, Anti-Tank 66 mm rockets, mines and booby traps, heavy machine guns, 50 cal sniper rifles, massive use of military hand grenades, and the most modern models of 40mm grenade machine guns. - http://www.mccaffreyassociates.com/pdfs/Mexico_AAR_-_December_2008.pdf
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The Mexican cartels recruit open from the Mexican military and police. When they desert to go to work for the cartels, guess what they take along? Then there are Los Zetas....
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·11250 Waples Mill Road · Fairfax, Virginia 22030 ·800-392-8683
http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Fe...d.aspx?id=4713
Mexican Drug Violence--Anti-Gunners Lead Witness Friday, April 03, 2009 As we continue to report, Congress has jumped into the topic of Mexican border violence with both feet, having held 10 different Subcommittee and Full Committee hearings on the topic, with more coming. It has also become clear that anti-gun politicians and groups are intent on using this issue to advance new gun laws.
In the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Drugs and Crime, Sen. Dianne Feinstein renewed her attacks on gun owners' rights. During her remarks, she stated that there are over 2,000 guns smuggled into Mexico from the U.S. each day. But when she tried to elicit support for that number from a representative from the BATFE, he responded that the number was much lower. Senator Feinstein was clearly unhappy that he would not endorse her anti-gun sound bite.
Feinstein also repeated the claim that 90% of seized guns are from American sources (please see related story below). In fact, it is unknown where most of the arms possessed by the cartels originate. According to the BATFE 90% of the firearms traced are from American sources, but BATFE only traces 25% of the guns seized by Mexican authorities. The remaining 75% of guns seized along with all the firearms remaining in the hands of the cartels are of unknown origin. The fact that only 25% of the guns seized are traced raises a significant question: Why has the Mexican government not requested traces on the remaining 75%? Could it be because those guns are far less likely to have originated in America? Could it be that the Mexican authorities do not want it known where these guns come from? Could it be that it benefits the Mexican government to continue to blame U.S. gun laws to divert attention away from the rampant corruption of local governments and police forces? Could it be all of the above?
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has also entered the debate, traveling to Mexico and taking the opportunity to blame American gun laws. She called for a renewal of the semi-auto ban, and even trumpeted the ban's illusory impact: "And there's no doubt in my mind that the 10 years we had an assault weapons ban in America was one of the tools that helped to drive down the crime rate."
Perhaps if Clinton had read the congressionally mandated study performed by the Urban Institute (http://www.urban.org/UploadedPDF/aw_final.pdf) she would know it showed that the ban couldn't possibly have had much impact on crime because "the banned guns were never used in more than a modest fraction of all gun murders" before the ban.
In another development that will not please the gun ban crowd, the leader of the Border Patrol Union, T.J. Bonner, said he was "underwhelmed" by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano's plans to secure the border and went on to debunk the idea that Mexican violence is caused by American guns: "The U.S. has more weapons but we don't have that kind of violence in our streets," he said.
American gun owners know that that the real solution to the border violence is to actually secure the border. Shifting the focus to gun laws is nothing more than a calculated attack on our Second Amendment rights.
For more information on the hearings, please go to www.nraila.org.
Find this item at: http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Fe...indow.print();
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http://hotair.com/archives/2009/04/03/video-the-mexican-gun-canard/
Obama and anti-gun lies.
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Woof,
Well here we are fighting the same battle over and over again. The recent spate of Media inspired maniacs going out in a blaze of gory (pun intended), has all the anti gun dim wits', panties in a twist again and calling for gun control. What about nut job control? It would help a lot if the Media didn't give these guys a stage to play out their sick fantasies on and give them ideas as to how to out nut job the last nut job that went out and killed a bunch of people because their feelings were hurt.
Here's the deal, people that are willing to commit murder and face the death penalty or life in prison, are not going to let a gun law stand in their way. Gun laws are like stop signs, they are not brick walls that are going to stop anyone from doing anything. They only work if people obey them.
I've seen all kinds of stats being thrown around that show that guns are used to kill people. I'm shocked! :-o The stats don't show that most of the people killed and the people doing the killing are gangbangers, drug dealers, and other felon criminals that can't have a gun legally in the first place. They also don't show how many lives have been saved because law abiding citizens used a firearm that stopped the beginning of a killing spree because they defended themselves with a firearm.
In every state that passed a conceal carry law, the crime and murder rates went down. Passing gun laws that infringe on gun rights gives the nut jobs and the criminals just what they want, defenseless victims to prey on. What these anti gun losers want us to buy into is that people can't be trusted because anyone could just go nuts at anytime and if there's a gun then, boom!. If you buy that then can we be trusted to govern ourselves? To be in control of our own lives and be allowed any freedoms or rights? We can't just let potential nut jobs run free, there's no telling what we might do.
Be careful what you buy into people.
P.C.
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A positive trend.
Now if we could only get a few democrats to sign up and realize that gun control is not the answer...
Poll: Fewer Americans support stricter gun control laws
Story Highlights
Poll: 54 for percent favored stricter laws in 2001, compared with 39 percent today
Long-term decline in support for gun control coincided with a decline in murder rate
Sudden change may be influenced by politics, namely the Obama administration
Nearly all the decline is from people who don't identify themselves as Democrats
From Bill Schneider
CNN Senior Political Analyst
(CNN) -- From Oakland, California, to Binghamton, New York, several mass shootings in recent weeks have killed dozens across the country. But has there been an effect on public opinion?
Yes, and in a surprising way.
Since 2001, most Americans have favored stricter gun laws, though support has slightly dropped in recent years: 54 percent favored stricter laws in 2001, compared with 50 percent in 2007, according to Gallup polling.
Now, a recent poll reveals a sudden drop -- only 39 percent of Americans now favor stricter gun laws, according to a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll.
The gradual, long-term decline in support for gun control from the early 1990s to 2008 coincided with a decline in the murder rate. But this year's sudden drop seems to be influenced by politics, namely the Obama administration.
"If [President Obama] and the people in control of Congress right now could have what they want, they would heavily restrict or eliminate guns from this country," said Sean Healy, an attorney who has advocated on behalf of gun-owner rights. Watch why some people don't want stricter gun laws »
Or, Americans may have heard the new administration's take on assault weapons.
"There are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstate the ban on the sale of assault weapons," said Attorney General Eric Holder in February.
In March, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "I, as a senator, supported measures to try and reinstate it. Politically, that is a very big hurdle in our Congress. But there may be some approaches that could be acceptable, and we are exploring those."
Still, the decline in American favor for stricter gun laws doesn't mean people want to see restrictions lifted -- 46 percent want no change in the current law, while only 15 percent want gun laws that are less strict.
Nearly all the decline in support for stricter gun laws is from people who don't identify themselves as Democrats. Six in 10 Democrats still support stricter gun laws, but support has dropped 13 points among Republicans and 17 points among independents. Half of all independents supported stricter gun laws in 2007; now only a third of them do.
The poll, based on phone interviews with 1,023 U.S. adults from Friday through Sunday, were conducted after Friday's mass shooting in Binghamton, New York, where 13 people were killed at an immigrant services center.
On the issue of whether gun laws should be stricter, the poll contains a sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points. The breakdown of opinions on that issue over party lines had a sampling error of plus or minus 5.5 percentage points.
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Equipped to be a Killer
The Firearms Coalition ^ | Daniel White
April 9, 2009)
There is a funny story about a woman who rowed her husband’s boat out for a little solitude. While she was enjoying the fresh air and sunshine a Park Ranger pulled up alongside and asked to see her fishing license. When she told him she didn’t have one he said that he was going to write her a ticket because, even though she was just sitting in the boat reading, there was fishing equipment in the boat. The woman replied that she wanted to charge the Ranger with rape then because, even though he was just sitting in his boat talking, he had all of the necessary equipment.
Unfortunately, in the real world, the woman’s quick wit would probably not get her out of the ticket and might cost her more charges, but there is a truth in this story that deserves careful consideration. There is a dramatic difference between having tools and having intent. While this truth should apply to fishing gear or guns in parks, it is also one of the fundamental flaws in the thinking of hoplophobes and their attacks on individual rights – that having tools and using tools is the same thing.
I recall a story of a hoplophobic politician or reporter who, looking at the firing line at Camp Perry saw hundreds of “potential assassins” rather than hundreds of dedicated sportsmen, patriots, and potential defenders of the nation. That distorted perception demonstrates a level of fundamental human distrust which is simply astounding. How can a person who is so mistrustful of his fellow man ever get behind the wheel of a car or even leave his home?
But this is the mindset that we in the rights movement are up against. These people believe that having the equipment is the same as being equipped, leaving out the most important factors; motivation and inclination. Virtually everyone in the world has the equipment to be “violent killers,” but only a small fraction of the world’s population are equipped with the desire and inclination to truly be violent killers. (And then there is the question of those who equip themselves to be violent killers to protect civilized society, but that’s a whole other can of worms.)
What the hoplophobes refuse to see or understand is that criminal behavior – whether with a gun, knife, car, or bare hands – is always first and foremost about the behavior. The tool is a side issue. Behavior is the problem and any “solution” that fails to address behavior is no solution at all. While there is some truth to the old saw, “the clothes make the man,” likewise having the accoutrements of criminal behavior at hand can help to facilitate that behavior – but only in people predisposed to the behavior and only to a very limited degree. Dress an honor student in gang-banger duds and give him a gun and he’s not likely to start ripping off liquor stores. Conversely, dress a street punk in Ralph Lauren and he’s still not someone you want your daughter dating.
Most importantly, even if it were possible to keep guns away from people who are predisposed to criminal violence (which is not really possible, but let’s play “even if…”) the lack of a firearm is not going to deter those people from engaging in their criminal violence. There is no credible, statistical evidence that violent crime, including murder, has ever been significantly reduced by restrictions on firearms. Crime involving firearms might go down some, depending on how draconian the gun control laws are and how actively they are enforced, but actual numbers of murders, assaults, rapes, and robberies tend to go up rather than down in the wake of stricter gun laws. That’s why the anti-gun agitators are always careful to focus their attention on “gun crime” rather than just crime.
People with an irrational fear of weapons, particularly firearms, think that it is the weapon that causes the crime. If they were able to think rationally they would realize that it is criminals who cause crime and criminals, by definition, violate laws such as laws against acquisition and possession of weapons just as they do laws against rape, robbery, and murder.
Something that rights supporters must understand is that hoplophobes can not be “cured” with reason any more than people with an irrational fear of spiders or snakes can be convinced that such vermin are “friendly.” That’s what irrational means.
Therefore efforts to reform hoplophobes are wasted. Instead we must focus our energies on exposing the irrationality and distortions put forward by these people so that the rational public can see the truth.
Gun laws don’t work.
Restricting the rights of responsible citizens does nothing to reduce crime or protect society.
Focusing on tools diverts resources away from effective strategies for reducing crime and suicide.
Permission to reprint or post this article in its entirety for non-commercial purposes is hereby granted provided this credit is included. Text is available at www.FirearmsCoalition.org. To receive The Firearms Coalition’s bi-monthly newsletter, The Hard Corps Report, write to PO Box 3313, Manassas, VA 20108. ©Copyright 2009 Neal Knox Associates
http://www.ohioccw.org/content/view/4362/53/
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Good interview with John Lott:
http://www.c-span.org/Watch/watch.aspx?ProgramId=HP-A-41601
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Where's the gun store in Texas that's selling that machine gun?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1170064/Whats-nice-girl-like-doing-arsenal-like-Police-seize-20-year-old-guarding-vast-weapons-cache--including-anti-aircraft-gun.html
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Where's the gun store in Texas that's selling that machine gun?
Heck, where's the "anti-aircraft gun"? I see what looks like a .50 with a big muzzle brake on the left side of the longshot; it doesn't appear to be set up on an AA mount of any sort have been used for AA in the past, most notably during WW II, they were usually arranged in task specific mounts in tandem or quad arrangements. About the only aircraft the gun shown could shoot would be one sitting on the tarmac.
Inside baseball stuff, I suppose, but it bugs the bejesus out of me that no MSM story regarding firearms can be reported without incorporating major errors caused by breathless ignorance.
BTW, like how the spread all those AK mags out to increase the apparent size of the haul. . . .
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Gun Control for the Sake of Mexico: The Meme That Wouldn’t Die
Posted by David Rittgers
Fox News already debunked the claim that 90% of the guns involved in Mexico’s drug war come from the United States. Facts aside, the press onslaught continues in a new push for gun control.
The fact is that out of 29,000 firearms picked up in Mexico over the last two-year period for which data is available, 5,114 of the 6,000 traced guns came from the United States. While that is 90% of traced guns, it means that only 17% of recovered guns come from the United States civilian market.
Where did the rest come from? A number of places. To begin with, over 150,000 Mexican soldiers have deserted in the last six years for the better pay and benefits of cartel life, some taking their issued M-16 rifles with them.
Surprisingly, a significant number of the arms are coming to the cartels via legitimate transactions. They are produced and exported legally every year, regulated by the State Department as Direct Commercial Sales. FY 2007 figures for the full exports are available here, and State’s report on end-use is available here, alleging widespread fraud and use of front companies to funnel the weapons into the black market. (H/T to Narcosphere) This doesn’t even take into account the thousands of weapons floating around Latin America from previous wars of liberation. This Los Angeles Times article also shows how the cartels are getting hand grenades, rocket launchers, and other devices you can’t pick up at your local sporting goods store.
Perhaps this is why law enforcement officials did not ask for new gun laws to combat Mexican drug violence at recent hearings in front of Congress.
Never mind those pesky facts. The story at the New York Times recycles the 90% claim. The associated video is just as bad. Narrator: “The weapons that are arming the drug war in Juarez are illegal to purchase and possess in Mexico.” They’re also illegal in the United States. As the narrator says these words, the Mexican officer is handling an M-16 variant with a barrel less than sixteen inches long. This rifle would be illegal to possess in the United States without prior approval from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATFE). As the video mentions the expired “Assault” Weapons Ban, the submachine gun in frame would also be classified as a short-barreled rifle and require BATFE approval. Ditto for many of the rifles shown in the video. The restrictions on barrel length would not apply to weapons exported as Direct Commercial Sales. Law enforcement folks call this a “clue.”
The language of gun control advocates is changing subtly to demonize “military style” weapons. “Military style” weapons is a new and undefined term that means either (1) automatic weapons, short barreled rifles, short barreled shotguns, and destructive devices already heavily regulated by federal law; or (2) a term inclusive of all modern firearms in a back-door attempt to enact a new gun control scheme.
Yes, ALL modern firearms. Grandpa’s hunting rifle? Basis for the system used by military snipers. The pump-action shotgun you use to hunt ducks and quail? Basis for the modular shotgun produced for the military. The handgun you bought for self-defense, a constitutionally protected right? Used by every modern military.
This is not a new tactic. The Violence Policy Center has previously tried to fool people by portraying ordinary rifles as machine guns with the term “assault” weapons: “The weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons-anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun-can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.”
Making our domestic policies based on the preferences of other countries is unacceptable, especially in an activity protected by the Constitution. One of Canada’s Human Rights Commissioners is on record saying that “[f]reedom of speech is an American concept, so I don’t give it any value.” (Apparently, it makes the folks at the Department of Homeland Security nervous too) In a similar vein, the United Nations says “[w]e especially encourage the debate on the issue of reinstating the 1994 U.S. ban on assault rifles that expired in 2004.”
It’s not theirs to say, and we shouldn’t listen to an argument based on lies. Related posts here and here.
David Rittgers • April 15, 2009 @ 5:37 pm
Filed under: Foreign Policy and National Security; Law and Civil Liberties
Tags: Congress, department of homeland security, drug, drug violence, drug war, gun control, guns, latin america, Mexican drug violence, Mexico, military, rifles, violence
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2009/04/15/gun-control-for-the-sake-of-mexico-the-meme-that-wouldnt-die/
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Our resident lawyer will have to explain why this is a big deal as the whole "incorporation" process strikes me as having more to do with transubstantiation than the cold light of law, but regardless this is a big deal for gun owners. Link to the decision here:
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2009/04/20/0715763.pdf
[Eugene Volokh, April 20, 2009 at 1:03pm] Trackbacks
Second Amendment Incorporated by Ninth Circuit Panel, in
Nordyke v. King. For those who count such things, the unanimous panel consists of a Reagan appointee (Judge O'Scannlain, who wrote), a Carter appointee (Judge Alarcon), and a Clinton appointee (Judge Gould).
The panel avoids the late 19th-century cases United States v. Cruikshank (1876) and Presser v. Illinois (1886) by reading them as simply foreclosing the direct application of the Second Amendment to the states, or the application of the Second Amendment to the states via the Privileges or Immunities Clause. The panel instead follows the Supreme Court's "selective incorporation" cases under the Due Process Clause, and concludes that the right to bear arms "ranks as fundamental, meaning 'necessary to an Anglo-American regime of ordered liberty.'" And in footnote 16 it points out that
Because, as Heller itself points out, 128 S. Ct. at 2813 n.23, Cruikshank and Presser did not discuss selective incorporation through the Due Process Clause, there is no Supreme Court precedent directly on point that bars us from heeding Heller’s suggestions. Cf. Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/Am. Express, Inc., 490 U.S. 477, 484 (1989) (“If a precedent of this Court has direct application in a case, yet appears to rest on reasons rejected in some other line of decisions, the Court of Appeals should follow the case which directly controls ....”). But see Maloney v. Cuomo, 554 F.3d 56, 58-59 (2d Cir. 2009) (concluding that Presser forecloses application of the Second Amendment to the states).
(I should note that many scholars view Due Process Clause incorporation as historically unfounded, but take the view that the Privileges or Immunities Clause was originally understood as incorporating nearly all of the Bill of Rights against the states; but that is not the view the Supreme Court has taken.)
This sort of "fundamentalness" reasoning in naturally mushy — as it has been throughout the Court's selective incorporation cases — but here's roughly how the panel goes through it: (1) It points to evidence that the right was seen as very important by the Framers, and concludes, "This brief survey of our history reveals a right indeed 'deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition.' Moreover, whereas the Supreme Court has previously incorporated rights the colonists fought for, we have here both a right they fought for and the right that allowed them to fight."
(2) It points to continued support for the right from the Framing on, noting among other things that 44 state constitutions contain a right-to-bear-arms provision.
(3) It particularly points to the support of the right, including its self-defense component, around the time the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified.
Note that the better articulation of the test the panel actually applied was probably whether the right is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition" (citing Glucksberg), not whether it's "necessary to an Anglo-American regime of ordered liberty." Among other things, the Anglo- half of "Anglo-American" abandoned the right decades ago, and it's pretty clear that many of the rights that have indeed been incorporated (such as, for instance, the privilege against self-incrimination) aren't strictly necessary to our regime of ordered liberty. But that criticism would equally apply to many of the Court's selective incorporation cases, which probably also followed the "deeply rooted" test even if they didn't articulate their reasoning that way.
The panel's reasoning begins by pointing to the Framing Era sources
Thanks to Alice Marie Beard for the tip. Will blog more as soon as I can carefully read the opinion.
Related Posts (on one page):
What Now for the Question Whether the Second Amendment is Incorporated Against State and Local Governments?
Why the Gun Show Organizers Nonetheless Lost their Case,
Concurrence by Judge Gould (a Clinton Appointee) in the Second Amendment Incorporation Case:
Second Amendment Incorporated by Ninth Circuit Panel, in
http://www.volokh.com/posts/1240247034.shtml
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"The panel instead follows the Supreme Court's "selective incorporation" cases under the Due Process Clause, and concludes that the right to bear arms "ranks as fundamental, meaning 'necessary to an Anglo-American regime of ordered liberty.'"
:-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o
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An email I received:
======================
Before Heller, and now Nordyke, numerous law review articles and other material debating what the Second Amendment means, the origins of it, collective right v. individual rights...were published.
But I haven't yet come across any scholarship discussing what types of arms would be necessary to preserve the second amendment's core purpose as discussed in Heller and Nordyke - Self Defense and Defense Against Tyranny.
Right now the cases are focusing on incorporation, getting it applicable to the states, but once that is successful...then what?
Eventually, an assault weapon ban case will be before the court.
It's easy to argue how your rights have been infringed upon when you can't even buy a gun, or you have to keep it in a condition that renders it useless...but it's a lot harder to sell a court on overturning an assault weapon ban.
A Court will ask, "Well, won't a revolver, a pistol or a shotgun do just as well to preserve your right to bear arms? Why do you need a weapon such as an AR-15/a 30 round magazine/other... to preserve your right to bear arms when other options are available to you under the law you are contesting?".
Has anything published from a constitutional law & tactical point of view on what kind of arms would be needed at a minimum to make rights under the second amendment anything more than dead letter?
If it has...someone let me know were I can get a copy...But, if it hasn't been done yet, Why not do it?
If no material exists for a court or future litigants to look at, something that addresses the issue from a trainer's prospective on the "minimum arms" needed to keep the right to bear arms from being relegated to uselessness, and to address how the case law in other areas such as reproductive freedom and privacy rights should apply to such arms...
Why not create it? Why not set the standard before a court starts to look for one?
Anybody interested?
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From the 'Court Jesters' File: Accidental Shooting Ruling
The Supreme Court also ruled this week on a case involving a robbery during which the perpetrator accidentally fired his gun. He claimed that the automatic 10-year sentence for firing a weapon during a crime was too harsh for something that was an accident. The Court disagreed. Mandatory minimum sentences are another can of worms, but we agree with Chief Justice John Roberts, who pointed out that if criminals wanted to avoid the penalty for firing the gun, even by accident, they should "lock or unload the firearm, handle it with care during the underlying violent or drug trafficking crime, leave the gun at home or -- best yet -- avoid committing the felony in the first place."
Funnier still is the dissent, written by Justice John Paul Stevens and joined by Stephen Breyer, which said, "Accidents happen, but they seldom give rise to criminal liability. Indeed, if they cause no harm, they seldom give rise to any liability. The court today nevertheless holds that petitioner is subject to a mandatory additional sentence -- a species of criminal liability -- for an accident that caused no harm." Call us crazy for pointing it out, but these are two of the justices who dissented from last year's Heller ruling, which affirmed the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. In other words, they are in the unusual position of defending a criminal who accidentally fired a weapon during a crime while maintaining that law-abiding citizens have no right to own a firearm.
PatriotPost
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http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepu...efolo0425.html
Phoenix police reported 11 of their own assault rifles missing this week based on the results of an audit which showed no trace of the weapons.
With 381 rifles deployed from precinct patrols to SWAT teams across Phoenix, police spokesmen downplayed the audit. Four days after a detective filed a loss report, they said the weapons probably were stashed in a car trunk or locker somewhere and were simply misplaced, rather than out on the street.
"They were put into the (National Crime Information Center database) to ensure they don't get into the wrong hands," said Officer Luis Samudio. A loss report detailed more than $7,000 in stolen weapons, according to Samudio.
Board members from the Phoenix Law Enforcement Association argued that the missing rifles reflected poorly on a department that prohibits its sworn officers from purchasing their own assault rifles for duty. The list included a non-lethal training rifle and a Steyr-AUG rifle which sells for as much as $5,000, according to some estimates.
"If they were still conducting their audit and they felt confident they knew where they are, why would they enter them into NCIC as stolen?" said Ken Crane, a board member of the law-enforcement group. "They wouldn't have taken that step unless they exhausted all means to locate those rifles first."
Some major U.S. police departments allow private purchases to equip more officers with the high-powered weapons required in some situations. Phoenix City Council approved the purchase of 80 more Bushmaster AR-15 rifles in March, allowing police to use more than $59,000 to secure the added firepower. However, it could take until this fall to phase the weapons into patrol because of manufacturer backlogs due to military orders.
This spring's order marked the first police rifle purchase since actor David Spade donated $100,000 in December to help buy more rifles.
Representatives of the law-enforcement group estimated that one in 10 Phoenix patrol officers have access to a rifle in field, with only 128 available to the patrol force of about 1,200 officers.
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College Student Shoots, Kills Home Invader
COLLEGE PARK, Ga. -- A group of college students said they are lucky to be alive and they’re thanking the quick-thinking of one of their own. Police said a fellow student shot and killed one of two masked me who burst into an apartment.
Channel 2 Action News reporter Tom Jones met with one of the students to talk about the incident.
“Apparently, his intent was to rape and murder us all,” said student Charles Bailey.
Bailey said he thought it was the end of his life and the lives of the 10 people inside his apartment for a birthday party after two masked men with guns burst in through a patio door.
“They just came in and separated the men from the women and said, ‘Give me your wallets and cell phones,’” said George Williams of the College Park Police Department.
Bailey said the gunmen started counting bullets. “The other guy asked how many (bullets) he had. He said he had enough,” said Bailey.
That’s when one student grabbed a gun out of a backpack and shot at the invader who was watching the men. The gunman ran out of the apartment.
The student then ran to the room where the second gunman, identified by police as 23-year-old Calvin Lavant, was holding the women.
“Apparently the guy was getting ready to rape his girlfriend. So he told the girls to get down and he started shooting. The guy jumped out of the window,” said Bailey.
A neighbor heard the shots and heard someone running nearby.
“And I heard someone say, ‘Someone help me. Call the police. Somebody call the police,’” said a neighbor.
The neighbor said she believes it was Lavant, who was found dead near his apartment, only one building away.
Bailey said he is just thankful one student risked his life to keep others alive.
“I think all of us are really cognizant of the fact that we could have all been killed,” said Bailey.
One female student was shot several times during the crossfire. She is expected to make a full recovery.
Police said they are close to making the arrest of the second suspect.
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PANAMA GUN LAWS
Introduction – This article is written for the Ex-Pat who has legally become a resident of the Republic of Panama and wishes to acquire a firearm. We will walk you through the process. Tourists can not acquire firearms in Panama. You must have a residency or be a Pensionado. You do not need to retain a lawyer to purchase a gun. If you have permission to buy the firearm you can carry it concealed on your person, in your pocket or purse, in your vehicle etc. Certain buildings have a firearms prohibited sign on the entrance and of course you should obey these signs. Banks, airports, government offices have such signs. So there are no concealed carry permits in Panama, if you can buy the gun lawfully you can carry it concealed. Exposed carry of the firearm is not allowed and will cause police attention fast.
Types of Guns in Panama – You can buy handguns (semi-auto handguns, revolvers), rifles and shotguns. You can have hi-capacity magazines in any type gun, no restrictions. You can not have full-auto firearms. You can have semi-auto rifles and handguns. You can not have a silencer. Guns are costly in Panama, figure 50% higher than North America on name brand guns like Ruger, Sig Sauer, Smith, Remington, etc. Gun dealers generally do not have a large inventory in Panama. Expect to see 10 or so rifles and shotguns in stock and perhaps as many handguns. Many of the guns will be cheapies from Argentina and Russia. The dealer can order you what you want but expect a wait of 2-3 months or more then add in the time for the permission to buy the gun to go through.
The Gun Buying Process in Panama – First you go to the gun store and prove to them you are eligible to buy a firearm by way of Residency, Pensionado, etc. Next you select a gun and pay for it. Then the gun store will have you go to the bathroom and pee in a cup which is a medical sample cup. Then you will be given a form to take to a government health office for a finger prick blood test – DNA sample. Plan on a wait to get your blood sample. Next the gun store sends the paperwork through the police system. It goes to three departments and can take 6-10 weeks to clear. When it is complete you get the gun. More than one gun can be bought at the same time. You also get a gun permit which is a folded piece of green cardboard paper which a photo on it. You can enter up to 10 guns on the permit. Panama does not limit amount of guns so if you earn more than 10 guns an additional listing page will be provided for the permit. The police will take ballistic sample of a fired round.
Sawed off Shotguns and Short Barreled Rifles – These are legal in Panama. They are not sold that way but can be modified by a gunsmith to suit. Pistol grip shotguns with no shoulder stock are generally available in the stores with an 18” barrel and a large magazine underneath. Double barrel shotguns are available and of course can easily be shortened by a gunsmith; you could even add a choke so the short barrel groups tight. Short barrel rifles can also be created by a gunsmith but the purpose of this is hard to determine other than slightly reducing the barrel length on an assault rifle but in any event it is lawful. I guess some want to do it because they could not do so in their home country?
Ammo- No armor piercing ammo allowed. Hollow points, high speed light weight defensive rounds etc. are fine.
Firearm Importation into Panama – This is possible. Generally this appeals to Americans since they seem to have lots of firearms. You go to a gun store and get their assistance. You apply for an importation permit which is something like the same process for a purchase if you do not already have a permit. It is easier if you have a permit. Then you get permission to import the weapon into Panama. There can be problems and restrictions shipping a firearm from other countries like the USA which require the services of a licensed gun dealer able to export. You would Fed Ex the unloaded gun with paperwork from USA and Panama to Panama. Then you would hope for the best and that things sort themselves out before the gun rusts out in some non-climate controlled government warehouse somewhere. You will be required to pay an import duty which can be steep. A customs broker would be best source for costs on this, we do not know but a guess would be 50% of the value – is it new or used, etc. We are a law firm not a customs broker. If you have a question about bringing in some rare special gun like a Browning Safari Grade Rifle or a Heckler and Koch squeeze cocker handgun we really have no idea what the taxes will be. First become eligible for buy a gun and then retain a customs broker. Suggestion: Skip the importation process, buy a gun in Panama.
Ranges – There are an ample amount of indoor handgun ranges and outdoor ranges. No worries.
Knives – You can carry concealed knives. Do not carry an exposed sheath knife in the city – asking for trouble from the police. There are no blade size restrictions. You can carry butterfly knives, automatic knifes, gravity or flick knives, out the front knives, double edge folders (carry Band-Aids) whatever kind of knife. Most of the available knives are the cheapos, sometime you see a medium grade product like a Smith and Wesson knife. Bring your good knives with you, not in carry on. Do not take knives into government buildings, airports, banks and other restricted places. It will come up on the metal detector.
Pepper Spray – Readily available small canisters. No permits needed. Decent quality, not gourmet pepper spray but effective enough.
Swords, Tonfas, Batons, Billy Clubs, Staffs, Nunchukas – All readily available and not restricted.
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Could be filed several places:
On guns and climate, the elites are out of touch
By: Michael Barone
Senior Political Analyst
05/10/09 10:05 PM EDT
On issues like global warming and gun control, the political elite does not see eye-to-eye with the American public. (Photos by Photos.com)
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Many years ago political scientists came up with a theory that elites lead public opinion. And on some issues they clearly do. But on some issues they don’t. Two examples of the latter phenomenon are conspicuous at a time when Barack Obama enjoys the approval of more than 60 percent of Americans and Democrats have won thumping majorities in two elections in a row. One is global warming.
The other is gun control. On both issues, the elites of academe, the media and big business have been solidly on one side for years. But on both, the American public has been moving in the other direction.
Over the last decade, the Gallup organization has been asking Americans whether the seriousness of global warming is generally exaggerated or generally correct. From 1998 to 2007, except for the runup to the 2004 election, they said it was generally serious by roughly a 2-1 margin — 66 to 30 percent in 2006, for example. But in March 2009, that margin slipped to only 57 to 41 percent, with two-thirds of Republicans and nearly half of independents saying concern is exaggerated.
Similarly, last month pollster Scott Rasmussen found that only 34 percent believe that global warming is caused by human activity, while 48 percent said it was caused by long-term planetary trends. That’s almost exactly the opposite of what he found 12 months before — 47 to 34 percent the other way around. However, 48 percent of the group Rasmussen calls the Political Class — in other words, the elite — continues to believe global warming is man-made.
On guns, Gallup has been testing opinion for many years on one extreme proposal that is the goal, usually unstated, of many gun control advocates: banning the possession of handguns. Support was 60 percent in 1960 and 49 percent in 1965. It was as high as 43 percent in the early 1990s, before the Clinton Congress passed the so-called assault weapon ban. In March 2007 it had fallen to 29 percent — a minority, almost a fringe position. In the early 1990s Gallup found that Americans by a 2-1 margin favored stricter gun sale laws over less strict ones or keeping them the same. By fall 2008 they were evenly split.
Some of these shifts in opinion may be responses to events that liberal elites have not deigned to notice. Forty of the 50 states now have concealed weapons laws that allow law-abiding citizens to get permits to carry guns. Gun controllers predicted these would result in traffic shootouts and general mayhem. They haven’t. It turns out that criminals are deterred from attacks less by gun control laws than by the possibility that their intended victims may be armed. As for global warming, many Americans may have noticed that temperatures actually haven’t been rising over the last decade as global warming alarmists predicted. The elites are able to hire armed security guards and jet off on private jets, so they are less likely to notice these things.
I think there’s something else at work here. For liberal elites, belief in gun control and global warming has taken on the character of religious faith. We have sinned (by hoarding guns or driving sport utility vehicles), we must atone (by turning in our guns or recycling), we must repent (by supporting gun control or cap-and-trade schemes). You may notice that the “we” in question is usually the great mass of ordinary American citizens.
The liberal elite is less interested in giving up its luxuries (Al Gore purchases carbon offsets to compensate for his huge mansion and private jet travel) than in changing the lifestyles of the masses who selfishly insist on living in suburbs and keeping guns for recreation or protection. Ordinary Americans are seen not as responsible fellow citizens building stable communities but as greedy masses who must be disciplined to live according to the elite’s religious dogmas.
It should not be completely surprising that, over time, these views have become less congenial to the masses who are the object of such condescension. Democratic officeholders who must live by the discipline of the ballot have noticed. Party leaders did not press to re-enact the assault weapons ban when it expired and are currently flummoxed by their backbenchers who are resisting a cap-and-trade bill that will impose huge costs on those who use electricity. Elites may lead, but Americans do not always follow.
Find this article at:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/On-guns-and-climate-the-elites-are-out-of-touch-44616257.html
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Second post. The 9th Circuit again finds in favor of firearm rights:
[Eugene Volokh, May 11, 2009 at 4:43pm] Trackbacks
Ninth Circuit Panel Applies and Upholds the Federal Statute Preempting Various Lawsuits Against Gun Manufacturers, in Ileto v. Glock, Inc. (just handed down today). I might not have time to say much about this, but I thought I'd give the pointer, and note that the opinion was by Judge Graber joined by Judge Reinhardt, with a partial concurrence and partial dissent by Judge Berzon. For more on the underlying tort theory, which the Ninth Circuit accepted before Congress passed the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, see the four posts that begin here.
Note that the panel did hold that the Act doesn't apply to one of the defendants, a foreign manufacturer that isn't "licensed to engage in business as such a manufacturer under [federal law]," to quote the Act; but while there was some argument about that, the result seems to be pretty clearly correct. Thanks to How Appealing for the pointer.
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_05_10-2009_05_16.shtml#1242074620
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2009/05/11/06-56872.pdf
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A new Second Amendment case
Tuesday, June 9th, 2009 4:55 pm | Lyle Denniston | Print This Post
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Alan Gura, the Alexandria, Va., attorney who won the historic Supreme Court ruling last year establishing a personal right to have a gun for self-defense at home, started a new challenge in the Supreme Court Tuesday. It seeks to have the Second Amendment right enforced against state, county and city gun control laws. The petition in McDonald, et al., v. City of Chicago, can be downloaded here. (A docket number has not yet been assigned.)
Last week, the National Rifle Association filed a separate appeal raising the same issue (NRA, et al., v. City of Chicago, docket 08-1497). It is doubtful that the Court will consider the two new cases before recessing for the summer, probably late this month.
The McDonald petition involves four Chicago residents, the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association, all challenging a handgun ban in Chicago. Their petition said the ban is identical to one struck down by the Supreme Court in its Second Amendment ruling last June in District of Columbia v. Heller (07-290).
The Heller decision, however, applied only to laws enacted by Congress or for the federal capital in Washington. The Court expressly left open the question of whether individuals would have the same right against state and local government gun restrictions.
Arguing that the Second Amendment right is a “fundamental” one, the new petition said that means that the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees that such rights “may not be violated by any form of government throughout the United States. Accordingly, Chicago’s handgun ban must meet the same fate as that which befell the District of Columbia’s former law.”
Part of their argument is that the Justices should step in now to resolve a dispute among federal appeals courts and state supreme courts on whether the Second Amendment is absorbed (technically, “incorporated”) into the Fourteenth Amendment — a part of the Constitution that operates against state and local government.
The question posed to the Court is whether the incorporation is accomplished under either the “privileges or immunities” clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, or under its “due process” clause. The petition urges the Court to use this case as an opportunity to reexamine the meaning of the “privileges and immunities” provision, which it noted was given an “almost meaningless construction” by the Court’s controversial decision in the Slaughter- House Cases in 1873.
The split of authority in lower courts “warrants speedy resolution, as it perpetuates the deprivation of fundamental rights among a large portion of the population,” it said. It would serve no purpose to let this conflict go on, the petition contended.
http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/a-new-second-amendment-case/
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See entry #16 for a fascinating piece on these issues:
http://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?topic=1850.0
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A legal shootout over the right to own a gun
Conflicting court opinions gun may result in linking the 2nd Amendment with the 14th.
June 10, 2009
Two federal appeals court opinions -- one signed by Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor -- have created a quandary for those who cherish the protections of the Bill of Rights and also believe in meaningful gun control. But the way out of the dilemma is not to urge the high court to pick and choose which constitutional rights are protected against state and local laws.
Among the charges leveled by some conservatives against Sotomayor is that she has been insufficiently protective of the 2nd Amendment, which says that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Exhibit A was the judge's role in a decision by the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals upholding the constitutionality of a New York state law banning the possession of nunchucks.
Sotomayor and two other judges ruled that the 2nd Amendment applies only to the federal government, a long-standing view that the Supreme Court didn't address when it struck down a gun control law in Washington, D.C., last year. In legal jargon, the high court hasn't explicitly "incorporated” the 2nd Amendment in the 14th Amendment, which protects "liberty" against state interference. Other amendments long have been incorporated, making it possible to sue the states for violating many of the protections of the Bill of Rights.
Using the 2nd Circuit decision to portray Sotomayor as an opponent of gun rights became harder last week when two of the nation's most prominent conservative judges issued an opinion espousing the same view. The opinion for a three-judge panel of the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals was written by Judge Frank Easterbrook, a President Reagan appointee. The justices may soon address the incorporation question in order to resolve a conflict between the position taken by the 2nd and 7th circuits and the opposite view adopted by the San Francisco-based U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.
It's tempting for supporters of gun control -- including this page -- to hope that the high court will rule that the 2nd Amendment doesn't apply to the states. That would be a mistake and would give aid and comfort to conservative legal thinkers, among them Justice Clarence Thomas, who have questioned the incorporation doctrine.
We were disappointed last year when the Supreme Court ruled that the right to keep and bear arms was an individual right, giving short shrift to the first part of the amendment, which refers to "a well-regulated militia." But we also believe the court has been right to use the doctrine of incorporation to bind states to the most important protections of the Bill of Rights. If those vital provisions are to be incorporated in the 14th Amendment, so should the right to keep and bear arms.
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and inform foreign govts of US gun owners to boot!
http://wearechangecoloradosprings.org/blog/?p=594
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The good news is that blue helmets and berets make good targets.
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If Knives Are Outlawed…Customs And Border Protection Proposal Could Ban Many Pocketknives
Friday, June 12, 2009
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has issued a proposed rule change that directly targets the importation of "assisted opening" folding knives. (Read the proposed rule here.) The proposed regulations would designate all these knives as "switchblades" (despite the fact they do not fall under the federal definition of "switchblades"), and would make them illegal for import into the United States.
The proposed rule could affect all knives that can be opened with one hand, because it also includes changes in the interpretation of "gravity and inertia" opening knives in a way that could outlaw all knives that can be opened with a single hand. This means the new regulation could ban the importation of most of the pocketknives that are now in popular use.
And it could have a far greater impact. The American Knife and Tool Institute and Knife Rights, Inc. have both reviewed the proposed new regulations and are very concerned that the impact will be far greater than just a ban on the importation of assisted opening knives. If the new regulations also affect the broader category of single-handed opening knives, it could make millions of knives illegal for import. More importantly, many local jurisdictions and some states depend on the definitions used by the CBP. These changes could make hundreds of millions of knives now in regular use, illegal. And, of course, millions of hunters use and rely on their knives and would be adversely affected by this proposed regulation.
CBP is attempting to expedite this rulemaking and is only keeping comments open until June 21, 2009. The American Knife and Tool Institute and Knife Rights, Inc. are leading the charge against the. For more information and to make your voice heard in opposition to these new regulations, please go to: http://www.kniferights.org/index and http://www.akti.org/.
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Find this item at: http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=4972
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Will Second Amendment Be Incorporated Through Citizenship Clause?
Posted Jun 17, 2009, 06:49 am CDT
By Debra Cassens Weiss
Federal appeals courts hearing gun rights cases after the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment ruling last year in District of Columbia v. Heller are confronting an old issue: whether the amendment applies to restrict state and local laws under the incorporation doctrine.
Heller found that the Second Amendment protected an individual right to own a gun in the District of Columbia, a federal enclave. New suits challenging state and local laws have resulted in a split. Two federal appeals courts refused to apply the Second Amendment to local laws without express Supreme Court authorization. A third disagreed.
University of Texas law professor Sanford Levinson told the New York Times that the case could present a dilemma for some conservative justices who scoffed at incorporation arguments in the past. Because of the touchy issues, he says he would be surprised if the U.S. Supreme Court agrees to hear new cases on the issue.
Yale law professor Akhil Reed Amar told the Times that incorporation fell out of favor after the 1960s, but it’s being resurrected by liberal scholars. Most of the Bill of Rights have been applied to the states under liberal Warren Court rulings that found the 14th Amendment required incorporation. One exception is the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial, which has not been applied to the states.
“The precedents are now supportive of incorporation of nearly every provision of the Bill of Rights,” Amar told the Times. “Now what’s odd is that the Second Amendment doesn’t apply to the states.”
He believes the justices will support incorporation. A post at the Volokh Conspiracy after the Heller ruling cited evidence that Justice Antonin Scalia may be on board.
Scalia’s Heller opinion highlights the importance to the newly freed slaves of the right to keep and bear arms in the home—the kind of evidence used to support incorporation. One Scalia passage hints that he believes the amendment could be incorporated through the 14th Amendment’s citizenship clause, rather than due process safeguards, says the Volokh Conspiracy writer, University of Minnesota law professor Dale Carpenter.
http://www.abajournal.com/news/will_second_amendment_be_incorporated_through_citizenship_clause
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BBG:
EXCELLENT find! I am spreading it around.
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Here's this:
23 State Attorneys General To Attorney General Holder: "No Semi-Auto Ban"
Friday, June 12, 2009
On June 11, the top law enforcement officials of nearly half the states signed a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, expressing their opposition to reinstatement of the federal ban on semi-automatic firearms.
"We share the Obama Administration's commitment to reducing illegal drugs and violent crime within the United States. We also share your deep concern about drug cartel violence in Mexico. However, we do not believe that restricting law-abiding Americans' access to certain semi-automatic firearms will resolve any of these problems," the letter said.
The letter notes congressional opposition to bringing back the ban, and calls for increasing enforcement of existing laws.
We encourage NRA members to let these state officials know we appreciate them standing up to the incessant clamor for gun control that is currently coming from anti-gun groups and their media allies.
The 23 state Attorneys General, in alphabetical order, by state, are:
Arkansas – The Honorable Dustin McDaniel
Alabama - The Honorable Troy King
Colorado - The Honorable John W. Suthers
Florida - The Honorable Bill McCollum
Georgia - The Honorable Thurbert E. Baker
Idaho - The Honorable Lawrence G. Wasden
Kansas - The Honorable Steve Six
Kentucky - The Honorable Jack Conway
Louisiana - The Honorable James D. Caldwell
Michigan - The Honorable Mike Cox
Missouri - The Honorable Chris Koster
Montana - The Honorable Steve Bullock
Oklahoma - The Honorable W.A. Edmonson
Nebraska - The Honorable Jon Bruning
Nevada - The Honorable Catherine Cortez Masto
New Hampshire - The Honorable Kelly A. Ayotte
North Dakota - The Honorable Wayne Stenehjem
South Carolina - The Honorable Henry McMaster
South Dakota - The Honorable Lawrence Long
Texas - The Honorable Greg Abbott
Utah - The Honorable Mark L. Shurtleff
Wisconsin – The Honorable J.B. Van Hollen
Wyoming - The Honorable Bruce A. Salzburg
To read the letter in its entirety, please click here.
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Commencing July 1, 2010, it will be illegal for anyone in CA to privatley transfer more than 50 rounds of handgun ammunition....
quote:
(3) Commencing July 1, 2010, a vendor shall not sell or otherwise
transfer ownership of any handgun ammunition without at the time of
delivery legibly recording the following information on a form that
is in a format to be prescribed by the department:
(A) The date of the sale or other transaction.
(B) The purchaser's or transferee's driver's license or other
identification number and the state in which it was issued.
(C) The brand, type, and amount of ammunition sold or otherwise
transferred.
(D) The purchaser's or transferee's signature.
(E) The name of the salesperson who processed the sale or other
transaction.
(F) The right thumbprint of the purchaser or transferee on the
above form.
(G) The purchaser's or transferee's full residential address and
telephone number.
(H) The purchaser's or transferee's date of birth.
http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/...amended_asm_v98.html
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I presume "private" covers retail sales? Any clue how it impacts reloading?
I don't envy you denizens of the People's Republic of Kalifornia. I blow through at least a hundred rounds per practice session; guess you all will now have to stand in line twice to make that nut?
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It is a sad state of affairs indeed! Time for the citizens of California to vote, either in an election to stop this madness or with their feet. :-o :cry:
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http://www.jpfo.org/filegen-a-m/movieplay-ngn-swf.htm
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Don't expect to see the implications of this article in the MSM any time soon.
The most violent country in Europe: Britain is also worse than South Africa and U.S.
By JAMES SLACK
Last updated at 3:24 AM on 02nd July 2009
Britain's violent crime record is worse than any other country in the European union, it is revealed today.
Official crime figures show the UK also has a worse rate for all types of violence than the U.S. and even South Africa - widely considered one of the world's most dangerous countries.
The figures comes on the day new Home Secretary Alan Johnson makes his first major speech on crime, promising to be tough on loutish behaviour.
Britain even has a worse violence rate than South Africa, where violent clashes last year in Johannesburg resulted in a man being set alight
The Tories said Labour had presided over a decade of spiralling violence.
In the decade following the party's election in 1997, the number of recorded violent attacks soared by 77 per cent to 1.158million - or more than two every minute.
The figures, compiled from reports released by the European Commission and United Nations, also show:
The UK has the second highest overall crime rate in the EU.
It has a higher homicide rate than most of our western European neighbours, including France, Germany, Italy and Spain.
The UK has the fifth highest robbery rate in the EU.
It has the fourth highest burglary rate and the highest absolute number of burglaries in the EU, with double the number of offences than recorded in Germany and France.
But it is the naming of Britain as the most violent country in the EU that is most shocking. The analysis is based on the number of crimes per 100,000 residents.
In the UK, there are 2,034 offences per 100,000 people, way ahead of second-placed Austria with a rate of 1,677.
(http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2009/07/02/article-1196941-05900DF7000005DC-677_468x636.jpg)
The U.S. has a violence rate of 466 crimes per 100,000 residents, Canada 935, Australia 92 and South Africa 1,609.
Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said: 'This is a damning indictment of this government's comprehensive failure over more than a decade to tackle the deep rooted social problems in our society, and the knock on effect on crime and anti-social behaviour.
'We're now on our fourth Home Secretary this parliament, and all we are getting is a rehash of old initiatives that didn't work the first time round. More than ever Britain needs a change of direction.'
The figures, compiled by the Tories, are considered the most accurate and up-to-date available.
But criminologists say crime figures can be affected by many factors, including different criminal justice systems and differences in how crime is reported and measured.
New Home Secretary Alan Johnson is to make his first major speech on crime today
In Britain, an affray is considered a violent crime, while in other countries it will only be logged if a person is physically injured.
There are also degrees of violence. While the UK ranks above South Africa for all violent crime, South Africans suffer more than 20,000 murders each year - compared with Britain's 921 in 2007.
Experts say there are a number of reasons why violence is soaring in the UK. These include Labour's decision to relax the licensing laws to allow round-the-clock opening, which has led to a rise in the number of serious assaults taking place in the early hours of the morning.
But Police Minister David Hanson said: 'These figures are misleading.
Levels of police recorded crime statistics from different countries are simply not comparable since they are affected by many factors, for example the recording of violent crime in other countries may not include behaviour that we would categorise as violent crime.
'Violent crime in England and Wales has fallen by almost a half a peak in 1995 but we are not complacent and know there is still work to do. That is why last year we published 'Saving lives. Reducing harm. Protecting the public. An Action Plan for Tackling Violence 2008-11'.'
The timing of the Europe-wide violence figures is a blow for Mr Johnson, who will today seek to reassert Labour's law and order credentials.
In his first major speech on crime since becoming Home Secretary, Mr Johnson is expected to promise a concerted crack down on antisocial behaviour.
He wants to set up a website to allow the public to see what is taking place in their neighbourhood, such as the number of louts who have been served with Asbos.
Mr Johnson is also known to support early intervention to stop children going off the rails.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html
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By ALEX ROTH and ANSLEY HAMAN
Gun-rights advocates have won victories in several states in recent months allowing gun owners to carry concealed weapons in public parks, taverns and their work places.
So it came as a surprise to Tennessee state Rep. Stacey Campfield that he couldn't persuade his colleagues to pass a law allowing students at public colleges to carry concealed firearms on campus. The bill died this spring in the Republican-controlled legislature -- one of 34 straight defeats nationwide for people who believe a gun wouldn't be out of place in a college student's knapsack.
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Associated Press
The shooting at Virginia Tech, where students observed its April 15 anniversary, mobilized supporters and opponents of campus-carry laws.
Raucous debates over the parameters of the Second Amendment have become a staple of the culture wars. But even on an issue as divisive as gun control, states may be nearing something resembling a national consensus: Guns don't belong in a college classroom.
In the two years since a Virginia Tech student shot and killed 32 students and professors, gun-rights advocates have failed to pass laws even in states strongly supportive of gun owners' rights, including Louisiana, Alabama, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Mississippi and Kentucky. In June, a bill died in the Texas legislature in the face of criticism from college administrators and student groups, who invoked the specter of students toting loaded weapons to booze-soaked campus parties.
Gun-control advocates tout what they label an unprecedented winning streak, noting that it comes at a time when even many Democrats are wary of alienating U.S. gun owners.
Proponents of the bills are pressing on, arguing that passing such laws could help prevent the next Virginia Tech-style massacre. Mr. Campfield said he intends to reintroduce his bill in the next Tennessee legislative session. His state, which had 6.21 million residents in 2008, has approved the sale of more than 2.6 million firearms and issued more than 231,000 handgun carry permits, according to state records. The bill is "coming back stronger next year," Mr. Campfield said.
Some gun-rights advocates predict Texas will eventually provide their first victory, saying the legislature had the votes to pass the bill but simply ran out of time. "If Texas were to pass it, we predict that it would catch on in other states," said Katie Kasprzak, director of public relations for Students for Concealed Carry on Campus.
Only Utah expressly allows students at public universities to carry guns to class. The state passed such a law in 2004, before the Virginia Tech killings. Several states leave the decision up to schools. But only two schools in those states -- Blue Ridge Community College in Virginia and Colorado State University -- allow students to carry guns to class.
The push for legislation began in the immediate aftermath of the Virginia Tech killings. Ken Stanton, an engineering student there, helped found the first local chapter of Students for Concealed Carry on Campus, arguing it would allow students to defend themselves and prevent massacres from taking place. Within a year of the shooting, bills to expand the firearms-carrying rights of college students had been introduced in more than a dozen states.
But if the Virginia Tech shootings helped mobilize supporters of guns on campus, it also helped mobilize opponents. And some of the most vocal have been either victims of the shootings or people who lost loved ones.
Colin Goddard, a 21-year-old junior at the time, was shot four times in a classroom where his teacher and 11 fellow students were killed. Not long afterward, Mr. Goddard began speaking out against guns on campus, and he is now an intern at the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence in Washington.
Like other critics of these proposed bills, including many police departments, Mr. Goddard argues that a proliferation of firearms would simply add to the chaos during a shooting spree, making it impossible for police to distinguish between good guys and bad. He also says events unfolded at such a lighting pace during the shootings that even an armed student would have been powerless to prevent them.
"There were students dead in their chairs -- it happened that quick," he said. "I was shot before I really even knew what was going on."
Another former Virginia Tech student, John Woods, whose girlfriend was killed in the shootings, helped lead the fight this spring against the bill in Texas, where he is now a graduate student at the University of Texas.
In some states, legislators with strong gun-rights voting records have found themselves opposing these bills. This spring, Louisiana state Rep. Hollis Downs was one of 86 members of the Louisiana House to vote against allowing students with concealed-weapons permits to bring their guns onto the state's public campuses. The bill was defeated 86-18.
"I thought that the last thing that law enforcement needed was the fraternity militia to charge the building [in a shooting] with all guns blazing," said Mr. Downs, a Republican whose district includes Louisiana Tech University.
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Also posted in the Mexico-US thread:
Mexico: Economics and the Arms Trade
July 9, 2009
By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton
On June 26, the small Mexican town of Apaseo el Alto, in Guanajuato state, was the scene of a deadly firefight between members of Los Zetas and federal and local security forces. The engagement began when a joint patrol of Mexican soldiers and police officers responded to a report of heavily armed men at a suspected drug safe house. When the patrol arrived, a 20-minute firefight erupted between the security forces and gunmen in the house as well as several suspects in two vehicles who threw fragmentation grenades as they tried to escape.
Related Special Topic Page
Tracking Mexico’s Drug Cartels
When the shooting ended, 12 gunmen lay dead, 12 had been taken into custody and several soldiers and police officers had been wounded. At least half of the detained suspects admitted to being members of Los Zetas, a highly trained Mexican cartel group known for its use of military weapons and tactics.
When authorities examined the safe house they discovered a mass grave that contained the remains of an undetermined number of people (perhaps 14 or 15) who are believed to have been executed and then burned beyond recognition by Los Zetas. The house also contained a large cache of weapons, including assault rifles and fragmentation grenades. Such military ordnance is frequently used by Los Zetas and the enforcers who work for their rival cartels.
STRATFOR has been closely following the cartel violence in Mexico for several years now, and the events that transpired in Apaseo el Alto are by no means unique. It is not uncommon for the Mexican authorities to engage in large firefights with cartel groups, encounter mass graves or recover large caches of arms. However, the recovery of the weapons in Apaseo el Alto does provide an opportunity to once again focus on the dynamics of Mexico’s arms trade.
White, Black and Shades of Gray
Before we get down into the weeds of Mexico’s arms trade, let’s do something a little different and first take a brief look at how arms trafficking works on a regional and global scale. Doing so will help illustrate how arms trafficking in Mexico fits into these broader patterns.
When analysts examine arms sales they look at three general categories: the white arms market, the gray arms market and the black arms market. The white arms market is the legal, aboveboard transfer of weapons in accordance with the national laws of the parties involved and international treaties or restrictions. The parties in a white arms deal will file the proper paperwork, including end-user certificates, noting what is being sold, who is selling it and to whom it is being sold. There is an understanding that the receiving party does not intend to transfer the weapons to a third party. So, for example, if the Mexican army wants to buy assault rifles from German arms maker Heckler & Koch, it places the order with the company and fills out all the required paperwork, including forms for obtaining permission for the sale from the German government.
Now, the white arms market can be deceived and manipulated, and when this happens, we get the gray market — literally, white arms that are shifted into the hands of someone other than the purported recipient. One of the classic ways to do this is to either falsify an end-user certificate, or bribe an official in a third country to sign an end-user certificate but then allow a shipment of arms to pass through a country en route to a third location. This type of transaction is frequently used in cases where there are international arms embargoes against a particular country (like Liberia) or where it is illegal to sell arms to a militant group (such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known by its Spanish acronym, FARC). One example of this would be Ukrainian small arms that, on paper, were supposed to go to Cote d’Ivoire but were really transferred in violation of U.N. arms embargoes to Liberia and Sierra Leone. Another example of this would be the government of Peru purchasing thousands of surplus East German assault rifles from Jordan on the white arms market, ostensibly for the Peruvian military, only to have those rifles slip into the gray arms world and be dropped at airstrips in the jungles of Colombia for use by the FARC.
At the far end of the spectrum is the black arms market where the guns are contraband from the get-go and all the business is conducted under the table. There are no end-user certificates and the weapons are smuggled covertly. Examples of this would be the smuggling of arms from the former Soviet Union (FSU) and Afghanistan into Europe through places like Kosovo and Slovenia, or the smuggling of arms into South America from Asia, the FSU and Middle East by Hezbollah and criminal gangs in the Tri-Border Region.
Nation-states will often use the gray and black arms markets in order to deniably support allies, undermine opponents or otherwise pursue their national interests. This was clearly revealed in the Iran-Contra scandal of the mid-1980s, but Iran-Contra only scratched the surface of the arms smuggling that occurred during the Cold War. Untold tons of military ordnance were delivered by the United States, the Soviet Union and Cuba to their respective allies in Latin America during the Cold War.
This quantity of materiel shipped into Latin America during the Cold War brings up another very important point pertaining to weapons. Unlike drugs, which are consumable goods, firearms are durable goods. This means that they can be useful for decades and are frequently shipped from conflict zone to conflict zone. East German MPiKMS and MPiKM assault rifles are still floating around the world’s arms markets years after the German Democratic Republic ceased to exist. In fact, visiting an arms bazaar in a place like Yemen is like visiting an arms museum. One can encounter century-old, still-functional Lee-Enfield and Springfield rifles in a rack next to a modern U.S. M4 rifle or German HK93, and those next to brand-new Chinese Type 56 and 81 assault rifles.
There is often a correlation between arms and drug smuggling. In many instances, the same routes used to smuggle drugs are also used to smuggle arms. In some instances, like the smuggling routes from Central Asia to Europe, the flow of guns and drugs goes in the same direction, and they are both sold in Western Europe for cash. In the case of Latin American cocaine, the drugs tend to flow in one direction (toward the United States and Europe) while guns from U.S. and Russian organized-crime groups flow in the other direction, and often these guns are used as whole or partial payment for the drugs.
Illegal drugs are not the only thing traded for guns. During the Cold War, a robust arms-for-sugar trade transpired between the Cubans and Vietnamese. As a result, Marxist groups all over Latin America were furnished with U.S. materiel either captured or left behind when the Americans withdrew from Vietnam. LAW rockets traced to U.S. military stocks sent to Vietnam were used in several attacks by Latin American Marxist groups. These Vietnam War-vintage weapons still crop up with some frequency in Mexico, Colombia and other parts of the region. Cold War-era weapons furnished to the likes of the Contras, Sandinistas, Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front and Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity movement in the 1980s are also frequently encountered in the region.
After the civil wars ended in places like El Salvador and Guatemala, the governments and the international community attempted to institute arms buy-back programs, but those programs were not very successful and most of the guns turned in were very old — the better arms were cached by groups or kept by individuals. Some of these guns have dribbled back into the black arms market, and Central and South America are still awash in Cold War weapons.
But Cold War shipments are not the only reason that Latin America is flooded with guns. In addition to the indigenous arms industries in countries like Brazil and Argentina, Venezuela has purchased hundreds of thousands of AK assault rifles in recent years to replace its aging FN-FAL rifles and has even purchased the equipment to open a factory to produce AK-103 rifles under license inside Venezuela. The Colombian government has accused the Venezuelans of arming the FARC, and evidence obtained by the Colombians during raids on FARC camps and provided to the public appears to support those assertions.
More than 90 Percent?
For several years now, Mexican officials have been making public statements that more than 90 percent of the arms used by criminals in Mexico come from the United States. That number was echoed last month in a report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) on U.S. efforts to combat arms trafficking to Mexico (see external link).
External Link
GAO report on arms trafficking to Mexico
(STRATFOR is not responsible for the content of other Web sites.)
According to the report, some 30,000 firearms were seized from criminals by Mexican officials in 2008. Out of these 30,000 firearms, information pertaining to 7,200 of them, (24 percent) was submitted to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) for tracing. Of these 7,200 guns, only about 4,000 could be traced by the ATF, and of these 4,000, some 3,480 (87 percent) were shown to have come from the United States.
This means that the 87 percent figure comes from the number of weapons submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF that could be successfully traced and not from the total number of weapons seized by the Mexicans or even from the total number of weapons submitted to the ATF for tracing. The 3,480 guns positively traced to the United States equals less than 12 percent of the total arms seized in 2008 and less than 48 percent of all those submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF for tracing.
In a response to the GAO report, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) wrote a letter to the GAO (published as an appendix to the report) calling the GAO’s use of the 87 percent statistic “misleading.” The DHS further noted, “Numerous problems with the data collection and sample population render this assertion as unreliable.”
Trying to get a reliable idea about where the drug cartels are getting their weapons can be difficult because the statistics on firearms seized in Mexico are very confusing. For example, while the GAO report says that 30,000 guns were seized in 2008 alone, the Mexican Prosecutor General’s office has reported that between Dec. 1, 2005, and Jan. 22, 2009, Mexican authorities seized 31,512 weapons from the cartels.
Furthermore, it is not prudent to rely exclusively on weapons submitted to the ATF for tracing as a representative sample of the overall Mexican arms market. This is because there are some classes of weapons, such as RPG-7s and South Korean hand grenades, which make very little sense for the Mexicans to pass to the ATF for tracing since they obviously are not from the United States. The ATF is limited in its ability to trace weapons that did not pass through the United States, though there are offices at the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency that maintain extensive international arms-trafficking databases.
Mexican authorities are also unlikely to ask the ATF to trace weapons that can be tracked through the Mexican government’s own databases such as the one maintained by the Mexican Defense Department’s Arms and Ammunition Marketing Division (UCAM), which is the only outlet through which Mexican citizens can legally buy guns. If they can trace a gun through UCAM there is simply no need to submit it to ATF.
The United States has criticized Mexico for decades over its inability to stop the flow of narcotics into U.S. territory, and for the past several years Mexico has responded by blaming the guns coming from the United States for its inability to stop the drug trafficking. In this context, there is a lot of incentive for the Mexicans to politicize and play up the issue of guns coming from the United States, and north of the border there are U.S. gun-control advocates who have a vested interest in adding fuel to the fire and gun-rights advocates who have an interest in playing down the number.
Clearly, the issue of U.S. guns being sent south of the border is a serious one, but STRATFOR does not believe that there is sufficient evidence to support the claim that 90 percent (or more) of the cartels’ weaponry comes from the United States. The data at present is inclusive — the 90 percent figure appears to be a subsample of a sample, so that number cannot be applied with confidence to the entire country. Indeed, the percentage of U.S. arms appears to be far lower than 90 percent in specific classes of arms such as fully automatic assault rifles, machine guns, rifle grenades, fragmentation grenades and RPG-7s. Even items such as the handful of U.S.-manufactured LAW rockets encountered in Mexico have come from third countries and not directly from the United States.
However, while the 90 percent figure appears to be unsubstantiated by documentable evidence, this fact does not necessarily prove that the converse is true, even if it may be a logical conclusion. The bottom line is that, until there is a comprehensive, scientific study conducted on the arms seized by the Mexican authorities, much will be left to conjecture, and it will be very difficult to determine exactly how many of the cartels’ weapons have come from the United States, and to map out precisely how the black, white and gray arms markets have interacted to bring weapons to Mexico and Mexican cartels.
More research needs to be done on both sides of the border in order to understand this important issue.
Four Trends
In spite of the historical ambiguity, there are four trends that are likely to shape the future flow of arms into Mexico. The first of these is militarization. Since 2006 there has been a steady trend toward the use of heavy military ordnance by the cartels. This process was begun in earnest when the Gulf Cartel first recruited Los Zetas, but in order to counter Los Zetas, all the other cartels have had to recruit and train hard-core enforcer units and outfit them with similar weaponry. Prior to 2007, attacks involving fragmentation hand grenades, 40 mm grenades and RPGs were somewhat rare and immediately attracted a lot of attention. Such incidents are now quite common, and it is not unusual to see firefights like the June 26 incident in Apaseo el Alto in which dozens of grenades are employed.
Another trend in recent years has been the steady movement of Mexican cartels south into Central and South America. As noted above, the region is awash in guns, and the growing presence of Mexican cartel members puts them in contact with people who have access to Cold War weapons, international arms merchants doing business with groups like the FARC and corrupt officials who can obtain weapons from military sources in the region. We have already seen seizures of weapons coming into Mexico from the south. One notable seizure occurred in March 2009, when Guatemalan authorities raided a training camp in northern Guatemala near the Mexican border that they claim belonged to Los Zetas. In the raid they recovered 563 40 mm grenades and 11 M60 machine guns that had been stolen from the Guatemalan military and sold to Los Zetas.
The third trend is the current firearm and ammunition market in the United States. Since the election of Barack Obama, arms sales have gone through the roof due to fears (so far unfounded) that the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress will attempt to restrict or ban certain weapons. Additionally, ammunition companies are busy filling military orders for the U.S. war effort in Iraq and Afghanistan. As anyone who has attempted to buy an assault rifle (or even a brick of .22 cartridges) will tell you, it is no longer cheap or easy to buy guns and ammunition. In fact, due to this surge in demand, it is downright difficult to locate many types of assault rifles and certain calibers of ammunition, though a lucky buyer might be able to find a basic stripped-down AR-15 for $850 to $1,100, or a semiautomatic AK-47 for $650 to $850. Of course, such a gun purchased in the United States and smuggled into Mexico will be sold to the cartels at a hefty premium above the purchase price.
By way of comparison, in places where weapons are abundant, such as Yemen, a surplus fully automatic assault rifle can be purchased for under $100 on the white arms market and for about the same price on the black arms market. This difference in price provides a powerful economic incentive to buy low elsewhere and sell high in Mexico, as does the inability to get certain classes of weapons such as RPGs and fragmentation grenades in the United States. Indeed, we have seen reports of international arms merchants from places like Israel and Belgium selling weapons to the cartels and bringing that ordnance into Mexico through routes other than over the U.S. border. Additionally, in South America, a number of arms smugglers, including Hezbollah and Russian organized-crime groups, have made a considerable amount of money supplying arms to groups in the region like the FARC.
The fourth trend is the increasing effort by the U.S. government to stanch the flow of weapons from the United States into Mexico. A recent increase in the number of ATF special agents and inspectors pursuing gun dealers who knowingly sell to the cartels or straw-purchase buyers who obtain guns from honest dealers is going to increase the chances of such individuals being caught. This stepped-up enforcement will have an impact as the risk of being caught illegally buying or smuggling guns begins to outweigh the profit that can be made by selling guns to the cartels. We believe that these two factors — supply problems and enforcement — will work together to help reduce the flow of U.S. guns to Mexico.
While there has been a long and well-documented history of arms smuggling across the U.S.-Mexican border, it is important to recognize that, while the United States is a significant source of certain classes of weapons, it is by no means the only source of illegal weapons in Mexico. As STRATFOR has previously noted, even if it were possible to hermetically seal the U.S.-Mexican border, the Mexican cartels would still be able to obtain weapons from non-U.S. sources (just as drugs would continue to flow into the United States). The law of supply and demand will ensure that the Mexican cartels will get their ordnance, but it is highly likely that an increasing percentage of that supply will begin to come from outside the United States via the gray and black arms markets.
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Fears of Interstate Handgun Laws Soon Forgotten?
Just like the original ruckus over passing concealed handgun laws, the fears about allowing people to travel with guns will soon be forgotten.
Wednesday morning the US Senate voted on whether to allow concealed handgun permit holders to carry handguns across state lines. The legislation sponsored by Senator John Thune (R, SD) would only allow reciprocity in permitting, as anybody would still be required to obey the laws of the states that they travel in. This is the same way driver's licenses work.
Yet, gun control advocates are predicting the worst. Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D, NJ) warns it is an "attempt by the gun lobby to put its radical agenda ahead of safety and security in our communities." Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D, NY) calls it a "harmful measure" that will put the public at risk. Senator Chuck Schumer (D, NY) says: "It could reverse the dramatic success we've had in reducing crime in most all parts of America."
The claims echo those made when concealed-handgun laws were originally passed, when gun control advocates warned that permit holders would lose their tempers and there would be blood in the streets.
Obviously that never happened. We now have extensive experience with concealed-handgun permit holders. In 2007, about 5 million Americans were permitted to carry concealed handguns across 48 states that let citizens carry. 39 of these states have relatively liberal right-to-carry laws that let people get permits once they pass a criminal background check, pay a fee, and in many states receive training
Take Florida, for example. Between Oct. 1, 1987, and March 31, 2009, Florida issued permits to 1,480,704 people, many of whom renewed their permits multiple times. Only 166 had their permits revoked for a firearms-related violation - about 0.01 percent.
Similarly in Texas, in 2006, there were 258,162 active permit holders. Out of these, one hundred forty were convicted of either a misdemeanor or a felony, a rate of .05 percent. That is about one-seventh the conviction rate in the general adult population, and the convictions among permit holders tend to be for much less serious offenses. The most frequent type of revocation, with 33 cases, involved carrying a weapon without their license with them.
The same pattern occurs in state after state. Permit holders lose their permits at hundredths or thousands of one percent for any type of gun related violations, and even then they are usually for relatively trivial offenses.
Gun control groups such as the Violence Policy Center and the Brady Campaign have put out reports this week that attempt to show how dangerous permit holders are. But they make several serious mistakes: they usually include arrests and not convictions and they make mistakes on whether the people have concealed handgun permits. Even in the few cases where they correctly identify problems, they never discuss the rate that permit holders violate the law.
If a permit holder fires a gun defensively and kills or wounds an attacker, even if the shooting was completely justified, they will almost always be arrested. A police officer who arrives on the scene simply can't be sure what happened until an investigation is completed. But these justified shootings are exactly why concealed handgun permits are allowed and including them as a cost of concealed handgun laws has the entire process backwards.
Even though the adoption of right-to-carry laws was highly controversial in some states, the laws were so successful that no state has ever rescinded one. Indeed, no state has even held a legislative hearing to consider rescinding concealed-carry.
Everyone wants to keep guns away from criminals. The problem is that law-abiding citizens are the ones most likely to obey the gun control laws, leaving them disarmed and vulnerable and making it easier for criminals to commit crime.
Police are extremely important in deterring crime - according to my research, the most important factor. But the police also understand that they almost always arrive after the crime has been committed.
There is a lot of refereed academic research on the impact that right-to-carry laws across the country have crime rates. While a large majority of the refereed studies by economists and criminologists find that crime rate fall after these laws are adopted and some claim to find no effect, no such studies find a bad effect on crime rates, suicides or accidental deaths.
The legislation before the senate doesn't really break new ground. Most states already recognize permits from other states: 34 states recognize Missouri's permits, 33 for Utah, 32 for Florida, 31 Texas, 26 Ohio, and 24 Pennsylvania. And there is no evidence that these reciprocity agreements have caused any problems.
Here is a prediction. Just like the original ruckus over passing concealed handgun laws, the fears about allowing people to travel with guns will soon be forgotten.
John Lott is the author of More Guns, Less Crime. John Lott's past pieces for Fox News can be found here and here.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2009/07/21/john-lott-concealed-carry/
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Bill Whitle: blog is Eject, Eject, Eject
FREEDOM is the second essay in SILENT AMERICA. It started out as a series of comments in Rachel Lucas’s blog (which for some reason I cannot seem to link to, but it’s www.rachellucas.com) on the subject of gun ownership. Rachel mentioned she had a friend who wanted to buy a gun, and asked if anyone could help her make the case.
The honest truth is I had never given the matter any thought at all. My dad was a hunter and 2nd Lt. in the U.S. Army, so we always had guns in the house and I was taught how to respect them from the day I was born. But I had never owned a gun, and only fired a real one on two or three occasions when visiting my dad as a teen and young man.
However, I remember very, very clearly watching a store clerk pull down two Daisy Winchester BB guns — one for me and one for my brother — and as he did, I can still hear my father telling us what would happen to us if we EVER pointed it at another person, car or house. I don’t remember all the details exactly but it involved a lot more than the worst thing we thought he could do at the time; namely, take the BB guns away.
Anyway, I started thinking about it, and wrote three or four long replies in Rachel’s comments section. She thought they were good enough to combine and publish on her front page, and the response was so overwhelming that she personally created Eject! for me out of thin air — did all of the set-up and got it hosted and everything, for which I am eternally grateful and without which I would not be here.
Many long-time readers think this was the first impression I made on the web, back in late 2003. Actually, the reason this is the second essay is because about a month earlier, I had returned to LA from attanding my father’s funeral at Arlington National Cemetery, and I was (and remain) a huge fan of Steven Den Beste and his USS Clueless blog. Steven had posted an article on the nature of American armies versus Arab ones, and I wrote him to tell him of my experience at Arlington. He posted the letter in full, and that, with very minor modifications, became the first essay in the Silent America book: HONOR, which I will re-post here next week.
Anyway, that’s the story. Here’s FREEDOM]
When I was a little kid, I asked my dad about an image I had seen of really huge numbers of prisoners being marched to their execution in a forest clearing, guarded by perhaps five or ten men with rifles. I wanted to know why they didn’t just rush the guards? I mean, it’s one thing if they were heading to another crappy day at work camp, but these people were being led off to be killed. I mean, for God’s sake, what did they have to lose?
I was six. My dad looked at me. He had served in the latter days of WW2 in Europe as a U.S. Army intelligence officer. No parachuting onto the decks of enemy U-Boats at night to steal Enigma machines — just newly-minted, 2nd Lieutenant grunt work. He’d been to the camps though, seen some horrible things. When I asked him why they didn’t fight back or run for the woods, he said, without any arrogance or contempt or jingoism, “I don’t know Billy, I can’t figure that one out myself.” Then there was a long moment. “But I can’t imagine Americans just walking off like that, either.”
Now before the combined military might of the European Union responds with a very harshly worded letter, let me clarify something: When he said he couldn’t imagine Americans marching off to their deaths, he meant, obviously, Americans like the ones he knew. Kids who grew up hunting, kids who got a BB gun for their fifth birthday (never Christmas though — you could shoot your eye out!)
I don’t believe for an instant in any genetic nonsense about slave races or nations of pure-bred heroes. That’s a deadly trap, and the end result of such thinking is a place on the watchtower machine-gunning starving prisoners. But humans are the most successful species this planet has seen not for being ferocious or fast or strong or even intelligent, but for their malleability. Humans can, and do, adapt to anything. It is their culture that determines what is in their hearts.
Consider the case of Jews in Germany, during the 1930’s:
Here was a people who had been so tormented and prosecuted and psychologically beaten down that they came to believe the outrageous slander that they were guests in their own county. Behind their shuttered doors at night, they created cocoons of astonishing culture and beauty, a symphony of violins and cellos and poetry and literature. They were far over-represented in occupations we rightly esteem as among the most noble of our species: surgeons, musicians, teachers and scientists.
By any measure of human decency, these were the people that should have been helping to lead a ravaged Germany back to respect and prosperity. Yet they were massacred in their millions by brutes and sadists who could barely write their own names.
If it is possible to write a clearer lesson on human nature, then I cannot imagine it, nor can I imagine the amount of blood it will take to convince people unwilling to look reality in the face; that reality being that compassion, culture, law and philosophy are precious, rare and acquired habits that must be defended with force against people who understand nothing but force. The great failure and staggering tragedy of European Jews is that they could not accept that some of their neighbors were not as decent, humane and educated as they were. A culture that learned to survive by turning inward simply never was willing to face the reality of what they were up against; namely, that hoping for compassion and humanity from the likes of the Nazis was akin to reading poetry to a hurricane. This denial — and that is the only word for it — is, in the final horrible analysis, a form of unconscious arrogance, a refusal to see things for what they are. A people of astonishing internal beauty simply could not look into the face of such ugliness without turning away. And now they are dead.
And there are many intelligent, enlightened, gentle and good-hearted people today who believe exactly the same thing. If we let this moral blindness continue to gain ground, then they will get us all killed, too. And then who will put their boot on humanity’s neck for the next thousand years?
I recently visited a website that featured a picture of Star Trek’s Mr. Spock, with the caption: My hero! Someone who thinks his way out of trouble! The implication, of course, is that force and violence are universally to be rejected and despised as unworthy of thinking people (or Vulcans).
Well bucko, Spock carried a phaser as well as a tricorder, and he used it when he had to. If the Star Trek future represents a hope for our species at its most reasonable and open-minded best, it would be well to remember that the Enterprise carries a hell of a lot of photon torpedoes because the cause of human decency cannot be advanced if all the decent humans lie dead.
Freedom is preserved by free people. Our 40th President wrote that “no weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.”
Free people know in their heart that they are free. Back again for a moment to a culturally rich, bathed in literature and opera, non-simplisme culture like 1940s Germany: I also asked my father what would happen if the Gestapo came for us one night. He said he couldn’t stop them from taking us, but he could damn sure take a few of those bastards with them, and I decided right there that I’d do the same thing.
In the Warsaw Ghetto, in Solzhenitsyn’s Gulags, in countless other miserable terrifying pits of murder, some people woke up to the idea that resistance is NOT futile. Which is why that old saw, which in my terribly, tragically misspent liberal youth I used to sneer at as the mark of a real idiot – “they can have my gun when they pry it from my cold dead fingers” – suddenly makes a new kind of sense to me.
That is not the statement of someone who doesn’t want to give up a snowmobile or a Beemer. That is a statement that draws a line in the sand for the government, or any other oppressor, to plainly see. You want to take this freedom away from me? COME AND GET IT.
I believe gun ownership is the truest form of freedom, and here’s why: It says you are your own person, responsible for your own actions. You are not willing to be collectively punished for the misdeeds of others. In fact, those that abuse this freedom by committing crimes are thought of and dealt with much more harshly by gun owners, as a rule, than Hollywood celebrities, precisely because a free person understands the responsibility that comes with freedom.
To the many thoughtful and intelligent Europeans and Canadians who scorn the 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution as the dangerous plaything of illiterate, mindless oafs who enjoy loud noises, let me simply refer you to that great unbiased and incorruptible teacher: History.
Ask yourselves why intellectual elites so love totalitarian states where people are unarmed and dependant sheep. Look at the examples of Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and Saddam, and the horrors they have inflicted at will on their own people. And when contemplating your ever-so-sophisticated foreign policy, ask yourselves what real options you are left with when facing a determined, heartless bastard like Hitler, Napoleon, Ghengis Khan or Attila.
Maybe the time for real evil like that has finally gone. I hope you are right, I really do. I don’t want to go fight those bastards; I’d rather barbeque and watch the Gators. I’m sure the Jews in 1930 Germany thought such things could never happen again, not in the heart of European culture and civilization. I’m sure every bound and beaten musician, surgeon, philosopher and painter being lined up at the side of a ditch thought exactly that.
Try and understand this about Americans like myself and others who can look such horrors in the eye: We are not going out like that. Get it? We’ll put up with handgun murders if we have to, but we are not going down that road. As a general rule, we are quiet, peaceful, decent people with better things to do than referee endless bloodbaths abroad. But it is possible to get our attention. And believe me, you have it now, and I believe the time will come when you will regret calling us cowboys and Nazis and idiots, because the day may come when you once again need the help of a free and determined people, fighting forces you ignore not from superior sophistication but from sheer moral cowardice.
Great Britain, the philosophical home and mother to this nation, has responded to a horrible shooting tragedy by essentially disarming their entire population. That is their decision alone to make, and history will record whether it was a wise one or not. But consider this:
A Marine Corps officer wondered to himself whether such an order would be carried out in the United States. He was surprised to see that most of his men would not follow an order to disarm the populace by force.
This, to my mind, is the fundamental difference between the Europeans and the U.S.: We trust the people. We fought wars and lost untold husbands and brothers and sons because of this single most basic belief: Trust the people. Trust them with freedom. Trust them to spend their own money. Trust them to do the right thing. Trust them to defend themselves. To the degree that government can help, great – but TRUST THE PEOPLE.
It would take an army — not an army of celebrities or trial lawyers, an actual SHOOTING ARMY — to forcibly disarm this nation. Who will do the dirty work? Volunteer citizen soldiers, that’s who – and the first guns they’d have to turn in would be their own.
See, we don’t have shock troops here, boyo. No Republican Guards, Special or otherwise; no Hussars, no Cossacks, no SS; we lack Praetorian elites, Napoleonic bodyguard units – any of that ideologically inculcated poison. Just kids serving their country, making some money for college. You think those people would fire on a crowd of American citizens fighting to preserve the Constitution, when they themselves have taken the same oath? Think again.
Unlike the those poor, unarmed, psychologically battered Jews, Poles, homosexuals and uncounted other souls lost in the mid 1940s, NO ONE is pulling ANY kids out of this crowd’s house at night and going home fully staffed, ready to try again tomorrow. Understand? THAT is the point.
Here is a sociological experiment that might have something to teach us:
Kick down100 doors of self-proclaimed French pacifists, grab the women and kids, and haul them away. Then try again in Texas, with 100 NRA members. Collate, or rather, have a surviving relative collate the results. Extrapolate the abductors’ rates of casualties to determine the total number of murdering swine needed. See what percentage of jackbooted thugs have a suicide wish and then determine the number of men you will need to disarm, kidnap and murder 50 million armed people.
You will need a lot of men. More than you can raise.
These trust the people freedoms are so deeply engrained in the fabric of America as to be almost hereditary, I think. I used to worry that we’d bred that out of us, and then along comes Todd Beamer and company on United Flight 93, who, first among us that day, realized they were being marched to their deaths and decided to do something about it. Not for themselves, because by taking that action they knew they were doomed. They did it for us. Not only to save the lives of those on the ground for whom their aircraft was headed, but to remind us of who we are as a people, to add to the list of ordinary Americans who can gather extraordinary courage and resolve because they have been trusted all their lives by their government and their fellow citizens.
We are a nation of unruly immigrants, self-selecting people who placed bold action above endless suffering, sold what little they had and bought passage to take a chance on a place they had never seen except in their quiet hopes, a land our 40th President, Ronald Reagan, described as “a beacon, a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.” Intellectuals have called Ronald Reagan an idiot, but that is to be expected from people incapable of being moved by anything other than the sound of their own bitter and small voices in a world too full of hope for them to grasp.
We are, and remain, the descendents of people who had had quite enough of being told what to do by inbred aristocratic fops and unelected, intellectual sadists. When Europeans call us simplisme, they show themselves incapable of recognizing the difference between intelligence, of which we are amply endowed, and intellectualism, that circle-jerk of coffee table revolution and basement politburo planning that we have never had much patience with.
To those who doubt our mental sophistication, I would remind you that our grandparents walked upon the moon. And why is it that of all we produce and all we exult, the only things that seem to have caught on in Europe are McDonald’s and Baywatch? That says much more about them than it does about us, and none of it good, I’m afraid.
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We as a nation suffer an appalling number of handgun-related deaths each year — perhaps 11,000 of them. The number is not important; each is a personal tragedy and those lives can never be replaced.
If we attempt to reduce this horrible number by banning handguns, we are taking away the property of a person who has broken no laws by a government whose legitimacy is determined by a document that specifically allows that property, namely guns.
Destroy that trust by punishing the innocent, by pulling a plank from the Bill of Rights, and the contract between the government and the people falls apart. Once the Second Amendment goes, the First will soon follow, because if some unelected elite determines that the people can’t be trusted with dangerous guns then it’s just a matter of time until they decide they can’t be trusted with dangerous ideas, either. Dangerous ideas have killed many millions more people than dangerous handguns – listen to the voices from the Gulag, the death camps, and all the blood-soaked killing fields through history.
The Framers, in their wisdom, put the 2nd Amendment there to give teeth to the revolutionary, unheard-of idea that the power rests with We The People. They did not depend on good will or promises. They made sure that when push came to shove we’d be the ones doing the pushing and shoving, not the folks in Washington. And by the way, gun rights supporters are frequently mocked when they say it deters foreign invasion – after all, come on, grow up, be realistic: Who’s nuts enough to invade America? Exactly. It’s unthinkable. Good. 2nd Amendment Mission 1 accomplished.
But back to the undeniable domestic cost: When confronted with the idea of banning handguns to reduce this horrible toll, many handgun defenders are tempted to point to the numbers killed on the highways each year — perhaps four times that number — and ask why we don’t ban cars as well.
The logical response is that bans on travel – cars, airplanes, etc. – are a false analogy compared to banning guns because cars have a clear benefit while guns don’t do anything other than kill what they are aimed at.
While that is exactly true, I think it misses the point, which to me is simply this: We’d never ban car travel to avoid thousands of highway deaths. It’s clearly not worth it in both economic and personal freedom terms. We chose, reluctantly, and with many a lost loved one in mind, to keep on driving.
Here is my dry-eyed, cold-hearted, sad conclusion: I believe that the freedom, convenience and economic viability provided by the automobile is worth the 40,000 lives we lose to automotive deaths each year — a number made more horrible by the fact that perhaps 40% are related to drunk driving and therefore preventable.
By the same calculation, I accept that the freedoms entrusted to the people of the United States is worth the 11,000 lives we lose to gun violence each year.
I wish I could make both those numbers go away. I will support any reasonable campaign to make them as low as possible.
But understand this: 11,000 handgun deaths a year, over four years is very roughly 50,000 killed. In Nazi Germany, an unarmed population was unable to resist the abduction and murder of 6,000,000 people in a similar period: a number 120 times higher. Throw in the midnight murders of the Soviets, the Chinese, the various and sundry African and South American genocides and purges and political assassinations and that number grows to many hundreds, if not several thousand times more killings in unarmed populations.
Visualize this to fully appreciate the point. Imagine the Superbowl. Every player on the field is a handgun victim. All the people in the stands are the victims who were unable to resist with handguns. Those are historical facts.
I, myself, am willing to pay that price as a society – knowing full well that I or a loved one may be part of that terrible invoice. I wish it was lower. Obviously, I wish it didn’t exist at all. But any rational look into the world shows us places where the numbers of innocents murdered by their own governments in unarmed nations are far, far higher.
Of course, many societies have far lower numbers. Japan is a fine example. I’m sure if the United States had 2000 years of a culture whose prize assets are conformity and submission then our numbers would be a lot lower. Alas, we are not that society. Thank God, we are not that society.
It is abundantly clear that the rate of handgun murders in the United States is not uniform. Very large murder rates can be observed in small, exceedingly violent populations of every race in this country, and these rates seem to be more related to issues of income, education and living conditions. Certainly guns are freely available in areas where our murder rates are appallingly high. They are also found in very large numbers in communities where handgun crime is virtually nonexistent.
Doesn’t that tell us that there something deeper at work here? Could it be, perhaps, that the problem is not with the number of guns in this country but rather in the hearts of those who we allow to wield them, repeatedly? Could it really be as simple as apprehending, and punishing, those that would do harm to innocents and to civilization? Rather than banning guns, should we not attack the moral rot that infests these small, violent populations of every color who put such horrible numbers at our feet?
Assume for a moment you could vaporize every gun on the planet. Would crime go away? Or would ruthless, physically strong gangs of young men be essentially able to roam free and predate at will?
The history of civilization shows time and time again how decent, sophisticated city dwellers amass wealth through cooperation and the division of labor – only to be victimized by ruthless gangs of raping, looting cutthroats who couldn’t make a fruit basket, sweeping down on them, murdering them and carting away the loot, to return a few years later, forever, ad infinitum. Vikings, Mongols, desperadoes of every stripe – they are a cancer on humanity but there they are and there they have always been.
If civilization is worth having (and I believe it is) then it has to be defended, because the restraining virtues of justice, compassion and respect for laws are products of that civilizing force and completely unknown to those who would do it harm.
Therefore, since I believe in this civilization, in its laws, science, art and medicine, I believe we must be prepared to defend it against what I feel no embarrassment for calling the Forces of Darkness. Those forces could be raiders on horseback, jackbooted Nazi murderers, faceless KGB torturers or some kid blowing away a shopkeeper.
For the gun-ban argument to be convincing, you’d have to show me a time before shopkeepers were blown away, hacked away, pelted away or whatever the case may be. You would have to show me a time in history before the invention of the firearm, when crime and raiding and looting did not exist, when murders and rapes did not exist. We may lose 11,000 people to handguns a year. How many would we lose without any handguns, if murderers and rapists roamed free of fear, ignoring reprisal from citizens or police? I don’t know. You don’t know either. Maybe it’s a lot fewer people, and maybe, in a world where strength and ruthlessness trump all, it would be a far higher one.
You may argue that only the police should be allowed to carry guns. Consider this carefully. Do we really want to create an unelected subculture that views itself as so elite and virtuous as to be the only ones worthy of such power, trust and authority? Have we not clearly seen the type of people drawn to such exclusive positions of authority, and the attitudes and arrogance it promotes?
Furthermore, I can’t see any moral distinction between a policeman and a law-abiding citizen. Policemen are drawn from the ranks of law-abiding citizens. They are not bred in hydroponics tanks. They are expected to show restraint and use their weapon as a last resort. Millions upon millions of citizens, a crowd more vast than entire armies of police, do exactly this every day.
If all of these horrors had sprung up as a result of the invention of the handgun I’d be right there beside those calling for their destruction.
But clearly, this is not the case. In our cowboy past we used to say that “God created Man, but Sam Colt made them equal.” This is simple enough to understand. It means that a villager, let’s say a schoolteacher, can defeat a human predator who may have spent his entire life practicing the art of war. Firearms are what tipped the balance toward civilization by eliminating a lifetime spent studying swordplay or spear play or pointed-stick play. The bad guys have always used weapons and they always will. The simple truth about guns is that they are damn effective and even easier to operate. They level the playing field to the point where a woman has a chance against a gang of thugs or a police officer can control a brawl.
I don’t see how vaporizing all the guns in the world would remove crime or violence – history shows these have always been with us and show no signs of responding favorably to well-reasoned arguments or harsh language. I wish it were not true. I wish the IRS did not exist either, but there it is.
Criminals, and criminal regimes ranging from The Brow-Ridged Hairy People That Live Among the Distant Mountains all the way through history to the Nazis and the Soviets, have and will conspire to take by force what they cannot produce on their own. These people must be stopped. The genius of the 2nd Amendment is that it realizes that these people could be anybody – including the U.S. Army. That is why this power, like the other powers, is vested in the people. Nowhere else in the world is this the case. You can make a solid argument that the United States is, by almost any measure, the most prosperous, successful nation in history. I’m not claiming this is because every American sleeps with a gun under the pillow – the vast majority do not. I do claim it is the result of a document that puts faith and trust in the people – trusts them with government, with freedom, and with the means of self-defense. You cannot remove that lynchpin of trust without collapsing the entire structure. Many observers of America never fully understand what we believe in our bones, namely, that the government doesn’t tell us what we can do – WE tell THOSE bastards just how far they can go.
Of course, all of this is completely whimsical, because, like nuclear weapons, guns are HERE and they are not going to go away. You cannot just vaporize them. Honest people might be compelled to turn in their weapons; criminals clearly will not. So what do you propose? Forget the moral high ground of gun ownership. Again a simple truth, often maligned but demonstrably dead-on accurate: When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.
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The American Revolution surely is unique in the sense that the ringleaders – Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, Hamilton, etc – were men of property, wealth and prestige; in other words, men with something to lose. Compare this to any other revolution in history, where the ringleaders were outsiders; plotters staring in the windows of prosperity, powerless. The Russian Revolution, French Revolution, etc – these were joined by desperate people fighting mind-numbing poverty and severe political repression.
And yet the Founding Fathers were men who were as well-off as any men on earth at the time, and furthermore, any of them could have been (and were) political leaders under His Majesty’s government. The average colonial farmer likewise led a life far more comfortable than those of his cousins in Europe, to say nothing of Asia or Africa.
For all practical intents and purposes, these people had absolutely nothing to gain, and everything in the world to lose, by taking on the greatest military force the world had ever known. Why would they do this? What possible motivation could, well-off, comfortable people have? Militarily, they seemed certain to lose, and they knew before they started – and Patrick Henry made the point crystal clear – that they would be hanged as common criminals if they failed.
Of course, the answer is, they did it to be free. And they did it to make the rest of their nation – the poor, the disenfranchised – free as well. And it is clear as crystal from their collective writings that they took that risk to make Noam Chomsky and Michael Moore and the rest of us in their unseen posterity free, too. They could look down the dim, moonlit riverbanks of the future and see a society worthy of their sacrifice and determination. They knew that God, (or for me, chance perhaps) had put them together in a time and place where bold, courageous action followed by much suffering, doubt, blood and fear could, perhaps, unleash in mankind an energy source the likes of which they could not imagine.
So for me, a child of that bet – that guess, that commitment, that roll of the dice – for ME, I owe them the defense of that freedom, and I will do my poor mite to pass it on as best I can. These men pledged to each other their Lives, their Fortunes and their sacred Honor. They pledged that to ME. I owe them. I do not have the right to take away someone else’s freedom and property – it is offensive to me to even contemplate it. Of course, if someone breaks the freedom/responsibility covenant by committing a crime, then all bets are off. To that extent, I view handgun murderers not just as criminals but as traitors as well.
I hate seeing our kids get shot on the street, I hate it, I hate it. But that is the cost of freedom. People get horribly killed on Spring Break road trips to Florida at age 18. They’re driving drunk. We could prevent them from going. We would save lives. Enron and MCI steal like the worst characters from Dickens, taking people’s Christmas dinners so they can have gold plated faucets. We could regulate more, make things harder for the millions of honest businesses that build and trade honorably each day. The day may come when someone flies a Cessna into a stadium. We can ban the airplanes. Ditto for pleasure boats. We can ban and confiscate and regulate to our hearts content, and we will undoubtedly save many, many innocent lives by doing so. All for the price of a little freedom.
I believe we should punish the perpetrators. I will not agree to restrict the freedoms of the vast numbers of people who abide by the concomitant responsibility and live lives of honesty and decency.
And there is more than the physical restriction of freedoms: There is the slow erosion of self-reliance, self-confidence and self-determination among a nation. The more your government restricts your options, the more you psychologically look to government to keep you safe, fed, clothed, housed and sustained.
There is a word for people who are fed, clothed, housed and sustained fully by others, and that word is SLAVES.
If Congress were occupied by angels and Michael sat in a throne of glory in the Oval Office, I would listen to what they said for my own greater good. But no government is made of angels, not even the Canadian government in all its decency and compassion. So who determines how much freedom we trade for how much security? People do. People are not unknown to place their own interests above those of others. There is even a vanishing remote chance that Jean Cretien has at some point perhaps put personal interest above those of his constituents.
The real genius of the Founding Fathers was that these great and good men had the foresight and the courage to look into their own darker motives, and construct a system that prevents the accumulation of power.
The Constitution they created could only be torn up by force of arms. And that is why the Founders left that power in the hands of the people, who together can never be cowed by relatively small numbers of thugs holding the only guns.
As PJ O’Rourke points out, the U.S. Constitution is less than a quarter the length of the owner’s manual for a 1998 Toyota Camry, and yet it has managed to keep 300 million of the world’s most unruly, passionate people safe, prosperous and free. Smarter people than me may disagree with that document – I’m for not touching a comma.
So as a proud son of those brave men, I’ll take freedom – all of it – and because I accept the benefits of those freedoms, I’ll solemnly take the responsibilities as well. I may someday lose a child on a trip to Spring Break, but I’ll never lock them in the basement to keep them safe. And I’ll accept the fact that living in Los Angeles puts me at risk for being shot to death because I feel the freedom is worth it. I breathe that freedom every day, and hey, we all gotta go sometime. I’ll continue to fly experimental airplanes because I am careful, meticulous, precise and responsible, and yet the day may come when I am out of altitude, out of airspeed and out of ideas all at the same time. Oh well. I have seen and done things up there that you cannot imagine and I cannot describe. Freedom.
I respect and admire Canada. Although we have chosen certain diverging paths since the days of the Revolution, we have been, and always will be, the best of friends despite our differences. Canada is unquestionably as decent, modest and good a society as exists on Earth today. And yet while Canadians frequently point out that they are free of our vices, I perceive that they are free of our greatness as well. You can’t have it both ways.
Me, personally, I’ll take the spirit, ingenuity and passion that can plant the American flag on the moon over pre-paid health care. I can buy health care. Thirty three years after watching the event as a ten year old boy, I’m still trying to go to the moon. (Some of us in the Mojave desert may still have few tricks up our sleeve on this one. We’re still free to build airplanes and spacecraft from our garages and fly the goddamn things. Try and keep up with a nation that builds working spacecraft in the garage. As a hobby. Out of pocket. For FUN.)
And everyone who has taken America’s disdain for intellectualism as a lack of intelligence has woken up looking at our dust trail as we speed ever faster beyond them. We’re not just a smart country – we’re THE smart country. Behold the list of inventions and Nobel Prize winning scientists. Einstein was an American. Of course he emigrated here — we all did. Germany threw him away – he’s ours now, by his choice, not ours. Ditto Von Braun and numerous others, not to mention the legion of homegrown geniuses like the Wright Brothers and Robert Goddard, just to draw two names from the narrow field I know best. Staggeringly brilliant men and women, the best, most active minds on the planet pulling for the same team.
Canada is free of many of the foreign policy disasters and failures of vision that the United States has been correctly charged with, but they are free too of the satisfaction and pride of being history’s singular bulwark of freedom and prosperity, and the eternal, unintimidated scourge of tyrants and murderers from the Barbary pirates, through the armed might of the 20th Century’s parade of totalitarians and right up to Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin Laden and the criminal lunatics that run North Korea.
Our failures and disgraces cruelly remind us that we, like every other government, are composed of fallible men and women with no divine ability to read the future or foresee all outcomes. But these failures are failures of action, action borne of confidence and a belief in our way of life, and come all the more painful for their contrast to the everyday standards to which we hold ourselves as a people and a nation. For it is an undeniable fact that no great nation in history has held a shadow of our measure of power, and yet exercised it with such restraint, nor does any time in the bloody history of warfare reflect a people so magnanimous in victory against enemies sworn to our murder and destruction. From our first hour, we have been, and remain, the beacon of hope and freedom for a world desperate and longing for such an example, and we can measure our success in building such a place by the numbers of those who are literally dying in an attempt to come and be part of it.
So take your pick: Freedom or security? Greatness or goodness? Passion or decency?
Our respective ancestors made their choice and here we are. I respect anyone’s right to chose differently. I only speak up to defend the choice we Americans made as a deeply spiritual one, borne of reflection and danger and a spectacular triumph against all odds. I cannot stand idly by to hear people denounce our freedoms as the dimwitted macho posturing of a mob of illiterate uncultured idiots who are so vulgar and uncouth as to still believe in Hollywood myths manufactured for our simple complacent unsophisticated nature.
From the Revolution until today, the choice for full freedom with all its accompanying excesses and failures is a profoundly well-reasoned, moral and ethical choice, and the result has been national and personal success unparalleled in the history of this world.
I am deeply proud to be a member of such a magnificent group of people. I hope to God I can give back as much as I owe.
Bill Whitle: blog is Eject, Eject, Eject
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Marta crime rate falls in wake of gun law
December 14, 3:28 PM
Atlanta Gun Rights Examiner
Ed Stone
One year anniversary of HB 89 arrives without dire consequences
Violent crime lower following law permitting legalized carry of firearms on mass transit.
Today the Atlanta Gun Rights Examiner brings you a story you are not going to see anywhere else.
The Georgia General Assembly passed HB 89 in 2008, which made criminal prohibitions on carrying firearms on public transportation, in restaurants that serve alcohol, in state parks, and in wildlife management areas inapplicable to Georgians possessing a firearms license. HB 89 took effect on July 1, 2008, and many predicted mass bloodshed as a result. Nowhere was the controversy so acute as the city of Atlanta and its public transportation system.
The city of Atlanta immediately declared the airport off limits to firearms, and won a lawsuit filed by GeorgiaCarry.Org seeking to enjoin arrests of people with firearms licenses at the Atlanta airport. The other hot button issue was the carry of firearms on the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit system, known affectionately to Atlantans by the acronym MARTA. People predicted shootouts on the trains and busses, and both the city of Atlanta and MARTA officials lobbied strenuously against the bill.
MARTA bus drivers gathered more than 1,000 signatures on a petition to have bullet proof shields installed, as if Georgia firearms licensees had just been waiting for the new law to pass so that they could shoot a bus driver. "We don't want cameras. Cameras don't save people's lives. ... We want something that gives us a fighting chance," said Terry Jackson, the MARTA driver who started the petition. Beverly Scott, MARTA's general manager, called the bill "vigilantism."
Atlanta's mayor went so far as to declare, "The presumption needs to be, in order to have a safe city, that there are no concealed weapons."
MARTA Office of Government and Community Relations employee Rhonda Briggins issued a widely distributed "Call to Action!" alert calling the gun bill "a recipe for disaster."
So at the end of 2009, it is worth a look to see what actually happened to crime rates on MARTA. Since July of 2008, there have been no news stories of blazing gun battles on MARTA, which would surely have been newsworthy events. That leaves interested researchers with the publicly available crime rates, and they tell a story at odds with the hysterical predictions of 2008.
Murders drop to zero
In 2007, MARTA had two murders occur on its property. In 2008, the year the new law took effect and peaceable citizens began lawfully carrying firearms on MARTA trains and busses, the number of murders dropped to zero, and there has not been a murder reported on the system since.
Robbery rate drops
The murder rate was not the only category of violent crime to go down in the wake of the new gun law. There were 94 robberies on the MARTA system in 2007. In 2008, the year the new law took effect, the number of robberies dropped to 71, and in 2009, it has dropped again to 67 (although we still have two weeks to go).
Overall rate lower
The overall rate per number of riders has also dropped since the new law took effect.
Part I Crime Rate per 1,000,000 Riders
MARTA PART I CRIME RATE FY06* FY07* FY08* FY09*
PER 1,000 RIDERS 3.90% 3.34% 3.35% 3.09%
Not all categories of crime experienced a decrease, however. Aggravated assaults went up from 2007 to 2008 and remained constant for 2009. The statistics also reflect one rape in the first quarter of 2009, with none in the previous three years.
You may view the raw numbers for yourself here.
So judge for yourself whether the predictions of massive bloodshed as a result of the new law have come to pass. Alice Johnson, the leader of Georgians for Gun Safety, a gun control group that lobbied against permitting lawful carry of firearms on MARTA, sent an email in the spring of 2008 claiming, "Innocent bystanders and law enforcement personnel stand a greater chance of being accidentally shot if more citizens carry concealed weapons in public . . ." and calling the bill "deadly legislation" that "seriously compromises community safety."
The MARTA crime numbers speak for themselves. HB 89 has failed to live up to its reputation as a serious compromiser of community safety. As the General Assembly takes up new gun bills in 2010, relating to carrying firearms lawfully in other places currently prohibited by law, the public will do well to remember what the opponents of HB 89 said and the actual result. In spite of the predictions, there have been no reported misuses of a firearm by any of the hundreds of thousands of Georgia firearms license holders on the MARTA system. In addition, crime rates on MARTA fell after the new law took effect. It would be nice to interview a few of the opponents of HB 89 now to hear whether their opinions have been modified in the slightest.
http://www.examiner.com/x-5619-Atlanta-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m12d14-Marta-crime-rate-falls-in-wake-of-gun-law
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More Guns, Less Crime in '09
By Joe Gimenez
Americans went on binges buying guns and ammunition in early 2009, worried that a radical leftist president and Democrat-dominated Congress would violate their Second-Amendment rights to keep and bear arms. The effects? Less murder, robbery, rape, and property crime, according to an FBI report released Monday. This gives the young president and Democrat Congress at least one proud but unintended accomplishment for which they'll never claim credit.
Indeed, gun buyers were out in droves in late 2008 and early 2009. While it's easy to infer that increased gun ownership figures align precisely with the drop in crime in the same calendar period, you won't see that headline in the New York Times, despite their penchant for such inferences about increases in crime coinciding with increasing "guns on the street."
The gun-buying started shortly before, and then took off after, Obama's election. The Toronto Star reported a 15% increase of 108,000 more FBI background checks in October 2008 than during the same month in 2007. People were already anticipating the dire consequences of an Obama victory. Then, in November 2008, the number of FBI background checks on applicants buying guns spiked 42% from the previous year. The FBI performed 12.7 million background checks in 2008, compared to 11.2 million in 2007, a 13% increase.
More evidence of rampant gun-buying loads up in the states. Through June 2009, the Texas Department of Public Safety received a monthly average of 12,700 applications for concealed handgun licenses, up 46% from the average in 2007. Even the New York Times noted how gun sales were up in 2009; in a June story, it focused on its less sophisticated neighbors in New Jersey. Even in liberal Massachusetts, gun permits surged 15% over the last two years (after falling several years before that).
While background checks and applications for concealed handgun licenses don't directly equate to the number of new guns on the street -- some applicants are refused, and applications can include multiple guns at the same time of purchase -- the numbers do indicate that more law-abiding Americans had new or enhanced arms in the first six months of 2009. Most criminals don't subject themselves to background checks.
(This is a good place to note that "new guns on the street" is just a liberal scare cliché we should not carelessly adopt. These statistics indicate the real dynamic: gun purchases and concealed licenses acquisitions are made predominantly by law-abiding citizens taking their guns home with them from the store, for self-defense, hunting, and target-shooting purposes.)
But shouldn't more guns equate to more murders and other violent crime? Only if you live in liberal never-never land.
That certainly has not been the case in early 2009. Guns are purchased so that good people can protect themselves against bad people. And moreover, self-protection is a basic human right, despite the fact that our new wise Latina Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor couldn't bring herself to acknowledge that this summer.
The newspapers west of the Hudson River are chock full of stories in which law-abiding citizens protected themselves by using guns. And these are just the incidents that are reported. The Armed Citizen blog does a great job of capturing these stories in their raw form, and every thinking American needs to make his own inferences about the value of guns in these situations: They prevent people from becoming statistics. Go through the news reports compiled on the Armed Citizen blog and make your own count of people who refused to become statistics.
For instance, in May, eleven students in Atlanta avoided becoming murder statistics thanks to the bravery of one among them who had a gun in his backpack. He used it to kill one robber and injure another. Chillingly, the news reports describe how the robbers were counting their bullets to make sure they had enough to kill their victims. One of the robbers was about to rape a woman as well. That's at least thirteen fewer violent crimes (murder, rape, robbery) that did not need to be included in the FBI's crime report for the first half of 2009.
As 2009 winds down, the Democratic Party deserves an off-handed "thank you" for inspiring more law-abiding citizens to purchase weapons and protect themselves from bad people, at least in the first half of the year.
But even while giving them that tribute, it's important to reflect that the only direct result of their gun control efforts in the past -- the Clinton administration's regulation forbidding U.S. military personnel from carrying personal firearms -- resulted in the deaths of thirteen people and an unborn infant in Fort Hood.
Sadly, those deaths will add to an increase in the second half of 2009's statistics -- and renewed calls for gun control legislation, to be sure.
Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2009/12/more_guns_less_crime_in_09.html at December 30, 2009 - 10:00:50 AM EST
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TC2xTCb_GU&feature=player_embedded
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Woof,
This is what happens when the lawabiding population of a nation is disarmed, through the efforts of its own government and the U.N. www.kentucky.com/latest_news/story/1101085.html
When a government fails its people, and at some point they always do for whatever reason, then only the criminals will be armed and the lawabiding citizens will be left to defend themselves with sticks, stones and whatever hand tools are available while the criminals use fully automactic weapons. :-P
P.C.
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Woof Rarick,
But how could they further their agenda to undermine the second amendment and circumvent the rights of citizens to keep and bear arms if they simply enforce the gun laws that are already on the books? Here's the deal; our politicians don't adequately protect our borders or enforce our immigration laws or enforce the gun laws we already have. So guess what; we have a bunch of people here illegally that illegally buy firearms from individuals that sell guns to them illegally and then they illegally take guns back into Mexico. Now even though 99% of the sales at gunshows are legal; in our politician's minds the easy fix is to pass yet another law that makes it illegal for a private lawabiding citizen to sell a firearm to another lawabiding private citizen. It doesn't matter if that won't solve the real problems of illegal immigration and gun running by criminals. It does however, restrict the rights of citizens, giving more power and control to our government and the elitist, power hungry, corrupt, do nothing politicians, that endanger us with their ineptness, that want to herd us like sheep. :-P
P.C.
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As the saying goes "I carry a gun because a policeman is too heavy" though as a subject of the PR of CA, that is not true in my case.
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Oh yes, another thing that brought me to this thread........
http://www.examiner.com/x-1417-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2010m1d19-Austin-Police-statement-on-banning-private-sales-at-Texas-Gun-Shows (http://www.examiner.com/x-1417-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2010m1d19-Austin-Police-statement-on-banning-private-sales-at-Texas-Gun-Shows)
Basically some police backdoored a requirement for private citizens to have a FFL holder involved in every firearm sale transaction at a Texas gun show. It may violate several laws in Texas. This is because Illegal Aliens have been buying guns from private citizens, then smuggling them back accross the border. I do not get it, arrest the criminals, and leave the others alone, don't act "Undercolor of the Law" to intimidate law abiding citizens into giving up their rights.
Wow. The APD met with the paties involved and came to an agreement to address the issues. More hysteria for the ignorant. :roll:
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Woof GM,
The violation of a Constitutionally protected right or encouraging citizens not to exercise their rights through intimidation by law enforcement or other government agency, whatever the reasoning behind it, well intentioned or otherwise, is something to be concerned about and only the truly ignorant would think otherwise.
P.C.
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So, are you asserting that illegal aliens and felons have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms? Do legitimate gun owners and the firearms industry have a moral, ethical responsibility to prevent such individuals from purchasing weapons at their venue?
The fact that the blogger cites Alex Jones of Prisonplanet.com says this is typical fever swamp paranoia.
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I think it's fairly obvious that I made no such assertions about felons and illegal aliens having gun rights and futhermore the firearms industry and individual lawabiding citizens do act responsibly at gunshows and obey the law and are perfectly within their rights both morally and ethically to make legal transactions while they are there. As for who is charged with the responsibility to prevent these illegal purchases and sales, that's easy; it's the U.S. Government and its law enforcement agencies that have the authority and duty to secure our borders and round up illegal aliens that get pass them and it's also their duty to arrest and prosecute criminals that illegally sell guns. What's more, the people making this deal to only sell through a FFL dealer, are making the false assumption that this will stop illegal gun sales. It won't. Are they so naive to believe that a person willing to sell a gun illegally or an illegal alien that wants to buy one, will go through the check? All they'll do is move the sale out to the parking lot. This won't stop criminals, but it does put an unnecessary invasive burden on lawabiding citzens making a lawful transaction. That's the theory at work here, that we should restrict the freedoms and rights of responsible lawabiding citizens and punish them for the wrong doings of others and the ineptness and failures of politicans and the government agencies they mismanage. I see something fundamentally wrong with that. What kind of deranged upside down swamp fever delusion could make someone think that way? That's not how things are suppose to work in our Constitutional Republic but it is something that we see more and more of all the time; individual freedoms being attacked and left undefended because of the Liberal virus we have been infected with. It's getting to the point where people are beginning to believe that we are all born guilty instead of free.:-P It's through intimidation by politicians and bureaucrats that abuse their power that citizens are fleeced of their rights, and being shamed by ideologues for not behaving morally or ethically to make them question their own integrity, when if fact it's the accuser that lacks these very qualities. When that doesn't work they dismiss you as being ignorant or hysterical or suffering from paranoia, and all of it is intended to strip you of your will to protect your god given rights as a free human being and allow yourself to be inslaved. Don't fall for it guys.
P.C.
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**Here is a nice article on Alex Jones and paranoia**
http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200909/field-guide-the-conspiracy-theorist-dark-minds
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Field Guide to the Conspiracy Theorist: Dark Minds
Alex Jones is trying to warn us about an evil syndicate of bankers who control most of the world's governments and stand poised to unite the planet under their totalitarian reign, a "New World Order." While we might be tempted to dismiss Jones as a nut, the "king of conspiracy" is a popular radio show host. The part-time filmmaker's latest movie, The Obama Deception, in which he argues that Obama is a puppet of the criminal bankers, has been viewed millions of times on YouTube.
When we spoke, Jones ranted for two hours about FEMA concentration camps, Halliburton child kidnappers, government eugenics programs—and more. When I stopped him to ask for evidence the government is practicing eugenics, he pointed to a national security memorandum. But I found the document to be a bland policy report.
Jones "cherry picks not just facts but phrases, which, once interpreted his way, become facts in his mind," says Louis Black, editor of the Austin Chronicle, who knows Jones, a fellow Austin resident. When I confronted Jones with my reading of the report, he became pugnacious, launching into a diatribe against psychologists as agents of social control.
Conspiracy thinking is embraced by a surprisingly large proportion of the population. Sixty-nine percent of Americans believe President John F. Kennedy was killed by a conspiracy, and 42 percent believe the government is covering up evidence of flying saucers, finds Ted Goertzel, a professor of psychology at Rutgers University at Camden. Thirty-six percent of respondents to a 2006 Scripps News/Ohio University poll at least suspected that the U.S. government played a role in 9/11.
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http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Read.aspx?id=5313
Texas Gun Show Statement
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
NRA has received many inquiries about reports that the Austin, Texas Police Department and the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives tried to stop private gun sales at an Austin gun show.
It appears that these reports refer to a voluntary agreement concerning the transfer of firearms at the Austin gun show, evidently reached among law enforcement agencies, property owners and managers, and the gun show promoter in question. This was a self-imposed regulation, not a rule from the BATFE or an ordinance of the City of Austin.
NRA and our state affiliate, the Texas State Rifle Association, continue to research and investigate this matter -- including examining whether this show was unfairly targeted. We will inform our members of any new developments.
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Woof,
I don't know Alex Jones, I'm just saying that I don't see questioning the motives behind this agreement as being paranoid or part of a conspiracy theory. Alex Jones may say all kinds of crazy things but that does not mean that everything he says is crazy. To label anyone and everyone that has concerns about gun rights issues as being paranoid just because some nut job weighs in on it, is what I call crazy. JFK is a Left Wing conspiracy isn't it? Oliver Stone? :-D And the NRA response seems to be measured and reasonable but since I'm not paranoid and seeing conspiracy theorist everywhere I'm not sure I can trust my own eyes.
P.C.
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The NRA's position is rather than create new gun laws, law enforcement needs to enforce the laws currently in existence. The gun banners are pushing the "gun show loophole" that needs to be addressed by new federal legislation. Is it better to have gun shows work in a partnership with law enforcement to go after criminals at these venues or do you want to give the gun banners "ammo" to use against us?
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Woof GM,
The gun banners are not interested in stopping crimes, they are interested in eroding individual rights. Giving in to these people is more ammo for them to use. Appeasement never works. And let me define what the so called "Gun Show Loophole" is: first there is no loophole and gun shows have little to do with the law that the gun banners want to pass. What they want to do is make it illegal for a citizen to sell a gun that they legally own, to another citizen that can legally buy it. That's the loophole and it won't be limited to just guns sold at gun shows, it will be for any sale, anywhere. In other words they want to make all private sales or trades or other transactions of firearms illegal. So if granddad wants to hand down his shotgun to the next generation he'll have to go to a gun shop or other FFL holder have a background check done on his grandson and fill out the paperwork so there is a record of it and then pay the FFL holder a fee for his services. It's already illegal to sell a gun to a felon and it's already illegal for a felon to buy a gun. Again, what dumb ass felon or gun runner would go through a check? The answer is, none of them. They are still going to do the illegal transaction. So why impose all this government B.S. on the law abiding, unless what you really want is information on law abiding citizens and their guns? Guns that they own legally and have the right to own. It's none of the government's business on how many or what kind of guns private citizens own. This is an invasion of privacy and infringement on second amendment rights to keep and bear arms. This is what freedom is, not having the government be your babysitter, looking over your shoulder, prying into your daily life, treating you with mistrust and suspicion even though you have done nothing wrong.
Now what happens if they do get this law passed, do you really think that will be the last gun law ever? Of course not because the crooks are still going to buy and sell guns, so then the gun banners go after another so called "loophole". To them the second amendment is a loophole; am I getting through to you with any of this or am I just wasting my time?
P.C.
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I saw this the other day;
HOW TO CALL THE POLICE WHEN YOUR OLD
George Phillips, in his 80's, was going to bed when his wife told him she had heard noise coming from their garden shed. George opened the back door and saw that there were some guys stealing stuff and sitting it outside to take away. He dialed 911 and told them what was happening and the dispatch asked him if they were trying to get into his home.
George said "No but they are stealing from me."
The dispatch said "Sir all our units are busy right now but someone will be there in about 30 minutes."
George, hung up the phone, waited 30 seconds and dialed 911 again. When the dispatch answered he said, "There isn't any hurry in getting the police here now, I just shot them thieves!" and he hung up.
Within 4 minutes a half a dozen patrol cars, SWAT and emergency crews pulled up at George's house and the officers caught the thieves in the act.
One officer asked George "Why did you lie about shooting those guys?"
George snapped back, "Why did that jerk, lie about how busy you were?"
P.C. :-D
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Woof GM,
The gun banners are not interested in stopping crimes, they are interested in eroding individual rights. Giving in to these people is more ammo for them to use.
**Look at who the president is, and both houses of congress. With the MSM pushing "Gun show loophole", you better believe it can get passed.**
Appeasement never works. And let me define what the so called "Gun Show Loophole" is: first there is no loophole and gun shows have little to do with the law that the gun banners want to pass. What they want to do is make it illegal for a citizen to sell a gun that they legally own, to another citizen that can legally buy it.
**I know this. Again, this is why it's in every gun owner's best interest to make sure the laws currently in existance get enforced. This is why it's a good thing for a gun show owner to work with law enforcement to keep those who want to make illegal purchases away from his venue.**
It's already illegal to sell a gun to a felon and it's already illegal for a felon to buy a gun. Again, what dumb ass felon or gun runner would go through a check?
**A private citizen selling a gun has no way to check the buyer's background, that's why they look for private sellers.**
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I believe the great majority of the Mexican issue to be a red herring. The armaments used by the gangs are not available to civilians in America. Just as the Zetas were originally trained by the US govt, so too automatics, grenade launchers and the like are available only from govts-- including the Mexican govt. The Mexican army is IMHO a major source of the arms purchased by the narcos.
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Crafty,
The US guns to Mexico is a red herring. The legitimate issue are the illegal aliens who use the guns here for illegal acts. Aside from the guns that originate from the Mexican gov't, the drug cartels can purchase military grade small arms from around the globe.
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Yes.
As I am sure you already know, the real reason a big deal is made of this though is part of the deep plan to subvert US C'l gun rights via international treaty.
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Gun control advocates are pushing the "US guns going to Mexico" meme. The real threat is the Mexican drug cartel affiliated gangs operating CONUS. Bitch about the BATFE all you want, but they are one of the most effective law enforcement agencies as far as targeting violent criminal gangs.
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**Oh my god! Recommendations! How horrific!**
http://www.news8austin.com/content/your_news/default.asp?ArID=264390
APD makes recommendations on illegal sales at gun shows
1/19/2010 7:36 PM
By: News 8 Austin Staff
The Austin Police Department said in the last year, eight people were arrested and convicted for illegal gun possession.
All of them were convicted felons or illegal immigrants, and all bought their weapons from unlicensed dealers at shows at the North Austin Event Center, on North Lamar Boulevard.
Now APD is making recommendations to crackdown on illegal sales at gun shows.
It's not illegal for an unlicensed dealer to sell at the shows, but APD is urging promoters and property owners to require their vendors to have a license.
"There have been questions posed to us about whether or not we are trying to create new rules regarding the private sales of guns. We are not. We are just making recommendations to the property owner and how he can control the activity on his property in order to avoid ongoing violations of the law," APD Detective TJ Vineyard said.
APD also recommends that promoters provide onsite security, so that sales are prohibited from taking place in parking lots.
So far, police said all property owners and managers have agreed to follow the recommendations.
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So you don't think the Brady Bunch et al are using the "gun show loophole" as a backdoor attempt to ban private sales of firearms?
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Sure they are, which is why it's important for legitimate gun owners and dealers to work with law enforcement to make a good faith effort to keep firearms out of the hands out of felons/illegal aliens.
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**I know this. Again, this is why it's in every gun owner's best interest to make sure the laws currently in existance get enforced. This is why it's a good thing for a gun show owner to work with law enforcement to keep those who want to make illegal purchases away from his venue.**
It's already illegal to sell a gun to a felon and it's already illegal for a felon to buy a gun. Again, what dumb ass felon or gun runner would go through a check?
**A private citizen selling a gun has no way to check the buyer's background, that's why they look for private sellers.**
Woof GM,
Our freedoms are based on trust and through the Constitution and the Bill of Rights the government and its agencies have no choice in the matter they are bound by law to trust us and respect our rights under the law. If the gun show people make some kind of deal where by they impose their own gun law, forcing people at a public event to give up their rights at the door, then all they are, are surrogates for the police. If they give people a choice whether to do the check or not, I'm O.K. with that and I'm sure the NRA would be too. If it's forced then I would boycott any event these people held. As far as being a responsible citizen, I can't imagine selling a gun to someone I don't know without asking to see a drivers license for proof of age and residence and keeping a record of his name. I think most responsible citizens do that but the ones that don't shouldn't be used to paint all of us as being untrustworthy.
If you want to live in a perfectly safe society then we all should be considered guilty at birth and kept in a prison cell until we die. Freedom comes at a cost and their are risks involved, some people will betray the trust. It is those few that should be punished and no longer trusted and that is how our laws and our legal system is set up and it's the government and its agencies that are responsible for enforcing those laws. We are innocent until proven guilty and the government has no authority to infringe on the rights of law abiding citizens or arbitrarily force people into doing anything against their will. When the government does this kind of thing, even though it may be well intentioned, and even though they might think it's in the best interest of safety, it is an act of controling the activites of the population, which is what happens in a police state and then we are no longer free. The consequences of that are much more dangerous than a few guns being sold illegally. The criminals will find a way to get guns regardless and the rest of us will be left defenseless; this kind of thing is not about safety, it is about trust.
P.C.
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If you want to live in a perfectly safe society then we all should be considered guilty at birth and kept in a prison cell until we die.
**No one is sugesting that. Take an absolutist position if you want, but the courts and the general public understand that individual rights get balanced with the greater public good.**
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Woof
I'm not taking an absolutist position, the law is what it is and our rights are what they are and if the choice remains with the people then I'm O.K. with that. The law enforcement agencies of our government has the duty and power to enforce the laws we have. They are restrained from going beyond the enforcement of those laws. If the law is changed by Congress per the will of the people then they can enforce it, but they don't get to make the laws up as they go nor can they strongarm citizens into giving up their rights. That is the balance, and in this case they may have stepped over the line and if people turn a blind eye to this kind of thing and don't clearly mark where the line is, governments have a long history of getting use to crossing that line at will. Do you see the danger here and what is truly for the public good? Illegal gun sales are bad, police states are worse, much worse.
P.C.
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Meeting with a gun show owner to make recommendations to prevent illegal aliens and convicted felons from accessing firearms is hardly the acts of a police state.
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Woof,
If that is all there was to it I might agree with that, but when the gun show people make it mandatory and don't give people a choice, I have a problem with that and would advise my fellow citizens not to attend shows where these rules were forced on them. I would also have a problem with the police if they used some type of threat of repercussions or bribed the gun show folks with some kind of special consideration to make them implement the rule. That would be an abuse of power. The same kind of thing was tried by President Clinton when he got Smith and Wesson to go beyond what is required by law when selling their guns back a few years ago. People boycotted them and they almost went out of business because of it.
http://clinton3.nara.gov/WH/New/html/20000317_2.html
http://hunting.about.com/library/weekly/aa010515.htm
I'm all for law enforcement but when these agencies or government leaders start looking at our rights and freedoms as obstacles and start circumventing our system of governace by doing end runs around the will of the people, then that has got to be challenged. I don't care how smart they think they are or how right they think they are or how easy it makes it for them or how safe they think we will all be. I would rather be free. If a cop wants it to be that easy then he should get a job in Iran. If a politician wants to dictate and impose his ideas of gun control on a nation, he should stage a coup in Venezuela. But here they should damn well respect our rights and our system of government and they are just going to have to trust us until we do something wrong.:-P In the meantime they should do their jobs; protect our borders, enforce our laws and punish the criminals; if they did that then they wouldn't have any time left over for social engineering and meddling in the lives of law abiding citizens; if they can't, then they shouldn't swear an oath to protect the Constitution of the United States and then try to subvert it. To me, that makes them a traitor.
P.C.
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Woof Rarick,
Interesting read; thanks.
P.C.
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How the right to arms saved the non-violent civil rights protesters
David Kopel • February 8, 2010 3:42 pm
Over at The Faculty Lounge, there are some pictures of sit-ins from the early 1960s. Regarding a 1963 sit-in in Jackson, Mississippi, TFL writes: “By one account, members of the all-White Jackson police force stood guard outside, while several FBI agents (the guys in back wearing shades) ‘observed’ from inside. That White guy at the counter, that’s Tougaloo professor and community activist Hunter Gray (John R. Salter) who helped organize the Jackson sit-ins. And that’s blood on his shirt. All of the protesters had been covered in slop, and some were beaten with brass knuckles and broken bottles.”
The non-violent Civil Rights protesters allowed themselves to be beaten in public while the media watched; the images helped win sympathy for the Civil Rights Movement in the North, and proved to be crucial in developing the political will for the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
In a limited sense, the media’s presence provided some protection for the protesters; there was never a case in which a civil rights protester was murdered in front of media cameras. At night, when everyone had gone home, things were very different. As Salter later explained:
I was beaten and arrested many times and hospitalized twice. This happened to many, many people in the movement. No one knows what kind of massive racist retaliation would have been directed against grassroots black people had the black community not had a healthy measure of firearms within it.
When the campus of Tougaloo College was fired on by KKK-type racial night-riders, my home was shot up and a bullet missed my infant daughter by inches. We received no help from the Justice Department and we guarded our campus — faculty and students together — on that and subsequent occasions. We let this be known. The racist attacks slackened considerably. Night-riders are cowardly people — in any time and place — and they take advantage of fear and weakness.
Later, I worked for years in the Deep South as a full-time civil rights organizer. Like a martyred friend of mine, NAACP staffer Medgar W. Evers, I, too, was on many Klan death lists and I, too, traveled armed: a .38 special Smith and Wesson revolver and a 44/40 Winchester carbine.
The knowledge that I had these weapons and was willing to use them kept enemies at bay. Years later, in a changed Mississippi, this was confirmed by a former prominent leader of the White Knights of the KKK when we had an interesting dinner together at Jackson.
In the 1970s, I was Southside director of the large, privately-funded Chicago Commons Association. Our primary focus involved assisting minority people in developing sensible community organizations — vis-a-vis schools, city services, anti-crime.
We were opposed by white racist organizations (e.g., Nazi Party) and various youth gangs of many sorts. My staff and I received countless death threats, there were arson attacks on our offices, and, on one occasion, men with weapons came to my home and told my wife and children that they intended to kill me. (I happened to be at work.)
Again, I was glad I had many firearms and, again, we guarded our home and let this be known. We responded to hate calls on the telephone by telling the callers we were quite prepared for them.
For Salter, the right to own a handgun was apparently a crucial part of his ability to exercise his right to defend himself and his family, which was a sine qua non of his ability to stay alive in order to exercise his First Amendment rights to advocate for enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment.
Yet in modern Chicago, decent law-abiding citizens are forbidden to own handguns. As I detailed in my amicus brief in McDonald v. Chicago (pages 39–45), many people find that a handgun is best choice for family defense, especially in urban areas such as Chicago. As the history of the Civil Rights Movement demonstrates, the denial of the constitutional right to own a handgun could endanger other constitutional rights, particularly the rights of community organizers.
http://volokh.com/2010/02/08/how-the-right-to-arms-saved-the-non-violent-civil-rights-protesters/
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BBG:
Nice find.
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Gail Collins is an arch liberal progressive columnist for Pravda on the Hudson, the NYT, but what do we make of the question presented here?
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Congress, Up in Arms
By GAIL COLLINS
Published: May 5, 2010
There seems to be a strong sentiment in Congress that the only constitutional right suspected terrorists have is the right to bear arms.
“I think you’re going too far here,” said Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina at a hearing of the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday. He was speaking in opposition to a bill that would keep people on the F.B.I. terrorist watch list from buying guns and explosives.
Say what?
Yes, if you are on the terrorist watch list, the authorities can keep you from getting on a plane but not from purchasing an AK-47. This makes sense to Congress because, as Graham accurately pointed out, “when the founders sat down and wrote the Constitution, they didn’t consider flying.”
The subject of guns turns Congress into a twilight zone. People who are perfectly happy to let the government wiretap phones go nuts when the government wants to keep track of weapons permits. A guy who stands up in the House and defends the torture of terror suspects will nearly faint with horror at the prospect of depriving someone on the watch list of the right to purchase a pistol.
“We make it so easy for dangerous people to get guns. If it’s the Second Amendment, it doesn’t matter if they’re Osama bin Laden,” said Paul Helmke, the president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
Graham wanted to make it clear that just because he doesn’t want to stop gun purchases by possible terrorists, that doesn’t mean he’s not tough on terror.
“I am all into national security. ... I want to stop reading these guys their Miranda rights,” he said.
The Obama administration has been criticized by many Republicans for having followed the rules about how long you can question a terror suspect before you read him his rights. These objections have been particularly loud since the arrest of Faisal Shahzad in the attempted Times Square bombing. No one seems moved by the fact that Shahzad, after being told that he had the right to remain silent, continued talking incessantly.
“Nobody in their right mind would expect a Marine to read someone caught on the battlefield their rights,” Graham said.
Terror threats make politicians behave somewhat irrationally. But the subject of guns makes them act like a paranoid mother ferret protecting her litter. The National Rifle Association, the fiercest lobby in Washington, grades every member of Congress on how well they toe the N.R.A. line. Lawmakers with heavily rural districts would rather vote to legalize carrying concealed weapons in kindergarten than risk getting less than 100 percent.
The Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing on “Terrorists and Guns: The Nature of the Threat and Proposed Reforms,” concerned a modest bill sponsored by Senator Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey. It would allow the government to stop gun sales to people on the F.B.I. terror watch list the same way it does people who have felony convictions. Because Congress has repeatedly rejected this idea, 1,119 people on the watch list have been able to purchase weapons over the last six years. One of them bought 50 pounds of military grade explosives.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York City and his police commissioner, Ray Kelly, dutifully trekked down to Washington to plead for the bill on behalf of the nation’s cities. The only thing they got for their trouble was praise for getting the city through the Times Square incident in one piece. And almost everyone had a good word for the T-shirt vendor who first noticed the suspicious car and raised an alert. Really, if someone had introduced a bill calling for additional T-shirt vendors, it would have sailed through in a heartbeat.
Gun legislation, not so popular.
Lautenberg’s bill has been moldering in committee, and that is not going to change.
“Let me emphasize that none of us wants a terrorist to be able to purchase a gun,” said Senator Susan Collins of Maine, who nevertheless went on to argue against allowing the government to use the terrorist watch list to keep anyone from being able to purchase, um, a gun.
“Some of the people pushing this idea are also pushing the idea of banning handguns,” said Graham, darkly. “I don’t think banning handguns makes me safer.”
The terrorist watch list is huge, and some of the names on it are undoubtedly there in error. The bill would allow anyone denied the right to purchase a firearm an appeal process, but that would deprive the would-be purchaser some precious gun-owning time. Before we subject innocent Americans “to having to go into court and pay the cost of going to court to get their gun rights back, I want to slow down and think about this,” said Graham.
Slow is going to be very slow, and the thinking could go on for decades.
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You can deprive a person of their rights, but only through due process.
This differs from engaging an enemy on a battlefield. When the Marines waded onto Iwo Jima, they were not serving a search warrant on the Japanese bases on the island and placing the Japanese troops under arrest.
Placing a person on a watchlist is a law enforcement tool for internal use. Placing a person on a watchlist does not remove their core constitutional rights. Until you establish probable cause for an arrest, and it's upheld by judicial review, you cannot deprive them of freedoms.
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"The Gun Is Civilization"
As the Supreme Court hears arguments for and against the Chicago, IL Gun Ban, I offer you another stellar example of a letter (written by a Marine) that places the proper perspective on what a gun means to a civilized society.
Read this eloquent and profound letter and pay close attention to the last paragraph of the letter...
The Gun is Civilization by Maj. L. Caudill USMC (Ret)
Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or force me to do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force.
The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gang banger, and a single guy on equal footing with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force equations. These are the people who think that we'd be more civilized if all guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a [armed] mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger's potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat--it has no validity when most of a mugger's potential marks are armed.
People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many, and that's the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted him a force monopoly.
Then there's the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser. People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don't constitute lethal force watch too much TV, where people take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level.
The gun is the only weapon that's as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weight lifter. It simply wouldn't work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn't both lethal and easily employable.
When I carry a gun, I don't do so because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don't carry it because I'm afraid, but because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn't limit the actions of those who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It removes force from the equation... and that's why carrying a gun is a civilized act.
By Maj. L. Caudill USMC (Ret)
So the greatest civilization is one where all citizens are equally armed and can only be persuaded, never forced.
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A constant theme emerging here is the need for Libertarians to abandon their Utopian fantasies if they wish to actually make any impact on the body politic. You might be armed, but the force of law has the upper hand in using force and that is the ultimate form of persuasion.
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Yeah, and Catholics should abandon the Trinity and Druids trees. That'll fix stuff, too. :evil:
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Maybe not appropriate to this forum....
But I include knife in the definition of "well-armed people".
NEW YORK - After stabbing two men to death on a subway train, a criminal justice student insisted to authorities that he was trying to save himself from an abrupt and brutal attack.
Brenddy Garcia was vindicated Friday as a grand jury dismissed all charges against him and prosecutors said "significant evidence of self-defense" had emerged after his arrest. Jailed since early April, the 19-year-old Garcia was expected to be freed later Friday or early Saturday, said his lawyer, Lawrence Fredella.
"Brenddy Garcia never wanted this to happen. He never intended to kill anyone," Fredella said. He said Garcia, who sobbed in court when he was arraigned last month, had been distraught over the incident and the charges and wanted to extend condolences to the slain men's families.
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The Magna Carta and English Common Law recognized an inherent right to self defense. This is quite different than the "I don't need no gubbamint" posture of some loonatarians.
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GM:
I would be very interested in learning more about exactly that. If you would be so kind as to post on the American Creed: Constitutional thread on the SCH forum I would greatly appreciate it.
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A constant theme emerging here is the need for Libertarians to abandon their Utopian fantasies if they wish to actually make any impact on the body politic. You might be armed, but the force of law has the upper hand in using force and that is the ultimate form of persuasion.
Woof,
Yes, and I would invoke the reasoning behind this saying; Better to be tried by twelve than carried by six.
P.C.
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Even better is to not be carried by six or tried by twelve.
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Woof GM,
Excellent point! :lol:
P.C.
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More Guns Mean Less Crime
by David Alan Coia (more by this author)
Posted 05/29/2010 ET
In the new edition of More Guns, Less Crime, economist John R. Lott, Jr., easily dispels any lingering doubt that allowing citizens to carry concealed handguns is strongly associated with—if not a direct cause for—lowering the rates of violent crime.
“The hypothesis that more guns connects to less crime has stood up against massive efforts to criticize it,” Lott writes in the book’s third edition, now available from the University of Chicago Press in the United States and on June 14 in the United Kingdom. He backs that statement with cold, hard facts.
The new edition, which includes data and analysis from 39 states and now covers 29 years (1977-2005), will make it much more difficult for Lott’s critics and anti-gun groups to continue their attempts to disarm law-abiding Americans. In fact, Lott frequently turns the tables on his critics by demonstrating how their own data actually support the More Guns, Less Crime thesis.
“There are large drops in overall violent crime, murder, rape, and aggravated assault that begin right after the right-to-carry laws have gone into effect,” Lott writes. “In all those crime categories, the crime rates consistently stay much lower than they were before the law.”
From the time states passed right-to-carry concealed handgun laws, the average murder rate dropped from 6.3 per 100,000 to 5.2 per 100,000 nine-to-ten years later—“about a 1.7% drop in the murder rate per year for ten years.”
Overall violent crime rates similarly dropped from 475 crimes per 100,000 people to a range of 415-440 after the second full year that concealed-carry laws were passed. Rapes dropped from 40.2 per 100,000 people to 35.7 per 100,000 nine to 10 years later (a 12% drop).
“Of all the methods studied so far by economists, the carrying of concealed handguns appears to be the most cost-effective method for reducing crime,” Lott wrote in the second edition of his book.
Based on National Institute of Justice figures, Lott estimates in the new edition that the economic loss resulting from a murder in 2007 dollars at $3.9 million, with the average loss from rape and robbery at $115,260 and $10,758 respectively. “If we use these figures [including the costs of aggravated assault and property crimes], the 29 states that we study save over $30 billion a year, with over half of that coming just from the reduction in murder rates.”
Dozens of academics have published studies that “have either confirmed the beneficial link between gun ownership and crime or at least not found any information that ownership increases crime,” Lott says, adding that “not a single refereed study finds the opposite result.”
Lott demonstrates that not only does the presence of concealed handgun carriers—just more than 2% of American adults—lower rates of violent crime, but where gun bans are imposed, violent crime has consistently risen—in the United States and abroad.
“Great Britain banned handguns in January 1997. But the number of deaths and injuries from gun crime in England and Wales increased an incredible 340% in seven years from 1998 to 2005,” Lott writes, identifying detrimental effects of gun bans in many other countries including India, Jamaica, Germany, Finland, and Greece.
“One big difference between the earlier work on right-to-carry laws and the current discussion on gun bans is that with 39 states passing right-to-carry laws we have had the same experiment over and over again in many different years in many different places,” Lott points out.
Unfortunately, most mainstream media reports do not focus on instances in which armed citizens defend themselves successfully without firing a shot, but instead focus on criminal shootings or shootings in self defense.
A national survey conducted by Lott in 2002 “indicates that about 95% of the time that people use guns defensively, they merely have to brandish a weapon to break off an attack.”
Other survey results “indicate that citizens use guns to stop violent crime about 2.5 million times each year—a large order of magnitude bigger than the reported number of crimes committed with guns.”
However, news organizations typically report the atypical event in which a shooting ends in a fatality, leaving the impression that “some events appear to be much more common than they actually are,” Lott writes.
Gun Control Advocates Lack Credibility
Lott is troubled by the way so many reporters’ uncritically accept opinions of groups that aim to disarm Americans , groups that are dishonest in their presentation of facts.
Lott illustrates how “the Brady Campaign and other gun-control organizations cherry pick a few cases, while omitting important facts, such as whether the permit holder was found to have used justifiable force.”
“Probably most telling,” he writes, “is that the Brady Campaign and the Violence Policy Center keep track of arrests of permit holders, not convictions—ignoring that defensive uses frequently result in arrests simply because a police officer can’t be sure what happened.”
Accurate accounts contradict the points the Brady Campaign attempts to make and show that “concealed handguns, in fact, help to protect people from getting killed when attacked.”
Law-Abiding Citizens
Lott shows that “concealed handgun permit holders are extremely law-abiding.” For example, “Permit holders committed murder at 1/182 of the rate of the general public.” And permit revocation rates are typically well below one-half of one percent, with the revocations almost never relating to the use or misuse of a gun.
A National Association of Chiefs of Police mail survey of 22,200 police chiefs and sheriffs found that 92% believed law-abiding citizens should be able to purchase guns for self defense. Furthermore, “support among the rank-and-file police officers and the general population for the right of individuals to carry guns for self-protection is even higher than it is among police chiefs,” Lott says.
HUMAN EVENTS reported in December that the number of police officer deaths declined with the rise in concealed handgun permits.
Many lawmakers have heard the message. Lott notes the “surprising fact” that many state legislators now have concealed carry permits. “In South Carolina, 20% of the state legislature had permits [to carry concealed handguns] in 2008. In Tennessee, 25% have permits. Exactly a third of the 24 Virginia state legislators from the area around Norfolk, Va., have permits.”
However, Lott points out that reductions in crime rates do not occur evenly in all locations. Clearly other factors exert an influence, such as the extent to which crimes are prosecuted and the liberality of the right-to-carry laws. States that reluctantly allow citizens to carry concealed handguns—requiring high fees, inordinately long training periods or that require frequent renewal of permits—do not experience the same level of crime rate reduction as states that impose fewer restrictions.
Unfortunately, only two states—Alaska and Vermont—impose no restrictions on citizens’ rights to carry concealed handguns.
Lott presents the most thorough and credible analysis of the effects of concealed handguns and crime rates. Any serious discussion by the media, legislative bodies and the courts must include a thorough reading of the 2010 edition of More Guns, Less Crime. The opinion of anyone who has not read the book but who professes an understanding of the effects of concealed handguns on crime rates should not be taken seriously.
Mr. Coia is a freelance journalist based in Arlington, Virginia.
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=37245
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Once again the gun banners are embracing some incredibly specious arguments as a means of circumventing second amendment protections. In the latest instance, they use heavily massaged stats to draw the conclusion US gun sales are responsible for Mexican drug cartel violence. This piece begs to differ.
Mexico City newspaper points to source of drug cartels' guns--the government
June 2, 12:28 PM · Kurt Hofmann - St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner
The fable of the U.S. civilian gun market being responsible for "arming" Mexico's brutal drug cartels has become so deeply entrenched, that to question it is to be labeled a "right wing gun lobby shill." The claimed numbers, though, as National Gun Rights Examiner David Codrea points out, have continued to drop, as more light is shed on the actual facts.
Hence, the Brady Campaign's and Violence Policy Center's claims of "95 to 100%" of Mexican "crime guns" coming from the U.S. civilian market first dropped a bit to "over 90%," and now Mexican President Felipe Calderón has settled on 80% (with Brady Campaign backing).
What those who toss these numbers around rarely mention, if not pressed, or under oath, is that whatever the percentage they're currently quoting, that's the percentage of guns submitted to the BATFE for tracing (and successfully traced). We've discussed the fact that Senator John Kerry (D-MA)--no friend to gun owners--admitted once that only about a quarter of the seized guns are ever submitted for BATFE tracing. Go to Mr. Codrea's piece to see the details (here's the link again), especially the National Shooting Sports Foundation's (NSSF) explanation.
Today, let's take a look at a second part of what the NSSF is telling us.
In recent years as many as 150,000 Mexican soldiers, 17,000 last year alone, defected to go work for the drug cartels -- bringing their American-made service-issued firearms with them. It has also been well documented that the drug cartels are illegally smuggling fully automatic firearms, grenades and other weapons into Mexico from South and Central America. Such items are not being purchased at retail firearms stores in the United States.
That brings us nicely to MexiData's "An Inside Look at Mexican Guns and Arms Trafficking." Quoting the Mexico City newspaper El Universal, it tells us about a Mexican "crime gun" source that Calderón, the Brady Campaign, the Violence Policy Center, and others would like us not to know about, because it's obvious that no combination of restrictions on American civilians can do anything about it.
A percentage of the weapons, the seller said, come from Mexico via Ministry of Defense personnel who provide [them] in part from weapons seized in raids, or stolen from the ministry's own arsenal.
Corruption in the Mexican government? I'm shocked, I tell you--shocked!
Another of Mr. Codrea's articles took an in-depth look at the U.S. government's (indirect) role in arming the cartels.
If traced by the BATFE, any of the firearms above would return as "originating in the US." Origination in the US clearly does not equate to an origination in the lawful US civilian market. Is it possible that the Mexican government is not making the majority of seized weapons available for BATFE tracing in order to cover corruption?
Perhaps the U.S. State Department should be required to have an FBI "background check" run on all foreign government organizations to which they wish to transfer firearms.
http://www.examiner.com/x-2581-St-Louis-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2010m6d2-Mexico-City-newspaper-points-to-source-of-drug-cartels-gunsthe-government
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Good find.
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I strongly encourage the Mexican government to secure the border to keep guns out of the otherwise eutopian wonderland they have created.
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Think Tough Gun Laws Keep Europeans Safe? Think Again...
Contrary to public perception, Western Europe, where most countries have much tougher gun laws, has experienced many of the worst multiple victim public shootings.
It wasn't supposed to happen in England, with all its very strict gun control laws. And yet last week Derrick Bird shot and killed 12 people and wounded 11 others. A headline in The Times of London read: "Toughest laws in the world could not stop Cumbria tragedy."
Multiple victim public shootings were assumed to be an American thing for it is here the guns are, right? No, not at all. Contrary to public perception, Western Europe, where most countries have much tougher gun laws, has experienced many of the worst multiple victim public shootings. Particularly telling, all the multiple victim public shootings in Europe occurred where guns are banned. So it is in the United States, too -- all the multiple victim public shootings (where more than three people have been killed) have taken place where civilians are not allowed to have a gun.
Look at recent history. Where have the worst K-12 school shootings occurred? It has not been in the U.S. but Europe. The very worst one occurred in a high school in Erfurt, Germany in 2002, where 18 were killed. The second worst took place in Dunblane, Scotland in 1996, where 16 kindergarteners and their teacher were shot. The third worst high school attack, with 15 murdered, happened in Winnenden, Germany. The fourth worst shooting was in the U.S. -- Columbine High School in 1999, leaving 13 killed. The fifth worst school related murder spree, with 11 murdered, occurred in Emsdetten, Germany.
With three of the worst five attacks, Germany may be a surprise to those who believe in gun control. Even by European standards, Germany has some of the strictest gun control laws. Indeed, these laws are far stricter than existing gun control in the U.S., or for that matter, the restrictions currently being discussed in the United States.
Though not quite as tight as U.K. regulations, Germany has strict licensing and registration requirements. German licenses are only valid for three years and to obtain a gun license people must demonstrate such hard-to-define characteristics as trustworthiness as well as convince authorities that they have a necessity for a gun. This comes on top of requirements against mental disorders, drug or alcohol addictions, violence or aggressive tendencies, and felony convictions.
The attacks in Europe might not get as much attention in the U.S. or even in other countries in Europe besides where the attack occurred as the attack in the U.S., but multiple victim public shootings appear to be at least as common in Europe as they are here. The following is a partial list of attacks occurring in Europe since 2001. As mentioned, all of them occurred in gun free zones, places where guns in the hands of civilians were not allowed:
- Zug, Switzerland, September 27, 2001: a man murdered 15 members of a cantonal parliament.
- Tours, France, October 29, 2001: four people were killed and 10 wounded when a French railway worker started killing people at a busy intersection in the city.
- Nanterre, France, March 27, 2002: a man kills eight city councilors after a city council meeting.
- Erfurt, Germany on April 26, 2002: a former student kills 18 at a secondary school.
- Freising, Germany on February 19, 2002: Three people killed and one wounded.
- Turin, Italy on October 15, 2002: Seven people were killed on a hillside overlooking the city.
- Madrid, Spain, October 1, 2006: a man kills two employees and wounds another at a company that he was fired from.
- Emsdetten, Germany, November 20, 2006: a former student murders 11 people at a high school.
- Southern Finland, November 7, 2007: Seven students and the principal were killed at a high school.
- Naples, Italy, September 18, 2008: Seven dead and two seriously wounded in a public meeting hall (not included in totals below because it may possibly have involved the mafia).
- Kauhajoki, Finland, Sept. 23, 2008: 10 people were shot to death at a college.
Winnenden, Germany, March 11, 2009: a 17-year-old former student killed 15 people, including nine students and three teachers.
- Lyon, France, March 19, 2009: ten people injured after a man opened fire on a nursery school.
- Athens, Greece, April 10, 2009: three people killed and two people injured by a student at a vocational college.
- Rotterdam, Netherlands, April 11, 2009: three people killed and 1 injured at a crowded cafe.
Vienna, Austria, May 24, 2009: one dead and 16 wounded in an attack on a Sikh Temple.
- Espoo, Finland, Dec. 31, 2009: 4 killed while shopping at a mall on New Year's Eve.
- Cumbria, England, June 2, 2010: 12 people killed by a British taxi driver.
So how does this compare to the United States? The University of Chicago’s Bill Landes and I have collected data on all the multiple victim public shootings in the United States from 1977 to 1999 (for a discussion of that information see the newly revised third edition of my book "More Guns, Less Crime"). If we only examine those cases where 4 or more people have been killed in an attack, the worst such attack was the Luby's Cafeteria shooting in which 23 people died. On average 10.56 people have died each year,
One reason for limiting the cases to attacks with 4 or more deaths is that I haven't collected all the cases in Europe, and the quick review here will miss fewer of the larger cases.
Obviously, my list above for Western Europe will not have many cases where 4 or more people have been killed in a multiple victim public shooting, and I have not included attacks in Northern Ireland. That said, the average number for Europe over the 9.5 years from 2001 to the present is about 11.8 deaths per year -- essentially the same as the U.S. rate.
On the other hand, Western Europe’s population over the last decade is about 48 percent larger than the U.S. population over the earlier period (about 387 million to 262 million). To have the same per capita rate as the U.S., Western Europe would have had to experience one more shooting involving 4 people killed per year in six of the nine-and-a-half years. Whether a more detailed search would find that many more cases isn’t clear, but that is surely possible.
Large multiple victim public shootings are exceedingly rare events, but they garner massive news attention and the ingrained misperceptions they produce are hard to erase.
When I have been interviewed by foreign journalists, including those from Germany, they usually start off by asking for my opinion as to why multiple victim public shootings are such an American problem.
And of course, they are astonished when I remind of attacks in their own countries and I point out that this is a universal problem, but with a common factor: the attacks take place where civilians are banned from carrying guns.
John R. Lott, Jr. is a FoxNews.com contributor. He is an economist and author of "More Guns, Less Crime."(University of Chicago Press, 2010), the third edition of which was published in May."
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2010/06/10/john-lott-america-gun-ban-murders-multiple-victim-public-shootings-europe/
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I like John Lott... a lot. It seems like this http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/09/04/russia.school/ might deserve a mention though.
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http://www.todaystmj4.com/news/local/95999354.html
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1st rule of self defense......be aware of your surroundings. May not have helped but I bet it would have......... This is the type of story that will work against Texas open carry or any pro gun carry law, very frustrating.
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Now that's funny! Maybe open carry advocates can STFU now.
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No foolin', GM. Not only should stupid hurt, but attention whoredom should to, and I've got a local candidate I'd nominate for the beta test.
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I'm an NRA Life Member and certified instructor and so am not usually one to argue against them. They, however, have made a Faustian bargain with Democratic lawmakers who usually seek to do them ill to exempt themselves from the "Disclose" bill soon to be voted on in the house, a bill that looks to me like it's narrowly tailored to prevent some types of political speech while leaving other unhindered.
I think the NRA's stance is tremendously short sighted. As I put it elsewhere, the good news is that the NRA struck a deal where the 3rd amendment is concerned, too, and such won't have to quarter troops at their corporate headquarters. The bad news is that the rest of us need to make up the guest bed. An article that speaks to a related sentiment follows:
NRA exemption shows campaign disclosure bill's cynical, fatal flaws
By Cleta Mitchell
Thursday, June 17, 2010; A21
The cynical decision this week by House Democrats to exempt the National Rifle Association from the latest campaign finance regulatory scheme is itself a public disclosure. It reveals the true purpose of the perversely named Disclose Act (H.R. 5175): namely, to silence congressional critics in the 2010 elections.
The NRA "carve-out" reaffirms the wisdom of the First Amendment's precise language: "Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech."
Congress can't help itself. Since 1798, with the Alien and Sedition Acts, incumbent politicians have yearned for legal duct tape for their opponents' mouths. The Disclose Act is a doozy of a muzzle.
For its part, the NRA -- on whose board of directors I serve -- rather than holding steadfastly to its historic principles of defending the Constitution and continuing its noble fight against government regulation of political speech instead opted for a political deal borne of self-interest in exchange for "neutrality" from the legislation's requirements. In doing so, the NRA has, sadly, affirmed the notion held by congressional Democrats (and some Republicans), liberal activists, the media establishment and, at least for now, a minority on the Supreme Court that First Amendment protections are subject to negotiation. The Second Amendment surely cannot be far behind.
Since the court's January decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission that corporations cannot be constitutionally prohibited from making independent candidate-related expenditures, Democrats have been hyperventilating at the notion that corporations might spend millions of dollars criticizing them. To foreclose that possibility, the Disclose Act would impose onerous and complicated "disclosure" restrictions on organizations that dare to engage in constitutionally protected political speech and on corporations that dare to contribute to such organizations.
Democrats would effectively neuter the court's decision by requiring the names of multiple donors to be recited in ads (thus shrinking the time spent on actual speech), requiring the CEO of a corporate donor to personally appear in campaign-related ads, expanding the coverage period to virtually the entire election year, and including myriad other rules that the NRA described last month as "byzantine" and an "arbitrary patchwork of reporting and disclosure requirements."
The NRA's wheel-squeaking bought it an exemption from those requirements. Tea Party organizations arising spontaneously since 2009? Out of luck. Online organizations with large e-mail followings but perhaps no formal dues structure? Forget it.
Receiving less attention than the NRA "carve-out" but no less cynical is the bill's sop to organized labor: Aggregate contributions of $600 or more would be disclosed. Why start at $600? Why not $200 or, say, $500? Because most union members' dues aggregate less than $600 in a calendar year and thus members' contributions to labor's campaign-related spending wouldn't need to be disclosed . . . even to the union members whose dues are spent for political purposes.
In Citizens United, the court held that the First Amendment doesn't permit Congress to treat different corporations differently; that the protections afforded political speech arise from the Constitution, not Congress. Otherwise, it would be tantamount to a congressional power to license the speech of some while denying it to others.
The NRA carve-out is a clear example of a congressional speech license.
The ostensible purpose of the legislation is benign "disclosure," upheld in Citizens United as permissible under the First Amendment. Even conservative Justice Antonin Scalia has expressed skepticism about the constitutional infirmity of disclosure requirements in another case argued this term; Scalia intoned in oral argument that "running a democracy takes a certain amount of civic courage."
That's true. Indeed, the law upheld in Citizens United requires all donors to candidate-related expenditures to be publicly disclosed to the FEC in a timely manner.
But the Disclose Act isn't really intended to elicit information not currently required by law. The act serves notice on certain speakers that their involvement in the political process will exact a high price of regulation, penalty and notoriety, using disclosure and reporting as a subterfuge to chill their political speech and association.
It is only disclosure, say the authors. And box-cutters are only handy household tools . . . until they are used by terrorists to crash airplanes.
This is not just "disclosure." It is a scheme hatched by political insiders to eradicate disfavored speech. There is no room under the First Amendment for Congress to make deals on political speech, whether with the NRA or anyone else.
The writer is a partner at Foley & Lardner who works in campaign finance law and is a member of the NRA's board of directors.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/16/AR2010061604221.html
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That seems well reasoned. May I ask that you also post it in the Constitutional Law and the Free Speech threads as well so as to facilitate its discovery via future Search requests?
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Woof,
Boy, those gun control laws they have in Chicago are really doing the trick aren't they? :-P
www.suntimes.com/news/metro/2415428,weekend-shooting-roundup-062110.article
P.C.
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Woo Hoo! Looks like the Second Amendment just got incorporated. The 5-4 margin is perplexing, however. . . .
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Second Post:
The Court Restores a Fundamental Right
Posted by Ilya Shapiro
Today is a big victory for gun rights and a bigger one for liberty. The Supreme Court has correctly decided that state actions violating the right to keep and bear arms are no more valid than those taken by the federal government.
It could not have been otherwise: the Fourteenth Amendment, coming on the heels of the Civil War, says clearly that never again would the Constitution tolerate state oppressions, and that all individuals possess certain fundamental rights. It is equally clear that the right to keep and bear arms is one of those deeply rooted fundamental rights, not least because the Framers thought so highly of it as to enumerate it in the Second Amendment.
Still, Justice Alito’s plurality opinion leaves a lot to be desired, in that his ultimately correct conclusion rests on a dog’s breakfast of Substantive Due Process “incorporation” doctrine that arose only because the Privileges or Immunities Clause was strangled in its crib by an 1870s Supreme Court that refused to reconcile itself to the changes in constitutional structure wrought by the Fourteenth Amendment. Justice Thomas’s response to this tortured attempt to fit a square fundamental right into a round procedural guarantee is the right one: “I cannot accept a theory of constitutional interpretation that rests on such tenuous footing.”
Only Justice Thomas grapples with the original meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, surveying the rich history of the terms “privileges” and “immunities” to find that the right to defend oneself is part and parcel of the inalienable rights we all possess—and indeed it is “essential to the preservation of liberty.” The Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment—the most important “Framers” in this context—plainly deemed this right “necessary to include in the minimum baseline of federal rights that the Privileges or Immunities Clause established in the wake of the War over slavery.” All arguments to the contrary lack legal, historical and even philosophical basis.
And so it is a very good thing, again for liberty, that the Court needs Thomas’s fifth vote to rule as it does: while the plurality declines to reconsider the old and discredited Privileges or Immunities precedent, Thomas’s clarion call for a libertarian originalism provides a step on which to build in future.
Finally, as we celebrate the belated recognition of a precious right—the one that allows us to protect all the others—we must be shocked and saddened to see four justices (including Sonia Sotomayor, who at her confirmation hearings suggested she would do otherwise) standing for the proposition that states can violate this right at will, checked by nothing more than the political process. This is a nation of laws, not men—a republic, not a pure democracy—and thus it is disconcerting to see, as we do time and time again with this Court, that the only thing separating us from rule by a crude majoritarian impulse is one vote. Thank God that, in this case, that vote was Justice Thomas’s.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2010/06/28/the-court-restores-a-fundamental-right/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Cato-at-liberty+%28Cato+at+Liberty%29&utm_content=Google+Reader
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http://secondcitycop.blogspot.com/2010/06/mcdonald-decision.html
It seems City Hall took delivery of 30 or 40 oxygen canisters early this AM. Daley is in full hyperventilation mode, blaming guns guns guns and attempting to ram through a whole bunch of delaying tactics or blatantly illegal ordinances that will accomplish nothing but wasting taxpayer dollars - which as we all know are few and far between nowadays.
Give it up Shanks - we can't protect everyone all the time and you are actively seeking to create more casualties as the city spirals into Detroit II. Give law abiding citizens a fair chance to defend themselves, their loved ones and their property.
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GM; if I remember correctly you are a police officer and your wife is also, or at least if I remember, she is in training.
From a law enforcement perspective,
I would be curious about your thoughts on the issue of CCW's. Here in LA it is near impossible, but
my question is, are you in favor of the general public being able to have a CCW permit? Of course I assume
a general background check and certain exclusions, but within general limits, as an Officer of the Law,
are you in favor of CCW's being widely held and issued?
Also, do you think the recent ruling will make CCW's easier to obtain?
Thank you.
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I am a strong advocate for law abiding citizens to be able to carry. The vast majority of working cops take this stance as we are well aware that American law enforcement, as pro-active as we might try to be, are basically stuck responding to crime after the fact. We are not omniscient, and certainly not omnipresent. Bottom line, you are responsible for protecting yourself and your family.
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Thank you.
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Woof,
I've always known that the Second Amendment was an individual right to keep and bear arms; Am I that much smarter than the Supremes? :lol:
Yawn, I'm going back to sleep now...with my gun under the pillow. :-D
P.C.
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PC, I agree it's kind of scary that the second amendment was in question and the support on the court was only 5-4. I wonder how they feel about Article III authorizing the judiciary.
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From the New England Journal. The lead article! That is why I hate this journal. No political agenda here - yeah right.
***Published at www.nejm.org June 30, 2010 (10.1056/NEJMp1006890)
Bracing for the Impact of Expanded Second Amendment Rights
Julie D. Cantor, J.D.
Otis McDonald thought he needed a gun. Not just any gun. Something more agile than his hunting shotguns. Something to deter the seedy element that had, over the years, infected his Chicago neighborhood with drugs and crime from threatening his life and breaking into his home yet again. He thought he needed a handgun. But city laws that effectively banned handgun possession by private citizens stood in his way.
Two years ago, McDonald agreed to be the lead plaintiff in a case orchestrated to challenge those laws as violations of the Second Amendment. The lawsuit began the very day the Supreme Court laid the constitutional groundwork for it in District of Columbia v. Heller, a decision it announced after a nearly 70-year hiatus from Second Amendment jurisprudence. In Heller, a five-to-four decision in which the justices split along familiar philosophical lines, the Court struck down a Washington, DC, ordinance that, among other things, banned handguns. It held that the Second Amendment includes the right of individuals to possess firearms, including handguns, at home for self-defense. But because Heller involved federal law, the case left open the question of whether the Second Amendment affects state and local government action. Most, but not all, of the Bill of Rights' protections do.
(Table)
View this table:
[in this window]
[in a new window]
Number of Murders and Justifiable Homicides Committed with Handguns.
We now have the answer. On June 28, in another five-to-four decision that mirrored the Heller voting, the Court held in McDonald v. Chicago that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment "incorporated" the right described in Heller. Over the past 50 years, the Court has used that clause to extend enumerated federal rights, and a plurality of justices followed that approach in this case. The "right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense" is now "fully applicable" to the states. The case shifts the constitutional landscape, and its five opinions — collectively clocking in at over 200 pages — illustrate sharp divisions in the justices' views of history, the judicial role, and constitutional law.
Justice Samuel Alito's plurality opinion, referencing a physician-assisted–suicide case, explained that the right described in Heller is "deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition"1 and is "among those fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty." Justice Clarence Thomas's concurrence, which no other justice joined, argued that a different phrase within the Fourteenth Amendment, the Privileges or Immunities Clause, created the better analytic framework for deciding the scope of the right to keep and bear arms. Although McDonald and his fellow petitioners favored that approach, the plurality passed on the opportunity, which would have required disturbing a line of cases that dates to the post–Civil War period. (If the petitioners' goal was to convince the Court to revive that theory — and they devoted nearly their entire 72-page brief to arguing for it — they won the battle but lost the war.) Justices John Paul Stevens and Antonin Scalia wrote for themselves in dueling opinions. Justice Stevens's dissent, the coda to his career, offered a fluid view of "liberty" and suggested that a focus on "deeply rooted" rights was flawed, since it could sanction racist laws. And in a characteristically biting concurrence, Justice Scalia dismantled Justice Stevens's approach and lambasted certain "liberty" cases, such as those addressing abortion and gay rights, as unconstrained exercises in judicial lawmaking in which judges impose their moral values and, consequently, undercut democracy.
Justice Stephen Breyer, in an impassioned dissent that Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Sonia Sotomayor joined, proffered a states'-rights view usually embraced by the Court's conservative wing and argued that Heller should be overturned, or at least not extended. In his view, the Court "should not look to history alone," especially in cases like this one, for which the historical record is mixed, in its decision making — it should "consider the basic values that underlie a constitutional provision and their contemporary significance" as well as "the relevant consequences and practical justifications" of a decision.
Like Justice Breyer, physicians are well aware that esoteric questions of constitutional law may have real-world implications. Gun violence is a major public health concern, resulting in more than 30,000 deaths and about twice as many injuries annually. The cost of gun violence is prohibitive. Scholars estimate that its yearly total tops $100 billion.2 Handguns are particularly troubling. Research links their presence to substantially increased risks of suicide and homicide, especially for women living in abusive settings. And for children, "gun safety" is an oxymoron. To the extent that McDonald means more handguns, physicians have reason to be concerned. But any hysteria that this case inspires should, for the moment, be tempered.
In the aftermath of Heller, many in the public health community worried that the decision would unleash a torrent of guns on the public, bringing sudden, high spikes in rates of injury and death. Though it is too early to be completely reassured, dire predictions have not yet been realized. Heller did not create an unfettered right. As the Court explained in that opinion, it is "not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose." Thus far, it has not given lower courts a license to annihilate gun-control laws; in the more than 200 post-Heller federal and state cases, courts have left the legal status quo largely intact.3 Perhaps coincidentally, recent rates of violent crime have been at historic lows.
Conventional wisdom suggests that, even after McDonald, most gun-control laws will withstand scrutiny. In the Court`s view, its decision "does not imperil every law regulating firearms," and quoting Heller, it perceives no threat to "such longstanding regulatory measures as 'prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill,' 'laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.'" Total handgun bans will probably fall — and their effectiveness is uncertain in any event — but otherwise the impact of this sea change in constitutional law may be modest. Still, it will be years, even decades, before that conclusion is clear. And the possibility of more guns in homes, especially handguns, is troubling, as is the lack of guidance the Court's opinion offered to lower courts. For their part, physicians should remain vigilant and address gun issues, such as access and storage, with patients, especially those who may be suicidal, have survived domestic violence, or live with children. We can only hope that in hindsight, bleak post-Heller, post-McDonald forecasts will seem hyperbolic.
Otis McDonald has not won yet. A lower court will now decide whether the laws that thwarted him are constitutional. But McDonald is surely a foothold to victory. In all likelihood, he will get his gun. Ironically, that handgun may not be the panacea he seeks. It will not address the root causes of the drug- and gang-related crime plaguing his neighborhood. Its promise of safety may be illusory, and it may just increase the risks of homicide, suicide, and accidental injury and death of those who live in or, like his grandchildren, visit his home. It may also create legal problems. If he kills a neighborhood thug in self-defense, the odds that he will be held blameless are slim: in every year from 2004 through 2008, less than 2.5% of handgun-related killings by private citizens were deemed justifiable homicides.4 McDonald has, however, secured a measure of immortality; he will forever be associated with the case that bears his name.
That case marks another installment in high-minded constitutional debates. But we should not forget that the collateral damage from firearms, especially handguns, is breathtaking. In the face of staggering statistics about eminently avoidable gun-related harms, perhaps the wisest play for this newfound constitutional right is not to use it at all.
Disclosure forms provided by the author are available with the full text of this article at NEJM.org.
Source Information
From Goldman Ismail Tomaselli Brennan & Baum, Santa Monica, CA, and the UCLA School of Law, Los Angeles.
This article (10.1056/NEJMp1006890) was published on June 30, 2010, at NEJM.org.
References
Washington v. Gluckberg, 521 U.S. 702, 721 (1997).
Cook PJ, Ludwig J. Gun violence: the real costs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
Post-Heller litigation summary. San Francisco: Legal Community Against Violence, 2010. (Accessed June 30, 2010, at http://www.lcav.org/content/post-heller_summary.pdf)
Crime in the United States, 2008. Washington, DC: Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation, 2009. (Accessed June 30, 2010, at http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/offenses/expanded_information/homicide.html.)
The New England Journal of Medicine is owned, published, and copyrighted © 2010 Massachusetts Medical Society. All rights reserved.****
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Woof,
Well, as I've seen it all along the big gaping logic hole in their argument has been that somehow a right of the people can't be infringe upon by the Federal government but at the same time the state or local governments could infringe at will. If this were true then that would mean that all the other rights of the people listed in the Bill of Rights could be infringed as well because there are no special clauses in there that protects the rest of our rights from being nullified by the states or local government. So, if your local city council passed a law banning churches within city limits that would be fine with these justices? Like I've said before, the enemy is within the gates. :-P
P.C.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2010/07/05/how-the-mcdonald-decision-shows-that-activism-works/
The new mainstream.
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http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/7/4/881431/-Why-liberals-should-love-the-Second-Amendment
Daily Kos
Why liberals should love the Second Amendment
by Kaili Joy Gray aka Angry Mouse
Digg this! Share this on Twitter - Why liberals should love the Second AmendmentTweet this submit to reddit Share This
Sun Jul 04, 2010 at 10:00:03 AM PDT
Liberals love the Constitution.
Ask anyone on the street. They'll tell you the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a liberal organization. During the dark days of the Bush Administration, membership doubled because so many Americans feared increasing restrictions on their civil liberties. If you were to ask liberals to list their top five complaints about the Bush Administration, and they would invariably say the words "shredding" and "Constitution" in the same sentence. They might also add "Fourth Amendment" and "due process." It's possible they'll talk about "free speech zones" and "habeus corpus."
There's a good chance they will mention, probably in combination with several FCC-prohibited adjectives, former Attorney Generals John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales.
And while liberals certainly do not argue for lawlessness, and will acknowledge the necessity of certain restrictions, it is generally understood that liberals fight to broadly interpret and expand our rights and to question the necessity and wisdom of any restrictions of them.
Liberals can quote legal precedent, news reports, and exhaustive studies. They can talk about the intentions of the Founders. They can argue at length against the tyranny of the government. And they will, almost without exception, conclude the necessity of respecting, and not restricting, civil liberties.
Except for one: the right to keep and bear arms.
When it comes to discussing the Second Amendment, liberals check rational thought at the door. They dismiss approximately 40% of American households that own one or more guns, and those who fight to protect the Second Amendment, as "gun nuts." They argue for greater restrictions. And they pursue these policies at the risk of alienating voters who might otherwise vote for Democrats.
And they do so in a way that is wholly inconsistent with their approach to all of our other civil liberties.
Those who fight against Second Amendment rights cite statistics about gun violence, as if such numbers are evidence enough that our rights should be restricted. But Chicago and Washington DC, the two cities from which came the most recent Supreme Court decisions on Second Amendment rights, had some of the most restrictive laws in the nation, and also some of the highest rates of violent crime. Clearly, such restrictions do not correlate with preventing crime.
So rather than continuing to fight for greater restrictions on Second Amendment rights, it is time for liberals to defend Second Amendment rights as vigorously as they fight to protect all of our other rights. Because it is by fighting to protect each right that we protect all rights.
And this is why:
(Reasons below the fold)
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No. 1: The Bill of Rights protects individual rights.
If you've read the Bill of Rights -- and who among us hasn't? -- you will notice a phrase that appears in nearly all of them: "the people."
First Amendment:
...the right of the people peaceably to assemble
Second Amendment:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Fourth Amendment:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects...
Ninth Amendment:
...shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people
Tenth Amendment:
...are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
Certainly, no good liberal would argue that any of these rights are collective rights, and not individual rights. We believe that the First Amendment is an individual right to criticize our government.
We would not condone a state-regulated news organization. We certainly would not condone state regulation of religion. We talk about "separation of church and state," although there is no mention of "separation of church and state" in the First Amendment.
But we know what they meant. The anti-Federalists refused to ratify the Constitution without a Bill of Rights; they intended for our rights to be interpreted expansively.
We believe the Founders intended for us to be able to say damn near anything we want, protest damn near anything we want, print damn near anything we want, and believe damn near anything we want. Individually, without the interference or regulation of government.
And yet, despite the recent Heller and McDonald decisions, liberals stumble at the idea of the Second Amendment as an individual right. They take the position that the Founders intended an entirely different meaning by the phrase "the right of the people" in the Second Amendment, even though they are so positively clear about what that phrase means in the First Amendment.
If we can agree that the First Amendment protects not only powerful organizations such as the New York Times or MSNBC, but also the individual commenter on the internet, the individual at the anti-war rally, the individual driving the car with the "Fuck Bush" bumper sticker, can we not also agree that the Second Amendment's use of "the people" has the same meaning?
But it's different! The Second Amendment is talking about the militia! If you want to "bear arms," join the National Guard!
Right?
Wrong.
The United States Militia Code:
(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
Aside from the fact that the National Guard did not exist in the 1700s, the term "militia" does not mean "National Guard," even today. The code clearly states that two classes comprise the militia: the National Guard and Naval Militia, and everyone else.
Everyone else. Individuals. The People.
The Founders well understood that the militia is the people, for it was not only the right but the obligation of all citizens to protect and preserve their liberty and to defend themselves from the tyranny of the government.
And fighting against the tyranny of the government is certainly a liberal value.
No. 2: We oppose restrictions to our civil liberties.
All of our rights, even the ones enumerated in the Bill of Rights, are restricted. You can't shout "Fire!" in a crowd. You can't threaten to kill the president. You can't publish someone else's words as your own. We have copyright laws and libel laws and slander laws. We have the FCC to regulate our radio and television content. We have plenty of restrictions on our First Amendment rights.
But we don't like them. We fight them. Any card-carrying member of the ACLU will tell you that while we might agree that certain restrictions are reasonable, we keep a close eye whenever anyone in government gets an itch to pass a new law that restricts our First Amendment rights. Or our Fourth. Or our Fifth, Sixth, or Eighth.
We complain about free speech zones. The whole country is supposed to be a free speech zone, after all. It says so right in the First Amendment.
But when it comes further restrictions on the manufacture, sale, or possession of firearms, liberals are not even silent; they are vociferously in favor of such restrictions.
Suddenly, overly broad restrictions are "reasonable." The Chicago and Washington D.C. bans on handguns -- all handguns -- is reasonable, even though the Supreme Court has now said otherwise.
Would we tolerate such a sweeping regulation of, say, the Thirteenth Amendment?
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
What if a member of Congress -- say, a Republican from a red state in the south -- were to introduce a bill that permits enslaving black women? Would we consider that reasonable? It's not like the law would enslave all people, or even all black people. Just the women. There's no mention of enslaving women in the Thirteenth Amendment. Clearly, when Lincoln wanted to free the slaves, he didn't intend to free all the slaves. And we restrict all the other Amendments, so obviously the Thirteenth Amendment is not supposed to be absolute. What's the big deal?
Except that such an argument is ridiculous, of course. Liberals would take to the streets, send angry letters to their representatives in Washington, organize marches, call progressive radio programs to quote, verbatim, the Thirteenth Amendment. Quite bluntly, although not literally, liberals would be up in arms.
And yet...A ban on all handguns seems reasonable to many liberals. Never mind that of 192 million firearms in America, 65 million -- about one third -- are handguns.
Such a narrow interpretation of this particular right is inconsistent with the otherwise broad interpretation of the Bill of Rights. And just as conservatives weaken their own arguments about protecting the Second Amendment when they will not fight as vigilantly for protecting all the others, so too do liberals weaken their arguments for civil liberties, when they pick and choose which civil liberties they deem worthy of defense.
No. 3: It doesn't matter that it's not 1776 anymore.
When the Founders drafted the Bill of Rights, they could not have imagined machine guns. Or armor-piercing bullets (which are not available to the public anyway, and are actually less lethal than conventional ammunition). Or handguns that hold 18 rounds. A drive-by shooting, back in 1776, would have been a guy on a horse with a musket.
Of course, they couldn't have imagined the internet, either. Or 24-hour cable news networks. Or talk radio. When they drafted the First Amendment, did they really mean to protect the rights of Bill O'Reilly to make incredibly stupid, and frequently inaccurate, statements for an entire hour, five nights a week?
Actually, yes. They did. Bill O'Reilly bilious ravings, and Keith Olbermann's Special Comments, and the insipid chatter of the entire cast of the Today show are, and were intended to be, protected by the First Amendment.
Liberals are supposed to understand that just because we don't agree with something doesn't mean it is not protected. At least when it comes to the First Amendment. And one's personal dislike of guns should be no better a reason for fighting against the Second Amendment than should one's personal dislike of Bill O'Reilly justify fighting against the First Amendment.
And yet, when discussing the Second Amendment, liberals become obtuse in their literalism. The Second Amendment does not protect the right to own all guns. Or all ammunition. It doesn't protect the right of the people as individuals.
Liberals will defend the right of Cindy Sheehan to wear an anti-war T-shirt, even though the First Amendment says nothing about T-shirts.
They will defend the rights of alleged terrorists to a public trial, even though the Founders certainly could not have imagined a world in which terrorists would plot to blow up building with airplanes.
But we do not quibble about the methods by which we practice our First Amendment rights because methodology is not the point. Red herring arguments about types of ammunition or magazine capacity or handguns versus rifles are just that -- red herrings. They distract us from the underlying purpose of that right -- to ensure a free society that can hold its government accountable. The Second Amendment is no more about guns than the First Amendment is about quill pens.
No. 4: It doesn't matter if you can use it.
Fine, you say. Have your big, scary guns. It's not like you actually stand a chance in fighting against the United States government. The Army has bigger, badder weapons than any private citizen. Your most deadly gun is no match for their tanks, their helicopters, their atom bombs. Maybe two hundred years ago, citizens stood a chance in a fight against government, but not today. The Second Amendment is obsolete.
Tell that to the Iraqi "insurgents" who are putting up a pretty good fight against our military might with fairly primitive weapons.
The Second Amendment is obsolete?
What other rights might be considered obsolete in today's day and age?
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
When was the last time a soldier showed up at your door and said, "I'll be staying with you for the indefinite future"?
It's probably been a while. But of course, were it to happen, you'd dust off your Third Amendment and say, "I don't think so, pal."
And you'd be right.
What about the Twenty-Sixth Amendment? How much use does that get?
The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.
We all know the youth vote is typically pretty abysmal. Those lazy kids can barely get out of bed before noon, let alone get themselves to the voting booth. If they're not going to use their Twenty-Sixth Amendment rights, shouldn't we just delete the damn thing altogether?
Hell no. And this is why liberals work so hard to get out and rock the vote -- to encourage citizens to exercise their rights. That is our obligation as citizens, to protect against the government infringing upon our rights by making full use of them.
And yet, when it comes to the Second Amendment, liberals do not fight to protect that right. Instead them demand more laws. Regulate, regulate, regulate -- until the Second Amendment is nearly regulated out of existence because no one needs to have a gun anyway.
And that, sadly, is the biggest mistake of all.
No. 5: The Second Amendment is about revolution.
In no other country, at no other time, has such a right existed. It is not the right to hunt. It is not the right to shoot at soda cans in an empty field. It is not even the right to shoot at a home invader in the middle of the night.
It is the right of revolution.
Let me say that again: It is the right of revolution.
Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government.
To alter or abolish the government. These are not mild words; they are powerful. They are revolutionary.
The Founders might never have imagined automatic weapons. But they probably also never imagined a total ban on handguns either.
We talk about the First Amendment as a unique and revolutionary concept -- that we have the right to criticize our government. Does it matter whether we do so while standing on a soapbox on the corner of the street or on a blog? No. Because the concept, not the methodology, is what matters.
And the Second Amendment is no different. It is not about how much ammunition is "excessive" or what types of guns are and are not permissible. Liberals cling to such minutia at the expense of understanding and appreciating the larger concept that underlies this right.
So.
What is the point? Is this a rallying cry for liberals to rush right out and purchase a gun? Absolutely not. Guns are dangerous when used by people who are not trained to use them, just as cars are dangerous when driven by people who have not been taught how to drive.
No, this is a rallying cry for the Bill of Rights -- for all of our rights.
This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "I just don't like guns."
This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "No one needs that much ammunition."
This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "That's not what the Founders meant."
This is an appeal to every liberal who supports the ACLU.
This is an appeal to every liberal who has complained about the Bush Administration's trading of our civil liberties for the illusion of greater security. (I believe I’ve seen a T-shirt or two about Benjamin Franklin’s thoughts on that.)
This is an appeal to every liberal who believes in fighting against the abuses of government, against the infringement of our civil liberties, and for the greater expansion of our rights.
This is an appeal to every liberal who never wants to lose another election to Republicans because they have successfully persuaded the voters that Democrats will not protect their Second Amendment rights.
This is an appeal to liberals, not merely to tolerate the Second Amendment, but to embrace it. To love it and defend it and guard it as carefully as you do all the others.
Because we are liberals. And fighting for our rights -- for all of our rights, for all people -- is what we do.
Because we are revolutionaries.
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Second post
http://www.oaoa.com/opinion/court-49624-supreme-shy.html
Gun shy Supreme Court justices
The Supreme Court has ruled that the Second Amendment applies to states and cities as well as the federal government. Judging from their objections, the four dissenters were still reeling from the court’s landmark 2008 decision recognizing that the amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms.
In their dissenting opinions, Justices John Paul Stevens and Stephen Breyer (joined by Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor) worry that overturning gun control laws undermines democracy. If “the people” want to ban handguns, they say, “the people” should be allowed to implement that desire through their elected representatives.
What if the people want to ban books that offend them, establish an official church or authorize police to conduct warrantless searches at will? Those options are also foreclosed by constitutional provisions that apply to the states by way of the 14th Amendment. The crucial difference between a pure democracy and a constitutional democracy like ours is that sometimes the majority does not decide.
Likewise, Stevens defends “state and local legislatures’ right to experiment,” while Breyer is loath to interfere with “the ability of states to reflect local preferences and conditions — both key virtues of federalism.” Coming from justices who think Congress can disregard state decisions about the medical use of marijuana because a plant on the windowsill of a cancer patient qualifies as interstate commerce, this sudden concern about federalism is hard to take seriously.
Another reason to doubt the dissenters’ sincerity: They would never accept federalism as a rationale for letting states “experiment” with freedom of speech, freedom of religion or due process protections. Much of their job, as they themselves see it, involves overriding “local preferences” that give short shrift to constitutional rights.
Second Amendment rights are different, Breyer says, because “determining the constitutionality of a particular state gun law requires finding answers to complex empirically based questions.” So does weighing the claims in favor of banning child pornography or depictions of animal cruelty, relaxing the Miranda rule, admitting illegally obtained evidence or allowing warrantless pat-downs, dog sniffs or infrared surveillance.
When they decide whether a law or practice violates a constitutional right, courts cannot avoid empirical questions. In cases involving racial discrimination or content-based speech restrictions, for example, they ask whether the challenged law is “narrowly tailored to serve a compelling state interest” and is the “least restrictive means” of doing so.
But unlike equal protection or freedom of speech, Stevens says, “firearms have a fundamentally ambivalent relationship to liberty.” How so? “Just as they can help homeowners defend their families and property from intruders,” he explains, “they can help thugs and insurrectionists murder innocent victims.”
Every right can be abused, with results that are immoral, illegal or both. Freedom of speech can be used to spread hateful ideas, promote pernicious political philosophies, slander the innocent or engage in criminal conspiracies. If there were no potential for harm from exercising a right, there would be no need to protect it, because no one would try to restrict it.
The dissenters’ most frivolous objection is that making states obey the Second Amendment “invites an avalanche of litigation,” as Stevens puts it. Every day we hear about cases in which people argue that the government has violated their rights under the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth or Eighth amendment. Neither Stevens nor Breyer wants to stop this “avalanche.” Only when the Second Amendment is added to the mix do they recoil in horror at the prospect that Americans will use the courts to vindicate their rights.
Stevens warns that “the practical significance of the proposition that ‘the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the states’ remains to be worked out by this court over many, many years.” But that’s because the court for many, many years ignored the Second Amendment while gradually defining the contours of its neighbors in the Bill of Rights. There is a lot of catching up to do.
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Woof,
Liberal lawyers, judges, professors, and other so called Constitutional experts have for many years been poisoning the well by putting various ideas and interpretations of the Second Amendment out in the public sphere that completely goes against what the amendment was intended to protect. Any course you take in college or book you pick up on the Bill of Rights, will firmly place these ideas in your mind; things like saying the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights to make sure the government had soldiers at the ready and now it is outdated for that purpose. In other words this wasn't about protecting a citizens right to keep and bear arms at all but instead it was about protecting the United States from attack and it was put there as a benefit to the government and the states to have a armed militia.
This poison pill that they have drilled into our heads and into every lawyer and Constitutional expert that comes out of our finest schools, has been what the enemies of freedom have hung their hat on in order to strip the Second Amendment of its power to protect citizens from tyranny. Of course the latest ruling from the Supreme Court of the United States, has worked as an antidote to lessen the effect of that poisonous idea. However, the poison is still there in every major work on the Bill of Rights and Constitutional law. So here I would like to counter these ideas with some simple facts that you might use to correct the record.
Let's start with first things first. What was the intended purpose of the Bill of Rights to begin with? For that we can look at the preamble to the Bill of Rights. What? Never heard of that before? I wonder why? Well, here it is:
PREAMBLE
Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New-York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine
THE Conventions of a number of States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that futher declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent starts of its institution.
RESOLVED by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following Articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States, all, or any of which Articles, when ratified by three fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of the said Constitution; viz.
ARTICLES in addition to, and Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America, proposed by Congress, and ratified by the Legislatures of the several States, pursuant to the fifth Article of the original Constitution.
The second paragraph states the reason and purpose for the Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment by the way, very plainly..."in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent starts of its institution."
It makes it very clear that these amendments are intended to restrict the government and not to give it protections, but instead to ensure public confidence. Next, what the Second Amendment actually said before it was misconstructed and abused and rewritten by the poisonous pen of interpretation.
Second Amendment
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."
The first part is what the interpreters deem to contain the important meaning and purpose of the amendment and the last half, according to them, is just meaningless drivel. Now, anyone who's thinking hasn't been impaired by the poisonous ideas planted in all the literature about the Second Amendment would immediately recognize the first part as being a supporting statement to what follows, and they would respect the placement of commas that separate the statement from the declaration and restriction clause. What did the Preamble say? "...in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that futher declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added." and what does the last half of the Second Amendment say? This is the declaratory part, note the comma: "the right of the people to keep and bear arms, And the restrictive part: shall not be infringed."
The first part that mentions the Militia as a supporting statement, is just one given reason among many as to why this declaration and restriction had its place in the Bill of Rights and it has no importance or bearing on its meaning at all, at least not if you believe the preamble. Which might explain why it is never mentioned in all those expert opinions.
Am I really that much smarter than all all those Constitutional experts? :lol: These people are despicable for intentionally misleading the public and undermining our rights by way of academic terrorism. This is intellectual dishonesty at its worse. :-P :x
P.C.
all rights reserved, copyright 2010 by Prentice Crawford
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Excellent point PC, indeed outstanding! I will be pasting this on the American Creed thread on the SCH forum too.
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"A well regulated militia, composed of the gentlemen, freeholders, and other free men was necessary to protect our ancient laws and liberty from the standing army. And we do each of us, for ourselves respectively, promise and engage to keep a good fire lock in proper order and to furnish ourselves as soon as possible with and always keep by us, one pound of gunpowder, four pounds of lead, one dozen gun flints and a pair of bullet moulds, with a cartouch box or powderhorn and bag for balls."
Fairfax County Militia Plan, written by George Mason, co author with James Madison of the Second Amendment
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George Mason rocks.
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http://reason.com/blog/2010/07/16/post-mcdonald-challenges-to-gu
Reason Magazine
Post-McDonald Challenges to Gun Laws--from the Second Amendment Foundation and, Believe It or Not, the ACLU
Brian Doherty | July 16, 2010
New legal challenges to state and local laws restricting Second Amendment rights allowed by last month's decision in McDonald v. Chicago are rolling out.
From the same team of lawyer Alan Gura and institutional plaintiff Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) that fought and won McDonald comes Kachalsky v. Cacase. Details from the SAF press release:
The Second Amendment Foundation has filed a federal lawsuit against Westchester County, New York and its handgun permit licensing officers, seeking a permanent injunction against enforcement of a state law that allows carry licenses to be denied because applicants cannot show “good cause.”
SAF is joined in the lawsuit by Alan Kachalsky and Christina Nikolov, both Westchester County residents whose permit applications were denied. Kachalsky’s denial was because he could not “demonstrate a need for self protection distinguishable from that of the general public.” Nikolov’s was denied because she could not demonstrate that there was “any type of threat to her own safety anywhere.”...
Under New York Penal Code § 400.00, handgun carry permit applicants must “demonstrate good cause for the issuance of a permit,” the lawsuit alleges. This requirement violates the Second Amendment, according to the plaintiffs.
“American citizens like Alan Kachalsky and Christina Nikolov should not have to demonstrate good cause in order to exercise a constitutionally-protected civil right,” noted SAF Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb. “Our civil rights, including the right to keep and bear arms, should not be subject to the whims of a local government or its employees, just because they don’t think someone ‘needs’ a carry permit...."
The Kachalsky complaint.
And from a far more unexpected place, the American Civil Liberties Union in Florida is suing the Broward County sheriff's office pro bono to help a man get his guns back. Details from the Sun-Sentinel (Full disclosure: I was a paperboy for the Sun-Sentinel when I was 12 years old.):
That the ACLU, a long-time target of conservatives' scorn, is supporting gun ownership is "a breath of fresh air," said Marion P. Hammer, board member of the National Rifle Association....
Is this new alliance a sign of the apocalypse?
Not really, says Fort Lauderdale attorney Barry Butin, a cooperating attorney for the ACLU of Florida's Broward Chapter who is representing the gun owner, Pompano Beach retiree Robert Weinstein.
Two recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions have affirmed the right to maintain guns in the home.
"Under the Second Amendment, he has a right to have his guns in his house. He's not a convicted felon," Butin said. "It is unusual for the ACLU. But the ACLU supports all constitutional rights. We don't pick and choose."....
Weinstein, a retired bar and restaurant owner from Hartford, Conn., had his weapons seized in February after Dana, his wife of 61 years, died. He told the Broward Medical Examiner's Office that he wanted to "blow his head off," according to a sheriff deputy's report.
He said he was upset because three weeks after Mrs. Weinstein died, her ashes still hadn't shown up at the funeral home that was to bury them.
Weinstein's call to the medical examiner prompted a visit from a sheriff's deputy, who took the widower to a hospital for evaluation.
Weinstein said he agreed to surrender his Colt semi-automatic .25-caliber pistol and his Wesson .357 revolver, along with ammunition and holsters, for safekeeping after authorities insisted on it.
A hearing on his petition is scheduled before Circuit Judge Dale Ross on Monday.
Robert Weinstein insists authorities took his comment about killing himself out of context. And although Florida's Baker Act allows people with mental illnesses to be involuntarily admitted to a hospital, that did not happen to him.
Butin said he has a doctor's letter certifying that Weinstein is not a threat to himself. His client also has a clean Florida criminal record.
Weinstein, who said he learned to shoot in the military, said his guns were only kept for protection.
Of course, the ACLU does pick and choose where its attention and resources go and doesn't defend all constitutional rights with the same attention and vigor. Which makes it all the more interesting, and better, that now another ACLU affiliate now has its eyes on the Second Amendment. (The Texas ACLU also acted in defense of Second Amendment rights back in 2007, as Jacob Sullum blogged.) My Reason Online piece about the McDonald decision and its meaning.
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Coyotes in the State of Nature
From the July 19, 2010, issue of NR.
Here’s a two-Americas story for you: Westchester County, in the suburbs of New York City, was home to Hillary Clinton when she pretended to represent New York in the U.S. Senate, and its voters gave Barack Obama 63 percent of their ballots in 2008. It’s the sort of place that causes heavy breathing among the liberal faithful de voutly awaiting the coming of the New Democratic Majority, that blessed condition that will enrapture America when formerly Republican white suburbanites once and for all join forces with the traditional Democratic coalition of ward heelers and welfare recipients in common cause against the pro-lifers, gun nuts, and tea-partying Palin enthusiasts of the GOP. So sayeth the Gospel according to Paul Begala.
But Westchester County has a prob lem more often seen in rural, Republican-leaning jurisdictions: coyotes. These ca nine predators are a real menace, a fact that was dramatically illustrated in late June by the case of young Emily Hod u lik, age six, who was attacked by a pair of coyotes on a leafy suburban street in the quaint town of Rye. The coyotes’ offensive proceeded along classically predatory lines as the canines ignored the other children in the group and targeted the smallest, weakest child. Miss Hodulik suffered serious bite wounds but escaped without life-threatening injuries. She’s undergoing a series of rabies shots, doesn’t like to sleep alone, and is afraid that there are coyotes in the basement of the family home. Local officials have warned Westchester residents to keep an eye out for the beasts, especially if they have small children.
Coyotes like to attack the little ones, human or otherwise. That was the case for one unfortunate coyote that attacked a puppy out for a jog with his master in Travis County, Texas, in the suburbs of Austin, where coyotes have it a little rougher than they do in suburban New York. That particular coyote had the bad luck to set his gaze on a puppy owned by Gov. Rick Perry, who produced a laser-sighted .380-caliber automatic pistol, loaded with hollowpoints, and sent it to the Happy Hunting Grounds.
Governor Perry made light of the epi sode — he later signed a peace treaty with the San Antonio Spurs’ coyote mascot — but the gunplay riled more than a few liberals. A Huffington Post story about it received more than 3,000 reader comments, many of them mocking in tone, most aghast that the governor was packing his own laser-sighted heat. Some of them bemoaned the suburban sprawl that is encroaching on the coyotes’ natural habitat, all but demanding a collective examination of conscience: Why do the coyotes hate us? Never mind that coyotes have turned up in Central Park, or that one recent deadly coyote attack — ending the life of a young Canadian folk singer — happened on a hiking trail in a national park. Evolution bred coyotes to be predators. They are what they are, and sometimes they have to be shot.
People have a visceral reaction to guns, which is why the reactions to the Supreme Court’s recent decision in McDonald v. City of Chicago have been so emotional. One extraordinarily telling reaction came from David Ignatius of the Washington Post, whose response was headlined: “The Supreme Court Gun Decision Moves Us Toward Anarchy.” Mr. Ignatius wrote: “My biggest worry with Monday’s Supreme Court decision is that by ruling, in effect, that every American can apply for a gun license, the justices will make gun ownership much more pervasive in a society that already has too many guns. After all, if I know that my neighbor is armed and preparing for Armageddon situations where law and order break down (as so many are — just read the right-wing blogs) then I have to think about protecting my family, too. That’s the state-of-nature, everyone for himself logic that prevails in places such as Lebanon, Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Mr. Ignatius here is remarkably forthcoming: He is not worried about guns in the hands of criminals, but about guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens, people who are willing to apply for a permit and jump through the bureaucratic hoops re quired of gun buyers. His nightmare is not an America in which criminals run amok with Glocks, or even an America in which gun permits are handed out liberally, but an America in which “every American can apply for a gun license.” Never mind the approval of licenses, the mere application gives Mr. Ignatius the howling fantods. It is wonderfully apt that he references the “state of nature” in his criticism, imagining a Hobbesian version of life in these United States: solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short, permeated by the aroma of cordite. Mr. Ignatius, like Thomas Hobbes, is casting his lot with Leviathan and makes no apology for it.
That is the essence of 21st-century progressivism: In matters ranging from financial derivatives to education to gun control, the Left believes that we face a choice between a masterful state and a Hobbesian war of all against all. For all of the smart set’s vaunted and self-congratulatory nu ance, it is this absolutist vision, this Manichean horror, that forms the foun dation of progressivism.
This, and not the threat of uncontrollable crime, is really at the heart of the subur ban progressives’ abomination of firearms. Coyotes may be an occasional menace, but the predators most commonly stalking Central Park, Westchester County, or the Austin suburbs go on two legs, not four. Just before the Supreme Court handed down its ruling in McDonald v. City of Chicago, there were in one weekend 50-odd shootings in the Windy City, at least ten of them fatal. Some of the shootings were instances of the random and chaotic violence that plagues urban America. Some were more sinister: Two young black men were found stripped naked and shot, face down in the dirt near the railroad tracks on the South Side. As of June, the murder rate in New York City — which likes to advertise itself as the safest big city in America — was up 7.2 percent over last year.
But the idea that individuals might use firearms lawfully to defend themselves is either anathema to progressives or inconceivable to them. President Obama’s reaction to the Heller decision, the predecessor to McDonald v. Chicago, suffered the in evitable lacunae: “I have always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms, but I also identify with the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through commonsense, effective safety measures,” he said, unable to consider the possibility that citizens’ arming themselves against criminals is one potentially effective safety measure. “As president, I will uphold the constitutional rights of law-abiding gun-owners, hunters, and sportsmen. I know that what works in Chicago may not work in Cheyenne.” Coming from a city of gangland executions, Barack Obama affirms his commitment to Elmer Fudd’s blunderbuss, and reasonable people might wonder: What exactly does work in Chicago, Mr. President? That is an unaskable question in the world of Barack Obama, because it is a question that penetrates to the center of his philosophy and exposes it as inadequate.
Violence is traditionally something upon which the state maintains a monopoly, and the application of lethal force is the state’s most jealously guarded prerogative. It is treated as a kind of holy office, which is one of the reasons that American executions are such strangely ritualized ceremonies. Under more frankly statist re gimes, executions are much more plebeian affairs: China, for instance, has a mobile “death van,” a kind of lethal-injection chamber on wheels, which it uses to dispatch with maximum efficiency those sentenced under one of its 68 varieties of capital offense. The execution vans are manufactured by Jinguan Auto, which also builds fortified limousines for China’s burgeoning class of oligarchs, and there’s a certain symmetry to that.
To use lethal force in self-defense is the ultimate declaration of independence, a kind of momentary secession from the authority of the government whose laws and prisons and police officers have, in that moment, failed the citizen. To acknowledge the right to self-defense — and the concomitant right to be forearmed against aggressors — is to acknowledge that some things are outside the state and its authority, or at least that some moments are outside the state and its authority.
The horror that progressives feel for gun owners is in many ways like the horror they feel for homeschoolers, whom they recognize, correctly, as one of the few truly radical movements in America. Prof. Robin West of Georgetown University’s law school offers a typical reaction to the phenomenon: “The husbands and wives in these families feel themselves to be under a religious compulsion to have large families, a homebound and submissive wife and mother who is responsible for the schooling of the children, and only one breadwinner. These families are not living in romantic, rural, self-sufficient farmhouses; they are in trailer parks, 1,000-square-foot homes, houses owned by relatives, and some, on tarps in fields or parking lots. Their lack of job skills, passed from one generation to the next, depresses the community’s overall economic health and their state’s tax base.” God defend the holy tax base!
Homeschooling families in fact have higher average incomes than non-homeschool families, a fact that Professor West acknowledges and then magics away through the device of the “radically fundamentalist movement family,” the one she locates on tarps in parking lots. Like Mr. Ignatius, Professor West is forthright about the statist origins of her horror: “Parents in many states have full authority, free of all state oversight, to determine the content of their children’s education,” a situation almost as unendurable as life in a 1,000-square-foot house. Professor West writes longingly of the golden age when practically all education was conducted under the tutelage of the state and opting out of the system was forbidden — and “parents who did so were criminals.”
You will not be surprised to read her lamenting a “constitutional culture” dominated by “militias, gun collectors, and ideologues constructing, with little help from courts and no resistance from liberals, an individual Right to Bear Arms.” She connects this Second Amendment horror to other challenges to unlimited state supremacy — the anti-tax movement and citizen border patrols — and, like David Ignatius, she cites Hobbes, framing the debate as Leviathan vs. anarchy, leaving no room for well-ordered liberty under constitutionally limited government: If those rubes out on the tarps can fill the young skulls of their plenteous broods with any old rubbish, without the least privity or countenance of authority, then they’re bound to get funny ideas about guns and taxes and illegal immigrants. And they are bound to chafe at having their lives run by Georgetown law professors.
Just as state schooling is not about education, but about the state, gun control is not about guns: It’s about control. A citizen who can fend for himself when the predators come or the schools fail is less inclined to look to the state for sustenance and oversight in other areas of life. To progressives, that’s an invitation to anarchy. To the men who wrote the Second Amendment, it was a condition of citizenship in a free republic. It’s what free men did, and do.
— Kevin D. Williamson is deputy managing editor of National Review, in whose July 19, 2010, issue this article first appeared.
http://article.nationalreview.com/438232/coyotes-in-the-state-of-nature/kevin-williamson
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One Month after McDonald
The state of the Second Amendment.
One month ago, the Supreme Court held in McDonald v. City of Chicago that states, not just the federal government, are prevented from violating Americans’ Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The Supreme Court did not, however, define the full scope of the right, nor the standard of review by which challenged statutes will be judged.
In other words: It ain’t over yet. A number of pending lawsuits across the country will further shape how the Second Amendment will be applied.
The first lawsuit of note comes from Chicago. As soon as the Supreme Court struck down the city’s handgun ban in McDonald, Mayor Richard Daley worked with the city council to pass a very restrictive gun-control regime to take the ban’s place. The National Rifle Association promptly filed suit, challenging, among other things: a ban on having more than one “assembled and operable” firearm in the home at any time; a rule forbidding gun owners to carry their firearms in their own garages, porches, and places of business; and a policy outlawing gun shops and shooting ranges in the city in spite of the training and range time the city requires for obtaining a permit.
California, which has long been the darling of gun-control groups for its heavy firearm restrictions, is also facing a day in court. Gun-show promoters have been litigating their right to have a show on Alameda County grounds, an action barred by a county ordinance. A three-judge panel decided last April that the Second Amendment applied to California, anticipating the conclusion in McDonald, but found that the ban on gun shows on county property was still constitutional.
The Ninth Circuit voted to re-hear the case en banc (that is, all nine justices would review the decision of the three-judge panel), but in light of McDonald, that order has been rescinded and the case remanded to the original panel for reconsideration. Rescinding an en banc re-hearing is an unusual turn of events, but nothing follows the norm in this suit. The panel has asked for further briefing from the parties, indicating that it may reverse itself on the constitutionality of the gun-show ban.
Also, the Supreme Court has vacated a decision of the Second Circuit upholding New York’s ban on nunchuks and remanded the case for reconsideration in light of its holding in McDonald. Though the McDonald case focused on firearms, the text of the Second Amendment encompasses “arms” in general, and the Second Circuit will provide some guidance on the constitutional protection of martial-arts weapons.
Just up the Hudson River, Alan Gura, the attorney who carried the day in the Heller and McDonald decisions, filed suit to challenge the discretionary permitting system for handgun carry in Westchester County, N.Y. At issue is whether permit applicants can constitutionally be required to show a “unique, heightened need for self-defense apart from the general public” in order to carry a gun. The Second Amendment allows for no such restriction on the right to bear arms, and by the time a need for self-defense arises — think, for example, of a woman who’s being stalked — a potential victim needs to be able to carry a gun right now, not after pulling together paperwork and waiting for government approval.
The New York right-to-carry case joins a similar suit that Gura filed against the District of Columbia in the wake of the Heller decision. California guns activists have an existing lawsuit challenging the concealed-carry policies of Yolo and Sacramento counties that will now be reconsidered in light of the McDonald decision. At least one Wisconsin prosecutor has declared that he will no longer enforce the state’s ban on concealed carry because of the recent Supreme Court action.
Yet another Alan Gura lawsuit is a challenge to North Carolina’s emergency-powers statutes. In essence, whenever a state of emergency is declared at any level of government in the Tarheel State, firearms sales or transfers are outlawed, as is carrying a firearm off one’s own premises (even for those with concealed-handgun permits). That doesn’t sound unreasonable at first blush, but officials have declared at least a dozen emergencies since September 2004, usually encompassing the entire state. This is an on/off switch for an enumerated right. Why have rights at all if the government can turn them off at will?
The future of the scope of the Second Amendment is unclear, but McDonald has guaranteed that, at last, a liberty the Founders considered worthy of a constitutional amendment will be taken seriously in courts across the land.
— David Rittgers is an attorney and legal-policy analyst at the Cato Institute.
http://article.nationalreview.com/438841/one-month-after-imcdonaldi/david-rittgers
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Do we really need an ATF?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2sWiZ8BizI[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTThAHtQWOA[/youtube]
This last isn't funny and speaks more towards gun safety..Always make sure the gun is NOT LOADED!!!
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uADb3NyYlSA[/youtube]
Boyo
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http://www.amazon.com/Under-Alone-Undercover-Infiltrated-Motorcycle/dp/1400060842/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1280511697&sr=8-1
I won't defend every act from the BATFE, but keep in mind they do a lot of heavy lifting targeting some of the most violent, dangerous criminal organizations we have in the US, often at great risk in doing so. They also provide a huge amount of funding and expertise to state and local law enforcement working arson/explosives cases.
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GM
I see the BATF as an unneeded national police force. To begin with alcohol ,Tobacco and Firearms are all legal and are regulated locally by sates and communities( Montana no not enforcing federal gun laws or Mi and Ca smoking bans). Also why should the BATF be a middle man funneling off tax dollars just to return it to local and state law enforcement? Most major cities and states have bomb squads and swat teams and investigating arson is better suited to the fire dept ,they specialize in that stuff then turn it over to local authorities.
Now I am not taking away from the risk of the individuals perform doing thier jobs .I am just saying that the BATF is redundant federal agency whose job could be handled better locally via the states or local agencies saving the tax payer money and getting rid of a layer of regulations.
Boyo
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The BATFE enforces federal laws passed by congress concerning alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives. States may or may not choose to have their own laws, but I'd argue and I think most of the public would agree that the federal gov't has a role in enforcing those laws passed at the federal level.
Not long ago, I was in an arson investigation class where one of the instructors was a homicide detective from a big, well funded department. He worked on a double homicide that stemmed from an arson at a mega sized apartment complex (Three story, 135 units). The arson destroyed the complex, injured many people and as it turned out, killed two people that had no connection to the gangster thugs that were trying to burn other people to death (an ex girlfriend and her child).
The case was overwhelming to both fire/rescue and law enforcement. Resources were called in from surrounding agencies, state investigators and the BATFE. The BATFE flew in arson specialists from around the country to assist in processing the sprawling crime scene. When preparing for trial, the BATFE built an exact model of the first section of apartment buildings to the exact specifications of the original buildings, filled with the same electrical system, carpeting and burned it in a recreation of the arson. The film of the reconstruction and the nationally recognized arson experts testified for the prosecution in the case, resulting in the conviction of the two thugs.
Arson investigation is very complex, expensive and can happen anywhere, including jurisdictions with small, underfunded local/state level agencies. Being able to pick up a phone to call in BATFE help in those scenarios is vital to solving/prosecuting those major cases.
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That is all well and good, but I still see the ATF as a redundant ,unneeded agency whose job could be handled locally and by the states just as well. These agencies might also have an increase in funding if they didn't have the ATF acting as a middle man.Plus what do you do with the FBI ,DEA, US Marshalls , Home Land security and the Sercret Service?These are all federal law enforcement agencies that could also be contacted not to mention other states or localities.I'm just saying that the ATF or maybe one of the others need to go away like the Dept of energy and the Dept of education.As far as regulations go , there is the second amendment that is all the federal regulations you need ,as far as firearms go, and for the rest let the states deal with it ,like they are already doing with sate liquor boards and tobacco laws. That is why I say the ATF is not needed but don't get me started on Home land security. :wink:
Boyo
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The BATFE acts as a risk pool for local/state law enforcement. I'll remind you that the US Marshals were a creation of the founding fathers:
http://www.justice.gov/marshals/usmshist.html
George Washington Appoints First Marshals - 1789
The offices of U.S. Marshal and Deputy Marshals were created more than 200 years ago by the first Congress in the Judiciary Act of 1789, the same legislation that established the federal judicial system. The Marshals were given extensive authority to support the federal courts within their judicial districts and to carry out all lawful orders issued by judges, Congress, or the President.
The Marshals and their Deputies served the subpoenas, summonses, writs, warrants, and other process issued by the courts, made all the arrests, and handled all the prisoners. They also disbursed the money.
The Marshals paid the fees and expenses of the court clerks, U.S. Attorneys, jurors, and witnesses. They rented the courtrooms and jail space and hired the bailiffs, criers, and janitors. They made sure the prisoners were present, the jurors were available, and the witnesses were on time.
But this was only a part of what the Marshals did. When George Washington set up his first administration and the first Congress began passing laws, both quickly discovered an inconvenient gap in the constitutional design of the government. It had no provision for a regional administrative structure stretching throughout the country. Both the Congress and the executive branch were housed at the national capitol. No agency was established or designated to represent the federal government's interests at the local level. The need for a regional organization quickly became apparent. Congress and the President solved part of the problem by creating specialized agencies, such as customs and revenue collectors, to levy the tariffs and taxes. Yet, there were numerous other jobs that needed to be done. The only officers available to do them were the Marshals and their Deputies.
Thus, the Marshals also provided local representation for the federal government within their districts. They took the national census every 10 years through 1870. They distributed Presidential proclamations, collected a variety of statistical information on commerce and manufacturing, supplied the names of government employees for the national register, and performed other routine tasks needed for the central government to function effectively. Over the past 200 years, Congress and the President also have called on the Marshals to carry out unusual or extraordinary missions, such as registering enemy aliens in time of war, capturing fugitive slaves, sealing the American border against armed expeditions from foreign countries, and swapping spies with the former Soviet Union.
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http://www.theonion.com/articles/shiite-terrorists-cross-county-line,1636/
A local level approach to homeland security more to your liking? :wink:
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GM
I love the onion they are a scream. I was in tears reading that.Also like the info on the US Marshals( learn something new everyday thanks)..See they(US Marshals) were already doing the job that home land secruity is doing and the ATF plus some other jobs.Think of it like the SEC ,and the financial collapse, they didin't enforce the regs that were already in place( actually encouraged bad loans do in part to the FM's) the govt in order to solve the problem creates more govt. Namely the finance reform bill more regulations and yet another govt agency involving enforcement of regulations.the govt that governs best governs least..believe that is Jeffereson.I believe the answer is always less govt be it regulations or agencies.
Boyo
Ps sorry about the scatter shot ideas above trying to get out and teach.JKD
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This is exactly the sort of subject in which POTH must be read with maximum care:
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One June morning last year, Jack Dailey drove from his home in North Carolina’s Piedmont country, through verdant, hilly farmland to a rifle range near the town of Ramseur. Eleven men and a woman had mustered there for a weeklong boot camp run by the Appleseed Project, a group Dailey started that is dedicated to teaching every American how to fire a bullet through a man-size target out to 500 yards. So far Appleseed has taught 25,000 people to shoot; 7,000 more will learn by the end of this year. Its instructors teach this skill not for the purpose of hunting or sport. They see marksmanship as fundamental to Americans’ ability to defend their liberty, whether against foreigners or the agents of a (hypothetical) tyrannical government. Appleseed frames this activity as being somewhere between a historical re-enactment and a viable last resort. I came to find out how serious they were.
Dailey, Appleseed’s founder and rhetorician in chief, is a tall man with silver hair. He wore black sneakers, a red polo shirt tucked into jeans and a red baseball cap. Sixty-six years old, he could have been a grandfather spending a leisurely morning on a public golf course if not for his unyielding expression and his voice, which is well equipped for the stirring up of men.
In the previous day’s lecture, Dailey discussed taxes — the situation of the American taxpayer, he said, compared unfavorably with the lives of slaves in ancient Egypt. Today he got down to the matter at hand: defense against overweening government. “Look at the choice those guys made,” he said, referring to the colonial-era militia. “I’ll post you 65 yards from the road. In a few hours there’s gonna be hundreds of redcoats marching down that road. Your liberty depends on you stopping ’em.”
Two lead musket balls were passed around the clubhouse, through the hands of a camouflaged Navy midshipman, two sheriff’s deputies, a farm-owning factory worker, a college professor, a pilot, a retiree and a high-school sophomore. Those who shot an “expert” score on Dailey’s qualification test would become “riflemen,” as designated by olive-green patches. For now, most of these novice shooters were referred to as “cooks.”
“When you fire that first shot, those redcoats are gonna be mad,” Dailey said. “They’re gonna come at you with those 16-inch bayonets. There’ll be three or four of ’em before you load your second shot.” He paused. Thoughts of bayonets seemed to linger in the silent room. “Not much percentage in that choice. We know now that they won. But for them? No guarantees.”
The Appleseed Project began with commentaries Dailey writes, under the byline of “Fred,” that run beside advertisements for his surplus-rifle-stock business in the magazine Shotgun News. In 2005, he organized his first Appleseed shoots in Wyoming and Texas. The combination of military-style rifle training, star-spangled rhetoric and low cost ($70 for two days; free for women, minors and military personnel) proved catching. Word of the program spread through gun culture and survivalist Web sites. The tax filings of the Revolutionary War Veterans Association, the nonprofit group that oversees Appleseed, show that the group now has $334,000 in cash. The Appleseed Web site lists as many as 100 shoots a month on the outskirts of towns like Eureka, Kan., Pine Bluffs, Wyo., and Coeur D’Alene, Idaho.
At the North Carolina shoot, the cooks came from Georgia, Florida, Illinois and Ohio, bearing .22-caliber Rugers and Marlins outfitted with custom sights — what Appleseed calls Liberty Training Rifles. Though they were diverse in age and class, their uniformly white skin, down-home talk and traditional values suggested a common attachment to an America that had lost its long-held claim to the cultural center. While Dailey has said Appleseed should be apolitical, the talk at this Appleseed boot camp and at several others I attended across the country over the course of a year contained pieces of a conversation that has unfolded behind the motley carnivals of the Tea Party movement: a serious deliberation on the right about the nature of the American founding and the limits of incivility. Sharron Angle, the Republican nominee for Senate in Nevada who is campaigning against Harry Reid, has spoken of the possibility of “Second Amendment remedies” for Congressional action. “The nation is arming,” she told The Reno Gazette-Journal in May. “What are they arming for if it isn’t that they are so distrustful of their government? They’re afraid they’ll have to fight for their liberty in more Second Amendment kinds of ways. That’s why I look at this as almost an imperative. If we don’t win at the ballot box, what will be the next step?” Rick Barber, a Republican candidate for Congress in Alabama, has broadcast an ad in which an actor dressed as George Washington declares, “Gather your armies.”
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Firing Line
Published: July 29, 2010
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Are statements like these rhetorical flourishes or calls to arms? Determining whether this revolutionary talk constitutes a threat comes down to finding the fine line between expressing anger and inciting the angry to action, a distinction that is clear as a matter of law but less so in cultural practice. In April, on the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, former President Bill Clinton sought to move this cultural line, comparing today’s antigovernment sentiment with that of the mid-’90s. Clinton argued that those who demonize the federal government could be courting another tragedy. There is, however, a rejoinder to this from the right. “The sense in the year 2010 that there’s something threatening about civilian marksmanship is a function of 1990s political correctness and guilt by association,” Nick Dranias, director of the Center for Constitutional Government at the Goldwater Institute, said. “These groups are trying to take guns out of the shadows and display them proudly, in public, not as a bunch of weirdos crawling around the forest at night.”
nside the Appleseed Project, the question of where an armed citizenry should draw this line remains open. Later that week, as he sipped a Coke at a nearby McDonald’s, Dailey flirted with an answer. “If you ever have to reach for your guns, you’ve lost before you started,” he said, and then doubled back. “Now, there are probably some narrow, hypothetical exceptions to that. Like if somebody in the government said, ‘We’re taking over the country.’ You might find there’d be a spontaneous. . . . I don’t know. I don’t know what it would be. And to be perfectly honest with you, I wouldn’t want to see it.”
The first night’s campfire sounded less like sedition and more like men telling stories of times they looked death in the eye. Ron Vandiver, the boot camp’s head instructor, made death’s acquaintance while trying to repair a swaying radio tower on a stormy afternoon. Vandiver is the kind of man that Dailey likes to characterize as a “regular American,” words intended as the highest praise. A stout 42-year-old with a gadget-laden belt, he looked like a dad I might see at Home Depot. His eyes watered up when he spoke of an ancestor who fought in the Continental Army. He asked how far back each of us could feel our national history as opposed to just reading about it. “The war between the states,” one man said. “World War II,” another said. “That’s a shame,” Vandiver said. “We’re here to extend your historical horizon of empathy.”
The main zones for projecting the past onto the present were the “redcoats,” paper targets stapled to wooden poles at 25 meters. Four red silhouettes represented kills at 100, 200, 300 and 400 yards. On the third day the cooks moved to the 500-yard range, where they fired AR-15’s, M1As, and M1 Garands. In the middle of the firing line lay David and Darrell Garvey, two brothers with sun-reddened skin and graying beards. Before the housing crash, the Garveys grossed as much as $1 million a year installing floors in vacation homes. Now they were unemployed. They loaded their magazines and pulled the charging handles. “Ready on the right!” Vandiver bellowed. “Ready on the left! All ready on the firing line. . . . Fire!”
Darrell Garvey pressed his eye to the scope, trying to keep a red dot fixed on the blurry figure in the distance. He stilled his breathing and slowly squeezed the trigger. “Cease fire!” Vandiver shouted. “Unload and clear!” Darrell disarmed his rifle. He walked up the slope to his target and huffed in exasperation. A few shots hadn’t even hit the paper.
Darrell turned to Vandiver. “If, God forbid, the worst happens and this all becomes reality, would you recommend shooting out at 500 or waiting ’til they came closer in?”
“I’m too old and fat to run fast,” Vandiver answered. “So I like to give myself as big a head start as possible. On a two-way shooting range, I’m inclined to hit them out at 500.”
“Fred’s Plan to Save America,” an early photocopied manifesto, sets forth a doctrine of deterrence. Shooting is “training for the Day,” Dailey wrote. “The Day that will never come, if enough of us are ready for it.” Appleseed occasionally attracts those who believe this Day is already here. Dailey calls such fringe beliefs “the dark side.” One man at an Appleseed boot camp in Nevada announced his plan to assassinate county officials and ignite a guerrilla war. “It kinda floored me when he blurted that out,” Dailey recalls. “We fight this militia stuff all the time. If there’s the slightest truth to what he said, he was a dead man. Which means there’s probably no truth at all.” In Ramseur, Dailey’s rousing talk was followed by an introduction to the “soft war” fought with “ballots, not bullets.” Dailey did not say how the ballots should be cast, but I did meet many senior Appleseed instructors with affinities for The Limbaugh Letter and Tea Party rallies (all of whom nonetheless obeyed the prohibition on partisan discussions during the program itself).
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Last fall, a report by the Anti-Defamation League called Appleseed part of a trend in which romanticized notions of armed resistance have “percolated beyond extremist groups and movements into the mainstream.” It stopped short of saying Appleseed was itself an extremist group, though Mark Pitcavage, the A.D.L.’s director of investigative research, characterized Appleseed as a potential gateway to militias. “I’m concerned not in the sense that I think the Appleseed Project is dangerous,” he told me. “But it does have a goal of indoctrination.”
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But the sociologist James William Gibson, whose book “Warrior Dreams” analyzed civilian paramilitary culture since the mid-’70s, says Appleseed and the broader movement around it are unlikely to pose a danger to civil society. “When a culture is in crisis, the first response is often to go back to the creation myth and start over again,” he told me. “The narrative is ‘we’re going to redo the narrative of the United States by returning to origins, to marksmanship.’ People are focusing on the idea that America’s problems can be resolved into something that can be shot. It doesn’t exactly encourage systematic reflection, but it’s a long ways from a civil war.”
The National Rifle Association declined to address the question of where Appleseed fits into the gun culture. “We are familiar with who they are and what they do,” a spokesman, Andrew Arulanandam, told me. “But given that we don’t have firsthand experience, we are reticent to say anything beyond that.” Maynard Reid Jr., the sheriff of Randolph County in North Carolina, which includes the Ramseur range, told me he hadn’t heard of the Appleseed Project, though he sometimes rents the range from Dailey for sniper training. “Jack Dailey is a straightforward guy,” he told me. “He don’t try to sugarcoat things. He’s a good man, as far as I know.”
Appleseed’s claim to mainstream legitimacy is bolstered by the group’s ties to active-duty members of the military. In March, an instructor who works as a researcher at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico arranged for Appleseed to conduct five days of training with a brigade from the Second Engineer Battalion. Appleseed also gave free on-base training to a unit from the South Carolina National Guard. I shot at Appleseed boot camps alongside Marines looking to hone their skills before deployment. They came to Appleseed out of uniform, on their own accord. The final two days of the Ramseur boot camp were led by 26-year-old John Hawes, who won a Silver Star in Afghanistan and recently taught marksmanship to soldiers at Fort Jackson. “The Army’s gotten away from the basics,” he told me.
On one of the final afternoons of boot camp, Gordon Wade, a math professor at Bowling Green State University, was cooking outside his tent. Dailey lumbered up and told Wade he had the makings of a good instructor. Wade said he wasn’t sure how many of his academic peers he could bring into the Appleseed fold. “They might think it’s some kind of militia,” he said.
The men stood in silence. Wade stirred his dinner. “A man should have a rifle,” he said. “Not just a .22. A man should have an AR-15 the same way he should have one good suit. Now, I can’t really think of a scenario where I’m going to use my AR-15 as an AR-15. I can’t quite articulate it. It sounds like I want to go out fighting zombies” — slang for the unprepared — “or feds. I don’t want to. But if it ever comes to that, God forbid, I want to be able to. But no, no. . . .” He shook his head. “That isn’t it either. It’s just something that I think I should have. Fred, why should I have an AR-15?”
Dailey stood with his arms crossed. He said: “Because they want to tell us what to do. And we don’t want them to tell us what to do.”
Dailey keeps his rifle stocks in an old Coca-Cola warehouse filled to the rafters with the remainders of war — empty bandoleers, rifle slings, rifle butt plates, rifle brushes, rifle grease. Thousands of wooden stocks stripped of their actions lay in jumbled piles. Dailey fired his first gun at age 6, a .22 aimed at a tree stump. He pulled the trigger; his father held the stock. His first rifle was a Japanese Model 99, a present from his mother for his 19th birthday. The physical fact of the gun led him to consider what action it might have seen. “The joy of owning these things is tough to explain,” he says. “Either you feel it or you don’t.” In the Army R.O.T.C. at North Carolina State University, he learned to fire and strip an M1 Garand. Academic deferments kept him out of Vietnam. In 1969, he took a bus to Washington to march against the war. “I thought this was a serious thing,” he says. “Everyone else was there to party.” He gave up his activist stirrings for law school, married, graduated and began rehabbing apartment buildings in Chicago. He did well enough to retire at 42, but the experience eroded his idealism. “A landlord is like a cop or a bartender,” he says. “You get to see people as they really are.” His politics moved toward “the iron rule of life: everyone wants to be first in line to eat and last in line to die.” The economic malaise of the late 1970s seemed to confirm this pessimism. He sought comfort in survivalist magazines and stockpiled rifles and canned food. In the mid-1980s, he sold off his properties and moved with his wife back to North Carolina.
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Dailey’s frustration with the government peaked during the 1990s after the fatal conflicts at Ruby Ridge and Waco. “Uncle Sam told 76 Americans to come out of their own house, lay down their arms and spread-eagle on the ground,” he says of Waco. “Does that sound to you like the sovereignty of the individual?” At that time, growing restive, he bought more than half a million pounds of rifle stocks at an army-surplus auction. He named his new venture “Fred’s,” after his dog, and wrote indictments of the Clintons and the “New World Order” that reached 94,000 readers. As the radical right gathered steam in the ’90s, Dailey’s anger fixated on the United Nations, which he saw as a metagovernment bent on covertly undermining American sovereignty. He organized a “U.N. Day” shoot at a local gun club, painting targets United Nations blue and firing holes through a steel U.N. helmet. In 2002, Dailey wrote “Battlin’ the U.N.,” a near-future story of six riflemen who ambush a U.N. convoy rolling through Iowa. Using the accompanying targets, Dailey’s readers could practice shooting Boris, the villainous U.N. commander.
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Dailey calls all this “my young and stupid years.” The Appleseed Project appeals to a broad constituency, one whose edges blur into the N.R.A. at one end and into violent militias like the Hutaree, nine of whose members were indicted in March for conspiracy to murder, at the other end. Notices of Appleseed shoots appear regularly on militia Web sites. Dailey argues that outreach like this attracts radical anger and then moderates it. Many Appleseeders have stories like that of Rod Jackson, a former bouncer whom I met at a shoot in Fresno, Calif. After leaving the Navy, Jackson spent years as a homeless alcoholic but now works by day as a telecommunications technician and by night at a gun range. He has long been preparing for an event he read about online — Teotwawki, which stands for “the end of the world as we know it.” He stored up enough food to feed his family for 30 days and planned to relocate to a remote valley. “I was going to hide myself in a hole,” he said. “Then Fred made this comment that people who build caves are cowards. That stung.”
As his involvement with Appleseed deepened, Jackson found his focus shifting to what he could accomplish within the present system. “A lot of folks in the gun community talk about stepping up and fighting,” he said. “That’s skipping over the easy stuff for the hard stuff. The point is that we don’t need to fight now. We have another option.” That option, he said, was contacting elected representatives.
In a cramped room adjoining the warehouse, Dailey monitors the message board and plows through queries from instructors. In a recent post he acknowledged that though he once “flirted with the dark side,” there was no place for the rhetoric of deterrence within Appleseed. Statements like “we’ll soon be in a future when the shooting starts,” he wrote, are not compatible with Appleseed’s mission.
During my travels through Appleseed country, I spoke with nearly 100 cooks and riflemen and corresponded with dozens more. None seemed as close to the dark side as James Faire of Monroe, Wash., a man obsessed with reducing the space between readiness and action to the thinnest possible line. After years of practice Faire has whittled that space down to the fraction of a second that it takes him to open the snap holster on his belt, draw and level the Kimber 1911 he carries whenever outside the house, apply pressure to the hair trigger and fire a hollow-point .460-caliber round into his target, all while backpedaling at a 45-degree angle. “This is called moving off the X,” he told me. “By the time you draw on them and say, ‘Drop the weapon,’ you’re already dead.”
Faire has practiced this maneuver thousands of times. He says he came close to using it last year while trying to clear a downed tree from the road leading to his five-acre homestead in Monroe. A sheriff’s deputy drove up, lights flashing, with his own ideas about how best to clear the tree. Words were exchanged. The hands of both men drifted down toward their holsters. The way Faire tells it, the peace of Snohomish County momentarily teetered. Then the deputy got back in his car and drove away.
Deputies, Faire says, are criminals operating “under the color of law.” He refuses to vote, and the signature on his driver’s license appears with the disclaimer “all rights reserved.” Some of Faire’s views resemble those of the sovereign-citizen movement, extremists who deny the legitimacy of federal law. Faire heard about Appleseed through a Web site he administers called A Well Regulated Militia. Last year he began hosting monthly Appleseed shoots on his land, which appeared on Appleseed’s print and online schedules. In 2008, a government informant reportedly observed Andrew Steven Gray shooting an AR-15-style rifle and a pistol on Faire’s range. Gray, a 33-year-old convicted felon, is legally barred from owning any firearms. In Gray’s storage locker, according to a government complaint, federal agents found a cache of 21 guns, four silencers, two bulletproof vests and 9,000 rounds of ammunition. At his home nearby, says the complaint, were several hundred marijuana plants. Last month Gray was sentenced to four years in prison on gun and drug charges.
The complaint against Gray states that Faire’s range is known as the Militia Training Center, which “routinely holds training for individuals involved with the militia movement.” When I brought all this up to Dailey, he said Faire was “wrapping himself in the flag of Appleseed” to manage his troubles with the county, which closed his range for code violations. I asked Faire whether Dailey had given him any flack. “Privately, they’ve been very supportive,” he said. Though Faire says he obeyed Appleseed’s prohibition against talking politics during his shoots, he can still be seen explaining Appleseed’s basics on YouTube and accusing President Obama of “telling people to shut up and not talk.”
Shortly after the arrests in March of nine people thought to be members of the Hutaree militia, I e-mailed Faire and asked whether he had any contact with the group. He replied that he trained with one of the accused Hutaree in 2005, “although he showed mental instability and further association was discouraged.” Faire says the charges were “made up of whole cloth. They had the motive and means and opportunity to resist their arrest but did not. If they were guilty, they would have resisted.”
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On an overcast winter day in Monroe, Faire and I sat beside a wood stove in a classroom a few steps away from his house. Targets of kaffiyeh-clad figures armed with rocket-propelled grenades leaned against the wall. I sipped coffee as Faire split wood and unfurled his politics. “The government has quite literally become tyrannical,” he said. “It is fulfilling the principles outlined in ‘The Communist Manifesto.’ ” His seemed to have a deep urge to see himself as a revolutionary, and it was hard to imagine him at a loss for a framework that would let him do so.
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“It’s completely out of control,” he continued, “from city to state to federal to international law. All predicate their existence on plundering the individual and his rights. The only thing to do now is to organize citizens into a militia to abolish this government. They’re the supreme law of the land, the only ones who have the moral and legal authority to do it.” His voice was calm. It was as if he knew these things were true to both of us.
Faire, who is 50, has a neat mustache and moves with a martial steadiness. He often grips his belt with his right hand during conversation. It holds the holster of his 1911, the muzzle of which peeks out from beneath the waist of his black tactical jacket. The police, he said, often mistake him for an off-duty officer. He gave me a tour of his land, pointing out a ruined minivan used for sniper practice. Somewhere in the surrounding hills he once buried waterproof tubes containing clothes, provisions and six M1 Garands; he later dug them up and sold them to pay for his legal battle with the county over the code violations.
After lunch in the nearby city of Gold Bar, we returned to Monroe for a meeting at a diner with two friends that Faire met while working on the Ron Paul presidential campaign. One talked of establishing a camp where like-minded dissidents might be trained in the use of arms. The man asked for Faire’s help. Faire seemed reluctant to commit. The man said, “I told my wife 30 years ago, ‘I’m tired of being an insignificant man living in a broken culture.’ ” And yet here he was three decades later, still looking for his first recruit. Did he really want to be dangerous?
When American men talk like this, they are usually giving voice to fantasy. Only in fantasy, after all, are governments overthrown by men trained to do nothing more than shoot long-distance targets in a controlled environment. Some of these men seek out unlikely battlefields, where they can be warriors of the future, warriors of the imagination or reluctant warriors in waiting who are passing their time on the Internet. The power of a gun to take a life is not so much a threat as a talisman connecting these fantasies to the real world.
“When I hold a rifle in my hands, I can feel the choice that I’m making,” one Appleseeder, a computer programmer from Southern California, told me. “I know what I can do with this gun, but I also know I’m not going to do that. I have become death. When you have that power and that choice, you know what choice you’re going to make. When someone can be death over a quarter mile, that’s a tremendous responsibility.”
The exceptions to the rule of the responsible gun owner generate headlines and casualties. The largest threat that Appleseed poses is the possibility that some future gunmen will find their way from some dark-side message board to an Appleseed boot camp. “There’s always going to be someone who thinks the revolution is sooner rather than later,” Heidi Beirich of the Southern Poverty Law Center says. “Now they’re learning to be snipers. You would hope Appleseed would do some screening.”
When I asked Dailey about this, he said, “If we recruited 500 people from one of these crazy boards and 499 of them wound up agreeing with us, then what would you say?”
“I would want to know about the one who didn’t agree,” I said. “You’ve taught him how to kill with a rifle out to 500 yards.”
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“Well, the only precaution for that is not to teach the skills at all. Why even let them have the hardware, in that case?” He proposed an analogy. “What if the inmates in the asylum were stabbing each other with knives? Do you give them plastic spoons? Or do you cure the insanity?”
“But part of what you’re doing is sharpening the knives.”
“If we can cure the insanity, I think it’s a fair trade.”
On my last day in North Carolina, Dailey and I visited a Revolutionary War battlefield an hour’s drive from the warehouse. We walked through the wooded site as joggers and couples passed us on the trail. We came to a stop at two cannon replicas beside what had once been colonial lines. Dailey paraphrased what he called “the gay quote,” John Adams’s sentiment that he would study war, so his sons could study business and agriculture, so their sons could study the arts. “What a bad plan!” Dailey said. “The bad people of the world are still going to be there in three generations. So your grandson better know something about war. You can’t just have the third generation sitting around, ballet dancing, playing pianos and talking dilettante talk.”
I asked whether Appleseed was really about the decline of the American man. Dailey vehemently disagreed. To prove me wrong he stopped two young women, introduced himself and began to pitch the program. Wearing sandals and modish sunglasses, they appeared to be the sort of prospective Appleseeders who could buttress the program against the dark side.
“Pop quiz,” Dailey said. “When was the American Revolution won?”
“Yorktown is considered the final victory,” one of the women, Melissa Hogg, said. She majored in history at the University of Virginia, she said, specializing in the Revolutionary War.
“Would you believe what a founder said?” Dailey asked. “It was won before the first shot was fired, in the hearts and minds of the American people.”
“Of course,” Hogg said. “It’s a matter of ideology.”
Dailey seemed to bristle at this, hearing in Hogg’s words a disbelief in the specialness of American hearts and minds — and the suggestion that the motives behind the American Revolution were no better or worse than those of any other. Nevertheless, he gave the women Appleseed’s Web address.
As we made our way back to the parking lot, he shook his head. “You see what we’re up against?” he asked. “Imagine 300 million of those.”
a call to arms Online video of an Appleseed Project target practice in Iowa at nytimes.com/magazine.
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Boyo,
There has been federal level law enforcement since the dawn of this nation, and from personal experience, I can tell you that we are better off having different agencies that fill specific roles. The BATFE has it's place, the FBI, it's, the Border Patrol, US Secret Service and others that work at the federal level do things that local/state agencies cannot. Don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. I support some BATFE reforms, but dissolving it won't end federal gun laws and another agency would just get tasked with enforcing those laws anyway.
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Obama bans over 100,000 rifles
David Kopel • August 18, 2010 12:09 am
According to The Korea Times, the Obama administration has blocked efforts by the South Korean government to sell over a hundred thousand surplus M1 Garand and Carbine rifles into the United States market. These self-loading were rifles introduced in 1926 and 1941. As rifles, they are especially well-suited to community defense in an emergency, as in the cases of community defense following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and Hurricane Andrew in 1992. Along with AR-15 type rifles, the M1 rifles are the quintessential firearms of responsible citizenship, precisely the type of firearms which civic responsibility organizations such as the Appleseed Project teach people how to use.
According to a South Korean official, “The U.S. insisted that imports of the aging rifles could cause problems such as firearm accidents. It was also worried the weapons could be smuggled to terrorists, gangs or other people with bad intentions.”
Regarding the second objection, any firearm lawfully imported into the United States would eventually be sold by a Federal Firearm Licensee who, pursuant to the background check system imposed by Congress (and endorsed by the NRA) would have to contact federal or state law enforcement to verify that the gun buyer is not prohibited from possessing firearms. Accordingly, the risk that the South Korean surplus guns might fall into the hands of gangsters or other bad people is exactly the same as with the sale of any other retail firearm in the United States. Notably, neither the M1 Garand nor the M1 carbine are concealable, and the M1 Garand is long, heavy, and bulky. Accordingly, the criminal utility of such guns is relatively low.
The second Obama administration objection is accidents. But in fact, increasing gun density in the United States has been associated with steeply declining rates of gun accidents. In 1948 there were .36 guns per person. (That is, about one gun for every three Americans.) By 2004, there was nearly one gun for every American. In 1948, there were 1.6 fatal gun accidents per 100,000 persons. By 2004, the rate had fallen by 86%, so that there were .22 fatal accidents per 100,000 persons. (For underlying data, see Appendix B of my amicus brief in Heller.)
Legally, it is indisputable that the guns are importable. Being over 50 years old, the rifles are automatically “Curios and Relics” according to federal law. 27 CFR section 478.11. Accordingly, they are by statutory definition importable. 18 USC section 925 (e)(1). Notwithstanding the law, the Obama administration has the ability to pressure the South Korean government to block the sale of the guns.
President Obama was elected on the promise that he supported individual Second Amendment rights. His administration’s thwarting of the import of these American-made rifles is not consistent with that promise.
http://volokh.com/2010/08/18/obama-b...-100000-rifles
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I know the M-1 is California legal, I'm guessing the M-1 Carbine is legal there too. It's a pity that the Obama thugs won't let these in.
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Woof,
If you go on a witch you're bound to find some.
www.news.yahoo.com/s/time/08599202251600
P.C.
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The 21st-Century Militia: State Defense Forces and Homeland Security
Published on October 8, 2010 by James Carafano, Ph.D. and Jessica Zuckerman BACKGROUNDER #2474
Abstract: State militias have helped to defend the United States since the Revolutionary War. Today, 23 states and territories have organized militias, most commonly known as State Defense Forces (SDFs). SDFs provide governors with a cost-effective, vital force multiplier and resource, especially if state National Guard units are deployed out of state. However, in general, SDFs are underfunded and undersupported. Some states at high risk for a natural or man-made disaster have not even created SDFs. The U.S. and its states can no longer afford to sideline these national security assets.
Since the founding of the United States of America, local militias have played an important role in its defense and security. Bolstered by the Founding Father’s concerns about maintaining a large standing army and preserved within the Constitution, the concept of the citizen soldier has since become ingrained in American culture and government.
Currently, 23 states and territories have modern militias. As of 2005, these militias had a force strength of approximately 14,000 individuals nationwide.[1] Most commonly known as State Defense Forces (SDFs) or state militias, these forces are distinct from the Reserves and the National Guard in that they serve no federal function. In times of both war and peace, SDFs remain solely under the control of their governors, allowing the governors to deploy them easily and readily in the event of a natural or man-made disaster.
Building on a strong U.S. militia tradition, today’s State Defense Forces offer a vital force multiplier and homeland security resource for governors throughout the nation. SDFs can greatly fortify homeland security efforts in the states by serving as emergency response and recovery forces. Consequently, state leaders should make strengthening existing SDFs a priority, while encouraging their creation in states that do not yet have SDFs, especially in states at high risk of a natural or man-made disaster.
This paper is the result of a first attempt by any organization to conduct a comprehensive survey of the nation’s SDFs. The Heritage Foundation sent surveys to the leaders of all 23 of the nation’s SDFs, and 13 responded. This paper analyzes their responses, looks at the history of the SDFs and the issues and challenges that they face, and makes recommendations on expanding the SDF role in homeland security.
From the Founding Through Today
Informed by British history and colonialism, many of the Founding Fathers believed that a large standing army could easily become an instrument of tyranny.[2] Nevertheless, the onset of the Revolutionary War clearly demonstrated the undeniable need to field a unified, professional national defense force to defeat the British. Thus, in 1775, despite the colonies’ long reliance on militias to defend their territories, the Continental Congress created the Continental Army, the nation’s first standing military force.[3]
However, creation of the Continental Army did little to impede the continued existence of militias throughout the nation. While militias were decidedly less effective during the Revolutionary War than the Continental Army, they nevertheless contributed to the war effort. In the early battles and later as auxiliary support to the Continental Army, the militia helped to win the war, securing their continued role in the nation.[4]
Ultimately, despite misgivings about the effectiveness of militias, the Founding Fathers incorporated their belief that a well-regulated militia was “the ultimate guardian of liberty” into the Constitution.[5] Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution states:
The Congress shall have the power…to provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.[6]
The language of the Constitution granted the federal government the power to call forth the militia of the United States, but left the states the ability to appoint officers and to train their militias.
Five years after the Constitution was ratified, state militia powers were more firmly defined by the Militia Act of 1792, which required all free men ages 18 to 45 to serve in the enrolled militia. Further, laying the basis for principles that guide today’s State Defense Forces, the act dictated that the Adjutant General (TAG) of each state would command the militia and that state militias would receive no federal funds. At the same time, however, the Calling Forth Act of 1792 gave the President power to mobilize any and all state militia forces when the nation was under threat of invasion or in times of “insurrections in any State.”[7]
However, the Militia Act and Calling Forth Act did not end the contest between state governors and the federal government for control over militia forces. Within a few decades, this debate reached the Supreme Court. In 1827, the Court ruled in Martin v. Mott that the President had the exclusive right to determine if conditions warranted mobilization of militia forces. However, in 1820, the Court held in Houston v. Moore that states maintained concurrent authority with the President to mobilize the militia in the event of a natural disaster, civil unrest, insurrection, or invasion. This decision helped to set the basis for the modern state-apportioned militias.[8]
By the end of the War of 1812, the militias enrolled under the Militia Act of 1792 had largely declined as population growth made their size unwieldy and ineffective.[9] As states increasingly abolished mandatory militia service, volunteer militias became more prevalent. During the Civil War, the combined force of enrolled and volunteer militias proved more useful than in any previous war. Northern militias acted both independently and in conjunction with the U.S. Army to guard prisoners, man forts, and protect the coast, freeing up federal troops for duty elsewhere.[10]
Despite their utility during the Civil War, volunteer militia forces remained largely disparate and disorganized bodies until the 20th century. In 1903, the latest Militia Act (the Dick Act) transformed all state militia forces into units of the National Guard.[11] While this measure helped to professionalize and organize the U.S. militia, World War I created unforeseen challenges for state governors.
Within months of the U.S. entrance into World War I, the entire National Guard Force of more than 300,000 guardsmen was mobilized for active duty.[12] Deprived of their National Guard units and concerned about sabotage and espionage attempts on the mainland, governors began to call for the creation of home defense forces or organized state militias. The Home Defense Act of 1917 permitted the states to raise home defense forces in cases where the National Guard had been federalized.[13] By December 1917, eight months after the U.S. entered the war, 42 states had formed home guards or State Defense Forces with a total force strength of approximately 100,000 men.[14] After World War I, most SDF units were disbanded, but they were revived again during World War II,[15] growing to 150,000 members in 46 states and Puerto Rico.[16]
After World War II, militias again declined, and circumstances did not prompt creation of large State Defense Forces until late in the Cold War. In the 1950s, Congress again passed legislation supporting the formation of state militias.[17] However, the creation and expansion of SDFs throughout the United States remained slow until U.S.–Soviet relations worsened and détente collapsed in the late 1970s.[18]
At the same time that the Cold War was driving the expansion of State Defense Forces, the unpopularity of the Vietnam War led to a drive to end conscription. In 1969, President Richard Nixon established a commission to determine how best to abolish the draft. The Gates Commission concluded that the best alternative to conscription would be an all-volunteer force. However, creating and maintaining this all-volunteer force would rely heavily on the Total Force Concept, which called for complete integration of all Active and Reserve components. Further, the Total Force Concept’s heavy reliance on Reserve forces increased the likelihood that states would be left without their National Guard troops if they were deployed overseas.[19] This realization led many states to revive their SDFs in the 1980s. Ultimately, in 1983, Congress amended the National Defense Act to authorize all states to maintain permanent State Defense Forces.[20]
The Modern Militia: State Defense Forces
At present, 23 states and territories have SDFs, and their estimated force strength totaled 14,000 members as of 2005.[21] Authorized under federal statute Title 32 of the U.S. Code, SDFs are entirely under state control—unlike the National Guard— both in peace and otherwise.[22] Hence, while the National Guard is a dual-apportioned force that can be called to federal service under Title 10 or remain a state force under Title 32, State Defense Forces serve solely as Title 32 forces.
This status gives SDFs two important advantages. First, SDFs are continually stationed within their respective states and can be called up quickly and easily in times of need. Such a capability is particularly important when catastrophic disasters overwhelm local first responders and federal forces can take up to 72 hours to respond.[23] Second, SDFs are exempt from the restrictions of the Posse Comitatus Act, which prohibits federal military forces from engaging in domestic law enforcement activities within the United States.[24] While the Posse Comitatus Act has never proven a major obstacle to deploying federal forces for domestic emergency response, SDFs permit a state military response uninhibited by legal obstacles.[25]
Each SDF is under the control of its respective governor through the state’s military department.[26] The Adjutant General, the state’s senior military commander and a member of the governor’s cabinet, commands the SDF on behalf of the governor. As SDF commander, TAG is responsible for all training, equipment allocation, and decisions regarding the SDF’s strength, activity, and mission. The Adjutant General is also the commander of the state’s National Guard units and often directs state emergency response.[27] Through TAGs, SDFs can easily coordinate with other key components of the state emergency response.
Despite its recognition in federal statute, creation of a State Defense Force remains at the discretion of each state governor, and 28 states have chosen not to create such forces. Creation of SDFs has met resistance from TAGs and the National Guard Bureau due to concerns over turf, costs, and even arming SDF members.[28] However, such objections make little sense given that SDFs are entirely volunteer organizations and offer the states a vital, low-cost force multiplier. Members are not paid for training, only some states compensate them for active duty, and SDFs generally have little equipment.[29] For example, in 2002 alone, the Georgia State Guard reportedly saved the state of Georgia $1.5 million by providing 1,797 days of operational service to the state.[30] In all, the state-apportioned status, organizational structure, and low-cost burden of SDFs make them a vital and practical resource for the states.
State Defense Forces Post-9/11
Only months before 9/11, the U.S. Commission on National Security/21st Century (the Hart– Rudman Commission) suggested making homeland security the primary mission of the National Guard.[31] However, after September 11, 2001, National Guard deployments reached their highest level since the Korean War.[32] This was understandably troubling to many state leaders given that “[g]overnors have the greatest responsibility for managing consequences of attacks,” but “[t]hey have the fewest resources with which to do it…only the state police and the National Guard to provide for law and order.”[33] In recent years, the high levels of National Guard deployment largely removed this resource from numerous states. Even in the states where National Guard forces remain present, the Guard is maintaining only about 62 percent of its equipment on hand for the states because of overseas deployments.[34] This has left some governors with just state police units to help to maintain security and facilitate emergency response. In addition, an emergency, particularly a catastrophic disaster, could quickly overwhelm state police and other first responders. If National Guard forces are unavailable because they are deployed elsewhere, then the state could rely on its SDF, if it has one, to reinforce police and first responders. While largely underdeveloped and underresourced, SDFs can fill this gap in state homeland security capabilities, giving governors a valuable force multiplier.
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In recent years, State Defense Forces have proven vital to homeland security and emergency response efforts. For example, after 9/11, the New York Guard, New York Naval Militia, and New Jersey Naval Militia were activated to assist in response measures, recovery efforts, and critical infrastructure security.[35] An estimated 2,274 SDF personnel participated in support of recovery efforts after Hurricane Katrina. SDF personnel were activated in at least eight states, including Texas, Maryland, Virginia, and Tennessee. They assisted directly with recovery efforts or stayed in their states to fill the roles of the state National Guard units that were deployed to assist in the recovery.[36] SDFs have also offered critical infrastructure protection. In Operation Noble Eagle, the homeland defense and civil support operation after 9/11, the Alaskan SDF aided in the efforts to protect the Alaska oil pipeline.[37]
History suggests that State Defense Forces may be most valuable in assisting the states in emergency response. In the event of a natural or man-made disaster, the first tier of response is state and local first responders. However, Hurricane Katrina exposed a vital difference between a “normal” disaster and a catastrophic disaster.[38] A catastrophic disaster quickly stresses the resources and capabilities of state and local responders. In such cases, the Title 32 National Guard troops can serve as the second tier of response. Yet given the National Guard’s high operational tempo over the past decade, the state Guard units may be unavailable. Likewise, the third tier, federal support in the form of reserve troops or FEMA assistance, may take up to 72 hours to mobilize and arrive at the scene of the disaster.[39] In contrast, State Defense Forces are by their nature located nearby. They also know the area and the resources at hand, giving them the potential to be a key element of emergency response for the states.
Besides being readily available and continually stationed within states, SDFs can carry out state homeland security missions without any major reorganization, which would be required if Congress were to implement the Hart–Rudman Commission’s recommendation to task the National Guard with this role. Furthermore, by assuming greater homeland security responsibility, SDFs would allow the National Guard to focus more on their Title 10 mission in the global war on terrorism. Moreover, unlike the dual-apportioned National Guard, State Defense Forces could focus more completely on homeland security than the National Guard.
Challenges Faced
State Defense Forces offer an important homeland security asset to many states, but several challenges have prevented these forces from reaching their full potential. Existing SDFs are often underfunded and undersupported, and some vulnerable states have not yet formed SDFs.
One of the greatest challenges to the creation and maintenance of State Defense Forces across the nation is ignorance among state and national security leaders. Many of these leaders are fundamentally unaware of the existence and capabilities of SDFs. This is largely a public relations nightmare for the SDFs because this general ignorance greatly impedes SDF leaders’ efforts to make their cause and merits known.
However, lack of awareness is not the SDFs’ only major public relations challenge. Often those who are aware of SDFs confuse them with private militia forces associated with radical organizations. State Defense Forces are the modern state militias. These forces are government-authorized, organized, professional militias, in sharp contrast to their radical “counterparts.”
SDFs are also limited by the restriction forbidding them from receiving in-kind support from the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD). While SDFs should remain funded solely by the states, in-kind support in the form of equipment and facilities would enhance SDF training and capabilities. However, because the DOD does not directly support SDFs, they cannot use federal resources, even surplus federal equipment and supplies. This is particularly challenging given that many SDFs work closely with their state National Guards. Nevertheless, SDFs are not permitted to use Guard facilities, trucks, or equipment, even when state National Guard troops are deployed elsewhere and SDFs are filling in during their absence.
The Current State of SDFs
The State Defense Forces offer the states a much needed force multiplier for homeland security operations and provide critical support as an auxiliary to the National Guard. While the potential roles of SDFs received heightened attention immediately after 9/11, that attention has faded in recent years.
To assess current SDF resources and capabilities, The Heritage Foundation sent a survey to the leaders of the 23 existing SDFs. Thirteen states—Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, and Virginia—responded, providing a sampling of SDFs from across the United States. While the data received are limited and cannot draw a national picture of State Defense Forces, much can still be learned from the information gathered.
Mission. First, 11 of the 13 respondents indicated that their State Defense Forces have a defined mission under state law, but the identified missions varied greatly from state to state. Some forces focused more on a National Guard auxiliary mission. Other SDFs emphasize homeland security and civil support. The SDFs of Alabama, Georgia, Maryland, New Mexico, Oregon, Tennessee, Vermont, and Virginia identified their mission as acting largely to support the state National Guard. Other states defined their mission as providing communication backup and support, serving as a direct resource of the governor, operating search and rescue efforts, assisting in disaster response, and/or supporting emergency operating agencies and law enforcement as key components.
In emergency response, 10 of the 13 SDFs play a designated role in their state or local emergency operation centers. Several of the SDFs participate in planning disaster mitigation tactics, either at the direction of the state National Guard, the governor, and/or the Adjutant General, rather than following a predetermined plan for disaster mitigation. Others simply encourage greater training and education among their members. Virginia and Georgia have gone so far as to incorporate their SDFs into their state all-hazards or disaster mitigation plans.
Funding. Survey results also support the notion that State Defense Forces provide a cost-effective solution to the problem of maintaining sufficient homeland security manpower at the state level. Only four of the 13 responding SDFs indicated that they pay their members when on active duty. The rest rely solely on volunteer service. Nevertheless, while SDFs are considered a low-cost asset, they still require adequate state funding to ensure that they have the resources necessary to carry out their assigned missions. In this regard, only nine of the 13 SDFs indicated that they receive state-appropriated funds. Yet despite inadequate funding, 10 of the 13 respondents plan to expand their SDFs, clearly reflecting the importance of these forces.
Force Strength. In force strength and composition, 10 of the 13 SDFs had active force strengths above 100 personnel as of January 2010. Vermont, Maryland, Virginia, Tennessee, Indiana, Georgia, and Alabama reported forces of more than 200 members each, and Texas indicated an active force strength of 1,750—the largest of the SDFs.
Yet many high-risk states do not have SDFs. Judging from more than 50 years of actuarial data on natural disasters, certain states face a predictable, high risk of experiencing a natural disaster.[40] Further, an analysis of funding of cities through the Department of Homeland Security’s Urban Areas Security Initiative (UASI) program has identified the 37 “highest risk” jurisdictions as indicated by the federal government. Of these high-risk states, Arizona, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Missouri, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania lack SDFs.
Additionally, SDF personnel tend to be retired military personnel and other professionals. In all but one of the 13 SDFs, the average age of SDF personnel is 42 years or older. While some point to the higher age of SDF members as a disadvantage, in fact this is a great strength because it often reflects the members’ extensive experience. “In many cases it is not uncommon in a group of four or five SDF officers to find 100 plus years of military experience.”[41] According to survey results, responding SDFs primarily draw on such experience and professional backgrounds in offering medical, financial, and legal aid within the SDF and to the National Guard.
Only Texas, Virginia, and Indiana reported having an SDF naval or marine arm. The Texas, Virginia, and Vermont SDFs have air arms.
Seven of the 13 SDFs reported that they trained and served side by side with the state National Guard on a regular basis. All 13 respondents responded that they conducted regular assessments of their SDFs.
In all, the survey data show that too many SDFs receive insufficient recognition and support. Because they are predominantly volunteer organizations, their capabilities tend to be overlooked. Yet the states with SDFs should seek to expand the size, scope, and utility of their SDFs to provide themselves with a dynamic resource at a low cost. High-risk states without SDFs should seriously consider forming them. In addition to receiving greater federal recognition and in-kind support as well as state resources, SDFs should be given the opportunity to train side by side with their National Guard counterparts. SDFs will be a significantly greater asset to their states if they are more professionally trained and equipped.
Expanding the Role of SDFs in Homeland Security
In 2009, the State Defense Force Improvement Act (H.R. 206) was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill would have amended Title 32 of the U.S. Code to enhance the nation’s SDFs.[42] The bill sought to clarify federal regulation of SDFs and to improve standardization and coordination with the DOD and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS). However, since its introduction, H.R. 206 has been on hold.
Expansion and enhancement of SDFs remains vital to homeland security. To further such efforts, state leaders, Congress, the DOD, and the DHS should:
Promote the creation of SDFs in high-risk states. Only 23 states and territories have SDFs. The hesitation of many governors makes little sense given that SDFs offer a low-cost force multiplier for homeland security efforts. In particular, the high-risk states without SDFs would greatly benefit from creating SDFs for disaster recovery and response efforts.
Create state standards and clarify federal regulation. Clarifying federal regulation would provide a clearer picture on SDFs’ powers and mission. At the same time, creating state standards for tactics, techniques, and organization based on the needs of each individual state would strengthen and enhance SDF performance. State standards should be communicated to the Council of Governors and the State Guard Association of the United States to facilitate sharing of best practices among the states.
Incorporate SDFs into state and national emergency management plans. Expanding SDFs while clarifying regulation and setting standards is only the first step. The states, the DOD, and the DHS should ensure that SDFs are incorporated into existing and future emergency management plans and exercises. Including SDFs will help to ensure that all state and national actors in emergency response know their respective roles. Further, emergency management plans and exercises will provide SDFs with greater guidance on what is expected of them in the event of a man-made or natural disaster.
Permit SDFs to train side by side with the National Guard. While SDFs and the National Guard differ in their overall missions, they share emergency management responsibilities in their respective states. In each state, they also have a common commander, the state’s Adjutant General. Having the SDFs train alongside the state National Guards would be an effective use of resources and provide the specialized training needed to strengthen the SDFs. State Defense Forces will be a significantly greater asset to their states if they are more professionally trained and equipped. Accordingly, Congress should amend the law to allow the National Guard to provide assistance to all auxiliary forces, including SDFs and Coast Guard Auxiliaries.[43] This assistance could include technical training, administrative support, and use of National Guard facilities and equipment.
Encourage greater state support and resource allocation, and federal in-kind support. Four of the 13 SDFs do not receive state funding. While SDFs are a low-cost resource, the size and scope of their functionality is hindered by insufficient support and resources. To increase the quality and capability of SDFs, states need to provide adequate support and resources. Additionally, while SDFs should remain solely funded by the states, these forces would greatly benefit from receiving federal in-kind support from the Department of Defense. Allowing SDF members to train at military facilities and to receive excess federal equipment and supplies would greatly benefit the SDFs with minimal burden on the DOD.
The Future of the Modern Militia
There are clear historical, legal, and practical justifications for strengthening the State Defense Forces. Since the founding of this country, militias have played a vital role in fulfilling the constitutional duty of providing for the common defense. Today, as strictly state forces, SDFs continue to provide critical manpower at minimal cost.
Despite the undeniable benefits from having an effective SDF, many SDFs lack the resources and the operational standards needed to make them more effective. Some states at high risk of natural or man-made disasters have not even formed SDFs. The U.S. and its states can no longer afford to sideline these national security assets.
—James Jay Carafano, Ph.D., is Deputy Director of the Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for International Studies and Director of the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies, a division of the Davis Institute, at The Heritage Foundation. Jessica Zuckerman is a Research Assistant in the Allison Center.
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Reports/2010/10/The-21st-Century-Militia-State-Defense-Forces-and-Homeland-Security
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Source unknown:
Doctors
(A) The number of physicians in the U.S. is about 700,000.
(B) Accidental deaths caused by Physicians per year are 120,000.
(C) Accidental deaths per physician is 0.171.
Statistics courtesy of U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
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Now think about this:
Guns
(A) The number of gun owners in the U.S. is about 80,000,000.
(Yes, that's 80 million)
(B) The number of accidental gun deaths per year, all age groups, is about 1,500.
(C) The number of accidental deaths per gun owner is .00001875.
Statistics courtesy of FBI
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So, statistically, doctors are over 9,100 times more dangerous than gun owners.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Remember, 'Guns don't kill people, doctors do.'
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FACT: NOT EVERYONE HAS A GUN, BUT almost everyone has at least one doctor.
This means you are over 900 times more likely to be killed by a doctor as a gun
owner!!!
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Please alert your friends to this alarming threat. We must ban doctors before this gets completely out of hand!!!!!
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Out of concern for the public at large, I withheld the statistics on Lawyers for fear the shock would cause people to panic and seek medical attention!
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What if I'm a doctor with a gun? :-D
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What if I'm a doctor with a gun? :-D
Ironically enough, the late great Col. Jeff Cooper gave a lecture for a meeting of doctors a few years back that dissent in some ways from the ADA stance. It's an excellent speech!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGYttXa0d1k&feature=player_embedded
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Hat tip to BBG:
10
NOV
The BBC has an article up on the gun-smuggling from the US to Mexico. In typically one-sided fashion, it mentions that guns seized from narcos in Mexico are often traced back to the United States, and that the ATF isn’t effectively fighting this problem.
For those without much knowledge on the subject, it gives the impression that there’s a flood of illegal guns being bought in the US across the counter legally, and then shipped into Mexico to fuel the gun crime there–blaming our “lax gun laws” for Mexico’s narco turf war violence.
First of all, let’s point out that Mexico has a narco problem because the US has a hard-on for drug prohibition, not because Americans can buy guns legally. I’ve often read that canard about drug buyers financing drug crime with their purchases, but the simple twofold truth is that a.) people will always desire and buy mind-altering substances, no matter what the law says, and b.) the War on Drugs serves as a price control mechanism and profit guarantee for dealers and traffickers.
Second, let’s look at that article a little more closely. The picture that accompanies it shows a bunch of 40mm grenade launchers along with ammunition. Looking at that, your average BBC reader could be lead to believe that those things are legal to buy and own freely in the US, and that they originated at a US gun show or gun store. Grenade launchers are, of course, illegal to own, purchase, or sell in the United States without a special registration and tax stamp. Grenade launchers are tightly controlled “destructive devices”, as is their ammunition. (Every single 40mm grenade is also classified as a DD, and subject to a $200 transfer tax per round. Each grenade must be individually registered with the BATFE, which makes them super-expensive and very rare to find in civilian hands.) Considering the difficulty and expense of obtaining a launcher and the ammo for it, never mind the fact that every single launcher and round is registered to an owner with the ATF, I guarantee that the 40mm launchers in that picture came not from the US, but from Mexican military armories.
Third, the language in the article isn’t quite misleading, but it omits a few facts. We are told that “the majority of guns confiscated by Mexico and submitted to the ATF for tracing do originate in the US <emphasis mine>.” What it doesn’t mention is that the majority of guns seized from Mexican narcos do not originate in the US. The Mexican Federales do not submit most of their seized guns to the ATF for tracing because they know their provenance already. Mexico uses a licensed version of the H&K G36 assault rifle, for example, and whenever one of those shows up, they know it didn’t walk out of a gun store in San Antonio. (They also use the licensed version of the H&K 40mm grenade launcher, which happens to look exactly like the weapon in the center of the picture.) So they only send the serial numbers of the non-domestic guns to the ATF, which is the minority of seized weapons. Reading the article over a quick latte, one could however get the impression that most of the crime guns in Mexico are traced back to the US, because they omit that information.
Lastly, even those guns that were bought in the US and then smuggled into Mexico for use by narcos didn’t get sold to Mexican nationals legally. Gun shops have to run federal background checks on every single gun purchase, and foreign nationals, with few exceptions, are not eligible to buy firearms in the United States. If a rifle made it from a legal buyer into the hands of a Mexican criminal, the person buying the rifle and then handing it to said criminal broke federal law. (Buying a gun for a non-eligible person is called a “straw sale”, and will get you ten years in Club Fed.)
Mexico has plenty of problems, but corruption (where and how do you think the narcos get Mexican military hardware?) and the economic incentives created by drug prohibition make up the lion’s share of those, not legal gun sales in the United States. You want to curb the flow of guns and stop the violence in Mexico, you stop guaranteeing those dealers and traffickers a 10,000% profit margin on some powdered plant product. Drug dealers don’t care about cocaine or “poisoning America’s children”, they care about profit. If you held a voter referendum on keeping or tossing drug prohibition, all the drug dealers in the country would vote to keep them illegal. Take away their price control system, and they’ll go the way of the booze runners of the Prohibition era.
But nobody’s going to do that, of course. Between asset forfeiture, inability to learn from the Prohibition, the suitability of drug laws to curb inconvenient liberties, and the millions on the payroll of drug task forces and agencies nationwide, that wouldn’t be good business. And civil liberties continue to take it in the pants.
Remember: a vote for drug prohibition is a vote for gun control. Without illicit substance turf wars, we wouldn’t even have NFA ’34, GCA ’68, or the 1994 Crime Bill. We wouldn’t have asset forfeiture, RICO, or any of the many other onerous laws that shackle our movements and make a mockery of the Bill of Rights. But point that out to a self-righteous dope prohibitionist, and you get the old saw about the damage drugs can do, and do you want to see schoolchildren legally light up crack pipes in front of the CVS at eight in the morning? It’s the same kind of arrogant paternalism that the gun banners display when they talk about how blood would flow in the streets if we removed all the restrictions on gun ownership and carry. “Well, I know that I wouldn’t abuse them, but I’m damned sure those peasants all around me couldn’t handle the liberty…”
http://munchkinwrangler.wordpress.com/2010/11/10/lies-half-truths-and-omissions/
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http://volokh.com/2010/11/24/second-amendment-protects-gun-possession-by-the-housemates-of-felons/
"The First Amendment contains the freedom-of-speech guarantee that the people ratified, which included exceptions for obscenity, libel, and disclosure of state secrets, but not for the expression of extremely unpopular and wrong-headed views. The Second Amendment is no different. Like the First, it is the very product of an interest-balancing by the people... And whatever else it leaves to future evaluation, it surely elevates above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home."
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http://volokh.com/2010/11/24/second-amendment-protects-gun-possession-by-the-housemates-of-felons/
"The First Amendment contains the freedom-of-speech guarantee that the people ratified, which included exceptions for obscenity, libel, and disclosure of state secrets, but not for the expression of extremely unpopular and wrong-headed views. The Second Amendment is no different. Like the First, it is the very product of an interest-balancing by the people... And whatever else it leaves to future evaluation, it surely elevates above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home."
Very interesting. Thanks GM! :-D
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As the body count in the Mexican drug wars mounts beyond 30,000, federal authorities have tracked more than 60,000 guns in the past four years back across the border to American dealers. Congress, enthralled with the gun lobby, has done nothing about a legal loophole increasingly at the heart of the carnage — the dealers’ freedom to make multiple sales of AK-47s and other battlefield assault rifles without having to report to federal authorities, as the law requires for handgun sales.
No wonder one dealer felt free to sell 14 AK-47s to one trafficker in a single day.
The gun lobby previously convinced an obeisant Congress that “long guns” like military rifles and shotguns were not favored by criminals and deserved a pass at dealers supposedly catering to sportsmen. But the drug war toll is proving otherwise, with use of high- power long guns more than doubling in the past five years as cartel gunmen turn to the rat-a-tat annihilators easily obtainable across the border.
A big reason for that preference is the failure to require reports on multiple rifle sales, according to a new inspector general’s report at the Justice Department. In Texas, the traffic is white hot. Eight of the top 12 dealers in Mexican crime guns are nestled profitably near the border, according to The Washington Post, which spent a year penetrating some of the data secrecy that Congress has enacted to protect the gun industry.
With a more Republican Congress in the wings and Democratic lawmakers openly fearful of the gun lobby’s political clout, there is no expectation of courageous legislating to close the loophole. But executive order is another possibility. It has enough traction lately among Justice Department officials to prompt a “grass-roots alert” by the National Rifle Association to its four million members, according to The Post.
It is hard to believe that most ordinary N.R.A. members would not agree something must be done about the cross-border sale of war weapons that underpins the drug scourge. If it takes an executive order to cut the carnage, President Obama should not hesitate.
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I'll give a more detailed response after I read the IG's report.
The "AK-47s" you can buy in the US are strictly semi-automatic, meaning one trigger pull is required for every shot. Given the global arms markets are full of the real select fire versions produced by Russia, China and others, I can't imagine there is much demand for the more expensive, not full auto-capable US AK.
As noted in many press accounts of the warfare in Mexico, the narcos are often armed with full auto- belt fed machine guns, RPGs and hand grenades. None of which can be lawfully purchased at the typical gun store in the US.
There are already federal laws on the books about straw purchases (buying guns for another person who cannot legally purchase/own a firearm) and federal laws on the export of weapons. The BATFE already investigates and charges people engaging in illegal weapons purchases and exports.
If Mexico is so concerned about weapons from El Norte, perhaps they should secure that border, like they do their southern border and build a fence.
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Woof,
If a gundealer is illegally selling guns then prosecute them, if you want to stop the money coming in and the guns going out seal the F'in border. There is no loophole to be closed here, anyone buying a weapon of any kind from a dealer has to go through a F.B.I. background check. If someone is making straw purchases, that is illegal, investagate and prosecute, enforce the laws on the books. This is just the latest excuse for going after our gun rights. This is typical of the Left, blame the rights of America's lawabiding citizens for the 30,000 deaths in Mexico when most of the arms being used come from Mexico's own police and military. Nice. :-P And the NYT needs to check some facts.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War#Sources_of_weapons
P.C.
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http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/sections/news/OIG_report.pdf
OIG report.
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Woof,
And I wonder how many of these puppies find their way to the cartels? These are 50 cal American made Barretts being used by the Mexican Army.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fuerzas_Especiales_Michoac%C3%A1n.jpg (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Fuerzas_Especiales_Michoac%C3%A1n.jpg)
And that report seems to point at problems of the ATF being under funded and staffed, not gun laws as being the major player.
P.C.
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"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." --Cesare Beccaria, On Crimes and Punishment, quoted by Thomas Jefferson in Commonplace Book
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Woof,
Interesting piece on Glocks... despite the author's personal chagrin toward the company.
www.slate.com/id/2280829/?gt1=38001
P.C.
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I love Glocks. Carried one almost all of my time as a cop.
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Woof GM,
Yep nice weapons, I prefer the 40. cal's, the Glock 35 and the G27. Having a Lone Wolf 9mm barrel that drops in to replace the 40. barrel is nice also. Of course I'm still partial to my Springfield Armory 45 :lol:
P.C.
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I only own 9mm Glocks. 19s,17 and 26s.
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Woof,
The 40's offer maximum punch with less recoil than a 45 and more ammo in the mag and like I said you can turn them into another set of guns by just dropping a 9mm barrel in them for even more ammo capacity, less recoil and cheaper bullets when you want.
P.C.
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I have a 19 and a 26, but will be selling the 26 when I get around to it. The shorty handle, even with a pinky extender on the mag, just does not feel right for my hand.
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Crafty,
Have you tried using a 19 mag in the 26 with a grip extender?
I've used this on a 26 carried as a backup gun.
http://www.lonewolfdist.com/Detail.aspx?PROD=14&CAT=24
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I've used a naked 19 clip, and yes it works, and I like the look of the accessory shown there, but why not just carry the 19 then?
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Woof,
I've heard a number of people with that complaint about the mini Glocks, everyone is different in some regards, which makes it important to notice and go to a different weapon if serious enough to be a bother. I can handle my G27 fine, but for a conceal carry weapon it is a little bulky and I normally carry it on my hip and just wear a jacket over it. I've tried it in an ankle holster and inside the beltban but both are uncomfortable and not easily drawn, so for more concealment and utility I would opt for another weapon. However, I know guys that carry them in that manner with no problem. My fave comfort deep concealment pistol is the little 32. cal Davis Derringer with Glasser slugs, I carry with my change.
P.C.
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Woof,
The 40's offer maximum punch with less recoil than a 45 and more ammo in the mag and like I said you can turn them into another set of guns by just dropping a 9mm barrel in them for even more ammo capacity, less recoil and cheaper bullets when you want.
P.C.
I've talked to a forensic pathologist with a huge database of GSW documentation. He was very clear that there is no way to differentiate between handgun caliber wounds in human tissue. He identifies the caliber by the bullets/casings recovered.
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I've used a naked 19 clip, and yes it works, and I like the look of the accessory shown there, but why not just carry the 19 then?
It's still easier to conceal. The 26 rode in a inner pocket of my duty jacket, a 19 wouldn't have fit.
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GM: When testing it in my house (CC being off limits to me as a subject of Los Angeles) the 26 seemed bulky to me too. Interesting about GSW and caliber detection.
PC: Do you have a URL of that gun? Why those particular bullets?
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Crafty,
Everything is a trade off. A .380 is easier to conceal, but I like being able to use the same mags. I like my Ruger SP101 .357 Mag, but I like having more than 5 shots.
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Woof Guro Craftydog,
Unfortunately Davis was forced out of business during the flurry of lawsuits of the Clinton reign but another company called Cobra is making the same guns. www.cobraderringers.com/category/96-Corba_Derringer_Pistols.aspx
I use the Glaser in the little gun because the 32 ACP round is rather small for a personal defense round and have little expansion even with hollow points but these bullets have pellets in the tip and delivers more footpounds of energy at terminal velocity. They don't over penetrate and they don't ricochet like other rounds do, which is why they call them safety ammo. www.shopcorbon.com/Glaser-Safety-Slug/500/500/dept
Now just because I picked these for this particular weapon doesn't mean I think they are the best choice for all pistols or situations. As a matter of fact I only have one of these in one chamber and a solid in the other in case there is something between us. Also they make these guns in bigger caliber but they are heavy and bulge out in your pocket. You don't want the scare the women folk you know. :lol:
P.C.
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Thank you. That ammo looks interesting.
BTW, I've always wondered with the derringer design of no trigger guard, what prevents the gun from going off from inadvertent contact with the trigger?
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Aside from being very expensive, Glaser has a very poor track record in real world shootings.
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Woof,
There are some safety concerns with the design but they are safe so long as you know and understand the weapon. First like you said there is no trigger guard, so you should never carry the weapon fully cocked. There is a safety, a little bar stock pin that is pushed in that blocks the hammer from falling but it is awkward to get off and usually takes both hands to deal with, so forget taking it off quickly and firing the weapon. There is another safety and that is the half cocked position. Once the hammer is pulled back to the half cocked position and locked in the hammer cannot go forward again without being fully cocked back and the trigger pulled. Even if the weapon is dropped, damaged whatever it is impossible for the hammer to go back down from half cocked without going on to the full cock position. So it's best to carry it in the half cocked position and not bother with the safety slide pin. Now I know some guys are thinking that can't be right, carrying something half cocked has got to be dangerous. Well with a Derringer the opposite is true because when the hammer is down the firing pin is fully engaged. In other words if you have a round in the chamber and the hammer is down then the firing pin is in direct contact with the primer of the bullet, bang! Not all guns of this type are like that but these are. The thing you really have too watch for is when loading the weapon and closing it up, because if the hammer is down and you forceably close it up, again bang! So you must have the weapon at half cocked when loading it or carrying it loaded. To fire the weapon you simply pull back the hammer to full cock at that point you can fire the weapon... and so can anything else that hits the trigger. You are the safety at that point. To back down the hammer, is when I engage the safety and drop it back down to half cock, because to do this you have to hold back the hammer and pull trigger then ease the hammer back down. With the safety engaged the hammer can't just drop and fire the weapon.
P.C.
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Woof,
Like I said I don't recommend it for all uses.
P.C.
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I recommend finding ammo that functions 100% in your weapon. You'll need to run 150-200 rounds through to see if your ammo is reliable. I'm not sure I'd want to try that with Glaser.
Like real estate, ammo is all about location, location, location. Put the rounds where they need to go and they'll work.
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Woof,
I agree with that you want to make sure your weapon feeds and functions with the ammo you're going to be using for self defense. Some really good ammo just doesn't work in some guns but with the variety of ammo out there it's nice to have a choice that fits the conditions and situation that you personally are most likely to encounter with a gun that best fits the same. The little Derringer is what my Grandfather called a bellygun, you stick it to your attacker's belly and fire because if you don't you'll probably miss. The bullet when it leaves such a short barrel is barely scratched by the rifling and has little if any spin put to it, which of course makes it very inaccurate. So having a round that doesn't shoot through walls or bounce around ain't such a bad idea in the confines of a crowded 7/11, and most self defense ammo is +P and could blow my little gun up, Glaser isn't. So I think it's a good pick for my little gun that I carry when wearing my shorts, tee shirt, and flipflops when going to get ice in the summer. Besides I'll still have the shotgun in the trunk and my revolver or something else in the glove box and I don't use Glaser in those; all I use it for is one bullet in my little gun tucked in my pocket. :-D
P.C.
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I agree that the gun you have is better than the one you don't have if you suddenly need one.
Contact wounds are massive, compared to the damage of a bullet alone.
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Woof GM,
Where I live it's more important to have a little gun that no one can see because if they see it I'll get stuck in there for two or three hours talking about guns and my ice will melt before I get home. :lol:
P.C.
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I know the L.A. Times can be biased, but I think this article presents a pretty good
summary of Joe Zamudio's actions (favorably), yet discusses the dangers of having an ill trained person with a gun.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-zamudio-shooting-20110115,0,7713862.story
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Being a subject of Los Angeles, Pravda on the Beach a.k.a. the Left Angeles Times, is part of my environment; I saw the article already. My reaction to it was that here we had a perfect example contrary to the fears of those who would disarm the American people that recognizing the people's right to bear arms would lead to recklessness and what does POTB do? "Balance" the article with hypotheticals. Not a big deal (and POTB has done much, much worse) but IMHO a shading in favor of an agenda nonetheless.
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Woof,
Don't feel too bad about that, I've seen the same thing from the "I live in New York" reporters on Fox News do the same thing when it comes to citizens carrying weapons for protection outside their homes. They go a little wobbly on gun rights there.
P.C.
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http://dailycaller.com/2011/01/19/nra-lifetime-member-michael-moore-thinks-youre-a-racist-for-owning-a-gun/
NRA lifetime member Michael Moore thinks you’re a racist for owning a gun
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Woof,
We need to stop letting this idiot push our buttons, he is a useless commie hack that when ever he wants some attention crawls out from under the pile of cow sh#t he was born in and pukes this nonsense out on to his equally useless fan base and they lap it up.
F him. :-P
And I hope everyone appreciates my efforts at being non violent in my rhetoric toward the one individual on this planet I truly hate.
P.C. 8-)
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He is a ratings gimmick for MSNBC, just like FOX uses that race baiting scumbag Al Sharpton.
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Woof,
We need to stop letting this idiot push our buttons, he is a useless commie hack that when ever he wants some attention crawls out from under the pile of cow sh#t he was born in and pukes this nonsense out on to his equally useless fan base and they lap it up.
F him. :-P
And I hope everyone appreciates my efforts at being non violent in my rhetoric toward the one individual on this planet I truly hate.
P.C. 8-)
I have decided to adopt a new political philosophy due to the fact that everytime that I turn around, there is another person in the news that is irritating me; "Self Sufficiency in all things." That way, they can do whatever they want, I'll continue to vote and be responsible, but in the end, it doesn't matter what they do because I'm self reliant.
Guro Crafty nailed it. "He is a ratings gimmick."
Me? I don't even pay attention to them anymore and just surround myself with people and pay attention to the people that I want to emulate. It is the best that I can do without being driven mad by their stupidity.
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Woof,
The media plays people like a fiddle, this is true.
P.C.
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From today's POTH. Comments?
====================
WITH the Tucson shootings still in the news, there’s a good chance President Obama will discuss gun control in his speech. How he does it could mean progress or stalemate on the issue.
The President’s Speech
What Should the President Say?
Politicians, journalists and experts in various fields share what issues they would like addressed in the President’s State of the Union speech.
Read More »
.Over the last few weeks, gun-control advocates have focused on banning the type of high-capacity clips that the police say was used by the man accused in the Tucson shootings, Jared Loughner. But even timely efforts to ban particular kinds of weapons face long odds politically, and historically have less success in reducing crime.
To get something done with a skeptical Congress, the president ought to shift the focus from the instruments of violence to the perpetrators by calling for a substantial increase in the number of people who are listed by the F.B.I. as barred from purchasing guns.
This year, the government will conduct about 14 million background checks on prospective firearm buyers. Only about 200,000, or just over 1 percent, will be denied permission to buy.
What’s more, while the F.B.I. database, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, has nearly 6.5 million records of prohibited buyers, two-thirds are simply the names of undocumented immigrants, who as a group constitute just 1 percent of those who were denied a gun.
In contrast, the entire prohibited-buyer database holds just 2,092 names of drug abusers, and only one of every 5,000 prospective buyers in 2010 was denied for reasons of mental instability.
A big part of the problem is that people who should be on the list, like those diagnosed with severe mental-health problems, are often left off, either because of bureaucratic hurdles or because several states are slow to report them to the federal government. According to a report by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, New Jersey submitted just eight names in 34 months from 2008 to 2010, compared with 60,677 from Texas.
The president should therefore call for several additions to the database: names on the terrorist watch list, military recruits who fail drug tests and patients ordered to undergo mental-health treatment, if their doctor or family requests they be added. He should also demand that reluctant states supply court records on mentally incapacitated residents.
An approach aimed at the person, not the gun, has a real chance of winning bipartisan support.
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Meh. I foresee serious problems from this approach.
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Question presented: This will sound good to many people. How to reply?
1) Good idea! Lets work together on the details!
2) Bad idea because __________________ ! Instead lets:
a) keep things the way the are
b) here's a better way, specfically , , ,
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http://gunowners.org/ne0703.htm
BATFE Letter Re: Mental Disqualification
OPEN LETTER TO THE STATES' ATTORNEYS GENERAL
U.S. Department of Justice
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,
Firearms and Explosives
Office of the Director
May 9, 2007
We at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), like all Americans, were saddened by the tragic events that unfolded at Virginia Tech last month. In the immediate aftermath, many questions arose about whether the person responsible for the shootings was prohibited under Federal law from possessing a firearm, and how the shooter passed the background check required before purchasing the two firearms used on April 16, 2007.
As the Federal agency responsible for enforcing the Federal firearms laws, ATF works every day to prevent the criminal misuse of firearms. We stand ready to assist our State and local partners in better understanding the Federal prohibitors and how we can work together to prevent future tragedies. This letter serves to explain what ATF has done in response to the events at Virginia Tech and to provide information on the nature and scope of the Federal prohibition.
In the initial weeks after the Virginia Tech shootings, ATF took immediate steps to communicate with our State and local law enforcement partners and the licensed firearms community. In particular, ATF joined the Secretary of Health and Human Services, who, along with the United States Attorney General and the Secretary of Education, embarked on a twelve-State effort to meet with State and local leaders, educators, mental health experts, and law enforcement officials to find out what can be learned from the tragedy at Virginia Tech. A summary of lessons learned will be reported back to the President with recommendations about how the Federal Government, working in conjunction with State and local partners, can prevent such tragedies from happening in the future.
During the first week of May, ATF used the occasion of the annual FBI National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Users Conference in Portland, Oregon, to reach out to State law enforcement officials to clarify the meaning of the Federal prohibition for those persons adjudicated as a “mental defective” or committed to a mental institution. ATF has also begun the process of clarifying the Firearms Transaction Record (ATF Form 4473), the form that is completed whenever a person purchases a firearm from a federally licensed dealer. The new Form 4473 will make it clear, for example, that any person who has been found by a court, board, or other lawful authority to be a danger to self or others is prohibited from purchasing a firearm or ammunition. ATF will also be sending an open letter to all Federal firearms licensees to further instruct on the meaning of the Federal prohibition.
Many States are already taking steps to identify persons who are prohibited from possessing firearms as a result of their mental health history. However, as of April 2007, only 23 States have submitted any mental health information to the NICS system, and only four regularly report such information. ATF and our FBI partners who operate the NICS system are encouraging State authorities to take the necessary actions to ensure that all disqualifying information is provided to prevent the purchase of firearms by those prohibited from possessing firearms under Federal law. Accordingly, ATF stands ready to assist any State with questions or concerns they may have with respect to collecting additional information regarding whether a person is prohibited from possessing a firearm or ammunition pursuant to 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(4). Many States are considering how to enhance their collection efforts in the aftermath of Virginia Tech, ATF would like to provide all necessary assistance with those efforts.
Section 922(g)(4) of 18 U.S.C. makes it unlawful for any person who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or who has been committed to a mental institution to possess firearms or ammunition. This prohibition covers two classes of persons—those who have either been (1) adjudicated as a mental defective; or (2) committed to a mental institution.
Each of these terms is defined by Federal regulation at 27 C.F.R. § 478.11 as follows:
ADJUDICATED AS A MENTAL DEFECTIVE
1. A determination by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority that a person, as a result of marked subnormal intelligence, or mental illness, incompetency, condition, or disease:
1. Is a danger to himself or to others; or
2. Lacks the mental capacity to contract or manage his own affairs.
2. The term shall include—
1. A finding of insanity by a court in a criminal case; and
2. Those persons found incompetent to stand trial or found not guilty by reason of lack of mental responsibility pursuant to articles 50a and 72b of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, 10 U.S.C. 850a, 876b.
COMMITTED TO A MENTAL INSTITUTION
This term means a formal commitment of a person to a mental institution by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority. The term includes a commitment to a mental institution involuntarily. The term also includes a commitment for mental defectiveness or mental illness, and commitments for other reasons such as for drug use. The term does not include a person in a mental institution for observation or any voluntary admission to a mental institution.
ATF has historically interpreted these provisions as constituting two distinct prohibitions. Each prohibition represents a separate disqualification. For example, a “commitment” means a formal commitment, not a voluntary stay. Excluded are stays for observation only. Nor does the term include a stay in a mental institution that never involved any form of adjudication by a lawful authority. However, a stay that began as a voluntary stay may be subsequently transformed into a disqualifying stay if a court, board, or other lawful authority makes a determination that the person is a danger to self or others. Moreover, a voluntary stay that is by itself not disabling could be later converted into a formal commitment and therefore be disabling.
For purposes of a Federal firearms disability, ATF interprets “adjudicated mental defective” to include anyone adjudicated to be a “danger to him or herself,” “a danger to others,” or lacking “the mental capacity to contract or manage their own affairs.” For purposes of Federal law, “danger” means any danger, not simply “imminent” or “substantial” danger as is often required to sustain an involuntary commitment under State law. Thus, for example, adjudication that a person was mentally ill and a danger to himself or others would result in Federal firearms disability, whether the court-ordered treatment was on an inpatient or outpatient basis. This is because the adjudication itself (a finding of danger due to mental illness) is sufficient to trigger the disability.
It should be emphasized that whatever adjudication procedure a State employs, the Constitution requires certain guarantees of due process. In order for a particular commitment order to qualify as a prohibiting commitment, ATF historically has required that traditional protections of due process be present, including adequate notice, an opportunity to respond, and a right to counsel. Such protections are important because whether a person has been adjudicated a mental defective or committed to a mental institution, the firearms disability is permanent.
We recognize that the procedures that result in a person being prohibited vary widely under State law and we encourage each of you to work closely with ATF to determine whether your statutory or regulatory mental health commitment or adjudication procedures under a particular set of facts might result in a determination that qualifies as a Federal prohibition.
We appreciate the interest that Federal, State, and local law enforcement and other stakeholders have in improving the enforcement of our nation’s firearms laws, and ATF stands ready to assist the States in improving their efforts to ensure information on disqualified persons is collected and provided to the NICS system. Questions or concerns about any of these issues may be directed to your local ATF field office.
Signed By Michael J. Sullivan
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The president should therefore call for several additions to the database: names on the terrorist watch list,
**The terrorist watch list is arbitrary, a useful tool, but the potential for abuse is there. The 2nd. is a core constitutional right, this suggestion is a deprivation of due process.
military recruits who fail drug tests and patients ordered to undergo mental-health treatment, if their doctor or family requests they be added.
**Someone pees hot for weed at 18. Do we prevent him/her from ever owning a gun for the rest of his/her life? As far as those ordered by a court for psych treatment, that's already covered under the current statute.
He should also demand that reluctant states supply court records on mentally incapacitated residents.
**If there has been a legal action placing someone into psych treatment, then the records should already be accessible.
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http://formerspook.blogspot.com/2011/01/schumers-ploy.html
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Schumer's Ploy
This was inevitable...
When investigators discovered that Arizona gunman Jared Lee Loughner had been rejected by the Army (because of admitted drug use), it was just a matter of time before some politician connected the dots: Hey, let's require military recruiters to report anyone with a history of drug abuse to other federal agencies!
Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), come on down. Earlier this week, Mr. Schumer proposed that federal officials who learn of an individual's illegal drug use must report that information to the FBI. The admission would then go into a federal database, and be used to deny the individual the right to purchase a gun.
From FoxNews.com:
Noting that the alleged shooter in the Tucson massacre had admitted to military recruiters that he had used drugs on several occasions, Schumer said he is proposing to the Justice Department and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that the military be required to to notify federal officials about such admissions. He said such a process does not require new legislation.
[snip]
Schumer said if military recruiters or other officials report admissions of drug use to a national database, those individuals could be denied a gun.
After Jared Loughner was interviewed by the military, he was rejected from the Army because of excessive drug use. Now by law, by law that's on the books, she should not have been allowed to buy a gun," Schumer told NBC.
"But the law doesn't require the military to notify the FBI about that and in this case they didn't. So I--this morning--I'm writing the administration and urging that be done and the military notify the FBI when someone is rejected from the military for excessive drug use and that be added to the FBI database."
Obviously, Schumer's "proposal" is little more than a thinly-veiled effort to restrict Second Amendment rights. But unfortunately, his suggestion may gain traction, given the fallout from the Tucson tragedy and the administration's own feelings on gun control. We can hear the arguments now: This is a reasonable proposal; it won't require any new laws and it might prevent a similar massacre in the future.
But even a cursory examination reveals that the Schumer suggestion is a horribly bad idea, on multiple levels. First, it places a undue burden on military recruiters, who talk to literally dozens of potential recruits during any given week. We're reasonably sure that Senator Schumer has no idea (read: doesn't care) how much work--and paperwork--is involved in processing a single person into the U.S. military.
Now, on top of all that effort, Schumer wants armed forces recruiters--who often work in a "one-deep" office, miles from the nearest military installation--to screen all of their contacts for illegal drug use and report it to the FBI. Memo to Mr. Schumer: in 21st Century America, most of the young men and women who express an interest in military service are ultimately rejected, for a variety of reasons. So, the recruiter must wade through his list of rejects, looking for individuals whose drug use might make them a future, crazed gunman.
Readers will also note that Senator Schumer didn't bother to define the level of illegal drug use that should be reported to the FBI. Why is that an issue? Because the U.S. military, thank God, has standards that are much tougher than society as a whole. By regulation, the armed services routinely reject applicants who fail a urinalysis test, or admit to the recreational use of marijuana (or other drugs) on more than 15 occasions. That's the way it should be. We don't want stoners (or drunks) handling classified information, or maintaining multi-billion dollar weapons systems.
But that doesn't necessarily mean those same individuals should be denied the right to own a gun. In many cases, that rejection by the military is a wake-up call, convincing young people to give up the weed or the booze and become responsible adults. Those individuals, with no arrest record or convictions on file, should not be penalized for what they told a military recruiter years ago. Under current laws, persons in that category are still eligible for gun ownership, and we see no reason to change.
Besides, the type of drug use in Lougher's case was not a clear predictor of his future rampage. We're guessing the marijuana didn't help, but no one can make the case that Lougher was pushed over the edge because of his drug use. Indeed, the type of activity that Lougher told the Army about is a misdemeanor offense in much of the country.
Ask yourself this question: Do we really need to create a national database of young people who have admitted to marijuana use, and send the FBI to pay them a visit--on the very remote chance they might buy a gun and go off the deep end? Personally, I'd rather see the FBI devote its resources to more important tasks, such as tracking down the thousands of individuals from terrorist havens who enter this country each year. That group poses a far greater menace than military rejects who admit to past recreational drug use and may choose to buy a gun some day.
Schumer's proposal creates civil liberties issues as well. Requiring military recruiters to report applicant's admitted drug use could be construed as a form of illegal domestic surveillance. There's also the matter of where the reporting might end. At some point, most recruits fill out a SF-86, which provides background information for their security clearance. Would Mr. Schumer like the military to hand over those as well? Compared to recruiter interview forms, the SF-86 is a veritable goldmine of information on past residences, associations and travels.
And while we're on that topic, what about notes from the Defense Investigative Service agents who interview the family and friends of those applying for a clearance? Did we mention that some of the claims made in those interviews are unsubstantiated? Now, imagine all that information making its way into a national database, accessible to legions of bureaucrats and available for all sorts of purposes. Gee, whatever happened to that supposed right to privacy that the left keeps harping about?
If it's any consolation, the Schumer proposal is still a ways from becoming a legal requirement. But don't discount that possibility, since it can be implemented without new legislation. Stroke of the pen, law of the land, as the Clintonistas used to say.
***
ADDENDUM: Hard-core libertarians and the folks at NORML should not interpret this as an endorsement of legalizing drugs. Far from it. We still support the "zero tolerance" policy of the U.S. military and wish the same standard could be applied to military recruits. Unfortunately, the armed services have elected to tolerate certain levels of recreational drug use among prospective enlistees, due to the widespread use of marijuana among those in the primary recruiting cohort (18-25 year-olds).
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It is POTB so caveat lector. That said, not a pretty set of facts. What implications?
======================================================
20 arrested in gun smuggling case
Federal authorities indict the men on charges of buying hundreds of weapons in Arizona and conspiring to sell them to drug cartels in Mexico.
A cache of weapons are seized in a federal sting. According to the indictment, legal gun dealers sold serveral weapons to a single buyer, often in one day. (Matt York, AP / January 24, 2011)
By Kim Murphy, Los Angeles Times
January 25, 2011, 8:48 p.m.
In a case aimed at stemming the flow of U.S. weapons to the Mexican drug war, federal authorities indicted 20 men Tuesday on charges of buying an estimated 700 weapons in Arizona and conspiring to transfer them across the border, chiefly to the Sinaloa drug cartel.
The arrests, carried out by at least 100 federal agents, began early Tuesday, the latest crackdown targeting an international trafficking network that authorities say has seen as many as 60,000 weapons seized in Mexico and traced to U.S. sources.
"The massive size of this operation sadly exemplifies the magnitude of the problem: Mexican drug lords go shopping for war weapons in Arizona," Dennis Burke, U.S. attorney in Arizona, said in a statement.
Officials at the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said the case demonstrates the need to include long-barreled weapons in the requirement for gun sellers to report multiple weapon sales to a single buyer. The proposal has been opposed by the National Rifle Assn. and many gun owners as an inappropriate reach of federal authority.
Gun advocates say many of the weapons in the hands of Mexican drug traffickers were acquired from weapons stocks officially supplied by the U.S. government to Mexico and other Latin American countries.
The case involves the relatively common use of "straw purchasers," legal residents of the state who buy the weapons from licensed gun dealers and certify that they are for their own use, but end up selling the guns to the drug cartels.
None of those charged in the indictments are licensed gun dealers. But the indictments identify a number of Arizona dealers that legally supplied large quantities of weapons to individual buyers, often in a single day.
One of the defendants, Uriel Patino, for example, purchased 26 AK-47 rifles from Lone Wolf Trading Co. in Glendale, Ariz., on March 26; 10 more on June 2 from the same outlet; 16 on July 8; and 12 on Aug. 5 — in addition to purchasing a number of other weapons.
In all these cases, according to the indictment, Patino signed a federal form certifying that he was not buying the weapons for someone else, a requirement that is prominently featured on Lone Wolf's website.
But on Aug. 8, federal agents found all 12 of the AK-47s purchased Aug. 5 concealed in a stove and a television in what was an apparent attempt to smuggle them into Mexico through the border crossing at Lukeville, Ariz.
A few months earlier, on Feb. 20, law enforcement agents intercepted an Isuzu Rodeo on the Tohono O'odham Nation territory in southeastern Arizona that was loaded with 37 AK-47s purchased by Patino between Jan. 15 and Feb. 13.
The federal firearms bureau announced in December that it was proposing to require an estimated 8,500 gun dealers along the southwestern U.S. border to provide notice of multiple rifle sales, but gun advocates have said it is an attempt to blame lawful gun dealers for border enforcement problems and the violence in Mexico.
"This is just a shallow excuse to engage in a sweeping firearms registration scheme," Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's chief executive and executive vice president, wrote on the organization's website.
Tom Mangan, spokesman for the firearms bureau in Phoenix, said officials are hopeful the regulation will go through.
"It's not prohibiting; it's not infringing upon a purchaser's right to buy guns," he said.
kim.murphy@latimes.com
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Well, there are already federal laws that cover straw purchases and the export of weapons and it appears the BATFE is working those cases. Perhaps Mexico should secure it's border.....
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Notably missing in the State of the Union was any new attack on gun ownership. Still the questions posed in this thread are important. Pro-gun people should address the issue of making it more difficult for the known mentally disturbed to buy and carry. GM points out that those with court ordered psych treatments are already covered. There are gaps though if this Tucson nutcase could walk in and load up considering what everyone around him knew. I don't know the answer regarding privacy of mental records or the civil commitment process which is nearly impossible before a threat becomes reality, but fewer mass shootings would be good politics for gun ownership.
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Psychiatric illness is a tough thing to determine.
It is often particularly tough to determine who is a threat and who isn't.
Probably one out of three people in the US are or have been on some psyschiatric med at some point in their lives.
OFten psychiatrists do no more than ask someone if they are a danger to their self or someone else.
If they don't see obvious psychotic behavior or thinking they then simply rely on the person's saying yes or no.
This Az guy's case is somewhat extreme with multiple people expressing concerns, the school, many witnesses, even the police were notified.
In retrospect it seems more might have been done but by whom? Az apparantly does allow for someone to be hopitalized against their will without obvious/overt suicidal/homicidal intent.
In most states this person could not without consent have even been committed.
Should we force medicate people who are deemed psychotic?
The very vast majority ofr mentally ill, including psychotics are no "danger" to others except perhaps in screwing up not only their lives but those of family members.
Personally I favor just accepting the fact that there are occasionally nuts who will find a way to get guns and who will shoot people.
I prefer this vs a police state for anyone with a mental illness.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70C6JQ20110113
Jan 13 (Reuters Legal) - As evidence mounts that Jared Lee Loughner exhibited disturbing behavior months before the rampage in Tucson, it's increasingly clear that Arizona authorities could legally have detained him for psychiatric evaluation and treatment -- and potentially have been able to avert the tragedy. But officials in other states might not have had that power, a review of state laws on involuntary commitment suggests.
Arizona has one of the least restrictive laws when it comes to detaining apparently mentally ill people against their will. Under the state's broad involuntary-commitment statute, the government can mandate in-patient treatment for anyone determined to be "persistently or acutely disabled." That could include a broad range of seemingly troubled individuals. By comparison, many other states limit involuntary commitment only to people shown to be a danger to themselves or others, or who are found to be completely unable to take care of themselves.
Under Nevada's involuntary-commitment law, for example, prior to confining someone the state must demonstrate that the person "is mentally ill and, because of that illness, is likely to harm himself or others if allowed his liberty." In Connecticut, someone can be committed only if he or she has "psychiatric disabilities and is dangerous to himself or herself or others or gravely disabled" -- and "gravely disabled" has usually been interpreted to mean that the person is unable on his own to obtain adequate food, shelter and clothing. Under those standards, some mental-health law experts say it might have been hard to make a case for committing Loughner.
"I've never read about him threatening anyone or brandishing a gun," said Jonathan Stanley, a board member of Treatment Advocacy Center, a nonprofit organization that lobbies for the treatment of severe mental illnesses. "He was pretty creepy, and that's not grounds for commitment in the strict states."
ARIZONA GOES FARTHER
Arizona also goes farther than many other states in defining who may initiate involuntary-commitment proceedings. In Arizona, virtually anyone who had suspected that Loughner had mental problems and needed help could have filed an application to a state-licensed healthcare agency for a court-ordered evaluation. Some states require that the application be initiated by someone close to the troubled person, among other discrete categories.
Loughner's behavior had caused serious concern among students and faculty at Pima Community College where he was a student. Police documents released on Wednesday show that some even feared for their safety, according to reports in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. A professor requested that a campus-security officer be on guard outside one of Loughner's classes. One student told school officials she was scared Loughner had a knife after he made disturbing comments in a poetry class such as, "why don't we just strap bombs to babies."
The area of involuntary-commitment law highlights a tension within any democracy: balancing the rights of the individual against public-safety concerns. A landmark 1979 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, Addington v. Texas, made it harder for the government to commit people against their will, requiring officials to justify any such detention with "clear and convincing" evidence. Earlier, the standard had been a "preponderance of the evidence," which is used in most civil cases.
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I think everyone might agree with this CCP statement: "I prefer this vs a police state for anyone with a mental illness".
In my mind there has to be something in between.
GM's Reuters post makes the point that Arizona more than most states could have attempted civil commitment on this shooter. Prior to the shooting I'm not sure anyone knew commitment was necessary. He was an adult somewhat in the care of his parents, he made an attempt at college, sort of had friends. Yet he did have school, friends, family and police all notice a serious level of anti-social incoherence setting in.
CCP wrote: "Probably one out of three people in the US are or have been on some psychiatric med at some point in their lives."
Probably about right from things I have also read. Yet there are ways to categorize the type, severity and risk level further I think to where we are talking about a much smaller number of people.
I know someone close to me who suffers from schizophrenia. I would say no risk posed to others on or off the meds in this case, but I would also be okay with his/her loss of gun purchase rights in the battle with mental illness in exchange for having others with high risk face limits that might prevent one of these tragedies. Also I am very familiar with person(s) suffering from Bipolar/Manic Depression and Munchausen by Proxy (harm your baby to bring attention or importance to yourself). If anyone has ever threatened or attempted suicide or murder/suicide I would think that a lifetime restriction on firearms would be reasonable, not a violation of anyone's 2nd amendment rights or necessarily lead to a police state against the liberties of people with mental illness. To the contrary, having some level of safety and protection is IMO part of a system of how we can continue gun ownership and carry rights, and how we can avoid institutionalizing the functioning mentally ill among us against their will.
If you need to wear contacts to read the eye chart, that gets on your license for any future law enforcement encounter to discover. If your doctor knows you are one medication away from potentially dangerous psychopathic behavior, why can't that be tracked in a somewhat confidential way.
I guess I am saying if there is no way to mark someone and limit their arms purchases after they have had school, friends, family and police all notice he/she has checked out from reality, then I would like to be spared the big ordeal after each shooting of wondering what made them do it, were there any signs, and how could this have been prevented.
It is a risky world, defend yourself? Tell that to the 9 year old.
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There is no absolute safety, no matter what policy is implemented. As with other policies, it's a matter of balancing individual freedoms with public safety.
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Woof,
The gun ban crowd has any number of strategies for infringing on gun rights, from out right bans to incremental restrictions that remove more and more citizens from the group that can own guns. It's already illegal for a confirmed nut to buy or own a gun. If we start going down the road of widening that then it won't be long before anyone that takes a sleeping pill or ever took a sleeping pill or tells a doctor he doesn't sleep well, won't be able to buy or own a gun. This is a can of worms that the gun banners can't wait to open AND NONE OF IT WILL PREVENT A NUT FROM KILLING SOMEONE.
P.C.
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Doug noted on another thread the conspicuous absence of any mention of guns by Obama in the SOTU address. He is right in calling his address just a bunch of "head fakes".
Well of course here it comes. I think obvious it will be known as the *"Gifford" bill*. The Democarts simply cannot resist an opportunity to jump in and claim they are fixing every single minute ill with mankind with more regulation, more tax, more control.
****White House to Push Gun Control
Obama intentionally did not mention gun control in his State of the Union, but aides say that in the next two weeks the administration will unveil a campaign to get Congress to toughen existing laws.
Evan Vucci / AP
Arizona Congressmen Jeff Flake (left) and Raul Grijalva sit next to the empty seat of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Capitol Hill before President Obama's recent State of the Union address.
At the beginning of his State of the Union address, President Obama tipped his hat to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who’s now recuperating in a Houston medical facility. But throughout the hourlong speech, he never addressed the issue at the core of the Giffords tragedy—gun control—and what lawmakers would, or should, do to reform American firearm-access laws.
That was intentional, according to the White House. An administration official says Obama didn’t mention guns in his speech because of the omnipresent controversy surrounding the Second Amendment and gun control. Tuesday’s speech was designed to be more about the economy and how, as Obama repeated nine times, the U.S. could “win the future.”
But in the next two weeks, the White House will unveil a new gun-control effort in which it will urge Congress to strengthen current laws, which now allow some mentally unstable people, such as alleged Arizona shooter Jared Loughner, to obtain certain assault weapons, in some cases without even a background check.
Tuesday night after the speech, Obama adviser David Plouffe said to NBC News that the president would not let the moment after the Arizona shootings pass without pushing for some change in the law, to prevent another similar incident. “It’s a very important issue, and one I know there’s going to be debate about on the Hill.”
The White House said that to avoid being accused of capitalizing on the Arizona shootings for political gain, Obama will address the gun issue in a separate speech, likely early next month. He’s also expected to use Arizona as a starting point, but make the case that America’s gun laws have been too loose for much longer than just the past few weeks.
As the White House prepares its strategy, several gun-policy groups are saying they were burned by the lack of any mention of guns in the president’s highest-profile speech of the year. “President Obama tonight failed to challenge old assumptions on the need for, and political possibilities of, reducing the gun violence—which he suggested should be done two weeks ago in Tucson,” said Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the nation’s largest gun-safety group. No group said it had been consulted by the White House regarding legislative suggestions.
Meanwhile, the National Rifle Association has stayed largely silent following the Arizona shootings. Asked about a specialized White House effort on guns, a spokesman for the powerful gun lobby declined to comment.****
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Good. This will not pass, and continue to alienate blue dog dems.
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Woof,
Is it just me or would this guy make a great first dictator of the United States?
www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41358714/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts
P.C.
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Did they purchase salt and soft drinks in AZ as well? :-o
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Woof,
Isn't this one arrogant piece of crap elitist politician? And the fact that he keeps an (R) by his name, almost pushes me to the point of chewing off my little toe. What a complete tool. I honestly don't understand how anyone Left, Right, or plays with their own feces could ever bring themselves to cast a vote for someone so completely devoid of respect for the fellow citizenry in other states to govern themselves. If I lived in AZ I would go to New York and take a dump on this guy's throne.
P.C.
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Were I a NYC resident, I'd be more concerned about things like the clearance of snow from the streets.....
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Woof,
No kidding, and if I was paying taxes in NY I would be wondering if he was wasting my tax dollars doing this stuff, I mean just the waste of time involved would make me angry. I bet the ATF doesn't like him under cutting them either. I think this is a fairly clear case of someone abusing the power of their office to promote a personal agenda. How would New Yorkers feel if the governor of AZ set up stings in NY to catch the dealers and drug users that buy the drugs that are smuggled into AZ?
P.C.
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http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2007/02/us_attorneys_sl.php
US Attorneys slap down Bloomberg
Posted by David Hardy · 8 February 2007 03:39 PM
VCDL has the report.The Exec Office of US Attorneys informs the mayor that they will not prosecute any of the dealers he targeted, and warns that his engaging in "stings" without law enforcement authorization could jeopardize real operations and expose him and the city to liability.
The latter is pretty apparent. The dealers would have the defense that they didn't realize that the gun was going to the person who didn't sign the forms, but the buyers have no such defense -- they knew exactly that that was the plan. So there's no doubt that the buyers broke the Gun Control Act, and that those who set them to it were liable as aiders and abettors, not to mention on a conspiracy theory. I'd assume that Bloomberg and company (1) figured it was worth it for the publicity and (2) figured that the laws don't apply to the rich and powerful. They may just have been right on both.
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Woof,
I still think the AZ Gov. should go to New York and do stings on businesses and individals that hire illegal aliens of the grounds that what they are doing in New York impacts the safety and security of AZ. :-P
P.C.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=OQnU1t7UzgM
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http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=OQnU1t7UzgM
One of the many reasons I love this country!
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http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20110203,0,6169639.story
Guns tracked by firearms bureau found at firefight scene
Two AK-47s bought in Arizona were used in a firefight that left a Border Patrol agent dead last month. The discovery comes amid a growing congressional investigation into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
____________________________________________________________________
http://www.startribune.com/nation/114980294.html?elr=KArksLckD8EQDUoaEyqyP4O:DW3ckUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUvDEhiaE3miUsZ
PHOENIX - A U.S. senator is examining a claim that two guns sold in purchases sanctioned by federal firearms agents were later used in a December shootout that left a Border Patrol agent dead near the Arizona-Mexico border.
Republican Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa said in a letter provided Monday to The Associated Press he had received information that appears to partially corroborate the claim received by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee about the guns.
"Members of the Judiciary Committee have received numerous allegations that the ATF sanctioned the sale of hundreds of assault weapons to suspected straw buyers, who then allegedly transported these weapons throughout the Southwest border area and into Mexico," reads a letter sent Thursday from Grassley to Kenneth Melson, acting director of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
The letter does not elaborate on the role possible of federal agents in the sale of the guns, and it could not be determined if the purchases were part of a sting operation.
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http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/illinois/article_5e279c3c-3856-54b6-bea8-87de914a45fa.html
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But what of the crime-free paradise gun control laws have made in Chicago?
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"[A]fter every multiple murder, liberals come up with some crackpot idea to 'do something' that invariably involves infringing on some aspect of our Second Amendment rights. ... In an open society that includes Sheriff Dumbnik and the ACLU, deranged individuals may explode into murder and mayhem now and then. The best we can do is enact policies that will reduce the death toll when these acts of carnage occur. There's only one policy of any kind that has ever been shown to deter mass murder: concealed-carry laws. In a comprehensive study of all public, multiple-shooting incidents in America between 1977 and 1999, the highly regarded economists John Lott and Bill Landes found that concealed-carry laws were the only laws that had any beneficial effect. And the effect was not small. States that allowed citizens to carry concealed handguns reduced multiple-shooting attacks by 60 percent and reduced the death and injury from these attacks by nearly 80 percent. When there are no armed citizens to stop mass murderers, the killers are able to shoot unabated, even pausing to reload their weapons, until they get bored and stop. ... Consider just the school shootings -- popular sites for mass murder because so many schools are 'gun-free zones.' Or, as mass murderers call them, 'free-fire zones.'" --columnist Ann Coulter
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One psychiatrist agreed with me on two things:
1) It is very difficult to predict someone's future behavior with regards to violence. Like one forensic psychiatrist told me years ago most of the "criminally" insane could be released without them ever being a danger. Yet determining who is the one that will go on a rampage and hurt someone and the majority who don't is very hard.
2) People with personality disorders who lack conscious are in general much more dangerous than those who are schizophrenic or delusional.
The latter are usually unable to have the organzied thinking capacity to plan a murder ahead of time - though not impossible. The former are quite capable of planning to kill someone and appear totally "normal".
****Giffords Shooting Raises Questions About Guns and Mental IllnessJan 11, 2011 – 7:39 PM
Andrea Stone
Senior Washington Correspondent
WASHINGTON -- It takes a lot to be considered too crazy to own a gun in Arizona.
As authorities investigate the mass shooting that killed six people and left Rep. Gabrielle Giffords critically wounded, it appears clear that a growing list of troubling warning signs would not have prohibited suspect Jared Loughner from buying the Glock 19 semiautomatic pistol he is accused of using in the attack.
Gun-control advocates say the 22-year-old Loughner was technically within his rights to buy the weapon. And that's why they say stricter background checks and a new strategy for keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally ill is needed.
Karen Bleier, AFP / Getty Images
Gun-control advocates say the country needs a better way to ensure that mentally disturbed people and drug users cannot buy firearms."He was dangerous enough to get kicked out of algebra class, but that's not enough to get him disqualified from buying a gun," said Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. "Something is wrong with that system."
Despite ample warning signs that Loughner may have been mentally ill -- including behavior unsettling enough to get him kicked out of Pima Community College -- the suspect was eligible to buy and possess a gun.
Under the federal Gun Control Act of 1968, it is illegal for people to possess a firearm if they have "been adjudicated as a mental defective" or "been committed to a mental institution."
Neither applied to Loughner.
The federal law also bars drug users from owning a gun.
Yet a 2007 charge for possession of drug paraphernalia was expunged from court records after Loughner completed a diversion program. When he later tried to enlist in the Army he was turned down, according to Time magazine, for admitting that he used marijuana frequently.
Those facts did not show up in the federal database that cleared Loughner to buy the handgun at a Tucson, Ariz., store on Nov. 30, authorities say.
Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association, would not answer AOL News' questions about whether existing gun laws provide enough safeguards to prevent mentally ill people from purchasing firearms.
"At this time, anything other than prayers for the victims and their families would be inappropriate," he said in an e-mail.
But gun-control advocates say it is past time to speak out.
"Just enforcing the laws on the books isn't enough," Helmke said. "We need a stronger definition that covers somebody like this guy."
What that definition might be is complicated.
"This is a tough problem. It requires balancing of so many competing interests and imperatives," writes Jill Lawrence of Politics Daily. Among them: "gun and privacy rights versus a system that prevents weapons sales to unstable people."
For now, that latter priority is taking center stage. New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who heads Mayors Against Illegal Guns, called today for "commonsense fixes to some of our broken gun laws." Among them: tougher background checks to prevent drug abusers from getting around the system.
Other elected officials from New York, home to some of the nation's toughest gun-control laws, also are proposing measures. Republican Rep. Peter King plans to introduce a bill to make it illegal to bring a gun within 1,000 feet of a government official. Democrat Rep. Carolyn McCarthy wants to restrict the sale of high-capacity ammunition clips like those used in Saturday's deadly shooting.
Yet as the newly revived debate over gun control heats up, advocates say a top priority is to keep weapons out of the hands of the dangerously unbalanced.
"Everyone and his mother knew this kid was severely deranged," said Ladd Everitt of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, citing Loughner's run-ins with police and school officials.
He noted that a Google search would have been more effective than looking in the federal government's database because it would have turned up Loughner's now-removed MySpace post last month in which he wrote, "I don't feel good: I'm ready to kill a police officer!"
Arizona law allows anyone to petition the court for a psychiatric evaluation of a person who is acting strangely and is suspected of being a danger to himself or others. Despite concerns about Loughner, no one went to court.
The state's weak gun laws require only the most perfunctory background check and no permit. Had Loughner tried to buy a gun in New York, for instance, he would have had to undergo a licensing check by law enforcement officials. That might have uncovered online clues to his mental state as well as his problems at the Army recruiting office and school.
Helmke urged Congress to hold hearings to explore how federal background checks can pick up potentially dangerous people who don't fall within the narrow range of prohibited gun owners. He noted that states improved their reporting systems after the 2007 massacre at Virginia Tech by a man adjudicated as mentally ill whose record didn't show up in the federal database.
Since 2008, the names of nearly 1.1 million people disqualified from possessing firearms because of mental illness have been added to the federal system. Another 2 million names are still awaiting entry into the database.
At the time of the Virginia Tech shooting, Arizona had not submitted any mental health records to the federal government, according to government records. It has since listed 4,465 Arizonans and estimates there are nearly 122,000 others who still are not in the system.
Sponsored LinksYet even with better record-keeping since Virginia Tech, there have been several cases of accused killers with a history of mental illness who bought their weapons legally.
"Maybe crazy people will do crazy things," Virginia Tech survivor and gun-control activist Colin Goddard writes in a column for AOL News. "But why, I ask my country, my president, my representatives in Congress, why do we make it so damned easy?"
The answers aren't easy, said Michael Stone, a Columbia University forensic psychiatrist unrelated to this writer. Short of "preventive detention" for those who act strangely but don't break any laws, only the "extremely delusional and bizarre" can be stopped from obtaining firearms.
"It's very difficult to prevent a paranoid person from buying a gun who is able to present himself in a rational and coherent manner, as many are able to do," he said.****
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Woof,
Well, then the answer is obvious, human beings are just too unpredictable to have guns, so all guns should be banned. I mean come on it's plain as day. Actually, since people can kill using almost anything they can get their opposable thumb around, I think the ultimate solution is to just cut off everyone's thumbs at birth. A reasonable law like that shouldn't bother any sane person.
P.C.
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Don't give the left any ideas, P.C.
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Woof,
I guess your right, since they don't think a viable fetus is a human being with a right to life, they'll do me one better and just go snip snip, off with the thumbs in the womb, that way they won't have to hear any crying and they don't have to worry about the second amendment as well. That would be very reasonable by their thinking. :-P
P.C.
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By Scott Stewart
For several years now, STRATFOR has been closely watching developments in Mexico that relate to what we consider the three wars being waged there. Those three wars are the war between the various drug cartels, the war between the government and the cartels and the war being waged against citizens and businesses by criminals.
In addition to watching tactical developments of the cartel wars on the ground and studying the dynamics of the conflict among the various warring factions, we have also been paying close attention to the ways that both the Mexican and U.S. governments have reacted to these developments. Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects to watch has been the way in which the Mexican government has tried to deflect responsibility for the cartel wars away from itself and onto the United States. According to the Mexican government, the cartel wars are not a result of corruption in Mexico or of economic and societal dynamics that leave many Mexicans marginalized and desperate to find a way to make a living. Instead, the cartel wars are due to the insatiable American appetite for narcotics and the endless stream of guns that flows from the United States into Mexico and that results in Mexican violence.
Interestingly, the part of this argument pertaining to guns has been adopted by many politicians and government officials in the United States in recent years. It has now become quite common to hear U.S. officials confidently assert that 90 percent of the weapons used by the Mexican drug cartels come from the United States. However, a close examination of the dynamics of the cartel wars in Mexico — and of how the oft-echoed 90 percent number was reached — clearly demonstrates that the number is more political rhetoric than empirical fact.
By the Numbers
As we discussed in a previous analysis, the 90 percent number was derived from a June 2009 U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report to Congress on U.S. efforts to combat arms trafficking to Mexico (see external link).
According to the GAO report, some 30,000 firearms were seized from criminals by Mexican authorities in 2008. Of these 30,000 firearms, information pertaining to 7,200 of them (24 percent) was submitted to the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) for tracing. Of these 7,200 guns, only about 4,000 could be traced by the ATF, and of these 4,000, some 3,480 (87 percent) were shown to have come from the United States.
This means that the 87 percent figure relates to the number of weapons submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF that could be successfully traced and not from the total number of weapons seized by Mexican authorities or even from the total number of weapons submitted to the ATF for tracing. In fact, the 3,480 guns positively traced to the United States equals less than 12 percent of the total arms seized in Mexico in 2008 and less than 48 percent of all those submitted by the Mexican government to the ATF for tracing. This means that almost 90 percent of the guns seized in Mexico in 2008 were not traced back to the United States.
The remaining 22,800 firearms seized by Mexican authorities in 2008 were not traced for a variety of reasons. In addition to factors such as bureaucratic barriers and negligence, many of the weapons seized by Mexican authorities either do not bear serial numbers or have had their serial numbers altered or obliterated. It is also important to understand that the Mexican authorities simply don’t bother to submit some classes of weapons to the ATF for tracing. Such weapons include firearms they identify as coming from their own military or police forces, or guns that they can trace back themselves as being sold through the Mexican Defense Department’s Arms and Ammunition Marketing Division (UCAM). Likewise, they do not ask ATF to trace military ordnance from third countries like the South Korean fragmentation grenades commonly used in cartel attacks.
Of course, some or even many of the 22,800 firearms the Mexicans did not submit to ATF for tracing may have originated in the United States. But according to the figures presented by the GAO, there is no evidence to support the assertion that 90 percent of the guns used by the Mexican cartels come from the United States — especially when not even 50 percent of those that were submitted for tracing were ultimately found to be of U.S. origin.
This point leads us to consider the types of weapons being used by the Mexican cartels and where they come from.
Types and Sources of Guns
To gain an understanding of the dynamics of the gun flow inside Mexico, it helps if one divides the guns seized by Mexican authorities from criminals into three broad categories — which, incidentally, just happen to represent three different sources.
Type 1: Guns Legally Available in Mexico
The first category of weapons encountered in Mexico is weapons available legally for sale in Mexico through UCAM. These include handguns smaller than a .357 magnum such as .380, .38 Super and .38 Special.
A large portion of this first type of guns used by criminals is purchased in Mexico, or stolen from their legitimate owners. While UCAM does have very strict regulations for civilians to purchase guns, criminals will use straw purchasers to obtain firearms from UCAM or obtain them from corrupt officials. It is not uncommon to see .38 Super pistols seized from cartel figures (a caliber that is not popular in the United States), and many of these pistols are of Mexican origin. Likewise, cartel hit men in Mexico commonly use .380 pistols equipped with sound suppressors in their assassinations. In many cases, these pistols are purchased in Mexico, the suppressors are locally manufactured and the guns are adapted to receive the suppressors by Mexican gunsmiths.
It must be noted, though, that because of the cost and hassle of purchasing guns in Mexico, many of the guns in this category are purchased in the United States and smuggled into the country. There are a lot of cheap guns available on the U.S. market, and they can be sold at a premium in Mexico. Indeed, guns in this category, such as .380 pistols and .22-caliber rifles and pistols, are among the guns most commonly traced back to the United States. Still, the numbers do not indicate that 90 percent of guns in this category come from the United States.
Additionally, most of the explosives the cartels have been using in improvised explosive devices (IEDs) in Mexico over the past year have used commercially available Tovex, so we consider these explosives to fall in this first category. Mexican IEDs are another area where the rhetoric has been interesting to analyze, but we will explore this topic another time.
Type 2: Guns Legally Available in the U.S. but Not in Mexico
Many popular handgun calibers, such as 9 mm, .45 and .40, are reserved for the military and police and are not available for sale to civilians in Mexico. These guns, which are legally sold and very popular in the United States, comprise our second category, which also includes .50-caliber rifles, semiautomatic versions of assault rifles like the AK-47 and M16 and the FN Five-Seven pistol.
When we consider this second type of guns, a large number of them encountered in Mexico are likely purchased in the United States. Indeed, the GAO report notes that many of the guns most commonly traced back to the United States fall into this category. There are also many .45-caliber and 9 mm semiautomatic pistols and .357 revolvers obtained from deserters from the Mexican military and police, purchased from corrupt Mexican authorities or even brought in from South America (guns made by manufacturers such as Taurus and Bersa). This category also includes semiautomatic variants of assault rifles and main battle rifles, which are often converted by Mexican gunsmiths to be capable of fully automatic fire.
One can buy these types of weapons on the international arms market, but one pays a premium for such guns and it is cheaper and easier to simply buy them in the United States or South America and smuggle them into Mexico. In fact, there is an entire cottage industry that has developed to smuggle such weapons, and not all the customers are cartel hit men. There are many Mexican citizens who own guns in calibers such as .45, 9 mm, .40 and .44 magnum for self-defense — even though such guns are illegal in Mexico.
Type 3: Guns Not Available for Civilian Purchase in Mexico or the U.S.
The third category of weapons encountered in Mexico is military grade ordnance not generally available for sale in the United States or Mexico. This category includes hand grenades, 40 mm grenades, rocket-propelled grenades, automatic assault rifles and main battle rifles and light machine guns.
This third type of weapon is fairly difficult and very expensive to obtain in the United States (especially in the large numbers in which the cartels are employing them). They are also dangerous to obtain in the United States due to heavy law-enforcement scrutiny. Therefore, most of the military ordnance used by the Mexican cartels comes from other sources, such as the international arms market (increasingly from China via the same networks that furnish precursor chemicals for narcotics manufacturing), or from corrupt elements in the Mexican military or even deserters who take their weapons with them. Besides, items such as South Korean fragmentation grenades and RPG-7s, often used by the cartels, simply are not in the U.S. arsenal. This means that very few of the weapons in this category come from the United States.
In recent years the cartels (especially their enforcer groups such as Los Zetas, Gente Nueva and La Linea) have been increasingly using military weaponry instead of sporting arms. A close examination of the arms seized from the enforcer groups and their training camps clearly demonstrates this trend toward military ordnance, including many weapons not readily available in the United States. Some of these seizures have included M60 machine guns and hundreds of 40 mm grenades obtained from the military arsenals of countries like Guatemala.
But Guatemala is not the only source of such weapons. Latin America is awash in weapons that were shipped there over the past several decades to supply the various insurgencies and counterinsurgencies in the region. When these military-grade weapons are combined with the rampant corruption in the region, they quickly find their way into the black arms market. The Mexican cartels have supply-chain contacts that help move narcotics to Mexico from South America and they are able to use this same network to obtain guns from the black market in South and Central America and then smuggle them into Mexico. While there are many weapons in this category that were manufactured in the United States, the overwhelming majority of the U.S.-manufactured weapons of this third type encountered in Mexico — like LAW rockets and M60 machine guns — come into Mexico from third countries and not directly from the United States.
There are also some cases of overlap between classes of weapons. For example, the FN Five-Seven pistol is available for commercial purchase in the United States, but the 5.7x28 armor-piercing ammunition for the pistol favored by the cartels is not — it is a restricted item. However, some of the special operations forces units in the Mexican military are issued the Five-Seven as well as the FN P90 personal defense weapon, which also shoots the 5.7x28 round, and the cartels are obtaining some of these weapons and the armor-piercing ammunition from them and not from the United States. Conversely, we see bulk 5.56 mm and 7.62 mm ammunition bought in the United States and smuggled into Mexico, where it is used in fully-automatic AK-47s and M16s purchased elsewhere. As noted above, China has become an increasingly common source for military weapons like grenades and fully automatic assault rifles in recent years.
To really understand Mexico’s gun problem, however, it is necessary to recognize that the same economic law of supply and demand that fuels drug smuggling into the United States also fuels gun smuggling into Mexico. Black-market guns in Mexico can fetch up to 300 percent of their normal purchase price — a profit margin rivaling the narcotics the cartels sell. Even if it were somehow possible to hermetically seal the U.S.-Mexico border and shut off all the guns coming from the United States, the cartels would still be able to obtain weapons elsewhere — just as narcotics would continue to flow into the United States from other places. The United States does provide cheap and easy access to certain types of weapons and ammunition, but as demonstrated by groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, weapons can be easily obtained from other sources via the black arms market — albeit at a higher price.
There has clearly been a long and well-documented history of arms smuggling across the U.S.-Mexico border, but it is important to recognize that, while the United States is a significant source of certain classes of weapons and ammunition, it is by no means the source of 90 percent of the weapons used by the Mexican cartels, as is commonly asserted.
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Nice. Scott Stewart does outstanding work.
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Ann Coulter has one thing right. The Tucson shooting needed one conceal carry citizen to emerge sooner. Concealed carry was legal there which is why the shooter was saying good bye before he started. A suicidal, certifiable nut, whatever the medical or legal term may be.
Concealed carry resurgence has been a great trend both for safety and a symbol of retaining one founding right and a seriousness about keeping the rest.
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PC wrote previously: "It's already illegal for a confirmed nut to buy or own a gun."
What I want is for that one safeguard only to happen. If you qualify for the insanity plea for example, we need to know that sooner whenever possible.
I oppose fetal thumb or trigger finger removal. :-)
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http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/03/03/eveningnews/main20039031.shtml
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http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=7357550n&tag=related;photovideo
BATF let 2,500 guns "walk" into Mexico, including many AKs and some 50 calibers! :-o :-o :-o The cynical amongst us might even wonder if at some level there were Machiavellian machinations involved with an eye towards restricting US gun rights.
=====================
The Honorable Eric H. Holder, Jr.
Attorney General
U.S. Department of Justice
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20530
Dear Attorney General Holder:
I appreciate the staff briefing that Department of Justice (DOJ) and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) officials provided on February 10, 2011. However, the briefers focused on general issues related to challenges in successfully prosecuting gun trafficking cases. They refused to answer specific questions about the facts and circumstances that led me to request the briefing.
Specifically, they refused to say whether the approximately 103 weapons seized according to the Jaime Avila indictment were the only seizures related to the nearly 770 weapons mentioned in the indictment. They refused to say whether the third assault rifle purchased by Avila in January 2010—the one not found at the scene of CBP Agent Brian Terry’s shooting—has been recovered elsewhere. When asked whether ATF had encouraged any gun dealer to proceed with sales to known or suspected traffickers such as Avila, the briefers said only that they did not have any “personal knowledge” of that.
Therefore, please provide the following documents to the Committee:
1) All records relating to communications between the ATF and the Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL) who sold the weapons to Avila, including any Report of Investigation (ROI) or other records relating to the December 17, 2009 meeting “to discuss his role as an FFL during this investigation.”
2) All records relating to communications between ATF headquarters and Phoenix Special Agent in Charge (SAC) William Newell from December 1, 2010 to the present, including a memorandum, approximately 30 pages long, from SAC Newell to ATF headquarters following the arrest of Jaime Avila and the death of CBP Agent Brian Terry.
3) A copy of the presentation, approximately 200 pages long, that the Group 7 Supervisor made to officials at ATF Headquarters in the Spring of 2010.
PAGE 2
4) Copies of all e-mails related to Operation Fast and Furious, the Jaime Avila case, or the death of CBP Agent Brian Terry sent to or from SAC Newell, Assistant Special Agent in Charge (ASAC) George Gillette, Group 7 Supervisor, or the Case Agent between November 1, 2009 and January 31, 2011.
Please provide documents in batches on a rolling basis as they are identified and located. Also, please prioritize your search for documents and produce them in the following order: (1) documents in response to requests one through three, (2) documents in response to request four dated between December 13, 2010 and January 31, 2011, and (3) documents in response to request four dated between November 1, 2009 and December 13, 2010.
I look forward to receiving your response. Please provide the first set of requested documentation by no later than February 23, 2011. If you have any questions please contact Jason Foster or Brian Downey at ..... All formal correspondence should be sent electronically in PDF format to Brian_Downey@judiciary-rep.senate.gov or via facsimile to.....
Sincerely,
Charles E. Grassley
Ranking Member
cc: The Honorable Patrick Leahy, Chairman, United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
The Honorable Robert S. Mueller, III, Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation
Kenneth E. Melson, Acting Director, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives
The Honorable Alan D. Bersin, Commissioner, United States Customs and Border Protection
==================
Public Information Officers:
Please make every effort for the next two weeks to maximize coverage of ATF operations/enforcement actions/arrests at the local and regional level. Given the negative coverage by CBS Evening News last week and upcoming events this week, the bureau should look for every opportunity to push coverage of good stories. Fortunately, the CBS story has not sparked any follow up coverage by mainstream media and seems to have fizzled.
It was shoddy reporting, as CBS failed to air on-the-record interviews by former ATF officials and HQ statements for attribution that expressed opposing views and explained the law and difficulties of firearm trafficking investigations. The CBS producer for the story made only a feigned effort at the 11th hour to reach ATF HQ for comment.
This week (To 3/1/2011), Attorney General Holder testifies on the Hill and likely will get questions about the allegations in the story. Also (The 3/3/2011), Mexico President Calderon will visit the White House and likely will testify on the Hill. He will probably draw attention to the lack of political support for demand letter 3 and Project Gunrunner.
ATF needs to proactively push positive stories this week, in an effort to preempt some negative reporting, or at minimum, lessen the coverage of such stories in the news cycle by replacing them with good stories about ATF. The more time we spend highlighting the great work of the agents through press releases and various media outreaches in the coming days and weeks, the better off we will be.
Thanks for your cooperation in this matter. If you have any significant operations that should get national media coverage, please reach out to the Public Affairs Division for support, coordination and clearance.
Thank you,
Scot L. Thomasson
Chief, ATF Public Affairs Division
Washington, DC
Desk 202-648-7089
Cell 206-730-0005
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http://tucsoncitizen.com/view-from-baja-arizona/2011/02/24/more-calls-for-an-investigation-into-atfs-project-gunrunner-scandal/
BTW, amongst the many questions raised here, I wonder why the gun in question was dropped at the scene? Isn't that rather odd? Why were the illegals arrested at the scene of Agent Terry's killing deported instead of being held as material witnesses or more serious charges?
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http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/03/08/eveningnews/main20040803.shtml
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20040189-503544.html
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This makes no sense. Exactly what intel would be gained from an extended operation like this???
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Well, those of who believe in the will of Baraq and his minions to Machiavellian machinations, might suspect they are looking to create a crisis from which they can take advantage; that they will seek to leverage their campaign against American gun rights by creating a treaty with Mexico and/or the UN. OTOH others of us might simply believe in the remarkable capabilities of government, espeically the BATFE, for stupidity.
Both sides have ample raw material for their suspicions.
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Grassley Requests Investigation of ATF’s Fast and Furious Policy be Removed from the Justice Department Inspector General
WASHINGTON – Senator Chuck Grassley today said that he did not have confidence that the Justice Department Inspector General’s office could produce a report that the public would view as frank and unbiased in its investigation of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) policy of letting guns “walk” along the Southwest border—a policy that may have contributed to the death of a U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent.
In a letter today to Kevin Perkins, the head of the Integrity Committee of the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, Grassley cited several conflicts that lead him to believe that the Office of the Inspector General at the Department of Justice cannot be seen as completely disinterested and independent.
“There are certainly better and more independent ways to conduct this investigation. To have an acting Inspector General’s office lead an investigation like this one just won’t pass the smell test,” Grassley said. “The fact that the Inspector General did not take this whistleblower’s allegations seriously enough to even call him back raises a lot of red flags for me.”
Grassley’s concerns outlined in his letter are:
1. The Inspector General position at the Justice Department is currently vacant. Any acting Inspector General is ill-equipped to take on an entrenched bureaucracy and challenge senior officials with tough questions.
2. The Justice Department Inspector General’s office was made aware of the allegations brought forward by ATF Agent John Dodson shortly after Customs and Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry’s death. The Inspector General failed to respond to Dodson’s numerous attempts to contact the office until Grassley’s staff notified the office.
3. ATF officials have cited an Office of the Inspector General report as one of the factors that prompted the shift to a riskier strategy of letting guns be trafficked rather than arresting straw buyers.
Grassley began looking into allegations brought forward by Dodson, and more than a dozen other ATF agents, after the Justice Department Inspector General failed to investigate. The agents indicated that their supervisors kept them from stopping gun traffickers with the normal techniques that had been successfully used for years. They instead were ordered to only watch and continue gathering information on traffickers instead of arresting them as soon as they could. In the meantime, the guns were allowed to fall into the hands of the bad guys even as agents told supervisors that it could not end well. Many of the guns have subsequently been found in firefights along the border, including a December 14, 2010 firefight where Terry was killed.
Grassley’s requests for information have gone unanswered about what transpired at the ATF and the Department of Justice during the time when Terry was killed and the policies instituted during Project Gunrunner that allowed guns to be sold to known straw purchasers and moved across the border without intervention.
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There is a law enforcement technique called "controlled delivery", but, as one might guess from the name, you maintain a degree of control of the contraband and then arrest the recipients. You don't just facilitate the flow of contraband for years with no arrests.
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Exactly so, expecially when the contraband is 50 caliber and the recipient is in another country spiral into narco-anarchy/war.
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Anyone familiar with this issue?
http://capwiz.com/gunowners/utr/2/?a=34260501&i=95921896&c=
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More PATRIOT act paranoia. :roll:
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http://www.publicintegrity.org/articles/entry/2976/?utm_source=publicintegrity&utm_medium=social_media&utm_campaign=twitter
ATF let hundreds of U.S. weapons fall into hands of suspected Mexican gunrunners
Whistleblower Says Agents Strongly Objected to Risky Strategy
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http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/03/25_atf_agents_w.php
25 ATF Agents write letter outlining scandals
Posted by David Hardy · 17 March 2011 07:37 PM
The contents of their letter are pretty stunning. A few samples:
"The Bureaus second most powerful manager Deputy Director Edgar Domenech, himself filed a whistleblower complaint and publicly stated that the Bureau of ATF has a propensity for reprisal and he “knew” such actions would result in career suicide."
"A Special Agent attempts to resist an investigation using unlawful wiretaps. The Special Agent openly challenges and reports it to superiors. After 20 + years of exemplary service, the next 1 ½ years results in the Special Agent and his family being transferred 5 times, suspended for 3 days, attempts made to have a psyche evaluation conducted, 2 letters of reprimand, and ultimately a termination."
"Complainants or those who would challenge unethical and/or illegal acts by Special Agents in Charge or senior managers are often threatened with collecting their next pay check in Fargo, North Dakota or Anchorage, Alaska."
"An anonymous letter was sent to the Department of Justice OIG from Las Vegas, Nevada alleging government Fraud waste and abuse. The OIG provided the letter to ATF Internal affairs for follow up investigation into the allegations contained in the anonymous letter. One of the primary objectives by ATF Internal Affairs investigators was to identify the author of the anonymous letter. During theInternal Affairs investigation, ATF identified an Agent who ATF had perceived to have been the whistleblower. This Agent became the recipient of vindictive personnel actions that ranged from a letter of reprimand to a notice of proposed removal from Federal service. Further investigation identified the true author of the letter and he/she admitted to being the author of the letter. ATF management then directed their attack on the actual whistleblower. ATF continued their attack on the perceived whistleblower and terminated him from Federal service. The Agent was later reinstated by ATF after appealing his removal to the MSPB [Merit Systems Protection Board]."
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The whole "we need more laws to enforce the laws we have already" argument inspires major cognitive dissonance.
Predictable spin on "Operation Gunwalker"
POSTED BY DAVID HARDY · 24 MARCH 2011 05:48 PM
Spin: the fact that the agency allowed 1,700 guns to go to drug cartels proves they need more money and more laws to enforce.
"America’s frontline agencies aren’t always coordinated fully and often feel powerless to arrest suspected gun runners in the absence of tougher federal laws. As a result, weapons from an ATF sting in Arizona called “Fast and Furious” unwittingly ended up in the possession of a trafficking ring in a neighboring state while other guns crossed the border and at least one showed up at a murder scene in Mexico."
"James Cavanaugh, a former ATF commander, said stemming the flow of guns to Mexico is a Herculean task given the lack of law-enforcement resources and political will.
“I don’t see how it’s realistically going to slow down if we don’t make changes in resources, laws and policies,” he said. “It’s important because people are being slaughtered.”
Agents and prosecutors have been especially passionate in pleading for Congress to pass a specific law banning gun trafficking, and have repeatedly watched as courts threw out cases against straw buyers who made purchases that were technically legal."
1) ATF is saying that straw purchases are "technically" legal? Interesting news to folks who were prosecuted for them.
2) If they didn't have the resources to investigate, or the laws to enforce, why did they let the sales go through? Is this "we're going to keep on doing it and if you don't give us money it'll happen again." ?
3) Let's see... the 4473 form has a box asking if the buyer is purchasing for himself. Lying on the form is a felony. Transferring a gun with reasonable cause to believe that it will be used to commit a felony is another violation, punished by up to ten years' imprisonment.
And then there's 22 U.S. Code §2778, giving the President broad power to restrict export of "defense articles.' and requiring registration of any exporting the same (violations punishable by up to ten years' imprisonment) and 18 U.S. Code §554:
"Whoever fraudulently or knowingly exports or sends from the United States, or attempts to export or send from the United States, any merchandise, article, or object contrary to any law or regulation of the United States, or receives, conceals, buys, sells, or in any manner facilitates the transportation, concealment, or sale of such merchandise, article or object, prior to exportation, knowing the same to be intended for exportation contrary to any law or regulation of the United States, shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both."
And here's an ATF press release announcing indictments for illegally exporting firearms to Columbia. I bet the defendants would be surprised to hear that ATF says there are no laws against exporting arms!
http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/03/predictable_spi.php
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The thing that grates most on me about Gunwalker/Fast and Furious is how congruent those methods were with the ends of the AG/POTUS. Just before this pot boiled over BHO and the Mexican prez were holding hands and warbling about "assault weapons" sneaking across the border, and lo and behold the BATFE just happened to be working on a major investigative effort that conveniently provided sundry kinds of ammunition for those who would impinge on American second amendment freedoms. A wee bit too coincidental for me, as this editorial touches on:
Mexican Criminals, American Guns by David Rittgers
from Cato Recent Op-eds
Did the ATF help create its own crisis?
The next time gun-control advocates point to violence in Mexico and call for more restrictions on gun sales or a revived assault-weapons ban, they should consider that the problem may not be with the laws on the books, but with those who enforce them.
A number of outlets — among them CBS News, the L.A. Times, and the Center for Public Integrity — have alleged scandalous behavior at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) is investigating allegations that ATF supervisors ordered agents to let gun runners ship arms across the border. Two of those guns turned up in a gunfight that killed a Border Patrol agent.
ATF special agent John Dodson says that agents in the Phoenix office were ordered to let known gun traffickers purchase firearms. The plan, Operation Fast and Furious, was intended to help investigators follow low-level gunrunners to cartel leadership. That may justify letting a few illegal sales slip by, but agents say the number soon climbed into the hundreds and thousands.
Agents raised warnings to their superiors about the quantity of sales and the rising violence across the border, but were told that the operation had been approved at ATF headquarters. They were also told that if they didn't like it, they were welcome to seek employment at the Maricopa County jail as detention officers making $30,000 a year.
Dodson came forward after hearing that two of the guns showed up at a crime scene, a remote valley where Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was killed in an exchange of fire. Dodson gave an emotional on-camera interview to CBS reporter Sharyl Attkisson, clearly disturbed by Terry's murder.
The ATF's alleged malfeasance is all the more disturbing when considered in the context of the Mexican drug war. The problem, however, is not legal U.S. gun dealers.
The media — for example, Reuters — have widely reported that "nine out of ten guns" found at Mexican crime scenes came from U.S. gun dealers, but this claim has been debunked: The statistic takes into account only guns traced by the FBI. Such tracing is possible only if the Mexican authorities submit a weapon to the FBI, and they submit only weapons designed for the U.S. civilian market (the only kind of gun the FBI is equipped to trace). Once all guns retrieved in Mexico are included, only 17 percent come from U.S. gun dealers.
There are plenty of places for the cartels to buy guns other than the U.S. retail market. A goodly portion of weapons trotted out for the press cannot be legally purchased in the U.S. without the ATF's say-so and approval from the local chief law-enforcement officer (short-barreled rifles, for example). Rocket-propelled grenades and newly manufactured machine guns are not available at gun shows. Further gun control imposed on typical American buyers would have no effect on the ability of the cartels to purchase these military-grade weapons.
To acquire such weapons, the cartels put up recruiting billboards to persuade Mexican soldiers and police officers to leave their posts, and thousands have done so with weapons in hand. Past wars in Latin America have also created a healthy black market that the cartels can tap into. There remains the question of U.S. arms exports, but these, when legal, are monitored by the State Department.
Congress should be able to assume that the gun-control laws already on the books are being enforced. That does not seem to be the case. Congress should find out why, and the public should bear it in mind next time Attorney General Holder or Mexican president Felipe Calderón says that a new assault-weapons ban is necessary.
David Rittgers is an attorney and a legal-policy analyst at the Cato Institute.
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=12894
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March 30, 2011
Barack Obama's 'I am not a Crook' Moment
By T.L. Davis
The Senate Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Peace Corps and Global Narcotics Affairs might get a little more heated than usual on March 31, 2011. Among the panel members is Kenneth Melson, Acting Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE).
The hearing will be the first opportunity for senators to question the Acting Director of the ATF about events surrounding Customs Agent Brian Terry's death and the Gunwalker Scandal. Gunwalker, also called "Fast and Furious," was a deviation from Project Gunrunner that only tracked guns being purchased for use in the drug war raging in Mexico. Gunwalker/Fast and Furious actually allowed the guns to "walk" south of the Mexican border without the knowledge or permission of the Mexican government.
Nearly a week after Sharyl Atkisson presented the first major network report of Project Gunwalker on CBS Evening News, all three major political parties in Mexico asked for a clarification of the events surrounding the project. On March 8th, the Associated Press reported that "Congressman Humberto Trevino estimated Tuesday that 150 shooting injuries or deaths have been linked to guns that were allowed to proceed into Mexico as part of a U.S. effort to build cases against traffickers."
On March 13th Univision, a Spanish language network, broadcast two interviews, one with John Dodson, the subject of Sharyl Atkisson's first report on the growing scandal. The other interview was with Rene Jaquez, the former ATF attaché to Mexico. Both men reported knowledge of the operation and Dodson claimed that it had been ongoing since at least the end of 2009. Yet, when asked about the scandal, President Obama could only say that he had not authorized it.
Earlier this week Barack Obama sat down with Univision's star anchor Jorge Ramos and was asked the direct question: "The Mexican Government complains that they were not informed about the 'Fast and Furious' operation (Gunwalker). Did you authorize this operation and was President Calderon properly informed about it?"
President Obama responded quickly and firmly stating that neither he nor Attorney General Eric Holder authorized the operation. This was Barack Obama's equivalent to "I'm not a crook" statement. The question is not whether the President authorized it; it is when he knew about it. Did the President of the United States know about Project Gunwalker when he slapped the back of President Calderon and told him that they were working to stop the flow of guns, when in fact the operation was engaged in just the opposite?
In the Univision interview Obama revealed more than he would have liked. At one moment he tried to claim that the American government has "too many moving parts" for him to keep up with things like Project Gunwalker. It was a thinly veiled attempt to divert the conversation, but it left Obama looking as if the injuries and deaths of at least 150 Mexican nationals didn't rate his attention. However, that fact is getting a lot of attention in Mexico where the PGR, or the Mexican Attorney General's office is seeking information on U.S. agents who might have committed crimes by facilitating the movement of arms into Mexico.
Alberto Morales of El Universal, a Mexican national newspaper closely following the developing scandal, has subsequently written an article based on the CBS report by Sharyl Attkisson that featured Darren Gil, former ATF attaché to Mexico. In the interview Gil revealed that he had on numerous occasions requested permission to inform the Mexican government about "Fast and Furious." This would seem to be in direct conflict with the impression left by President Obama only hours before that high-level officials had no knowledge of the operation.
In the interview, Darren Gil revealed that when he asked his supervisor about Fast and Furious he was told that "not only is the director (of the ATF) aware of it, but the Department of Justice is aware of it." Sharyl Attkisson asks: "They didn't want you to inform your Mexican counterparts?" Gil: "That's correct."
When the scandal first broke on CleanUpATF.org and was brought to light by the strident efforts of David Codrea of Examiner.com and Mike Vanderboegh of Sipsey Street Irregulars, there was a flurry of activity between Washington and the Phoenix office of the ATF. A serious effort to cover up the scandal took place, evidenced by a letter from Scot L. Thomasson, Chief of the ATF Public Affairs Division wherein Thomasson directs other public information officers to "proactively push positive stories this week, in an effort to preempt some negative reporting, or at minimum, lessen the coverage of such stories in the news cycle by replacing them with good stories about ATF."
Kenneth Melson as the Acting Director must have some of the answers that Eric Holder and boss Barack Obama refuse to address. Among the sitting committee members are Republican Marco Rubio of Florida as Ranking Member and Democrat Tom Udall of New Mexico, either one of whom are in a position to ask some tough questions. While New Mexico has not been featured in the border violence, it is doubtless that some of the estimated 2,500 weapons allowed to "walk" into Mexico have impacted the state that shares a border with Mexico and is only miles from the cartel hotspot of Ciudad Juarez. Marco Rubio as a rising force in the Republican Party could seize this opportunity to strengthen his brand and expose the cynical nature of the Obama Administration.
Should either Tom Udall or Marco Rubio choose to take an active role in discovering the truth behind Project Gunwalker, they might ask a few important questions at the hearing. Since the president has disavowed the authorization of Fast and Furious for himself and Eric Holder who then authorized the project? With millions of taxpayer funds going into this project for the past two years, when was its existence revealed to the President and the Attorney General? Is it typical for the Director of the BATFE to engage in international activity without the knowledge of the Attorney General,the President of the United States or the Secretary of State? In a letter dated February 4, 2011, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich responded to a question put to him by Senator Charles Grassley by stating that straw purchases of weapons had never been "sanctioned" by the ATF, is that a true statement?
Page Printed from: http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/03/barack_obamas_i_am_not_a_crook.html
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The decision making chaos on Libya puts new curiosity on this. It struck me at the time that the only answer worse than 'I knew and approved this' was to say 'I am Commander in Chief and I had no idea we were arming cross border criminal rebels to undermine a fragile, sovereign, friendly, neighboring country'. As it looks more and more like war, a guy might want to consult with congress on that. As disengaged as he is, it is actually believable that he did not know. Golf and home brew and fund raisers, he has a young family at a home, a mother in law in the White House, just bought a boatload of new suits, date night night in NY, Madrid, Rio, b-ball picks - it is march madness season... Whoever really is in charge - it ain't Joe Biden - probably knew he wouldn't want to know. Can we at least put him under oath and ask him who really is in charge of the executive branch? Maybe the mayor of Chicago approved the operation, or the campaign manager.
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Although given the political convenience of this operation to the gun control objectives of Team Obama it is not impossible that some word from on high was whispered into someone's ear at BATF (and this would be an impeachable offense if it did happen IMHO) what makes sense to me is that operations such as this stay within the bureaucracy and do not reach the White House.
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How 'bout the DOJ? Looks to me like the trail gets pretty muddy there, and Eric Holder has a very partisan/activist history.
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It's my understanding that every federal operation like this has an AUSA monitoring/advising on it, so it can reasonably be assumed that the DOJ was aware/signed off on this.
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What is AUSA?
Would the sign-off necessarily be something Holder would know about? Would it request for approval be apparent on its face as the clusterfcuk it was destined to be?
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AUSA=Assistant US Attorney
The federal version of an assistant/deputy DA.
It would go up the chain of command. How far? We'll need to subpoena the paper trail and people answering questions under oath to determine this.
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Which won't be forthcoming. The stonewalling continues:
March 29, 2011 12:02 PM
ATF chief won't appear at Senate hearing in wake of "gunwalking" scandal
Posted by Sharyl Attkisson 4 comments
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ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson (Credit: AP)
Updated 1:57 p.m. ET
So far, Congress and the media haven't had much luck getting answers on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms' ongoing "gunwalking" controversy.
The Department of Justice and ATF have missed repeated deadlines to turn over information and documents to Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), who's investigating. ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson (at left) was scheduled to appear before a Senate hearing Thursday, in which he would likely have been asked questions about the scandal. However, CBS News has confirmed Melson has now been pulled from the hearing witness list.
We contacted the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to ask why Melson is no longer scheduled to appear. They referred us to the office of Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) who chairs the subcommittee holding the hearing. A press spokeswoman at the senator's office said it was Melson's decision not to testify, and that the subcommittee doesn't have jurisdiction over ATF.
Later, a spokesman told us in an email, "The Subcommittee had invited, but not confirmed, Mr. Melson as well as other officials from ATF to testify at the hearing this week. In the end, ATF declined to send a representative."
The gunwalking investigation may also have derailed any chance for Andrew Traver, President Obama's nominee to be the permanent head of the ATF, to have confirmation hearings anytime soon. Mr. Obama made Melson, a former Justice Department attorney, acting director in April 2009. Sources on the Senate Judiciary Committee believed confirmation hearings for Traver were about to be scheduled before the gunwalking scandal broke. Now, they believe confirmation hearings for Traver will not happen in the near future.
Correction: A former version of this post incorrectly stated that the confirmation hearings would be for Melson instead of Traver.
All of Investigative Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson's reports, videos and articles can be found in one place at cbsnews.com/sharylattkisson.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20048331-10391695.html
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http://pajamasmedia.com/tatler/2011/03/30/u-s-admits-that-mexican-cartels-get-military-weaponry-from-central-america/
U.S. admits that Mexican cartels get military weaponry from Central America
Here’s a breaking story that’s only reported by Central American media and Fox.
“The most fearsome weapons wielded by Mexico’s drug cartels enter the country from Central America, not the United States, according to U.S. diplomatic cables disseminated by WikiLeaks and published here Tuesday by La Jornada newspaper.”
Inventory includes grenades and rocket launchers, necessary items for beating the Mexican army.
This corroborates an LA Times report from early 2009, which catalogued “hand grenades, grenade launchers, armor-piercing munitions and antitank rockets…”
The U.S. still blames American gun owners, by asserting that American guns “fuel” Mexico’s drug war. Even President Obama asserts: “More than 90 percent of the guns recovered in Mexico come from the United States.”
In statistics, “sampling error” essentially means that a small subset isn’t representative of the entire group.
In 2008, Mexico confiscated 30,000 firearms from drug cartels. Out of this, they selected 24% (7,200) to send to the U.S. for tracing. Of these, the ATF was able to trace 4,000. Of the 4,000, 3,480 (87%) were American.
**I wonder how many of those came from US, thanks to "Gunwalker"?**
Actually, 90% of all cartel guns are not American. (For more, read here.)
Why would cartels spend over $1,000–plus a background check and smuggling risks–for a decent American semi-automatic rifle, when they can buy 4-5 fully automatic AK-47s for the same price on the black market?
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53 page examination of the future of the second amendment in light of Heller. Abstract follows:
The Constitutionality of Social Cost
Josh Blackman
Penn State Dickinson School of Law
Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, Vol. 34, 2011
Abstract:
During the Passover Seder, it is customary in the Jewish faith for the youngest child at the table to ask a series of four questions that begins with, “why is this night different from all other nights?” In order to understand the future of the Second Amendment, one must ask, “why is this right different from all other rights?” In District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago, while the majority and dissenting opinions wildly differed over the historical pedigree of the individual right to keep and bear arms, they agreed that the governmental interest in reducing the risk of danger from firearms should play some role in the constitutional calculus, and that the Second Amendment should be treated differently.
At first blush, this makes sense. Guns can be dangerous. As Justice Breyer noted, “the carrying of arms . . . often puts others lives at risk.” Since a “primary concern of every government [is a] a concern for the safety and indeed the lives of its citizens,” when construing the Second Amendment, it would seem straightforward that courts take into consideration the social cost, or negative externalities, of private ownership of firearms. So obvious in fact, that courts and pundits perfunctorily gloss over the constitutionality of limiting liberty in order to minimize social costs. This judicial oversight is glaring, and has contributed in no small part to the current disjointed state of Second Amendment jurisprudence.
While the Second Amendment has been singled out from its brethren in the Bill of Rights as the most dangerous right, it is not the only dangerous right. The Supreme Court has developed over a century of jurisprudence to deal with forms of liberty that that yield negative externalities. The right to speak freely is balanced with the possible harm that can result from people preaching hate, violence, intolerance, and even fomenting revolution. The freedom of the press permits the media to report on matters that may harm national security. The freedom of association allows people to congregate, and advocate for certain types of violence. The freedom to be secure in one’s persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searched and seizures permits people to possess the fruits and instrumentalities of crime with impunity. Inculpatory evidence seized in violation of this right is generally inadmissible during trial, permitting crimes to go unpunished. Likewise, a violation of a person’s Miranda rights renders any confessions – even an uncoerced inculpatory confession – inadmissible. Procedural rights during the criminal trial – including the right to grand jury indictment, the right against self-incrimination, the right against double jeopardy, the right of compulsory process, the right of confrontation, the right of a speedy and public trial, the right of trial by jury – all make the prosecution of culpable defendants significantly harder. The due process clause, which imposes limitations on all government actions, places the burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt on the prosecution. The right to non-excessive bail and reasonable fines make it easier for suspects to avoid prison during prosecutions, and perhaps, allows them to abscond before trial. The right against cruel and unusual punishments removes certain forms of retribution from the quiver of the state, thereby limiting the ability to punish those found guilty of a crime. The right of habeas corpus ensures that a person – however dangerous – cannot be indefinitely detained without proper procedures. Liberty’s harm to society takes many forms – not just loaded weapons.
These precedents show how the Court balances freedom and the harm that may result from its exercise. While a “primary concern of every government [is a] a concern for the safety and indeed the lives of its citizens,” this concern is not constitutionally sacrosanct.
This article proceeds in five parts. Part I introduces a Coasean view of freedom that balances liberties and externalities, and the concept of the constitutionality of social cost. Part II provides an overview of the competing views of social cost in District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago, focusing on Justice Breyer’s balancing beam and Justice Scalia’s devastating dicta. Part III considers the loneliness of the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights, and confronts many of the arguments of the dissenting Justices that the Majority did not refute. While the majority prevailed with respect to the historical narrative, it remains to be seen whether the majority’s dicta-cum-pragmatism, or the dissenter’s pragmatism – which can be easily blurred together – will prevail. Part IV views the Second Amendment through the prism of the constitutionality of social cost, and considers the “wide variety of constitutional contexts [in which the Court] found public-safety concerns sufficiently forceful to justify restrictions on individual liberties.” Building on Parts I-IV, Part V provides a roadmap for the development of Second Amendment jurisprudence going forward.
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1763830
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http://thetruthaboutguns.com/2011/04/robert-farago/calderons-silence-on-atf-gunwalker-scandal-explained/
Calderon’s Silence on ATF Gunwalker Scandal Explained
Posted on April 4, 2011 by Robert Farago
Mystery surrounds the ATF Gunwalker scandal. Who authorized the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ stingless sting operation that allowed, indeed enabled thousands of U.S. guns to flow to Mexican drug cartels? Why is the Obama administration stonewalling the Congressional investigation of Project Gunrunner and Operation Fast and Furious? What else are they hiding? And here’s another one: why has Mexican President Felipe Calderon remained on the sidelines of this story, continuing to cozy-up to President Obama when it’s clear that Uncle Sam supplied weapons to the narco-terrorists plaguing his country? Well, it looks like we might have an answer via eldiariodechihuahua.com [warning Google translation] . . .
The security strategy deployed by the federal government in Mexico and particularly in Ciudad Juárez to fight drug trafficking is a lie because the government of Felipe Calderón protects the Sinaloa cartel and its leader, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, claims Anabel Hernandez, Mexican journalist.
The author of “The Lords of Narco” said the U.S. action in the midst of this “war” has not been very clear. Information is surfacing that indicates that Sinaloa Cartel operations in Mexico have the concurrence of bodies like the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
“For the federal government priority is only the enemies of ‘El Chapo’ and that’s why we have the slaughter, so Ciudad Juárez is as it is,” says the journalist from Italy, where she teaches a series of conferences on the issue of organized crime.
Anabel Hernández has made quite the charge: the Sinaloa cartel has bought the Mexican government lock, stock and Calderon. What’s more, the DEA knows about the corruption and plays ball with Calderon to catch other cartels, giving the Sinaloas a pass. Which would account for Calderon’s lack of indignation on the whole Gunwalker deal.
This could blow up big, and not only in the halls of Congress . . .
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CHAIRMAN ISSA SUBPOENAS ATF FOR 'PROJECT GUNRUNNER' DOCUMENTS
Subpoena comes after ATF fails to meet earlier deadline
WASHINGTON. D.C. – Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), the Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform today announced the issuance of a subpoena to the Department of Justices' Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) for documents related to the highly controversial "Project Gunrunner."
"The unwillingness of this Administration – most specifically the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms – to answer questions about this deadly serious matter is deeply troubling," said Chairman Issa. "Allegations surrounding this program are serious and the ability of the Justice Department to conduct an impartial investigation is in question. Congressional oversight is necessary to get the truth about what is really happening."
On March 16, 2011, Chairman Issa wrote a letter to Acting Director Kenneth Melson of the ATF requesting specific documents related to Project Gunrunner, its "Fast and Furious" component, and records related to the death of Border Agent Brian Terry. ATF failed to meet the March 30th deadline for producing these documents and furthermore refused to voluntarily commit to any date for producing them.
Media reports have raised questions about the handling of operations involving gun trafficking into Mexico – specifically the allegation that ATF has had a policy of permitting – and even encouraging – the movement of guns into Mexico by straw purchasers. This practice may have contributed to the deaths of hundreds on both sides of the border, including federal law enforcement agents. Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IA), who has also been pursuing the matter, recently stated, "I'm still asking questions and we're still getting the runaround from the Justice Department, [t]hey're stonewalling."
President Obama recently stated that neither he nor Attorney General Holder authorized this operation. His statement did not specify whether Attorney General Holder was aware of this policy or who did authorize it. The Committee's investigation seeks answers to these questions and the true nature of Project Gunrunner.
Documents subpoenaed and due to the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform by April 13, 2011, include:
Documents and communications relating to the genesis of Project Gunrunner and Operation Fast and Furious, and any memoranda or reports involving any changes to either program at or near the time of the release of the Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of the Inspector General report about Project Gunrunner in November 2010.
Documents and communications relating to individuals responsible for authorizing the decision to "walk" guns to Mexico in order to follow them and capture a "bigger fish."
Documents and communications relating to any investigations conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) or any other DOJ component following the fatal shooting of Agent Brian Terry, including information pertaining to two guns found at the crime scene that may have been connected to Project Gunrunner.
Documents and communications relating to any weapons recovered at the crime scene or during the investigation into the death of Agent Brian Terry.
Documents and communications between ATF and the Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL) who sold weapons to Jaime Avila, including any Report of Investigation (ROI) or other records relating to a December 17, 2009 meeting "to discuss his role as an FFL during this investigation."
A copy of the presentation, approximately 200 pages long, that the Group 7 Supervisor made to officials at ATF headquarters in the spring of 2010.
Documents and communications relating to Operation Fast and Furious between and among ATF headquarters and Special Agent in Charge William D. Newell, Assistant Special Agents in Charge Jim Needles and George Gillette, Group Supervisor David Voth, or any Case Agent from November 1, 2009 to the present. The response to this component of the subpoena shall include a memorandum, approximately 30 pages long, from SAC Newell to ATF headquarters following the arrest of Jaime Avila and the death of Agent Brian Terry.
Documents and communications relating to complaints or objections by ATF agents about: (1) encouraging, sanctioning, or otherwise allowing FFLs to sell firearms to known or suspected straw buyers, (2) failure to maintain surveillance on known or suspected straw buyers, (3) failure to maintain operational control over weapons purchased by known or suspected straw buyers, or (4) letting known or suspected straw buyers with American guns enter Mexico.
http://thurly.net/1944
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Grassley says emails suggest ATF blocking Senate gun probe
By Jerry Seper
The Senate Judiciary Committee's ranking Republican, who has questioned whether the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives allowed suspected gun smugglers to purchase assault rifles that later may have been used in the killing of a U.S. Border Patrol agent, wants to know if ATF has ordered its agents not to cooperate in his investigation of the shooting.
In a letter Friday to ATF Acting Director Kenneth E. Melson, Sen. Charles E. Grassley said emails obtained through the Freedom of Information Act "appear to contain proposed guidance" on how to respond to questions from the senator's office, including instructions that agents were "in no way obligated to respond" and should refer inquiries in the matter to ATF's office of congressional affairs.
The Iowa Republican described the emails as "further attempts to prevent direct communications with my office" by telling agents they were "not authorized to disclose non-public information.
"It is of grave concern because, as you know, such attempts to prevent direct communications with Congress are not a lawfully authorized activity of any officer or employee of the United States whose salary is paid with appropriated funds," he wrote.
Mr. Grassley has raised questions on whether ATF allowed suspected gun smugglers to purchase and keep assault rifles that later were used to kill Border Patrol Agent Brian A. Terry, and if the agency allowed the sale of the weapons to "known and suspected straw purchasers for an illegal trafficking ring near the Southwest border." He said two of those weapons reportedly were recovered at the site of the Terry shooting.
The senator said ATF agents told his staff the agency, as part of "Project Gunrunner" and its "Fast and Furious" component, allowed guns to "walk" across the border, despite warnings from agents in the field that the policy would result in somebody getting killed. "Fast and Furious" was a gunrunning sting set up by ATF that funneled more than 1,700 smuggled weapons from Arizona to Mexico.
Terry, 40, was attempting to arrest bandits who prey on illegal aliens when he was fatally shot about 10 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border.
Mr. Grassley said ATF had been tracking the gun purchases of one of those arrested in the shooting, Jaime Avila, since November 2009 when he made his first buys at a Glendale, Ariz., gun shop. He said Avila bought three more weapons at the same dealer on Jan. 9, 2010, and three AK-47 assault rifles on Jan. 16. Over the next several months, he said ATF continued to track his multiple firearms purchases, including two purchases of .50-caliber rifles in June 2010.
While at least one Arizona gun dealer wanted to stop participating in sales "like those to Avila," he said ATF encouraged the dealer to continue selling to suspected traffickers.
After the Terry shooting, law enforcement officials recovered from the scene two assault rifles that were traced by the agency and matched two of the three rifles purchased by Avila "and tracked by ATF nearly a year earlier."
The Justice Department has denied that guns sold in purchases sanctioned by federal firearms agents were later used in the shootout that left Terry dead. Assistant U.S. Attorney General Ronald Weich said in a letter to Mr. Grassley that the claim was false.
In his letter, Mr. Grassley said that for Congress to exercise its oversight authority and act as a check on executive power, it was "crucial" that agency employees were free to communicate directly with members of Congress and their committee staffs. He said without such unfiltered communications, "Congress would still be unaware of and unable to inquire about the serious allegations involving the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and the sales of weapons to known and suspected gun traffickers."
Among the emails noted by Mr. Grassley was one to ATF Deputy Director Billy Hoover regarding suggestions on how agents should be directed to respond to congressional requests.
"Since our investigation began, I've continued to be contacted by agents and others within ATF about wrongdoing regarding Fast and Furious at the ATF and the Justice Department," Mr. Grassley said. "If people have concerns they should be able to express themselves without feeling pressure from their bosses."
He said one agent who contacted him was George Gillett, assistant special agent in charge of the ATF's Phoenix field division, who chose to disclose to the agency that he had protected contacts with Congress. Mr. Grassley said the contact was "an essential component of our inquiry," noting that the high-ranking ATF agent had participated in two meetings with staffs from the Senate Judiciary Committee and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
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This is why people need to be questioned under oath and documents subpoena'ed.
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latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-guns-20110415,0,132336.story
U.S. urged dealer to continue gun sales despite concerns, inquiry finds
The Arizona gun dealer repeatedly raised red flags about weapons ending up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels as part of Project Gunrunner, but his concerns were brushed aside, congressional investigators say.
By Kim Murphy, Los Angeles Times
April 15, 2011
The investigation into a federal operation that allowed Mexican drug cartels to acquire U.S. weapons escalated Thursday with new revelations that an Arizona gun dealer repeatedly expressed fears that his guns were falling into the "hands of the bad guys" but was encouraged by federal agents to continue the sales.
A series of emails released by congressional investigators showed that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives encouraged the gun dealer against his better judgment to sell high-powered weapons to buyers he believed were agents for the drug cartels.
Employees of the dealer videotaped gun buyers — suspected "straw purchasers" who could legally buy the guns, though cartel members could not — exchanging money with other individuals on the dealer's premises.
The aim of the ATF program, called Project Gunrunner, was to gather intelligence on suspicious weapons sales and arrest senior members of international trafficking chains.
In an eerie case of premonition, the gun dealer expressed fears that the guns he was selling could be used against U.S. border agents.
"I wanted to make sure that none of the firearms that were sold per our conversation with you and various ATF agents could or would ever end up south of the border or in the hands of the bad guys," the dealer, who has not been named, wrote in June 2010 to David Voth, the lead ATF case agent in Phoenix. "I want to help ATF with its investigation but not at the risk of agents' safety, because I have some very close friends that are U.S. Border Patrol agents in southern AZ."
Three guns sold to suspects who were part of Project Gunrunner have since turned up at the scenes of the deaths of two U.S. agents — in the Mexican state of San Luis Potosi and near the Mexican border in Arizona.
"Not only were the ATF agents who later blew the whistle [on the investigation] predicting that this operation would end in tragedy, so were the gun dealers — even as ATF urged them to make the sales," Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in a letter with the new emails to Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr.
The Justice Department in its only official response to the congressional inquiry denied that the ATF "sanctioned" or "otherwise knowingly allowed" the sale of assault weapons to straw purchasers, who then transported them to Mexico.
The new emails suggest that the Arizona gun dealer was seeking assurances from the ATF and the U.S. attorney's office that the company would not be held responsible if someone got hurt with guns that ended up in the hands of gunrunners.
Voth, the ATF agent, wrote to the dealer: "I understand that the frequency with which some individuals under investigation by our office have been purchasing firearms from your business has caused concerns for you. … However, if it helps put you at ease we (ATF) are continually monitoring these suspects using a variety of investigative techniques which I cannot go into [in] detail."
News reports in June 2010 that guns purchased in the U.S. were being found at Mexican crime scenes prompted the dealer to again express concerns.
"I shared my concerns with you guys that I wanted to make sure that none of the firearms that were sold per our conversation with you and various ATF agents could or would ever end up south of the border or in the hands of the bad guys," the dealer wrote, adding that the reports are "disturbing."
On "one or two" occasions when the dealer's employees videotaped a suspected straw purchaser exchanging money with another person, the ATF urged that the sale go forward, but the employees refused, Grassley said in his letter.
"In light of this new evidence, the Justice Department's claim that the ATF never knowingly sanctioned or allowed the sale of assault weapons to straw purchasers is simply not credible," Grassley wrote.
Thousands of guns were sold to straw purchasers under Project Gunrunner. The ATF has acknowledged that at least 195 U.S. firearms sold to suspected straw purchasers have been recovered in Mexico, but agents have said thousands slipped outside ATF oversight.
kim.murphy@latimes.com
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2nd post. Jaw dropping letter and source material from Sen. Grassley's office:
http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/gunwalking_emails_041411.pdf
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I'm amazed that CBS is actually covering the story.
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Issa Steps Up Fight over ATF Documents
By Louise Radnofsky
House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa threatened to hold the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms in contempt of Congress for its refusal to produce documents. The agency says releasing them will compromise ongoing criminal cases.
The fight involves the bureau’s Project Gunrunner, in which law enforcement officers may have watched as guns were sold to U.S. buyers planning to smuggle them into Mexico. The idea was to intercepting guns later. Mr. Issa, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) and others believe that some of the guns may have been used in fatal shootings of law enforcement officials, including U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.
In a letter Wednesday to Bureau Director Kenneth Melson, Mr. Issa said he intends to enforce the a March 31 subpoena because “Congress is legally entitled to all of these documents.”
“If you do not comply with the subpoena, the committee will be forced to commence contempt proceedings,” Mr. Issa warned.
Attached to the letter were ATF documents that Mr. Issa said were obtained without the help of Justice Department officials. He said they show ATF agents allowed the transfer of guns to suspected criminals, and that some of these weapons had later turned up at crime scenes. In addition, email messages from an ATF group supervisor responded to apparent concerns over the program from a gun store owner and from other federal agents he manages.
The top Democrat on the committee, Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, repeated his call for Mr. Issa to join him to sit down with the Justice Department to come to an agreement over the documents.
A spokeswoman for the Justice Department said that Mr. Issa’s latest letter was being reviewed.
http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2011/04/20/issa-steps-up-fight-over-atf-documents/
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Sic'em Darrell!!! :evil:
And coincidentally enough, the Mexicans have announced that they have retained counsel to look into suing American gun manufacturers.
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Perhaps we can deduct that from the bill we need to send them for all the costs of illegal immigration.
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Tabling in this piece would be hard to reproduce hence a link only:
http://trac.syr.edu/tracreports/crim/249/
Nutshell: firearm prosecutions have fallen on BHO's/Holder's watch, yet they want more laws they can then not prosecute?
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Woof,
Concerning a ban on imported shotguns!!!!
www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=6576 (http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=6576)
Send your comment to shotgunstudy@atf.gov OR FAX 202 648-9601 both must contain your name and address. Please be respectful but let them know the Second amendment wasn't intended for sporting purposes only and arbitrary bans like this one make no sense at all other than to harass law abiding citizens that want to legally purchase firearms that are legal for them to own.
P.C.
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Wow, if a Republican administration had embarked on this kind of stonewalling campaign the breast rending would be deafening. . . .
Investigators land in Arizona for "Gunwalker" probe
Posted by Sharyl Attkisson 5 comments
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(Credit: CBS)
CBS News has learned that House and Senate investigators have descended upon Arizona for their probe into the so-called "Gunwalker" scandal. They're gathering interviews from witnesses, including ATF insiders and area gun shop owners. Sources tell CBS News the congressional investigators are frustrated by what they view as across-the-board stonewalling by government agencies which have refused to provide information in the investigation. Government officials have said they won't provide information while their own investigations are ongoing.
Gunrunning scandal uncovered at the ATF
"They're investigating themselves," says one source on Capitol Hill, "and then claiming the open investigations preclude them from giving Congress information it needs for independent oversight. It's highly improper."
ATF insiders being interviewed in Arizona are among those who told CBS News that their own agency employed a controversial strategy beginning in late 2009 called "letting guns walk," to try to gather intelligence. In that strategy, used in an operation ATF called "Fast and Furious," ATF allegedly allowed thousands of assault rifles and other weapons cross the Mexican border into the hands of drug cartels. Many of the guns later turned up at Mexican crime scenes, and ATF was notified; but documents show the agency continued to encourage local gun shop owners to sell more guns to the same suspects.
Sharyl Attkisson's original "gunwalking" report
ATF agent cooperates in gunwalking investigation ATF gunwalking: Who knew, and how high up? Agent: I was ordered to let U.S. guns into Mexico
ATF gunwalking scandal: Second agent speaks out
Sources and documents indicate the prosecutor who advised the "Fast and Furious" case in Phoenix was Asst. U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley. His boss, Arizona's US Attorney Dennis Burke, was a longtime chief of staff for Homeland Security Chief Janet Napolitano when she served as Arizona governor. In brief questioning from Congress in March, Napolitano said it was "premature" to comment on details of the Fast and Furious controversies. She also said she was "not aware" that an agent under Homeland Security was on the ATF Fast and Furious task force in Phoenix. Speaking of herself in the third person, Napolitano stated that "no concerns were expressed to the Secretary."
ATF's former lead agent in Mexico, Attache Darren Gil, told CBS News in an exclusive interview that he believes senior Justice Dept. official Lanny Breuer and several of his deputies who visited Mexico amid the controversy last summer knew all about the alleged gunwalking, as did ATF's Acting Director Kenneth Melson. None of those officials would speak to CBS News. Federal agencies have refused Congressional requests to turn over documents related to the official's Mexico trips.
In another development, the Assistant Special Agent in charge of ATF's Phoenix Division, George Gillett, continues to provide information to Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) who's investigating. Of the top managers possibly implicated in the gunwalking strategy, Gillett is the only one who's hired an attorney and is voluntarily providing information to Grassley's office.
WATCH: Issa demands info on ATF "gunwalking" scandal from State Dept.
WATCH: ATF "Gunrunner" program may be years old
WATCH: Obama on "gunwalking": Serious mistake may have been made
According to interviews and documents, a number of ATF agents objected to what they saw as an unprecedented and dangerous approach to gathering intelligence. Objections also came from ATF supervisors and gun shop owners enlisted by the ATF to make the sales. Those who expressed concerns say they were punished, ostracized and even threatened with their jobs by managers.
An internal email from Feb. 3, 2011 indicates ATF officials may have improperly guided employees not to answer Congressional inquires in the gunwalking scandal.
"As always, you are in no way obligated to respond to congressional contacts or requests for information and generally, consistent with ATF policy, you should refer congressional staff who seek information from you to ATF's office of congressional affairs. You are not authorized to disclose non-public information about law enforcement matters... to anyone including congressional staff.." reads the email, in part.
When Sen. Grassley learned of the email and also of alleged retaliation attempts against whistleblowers, he fired off a letter April 8 to ATF Acting Director Melson. The letter states that it is "unlawful" for ATF to "inappropriately intimidate employees to discourage from speaking with Congress."
Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20057548-10391695.html#ixzz1KqaRlxe6
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There is nothing that would prevent congress from investigating while the ATF's OPR (Internal Affairs) did an investigation, or the DOJ's IG did an investigation at the same time. Time to serve subpeonas and question people under oath.
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Breaking News: Holder to appear before House Committee Tomorrow
May 2nd, 2011 5:14 pm ET
David Codrea
Gun Rights Examiner
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WASHINGTON DC (Gun Rights Examiner): "Tomorrow, Attorney General Eric Holder will testify before the House Judiciary Committee," an email sent this afternoon by the Deputy Press Secretary, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform announces:
Congressman Issa will press Attorney General Holder on the role of the ATF’s Phoenix office in 'Operation Fast and Furious', a botched gun tracking project which knowingly allowed guns into the hands of drug cartels leading to the death of U.S. Customs and Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.
The testimony will occur Tuesday 5/3/2011 at 10:15 a.m. at 2141 Rayburn House Office Building. It will be webcast live at www.judiciary.house.gov.
Gun Rights Examiner had information about this pending testimony last week from a correspondent in contact with another congressional office, but did not make it public until this announcement at the specific request of the source.
Correction: The initial GRE report stated Holder would appear before Darrell Issa's committee. He will appear before the House Judiciary Committee.
http://www.examiner.com/gun-rights-in-national/breaking-news-holder-to-appear-before-issa-s-house-committee-tomorrow
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Hmmmmmm. Better hope we've got a bead on Zawahiri before the next media cycle.... :-D
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Exactly. That came up way too fast after all the previous stonewalling.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2011/05/04/holder-grilled-on-project-gunrunner/
Holder Grilled on Project Gunrunner
posted at 3:24 am on May 4, 2011 by Patterico
It’s the Republicans’ top investigator in the House absolutely raking the AG over the coals, as he probes a failed policy that may have cost American lives. High drama indeed.
Attorney General Eric Holder was on the hot seat yesterday, squirming as he dodged tough questions about Project Gunrunner, the controversial ATF policy that may have resulted in the deaths of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and ICE Agent Jaime Zapata.
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Thank you for keeping this on our radar screen GM
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http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/05/16/federal-judge-rules-calif-gun-advocates/?test=latestnews
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I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them. -- George Mason, coauthor of the 2nd Amendment.
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Latest on Project Gunwalker
POSTED BY DAVID HARDY · 16 MAY 2011 11:05 AM
The Sipsey Street Irregulars post the latest analysis of ATF documents, and a link to a pdf of one September 2010 plan.
I found much interesting on pp. 12-13 (of pdf pagination):
"Historically, ATF has placed much emphasis on the roles of the straw purchaser and the Federal firearms licensee in identifying and disrupting firearms trafficking schemes. However, straw purchasers by definition lack serious criminal records and therefore are frequently viewed as undesirable targets for criminal prosecution."
"FFLs remain both an important source of firearms (often unwittingly) to firearms traffickers and an investigative source of information. On occasion, FFLs become targets of criminal investigation and prosecution. When criminal wrongdoing by FFLs is suspected they will be aggressively investigated and recommended for prosecution. Corrupt FFLs constitute high-value targets due to the damage they cause and the special responsibility they hold to ensure that firearms are not illegally diverted from lawful commerce."
"Additionally, we must not overlook the fact that firearms traffickers and other violent criminals also obtain firearms from secondary sources... Analysis of source location trace data for specific market areas, when adjusted for time-to-crime, may not only reveal actionable investigative leads, but also that secondary sources (e.g.,gun shows, thefts and private sales) are a greater source of trafficked crime guns than licensed dealers."
"This strategy will present certain challenges as some of the persons we seek to investigate, indict, and apprehend will reside outside the United States and/or may be priority targets of other U.S. law enforcement agencies. When appropriate, this strategy envisions that ATF will refer information and actionable intelligence to the Government of Mexico and/or other U.S. law enforcement agencies."
Hmmm.... straw man purchasers are uninteresting targets. The cartels themselves are out of our reach. That seems to leave FFLs and gunshows.
And the responsibility for the agency-sponsored gun running seems to go right to the top. P. 18 is devoted to HQ monitoring of operations. "The monitoring and coordinating of Southwest border investigations will be the responsibility of the recently established Firearms Operations Division."
P. 19: "The controlled movement of firearms, ammunition, explosives, explosives devices, and/or components or non-functional “props” of such items across the U.S.-Mexico border from the United States shall be coordinated with and approved in advance by Bureau headquarters and the MCO [Mexico Country Office, of ATF]"
http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/05/latest_on_proje.php
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Major ATF Phoenix shake-up after "Gunwalker"
Posted by Sharyl Attkisson
(Credit: CBS) CBS News has learned that virtually all the top ATF managers in Phoenix involved in the controversial "Fast and Furious" operation have been reassigned and replaced. The shake-up comes in the wake of the gunwalking scandal in which ATF allegedly allowed more than 2500 weapons to hit the streets or "walk."
Special Agent in Charge (SAC) Bill Newell has been replaced by the former Detroit SAC Tom Brandon. Newell was reassigned to ATF headquarters in Washington D.C. shortly after CBS News interviewed an ATF agent-turned-whistleblower about the alleged gunwalking.
Two new Assistant Special Agents in Charge (ASACs) have also moved into the ATF Phoenix office: Joe Anarumo of Miami and Tom Atteberry of Kansas City. Sources say they replace the ASACs who oversaw Fast and Furious in Phoenix: George Gillett, who's being reassigned to Washington D.C. headquarters; and Jim Needles, who's been tasked to the Phoenix U.S. Attorney's office.
"This is unprecedented and welcome," says one insider, who describes the new Phoenix management as "the A-Team" and "respected."
Gunrunning scandal uncovered at the ATF
Another move involves Agent David Voth, who directly supervised the Phoenix ATF "Group VII," that executed Fast and Furious. Sources say he's also been assigned to the U.S. Attorney's office along with Agent Hope McAllister. Sources say McAllister was the agent in charge of Fast and Furious. Replacing Voth as head of Group VII is Steve Barborini from Miami.
None of the managers who've been moved have had any disciplinary action announced against them. The fact of their transfers does not in itself suggest any wrongdoing. There are at least two investigations underway looking into how and why ATF allegedly let assault rifles and other weapons "walk." Sources say at the time, agents believed the guns would likely end up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels. One of the allegedly walked guns was used at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. Officials are also looking into a possible link to the murder of Customs Agent Jaime Zapata.
Nobody from the ATF public affairs or from the Justice Department, which oversees ATF, would immediately confirm the personnel shifts. As of this writing, the official ATF web site for Phoenix still listed Newell, Needles and Gillette as their former positions in Phoenix ATF Division Management.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20063716-10391695.html
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Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams Should Be Arrested
Thursday, May 19th, 2011
I wanted to comment a bit more on the Mark Fiorino story that guest blogger Dave Kruger posted earlier this week, because it’s pretty goddamned outrageous.
Fiorino is the guy who was accosted by police officers in Philadelphia for openly carrying a gun in the city, despite the fact that he was perfectly within his legal rights to do so. He was in full compliance with the law. The problem is that the Philadelphia cops who confronted him were ignorant of the law. In the course of the confrontation, the cops repeatedly threatened to kill Fiorino, despite the fact that, again, he had broken no laws. They also illegally detained and arrested him. They then had to release him when they actually checked the law and discovered they were wrong.
When I’ve written about the arrests of citizens who record or photograph cops over the last couple years, I’ve repeatedly pointed out the double standard that exists when it comes to ignorance of the law. Citizens are expected to know every law. Break one, and you suffer the consequences. Ignorance is no defense, even when it comes to vague, obscure, or densely-written laws. But when law enforcement officials—the people we pay to enforce the criminal code—when they prove to be ignorant of the law, when they illegally detain, arrest, and jail someone based on a mistaken understanding of the law, they rarely if ever suffer any consequences.
The Fiorino case is a perfect example of that double standard. But the Fiorino case is even more pernicious. Because he’d had previous episodes with cops who were ignorant of local gun laws, Fiorino was carrying an audio recorder with him in Philadelphia. He recorded his confrontation with the Philly cops, and that audio exposed them for the ignorant, thuggish threats to the public that they are. (Note: I regularly caution against holding individual cops responsible for enforcing bad policy. I don’t use words like “ignorant” and “thuggish” lightly. These cops were both.) The recording Fiorino made of his encounter was also perfectly legal.
So what are we to then make of Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams’ decision to arrest and charge Fiorino after Fiorino posted the recordings on the Internet?
Here’s what I make of it: It’s criminal. Fiorino embarrassed Philadelphia cops, and Williams is punishing him for it. Williams and the police spokesman are claiming Fiorino deliberately provoked the cops. No, he didn’t. He didn’t wave the gun at anyone. He didn’t invite police scrutiny. The cops confronted him upon seeing a weapon he was legally carrying in a perfectly legal manner. And they were wrong. Make no mistake. This is blatant intimidation.
But while their behavior in this story was repugnant, at least the cops had the plausible explanation of ignorance for the initial confrontation, then fear for their safety when an armed man they incorrectly thought was violating the law pushed back (though neither is an excuse, and neither should exclude them from discipline). What Williams has done since is much worse. It is premeditated. Much more than the cops, Williams should know the law. Moreover, even if he didn’t know the law at the time, he has since had plenty of time to research it. By now, Williams does know the law. (If he doesn’t, he is incompetent.) And he knows that even if Fiorino did deliberately provoke the cops to test their knowledge of Philadelphia’s gun laws, that also is not a crime.
Yet he’s charging Fiorino anyway, with “reckless endangerment and disorderly conduct”—the vague sorts of charges cops and prosecutors often fall back on when they can’t show any actual crime. A spokesperson for Williams said Fiorino was “”belligerent and hostile” to police who were investigating a possible crime. Read the transcript of the audio in the linked article above and tell me who is “belligerent and hostile.” Read it knowing who was breaking the law, who was following it, and while remaining cognizant of which party was threatening to put a bullet in the head of the other.
Note that nothing Fiorino did was on its own illegal. Willliams is attempting a striking, blatantly dishonest bit of legal chicanery. His theory goes like this: If you undertake a series of actions that are perfectly legal and well within your rights, but that cause government agents to react in irrational ways that jeopardize public safety, you are guilty of endangering the public.
This can’t stand. It’s a blatant abuse of office. Williams is using the state’s awesome power to arrest and incarcerate to intimidate a man who exposed and embarrassed law enforcement officials who, because of their own ignorance, nearly killed him. Exposing that sort of government incompetence cannot be illegal. And it isn’t illegal.
The message Williams is sending is this: Yes, you might technically have the right to carry a gun in Philadelphia. But if you exercise that right, you should be prepared for the possibility that police officers will illegally stop you, detain you, threaten to kill you, and arrest you. And I’m not going to do a damn thing about it. And yes, you may technically also have First Amendment rights in Philadelphia, but if you dare exercise them to let the larger public know what happened to you for exercising your right to carry a gun, I will try to put you in prison.
I’m not trying to be needlessly provocative, here. This is important. Prosecutors can’t get away with this kind of behavior. Even if the charges are eventually dropped, that isn’t enough. Philadelphia District Attorney R. Seth Williams should be arrested. And he should be charged with knowingly, criminally violating Mark Fiorino’s civil rights.
http://www.theagitator.com/2011/05/19/philadelphia-district-attorney-r-seth-williams-should-be-arrested/
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More on "Project Gunwalker"
POSTED BY DAVID HARDY · 22 MAY 2011 10:54 AM
CBS News: DEA and ATF in tug of war after DEA seizes guns "walked" by ATF.
David Codrea has a post on new revelations in the case, with video interview of a a BATF informant (i.e., not an agent) here. He has some interesting insights. Agencies don't need more money, they need less turf fighting and human intel. He was ordered to give info to one agency only, and not to communicate with others. He was informed by contacts in Mexico that full auto guns were coming in with approval of US government agencies. The smugglers had both American and Mexican LEOs paid off. Corruption is on both sides of the border, probably worse here. He also talks of military weapons being smuggled from Mexico into the US. He knows of one agent who gets a down payment, with final payment made after delivery.
Weapons coming in northward include a lot of US made weapons sold to Latin American governments, which now turn them for a profit in Mexico.
When ATF debriefed him... they sought info on where guns were being obtained, who was smuggling them, etc., but the purpose seemed to be to ensure nobody got caught with egg on the face. When he brought up the gun that killed Agent Terry, where he had reported the identity of the killer, he was told to forget about it, someone else was investigating that. He doesn't believe local LEOs are corrupted; they wouldn't have a role in moving guns or drugs, the cartels want to corrupt Federal agents. Local LEOs have no power over a port of entry.
Evidence indicates tunnels are being driven near Douglas AZ, from the Mexican side. Met with a contact involved in the tunnel, he said it would cost $100-200K, but since you can move tons of cocaine thru it, that's pocket change.
Worked with many, many agencies, Federal and State. Pay can be percent of drugs seized, but lately is low. Initial work was driven by concerns about terrorism and bio weapons. Then was in it for the money, now talking in hopes someone will see info and act. Drug war, terror war, claims that they are being fought successfully is a lie. Programs are failures. Drug war ... the amount of drugs coming in, not being interdicted, drug use steadily increasing. Heart of problem is in senior management, dismantling operations that are effective. Disillusioned, because been on ground, saw drugs and guns, reported it, watched cases dropped or dismissed, or agents say can't do it because his boss doesn't want to get involved in a field operation.
Link to the CBS story cited above: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20064443-10391695.html
http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/05/more_on_project_1.php
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The more the layers get peeled back, the worse this looks.
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Hmm, very telling exploration of Mexican gun trace request data, one that I expect won't see much ink in American papers:
http://wilsoncenter.org/news/docs/Goodman%20Update%20on%20US%20Firearms%20to%20Mexico.pdf
Excerpts, along with an astute comment, via Of Arms & the Law blog:
Guns tracing to Mexico
POSTED BY DAVID HARDY · 24 MAY 2011 05:39 PM
Colby Goodman, of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars has an interesting study. A few excerpts:
"While ATF has some information on firearms recovered in Mexico, a total of 69,808 firearms as of May 2010, ATF agents say they can use only about eight percent of Mexico’s firearm trace requests to initiate investigations, in part because many of the trace requests lack basic identification data and were purchased in the United States more than five years ago. The U.S. government also faces substantial challenges, particularly in identifying firearms traffickers and persuading U.S. Attorneys to accept more criminal cases related to firearms trafficking to Mexico. Perhaps the most worrying from the Mexican government’s point of view, however, is ATF’s Fast and Furious Operation based out of Phoenix, Arizona, which reportedly allowed hundreds of firearms to be sold to potentially known traffickers as a way to build more attractive cases for U.S. Attorneys and ATF did not notify Mexican authorities."
"According to new statistics provided by the U.S. and Mexican governments, Mexico has submitted a total of 78,194 firearm trace requests to the United States from FY 2007 to FY 2010.34 During approximately the same time frame, President Calderon said Mexico had seized about 90,000 arms.35 Looking at these numbers, it may appear Mexico is providing ATF with information on a large number of the firearms it has seized since the start of the Calderon Administration, but ATF now reports that tens of thousands of the trace requests are duplicates.36 In some cases, ATF has received information on the same firearm up to five times as Mexican police, a crime lab, the military, and the Attorney General’s office all write down information on the same firearm, and the individual in the Attorney General’s office in Mexico City submits trace requests on all of them."
"According to a detailed U.S. DOJ Inspector General report released in November 2010, about 26 percent of Mexico’s trace requests to the U.S. government for FY 2009 were untraceable because of serial number errors."
" In addition, according to the same Inspector General’s report, 75 percent of the firearms ATF was able to trace to the first purchaser in the United States were purchased more than five years ago. The report further says that only about 18 percent of the firearms were purchased less than three years ago."
"For example, ATF agents frequently use the act of illegally buying a firearm for someone else, otherwise known as straw purchasing, in seeking to stop firearms trafficking to Mexico, but the overwhelming majority of the defendants convicted of this crime have received less than one year in prison.48 The average prison sentences for two other crimes ATF most often uses to stop firearms trafficking – knowingly making a false statement and willfully engaging in a firearms business without a license – were also just over a one year.49 By comparison, drug conspiracy charges averaged 10 year sentences. As a result, ATF officials have said there is often an unwritten, minimum threshold of 10 to 20 illegal trafficked firearms and one firearm used in a crime before a U.S. Attorney will accept the case, which appears to have led to the problems with ATF’s Fast and Furious Operation.50 U.S. Attorneys also stated that they decided to reject ATF referred cases related to Project Gunrunner because the cases sometimes lacked evidence of criminal intent or had insufficient evidence"
"Lastly, although ATF could increase the penalties firearms traffickers face by engaging in joint investigations with ICE on criminal cases related to smuggling and arms export controls, it has continued to largely avoid working with ICE, which has the most experience on these types of violations.58 For example, the DOJ Inspector General found that charges related to smuggling on average resulted in five year prison sentences, which are much longer than the crimes ATF often pursues.59 However, the Inspector General found that from “FY 2004 through FY 2009, only seven defendants in Project Gunrunner cases were convicted of smuggling.”"
Comments
" In addition, according to the same Inspector General’s report, 75 percent of the firearms ATF was able to trace to the first purchaser in the United States were purchased more than five years ago. The report further says that only about 18 percent of the firearms were purchased less than three years ago."
In other words, the only seriously organized operation to buy guns in the US and smuggle them into Mexico is run by the BATFE.
http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/05/guns_tracing_to.php
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In other words, the only seriously organized operation to buy guns in the US and smuggle them into Mexico is run by the BATFE.
Amazing. Glad the USG still has the resources to go after those bunny farmers and the Amish raw milk sellers. Priorities, I guess.
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Arizona Department of Safety Officer pulled over a pick-up truck owner for a faulty taillight. When the officer approached the driver, the man
behind the wheel handed the officer his driver’s license, insurance card and
a concealed weapon carry permit.
The officer took all the documents, looked them over and said. "Mr..
Smith, I see you have a CCP. Do you have any weapons with you?"
The driver replied, " Yes sir, I have a 357 handgun in a hip holster, a
..45 in the glove box and a .22 derringer in my boot."
The officer looked at the driver and asked, "Anything else?"
"Yes sir, I have a Mossberg 500 12 gauge and an AR-15 behind the seat."
The officer asked if the man was driving to or from a shooting range
and the man said he wasn't, so the officer bent over and looked into the
driver's face and said "Mr. Smith, you're carrying quite a few guns.
May I ask what you are afraid of?
Mr. Smith locked eyes with the officer and calmly answered,
"Not a fucking thing!"
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I love that joke! From the more liberal jurisdictions I thought the ending would be that he got the ticket for driving a pickup truck.
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2011/05/08/
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Win on attorneys' fees in Chicago case
POSTED BY DAVID HARDY · 2 JUNE 2011 03:26 PM
7th Circuit ruling here. After losing in the Supreme Court, and before the case came back down to the trial court so it could enter judgment, the defendant cities changed their handgun bans, and the trial court dismissed the case as moot. It then ruled in the NRA case that there were no "prevailing parties" to recover fees, since the only final judgment was a dismissal.
The Seventh Circuit reverses this. As the court asks, "By the time defendants bowed to the inevitable, plaintiffs had in hand a judgment of the Supreme Court that gave them everything they needed. If a favorable decision of the Supreme Court does not count as “the necessary judicial imprimatur” on the plaintiffs’ position (Buckhannon, 532 U.S. at 605), what would?"
http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/06/win_on_attorney.php
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House Democrats Urge President to End Stonewalling on "Gunrunner"
Friday, June 03, 2011
Today, 31 U.S. House members -- all Democrats -- wrote to President Barack Obama, urging him to end Administration stonewalling on the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' "Project Gunrunner," and the "Fast and Furious" program under which border state dealers were encouraged to sell thousands of guns to suspicious buyers.
In the letter, spearheaded by Rep. Jason Altmire, D-Pa., the lawmakers called the investigative tactics "extremely troubling" and found the Justice Department's failure to provide information to congressional investigators "equally troubling." Saying that Americans deserve "prompt and complete answers," the letter concluded with a call for the administration to help "get to the bottom of this serious allegation of federal law enforcement misconduct."
To read the letter, click here [link to http://www.nraila.org/media/PDFs/Pro...S3June2011.pdf ] —and if your representative signed it, please be sure to thank him for taking this stand for strong congressional oversight of this disastrous program.
===============
CBS News has learned that the recent case of a Mexican military helicopter forced to land after it was fired upon is linked to the ATF Fast and Furious "gunwalker" operation.
Drug cartel suspects on the ground shot at Mexican government helicopters two weeks ago in western Mexico, forcing one chopper to land. Authorities seized more than 70 assault rifles and other weapons from the suspects.
===========
Among the seized weapons are guns sold to suspects as part of the ATF sting operation, sources say. That information came from traces of serial numbers.
"Shooting at an aircraft is a terrorist act," says one U.S. law enforcement source. "What does that say if we're helping Mexican drug cartels engage in acts of terror? That's appalling if we could have stopped those guns."
The Department of Justice provided no information or comment when asked about the incident by CBS News.
===========================
Congress set for first 'gunwalker' hearing
Quote:
The first in a series of Congressional hearings into the so-called "gunwalker" scandal is set for Monday, June 13th. The title:"Obstruction of Justice: Does the Justice Department Have to Respond to a Lawfully Issued and Valid Congressional Subpoena?"
As CBS News reported on April 1, the House Oversight Committee subpoenaed documents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF). House investigators say that instead of complying with the subpoena, the Justice Department (which oversees ATF) showed them a "handful of highly redacted documents" and provided additional documents already in the public record.
"They didn't comply with terms of the subpoena," says a House oversight staffer.
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http://www.ca7.uscourts.gov/tmp/8E0PHS5R.pdf
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The Brady Bunch regularly crows over the number of firearm sales disallowed due to background checks, but forgets to mention just about all those denials are made in error:
The Problem with Brady Background Checks: Virtually all of those denied purchasing a gun are false positives
There are several things to understand about how the Brady Law background check process works. At gun stores or other registered dealers, would-be buyers have to fill out a form asking whether there are any criminal convictions or types of mental illness that would prevent them from legally purchasing the weapon. Falsely answering these questions amounts to perjury. If people answer the question by saying that they have a background that prohibits them from buying, a gun dealers stop right there and do not even process those forms. And if people are believed to have knowingly provided false information on the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) form and prosecutors think that they can prove that knowingly false information was provided, the would-be buyer faces prosecution.
Yet, the NICS system accidentally flags many law-abiding people, stopping those who simply have the same name as a prohibited individual from buying a gun.
Some may remember the five times the late Senator Ted Kennedy was placed on a “no fly list.” If someone is flagged by the NICS system, it is because it appears that they didn’t put down something in their background that disqualified them from buying a gun. Yet, an initial denial does not mean that the individual is actually disqualified from owning a gun. Take the numbers for 2009, the latest year with data available. There were 71,010 initial denials. Of those, only 4,681, or 6.6 percent, were referred to the BATF for further investigation. As a report on these denials by the U.S. Department of Justice indicates, “The remaining denials (66,329 – 93%) did not meet referral guidelines or were overturned after review by Brady Operations or after the FBI received additional information.” To put it differently, the initial review didn’t find that these individuals had a record that prevented them from buying a gun.
Still that isn’t the end of the story. Of these 4,681 referrals, over 51 percent, or 2,390 cases, involve “delayed denials,” cases where a check hasn’t even been completed. Of the rest, 2,291 covered cases where initial reviews indicated that the person should have been denied buying a gun. But the government admits that upon further review another 572 of these referrals were found “not [to be] a prohibited person,” leaving about 4,154 cases. That implies an initial false positive rate of roughly 94.2%. And it still doesn’t mean that the government hasn’t made a mistake on the remaining cases. In some cases for example, a person’s criminal record was supposed to be expunged, and it had not been?
Up until this point, no discretion about the merits of the case has entered the picture. If a review of the records indicates that someone is a prohibited individual, they are included. But of these 4,154 cases, only 140 cases involving banned individuals trying to purchase guns being referred to prosecutors, just 60 of which involved providing false information when buying a firearm. Of those 140 cases, prosecutors thought the evidence was strong enough to bring a case only 77 times.
Prosecution may be declined either because further investigation revealed that the person wasn’t prohibited from owning a gun, because false information hadn’t knowingly been provided, or prosecutors didn’t believe that the cases “merited” prosecution. But if someone is indeed prohibited from owning a gun and they left that information off their NICS form, it is relatively easy for authorities to prove they knowingly concealed that information. The most frequently claimed reasons that people failed the background checks are: “restraining orders, domestic violence misdemeanors, non-immigrant aliens, violent felonies, warrants, and indictments.” How hard is it for prosecutors to prove that someone hadn’t accidentally forgotten that they had a conviction for a violent felony or they had a restraining order?
While prosecutors tend to go forward with their strongest cases, those prosecuted are often not found guilty. By the end of 2010, prosecutors had only 32 convictions or pleas agreements, and only 13 of those involved falsified information when buying a gun or illegal possession of a gun, that translates into just 0.018% of the 71,010 initial denials.
So we have two estimates of the false positive rate: 94.2% or 99.98%. The first estimate is obviously too low, it assumes that all the cases identified up to that point are accurate. The second estimate is obviously too high, it only counts as prohibited individuals those who have been proven so beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law. These numbers are just one of the reason that no study by criminologists or economists has found that the Federal Brady Law has reduced national crime rates.
Of course, being falsely labeled as being ineligible to own a gun isn’t the only cost imposed on law-abiding Americans. Even those who aren’t prevented from buying a gun face delays in getting approved. Eight percent of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System checks are “not resolved immediately.” Two-thirds of those checks take up to 3 business days, and the rest take even longer, though these further delays can’t stop one from obtaining a gun at that point.
http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/2011/06/problem-with-brady-background-checks.html
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Congress irate over ATF guns-to-Mexico program
By Sharyl Attkisson
Congress grilled representatives from the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms and the Department of Justice Wednesday over a program that intentionally let guns flow over the border into Mexico -- and into the hands of criminals -- in order to track drug cartels.
CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson broke the story on the CBS Evening News in March. Earlier this year, two of the guns may have been used in the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent, prompting outrage and investigations, Attkisson reports.
Six months ago today, border patrol agent Brian Terry was gunned down. Today, three senior ATF agents sat beside Terry's mom, cousin and sister -- and said their agency may be to blame.
Two of the guns found at the scene of Terry's murder were part of thousands the ATF allegedly allowed gun traffickers to purchase. The ATF called it letting "guns walk" -- a tactic they hoped would lead to them to drug kingpins. Agents who disagreed with the strategy blew the whistle.
"To walk a single gun is in my opinion an idiotic move," said ATF senior special agent Pete Forcelli. "We weren't giving guns to people who were hunting bear. We were giving guns to people who were killing other humans."
After Terry's murder, ATF quickly rounded up gun trafficking suspects they'd watched for a year. That's when the first reports of gunwalking began to surface. Asked if they were true at the time, ATF Phoenix chief Bill Newell told reporters "hell no" -- surprising those who worked for him.
"I was appalled, because it was a blatant lie," Forcelli said. Newell didn't respond to interview requests.
Also under attack: the Justice Department which oversees the ATF. Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich says the agency is cooperating with Congress, but Rep. Darryl Issa says information is being withheld.
"You should be ashamed of yourself," Issa said at the hearing Wednesday holding up a blacked-out sheet of paper. "The pages go on like this forever. You've given us black paper instead of white paper. How dare you make an opening statement of 'cooperation.'"
Issa pressed Weich on who in Washington authorized the program -- and received no answer.
"There was serious profound disagreement about strategy -- but the common goal was to stop gun trafficking to Mexico," Weich said. "Some of the testimony provided today is of great concern. That is why the attorney general asked the inspector general to look into it."
When Brian Terry was gunned down last December, he'd already mailed Christmas gifts.
"The gifts that Brian had picked out with such thought and care began to arrive in the mail that same week," recalled Terry's cousin Robert Heyer, a Secret Service agent. "With each delivery, we felt the indescribable pain of Brian's death."
Terry's family wants someone to accept responsibility. The Department of Justice inspector general is investigating -- and any gunwalking that was taking place has been halted.
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BTW Fox's Bret Baier Report, a genuine news show, is beginning to give the ATF Gun Running Story some ongoing coverage. Looks like they may have been amongst the lurkers here :-D
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Around the gun blogosphere folks are starting to ask just what the BATFE's end game was. It seems highly unlikely that letting any number of guns slip over the border would impact the arrest and prosecution of narco-terrorists--already got tons of drugs and bodies stacked like cord wood to prosecute--so various pundits are trying to backward engineer just what the goal was. The answer various people are arriving at is that the BATFE's upper management sought to provide their superiors with strong arguments for imposing draconian gun laws by demonstrating a problem flow of weapons, a flow they initiated. It's been funny watching the Dems involved in various hearings this week as they seem to be singing off that exact talking point.
One such example of blogosphere ruminations:
BATFE Report
In the airport, but I did want to comment on the Congressional report on the BATFE Gunwalker scandal. This from the Washington Examiner:
Rep. Darrell Issa, the California Republican who chairs the House committee, the report focuses on the efforts of four BATF agents who brought direct knowledge of the program:
“ATF agents have shared chilling accounts of being ordered to stand down as criminals in Arizona walked away with guns headed for Mexican drug cartels,” Issa said. “With the clinical precision of a lab experiment, the Justice Department kept records of weapons they let walk and the crime scenes where they next appeared. To agents’ shock, preventing loss of life was not the primary concern.”
Among the report's highlights, according to an Issa spokesman, are these:
* The supervisor of Operation Fast and Furious was “jovial, if not, not giddy but just delighted about” walked guns showing up at crime scenes in Mexico according to an ATF agent. (p. 37)
* Another ATF agent told the committee about a prediction he made a year ago that “someone was going to die” and that the gunwalking operation would be the subject of a Congressional investigation. (p. 24)
* The shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords created a “state of panic” within the group conducting the operation as they initially feared a “walked” gun might have been used. (p. 38)
* One Operation Fast and Furious Agent: “I cannot see anyone who has one iota of concern for human life being okay with this …” (p. 27)
* An ATF agent predicted to committee investigators that more deaths will occur as a result of Operation Fast and Furious. (p.39)
* Multiple agents told the committee that continued assertions by Department of Justice Officials that guns were not knowingly “walked” and that DOJ tried to stop their transport to Mexico are clearly untruthful. (p. 45-50).
Here's the link to the whole report over at the No Lawyers Only Guns & Money blog.
Here's my quick take...reiterating what I said on the podcast this AM:
1) The ONLY way Fast & Furious makes sense is as a direct attack on the Second Amendment. Otherwise, it makes no sense at all. The idea of "rolling up" a firearms trafficking ring is nonsense. If that had been the intent, it would have been a joint operation with the Mexican government. It wasn't...in fact, ATF went to some length to keep the Mexicans in the dark.
2) The idea of getting a gunrunning indictment against any of the cartel heads is equal nonsense. A gunrunning indictment? Against men that are, in effect, men with standing death warrants on their heads, mass murderers with their own private armies? Wow, they'd be shaking in their boots!
3) Fast & Furious worked exactly as the ATF and the people holding its strings -- the Department of Justice and probably Homeland -- planned for it to work. That is, it put demonstrably made-in-America, sold-in-America guns at Mexican crime scenes, waiting for the largely inept, totally corrupt Mexican law enforcement to find them, submit them to the US for tracing and shout loudly that they had found the literal "smoking gun," that American gun shops/shows were flooding Mexico with arms. That's why supervisors were "jovial, if not giddy" when the first Gunwalker guns began turning up at Mexican crime scenes...it was working!
4) I think ATF believed it had enough regulatory juice to keep the gun stores involved from talking, or if not keeping them from talking demonizing them, and maybe driving them out of business, if they did.
It's hardly a secret that I don't think much of the failed narco-state of Mexico, a country of peasants that has allowed a series of blowhard morons turn their country in something resembling one of the rings of hell. But one thing that strikes me as horrific, and breaks my heart, is how easily, how casually, a group of men in suits, in air conditioned offices in Arizona,, in Texas, and, ultimately, in Washington D.C., sanctioned the inevitable deaths of brown people in another country.
Collateral damage...like Brian Terry.
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I can't see any legitimate law enforcement purpose to what was done in "Gunwalker". If there was, I'd expect they'd be out front with it rather than circling the wagons and trying to avoid congressional scrutiny.
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Quote
1) The ONLY way Fast & Furious makes sense is as a direct attack on the Second Amendment. Otherwise, it makes no sense at all. The idea of "rolling up" a firearms trafficking ring is nonsense. If that had been the intent, it would have been a joint operation with the Mexican government. It wasn't...in fact, ATF went to some length to keep the Mexicans in the dark.
2) The idea of getting a gunrunning indictment against any of the cartel heads is equal nonsense. A gunrunning indictment? Against men that are, in effect, men with standing death warrants on their heads, mass murderers with their own private armies? Wow, they'd be shaking in their boots!
3) Fast & Furious worked exactly as the ATF and the people holding its strings -- the Department of Justice and probably Homeland -- planned for it to work. That is, it put demonstrably made-in-America, sold-in-America guns at Mexican crime scenes, waiting for the largely inept, totally corrupt Mexican law enforcement to find them, submit them to the US for tracing and shout loudly that they had found the literal "smoking gun," that American gun shops/shows were flooding Mexico with arms. That's why supervisors were "jovial, if not giddy" when the first Gunwalker guns began turning up at Mexican crime scenes...it was working!
4) I think ATF believed it had enough regulatory juice to keep the gun stores involved from talking, or if not keeping them from talking demonizing them, and maybe driving them out of business, if they did.
EDN QUOTE
Exactly so. On the other hand, this is claptrap:
"It's hardly a secret that I don't think much of the failed narco-state of Mexico, a country of peasants that has allowed a series of blowhard morons turn their country in something resembling one of the rings of hell." Given the ongoing destruction of this country, a whole bunch more of humility would be in line.
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One of the frightening things about the U.S. government's war on drugs is that it is being waged by federal bureaucracies. The legend of Elliot Ness notwithstanding, this implies that it is not only fraught with ineptitude but that before it is all over, there are going to be a lot of avoidable deaths.
Witness "Operation Fast and Furious," a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms plan that allegedly facilitated the flow of high-powered weapons into Mexico in the hope that it might lead to the take-down of a major cartel. It did not. But it may have fueled a spike in the murder rate and led to the death of U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.
ATF agents are trained to tail buyers of multiple high-powered weapons and find out what they do with them. Fast and Furious broke with this practice, according to a 51-page joint staff report released Wednesday by Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R., Iowa). It cites ATF agents who testified that the plan was to let the buyers disappear, to later recover the weapons at crime scenes, and then to use the serial numbers to identify where they came from. This was supposed to lead to the arrest of not only the Arizona "straw" buyer who had made the purchase for the capos, but to the bust of the big players in drug-trafficking organizations.
The ATF told me that it "can not comment on any of the allegations brought by the Issa-Grassley oversight committee" due to an ongoing investigation, and the Department of Justice did not return a request for comment. But as described in the report, the idea had two major flaws. First, it assumed that it didn't matter who got murdered with those weapons before they were recovered. Second, it was built on the theory that the operation could haul in the big fish. According to the report, the feds were wrong on both counts.
For the local gun merchants who cooperated with the feds and for some of the ATF agents in Arizona, the plan was dubious from the start. An estimated 2,000 of these guns disappeared over the 14-month period of Fast and Furious, and the agents who testified said that this contradicted everything they had learned about never letting a gun "walk"—that is, be taken by a suspicious purchaser without following him and finding out where it went.
View Full Image
Associated Press
Border Patrol Chaplain Mark A. Vander Lee pauses at the memorial service for slain agent Brian Terry on Jan. 21, in Tucson, Ariz.
One agent described his frustration: "Every day being out here watching a guy go into the same gun store buying another 15 or 20 AK-47s or variants or . . . five or tenDraco pistols or FN Five-seveNs . . . guys that don't have a job, and he is walking in here spending $27,000 for three Barrett .50 calibers . . . and you are sitting there every day and you can't do anything." Agents say that their concerns, expressed to supervisors, were rebuffed. There was even a threat of dismissal if they didn't get with the program.
At the same time, violence was spiking in Mexico. In an email dated April 2, 2010, the group's supervisor reported that in the month of March "our subjects" had purchased 359 firearms and that 958 people were killed in Mexico in drug violence. It was the bloodiest month since 2005 and included 11 policemen in the state of Sinaloa. As another agent interviewed for the staff report said: "We were all sick to death when we realized . . . what was going on or when we saw what was going on by the trends. We were all just, yes, we were all distraught."
Well, not all. The agents interviewed say supervisors viewed the bloodshed with chilling indifference—or worse. As the report summarizes, "An increase of crimes and deaths in Mexico caused an increase in the recovery of weapons at crime scenes. When these weapons traced back through the Suspect Gun Database to weapons that were walked under Fast and Furious, supervisors in Phoenix were giddy at the success of their operation."
Agents say that the loss of life and worries that the guns might eventually be used on U.S. personnel were not addressed because supervisors thought their plan was working. The "sentiment" from higher-ups, according to one agent's testimony, was "if you are going to make an omelet, you need to scramble some eggs." It was only when Agent Terry was murdered and two AK-47s that had "walked" were found at the scene, that the operation came under scrutiny. The ATF subsequently arrested a number of straw purchasers but none of those arrests involved "key players of a criminal syndicate," according to the report. For the record, an ATF official in the report says that the bureau never let guns "walk."
By any measure the 40-year-old war on drugs has been a failure. One unintended consequence is the financing that the sale of prohibited substances provides to gangsters who then buy guns. That's bad enough. But when the ATF puts making the big cartel bust above human life, it's a new low.
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Is it just me, or are echos of the "argument" this pieces starts off with satirically found around here?
A Suicide Pact
Can the U.S. afford the Bill of Rights?
A. Barton Hinkle | June 17, 2011
Earlier this week the Fort Worth Star-Telegram published one of the more astounding documents of our age. It was written by Joaquin "the Hatchet" Zapata—a notorious enforcer for the Zetas drug cartel, which controls much of the cocaine trade across the border of southern Texas.
Resembling nothing so much as an army field manual for mules and midlevel traffickers, the "Instrucciones" on shipping cocaine include a lengthy section on what to do if captured by U.S. authorities. Going into great detail about the legal rights of criminal defendants in America, it advises couriers to clam up, ask for an attorney, claim irregularities in the search (the exclusionary rule won't allow tainted evidence in court), and so on.
Naturally, right-wingers have jumped on the story. "The pendulum has swung too far in the narcoterrorists' favor," intoned GOP presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty. Michele Bachmann demanded that Democrats join Republicans in rolling back any "technicalities" that work in the drug lords' favor.
As usual, Sarah Palin went further than most: "The Constitution of this great country of ours that I love so much is not some kind of suicide deal," she said (misquoting the late Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson), "and that is why I am urging our Congress today to repeal back the Fourth"—i.e., to draw a blue line through the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Palin is right. If drug dealers are exploiting our freedoms, then we no longer can afford them. Right?
Ha! Only kidding. None of that really happened. (Had you there for a second though, right?)
As you may have guessed by now, the foregoing is a rather ham-fisted parable. There are no Instrucciones, and Republicans have not been waving them about as proof that America should repeal the Bill of Rights.
Yet we are hearing just that sort of argument—in nature, if not in degree—from progressives right now.
Several days ago Adam Gadahn, an American-born spokesman for Al Qaeda, urged would-be jihadists to buy guns at gun shows: "America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms," he said. "You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?"
Within a couple of femtoseconds, progressive America began quoting Gadahn as proof that the U.S. needs to close the gun-show loophole. "There may never be a better spokesman" for doing so than Gadahn, opined The Washington Post—echoed by ThinkProgress, the New York Daily News, the Brady Campaign, and countless others.
This has to qualify as the Mount Everest of non sequiturs. The "loophole," as it is called, refers to the fact that private citizens who are not licensed gun dealers can sell their guns without conducting background checks—not only at gun shows, but anywhere. There are some sound arguments for closing the gun-show loophole, and there are some sound arguments for not closing it, and anyone who has followed the debate is familiar with most of them.
There are also some stupid arguments on both sides. Contending that the loophole should be closed because it might redound to the benefit of terrorists has to be one of the stupidest. Many of those making it simply cite Gadahn's words alone as sufficient proof—as though it were intuitively obvious that any policy potentially useful to Al Qaeda must be repealed at once.
If so, then Congress will be very busy. Because the so-called loophole is not the only policy potentially useful to Al Qaeda. So are a great many others. Among them: habeas corpus, which the Supreme Court reaffirmed in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld; the Fourth Amendment and its various progeny, such as the unique-to-America exclusionary rule; Miranda guarantees; the FISA court, which (some say) hamstrings counterintelligence efforts; and so on.
Indeed, during the Bush years you heard a lot of talk along just such lines: Many conservatives argued with perfectly straight faces that the blood of a hundred-thousand innocent people would be on the hands of anyone who let constitutional scruples get in the way of hunting terrorists down. Dissenting in Boumediene v. Bush, for example, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia lamented that upholding the habeas rights of alleged enemy combatants "will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Well. After the High Court struck down a Chicago gun-control law last year, The New York Times—which praised recognizing the habeas rights of suspected terrorists—condemned recognizing the Second Amendment rights of American citizens. The arguments in the Chicago ruling, it lamented, "were infuriatingly abstract, but the results will be all too real and bloody."
Constraints upon government meant to protect the innocent sometimes end up protecting the guilty as well. That is one of the prices we pay for our liberties, and in that regard Justice Jackson was wrong. In some ways, the Constitution is a suicide pact: We accept the dangers of liberty in return for not living in a police state.
Or at least that is how it is supposed to work. People tend to want to carve out exceptions, though. So while liberals and conservatives don't agree on much, they do agree on this: American lives are far too precious to squander in defense of any item of the Bill of Rights cherished by the other side.
A. Barton Hinkle is a columnist at the Richmond Times-Dispatch. This article originally appeared at the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
http://reason.com/archives/2011/06/17/a-suicide-pact
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There is no way muslims would buy guys to do violence. Islam is a religion of peace and jihad means an internal spiritual struggle. How un-progressive to suggest otherwise.
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Rumor has it BATFE director Melson is about to get tossed under the bus:
Issa leaks ATF emails
By Jordy Yager - 06/15/11 11:58 AM ET
The chairman of the House Oversight Committee released copies of redacted emails on Wednesday that detail the involvement of the head of the nation's firearms law enforcement agency in a controversial gun-tracking program as early as March 2010.
The emails strike a stark contrast to letters the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) have sent to lawmakers in which they denied selling assault weapons to known and suspected straw purchasers for drug cartels and claimed that they made every effort to prevent weapons from ending up in Mexico.
In one of the emails, released by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), with the subject heading “Director’s questions,” the supervisor of the “Fast and Furious” operation wrote to the assistant special agent in charge of Phoenix field operations with an Internet Protocol address for one of the video monitoring units in a gun store which was authorized to sell guns to the suspects.
The emails seem to indicate that ATF acting director Kenneth Melson had asked for this information.
“With this information, acting Director Melson was able to sit at his desk in Washington and – himself – watch a live feed of the straw buyers entering the gun stores to purchase dozens of AK-47 variants,” said a Republican committee statement.
Earlier this year, in response to a letter from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) to Melson asking him about his knowledge of the gun-tracking operation, the Justice Department wrote the senator, denying knowingly selling assault weapons to straw purchasers and stating that it made every effort to prevent weapons from ending up in Mexico.
In another email dated March 10, 2010, the assistant special agent in charge of Phoenix field operations wrote to the supervisor of the “Fast and Furious” operation and said, “Not sure if you know, but Mr. Melson and Mr. Hoover are being briefed weekly on this investigation and the recent success with [redacted] so they are both keenly interested in case updates.”
The release of the emails come as Issa was holding a hearing on the gun-tracking program with ATF agents.
http://thehill.com/homenews/news/166575-issa-leaks-atf-emails
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"Constraints upon government meant to protect the innocent sometimes end up protecting the guilty as well. That is one of the prices we pay for our liberties, and in that regard Justice Jackson was wrong. In some ways, the Constitution is a suicide pact: We accept the dangers of liberty in return for not living in a police state."
Of course there is the matter of balancing individual freedoms with the greater good. We have a military and intelligence agencies to do things we don't want the criminal justice system to do within our borders. No freedom is absolute and there are real threats that require unpleasant policy solutions.
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-from-obamas-inauguration-to-issas-report/?singlepage=true
Gunwalker: From Obama’s Inauguration to Issa’s Report
The terrible gun policy and administration lies that have led to the scandal of scandals.
June 20, 2011 - 12:00 am - by Bob Owens
Major scandals don’t always have the most dramatic beginnings. Andrew Johnson was impeached for replacing the sitting secretary of war; Richard Nixon’s collapse started with a breaking and entering. Bill Clinton’s infamy was guaranteed for quibbling over the definition of a common verb.
It now appears that high-ranking officials in the Obama administration may be writing the end of their careers and risking a life behind bars by arguing about the technical definition of “walking” firearms.
“Gunwalker” now involves the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF); its parent agency, the Department of Justice (DOJ); the Department of Homeland Security (DHS); and the White House itself. But to understand the depth of the scandal you must return to its roots at the beginning of the Obama adminstration.
Within weeks of President Obama’s inauguration in January of 2009, newly installed Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Attorney General Eric Holder began to craft the meme that Mexican drug cartel violence was rooted in what they view as lax American gun laws. By February 4, we were hearing the infamous “90 percent lie,” the administration’s false accusation that 90 percent of the guns used in cartel crime could be traced to U.S. gun shops.
The assertion was not based upon the total percentage of civilian-origin firearms captured from Mexican cartels and traced back to U.S. gun shops, but upon the small percentage of weapons that the Mexican government saw markings on which indicated they could have come from or through the States. Only this much smaller percentage of guns were sent to the ATF for tracing. Unsurprisingly, a large percentage of guns with U.S. markings did come from the U.S., but they were a small fraction of the total number of guns confiscated by Mexican authorities.
How large was the discrepancy between the Obama administration’s lie and reality?
Mexico has more than 300,000 confiscated weapons locked in vaults. Mexico has asked the U.S. government to trace just a small fraction of those, including just 11,000 in 2007-2008, of which a little more than half — close to 6,000 — were successfully traced. This means roughly 5,000 of the 11,000 submitted could not be traced at all. Of those 6,000 guns that could be traced, 5,114 were traced to the U.S.
It is unknown how many of those traced weapons were purchased in U.S. gun shops, how many were stolen, and how many were Mexican military weapons sold to cartels by deserting Mexican soldiers.
A few thousand firearms out of more than 300,000 doesn’t make for a good crisis, so the Obama administration lied: again and again they pushed the 90 percent lie in the media, hoping to spur calls for gun control.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder tipped the administration’s hand just a little more than a month into Obama’s term, using cartel violence as an excuse to push for reinstatement of the failed Clinton-era “assault weapons” ban. The ban, part of the 1994 crime bill, outlawed several firearms by name and limited the number of certain other cosmetic features that politicians thought were scary, even though they did not have anything to do with a firearm’s rate of fire or accuracy. Examples of the cosmetic features banned included bayonet lugs, pistol grips, and barrel shrouds. Manufacturers released the exact same firearms, sans the offending cosmetics, the very next day with no reduction in lethality. The result of this pseudo-ban was to make these firearms more attractive to Americans, who purchased these weapons in far greater numbers than they ever had before.
The ban also stopped the new manufacture of standard capacity and high capacity magazines, but did nothing to address the ownership or sales of existing magazines. Wholesalers and retailers had millions of magazines in their warehouses, and they were available for retail, catalog, mail-order, and internet purchase throughout the life of the ban.
The “law of unintended consequences” also resulted in handgun manufacturers deciding that if they were going to be stuck dealing with an entirely arbitrary magazine capacity limit of ten rounds, then they would make the smallest ten-shot pistols imaginable. Because of the 1994 ban, we have an entirely new class of powerful subcompact centerfire pistols, and entirely new gun companies dedicated to better serving that market.
After the Obama administration was firmly rebuffed, they were forced to publicly withdraw their call for a reinstatement of the ban in March, though they still pushed the 90 percent lie.
By April, the administration began shifting resources to the border states as part of a “federal blitz,” and announced to great fanfare that they were going to step up efforts to stop gun and drug trafficking across the border — portraying American gun dealers as a key part of the problem. The political messaging being pushed by the White House through the DOJ, the DHS, and the ATF was so overt that by late April, the National Rifle Association warned their members about the scapegoating.
In August, Acting ATF Director Ken Melson signed an agreement with the Mexican government to interdict gun smugglers moving weapons from the United States into Mexico. We now know that that feigned agreement was a farce, as a little more than a month later Operation Fast and Furious was forcing U.S. law enforcement agents to deceive Mexican authorities about their interdiction efforts. The administration allowed roughly 2,000 firearms to walk across the border beginning in October of 2009.
The eventual — perhaps inevitable — death of a U.S. Border Patrol Agent killed by criminals armed with at least two “walked” AK-pattern semi-automatic rifles finally shut the program down in December of 2010. The shooting death of an American cop was the final straw for the ATF whistleblower who exposed the program, which may also have contributed to an estimated 150 or more Mexican police and soldier shootings, and many of civilians. Had a whistleblower come forward earlier, all might have been alive today.
You can read more about the timeline of what happened after Gunwalker was exposed on several blogs (this is a good rundown), and you will find calls for those responsible for this nightmare to be removed from office. Acting ATF Director Ken Melson will be the first official likely dismissed as a result of Gunwalker, but there are significant indications that more senior administration officials knew about and perhaps have lied about their knowledge of the program.
This operation could not have taken place without the cooperation of the Department of Homeland Security — DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano should bear responsibility for her agency’s actions. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has apparently lied to Congress about when he knew of Gunwalker, and considering the scope of the operation it is implausible that he was not involved in its implementation.
It is only reasonable to believe that knowledge of this operation did not stop with cabinet-level officials. If the directors of so many executive branch agencies were involved in this scandal, as it appears they might have been, it is plausible that knowledge of this scheme — perhaps the origination? — came directly from the White House.
One might ask what our laws demand of officials complicit in a plot that used the power of U.S. law enforcement agencies to pressure gun shops into selling weapons to narco-terrorists. If this is indeed the case, impeachment and resignations are just the beginning of the process of seeking justice. Those who authorized this operation and facilitated what was essentially a gunrunning operation to achieve what appears to be a political goal may very well be guilty of a number of felonies — and wanted for extradition to face justice in Mexican courts as well.
Under Article III, Section 3 of the Constitution, any person who levies war against the United States or adheres to its enemies by giving them aid and comfort is guilty of the act of treason. Gunwalker supplied narco-terrorists on our southern border with thousands of firearms.
Less dramatic, but more damning, is the fact that those that authorized this operation betrayed our ally Mexico, and are arguably accessories to more than 150 shootings of Mexican law enforcement officers and soldiers.
The Constitution puts no one above the law. If Melson, Napolitano, Holder, Obama and their staffs were complicit in a plot to arm narco-terrorists that led to hundreds dead and wounded, they must face justice.
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BATFE has been releasing data with a very slanted, myopic cast through gun-grabber Diane Feinstein. Grassley responds:
http://grassley.senate.gov/judiciary/upload/Guns-06-16-11-signed-letter-to-Melson-incomplete-gun-data.pdf
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Now there's a shocking development! :roll: :x
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"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined." --Patrick Henry
Editorial Exegesis
"Acting ATF director Kenneth Melson is apparently ready to take the fall for what may be the most morally repulsive scandal to befall the Obama administration so far. Our neighbor Mexico lies bleeding from a long, vicious war to fight seven major drug cartels at once. Some 38,000 have been left dead since 2006. Amid all this, U.S. ATF agents had orders from on high to supply U.S. weapons to cartel middlemen buying them on U.S. soil for the odd purpose of 'tracing' them. The news that Melson is resigning seems to be a bid by the Obama administration to paint this as simply an example of Keystone Kop-style bungling being corrected. But many things suggest the operation may have been done for political purposes, and not merely stupidity. The idea behind 'Operation Fast and Furious' was to let gun dealers sell weapons to cartel middlemen, who would then ship them to criminal gangs in Mexico, and damn the consequences. ... There was no effort to trace the weapons even after letting them get out. If the weapons weren't traced, why was this operation sanctioned? ... [Barack Obama ... wanted to reinstate an assault-weapon ban in 2008, but said he did not have the political capital to do it. Bob Owens, writing for Pajamas Media, noted that the administration seemed to want to whip up a crisis requiring a crackdown on guns in the U.S. It gets worse. President Obama has long wanted gun-control-oriented ATF agent Andrew Traver to head the agency. Now, with Melson rumored to be ready to quit this week, he may get his way and benefit. There are real questions that must be answered about who knew about this, and when. An American lies murdered for what may be political aims. He has a right to justice -- as high up as it goes." --Investor's Business Daily
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A Functional Definition of "Racism"
“
Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot, in things racial we have always been and I believe continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards.
"
-- U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder
February 18, 2009
CBS is reporting another death directly attributed to "Fast & Furious" guns, this one the brother of a Mexican state Attorney General, who was tortured and killed by cartel terrorists.
The majority view of ATF's "Fast & Furious" -- jolly pirate names for the jolly pirate club -- is now that it was a purely political operation, part of President Barack Obama's "under the radar" gun control effort. As I have said from the beginning of this fiasco, "Fast & Furious" makes no sense any other way. It was not a law enforcement operation, as made clear in testimony before Congress, because the ostensible law enforcement goals, "rolling up" the entire cartel gun smuggling operation or getting warrants against the mass murderers who head the Mexican cartels, was nonsensical even to the brave agents who have stepped forward to testify.
Those hero agents who stepped forward told their bosses the same thing they told s -- that people were going to die as a direct result of "Fast & Furious."
Apparently, the brass at the ATF and their handlers at the Department of Justice, including Attorney General Eric Holder, were okay with that, as long as it was Mexican nationals doing the dying. Let's be clear about this...all the people involved in "Fast & Furious" knew people were going to die. Their own experienced agents told them so. The cartels have routinely slaughtered family members of people opposed to them, and the concept of "innocent bystander" simply doesn't exist south of the U.S. border.Providing the cartel with a new, easy source of guns was guaranteed to have lethal results.
But wouldn't that just play into the meme? ATF leaders were happy, even described as "giddy," when "Fast & Furious" guns began turning up at Mexican crime scenes.
POSTED BY MICHAEL BANE AT 10:02 AM
http://michaelbane.blogspot.com/2011/06/functional-definition-of.html
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/fired-gunrunner-whistleblower-vince-cefalu-speaks-pjm-exclusive/?singlepage=true
‘Gunrunner’ Whistleblower Vince Cefalu Speaks (PJM Exclusive)
Just a day after Rep. Issa warned the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms to not touch the whistleblowers, they present termination papers to Agent Cefalu -- a 30-year veteran of the ATF. (PJM will be posting Cefalu's termination papers shortly.)
June 24, 2011 - 12:51 pm - by Patrick Richardson
Earlier this week, Rep. Darrell Issa, (R-CA) sent a letter to Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Deputy Director William J. Hoover, insisting on assurances there would be no reprisals against the ATF agents who have chosen to testify about the failed Operation Fast and Furious — the operation Issa has called “felony stupid.”
Just a day later, ATF Special Agent Vince Cefalu received notice ATF wants to terminate his employment after more than 30 years with the agency. Cefalu is one of the founders of CleanUpATF.org, a message board dedicated to addressing abuses within the ATF. He is one of the most vocal critics of the heads of the organization.
He said the main reason given in the four-page document for his termination is “lack of candor.”
Four years ago, what originally landed Cefalu in trouble was a case called “Road Dog“. In that case, local law enforcement was allegedly using an illegal wiretap — something Cefalu resisted:
I threw the locals under the bus … I became the most vocal critic and they got sick of my s***.
He’s since spent four years in a do-nothing job, with ATF managers hoping he’d get the message and retire:
They put me in a cage, paid me full salary, and hoped it would break me down mentally and I would retire.
Since he did a three-part series of interviews about the problems in ATF with CNN’s Anderson Cooper last May, Cefalu says he’s been given only 122 minutes of work:
Not GS-13 investigative work either. Changing batteries or filling cars with gas.
Cefalu said he’s suffered persecution in several other ways as well:
[Acting Director] Ken Melson can’t even respond to a letter from a committee chairman. … I can’t fart in public without being accused of violations. I’ve submitted to seven internal affairs investigations since I blew the whistle. Without an attorney present, I answered every question.
I’m representing dozens of agents [in greivance cases]. They take me out of play, they take a bunch of these cases out of play.
Cefalu says there should be prosecutions in the failed Operation Fast and Furious case, also known as “Gunwalker.” When asked if ATF had violated the law in this case, he responded:
Of course if violates the law! They conspired to traffic firearms, you can’t do that under color of law. … There was no intent to follow the guns, this never had a chance of succeeding. It was a failed plan from the beginning.
He also says there is no huge gun-trafficking operation, no “Iron Pipeline” of firearms traveling from the U.S. to Mexico — just lots of buyers who can make a couple thousand dollars selling weapons across the border.
In addition, he has some more explosive allegations: he says the Mexican Government was not made aware of the operation, and neither was the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico.
And he says people within the Justice Department had to be aware of the operation — contrary to what Attorney General Eric Holder claimed. Cefalu says no one runs a major operation like this without getting approval from their boss.
Despite all of it, Cefalu said he just wants to see the agency he loves cleaned up:
It breaks my heart, it’s shameful to me. … I’m afraid the agency will be abolished because of the actions of a few self-serving individuals.
Patrick Richardson is a 12 year veteran of the community newspaper business. He is that rare bird, the conservative journalist. Living his whole life in Kansas, he has come to appreciate the conservative values of hard work, honesty and honor. Patrick blogs at View from Flyover Country .
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2011/06/26/
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2011/06/27/
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http://hotair.com/archives/2011/07/01/atf-gunrunning-weapons-turning-up-in-phoenix-crime-investigations/
If Americans think that the ATF’s gunrunning fiasco will only impact Mexico, think again. The same porous border that allowed the ATF and the Department of Justice to send a flood of illegal weapons south has already allowed for them to flow north as well. The ABC affiliate in Phoenix uncovers evidence that weapons from Operation Fast and Furious have been found in crime scenes in the Valley of the Sun, a situation that one ATF agent says will continue “for years to come”:
Click on the link and watch the video.
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http://www.atf.gov/training/firearms/ffl-learning-theater/swf/toon4.html
Watch and learn.
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Interesting training video, but in today's economy, it seems a bit altruistic. if I buy the gun, lie and complete Form 4473 and say it's for me,
the store has minimal if any liability. I'm guessing most stores, with a wink, or for that matter if I don't even bring the other person along,
will be happy to sell me the gun. I committed the "crime", lying on Form 4473, not the store, (they will deny knowing).
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Interesting training video, but in today's economy, it seems a bit altruistic. if I buy the gun, lie and complete Form 4473 and say it's for me,
the store has minimal if any liability. I'm guessing most stores, with a wink, or for that matter if I don't even bring the other person along,
will be happy to sell me the gun. I committed the "crime", lying on Form 4473, not the store, (they will deny knowing).
U.S. Department of Justice
United States Attorney
Southern District of Indiana
Southern District of Indiana
www.justice.gov/usao/ins
For Immediate Release
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Joseph H. Hogsett, United States Attorney
Contact: Mary Bippus
(317) 229-2403
mary.bippus@usdoj.gov
Gun Shop Owner Arrested, Thousands of Firearms Seized Following Federal Investigation
INDIANAPOLIS – Joseph H. Hogsett, United States Attorney, announced today that Charles F. Ludington, 61, Parker City, Ind., was charged with violating numerous federal firearms laws following a thorough three month investigation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF).
According to the allegations in the criminal complaint, Charles F. “Fred” Ludington (Ludington) is the sole owner of Ludco Gun Shop, a federally licensed firearms dealer located in Parker City. Between August and November of 2010, Ludington’s firearms dealership underwent a routine, periodic audit conducted by agents of the ATF. During the course of that audit, ATF Inspectors discovered that Ludington had acquired but could not account for 997 firearms that were recorded in his inventory. Ninety-three (93) firearms were located in the physical inventory that had not been logged into the A & D record. In twenty-five (25) instances, a firearm was found in physical inventory but the A & D books reflected the firearm has been sold. Additionally, inspectors uncovered documents suggesting that, on at least seven (7) occasions, Ludco sold firearms to persons who were prohibited by federal law from possessing them. Ludington was also cited with selling a handgun to an out of state resident in violation of federal law, and numerous other regulatory and record keeping violations. At the conclusion of the audit, the inspectors issued Ludington a warning not to engage in such unlawful conduct in the future.
As a result of this audit, an investigation was initiated in January of 2011. On five (5) separate occasions between January and March 2011, undercover Indiana State Police detectives, ATF agents, and a confidential informant went to Ludco posing as customers. On each of those occasions, Ludington sold firearms despite the fact that someone other than the actual purchaser of the firearms was filling out the mandatory paperwork. This practice is commonly referred to as a “straw purchase.” In three (3) of those instances, an informant (who is also a convicted felon) informed Ludington that he wanted to purchase a firearm. Ludington knew the purchaser was a convicted felon, yet sold the firearm anyway. Ludington assisted an undercover ATF agent, acting as a straw purchaser, in filling out the required paperwork for the firearms the convicted felon wanted to buy. Ludington allowed the felon to purchase two 9mm pistols, two 7.62x39mm assault rifles, a 9mm assault rifle, and a .45 caliber revolver capable of firing a 410 shotgun shell. While the undercover ATF agent was filling out the required paperwork, Ludington asked the convicted felon whether he needed any ammunition. The convicted felon handed Ludington the money to complete the purchase of the firearms.
According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Matthew J. Rinka, who is prosecuting the case for the government, ATF and ISP also executed search warrants today at Ludco Gun Shop, Ludington’s residence, and at a storage facility owned by Ludington, seizing the more than 3,000 firearms in Ludington’s inventory and as well as records related to Ludco’s business operation. The government is seeking forfeiture of all the firearms on grounds that Ludington’s business is permeated with an active scheme to defraud federal regulators and violate federal law, and that proceeds of unlawful firearms sales were used to maintain Ludco's extensive inventory of firearms.
If convicted of the charges, Ludington faces a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. An initial hearing will be scheduled for a later date in Indianapolis before a U.S. Magistrate Judge.
A criminal complaint is only an allegation and is not evidence of guilt. A defendant is presumed innocent and is entitled to a fair trial at which the government must prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
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What does this have to do with the Video?
"someone other than the actual purchaser of the firearms was filling out the mandatory paperwork."
Of course he should go to jail.
However, the Video, and my point was different....
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Badguys talk, which can result in the investigation of a FFL dealer, so can spot checks or a pattern of guns seized from felons or found to be involved in crimes can result in scrutiny of those FFL holders that the firearms originated from.
If someone stands next to the buyer of the firearm, giving directions as seen in the video, that's a straw purchase and allowing it is a crime.
http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/18C44.txt
It shall be unlawful for any person to sell or otherwise
dispose of any firearm or ammunition to any person knowing or
having reasonable cause to believe that such person -
(1) is under indictment for, or has been convicted in any court
of, a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one
year; (2) is a fugitive from justice;
(3) is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled
substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances
Act (21 U.S.C. 802));
(4) has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been
committed to any mental institution;
(5) who, being an alien -
(A) is illegally or unlawfully in the United States; or
(B) except as provided in subsection (y)(2), has been
admitted to the United States under a nonimmigrant visa (as
that term is defined in section 101(a)(26) of the Immigration
and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1101(a)(26)));
(6) who (!2) has been discharged from the Armed Forces under
dishonorable conditions;
(7) who, having been a citizen of the United States, has
renounced his citizenship;
(8) is subject to a court order that restrains such person from
harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner of such
person or child of such intimate partner or person, or engaging
in other conduct that would place an intimate partner in
reasonable fear of bodily injury to the partner or child, except
that this paragraph shall only apply to a court order that -
(A) was issued after a hearing of which such person received
actual notice, and at which such person had the opportunity to
participate; and
(B)(i) includes a finding that such person represents a
credible threat to the physical safety of such intimate partner
or child; or
(ii) by its terms explicitly prohibits the use, attempted
use, or threatened use of physical force against such intimate
partner or child that would reasonably be expected to cause
bodily injury; or
(9) has been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of
domestic violence.
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to any person knowing or having reasonable cause to believe....."
"I'll take the black one right there".
ANY decent attorney who graduated from Podunk U could simply say that what was said was, "I'ld take the black one there."
Further, my friend might have said, "I'll take the black one there" and I could say, I agree, I'll I buy the black one there.
I'm buying the gun. I'm completely the paperwork.
While I agree if it is obvious, it is and should be crime to sell, but if I come in alone, or my "friend" merely
points out a gun he/she likes, and/or keeps their mouth shut, the SALE is to me, a valid buyer. The Dealer has no liability.
Further, your previous post gave totally different and incriminating circumstances. That guy deserves what he gets. It was a bad example to prove your point.
My point is while I am in favor of regulating gun sales as you outlined, unlike your extreme example, it is really difficult (see video)
for the dealer to know. This point is also exacerbated with his desire as an owner/salesman to make the sale. It's tough for the Store.
But the bad apples deserve to be punished.
However, "I didn't know" and I sold it to the older Mr. X who completed the Form 4473 in this video would probably be OK.
"I had no reasonable cause to believe that such person is ....."
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I'd say GM's example is relevant because it is of a gun store owner getting in trouble, which is contrary to your apparent suggestion that for practical purposes the statute is useless.
I will give you another example. "Operation Fast and Furious" started with gun dealers approaching the BATF about what they saw as illegal purchases. It was the BATF that told the dealers to proceed. This struck the dealers as so odd that some (or all? not sure) of them said "You better give me that in writing!"
Net result? Some 2,000 to 2,500 guns were deliberately sold in violation of US Federal Law to narco gangs in Mexico. By way of reference, and I believe I have my data correct here, at the request of the Mexican government the US has traced 5,100 guns as coming from the US. In other words, some 40-50% of the guns traced back to the US were the result of Operation Fast and Furious. Let us also note that the Zetas were Mexican Special Forces trained by the US Army at Fort Bragg-- until they went rogue. Feel free to research the point further, but it is quite clear that a goodly portion of narco armament is of the sort not available to US civilians under any conditions-- but it is of the sort that our government has sold to the Mexican military, or other Latin militaries. In other words, the US government is responsible for quite a bit more than the 40-50% of guns traced as originating in the US.
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http://www.atf.gov/publications/download/ycgii/1999/ycgii-report-1999-enforcement.pdf
Trafficking in New and Secondhand Firearms
by Corrupt Federal Firearms Licensee.
St. Louis, Missouri. ATF analyses of firearms
trace data revealed that hundreds of crime guns
were traced to Marshal’s Gun Shop, a Federal
firearms licensee. From January 1988 though
March 1999, approximately 611 crime guns
were traced back to Marshal’s. Although some
were secondhand guns, most were new. They
included Mossberg 12 gauge shotguns, Davis
Industries .380 and 9mm caliber semiautomatic
pistols, Lorcin Engineering .380 caliber semiautomatic
pistols, Smith & Wesson .38 caliber
revolvers, Ruger 9mm caliber semiautomatic
pistols, Glock G.m.b.H. .40 and .45 caliber
semiautomatic pistols, Maverick Arms l2 gauge
shotguns, and North China Industries
7.62x39mm caliber rifles.
Many of these guns were recovered from youth
under the age of 24 and in different States.
Over 200 were sold through straw purchases to
convicted felons, gang members, youth, and
juveniles. Several of the trafficked firearms
were subsequently recovered in a variety of
crimes, including drug violations, unlawful use
of a weapon, homicides, robberies, and assaults.
On August 5, 1999, the 69-year-old owner of the
gun store pled guilty to violations of 18 U.S.C.
Sec. 922 (m), knowingly making false entries in
required records, and was sentenced to 6
months’ imprisonment and 3 years’ supervised
release. The two employees pled guilty to
violations of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 922 (m) in Spring
1999 and were sentenced to 3 years’ supervised
release.
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You are missing my point, and/or you are making a different point.
Maybe we are both bored on a Friday night? :-)
"On August 5, 1999, the 69-year-old owner of the
gun store pled guilty to violations of 18 U.S.C.
Sec. 922 (m), knowingly making false entries in
required records, and was sentenced to 6
months’ imprisonment and 3 years’ supervised
release..... "
The key words are KNOWINGLY. And FALSE entries. Those have to be proved
beyond a reasonable doubt. The Video example, albeit cute, doesn't cut it.
That said, I absolutely agree, arrest the dealers who sell arms to bad
and/or illegal guys. It gives a bad name to honest dealers and buyers and in
the end, hurts all legitimate gun owners. But it's tough...
611 guns? Good grief. This guy should have been
locked up for longer than 6 months. And the employees got probation???
Probably a plea bargain; that just shows you how tough it is to get a true conviction in these matters.
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Were I to guess, the light sentences in that case resulted from pleas in exchange for testimony. The FFL licensee and employees were the small fry in this case.
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, APPELLEE,
v.
THEODORE "TED" HERN, JR., APPELLANT
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Honorable Elsijane Roy, Judge.
COUNSEL
Counsel who represented the appellant was Gene Worsham of Little Rock, Arkansas.
Counsel who represented the appellee was Lesa Jackson, AUSA, of Little Rock, Arkansas.
John R. Gibson, Circuit Judge, Henley, Senior Circuit Judge, and Patrick A. Conmy,*fn* Chief District Judge.
Author: Henley
HENLEY, Senior Circuit Judge
Theodore Hern, Jr. appeals from a judgment of the district court*fn1 entered upon a jury verdict finding him guilty of failing to record the receipt of firearms in violation of 18 U.S.C. ? 923(g)(1) (Count I), failing to record the sale of firearms in violation of 18 U.S.C. ? 922(b)(5) (Count II), conspiracy to sell firearms to nonresidents in violation of 18 U.S.C. ?? 371 and 922(b)(3) (Count III), and recording false statements in violation of 18 U.S.C. ? 922(m). We affirm.
Hern was a federally-licensed firearms dealer doing business as Ted's Gun and Pawn Shop in Russellville, Arkansas. On January 8, 1987 undercover police officer Kelly Watkins went to the gun shop and informed Hern that he was interested in purchasing a gun, but that he was a convicted felon and needed to purchase a gun without any "paperwork."*fn2 Watkins testified that Hern reviewed his record books and advised him that a Jennings .22 caliber firearm was available, which Watkins purchased without paperwork. On March 24, 1987 undercover police officer Kimberly Powell also advised Hern that she wanted to purchase a gun, but did not want to complete any paperwork. Hern complied and sold her a Bersa Lusber pistol. The officers reported the undercover sales to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF).
On November 2 and 3, 1987 ATF agent Paul Bishop conducted a compliance inspection of Hern's business. Bishop reviewed Hern's acquisition and disposition books and discovered that the Jennings weapon Hern had sold to Watkins had been recorded as having been sold in December, 1986 to Roy Alford and that the Bersa weapon sold to Powell had been recorded as having been sold in March, 1987 to Robert Jackson. Alford testified he had returned the gun to Hern because it was defective and Hern explained that the gun would have to be returned to the factory for repair. Jackson testified that he also returned the Bersa to Hern, but Hern did not remember Jackson returning the gun.
During the course of his inspection, Bishop also discovered a large number of transactions in which Hern recorded guns as having been sold the same day they were recorded as having been received in inventory. Bishop thought these transactions were unusual because inventory generally did not turn over so quickly. Hern explained to him that the transactions resulted from sales at gun shows. Lyle Grunland, a federally licensed firearms dealer doing business in Kansas, attended several gun shows in Arkansas. Grunland testified that he knew federal law prohibited him from selling weapons at the shows directly to Arkansas residents,*fn3 but was informed by a gun show promoter that for a fee Hern would act as a "middleman" and complete the necessary paperwork and record the sale of the firearms in his record books. Grunland testified that he believed that Hern conducted at least one hundred transactions for him. Although Grunland stated he did not intend to violate the law, he acknowledged that use of a "middleman" was a "way of circumventing the law, which is a kind of sneaky way of saying it's not legal," and that in other states he would enter into partnerships with resident licensed dealers. Robert Longinotti, Michael Griffin and Derrel Smith testified that they purchased firearms at gun shows from one of Grunland's businesses, and not Hern, and produced cancelled checks or receipts in support.
On appeal Hern argues that the district court erred in denying his motion for acquittal on the ground of insufficient evidence. "A district court has very limited latitude in ruling on a motion for judgment of acquittal." United States v. Jewell, 893 F.2d 193, 194 (8th Cir. 1990). "'A motion for judgment of acquittal should be granted only where the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the government, is such that a reasonably minded jury must have a reasonable doubt as to the existence of any of the essential elements of the crime charged.'" Id. (quoting United States v. Mundt, 846 F.2d 1157, 1158 (8th Cir. 1988)).
Before reviewing Hern's allegations concerning the sufficiency of the evidence, we address the penalty provisions of the Firearms Owners' Protection Act (FOPA) set forth in 18 U.S.C. ? 924(a).*fn4 "Normally, the mens rea for a crime is set out as part of the substantive offense, not as part of a penalties provision, as in section 924(a)." United States v. Sherbondy, 865 F.2d 996, 1001 (9th Cir. 1988). In Sherbondy, the court explained that "the earliest versions of FOPA required that all offenses be 'willful,'" but that the "Treasury Department, along with various witnesses and members of Congress, objected that, with respect to certain serious offenses, . . . the government should not be required to prove intent to violate the law." Id. at 1002. "In response to this objection, Congress reduced the mens rea requirement for the most serious offenses from 'willfully' to 'knowingly.'" Id. In Sherbondy, the court held that a "knowing" violation did not require proof of knowledge of the law, noting there are "few exceptions to the rule that ignorance of the law is no excuse."*fn5 Id. The court, however, did not decide what would constitute a "willful" violation. Id. at 1003 n.9. In this appeal, Hern assumes, and the government does not dispute, that "willful" means an intentional violation of a known legal duty.*fn6 Hern asserts, and the government appears to agree, that Counts I, II and III required proof of willful violations. Hern argues there was insufficient evidence of willfulness.
Hern first argues there was insufficient evidence to establish that he willfully failed to record the receipt of the Jennings and Bersa weapons,*fn7 noting there was no direct evidence of his intent. We disagree. Willfulness and intent need not be proven by direct evidence, but "may also be proven by circumstantial evidence and frequently cannot be proven in any other way." United States v. Lanier, 838 F.2d 281, 283 (8th Cir. 1988) (per curiam). In this case, we believe a jury could have reasonably found that Hern willfully failed to record the receipt of the Jennings and Bersa weapons, especially in light of the subsequent unrecorded sales of the weapons to officers Powell and Watkins.
Hern also argues that there was insufficient evidence to establish that he willfully failed to record the sales to Powell and Watkins. He attacks the officers' credibility and notes that his father testified that on March 24, 1987 he sold the Bersa to a man who left the shop with the gun before completing the paperwork. However, "it is the function of the jury, not an appellate court, to resolve conflict in the testimony or judge the credibility of witnesses." Smalley v. United States, 798 F.2d 1182, 1188 (8th Cir. 1986) (quotation omitted).
We also reject Hern's assertion that there was insufficient evidence to sustain his conviction for conspiracy to violate 18 U.S.C. ? 922(b), which prohibited Grunland from selling guns to Arkansas residents. Hern asserts there can be no conspiracy because Grunland testified it was not his intent to violate the law. However, this court has held that "the government need not prove the specific intent or knowledge of the alleged coconspirators . . . ." United States v. Austin, 823 F.2d 257, 259 (8th Cir. 1987), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 1044, 98 L. Ed. 2d 864, 108 S. Ct. 778 (1988). "It need only show that defendant entered into an agreement with at least one other person, the objective of which was unlawful, and that one of those in agreement committed an overt act in furtherance of the objective." Id. Hern also argues that there was no evidence to establish that he intended to violate ? 922, noting that he recorded the receipt and sales of the weapons in his books. We disagree. Although the use of a "middleman" may be common practice at gun shows, ? 922(b) "is violated by a sham sale made to a resident when the transaction is really with a nonresident, and it is for the jury to decide, on all the relevant evidence . . . whether such a charade occurred or whether there was a bona fide sale to a resident." United States v. Brooks, 611 F.2d 614, 619 (5th Cir. 1980) (subsequent history omitted); see also United States v. Lawrence, 680 F.2d 1126, 1128 (6th Cir. 1982) (toleration of sham sales would in effect be "tantamount" to repeal of gun control legislation). We agree with the government that there was sufficient evidence from which the jury could find that Hern knew the transactions were sham. We note that Grunland paid Hern a fee for his services and admitted it was the "consensus" at gun shows that "middleman" services were designed to circumvent the prohibition on sales to nonresidents. We also reject Hern's assertion that the recording of a sham transaction is not a false statement within the meaning of 18 U.S.C. ? 922(m).*fn8 See United States v. Brooks, 611 F.2d at 616. See also Smalley v. United States, 798 F.2d at 1183 (court upholds conviction for conspiracy to violate ? 922 where records falsely reflected sales of firearms).
Last, Hern challenges his pre-Sentencing Guidelines sentence. Because we find that Hern's violations of the statutory sections were willful, we reject his assertions that the penalty provisions of 18 U.S.C. ? 924 were inapplicable. We also reject his assertion that his sentence was excessive or that the district court abused its discretion in imposing imprisonment instead of probation.*fn9 While the totality of the sentence may seem harsh, in sentencing questions this court ordinarily will not substitute its judgment for that of the district court. See United States v. Rosandich, 729 F.2d 1512, 1512 (8th Cir. 1984).
Accordingly, the judgment of the district court is affirmed.
Disposition
Affirmed.
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http://www.atf.gov/publications/download/p/atf-p-5300-15.pdf
Prohibited Transfers
You MAY NOT sell or transfer a firearm or ammunition to any person you know or have reasonable cause to believe is prohibited from possessing or receiving a firearm. Do not sell or otherwise transfer a firearm and do not contact NICS if you have reason to believe that a person seeking to obtain a firearm is prohibited from receiving or possessing a firearm.
Note: If a person answers “No” to Item 11.a or 12 of Form 4473, or answers “Yes” to one or more questions in Items 11.b through 11.l of Form 4473, that person has given you reason to believe he or she is prohibited and the transaction must be stopped.
You MAY NOT sell or transfer a firearm or ammunition to any of the following prohibited persons or in the following circumstances:
1. Straw Purchaser: A “straw purchaser” is a person who is not the “actual buyer” of the firearm; that is, a person who obtains a firearm for another person. Straw purchases are a primary source of firearms used in crime. If you suspect that a transaction is a straw purchase or there are suspicious circum- stances surrounding the potential sale—such as one person picking out the firearm, handling the firearm, and providing the payment for the firearm while another person completes the Form 4473—you should not sell the firearm. Similarly, if one person attempts to purchase a firearm, NICS denies or delays the attempted purchase, and another person with him or her attempts to buy the same firearm, you must not complete this sale.
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Thank you for those specific examples of the standard of proof required GM. (As usual, the post would be helped by some introductory words by you as to why you are posting it :wink: ) That said, one suspects it is relatively easy for a smarter-than-stupid dealer to not get caught -- which I think is JDN's point.
Which I think, brings us to my point-- that the government itself has been a far bigger source of the guns used by the Narco Gangs than anyone else-- yet the Obama Gang continues to use dishonest data in order to attack the American people's right to bear arms. When viewed in conjunction with the President's very curious statement about "working under the radar" the reasonable yet admittedly circumstantial inference is that the President, AG Holder, and all his people involved are some seriously cold, and IMO criminal people.
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Crafty,
Actually I'd argue that for a rogue FFL dealer, it's pretty easy to get caught once he/she becomes the focus of an investigation. Guns that originate from legit manufacturers have traceable serial numbers and a paper trail from factory, to wholesale distribution, to the FFL. Once a firearm is seized, you can often trace is back to the FFL. If there is an inordinate number tracing back to a FFL, or a potential straw purchaser, there you have the focus of your investigation. It doesn't take a BATFE S/A to see if a FFL is willing to sell to someone posing as a felon and make a case from there.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/03/us/03guns.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23
A major piece on restoring gun rights to people who rights were terminated due to mental illness.
Yes, it is POTH, but it does seem like some people who should not have their rights restored are getting their rights restored.
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http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4069761537893819675#
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/email-confirms-gunwalker-known-throughout-justice-department/?singlepage=true
Email Confirms ‘Gunwalker’ Known Throughout Justice Department
Attorney General Holder's credibility takes another hit.
July 6, 2011 - 8:20 am - by Bob Owens
An email cited in Senator Charles Grassley’s testimony in front of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Operation Fast and Furious indicates that knowledge of the program was spread across the highest levels of the Justice Department. This lends even greater suspicion to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s claim that he knew nothing about the program until well after Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed.
The October 27, 2009 email from ATF Phoenix Field Division Special Agent in Charge (SAC) William Newell regarded a Southwest Border Strategy Group meeting that focused on Fast and Furious. It contained a laundry list of high ranking Justice Department officials that attended the meeting, including:
•Assistant Attorney General (Criminal Division) Lanny Breuer,
•Kenneth Melson, Acting Director, ATF
•William Hoover, Acting Deputy Director, ATF
•Michele Leonhart, Administrator, DEA
•Robert Mueller, Director FBI
Four other Justice Department directors or their representatives came from the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF), Bureau of Prisons (BOP), U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), and the Executive Office for United States Attorneys (EOUSA). The chair of the Attorney Generals Advisory Committee (AGAC) also attended the session. Their names were redacted in the released document. U.S. attorneys for all four southwest border states also attended.
Operation Fast and Furious, now known to many by the more accurate name of “Gunwalker,” was a multi-agency operation that allowed and — in some instances — approved the purchase of firearms destined for Mexican drug cartels by so-called “straw buyers.” The purchasers, who had clean criminal records, would buy firearms from U.S. gun stores for drug gangs. While most gun smuggling involves small quantities of weapons, a small number of high-volume straw purchasers each bought hundreds of firearms for the cartels.
ATF agents were told by their supervisors to ignore their agency’s charter and training and allow the guns to be smuggled into Mexico without interdiction. Roughly 2,000 firearms — ranging from pistols and AK-pattern semi-automatic rifles to .50 BMG sniper rifles — were smuggled into Mexico under Gunwalker and without the knowledge of Mexican authorities. Hundreds of smuggled weapons have turned up at crime scenes across Mexico and the U.S. border states and at least 152 law enforcement officers and soldiers have been killed with Gunwalker weapons.
While it has been known since the beginning of the investigation that the ATF, DOJ, DHS, and the IRS were heavily involved in Gunwalker, the Newell email confirms that every major agency within the Department of Justice was briefed on Gunwalker, including the AGAC, which has the formally ordered functions of giving U.S attorneys a voice in department policies and advising the attorney general.
It strains credibility to claim that the assistant attorney general, the AGAC, the directors of the five major DOJ agencies in charge of law enforcement, and all the U.S. attorneys in the Southwest region were privy to Gunwalker, but that the attorney general himself was unaware of the operation. It suggests that either Holder is being untruthful about what he knew about the operation, and when he knew about it, or that he is so out of touch with a major operation conducted by his key law enforcement agencies that he is too incompetent to fulfill his official duties.
Senator Grassley made an observation in his presentation to the House Oversight Committee that indicates that DOJ-wide incompetence or politics may be in play as well:
According to an internal briefing paper, Operation Fast and Furious was intentionally designed to “allow the transfer of firearms to continue to take place.”[3]
Why would the ATF do such a thing?
Well, the next line in the brief paper tells us. It was, “to further the investigation and allow for the identification of additional co-conspirators[.]”[4] So, that was the goal. The purpose of allowing straw buyers to keep buying was to find out who else might be working with them — who else might be in their network of gun traffickers. Of course, that assumes that they are part of a big, sophisticated network. That kind of assumption can cause you to start with a conclusion and work backwards, looking for facts that fit. Until you figure out that you’ve got the cart before the horse, you’re probably not going to get anywhere.
Professor of Criminology Gary Kleck recently published an article in the Wall Street Journal called “The Myth of Big-Time Gun Trafficking.”[5] Professor Kleck said that according to his study of national crime data, ATF handles only about 15 operations each year that involve more than 250 guns.[6] According to his study, a typical trafficking operation involves fewer than 12 guns.[7]
The operation was a snipe hunt. Operation Fast and Furious was chasing a phantom network that DOJ either imagined or was desperate to create in order to perpetuate the Obama-administration lie that 90-percent of crime guns in Mexico originated from the United States.
Newsmax interviewed Senator Grassley in an article published Monday, and asked him whether or not the operation was an attempt by the administration to change public opinion on “assault weapons” in order to lead to the introduction of gun control measures by Democrats. Grassley was not ready to discount that hypothesis, a wise move considering the forum Rep. Elijah Cummings conducted last week to demonize gun owners. The report Cummings issued called for no less than three gun control measures.
Predictably, most mainstream media organizations covering Gunwalker aren’t willing to acknowledge the depth, breadth, or severity of the scandal or its illegality. Judged by the numbers of crimes committed, lives lost, and executive branch officials involved, Gunwalker has the potential to surpass both Watergate and Iran-Contra as one of the worst scandals in American political history just based upon what little we publicly know of the operation and its equally abortive and incompetent cover-up.
Let us lay this out as clearly and unambiguously as possible, so there can be no mistake.
Senior law enforcement officers within the Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security, including government appointees, potentially committed felonies that led to the deaths of dozens, if not hundreds of Mexican police, soldiers, and civilians, and the murders of least two American federal agents. This program was put in place in order to pursue a phantom gun-smuggling network that only seemed to exist in the the minds of those pushing a political agenda of gun control championed exclusively by the left wing of the Democratic Party, Attorney General Eric Holder himself, and the president of the United States, Barack Obama.
Mexican government officials are infuriated by the scandal, and unlike the New York Times and Washington Post that seek to minimize it, they want justice.
Senator Rene Arce is chairman of Mexico’s Commission for National Security, a congressional panel similar to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He told Fox News that the American officials that authorized Gunwalker should face felony charges in the United States, and then be extradited to Mexico to stand trial there.
It is highly unlikely that we will see Janet Napolitano, Eric Holder, Lanny Breuer, Kenneth Melson, or any other government officials in Mexico to face the possibility of life in a Mexican prison, but the fact that senior government officials in Mexico think that Gunwalker is that serious should turn heads here in the United States.
When Justice is administered by the lawless, there is no justice. We must have have criminal investigations into Gunwalker. There simply is no other option in a lawful society.
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Should Eric Holder (and Obama) be tried in Mexico or in America (or at The Hague) for this type of crime?
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http://washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/2011/07/dozens-fast-furious-guns-were-confiscated-illegal-aliens-phoenix
Let's see, the US DOJ will go after the state of Arizona and Maricopa county sheriff for trying to protect it's citizens from the illegal alien invasion, while it runs guns into Mexico and arms those illegals in AZ.
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"the US DOJ will go after the state of Arizona and Maricopa county sheriff for trying to protect it's citizens from the illegal alien invasion, while it runs guns into Mexico and arms those illegals in AZ."
I simply don't understand this scandal/operation. Is there someone of authority stepping forward and explaining this is what we did and this is why we did it? Arming cross-border militants (what could possibly go wrong?) at a time we should be attacking INSIDE Iran for doing the same thing? Maybe it will all come out in congressional hearings:
http://pl-mgroup-akamai.powerlineblog.com/admin/ed-assets/2011/07/RAMclr-070811-fast-IBD.jpg.cms_.jpeg
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http://legalinsurrection.com/2011/07/obama-sold-tracked-same-guns-to-cartels-he-hoped-to-ban-because-they-were-tracked-from-cartels/
Obama Sold, Tracked, Same Guns To Cartels He Hoped To Ban Because They Were Tracked From Cartels
Posted by Matthew Knee Saturday, July 9, 2011 at 8:30am
In the Spring of 2009, the Obama administration called for the banning of “assault rifles” and .50 BMG “sniper rifles” due to their use in crimes by Mexican drug cartels. Obama dubiously alleged that 90% of these weapons were tracked back to the United States, implying that Americans have an obligation to surrender some of our freedoms to keep these weapons from being smuggled illegally over the border and used in Mexican-on-Mexican violence in Mexico. In this vintage clip, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre discusses Obama’s proposals with Glen Beck.
Obama backed off these proposals a month later, noting that such a ban would not be politically feasible at this time.
In Fall of 2009, the Obama Administration conceived Operation Fast and Furious, in which the ATF sold thousands of advanced weapons to Mexican drug cartels in order to track them once they were used in crimes. This policy perfectly dovetailed with Obama’s gun control arguments. First of all, by selling guns to the cartels that the ATF could definitely trace back to the US (because they were bought from the ATF), the percentage of guns used in Mexican crimes traceable to American guns would increase. ATF supervisors rejoiced at their success when they found that these guns were being used for violence in Mexico.
Surveillance video obtained by CBS News shows suspected drug cartel suppliers carrying boxes of weapons to their cars at a Phoenix gun shop. The long boxes shown in the video being loaded in were AK-47-type assault rifles…
…Documents show the inevitable result: The guns that ATF let go began showing up at crime scenes in Mexico. And as ATF stood by watching thousands of weapons hit the streets… the Fast and Furious group supervisor noted the escalating Mexican violence.
One e-mail noted, “958 killed in March 2010 … most violent month since 2005.” The same e-mail notes: “Our subjects purchased 359 firearms during March alone,” including “numerous Barrett .50 caliber rifles.”
Dodson feels that ATF was partly to blame for the escalating violence in Mexico and on the border. “I even asked them if they could see the correlation between the two,” he said. “The more our guys buy, the more violence we’re having down there.”
Senior agents including Dodson told CBS News they confronted their supervisors over and over.
Their answer, according to Dodson, was, “If you’re going to make an omelette, you’ve got to break some eggs.”
There was so much opposition to the gun walking, that an ATF supervisor issued an e-mail noting a “schism” among the agents. “Whether you care or not people of rank and authority at HQ are paying close attention to this case…we are doing what they envisioned…. If you don’t think this is fun you’re in the wrong line of work… Maybe the Maricopa County jail is hiring detention officers and you can get $30,000 … to serve lunch to inmates…”
And which guns did the ATF sell to the cartels? AK-47-type assault rifles and Barrett .50 BMG sniper rifles. Exactly the types of guns that Obama hoped to ban due to their use by the cartels.
I’m not saying that the Obama Administration intentionally magnified the precise circumstances that they were using to justify their gun control proposals. However, their reckless policy not only had this effect, but provided guns to criminal gangs that were used to murder U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, ICE Special Agent Jaime Zapata and about 150 Mexican law enforcement personnel. Those involved in this tragic irony must be punished accordingly. It is vital that the public comes to know who in the administration knew what and when they knew it. Kudos to Congressman Issa for bringing this deadly scandal into the light. Shame on the MSM for not making this a top story.
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Thanks for keeping us up to date with this story, GM. It is indeed an important story to follow.
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Amen. I thought that last post really pulled things together.
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This is the part that gets me:
Senior agents including Dodson told CBS News they confronted their supervisors over and over.
Their answer, according to Dodson, was, “If you’re going to make an omelette, you’ve got to break some eggs.”
There was so much opposition to the gun walking, that an ATF supervisor issued an e-mail noting a “schism” among the agents. “Whether you care or not people of rank and authority at HQ are paying close attention to this case…we are doing what they envisioned…. If you don’t think this is fun you’re in the wrong line of work… Maybe the Maricopa County jail is hiring detention officers and you can get $30,000 … to serve lunch to inmates…”
The line level agents saw this and balked, and were told STFU by the bosses. The ATF and other feds do "controlled delivery" cases all the time, this was not "controlled delivery", it was the USG engaging in blatant violations of federal law with the full knowledge of high ranking US DOJ figures.
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This is what a controlled delivery case looks like:
Manchester Man Charged with Illegally Importing, Possessing Body Armor
U.S. Attorney’s Office December 06, 2010
District of Connecticut(203) 821-3700
David B. Fein, United States Attorney for the District of Connecticut, today announced that WAHEED ISLAM, also known as WALTER MISSOURI, JR., 43, of Seaman Circle, Manchester, has been charged by criminal complaint with the illegal importation and possession of a bullet proof vest.
According to the allegations set forth in the federal criminal complaint, on November 28, 2010, a U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officer at the DHL Hub located in Hebron, Kentucky intercepted and selected for border inspection a suspicious DHL package that had originated in China. The package, which was addressed to WAHEED ISLAM, was manifested as containing a “100% cotton knitted men’s vest.” However, subsequent examination of the package revealed that it contained a bullet proof vest, specifically one set of Level IIIa body armor.
The complaint further alleges that WAHEED ISLAM’s criminal history includes numerous convictions for violent assaults, robberies and burglaries of varying degrees. It is a violation of federal for an individual to possess body armor if he has previously been convicted of a crime of violence.
Today, law enforcement officers from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security, including a law enforcement officer acting in an undercover capacity, made a controlled delivery of the DHL package to WAHEED ISLAM’s Manchester residence. WAHEED ISLAM was arrested after he signed for and accepted delivery of the parcel.
Following his arrest, WAHEED ISLAM appeared before United States Magistrate Judge Thomas P. Smith in Hartford and was detained pending a detention hearing that is scheduled for December 8 at 10:00 a.m.
WAHEED ISLAM is charged in the complaint with possession of ballistic body armor by an individual who has been convicted of a crime of violence, which carries a maximum term of imprisonment of three years. He also is charged with illegally concealing the true nature of imported merchandise into the United States, which carries a maximum term of imprisonment of 20 years.
U.S. Attorney Fein stressed that a complaint is only a charge and is not evidence of guilt. Charges are only allegations and the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
U.S. Attorney Fein commended the substantial efforts and cooperation of the several agencies involved in this investigation in both Connecticut and Kentucky, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”), Homeland Security Investigations (“HSI”) and Customs and Border Protection (“CBP”); the Manchester Police Department; and the State of Connecticut Office of Adult Probation. This case is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Stephen B. Reynolds.
What you don't do is knowingly let Mr. Islam take possession of the vest, then wait to see if he ends up in the newspapers.
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This is what happens to a state level LEO who does his own "operation gunwalker".
http://myhighplains.com/fulltext?nxd_id=148475
An Oklahoma Drug Agent Arrested for Smuggling Guns to Mexico
Reported by: Lori Rozzell
OKLAHOMA--A drug agent for the state of Oklahoma is on house arrest after accusations that he smuggled guns for a Mexican drug cartel. Francisco Reyes led a double life during his three years with the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics. According to court documents filed Monday, he's facing three counts for conspiring to smuggle guns. ATF agents say they've been tracking Reyes and his whereabouts for some time now. According to court documents, ATF agents recovered dozens of assault rifles heading to Laredo and then traced them back to Oklahoma, and then ultimately to Reyes. Investigators say Reyes would recruit several friends-- one in particular named Gregorio Morales; he was also arrested.
"We want to stress that his was a single individual employee acting on his own, on his own time, and not during the Bureau hours or in Bureau vehicles," Mark Woodward of the Oklahoma Bureau of Narcatoics said.
Investigators say Reyes would recruit several friends in the Stillwater area and across the state to buy the firearms for him before he completed the paperwork to get the guns to Mexico. Reyes was a reserve officer with the Goodwell Police Department for two years. He left in May of 2004. His supervisor at the time said there was no problems or issues, and he left in good standing with the Department. ATF agents have been tracking weapons Reyes bought at several gun stores since June.
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Pertinent counter-point there GM as to the right way of doing things.
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Urge Your U.S. Senator To Sign Sen. Moran's Letter To The President Opposing The UN Arms Trade Treaty
Friday, July 01, 2011
NRA will be in full attendance at the UN's Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) "Preparatory Committee" meeting in New York, July 11-15. The so-called "Prep. Com." will be laying the ground work for a final negotiation session in 2012. NRA's message will be simple and strong – an ATT which in any way, shape or form affects the constitutional rights of American gun owners is simply unacceptable. Civilian firearms must not be within the scope of an ATT. There will be no compromise on this crucial point.
U.S. Senator Jerry Moran (R-Kansas) agrees with NRA's position and has drafted a letter to President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton expressing "grave concern about the dangers posed by the United Nations' Arms Trade Treaty."
Members are strongly encouraged to contact their U.S. Senators and urge them to stand by Sen. Moran, the Constitution and America's gun owners by supporting and signing this critically important letter (you can find contact information for your U.S. Senators here, or you may contact them by phone at (202) 224-3121). It is imperative that we get backing from your senators in order to show the UN and the Obama administration that they don't have sufficient support or votes in the U.S. Senate to ratify a gun-ban treaty.
As we have often reported, NRA has been engaged at the United Nations and elsewhere internationally in response to anti-small arms initiatives for more than 15 years. During this time, we have been actively opposing transnational efforts that would limit Americans' Second Amendment freedoms and have been monitoring and actively fighting any and all attempts on the part of the UN to restrict our sovereignty and gun rights.
NRA has been a recognized Non-Governmental Organization at the United Nations since 1997. Our status as an NGO allows us to closely monitor the internal UN debate over firearm issues and report back to our members. Our NGO status also allowed NRA to take an active role in thwarting the absurdly titled "UN Conference to Review Progress Made in the Implementation of the Programme of Action to Prevent and Eradicate the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects" in 2006, and the previous meeting, the "UN Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons" in the summer of 2001.
In addition to its UN activities, NRA is a founding member of the World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities. The WFSA is an association of hunting, shooting, and industry organizations that was founded in 1996. The WFSA includes over 35 national and international organizations, representing over 100 million sport shooters worldwide.
NRA members may rest assured that NRA will be actively involved in this process and will oppose any treaty that attempts to impose limits on our Second Amendment rights. In the meantime, members should contact their U.S. Senators and urge them to sign Sen. Moran's letter.
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http://capwiz.com/nra/dbq/officials/
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By the way, I note this thread now has over 100,000 reads 8-)
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I don't remember where, but I heard something about the Operation Gun Runner in Texas-Mexico apparently has a correlary in Florida running guns to Central America. Anyone heard anything about it?
There is a brief reference to it in the piece below:
=========================
Guns Gone Wild -- ATF's Good Intentions Gone Bad
Obama's Solution: New Gun Control Measures
"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition." --James Madison
Obama's ATF Political FollyIn January of this year, Federal Judge John Roll, a Republican nominated by President George H.W. Bush, was among six citizens murdered by a psychopath in Tucson. Democrat Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was among 14 wounded in that attack.
Predictably, Barack Hussein Obama and his Leftist cadres in the Democrat Party were quick to convert the Tucson tragedy into political fodder to formulate a new round of "common sense" gun control legislation. Indeed, Obama claimed the Tucson assault should "at least be the beginning of a new discussion on how we can keep America safe for all our people." He went on, "I believe that if common sense prevails, we can get beyond wedge issues and stale political debates to find a sensible, intelligent way [to confiscate guns]."
But Obama's nefarious plan to undermine the Second Amendment was well underway many, many months prior to the Tucson murders -- and well below the radar. In fact, anti-gun activist Sarah Brady said that Obama told her, "I just want you to know that we are working on [gun control]. ... We have to go through a few processes, but under the radar."
Why would Obama want to be so clandestine with his anti-2A agenda?
In recent decades, Democrats have suffered serious electoral and judicial setbacks when trying to enact gun control measures. Given the lack of broad support for such measures, Obama is silently advancing the Socialist agenda to disarm Americans and, ultimately, neutralize our ability to defend Essential Liberty.
In March of this year, I detailed insider accounts regarding Project Gunrunner, a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives operation begun in 2005, which originally had the objective of tracking weapons transfers between the U.S. and Mexico in order to expose Mexican drug cartels.
However, in early 2009, the Obama administration determined that the original purpose of Gunrunner could be altered in order to provide a new mandate for implementing their gun control rationale: Stopping the flow of "assault weapons" into Mexico. To facilitate that agenda, Attorney General Eric Holder authorized operation "Fast and Furious," that set into motion an ATF plan to encourage and enable "straw purchase" firearm sales to arms traffickers, and allow the guns to make their way into the hands of violent Mexican drug cartel assassins.
Holder determined that he could manufacture a case that guns purchased in the U.S. were responsible for all the violence in Mexico. Then Obama could use that "evidence" to make the argument that, in order to stem the violence, more stringent gun control measures were necessary, starting incrementally with restricting gun sales in Border States. As Demo Rep. Carolyn McCarthy put it, "[Obama] is with me on [gun control], and it's just going to be when that opportunity comes forward that we're going to be able to go forward."
Border Patrol Agent Brian TerryThe "opportunity" was moving forward unabated until one of the ATF's Fast and Furious guns was used last December to murder U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, and other guns were used in the February ambush of Immigration and Customs Agents Jaime Zapata and Victor Avila by Los Zetas Cartel soldiers in Mexico. Agent Zapata was killed in that assault.
I should note here that in all accounts from my sources within ATF, clearly the agents involved at the tactical level of Gunrunner and F&F were under the impression that these operations were legitimate efforts to identify transit lines between the U.S. and members of Los Zetas and other Mexican drug cartels.
However, at the strategic (high-level management) levels of the ATF in Arizona and Texas, it was well understood that Holder had a scheme to use this operation to jumpstart Obama's gun control scheme. (In a March 2010 ATF memo, agents reported that the managers in charge of Fast and Furious were "jovial, if not giddy" over news that ATF guns were associated with murders in Mexico.)
There is new evidence that Holder even used "stimulus debt" to launch "Operation Castaway" in Florida -- putting guns into the hands of the world's most brutal transnational gang, Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) -- to generate additional "supporting evidence" for Obama's gun control mandate.
Recall if you will, Democrat outrage when Oliver North, working for the Reagan administration, ran a clandestine operation selling arms to Middle East bad guys so they could kill other bad guys over there, and then used some of the sales proceeds to fund the good guys in Central America fighting against Marxists south of our border. No such Democrat angst is evident this time.
Obama and Holder are moving forward with their subterfuge with no concern about rebuke. Moreover, they are doing so as if agents Terry and Zapata were still walking the line.
Last Thursday, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney announced, "The president directed the attorney general to form working groups with key stakeholders to identify common-sense measures that would improve Americans' safety and security while fully respecting Second Amendment rights. That process is well underway at the Department of Justice with stakeholders on all sides working through these complex issues. And we expect to have some more specific announcements in the near future."
Well underway, indeed. Lost amid the din of all the extra-constitutional federal tax-n-spend debates this week, Obama spared Democrat congressional action on gun control by unilaterally circumventing the Second Amendment via an Executive Order. You guessed it -- he decreed new restrictions on gun sales in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. Holder's Deputy Attorney General, James Cole, claimed that Obama's EO would help the ATF disrupt illegal weapons trafficking networks between the U.S. and Mexico.
Meanwhile, there's a growing list of serious crimes committed in the U.S. with ATF guns that were thought to be in Mexico.
Parents of Agent Jaime ZapataAs Obama ramps up additional gun control measures, I would remind him that the first shots of the American Revolution were fired in response to the government's attempt to disarm American colonists, specifically to capture and destroy arms and supplies stored by the Massachusetts militia in the town of Concord.
As reflected in James Madison's words regarding the "ultimate authority" for defending liberty, our Founders fully understood that to secure Liberty, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."
As Madison's Supreme Court appointee, Justice Joseph Story, wrote in his 1833 "Commentaries on the Constitution," "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
The Second Amendment was and remains "The Palladium of Liberties."
Those who are foolishly willing to compromise Essential Liberty to pursue Obama's illusion of safety, in the timeless judgment of Benjamin Franklin, "deserve neither liberty nor safety."
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Mark Alexander
Publisher, The Patriot Post
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More ‘Gunwalker’ Emails Suggest Gun-Control Conspiracy
Posted By Bob Owens On July 15, 2011 @ 8:46 am
A Washington Times editorial notes that Operation Fast and Furious was “too fast, too furious [1],” as the gunrunning scandal continues to widen.
It was bad enough that more than a half-dozen director-level law enforcement officials and an unknown number of supervisors and managers acquiesced to a plot that armed cartels with more than 2,000 weapons in ATF’s Phoenix Field Operations area. But saying that a combination of groupthink, stupidity, and institutional inertia is to blame for this fiasco is giving dozens of federal law enforcement officers across multiple agencies the benefit of the doubt that they are merely criminally incompetent.
The increasingly more plausible motivation: political appointees of the current administration concocted a scheme to destabilize a friendly government to restore the flagging anti-gun movement.
That scenario would have seemed paranoid just weeks ago, but new evidence appearing almost daily indicates that the “Fast and Furious” scandal based in Arizona may be just one part of a much wider campaign by multiple government agencies acting well beyond the law.
Recent developments indicate that in addition to Fast and Furious in Arizona, another gunrunning operation was headquartered in ATF’s Tampa Field Operations area. It allowed roughly 1,000 firearms to be smuggled to the ultra-violent MS-13 gang in Honduras.
Evidence also suggests that similar multi-agency programs exist in both the Houston and Dallas Field Operations areas covering all of Texas and Oklahoma.
Taken together, this suggests that we are not dealing with an isolated incident, but an ambitious and insidious attempt by the highest levels of a rogue government to reshape our world by any means necessary.
Katie Pavlich broke the story [2] yesterday of a ”smoking gun” email between ATF officials: Mark R Chait, assistant director for field operations with the ATF, copied ATF deputy assistant director for field operations on an email to William Newell, the special agent in charge (SAC) of the Phoenix Field Division:
Bill – Can you see if these guns were all purchased from the same FfL and at one time. We are looking at anecdotal cases to support a letter on long gun multiple sales.
Chait was asking Newell to use tracing data to support an initiative supported by the administration to require the reporting of multiple rifle sales.
If that sounds familiar, it should; this week, President Obama pushed an executive order — an end-run around Congress – stating the feds will now require the reporting of multiple rifle sales within a five-day period. That the office of the presidency lacks the constitutional authority to enact such a rule seems irrelevant to this administration, which is certain to see this edict challenged in court if the ATF attempts to enforce it.
Even more damning: the existence of more emails that confirm these same ATF officials and others were colluding to use the Operation “Fast and Furious” guns that they helped smuggle into Mexico as a pretext for the new reporting regulation.
Congressman Darrell Issa and Senator Charles Grassley continue to unravel this plot. Along with the emails proving that the ATF was using “walked” guns to justify stricter gun laws, they sent a letter to embattled Attorney General Eric Holder asking the following:
Is there any other evidence suggesting that ATF of DOJ officials discussed how Operation Fast and Furious could be used to justify additional regulatory authorities for the ATF? IF so, are there any such indications prior to July 14, 2010?
Rather than collecting additional information on law-abiding gun owners, what steps have you taken to ensure that the ATF is better able to act on the information it already possesses to interdict the flow of firearms to criminals?
If most of the claims regarding this scandal are substantiated — and developing evidence certainly indicates a high likelihood of that happening — we face a watershed moment in American history.
Every component of federal law enforcement within the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security — and most likely with the knowledge of the Department of State — undertook a massive operation designed to facilitate the flow of thousands of weapons into the hands of some of the most vicious criminal organizations on Earth. These operations likely took place with the full knowledge of cabinet level officials, and possibly the White House. The weapons “walked” were used to gun down innocent men, women, and children, not to mention the brave police officers and soldiers in each nation trying to wage peace.
It demands a criminal investigation and the possible RICO prosecution [3] of dozens of federal law enforcement officers, supervisors, senior management, political appointees, and possibly elected officials.
Our federal law enforcement apparatus became a criminal conspiracy. This was an assault on the democratic rule of law and the very essence of our republic.
URL to article: http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/more-gunwalker-emails-suggest-gun-control-conspiracy/
URLs in this post:
[1] too fast, too furious: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jul/13/too-fast-too-furious/
[2] broke the story: http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2011/07/13/operation_fast_and_furious_designed_to_promote_gun_control
[3] RICO prosecution: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_96.html
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http://www.scribd.com/doc/59954012/Operation-Castaway-2011-07-12
http://www.scribd.com/doc/59954099/Operation-Castaway-ICE-2011-07-13
Unanswered questions from congress.
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-atf-targets-were-actually-fbi-informants/?singlepage=true
Gunwalker: ATF Targets Were Actually FBI Informants
It would be comical if we weren’t talking about dead federal agents and Mexican nationals.
July 18, 2011 - 10:39 am - by Bob Owens
Writing from the Los Angeles Times Washington Bureau, Richard Serrano reveals that at least six of the ATF’s targets in Operation Fast and Furious were paid FBI informants.
Your tax dollars at work:
In a letter to FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III, the investigators asked why U.S. taxpayers’ money apparently was paid to Mexican cartel members who have terrorized the border region for years in their efforts to smuggle drugs into this country, and to ship U.S. firearms into Mexico.
“We have learned of the possible involvement of paid FBI informants in Operation Fast and Furious,” wrote Rep. Darrel Issa (R-Vista), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. The two have been the leading congressional critics of the program.
“At least one individual who is allegedly an FBI informant might have been in communication with, and was perhaps even conspiring with, at least one suspect whom ATF was monitoring,” they wrote.
The FBI and DEA did not tell the ATF about the alleged informants. The ATF and congressional investigators learned later that those agencies apparently were paying cartel members whom the ATF wanted to arrest.
To simplify: the Department of Justice was paying ATF agents to ignore federal laws in order to provide weapons to criminal informants paid by the FBI, who then distributed those weapons to other cartel members who killed federal agents from Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs Enforcement plus an estimated 150 soldiers and police in Mexico.
The development draws FBI Director Robert Mueller further into the scandal, and suggests that acting ATF Director Ken Melson was being truthful when he claimed he was unaware of key elements of Operation Fast and Furious. Congressional investigators now need to interview the FBI director and determine if Mueller was also being provided with only partial details about the operation.
If that turns out to be the case, it is a damning indictment of the Justice Department and senior officials within the Department, who learned nothing about the disastrous and deadly effects of compartmentalization which were partially to blame for the success of Islamic terrorists on September 11, 2001. The “wall of separation” created by Clinton-era Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick seems to have been embraced by her successor Eric Holder, who is now the attorney general under Barack Obama.
The “wall” was created to safeguard the civil liberties of terrorists by keeping counter-terrorists from communicating with federal prosecutors, but can be twisted to serve a far more nefarious purpose, as the various “Gunwalker” operations being uncovered seem to show.
“Operation Fast and Furious” was run out of Phoenix as a multi-agency operation, and Congress is now pursuing leads into “Operation Castaway,” an operation based out of Tampa that seems to have mirrored the goals and tactics of the Arizona operation while providing weapons to the violent MS-13 gang in Honduras. Additionally, ICE Agents Jaime Zapata and Victor Avila were ambushed — and Zapata killed — with a weapon traced back to a yet-unnamed operation based out of Dallas. A steady recovery of weapons to southern Mexico out of the Houston area seems to indicate the possibility of a fourth operation.
It has been know from the beginning of the scandal that Operation Fast and Furious was a multi-agency operation involving elements of the Department of Justice (ATF, DEA, FBI, etc.) the Department of Homeland Security, the IRS, and almost certainly the State Department. It is suspected that this operation violated the Arms Export Control Act, and turned federal law enforcement officers into felons.
While the administration originally tried to scapegoat acting ATF Director Melson and a key source indicates that Deputy Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Blanco is now being set-up to take the fall, neither man has the authority or reach to initiate or approve this kind of operation. It is unlikely that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder was unaware of such wide-ranging and vast operations that involved every law enforcement agency within the Department of Justice. It is also possible — even probable at this point — that he perjured himself in congressional testimony.
Holder either knew of the operation and purposefully committed his agencies to committing thousands of felony acts, or he is a serial incompetent playing the role of patsy for a cabinet-level peer or his superior.
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http://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2011/07/their_latest_le.php
Issa and Grassley -- more bombshells
Posted by David Hardy · 18 July 2011 07:39 PM
Their latest letter to Justice.
The most impressive revelations are of data that Acting Director Melson gave them. ATF was ready to cooperate until it was gagged by the Deputy Attorney General. They informed the Deputy AG that they had documents that contradicted the "official story" Justice was giving out. A memo describing an important meeting -- held to convince a cooperating gun dealer who was getting worried about allowing all these suspicious gun buys -- was actually written over a year later, after the controversy broke. Melson says there is a memo that is a "smoking gun," which Justice is still refusing to reveal to the Committee.
This is the hottest political story since Watergate ... and of course (with a few exceptions) the MSM is ignoring it. The government itself sets up operations that run thousands of guns to drug cartels, gets two Federal agents and hundreds of Mexican nationals killed, then the coverup goes right up to the Deputy AG (which means it goes at least to the AG: his deputy wouldn't want to be accused of going behind his back), an agency head goes defector. And the MSM is in "move on folks, nothing to see here" mode.
If that weren't enough entertainment for the day, Sipsey Street Irregulars reports on letters that Issa and Grassley asking for information on the murdered Border Patrol Agent and the murdered ICE agent, and data on their paid informants who were part of the gun distribution system in Mexico.
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/worse-than-gunwalker-state-dept-allegedly-sold-guns-to-zetas/?singlepage=true
Worse Than Gunwalker? State Dept. Allegedly Sold Guns to Zetas
It’s a stunning allegation that makes the other gunrunning scandals look like child’s play.
July 22, 2011 - 10:35 am - by Bob Owens
Phil Jordan, a former CIA operative and one-time leader of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s El Paso Intelligence Center, claims that the Obama administration is running guns to the violent Zetas cartel through the direct commercial sale of military grade weapons:
Jordan, who served as director of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s El Paso Intelligence Center in 1995, said the Zetas have shipped large amounts of weapons purchased in the Dallas area through El Paso.
Robert “Tosh” Plumlee, a former CIA contract pilot, told the Times he supported Jordan’s allegations, adding that the Zetas have reportedly bought property in the Columbus, N.M., border region to stash weapons and other contraband.
“From the intel, it appears that a company was set up in Mexico to purchase weapons through the U.S. Direct Commercial Sales Program, and that the company may have had a direct link to the Zetas.”
The U.S. Direct Commercial Sales program is run from the U.S. State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls. It regulates and licenses private U.S. companies’ overseas sales of weapons and other defense materials, defense services, and military training. This does not include the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program, which authorized sales to foreign governments.
An El Paso Times article – as of now ignored by mainstream media — went into much more shocking detail:
“They’ve found anti-aircraft weapons and hand grenades from the Vietnam War era,” Plumlee said. Other weapons found include grenade launchers, assault rifles, handguns and military gear including night-vision goggles and body armor.
“The information about the arms trafficking was provided to our U.S. authorities long before the ‘Columbus 11′ investigation began,” said Plumlee, referring to recent indictments accusing several Columbus city officials of arms trafficking in conjunction with alleged accomplices in El Paso and Chaparral, N.M.
Jesús Rejón Aguilar, the number three man in the Zeta’s hierarchy, disclosed last week that the Zetas bought weapons in the United States and transported them across the Rio Grande. Mexican federal authorities captured Rejón on July 3 in the state of Mexico, and presented him to the news media the next day. His recorded video statement was uploaded on YouTube.
Jordan agreed with Plumlee’s allegations that the Zetas are operating in the Columbus-Palomas border.
Plumlee, who has testified before U.S. congressional committees about arms and drug trafficking, said the roads in Southern New Mexico provide smugglers easy access to Mexico’s highway networks.
Insight.org provides a map of the air-smuggling route originating in Dallas at Alliance Airport and ending in Columbus, New Mexico — a small town that has also been rocked by the arrests and guilty pleas of the town mayor and other elected officials who were running guns to a cartel safehouse, and then apparently into Mexico.
There is no direct link made as of yet between the Columbus, NM, officials case and the allegations of the Dallas-to-Columbus air smuggling route, but the possible connection should raise eyebrows.
If these allegations can be verified: what on Earth was the State Department thinking supplying the direct sale of military weapons to a cartel front company? Weapons that were then smuggled out of the very airport used by the Drug Enforcement Agency charged with bringing down the cartels?
Anthony Martin at the Examiner brings up one of the most damning and compelling questions that the State Department and Obama administration must answer if this story is true:
The program is set up so that the sale of U.S. guns to foreign entities involve direct negotiations with the governments of those countries purchasing the weapons. The description of the program specifically states that it regulates the sale of U.S. firearms to other countries or international organizations.
How, then, did a drug cartel purchase weapons through this program when it is neither an international organization nor a government?
At The Truth About Guns, Brad Kozak opines:
The ATF was not the only ones running guns to Mexico. Apparently the State Department was playing, too. And then consider this angle — was the State Department competing with the ATF for the hearts and minds of the Mexican drug trade?
…
If the ATF is supplying the Sinaloas (with Calderón’s tacit approval and/or help) and State is playing for the Zetas, where does that leave the rest of America?
It sounds like a fictional thriller, but considering what we’ve already learned of Operation Fast and Furious, the Justice Department, and the possibility of even more gunrunning operations (Operation Castaway) out of DOJ, is a rival program being run out of State really a bizarre accusation?
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I hate to say it, but this actually makes me laugh.
Lots of excellent info, but the portion about the government (I'm currently in one of those third world countries) (check the ip), telling people that they can't have firearms because way back when someone was bad, whilst they're selling them to the cartel is exactly why I scoff at them and anyone else that thinks they have the right to regulate another's ability to have firearms for any reason.
News flash to some.... the world never has been, will be, nor was it meant to be... SAFE. Some people need to take responsibility for that and cope. No-one is responsible for my safety but myself, and I like it that way. Especially these days. You can't even trust your own government (as though one ever could). Enough out of me.
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You can never make the world 100% safe. You can make sure where you live doesn't look like Mogadishu or Juarez. You shouldn't blindly trust your government, which is why it is the responsibility of the public to monitor the elected officials and those that answer to them and make changes as needed.
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GM, you bring up some excellent points. I've been to Juarez several times and though I've not yet been to Mogadishu, Juarez and other places here in Mexico can't help but make me wonder if humans were ever designed to live in peace.
I and others (and I suspect yourself), have seen a great deal of the "peaceful" nature of our species, which is to say, I wonder if we're aren't just yanking each other's chains in any attempt to control it (gun control laws).
As Guro Crafty had posted earlier, there have been studies done, that reflect that the only policy to have made an impact is one where people are allowed concealed carry licenses.
I have a huge amount of respect for what law enforcement puts on the line in terms of risking their lives, but even they will tell us that the citizens are the first line of defense, and though we know what that means, for the benefit of others, simply put; the police cannot protect you no matter how much one may wish that to be true.
I'll forego the God given right for everyone, regardless of what other's think, felons included, to protect their lives, and simply state that politicians are virtually useless (there is a heavy amount of evidence to support this), and that for all of the laws that they pass, they still cannot stop one person from harming another, if that person is bent on doing that. An excellent example of this is the tragedy that just happened in Norway.
Telling each of those people on the island that they can't have firearms wouldn't have saved their lives, but allowing each of them to have a CCL most definitely would have changed the outcome.
Me? Everyone should be armed. It is their responsibility and ours, to protect ourselves. The problem arises, when leftists, who fail to acknowledge their responsibility, think that they're somehow going to form some type of policy that will fabricate a peaceful world. It simply isn't going to happen.
Ad note: Those same leftist politicians (many of them) have CCL's as well. I wonder why.
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Well, we that live in the modern, western nations live in a greater degree of peace and safety than other humans elsewhere. If we look at the rates of death from tribal warfare from hunter-gatherer societies, they have a much high rate of deaths as a percentage of their population. Look at our own history and the massive loss of life in the civil war or WWI and compare that with our current wars.
Having said that, there are real dangerous people within our societies walking free among us. Very rarely is law enforcement in the right place at the right time to prevent a crime from being completed. The odds are probably better that your assailant would be struck by lightning rather than be stopped by a patrol officer who happens to be nearby. I've often joked that if the general public knew who was walking among them, not only would they buy a gun, they'd move to a deserted island and ring the shores with razor wire and land mines.
A few bipedal predators I've dealt with professionally leap to mind. One is a hulking young adult male whom I believe has already committed one murder (I tried to get the case re-opened and re-investigated, but couldn't) who is obsessed with abducting, raping, torturing and cannibalizing women. He has a "book" he has written filled with graphic descriptions and drawings of bound women with amputated limbs in torture chamber settings.
To my knowledge, he is currently walking free, no probation, no parole and no pending cases that I am aware of.
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U.S. Taxes Bought ATF Guns for Cartels; Holder Lied
Written by Alex Newman
Tuesday, 12 July 2011 16:00
As the scandal surrounding the Obama administration’s operation to put high-powered guns in the hands of Mexican drug cartels continues to grow, new revelations suggest that American taxpayers might have actually paid for the weapons through the stimulus bill and multiple agencies. On top of that, Attorney General Eric Holder apparently lied about his knowledge of the scheme.
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (still known as ATF) is facing growing pressure after whistleblowers exposed “Project Gunrunner” and “Operation Fast and Furious” to public and congressional scrutiny. It turns out many of the guns shipped to Mexican crime syndicates with ATF permission have ended up at crime scenes on both sides of the border. And at least three of the weapons were involved in the slaying of U.S. federal agents.
But despite the Obama administration’s frantic efforts to cover up and minimize the fiasco while demonizing guns, the furor continues to grow. And more federal agencies are now coming under scrutiny for their roles in the plot.
Acting ATF boss Kenneth Melson (standing right in picture above), recently threatened with contempt of Congress charges for obstructing the investigation, revealed a startling new twist to investigators late last week. At least some of the criminals supposedly being armed with ATF permission for “investigations” were actually working for the FBI and the DEA — unbeknownst to the ATF. Or so the story goes.
Melson may have been pressured by the Department of Justice not to disclose details of the operation, and some members of Congress believe he was being set up as a fall guy to avoid investigations of higher-ups. But in testimony last week, the embattled ATF boss claimed his agency was not aware of the other agencies’ involvement because information was not properly shared.
His recent statement sparked a widening of the congressional investigation, according to a source close to the probe cited in the San Francisco Gate. "We know now it was not something limited to just a small group of ATF agents in Arizona," the congressional source explained.
Members of Congress leading the inquiry into the scandal are getting very suspicious. "The evidence we have gathered raises the disturbing possibility that the Justice Department not only allowed criminals to smuggle weapons but that taxpayer dollars from other agencies may have financed those engaging in such activities," wrote Rep. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) in a letter to Attorney General Holder.
“It is one thing to argue that the ends justify the means in an attempt to defend a policy that puts building a big case ahead of stopping known criminals from getting guns,” they added. “Yet it is a much more serious matter to conceal from Congress the possible involvement of other agencies in identifying and maybe even working with the same criminals that Operation Fast and Furious was trying to identify.”
Even more explosive was a recent statement by one of the founders of a top Mexican drug cartel, Los Zetas. In a taped interrogation released to the public, Jesús "El Mamito" Aguilar told Mexican police earlier in July that his crime syndicate was getting weapons directly from the U.S. government. Similarly, a top operative in the Sinaloa drug cartel explained to a federal court earlier this year that he was trafficking drugs with permission from the U.S government.
Beyond the question of whether or not the U.S government has been deliberately aiding gun and drug trafficking, however, there’s still more. Top administration officials — and even Obama himself — have made headlines in recent days after reportedly getting caught in blatant lies.
Attorney General Holder, for example, is under intense fire. He told Congress in May of this year that he had “probably” learned about the government’s involvement in gun running only in “the last few weeks.”
But a couple of years ago, he was bragging about the scandalous program by name during a speech in Mexico. “My department is committing 100 new ATF personnel to the Southwest border in the next 100 days to supplement our ongoing Project Gunrunner,” he boasted to an anti-gun crowd outside of Mexico City in 2009.
Similarly, Obama said he neither approved nor had knowledge of the program to arm the cartels. But the so-called “stimulus” bill, which the President signed, contained an explicit appropriation of tens of millions of dollars in funding for the scheme.
“The evidence suggests that [Border Patrol] Agent [Brian] Terry's death was financed by the president's stimulus package with the full knowledge and support of Attorney General Holder,” charged the Investor’s Business Daily in a scathing editorial entitled "The Stimulation of Murder" about the ATF program. “President Obama needs to man up about Gunrunner and either take responsibility for this tragedy or admit, under oath if need be, that even he didn't know what was in the stimulus bill.”
Critics of the administration have for weeks been raising the possibility that federal officials may have been deliberately arming the cartels for ulterior motives. But even as the gun trafficking scandal explodes, the Obama administration is making good on threats to impose more unconstitutional restrictions on Americans’ Second Amendment rights by executive decree.
As the public outcry over the federal gun smuggling operations intensifies, blame will eventually be pinned on someone. The media frenzy has been steadily growing for months as new revelations continue to shock observers. Where it will all end, however, remains to be seen.
http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/congress/8194-us-taxes-bought-atf-guns-for-cartels-holder-lied
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U.S. Taxes Bought ATF Guns for Cartels; Holder Lied
I didn't see anything inaccurate in the piece, but you are aware that the "New American" is the John Birch Society, right?
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NO, I was NOT aware. THANK YOU for bringing that to my attention. It most certainly is worth noting. It was sent to me by someone who has been a consistent source of good material and so I did not think to question it.
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Woof,
The person that sent it to you wasn't aware either. :-P
P.C.
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What led to 'Project Gunwalker'?
By PAULINE ARRILLAGA - AP National Writer | AP – 56 mins ago
PHOENIX (AP) — Ten days before Christmas, ATF agent John Dodson awoke, got his morning coffee, switched on the TV news — and heard the words he had dreaded every day of every month he had been a member of the gun-trafficking investigative team called the Group VII Strike Force.
A Border Patrol agent had been shot dead in a gun battle with suspected bandits. The agent was 40, only months older than Dodson himself, another ex-military man who chose to serve his country by working for the U.S. government.
An all-too familiar feeling returned to the pit of Dodson's stomach, an awful mix of panic, fear and disgust that flowed from one haunting question:
In allowing guns onto the streets in hopes of knocking off a big arms-trafficking ring, had ATF's Group VII been unwitting accomplices in the death of a fellow federal agent?
Dodson had come to Phoenix to carry out a key component of ATF's mission: To stop gunrunning to Mexican drug cartels. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had stepped up efforts to dam the "Iron River" flowing south, and Group VII was supposed to be leading the way with an operation aptly called "Fast and Furious."
The focus was a group of individuals alleged to have bought more than 1,500 weapons in 15 months from Phoenix-area gun dealers on behalf of the cartels.
Some days, dozens of AK-47 variants would be purchased at once. The same buyer might return to the same store days later to buy 20, 30, 40 more weapons.
Dodson and the Group VII team often observed these buys from inside unmarked cars in the parking lots of the shops. But from the very beginning, he and other agents realized their mission in Phoenix wasn't to stop the guns at all.
"Stand down," the investigators were told whenever they sought permission to make a stop and attempt to retrieve the weapons. "Just surveil."
At times, agents followed buyers to their homes or drop points, but they would eventually be instructed to leave. They saw guns being transferred from one car into another, but then watched as that car drove away with the weapons.
In law enforcement parlance, the practice was known as "walking" guns. And the many hundreds of guns sold during Fast and Furious walked far: To border towns in Arizona, to El Paso and San Antonio, to remote reaches of Mexico — places like Tamaulipas, 1,400 miles from Phoenix, and Guerrero, 1,700 miles south.
On Dec. 14, two of them somehow found their way to a swath of Arizona desert called Peck Canyon, where Brian Terry and three other U.S. Border Patrol agents came upon a crew of border outlaws. Gunfire was exchanged, and Terry, his wrists decorated with bands that read "Honoring the Fallen," was shot in the back. He died amid the mesquite.
It didn't take long that next day for confirmation to reach Group VII: Two Romanian-made AK-47 type rifles had been found at the shooting scene. Both had been purchased nearly a year earlier. And the buyer was a known Fast and Furious suspect who was, immediately after the shooting, finally arrested though he'd been watched for months.
"I just felt sick," Agent Dodson says. "I still do."
Worse, he knew that hundreds more weapons sold as part of Fast and Furious were still out there in the hands of criminals who wouldn't hesitate to use them.
___
It was supposed to be the big case — the one that went beyond the buyers, the drug cartels' equivalent of pawns in a game of chess. Taking them out alone doesn't assure victory.
Fast and Furious had far loftier goals: To go after those directing gun buys on behalf of the cartels. Maybe bring down an entire trafficking cell. Or even cripple a cartel itself.
To try and capture a few kings.
A different kind of strategy was developed and put in motion. It went like this: Instead of working to interdict the many guns that were bought, ATF agents allowed weapons to move through the trafficking network in an attempt to identify additional conspirators and, ideally, build a bigger, stronger case.
It was a risky proposition for a typically risk-adverse agency, a strategy in which the consequences may not have been entirely thought through. But this puzzle had many more pieces that came together to complete the final picture: Gun laws that make curbing arms trafficking challenging. Several unsuccessful prosecutions. A government faced with a deadly, and growing, problem — and the need for a solution, no matter the hurdles.
By the time Fast and Furious was launched in the fall of 2009, gun violence in Mexico was clearly out of control. Daily news reports described bloody shootouts as drug cartels battled for power, and worry had increased about cross-border violence in the many burgs straddling the U.S.-Mexico boundary.
Mexico looked to the United States to both blame and beg for help. Its own stiff gun laws had long driven criminals north of the border to expand their armories, but better efforts to trace crime guns recovered in Mexico underscored the enormity of the problem.
By 2009, the ATF was reporting that some 90 percent of the weapons Mexican authorities recovered and submitted for tracing originated in the United States, and pressure was increasing from Mexican officials for the United States to address the issue. Even before he was sworn in, Barack Obama vowed to Mexican President Felipe Calderon that the United States would step up efforts to stop the trafficking of weapons south.
The question was how to do it.
Old strategies primarily targeted the straw purchasers who were paid to buy weapons for higher-level traffickers, but those cases could be difficult to make, especially in Arizona.
For one, there is nothing illegal about walking into an Arizona gun shop and buying an unlimited number of weapons, so long as the purchaser passes a federal background check. A crime occurs only when weapons are exported to Mexico or if individuals are acting as unlicensed dealers by buying and reselling large quantities of weapons.
Straw purchasers themselves are typically prosecuted for what's known as "lying and buying": making a false statement on the federal documentation they fill out when purchasing a gun by claiming they are the actual intended possessor when, in fact, the gun is for someone else. But even in those cases, courts have held that the evidence must show the gun was purchased on behalf of a "prohibited possessor" — a felon, for example.
All of these things can be tough to prove, and several cases had been tossed over lack of evidence. Most notable was one of the last big cases the Phoenix ATF investigated before Fast and Furious — the widely publicized probe of gun shop owner George Iknadosian, who was accused of knowingly selling hundreds of guns to straw buyers.
In March 2009, a judge threw out the case against Iknadosian, noting that the weapons were purchased legally and there was no proof that they ultimately wound up in the hands of unlawful possessors. It was a hard pill to swallow, and the lead agent on that case, ATF special agent Hope MacAllister, would go on to become the lead case agent for Fast and Furious.
"You have a lot of worlds colliding," said James Cavanaugh, a retired ATF supervisor who negotiated a cease-fire with the Branch Davidians following the bureau's botched 1993 raid in Waco, the last major scandal to embroil the ATF. "You have the war on the border. Prosecutors who are overly skittish on taking a gun case" because of the laws and gun culture in Arizona but also, said Cavanaugh, because they'd been "burned by other cases."
There was also a growing desire in both the Justice Department and the ATF to move beyond straw-purchase investigations, considered the equivalent to arresting a corner drug dealer to try to stop drug smuggling. In search of a more meaningful solution to the overall trafficking problem, the Justice Department in the fall of 2009 began developing a revised strategy that concluded "merely seizing firearms" wouldn't end gun smuggling. Rather, it said, the focus should be on finding ways to investigate and eliminate an entire trafficking network.
"It was with this guidance in mind that Operation Fast and Furious originated," the former head of the ATF in Phoenix, William Newell, told a congressional committee Tuesday.
The Justice Department's Office of Inspector General then began a review of ATF gun trafficking efforts, a report that criticized the agency's "low-level investigative focus" and recommended "developing more complex conspiracy cases" against those further up the food chain.
Soon, the ATF issued its own reworked policy, calling for a more "creative" approach to gun probes and suggesting that straw purchasers be viewed as a stepping stone to identifying other members of a gun trafficking operation. The document noted that such a strategy was already being used in several ATF field divisions. Places like Phoenix, where ATF supervisors acknowledged in a memo summarizing Fast and Furious back in January 2010 that their strategy was to "allow the transfer of firearms" to take place in order to identify co-conspirators.
All of this led to a dramatic shift in tactics: ATF agents could let guns go in order to make a more substantial case. The ATF memo called it "limited or delayed interdiction," and seemed to anticipate what this would mean in terms of weighing risks vs. benefits. It warned that "practical considerations" may require bringing investigations to a quick close. Those included probes in which "numerous diverted firearms ... are being used in violent crimes and recovered by law enforcement."
It's an approach that some longtime ATF agents found astonishing.
"I can tell you in every case I was involved in, the bureau would've been afraid to let the guns go," said William Vizzard, who worked almost 30 years doing gun investigations for ATF and later taught criminal justice at California State University. "There was always the obsessive fear that if a gun goes out there ... it may be misused and traced back to you, and the political implications are terrible."
Mike Bouchard, a former assistant director for field operations, said the endless criticism may have left some at ATF figuring, "No matter what we do we're going to get beat up. Take off the little guy, people say you're not going after big enough people. Take off big people, these are the risks. ... And I'm not sure people thought of the risks that come along with going after the big guys."
That's not to say that guns were never "walked" in past ATF investigations, former agents said. The difference is how it was done.
Jay Wachtel worked more than two decades as an ATF agent in Arizona and California, where he ran his own gun-trafficking unit. He now teaches firearms law and policy at California State University, Fullerton. Letting guns walk has been a practice, he said, so long as it is done in a controlled manner that involves surveillance — and eventual seizure — of the weapons.
"The idea was that you would follow it long enough until you were sure you had enough probable cause" to make a traffic stop or get a search warrant or initiate an arrest, he said, or do what's known as a "knock and talk" — approach a suspect and see if he'll spill the beans. But letting guns walk into Mexico was unheard of, he said.
Wachtel recalled a few times in his career in which loads were lost — including one suspect with 20-30 guns that his team lost in traffic — and the devastation agents felt.
"You have to be an idiot not to worry about what happens with guns," he said. "We used to lose sleep."
The very same fear gripped some members of Group VII from the start.
___
They began assembling in Phoenix around December 2009 — excited, at first, to be on the front lines of a major border gun case.
The seven-member team included Larry Alt, an 11-year ATF veteran with a law degree; Olindo "Lee" Casa, a transfer from Chicago with 18 years under his belt; and Dodson, who had worked counter narcotics in the Army and the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office in Virginia before joining ATF around 2004.
Everything seemed to be in place: A number of suspected straw purchasers had already been identified, and several area gun dealers had been briefed on the investigation and asked to partner with ATF in alerting the agency whenever a suspect came in.
One day soon after their arrival, Dodson and Casa were dispatched to a shop to observe a suspect who was about to make a buy. From the parking lot, the agents watched as the suspect walked out with numerous assault rifles. They got on the radio and asked the lead case agents: At what point are we going to take him?
Just follow, came the response.
Dodson figured they were going to execute a search warrant. Instead, after following the suspect back to his house, he was stunned when the order came down to end surveillance and leave. The guns stayed with the suspect.
It happened again and again. As the case progressed and wiretaps went up, agents began regular surveillance of the straw purchasers, taking pictures and video. Agents would sometimes watch buyers meet with the moneymen, then follow them to the gun shops and wait outside as they went in and purchased the weapons, then follow them back to a house or business where the guns were passed on to someone else.
Still, when agents inquired about making stops, their supervisors said no.
"On several occasions I personally requested to interdict or seize firearms in such a manner that would only further the investigation, but I was always order to stand down and not to seize the firearms," Casa would later tell congressional investigators.
"Prior to my coming to Phoenix ... I had never witnessed a situation where there wasn't at least an attempt to interdict or take the firearm at some point," said Alt.
Dodson began asking just about anyone who would listen: What's the plan here?
"Essentially the attitude was ... 'We know what we're doing. The U.S. attorney's office is on board with this. This is how it works,'" Dodson said.
Firearms dealers were regularly providing purchase forms and receipts to the ATF whenever the identified suspects made buys, and then Group VII agents would enter that information — serial numbers, the buyer's name, the type of weapon — into a database meant to help trace guns once they were recovered.
The idea was if the guns were recovered, authorities in the United States or Mexico could initiate a trace — and the ATF would have more evidence in their case against members of the gunrunning scheme. They might also identify additional suspects across the network.
It didn't take long for that database to start getting hits. In November 2009 some 37 weapons purchased by known Fast and Furious suspects were seized by Mexican authorities across the border from Arizona.
By mid-January 2010, more than 20 individuals had been added to the ATF's "suspect person database" as alleged Fast and Furious straw purchasers. Among them was Jaime Avila, who later that month purchased the weapons that would be found at the scene of Brian Terry's shooting. By February, some 200 Fast and Furious guns had been recovered in Mexico.
Over weeks and months, the buying frenzy continued. In just one month, the targets of Fast and Furious purchased 359 firearms. One suspect alone would purchase more than 600 guns himself after he had been identified as a suspect in the probe, according to internal ATF records turned over to congressional investigators.
Among Group VII, dissent quickly set in. Dodson, Casa and others complained about the strategy and warned of its potentially deadly consequences. At one point Dodson pointedly asked his case agent, MacAllister, if she was prepared to attend the funeral of a border agent or sheriff's deputy killed with one of the walked guns.
Alt was predicting that someone would eventually have to answer to Congress. Later he would say: "I was in agreement with Agent Dodson that someone was going to die."
By March 2010, the group supervisor, David Voth, sent out an email about a team meeting to address a "schism" developing within Group VII. Saying the agents needed to "get on with the mission at hand," he wrote that people of "rank and authority ... believe we are doing what they envisioned the Southwest Border Groups doing."
He called Group VII "the tip of the ATF spear" in border arms trafficking, adding: "I will be damned if this case is going to suffer due to petty arguing, rumors or other adolescent behavior."
But soon, the agents weren't the only ones voicing concerns. Gun dealers also grew wary as more and more weapons were sold.
Speaking on condition of anonymity because of ongoing inquiries, one dealer described the pace of the sales as "unprecedented ... It had never happened like that before."
Still another said that because of the volume, "our sales people would go behind the door and have a direct dial to ATF, speak to somebody and they'd say, 'Yup, they're on our list. Go ahead and make the sale.' Otherwise, we probably wouldn't have."
One dealer even met with Voth and the lead prosecutor on the case, Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley, to seek assurances that guns weren't going south of the border. That same dealer emailed Voth in June 2010, saying he was worried for friends who were Border Patrol agents.
"I want to help ATF with its investigation but not at the risk of (agents') safety," wrote the dealer. Voth earlier had emailed the same gun shop owner, saying: "If it helps put you at ease we (ATF) are continually monitoring these suspects using a variety of investigative techniques which I cannot go into detail."
Among agents on the ground, there was a sense of foreboding. When a pregnant U.S. consulate worker was fatally shot across the border from Texas, there were rumblings: What if the murder weapon was a "Fast and Furious" gun? When Voth sent around emails citing the alarmingly high number of drug-related murders every month in Mexico, Dodson wondered whether ATF was, in some way, responsible.
"You would just hear: Nine people killed. Six people," he remembered. "But you never saw a picture."
Never, that is, until Terry was shot.
The very day after the shooting, ATF agents arrested Jaime Avila. According to court documents, Avila allegedly admitted on the spot to buying some 40 AK-47 variants.
Dodson, who had been transferred out of Group VII several months earlier, figured that at last his supervisors would admit mistakes had been made. Then he saw the ATF's initial investigative report regarding the shooting, and it made no mention of the fact that Avila had been a known suspect for months on end.
Fearing a potential cover-up, he tried calling the ATF's chief counsel in Washington but got no reply. He called the inspector general's hot line and again got nothing.
Then he learned that U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley's office might be looking into the operation and sent a note via an email address set up for potential whistleblowers.
Talk to me, he wrote.
___
Seven months later, Fast and Furious has fast become a political thorn for the Obama administration, prompting calls for the resignation of ATF's acting director, stirring the debate over gun control and straining relations with Mexican officials. Attorney General Eric Holder has ordered the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General to look into what happened, and Obama has vowed to take "appropriate actions."
Meanwhile, a parade of ATF agents have come forward, offering astonishing testimony in condemnation of their own employer over a probe they now call embarrassing, shameful, dumbfounding. They include some of the Group VII agents, including Dodson, Casa and Alt, but also another Phoenix-based supervisor, an ATF intelligence specialist and three Mexico-based agents.
"Put bluntly, it is inconceivable in my mind ... to allow firearms to disappear at all," Darren Gil, the former ATF attache to Mexico, testified Tuesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. "It is even more inconceivable that a competent ATF special agent would allow firearms to cross an international border, knowing that they are ultimately destined for the hands of the worst of the worst criminals."
In his own interview with congressional investigators, ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson said there were "some mistakes made" during Fast and Furious and that he believes interdiction could have occurred but didn't. William McMahon, who heads ATF field operations in the West, and Newell, the former top man in Phoenix, have also acknowledged mistakes.
Newell told the House committee Tuesday that it was never the purpose of Fast and Furious to permit the transportation of firearms into Mexico. He nevertheless acknowledged that his office knew as early as November 2009 that guns being purchased by Fast and Furious suspects were, indeed, being recovered there.
When asked why the operation wasn't aborted, Newell stressed the difficulty in proving such cases and said prosecutors wanted more evidence. He also pointed to the larger mission of the operation.
"These Mexican drug cartels are going to get their firearms ... so we have to do everything we can in terms of taking out the infrastructure. Straw purchasers are the lowest rung on the ladder," he said, adding that focusing just on them would not have had "a lasting impact."
That the goal was laudable, no one disputes. But in the aftermath of Fast and Furious, the ATF and Justice Department are rethinking old investigative techniques vs. new, whether the end justifies the means, and how to better weigh risks vs. benefits.
The Justice Department has since clarified its policy regarding gun investigations, prohibiting operations "which include guns crossing the border." The policy adds that if there is knowledge that guns are about to enter Mexico, "immediate action" should be taken to get the weapons — even if it jeopardizes an investigation. Also, gun shops in Texas, California, New Mexico and Arizona are now required to alert the ATF to purchases of two or more high-powered rifles in a five-day span to help agents spot suspicious buying patterns.
In January, Avila and 19 other members of the alleged Fast and Furious network were indicted on charges including conspiracy, dealing in firearms without a license and making false statements in the acquisition of guns. Trial is currently set for February, though officials say the investigation continues and other suspects may be charged.
At the time of the indictment, the heads of the ATF and Arizona U.S. Attorney's Office touted the recovery of some 567 weapons in both Mexico and the United States. But in congressional testimony Tuesday, an ATF intelligence analyst said that Fast and Furious associates had purchased, in all, more than 2,000 firearms — and that 1,430 had yet to be recovered.
For their part, the Terry family is still waiting to learn more about how the two guns found at Brian Terry's slaying made their way there. One suspect has been charged with second-degree murder in the shootout and is awaiting trial, but other suspects remain on the loose.
Sources have told The Associated Press that the fatal bullet did not conclusively match either of the recovered Fast and Furious guns, according to ballistics tests. Patrick McGroder, an Arizona attorney hired by the Terry family to weigh possible legal action, said those tests are "less than equivocal." He plans an independent test.
"The obvious questions are: What were those guns doing in the possession of the outlaws? Were those weapons fired at Brian? And more importantly — if so — was the fatal bullet fired from one of those weapons?" said McGroder.
The agent's mother, Josephine Terry, said in an interview with the AP: "Justice, to us, is not beating around the bush. If the government wants to hide something, that's what irritates us. If you made a mistake ... say you did. Just say you did."
In Phoenix, several of those who helped oversee Fast and Furious have since been reassigned out of state, including Newell and Voth, the Group VII supervisor. Voth did not respond to phone messages and emails from the AP. MacAllister also did not return a phone message. ATF spokesman Scot Thomasson said they could not comment due to the pending criminal cases and ongoing internal and congressional inquiries.
Dodson, for now, remains in Phoenix — waiting to see what becomes of his ATF career now that he's been labeled as the guy who helped blow the whistle on Fast and Furious.
But he and other Group VII agents are still searching for answers to their own lingering questions, including how it all came to happen and who, ultimately, is responsible.
Perhaps the most important question that has no clear answer: Where are the rest of the guns?
"People say, well they're going to get guns anyway, so at least this way we were trying to make a case," Dodson said. "Even if that is the case, we in no way should facilitate it for them. We should do everything we can to obstruct it. ... I struggle a lot with: What more could I have done sooner? Why did it have to take a murder for something to finally happen?"
And he wonders, still: "How many other families like the Terrys are there going to be?"
___
EDITOR'S NOTE — This story is based on interviews with ATF agents, past and present; gun dealers who cooperated in Fast and Furious; court records in the Fast and Furious case; the testimony of current and former ATF agents before congressional committees and to congressional investigators; and a review of internal ATF emails and investigative documents assembled as part of the congressional inquiry into Fast and Furious as well as government strategy documents and reports regarding ATF's approach to gun probes.
http://news.yahoo.com/led-project-gunwalker-155450530.html (http://news.yahoo.com/led-project-gunwalker-155450530.html)
P.C.
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BTW, with considerable pride I note that this thread has over 100,000 reads. I am honored gentlemen by your presence here.
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http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/bombshell-white-house-new-about-atf-gunrunning-scandal_577666.html
A few weeks ago, I wrote about the ATF's "Fast and Furious" or "Gunwalker" scandal, which appears to reach the highest levels of the Justice Department. Read the whole magazine article here, but the short version is that the Justice Department knowingly allowed thousands of weapons to fall in the hands of criminals in Mexico that were then used to kill U.S. law enforcement agents.
Well, today a bombshell dropped. It's not just the Justice Department that looks culpable -- it looks like the White House was briefed on the operation as well:
At a lengthy hearing on ATF's controversial gunwalking operation today, a key ATF manager told Congress he discussed the case with a White House National Security staffer as early as September 2010. The communications were between ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix office, Bill Newell, and White House National Security Director for North America Kevin O'Reilly. Newell said the two are longtime friends. The content of what Newell shared with O'Reilly is unclear and wasn't fully explored at the hearing.
For various reasons relating to the White House's gun policies and relations with Mexico, many have speculated that the White House was involved. (This involves a lot of political posturing on guns by the White House, which I explain in detail in my piece mentioned above.) But this is the first concrete proof that the White House knew what was going on.
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q0jTJq_VfS8[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q0jTJq_VfS8
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Someone please educate me. Is the John Birch society a bad thing, and if so, how? (From a Conservative- Libertarian frame of mind)
Thank you in advance.
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"Is the John Birch society a bad thing, and if so, how? (From a Conservative- Libertarian frame of mind)"
I don't know exactly when or where they went too far to be so widely discredited. As we are all (conservatives-libertarians) constantly accused of being extremists, it is important to not be unnecessarily guilty of it - in order to influence swing voters and win elections.
Looking through wikipedia and a few articles I find that the main core beliefs mostly match conservatism, but there are a number of planks of John Birchers that I disagree with. I see they had quite a feud with the Wm F Buckley types of conservatism in their time - and lost. The main point I think would be to not go back now and re-fight those fights. More constructive IMHO would be to join forces with the best of the new groups and keep them focused on the right issues and right solutions.
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Woof HK,
For the most part they are as I am, a group that supports original Constitutional ideas and are anti communist and stands against just about everything the Left stands for. This of course makes them a prime target for attacks from the Left just off hand but what is of concern is their mix of religious and racial ideology within their political stances that put them in the extreme radical Right category and has left them exposed to charges of being a antisemitic and a racist organisation in the past. However, some like Ron Paul still associate with the society because of it's staunch support of the Constitution, limited government and Conservative causes.
John Birch Society
Robert Welch introduced the idea of the John Birch Society at an Indianapolis meeting he convened on December 9, 1958 of 12 "patriotic and public-spirited" men. The first chapter was founded a few months later in February 1959. The core thesis of the society was contained Welch's initial Indianapolis presentation, transcribed almost verbatim in The Blue Book of the John Birch Society, and subsequently given to each new member. According to Welch, both the US and Soviet governments are controlled by the same furtive conspiratorial cabal of internationalists, greedy bankers, and corrupt politicians. If left unexposed, the traitors inside the US government would betray the country's sovereignty to the United Nations for a collectivist new world order managed by a "one-world socialist government." The Birch Society incorporated many themes from pre-WWII rightist groups opposed to the New Deal, and had its base in the business nationalist sector discussed earlier.
Welch was born in 1899 and worked "in the candy manufacturing business all of his adult life," for many years as the vice president for sales and advertising of the James O. Welch Company, founded by his brother. He was on the board of directors of the ultraconservative National Association of Manufacturers for seven years starting in 1950, and chaired NAM's Educational Advisory Committee for two years. It was at NAM, during the height of the Red Menace hysteria, that Welch honed his Americanist philosophy. Welch toured the country chairing meetings on the state of American education, and producing a 32-page brochure "This We Believe About Education," that "concluded that in America parents--and not the State--have the ultimate responsibility for the education of their children." 200,000 copies of the brochure were distributed by NAM.
Welch served as vice chairman of the Massachusetts Republican Party finance committee in 1948, and unsuccessfully ran for Lt. Governor in the 1950 Republican primary. Welch supported the ultraconservative Taft over the more moderate Eisenhower by running as a Massachusetts Taft delegate to the 1952 Republican convention. In 1952 Welch wrote May God Forgive Us, a study alleging "subversive influences" by government officials and their allies to shape "public opinion and governmental policies to favor the Communist advance." The book was published by the ultraconservative Henry Regnery Company, which in 1954 also published Welch's The Life of John Birch, which told the story of a fundamentalist missionary in China who became an intelligence agent for General Claire Chennault's Flying Tigers. Birch was killed by Chinese communist soldiers while he was on a mission at the end of WWII. In February of 1956 Welch started publishing a magazine, One Man's Opinion, and in January 1957 he left the candy business to devote his energies to "the anti-Communist cause."
Welch saw collectivism as the main threat to western civilization, writing "both the Greek and the Roman civilizations did perish of the cancer of collectivism, and the civilization of Western Europe is doing so today." This view was shared by many conservatives of the day, and had been developed by such conservative intellectuals as Hayek. The ingredient that Welch added was an "uncompromising conspiracy theory of world events, one that blamed domestic rather than foreign enemies for the spread of communism," as Diamond summarized. Although critical of Oswald Spengler's intellectual snobbery, Welch agreed with Spengler's thesis in Decline of the West, of a "cyclical theory of cultures," but Welch argued that western European civilization was being prematurely put at risk by a conspiracy to promote the decay of collectivism.
According to the JBS theory, liberals provide the cover for the gradual process of collectivism, therefore many liberals and their allies must actually be secret communist traitors whose ultimate goal is to replace the nations of western civilization with one-world socialist government. "There are many stages of` welfarism, socialism, and collectivism in general," wrote Welch, "but communism is the ultimate state of them all, and they all lead inevitably in that direction." A core tenet of the JBS was that the US is a republic not a democracy, and that collectivism has eroded that distinction. That this distinction was largely a semantic trick--used to cover the essential autocratic elitism of Welch and the JBS philosoph--was examined by Lester DeKoster, a conservative Christian who warned of the JBS anti-democratic agenda in his monograph titled The Citizen and the John Birch Society.
The JBS concern that collectivism, statism, and internationalism would be ushered in through a subversive communist conspiracy naturally evolved into the JBS "Get US out of UN!" campaign, which alleged in 1959 that the "Real nature of [the] UN is to build One World Government (New World Order)." Behind much of this concern was opposition to communism not only on economic, ideological, and pragmatic geopolitical grounds, but also because it was seen as a godless conspiracy. The influence of fundamentalist Christian beliefs on Birch doctrine are often obscured by the group's ostensible secular orientation. As Welch put it, "This is a world-wide battle, between light and darkness; between freedom and slavery; between the spirit of Christianity and the spirit of anti-Christ for the souls and bodies of men."
Welch's magazine, renamed American Opinion, became the official JBS publication in 1959, as chapters began to be built. In January 1960 the Birch Society had 75 chapters and 1,500 members, and by September 1960 there were 324 chapters and some 5,300 members. In March of 1961, according to Welch, there was "a staff of twenty-eight people in the Home Office; about thirty Coordinators (or Major Coordinators) in the field, who are fully-paid as to salary and expenses; and about one hundred Coordinators (or Section Leaders as they are called in some areas), who work on a volunteer basis as to all or part of their salary, or expenses, or both." Estimates of Society membership by the end of 1961 ranged from 60,000 to 100,000. The actual membership figures are shrouded in secrecy and often disputed. Broyles argues that in 1966 the actual active membership was more like 25,000 to 30,000, but this seems a low, and active members are outnumbered by paid members in most groups.
No matter what the actual membership, the JBS pioneered grassroots lobbying, combining educational meetings, petition drives, and letter writing campaigns. One early campaign against the second Summit Conference between the US and the Soviet Union generated over 600,000 postcards and letters, according to the Society. A June 1964 Birch campaign to oppose Xerox Corporation sponsorship of TV programs favorable to the UN produced 51,279 letters from 12,785 individuals.
Much of the early Birch conspiracism reflects an ultraconservative business nationalist critique of business internationalists networked through groups such as the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). The CFR is viewed through a conspiracist lens as puppets of the Rockefeller family in a 1952 book by McCarthy fan, Emanuel M. Josephson, Rockefeller, 'Internationalist': The Man Who Misrules the World. In 1962 Dan Smoot's The Invisible Government added several other policy groups to the list of conspirators, including the Committee for Economic Development, the Advertising Council, the Atlantic Council (formerly the Atlantic Union Committee), the Business Advisory Council, and the Trilateral Commission. Smoot had worked at FBI headquarters in Washington, DC before leaving to establish an anticommunist newsletter, The Dan Smoot Report. The shift from countersubversion on behalf of the FBI to countersubversion in the private sector was an easy one. The basic thesis was the same. In Smoot's concluding chapter, he wrote, "Somewhere at the top of the pyramid in the invisible government are a few sinister people who know exactly what they are doing: They want America to become part of a worldwide socialist dictatorship, under the control of the Kremlin."
In a 1966 speech, Welch coined the name "The Insiders" to describe the leaders of the conspiracy. The Birch Society seems unable to make up its mind if the Insiders are direct descendants of the Illuminati Freemason conspiracy, although the basic concept is clearly related. During the late 1980's and early 1990's the Birch leadership downplayed the connection, while in the late 1990's, the Birch book list began sprouting titles seeking to prove the link to the Illuminati Freemason conspiracy. Many Birch members, and founder Welch himself, expressed support for this thesis, sometimes in writing, sometimes at Birch public meetings. According to the theory, there is an unbroken ideologically-driven conspiracy linking the Illuminati, the French Revolution, the rise of Marxism and Communism, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the United Nations. Of course, not all Birch members agreed with everything that Welch or the Society proposed. Welch's famous book, The Politician, caused a stir even among many loyal Birch members who were shocked by Welch's assertion that President Dwight D. Eisenhower was "a dedicated conscious agent of the communist conspiracy."
Birch Society influence on US politics hit its high point in the years around the failed 1964 presidential campaign of Republican candidate Barry Goldwater who lost to incumbent President Lyndon Johnson. Welch had supported Goldwater over Nixon for the 1960 Republican nomination, but the membership split with two-thirds supporting Goldwater and one-third supporting Nixon. A number of Birch members and their allies were Goldwater supporters in 1964 and some were delegates at the 1964 Republican convention.
The John Birch Society White Book was a spiral-bound collection of all JBS Weekly Bulletins issued in the previous year and handed to every new member. The Bulletins in the 1964 White Book contain chatty and anecdotal information about the campaigns important to the JBS. A major effort was conducted under the slogan "Impeach Earl Warren," which was reported to be generating 500 letters per day to members of Congress. The JBS also sought to restore prayer in school, repeal the graduated personal income tax, stop "Communist influences within our communications media," and stop the "trend of legislation by judicial fiat."
The phrase "legislation by judicial fiat," was widely interpreted within the JBS as opposition to federal assistance to the goals of the civil rights movement over the objections of persons insisting that state's rights should supersede federal laws. During its heyday in the mid-1960s the Birch response to the civil rights movement and urban unrest was to launch two "campaigns under the banners of Support Your Local Police, and Expose The 'Civil Rights' Fraud.
The "Support Your Local Police" campaign opposed the use of federal officers to enforce civil rights laws. "[T]he Communist press of America has been screaming for years to have local police forces discredited, shunted aside, or disbanded and replaced by Federal Marshals or similar agents and personnel of a national federalized police force," one article complained. Another reason articulated for opposing the civil rights movement was that it was a creation of Communists, and Birch members were urged to "Show the communist hands behind it." According to a 1967 personal letter from Welch to retired General James A. Van Fleet inviting him to serve on the Birch National Council:
==="Five years ago, few people who were thoroughly familiar with the main divisions of Communist strategy saw any chance of keeping the Negro Revolutionary Movement from reaching decisive proportions. It was to supply the flaming front to the whole 'proletarian revolution,' as planned by Walter Reuther and his stooge, Bobby Kennedy"
Despite its opposition to civil rights, throughout this period the JBS had a handful of black conservative members who supported this position on philosophical grounds involving states rights, economic libertarianism, and opposition to alleged communist subversion of the civil rights movement.
The JBS simultaneously discouraged overt displays of racism, while it promoted policies that had the effect of racist oppression by its opposition to the Civil Rights movement. The degree of political racism expressed by the JBS was not "extremist" but similar to that of many mainstream Republican and Democratic elected officials at the time. This level of mainstream racism should not be dismissed lightly, as it was often crude and sometimes violent, treating Black people in particular as second-class citizens, most of whom had limited intelligence and little ambition. In Alan Stang's book published by the JBS, It's Very Simple: The True Story of Civil Rights, Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. is portrayed as an agent of a massive communist conspiracy to agitate among otherwise happy Negroes to foment revolution, or at least promote demands for more collectivist federal government intrusion.
The same is true with JBS levels of personal and political antisemitism. When crude antisemitism was detected in JBS members, their membership was revoked. The most celebrated incident involved Birch leader Revilo P. Oliver who moved over to work with Willis Carto and the Liberty Lobby after being forced to resign from the Birch Society for making antisemitic and White supremacist comments at a 1966 Birch rally.
The Birch Society promoted the book None Dare Call It Conspiracy by Gary Allen who included a dubious discussion of the Rothschilds and other Jewish banking interests as part of a sketch of a much larger conspiracy involving financial and political elites and the Council on Foreign Relations. Allen explicitly rejected the idea that by focusing on the early roll of the Rothschilds in investment banking he was promoting a theory of a Jewish conspiracy:
==="Anti-Semites have played into the hands of the conspiracy by trying to portray the entire conspiracy as Jewish. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The traditionally Anglo-Saxon J. P. Morgan and Rockefeller international banking institutions have played a key role in the conspiracy. But there is no denying the importance of the Rothschilds and their satellites. However it is just as unreasonable and immoral to blame all Jews for the crimes of the Rothschilds as it is to hold all Baptists accountable for the crimes of the Rockefellers.
Nicely put, yet Allen used insensitive loaded language concerning the "cosmopolitan" nature of the "international bankers," and he slipped when comparing Jews to Anglo-Saxons, mixing issues of race, ethnicity, and religion. He seemed sincere in rejecting overt and conscious antisemitism and did not seem to be cloaking a hidden hatred or distrust of Jews, but he included a hyperbolic and inaccurate assessment of the role of the Rothschilds, Warburgs, and other Jews compared to the non-Jewish banking interests that grew along with industrial capitalism. The problem was unintentional, but still real, and the stereotype of a Jewish establishment was clearer in Allen's other work, as Mintz explained, "A conspiracist unimpressed by anti-Semitism could construe the material differently from a confirmed sociological anti-Semite, who could find a codification of his fears and anxieties."
In a similar fashion the Society promoted conspiracist theories that involved mild antisemitism, and Welch once buttressed his claims of the Illuminati conspiracy by citing notorious British antisemite Nesta Webster. At its core, however, the Birch view of the conspiracy does not reveal it to be controlled or significantly influenced by Jews in general, or a secret group of conniving Jews, nor is their evidence of a hidden agenda within the Society to promote suspicion of Jews. The Society always struggled against what it saw as objectionable forms of prejudice against Jews, but it can still be criticized for having continuously promoted mild antisemitic stereotyping. Nevertheless, the JBS was closer to mainstream stereotyping and bigotry than the naked race hate and genocidal antisemitism of neonazi or KKK groups. When the Society promoted a historic tract about the conspiracy, it was usually their reprint of Robison's Proofs of a Conspiracy.
In a sense, the Birch society pioneered the encoding of implicit cultural forms of ethnocentric White racism and Christian nationalist antisemitism rather than relying on the White supremacist biological determinism and open loathing of Jews that had typified the old right prior to WWII. Throughout its existence, however, the Society has promoted open homophobia and sexism.
The Society's anti-communism and states rights libertarianism was based on sincere principles, but it clearly served as a cover for organizing by segregationists and White supremacists. How much of this was conscious, and how much unconscious, is difficult to determine. That the Birch Society clearly attracted members with a more hate-filled (even fascistic) agenda is undeniable, and these more zealous elements used the JBS as a recruitment pool from which to draw persons toward a more neonazi stance on issues of race and culture. As Birch members assisted in building grassroots support for Goldwater's Republican presidential bid in 1964, critics of the JBS highlighted the group's more unsavory elements as a way to discredit Goldwater, who was labeled an extremist. For the JBS, however, Goldwater was a compromise candidate. JBS records from 1964 reveal Birch misgivings about the political reliability of Goldwater. Newspaper articles from the Birch archives show Goldwater quotes that conflict with Birch dogma heavily underlined and sporting rows of question marks; yet a racist and antisemitic attack on Goldwater by the White supremacist Thunderbolt, is labeled "Poison," with a bold pen stroke.
After Goldwater was soundly drubbed in the general election, Welch tried earnestly to recruit another politician to accept the Birch torch-former Alabama Governor George Wallace. "It is the ambition and the intention of Richard Nixon, during the next eight years, to make himself the dictator of the world," warned Welch in a November 11, 1968 post-election letter to Wallace. "The people of this country are ready for an anti-Communist crusade behind some political leader who really means it," wrote Welch urging Wallace to adopt the Birch platform.
The more pragmatic conservatives and reactionaries who had been fundraising and organizing specialists during the Goldwater campaign would form the core of what became known as the New Right. Although many New Right and new Christian Right activists were groomed through the Birch Society, the group's core conspiracism, passionate and aggressive politics, and its labeling by critics as a radical right extremist group tainted by antisemitism and racism, were seen as impediments to successful electoral organizing. The Birch Society became a pariah. In the late 1970's the New Right coalition of secular and Christian conservatives and reactionaries emerged as a powerful force on the American political landscape, and was influential in helping elect Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1980. The eclipsed Birch Society saw its influence dwindle even further after Reagan took office, and further still after they attacked Reagan's policies.
When Robert F. Welch died in 1985, the Birch Society had shrunk to less than 50,000 members. There then ensued an internal struggle over who would grab the reins of the organization. The victors even alienated Welch's widow who denounced the new leadership from her retirement home in Weston, MA. Magazine subscriptions, often a close parallel to membership, fell from 50,000 to 30,000 to 15,000.
The collapse of communism in Europe and the end of the Cold War might have signaled the end of the Birch Society, but the UN role in the Gulf War and President Bush's call for a New World Order unwittingly echoed Birch claims about the goals of the internationalist One World Government conspiracy. As growing right-wing populism sparked new levels of cynicism regarding politicians, and economic and social fears sparked rightist backlash movements, the Birch Society positioned itself as the group that for decades had its fingers on the pulse of the conspiracy behind the country's decline. Between 1988 and 1995 the Birch Society at least doubled, and perhaps tripled its membership to over 55,000.
In the Birch Orbit
Conspiracist anti-communism similar to that offered by the JBS was widespread on the nativist right during the 1950s and 1960s. In addition to the books by Gary Allen, Robert Welch, Dan Smoot, and Alan Stang are enough books in the genre to fill several library shelves.
Among the most influential leaders of the countersubversion movement against the global communist conspiracy following the McCarthy period was Dr. Fred Schwarz and his California-based Christian Anti-communism Crusade. A tireless lecturer, Schwarz in 1960 authored You Can Trust the Communists (to be Communists) which sold over one million copies.Schwarz's newsletter once suggested that communists promote abortion, pornography, homosexuality, venereal disease and mass murder as ways to weaken the moral fiber of America and pave the way for a communist takeover.
The assault on America by forces of godless communism were central themes in three other widely distributed books which were used to mobilize support for the 1964 Goldwater campaign. The best known book was Phyllis Schlafly's A Choice, Not an Echo which suggested a conspiracist theory in which the Republican Party was secretly controlled by elitist intellectuals dominated by members of the Bilderberger banking conference, whose policies were designed to usher in global communist conquest.Schlafly's husband Fred had been a lecturer at Schwartz's local Christian Anti-communism Crusade conferences. The title "A Choice, Not an Echo" became one of Goldwater's campaign slogans.
Schlafly elaborate on the theme of the global communist conspiracy and its witting and unwitting domestic allies in The Gravediggers, a book on military preparedness co-authored with retired Rear Admiral Chester Ward. Ward, a member of the National Strategy Committee of the American Security Council was also a lecturer at the Foreign Policy Research Institute which formulated many benchmark Cold War anti-communist strategies.The Gravediggers, claimed U.S. military strategy and tactics was actually designed to pave the way for global communist conquest. The Gravediggers was tailored to support the Goldwater campaign.
Often overlooked because of the publicity surrounding A Choice, Not an Echo was John Stormer's, None Dare Call it Treason, which outlined how the equivocation of Washington insiders would pave the way for global communist conquest. None Dare Call it Treason sold over seven million copies, making it one of the largest-selling paperback books of the day. The back cover summarizes the text as detailing "the communist-socialist conspiracy to enslave America" and documenting "the concurrent decay in America's schools, churches, and press which has conditioned the American people to accept 20 years of retreat in the face of the communist enemy." Stormer updated his text in the late 1980's to expand on his theory, shifting his focus from anti-communism to claim secular humanism now played a key role in undermining America.
One of the core ideas of the US right is that modern liberalism is an ally of collectivism and a handmaiden for godless communism.
This article has been adapted from the book:
Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort
John Birch Society
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
John Birch Society
Logo of the JBS.
Formation
1958
Type
Educational and Political advocacy group
Headquarters
Appleton, Wisconsin
Region served
United States
CEO
Arthur Thompson
Website
http://www.jbs.org/
The John Birch Society is an American political advocacy group that supports anti-communism, limited government, a Constitutional Republic[1][2] and personal freedom.[3] It has been described as radical right-wing[4][5]
It was founded in 1958 by Robert W. Welch Jr. (1899–1985), who developed an elaborate infrastructure that enabled him to keep a very tight rein on the chapters.[6] Originally based in Belmont, Massachusetts, the JBS is now headquartered in Grand Chute, Wisconsin,[7] with local chapters in all 50 states. The organization owns American Opinion Publishing, which publishes the journal The New American.[8]
Contents
[hide] 1 Values 1.1 Characterizations
2 History 2.1 Origins
2.2 1960s
2.3 Eisenhower issue
2.4 1970s
2.5 After Welch
2.6 2009–present
3 In popular culture
4 Officers 4.1 Presidents
4.2 CEOs
5 Members 5.1 Notable members
6 See also
7 References
8 Further reading 8.1 Scholarly studies
8.2 Primary sources 8.2.1 Criticizing the John Birch Society
9 External links
Values
The society upholds an originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, which it identifies with Christian principles. It seeks to limit the powers of government and opposes wealth redistribution, economic interventionism. It opposes collectivism and Totalitarianism, particularly communism, but also socialism and fascism. In a 1983 edition of Crossfire, Congressman Larry McDonald (D-Georgia), then its newly appointed president, characterized the society as belonging to the Old Right rather than the New Right.[9]
The society opposed aspects of the civil rights movement in the 1960s because of its concerns that the movement had communists in important positions - for instance, in the latter half of 1965, the JBS produced a flyer titled “What’s Wrong With Civil Rights?”, to also be used as a newspaper advertisement.[10][11] As published, one of the answers provided by the JBS was: “For the civil rights movement in the United States, with all of its growing agitation and riots and bitterness, and insidious steps towards the appearance of a civil war, has not been infiltrated by the Communists, as you now frequently hear. It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years.”[12] The society opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, saying it was in violation of the Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and overstepped the rights of individual states to enact laws regarding civil rights. The society is against "one world government", and has an immigration reduction view on immigration reform. It opposes the United Nations, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), and other free trade agreements. The society argues that there is a devaluing of the U.S. Constitution in favor of political and economic globalization, and that this trend is not an accident. It cites the existence of the Security and Prosperity Partnership as evidence of a push towards a North American Union.[13] Stuart A. Wright has said, their political racism however was no different from both Republicans and Democratic politicians of the time.[14]
Characterizations
It has been described as "ultraconservative",[15] "far right",[16] and "extremist".[17] The Southern Poverty Law Center lists the society as a "'Patriot' Group".[18] Other sources consider the society as part of the patriot movement.[19][20]
History
Origins
The society was established in Indianapolis, Indiana, on December 9, 1958, by a group of 12 led by Robert Welch, Jr., a retired candy manufacturer from Belmont, Massachusetts. Welch named the new organization after John Birch, an American Baptist missionary and U.S. military intelligence officer who was killed by communist forces in China in August 1945, shortly after the conclusion of World War II. Welch claimed that Birch was an unknown but dedicated anti-communist,[6] and the first American casualty, Welch contended, of the Cold War.
One of the founding members[21][22][23] was Fred Koch,[24] founder of Koch Industries, one of the largest private corporations in America.[25] Another was Revilo P. Oliver, a University of Illinois professor who later severed his relationship with the society and helped found the National Alliance. A transcript of Welch's two-day presentation at the founding meeting was published as The Blue Book of the John Birch Society, and became a cornerstone of its beliefs, with each new member receiving a copy.[9] According to Welch, "both the U.S. and Soviet governments are controlled by the same furtive conspiratorial cabal of internationalists, greedy bankers, and corrupt politicians. If left unexposed, the traitors inside the U.S. government would betray the country's sovereignty to the United Nations for a collectivist New World Order, managed by a 'one-world socialist government.'"[26][27] Welch saw collectivism as the main threat to Western Civilization, and liberals as "secret communist traitors" who provided cover for the gradual process of collectivism, with the ultimate goal of replacing the nations of western civilization with a one-world socialist government. "There are many stages of welfarism, socialism, and collectivism in general," he wrote, "but Communism is the ultimate state of them all, and they all lead inevitably in that direction."[27]
The society's activities include distribution of literature, pamphlets, magazines, videos and other educational material while sponsoring a Speaker's Bureau, which invites "speakers who are keenly aware of the motivations that drive political policy".[28] One of the first public activities of the society was a "Get US Out!" (of membership in the UN) campaign, which claimed in 1959 that the "Real nature of [the] UN is to build a One World Government."[29] In 1960, Welch advised JBS members to: "Join your local P.T.A. at the beginning of the school year, get your conservative friends to do likewise, and go to work to take it over."[30] One Man's Opinion, a magazine launched by Welch in 1956, was renamed American Opinion, and became the society's official publication. The society publishes the journal The New American on a biweekly basis.[8]
1960s
By March 1961 the society had 60,000 to 100,000 members and, according to Welch, "a staff of 28 people in the Home Office; about 30 Coordinators (or Major Coordinators) in the field, who are fully paid as to salary and expenses; and about 100 Coordinators (or Section Leaders as they are called in some areas), who work on a volunteer basis as to all or part of their salary, or expenses, or both." According to Political Research Associates (a progressive research group that investigates the far right), the society "pioneered grassroots lobbying, combining educational meetings, petition drives and letter-writing campaigns.[27] One early campaign against the second summit between the United States and the Soviet Union generated over 600,000 postcards and letters, according to the society. A June 1964 society campaign to oppose Xerox corporate sponsorship of TV programs favorable to the UN produced 51,279 letters from 12,785 individuals."[27]
In the 1960s Welch insisted that the Johnson administration's fight against communism in Vietnam was part of a communist plot aimed at taking over the United States. Welch demanded that the United States get out of Vietnam, thus aligning the Society with the far left.[31]
The JBS was moderately active in the 1960s with numerous chapters, but rarely engaged in coalition building with other conservatives. Indeed, it was rejected by most conservatives because of Welch's conspiracy theories. Ayn Rand said in a Playboy interview that "What is wrong with them is that they don't seem to have any specific, clearly defined political philosophy... I consider the Birch Society futile, because they are not for Capitalism but merely against Communism."[32][33]
Former Eisenhower cabinet member Ezra Taft Benson – a leading Mormon – spoke in favor of the John Birch Society, but in January 1963 the LDS church issued a statement distancing itself from the Society.[34]
Anti-semitic, racist, anti-Mormon, anti-Masonic, and religious groups criticized the group's acceptance of Jews, non-whites, Masons, and Mormons. These opponents accused Welch of harboring feminist, ecumenical, and evolutionary ideas.[35][36][37]
In 1964 Welch favored Barry Goldwater over Richard Nixon for the Republican nomination, but the membership split, with two-thirds supporting Goldwater and one-third supporting Nixon. A number of Birch members and their allies were Goldwater supporters in 1964[38] and some were delegates at the 1964 Republican National Convention. The JBS played no known role in the fall election campaign.
In April 1966, a New York Times article on New Jersey and the society stated – in part – a concern for "the increasing tempo of radical right attacks on local government, libraries, school boards, parent-teacher associations, mental health programs, the Republican Party and, most recently, the ecumenical movement."[39] It then characterized the society as, "by far the most successful and 'respectable' radical right organization in the country. It operates alone or in support of other extremist organizations whose major preoccupation, like that of the Birchers, is the internal Communist conspiracy in the United States."
Eisenhower issue
Welch wrote in a widely circulated statement, The Politician, "Could Eisenhower really be simply a smart politician, entirely without principles and hungry for glory, who is only the tool of the Communists? The answer is yes." He went on. "With regard to ... Eisenhower, it is difficult to avoid raising the question of deliberate treason."[40]
The controversial paragraph was removed before final publication of The Politician.[41]
The sensationalism of Welch's charges against Eisenhower prompted several conservatives and Republicans, most prominently Goldwater and the intellectuals of William F. Buckley's circle, to renounce outright or quietly shun the group. Buckley, an early friend and admirer of Welch, regarded his accusations against Eisenhower as "paranoid and idiotic libels" and attempted unsuccessfully to purge Welch from the Birch Society.[42] From then on Buckley, who was editor of National Review, became the leading intellectual spokesman and organizer of the anti-Bircher conservatives.[43] In fact, Buckley's biographer John B. Judis wrote that "Buckley was beginning to worry that with the John Birch Society growing so rapidly, the right-wing upsurge in the country would take an ugly, even Fascist turn rather than leading toward the kind of conservatism National Review had promoted."[43]
1970s
The society was at the center of an important free-speech law case in the 1970s, after American Opinion accused a Chicago lawyer representing the family of a young man killed by a police officer of being part of a Communist conspiracy to merge all police agencies in the country into one large force. The resulting libel suit, Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., reached the United States Supreme Court, which held that a state may allow a private figure such as Gertz to recover actual damages from a media defendant without proving malice, but that a public figure does have to prove actual malice, according to the standard laid out in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, in order to recover presumed damages or punitive damages.[44] The court ordered a retrial in which Gertz prevailed.
Key society causes of the 1970s included opposition to both the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and to the establishment of diplomatic ties with the People's Republic of China. The society claimed in 1973 that the regime of Mao Zedong had murdered 64 million Chinese as of that year and that it was the primary supplier of illicit heroin into the United States. This led to bumper stickers showing a pair of scissors cutting a hypodermic needle in half accompanied by the slogan "Cut The Red China Connection." According to the Voice of America, the society also was opposed to transferring control of the Panama Canal from American to Panamanian sovereignty.[45]
The society was organized into local chapters during this period. Ernest Brosang, a New Jersey regional coordinator, claimed that it was virtually impossible for opponents of the society to penetrate its policy-making levels, thereby protecting it from "anti-American" takeover attempts. Its activities included the distribution of literature critical of civil rights legislation, warnings over the influence of the United Nations, and the release of petitions to impeach U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren. To spread their message, members held showings of documentary films and operated initiatives such as "Let Freedom Ring", a nation-wide network of recorded telephone messages.
After Welch
A sign advocating America's withdrawal produced by the John Birch Society.
By the time of Welch's death in 1985, the society's membership and influence had dramatically declined, but the UN's role in the Gulf War and President George H.W. Bush's call for a 'New World Order' appeared to many society members to validate their claims about a "One World Government" conspiracy.
The society continues to press for an end to U.S. membership in the United Nations. As evidence of the effectiveness of JBS efforts, the society points to the Utah State Legislature's failed resolution calling for U.S. withdrawal, as well as the actions of several other states where the Society's membership has been active. The society repeatedly opposed overseas war-making, although it is strongly supportive of the American military. It has issued calls to "Bring Our Troops Home" in every conflict since its founding, including Vietnam. The society also has a national speakers' committee called American Opinion Speakers Bureau (AOSB) and an anti-tax committee called TRIM (Tax Reform IMmediately).[46]
The second head of the Society was Congressman Larry McDonald from Georgia, who was killed on September 1, 1983, when the Soviets shot down KAL 007. The only congressman killed by the Soviets during the Cold War, he was on the way to the 30th year commemoration of the U.S.-S. Korea Mutual Defense Treaty in Seoul.
2009–present
The Society has been active in supporting the auditing[47] of, and aims to eventually dismantle, the Federal Reserve System. The JBS believes that the U.S. Constitution gave only Congress the ability to coin money, and did not intend for it to delegate this power to a banking monopoly, or to transform it into a fiat currency not backed by gold or silver.
The JBS was a co-sponsor of the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference, ending its decades-long exile from the mainstream conservative movement.[48][49]
In popular culture
In 1964, Dizzy Gillespie made a semi-satirical run for President, and formed chapters of the "John Birks Society" (his real name was John Birks Gillespie) in 25 states.[50]
Bob Dylan wrote "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues",[51] narrated by a paranoid society member who looks everywhere for Communists, even in his toilet bowl and at one point decides that they are in his television set.
Charlie Daniels song "Uneasy Rider" references the group - the man with green teeth response "I'm a faithful follower of Brother John Birch"
General Jack Ripper in the movie Dr. Strangelove was based upon the John Birch Society's anti-fluoridation campaign.[52]
The Chad Mitchell Trio performed the satirical song "The John Birch Society".[53]
Steve Jackson Games included a mythical "Fred Birch Society" as one of hundreds of groups in the collectible card game Illuminati: New World Order.[54]
Walt Kelly used his comic strip Pogo to produce a satire that appeared in book form as "The Jack Acid Society Black Book."[55][56]
Officers
Presidents
Robert W. Welch, Jr. (1958–1983)
Larry McDonald (1983) – a U.S. Representative killed by the Soviet Air Force in the 1983 KAL-007 shootdown incident.
Robert W. Welch, Jr. (1983–1985)
Charles R. Armour (1985-1991)
John F. McManus (1991–2004, 2005–present)
G. Vance Smith (2004–2005)
CEOs
G. Allen Bubolz (1988–1991)
G. Vance Smith (1991–2005)
Arthur R. Thompson (2005–present)
Members
One survey in the early 1970s found the typical John Birch Society members were middle or upper-middle class, Republican and Protestant.[citation needed] They were also fairly young and well educated: the majority of the sample was under 40 at time of recruitment and had completed at least three years of college. A later survey in the mid 1980s found the membership then was disproportionately from the Southwestern United States, young, urban, male, and Catholic. They were consistently conservative on secular issues, antigovernment, and negative toward communism. Wilcox (1988) reports the evidence does not support liberal notions that irrationality, social strains, or status anxiety explained their beliefs.[57]
Notable members
Robert Adelmann
Gary Allen
Thomas J. Anderson
Lloyd W. Bailey
Guy Banister
Reed Benson
Taylor Caldwell
Roy Cohn
Robert DePugh
Medford Bryan Evans
Bonner Fellers
John William Finn
Ezola B. Foster
G. Edward Griffin
William Norman Grigg
J. Evetts Haley
Billy James Hargis
Merwin K. Hart
Edgar W. Hiestand
William P. Hoar
H. L. Hunt
Meir Kahane (as FBI informant)
Carl Karcher
Jamie Kelso
Granville Knight
Fred C. Koch
Alfred Kohlberg
David Lane
Jacqueline Logan
Robert Jay Mathews
Larry McDonald
Tom Metzger
David A. Noebel
Revilo P. Oliver
Robert M. Owens
Floyd Paxton
Westbrook Pegler
William Luther Pierce
John Rees
H. L. Richardson
Thomas Robb
Archibald Roosevelt
John H. Rousselot
Morrie Ryskind
Kurt Saxon
Phyllis Schlafly
John G. Schmitz
George Schuyler
Philippa Schuyler
Eric Show
Edwin Walker
John Wayne
See also
Authoritarianism
United States isolationism
Paleoconservatism
United States withdrawal from the United Nations
Wise Use Movement
Separation of church and state
Edmund Burke Society, similar Canadian organization
References
^ Principles of the John Birch Society, 1962. "We believe that a Constitutional Republic, such as our Founding Fathers gave us, is probably the best of all forms of government"
^ LectLaw "We believe that our system of government, a Constitutional Republic, is the finest yet developed by man."
^ "The JBS Mission". The John Birch Society. Retrieved 2010-02-18.
^ Webb, Clive. Rabble rousers: the American far right in the civil rights era. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2010 ISBN 0820327646 p. 10
^ Bernstein, Richard (May 21, 2007). "The JFK assassination and a '60s leftist prism Letter from America". International Herald Tribune (Paris): p. 2.
JORDAN, IDA KAY (August 26, 2001). "VOTERS ADMIRED N.C. SENATOR'S INDEPENDENT STREAK, SOUTHERN CHARM". Virginian — Pilot (Norfolk, Va.): p. J.1.
Brinkley, Douglas (February 10, 1997). "The Right Choice for the C.I.A.". New York Times: p. A.15.
^ a b Schoenwald, Jonathan M. (2002). "Chapter 3 - A New Kind of Conservatism: The John Birch Society". A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism. Oxford University Press (US). ISBN 0195157265.
^ Dan Barry (June 25, 2009). "Holding Firm Against Plots by Evildoers". The New York Times. Retrieved 2010-04-04.
^ a b The New American.
^ a b "Larry McDonald on the New World Order". Liveleak. 2008-02-15. Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ Epstein, Benjamin R.; Forster, Arnold (1966). Report on the John Birch Society, 1966. Random House. p. 9.
^ What's Wrong with Civil Rights?. Belmont, MA: American Opinion. 1965. OCLC 56596124.
^ "The John Birch Society Asks: What's Wrong With Civil Rights?". The Post-Times (West Palm Beach, FL): p. A10 cols. 1–6. 31 October 1965. Retrieved 30 January 2011.
^ Farmer, Brian (2007-09-17). "The North American Union: Conspiracy Theory or Conspiracy Fact?". The John Birch Society. Retrieved 2011-04-07.
^ Wright p55
^ Lunsford, J. Lynn (February 4, 2009). "Business Bookshelf: Piles of Green From Black Gold". Wall Street Journal: p. A.11.
"Beck's backing bumps Skousen book to top". Deseret News (Salt Lake City, Utah). March 21, 2009.
Byrd, Shelia (May 25, 2008). "Churches tackle tough topic of race". Sunday Gazette — Mail (Charleston, W.V.): p. C.5.
^ Burch, Kurt; Robert Allen Denemark (1997). Constituting international political economy. Lynne Rienner Publishers. p. 125. ISBN 9781555876609.
Oshinsky, David (January 27, 2008). "In the Heart of the Heart of Conspiracy". New York Times Book Review: p. 23.
Danielson, Chris (February 2009). ""Lily White and Hard Right": The Mississippi Republican Party and Black Voting, 1965-1980". The Journal of Southern History (Athens) 75 (1): 83.
Lee, Martha F (Fall 2005). "NESTA WEBSTER: The Voice of Conspiracy". Journal of Women's History (Baltimore) 17 (3): 81.
^ LIEBMAN, MARVIN (March 17, 1996). "PERSPECTIVE ON POLITICS; The Big Tent Isn't Big Enough; By allowing extremists to flourish openly, the GOP forces out those who represent the party's moderate values.". Los Angeles Times: p. 5.
TOBIN, JONATHAN S. (March 9, 2008). "The writer who chased the anti-Semites out". Jerusalem Post: p. 14.
Gerson, Michael (March 10, 2009). "Looking for conservatism". Times Daily (Florence, Ala.).
^ "'Patriot' Groups". Southern Poverty Law Center. Spring 2009. Retrieved 2009-07-31. "Generally, Patriot groups define themselves as opposed to the 'New World Order' or advocate or adhere to extreme antigovernment doctrines. ... Listing here does not imply that the groups themselves advocate or engage in violence or other criminal activities, or are racist."
^ Thomas, Jeff (February 13, 1995). "Determined `patriots' say their time has come/ Reduction of government sought". Colorado Springs Gazette - Telegraph: p. A.1.
^ Junas, Daniel (March 14, 1995). "DISAFFECTED CITIZENS FORMING ARMED MILITIAS". Seattle Post - Intelligencer: p. A.9.
^ Davis, Jonathan T. (1997). Forbes Richest People: the Forbes Annual Profile of the World's Wealthiest Men and Women. Wiley. pp. 138. ISBN 9780471177517. "Founding member (1958) John Birch Society — reportedly after seeing Russian friends liquidated"
^ Hoover's 500: Profiles of America's Largest Business Enterprises. Hoover's Business Press. 1996. pp. 286. ISBN 9781573110099. "In 1929 Koch took his process to the Soviet Union, but he grew disenchanted with Stalinism and returned home to become a founding member of the anticommunist John Birch Society."
^ Wayne, Leslie (7 December 1986). "Brothers at Odds.". The New York Times (NY): p. Sec. 6; Part 2, p 100 col. 1.. ISSN 0362-4331. "He returned a fervent anti-Communist who would later become a founding member of the John Birch Society."
^ Diamond, Sara (1995) Roads to Dominion: Right-Wing Movements and Political Power in the United States NY: Guilford Press p. 324 n. 86. ISBN 0-89862-862-8
^ Mayer, Jane (2010-08-30). "Covert Operations: The billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama.". The New Yorker (Condé Nast Publications). Retrieved 2011-02-06.
^ Welch, Robert E. (1961). Blue Book of the John Birch Society. American Opinion Books. ISBN 0-88279-215-6.
^ a b c d "John Birch Society". Political Research Associates. Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ John Birch Society Speakers Bureau
^ Matthew Lyons; Chip Berlet (2000). Right-Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort. New York: The Guilford Press. pp. 179. ISBN 1-57230-562-2.
^ French, William Marshall (1967). American Secondary Education. Odyssey Press. pp. 477. ISBN 0771991983. Retrieved 2008-07-20.
^ Stephen Earl, Bennett (1971). "Modes of Resolution of a 'Belief Dilemma' in the Ideology of the John Birch Society". Journal of Politics 33 (3): 735–772. doi:10.2307/2128280.
^ "Who was Ayn Rand? - a biography, Playboy interview, 1964". Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ "The Atlas Society : "The 'Lost' Parts of Ayn Rand's Playboy Interview"".
^ Prince, Gregory A. (2004). "The Red Peril, the Candy Maker, and the Apostle: David O. Mckay's Confrontation with Communism". Dialogue: a Journal of Mormon Thought 37 (2): 37–94.
^ Bryant, John. "The John Birch Society – Exposed!". Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ "A Spectre Haunting Mormonism". Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ Bove, Nicholas J., Jr.. "The Belmont Brotherhood". Retrieved 2008-07-18.
^ William F. Buckley, "Goldwater, the John Birch Society, and Me"
^ Ronald Sullivan, "Foes of Rising Birch Society Organize in Jersey," New York Times, April 20, 1966, page 1
^ Quoted at "Glenn Beck talks with JBS President John F. McManus" Aug. 15, 2006.
^ Welch, Robert (1975). The Politician. Boston: Western Islands. cxxxviii–cxxxix. ISBN 99908-64-98-5. "At this point in the original manuscript, there was one paragraph in which I expressed my own personal belief as to the most likely explanation of the events and actions with this document had tried to bring into focus. In a confidential letter, neither published nor offered for sale and restricted to friends who were expected to respect the confidence but offer me in exchange their own points of view, this seemed entirely permissible and proper. It does not seem so for an edition of the letter that is now to be published and given, probably, fairly wide distribution. So that paragraph, and two explanatory paragraphs, connected with it, have been omitted here. And the reader is left entirely free to draw his own conclusions."
^ John B. Judis, William F. Buckley, Jr.: Patron Saint of the Conservatives (2001) pp 193-200
^ a b Confounding Fathers: The Tea Party’s Cold War Roots by historian Sean Wilentz, The New Yorker, October 18, 2010
^ Haiman, Franklyn Saul; Tedford, Thomas L.; Herbeck, Dale (2005). "Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc". Freedom Of Speech In The United States. Strata Publishing. ISBN 1-891136-10-0.
^ Guthrie, Andrew (1999-11-24). "Is Panama Canal Falling Under Chinese Control?". Voice of America. Retrieved 2008-07-25.
^ The Ross Institute.
^ http://www.jbs.org/index.php/inflation-taxes-economy-blog/4569
^ CPAC 2010 Cosponsors. Retrieved January 30, 2010.[dead link]
^ Bill Hahn, JBS Public Relations Manager (December 15, 2009). "The John Birch Society Announces CPAC 2010 Cosponsorship". Retrieved 2010-01-30.
^ "Before Colbert, there was Dizzy" : WFIU Public Radio, 2007.
^ "Talkin' John Birch Paranoid Blues". BobDylan.com. Retrieved 2011-02-24.
^ JENKINS, LOGAN (March 27, 1999). "Fluoride feud hasn't lost its bite". The San Diego Union - Tribune: p. B.11.
^ MSN reviews "At the Bitter End" by The Chad Mitchell Trio
^ List of INWO groups.
^ Walt Kelly biography from BPIB.com
^ Coyne, Connie (April 12, 2003). "Cartoonists Are an Independent Lot -- as 'Boondocks' Proves". The Salt Lake Tribune: p. B.2.
^ Stone (1974); Wilcox (1988).
Further reading
Scholarly studies
McGirr, Lisa. Suburban Warriors: The Origins of the New American Right (2001), focus on Los Angeles suburbs in 1960s
Schoenwald; Jonathan . A Time for Choosing: The Rise of Modern American Conservatism (2002) pp 62–99 excerpt and text search
Stone, Barbara S. "The John Birch Society: a Profile," Journal of Politics 1974 36(1): 184-197,
Wilcox, Clyde. "Sources of Support for the Old Right: a Comparison of the John Birch Society and the Christian Anti-Communism Crusade." Social Science History 1988 12(4): 429-450,
Wright, Stuart A. Patriots, politics, and the Oklahoma City bombing. Cambridge University Press. 11 June 2007. ISBN 978-0521872645
Primary sources
Robert W. Welch Jr. The New Americanism and Other Speeches. Boston: Western Islands, 1966.
Gary Allen. None Dare Call It Conspiracy. G S G & Associates, Inc., 1971.
Welch, Robert (1961). The blue book of the John Birch Society. Boston: Western Islands. ISBN 0-88279-105-2. OCLC 16903114.
Welch, Robert (1964). The Politician. Belmont, Massachusetts: Belmont Publishing. ISBN 9990864985. OCLC 376165.
Welch, Robert; John Birch Society (1964). The White Book of the John Birch Society for 1964. Belmont, Massachusetts: John Birch Society. OCLC 21571870.
Welch, Robert (1966). The New Americanism and Other Speeches. Boston: Western Islands. ISBN 0-88279-211-3.
Criticizing the John Birch Society
De Koster, Lester. (1967). The Citizen and the John Birch Society. A Reformed Journal monograph. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans.
Epstein, Benjamin R., and Arnold Forster. (1966). The Radical Right: Report on the John Birch Society and Its Allies. New York: Vintage Books.
Grove, Gene. (1961). Inside the John Birch Society. Greenwich, CT: Fawcett.
Grupp, Fred W., Jr. (1969). "The Political Perspectives of Birch Society Members." In Robert A. Schoenberger (Ed.), The American Right
Hardisty, Jean V. (1999). Mobilizing Resentment: Conservative Resurgence from the John Birch Society to the Promise Keepers. Boston: Beacon.
External links
John Birch Society website
The New American, JBS biweekly publication
"John Birch Society," Political Research Associates
Report of the California Senate Fact finding Subcommittee on Un-American Activities on the John Birch Society
"What is the John Birch Society?", short excerpt of a film, released circa 1965, of Robert W. Welch Jr., explaining why he founded the John Birch Society and its aims.
FBI FILES ON JOHN BIRCH SOCIETY
Categories: John Birch Society | Appleton, Wisconsin | COINTELPRO targets | Conservatism in the United States | Organizations established in 1958 | Political organizations in the United States
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P.C.
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Thank you for that very informative read PC.
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In a 1966 speech, Welch coined the name "The Insiders" to describe the leaders of the conspiracy. The Birch Society seems unable to make up its mind if the Insiders are direct descendants of the Illuminati Freemason conspiracy, although the basic concept is clearly related. During the late 1980's and early 1990's the Birch leadership downplayed the connection, while in the late 1990's, the Birch book list began sprouting titles seeking to prove the link to the Illuminati Freemason conspiracy. Many Birch members, and founder Welch himself, expressed support for this thesis, sometimes in writing, sometimes at Birch public meetings. According to the theory, there is an unbroken ideologically-driven conspiracy linking the Illuminati, the French Revolution, the rise of Marxism and Communism, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the United Nations. Of course, not all Birch members agreed with everything that Welch or the Society proposed. Welch's famous book, The Politician, caused a stir even among many loyal Birch members who were shocked by Welch's assertion that President Dwight D. Eisenhower was "a dedicated conscious agent of the communist conspiracy."
*Things like the above tend to damage it's brand.
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:lol: :lol: :lol:
Hence my reaction upon realizing I had posted an article of Bircher origin.
That fact that I found the article agreeable of course is worth noting, but the fact also remains that I continue to find the Bircher brand quite problematic.
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Yeah, I thought the article was fine. I glanced at the URL and :-o
There is a good point in looking at "gunwalker" vs. all the finge conspiracy theories. In gunwalker, there are many whistleblowers and a paper trail a mile wide that seems to grow daily. Funny how out of the massive number of people that would be required to pull off the 9/11 "inside job", not one single whistleblower. Must be the alien mind control technology we recovered from the Roswell crash in '47 or something.
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Woof,
Back to focus; fire Holder.
http://www.nra.org/fireholder/petition.aspx?mid=000032862690&ek=Y1GV249N (http://www.nra.org/fireholder/petition.aspx?mid=000032862690&ek=Y1GV249N)
P.C.
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"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States." --Noah Webster, An Examination of the Leading Principles of the Federal Constitution, 1787
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http://video.foxnews.com/v/1095760427001/fierce-battle-over-gun-rights
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(http://www.battleswarmblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/London-Burning.jpg)
http://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=8016
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http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/nilegardiner/100100323/if-british-shopkeepers-had-the-right-to-bear-arms-vicious-thugs-would-think-twice-before-looting/
If British shopkeepers had the right to bear arms, vicious thugs would think twice before looting
By Nile Gardiner
World
Last updated: August 10th, 2011
Turks on the streets of Dalston on Monday night
During the Los Angeles riots in 1992, many store owners in the south central part of the city defended their property against marauding gangs with their own weapons, and succeeded in protecting their livelihoods and thousands of jobs that depended on them. And across the country, Americans admired their bravery, thankful for the Second Amendment to the US Constitution which protects their right to keep and bear arms, and thereby defend themselves, their families and their property. In contrast in London in 2011, shopkeepers were left at the mercy of feral, brutal thugs acting with impunity across whole swathes of the capital as the police were overwhelmed. If they had the right to bear arms and defend their stores with force, it would have been a very different story, and brutal looters would have met firm resistance.
Britain’s gun laws are among the most draconian in the world, yet the nation has some of the highest levels of violent crime and burglary in the West, and there is no shortage of gun crime in major cities such as London and Manchester. While criminal gangs are often able to acquire firearms on the black market, ordinary law-abiding British citizens are barred from owning guns for self-defence.
The riots in London, the West Midlands and the North West should prompt a renewed debate in Britain over the right to bear arms by private citizens. The shocking scenes of looting across the country are a reminder that the police cannot always be relied upon to protect homes and businesses during a period of widespread social disorder. The defence of life and property can never be entrusted solely to the state, not least when there is a complete breakdown in law and order. As we have seen this week in Britain, when individuals are barred from defending their own property from mobs of vicious thugs, sheer anarchy and terror reins.
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http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/08/10...est=latestnews
A Playboy playmate was charged with firearm offenses after attempting to board a plane in Florida with a loaded handgun in her bag, the Orlando Sentinel reported Wednesday.
Shanna Marie McLaughlin, Playboy's Miss July 2010, was arrested around 6:35pm Monday at Orlando International Airport as she attempted to board a plane to Los Angeles.
The 26-year-old, who has a valid permit to carry a concealed weapon, told police that the bag she was carrying was hers, but that she did not know that her boyfriend had put his loaded .45 caliber Colt revolver in it.
The model was jailed Monday on charges of carrying a firearm in a place prohibited by law, but has since been released, the Sentinel reported.
McLaughlin's former school, the University of Central Florida, had to apologize publicly last year after she was photographed scantily clad in a sports locker room for a magazine spread.
McLaughlin was back in the headlines last month when she publicly lent her support to Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, who had been criticized by his former fiance Crystal Harris over his sexual prowess.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/08/10...#ixzz1UeyEClDr
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Birmingham: Three Killed in Riots
Posted by Caitlin Bronson on August 11, 2011 5:53 AM
Shop keepers begin to clean up on Ealing High Street, west London following a third straight of disturbances on the stre... Read More
A standoff in Birmingham between rioters and the Muslims of Dudley Road ended in tragedy Wednesday as the U.K. riots reached the country’s second-largest city. According to the Associated Press, three young men were killed when a carload of rioters drove into a fleeing crowd of people who were trying to save a row of family-run shops from looters.
The three men killed were 21-year-old amateur boxer Haroon Jahan, and brothers Shazzar Ali, 30, and Abdul Musavir, 31. They were part of a large group of Muslims in Birmingham’s west end to attempt to defend shops and a mosque from rioting looters.
“We all had stones in our hands. But we had no defense to stop a car,” Mohammed Ibrahim, 23, told the AP. “They revved their engines and drove right at us as fast as they could. These men deliberately tried to kill us all.”
As racial tension in the riots was laid bare, Haroon’s father, Tariq Jahan, took the time to plead with South Asian community not to seek revenge for his son’s death.
“Today we stand here to plead with all the youth to remain calm, for our community to stand united,” Jahan said. “This is not a race issue. The family has received messages of sympathy and support from all parts of the community—all races, all faiths and backgrounds.”
He urged the angry young men to “grow up” and return home.
www.thirdage.com/news/birmingham-three-killed-in-riots_08-11-2011 (http://www.thirdage.com/news/birmingham-three-killed-in-riots_08-11-2011)
Citizens don't need gun rights now that we have modern police protection. Yeah, right! :-P :x :-P The anti gun zealots and politicians in Britain have more blood on their hands now.
P.C.
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http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Rioting-for-Fun-and-Profit
Rioting for Fun and Profit
Paul A. Rahe · 9 hours ago
The riots in Britain are instructive. There is, according to The Wall Street Journal, one neighborhood where the rioters backed off. In the North London neighborhood of Dalton, we are told,
Hundreds of Turkish and Kurdish men, many armed with broken billiard cues, poured onto the streets to protect their businesses and homes from the kind of mayhem that was laying waste to other parts of London.
"They created a barrier and chased the kids back," said Burcu Bay, who works as a waitress at Tugra, a Turkish sweet shop and cafe on Dalston's main thoroughfare. "It was like being in a war."
What happened in Dalston, an area defined by its large Turkish and Kurdish immigrant community, was a rare instance of locals uniting to defy the wave of violence that has swept London in recent nights, leaving a trail of burned-out buildings, looted shops and broken glass. In other areas, rioters encountered little resistance, as terrified locals took cover and stretched police were.
The clashes in Dalston, a ramshackle neighborhood of pawn shops, Turkish social clubs and kebab joints, began when a gang of about 50 youths approached the area from the east, setting fire to a bus and smashing in the windows of a chain restaurant, a bank and an electrical goods shop.
Dozens of local men came out on the street to block their progress. Over the course of the evening, they pushed back the heavily outnumbered troublemakers in three separate surges, driving them away from a cluster of Turkish-owned shops and businesses. Women and elderly men sought refuge in local cafés to watch the clashes from a safe distance.
In some instances, skirmishes turned violent. "The police wanted to arrest one of my friends because he punched some of the guys," said a waiter at the Somine restaurant. "We didn't let them."
A key driver behind the locals' response was the strong sense of communal identity among Turkish and Kurdish residents of Dalston, who saw the rioters as a kind of alien invasion. "These people weren't local," said the waiter. "We've been here for ten years and would have known them if they were from the area."
The article – written by Guy Chazan and Jeanne Whalen with help from Peter Evans – is a nice piece of reporting. It tells you everything that you need to know – right down to the crucial fact that the police wanted to arrest one man for punching a thug intent on stealing his property. What is happening right now in London and in cities to the north could best be described as a self-inflicted wound.
Do you remember the riots a year or two ago in Paris and in other French cities and the burning of cars along the Champs Ėlysées? What you may not remember is something else that was reported in passing at the time – that, for some years prior to these riots, one hundred cars a night were being torched in the cities of France. I passed through Paris not long after these events, and a French professor I know told me that this latter piece of news came as a real shock to her. The truth is that the police had, in effect, abandoned the Muslim neighborhoods and that impecunious, hard-working Muslims living in these neighborhoods, men and women who had scrimped and saved to buy jalopies, had been losing them to the thugs for some time. None of this was reported until the disorders spread from the slums in the suburbs to the wealthy districts of Paris.
Something of the same sort can be said about Britain as well. There are two dimensions to the British story. First – although what we call the right to bear arms had its origins as an English right, guaranteed in the 1688/89 Declaration of Rights and Bill of Rights – that right was gradually abrogated in the course of the twentieth century. Second – although the right to self-defense, the right to defend one’s person and property when the authorities cannot in a timely and effective fashion provide protection – is a natural right and had always, until recently, been recognized as such in Britain – that right, too, was abrogated in the course of the last century. There is a very fine book on the subject by my friend Joyce Lee Malcolm, author of To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right. Entitled Guns and Violence: The English Experience, it was published by Harvard University Press seven years ago. Her two books ought to be force-fed to every member of Parliament.
For some time now – and this was already true, alas, in the Thatcher years – the political class (Labour, Tory, and Liberal) has been united behind the principle that these matters must be left to the police – that, if one’s life or limbs are in danger, one can of course use force to defend one’s person but that one cannot rightfully lift a finger to defend one’s property and that, if the attack extends to one’s person, the force that one deploys in its defense must be strictly proportionate to the threat. If, for example, your home was burglarized over and over again and you secured a gun, a knife, or a baseball bat and killed or harmed an intruder, you would go to prison for a long stay.
I am not making this up. I was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford between 1971 and 1974. I was a visiting fellow at Clare Hall, Cambridge in the spring of 1999, and I was a visiting fellow at All Souls College, Oxford in 2005/6. In the quarter-century that passed between my first stint in the UK and my second, Britain changed. I remember a man living in a rural area being sent to prison for what amounted to life for killing someone who had repeatedly broken into his home.
I remember other things as well. When I was at Cambridge University, my wife and I went into London one evening to go to the opera. Our return on the train was decidedly uncomfortable. Our car – and the other cars nearby – came to be filled with young women and men (mostly the latter) who were drunk and disorderly. There was no one on the train to prevent them from making our trip a real misery. Had we said a word, I have no doubt that the crowd would have turned on us. It reminds me a bit of what it was like in New York City in the summer of 1969. The hooligans were in command.
In fact, it was worse than that. One evening, a group of thugs took the train into Cambridge from a nearby town, walked to Clare Hall, hurled bricks through the windows, broke into the apartments, stole computers, then marched to the train station and journeyed home. No one was ever caught.
I am told that fewer than ten percent of burglaries are solved and that, of those who are convicted, fewer than ten percent do time. In effect, there is no law and there is no order in Britain. You cannot bear arms. You are denied the means of self-defense. It is illegal to use force to defend your property. If you use “disproportionate force” in defending your person, you can and will be jailed. It is demanded that you leave all such matters to the police, and law enforcement is ineffectual. Not surprisingly, even before the riots that Britain is suffering right now, theft and violent crime were considerably greater there than in the United States.
In Britain, they have a lot to learn – or relearn – and it is an open question whether these recent events will give rise to a bout of a rethinking or not. I rather doubt that David Cameron has the backbone, and one cannot look to the Liberals or to Labour. Those associated with the last-mentioned party, which is out of power right now, will whine and whine about “social justice.” In the United Kingdom, as in the United States, a left-liberal is someone who pities the criminal, not the victim.
In the US, we are generally better off. For one thing, we incarcerate criminals. There has been much hand-wringing about this in recent years, as our own left-liberals fulminate against the incarceration rate. But there is one truth that cannot be gainsaid: a criminal who is locked up is not on the streets committing crimes. Lock them up and the crime rate will go down (as it has in the US).
We are better off in other ways as well. The right to bear arms is not only given lip service here. In recent years, it has been reasserted by the Supreme Court. Moreover, in many states, one has a right to defend one’s property. In those states, if someone breaks into my home, I can kill him with impunity. And, finally, thanks in part to the example of Rudy Giuliani in New York, we have policing methods aimed at concentrating attention on high-crime areas and on harassing criminals that really work.
The appearance of flash mobs in Philadelphia and Chicago is, however, a warning. I would like to know more than I do about the incarceration rate in Pennsylvania and Illinois, about the policing methods used, and about the laws pertinent to the right of a shopkeeper to gun down thieves.
In times like these, it is useful to remember the immortal words of John Adams: “We talk of liberty and property, but, if we cut up the law of self-defence, we cut up the foundation of both. . . . If a robber meets me in the street, and commands me to surrender my purse, I have a right to kill him without asking questions.”
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Unfortunately, if John Adams lived in LA today he would probably go to jail.
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Unfortunately, if John Adams lived in LA today he would probably go to jail.
Reason #198,895 not to live in LA.
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Let me rephrase that, if John Adams lived in almost ANY city in America, he would probably go to jail.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it's my understanding that unless you can prove that your life is in imminent danger, not merely the taking of your "purse", you have no "right to kill him without asking questions". Odds are if you do, you will go to jail for a long time.
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And here is how to know for sure, state by state:
http://dogbrothers.com/store/index.php?cPath=46&osCsid=2cb663c9256c6773190b9df65b85da68
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Let me rephrase that, if John Adams lived in almost ANY city in America, he would probably go to jail.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but it's my understanding that unless you can prove that your life is in imminent danger, not merely the taking of your "purse", you have no "right to kill him without asking questions". Odds are if you do, you will go to jail for a long time.
Robbery is commonly defined as taking something of value by the illegal use of force, or the threatened illegal use of force. Meaning that this isn't a pickpocket, this is someone saying "Give me your property or I'll harm you". In places in the US where some degree of sanity still exists, you can use force, including deadly force to protect yourself and others from this.
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I understand; the theory being you can use deadly force to protect yourself. I agree with your comment, "you can use force, including deadly force to protect yourself and others from this."
I am quibbling with your quote, "If a robber meets me in the street, and commands me to surrender my purse, I have a right to kill him without asking questions.”
If it had said, "I have a right to kill him if I feel that my life is threatened" I agree. However, if he/they comes into your shop for example, unarmed, and start taking and/or destroying merchandise, you do not have the right to use deadly force unless they threaten you or someone.
Perhaps more grey is if you are stopped on the street, you feel threatened, although they are unarmed, perhaps there are 2-3 of them, younger and bigger than you. Still, I would argue that you are required to "ask questions" i.e. give them your wallet i.e. without shooting them. However, if you feel that they are threatening you directly with loss of life or great bodily harm, it is my understanding that you can use commensurate force. Still, I question your legal right to shoot and kill them if they are unarmed.
Imagine, three unarmed thugs come up to you on the street and ask for your 'purse". In response, asking no "questions", saying nothing, you pull your gun out and shoot all three dead on the street. Wow.... I'ld say you need a good lawyer.
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Woof,
Yes, but if you were allowed by law to do so, wouldn't it be a strong deterrent for the 2 or 3 unarmed, young, big threatening guys from stopping you in the first place? As for the unarmed part, I'm certainly capable of killing someone with my bare hands and I would assume 2 or 3 big young guys would be capable of doing it as well. Does that mean you have to wait until after they've killed you before you can protect yourself? :-P
P.C.
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Man arrested for invasion of congressman's Iowa home
77-year-old Rep. Boswell fought off man who attacked daughter
Below:
Rep. Leonard Boswell, D-Iowa, helped fight off an invader at his farm house on Saturday night. msnbc.com staff and news service reports
updated 7/19/2011 4:09:02 PM ET 2011-07-19T20:09:02 Font: + - DES MOINES, Iowa — One man has been arrested, and a warrant issued for another in an attack at Iowa Congressman Leonard Boswell's home Saturday night, according to a report in the Des Moines Register.
The alleged getaway driver, Cody John Rollins, 19, of Lamoni, Iowa, was arrested Monday, according to Decatur County Sheriff Herbert Muir. The alleged intruder, David Palmer Dewberry, 20, of Fremont, Neb., has a warrant out for his arrest.
The intruder is the son of a family friend, reported the Des Moines Register. Police asked the public to be on the lookout for Dewberry, who could be armed and dangerous.
According to online court records, Dewberry has a record. He was charged with third-degree theft in 2009 in juvenile court. He will face felony charges of burglary and assault while committing a felony if arrested, police said.
Boswell, an eight-term congressman helped fight off an armed man, allegedly Dewberry, who invaded his farm house in Decatur County and attacked his daughter on Saturday night, according to a statement from his office.
The attack occurred around 10:45 p.m. on Saturday at a farm in Lamoni, where Boswell, a 77-year-old Democrat who represents Iowa's third congressional district, was spending the weekend with his wife, Dody, 77, daughter, Cynthia Brown, and grandson, Mitchell Brown, 22.
"The intruder entered the front door of the farm house and physically assaulted Cindy while demanding money at gunpoint," read the statement from Boswell's office.
Advertise | AdChoicesAdvertise | AdChoicesAdvertise | AdChoicesAfter hearing his daughter's screams, the congressman "entered the walkway of their house and immediately went for the guy's gun and was wrestling with him. They were both on the ground," Boswell's chief of staff Grant Woodard told local news station KCCI.
While the two scuffled, Boswell's grandson Mitchell grabbed a loaded .12-gauge shotgun from a nearby room and confronted the intruder, who then fled into the surrounding field and reportedly was still on the run.
"That was my daughter. This guy had his hand on her throat and a gun to her face. If he was going to shoot somebody, I preferred that he shoot me," Boswell said in an interview with easterniowagovernment.com.
Boswell praised his entire family for their "grit" and "determination" in fighting off the attacker.
Only on msnbc.com Updated 116 minutes ago 8/12/2011 4:34:25 PM +00:00 Is culture mutual of respect what UK needs? Is your ISP cheating you out of bandwidth? Four storylines to watch in GOP debate US ballerinas leap at chance to train in Moscow
Corbis file Drug patches pose overlooked danger to kids
Brigham and Women's Hospital Chimp attack victim reveals her new face New leukemia treatment exceeds 'wildest expectations' "The congressman just did what anybody would do if he knew his family was in trouble," said Woodard. "He jumped right into the situation and helped his daughter."
Boswell lives in Des Moines and owns the farm in southern Iowa. He is recovering from a broken rib suffered during the incident.
"I wanted a piece of him. He was threatening somebody I care for very much," Boswell told reporters at a Statehouse news conference, according to easterniowagovernment.com.
The Decatur County Sheriff's Department and state and federal authorities are investigating. The sheriff's department said Saturday that the intruder had not been caught. The attacker is still at large.
Decatur County Sheriff Herbert Muir said "we might" have a suspect in mind. "We have a direction we're going," Muir said, according to easterniowagovernment.com.
"The congressman says the military is the best training for situations like this," said Woodard, referring to Boswell's 20-year military career. "It's a wakeup call to everybody to take precautions and do what they need to do to keep their family safe."
© 2011 msnbc.com
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A couple of points were made over on the UK riot thread, US having lax gun legislation and murder rates higher in gun owning societies.
First, just the constitutional requirement gets ignored when we start to talk about laws or statistics. Different people read different meanings into the second amendment, but for sure it includes a) the right to bear arms because it's constitutional, it is above the laws written to restrict it, and b) that it's really really hard to change the constitution.
Second, we discuss different murder rates with guns or not as if there is a switch we could flip, if not for right wing extremists, that makes the guns go away.
Other than using The Giant Magnet Theory, passing a law now restricting guns affects only the abiding people. Only an amazingly powerful, giant magnet could actually take guns from bad guys at the same rate as taking them from the law abiding and law enforcement.
The question is... knowing the bad guys are armed, what do you want to have with you, ready, when you encounter them?
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Doug, unless you know where to buy that giant magnet, :-D I unfortunately agree with your points.
While I prefer a society without guns (giant magnet), as you point out, passing a law now will only restrict law abiding citizens.
But I believe the laws should be draconian for anyone using a gun in the commission of a crime.
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If the giant gun magnet worked, it means the gang members have the advantage when they swarm unarmed victims and the hulking sex offender wins when he confronts a petite female.
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJH4lGlLOpQ&NR=1[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJH4lGlLOpQ&NR=1
A great place for law abiding citizens to develop their 2nd amendment skills. My favorite vacation spot.
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GM:
I found the reason article very interesting.
a) I thought it very pertinent to note the very low crime/murder rates in the late 1800s when gun ownership was quite high and the increase the more the gun laws became more restrictive. I would add the decrease in crime/murder rates in the US as gun ownership (and right to concealed carry) increases.
b) Concerning the Martin case mentioned in the article, when I first read about the case I was very indignant. As I learned more I learned it was not a 100% black and white case. While my sympathies remain overwhemlmingly with Martin and I remain appalled at some of the actions of the authorities, if I remember correctly there was something about a booby trap and something about shooting one of the bad guys after he had already exited the house.
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GM:
I found the reason article very interesting.
a) I thought it very pertinent to note the very low crime/murder rates in the late 1800s when gun ownership was quite high and the increase the more the gun laws became more restrictive. I would add the decrease in crime/murder rates in the US as gun ownership (and right to concealed carry) increases.
**I'd add that Maine has the 2nd highest rate of gun ownership in the US and the lowest violent crime rate. Now, it's a complex mix of factors as far as crime reductions go, law enforcement and the other elements of the criminal justice can make an impact, as has been demonstrated. The demographics and culture of the city/state apply and of course criminals respond to disincentives, like armed citizens. In fact, criminals dread armed citizens much more than police, because they understand police operate under greater restrictions on the use of force.
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UK Mayhem Leaves Disarmed Citizens at the Mercy of Criminals
Friday, August 12, 2011
By now you have seen the headlines and images of destruction: the rioting, looting, violent assaults, and arson. London and other UK cities look like war zones and their citizens are afraid to venture out, because the danger is very real. It's a view of the temporary breakdown of society. It is gut check time; a time when the concept of being able to defend oneself gives way to the stark reality that few viable options to do so exist.
Gun laws in the UK are among the most restrictive in the world. In March of 1996, a deranged man walked into a school in Dunblane, Scotland and killed 16 children and one teacher. In the aftermath of this tragedy, British politicians sought to reduce violent crime by enacting a ban on all handguns. Handgun owners were given a February 1998 deadline to turn in their firearms--and they did. The UK was supposed to become a much safer place--but dramatic increases in crime following the gun ban proved it didn't.
A July 3, 2009, Daily Mail article reported that "Britain's violent crime record is worse than any other country in the European Union, it has been revealed. Official crime figures show the U.K. also has a worse rate for all types of violence than the U.S. and even South Africa."
And the current bedlam has proved it further. Restrictive laws concerning long-guns, combined with the outright ban on handguns, leave the country's citizens largely defenseless (it was reported this week that sales of one type of aluminum baseball bats on Amazon UK rose 6,541 percent). In many places, it was reported that police were unable to stop the mayhem. As a result, panicked, defenseless law-abiding citizens were forced to flee their homes, while others watched as their businesses were destroyed. Compare this to the 1992 Los Angeles riots, when armed citizens were able to protect their lives, families, and property from looters and violent mobs.
An August 11 Herald Sun article reported one resident as saying, "its absolute bedlam on the street. People have been openly looting for an hour, two hours, and the police have been ineffectual. They've done nothing." Another victim, who was trapped in her hair salon in Clapham Junction while a mob smashed its way in and trashed it, said, "They were mocking us, [saying] 'look, look, they look scared'. Where is the police? I want protection. This is what they're here for . . . I'm not secure at my workplace. I'm not secure at my home place. Will they be there to protect us tonight? They weren't here to protect us last night."
The Telegraph.com.au reported on Tuesday that mobs were forcing hapless victims to strip off their clothes while being robbed, and described a shocking video that shows a bleeding, already-pummeled teenager being robbed in broad daylight by lawless thugs who pretend to help him to his feet, and then steal the contents of his backpack while he can barely remain standing, much less defend himself.
This is what a disarmed country looks like. This is how little is left when free men and women surrender their right to own a firearm.
One has to wonder how differently this all would be playing out if the law-abiding were allowed to arm themselves. How different would the reports be if violent, opportunistic, amoral thugs were confronted with armed resistance from their intended victims?
It has been said that, "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing." In this case, good men and women have been stripped of their ability to do something, and evil has certainly triumphed.
Ironically, the UK is an outspoken proponent of the United Nations' efforts to negotiate an Arms Trade Treaty. Presumably the UK's goal in supporting an ATT is to spread the "safety and sanctity" they imagine their country as having to the rest of the world. Perhaps the recent calamities will cause the British to rethink their position; we certainly hope so. It's time for the British government to drop its draconian gun-control laws and restore the right of self-defense to its law-abiding citizens.
It's time to face the facts. When law-abiding citizens are disarmed, is their society a safer one? Do gun bans reduce violent crime? Will the police always be there to protect you? England's current plight is just the latest example to show us, yet again, that the answer to these questions is an emphatic "No."
Copyright 2011, National Rifle Association of America, Institute for Legislative Action.
http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=7025 (http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Federal/Read.aspx?id=7025)
P.C.
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http://www2.timesdispatch.com/news/news/2011/aug/14/tdmain01-gun-crime-drops-at-virginia-bars-and-rest-ar-1237278/
Virginia's bars and restaurants did not turn into shooting galleries as some had feared during the first year of a new state law that allows patrons with permits to carry concealed guns into alcohol-serving businesses, a Richmond Times-Dispatch analysis found.
The number of major crimes involving firearms at bars and restaurants statewide declined 5.2 percent from July 1, 2010, to June 30, 2011, compared with the fiscal year before the law went into effect, according to crime data compiled by Virginia State Police at the newspaper's request.
And overall, the crimes that occurred during the law's first year were relatively minor, and few of the incidents appeared to involve gun owners with concealed-carry permits, the analysis found.
**Oh yes, they are!
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Speaking of Virginia...
"The law forbids concealed-gun permit holders to drink alcohol while they are inside bars and restaurants with guns hidden from view. Patrons who legally carry firearms openly into bars and restaurants can drink freely."
I think there is definite merit in issuing CCW's (I'm just jealous I can't get one in LA).
BUT, I'm not sure "drinking freely", especially at a bar and guns, whether hidden or not, go together.
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Speaking of Virginia...
"The law forbids concealed-gun permit holders to drink alcohol while they are inside bars and restaurants with guns hidden from view. Patrons who legally carry firearms openly into bars and restaurants can drink freely."
I think there is definite merit in issuing CCW's (I'm just jealous I can't get one in LA).
BUT, I'm not sure "drinking freely", especially at a bar and guns, whether hidden or not, go together.
In most states, possessing a firearm while intoxicated is a seperate offense. It is in mine.
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I guess what I am saying is that I don't think drinking and guns go together.
I'm in favor of CCW's, but I think whether exposed or concealed they should probably be banned from bars (over 50% of their revenue is from alcohol).
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Getting drunk and guns don't go together. However if one isn't getting intoxed, there is no reason to forbid that person from carrying.
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The question presented is a logical and fair one, but so far it appears the empirical evidence is as GM states.
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Pravda on the Beach reported this morning that the three officials at BATF responsible for Op F&F have been promoted, , , :cry: :x :x
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Woof,
That's no surprise, people who do what their bosses tell them to do and cover their bosses asses at the same time always move up. :-P
P.C.
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By Richard A. Serrano, Washington Bureau
August 17, 2011
Reporting from Washington— Firearms from the ATF's Operation Fast and Furious weapons trafficking investigation turned up at the scenes of at least 11 violent crimes in the U.S., as well as at a Border Patrol agent's slaying in southern Arizona last year, the Justice Department has acknowledged to Congress.
The department did not provide details about the crimes. But The Times has learned that they occurred in several Arizona cities, including Phoenix, where Fast and Furious was managed, as well as in El Paso, where a total of 42 weapons from the operation were seized at two crime scenes.
The new numbers, which expand the scope of the danger the program posed to U.S. citizens over a 14-month period, are contained in a letter that Justice Department officials turned over to the Senate Judiciary Committee last month.
In the letter, obtained by The Times on Tuesday, Justice Department officials also reported that Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives officials advised them that the agency's acting director, Kenneth E. Melson, "likely became aware" of the operation as early as December 2009, a month after it began.
Melson has said he did not learn about how the operation was run until January of this year, when it was canceled.
The July 22 letter, signed by Assistant Atty. Gen. Ronald Weich, was sent to Sens. Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) and Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), the top members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. It was in response to questions posed to the Justice Department about Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr. and the weapons operation.
The program was intended to identify Mexican drug cartel leaders and smuggling routes across the border by allowing illegal purchases of firearms and tracking the weapons. Instead, many of the guns vanished.
Weich said that although the "ATF does not have complete information" on all of the lost guns, "it is our understanding that ATF is aware of 11 instances" beyond the Border Patrol agent's killing where a Fast and Furious firearm "was recovered in connection with a crime of violence in the United States."
Justice Department officials did not provide any more details about the crimes or how many guns were found.
But a source close to the controversy, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the continuing investigation, said that as early as January 2010, just after the operation began, weapons had turned up at crime scenes in Phoenix, Nogales, Douglas and Glendale in Arizona, and in El Paso. The largest haul was 40 weapons at one crime scene in El Paso.
In all, 57 of the operation's weapons were recovered at those six crime scenes, in addition to the two seized where Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed.
Weich's letter also said a total of 1,418 firearms were circulated under the program. How many remain missing in the U.S. and Mexico is unclear. The total is considerably lower than earlier estimates, when authorities said that at least 2,000 guns had vanished.
Melson has told congressional investigators that he learned how the program operated in the field only after it was shut down in January.
But Weich wrote that the ATF had advised Justice Department officials that Melson "likely became aware on or about Dec. 9, 2009, as part of a briefing following a seizure of weapons in Douglas, Ariz."
Weich added that the ATF told the Justice Department that although Melson was not given "regular" briefings on the program, "periodic updates were provided to the acting director as determined to be necessary by the [ATF] Office of Field Operations. These briefings typically coincided with planned field visits or in preparation for meetings."
Weich added that Holder first spoke to Melson about the operation "in or about late April" of this year, after the attorney general learned of the program and during a regular briefing.
Senior Justice Department officials have insisted they did not know about the "operational tactics" of the program, and the Weich letter reemphasized that point. Weich noted that the officials were cooperating with investigations by Congress and the Justice Department inspector general's office, which reflects "our commitment to learning the facts underlying this matter."
Copyright © 2011, Los Angeles Times
http://latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20110817,0,7742514.story (http://latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20110817,0,7742514.story)
P.C.
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From the ATF's website
ILLEGAL FIREARMS TRAFFICKING 5
B U R E A U O F A L C O H O L , T O B A C C O , F I R E A R M S A N D E X P L O S I V E S
STRATEGIC GOAL 1
ILLEGAL FIREARMS
TRAFFICKING
CHALLENGES AND THREATS
IN THE ILLEGAL FIREARMS
TRAFFICKING DOMAIN
Firearms violence associated with drug trafficking
and violent crime continues to erode
the quality of life in many American communities.
There is widespread traffic in firearms
moving in or otherwise affecting interstate and
international commerce. States and cities
across the country seek effective programs to
reduce or eliminate violent crime by stemming
the flow of illegally trafficked firearms
into their communities.
Mexico’s drug traffickers have aggressively
turned to the United States as a source of
firearms and routinely transport firearms
from the United States into Mexico. The
U.S.-Mexican border is the principal arrival
zone for most illicit drugs smuggled into the
United States, as well as the predominant staging
area for the subsequent distribution of
drugs throughout the country. Firearms are an
integral part of these criminal enterprises. They
are the “tools of the trade” that drug traffickers
use against each other as well as against
Mexican and American law enforcement officials
and innocent civilians on both sides of
the border.
Illegal firearms trafficking via the Internet is
an emerging threat. The privacy of the Internet
makes it an ideal means for gang members,
violent criminals, terrorists, and juveniles to
traffic and obtain illegal firearms.
ATF’S ROLE IN ELIMINATING
ILLEGAL FIREARMS
TRAFFICKING
The goal of ATF’s illegal firearms trafficking
enforcement and industry regulation is to
reduce violent crime and protect national security.
We investigate and arrest individuals and
organizations who illegally supply firearms to
prohibited individuals. ATF is the Federal law
enforcement organization that regulates the
firearms industry. We deter the diversion of
firearms from lawful commerce into the illegal
market with enforcement strategies and technology.
ATF regulates and partners with the
firearms industry to promote compliance, to
prevent diversion, and to detect those criminals
that bring violence to our communities.
I don't think the guys running the Fast and Furious operation read that last part carefully enough. :-P
P.C.
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More from the ATF site
APPENDIX A: POLICY ENVIRONMENT 43
B U R E A U O F A L C O H O L , T O B A C C O , F I R E A R M S A N D E X P L O S I V E S
APPENDIX A:
POLICY ENVIRONMENT
ATF’s operations are guided by Federal
statutes, the Code of Federal Regulations, formal
memoranda of understanding, international
partnerships, and policy guidance.
Federal statutes, such as the GCA, the NFA,
the Arms Export Control Act, and sections of
the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970
(including the Safe Explosives Act) govern
ATF’s critical mission activities. ATF enforces
these statutes and regulations with a multidisciplined
and balanced approach, in accordance
with guidance issued by DOJ.[/b]In accordance with Presidential Directives,[/b]ATF will continue to play a key role in shaping
the national response to domestic incidents
and coordinating efforts with partners
to ensure safety for all Americans.
Who's calling the shots?
P.C.
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Acting Director Melson and the AZ US Attorney are out:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...urious-uproar/
Quote:
Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson has been reassigned to a lesser post in the Justice Department and the U.S. attorney for Arizona was also pushed out Tuesday as fallout from Operation Fast and Furious reached new heights.
Melson's step down from his role as head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to the position of senior adviser on forensic science in the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Programs is effective by close of business Tuesday, administration officials announced. U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota B. Todd Jones will replace Melson.
U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke, one of the officials closely tied to Fast and Furious, is also a casualty in a shakeup tied to the botched gun-running program. Burke was on the hot seat last week with congressional investigators and, according to several sources, got physically sick during questioning and could not finish his session.
The purge of those responsible for the firearms trafficking scandal continued as new documents reveal a deeper involvement of federal agencies beyond ATF.
In Phoenix, Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley, who oversaw Fast and Furious on a day-to-day basis, was reassigned from the criminal to civil division. Also in Phoenix, three out of the four whistleblowers involved in the case have been reassigned to new positions outside Arizona. Two are headed to Florida, one to South Carolina.
Hurley's reassignment came after three ATF supervisors responsible for the operation were promoted. William G. McMahon, a former deputy director of operations, took over the Office of Professional Responsibility. Field supervisors William D. Newell and David Voth also moved up despite heavy criticism.
The moves follow a series of reports by Fox News detailing the face-off between Attorney General Eric Holder, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, whose investigators have recently broadened their probe. It now reportedly shows a deeper involvement of the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department of Homeland Security.
"While the reckless disregard for safety that took place in Operation Fast and Furious certainly merits changes within the Department of Justice, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee will continue its investigation to ensure that blame isn't off-loaded on just a few individuals for a matter that involved much higher levels of the Justice Department," Issa, chairman of the House panel.
"There are still many questions to be answered about what happened in Operation Fast and Furious and who else bears responsibility, but these changes are warranted. ... I also remain very concerned by Acting Director Melson's statement that the Department of Justice is managing its response in a manner intended to protect its political appointees," Issa continued.
Operation Fast and Furious, a program designed to track illegal gun sales, turned into an embarrassing scandal after weapons linked to it were found at the scene of a U.S. Border Patrol agent's murder last year. Thousands of guns ended up in the hands of Mexican cartel members.
Melson has led the agency since April 2009, supplanting a Bush administration acting director who was also unable to get Senate confirmation over the objections of gun rights groups. It was during his tenure that the ATF Phoenix office began Operation Fast and Furious in the fall of 2009.
According to the Justice Department, Jones will take over ATF in place of Melson beginning Wednesday, and will continue to serve as a U.S. attorney. A permanent replacement at ATF would need to be confirmed by the U.S. Senate.
"As a seasoned prosecutor and former military judge advocate, U.S. Attorney Jones is a demonstrated leader who brings a wealth of experience to this position," Holder said. "I have great confidence that he will be a strong and steady influence guiding ATF in fulfilling its mission of combating violent crime by enforcing federal criminal laws and regulations in the firearms and explosives industries."
Without mentioning either Melson or Burke's role in the Fast and Furious fiasco, Holder also praised the two for their "dedication" and "commitment" to the Department of Justice.
Fox News' Laura Prabucki contributed to this report.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...#ixzz1WXO8ysDW
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Monday Night Massacre?
Imagine the media firestorm if a republican did it, episode # 12899765
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-cover-up-accelerates-ken-melson-reassigned/?singlepage=true
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Post 1
Cover Up - The Fast and Furious Edition
By Michelle Malkin August 31, 2011 6:30 am Text Size: A A A There are now enough Operation Fast and Furious officials playing hide-and-seek in the Obama administration to fill a "rubber room."
That's the nickname for taxpayer-subsidized holding pens, such as the ones in the New York City public schools, where crooked employees are separated from the system and paid to do nothing. Perhaps the White House can stimulate a few construction jobs by adding an entire rubber room annex for "reassigned" scandal bureaucrats at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. It's getting mighty crowded.
On Tuesday, the Justice Department announced it was shuffling Kenneth Melson, acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, out of his job. The disclosure comes amid continued GOP investigations into the administration's fatally botched straw gun purchase racket at the border and spreading outrage over legal obstructionism and whistleblower retaliation by DOJ brass. The DOJ inspector general is also conducting a probe.
Internal documents earlier showed that Melson was intimately involved in overseeing the program and screened undercover videos of thousands of straw purchases of AK-47s and other high-powered rifles -- many of which ended up in the hands of Mexican drug cartel thugs, including those who murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry last December. Fast and Furious weapons have been tied to at least a dozen violent crimes in America and untold bloody havoc in Mexico.
In secret July 4 testimony, Melson revealed he was "sick to his stomach" when he discovered the extent of the operation's deadly lapses. Join the club, pal.
Melson told congressional investigators that he and ATF's senior leadership "moved to reassign every manager involved in Fast and Furious, from the deputy assistant director for field operations down to the group supervisor" after ATF whistleblowers went to the press and Capitol. But according to Melson, he and company were ordered by Justice Department higher-ups to remain silent about the reasons for the reassignments.
In other words: the ATF managers in the know were "effectively muzzled while the DOJ sent over false denials and buried its head in the sand," as GOP Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Sen. Charles Grassley, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, concluded in July.
Melson has been kicked back to DOJ's main office in a flabbergasting new slot as "senior adviser on forensic science in the department's Office of Legal Policy." He may have been "sick to his stomach," but the federal careerist apparently has no intention of quitting an administration with blood on its hands. And now he'll be advising others on how to track and handle evidence. Nice make-work if you can get it.
Others on the Fast and Furious dance card of lemons:
-- Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley in Phoenix, who helped oversee the straw gun purchase disaster. He's being transferred out of the U.S. Attorney's Office's criminal division and into the civil division.
-- Assistant ATF Special Agents in Charge George Gillett and Jim Needles. Moved to other positions.
-- BATF deputy director of operations in the West, William McMahon. Promoted to ATF headquarters.
-- ATF Phoenix field supervisors William Newell and David Voth. Promoted to new management positions in Washington.
Keep your friends close and your henchmen on the verge of spilling all the beans closer.
There's been only one visible Fast and Furious resignation: U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Phoenix, who quietly stepped down on Tuesday. One of his last acts? Opposing the request of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry's family to qualify as crime victims in a court case against the thug who bought the Fast and Furious guns used in Terry's murder.
The fish rots from the head down, of course. DOJ is run by Eric Holder, the Beltway swamp creature who won bipartisan approval for his nomination -- even after putting political interests ahead of security interests at the Clinton Justice Department in both the Marc Rich pardon scandal and the Puerto Rican FALN terrorist debacle. Remember: Holder won over the Senate by arguing that his poor judgment made him more qualified for the job.
Screw up, move up, cover up: It's the Holder way, the Obama way, the Washington way. And innocent Americans pay.
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Michelle Malkin is the author of "Culture of Corruption: Obama and his Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks & Cronies" (Regnery 2010).
COPYRIGHT 2011 CREATORS.COM
P.C.
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Post 2
U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke resigns
103 commentsby Robert Anglen - Aug. 31, 2011 12:00 AM
The Arizona Republic
Seven months after controversy erupted over a botched federal gun-running probe, a major shake-up hit Justice Department offices Tuesday that included the resignation of Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke.
The departure of Burke and the reassignments of two others who oversaw Operation Fast and Furious, however, were cast as voluntary rather than disciplinary by the U.S. Department of Justice. The department has been under fire since January as congressional committees investigate the gun-trafficking probe, which put hundreds of weapons in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.
Roberts: Burke a 'fall guy' | Resignation letter | Prosecutor assumes interim post
Lawmakers leading those investigations raised questions about whether the Obama administration made scapegoats of the three officials. They vowed to continue probing who authorized agents with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to step aside as guns purchased in Valley stores were given to smugglers.
"The Oversight and Government Reform Committee will continue its investigation to ensure that blame isn't offloaded on just a few individuals for a matter that involved much higher levels of the Justice Department," said Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., the committee's chairman. "There are still many questions to be answered about what happened in Operation Fast and Furious and who else bears responsibility."
Burke announced that his resignation would be effective immediately because "it is the right time to move on to pursue other aspects of my career and my life and allow the office to move ahead."
His resignation came two weeks after he ended his testimony about Fast and Furious before Issa's committee.
Excerpts of Burke's testimony released by Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., the ranking committee member, show that Burke took responsibility for mistakes.
"I get to stand up when we have a great case to announce and take all the credit for it regardless of how much work I did on it," Burke said. "So, when our office makes mistakes, I need to take responsibility, and this is a case, as reflected by the work of this investigation, it should not have been done the way it was done, and I want to take responsibility for that, and I'm not falling on a sword or trying to cover for anyone else."
Burke said he was unaware agents were watching people buy guns and not interdicting the purchases.Minutes before Burke sent an e-mail to his staff announcing his resignation, the Justice Department announced that a new acting director - Todd Jones, U.S. attorney in Minnesota - would take over operation of the ATF. Former acting ATF Director Ken Melson was assigned to the Office of Legal Policy as an adviser on forensic science.
The lead prosecutor for Operation Fast and Furious cases in Burke's office was also reassigned Tuesday. Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley was transferred to the civil division in Arizona at his own request, a spokeswoman for Arizona U.S. Attorney's Office said.
Issa's office said Burke's resignation does not excuse him from his promise of future testimony.
"The committee still expects him to honor his commitment," committee spokesman Frederick Hill said.
Burke, who took office in 2009, could not be reached for comment. His first assistant prosecutor, Ann Scheel, will serve as acting U.S. attorney for Arizona until a permanent replacement is named.
Questions about Fast and Furious began to emerge in January as members of Congress began pressing ATF officials for answers about the operation. The probe was designed to track small-time gun buyers until the guns reached the hands of major weapons traffickers along the southwestern border.
Instead, ATF agents ended up arresting low-level suspects, and about 1,800 of the weapons were unaccounted for, with nearly two-thirds of those guns likely in Mexico, according to testimony that ATF agents gave to a House committee in June.
Agents also confirmed that two of the weapons connected to the ATF operations were found at the scene of a December gunbattle near Rio Rico that left Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry dead. Terry's murder effectively ended the operation.
On Tuesday, an attorney representing Terry's parents said Burke's resignation does not help answer questions about the gun-trafficking case.
"I don't know that it moves us forward," Phoenix lawyer Patrick McGorder said. "The motivation behind the moves today leaves us with more questions than answers."
McGorder said the family still does not understand the genesis of the operation and who controlled it.
In a news conference with the ATF in January, Burke announced that 700 weapons were seized and 34 people were charged with smuggling guns to Mexico as part of Operation Fast and Furious.
Patrick Cunningham, chief of the criminal division for the Arizona U.S. Attorney's Office, who supervised Fast and Furious prosecutions, denied in a recent interview that his office knowingly allowed guns to cross the border.
Cunningham said agents with the ATF, who took the lead in day-to-day operations, repeatedly assured his staff that guns were not being allowed to go to Mexico.
Moreover, Cunningham said, his office gave agents a green light to seize guns every time they requested permission, save one, where it was determined by agents and prosecutors that agents lacked probable cause.
In his letter of resignation to President Barack Obama, Burke made no mention of Fast and Furious.
"My office has made considerable progress during my tenure in prosecuting cases in the areas of border security/immigration, Indian country and white-collar fraud as well as the creation of the first civil-rights unit in the district (of Arizona). We have made unprecedented gains in so many areas," Burke wrote.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder praised Burke's leadership and said his office handled many crucial issues, including the Jan. 8 shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 18 others.
"I am grateful to Dennis for his dedication and service to the Department of Justice over these many years and commend his decision to place the interests of the U.S. Attorney's Office above all else," Holder said in a written statement.
Former state Attorney General Grant Woods said Burke was an exemplary U.S. attorney.
"I think Dennis has had more on his plate in two years than anyone that I can ever remember who assumed a top prosecutorial post," Woods said. "If you go in with nothing unusual, you have a full plate. Then, you add to that the (Jared) Loughner case, the county-corruption case, the Fast and Furious controversy, all of the border issues and border cases that they've pursued, it's been pretty amazing - like nothing I've ever seen."
Woods said Burke has "done an excellent job, and I think he probably welcomes the chance to take a breather."
Former Arizona Sen. Dennis DeConcini said that if the resignation is tied to Fast and Furious, it would be a misguided effort to lay blame on Burke. "If his resignation is tied to Fast and Furious, it's ridiculous. It would be absolutely outrageous for 'Justice Main' to take it out on Dennis and make him the fall guy," DeConcini said. "It's just typical Washington cronyism. It just shows you how incompetent government can be to save themselves. It appears they screwed up, based on congressional hearings."
Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking minority member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, have pressed the ATF for months to disclose details of Operation Fast and Furious and to justify a policy that allowed weapons into Mexico.
Last month, William McMahon, who has since been reassigned as head of the ATF's Western region, testified that the agency had good intentions when it launched Operation Fast and Furious in 2009. But there are things the ATF would have done differently, he said.
Appearing before the House Oversight Committee, McMahon said that he was committed to dismantling criminal networks on both sides of the border and that "in our zeal to do so, and in the heat of battle, mistakes were made. And for that I apologize."
Arizona Congressman Paul Gosar, who sits on the House Oversight Committee, said in a statement Tuesday that the personnel shake-ups are "small steps."
"I must not rest until the American people are informed about who authorized the program, who allowed it to continue despite grave misgivings on the part of dedicated ATF agents," Gosar said, adding that he also wants to know "who is responsible for the lack of transparency."
Republic reporters Yvonne Wingett-Sanchez and JJ Hensley contributed to this
P.C.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2011/09/02/fast-and-furious-e-mails-reached-at-least-three-white-house-officials/
Fast and Furious e-mails reached at least three White House officials
posted at 2:05 pm on September 2, 2011 by Tina Korbe
New e-mails obtained yesterday by The Los Angeles Times show at least three national security officials received information about Operation Fast and Furious. An anonymous administration official says these e-mails don’t prove anyone in the White House knew about the covert “investigative tactics” used in the program — but they do show William Newell, then the ATF field supervisor for Arizona and New Mexico, was in close contact with Kevin O’Reilly, director of North American affairs for the White House national security staff, between July 2010 and February of this year.
In fact, Newell sought the White House’s help to persuade the Mexican government to let ATF agents recover U.S. guns across the border, and O’Reilly on several occasions sounded out Newell to see how efforts to combat gun trafficking in Arizona were going. In response to O’Reilly’s requests, Newell praised ATF agents’ work on “firearms trafficking investigations with direct links to Mexican” cartels.
O’Reilly forwarded the information Newell provided to two other officials – Dan Restrepo, the president’s senior Latin American advisor, and Greg Gatjanis, a White House national security official. But O’Reilly reassured Newell the information “would not leave NSS.” Newell answered, “Sure, just don’t want ATF HQ to find out, especially since this is what they should be doing (briefing you)!”
Evidence of another kind of cover-up in the scandal has surfaced, too. Late last night, Sen. Chuck Grassley’s office revealed 21 Fast and Furious guns have been found at violent crime scenes in Mexico. Previously, we knew 11 guns had been found at violent crime scenes in the U.S., but ATF now says that number was inflated. The downward revision on the number of recoveries in the U.S. is scarcely comforting in light of the larger number of recoveries in Mexico, though.
As Grassley put it in a statement yesterday, “The Justice Department has been less than forthcoming since day one, so the revisions here are hardly surprising, and the numbers will likely rise until the more than 1,000 guns that were allowed to fall into the hands of bad guys are recovered — most likely years down the road. … What we’re still waiting for are the answers to the other questions the Attorney General failed to answer per our agreement. The cooperation of the Attorney General and his staff is needed if we’re ever going to get to the bottom of this disastrous policy and help the ATF and the department move forward.”
Yep. Still waiting … and now we’re waiting for a more satisfactory answer of the significance of the White House e-mails, too.
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Heads Roll In Wake of BATFE “Fast and Furious” Scandal
Friday, September 02, 2011
In the latest development in the on-going Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE) “Fast and Furious” scandal, the Department of Justice announced this week the appointment of U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota B. Todd Jones to serve as Acting Director of BATFE, replacing Kenneth Melson. The DOJ also announced that Dennis Burke, U.S. attorney for the district of Arizona, has resigned. And the Wall Street Journal reported that Emory Hurley, the assistant U.S. attorney responsible for the day-to-day operations of “Fast and Furious,” has been removed from his post and reassigned to the department’s Civil Division.
As we have frequently noted in this Alert, the reckless and utterly failed BATFE operation known as “Operation Fast And Furious” was run out of the BATFE’s field office in Phoenix. The bungled operation put thousands of guns into the hands of violent criminals in Mexico.
The more information comes out about “Fast and Furious,” the more clear it seems that knowledge of the operation, and approval for it, went higher than the Phoenix field office, or even BATFE. There is clear evidence, uncovered by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee headed by Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), that senior Obama Administration officials were aware of this disastrous operation. And as the evidence continues to mount, it’s looking more and more likely that what we’re seeing unfold is a large-scale cover-up.
A Thursday Fox News story reported that federal officials quickly tried to cover up evidence that a gun found at the scene of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder was one the government intentionally helped sell to the Mexican cartels via the “Fast and Furious” program. The article also reported that late Thursday, the office of Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, revealed that 21 more “Fast and Furious” guns have been found at violent crime scenes in Mexico, up from 11 the agency admitted to just last month. According to the article, Sen. Grassley and Rep. Issa said Thursday they are expanding their investigation into the scandal, and have sent a strongly worded letter to Anne Scheel, the new U.S. attorney for Arizona, requesting interviews, e-mails, memos and even hand-written notes from members of the U.S. Attorney's office that played key roles in the failed program.
Regarding this week’s shake-up, Rep. Issa released the following statement: "While the reckless disregard for safety that took place in Operation Fast and Furious certainly merits changes within the Department of Justice, the Oversight and Government Reform Committee will continue its investigation to ensure that blame isn't offloaded on just a few individuals for a matter that involved much higher levels of the Justice Department. There are still many questions to be answered about what happened in Operation Fast and Furious and who else bears responsibility, but these changes are warranted and offer an opportunity for the Justice Department to explain the role other officials and offices played in the infamous efforts to allow weapons to flow to Mexican drug cartels. I also remain very concerned by Acting Director Melson's statement that the Department of Justice is managing its response in a manner intended to protect its political appointees. Senator Grassley and I will continue to press the Department of Justice for answers in order to ensure that a reckless effort like Fast and Furious does not take place again."
Sen. Grassley released this statement: "[This week’s] announcement is an admission by the Obama administration that serious mistakes were made in Operation Fast and Furious, and is a step in the right direction that they are continuing to limit any further damage that people involved in this disastrous strategy can do. There's a lot of blame to go around. As our investigation moves forward, and we get to the bottom of this policy, I wouldn't be surprised to see more fall out beyond the resignations and new assignments announced today. The Justice Department and the ATF have yet to answer a majority of the questions and still must produce many of the documents Congressman Issa and I have asked for. We're looking for a full accounting from the Justice Department as to who knew what and when, so we can be sure that this ill-advised strategy never happens again."
And House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) said: "The announcement by the Department of Justice to reassign Kenneth Melson is not the resolution Congress and the American people need. This move by the Administration indicates that Director Melson may be being used as a scapegoat for a much larger problem within ATF and DOJ. It appears that other senior officials at DOJ may have been involved in this deadly operation. The American people and Congress will not be appeased until we have the whole truth about how and why Operation Fast and Furious was authorized. Congress will not ignore an agency so out of control that its decisions and operations cost American lives."
Meanwhile, Attorney General Eric Holder has insisted that he knew absolutely nothing about “Fast and Furious.” As the investigation continues, hopefully we’ll find out if that unlikely insistence is the truth.
P.C.
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Frankly I think they should be fired; what's with this resigned and reassigned stuff.
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Frankly I think they should be fired; what's with this resigned and reassigned stuff.
Because those above them want to keep them quiet. If they were fired, they wouldn't have any control over them anymore.
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Probably true.... :-(
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We also need to remember that, as reported here, F&F is but one operation and that there were others of similar characteristics.
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Exclusive Report: Documents indicate ATF, FBI allowed Indiana ‘crime gun’ sales
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has acknowledged an Indiana dealer’s cooperation in conducting straw purchases at the direction of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Exclusive documents obtained by Gun Rights Examiner show the dealer cooperated with ATF by selling guns to straw purchasers, and that bureau management later asserted these guns were being traced to crimes.
From the confidential source providing the documents:
The dealer…was sent a "demand letter," based on the number of traces to him, which was retracted after his attorney pointed out they resulted from his cooperation with ATF. (Strangely, he got two voicemails from two different ATF people, both saying they were the head of the tracing operation).
Some of the straw men turned out to have felony convictions, the agents called the FBI background check system and fixed it so the transactions would be approved, something which may also have happened in Phoenix. (The attorney wasn't clear as to whether the guns were actually delivered to the gangs).
If the guns did not make it to criminal end users, why the demand for the reporting requirement was made remains unexplained: A demand letter, dated February 14, 2011 and signed by Charles J. Houser, Chief, National Tracing Center Division, informed the dealer he was required to provide acquisition and disposition information on firearms obtained from non-licensees, as well as to provide quarterly reports, based on ATF’s assessment that the dealer “had an unusually high number of traces of new crime guns with a relatively short ‘time-to-crime’…”
In a response dated March 10, 2011, attorney Brent R. Weil of Kightlinger and Gray, LLP, informed Houser:
Specifically, my client participated with and cooperated in certain law enforcement operations during 2009/2010 at the behest of ATFE enforcement officers from the Evansville, Indiana office (Agent Kevin Whittaker) and in the course of doing so, followed their instructions regarding the completion of certain transactions and the delivery of firearms to purchasers who did not clear the standard NICS [National Instant Check System] background check and were suspected of being involved in the purchase and transportation of handguns out of state despite passing NICS’s background checks.
In order to verify ATF claims, Weil requested they “be given a list of the ‘ten or more crime guns with a “time-to-crime: of three years or less’ so that we can satisfy ourselves that we are not being improperly included in this program because of our cooperation with and/or involvement with ATFE enforcement activities.”
The response letter resulted in a voice mail from Houser to Weil on March 15, 2011, ignoring his request for the list of guns, but promising:
If…that count is composed of firearms that were, where your client was working in conjunction with ATF, we will get your client removed entirely from the program.”
That same day, another voice mail was received, this time from Brenda Bennett, also identifying herself as “Chief of the National Tracing Center,” who informed Weil:
I have verified the information in the letter. I talked to law enforcement and they confirmed what he had to say. Therefore, he is being removed from the demand list.
See the sidebar slideshow accompanying this article for screen captures of all documents referred to in this column. At the very least, as with “Project Gunwalker,” they indicate straw purchased guns ended up in crime traces, something those directing surveillance were well aware of. It also indicates the FBI and ATF were once again involved with allowing transactions rejected by NICS to proceed, indicating this practice could be more widespread than has been previously documented, and not confined to Southwest border operations.
It’s fair to ask at this point what Robert J. Browning knows about this. He’s the Special Agent In Charge (SAC) of the Columbus Field Division, which directs Indiana and Ohio field offices. Also worth questioning: Joseph H. Hogsett, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, specifically about what he has directed and approved that has any bearing on “crime guns” making their way to the street following law enforcement firearm transfer approvals to straw purchasers within his jurisdicition.
It’s also fair to ask if it seems credible that such similar operations would develop independently in the Southwest (“Project Gunwalker”) and the Midwest (“Project Gangwalker’?), without authorization from and oversight coordination by Main Justice.
Mike Vanderboegh of Sipsey Street Irregulars has advocated opening “a second front” to complement House Oversight Committee investigations, and this column has been a consistent advocate for appointment of a truly independent special investigator, as well as for individual state attorneys general determining if multiple felony violations of their state laws, committed jointly by two or more persons, have been perpetrated. What seems clear is none of this will happen unless gun owners create such an uproar that their demands cannot be ignored—by timid political wind riders who don’t wish to get involved, by an arrogant, stonewalling administration, and by their protectors/abettors in the mainstream press.
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GM, anyone:
Michelle Malkin:
Fast and Furious update: And now…Project Grenadewalker?!
The truth is still seeping out, despite Team Obama’s best efforts to cover up and shut up the Fast and Furious whistle-blowers.
Last week, we noted the latest evidence that the scandal went straight to the top and chronicled the desperate dance of the lemons. In discussing the quiet resignation of U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Phoenix, I talked with NRA News’s Cam Edwards about Burke’s transparent attempt at liability avoidance.
Today, the WSJ spotlights the Phoenix USAO’s botched handling of an Arizona man accused of supplying grenades to a Mexican drug cartel. Business Insider provides a closer look (h/t William Amos):
Quote:
The WSJ reports today that federal authorities are now investigating why the U.S. Attorney’s office in Phoenix — the same office that oversaw Fast and Furious — released Jean Baptiste Kingery after he confessed to providing military-style weapons to the now-defunct La Familia Michoacana drug cartel.
Kingery, who was arrested and released in June 2010, confessed to manufacturing improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using grenade components from the U.S. He also admitted to helping the cartel convert semi-automatic rifles into machine guns. Mexican criminal organizations are increasingly using these military-style weapons as the cartels’ escalate their wars against the government and one another.
Despite Kingery’s confession, and over loud protestations from the arresting ATF officers, the U.S. Attorney’s office let Kingery go within hours of his arrest.
Kingery’s release is now the subject of an internal probe by the DOJ inspector general. The findings in the DOJ probe were a major catalyst in the recent staff shakeup that ousted Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennie Burke and Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson from their posts.
The Phoenix U.S. Attorney’s office denies that it declined to prosecute the case, saying that it wanted to continue surveillance. The office alternatively told investigators that ATF agents wanted to make Kingery an informant, but lost contact with him within weeks of his release.
…The Congressional Oversight Committee has also expanded its Fast and Furious investigation to include the Kingery case. The Committee is investigating who in the Obama administration knew about the gunrunning program, under which ATF agents allowed more than 2,000 guns to “walk” across the border.
On a related note, Kathleen Millar focuses on the State Department and poses provocative questions about F&F and the Arms Export Control act, which brought down the architects of Iran-Contra during the Reagan years:
Quote:
The Arms Export Control Act prohibits US arms merchants and defense manufacturers from selling lethal weapons and sensitive or dual-use technology to people who may want to use those weapons and technology to fire back at US citizens—at the military, law enforcement agents, and more and more often, a lot of just plain Americans who routinely miss those signs 80 miles inland on the US side of the Mexico-Arizona border warning tourists to go no further–Mexican gunmen on the prowl.
US weapons cannot be sold and shipped to countries that support terrorism, or nations, states, groups, or other entities deemed unfriendly to the United States.
I’d say Mexican cartels, especially the violent assassination squads that comprise Los Zetas, fall into that category, wouldn’t you?
Even more importantly, the Arms Export Control Act is, in fact, a servant to Article Three of the United States Constitution, which defines the act of selling weapons to those who would ‘levy war against the United States’ or ‘giving aid and comfort to our enemies’ as treason. No kidding. Treason.
If a US law enforcement agency wants to involve itself in the sale of weapons purchased from US gun dealers for export purposes–sales that may be part of an legitimate enforcement or military operation–that agency, let’s say ATF, must apply to the State Department for an exemption from the licensing requirements normally imposed on the commercial sale and export of such weapons. If an enforcement agency or military entity intent on running a covert op involving the export of lethal weapons does not obtain the necessary exemptions from State, for–listen carefully–each weapon or bundle of weapons purchased, that agency or military purchaser has committed a crime. Consider. ATF sent more than 1700 weapons across the border into Mexico–that could translate into 1700+ violations of the Arms Export Control Act.
…Forced resignations, diversionary political rationales, debates about the letter of the law versus the spirit of the law—none of this speaks to the central question. Did ATF, under advisement of its political administrators, break the laws of the United States of America?
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Quote:
The WSJ reports today that federal authorities are now investigating why the U.S. Attorney’s office in Phoenix — the same office that oversaw Fast and Furious — released Jean Baptiste Kingery after he confessed to providing military-style weapons to the now-defunct La Familia Michoacana drug cartel.
Kingery, who was arrested and released in June 2010, confessed to manufacturing improvised explosive devices (IEDs) using grenade components from the U.S. He also admitted to helping the cartel convert semi-automatic rifles into machine guns. Mexican criminal organizations are increasingly using these military-style weapons as the cartels’ escalate their wars against the government and one another.
Despite Kingery’s confession, and over loud protestations from the arresting ATF officers, the U.S. Attorney’s office let Kingery go within hours of his arrest.
Kingery’s release is now the subject of an internal probe by the DOJ inspector general. The findings in the DOJ probe were a major catalyst in the recent staff shakeup that ousted Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennie Burke and Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson from their posts.
The Phoenix U.S. Attorney’s office denies that it declined to prosecute the case, saying that it wanted to continue surveillance. The office alternatively told investigators that ATF agents wanted to make Kingery an informant, but lost contact with him within weeks of his release.
This does not pass the smell test. If you arrest someone and want to flip them, you don't drop charges and let them get "into the wind". Let's see, let's give the media his name and the fact that he gave a confession to the feds, so the cartels he did business with know he's a snitch. Either he goes to ground very, very deep, or his body parts might be found on one side of the border or another. Either way, the odds of him appearing alive before a congressional body are smaller than Joe Biden getting into Mensa.
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So, please spell it out. What do you think is going on here?
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People in the DOJ don't want him under oath in front of Darrell Issa?
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http://hotair.com/archives/2011/09/07/gunwalker-goes-to-the-hoosier-state/
Gunwalker goes to the Hoosier State
posted at 10:05 am on September 7, 2011 by Jazz Shaw
Old and busted: Gunwalker
New hotness: Gangwalker?
At Pajamas Media, Bob Owens stays on on the trail of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who, apparently in concert with the FBI, have gotten the White House in some serious hot water. Having already explored the disastrous experiment known as Operation Fast and Furious, we now learn that it may have a kissing cousin out in Indiana. From the Washington Examiner:
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has acknowledged an Indiana dealer’s cooperation in conducting straw purchases at the direction of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Exclusive documents obtained by Gun Rights Examiner show the dealer cooperated with ATF by selling guns to straw purchasers, and that bureau management later asserted these guns were being traced to crimes.
It’s a long, detailed report with chilling similarities to the original Gunwalker scandal. The federal government essentially provides cover for straw purchasers to take delivery of weapons without interference from state or local officials. The weapons then wind up at crime scenes, having been used for all manner of mayhem. The difference in this case is that, rather than heading out of the country to Mexican drug cartels, they go to American organized crime gangs. Retaliation against a whistle-blower follows in short order.
Bob Owens sees a pattern in the government incompetence.
There was never any mechanism within Fast and Furious to intercept the thousands of Gunwalker weapons once they left the gun shops, and the multi-agency team (DOJ, ATF, FBI, DEA, IRS, DHS) acted as nothing more or less than a shield to prevent straw purchasers and smugglers from being intercepted by local or state law enforcement.
The apparent purpose of the operation was to lend the thinnest veneer of truth to the 90-percent lie spread by Barack Obama, Eric Holder, and Hillary Clinton from the very beginning of the Obama administration. It makes sense only as a plot to manufacture evidence for the punitive gun control laws that Obama has championed his entire political career. Indeed, even after Gunwalker was exposed, the number of U.S. guns in Mexico, many of which were put there by the actions of the government itself, was still brazenly used as the excuse for ATF long gun reporting requirements currently being challenged in courts.
Likewise, what Codrea has dubbed as “Gangwalker” appears to be another attempt to provide guns to criminals in order to generate more gun crime and then more calls for gun control.
The biggest difference between the two operations at this early date only seems to be that Gangwalker is a purposeful attempt to create the deaths of American citizens in order to pursue the administration’s fanatical anti-gun agenda.
So was it just stunning stupidity and incompetence spread across multiple offices of two different agencies, or is there some hidden agenda at work. I’ll leave that speculation to the reader, but it’s certainly food for thought. The real loser in all of this – after those killed or injured in the ensuing criminal activity, of course – is the American gun owner and proponent of second amendment rights. But by exposing these operations before we see new gun control measures popping up in Congress we may be staunching the wound before it fully breaks open.
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EXCLUSIVE: Third Gun Linked to 'Fast and Furious' Identified at Border Agent's Murder
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A third gun linked to "Operation Fast and Furious" was found at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, new documents obtained exclusively by Fox News suggest, contradicting earlier assertions by federal agencies that police found only two weapons tied to the federal government's now infamous gun interdiction scandal.
Sources say emails support their contention that the FBI concealed evidence to protect a confidential informant. Sources close to the Terry case say the FBI informant works inside a major Mexican cartel and provided the money to obtain the weapons used to kill Terry.
Unlike the two AK-style assault weapons found at the scene, the third weapon could more easily be linked to the informant. To prevent that from happening, sources say, the third gun "disappeared."
In addition to the emails obtained by Fox News, an audio recording from a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent investigating the Terry case seems to confirm the existence of a third weapon. In that conversation, the agent refers to an "SKS assault rifle out of Texas" found at the Terry murder scene south of Tucson.
The FBI refused to answer a detailed set of questions submitted to officials by Fox News. Instead, agency spokesman Paul Bresson said, "The Brian Terry investigation is still ongoing so I cannot comment." Bresson referred Fox News to court records that only identify the two possible murder weapons.
However, in the hours after Terry was killed on Dec. 14, 2010, several emails written to top ATF officials suggest otherwise.
In one, an intelligence analyst writes that by 7:45 p.m. -- about 21 hours after the shooting -- she had successfully traced two weapons at the scene, and is now "researching the trace status of firearms recovered earlier today by the FBI."
In another email, deputy ATF-Phoenix director George Gillett asks: "Are those two (AK-47s) in addition to the gun already recovered this morning?"
The two AK-type assault rifles were purchased by Jaime Avila from the Lone Wolf Trading Co. outside of Phoenix on Jan. 16, 2010. Avila was recruited by his roommate Uriel Patino. Patino, according to sources, received $70,000 in "seed money" from the FBI informant late in 2009 to buy guns for the cartel.
According to a memo from Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley, who oversaw the operation, Avila began purchasing firearms in November 2009, shortly after Patino, who ultimately purchased more than 600 guns and became the largest buyer of guns in Operation Fast and Furious.
Months ago, congressional investigators developed information that both the FBI and DEA not only knew about the failed gun operation, but that they may be complicit in it. House Government Reform and Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, fired off letters in July requesting specific details from FBI director Robert Mueller and Drug Enforcement Administration chief Michele Leonhart.
"In recent weeks, we have learned of the possible involvement of paid FBI informants in Operation Fast and Furious," Issa and Grassley wrote to Mueller. "Specifically, at least one individual who is allegedly an FBI informant might have been in communication with, and was perhaps even conspiring with, at least one suspect whom ATF was monitoring."
Sources say the FBI is using the informants in a national security investigation. The men were allegedly debriefed by the FBI at a safe house in New Mexico last year.
Sources say the informants previously worked for the DEA and U.S. Marshall's Office but their contracts were terminated because the men were "stone-cold killers." The FBI however stopped their scheduled deportation because their high ranks within the cartel were useful.
In their July letter, Issa and Grassley asked Mueller if any of those informants were ever deported by the DEA or any other law enforcement entity and how they were repatriated.
Asked about the content of the emails, a former federal prosecutor who viewed them expressed shock.
"I have never seen anything like this. I can see the FBI may have an informant involved but I can't see them tampering with evidence. If this is all accurate, I'm stunned," the former prosecutor said.
“This information confirms what our sources were saying all along -- that the FBI was covering up the true circumstances of the murder of Brian Terry," added Mike Vanderboegh, an authority on the Fast and Furious investigation who runs a whistleblower website called Sipsey Street.
"It also confirms that the FBI was at least as culpable, and perhaps more culpable, than the ATF in the (Fast and Furious) scandal, and that there was some guiding hand above both these agencies (and the other agencies involved) coordinating the larger operation," Vanderboegh said.
Asked about the new evidence, Terry family attorney Pat McGroder said, "The family wants answers. They'd like to put this to rest and put closure to exactly what happened to Brian."
By William Lajeunesse
Published September 09, 2011
| FoxNews.com
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics...0,109137.story
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Asked about the content of the emails, a former federal prosecutor who viewed them expressed shock.
"I have never seen anything like this. I can see the FBI may have an informant involved but I can't see them tampering with evidence. If this is all accurate, I'm stunned," the former prosecutor said.
It's almost like Chicago-style corruption has gone to the federal level. I wonder how that happened.....
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/sep/8/toying-with-gun-control/
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Quick Summary of the Proposed National Right to Carry Act (H.R.822)
Posted on September 13, 2011 by Nick Leghorn
The “National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act of 2011,” known also as H.R.822 or “The Streets Aren’t Red Enough Act” by the Brady Campaign has been talked about a lot in the news, but not many news organizations have taken the time to actually read through the damned thing and parse it out for their readers (despite the fact that it’s currently only six pages long). Seeing as I’m a bit of a legislation nerd I figured I would give it a go and walk you guys through exactly what’s being proposed.
The preamble, which is the first actual line of the bill, is supposed to succinctly state what the rest of the text is going to do. In this case it does a pretty good job.
To amend title 18, United States Code, to provide a national standard in accordance with which nonresidents of a State may carry concealed firearms in the State.
The purpose of this bill, according to the preamble, is to change the penal code of the United States to outline some standards to enable interstate concealed carry.
Since the concept of universal concealed carry isn’t exactly res ipsa loquitur for everyone in congress the next important section outlines the reasons why this should be implemented. The very first statement more or less sets the mood for the rest of the bill:
The Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States protects the fundamental right of an individual to keep and bear arms, including for purposes of individual self-defense.
The writer is enshrining the Supreme Court’s interperetation of the second amendment as an incorporated right applied to every citizen of the United States and not just on a federal level. This is backed up by the second statement, which refers to the Heller decision of the Supreme Court.
The fourth statement is probably the one that is going to rub opponents the wrong way the most:
The right to bear arms includes the right to carry arms for self-defense and the defense of others.
Boom. Right there. If this becomes law, the right to carry for self defense would be enshrined in law forever. Or until something else comes along to strike it down. And not only does it include personal safety in that clause as a valid reason for employing deadly force but also the safety of “others” as well.
There are a couple of statements thrown in here which argue that there is precedent for such a move. Statement #5, for example, is a reminder that Congress previously authorized off-duty officers to carry concealed weapons wherever they go without a permit. Statement #6 is a reminder that 48 states provide some mechanism for citizens to carry a concealed firearm. And statement #7 notes that the overwhelming majority of CCW holders don’t go around shooting up their states.
The real authority for this bill, however, doesn’t come from the previous statements but from statement #8, which states that a lack of reciprocity harms interstate commerce. The U.S. Constitution has what’s known as the “commerce clause” in the legislative powers section of the constitution. From the section enumerating Congress’ powers:
To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;
As any good High School student will tell you, any powers not enumerated specifically in the constitution are reserved to the states themselves. This is where the states get their authority to issue carry permits as they see fit. However, by not providing universal reciprocity the states have set up a condition where a citizen in one state may choose not to travel in interstate commerce due to that lack of reciprocity. Because of that effect on interstate commerce, Congress has the ability to act.
Yeah. I know. It kinda makes your brain hurt. But this is the same crutch Congress uses to pass a good chunk of their legislation that doesn’t seem to fit anywhere else in the outlined powers, so I guess what’s good for the goose and all.
Enough about the findings and the legal precedents, what does this bill actually DO? Here’s the main section:
(a) Notwithstanding any provision of the law of any State or political subdivision thereof, related to the carrying or transportation of firearms, a person who is not prohibited by Federal law from possessing, transporting, shipping, or receiving a firearm, and who is carrying a government-issued photographic identification document and a valid license or permit which is issued pursuant to the law of a State and which permits the person to carry a concealed firearm, may carry a concealed handgun (other than a machinegun or destructive device) that has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce, in any State, other than the State of residence of the person, that–
`(1) has a statute that allows residents of the State to obtain licenses or permits to carry concealed firearms; or
`(2) does not prohibit the carrying of concealed firearms by residents of the State for lawful purposes.
In English: As long as there are no local or state ordinances against carrying a concealed weapon, any U.S. Citizen who meets the following criteria can carry a concealed firearm (but not a machine gun or destructive device) in any state that allows concealed carry:
■Can legally own a firearm
■Carrying a government issued photo ID
■Carrying a concealed firearms permit issued by ANY state (not just the state of residence)
■Use a firearm that came from a different state or country
That last bit about the firearm coming from a different state might be another attempt to invoke the commerce clause, but it makes it a pain in the ass if you want to use a gun that was made in your state.
The big catch there is that the state you’re in has to have some sort of mechanism for allowing concealed carry. Illinois and the District of Columbia are the only two “states” that don’t allow concealed carry in some form or another.
Here’s another good question: What laws does the CCWer have to follow? If this new bill goes into effect, the laws of the state and locality where you’re carrying apply. So if you’re in a state that doesn’t allow carry in a restaurant you can’t walk into Applebee’s with your Glock under your shirt even if you have a permit from a state that says it’s OK. Rules about magazine size default to the current state you’re in as well.
On the other hand, if the local government issues their permits with restrictions (time, etc) on the licenses, this bill would allow out of state permit holders to operate as if they had “unrestricted” permits.
The rest of the bill clarifies some legal stuff to keep from pissing off the states too much, and allows the bill to be “severable.” That means that if one section is unconstitutional, only that section is struck down and the rest lives on.
That just about covers this bill as it stands right now. It’s still sitting in committee with 243 cosponsors, but hasn’t moved since it was introduced. Suffice it to say, should anything happen we will let you know.
About Nick Leghorn
Nick Leghorn (Staff Writer - TTAG) is a Risk Analyst living in Northern Virginia. In his free time, he's a competition shooter (USPSA, 3-gun and NRA High Power service rifle division) and enjoys mixing statistics and science with firearms. Click here for his most recent competition results.
http://thetruthaboutguns.com/2011/09/foghorn/quick-summary-of-the-proposed-national-right-to-carry-act-h-r-822/
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Woof,
This will put some Dem's on the hot seat right before an election year. The Left is as anti-gun as ever but a number of so called moderate Dem's were reelected last time around because they said they were pro gun. We'll see.
P.C.
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"As any good High School student will tell you, any powers not enumerated specifically in the constitution are reserved to the states themselves. This is where the states get their authority to issue carry permits as they see fit. However, by not providing universal reciprocity the states have set up a condition where a citizen in one state may choose not to travel in interstate commerce due to that lack of reciprocity. Because of that effect on interstate commerce, Congress has the ability to act."
I have a bit of a problem here. I think current Interstate Commerce clause jurisprudence exceeds by quite a bit what the Constitution really says. It makes sense to me that each state find its way on these things.
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3 more murders linked to Gunwalker
By Sharyl Attkisson
Weapons linked to ATF's controversial "Fast and Furious" operation have been tied to at least eight violent crimes in Mexico including three murders, four kidnappings and an attempted homicide.
According to a letter from U.S. Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), the disclosed incidents may be only a partial list of violent crimes linked to Fast and Furious weapons because "ATF has not conducted a comprehensive independent investigation."
When added to the guns found at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry in the U.S., the newly-revealed murders in Mexico bring the total number of deaths linked to Fast and Furious to four.
According to the Justice Department letter:
One AK-47 type assault rifle purchased by a Fast and Furious suspect was recovered Nov. 14, 2009 in Atoyac de Alvarez, Mexico after the Mexican military rescued a kidnap victim.
On July 1, 2010, two AK-47 type assault rifles purchased by Fast and Furious suspects were recovered in Sonora, Mexico after a shootout between cartels. Two murders were reported in the incident using the weapons.
On July 26, 2010, a giant .50 caliber Barrett rifle purchased by a Fast and Furious suspect was recovered in Durango, Mexico after apparently having been fired. No further details of the incident were given.
On Aug. 13, 2010, two AK-47 type assault rifles purchased by a Fast and Furious target were recovered in Durango, Mexico after a confrontation between the Mexican military and an "armed group."
On Nov. 14, 2010, two AK-47 type assault rifles purchased by Fast and Furious targets were recovered in Chihuahua, Mexico after "the kidnapping of two individuals and the murder of a family member of a Mexican public official." Sources tell CBS News they believe this is a reference to a case we previously reported on: the terrorist kidnapping, torture and murder of Mario Gonzalez Rodriguez. Rodriguez was the brother of then-attorney general Patricia Gonzalez Rodriguez. The terrorists released video of Rodriguez before his death, in handcuffs surrounded by hooded gunmen.
On May 27, 2011, three AK-47 type assault rifles purchased by Fast and Furious targets were recovered in Jalisco, Mexico after having been fired. No other details of the incident were provided, but the date and location match with another incident previously reported by CBS News. On May 27 near Jalisto, cartel members fired upon a Mexican government helicopter, forcing it to make an emergency landing. According to one law enforcement source, 29 suspected cartel members were killed in the attack.
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- All American Blogger - http://www.allamericanblogger.com -
Violent Crimes Drop 12%, Reason Unknown; In Other News, Record Number of Americans Carrying Concealed Weapons
Posted By Duane Lester On September 16, 2011 @ 8:01 pm In The Blog | 5 Comments
The “experts” expected an increase in violent crimes with the poor state of the economy. What they found was quite the opposite:
The number of violent crimes fell by a surprising 12 percent in the U.S. last year, a far bigger drop than the nation has been averaging since 2001, the Justice Department said.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics reported there were 3.8 million violent crimes last year, down from 4.3 million in 2009.
Experts aren’t sure why.
That really is bizarre. I wonder what could be behind the incredible decrease in violent crime…
Gun owners are packing heat in record numbers, fearful of stricter gun control under the Obama administration and higher crime in a sour economy.
Some states and counties report a surge in applications for concealed weapons permits since the November election. All states but Illinois and Wisconsin allow concealed weapons, but requirements differ.
Applications already have hit a record this year in Clay County, Mo., where the sheriff’s office received 888 through June, compared with 863 in all of last year, says Sheriff Bob Boydston. The office recently hired two part-time workers to deal with the rush.
Also, this:
Johnson is about to become one of the millions of Americans who are permitted to carry a concealed weapon, having completed a course with Utah Legal Heat, a company that offers concealed weapons instruction — one of many options that meets the requirement for proof of firearms training for the application process. He said he’s never been threatened directly, but he also wants the option of defending himself.
“I pray that I never use (a gun),” he said, “but I want to be prepared.”
Figures indicate that more Americans like Johnson are seeking permission to carry concealed weapons — including both firearms and knives — at all times. In Idaho alone, there are currently 71,249 valid permits. Neighboring Utah has reported 246,831 valid permits as of June 30 and has seen its number of valid permits rise 458.8 percent since 2001, when 44,173 permits were reported.
And, this:
Florida had 813,127 active permit holders as of the end of April. Since May 31, 2010 when there were 729,000 permits, there has been about a 12 percent increase in permit holders. In Texas, from December 31, 2009 to December 31, 2010, there was an increase from 402,914 to 461,724 permits, a 15 percent increase. On December 31, 2008, there were 314,574 permits, showing a 28 percent increase from 2008 to 2009.
Add Florida, Pennsylvania, and Washington state together and those three states account for almost 2 million permit holders by themselves.
There’s plenty of articles I can pull quotes from, but that all would say the same thing. More and more Americans are carrying a concealed weapon.
Yet the occurrence of violent crime dropped 12%.
Unexpected?
Hardly.
While correlation does not equal causation, there is evidence to show the rise in guns has impacted the frequency of crime:
“This is just the type of thing that was predicted,” economist John R. Lott told HUMAN EVENTS. Lott, author of More Guns, Less Crime (Chicago University Press), pointed to research done eight years ago by David P. Mustard and published in Chicago University’s Journal of Law and Economics.
“States that enact concealed-carry laws are less likely to have a felonious police death and more likely to have lower rates of felonious police deaths after the law is passed,” Mustard concluded in his 2001 journal article.
More guns, less crime. In fact:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Article printed from All American Blogger: http://www.allamericanblogger.com
URL to article: http://www.allamericanblogger.com/17432/violent-crimes-drop-12-reason-unknown-in-other-news-record-number-of-americans-carrying-concealed-weapons/
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Woof,
The rate would drop even more if our idiot Leftwing media would stop brainwashing psycho's and putting the idea into their sick minds that AK47's and high capacity magazines must be the best way for them to kill a bunch of people and commit suicide. The psycho's in the past normally just used cheap small caliber revolvers and rifles, even though AK's and high capacity mag's were just as available and cheaper than they are now but with the education and direction of the media now they are just starting to use them in their attacks. Attention all psycho's and suicidal maniacs your next weapon of choice is to be a .50 BMG sniper rifle, that's the latest target for banning and the media is just yammering on and on about how dangerous and deadly it could be in the hands of a nutjob. Of course no one in the U.S. has been killed by one up to this point. :-P If you want someone to blame for the Gifford's shooting with the high capacity mag's or the massacre in NV with the AK then you need look no further than the news media. It's not the second amendment or citzens with carry permits or the NRA or even the weapons themselves that's driving the problem. It's the Leftwing media that is creating these monsters and giving them a world stage to act out their insanity and then they spawn and inspire copycat killers all over the world by running 24/7 coverage for weeks on end detailing how they did it and how the next one could make it worst. The blood is on their hands.
P.C.
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"It would drop even more if our idiot Leftwing media would stop brainwashing psycho's and putting the idea into their sick minds that AK47's and high capacity magazines must be the best way for them to kill a bunch of people and commit suicide."
PC,
You assume they don't mean for that to happen. Like "Fast and Furious", it's exactly what is intended.
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Woof,
I agree, they know exactly what they're doing.
P.C.
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http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/cloward-piven-the-ultimate-goal-of-gunwalker/?singlepage=true
Cloward-Piven: The Ultimate Goal of Gunwalker?
It's hard to think of a more logical reason for Gunwalker to exist.
September 17, 2011 - 12:00 am - by Bob Owens
PJMedia reader “eon” posted an insightful comment in response to my September 15 article on the Gunwalker scandal:
To the best of my knowledge, no previous U.S. administration has ever destabilized the government of a putatively friendly foreign power purely for domestic political gain.
The closest you can get would be the revolutionary movement in what is now Panama, that the U.S. nurtured to gain that area’s independence (from Nicaragua) — to facilitate building the Panama Canal. But that was a pre-existing revolutionary movement with pre-existing complaints against the Nicaraguan government that did not include stopping them from selling illegal drugs. (Editor’s note: Panama gained its independence from Colombia, not Nicaragua.)
The gains Obama & Co. seem to be seeking come in three flavors. Ranked in order of time-criticality from their POV, they are most likely:
1. Short-term: Increased illegal immigration from Mexico as people attempt to flee the increasing violence (allowing them to push the DREAM Act through, and “stacking the deck” in the next election via ACORN and SEIU);
2. Medium-term: Propaganda for tighter gun laws (possibly enacted by Executive Order, bypassing the Congress);
3. Long-term: Legalization of “recreational drugs,” helped by a “drug friendly” Mexican government, influenced by if not overtly controlled by the drug cartels.
I strongly suspect that (3) is the ultimate objective, with (1) and (2) being seen (at least by Obama & Co.) as “stepping-stones” to attaining it.
While I personally think (3) is a non-starter even as a long-term issue, investigators and pundits closely tracking Gunwalker have long suspected a larger game was afoot.
A high-risk plot involving major elements of the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, Treasury, and State, including the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Border Patrol, and the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division (IRS-CID), requiring approval from the State Department, isn’t something that comes from a mid-level bureaucrat. It is typically incited and decided by the very highest levels of appointed and elected officials.
As anyone with any experience in government will attest, there is massive institutional inertia against both change and risk. It is insurmountable without significant stakeholder support. In government, this means directors, secretaries, and elected officeholders.
An operation like Fast and Furious would have been jettisoned in the conceptual stages as inherently dangerous and assured of failure, as various veteran law enforcement officers have attested (including here at PJMedia in an article by LAPD veteran “Jack Dunphy”):
I can appreciate the desire to use novel law enforcement approaches in confronting the violence attendant to drug trafficking in Mexico. Someone, displaying a bit of that outside-the-box thinking, came up with the idea of allowing thousands of weapons to be bought on this side of the border with the idea that they could be tracked as they made their way through the network of cartel members and facilitators and into the hands of Mexican outlaws.
This was a pipe dream. To me, it is inconceivable that this operation ever made it out of the first meeting where it was discussed. It goes to show how detached police executives can be from the reality of police work as it is actually practiced. There is simply no effective way to track a gun once it leaves the store where it was purchased.
We’ve long suspected that what “eon” calls a “medium-term” goal — propaganda for tighter gun laws — was the ultimate goal of Gunwalker, but the plot makes significantly more sense if Gunwalker did have multiple goals, of which gun control was just one.
A logical speculation posted by “eon” is that the short-term goal of Gunwalker was to increase violence in Mexico. This would drive more Mexican citizens northward as illegal aliens, seeking respite from the violence in their home country. Their plight would provide the administration a way to pitch the DREAM Act as an act of kindness to political refugees and another step towards amnesty.
This would be a strategy straight from the Cloward-Piven playbook.
As James Simpson noted several months ago at American Thinker, the Cloward-Pieven strategy is always approached the same way:
1.The offensive organizes previously unorganized groups eligible for government benefits but not currently receiving all they can.
2.The offensive seeks to identify new beneficiaries and/or create new benefits.
3.The overarching aim is always to impose new stresses on target systems, with the ultimate goal of forcing their collapse.
Gunwalker purposefully increases social unrest (increased gun violence/destabilizing Mexico), with the possible result of overloading the U.S. public welfare system (more illegal aliens fleeing the violence in Mexico and Central America). Gunwalker’s perpetrators could then use that influx to create an insurmountable constituency of poor seeking handouts from the Democratic Party. The hope of the strategy is to force a system-wide collapse of the current system, and then to rebuild the government in a variant of the strongest socialist model they think the public will accept.
It sounds too devious. It appears to fit.
Take Operation Fast and Furious in Arizona, the two suspected operations in Texas, Operation Castaway in Tampa, and the newer allegations of “Gangwalker” in the Midwest — they make sense only in the larger context of a Cloward-Piven framework.
These operations could not possibly succeed at interdicting straw purchasers, smugglers, and cartel bosses. No one actually involved in law enforcement could possibly believe that such idiotic operations could work. But these operations are logical when viewed through the context of their implementation as tactical applications designed to support a Cloward-Piven strategy.
Operation Castaway provided weapons to destabilize Central American countries and to help keep the cartel drug supply lines from Central and South America open. The unnamed gunwalking operations in Texas provided a steady flow of U.S. firearms to southern and central Mexico. Operation Fast and Furious provided the Sinaloa cartel more than 2,020 weapons in northern Mexico along the U.S. border. And to make sure the cartel wars didn’t get too one-sided, the State Department made sure the bloodthirsty Zetas were armed with American military equipment by selling them military hardware through a transparent front company.
The violence in Mexico triggered by the administration’s gunwalking efforts also seems logically designed to reverse a trend that had begun of Mexicans and others originating from south of the border leaving the United States because of our current economic situation.
If the net flow of illegal aliens is negative, the Democratic Party’s desires are inhibited: increasing numbers of illegal aliens can create the sort of economic crisis they need to force amnesty laws, to assure a long-term Democratic majority, and to establish lock-step control over Hispanic voters as they have established over blacks.
Operation Fast and Furious doesn’t make sense as a anti-cartel operation, but it makes perfect tactical sense as a way of implementing Cloward-Piven, something that President Obama, Attorney General Holder, Secretary Napolitano, and Secretary Clinton have long embraced as followers of those radicals and Saul Alinsky. Gunwalker is the start of a coup d’état against the republic by the very souls entrusted to guard it.
Of course, this is entirely speculation at this point. It’s just damn hard to think of a more logical reason for Gunwalker to exist.
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**Oh, there weren't any. Hey, does this mean this is Obama's next undeclared war?
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/09/20/report-at-least-200-murders-in-mexico-now-linked-to-fast-furious-weapons/
Report: At least 200 murders in Mexico now linked to Fast & Furious weapons
posted at 8:42 pm on September 20, 2011 by Allahpundit
A conservative estimate from this morning’s conference call with Darrell Issa, via our Townhall cousin Katie Pavlich.
In a conference call this morning with Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Darrell Issa, reporters were told the Attorney General in Mexico has confirmed at least 200 murders south of the border happened as a result of Operation Fast and Furious. Eleven crimes in the United States have been linked to Operation Fast and Furious up to this point. Issa said he expects as the investigation in the operation continues, more crimes connected to Fast and Furious will come to light and be exposed. This is not surprising, considering out of 2500 weapons the Obama Justice Department allowed to “walk,” and that only 600 have been recovered, the rest are lost until they show up at violent crime scenes. The damage from Operation Fast and Furious has only started to be seen. Remember, the Mexican Government and ATF agents working in Mexico were left completely in the dark about the operation.
They’re discovering more every day, you know. But as I say, 200 is the conservative number. Some Mexican officials think it may go considerably higher than that.
Marisela Morales, Mexico’s attorney general and a longtime favorite of American law enforcement agents in Mexico, told The Times that she first learned about Fast and Furious from news reports. And to this day, she said, U.S. officials have not briefed her on the operation gone awry, nor have they apologized.
“At no time did we know or were we made aware that there might have been arms trafficking permitted,” Morales, Mexico’s highest-ranking law enforcement official, said in a recent interview. “In no way would we have allowed it, because it is an attack on the safety of Mexicans.”…
In March 2010, with a growing number of guns lost or showing up at crime scenes in Mexico, ATF officials convened an “emergency briefing” to figure out a way to shut down Fast and Furious. Instead, they decided to keep it going and continue to leave Mexico out of the loop…
Mexican Congressman Humberto Benitez Trevino, who heads the justice committee in the Chamber of Deputies, said the number of people killed or wounded by the weapons had probably doubled to 300 since March, when he said confidential information held by Mexican security authorities put the figure at 150. The higher number, he said, was his own estimate.
They kept the program a secret from Mexico initially because they feared corrupt government officials might spill the beans, but I can’t fathom why they’d continue to refuse to offer a full accounting to the Mexican AG. It makes an already hideously shady operation seem that much shadier. Is there no contrition at all for this? Three hundred people shot dead with guns that shouldn’t have been there and not so much as a briefing for the country’s top law enforcement officer? There must be some awfully important details they’re worried might come out.
Via CNS, here’s Issa on this morning’s call reiterating his point that there’s no good reason for Holder not to have known about this. Quote: “f Eric Holder didn’t know, it’s because he didn’t want to know or because he wasn’t doing his job.” Click the image to listen.
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http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20108965-10391695.html?tag=strip
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Comments by poster on another forum:
"OK, so, according to his lawyer, Howard was actually trying to get that ATF agent to incriminate herself in those conversations. And DOJ's inspector general cannot be trusted to investigate the department she works for. What a surprise."
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Quote:
Lawmakers Claim Justice Inspector Obstructed Probe Into ‘Fast and Furious’
By William Lajeunesse
Published September 21, 2011 | FoxNews.com
The inspector general of the Department of Justice undermined and obstructed a congressional investigation by releasing secret tape recordings that corroborate allegations of misconduct in "Operation Fast and Furious," according to a letter written by Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley.
The two lawmakers leading the probe into the Obama administration scandal claim Justice Inspector General Cynthia Schnedar compromised their investigators' ability to get to the truth and potentially prosecute those responsible for selling thousands of weapons to the Mexican drug cartels.
Schnedar failed to even listen to the recordings before handing them over to the actual targets of the investigation, the letter alleges.
"Each of these disclosures undermines our ability to assess the candor of witnesses in our investigation and thus obstructs it," they wrote in a letter dated Tuesday. "Moreover, your decision to immediately disclose the recordings to those you are investigating creates at least the appearance, if not more, that your inquiry is not sufficiently objective and independent.
"It appears that you did not consider the significant harm that providing these recordings to the very individuals under investigation could cause to either our inquiry or your own. You did not consult with us about the recordings even though the congressional inquiry and reactions to it are discussed at length."
The OIG argues that under discovery rules it is required to turn the tapes over to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
The tapes Issa and Grassley refer to were recorded by Andre Howard, owner of the Lone Wolf Trading Co., after he suspected the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was lying to him about the guns they recruited him to sell to buyers of the Sinaloa Cartel.
On two occasions Howard taped Hope MacAllister, the lead agent in the Fast and Furious case.
Dallas lawyer Larry Gaydos, who represents the Lone Wolf Trading Co., claims Howard was trying to get MacAllister to implicate herself and the ATF in the illegal gun-running scheme.
"He became very suspicious and in his own defense would tape key conversations with Ms. MacAllister and try to get her to make admissions about the truth of the matter," said Dallas attorney Larry Gaydos. "Andre was trying to get her to admit that indeed they let guns go to Mexico."
Howard has become a key witness in the congressional investigation of the Department of Justice and its alleged cover up of Operation Fast and Furious. The Justice Department has repeatedly said it did not allow guns -- purchased under its direction and authority -- to reach Mexico.
The facts in the case suggest otherwise, but the agency continues to deny it and refuses to turn over pertinent documents to Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
"Andre was acting under the direct supervision of the Department of Justice and ATF. And he thought he was making a difference and that these people were being arrested and there were going to be indictments and that there were going to be prosecutions," Gaydos told Fox News exclusively on Tuesday.
"He is appalled at the position being taken by the Department of Justice and the lack of candor and the lack of cooperation with Congress. He wants the truth to come out for the American people and the Terry Family."
Howard is not alone in his regret. Speaking in reaction to the tapes Tuesday was ATF agent and whistleblower Larry Alt, who has never spoken publicly about his opposition to the case and the retaliation he has suffered as a result of it.
"Agent Terry's death brought just a tremendous amount of, I guess, regret and sorrow, disappointment, disgust to myself, to other members of the group. I can't express enough--I've never had an opportunity to publicly express condolences to the Terry family," Alt told Fox News. "I'm almost speechless when it comes to that."
Alt stepped forward after hearing MacAllister disparage his wife and family on the tapes. He felt it was necessary to defend them, and his own reputation. A decorated soldier and police officer, an instructor at the ATF academy, Alt says he and fellow whistleblower John Dodson were transferred to dead-end jobs after standing up to Agent-in-Charge Bill Newell. The ATF in Phoenix and U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona then attempted to conceal the role they played in directing area gun dealers to sell weapons to buyers the agency knew were breaking the law.
"We were transferred from the group. We were placed in positions away from the investigation itself, denied access to the investigation," said Alt. "I would view that as a measure of control and if you want to call it a cover up, that would be an accurate statement."
Howard made the tapes in March 2011 after a meeting he and his attorneys held with federal officials. In that meeting, Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley continued to insist the guns Lone Wolf sold were stopped and seized before reaching Mexico.
But ATF officials are quoted in a Washington Post article and the Spanish language daily La Opinion saying just the opposite -- blaming Lone Wolf for "selling guns to the cartels" with no mention that Howard was operating under the federal government's direction, encouragement and approval.
===========================
What do we make of this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec667Esbjec
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"New documents reveal the Department of Justice lied to Congress and show how U.S. officials bought guns with tax dollars and then made sure no one stopped their transfer to Mexican drug cartels. The funneling of thousands of American guns into the hands of Mexican drug cartels in the operation known as Fast and Furious was not a botched sting operation or the result of bureaucratic incompetence. It was not designed to interdict gun trafficking, but to facilitate it. We now know that it involved not just the use of straw buyers, but also agents of the federal government purchasing weapons with taxpayer money, ordering the licensed dealers to conduct the sales off the books, then calling off surveillance of the gun traffickers and refusing to interdict the transfer of the weapon or arrest the people involved. ... A two-year-old C-SPAN video shows Deputy Attorney General David Ogden, who would resign nine months later after less than a year's service, telling reporters at a Justice Department briefing of major policy initiatives to fight the Mexican drug cartels. 'The president has directed us to take action to fight these cartels,' Ogden began, 'and Attorney General Holder and I are taking several new and aggressive steps as part of the administration's comprehensive plan.' Ogden said the administration's plan, at the president's direction, included the ATF's 'increasing its efforts by adding 37 new employees in three new offices, using $10 million in Recovery Act funds and redeploying 100 personnel to the Southwest border in the next 45 days to fortify its Project Gunrunner,' of which Operation Fast and Furious would be a part. ... Fast and Furious should spark our pursuit of the truth, even if the trail leads to the Oval Office." --Investor's Business Daily
Will the administration succeed in its Fast & Furious goals?
Upright
"The entire [Fast & Furious] operation ended with only 20 indictments of straw purchasers -- indictments that could have happened immediately upon transfer of the weapons, stopping the flow. In fact, the straw purchasers, at issue, were known to be straw purchasers from the get-go. The indictments only took place at all because U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered using the weapons authorized for free flow by ATF and DOJ. ... So what was the real goal of the DOJ and ATF? It certainly wasn't to shut down access to arms for the cartels -- the ATF was agreeing to such access. It wasn't to stop straw purchasers -- the ATF was signing off on the straw purchasers. It wasn't to track the movements of the cartel -- there was no way to do that. It was, very simply, to establish for political reasons that American guns were being used in crimes by foreign cartels." --columnist Ben Shapiro
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Media Silence Is Deafening About Important Gun News
By John Lott
Murder and violent crime rates were supposed to soar after the Supreme Court struck down gun control laws in Chicago and Washington, D.C. Politicians predicted disaster. "More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence," Washington’s Mayor Adrian Fenty warned the day the court made its decision. Chicago’s Mayor Daley predicted that we would "go back to the Old West, you have a gun and I have a gun and we'll settle it in the streets . . . ." The New York Times even editorialized this month about the Supreme Court's "unwise" decision that there is a right for people "to keep guns in the home."
But Armageddon never happened. Newly released data for Chicago shows that, as in Washington, murder and gun crime rates didn't rise after the bans were eliminated -- they plummeted. They have fallen much more than the national crime rate.
Not surprisingly, the national media have been completely silent about this news.
One can only imagine the coverage if crime rates had risen. In the first six months of this year, there were 14% fewer murders in Chicago compared to the first six months of last year – back when owning handguns was illegal. It was the largest drop in Chicago’s murder rate since the handgun ban went into effect in 1982.
Meanwhile, the other four most populous cities saw a total drop at the same time of only 6 percent. Similarly, in the year after the 2008 "Heller" decision, the murder rate fell two-and-a-half times faster in Washington than in the rest of the country. It also fell more than three as fast as in other cities that are close to Washington's size. And murders in Washington have continued to fall. If you compare the first six months of this year to the first six months of 2008, the same time immediately preceding the Supreme Court's late June "Heller" decision, murders have now fallen by thirty-four percent.
Gun crimes also fell more than non-gun crimes.
Robberies with guns fell by 25%, while robberies without guns have fallen by eight percent. Assaults with guns fell by 37%, while assaults without guns fell by 12%.
Just as with right-to-carry laws, when law-abiding citizens have guns some criminals stop carrying theirs.
The benefit could have been even greater. Getting a handgun permit in Chicago and Washington is an expensive and difficult process, meaning only the relatively wealthy go through it.
Through the end of May only 2,144 people had handguns registered in Chicago. That limits the benefits from the Supreme Court decisions since it is the poor who are the most likely victims of crime and who benefit the most from being able to protect themselves.
The biggest change for Washington was the Supreme Court striking down the law making it illegal to have a loaded gun. Over 70,000 people have permits for long guns that they can now legally used to protect themselves.
Lower crime rates in Chicago and Washington, by themselves, don’t prove that gun control increases murders, even when combined with the quite familiar story of how their murder rates soared and stayed high after the gun bans were imposed.
But these aren’t isolated examples. Around the world, whenever guns are banned, murder rates rise.
Gun control advocates explained the huge increases in murder and violent crime rates Chicago and Washington by saying that those bans weren’t fair tests unless the entire country adopted a ban.
Yet, even island nations, such as Ireland and the U.K. -- with no neighbors to blame -- have seen increases in murder rates. The same horror stories about blood in the streets have surrounded the debate over concealed handguns. Some said it was necessary to ban guns in public places. The horror stories never came true and the data is now so obvious that as of November, only one state, Illinois, will still completely ban law-abiding from carrying concealed handguns.
Forty-one states will have either permissive right-to-carry laws or no longer even require a permit.
The regulations that still exist in Chicago and Washington primarily disarm the most likely victims of crime.
Hopefully, even the poor in these areas will soon also have more of an opportunity to defend themselves, too.
John R. Lott, Jr. is a Fox News.com contributor and the author of the revised third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago Press, 2010)."
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second post of the day:
Looks like the Obama administration is willing to go far in order to get rid of the evidence - which would make sense, considering the seriousness of the crime.
Quote:
Bombshell: DOJ Considering Elimination of ATF
By Katie Pavlich
9/30/2011
Multiple sources, including sources from ATF, DOJ and Congressional offices have said there is a white paper circulating within the Department of Justice, outlining the essential elimination of ATF. According to sources, the paper outlines the firing of at least 450 ATF agents in an effort to conduct damage control as Operation Fast and Furious gets uglier and as election day 2012 gets closer. ATF agents wouldn’t be reassigned to other positions, just simply let go. Current duties of ATF, including the enforcement of explosives and gun laws, would be transferred to other agencies, possibly the FBI and the DEA. According to a congressional source, there have been rumblings about the elimination of ATF for quite sometime, but the move would require major political capital to actually happen.
“It’s a serious white paper being circulated, how far they’d get with it I don’t know,” a confidential source said.
After a town hall meeting about Operation Fast and Furious in Tucson, Ariz. on Monday, ATF Whistleblower Vince Cefalu, who has been key in exposing details about Operation Fast and Furious, confirmed the elimination of ATF has been circulating as a serious idea for sometime now and that a white paper outlining the plan does exist.
Sounds great right? Eliminating ATF? But there is more to this story. Remember, low level ATF field agents, like ATF whistleblower John Dodson, were uncomfortable conducting Operation Fast and Furious from the beginning, but were told by high level officials within ATF that if they had a problem with the operation, they could find a job elsewhere.
“Allowing loads of weapons that we knew to be destined for criminals, this was the plan. It was so mandated,” ATF Whistleblower John Dodson said in testimony on Capitol Hill on June 15, 2011.
In fact, not only were the ATF agents forced to carry out the operation, they were told to go against what they had been taught in training.
“This operation, which in my opinion endangered the American public, was orchestrated in conjunction with Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley. [Emory Hurley is the same Assistant U.S. Attorney who previously prevented agents from using some of the common and accepted law enforcement techniques that are employed elsewhere in the United States to investigate and prosecute gun crimes.] I have read documents that indicate that his boss, U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, also agreed with the direction of the case,” Special Agent Peter Forcelli said in testimony on Capitol hill on June 15, 2011.
“I recall my first days at the ATF academy, where it was drilled into us as new agents that under no circumstances would any firearms, in any investigation, leave the control of ATF. Instructors stressed that even if a weapon was lost “by accident,” the agent was still subject to termination,” former ATF Attaché to Mexico Darren D. Gil said in testimony on June 15, 2011.
ATF field agents weren’t the problem with Operation Fast and Furious, high ranking officials within ATF and the Department of Justice were and still are. DOJ would eliminate ATF only to take the heat off of the Obama Administration. By eliminating the bureau, it makes it seem like DOJ is taking Operation Fast and Furious so seriously, they decided to “clear out the corruption, clean house,” however, it would only be a distraction away from the people at the top of the investigation. In fact, evidence shows the DOJ has been stonewalling the Oversight Committee investigation into the operation to protect Obama political appointees.
“It was very frustrating to all of us, and it appears thoroughly to us that the Department is really trying to figure out a way to push the information away from their political appointees at the Department,” former ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson, who has since been moved to a position within DOJ, said of his frustration with the Justice Department’s response to the investigation in transcribed closed door testimony with the Oversight Committee in July 2011.
When I called the Department of Justice last week (five times) to request the white paper and receive a comment surrounding the idea of eliminating ATF, I received the following response: “Everyone is away from their desk right now.”
Up to this point, the Department of Justice has denied all allegations or involvement in Operation Fast and Furious, yet journalists and the House Oversight Committee have proved allegation after allegation to be true. For example, during a Congressional hearing in July, former ATF Special Agent in Charge William Newell, who has since been promoted to a position within the Justice Department, denied that his agency was trafficking guns to Mexico, despite overwhelming evidence and testimony from other ATF agents proving otherwise.
“At no time in our strategy was it to allow guns to be taken to Mexico,” Newell said on July 26, 2011, adding that at no time did his agency allow guns to walk.
We’ve heard this was a low level, “rogue” operation, turns out high level officials in the Justice Department, DEA, FBI, DHS, and even members of the White House national security team knew about Operation Fast and Furious.
Last week, ATF offered 400 agents buy outs to avoid budget cuts and is expecting 250-275 agents to take the offer through Voluntary Early Retirement. These buyouts come at a convenient time for the Justice Department, which can eliminate ATF, then say it’s because of budget cuts, when really, it’s to cover their tracks.
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third post of day:
White House sends Hill Fast & Furious docs, but withholds some
The White House sent another installment of documents to Congress on Friday detailing White House staffers' knowledge about the controversial "Operation Fast & Furious" gunrunning probe run by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives.
However, the chief counsel to President Barack Obama, Kathryn Ruemmler, indicated that the White House was withholding an unspecified number of internal e-mails exchanged among three National Security Staff aides.
"These internal NSS emails are not included in the enclosed documents because the [Executive Office of the President] has significant confidentiality interests in its internal communications," Ruemmler wrote in a letter to House Oversight & Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). The letter, posted here, was obtained Friday by POLITICO.
The latest batch of 102 pages of records partially duplicated information previously sent to Congress and didn't appear to include any smoking guns showing that White House officials were aware that the operation involved allowing hundreds or thousands of guns to flow essentially unimpeded from the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels.
"As today's production makes clear, none of the communications between ATF and the White House revealed the investigative law enforcement tactics at issue in your inquiry, let alone any decision to let guns 'walk,'" Ruemmler wrote in response to a letter to Issa and Grassley sent to National Security Adviser Tom Donilon earlier this month.
(Sure... And we're supposed to believe that's also the case with that "unspecified number of internal e-mails" the White House chose to withhold from Congress - you know, due to "significant confidentiality interests", or something. Right.)
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New Fast and Furious docs released by White House
WASHINGTON - Late Friday, the White House turned over new documents in the Congressional investigation into the ATF "Fast and Furious" gunwalking scandal.
The documents show extensive communications between then-ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix office Bill Newell - who led Fast and Furious - and then-White House National Security Staffer Kevin O'Reilly. Emails indicate the two also spoke on the phone. Such detailed, direct communications between a local ATF manager in Phoenix and a White House national security staffer has raised interest among Congressional investigators looking into Fast and Furious. Newell has said he and O'Reilly are long time friends.
ATF agents say that in Fast and Furious, their agency allowed thousands of assault rifles and other weapons to be sold to suspected traffickers for Mexican drug cartels. At least two of the guns turned up at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry last December.
ATF Manager says he shared Fast and Furious with the White House
The email exchanges span a little over a month last summer. They discuss ATF's gun trafficking efforts along the border including the controversial Fast and Furious case, though not by name. The emails to and from O'Reilly indicate more than just a passing interest in the Phoenix office's gun trafficking cases. They do not mention specific tactics such as "letting guns walk."
A lawyer for the White House wrote Congressional investigators: "none of the communications between ATF and the White House revealed the investigative law enforcement tactics at issue in your inquiry, let alone any decision to allow guns to 'walk.'"
Among the documents produced: an email in which ATF's Newell sent the White House's O'Reilly an "arrow chart reflecting the ultimate destination of firearms we intercepted and/or where the guns ended up." The chart shows arrows leading from Arizona to destinations all over Mexico.
In response, O'Reilly wrote on Sept. 3, 2010 "The arrow chart is really interesting - and - no surprise - implies at least that different (Drug Trafficking Organizations) in Mexico have very different and geographically distinct networks in the US for acquiring guns. Did last year's TX effort develop a similar graphic?"
The White House counsel who produced the documents stated that some records were not included because of "significant confidentiality interests."
Also included are email photographs including images of a .50 caliber rifle that Newell tells O'Reilly "was purchased in Tucson, Arizona (part of another OCDTF case)." OCDTF is a joint task force that operates under the Department of Justice and includes the US Attorneys, ATF, DEA, FBI, ICE and IRS. Fast and Furious was an OCDTF case. An administration source would not describe the Tucson OCDTF case. However, CBS News has learned that ATF's Phoenix office led an operation out of Tucson called "Wide Receiver." Sources claim ATF allowed guns to "walk" in that operation, much like Fast and Furious.
Congressional investigators for Republicans Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) have asked to interview O'Reilly by September 30. But the Administration informed them that O'Reilly is on assignment for the State Department in Iraq and unavailable. (How convenient.)
One administration source says White House national security staffers were "briefed on the toplines of ongoing federal efforts, but nobody in White House knew about the investigative tactics being used in the operation, let alone any decision to let guns walk."
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Gunwalker: Holder Appears To Be Fast, Furious, and Finished
News documents indicate that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder more than likely perjured himself in congressional testimony about Operation Fast and Furious earlier this year.
October 3, 2011 - 7:57 pm - by Bob Owens
News documents indicate that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder more than likely perjured himself in congressional testimony about Operation Fast and Furious earlier this year.
Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News and William LaJeunesse of Fox News have been the only mainstream media reporters diligently working on the most important scandal in White House history, and it is no surprise that they concurrently released information indicating that the attorney general, who claimed in direct testimony on May 3 of this year in front of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that he first heard about Operation Fast and Furious “over the last few weeks,” had actually been briefed on the program in a memo by the director of the National Drug Intelligence Center almost a year earlier on July 5, 2010.
A copy of the heavily redacted weekly report posted by CBS News offers direct evidence that not only was the attorney general briefed on Operation Fast and Furious, but that he was briefed on it regularly and was well aware that the program was sending thousands of weapons into the hands of the Sinaloa cartel:
From July 12 through July 16, the National Drug Intelligence Center Document and Media Exploitation Team at the Phoenix Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCTDETF) Strike Force will support the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ Phoenix Field Division with its investigation of Manuel Celis-Acosta as part of OCDETF Operation Fast and Furious. This investigation, initiated in September 2009 in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Phoenix Police Department, involves a Phoenix-based firearms trafficking ring headed by Manual Celis-Acosta. Celis-Acosta and [redacted] straw purchasers are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug trafficking cartels. They also have direct ties to the Sinaloa Cartel which is suspected of providing $1 million for the purchase of firearms in the greater Phoenix area.
That excerpt stated what the task force would do in the near future, while the same language was used later in the report to show what the task force had done that week:
From July 6 through July 9, the National Drug Intelligence Center Document and Media Exploitation Team at the Phoenix Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCTDETF) Strike Force will support the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ Phoenix Field Division with its investigation of Manuel Celis-Acosta as part of OCDETF Operation Fast and Furious. This investigation, initiated in September 2009 in conjunction with the Drug Enforcement Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and the Phoenix Police Department, involves a Phoenix-based firearms trafficking ring headed by Manual Celis-Acosta. Celis-Acosta and [redacted] straw purchasers are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug trafficking cartels. They also have direct ties to the Sinaloa Cartel which is suspected of providing $1 million for the purchase of firearms in the greater Phoenix area.
Attorney General Holder’s eventual criminal defense attorney is certain to state that the attorney general is provided with dozens of reports each week, and that is within the realm of reasonable doubt that he simply overlooked or did not remember the specifics of this memo.
Prosecutors would likely cast doubt on such a claim, citing the fact that the report was named Operation Fast and Furious, that it referred to the number of guns walked by the program at that time (1,500), and that it even noted how much they thought the Sinaloa cartel had budgeted for weapons ($1 million). They will then note that this information was cited twice in each weekly report for both current and future operations.
The prosecutors will more than likely be able to state with a great degree of certainly that Holder was provided this information in x number of weekly reports spanning y number of months in a report that only cites the most important National Drug Intelligence Center cases.
It will be very interesting to see if the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has the ability or interest to imprison a sitting attorney general for contempt of Congress, which would in and of itself bring up a question of separation of powers, as it would require Congress having the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia attempting to arrest and imprison a member of the executive branch. This is more than likely a moot point, however, as Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa expressed in a conference call with new media representatives that he would call for the appointment of an independent special prosecutor, who would be given the power to pursue criminal charges that carry a much longer prison sentence than the maximum one year that Congress may impose for contempt.
Another communication acquired by Attkisson and LaJeunesse shows a series of emails between two Department of Justice officials, Jason Weinstein, deputy assistant attorney general of the Criminal Division, and Deputy Chief of the National Gang Unit James Trusty.
The two men discuss Operation Fast and Furious in conjunction with another gun-walking operation based in Tucson (OFF was in Phoenix) and a third, unnamed gun-walking operation.
Trusty wrote to Weinstein:
Looks like we’ll be able to unseal the tucson case sooner than Fast and Furious (although this may be the difference between Nov and Dec). It’s not clear how much we’re invlvoed in the main F and F case, but we have Tucson and now a new, related case with [redacted] targets. It’s not going to be any big surprise that a bunch of US guns are being used in MX, so I’m not sure how much grief we get for “gun walking.” It may be more like, “Finally, they’re going after people who sent guns down there.”
The Trusty email confirms that senior Department of Justice officials were aware of not just Operation Fast and Furious, but that Operation Fast and Furious was a gun-walking operation; Trusty used that exact phrase. The news of the Tucson operation is the second confirmation of that gun-walking operation (Operation Wide Receiver), which was first revealed in a Friday afternoon document dump by the White House.
There is scant reference to the third operation, and it is unclear if this is another Arizona-based case or one of the Texas-based gun-walking operations that was also mentioned in passing in the O’Reilly email released Friday as “last year’s TX effort.”
In the flurry of documents released in the past several days, top officials of the Department of Justice are confirmed talking about at least three and as many as four gun-walking operations, dramatically raising the probability that gun-walking was known throughout the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security, and State, as well as the White House.
These documents seem to convincingly argue that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder knowingly perjured himself in congressional testimony. As Holder knew, it is likely that Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, whose agents were also part of the task force, received similar weekly reports from either her direct reports or U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, a close personal confidant who was her chief of staff while she was Arizona’s governor and who was appointed U.S. attorney through Napolitano’s influence. State should have been informed as they would have to waive what are clear violations of the Arms Export Control Act, but there is not any evidence yet that Secretary of State Clinton was involved in the operations.
It is starting to appear that Eric Holder might soon find himself thrown under the proverbial bus. It now seems only a matter of time before we discover who was driving a bus that seems destined for the United States Penitentiary in Leavenworth, Kansas.
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A little trip down memory lane :evil:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/obamas-new-advisor-stained-by-clinton-pardon-scandal/?singlepage=true
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Third post of day
EXCLUSIVE: House Republicans are calling for a special counsel to determine whether Attorney General Eric Holder perjured himself during his testimony to the House Judiciary Committee on Operation Fast and Furious, Fox News has learned.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, was sending a letter to President Obama on Tuesday arguing that Holder cannot investigate himself, and requesting the president instruct the Department of Justice to appoint a special counsel.
The question is whether Holder committed perjury during a Judiciary Committee hearing on May 3. At the time, Holder indicated he was not familiar with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives program known as Fast and Furious until about April 2011.
"I'm not sure of the exact date, but I probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks," Holder testified.
However, a newly discovered memo dated July 2010 shows Michael Walther, director of the National Drug Intelligence Center, told Holder that straw buyers in the Fast and Furious operation "are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to the Mexican drug trafficking cartels."
Other documents also indicate that Holder began receiving weekly briefings on the program from the National Drug Intelligence Center "beginning, at the latest, on July 5, 2010," Smith wrote.
"These updates mentioned, not only the name of the operation, but also specific details about guns being trafficked to Mexico," Smith wrote in the letter to Obama.
"Allegations that senior Justice Department officials may have intentionally misled members of Congress are extremely troubling and must be addressed by an independent and objective special counsel. I urge you to appoint a special counsel who will investigate these allegations as soon as possible," Smith wrote.
In response to the release of the memos, a Justice Department official said that the attorney general "has consistently said he became aware of the questionable tactics in early 2011 when ATF agents first raised them publicly, and then promptly asked the (inspector general) to investigate the matter."
The official added that in March 2011, Holder testified to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee of that development, and regularly receives hundreds of pages, none of which contained information on potential problems with Fast and Furious.
"The weekly reports (100 + pages) are provided to the office of the AG and (deputy attorney general) each week from approximately 24 offices and components. These are routine reports that provide general overviews and status updates on issues, policies, cases and investigations from offices and components across the country. None of these reports referenced the controversial tactics of that allowed guns to cross the border," the official said.
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., "of all people, should be familiar with the difference between knowing about an investigation and being aware of questionable tactics employed in that investigation since documents provided to his committee show he was given a briefing that included the fast and furious operation in 2010 – a year before the controversy emerged," the official continued.
Issa told Fox News on Tuesday morning that Holder saying he didn't understand the question rather than he didn't know of the program is not a successful defense to perjury.
Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, added that months before Holder testified -- on Jan. 31 -- he came to Grassley's office, where Grassley gave him a letter detailing the investigation of Fast and Furious.
"If he read my letter, he knew on January 31," Grassley told Fox News. "He probably actually knew about it way back in the middle of last year or earlier.
Grassley said since he's not a lawyer he's not going to make a judgment on whether Holder committed perjury.
"But I can tell you this. They're doing everything they can, in a fast and furious way, to cover up all the evidence or stonewalling us. But here's the issue, if he didn't perjure himself and didn't know about it, the best way that they can help us, Congressman Issa and me, is to just issue all the documents that we ask for and those documents will prove one way or the other right or wrong."
FILE: Attorney General Eric Holder testifies on Capitol Hill May 3 before a House Judiciary Committee oversight hearing.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011...r-on-fast-and/
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"Somewhere, Scooter Libby must be scratching his head. He was indicted and convicted simply because his recall of when a meeting occurred differed from others. He didn't lie about a gun-running operation that led to the deaths of two American agents and at least 200 Mexicans. But Attorney General Eric Holder did, according to memos obtained by CBS News and Fox News. They show Holder lied to Congress on May 2, 2011, when he was asked about when he knew about the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' Fast and Furious gun-running operation. He told House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa he was 'not sure of the exact date, but I probably learned about Fast and Furious over the last few weeks.' Holder learned of the operation as early as July 2010 in a memo from the director of the National Drug Intelligence Center informing him of an operation run by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force out of the Phoenix ATF office, under which 'straw purchasers are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug cartels.' ... Holder, quite simply, has lied to Congress, although the defense now being offered is he didn't understand Issa's question, doesn't read all the memos sent to him or was otherwise out of the loop. It is perhaps the first time incompetence has been offered as a defense to possible charges of criminality. ... As Issa told radio talk show host Laura Ingraham last month: 'We have a paper trail of so many people knowing that the only way the attorney general didn't know is he made sure he didn't want to know. ... But if you don't want to know something of this sort, then you shouldn't have the job he has.' We'd go a step further. Baseball star Roger Clemens was equally vehement when he told a House committee in 2008: 'Let me be clear. I have never taken steroids or HGH.' Clemens was indicted for lying to Congress. The same should go for Eric Holder." --Investor's Business Daily
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'Furious' mess has Justice in full panic
By MICHAEL A. WALSH
Last Updated: 4:52 AM, October 6, 2011
Posted: 10:22 PM, October 5, 2011
So now the Fast and Furious affair has reached Stage 2 of the classic Washington scandal: House Republicans have called for a special counsel to investigate Attorney General Eric Holder himself for possible perjury.
Justice Department documents indicate that Holder knew of the operation way back in July 2010 -- far earlier than the “in the last few weeks” that he told congressional investigators under oath last May.
Memos from Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer and others to Holder clearly show the scope, if not the nature, of the disastrous project: “This investigation, initiated in September 2009 . . . involves . . . straw purchasers [who] are responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug cartels.”
That’s the crux of the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ infamous “gunwalking” program, allegedly designed to track illegal gun sales to Mexican drug gangs by turning a blind eye toward, and possibly facilitating, arms sales in Arizona and elsewhere. The death toll so far is more than 200.
The heavily redacted memos don’t explicitly implicate ATF and other federal agencies in an illegal scheme, as ATF whistleblowers have alleged. But if there’s a coverup going on, why would they?
And coverup there seems to be. On top of stonewalling Rep. Darrell Issa’s House investigation of the mess, Justice has floated a series of contradictory excuses:
* There was no such program.
* Even if there weres, Holder never knew about it.
* Even if he should have known about it, he might not have read Breuer’s memos.
* Even if he read Breuer’s memos, he misunderstood the simple question: “When did you first know about the program, officially, I believe, called Fast and Furious?”
With the recent exposure of another apparent “gunwalking” operation, Wide Receiver, that may date back to the Bush administration, some are already pushing a “Bush-did-it-too” meme. If true, it shows the rot at Justice goes deeper than we thought -- but it has nothing to do with whether Holder may have committed perjury.
If Holder is so innocent, why, sources inside Justice say, are folks there engaging in a panicked orgy of finger-pointing and blame-shifting?
A trial balloon has reportedly been floated within Justice to essentially eliminate the ATF by firing 450 agents and transferring the embattled agency’s duties to the Drug Enforcement Administration and the FBI.
While the bulk of the national press corps is off inspecting Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s back forty for residual signs of racism, CBS’ Sharyl Attkisson and Fox’s William La Jeunesse have been doing the heavy lifting on Fast and Furious -- and getting some tough pushback from Obama officials.
On the Laura Ingraham radio show yesterday, Attkisson told of being “yelled at” by Justice flack Tracy Schmaler and being “screamed” at by White House official Eric Schultz for being “unfair.”
Said Attkisson: “They will tell you that I’m the only reporter -- as they told me -- that is not reasonable. They say The Washington Post is reasonable, the LA Times is reasonable, The New York Times is reasonable, I’m the only one who thinks this is a story, and they think I’m unfair and biased by pursuing it.”
CBS has reportedly yanked Attkisson from further media appearances this week. But isn’t independent inquiry the function of a free press? Nobody thought there was a story in Watergate, either, until Woodward and Bernstein proved otherwise.
There’s still plenty of time for Justice and the other implicated agencies to come clean. But to date, all we’ve heard is dog-ate-my-briefing-book excuses and desperate attempts to change the subject.
It’s possible that Fast and Furious was a rogue, poorly conceived sub-operation of the legitimate Project Gunrunner, begun in 2005 to track and interdict illegal weapons traffic. But Holder’s track record in previous congressional testimony leaves ample cause for skepticism.
As former federal prosecutor Andrew McCarthy pointed out yesterday at National Review Online, Holder’s current amnesia recalls his misleading testimony to Congress about another scandal, President Bill Clinton’s pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich. Even though Holder helped arrange the pardon, he told the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2001 that Rich’s name was “unfamiliar” to him.
With the 2012 elections looming, the chances of Holder’s appointing a special prosecutor to investigate himself are slim and none. The Obama administration will bury the scandal -- unless the media and public demand otherwise.
Michael Walsh’s new thriller, “Shock Warning,” is out this week on Amazon Kindle.
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/furious_mess_has_justice_in_full_WYXAPQoFlBaBVer5Q47oi
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We now know he lied about what he knew when saying he just learned about in the last few weeks a year after he was briefed. His no.2 and no.3 were intimately involved and he wouldn't know what they were doing on the job? Why wouldn't he be fired just for being out of the loop in his own department, if that story were true?
I can't believe the coverup is aimed at Holder instead of Obama. Is it realistic that a cross border operation did not have the authorization from the highest levels of BOTH the American and Mexican?
What could possibly go wrong sending artillery into a neighboring civil war zone.
This is story is breaking out like a slowly dripping faucet. A CBS reporter silenced in the face of screaming from administration officials and with pressure from the reporter's higher-ups.
Wouldn't they want to get this behind them sooner rather than later- with an election coming up next year? They should have put what mistakes they made behind them last May instead of next November.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-20115038-10391695.html
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1011/65208_Page2.html
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/cbs-news-reporter-says-white-house-screamed-swore-her-over-fast-and-furious_595011.html
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**Note: Arizona has a total of 15 counties
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2011/10/arizona-sheriffs-demand-investigation-of-eric-holder-say-fast-and-furious-scandal-worse-than-watergate-video/
Arizona Sheriffs Demand Investigation of Eric Holder – Say ‘Fast and Furious’ Scandal Worse Than Watergate (Video)
Posted by Jim Hoft on Saturday, October 8, 2011, 7:33 AM
Ten Arizona sheriffs held a press conference yesterday in Phoenix demanding a special counsel investigation on Attorney General Eric Holder.
The sheriffs called the operation a betrayal of state law enforcement and worse than Watergate.
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In spite of how well covered this scandal was on the board I have been very slow to figure out who really was trying to do what. Still working on my theory and its disjointed components:
The Attorney General Eric Holder felt justified in lying about the year he was briefed. He knew that he wasn't betraying his higher-ups when he chose to obstruct public and congressional oversight. That means they already knew. Cross border arms supplying into a neighboring country's civil was isn't something that starts at Attorney General or below. If it was and it was unauthorized, he would be fired.
Obama STILL hasn't been briefed? Still knows nothing? Do you buy it? I don't buy it. We just can't find a reporter to ask him. Or has someone heard a coherent explanation of policy objectives, risk assessments and controls?
Pres. Obama has no reaction whatsoever to learning that his Attorney General was lying under oath for him. No firing, no promise to get to the bottom of it. No call for a special prosecutor or an independent investigator. Nothing. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111007,0,6300714.story
Am I the last guy on earth to figure out that Obama knew about this all along? It says to me that this operation was the brainchild his own closest political advisersl.
The same ones that wrote his jobs plan.
Felipe Calderon's knowledge and role in it? I don't know.
There is one reason I don't believe in conspiracies: There aren't two people who can keep a secret.
This was hardly a secret.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111009,0,6431788.story?track=rss
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There is also the matter of Baraq's mysterious comment at an anti-gun event to someone that "I can't tell you about it, but we are working on something under the radar."
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There is also the matter of Baraq's mysterious comment at an anti-gun event to someone that "I can't tell you about it, but we are working on something under the radar."
1. Create crisis.
2. "Never let a crisis go to waste".
3. Change!
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2011/10/07/
et seq.
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Woof,
I'm enjoying watching the rats scurry :lol: :lol:, and it will be even funnier if they get caught in a big ole fat rat trap. :lol: :lol: :lol: However, what they did, isn't the least bit funny and I'm still skeptical of there being any real justice dealt out to those involved. It's a shame too, because many of these people took the oath of office to uphold the Constitution of the United States and instead, used their office as a weapon to undermine the rights of U.S. citizens for idealogical reasons, endangered the lives of both American and Mexican law enforcement and private citizens and were the agents of some of their deaths. If found guilty of such crimes they should pay for it with long prison terms but most likely they'll just walk away from it. Corruption on both sides of the border is going to be our undoing.
P.C.
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WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa today sent a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder responding to his letter of October 7. The text of Chairman Issa's letter to Attorney General Holder is below:
Dear Attorney General Holder:
From the beginning of the congressional investigation into Operation Fast and Furious, the Department of Justice has offered a roving set of ever-changing explanations to justify its involvement in this reckless and deadly program. These defenses have been aimed at undermining the investigation. From the start, the Department insisted that no wrongdoing had occurred and asked Senator Grassley and me to defer our oversight responsibilities over its concerns about our purported interference with its ongoing criminal investigations. Additionally, the Department steadfastly insisted that gunwalking did not occur.
Once documentary and testimonial evidence strongly contradicted these claims, the Department attempted to limit the fallout from Fast and Furious to the Phoenix Field Division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF). When that effort also proved unsuccessful, the Department next argued that Fast and Furious resided only within ATF itself, before eventually also assigning blame to the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona. All of these efforts were designed to circle the wagons around DOJ and its political appointees.
To that end, just last month, you claimed that Fast and Furious did not reach the upper levels of the Justice Department. Documents discovered through the course of the investigation, however, have proved each and every one of these claims advanced by the Department to be untrue. It appears your latest defense has reached a new low. Incredibly, in your letter from Friday you now claim that you were unaware of Fast and Furious because your staff failed to inform you of information contained in memos that were specifically addressed to you. At best, this indicates negligence and incompetence in your duties as Attorney General. At worst, it places your credibility into serious doubt.
Following the Committee's issuance of a subpoena over six months ago, I strongly believed that the Department would fully cooperate with Congress and support this investigation with all the means at its disposal. The American people deserve no less. Unfortunately, the Department's cooperation to date has been minimal. Hundreds of pages of documents that have been produced to my Committee are duplicative, and hundreds more contain substantial redactions, rendering them virtually worthless. The Department has actively engaged in retaliation against multiple whistleblowers, and has, on numerous occasions, attempted to disseminate false and misleading information to the press in an attempt to discredit this investigation.
Your letter dated October 7 is deeply disappointing. Instead of pledging all necessary resources to assist the congressional investigation in discovering the truth behind the fundamentally flawed Operation Fast and Furious, your letter instead did little but obfuscate, shift blame, berate, and attempt to change the topic away from the Department's responsibility in the creation, implementation, and authorization of this reckless program. You claim that, after months of silence, you "must now address these issues" over Fast and Furious because of the harmful discourse of the past few days. Yet, the only major development of these past few days has been the release of multiple documents showing that you and your senior staff had been briefed, on numerous occasions, about Fast and Furious.
The Mexican Cartels
A month after you became Attorney General, you spoke of the danger of the Mexican drug cartels, and the Sinaloa cartel in particular. The cartels, you said, "are lucrative, they are violent, and they are operated with stunning planning and precision." You promised that under your leadership "these cartels will be destroyed." You vowed that the Department of Justice would "continue to work with [its] counterparts in Mexico, through information sharing, training and mutual cooperation to jointly fight these cartels, both in Mexico and the United States."
Under your leadership, however, Operation Fast and Furious has proven these promises hollow. According to one agent, Operation Fast and Furious "armed the cartel. It is disgusting." Fast and Furious simply served as a convenient means for dangerous cartels to acquire upwards of 2,000 assault-style weapons. On top of that, the Government of Mexico was not informed about Fast and Furious. In fact, DOJ and ATF officials actively engaged in hiding information about Fast and Furious from not only Mexican officials, but also U.S. law enforcement officials operating in Mexico for fear that they would inform their Mexican counterparts. This strategy is inapposite and contradicts the promises you made to the American people.
Your September 7, 2011 Statement
On September 7, 2011, you said that "[t]he notion that [Fast and Furious] reaches into the upper levels of the Justice Department is something that at this point I don't think is supported by the facts and I think once we examine it and once the facts are revealed we'll see that's not the case." Unfortunately, the facts directly contradict this statement.
Lanny Breuer, the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division, clearly a member of the Department's senior leadership, knew about Fast and Furious as early as March 2010. In fact, I have learned that the amount of detail shared with Breuer's top deputies about Fast and Furious is simply astounding.
For example, Manuel Celis-Acosta was the "biggest fish" of the straw purchasing ring in Phoenix. From the time the investigation started in September 2009 until March 15, 2010, Manuel Celis-Acosta acquired at least 852 firearms valued at around $500,000 through straw purchasers. Yet in 2009, Celis-Acosta reported an Arizona taxable income of only $15,475. Between September 2009 and late January 2010, 139 of these firearms were recovered, 81 in Mexico alone. Some of these firearms were recovered less than 24 hours after they were bought.
This information, and hundreds of pages worth of additional information, was included in highly detailed wiretap applications sent for authorization to Breuer's top deputies. It is my understanding, the Department applied to the United States District Court for the District of Arizona for numerous wire taps from March 2010 to July 2010. These wire tap applications were reviewed and approved by several Deputy Assistant Attorney Generals, including Kenneth A. Blanco, John C. Keeney, and Jason M. Weinstein. Breuer's top deputies approved these wiretap applications to be used against individuals associated with the known drug cartels. As I understand it, the wire tap applications contain rich detail of the reckless operational tactics being employed by your agents in Phoenix. Although Breuer and his top deputies were informed of the operational details and tactics of Fast and Furious, they did nothing to stop the program. In fact, on a trip to Mexico Breuer trumpeted Fast and Furious as a promising investigation.
Gary Grindler, the then-Deputy Attorney General and currently your Chief of Staff, received an extremely detailed briefing on Operation Fast and Furious on March 12, 2010. In this briefing, Grindler learned such minutiae as the number of times that Uriel Patino, a straw purchaser on food stamps who ultimately acquired 720 firearms, went in to a cooperating gun store and the amount of guns that he had bought. When former Acting ATF Director Ken Melson, a career federal prosecutor, learned similar information, he became sick to his stomach:
I had pulled out all Patino's -- and ROIs is, I'm sorry, report of investigation -- and you know, my stomach being in knots reading the number of times he went in and the amount of guns that he bought. Transcribed interview of Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson at 42.
At the time of his briefing in March of last year, Grindler knew that Patino had purchased 313 weapons and paid for all of them in cash. Unlike Melson, Grindler clearly saw nothing wrong with this. If Grindler had had the sense to shut this investigation down right then, he could have prevented the purchase of an additional 407 weapons by Patino alone. Instead, Grindler did nothing to stop the program.
Following this briefing, it is clear that Grindler did one of two things. Either, he alerted you to the name and operational details of Fast and Furious, in which case your May 3, 2011 testimony in front of Congress was false; or, he failed to inform you of the name and the operational details of Fast and Furious, in which case Grindler engaged in gross dereliction of his duties as Acting Deputy Attorney General. It is fair to infer from the fact that Grindler remains as your Chief of Staff that he did not engage in gross dereliction of his duties and told you about the program as far back as March of 2010.
In the summer of 2010, at the latest, you were undoubtedly informed about Fast and Furious. On at least five occasions you were told of the connection between Fast and Furious and a specific Mexican cartel – the very cartel that you had vowed to destroy. You were informed that Manuel Celis-Acosta and his straw purchasers were responsible for the purchase of 1,500 firearms that were then supplied to Mexican drug trafficking cartels. Yet, you did nothing to stop this program.
You failed to own up to your responsibility to safeguard the American public by hiding behind "[a]ttorneys in [your] office and the Office of the Deputy Attorney General," who you now claim did not bring this information to your attention. Holder Letter, supra note 1. As a result of your failure to act on these memos sent to you, nearly 500 additional firearms were purchased under Fast and Furious.
The facts simply do not support any claim that Fast and Furious did not reach the highest levels of the Justice Department. Actually, Fast and Furious did reach the ultimate authority in the Department – you.
Your May 3, 2011 Statement
On May 3, 2011, I asked you directly when you first knew about the operation known as Fast and Furious. You responded directly, and to the point, that you weren't "sure of the exact date, but [you] probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks." This statement, made before Congress, has proven to be patently untrue. Documents released by the Department just last week showed that you received at least seven memos about Fast and Furious starting as early as July 2010.
In your letter Friday, you blamed your staff for failing to inform you about Operation Fast and Furious when they reviewed the memos sent to you last summer. Your staff, therefore, was certainly aware of Fast and Furious over a year ago. Lanny Breuer was aware of Fast and Furious as early as March 2010, and Gary Grindler was also aware of Fast and Furious as early as March 2010. Given this frequency of high level involvement with Fast and Furious as much as a year prior to your May 3, 2011 testimony, it simply is not believable that you were not briefed on Fast and Furious until a few weeks before your testimony. At the very least, you should have known about Fast and Furious well before then. The current paper trail, which will only grow more robust as additional documents are discovered, creates the strong perception that your statement in front of Congress was less than truthful.
The February 4, 2011 Letter
Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of this intransigence is that the Department of Justice has been lying to Congress ever since the inquiry into Fast and Furious began. On February 4, 2011, Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich wrote that "ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transport into Mexico." This letter, vetted by both the senior ranks of ATF as well as the Office of the Deputy Attorney General, is a flat-out lie.
As we understand it, in March 2010, top deputies to Lanny Breuer were informed that law enforcement officers intercepted calls that demonstrated that Manuel Celis-Acosta was conspiring to purchase and transport firearms for the purpose of trafficking the firearms from the United States into Mexico. Not only was ATF aware of this information, but so was the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. This information was shared with the Criminal Division. All of these organizations are components of the Department of Justice, and they were all aware of the illegal purchase of firearms and their eventual transportation into Mexico.
These firearms were not interdicted. They were not stopped. Your agents allowed these firearms purchases to continue, sometimes even monitoring them in person, and within days some of these weapons were being recovered in Mexico. Despite widespread knowledge within its senior ranks that this practice was occurring, when asked on numerous occasions about the veracity of this letter, the Department has shockingly continued to stand by its false statement of February 4, 2011.
Mr. Attorney General, you have made numerous statements about Fast and Furious that have eventually been proven to be untrue. Your lack of trustworthiness while speaking about Fast and Furious has called into question your overall credibility as Attorney General. The time for deflecting blame and obstructing our investigation is over. The time has come for you to come clean to the American public about what you knew about Fast and Furious, when you knew it, and who is going to be held accountable for failing to shut down a program that has already had deadly consequences, and will likely cause more casualties for years to come.
Operation Fast and Furious was the Department's most significant gun trafficking case. It related to two of your major initiatives – destroying the Mexican cartels and reducing gun violence on both sides of the border. On your watch, it went spectacularly wrong. Whether you realize yet or not, you own Fast and Furious. It is your responsibility.
Sincerely,
Darrell Issa
Chairman
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1)
and knew that Holder didn't know of it?!?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=nBIWSyoe6vA
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2)
CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, who has reported on this story from the beginning, said on "The Early Show" that the investigation into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)'s so-called "Fast and Furious" operation branches out to a case involving grenades. Sources tell her a suspect was left to traffic and manufacture them for Mexican drug cartels
Police say Jean Baptiste Kingery, a U.S. citizen, was a veritable grenade machine. He's accused of smuggling parts for as many as 2,000 grenades into Mexico for killer drug cartels -- sometimes under the direct watch of U.S. law enforcement.
Law enforcement sources say Kingery could have been prosecuted in the U.S. twice for violating export control laws, but that, each time, prosecutors in Arizona refused to make a case.
Grenades are weapons-of-choice for the cartels. An attack on Aug. 25 in a Monterrey, Mexico casino killed 53 people.
Sources tell CBS News that, in January 2010, ATF had Kingery under surveillance after he bought about 50 grenade bodies and headed to Mexico. But they say prosecutors wouldn't agree to make a case. So, as ATF agents looked on, Kingery and the grenade parts crossed the border -- and simply disappeared.
Six months later, Kingery allegedly got caught leaving the U.S. for Mexico with 114 disassembled grenades in a tire. One ATF agent told investigators he literally begged prosecutors to keep Kingery in custody this time, fearing he was supplying narco-terrorists, but was again ordered to let Kingery go.
The prosecutors -- already the target of controversy for overseeing "Fast and Furious," wouldn't comment on the grenades case. U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke recently resigned and his assistant, Emory Hurley, has been transferred. Sources say Hurley is the one who let Kingery go, saying grenade parts are "novelty items" and the case "lacked jury appeal."
Attkisson added on "The Early Show" that, in August, Mexican authorities raided Kingery's stash house and factory, finding materials for 1,000 grenades. He was charged with trafficking and allegedly admitted not only to making grenades, but also to teaching cartels how to make them, as well as helping cartel members convert semi-automatic rifles to fully-automatic. As one source put it: There's no telling how much damage Kingery did in the year-and-a-half since he was first let go. The Justice Department inspector general is now investigating this, along with "Fast and Furious."
© 2011 CBS Interactive Inc.. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/...20120395.shtml
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Second post of evening.
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ATF agent Newell (working from memory here on the name), the same guy who let OFF run, was reported on Bret Baier Report today to have shut down a 200 gun version of OFF under Bush after the guns were allowed to walk into Mexico where Mex authorities who were in on it were supposed to catch the bad guys in the act. The Mex authorities did not do so and so the program was shut down by the same man who OK'd it under Holder-Baraq. Furthermore, substantial correspondence shows that he was well aware of the legal, political, and moral issues.
Watch for the Dems to try to muddy the waters with this one; note the key difference is that there was supposed to be teamwork with the Mexican authorities and when it did not manifest the program was immediately shut down.
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Third post:
In Holder Subpoena, Issa Also Probes White House Press Aide
By Jonathan Strong
Roll Call Staff
Oct. 14, 2011, 5 a.m.
House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) made headlines this week by issuing a subpoena for documents from Attorney General Eric Holder about a botched weapons investigation, but Holder is apparently not Issa’s only target.
A little-noticed provision of the subpoena targets the White House, specifically naming Eric Schultz, a communications aide who was hired in May to respond to media inquiries on oversight matters.
Issa issued the subpoena as part of his investigation into a program called Fast and Furious, which whistle-blowers have described as allowing assault weapons and military-grade sniper rifles to transfer into criminal networks.
The subpoena demands “all communications” to or from Holder and 15 other top Justice Department officials on Fast and Furious, as well as every weekly update memo to Holder on any topic over a nearly two-year period. Issa contends that Holder may have learned about the program much earlier than he has acknowledged, and the California Republican been conducting a blitz of media interviews making that point.
The subpoena also requires Holder to produce “all communications between and among Department of Justice (DOJ) employees and Executive Office of the President employees, including but not limited to Associate Communications Director Eric Schultz, referring or relating to Operation Fast and Furious or any other firearms trafficking cases.”
“We know there were communications that did go to the White House on Fast and Furious. We’ve been told that they were personal communications that just happened to occur. We wanted an official assurance on that,” Issa told Roll Call on Wednesday, jokingly referring to Schultz as “my friend.”
But a GOP source familiar with the committee’s investigation said there was more to the request.
“The question is whether the White House has been instructing the Justice Department on what [documents] to release,” the source said.
The source added that recent allegations by a CBS reporter that Schultz yelled at her over her coverage of Fast and Furious in part prompted Issa’s questions on the matter, but the source maintained that the inquiry is unrelated to Schultz’s communications with reporters.
“This investigation is focused on discussions and communications among officials and not their interactions with outside parties, including reporters,” the source said.
This source noted that “there’s nothing necessarily inappropriate about the White House playing some role” but added that the documents produced by the subpoena will provide a fuller picture of what interaction is taking place.
A lawyer close to the Obama administration said it would not be unusual for the Justice Department to keep the White House informed of how it is responding to Issa’s document demands or to give the White House a heads-up before documents involving White House personnel are sent to Congressional investigators.
But Democrats familiar with the investigation scoffed at the idea that a member of the White House communications staff is telling the Justice Department how to respond to Issa’s document demands.
Other portions of the subpoena also appear to reach beyond Holder’s involvement in the program.
For instance, the subpoena demands that the Justice Department provide all photographs of the crime scene of the slaying of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent Jaime Zapata and “surveillance tapes recorded by pole cameras inside the Lone Wolf Trading Co. store between 12:00 a.m. on October 3, 2010 and 12:00 a.m. on October 7, 2010.” Both the store and Zapata’s slaying have been linked to the Fast and Furious operation.
Oversight and Government Reform ranking member Elijah Cummings assailed Issa’s document demands. “This subpoena is a deep-sea fishing expedition and a gross abuse of the committee’s authority,” the Maryland Democrat said. “It demands tens of thousands of pages of highly sensitive law enforcement and national security materials that have never been requested before and are completely unrelated to Operation Fast and Furious. Rather than legitimate fact-gathering, this looks more like a political stunt.”
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One was a failed law enforcement operation. The other was a possible criminal conspiracy. (Related: Ed Driscoll asks, How would the story play in the MSM if Bush were still in power?)
There seem to be two avenues of document extraction in the ongoing Gunwalker scandal, in addition to witness testimony. One is the subpoena process being used by House and Senate committees investigating the plot. The other is selective leaking to favored media sources, which appears to be a preferred tactic of the White House. The former is official process, the latter an attempt to short-circuit the process.
Both approaches have been used in a pair of articles released via the Associated Press (via National Public Radio) and ABC News about an early Operation Gunrunner interdiction effort known as Operation Wide Receiver.
The Associated Press article presents an interesting variation of reality:
A second Bush administration gun-trafficking investigation has surfaced using the same controversial tactic for which congressional Republicans have been criticizing the Obama administration.
The tactic, called “gun walking,” is already under investigation by the Justice Department’s inspector general and by congressional Republicans, who have criticized the administration of Democratic President Barack Obama for letting it happen in an operation called “Fast and Furious.” …
The 2007 probe operated out of the same ATF office that more recently ran the flawed Operation Fast and Furious. Both probes resulted in weapons disappearing across the border into Mexico, according to the emails. The 2007 probe was relatively small — involving over 200 weapons, just a dozen of which ended up in Mexico as a result of gun-walking. Fast and Furious involved over 2,000 weapons, some 1,400 of which have not been recovered and an unknown number of which wound up in Mexico.
The Associated Press article goes on to paint the picture of a serially incompetent ATF office that began acting in a dangerous manner in 2007 and which continued until ATF whistleblowers came forward after Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was gunned down in December of 2010, in a variation of the “Bush did it” meme that has long been a reflexive defense mechanism of the Obama White House.
But the ABC News article paints a very different picture, using newly obtained emails between ATF supervisors running Operation Wide Receiver:
“ATF agents observed this vehicle [carrying guns] commit to the border and reach the Mexican side until it could no longer be seen,” Carroll wrote in a Sept. 28, 2007 email. “We, the ATF … did not get a response from the Mexican side until 20 minutes later, who then informed us that they did not see the vehicle cross. For the first time we are working hand in hand with the GOM [Government of Mexico] and providing them with what they want and this is what we get!”
The following day, ATF Acting Director for Field Operation William Hoover was demanding information on the strategy.
“Have we discussed the strategy with the U.S. Attorney’s Office re letting the guns walk? Do we have this approval in writing? Have we discussed and thought thru the consequences of same?” Hoover wrote to Newell and Carroll. “Are we tracking south of the border? Same re U.S. Attorney’s Office. Did we find out why they missed the hand-off of the vehicle? What are the expected outcomes?
“I do not want any firearms to go south until further notice,” Hoover wrote on Oct 5. “I expect a full briefing paper on my desk Tuesday morning from SAC Newell with every question answered.”
On Oct. 6, 2007, Newell wrote in an email, “I’m so frustrated with this whole mess I’m shutting the case down and any further attempts to do something similar. We’re done trying to pursue new and innovative initiatives – it’s not worth the hassle.”
The AP claim that the Bush-era Wide Receiver and Obama-era Fast and Furious were “using the same controversial tactic” is deceptive, verging upon being a fabrication. The differences between the botched Bush-era interdiction effort that was Wide Receiver and the blatant gun-running of Obama’s Fast and Furious are something that we’ve discussed previously, but the ABC News article provides even more details that highlight just how different the operations were.
Wide Receiver was a botched, small-scale, law enforcement gun-smuggling interdiction effort that involved local Phoenix-based ATF agents working in conjunction with Mexican law enforcement. When guns were lost — roughly 200 — irate supervisors immediately shut down the program.
Wide Receiver could hardly be any more different than Fast and Furious.
Fast and Furious used elements of at least four cabinet-level departments: Justice, State, Homeland Security, and Treasury. U.S. attorneys, the directors of the FBI and DEA, the Attorney General’s Advisory Committee, and senior DOJ officials were briefed. High-level State Department approval was critical, in order to avoid breaking arms export control laws. Even the White House National Security Counsil (NSC) had direct communications about the operation.
Unlike Wide Receiver, Operation Fast and Furious excluded Mexican government officials. Instead of working in conjunction with Mexican law enforcement in order to prevent gun smuggling, the operation was designed to ensure that more than 2,000 guns would be successfully smuggled into Mexico by the drug cartels to be used in violent crimes.
The same supervisors that were appalled at the failures of Wide Receiver seemed to be giddy at the “success” of Fast and Furious when the weapons they sent over the border were found at murder scenes, or taken from the bodies and stash houses of narco-terrorists.
Operation Wide Receiver was a failed law enforcement operation that was shut down immediately when it went wrong. Operation Fast and Furious was a possible criminal conspiracy to ensure that one of the most powerful and violent criminal cartels in the world was armed not with inexpensive fully-automatic military weapons that can be had on the black market very cheaply, but with sporting semi-automatics that were American-imported or manufactured firearms costing 100%-400% more. The obvious, and only logical, explanation for such a plot was to ensure that as many American weapons as possible were showing up at Mexican crime scenes.
Perhaps one day the mainstream media will finally ask who ordered Operation Fast and Furious, who approved the plot, and why.
Until then, Congress is right to push for oversight and the presidential appointment of a special counsel to investigate the criminal conspiracy and the coverup.
Bob Owens
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/new-doc...inglepage=true
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RELIABILITY OF THIS SITE/AUTHOR IS UNKNOWN:
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http://www.examiner.com/conservative-in-national/breaking-new-evidence-show-hillary-a-mastermind-behind-gunwalker
Last week it was reported that the State Department and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton were deeply involved in the scandal known as Operation Fast and Furious, or Project Gunwalker. Today, however, new evidence has surfaced indicating that not only was Hillary deeply involved in the scandal but was one of the masterminds behind it.
According to investigative citizen journalist Mike Vanderboegh, sources close to the development of the Gunwalker scheme state that early on, Hillary and her trusted associated at State, Andrew J. Shapiro, devised at least part of the framework of what would later become Operation Fast and Furious. It was Shapiro who first described the details of the proposed scheme early in 2009 just after the Obama Administration took office.
Vanderboegh relates the following:
My sources say that as Hillary's trusted subordinate, it was Shapiro who first described to the Secretary of State the details of what has become the Gunwalker Scandal.
The precise extent to which Hillary Clinton's knowledge of, and responsibility for, the Gunwalker Plot, lies within the memories of these two men, Shapiro and Steinberg, sources say.
The sources also express dismay that the Issa committee is apparently restricting itself to the Department of Justice and not venturing further afield. The House Foreign Affairs Committee, they say, needs to summon these two men and their subordinates -- especially at the Mexico Desk at State -- and question them under oath as to what Hillary Clinton knew about the origins of the Gunwalker Scandal and when she knew it.
There is one other thing those sources agree upon. The CIA, they say, knows "everything" about the "Mexican hat dance" that became the Gunwalker Scandal.
The 'Steinberg' mentioned in the quote above is Hillary Clinton's former Deputy Secretary of State, who was appointed directly by Barack Obama and was considered from the start to be an 'Obama man' whose objective was to carry out the wishes of the President in the State Department.
Hillary had said of Steinberg,
Clinton said Steinberg had been a “fixture” at meetings with the National Security Council (NSC) and frequently represented the US State Department at the White House.
That statement is key. Hillary herself stayed out of all meetings dealing with strategy concerning the euphemism the Administration used to designate Gunwalker, 'strategy meetings on Mexico and the problem of drug and gun trafficking.' Hillary's absence would give the impression that she had no connection to the scheme while making sure that her views were represented by Steinberg and Shapiro, both of whom were fully complicit with the details that developed concerning how to pad statistics on U.S. guns in Mexico.
According to sources, Hillary was obsessed with gun statistics that would prove that '90% of the firearms used by Mexican criminals come from the United States.' As previouly reported, that meme, repeated incessantly by Democratic Senators, Barack Obama, certan members of the ATF, Janet Napolitano, and Hillary Clinton was patently and blatantly false. The fact that they all knew it was false is borne out by the lengths to which each of the above named co-conspirators went to attempt to 'prove' that the 90% figure was true.
Again, Vanderboegh relates the following:
My sources say that this battle of the "statistics" was taken very seriously by all players -- the White House, State and Justice. Yet, WHY was this game of statistics so important to the players? If some weapons from the American civilian market were making it to Mexico into the hand of drug gang killers that was bad enough. What was the importance of insisting that it was 90 percent, 80 percent, or finally 70 percent? Would such statistics make any difference to the law enforcement tactics necessary to curtail them? No.
This statistics mania is similar to the focus on "body counts" in Vietnam. Yet if Vietnam body counts were supposed to be a measure of how we were winning that war, the focus on the 90 percent meme was certainly not designed to be a measure of how we were winning the war against arming the cartels, but rather by what overwhelming standard we were LOSING. Why?
Recall what the whistleblower ATF agents told us right after this scandal broke in the wake of the death of Brian Terry: "ATF source confirms ‘walking’ guns to Mexico to ‘pad’ statistics."
Thus, from the beginning the scheme was to pad statistics on U.S. guns in Mexico in order to be in a strengthened position to call for gun bans and strict gun control at a time when it was politically unpopular. Further, the scheme would involve a made-up statistic, out of thin air--90%--which then had to be proved by using civilian gun retailers along the southern border as unsuspecting pawns to walk U.S. guns into Mexico by ATF agents, straw purchasers, and others with connections to Mexican drug cartels.
And the evidence points to the fact that Hillary Clinton was one of the original Administration officials who was 'in the loop' on the scheme from the very beginning.
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ATF Whistleblower Backs Up Latest Allegations Against William Newell
Fast and Furious whistleblower Vince Cefalu supports allegations that ATF Special Agent in Charge Newell just framed one of his own for arson.
October 21, 2011 - 1:08 pm - by Patrick Richardson
According to a story by Townhall.com’s Katie Pavlich, credible death threats against one of the ATF agents who blew the whistle on the Operation Fast and Furious debacle were ignored by the ATF.
Further, ATF attempted to frame him for arson:
Jay Dobyns is a father, husband and 25-year highly respected and highly decorated Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms Special Agent.
…
Dobyns has put a number of the nations’ most violent criminals behind bars, which naturally comes with threats from those criminals and their buddies in return. After he finished his work bringing down the Hells Angels, things were no different.
Approximately a year after Operation Black Biscuit concluded beginning in 2004 through 2008, Dobyns and ATF became aware of credible and substantial violent threats against him and his family. Those threats included plans to murder him either with a bullet or by injecting him with the AIDS virus, kidnapping and torturing his then 15-year-old daughter and kidnapping his wife in order to videotape a gang rape of her. Dobyns and ATF also learned contracts were solicited between the Hells Angels, the Aryan Brotherhood and the MS-13 gang to carry out these threats.
…
Dobyns reported these threats to Special Agent in Charge William Newell, asking for protection for his family. The threats were based in Arizona and Dobyns lived in Arizona at the time. Newell was in charge of investigating and handling all threats made against agents working out of the ATF Phoenix Field Office. The threats were ignored. When Dobyns essentially “blew the whistle” on Newell, pointing out his failures to address violent death threats against a federal agent, he was retaliated against. Newell dismissed the threats and then covered up his blatant dismissal of those threats within the Phoenix Field Office.
This is the same William Newell who was in charge of Fast and Furious — the operation which allowed thousands of military-style weapons into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels — and who apparently lied to Congress about his involvement.
According to Pavlich, Newell was sanctioned for his failures by the Office of the Inspector General:
Additionally, in response to the ATF/FBI interview, despite all the evidence the death threats were credible, Special Agent in Charge of the Los Angeles Field Division John Torres, who like Newell has also been promoted into ATF headquarters, informed Dobyns through an email, “The Chief of Operations Security does not deem the emergency action is required as of this date and time.”
Later, a DOJ Inspector General report concluded that management within the ATF Phoenix office, despite having the necessary resources, did not adequately address threats made against Dobyns and found “absence of any corrective measures proposed to address the failure to conduct timely and thorough investigations into the death threats made against Dobyns.”
In addition, a U.S. Office of Special Counsel report concluded, “I note with concern the absence of any corrective measures proposed to address the failure to conduct timely and thorough investigations into the death threats made against Special Agent Dobyns. ATF does not appear to have held anyone accountable in this regard. Fully addressing the problems and failures identified in this care requires more than amending ATF policies and procedures. It requires that threats against ATF agents be taken seriously and pursued aggressively and that ATF officials at all level cooperate to ensure the timely and comprehensive investigation of threats leveled against its own agents.”
Well, Dobyns’ house was then set on fire.
And ATF has named him as a suspect:
On top of ignoring death threats, recently Dobyns’ house was set on fire at 3 a.m. with his wife, son and daughter sleeping inside in a confirmed act of arson. It is suspected members of the Hells Angels, or close associates of the gang carried out the arson in retaliation of Dobyns’ undercover work.
When Dobyns reported the incident to both ATF and Newell, he asked for an investigation into the case. Newell not only refused to investigate, calling the incident “just scorching,” but allowed his subordinates, including Gillett, to attempt to frame Dobyns, accusing him of purposely burning down his own home with his family inside, has named him as a suspect and is investigating him. Newell conspired to destroy and fabricate evidence to “prove” his case. Emails, witness testimony, phone conversations and other documentation show the ATF Phoenix Field Divisions’ intentions, led by Newell, were to frame Dobyns, yet Newell denied under oath any involvement in this activity. His subordinates Gillett and ATF Tucson Group Supervisor over Operation Wide Receiver Charles Higman, also denied any attempts to frame Dobyns under oath, despite evidence showing otherwise.
According to ATF Special Agent Vince Cefalu — who has been the target of retaliation by ATF bosses himself — this is part of a pattern of behavior by ATF upper management:
These are just deplorable actions. It’s just nauseating; the family’s been through enough.
Cefalu said the response was lackluster at best:
I was there three days after the fire, there wasn’t an ATF agent within a hundred … miles.
Cefalu was understandably incensed by the attempt to paint a decorated agent as an arsonist. Cefalu noted that had it been an FBI agent or DEA agent whose home had been burned, federal agents would have descended in droves.
Instead, he noted, the investigation was botched from the beginning. Cefalu said a neighbor saw a glow that might have been a cell phone in the backyard of Dobyns’ house, and agents tried back-channel to get the U.S. Marshals Service to ping the cellphone towers to try to find out who might have had an active phone in the area at the time of the fire — to no avail.
In addition, protocol would have made the investigation a federal matter, since it involved a federal agent who received death threats pertaining to some of his cases. That’s not what initially happened:
We [ATF] are the arson police, that’s what we do.
But instead of ATF leading the investigation, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department took the lead. Additionally, any information that Dobyns was a suspect should have been turned over to the FBI within 24 hours, as should any evidence ATF collected based on the death threats Dobyns had received. Instead, according to Cefalu, ATF waited 30 days:
Our policy is information has to be turned over to FBI within 24 hours. … ATF sat on it for a month. Nobody did nothing.
At this point, who burned down Dobyns’ house will probably never be known, according to Cefalu:
“All the physical evidence has been tainted,” he said, adding FBI never reduced interviews to writing, so there’s nothing even to go back to check against should fresh evidence or suspects be uncovered. “FBI did a lackluster job.”
According to Pavlich, this is par for the course where retaliation in the ATF is concerned:
Throughout the years it has become clear that ATF is more interested in protecting and promoting the corrupt practices of the men who have made careers profiting off of corruption, obstruction of justice and lies, like Newell, rather than rewarding field agents taking out dangerous criminals like ATF Special Agent Jay Dobyns, ATF Operation Fast and Furious Whistleblowers John Dodson, Pete Forcelli, Vince Cefalu and others for their bravery and sacrifice to fight violent crime and for exposing corruption within the agency. The bottom line is, ATF as an agency doesn’t care about recommendations or evidence of misconduct, in fact, the agency rewards screw ups on a regular basis. The Dobyns case could be counted as the most reckless case of retaliation in ATF history, yet nobody has been held accountable for it.
It’s impossible for field agents to do their jobs if they cannot trust that management has their backs. At ATF it’s clear that not only is that not the case, but that the “bosses,” as Cefalu calls them, will not only hang agents out to dry, but are apparently willing to let them be killed in retaliation for blowing the whistle on their corrupt practices.
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Cornyn urging wider probe of 'Fast and Furious'
‘Spillover effects’ in Texas cited
Sen. John Cornyn, Texas Republican and a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked Sen. Chuck Grassley and Rep. Darrell E. Issa on Monday to expand their formal "Fast and Furious" investigation to include accusations that similar gunrunning probes took place in Texas.
Mr. Cornyn said he asked U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in August to address the "scope and details of any past or present ATF gun-walking programs" in his home state, but never got a response.
"Though their failure to respond is not direct evidence of malfeasance, the department's reluctance to address allegations of additional 'gun-walking' schemes in my state raises serious questions, and Texans deserve a full accounting of the department's role in this matter," he wrote.
Mr. Cornyn, a former Texas attorney general, said Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) "gun-walking" schemes have had significant "spillover effects" in Texas. In two separate incidents in January and April 2010, 60 rifles that were "walked" during the Fast and Furious operation were recovered from criminals in El Paso, Texas.
He said the attorney for a federal firearms licensee (FFL) in Houston has charged that his employees were ordered by ATF to conduct suspicious sales of firearms to purchasers who may have been working on behalf of Mexican drug cartels.
Last December, he said, the Justice Department convened a grand jury to investigate whether several salespersons at the Houston gun dealers were criminally liable for selling weapons to straw purchasers. The investigation, he said, was dropped only after the licensed firearms dealers revealed that the illicit sales were carried out at the behest of the ATF.
"I fear that ATF may have pressured other FFLs in Texas to conduct illegal activities, and that many of these weapons may have ended up in the hands of cartels and at the scene of multiple violent crimes in Mexico," Mr. Cornyn said.
He also asked that the investigation include a look into whether a Texas-based "gun-walking" program was responsible for the slaying of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent Jaime Zapata on Feb. 15, 2011, in Mexico. One of the weapons used to kill Zapata was purchased by Texas resident Otilio Osorio in October 2010 and, according to Mr. Cornyn, later trafficked to Mexico through Laredo, Texas.
Zapata was fatally shot, and his partner, Victor Avila, was wounded twice in the leg in the ambush on a major highway near the city of San Luis Potosi, about 250 miles north of Mexico City. The men, assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, were returning to their office after a meeting with other U.S. personnel in San Luis Potosi.
Neither man was armed, as Mexico does not allow U.S. law enforcement personnel to carry weapons in the country.
Mr. Osorio, 22, and his brother, Ranferi, 27, were arrested at their home on charges of possessing firearms with an obliterated serial number. Kelvin Leon Morrison, 25, also was arrested and charged in a separate complaint with making false statements in connection with the acquisition of firearms and dealing in firearms without a license. He lives next door to the Osorios.
According to court documents, a confidential ATF informant arranged a meeting in early November with people who had firearms to be transported from Dallas to Laredo. The meeting was arranged as part of an investigation of Los Zetas, a violent and ruthless Mexican drug-trafficking gang.
Mr. Cornyn said evidence uncovered by Mr. Grassley, Iowa Republican, suggests that the ATF was aware of Mr. Osorio's weapons-trafficking activities "long before that date."
"The delay in his arrest raises concerns that the ATF knowingly allowed Osorio to continue trafficking weapons through Texas as part of a broader 'gun-walking' program," he said, adding in his letter that he supported efforts by the two lawmakers "to hold the Department of Justice accountable for their involvement in the Operation Fast and Furious tragedy."
"American tax dollars should never again be spent to arm Mexican drug cartels," he said.
In the Arizona-based Fast and Furious operation, 20 "straw buyers" purchased more than 2,000 weapons between September 2009 and December 2010, many of which were walked into Mexico and turned over the Mexican drug smugglers. The weapons included AK-47 assault weapons, Barrett .50-caliber sniper rifles, FN 5.7mm semi automatic pistols and other assorted rifles, shotguns and handguns — many of which remain unaccounted for.
The straw buyers paid as much as $900,000 for the weapons, with much of the illicit cash being furnished by the drug cartels.
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BREAKING: PJ Media Finds Gunwalker’s ‘Unreachable’ Man in the White House
The Obama admin. told Rep. Darrell Issa that Kevin O’Reilly — Gunwalker’s possible connection to Obama — was “in Iraq and unavailable.” He’s there, but available. After we called him, his phone number was deactivated.
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform led by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) is investigating to what extent the White House was aware of — or involved in — the “Fast and Furious” gunwalking scandal.
The committee recently requested to speak with former White House National Security Staffer Kevin O’Reilly. According to CBS News reporter Sharyl Attkisson, the Obama administration answered:
O’Reilly is on assignment for the State Department in Iraq and unavailable.
Through a tip, PJ Media learned that Kevin O’Reilly was unexpectedly named director of the International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Bureau for Iraq (INL-Iraq). Long-time INL-Iraq employee Virginia Ramadan had been expected to get the position — many were quite surprised when she did not.
The previous occupants of the Director, INL-Iraq position — Joe Manso and Francisco Palmieri — were not considered “unreachable” to press or government access. A quick internet search reveals Palmieri, while director, attended a media event on August 23, 2010.
On October 21, PJ Media reporter Patrick Richardson called the number for Office of the Director, INL-Iraq:
1-240-553-0581, ext. 3275
Richardson reached a voicemail message confirming that it was indeed the correct number. He left a message that was not returned.
On Monday Richardson called again, and an assistant answered. Richardson asked to speak with Kevin O’Reilly, and the assistant asked who was calling. Richardson gave his name and stated he was with PJ Media.
The assistant said O’Reilly was currently on a conference call, and asked if Richardson wanted to leave a message. Richardson gave his phone number. His call was not returned.
This morning, Richardson called again. He received a prerecorded message saying “this number is not in service.”
PJ Media is aware that the number was in service as the line to the director’s office for several years prior to Richardson’s calls.
Today, PJ Media is forwarding this information over to Darrell Issa, along with some suggested questions to ask of the Obama administration:
– Why were we told Kevin O’Reilly was “unavailable” if he was employed in a position that has always been open to media, and indeed was easily reached by PJ Media?
– Why did Kevin O’Reilly suddenly get sent to Iraq for the Director, INL-Iraq position when another employee was widely considered the most-qualified person for the job?
– Now that we know he is in the Director, INL-Iraq position and not in a position ever considered “unreachable,” when will you be sending him to Washington to testify?
The committee’s interest in Kevin O’Reilly stems from documents the White House released last month on September 30 – a late afternoon “Friday document dump.” From Sharyl Attkisson’s reporting on the documents:
The documents show extensive communications between then-ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix office Bill Newell — who led Fast and Furious — and then-White House National Security Staffer Kevin O’Reilly. Emails indicate the two also spoke on the phone. Such detailed, direct communications between a local ATF manager in Phoenix and a White House national security staffer has raised interest among Congressional investigators looking into Fast and Furious. Newell has said he and O’Reilly are long time friends.
The email exchanges span a little over a month last summer. They discuss ATF’s gun trafficking efforts along the border including the controversial Fast and Furious case, though not by name. The emails to and from O’Reilly indicate more than just a passing interest in the Phoenix office’s gun trafficking cases. They do not mention specific tactics such as “letting guns walk.”
A lawyer for the White House wrote Congressional investigators: “none of the communications between ATF and the White House revealed the investigative law enforcement tactics at issue in your inquiry, let alone any decision to allow guns to ‘walk.’”
Among the documents produced: an email in which ATF’s Newell sent the White House’s O’Reilly an “arrow chart reflecting the ultimate destination of firearms we intercepted and/or where the guns ended up.” The chart shows arrows leading from Arizona to destinations all over Mexico.
In response, O’Reilly wrote on Sept. 3, 2010 “The arrow chart is really interesting — and — no surprise — implies at least that different (Drug Trafficking Organizations) in Mexico have very different and geographically distinct networks in the US for acquiring guns. Did last year’s TX effort develop a similar graphic?”
The White House counsel who produced the documents stated that some records were not included because of “significant confidentiality interests.”
Also included are email photographs including images of a .50 caliber rifle (left) that Newell tells O’Reilly “was purchased in Tucson, Arizona (part of another OCDTF case).” OCDTF is a joint task force that operates under the Department of Justice and includes the US Attorneys, ATF, DEA, FBI, ICE and IRS. Fast and Furious was an OCDTF case.
An administration source would not describe the Tucson OCDTF case. However, CBS News has learned that ATF’s Phoenix office led an operation out of Tucson called “Wide Receiver.” Sources claim ATF allowed guns to “walk” in that operation, much like Fast and Furious.
Congressional investigators for Republicans Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) have asked to interview O’Reilly by September 30. But the Administration informed them that O’Reilly is on assignment for the State Department in Iraq and unavailable.
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Woof,
I appreciate the sentiment but wrong is wrong and this guy is wrong.
www.news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/ad-gun-training-bars-muslims-obama-voters-153954962.html
P.C.
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Woof,
I appreciate the sentiment but wrong is wrong and this guy is wrong.
www.news.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/ad-gun-training-bars-muslims-obama-voters-153954962.html
P.C.
PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. -- Fifteen of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers had ties to Florida, and at one point, 12 of them lived in Palm Beach County.
They visited Palm Beach County pharmacies, took flying lessons at local airports, and even learned self defense in South Florida gyms.
Three of the hijackers lived in the Delray Raquet Club.
Pharmicist Greg Chatterton came face to face with the mastermind, Mohammed Atta, when he went to Huber's Pharmacy in Delray looking for something to treat his hands.
The terrorist who piloted the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania learned martial arts at a Dania Beach fitness club.
Said US 1 Fitness owner Bert Rodriguez, "He wasn't interested in boxing or kick boxing, he just wanted to learn street defense -- how to ward off attackers or control someone."Read more: http://www.wpbf.com/news/9823300/detail.html
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Woof,
Like I said, I appreciate the sentiment but by law and under his permit to teach the conceal carry class he can not discriminate any more than a employer or a State or Federal agency can. He didn't say he would refuse to train terrorist's, he said Muslim's and that's religious discrimination. If he was a private citizen teaching a self defense class in firearms or hand to hand then he would have the discretion of choosing who he taught. He is licensed by the State and the only way he can deny someone training is if he knew them to be terrorist's and not all Muslims are terrorist. As for Obama and his voters, they have the same rights to keep and bear arms as all other Americans and until they are successful in doing away with the Constitution and Bill of Rights, they too have the right under Texas State law to go through training and get a permit and once again he is licensed by the State and under State law he cannot refuse to teach them unless they are convicted felons. Maybe in the future they will be but they aren't yet, so innocent until proved guilty is what we operate under and thank God for it, because if that wasn't the case we would be Iran already and there would be nothing to defend or fight for. :wink: There is always the possibility that someone he trains could use their training to harm others but that is the chance we take in trusting our fellow citizens not to abuse their rights. The alternative is that we trust no one with a firearm and that is exactly what Obama and the Left has in mind. We need to be very careful of dangerous ideology, regardless of who's head it is in. He said a true Muslim can't be an American. Who is he to decide that? Who else would he put on that list for religious or political reasons; true Catholics, true Jews, or maybe Libertarians? Wrong is wrong.
P.C.
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Is that guy the only trainer in Texas? I'm guessing not.
Is there a good test for parsing out jihadists from other muslims?
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Woof,
He could be the only one or there could be a million and it still would not make a difference under the terms of his license to teach the class. If he personally objects to that then he should not be teaching as a public service and go private. It's the same test for all of us, you're a citizen of good standing until you actually break a law. Anyone, could become a killer for whatever reason, including terrorism. There is no way in a free society to be absolutely safe from any form of violence, that is why it's necessary for citizens to be armed in the first place. Not only can they protect themselves, collectively they protect the society at large; that's the militia mentioned in the second amendment as being necessary. On the other hand there is no way in a police state to be absolutely safe from any form of violence either; the difference there being the unarmed citizens don't even have the means to protect themselves let alone the society at large.
P.C.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the trainer in question a private business teaching a class for profit?
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Woof,
He does not work for the State, but in order to teach a certified course that delivers a State permit to carry concealed weapons you must be licenced by the State to teach that course. As part of that licence you are required by the State to follow the license agreement, which includes non discrimination for any reason. If anyone that's qualified under the law to have a conceal carry permit comes to your class you are required to teach them or your license can be revoked by the State. Which is what will happen in this case the first time he refuses to teach someone on the grounds he stated. Being Obama (other than the fact he lives out of State), voting for him, or being Muslim does not disqualify anyone from having the permit so he is obligated to teach them in his class.
P.C.
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Is there a difference in this case between what is legal and what is moral?
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As the conversation between the two of you continues, I note that this statement is not true:
"If he was a private citizen teaching a self defense class in firearms or hand to hand then he would have the discretion of choosing who (sic) he taught."
Perhaps it should be otherwise, but my understanding is that any an all businesses are required by law to not discriminate on the basis of blah blah under penalty of law.
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Woof,
There is an issue of separation of church and state and legal/moral differences. The State cannot discriminate against any religion or differentiate between religions favoring one over the other when it comes to providing their permit. Period. The guy wanting to teach the class has to have a State issued license to teach, so that participants in his class can received their State issued permit. This is a State program that he is voluntarily involving himself with. If he objects to the license agreement on any grounds, for any reasons, moral or otherwise, then he is free to leave the program. What he wants, is to have his cake and eat it too. He wants to teach under the program but only to people he deems qualified. That would be similar to letting individual DMV clerks decide who they give a drivers licence to; maybe just Muslims. The State can't allow that to happen in anything that they are involved in, including this conceal carry permit program. The guy has a choice, leave the program or abide by the State regulations.
P.C.
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As the conversation between the two of you continues, I note that this statement is not true:
"If he was a private citizen teaching a self defense class in firearms or hand to hand then he would have the discretion of choosing who (sic) he taught."
Perhaps it should be otherwise, but my understanding is that any an all businesses are required by law to not discriminate on the basis of blah blah under penalty of law.
Woof,
By, their discretion, I meant they are not controlled by the States discression as to what qualifies someone to be taught and individuals can refuse service to anyone, just not on those grounds of religion and so on, so they have the discretion to refuse on other grounds. NO SHIRT NO SHOES NO SERVICE.
P.C.
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A nationally known firearms trainer was offered a large sum of money to privately train "students" at a white supremacist enclave. He declined. Was that wrong?
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Woof,
I'm not sure what that has to do with the price of eggs here. A white supremacist group, ain't the State or a religion or even a race. They are a group and can be turned down for any reason, including moral reasons.
P.C.
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Did you not use the phrase "wrong is wrong" in addressing this topic? Some white supremacists have a deviant, racist version of christianity they follow (Think Obama's church), others follow pagan nordic beliefs, some are atheist. Is refusing to teach white supremacists racial/political/religious discrimination? Is it morally right or wrong, aside from the legal question?
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Woof,
I don't know what the reasons were for this guy to turn down their money, but as far as I know this wasn't a State program that he was involved in or licensed by so he was using his own discretion. The individual group members may be of some faith or another but that does not make the group a recognized religion and while it's not illegal to be a racist, it does not mean that everyone is obligated to do business with them. However, if they showed up at the other guy's class in Texas he would have to teach them and they would qualify for the permit so long as they were not felons or been in a mental institution.
P.C.
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"but that does not make the group a recognized religion"
What's the legal standard for a "recognized religion" vs. an "unrecognized religion"?
"However, if they showed up at the other guy's class in Texas he would have to teach them and they would qualify for the permit so long as they were not felons or been in a mental institution."
Legally, that may be the case, however is that morally correct? If someone showed up at a firearms class I was teaching wearing Neo-nazi gear or a New Black Panther Party uniform, I'd refund their money and eject them from the class. Is that right or wrong from a moral perspective?
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Woof,
Morally, there is a higher principle involved here and it's called equal protection under the law. If the guy feels he is betraying his individual moral beliefs, then he should leave the program. Others might look at it from a different perspective and without compromising their own morals, see these people as being immoral, but despite their presence at the class see others that are moral, and to keep the classes from becoming nothing but gun classes for the immoral, being taught by the immoral; instead see the greater good of staying and teaching.
P.C.
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PC:
Your reasoning is sound and protects us from sliding down a slippery slope to places to which we do not want to go. That said, please forgive the intrusion of this ridiculous hypothetical :-D
The Aztec religion worshipped the Sun God. As part of that religion they waged war, captured prisoners, and sacrificed them to the Sun God by cutting out their still beating hearts. Question presented: Could the CCW instructor deny them instruction on the basis of their religion?
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Woof,
If they were tried and convicted for a crime committed by them exercising their religious belief yes, but just because they belonged to such a religion doesn't mean they are automatically guilty of doing anything that would prevent them from receiving training under State law. I'll add that morally, even if they got up right from the class and killed a hundred people in front of the building to please the Sun God, the onus of both legal and moral responisbiliy is on them, not the teacher of the class or even the State. Hopefully one of their class mates, not of their religion, would blow their f'in heads off.
P.C.
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Goodness, I feel like I am back in law school! :lol:
"I'll add that morally, even if they got up right from the class and killed a hundred people in front of the building to please the Sun God, the onus , , , of moral responsibility is on them, not the teacher, , ,."
Of course it is on them, but morally and spiritually speaking, it is not clear to me that the teacher is off scott free though.
a) Neo Nazis who go on to kill blacks, and jews, and asians, and Mexicans and , , ,
b) KKKers who go on to kill blacks, and jews, and asians, and Mexicans, and , , ,
Indeed, aren't bartenders sometimes held responsible for serving the obviously inebriated when they then go drive and kill someone?
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Woof,
Over serving the obviously inebriated is illegal to begin with, it's just that it is unusual for them to be caught or prosecuted for it unless there is an accident. Teaching a State certified gun class is not illegal and yes any teacher would be slammed by the Press and the public would call for his head, and he himself would certainly feel remorse and feel personally responsible; but legally and morally he is not responsible for the acts of others just because he taught a class that they were within their rights to take and he was obligated to give. You assume that the teacher is going to know who is with what group or religion when in most cases they won't and it might be illegal discrimination to even ask. If they actually did something overtly that let the teacher know of their intentions, then that would be a different kettle of fish; such as stand up in the class and say, "Soon as I get my permit, I'm going to go over to my ex wife's workplace and pop a cap into her." Then he could call the cops, but just because the guy has an ex wife doesn't mean the teacher has grounds not to teach the class or is immoral for doing it, even if afterwards, he goes and kills her. And there again hopefully the ex will already have her permit and training and plug him at the door. :lol:
P.C.
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I don't think "Equal protection" is a moral absolute. Is "No shirt, no shoes, no service" a civil rights violation?
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Woof GM,
There are personal moral standards that individuals live by and they are derived from a variety of influences: Parents and family upbringing, religious teachings and experiences, societal norms and personal interactions and experiences. As a result we have individually different personal moral standards that we hold ourselves to. You may try to hold me to your standard or I might try to hold you to mine but neither of us have the right to do that. You speak of morals as if they are written in stone and that ones' moral's, whatever they may be, should apply to all. That is why equal justice under the law is a higher principle. Maybe some religion does believe in human sacrifice and they may believe that morally it's justified because their God demands it. Does the first amendment protect their religious right to commit that religious act by sacrificing you? I don't think so. Their right ends where your life and rights begin. On the otherside of that the same principle protects them from you forcing your morals on them. The laws that govern such things need to be applied justly and that's what equal protection provides.
P.C.
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"There are personal moral standards that individuals live by and they are derived from a variety of influences: Parents and family upbringing, religious teachings and experiences, societal norms and personal interactions and experiences. As a result we have individually different personal moral standards that we hold ourselves to."
Agreed.
This is why I questioned your assertion that:
"Wrong is wrong" related to this topic.
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Woof,
He is wrong. His personal set of morals does not trump the States' mandate of equal protection under the law. So he has no right to choose who he teaches under this State program. He must teach all that come, so long as they meet the legal requirements of the State. He can choose not to be a part of the program on personal moral grounds but he is wrong in believing he can impose his personal standards and discriminate against people and remain a part of the State program and in order for the State to award a conceal carry permit the class must be certified by the State and the teacher licensed by the State. As a part of that, the licensee agrees not to discriminate, and then adhere to the terms of State regulations. An impostion of his own standards is a blatant violation of that agreement and he is in breach of contract with the State. Wrong is wrong and we are back where we started so I'll leave it here. Interesting exchange, regards. :-)
P.C.
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PC has already expressed himself very well on this, but FWIW here is Glenn Beck with the instructor in question:
http://www.glennbeck.com/2011/10/31/glenn-interviews-controversial-gunshop-owner/
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PC has already expressed himself very well on this, but FWIW here is Glenn Beck with the instructor in question:
http://www.glennbeck.com/2011/10/31/glenn-interviews-controversial-gunshop-owner/
I'd like to point out again that islam is not a race, nor is it simply a religious belief.
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This past week, top government leaders continued to spin the deadly 2009 gunwalking Fast and Furious operation as some low-level rogue operation. In addition, there were inside-the-Beltway rumors, letters sent between key players, and demands for Holder's resignation.
The heroic online journalists at sites like Sipsey Street Irregulars, PajamasMedia, and Townhall have worked for months uncovering facts leading to the foul murders of federal agents and Mexican citizens. During the week leading up to Halloween, certain signs appeared suggesting that their diligent work is beginning to yield some interesting fruit.
Working backwards Memento-style, here are the highlights in what may turn out to be a watershed week in the high-stakes scandal known as Fast and Furious.
Friday, October 28 2:24PM
Katie Pavlich reports from Townhall.com that Attorney General Holder will testify before the House Judiciary Committee on December 8.
Holder better get his lies, the lies of President Obama and the lies of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano in order before promising to tell the truth, and nothing but the truth about this deadly program. His testimony is sure to be "consistent and truthful" with his efforts to cover-up Fast and Furious since the beginning of the House Oversight Committee investigation.
Will he take the fifth?
Friday October 28
Representative Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, penned a letter to Chairman Issa suggesting that Kenneth Melson, the former head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, appear before the members to "help the Committee and the American people better understand what mistakes were made in Operation Fast and Furious, how these tactics originated, who did and did not authorize them, and what steps are being taken to ensure that they are not used again."
The tone of Cummings' letter should have interested parties a bit perplexed. The congressman sounds a lot more subdued and respectful towards Congressman Issa. Two weeks ago, an angry Cummings disparaged the chairman's investigation into Fast and Furious as a "deep-sea fishing expedition" and "political stunt." What's up, Mr. Cummings?
Thursday, October 27
Big media shill Jonathan Alter pens a comically dead serious editorial for Bloomberg.com entitled "Obama Miracle Is White House Free of Scandal."
President Barack Obama goes into the 2012 with a weak economy that may doom his reelection. But he has one asset that hasn't received much attention: He's honest.
Although it's possible that the Solyndra LLC story will become a classic feeding frenzy, don't bet on it. Providing $535 million in loan guarantees to a solar-panel maker that goes bankrupt was dumb, but so far not criminal or even unethical on the part of the administration
Every time Representative Darrell Issa, the Republican from California who leads a House investigative committee, calls the Obama administration "corrupt" without offering any evidence, he hurts his cause. It's much harder to make a story register as a bona fide scandal when the political motivation is so obvious.
How terrified are these people? Alter mentions Solyndra, a scandal covered by the mainstream media, but only alludes to Fast and Furious via Congressman Issa. This kind of over-the-top damage control must mean that F and F is sending shudders through the halls of power.
Thursday, October 27
Blogger Anthony Martin at Examiner.com reveals that there's a rumor swirling around D.C. that former Deputy Attorney General David Ogden, who abruptly resigned in December 2009, has turned over a stack of documents to Congressman Darrel Issa's Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Issa's office won't confirm or deny according to Martin.
One thing is for sure: by his own admission, Ogden was in on the ground floor of whatever the higher-ups were planning in secret meetings back in 2009. On March 24, 2009, Ogden spoke at a Department of Justice briefing and announced, "The President has directed us to take action to fight these cartels and Attorney General Holder and I are taking several new aggressive steps as part of the Administration's comprehensive plan."
If Ogden handed over documents that truly "vindicate ATF whistleblowers" and "confirm the guilt of the perpetrators of the scheme within the DOJ," then Issa needs to play it close to the vest. If this turns out to be just cover-up "disinformation," could Ogden be the administration's designated fall guy?
Thursday October 27
Appearing before the House Foreign Affair Committee, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Representative Connie Mack (R-Fla) that the State Department had not issued a license or waiver to "allow for the transfer of thousands of weapons across the US.-Mexico border." Clinton stated that "there is no record of any request for coordination. We have no record of any kind of notice or heads up."
Asked when she first heard about Fast and Furious, Mrs. Clinton stated, "[F]rom the press." When interviewed by a reporter from CNN Español in March 2011, President Obama gave a similar response, saying he first heard about the gun-trafficking program "in the news."
Wednesday, October 26
If anyone thought the internet would make old-fashioned letter-writing obsolete, think again. Hard-copy correspondence is making its way to major players allegedly involved in Fast and Furious. Representative Joe Walsh (R-Ill) joined the fray and wrote a no-holds-barred letter to Attorney General Eric Holder telling him "to resign immediately and issue an apology to the American people he has failed to serve." But the best part centered on Walsh's reference to the current "anti-gun administration."
This not only raises serious questions about your ability to serve as the head of the Justice Department, but also begs the question of why an anti-gun Administration would knowingly force licensed firearms dealers to sell guns to violent criminals. I raise this because Operation Fast and Furious - if the facts of this case had not come to light - would have been used by this Administration as another false argument to attack law-abiding American gun owners.
Representative Joe Walsh became the fourth congressman to demand Holder's resignation.
Wednesday, October 26
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano got a grilling during a House Judiciary hearing from Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), Representative Trent Gowdy (R-SC), and Congressman Darrell Issa (R-CA) (see video).
The "testy" stone-faced secretary showed little empathy for the murdered agents despite her defensive remarks.
I think we all should be outraged at the death of Agent Terry and I think the first thing is to recognize who actually killed him and that our No. 1 priority was to make sure the shooters were found - some had gone back into Mexico - and that the FBI was in charge of that investigation.
Napolitano then called Operation Fast and Furious "troublesome" and denied any involvement, conveniently passing the buck to the Department of Justice. She spoke in the customary cover-up language, advising committee members not to "rush to judgment" and promising that "there will be lessons learned from this."
Tuesday, October 25
Congressman Darrell Issa (R-Ca), chairman of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Senator Chuck Grassley, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Attorney General Holder, head of the Department of Justice, demanding answers on the murder of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jaime Zapata on February 15, 2011. Zapata was shot to death while driving on a highway near the northern city of San Luis Potosi. A fellow agent was wounded in the deadly attack.
The letter "raises red flags about the nature of the ATF investigation" into Zapata's killing. The opening paragraphs cites a March 1, 2011 ATF press release denying knowledge of Otilio Osorio's purchase of the weapon on September 17, 2010 used to kill Zapata in February 2011.
According to ATF documents, however, the agency had reason to believe as early as September 17, 2010, that Otilio's brother, and co-habitant Ranfari Osorio, and their next-door neighbor Kelvin Morrison were straw purchasers. Yet the ATF apparently made no effort to contact Ranfari Osorio or Kelvin Morrison and inquire about how their weapons came to be trafficked to Mexico within 2 weeks of their purchase.
The ATF did not submit a Report of Investigation (ROI) on a November 9, 2010 transfer of firearms among the Osorio brothers, Morrison, and a Dallas ATF confidential informant until February 25, "the same day ATF received the report tracing the Zapata murder weapon back to the purchase by Otilio Osorio."
The letter implicates Operation Fast and Furious as a game of Russian roulette with other people's lives.
At the heart of the Operation Fast and Furious debacle stands the memory of the victims and their families' search for the truth. It's becoming clearer and clearer each day this investigation may end at the White House. AG Holder has already perjured himself in front of a congressional hearing, and what the mainstream media once termed a "botched sting operation" is turning into a mass murder tragedy threatening to upend our rule of law.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/...d_furious.html
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A proposed revision to Freedom of Information Act rules would allow federal agencies to lie to citizens and reporters seeking certain records, telling them the records don’t exist.
The Justice Department has proposed the change as part of a large revision of FOIA rules for federal agencies. Specifically, the rule would direct government agencies who are denying a request under an established FOIA exemption to “respond to the request as if the excluded records did not exist,” rather than citing the relevant exemption.
The proposed rule has alarmed government transparency advocates across the political spectrum, who’ve called it “Orwellian” and say it will “twist” public access to government.
Justice Dept. proposes lying, hiding existence of records under new FOIA rule
http://dailycaller.com/2011/10/24/justice-dept-proposes-lying-hiding-existence-of-records-under-new-foia-rule/#ixzz1cPrGQbez
__________________
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Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer Blames Second Amendment For ATF/DOJ Gun Walking Mistakes
Katie Pavlich
During a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing today on Capitol Hill, Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, who is facing pressure surrounding his role in the Obama Justice Department’s Operation Fast and Furious, asked for more gun control and blamed law abiding gun shop owners for violence in Mexico.
Breuer declared that nearly 70 percent of guns found in Mexico come from the United States, a figure that has been disproven by the National Rifle Association, FactCheck.org, PolitiFact and by Senator Charles Grassley’s office multiple times. Also during testimony, Democratic Senator Diane Feinstein pushed for more gun control and Breuer expressed his agreement with her statements that American gun laws are too “lax” and therefore result it more violent crime.
Feinstein asked Breuer if he thought a reporting measure for long gun rifles would be helpful to ATF. Breuer answered yes. Remember, the Department of Justice has already circumvented Congress by requiring the sale of multiple long gun rifles in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas be reported to the ATF. These new regulations were implemented in early July 2011:
Quote:
The international expansion and increased violence of transnational criminal networks pose a significant threat to the United States. Federal, state and foreign law enforcement agencies have determined that certain types of semi-automatic rifles – greater than .22 caliber and with the ability to accept a detachable magazine – are highly sought after by dangerous drug trafficking organizations and frequently recovered at violent crime scenes near the Southwest Border. This new reporting measure -- tailored to focus only on multiple sales of these types of rifles to the same person within a five-day period -- will improve the ability of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to detect and disrupt the illegal weapons trafficking networks responsible for diverting firearms from lawful commerce to criminals and criminal organizations. These targeted information requests will occur in Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas to help confront the problem of illegal gun trafficking into Mexico and along the Southwest Border.
“The problem is, anybody can walk in [to a gun shop] and buy anything,” Feinstein said.
This comment by Feinstein was particularly disappointing considering during Operation Fast and Furious law abiding gun shop owners expressed deep discomfort with selling massive amounts of high powered weapons to known drug cartel straw purchasers, yet ATF officials told them to do so anyway, saying they would be “serving their country” by helping ATF in the operation.
Breuer said the number one tool he needs is to know when guns are purchased, essentially what can be interpreted as a national reporting measure. What Breuer and Feinstein are missing is this: The Obama Justice Department in partnership with ATF is the largest American supplier of weapons to Mexican drug cartels through Operation Fast and Furious; not law abiding gun shops. See Obama DOJ Gave Cartel Enough Guns to Arm a Marine Regiment.
Also, Breuer tried to claim that when Operation Fast and Furious came to light publically in Spring 2011 through media reports, ATF officials “made it clear” they don’t condone walking guns. Not true, in fact William Newell, ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix Field Division at the time Operation Fast and Furious was implemented (he has since been promoted to a cushy position in Washington D.C.) and carried out, wouldn’t rule out the idea of conducting another program like Fast and Furious in the future when asked during Congressional testimony in July 2011.
As I wrote in July after a House Oversight Hearing about Fast and Furious:
Former ATF Special Agent in Charge William Newell would not condemn Operation Fast and Furious and allowing guns to walk into Mexico during testimony and questioning. In fact, Newell went so far as to say he was unaware of guns walking into Mexico, despite internal emails showing he did know. Newell admitted the agency made mistakes but would not admit the program was a bad idea and exposed that he was in communication with a member of the White House national security team. His testimony also conflicted with previous testimony given by Special Agent John Dodson of the Phoenix Field Division who said on June 15, “Allowing loads of weapons that we knew to be destined for criminals, this was the plan. It was so mandated.”
“At no time in our strategy was it to allow guns to be taken to Mexico,” Newell said, adding that at no time did his agency allow guns to walk.
“You’re entitled to your opinion, not your own facts,” Issa responded.
Yesterday Breuer came out publically to admit he had made a “mistake” by not telling Attorney General Eric Holder about gun walking that occurred under the Bush Administration through Operation Wide Receiver, saying essentially he should have sounded a warning about gun walking when it started to occur during Fast and Furious, but he remained silent. It is important to point out that under Wide Receiver, there was an effort to track 300 weapons in collaboration with the Mexican Government. Under Operation Fast and Furious, there was no effort to track 2,000 guns that were purposely walked in to Mexico and the Mexican Government was left in the dark about the operation. Today during testimony, Breuer said he, “Didn’t draw the connection,” between the tactics used in the two separate programs, which is hard to believe.
Breuer’s testimony and statements about “not making connections” between two separate but similar gunwalking programs and his claim he never told Attorney General Holder about his concerns or Fast and Furious at all, raise new questions.
Why is Breuer coming out with these revelations now? The House Oversight Committee Investigation into Fast and Furious has been going on for months, yet Breuer all the sudden regrets not sounding the alarm about the dangers of gunwalking when Operation Fast and Furious started in the Fall of 2009? While claiming he never told Attorney General Eric Holder about the program? Although Breuer claims he personally never told Holder about the tactics being used in Fast and Furious, five detailed memos about the lethal program dated July and August 2010 were addressed directly to Holder. Despite Breuer’s testimony, the question of “who authorized Fast and Furious,” remains unanswered.
"The American people—and especially the family of murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry—deserve answers from the Justice Department about why they claim they didn’t know gunwalking was occurring in Operation Fast and Furious when the department’s fingerprints are all over it," Senator Grassley said during the hearing.
It looks like someone, Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, is falling on a sword, and that sword happens to be Eric Holder’s.
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Third post
Sen. Feinstein: Lax gun control is real ‘problem’ with Fast and Furious
By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller
Democratic California Sen. Dianne Feinstein told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing that lax gun control laws, not Obama administration malfeasance within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATF), was the real problem uncovered by Operation Fast and Furious.
“My concern, Mr. Chairman, is there’s been a lot said about Fast and Furious, and perhaps mistakes were made, but I think this hunt for blame doesn’t really speak about the problem,” Feinstein said during the Tuesday hearing. “And the problem is, anybody can walk in and buy anything, .50-caliber weapons, sniper weapons, buy them in large amounts, and send them down to Mexico. So, the question really becomes, what do we do about this?”
“I’ve been here 18 years,” Feinstein continued. (Many thanks to the people of California for that - LD) “I’ve watched the BATF get beaten up at every turn on the road. And, candidly, it’s just not right.”
After the hearing, Feinstein’s staff refused to answer when The Daily Caller asked how gun control laws would have prevented the abuses in Operation Fast and Furious when the law enforcement agents responsible for upholding gun laws were the individuals giving the weapons to drug cartels.
They also refused to say whether the Sen. Feinstein wanted to hold Obama administration officials accountable for shipping guns into Mexico, for Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder, or for the murders of countless Mexican citizens directly resulting from the failed gun-walking program.
When TheDC asked if Sen. Feinstein cared about the program’s connections to the murder of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jaime Zapata, Feinstein’s spokesman pointed to a comment she made during a March 9, 2011 hearing. Then, Feinstein did not mention any relationship between the murder and Operation Fast and Furious.
House oversight committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa recently indicated that Attorney General Eric Holder may be withholding more information about Zapata’s murder.
During Tuesday’s hearing, Sen. Feinstein advocated for Operation Fast and Furious as a springboard from which to advocate for gun control laws, including national databases and government-controlled firearms registration. She argued that such laws would prevent future programs like Fast and Furious from reaching maturity.
“So, the question comes, what can we do?,” Feinstein asked Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, a hearing witness. “And, I’d really rather concentrate on the constructive, rather than other things, so the questions comes: Do you believe that, if there were some form of registration when you purchase these firearms, that that would make a difference?”
Breuer, a high-ranking Obama administration official who is notable for his willingness to accept some responsibility for the scandal, said it would.
“Senator, we’re talking today about transnational organized crime,” Breuer said, ”and your leadership, and the chairman’s, and other senators’ shows that information — information — is the tool we need to challenge and defeat organized crime.”
“I know others disagree,” Feinstein added, “but we have very lax laws when it comes to guns and I think, to some extent, this influences BATF as to whether they have political support or not,” Feinstein said. “But, I think these numbers are shocking — and when you know the number of deaths these guns have caused, used by cartels against victims, it’s literally up in the tens of thousands.”
According to the Obama administration’s BATF, 70 percent of weapons recovered in Mexico come from the United States. Feinstein insisted those numbers are a “very deep concern for me.”
Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican, contested the weapons-trafficking statistics Feinstein and Breuer cited, arguing that they appear to make the U.S. appear to be a more rampant source of illicit firearms than is actually the case. Grassley has been challenging those statistics since June, when he wrote a letter to then-acting BATF director Ken Melson.
“I am concerned that the selective release of certain statistical data without further clarification and categorization may inaccurately reflect the scope and source of the problem of firearms in Mexico and the DTO [drug trafficking organization] violence,” Grassley wrote to Melson in June.
At least 29 members of Congress have now called on Attorney General Eric Holder to resign over Operation Fast and Furious. With a Tuesday tweet, North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones became the latest, writing: “It’s time for Eric Holder to go!”
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Is Sen. Feinstein admitting this operation had something to do with tightening up gun laws in this country? If so, unblievable. If not, what is she saying was the aim of the program? It happened under her watch as a senior senator of our largest state serving in the majority in the United States Senate with plenty of oversight clout from within congress and plenty of clout inside the administration. What does she think was the legitimate intention of the program? Either I haven't heard anyone other than firebrand right wing pundits explain it or I am too dense to understand that they have.
In Fast and Furious - the dead Mexicans and dead border agent scandal, they all seem to admit something went wrong. Sen. Feinstein: "perhaps mistakes were made" PERHAPS MISTAKES WERE MADE, ARE YOU F*KCING KIDDING?? But what was supposed to have gone right if perhaps mistakes were not made? If all had happened according to plan, what was the plan? Big guns and ammunition would travel illegally across sovereign lines without knowledge on either side, into a volatile, civil war torn country with a cross border war like situation, never be used, and then would return, be found unused and tracked back to their own agency arranged sales for enforcement?? I still don't get it!
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Betcha Harold Koh is behind this , , ,
http://www.examiner.com/law-enforcement-in-national/global-gun-control-law-pushed-by-clinton#ixzz1bjW4PQC4
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is pushing for the United States to become a party to a global gun control law proposed by the United Nations. And President Barack Obama appears to be sympathetic to such an international power-grab and he's already displayed a propensity for bypassing the legislative process.
In fact, many believe the recent "Operation Fast and Furious" scandal had more to do with gaining support for gun control and gun ownership bans than it had to do with crimefighting and drug cartels.
"The Obama Administration will take its first major step in a plan to ban all firearms in the United States. The Obama White House intends to force gun control and a complete ban on all weapons for US citizens through the signing of international treaties with foreign nations," according to journalist Joan Sharon.
The goal of the treaty is to come up with internationally recognized rules governing the trade of guns and ammo. The United States is the world's largest exporter of arms.
To sooth concerns, the administration has said that it would sign the accord only if all other states agreed to it first, but pro-gun groups view the international treaty as a first step toward home-grown gun control.
U.S. lawmakers and groups like the National Rifle Association argue that it would essentially gut the Second Amendment by allowing an international authority to control American gun ownership.
A final version of the treaty is expected to be finished next year.
By signing international treaties on gun control, the Obama administration can use the U.S. State Department to bypass the normal legislative process in Congress. Once the U.S. government signs these international treaties, all US citizens will be subject to those gun laws created by foreign governments.
These are laws that have been developed and promoted by organizations such as the United Nations and individuals such as radical billionaire George Soros and New York City's Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
"The laws are designed and intended to lead to the complete ban and confiscation of all firearms," according to Sharon.
"The Obama administration is attempting to use tactics and methods of gun control that will inflict major damage to our 2nd Amendment before US citizens even understand what has happened," she added.
Critics believe Obama will appear before the public and tell them that he does not intend to pursue any legislation in the United States that will lead to new gun control laws, while cloaked in secrecy, his Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, is committing the US to international treaties and foreign gun control laws.
"We will wake up one morning and find that the United States has signed a treaty that prohibits firearm and ammunition manufacturers from selling to the public. We will wake up another morning and find that the US has signed a treaty that prohibits any transfer of firearm ownership. And then, we will wake up yet another morning and find that the US has signed a treaty that requires US citizens to deliver any firearm they own to the local government collection and destruction center or face imprisonment," Ms. Sharon stated.
Jim Kouri, CPP is currently fifth vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police and he's a columnist for The Examiner (examiner.com) and New Media Alliance (thenma.org). In addition, he's a blogger for the Cheyenne, Wyoming Fox News Radio affiliate KGAB (www.kgab.com). Kouri also serves as political advisor for Emmy and Golden Globe winning actor Michael Moriarty.
He's former chief at a New York City housing project in Washington Heights nicknamed "Crack City" by reporters covering the drug war in the 1980s. In addition, he served as director of public safety at a New Jersey university and director of security for several major organizations. He's also served on the National Drug Task Force and trained police and security officers throughout the country. Kouri writes for many police and security magazines including Chief of Police, Police Times, The Narc Officer and others. He's a news writer and columnist for AmericanDaily.Com, MensNewsDaily.Com, MichNews.Com, and he's syndicated by AXcessNews.Com. Kouri appears regularly as on-air commentator for over 100 TV and radio news and talk shows including Fox News Channel, Oprah, McLaughlin Report, CNN Headline News, MTV, etc.
To subscribe to Kouri's newsletter write to COPmagazine@aol.com and write "Subscription" on the subject line.
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AG Holder arranged the Marc Rich pardon.
Here's this on Breuer:
====================
After graduating from Columbia Law School, (yet anothe stain on my alma mater!) Breuer was an assistant district attorney in Manhattan from 1985 to 1989. As a special White House counsel, he helped represent President Bill Clinton from 1997 to 1999 during independent-counsel and Congressional investigations, and the impeachment hearings.
(...)
Breuer made headlines when a friend from the White House, Sandy Berger, (a.k.a. Sandy "Fingers" Berger) asked for representation after an investigation disclosed Berger’s theft of classified documents from the National Archives. (IIRC the documents would have proven that Hillary perjured herself with regard to the billing conspiracy of her law firm , , , or was it her husband's pardon of her brother? GM?)
On January 22, 2009, President Obama selected Breuer to head the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lanny_A._Breuer
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I was surprised to see the NY Times jump all over this issue - a couple of years too late... Of course theitr very first point is to blame it on Bush and to set it up as an independent department run amok as if they did not report directly to the Attorney General and the President. Then they close with the need for congress to pass a new law banning dangerous weapons.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/07/opinion/gun-walking-the-mexican-border.html?_r=1&ref=opinion
Editorial
Gun Walking the Mexican Border
Published: November 6, 2011
It turns out that Fast and Furious, the foolhardy government operation that allowed high-powered weapons to cross the border to Mexican drug cartels, was not a one-off. The Bush administration used the same improper tactic in Operation Wide Receiver in 2006-7.
The history of these risky “gun walking” operations — devised by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to try to track illicit gun-shop purchases in Arizona to the cartel bosses — was spelled out to Congress by Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division. Fast and Furious, in place from 2009 to early 2011, sent more than 2,000 assault weapons onto streets on both sides of the border. Some showed up at crime scenes, including a shootout where a Border Patrol agent was killed last December.
In denouncing the tactic as “unacceptable and misguided,” Mr. Breuer apologized for his own failure to respond aggressively when he learned about Operation Wide Receiver even as Fast and Furious was under way. He said that he did not alert Justice Department leaders when he found out about it in April 2010.
Congressional Republicans have rebuked the Obama administration for the Fast and Furious fiasco. That this tactic — which ranges so far from proper law enforcement — was used in the Bush years is equally disturbing. Congress should bring responsible officials to account, but it cannot duck the need for far stronger laws to control gun trafficking.
Mr. Breuer said in the past five years, 94,000 weapons have been recovered in Mexico and 64,000 were traced to American sources. “We need more tools,” he said. To which Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, predictably responded, “The answer isn’t to clamp down on law abiding-citizens or gun dealers.” There is no problem with law-abiding citizens. It’s Congress’s failure to ban sales of assault weapons that is feeding the drug wars.
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Gents:
Lott dials in why the Bush ATF's program was completely different from the Obama ATF's OFF.
======================================
Blame Bush -- Is That Holder's Strategy to Get Out of the 'Fast and Furious' Mess?
By John Lott
Published November 08, 2011 | FoxNews.com
Blame Bush. It has been almost three years since President Obama took office, yet he still blames Bush for the bad economy. Now the Obama administration is following the same strategy to get out of the "Fast and Furious" mess.
"Fast and Furious," also called the "Gunwalker" case, involves the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATF) agents ordering American gun dealers to sell guns to obvious Mexican drug gang members during 2009 and 2010. This was done over the objections of the gun dealers.
Both Fox News and the Washington Post started covering this scandal in early February this year. It may be excusable that Attorney General Eric Holder did not read the press reports, but, if we are to believe his congressional testimony Tuesay, he and his staff also neglected to pay attention to the 100 or so page "weekly reports" summarizing activity in the Justice Department.
Those reports began mentioning the operation as long ago as July 2010. When Holder testified before the House Judiciary Committee in May this year he claimed: "I probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks." Holder reiterated again Tuesday that he simply didn't have the time to read even the summaries. Neither did his staff.
Holder had few options today.
Even President Obama gave an interview in March where he indicated that at that time Holder knew about the operation. With the president on record saying that he knew about the operation before April, Holder conceded Tuesday that probably knew about the operation at least a month earlier than he had previously testified.
The Obama administration has also tried to show the practice originated in the Bush administration during 2006 and 2007 under operation “Wide Receiver.” After all, it is what Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer argued just last week. When Breuer testified last week, he confessed that he had learned about "gun walking" tactics as far back as April 2010, but it wasn't the Obama administration's "gun walking" that he confessed to learning about, it was a program run briefly during the Bush administration.
And on Monday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-Vermont) pushed this further by asking the Justice Department’s inspector general to include the Bush-era operation in his investigation of “Fast and Furious.”
But trying to shift blame to President Bush doesn't hold water, as the two programs were very different.
Obama's "Fast and Furious" was a gun-tracing program that didn't even try to trace guns.
In sharp contrast, Bush's “Wider Receiver” program gave direct notice to the Mexican authorities so that they could try to track the guns as they crossed the border. Bush officials might have learned that Mexican police weren't up to tracing the guns, but at least they had a plan to try to have the guns followed.
"Fast and Furious" made no such attempt to notify the Mexican authorities in any way. Worse, the Obama officials knew that they had a problem. "Fast and Furious" gave out the guns, but agents and middle level people complained to administrators that the guns weren't being traced.
Indeed, when BATF agents' warnings that the guns weren’t being tracked during the Obama administration went unheeded, in despair at least one agent went to his local Radio Shack store to try jerry-rigging a GPS tracking bug for the guns.
A widely run Associated Press story last week by Pete Yost pointed out that both the Bush and Obama programs involved "gun-walking." Yet somehow Yost managed to leave out the very central point about tracing. Other articles, such as those in the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal, have likewise left out this important point.
What is really missed by all this is the utter failure of gun tracing programs. The problem isn't really that the Obama administration simply screwed up the tracing plan. Few guns move from the U.S. to Mexico and just as drug cartels bring in drugs from other countries, they can bring in the weapons that they need to protect those drugs. Mexican drug cartels aren't getting their machine guns, grenades, and rocket launchers from the United States.
Why would the Obama administration not trace the guns? Why would they not inform Mexican officials about the program? One hopes that it was sheer incompetence combined with a desire to stonewall any investigation, but the fact that people knew that the guns weren’t being traced raises questions even about this plan.
The only other possibility -- deliberately increasing the number of guns sold to increase the share of crime guns in Mexico from the United States and thus generate support for more gun control -- is conceivable if only because "Fast and Furious" started at the same time that Obama began his campaign falsely claiming that most Mexican crime guns came from the United States.
We can only hope that even for the Obama administration that scenario is too cynical to be possible.
John R. Lott, Jr. is a FOXNews.com contributor. He is an economist and author of the newly revised edition of "More Guns, Less Crime (University of Chicago Press, 2010)."
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Former U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Arizona, who resigned in the wake of a congressional probe into the Fast and Furious undercover investigation his office oversaw, has admitted leaking a sensitive document about a federal agent who blew the whistle on the gunrunning operation, according to Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican.
Mr. Grassley, in a statement late Tuesday, said the leaked document was "deemed so sensitive by the Justice Department that it was not provided to Congress, except in a secured room at department headquarters."
"Leaking sensitive documents to the press and retaliating against whistleblowers is not good faith cooperation with Congress," Mr. Grassley said.
The leak involved Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Agent John Dodson, one of several agents who testifed in June before a House committee that their ATF superiors told them to stand down and watch as weapons flowed from gun dealers in Arizona to criminals and violent drug cartels in Mexico as part of the Fast and Furious operation.
Agent Dodson told the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that the operation facilitated the sale of more than 2,000 firearms, and while hundreds have been recovered, there could be more than 1,000 still out. Agent Dodson said that of those, two-thirds were likely in Mexico and the rest still in the U.S.
"The Justice Department confirmed that the Inspector General continues to investigate the leak, which means there are others who may be involved in drafting and distributing the talking points and document to the press," Mr. Grassley said.
In August, Mr. Burke, who oversaw all federal prosecutions in Arizona, resigned while Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley, the lead prosecutor in the Fast and Furious investigation, was reassigned from the criminal division to the civil division. Kenneth E. Melson, ATF's acting director, was reassigned the same day to a lesser role as senior adviser on forensic science.
The three Justice Department officials had come heavy criticism after Mr. Grassley and Rep. Darrell Issa, California Republican and chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, discovered that hundreds of weapons sold to straw buyers in the Fast and Furious operation had been "walked" to drug smugglers in Mexico.
At least two of those weapons, AK-47 assault rifles, turned up at the site of the fatal Dec. 14, 2010, shooting of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian A. Terry, killed by Mexican bandits just north of Nogales, Ariz.
Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced the Burke resignation and the reassignments. The Fast and Furious operation has been disavowed by Mr. Holder and President Obama.
Mr. Burke's Phoenix attorney, Lee Stein, said in a Nov. 8 letter to the Justice Department's Office of Inspector General — which was posted on Politico — that his client had provided information to a reporter who was working on several stories involving Fast and Furious. The attorney said "it was clear" to Mr. Burke from their conversations that the reporter already was aware of a memo about Agent Dodson and he wanted "to give context to information the reporter already had."
The attorney wrote that because the memo's topics involved closed investigations, it was not subject to any limitations on disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act.
"Dennis regrets his role in disclosing the memo but he's a stand-up guy and is willing to take responsibility for what he did," the letter said. "It was absolutely not Dennis's intent to retaliate against Special Agent Dodson or anyone else for the information they provided Congress."
Mr. Stein said Mr. Burke has been "cooperating fully with the Department of Justice and with the Congress and will continue to do so." It is unclear who else at Justice took part in sharing the memo with reporters. The Inspector General's investigation into the leak was first reported by NPR in July.
The Inspector General's Office and the department's Office of Professional Responsibility are investigating the Fast and Furious operation, but it is not known when a final report might be made public.
Agent Dodson's attorney, Robert Driscoll, said in a statement: "Special Agent Dodson demonstrated both tremendous courage and fidelity to the mission of ATF when he came forward to discuss the misguided Fast and Furious investigation. It is unfortunate that his superiors at ATF and DOJ did not listen to his attempts to address the matter internally, and instead chose to attack him once he, out of necessity, stepped forward."
Mr. Driscoll described Mr. Burke's public acknowledgment that he "participated in such misguided efforts to smear Agent Dodson is welcome, but unfortunately Burke did not act alone in attempting to ruin Special Agent Dodson's career."
By Jerry Seper
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The Washington Times
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...=all#pagebreak
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Police weapon exemptions in spotlight
Officers can buy guns usually not available to public
By DON THOMPSON
Associated Press
Posted: 11/09/2011 01:50:18 AM PST
Updated: 11/09/2011 01:50:19 AM PST
SACRAMENTO — A federal investigation into weapons dealing by officers in three Sacramento-area law enforcement agencies has shined a light on provisions in California law that allow peace officers to buy guns, high-capacity magazines and assault weapons that are illegal for the public.
Officers only need show their law enforcement credentials to buy ammunition clips that exceed the 10-round limit and buy guns not available to others. Their police chief or sheriff can give them permission to buy an assault weapon or avoid the 10-day waiting period for buying a gun and undergoing a background check.
There is no statewide data available to show the extent of the practice, what weapons officers are buying or why they need them. Policies on applying the law vary among law enforcement agencies.
Exemptions in state law drew attention last week with the disclosure that the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is investigating deputies in the Sacramento County Sheriff's Department and officers in the Roseville and Sacramento police departments for selling weapons most civilians can't legally buy and sell.
Federal agents served search warrants, but no one has been arrested or charged. Authorities haven't disclosed what weapons were being sold or to whom, but officers and deputies have access to weapons prohibited to others.
"Under the law, all they have to do is show their law enforcement credential to a dealer. That's enough to purchase an off-list handgun or high-capacity magazine," said Steve Lindley, chief of the state Department of Justice's Bureau of Firearms.
There are more restrictions on assault rifles, which must be registered with the state and sold or returned to the local law enforcement agency when the officer or deputy retires or leaves law enforcement. The assault rifle is supposed to be "deregistered" with the state, although in practice authorities say it can easily be converted so it no longer meets the legal definition of an assault rifle.
Weapons permitted under the law are semiautomatics, meaning they fire one bullet with each pull of the trigger. Fully automatic weapons that fire continuously are not permitted without meeting much stricter federal regulations.
Officers or deputies must get permission from their chief or sheriff to buy assault weapons, but in many cases there are few checks or policies that limit officers' purchase of the weapons.
Sacramento sheriff's spokesman Jason Ramos said his department has an informal practice of letting deputies buy one assault rifle during their career, with the approval of the sheriff and the captain in charge of weapons and training.
"A guy can't be in the habit of every year or two buying another one," Ramos said. "You can't just be out buying these cool weapons."
On the other hand, the department provides its own assault weapons for qualified deputies, so Ramos said the department's 1,245 deputies have no need to buy the guns for official reasons.
"It's more really for personal interest," Ramos said.
The department permits 25 to 30 assault weapon purchases this year.
http://www.montereyherald.com/state/ci_19296231
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It's my understanding that the California Dept. of Justice has a specialized unit dedicated to investigating and prosecuting Californian LEOs for firearms violations. It's also my understanding that under PRK law, when you retire as a LEO, firearms purchased with your LEO creds cannot be legally owned in CA, meaning either you get rid of them or move out of state.
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Testifying before an intensely partisan Senate Judiciary Committee hearing yesterday, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder only deepened suspicions about the Department of Justice’s possible criminal involvement in a gunwalking operation known as Operation Fast and Furious. The scheme saw the federal government provide more than 2,000 firearms to Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel.
Holder presented the improbable case that he was not responsible for — or even aware of — the plot:
I have ultimate responsibility for that which happens in the Department, but I cannot be expected to know the details for every operation that is ongoing in the Justice Department on a day-to-day basis. I did not know about Fast and Furious as is indicated in the chart that you have up there until I guess, well, until it became public.
Operation Fast and Furious was run primarily by the DOJ, but involved Obama administration officials spread across four Cabinet-level departments, and included direct links to the White House’s National Security Council.
Attorney General Holder’s claim that he was ignorant of one of the most deadly political scandals in U.S. history, which was run out of his department with key input and the understanding of his top lieutenants, is simply not credible.
Holder used his opening statement to shift the blame to the American gun dealers — whom his Department forced to supply weapons to the cartels — and Congress:
“Unfortunately, earlier this year the House of Representatives actually voted to keep law enforcement in the dark when individuals purchase multiple semi-automatic rifles and shotguns in Southwest border gun shops,” Holder’s written testimony declares. “Providing law enforcement with the tools to detect and disrupt illegal gun trafficking is entirely consistent with the constitutional rights of law-abiding citizens and it is critical to addressing the public safety crisis on the Southwest border.”
It took considerable gall for Holder to make that allegation against Congress: the long-gun reporting requirement he mentioned was suggested by the Department of Justice to combat a problem that they had created with Operation Fast and Furious.
The hearing was full of jaw-dropping moments. For the first time, Holder conceded the obvious fact: Justice was responsible for firearms being “walked” to Mexican drug lords:
“I want to be clear: any instance of so-called ‘gun-walking’ is simply unacceptable,” Holder said in his opening statement before the Senate Judiciary committee. “Regrettably, this tactic was used as part of Fast and Furious, which was launched to combat gun trafficking and violence on our Southwest border. This operation was flawed in concept, as well as in execution. And, unfortunately, we will feel its effects for years to come as guns that were lost during this operation continue to show up at crime scenes both here and in Mexico.”
The concession came after months of the Department’s top officials claiming that just the opposite was true, until the compiled evidence was insurmountable.
Holder also claimed he did not commit perjury in May, when he claimed under oath that he had first heard about gunwalking just weeks before the hearing. Yet a series of five memos addressed to the attorney general were received ten months before, as was a detailed public statement from President Obama and letter from Senator Charles Grassley dated nine months before his testimony.
The attorney general also claimed that he had other “regrets” involving operation Fast and Furious, including a February letter from the Justice Department that blatantly lied and claimed there was never any gunwalking in the operation. Holder also voiced regret that Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was gunned down — though in the testimony’s most shocking moment, he posited that it was not fair to claim Operation Fast and Furious was responsible for Terry’s death. He made this statement despite the fact that the current official story from the DOJ claims the only two weapons recovered from the murder scene were traced to the operation.
As contentious as the hearing became between Holder and several of the minority Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Senate’s majority Democrats were almost seditiously uninterested in finding out anything about the plot.
Senators Diane Feinstein (D-CA) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY) dishonestly claimed that the plot was an extension of the Bush-era Operation Wide Receiver. It most decidedly was not, and Holder himself refuted that connection.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Feinstein argued that the plot — in which the government forced firearms dealers to give weapons to criminals — justified more gun-control laws.
And in a surreal moment, Senator Al Franken (D-MN) decided the occasion was a wonderful time to discuss the bullying of gay schoolchildren.
Attorney General Eric Holder will not apologize for the deaths of the U.S. federal agents gunned down as a result of the crimes his Department ramrodded, nor will he or his employer, President Barack Obama, accept responsibility or even demand accountability. They incredibly still insist that they don’t know who came up with the operation or know who approved it, even as documentation points directly to men and women in their employment.
Operation Fast and Furious is beyond impeachable. It was a “felony stupid” plot at best, and at worst a treasonous attempt to amplify violent crime in order to subvert the Constitution.
Playing dumb won’t cut it. Relying on an employee/crony to conduct an investigation while leaking information to those she is investigating won’t cut it. Our government is responsible for arming criminals with thousands of weapons, causing hundreds of deaths.
Either Operation Fast and Furious is investigated by an independent counsel, or there is no rule of law in America.
http://pjmedia.com/blog/holder-plays...inglepage=true
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(http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/111011.jpg)
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/111011.jpg
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Concealed Carry Reciprocity Bill
Passes House
Troubling Amendment Added
The House passed national concealed carry reciprocity legislation on Wednesday evening by a vote of 272-154.
The bill, H.R. 822, is intended to allow persons who hold a concealed carry permit from one state to also carry anywhere in the country, with the exception of Illinois and Washington, D.C.
Though the bill passed by a wide margin, it was not without controversy on the pro-gun side of the debate. In previous alerts, GOA has pointed out several flaws in the legislation:
• It forces Vermont residents (who do not need a permit to carry) to either obtain an out-of-state permit or to push their state to pass a more restrictive concealed carry law than it now enjoys;
• By requiring permits for reciprocity, the bill undermines efforts at the state level to pass constitutional carry (i.e., Vermont-style carry);
• In restrictive “may issue” states, the bill allows for non-residents to carry firearms in the state while most residents would still be prohibited, and;
• The bill is yet another example of Congress distorting of the Constitution’s Commerce Clause.
Representative Justin Amash (R-MI), who voted against the bill, addressed this last point in a statement, calling H.R. 822 “an unconstitutional bill that improperly applies the Commerce Clause to concealed carry licensing.”
Another freshman Representative, Rob Woodall (R-GA), noted that the right to carry a concealed firearm is already protected by the Second Amendment.
“If the Second Amendment protects my rights to carry my concealed weapon from state to state to state, I don’t need another federal law,” Rep. Woodall said. He went on to remind his colleagues of the original intent of the right to keep and bear arms.
“I don’t believe the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights to allow me to shoot targets [or] hunt for deer and turkey. I think the Second Amendment was put in the Bill of Rights so that I could defend my freedom against an overbearing federal government.”
Anti-gun Amendment Passes
One extremely troubling amendment to the bill was slipped in on a voice vote. Sponsored by Republican David Reichert (“C” rated by GOA), the amendment instructs the Government Accounting Office to:
“Conduct a study of the ability of State and local law enforcement authorities to verify the validity of licenses or permits, issued by other States, to carry a concealed firearm.”
Nowhere in the Constitution is there even a hint of authority for the federal government to “study” the exercising of a right. Even worse, you can be sure that anti-gunners will use any excuse, including this study, to push for some type of national carry license.
The bill now heads to the Senate, where GOA is already working with key Senators to address ALL of the problems with the bill. GOA is also working with Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) on legislation, H.R. 2900, that takes a constitutional approach to concealed carry recognition.
Click here to act
http://capwiz.com/gunowners/issues/alert/?alertid=56876501
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51 congressmen to Eric Holder: You must resign immediately
By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller 12:40 AM 11/18/2011
The surge in congressional calls for Attorney General Eric Holder’s immediate resignation has reached a new milestone: More than 50 members of Congress are now demanding Holder step down in the wake of Operation Fast and Furious.
The number of congressmen calling for Holder’s immediate resignation is now 51. New additions to that list include Republican Reps. Todd Akin and Blaine Luetkemeyer of Missouri, Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia, Steven Palazzo of Mississippi and Jeff Duncan of South Carolina.
Rep. Westmoreland said Operation Fast and Furious was a disgrace to the American people and that Holder needs to resign immediately.
“Fast and Furious played fast and loose with the American public’s safety, leaving a U.S. Border patrol agent dead and DOJ-purchased guns in the hands of Mexican drug lords,” Westmoreland told The Daily Caller. “To say this program was a failure and an embarrassment to the U.S. justice system is an understatement.”
“No matter how many times the attorney general’s statement of when he was aware of Operation Fast and Furious changes — and it has changed almost daily — at the end of the day, he is the head of the Department of Justice and the buck stops with him,” said Westmoreland.
“It’s time for Mr. Holder to hold himself accountable,” he added.
On Thursday morning there were 46 congressmen demanding Holder’s resignation. Holder is currently on a taxpayer-subsidized junket in the Caribbean with his spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler, who has repeatedly declined to answer questions about the increasing congressional disapproval of Holder’s job performance.
Akin and Luetkemeyer had not previously called for Holder’s immediate resignation, but cast doubts on the truthfulness of the attorney general’s testimony before Congress.
“Given Mr. Holder’s inconsistencies and general lack of compelling testimony before the Judiciary Committee on such a serious matter as the ‘fast and furious’ gun walking debacle, his resignation would go a long way to restoring credibility to the office he now holds,” Akin told TheDC.
The recent surge in calls for Holder’s resignation can be attributed to two factors. First, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona, the third congressman to demand Holder step down, hosted a press conference on Tuesday to amplify calls for Holder’s resignation. Second, Rep. Joe Walsh of Illinois is currently circulating a letter on Capitol Hill asking for Holder to resign or for Obama to fire him.
The Walsh letter, addressed to Obama, urges him to “hold attorney general Eric Holder accountable for Operation Fast and Furious” and “ask for his immediate resignation.”
The new congressmen demanding Holder step down now are also signatories to Walsh’s letter — which currently has 39 co-signers.
The White House and the Justice Department remain silent as pressure for Holder’s immediate resignation builds, which may be a sign that the Obama administration is prepared to force Holder out if it is politically necessary.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/nov/22/armed-illegals-stalked-border-patrol/?page=all#pagebreak
Armed illegals stalked Border Patrol
Mexicans were ‘patrolling’ when agent was slain, indictment says
By Jerry Seper
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The Washington Times
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
SLAIN: Border Patrol agent Brian A. Terry called out, “I’m hit,” after a bullet pierced his aorta. He died at the scene. (Associated Press)
Five illegal immigrants armed with at least two AK-47 semi-automatic assault rifles were hunting for U.S. Border Patrol agents near a desert watering hole known as Mesquite Seep just north of the Arizona-Mexico border when a firefight erupted and one U.S. agent was killed, records show.
A now-sealed federal grand jury indictmentin the death of Border Patrol agent Brian A. Terrysays the Mexican nationals were “patrolling” the rugged desert area of Peck Canyon at about 11:15 p.m. on Dec. 14 with the intent to “intentionally and forcibly assault” Border Patrol agents.
At least two of the Mexicans carried their assault rifles “at the ready position,” one of several details about the attack showing that Mexican smugglers are becoming more aggressive on the U.S. side of the border.
According to the indictment, the Mexicans were “patrolling the area in single-file formation” a dozen miles northwest of the border town of Nogales and — in the darkness of the Arizona night — opened fire on four Border Patrol agents after the agents identified themselves in Spanish as police officers.
Two AK-47 assault rifles found at the scene came from the failed Fast and Furious operation.
Using thermal binoculars, one of the agents determined that at least two of the Mexicans were carrying rifles, but according to an affidavit in the case by FBI agent Scott Hunter, when the Mexicans did not drop their weapons as ordered, two agents used their shotguns to fire “less than lethal” beanbags at them.
At least one of the Mexicans opened fire and, according to the affidavit, Terry, a 40-year-old former U.S. Marine, was shot in the back. A Border Patrol shooting-incident report said that Terry called out, “I’m hit,” and then fell to the ground, a bullet having pierced his aorta. “I can’t feel my legs,” Terry told one of the agents who cradled him. “I think I’m paralyzed.”
Bleeding profusely, he died at the scene.
After the initial shots, two agents returned fire, hitting Manuel Osorio-Arellanes, 33, in the abdomen and leg. The others fled. The FBI affidavit said Osorio-Arellanes admitted during an interview that all five of the Mexicans were armed.
Peck Canyon is a notorious drug-smuggling corridor.
Osorio-Arellanes initially was charged with illegal entry, but that case was dismissed when the indictment was handed up. It named Osorio-Arellanes on a charge of second-degree murder, but did not identify him as the likely shooter, saying only that Osorio-Arellanes and others whose names were blacked out “did unlawfully kill with malice aforethought United States Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry while Agent Terry was engaged in … his official duties.”
The indictment also noted that Osorio-Arellanes had been convicted in Phoenix in 2006 of felony aggravated assault, had been detained twice in 2010 as an illegal immigrant, and had been returned to Mexico repeatedly.
Bill Brooks, U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s acting southwest border field branch chief, referred inquiries to the FBI, which is conducting the investigation. The FBI declined to comment.
The case against Osorio-Arellanes and others involved in the shooting has since been sealed, meaning that neither the public nor the media has access to any evidence, filings, rulings or arguments.
The U.S. attorney’s office in San Diego, which is prosecuting the case, would confirm only that it was sealed. Also sealed was the judge’s reason for sealing the case.
The indictment lists the names of other suspects in the shooting, but they are redacted.
In the Terry killing, two Romanian-built AK-47 assault rifles found at the scene were identified as having been purchased in a Glendale, Ariz., gun shop as part of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ (ATF) failed Fast and Furious investigation.
A number of rank-and-file Border Patrol agents have questioned why the case has not gone to trial, nearly a year after Terry’s killing. Several also have concerns about the lack of transparency in the investigation, compounded now by the fact that the court case has been sealed.
Shawn P. Moran, vice president of the National Border Patrol Council, which represents all 17,000 nonsupervisory agents, said it is rare for illegal immigrants or drug smugglers to engage agents in the desert, saying they usually “drop their loads and take off south.”
“The Brian Terry murder was a real wake-up call,” Mr. Moran said. “It emphasizes the failed state of security on the U.S. border, which poses more of a threat to us than either Iraq or Afghanistan. We have terrorism going on right on the other side of the fence, and we’re arming the drug cartels.
“My biggest fear is that someday a cartel member is going to go berserk, stick a rifle through the fence and kill as many Border Patrol agents as he can,” he said.
Mr. Moran said he understood the “rationale of working things up the food chain,” as suggested in the Fast and Furious probe, but had no idea how ATF planned to arrest cartel members who ultimately purchased the weapons since the agency lacks jurisdiction south of the border and never advised Mexican authorities about the operation.
“It was a ridiculous idea from the beginning, and it baffles us on how it was ever approved,” he said.
Mr. Moran also challenged the use of less-than-lethal s in the shooting incident, saying field agents have been “strong-armed” by the agency’s leadership to use nonlethal weapons. He said they were not appropriate for the incident in which Terry was killed.
“That was no place for beanbag rounds,” he said, noting that the encounter was at least 12 miles inside the U.S. and was carried out by armed men looking specifically to target Border Patrol agents.
CBP has said Terry and the agents with him carried fully loaded sidearms, along with two additional magazines, and were not under orders to use nonlethal ammunition first.
Mr. Moran, himself a veteran Border Patrol agent, said he also was “surprised” that the suspected Mexican gunmen were carrying their weapons at the ready position, meaning that the butts of the weapons were placed firmly in the pocket of the shoulder with the barrels pointed down at a 45-degree angle. He said this probably meant they had some level of military training.
More than 250 incursions by Mexican military personnel into the United States have been documented over the past several years.
The Border Patrol has warned agents in Arizona that many of the intruders were “trained to escape, evade and counter-ambush” if detected. The agency cautioned agents to keep “a low profile,” to use “cover and concealment” in approaching the Mexican units, to employ “shadows and camouflage” to conceal themselves and to “stay as quiet as possible.”
Several of the incursions occurred in the same area where Terry was killed, including a 2005 incident in which two agents were shot and wounded by assailants dressed in black commando-type clothing in what law-enforcement authorities said was a planned ambush. More than 50 rounds were fired at the agents after they spotted the suspected gunmen.
Many of the Mexican drug cartels use former Mexican soldiers, police and federal agents to protect drug loads headed into the U.S. Many cartel leaders also have targeted U.S. Border Patrol agents and state and local police, sometimes offering bounties of up to $50,000.
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(http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/112311.jpg)
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/112311.jpg
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There's been an 800 pound gorilla lurking just out of range or most Gunwalking reporting: how many of the firearms being used criminally in Mexico were first sold by the State Department to the Mexican government? This piece outlines the broad parameters:
U. S. Government May Be Primary Suppliers of Mexican Drug Cartel Guns
by Tom Stilson
With Operation Fast and Furious headlining the news, there is no doubt civilian arms have been trafficked into Mexico. However, many of the arms used by Mexican cartels are NOT supplied by civilian gun outlets in the United States. Based upon the statistics I have compiled, our State and Defense Departments may be the premier suppliers of weaponry to Mexican drug cartels — not the US civilian.
From 2003-2009, over 150,000 Mexican soldiers deserted from their ranks. Drug cartels became so confident in their recruitment of military personnel that they posted help wanted ads for hit men, traffickers, and guards. When these soldiers desert, their US-supplied weapons (grenades, sniper rifles, assault weapons, etc.) often accompany them over to the cartels. In 2008 and 2009, 13,792 and 20,530 small arms were exported to Mexico from the US. Over 92% of these arms were civilian legal semi-automatic or non-automatic firearms, a number eerily similar to the debunked 90% number echoed by the ATF. A 2008 State Department memo to then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi shows a $1,000,000 shipment of select fire M4A2 assault rifles to the Mexican Federal Police Force, (AKA Federales) one of the most corrupt Mexican government agencies.
The most recent numbers from 2010 show the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (DDTC) — the State Department agency responsible for overseeing the exportation of military goods — authorized the transfer of 2.5 million units of small arms, weapon optics, silencers, and related components. In that same year, over 11 million units of ammunition and 127,000 units of explosive ordnance were cleared for exportation to Mexico. This amounted to $25 million worth of small arms, ammunition, and explosives shipped to Mexico authorized by our State Department.
In recent months, allegations have surfaced that the State Department’s US Direct Commercial Sales Program and DDTC may have directly shipped arms to the Zetas, the Gulf Cartel’s hit squad. The Zetas were at one time trained and supplied with American weaponry by our own 7th Special Forces Group in the early 1990s. These claims against the State Department arose even after the DDTC recognized the Americas Region in 2009 as having the highest rate of unfavorable traces for their Blue Lantern Program. The Blue Lantern Program involves traces performed by the DDTC to ensure exported military weaponry does not end up with an unauthorized nation or organization. For the Americas, 80% of traces where unauthorized end users were identified involved small arms. Data specifically for Mexico was unavailable from the State Department.
From 2008 to 2009, when President Obama entered office, Defense Department expenditures to Mexico have increased from $12 million to $34,000,000 and State Department expenditures increased from $7.2 million to $356 million. While 2010 data is currently unavailable, it appears our foreign aid to Mexico has continued to increase for 2011. These statistics imply the State and Defense Departments may very well be the top suppliers of small arms to Mexico’s drug cartels and not civilians. Only the information obtained from ATF Firearms Traces will tell. However, those records are not public. After the DOJ and the White House knowingly pursued attemp
http://biggovernment.com/tstilson/2011/11/21/u-s-government-may-be-primary-suppliers-of-mexican-drug-cartel-guns/ts at new gun control legislation, we are left to ask the question; is this just another case of government stupidity or is this something more premeditated?
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http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2011/11/27/european-economic-crisis-highlights-an-increasingly-important-reason-to-oppose-gun-control/
European Economic Crisis Highlights an Increasingly Important Reason to Oppose Gun Control
November 27, 2011 by Dan Mitchell
About a year ago, I spoke at a conference in Europe that attracted a lot of very rich people from all over the continent, as well as a lot of people who manage money for high-net-worth individuals.
What made this conference remarkable was not the presentations, though they were generally quite interesting. The stunning part of the conference was learning – as part of casual conversation during breaks, meals, and other socializing time – how many rich people are planning for the eventual collapse of European society.
Not stagnation. Not gradual decline. Collapse.
As in riots, social disarray, plundering, and chaos. A non-trivial number of these people think the rioting in places such as Greece and England is just the tip of the iceberg, and they have plans – if bad things begin to happen – to escape to jurisdictions ranging from Australia to Costa Rica (several of them remarked that they no longer see the U.S. as a good long-run refuge).
This was rather sobering. I’ve never been an optimist about Europe’s future, as I explain here and here, but is the situation really this bad?
Well, the U.K. government seems to think things will get worse. Here are some excerpts from the Telegraph.
British ministers privately warned that the break-up of the euro, once almost unthinkable, is now increasingly plausible. Diplomats are preparing to help Britons abroad through a banking collapse and even riots arising from the debt crisis. The Treasury confirmed earlier this month that contingency planning for a collapse is now under way. …Recent Foreign and Commonwealth Office instructions to embassies and consulates request contingency planning for extreme scenarios including rioting and social unrest. …Diplomats have also been told to prepare to help tens of thousands of British citizens in eurozone countries with the consequences of a financial collapse that would leave them unable to access bank accounts or even withdraw cash. …Analysts at UBS, an investment bank earlier this year warned that the most extreme consequences of a break-up include risks to basic property rights and the threat of civil disorder. “When the unemployment consequences are factored in, it is virtually impossible to consider a break-up scenario without some serious social consequences,” UBS said.
Let’s think about what this means, and we’ll start with an assumption that European politicians won’t follow my sage advice and that they’ll instead continue to kick the can down the road – thus making the debt bubble even bigger and creating the conditions for a nasty collapse.
I’ve learned over the years that things are usually never as bad as they seem (or as good as they seem), so I don’t expect that a nightmare situation will materialize, but I certainly can understand why wealthy people have contingency plans to escape.
But what about the rest of us? We don’t have property overseas and we don’t have private jets, so what’s our insurance policy?
Part of the answer is to have the ability to protect ourselves and our families. As explained here, firearms are the ultimate guarantor of civilization.
In my discussions and debates about this issue, I’ve traditionally relied on these four arguments:
1. Respect for the Constitution. The Founding Fathers were wise to include “the right of the people to keep and bear arms” in the Bill of Rights. The Second Amendment recognizes the value of a well-armed citizenry, and today’s politicians (or courts) shouldn’t be allowed to weaken that fundamental freedom.
2. The presumption of liberty. It’s sometimes said that everything that isn’t expressly forbidden is allowed in the United States, whereas in Europe it’s the other way around, with everything forbidden unless explicitly permitted. This certainly seems to be the case for guns, with most European governments prohibiting firearms ownership for the vast majority of people.
3. Personal protection against crime. As the first image in this post powerfully illustrates, it doesn’t really matter if cops are only a few minutes away when a person only has a few seconds to protect against danger. And since the evidence is overwhelming that gun ownership reduces crime, this is a powerful argument for the Second Amendment.
4. Ability to resist government oppression. Totalitarian governments invariably seek to disarm people, as this poster indicates. And with the majority of the world still living in nations that are not free, private gun ownership is at least a potential limit on thuggish governments.
But perhaps we now need to add a fifth reason:
5. Personal protection against social breakdown. If politicians destroy the economic system with too much debt and too much dependency, firearms will be the first and last line of defense against those who would plunder and pillage.
Here’s a thought experiment to drive the point home. If Europe does collapse, which people do you think will be in better shape to preserve civilization, the well-armed Swiss or the disarmed Brits?
I hope we never have to find out, but I know which society has a better chance of surviving.
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http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-admin-seals-records-murdered-border-patrol-agent-implicated-fast-and-furious_610783.html
Obama Admin Seals Records of Murdered Border Patrol Agent Implicated in Fast and Furious
11:45 AM, Nov 30, 2011 • By MARK HEMINGWAY
And to think that Attorney General Eric Holder is getting testy about congressional calls for his resignation. After all, the Justice Department has nothing to hide, right?
The Obama Administration has abruptly sealed court records containing alarming details of how Mexican drug smugglers murdered a U.S. Border patrol agent with a gun connected to a failed federal experiment that allowed firearms to be smuggled into Mexico.
This means information will now be kept from the public as well as the media. Could this be a cover-up on the part of the “most transparent” administration in history? After all, the rifle used to kill the federal agent (Brian Terry) last December in Arizona’s Peck Canyon was part of the now infamous Operation Fast and Furious. Conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the disastrous scheme allowed guns to be smuggled into Mexico so they could eventually be traced to drug cartels.
The murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent is related to a Justice Department willingly turning over thousands of guns to Mexican criminal gangs, and Obama administration is hiding information about his death from the public. Amazing.
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Unfg real :x
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Woof,
This is some of what was in the records before Holder sealed them.
www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/nov/22/armed-illegals-stalked-border-patrol/?page=all#pagebreak
P.C.
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http://pjmedia.com/blog/fbi-criminal-informant-complicit-in-brian-terrys-death-pjm-exclusive/?singlepage=true
FBI Criminal Informant Complicit in Brian Terry’s Death (PJM Exclusive)
From multiple sources come shocking charges of deadly ineptitude and an FBI coverup in Fast and Furious.
by
Bob Owens
December 1, 2011 - 7:00 am
In the growing Fast and Furious scandal, Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry’s death in Peck Canyon, Arizona was previously described as a chance meeting that led to a firefight: an illegal alien “rip crew” working for the Sinaloa cartel was hoping to find other illegal aliens and to rob them at gunpoint. Instead, they stumbled across a Border Patrol unit and murdered Agent Terry.
Last week, the Washington Times offered a new version of the encounter: they reported that the rip crew was not hunting illegals, but Border Patrol teams — with the intention of engaging them in combat.
Sources now tell PJ Media that neither version of events is accurate: the rip crew was not waiting for a chance encounter with other illegals, nor did the members intend to engage American law enforcement agents.
The rip crew was in Peck Canyon that evening with the intention of stealing money and drugs from a specific shipment of which they had prior knowledge.
Sources claim the Department of Justice has been trying for almost a year to hide the key information — how the rip crew knew the shipment was coming through that night.
Criminal informants (CIs) are a common tool of law enforcement agencies. When agencies apprehend criminals, agencies often reduce or drop charges in exchange for information leading to the arrests of higher-ranking criminals. Earlier this year, reports claimed that Operation Fast and Furious weapons smuggled over the border were actually chosen by an FBI informant, and paid for with money provided by the federal government.
The rip crew knew to be in Peck Canyon that December evening because a CI working for the FBI found out about a smuggling run — from the FBI.
It is not clear if the information was provided intentionally, but a possible motivation for the FBI to provide the information is known to exist: the CI had previously lost a shipment of drugs, and wanted to regain the trust of the cartel with an offering of drugs or money. The other possibility is that the FBI mistakenly allowed the CI to discover the information.
The CI used this information to organize an ambush of the drug convoy. A source tells PJM that the FBI knew from wiretaps that the CI was using their information to set up an ambush.
The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) — through its own CIs and communications intercepts — was also aware of the planned assault.
Neither the DEA nor FBI warned Border Patrol about the expected criminal activity.
The federal government will still not reveal if one of the two WASR-10 AK-pattern semi-automatic rifles located near the scene — provided to the Sinaloa cartel via Operation Fast and Furious — was the weapon that put a bullet through Brian Terry’s heart. The existence of a third recovered gun, an SKS carbine, has been disputed by the FBI despite the fact it had been talked about openly in the beginning of the investigation among federal agents.
Multiple sources tell PJM that this third weapon “disappeared” because it was the weapon carried by the FBI CI who ran the rip crew. When it was recovered near the scene of the murder and subsequently traced by the ATF, it traced back to the FBI CI via the gun shop in Texas where it was purchased.
Deconfliction is a major element of high-risk undercover law enforcement work. Undercover agents and informants often cross jurisdictional paths, and deconfliction is the process whereby agencies warn off other agencies so that their assets don’t end up in conflict, putting investigations and lives at risk.
In this case, the FBI and DEA failed to deconflict. Neither agency bothered to warn Border Patrol to keep their BORTAC teams out of Peck Canyon that evening. As a direct result of this FBI and DEA failure — combined with Homeland Security forcing BORTAC units to carry less-lethal beanbag rounds in some of their primary weapons — Brian Terry’s under-armed four-man unit walked into an ambush against a heavily armed rip crew, at least five of whom were carrying rifles.
Brian Terry’s murder was entirely preventable. The incompetence of the DEA and FBI let his Border Patrol unit walk into an ambush. After the ambush, it appears the FBI tampered with evidence to cover up that one of their informants was involved with the murder of a federal agent.
The government has recently sealed the case against the only suspect the FBI chose to keep behind bars.
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Woof,
Whoa GM, this just keeps getting worse all the time.
P.C.
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Woof,
Whoa GM, this just keeps getting worse all the time.
P.C.
Yes it does.
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Justice Dept. details how it got statements wrong
PETE YOST
From Associated Press
December 02, 2011 10:56 PM EST
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department on Friday provided Congress with documents detailing how department officials gave inaccurate information to a U.S. senator in the controversy surrounding Operation Fast and Furious, the flawed law enforcement initiative aimed at dismantling major arms trafficking networks on the Southwest border.
In a letter last February to Charles Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Justice Department said that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms had not sanctioned the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser and that the agency makes every effort to intercept weapons that have been purchased illegally. In Operation Fast and Furious, both statements turned out to be incorrect.
The Justice Department letter was responding to Grassley's statements that the Senate Judiciary Committee had received allegations the ATF had sanctioned the sale of hundreds of assault weapons to suspected straw purchasers. Grassley also said there were allegations that two of the assault weapons had been used in a shootout that killed customs agent Brian Terry.
In an email four days later to Justice Department colleagues, then-U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke in Phoenix said that "Grassley's assertions regarding the Arizona investigation and the weapons recovered" at the "murder scene are based on categorical falsehoods. I worry that ATF will take 8 months to answer this when they should be refuting its underlying accusations right now." That email marked the start of an internal debate in the Justice Department over what and how much to say in response to Grassley's allegations. The fact that there was an ongoing criminal investigation into Terry's murder prompted some at the Justice Department to argue for less disclosure.
Some of what turned out to be incorrect information was emailed to Lanny Breuer, the assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's criminal division. Breuer sent an email saying "let's help as much as we can" in responding to Grassley.
The emails sent to Capitol Hill on Friday showed that Burke supplied additional incorrect information to the Justice Department's criminal division that ended up being forwarded to Breuer. For example, Burke said that the guns found at the Terry murder scene were purchased at a Phoenix gun shop before Operation Fast and Furious began. In fact, the operation was under way at the time and the guns found at the Terry murder scene were part of the probe. Breuer was one of the recipients of that information. In written comments this week to Grassley, Breuer said that he was on a three-day official trip to Mexico at the time of the Justice Department response and that he was aware of, but not involved in, drafting the Justice Department statements to Grassley. Breuer says he cannot say for sure whether he saw a draft of the letter before it was sent to Grassley.
Where Burke got the inaccurate information is now part of an inquiry conducted by the inspector general's office at the Justice Department.
Burke's information was followed by a three-day struggle in which officials in the office of the deputy attorney general, the criminal division and the ATF came up with what turned out to be an inaccurate response to Grassley's assertions.
The process became so intensive that Breuer aide Jason Weinstein emailed his boss, "The Magna Carta was easier to get done than this was." A copy of the latest draft was attached to the emails.
Initial drafts of the letter reflected the hard tone of Burke's unequivocal assertions that the allegations Grassley was hearing from ATF agents were wrong. Later drafts were more measured, prompting Burke to complain in one email: "Every version gets weaker. We will be apologizing" to Grassley "by tomorrow afternoon." Regarding the allegation that ATF sanctioned the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser, the Justice Department denial was scaled back slightly from "categorically false" to "false." ''Why poke the tiger," Lisa Monaco, the top aide to the deputy attorney general, explained in an email to Ron Weich, the assistant attorney general for legislative affairs whose signature was on the letter.
In another email, Burke wrote, "By the way, what is so offensive about this whole project" of response "is that Grassley's staff, acting as willing stooges for the Gun Lobby, have attempted to distract from the incredible success in dismantling" Southwest Border "gun trafficking operations" and "not uttering one word of rightful praise and thanks to ATF — but, instead, lobbing this reckless despicable accusation that ATF is complicit in the murder of a fellow federal law enforcement officer."
On Friday night, Grassley spokeswoman Beth Levine said that "Burke personally apologized to Sen. Grassley's staff for the tone and the content of the emails" after learning from the Justice Department that the emails would be released.
It is unusual for the Justice Department to provide such detail of its internal deliberations as it did on Friday with Congress.
The department turned over 1,364 pages of material after concluding "that we will make a rare exception to the department's recognized protocols and provide you with information related to how the inaccurate information came to be included in the letter," Deputy Attorney General James Cole wrote Grassley and Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which is looking into the Obama administration's handling of Operation Fast and Furious.
Operation Fast and Furious involved more than 2,000 weapons that were purchased by straw buyers at Phoenix-area gun stores. Nearly 700 of the Fast and Furious guns have been recovered — 276 in Mexico and 389 in the United States, according to ATF data as of Oct. 20.
Amid probes by Republicans in Congress and the IG, the Justice Department in August replaced Burke, acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson and the lead prosecutor in Operation Fast and Furious.
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TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 47 > § 1001
§ 1001. Statements or entries generally
(a) Except as otherwise provided in this section, whoever, in any matter within the jurisdiction of the executive, legislative, or judicial branch of the Government of the United States, knowingly and willfully—
(1) falsifies, conceals, or covers up by any trick, scheme, or device a material fact;
(2) makes any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or representation; or
(3) makes or uses any false writing or document knowing the same to contain any materially false, fictitious, or fraudulent statement or entry;
shall be fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 5 years or, if the offense involves international or domestic terrorism (as defined in section 2331), imprisoned not more than 8 years, or both. If the matter relates to an offense under chapter 109A, 109B, 110, or 117, or section 1591, then the term of imprisonment imposed under this section shall be not more than 8 years.
(b) Subsection (a) does not apply to a party to a judicial proceeding, or that party’s counsel, for statements, representations, writings or documents submitted by such party or counsel to a judge or magistrate in that proceeding.
(c) With respect to any matter within the jurisdiction of the legislative branch, subsection (a) shall apply only to—
(1) administrative matters, including a claim for payment, a matter related to the procurement of property or services, personnel or employment practices, or support services, or a document required by law, rule, or regulation to be submitted to the Congress or any office or officer within the legislative branch; or
(2) any investigation or review, conducted pursuant to the authority of any committee, subcommittee, commission or office of the Congress, consistent with applicable rules of the House or Senate.
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Gunwalker: Justice Dept. Violated U.S. Laws Beyond Those Being Investigated
I know, because I was the principal drafter of some of the legislation.
by
JAMES K. STINEBOWER
Bio
December 5, 2011 - 12:00 am
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As we continue to watch the general uproar over the Operation Fast and Furious program, and specifically what Attorney General Holder knew and when he knew it, it needs to be noted that perjury is not the only apparent violation of law to have occurred.
I refer to the apparent violation of at least one (probably two) major U.S. laws by the Holder Justice Department. A few years ago, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (50 U.S.C. 1701, the follow-on to the Trading with the Enemy Act) was expanded in order to criminalize any transactions between U.S. entities — to include departments and agencies of the U.S. government — and all foreign drug cartels.
I am familiar with these prohibitive statues because several years ago, while serving as the senior drug analyst for the Senate Intelligence Committee, I was tasked to initiate and became the principal drafter of legislation which became known as the Kingpin Act (21 U.S.C. §§ 1901-08). The Kingpin Act is an extension of the highly successful IEEPA sanctioning program specifically targeting Colombian drug cartels. It expands sanctions authority against various drug cartel operations worldwide — including Mexico — which have been determined by the president to be threats to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States.
A violation of any of the IEEPA sanctioning programs or the Kingpin Act carries stiff penalties, both criminal and civil, and potentially totaling decades in prison and tens of millions of dollars in fines. It is not necessary that an individual or governmental entity be shown to have “knowingly” violated any of these programs: it is illegal for any U.S. entity or individual to aid, abet, or materially assist — or in the case of Operation Fast and Furious, to facilitate others to aid, abet, or materially assist — designated drug traffickers. There are no exceptions within IEEPA programs for unlicensed U.S. law enforcement or intelligence agency operations.
Based on the July 5, 2010, memo to Eric Holder, it would appear that Fast and Furious facilitated the delivery of weapons to — at a minimum — the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico. The U.S. Department of the Treasury, which administers both the IEEPA and Kingpin Act programs, has designated numerous members of the Sinaloa cartel under both programs. IEEPA prohibitions apply to the U.S. government as well as to individuals, and as stated there are no exceptions within IEEPA programs for unlicensed U.S. law enforcement or intelligence agency operations.
There is a provision in the Kingpin Act for “authorized” law enforcement and intelligence activities, however the only procedure by which an Operation Fast and Furious program could have been “authorized” under the Kingpin Act was by the U.S. attorney general requesting a waiver (known within the Treasury Department as a Specific License), prior to any such operation being undertaken. To illustrate and emphasize this point: even during the run-up to war in Iraq, the U.S. secretary of Defense had to obtain waivers (specific licenses) from the Treasury Department to allow U.S. Special Forces and their necessary equipment (to include weapons, intelligence gathering, and targeting gear) to go into Iraq, as Iraq at the time was under separate IEEPA sanctions.
As an aside: having spent many hours in discussions and negotiations over the exception in the Kingpin Act for authorized law enforcement and the intelligence community, I can assure the reader that the intent of this provision was not to allow for the transfer of thousands of semi-automatic weapons to cartel members. The intent of this portion of this particular Act is to allow for cash payments by U.S. law enforcement and intelligence agencies to confidential informants and intelligence sources within cartels to aid in their dismantlement, and not to facilitate the transfer of weapons used to murder hundreds of innocent civilians in Mexico and a U.S. Federal Border Agent.
As part of Congress’ ongoing investigation, as well as its constitutionally mandated oversight activities, it should be asked of Attorney General Holder if any such specific licenses were requested or granted by the Treasury Department. Additionally, Treasury Secretary Geithner should explain whether his Department has begun an investigation into these apparent violations of IEEPA and the Kingpin Act.
Interestingly, and of serious note — if Secretary Geithner finds that the laws and programs which his Department administers have been violated, Treasury procedures mandate that the matter be referred to Eric Holder’s Justice Department for enforcement!
Perhaps the appointment of a special prosecutor is necessary after all.
Mr. Stinebower is a former Navy Intelligence Officer, Professional Staff Member to the Senate Intelligence Committee, and Naval Attache.
http://pjmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-justice-dept-violated-us-laws/?singlepage=true
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Woof,
Holy sh#t balls! If only we didn't have such a thoroughly corrupt government; someone might be held accountable.
P.C.
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That is an excellent post, BBG.
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Real glad to have you back BBG 8-)
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Fast & furious lies
By MICHAEL A. WALSH
Last Updated: 11:31 PM, December 4, 2011
Posted: 10:54 PM, December 4, 2011
It was all a lie. The angry denials, the high dudgeon, the how-dare-you accuse-us bleating emanating from Eric Holder’s Justice Department these last nine months.
Operation Fast and Furious — the “botched” gun-tracking program run by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives — did, in fact, deliberately allow some 2,000 high-powered weapons to be sold to Mexican drug cartel agents and then waltzed across the border and into the Mexican drug wars — just as Sen. Chuck Grassley and Rep. Darrell Issa, who are leading the congressional investigations, have charged all along.
That’s the conclusion we can draw from Friday night’s nearly 1,400-page document dump, which gives us a glimpse into the inner workings of the Justice Department as it struggled earlier this year to come up with an explanation for the deadly mess — and “misled” Congress.
Now the man who supervised it, Attorney General Holder, will appears before Congress again Thursday to testify in the exploding fiasco. But there’s really only one question he needs to answer: Why?
Why did Justice, the ATF and an alphabet soup of federal agencies facilitate the transfer of guns across the border — without the knowledge of Mexican authorities — when they knew they couldn’t trace them properly?
The scandal erupted late last year, after at least two F&F weapons were found at the southern Arizona scene of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder. Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked Justice for an explanation.
The response was a Feb. 4 letter from assistant AG Ron Weich, who insisted, “The allegation . . . that ATF ‘sanctioned’ or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons . . . is false.” The ATF, Weich went on, “makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to Mexico.”
That letter has now been formally withdrawn. “Facts have come to light during the course of this investigation that indicate the Feb. 4 letter contains inaccuracies,” wrote deputy attorney general James Cole on Friday.
Nice to finally see the government admitting what we’ve known all along — that according to ATF whistleblowers, Fast and Furious was an ill-advised, poorly supervised mess that was doomed from the start.
Fox News recently unearthed a Feb. 3 memo in which ATF agent Gary Styers recounted to his superiors his conversations with Grassley’s investigators: “It is unheard of to have an active wiretap investigation without full-time, dedicated surveillance units on the ground,” he wrote, adding that objections by agents were “widely disregarded.”
Again — why? Perhaps the point was to put the onus for the Mexican drug violence on the American “gun lobby.” The newly released e-mails show Dennis Burke, the since-fired US attorney in Arizona who supervised the operation, furiously pushing back against Grassley and his staff, calling them “willing stooges for the Gun Lobby.”
Holder has insisted he knew nothing about F&F, but the documents show his underlings’ fingerprints. Weich’s original "misleading" letter, for example, was edited by Jason Weinstein, a deputy to Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer, who forwarded various drafts to his boss.
But Breuer (who reports to Holder) has denied that he had anything to do with drafting or editing Weich’s letter and doesn’t even remember reviewing it before it went to Congress.
So who’s telling the truth?
Meanwhile, Holder spins that F&F was merely a continuation of the Bush-era Operation Wide Receiver, which also lost a few weapons. The difference is that Wide Receiver’s mistakes were inadvertent: That gun-tracking program was under tight surveillance and — unlike F&F — was a joint venture between the US and Mexican authorities.
It’s time for the months of lies to end — but don’t hold your breath. The administration recently sealed the court records relating to agent Terry’s murder and — a year later — the one man arrested hasn’t been tried.
So far, three presidential candidates, a couple of senators and more than 50 congressmen have called for Holder to resign. If he can’t answer the one question that matters — why — that number ought to include his boss.
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The Next Decisive Date in American History
By Wayne LaPierre
12/5/2011
In all of our nation’s history, a handful of dates stand out – dates that meant life or death for America and our freedoms.
On July 4, 1776, our Founding Fathers put their lives on the line and declared that America would be independent and free. On June 6, 1944, American troops landed at Normandy and America took a critical step toward ending history’s bloodiest war. And on September 11, 2001, we witnessed the deadliest terrorist attack ever to take place on American soil.
These events, and many others, shaped our destiny and still affect our lives today.
And as I travel the country talking to fellow National Rifle Association members, gun owners, and Americans from all walks of life, it is clear to me that the next decisive date in American history will be November 6, 2012 – the day America must decide whether President Barack Obama deserves a second term in the White House.
I say this because so many Americans genuinely, and rightly, fear that something is deeply wrong in our great nation. We fear that the America we know and love is in danger of jumping the tracks and spiraling out of control. We see a President whose values and goals are, in many ways, the exact opposite of our beliefs and what generations of Americans have fought and died for.
This is why all gun owners and freedom-loving Americans must ask this question: “If Barack Obama wins a second term in office, will my freedom, and particularly my Second Amendment freedom, become more or less secure?”
And then, we must consider the facts.
Every one of President Barack Obama’s big decisions – on health care, foreign policy, and the economy – has been rooted in stripping away our freedom and replacing it with increased government control over our lives. And although Obama has held off challenging gun owners and the National Rifle Association directly, he has spent his first term in office setting the stage for a massive second term assault on our gun rights.
Already, Obama has begun to stack our federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, with anti-Second Amendment judges who will advance his gun-ban agenda. If he wins reelection, Obama could have the opportunity to tip the fragile balance of the Supreme Court to an anti-gun majority that will reverse the recent Heller and McDonald decisions that affirmed the Second Amendment as an individual right.
Obama has already reversed our country’s strong stance against the coming United Nations gun ban treaty. The U.N. will unveil this sovereignty-killing monster next summer, and Obama’s State Department has publicly declared that achieving a “legally binding Arms Trade Treaty” is a “fundamental policy commitment.” The gun-ban lobby has been working toward this treaty for nearly two decades, and now, they are closer than ever to their goal of controlling civilian firearms ownership worldwide.
Barack Obama falsely accused the United States of arming Mexican drug cartels, and even blamed our Second Amendment rights for Mexican drug crime and murder. Meanwhile, it was the Obama administration that illegally facilitated the transfer of thousands of guns to violent drug cartels in Mexico. To this day, the Obama administration continues to stonewall congressional investigators and hide the details related to its deadly “Fast and Furious” scandal.
In flagrant violation of our rule of law, Obama unilaterally imposed gun registration in four border states – requiring gun dealers to register the sales of any law-abiding citizen who purchases more than one semi-automatic rifle within one week.
And just one month ago, Obama’s Assistant Attorney General, Lanny Breuer, told the U.S. Senate that all Americans should be forced to register their guns. Breuer even hinted at a possible ban on many common handguns, hunting rifles and shotguns, claiming: “Very few hunters in the United States or sports people and law-abiding people really need to have semiautomatic weapons or long guns.”
There can be no question that the Second Amendment, as we know it, may cease to exist should Barack Obama win a second term in office.
This is why I’m asking every NRA member, every gun owner, and every patriotic American to view next year’s election through the lens of freedom. If we fail to draw a line in the sand and defend the future of our Second Amendment rights, then we will lose the one freedom that gives common men and women uncommon power to protect all freedoms. And then, it’s only a matter of time before every freedom in our Bill of Rights is scaled back, diluted or even destroyed.
Wayne LaPierre is the Executive Vice President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Rifle Association of America.
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This is offered for consideration only. I will not be defending this. I just thought the different view was worth the read.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/30/mexican_roulette
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This is offered for consideration only. I will not be defending this. I just thought the different view was worth the read.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/30/mexican_roulette
What a steaming pile of MSM product.
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This is offered for consideration only. I will not be defending this. I just thought the different view was worth the read.
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/08/30/mexican_roulette
What a steaming pile of MSM product.
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/12/06/video-us-approved-large-escalation-of-legal-gun-sales-to-mexico/
Watch the video and see how it guts the aformentioned pile of steaming MSM product.
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BD: I am super pressed for time due to catching up from my recent trip. May I ask you for a summary of the article's hypothesis?
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BD: I am super pressed for time due to catching up from my recent trip. May I ask you for a summary of the article's hypothesis?
Blame the gun lobby.
As I said, GM, you will get zero argument from me. I just found it and thought it should be read. Know your enemies (and their specific arguments).
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BD: I am super pressed for time due to catching up from my recent trip. May I ask you for a summary of the article's hypothesis?
Blame the gun lobby.
As I said, GM, you will zero argument from me. I just found it and thought it should be read. Know your enemies (and their specific arguments).
Copy BD. My fire was directed at the FP piece, not you. Your disclaimer was noted.
Crafty,
If Americans would just stop bitterly clinging to their guns, the ATF wouldn't have to arm the Mexican drug cartels.
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BD: I am super pressed for time due to catching up from my recent trip. May I ask you for a summary of the article's hypothesis?
Blame the gun lobby.
As I said, GM, you will zero argument from me. I just found it and thought it should be read. Know your enemies (and their specific arguments).
An even better synopsis. And sorry... I am not used to not being the object of the fire!!! :lol:
Copy BD. My fire was directed at the FP piece, not you. Your disclaimer was noted.
Crafty,
If Americans would just stop bitterly clinging to their guns, the ATF wouldn't have to arm the Mexican drug cartels.
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"An even better synopsis. And sorry... I am not used to not being the object of the fire!!!"
Hey, it's "Higher Consciousness through hard contact", even in the written format, right? :wink:
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"An even better synopsis. And sorry... I am not used to not being the object of the fire!!!"
Hey, it's "Higher Consciousness through hard contact", even in the written format, right? :wink:
Absolutely. And I genuinely appreciate our discussions... and the bruises.
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Oh goody, Sharyl Attkisson, who has done some of the best MSM Gunwalking reporting, now sets her sights on the State Department. One can only hope this trend continues. Anyone want to make book on what percentage of the "guns not submitted for trace" were funneled to Mexico by State? Wouldn't it be great if there was a memo somewhere that stated "please don't submit guns obtained through 'direct commercial sales' lest we have to end the program"?
Legal U.S. gun sales to Mexico arming cartels
By Sharyl Attkisson
(CBS News) Selling weapons to Mexico - where cartel violence is out of control - is controversial because so many guns fall into the wrong hands due to incompetence and corruption. The Mexican military recently reported nearly 9,000 police weapons "missing."
Yet the U.S. has approved the sale of more guns to Mexico in recent years than ever before through a program called "direct commercial sales." It's a program that some say is worse than the highly-criticized "Fast and Furious" gunrunning scandal, where U.S. agents allowed thousands of weapons to pass from the U.S. to Mexican drug cartels.
CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson discovered that the official tracking all those guns sold through "direct commercial sales" leaves something to be desired.
One weapon - an AR-15-type semi-automatic rifle - tells the story. In 2006, this same kind of rifle - tracked by serial number - is legally sold by a U.S. manufacturer to the Mexican military.
Three years later - it's found in a criminal stash in a region wracked by Mexican drug cartel violence.
That prompted a "sensitive" cable, uncovered by WikiLeaks, dated June 4, 2009, in which the U.S. State Department asked Mexico "how the AR-15" - meant only for the military or police - was "diverted" into criminal hands.
And, more importantly, where the other rifles from the same shipment went: "Please account for the current location of the 1,030 AR-15 type rifles," reads the cable.
There's no response in the record.
The problem of weapons legally sold to Mexico - then diverted to violent cartels - is becoming more urgent. That's because the U.S. has quietly authorized a massive escalation in the number of guns sold to Mexico through "direct commercial sales." It's a way foreign countries can acquire firearms faster and with less disclosure than going through the Pentagon.
Here's how it works: A foreign government fills out an application to buy weapons from private gun manufacturers in the U.S. Then the State Department decides whether to approve.
And it did approve 2,476 guns to be sold to Mexico in 2006. In 2009, that number was up nearly 10 times, to 18,709. The State Department has since stopped disclosing numbers of guns it approves, and wouldn't give CBS News figures for 2010 or 2011.
With Mexico in a virtual state of war with its cartels, nobody's tracking how many U.S. guns are ending up with the enemy.
"I think most Americans are aware that there's a problem in terms of the drug traffickers in Mexico, increases in violence," said Bill Hartung, an arms control advocate with the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy. "I don't think they realize that we're sending so many guns there, and that some of them may be diverted to the very cartels that we're trying to get under control."
The State Department audits only a tiny sample - less than 1 percent of sales - but the results are disturbing: In 2009, more than a quarter (26 percent) of the guns sold to the region that includes Mexico were "diverted" into the wrong hands, or had other "unfavorable" results.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation's Larry Keane, who speaks for gun manufacturers, said he understands the potential for abuse.
"There have been 150,000 or more Mexican soldiers defect to go work for the cartels, and I think it's safe to assume that when they defect they take their firearms with them," Keane told CBS News.
But Keane said the sales help the U.S.
"These sales by the industry actually support U.S. national security interests," Keane told Attkisson. "If they didn't, the State Department wouldn't allow them."
"Do they need better oversight?" asked Attkisson.
"It's certainly for the State Department and the Mexican government to try to make sure that the cartels don't obtain firearms that way," he replied. "But that's really beyond the control of the industry."
Mexico is now one of the world's largest purchasers of U.S. guns through direct commercial sales, beating out countries like Iraq. The State Department office that oversees the sales wouldn't agree to an interview. But an official has told Congress their top priority is to advance national security and foreign policy.
http://liten.be//jAOkC
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Oh goody, Sharyl Attkisson, who has done some of the best MSM Gunwalking reporting, now sets her sights on the State Department. One can only hope this trend continues. Anyone want to make book on what percentage of the "guns not submitted for trace" were funneled to Mexico by State? Wouldn't it be great if there was a memo somewhere that stated "please don't submit guns obtained through 'direct commercial sales' lest we have to end the program"?
I'd bet good money there is a memo like that just waiting to be discovered.
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Emails Show ATF Intended to Use ‘Fast and Furious’ to Promote Gun Control
Posted By Bryan Preston On December 7, 2011 @ 12:34 pm In Politics | No Comments
CBS’ Sharly Attkinson may force me to retire the CBS-Sauron photoshop I did in my Junkyardblog days. Her reporting has blazed the trail on Fast and Furious, and her latest story may seal the deal on just what that operation was really all about.
In Fast and Furious, ATF secretly encouraged gun dealers to sell to suspected traffickers for Mexican drug cartels to go after the “big fish.” But ATF whistleblowers told CBS News and Congress it was a dangerous practice called “gunwalking,” and it put thousands of weapons on the street. Many were used in violent crimes in Mexico. Two were found at the murder scene of a U.S. Border Patrol agent.
ATF officials didn’t intend to publicly disclose their own role in letting Mexican cartels obtain the weapons, but emails show they discussed using the sales, including sales encouraged by ATF, to justify a new gun regulation called “Demand Letter 3?. That would require some U.S. gun shops to report the sale of multiple rifles or “long guns.” Demand Letter 3 was so named because it would be the third ATF program demanding gun dealers report tracing information.
On July 14, 2010 after ATF headquarters in Washington D.C. received an update on Fast and Furious, ATF Field Ops Assistant Director Mark Chait emailed Bill Newell, ATF’s Phoenix Special Agent in Charge of Fast and Furious:
“Bill – can you see if these guns were all purchased from the same (licensed gun dealer) and at one time. We are looking at anecdotal cases to support a demand letter on long gun multiple sales. Thanks.”
“We’re going to use our own mandate to sell long guns to argue for more control over the sale of long guns.” Basically.
Several gun dealers who cooperated with ATF told CBS News and Congressional investigators they only went through with suspicious sales because ATF asked them to.
Sometimes it was against the gun dealer’s own best judgment.
Read the email
In April, 2010 a licensed gun dealer cooperating with ATF was increasingly concerned about selling so many guns. “We just want to make sure we are cooperating with ATF and that we are not viewed as selling to the bad guys,” writes the gun dealer to ATF Phoenix officials, “(W)e were hoping to put together something like a letter of understanding to alleviate concerns of some type of recourse against us down the road for selling these items.”
Read the whole thing. These emails seem to be the smoking gun (har har) proving that the intent of Fast and Furious was political — to weaken resistance to gun control, which we know that Obama told gun control advocates he was working on “under the radar.” And way outside the legislative process. The president, AG Holder and SecState Clinton were all making public statements blaming Mexico’s drug war violence on US gun laws while Fast and Furious was going on. It strains credulity to believe that there was no connection.
Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry is dead because of Fast and Furious. As many as 300 Mexicans may be dead because of FnF. And the Obama administration sealed the records of the investigation into Terry’s murder.
What we have here is a murder cover-up that likely reaches the president himself.
Maybe we need to re-think merely firing Eric Holder, and find a way to get him to turn state’s evidence on his crime boss.
h/t Ace
Article printed from The PJ Tatler: http://pjmedia.com/tatler
URL to article: http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2011/12/07/emails-show-atf-intended-to-use-fast-and-furious-to-promote-gun-control/
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Original CBS cited by GM above can be found here:
http://liten.be//7AAew
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From the TPI forum-- your thoughts on this BD? GM?:
Just musing here...but their is this wonderful writ called a mandamus I'd like to post about...
http://www.lectlaw.com/def2/m079.htm
The name of a writ, the principal word of which when the proceedings were in Latin, was mandamus, we command.It is a command issuing in the name of the sovereign authority from a superior court having jurisdiction, and is directed to some person, corporation, or, inferior court, within the jurisdiction of such superior court, requiring them to do some particular thing therein specified, which appertains to their office and duty, and which the superior court has previously determined, or at least supposes to be consonant to right and justice.Mandamus is not a writ of right, it is not consequently granted of course, but only at the discretion of the court to whom the application for it is made; and this discretion is not exercised in favor of the applicant, unless some just and useful purpose may be answered by the writ.This writ was introduced io prevent disorders from a failure of justice; therefore it ought to be used upon all occasions where the law has established no specific remedy, and where in justice and good government there ought to be one. Mandamus will not lie where the law has given another specific remedy.The 13th section of the act of congress of Sept. 24, 1789, gives the Supreme Court power to issue writs of mandamus in cases warranted by the principles and usages of law, to any courts appointed or persons holding office, under the authority of the United States. The issuing of a mandamus to courts, is the exercise of an appellate jurisdiction, and, therefore constitutionally vested in the supreme court; but a mandamus directed to a public officer, belongs to original jurisdiction, and by the constitution, the exercise of original jurisdiction by the supreme court is restricted to certain specified cases, which do not comprehend a mandamus. The latter clause of the above section, authorizing this writ to be issued by the supreme court to persons holding office under the authority of the United States, is, therefore, not warranted by the constitution and void.The circuit courts of the United States may also issue writs of mandamus, but their power in this particular is confined exclusively to those cases in which it may be necessary to the exercise of their jurisdiction.
Now...that's fallen into obscurity for the most part...
But I'm just thinking...
For shits & giggles, the NRA may want to, I duno...draft one of them and serve it on one Timothy Franz Geithner, demanding he follow up on International Emergency Economic Powers Act violations.
SecTres or his delagate would have to appear in Court and answer the Writ on the record, under oath. Or, at least, file a motion to dismiss and have that heard.
Win or loose, wouldn't that be kinda fun to see.
It's the kind of shitty, underhanded move I'd do if I was in the NRA's legal department just to make things uncomfortable for the Administration.
I'd do it by proxy that didn't have any link to the NRA, because all you'd need was a lawyer admitted in the DC bar, a marshal for service of process on the treasury and the filing fees...then staff to handle the response motions.
You know, another bit of distraction to keep the initiative going against them.
But.
That's me just thinking...
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"Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry is dead because of Fast and Furious. As many as 300 Mexicans may be dead because of FnF. And the Obama administration sealed the records of the investigation into Terry’s murder.
What we have here is a murder cover-up that likely reaches the president himself.
Maybe we need to re-think merely firing Eric Holder, and find a way to get him to turn state’s evidence on his crime boss."
Now I'm not excusing Fast and Furious, pretty stupid, nor am I excusing Holder, especially if he is covering up, I mean throw him to to wolves for all I care, I hate coverups, but I don't understand the vehemence and indignation on this matter. Does anyone really believe that if we hadn't sold the Cartel's these guns (I haven't followed the details closely of FnF) they wouldn't have found other guns to kill each other and the police? The Cartel's never seem to have a problem with guns or killing.
This forum in general strongly supports the individual's right to arm themselves. Further, few if any gun control laws are supported. Other countries that do have restrictive gun laws are criticized. "Guns don't kill people; people kill people" is the theme. And basically I agree; I mean it seems all the bad guys in LA have guns, why can't I? Most of us on this site probably own a gun and would be loath to give it up.
As I mentioned, I understand criticizing the stupidity and incompetence of Fast and Furious, and if there is a coverup that is worse, but I don't understand why "blood" is on anyone's hand except the man who pulled the trigger. If a bad guy shoots at me, I don't blame S&W or the gun dealer who sold him the gun; I blame the guy shooting at me. There is no "blood" on anyone's hand except the guy shooting at me and maybe me - hopefully not. :-)
What little I know, Fast and Furious seems like a very stupid idea. Especially in hindsight. But I doubt if one way or another it had an impact on the number of dead in Mexico. Or if you believe it did, aren't you indirectly saying that you support gun control?
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"But I doubt if one way or another it [a flood of cross-borders guns] had an impact on the number of dead in Mexico. Or if you believe it did, aren't you indirectly saying that you support gun control?"
I'll leave the question posed to others, but that thinking also explains our non-response to Iran for **building** explosive devices that killed hundreds or thousands American servicemen and women. They would have been blown up anyway.
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** update for clarity: knowingly supplying to enemies of the U.S. for the express purpose of killing hundreds or thousands of American servicemen and women.
I didn't mean to say merely the act of building devices.
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Ouch! :evil:
Still the answer to the question posed needs articulation.
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Ouch? :?
The subject is guns; a subject near and dear to many on this site.
Guns are legal here; I, including most on this site support the right to own arms. We even "suggest" that people buy guns.
Never do we blame the manufacturer or gun store/salesperson if someone dies. We blame the shooter.
Explosive devices? Hmmm bombs, WMD, rockets, missiles, tanks, etc. are illegal here; the analogy is irrelevant on many levels. Guns are a legal product.
If Mexico manufactured and shipped guns to LA; then thereafter, let's assume that these guns were then purchased by bad guys at gun shops. Would we blame Mexico? Of course not. Austria and Germany make some good guns; they ship thousands here every year. We don't blame them for our homicides. Or the store owner.
FnF was a stupid idea; probably not the last time stupid ideas are tried out. The coverup, if there is one, is inexcusable. But the only "blood" is on the hands of the shooter. Not the manufacturer or distributor of the gun.
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Going back to the foreignpolicy.com Mexican Roulette piece where bigdog wrote: "I will not be defending this" and GM wrote: "What a steaming pile of MSM product."
I am struck by statements like this in the piece:
"Let's start with the obscenely irresponsible laws that cover gun sales in America. For instance, anyone without a criminal record can legally purchase as many rifles and other long guns as they want in the United States."
I wonder what other exercising of constitutional rights is "obscenely irresponsible". You rarely hear that criticism against overuse of other freedoms like speech or religion. Only abortion comes to mind where the backers a 'right' want something that already kills a million a year to remain 'safe, legal and rare'.
Using a firearm to commit a crime is highly illegal in 50 states and federal law (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/18/3559.html). Conspiracy in that context I'm sure is similarly prohibited and punished. The export of firearms is a strictly governed activity: http://www.bis.doc.gov/licensing/exportsoffirearms.htm
It is not legal for me to knowingly supply a criminal operation or to knowingly export to anyone, shipped through anyone, without proper governmental authorization. The dead Mexicans and dead border agent scandal wasn't just a stupid idea. It is a felony, or more like an act of war, if you or I did it.
The article though, it seemed to me, was criticizing law-abiding gun ownership transfers, which are not the question here.
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Perhaps it isn't online maybe on Rush's website but Rush today has pointed out emails that prove he was right. Part of Fast and Furious was exactly about liberals trying to affect gun laws in the US. The libs thought the public outrage over people getting killed from the US guns would spark another round of public outcry for stricter gun laws.
Remember well the Prez is the guy who condescending opinion was "they cling to their guns and their religion".
The wagons are certainly circled. The ongoing investigation is leading to a coverup that may have only one recourse - impeachment proceedings.
OK Woodward where are you now?
I am not holding my breath.
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Ouch? :?
The subject is guns; a subject near and dear to many on this site.
Guns are legal here; I, including most on this site support the right to own arms. We even "suggest" that people buy guns.
Never do we blame the manufacturer or gun store/salesperson if someone dies. We blame the shooter.
Explosive devices? Hmmm bombs, WMD, rockets, missiles, tanks, etc. are illegal here; the analogy is irrelevant on many levels. Guns are a legal product.
If Mexico manufactured and shipped guns to LA; then thereafter, let's assume that these guns were then purchased by bad guys at gun shops. Would we blame Mexico? Of course not. Austria and Germany make some good guns; they ship thousands here every year. We don't blame them for our homicides. Or the store owner.
FnF was a stupid idea; probably not the last time stupid ideas are tried out. The coverup, if there is one, is inexcusable. But the only "blood" is on the hands of the shooter. Not the manufacturer or distributor of the gun.
Woof JDN,
You are using a false analogy here or rather an inaccurate comparison. True, someone that lawfully transfers a gun to someone else in a business transaction, and has no knowledge of or reason to suspect that the person will use it for wrong doing, can't be held accountable or even thought of as being responsible for the illegal acts of others. This situation is nothing like that. First, any law enforcement agency conducting a sting operation must ensure that their own officers and the public aren't put at undue risk. Secondly, they cannot commit illegal acts and break international laws in the process. Yes, they can lie and deceive but they can't aid and abet the smuggling of illegal arms into another country without the full cooperation and knowledge of the other nation. On top of that there is no evidence that these weapons where being tracked after they came into the hands of the cartels and many don't seem to have been tracked even after they left the gun store. Thirdly they knew without a doubt that these weapons were going to be put into the hands of violent cartels that had been murdering people by the thousands. Then finally, where are the arrests? At what point were they going to recover the guns and get the bad guys? You know, what was the end game, what was the point of the operation in the first place? If it wasn't to make arrests and put the people who were running guns in jail, then what the F was it for?
There is more to this than just covering up a little mistake, because none of this was a mistake. You don't accidentally put together an operation like this. They did this intentionally and it's not fully clear what their intent was or who all was involved in it's planning and execution. The American public, Mexico and the family of Brian Terry deserve to know every little detail. Our government agencies and the people put in charge of overseeing them have got to be held accountable for any wrongdoing or negligence of leadership on their watch. We entrust them with a great deal of power (our power), and it's up to us to make sure it's not used for their own corrupt purposes or mismanaged. This was not a business transaction, nor was it even a legitimate law enforcement sting operation. This was something else, and whatever it was, negligence or abuse of power, the people that put it together and their bosses are responsible for the consequences of the operation, even the unintended ones, so yes the blood is on their hands. However, as I have said before, I think there is little chance of justice actually being served because our Federal government has never been so corrupt and the powerful on both the Left and Right are going to protect eachother. They will fuss and fume and make a great noise while posturing in front of the cameras, then soon as something else grabs the publics attention they'll superficially investigate and come to prefabricated deadends, then payoff Mexico. There might be a head to roll, someone that will take the fall, but the real culprit's will skate as usual.
P.C.
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Well said PC.
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I agree, Prentice, you made some good points. However, as you imply I think it was a law enforcement sting operation gone bad. "Yes, they can lie and deceive but they can't aid and abet the smuggling of illegal arms into another country without the full cooperation and knowledge of the other nation.". Heck, we do that all the time around the world. Further, I'm not sure we don't have the knowledge (we don't need the full cooperation) of Mexico. As some have improperly implied, it wasn't a felony, nor was it an act of war. :? It was simply a sting operation gone bad; mostly I bet because the Mexican government didn't do their follow up part. Probably not the first time or last time. Nor will it be the first or last time communication between law enforcement departments broke down.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/04/fast-and-furious-bush-administration_n_1076148.html
Guns are designed to kill people. There is lots of blood in America from gun violence. Good people and violent people here in America buy guns. I own one and so do you. Except for minimal checks and balances, which even those the the NRA has fought, a gun shop will sell a gun to anyone. My point is it seems a bit hypercritical to complain about guns being sold in Mexico provided by us as a sting operation yet are sold legally across the counter here in America. As for import/export, many guns sold here are manufactured in foreign countries. The "blood" shed was caused by the shooter; NOT the weapon. Or if you truly believe the weapon caused the death, then perhaps we should ban guns in America? But I know you are not arguing that. Rather all the "shooters" in Mexico should be arrested.
Why there was no arrests, well I guess you have to ask the Mexican government why thousands of Cartel Members are still free and running around. As you ask, "Where are the arrests?".
Frankly, I don't know if or even why there is a cover up. If they simply said, "Yep, we sold 2000 guns in Mexico. It was a sting operation. We were trying to trace the guns to the cartels. It didn't work,
because their was a breakdown in communication (the Mexican's messed up) so we closed the sting." I don't think anyone would care.
There is no "crime" here; it's just a sting operation gone bad. Incompetence maybe/probably. But after the fact it's always easy to criticize.
Guns don't kill people, people kill people. In the line of duty, Terry was killed by a bad guy; where the gun that killed him was manufactured be it America, Germany or Austria is not particularly important. Until Mexico does something about the Cartels there will be more killing. Terry's blood is on the hands of the guy who shot him, no one else.
But no one likes a coverup. If there is a coverup, I'm all for going after the culprit. But I don't think many Americans think this is a big deal.
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JDN:
"It was simply a sting operation gone bad; mostly I bet because the Mexican government didn't do their follow up part."
NO, the point is PRECISELY that it was NOT a sting operation. A sting operation would have some effort at tracking the guns. Here there was NONE.
In posting the HuffPo piece you have fallen for an operation of the Progressive propaganda machine to confuse the issue with what happened during the Bush era. However a look at the facts will prove instructive:
It WAS an effort at a sting operation. There WAS an effort to track the guns. There WAS an effort to work with Mexican authorities and when they failed to show up to arrest the bad guys, the operation was SHUT DOWN. In all of these things OFF was the complete opposite.
An additional point is that existing measures to minimize gun sales to bad guys were having results. There were GUN STORE OWNERS who wer bringing this to the ATF's attention; indeed the ATF's behavior seemed so weird to them that they demanded written confirmation that the ATF wanted them to make these sales.
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Crafty, I'm not defending Fast and Furious. But it seems it was a sting operation, albeit poorly run. Perhaps our fault, but perhaps, given their poor track record, the Mexican's fault. As you point out, even during
the Bush area, there was an effort to work with the Mexicans, and yet they failed to arrest the bad guys. Perhaps that is where the blame is....
"Under Fast and Furious, begun in fall 2009, the ATF allowed illegal buyers to walk away with weapons in the hope that agents in Phoenix could track the guns and arrest cartel leaders."
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/08/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111009
My point however was not to defend FnF, or criticize the Bush effort. In retrospect FnF was poorly done, (as a side note, it's always easy to criticize and critique a law enforcement operation the day after). My point however is to point out that the "blood" is to be blamed on the shooter; not the weapon, a gun shop, or the ATF or the Justice Dept. or anyone else other than the shooter. "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" is almost a mantra on this and many other gun forums. And I agree. Somehow Mexico needs to arrest the shooters - they cause the blood. But don't blame the guns.
However, if there is now a coverup of some greater overall scheme, at this point I don't know why other than the sting wasn't successful, then we should get to the bottom of it.
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I think we all here agree that the guns themselves are not to blame, but I do directly contest your assertion, and that of the Left Angeles Times a.k.a. Pravda on the Beach that "But it seems it was a sting operation." In this particular case I speak with more than the dominant-around-here "attitude"; I directly emailed the LA Times reporter (quite politely I might add) with info showing her how Clinton, Holder, et al were misstating the facts with their assertions about 90% of the guns coming from US sales in the border regions. She answered me and we continued the conversation a bit with me bringing to her attention some of the material that was being developed here until it became apparent that she had an opinion that was not interested in being adjusted by the facts.
Perhaps in a Clintonian sense this is true it "seemed" it was a sting, but in point of fact IT WAS NOT and aspects of your most recent posts seem to have conflated this false meme with the point on which we do agree-- that it was not the fault of the guns.
There is one more point to make: Though the guns do not bear the blame, do not people who deliberately set guns out on paths that apparently INTENDED to fall into the hands of the bad guys in order to further their anti-gun political purposes bear substantial legal, moral, and spiritual blame?
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Gunwalker Goes ‘Legal’: Obama Admin Massively Increased Gun Sales to Mexican Military
More than a quarter of these guns ended up in cartel hands in 2009, yet the admin continued the sales program.
by
Bob Owens
December 8, 2011 - 10:44 am
Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News has posted a bombshell article detailing how the Obama administration has greatly increased gun sales to the Mexican military. But further investigation into Attkisson’s discovery points toward the padding of a gun-control statistic — one frequently mentioned by the Obama administration — as the motive behind the increased sales.
Writes Attkisson:
One weapon — an AR-15-type semi-automatic rifle — tells the story. In 2006, this same kind of rifle — tracked by serial number — is legally sold by a U.S. manufacturer to the Mexican military.
Three years later — it’s found in a criminal stash in a region wracked by Mexican drug cartel violence.
That prompted a “sensitive” cable, uncovered by WikiLeaks, dated June 4, 2009, in which the U.S. State Department asked Mexico “how the AR-15″ — meant only for the military or police — was “diverted” into criminal hands.
And, more importantly, where the other rifles from the same shipment went: “Please account for the current location of the 1,030 AR-15 type rifles,” reads the cable.
There’s no response in the record.
The problem of weapons legally sold to Mexico — then diverted to violent cartels — is becoming more urgent. That’s because the U.S. has quietly authorized a massive escalation in the number of guns sold to Mexico through “direct commercial sales.” It’s a way foreign countries can acquire firearms faster and with less disclosure than going through the Pentagon.
Perhaps the most interesting disclosure: the 1,030 weapons that were sold for use by the Mexican military were not military-grade weapons. The Mexican government was acquiring the AR-15, a semi-automatic firearm designed for the civilian market. Selective-fire weapons (which have the ability to fire either in fully automatic or semi-automatic) would be preferred by virtually any modern military force.
Why was the Mexican military buying commercial, off-the-shelf AR-15 rifles from the Obama administration via the State Department in record numbers? Writes Attkisson:
[The State Department] approve[d] 2,476 guns to be sold to Mexico in 2006. In 2009, that number was up nearly 10 times, to 18,709. The State Department has since stopped disclosing numbers of guns it approves, and wouldn’t give CBS News figures for 2010 or 2011.
With Mexico in a virtual state of war with its cartels, nobody’s tracking how many U.S. guns are ending up with the enemy.
…
The State Department audits only a tiny sample — less than 1 percent of sales — but the results are disturbing: In 2009, more than a quarter (26 percent) of the guns sold to the region that includes Mexico were “diverted” into the wrong hands, or had other “unfavorable” results.
If the audited sample is representative of the total, 26 percent of 18,709 — 4,864 guns — were diverted from the Mexican military to the cartels in one year, and the Obama administration apparently chose not to stop the program.
Does a logical reason exist for the administration to continue to approve such sales?
If the goal of Operation Fast and Furious was — as ATF agents have alleged under oath — to arm violent Mexican drug cartels, and the purpose of arming cartels was so guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico would be traced back to American sources, then the Direct Commercial Sales (DCS) route was an avenue to greatly increase the flow of traceable weapons into the hand of the cartels.
The DCS program is run from the U.S. State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls. It regulates and licenses private U.S. companies’ overseas sales of weapons and other defense materials, defense services, and military training.
This is different than the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) program, the Defense Department program mentioned by Attkisson in her article. The main distinctions between the two programs: FMS is government-to-government, while DCS is private-to-government and has fewer controls.
The DCS program appears to have been a much more effective way of arming the cartels than Operation Fast and Furious. DCS is legal.
When these DCS-obtained firearms are recovered at crime scenes, they are identified by Mexican authorities as being American by any number of distinguishing marks, though primarily by the manufacturer’s name etched in the lower receiver.
A weapon, once identified as being American in origin, has its serial number submitted to the ATF for tracing. The ATF runs the serial number, likely coming up with a “hit” confirming that the weapon in question was indeed of U.S. origin.
The weapon can then be used to pad the statistics of the 90-percent lie that President Obama, Attorney General Holder, and Secretaries Clinton and Napolitano have used to call for more gun control in the United States.
Operation Fast and Furious, perhaps the most incompetent and deadly law enforcement operation in U.S. history, occurred at the same time as the emerging “moneywalker” scandal, perhaps the most incompetent DEA drug money-laundering scheme in U.S. history, and at the same time as the Mexico DCS program, perhaps the most incompetently audited and controlled weapons purchase program in U.S. history.
Taken together, these concurrent pro-cartel developments do not look like coincidence. They look like policy.
Those controlling that policy from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue have a lot of accounting to do for the death and destruction they have caused and may still be contributing to in Mexico and along our southwest border.
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I'm glad we agree, it's not the fault of the guns. So we should agree then that if we sell guns legally and above board to and at the request of the Mexican Government; we have no culpability?
If in FACT FnF's only intention was to "further their anti-gun political purposes" then I agree, that is wrong. However, to my knowledge, absolutely no proof has been offered that to be the case. No offense, but that does seem like a rather bizarre, illogical and unsubstantiated accusation. I don't even get the connection.
You quoted, ""But it seems it was a sting operation." "Seems" is rather nebulous I admit - where is this word in the article? In the article I posted, written by Richard Serrano and contributed to by Tracy Wilkinson it stated, "Under Fast and Furious, begun in fall 2009, the ATF allowed illegal buyers to walk away with weapons in the hope that agents in Phoenix could track the guns and arrest cartel leaders."
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/oct/08/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20111009
A rather firm statement that the intent was to "track the guns and arrest cartel leaders". Nothing wrong with that. Sounds like a sting operation, albeit a rather poor and unsuccessful one. Especially if you have to depend upon the Mexican government to do the arresting. On that point, if Mexico is asking for more guns, we help them out and sell them more guns. They lose the guns. :-o Incompetence on the part of Mexico, yes, but hardly an anti-gun conspiracy here in America.
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Holder Testimony: Issa Attacks, Dems Push Gun-Control
Please do not let this post take your eye of the ball regarding the substance of my previous post!!!
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Rep. Darrell Issa demanded truth, while Attorney General Eric Holder parsed the definition of "lying."
by
Patrick Richardson
December 9, 2011 - 5:50 am
Accusations and counter-accusations flew at Thursday’s hearing of the House Judiciary Committee, as GOP lawmakers threatened Attorney General Eric Holder with everything from impeachment to contempt of Congress during testimony over Operation Fast and Furious. The operation allowed thousands of weapons to fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, resulting in the deaths of hundreds including U.S. federal agent Brian Terry.
Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa asked early in the hearing for Holder to testify under oath, and was told by Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith he refused. He said Holder received a letter reminding him of his responsibility to be truthful and was therefore “deemed” to be under oath.
Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) took Holder to task over the lack of disclosure by the Justice Department and over what Oversight and Issa would later term “systematic lying” by DOJ officials:
Do you think the buck stops with you?
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Lying to Congress is a federal felony. I don’t want to say you lied but what are you going to do to clean up the mess?
…
There is really no responsibility within the Justice Department. The thing is, if we don’t get to the bottom of this — and that requires your assistance on that — there is only one alternative that Congress has and it is called impeachment.
Holder used Clintonesque sentence parsing: he said the legal difference between lying and misleading was state of mind, and here there was no intent to lie. This comes on the heels of the DOJ’s unusual move just a few days ago of withdrawing a letter the DOJ earlier sent to Congress, claiming it was “misleading.” Weeks ago, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives Special Agent William Newell also admitted his testimony on Operation Fast and Furious “lacked completeness.”
Democrats, and indeed Holder, spent most of the hearing calling for more gun control. There was advocation for a regulation blocked by Republicans which would have required multiple purchases of long-guns to be reported to ATF in the four southwest border states. Said Howard Berman (D-CA):
[I have] heard a lot today, some of it quite unbelievably overblown. … Every day thousands of guns are smuggled across the border.
Maxine Waters (D-CA) — in what appeared to this writer to be a rehearsed moment — looked surprised when Holder told her there was no requirement for a federal firearms dealer to report the sale of 100 AK-47s. However, Holder admitted the example was “dramatic.”
Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA) asked Holder:
How many firearms are sold to al-Qaeda terrorists, to other convicted felons, to domestic violence perpetrators … to white supremacists” at “unregulated” gun shows?
Holder said he didn’t have those numbers but would “get them … after the hearing.”
Perhaps the greatest sparks of the day came when Issa questioned Holder. Issa took issue with what he considered a lack of candor and cooperation from Holder and DOJ, saying in his opening statement:
The president says he has full confidence in this attorney general. I have no confidence in a president who has confidence in this attorney general. … Mr. Attorney General, the blame must go to your desk.
Issa added that he did not believe DOJ was actually interested in finding out who murdered Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, whose murder was one of the precipitating factors in the current scandal:
They are not looking for who killed Brian Terry, but are more interested in maintaining plausible deniability.
Holder later claimed that there has been an indictment in the Terry murder case but said he could not comment further as the case was under court-ordered seal.
Issa expressed frustration at the difficulties inherent in getting Holder and his deputies to agree to testify before his committee.
Do I need to serve a subpoena on yourself, Lanny Breuer, and the other people under direct investigation by my committee? Or will you agree to come voluntarily in the January time frame before the committee?
Issa threatened Holder with contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over any documents generated after February of 2010. Issa asked Holder if he was aware he was potentially standing in contempt of Congress for refusing to release documents requested by the committee without giving a constitutional reason to have done so. Holder responded:
We will respond as other attorney’s general and other Justice departments have done.
Issa retorted:
John Mitchell responded that way too.
Mitchell was Richard Nixon’s AG during Watergate. Holder fired back by referring to the Joe McCarthy hearings:
As they said in the McCarthy hearings, have you no shame?
It was clear that Democrats and Holder were in damage control mode, trying to both salvage Holder and to use the operation to call for more gun control while blaming Republicans. Rep. Dan Lungren (R-CA), attacked this strategy:
You screwed up, you admit you screwed up, but don’t use your screw up as an attempt to extend your authority.
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Woof,
And they huff and they puff. :-P Oh and did you miss the first installment of Mexico's payoff? All those new guns they are getting. :evil:
P.C.
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Woof,
Upon futher reflection on the hearings I think there needs to be a new law. Since it is a felony to lie to Congress, shouldn't it be a felony for a setting member of Congress to lie to the American public? When someone tells a big fat lie such as referring to 'unregulated' gunshows during one of these hearings, shouldn't they go to jail? Gun shows are subject to and are regulated by all U.S. gun laws. If you are a gun dealer at your store or a gun show, you are required to have a Federal Firearms license and you must run a background check on any buyer through the F.B.I. system. If you are an individual making a private sale to another individual all Federal gun laws apply to that sale, regardless of whether you are in your livingroom at home or at a gun show. If you sell a firearm to someone you know is a felon, then you have broken the law. If a felon buys a firearm from an individual but lies and tells them that they can legally own a gun, then the felon is breaking the law. It's up to law enforcement to investigate and prosecute these crimes, no matter where they take place.These anti gun Congress members are deceiving the public on two counts. One is that gun shows are unregulated and the other is hiding their true agenda which is to make it illegal for a private citizen to sell a gun to another private citizen or hand down a weapon from one family member to the next generation.
Actually there is a third reason they brought this up during the hearing, they don't want to address the real issue of a dead Border Patrol Agent murdered by a gun not sold at a gun show, but instead by one that was allowed to 'walk'. They don't want to talk about that at all.
P.C.
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Woof,
October 14, 2011 8:19 AM PrintText "Grenade-walking" part of "Gunwalker" scandal
(CBS News) There's a new twist in the government's "gunwalking" scandal involving an even more dangerous weapon: grenades.
"Gunwalking" subpoena for AG Holder imminent
CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, who has reported on this story from the beginning, said on "The Early Show" that the investigation into the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF)'s so-called "Fast and Furious" operation branches out to a case involving grenades. Sources tell her a suspect was left to traffic and manufacture them for Mexican drug cartels.
Police say Jean Baptiste Kingery, a U.S. citizen, was a veritable grenade machine. He's accused of smuggling parts for as many as 2,000 grenades into Mexico for killer drug cartels -- sometimes under the direct watch of U.S. law enforcement.
For more on this investigation, visit CBS Investigates.
Law enforcement sources say Kingery could have been prosecuted in the U.S. twice for violating export control laws, but that, each time, prosecutors in Arizona refused to make a case.
Grenades are weapons-of-choice for the cartels. An attack on Aug. 25 in a Monterrey, Mexico casino killed 53 people.
Sources tell CBS News that, in January 2010, ATF had Kingery under surveillance after he bought about 50 grenade bodies and headed to Mexico. But they say prosecutors wouldn't agree to make a case. So, as ATF agents looked on, Kingery and the grenade parts crossed the border -- and simply disappeared.
Six months later, Kingery allegedly got caught leaving the U.S. for Mexico with 114 disassembled grenades in a tire. One ATF agent told investigators he literally begged prosecutors to keep Kingery in custody this time, fearing he was supplying narco-terrorists, but was again ordered to let Kingery go.
The prosecutors -- already the target of controversy for overseeing "Fast and Furious," wouldn't comment on the grenades case. U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke recently resigned and his assistant, Emory Hurley, has been transferred. Sources say Hurley is the one who let Kingery go, saying grenade parts are "novelty items" and the case "lacked jury appeal."
Attkisson added on "The Early Show" that, in August, Mexican authorities raided Kingery's stash house and factory, finding materials for 1,000 grenades. He was charged with trafficking and allegedly admitted not only to making grenades, but also to teaching cartels how to make them, as well as helping cartel members convert semi-automatic rifles to fully-automatic. As one source put it: There's no telling how much damage Kingery did in the year-and-a-half since he was first let go. The Justice Department inspector general is now investigating this, along with "Fast and Furious."
P.C.
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‘Fast and Furious’ Gets New Scrutiny
Issa to Interview Gun Sting Principal Again
By Jonathan Strong
Congressional investigators will get another crack at one of the Justice Department principals for Operation Fast and Furious, a weapons sting that has set up an oversight battle between Republicans and the Obama administration.
Dennis Burke, the former U.S. attorney for Arizona, will be interviewed by the office of Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) for the first time since an interview over the summer was cut short.
When Senate Judiciary ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) first asked the Justice Department about allegations that a gun-smuggling investigation on the Southwestern border allowed hundreds of assault weapons to escape into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, Burke denounced Grassley for even asking the question.
“What is so offensive about this whole project is that Grassley’s staff, acting as willing stooges for the gun lobby, have attempted to distract from the incredible success in dismantling [Southwest border] gun trafficking operations,” Burke told Justice Department lawyers who were preparing a response.
Pushing lawyers to “categorical[ly]” deny the allegations, Burke bristled when other officials raised the “risks” of an aggressive denial. “What risk?” Burke wrote to colleagues.
Grassley had questioned whether two AK-47s that had been found at the site of U.S. Border Agent Brian Terry’s murder had been tracked by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives’ investigation.
In fact, they had been. But Burke, in a Feb. 4 email, blasted Grassley’s office for “lobbing this reckless despicable accusation that ATF is complicit in the murder of a fellow federal law enforcement officer.”
The same day the email was sent, the Justice Department would send a letter to Grassley broadly denying that ATF investigations had allowed guns to “walk,” which means ending surveillance on guns suspected to be in transit to criminal networks.
Attorney General Eric Holder has since conceded the letter contained false information, and the letter was formally withdrawn by the Justice Department on Dec. 2.
“Any instance of so-called gunwalking was unacceptable. This tactic was unfortunately used as part of Fast and Furious,” Holder told Senators at a Nov. 8 Judiciary Committee hearing. “This should never have happened.”
Burke received frequent oral and written briefings from the operation’s lead prosecutor and from ATF officials heading it. Congressional investigators have asked whether Burke knew gunwalking tactics were being used at the time he told Justice Department lawyers to deny to Congress they were, and if not, how he could have been ignorant about them.
In an Aug. 18 transcribed interview, Burke opened by saying he was taking responsibility for Fast and Furious. “I’m not going to say mistakes were made. I’m going to say we made mistakes,” Burke said, according to a source close to the investigation.
He hinted at his role urging Justice Department lawyers to deny Fast and Furious allowed guns to walk, saying, “I regret that I was strident” when Grassley first contacted the Justice Department.
Burke said he didn’t have “full knowledge” of the investigation at the time the letter was sent and talked about how his “attitude” about the case had “evolved.”
Pressed repeatedly about what exactly he had learned since he urged the Justice Department to broadly deny guns were walked, Burke cited matters such as how long the case took and that there should have been more questions about “anecdote” from Fast and Furious that “occurred in Mexico.”
Unlike other officials, such as Kenneth Melson, the former head of ATF, Burke did not describe a process of learning that the investigation was allowing hundreds of assault weapons to escape to Mexican drug cartels.
Burke eventually asked to “come back to you on that” so he could “give it more thought.”
Today’s interview represents the continuation.
“These aren’t the answers you would anticipate from someone who was in the dark and had only recently come to learn about the outrages in Fast and Furious,” the source close to the investigation said.
A Dec. 7 “frequently asked questions” memo from Democrats on the House Oversight panel sent to Democratic staff and obtained by Roll Call asks whether Burke “approve[d]” of gunwalking in Fast and Furious.
“No, according to then-U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke,” the memo said, citing other portions of Burke’s Aug. 18 interview in which he denied approving the tactic’s use and said he did not “recall” knowledge of its use.
“Did you ever discuss with [ATF Special Agent-in-Charge William Newell] a deliberate tactic of non-interdiction to see where the weapons ended up? To see if they ended up with the [cartel] in Mexico?” Congressional investigators asked Burke.
“I do not recall that at all,” Burke said.
However, in January 2010, Burke was prompted by lawyers in his office to decide on two tactical approaches in Fast and Furious, according to documents released by the Justice Department on Oct. 31.
Emory Hurley, the lead prosecutor on Fast and Furious, discussed the approaches in a Jan. 5, 2010, memo about the main target of the case, Manuel Celis Acosta, who was suspected of trafficking more than 600 firearms to Mexico.
“In the past, ATF agents have investigated cases similar to this by confronting the straw purchasers and hoping for an admission that might lead to charges,” Hurley wrote. “Straw purchasers” are individuals who buy guns on behalf of gun traffickers.
Rather than use that approach, “Local ATF favors pursuing a wire[tap] and surveillance to build a case against the leader of the organization,” Hurley wrote.
Mike Morrisey, also from the Arizona U.S. attorney’s office, forwarded the memo to Burke via email and said, “local ATF is on board with our strategy but ATF headquarters may want to do a smaller straw purchaser case.”
Burke replied, “Hold out for bigger. Let me know whenever and w/ whomever I need to weigh-in.”
In an Oct. 21 memo prior to that correspondence, Hurley had written that “[a]gents have not purposefully let guns ‘walk.’”
Issa’s office has not yet interviewed Hurley.
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Deep kimchee.
It's a felony to lie to congress.
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In response to JDN above, where he asks if people should be held responsible for gun sales, my thought would be that, if it's in furtherance of criminal enterprise, of course they should. Straw purchases by private citizens are a serious matter: folks who make such purchases should be prosecuted. Curiously, those sorts of prosecutions are declining under the current administration.
Should a government provide guns in furtherance of criminal enterprise, it should be held accountable. A piece I posted earlier note that there are specific laws forbidding the State Department from making weapons sales that further drug cartel interests. If F&F turns out to have been designed to provide guns to nasty people who would then rack up a murder count traceable back to gun store-sold firearms it strikes me that there are several prosecutable offenses contained in that set of circumstances.
As that may be, the Feds have played pattycake with cartels more than once. You'd think they'd learn:
Feds Palling Around With Mexican Cartels
Posted by Juan Carlos Hidalgo
Two years ago the Washington Post reported that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency brought dangerous Mexican drug traffickers to the U.S. who, while continuing their criminal activities in Mexico and the U.S., also served as informants to the federal authorities in their war on drugs.
In June, Operation Fast and Furious came to light where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed suspicious straw-purchasers of firearms to buy weapons in the U.S. and smuggle them into Mexico. The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization. Overall, the ATF facilitated the purchase of hundreds of guns by Mexican cartels. Many were later found in crime scenes in Mexico, including one where a U.S. Border Patrol agent was assassinated.
On Sunday, the New York Times reported that the Drug Enforcement Agency has been laundering millions of dollars for Mexican cartels. The goal of the undercover mission is to follow the money all the way up to the top ranks of the criminal organizations. However, as the NYT notes, “So far there are few signs that following the money has disrupted the cartels’ operations and little evidence that Mexican drug traffickers are feeling any serious financial pain.”
So there we have it: in the name of the war on drugs, the federal government has provided safe havens to Mexican drug traffickers, facilitated their purchase of powerful firearms, and has even laundered millions of dollars for the cartels.
After spending millions of dollars toward fighting the drug war in Mexico, the United States has little to show for its efforts. It seems Washington is becoming more desperate each year to produce new leads and results. These three incidents display a stunning lack of foresight and borders on the federal government aiding the Mexican drug cartels, with little to show in return. The unintended consequences of these programs aimed at dismantling the cartels would be laughable were it not for the thousands that have died in Mexico’s drug related violence.
It is time for the United States to rethink the war on drugs and consider policies that will successfully undermine the Mexican drug cartels.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/feds-palling-around-with-mexican-cartels/
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Second post. The Washington Post's role in this passion play, as noted below, is particularly chilling.
One Year Ago, Holder's Operation Fast and Furious Came Undone
Terry's death stopped the star-crossed gun walking program.by Neil W. McCabe12/13/2011
Comments
Brian A. Terry
One year ago today, The Washington Post published its “Hidden Life of Guns” article exposing how under-regulated gun sales along the Mexican border were sending firearms into that country feeding its crime and instability.
The paper’s four-reporter team operated as full-partners of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives PR department receiving internal statistics, documents and even an interrogation video.
One of the two gun stores were correctly singled out by the Post: Lone Wolf in Arizona and Carter Country in Texas. But, one year later, we know it was for the wrong reasons.
It was on a Dec. 13 Houston's KRIV-TV news broadcast that the lawyer for Carter Country, responding to that morning's report in the Post, made the outrageous charge that agents from the BATFE actively encouraged reluctant Carter Country employees to sell weapons to suspected “straw purchasers.”
The charges were ignored by The Washington Post and everyone else, and would have stayed ignored, if not for the events of the following night.
During the overnight of December 14 into 15, an AK-47 sold to a straw purchaser with the blessing of the ATF at the Lone Wolf gun store was used in the firefight that cut down Border Patrol Agent Brian A. Terry.
Within a few hours, four men who fired upon Terry were wrapped up, while a fifth was tracked down the next day in a manhunt that included federal agents on horseback and in helicopters.
Within 24 hours of Terry’s death, federal officials had traced the AK-47 to Fast and Furious.
Behind the scenes, ATF and other federal agents aware of the gun walking program called Operation Fast and Furious, staged a mutiny and the operation was shut down.
In the next week, two cabinet officers visited Arizona, Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder Jr., for the funeral and Homeland Security Sec. Janet Napolitano, to meet with members of Terry’s special tactics unit, known as BorTac. Holder’s Justice Department oversees the BATFE and Napolitano’s department includes the Border Patrol.
By Napolitano’s December 18 visit, both she and Holder, who both were aware of Fast and Furious, knew that Terry was killed with a Fast and Furious AK-47. They were both fully briefed on Fast and Furious, and though the operation was still a secret, they had both touted in public speeches the overall program it was a part of called Operation Gun Runner.
Conceivably, Napolitano was even better informed than Holder because her former gubernatorial chief of staff Dennis K. Burke was the U.S. Attorney for the Arizona Department. It is fair to guess, that Burke briefed his former boss, who sponsored his appointment.
Burke was a useful part of the Fast and Furious cover-up and damage control. After waiting more than two weeks to charge the men who killed Terry, he charged them with unrelated gun violations. This move allowed him to deny Terry’s parents' request for victims-of-crime rights. Under federal law, victims of crimes are afforded special briefings about the progress of investigations and prosecutions.
Burke also saw to it that the Terry case was sealed and all press relations were handled through the local FBI office that he controlled rather than through Border Patrol public information officers.
One year later, the Post has published the obligatory articles about Fast and Furious, and the various hearings and shuffling of personnel. But, it may not get the Pulitzer it was gunning for when it launched its blowout expose on the wrong side of the story.
The poor Carter County clerk, whose indictment for facilitating illegal guns sales the paper celebrated as validation of its crusade, had all charges dismissed—lest he explain in court what really happened.
Holder and Napolitano have weathered the storm and still enjoy the confidence and support of the President. But, Burke has resigned and awaits what other shoes may drop.
One year ago today, we had no idea that the Obama administration was funneling guns to Mexico at the same time it blamed under-regulated gun sales for destabilizing our neighbor to the south. We have learned many of the details in the last year, but there is still so much that does not make sense or add up.
Most troubling of all, if Terry knew the full extent of what his government was doing, the 6-foot, 4-inch former Marine and Iraq veteran might have had a better chance.
Neil W. McCabe is the editor of Guns & Patriots. McCabe, was a reporter and photographer at The Pilot, Boston's Catholic newspaper for several years. An Army reservist, he served 14 months in Iraq as a combat historian. Follow him on Twitter
http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48088
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BBG, A little further up the thread I wrote: "It is not legal for me to knowingly supply a criminal operation...a felony...if you or I did it."
Only to have 'someone' twist it beyond recognition: "As some have improperly implied, it wasn't a felony..." for the government to run a sting operation". Clearly nothing to do with what I wrote. Then to compare ** selling legally with no knowledge of supplying a criminal operation, with knowingly supplying a criminal operation and a foreign civil war that we all should know will go wrong... Suffice it to say, invest your time in straw, circular and backwards arguments at your own risk. For me, it spoils the fun.
** "My point is it seems a bit hypercritical to complain about guns being sold in Mexico provided by us as a sting operation yet are sold legally across the counter here in America."
It is not legal for citizens or gun dealers to knowingly seek out and supply a criminal operation across the counter here in America, as the government apparently did in this operation. What a bunch of excrement.
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It's not "excrement", its fact; the government can and did do a sting operation that went bad. Perfectly "legal". No one of intelligence has questioned that. :-o To compare private citizens to government sting operations is "excrement". Stings happen all the time. The ATF wanted to track the guns. The DEA is trying to track the dollars. A police officer will offer to sell narcotics to catch a criminal for example. Obviously, private citizens can't do that either.
As BbyG has pointed out,
"In June, Operation Fast and Furious came to light where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed suspicious straw-purchasers of firearms to buy weapons in the U.S. and smuggle them into Mexico. The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization. Overall, the ATF facilitated the purchase of hundreds of guns by Mexican cartels. Many were later found in crime scenes in Mexico, including one where a U.S. Border Patrol agent was assassinated.
On Sunday, the New York Times reported that the Drug Enforcement Agency has been laundering millions of dollars for Mexican cartels. The goal of the undercover mission is to follow the money all the way up to the top ranks of the criminal organizations. However, as the NYT notes, “So far there are few signs that following the money has disrupted the cartels’ operations and little evidence that Mexican drug traffickers are feeling any serious financial pain.”
After spending millions of dollars toward fighting the drug war in Mexico, the United States has little to show for its efforts. It seems Washington is becoming more desperate each year to produce new leads and results. These three incidents display a stunning lack of foresight and borders on the federal government aiding the Mexican drug cartels, with little to show in return. The unintended consequences of these programs aimed at dismantling the cartels would be laughable were it not for the thousands that have died in Mexico’s drug related violence.
It is time for the United States to rethink the war on drugs and consider policies that will successfully undermine the Mexican drug cartels."
Frankly, I have no idea how to solve the "war on drugs". It's not easy. Nor does our government, be it republicans or democrats, know how to "solve" the problem. Then again, I don't know how to solve the
war on crime here in America. It is very easy for a criminal to purchase weapons, yet all attempts to tighten and restrict sales are met with opposition by the gun lobby. Again, I don't know the answer. And as
long as the bad guys can easily get guns, I'm going to have one too.
However, in contrast to this perfectly legal sting operation, IF there is a coverup, and/or the operation was done for political reasons, rather than law enforcement reasons, then it should be investigated and if true, the perpetrators should be brought to justice.
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It's not "excrement", its fact; the government can and did do a sting operation that went bad. Perfectly "legal". No one of intelligence has questioned that. To compare private citizens to government sting operations is "excrement". Stings happen all the time. The ATF wanted to track the guns. The DEA is trying to track the dollars. A police officer will offer to sell narcotics to catch a criminal for example. Obviously, private citizens can't do that either.
Please explain how this "sting" was supposed to have worked.
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Beats me how this sting was suppose to have worked; ask the ATF who ran the sting; they are the experts. But then I bet a lot of stings don't work out as planned. Even routine narcotic stings.
"In June, Operation Fast and Furious came to light where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed suspicious straw-purchasers of firearms to buy weapons in the U.S. and smuggle them into Mexico. The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization. Overall, the ATF facilitated the purchase of hundreds of guns by Mexican cartels."
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"Beats me how this sting was suppose to have worked"
Exactly.
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Jeepers, maybe everyone who favors limiting second amendment protections by any means at hand calls this false flag operation a "sting" because they don't want the general public to know it's really a false flag operation. Too bad they were so ham fisted about it.
Be that as it may, giving criminals money with which to buy guns to give to other, violent, criminals so that they use those guns in numerous crimes including 300 murders that can then be blamed on American gun stores as an opening gambit to subvert the second amendment is not only many kinds of criminal act, but can be construed as an act of war. Any other conclusion is equivocation of the rankest sort.
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Tis a truly scary thought, but BINGO. IMHO BBG has spoken the Truth.
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Tis a truly scary thought, but BINGO. IMHO BBG has spoken the Truth.
Yes, it truly is a scary thought, but BINGO? :?
To my knowledge, no FACTS have come out to prove this is a "false flag operation". Conjecture, hyperbole and wishful thinking is one thing. But facts.... Any facts anyone?
That said, frankly I don't understand why it would even affect gun control in America. I mean 10's of thousands of Mexicans have already been gunned down
by the Cartels. What's a few hundred more guns that frankly/obviously given the death count, could have been bought elsewhere? Surely if it was a "false
flag operation" to promote gun control in America they could have done better. Frankly, and sadly, no one cares in America about the huge death toll in Mexico. I truly doubt
if it would even affect gun control in America one way or another.
But facts. Everyone agrees the ATF "sting" went bad. But I bet a lot of stings go bad. I think even GM would agree, it's easy to criticize law enforcement after the the fact. Although
I agree with his point, it wasn't the best plan I've ever heard. :-)
Criminal act? I suppose selling drugs is a "criminal act" but somehow the DEA does it undercover. As BbyG's article pointed out, the DEA launder's money, but that is illegal too. Still,
I doubt if they will be arrested. Somehow it's "legal". An "act of war"? Gee, I don't hear Mexico declaring an "act of war". That's pretty silly. In contrast, Mexico is considering doing the same to track weapons.
Radical steps need to be taken to stop the Cartels; but all ideas don't work. No one seems to have the solution.
Odd, given I'm the "liberal" that I'm the one defending the ATF. But as been pointed out elsewhere, unless the facts to the contrary come out, the "conclusion" is that
it was a sting gone bad - even BbyG's post said the same. Shit happens. I'ld like to think all law enforcement actions work out perfectly, but that's not reality.
That said, IF there is a coverup, or if there was a political, i.e. gun control motivation, and there is PROOF, then let the chips fall. But please, don't call this a "limiting second amendment"
issue without any proof. It is a "scary THOUGHT", but to date, it is only a "thought" but that "conclusion" does it even resemble the proven TRUTH...
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Please post all the facts for us to review. In the meantime, if you don't enjoy participating in the conjecture while we wait for the facts, have you considered staying off the thread?
This is the rambling of a guy who had a putdown today for other people's intelligence:
Yes, it truly is a scary thought, but BINGO? :?
To my knowledge, no FACTS have come out to prove this is a "false flag operation". Conjecture, hyperbole and wishful thinking is one thing. But facts.... Any facts anyone?
That said, frankly I don't understand why it would even affect gun control in America. I mean 10's of thousands of Mexicans have already been gunned down
by the Cartels. What's a few hundred more guns that frankly/obviously given the death count, could have been bought elsewhere? Surely if it was a "false
flag operation" to promote gun control in America they could have done better. Frankly, and sadly, no one cares in America about the huge death toll in Mexico. I truly doubt
if it would even affect gun control in America one way or another.
But facts. Everyone agrees the ATF "sting" went bad. But I bet a lot of stings go bad. I think even GM would agree, it's easy to criticize law enforcement after the the fact. Although
I agree with his point, it wasn't the best plan I've ever heard. :-)
Criminal act? I suppose selling drugs is a "criminal act" but somehow the DEA does it undercover. As BbyG's article pointed out, the DEA launder's money, but that is illegal too. Still,
I doubt if they will be arrested. Somehow it's "legal". An "act of war"? Gee, I don't hear Mexico declaring an "act of war". That's pretty silly. In contrast, Mexico is considering doing the same to track weapons.
Radical steps need to be taken to stop the Cartels; but all ideas don't work. No one seems to have the solution.
Odd, given I'm the "liberal" that I'm the one defending the ATF. But as been pointed out elsewhere, unless the facts to the contrary come out, the "conclusion" is that
it was a sting gone bad - even BbyG's post said the same. Shit happens. I'ld like to think all law enforcement actions work out perfectly, but that's not reality.
That said, IF there is a coverup, or if there was a political, i.e. gun control motivation, and there is PROOF, then let the chips fall. But please, don't call this a "limiting second amendment"
issue without any proof. It is a "scary THOUGHT", but to date, it is only a "thought" but that "conclusion" does it even resemble the proven TRUTH...
[/quote]
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Everyone agrees the ATF "sting" went bad. But I bet a lot of stings go bad. I think even GM would agree, it's easy to criticize law enforcement after the the fact. Although
I agree with his point, it wasn't the best plan I've ever heard.
There is a difference between informed and uninformed criticism of law enforcement. I object to the uninformed kind. When I first saw articles on "Gunwalker" I was expecting that it was a typical uninformed attack on law enforcement. The more information that came to light, including an extensive paper trail and ATF whistleblowers, the clearer it became this was no "sting gone wrong".
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That said, frankly I don't understand why it would even affect gun control in America. I mean 10's of thousands of Mexicans have already been gunned down
by the Cartels. What's a few hundred more guns that frankly/obviously given the death count, could have been bought elsewhere? Surely if it was a "false
flag operation" to promote gun control in America they could have done better. Frankly, and sadly, no one cares in America about the huge death toll in Mexico. I truly doubt
if it would even affect gun control in America one way or another.
Woof JDN,
Really??? Come off it man.
P.C.
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Please post all the facts for us to review. In the meantime, if you don't enjoy participating in the conjecture while we wait for the facts, have you considered staying off the thread?
Actually, I'm the one waiting for facts, ANY facts to support this hilarious 2nd Amendment conspiracy conjecture. In contrast, to date, the only fact is that it's a sting gone bad, albeit poorly planned and poorly executed. And, since people died, there does seem to be a coverup - not good. Then again, if the DEA did a narcotic sting and it went bad and people died, there might be an attempt to cover it it up too. People like to cover up their mistakes, but that often comes back to bite them. But I doubt if there is some greater underlying conspiracy here.
But I agree, nothing wrong with "participating in conjecture while you wait for the facts". Actually, I've done that a few times; participated in conjecture and then the facts proving my point did come out. Remember Doug? :-D
I'm STILL waiting for any opposing FACTS on this matter. Call the operation(s) really stupid, tragic, but please don't call the ATF's actions or the DEA's actions "illegal" or that it was an "act of war".
The "facts" to date are....
In June, Operation Fast and Furious came to light where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed suspicious straw-purchasers of firearms to buy weapons in the U.S. and smuggle them into Mexico. The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization. Overall, the ATF facilitated the purchase of hundreds of guns by Mexican cartels. Many were later found in crime scenes in Mexico, including one where a U.S. Border Patrol agent was assassinated.
On Sunday, the New York Times reported that the Drug Enforcement Agency has been laundering millions of dollars for Mexican cartels. The goal of the undercover mission is to follow the money all the way up to the top ranks of the criminal organizations. However, as the NYT notes, “So far there are few signs that following the money has disrupted the cartels’ operations and little evidence that Mexican drug traffickers are feeling any serious financial pain.”
So there we have it: in the name of the war on drugs, the federal government has provided safe havens to Mexican drug traffickers, facilitated their purchase of powerful firearms, and has even laundered millions of dollars for the cartels.
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You quote my question and then don't answer it. I can only go backwards and circular to answer yours - again. I assume that is your intent.
As far as the times we engaged and you were proven right, scratching my small brain, nothing comes to mind. I suppose you are remembering your claim of no damage to the French supermarket ransacked by 'free speech', Israel's non-existent right to exist, Huntsman's two terms, NOAA is a third grade blogger, or that mid-level ATF administrators can declare war in Mexico without congressional approval. Now this:
"no one cares in America about the huge death toll in Mexico."
Excrement that never ends (hint to moderator). JDN, speak for your f'g self.
You prefer the term liberal to internet troll but you have neither proven that you are the former nor proven you are not the latter.
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JDN:
As best as I can tell, we have done a rather strong job of collecting evidence that the government sent guns
(somehow the original number of 2,000-2,500 keeps getting massaged downward, now into "hundreds") out the door unsupervised. Therefore it was NOT a sting. Turning weapons loose with the hope and purpose that they wind up in bad guys hands doing bad things is NOT a sting. It is a vile and morally deranged act.
Your continued pretense otherwise is a key ingredient to the frustrations with you being expressed here.
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Hmmm I'm not confused; rather I quoted a piece that BbyG posted saying that it was a "Sting". It's not my words. The same article said the DEA was laundering money for the Cartels; that too is also perhaps wrong, but the theory is that the means justifies the end. IMHO the war on drugs is a losing war.
Further, while you and others have been "collecting evidence", no "evidence" to date indicates anything illegal was done nor did anyone, much
less the ATF "declare war in Mexico". Even the Mexican government hasn't said that. Conjecture and innuendo is not "evidence". Even if there
was/is a coverup, it's only evidence of a coverup, that's wrong of course, but it's not evidence of previous wrongful or illegal action by the ATF.
As for Doug, "scratching (his) small brain" I am happy to point out, again, the errors of his past logic, but he doesn't seem to want to listen.
I too agree FnF was "a vile and morally deranged act". It never should have been done. But then I question many "sting" operations.
That said, regarding FnF, let's see if any facts or "evidence" comes out, or if criticism of illegal wrongdoings remains only "conjecture" and political
posturing.
As for me, I'm happy to move on; the subject really isn't that important to me. Nor to most Americans.
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Woof JDN,
First you claim that Americans aren't concerned about the thousands of murders taking place in Mexico and now you want Americans to ignore one of our government agency's that has help facilitate some of those deaths as well as the death of one of our Border Patrol agents. If it was a mistake, do you want it to happen again? If people do ignore it, that will almost guarantee it will happen again. If it was a legit sting that was botched by some kind of half ass political play and interference from the Administration, don't you think something like that should be ferreted out? Do you think people inside this Administration and the government are going to do that without any pressure from We the People? Of course not. You're an intelligent guy but some of your post's aren't congruent enough for anyone to nail down what your viewpoint is and they leave some of us feeling somewhat schizophrenic in trying to figure out how or even what to respond to. I think you are conflicted on various points of the issue and need to work those out for yourself. I'm not attacking you or telling you what to think but I believe you have some important points to make and once you reslove and more precisely define how you feel about them I think you'll find that you are not as embattled here by the other poster's as it seems right now. I think part of what you are saying is that you don't want this to turn into a political witchhunt if in fact it was just an operation they lost control of, and you also seem to be saying even if there was some failings by higher ups no one really has the moral high ground to beat them over the head with it because stuff like this happens all the time regardless of who's in office and there is little if any evidence of intentional wrong doing so far. On the other hand you accuse and lament that American's don't care about what happens in Mexico but at the same time they should ignore this story and not be concerned about the reasoning or motovations that went into this operation that violated Mexico's sovereignty and adds to the violence of the cartels against eachother and innocent citizens, then you say it's awful and terrible that this happened. So right now what I'm getting from all this is that: It's bad that this happened, American's are heartless, there's no evidence it was politically motivated even though it involved illegal guns being moved across the border, which is a political hot topic of this Administration and an issue they have been using as a reason for more gun control but none of that should be looked at, and no one should be held accountable if it was a mistake and American's shouldn't care if it was a mistake or not. :roll:
P.C.
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Prentice, you post was a little circuitous, but you made some good points.
First, I would like to say I do support the 2nd Amendment. And frankly, I've learned a lot about guns from your posts and links. So I'll try to answer.
In response to your comment, I do not believe America is heartless; frankly, I think our heart if anything is too big. But thousands of people are dying in Mexico due to a drug war we indirectly support (we are the number 1 customer). I'm not sure what to do, nor does even Mexico know what to do. But it's a drug war, therefore I don't think most American's are deeply concerned versus if it was an earthquake or natural
disaster that killed the same number of people. Frankly, if you look at the news here in America, deaths in Mexico is a non item. News gravitates towards interest, ergo....
"I think part of what you are saying is that you don't want this to turn into a political witchhunt if in fact it was just an operation they lost control of, and you also seem to be saying even if there was some failings by higher ups no one really has the moral high ground to beat them over the head with it because stuff like this happens all the time regardless of who's in office and there is little if any evidence of intentional wrong doing so far."
I couldn't have said it better myself. :-) although I might add that discipline should be considered for those who conceived this crazy idea. Maybe put them on paid administrative leave. That seems to be the typical punishment for judgment errors.
As for gun control, maybe I don't understand the direct connection, but I don't think most Americans do either. Are you saying that if the ATF illegally shipped hundreds maybe a couple of thousand guns across the border, and they are used by the Cartels to kill people, mind you, the same Cartels have already killed 10's of thousands of people before we ever did this "sting", that America will be more prone to favor gun control here in America? I don't get the connection. This seems like the most convoluted way to sway support for gun control legislation that I have ever heard of. It doesn't make sense. But enlighten me.
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Woof,
The short answer is because those guns were counted as illegal guns that were traced back to America and those numbers were used to call for more gun control laws and restrictions in the U.S.
P.C.
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and the data was presented in such a dishonest way that when confronted about it, the officials in question had to back off, even as they sedulously worked to spread the false meme throughout the Pravdas.
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Oy fg vey :roll:
Attorney General Eric Holder accused his growing chorus of critics of racist motivations in a Sunday interview published in the New York Times. When reached by The Daily Caller Monday morning, the Department of Justice provided no evidence to support the attorney general’s claims.
Holder said some unspecified faction — what he refers to as the “more extreme segment” — is driven to criticize both him and President Barack Obama due to the color of their skin. Holder did not appear to elaborate on who he considered to make up the “more extreme segment.”
“This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him,” Holder said, according to the Times. “Both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we’re both African-American.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/12/19/ju...#ixzz1h0b3COgg
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Oy fg vey :roll:
Attorney General Eric Holder accused his growing chorus of critics of racist motivations in a Sunday interview published in the New York Times. When reached by The Daily Caller Monday morning, the Department of Justice provided no evidence to support the attorney general’s claims.
Holder said some unspecified faction — what he refers to as the “more extreme segment” — is driven to criticize both him and President Barack Obama due to the color of their skin. Holder did not appear to elaborate on who he considered to make up the “more extreme segment.”
“This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him,” Holder said, according to the Times. “Both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we’re both African-American.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/12/19/ju...#ixzz1h0b3COgg
S'ok, ever time they play that card, it means less and less.
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Woof,
Holder's record on gun control:
Tags: holder | gun | control Eric Holder Was a Gun Control Nightmare
Friday, 21 Nov 2008 11:03 AM
By Jim Meyers
Barack Obama’s nomination of Eric Holder for attorney general will not sit well with advocates of Second Amendment rights — Holder has consistently championed stronger gun-control measures.
As deputy attorney general in the Bill Clinton administration from 1997 to 2001, Holder “was a strong supporter of restrictive gun control,” according to The Volokh Conspiracy, a Web site that focuses on the legal system and the courts.
He advocated federal licensing of handgun owners, a three-day waiting period on handgun sales, rationing handgun sales to no more than one per month, banning possession of handguns and so-called "assault weapons" by anyone under age 21, a gun show restriction bill that would have given the federal government the power to shut down all gun shows, and national gun registration.
“He also promoted the factoid that ‘Every day that goes by, about 12, 13 more children in this country die from gun violence’ — a statistic that is true only if one counts 18-year-old gangsters who shoot each other as ‘children,’” noted the Web site, founded by law professor Alexander Volokh.
After the 9/11 attacks, Holder wrote an opinion piece for The Washington Post arguing that a new law should give "the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms a record of every firearm sale." He also said prospective gun buyers should be checked against the secret "watch lists" compiled by various government entities.
Earlier this year, Holder — who would become the first African-American attorney general — co-signed an amicus brief in support of the District of Columbia’s ban on all handguns and on the use of any firearm for self-defense in the home.
Holder also played a key role in the snatching of 6-year-old Cuban Elian Gonzalez from his Miami relatives’ home in April 2000, according to the Web site. Gonzalez was to be sent to Cuba where his father lived.
Although a photo clearly showed a federal agent pointing a gun at the man who was holding the terrified child, Holder claimed that the federal agents sent to capture Gonzalez had acted "very sensitively."
David Kopel, author of the Volokh Conspiracy report, observed: “If Mr. Holder believes that breaking down a door with a battering ram, pointing guns at children (not just Elian), and yelling ‘Get down, get down, we'll shoot’ is an example of acting ‘very sensitively,’ his judgment about the responsible use of firearms is not as acute as would be desirable for a cabinet officer who would be in charge of thousands and thousands of armed federal agents, many of them paramilitary agents with machine guns.”
Eric Holder: Gun GrabberBy: John Lott
FoxNews.com | Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Despite a huge Democratic Senate majority, Eric Holder’s confirmation hearings are going to be difficult. He has a long record to defend. Whether it is his involvement and inconsistent statements about Bill Clinton’s pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich’s or his pushing Clinton’s clemency of the FALN terrorists or his failure to disclose his work for troubled Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich after Blagojevich's legal problems surfaced, he faces tough questions.
But Holder’s nomination raises other questions about what President-elect Barack Obama claimed he believed during the campaign. Numerous times he promised that he supported an individual’s right to own guns and that he wouldn’t do anything to take away people’s guns.
Just last year in a brief to the Supreme Court, Holder argued that “the Second Amendment did not protect an individual right to keep and bear arms,” that it only protected government militias’ rights to guns. He claimed that the Second Amendment posed no obstacle to implementing gun bans.
I can’t find even one gun control law that Holder has opposed. On every gun control regulation he has discussed, he has been supportive, including: bans, raising the age that someone can possess a gun, registration and licensing, one-gun-a-month limit on purchases, and mandatory waiting periods.
Even more troubling, while Holder served in the Clinton Justice Department, he oversaw the background check system, but he has never been asked to explain why the system broke down so consistently while he ran it.
The constant breakdowns of "instant" background-check systems during the Clinton administration halted gun sales for hours or even days at a time, costing stores untold sales and additional costs. Even by the end of the Clinton administration, from September 1999 to December 2000, the system was down about one hour for every 16.7 hours of operation. The breakdowns often came in big blocks of time, the worst during a period covering 60 business hours during two weeks in the middle of May 2000. During his tenure, gun shows sometimes found that they couldn’t sell guns during the entire weekend that they were open.
Try running a business where you face random shutdowns and neither customers nor sellers are ever informed of how long outages are expected to last. In addition to the government-imposed fees on gun sellers and the regulatory harassment of gun sellers with no evidence that these policies have reduce crime, it is not surprising that the number of gun dealers has plummeted by over 80 percent since 1992.
The breakdown in background checks, which had been a problem for years under the Clinton administration, magically fixed itself within weeks of President Bush assuming office in 2001, and the problems have not recurred.
What few realize is the huge power that the attorney general has to make legitimate gun selling very difficult without any new laws or regulations having to be passed. This is even more important now than it was under the Clinton administration, as the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms has recently moved from the Treasury Department to the Justice Department.
I always questioned Obama’s claims and argued that up until the presidential campaign his whole career had supported gun bans, but there was no lack of politicians and advisers who attested to Obama’s sincerity on the issue. Obama and his campaign constantly tried to explain away his past support for gun control as being mistakes by subordinates who had incorrectly explained his positions.
Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, a Democrat, promised reporters last August about Obama: “He ain't going to take your gun away. He ain't ever going to take your gun away.” Joe Biden made similar statements while campaigning in places such as rural southwest Virginia. An Obama adviser, Stanford law professor Larry Lessig, said on Hugh Hewitt's national radio show last fall that "I think that he has always been an individual rights person on the Second Amendment." Another adviser, Professor Cass Sunstein at Harvard, told Time Magazine in June: "Obama has always expressed a belief that the Second Amendment guarantees a private right to bear arms." The list goes on. It was a constant theme of the campaign.
Just before the November election, the Los Angeles Times questioned the honesty of those who questioned Obama’s stand on guns, because "Obama does not oppose gun rights. He has made a point of pounding this home to rural audiences, telling them he has no intention of taking their guns away: not their shotguns, not their handguns, not anything."
There are few such issues that the Obama campaign promised over and over again during the campaign.
Holder’s nomination suggests this promise was not serious. And it also suggests that Obama won’t appoint judges who believe it either. With Appeals Courts around the country already facing Second Amendment cases and a very closely divided Supreme Court likely to rehear the issue, the judges Obama will appoint could easily reverse last year’s Supreme Court decision striking down the D.C. gun, a decision that he claims to support.
P.C.
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Dennis Burke And Gun Control
The fallout from Operation Fast and Furious cost Dennis Burke his position as the U.S. Attorney for the District of Arizona back in August.
More recently, in the Friday e-mail dump that preceded Attorney General Eric Holder's appearance before the House Judiciary Committee, an email from Burke expressed his anger at Sen. Chuck Grassley and his staff over their investigation into Operation Fast and Furious. He called them "willing stooges for the Gun Lobby." His e-mail went on to say:
Quote:
No commentary by Grassley on the lax laws, nor greedy gun shop owners, nor careless straw purchasers, and not boo about the evil gun traffickers for the Cartels. Nope. Just demonize ATF w/ a strategically-timed repulsive letter e-mailed to the entire press world before we ever saw it.
Burke later issued a groveling apology over his comments.
It should be noted that Burke is not a newcomer to the business of gun control. In an article in the Arizona Republic about the political ramifications on Arizona politicians for supporting gun control, former Sen. Dennis DeConcini (D-AZ), a supporter of the Clinton "Assault Weapons Ban", had this to say about Dennis Burke:
Quote:
DeConcini credits Judiciary Committee staff aide Dennis Burke, now the U.S. attorney for Arizona, for much of the work in developing the ban, which became law during DeConcini's final year in the Senate but expired after 10 years.
Burke also was Senior Policy Analyst for the White House's Domestic Policy Council from 1995 to 1997. This time overlaps with when Elena Kagan - now Justice Kagan - served as its Deputy Director. It was during this time that Executive Orders were used to further extend the ban on so-called assault weapons and to implement the Brady Act. Given his prior work on the Assault Weapons Ban in the Senate, it would not surprise me that Burke assisted in this effort.
Looking at Burke's background and his attitude towards gun rights and those who support them, I see this as even further confirmation that the intent of Operation Fast and Furious from the very beginning was to build support for another so-called assault weapons ban. I just don't think it was coincidental that Operation Fast and Furious was centered in Arizona as opposed to New Mexico or west Texas where the U.S. Attorneys have long careers as prosecutors.
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Hmm, very interesting memo that was written the day before the DOJ withdrew its false letter to Grassley. JDN's equivocations aside (by the way, dude, quit citing me as the source when in fact you are [inaccurately] referring to source material I posted) the "no surveillance teams" info strikes me as incredibly damning:
U.S. Department of Justice
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,Firearms and Explosives
www.atf.gov
February 3, 2011
MEMORANDUM TO: Special Agent in Charge, Dallas Field Division
THRU: Resident Agent in Charge , Lubbock Field Office
FROM: Gary M. Styers, Special Agent, Lubbock Field Office
SUBJECT: Contact with Congressional Investigators
On February 2, 2011, at approximately 1500 hours, ATF Special Agent Gary Styers was contacted telephonically by Robert Donovan and Brian Downey, representing United States Senator Chuck Grassley and the Senate Judiciary Committee. Downey and Donovan after identifying themselves asked Special Agent Styers if he would be willing to answer some questions regarding the time Special Agent Styers spent on a detail to the Phoenix Field Division, Phoenix Group VII Office. Special Agent Styers said he would be willing to answer questions to the best of his knowledge.
Special Agent Styers was asked if he was familiar with the large firearms trafficking case in Phoenix Group VII and Special Agent Styers said he was. Downey and Donovan asked if Special Agent Styers knew the name of the case and he responded that it was "Fast and Furious". Downey and Donovan then asked if Special Agent Styers knew who the case agent was and Special Agent Styers said it was Special Agent Hope McAllister. Special Agent Styers was also asked who the supervisor of the group was and Special Agent Styers said it was Group Supervisor David Voth. Downey and Donovan also asked who helped Special Agent McAllister, Special Agent Styers said that Special Agent McAllister had a CoCase Agent from hnmigration and Customs Enforcement CICE) as well as an agent from Group VII. Downey and Donovan asked who was the Agent from ICE and Special Agent Styers told them it was Lane France.
Downey and Donovan asked Special Agent Styers ifhe knew what the agents were assigned to do on the investigation. Special Agent Styers explained that a group of agents were assigned to the case and that since the case was in the stage of an active wiretap, some agents were working within the group and others were working at various functions related to the wire. Special Agent Styers further said that he did not specifically know the role of each individual agent.
Downey and Donovan inquired as to the role that Special Agent Styers had in this case and Special Agent Styers advised that he had assisted with some surveillance operations with the case. Special Agent Styers was asked to describe the operations and relayed that one of the operations was a suspected transaction that was to occur at a gas station and detailed agents were asked to cover the transaction. While positioning to observe the suspects, Special Agent Styers and other detailed agents were told by Special Agent McAllister that agents were too close and would burn the operation. Special Agent McAllister told all the agents to leave the immediate area. While the agents were repositioning, the transaction between the suspects took place and the vehicle that took possession of the firearms eventually left the area without agents following it.
Downey and Donovan asked Special Agent Styers ifhe ever saw guns actually go into Mexico. Special Agent Styers said he did not see any firearms cross the border to Mexico. They also asked if Special Agent Styers had worked with any agencies in Mexico, Special Agent Styers relayed that he had not, but had knowledge that other agents within Group VII spoke of communication with other ATF Special Agents assigned in Mexico.
Downey and Donovan then asked if Special Agent Styers had any knowledge that Federal Firearms Licensees (FFLs) were reporting suspected straw purchasers. Special Agent Styers explained that FFLs were indeed reporting such situations and that Special Agent Styers had numerous contacts with FFLs in the Phoenix area and had also worked inside of an FFL in an undercover capacity, while an individual attempted a large scale straw purchase. Special Agent Styers told Downey and Donovan that in speaking with the FFL holder and owner of the gun shop, he told Special Agent Styers that he had asked ATF to install cameras inside his shop and to have an undercover agent inside on a more regular basis. Downey and Donovan inquired as to what the procedures were and who handled the calls from the FFLs when they reported such suspected transactions. Special Agent Styers told them that he had no knowledge of any special procedures. If the FFLs called during normal business hours, Special Agent Styers assumed that, if they called the office number, their call was handled by the Group Supervisor.
Special Agent Styers also told Downey and Donovan that if the FFLs were calling individual agents within the group, he had no direct knowledge of those calls and what the ATF response was to those reports. However, Special Agent Styers did tell Downey and Donovan that he had heard from within the group that FFLs were calling case agents.
With regards to statistics and reporting, Downey and Donovan, questioned Special Agent Styers as to whether he had any knowledge of "padding of statistics or inconsistent reporting". Special Agent Styers advised them that he had no knowledge of a wide scale effort to skew statistics. However, Special Agent Styers relayed that he did question the Group Supervisor as to why he wanted Special Agent Styers to trace firearms that had not been recovered. Special Agent Styers was assigned to the investigation and provided the ATF Form 4473s, the Firearms Transaction Record, and told to trace said frrearms. Special Agent Styers asked as to why, when ATF has the Suspect Gun Database, which is designed for such firearms that have yet to be recovered by law enforcement. Group Supervisor Voth said he wanted them traced so that if someone else traced the firearms, they would know the firearms were connected to the case Special Agent Styers was assigned. Special Agent Styers relayed that even though he disagreed with the requested procedures, he follow the request of Group Supervisor Voth. Special Agent Styers also informed Donovan and Downey that he asked several agents also assigned to Group VII if they had to submit similar firearms traces and they replied that they in fact also were told to trace all firearms in a similar fashion.
Special Agent Styers was then asked about his general impression of the Fast and Furious case. Special Agent Styers stated that the case had systematically divided and isolated agents from the group. The case agent had solicited the advice of numerous experienced agents, inclucding Special Agent Styers, regarding how to conduct and end the wiretap operations and case overall. Special Agent Styers gave the case agent his honest opinion and advice since Special Agent Styers had worked two wiretap investigations in his career. Special Agent Styers felt that his advice and opinions, as well as other agents' advice and opinions were widely disregarded. Along with other agents within the group, Special Agent Styers explained that he was no longer asked to assist with Fast and Furious and concentrated on his assigned cases and provided necessary assistance to fellow agents within the detail and group.
Downey and Donovan asked Special Agent Styers what he felt was incorrect about the way the Fast and Furious case was conducted. Special Agent Styers explained that first and foremost, it is unheard of to have an active wiretap investigation without full time dedicated surveillance units on the ground. Special Agent Styers relayed that no agents in the group were assigned to surveillance on the Fast and Furious case. Special Agent Styers said that other agencies or task force officers may have been used to conduct surveillance and respond to calls of FFLs, but it seemed that either the case agent or Group Supervisor would poll the office for agents who were available to respond at short notice.
Secondly, Special Agent Styers said that it appeared odd to have a majority of ATF Agents working on a wiretap investigation, who had never worked such a case. Especially, when numerous, permanent Group VII agents and detailers had previous wiretap experience.
Special Agent Styers was provided with contact information for Downey and Donovan and the conversation was ended. Special Agent Styers contacted the Lubbock Resident Agent in Charge, Jim Luera at 1545 hours after the conversation with Downey and Donovan ended, to inform him of the contact. Special Agent Styers was later asked to document the conversation herein and attempted to do so to the fullest extent possible.
Respectfully,
Gary M. Styers
Special Agent, ATF
Original here:
http://www.grassley.senate.gov/judiciary/upload/ATF-12-14-11-Styers-memo.pdf
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JDN's equivocations aside (by the way, dude, quit citing me as the source when in fact you are [inaccurately] referring to source material I posted)
Hey, he's doing the best he can with the DNC/LA Times talking points. What else could could be done except for repeating "It's a sting gone wrong"?
JDN explanation of "Fast and Furious":
1. Illegally send guns to Mexican drug cartels, resulting in the deaths of Mexican nationals and US law enforcement.
2. ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
3. "Sting gone wrong."
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http://campaign2012.washingtonexaminer.com/blogs/beltway-confidential/doj-indicts-gundealer-fastfurious-style-sales/268216
DOJ indicts gundealer for Fast&Furious-like sales
by Joel Gehrke Commentary Staff Writer
What rhymes with "pot" and "kettle"? How about "Fast and Furious"?
The Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a complaint requesting "forfeiture of property" belonging to a New Mexico gun dealer charged with knowingly selling weapons to straw purchasers operating on behalf of Mexican drug cartels. This crime occurred during the same time frame in which DOJ conducted its own gunwalking scheme, Operation Fast and Furious, encouraging other gun dealers to do exactly the same thing.
Rick Reese of New Deal Shooting Sports, according to DOJ, "sold firearms and ammunition to individuals, knowing that these firearms and the ammunition were being illegally sent to Mexico." DOJ claims that "the Reeses sold firearms and ammunition to confidential sources who were working with law enforcement and to undercover law enforcement agents posing as straw purchasers, believing that the confidential sources and agents intended to illegally smuggle the firearms and ammunition to Mexico."
"I hope my guns go to Mexico," DOJ quotes Reese -- who was arrested August 30th -- as saying in the complaint requesting a forfeiture judgement. "I hope they use them to shoot those [Mexican police officers]."
The Mexican Attorney General, Marisela Morales, has offered strong criticism for the traffic of weapons from the United States to Mexican drug cartels. "It is an attack on the safety of Mexicans," said Morales. But she wasn't talking about Reese's alleged crime.
Morales was referring to the now-infamous gunwalking scheme conducted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), which instructed American gun dealers to sell weapons to straw purchasers, in the hopes that those guns could later be traced to drug cartels. U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered just over one year ago by someone who had a weapon purchased through Operation Fast and Furious.
"I have no intention of resigning," U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder told Congress last week during testimony about the program run under his watch, and about which he received memos throughout 2010.
Reese, who also allegedly sold weapons he believed would go to cartels, faces 60 years in prison if he is convicted.
The Washington Examiner has asked DOJ if Reese was ever involved in Fast and Furious gun sales, and whether DOJ is considering prosecutions against gundealers who participated in the program.
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"It's a sting gone wrong". I repeat it since in addition to the LA Times, that is what it said in the article posted by BbyG.
"The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization."
I haven't seen any proof to the contrary. So far is all conjecture, innuendo, and hyperbole. It makes for good politics.
That said, if there was a political motivation, i.e. gun control, I'm all for bringing the facts to light. But I'm still waiting...
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"The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization"
How were the guns to be tracked? Answer, they were not tracked.
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"The purpose was to track the guns all the way to the ultimate buyer—a Mexican drug trafficking organization"
How were the guns to be tracked? Answer, they were not tracked.
Now THAT'S what I call a sting gone wrong! :-)
Incompetence? Absolutely. :-(
But illegal? Criminal? a "Declaration of war". So far, except for conjecture and hyperbole, no...
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http://blog.heritage.org/2011/06/29/operation-fast-and-furious-the-atf-gunrunning-scandal/
Operation Fast and Furious: The ATF Gunrunning Scandal
Rory Cooper
June 29, 2011 at 2:30 pm
The U.S. government intentionally sells assault weapons to Mexican drug cartels. Those cartels use those weapons to kill, among others, a U.S. law enforcement officer. The White House deflects questions on the subject. The director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), who watched the gun sales on video in his office, stonewalls Congress. So does the Justice Department. The whistleblower that exposed it all is fired.
Paperback novel or real-life Obama Administration scandal? Time’s up.
Just last week, Vince Cefalu, a special agent in the ATF for 24 years, was dismissed from his job after helping expose an operation code named “Operation Fast and Furious,” which was designed to purposefully put assault weapons into the hands of Mexican drug cartels so they could then be tracked to collect intelligence.
The operation itself is an exhausting series of unbelievable mistakes and lapses of judgment, but the Administration’s response is even more disturbing, as is the subdued media reaction.
According to the written testimony of Supervisory Special Agent Peter Forcelli: “ATF agents assigned to the Phoenix Field Division, with the concurrence of their local chain of command, ‘walked’ guns. ATF agents allowed weapons to be provided to individuals whom they knew would traffic them to members of Mexican drug trafficking organizations.”
The goal was to uncover larger criminal conspiracies across the border. Without informing Mexican authorities, the ATF facilitated over 2,500 assault weapons entering Mexico illegally. The only modern “tracking” method was a rigged-up GPS from Radio Shack that Forcelli took it upon himself to install, since the only other tracking method would be serial numbers on the guns. That device failed.
ATF agent John Dodson, who feared that this operation would cost lives, was told to stand down and “fall in line” by supervisors. Dodson testified to Congress: “Although my instincts made me want to intervene and interdict these weapons, my supervisors directed me and my colleagues not to make any stop or arrest.”
ATF agent Olindo James Casa agreed. Casa testified:
On several occasions I personally requested to interdict or seize firearms, but I was always ordered to stand down and not to seize the firearms.
Later, guns sold in this operation were discovered at the scene of a shootout in Arizona in December 2010 in which Customs and Border Protection agent Brian Terry was killed. As Forcelli testified: “To allow a gun to walk is idiotic.… This was a catastrophic disaster.”
Since then, we have learned that this operation had support in Washington and that its tactics were not a secret. Forcelli testified that Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley helped orchestrate the operation and that U.S. Attorney Dennis Burk “agreed with the direction of the case.” E-mails show that Deputy Assistant Director for ATF Field Operations William McMahon was “so excited about Fast and Furious that he received a special briefing on the program in Phoenix.”
Acting ATF director Kenneth Melson actually watched—yes, watched—live video surveillance of the operations from his office in Washington. He and his deputy were briefed weekly on the operation.
President Obama said in a press conference today: “My Attorney General has made clear that he wouldn’t have ordered gun running into Mexico.… That would not be an appropriate step by the ATF.” He then deflected further questions by citing an “ongoing investigation.” Press Secretary Jay Carney had previously said that the President “did not know about or authorize this operation.”
If that’s the case, how could neither he nor Attorney General Eric Holder not know about an operation that everyone else at the Department of Justice seemed to be actively involved in, including the Assistant Attorney General, U.S. Attorney and head of the ATF? Melson has finally agreed to testify in the Senate in July, and hopefully that will answer some of those questions.
And it’s about time that Melson was finally authorized by Holder to testify. The Administration’s stonewalling on this subject has been embarrassing. Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich wrote to Senator Chuck Grassley (R–IA) in February that “the allegation described in your January 27 letter—that ATF ‘sanctioned’ or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico—is false.” We now know that this is not true.
Weich went on:
I also want to assure you that ATF has made no attempt to retaliate against any of its agents regarding this matter. We recognize the important of protecting employees from retaliation to their disclosures of waste, fraud, and abuse. ATF employees receive annual training on their rights under the Whistleblower Protection Act.
Of course, last week, Cefalu was dismissed, allegedly as retaliation for his disclosure of waste, fraud, and abuse.
Grassley then responded with a letter to Holder with the specifics of the operation that he had previously delivered. The Department of Justice continued to ignore Congress’s requests for information. Only recently, when Congressman Darrell Issa (R–CA) held a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, did details begin to emerge and the media begin to take notice.
However, even as stories have been written, and some broadcast outlets, including Fox and ABC, have run some stories on it, the attention this story merits is not matched by the attention it is getting. ABC’s Jake Tapper asked the White House: “What is the exact date that the President learned about the Justice Department ATF operation?” Carney deflected the question.
An anonymous Justice Department source had been circulating a false story last week that Issa had been briefed on the operation in April 2010. The Washington Post published the claim despite clear evidence to the contrary and only anonymous sources. More credible and transparent reporting on the operation is vital.
As of today, the only person punished for Operation Fast and Furious has been someone who helped expose the details. Accountability for this massive operational failure is essential, and it will come only with more media attention.
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http://www.nraila.org/pdfs/SAForcelli.pdf
Fast forward to “Operation Fast and Furious” itself. ATF agents assigned to the Phoenix Field Division, with the concurrence of their local chain of command, “walked” guns. ATF agents allowed weapons to be provided to individuals whom they knew would traffic them to members of Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs). They did so by failing to lawfully interdict weapons that they knew were going to be delivered to members of DTOs, and they did so by encouraging federal firearms licensees to continue selling weapons that were destined for delivery to members of the DTOs where no interdiction efforts were planned.
When I voiced surprise and concern with this tactic to SAC William Newell and ASAC George Gillett, my concerns were dismissed. SAC Newell referred to the case as “groundbreaking” and bragged that “we’re the only people in the country doing this”. My other ASAC, Jim Needles, merely said “Pete, You know that if you or I were running the case, it wouldn’t be run this way”
This operation, which in my opinion endangered the American public, was orchestrated in conjunction with Assistant U.S. Attorney Emory Hurley. [Emory Hurley is the same Assistant U.S. Attorney who previously prevented agents from using some of the common and accepted law enforcement techniques that are employed elsewhere in the United States to investigate and prosecute gun crimes.] I have read documents that indicate that his boss, U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, also agreed with the direction of the case.
Allowing firearms to be trafficked to criminals is a dangerous and deadly strategy. The thought that the techniques used in the “Fast and Furious” investigation would result in “taking down a cartel” given the toothless nature of the “straw purchasing law” and the lack of a “firearms trafficking statute” is, in my opinion, delusional.
4
Based upon my conversations with agents who assisted in this case, surveillance on individuals who had acquired weapons was often terminated far from the Mexican border. Therefore, while the case agents and others believed that the weapons were destined for Mexico, the potential exists that many were sent with cartel drugs to other points within the United States. As a career law enforcement officer, who has had to investigate the deaths of police officers, children and others at the hands of armed criminals, I was and continue to be horrified. I believe that these firearms will continue to turn up at crime scenes, on both sides of the border, for years to come.
In closing, I want the members of the committee and all Americans to know: This is not how ATF agents conduct business. I am very proud of some of the incredible work done by ATF agents around the country every day. Many ATF agents have given their lives in the performance of their duties. On my last trip to New York City, I participated in a homicide trial on a case that I initiated in the U.S District Court for the Southern District of New York. Three other separate homicide trials were also being conducted in that courthouse. Each was the result of work done by outstanding ATF case agents, who solved those murders through conducting complex criminal investigations, while working hand in hand with dedicated prosecutors. Like myself and the members of the Committee, they too want the truth to come out, and those who acted irresponsibly held accountable. They deserve it, the family of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry deserves it, and the American people demand it.
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Sigh. Arming the most violent and criminal gangs in the hemisphere resulting in hundreds of deaths with no rational means of interdiction available = nothing to see here, move along in JDN land. Agent testimony that they were specifically instructed to ignore standard investigatory procedures for this case and no other = a random case of directed incompetence in JDN land. Moving all the supervisors into into cushy, high paying desk jobs while firing or harassing all the whistle blowers and others who testified off the talking points = some sort of crazy coincidence in JDN land. Arming foreign entities engaged in hostilities against your nation that then kill your citizens and law enforcement officers with those arms would be construed as an act of war by numerous nations and leaders going back thousands of years, except in JDN land where it is no doubt an invitation to engage in meaningful dialog or some other twaddle.
You, sir, are a troll. There is no point in engaging you. Quote that in a manner that turns it's meaning around 180 degrees and insert my moniker in it to cement your trolling credentials.
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There is no point in engaging you.
Then don't.
Sigh.... FINALLY we agree - I have no desire to engage you either. It's a waste of my time...
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As John Meynard Keynes once said in a rare moment of lucidity :lol: when asked what he did when the facts proved him wrong: "I change my mind sir. What do you do?"
JDN, stating the matter simply here, you're getting your assed kicked on the merits. Time to change your mind.
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As John Meynard Keynes once said in a rare moment of lucidity :lol: when asked what he did when the facts proved him wrong: "I change my mind sir. What do you do?"
JDN, stating the matter simply here, you're getting your assed kicked on the merits. Time to change your mind.
Actually, I agree with Keynes, if facts prove me wrong, I will be happy to change my mind. :-)
However, so far, regarding the FnF operation itself, no evidence or proof has come out of illegal activity; the "merits" indicate only truly gross incompetence, not illegal activity.
Conjecture, hyperbole, and political posturing don't really matter a whole lot - you know that. I'm still waiting for the arrests or even indictments stating criminal wrongdoing. Until them, it remains a "sting", poorly planned and executed, but not in and of itself, illegal.
That said, although of have seen no evidence of the sting itself being illegal, if there has been systematic coverup of this sting that went horribly wrong, Holder and his aides may be guilty of high crimes including perjury, obstruction of justice and abuse of power. If true, I have no sympathy for them.
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"Move to strike you honor as non-responsive!"
"Granted."
While certainly you are entitled to your opinion JDN, right now it is not measuring up to the standards around here. Please cease posting on OFF on this thread.
Thank you,
Marc
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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npjOSLCR2hE[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npjOSLCR2hE
It's dead! No it's not!
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Gentlemen:
While the meme "It was just a sting gone wrong" certainly remains fair game, a gentle reminder that there is no need for personally snarky commentary directed towards JDN, who cannot defend himself.
Thank you.
Forward.
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Controlling Guns, Controlling People
A new history shows how gun control goes hand in hand with fear of black people—and The People.
Thaddeus Russell from the January 2012 issue
Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America, by Adam Winkler, W.W. Norton, 361 pages, $27.95
I first learned about the contradictions of gun politics when I was about 10 years old, growing up in the radical milieu of 1970s Berkeley. My mother and stepfather were members of a revolutionary organization called the International Socialists. Although the group’s members were mostly bookish nerds with little taste for violence, their inspiration was Leon Trotsky, who led the Bolsheviks’ armed insurrection in 1917 and then headed up the Red Army, which killed hundreds of thousands of the Soviet regime’s opponents in the ensuing civil war. Because my parents’ politics were primarily an exercise in middle-class intellectual fantasy, I was never exposed to real violence or even violent rhetoric, and they never owned a gun.
My stepfather’s best friend, Jeff, who lived in a cottage behind ours, was a member of the Spartacist League, a rival Trotskyist organization that was less shy about the violent implications of its rhetoric. The Spartacists were known for physically attacking strikebreakers and Klansmen and for rumbling with Maoists over the imagined turf of the Bay Area’s revolutionary working class. One day I happened upon Jeff cleaning a pistol at his kitchen table. Despite the fact that his and my parents’ hero was one of the greatest perpetrators of gun violence in the 20th century, I somehow saw guns as not only scary but also right-wing and politically “bad.” I told Jeff I hated guns and wished they all would be rounded up and melted down. “But we can’t have a revolution without them,” he said with a sanguine smile.
As an adult I continued to fear and hate guns and to generally align myself with the gun control cause, but Jeff’s suggestion that the regulation of people’s access to guns is essentially conservative nagged at me, unresolved, until I read UCLA law professor Adam Winkler’s stunning new book Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America. At the heart of his narrative, Winkler convincingly argues that the people who began the movement against gun control operated not out of the National Rifle Association’s national headquarters in Washington, D.C., but out of a nondescript two-story brick building three blocks from where I sat staring at that pistol: 3106 Shattuck Avenue, in the heart of radical Berkeley. It was there, in 1967, at the headquarters of the Black Panther Party, that Huey Newton and Bobby Seale planned an armed march into the California State Capitol that “launched the modern gun-rights movement.”
Despite my feelings about guns, even as a child I admired that the Panthers made their name shortly after their founding in 1966 by patrolling West Oakland streets with rifles and shotguns and confronting police officers who were detaining blacks. It seemed to me that there was no more effective means of curbing the daily police brutality being meted out to the residents of Oakland’s ghetto. But I did not know until reading Gunfight that the Panthers’ armed patrols provoked the drafting of legislation that established today’s gun regulation apparatus, or that the champions of that legislation were as conservative as apple pie.
In 1967 Don Mulford, the Republican state assemblyman who represented the Panthers’ patrol zone and who had once famously denounced the Free Speech Movement and anti-war demonstrations at the University of California at Berkeley, introduced a bill inspired by the Panthers that prohibited the public carrying of loaded firearms, open and concealed. As Winkler puts it, the text of what became the Mulford Act “all but pointed a finger at the Panthers when it said, ‘The State of California has witnessed, in recent years, the increasing incidence of organized groups and individuals publicly arming themselves for purposes inimical to the peace and safety of the people of California.’ ” The law made California the first state to ban the open carrying of loaded firearms.
Shortly after Mulford introduced his bill, a contingent of 30 Black Panthers arrived in a convoy of cars in front of the Capitol in Sacramento. They loaded ammunition into .357 Magnums, 12-gauge shotguns, and .45-caliber pistols, then brought the guns up the steps of the statehouse, where Bobby Seale read a statement denouncing the Assembly’s attempt “at keeping the black people disarmed and powerless at the very same time that racist police agencies throughout the country are intensifying the terror and repression of black people.” Seale concluded that “the time has come for black people to arm themselves against this terror before it is too late. The pending Mulford Act brings the hour of doom one step nearer.” With that, the Panthers marched with their weapons through the front doors of the statehouse and into the viewing area of the Assembly chamber. Carrying loaded guns into the Capitol building was perfectly legal—until three months later, when Gov. Ronald Reagan signed the Mulford bill into law.
The Panthers weren’t the only black people using guns for political purposes. Two months after the invasion of Sacramento, riots erupted in response to instances of police brutality in the black sections of Detroit and Newark. From rooftops, windows, and doorways, gunmen fired on police, National Guardsmen, and Army troops sent to quash the rebellions. Congress responded by passing the Gun Control Act of 1968 and its companion bill, the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act. Although Winkler chastises “extremists” on both sides of the current gun control debate who characterize their opponents as totalitarians, he does note that while drafting the 1968 bills, Sen. Thomas Dodd (D-Conn.) had the Library of Congress provide him with an English translation of the gun control regulations that the Nazis used to disarm Jews and political dissidents.
The 1968 legislation, which underlies the modern system of federal gun regulation, prohibited interstate sales except among licensed dealers and collectors. It also banned gun sales to “prohibited persons,” including felons, the mentally “defective,” illicit drug users, and anyone who, like many black radicals at the time, “has renounced his citizenship.” These laws “marked Congress’s first attempts at serious gun regulation since the 1930s,” Winkler writes, “and, like California’s law, they also represented a backlash against armed blacks who were seen to be undermining social order.”
Winkler shows that Mulford, Reagan, and Dodd weren’t the first political elites to attempt to quell popular resistance through the regulation of guns. The Founding Fathers advocated the forcible disarmament of not only slaves, free blacks, and people of mixed race but also of whites who refused to swear allegiance to the cause of independence. The Loyalists whose guns were confiscated during the War of Independence “weren’t criminals or traitors who took up arms on behalf of the British,” Winkler writes. “They were ordinary citizens exercising their fundamental right to freedom of conscience.” More important, despite their reputation as freedom lovers, the Founders proved to be “perfectly willing to confiscate weapons from anyone deemed untrustworthy—a category so broadly defined that it included a majority of the people.”
Although contemporary gun control moralists such as Michael Moore portray their cause as being on the right side of history, Gunfight establishes that the first gun control organizations in the United States were the posses that terrorized freed slaves after the Civil War. Many freedmen came into possession of guns that were confiscated from former masters and Confederate soldiers. But organizations with names like the Men of Justice, the Knights of the White Camellia, and the Knights of the Rising Sun roamed on horseback across the South, shooting, hanging, and disarming blacks. “The most infamous of these,” Winkler reports, “was the Ku Klux Klan.”
Winkler found that in the allegedly gun-loving outposts of the wild West, gun confiscation was commonplace. “Frontier towns handled guns the way a Boston restaurant today handles overcoats in winter,” he writes. “New arrivals were required to turn in their guns to authorities in exchange for something like a metal token. Certain places required people to check their guns at one of the major entry points to town or leave their weapons with their horses at the livery stables.” Further confounding the notion that gun control is a people’s cause, Winkler reports that guns were taken away not just in the interest of public safety but also to promote what leftists now call corporatism. Because the political leaders of frontier towns wanted to attract business investors who would spur economic development, they chose to follow the dictum of a newspaper editor in the cattle town of Caldwell, Kansas: “People who have money to invest go where they are protected by law, and where good society and order reign.”
The next surge of gun control legislation accompanied the progressive movement of the early 20th century, when New York state adopted the Sullivan Act of 1911, the first law in the United States requiring a permit for the possession of a firearm. Winkler notes that “enhancing public safety by regulating guns was of a piece with the progressive ferment that pushed for minimum-wage laws, child labor laws, and food quality legislation.” He does not mention that—at least according to many historians of progressivism—gun control and minimum wage laws were also of a piece with the progressives’ overarching desire for social control.
Similarly, Winkler fails to connect his argument that gun control historically served the interests of political elites with his analysis of Franklin D. Roosevelt, who as president launched a massive campaign against the right to bear arms through the Bureau of Investigation. According to Winkler, “the New Deal for Crime” was designed merely to protect innocent citizens from gangsters and their guns. Yet his main source for this section of the book is Claire Bond Potter’s War on Crime, which presents a scholarly case that Roosevelt’s Bureau of Investigation helped establish the supremacy of centralized government over individual rights and social movements in mid-20th-century American culture.
Despite Winkler’s apparent fondness for modern liberalism and consequent blind spots, he presents a history that turns on its head the modern liberal’s conceit that those who side with gun control necessarily side with the people.
Thaddeus Russell is the author of A Renegade History of the United States (Free Press).
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Lieberman directs staff to examine Fast and Furious coordination
By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller 12:13 AM 12/22/2011
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Connecticut independent Sen. Joe Lieberman has directed the staff of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, which he chairs, to examine miscommunication between law enforcement agencies related to the Justice Department’s Operation Fast and Furious.
A spokesperson told The Daily Caller Wednesday that Lieberman “believe(s) that the lack of interagency coordination along the border merits further examination, and as Chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, he has directed his staff to follow up with the relevant federal agencies on that topic.”
Fast and Furious was a program of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, overseen by Holder’s DOJ. It sent thousands of weapons to Mexican drug cartels via straw purchasers — people who legally purchase guns in the United States with the known intention of illegally trafficking them somewhere else.
At least 300 people in Mexico were killed with Fast and Furious weapons, as was Border Patrol agent Brian Terry. The identities of the Mexican victims are unknown.
Some reports suggest that the FBI, the Drug Enforcement Agency and Immigration and Customs Enforcement were also involved in some manner or another with the operation.
For instance, Pajamas Media reported that the night Terry was killed, an FBI informant was in the drug cartel rip crew that used Fast and Furious weapons to murder him. Rip crews are armed groups of bandits who work for specific drug cartels and try to rob rival cartel shipments and illegal immigrants as they’re crossing the border.
Pajamas reports that the DEA also had some knowledge of that drug cartel rip crew’s whereabouts. Assuming the reports are true, the DEA and the FBI failed to “deconflict,” or warn other agencies including the Border Patrol about potentially deadly risks.
With Lieberman’s committee now examining Fast and Furious details, that means two Senate committees are probing the matter — the homeland security committee and the judiciary committee.
On the House side, the oversight and judiciary committees are investigating the DOJ’s role in Fast and Furious and the homeland security committee’s subcommittee on oversight has launched an investigation into the Department of Homeland Security’s role in Fast and Furious, a spokesperson for subcommittee chairman and Texas Rep. Michael McCaul confirmed for TheDC.
Sixty-one congressmen, two U.S. senators and two sitting governors have called for Attorney General Eric Holder’s resignation over Fast and Furious. Lieberman has not called on Holder to resign.
http://dailycaller.com/2011/12/22/lieberman-directs-staff-to-investigate-fast-and-furious-coordination/
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This is what we are up against:
By ROBERT M. MORGENTHAU
Historians have long debated who was the first person to call the U.S. Senate the "world's greatest deliberative body." Soon we may ask who was the last person to believe it. Our dysfunctional Congress has repeatedly failed to perform its duties under the Constitution to pass a budget, to advise and consent on presidential nominations, and, perhaps most tragically, to curb illegal handgun violence.
In New York, we've recently seen only too dramatically the consequences of this dysfunction. Just this month, a New York City police officer was shot and killed by a fugitive from North Carolina wielding an illegal handgun. And in November, a New York judge sentenced violent drug gang members on gun charges and other crimes committed in a neighborhood where 244 shootings, 34 of them fatal, had been perpetrated in the past two years.
That judge, Edward McLaughlin, was frustrated that nearly all of those shootings remained unsolved. He used the occasion of his sentencing remarks to challenge the local community to take responsibility for ending the insanity. He called on families to search their homes for guns, to oppose violence in their neighborhoods, and to cooperate with local law enforcement.
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.In the same spirit, we might issue a challenge to Congress to do its job. An essential function of the federal government, delineated by the Constitution, is to "insure domestic Tranquility." This does not authorize the government to act as a national police force, but it does require the federal government to protect us from international terrorists and criminals who transport illegal weapons across state lines.
For a while, it seemed that the federal government got the message. Shortly after 9/11, President George W. Bush, as part of the Homeland Security Act, reorganized the bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), placed it under the Department of Justice, and focused the agency on stopping illegal sales and transportation of firearms and explosives.
And indeed, immediately after 9/11, ATF dramatically increased its enforcement. But before long, attention waned and congressional dysfunction took over. For nearly six years now, Congress, responding to pressure from the gun lobby, has denied the ATF a permanent director. And for each of those six years, federal prosecutions initiated by ATF have declined—from a peak of 10,715 in fiscal year 2005 to fewer than 7,300 in the first 10 months of fiscal 2011.
This level of enforcement is indefensible when measured by the dimensions of gun violence in America. According to the FBI, over two-thirds of murders nationwide are committed by criminals using handguns. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the leading cause of death for African-Americans aged 25 to 34 is homicide committed by firearm.
Where are all these guns coming from? According to statistics from the ATF itself, of those handguns recovered in crimes nationwide, three in 10—about 42,000 handguns every year—have crossed state lines before being recovered. For New York state, the figures are even more dramatic—two-thirds of the guns recovered in crimes were traced to other states. Starkest of all are the figures for New York City—85% of the firearms recovered there come here from other states.
The story of gang violence is largely the story of crimes committed with illegal guns—often stolen guns—that have crossed state lines. Without federal enforcement, states and localities have little hope of eliminating gang violence.
This is not an issue of curbing gun rights. The Supreme Court has made it clear that the Second Amendment protects law-abiding gun owners, and for good reason. I know from firsthand experience the virtues of responsible gun ownership: I received my first rifle when I was 6, and my first pistol, a .22 Colt revolver, for my 16th birthday.
Nor is this a matter of ceding to the federal government law-enforcement functions properly left to the states and localities. When I was Manhattan district attorney, I was not afraid to challenge the local U.S attorney when that office brought a case that I believed exceeded the appropriate bounds of its jurisdiction. Local law enforcement must be entrusted to local prosecutors.
But that still leaves the federal government with an indispensable role in preventing firearms and explosives from crossing state lines and reaching the hands of criminals.
As long as federal authorities bring fewer gun prosecutions year after year—so long as the flood of illegal handguns into our communities continues unabated—calling on local families and law enforcement to eliminate gun violence is like telling them to make bricks without straw.
In his impassioned sentencing speech last month, Judge McLaughlin said to families in violence-plagued neighborhoods, "If you do nothing, you are complicit." We might say the same thing to the Congress. Our Founding Fathers were right: Within our system of limited government, Congress and the president have a duty to insure domestic tranquility. Washington needs to set politics aside and focus on proven policies that stop the illegal flow of handguns—and make our neighborhoods safer.
Mr. Morgenthau, of counsel at the New York law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, was Manhattan district attorney from 1975 to 2009.
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Woof,
Just one good gun control law could put an end to the gangs? Where do I sign up! :-P What an unmitigated piece of sh#t work that was.
P.C.
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Alan Simons was enjoying a Sunday morning bicycle ride with his family in Asheville, N.C., two years ago when a man in a sport utility vehicle suddenly pulled alongside him and started berating him for riding on the highway. Mr. Simons, his 4-year-old son strapped in behind him, slowed to a halt. The driver, Charles Diez, an Asheville firefighter, stopped as well. When Mr. Simons walked over, he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
“Go ahead, I’ll shoot you,” Mr. Diez said, according to Mr. Simons. “I’ll kill you.”
Mr. Simons turned to leave but heard a deafening bang. A bullet had passed through his bike helmet just above his left ear, barely missing him.
Mr. Diez, as it turned out, was one of more than 240,000 people in North Carolina with a permit to carry a concealed handgun. If not for that gun, Mr. Simons is convinced, the confrontation would have ended harmlessly. “I bet it would have been a bunch of mouthing,” he said.
Mr. Diez, then 42, eventually pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill.
Across the country, it is easier than ever to carry a handgun in public. Prodded by the gun lobby, most states, including North Carolina, now require only a basic background check, and perhaps a safety class, to obtain a permit.
In state after state, guns are being allowed in places once off-limits, like bars, college campuses and houses of worship. And gun rights advocates are seeking to expand the map still further, pushing federal legislation that would require states to honor other states’ concealed weapons permits. The House approved the bill last month; the Senate is expected to take it up next year.
The bedrock argument for this movement is that permit holders are law-abiding citizens who should be able to carry guns in public to protect themselves. “These are people who have proven themselves to be among the most responsible and safe members of our community,” the federal legislation’s author, Representative Cliff Stearns, Republican of Florida, said on the House floor.
To assess that claim, The New York Times examined the permit program in North Carolina, one of a dwindling number of states where the identities of permit holders remain public. The review, encompassing the last five years, offers a rare, detailed look at how a liberalized concealed weapons law has played out in one state. And while it does not provide answers, it does raise questions.
More than 2,400 permit holders were convicted of felonies or misdemeanors, excluding traffic-related crimes, over the five-year period, The Times found when it compared databases of recent criminal court cases and licensees. While the figure represents a small percentage of those with permits, more than 200 were convicted of felonies, including at least 10 who committed murder or manslaughter. All but two of the killers used a gun.
Among them was Bobby Ray Bordeaux Jr., who had a concealed handgun permit despite a history of alcoholism, major depression and suicide attempts. In 2008, he shot two men with a .22-caliber revolver, killing one of them, during a fight outside a bar.
More than 200 permit holders were also convicted of gun- or weapon-related felonies or misdemeanors, including roughly 60 who committed weapon-related assaults.
In addition, nearly 900 permit holders were convicted of drunken driving, a potentially volatile circumstance given the link between drinking and violence.
The review also raises concerns about how well government officials police the permit process. In about half of the felony convictions, the authorities failed to revoke or suspend the holder’s permit, including for cases of murder, rape and kidnapping. The apparent oversights are especially worrisome in North Carolina, one of about 20 states where anyone with a valid concealed handgun permit can buy firearms without the federally mandated criminal background check. (Under federal law, felons lose the right to own guns.)
Ricky Wills, 59, kept his permit after recently spending several months behind bars for terrorizing his estranged wife and their daughter with a pair of guns and then shooting at their house while they, along with a sheriff’s deputy who had responded to a 911 call, were inside. “That’s crazy, absolutely crazy,” his wife, Debra Wills, said in an interview when told that her husband could most likely still buy a gun at any store in the state.
Mr. Wills’s permit was revoked this month, after The Times informed the local sheriff’s office.
Growing National Trend
Page 2 of 3)
Gun laws vary across the country, but in most states, people do not need a license to keep firearms at home. Although some states allow guns to be carried in public in plain sight, gun rights advocates have mostly focused their efforts on expanding the right to carry concealed handguns.
The national movement toward more expansive concealed handgun laws began in earnest in 1987, when Florida instituted a “shall issue” permit process, in which law enforcement officials are required to grant the permits as long as applicants satisfy certain basic legal requirements.
The authorities in shall-issue states deny permits to certain applicants, like convicted felons and people who have been involuntarily committed to a mental health institution, unless their gun rights have been restored. North Carolina, which enacted its shall-issue law in 1995, also bars applicants who have committed violent misdemeanors and has a variety of other disqualifiers; it also requires enrollment in a gun safety class.
Today, 39 states either have a shall-issue permit process or do not require a permit at all to carry a concealed handgun. Ten others are “may issue,” meaning law enforcement agencies have discretion to conduct more in-depth investigations and exercise their judgment. For example, the authorities might turn down someone who has no criminal record but appears to pose a risk or does not make a convincing case about needing to carry a gun. Gun rights advocates argue, however, that such processes are rife with the potential for abuse.
For now, the permits are good only in the holder’s home state, as well as others that recognize them. The bill under consideration in Congress would require that permits be recognized everywhere, even in jurisdictions that might bar the holder from owning a gun in the first place.
In recent years, a succession of state legislatures have also struck down restrictions on carrying concealed weapons in all sorts of public places. North Carolina this year began allowing concealed handguns in local parks, and next year the legislature is expected to consider permitting guns in restaurants.
Efforts to evaluate the impact of concealed carry laws on crime rates have produced contradictory results.
Researchers acknowledge that those who fit the demographic profile of a typical permit holder — middle-age white men — are not usually major drivers of violent crime. At the same time, several states have produced statistical reports showing, as in North Carolina, that a small segment does end up on the wrong side of the law. As a result, the question becomes whether allowing more people to carry guns actually deters crime, as gun rights advocates contend, and whether that outweighs the risks posed by the minority who commit crimes.
Gun rights advocates invariably point to the work of John R. Lott, an economist who concluded in the late 1990s that the laws had substantially reduced violent crime. Subsequent studies, however, have found serious flaws in his data and methodology.
A few independent researchers using different data have come to similar conclusions, but many other studies have found no net effect of concealed carry laws or have come to the opposite conclusion. Most notably, Ian Ayres and John J. Donohue, economists and law professors, concluded that the best available data and modeling showed that permissive right-to-carry laws, at a minimum, increased aggravated assaults. Their data also showed that robberies and homicides went up, but the findings were not statistically significant.
In the end, most researchers say the scattershot results are not unexpected, because the laws, in all likelihood, have not significantly increased the number of people carrying concealed weapons among those most likely to commit crimes or to be victimized.
Crimes by Permit Holders
Gun advocates are quick to cite anecdotes of permit holders who stopped crimes with their guns. It is virtually impossible, however, to track these episodes in a systematic way. By contrast, crimes committed by permit holders can be.
The shooting at the Hogs Pen Pub in Macclesville in August 2008, happened when two men, Cliff Jackson and Eddie Bordeaux, got into a scuffle outside the bar. John Warlick, who was there with his wife, helped separate them, only to see Eddie’s brother, Bobby Ray, fatally shoot Mr. Jackson in the back of the head. Mr. Bordeaux then shot Mr. Warlick in the upper torso, wounding him.
Bobby Ray Bordeaux had obtained a concealed carry permit in 2004 and used to take a handgun everywhere. He was also an alcoholic and heavy user of marijuana with a long history of depression, according to court records. He had been hospitalized repeatedly for episodes related to his drinking, including about a year before, when he shot himself in the chest with a pistol while drunk in an apparent suicide attempt. Mr. Bordeaux, then 48, started drinking heavily at age 13. He had been taking medication for depression but had not taken it the day of the shooting, he later told the police. He also said he had 15 beers and smoked marijuana that night and claimed to have no memory of what occurred. He was eventually convicted of first-degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury.
John K. Gallaher III, a permit holder since 2006, was also an alcoholic with serious mental health issues, said David Hall, the assistant district attorney who prosecuted him for murder. In May 2008, Mr. Gallaher, then 24, shot and killed a friend, Sean Gallagher, and a woman, Lori Fioravanti, with a .25-caliber Beretta after an argument at his grandfather’s home. The police found 22 guns, including an assault rifle, at his home. Mr. Gallaher pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder last year.
Among the other killings: three months after receiving his permit in July 2006, Mark Stephen Thomas killed Christopher Brynarsky with a handgun after an argument at Mr. Brynarsky’s custom detail shop. In 2007, Jamez Mellion, a permit holder since 2004, killed Capt. Paul Burton Miner III of the Army by shooting him 10 times with two handguns after finding him with his estranged wife. William Littleton, who obtained a permit in 1998 and was well known to the police because of complaints about him, shot his neighbor to death with a rifle in 2008 over a legal dispute.
Page 3 of 3)
More common were less serious gun-related episodes like these: in July 2008, Scotty L. Durham, who got his permit in 2006, confronted his soon-to-be ex-wife and another man in the parking lot of Coffee World in Durham and fired two shots in the air with a .45-caliber Glock. Antoine Cornelius Whitted, a permit holder since 2009, discharged his semiautomatic handgun during a street fight in Durham last year. Jerry Maurice Thomas, a permit holder since 2009 whose drinking problems were well known to the authorities, held a gun to his girlfriend’s head at his house in Asheville last year, prompting a standoff with the police.
Falling Through the Cracks
Gun rights advocates in North Carolina, as well as elsewhere, often point to the low numbers of permit revocations as evidence of how few permit holders break the law. Yet permits were often not suspended or revoked in North Carolina when they should have been.
Charles Dowdle of Franklin was convicted of multiple felonies in 2006 for threatening to kill his girlfriend and chasing her to her sister’s house, where he fired a shotgun round through a closed door. He then pointed the gun at the sister, who knocked it away, causing it to fire again. Mr. Dowdle was sentenced to probation, but his concealed handgun permit remained active until it expired in 2009.
Mr. Dowdle, 63, said in a telephone interview that although he gave away his guns after his conviction, no one had ever done anything about his permit. He said he “could probably have purchased” a gun with it but had not done so because federal law forbade it.
Besides felons like Mr. Dowdle, The Times also found scores of people who kept their permits after convictions for violent misdemeanors. They included more than half of the roughly 40 permit holders convicted in the last five years of assault by pointing gun and nearly two-thirds of the more than 70 convicted of a common domestic violence charge, assault on a female.
Precisely how these failures of oversight occurred is not clear. The normal protocol would be for the local sheriff’s office to suspend and eventually revoke a permit after a holder is arrested and convicted of a disqualifying crime, the authorities said. The State Bureau of Investigation, which maintains a computerized database of permits, also tries to notify individual sheriffs when it discovers that a holder has been arrested for a serious crime, according to a spokeswoman, but the process is not formalized.
In Ricky Wills’s case, he not only threatened his wife and daughter last May with a handgun and a rifle, but he shot at their house while a Union County sheriff’s deputy was inside. It led to convictions on two charges: assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill and assault on a police officer.
Soon after the shooting, Mr. Wills’s wife obtained a restraining order, which also should have led to his permit being suspended.
Sgt. Lori Pierce, who handles concealed handgun permits in Union County, said no one ever notified her about Mr. Wills, who was released from prison in November. And as the sole person handling permits in her county, she said, she does not have time to conduct regular criminal checks on permit holders, unless they are up for a five-year renewal.
As it is, she said, she can barely keep up with issuing permits. She has granted about 1,300 this year.
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Woof,
My, what a FAIR AND BALANCED piece of crap journalism that was. In their defense however, if they had given the number of lives saved and crimes prevented by conceal carry permit holder's it would have been a very one sided story the other way. :lol:
P.C.
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Other than that :lol: the point about following up on felony convictions and removing guns does seem fair though , , ,
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Woof,
And that's exactly what most people miss when these idiot's call for more gun control; they don't enforce the one's we already have. :-P They are actually making the case for why citizens need conceal carry permits!
P.C.
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President Obama's Anti-Gun Agenda Shows No Sign of Stopping
By John Lott
Published December 28, 2011 | FoxNews.com
President Obama keeps pushing for gun control. "I just want you to know that we are working on [gun control]. We have to go through a few processes, but under the radar,” President Obama told Sarah Brady, the former president of the Brady Campaign, this past spring.
His push as been quiet but relentless.
Just this past week Obama signaled that he was going to just ignore two new parts of the 2012 Omnibus Spending bill. Although he signed the spending bill into law, he simultaneously issued a so-called "signing statement," a note that presidents have started attaching to legislation stating how they interpret the law they are signing or whether they believe part of it is unconstitutional.
Obama’s statement claimed that Congress couldn’t put restrictions on how he wanted to spend to fund lobbying for gun control and the National Institute of Health studies of gun control.
But why should the federal government use taxpayer dollars to pay for lobbying?
Obama has had numerous false starts on gun control. Just in November, his administration moved to ban target practice on public lands, but the opposition was so swift and strong they immediately backtracked.
A couple of weeks ago the Obama administration suffered another embarrassment. It was discovered that the Obama administration oversaw the sale of guns to Mexican drug gangs in its Fast & Furious program to bolster statistics of guns crossing over to the border to these very drug gangs.
This scandal is quite incredible as the Obama administration ordered gun dealers to make sales to Mexican drug gangs against their wishes to help the administration’s push for more gun control. And this follows the revelation in July that the Obama administration had pushed federal agents involved in the Fast & Furious scandal to support gun control regulations during their congressional testimony.
It doesn’t help that the Obama administration started pushing these sales at the same time they wanted to bolster their case that America was supply illegal guns to Mexico backfired. All this undercut any justification for new regulations and destroyed any support that they might have had.
With 90 congressmen signing a "no confidence" resolution in Attorney General Eric Holder’s handling of “Fast & Furious,” last week Holder lashed out against his critics. “This is a way to get at the president because of the way I can be identified with him both due to the nature of our relationship and, you know, the fact that we’re both African-American,” Holder told the New York Times. Holder seems unwilling to recognize the genuine outrages the administration’s gun-control agenda has produced.
Still the administration has successfully manage to push through gun control regulations in many, less visible ways: -- The Obama administration instituted a ban on importing "historic" semi-automatic rifles into the US. -- In sharp contrast to the Bush administration, President Obama strongly supports the UN Arms Trade Treaty even though he knows that any such treaty are unlikely to obtain the two-thirds vote in the Senate needed for ratification. What the regulations will do is lead to severe restrictions on private gun ownership around the world.
The administration instituted new rules on selling "high-powered rifles," defined as a caliber of greater than .22. -- The administration nominated Andrew Traver, someone who supports gun bans, as the head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.
Obama has stuck by Traver despite his nomination being stalled in the Senate for a year and the fierce opposition it has generated.
Obama’s most lasting impact on gun control is likely to be through the federal court judges he appoints. His most visible appointments have been the gun-control advocates he has made to the Supreme Court.
Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan headed up President Clinton’s push for gun control when she worked for his White House during the 1990s. And Justice Sonia Sotomayor has signed on to a Supreme Court opinion stating that there is no individual right to "private self-defense" with guns.
The pro-gun control views of Obama’s nominees have played a role the Senate filibustering of two Appeals Court nominees. Caitlin Joan Halligan was particularly controversial when nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit because she opposes an individual’s right to self defense and – even more damning -- she was one of the trial lawyers who had sued gun makers. Thus in New York v. Sturm & Ruger, she argued that gun makers should be liable for the criminal acts of third parties but not given any credit for the benefits from self-defense.
If elected to a second term, Obama will end up appointing over half the federal judges. That sure can make a big difference.
Most importantly, the Supreme Court is only one vote away from reversing the 5 to 4 decisions that so narrowly struck down the handgun bans in Chicago and the District of Columbia.
Two of the Justices who voted to strike down the bans, conservative Antonin Scalia and moderate Anthony Kennedy, will be well into their 80s during the next administration.
While a couple of Justices have made it to 90 while serving on the court, remember the rare glimpse into Obama’s views during the 2008 campaign when he referred to those “bitter” Americans who “cling to their guns, cling to their religion.”
It surely fits his earlier statement: “I don’t believe that people should be able to own guns.”
Yet, despite all this evidence of an anti-gun agenda, recent articles by the Associated Press and other news media paint Obama as a moderate on guns and as somebody who wants to "protect the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens” and merely support so-called “gun safety” measures.
Of course, they are wrong. Unfortunately, Obama’s patient “under the radar” campaign seems to be working. He is fundamentally changing the courts and leaving them much more hostile to gun ownership. If Americans catch on, this could still be a major issue in the 2012.
John R. Lott, Jr. is a FoxNews.com contributor. He is an economist and author of the third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime" (University of Chicago Press, 2010).
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Hmm, so it looks like the next act will have the DOJ treating Gunwalker as a personnel issue rather than a criminal one. Be interesting to see if the sacrificed take issue with the coming passion play:
Breaking: ATF reportedly relieves Fast and Furious managers prior to OIG report
David Codrea, Gun Rights Examiner
January 4, 2012 - Like this? Subscribe to get instant updates.
Gun Rights Examiner and Sipsey Street Irregulars received information this evening that three of the prime Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives players in the Fast and Furious gunwalking scandal have been relieved of duties.
William Hoover, ATF's Deputy Director during Fast and Furious, who was recently reassigned as Special Agent in Charge of the Washington Field Office, Assistant Director in Charge of Field Operations Mark Chait, likewise reassigned as head of the Baltimore Field Office, and Deputy Assistant Director of Field Operations William McMahon have reportedly been sidelined pending the outcome of the anticipated report from the Office of Inspector General. Debbie Bullock a mid-level manager has reportedly been advised that she is now the acting SAC for Baltimore, and will assume Chait's functions.
These three were the recipients of a January 20, 2011 email from ATF Associate Chief Counsel Barry Orlow, advising them and other Bureau attorneys of Gun Rights Examiner's “Open Letter to Senate Judiciary Committee staff on 'Project Gunwalker',” which put Senator Chuck Grassley's office on notice that ATF employees want d to come forward to provide testimony and documentation about gunwalking to Mexico. They were also prominent in a position issued by the CleanUpATF webmaster:
Whereas overwhelming evidence establishes that substantial acts of wrongdoing may have been committed by senior Officials of the United States Government, including persons such as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr., Ronald H. Weich, Dennis Burke, and others acting for or on behalf of the United States Department of Justice (DOJ), Kenneth E. Melson, William J. Hoover, Mark Chait, William G. McMahon, William D. Newell, George Gillett Jr., and others of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), and possibly other officials within the Obama Administration, CleanUpATF.org hereby respectfully requests that Congress should enact and empower, on behalf of the American people and pursuant to 28 C.F.R. PART 600, one or more Special Prosecutors...
Disciplinary actions could take momentum away from that. Sources tell Gun Rights Examiner and Sipsey Street Irregulars that "ATF is going to follow the long-awaited OIG report to a 't': If OIG says XX gets terminated, they are going to terminate." That this would be treated as a personnel matter, subject to disciplinary procedures, as opposed to a criminal matter, subject to prosecution was the topic of a recent post in this column.
Left unsaid is why these three have been singled out prior to the OIG report being submitted, particularly since their sharing findings with the Department of Justice and ATF subjects of their investigation would violate all principles of independence from influence. If that did not happen, a fair conclusion to assume would be that the process of the investigation itself led those answering questions and providing documentation to an inevitable conclusion. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa wrote a December 7 column claiming Attorney General Eric Holder, scheduled to testify again on February 2, was "protecting staff over 'Fast and Furious'."
This latest reported development lends itself to the observation that Holder is protecting something else, and that this is a tactical move in anticipation of the report's release and his next trip to the Hill.
http://www.examiner.com/gun-rights-in-national/breaking-atf-reportedly-relieves-fast-and-furious-managers-prior-to-oig-report
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*Fast and Furious Defense Strategy: Keep Them Quiet*
An overlooked detail of the personnel shuffling that has occurred in the wake of Operation Fast and Furious: current Acting ATF Director B. Todd Jones was in a position to be as culpable regarding the gunwalking plot as was the removed director, Kenneth Melson.
Before taking over for Melson in a DOJ push to appear to have done “something,” Jones was the chairman of the attorney general’s Advisory Committee. He sat in on Fast and Furious calls as early as October 26, 2009 (http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2011/09/28/fast-and-furious-just-might-be-president-obamas-watergate/) [1] — a meeting Melson also attended.
With the personnel move to Jones, control merely shifted from one possible co-conspirator to another, though the administration assured that they still held a tight rein over the new acting director with the choice of Jones.
In a Christmas Eve article in the Los Angeles Times, reporter Richard Serrano revealed that Melson had blamed ATF staff (http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/24/nation/la-na-fast-furious-20111225) [2] for Operation Fast and Furious during confidential testimony with congressional investigators:The deposition, which was taken in July and was recently obtained by the Washington bureau, shows that Kenneth E. Melson was irate. Even his chief intelligence officer at ATF headquarters was upset with the operation, dubbed Fast and Furious, but did little to shut it down, Melson complained. “He didn’t come in and tell me, either,” Melson said. “And he’s on the same damn floor as I am.”
Perhaps the most vital information in Serrano’s article is how the DOJ is apparently intending to handle the inspector general’s investigation:At Holder’s request, the Justice Department’s inspector general began investigating Fast and Furious in February, a month after the controversial operation in the ATF’s Phoenix field office came to light.
Jones expects the inspector general’s report early next year. He said he will immediately refer it to the ATF’s Office of Professional Responsibility for recommendations on job terminations or suspensions. “We sure will” be making some quick personnel decisions, he said.
In response to a gunwalking operation that put more than 2,000 firearms into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, and which led to the death of at least one U.S. law enforcement agent and more than 300 people in Mexico, the ATF will look for “recommendations on job terminations or suspensions.”
Numerous felonies were committed by government employees of Barack Obama’s administration. These felonies include violations of the Arms Export Control Act, violations of the Kingpin Act, possible RICO violations, violations of the Whistleblower Protection Act, felonies related to the cover-up of Brian Terry’s death at the hands of an FBI criminal informant, including the hiding of the informant’s SKS rifle, and other crimes. Eric Holder’s apparent perjury in front of Congress about when he know of Operation Fast and Furious is the least of the administration’s problems.
This points to a possible DOJ defense tactic: in exchange for suspensions and resignations, those responsible will be thrilled to have the option of not talking about the criminality of their actions. Those in the position to “tell all” to reduce their sentence length with a plea bargain in a criminal trial have no reason whatsoever to talk if their continued silence can be bought for such a cheap price.
If Inspector General Cynthia Schnedar really does allow the conspirators off without any criminal charges being filed, you can be assured that the fix is in.
http://pjmedia.com/blog/fast-and-furious-defense-strategy-keep-them-quiet/?singlepage=true
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Dear Marc F.,
Thanks to the action of tens of thousands of National Association for Gun Rights’ members, New Jersey gun owner Brian Aitken was able to spend Christmas 2010 with his family.
But for a long time this story looked like it would have a grim ending...
Mr. Aitken was convicted and sentenced to seven years in prison in New Jersey for never actually committing a crime.
After moving from Colorado, Aitken was careful to follow every absurd gun law in New Jersey to a “T”.
His efforts were in vain as he was promptly imprisoned for violating those same laws after a judge threw out most of the evidence proving Aitken’s innocence.
In prompt response, I launched a series of e-mails asking National Association for Gun Rights members to sign a petition demanding Governor Christie pardon and release Mr. Aitken.
National Association for Gun Rights’ members answered the call and unleashed an avalanche of real political pressure.
Volunteers on the ground in New Jersey personally delivered more than 25,000 petitions to Governor Christie’s office.
As Senator Everett Dirkson once said "when I feel the heat, I see the light."
And pro-gun Americans lit the fire that forced a spotlight of attention on Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey.
It's tough for any politician not to notice that many signatures.
And the Monday after delivery, Mr. Aitken's sentence was fully commuted and he was released from prison to spend the holidays with his family.
You read that correctly: Governor Christie felt the pressure of Second Amendment supporters like you and freed Brian Aitken from prison.
That's the kind of fight you can expect as a member of the National Association for Gun Rights.
Unfortunately, it wasn't a full pardon, and that's why I am keeping my eye on New Jersey.
Governor Christie shows all the signs of a man who could attempt to secure the Republican nomination for a White House run, and you and I must get him on the record as saying that the gun laws in places like New Jersey are a slap in the face to its citizens.
Simply commuting the sentence of an innocent man isn't enough by itself.
Political insiders are keenly aware of how much the votes of Second Amendment supporters can make a difference in a national election.
But people like Governor Christie have spent their political careers in places like New Jersey where they've tried to play both sides of the fence.
He needs to be aware of the fact that the rest of this country will not tolerate offenses to our Constitutional liberties.
Nor will they allow Gestapo-style kangaroo courts where law-abiding citizens go to prison with stiffer sentences than drug dealers and rapists for exercising their basic freedoms.
Members and activists from the National Association for Gun Rights are driving this point home by holding Governor Christie's feet to the fire with petitions from across the country.
He now has to contend with the simple fact that, in less than a week, you and other members of the National Association for Gun Rights were able to blast out 25,000 petition signatures as well as print them and deliver them directly to his office.
Applying political pressure does make a difference, especially when the pressure is crate after crate of petitions dumped on a governor's desk.
And Mr. Aitken spent his Christmas with his family instead of behind bars.
If you want to get involved in the next battle for the Second Amendment, stay connected and look for alerts from the National Association for Gun Rights.
Yours in Freedom,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights
P.S. Click here to help the National Association for Gun Rights continue to fight for people like Brian Aitken by making a donation.
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Woof,
The payoff for sacrificing a Border Patrol Agent.
U.S. judge backs multiple rifle sales reporting
By Jeremy Pelofsky | Reuters – 15 hrs ago
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Friday refused to block new federal rules requiring gun dealers in four states bordering Mexico to report the sales of multiple semi-automatic rifles, a victory for the Obama administration.
The administration issued the reporting requirements last year despite opposition from the gun industry as part of a stepped-up effort to clamp down on the weapons flowing across the border to violent drug cartels in Mexico.
The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) ordered more than 8,000 gun dealers in Texas, Arizona, New Mexico and California to report the sale within five business days of two or more semiautomatic rifles to the same person.
That also includes rifles with a caliber greater than .22 and with the ability to accept a detachable magazine.
Mexican officials have complained bitterly about guns illegally coming from the United States. Tens of thousands of Mexicans have died in the drug wars since 2006 when the government there decided to take on the cartels.
Judge Rosemary Collyer, appointed to the bench by Republican President George W. Bush, found that the ATF's requirement was sufficiently narrowly tailored and that it was rational by focusing on the states that border Mexico.
"Congress has effected a delicate balance between ATF's regulation of firearms and the right to privacy held by lawful firearms owners," Collyer wrote in a 21-page ruling. The ATF's reporting requirement "did not disturb that balance."
Gun dealers backed by the National Rifle Association, a powerful lobbying organization, and the National Shooting Sports Foundation challenged the requirements arguing that it would effectively require national registration of firearms sales, which they said the ATF was not authorized to do.
The gun industry has also said that the rules will have no impact on the cartels but rather burden law-abiding retailers and that the reporting requirement was overly burdensome.
"If President (Barack) Obama gets a second term, I think law-abiding gun owners are going to see a lot more of it," Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the NRA, told Reuters.
"These drug cartels ... rape, they rob, they murder they throw people into lions' pits, they're not going to be deterred by a form. That must be some form," he said. The groups plan to appeal the ruling.
Some 36,000 reports of multiple handgun sales were made from the four border states in fiscal 2010, according to the ATF.
The decision came as the ATF has been under scrutiny in recent months after a sting operation to track guns being smuggled to Mexican cartels went awry.
(Reporting By Jeremy Pelofsky; Editing by Will Dunham)
P.C.
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I'm all for gun rights; I own a few guns and I was given my first rifle when I was 6 years old, but why is it wrong to require gun dealers on the border, or for that matter anywhere in America, to
report the sales of multiple semi-automatic rifles?
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Inside President Obama's War On The Fast & Furious Whistleblowers
Image by Getty Images Europe via @daylife
Legal Dictionary: Whistleblower: an employee who brings wrongdoing by an employer or other employees to the attention of a government or law-enforcement agency and who is commonly vested by statute with rights and remedies for retaliation
Slang Dictionary: Whistleblower: n.
someone who calls a halt to something; an informer; an enforcer; a stool (pigeon): I don’t know who the whistle-blower was, but a good time was really ruined.
The synonyms thesaurus.com gives for “whistleblower” are even less charitable than the word’s definition: canary, nark, rat, snake, snitch, squealer, stoolie, tattletale, weasel…. But none of these labels seem harsh enough to federal bureaucrats. They’ve left whistleblowers in legal limbo; they’ve barred whistleblowers from offices and forced others to transfer to backwater districts; they’ve mined records to publically disparage at least one recently (more on him in a moment); they’ve deemed a few to be “traitors” and had them shunned by colleagues … and this is just the beginning of what they’ve been doing to the few courageous squealers who exposed Operation Fast and Furious, the once-secret operation that, by design mind you, let thousands of guns “walk” from U.S. gun stores to the arsenals of Mexican drug cartels.
To find what is being done to protect these and other government whistleblowers, I sat down with Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA). He’s the Obama administration’s gadfly on this topic. Grassley was one of the original authors of the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989. Thanks to this legislation, if authorities in a federal agency take (or threaten to take) retaliatory action against a whistleblower, then they’ve broken the law. Nevertheless, the bureaucrats who often make life difficult for whistleblowers have had little to fear from this law.
The quasi-judicial agency that adjudicates government whistleblower complaints (called the Merit Systems Protection Board) uses appointed judges to hear whistleblower cases. These judges have more often than not sided with the government; in fact, since 2000, this board has ruled in favor of whistleblowers only about 5 percent of the time (just three times in 56 cases) according to a Government Accountability Project study.
Senator Grassley has criticized this board for allowing the federal bureaucracy to have its revenge on those who uncover corruption. More recently, he’s been working to update the Whistleblower Protection Act and he’s written multiple letters to Attorney General Eric Holder telling him not to punish whistleblowers.
As Senator Grassley is clearly passionate about this topic, I said, “Just speak your mind Senator Grassley. Don’t let me stop you.”
He smiled warmly and leaned over his Capitol Hill desk as he said, “Whistleblowing ruins people professionally. I’d say there’s more retaliation out there than you and I know about. Because of this, though people want to do right, by golly they can’t because they know they’re going to get hurt. This is why I’ve always advised presidents, going back to President Ronald Reagan, that we need a Rose Garden ceremony celebrating a whistleblower now and then. That way they’d know there is some support for standing up against corruption.”
Senator Grassley then pointed out that the first whistleblower to come forward about Fast and Furious (ATF Agent John Dodson) had recently been attacked by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). According to Senator Grassley, “Someone in the Justice Department leaked a document to the press along with talking points in an attempt to smear [Dodson.]” The letter insinuated that Dodson went rogue and started a gun-walking operation on his own. This was easy to prove false; however, if Republicans hadn’t taken control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2010 election (meaning an opposing political party wouldn’t have had the power to do an investigation) then Dodson would have been left dangling in these political winds, as records giving the complete picture would likely not have been available.
Senator Grassley pointed out that the documents DOJ released to smear Dodson were actually supposed to be so sensitive that the DOJ wouldn’t provide them to congressional investigators. But then, to harm a whistleblower, someone from the DOJ provided these specifically selected documents to the press. In fact, the name of the criminal suspect in the documents was redacted, but Agent Dodson’s name was left for all to see. “This looks like a clear and intentional violation of the Privacy Act as well as an attempt at whistleblower retaliation,” said Grassley.
In a subsequent letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, Grassley said, “In a private phone conversation with me, you already told me that someone has been held accountable for this. But your staff refused to provide my staff with any details. Who was held accountable and how?”
No one at DOJ is known to have been held accountable for this attack on Dodson. Meanwhile, the whistleblowers who blew the top off Fast and Furious are paying the price.
Agent John Dodson, after nearly a year of harassment, including being given menial assignments and being barred from areas of the ATF building in Phoenix, is in the process of trying to sell his home in Arizona so he can transfer to South Carolina.
Agent Larry Alt transferred to Florida. He still has unresolved legal claims against the ATF.
Agent Pete Forcelli was demoted to a desk job after he testified before Congress. He has requested an internal investigation to address retaliation targeting him.
Agent James Casa took a transfer to Florida.
Agent Carlos Canino, who was a deputy attache in Mexico City, was moved to Tucson.
Meanwhile the officials who went along with the operation and its subsequent cover up have mostly been rewarded. “These transfers/reassignments have never been described as promotions in any of the documents announcing them,” said an ATF statement after journalists noted that those who didn’t become whistleblowers profited from their silence. The ATF says that because these officials pay didn’t go up they weren’t promoted; however, in many cases their titles and positions have inarguably been enhanced.
Former Acting ATF Chief Ken Melson, after refusing to be a scapegoat for this operation, became an adviser in the Office of Legal Affairs in Washington, D.C.
Acting Deputy Director Billy Hoover is now the special agent in charge of the D.C. office.
Deputy Director for Field Operations William McMahon—he’d received detailed briefings Fast and Furious—is now at the ATF’s Office of Internal Affairs.
Former Special Agent in Charge of Phoenix William Newell—he oversaw Fast and Furious and lied by saying guns hadn’t been allowed to go south of the border—is now at the Office of Management in Washington, D.C.
Phoenix Deputy Chief George Gillette is now in to Washington, D.C., as ATF’s liaison to the U.S. Marshal’s Service.
ATF Group Supervisor David Voth—he managed Fast and Furious out of the Phoenix office—is now in a management position in Washington, D.C.
Agent Hope McCallister—she had management duties on the team that ran Fast and Furious—was given a “Lifesaving Award” after it came to light she’d ordered agents to stop tailing suspects who the ATF had allowed to buy guns.
In light of all of this, Senator Grassley pivoted and said, “With regards to Operation Fast and Furious, we want the person at the highest level of government who approved Fast and Furious to be fired. We want justice for Brian Terry’s family—they still don’t know what happened that night when Brian was killed. And we want to know that this stupid program will never happen again.”
Then Senator Grassley highlighted a related issue that hasn’t made the headlines. This issue puts the politics behind the cover up of Fast and Furious in perspective. In November internal documents showed that the DOJ was considering changing existing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) regulations (this is a process that allows citizens to seek and obtain unclassified documents) to allow agencies responding to a FOIA request to answer the person by saying “no records exist,” even if the records do, in fact, exist. This way when someone makes a request for government documents, the agency would be able to fib and thereby work to discourage other such requests. The idea was that agencies could do this whenever someone requested a document that the law allows the government to keep from the public, such one that has a “top-secret” rating.
“They were giving themselves a license to legally lie,” Senator Grassley deadpanned. “This was supposed to be the most transparent administration we’ve ever seen. Well, they’re not.”
After Senator Grassley’s staff made this attempt to give themselves a “license to legally lie” public the DOJ was “so embarrassed they withdrew the proposal right away,” said Senator Grassley.
So whistleblowers who’d been ordered to let guns “walk” in Operation Fast and Furious—and those federal employees who find themselves in other misguided programs or corruption—either can keep their mouths shut or they can come forward and be crushed by the bureaucracy as they attempt to reform the system. This isn’t a decision citizens in a country with the freedom of speech enshrined in the U.S. Bill of Rights should have to contend with.
Just when did the federal bureaucracy get so strong that it lost its fear of the people? Just when did the people become more afraid of the bureaucracy? Given the gauntlet whistleblowers now face, it isn’t surprising that Americans have become cynical about Washington; however, perhaps instead of deciding all politicians are tainted, we should instead realize it’s the growing bureaucratic swamp that needs to be drained.
In fact, saying all of Washington’s politicians are corrupt is too convenient a philosophy; such fashionable cynicism can even be self-fulfilling, as deciding all politicians are crooked doesn’t allow a Senator Grassley, for example, to now and then be a shining example of what a statesman should be.
This article is available online at:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2011/12/07/inside-president-obamas-
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Issa issues another subpoena in probe of 'Fast and Furious'
By Jordy Yager - 01/19/12 01:22 PM ET
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) has subpoenaed a senior official from the U.S. Attorney's Office in his investigation of the botched gun-tracking operation "Fast and Furious."
Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, issued a subpoena for Patrick Cunningham, the chief of the Phoenix office’s criminal division within the U.S. Attorney’s office in Arizona.
In a letter to Cunningham sent on Wednesday, Issa said Justice Department (DOJ) officials have suggested that Cunningham is “the most appropriate person to interview from the U.S. Attorney’s Office regarding Operation Fast and Furious.”
“Senior Justice Department officials have recently told the committee that you relayed inaccurate and misleading information to the department in preparation for its initial response to Congress,” said Issa in the letter, which was made public on Thursday.
Though Issa does not specify what “initial response to Congress” he is referring to, he is likely talking about a letter from DOJ sent last year to Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) that contained false statements about the operation led by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
One Republican lawmaker, Wisconsin Rep. James Sensenbrenner, has suggested impeaching Attorney General Eric Holder for lying to Congress.
In that February letter, which has since been rescinded, DOJ stated that it did everything in its power to make sure that firearms do not cross the border into Mexico.
Later, it came to light that Operation Fast and Furious oversaw the sale of nearly 2,000 guns to known and suspected straw buyers for Mexican drug cartels. Officials did not provide surveillance for the weapons — a highly controversial and frowned upon tactic known as letting guns “walk” — which has caused many of the firearms to go missing.
In late 2010, two of the guns sold under the operation were found at the murder scene of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry in Arizona miles from the border.
Issa said that Cunningham insisted that “no unacceptable tactics were used” in Fast and Furious even after the “initial response” to Congress.
Issa has been investigating the operation and the tactics it used since March of last year. Holder and President Obama have denied ever approving or knowing about the tactics used in Fast and Furious. A separate inspector general investigation has been ongoing since March 2011 as well.
Holder is scheduled to appear before Issa's committee in two weeks.
The committee has been working with Cunningham’s lawyer since August to try and arrange an interview, and one had been scheduled for Thursday, according to Issa’s letter. But Cunningham canceled on Tuesday, leading the chairman to issue a subpoena.
“As a result of your recalcitrance and inflexible positions, the committee is now forced to engage in compulsory process to obtain your testimony,” Issa stated.
Cunningham was named once before in a subpoena Issa issued in October that sought email communications between top DOJ officials. In the subpoena was a request for correspondence sent to or from Cunningham between the dates of Dec. 16 and Dec. 18, 2009, Dec. 15 and Dec. 17, 2010, and March 9 and March 14, 2011.
Cunningham joined the U.S. Attorney’s office in Arizona in late 2009 and worked directly under former U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke. Burke, who oversaw much of the legal advice given during Operation Fast and Furious, resigned in August.
A spokesperson for the Justice Department declined to comment. Requests for comment from the U.S. Attorney's office in Arizona were not immediately returned.
This story has been updated to clarify that a senior official for the U.S. Attorney's Office was subpoenaed.
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This from Gun Owners of America. GOA's emails have started appearing in my email box, but I am not really familiar with them.
Well, this past Friday, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia issued a setback to gun owners. The issue involved a lawsuit challenging Barack Obama’s illegal multiple sales regulations. [NSSF v. Jones, Acting Director, BATFE.]
Through those regulations, Obama has demanded, by regulatory fiat, that firearms licensees in four southwestern states report multiple sales of certain long guns to the federal government.
In upholding this action, Judge Rosemary Collyer -– a Bush appointee! –- ignored the Constitution, the Supreme Court’s decision in the Heller case, and the clear language of federal law.
Of course, this once again underscores the danger of putting all our eggs in the “court basket.” It’s not a bad idea to challenge unconstitutional measures in the courts, but it’s problematic if we look to them as being the ultimate defenders of our gun rights. Clearly, they are not.
Among other things, Judge Collyer ignored the obvious language of the 1986 McClure-Volkmer Act, which prohibits the ATF from demanding any information on gun owners other than information explicitly allowed by statute.
Specifically, the section states: “Such [licensees] shall not be required to submit to the Attorney General reports and information with respect to such records and the contents thereof, except as expressly required by this section.” (18 U.S.C. 923(g)(1))
Paragraph (g)(5) allows the Attorney General to demand information by issuing a “demand letter,” but participants in the drafting of McClure-Volkmer affirm that this was not intended to trump the paragraph (1) limitation, in order to statutorily mandate reporting requirements.
To interpret paragraph (g)(5), as Obama and Attorney General Holder have interpreted it, is to say that there are NO limits on the information the Attorney General can demand -– up to and including every 4473 in the country.
In opening this door, Collyer cited much narrower decisions in the Fourth and the liberal Ninth Circuit, but expanded them beyond any judicial precedent. Citing a test that looked at whether the ATF’s action constituted a “clear error of judgment” or was “arbitrary or capricious,” Collyer gave all of the benefit of the doubt to Obama -– and none to the Second Amendment, which wasn’t even considered in her 21-page opinion.
The decision will presumably be appealed to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals -– a supposedly “conservative” circuit that nevertheless upheld ObamaCare.
But the larger issue is this: Congress can block these regulations by simply cutting off the money to implement them. Last fall, we demanded that the House include such a prohibition in its giant money bill. But congressional leaders ignored the Second Amendment community on this and a variety of other pro-gun issues, including defunding ObamaCare.
It is late in the game. But there is still an opportunity to prohibit funding for the multiple sales regulations on the annual Department of Justice Appropriations bill and the “continuing resolution” which will inevitably follow around September 30.
True, a lot of damage will have been done by that point. But we cannot allow to stand the precedent that the Attorney General can seize any and all gun-related information, simply by saying he wants it.
ACTION: Click here to ontact your representative. Tell him Congress must act to block funding for the unlawful, anti-gun Obama multiple sales regulations.
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second post:
Federal official in Arizona to plead the fifth and not answer questions on 'furious'
By William La Jeunesse
Published January 20, 2012
FoxNews.com
The chief of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona is refusing to testify before Congress regarding Operation Fast and Furious, the federal gun-running scandal that sent U.S. weapons to Mexico.
Patrick J. Cunningham informed the House Oversight Committee late Thursday through his attorney that he will use the Fifth Amendment protection.
Cunningham was ordered Wednesday to appear before Chairman Darrell Issa and the House Oversight Committee regarding his role in the operation that sent more than 2,000 guns to the Sinaloa Cartel. Guns from the failed operation were found at the murder scene of Border Agent Brian Terry.
The letter from Cunningham’s Washington DC attorney stunned congressional staff. Last week, Cunningham, the second highest ranking U.S. Attorney in Arizona, was scheduled to appear before Issa‘s committee voluntarily. Then, he declined and Issa issued a subpoena.
Cunningham is represented by Tobin Romero of Williams and Connolly who is a specialist in white collar crime. In the letter, he suggests witnesses from the Department of Justice in Washington, who have spoken in support of Attorney General Eric Holder, are wrong or lying.
“Department of Justice officials have reported to the Committee that my client relayed inaccurate information to the Department upon which it relied in preparing its initial response to Congress. If, as you claim, Department officials have blamed my client, they have blamed him unfairly,” the letter to Issa says.
Romero claims Cunningham did nothing wrong and acted in good faith, but the Department of Justice in Washington is making him the fall guy, claiming he failed to accurately provide the Oversight Committee with information on the execution of Fast and Furious.
"To avoid needless preparation by the Committee and its staff for a deposition next week, I am writing to advise you that my client is going to assert his constitutional privilege not to be compelled to be a witness against himself." Romero told Issa.
This schism is the first big break in what has been a unified front in the government’s defense of itself in the gun-running scandal. Cunningham claims he is a victim of a conflict between two branches of government and will not be compelled to be a witnesses against himself, and make a statement that could be later used by a grand jury or special prosecutor to indict him on criminal charges.
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Arizona's state legislature will open its own investigation into the Obama administration's disgraced gun-running program, known as "Fast and Furious," the speaker of the state House said Friday.
Speaker Andy Tobin created the committee, and charged it with looking at whether the program broke any state laws — raising the possibility of state penalties against those responsible for the operation.
It's a turnaround from the rest of the immigration issue, where the federal government has sued to block the state's own set of laws.
A law requiring businesses to check new workers' legal status was upheld by the Supreme Court last year, and the court has agreed to hear the case of Arizona's crackdown law that makes being an illegal immigrant a state crime and gives state and local police the power to enforce that law.
Fast and Furious was a straw-purchase program run by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The goal was to try to trace guns sold in Arizona shops and then trafficked across the Mexican border, where they landed in the hands of drug cartels.
As part of the operation, however, agents let the guns "walk" — meaning they lost track of them. At least two of the guns ended up at the scene where Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in a shootout with Mexican bandits along a smuggling corridor in Arizona.
Mr. Tobin will announce the committee's jurisdiction at a press conference in Phoenix on Monday. The committee is charged with looking into the facts about the program, what impact it had on Arizona and whether any of the state's laws were broken.
A report is due back by March 30.
Arizona's investigation into Fast and Furious comes on top of an investigation by Republicans in Congress.
On Friday the chief of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona told a House committee he will decline to answer their questions next week, citing his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.
The official's lawyer, in a letter to the committee, said his client is innocent but is "ensnared by the unfortunate circumstances in which he now stands between two branches of government."
http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/...es-feds-over-/
By Stephen Dinan
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*Ariz. attorney who pleaded 5th in Fast and Furious investigation leaves job* (http://www.azfamily.com/news/Ariz-attorney-who-pleaded-5th-in-Fast-and-Furious-investigation-leaves-job-138196964.html)
by Catherine Holland
PHOENIX -- The head of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Arizona if officially leaving his job.
Patrick Cunningham is one of several who have been under fire since the botched gun-trafficking operation known as Fast and Furious came to light. Those investigating Fast and Furious believe Cunningham had a significant hand in the decisions made during the controversial operation.
According to a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder from House Oversight chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA), the Department of Justice had "identified Patrick Cunningham as the best person in the U.S. Attorney's Office to provide information about Fast and Furious to the Committee."
When Cunningham summoned to go before the House Oversight committee last week to be deposed about his role in the operation, he invoked the Fifth Amendment, which is the right to not implicate oneself in a crime.
In his letter to Holder, Issa said Cunningham's decision to plead the Fifth "suggests that the Department has jeopardized public safety and the public trust by allowing individuals with potential criminal culpability to remain in positions of authority."
It's believed that Cunningham and his office allowed more than 2,000 guns purchased in Arizona to be taken into Mexico. The intent was to follow the guns from small-time buyers to the big players in the drug cartels. The guns, however, vanished, many turning up later at crimes scene in both Mexico and the U.S. Two of those guns were recovered from the scene of the December 2010 shooting that killed border agent Brian Terry on the U.S. side of the border.
More than 1,400 of the Fast and Furious weapons are still missing.
Holder is slated to testify again on Tuesday. While many have called for Holder's resignation, both he and President Barack Obama have denied responsibility for the failed operation.
After Cunningham invoked his Fifth Amendment privilege, Issa requested that Holder make an assistant U.S. attorney who was under Cunnigham's direct supervision available for testimony.
Appointed by former U.S Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke, Cunningham had been the chief of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Arizona since Jan. 11, 2010.
On Friday, Cunningham left the U.S. Attorney's Office for a job in the private sector.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2012/01/29/holder-informed-of-fast-furious-five-months-before-testimony/
Holder informed of Fast & Furious five months before testimony?
posted at 3:15 pm on January 29, 2012 by Ed Morrissey
When Eric Holder testified about his knowledge of Operation Fast and Furious on May 3, 2011, he told the House Judiciary Committee that he had only been informed of the operation “a few weeks ago.” Later, Holder amended that to say that it would have been more accurate to call the time period “a couple of months.”
Does five months qualify as “a couple” or “a few weeks”?
Attorney General Eric Holder’s Department of Justice dumped documents related to Operation Fast and Furious on congressional officials late Friday night. Central to this document dump is a series of emails showing Holder was informed of slain Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder on the day it happened – December 15, 2010 – and that he was informed the weapons used to kill Terry were from Fast and Furious on the same day.
An email from one official, whose name has been redacted from the document, to now-former Arizona U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke reads: “On December 14, 2010, a BORTAC agent working in the Nogales, AZ AOR was shot. The agent was conducting Border Patrol operations 18 miles north of the international boundary when he encountered [redacted word] unidentified subjects. Shots were exchanged resulting in the agent being shot. At this time, the agent is being transported to an area where he can be air lifted to an emergency medical center.”
That email was sent at 2:31 a.m. on the day Terry was shot. One hour later, a follow-up email read: “Our agent has passed away.”
Burke forwarded those two emails to Holder’s then-deputy chief of staff Monty Wilkinson later that morning, adding that the incident was “not good” because it happened “18 miles w/in” the border.
Wilkinson responded to Burke shortly thereafter and said the incident was “tragic.” “I’ve alerted the AG [Holder], the Acting DAG, Lisa, etc.”
So far, it just sounds like a normal notification of an agent death — until one reads an e-mail from later in the same day:
Then, later that day, Burke followed up with Wilkinson after Burke discovered from officials whose names are redacted that the guns used to kill Terry were from Fast and Furious. “The guns found in the desert near the murder BP officer connect back to the investigation we were going to talk about – they were AK-47s purchased at a Phoenix gun store,” Burke wrote to Wilkinson.
“I’ll call tomorrow,” Wilkinson responded.
It’s amazing what one can find in Friday night document dumps, isn’t it? Small wonder that the DoJ didn’t want this released during the week, when the newspapers and media could draw more eyes to it. This e-mail utterly negates the notion that Holder had no idea about Fast and Furious when Terry was murdered with weapons sent over the border by the ATF.
Could this open another line of Fast and Furious investigation, this time into potential perjury charges against Holder? Holder was probably vague enough to avoid a legal finding of perjury in his initial testimony, but he clearly intended to deceive Congress in that testimony. Either he knew about F&F when notified of Terry’s death, or didn’t bother to check with his own deputy chief of staff to follow up on the matter.
Holder will appear on Tuesday to testify before the House Oversight Committee and its chair, Rep. Darrell Issa. The only thing that might overshadow this new revelation would be Issa demanding to know why a senior DoJ official planned to take the 5th before the committee.
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The career path of former U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke can be charted through an ascending string of jobs from Arizona's Supreme Court to the U.S. Senate, White House, Department of Homeland Security and Justice Department.
It is a resume that spans more than two decades in three branches of government.
Then, suddenly, it nose-dives on Aug. 30, 2011, when Burke resigned as U.S. attorney amid a scandal over a gun-smuggling case known as Operation Fast and Furious.
Since that day, the gregarious public servant has gone silent, and nearly invisible, except that his name appears prominently in Justice Department documents, congressional hearings and news reports.
Burke's political downfall may have been shocking, but an Arizona Republic analysis of his career suggests that the cause -- firearm politics -- has been a pet theme through most of his 23 years in government.
The end came after federal records and testimony revealed that Burke last year pressed colleagues and superiors to deny that the Justice Department knowingly allowed guns to be smuggled into Mexico under his watch, and that two of those weapons wound up at the murder scene of a U.S. Border Patrol agent.
In e-mail exchanges with DOJ officials, Burke incorrectly described allegations about Fast and Furious by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, as "categorically false." He also reviled congressional investigators as "stooges" for gun-rights zealots.
Burke finally quit his post after testifying in secret to congressional investigators about the case.
He was not the only federal official to suffer fallout. At the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, national Director Kenneth Melson was reassigned and Arizona's top agent, William Newell, was transferred. On Capitol Hill, Grassley called for the removal of Lanny Breuer, second in command of the Justice Department, and many in Congress have said Attorney General Eric Holder should be fired.
But, of all the officials caught up in America's so-called "gun-walking" scandal, Dennis Kiernan Burke is the only one to lose his job.
A resignation letter to President Barack Obama said simply, "It is the right time to move on to pursue other aspects of my career and my life."
The question: Has he hit bottom yet, and can he rise again?
'A stand-up guy'
Since leaving his skyscraper office in downtown Phoenix, Burke has turned down all interview requests, leaving his lawyers to describe him as a "stand-up guy" who didn't intentionally mislead Congress or the public.
An inspector general probe is still under way, as well as congressional investigations.
Friends say Burke, who had been touted as a possible candidate for governor or Congress, is lying low, volunteering full time with a rape-crisis network and playing golf. All of them speak of him with glowing adjectives: articulate, positive, hardworking, decent, funny, loyal.
"He doesn't have enemies," said Robbie Aiken, a longtime friend and vice president for federal affairs with Pinnacle West Capital Corp. "All the things he's done, yet I've never really heard anybody say anything negative about him."
But there are critics, especially among staunch Second Amendment advocates, who paint Burke as a liberal apparatchik who was willing to let criminals move weapons to Mexican cartels if it would help justify new firearms restrictions.
"It's no coincidence that Dennis Burke, a longtime anti-gun policy person, was made U.S. Attorney in mid-2009 ... the same month (sic) that Fast and Furious begins," said Mike Vanderboegh, a gun-rights blogger. "They picked precisely the right guy to run a clandestine program." (The operation began a month after Burke's appointment was confirmed.)
Curiously, the supporters and detractors agree on one point: They say Burke became a scapegoat to protect higher officials in the Justice Department or White House. Dave Workman, a gun-rights blogger, described Burke as "the chief sacrificial lamb."
Sen. Grassley, in an October statement, said: "Mr. Burke is to be commended, to some extent, for being the only person to resign and take responsibility for the failed operation. Of course, I do not believe he should feel obligated to be the only fall guy."
Phoenix attorney Andy Gordon, a close friend for nearly two decades, said Burke may be loyal to a fault, protecting higher-ups in the Justice Department. "DOJ threw him under the bus. That's my view," Gordon said.
Another friend, attorney Tim Nelson, said: "I don't know the workings of the Obama administration, whether they were looking for a fall guy or what. But it certainly looks that way."
Whether those evaluations are valid or not, associates agree Burke was devastated to lose a dream job and see his reputation tainted by scandal.
Kevin Burke, an older brother who serves as a county judge in Minnesota, said Dennis is focused on defending himself as investigations continue.
"He's certainly bummed," Judge Burke said. "You want people to understand what you did and why you did it." Asked if Dennis privately admits to making mistakes, Kevin answered, "I can categorically deny that. The idea that he is going around saying, 'Boy, I really screwed up'? He's never told me that."
Strong work ethic and ambition
Since Dennis Burke got his law degree at the University of Arizona in 1988, he has flourished in high-profile government jobs, handling politicians, journalists, lobbyists and lawyers with aplomb.
Born in 1962 in Chicago, the last of five children in an Irish-Catholic home, Burke once credited his immigrant grandfather with instilling a work ethic to match ambitions. When Dennis was just a boy, the family moved to Phoenix, where he attended Catholic schools. (As an adult, he once said his life motto was "Love your neighbor as you do yourself" because "several nuns beat that into my head in grade school.")
After graduation from Brophy College Preparatory, Burke earned a bachelor's degree at Georgetown University and got an early taste of national politics by serving as an intern for U.S. Rep. Martin Sabo, D-Minn.
"He was kind of bitten by the Hill bug," said Kevin Burke, who is president of the American Judges Association.
Former Sen. Dennis DeConcini, D
-Ariz., who hired Burke from law school as a congressional intern, said the student stood out for legal smarts and people skills. "Just really bright," DeConcini said, "and he was good with Republicans."
Fresh out of law school, Burke won a coveted position as clerk with the Arizona Supreme Court under Justice James Moeller.
Then, in 1989, he was hired as a low-level staff lawyer at the U.S. Senate. Within a year -- at age 27 -- Burke was assigned to the Judiciary Committee, eventually playing a behind-the-scenes role in confirmation proceedings for three Supreme Court justices.
And he began working on gun control. DeConcini said Burke helped draft the Anti-Drug Assault Weapons Limitation Act of 1989. A five-year battle ensued, ending with President Bill Clinton signing the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, which made it a federal offense to possess certain semiautomatic rifles manufactured after the law's passage.
DeConcini said Burke fostered the measure in concert with a key figure in the White House, policy analyst Rahm Emanuel, who years later would become chief of staff for President Obama. Emanuel now is mayor of Chicago.
"Dennis was the one who worked with everyone on the Judiciary Committee to line up these members and votes," DeConcini said. "Dennis had all these pictures of these guns -- the Streetsweepers and the AK-47s. And it passed by one vote. A lot of it was not my eloquence on the bill, it was stuff that Dennis had done."
The law was adopted shortly before Burke left his Senate job for a position in the Clinton White House as a senior policy analyst for law enforcement and drug issues, again working with Emanuel.
According to preserved e-mails, Burke continued handling firearm issues, discussing whether executive orders could be used to extend the Brady Handgun Violence Protection Act requirement for background checks.
In 1997, Burke became a federal prosecutor under U.S. Attorney Janet Napolitano, getting firsthand experience with Mexican syndicates that were smuggling narcotics and firearms. In an interview that year with the Arizona Business Gazette, he identified earlier gun-regulation efforts as the most fulfilling professional assignment he'd undertaken.
Over the next decade, he served as a chief deputy to Napolitano as she became Arizona attorney general, governor and then director of Homeland Security, where he again dealt with gun-running into Mexico.
Fast and Furious launched
On July 10, 2009, President Obama named Burke as his nominee for U.S. attorney for Arizona. He was confirmed by unanimous consent in the Senate on Sept. 15 of that year.
From the beginning, there were huge controversies: Senate Bill 1070, Arizona's anti-immigration law, was under challenge in court. The Maricopa County Sheriff's Office was being investigated for alleged civil-rights violations. Border security had become a political firefight, with Arizona as a funnel point for smuggling amid growing fear that Mexican violence would spill onto U.S. soil.
Authorities in both nations were blaming liberal U.S. gun laws for arming the cartels. The assault-weapons law had expired in 2004. Restoration of the statute had been on Obama's platform, and Burke was among the public adherents.
During a news conference in 2010, Burke complained that scores of guns from Arizona were being recovered in Mexico. "We have a huge problem here. We have now become the gun locker of the Mexican drug cartels." What Burke did not mention was that his prosecutors had allegedly instructed ATF agents to let some of those weapons "walk" across the border.
In fact, just one month after Burke's appointment as U.S. attorney was confirmed by the Senate, Operation Fast and Furious was secretly launched in Arizona.
According to congressional testimony and DOJ records, the idea was to follow the firearms south so that drug lords who received them could be identified and prosecuted. Over a two-year period, smugglers moved as many as 1,400 weapons across the border. The problem: Those AK-47s and .50-caliber rifles were being used for mayhem in Mexico, and U.S. investigators had not devised a successful way to track them.
Agent Terry's death
Burke's supporters question whether he understood that the ATF strategy knowingly let guns into Mexico, but critics say e-mails and other Justice Department records indicate he knew exactly what was going on.
For example, an ATF memo in January 2010 says Burke was briefed in detail on Fast and Furious and expressed "full agreement" with a strategy allowing "the transfer of firearms to continue to take place ... in order to further the investigation and allow for the identification of additional co-conspirators."
In an April 2010 e-mail to a colleague, Burke predicted that the operation would have a huge public impact: "It's going to bring a lot of attention to straw purchasers of assault weapons," he wrote. "Some of these weapons bought by these clowns in Arizona have been directly traced to murders of elected officials in Mexico by the cartels, so Katie-bar-the-door when we unveil this baby."
However, available Justice Department documents do not include any record where Burke explicitly acknowledged an awareness of the gun-walking strategy, and it is unclear whether he believed a furor would result because of the investigative tactic, or because so many U.S. firearms were responsible for Mexico's cartel bloodshed.
At least some ATF agents bristled at the ATF operation, warning of potentially fatal consequences. Those predictions proved true on Dec. 14, 2010, when Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in a midnight shootout with bandits near Nogales. Within hours, Burke was notified that two guns found at the scene were linked to Fast and Furious.
A man, who bought them 11 months earlier at a Glendale firearms store, was promptly arrested on suspicion of illegal-weapons purchases, along with other gun-buy suspects. Yet, at a news conference announcing the busts, federal officials failed to reveal the link with Terry's death and denied that guns had been allowed to "walk" as part of the case.
ATF agents, horrified at what happened, became whistle-blowers, leaking information to Congress. Last January, Sen. Grassley sent letters to ATF, alleging that the bureau had knowingly allowed guns into the hands of Mexican criminals and that two of those weapons were tied to Terry's murder. Burke reacted by sending e-mails to DOJ colleagues denouncing the senator's assertions as "categorical falsehoods."
In early messages to DOJ superiors, he incorrectly claimed weapons found at the murder scene were purchased before Fast and Furious started. Later, he clarified that although Fast and Furious was under way, the buyer was not being surveilled at the time he bought them.
Bitter denunciations
On Feb. 1,The Republic published the first mainstream news story on the gun-running scandal and about a congressional inquiry into Fast and Furious.
Burke e-mailed a top Justice Department official, complaining about the bad publicity and about Grassley's letter. "They (ATF) got smoked today in the Arizona Republic. Just smoked," he wrote. "They punted going on the record to deny completely fabricated assertions that cut at the heart of their agency and the mission of law enforcement."
ATF and Justice officials spent three days arguing over language for a rebuttal to Grassley's letter. Burke, who wanted a hard-line denial, complained bitterly to colleagues: "What is so offensive about this whole project is that Grassley's staff, acting as willing stooges for the Gun Lobby, have attempted to distract from the incredible success in dismantling SWB (Southwest Border) gun trafficking operations," he wrote. "Not uttering one word of rightful praise or thanks to ATF -- but, instead, lobbing this reckless, despicable accusation that ATF is complicit in the murder of a federal law enforcement officer."
In another missive, Burke wrote, "I am so personally outraged by Senator Grassley's falsehoods. It is one of the lowest acts I have ever seen in politics."
DOJ eventually issued a letter denouncing Grassley's allegations about Fast and Furious as "false."
Holder has since acknowledged that the senator's assertions were true, and that Fast and Furious was a flawed operation. Spurred by those admissions, congressional investigators redoubled their efforts, digging up more records and questioning witnesses under oath. This past summer, Burke was called before congressional investigators for two closed-door interviews.
According to subsequently released excerpts, Burke acknowledged mistakes and accepted blame. "It should not have been done the way it was done," he said, "and I want to take responsibility for that. And I'm not falling on my sword or trying to cover for anyone else."
Motives debated
Attorneys Lee Stein and Chuck Rosenberg, who represent Burke, said their client did not intentionally provide false information to colleagues and superiors in the Justice Department.
"Dennis has cooperated with congressional investigators and the (Justice) Department's inquiry into this matter," Stein said. "He takes his public service seriously."
Critics say the constellation of facts points to Burke as a ramrod behind Fast and Furious, working to provide political powder for more firearm regulations.
In a Dec. 18 post, Second Amendment blogger John Richardson wrote: "Looking at Burke's background and his attitude towards gun rights and those who support them, I see this as even further confirmation that the intent of Operation Fast and Furious from the very beginning was to build support for another so-called assault-weapons ban. I just don't think it was coincidental that Operation Fast and Furious was centered in Arizona."
DeConcini, who has sought to help Burke behind the scenes with members of Congress, said such inferences are "totally unfair," and he insisted that Burke did not learn of the gun-walking strategy until after Brian Terry's death.
Kevin Burke said it is absurd to suggest that his brother came up with some "Machiavellian plan" to justify gun-control measures. He said Dennis was dedicated to stopping firearm deaths -- not adding to them -- and he would never have risked lives or his career on such a gambit.
David Steele, a political consultant and friend, agreed: "The Dennis Burke I know doesn't engage in that kind of political triangulation," he said. "The whole notion that he did this as a conspiracy for gun control is laughable."
Epilogue
Investigations by Congress and the inspector general are ongoing.
Guns from Fast and Furious continue to surface at crimes scenes in Mexico and the United States.
The case against those accused of killing Brian Terry is sealed in federal court.
And Dennis Burke remains under a cloud.
His attorney Stein said the experience has been "sobering," but Burke keeps busy volunteering with a rape-crisis network. "He's really been using this time to reconnect with family and friends, and to try to get through all this and decide what he'll do with the rest of his life," Stein said.
Other friends say he understands how scandals work in the nation's capital. "It's a tough town," said Aiken, who worked in the Reagan administration. "Dennis knows that. He's a tough guy. And I suspect he'll come out of this A-OK. (But) I don't think he was treated altogether fairly."
by Dennis Wagner - Jan. 28, 2012 10:21 PM
https://www.azcentral.com/arizonarep...al-career.html
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The family of murdered Border Patrol agent Brian Terry has filed a $25 million wrongful death suit against the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives claiming Terry was killed with AK-47s that were knowingly sold under the Fast and Furious gunrunning probe to a straw purchaser for drug cartels.
In a 65-page complaint, filed in Arizona state court on Wednesday, attorneys for the family claim ATF "wrongdoing" in Operation Fast and Furious.
“ATF's failures were not only negligent but in violation of ATF's own policies and procedures," the complaint claims.
The family has also filed a suit against the Lone Wolf Trading Company seeking unspecified damages for negligence in selling the weapons to the purchaser and aiding and abetting in Mexican drug cartels’ conduct.
The suit says Lone Wolf knowingly sold "hundreds of weapons" to various straw purchasers and in turn realized "hundreds of thousands of dollars in profits from these sales."
The suit alleges that "but for defendants' negligent and illegal sales ... Brian Terry would not have been murdered in the Arizona desert on Dec. 14, 2010."
The family is seeking a jury trial.
The government now has 60 days to respond or the Terry family will file the suit for the $25 million.
According to the claim, agent Terry was patrolling near Rio Rico on the night of Dec. 14, 2010 when he was shot and killed by criminals yielding assault rifles. Those rifles were traced to a straw purchaser for Mexican drug cartels in Arizona who the ATF knew about and allowed to deliver the weapons to the cartels.
“The murder of agent Terry and other acts of violent crimes were the natural consequence of ATF's decision to let dangerous weapons designed to kill human beings 'walk' into the hands of violent drug-trafficking gangs,” the complaint reads.
The claim also contends that the circumstances that led to Terry’s murder were not isolated events, but rather there were thousands of guns purchased under occasional ATF surveillance with no way of tracking all the weapons from straw purchases.
In a second claim filed against Lone Wolf Trading Company, the Terrys say the company should have recognized the illegal and risky nature of the purchases, but it instead ignored its legal obligation under federal and state law to refuse illegal firearm sales.
The company was not only aware that the purchases were illegal and part of the Fast and Furious operation, but it also knew the ATF did not arrest the purchasers and let the straw buyers continue to make illegal buys, according to the claim.
Both the ATF and Lone Wolf were unavailable for comment on Wednesday.
The family stated in their claim against the ATF that Christmas 2010 was to be the first the family was to spend together in three years because of Brian’s ATF duties. Brian was killed two days before he was to fly home to Michigan.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/02/01/family-murdered-border-patrol-agent-files-25m-suit-against-atf/
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My heart goes out to the family, but this sounds like a frivolous lawsuit. Better legal minds on this forum than mine can correct me, but suing the U.S. Government (ATF) seems like a losing
proposition - immunity, etc. overall a waste of time and money, albeit great publicity.
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I'm sure there is a motive for seeking publicity, as much of the state media has tried to bury the story, but it's also about the discovery, and qualified immunity is indeed not absolute, especially when gov't officials act outside the scope of their authority and break state and federal laws.
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My legal instincts, hazy as they may be, go in the general direction of GM's comments. I'm not seeing any simple ways of knocking it out of the box off the top of my head. Restating GM in my own words, the immunities of which you think are not a grant of the right to deliberately commit felonies.
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http://pjmedia.com/blog/fast-and-furious-three-questions-not-asked/?singlepage=true
Fast and Furious: Three Questions Not Asked
A competent media would relentlessly pursue the three answers.
by
Bob Owens
Bio
February 6, 2012 - 12:01 am
Attorney General Eric Holder provided a sixth unsatisfactory performance in front of Congress this past week, dodging questions about the nation’s deadly gunrunning scandal.
To date, the media has largely buried the story of the Department of Justice scheme that contributed to the deaths of a federal agent and more than 300 Mexican citizens. Such a story would have held front-page, top-of-the-hour focus until answers were provided and officials had been hounded out of office or imprisoned had it occurred under a Republican administration.
But Barack Obama is a Democrat, and black. Also, Eric Holder is a Democrat, and black. It is inconceivable for the mainstream media to grill the decisions, motives, or goals of black Democrats for fear of being “racist” according to their own definition of the term, which is criticism of a minority member who professes the “correct” political ideology. Radically different rules apply for minority Republicans.
Whether Operation Fast and Furious was a legitimate law enforcement operation, as the Department of Justice claims, or was part of a plot to impose gun control, it was radically different from all other border gun operations in one crucial way. Operation Fast and Furious was the only border gun operation that was undertaken with the full intention of the straw-purchased guns leaving the control of law enforcement officers and reaching the armories of drug cartel murderers. That fact alone should lead to the impeachment or administrative removal of everyone, from field agents to political appointees and elected officials that knew or should have known about the plot.
But that is only half of the horror story.
Operation Fast and Furious was specifically conceived so that “walked” guns would be recovered at crime scenes in Mexico. Their serial numbers would be provided to the ATF by Mexican authorities for tracing. Regardless of motive, the entire operation was premised on weapons being recovered at crime scenes in Mexico, and law enforcement agencies are well aware that criminals primarily abandon weapons only after they’ve been used in serious felony crimes such as murder or attempted murder.
Operation Fast and Furious was conceived knowing that Mexican nationals would be sacrificed in significant numbers if the tracing operation had any chance of working.
Operation Fast and Furious allowed more than 2,000 weapons to “walk,” indicating that those in charge of the operation were willing to let thousands of Mexican nationals die in an effort to identify the ringleaders of a cartel’s weapon acquisition team.
The Department of Justice claims that they did this so that they could trace the weapons to higher-ups in the cartels and take down entire gun-smuggling networks. Decent people can disagree on many aspects of crime fighting and the amount of risk we should be willing to absorb to fight crime, but we should all agree that no criminal network is worth sacrificing the lives of hundreds or thousands of victims. Yet that is precisely the way Operation Fast and Furious was designed to work.
The first question is obvious, and yet remains unasked by the media and unanswered by the Obama administration and Department of Justice:
1.Who conceived this radical departure from normal law enforcement practices? Who conceived an operation that depended upon the deaths of hundreds or thousands of Mexican nationals for its success?
But as disturbing as the conception of the plot was, it was merely an idea, if one that most would agree is objectively evil in design. It should have died stillborn on the proverbial drawing board. Somehow, this idea was not just allowed, but someone with significant political and operational clout within the Justice Department was able to shepherd this high-risk and inarguably lethal program from idea through planning and budgeting into execution. This strongly suggests high-level sponsorship within the Department of Justice. This demands answers to a second question:
2.Which Department of Justice officials saw that Operation Fast and Furious was dependent on hundreds or thousands of firearms being given to the cartels and recovered at the scenes of crimes, knew that the crimes in question were likely to be murders of Mexican nationals or U.S. citizens along the Mexican border where the cartels operate, and approved the operation anyway?
We know that Operation Fast and Furious depended entirely upon hundred or thousands of walked weapons being recovered at crime scenes so that weapons could be traced, and that those crime scenes would almost certainly be murders. We know that such a high-risk, low-reward program could not have be conceived or approved at a local level, and that it must have had high-level sponsorship within Justice. It is reasonable to make the assumption, unless proven otherwise, that such approval could only come from the level of a deputy attorney general or higher.
President Barack Obama is the very definition of a “political creature,” vaulting through local and state politics to the U.S. Senate and into the presidency at phenomenal speed. He knows that liabilities are to be relentlessly purged, and he did so repeatedly to separate himself from old allies and even mentors in his 2008 political campaign. Sentimental he is not.
He is also well aware that an ongoing, long-term political scandal is just the kind of public relations nightmare he does not need as he enters his reelection campaign season in earnest. Once the Republican primary battle is over and the stage is set for the general election battle, the political and legal spectacle of Operation Fast and Furious will be brought to the forefront by the Republican challenger or by one of the super PACs. Operation Fast and Furious is a serious and unresolved problem that endangers his second term as seriously as a problematic economy.
Any competent political operative within the Obama campaign would want the scandal surrounding Operation Fast and Furious resolved as quickly as possible to remove it as a weapon against Obama’s election. Fair or foul, cutting your losses is how the game is played, and it is miraculous that Attorney General Eric Holder still retains the president’s support after the allegations of Operation Fast and Furious and various other scandals that are emerging at precisely the wrong time.
This leads us to a third question:
3. Knowing that Operation Fast and Furious could be the political and criminal albatross that drives away moderates and Latino voters and destroys his chances of winning a second term, why does President Obama refuse to appoint a special prosecutor or, at the very least, call for Eric Holder and his direct reports to resign?
Considering the president’s close relationship with the attorney general, it is possible that Mr. Obama simply does not want to turn on a friend and political ally. There is also the possibility, however, that Mr. Holder is quite well below the person who approved the operation and was aware of it. Evidence suggests that White House officials may have been briefed on the operation. It is conceivable that the attorney general holds evidence that assures he will not be forced out.
These are intriguing questions, and each demands a thorough explanation.
If the media were interested in some sort of objective view of reality that most non-ideologues could easily confuse with something akin to truth, they would only need to relentlessly seek the answers to these three questions on which a presidency may indeed turn.
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West Allis (City in Wisc.) pays $30,000 to man arrested for wearing gun
(He was planting a tree in his back yard! In America! "...the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."??)
http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/news/138816959.html
The city of West Allis has agreed to pay $30,000 to settle a federal civil rights lawsuit prompted by one of the first tests of Wisconsin residents' right to openly carry guns.
Brad Krause was planting a tree in his backyard in August 2008 -- while wearing a holstered handgun -- when police arrived, drew their weapons and arrested him.
In February 2009, a municipal judge found Krause not guilty of disorderly conduct, and in April of that year state Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen issued a memo advising law enforcement agencies that the mere fact of wearing a gun, by itself, would not support a charge of disorderly conduct.
Krause sued the city in federal court in 2010.
"This is a clear victory for Mr. Krause and Wisconsin residents who wish to assert their rights under the state and federal Constitution to bear arms lawfully," said his attorney, John Schiro.
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That is a very good article GM and would serve well for introducing people to this subject.
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In what appears to be an exclusive for border issues-focused Fronteras, Michel Marizco reveals information that seems to directly undermine the Department of Justice’s insistence that Operation Fast and Furious was a localized and compartmentalized plot within the Phoenix ATF and Phoenix U.S. Attorney’s Office.
In sworn testimony in front of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform last week, U.S. Attorney Eric Holder continued with this stance. Holder was supported by congressional Democrats who cited a lack of evidence of corruption — corruption that the Oversight majority speculated was a result of the DOJ refusing to hand over the majority of the documents and witnesses requested.
Retired DEA official Tony Coulson was in charge of DEA-Tucson during Operation Fast and Furious. He now states that his agency and Immigration and Customs Enforcement were not only aware of the gunwalking plot, but that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were actively interdicting the plot, confiscating weapons the ATF was walking to Mexican narco-terrorists (http://www.fronterasdesk.org/news/2012/feb/06/source-gun-walking-mexico-known-outside-atf/) [1]:“In 2009, 2010, I became aware that ATF was walking guns into Mexico,” Coulson said. “I also learned that Homeland Security Investigations, then ICE, actually interceded on more than one occasion where they seized weapons at the ports of entry when they were heading southbound contrary to ATF’s plans.”
There was serious friction, Coulson claims, between ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) and the ATF in Phoenix. When Coulson took the gun walking to his bosses in Phoenix, he was told the lead law enforcement official in Arizona — U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke — was already aware of it.
Coulson reveals not just the extent of how widely Operation Fast and Furious was known of within federal law enforcement, but that the gunwalking plot was actively opposed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents that interdicted the ATF-run weapons shipments on multiple occasions.
Coulson’s information opens up an entirely new group of federal law enforcement officers for interviews by congressional investigators. Investigators could get an idea from interviews with DEA and ICE agents just how widely Operation Fast and Furious was known of among the branches of the Obama administration.
Matthew Boyle of the Daily Caller followed up with Coulson in an interview (http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/07/former-tucson-dea-head-holder-either-knew-of-gun-walking-or-was-willfully-unaware/) [2] that seems to seriously undermine the position Attorney General Holder has taken that he did not know gunwalking was occurring:Contrary to the picture Holder has tried to paint during his congressional hearing appearances, Coulson said that “yeah, absolutely” law enforcement officials were widely aware the ATF was using gun-walking tactics in Arizona. Coulson went so far as to say he suspects Holder himself was aware of the tactic, or was willfully unaware — meaning he didn’t want to know and made sure he wasn’t informed of gun-walking.
Depending on where the evidence takes them, Congress may very well have good reason to put DEA Administrator Michele Leonhart under oath to determine what her chain of command knew about Operation Fast and Furious. Leonhart had previously claimed that her department played only a support role (http://pjmedia.com/blog/gunwalker-drug-enforcement-agency-admits-involvement/) [3], which is vastly different than the ATF’s Bill Newell’s position under oath when he claimed (http://nation.foxnews.com/botched-gun-operation/2011/07/26/fast-and-furious-scandal-spreads-four-agencies) [4] that ATF, DEA, ICE, and the Internal Revenue Service were all “full partners” in the gun-walking operation.
Investigators may also find cause to have Department of Homeland Security (DHS) personnel testify, and to issue subpoenas for relevant documents from both the DEA and DHS. Interviews with ICE agents and supervisors in Arizona could investigate the alleged interdictions of Fast and Furious weapons, the disposal of those firearms, and precisely what occurred as a result of the “serious friction” between ICE and ATF due to the latter organization’s plot to arm the Sinaloa cartel.
Former U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke ran Operation Fast and Furious according to the Department of Justice’s current position. Burke’s history is interesting in the context of the gunwalking plot: he has long been a gun-ban architect for the Democratic Party and was behind the ineffectual 1994 “assault weapon” ban that sunset in 2004. Burke was the former Chief of Staff for former Governor Janet Napolitano for a number of years before she became the Secretary of Homeland Security. Considering their long-term relationship, his role running the plot on Napolitano’s home turf, and the ICE/DHS intercepts of Fast and Furious weapons, investigators may find a legitimate reason to request that Secretary Napolitano testify under oath in front of Congress about what she or other DHS officials may have known about the “widely known” plot.
Marizco’s discussion with Coulson also lends credence to the theory that Operation Fast and Furious was not a legitimate law enforcement operation, but was instead conducted to manufacture evidence to support the Obama administration’s desire for more restrictive gun-control laws:Burke has since resigned, as a result of the public scandal resulting from Operation Fast and Furious.
Coulson also claims politics played a role in how Fast and Furious unfolded. The ATF officials who supervised the gun walking out of Phoenix were telling the news media as early as 2008 that 90 percent of the guns seized in Mexico came from the U.S. In other words, the same agency that was waging a public battle against gun smuggling was facilitating gun walking at the same time.
“Among federal law enforcement, that became somewhat of a joke,” Coulson said. “We all knew that was whatever weapons the Mexican government decided to follow or trace back to the U.S. And never took into account the weapons that come in from Central America, from other countries around the world.”
The weapons that the ATF “walked” to the Sinaloa cartel were not necessarily the firearms that would be most useful for narco-terrorists, but were instead firearms that U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke and his Democratic sponsors have attempted to ban in the past (http://pjmedia.com/blog/smoking-gun-most-gunwalker-guns-targets-of-ban-efforts-but-not-wanted-by-cartels/) [5]. It wasn’t remotely cost-effective to buy semi-automatic (one shot per trigger pull) AR-15 and AK-47 pattern rifles in the United States when the selective-fire military variants (real assault rifles) were both much less expensive to acquire and easier to acquire in bulk in many of the same countries from which they obtained their drugs.
In the Daily Caller article, Coulson leaves no doubt that Fast and Furious was a gun-control plot (http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/07/former-tucson-dea-head-holder-either-knew-of-gun-walking-or-was-willfully-unaware/2/) [6]:Coulson also said most other law enforcement officials in Arizona knew Newell had a gun control agenda behind his actions with Fast and Furious and other operations. “Whenever Bill would make those [anti-gun rights] statements [with inflated gun trafficking statistics], everyone would roll their eyes and say, ‘when is someone going to call him on this?’” Coulson said. “That’s because it was only weapons which the Mexican government seized which they chose to trace back to the United States.”
“[Newell] is trying to make this political statement that there is this river of guns, which then the Mexican government picked up on, and said ‘it’s your guns, that’s why we’re having all this violence here,”‘ Coulson added. “And there’s never any accounting for the fact that probably a majority of the guns, in terms of what law enforcement generally knows, are coming up through Central America and they’re coming from other countries. The 90 percent figure has been debunked as you go along the way. It’s actually something considerably less. … They’re just picking a figure and saying 90 percent of the weapons they seized come from the U.S. Well, really, it’s 90 percent of the weapons that they choose to do a search on results in it originating from the U.S.”
These weapons were apparently purchased at the explicit direction of FBI informants (http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com/2011/10/ssi-exclusive-prior-knowledge-atf-knew.html) [7] in an effort to support the 90-percent lie (http://pjmedia.com/blog/testimony-on-assault-weapons-guts-obamas-90-percent-lie/) [8] that was pushed so hard by the Obama administration in 2009 as justification for increased gun-control efforts along the border states. That effort became reality even after Fast and Furious was exposed, when the ATF unilaterally directed dealers to report multiple long-gun sales even as the plot was publicly falling apart.
Every Friday afternoon document dump seems to indicate that Operation Fast and Furious may have been nothing more than an elaborate gun-control plot. Evidence and testimony collected so far suggest that the Obama administration’s law enforcement assets supplied weapons to generate gun violence in Mexico to justify a crackdown on Second Amendment freedoms for Americans.
The body count attributed to Operation Fast and Furious is over 300 and growing as the Obama administration continues to deny the mountain of evidence growing against them.
Article printed from PJ Media: *http://pjmedia.com*
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*Mexico’s gun problem isn’t traceable to the U.S.*
Published: February 11
Regarding the Feb. 5 editorial “The gun flow to Mexico”:
The Post’s assertion that 70 to 80 percent of traceable guns can be traced to the United States has long been discredited. Mexican police trace only a fraction of the guns they seize, and they are specifically trained not to request U.S. traces on guns without U.S. markings, according to Sen. Charles E. Grassley (http://www.grassley.senate.gov/judiciary/upload/Guns-06-16-11-signed-letter-to-Melson-incomplete-gun-data.pdf) (Iowa), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Furthermore, according to federal data released in June (http://www.gao.gov/assets/300/291223.pdf), 78 percent of firearms submitted for tracing in 2009 and 66 percent of firearms submitted in 2010 were not traced back to final sales by U.S. licensed dealers.
The Calderon and Obama administrations need every possible diversion from the real problems that cause and exacerbate this drug war.
The Mexicans need to take the spotlight away from the rampant corruption that plagues their government, judiciary, law enforcement agencies and military.
President Obama desperately needs distractions from the criminal culpability and gross incompetence of his Justice Department and his attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., with regard to the deadly Fast and Furious tragedy.
Regrettably, it appears that both administrations have found a willing collaborator in The Post.
Chris W. Cox, Fairfax
The writer is executive director of the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action.
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second post of day
Huge Issue Looming Under the Surface of Presidential Politics
Dear Friend of the Second Amendment,
While most people would rate the economy and jobs as the most important issues in the 2012 Presidential campaign, another issue of overwhelming importance would be the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty.
Many Americans have never heard of this treaty. But President Obama and Hillary Clinton reversed the position of President Bush and are pushing a UN treaty that could ban large classes of firearms (such as semi-automatic firearms) and license everything else.
In secretive, behind-closed-door meetings, the UN committee charged with drafting the Arms Trade Treaty language has covered lots of ground. From deciding how to force the US to reduce its military strength, to deciding if every American should give up our guns, these folks have every intention of weakening our ability to protect our nation.
If this treaty were to be ratified by the United States Senate, every American citizen's Second Amendment rights would be threatened by the United Nations. If that doesn't scare every freedom-loving American, nothing will!
This is one of the biggest reasons why Gun Owners of America believes the most important elections in 2012 after the Presidential race are in the United States Senate, where we must take the gavel away from left-wing dictator Senator Harry Reid.
There is only one Republican candidate running for President who has not committed to reversing the Obama/Clinton position on the Arms Trade Treaty -- Mitt Romney.
While every other candidate still in the running for the Republican Presidential nomination has said they would oppose this treaty, Mitt Romney has refused to state his position, refusing to answer the Gun Owners of America questionnaire on this and many other gun-related issues.
Many in the media have tried to coronate Mitt Romney as the eventual nominee, but we think the nomination is still up for grabs. This is why we want to get every Republican on record.
There is too much at stake to allow Mitt Romney a "pass" on this issue. With the field getting smaller--we need an answer from Romney.
Gun Owners of America is asking every person who reads this alert to contact the Romney campaign and ask why he is ducking our Questionnaire, especially on the question of the UN Arms Trade Treaty.
You can email the Romney headquarters at info@mittromney.com, or call 857-288-3500. Let him know what you think and tell him you would like an answer.
Time is running out. It's time to get EVERY candidate to answer the tough questions. Stop dodging, Mitt . . . start answering.
Sincerely,
Tim Macy
Vice Chairman
PS Of the four Republican candidates remaining in the race, only Mitt Romney has refused to take a stand on important issues such as opposing a UN gun control treaty. Please contact the Romney campaign at info@mittromney.com, or call 857-288-3500 and urge him to return the Gun Owners of America Presidential Questionnaire.
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**This could go many places, as it demonstrates the utter hypocrisy of the left, like a multimillionaire Noam Chomsky getting rich preaching marxism.
http://hotair.com/archives/2012/02/15/media-matters-took-600k-for-gun-control-while-carrying/
Media Matters took $600K for gun control while carrying?
posted at 10:25 am on February 15, 2012 by Ed Morrissey
The Daily Caller continues its series on Media Matters for America, this time looking at its tax returns and its tax exemption as a political organization. The tax returns don’t reveal anything shocking, except for one point of hypocrisy. In the first report, The DC revealed that the personal assistant to founder David Brock carries a concealed Glock when Brock goes out in public to protect him from attackers, either real or imaginary. That is a defensible action to take as political debate sometimes brings out the fringe crazies, as I can personally attest, except for two things. First, if he’s carrying in Washington DC, it’s probably not legal. And the reason it’s not legal is because of organizations like Media Matters for America, whose tax returns show a hefty amount of cash earmarked for gun-control activism:
Media Matters reported at the end of 2010 that $612,500 of its assets were “restricted” by donors to be applied to “gun and public safety issues.” During this time, The Daily Caller has already reported, Brock’s personal assistant was carrying a holstered and concealed Glock handgun when he accompanied Brock to events.
That’s hardly the only example of hypocrisy in the gun-control movement. A while back, I wrote about the difficulties in California over open carry; when researching that post, I ran across an article that reported on the difficulties in getting a concealed-carry permit in the state, thanks to the overwhelming power of the sheriffs to make arbitrary decisions on who should get them. In the county of Los Angeles, few permits get issued, but one went to an attorney who conducts activism for — you guessed it — gun-control legislation. I can’t find the link at the moment, but I’ll add it if I come across it.
On the matter of MMFA’s tax exemption, The DC reports that Congress may open an investigation into their status:
Congressional Republicans are now interested in examining the Media Matters For America‘s tax-exempt status, The Daily Caller has learned. Doing so would cause the GOP to wade into the complex world of tax laws that govern “exempt organizations” such as Media Matters and more than 1 million other charitable organizations that are exempt from federal income tax.
Media Matters’ critics have questioned its tax-exempt status for some time. The Internal Revenue Service has a series of requirements that must be met before organizations can qualify. Successful applicants pay no federal income tax because the government presumes such charities perform services that benefit the public. Donors also may deduct their charitable contributions.
One central requirement before an organization like Media Matters can achieve the gold-standard nonprofit status — known by its place in the tax code, Section 501(c)(3) – is that it may not “attempt to influence legislation as a substantial part of its activities” or “participate in any campaign activity for or against political candidates.”
But the law, and how it is implemented, is complex.
I think this is a mistake. Setting a precedent of opening tax investigations on the basis of partisan grudges is one that Republicans and their allied political organizations will regret, and probably sooner rather than later.
What we should be doing is ending tax exemptions for political organizations entirely, along with the forty years of campaign finance laws that ended up with super-PACs running elections. Eliminate the tax deductions for all political contributions, or perhaps all but those going to a specific candidate, although I’d prefer to make it absolute. Taxpayers don’t need to subsidize the contributions of others through the tax code.
At the same, eliminate the contribution limits to candidates and instead impose requirements for immediate and continuous disclosure on the Internet through the FEC. The technology to accomplish this has existed for well over a decade, and should be put into use for true transparency. Taking those two steps would put the cash back into the hands of the candidates, who would be held accountable for the messaging conducted in the campaigns.
Let’s fix the real problem, rather than attack the symptoms, or the minor players.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hralcrOG8U
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http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/02/21/new-hampshire-man-faces-felony-charge-after-firing-gun-into-ground-near-burglar/
I hope my neighbor would do the same.
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Wow :cry:
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It will be a terrible day when the only people that are armed are everyone except for the general public i.e. the government and people that just refuse to to listen to the law.
Got to love progressive politics or anyone that thinks the right to defend oneself can in any way be controlled under law.
The right to self preservation comes from oneself and their Creator and is not subject to any other person's say, no matter what other people think.
I feel bad for this guy.
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I'm going to take the unpopular viewpoint; what else is new? :-)
DF; I absolutely agree with you; self preservation and the right to defend ourselves should be inviolate.
BUT.... Is it ok to shoot someone, kill them, for taking your neighbor's TV set? They are unarmed, no threat to you,
but there is that pesky little with your neighbor's TV running down the street. So shoot him you say?
On another thread, it was pointed out,
"if you look closely at NH's laws, the use of deadly force against someone committing a burglary has to involve a threat to the person, not just property"
Frankly, if there is no physical threat, killing someone should not be an option; sorry. I agree with NH law. I mean some teen age kid breaks into your house,
takes your TV set, and you think you are entitled to shoot and kill him for that as he's running down the driveway, unarmed (except for the TV) away from you?
I suppose if the police did that our jails would be empty, but somehow it doesn't seem right.
But you might argue, he just shot at the ground, he didn't shoot to kill. I will leave it to GM to defend, but it seems to me policemen don't "shoot at the ground"
as a warning. Nor do they shoot if someone is taking a TV set down the street. IF they need need to shoot, it seems to me they are shooting to defend themselves
or another person in possible fear of their life, and they shoot to kill.
Further, I rarely disagree with bigdog, but I'm not sure I want my neighbor walking up the street, shooting his gun in my yard, and if the thief started to run, my
neighbor shoots to kill him on my property. Oh yeah, I saved my TV set. But no one was threatened or in fear of their life except maybe the unarmed thief.
I bet the fallout will cost more than my TV set.
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Gee, if only someone would write a book about the self defense laws of all 50 states......
If only there was someplace I could buy such a book..... :-D
Anyway, as a rule of thumb, if it's not worth dying over, going to prison over, getting sued over, it's not worth fighting/shooting over.
A lawfully armed citizen or LEO shoots to stop the immediate threat of serious bodily injury/death. Once the threat is ended, the shooting stops. You do not "shoot to kill". Death may result, but that is not the intent.
Now, some enlightened places like Texas grant much wider latitude, but I, myself would restrict myself to the concepts mentioned above no matter the laws in any jurisdiction you might live in or visit.
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Perhaps my powers of reading for comprehension fail me, but I fail to see where anyone, including the citizen in question, tried to shoot anyone over a TV set.
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Crafty; I don't know what the thief stole; I used a TV set as an example. Since he put everything in a backpack, I doubt if it was truly a TV.
Does it matter what he stole from the neighbor's house? A TV, or a computer, or some CD's?
The citizen in question, down the street, at a neighbor's house, saw a guy climbing out of a window and fired his gun. The bad guy was
unarmed, non threatening (he was climbing out of a window). If the guy got out of the window and proceeded to run away (non threatening)
are you entitled to shoot him? IMHO the answer is still no. Burglary is not a capital offense.
I brought GM into the equation since I notice Police never (to my knowledge) shoot at the ground, nor do they shoot to wound;
IF their life is threatened, they shoot to defend themselves (I meant no offense by my comment, "shoot to kill", but that's fine with me).
However, IF their life or someone else's life is NOT threatened, the bad guy is unarmed,I presume the police will not shoot a simple burglar.
Nor should a private citizen.
GM's post succintly summarizes my opinion. Wow; we agree! :-)
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The only law enforcement entities that allow for "warning shots" to be fired are correctional facilities, given that they have controlled environments.
Outside of controlled environnments, any shot that you fire has the potential to ricochet and injure/kill innocents. Bad idea.
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JDN:
I still don't think you are tracking my point. You speak (a tad self-righteously) of not shooting someone over property (TV set, whatever) yet that is not the question presented. The citizen in question fired at the ground.
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*Second gun used in ICE agent murder linked to ATF undercover operation* (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-57383089-10391695/second-gun-used-in-ice-agent-murder-linked-to-atf-undercover-operation/?tag=contentMain%3BcontentBody)
By Sharyl Attkisson
Prosecutors recently sentenced a Texas man, Manuel Barba, for trafficking a weapon connected to the murder of Immigration and Customs (ICE) Agent Jaime Zapata. Nobody was more astonished to learn of the case than Zapata's parents, who didn't know that Barba had been arrested or linked to their son's murder.
"The family was obviously surprised to learn that there was a case involving a weapon linked to the Zapata incident," attorney Trey Martinez told CBS News. Martinez represents Zapata's parents and the surviving ICE agent in the assault, Victor Avila. "They were surprised they had never been contacted in the capacity as victims so they could give a response or some kind of reaction at the time of sentencing."
Barba was sentenced to 100 months in prison on January 30th. When we asked why the Zapatas weren't contacted, prosecutors in Houston told CBS News they only handled the weapons charges: conspiracy, false statements and exportation/receipt of firearms. Zapata's actual murder "is being handled by another US Attorney's office and... is separate and apart from the firearms case that was handled by our district," said a spokeswoman. She added the firearms offenses "are crimes that do not involve victims in the legal sense of the word and therefore, notifications are not part of the legal process."
In a related development, CBS News has obtained documents showing that Barba was under ATF surveillance for at least six months before a rifle he trafficked was used in Zapata's murder. Zapata's government vehicle was ambushed by suspected cartel thugs in Mexico Feb. 15, 2011.
Documents indicate ATF opened its case against Barba, entitled "Baytown Crew," in June of 2010. During the investigation, court records state Barba recruited straw purchasers and "facilitated the purchase and exportation of at least 44 firearms" including assault rifles. On August 20, 2010 Barba took delivery of the WASR-10 semi-automatic rifle later used in Zapata's murder, obliterated its serial number, and sent it to Mexico with nine others just like it. Nearly two months later, on Oct. 8, 2010, ATF agents recorded a phone call in which Barba "spoke about the final disposition of ... firearms to Mexico and also about the obliterating of the serial numbers before they were trafficked." Barba told straw purchasers the guns were destined for the Zeta drug cartel.
A warrant wasn't issued for Barba's arrest until four months later; coincidentally, the day before a rifle he trafficked was used against Zapata.
Barba is now the second weapons trafficker who had been under ATF surveillance to be linked to Zapata's murder. As CBS News previously reported, ATF had also been watching suspect Otilio Osorio during the time he trafficked a different weapon used in Zapata's assault. Records show ATF watched on Nov. 9, 2010 as Osorio, his brother Ranferi and Kelvin Leon Morrison transferred a cache of illegal weapons to a confidential informant but failed to arrest the men at the time.
The government has kept a close hold on nearly all information surrounding Zapata's murder, denying the family's Freedom of Information requests on the basis of an ongoing investigation. The Zapata's attorney says they will keep pursuing the information by "whatever means necessary."
---End Quote---
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JDN:
I still don't think you are tracking my point. You speak (a tad self-righteously) of not shooting someone over property (TV set, whatever) yet that is not the question presented. The citizen in question fired at the ground.
I am. The citizen in question illegally FIRED a gun. He was not in fear of his life; in contrast he went down the street looking for problems. The thief was climbing out of a window. No one was hurt or physically threatened. As GM succinctly explained, even trained police think firing "warning shots" is a "bad idea". Further, if this thief did not stop, but rather ran, is this citizen, after firing a warning shot, entitled to shoot the unarmed thief in the back as he runs? That's why NH has the law; that is why he was arrested. You can ONLY shoot (where is aimed doesn't enter into the discussion) (use deadly force) when you are in fear of your life. That is how the law should read.
As a further question, what's a "warning" shot? At the ground? In the air? One aimed 5 feet from your head. Closer? The answer is easy; simply don't fire the gun unless you are in fear of your life. Things go wrong; no property is worth it.
That said, in this case no one was hurt. The thief "cooperated". Probably time to move on. This is not a good case for the DA.
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I would not call stopping a neighbor's home from being burglared "looking for trouble"!
Again, NO ONE here is advocating shooting a fleeing thief over a TV or whatever.
So, lets take a look at this afresh: What was our heroic neighbor to do?
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I would not call stopping a neighbor's home from being burglared "looking for trouble"!
At this point in time, there was absolutely no threat to Fleming's (citizen) body or property. Instead,
"Police later found out that Fleming had been looking for Hebert (thief) for about half-an-hour after the robbery."
I call that "looking for trouble.
Again, NO ONE here is advocating shooting a fleeing thief over a TV or whatever.
No offense, but indirectly, yes you are. What is a "warning shot"? Basically, a command that if you don't respond/cooperate you will be shot.
The thief was not armed, nor did the thief threaten Fleming (he was too busy climbing out of a window). So the only reason to shoot was
to preserve property.
So, lets take a look at this afresh: What was our heroic neighbor to do?
Call the Police! "Fleming told WBZ-TV Monday he was wrong to take the law into his own hands."
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I wonder if this is the deterrent effect that the state was looking for. That is, was he wrong to take the law into his own hand, or has decided he was wrong due the implications of the arrest and pending prosecution? And if it is the latter, the consequence, intended or not, goes far beyond the discharge of a firearm. It is more likely to make good, moral, upstanding citizens look out for their neighbors, friends and family in times of distress.
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It is more likely to make good, moral, upstanding citizens look out for their neighbors, friends and family in times of distress.
I happen to live in the City of LA. My little area is a little hilltop surrounded by gang/crime. Many of us who live on our hill work at home. We have
a superb neighborhood watch program, many people go for walks, people are friendly; we know one another. It's a diverse crowd; my immediate neighbor works for Bank of America, others are lawyers, doctors, professors, film directors, artists, and business people. Most are straight, but we have a high percentage of gay/lesbians. The excellent local public elementary school is strongly supported by parents. I feel quite safe here. Often I don't lock my doors.
My point is that we do look out for one another. We try to help one another in times of distress. But I don't think any of us would bring a gun, much less shoot it, if all we saw is a robbery. We would call the police. Bringing a gun to robbery can cause all sorts of negative repercussions. However, if I thought my neighbor was being physically threatened, she was clearly in fear of her life, I would have no problem bringing my gun and shooting the person, if necessary to defend her life. Further I have no qualms about defending inside my home with deadly force if I or my wife are threatened.
I distinguish between property which is insured or can be replaced and human life.
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I am not advocating anyone break the law, just enjoying the freedom of this venue to disagree with laws and try to distinguish between right or wrong.
I couldn't disagree more strongly with the idea presented that a home invasion, a stranger with known criminal capacity forcibly or wrongfully entering the structure you bought or built to separate yourself and your family from such strangers, is only an insurable property crime?? To me, that is very wrong. By entering, they put your irreplaceables into an unacceptable risk of danger, IMHO.
My thought is that if a person willing to threaten or scare a family to that extreme extent received a shot from a neighbor that hit only his earring, that would also only be an insurable property crime.
Who is the victim of the shot into the ground?
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Doug, the citizen at that time WASN'T defending his property. The thief was NOT inside HIS house. Nor did the citizen even own the structure. The thief did not put any person in danger or even scare a family. He was climbing OUT of a window, unarmed, with a few CD's or whatever in his backpack.
I agree, IF he had put anyone in direct danger, if anyone was fearing for their life, then sure, go ahead and shoot the earring off (nice shot). But if NO ONE
is physically threatened, and you shoot the earring off, YOU could/will go to jail not to mention civil repercussions; rightfully so. Shooting the earring off someone who is unarmed and no threat to anyone is not a minor insurable property crime, it's probably attempted murder or some other serious criminal offense.
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JDN, Entering one's home when you are home or not home has a TERROR affect on the family and the neighborhood; that is not just a property crime and that is MY opinion, not the law. Almost grazing their cheek with a bullet if you have that ability does no harm either by your standard if you think the only damage of forcible entry with a stranger in a family home is the loss of CDs. I was clear BTW about not advocating breaking the law so don't take my comment out of its context. Thank you.
You wrote yourself: "This is not a good case for the DA."
Why not? Because he didn't do anything wrong.
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JDN: That is a remarkably clueless description of a home burglary. You're better than that.
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"I'm better than that". Perhaps, but maybe I'm a little tired today.... I still don't get your point as it relates to this shooting. Objectively,
I thought I was quite clear. The citizen was wrong.
Home burglary, someone invading your home and your privacy, even when no one is home, while of course terrible, is not, by definition, a violent crime. Notice, it was not robbery; plus no one was home when the thief went through the window. Nor did the thief even have a weapon. Bottom line, the thief didn't threaten anyone.
In this particular case, the citizen shot his gun in a situation where the thief was not even in the citizen's (the shooter) home or property. He was down the street. The citizen was not threatened in any way. Nor was anyone else.
I presume Doug is speaking tongue in cheek; the criminal punishment for shooting at someone and "almost grazing their cheek" when they had never physically threatened you or anyone else whatsoever is far more severe than simple daytime home burglary with no one home. Not to mention, think about the civil repercussions.
Bottom line; the citizen had no legal justification to fire his firearm. He committed a crime. Period. He should have simply called the police.
As for the DA, the publicity is a nightmare therefore he will probably not press further charges or some community service will be agreed upon. No one was hurt, but if the thief had been shot, or an innocent bystander hit, serious criminal and civil issues would arise for the citizen. We all cheer for the citizen, this is a pro gun (I am too) forum, but we don't think about what could go wrong; as GM pointed out even trained police don't fire a warning shot for fear of hurting others. The average citizen is not nearly as well trained as a police officer.
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"Home burglary, someone invading your home and your privacy, even when no one is home, while of course terrible, is not, by definition, a violent crime."
If your wife walks out of the bathroom to discover the 'unarmed' (how do we know that at the time) burglar who only wants the necklace, not to rape, torture and kill her (how do we know that at the time), then has she only lost a necklace, or some CDs? No! She has lost perhaps forever the feeling of safety and security that she once had in the privacy of her own home.
I honestly don't know what you don't get about that unless you and your wife have no capacity for fear or a personal feeling of violation.
Yes, he 'should have' called the police instead. The odds that the police would apprehend him if the call is made as the man is leaving: near zero.
The odds that he will return to that home or that neighborhood if the job was successful: extremely high.
The odds that he will return after thinking he was shot at while escaping: zero.
Seems to me the shot fired harmlessly will cause him extreme fear that he deserves to feel and cause him to not return, which is protecting the neighbor's home too. A firecracker might have served the same purpose; he just didn't have one handy and also no doubt illegal.
Of course we don't want to encourage people to take the law into their own hands or to discharge weapons in residential areas for no good reason, but in this case a pretty good result came out of it - at least until they sue or prosecute or the wrong guy. (IMHO)
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Doug you don't get it. My wife, his wife, has NOTHING to do with it. It was burglary; that means NOBODY was home! No one was in fear of their life nor was anyone threatened. Zero!
If my wife was home like in your example that's robbery. If my wife felt fear for her well being because this stranger broke into her house she can shoot him for all I care.
But your analogy is night and day.
So what's your point?
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Reminds of when you thought the French supermarket wasn't vandalized. A waste of my time. Let's not answer each other's posts.
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Huh? No offense but you've got your facts mixed up. NO ONE was threatened. No wife, NOBODY was threatened. . And he still used lethal force!
I'm still waiting for your point... Or you can simply say I was wrong. And then let's move on.
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I don't find that pointing out elephants in a room productive on a 4th try to someone who denies seeing them on the first 3.
A home INVASION with a criminal in a home is not like losing a couple of 20s in the wash. Yes, if you don't see that you are simply wrong and I should stop there. A known criminal of unknown limits and capacities and presumed dangerous was in the home where you secure your family even if you are a family of one. You really need that explained further?
Shooting at the ground is not using lethal force, shooting in the head or chest is. It was to scare someone who has no qualms about scaring others. Actually kind of funny that the guy with nerves of steel to do that in the first place got scared and ran. If just the fact that it is a gun makes it lethal, then backing your car out of the garage while your neighbor is outdoors is the use of lethal force also. The car is also a lethal weapon. Would you like case law cited on that?
I see this from the point of view as a father homeowner whose daughter could have been home, wishing I could explain to you as a husband whose wife could have been home. I don't believe that wouldn't bother you, like I said, just wasting my time. To the neighbor it is empathy for that situation and desire to not have it next at his house.
In this TYPE of break-in, how did he (the burglar) know for sure she (a hypothetical wife or daughter or whoever that someone might want to protect) wasn't home. He didn't. He was still willing to enter not knowing no one was home for sure. How did we know AS IT HAPPENED he was unarmed. We didn't. Do we know on sight of him if he not is also a rapist and a murderer? No, we don't. But we KNOW he is a CRIMINAL IN OUR HOME and those are other things criminals in homes do. If he is so comfortable entering, got away with it and knows his way around now and knows what else to take next time, why wouldn't he come back? He probably would. You say insurable loss? FYI if you didn't know, they steal the insured stuff and then they come back to get the new stuff that the insurance company buys to replace it. Have you ever had your home invaded? Would he the criminal kill her with his bare hands or other implement within reach next time if she was home and startled him? Yes, it's possible. Should she worry about that every moment she is home and thinks about it? Yes, that would be a perfectly normal reaction. Keyword TERROR. Will she be home next time? Yeah, maybe. Will she now live in fear? Yes, that would make sense. Or have to sell, move and leave her home to try to escape that fear. Should the neighbor rationally believe that his home and his family is next if the guy gets away with this one so close and within sight of his home without incident? Yes.
Was he right to discharge his firearm safely, but illegally? That depends on his judgment of the likelihood of prosecution and size and scope of the expected penalty as opposed to the cost of doing nothing when you could have scared off that intruder forever.
Do I believe that you, a double major college graduate, really don't get that a home invasion is an INVASION, and is not equivalent to losing a couple of 20s in the wash? Just an insurable loss? No. I don't.
But we have been through this before.
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Doug, I think you are out of your element here; you may want to go back to economics and politics. Just like I don't usually address the issues of sun spots or climate change; my limited science education
is inadequate.
A home INVASION with a criminal in a home is not like losing a couple of 20s in the wash. Yes, if you don't see that you are simply wrong and I should stop there. A known criminal of unknown limits and capacities and presumed dangerous was in the home where you secure your family even if you are a family of one. You really need that explained further?
Nope, I agree.
Shooting at the ground is not using lethal force, shooting in the head or chest is. It was to scare someone who has no qualms about scaring others. Actually kind of funny that the guy with nerves of steel to do that in the first place got scared and ran. If just the fact that it is a gun makes it lethal, then backing your car out of the garage while your neighbor is outdoors is the use of lethal force also. The car is also a lethal weapon. Would you like case law cited on that?
Actually, that is not quite right. As GM has pointed out, shooting a warning shot can be dangerous. If you shoot your gun, it is to defend yourself or another. And it definitely is considered use of lethal force. Even if a police officer fires their gun, they need to justify it later. Further, how about if i shoot five feet in front? Or I shoot at the earrings as you suggested? Is that use of lethal force? Of course it is. A car can be a lethal weapon; I agree, but merely backing it out of my driveway while my neighbor is outdoors is NOT use of lethal force. If I swerved towards him and tried to hit him, then it's consider lethal use of force. A gun is different. But you know that.
In this TYPE of break-in, how did he (the burglar) know for sure she (a hypothetical wife or daughter or whoever that someone might want to protect) wasn't home. He didn't. He was still willing to enter not knowing no one was home for sure. How did we know AS IT HAPPENED he was unarmed. We didn't. Do we know on sight of him if he not is also a rapist and a murderer? No, we don't. But we KNOW he is a CRIMINAL IN OUR HOME and those are other things criminals in homes do. If he is so comfortable entering, got away with it and knows his way around now and knows what else to take next time, why wouldn't he come back? He probably would. You say insurable loss? FYI if you didn't know, they steal the insured stuff and then they come back to get the new stuff that the insurance company buys to replace it. Have you ever had your home invaded? Would he the criminal kill her with his bare hands or other implement within reach next time if she was home and startled him? Yes, it's possible. Should she worry about that every moment she is home and thinks about it? Yes, that would be a perfectly normal reaction. Keyword TERROR. Will she be home next time? Yeah, maybe. Will she now live in fear? Yes, that would make sense. Or have to sell, move and leave her home to try to escape that fear. Should the neighbor rationally believe that his home and his family is next if the guy gets away with this one so close and within sight of his home without incident? Yes.
No offense, but you are confusing the circumstances. I repeat; this was BURGLARY. Not robbery. No one was home. NO LIFE OR ANY INDIVIDUAL WAS IN DANGER OR THREATEN. No weapon was present. That is the part you keep mixing up. You gave analogy after analogy that weren't relevant. IF someone was home and the thief entered, youR points would be correct. And I would tell my wife shoot away if she felt in danger; inside your home you have every right. BUT, no one was home, no one was threatened, the thief was leaving out out the window, he did not have a weapon, etc. It's not a violent crime.
Was he right to discharge his firearm safely, but illegally? That depends on his judgment of the likelihood of prosecution and size and scope of the expected penalty as opposed to the cost of doing nothing when you could have scared off that intruder forever.
I agree. But I'm curious. The citizen yelled, "freeze". What happens if the guy doesn't "freeze"? He just starts walking away. Or sideways. Or even towards you, but he is obviously unarmed. Are you going to shoot him since you already fired a warning shot? I mean you've got this gun in your hand. You have already fired it once. Imagine the adrenaline pumping. For stealing two twenties off the kitchen counter, are you going to kill him? If he walks towards you unarmed, will you shoot him? Just think about the repercussions. You will have lots of time while you are in prison to say I wish I didn't do that.
Do I believe that you, a double major college graduate, really don't get that a home invasion is an INVASION, and is not equivalent to losing a couple of 20s in the wash? Just an insurable loss? No. I don't.
I do get it; it's far worse than losing a couple of twenty's in the wash. I do agree it's an invasion. I don't like it. But if someone burglarized my house and stole those two twenties off my kitchen table, the law doesn't call it a violent crime. Frankly, the law probably calls it a misdemeanor - sort of like getting caught with a joint. Not good, but not worth potentially killing someone.
For your benefit; I'm going to repeat myself. We are talking burglary, not robbery. There is no elephant in the room. No one was home, no one was threatened or in fear since no one was home. He was unarmed. Conjecture, and what ifs changes the facts. In contrast, I fully agree that if you are home and feel in danger, shoot away. But for this discussion, don't confuse the facts. In this case it was a robbery.
But let's move on. I think everyone understands and while openly cheering for the citizen, inside is happy nobody got hurt or that there were no repercussions. IMHO Lethal Force should ONLY be used if you are in fear of your life or for another persons life. Period.
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"But let's move on."
I was right about wasting my time. I don't come here for escalating insults.
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Doug; I meant no insult. Home invasion is terrible. It's emotional. Approximately fifteen years ago it did happen to me once while I was on vacation. The house was a mess; from the refrigerator he had even drank a few beers and tossed the bottles on the floor. Not a wine guy though; he left all the wine stacked up. :-) I remember the whole situation quite vividly even though it happened a long time ago, perhaps that is indicative of your point; i.e. it's serious. You and I just disagreed on the proper response. I was never there, I was never physically threatened, so I didn't go looking for him with a gun.
That said, I do have a gun(s). IF I'm home, I have no qualms about shooting if someone invades my home and threatens me or my wife.
However, I like to think I educated you on the distinct differences between burglary and robbery. There is a big difference; both legally speaking and emotionally.
But here nor there, yes, let's move on....
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You did not educate me. Put the insults in a private message so that I can not read them over there.
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The following is posted from a semi-private forum.
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http://ia600501.us.archive.org/1/ite...72.docket.html
Go to document 53. It's a PDF of the order.
This ruling is good, solid reasoning that will stand up, and be tough to get around - but it's not as good as it could have been.
The Court views the carrying of handguns outside the home as outside the core areas of 2nd amendment protection as Heller's ruling focused on the fundamental rights to have a firearm in the home for protection; therefore, this court reasons that the right must exist outside the home, as the bearing of arms doesn't occur at home, but it's not part of Heller's core rights.
Carrying of arms, and by extension, the permit process attached thereto, is protected under intermediate scrutiny:
Intermediate scrutiny requires more; the government‘s interest must be ―significant,‖ ―substantial,‖ or ―important,‖ see, e.g., Turner Broad. Sys., Inc. v. FCC, 512 U.S. 622, 662 (1994), and the ―fit‖ between the challenged regulation and the asserted objective must be reasonable, though not perfect. See, e.g., Lorillard Tobacco Co. v. Reilly, 533 U.S. 525, 556 (2001).
The MD law does not meet this burden at all as it stands:
ii. Intermediate Scrutiny
As stated, Maryland‘s permitting scheme, insofar as it requires a ―good and substantial‖ reason for a law-abiding citizen to carry a firearm outside his home, is subject to intermediate scrutiny. In order to prevail, the State must demonstrate that the challenged regulation is reasonably adapted to a substantial governmental interest. Under this standard, the ―degree of fit‖ between the regulation and ―the well-established goal of promoting public safety need not be perfect; it must only be substantial.‖ Heller v. Dist. of Columbia, 698 F. Supp. 2d 179, 191 (D.D.C. 2010).
Beyond peradventure, public safety and the prevention of crime are substantial, indeed compelling, government interests. See, e.g., United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 748–50 (1987) (noting that ―the Government‘s regulatory interest in community safety can, in appropriate circumstances, outweigh an individual‘s liberty interest‖ and holding that the government‘s interest in preventing crime is not only important, but compelling); Schall v. Martin, 467 U.S. 253, 264 (1984) (―The legitimate and compelling state interest in protecting the community from crime cannot be doubted.‖) (citations and quotation marks omitted).
The Maryland statute‘s failure lies in the overly broad means by which it seeks to advance this undoubtedly legitimate end. The requirement that a permit applicant demonstrate ―good and substantial reason‖ to carry a handgun does not, for example, advance the interests of public safety by ensuring that guns are kept out of the hands of those adjudged most likely to misuse them, such as criminals or the mentally ill. It does not ban handguns from places where the possibility of mayhem is most acute, such as schools, churches, government buildings, protest gatherings, or establishments that serve alcohol. It does not attempt to reduce accidents, as would a requirement that all permit applicants complete a safety course. It does not even, as some other States‘ laws do, limit the carrying of handguns to persons deemed ―suitable‖ by denying a permit to anyone ―whose conduct indicates that he or she is potentially a danger to the public if entrusted with a handgun.‖ See Kuck v. Danaher, No. 3:07cv1390(VLB), 2011 WL 4537976 at *11 (D. Conn. Sept. 29, 2011).
Rather, the regulation at issue is a rationing system. It aims, as Defendants concede, simply to reduce the total number of firearms carried outside of the home by limiting the privilege to those who can demonstrate ―good reason‖ beyond a general desire for self-defense.
In support of this limitation, Defendants list numerous reasons why handguns pose a threat to public safety in general and why curbing their proliferation is desirable. For example, they argue that an assailant may wrest a handgun away from its owner, and cite evidence that this possibility imperils even trained police officers. See Defs.‘ Mot. Summ. J. 15, Docket No. 26. They note that when a police officer is engaged in a confrontation with a criminal, the presence of an armed civilian can divert the officer‘s attention. Id. at 16. In addition, Defendants urge that while most permit holders are law-abiding, there is no guarantee that they will remain so. They cite studies purporting to show that the majority of murderers have no previous felony conviction that would have prevented them from obtaining a permit. Id. at 35. Thus, they argue, a permitting scheme that merely denies permits to convicted felons is inadequate.
These arguments prove too much. While each possibility presents an unquestionable threat to public safety, the challenged regulation does no more to combat them than would a law indiscriminately limiting the issuance of a permit to every tenth applicant. The solution, then, is not tailored to the problem it is intended to solve. Maryland‘s ―good and substantial reason‖ requirement will not prevent those who meet it from having their guns taken from them, or from accidentally shooting themselves or others, or from suddenly turning to a life of crime. Indeed, issuing permits specifically to those applicants who can demonstrate an increased likelihood that they may need a firearm would seem a strange way to allay Defendants‘ fear that ―when handguns are in the possession of potential victims of crime, their decision to use them in a public setting may actually increase the risk of serious injury or death to themselves or others.‖ Id. at 15. If anything, the Maryland regulation puts firearms in the hands of those most likely to use them in a violent situation by limiting the issuance of permits to ―groups of individuals who are at greater risk than others of being the victims of crime.‖
Id. at 40.
A law that burdens the exercise of an enumerated constitutional right by simply making that right more difficult to exercise cannot be considered ―reasonably adapted‖ to a government interest, no matter how substantial that interest may be. Maryland‘s goal of ―minimizing the proliferation of handguns among those who do not have a demonstrated need for them,‖ id. at 40, is not a permissible method of preventing crime or ensuring public safety; it burdens the right too broadly.
Those who drafted and ratified the Second Amendment surely knew that the right they were enshrining carried a risk of misuse, and states have considerable latitude to channel the exercise of the right in ways that will minimize that risk. States may not, however, seek to reduce the danger by means of widespread curtailment of the right itself. ―[E]ven the most legitimate goal may not be advanced in a constitutionally impermissible manner.‖ Carey v. Brown, 447 U.S. 455, 464–65 (1980).
At bottom, this case rests on a simple proposition: If the Government wishes to burden a right guaranteed by the Constitution, it may do so provided that it can show a satisfactory justification and a sufficiently adapted method. The showing, however, is always the Government‘s to make. A citizen may not be required to offer a ―good and substantial reason‖ why he should be permitted to exercise his rights. The right‘s existence is all the reason he needs.
The Court wishes to emphasize the limits of this decision. While it finds Maryland‘s requirement that a permit applicant demonstrate ―good and substantial reason‖ to be unconstitutional, the Court does not address any of the State‘s other regulations relating to the possession and use of firearms, many of which would qualify as presumptively lawful.
Nor does the Court speculate as to whether a law that required a ―good and substantial reason‖ only of law-abiding citizens who wish to carry a concealed handgun would be constitutional.11 Finally, the Court does not speak to Maryland‘s ability to declare that a specific applicant is unfit for a permit because of some particular aspect of the applicant‘s character or history.
This case is not the ringing decleration of the RKBA we'd all hope for.
Instead, it's an attack agains arbitrary and caprecious laws restricting the RKBA.
It says to MD "If you want to have a permit process, fine. Have one with a goal that is acceptable - public safety - and a law's methods reasonably and substantively related to that goal that is applied fairly. I'm not going to tell you want that is, just that the goal of burdening the right to make it unexcercised is NOT going to be tolerated. I'm not saying you have to go Texas...but I'm telling you that you aren't going to pass muster with a law designed as a winnowing process from the get-go."
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http://hotair.com/archives/2012/03/19/holder-in-1995-we-have-to-brainwash-people-against-guns/comment-page-1/#comments
Holder in 1995: We have to “brainwash” people against guns
posted at 11:00 am on March 19, 2012 by Ed Morrissey
If you wanted to “really brainwash” people against guns, how would you go about it? Ask people to start buying anti-gun ads to combat what some might see as a pro-gun bias in entertainment (skipping MacGyver, of course). What if that didn’t work? Well, if you got a chance to be Attorney General, you might order ATF operations designed to put American gun stores in the worst possible light. Breitbart.com unearthed C-SPAN video of Eric Holder in 1995 when Holder served as US Attorney for Washington DC in the Clinton-era Department of Justice, talking about the need to “brainwash” Americans into becoming hostile to gun rights:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LH253ErC9c8[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LH253ErC9c8
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*Prime gunwalking suspect was held by ATF but released, documents show (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-57400267-10391695/prime-gunwalking-suspect-was-held-by-atf-but-released-documents-show/)*
By Sharyl Attkisson
The prime suspect in the botched gun trafficking investigation known as "Fast and Furious" -- Manuel Acosta -- was taken into custody and might have been stopped from trafficking weapons to Mexico's killer drug cartel early on. But the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) let him go, according to new documents obtained by CBS News.
An ATF "Report of Investigation" obtained by CBS News shows Border Patrol agents stopped Acosta's truck on May 29, 2010. Inspectors said they found illegal materials including an "AK type, high capacity drum magazine loaded with 74 rounds of 7.62 ammunition underneath the spare tire." They also noted ledgers including a "list of firearms such as an AR15 short and a Bushmaster" and a "reference about money given to 'killer.'"
The Border Patrol ran a check and found Acosta was already "under investigation for firearms trafficking" in Fast and Furious, so they called in the lead ATF case agent Hope MacAllister. Under questioning, Acosta allegedly described his contacts with a Mexican cartel member nicknamed "Chendi," and admitted going to Chendi's house for a shipment of narcotics.
But ATF knew even more about Acosta's alleged illegal activities than what he described in the interview. ATF trace records showed "a large number of the weapons purchase by the Acosta organization are AK type rifles or FN Herstal pistols" which Acosta referred to as "cop killers" and said were preferred by drug cartels.
Instead of pursuing charges, Agent MacAllister asked Acosta if he'd be willing to cooperate with federal agents. He agreed and was released. Apparently, the promised cooperation never materialized. The report notes that 17 days after Acosta was let loose, he still had "not initiated any contact with Special Agent MacAllister."
In a letter today, Congressional Republicans investigating Fast and Furious asked the Justice Department why Acosta wasn't arrested in May of 2010. They also want to know why the Justice Department failed to turn over the documents on Acosta's detainment and release, which were covered under a longstanding subpoena.
One law enforcement source calls the Acosta report "completely embarrassing." "He's exporting ammunition, which is a violation of law," says the source. "But they let him go."
Before releasing Acosta, MacAllister wrote her contact information on a $10 bill at Acosta's request, gave it to him, then warned him "not to participate in any illegal activity unless under her direction."
Acosta wasn't arrested until Feb. 2, 2011, more than eight months after the Border Patrol stop. By then, ATF had allowed more than 2,000 weapons to "walk" into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, and two of the rifles had turned up at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.
The Justice Department and ATF had no immediate comment. ATF officials who approved of Fast and Furious have said they were trying to get to the "big fish" in a drug cartel.
In a related case also run by ATF's Phoenix office, CBS News has reported a grenade parts trafficker named Jean Baptiste Kingery was caught smuggling 114 disassembled grenades in a tire in 2010, but was released. The same prosecutors faulted in Fast and Furious allegedly refused to bring charges saying grenade parts are "novelty items" and the case "lacked jury appeal." Mexican authorities arrested Kingery a year later at a stash house with enough materials for 1,000 grenades.
The Inspector General has been investigating Fast and Furious for more than a year. Attorney General Eric Holder, who's denied knowing about any gunwalking, has said use of the "inappropriate tactics is neither acceptable nor excusable."
The Justice Department had no immediate comment. ATF told CBS News: "The criminal case is still ongoing in federal court, and there is also inspector general's investigation looking at the overall case. Therefore, ATF cannot comment about the investigation.
---End Quote---
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On a visceral level, I can't say that I am real enthused about open carry.
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By NATHAN KOPPEL
TULSA, Okla.—Gun owners in this state could walk down the street openly packing their pistols under legislation passed by lawmakers that would make Oklahoma the first state in seven years to allow residents to openly display their handguns in public.
Advocates of "open carry" laws have been pushing for several years to make it legal for gun owners to display their handguns in public places, arguing the practice would increase public safety and is protected under the Second Amendment.
Their campaign has had mixed results. Florida last year enacted a law allowing people to "briefly and openly" display firearms, provided they don't do so in "an angry or threatening manner." That law loosened how people can handle guns in public but is considered too restrictive by most open-carry proponents.
California last year banned the open carry of firearms, as have Illinois and Texas.
Fourteen states have laws allowing handgun owners to openly display their weapons. Advocates say the practice is legal in 29 states that are silent on the issue, according to OpenCarry.org, a gun-rights organization. "Just because it is not in vogue to openly carry doesn't mean that it is improper or illegal," said Dave Workman, editor of TheGunMag.com.
In Oklahoma, people generally must conceal their handguns. In 2010, then-Gov. Brad Henry, a Democrat, vetoed an open-carry bill, stating it could make it hard for police to distinguish criminals from law-abiding citizens.
But the Oklahoma House and Senate this month easily passed bills that would permit handgun owners with a concealed-carry permit to openly display their weapons. The moves are backed by Republican Gov. Mary Fallin, and are likely to be enacted after a final vote in May.
Oklahoma would be the first state since Minnesota in 2005 to allow open carry by gun owners with concealed-carry permits.
oth the House and Senate versions of the bill would generally authorize the open carry of handguns, but not rifles.
"Just because some people are not in favor of the practice doesn't mean we should forbid it," said Oklahoma Republican Rep. Steve Martin, who co-authored the House bill. "If that were the case would we would also ban face piercing."
The open-carry movement has gathered momentum in recent years. In states that don't have laws either allowing or banning open-carry, gun-rights advocates have staged events in which supporters wear holstered pistols in public places, including protests at multiple Starbucks locations.
Brian Malte, a spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said the open-carry bills seek to normalize a practice that most people find alarming. In California, he saidopen-carry demonstrations in California prompted calls to police. "It puts police in a difficult position," he said. "How do you tell if someone with a gun should be ordered to get face down on the ground or whether they are merely grabbing a cup of coffee?"
Some observers say a sense of alarm can extend not just to the public, but also to police officers.
"Law-enforcement officers will be that much more jumpy and nervous if they see a gun," said Keith Barenberg, president of the Oklahoma State Troopers Association. He said that an issue as controversial as open carry should be put to a statewide vote. He didn't take a position on the state's open-carry legislation.
Jeannie McDaniel, a Democratic House member from Tulsa, said she voted against the open carry bill because she saw no need to return to a bygone era in the state when people routinely wore guns. "When you see a weapon it raises your level of concern," she said.
Russell Cook, an assistant director of OK2A, a pro gun-rights organization, open display of guns should not cause alarm. "Criminals do not carry openly," he said. "Law abiding citizens do."
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On a visceral level, I can't say that I am real enthused about open carry.
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On a tactical and practical level, it's not a great idea.
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We all know the anti gun crowd will go bonkers over th Sanford Florida thing but turning into a Demcratic party theme and of course the Farrakan/Sharptons of the world threatening to turn this into a race war. Of course Obama is going to weigh in (oh, but he was pressured) . There is never an end to the escalations, the attempts at extortion for more and more and more. Why cannot this tragedy be dealt with as the individual case it is?:
http://www.politico.com/politico44/2012/03/obama-i-had-a-son-hed-look-like-trayvon-118439.html
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We all know the anti gun crowd will go bonkers over th Sanford Florida thing but turning into a Demcratic party theme and of course the Farrakan/Sharptons of the world threatening to turn this into a race war. Of course Obama is going to weigh in (oh, but he was pressured) . There is never an end to the escalations, the attempts at extortion for more and more and more. Why cannot this tragedy be dealt with as the individual case it is?:
http://www.politico.com/politico44/2012/03/obama-i-had-a-son-hed-look-like-trayvon-118439.html
Wait, I thought Obama was the post-racial healer. Still, he'd rather talk about this than Obamacare or gas prices.
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"I thought Obama was the post-racial healer"
Exactly. Instead of feeding the shark frenzy how about Obama calling for calm and to stop the race baiting and threats of violence and the ridiculous attempt at turning this into a Democrat Republican thing.
To date he has not done this with any similar situation. He simply tries to make political self gain out of it.
He did sit and have "a beer" with the Harvard professor and the Cambrige police officer after that bruhaha some years ago. But only after HE, the ONE, looked like a fool weighing in and calling the police officer stupid. It was more for damage control to HIS image rather than anything else.
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Well I guess there IS some pressure. Though great one's (no not Marc Levin or Rush Limbaugh) response is not helpful:
http://news.yahoo.com/florida-black-panthers-rip-obama-holder-over-martin-223207436.html
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http://www.nationalreview.com/the-feed/294250/rep-allen-west-statement-trayvon-martin
What was Trayvon was doing in Sandford? Whatever the reason sounds like Zimmerman did the wrong thing yet this question is not irrelevant.
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http://www.nationalreview.com/the-feed/294250/rep-allen-west-statement-trayvon-martin
What was Trayvon was doing in Sandford? Whatever the reason sounds like Zimmerman did the wrong thing yet this question is not irrelevant.
It's my understanding he was visiting a family member that lives there.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lShFbQHgoqQ&feature=relmfu
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(http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/032712.jpg)
But it's not unrealistic.
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(http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2012/04/02/obama_calderon_press_avoid_fast_and_furious_discussion)
By Katie Pavlich
4/2/2012
President Barack Obama just wrapped up a joint press conference with Mexican President Felipe Calderon and Candadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. The three world leaders discussed a number of topics including trade and energy, but what did they fail to discuss? Operation Fast and Furious. Although the topic of gun trafficking was discussed at length by both Calderon and Obama, reporters never asked about Fast and Furious specifically and the two leaders weren't going to go out of their way to bring it up.
Calderon, as a expected, blamed Mexico’s cartel violence not on the cartels themselves, but on the large “flow” of guns from the United States into Mexico. Calderon reiterated his view the United States should re-instate the ban on “assault,” or semi-automatic weapons. It seems that President Calderon, who is always harping about the “flow” of guns from the United States into Mexico, would have expressed outrage that President Obama’s Justice Department had deliberately placed 2500 guns into the hands of ruthless cartels during Operation Fast and Furious. Instead, Calderon chose to blame the Second Amendment for his country’s out of control violence. Calderon also failed to mention the reason why his people are being slaughtered is because they don’t have the ability to legally own guns and fight back against the cartels. Mexico's strict gun laws have left its innocent people as sitting ducks.
On the issue of guns flowing from “north to south,” President Obama, whose Justice Department once again, under leadership of Attorney General Eric Holder walked 2500 guns into Mexico, failed to mention Fast and Furious. In fact, President Obama predictably gave himself credit for stopping the so-called flow of guns from the U.S., south.
“When you have innocent families, women and children being gunned down in the streets, that should be everyone’s problem,” Obama said. “We’ve put in efforts to stop illegal gun trafficking from north to south.”
Calderon also gave Obama credit for stopping the so-called flow of guns from the U.S. into Mexico.
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www.examiner.com/conservative-in-national/alaska-gun-stores-say-atf-engaging-new-illegal-activity?CID=examiner_alerts_article=
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http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=50807
Napolitano perjured herself to Congress in Fast & Furious testimony
by Neil W. McCabe
04/13/2012
In her explosive new book Fast and Furious, Katie Pavlich makes the case that Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano not only failed to stop an operation that led to the death of one of her own, Border Agent Brian A. Terry, but she may have also lied to Congress in sworn testimony at a hearing held to find out what really happened.
Inside sources told Pavlich that Napolitano’s testimony was in direct contradiction to emails she exchanged, and reports and briefing she received, according to an exclusive preview of the book by Human Events.
Pavlich’s book Fast and Furious is due to be released Monday, April 16. It is published by Regnery Publishing, owned by Eagle Publishing, which also owns Human Events.
Most of the focus in the Fast and Furious scandal has been on attorney Gen. Eric Holder, because his Department of Justice ran the program through its Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, still referenced to as ATF, its old initials from before it was tasked with explosives.
But while Holder's people waved the questionable gun purchasers through the checkout line, Napolitano was in charge of the Mexican border those guns crossed.
Pavlich's book is particularly revealing, especially considering the lengths the Obama administration has gone to keep anyone from knowing anything about Fast & Furious and other gun-running operations. These operations involved multiple federal agencies facilitating illegal gun purchases, by co-opting the normal checks at gun stores in the Southwest, and then ignoring the guns as they were taken into Mexico. In Mexico, the guns were picked up at hundreds of gun sites.
Letting the guns slip away is a called “gun walking,” because the guns were allowed to walk.
In her September testimony to a Senate committee, Napolitano told senators she knew nothing about Fast & Furious until after Terry was killed in a gunfight on the night of Dec. 14, 2010 with an AK-47 purchased at one of the gun stores that was one of the key retailers where federal agents actively let guns walk.
In October, she told Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) at a hearing at the Senate Judiciary Committee she never spoke to the Dennis Burke about Fast & Furious. Burke, who was the U.S. Attorney for the Arizona Department, was her chief of staff when she was the governor of Arizona and a close friend.
In the same month, the Napolitano told Rep. Jason E. Chaffetz (R-Utah) at a hearing held by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that she never spoke to Holder about Fast & Furious.
Homeland Security insiders paint a different picture, Pavlich reports.
Members of Congress questioning the secretary seem to know it, too.
One source said to the author, “When she says that [she] and Attorney General Eric Holder have not discussed it, that is a lie. That's why they keep asking her those questions in the Judicial, Oversight, Homeland Security Committee hearings. They've asked her that same questions twice and she’s lied twice.”
How did she know? The source said, “There are five emails linking her to Holder. They go back two days after it happened—the first email was two days after Brian was killed.”
In the emails, Holder and Napolitano discuss Terry's murder, the source said to Pavlich.
The source concedes that Holder may have “kept her in the dark” about all of the details of the gun walking, but her office approved letting the guns walk into Mexico and one of the agencies under her command, Customs and Border Protection, allowed guns through.
Another source from the ATF confirmed to Pavlich that Napolitano was briefed regularly by an agent from another of her agencies, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE.
“There was an ICE agent assigned specifically to be the co-case agent of Fast & Furious. He had to [file] an ICE report that either mirrored or referenced every ATF report that was done,” the ATF source said.
Beyond reports, there were inter-agency jealousies that had to be settled in Washington, he said.
The source said to Pavlich there were constant battles between ICE and ATF agents over who would get credit for different seizures or other issues. “I know phone calls were made to both headquarters to try and settle those disputes.”
It was Terry's death that brought Operation Fast and Furious to an abrupt end. But now, more than 16 months later, no one has been charged with crimes associated with either the gun walking programs or the cover-up.
Pavlich makes a strong case that when people are finally charged with crimes, Napolitano will have to answer for her perjury to Congress.
“Let me tell you something about Janet,” another source said to the author. “Janet will be lucky not to go to prison.”
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"But now, more than 16 months later, no one has been charged with crimes associated with either the gun walking programs or the cover-up."
And I bet no one, at least anyone of substance, will be either.
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"But now, more than 16 months later, no one has been charged with crimes associated with either the gun walking programs or the cover-up."
And I bet no one, at least anyone of substance, will be either.
Just like the New Black Panther Party, this administration has nothing to fear from the US Dept. of (Social) Justice, no matter what crimes they commit. I'm sure you're very proud of seeing Chicago Corruption on a national scale.
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http://townhall.com/columnists/katiepavlich/2012/04/16/opening_the_flood_gates_on_fast_and_furious/page/full/
Barack Obama's Bloodiest Scandal
Katie Pavlich
News Editor, Townhall
Apr 16, 2012
Operation Fast and Furious is the deadliest and most sinister scandal in American history. A scandal so big, it’s worse than Iran-Contra and makes Watergate look like a high school prank gone wrong.
In the early days of the Obama Administration, President Obama claimed his goal was to stop the trafficking of guns from the United States into the hands of violent Mexican drug cartels. He claimed gun dealers in the United States were responsible for sending guns to Mexico. Both of his claims were lies.
In order to push his lies and policies built around them, with a goal of implementing harsher gun control laws and reinstating the assault weapons ban, President Obama packed his administration full of anti-Second Amendment zealots. After all, personnel is policy.
In my new book, Fast and Furious: Barack Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal and Its Shameless Coverup, I document the conspiracy of senior Obama officials to subvert the Second Amendment, which led directly to the murders of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, I.C.E. Agent Jaime Zapata and countless, faceless lives in Mexico. It debunks the Obama administration’s lies, denials and excuses. This administration was willing to use humans as collateral damage to push a political agenda, and had no shame in doing so. Now, the administration has no shame in covering up their reckless actions.
Since just moments after Brian Terry was killed in the Arizona desert on December 15, 2010 by Mexican cartel thugs, carrying AK-47s provided to them by the Obama Justice Department through Operation Fast and Furious, the FBI, Homeland Security, ATF, Justice Department and the White House have been engaged in a full scale cover-up. These are simply names of government agencies, but who are the people behind the cover-up?
I unravel a tangled web connecting President Obama, Eric Holder, Janet Napolitano and a number of advisors and political appointees behind Fast and Furious. These officials have deep loyalties to each other and their anti-Second Amendment ideology dating as far back as the Clinton Administration. In fact, many key Fast and Furious players have deep ties to Chicago and helped craft the 1994 Clinton assault weapons ban legislation.
If the majority of American people knew Fast and Furious like they know Solyndra or the GSA scandal, they would be outraged. Despite very few exceptions, the media has been complicit in the cover-up of Obama’s bloodiest scandal by ignoring and refusing to report about it. Why? To protect the President. This scandal, one that has left hundreds of bodies in its wake, would be deadly to the administration. This is the scandal that will bring President Obama down in November, so long as the American people know its details.
Over the weekend, GOP Presidential Candidate Mitt Romney officially made Fast and Furious a general election issue. His advisors are now directly pointing to the scandal as an example of how the Obama Administration used in its first term to “provide cover for potential efforts to restrict Second Amendment rights." In the book, I provide the documents and interviews to prove it.
The Obama administration is acting guilty, not innocent, in its actions to continually stonewall and deny the truth. Any American who believes the President, the Attorney General of the United States, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and a long list of other government officials responsible for this reckless program are not above the law, need this book.
Operation Fast and Furious wasn't a "botched" program. It was a calculated and lethal decision to purposely place thousand of guns into the hands of ruthless criminals. The operation was a coordinated and planned effort not to track guns, but to arm thugs south of the border for political gain. Eric Holder should be removed from office for incompetence, dishonesty and charged with perjury. My sources, documented in the book, say Janet Napolitano may also face charges of perjury and potentially obstruction of justice. It is time for President Obama to take responsibility, denounce the operation and fire those involved.
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walking-papers-the-incredibly-thin-speculative-zimmerman-affidavit
Zimmerman was merely reporting suspicious behavior, just as our own Department of Homeland Security advocates with its “If You See Something, Say Something” campaign, which has been created and promoted by cabinet officials appointed by the Obama Administration. Zimmerman saw someone acting suspiciously, and did precisely what DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano wants citizens to do in that situation.
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Nice point. The Self Defense Law thread might be a better place for it though.
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ATF to accept public comments prior to outlawing shotguns
by Jack Minor
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is taking a rare step of allowing public comments prior to issuing a decision on a study that could result in outlawing certain types of shotguns currently available to citizens.
The ATF completed a study regarding the importability of certain shotguns. The basis for a possible ban is based on a loosely defined "Sporting Purpose" test. Using the vague definition almost all pump-action and semi-automatic shotguns could be banned as they are all capable of accepting a magazine, box or tube capable of holding more than 5 rounds. Other characteristics determined to be "military" by the ATF can also be used as a basis for a ban.
Ironically, many shotguns with "military" features are currently being used in shooting competitions held by the USPSA, IDPA and IPSC. The rules could also result in obscure regulations where an individual would be unsure if he is violating them or not.
Dudley Brown, Executive Director of Rocky Mountain Gun Owners, said if the ATF succeeds with the banning of tactical shotguns it "will be the most dangerous interpretation of the 1968 Gun Control Act ever envisioned and will outlaw thousands of perfectly legitimate home defense shotguns."
The ATF is currently allowing public comments on the study until the end of the month. Those wishing to express concerns about the study can send an email to shotgunstudy@atf.gov
Amended to add that this is from January 2011. Anyone have naything current on this?
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The basis for a possible ban is based on a loosely defined "Sporting Purpose" test.
I missed the part of the 2nd AMD where it says "sporting purposes".
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Major Fast and Furious Player Who Misled Congress Jumping DOJ Ship
By Katie Pavlich
4/25/2012
Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich, Obama's Department of Justice point man for communications, or in other words, chief obfuscator about Operation Fast and Furious, is jumping ship. Weich has accepted a position as dean of the University of Baltimore School of Law. University officials have confirmed Weich will start his new position in July.
Quote:
"During this time of considerable transition in legal education and the legal profession, it's important to have leadership with integrity and vision," said Robert Bogomolny, the university's president. "Ron Weich embodies those qualities. I look forward to working with him, and I know our students, faculty, staff and alumni will be energized by his arrival."
As for Weich, "I'm aware of the history and it doesn't concern me," he said. "I'm confident that in partnership with others, we'll make sure the law school has the resources it needs to be effective."
As a reminder, Weich is the man who signed and delivered a letter to Senator Charles Grassley on February 4, 2011 about Fast and Furious that was so misleading and full of falsehoods, that it was eventually withdrawn eight months later. The letter stated:
Quote:
At the outset, the allegation described in your January 27 letter-that ATF "sanctioned" or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico-is false. ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to Mexico......
I also want to assure you that ATF has made no attempt to retaliate against any of its agents regarding this matter. We recognize the importance of protecting employees from retaliation relating to their disclosers of waste, fraud and abuse. ATF employees receive annual training on their rights under the Whistleblower protection Act, and those with knowledge of waste, fruad or abuse are encouraged to communicate directly with the Department's Office of the Inspector General.
Both of these assertions are lies, or in Eric Holder's words are "inaccurate."
Video: Holder Says Definition Of "Lying" To Congress Depends On "State Of Mind"
Not only did the ATF knowingly allow 2500 AK-47 style and .50 caliber rifles to walk into the hands of dangerous Mexican drug cartels, ATF whistleblowers were mandated to do so, and then were retaliated against for speaking out against the program. Operation Fast and Furious has resulted in the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and at least 300 Mexican citizens.
Quote:
“Allowing loads of weapons that we knew to be destined for criminals, this was the plan. It was so mandated.” –Special Agent John Dodson ATF Phoenix Field Division, June 15, 2012.
So, now Weich, the guy who issued a letter in an attempt to mislead Congress about the Obama Justice Department's fatal Operation Fast and Furious, is going to head one of our law schools. Great news, since every law student should have a dean willing to submit false information to Congress.
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http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/26/obama-admin-let-grenades-walk-in-fast-and-furious-documents-show/
Obama admin. let grenades walk in Fast and Furious, documents show
Published: 12:33 AM 04/26/2012
By Matthew Boyle - The Daily Caller
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Matthew Boyle is a reporter at The Daily Caller. He studied journalism at Flagler College in St. Augustine, Florida, where he worked as an editor at the school's newspaper, The Gargoyle.
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In a shocking development in the Operation Fast and Furious investigation, documents show Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents allowed grenade parts to walk in addition to guns.
The emails also show Obama administration officials acknowledging that they may lose track of grenades but would still be able to accomplish their original objective even if the grenades explode.
According to an internal email that was provided to Congress by the Department of Justice and first reported by CBS News’ Sharyl Attkisson — who’s been the media’s most dogged reporter in tracking down facts on Fast and Furious – ATF began watching accused smuggler Jean Baptiste Kingery’s AK-47 purchases in 2004. In the 2009 internal ATF email, Obama administration officials admitted they believed Kingery was “trafficking them into Mexico.”
The 2009 email shows the ATF officials had then become aware of Kingery’s alleged grenade trafficking.
The administration officials then put together a plan: They secretly intercepted Kingery’s grenade parts after he ordered them online, marked them with special paint and gave them back to him. Then, they allowed him to take those grenade parts into Mexico. ATF was going to try to find his weapons factory there — even though the U.S. government and its federal law enforcement agencies have no jurisdiction in Mexico — with the apparent goal of building a bigger case against Kingery.
ATF agents had planned to work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials — who, unlike ATF agents who ultimately report to Attorney General Eric Holder, report up the chain to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. (RELATED: Full coverage of Operation Fast and Furious)
The emails show ATF agents were aware they might lose track of Kingery while they allowed him to transport the grenade parts into Mexico. The emails also show ATF agents knew that the grenades could end up exploding and killing innocent people if they proceeded with the plan. That didn’t stop the Obama administration’s ATF from allowing the grenades to walk.
“Even in a post blast, as long as the safety lever is recovered we will be able to identify these tagged grenades,” an official wrote in one email.
In addition to those revelations, new evidence photos have emerged: More than 2,000 rounds of ammunition and scores of grenade parts and fuse assemblies are seen in evidence photos that were just turned over to Congress. According to Attkisson’s report, officials had taken Kingery into custody in 2010 — long before Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was murdered with a Fast and Furious-supplied gun — after having caught him trying to transport that ammunition and those grenade parts and fuse assemblies into Mexico hidden inside the spare tire of the SUV he was travelling in.
Attkisson said that ATF agents questioned Kingery at that point but then “inexplicably released” him.
Internally, some in the ATF objected to these practices. For instance, ATF’s Mexico attaché, Carlos Canino — who has cooperated with congressional investigators and appeared willingly before the House Oversight Committee last summer — said ATF was not supposed to allow weapons, including grenades, to walk.
“We are forbidden from doing that type of activity,” Canino wrote in one email. “If ICE is telling you they can do that, they are full of shit.”
This news comes on the heels of Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich’s decision to resign his post at the Department of Justice soon. The University of Baltimore School of Law hired him as its new dean and he starts in July. Weich was the DOJ official who provided provably false information to Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa when Grassley began investigating Fast and Furious.
On Feb. 4, 2011, Weich wrote to Congress that the idea that “ATF ‘sanctioned’ or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons to a straw purchaser who then transported them into Mexico … is false.”
“ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to Mexico,” Weich added in that letter.
The DOJ has since retracted Weich’s letter.
Not one government official has been held accountable for Operation Fast and Furious. Scores of lawmakers — 125 House members, three U.S. senators, two governors — and many major political figures, including likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, have demanded Holder’s resignation or firing over Fast and Furious.
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Republicans moving on contempt citation for Holder; Gowdy says ‘He will comply’
By Dave Workman
Senior Editor
CBS News is reporting that House Republicans are preparing to pursue a contempt citation against Attorney General Eric Holder, in an attempt to force him into releasing thousands of pages of documents that have been subpoenaed by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform relating to Operation Fast and Furious.
The gun trafficking sting operation was mounted by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives in the fall of 2009, and abruptly shut down in December 2010 after two guns linked to the investigation were recovered at the scene of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry’s murder in Arizona.
In an interview with TGM, Congressman Trey Gowdy (R-SC) said with certainty that Holder “will comply” with those subpoenas, if not through a contempt citation, than under pressure from House budget cutters when the Justice Department appropriation is debated on the House floor in May.
That interview followed Gowdy’s appearance on Fox News’ “On the Record” with Greta Van Susteren, in which he said Holder would comply before Memorial Day.
“Before Memorial Day, Eric Holder will either comply or he will suffer consequences, and when I say consequences, I mean contempt of Congress,” he told Van Susteren.
Gowdy, a former federal prosecutor now in his freshman term in the House, has an ace up his sleeve: Money. He told TGM that Holder may face a budget axe, which is a “wonderful way of getting people’s attention.”
“There has to be consequences for not complying with a legal subpoena,” Gowdy said.
He noted that Holder has been given months to comply with subpoenas for tens of thousands of documents related to Operation Fast and Furious. So far, he said, the few thousand pages of documents that have been delivered have curiously not included any e-mails or memoranda with Holder’s name on them.
That prompted Gowdy to recall from his days as a prosecutor that when there are documents that would benefit someone’s case, “most people go ahead and produce them pretty quickly.” However, when someone either destroys evidence or withholds it, there is the presumption that the evidence is detrimental to their case.
When Gowdy spoke with TGM, he was heading into a meeting with Congressman Darrell Issa (R-CA), chairman of the House Oversight Committee. He indicated that the subject was Fast and Furious, and that two other committee members with backgrounds as prosecutors were also attending.
Issa and Senator Charles Grassley have complained for months that Holder and his subordinates in the Justice Department have been withholding documents. Many of the documents that have been provided to the committee have been so heavily redacted as to be useless.
But there are still an estimated 70,000 pages of subpoenaed documents that have not been provided to the committee or to Sen. Grassley, who actually inaugurated a probe of Fast and Furious.
Although the congressional investigation has spanned more than a year and resulted in several hearings on Capitol Hill, nobody involved in the operation has been fired. Former U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke resigned from his job last August at the same time that William Newell, former special agent in charge at the Phoenix BATF field office, was transferred to Washington, DC headquarters and his immediate subordinate, George Gillett was also transferred, after having retained counsel and apparently cooperated with congressional investigators.
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Government's answer to "Fast and Furious" records requests: Blank pages
By Sharyl Attkisson
For more than a year, CBS News has been investigating the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms' "Fast and Furious" operation and related cases that also employed the controversial tactic of "gunwalking." With Justice Department officials refusing all interview requests to date, CBS News requested numerous public documents through the Freedom of Information Act.
So far, all of the requests that have been answered have been denied in part or in full.
This week, we received a partial response to a request made more than a year ago. It asked for communications involving "Project Gunrunner," the umbrella program for Fast and Furious, from 2010 through April 2011. Specifically, it sought any communications to which any of the following top Justice officials were a party: Attorney General Eric Holder; Lanny Breuer, Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division; Kevin Carwile, chief of the Capital Case Unit; and Deputy Assistant Attorney Generals Bruce Schwarz and Kenneth Blanco.
The response includes mostly-blank pages.
See the nearly-blank provided to CBS News (PDF)
Federal agencies can legally claim exemptions from the Freedom of Information Act for a number of reasons including attorney-client privilege, law enforcement purposes, and personal privacy. However, they've fallen under sharp criticism from the media and public interest groups in the past decade as a large number of FOIA requests have languished, sometimes for years.
FOIA was originally intended to expedite the release of public materials to the public and media. However, in practice, FOIA requests are often not even marginally effective at obtaining documents for news reporting. To be most effective and helpful, the requests would often need to be filled in a matter of days or at least weeks.
Few requests filed by this reporter are answered within a year. When and if documents are ever produced, they are often heavily redacted and the timeliness of the information relative to the public interest has long since subsided.
Separately the FBI has denied CBS News all information requested regarding the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. Two Fast and Furious weapons were found at his murder scene in December 2010. The FBI stated that the information was withheld because the murder investigation is ongoing. That investigation has now entered its second year.
CBS News appealed the FBI's denial, arguing that some records had already been made public by FBI to news agencies, that releasing certain parts of its investigative documents would not jeopardize any investigation, and that the FBI should provide, at a minimum, a log of the withheld materials. The appeal was denied. The ATF likewise denied our FOIA request under the basis of "opening investigation."
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Second post of morning.
Standing Guard
By Wayne LaPierre 2:28 PM 04/25/2012
For anyone who doubts President Barack Obama’s dedication to a second-term all-out war on the Second Amendment, say just one name—Mayor Rahm Emanuel—the new boss of Chicago machine politics, tapped as the star co-chair for Obama’s re-election campaign.
Obama’s Chicago-based campaign manager characterized the mayor as key among those who “share the president’s vision of a future. …”
The focus of that Obama-Emanuel shared vision for the nation’s gun owners can be summed up in Emanuel’s pursuit of gun bans by any means.
This is no honorary job. It is real power linking Obama’s re-election with Emanuel’s fanaticism for destroying the Second Amendment.
Emanuel has spent his political life pressing for gun control—as policy advisor to President Bill Clinton, as a member of Congress, then as Obama’s White House chief of staff. As mayor of Chicago, he is doubling down on his vendetta against lawful gun owners. And as the most visible campaign co-chair, his efforts are unconditionally tied to Obama’s re-election agenda.
Days before his campaign appointment, Emanuel launched a vicious attack on law-abiding Illinois gun owners that was stunning even by Chicago standards. Blaming peaceable citizens for Chicago’s runaway criminal violence, Emanuel has demanded that Illinois firearm owners be forced to register their handguns at $65 a pop. Possession of an unregistered gun by ordinary citizens would be a felony. Further, gun owners would be required to re-register their firearms every five years, paying an additional $25 fee per-gun. Failure to comply would be a criminal act.
Forget to renew your registration: go to jail. Move and fail to notify authorities within 72 hours: go to jail. Take your handgun to the range, but forget your registration certificate: go to jail.
As a final insult, the mayor is demanding a punitive or “sin tax” on all ammunition sales to pay for trauma wrought by violent Chicago criminals whom he is unable or unwilling to control.
In a Feb. 9, 2012 report headlined “Emanuel Calls For Statewide Gun Registry,” CBS in Chicago reported Emanuel as bragging, “I have a long history, both on the Brady Bill, assault weapon ban, and passing gun legislation.”
Boss Emanuel credited his draconian gun registration scheme to Rev. Michael Pfleger, a radical leftist whom Barack Obama once characterized in the Chicago Sun Times as being among his personal “spiritual advisors.”
What does Obama’s “spiritual advisor” say about the NRA? Try this from a guest sermon: “It’s a MIDNIGHT HOUR when gun manufacturers and distributors and the NRA under the disguise of rights to hunt, continue to market guns as part of America’s new wardrobe and continue to arm gangs and criminals out of back rooms and back alleys of our cities, and then … seek like Pilate to wash their hands of the responsibility and accountability, of their death dealing, that causes hearses to drive down the streets of our neighborhoods carrying the bodies of our children and they say ‘We are not guilty.’”
Speaking of death and murder, for those who don’t recall, it was Pfleger who called for the killing of a Chicago area gun store owner and threatened pro-gun Illinois legislators as targets to be “snuffed out.” In June 2007, leading a near-lynch-mob at that suburban gun store, Pfleger screamed for the violent demise of the licensed dealer:
“We’re going to find you and snuff you out. … Like a rat you’re going to hide. But like a rat, we’re going to catch you and pull you out. … We’re going to snuff out John Riggio.” As for pro-gun rights state legislators: “We’re going to snuff out legislators that are voting against our gun laws. We’re coming for you because we’re not going to sit idly.”
For his clear threats of violence, there was no prosecution. Under the “Chicago Way,” Pleger’s call to “snuffing” is apparently protected.
And today, Rahm Emanuel’s in-your-face, Pfleger-inspired gun proposals are part and parcel to his being chosen as an Obama campaign major domo. This is the web of Chicago thug political connections that cannot be ignored. Know your enemies by the company they keep.
Among others tapped as campaign chairs who “each share the President’s vision” are a select group—“F-rated” gun-ban politicians, including U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-IL and U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-IL; Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee, I; California Attorney General Kamala Harris, D and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, D.
Guilt by association? You bet.
With all of the talk about “transparency,” one thing is truly clear—the web of lies spun about the president’s phony, claimed support of the Second Amendment. Obama’s vision of the Second Amendment and the vision of his fellow travelers, Pfleger and Boss Emanuel, is the one that disarmed the citizens of both Washington, D.C., and Chicago—the vision that says there is no individual right to keep and bear arms.
Every gun owner must be “All In” to defeat Barack Obama in the political fight of our generation this November 6—when all of our freedoms are on the line.
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I get email from "Southern Pulse/Networked Intelligence". The following is according to them but not well cited. How many of these guns e.g. were govt to govt (Mex military) which then walked for example? Once suspects this 68k number will be bandied about and given the ATF's track record of Orwellian dissimulation we need to be on the alert. If anyone can pin this down further, it would be appreciated.
MEXICO - ATF acknowledges U.S. origin of recovered guns
On 26 April 2012, the U.S. government announced that about 68,000 guns recovered by Mexican authorities in the past five years originated in the United States. According to data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), all of the weapons seized in Mexico and submitted for tracing were suspected of being used in crimes in Mexico.
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House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) released a staff memo today arguing the House should hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress, saying the Department of Justice has refused to produce internal documents relating to a botched operation.
The memo outlines Issa’s investigation into the issue and includes a draft resolution of contempt against Holder.
“Congress now faces a moment of decision between exerting its full authority to compel an agency refusing to cooperate with congressional oversight or accepting a dangerous expansion of Executive Branch authority and unilateral action allowing agencies to set their own terms for cooperating with congressional oversight,” according to the memo.
(continued)
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I caught Issa on FOX this AM with some blonde barbie (do they have any other hair color over there at FOX? but I digress , , , ) and it sounded very much like "This is your last chance to cough up the documents to which the American people are entitled or else".
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http://www.youtube.com/user/pajamasmedia?v=ufColuskra8
Good introductory summary for those not familiar with OFF. Under ten minutes.
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http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-oly-shooting-rhode-20120504,0,1147513.column
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http://www.dickmorris.com/obamas-secret-gun-control-plan-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/
BD, is he right in what he says about the legal force of a treaty viz our Constitutional rights?
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There is a great deal in that 3 minute video.
He says that President Obama could backdoor the small arms ban without congressional approval. He then, correctly, notes that a treaty must be passed by the Senate. He then goes on to say that this could happen "easily with a Democratic lame duck Senate." This I find hard to believe for a few reasons. First, I think he "misunderestimates" the role of the filibuster. Second, it takes a supermajority of two thirds for the treaty to be ratified. Third, I suspect that there are Democrats who are not leaving, but are up for reelection in 2014 who might think twice about voting for the treaty. But all of that is not what you are asking about.
The answer is sort of. According to Art. VI, "This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding." So, Dick Morris seems to want to focus on the portion I bolded. However, the portion that follows is really key to the argument, and somehting I think Morris is likely overlooking. "[A]ny Thing in the Constitution to the Contrary notwirhstanding" is extremely important. It would seem, especially with the incorporation of the Second Amendment (fingers crossed for its continued recogniton), that there is protection against what Morris claims Obama is attempting. (See http://iapcar.org/?p=567 for a nice discussion.)
I think he wants to sell books.
http://www.dickmorris.com/obamas-secret-gun-control-plan-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/
BD, is he right in what he says about the legal force of a treaty viz our Constitutional rights?
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Thank you.
Forgive me for being anal here, but the point is really important and I really want to make sure I get it right.
What is the meaning of "any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding."?
Does it mean that even if contradicted by some part of the Constitution, it still is legally valid? It seems to say that to me , , , sorry to be slow-witted here , , ,
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According to the best interpretation of the Constitution, and the specific clause you are asking about, treaties do NOT supercede the Constitution.
Thank you.
Forgive me for being anal here, but the point is really important and I really want to make sure I get it right.
What is the meaning of "any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding."?
Does it mean that even if contradicted by some part of the Constitution, it still is legally valid? It seems to say that to me , , , sorry to be slow-witted here , , ,
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So, there is dispute about this point?
I hope I do not impose with my request, but would you flesh this out further please?
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I know nothing of this website or its organization, but it does a nice job summarizing the discussion/dispute. I don't really understand the dispute (as in, it seems facially obvious to me what the Framers were doing). But, here it is:
"In spite of the clear evidence that the treaty power was intended to be limited, promoters of big government in our century have attacked our constitutional protections through a deliberate misinterpretation of Article VI. They read it as "Treaties...shall be the supreme Law of the Land...any Thing in the Constitution...to the Contrary notwithstanding." They claim that the mention of a Constitution refers to the US Constitution, when the grammar in this clause and usage elsewhere in the document clearly shows that it is referring to the "Constitution or Laws of any State." In other words, while treaties are to take precedence over state laws and constitutions, the would-be tyrants assume that they take precedence over our federal Constitution."
http://www.neusysinc.com/columnarchive/colm0093.html
So, there is dispute about this point?
I hope I do not impose with my request, but would you flesh this out further please?
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Bingo-- the foundation of my confusion, and the nature of the danger, is now made clear. Thank you.
One would think that there is SCOTUS case law on point , , ,
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One would think:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89100044
http://www.sweetliberty.org/issues/staterights/treaties.htm
As I said, I really just get the feeling that Dick Morris is trying to sell his book.
Bingo-- the foundation of my confusion, and the nature of the danger, is now made clear. Thank you.
One would think that there is SCOTUS case law on point , , ,
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Thank you BD.
I note the mention of Harold Koh, now at Hillary's elbow in some Int'l Law post at State, in NPR piece you posted, upset at the logic of the SCOTUS decision. He is well positioned (and will be well supported by SecState Clinton in these efforts) to negotiate something really cute in the language that will seek to provide a basis for the criteria mentioned in , , , I see the piece does not name the case-- any chance you could find us the case and its citation BD?
This concerns me:
"The court said the president, acting on his own, cannot make a treaty binding on the states.
"The Supreme Court ruled that they are binding only if the treaty explicitly says so or if there is legislation to make that clear. For all of American history, many treaties have been deemed to be what is called "self-executing," meaning that their provisions are automatically binding. But not all treaties fall into this category. The Supreme Court's ruling set a bright line for which treaties are self-executing — namely, those that explicitly say so or have accompanying legislation that says so."
So, the President and the Senate can override the Constitution if the President and a majority of the Senate and House pass supporting legislation? Doesn't this bypass the defined procedures for modifying the C.?
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second post
http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/federal-appeals-court-says-illegal-immigrants-dont-have-right-to-bear-arms/2012/05/08/gIQAvovfAU_story.html
DENVER — A federal appeals court says illegal immigrants don’t have a right to own firearms under the U.S. Constitution.
Emmanuel Huitron-Guizar of Wyoming pleaded guilty to being an illegal immigrant in possession of firearms after his arrest last year. He was ordered held by immigration authorities at the Natrona County Detention Center in Wyoming.
An attorney for Huitron-Guizar appealed the case, saying illegal immigrants are not excluded from possessing firearms like felons and people who are mentally ill, and should have the same rights as U.S. citizens to buy a gun for hunting and protection.
The 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Denver ruled Monday that illegal immigrants have only limited protection under the Constitution.
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Woof,
Here we go.......
Trayvon Martin's mother in Bloomberg gun control video
By Chris Francescani | Reuters – 4 hrs agoRelated ContentParents of slain teenager Trayvon …
(Reuters) - The mother of Florida shooting victim Trayvon Martin appears in a Mother's Day gun control video produced by an advocacy group led by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Martin, 17, was shot and killed on the night of February 26 in the central Florida town of Sanford following an encounter with armed neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, who said he acted in self-defense.
Police initially declined to arrest Zimmerman, 28, in the shooting of the unarmed black teenager, citing Florida's "Stand Your Ground" law.
Florida, which has some of the most lenient gun laws in the nation, enacted the self-defense measure in 2005, which provides people wide latitude to use deadly force if they fear bodily harm. The law is now in effect in more than 20 states.
Noting that "this will be my first Mother's Day without my son, Trayvon," Sybrina Fulton asks viewers to urge their state governors "to re-examine similar Stand Your Ground laws throughout the nation to keep our families safe."
"Nobody can bring our children back," Fulton says in the video, released on Thursday to several websites by a Bloomberg-led gun control coalition called Second Chance on Shoot First.
"But it would bring us comfort if we can help spare other mothers the pain that we will feel on Mother's Day and every day for the rest of our lives."
Forty-five days after the shooting, following the appointment of a special prosecutor and protest marches across the country, Zimmerman was charged with second-degree murder in the racially charged case.
He pleaded not guilty to the charge and is free on bail.
"SHOOT FIRST" LAWS
Bloomberg and Florida State Senator Chris Smith launched Second Chance on Shoot First last month in partnership with several civil rights groups.
Bloomberg often refers to the Stand Your Ground laws as "shoot first" laws.
"I hope Sybrina Fulton's courage will persuade state legislators to take a second look at shoot first laws and take a second chance to get them right," Bloomberg said in a statement.
Bloomberg is one of the nation's most outspoken mayors on the issue of gun control. He has crafted gun law legislation at the local and national level, formed a gun control coalition that counts at least 600 U.S. mayors, and in 2006 directed city attorneys to sue out-of-state gun dealers whose weapons were used in crimes in New York City.
Florida, like many other states, has long held citizens have the right to defend themselves in their own homes, a legal precedent known as the castle doctrine.
Court rulings have expanded that right to include employees in workplaces and drivers in their cars. But Florida courts expressed reluctance to extend those rights to public places, with judges ruling that citizens under threat must make some effort to escape danger without resorting to violence.
In 2005 Florida lawmakers overwhelmingly passed a "Stand Your Ground" bill that eliminated the requirement to flee, and then-Governor Jeb Bush signed it into law.
The National Rifle Association, which has led pro-gun legislation lobbying efforts in Florida and other states, did not return calls and emails seeking comment.
(Reporting by Chris Francescani; Editing by Daniel Trotta and Xavier Briand)
@yahoonews on Twitter, become a fan on Facebook
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Thank you BD.
I note the mention of Harold Koh, now at Hillary's elbow in some Int'l Law post at State, in NPR piece you posted, upset at the logic of the SCOTUS decision. He is well positioned (and will be well supported by SecState Clinton in these efforts) to negotiate something really cute in the language that will seek to provide a basis for the criteria mentioned in , , , I see the piece does not name the case-- any chance you could find us the case and its citation BD?
Name, citation, briefs and oral argument. http://oyez.org/cases/2000-2009/2007/2007_06_984
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"If I remember correctly, the holding of Medellin really focuses on whether or not there is a presumption of self-execution for treaties. The court found that there is a presumption that treaties are not self-executing unless the treaty itself or the Senate makes clear that the treaty is self-executing.
"The more on-point case for treaties that conflict with state laws is Missouri v. Holland, where the court found that treaties trump all state laws and constitutions through the supremacy clause. However, a treaty cannot conflict with the U.S. Constitution. There is still some question about whether the federal government can accomplish through treaty what it does not have the power to do in Art. I-II of the Constitution.
"As it currently stands, the Second Amendment provides a minimum floor for a right to arms, states cannot provide lesser rights to their citizens. There is no upper limit, and many states choose to provide their citizens with a broader right to arms than guaranteed by the Second Amendment. A treaty could theoretically also make the Second Amendment the upper limit by restricting the right to only what is protected in the Constitution."
This sounds sound to me BD. What do you think?
Using BD's source, here is a citation for Missouri v. Holland: http://oyez.org/cases/1901-1939/1919/1919_609
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From the Crafty Dog: "This sounds sound to me BD. What do you think?"
Agreed.
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http://firearmsregulation.org/
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8-) 8-)
http://firearmsregulation.org/
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"[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them." --Zacharia Johnson, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788
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GOA Sues ATF to Produce Documents
The foundation of Gun Owners of America today filed suit in the U.S. District Court for D.C. to compel the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to produce thousands of documents related to Operation Fast & Furious.
Depending upon the outcome of this case, Justice Department officials could spend time in jail.
Last year, Gun Owners Foundation submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) which -- not surprisingly -- has virtually been ignored by the ATF. Although the agency has told GOF several times that it would comply with the FOIA request, the ATF has violated each and every one of its self-imposed deadlines.
On March 16, 2011, Congressman Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, sent a letter to ATF requiring production of records related to their involvement in Operation Fast & Furious -- where thousands of firearms were smuggled from the United States to Mexico.
On April 21, 2011, Gun Owners Foundation submitted its own FOIA request to the ATF, to which the ATF has responded in various ways. The agency has sometimes ignored our requests entirely. Several times, ATF has promised (but failed) to produce information by a certain date. And at least once, the ATF suggested we were mistaken, claiming that they had already given us the requested information -- only to follow up that communication with a new promise and new deadline for producing the requested documents.
If the court finds in favor of the GOF complaint, the ATF will have to produce the requested documents or face “contempt of court” charges. Given that media reports indicate the House of Representatives may decline to press contempt charges, Gun Owners Foundation remains committed to pressing this case until justice is realized.
Please help Gun Owners Foundation to continue doing this important work. You can contribute to GOF at: http://www.gunowners.com/donate.htm
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http://www.gsnmagazine.com/article/2...x_ied_attacker
ATF puts up $10,000 reward for info on Phoenix IED attacker
Fri, 2012-06-01 10:16 AM By: Mark Rockwell
6-volt handheld flashlight
A series of three bomb attacks in Arizona using flashlights converted into IEDs has the ATF offering a $10,000 reward for the maker of the devices.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Phoenix Field Division special agent in charge Thomas Atteberry said on May 31 that the reward would be given for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for the recent bombings in Glendale and Phoenix, Arizona.
ATF, FBI, Glendale Police Department and the Phoenix Police Department are currently investigating these incidents, said the ATF.
Three Victim-Operated Improvised Explosive Devices (VOIEDs), have been detonated in the Phoenix area since mid-May. The devices are contained within yellow plastic 6-volt handheld flashlights. The devices exploded when the victims picked up what they thought was a discarded item and flipped the on/off switches to see if the flashlights worked.
Two of the incidents occurred in Glendale, AZ, on May 13 and May 14, said ATF. The third incident took place in Phoenix, Arizona, on May 24, it said. Five people received minor injuries related to the detonation of the three devices. ATF said it was withholding further details about the IEDs “to avoid compromising the criminal investigation.”
In the May 13, Glendale incident, the flashlight was left near a business and found in the landscaping area for the business. Two people received minor injuries.
On May 14 in Glendale, a flashlight was discovered in the landscaping area for a second business and one person received minor injuries.
On May 24, in Phoenix, the flashlight was found by an employee of a Salvation Army Rehabilitation facility while sorting through donations to the Salvation Army. Two individuals received minor injuries in that explosion, said ATF.
"We are offering a $10,000 reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons responsible for these criminal bombings," said Atteberry, Special Agent in Charge of ATF. "Our immediate concern is that of public safety, if anyone discovers a flashlight that does not belong to them or appears out of place, no matter the color or shape, DO NOT attempt touch or manipulate the flashlight in any way. We are confident the public can assist in providing additional information.”
The agency encourage anyone with information about the crimes is to call its toll-free, 24-hour hotline at 1-888-ATF-BOMB (1-888-283-2662).
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http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/303808/fast-and-furious-and-ocdetf-andrew-c-mccarthy?pg=1
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I haven't had a chance to check it out for myself, but this blog comes well recommended to me:
http://waronguns.blogspot.com/
=======================
Separately, here's this from "Bullet Points":
Microstamping Dies in New York, Again
New York State Capitol
DESPITE HOUSE PASSAGE, BILL FAILS FOR FIFTH STRAIGHT YEAR . . . Late last week, New York state's microstamping bill died in the Senate after being passed by the Assembly, though with five fewer votes than in years past. Despite being backed by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and gun-control groups like the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence and the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, the bill failed for the fifth consecutive year. Earlier in the week, a Baltimore Sun editorial unwisely suggested that Maryland adopt microstamping, a suggestion which drew a published response from Jeff Reh, general counsel and vice-general manager at Maryland-based Beretta USA, who noted in his letter that implementing microstamping would be cost prohibitive to both manufacturers and to gun buyers. Read a recap of the busy "microstamping" week in the NSSF Blog.
Traditional Ammunition
• NSSF FILES MOTION TO PROTECT TRADITIONAL AMMUNITION . . . As it promised to do, NSSF today filed a motion to intervene in the frivolous lawsuit brought on June 7 by the anti-hunting Center for Biological Diversity and six other organizations to force the Environmental Protection Agency to ban traditional ammunition containing lead components. By intervening in the case, NSSF seeks to ensure that the interests of the firearms and ammunition industry are protected and to ensure that hunters and target shooters still will be able to select the ammunition of their choice. For a recap on the issue, read today's NSSF press release.
Retailers and Ranges
• SELL-OUT CROWD OF NEARLY 100 ATTENDS RANGE & RETAIL WORKSHOP . . . An unqualified success is one way to describe the recent NSSF Indoor Range & Retail Development Workshop held in St. Louis from June 18-21. The seminar provided an opportunity for people in the developmental and exploratory stages to network and gain a wealth of insights from successful range/retail owners who addressed the attendees. A video created from the workshop proceedings is being developed, and when completed, NSSF will announce details of availability.
• NSSF RESPONDS TO JESSE JACKSON'S ATTACKS ON FIREARMS RETAILERS . . . In a blog post last week, NSSF pointed out that the Rev. Jesse Jackson has revved up the blame game against law-abiding, federally licensed firearms retailers in the suburbs of troubled cities like Detroit, attempting to make the argument that the legal sale of firearms is somehow the cause of urban violence. His "guns out, jobs in" campaign ignores that the firearms industry has been responsible for a 30.6 percent increase in jobs from 2008 through 2011, keeping thousands of workers off unemployment lines and homeowners off foreclosure lists. Read more.
• NSSF LAUNCHES NEW ONLINE COMPLIANCE RESOURCE CENTER . . . The NSSF's new Regulatory Compliance Resource Center now provides one convenient and centralized hub devoted to helping industry members operate their businesses in compliance with the ever-changing terrain of laws and regulations. The website offers an array of practical and essential compliance resources, including articles, videos, products and solutions, on-demand training courses, and much more. Federal Firearms Licensees can also order free Don't Lie for the Other Guy retailer education kits and access information about NSSF's ATF compliance consultation program and NSSF-endorsed Firearms Business Insurance providing up to $25,000 in defense coverage against any ATF record-keeping or administrative action.
• FFLs: BECOME A MEMBER AND LET NSSF WORK FOR YOU . . . The benefits and resources afforded to NSSF member FFLs are often free, if not substantially discounted from standard service rates. These benefits include expert guidance to maintain ATF/legal compliance and everything from a Form 4473 overlay to a new hotline just for retailers, the opportunity to work with experienced ATF compliance advisors, business property and casualty insurance including ATF defense coverage, discounts on the industry's benchmark research and much more. Not yet a member? Click here to learn more and join NSSF today so we can grow stronger together.
Government Relations
• HOLDER HELD IN CONTEMPT OVER FAST AND FURIOUS . . . The U.S. House Government and Oversight Reform Committee voted 23-17 last Wednesday to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for failing to turn over documents connected with the "gun-walking" operation known as Fast and Furious. According to a Washington Post story, a House floor vote could be taken on the matter as early as this week. Hours before the committee voted, President Obama asserted executive privilege to withhold the documents. See Holder's letter to Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the committee, on the matter.
• BRADY CENTER'S DAN GROSS INSULTS FIREARMS INDUSTRY . . . During a debate about microstamping on MSNBC, Dan Gross, president of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, hurled this insult at firearms manufacturers, saying, "This is an industry that at all costs wants to protect its profits, and it does it at the cost of human lives." Go to the 5:00 mark in the video to hear it. Members of our industry who make and sell products that people around the world own in order to protect their lives should be aware of this highly offensive remark from the leader of this anti-gun group. In response, read the challenge offered to Gross by NSSF Senior Vice President and General Counsel Larry Keane at the end of this blog post.
• SUNDAY HUNTING BILL INTRODUCED IN DELAWARE . . . State Rep. John Atkins has introduced Delaware HB 367, which would amend Title 7 of the Delaware code relating to the prohibition on Sunday hunting. The bill would allow Sunday hunting on private properties after noon.
• HOUSE PASSES BILL BENEFITTING PUBLIC-LANDS SHOOTING RANGES . . . With broad bipartisan support, the U.S. House of Representatives last week passed the Target Practice and Marksmanship Training Support Act (H.R. 3065) as Title XII of the Conservation and Economic Growth Act (H.R. 2578). Sponsored by Rep. Heath Schuler (D-N.C.), the legislation provides state game and fish agencies with more flexibility and discretion to use Pittman-Robertson (Wildlife Restoration Trust Fund) funds for the creation, enhancement and maintenance of public shooting ranges. Read the NSSF press release.
• FEDERAL JUDGE RULES AGAINST PART OF CHICAGO GUN LAW . . . U.S. District Judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan has ruled that the Chicago firearm ordinance banning permits for people convicted of unlawful use of a weapon that is a firearm is vague and unconstitutional, reported the Chicago Tribune. Shawn Gowder challenged the city's gun law after he was denied a permit because of a misdemeanor conviction, and the judge said the law, "unconstitutionally void for vagueness," violated the plaintiff's right to keep and bear arms under the Second Amendment, reported the Chicago Sun-Times.
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much more on Fast and Furious
« Reply #784 on: Today at 08:07:26 AM »
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http://features.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2012/06/27/fast-and-furious-truth/?hpt=hp_t2
In the annals of impossible assignments, Dave Voth's ranked high. In 2009 the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives promoted Voth to lead Phoenix Group VII, one of seven new ATF groups along the Southwest border tasked with stopping guns from being trafficked into Mexico's vicious drug war.
Some call it the "parade of ants"; others the "river of iron." The Mexican government has estimated that 2,000 weapons are smuggled daily from the U.S. into Mexico. The ATF is hobbled in its effort to stop this flow. No federal statute outlaws firearms trafficking, so agents must build cases using a patchwork of often toothless laws. For six years, due to Beltway politics, the bureau has gone without permanent leadership, neutered in its fight for funding and authority. The National Rifle Association has so successfully opposed a comprehensive electronic database of gun sales that the ATF's congressional appropriation explicitly prohibits establishing one.
http://nationaljournal.com/congress-legacy/first-democratic-lawmaker-says-holder-should-be-held-in-contempt-20120627
The first Democratic member of Congress has said that he will vote to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for withholding documents related to the “Fast and Furious” investigation that has plagued the Justice Department, the Salt Lake Tribune reports.
Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, joined House Republicans on Tuesday with his announcement. Most Democratic members are expected to support Holder.
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/hoyer-challenges-issa-to-show-e-mails/?smid=fb-share
With the House just days away from a vote on holding Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt, Representative Darrell Issa, Republican of California, appeared on national television on Sunday to say he had e-mails showing that the architects of a federal gun-smuggling investigation intended to use the operation to build a case for reinstating the lapsed ban on assault-weapons sales.
“We have e-mail from people involved in this that are talking about using what they’re finding here to support the — basically assault weapons ban or greater reporting,” Mr. Issa, the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said on ABC’s “This Week.”
On Tuesday, Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland and the House minority whip, challenged Mr. Issa to prove it.
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Quite a bit in here contrary to my understandings:
http://features.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2012/06/27/fast-and-furious-truth/?hpt=hp_t2
3,384 comments The truth about the Fast and Furious scandal
June 27, 2012: 5:00 AM ET
162 Email Print A Fortune investigation reveals that the ATF never intentionally allowed guns to fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. How the world came to believe just the opposite is a tale of rivalry, murder, and political bloodlust.
By Katherine Eban
Dave Voth, Fast and Furious supervisor for the ATF
FORTUNE -- In the annals of impossible assignments, Dave Voth's ranked high. In 2009 the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives promoted Voth to lead Phoenix Group VII, one of seven new ATF groups along the Southwest border tasked with stopping guns from being trafficked into Mexico's vicious drug war.
Some call it the "parade of ants"; others the "river of iron." The Mexican government has estimated that 2,000 weapons are smuggled daily from the U.S. into Mexico. The ATF is hobbled in its effort to stop this flow. No federal statute outlaws firearms trafficking, so agents must build cases using a patchwork of often toothless laws. For six years, due to Beltway politics, the bureau has gone without permanent leadership, neutered in its fight for funding and authority. The National Rifle Association has so successfully opposed a comprehensive electronic database of gun sales that the ATF's congressional appropriation explicitly prohibits establishing one.
Voth, 39, was a good choice for a Sisyphean task. Strapping and sandy-haired, the former Marine is cool-headed and punctilious to a fault. In 2009 the ATF named him outstanding law-enforcement employee of the year for dismantling two violent street gangs in Minneapolis. He was the "hardest working federal agent I've come across," says John Biederman, a sergeant with the Minneapolis Police Department. But as Voth left to become the group supervisor of Phoenix Group VII, a friend warned him: "You're destined to fail."
Voth's mandate was to stop gun traffickers in Arizona, the state ranked by the gun-control advocacy group Legal Community Against Violence as having the nation's "weakest gun violence prevention laws." Just 200 miles from Mexico, which prohibits gun sales, the Phoenix area is home to 853 federally licensed firearms dealers. Billboards advertise volume discounts for multiple purchases.
Customers can legally buy as many weapons as they want in Arizona as long as they're 18 or older and pass a criminal background check. There are no waiting periods and no need for permits, and buyers are allowed to resell the guns. "In Arizona," says Voth, "someone buying three guns is like someone buying a sandwich."
By 2009 the Sinaloa drug cartel had made Phoenix its gun supermarket and recruited young Americans as its designated shoppers or straw purchasers. Voth and his agents began investigating a group of buyers, some not even old enough to buy beer, whose members were plunking down as much as $20,000 in cash to purchase up to 20 semiautomatics at a time, and then delivering the weapons to others.
MORE: 10 ways Toyota is topping Ford
The agents faced numerous obstacles in what they dubbed the Fast and Furious case. (They named it after the street-racing movie because the suspects drag raced cars together.) Their greatest difficulty by far, however, was convincing prosecutors that they had sufficient grounds to seize guns and arrest straw purchasers. By June 2010 the agents had sent the U.S. Attorney's office a list of 31 suspects they wanted to arrest, with 46 pages outlining their illegal acts. But for the next seven months prosecutors did not indict a single suspect.
On Dec. 14, 2010, a tragic event rewrote the narrative of the investigation. In a remote stretch of Peck Canyon, Ariz., Mexican bandits attacked an elite U.S. Border Patrol unit and killed an agent named Brian Terry. The attackers fled, leaving behind two semiautomatic rifles. A trace of the guns' serial numbers revealed that the weapons had been purchased 11 months earlier at a Phoenix-area gun store by a Fast and Furious suspect.
Ten weeks later, an ATF agent named John Dodson, whom Voth had supervised, made startling allegations on the CBS Evening News. He charged that his supervisors had intentionally allowed American firearms to be trafficked—a tactic known as "walking guns"—to Mexican drug cartels. Dodson claimed that supervisors repeatedly ordered him not to seize weapons because they wanted to track the guns into the hands of criminal ringleaders. The program showed internal e-mails from Voth, which purportedly revealed agents locked in a dispute over the deadly strategy. The guns permitted to flow to criminals, the program charged, played a role in Terry's death.
After the CBS broadcast, Fast and Furious erupted as a major scandal for the Obama administration. The story has become a fixture on Fox News and the subject of numerous reports in media outlets from CNN to the New York Times. The furor has prompted repeated congressional hearings—with U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder testifying multiple times—dueling reports from congressional committees, and an ongoing investigation by the Justice Department's inspector general. It has led to the resignations of the acting ATF chief, the U.S. Attorney in Arizona, and his chief criminal prosecutor.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R.-Calif.)
Conservatives have pummeled the Obama administration, and especially Holder, for more than a year. "Who authorized this program that was so felony stupid that it got people killed?" Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, demanded to know in a hearing in June 2011. He has charged the Justice Department, which oversees the ATF, with having "blood on their hands." Issa and more than 100 other Republican members of Congress have demanded Holder's resignation.
The conflict has escalated dramatically in the past ten days. On June 20, in a day of political brinkmanship, Issa's committee voted along party lines, 23 to 17, to hold Holder in contempt of Congress for allegedly failing to turn over certain subpoenaed documents, which the Justice Department contended could not be released because they related to ongoing criminal investigations. The vote came hours after President Obama asserted executive privilege to block the release of the documents. Holder now faces a vote by the full House of Representatives this week on the contempt motion (though negotiations over the documents continue). Assuming a vote occurs, it will be the first against an attorney general in U.S. history.
As political pressure has mounted, ATF and Justice Department officials have reversed themselves. After initially supporting Group VII agents and denying the allegations, they have since agreed that the ATF purposefully chose not to interdict guns it lawfully could have seized. Holder testified in December that "the use of this misguided tactic is inexcusable, and it must never happen again."
There's the rub.
Quite simply, there's a fundamental misconception at the heart of the Fast and Furious scandal. Nobody disputes that suspected straw purchasers under surveillance by the ATF repeatedly bought guns that eventually fell into criminal hands. Issa and others charge that the ATF intentionally allowed guns to walk as an operational tactic. But five law-enforcement agents directly involved in Fast and Furious tell Fortune that the ATF had no such tactic. They insist they never purposefully allowed guns to be illegally trafficked. Just the opposite: They say they seized weapons whenever they could but were hamstrung by prosecutors and weak laws, which stymied them at every turn.
Indeed, a six-month Fortune investigation reveals that the public case alleging that Voth and his colleagues walked guns is replete with distortions, errors, partial truths, and even some outright lies. Fortune reviewed more than 2,000 pages of confidential ATF documents and interviewed 39 people, including seven law-enforcement agents with direct knowledge of the case. Several, including Voth, are speaking out for the first time.
How Fast and Furious reached the headlines is a strange and unsettling saga, one that reveals a lot about politics and media today. It's a story that starts with a grudge, specifically Dodson's anger at Voth. After the terrible murder of agent Terry, Dodson made complaints that were then amplified, first by right-wing bloggers, then by CBS. Rep. Issa and other politicians then seized those elements to score points against the Obama administration, which, for its part, has capitulated in an apparent effort to avoid a rhetorical battle over gun control in the run-up to the presidential election. (A Justice Department spokesperson denies this and asserts that the department is not drawing conclusions until the inspector general's report is submitted.)
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"Republican senators are whipping up the country into a psychotic frenzy with these reports that are patently false," says Linda Wallace, a special agent with the Internal Revenue Service's criminal investigation unit who was assigned to the Fast and Furious team (and recently retired from the IRS). A self-described gun-rights supporter, Wallace has not been criticized by Issa's committee.
The ATF's accusers seem untroubled by evidence that the policy they have pilloried didn't actually exist. "It gets back to something basic for me," says Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa). "Terry was murdered, and guns from this operation were found at his murder site." A spokesman for Issa denies that politics has played a role in the congressman's actions and says "multiple individuals across the Justice Department's component agencies share responsibility for the failure that occurred in Operation Fast and Furious." Issa's spokesman asserts that even if ATF agents followed prosecutors' directives, "the practice is nonetheless gun walking." Attorneys for Dodson declined to comment on the record.
For its part, the ATF would not answer specific questions, citing ongoing investigations. But a spokesperson for the agency provided a written statement noting that the "ATF did not exercise proper oversight, planning or judgment in executing this case. We at ATF have accepted responsibility and have taken appropriate and decisive action to insure that these errors in oversight and judgment never occur again." The statement asserted that the "ATF has clarified its firearms transfer policy to focus on interdiction or early intervention to prevent the criminal acquisition, trafficking and misuse of firearms," and it cited changes in coordination and oversight at the ATF.
Irony abounds when it comes to the Fast and Furious scandal. But the ultimate irony is this: Republicans who support the National Rifle Association and its attempts to weaken gun laws are lambasting ATF agents for not seizing enough weapons—ones that, in this case, prosecutors deemed to be legal.
The investigation begins
The ATF is a bureau of judgment calls. Drug enforcement agents can confiscate cocaine and arrest anyone in possession of it. But ATF agents must distinguish constitutionally protected legal guns from illegal ones, with the NRA and other Second Amendment activists watching for missteps.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder
Critics have depicted the ATF as "jackbooted government thugs" trampling on the rights of law-abiding gun owners. From the deadly standoff with the Branch Davidian cult in Waco, Texas, in 1993 to allegations that ATF agents illegally seized weapons from suspected straw purchasers at a Richmond gun show in 2005, these scandals have helped cement the bureau's reputation in some quarters for law-enforcement overreach.
In part because of these notorious cases, the bureau has operated in a self-protective crouch. It has stuck to small single-defendant cases to the detriment of its effort to combat gun trafficking, the Justice Department's inspector general found in a review of ATF cases from 2007 to 2009. To refocus its efforts, the ATF established Group VII and the other Southwest border units to build big, multi-defendant conspiracy cases and target the leaders of the trafficking operations.
Of course, the ATF can be its own worst enemy. Voth arrived in Phoenix in December 2009 only to discover that his group had not been funded. The group had little equipment and no long guns, electronic devices, or binoculars, forcing Voth to scrounge for supplies.
Then there was Voth's seven-agent team, which was almost instantly at war with itself. Most of the agents were transplants, unfamiliar with Arizona or one another. Fast and Furious' lead case agent, Hope MacAllister, 41, was the exception—a tough, squared-away Phoenix veteran with little tolerance for complaints. Her unsmiling demeanor led Voth to give her the ironic nickname "Sunshine Bear." She declined to be interviewed.
Dodson, 41, arrived one day before Voth from a two-man outpost of ATF's Roanoke field office, where he'd worked since 2002. He had joined the ATF from the narcotics section of the Loudoun County sheriff's office in Virginia, where his blunt, even obnoxious manner did not earn him friends. He's "an asshole sometimes—there is no other way to put it," says his former partner, Ken Dondero, who served as best man at Dodson's wedding. "He's almost too honest. He believes that if he has a thought in his head, it's there to broadcast to everyone."
Voth, MacAllister, and a third agent, Tonya English, were quintessential by-the-book types. By contrast, Dodson and two other new arrivals, Olindo "Lee" Casa and Lawrence Alt, seemed to chafe at ATF rules and procedures. (An attorney for Casa says that "in light of the current congressional investigation, as well as investigations by the Department of Justice Inspector General and the Office of Special Counsel" it would be premature to comment. A lawyer for Alt says Alt could not be interviewed because he is in mediation to settle a suit he filed in which he charges that he was retaliated against for being a whistleblower.)
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Dodson's faction grew antagonistic to Voth. They regularly fired off snide e-mails and seemed to delight in mocking Voth and his methodical nature. They were scornful of protocol, according to ATF agents. Dodson would show up to work in flip-flops. He came unprepared for operations—without safety equipment or back-up plans—and was pulled off at least one surveillance for his own safety, say two colleagues. He earned the nickname "Renegade," and soon Voth's group effectively divided into two clashing factions: the Sunshine Bears and the Renegades.
Even had they all gotten along, they faced a nearly impossible task. They were seven agents pursuing more than a dozen cases, of which Fast and Furious was just one, their efforts complicated by a lack of adequate tools. Without a real-time database of gun sales, they had to perform a laborious archaeology. Day after day, they visited local gun dealers and pored over forms called 4473s, which dealers must keep on file. These contain a buyer's personal information, a record of purchased guns and their serial numbers, and a certification that the buyer is purchasing the guns for himself. (Lying on the forms is a felony, but with weak penalties attached.) The ATF agents manually entered these serial numbers into a database of suspect guns to help them build a picture of past purchases.
By January 2010 the agents had identified 20 suspects who had paid some $350,000 in cash for more than 650 guns. According to Rep. Issa's congressional committee, Group VII had enough evidence to make arrests and close the case then.
Prosecutors: Transferring guns is legal in Arizona
This was not the view of federal prosecutors. In a meeting on Jan. 5, 2010, Emory Hurley, the assistant U.S. Attorney in Phoenix overseeing the Fast and Furious case, told the agents they lacked probable cause for arrests, according to ATF records. Hurley's judgment reflected accepted policy at the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona. "[P]urchasing multiple long guns in Arizona is lawful," Patrick Cunningham, the U.S. Attorney's then–criminal chief in Arizona would later write. "Transferring them to another is lawful and even sale or barter of the guns to another is lawful unless the United States can prove by clear and convincing evidence that the firearm is intended to be used to commit a crime." (Arizona federal prosecutors referred requests for comment to the Justice Department, which declined to make officials available. Hurley noted in an e-mail, "I am not able to comment on what I understand to be an ongoing investigation/prosecution. I am precluded by federal regulation, DOJ policy, the rules of professional conduct, and court order from talking with you about this matter." Cunningham's attorney also declined to comment.)
It was nearly impossible in Arizona to bring a case against a straw purchaser. The federal prosecutors there did not consider the purchase of a huge volume of guns, or their handoff to a third party, sufficient evidence to seize them. A buyer who certified that the guns were for himself, then handed them off minutes later, hadn't necessarily lied and was free to change his mind. Even if a suspect bought 10 guns that were recovered days later at a Mexican crime scene, this didn't mean the initial purchase had been illegal. To these prosecutors, the pattern proved little. Instead, agents needed to link specific evidence of intent to commit a crime to each gun they wanted to seize.
ATF agent John Dodson
None of the ATF agents doubted that the Fast and Furious guns were being purchased to commit crimes in Mexico. But that was nearly impossible to prove to prosecutors' satisfaction. And agents could not seize guns or arrest suspects after being directed not to do so by a prosecutor. (Agents can be sued if they seize a weapon against prosecutors' advice. In this case, the agents had a particularly strong obligation to follow the prosecutors' direction given that Fast and Furious had received a special designation under the Justice Department's Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force. That designation meant more resources for the case, but it also provided that prosecutors take the lead role.)
In their Jan. 5 meeting, Hurley suggested another way to make a case: Voth's team could wiretap the phone of a suspected recruiter and capture proof of him directing straw purchasers to buy guns. This would establish sufficient proof to arrest both the leaders and the followers.
On Jan. 8, 2010, Voth and his supervisors drafted a briefing paper in which they explained Hurley's view that "there was minimal evidence at this time to support any type of prosecution." The paper elaborated, "Currently our strategy is to allow the transfer of firearms to continue to take place, albeit at a much slower pace, in order to further the investigation and allow for the identification of additional co-conspirators."
Rep. Issa's committee has flagged this document as proof that the agents chose to walk guns. But prosecutors had determined, Voth says, that the "transfer of firearms" was legal. Agents had no choice but to keep investigating and start a wiretap as quickly as possible to gather evidence of criminal intent.
Ten days after the meeting with Hurley, a Saturday, Jaime Avila, a transient, admitted methamphetamine user, bought three WASR-10 rifles at the Lone Wolf Trading Company in Glendale, Ariz. The next day, a helpful Lone Wolf employee faxed Avila's purchase form to ATF to flag the suspicious activity. It was the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, so the agents didn't receive the fax until Tuesday, according to a contemporaneous case report. By that time, the legally purchased guns had been gone for three days. The agents had never seen the weapons and had no chance to seize them. But they entered the serial numbers into their gun database. Two of these were later recovered at Brian Terry's murder scene.
Rebuffed by the prosecutors
Voth was a logical thinker. He lived by advice he received from an early mentor in law enforcement: "There's what you think. There's what you know. There's what you can prove. And the first two don't count."
But he was not operating in a logical world. The wiretap represented the ATF's best—perhaps only— hope of connecting the gun purchases it had been documenting to orders from the cartels, according to Hurley. In Minneapolis, the prosecutors Voth had worked with had approved wiretap applications within 24 hours. But in Phoenix, days turned into weeks, and Group VII's wiretap application languished with prosecutors in Arizona and Washington, D.C.
No one has yet explained this delay. Voth thinks prosecutor Hurley's inexperience in wiretapping cases may have slowed the process. Several other agents speculate that Arizona's gun culture may have led to indifference. Hurley is an avid gun enthusiast, according to two law-enforcement sources who worked with him. One of those sources says he saw Hurley behind the counter at a gun show, helping a friend who is a weapons dealer.
William Newell, then special agent in charge of the ATF's Phoenix field division, suspected that U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke, an Obama appointee, was not being briefed adequately by deputies about the volume of guns being purchased. He wrote to colleagues in February 2010 that the prosecutor seemed "taken aback by some of the facts I informed him about"—by then, the Fast and Furious suspects had purchased 800 guns—"so I am setting up a briefing for him (alone no USAO 'posse') about this case and several other cases I feel he is being misled about."
The conflict between federal prosecutors and ATF agents had been growing for years. Pete Forcelli, who served as group supervisor of ATF's Phoenix I field division for five years, told Congress in June 2011 that he believed Arizona federal prosecutors made up excuses to decline cases. "Despite the existence [of] probable cause in many cases," he testified, "there were no indictments, no prosecutions, and criminals were allowed to walk free." Prosecutors in Los Angeles and New York were far more aggressive in pursuing gun cases, Forcelli asserted.
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Phoenix-based ATF agents became so frustrated by prosecutors' intransigence that, in a highly unusual move, they began bringing big cases to the state attorney general's office instead. Terry Goddard, Arizona's Attorney General from 2003 to 2011, says of federal prosecutors, "They demanded that every i be dotted, every t be crossed, and after a while, it got to be nonsensical."
For prosecutors, straw-purchasing cases were hard to prove and unrewarding to prosecute, with minimal penalties attached. In December 2010, five U.S. Attorneys along the Southwest border, including Burke in Arizona, wrote to the U.S. Sentencing Commission, asking that penalties for straw purchasing be increased. The commission did increase the recommended jail time by a few months. But because the straw purchasers, by definition, have no criminal record and there is no firearms-trafficking statute that would allow prosecutors to charge them with conspiracy as a group, the penalties remain low.
Prosecutors repeatedly rebuffed Voth's requests. After examining one suspect's garbage, agents learned he was on food stamps yet had plunked down more than $300,000 for 476 firearms in six months. Voth asked if the ATF could arrest him for fraudulently accepting public assistance when he was spending such huge sums. Prosecutor Hurley said no. In another instance, a young jobless suspect paid more than $10,000 for a 50-caliber tripod-mounted sniper rifle. According to Voth, Hurley told the agents they lacked proof that he hadn't bought the gun for himself.
Voth grew deeply frustrated. In August 2010, after the ATF in Texas confiscated 80 guns—63 of them purchased in Arizona by the Fast and Furious suspects— Voth got an e-mail from a colleague there: "Are you all planning to stop some of these guys any time soon? That's a lot of guns…Are you just letting these guns walk?"
Voth responded with barely suppressed rage: "Have I offended you in some way? Because I am very offended by your e-mail. Define walk? Without Probable Cause and concurrence from the USAO [U.S. Attorney's Office] it is highway robbery if we take someone's property." He then recounted the situation with the unemployed suspect who had bought the sniper rifle. "We conducted a field interview and after calling the AUSA [assistant U.S. Attorney] he said we did not have sufficient PC [probable cause] to take the firearm so our suspect drove home with said firearm in his car…any ideas on how we could not let that firearm 'walk'"?
Voth believed the wiretap could help bring the case to a swift and successful close. On March 5, 2010, ten days before their first wiretap was set to begin, Voth was in Washington, D.C., to brief ATF brass and Justice Department officials on Fast and Furious. The response was overwhelmingly positive. A senior ATF attorney wrote Voth, "This is exactly the types of cases ATF should be doing with a wire, it is fantastic."
The schism inside Phoenix Group VII
Voth returned to Phoenix fully expecting his team to unite for the work that lay ahead. But instead he found a minor mutiny—over the schedule for the wire, which needed to be monitored around the clock. Dodson didn't want to work weekends. Casa felt his seniority should exclude him from the effort.
Agents were getting pulled from other field offices to assist, and on March 11, one wrote to ask Voth, "You're not going to give the out-of-towners the crappy shifts, are you?" Voth responded, "I am attempting to split the weekends so everyone has to work one of the two days that way no one gets screwed too hard and everybody gets screwed a little bit."
The next day, March 12, Voth sent out the wire schedule at 5:15 p.m. but got such a blizzard of complaints about the shifts that, two hours later, he sent another e-mail to the group. It read in part: "[T]here may be a schism developing amongst the group. This is the time we all need to pull together not drift apart. We are all entitled to our respective (albeit different) opinions however we all need to get along and realize we have a mission to accomplish. I am thrilled and proud that our Group is the first ATF Southwest Border Group in the country to be going up on [a] wire…I will be damned if this case is going to suffer due to petty arguing, rumors or other adolescent behavior…I don't know what all the issues are but we are all adults, we are all professionals, and we have an exciting opportunity to use the biggest tool in our law enforcement tool box. If you don't think this is fun you're in the wrong line of work—period! This is the pinnacle of domestic U.S. law-enforcement techniques. After this the tool box is empty."
The wire turned out to be short lived. Within days, the agents realized that their suspect was phasing out use of the phone they were monitoring. Group VII would have to reapply, all over again, for permission to tap the new phone number.
But Voth's so-called "schism e-mail" would live in infamy. Today it is held up as proof that the group was desperately divided over the tactic of gun walking and that Voth belittled those who opposed it. But there is no documentary evidence that agents Dodson, Casa, or Alt complained to their supervisors about the alleged gun walking, had confrontations about it, or were retaliated against because of their complaints, as they all later claimed.
Who's opposed to gun walking?
The atmosphere inside Voth's group had become toxic. The subjects of dispute were often trivial. For example, when Voth asked Casa to turn off his computer's Godzilla sound effect, which roared each time he got an e-mail, Casa replied, "I have done some limited research and have found no ATF order or internal division memo addressing this issue."
Voth remained even-tempered but did take a stand after one incident. Alt taped to Voth's door an eight-point takedown of agent MacAllister, sarcastically stating that she was in charge of everything. Voth reported the note to an ATF attorney, and Alt apologized. It's unclear what drove the men's anger, but it seems unlikely that it was caused by disagreements over alleged gun walking.
View this document on ScribdHow is it possible to deduce that? Because Dodson then proceeded to walk guns intentionally, with Casa and Alt's help. On April 13, 2010, one month after Voth wrote his schism e-mail, Dodson opened a case into a suspected gun trafficker named Isaiah Fernandez. He had gotten Casa to approve the case when Voth was on leave. Dodson had directed a cooperating straw purchaser to give three guns to Fernandez and had taped their conversations without a prosecutor's approval.
Voth first learned these details a month into the case. He demanded that Dodson meet with him and get approval from prosecutors to tape conversations. Five days later, Dodson sent an uncharacteristically diplomatic response. (He and Alt had revised repeated drafts in that time, with Alt pushing to make the reply "less abrasive." Dodson e-mailed back: "Less abrasive? I felt sick from kissing all that ass as it was.") Dodson wrote that he succeeded in posing undercover as a straw purchaser and claimed that prosecutor Hurley—who he had just belatedly contacted—had raised "new concerns." The prosecutor had told Dodson that an assistant U.S. Attorney "won't be able to approve of letting firearms 'walk' in furtherance of your investigation without first briefing the U.S. Attorney and Criminal Chief."
It was the first time Voth learned that Dodson intended to walk guns. Voth says he refused to approve the plan and instead consulted his supervisor, who asked for a proposal from Dodson in writing. Dodson then drafted one, which Voth forwarded to his supervisor, who approved it on May 28.
On June 1, Dodson used $2,500 in ATF funds to purchase six AK Draco pistols from local gun dealers, and gave these to Fernandez, who reimbursed him and gave him $700 for his efforts. Two days later, according to case records, Dodson—who would later testify that in his previous experience, "if even one [gun] got away from us, nobody went home until we found it"—left on a scheduled vacation without interdicting the guns. That day, Voth wrote to remind him that money collected as evidence needed to be vouchered within five days. Dodson e-mailed back, his sarcasm fully restored: "Do the orders define a 'day'? Is it; a calendar day? A business day or work day….? An Earth day (because a day on Venus takes 243 Earth days which would mean that I have plenty of time)?"
The guns were never recovered, the case was later closed, and Fernandez was never charged. By any definition, it was gun walking of the most egregious sort: a government agent using taxpayer money to deliver guns to bad guys and then failing to intercept them.
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On Feb. 4, 2011, the Justice Department sent a letter to Sen. Grassley saying that the allegations of gun walking in Fast and Furious were false and that ATF always tried to interdict weapons. A month later, Grassley countered with what appeared to be slam-dunk proof that ATF had indeed walked guns. "[P]lease explain how the denials in the Justice Department's Feb. 4, 2011 letter to me can be squared with the evidence," Grassley wrote, attaching damning case reports that he contended "proved that ATF allowed guns to 'walk.'" The case and agent names were redacted, but the reports were not from Fast and Furious. They came entirely from Dodson's Fernandez case.
An unusual alliance
By the end of July 2010, the Fast and Furious investigation was largely complete. The agents had sent prosecutors 20 names for immediate indictment, Jaime Avila's among them. His purchase of the three WASR-10s were listed among his criminal acts. On Aug. 17, 2010, ATF agents met in Phoenix with prosecutors, including U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke. According to two people present, the ATF presented detailed evidence, including the fact that their suspects had purchased almost 2,000 guns, and pushed for indictments. A month later, on Sept. 17, an ATF team—this time including ATF director Kenneth Melson—met with prosecutors again and again pushed for action. The sides agreed to aim for indictments by October, according to one person in attendance.
But as weeks and then months passed, prosecutors did not issue indictments. The ATF agents grew increasingly concerned. By December, prosecutors had dropped Avila's name from the indictment list for what they deemed a lack of evidence.
Only when Terry, the U.S. Border Patrol agent, was murdered in December 2010 did the prosecutors act. Voth's agents arrested Avila within 24 hours of Terry's death. On Jan. 19, 2011, a federal grand jury indicted him and 19 other suspects. (Avila has since pleaded guilty to dealing guns without a license).
Meanwhile, a crucial part of the Fast and Furious scandal—an unusual alliance that would prod politicians and spread word of the failure to stop guns from making their way to Mexican drug cartels—was waiting in the wings. Little more than a week after Terry's murder, a small item about the possible connection between his death and the Fast and Furious case appeared on a website, CleanUpATF.org. The site was the work of a disgruntled ATF agent-turned-whistleblower, Vince Cefalu, who is suing the bureau for alleged mistreatment in an unrelated case. His website has served as a clearinghouse for grievances and a magnet for other ATF whistleblowers.
It had also attracted gun-rights activists loosely organized around a blog called the Sipsey Street Irregulars, run by a former militia member, Mike Vanderboegh, who has advocated armed insurrection against the U.S. government. It was an incendiary combination: the disgruntled ATF agents wanted to punish and reform the bureau; the gun-rights activists wanted to disable it. After the item about Terry appeared, the bloggers funneled the allegations through a "desert telegraph" of sorts to Republican lawmakers, who began asking questions.
A week after the initial Fast and Furious press conference in January 2011, Dodson dropped a small bombshell. He told a supervisor that he had been contacted by congressional staff. Dodson met that day with two ATF supervisors. According to their written contemporaneous accounts, Dodson was vague but claimed that Voth had always "treated him like shit" and that it "felt good" to speak with someone outside ATF.
Dodson appeared on the CBS Evening News a week later. As Voth watched the program from his living room, he says, he wanted to vomit. He saw sentences from his "schism" e-mail reproduced on the TV screen. But CBS didn't quote the portions of Voth's e-mail that described how the group was divided by "petty arguing" and "adolescent behavior." Instead, CBS claimed the schism had been caused by opposition to gun walking (such alleged opposition is not discussed anywhere in the e-mail, which is below). CBS asserted that Dodson and others had protested the tactic "over and over," and then quoted portions of Voth's e-mail in a way that left the impression that gun walking was endorsed at headquarters. CBS contacted the ATF (but not Voth directly). The result was a report that incorrectly painted Voth as zealously promoting gun walking. (A CBS spokeswoman, Sonya McNair, says CBS does not publicly discuss its editorial process but notes, "The White House has already acknowledged the truth of our report.")
View this document on ScribdThe "Witch Hunt"
Less than 36 hours after the CBS report, Voth was jolted awake at dawn by the blaring of his burglar alarm. With his wife and children still in bed, he crept down the stairs of his desert home, his ATF-issued .40 caliber Sig Sauer extended before him. In the garage, he saw a door ajar and a massive kettle bell he used for workouts knocked from its place. Outside, the fleeing intruder had left behind a partial footprint in the sand.
As Voth waited for the police, he checked his e-mail and found an anonymous threat, sent minutes earlier: "You God-damned stupid 'Yes-Man' who does not have either the morals, or the intelligence, to realize that allowing this 'Fast and Furious' operation would result in unnecessary, unjustified deaths: MAY YOU EAT SHIT AND DIE." Later his wife found a strange car outside their house and an angry post on the Internet listing their home address. Voth confidentially shared his concern about that post in a meeting with two senior ATF officials, only to find an account of the meeting on the Sipsey Street blog within 24 hours.
The ATF's office of operations security investigated the threats to Voth. A confidential report on March 29, 2011, concluded, "ATF 'insiders' are the number one threat to GS Voth and his family." The report cited "at least six individuals," whom it did not name, who had "personal agendas to undermine the credibility of ATF supervisors and members of management as retribution for [Voth's] operational shortcomings." The report cited the two blogs and concluded that "the malicious intent of insiders" had led directly to Voth's becoming the target of a "nation-wide…libel campaign."
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Politicians soon got involved, and the situation grew worse for the ATF. In June, Republican staffers for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the Senate Judiciary Committee released a joint report that leaned heavily on interviews with Dodson, Casa, and Alt and identified Voth as a central figure in the scandal. It quoted Dodson describing Voth as "giddy" over the slaughter in Mexico—Voth says he was deeply upset by the violence—but didn't reflect Voth's perspective. The report was released two weeks before Voth was scheduled to be questioned for the first time by congressional investigators. (A spokesman for Issa says the committee attempted to interview Voth earlier.)
As the allegations mounted, pressure intensified. In early July the ATF's once supportive acting director, Melson—who according to e-mails had been briefed weekly on the case—went to Congress and threw his own people under the bus. Melson told Grassley that he had read the case reports only after the scandal broke, and had been "sick to his stomach," according to press accounts of the meeting. In August, Melson resigned, as did Arizona's U.S. Attorney, Burke. (Melson's lawyer, Richard Cullen, says the Justice Department's inspector general will likely answer many of the continuing questions.) In December 2011, the Justice Department retracted its Feb. 4 letter, in which it had denied walking guns in the Fast and Furious case.
For Voth, steeped in military loyalty, Melson's betrayal was the blow he couldn't fathom. Voth began losing weight, losing sleep. As he puts it, "You barely remember your own name, your mind is going 100 miles an hour." He no longer knew what to do or who could be trusted. "There would be no way," he says, "to foreshadow this."
Since the scandal erupted, almost everyone associated with Fast and Furious has been reassigned. Dodson, Casa, and Alt have been transferred to other field offices. Voth, who has now been interviewed by congressional investigators and the Justice Department's inspector general, has been reassigned to a desk job in Washington.
New facts are still coming to light—and will likely continue to do so with the Justice Department inspector general's report expected in coming months. Among the discoveries: Fast and Furious' top suspects—Sinaloa Cartel operatives and Mexican nationals who were providing the money, ordering the guns, and directing the recruitment of the straw purchasers—turned out to be FBI informants who were receiving money from the bureau. That came as news to the ATF agents in Group VII.
Today, with Attorney General Holder now squarely in the cross hairs of Congress, Democrats and Republicans are accusing each other of political machinations. Rep. Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat and ranking member of the oversight committee, has accused Issa of targeting Holder as part of an "election-year witch hunt." Issa has alleged on Fox News that Fast and Furious is part of a liberal conspiracy to restrict gun rights: "Very clearly, [the ATF] made a crisis and they are using this crisis to somehow take away or limit people's Second Amendment rights." (Issa has a personal history on this issue: In 1972, at age 19, he was arrested for having a concealed, loaded .25-caliber automatic in his car; he ultimately pleaded guilty to possession of an unregistered gun.)
Issa's claim that the ATF is using the Fast and Furious scandal to limit gun rights seems, to put it charitably, far-fetched. Meanwhile, Issa and other lawmakers say they want ATF to stanch the deadly tide of guns, widely implicated in the killing of 47,000 Mexicans in the drug-war violence of the past five years. But the public bludgeoning of the ATF has had the opposite effect. From 2010, when Congress began investigating, to 2011, gun seizures by Group VII and the ATF's three other groups in Phoenix dropped by more than 90%.
Reporter Associate: Doris Burke
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http://www.rollcall.com/news/darrell_issa_puts_details_of_secret_wiretap_applications_in_congressional-215828-1.html
In the midst of a fiery floor debate over contempt proceedings for Attorney General Eric Holder, House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) quietly dropped a bombshell letter into the Congressional Record.
The May 24 letter to Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), ranking member on the panel, quotes from and describes in detail a secret wiretap application that has become a point of debate in the GOP’s “Fast and Furious” gun-walking probe.
The wiretap applications are under court seal, and releasing such information to the public would ordinarily be illegal. But Issa appears to be protected by the Speech or Debate Clause in the Constitution, which offers immunity for Congressional speech, especially on a chamber’s floor.
According to the letter, the wiretap applications contained a startling amount of detail about the operation, which would have tipped off anyone who read them closely about what tactics were being used.
continued on web site.
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*Fast and Furious whistleblowers now supervised by ATF manager who allegedly threatened retaliation* (http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-31727_162-57464286-10391695/fast-and-furious-whistleblowers-now-supervised-by-atf-manager-who-allegedly-threatened-retaliation/)
By Sharyl Attkisson
(CBS News) Two Fast and Furious whistleblowers have reportedly been placed under the supervision of an ATF official who allegedly threatened to "take them down."
That's according to Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) who have asked the Inspector General to immediately investigate.
When the ATF whistleblowers, Special Agents John Dodson and Pete Forcelli, went public last year, Scot Thomasson headed up ATF Public Affairs. According to an eyewitness, Thomasson stated "We need to get whatever dirt we can on these guys (whistleblowers) and take them down." Now, Grassley and Issa say the agents have been put under the charge of ATF's Scot Thomasson who is Division Chief of the Firearms Operations Unit.
Thomasson was also allegedly heard to have said "ATF needs to f__k these guys." And when asked if the whistleblower allegations were true, Thomasson purportedly said he didn't know and didn't care. The accounts are contained in a May 3, 2012 House Oversight memo attached to Congress' draft contempt report against Attorney General Eric Holder.
Dodson went public about the agency's controversial gunwalking tactics in an interview with CBS News in February 2011. He later testified before Congress along with Forcelli.
"It is difficult to understand why ATF leadership would put two of these courageous whistleblowers at the mercy of an individual who made such reckless, irresponsible and inaccurate comments about them 18 months ago," say the members of Congress in today's letter to the Inspector General. The letter also asks "what steps, if any, are being taken to ensure that Thomasson does not use his new position to engage in a campaign of retaliation along the lines he expressed a desire to conduct last year."
ATF told CBS News: "As a general policy, atf does not comment on personnel matters. we respect the rights of all our employees and will proceed an appropriate manner." ATF did not respond to our request to speak to Thomasson, nor did he respond to an email request for comment.
---End Quote---
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFIpoL3jrfo
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Second or third post of the day:
No URL on this but it is forwarded by a very reliable person:
Page 16 of the 2009 Stimulus Plan authorizes $10m for Project Gunrunner.
"For an additional amount for ‘‘State and Local Law Enforcement
Assistance’’, $40,000,000, for competitive grants to provide
assistance and equipment to local law enforcement along the
Southern border and in High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas to
combat criminal narcotics activity stemming from the Southern
border, of which $10,000,000 shall be transferred to ‘‘Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Salaries and Expenses’’
for the ATF Project Gunrunner."
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*Blood Money: Obama Contributor Ran Fast and Furious* (http://news.investors.com/article/616921/201207021850/obama-contributor-ran-fast-and-furious.htm?p=full)
Scandal: A campaign contributor who was an architect of the 1994 assault weapons ban was the mastermind behind the Fast and Furious operation that let guns walk into Mexico, including those that killed two U.S. agents.
Shortly after the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry on Dec. 15, 2010, Attorney General Eric Holder's deputy chief of staff, Monty Wilkinson, received an email from U.S. Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke telling him just that:
"The guns found in the desert near the murder(ed) BP officer connect back to the investigation we were going to talk about — they were AK-47s purchased at a Phoenix gun store."
It is an email that helps demonstrate that Holder, despite his congressional testimony — as vague, contradictory and misleading as it was — could not have been ignorant about Fast and Furious and its deadly consequences.
It also brings to light the name of Dennis Burke, a seldom-mentioned Obama campaign donor who oversaw Fast and Furious and helped convert it from a gun-interdiction to a gun-walking program.
Burke, who resigned shortly after the scandal became public, has long been a gun-ban architect for the Democratic Party.
As a lawyer for the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee, he was behind the ineffectual 1994 "assault weapon" ban that sunset in 2004. Burke was also the chief of staff for Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano for a number of years before she became the secretary of homeland security.
Former Sen. Dennis DeConcini, D-Ariz., had high praise for Burke's 1994 effort: "Dennis had all these pictures of these guns — the street sweepers and the AK-47s. And it passed by one vote. A lot of it was not my eloquence on the bill; it was stuff that Dennis had done."
Burke also is an Obama donor, a prime consideration in the staffing of the Obama administration. Federal Election Commission records show that on Jan. 9, 2008, while working for Napolitano, Burke contributed $2,000 to Sen. Barack Obama's presidential primary campaign. Since 1997, according to FEC records, Burke has given $16,350 to Democratic candidates.
Burke would leave that Gov. Napolitano post to join the Obama transition team. He was soon rewarded for his many contributions, monetary and otherwise, when on July 10, 2009, the president nominated him to be the U.S. attorney in Arizona. The Senate confirmed him that Sept. 15.
In July 2010, Burke told the Arizona Capitol Times there had "clearly been direction provided already by President Obama and Attorney General Holder as to what they want to be doing."
That's an interesting statement, considering what Burke would do and how Holder and Obama would claim they were out of the operational loop.
As Fred Lucas notes in his excellent documentation for CNSnews.com of Burke's record, six weeks after Burke was confirmed, he was named to the attorney general's advisory committee of U.S. attorneys with a specific responsibility to report to Deputy Attorney General David Ogden on border and immigration enforcement.
Ogden's office made a significant change in the federal government's strategy on Fast and Furious. "This new strategy directed federal law enforcement to shift its focus away from seizing firearms from criminals and focus instead on identifying members of trafficking networks," House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa wrote in a May 3 memo to other members of his committee.
Burke oversaw this new strategy, which let guns walk into Mexico and into the hands of the drug cartels. The result was the killing of U.S. agents Brian Terry and Jaime Zapata (and some 300 Mexicans-- Marc)
The stench from all this arguably reaches all the way to the Oval Office.
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http://dickmorris.rallycongress.com/7175/gun-control/
Sign the petition!
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Dick Morris lately has not been checking his facts.
The treaty only pertains to international arms trade, and would have NO effect on current domestic laws. We would NOT lose our 2nd Amendment Rights. Morris is all hyperbole.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/guns/untreaty.asp
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Morris does often flap his gums outside his lane e.g. here.
That said, I think the underlying concept is true-- the Treaty will be used to jam through more restrictive laws and regulations and quite possibly total registration.
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http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2012/06/englands_prince.html
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"Most Americans don't care about whether Attorney General Eric Holder is hiding Fast and Furious documents because they don't understand the story. ... [T]he problem with Republican rectitude in discussing this scandal is that as soon as they start talking about subpoenas and dates and documents, TV channels change across America. They're never going to get answers unless they first explain to the American people why it matters. ... The notion that most guns used by Mexican drug gangs came from the U.S. was a lie -- exposed on about 1 million gun blogs and on Fox News. So, then the Obama administration did exactly what Democrats had been falsely accusing American gun sellers of doing: They put American guns in the hands of Mexican drug cartels. The only explanation for Fast and Furious is that it was a program to prop up a losing gun control argument. ... Republicans refuse to state this clearly because they can't prove it. Instead, they just keep chattering about the documents that haven't been turned over and subpoenas that haven't been answered. ... This isn't just another government program gone bad -- a $300 ashtray, stimulus money fraud, Solyndra or Van Jones. ... It would be as if the Bush administration had implemented a covert operation to dump a dangerous abortifacient in Planned Parenthood clinics, resulting in hundreds of women dying -- just to give pro-lifers an argument about how dangerous abortion clinics are. That's what Fast and Furious is about." --columnist Ann Coulter
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The Other Consequences of Fast and Furious
July 12, 2012 | 0900 GMT
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Stratfor
By Scott Stewart
On the night of Dec. 14, 2010, U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was shot and killed while on patrol in an Arizona canyon near the U.S.-Mexico border. Two guns found at the scene were linked to an investigation being run by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) called "Operation Fast and Furious," sparking a congressional inquiry into the program and generating considerable criticism of the ATF and the Obama administration. Because of this criticism, in August 2011 ATF acting director Kenneth Melson was reassigned from his post and the U.S. attorney for Arizona was forced to resign.
Currently, the congressional inquiry is focused on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, who has been accused of misleading Congress about what he knew about Fast and Furious and when he learned it. The Obama administration has invoked executive privilege to block the release of some of the Department of Justice emails and memos sought by Congress pertaining to the operation. The controversy escalated June 28 when the U.S. House of Representatives voted to hold Holder in contempt of Congress for ignoring its subpoenas.
As all Second Amendment issues are political hot buttons, and with this being a presidential election year in the United States, the political wrangling over Fast and Furious is certain to increase in the coming months. The debate is also sure to become increasingly partisan and pointed. But, frankly, this political wrangling is not what we find to be the most interesting aspect of the operation's fallout. Rather, we are more interested in the way that criticism of Fast and Furious has altered law enforcement efforts to stem the flow of guns from the United States to Mexico and the way these changes will influence how Mexican cartels acquire weapons.
Law Enforcement Shifts
Several of these law enforcement changes already have been enacted. For example, the number of ATF inspectors has been increased due to additional funding for an inspection program through the U.S. Southwest Border Initiative. This means that there are more inspectors to audit the sales records of licensed gun dealers. In southern Arizona, for example, the number of inspectors was increased from three to eight. According to the ATF, these inspectors oversee the operations of some 430 federally licensed firearms dealers in six border counties.
These firearms dealers include gun store proprietors as well as independent dealers working the gun show circuit. The increase in ATF inspection staff and activity has sparked an outcry from gun show dealers who claim they are being unfairly harassed by inspectors. ATF sources have told Stratfor that they do not harass dealers but that the staff increase has allowed the bureau to catch up on inspections it was not able to conduct in the past. The sources also said they believe that their increased presence at gun shows is scaring away cartel buyers, although, obviously, some gun show firearms are still finding their way into cartel hands.
Another procedural change occurred in August 2011, when the ATF began a new program in which licensed gun dealers in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California are required to report to the ATF bulk sales of certain types of rifles, namely semi-automatic rifles larger than .22 caliber with detachable magazines such as the semi-automatic AR-15 and AK-47 variants favored by the cartels. The new rule requires gun dealers to report people without federal firearms licenses who buy two or more of such rifles to the ATF within five working days. The rule has raised the ire of some Second Amendment activists, but the ATF notes that it has had a similar reporting regimen for multiple sales of handguns in place since 1975.
The attention that Fast and Furious attracted to the gun smuggling problem also has led to an increase in interdiction efforts by other U.S. federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, including Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Furthermore, weapons cases have reportedly been given increased prosecutorial priority by U.S. attorneys -- meaning they are now less likely to decline prosecution of a gun case than before the controversy emerged. This has led to increased pressure on lower-level violators such as straw purchasers -- people paid by arms traffickers to buy guns from dealers. Greed will ensure that people continue to work as straw purchasers, but considering the increased risk of prosecution and the new reporting requirements, straw purchasers and the traffickers who employ them will be more exposed.
In May 2012, the ATF claimed that the reporting requirements have led to a decrease in large-volume sales of semi-automatic rifles (10 or more in a single purchase). The ATF also said that traffickers are adapting their weapons procurement methods to the new regulations.
Arms Smugglers Adapt
Despite their impact, the law enforcement and reporting changes cannot stem the tide of weapons entirely. In the same way that drug flows adapt to law enforcement interdiction efforts, weapons flows will also adjust. Previous federal investigations have shown that Mexican cartels have contacts in many different parts of the United States, including cities such as Chicago and Atlanta, far from the border. One way to bypass the increase in ATF inspections and the border state reporting requirements is to buy guns in states located farther from the border. Of course, this would require the weapons to be transported longer distances to get to Mexico, increasing transportation costs as well as exposure to interdiction efforts. A shift in the points of purchase would also almost certainly result in the expansion of the new reporting requirements to other states.
Although it will never be possible to completely cut off the flow of guns to Mexico from the United States, it can be reduced. This would force the cartels to search for new sources of weapons.
One significant emerging source of AR-15/M16 variants is something called an 80 percent lower receiver. (The lower receiver is the part of the AR-15/M16/M4 that carries a manufacturer's serial number. These 80 percent lower receivers do not have any serial numbers.) Under U.S. federal firearms law, the unfinished lower receiver is not considered a firearm and thus can be shipped anywhere and sold to anyone without a license. Once the remaining machining on the lower receiver is completed, one can build an AR-15, M16 or M4 carbine by purchasing the additional required parts -- such as the bolt assembly, trigger assembly and barrel -- which also are not considered firearms. Once the weapon is fully assembled, it is then considered a firearm and subject to federal firearms law.
While the 80 percent lower receivers are intended for do-it-yourself gun enthusiasts, according to the ATF, these guns have also begun to show up in increasing numbers in Mexico.
Many if not most of the semi-automatic rifles purchased in the United States and smuggled into Mexico are converted to be capable of fully automatic fire by armorers working for various cartel groups. The same armorers are capable of finishing the machining on 80 percent lower receivers and assembling completed firearms from them. The finishing process is not difficult, and there are specialized jigs one can buy and instructional videos posted on the Internet to assist in the process. With experience, proper parts and equipment, a competent machinist can quickly and easily finish a lower receiver in an hour or less.
But acquiring 80 percent lower receivers is not the only alternative for cartels. As noted previously, the Mexican cartels obtain weapons from a variety of sources. The main reason they buy rifles and high-powered pistols from the United States is that such weapons are cheap and readily available. The United States is also nearby, so the guns do not have to be transported very far. Once in Mexico, such weapons can be sold to cartels or on the black market for three times their purchase price in the United States. This explains the difficulty of shutting down the flow of weapons between the two countries. The gun trade is almost as lucrative as the narcotics flowing north.
The premium prices Mexican cartels are paying for guns mean that even if the U.S.-Mexican border could somehow magically be sealed tomorrow, arms merchants from elsewhere would be able to fill the void. Indeed, there are some weapons that the cartels simply cannot buy from the United States due to a lack of availability. Such weapons include hand grenades, 40 mm grenades, M60 machine guns, rocket-propelled grenades and M-72 anti-tank rockets. Instead, the cartels buy such items from members of the Mexican military, militaries in countries such as Guatemala and El Salvador, or international arms dealers. The cartels would go to these same sources to replace the weapons unavailable in the United States due to increased arms interdiction efforts. South American groups such as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and Peru's Shining Path have demonstrated that it is not difficult for groups to arm themselves via the black arms market in the Western Hemisphere.
Rifles and other weapons are durable goods, and it is not unusual to find weapons in Mexico that were provided by the United States, the Soviets or the Cubans to various governments and insurgent groups during the Cold War. Weapons are also fungible, or easily substituted for each other. This means that an AK-47 rifle made in the Soviet Union in the 1950s could be replaced by a variant made in East Germany in the 1970s or in China or Romania today. Indeed, it is not uncommon to find assault rifles of various makes and ages in cartel possession. In videos published by groups such as the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generacion, gunmen armed with FN-FAL rifles have appeared alongside comrades armed with various models of AKs, M16s and M4s. A cartel gunman does not care where his rifle comes from.
In recent years, Mexican cartels have begun to forge close relationships with Chinese organized crime groups that are helping the cartels obtain precursor chemicals for the manufacture of methamphetamine and other synthetic drugs. These Chinese groups also are reportedly becoming increasingly important components of Mexican cartel money-laundering efforts. Chinese criminal groups have close ties with the Chinese arms manufacturers, and it is possible that they could begin sending guns to their Mexican contacts with the other illicit cargo.
The Mexican cartels have also reportedly become progressively more involved in the transportation of cocaine to Europe via Africa -- a continent awash in black market assault rifles and other weapons. Some of the cocaine trafficked into Europe is handled by Balkan groups with access to large stockpiles of weapons in Eastern Europe.
These various connections ensure that the Mexican cartels will continue to have access to assault rifles and other military ordnance for the foreseeable future, regardless of how much progress U.S. authorities make in their efforts to stem the flow of guns to Mexico.
Editor's Note: We now offer the daily Mexico Security Monitor, an additional custom intelligence service geared toward organizations with operations or interests in the region, designed to provide more detailed and in-depth coverage of the situation. To learn more about this new fee-based custom service, visit www.stratfor.com/msm.
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Read more: The Other Consequences of Fast and Furious | Stratfor
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Sipsey Street Exclusive: Stratfor's "intelligence" analysis of Gunwalker less than persuasive. ATF's new target: "The Attack of the Eighty Percent Receiver."
I have never been particularly impressed with Stratfor Global Intelligence's analyses of current events, and had that reaffirmed with a recent article entitled, "The Other Consequences of Fast and Furious."
Beginning with the false premise that the majority of cartel weapons in Mexico were obtained from American gun shows and gun stores (precisely the propaganda point that the Gunwalker Scandal was designed to elicit), Stratfor eschews witha sniff the political controversy and says:
Rather, we are more interested in the way that criticism of Fast and Furious has altered law enforcement efforts to stem the flow of guns from the United States to Mexico and the way these changes will influence how Mexican cartels acquire weapons.
The Statfor article then details "Law Enforcement Shifts" based almost entirely on ATF sources, designed to push the "Iron River" meme and the valiant struggle of the gun cops to overcome it.
Despite their impact, the law enforcement and reporting changes cannot stem the tide of weapons entirely. In the same way that drug flows adapt to law enforcement interdiction efforts, weapons flows will also adjust. Previous federal investigations have shown that Mexican cartels have contacts in many different parts of the United States, including cities such as Chicago and Atlanta, far from the border. One way to bypass the increase in ATF inspections and the border state reporting requirements is to buy guns in states located farther from the border. Of course, this would require the weapons to be transported longer distances to get to Mexico, increasing transportation costs as well as exposure to interdiction efforts. A shift in the points of purchase would also almost certainly result in the expansion of the new reporting requirements to other states.
Although it will never be possible to completely cut off the flow of guns to Mexico from the United States, it can be reduced. This would force the cartels to search for new sources of weapons.
Riiiight. And what are these new sources? Why Stratfor has a suspect, courtesy of the ATF, the "80% receiver."
One significant emerging source of AR-15/M16 variants is something called an 80 percent lower receiver. (The lower receiver is the part of the AR-15/M16/M4 that carries a manufacturer's serial number. These 80 percent lower receivers do not have any serial numbers.) Under U.S. federal firearms law, the unfinished lower receiver is not considered a firearm and thus can be shipped anywhere and sold to anyone without a license. Once the remaining machining on the lower receiver is completed, one can build an AR-15, M16 or M4 carbine by purchasing the additional required parts -- such as the bolt assembly, trigger assembly and barrel -- which also are not considered firearms. Once the weapon is fully assembled, it is then considered a firearm and subject to federal firearms law.
While the 80 percent lower receivers are intended for do-it-yourself gun enthusiasts, according to the ATF, these guns have also begun to show up in increasing numbers in Mexico.
Many if not most of the semi-automatic rifles purchased in the United States and smuggled into Mexico are converted to be capable of fully automatic fire by armorers working for various cartel groups. The same armorers are capable of finishing the machining on 80 percent lower receivers and assembling completed firearms from them. The finishing process is not difficult, and there are specialized jigs one can buy and instructional videos posted on the Internet to assist in the process. With experience, proper parts and equipment, a competent machinist can quickly and easily finish a lower receiver in an hour or less.
I did some checking around and this business of the "eighty percent receiver" says more about the appetite of the ATF for an expanded mandate to control gun manufacturing in this country than it does about reality in Mexico.
I asked a number of folks including Georgia gun designer and SOT-licensed manufacturer Len Savage (a good friend of Ramsey A. Bear) about the Statfor article's premises and he replied to the email recipients:
I saw this earlier this week.
A couple of things to note:
* 80% receiver thing...bullshit. There is no such thing. ATF or any govt agency does not recognize 80%. Term of art nothing more.
* Since the mid 90's manufacturing machinery has been going to Mexico...I KNOW this. I made some of those machines that went when I worked for SESCO (Special Engineering Services Co.)
* With a simple and relatively cheap 3 axis CNC you can just push a button and make as many machinegun receivers as you wish....Prints and data package are available online at no cost (google if you don't believe me).
* Mike has been to my shop, and can tell you: very simple and modest (less than 800 square feet) and no CNC equipment. I make MG's or semiautos regularly in it. There is also the example of the Khyber pass gun makers in mud huts, an anvil and files have been making guns for the last hundred years with no electricity!!!!!
* With cartel money and influence they could get the equipment and it is not that difficult (think of all the small ffl/07's in this country working out of their homes and garages) Ronny Barrett designed and made his now famous .50 cal sniper rifle in his garage on simple machines.
A source within the ATF confirmed that the "eighty percent receiver" was just "the latest boogeyman-threat invented by the higher-ups to persuade the Congress to give them more power to regulate manufacturers and strangle the legal individual manufacture of semi-auto ARs for personal use."
Another source familiar with the gun industry pointed out that the eighty percent receiver's offered for sale were "just not that cheap. If you're a drug cartel drowning in money, you can afford an arms manufactory with all the bells and whistles . . . (after the initial investment in machinery) you can crank 'em out, for a fraction of the cost of the 80 percent receiver blank, which still requires machining to finish it anyway."
Readers may recall this story from back in October of last year which quoted a State Department cable from October 2009 which warned:
Quote:
"Claims by Mexican and U.S. officials that upwards of 90 percent of illegal recovered weapons can be traced back to the U.S. is based on an incomplete survey of confiscated weapons. In point of fact, without wider access to the weapons seized in Mexico, we really have no way of verifying these numbers."
Thefts from Mexican government arsenals, importations of weapons left over from the guerrilla wars in Central and South America in the 90s are also significant sources of cartel weapons. Yet, the meme invented by Billy Hoover of the ATF and parroted by many anti-gun politicians including the President, has always been that American gun shows and gun stores (the same gun stores whose owners had to be coerced into selling to straw buyers) are the principal sources of cartel weapons.
In this lie, Stafor has now apparently been recruited as a willing pawn. So much for "intelligence
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http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/20/12850048-14-shot-dead-at-dark-knight-rises-screening-in-aurora-colorado?lite
14 dead. :cry: :cry:
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Indeed.
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http://nation.foxnews.com/fast-and-furious/2011/07/07/breaking-43-weapons-phoenix-traffic-stop-linked-holder-s-gunrunning-scan
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Rifle in Shooting Once Was Federally Restricted .Article Video Comments more in US | Find New $LINKTEXTFIND$ ».smaller Larger
By MATTHEW DOLAN And STEVE EDER
James Holmes, the man accused of a mass shooting spree inside a crowded movie theater, would have had a tougher time buying an AR-15 rifle legally eight years ago, when it was subject to federal restrictions. And many types of the weapon still can't be bought in the alleged shooter's home state of California.
But Mr. Holmes was able to obtain a weapon gun enthusiasts praise for its ease of use and rock-solid reliability and, according to authorities, put it to use in his attack early Friday at a Aurora, Colo., movie theater.
Authorities said last week that Mr. Holmes had a AR-15-style semiautomatic rifle, along with a shotgun and at least one handgun.
A Bass Pro Shops retailer in Denver sold Mr. Holmes a handgun and shotgun, according to the company, but the seller of the assault rifle has not come forward publicly. Gander Mountain, another gun retailer with two stores in the Denver area, said in a statement last week that the company was "fully cooperating with this on-going investigation" but declined to say whether it had sold Holmes any firearms.
A federal ban on assault weapons went into effect in 1994, under President Bill Clinton, including a restriction on sales of the AR-15. But in 2004, the ban expired and it was not re-enacted.
The federal ban targeted weapons with specific features, including a device that hides the flash from a gun shooting in the dark. It is unclear whether Mr. Holmes' rifle had those features which would have then qualified the weapon for the federal ban. Indeed, stripped-down versions of the AR-15 were sold legally during the federal ban, experts say.
In the Aurora shooting, "this shooter was planning a military style assault and he chose a rifle that was designed for just such an attack," said Dennis Henigan, vice president of the Brady Campaign to Reduce Gun Violence. He added that the impact of the violence was widened by the rifle's large stock of ammunition—a 100-round drum magazine, said Colorado authorities—which would have been restricted to only 10 rounds per weapon under the previous federal law.
But organizations representing the gun industry say gun control advocates misrepresent the uses for the AR-15 rifle, which is known for its light recoil, unlike some other semi-automatic weapons that kick back hard after firing. The AR-15 rifle is "cheap to shoot, accurate, easy to take care of and take down," said Joe M. Cornell, a federally license gun dealer in Denver who also appraises firearms for his business A Accredited Appraisal Services.
One legitimate use of the AR-15 is marksmanship competitions in the United States, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association for the firearms industry. "And their cartridges are standard hunting calibers, useful for game up to and including deer," the foundation's fact sheet reads.
The AR-15 was created by ArmaLite—hence the initials AR—and licensed to Colt's Manufacturing Company LLC in 1959. Its related weapon is the military grade M16 fully automatic weapon first used by U.S. military personnel in Vietnam and lauded for its high velocity and lighter-weight plastic parts, according to the companies and gun experts.
Today, several gun manufacturers make AR-15-style rifles.
"It was our counterpart to the Russian AK-47," said Joe Vince, the former chief of the crime guns analysis bureau at the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives.
Colt's semiautomatic rifles are "the only rifles available to sportsmen, hunters and other shooters that are manufactured in the Colt factory and based on the same military standards and specifications as the United States issue Colt M16 rifle and M4 carbine," the company said on its web site. Attempts to reach a company representative over the weekend were unsuccessful.
.On the day of the Aurora shooting, Mr. Cornell said, a friend called him inquiring about an AR-15 to buy his teenage son. The weapon is not appropriate to hunt big game because of its low-caliber ammunition, but can be used to kill varmints, including coyotes, according to Mr. Cornell.
"If I had 100 AR-15s, in seven to 10 days, I could sell them all. They're that popular," he said.
It's difficult to determine how many of these rifles are made in the U.S. each year. The U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms reports how many rifles are manufactured each year—2,293,247 in 2011 according to interim figures, up 70% since 1998—but does not break down the rifles by make and model or how many qualified as so-called assault weapons.
A few states, including California, New York and Massachusetts, have bans on assault weapons. The one in place in Massachusetts was made permanent under the watch of then-Gov. Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican president candidate who now opposes any new gun laws.
There were renewed calls for a federal assault weapons ban in 2009, after Michael McLendon killed 10 people in southeastern Alabama. He used two assault rifles in the attack—an SKS and a Bushmaster. Now, Gary Kleck, a professor of criminology at Florida State University, is predicting yet another "effort to resuscitate the assault weapon ban."
Still, he said, "The political odds are stacked against it" actually happening as the federal government has been reluctant to act on gun control issues. "For the most part, merely passing new laws, which for the most part go unenforced, won't do any good," Mr. Kleck said.
The congressman from Aurora, Colo., on Sunday called on Congress to reinstate a federal ban on assault weapons. "We've got to do something," said Democratic Rep. Ed. Perlmutter, speaking on CBS' "Face the Nation."
But only a smattering of politicians, mainly Democrats, joined him in demanding a legislative response to the massacre. While expressing remorse for the victims and outrage at the violence, neither President Barack Obama nor his Republican challenger, Mr. Romney, has asserted that easy access to firearms and ammunition had contributed to the massacre.
To the contrary, many Democrats avoided any suggestion that gun laws should be tightened, while at least one Republican speculated that more lives could have been saved had some audience members drawn weapons themselves and returned fire within the theater.
"If it wasn't one weapon, it would have been another. I mean, he was diabolical," Colorado's Democratic governor, John Hickenlooper, said on CNN's "State of the Union."
"If there were no assault weapons available, and no this or no that, this guy is going to find something, right? He's going to know how to create a bomb."
—Jess Bravin, Jamila Trindle and Daniel Lippman contributed to this article.
Write to Matthew Dolan at matthew.dolan@wsj.com and Steve Eder at steve.eder@wsj.com
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"The responses of both presidential candidates to the horror in Colorado feel weak to me. They are characteristic of our culture, which treats each of these grotesque acts of mass killing as 'tragedies.' The proper response to such an atrocity is rage. It wouldn't be out of place for the president and the man who hopes to replace him to refer to the shooter as a 'monster.' We don't do that. Instead, we focus on 'healing.' We've become excellently behaved victims." --columnist Mona Charen
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Some people are just the epitome of hypocracy. Others are just cowards who get others to do their dirtywork. Moore is seemingly both.
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I don't follow these tragedies closely but in the hypothetical, if everyone in the front row was a concealed carry holder, the shooting might have stopped sooner.
Still in the hypothetical, if they had a sign saying this establishment bans all guns on the premises, it would prevent defense, not crime.
They didn't have such a sign as far as I know and Colo is a concealed carry state.
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I think Doug's analysis makes sense. It may not have killed him, or it may have. It may have bought some people time, or deterred him from continuing the attack. Hard to say in hindsight. Its just sad that that person didnt exist at that time.
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I heard an excellent interview with an FBI crime analyst today. His basic message was that of awareness, and that those who have the ability to be aware and vigilant of their surroundings are almost always the ones who take matters into their own hands. This is the number 1 thing that can improve your ability to survive. Good interview and a message that I have always tried to follow. I always subconciously make a note of exits, people, objects, and place myself in a position of quick exit or defense. My wife sometimes gets angry with me because I make her hold my left hand instead of my right. In crowds I wont let her hold my hand sometimes at all. Maybe Im paranoid, but it just feels natural.
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Posted on behalf of Crafty Dog
(http://www.dogbrothers.com/kostas/gun_rights.jpg)
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Eric Holder also played a huge role in the cover up of the brutal torture and murder of Jesse Trenadue in the Elohim city operation after the OKC bombing.
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James:
You're new here so forgive me the gentle reminder to please use the subject line. The idea is to have the Search function enable this forum to be a tremendous research tool i.e. when someone wants to find a post he can do so.
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Democrats slip gun control into cybersecurity bill
July 27, 2012
By Anthony Martin
Senate Democrats slipped in a gun control amendment to a cybersecurity bill Friday, claiming that it is time to impose "reasonable gun control measures," according to The Hill.
The cybersecurity bill has advanced to the stage in the process when amendments can be attached. Amendments to bills often have nothing to do with the issue being addressed in the bill itself.
Senators Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J., Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., Bob Menendez, D-N.J., and Jack Reed, D-R.I., sponsored bill S.A. 2575 which would make it illegal to possess or transfer large capacity magazines, belts, feed stripes, or drums holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition.
Schumer has been one of the most ardent proponents of gun control in the U.S. Senate, along with Lautenberg and Feinstein.
Anticipating the heated opposition the amendment will encounter from Republicans and gun rights activists, Schumer claimed that both sides can find "common ground." Said Schumer,
Quote:
The basic complaint is that the Chuck Schumers of the world want to take away your guns. I think it would be smart for those of us who want rational gun control to make it know that that’s not true at all.
But gun rights activists have not suggested that Senate Democrats proposed the repeal of the Second Amendment. The problem, say pro-gun groups, is that politicians such as Schumer gradually render the Second Amendment null and void not by repealing it but by passing a series of laws over a period of time that have the effect of violating the specific wording of the Amendment, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."
Gun rights groups such as Gun Owners of America, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, and the NRA have stated that each time politicians pass gun control laws, they infringe on the right of the people to keep and bear arms -- a direct violation of the Second Amendment.
For example, why should citizens who have never committed a crime be deprived of using magazines that fire more than 10 rounds? If criminals can get their hands on such devices, which they do each day on the streets illegally, then preventing average citizens from purchasing them legally only strengthens the hand of dangerous persons who intend to do harm to others.
Thus, the Second Amendment can be rendered useless by loading it up with various restrictions and limitations passed by Congress that have the effect of nullifying the Amendment without repealing it.
Despite their claims that they would not do so, Democrats have jumped at the chance to implement more gun control in the wake of the Colorado shooting last Friday.
President Obama also waded into the waters of the controversial issue when he stated Wednesday in a campaign speech that only soldiers need to have semi-automatic high capacity firearms rather than criminals.
But the overwhelming majority of persons who own semi-automatic weapons are not criminals but average citizens who bought them legally and use them responsibly. The laws that are already on the books prevent criminals from purchasing these and other weapons, meaning that they get them from the black market on the street.
Thus, why would an American president wish to punish average citizens by banning them from owning such guns, when criminals are going to get them anyway through illegal means?
Although the Senate will more than likely pass the gun ban amendment to the cybersecurity bill next week, the measure will be dead on arrival in the House where Republicans hold the majority.
Most House Republicans strongly oppose gun control measures, and most are fully aware that citizens are in no mood for more gun control, given that firearms and ammo sales have skyrocketed in recent years, especially after the Colorado shooting.
Democrats still hold a 53-47 seat majority in the Senate.
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Forgive me Im still trying to learn how to post on here.
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http://influencealley.nationaljournal.com/2012/07/the-nras-got-nothing-on-hollyw.php
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http://smartgirlpolitics.ning.com/group/tennesseesgp/forum/topic/show?id=2488056%3ATopic%3A590826&xg
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Republicans to issue report blaming five ATF employees for Fast and Furious' debacle
Published July 31, 2012
FoxNews.com
WASHINGTON – Congressional Republican investigators have singled out five employees in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to blame for the botched anti-gunrunning operation known as Fast and Furious, in a report on the scandal obtained by Fox News.
The report, the first of three to be issued from the congressional investigation, concludes that the five employees were responsible for an operation "marred by missteps, poor judgments and inherently reckless strategy." All five have since been reassigned but remain employed in the agency.
The findings, first reported by the Los Angeles Times, put additional pressure on the Obama administration in an ongoing battle over what higher-level officials knew, if anything, about the ATF operation.
For more than a year, Republicans have been leading an investigation into Fast and Furious, which was launched in Arizona in late 2009 by ATF, with help from the U.S. attorney's office there. The operation's targets bought nearly 2,000 weapons over several months. But for reasons that are still in dispute, most of the weapons sold were never followed, and high-powered weapons tied to the investigation ended up at crime scenes in Mexico and the United States, including the December 2010 murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.
The Republican-led House voted late in June to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt, but Justice officials since then essentially have said the ball is still in Republicans' court, if they intend to follow through with vows to file a civil lawsuit seeking the remaining documents.
The congressional investigative report, to be issued Tuesday, specifically faults Acting Director Kenneth Melson; Deputy Director William Hoover; William Newell, special agent in charge of the Phoenix Field Division; William McMahon, deputy assistant director for field operations, and Mark Chait, assistant director for field operations.
Melson told investigators he felt the Justice Department was making him a scapegoat for the operation's failure.
"I think they were doing more damage control than anything," he testified, as quoted in the investigative report. "My view is that the whole matter of the department's response in this case was a disaster."
The congressional investigators noted that Melson "was concerned that Fast and Furious did not end sooner", but they also faulted him for never ordering it to be shut down.
The report faults Hoover for knowing Newell had employed "risky tactics" but allowing them to continue. Chait, for his part "paid a surprisingly passive role during the operation," while McMahon seemed to be nothing more than a "rubber stamp" for field operations, the report concludes.
The two other reports being prepared for release will focus more on the Justice Department's oversight role in the operation and its dealings with congressional investigators. Republicans have suggested Justice officials have resorted to political stonewalling in an attempt to cover up the truth, while administration officials have described the Republican investigation as a witch hunt.
But several Democrats joined House Republicans in voting for the contempt resolutions after Holder failed to give congressional investigators documents in response to a subpoena last year. Meetings in the run-up to the vote failed to reach a compromise, after President Obama asserted executive privilege over the documents.
Specifically, the documents at issue are mostly composed of internal Justice Department emails after Feb. 4, 2011, when department officials realized they would have to retract a letter to Congress that denied Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents ever let guns fall into the hands of suspected criminals.
In one email from early 2011, described to Fox News, Holder told subordinates: "We need answers on this. Not defensive BS. Real answers." The email was among several shown in two separate meetings with House Republicans and Democrats last week.
The chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., has said it is "critically important" to obtain the post-Feb. 4, 2011, documents at issue because, among other things, they could show whether top officials were "surprised or were already aware" about so-called "gunwalking" in Fast and Furious when confronted with new information. In essence, Republicans say the documents could show whether the false letter was part of a "cover-up."
In a hearing before the contempt votes, Issa insisted Holder offered "to provide subpoenaed documents only if the committee agrees in advance to close the investigation," adding, "No investigator would ever agree to that."
But Justice Department officials have disputed that account. A Justice Department official insisted last month the documents at issue "show no intention or attempt to conceal information or mislead (Congress)."
Nevertheless, Boehner has said that a civil lawsuit to obtain the documents would be pursued.
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from www.yahoonews.com
*****
By JOHN R. LOTT JR.
In the wake of the recent mass shooting in Colorado, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg called on police to join him in fighting for more gun control: "I don't understand why the police officers across this country don't stand up collectively and say we're going to go on strike." It is illegal for police to go on strike, and Mr. Bloomberg later backed off his statement. But the mayor is just as far off the mark in his assumption that police agree with him on gun control.
Take the annual survey by the National Association of Chiefs of Police of more than 20,000 chiefs of police and sheriffs. In 2010 it found that 95% believed "any law-abiding citizen [should] be able to purchase a firearm for sport or self-defense." Seventy-seven percent believed that concealed-handgun permits issued in one state should be honored by other states "in the way that drivers' licenses are recognized through the country"—and that making citizens' permits portable would "facilitate the violent crime-fighting potential of the professional law enforcement community."
National surveys of street officers are rare, but they show officers to be overwhelmingly in favor of law-abiding civilians owning and carrying guns. A 2007 national survey of sworn police officers by Police Magazine found that 88% disagreed that "tighter restrictions on handgun ownership would increase or enhance public safety." In the same survey, 67% opposed tighter gun control because the "law would only be obeyed by law-abiding citizens."
Regional or local surveys show similar patterns. For example, a 1997 survey conducted by the San Diego Police Officers Association found that 82% of its officers opposed an "assault weapons" ban, 82% opposed a limitation on magazine capacity, and 85% supported letting law-abiding private citizens carry concealed handguns.
These are not views consistent with Mayor Bloomberg's assertion: "The bottom line is if we had fewer guns, we would have a lot fewer murders." Police generally understand that too often the laws disarm law-abiding citizens, not criminals, and thus make it easier for criminals to commit crime. Police are extremely important for reducing crime, but they know that virtually always they arrive at the crime scene after the crime has been committed. When victims face a criminal by themselves, guns are critical for self-defense.
Mr. Bloomberg's claims about guns are mere hypotheticals, apparently based on guesses and little knowledge of what happens in real life. He also uses inaccurate, scaremongering terminology that suggests he doesn't even understand how guns operate.
He seems to dismiss the idea of letting people defend themselves when he speculates that if concealed-handgun permit holders had been present at the Colorado attack, the crossfire between permit holders and the killer would have been even worse than the mass shooting itself. But we have the evidence of multiple occasions when mass shootings were prevented by civilians.
One incident took place at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs in December 2007. There were 7,000 people inside when an armed man came on the church's property and began shooting, killing two people and wounding others. What stopped him was a parishioner who had permission to carry her permitted concealed weapon on church property. Despite this and other incidents—preventing shootings in schools, a mall and other public places—there is no case on record of a permit holder accidentally shooting a bystander.
Mr. Bloomberg keeps pushing for renewing the federal ban on assault weapons, which expired in 2004 after being enacted during the Clinton administration in 1994. What the mayor ignores is that no published peer-reviewed research by criminologists or economists—even that funded by the Clinton administration itself—found reductions in violent crime from the 1994 ban. It is particularly noteworthy that the law's sunset in 2004 was not followed by the bloodbath that Mr. Bloomberg and so many others predicted.
As for assault weapons, the AR-15s or AK-47s used by civilians are indeed "military-style weapons." But the key word is "style," since the weapons look similar but operate differently. The guns covered by the federal assault-weapons ban were not the fully automatic machine guns used by the military but semiautomatic versions of those guns, meaning they fire only one bullet per pull of the trigger. If the mayor wants to ban all semiautomatic guns—meaning a vast number of civilian-owned weapons that can fire a number of bullets without reloading—he should say so.
Mr. Bloomberg complains that "gun manufacturers flooded the market with the type of high-capacity magazines [the killer in Colorado] used." But we have already tried a magazine ban as part of the assault-weapons ban, and it won't be any more helpful now. A magazine, which is basically a metal box with a spring, is trivially easy to make in any size. Even if large magazines are banned, they will always be readily available on the illegal market.
Although Mr. Bloomberg wants to ban "armor-piercing bullets," he doesn't seem to know much about them, either. First, nobody can get them legally for handguns except the police. Then the mayor claims that: "The only reason to have an armor-piercing bullet is to go through a bullet-resistant vest." That is just not so. Rifles with standard ammunition often can penetrate such vests, because their bullets travel faster than those fired from handguns. Yet if the mayor had said that hunting rifles can penetrate these bullet-resistant vests, his comments wouldn't have generated the same support.
Mr. Bloomberg's emotional responses are understandable. But facts matter. The mayor should take a private lesson from his police officers on gun basics.
Mr. Lott is a former chief economist at the United States Sentencing Commission and the author of the expanded third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime" (University of Chicago Press, 2010).
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*ATF head Jones avoiding volunteered evidence about earlier gun operation 'Project Gunwalker' (http://www.examiner.com/article/atf-head-jones-avoiding-volunteered-evidence-about-earlier-gun-operation?CID=examiner_alerts_article)*
August 5, 2012
By: David Codrea
Acting Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Director B. Todd Jones has failed to acknowledge overtures by the confidential informant at the heart of Operation Wide Receiver to give him detailed information about the failed gun smuggling investigation, Gun Rights Examiner learned over the weekend. Firearms dealer Mike Detty, who sold about 450 guns to straw purchasers under the assurances of his ATF handlers that they would be under surveillance, attempted to give Jones operational information both in person and by letter earlier this year, only to be ignored.
*“I met him in the Sig booth at SHOT this year,” Detty told this correspondent. “I asked one of his people if he had time to say hello to another former Marine. He came over with a big smile and shook hands. I handed him a business card and told him, ‘If you're serious about getting to the bottom of the gunwalking scandal you'll need to start at the beginning--that's me and Operation Wide Receiver.’
“He nodded and said he'd be in touch,” Detty continued. “Several weeks later I sent him a letter with my contact info and offer to help. Nothing.”*
Gun Rights Examiner has obtained a copy of that letter, written on February 27, as well as the certified domestic mail return receipt, providing proof of delivery on March 5.
“There are currently something like 30 people serving prison sentences because of my involvement to help end illegal gun trafficking to Mexico,” Detty informed Jones, giving him a means of validating his credibility with an easily verifiable claim. “Not one case has gone to trial because of the overwhelming and indisputable documentation of these transactions--often videotaped in the living room of my home.”
“Operation Wide Receiver accounted for 450 guns being lost across the border but there were two other major cases that I brought to ATF that accounted for at least another 200 guns that are now in cartel hands,” Detty related. “As a CI it was not my place to question ATF’s motives or demand a detailed plan of action. I had assumed that my efforts would truly be used to help take down a powerful cartel.”
“If you’re sincere in wanting to get to the bottom of the gunwalking scandal then you’ll need to start at the beginning and that is me and Operation Wide Receiver,” Detty advised Jones. *“Throughout my time as a CI, I kept meticulous notes--some 600 pages worth. In fact, it was my journal that raised the ire of SAC Newell. Once he learned of my documentation he ordered the field agents not to accept any new cases from me. He knew immediately that my records, irrefutable and unimpeachable, would prove troublesome for him at some point in the future.”*
Repeating his offer “to help you in any way possible, Detty pledged to make himself available and “to share any of my documentation with you,” reminding Jones “It seems odd to me and even sad that when top officials at the ATF and DOJ came out, after Agent Terry’s murder, and said that guns had never been allowed to cross the border as part of any investigation, that only ONE field agent between the Phoenix and Tucson offices had the [courage] to step forward and correct this.
“It should be obvious to you why I have lost faith in the very agents I once trusted with my life and why I am now embarrassed for the role that I played in this huge mess,” Detty confessed. “The lack of integrity that ATF has displayed at all levels is disappointing! I am hoping that your leadership will correct this!”
To date, Jones has ignored this resource who can provide not only vast and detailed personal recollections, but actual documentation to back up his testimony. Instead, the acting director has pursued a course to relegate the actions of ATF managers involved in Operation Fast and Furious to a personnel issue instead of a criminal matter, and recently stirred up controversy with an in-house video widely perceived to be a chilling warning to whistleblowers.
The unwillingness of the acting director to even have a subordinate contact Detty is revealing, particularly since Jones publicly laments his agency is “under the microscope” and that running it is “testing all of [his] skill sets.” It’s also curious, as the former confidential informant has first-hand information about his dealings with former Phoenix Field Office Special Agent in Charge William Newell, one of five ATF careerists identified as culpable for Fast and Furious gunwalking in the Congressional joint staff report recently prepared for Rep. Darrrell Issa and Sen. Charles Grassley, who “quickly forwarded information about such recoveries to ATF headquarters, where ATF senior officials became fully informed of the early ‘successes’ of the operation.”
That Jones does not wish to create a record of receiving information from any source outside his control indicates many things, but a commitment to use all means to determine the truth does not appear to be one of them.
“*Whoever said he was a placeholder is correct,” Detty has sadly concluded in a private correspondence to Gun Rights Examiner. “He doesn't care a bit about changing anything at ATF*.”
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Drug cartel operatives used weapons from Operation Fast and Furious in a failed attempt to assassinate a high-ranking Mexican law enforcement official, the El Paso Times reports in an article that follows up on an initial report from Breitbart News’ Mary Chastain.
The gun — which “was seized in Tijuana in connection with a drug cartel’s conspiracy to kill the police chief of Tijuana, Baja California, who later became the Juárez police chief” — is tied to Fast and Furious.
“The firearm was found Feb. 25, 2010, during an arrest of a criminal cell associated with Teodoro ‘El Teo’ García Simental and Raydel ‘El Muletas’ López Uriarte, allies of the Sinaloa cartel,” Diana Washington Valdez wrote on Monday for the El Paso Times. “Tijuana police said they arrested four suspects in March 2010 in connection with a failed attempt to take out Julián Leyzaola, and that the suspects allegedly confessed to conspiring to assassinate the police chief on orders from Tijuana cartel leaders.”
“Leyzaola, a retired Mexican army officer, reportedly survived several attempts on his life while trying to bring order to Tijuana, a city torn apart by turf battles following the arrests and deaths of Arellano Felix cartel leaders,” Valdez added.
Leyzaola has since moved to Ciudad Juarez, a town right across the border from El Paso, Texas, to become the police chief there.
This new information comes on the heels of the release of a lengthy congressional report into Fast and Furious from House oversight committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Chuck Grassley. That report — the first of three — named five Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives officials Grassley and Issa believe are ultimately responsible for Fast and Furious. On the same day of the report’s public release, one of those officials — former deputy ATF director William Hoover — resigned his position.
That congressional report also saw the release of new evidence that Obama administration ATF officials sought to cover up the Fast and Furious connection to a death other than that of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry.
Mario Gonzalez, the brother of then-Mexican prosecutor Patricia Gonzalez, was killed with Fast and Furious weapons in early November 2010. According to internal ATF emails congressional investigators obtained and released in this report, one ATF agent had discovered that two of the guns found at Mario Gonzalez’s murder scene were Fast and Furious weapons.
That agent, Tonya English, emailed her supervisors David Voth and Hope MacCallister asking them to “not release any information” on the Fast and Furious connection to that murder.
House Republicans are gearing up their lawsuit against President Barack Obama’s assertion of executive privilege to withhold Fast and Furious documents from Congress and the American people. Because the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia has refused to enforce the congressional citation finding Attorney General Eric Holder in criminal contempt of Congress, the House is moving on the civil contempt of Congress resolution. That civil contempt resolution allows the House to fight the president’s privilege claim in court.
Issa recently said he’s “100 percent” confident a federal judge will force Obama to cough up the documents.
http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/07/re...-plot/?print=1
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Second post of the day:
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/high-ranking-mexican-drug-cartel-member-makes-explosive-allegation-fast-and-furious-is-not-what-you-think-it-is/
A high-ranking Mexican drug cartel operative currently in U.S. custody is making startling allegations that the failed federal gun-walking operation known as “Fast and Furious” isn’t what you think it is.
It wasn’t about tracking guns, it was about supplying them — all part of an elaborate agreement between the U.S. government and Mexico’s powerful Sinaloa Cartel to take down rival cartels.
The explosive allegations are being made by Jesus Vicente Zambada-Niebla, known as the Sinaloa Cartel’s “logistics coordinator.” He was extradited to the Chicago last year to face federal drug charges.
Jesus Vincente Zambada-Niebla (Source: MSNBC)
Zambada-Niebla claims that under a “divide and conquer” strategy, the U.S. helped finance and arm the Sinaloa Cartel through Operation Fast and Furious in exchange for information that allowed the DEA, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and other federal agencies to take down rival drug cartels. The Sinaloa Cartel was allegedly permitted to traffic massive amounts of drugs across the U.S. border from 2004 to 2009 — during both Fast and Furious and Bush-era gunrunning operations — as long as the intel kept coming.
This pending court case against Zambada-Niebla is being closely monitored by some members of Congress, who expect potential legal ramifications if any of his claims are substantiated. The trial was delayed but is now scheduled to begin on Oct. 9.
Zambada-Niebla is reportedly a close associate of Sinaloa Cartel kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman and the son of Ismael “Mayo” Zambada-Garcia, both of which remain fugitives, likely because of the deal made with the DEA, federal court documents allege.
Based on the alleged agreement ”the Sinaloa Cartel under the leadership of defendant’s father, Ismael Zambada-Niebla and ‘Chapo’ Guzman, were given carte blanche to continue to smuggle tons of illicit drugs into Chicago and the rest of the United States and were also protected by the United States government from arrest and prosecution in return for providing information against rival cartels which helped Mexican and United States authorities capture or kill thousands of rival cartel members,” states a motion for discovery filed in U.S. District Court by Zambada-Niebla’s attorney in July 2011.
A source in Congress, who spoke to TheBlaze on the condition of anonymity, said that some top congressional investigators have been keeping “one eye on the case.” Another two members of Congress, both lead Fast and Furious Congressional investigators, told TheBlaze they had never even heard of the case.
One of the Congressmen, who also spoke to TheBlaze on the condition of anonymity because criminal proceedings are still ongoing, called the allegations “disturbing.” He said Congress will likely get involved once Zambada-Niebla’s trial has concluded if any compelling information surfaces.
“Congress won’t get involved in really any criminal case until the trial is over and the smoke has cleared,” he added. “If the allegations prove to hold any truth, there will be some serious legal ramifications.”
Earlier this month, two men in Texas were sentenced to 70 and 80 months in prison after pleading guilty to attempting to export 147 assault rifles and thousands of rounds of ammunition to Mexico’s Los Zetas cartel. Compare that to the roughly 2,000 firearms reportedly “walked” in Fast and Furious, which were used in the murders of hundreds of Mexican citizens and U.S. Border Agent Brian Terry, and some U.S. officials could potentially face jail time if they knowingly armed the Sinaloa Cartel and allowed guns to cross into Mexico.
If proven in court, such an agreement between U.S. law enforcement agencies and a Mexican cartel could potentially mar both the Bush and Obama administrations. The federal government is denying all of Zambada-Niebla’s allegations and contend that no official immunity deal was agreed upon.
To be sure, Zambada-Niebla is a member of one of the most ruthless drug gangs in all of Mexico, so there is a chance that he is saying whatever it takes to reduce his sentence, which will likely be hefty. However, Congress and the media have a duty to prove without a reasonable doubt that there is no truth in his allegations. So far, that has not been achieved.
Zambada-Niebla was reportedly responsible for coordinating all of the Sinaloa Cartel’s multi-ton drug shipments from Central and South American countries, through Mexico, and into the United States. To accomplish this, he used every tool at his disposal: Boeing 747 cargo planes, narco-submarines, container ships, speed boats, fishing vessels, buses, rail cars, tractor trailers and automobiles. But Guzman and Zambada-Niebla’s overwhelming success within the Sinaloa Cartel was largely due to the arrests and dismantling of many of their competitors and their booming businesses in the U.S. from 2004 to 2009 — around the same time ATF’s gun-walking operations were in full swing. Fast and Furious reportedly began in 2009 and continued into early 2011.
According Zambada-Niebla, that was a product of the collusion between the U.S. government and the Sinaloa Cartel.
Soldiers and police officers guard packages of seized marijuana during a presentation for the media in Tijuana, Mexico. (AP Photo/Guillermo Arias)
The claims seem to fall in line with statements made last month by Guillermo Terrazas Villanueva, a spokesman for the Chihuahua state government in northern Mexico who said U.S. agencies ”don’t fight drug traffickers,“ instead ”they try to manage the drug trade.”
Also, U.S. officials have previously acknowledged working with the Sinaloa Cartel through another informant, Humberto Loya-Castro. He is also allegedly a high-ranking member of the Sinaloa Cartel as well as a close confidant and lawyer of “El Chapo” Guzman.
Joaquin Guzman Loera, aka "El Chapo" (STR/AFP/Getty Images)
Loya-Castro was indicted along with Chapo and Mayo in 1995 in the Southern District of California in a massive narcotics trafficking conspiracy (Case no. 95CR0973). The case was dismissed in 2008 at the request of prosecutors after Loya became an informant for the United States government and subsequently provided information for years.
In 2005, “the CS (informant Loya-Castro) signed a cooperation agreement with the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California,” states an affidavit filed in the Zambada-Niebla case by Loya-Castro’s handler, DEA agent Manuel Castanon.
“Thereafter, I began to work with the CS. Over the years, the CS’ cooperation resulted in the seizure of several significant loads of narcotics and precursor chemicals. The CS’ cooperation also resulted in other real-time intelligence that was very useful to the United States government.”
Under the alleged agreement with U.S. agencies, “the Sinaloa Cartel, through Loya-Castro, was to provide information accumulated by Mayo, Chapo, and others, against rival Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations to the United States government,” a motion for discovery states.
In return, the United States government allegedly agreed to dismiss the charges in the pending case against Loya-Castro (which they did), not to interfere with his drug trafficking activities and those of the Sinaloa Cartel and not actively prosecute him or the Sinaloa Cartel leadership.
Taken directly from the motion filed in federal court:
“This strategy, which he calls ‘Divide & Conquer,’ using one drug organization to help against others, is exactly what the Justice Department and its various agencies have implemented in Mexico. In this case, they entered into an agreement with the leadership of the Sinaloa Cartel through, among others, Humberto Loya-Castro, to receive their help in the United States government’s efforts to destroy other cartels.”
“Indeed, United States government agents aided the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel.”
The government has denied this and says the deal did not go past Loya-Castro.
Zambada-Niebla was arrested by Mexican soldiers in late March of 2009 after he met with DEA agents at a Mexico City hotel in a meeting arranged by Loya-Castro, though the U.S. government was not involved in his arrest. He was extradited to Chicago to face federal drug charges on Feb. 18, 2010. He is now being held in a Michigan prison after requesting to be moved from Chicago.
“Classified Materials”
During his initial court proceedings, Zambada-Niebla continually stated that he was granted full immunity by the DEA in exchange for his cooperation. The agency, however, argues that an “official” immunity deal was never established though they admit he may have acted as an informant.
Zambada-Niebla and his legal council also requested records about Operation Fast and Furious, which permitted weapons purchased in the United States to be illegally smuggled into Mexico, sometimes by paid U.S. informants and cartel leaders. Their request was denied. From the defense motion:
“It is estimated that approximately 3,000 people were killed in Mexico as a result of ‘Operation Fast and Furious,’ including law enforcement officers in the state of Sinaloa, Mexico, the headquarters of the Sinaloa cartel. The Department of Justice’s leadership apparently saw this as an ingenious way of combating drug cartel activities.”
“It has recently been disclosed that in addition to the above-referenced problems with ‘Operation Fast & Furious,’ the DOJ, DEA, and the FBI knew that some of the people who were receiving the weapons that were being allowed to be transported to Mexico, were in fact informants working for those organizations and included some of the leaders of the cartels.”
Zambada’s attorney has filed several motions for discovery to that effect in Illinois Federal District Court, which were summarily denied by the presiding judge who claimed the defendant failed to make the case that he was actually a DEA informant.
In April, 2012, a federal judge refused to dismiss charges against him.
From a Chicago Sun Times report: “According to the government, [Zambada-Niebla] conveyed his interest and willingness to cooperate with the U.S. government, but the DEA agents told him they ‘were not authorized to meet with him, much less have substantive discussions with him,’” the judge wrote.
In this courtroom artist's drawing Jesus Vincente Zambada-Niebla appears before U.S. District Judge Ruben Castillo Tuesday, Feb. 23, 2010, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Verna Sadock)
In their official response to Zambada-Niebla’s motion for discovery, the federal government confirmed the existence of “classified materials” regarding the case but argued they “do not support the defendant’s claim that he was promised immunity or public authority for his actions.”
Experts have expressed doubts that Zambada-Niebla had an official agreement with the U.S. government, however, agree Loya Castro probably did. Either way, the defense still wants to obtain DEA reports that detail the agency’s relationship with the Sinaloa Cartel and put the agents on the stand, under oath to testify.
The documents that detail the relationship between the federal government and the Sinaloa Cartel have still not been released or subjected to review — citing matters of national security.
(Editor’s note: The impetus for this article came from author Reed A. Williams, whose upcoming book “The Weed That Just Won’t Die” delves deeply into the Zambada-Niebla court case. Get more details on the book here.)
Follow Jason Howerton (@jason_howerton) on Twitter
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Woof,
I bet that puckered some butts at the AG'S office. :D
P.C.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qesnbpgO304
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Woof,
This confuses me, and when I'm confused about something it usually means there is something really wrong going on.
http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/17/who-does-the-government-intend-to-shoot/?fb_action_ids=297876136986895&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=246965925417366 (http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/17/who-does-the-government-intend-to-shoot/?fb_action_ids=297876136986895&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=246965925417366)
P.C.
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PC: Would you be our point man on this please?
PS: Shouldn't it be ""Whom" does the govt wish to shoot?" :lol:
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Here is what the Daily Caller Op-ed said:
"The Social Security Administration (SSA) confirms that it is purchasing 174 thousand rounds of hollow point bullets to be delivered to 41 locations in major cities across the U.S. No one has yet said what the purpose of these purchases is, though we are led to believe that they will be used only in an emergency to counteract and control civil unrest.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/08/17/who-does-the-government-intend-to-shoot/#ixzz25WESbCvY"
As I posted on FB this is about buying ammunition for use by the Special Agents of the SSA-OIG.
The SSA has a law enforcement division which is part of of the Office of Inspector General (SSA-OIG). SSA-OIG Special Agents are sworn law enforcement officers who conduct violations of SSA focusing on fraud, waste and abuse. They are a relatively small agency but often work cases that go beyond simple social security fraud. Often large criminal organizations are involved in social security fraud as a peripheral part of the larger crime. The special agents of SSA-OIG would go through about 70,000 rounds just qualifying with their weapons each year. Approximately 295 agents qualifying four times a year, 60 rounds per qual. so 295 agents * 60 rounds * 4 annual quals. = 70800. That would be to qual only not including the ammo they carry with them, as well as ammo used for training. There is nothing at all surprising that a law enforcement agency would need that many rounds. At the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center a trainee may go through thousands of rounds while doing his criminal investigator training program (refered to as CITP).
As to why "hollow-point", generally speaking in the federal government you qualify with what you carry.
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Sheep Dog:
Your contributions are appreciated.
Marc/Crafty Dog
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Second Amendment: When Self-Defense Matters
When it comes to bearing arms in self-defense, it seems the Brits would rather have someone dead and robbed than alive and armed. This past week, a businessman and his wife across the Pond were arrested after the man shot intruders breaking into his home. Never mind that he successfully foiled the robbery attempt. Never mind that the would-be robbers will never try that home again. Never mind that the man and his wife escaped injury. In Britain, gun bans have effectively criminalized the innocent and victimized the guilty.
Yet while the Brits have all but abandoned the centuries-old Castle Doctrine -- which asserts the right to use force to defend one's home -- 92-year-old Earl Jones of Kentucky has not. Jones, a World War II veteran, this past week shot and killed an intruder who had entered his home. "It was simple," Jones said. "That man was going to take my life. He was hunting me. I was protecting myself." Our Founding Fathers recognized the God-given right to bear arms in self-defense and codified it in the Second Amendment of our Constitution -- a Constitution Jones fought to preserve. "I didn't go to war for nothing," he said. "I have the right to carry a gun." When it comes to who we want guarding our back, we'll take Jones any day over the entire British government.
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Posting this here on Big Dog"s behalf
"That is why I took up the gun — not to shoot, not to kill, not to destroy, but to stop those who would do evil, to protect the vulnerable, to defend democratic values, to stand up for the freedom we have to talk … about how we can make the world a better place.”
http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_van_uhm_why_i_chose_a_gun.html
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I understand why you moves it here, but the talk is given by the Netherlands' chief of defense and really does focus on military issues. Hence, the reason why I posted under military matters to begin with.
Posting this here on Big Dog"s behalf
"That is why I took up the gun — not to shoot, not to kill, not to destroy, but to stop those who would do evil, to protect the vulnerable, to defend democratic values, to stand up for the freedom we have to talk … about how we can make the world a better place.”
http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_van_uhm_why_i_chose_a_gun.html
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Ah, I skimmed too quickly and did not notice that. Your call was correct.
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"Move to strike you honor as non-responsive!"
"Granted."
While certainly you are entitled to your opinion JDN, right now it is not measuring up to the standards around here. Please cease posting on OFF on this thread.
Thank you,
Marc
Vindication? :-) I guess it really was just a sting gone bad?
I guess I was right all along huh? :evil:
"A reading of the Inspector General's report appears to corroborate that there was no conspiracy to walk guns, no higher-up plan to do so and that walking guns was not the goal of the investigation, but rather a response to "legal and tactical" circumstances on the ground, as the report states."
The Inspector General's doorstop of a report, at 471 pages, blames agents at ATF's Phoenix field division, prosecutors at the United States Attorney's office in Phoenix, and officials at their respective headquarters in Washington D.C. for a poorly conceived, executed and supervised investigation that failed in the primary mission of law enforcement -- to prioritize public safety. The report argues that a strategy of deferring overt enforcement -- and not immediately approaching straw buyers to seek confessions -- allowed the frenzied gun buying to continue, relatively unchecked. In December 2010, two of the guns purchased previously by a suspect in the case were found at the site of a shootout where Mexican bandits killed U.S. border patrol agent Terry. ATF whistleblowers subsequently alleged that ATF supervisors had directed them to "walk guns," or to allow the guns to flow into the hands of Mexican drug traffickers, as a tactic to build a bigger case.
http://documents.latimes.com/fast-and-furious-oig-report/
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Until Holder/Obama cough up the documents subpoenaed by Issa's committee then the report can only report on the info it has.
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Darrel Issa last night on Bret Baier pointed out one of the dismissed/resigned was a right hand man of Holder, reporting directly to him. Issa still thinks Holder guilty.
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Bullets Follow Guns to Mexico
Ammunition Is Easier to Buy and Hide Than Weapons; Smuggling Is Harder to Stop .
By ANA CAMPOY
Agents unload ammunition following an April bust that discovered some 280,000 rounds of ammunition in a truck heading to Mexico from Texas.
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Congressional hearings have put gunrunning to Mexico in the headlines, but the parallel flow of ammunition across the border is proving to be more difficult to stop.
In a series of arrests this year, U.S. agents in New Mexico and Texas seized hundreds of thousands of rounds bound for the border—many of them bullets for the AK-47 and M16 assault rifles favored by Mexican drug cartels.
Bullets are much easier to buy, hide and smuggle than guns, and federal and state laws require relatively little tracking of their sales. That makes ammunition smugglers particularly difficult to catch.
Such cases also get little publicity compared to gun trafficking. That is especially true since members of the U.S. Congress and a Justice Department watchdog this year criticized the department's "Fast and Furious" sting operation, which allowed smugglers to buy hundreds of weapons without tracking whose hands they ended up in. Some of the guns later turned up at crime scenes in Mexico and the U.S., including one where a U.S. border agent was killed.
Federal agencies including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms have been trying to crack down on ammunition smuggling with operations that include elaborate undercover investigations as well as routine border stops. In some cases the agencies work with state and local authorities.
"The bottom line is a gun is worthless if you don't have a bullet to put in," said Jerry Robinette, a federal special agent with Homeland Security Investigations in San Antonio.
Mr. Robinette said his agency is trying just as hard to stop ammunition from illegally entering Mexico as it is weapons.
Unlike gun dealers, sellers of bullets in most places don't need a license and aren't required to verify whether a buyer qualifies to own ammunition. Federal law bans the sale of ammunition to certain people, such as those younger than 18, felons and illegal immigrants.
In contrast to gun sales, which must be tracked by law, no record keeping is required for ammunition purchases. Most U.S. states impose no limits on how many bullets a person can buy. The U.S. forbids the export of ammunition without a license, and Mexico prohibits its import. Mexican law limits ammunition purchases, and violations are punishable by up to six years in jail. Clandestinely bringing bullets into the country carries a sentence of up to 30 years. But the dearth of information available on ammunition sales can make it difficult to pursue smuggling cases.
"You can't track ammunition the way you can AK-47s," said Eric Olson, a senior associate with the Mexico Institute at the Wilson Center in Washington, D.C. The think tank, which focuses on U.S.-Mexico relations, has recommended that the U.S. change its laws governing ammunition to make it easier to track sales.
There are few statistics to quantify how much ammunition is smuggled. But a string of recent cases suggests a steady southbound flow of bullets and magazines, from piecemeal shipments to large orders.
Federal authorities in Laredo, Texas, earlier this month took four men into custody for allegedly trying to smuggle more than 9,000 rounds of ammunition and close to 1,000 assault-rifle magazines to Mexico. Three of the men have pleaded not guilty; the other hasn't entered a plea. The owners of a Laredo gun shop, who allegedly sold them the goods, also face federal criminal charges. They have pleaded not guilty.
In August, federal agents arrested a New Mexico man after finding in his apartment more than 65,000 rounds of assault-rifle ammunition he had allegedly bought online, as well as three Kevlar military helmets and one ballistic vest. Investigators said the man told them he had purchased about 200,000 rounds since late 2011 and sent them to Mexico, according to court filings by prosecutors.
In June, a federal judge sentenced a pair of smugglers to more than two years in prison for buying ammunition at locations of Academy Sports + Outdoors, which is owned by private-equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., in communities near the border and moving it into Mexico without a license. Academy and KKR didn't respond to requests for comment.
In April, a U.S. trucker crossed the international bridge in El Paso, Texas, with more than 200,000 rounds in his truck, according to Mexican authorities. He was apprehended on the Mexican side and charged with illegal possession of ammunition. His lawyer said the man was carrying legal cargo to be delivered in the U.S., but mistakenly took a wrong turn and ended up in Mexico.
And in February, border officials in Laredo arrested a brother-and-sister team for trying to sneak about 900 rounds of ammunition—some already loaded into high-capacity magazines—into Mexico. The ammunition was wrapped in black electrical tape near the engine of their truck when they were stopped for a random inspection at an international bridge linking Laredo to Mexico.
In August, a federal judge sentenced the siblings to more than two years.
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That Loaded Gun in My Carry-On? Oh, I Forgot
By JOE SHARKEY
Published: September 28, 2012
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The list of potentially lethal weapons was certainly eye-opening: 47 guns (38 of them loaded, including six with rounds in their chambers), three inert hand grenades, supplies of black powder, hunting knives, timing fuses and a sword. Then, consider that the list was compiled by the Transportation Security Administration, of weapons found in airline travelers’ carry-on bags in the seven days that ended on Sept. 20.
In fact, the T.S.A. says the number of guns found at airport security checkpoints has been steadily rising for the last couple of years. Through Friday, 1,105 guns have been found this year, a pace that is higher than last year’s. In 2011, the total was 1,320, up from 1,123 in 2010, the agency says.
Security experts attribute the increase to two factors: a rise in gun sales and the sharp growth of so-called right-to-carry laws across the country that significantly relax regulations on carrying guns in many areas of public life, from colleges to hospitals. Invariably, according to the T.S.A., travelers at airports with guns in their carry-on bags say they simply forgot they had them. “It’s almost always inadvertent rather than intentional,” said David Castelveter, a spokesman for the agency
Like other professionals in security, law enforcement and firearms safety, Mr. Castelveter was baffled by how anyone could forget that they were carrying a gun. “I’m a Vietnam vet, and when I went through training I was taught that my gun was my best friend — and God forbid you should ever lose sight of that fact. I would never, ever not know that I have a gun in my bag.”
Yet that was the exactly the excuse offered by a 27-year-old flight attendant who was stopped at a checkpoint at the Philadelphia airport on Sunday. The flight attendant, arriving for work on a US Airways flight, had a valid handgun permit — but of course, not a permit to carry it on an airplane. As it routinely does in such cases, the T.S.A. notified local law enforcement. A Philadelphia police officer who responded tried to unload the 38-caliber handgun weapon but instead accidentally fired it. No one was hurt, and the flight attendant was issued a summary citation for disorderly conduct.
could have seemed like a Keystone Kops episode. Instead, it occurred as air travel has become increasingly tense. The potential for trouble posed by prohibited guns on crowded airplanes is obvious, even beyond any overt issues of terrorism or premeditated crime. Except in rare instances where T.S.A. officials believe the Federal Bureau of Investigation needs to be notified, local law enforcement officials usually handle reports of guns at airport checkpoints.
“All we’re permitted to do is confiscate the weapon and call law enforcement agents, who then will take custody of it and determine whether or not you’re arrested,” said Mr. Castelveter, who is part of the security agency’s effort to notify local news media to aggressively publicize reports of guns and other prohibited weapons being found at checkpoints.
The growing number of guns being found at airports dovetails with the growth in firearms sales nationally. Last year, requests for background checks for firearms sales submitted under the National Instant Criminal Background Check System of the F.B.I. totaled 16.4 million, up from 14.4 million in 2010 and 8.9 million in 2001, according to F.B.I. data. But firearms safety experts also suspect that some people new to firearms possession may not have basic weapons education, which used to be a stronger focus of gun advocacy groups like the National Rifle Association. (POTH calling for more NRA? Don't see that very often! Ha!)
Guns at airport checkpoints reflect “the pervasiveness of concealed-carry weapons, which have gone up enormously in the last 10 years because concealed permits have got easier to get,” said Matt Bennett, a co-founder of Third Way, a Washington research group that promotes what it refers to as centrist views on “divisive social issues,” among them constitutional gun rights.
Page 2 of 2)
“When people become accustomed to carrying their firearms everywhere they go, even in places like churches and schools in certain states, they can just simply forget they have them,” Mr. Bennett said. “Because concealed-carry permits are now so easy to get, it becomes second nature in kind of a bad way — instead of being thought of as a really significant act — carrying any firearm around.”
Finding the T.S.A. screener digging a gun out of your carry-on bag at the airport “does get to the heart of the matter, in that it shows a lack of focused training” in gun handling, said Ron Danielowski, a former Marine marksman and security consultant in the Middle East, and a founder of Pulse O2DA Firearms Training, an Illinois company that provides intensive weapons and self-defense instruction. Mr. Danielowski echoed the advice on the T.S.A.’s blog that people can travel with a firearm in a checked bag, provided the airline is notified in advance and the weapon is contained in a hard-locked case. But he and other firearms advocates note that conflicting state and local laws can still cause problems, even for those who comply with the federal regulations, if they arrive with a gun in a location that has different rules.
“That’s a huge mess,” he said of conflicting federal, state and local gun laws that sometimes catch a person otherwise legally transporting a gun. “We’re trying to address that on a local, democratic level. But the first thing right now is, if we’re going to travel with a firearm and plan to go through other states and jurisdictions, we need to make sure that we’re compliant. That’s on us.”
The T.S.A. intends to continue to focus attention on guns at checkpoints, even though Mr. Castelveter said that airports themselves often object because of the effect of the topic on the flying experience. Once a gun is found, assuming there is no indication of a federal crime, local laws apply. In some locations, “if you come to the checkpoint with a weapon and law enforcement gets involved, they’ll just tell you take it back to your car, because you’re in a state where you’re allowed to carry one” in most places. “But do that in a place like New York and you could be in Rikers Island in about 30 seconds,” Mr. Castelveter said.
“The interesting thing to me is all of these items, from handguns to brass knuckles, a passenger could take from Point A to Point B if it was properly checked” rather than carried through the airport, said Nico Melendez, a T.S.A. official in Los Angeles who posts regularly on the agency’s blog.
“Gun owners should all know where their weapons are, for our own safety and for the safety of those we live with and those around us,” Mr. Melendez said. “I always know where mine is. It’s really kind of basic. Weapons are dangerous.”
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Watch the video too!
http://abcnews.go.com/ABC_Univision/News/57-previously-undiscovered-fast-furious-guns-mexican-crimes/story?id=17361775
Fifty seven previously unidentified firearms linked to Operation Fast and Furious were recovered in sites associated with murders, kidnappings, and at least two gruesome massacres.
Univision News obtained the list of Fast and Furious weapons and a list containing almost 60,000 recovered firearms compiled by Mexico's Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional (SEDENA). A cross-reference of the serial numbers of the guns resulted in 96 full matches (several partial matches were discarded). The 96 firearms linked to Operation Fast and Furious all turned up at crime scenes in Mexico from 2009 to 2010.
In a report published on July 26, Congress mentioned there were "at least 48 recoveries involving 122 weapons [in Mexico] connected to Operation Fast and Furious." To check whether those were the same guns pinpointed by the data cross-reference, Univision News contacted congressional investigators asking for the serial numbers of the 122 guns in Congress' report. After an initial request by Univision News in mid-September and despite numerous phone calls and emails, there was no further response.
The Associated Press
Univision found new evidence of weapons... View Full Size
Who are the human faces of the U.S. government's botched Fast and Furious gun-walking operation? Watch Video
Univision News then gathered all the serial numbers available in the evidence appendixes of the major congressional investigation released by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Iowa Senator Charles Grassley last July. Another data analysis showed that five of the weapons in the list of 96 were already mentioned in the hundreds of emails and the 4473 forms that the Department of Justice had given to Congress. (The 4473 forms, also known as Firearm Transaction Records, are the documents that people who are purchasing guns from a Federal Firearm Licensee must fill.)
A search of SEDENA's press releases, which often include the serial numbers of seized firearms, resulted in one more firearm whose serial number matched one of those already in Congress' list.
Finally, Univision News compared the recovery dates and locations highlighted in The Department of Justice's Operation Fast and Furious: Fueling Cartel Violence, with those found in the remaining list of 90 weapons. For the cross-reference list and Congress' list, we divided each year's recovered guns by state. After that, we compared the number of weapons found in each state on both lists. That is, we compared the number of guns recovered, say, in 2009 in Baja California, according to lists by Congress and by Univision News.
For instance, if Congress had identified seven Fast and Furious weapons recovered in Baja California in 2009, and our list mentioned 24, then we concluded that our list included at least 17 new weapons. In the end, the state-by-state analysis showed that 57 of the firearms in the cross-reference were not included in Congress' report.
Univision News started looking for unreported Fast and Weapons after discovering a SEDENA document, which said that three guns from an ATF gun-tracing operation were used in the massacre in Villas de Salvarcar, Ciudad Juarez.
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http://pjmedia.com/blog/univision-breaks-new-details-of-obama-admins-fast-and-furious-cover-up/?singlepage=true
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/here-are-5-things-you-didnt-know-about-operation-fast-and-furious/
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The Univision program in Spanish with English substitles
http://videos.univision.com/programas/aqui-y-ahora/video/2012-10-01/operation-fast-and-furious-arming-the-enemy
and some more commentary on it:
"We may never know how many deaths, kidnappings and other criminal activities were facilitated by more than 2,000 weapons that were allowed to 'walk' into Mexico under the Obama administration's Fast and Furious program, but a Univision special aired Sunday exposes more of the carnage. The special, put together by Univision's investigative unit and aired as a special edition of Univision's 'Aqui y Ahora' ('Here and Now') identified massacres committed using guns from the ATF operation.... In addition to fueling increased gun violence in Mexico, guns from Fast and Furious previously unreported by congressional investigators found their way into the hands of drug traffickers across Latin America in countries such as Honduras and Colombia, as well as the U.S. Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Kudos to Univision, which regrettably will not have a reporter at Wednesday's presidential debate to ask the tough questions the administration's media sycophants will not, for pursuing the truth on Fast and Furious with more vigor than most American media outlets. ... Univision found 57 Fast and Furious weapons in addition to 122 specifically mentioned in a congressional report. They included weapons used in the massacre at a party just one year after President Obama's inauguration and less than a year before Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed in December 2010 at the hands of an illegal immigrant working for the Sinaloa Cartel just 10 miles from the Mexican border near Nogales, Ariz. ... The report also reveals the botched operation may have played a role in a 2009 massacre, where 18 young men were killed at a rehabilitation center also in Juarez. The massacre was reportedly ordered and carried out by Mexican hit men. Current estimates put the number of Mexican nationals murdered by Fast and Furious weapons at 300. More such evidence will be found and the Fast and Furious body count will rise, ignored by the administration and its media protectors." --Investor's Business Daily
Upright
"[A]BC, CBS and NBC have yet to report the Spanish-language network's findings. ... The blackout on ABC's broadcasts is particularly confounding since they have an excerpt from Univision's September 30 report on ABC's official Web site. The refusal by ABC, CBS or NBC to report the findings is remarkable since the Univision report not only contains politically explosive information to a sitting administration at the height of the election season but also compelling human tragedy. ... The lack of coverage by the Big Three ... networks continues their trend of mostly ignoring major events in the scandal that has led to calls for Attorney General Eric Holder's resignation." --Newsbuster's Geoffrey Dickens
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Funny how Univision is doing the work the MSM won't do. Must not have a journo-lista email list.
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Maybe it notices the 300 Mexican citizens thought to have been killed by OFF guns , , ,
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_NDT7am2VWw
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---Quote---
*Univision Does Its Homework* (http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/329145/univision-does-its-homework-john-g-malcolm)
By John G. Malcolm
October 3, 2012 4:00 A.M.
Univision has done some outstanding investigative reporting on Operation Fast and Furious, the ill-conceived and disastrously executed gun-smuggling operation that was designed to identify the kingpins of a Mexican firearms-trafficking network but resulted in the transfer of approximately 2,000 high-powered weapons into the hands of dangerous thugs connected with the drug cartels. A recently issued report from the Justice Department’s inspector general criticizes the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Arizona, and senior DOJ officials for their roles in this botched investi*gation. The report cites “a series of misguided strategies, tactics, errors in judgment, and management failures that permeated ATF Headquarters and the Phoenix Field Division, as well as the U.S. Attorney’s Office.”
President Obama remains in denial about Fast and Furious. When asked about it two weeks ago, he responded: “Well, first of all, I think it’s important to understand that the Fast and Furious program was a field-initiated program, begun under the previous administration. When Eric Holder found out about it, he discontinued it.” This is wrong on two counts. First, Operation Fast and Furious began in the fall of 2009, under the current administration. Second, it ended on December 15, 2010, the day it was discovered that two Fast and Furious weapons were found at the scene where U.S. Border Patrol agent Brian Terry was murdered. That was two full months before Attorney General Eric Holder claims to have known about the operation.
Operation Fast and Furious began in 2009, after federally licensed firearms dealers informed ATF that several individuals were purchasing large quantities of AK-47-style rifles and FN 5.7 caliber pistols. These pistols are known as “cop killers” in Mexico because the bullets fired from them can penetrate the Kevlar vests worn by law-enforcement authorities. At the time, the northern Mexican states were a veritable battlefield, where the Sinaloa and Juárez drug cartels were fighting for control and the increasingly powerful Zetas were seeking to enlarge their territory. ATF encouraged gun-store owners to continue selling to the straw purchasers it was monitoring to avoid alerting the criminals to the presence of law enforcement.
Former Mexican attorney general Victor Humberto Benítez Treviño estimates that approximately 300 Mexican citizens have been killed with Fast and Furious weapons, and hundreds of guns remain unaccounted for. Some victims had been identified even before the Univision report. For example, there was Mario Gonzalez Rodriguez — the brother of former Chihuahua state attorney general Patricia Gonzalez Rodriguez — who was kidnapped by members of the Sinaloa drug cartel in October of 2010. His tortured body was later discovered in a shallow grave. Following a shootout with Rodriquez’s suspected kidnappers, Mexican police seized 16 weapons, two of which were traced to Operation Fast and Furious.
But Univision has made some startling new and tragic connections. On the night of September 2, 2009, twelve hit men, looking for members of the Sinaloa cartel and carrying AK-47s they had acquired thanks to Fast and Furious, forced open the main door of Casa Aliviane, a drug-rehabilitation center in Ciudad Juárez. Once inside, they sprayed the building with bullets. Of the 19 young recovering addicts, 18 were killed. The massacre was ordered by José Antonio Acosta Hernandez (also known as “El Diego”), the leader of La Linea, the enforcement arm of the Juárez cartel.
At the time, Acosta Hernandez was at war with José Antonio Torres Marrufo, an enforcer — he reportedly once skinned an enemy’s face to make a soccer ball — close to Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, the head of the Sinaloa cartel. When Mexican authorities captured Marrufo in February 2012, they found a cache of guns that included powerful anti-aircraft weapons, as well as firearms linked to Operation Fast and Furious.
According to Univision, Acosta Hernandez was behind another bloodbath involving Fast and Furious guns. On January 30, 2010, a commando unit of at least 20 hit men parked outside a house in Ciudad Juárez. A birthday party of high-school and college students was going on inside, but Hernandez mistakenly thought it was occupied by members of the Sinaloa cartel. Around midnight, his men broke into the house and opened fire on nearly 60 teenagers. Outside, lookouts gunned down a screaming neighbor and several students who tried to escape. When the hit men fled, they left 16 young people dead and twelve others wounded. Three of the weapons used that night were traced to Operation Fast and Furious. When Acosta Hernandez was finally captured in July 2010, with Fast and Furious weapons in his possession, he confessed to Mexican authorities that he was responsible for nearly 1,500 murders.
And, as if letting 2,000 high-powered guns “walk” were not enough, it appears that the Obama administration launched other gun-walking operations as well. According to Univision, “weapons from [Florida-based] Operation Castaway ended up in the hands of criminals in Colombia, Honduras and Venezuela.” And the inspector general’s report states that his office is investigating “at least one other ATF [operation] . . . that involves an individual suspected of transporting grenade components into Mexico, converting them into live grenades, and then supplying them to drug cartels.”
The Mexican government has every right to be furious about this matter. If foreign law-enforcement agents had let nearly 2,000 weapons be delivered into the hands of U.S. gang-bangers — without any notice to or coordination with the feds — there would be serious repercussions.
Operation Fast and Furious is a disaster and a disgrace. Univision and the inspector general deserve credit for attempting to get to the bottom of this mess.
— John G. Malcolm is a senior legal fellow at the Center for Legal & Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation.
---End Quote---
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Remington Arms has already moved much of their skilled operations and management to North Carolina because of the tax policies of New York state, and now it appears to be on the verge of moving the rest of its facilities, all due to microstamping legislation:
Microstamping, or ballistic imprinting, is a patented process that uses laser technology to engrave a tiny marking of the make, model, and serial number on the tip of a gun’s firing pin to allow an imprint of that information on spent cartridge cases. Supporters of the technology say it will be a “game changer,” allowing authorities to quickly identify the registered guns used in crimes. Opponents claim the process is costly, unreliable, and may ultimately impact the local economies that heavily depend on the gun industry, including Ilion, N.Y., where Remington Arms maintains a factory, and Hartford, Conn., where Colt’s manufacturing is headquartered.
“Mandatory microstamping would have an immediate impact of a loss of 50 jobs,” New York State Sen. James Seward, a Republican whose district includes Ilion, said, adding that Remington employs 1,100 workers in the town. “You’re talking about a company that has options in other states. Why should they be in a state that’s hostile to legal gun manufacturing? There could be serious negative economic impact with the passage of microstamping and other gun-control laws.”
Microstamping tooling is extremely expensive, prone to breakage, easily disabled, and ineffective on entire families of weapons. Let’s take a deeper look at what microstamping does, and how easily it is beaten.
Microstamping is a series of letters and numbers reverse printed on the firing pin of weapons. In theory, when a gun is fired, the firing pin will leave a mark on the cartridge’s primer (the rim of a rimfire cartridge), and the shell casing recovered at the scene will provide law enforcement information about which gun fired the cartridge. Cops will enter the microstamping code into a computer, which will check it against a database, and the police will know who the shooter is within minutes.
At least, that is the theory. Reality is another matter. For starters: microstamping fails to work on any firearm that already exists, something in the neighborhood of more than 300 million firearms. As firearms last indefinitely, it would be decades before they became a significant number of total firearms — even if the technology was foolproof.
But microstamping is not foolproof. Let’s look at the ways microstamping fails, beyond the numbers:
•Microstamping does not work if shell casings aren’t automatically ejected from the crime gun. Revolvers, derringers, double-barrel shotguns, pump shotguns and rifles, and semi-automatic firearms that can be equipped with inexpensive brass catchers (common among some shooters) would leave no cartridges at the scene of a shooting.
•Microstamping does not work because firing pins are inexpensive and easy to replace. The firing pin for most weapons are easily replaced by someone with a minimum of ability to read and follow the basic cleaning directions for his firearm. The expense of millions of dollars in retooling is thwarted by the purchase of a $12 part.
•Microstamping does not work because the stamping is easily defaced. It would take a matter of a half-dozen passes of a standard diamond file, and less than a minute, to eradicate the microstamping.
•Microstamping is incredibly fragile. The stamping would wear out over time through simple use of the firearm, or be thwarted by the normal powder residue that builds up on small parts.
•Microstamping could easily be spoofed and waste police time — or worse, send the wrong people to jail. Most shooters do not reload their own ammunition, and leave their shell casings at the range. All it would take to turn microstamping to a criminal’s advantage would be for a criminal or one of his associates to pick up brass from a firing range in the same caliber as the weapon he carries. After he uses a microstamping-free weapon in a crime, he would merely drop the brass he recovered from Joe Citizen at the range at the crime scene. Joe will wake up with a SWAT team crashing through his door at 5:00 a.m., and if he’s lucky, innocent Joe won’t be gunned down along with his family pets.
Easily thwarted and capable of being used to a criminal’s advantage, microstamping is a horrible idea as well as an expensive one.
Remington and Colt are right to threaten to leave New York and Connecticut if ignorant Democratic politicians push forward with their demands for microstamping legislation. As for Colt and Remington, I’d merely offer that North Carolina is a much more gun-friendly and intelligent state, and they would be more than welcome to relocate here.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/08/us/with-military-suicides-rising-new-policies-take-shape.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20121008
Pentagon and Congress are moving to establish policies intended to separate at-risk service members from their personal weapons.
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Yeah, this will stop those gangbangers from wasting ammo. : :-P http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49458564/
P.C.
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Yeah, this will stop those gangbangers from wasting ammo. : :-P http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49458564/
P.C.
Wait, I thought all those tough gun laws already made Chicago a crime-free paradise. No?
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Those who have been following Fast and Furious know that much of the original reporting was developed by sources at Clean Up ATF. ATF officials have been gunning for an ATF investigator who is also a founder of CUATF, Vincent Cefalu, and terminated his employment in a Denny's parking lot several weeks back. Cefalu just one a stay on his termination and has been ordered reinstated. With luck future hearings and law suits will bring the ATF house of cards down.
Order of reinstatement here: http://www.mspb.gov/netsearch/viewdocs.aspx?docnumber=766615&version=769489&application=ACROBAT
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Reliability of this source is unknown to me:
http://www.examiner.com/article/obama-to-bypass-congress-to-ban-semiautomatic-firearms-warns-expert
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second post
Times Dispatch
Gun-related violent crime in Virginia has dropped steadily over the
past six years as the sale of firearms has soared to a new record,
according to an analysis of state crime data with state records of gun
sales.
The total number of firearms purchased in Virginia increased 73 percent
from 2006 to 2011. When state population increases are factored in, gun
purchases per 100,000 Virginians rose 63 percent.
But the total number of gun-related violent crimes fell 24 percent over
that period, and when adjusted for population, gun-related offenses
dropped more than 27 percent, from 79 crimes per 100,000 in 2006 to 57
crimes in 2011.
The numbers appear to contradict a long-running popular narrative that
more guns cause more violent crime, said Virginia Commonwealth
University professor Thomas R. Baker, who compared Virginia crime data
for those years with gun-dealer sales estimates obtained by the Richmond
Times-Dispatch.
http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/local/central-virginia/gun-related-violent-crimes-drop-as-gun-sales-soar-in/article_54cca13a-35ee-11e2-83f0-0019bb30f31a.html
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American Patriots and Guns
All Patriots Are Obligated to Be Armed and Ready
"The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic." --Joseph Story
On the most recent "Black Friday," the day after Thanksgiving, which has become the biggest commercial sales day of the year, despite the continuing economic decline, there were record sales in one notable product category: Guns.
According to Stephen Fischer, director of the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System, "NICS experienced its highest number of transactions processed since system inception [in 1998], with 154,873, which is nearly 20 percent over the 129,166 processed on Black Friday 2011." This year's total checks will undoubtedly beat last year's record of 16.4 million.
In fact, the top 10 record gun sales days have occurred since Barack Obama's election in 2008, and gun ownership has skyrocketed over the last four years. According to a worldwide survey conducted the year before Obama's election, though the United States had only 5% of the world's population, Americans owned 50% of the world's guns. Of course, unlike virtually every other nation, Americans are ensured the incontrovertible right to arm themselves.
The current estimate of legally and privately held guns in the U.S. is more than 250 million (the average gun-owning household having three guns).
With that as a backdrop, I was asked this week if Patriots have an obligation to arm themselves -- to be gun owners, and be proficient at the use of arms. I thought at first the question was rhetorical, but after some consideration, I realize that there are millions of grassroots Patriots who are NOT among the 60 million plus Patriots who are already law-abiding gun owners.
Apparently, the question needs to be addressed, as the answer may not be as obvious to some folks as it should be. By way of responding to this question, let me first briefly reiterate the historical and enduring case for gun ownership, which is as relevant today and tomorrow as it was at the dawn of our national founding.
There are two foundational tenets of Essential Liberty that all American Patriots must understand and embrace in order to sustain Liberty and extend it to the next generation.
First, it is "self-evident" that Liberty is an "unalienable right," innately assured as "endowed by our Creator." In other words, it is not awarded by men or government; it is the birthright of all people.
Second, as history records countless examples of men using the power of government to arbitrarily revoke Liberty and invoke tyranny, our Founders understood that, in the words of John Adams, "liberty must at all hazards be supported." Adams continued, "We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood."
Thus, all American Patriots today, those imbued with the spirit of Liberty that has motivated Patriots since 1776, must be prepared to defend both individual and corporate Liberty, to defend the Rule of Law over the rule of men.
Of the ability to defend Liberty, James Madison wrote, "The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition." (Federalist No. 46)
To ensure that advantage, our Founders enumerated a constitutional prohibition on government interference with that barrier, the Second Amendment, affirming, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."
In his exhaustive "Commentaries on the Constitution," Madison's Supreme Court Justice, Joseph Story, wrote, "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."
In other words, gun ownership is not about "the tradition of hunting" as Barack Obama claimed recently, unless he was referring to hunting those who infringe on the inalienable rights of man. Of course, Liberty is the antithesis of statism, which is why Obama and his socialist Democrat cadres are endeavoring to undermine the Second Amendment.
Obama has asserted erroneously, "The vast majority of Americans would like to see serious gun control, [but] it doesn't pass because there is this huge disconnect between what people think and what legislators think and are willing to act upon." His disdain for grassroots gun owners was summed up in his unguarded remarks to campaign donors in 2008, when he said that they "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
Thus, I expect to see new second term Obama administration proposals endeavoring to implement incremental encroachments on the Second Amendment. However, Obama's most coveted gun control objective would be to rally two-thirds of the Senate next year for passage of the United Nations' Arms Trade Treaty regulating small arms. The ATT is a Trojan Horse. While it ostensibly exempts domestic gun sales and ownership in the U.S., with the stroke of a pen, it could implement severe gun restrictions and even confiscations -- an end run on the Second Amendment that would provide political cover for gun-grabbing Leftists in the Senate and House.
Indeed, as summed up by Sen. Rand Paul, "The day after his re-election, Obama's UN delegation voted for a renewed effort to pass the Small Arms Treaty. This effort by globalists to undermine our Constitution is set to reconvene March 18th-28th in order to pass the final version of the treaty that will be sent to the Senate for ratification. Make no mistake, they will ultimately register, ban and CONFISCATE firearms owned by private citizens. Not long ago, Obama told Sarah Brady from the anti-gun Brady Campaign, 'I just want you to know that we are working on [gun control]. We have to go through a few processes, but under the radar.'"
In regard to gun confiscation, I recommend that Obama pick up an American History text, one that has not been "revised" by teacher or librarian unions, and read about the first American Revolution. He will find that it commenced with "the shot heard round the world," as immortalized by poet Ralph Waldo Emerson -- a shot fired by Patriots at the Massachusetts governor's enforcers, who were sent to Concord with orders to confiscate and destroy militia arms. There is a subtle lesson there...
(Sidebar: On the subject of revisions, next week Obama's UN delegation will meet with the UN agency overseeing global telecommunications, the International Telecommunications Union, to revise Internet regulations.)
Clearly the surge in gun sales and ownership over the last four years has been driven by Obama's agenda to implement new "gun control" measures, which are, of course, not about guns but about control, as tragically demonstrated by the appalling record of genocide meted out by tyrants toward those who had no means of self defense.
According to gun-rights expert, Professor Raymond Kessler, J.D., "In truth, attempts to regulate the civilian possession of firearms have five political functions. They increase citizen reliance on government and tolerance of increased police powers and abuse; help prevent opposition to the government; facilitate repressive action by government and its allies; lessen the pressure for major or radical reform; and can be selectively enforced against those perceived to be a threat to government."
So, given that Liberty must be supported and defended at all hazards, and given the current assault on gun ownership, consider again the question, "Do Patriots have an obligation to arm themselves -- to be gun owners, and be proficient at the use of arms?"
The answer is, emphatically and absolutely, YES. Moreover, I would argue that it is the responsibility of all gun-owning Patriots to educate their like-minded family and friends about the overarching rationale for gun ownership -- the ability to defend Liberty -- and to encourage them to become responsible gun owners.
I know many Patriots who, since Obama's election, have become first-time gun owners. The fact that 49 states authorize carry permits, 41 of those being "shall issue" states providing on-demand concealed-carry permits to law-abiding citizens, has encouraged that trend. The lone state denying the right to carry is, naturally, Obama's state of residence, Illinois.
In recent years, I've proudly encouraged and assisted dozens of Patriot friends to become responsible gun owners. One of those "new" gun owners was my wife, who, along with six other women friends, took the required training and now has her carry permit. Each of my children is also a gun owner. (My oldest son, an Air Force Cadet, is an outstanding shooter. The weapons of my two minor children only come out under strict supervision, but my 13-year-old already shoots a very tight pattern at 100 meters with his M-4.)
One of my wife's friends said that when some of her liberal family members came to visit recently (one of those tragic "mixed families"), they got wind that she now owns not one, but three guns. Her brother inquired, "Why would anyone own three guns?" Without missing a beat, she replied, "Because I can!" (That has got to rank first among the most cutting and concise rebuttals I have ever heard.)
And on that note, three other friends, who grew up in former Soviet satellite states, told me that after becoming U.S. citizens (the old fashioned way -- legally), the first thing they did was obtain their right-to-carry permits. They each have a fuller appreciation for that right.
So, how do dedicated Patriots who are not familiar with firearms make the leap to gun ownership and proficiency?
I received a letter this week from a reader among our Patriot ranks, who included a brief history of how his whole family made the transition from non-gun owners to never leaving home without one. I have included a brief excerpt of his story in order that it might help others make that transition.
He writes, "Growing up in Chicago, where guns were outlawed and only outlaws had guns, when the topic of guns came up, my parents replied, 'Only gangsters and hunters carry guns -- and we are neither.'" Given this prohibitive backdrop, I invite you to read the rest of his Second Amendment testimony.
For the record, when it comes to Liberty, I would much prefer constitutional restoration over insurrection -- if the former is achievable. (I've been around a few revolutions in Africa and the Middle East, so I'm well aware of the violence that accompanies the latter course.) But as current day American Patriots, we all have an obligation to not only stand ready to defend our family and property, but moreover to defend Liberty.
I'll leave you, then, with these words from Thomas Jefferson on both the individual right of self-defense, and the corporate responsibility to uphold Liberty.
Quoting 18th-century Italian jurist and philosopher Cesare Beccaria in his "Commonplace Book," Jefferson wrote, "Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."
Regarding our corporate obligation in defense of Liberty, Jefferson wrote, "What country can preserve its liberties, if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms."
Pro Deo et Constitutione — Libertas aut Mors
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis
Mark Alexander
Publisher, The Patriot Post
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Gun Showdown at Work
GOP's Business Backers Fight NRA Push to Let Employees Leave Firearms in Cars.
By JOE PALAZZOLO
Gun legislation in some Southern states is forcing Republican lawmakers to choose between two core values of their party: the right of business owners to control what happens on their property and people's Second Amendment right to bear arms.
Their dilemma is the result of bills pushed by the National Rifle Association that would let employees bring firearms—ranging from handguns, rifles and shotguns—to work and store them in their vehicles, even against an employer's wishes.
About 20 states have passed so-called parking-lot bills since 2004, including an expansion this year of a gun-rights law in Maine. But a split has started to materialize in GOP-controlled legislatures in some of the country's most gun-friendly states. Alabama, Georgia and Tennessee have refused to support such laws, proving receptive to a push by business groups in those states that have argued that the rules trample on their property rights.
Businesses in other states have sought to oppose parking-lot bills by emphasizing the liability dangers that such legislation could create, but those efforts have been less successful.
"We are opposed to guns people saying what we can do on our property," said Wayne K. Scharber, interim president of the Tennessee Chamber of Commerce & Industry. Executives at several large companies such as FedEx Corp. FDX -1.40%and Volkswagen VOW3.XE +0.39%also testified against the legislation in that state earlier this year, saying it would hamper efforts to ensure workplace safety.
The number of victims of workplace homicides aged 16 or older decreased by 57% from 1993 to 2011, the most recent year for which data is available, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Of 458 homicides in 2011, 358 were by shooting.
The NRA argues, however, that many employees, particularly those who work far from home, are vulnerable to violent crime on their way to and from work. If their employers ban guns, they spend the majority of their time unarmed.
Chris Patterson, owner of Hokes Bluff Auto Parts in Gadsden, Ala., said he supported the legislation out of concern for the safety of employees who travel long distances to work. "That's their privilege, being that their vehicle is their personal property," said Mr. Patterson.
But amid Republican divisions on the issue, the NRA, one of the nation's most powerful and well-funded lobbying groups, is having to rely on pro-gun Democrats to carry some of the bills. Democrats in Alabama have already refiled bills for the legislative session that begins in February, and lawmakers are expected to do the same in Tennessee. Democrats carrying the bills say they believe gun rights should trump employers' property rights.
"You're not violating a person's property rights just by keeping a gun locked in your vehicle," said Rep. Craig Ford, a Democrat who in October submitted a parking-lot bill in Alabama.
In addition to forming an alliance with Democrats, the NRA is targeting one-time allies who refuse to back such laws.
When Republican Debra Maggart, a staunch supporter of the gun group over her seven-year career in the Tennessee House of Representatives, decided with other members of her party to hold up a parking-lot bill introduced by Democratic Rep. Eddie Bass this year, she felt the consequences. The NRA spent tens of thousands of dollars on attack ads against Ms. Maggart, the only member of Republican leadership to face a primary challenge. One NRA flier declared: "Debra Maggart wants to shred your Second Amendment rights."
Ms. Maggart said she opposed the bill because it encompassed properties such as day-care centers and colleges. "They singled me out to bully our caucus into voting for a poorly written piece of legislation."
Ms. Maggart, a lifelong NRA member who owns a Remington shotgun, ultimately lost to the NRA-backed candidate by 971 votes in the primaries in August.
The NRA didn't respond to repeated calls seeking comment.
In Georgia, another Republican—state Senate Majority Leader Chip Rogers—faced consequences after his caucus rebuffed NRA efforts to provide more protections for gun owners by prohibiting employers from enforcing gun bans in parking lots.
The NRA gave Mr. Rogers only a "B" rating while giving his challenger in the primary race, Brandon Beach, the top rating for a candidate with no legislative record on gun issues. "My voting record on NRA issues is perfect for 10 years," said Mr. Rogers, who is a member of the NRA. He attributed his lowered rating to "tactics used by certain paid lobbyists" that have tarnished an "otherwise outstanding organization."
In Alabama, debate over the gun legislation has consumed more legislative energy with each year, lawmakers and lobbyists said. "The issue has split the Republican Party down here," said Michael Sullivan, an Alabama lobbyist who represents the NRA. Mr. Sullivan has pushed parking-lot legislation in the Alabama house and senate, but never both in the same year, he said. He has tried to persuade Republican lawmakers with the argument that state and federal government impose many workplace regulations on business owners, including anti-discrimination laws and safety regulations, and that the parking-lot legislation is no different.
"To say they can circumvent the Second Amendment right of gun owners is a very hollow argument," he said.
Mike Hubbard, the speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives, said he has asked the business community and NRA leadership in Washington to compromise on a bill.
Prospects for an agreement seem dim, however. "Republicans would rather side with big business," said Rep. Craig Ford of Alabama, adding that Ms. Maggart's defeat in Tennessee "set a precedent for what the NRA is going to do elsewhere."
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Second post of the day
Report: Security Clearances Revoked, Criminal Charges Pending For ATF Fast and Furious Officials
by Katie Pavlich
Washington D.C. - According to credible ATF sources, officials heavily involved in Operation Fast and Furious and named as partially responsible for the program's failure by Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz and the House Oversight Committee have been stripped of their government security clearances while some have been fired, demoted, and transferred. Criminal charges are also reportedly pending.
Former ATF Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix Field Division Bill Newell, former ATF Special Agent in Charge of Operations in the West Bill McMahon and former Assistant Special Agent in Charge of the Phoenix Field Division George Gillett have been fired while former Assistant Special Agent in Charge Jim Needles and Field Supervisor David Voth have been demoted. Hope McAllister, the lead case agent for Fast and Furious, has been put on leave and transferred out of Phoenix according to reports. McMahon and ATF came under heavy fire just a few months ago after it was revealed McMahon had been receiving ATF paid leave while pulling a six figure salary from J.P. Morgan, the same bank that owns the bureau's credit cards.
In addition to involvement in Operation Fast and Furious, the consequences for these officials come as a result of their handling of the Jay Dobyns' arson case. All are expected to receive full retirement benefits.
The ATF Public Affairs Division did not return calls for comment. The Department of Justice Inspector General's Office said they would get back to Townhall with a comment "sometime next week."
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Here's the video of what he said on the NFL halftime show:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/12/03/nbcs_bob_costas_goes_on_gun_control_rant_about_nfl_players_murder-suicide.html
"If Jovan Belcher didn’t possess a gun, he and Kasandra Perkins would both be alive today."
Costas' former broadcast partner disagrees.
(http://3-ps.googleusercontent.com/h/www.powerlineblog.com/admin/ed-assets/2012/12/265x397xKnife-Control-copy.jpg.pagespeed.ic.T77-4OpJo3.jpg)
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http://thedaleygator.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/illinois-anti-gun-legislator-arrested-for-wait-for-it-trying-to-bring-a-gun-on-a-plane/
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http://thedaleygator.wordpress.com/2012/12/06/illinois-anti-gun-legislator-arrested-for-wait-for-it-trying-to-bring-a-gun-on-a-plane/
Laws are for the little people, not loyal party members.
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http://www.scribd.com/doc/116435469/7th-Circuit-Court-overturns-Illinois-concealed-carry-ban
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:cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry: :cry:
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Culture of violence: Gun crime goes up by 89% in a decade
By James Slack
UPDATED: 03:42 EST, 27 October 2009
Comments (29) Share
..
Gun crime has increased five-fold in some parts of the UK
Gun crime has almost doubled since Labour came to power as a culture of extreme gang violence has taken hold.
The latest Government figures show that the total number of firearm offences in England and Wales has increased from 5,209 in 1998/99 to 9,865 last year - a rise of 89 per cent.
In some parts of the country, the number of offences has increased more than five-fold.
In eighteen police areas, gun crime at least doubled.
The statistic will fuel fears that the police are struggling to contain gang-related violence, in which the carrying of a firearm has become increasingly common place.
Last week, police in London revealed they had begun carrying out armed patrols on some streets.
The move means officers armed with sub-machine guns are engaged in routine policing for the first time.
Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Grayling, said last night: 'In areas dominated by gang culture, we're now seeing guns used to settle scores between rivals as well as turf wars between rival drug dealers.
'We need to redouble our efforts to deal with the challenge.'
He added: 'These figures are all the more alarming given that it is only a week since the Metropolitan Police said it was increasing regular armed patrols in some areas of the capital'.
More...The raid that rocked the Met: Why gun and drugs op on 6,717 safety deposit boxes could cost taxpayer a fortune
Motorcycle police with machine guns to patrol violent gang hot spots
The gun crime figures, which were obtained by the Tories from official Parliamentary answers, do not include air weapons.
But they provide the first regional breakdown of the increasing use of firearms.
Lancashire suffered the single largest rise in gun crime, with recorded offences increasing from 50 in 1998/99 to 349 in 2007/08, an increase of 598 per cent.
Armed: Officers engaged in routine policing are carrying sub-machine guns for the first time
Only four police forces - Cleveland-Humberside, Cambridgeshire and Sussex - recorded falls in gun crime.
The number of people injured or killed by guns, excluding air weapons, has increased from 864 in 1998/99 to a provisional figure of 1,760 in 2008/09, an increase of 104 per cent .
The figures follow a warning by Mr Grayling that U.S.-style gang culture has reached some parts of the UK.
In August, he made a controversial speech warning that a collapse of 'civilised life' had allowed a brutal drug and gun crime culture - like that of the U.S. TV show The Wire - to flourish in Britain.
The hit TV series tracks the nightmare of gangs and organised crime in inner city West Baltimore and the futile efforts of police to deal with them.
The Met's decision to employ armed officers on the streets has attracted criticism.
But the force, which has already begun the scheme, insists that the unprecedented tactic is a proportionate and temporary response to prevent armed gangs from controlling estates.
Trident poster campaign warning of dangers of young women and girls storing and transporting guns for others
Last month, police warned that teenage girls were now being dragged into the gun culture by hiding weapons for their boyfriends.
Police are targeting girls between 15 and 19 with an advertising blitz warning them that they can expect a five-year prison sentence if they are caught.
The number of women charged with firearms offences in London has increased six-fold in the past year - 12 have been charged since January.
Seven of them were teenagers, including a 16-year-old arrested after a 9mm Browning self-loading pistol was found in her bedroom.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1223193/Culture-violence-Gun-crime-goes-89-decade.html
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UK and China have strict gun laws! Connecticut has some of the strictest in the country: http://www.denverpost.com/commented/ci_22193747?source=commented-
If "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed", if that is a good idea - shouldn't that go through the amendment process, instead of congress, city hall or the Holder Justice Dept.??
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GM:
I don't know how you find pertinent pieces with such consistency, but once again you come through.
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I am a huge fan of gun control. The liberal party is going in the right direction.
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http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/335739/facts-about-mass-shootings-john-fund#
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http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/335739/facts-about-mass-shootings-john-fund#
Mass shootings are no more common than they have been in past decades, despite the impression given by the media.
In fact, the high point for mass killings in the U.S. was 1929, according to criminologist Grant Duwe of the Minnesota Department of Corrections.
Incidents of mass murder in the U.S. declined from 42 in the 1990s to 26 in the first decade of this century.
The chances of being killed in a mass shooting are about what they are for being struck by lightning.
**I did not know that. I thought it was mostly a modern pathology.
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Manchin Gives Boost to Gun-Restrictions Push.
Neil King Jr.
AP
U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, D-WV., thanks supporters at his campaign celebration in Fairmont, W. Va., Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2012. The call for some form of new gun limits got a boost Monday when Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a strong defenders of gun rights in Congress, said it was “time to move beyond rhetoric” and suggested he would be open to restrictions on assault rifles.
The comments by the Democratic senator and former governor, made on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” suggest even strong proponents of gun rights in Congress may begin to shift in their views after the deadly shooting rampage last week in Newtown, Conn.
Sen. Manchin got an “A” grade from the National Rifle Association and an endorsement in October from the group’s lobbying arm, which praised the senator as “committed to protecting the Right to Keep and Bear Arms guaranteed to all Americans.”
In the wake of the school shooting, Mr. Manchin said lawmakers “need to sit down and have a common-sense discussion and move in a reasonable way.”
He said that “everything has to be on the table,” and expressed astonishment that anyone would need to own the sort of assault rifle that the Connecticut shooter used.
“I don’t know anyone who in the hunting or sporting arena that goes out with an assault rifle. I don’t know anybody that needs 30 rounds in the clip to go hunting,” he said, adding that he had just returned from deer hunting with his family.
The senator said that as discussions begin in Congress, the NRA should also have a seat at the table.
The comments come as other Democratic senators say they plan to move quickly in January to introduce gun-related legislation.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.), speaking Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” said that on the first day of the new Congress next year, she would introduce legislation to ban assault weapons to, as she put it, get “weapons of war off our streets.”
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Breaking the Gun Control Stalemate
Most mass shootings involve mental illness. Legal reforms could protect society without trampling gun rights.
Article Comments (736) more in Opinion | Find New $LINKTEXTFIND$ ».
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By ROBERT LEIDER
In addition to causing horror and outrage, Friday's shooting deaths by Adam Lanza of 27 people, including 20 school children, in Sandy Hook, Conn., are already prompting calls for new gun laws. Supporters of gun control demand restrictions on ammunition magazines and bans on so-called assault weapons—semiautomatic versions of military firearms. Gun-rights advocates see another mass shooting in a "gun-free zone" and argue for expanding the places where individuals with valid permits may carry their weapons.
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A group shares a moment of silence at the entrance to Newton, Conn.'s Sandy Hook Elementary School, Dec. 15.
.Neither proposal will accomplish much—except to alienate the other side. Those in favor of gun rights feel that gun-control advocates are using the deranged actions of a few as a pretext to erode the right to bear arms. Because crimes committed with assault weapons are rare, they correctly note that such bans will have little or no impact on crime.
Gun-control advocates, meanwhile, are completely frustrated with Congress's unwillingness to strengthen gun laws, despite the mounting body count over the years. For them, an assault-weapons ban is a first step toward bringing some rationality to this country's gun policy.
The result is stalemate. Gun-control supporters have not passed a major federal law since the 10-year freeze on assault weapons in 1994. Gun-rights advocates have not significantly rolled back existing federal restrictions on firearms since 1986.
This stalemate can be broken—but only if both sides retreat slightly instead of standing their ground.
In addition to guns, the common denominator in most of these mass shootings has been mental illness. Seung-Hui Cho (Virginia Tech), Jared Lee Loughner (Tucson, Ariz.), James Eagen Holmes (in the Aurora, Colo. theater), and now Adam Lanza all had significant mental health problems. As the country turns its attention to overhauling its health-care delivery system, we must discuss improving access and delivery of mental health care to those who need it. As part of this conversation, we need to update federal firearm laws as they relate to persons with mental illness—laws that currently are primitive and rooted in stereotypes.
Federal law generally prohibits the possession or acquisition of a firearm by a person "who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or who has been committed to a mental institution." Putting aside the offensive label and legal jargon, in simple terms this means that a person is prohibited for life from possessing firearms if the person has ever been: involuntarily committed to a mental institution, or found by a court to be a danger to himself or others, found not guilty of a crime by reason of insanity or incompetent to stand trial, or unable to manage his own affairs. It does not matter whether the person currently has a mental illness.
Federal law is both under- and over-inclusive. It is under-inclusive because plenty of people with severe mental illnesses escape the ban on possessing firearms—provided, for example, they have managed not to be formally committed to a mental institution, or found by a court to be incompetent or insane. The ban is over-inclusive because many people recover from mental illness and lead healthy and productive lives. A single involuntary commitment for a severe eating disorder at age 20 will preclude a person from possessing a hunting rifle for the rest of his life.
There is plenty of room to compromise on this issue, and in a way that may produce meaningful results. Both sides should continue to work together to update the "National Instant Check System." Gun dealers use this system to vet gun purchasers before transferring firearms. Unfortunately, despite a 2007 federal law that was supposed to mandate better reporting by states (passed in response to the Virginia Tech massacre), many states lag behind in reporting individuals who are barred from possessing firearms due to mental illness.
The lack of proper reporting by Virginia led to Seung-Hui Cho's firearm purchase, even though a judge had found Cho a danger to himself—a finding that made him ineligible to purchase firearms under federal law. Colorado's James Eagen Holmes purchased his weapons legally because he had not been formally committed despite his mental health problems. Although the information remains preliminary, Adam Lanza's mother may not have secured her guns from her son despite his apparent history of behavioral problems.
Gun-rights advocates should support efforts to strengthen the prohibition on possessing firearms by those who have mental illness. Many people with severe mental illness are too dangerous to entrust with firearms—regardless of whether they have been formally labeled under the current law as ineligible.
Mechanisms can be put in place to identify such people—and restrict their access to firearms, including expanding background checks to private sales, i.e., between individuals who are not in the business of selling firearms. Gun owners (especially close relatives of such persons, such as Adam Lanza's mother) should also be obligated to store unused firearms safely so that potentially dangerous persons and minor children do not gain easy access to them.
As for gun-control advocates, they should show more flexibility about restoring firearm rights for people who may have suffered from mental illness in the past but are no longer a danger. Instead of lobbying to expand the number of people permanently ineligible to possess any type of firearm, gun-control advocates should accept a risk-based approach.
Some patients may be permanently impaired, making them too much of a risk ever to trust with firearms. Others should be temporarily barred or restricted. But efforts to restrict the types of firearms possessed by law-abiding, healthy adults are counterproductive. They unnecessarily repel gun-rights advocates at a time when what America needs most is a united front.
A risk-based approach reflective of a person's present danger would leave law-abiding, mentally stable citizens free to pursue their hobbies. It also would modernize federal firearm laws by expanding the ability to remove firearms from those too unstable to possess them. The stalemate can be broken, but only if both sides exit their trenches.
Mr. Leider is a fellow at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law.
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http://www.kgw.com/news/Clackamas-man-armed-confronts-mall-shooter-183593571.html
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http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/12/17/austin-gun-store-owner-offers-teachers-a-discount/
Austin Gun Store Owner Offers Teachers A Discount
AUSTIN (CBSDFW.COM) – An Austin-area gun store owner is joining the gun rights debate with a controversial offer for teachers in light of the tragic shooting in Connecticut.
Crocket Keller of Kellers Riverside Gun Store says if educators want to get a concealed handgun license, he’ll give them a discount.
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Don't let this get political...
Rahm Emanuel calls for nationwide assault-weapons ban
- of weapons already banned in Connecticut?
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/chi-emanuel-calls-for-assault-weapons-bans-in-illinois-nationwide-20121217,0,629612.story?track=rss
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http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/12/17/cnns_soledad_obrien_vs_gun_advocate_john_lott_on_gun_control.html
(Professional Journalist? Did she hear a word he said?)
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Mass killings on the decline
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/associated-press-story-believe-it-or-not-mass-killings-are-not-on-the-rise-they-are-on-the-decline/
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Make no question about it. Gun control is about government control of citizens, given away by people that believe the world can be a "safe" place.
Safety is an illusion. It simply doesn't exist.
Firearms are about being able to inflict violence in order to exert control. That is why the police and military have them.
Gun control advocates will throw every insult and excuse under the sun at people that see the wisdom in being able to protect oneself. They will say things like "real men don't need to hide behind a gun," but they expect their police to have them, "thirty round magazines aren't needed to hunt deer," and "guns kill."
These same liberals never want to confront the argument that many dictators around the world have killed the same people they were supposed to protect, with a body-count that tallies in the hundreds of millions of innocents killed. We have seen this same lesson repeated throughout history time and time again, yet they choose to ignore it.
Throughout the course of mankind, there has only ever been one pertinent question in regard to freedom: "Can my violence conquer your violence?"
Every shred of freedom that has ever existed has depended upon the ability to inflict violence if necessary. With examples like Stalin, Hitler, Kim il Sung, Kim Jong Il, Pol Pot, Mao, Castro, Amin, Pinochet, Taylor, and many, many others, we would be ill advised to forgo our inalienable right to defend ourselves from anyone, especially those that wield power simply because others "think" the world can be made into a safe place to live.
Gun control MUST be resisted at any and all costs! History has shown us as much.
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I truly fear the passions are present to drive the agenda that has long laid dormant waiting for the right tragedy to exploit. The only strategy that gun owners can have is somehow shape the debate toward a compromise that will leave gun rights intact while providing the public the belief that something substantative has been done. They were waiting for the right tragedy, and boy they found it. I fear a new AWB with no sunset provision is on the horizon, how soon depends on whether Republicans will cave in the house.
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Haven't seen you in these parts for quite some time SgtMac. Welcome back.
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http://gunssavelives.net/
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2011/crime-in-the-u.s.-2011/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-15
http://johnrlott.blogspot.com/
www.thevrwc.org/JohnLott.pdf
http://www.johnlott.org/
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The Bill of Rights Sentinel
Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership, Inc.
P.O. Box 270143
Hartford, WI 53027
Phone (262) 673-9745
Fax (262) 673-9746
Fall 1998 The Firearms Sentinel
How Gun Control "Worked" in Jamaica
© 1998 Tina Terry
Those who stridently and self-righteously lobby for the seizure of all guns by the government in America, particularly women like Sarah Brady, Barbra Streisand, Senators Diane Feinstein and Barbara Boxer and Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy, would do well to study the results of forced disarmament in other countries.
I have personally lived through a government-instigated disarmament of the general public, and its subsequent, disastrous consequences: From 1961 to 1977 my father (who is a white American, as are my mother, sister and I) was stationed with his family and business in Kingston, Jamaica.
Around 1972, the political situation in Jamaica had so seriously deteriorated that there were constant shootings and gun battles throughout the city of Kingston and in many of the outlying parishes (counties). In years past no one had even had to lock their doors, but now many people hardly dared venture out of their homes. This was especially true for white people, and even more especially for Americans, because of the real risk of being gunned down or kidnapped and held hostage by Jamaicans, who had become increasingly hostile towards whites and foreigners. My father took his life into his hands every morning simply driving to work. Going to the market or to do a simple errand was often a terrifying prospect. The open hatred and hostility which was directed at us seemed ready at any time to explode into violence, and indeed did so towards many people on many occasions, often with tragic or fatal results.
The Jamaican government decided that the only solution to this volatile situation was to declare martial law overnight, and to demand that all guns and bullets owned by anyone but the police and the military be turned into the police within 24 hours. The government decreed that anyone caught with even one bullet would be immediately, and without trial, incarcerated in what was essentially a barbed-wire enclosed concentration camp which had been speedily erected in the middle of Kingston. In true Orwellian fashion, the government referred to this camp as "the gun court."
My father and all of our American, Canadian, British and European friends, as well as middle class Jamaicans of all colors (locally referred to as "black," 'white," or "beige") knew that we were all natural targets of this kind of draconian government punishment. The relentless anti-American propaganda spewed forth by Michael Manley, Jamaica's admittedly pro-Castro Prime Minister, had resulted in the widespread hatred of Americans, British and Europeans by many Jamaicans. Racial hatred of whites and "beiges," as well as class hatred of anyone who appeared to have money or property, were rampant.
Consequently, we all dutifully and immediately disarmed ourselves, and handed our weapons in at the nearest police station. It was either that or be sent straight to the gun court. Even after we had disarmed ourselves, we lived in deathly fear that the cops, not known for their integrity, and well-known for their hatred of whites and Americans, would plant a gun or bullet on our property or persons.
So there we all were - government-disarmed, sitting-duck, law-abiding citizens and expatriates. Anyone can guess what happened next: the rampant and unfettered carnage began in earnest. Robberies, kidnappings, murders, burglaries, rapes - all committed by the vast populace of still-armed criminals. Doubtless the criminals were positively ecstatic that the government had been so helpful in creating all these juicy and utterly defenseless victims for their easy prey.
We've all heard the phrase, "When guns are outlawed only outlaws will have guns." I can personally confirm that this statement is absolutely and painfully true, because that is exactly how the Jamaican disarmament worked. At the time of the disarmament order, I was away at boarding school in the United States. However, I remember vividly coming home for the summer. I remember the muted but pervasive atmosphere of tension and terror which constantly permeated our household, affecting even our loyal black servants, who worked for and lived with us, and whom we took care of. (Practically every household in Jamaica, except the very poorest, had live-in servants. There was no welfare or public school in Jamaica, so middle-class families became completely responsible for the well-being of their servants, who were considered to be part of the family, including taking them to the doctor, and helping to educate their children.)
I remember lying awake in bed at night, clutching the handle of an ice-pick I had put under my pillow, and listening to the screaming of car-loads of Jamaican gangs going by our house, praying that they wouldn't pick our home to plunder. The favorite tactic was for a group of thugs to roar up to a house, pile out, batter down the door and rape, steal, kill, kidnap... whatever they felt like. They knew the inhabitants had been disarmed, and that they would be met with only fear and defenselessness. My pathetic ice-pick seemed incredibly puny, but it was all I could think of. Our family didn't even own a baseball bat. I remember lying awake thinking about how our beloved dogs were old and feeble, and that they could not protect us. And that I could not protect them either.
I can barely describe the abject terror and helplessness I felt as both a white American and as a young woman during that time. Jamaica was then about 90% black. Although I was (and still am) an American citizen, my family had lived in Kingston for almost 12 years when this situation occurred, and I considered Jamaica to be my real home. Many of my friends were Jamaican. My first serious boy-friend was Jamaican. For all its faults, I loved this beautiful, suffering island dearly, and I felt like a stranger when I was away at school in America, where I was always homesick for Jamaica.
When we had first moved to Jamaica in 1960, my sister and I (both blonde and obviously white) had been able to ride our horses up into the hills, and, whenever we encountered local Jamaicans, their salutation to us was open and friendly, as was ours to them. As things deteriorated into the reign of terror, and then the government instituted overnight citizen disarmament, when we ventured outside our home, we almost always encountered hate-filled stares and hostile hisses of, "Eh, white bitch! Eh, look 'ere, white bitch!" and other unprintable epithets.
Jamaica was, in the 1970's, a country with at least 50% illiteracy and an illegitimacy rate of over 50%. If a Jamaican girl wasn't pregnant by the age of 15 or 16, she was often derisively branded "a mule," since mules, the offspring of horses and donkeys, are almost always sterile. Being a woman, let alone a white woman, in such a climate, especially after the disarmament of the citizenry by the government, was one of the most terrifying experiences one can imagine.
At that time, I had never held or fired a gun. I had rarely ever even seen a gun. No one in my family had ever learned about, used or even talked about firearms, except my father, who had been in the U.S. army. In our social circle, guns were deemed "unseemly" and "inappropriate" for polite society, and especially for young ladies. I had never given much thought to any of the Bill of Rights, let alone the Second Amendment. Yet we Americans all knew the Bill of Rights did not protect us in Jamaica, just as it hadn't applied to us at our previous station in Singapore.
My dad had fought in World War II, however, and had brought back a Luger pistol, which he had taken with him to Jamaica when we moved there after having spent 6 years in Singapore. No law had prevented his bringing a gun to Jamaica in 1960. When my dad handed that pistol and all his bullets in to the police, I vaguely realized that he was no longer allowed by the government to protect my mom, my sister or me, or our household.
I was pretty confused at the time. Terrified of being kidnapped, raped, murdered, robbed, at the same time I was still mindlessly anti-gun, because the criminals all had guns, and the government had declared guns to be contraband, and we were all terrified of being hurt by bad guys with guns, all of which somehow meant that guns must be "dangerous" and "bad" and therefore should be banned, just as the Jamaican government had decreed. As white Americans, our status was that of permanent guests in a foreign and increasingly hostile country. In fact, after 6 years in Singapore, and 12 in Jamaica, we well knew how to strive to be "model guests," which meant that questioning or challenging the Jamaican government's authority was unthinkable -- even when such government authority decreed that we be made helpless. None of us had any illusions about any "rights" to defend ourselves. We might have been able to do so with the government's blessing in the good old days, before chaos and violence and racial hatred had taken over. But now it was different. Now we were white, visible, foreign, sitting ducks in a hostile black sea. And I was a white, visible, foreign, female sitting duck.
As obedient as I was to authority, I grasped that our household was defenseless, and that I as a woman was particularly defenseless. And I realized that, had my dad still had his pistol, I would have felt much safer. I even realized that I would be willing to pick up a gun if my life were threatened. For a person who claimed to be anti-gun, these feelings really confused me.
At least eleven friends and acquaintances of my family were raped, kidnapped, murdered or robbed within about a year after the disarmament, and I believe it is a miracle that we are all still alive. I am convinced that many of these people would not have been victims had they not been disarmed by the Jamaican government. It was tragically ironic that the government had sold this whole disarmament program to us with the promise that: "We're here to help you, and this is for your own good and safety."
Because of this horrid and indelible experience, and of my interest in and undying loyalty to the American Bill of Rights, I have made it my personal business to study the history of the Second Amendment. I have studied related topics, too, such as police responsibility to citizens. It is my belief that many people believe that disarmament is no big deal, because it is the job of the police to protect us. Particularly many women seem to believe this. The media and of government authorities continue to generate pervasive and corrosive propaganda aimed at creating a helpless and disarmed populace. I used to completely believe this propaganda, but I have learned the following realities:
1. The police have no legal duty to protect individual citizens, and cannot be held responsible if they fail to do so. Even if a citizen's 911 call gets through to the emergency center, the police can simply choose not to show up, and the citizen has no legal recourse against the police. The courts have repeatedly ruled on this. As the court wrote in Bowers v. DeVito, 686 F.2d 616 (7th Cir. 1982): "There is no constitutional right to be protected by the state against being murdered by criminals or madmen. It is monstrous if the state fails to protect its residents against such predators but does not violate the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, or, we suppose, any other provision of the Constitution. The Constitution is a charter of negative liberties: it tells the state to let the people alone; it does not require the federal government or the state to provide services, even so elementary a service as maintaining law and order." The U.S. Supreme Court, in MU 59 U.S. 396, ruled in a similar vein as far back as 1856.
2. The police carry guns primarily to defend themselves, not to protect us.
3. Because of items 1 and 2 above, we should all consider the police to be, essentially, historians. They show up after the crime has been committed and attempt to reconstruct and document the history of the crime. If the history is satisfactorily re-constructed, then the perpetrator is apprehended (if he can be found) and then (perhaps) prosecuted. This after-the-fact law enforcement does little good for the dead or wounded crime victims.
4. Women have a particular stake in preserving the right to bear arms. There is no way to describe the helplessness a woman feels when she is disarmed and made helpless by anyone. Add to that the rage she feels when the agency who is disarming her and leaving her at the mercy of rapists, murderers, goons and thugs, is a sanctimonious government telling her that it's "for her own good."
Although there are many serious issues in today's roiling political and social stew, I believe that preserving and restoring the Bill of Rights in general, and the Second Amendment in particular, is the most pivotal and basic issue to all Americans, and particularly female Americans, even if they don't yet know it. The consummate idiocy propounded by some folks (including some women) that the Second Amendment exists only to protect sportsmen's rights is particularly ridiculous relevant to women, most of whom don't hunt, and who care more about being able to get a decent hand-gun for self-protection than a hunting rifle to pursue deer or elk.
Anyone who thinks the Bill of Rights is either "out of date," "hokey" or "needs revising" - all of which I've heard from well-meaning but tragically ignorant and complacent Americans - should try living in a country which doesn't have one. I have been there and done that, and I don't want to go through it ever again - especially not in my own native nation. So I am dedicated to preventing today's government nanny from turning, as so often has occurred in history, into tomorrow's government despot.
Finally, I implore anyone reading this, particularly women, to likewise dedicate themselves to studying this issue carefully, and to likewise taking an active stance to preserve the Bill of Rights in general and the Second Amendment in particular.
Postscript: As of the latter part of August of this year (1998), it doesn't appear that the situation in Jamaica has changed much for the better. Many Jamaicans of all colors have immigrated to America to start businesses and to escape the hopelessness of the situation in their homeland. I recently spoke with a black Jamaican named Marcus, who has opened a wonderful Jamaican restaurant in Phoenix named Likkle Montego, where I can go and eat Jamaican food, and catch the latest news from my long-lost home. When asked how things are today in Kingston, Marcus simply shook his head: "Nottin' change attahl, y'know. Everyt'ing still de same. Crime is still bad, mon. Gov'ment still de same. T'ings dere is bad and terrible, mon. Bad and terrible."
And guns are still outlawed in Jamaica. Armed criminals still terrorize disarmed citizens, since still in Jamaica only outlaws (and the government) have guns.
Like the man said: Bad and terrible, mon. Bad and terrible.
Published originally in Fall 1998, pages 16-18 of The Firearms Sentinel, (now The Bill of RightsSentinel) the quarterly publication of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO), - P.O. Box 270143, Hartford, Wisconsin, 53027 - phone: 414-673-9746; web site: http://www.jpfo.org)
Please include the following republication information with any republishing:
Permission is given to republish this article, as long as none of it is changed, shortened or altered, the author and JPFO are given full credit in any such republishing, and this entire republishing message, including the below message concerning Dial 911 and Die, is included. Author may be reached by writing to: Tina Terry c/o JPFO, POB 270143, Hartford, WI, 53027, or by e-mailing to question.authority@hushmail.com
For anyone wanting to know more about what the law requires of the police in regard to protecting citizens, an excellent reference book is available on this topic: Dial 911 and Die, by Attorney Richard W. Stevens, available from Mazel Freedom Press, Inc., P.O. Box 270014, Hartford, WI, 53027. See also http://www.jpfo.org. Dial 911 and Die painstakingly examines the laws of every state regarding the obligation of the police to protect citizens, and the right of citizens to sue should police fail to protect them. James Bovard, nationally syndicated columnist and author of several books, including Lost Rights, Freedom in Chains and Feeling Your Pain, all published by St. Martin's Press, says this about Dial 911 and Die: "Anyone who reads Stevens' book will realize that their right to dial 911 when in imminent peril is often worth less than a plug quarter. There are many fine police officers in this country. However, both the law and the courts have consistently held that police need not respond to citizens in deadly peril. When the government fails to respond, it is scant consolation that a policeman arrives after the crime to chalk off the body." Richard Mack, former Sheriff of Graham County, Arizona, says, "How I wish the information in this book were not true. Nevertheless, this book speaks to the irrefutable truth: police do very little to prevent violent crime. We investigate crime after the fact. I applaud Richard Stevens for his tremendous research and his courage to tell this truth."
P.C.
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http://townhall.com/columnists/thomassowell/2012/12/18/invincible-ignorance-n1468784/page/full/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8RDWltHxRc&feature=player_embedded
http://www.policeone.com/active-shooter/articles/6067353-Newtown-shooting-Why-Minutemen-can-protect-against-active-shooters/
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I'll never forget doing a psychiatry rotation when we as medical students were invited to listen to an interview of a teenager with diagnosed boderline personality disorder.
It was quite chilling listening to him describing with glee in his eyes a scene from Rambo (I never could sit through the entire movie so I never verifed the scene) when Rambo holds his huge knife blade up to someone's throat and said, " I can kill you anytime I want".
This kid then stated, "I think THAT is the coolest thing I HAVE EVER SEEN!"
I don't want a ban a guns but if it does happen, damnit, we need to censure Hollywood and tax the shit out of the entertainment hypocrits who deliver huge quantities of endless violence, sadistic, gore and thrive quite well doing so.
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Chronicle • December 19, 2012
The Foundation
"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. ... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants." --Cesare Beccaria, quoted by Thomas Jefferson in Commonplace Book
Editorial Exegesis
"What happened in Newtown is not an occasion for a national political 'conversation.' It is an occasion to reflect on why we have political conversations at all. ... It is easy, and in moments of despair such as Friday quite understandable, to scream 'more' to gun control, 'more' to the morass of airport-style security that is spreading its way across our institutions, 'more' to the diagnosis and institutionalization of the mentally ill. But it is much harder to write the laws that would have guaranteed Adam Lanza could never find a gun, or enter a school by force, or go without what diagnosis, treatment, and supervision he might have needed. And hardest of all to write them in such a way that the republic we'd be left with would still look like America in the ways we value most. This is not so say such laws cannot or should not be written -- in the field of mental health, in particular, we think there are commonsense reforms that might make tragedies such as Newtown less likely -- but merely to caution humility and care in their crafting. The need for humility is especially acute in the case of gun control. The irreducible challenge the Second Amendment poses to gun restrictionists is that it does not bestow upon the people a right they previously lacked. It proscribes the government from infringing upon a right the people already have. It is not that the people are allowed to arm. It is that the government is disallowed to disarm them. The practical consequence of living for nearly two-and-a-half centuries under the almost universally benevolent protection of the Second Amendment is a society in which there are hundreds of millions of guns, in which 47 percent of families and nearly as many Democrats as Republicans own guns, and in which the dissent over the sacrosanctity of gun rights is heard largely because of the overrepresentation in the media of the coastal, urban Left. Those upset with the order of things are welcome to try, and doomed to fail, to repeal the Second Amendment via the constitutional process. But the guns of America aren't going anywhere any time soon, and generic calls to 'do something' -- even insofar as doing something is desirable -- must reckon with this fact." --National Review
"The key fallacy of so-called gun control laws is that such laws do not in fact control guns. They simply disarm law-abiding citizens, while people bent on violence find firearms readily available. If gun control zealots had any respect for facts, they would have discovered this long ago, because there have been too many factual studies over the years to leave any serious doubt about gun control laws being not merely futile but counterproductive. ... Yet many of the most zealous advocates of gun control laws, on both sides of the Atlantic, have also been advocates of leniency toward criminals. In Britain, such people have been so successful that legal gun ownership has been reduced almost to the vanishing point, while even most convicted felons in Britain are not put behind bars. ... Guns are not the problem. People are the problem -- including people who are determined to push gun control laws, either in ignorance of the facts or in defiance of the facts. There is innocent ignorance and there is invincible, dogmatic and self-righteous ignorance. Every tragic mass shooting seems to bring out examples of both among gun control advocates." --economist Thomas Sowell
"The rifle that Lanza used, a .223-caliber Bushmaster M4 carbine, is legal under Connecticut's 'assault weapon' ban, and the federal law used the same criteria. ... Any gun that can be used for self-defense or other legitimate purposes also can be used to murder people. Guns like Lanza's, modeled after the Colt AR-15, are among the most popular rifles in America, with an estimated 3.5 million sold since 1986. Only a tiny fraction of them are ever used in crimes. ... FBI numbers indicate that rifles of any kind (not just 'assault weapons') are used in less than 3 percent of murders. Even killers with multiple victims are much more likely to use ordinary handguns than 'assault weapons.' I use those scare quotes because the very term 'assault weapon' was invented by the anti-gun lobby as a way of blurring the distinction between semi-automatic firearms, which fire once per trigger pull, and machine guns such as the selective-fire assault rifles carried by soldiers." --columnist Jacob Sullum
"An industry devoted to serving the public's right to know gives twisted and evil men the means of becoming known. This problem is not obviously amenable to a solution, and it certainly is not amenable to a legal one. A regime of media regulation that would be both effective at preventing mass shootings and consistent with the American Constitution is no easier to imagine than a regime of gun regulation that would meet the same criteria." --Wall Street Journal columnist James Taranto
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1u0Byq5Qis&feature=youtube_gdata_player
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"Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." --Cesare Beccaria, On Crimes and Punishment, quoted by Thomas Jefferson in Commonplace Book
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M1u0Byq5Qis&feature=youtube_gdata_player
Wow! Very powerful.
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"[W]hereas, to preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them; nor does it follow from this, that all promiscuously must go into actual service on every occasion. The mind that aims at a select militia, must be influenced by a truly anti-republican principle; and when we see many men disposed to practice upon it, whenever they can prevail, no wonder true republicans are for carefully guarding against it." --Federal Farmer, Antifederalist Letter, No. 18, 1787
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http://wtop.com/256/3166925/Downloadable-guns-click-print-shoot
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Brilliant PC. Nice shot.
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Interesting that Mayor Bloomberg and Pres Obama have armed personnel surrounding them at all times. Why? Will the new Biden Commission bill end that? Why not?
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http://godfatherpolitics.com/8635/armed-citizen-saves-cops-life/
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http://pjmedia.com/blog/for-a-well-regulated-militia-what-firearms-gear-and-skills-should-you-own/
The brutal murders of 20 schoolchildren and six adults in Newtown, CT, stunned the world last week. A mentally ill young man apparently discovered that his long-suffering mother was going to attempt to have him committed to a psychiatric facility; he took out his rage upon her and then his former elementary school’s faculty, staff, and students.
It was senseless. It was barbaric. As parents, it is difficult for us to cope with the thought of having our youngest beloved ripped from us by any method, much less something as abhorrent as intentional, callous murder. No decent person could feel anything but anguish for their loss.
As Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel warned us, however, there is a mentality among the opportunistic political class that demands they “never let a serious crisis go to waste.”
While America recoiled, media vultures first pounced upon the survivors while they were still in shock. Since then, they have attacked America’s lawful gun owners, of which there are roughly 100 million.
We’ve heard calls for “gun control” in recent days, including specific demands for a ban on so-called “assault weapons.” Detractors question the need for weapons “designed for war” whose “only purpose is to kill”; they insist that you “don’t need an assault rifle” for hunting deer.
This is ignorance, and further, completely misses the point. To cite something I wrote earlier in the week:
The Second Amendment was not written to protect firearms designed for the taking of game, nor firearms designed for sport or individual personal defense, except that such a purpose proves to be militarily useful.
The explicit purpose that the Second Amendment was written was so that civilians that comprised the militia and alarm list would be armed with military-capable arms to depose would-be tyrants.
I’d amend that slightly to more accurately reflect that the intention was to arm citizens with contemporary arms of military utility. To assert that the right applied merely to flintlock muskets suggests that human rights are superseded by advances in technology, which is on its face a preposterous statement. Could anyone rationally argue that freedom of speech does not apply to modern forms of communication?
The Second Amendment was written to ensure citizens had contemporary rifles of military utility, and no single rifle more accurately fits that description today than AR-15 rifles patterned after the M-16 rifle and M-4 carbine that have been the U.S. military standard for half a century.
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Activists worried as groups say downloadable and printable guns possible
Published December 21, 2012
Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO – Downloading a gun's design plans to your computer, building it on a three-dimensional printer and firing it minutes later. No background checks, no questions asked.
Sound far-fetched? It's not. And that is disquieting for gun control advocates.
Rep. Steven Israel, D-NY, said the prospect of such guns becoming reality is reason enough for the renewal of the Undetectable Firearms Act, which makes illegal the building of guns that can't be detected by X-ray or metallic scanners. That law expires at the end of 2013.
At least one group, called Defense Distributed, is claiming to have created downloadable weapon parts that can be built using the increasingly popular new-generation of printer that utilizes plastics and other materials to create 3-D objects with moving parts. University of Texas law student Cody Wilson, the 24-year-old "Wiki Weapons" project leader, says the group last month test fired a semiautomatic AR-15 rifle -- one of the weapon types used in the Connecticut elementary school massacre -- which was built with some key parts created on a 3-D printer. The gun was fired six times before it broke.
Though no independent observer was there to verify the test, a short video clip showing the gun firing and breaking was posted to YouTube. Federal firearms regulators said they are aware of the technology's gun-making potential, but do not believe an entire weapon has yet been made.
"What's chilling is that last month a group of kids used a 3-D printer to actually manufacture (key parts) of the AR-15 and fire six bullets," Israel said. "When the (act) was last renewed in 2003, a gun made by a 3-D printer was like a Star Trek episode, but now we know it's real."
Even with gun control pushed to the top of the national political conversation, Wilson is steadfast about reaching his goal of making a fully downloadable gun. This weekend, he and his partners plan to print four new lower receivers -- the segment of the gun that includes the trigger, magazine and grip. He keeps three of these AR-15 parts -- one black, one white and another green -- in his tidy student apartment in Austin, TX.
While saddened by the Connecticut mass killing, Wilson said Thursday that protecting the right to bear arms by giving everyone access to guns is more important in the long term than a single horrible crime.
"Clearly what happened in Connecticut was a tragedy," he told The Associated Press. "Still, by affording the Second Amendment protection, we understand events like these will happen."
He said he discussed with his partners whether they should suspend their effort, and they all decided it was too important to stop.
Wilson acknowledged there still are many technical hurdles to creating a complete gun from a 3-D printer and provided no estimate on when his goal might be reached.
Special Agent Helen Dunkel of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, which helps enforce gun laws, said the agency is familiar with Wilson's project. She didn't offer an opinion but noted there is nothing illegal about making many types of guns at home. Exceptions would be high-powered weapons like machine guns and those not detectable by airport scanners.
Advances in 3-D printing technology are fueling Wilson's goal. The printers were developed for the automobile, aerospace and other industries to create product prototypes from the same hard plastics used in toys like Legos. Hobbyists mainly use the printers to design Christmas ornaments, toys and gadget accessories.
Prices on the machines have fallen as the consumer market grows, leading to a surge in interest from people in the so-called "maker" scene. Low-end 3-D printers can now be purchased online from between $1,500-$4,000. The more high-end printers needed to make gun parts are still priced from $10,000 and up.
Stratasys Ltd. Of Eden Prairie, Minn., makes 3-D printers. Shane Glenn, director of investor relations, said gun-making was never something envisioned for the machines.
"The gun issue is something that the 3-D printing industry will have to address going forward," Glenn said.
Right now, most people interested in 3-D printing rent time on one. There are a number of businesses and co-ops in major cities that allow access to the machines for a nominal fee. At San Francisco's TechShop, which features a 3-D printer for its members, "assembling firearms is strictly prohibited and our staff is trained on that policy," company spokeswoman Carrie Motamedi said.
Wilson acknowledged his idea has met resistance from those active in 3-D printing.
"The early adopters of 3-D printing technology seem to be an educated, more liberal group who were against firearms to begin with," he said. Wilson said some are worried the gun project might spur regulations that will hurt or curtail their projects.
Early schematics created by Wilson's group were posted on Thingiverse, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based website that serves as a hub for 3-D printing aficionados. After the school shooting, Thingiverse took down Wilson's links.
The site's spokeswoman Jenifer Howard said its focus is "to empower the creative process and make things for good." Howard said Thingiverse's terms of service state that users cannot use the site to share content that contributes to the creation of weapons.
Wilson said the group has already posted the links on its own website.
Paul Saffo, a Silicon Valley technology forecaster who teaches at Stanford University's engineering school, said Defense Distributed's work carries on a long tradition of tech geeks using innovation to make a political point, in this case on gun control and Second Amendment freedoms.
"If you want to get people's attention in Washington, you say something. If you want to do it in Silicon Valley, you make something," Saffo said.
He said the technology exists now for a highly motivated group to make a plastic gun on a 3-D printer that could avoid airport scanners. But the equipment is still too expensive for most people.
"Nobody right now needs to worry about the bright teenager making a gun on a printer in their bedroom," he said.
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/12/21/development-future-downloadable-guns-worries-activists/
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10-43: All Units...
with Doug Wyllie, PoliceOne Editor in Chief
Active shooters in schools: The enemy is denial
Preventing juvenile mass murder in American schools is the job of police officers, school teachers, and concerned parents
Editor's Note: Visit the Newtown Shooting special coverage page for more perspectives on active shooters in schools, including my article "Active shooters in schools: Should teachers be trained by police firearms instructors?" Have a perspective on this issue? Leave it in the comments below.
“How many kids have been killed by school fire in all of North America in the past 50 years? Kids killed... school fire... North America... 50 years... How many? Zero. That’s right. Not one single kid has been killed by school fire anywhere in North America in the past half a century. Now, how many kids have been killed by school violence?”
So began an extraordinary daylong seminar presented by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, a Pulitzer Prize nominated author, West Point psychology professor, and without a doubt the world’s foremost expert on human aggression and violence. The event, hosted by the California Peace Officers Association, was held in the auditorium of a very large community church about 30 miles from San Francisco, and was attended by more than 250 police officers from around the region.
Grossman’s talk spanned myriad topics of vital importance to law enforcement, such as the use of autogenic breathing, surviving gunshot wounds, dealing with survivor guilt following a gun battle, and others. But violence among and against children was how the day began, and so I'll focus on that issue here.
Lt. Col. Dave Grossman, pictured with PoliceOne Senior Editor Doug Wyllie, spoke before a crowd of more than 250 police officers in an event hosted by the California Peace Officers Association. (PoliceOne image)
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“In 1999,” Grossman said, “school violence claimed what at the time was an all time record number of kids’ lives. In that year there were 35 dead and a quarter of a million serious injuries due to violence in the school. How many killed by fire that year? Zero. But we hear people say, ‘That’s the year Columbine happened, that’s an anomaly.’ Well, in 2004 we had a new all time record — 48 dead in the schools from violence. How many killed by fire that year? Zero. Let’s assign some grades. Put your teacher hat on and give out some grades. What kind of grade do you give the firefighter for keeping kids safe? An ‘A,’ right? Reluctantly, reluctantly, the cops give the firefighters an ‘A,’ right? Danged firefighters, they sleep ‘till they’re hungry and eat ‘till they’re tired. What grade do we get for keeping the kids safe from violence? Come on, what’s our grade? Needs improvement, right?”
Johnny Firefighter, A+ Student
“Why can’t we be like little Johnny Firefighter?” Grossman asked as he prowled the stage. “He’s our A+ student!”
He paused, briefly, and answered with a voice that blew through the hall like thunder, “Denial, denial, denial!”
Grossman commanded, “Look up at the ceiling! See all those sprinklers up there? They’re hard to spot — they’re painted black — but they’re there. While you’re looking, look at the material the ceiling is made of. You know that that stuff was selected because it’s fire-retardant. Hooah? Now look over there above the door — you see that fire exit sign? That’s not just any fire exit sign — that’s a ‘battery-backup-when-the-world-ends-it-will-still-be-lit’ fire exit sign. Hooah?”
Walking from the stage toward a nearby fire exit and exterior wall, Grossman slammed the palm of his hand against the wall and exclaimed, “Look at these wall boards! They were chosen because they’re what?! Fireproof or fire retardant, hooah? There is not one stinking thing in this room that will burn!”
Pointing around the room as he spoke, Grossman continued, “But you’ve still got those fire sprinklers, those fire exit signs, fire hydrants outside, and fire trucks nearby! Are these fire guys crazy? Are these fire guys paranoid? No! This fire guy is our A+ student! Because this fire guy has redundant, overlapping layers of protection, not a single kid has been killed by school fire in the last 50 years!
“But you try to prepare for violence — the thing much more likely to kill our kids in schools, the thing hundreds of times more likely to kill our kids in schools — and people think you’re paranoid. They think you’re crazy. ...They’re in denial.”
Teaching the Teachers
The challenge for law enforcement agencies and officers, then, is to overcome not only the attacks taking place in schools, but to first overcome the denial in the minds of mayors, city councils, school administrators, and parents. Grossman said that agencies and officers, although facing an uphill slog against the denial of the general public, must diligently work toward increasing understanding among the sheep that the wolves are coming for their children. Police officers must train and drill with teachers, not only so responding officers are intimately familiar with the facilities, but so that teachers know what they can do in the event of an attack.
“Come with me to the library at Columbine High School,” Grossman said. “The teacher in the library at Columbine High School spent her professional lifetime preparing for a fire, and we can all agree if there had been a fire in that library, that teacher would have instinctively, reflexively known what to do.
"But the thing most likely to kill her kids — the thing hundreds of times more likely to kill her kids, the teacher didn’t have a clue what to do. She should have put those kids in the librarian’s office but she didn’t know that. So she did the worst thing possible — she tried to secure her kids in an un-securable location. She told the kids to hide in the library — a library that has plate glass windows for walls. It’s an aquarium, it’s a fish bowl. She told the kids to hide in a fishbowl. What did those killers see? They saw targets. They saw fish in a fish bowl.”
Grossman said that if the school administrators at Columbine had spent a fraction of the money they’d spent preparing for fire doing lockdown drills and talking with local law enforcers about the violent dangers they face, the outcome that day may have been different.
Rhetorically he asked the assembled cops, “If somebody had spent five minutes telling that teacher what to do, do you think lives would have been saved at Columbine?”
Arming Campus Cops is Elementary
Nearly two years ago, I wrote an article called Arming campus cops is elementary. Not surprisingly, Grossman agrees with that hypothesis.
“Never call an unarmed man ‘security’,” Grossman said.
“Call him ‘run-like-hell-when-the-man-with-the-gun-shows-up’ but never call an unarmed man security.
"Imagine if someone said, ‘I want a trained fire professional on site. I want a fire hat, I want a fire uniform, I want a fire badge. But! No fire extinguishers in this building. No fire hoses. The hat, the badge, the uniform — that will keep us safe — but we have no need for fire extinguishers.’ Well, that would be insane. It is equally insane, delusional, legally liable, to say, ‘I want a trained security professional on site. I want a security hat, I want a security uniform, and I want a security badge, but I don’t want a gun.’ It’s not the hat, the uniform, or the badge. It’s the tools in the hands of a trained professional that keeps us safe.
“Our problem is not money,” said Grossman. “It is denial.”
Grossman said (and most cops agree) that many of the most important things we can do to protect our kids would cost us nothing or next-to-nothing.
Grossman’s Five D’s
Let’s contemplate the following outline and summary of Dave Grossman’s “Five D’s.” While you do, I encourage you to add in the comments area below your suggestions to address, and expand upon, these ideas.
1. Denial — Denial is the enemy and it has no survival value, said Grossman.
2. Deter — Put police officers in schools, because with just one officer assigned to a school, the probability of a mass murder in that school drops to almost zero
3. Detect — We’re talking about plain old fashioned police work here. The ultimate achievement for law enforcement is the crime that didn’t happen, so giving teachers and administrators regular access to cops is paramount.
4. Delay — Various simple mechanisms can be used by teachers and cops to put time and distance between the killers and the kids.
a. Ensure that the school/classroom have just a single point of entry. Simply locking the back door helps create a hard target.
b. Conduct your active shooter drills within (and in partnership with) the schools in your city so teachers know how to respond, and know what it looks like when you do your response.
5. Destroy — Police officers and agencies should consider the following:
a. Carry off duty. No one would tell a firefighter who has a fire extinguisher in his trunk that he’s crazy or paranoid.
b. Equip every cop in America with a patrol rifle. One chief of police, upon getting rifles for all his officers once said, “If an active killer strikes in my town, the response time will be measured in feet per second.”
c. Put smoke grenades in the trunk of every cop car in America. Any infantryman who needs to attack across open terrain or perform a rescue under fire deploys a smoke grenade. A fire extinguisher will do a decent job in some cases, but a smoke grenade is designed to perform the function.
d. Have a “go-to-war bag” filled with lots of loaded magazines and supplies for tactical combat casualty care.
e. Use helicopters. Somewhere in your county you probably have one or more of the following: medevac, media, private, national guard, coast guard rotors.
f. Employ the crew-served, continuous-feed, weapon you already have available to you (a firehouse) by integrating the fire service into your active shooter training. It is virtually impossible for a killer to put well-placed shots on target while also being blasted with water at 300 pounds per square inch.
g. Armed citizens can help. Think United 93. Whatever your personal take on gun control, it is all but certain that a killer set on killing is more likely to attack a target where the citizens are unarmed, rather than one where they are likely to encounter an armed citizen response.
Coming Soon: External Threats
Today we must not only prepare for juvenile mass murder, something that had never happened in human history until only recently, but we also must prepare for the external threat. Islamist fanatics have slaughtered children in their own religion — they have killed wantonly, mercilessly, and without regard for repercussion or regret of any kind. What do you think they’d think of killing our kids?
“Eight years ago they came and killed 3,000 of our citizens. Do we know what they’re going to do next? No! But one thing they’ve done in every country they’ve messed with is killing kids in schools,” Grossman said.
The latest al Qaeda charter states that “children are noble targets” and Osama bin Laden himself has said that “Russia is a preview for what we will do to America.”
What happened in Russia that we need to be concerned with in this context? In the town of Beslan on September 1, 2004 — the very day on which children across that country merrily make their return to school after the long summer break — radical Islamist terrorists from Chechnya took more than 1,000 teachers, mothers, and children hostage. When the three-day siege was over, more than 300 hostages had been killed, more than half of whom were children.
“If I could tackle every American and make them read one book to help them understand the terrorist’s plan, it would be Terror at Beslan by John Giduck. Beslan was just a dress rehearsal for what they’re planning to do to the United States,” he said.
Consider this: There are almost a half a million school buses in America. It would require almost every enlisted person and every officer in the entire United States Army to put just one armed guard on every school bus in the country.
As a country and as a culture, the level of protection Americans afford our kids against violence is nothing near what we do to protect them from fire. Grossman is correct: Denial is the enemy. We must prepare for violence like the firefighter prepares for fire. And we must do that today.
Hooah, Colonel!
About the author
Doug Wyllie is Editor in Chief of PoliceOne, responsible for setting the editorial direction of the website and managing the planned editorial features by our roster of expert writers. In addition to his editorial and managerial responsibilities, Doug has authored more than 600 feature articles and tactical tips on a wide range of topics and trends that affect the law enforcement community. Doug is a member of International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association (ILEETA), and an Associate Member of the California Peace Officers' Association. He is also a member of the Public Safety Writers Association, and is a two-time (2011 and 2012) Western Publishing Association "Maggie Award" Finalist in the category of Best Regularly Featured Digital Edition Column. Even in his "spare" time, he is active in his support for the law enforcement community, contributing his time and talents toward police-related charitable events as well as participating in force-on-force training, search-and-rescue training, and other scenario-based training designed to prepare cops for the fight they face every day on the street.
P.C.
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Even Pravda on the Beach admits, on page 28, that mass shootings are not increasing.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-mass-shootings-common-20121218,0,6511082.story
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(http://cdn.pjmedia.com/instapundit/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/gunsmakeuslesssafe-600x357.png)
The USSS has other things to do.
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Does Piers Morgan’s bodyguard carry a gun?
9:56 AM 12/04/2012
Jim Treacher
You might not know who Piers Morgan is, because he’s on CNN. (If you don’t know what CNN is, Google it.) He’s a British guy who hosts a show on American cable news because Larry King finally realized he was 150 years old and retired, and CNN had absolutely no idea what to do with his time slot. So far, the experiment has been a miserable ratings failure, but I’m sure Jeff Zucker doesn’t mind.
Anyway, Morgan is really excited about that football player killing his girlfriend and then himself, because it’s an excuse for Morgan to tell all us stupid Americans how backwards and pointless our Second Amendment is.
Quite incredible that Bob Costas makes an impassioned plea for less handguns, and Americans go crazy with indignation. He’s 100% right.
— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) December 3, 2012
Piers Morgan ✔
@piersmorgan
Now getting bombarded with furious tweets informing me that MORE handguns in America would mean FEWER gun murders. They mean it, too.
3 Dec 12 Reply
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Piers Morgan ✔
@piersmorgan
The 2nd amendment was devised with muskets in mind, not high-powered handguns & assault rifles. Fact.
3 Dec 12 Reply
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Piers Morgan ✔
@piersmorgan
I know their sole purpose is to kill > RT @Beth_C97: Seriously, @piersmorgan you know probably nothing about guns.
4 Dec 12 Reply
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So, I ask again: Does Piers Morgan’s bodyguard carry a gun? If so, why?
I hereby call on Mr. Morgan to publicly announce that at no point in his day is he guarded by anyone with a gun. And if he’s serious about this, he needs to pressure everyone else at CNN to make the same pledge. If he wants to get rid of guns, he needs to set an example for all of us dumb Yanks.
Or does the Second Amendment apply only to him?
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/12/04/does-piers-morgans-bodyguard-carry-a-gun/
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMg0FQS6Fqo&feature=youtube_gdata_player
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http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/25/us/new-york-gun-permit-map/index.html
I just read through some of the comments, its pretty sad of course. It kind of make me wonder if the uneducated will eventually turn their eye to Martial Arts \ Artist. I know it probably wont happen but these people are afraid of legal gun owners and some people seem to consider them more of a threat than illegal gun owners.
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CNN) -- An interactive map showing the names and addresses of all handgun permit holders in New York's Westchester and Rockland counties has infuriated many readers since it was posted Saturday on a newspaper's website.
The map, published by The Journal News, allows readers to zoom in on red dots that indicate which residents are licensed to own pistols or revolvers. It had prompted more than 1,700 comments as of Wednesday morning.
Blue dots indicate permit holders who "have purchased a firearm or updated the information on a permit in the past five years."
"So should we start wearing yellow Stars of David so the general public can be aware of who we are??" one commenter wrote.
"This is crazy!" wrote another.
Fiery debate over guns in America
Gun control and the 2nd Amendment
Fareed's Take: Gun control Opinion: Guns endanger more than they protect
Some of those responding threatened to cancel their subscriptions or boycott the publication.
"I hope you lose readers now," one wrote.
The paper's publisher, Janet Hasson, president of the Journal News Media Group, defended the decision in a statement Wednesday.
"One of our roles is to report publicly available information on timely issues, even when unpopular. We knew publication of the database (as well as the accompanying article providing context) would be controversial, but we felt sharing information about gun permits in our area was important in the aftermath of the Newtown shootings," she said.
The newspaper also said it had wanted to publish even more information.
"We were surprised when we weren't able to obtain information on what kinds and how many weapons people in our market own," the newspaper said in a statement.
County clerks' offices had told the paper that "the public does not have the right to see specific permits an individual has been issued, the types of handguns a person possesses or the number of guns he or she owns," the statement said. "Had we been able to obtain those records, we would have published them."
The map came about in the wake of the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, The Journal News said.
"In the past week, conversation on our opinion pages and on our website, LoHud.com, has been keenly focused on gun control," the newspaper's editor and vice president, CynDee Royle, said in a statement Tuesday.
The names and addresses of the two counties' permit-holding residents were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The website notes that the map does not indicate whether the residents own handguns, only that they are legally able to, and that the data do not pertain to rifles or shotguns, which can be bought without a permit.
NRA doubles down: New gun laws won't work
Still, hundreds of residents were shocked to see their information posted without their being notified. Some said the map would prompt burglaries because thieves are now aware of where weapons might be found.
"Now everyone knows where the legal guns are kept, a valuable piece of information for criminals," a commenter wrote. "Why don't you do something helpful, like trying to find out where the illegal guns are kept?"
A great majority of readers commenting at CNN.com were opposed to the newspaper's move, but some defended it on the grounds that the public has a right to know who might own weapons.
One commenter wrote: "If you're a gun owner it's a matter of public record. If you're embarrassed by your gun, get rid of it. I have a car and a house -- they're no secret. People contact me all the time trying to sell me stuff. I don't expect a right to privacy for these things."
Another wrote, "Every gun manufactured, transferred, and sold should be on the internet, all on one website, including date of purchase, current owner, stored location, and gun license number."
Several Twitter commenters also came out in support in tweets to CNN:
-- "The gun permit maps are an effective way of showing how horribly widespread gun ownership is."
-- "please thank them. This could be a turning point. I do not want my daughter playing in a house with guns."
-- "LOVE the Gun License map! Excellent information to anyone concerned with who they live around!"
The Journal News argued that residents have a right to access information regarding weapon holders in Westchester and Rockland communities.
"Our readers are understandably interested to know about guns in their neighborhoods," Royle said in her statement.
In an article about the uproar, The Journal News says many of the thousands of people who "have taken to their computers and phones in rage" live outside the counties covered by the map.
In searching through hundreds of comments listed on the website, CNN did not immediately see any in support of the newspaper's decision to publish the interactive map.
The Journal News said it published an article in 2006 that received similar responses, but this time around, social media spread the story far and wide.
In 2007, roanoke.com, the website of The Roanoke Times, published a list of Virginians licensed to carry concealed weapons, and then deleted it the next day. The paper explained that the list, originally published as part of an opinion column, was removed "out of concern that it might include names that should not have been made public."
The Poynter Institute, a school for journalists, notes that some other news agencies have published various types of databases as well.
"Publishing gun owners' names makes them targets for theft or public ridicule. It is journalistic arrogance to abuse public record privilege, just as it is to air 911 calls for no reason or to publish the home addresses of police or judges without cause," Al Tompkins, a Poynter senior faculty member, said in a statement Wednesday. "Unwarranted publishing of the names of permitted owners just encourages gun owners to skip the permitting."
The paper said Royle was not available for interviews Wednesday.
Little common ground between pro- and anti-gun forces
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http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/blog-turns-tables-on-gun-map-paper-85520.html?ml=la
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Joyce Lee Malcolm: Two Cautionary Tales of Gun Control
After a school massacre, the U.K. banned handguns in 1998. A decade later, handgun crime had doubled..
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By JOYCE LEE MALCOLM
Americans are determined that massacres such as happened in Newtown, Conn., never happen again. But how? Many advocate more effective treatment of mentally-ill people or armed protection in so-called gun-free zones. Many others demand stricter control of firearms.
We aren't alone in facing this problem. Great Britain and Australia, for example, suffered mass shootings in the 1980s and 1990s. Both countries had very stringent gun laws when they occurred. Nevertheless, both decided that even stricter control of guns was the answer. Their experiences can be instructive.
In 1987, Michael Ryan went on a shooting spree in his small town of Hungerford, England, killing 16 people (including his mother) and wounding another 14 before shooting himself. Since the public was unarmed—as were the police—Ryan wandered the streets for eight hours with two semiautomatic rifles and a handgun before anyone with a firearm was able to come to the rescue.
Nine years later, in March 1996, Thomas Hamilton, a man known to be mentally unstable, walked into a primary school in the Scottish town of Dunblane and shot 16 young children and their teacher. He wounded 10 other children and three other teachers before taking his own life.
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David Klein
.Since 1920, anyone in Britain wanting a handgun had to obtain a certificate from his local police stating he was fit to own a weapon and had good reason to have one. Over the years, the definition of "good reason" gradually narrowed. By 1969, self-defense was never a good reason for a permit.
After Hungerford, the British government banned semiautomatic rifles and brought shotguns—the last type of firearm that could be purchased with a simple show of fitness—under controls similar to those in place for pistols and rifles. Magazines were limited to two shells with a third in the chamber.
Dunblane had a more dramatic impact. Hamilton had a firearm certificate, although according to the rules he should not have been granted one. A media frenzy coupled with an emotional campaign by parents of Dunblane resulted in the Firearms Act of 1998, which instituted a nearly complete ban on handguns. Owners of pistols were required to turn them in. The penalty for illegal possession of a pistol is up to 10 years in prison.
The results have not been what proponents of the act wanted. Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time. Moreover, another massacre occurred in June 2010. Derrick Bird, a taxi driver in Cumbria, shot his brother and a colleague then drove off through rural villages killing 12 people and injuring 11 more before killing himself.
Meanwhile, law-abiding citizens who have come into the possession of a firearm, even accidentally, have been harshly treated. In 2009 a former soldier, Paul Clarke, found a bag in his garden containing a shotgun. He brought it to the police station and was immediately handcuffed and charged with possession of the gun. At his trial the judge noted: "In law there is no dispute that Mr. Clarke has no defence to this charge. The intention of anybody possessing a firearm is irrelevant." Mr. Clarke was sentenced to five years in prison. A public outcry eventually won his release.
In November of this year, Danny Nightingale, member of a British special forces unit in Iraq and Afghanistan, was sentenced to 18 months in military prison for possession of a pistol and ammunition. Sgt. Nightingale was given the Glock pistol as a gift by Iraqi forces he had been training. It was packed up with his possessions and returned to him by colleagues in Iraq after he left the country to organize a funeral for two close friends killed in action. Mr. Nightingale pleaded guilty to avoid a five-year sentence and was in prison until an appeal and public outcry freed him on Nov. 29.
***
Six weeks after the Dunblane massacre in 1996, Martin Bryant, an Australian with a lifelong history of violence, attacked tourists at a Port Arthur prison site in Tasmania with two semiautomatic rifles. He killed 35 people and wounded 21 others.
At the time, Australia's guns laws were stricter than the United Kingdom's. In lieu of the requirement in Britain that an applicant for permission to purchase a gun have a "good reason," Australia required a "genuine reason." Hunting and protecting crops from feral animals were genuine reasons—personal protection wasn't.
With new Prime Minister John Howard in the lead, Australia passed the National Firearms Agreement, banning all semiautomatic rifles and semiautomatic and pump-action shotguns and imposing a more restrictive licensing system on other firearms. The government also launched a forced buyback scheme to remove thousands of firearms from private hands. Between Oct. 1, 1996, and Sept. 30, 1997, the government purchased and destroyed more than 631,000 of the banned guns at a cost of $500 million.
To what end? While there has been much controversy over the result of the law and buyback, Peter Reuter and Jenny Mouzos, in a 2003 study published by the Brookings Institution, found homicides "continued a modest decline" since 1997. They concluded that the impact of the National Firearms Agreement was "relatively small," with the daily rate of firearms homicides declining 3.2%.
According to their study, the use of handguns rather than long guns (rifles and shotguns) went up sharply, but only one out of 117 gun homicides in the two years following the 1996 National Firearms Agreement used a registered gun. Suicides with firearms went down but suicides by other means went up. They reported "a modest reduction in the severity" of massacres (four or more indiscriminate homicides) in the five years since the government weapons buyback. These involved knives, gas and arson rather than firearms.
In 2008, the Australian Institute of Criminology reported a decrease of 9% in homicides and a one-third decrease in armed robbery since the 1990s, but an increase of over 40% in assaults and 20% in sexual assaults.
What to conclude? Strict gun laws in Great Britain and Australia haven't made their people noticeably safer, nor have they prevented massacres. The two major countries held up as models for the U.S. don't provide much evidence that strict gun laws will solve our problems.
Ms. Malcolm, a professor of law at George Mason University Law School, is the author of several books including "Guns and Violence: The English Experience," (Harvard, 2002).
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http://m.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/21/1172661/-How-to-Ban-Guns-A-step-by-step-long-term-process
How to Ban Guns: A step by step, long term process
by sporks Dec 21, 2012 3:20am PST
It's nice that we're finally talking about gun control. It's very sad that it took such a terrible tragedy to talk about it, but I'm glad the conversation is happening. I hear a lot about assault weapon and large magazine bans, and whilst I'm supportive of that, it won't solve the problem. The vast majority of firearm deaths occur with handguns. Only about 5% of people killed by guns are killed by guns which would be banned in any foreseeable AWB.
Furthermore, there seems to be no talk about high powered rifles. What gun nuts don't want you to know is many target and hunting rifles are chambered in the same round (.223/5.56mm) that Lanza's assault weapon was. Even more guns are chambered for more powerful rounds, like the .30-06 or (my personal "favorite") 7.62x54R. Even a .22, the smallest round manufactured on a large scale, can kill easily. In fact, some say the .22 kills more people than any other round out there.
Again, I like that we're talking about assault weapons, machine guns, and high capacity clips. But it only takes one bullet out of one gun to kill a person. Remember the beltway sniper back in 2002? The one who killed a dozen odd people? Even though he used a bushmaster assault rifle, he only fired one round at a time before moving. He could have used literally any rifle sold in the US for his attacks.
The only way we can truly be safe and prevent further gun violence is to ban civilian ownership of all guns. That means everything. No pistols, no revolvers, no semiautomatic or automatic rifles. No bolt action. No breaking actions or falling blocks. Nothing. This is the only thing that we can possibly do to keep our children safe from both mass murder and common street violence.
Unfortunately, right now we can't. The political will is there, but the institutions are not. Honestly, this is a good thing. If we passed a law tomorrow banning all firearms, we would have massive noncompliance. What we need to do is establish the regulatory and informational institutions first. This is how we do it:
The very first thing we need is national registry. We need to know where the guns are, and who has them. Canada has a national firearms registry. We need to copy their model. We need a law demanding all firearms be registered to a national database. We need to know who has them and where they are. We need to make this as easy as possible for gun owners. The federal government provides the money and technical expertise, and the State police carry it out. Like a funded mandate. Most firearms already have a serial number on them, so it would really be a matter of taking the information already on the ATF form 4473 and putting it in a national database. I think about 6 months should be enough time.
Along with this, make private sales illegal. When a firearm is transferred, make it law that the registration must be updated. Again, make it super easy to do. Perhaps over, the internet. Dealers can log in by their FFLs and update the registration. Additionally, new guns are to be registered by the manufacturer. The object here is to create a clear paper trail from factory to distributor to dealer to owner. We want to encourage as much voluntary compliance as possible.
Now we get down to it. The registration period has passed. Now we have criminals without registered guns running around. Probably kooky types that "lost" them on a boat or something. So remember those ATF form 4473s? Those record every firearm sale, going back twenty years. And those have to be surrendered to the ATF on demand. So, we get those logbooks, and cross reference the names and addresses with the new national registry. Since most NRA types own two or (many) more guns, we can get an idea of who properly registered their guns and who didn't. For example, if we have a guy who purchased 6 guns over the course of 10 years, but only registered two of them, that raises a red flag.
Now, maybe he sold them or they got lost or something. But it gives us a good target for investigation. A nice visit by the ATF or state police to find out if he really does still have those guns would be certainly warranted. It's certainly not perfect. People may have gotten guns from parents or family, and not registered them. Perfect is the enemy of pretty darn good, as they say. This exercise isn't so much to track down every gun ever sold; the main idea would be to profile and investigate people that may not have registered their guns. As an example, I'm not so concerned with the guy who bought that bolt action Mauser a decade ago and doesn't have anything registered to his name. It's a pretty good possibility that he sold it, gave it away, or got rid of it somehow. And even if he didn't, that guy is not who I'm concerned with. I'm concerned that other guy who bought a half dozen assault weapons, registered two hunting rifles, and belongs to the NRA/GOA. He's the guy who warrants a raid.
So registration is the first step. Now that the vast majority are registered, we can do what we will. One good first step would be to close the registry to new registrations. This would, in effect, prevent new guns from being made or imported. This would put the murder machine corporations out of business for good, and cut the money supply to the NRA/GOA. As money dries up, the political capital needed for new controls will be greatly reduced.
There are a few other things I would suggest. I would suggest an immediate, national ban on concealed carry. A ban on internet sales of guns and ammunition is a no brainer. Microstamping would also be a very good thing. Even if the only thing it does is drive up costs, it could still lead to crimes being solved. I'm willing to try every advantage we can get.
A national Firearms Owner Identification Card might be good, but I'm not sure if it's necessary if we have a national database. We should also insist on comprehensive insurance and mandatory gun safes, subject to random, spot checks by local and federal law enforcement.
We must make guns expensive and unpopular, just like cigarettes. A nationwide, antigun campaign paid for by a per gun yearly tax paid by owners, dealers, and manufacturers would work well in this regard. We should also segway into an anti-hunting campaign, like those in the UK. By making hunting expensive and unpopular, we can make the transition to a gun free society much less of a headache for us.
I know this seems harsh, but this is the only way we can be truly safe. I don't want my kids being shot at by a deranged NRA member. I'm sure you don't either. So lets stop looking for short term solutions and start looking long term. Registration is the first step.
Tell Pres. Obama and democrats in congress to demand mandatory, comprehensive gun registration. It's the only way we can ban guns with any effectiveness.
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http://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/assault-weapons
Stopping the spread of deadly assault weapons
Stay informed
In January, Senator Feinstein will introduce a bill to stop the sale, transfer, importation and manufacturing of military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition feeding devices.
To receive updates on this legislation, click here.
Press releases
Feinstein to Introduce Updated Assault Weapons Bill in New Congress, December 17, 2012
Feinstein Statement on Connecticut School Shooting, December 14, 2012
Summary of 2013 legislation
Following is a summary of the 2013 legislation:
Bans the sale, transfer, importation, or manufacturing of:
120 specifically-named firearms;
Certain other semiautomatic rifles, handguns, shotguns that can accept a detachable magazine and have one or more military characteristics; and
Semiautomatic rifles and handguns with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds.
Strengthens the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban and various state bans by:
Moving from a 2-characteristic test to a 1-characteristic test;
Eliminating the easy-to-remove bayonet mounts and flash suppressors from the characteristics test; and
Banning firearms with “thumbhole stocks” and “bullet buttons” to address attempts to “work around” prior bans.
Bans large-capacity ammunition feeding devices capable of accepting more than 10 rounds.
Protects legitimate hunters and the rights of existing gun owners by:
Grandfathering weapons legally possessed on the date of enactment;
Exempting over 900 specifically-named weapons used for hunting or sporting purposes; and
Exempting antique, manually-operated, and permanently disabled weapons.
Requires that grandfathered weapons be registered under the National Firearms Act, to include:
Background check of owner and any transferee;
Type and serial number of the firearm;
Positive identification, including photograph and fingerprint;
Certification from local law enforcement of identity and that possession would not violate State or local law; and
Dedicated funding for ATF to implement registration.
A pdf of the bill summary is available here.
Effectiveness of 1994-2004 Assault Weapons Ban
Following are studies that have been conducted on the 1994-2004 Assault Weapons Ban:
In a Department of Justice study (pdf), Jeffrey Roth and Christopher Koper find that the 1994 Assault Weapons Ban was responsible for a 6.7 percent decrease in total gun murders, holding all other factors equal. They write: “Assault weapons are disproportionately involved in murders with multiple victims, multiple wounds per victim, and police officers as victims.”
Original source (page 2): Jeffrey A. Roth & Christopher S. Koper, “Impact Evaluation of the Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act of 1994,” The Urban Institute (March 1997).
In a University of Pennsylvania study (pdf), Christopher Koper reports that the use of assault weapons in crime declined by more than two-thirds by about nine years after 1994 Assault Weapons Ban took effect.
Original source (page 46): Christopher S. Koper, “An Updated Assessment of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban: Impacts on Gun Markets and Gun Violence, 1994-2003” (June 2004).
In a Washington Post story, reporters David Fallis and James Grimaldi write that the percentage of firearms seized by police in Virginia with high-capacity magazines dropped significantly during the Assault Weapons Ban. That figure has doubled since the ban expired.
Original source: In Virginia, high-yield clip seizures rise. By David S. Fallis and James V. Grimaldi, Washington Post.
In a letter to the editor in the American Journal of Public Health (pdf), Douglas Weil and Rebecca Knox explain that when Maryland imposed a more stringent ban on assault pistols and high-capacity magazines in 1994, it led to a 55 percent drop in assault pistols recovered by the Baltimore Police Department.
Original source (pages 297-298): Douglas S. Weil & Rebecca C. Knox, "Letter to the Editor, The Maryland Ban on the Sale of Assault Pistols and High-Capacity Magazines: Estimating the Impact in Baltimore," 87 American Journal of Public Health 2, Feb. 1997, at 297-98.
A recent study by the Violence Policy Center finds that between 2005 and 2007, one in four law enforcement officers slain in the line of duty was killed with an assault weapon.
Original source (pages 6-7): Violence Policy Center, "Target: Law Enforcement—Assault Weapons in the News," (Feb. 2010).
A report by the Police Executive Research Forum finds that 37 percent of police departments reported seeing a noticeable increase in criminals’ use of assault weapons since the Assault Weapons Ban expired.
Original source (page 2): Police Executive Research Forum, "Guns and Crime: Breaking New Ground by Focusing on the Local Impact," (May 2010).
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440+ School Age Children Shot in Gun-Controlled Chicago
(http://cdn.breitbart.com/mediaserver/Breitbart/Big-Government/2012/08/04/rahm-thumbs-up.jpg)
by AWR Hawkins 24 Dec 2012
Chicago has been a shining city on a hill for gun-grabbers for decades. In fact, so extreme is the gun control in the Windy City that prior to the 2010 Supreme Court decision in McDonald v. Chicago, you couldn't even have a gun in your own house with which to defend yourself or your family.
In other words, a Chicago home owner was like a public school teacher -- he had to sit defenseless with his fingers crossed and simply hope the criminals didn't target his house on a given day or night.
Even now, after the McDonald decision, you have jump through myriad hoops to get a gun. And, although they are working on it, concealed carry has yet to be legalized.
So in a gun-control-utopia such as this, you'd expect school-age children to be safe from all harm, if you buy into the theories of Sens. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY).
Yet the truth is more than 440 school-age children have been shot in Chicago in 2012. This is not to say that 440 school-age children died, simply that more than 440 school-age children were at least wounded. The number of school-age children killed is reported at approximately 60.
These numbers are well above those for the 2011-2012 school year, in which 319 Chicago students were wounded and another 24 were killed.
The bottom line: It seems that denying the free exercise of the right to keep and bear arms to law-abiding citizens not only does not curtail the actions of criminals, but actually emboldens them.
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http://www.examiner.com/article/anti-gun-crusader-michael-moore-s-bodyguard-carries-a-gun
Anti-gun crusader Michael Moore has an armed bodyguard
Connecticut School ShootingDecember 22, 2012
By: Victor MedinaSubscribe
On Friday, filmmaker Michael Moore used his Twitter account to criticize the National Rifle Association's "National School Safety Shield" program. While Moore has a problem with an armed guard protecting every school, he doesn't seem to have a problem with an armed guard protecting him.
The filmmaker, who rose to prominence with documentaries like the anti-gun Bowling for Columbine, often travels with a bodyguard, which is reasonable, considering his level of celebrity. That decision, however, led to an awkward situation in 2005 when his bodyguard was detained at JFK Airport in New York - for carrying a gun.
The story has again resurfaced as the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut has made gun control an issue again. Moore himself stepped into the fray by posting various anti-gun messages on Twitter. "Armed guards in schools? Hmmmm... Oh! That's why the 2 armed guards that were at Columbine HS that day were able to prevent the 15 deaths?" he tweeted Friday. On Tuesday, Moore tweeted the following statement: "Guns are for hunters...and cowards."
There have been those who claim the 2005 story is untrue, but they are only partially correct. Initial reports that the bodyguard was arrested were not correct. The bodyguard was not arrested, and did declare to a screener that he had an unloaded handgun, which he had a permit for. However, he refused to check it into luggage, and insisted he be allowed to carry it with him on the plane. After being briefly detained to argue his case, the bodyguard was reportedly not allowed to carry it on his person. The fact that he does carry a gun to protect Moore is still true.
It isn't the first time an anti-gun liberal has been caught being a hypocrite. California Senator Diane Feinstein has been critical of those advocating for increased concealed handgun access, but she admitted to having a concealed handgun permit in 1995.
After saying the National Rifle Association doesn't care about children killed by guns, but only for "white, Republican life," it was revealed that Rosie O'Donnell's bodyguard carries a gun. She angrily blamed gun rights supporters for spreading the truth only to shame her.
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http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/55534344-78/class-utah-concealed-teachers.html.csp?page=2
More than 150 Utah teachers, school workers attend concealed weapons class
Connecticut shooting » Class more popular now than ever.
By lisa schencker
| The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published 42 minutes ago • Updated 1 minute ago
More than 150 Utah teachers and school workers took time off from their winter breaks Thursday to attend a free class on how to carry concealed weapons and respond to mass violence such as the recent shooting in a Connecticut school.
It’s a course that’s been offered to Utah educators for more than a decade, but Thursday it attracted about 10 times as many people as usual, said Clark Aposhian, an instructor with Fairwarning Training and a chairman of the Utah Shooting Sports Council, which hosted the class with OPSGEAR. Aposhian said organizers had to turn away about 40 or 50 people for lack of space.
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He credited the course’s sudden popularity to increased media attention on the class and its timing, coming just weeks after a gunman’s massacre at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school killed 20 children and six adults.
Aposhian said parents and school employees in Utah and across the nation felt "utterly helpless" when they saw the tragedy that unfolded in Newtown.
"We want to give school employees one more option to protect themselves and their students," Aposhian said of the class, which went over the basics of how to respond to an attack, carrying concealed weapons and applying for concealed weapon permits.
"You’re never going to get all the mentally and criminally insane people off the streets, and you’re never going to be able to disarm all the criminals, so logically what do you do?"
Utah is one of two states that already allows concealed weapons permit holders to carry firearms on school grounds. The other state is Kansas.
The class came about a week after the National Rifle Association called for armed police officers in every school, and at least one Utah lawmaker, Rep. Curt Oda, R-Clearfield, asserted that more armed teachers would make classrooms safer.
Those positions have garnered much controversy in Utah and across the country. The nation’s two largest teachers unions, the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, have said that arming educators won’t improve school safety and that "guns have no place in our schools." The groups have instead called for a renewed focus on bullying prevention, mental health services and gun control.
But educators who packed a conference room at the Maverik Center on Thursday had a decidedly different view.
"When you are in a building full of kids all day anything can happen," said Kelli Stebbins, a technology teacher at East Midvale Elementary. She said it’s not realistic to think that a attack like the one in Connecticut couldn’t happen here.
"It can happen, and it will happen, and I’d rather be on the prepared side than the not-prepared side," Stebbins said.
Richard Summers, a sixth-grade teacher at Copper Hills Elementary in Magna, said after the shooting some of his students asked him what he would have done in that situation. He said he would have given his life to help them. Several of those who died in Connecticut were educators protecting their students.
"Certainly the incident in Connecticut," Summers said, "makes us want to be aware and know what to do."
Rachel Bateman, a fourth-grade teacher at Early Light Academy in South Jordan, said she also attended the class because she wanted to be prepared. Part of the course included instruction in awareness and other ways to respond to classroom attacks, such as gouging an attacker’s eyes, choking an attacker and how to hide.
Bateman said she hadn’t yet decided Thursday whether she would want to carry a gun in the classroom.
"I want to be able to protect my kids, my students, and people in the building, but on the other hand, different variables come with concealing a weapon," Bateman said, noting she might be worried, for example, that a student would feel a gun while hugging her.
Teachers weren’t the only ones to take advantage of the free class Thursday. Administrators, bus drivers, secretaries and others were also among those taking notes.
"If anything were to happen, I’ve got a large responsibility," said Scott Huntington, a custodian at Shelley Elementary in American Fork. "I don’t have just a single classroom. I’ve got the whole school to think about."
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Alpine School District bus driver Greg Lewis said he’s always wanted a permit, and he’d likely carry a gun on his bus if district policy allows it.
And Julie Wootan, a front office receptionist at Paradigm High in South Jordan, said she’s also been wanting a permit for a while and the events of this month encouraged her to finally get it.
"We’re the first place where they would walk by," Wootan said of her position in the front office. She said school employees should always be allowed to protect those around them.
Those who led the course Thursday emphasized that whether those in attendance pursued concealed carry permits or not, just by attending they were becoming more aware of how to protect themselves.
"This is definitely a message that you in the education program are definitely sending to not only our legislature, to our local government," Bill Pedersen, a board member with the Utah Shooting Sports Council, told those in attendance, "but to all those around the states."
Aposhian said the class will likely be offered again during the next school break.
lschencker@sltrib.com
Twitter: @lschencker
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http://foxnewsinsider.com/2012/12/20/texas-town-allows-teachers-to-carry-concealed-guns-superintendent-defends-policy-in-wake-of-sandy-hook-shooting/
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http://www.nationalreview.com/blogs/print/336529
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Gallup Poll: NRA Way More Popular Than the Media (2 threads this could go in.)
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*DC police say NBC was denied permission to show high-capacity magazine, launch probe (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/12/26/dc-police-investigating-nbc-gregory-over-purported-high-capacity-magazine-on/?test=latestnews)*
Published December 26, 2012
FoxNews.com
Washington – As District of Columbia police investigate NBC News' David Gregory for apparently holding up a restricted high-capacity magazine on his weekly Sunday show, the police department claims NBC was told in advance that the prop was "not permissible."
Gun laws in the nation's capital generally restrict the possession of high-capacity magazines, regardless of whether the device is attached to a firearm. Gregory, on "Meet the Press," held up what he described as one of those magazines during an interview with National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre.
That incident has since led to an investigation. And Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman Gwendolyn Crump claimed Wednesday that NBC sought permission ahead of the show, and was denied.
"NBC contacted (the Metropolitan Police Department) inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment. NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazine is not permissible and their request was denied. This matter is currently being investigated," Crump said in a written statement.
While interviewing LaPierre for Sunday's program, Gregory held an object, apparently as a prop to make a point, and said it was a magazine that could hold 30 rounds.
"Here is a magazine for ammunition that carries 30 bullets. Now, isn't it possible if we got rid of these, if we replaced them and said, `Well, you can only have a magazine that carries five bullets or ten bullets,' isn't it just possible that we could reduce the carnage in a situation like Newtown?"' Gregory asked, referring to the December 14 mass shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut.
LaPierre replied: "I don't believe that's going to make one difference. There are so many different ways to evade that even if you had that" ban.
"Meet the Press" is generally taped in Washington.
An NBC News spokeswoman declined to comment Wednesday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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The typical chimp at your local zoo knows more about quantum theory than your typical professional journalist/gun control advocate knows about guns (Yes, I repeat myself).
Bullets are the projectiles that actually exit the muzzle of the weapon (The pointy end, for you professional journalists out there). The individual unfired round of ammunition that includes the bullet, casing, powder charge and primer is more properly referred to as a cartridge.
Speaking of chimps.....
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSPrHl_6bO4[/youtube]
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What happens when the people allow themselves to be disarmed:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=vAU9AJfttls
Beginning after the credits (approx 45:00) the interviews are well worth the viewing as well.
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http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2012/12/can-gun-control-make-it-through-congress.html
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Haven't seen you in these parts for quite some time SgtMac. Welcome back.
Thanks, glad to be back. Hope to see you out in Fayetteville in March.....God willing and the creek doesn't rise.
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It is going to be an awesome Camp. I am really looking forward to this opportunity to raise my firearms level. Hope you make it!
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"[T]he people are not to be disarmed of their weapons. They are left in full possession of them." --Zacharia Johnson, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788
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I'll never forget doing a psychiatry rotation when we as medical students were invited to listen to an interview of a teenager with diagnosed boderline personality disorder.
It was quite chilling listening to him describing with glee in his eyes a scene from Rambo (I never could sit through the entire movie so I never verifed the scene) when Rambo holds his huge knife blade up to someone's throat and said, " I can kill you anytime I want".
This kid then stated, "I think THAT is the coolest thing I HAVE EVER SEEN!"
I don't want a ban a guns but if it does happen, damnit, we need to censure Hollywood and tax the shit out of the entertainment hypocrits who deliver huge quantities of endless violence, sadistic, gore and thrive quite well doing so.
Borderline? Odd diagnosis for someone who sounds clearly Anti-Social. Borderlines are usually self-destructive, usually female, hallmarked by drug abuse, promiscuity and instable interpersonal relationships jumping from idealization to devaluation......Their violence is usually self-directed OR turned directly toward the person closest to them.......Now if he was self-cutting after his boyfriend left him, i'd think it was BPD. But that's just from the small description of his statement, that may be no indicative of his overall behavior.......But the statement is definitely not prototypical BPD.......That's best summed up with the classic 'I HATE YOU.....Don't leave me!'.
As far as Hollywood is concerned, it's hard to take the idea that violent media makes people violent when violent crime and homicide rates have been on the decline for over 25 years to the point that they are now nationwide below Pre-1960 levels. Logic would dictate MORE violent media, MORE violent video games, would lead to MORE violent crime, if there is a causal link........but the opposite seems to be the trend.
That also goes for guns and gun laws.......With MORE guns, MORE guns being carried, MORE shall-issue CCW laws, MORE CCW holders.........Homicides have been on the decline in the US nationwide.........Even mass shootings have seen a slight decline over the last 40 years.
These mass shootings are likely tied to another psychiatric phenomenon, however, and that is Aspergers syndrome/Autism spectrum disorder..........Which seems to be a consistent diagnosis among the vast majority of these shooters, more than a coincidence, but given the statistical anamoly of these events, one should not throw them on to the multitudes of those with Aspergers who are violent to no one. It does seem statistically significant, however.
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/new-video-mocks-celebrities-demand-a-plan-gun-control-psa/
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/new-video-mocks-celebrities-demand-a-plan-gun-control-psa/
The left, including the celebrity left, aren't anti-gun, they are against the non-elites having guns.
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...given the statistical anamoly of these events, one should not throw them on to the multitudes of those with Aspergers who are violent to no one...
Cherry picking my excerpt for agreement. ) Disorders and syndromes like Asperger's are defined so vaguely or broadly (MHO) that drawing a connection to mass shooting I agree is a "statistical anomaly". I find the so called personality disorders to be more in the direction of Psychopath, but only extreme cases.
Much unknown and much to be learned about mental health. Far more helpful than studying guns.
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http://www.scribd.com/doc/30546045/1/I-INTRODUCTION
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:roll: :roll: :x
http://www.examiner.com/article/des-moines-columnist-calls-for-repeal-of-second-amendment-death-of-gun-owners
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.
:roll: :roll: :x
http://www.examiner.com/article/des-moines-columnist-calls-for-repeal-of-second-amendment-death-of-gun-owners
The left's mask is slipping and we see what exists underneath
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"Some have made the argument, bordering on the frivolous, that only those arms in existence in the 18th century are protected by the Second Amendment. We do not interpret constitutional rights that way. Just as the First Amendment protects modern forms of communications, e.g., Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, 521 U.S. 844, 849, 117 S.Ct. 2329, 138 L.Ed.2d 874 (1997), and the Fourth Amendment applies to modern forms of search, e.g., Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27, 35-36, 121 S.Ct. 2038, 150 L.Ed.2d 94 (2001), the Second Amendment extends, 2792*2792 prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding." D.C. v. Heller, 128 S. Ct. 2783 (2008) at 2791-2792.
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"That the people have a right to keep and bear arms; that a well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people trained to arms, is the proper, natural, and safe defence of a free state; that standing armies, in time of peace, are dangerous to liberty, and therefore ought to be avoided, as far as the circumstances and protection of the community will admit; and that, in all cases, the military should be under strict subordination to, and governed by, the civil power." --Recommended Bill of Rights from the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1778
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Now it is the advertisers and readers of a New York newspaper who are caught in the crossfire, after its controversial decision to publish the names and addresses of gun owners in its community.
The initial story by the Westchester Journal News on Dec. 22 prompted a bitter backlash by gun advocates, who published the names and addresses of some of the newspaper’s staff. Since then, supporters and critics of the newspaper's controversial stand have been taking potshots at each other in a near-daily exchange that has drawn national attention.
"The Journal News has made no credible case, nor offered any valid reason, for releasing the data."
- New York State Rifle & Pistol Association
“The data posted also includes active and retired police officers, judges, battered and stalked individuals, FBI agents, and more," the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association said in a release that marked the latest escalation. "The Journal News has made no credible case, nor offered any valid reason, for releasing the data, and it serves no investigative or journalistic purpose. It merely invites harassment and burglary.”
The association is calling for a possible boycott of the Gannett-owned newspaper's national advertisers. But the paper isn't just worried about suffering economic harm. On Dec. 28, it began posting armed guards outside one of its offices, according to local police, shortly after a blogger published the names and home addresses of the 50 journalists who worked on the interactive map showing who owned legally-registered guns.
And the battle shows no signs of subsiding. Hackers claim to have broken into the Journal News' online subscriber database and say they're circulating passwords and user information for 10,000 account holders. They have also made online threats to publish the home addresses and phone numbers of executives at the newspaper’s major advertisers.
One New York lawmaker said he plans to introduce legislation making it illegal to obtain gun permit holders’ information through Freedom of Information Act requests, which is how the Journal News obtained the permit holders’ information used to create their controversial online database.
“The Journal News has placed the lives of these folks at risk by creating a virtual shopping list for criminals and nut jobs,” said Republican State Sen. Greg Ball, in announcing his intent.
There is one apparent beneficiary of all the controversy: The paper's competitor, the Rockland County Times, claimed in an article to have seen an "influx of new subscribers who stated they canceled their subscription to the Journal News due to the gun story.”
Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/01/02/newspaper-decision-to-out-gun-owners-sparks-all-out-battle/#ixzz2GqZRfAQ2
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Not that I am advocating the illegal activity, just posting as possible confirmation to the article I just posted.
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http://www.google.com/search?q=Hackers+claim+to+have+broken+into+the+%22Journal+News%22+&hl=en&gbv=2&gs_l=heirloom-hp.12...578.578.0.1641.1.1.0.0.0.0.109.109.0j1.1.0...0.0...1c.1.vKtmQQuU4H8&oq=Hackers+claim+to+have+broken+into+the+%22Journal+News%22+
Group claims hacked subscriber database of NY newspaper which published gun permit map
Posted by William A. Jacobson Tuesday, January 1, 2013 at 8:05pm
The Lower Hudson Journal News, a Gannett newspaper, caused controversy when it published a map of names and addresses of gun permit holders, and announced that it planned to do so again. The plan for further publication may be in doubt as a neighboring county just announced it was denying the Journal News access to its gun permit database.
In protest, bloggers posted the home addresses and telephone numbers of Journal News editors and staff. Also cirulating was the personal and family contact information for the Chairwoman of Gannett.
The Journal News has hired armed guards for its offices, according to Politico, because of threats.
This privacy war has just escalated dramatically, as a group of self-described ”2nd Amendment supporters” claims it has downloaded and posted on the web what it describes as the “user” database of the Journal News.
Twitter users claim the list is being widely circulated. Although the links are easily available, I’m not including links to any of the websites containing the alleged database for the same reason I did not provide the personal information sent to me about Gannett’s Chairwoman.
At least two tweets (only one of which is imaged here) disclosing this development were copied to the Journal News account, @lohud:
Twice today I reached out to the Publisher and Editor of the Journal News, asking whether they were aware of this, whether they verified the information, what they were doing about it, and what their position was. This obviously is important because the users and subscribers of the Journal News website may not be aware that their personal information has been compromised.
Despite being told by a person in the newsroom that the Editor was checking her emails, I have heard nothing from the Journal News.
+870
47 Comments 2nd Amendment
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Who Pays for the Right to Bear Arms?
By DAVID COLE
Pravda on the Hudson
Published: January 1, 2013
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IN the days following the Newtown massacre the nation’s newspapers were filled with heart-wrenching pictures of the innocent victims. The slaughter was unimaginably shocking. But the broader tragedy of gun violence is felt mostly not in leafy suburbs, but in America’s inner cities.
The right to bear arms typically invokes the romantic image of a cowboy toting a rifle on the plains. In modern-day America, though, the more realistic picture is that of a young black man gunned down in his prime in a dark alley. When we celebrate gun rights, we all too often ignore their disproportionate racial burdens. Any effort to address gun violence must focus on the inner city.
Last year Chicago had some 500 homicides, 87 percent of them gun-related. In the city’s public schools, 319 students were shot in the 2011-12 school year, 24 of them fatally. African-Americans are 33 percent of the Chicago population, but about 70 percent of the murder victims.
The same is true in other cities. In 2011, 80 percent of the 324 people killed in Philadelphia were killed by guns, and three-quarters of the victims were black.
Racial disparities in gun violence far outstrip those in almost any other area of life. Black unemployment is double that for whites, as is black infant mortality. But young black men die of gun homicide at a rate eight times that of young white men. Could it be that the laxity of the nation’s gun laws is tolerated because its deadly costs are borne by the segregated black and Latino populations of North Philadelphia and Chicago’s South Side?
The history of gun regulation is inextricably interwoven with race. Some of the nation’s most stringent gun laws emerged in the South after the Civil War, as Southern whites feared what newly freed slaves might do if armed. At the same time, Northerners saw the freed slaves’ right to bear arms as critical to protecting them from the Ku Klux Klan.
In the 1960s, Huey P. Newton and the Black Panther Party made the gun a central symbol of black power, claiming that “the gun is the only thing that will free us.” On May 2, 1967, taking advantage of California’s lax gun laws, several Panthers marched through the State Capitol in Sacramento carrying raised and loaded weapons, generating widespread news coverage.
The police could do nothing, as the Panthers broke no laws. But three months later, Gov. Ronald Reagan signed into law one of the strictest gun control laws in the country.
The urban riots of the late 1960s — combined with rising crime rates and a string of high-profile assassinations — spurred Congress to pass federal gun control laws, banning interstate commerce in guns except for federally licensed dealers and collectors; prohibiting sales to felons, the mentally ill, substance abusers and minors; and expanding licensing requirements.
These laws contain large loopholes, however, and are plainly inadequate to deal with the increased number and lethality of modern weapons. But as long as gun violence largely targets young black men in urban ghettos, the nation seems indifferent. At Newtown, the often all-too-invisible costs of the right to bear arms were made starkly visible — precisely because these weren’t the usual victims. The nation took note, and President Obama has promised reform, though he has not yet made a specific proposal.
Gun rights defenders argue that gun laws don’t reduce violence, noting that many cities with high gun violence already have strict gun laws. But this ignores the ease with which urban residents can evade local laws by obtaining guns from dealers outside their cities or states. Effective gun regulation requires a nationally coordinated response.
A cynic might propose resurrecting the Black Panthers to heighten white anxiety as the swiftest route to breaking the logjam on gun reform. I hope we are better than that. If the nation were to view the everyday tragedies that befall young black and Latino men in the inner cities with the same sympathy that it has shown for the Newtown victims, there would be a groundswell of support not just for gun law reform, but for much broader measures.
If we are to reduce the inequitable costs of gun rights, it’s not enough to tighten licensing requirements, expand background checks to private gun sales or ban assault weapons. In addition to such national measures, meaningful reform must include initiatives directed to where gun violence is worst: the inner cities. Aggressive interventions by police and social workers focused on gang gun violence, coupled with economic investment, better schools and more after-school and job training programs, are all necessary if we are to reduce the violence that gun rights entail.
To tweak the National Rifle Association’s refrain, “guns don’t kill people; indifference to poverty kills people.” We can’t in good conscience keep making young black men pay the cost of our right to bear arms.
David Cole is a professor of constitutional law and criminal justice at the Georgetown University Law Center.
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second post:
following up on Robert's post: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/newspaper-that-published-the-names-addresses-of-gun-owners-hires-armed-guards/
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I deleted the link and posted it in the following thread
Knife Law
http://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?topic=2119.msg68881#msg68881
Whats after that? Targeting people who trained in the Martial Arts?
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Yes. Twaddle. (Who Pays for the Right to Bear Arms? By DAVID COLE)
"...the broader tragedy of gun violence is felt mostly not in leafy suburbs, but in America’s inner cities."
- The 'planners' want us out of x-urbs and into high density. But collisions increase with the square of density. http://www.chem.ufl.edu/~itl/2045_s99/lectures/lec_j.html
"The right to bear arms typically invokes the romantic image of a cowboy toting a rifle on the plains. In modern-day America, though, the more realistic picture is that of a young black man gunned down in his prime in a dark alley. When we celebrate gun rights, we all too often ignore their disproportionate racial burdens. Any effort to address gun violence must focus on the inner city. "
- No. The right to bear arms brings to me the image of the Bill of Rights, all of which are amendable. Substitute "constitutional rights" for "gun rights". Why do these anti-rights zealots want to teach constitutional law; yet ignore Article V, the amendment process?
"Last year Chicago had some 500 homicides, 87 percent of them gun-related...African-Americans are 33 percent of the Chicago population, but about 70 percent of the murder victims."
- Chicago has among the strictest gun laws in the country, and the highest gun crime rate. WHY?
"Could it be that the laxity of the nation’s gun laws is tolerated because its deadly costs are borne by the segregated black and Latino populations of North Philadelphia and Chicago’s South Side?"
- Where did that come from, is he a law professor or an MSNBC host? I would love to see his writings that plea us to shut down abortion 'rights' that hit blacks with similar disproportionality. Those deaths are FAR more preventable.
"Gun rights defenders argue that gun laws don’t reduce violence, noting that many cities with high gun violence already have strict gun laws. But this ignores the ease with which urban residents can evade local laws by obtaining guns from dealers outside their cities or states. Effective gun regulation requires a nationally coordinated response."
- Good point - if you believe the borders are sealed and the war on drugs was a success.
To tweak the National Rifle Association’s refrain, “guns don’t kill people; indifference to poverty kills people.”
- Liberal incoherence. We don't have poverty in these communities. We have dependency. We have hugely expensive programs that don't even look at unintended consequences. Poverty is the lack of wealth. We have widespread failure of an underclass to pursue the productive activities that lead to wealth creation. Indifference to poverty is when you support paying people to stay out of productive work, away from personal responsibility while selectively stomping out other rights like personal security, property rights and keeping the fruits of your labor.
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http://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/illinois-moves-to-outlaw-modern-firearms-and-criminalize-owners_01022013
The disrespect for the law and the Constitution on display here is mindboggling.
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U.S. MARINE’S SCATHING RESPONSE TO SEN. FEINSTEIN’S GUN CONTROL PROPOSAL: ‘I AM NOT YOUR SUBJECT. I AM THE MAN WHO KEEPS YOU FREE’
Posted on January 2, 2013 at 7:30pm by Jason Howerton
(CNN iReport)
One U.S. Marine was more than a little displeased with California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s draconian gun control proposal, which includes an assault weapons ban and provisions on handguns and even “grandfathered weapons.”
The letter, written by U.S. Marine Joshua Boston, was titled “No ma’am” and was first posted on CNN iReport on Dec. 27. The letter has since gone viral and has been shared extensively on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, as it seemingly has resonated with a segment of the American population.
Read Boston’s entire “No ma’am” letter below and then share it with others:
Senator Dianne Feinstein,
I will not register my weapons should this bill be passed, as I do not believe it is the government’s right to know what I own. Nor do I think it prudent to tell you what I own so that it may be taken from me by a group of people who enjoy armed protection yet decry me having the same a crime. You ma’am have overstepped a line that is not your domain. I am a Marine Corps Veteran of 8 years, and I will not have some woman who proclaims the evil of an inanimate object, yet carries one, tell me I may not have one.
I am not your subject. I am the man who keeps you free. I am not your servant. I am the person whom you serve. I am not your peasant. I am the flesh and blood of America.
I am the man who fought for my country. I am the man who learned. I am an American. You will not tell me that I must register my semi-automatic AR-15 because of the actions of some evil man.
I will not be disarmed to suit the fear that has been established by the media and your misinformation campaign against the American public.
We, the people, deserve better than you.
Respectfully Submitted,
Joshua Boston
Cpl,
United States Marine Corps
2004-2012
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/01/03/FBI-More-People-Killed-With-Hammers-and-Clubs-Each-Year-Than-With-Rifles
http://www.guns.com/2013/01/02/assault-rifle-vs-sporting-rifle-some-common-sense-courtesy-of-youtube-video/
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Who Pays for the Right to Bear Arms?
By DAVID COLE
Pravda on the Hudson
Published: January 1, 2013
.
IN the days following the Newtown massacre the nation’s newspapers were filled with heart-wrenching pictures of the innocent victims. The slaughter was unimaginably shocking. But the broader tragedy of gun violence is felt mostly not in leafy suburbs, but in America’s inner cities.
The right to bear arms typically invokes the romantic image of a cowboy toting a rifle on the plains. In modern-day America, though, the more realistic picture is that of a young black man gunned down in his prime in a dark alley. When we celebrate gun rights, we all too often ignore their disproportionate racial burdens. Any effort to address gun violence must focus on the inner city.
Last year Chicago had some 500 homicides, 87 percent of them gun-related. In the city’s public schools, 319 students were shot in the 2011-12 school year, 24 of them fatally. African-Americans are 33 percent of the Chicago population, but about 70 percent of the murder victims.
The same is true in other cities. In 2011, 80 percent of the 324 people killed in Philadelphia were killed by guns, and three-quarters of the victims were black.
Racial disparities in gun violence far outstrip those in almost any other area of life. Black unemployment is double that for whites, as is black infant mortality. But young black men die of gun homicide at a rate eight times that of young white men. Could it be that the laxity of the nation’s gun laws is tolerated because its deadly costs are borne by the segregated black and Latino populations of North Philadelphia and Chicago’s South Side?
The history of gun regulation is inextricably interwoven with race. Some of the nation’s most stringent gun laws emerged in the South after the Civil War, as Southern whites feared what newly freed slaves might do if armed. At the same time, Northerners saw the freed slaves’ right to bear arms as critical to protecting them from the Ku Klux Klan.
In the 1960s, Huey P. Newton and the Black Panther Party made the gun a central symbol of black power, claiming that “the gun is the only thing that will free us.” On May 2, 1967, taking advantage of California’s lax gun laws, several Panthers marched through the State Capitol in Sacramento carrying raised and loaded weapons, generating widespread news coverage.
The police could do nothing, as the Panthers broke no laws. But three months later, Gov. Ronald Reagan signed into law one of the strictest gun control laws in the country.
The urban riots of the late 1960s — combined with rising crime rates and a string of high-profile assassinations — spurred Congress to pass federal gun control laws, banning interstate commerce in guns except for federally licensed dealers and collectors; prohibiting sales to felons, the mentally ill, substance abusers and minors; and expanding licensing requirements.
These laws contain large loopholes, however, and are plainly inadequate to deal with the increased number and lethality of modern weapons. But as long as gun violence largely targets young black men in urban ghettos, the nation seems indifferent. At Newtown, the often all-too-invisible costs of the right to bear arms were made starkly visible — precisely because these weren’t the usual victims. The nation took note, and President Obama has promised reform, though he has not yet made a specific proposal.
Gun rights defenders argue that gun laws don’t reduce violence, noting that many cities with high gun violence already have strict gun laws. But this ignores the ease with which urban residents can evade local laws by obtaining guns from dealers outside their cities or states. Effective gun regulation requires a nationally coordinated response.
A cynic might propose resurrecting the Black Panthers to heighten white anxiety as the swiftest route to breaking the logjam on gun reform. I hope we are better than that. If the nation were to view the everyday tragedies that befall young black and Latino men in the inner cities with the same sympathy that it has shown for the Newtown victims, there would be a groundswell of support not just for gun law reform, but for much broader measures.
If we are to reduce the inequitable costs of gun rights, it’s not enough to tighten licensing requirements, expand background checks to private gun sales or ban assault weapons. In addition to such national measures, meaningful reform must include initiatives directed to where gun violence is worst: the inner cities. Aggressive interventions by police and social workers focused on gang gun violence, coupled with economic investment, better schools and more after-school and job training programs, are all necessary if we are to reduce the violence that gun rights entail.
To tweak the National Rifle Association’s refrain, “guns don’t kill people; indifference to poverty kills people.” We can’t in good conscience keep making young black men pay the cost of our right to bear arms.
David Cole is a professor of constitutional law and criminal justice at the Georgetown University Law Center.
IMHO David Cole is partially right.........And wrong when he invokes poverty as the reason for the high homicide rates in certain US populations. Poverty alone does not create violence, and no reputable study has shown a legitimate correlation between poverty and violent crime.
The root of violence in African American communities is associated with poverty, but not caused by it.......the dirty secret is that US drug policies, not poverty, not guns, are the direct link to the extraordinarily high homicide rates in African American communities in particular and the US in general........Specifically the way in which the 'drug war' has been fought since the early 1960's.........
Drug laws and law enforcement targeted black drug dealers with often violent tactics that would never have been tolerated in white communities, incarcerating large numbers of poor blacks in numbers vastly disproportionate to white criminals, and the result was the institutionalization and indoctrination into violent prison culture of generations of black men.......Leaving generations of black families broken, and generations of black children without fathers.
The result of that indoctrination in to prison gang culture? The bringing of that culture back to the streets where it was adopted as violent streets gang culture by the children of those men.........A culture that has perpetuated along with the illegal blackmarket drug trade.
If we want to know what has made America the violent country it is today..........One thing and one thing only........75% of the homicide rate of this country is a direct or indirect consequence of the drug war.........And if we weren't warehousing record numbers of Americans since 1992 with mandatory minimum sentences we'd be seeing higher rates than we are now. Without the 75% of the homicides attributed to the drug war, we'd have a homicide rate equal to Great Britains..........1.4 per 100,000..........A rate you see in the US among groups of similar socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds..........Britain is 92% European heritage..........So is the state of Wyoming, Vermont and New Hampshire, all have lax gun laws, all have populations 92% give or take European........All with homicide rates of 1.4 per 100,000 or less.
Poverty is a contributor..........But not the cause. There are plenty of places in the US with high poverty rates and low homicide rates. Brownsville, Tx is a prime example of a medium sized American city with 92% hispanic minority population, high poverty and a homicide rate actually BELOW the national average....Poverty doesn't drive homicide rates..........In a general sense, a marginalized population that perceives itself victimized by the larger population and viewing the official law enforcement/judicial system as illegitimate correlates to high homicide rates.
One can examine hispanic communities to really see the dichotomy of American society......In places like Brownsville, with long established community ties, violence is low........In places where newly transplanted Hispanic immigrants find themselves in conflict with the same black communities and gang culture that have resulted from the drug war, we see extraordinarily high homicide rates. In areas along the US/Mexican border along major drug distribution routes, large influxes of drug money has driven extraordinarly high homicide and violence rates.
South Africa may be the best example of this........A larger marginalized minority (in their case a majority) population and a homicide rate over 10 TIMES the US rate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bp7KTVbJj3Y
Being indoctrinated in to violent prison gang culture and the destruction of the black family is the root of the violence far more than 'guns' or poverty.
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Nice post sgtmac. Valid points for sure on the effects of the failed war on drugs. Your final point though is what I think is the key to it all: "...the destruction of the black family is the root of the violence..."
It is hard to establish cause and effect relationships. My view is that destruction of the inner-city family, too often black, was accelerated by our welfare state that often required removal of the father in order to qualify for the 'assistance'. Mothers had babies that guaranteed subsistence checks. 'Fathers' had idle time on their hands in place of the responsibility of supporting family. Able bodied men didn't get the assistance that we pay a single woman with children. The quickest and easiest appearing money in the neighborhood is in drugs, and illegal trafficking is enforced with violence.
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Agreed, Sgt Mac makes cogent points.
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The Heritage Foundation has done some excellent research on this - specifically Bill Bennett and Thomas Sowell. The black family unit used to be among the MOST stable subgroups in the country - prior to the welfare state instituted in the 1960s. It was at that point that the alarming increase in single-parent households (mothers without husbands) started, and with it the dramatic increase in crime among these inner-city blacks and other minorities.
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to inform on illegal guns, but frequently leaves out the word "illegal"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_rY8ZUbrnU
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second post of day:
Quite contrary to our point of view around here (and the description of the Australian data is contrary to what I thought I knew , , ,) . Still, if this argument is being made, we need to have our thinking in place.
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL
Published: January 5, 2013
IN the wake of the tragic shooting deaths at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., last month, the National Rifle Association proposed that the best way to protect schoolchildren was to place a guard — a “good guy with a gun” — in every school, part of a so-called National School Shield Emergency Response Program.
Indeed, the N.R.A.’s solution to the expansion of gun violence in America has been generally to advocate for the more widespread deployment and carrying of guns.
I recently visited some Latin American countries that mesh with the N.R.A.’s vision of the promised land, where guards with guns grace every office lobby, storefront, A.T.M., restaurant and gas station. It has not made those countries safer or saner.
Despite the ubiquitous presence of “good guys” with guns, countries like Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Colombia and Venezuela have some of the highest homicide rates in the world.
“A society that is relying on guys with guns to stop violence is a sign of a society where institutions have broken down,” said Rebecca Peters, former director of the International Action Network on Small Arms. “It’s shocking to hear anyone in the United States considering a solution that would make it seem more like Colombia.”
As guns proliferate, legally and illegally, innocent people often seem more terrorized than protected.
In Guatemala, riding a public bus is a risky business. More than 500 bus drivers have been killed in robberies since 2007, leading InSight Crime, which tracks organized crime in the Americas, to call it “the most dangerous profession on the planet.” And when bullets start flying, everyone is vulnerable: in 2010 the onboard tally included 155 drivers, 54 bus assistants, 71 passengers and 14 presumed criminals. Some were killed by the robbers’ bullets and some by gun-carrying passengers.
Scientific studies have consistently found that places with more guns have more violent deaths, both homicides and suicides. Women and children are more likely to die if there’s a gun in the house. The more guns in an area, the higher the local suicide rates. “Generally, if you live in a civilized society, more guns mean more death,” said David Hemenway, director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Center. “There is no evidence that having more guns reduces crime. None at all.”
After a gruesome mass murder in 1996 provoked public outrage, Australia enacted stricter gun laws, including a 28-day waiting period before purchase and a ban on semiautomatic weapons. Before then, Australia had averaged one mass shooting a year. Since, rates of both homicide and suicide have dropped 50 percent, and there have been no mass killings, said Ms. Peters, who lobbied for the legislation.
Distinctive factors contribute to the high rates of violent crime in Latin America. Many countries in the region had recent civil wars, resulting in a large number of weapons in circulation. Drug- and gang-related violence is widespread. “It’s dangerous to make too tight a link between the availability of weapons and homicide rates,” said Jeremy McDermott, a co-director of InSight Crime who is based in Medellín, Colombia. “There are lots of other variables.”
Still, he said that the recent sharp increase in homicides in Venezuela could be in part explained by the abundance of arms there. Although the government last spring imposed a one-year ban on importing weapons, there had previously been a plentiful influx from Russia. There is a Kalashnikov plant in the country.
In 2011, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Honduras led the world in homicides, with 91.6 per 100,000 people. But rates were also alarmingly high in El Salvador (69.1), Jamaica (40.9), Colombia (31.4) and Guatemala (38.5). Venezuela’s was 45.1 in 2010 but is expected to be close to to 80 this year. The United States’ rate is about 5.
THOUGH many of these countries have restrictions on gun ownership, enforcement is lax. According to research by Flacso, the Guatemalan Social Science Academy, illegal guns far outnumber legal weapons in Central America.
All that has spawned a thriving security industry — the good guys with guns that grace every street corner — though experts say it is often unclear if their presence is making crime better or worse. In many countries, the armed guards have only six weeks of training.
Guatemala, with approximately 20,000 police officers, has 41,000 registered private security guards and an estimated 80,000 who are working without authorization. “To put people with guns who are not accountable or trained in places where there are lots of innocent people is just dangerous,” Ms. Peters said, noting that lethal force is used to deter minor crimes like shoplifting.
Indeed, even as some Americans propose expanding our gun culture into elementary schools, some Latin American cities are trying to rein in theirs. Bogotá’s new mayor, Gustavo Petro, has forbidden residents to carry weapons on streets, in cars or in any public space since last February, and the murder rate has dropped 50 percent to a 27-year low. He said, “Guns are not a defense, they are a risk.”
William Godnick, coordinator of the Public Security Program at the United Nations Regional Center for Peace, Disarmament and Development in Latin America and the Caribbean, said that United Nations studies in Central America showed that people who used a gun to defend against an armed assault were far more likely to be injured or killed than if they had no weapon.
Post-Sandy Hook, gun groups in the United States are now offering teachers firearms training. But do I really want my kid’s teachers packing a weapon?
“If you’re living in a ‘Mad Max’ world, where criminals have free rein and there’s no government to stop them, then I’d want to be armed,” said Dr. Hemenway of Harvard. “But we’re not in that circumstance. We’re a developed, stable country.”
Elisabeth Rosenthal is a physician and a science reporter for The New York Times.
This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3DKuN2ey80
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This comes to me from a not always reliable source:
An Open Letter to Dr. Janet Rosenbaum (Swiss Facts vs American Propaganda)
finemrespice.com ^ | 19 December, 2012
01/05/2013 8:40:20 PM PST
Dr. Rosembaum: It appears today that your efforts to publicize your research ("Gun Utopias? Firearm Access and Ownership in Israel and Switzerland," Journal of Public Health Policy 33, p. 47 (2012)) have accelerated. The most recent showcase for your paper and the concepts that underlie it happens to be Foreign Policy ("A League of Our Own," Foreign Policy (December 19, 2012)) but Ezra Klein showcased your research in an interview for his Washington-Post sponsored Wonkblog some days before ("Mythbusting: Israel and Switzerland are not gun-toting utopias," Wonkblog (December 14, 2012)). It is unfortunate then that the body of your research on Switzerland can only be described as "shoddy," at best. At worst it appears more like raw academic fraud.
Here in Switzerland we resent being pressed into forced labor in the salt mines of America's rapidly devolving culture wars, but this would be somewhat easier service to tolerate if your representation of Swiss law, statistics on firearms related deaths and homicides in Switzerland, and Swiss culture were remotely accurate. They are not. Not even close.
Moreover, it is the considered opinion of finem respice that you know it.
By your own admission your conclusions about Swiss firearms law are based on your own translation of the French and German versions of the "Bundesgesetz über Waffen, Waffenzubehör und Munition" ("Swiss Federal Law on Weapons, Weapon Accessories and Ammunition"), which your research cites repeatedly. Based on the conclusions you arrive at in your research it seems apparent that your foreign language skills leave much to be desired.
Almost nothing at all that you claim as fact about Swiss firearms law is true. Literally, no material point you have been making in public (3 month permit renewals, proof of "need" requirements to purchase firearms) in support of the premise that Swiss firearms regulation is "strict gun control" is correct.
Your command of Swiss gun violence statistics are equally flawed.
In fact, Swiss gun homicides stood at 0.2389 per 100,000 residents in 2010. This figure is among the lowest in the world. In Europe it is effectively indistinguishable from the rates in France and Denmark, and lower than Finland, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Greece, and Luxembourg.
Luxembourg is a particularly interesting case, being small and culturally fairly homogenous (as Switzerland). But there the similarities end. Luxembourg ranks 147th out of 178 countries for the rate of private gun ownership in the Small Arms Survey of 2007 (which you cite repeatedly in your research as an authority and which ranks Switzerland 3rd of 178 countries in the very same chart). Moreover, despite your flawed understanding of Swiss gun law, gun control measures in Luxembourg are generally stricter than Switzerland. This is true of most if not all EU members, as they have generally aggressively implemented the European Council Directive on "Control of the Acquisition and Possession of Weapons" from 1991.
Italy is also an interesting case with victims of homicide by firearm per 100,000 residents of 0.36 in 2009 (the latest year for which figures are available from the World Health Organization's "European Detailed Mortality Database"). That was almost 17% higher than Switzerland that year and is 33.6% higher than Switzerland's current rate. And where does Italy rank in rate of firearms ownership? 55th of 178 countries according to the same Small Arms Survey data from 2007.
In fact, despite your absurd claims that ownership of firearms in Switzerland is "rare," the same data shows that Swiss civilians are better armed than the populations of Northern Ireland, Lebanon, Kosovo, Angola, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Libya, Mexico, Guatemala, South Africa, Pakistan, Jordan, Brazil, Nicaragua, Iran, El Salvador, Mozambique, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Myanmar, Syria, Egypt, Palestine, the Ivory Coast, Liberia, Laos, Chad, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, and Ethiopia. Perhaps now is a good moment to remind you once again that you cite the same report from which these figures are drawn repeatedly in your research?
Of course, it is habit among lazy scholars to attribute high rates of private ownership of firearms in Switzerland to the "militia." Unfortunately for those who argue this point, it is demonstrably false.
Admittedly, it is often difficult to get a handle on the total number of privately held firearms in Switzerland. This is because not all firearms have to be registered here.
Still, back in 2011 to inform citizens on the facts regarding firearms in Switzerland for the upcoming referendum, the Bundesamt für Statistik (The Swiss Federal Statistics Agency) published a series of figures on firearms, firearms deaths, and firearms violence. The agency estimated the total number of privately held firearms at 2,000,000 (though your source, the Small Arms Survey of 2007 cites the higher figure of 3,500,000 for its main calculations and suggests that figure might even be as high as 4,500,000). Of these:
Around 260,000 firearms are select-fire Sturmgewehr 90s (the "SIG 550" in the civilian market) held by members of the Swiss armed forces in connection with their current military service obligations. This is between 7.43% (using your source, the Small Arms Survey of 2007) and 13% (using the Bundesamt für Statistik estimates). If one takes the high end of the Small Arms Survey of 2007 the figure sinks to 5.78% of the total. In short, firearms ownership owing to current militia service is a small fraction of total firearms in private hands in Switzerland.
These are not secret figures by any means. One need only know how to download a spreadsheet from the official Bundesamt für Statistik site (although that would require a working knowledge of German or French, or the effort to walk to your local linguistics department and ask for a translation) or download the Small Arms Survey report from 2007 (which you obviously already had access to as it is cited in your work).
In the case of the former, the crime reports and population counts in Switzerland going back 10 years or more are readily available. These form the basis of the statistics cited here and should have influenced your research, though perhaps you would not have been able to talk Foreign Policy into giving you a four-page spread with the boring conclusions vis-a-vis Switzerland that would have resulted.
On reflection, so contorting are the intellectual acrobatics you go through to avoid these facts it becomes difficult to see anything other than academic malfeasance in support of advocacy (rather than science) at work here. But mere data cherry-picking is not the limit of the flaws in your arguments.
Many "scholars" in this area like to conflate "gun violence" with "deaths by firearm." You have been no exception. In fact, there is a strong argument that you have been among the worst offenders in this regard over the last 10 days. So let's look at total firearms related deaths in Switzerland, shall we?
At 3.0297 per 100,000 residents in 2010, total firearms related deaths in Switzerland ranks somewhat higher with respect to her peers. These figures are the sum of accidents and suicides, however. Using them as indicators of "gun violence" is to torture the definition of that term beyond recognition. Even this higher rate is, however, on par with France, and below Finland, and Canada.
Resorting again to the Bundesamt für Statistik we find that suicides account for a large part of these figures, but suicide by firearm is small as a percentage of total suicides. One of the effects of having a very low level of overall fatalities not due to natural causes is that small figures have big effects on ratios and percentages.
For the last five years total suicides by firearm have ranged from a high of 264 (in 2007) to a low of 222 (in 2010) or between 18.2% and 22.9% of the total. As a method, "hanging" beats firearms by several percentage points every year, "poisoning" exceeded firearms by as much as 12 percentage points from 2002 to 2009 (when assisted suicide figures were removed from the totals- the Swiss do not generally consider these "crime" figures, you understand) and alternates as the higher figure with "other methods" in the last five years.
As a policy matter, even if you cut suicides by firearm in Switzerland by 25% and assumed that those prevented never resorted to other methods (a highly dubious assumption) you are only talking about 55-65 suicides per year. You have to format excel to show six decimal places to see that this is 0.000062% of the population of Switzerland.
Perhaps this is a Swiss attitude, but curtailing the rights of nearly 9 million residents to prevent 0.000062% of the population from voluntarily ending their own lives seems slightly excessive.
Finally, there is the matter of your gross misrepresentation of trends in Swiss gun control, which you have repeatedly alleged is on the rise, or that Switzerland is "moving towards" greater control, whatever that means. Here your conduct has been so egregious it becomes difficult to believe that major American Universities have played host to your activities.
Any serious scholar of Swiss firearms policy would have known that in 2011 the Swiss held a popular referendum calling for more gun control, supported in large measure by the same organizations which pressed the Switzerland to join the European Union (a bullet Switzerland thankfully dodged). The gun-control measure was thoroughly trounced.
Switzerland requires referendums to pass both the popular vote by a majority and also carry a majority of the kantons. The referendum lost the popular vote by 12.6 points and carried only 35% of the kantonal electoral votes. Contrary to your absurd suggestions, gun control advocates have been oddly silent in Switzerland since the referendum.
Yesterday, finem respice called for you to retract your paper and publicly correct your flawed representations of Swiss firearms law, and firearm homicide and death rates in Switzerland. Now that you have been made aware of the real and material flaws in the body of your research that pertains to Switzerland it would be difficult to regard as anything other than academic dishonesty a refusal by you to publicly correct your position. Accordingly, and as finem respice indicated yesterday, if such a correction and retraction is not forthcoming within 10 days finem respice will formally submit its findings in support of charges of academic dishonesty to the University of Maryland, the institution you were affiliated with when the instant research was conducted, the State University of New York, where you are currently an Assistant Professor, and the Journal of Public Health Policy, which published your flawed study.
Of course, finem respice awaits your prompt and comprehensive reply.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2975352/posts
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Nice post sgtmac. Valid points for sure on the effects of the failed war on drugs. Your final point though is what I think is the key to it all: "...the destruction of the black family is the root of the violence..."
It is hard to establish cause and effect relationships. My view is that destruction of the inner-city family, too often black, was accelerated by our welfare state that often required removal of the father in order to qualify for the 'assistance'. Mothers had babies that guaranteed subsistence checks. 'Fathers' had idle time on their hands in place of the responsibility of supporting family. Able bodied men didn't get the assistance that we pay a single woman with children. The quickest and easiest appearing money in the neighborhood is in drugs, and illegal trafficking is enforced with violence.
EXACTLY! Alienation/Resentment+Institutionalized Poverty+Promise of Black Market Profit+Draconican Response+Children raised without fathers=Multi-generational poverty and violence.
There are so many angles present that one could spend years studying the interlocking roots of the problem.......One thing is certain, however, the dynamics making comparing Canada, UK and Australia to the US apples and bananas........Because we don't have a violent crime problem, we have a very specialized problem that they don't remotely have within their demographic. The UK is 92% European descent, comparable to the State of Wyoming, Vermont or New Hampshire, who have homicide rates of 1.4 per 100,000, 1.1 per 100,000 and 1.0 per 100,000, respectively, IDENTICAL to the UK's 1.4 per 100,000...........Comparing apples to apples we find the homicide rates are IDENTICAL, demographic to demographic, regardless whether it's unarmed UK or heavily armed (60% of the population armed) Wyoming........When people try to kill each other they succeed....Heavily armed folks are no more likely to try to kill each other because they are heavily armed than unarmed folks.........Attacking the tools do nothing to solve the reason why they are trying, and hence, don't solve the problem.
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http://tnsmartgirl.com/2013/01/06/school-shooting-in-tennessee-that-national-media-did-not-report/
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Though Alex Jones is I think a bit too belligerent here, he makes his points extremely well, and cuts off Morgan at the knees, as he deserves. Sad that we don't have any journalists in the mainstream media willing to do the same:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtyKofFih8Y
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http://tnsmartgirl.com/2013/01/06/school-shooting-in-tennessee-that-national-media-did-not-report/
Good outcome, very, very bad tactics and mindset.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEDEi8ZZ--E
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Obj:
I have seen things from Alex Jones that have put him on my "do not associate with nor quote this guy" list. I am not alone in this. Glenn says AJ makes us look bad:
http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/01/08/crazy-person-alex-jones-rants-and-raves-on-cnn/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-01-08_191047&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_191047_191055
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Alex Jones: That video was my first awareness of him. Glenn Beck is distancing himself even further from him today on the radio. Glenn refuses to accept rudeness. In this video, Jones' mistake was to go rude first. As Obj I think suggests, that type of strong response is what some of these hosts deserve after they refuse to let the guest talk. Even then it doesn't advance the cause of drawing more people to your viewpoint.
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/dc-attorney-generals-office-to-investigate-display-of-ammunition-magazine-on-tv/2013/01/08/84f86a1c-598c-11e2-beee-6e38f5215402_story.html?hpid=z2
The decision on whether anyone should be prosecuted after “Meet the Press” host David Gregory appeared to hold a high-capacity ammunition magazine on national television now belongs to the District’s Office of the Attorney General, authorities said Tuesday.
In an e-mail, a spokeswoman for D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said her department has “completed the investigation into this matter, and the case has been presented to the OAG for a determination of the prosecutorial merit of the case.”
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The NRA as well as WSJ editorial board and some otherson the right think prosecution is a bad idea because it is a silly law. The reaction on the left is mostly silence - what can you say to stupidity. The President's reaction was to be Gregory's star guest on the very next show, while the 'investigation' was proceeding.
What it really illustrates is what a worthless argument Gregory was putting forward, that we might reduce shootings by disarming law-abiding citizens - while demonstrating on national television how easy it is for everyone not concerned with the carefully legislated details of the laws to get any gun, ammo or magazine that they want.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jan/9/biden-executive-orders-action-can-be-taken-guns/
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I wonder if Biden is referring to the most common thread running through these violent episodes, these shootings are by people either taking psychiatric medications or who recently stopped taking them without sufficient monitoring by our failed mental health system. http://www.wnd.com/2013/01/the-giant-gaping-hole-in-sandy-hook-reporting/
More like he is talking about "infringing" further on the right of responsible, law abiding citizens to keep and bear arms.
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I've seen some VERY heated responses to this today by people who lack confidence that we remain a nation of laws.
Though this is "just" a cartoon, it skates pretty close to the edge of the legal ice , , , http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/01/10/
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Gun Confiscation By Presidential Decree?
Posted By Matthew Vadum On January 10, 2013 - www.frontpagemag.com
President Obama may soon act unilaterally to curtail Americans’ right to keep and bear arms and impose a new national firearms policy without congressional approval.
Spurred on by the Newtown, Connecticut schoolhouse massacre last month that took 26 lives, Obama could restrict, perhaps even abolish, private gun ownership with the stroke of his auto-pen.
Second Amendment backers are justifiably angry after Vice President Joe Biden spoke yesterday about ways to curb violent gun-related crime. He suggested that the president may take swift, decisive action without congressional approval.
“The president is going to act,” said Biden who is heading up a task force that is supposed to make policy recommendations to Obama later this month. The vice president reportedly “guaranteed” Boston Mayor Thomas Menino that President Obama would push through sweeping firearms restrictions before February.
“There are executive orders, there’s executive action that can be taken. We haven’t decided what that is yet. But we’re compiling it all with the help of the attorney general and the rest of the cabinet members as well as legislative action that we believe is required.”
Biden added, “As the president said, if your actions result in only saving one life, they’re worth taking. But I’m convinced we can affect the well-being of millions of Americans and take thousands of people out of harm’s way if we act responsibly.”
“I want to make it clear that we are not going to get caught up in the notion that unless we can do everything, we’re going to do nothing,” Biden said. “It’s critically important we act.”
In normal times the prospect of gun confiscation might be next to nil, the stuff of conspiracy theories, but in the age of Obama so many bad things seem possible. With the country in a sour mood, the economy stuck in a ditch, and a transformational Marxist in the White House, terrible outcomes that previously appeared farfetched now could become possible.
Consider that Obama is a devout ideologue who deep down doesn’t believe Americans should be allowed to own guns. He’s a longtime supporter of gun confiscation but when he began running for president he began claiming to be a supporter of the Second Amendment in order not to scare away moderate voters.
He has Freudian-slipped from time to time. In his first presidential campaign he mocked small-town Americans as “bitter” people who “cling to guns or religion,” paraphrasing Saul Alinsky’s attacks on ordinary Americans.
Consider also that Obama is a narcissistic president with a messiah complex who began his political career in the living room of unrepentant bomb-detonating terrorists.
Since winning the 2008 election Obama has: refused to enforce laws he dislikes including laws cracking down on the voter fraud Democrats often need to win elections; routinely assaulted the Bill of Rights; decreed a partial immigration amnesty after it was rejected by Congress; ignored court orders; recess-appointed high government officials when Congress wasn’t actually in recess; attempted to intimidate Supreme Court justices; kept a Nixon-style enemies’ list and labeled his detractors in the Tea Party movement as terrorists; waged class warfare and encouraged racial animosity; presided over the “Fast and Furious” gun-walking scandal that provided weapons to Mexican drug cartels; nationalized large swaths of private industry; ignored politically-inspired violence carried out by his allies; unilaterally moved to impose economy-killing carbon emission controls; openly disdained entrepreneurs; waged war without congressional approval; accepted illegal foreign campaign contributions; tried to get a governor to appoint his crony (Valerie Jarrett) to fill the Senate seat he vacated; said police “acted stupidly” when they dared to arrest his personal friend; turned a blind eye to rampant corruption in his administration; and forced health care providers to violate their religious beliefs.
Now Obama is apparently considering minting a $1 trillion platinum coin in order to evade the congressionally imposed national debt limit.
This is the behavior of a Third World banana republic caudillo, not the supposed leader of the free world.
Congressman Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) said the president’s proposal to go it alone sounded like “dictatorship” to him. “The Founding Fathers never envisioned Executive Orders being used to restrict our Constitutional rights,” he said in a press release. “We live in a republic, not a dictatorship.”
Two unusually insightful posts on the micro-blogging website Twitter summed up the public’s anxiety at Obama’s overreach and imperial approach to policymaking.
“Executive Orders on 2nd Amendment Rights could cascade into revolt,” tweeted @daxtonbrown. “I don’t think Obama realizes how seriously people take gun rights.”
A user with the handle @siftyboones tweeted, “My family will not be reduced to docile livestock at the whim of the government. The End.”
Any executive order taking Americans’ guns away would be a brutal assault on the rule of law. It could also lead to violent civil unrest in a nation founded upon a healthy distrust of governmental power.
Yesterday NRA president David Keene reaffirmed that the purpose of the Second Amendment to the Constitution was to prevent tyranny and deter foreign invaders.
“The Second Amendment has nothing to do with hunters. Hunters use firearms. Hunters have every right to use firearms, as do target shooters, as do gun collectors, as do others,” said Keene.
“The fact of the matter is that the Second Amendment has to do with personal and national defense. It was put into the Constitution by the Founders who considered it as important indeed as the First Amendment.”
As Charles Krauthammer waxed eloquent on Fox News Channel last night:
We have a 200-year history and culture of gun ownership. And we have a Second Amendment and we have a system that believes that the rights, the Second Amendment, in other words, predate the republic and the point of having a government, as in the Declaration [of Independence], is to secure the rights. In Britain you have no such right, the government will control gun ownership so unless you’re willing to confiscate, which would be unconstitutional and that would cause an insurrection in the country –Australia did– these things are not going to have an effect, except at the margins and that’s the tragedy here.
Although many law enforcement personnel would probably refuse to enforce something as profoundly un-American as a gun-confiscation diktat, it is not at all clear where Obama would get the legal authority to unilaterally impose new gun control measures. Even liberal constitutional law professor Laurence Tribe concedes that –at a minimum– the Second Amendment safeguards the individual right of Americans to “possess and use firearms in the defense of themselves and their homes.”
The Supreme Court has blown away gun grabbers in recent years. In the landmark case of District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the high court struck down the draconian ban on gun ownership that had long been in effect in the nation’s capital. The court found for the first time that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, affirming what serious constitutional scholars had known for years.
The court followed up in the case of McDonald v. Chicago, making it clear that the individual right to keep and bear arms acknowledged in the Heller ruling applies to the states as well. That 2010 decision quashed a Chicago city ordinance banning the possession of handguns.
Complicating matters further for Obama, it turns out then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) was correct when she said to lawmakers in 2010, “we have to pass the [health care] bill so that you can find out what’s in it.”
A new report from Breitbart.com indicates that a provision is buried in the Obamacare legislation that protects Second Amendment rights. The clause states that the government is not allowed to collect “any information relating to the lawful ownership or possession of a firearm or ammunition.”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) confirmed that he added the legislative language in order to keep the National Rifle Association out of the legislative battle over Obamacare. It probably seemed like a good idea at the time.
Will any of these legal concerns matter to President Obama who regards the Constitution at best as a living document and at worst as an inconvenience?
As gun and ammunition sales skyrocket nationwide, it is clear the public isn’t taking the chance that Obama will feel restrained by the laws of the land.
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I've seen some VERY heated responses to this today by people who lack confidence that we remain a nation of laws.
Though this is "just" a cartoon, it skates pretty close to the edge of the legal ice , , , http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/01/10/
We were a nation of laws. Now we are going "forward" into that fundamental change Buraq promised us.
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4 things we know about the Tucson shooting IMHO
1) The shooter's problem had to do with mental health
2) There is a copycat aspect to mass shootings
3) The shooting would only have stopped sooner if someone closer had a gun and a trained response
4) At the time of the shooting, the other 299,999,999 guns in America were not shooting at crowds
So what is the reaction? Mark the anniversary (encouraging copycats) with a new organization that doesn't address the problem but could threaten to prevent the solution.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/gabrielle-giffords-mark-kelly-launch-gun-control-initiative-in-effort-to-combat-gun-lobby/
Gabrielle Giffords & Mark Kelly Launch Gun Control Initiative in Effort to Combat ‘Gun Lobby’
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WORLDWIDE HISTORY OF GUN CONFISCATION
In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated...
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In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated.
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China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million educated people, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Chicago had 513 murders in 2012. By comparison 136 soldiers were killed in Afghanistan in 2012.
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WORLDWIDE HISTORY OF GUN CONFISCATION
In 1929, the Soviet Union established gun control. From 1929 to 1953, about 20 million dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated...
------------------------
In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917, 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
------------------------
Germany established gun control in 1938 and from 1939 to 1945, a total of 13 million Jews and others who were unable to defend themselves were rounded up and exterminated.
------------------------
China established gun control in 1935. From 1948 to 1952, 20 million political dissidents, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
------------------------
Guatemala established gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, 100,000 Mayan Indians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
------------------------
Uganda established gun control in 1970. From 1971 to 1979, 300,000 Christians, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
------------------------
Cambodia established gun control in 1956. From 1975 to 1977, one million educated people, unable to defend themselves, were rounded up and exterminated.
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Chicago had 513 murders in 2012. By comparison 136 soldiers were killed in Afghanistan in 2012.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWMIwziGrAQ
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWMIwziGrAQ[/youtube]
Undercover agent Larry Grathwohl, who had infiltrated and joined the Weather Underground, described their post-revolution governing plans for the United States in this video taken from the 1982 documentary "No Place to Hide." The Weather Underground openly discussed exterminating 25 million Americans who refused to be "re-educated" into communism.
Here's a transcript of his interview:
I bought up the subject of what's going to happen after we take over the government. We, we become responsible, then, for administrating, you know, 250 million people.
And there was no answers. No one had given any thought to economics; how are you going to clothe and feed these people.
The only thing that I could get, was that they expected that the Cubans and the North Vietnamese and Chinese and the Russians would all want to occupy different portions of the United States.
They also believed that their immediate responsibility would be to protect against what they called the counter-revolution. And they felt that this counter-revolution could best be guarded against by creating and establishing re-education centers in the southwest, where we would take all the people who needed to be re-educated into the new way of thinking and teach them... how things were going to be.
I asked, well, what's going to happen to those people that we can't re-educate; that are die-hard capitalists. And the reply was that they'd have to be eliminated. And when I pursued this further, they estimated that they would have to eliminate 25 million people in these re-education centers. And when I say eliminate, I mean kill. 25 million people.
I want you to imagine sitting in a room with 25 people, most of which have graduate degrees from Columbia and other well known educational centers, and hear them figuring out the logistics for the elimination of 25 million people.
And they were dead serious."
-- Larry Grathwohl, former member of the Weather Underground
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I've seen some VERY heated responses to this today by people who lack confidence that we remain a nation of laws.
Though this is "just" a cartoon, it skates pretty close to the edge of the legal ice , , , http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/01/10/
It's kind of a scary time.......For the first time in my life I am actually concerned that the rantings of folks like Alex Jones might come to pass in some fashion or another (despite the fact that I still think he's nuts).......Why would the VP invoke the notion of Executive Order on the subject unless they are trying to provoke some kind of response? I seriously get the impression that they not only want to pass laws, they want to ensure that we know they are in charge and they can do whatever they want. There is an arrogant swaggering quality to all of this.
In fact, having browsed some of the forums, the leftists are on there trying to provoke 'treason talk' with jibes of 'bring it on, I can't wait to see them drop JDAMS on your heads'........It's all taking on a rather 'Belfast' quality.
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The move of using executive orders is not without precedent. I know Clinton used EOs to limit "assault" weapons, including pistols (2 separate EOs, IIRC).
GHW Bush may also have used an EO in 1989, but I can't confirm that.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1101930823-162229,00.html
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=c74_1357807684&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/obama-executive-power-debt-ceiling_b_2447359.html?utm_hp_ref=politics
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The arrogance and idiocy of Piers Morgan never fails to amaze:
www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-TV/2013/01/10/CNNs-Morgan-Slams-Down-Constitution-Calls-It-Your-Little-Book
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rudA9LESQi0&sns=fb
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2013/01/11/friday-fun-ben-shapiro-destroys-cnns-piers-morgan-n1487128
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"I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them." --George Mason, Speech at the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788
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Third post
The next time you hear a fellow American bemoaning the lack of Washington bipartisanship, tell him to cheer up. There is one issue on which Congress still resoundingly agrees: gun rights. Bear that in mind, too, the next time you read a story about the "new" political debate over gun control.
An almost cosmic disconnect has been building in the political sphere since the tragedy of Sandy Hook. On the one side is the gun-control community, which sniffed a rare political opening and is determined to use it to the max. Vice President Joe Biden's gun-violence task force has given that community a vehicle for its ambitions, even as it has encouraged it to ramp up its demands.
By this week, the elites were calling for a gun-control agenda unmatched in modern times. The closing of the gun-show "loophole"? Restrictions on large-capacity clips? An "assault weapons" ban? They want all that, plus a national gun database, and a background check for every gun sale, and similar checks for ammunition sales, and regulation of Internet transactions, and Michael Bloomberg crowned emperor. (A position for which Mr. Bloomberg no doubt believes himself suited.) The media have reported all this as rational, reasonable and doable.
On the other side is the reality that any of these proposals must, in the normal course of things, pass Congress. A few quick facts about that body. 1) More than half of its members have an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association. 2) The few members today calling for gun control are the same few who have always called for gun control. 3) The House is run by Republicans.
Enlarge Image
Close
Associated Press
Vice President Joe Biden, with Attorney General Eric Holder beside him.
.Despite the press's exuberant efforts to cast congressional gun supporters as having changed their minds, there has been no actual movement. Senate Democrat Joe Manchin caused a media sensation when he declared, immediately after Sandy Hook, that nobody needed "30 rounds in a clip." Less reported was that it took the Democrat about the time necessary for your average West Virginian to drive to a ballot box to clarify that statement and to add that he's "so proud of the NRA." Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, even with the press's best efforts to parse his remarks, has committed himself to nothing more than a "thoughtful debate."
Montana's Jon Tester and Max Baucus, Alaska's Mark Begich, Arkansas's Mark Pryor, South Dakota's Tim Johnson, Louisiana's Mary Landrieu—all are quiet on that red-state Democratic front. North Dakota's brand new senator, Heidi Heitkamp, declared proposals mulled by the Biden task force as "way in the extreme" and "not gonna pass." Unlike Mr. Obama, all of these members still face elections.
Over in the House, when asked recently what was more likely—passage of gun control or Speaker John Boehner becoming a pagan—a senior GOP leadership aide told Buzzfeed: "Probably the latter."
Even were the Senate to summon 60 votes (unlikely), and even were Mr. Boehner to risk the renewed wrath of his caucus by moving such a bill (crazy unlikely), any legislation would fall to members such as Virginia's Bob Goodlatte (who runs the Judiciary Committee) and Pete Sessions (who runs the Rules Committee). Mr. Goodlatte is strong on gun rights. Mr. Sessions is from Texas.
Add to this one consequence of President Obama's intransigence on a debt solution: His other priorities are in limbo. Mr. Biden will announce his recommendations next week, just as Congress prepares to tackle the debt ceiling. At what point will Democrats have the spare bandwidth to address gun control? Also open to question is whether the White House intends to spend its political capital on that perilous subject, rather than on presidential priorities like immigration reform.
The White House is playing its usual fuzzy double-game. Does it intend to stick to mental-health recommendations and slough off on Congress any gun decisions? Or does it intend to embrace gun control in its liberal remake of the country? Was the leak that the Biden task force is debating big gun restrictions a signal of a fight to come? Or was it a deliberate head fake—to make smaller proposals look more reasonable? No one has a clue.
Whatever the White House intends, it is already in a tough position. The task-force leak, combined with Mr. Biden's tantalizing suggestion of a gun-related executive order, has seriously raised expectations. Anything less than the dismantling of the Second Amendment will earn Mr. Obama a lambasting from his left.
At the same time, the more sweeping any gun proposals, the more dead on arrival they will be in Congress. Mr. Obama might know that and be planning to take credit for going big while blaming failure on Congress. If so, he'll have to beat on his own party.
He might instead consider that gun rights are an excellent—and rare—example of an issue on which Republicans and Democrats have for some time been on common ground, and in which they have honestly represented their constituents. Last heard, that was exactly the sort of bipartisanship the president claimed to want more of.
Write to kim@wsj.com
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http://www.wsmv.com/story/20559778/tn-firearms-instructor-gains-attention-from-youtube-rant
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http://www.wsmv.com/story/20559778/tn-firearms-instructor-gains-attention-from-youtube-rant
Heh.
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http://www.wsmv.com/story/20559778/tn-firearms-instructor-gains-attention-from-youtube-rant
Yeah, I remember watching that yesterday on Yeager's facebook page........You know that moment when you realize you're watching a car wreck happening and there's nothing you can do to stop it? Yeah......It was one of those obvious moments of 'Oh my god, this isn't going to end well'.,........But if Yeager's goal was to become the lightening rod for this entire conflict, he succeeded in that in spades.......yikes!
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http://legalinsurrection.com/2013/01/david-gregory-and-wife-knew-d-c-attorney-general/
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http://www.westernjournalism.com/the-left-is-convinced-americans-wont-fight-for-2nd-amendment-rights/
The Left Is Convinced Americans Won’t Fight For 2nd Amendment Rights
January 7, 2013 By Doug Book 85 Comments
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Once cowed at the thought of provoking Second Amendment supporters, leftists will soon attempt to ban “assault weapons” (and much more) as legislation offered by Dianne Feinstein makes its way to the Senate floor. It seems that D.C. liberals have finally become convinced that American gun owners are too cowardly, too lazy or too dependent upon the generosity of Big Brother to fight for their Second Amendment rights.
During the past four years, the gun banning-Left have watched as American buyers broke sales records in the purchase of semi-automatic rifles. Opting for these and other powerful, efficient weapons, it is estimated that some 100 million private citizens are now in possession of over 300 million firearms. And these numbers continue to grow with each passing month.
Yet it’s against this backdrop of America’s unprecedented determination to assert the fundamental permanence of Second Amendment guarantees that Diane Feinstein, Michael Bloomberg, Barack Obama and others will choose to implement gun bans, demand the federal registration of firearms, and even legislate outright confiscation.
Maybe Democrats are confident that fallout from Sandy Hook will provide the floor votes necessary to disarm the American people. But if the Left is willing to risk picking this fight with millions of American gun owners, it must also believe something far more important—that Americans who have spent years arming themselves against the ultimate expression of tyranny by their own government–the overthrow of the Second Amendment– will choose to not fight when the time finally comes.
For decades, the Left have watched Americans simply “lie down” before every imaginable outrage and legislative assault on our liberty. The Constitution has been prostituted by power-hungry, America-hating Marxists in Congress, on the federal bench and in the White House. Elected officials have laughed when asked to provide Constitutional authority for the passage of massively unpopular pieces of legislation. Tax dollars are insolently manipulated to purchase votes, grease the skids of questionable legislation, and add to the wealth of bureaucrats and elected officials. And through it all, Americans are robbed of more and more liberty as we do nothing but “vote ‘em in and cuss ‘em out” every two years.
Liberals have come to depend upon the willingness of Americans to subordinate their desire for liberty to the wishes and whims of the political ruling class. The cowardly are rewarded for relenting while those with the courage to question dictatorial authority and refuse to submit are accused of domestic terrorism. And all who press their own beliefs—or worse, those of the nations’ Founders– are met with ridicule or intimidation in what was at one time a nation of free, thinking individuals.
In short, the Left has come to expect cowardice or disinterested submission from a people trained for decades to accept as given that the good intentions of their elected betters are sufficient to fulfill the requirements of constitutional authority. And it’s a safe bet neither Democrats nor RINO’s will expect anything different from the majority of Americans this time around as Feinstein and Company legislate last rites and a funeral for the Second Amendment.
We know what the Left believe. We’ll soon find out if they are right.
Photo credit: Rev. Xanatos Satanicos Bombasticos (ClintJCL) (Creative Commons)
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http://www.westernjournalism.com/the-left-is-convinced-americans-wont-fight-for-2nd-amendment-rights/
The Left Is Convinced Americans Won’t Fight For 2nd Amendment Rights
January 7, 2013 By Doug Book 85 Comments
inShare.13
Once cowed at the thought of provoking Second Amendment supporters, leftists will soon attempt to ban “assault weapons” (and much more) as legislation offered by Dianne Feinstein makes its way to the Senate floor. It seems that D.C. liberals have finally become convinced that American gun owners are too cowardly, too lazy or too dependent upon the generosity of Big Brother to fight for their Second Amendment rights.
During the past four years, the gun banning-Left have watched as American buyers broke sales records in the purchase of semi-automatic rifles. Opting for these and other powerful, efficient weapons, it is estimated that some 100 million private citizens are now in possession of over 300 million firearms. And these numbers continue to grow with each passing month.
Yet it’s against this backdrop of America’s unprecedented determination to assert the fundamental permanence of Second Amendment guarantees that Diane Feinstein, Michael Bloomberg, Barack Obama and others will choose to implement gun bans, demand the federal registration of firearms, and even legislate outright confiscation.
Maybe Democrats are confident that fallout from Sandy Hook will provide the floor votes necessary to disarm the American people. But if the Left is willing to risk picking this fight with millions of American gun owners, it must also believe something far more important—that Americans who have spent years arming themselves against the ultimate expression of tyranny by their own government–the overthrow of the Second Amendment– will choose to not fight when the time finally comes.
For decades, the Left have watched Americans simply “lie down” before every imaginable outrage and legislative assault on our liberty. The Constitution has been prostituted by power-hungry, America-hating Marxists in Congress, on the federal bench and in the White House. Elected officials have laughed when asked to provide Constitutional authority for the passage of massively unpopular pieces of legislation. Tax dollars are insolently manipulated to purchase votes, grease the skids of questionable legislation, and add to the wealth of bureaucrats and elected officials. And through it all, Americans are robbed of more and more liberty as we do nothing but “vote ‘em in and cuss ‘em out” every two years.
Liberals have come to depend upon the willingness of Americans to subordinate their desire for liberty to the wishes and whims of the political ruling class. The cowardly are rewarded for relenting while those with the courage to question dictatorial authority and refuse to submit are accused of domestic terrorism. And all who press their own beliefs—or worse, those of the nations’ Founders– are met with ridicule or intimidation in what was at one time a nation of free, thinking individuals.
In short, the Left has come to expect cowardice or disinterested submission from a people trained for decades to accept as given that the good intentions of their elected betters are sufficient to fulfill the requirements of constitutional authority. And it’s a safe bet neither Democrats nor RINO’s will expect anything different from the majority of Americans this time around as Feinstein and Company legislate last rites and a funeral for the Second Amendment.
We know what the Left believe. We’ll soon find out if they are right.
Photo credit: Rev. Xanatos Satanicos Bombasticos (ClintJCL) (Creative Commons)
I think they seriously underestimate the divide in this country, and the degree to which one half of this country resents them and outright despises what they perceive as the excesses and overreach of their political ideology in power. I think they don't realize that a significant minority of Americans see the union as nearly irreparably broken already, and are already expecting that this is going to come to a head somehow in the very near future. They live in a different circle, a different culture, that allows them to believe they are compeletely triumphant and that now they can remake America and the world in their image without any resistance whatsoever. I suspect that the reality will not be quite that.
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IF they try something radical to gut the Second Amendment, I think they are in for a VERY rude awakening. This is a line that a very significant minority of Americans won't tolerate crossing.
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I would say that a significant MAJORITY of Americans support our gun rights and a significant minority would entertain notions of resistance.
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I'm sure all the people who surged out to buy semauto rifles and magazines at 3x the normal price did so so they can turn them in for a 25$ gift card.
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I'm sure all the people who surged out to buy semauto rifles and magazines at 3x the normal price did so so they can turn them in for a 25$ gift card.
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/01/americans-buy-enough-guns-in-last-two-months-to-outfit-the-entire-chinese-and-indian-army/
Americans Buy Enough Guns in Last Two Months to Outfit the Entire Chinese and Indian Armies
Posted by Jim Hoft on Monday, January 14, 2013, 6:42 AM
Honest Americans Bought Enough Guns in November and December to Outfit the Entire Chinese and Indian Armies
The Obama Administration is the number one threat to the nation’s gun rights advocates. In the four years since Barack Obama was first elected president in November 2008, an estimated 67 million firearms have been purchased in the United States. In November a record 2 million guns were sold in America. This was followed up by another record in December. 2.7 million guns were sold in America in the last month of 2012.
(http://thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/nics-checks1-e1358113198884.jpg)
FBI.gov
To put this in perspective.
Chinese and Indian Standing Army Numbers:
•China
- There are 2.29 active members in the Chinese Army.
•India
- There are 1.13 active members in the Indian Army.
There were enough guns sold in the US in November and December to outfit each active member of the Chinese and Indian armies with a brand new gun.
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Honoring the second amendment has two different meanings. Gun rights are good, important and justified, but that is just part of it. The larger meaning I think is the second amendment is symbolic of the guarantee that the entire constitutional, limited government framework continues, and is not taken away either by elected majorities, unelected bureaucracy or a foreign aggressor.
It is ironic in the extreme to see that the effort to get us have fewer guns has led to perhaps the biggest peacetime surge in the weapons ownership in world history - enough to arm China or India!
(It could just be more people reading the forum, with GM recommending guns, ammo and canned food throughout the economic crisis.)
Liberal-fascist incompetence is not new or surprising. The war on poverty accelerated the foundations of poverty and more recently the attempt to take fossil fuels away from us to with high prices led to a huge surge in fossil fuel production.
Post-1812 and since the full settlement of the heartland with all these guns in private ownership we have taken hits like Pearl Harbor and 9/11, but no one other than our own oppressive government has ever really tried to invade or take us over by force. Not all of our nation's defenses are controlled by Washington.
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I would say that a significant MAJORITY of Americans support our gun rights and a significant minority would entertain notions of resistance.
I would say you're right......If even 1% of gun owners took significant action, that would be about 1 million men and women (by way of comparison there are only 800,000 police officers.......1.4 Million Active Duty military and 1.4 Million reserve).......To complicate the numbers further, many of those MOST likely to resist are among those 800,000 police officers AND 3 million active and reserve (among the most conservative members of society)........
'One in Three Americans Personally Own a Gun'
http://www.gallup.com/poll/150353/self-reported-gun-ownership-highest-1993.aspx
Further, that the majority of active duty military personnel are disproportionately from states MOST likely to be involved with any resistance of the federal government on the matter.
http://www.heritage.org/static/reportimages/E8F05D884C7E78E45A200DC953ED3854.gif
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Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Texas Proposal: JAIL Any Federal Officials Trying to Enforce New Gun Restrictions in the State
measure would make any federal firearms legislation passed by Congress or approved by Presidential order unenforceable in Texas
Jim Forsyth
A Texas lawmaker says he plans to file the Firearms Protection Act, which would make any federal laws that may be passed by Congress or imposed by Presidential order which would ban or restrict ownership of semi-automatic firearms or limit the size of gun magazines illegal in the state, 1200 WOAI news reports.
Republican Rep. Steve Toth says his measure also calls for felony criminal charges to be filed against any federal official who tries to enforce the rule in the state.
"If a federal official comes into the state of Texas to enforce the federal executive order, that person is subject to criminal prosecution," Toth told 1200 WOAI's Joe Pags Tuesday. He says his bill would make attempting to enforce a federal gun ban in Texas punishable by a $50,000 fine and up to five years in prison.
Toth says he will file his measure after speaking with the state's Republican Attorney General, Greg Abbott, who has already vowed to fight any federal measures which call for restrictions on weapons possession.
Toth concedes that he would welcome a legal fight over his proposals.
"At some point there needs to be a showdown between the states and the federal government over the Supremacy Clause," he said.
The Supremacy Clause is the portion of the Constitution which declares that federal laws and statutes are 'the supreme law of the land.'
"It is our responsibility to push back when those laws are infringed by King Obama," Toth said.
Texas is the second state to propose a measure to shield the state from the impact of any gun possession restrictions imposed by Congress or by Presidential order. A similar measure was introduced in Wyoming last week.
Read more: http://radio.woai.com/cc-common/mainheadlines3.html?feed=119078&article=10700507
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/01/11/Kentucky-Sheriff-To-Obama-There-Will-Be-No-Gun-Control-In-My-County
KENTUCKY SHERIFF TO OBAMA: NO GUN CONTROL IN MY COUNTY
by AWR HAWKINS 11 Jan 2013
Jackson County Kentucky Sheriff Denny Peyman is making it clear that no law that violates the Constitution will be upheld in his county.
This especially applies to new gun control edicts Obama & Co. are trying to push onto the American people.
Said Peyman: "My office will not comply with any federal action which violates the United States Constitution or the Kentucky Constitution which I swore uphold."
And far from worrying about repercussions for doing this, Peyman sees the gun control push as a sign of weakness that will crumble in the face of real opposition: "Just a few of us have to be willing to stand up to political opposition putting our people at risk. The other side will back down."
Ladies and Gentlemen, we have found a patriot. And his name is Sheriff Denny Peyman.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=8nF098HtY-s
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(http://www.ignatius-piazza-front-sight.com/images/blog/gun-control.jpg)
What must she have done to warrant experiencing the historically proven, natural progression of GUN CONTROL?
Did she practice a religion that no longer had the Government's favor?
Did she speak out against the Government?
Did she not pay her taxes?
Did she have too many children?
Did she get caught with an assault rifle?
Whatever she did, she is one of over 170 million people who have been exterminated by their governments, AFTER the governments enacted strict gun control to disarm their populations.
Can't happen here? WHY NOT?
I'll bet she didn't think it could happen to her, in her country, in her lifetime either.
The POWER we give away to the Government TODAY, by allowing them to take away our rights and ability to defend ourselves against enemies foreign and domestic, WILL BE USED ON US TOMORROW. It is not a question of IF, but rather a question of WHEN.
Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely!
STUDY YOUR HISTORY. Here it is...
Watch the documentary Innocents Betrayed, I co-produced with Aaron Zelman of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership. I co-produced Innocents Betrayed because it dramatically and irrefutably documents the direct connections between government gun control schemes and the subsequent genocides that have taken the lives of over 170 million people!
You can now see Innocents Betrayed here: http://libertycrier.com/front-page/innocents-betrayed-genocide-by-gun-control-true-history-of-gun-confiscation/
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On a side note, it appears that the Chinese actually have an official training program for mass executions.......Note the standardized techniques used in the above executions.
"One man with a gun can control 100 without one." -Vladimir I. Lenin
(http://www.konas.net/wdata/article/050928/050928_23031.jpg)
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Interesting, the first photo is older and has PLA troops, though they could be the People's Armed Police, that wear similar uniforms. The blue uniforms below are the normally unarmed "Jing Cha" Public Security Bureau police. They do most police duties in the cities and immigration/Customs at the airports.
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Crafty posted:
"I would say that a significant MAJORITY of Americans support our gun rights and a significant minority would entertain notions of resistance."
And I would add we can be very sure the Obama administration's Dept. of HS is making, keeping, cataloguing, watching and studying lists of that significant minority.
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http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news%2Flocal%2Fnew_york&id=8958116
Additions to be made to gun laws for law enforcement
Updated at 05:45 PM todayTags:new york city, albany, gun control, new york news, jim hoffer
Comment NowEmailPrintReport a typo
Jim Hoffer
More: Bio, Blog, Facebook, Twitter, Stories by Jim Hoffer, News Team Eyewitness News
NEW YORK (WABC) -- It appears someone forgot to exempt police officers from the ban of ammunition clips with more than 7 bullets in New York State's new gun control law.
It's a big oversight that apparently happened in the haste by the Cuomo Administration to get a tough package of gun-control measures signed into law.
On Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the sweeping gun measure, the nation's toughest. It includes a ban on the possession of high-capacity magazines.
Related Content
More: Follow us @EyewitnessNYC
More: Get AlertsSpecifically, magazines with more than 7 rounds will be illegal under the new law.
The problem as the statute is currently written does NOT exempt law enforcement officers.
The NYPD, the State Police and virtually every law enforcement agency in the state carry 9-milli-meter guns, which have a 15-round capacity.
Unless an exemption is added by the time the law takes effect in March, police would technically be in violation of the new gun measure.
Within the last hour, the Patrolman's Benevolent Association President released a statement saying, "The PBA is actively working to enact changes to this law that will provide the appropriate exemptions from the law for active and retired law enforcement officers."
State Senator Eric Adams, a former NYPD Captain, told us he's going to push for an amendment next week to exempt police officers from the high-capacity magazine ban. In his words, "You can't give more ammo to the criminals"
A spokesman for the Governor's office called us to say, "We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included."
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Is The NYPD going to get the David Gregory treatment? :evil:
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http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/01/17/glenn-breaks-down-the-23-executive-orders/
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http://reason.com/archives/2012/12/22/gun-restrictions-have-always-bred-defian
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Obama Goes Nuts and Offers
Anti-gunners Wish List
Most of his crazy proposals are so extreme,
only few of his initiatives pose serious threat
Surrounded by child-props, Barack Obama yesterday proposed a semi-automatic ban so extreme that it could potentially outlaw up to 50% of all long guns in circulation and up to 80% of all handguns.
Originally, Obama's allies had announced they would reintroduce the 1994 ban on commonly-owned, defensive firearms. That was until they found out that they would look like fools, since that semi-auto ban was largely the law of Connecticut on the day the Newtown shooting occurred -- and didn't cover Adam Lanza's AR-15. After that, gun grabbers just kept adding more and more guns until they would register (or ban) a huge percentage of the defensive guns in existence.
So where are we now?
Obama's crazy gun ban is now being denounced by many Democrats. And, although you don't "pop the cork" until Congress adjourns, it will probably take the magazine ban down the toilet with it.
This means that gun owners' focus must now shift to the part of Obama's agenda which poses the most danger because it is most likely to move: the requirement that the government approve every gun transfer in America -- the so-called universal background check.
All of you know why this is a problem. But how do you explain it so simply that even a congressman can understand? Let's take a crack at that:
ONE: THE FBI'S "SECRET LIST" WHICH IS BEING USED TO BAR AMERICANS FROM OWNING GUNS IS INSIDIOUS
The FBI’s database currently contains the names of more than 150,000 veterans. They served their country honorably. They did nothing wrong. But, because they sought counseling for a traumatic experience while risking their lives for America, they have had their constitutional rights summarily revoked, with no due process whatsoever.
You want to know something else? The "secret list" could soon include tens of millions of Americans -- including soldiers, police, and fire fighters -- with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, and even post-partem depression. This would be achieved under the 23 anti-gun "executive actions" that Obama announced yesterday.
TWO: THE FBI REFUSES TO INSURE US THAT IT ISN'T TURNING ITS "SECRET LIST" INTO A NATIONAL GUN REGISTRY
Our legislative counsel drafted the Smith amendment in 1998 to prohibit the FBI from using the Brady Check system to tax gun buyers or put their names into a gun registry. But the FBI refuses to tell us -- or even to tell U.S. Senators -- how (or whether) it is complying with the Smith amendment. Why in the world should we give the FBI more authority and more names if it abuses the authority it already has?
This is the inherent problem with any background check, where gun buyers’ names are given to a government bureaucrat. Is there any way to make sure that once a name is entered into a computer, that it doesn’t stay there permanently?
This concern is especially valid, considering how federal agents are already skirting the laws against gun owner registration. Several dealers around the country have informed GOA that the ATF is increasingly going into gun shops and just xeroxing all of the 4473's, giving them the names of every gun owner who purchased a gun through that shop -- and setting up the basis for a national registration system.
This is illegal under the 1986 McClure-Volkmer law, but that has apparently not stopped it from being done. If every gun in America has to go through a dealer, this will create a mechanism to compile a list of every gun owner in America. And, as we have seen with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who has just been legislatively handed such a list, when that happens, the talk immediately turns to “confiscation."
THREE: AS A RESULT, REQUIRING GOVERNMENT APPROVAL OF EVERY GUN OWNER IN AMERICA WOULD DO NOTHING BUT CREATE A PLATFORM FOR NATIONAL GUN REGISTRATION AND CONFISCATION.
As alluded to above, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo now has a comprehensive gun registry. This is the most dangerous thing that New York legislators could have done -- as Cuomo has made it clear he’s considering gun confiscation of lawfully-owned firearms.
“I don’t think legitimate sportsmen are going to say, ‘I need an assault weapon to go hunting,’” Cuomo said. “Confiscation could be an option. Mandatory sale to the state could be an option. Permitting could be an option -- keep your gun but permit it.”
How nice. He’ll let gun owners “permit” their guns for now -- so that, presumably, they can be confiscated later, just as certain defensive weapons were confiscated in New York City during the Mayor David Dinkins administration in 1991.
FOUR: THE FBI REFUSES TO COMPLY WITH THE LAW GUARANTEEING THE RIGHTS OF LEGITIMATE PURCHASERS
The Brady Law requires that the FBI correct erroneous denials of firearms purchases. And it requires that it reply, initially, within five days. According to attorneys familiar with the problem, the FBI NEVER, EVER, EVER complies with the law. In fact, it increasingly tells aggrieved legitimate purchasers to "sue us" -- at a potential cost of tens of thousands of dollars.
FIVE: EVEN UNDER CURRENT LAW, THE BRADY SYSTEM HAS BROKEN DOWN REPEATEDLY
Since its inception, the FBI’s computer systems have often gone offline for hours at a time -- sometimes for days. And when it fails on weekends, it results in the virtual blackout of gun sales at gun shows across the country.
According to gun laws expert Alan Korwin, "With the NICS computer out of commission, the only place you could legally buy a firearm -- in the whole country -- was from a private individual, since all dealers were locked out of business by the FBI’s computer problem."
Of course, now the President wants to eliminate that last bastion of freedom!
Recently, the FBI’s system went down on Black Friday, angering many gun dealers and gun buyers around the country. “It means we can’t sell no damn guns,” said Rick Lozier, a manager at Van Raymond Outfitters in Maine. “If we can’t call it in, we can’t sell a gun. It’s cost us some money.”
The bottom line: Our goal is to insure that Obama's politicized dog-and-pony show doesn't produce one word of new gun law. Not a single word.
And the biggest danger right now is universal background checks -- which would create a platform for national registration and confiscation.
We would note that, in addition, Obama is attempting to illegally enact gun control through unlawful and unconstitutional "executive actions." Click here to read about these.
ACTION: Click here to contact your senators and congressman. Urge them to oppose the universal background check because it is a platform for national firearms registration and confiscation
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Gun Violence is Not a Republican Problem, It’s a Democratic Problem
Posted By Daniel Greenfield On January 18, 2013 - www.frontpagemag.com
Forget Wal-Mart and skip your local gun show. The murderers of tomorrow will not be found wearing orange vests at your local sporting goods store. They won’t have NRA memberships or trophies on their walls.
You won’t find them in America. Look for them in Obamerica.
67% of firearm murders took place in the country’s 50 largest metro areas. The 62 cities in those metro areas have a firearm murder rate of 9.7, more than twice the national average. Among teenagers the firearm murder rate is 14.6 or almost three times the national average.
Those are the crowded cities of Obamerica. Those are the places with the most restrictive gun control laws and the highest crime rates. And many of them have been run by Democrats and their political machines for almost as long as they have been broken.
Obama won every major city in the election, except for Jacksonville and Salt Lake City. And the higher the death rate, the bigger his victory.
He won New Orleans by 80 to 17 where the murder rate is ten times higher than the national average. He won Detroit, where the murder rate of 53 per 100,000 people is the second highest in the country and twice as high as any country in the world, including the Congo and South Africa. He won it 73 to 26. And then he celebrated his victory in Chicago where the murder rate is three times the statewide average.
These places aren’t America. They’re Obamerica.
In 2006, the 54% of the population living in those 50 metro areas was responsible for 67% of armed killings nationwide. Those are disproportionate numbers especially when you consider that for the people living in most of those cities walking into a store and legally buying a gun is all but impossible.
Mayors of Obamerican cities blame guns because it’s easier than blaming people and now the President of Obamerica has turned to the same shameless tactic. The NRA counters that people kill people, but that’s exactly why Obamerican leaders would rather talk about the guns.
Chicago, the capital of Obamerica, is a city run by gangs and politicians. It has 68,000 gang members, four times the number of police officers. Chicago politicians solicit the support of gang members in their campaigns, accepting laundered contributions from them, hiring their members and tipping them off about upcoming police raids. And their biggest favor to the gang bosses is doing nothing about the epidemic of gang violence.
80% of Chicago’s murders are gang-related. But in 1999 when a bill came up in the Illinois State Senate to charge anyone carrying out a firearm attack on school property as an adult, a law that would have largely affected gang members, the future leader of Obamerica voted present. Had he not voted present, it is doubtful that he would have been reelected in an area where gang leaders wield a great deal of influence.
The majority of murders in the cities with the worst homicide rates are gang-related. And while it isn’t always possible to be certain whether a killing was gang-related, the majority of homicide victims in city after city have been found to have criminal records.
In 2010, there were 11,078 firearm homicides in the United States and over 2,000 known gang-related killings, over 90% of which are carried out with firearms. Since 1981, Los Angeles alone has had 16,000 gang related homicides. That’s more than twice the number of Americans killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This is what Obamerica looks like. It’s a place where life is cheap and illegal guns are as available as illegal drugs. It’s the war that we aren’t talking about, because it’s easier to talk about the inanimate objects being used to fight that war.
There are, as John Edwards said, two Americas. America is a country that runs pretty well. And then there’s Obamerica. Not all of Obamerica is broken, but a lot of it is. America does not have a gun violence problem. Obamerica does. And Obamerica has a gun violence problem for the same reason that it has a drug problem and a broken family problem.
Democratic leaders and machines, combined with social workers and justice crusaders have run Obamerica into the ground. Obamerican cities used to be the homes of industry and progress. Now they’re places where young Black and Hispanic men kill each other in growing numbers.
America does not need gun control. It is a mostly law-abiding place. And gun control cannot help Obamerica. Not when its murder rate is driven by gangs who have no trouble obtaining anything; whether it’s legal in the United States or not.
This country does not need to have a conversation about how many bullets should go in a clip. It does need to have a conversation about how many parents should go in a family. It needs to talk about the ghettos of Obamerica and have a serious conversation about broken families and generational dependency.
Obama has become a role model to millions of people in the black community. If anyone can address these problems, it’s him. But instead of trying to solve the problems of Obamerica, instead of doing something about the high levels of unemployment, the broken families and the glamorization of drug dealing and violent crime, he wimped out and picked a fight with rural America.
AIDS prevention was sabotaged by the claim that the disease was a general problem spreading through the population. It wasn’t. Neither is gun violence.
Adam Lanza is as much of a poster boy for gun violence, as Ryan White was for AIDS. A better poster boy for gun violence might be Jay-Z, who boasts of having been a drug dealer and claims to have shot his brother at the age of 12. The drug dealer to millionaire rapper is the Horatio Alger story of Obamerica. And Jay-Z can be seen partying with Obama.
If Obama really wants to get serious about gun violence, then all he has to do is turn to the man standing next to him. But Obama, like every Chicago politician before him, don’t want to end the violence. The death toll is profitable, not just for rappers writing bad poetry about dealing drugs and shooting rivals, but for the politicians atop that heap who score money and gain power by using the problems of Obamerica as some sort of call to conscience for the rest of the country.
That’s what Obama is doing now. Hiding behind Newtown and adorable little kids is the grim specter of Obamerica’s death toll. It’s buried inside the gruesome figures of how many Americans are shot each year issued as an indictment against the entire country in general and gun owners in particular. But those numbers are not an indictment of America. They are an indictment of Democratic mayors and liberal social policy. They are an indictment of Obama.
We need to set aside the same old tired social justice rhetoric and have a serious conversation about what is wrong with New Orleans, Detroit and Chicago. And we need to do it before it’s too late.
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http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news%2Flocal%2Fnew_york&id=8958116
Additions to be made to gun laws for law enforcement
Updated at 05:45 PM todayTags:new york city, albany, gun control, new york news, jim hoffer
Comment NowEmailPrintReport a typo
Jim Hoffer
More: Bio, Blog, Facebook, Twitter, Stories by Jim Hoffer, News Team Eyewitness News
NEW YORK (WABC) -- It appears someone forgot to exempt police officers from the ban of ammunition clips with more than 7 bullets in New York State's new gun control law.
It's a big oversight that apparently happened in the haste by the Cuomo Administration to get a tough package of gun-control measures signed into law.
On Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the sweeping gun measure, the nation's toughest. It includes a ban on the possession of high-capacity magazines.
Related Content
More: Follow us @EyewitnessNYC
More: Get AlertsSpecifically, magazines with more than 7 rounds will be illegal under the new law.
The problem as the statute is currently written does NOT exempt law enforcement officers.
The NYPD, the State Police and virtually every law enforcement agency in the state carry 9-milli-meter guns, which have a 15-round capacity.
Unless an exemption is added by the time the law takes effect in March, police would technically be in violation of the new gun measure.
Within the last hour, the Patrolman's Benevolent Association President released a statement saying, "The PBA is actively working to enact changes to this law that will provide the appropriate exemptions from the law for active and retired law enforcement officers."
State Senator Eric Adams, a former NYPD Captain, told us he's going to push for an amendment next week to exempt police officers from the high-capacity magazine ban. In his words, "You can't give more ammo to the criminals"
A spokesman for the Governor's office called us to say, "We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included."
I think it's very important that they don't exempt the police..........If you only need 7 rounds to defend yourself, that should be sufficient. I saw that as a 15 year police veteran. What's good for the goose......
As to gun registration, it's necessary to impose mandatory registration before confiscation can occur. If you allow people the illusion that they can keep their guns if they register them, they will register them. Then you can come back and confiscate what is registered. If you simply demand they turn them in, the non-complicance rate will be extraordinarily high and currently the government has no idea where all those guns are.
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http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news%2Flocal%2Fnew_york&id=8958116
Additions to be made to gun laws for law enforcement
Updated at 05:45 PM todayTags:new york city, albany, gun control, new york news, jim hoffer
Comment NowEmailPrintReport a typo
Jim Hoffer
More: Bio, Blog, Facebook, Twitter, Stories by Jim Hoffer, News Team Eyewitness News
NEW YORK (WABC) -- It appears someone forgot to exempt police officers from the ban of ammunition clips with more than 7 bullets in New York State's new gun control law.
It's a big oversight that apparently happened in the haste by the Cuomo Administration to get a tough package of gun-control measures signed into law.
On Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the sweeping gun measure, the nation's toughest. It includes a ban on the possession of high-capacity magazines.
Related Content
More: Follow us @EyewitnessNYC
More: Get AlertsSpecifically, magazines with more than 7 rounds will be illegal under the new law.
The problem as the statute is currently written does NOT exempt law enforcement officers.
The NYPD, the State Police and virtually every law enforcement agency in the state carry 9-milli-meter guns, which have a 15-round capacity.
Unless an exemption is added by the time the law takes effect in March, police would technically be in violation of the new gun measure.
Within the last hour, the Patrolman's Benevolent Association President released a statement saying, "The PBA is actively working to enact changes to this law that will provide the appropriate exemptions from the law for active and retired law enforcement officers."
State Senator Eric Adams, a former NYPD Captain, told us he's going to push for an amendment next week to exempt police officers from the high-capacity magazine ban. In his words, "You can't give more ammo to the criminals"
A spokesman for the Governor's office called us to say, "We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included."
I think it's very important that they don't exempt the police..........If you only need 7 rounds to defend yourself, that should be sufficient. I saw that as a 15 year police veteran. What's good for the goose......
As to gun registration, it's necessary to impose mandatory registration before confiscation can occur. If you allow people the illusion that they can keep their guns if they register them, they will register them. Then you can come back and confiscate what is registered. If you simply demand they turn them in, the non-complicance rate will be extraordinarily high and currently the government has no idea where all those guns are.
Imagine the logistics involved for the NYPD to find 7 rnd. mags for their duty weapons and collecting all the non-standard mags. They're in crisis at 1PP over this, I'll bet.
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/01/17/Holder-begs-court-to-indefinitely-delay-group-s-lawsuit-fighting-for-release-of-Obama-s-executive-privilege-Fast-and-Furious-documents
Holder Begs Court to Stop Document Release on Fast and Furious
by Matthew Boyle17 Jan 2013
Attorney General Eric Holder and his Department of Justice have asked a federal court to indefinitely delay a lawsuit brought by watchdog group Judicial Watch. The lawsuit seeks the enforcement of open records requests relating to Operation Fast and Furious, as required by law.
Judicial Watch had filed, on June 22, 2012, a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking all documents relating to Operation Fast and Furious and “specifically [a]ll records subject to the claim of executive privilege invoked by President Barack Obama on or about June 20, 2012.”
The administration has refused to comply with Judicial Watch’s FOIA request, and in mid-September the group filed a lawsuit challenging Holder’s denial. That lawsuit remains ongoing but within the past week President Barack Obama’s administration filed what’s called a “motion to stay” the suit. Such a motion is something that if granted would delay the lawsuit indefinitely.
Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said that Holder’s and Obama’s desire to continually hide these Fast and Furious documents is “ironic” now that they’re so gung-ho on gun control. “It is beyond ironic that the Obama administration has initiated an anti-gun violence push as it seeking to keep secret key documents about its very own Fast and Furious gun walking scandal,” Fitton said in a statement. “Getting beyond the Obama administration’s smokescreen, this lawsuit is about a very simple principle: the public’s right to know the full truth about an egregious political scandal that led to the death of at least one American and countless others in Mexico. The American people are sick and tired of the Obama administration trying to rewrite FOIA law to protect this president and his appointees. Americans want answers about Fast and Furious killings and lies.”
The only justification Holder uses to ask the court to indefinitely delay Judicial Watch’s suit is that there’s another lawsuit ongoing for the same documents – one filed by the U.S. House of Representatives. Judicial Watch has filed a brief opposing the DOJ’s motion to stay.
As the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform was voting Holder into contempt of Congress for his refusal to cooperate with congressional investigators by failing to turn over tens of thousands of pages of Fast and Furious documents, Obama asserted the executive privilege over them. The full House of Representatives soon after voted on a bipartisan basis to hold Holder in contempt.
There were two parts of the contempt resolution. Holder was, and still is, in both civil and criminal contempt of Congress. The criminal resolution was forwarded to the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ronald Machen–who works for Holder–for prosecution. Despite being technically required by law to bring forth criminal charges against Holder, under orders from Holder’s Department of Justice Machen chose to ignore the resolution.
The second part of the contempt resolution–civil contempt of Congress–allowed House Republicans to hire legal staff to challenge President Obama’s assertion of the executive privilege. That lawsuit remains ongoing despite Holder’s and the DOJ’s attempt to dismiss it and settle it.
It’s unclear what’s in the documents Obama asserted privilege over, but the president’s use of the extraordinary power appears weak. There are two types of presidential executive privilege: the presidential communications privilege and the deliberative process privilege. Use of the presidential communications privilege would require that the president himself or his senior-most advisers were involved in the discussions.
Since the president and his cabinet-level officials continually claim they had no knowledge of Operation Fast and Furious until early 2011 when the information became public–and Holder claims he didn’t read the briefing documents he was sent that outlined the scandal and how guns were walking while the operation was ongoing–Obama says he’s using the less powerful deliberative process privilege.
The reason why Obama’s assertion of that deliberative process privilege over these documents is weak at best is because the Supreme Court has held that such a privilege assertion is invalidated by even the suspicion of government wrongdoing. Obama, Holder, the Department of Justice, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and virtually everyone else involved in this scandal have admitted that government wrongdoing actually took place in Operation Fast and Furious.
In Fast and Furious, the ATF “walked” about 2,000 firearms into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels. That means through straw purchasers they allowed sales to happen and didn’t stop the guns from being trafficked even though they had the legal authority to do so and were fully capable of doing so.
Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and hundreds of Mexican citizens–estimates put it around at least 300–were killed with these firearms.
The Fast and Furious scandal and more is covered in detail in the New York Times best-selling book Corruption Chronicles.
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Putting OFF down the memory hole appears to be the model for Benghazigate as well.
==================================
The Facts About Assault Weapons and Crime .
By JOHN R. LOTT JR.
Warning about "weapons designed for the theater of war," President Obama on Wednesday called for immediate action on a new Federal Assault Weapons Ban. He said that "more of our fellow Americans might still be alive" if the original assault weapons ban, passed in 1994, had not expired in 2004. Last month, in the wake of the horrific shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn., Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) promised to introduce an updated version of the ban. She too warned of the threat posed by "military weapons."
After the nightmare of Newtown, their concern is understandable. Yet despite being at the center of the gun-control debate for decades, neither President Obama nor Ms. Feinstein (the author of the 1994 legislation) seems to understand the leading research on the effects of the Federal Assault Weapons Ban. In addition, they continue to mislabel the weapons they seek to ban.
Ms. Feinstein points to two studies by criminology professors Chris Koper and Jeff Roth for the National Institute of Justice to back up her contention that the ban reduced crime. She claims that their first study in 1997 showed that the ban decreased "total gun murders." In fact, the authors wrote: "the evidence is not strong enough for us to conclude that there was any meaningful effect (i.e., that the effect was different from zero)."
Messrs. Koper and Roth suggested that after the ban had been in effect for more years it might be possible to find a benefit. Seven years later, in 2004, they published a follow-up study for the National Institute of Justice with fellow criminologist Dan Woods that concluded, "we cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation's recent drop in gun violence. And, indeed, there has been no discernible reduction in the lethality and injuriousness of gun violence."
Moreover, none of the weapons banned under the 1994 legislation or the updated version are "military" weapons. The killer in Newtown used a Bushmaster .223. This weapon bears a cosmetic resemblance to the M-16, which has been used by the U.S. military since the Vietnam War. The call has frequently been made that there is "no reason" for such "military-style weapons" to be available to civilians.
Yes, the Bushmaster and the AK-47 are "military-style weapons." But the key word is "style"—they are similar to military guns in their cosmetics, not in the way they operate. The guns covered by the original were not the fully automatic machine guns used by the military, but semiautomatic versions of those guns.
The civilian version of the Bushmaster uses essentially the same sorts of bullets as small game-hunting rifles, fires at the same rapidity (one bullet per pull of the trigger), and does the same damage. The civilian version of the AK-47 is similar, though it fires a much larger bullet—.30 inches in diameter, as opposed to the .223 inch rounds used by the Bushmaster. No self-respecting military in the world would use the civilian version of these guns.
A common question is: "Why do people need a semiautomatic Bushmaster to go out and kill deer?" The answer is simple: It is a hunting rifle. It has just been made to look like a military weapon.
But the point isn't to help hunters. Semiautomatic weapons also protect people and save lives. Single-shot rifles that require you to physically reload the gun may not do people a lot of good when they are facing multiple criminals or when their first shot misses or fails to stop an attacker.
Since the Federal Assault Weapons Ban expired in September 2004, murder and overall violent-crime rates have fallen. In 2003, the last full year before the law expired, the U.S. murder rate was 5.7 per 100,000 people, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime Report. By 2011, the murder rate fell to 4.7 per 100,000 people. One should also bear in mind that just 2.6% of all murders are committed using any type of rifle.
The large-capacity ammunition magazines used by some of these killers are also misunderstood. The common perception that so-called "assault weapons" can hold larger magazines than hunting rifles is simply wrong. Any gun that can hold a magazine can hold one of any size. That is true for handguns as well as rifles. A magazine, which is basically a metal box with a spring, is trivially easy to make and virtually impossible to stop criminals from obtaining. The 1994 legislation banned magazines holding more than 10 bullets yet had no effect on crime rates.
Ms. Feinstein's new proposal also calls for gun registration, and the reasoning is straightforward: If a gun has been left at a crime scene and it was registered to the person who committed the crime, the registry will link the crime gun back to the criminal.
Nice logic, but in reality it hardly ever works that way. Guns are very rarely left behind at a crime scene. When they are, they're usually stolen or unregistered. Criminals are not stupid enough to leave behind guns that are registered to them. Even in the few cases where registered guns are left at crime scenes, it is usually because the criminal has been seriously injured or killed, so these crimes would have been solved even without registration.
Canada recently got rid of its costly "long-gun" registry for rifles in part because the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Chiefs of Police could not provide a single example in which tracing was of more than peripheral importance in solving a gun murder.
If we finally want to deal seriously with multiple-victim public shootings, it's time that we acknowledge a common feature of these attacks: With just a single exception, the attack in Tucson last year, every public shooting in the U.S. in which more than three people have been killed since at least 1950 has occurred in a place where citizens are not allowed to carry their own firearms. Had some citizens been armed, they might have been able to stop the killings before the police got to the scene. In the Newtown attack, it took police 20 minutes to arrive at the school after the first calls for help.
The Bushmaster, like any gun, is indeed very dangerous, but it is not a weapon "designed for the theater of war." Banning assault weapons will not make Americans safer.
Mr. Lott is a former chief economist at the United States Sentencing Commission and the author of "More Guns, Less Crime" (University of Chicago Press, third edition, 2010).
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http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news%2Flocal%2Fnew_york&id=8958116
Additions to be made to gun laws for law enforcement
Updated at 05:45 PM todayTags:new york city, albany, gun control, new york news, jim hoffer
Comment NowEmailPrintReport a typo
Jim Hoffer
More: Bio, Blog, Facebook, Twitter, Stories by Jim Hoffer, News Team Eyewitness News
NEW YORK (WABC) -- It appears someone forgot to exempt police officers from the ban of ammunition clips with more than 7 bullets in New York State's new gun control law.
It's a big oversight that apparently happened in the haste by the Cuomo Administration to get a tough package of gun-control measures signed into law.
On Tuesday, Governor Andrew Cuomo signed the sweeping gun measure, the nation's toughest. It includes a ban on the possession of high-capacity magazines.
Related Content
More: Follow us @EyewitnessNYC
More: Get AlertsSpecifically, magazines with more than 7 rounds will be illegal under the new law.
The problem as the statute is currently written does NOT exempt law enforcement officers.
The NYPD, the State Police and virtually every law enforcement agency in the state carry 9-milli-meter guns, which have a 15-round capacity.
Unless an exemption is added by the time the law takes effect in March, police would technically be in violation of the new gun measure.
Within the last hour, the Patrolman's Benevolent Association President released a statement saying, "The PBA is actively working to enact changes to this law that will provide the appropriate exemptions from the law for active and retired law enforcement officers."
State Senator Eric Adams, a former NYPD Captain, told us he's going to push for an amendment next week to exempt police officers from the high-capacity magazine ban. In his words, "You can't give more ammo to the criminals"
A spokesman for the Governor's office called us to say, "We are still working out some details of the law and the exemption will be included."
I think it's very important that they don't exempt the police..........If you only need 7 rounds to defend yourself, that should be sufficient. I saw that as a 15 year police veteran. What's good for the goose......
As to gun registration, it's necessary to impose mandatory registration before confiscation can occur. If you allow people the illusion that they can keep their guns if they register them, they will register them. Then you can come back and confiscate what is registered. If you simply demand they turn them in, the non-complicance rate will be extraordinarily high and currently the government has no idea where all those guns are.
Imagine the logistics involved for the NYPD to find 7 rnd. mags for their duty weapons and collecting all the non-standard mags. They're in crisis at 1PP over this, I'll bet.
Absolutely........Considering GLOCK doesn't make 7 round magazines that i'm aware of.
And to go and amend the law makes them look like hypocrites.
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http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/01/17/wiki-weapons-founder-they-can-never-eradicate-the-gun-from-the-earth/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-01-18_193339&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_193339_193360
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http://www.youtube.com/embed/vsVCHE7ayPE?rel=0
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http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-perspective/011613-640869-more-guns-means-less-crime.htm
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Another example of a gaffe being when someone accidentally speaks the truth: VP Biden: No time & Money to prosecute liars on background checks
http://www.nraila.org/news-issues/articles/2013/1/biden-says-administration-doesn't-have-time-to-prosecute-people-who-lie-on-background-checks.aspx
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Utah sheriffs warn Obama of deadly war over guns
January 20, 2013 | 1:28 pm
Paul Bedard
The Washington Examiner
In the most strident warning over gun control to President Obama yet, the Utah Sheriffs' Association is pledging to go to war over any administration plan to take guns away, even if it means losing their lives.
Calling the Second Amendment a sacred right of citizens to protect themselves from "tyrannical subjugation," the association state elected sheriffs said in a new letter, "we are prepared to trade our lives for the preservation of its traditional interpretation."
Theirs is the first meaningful proof that some in law enforcement and the military are preparing to fight federal forces if the president wins his goal of sweeping gun control.
In a direct warning to Obama, the FBI and other agencies, the sheriffs wrote: "Make no mistake, as the duly-elected sheriffs our our respective counties, we will enforce the rights guaranteed to our citizens by the Constitution. No federal official will be permitted to descend upon our constituents and take from them what the Bill of Rights--in particular Amendment II--has given them."
While he wants an assault weapons ban and limits on ammo magazines, the president has not yet suggested he wants to confiscate guns.
The association revealed their concerns in a letter to the president just made public. It was sent on January 17. It opens by decrying the recent shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
But the group argued that guns are simply "instruments," and that they are needed by law-abiding citizens to sometimes subdue killers. "The citizenry must continue its ability to keep and bear arms, including arms that adequately protect them from all types of illegality," said the letter.
Several groups have argued that assault weapons and high-capacity magazines are needed for self defense.
The association also called on Obama to push his efforts through Congress, not executive orders with no debate. "Please remember that the Founders of this great nation created the Constitution, and its accompanying Bill of Rights, an effort to protect citizens from all forms of tyrannical subjugation."
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one can soon download guns and ammo:
http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2012-08/wiki-blueprint-would-let-anyone-3-d-print-gun-home
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http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/01/va-democrat-who-brandished-ak47-on-house-floor-was-jailed-and-disbarred-in-1999/
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http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323485704578257942971371234.html?mod=opinion_newsreel
It turns out that NRA ad we partially defended last week was based on a false premise. The ad cited a Dec. 24 Breitbart.com story titled "School Obama's Daughters Attend Has 11 Armed Guards." Washington Post "fact checker" Glenn Kessler lived up to his job description for once and checked the facts:
[The claim] is based on the fact that the online directory for Sidwell Friends lists 11 people as working in the Security Department. Five are listed as "special police officer," while two are listed as "on call special police officer," which presumably means they do not work full-time. The directory also lists two weekend shift supervisors, one security officer and the chief of security.
Under the District of Columbia General Order 308.7, a special police officer is a private commissioned police officer with arrest powers in the area that he or she protects. They may also be authorized to bear firearms--but it is not required. Security officers, by contrast, cannot carry firearms and in effect are watchmen. So five to seven security personnel in theory could be licensed to carry firearms.
But we spoke to parents who said they had never seen a guard on campus with a weapon. And Ellis Turner, associate head of Sidwell Friends, told us emphatically: "Sidwell Friends security officers do not carry guns." (Note: this includes those listed as special police officers.)
Kessler awards the NRA ad "four Pinocchios," which again underscores the problem with the "fact checking" genre: It assumes that all errors of fact are the result of bad faith. This looks to us like a misunderstanding rather than a lie--though it is to the Breitbart site's discredit that it has not updated the initial post.
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http://reason.com/archives/2013/01/23/look-whos-mocking-fascist-fear-mongering
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Two-thirds of U.S. weapons owners would 'defy' a federal gun ban
An interesting little factoid has emerged from a new Fox News poll of U.S. voters: Personal sentiments are strong and defiant among many U.S. gun owners.
Question 46 in the wide-ranging survey of more than 1,000 registered voters asks if there is a gun in the household. Overall, 52 percent of the respondents said yes, someone in their home owned a gun. That number included 65 percent of Republicans, 59 percent of conservatives, 38 percent of Democrats and 41 percent of liberals.
But on to Question 47, addressed to those with a gun in their home: "If the government passed a law to take your guns, would you give up your guns or defy the law and keep your guns?"
The response: 65 percent reported they would "defy the law." That incudes 70 percent of Republicans, 68 percent of conservatives, 52 percent of Democrats and 59 percent of liberals.
Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/watercooler/2013/jan/20/two-thirds-us-weapons-owners-would-defy-federal-gu/
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http://www.13wham.com/news/local/story/Homeowners-Scare-Off-Burglars/7yaLSXAvCUGBkwgAZpGO4g.cspx
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http://p.washingtontimes.com/blog/watercooler/2013/jan/20/two-thirds-us-weapons-owners-would-defy-federal-gu/
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Second post of the day
http://www.theblaze.com/blog/2013/01/25/dem-rep-women-should-serve-in-combat-but-shouldnt-use-assault-weapons/
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Third post of the day-- there are some interesting implications in this piece worthy of our discussion I think.
What a 'Militia' Meant in Revolutionary America
The Kentish Guards were defined by a sense of community, not by their guns or by government edict..
By CHRIS BRAY
It's the discussion Americans can never settle: Does the Second Amendment convey an individual right to bear arms, or does it only establish the means to arm the state military institutions that the Founders knew as the militia and we know as the National Guard?
Those stark choices shrink our history into cartoonish simplicity. The real story is far more complex and illuminating. At the nation's beginning, there was a variety of middle ways regarding militias, a set of expectations and boundaries built in culture and enforced by community.
In a box at the Rhode Island Historical Society, a contract describes the creation of a militia in Kent County during the crisis year of 1774. "We the subscribers do unanimously join to establish and constitute a military independent company," reads an agreement signed by dozens of local men. "That on every Tuesday and Saturday in the afternoon for the future, or as long as occasion require it shall be judg'd necessary or expedient a Meeting to be held at the House of William Arnold in East Greenwich for the Purpose aforesaid."
You and Bill and I hereby agree to make an army, and let's meet at Bill's house to practice.
Formed by an agreement between armed individuals, the Kentish Guards became a militia organization without being a government institution, though the members would soon approach the colonial government of Rhode Island for a charter. It was a "militia of association," built in equal measure from multiple foundations. The men of the Kentish Guards weren't a militia merely because they each owned guns, and they weren't a militia because the government said they were. They became a militia when they talked among themselves, agreed on rules and a shared purpose, and signed a mutual contract. They were a militia as a community.
The agreement to make a militia empowered its members and restrained them at the same time, allowing them to act but demanding that they act together in considered ways. The early American militia was neither purely individual nor purely governmental; rather, it was deeply rooted in a particular place, making the militia a creature that stood with one foot in government and one foot firmly in civil society.
In this social vision, government couldn't properly take guns from the men who then made up political society, but those men couldn't properly use guns in ways that transgressed community values and expectations. The bearing of arms was a socially regulated act.
That mixed reality grew from a social world that looks nothing like our own. The first few American police departments were still many decades in the future, and the victims of crime could only shout for their neighbors.
Whole neighborhoods raced into the street in response to a cry for help, and victims could personally bring the accused before a local magistrate. Communities turned out to face military threats, neighbors joining neighbors for mutual defense. Adulterers and wife-beaters were often punished in the ritual called skimminton or charivari, bound to a fence post and paraded in shame by their jeering neighbors.
With this kind of local experience, the bearing of arms was an individual act undertaken in carefully shared and monitored ways. The historian T.H. Breen has described the citizen-soldiers of colonial Massachusetts as members of a "covenanted militia," bound by agreement.
Another historian, Steven Rosswurm, has described the negotiations between Pennsylvania's Revolutionary government and the ordinary men, serving as privates in the militia, who formed a "committee of privates" to present the terms under which they would perform armed service. Government did not just command; states and communities talked, bargained and agreed. Individuals were both free to act and responsible to one another for their actions, in a constantly debated balance.
In the predawn hours of April 19, 1775, militiamen of Lexington, Mass., gathered around their commander. Capt. John Parker greeted each man, writes the historian David Hackett Fischer in his book "Paul Revere's Ride," as "neighbor, kinsman, and friend," joining them to decide what they would do about the British regulars marching toward their town. "The men of Lexington . . . gathered around Captain Parker on the Common, and held an impromptu town meeting in the open air." They had a commander, and he joined them for discussion.
Today, we are presented with a false choice in which either the government bans assault weapons or an unfettered individual right makes it possible for a monster to spray bullets into schoolhouses. The forgotten middle ways of our nation's earlier days, that world of mutuality, excluded more people than it included, and its shortcomings are well known. But it also had real strengths, and the benefits of a strong civil society are lost to us when we expect government to address and solve our every problem.
Mr. Bray, a former Army infantry sergeant, is an adjunct assistant professor at Pitzer College in Claremont, Calif.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=fGaDAThOHhA
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/01/26/i-need-you-in-the-game-wis-sheriff-tells-residents-to-learn-how-to-use-a-gun-to-defend-themselves/
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/01/26/if-assault-weapons-are-bad-why-does-the-dhs-want-to-buy-7000-of-them-for-personal-defense/
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ooa98FHuaU0
http://gopthedailydose.com/2013/01/27/watch-two-young-ladies-explain-why-they-need-an-ar-15/
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"Do as I say, not as I do"- Official Slogan of the left
http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2013/01/28/breaking-ny-mayor-mike-bloomberg-uses-bodyguards-to-bully-journalist-in-washington/
BREAKING: NY Mayor Mike Bloomberg Uses Bodyguards to Bully Journalist in Washington
by
Bryan Preston
January 28, 2013 - 9:05 am
Jason Mattera caught up with New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg at the US Conference of Mayors on January 18. Bloomberg has been making headlines lately for pushing gun control, and New York State passed one of the most sweeping gun bans in the nation earlier in January.
Mattera confronts Mayor Bloomberg and asks him to disarm his praetorian guard, in the spirit of gun control. Bloomberg balks.
“Uh, we’ll get back to you on that,” Bloomberg says. Bloomberg’s five visible, and very large and armed, bodyguards get between Mattera and the mayor.
But that’s not where the story ends.
Once Mattera’s brief conversation with Bloomberg is over, he leaves the scene.
And one of Bloomberg’s body guards follows him.
Though the confrontation took place in Washington DC, NYPD Officer Stockton claims that he has “security jurisdiction.” Officer Stockton then tries to get Jason’s personal information. Mattera refuses, so Officer Stockton follows him down the street. The officer is clearly trying to intimidate Mattera for asking Bloomberg a question that made the mayor uncomfortable. There is no reason to believe that the officer is acting without orders from Mayor Bloomberg.
Mattera has been playing clips from the video today on the Andrea Tantaros Show with Jason Mattera. Watch the full video here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCC-rEx81PE
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCC-rEx81PE[/youtube]
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/01/27/illegal-guns-david-brock-media-matters/?print=1
Brock’s Glock: In anti-gun DC, Media Matters for America gave bodyguard illegal weapons to guard founder David Brock
Posted By Vince Coglianese On 11:54 PM 01/27/2013 @ 11:54 PM In DC Exclusives - Original Reporting
A staffer at left-wing Media Matters for America committed numerous felonies in the District of Columbia and around the country by carrying a firearm to defend the organization’s founder, David Brock, The Daily Caller has learned.
According to a knowledgeable source, multiple firearms used to protect the Media Matters founder were purchased with Brock’s blessing — and apparently with the group’s money.
TheDC has previously reported that Brock’s one-time aide, Haydn Price-Morris, carried a concealed Glock handgun as he traveled with the liberal leader to public events in Washington, D.C. (RELATED: Sources, memos reveal erratic behavior, Media Matters’ close coordination with White House and news organizations)
But the extent of Brock’s armed activities have been largely unknown until now, even among those closest to him. An array of current and former Media Matters sources, all with intimate knowledge about the inner workings of the organization, granted extensive interviews to TheDC.
Brock, whose struggles with mental health have seen him hospitalized in the past, became increasingly concerned by late 2010 that he was being targeted by right-wing assassins.
TheDC has learned that by that time, Brock had armed his assistant — who had no permit to carry a concealed firearm — with a Glock handgun.
According to an internal email exchange obtained by TheDC, the gun was purchased with cash in Maryland, likely to diminish the chances such a purchase would appear on the tax-exempt group’s books.
Between Price-Morris’ early 2009 arrival and late 2010 departure from Media Matters, he also acquired a shotgun for Brock’s protection.
Price-Morris was regularly armed when accompanying Brock on trips around the country, according to a source, and his firearm possession in Washington, D.C. constituted multiple felonies.
On at least one occasion, Brock — accompanied by his armed aide — visited California to attend a “Democracy Alliance” summit of major Democratic donors and lawmakers.
That gathering included such major figures in Democratic politics as billionaires George Soros, Peter Lewis and Bill Benter, former Service Employees International Union Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger, and the politician behind the federal government’s 1994 “Assault Weapons Ban,” California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein.
On Thursday, Feinstein re-introduced a new version of the ban which would reinstate and greatly expand the law, which expired in 2004. Reached Thursday, a spokesman for Feinstein did not respond to a request for comment related to the senator’s attendance, alongside Brock and Price-Morris, at the Democracy Alliance meeting.
Spokespersons for Soros and Benter did not reply to emailed requests for comment.
It’s unclear if Price-Morris was carrying his Media Matters-supplied Glock to that Democracy Alliance summit, but a well-placed source told TheDC he was carrying a concealed weapon at the event.
Brock’s aide was a “gun enthusiast,” according to the source, and often selected a weapon from his personal collection of firearms that would suit a given occasion and his taste. Price-Morris would occasionally carry a separate Glock that he owned personally, one with a high-capacity magazine — 17-rounds — if his outfit was loose enough to conceal the weapon.
Media Matters had reason to be concerned about news of its use of firearms becoming public. (RELATED: The Daily Caller’s complete coverage of Media Matters for America)
Aside from risking the disapproval or outrage of disenchanted anti-gun donors, it appears Media Matters personnel may have committed several serious crimes.
“If he carried it in DC, that’s a felony,” Stephen Halbrook, a D.C.-area lawyer with more than 35 years of experience practicing gun law nationwide, confirmed to TheDC.
“Any weapon [with] over 10 rounds is illegal under D.C. law,” said Halbrook of Price-Morris’ 17-round-capacity Glock. “And this is for mere possession. If you have a gun that’s unregistered, that’s another felony by the way.”
“If you’re carrying it around, you’re committing two crimes: one, the crime of carrying the firearm, and two, having it unregistered — the status of it being unregistered. Both of those would be felonies,” he explained.
“And then the ammunition can be a separate charge: If you don’t have a registered gun, then you can’t have ammunition in D.C.”
For carrying a fully-loaded Glock in Washington without a permit, Price-Morris “could be looking at some substantial prison time because if we use the low-end felony sentence of five years, you could get five years for the non-registration, five for the carrying, and then [more for] the second offenses of the magazine being over 10 rounds and then the cartridges,” said Halbrook.
Halbrook said Brock also risks facing criminal charges.
It could be considered a criminal “conspiracy,” Halbrook explained, “if they set up this arrangement and everything that was done was illegal. Then they would be a conspirator, or maybe an aider or abettor of a crime.”
Aside from Brock and Price-Morris, few at Media Matters knew Brock had armed his aide, according to multiple Media Matters sources.
One source described Brock as “very shy,” explaining that while Price-Morris was there, he rarely confided in anyone outside of his aide and two other people: then-Media Matters president Eric Burns and Brock’s longtime fundraiser, Mary Pat Bonner.
Burns has since started his own public relations firm and would not respond to TheDC’s requests for comment.
Bonner, who sources say now shares office space with Brock inside Media Matters, also did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
Whether they were aware of the guns or not, Media Matters sources viewed Price-Morris as “very protective” of Brock.
Reflecting on an incident — previously reported by TheDC — where Price-Morris whisked his boss from the roof of Media Matters’ Washington headquarters for fear of “snipers,” one former staffer said Brock’s aide was “a strange kind of guy.”
“I think he [Price-Morris] worried more about David’s security than David worried about it,” she said.
She was one of several sources that expressed displeasure with Price-Morris’ demeanor, calling him a “loose cannon.”
“Haydn was another one of those people that nobody in the office really got along with,” she said.
He was “arrogant,” agreed another source, who said Price-Morris exuded a “sense of entitlement” exceptional even for Washington, D.C.
Many of Brock’s senior employees claim they were caught completely by surprise when in late 2010, staffers became aware of Price-Morris’ gun after he revealed his concealed weapon to a female employee.
One former senior employee told TheDC the Media Matters staff was “shocked” to learn of the gun. Another said the in-house reaction was “like, ‘Holy shit!’ It was so beyond what was acceptable.”
Speaking to TheDC, multiple Media Matters staffers described an atmosphere of confusion surrounding why Price-Morris had a gun when so much of the liberal organization’s work was aimed at restricting the public’s access to firearms.
In the aftermath of the December 14 school shooting in Newtown, Conn., Media Matters has been on the gun control warpath, commissioning hundreds of pieces supportive of restrictions on firearms.
As one source put it, Brock was “terrified” that the gun story would get out.
“George Soros and a lot of groups connected to gun control are funding this group, and they wouldn’t be too happy that an employee of Media Matters was carrying a gun, especially when it was illegal in D.C.,” said the source.
The Joyce Foundation, a Chicago-based philanthropy whose board of directors included Barack Obama from 1994 to 2002, awarded $400,000 to Media Matters for “a gun and public safety issue initiative” in 2010 — the same year the staff learned of Price-Morris’ gun. (RELATED: Left-wing foundations lavish millions on Media Matters)
A spokeswoman for the Joyce Foundation did not respond to a request for comment.
Likewise, the David Bohnett Foundation — started by Geocities co-founder David Bohnett — gave Media Matters $75,000 between 2010 and 2011, specifically for “gun safety” operations.
Foundation executive director Michael Fleming declined to comment for this report.
One former Media Matters staffer expressed disbelief that Brock could have approved of Price-Morris carrying a concealed weapon. “I can’t imagine David wouldn’t have known this wasn’t the type of thing that wouldn’t blow up in his face,” the source explained.
Despite Brock’s knowledge of the guns, his organization successfully laid the blame for the lapse in judgment at Price-Morris’ feet, and he was quickly let go.
Price-Morris disappeared from Washington, D.C. not long after, moving with his wife from their Annapolis, Md. home to Jersey City, N.J. — but not before returning the guns to Media Matters through a third party.
By the beginning of April 2011, Media Matters was scrambling to retrieve the weapons from Price-Morris. An email exchange obtained by TheDC shows that the group clearly had a stake in the weapons.
Matt Reents, a former senior Media Matters staffer, emailed Price-Morris on April 4, 2011 asking him to transfer ownership of a shotgun to a man named Robert Stewart. Reents also explained that the Glock would be surrendered to the police.
“MD [Maryland] law doesn’t require paperwork or registration when transferring a shotgun,” Reents emailed Price-Morris that Monday morning. “For our records, you will just need to sign a letter designating Robert Stewart as the new owner of the gun (I’ll send the letter to sign once Robert gives me the shotgun’s serial number to put in the letter).”
“Robert is also going to surrender the handgun to the police,” Reents continued. “As it was not registered, this will be straight-forward and won’t require any additional action on your part. If you have any purchase documentation on the handgun, let me know (it was purchased with cash, right?).”
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http://www.naturalnews.com/038843_New_York_gun_owners_civil_disobedience.html
http://www.independencedeclaration.org/2013/01/28/seattle-gun-buyback-gets-jacked-turns-into-a-damn-gun-show-lol/
http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/01/28/video-dad-of-sandy-hook-victim-gives-emotional-remarks-on-gun-control-saying-the-problem-is-not-gun-laws/
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http://www.scribd.com/doc/122799297/Letter-from-Senator-Ted-Cruz-to-Chicago-Mayor-Rahm-Emanuel-Bank-of-America-TD-Bank-Group-Smith-Wesson-and-Sturm-Ruger-Co
http://www.businessinsider.com/virginias-response-to-gun-control-2013-1
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http://asmdss.com/page/news.html/_/articles/letter-from-special-forces-to-america-2nd-amendment.html
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"A system of licensing and registration is the perfect device to deny gun ownership to the bourgeoisie." --Russian communist revolutionary Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyYYgLzF6zU
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Third post of the day:
OK guys, how do we answer this one?
"Chicago is like a house with two parents that may try to have good rules and do what they can, but it's like you've got this single house sitting on a whole block where there's anarchy. Chicago is an argument for laws that are statewide or better yet, national."
REV. IRA J. ACREE, on a city that has strict firearms restrictions but is still plagued by gun violence
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Third post of the day:
OK guys, how do we answer this one?
"Chicago is like a house with two parents that may try to have good rules and do what they can, but it's like you've got this single house sitting on a whole block where there's anarchy. Chicago is an argument for laws that are statewide or better yet, national."
REV. IRA J. ACREE, on a city that has strict firearms restrictions but is still plagued by gun violence
Funny how all the backwards red states with high rates of gun ownership don't have Chicago's murder problems. Strange how that works.
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Ding! We have a winner!
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For another thread perhaps, what I intended with 'America's Inner City', but most of what is wrong in inner Chicago has nothing to do with gun laws either way. Yes, guns laws have left the law abiding and the innocent unarmed and exacerbated the crisis, but the shootings - the willingness to kill and risk life in prison and to be killed yourself at the rate of over 500 per year(!) - has to do with a cultural problem caused by multi-generational government inference in the finances and structure of the family more than by anything else IMHO.
An adult male, who does not have the responsibility of helping raise and support his family, to get to bed early and set an alarm clock for work, will go do what? Almost anything. Gang, drug, street fight, armed robbery, turf war, murders, yes. Start a white collar investment company that caters to all the thriving and growing small businesses in the neighborhood and marry his college sweatheart? Probably not, if those of you further away from these neighborhoods have seen the youtubes of the cultural climate their.
The murders are the symptom of the dysfunction, not the cause or the main problem.
The 500+ per year murders in just one, out of control city are in a different category of crime IMO than the mental health related, mass, copycat shootings of strangers for final attention that started this current, anti-2nd amendment, ball rolling.
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Ding! We have another winner!
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Well, at least the victims of the government policies that destroyed the black family reject the political party responsible for this nightmare, right?
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For another thread perhaps, what I intended with 'America's Inner City', but most of what is wrong in inner Chicago has nothing to do with gun laws either way. Yes, guns laws have left the law abiding and the innocent unarmed and exacerbated the crisis, but the shootings - the willingness to kill and risk life in prison and to be killed yourself at the rate of over 500 per year(!) - has to do with a cultural problem caused by multi-generational government inference in the finances and structure of the family more than by anything else IMHO.
An adult male, who does not have the responsibility of helping raise and support his family, to get to bed early and set an alarm clock for work, will go do what? Almost anything. Gang, drug, street fight, armed robbery, turf war, murders, yes. Start a white collar investment company that caters to all the thriving and growing small businesses in the neighborhood and marry his college sweatheart? Probably not, if those of you further away from these neighborhoods have seen the youtubes of the cultural climate their.
The murders are the symptom of the dysfunction, not the cause or the main problem.
The 500+ per year murders in just one, out of control city are in a different category of crime IMO than the mental health related, mass, copycat shootings of strangers for final attention that started this current, anti-2nd amendment, ball rolling.
I would add twin problems of multgenerational government interference both on the welfare/assistance front, and on the backend, by generations of incarceration, crime and poverty, resulting from those communities being heavily targeted for enforcement of the nations drug laws. Whether one believes in the objectives of the 'war on drugs' or not, one is forced to acknowledge that the unintended consequences is generations of inner-city youth left to be reared by single-mothers while their fathers, uncles, and brothers have been indoctrinated into a violent prison gang culture, cycling in and out of incarceration, and bringing that culture of violence to the next generation of males, who's only view of male role models are those same men who have been reared in violent prison culture.
If we're looking at one single factor that explains why the US has 3 times the homicide rate of the UK, for example, we must plant it squarely at the feet of unintended consequences for American drug control policies.......Likely 75% of all US homicides are directly or indirectly a result of the illegal drug trade.....Likely an even higher percentage of the homicides in Chicago, for example.
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Those are excellent points Sgt Mac.
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I'd point out that LBJ's "war on poverty" initiated the underclass pathology cycle.
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Armed at school stops a shooting
http://www.wsmv.com/story/20914589/authorities-teen-wounded-in-ga-school-shooting?clienttype=generic&mobilecgbypass
An LEO testifies-- very good, lots of factual examples supporting his case
https://www.facebook.com/index.php?stype=lo&lh=Ac9TLfFk5yhn5Q0Q
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http://www.gofundme.com/1tkukc
My brother, Nathan Haddad, is not only a decorated combat veteran, but models the character qualities that make him the kind of man who goes out of his way to help his fellow man and other veterans ((http://www.drum.army.mil/mountaineer/Article.aspx?ID=6283). He would not knowingly do anything against the law, compromise his faith and deeply rooted principles, or jeopardize his rights guaranteed by our Constitution. On Sunday January 6th he was arrested for possession of five, 30 round empty magazines that he believed were pre-ban magazines when he purchased them. Meanwhile, in Washington D.C, David Gregory of NBC news doesn’t even get a slap on the hand for a similar offense when he held up one on National TV during a newscast. My brother was medically discharged after 12 years of service and does not have the funds necessary needed for Attorney fees, and unless he has adequate defense and gets his charges reduced, he is not going to get the same treatment that David Gregory, a rich, white, liberal, media mogul got. This is a travesty! Please, anybody and everybody, would you be willing to donate to our fund to help support my brother? Below are some additional websites that will attest to the reason why my brother is deserving of your help. Thank you very much! Michael Haddad
http://www.drum.army.mil/mountaineer/Article.aspx?ID=6283
http://www.drum.army.mil/mountaineer/Article.aspx?ID=6170
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8674071.stm
http://wtc.armylive.dodlive.mil/warriorgames/nathan-haddad/
http://www.army.mil/article/37896/Three_3_85_Soldiers_to_compete_at_inaugural_Warrior_Games/
http://www.drum.army.mil/mountaineer/Article.aspx?ID=4561
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2013/01/11/david-gregorys-stunt-worked/
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The Disarmament folks have little idea just how powerful the forces with which they are messing are , , , and some on our side are just barking , , ,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BTdhVxva5KU
Unfortunately is does appear that many on the left are looking to establish a universal gun registry and to use it, as was the case in Australia and Great Britain, to disarm the American people. Unlike Australia and GB, many here will fight should such become the case. No matter who wins, such a thing would be terrible.
Our Founding Fathers gave us a republic, in the words of Ben Franklin "If we can keep it". Folks, take the time to ACT now via our political process. I've reupped for the NRA and joined the Gun Owners of America. Although I think he sometimes overdoes it in order to raise money, Sen. Rand Paul has my attention as someone who seems to be genuine in the cause of freedom.
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http://gunssavelives.net/self-defense/video-gun-carrying-girls-high-school-basketball-coach-shoots-2-armed-attackers-saves-2-female-players/
http://gopthedailydose.com/2013/02/02/10-stories-that-prove-guns-save-lives/
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And that was when machine guns were legal!
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/02/03/Chicago-gun-violence-Capone?utm_source=BreitbartNews&utm_medium=facebook
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Anyone have any input on the questions presented by vets with PTSD? What do we make of what the GOA says here?
====================
Gun Owners of America
________________________________________
Oppose Joe Manchin’s Veterans Gun Ban
and National Gun Registry
Reports out of Capitol Hill reveal that just-reelected turncoat West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin is about to stick a big knife in the back of American gun owners. And to make matters worse, he's lying about what he’s doing.
Both Manchin and House anti-gun crazy Carolyn McCarthy are claiming to be “working with NRA” to enact gun bans and national gun registries. NRA says flatly that Manchin is lying, and we believe he is. (The Hill, 1/24/13)
Ironically, Manchin was the “gun owner's best friend” on November 5 -- the day before his reelection to a six-year term let him to pull a great big “gotcha” on those West Virginians who were tricked into believing his representations.
But make no mistake about it: Joe Manchin’s draft would impose a gun ban on veterans and would set up the framework for a national gun registry.
150,000 honest law-abiding veterans are currently in the NICS system. They didn’t do anything wrong; they honorably served their country. But when they sought VA counseling for a traumatic combat experience, the VA appointed a fiduciary to oversee their fiscal affairs and then took away their guns. And, again, there are 150,000 honest veterans in the system.
New York Senator Charles Schumer viciously fought a Coburn amendment on the DoD bill which would require that veterans get their day in court before their rights were taken away from them, and he won.
What the Manchin bill is about is insuring that “bad guys” like veterans can’t get guns. And, under Barack Obama's “Executive Action #1,” the NICS list could soon include tens of millions of additional soldiers, police, firemen, and other law-abiding Americans.
But veteran disarmament is not the only problem with Joe Manchin’s gun ban.
Manchin's bill would set the framework for a national gun registry and impose a chokehold on gun sales. There are at least four big reasons for this:
FIRST: Every gun owner in the country would have a “Form 4473.” Increasingly, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives are going into gun dealerships and illegally copying all of those 4473's.
SECOND: The FBI refuses to tell us how or whether it's complying with federal law by destroying the Brady Check names, rather than keeping them for a national gun registry.
THIRD: As it is, the Brady Check system is breaking down on days such as last year’s Black Friday -- outlawing all gun purchases. If you have to drive 200 miles from your farm to sell your gun to your neighbor, this effectively outlaws any efforts to sell or buy a gun.
FOURTH: Increasingly, the FBI is blocking transfers because someone’s name is “similar” to someone else. When the legal purchaser complains, the FBI's response is “Sue us!”
ACTION: Please click here to contact your U.S. Senators. Ask them to oppose Joe Manchin’s veterans gun ban and national gun registry.
=======================
A related piece by Michael Yon: http://www.michaelyon-online.com/chris-kyle-navy-seal-murdered-some-thoughts.htm
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Gun Owners of America
________________________________________
Vote Now on the
Universal Background Check!
If any item on the Obama gun agenda passes, it would be a universal background check requirement. Under this provision, every gun transaction -- dealer or private -- would be subject to a Brady Check.
GOA has argued that the universal background check is tantamount to a universal gun registry because:
(1) The FBI will keep the Brady Check records, and
(2) The ATF will copy the 4473's, as it's currently doing.
Moreover, gun owners hate registration systems because they frequently serve as a prelude to gun confiscation -- as GOA has documented time and time again.
In addition, with WalMart and other sellers refusing to complete any gun sale until FBI affirmatively gives a green-light go-ahead, GOA fears system breakdowns and an increasing number of transactions which will be permanently blocked this way once the universal background check is adopted.
On the other side of the argument, Barack Obama argues that the universal background check will not result in a gun registry. Obama claims that a vast majority of gun owners support this and that sales will be completed quickly and easily -- and that checking all gun purchases will increase public safety.
Which side are you on?
Click here and go to the front page of GOA’s website to vote "yes" if you support Obama's universal background check or "no" if you oppose it.
GOA will provide the results of this poll to the U.S. Congress.
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Will this mean Holder will have to check the cartels before shipping them guns?
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What do we think about the notion of limiting police fire power to that which is legal for civilians?
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/02/foghorn/breaking-larue-tactical-plans-to-limit-law-enforcement-sales-to-civilian-standards/
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What do we think about the notion of limiting police fire power to that which is legal for civilians?
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/02/foghorn/breaking-larue-tactical-plans-to-limit-law-enforcement-sales-to-civilian-standards/
I think it's a good policy, at this point
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Brainwashing Kids About Guns
Posted By Mark Tapson On February 12, 2013 @ www.frontpagemag.com
A spate of recent incidents in which schoolchildren were punished for incidents triggering the hysteria of politically correct school officials highlights the left’s increasing insanity about guns.
A five-year-old girl from Pennsylvania was suspended from school last month after telling a friend she was going to shoot her with a pink toy gun that sprays bubbles. Despite not even having the bubble gun with her at the time of the shockingly dire threat, the kindergartener was later interrogated by school officials without her parents present. She was ultimately – are you sitting down for this? – labeled a “terrorist threat,” suspended for ten days, and required to undergo psychiatric evaluation.
At about the same time, a school in Maryland suspended two six-year-olds for making a gun gesture with their hands while playing cops-and-robbers during recess. Two weeks before that, another six-year-old was suspended for the same terrorist offense. This idiocy is reminiscent of an incident last year in which a deaf three-year-old was informed by school district officials that the signing he uses for his name too closely resembles him waving a gun. So now he is required to spell out his name letter by letter instead. That’ll teach him.
The insanity continues. Now a seven-year-old Colorado boy has been suspended for throwing a pretend grenade at a pretend box full of “evil forces” while playing “rescue the world” at recess. Again, that’s a pretend grenade he lobbed at a pretend box of evil (good thing he didn’t refer to it as an “axis of evil,” or the officials might have tarred and feathered the kid and run him and his Bush-loving parents out of town). His school maintains a list of “absolutes,” no-nos designed to keep the schoolgrounds safe, which includes “no fighting, real or imaginary; no weapons, real or imaginary.” Because it isn’t enough to ban students from playing with real weapons; it must be verboten even to think about them, even when combating evil.
Alex Evans said he threw the fake grenade “so nothing can get out and destroy the world… I was trying to save people and I just can’t believe I got dispended.” Alex, that’s because you’re not far enough along in school yet to have been sufficiently indoctrinated by your schoolteachers. In a few years, once you’ve absorbed enough Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky, you will understand that we are the ones destroying the world through our imperialistic war-mongering and racist theft of natural resources. However, had you thrown an imaginary grenade at an imaginary band of violent Tea Partiers, you would have gone to the head of the class.
In an article that contains more handwringing about how guns are poisoning our children’s minds, The New York Times reports on groups of “anti-toy-gun activists” (now there’s a pathetic label) who encourage exchanges in which toys like Hula Hoops are given to children who turn in their toy guns – a sort of children’s version of firearm buybacks like the one that disarmed Australians back in the 90s. One of those is the California group Alliance for Survival, whose coordinator Jerry Rubin explains, “No one is saying that if you play with a toy gun, you’re going to grow up to be a violent killer.” No? Then why ban toy guns? Because “the game is still the same: pretend to kill your friends, pretend to kill your classmates.” Except that kids aren’t pretending to kill their friends and schoolmates; they’re pretending to kill the bad guys. Anti-toy gun activists like Rubin can’t comprehend that this might be healthy practice for when these children grow up and one day have to confront uncompromising evil in the real world.
This is all part of the radical left’s determination to make pariahs out of American gun owners, even if those guns dispense nothing more dangerous than bubbles or a deaf boy’s name. As the totalitarian hypocrite Eric Holder said at the Women’s National Democratic Club years ago, American youth need to be “brainwashed” into thinking negatively about guns. In fact, he urges kids to report gun owners to authorities, so be careful who knows you have a legally purchased and registered handgun, all you law-abiding moms and dads. You might find yourselves betrayed to the government by your own children, just like during China’s Cultural Revolution. “I’ve also asked the school board to make a part of every day some kind of anti-violence, anti-gun message,” Holder said, “every day, every school, at every level… We need to do this every day of the week and really brainwash people into thinking about guns in a vastly different way.”
This is the Attorney General who funneled guns into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, resulting in hundreds of murders. He is part of an administration that turns a blind eye to gun violence committed in this country by leftists or Islamic terrorists like the Fort Hood shooter, whose massacre was labeled “workplace violence” (as opposed to the kindergartner who was called a terrorist threat). The Obama administration cares about a tragedy like Sandy Hook only insofar as it is a crisis they don’t want to let go to waste. The administration says nothing about the ongoing handgun massacre of children in tightly gun-restricted Chicago, because it doesn’t fit their “ban guns to save the children” narrative, and because, quite frankly, they don’t care about saving the children anyway. What they care about is disarming the American populace. Their obsession with gun control is about big-government gun confiscation, not gun crime prevention, just as their demonization of guns in the minds of schoolchildren is also about disarming Americans and molding a generation of defenseless pacifists.
This hatred of guns is ragingly irrational. The left wants to indoctrinate upcoming generations into believing that, in any and all circumstances, guns – even imaginary ones; even a pointed index finger – are the apotheosis of violent evil. And yet the Obama administration has now opened the door to combat for women in the military. How are those women – and our young men too, for that matter – supposed to deal with that disconnect, when from kindergarten onward they are relentlessly brainwashed to despise guns, and yet are now expected to go into combat and kill the enemy?
And then of course there is the hypocrisy of left-leaning Hollywood, which inundates young people with violent imagery and then pats itself on the back with smugly self-righteous public service messages calling for immediate political solutions to gun violence.
The left does not want American citizens to own guns – it’s that simple. And they want to shape our children into a helpless citizenry that entrusts its protection to the well-armed nanny state. They care nothing about the right of Americans to protect their homes, schools and loved ones from home invaders or burglars or rapists. They care least of all about our 2nd Amendment right to bear arms to oppose a tyrannical government, because that right stands in the way of the radical left’s tyrannical ambitions.
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/02/10/
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Crafty,
Now THAT is freakin' HILARIOUS :-)
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http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02/missouri-democrats-intruduce-legislation-to-confiscate-firearms-gives-gunowners-90-days-to-turn-in-guns/
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http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/02/missouri-democrats-intruduce-legislation-to-confiscate-firearms-gives-gunowners-90-days-to-turn-in-guns/
Good. Nice to see the mask is off. Passing it is one thing, try enforcing it.
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http://offgridsurvival.com/guncompanies-boycottnewyork/
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I wonder how far off the US is to seizing factories that "stop selling firearms to all New York law enforcement and government agencies," or other states that oppose civilian firearm ownership.
Maybe that is why Obama is signing executive orders at warp speed.
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www.alt-market.com/articles/1337-gun-rights-are-there-any-peaceful-solutions-left
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/19/justice-dept-internal-memo-admits-gun-buybacks-assault-weapons-bans-and-large-capacity-magazine-restrictions-dont-work/
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http://watchdogwire.com/florida/2013/02/17/all-67-florida-county-sheriffs-sign-pledge-to-protect-the-right-of-citizens-to-bear-arms/
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Second Amendment Foundation
12500 NE Tenth Place • Bellevue, WA 98005
(425) 454-7012 • FAX (425) 451-3959 • www.saf.org
7TH CIRCUIT LETS POSNER RULING STAND; HUGE WIN FOR CCW, SAYS SAF
For Immediate Release: 2/22/2013
BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation today won a significant victory for concealed carry when the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals let stand a December ruling by a three-judge panel of the court that forces Illinois to adopt a concealed carry law, thus affirming that the right to bear arms exists outside the home.
The ruling came in Moore v. Madigan, a case filed by SAF. The December opinion that now stands was written by Judge Richard Posner, who gave the Illinois legislature 180 days to “craft a new gun law that will impose reasonable limitations, consistent with the public safety and the Second Amendment…on the carrying of guns in public.” That clock is ticking, noted SAF Executive Vice President Alan Gottlieb.
“Illinois lawmakers need to create some kind of licensing system or face the prospect of not having any regulations at all when Judge Posner’s deadline arrives,” Gottlieb said. “They need to act. They can no longer run and hide from this mandate.”
“We were delighted with Judge Posner’s ruling in December,” he continued, “and today’s decision by the entire circuit to allow his ruling to stand is a major victory, and not just for gun owners in Illinois. Judge Posner’s ruling affirmed that the right to keep and bear arms, itself, extends beyond the boundary of one’s front door.”
In December, Judge Posner wrote, “The right to ‘bear’ as distinct from the right to ‘keep’ arms is unlikely to refer to the home. To speak of ‘bearing’ arms within one’s home would at all times have been an awkward usage. A right to bear arms thus implies a right to carry a loaded gun outside the home.”
Judge Posner subsequently added, “To confine the right to be armed to the home is to divorce the Second Amendment from the right of self-defense described in Heller and McDonald.”
“It is now up to the legislature,” Gottlieb said, “to craft a statute that recognizes the right of ordinary citizens to carry outside the home, without a sea of red tape or a requirement to prove any kind of need beyond the cause of personal protection.”
The ruling also affects a similar case filed by the National Rifle Association known as Shepard v. Madigan.
The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nation's oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 650,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control. In addition to the landmark McDonald v. Chicago Supreme Court Case, SAF has previously funded successful firearms-related suits against the cities of Los Angeles; New Haven, CT; New Orleans; Chicago and San Francisco on behalf of American gun owners, a lawsuit against the cities suing gun makers and numerous amicus briefs holding the Second Amendment as an individual right.
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/02/25/DOJ-Internal-Memo-Obama-s-Gun-Control-Agenda-Uneffective-Without-Forced-Buybacks
DOJ Memo: Gun Control Ineffective Without Forced Buybacks
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by AWR Hawkins 25 Feb 2013
A leaked internal memo from the National Institute of Justice--the research, development, and evaluation agency of the U.S. Department of Justice--shows that none of Obama's gun proposals will work without registration and forced buybacks amounting to confiscation of Americans' guns.
The memo illustrates this by showing why high capacity magazine bans, gun buybacks, and "assault weapons" bans have failed to work in the past.
For example, according to the memo, the high capacity magazine bans that were in place from 1994-2004 had little impact because the bans contained too many exemptions. The memo says one of the key errors was that "the 1994 ban exempted magazines made before 1994 so that the importation of large capacity magazines manufactured before 1994 continued [throughout] the ban."
Moreover, the memo points out that while the price of the magazines rose sharply, it was not driven up far enough to make them "unaffordable."
According to the memo, for a high capacity magazine ban to succeed Obama needs to ban not only the manufacture and sale of said magazines, but also the importation and possession. There also must be a federal buyback of all high capacity magazines already in circulation to ensure private owners haven't held on to any covered by the ban.
Regarding gun buybacks, the memo says they have also been ineffective "as generally implemented." Because such buybacks have been voluntary, they have been "too small," have resulted in the surrender of guns that are rarely used in crime, and have removed guns that are easily replaceable.
The memo intimates that the corrective for such ineffective buybacks are non-voluntary buybacks that are targeted at the kinds of weapons used in crime.
Lastly, the memo says the first "assault weapons" ban failed to work for many of the same reasons magazine bans and gun buybacks failed to work--there was simply too much wiggle room for gun owners. Moreover, the memo says that because "assault weapons" are used in such a low percentage of crimes, the only way a ban can be effective is if it eliminates every "assault weapon" in the country.
According to the memo, the only way to fix it is to couple a ban with "a gun buyback and no exemptions."
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Anyone who fails to understand that we are dealing with a tyrannical government with Obama and his administration is either ignorant or a fool or both. Unfortunately, the Republican leadership appears to feel that there is no political upside to opposing this president. We are living in ominous times.
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Source unknown
Federal Court Finds No Constitutional Right to Carry a Concealed Weapon — We Explain The Decision
Feb. 25, 2013 3:01pm
Mytheos Holt
While gun rights supporters might like to think the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution is an absolute guarantee against government interference, according to at least one (relatively conservative) appeals court, they are severely mistaken. In fact, according to that same court, when it comes to carrying concealed weapons, the Second Amendment is basically irrelevant.
Last Friday, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals handed down its decision in the case of Peterson v. Martinez, a case involving the question of whether a state has an obligation to provide a concealed carry license to anyone who has been granted such a license in another state. Their answer was, to put it mildly, “no.”
In fact, the court adopted a fairly novel approach in explaining why the right to keep and bear arms didn’t apply in this case: Rather than rely solely on precedent that restricted gun rights, they built most of their analysis on language from cases that expanded gun rights, but still made clear that there were limits, of which concealed carry was certainly one. As Lawyers.com’s Larry Bodine put it, “To bullet-proof the ruling against an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, the 10th Circuit recounted numerous court rulings and state laws dating back to 1813, and based its ruling on prior U.S. Supreme Court cases.”
Still, given which judges ended up deciding the case, this approach may be less surprising than it first appears. While the decision was written by Judge Carlos Lucero, a Clinton appointee, all three judges voted unanimously against the right to concealed carry, which may surprise some, given that one (Judge Bobby Ray Baldock) was a Reagan appointee, and the other (Judge Harriz Hartz) was a nominee by the second President Bush, neither of whom were presidents known for nominating liberal judges.
So why did they decide the way they did? To understand that, one needs to first understand a little about the case, and about court precedent regarding the Second Amendment.
The Case
The person bringing the case was one Gray Peterson, a resident of Washington state, who possessed concealed carry permits both in Washington and in Florida. Peterson frequently visited the Denver, Colorado area, and in so doing, wished to carry a firearm with him at all times. However, the city of Denver currently bans open carry of firearms, which means Peterson would need to get a concealed carry license from the state in order to carry his weapon in most situations.
Fortunately, Colorado did have a program for recognizing the concealed carry licenses of other states. The problem for Peterson was that Colorado only recognized concealed carry licenses from states that also recognized concealed carry licenses from Colorado. In other words, if a state wouldn’t recognize Colorado’s concealed carry licenses, Colorado wouldn’t recognize theirs. Neither Florida nor Washington state recognized Colorado’s concealed carry licenses, so Peterson was out of luck.
Worse, he couldn’t apply for a license on his own merits, because Colorado would only grant new licenses to Colorado residents, not people from out of state. In other words, there was literally no way for Peterson to get a concealed carry license in Colorado unless he moved. So, claiming he needed to carry a firearm with him, Peterson sued to get the law banning out of state residents from getting Colorado-issued concealed carry licenses struck down, claiming it violated his Second Amendment rights.
The court disagreed. Why? Because when it comes to the Second Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms is far less absolute than many people might like to think.
The Limits of the Second Amendment
As we previously covered at TheBlaze, the right to keep and bear arms is more extensive than many liberals would like to think, and more limited than many conservatives would like to think. At the time, we wrote this about the legal realities regarding the Second Amendment (emphasis added):
For now, at least, the legal reality regarding the Second Amendment is that it does guarantee a right to keep and bear arms of some kind to individual citizens. Barring a massive shift in power on the court, this is unlikely to change, as five of the sitting justices voted to hold that the right exists and protects citizens against both state and federal law in the two cases cited above.
Moreover, even cases that the majority of justice disagree with are not always changed after the fact, given the varying attitudes of various jurists towards the importance of upholding precedent. For the foreseeable future, therefore, the right to keep and bear arms is a fixed reality of the American legal and constitutional landscape.
However, in practice, this tells us very little about how far that right extends, which is where the current (and future) legal debate is likely to focus. A right to own a handgun is one thing, after all, but what about the right to own rocket launchers? Miniguns? Anti-tank ordinance? An actual, physical tank? Are all of these things protected by the right to keep and bear arms? They are, after all, arms.
Fortunately for those worrying about their neighbors acquiring weapons grade helicopters, even the most stringent supporters of gun rights admit that the law allows for limits on what sort of weapons are protected, or on how those weapons might be obtained. For his part, Scalia would limit the amendment solely to weapons that can be carried by an individual human being, knocking such armaments as tanks and missiles out of contention, and admitted in the majority decision in Heller that regulations such as background checks and concealed carry permits almost certainly pass constitutional muster.
This, as it turns out, is precisely the reasoning that the Court ended up using in this case. From Judge Lucero’s decision [emphasis added]:
With respect to Peterson’s claims against the Denver sheriff, we conclude that the carrying of concealed firearms is not protected by the Second Amendment or the Privileges and Immunities Clause. In Robertson v. Baldwin, 165 U.S. 275 (1897), the Supreme Court stated in dicta that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms is not infringed by laws prohibiting the carrying of concealed weapons.” More recently, in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), the Court noted that “the majority of the 19th-century courts to consider the question held that prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons were lawful under the Second Amendment or state analogues,” and explained that “nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions.” Id. at 626. In light of our nation’s extensive practice of restricting citizens’ freedom to carry firearms in a concealed manner, we hold that this activity does not fall within the scope of the Second Amendment’s protections.
Part of the issue at work here is that the Supreme Court’s decision to grant the right to keep and bear arms the same legal status as more longstanding rights like the right to free speech has been exceedingly recent (the two cases that established this precedent, District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago, were handed down in 2008 and 2010, respectively), and thus there is much less clarity about where that “right” begins and ends. The 10th circuit court explicitly acknowledged this:
In District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), the Supreme Court held “that the Second Amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms.” And in McDonald v. City of Chicago, 130 S. Ct. 3020 (2010), the Court concluded that “the Second Amendment right is fully applicable to the States.” Nevertheless, the Court has provided precious little guidance with respect to the standard by which restrictions on the possession of firearms should be assessed.
In Heller, the Court determined that the challenged statute, which completely barred possession of handguns in the home and required that any lawful firearm be kept in an inoperable condition, failed “nder any of the standards of scrutiny that we have applied to enumerated constitutional rights.” The Court rejected application of rational-basis scrutiny, but declined to select another standard. However, the Court stressed that its opinion should not be read to “cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms,” which the Court identified as “presumptively lawful regulatory measures.”
However, while the Supreme Court has proposed no method by which to gauge whether a restriction runs afoul of the Second Amendment, the 10th circuit court itself apparently does have a precedent, elucidated in the case United States v. Reese. The 10th Circuit specifically applied what the decision calls a “two-pronged approach” to Second Amendment claims. In other words, when assessing such claims, the court asks two questions:
1. Does the challenged law “impose a burden on conduct falling within the scope of the Second Amendment’s guarantee?” If not, the law is constitutional.
2. If so, does the law pass muster under a “means-end” test, IE does it pursue a constitutionally acceptable end using means that do not fall afoul of any explicit part of the constitution?
The court in this case completely avoided the second, more complicated question. Rather, they decided right out the gate that since carrying concealed weapons was not a right the Second Amendment was designed to protect, the law was presumptively constitutional:
We agree with the Fifth Circuit that in applying the two-step approach to Second Amendment claims, we consider at the first step “whether the law harmonizes with the historical traditions associated with the Second Amendment guarantee.” As the foregoing demonstrates, concealed carry bans have a lengthy history. Given…the Supreme Court’s admonition in Heller that “nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions,” we conclude that Peterson’s Second Amendment claim fails at step one of our two-step analysis: the Second Amendment does not confer a right to carry concealed weapons.
Nor was it only Heller and McDonald that the court relied on to make its decision. Rather, they used the treatises of the British legal scholar Blackstone (a contemporary of the Founding Fathers, and one of their inspirations), as well as quotations from several cases both in the early and late 19th century to prove that carrying concealed weapons was never a right that even the Founders meant to protect. In short, they wrote a decision with a liberal outcome using conservative reasoning on the limits of the Second Amendment. However, that is unlikely to be the end of the story.
So What Happens Now?
It is at this point that many gun rights supporters must be feeling nervous. After all, if a state can set up its concealed carry laws and open carry laws such that a citizen literally cannot carry their weapon in particular circumstances, surely that means the right to keep and bear arms is something of a formality.
Fortunately for these people, there are several factors that make that problem less pressing. Firstly, this case only applies to areas where the 10th Circuit Court has jurisdiction – specifically, Colorado, Kansas, most of Oklahoma, Utah and Wyoming, and may not even apply there, given that an appeal will almost certainly come out of the case, given that it directly contradicts another decision by the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.
Secondly, the court in this case did not rule that bans on open carry are constitutional (and, in fact, noted with some bewilderment that Peterson had not challenged the open carry statute in the decision), simply that there is no “right” to carry a concealed weapon implied by the Second Amendment. Again, other Circuit Courts differ with this assessment, and the Supreme Court will almost certainly be asked to step in.
For now, however, concealed carry licenses are a privilege, not a right.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/25/federal-court-finds-no-constitutional-right-to-carry-a-concealed-weapon-we-explain-the-decision/
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Second post of night
U.S. Gun Laws Retroactively Barred This Vietnam Vet From Owning a Firearm
Because of a Teenage Misdemeanor 45 Years Ago
Feb. 26, 2013 8:52am Becket Adams
A 19-year-old sailor stationed in Annapolis, Md., in 1968 was arrested for
getting into a fight with an alleged member of a street gang.
Now, 45 years later, he has been stripped of his right to own a gun.
Jefferson Wayne Schrader, 64, has been fighting a losing battle in the
courts since 2008 to get his name off the fed’s firearm ban list. In fact, just
last month, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., upheld a
lower-court ruling barring the U.S. Navy veteran from Cleveland, Ga., from owning a
firearm.
“It’s a depressing thing. A depressing thing,” he told TheBlaze in a
phone interview, “to have the government treat you like that. It’s not, well,
it’s not a good thing.”
The ban list is meant to prevent people of questionable standing,
including illegal aliens, drug addicts, people dishonorably discharged from the
U.S. military, and fugitives, from buying or selling guns.
And although Schrader — a certified expert with a handgun — served in
Vietnam from Jan. 1, 1968, until being honorably discharged in September 1970,
the U.S. government believes he is unfit to own a gun because of his
teenage misdemeanor.
“Due to a conviction some forty years ago for common-law misdemeanor
assault and battery for which he served no jail time, plaintiff Jefferson Wayne
Schrader, now a sixty-four-year-old veteran, is, by virtue of 18 U.S.C. §
922(g)(1), barred for life from ever possessing a firearm,” U.S. Circuit
Judge David Tatel wrote in the court’s January opinion.
“In rejecting plaintiffs’ constitutional claim, the district court relied
on the Supreme Court’s observation in District of Columbia v. Heller …
that ‘the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited,’ as well
as the Court’s inclusion of ‘longstanding prohibitions on the possession
of firearms by felons’ within a list of ‘presumptively lawful regulatory
measures,’” Judge Tatel added.
In its ruling against Schrader, the fed appeals court cited the Gun
Control Act of 1968 signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson, which makes it
more difficult for questionable characters to engage in interstate commerce
involving firearms.
But we’ll come back to that later.
The other gun law that led to Schrader’s odd set of circumstances is the
Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1993. This bill laid the groundwork
for the FBI’s 1998 National Instant Criminal Background Check System
(NICS).
So when Schrader tried to buy a handgun in 2008, the NICS flagged his
45-year-old misdemeanor – which only now qualifies in Maryland for a sentence of
two or more years in prison – and he was disqualified from making the
purchasing.
But here’s the weird thing: Schrader has been selling and trading guns for
a long time.
“I’ve bought and sold probably, oh, a dozen … maybe 15 guns over a 42
year time period” he said. “I never had a problem with it. I was just
surprised it happened at all. The ATF [Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and
Explosives] agent said I wasn’t allowed to have any guns.”
“But he said I could keep my black powder rifle. Thank you very much,” he
added sarcastically.
TROUBLE
As mentioned in the above, it all started in 2008 when an NICS check
flagged Schrader’s name for his 1968 misdemeanor.
The FBI blocked Schrader’s wife, Harriet, from buying him a shotgun for
his birthday and then blocked him on two different occasions from buying a
handgun.
But let’s back up for a second and revisit his 1968 misdemeanor.
As Schrader told TheBlaze, one evening in Annapolis he and his Navy
buddies were attacked by a street gang while walking back to base. A few weeks
later, Schrader saw one of his attackers hanging out on a street corner.
“I told the guy driving to stop and let me out,” Schrader said, “and I
walked over to him and was going to tell him, ‘You need to come with me, we’
re going to talk you over to the police station.’ And he said, ‘Oh, you
want some more?’ and stood up.”
As official court documents show, “a dispute broke out between the two, in
the course of which Schrader punched his assailant.”
Unfortunately for Schrader, he didn’t see the two police officers “
sitting at the red light.”
The sailor was arrested and convicted of common-law assault and battery.
He was told he could pay a $109 fine, which included court costs, or spend
thirty days in the hole.
He chose the former.
After paying the fine, Schrader went on to serve a 21-month tour of duty
in Vietnam and was honorably discharged upon his return.
>From that time forward, according to the complaint, he had no scrapes with
the law (except for one traffic violation).
REASON FOR THE BAN
After going more than five decades without any serious trouble with the
law, the 2008 background check came as a shock to Schrader.
“I don’t know why they’re coming after me,” Schrader said. “All I did
was punch someone in the nose.”
So what’s the court’s reasoning?
The Gun Control Act (remember we said we’d come back to this?)
specifically includes a ban on anyone convicted of a misdemeanor punishable under
state law by up to two years in prison.
Okay, but Schrader never had to serve a two-year prison sentence.
This is where it gets interesting. At the time of his arrest, the state of
Maryland did not set any maximum sentence for common-law assault and
battery convictions.
However, the DOJ reasons that because Maryland would have given him two or
more years if it had the laws it has today, well, that’s good enough to
keep Schrader on the banned list.
TODAY
Two years after having his name flagged for the Annapolis fight, Schrader
sued to challenge the ban and he has been fighting it ever since.
Unfortunately, things haven’t gone his way.
“All I can do now is wait and see what my attorney can do,” Schrader told
TheBlaze.
His lawyer, Alan Gura, a prominent civil rights attorney, says there are
still a few options left.
“Today is our deadline for filing a petition for rehearing and rehearing
en banc in the Schrader case,” Gura told TheBlaze in an email on Monday.
“Some misdemeanors are very serious and Congress can address those
specifically,” he added later in a phone interview, “but to broadly disarm anyone
who has ever been involved in even a minor scuffle, 45 years later, seems
to be excessive.”
“We hope that the court rehears the case. We think it’s worthy of that.
It raises the types of questions that courts often find they need to rehear.
If the court does not decide to reconsider the case then, of course, we
will consider the next step, which will be a petition to the Supreme Court.”
A spokeswoman with the U.S. Department of Justice did not immediately
respond to TheBlaze’s request for comment.
Here’s the full case: Schrader v. Holder, 11-cv-5352, U.S. Court of
Appeals for the District of Columbia:
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/26/u-s-gun-laws-retroactively-barre
d-this-vietnam-vet-from-owning-a-firearm-because-of-a-teenage-misdemeanor-45
-years-ago/
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http://www.firearmsandliberty.com/cramer.haynes.html
The Fifth Amendment, Self-Incrimination, and Gun Registration
by Clayton Cramer
A recurring question that we are asked, not only by gun control advocates, but even by a number of gun owners is, "What's wrong with mandatory gun registration?" Usually by the time we finish telling them about the Supreme Court decision U.S. v. Haynes (1968), they are laughing -- and they understand our objection to registration.
In Haynes v. U.S. (1968), a Miles Edward Haynes appealed his conviction for unlawful possession of an unregistered short-barreled shotgun. [1] His argument was ingenious: since he was a convicted felon at the time he was arrested on the shotgun charge, he could not legally possess a firearm. Haynes further argued that for a convicted felon to register a gun, especially a short-barreled shotgun, was effectively an announcement to the government that he was breaking the law. If he did register it, as 26 U.S.C. sec.5841 required, he was incriminating himself; but if he did not register it, the government would punish him for possessing an unregistered firearm -- a violation of 26 U.S.C. sec.5851. Consequently, his Fifth Amendment protection against self- incrimination ("No person... shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself") was being violated -- he would be punished if he registered it, and punished if he did not register it. While the Court acknowledged that there were circumstances where a person might register such a weapon without having violated the prohibition on illegal possession or transfer, both the prosecution and the Court acknowledged such circumstances were "uncommon." [2] The Court concluded:
We hold that a proper claim of the constitutional privilege against self-incrimination provides a full defense to prosecutions either for failure to register a firearm under sec.5841 or for possession of an unregistered firearm under sec.5851. [3]
This 8-1 decision (with only Chief Justice Earl Warren dissenting) is, depending on your view of Fifth Amendment, either a courageous application of the intent of the self-incrimination clause, or evidence that the Supreme Court had engaged in reductio ad absurdum of the Fifth Amendment. Under this ruling, a person illegally possessing a firearm, under either federal or state law, could not be punished for failing to register it. [4]
Consider a law that requires registration of firearms: a convicted felon can not be convicted for failing to register a gun, because it is illegal under Federal law for a felon to possess a firearm; but a person who can legally own a gun, and fails to register it, can be punished. In short, the person at whom, one presumes, such a registration law is aimed, is the one who cannot be punished, and yet, the person at whom such a registration law is not principally aimed (i.e., the law-abiding person), can be punished.
This is especially absurd for the statute under which Haynes was tried -- the National Firearms Act of 1934. This law was originally passed during the Depression, when heavily armed desperadoes roamed the nation, robbing banks and engaging in kidnap for ransom. The original intent of the National Firearms Act was to provide a method for locking up ex-cons that the government was unable to convict for breaking any other law. As Attorney General Homer Cummings described the purpose of the law, when testifying before Congress:
Now, you say that it is easy for criminals to get weapons. I know it, but I want to make it easy to convict them when they have the weapons. That is the point of it. I do not expect criminals to comply with this law; I do not expect the underworld to be going around giving their fingerprints and getting permits to carry these weapons, but I want them to be in a position, when I find such a person, to convict him because he has not complied.
During the same questioning, Cummings expressed his belief that, "I have no fear of the law-abiding citizen getting into trouble." Rep. Fred Vinson of Kentucky, while agreeing with Cummings' desire to have an additional tool for locking up gangsters, pointed out that many laws that sounded like good ideas when passed, were sometimes found "in the coolness and calmness of retrospect" to be somewhat different in their consequences. [5]
Unfortunately, Rep. Vinson's concern about law-abiding people running afoul of registration laws, while criminals run free, turned out to be prophetic. The same year as the Haynes decision, the New York City Gun Control Law was challenged in the courts. The statute sought to bring shotguns and rifles under the same sort of licensing restrictions as handguns. Edward Grimm and a number of others filed suit against the City of New York, seeking to overturn the city ordinance. Grimm, et. al., raised a number of objections to the law during the trial, most of which were based on the Second Amendment. After the trial but before the decision had been completed, the Haynes decision appeared. Grimm's attorneys pointed out the implications for New York City's gun registration requirement. The trial court held that the legislative intent of the law was:
that there existed an evil in the misuse of rifles and shotguns by criminals and persons not qualified to use these weapons and that the ease with which the weapons could be obtained was of concern... [6]
Yet on the subject of the Haynes decision:
In this court's reading of the Haynes decision, it is inapposite to the statute under consideration here. The registration requirement in Haynes was "...directed principally at those persons who have obtained possession of a firearm without complying with the Act's other requirements, and who therefore are immediately threatened by criminal prosecutions... They are unmistakably persons 'inherently suspect of criminal activities.'"... The City of New York's Gun Control Law is not aimed at persons inherently suspect of criminal activities. It is regulatory in nature. Accordingly, Haynes does not stand as authority for plaintiffs' position. [7]
In three pages, the court went from claiming that the registration law was intended to stop "an evil in the misuse of rifles and shotguns by criminals" to admitting that it was "not aimed at persons inherently suspect of criminal activities."
Nor is Grimm an exceptional case. A number of other judicial decisions have upheld gun registration laws, specifically because they did not apply to criminals, but only to law-abiding citizens. During the turbulent late 1960s, Toledo, Ohio, passed an ordinance that required handgun owners to obtain an identification card. [8] The plaintiffs attacked the law on a number of points, [9] including the issue of self-incrimination. Regarding the Fifth Amendment, the Court of Common Pleas asserted that application for a handgun owner's identification card (effectively, registration of gun owners) did not make a person "inherently suspect of criminal activities." (This quotation suggests the judge writing this opinion was aware of the Haynes decision, although not cited.) The court pointed out that unless the plaintiffs had been prohibited persons within the Toledo ordinance, the Fifth Amendment would have provided them no protection. Only criminals were protected from a mandatory registration law -- not law-abiding people.
Later that same year, in the Ohio case State v. Schutzler (1969), Gale Leroy Schutzler attempted to quash an indictment for failure to register a submachine gun in accordance with O.R.C. sec.2923.04, which required registration of automatic weapons. [10] At the original trial, Schutzler argued that the registration requirement violated his Fifth Amendment rights, based on Haynes. On appeal, the Court of Common Pleas did not agree with any of Schutzler's arguments, including his citation of the Fifth Amendment. Where the Haynes decision was based on the fact that Haynes was an ex-felon, and therefore his possession of a sawed-off shotgun was illegal, Schutzler was not breaking the law by possession; his only violation of the law was his failure to register the submachine gun and post a $5000 bond. [11] Had he been an ex-felon, the Haynes decision would have protected him. Because he was not a convicted criminal, he did not receive the benefit of the Fifth Amendment's protection.
In State v. Hamlin (1986), a case involving an unregistered short-barreled shotgun, the Louisiana Supreme Court refused to apply the Haynes precedent, because the Louisiana statute specifically prohibited the government from using registration information to prosecute convicted felons in possession of a firearm. The Louisiana registration law had been "sanitized" in a manner similar to the 1968 revision to the National Firearms Act, 26 U.S.C. sec.5801, which required that no information obtained from gun registration could be used against a person who could not legally possess a gun -- convicted felons could register their machine guns or short-barreled shotguns with complete confidence that they would not be prosecuted for illegal possession. [12]
If mandatory gun registration can't be used to punish ex-felons in possession of a firearm, what purpose does such a law serve? If mandatory gun registration can only be used to punish people that can legally possess a gun, why bother? Because of the Haynes decision, if we want to punish ex-felons who are caught in possession of a gun, there are only two choices available: We must either skip registration, so that we can severely punish gun possession by those who aren't allowed to own guns; or use the "sanitized" form of registration law -- where the criminal is guaranteed that gun registration can't hurt him, while the rest of us can be punished for failure to comply.
It sounds paranoid to suggest that gun registration records might be used in the future to confiscate guns -- although the second director of Handgun Control, Inc. has stated explicitly that mandatory registration is one of the steps towards prohibition of handgun ownership [13] -- but when we examine how the courts have crippled gun registration laws so that felons are effectively exempt, and only law-abiding citizens need to fear such laws, what other explanation can there be for the continuing plea for mandatory gun registration?
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Clayton E. Cramer is a software engineer with a telecommunications manufacturer in Northern California. His first book, By The Dim And Flaring Lamps: The Civil War Diary of Samuel McIlvaine, was published in 1990. Rhonda L. Cramer is completing her B.A. in English.
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1. Haynes v. U.S., 390 U.S. 85, 88, 88 S.Ct. 722, 725 (1968).
2. Haynes v. U.S., 390 U.S. 85, 96, 88 S.Ct. 722, 730 (1968).
3. Haynes v. U.S., 390 U.S. 85, 100, 88 S.Ct. 722, 732 (1968).
4. Haynes v. U.S., 390 U.S. 85, 98, 88 S.Ct. 722, 730 (1968).
5. National Firearms Act: Hearings Before the Committee on Ways and Means, 73rd Cong., 2nd sess., (Washington, DC, Government Printing Office: 1934), 21-22.
6. Grimm v. City of New York, 56 Misc.2d 525, 289 N.Y.S.2d 358, 361 (1968)
7. Grimm v. City of New York, 56 Misc.2d 525, 289 N.Y.S.2d 358, 364 (1968)
8. Photos v. City of Toledo, 19 Ohio Misc. 147, 250 N.E.2d 916 (Ct.Comm.Pleas 1969).
9. Photos v. City of Toledo, 19 Ohio Misc. 147, 250 N.E.2d 916, 923 (Ct.Comm.Pleas 1969).
10. State v. Schutzler, 249 N.E.2d 549 (Ohio Ct.Comm.Pleas 1969).
11. State v. Schutzler, 249 N.E.2d 549, 552 (Ohio Ct.Comm.Pleas 1969).
12. State v. Hamlin, 497 So.2d 1369, 1372 (La. 1986).
13. Richard Harris, "A Reporter At Large: Handguns", The New Yorker, July, 26, 1976, 57-58. A fascinating interview, Shields also describes the founder of Handgun Control, Inc., as a "retired CIA official" who was its first director -- without pay. For those people who regard the CIA as a secret government with nefarious motives, this will doubtless make them wonder about the origins of Handgun Control's current policies in support of prohibition of those rifles which are most necessary to restrain domestic tyranny.
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Very intriguing , , ,
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(https://sphotos-b.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash3/156416_566074536738233_1473177041_n.jpg)
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http://capwiz.com/gunowners/issues/alert/?alertid=62467136
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http://capwiz.com/gunowners/issues/alert/?alertid=62467136
Strange, it's almost like Obama wants to disarm the American people.....
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Oh, puhleeese. That could NEVER happen here in America. No politician would be dumb enough to try that. Then again...
This administration is in for a VERY RUDE awakening if they try this - and I am not convinced they won't.
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IMHO the strategy being employed is "slice the salami"-- they will not go for the whole thing at once.
Right now we are doing poorly in communicating that magazine limitations down to 10 bullets are unreasonable and that recording all sales will lead to national registration.
Any attempts at armed resistance/insurrection on the grounds of these two points will fail tactically, strategically, and politically.
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Crafty - I was referring to confiscation. I think you underestimate Obama and his administration - filled with Marxists, anti-Semites and socialist utopians. He will over-reach and face armed resistance if it is tried. I was not suggesting that it would be wise to use this tactic for gun registration or magazine/weapons bans.
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I agree that the goal is confiscation or virtual confiscation, but suggest that the strategy is slice the salami. STS can be a very challenging strategy to fight , , ,
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For your consideration. I believe that this man's essential thesis is correct. Obama is a Marxist. This can be demonstrated easily and has been documented quite well by Stanley Kurtz in his book "Radical-in-Chief." If you watch Obama's actions instead of listening to his rhetoric (which at least half of Americans fail to do, unfortunately) his ideology is crystal-clear. See the link below. I no longer think this is far-fetched:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzT6X3_Bg9o
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Sorry, but I am on a hotel lobby connection until 3/11 and cannot listen to anything.
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GM: "Actually the protests did spread to other cities, though Beijing was the center of it all."
True, but the protests that YOU were talking about were Tiananmen Square. You chose the place, not me. And that doesn't change the fact that TS is closed in. And it doesn't change the fact the the protests were peaceful. Neither of those things is likely to occur under a widespread to literally knock on doors and confiscate guns. And, it would have to be coordinated nationwide, because of the rise of technology and means of communication. Look at Flight 93. (And, incidentally, that was an unarmed revolt.)
GM: "Unarmed populations are easily dominated."
See http://www.amazon.com/Why-Civil-Resistance-Works-Nonviolent/dp/0231156820. If you choose to read the book, I'd love to discuss it with. (That is a serious offer; and the discussion can be an aside, Crafty, so as to not clog the forum with much of this discussion; my intention is not to bugger you).
GM: "...in 1989, the PLA, ... was very much a 3rd. world army."
I know you mentioned the massive size originally, but the PLA was the largest army in the world in 1989.
By 1989, there was 4-5 move to professionalize the Air Force. Not much, admittedly, by the 1980's there was a major push to improve the AF.
The move to modernize the PLA, more properly, was more than a decade old in 1989. The move to moderize meant a massive overhaul in training, education and troop realignment.
Tellingly, the Chinese military has always long exceeded that of other "3rd World Nations." By way of comparison:
In 1950, China spent 8 billion (1986 US) dollars on its military. This is more than India, South Korea, Taiwan, Argentina, Egypt and Brazil combined.
In 1960, China spent 16 billion (1986 US) dollars on its military. This is more than the above countries plus Japan.
In 1970, China spent 37 billion (1986 US) dollars on its military. Ditto.
In 1980, China spent 45 billion (1986 US) dollars on its military. This is 2 billion dollars less than the above. This seems like a typical 3rd world military to me.
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BD, GM: I'd be delighted to see that convesation have its own thread.
Returning to the point at hand, I still do not see any inconsistency with the notion that Baraq intends to weaken our military tremendously, yet it will still be able to back up random outbursts of resistance to the accumulating momentum of a slice the salami strategy.
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"Weakening our military tremendously" does not equate with "third world military." I still can't figure out which definiton/description/idea we are working with here. And it matters, unless people here don't mean what they say. If we are all subject to hyperbole, that's fine. Just let me know.
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True, but the protests that YOU were talking about were Tiananmen Square. You chose the place, not me. And that doesn't change the fact that TS is closed in.
I'm not sure how you are defining "closed in", but I can tell you that having been there in person, Tiananmen Square is hardly closed in by most any definition.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8070177.stm
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You take this book seriously? :-o
See http://www.amazon.com/Why-Civil-Resistance-Works-Nonviolent/dp/0231156820. If you choose to read the book, I'd love to discuss it with. (That is a serious offer; and the discussion can be an aside, Crafty, so as to not clog the forum with much of this discussion; my intention is not to bugger you).
For more than a century, from 1900 to 2006, campaigns of nonviolent resistance were more than twice as effective as their violent counterparts in achieving their stated goals. By attracting impressive support from citizens, whose activism takes the form of protests, boycotts, civil disobedience, and other forms of nonviolent noncooperation, these efforts help separate regimes from their main sources of power and produce remarkable results, even in Iran, Burma, the Philippines, and the Palestinian Territories.
Let's take this to another thread. I'll look up the book, but the intial premise is laughable.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2013/03/05/dem-state-senator-to-rape-victim-having-a-gun-on-you-probably-wouldnt-have-stopped-him-you-know/
Dem state senator to rape victim: Having a gun on you probably wouldn’t have stopped him, you know
posted at 6:01 pm on March 5, 2013 by Allahpundit
Via Katie Pavlich, who reminds us that Colorado is the same state that brought us the urination defense to sexual assault in lieu of carrying concealed plus this moron mumbling about women with guns maybe taking potshots at innocent men whom they only think are rapists. The thing to remember as you watch the clip, in which an honest to goodness state legislator reasons that because the victim couldn’t karate the rapist off of her then a gun probably wouldn’t have worked either, is that there really are no “good” arguments against women arming themselves against sexual assault. Gun-control fans resort to idiocy like this vis-a-vis rape simply because they’ve got nothing better on the shelf than “well, maybe try blowing a whistle to alert the police instead.” In fact, per Pavlich’s post, the victim here was attacked just 50 feet from a campus police station (yes, Bob Beckel, it does happen) and since it was after hours, there was no help on the way. Which, as Jeffrey Goldberg notes, is not uncommon when a crime’s in progress:
An important, and overlooked, fact of the Sandy Hook tragedy is that it took police 20 minutes to arrive at the school. The police are spread too thinly across many American communities to stop shootings in their first moments. And armed civilians have been instrumental in stopping shootings at New Life Church in Colorado, Pearl High School in Mississippi and elsewhere.
This hasn’t stopped some Democrats from arguing against armed self-defense. Some left-wing commentators, members of a class not previously known for its love of the police, think their fellow citizens don’t possess adequate faith that law enforcement will protect them…
Shortly after Sandy Hook, a blogger at the Washington Monthly, making the unfounded assumption that the police provide Americans with flawless protection, asked, “Isn’t one of the fundamental reasons of forming any kind of government in the first place to provide for a common defense, instead of having to bear the totality of that burden all by yourself?” Yes, but this misses the point entirely. When the government’s provision of defense is inadequate, as it usually is during a mass shooting, you have to defend yourself.
When you boil down Hudak’s “statistical” argument, what she’s really saying is that guns are so dangerous that society’s better off leaving women unarmed and tolerating a certain amount of rape than letting them arm up and risking extra gun thefts and shootings. Note to House Democrats: I encourage you to run on that message in 2014 as part of your big “yay, gun control” platform. Suggested slogan: “You’re safer when you’re defenseless.”
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=RgXsCnrYZGY[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=RgXsCnrYZGY
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You take this book seriously? :-o
See http://www.amazon.com/Why-Civil-Resistance-Works-Nonviolent/dp/0231156820. If you choose to read the book, I'd love to discuss it with. (That is a serious offer; and the discussion can be an aside, Crafty, so as to not clog the forum with much of this discussion; my intention is not to bugger you).
For more than a century, from 1900 to 2006, campaigns of nonviolent resistance were more than twice as effective as their violent counterparts in achieving their stated goals. By attracting impressive support from citizens, whose activism takes the form of protests, boycotts, civil disobedience, and other forms of nonviolent noncooperation, these efforts help separate regimes from their main sources of power and produce remarkable results, even in Iran, Burma, the Philippines, and the Palestinian Territories.
Let's take this to another thread. I'll look up the book, but the intial premise is laughable.
Yeah, it's hilarious. You like CVs. Look at Chenoweth's. Note her placements, the awards the book recieved and the money her research gathers. Laughable, indeed. https://wesfiles.wesleyan.edu/home/echenoweth/web/cv.pdf
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/03/06/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daybydaycartoon%2FkUnt+%28Day+by+Day+Cartoon+by+Chris+Muir%29#006866
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New O’Keefe Video: Cops Say ‘You’re On Your Own’ Without Gun
March 6th, 2013 - 4:59 am
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1AQ1WBb81BE[/youtube]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=1AQ1WBb81BE
James O’Keefe’s latest video shows the ugly truth: if you don’t own a gun, you are on your own. In the video, he goes into police stations (predominately in the anti-gun Northeast) and collects a shocking harvest of responses from officers about how the police have no ability to protect them. Traffic and time prevent effective responses to 911 calls. O’Keefe’s undercover protagonist pushes the issue, “well, how am I supposed to protect my family if I don’t have a gun?”
“You’re own your own,” is the common response. Others suggest defending your family with bleach, 2 x 4′s, yelling, or holding a cell phone to your ear and pretending you are talking to the police. It demonstrates the immorality of gun control policies in places like New York and New Jersey. One New York cop says a “shotgun or rifle is a luxury.” A government acts immorally when it prevents you from defending the lives of your children. If you care about keeping your family free from violence, move South.
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"The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed -- where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once." -- Justice Alex Kozinski, US 9th Circuit Court, 2003
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second post
Politics by Intimidation
By JOE NOCERA
Published: March 11, 2013 314 Comments
Three days before the December massacre in Newtown, Conn., a 22-year-old gunman named Jacob Tyler Roberts opened fire at the Clackamas Town Center, a suburban shopping mall in Portland, Ore. He killed two people before killing himself, though it could have been much worse. His stolen semiautomatic AR-15 rifle jammed early in his shooting spree.
"No one can dialogue with someone holding a machine gun... . The gun holders know that as well as those wanting to discuss with those of differing views. "
ginny feldman, portland, orRead Full Comment »
Ginny Burdick, 65, a veteran state legislator, is probably the fiercest gun control advocate in the Oregon State Senate. In recent years, however, as the chairwoman of the Senate Finance and Revenue Committee, she had focused most of her attention on tax policy and budgetary issues. Then came the horrors of Clackamas and Newtown.
“I said to my fellow legislators, ‘Sorry folks, I have to put this back on the front burner,’ ” she told me the other day. She had already sponsored a bill to limit magazines to 10 rounds or less. She immediately sponsored several other bills, including one requiring background checks for private gun sales. (Thanks largely to Burdick, Oregon was one of the few states that had already closed the “gun-show loophole.”) Another would make it illegal for people with concealed carry licenses to take their guns into an Oregon school.
“We were in the middle of a special session on a very important tax bill,” she said. “I was right on the middle of it. I said, ‘We’re going back to guns.’ ”
Although there is widespread gun ownership in Oregon, Burdick has consistently been re-elected because most of the state’s gun owners — like many gun owners across the country — are in favor of sensible gun regulation. But most of Burdick’s initiatives over the years have been thwarted by the National Rifle Association, which strikes fear in Oregon legislators, just as it does lawmakers across the country.
Which is also why Burdick felt so strongly that Clackamas and Newtown, horrible though they were, offered a unique opportunity. Many gun extremists, however, realized the same thing. They fought back. In mid-January, two men began walking around a Portland neighborhood with assault weapons strapped to their backs. Even as schools in the area were locking down, the men insisted that they were “educating the public” about their Second Amendment rights. A month later, at a pro-gun rally at the State Capitol, a number of gun owners openly wielded their weapons — even bringing them into the building.
Burdick began receiving, as she puts it, “the usual threatening e-mails” — as did a fellow gun control advocate in the Legislature, Mitch Greenlick. He told The Oregonian that the e-mail he received from gun extremists was often abusive, obscene and anti-Semitic. He predicted that gun legislation would go nowhere because legislators were too frightened to act. “Politics by intimidation,” he called it.
And then there was Burdick. She was scheduled to hold a town-hall meeting on March 4. But at an earlier town hall held by several other legislators, gun advocates badgered them with angry questions. One of the questioners admitted he was carrying a concealed weapon. Fearing that someone might show up with a gun at her town hall, Burdick decided to postpone it. Not wanting to inflame the situation, she said she had a scheduling conflict.
On the evening of March 4, two men sat in a car across from her home and videotaped her. They showed her driving into her garage and taking out her garbage. Having “proved” that Burdick did not have a scheduling conflict, they then put together a short video of Burdick at home. Jeff Reynolds, the chairman of the Multnomah County Republican Party, who also claims to be a citizen journalist, posted the video on a Web site he runs.
When I spoke to Reynolds, he conceded that the videographer was a friend but refused to divulge his name. He said the video had nothing to do with the gun issue. “She lied,” he told me. “She is accountable to we the people.”
He added, “This was no different than what Mike Wallace used to do at ‘60 Minutes.’ There was no intimidation.” Sure.
These days, Democrats control both houses of the Oregon Legislature as well as the governor’s office. Moderate Republicans running against incumbent Democrats are being beaten in legislative races. The Republicans even lack a credible candidate to take on the current governor, John Kitzhaber, in 2014.
The extremist tactics of people like Jeff Reynolds and his videographer friend are clearly part of the reason why — they’ve helped delegitimize the Oregon Republican Party. But the tactics have other consequences, too. The gun bills filed in the Oregon Legislature — by Burdick, Greenlick and others — are by no means assured of passage.
“Other legislators look at what happened to me, and they say to themselves, ‘Do I really want to get involved in this?’ ” Burdick said. “My argument is that this is our job. But it is tempting to look the other way.”
Thus is the gun battle fought in the post-Newtown world.
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http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/constitution/item/14752-new-york-state-counties-pass-anti-gun-control-resolutions
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http://www.guns.com/2013/03/14/image-leak-gabby-giffords-with-ar-15/
Her hubby, who has been on a sanctimonious anti-gun trip, recently purchased an AR as well.
http://www.guns.com/2013/03/11/captain-mark-kelly-doing-his-part-to-keep-guns-off-streets-one-ar-15-at-a-time-and-a-1911-and-some-magazines/
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http://www.guns.com/2013/03/14/image-leak-gabby-giffords-with-ar-15/
Her hubby, who has been on a sanctimonious anti-gun trip, recently purchased an AR as well.
http://www.guns.com/2013/03/11/captain-mark-kelly-doing-his-part-to-keep-guns-off-streets-one-ar-15-at-a-time-and-a-1911-and-some-magazines/
Guns for me, not for thee.
It's not that the anti-gunners are anti-gun, they are anti-gun for the unwashed masses.
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/03/11/Schakowsky-Assault-Weapons-Ban-is-Just-the-Beginning
Schakowsky: Assault Weapons Ban 'Just the Beginning'
by Joel B. Pollak11 Mar 2013
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), a member of the Democratic Party’s leadership in the House of Representatives, suggested to Jason Mattera at a Feb. 13 women’s rights rally that plans for an assault weapons ban and private-sales background checks were only the beginning of a broader gun control agenda extending to handguns as well.
Schakowsky evidently did not recognize Mattera, a conservative video journalist and senior investigative reporter for Talk Radio Network, who infamously confronted Vice President Joe Biden in the Capitol. (Mattera introduced himself to Schakowsky by name but did not indicate that he was filming or that he is conservative.) She spoke to Mattera as if he were a fellow gun control enthusiast--and Mattera played along, eliciting answers about Schakowsky’s enthusiasm for gun control.
“We want everything on the table,” Schakowsky told Mattera. “This is a moment of opportunity. There’s no question about it.”
One poignant exchange was as follows:
Schakowsky: We’re on a roll now, and I think we’ve got to take the--you know, we’re gonna push as hard as we can and as far as we can.
Mattera: So the assault weapons ban is just the beginning?
Schakowsky: Oh absolutely. I mean, I’m against handguns. We have, in Illinois, the Council Against Handgun... something [Violence]. Yeah, I’m a member of that. So, absolutely.
In another exchange, Schakowsky proposed allowances for states and municipalities to ban guns--though such laws have been repeatedly rejected by the Supreme Court:
Mattera: We’ll never get a handgun ban with the Second Amendment as stated.
Schakowsky: I don’t know. I don’t know that we can’t. And there may be an allowance, once again, for communities--I have communities in my district that prohibited handguns within their borders. The rights of municipalities and states to view that as a sensible way to keep people safe--I don’t think it’s precluded.
When Mattera asked why legislators were not pressing for a handgun ban, given that most murders are committed with handguns, Schakowsky replied: “Because we’re not going to be able to win that. Not now.” She went on to explain why background checks were a useful interim policy, arguing that they would “address any kind of weapon.”
Schakowsky’s remarks about plans for broader gun control are not the first time she has revealed the long-term goal behind short-term policy debates. She has a tendency to do so when speaking to apparently sympathetic audiences. In 2009, she told a crowd that the goal of Obamacare would be to “put the private insurance industry out of business.”
Officially, Democrats--including Schakowsky--hew to the party line as laid down by the president, which pledges support for the Second Amendment and for gun ownership in rural communities where hunting and shooting are viewed as traditional pastimes.
Gun owners fear that the Sandy Hook-inspired gun control measures before Congress--none of which would have stopped the mass shooting at Sandy Hook--are a prelude to broader regulations, including the banning of handguns and the eventual registration and confiscation of firearms, despite earnest assurances by Democrats to the contrary.
The Democratic Party has taken a hard line on guns recently, with President Obama’s strategist, David Axelrod, joining New York mayor Michael Bloomberg in backing gun control enthusiast Robin Kelly over former Rep. Debbie Halvorson, who has an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association, in the recent primary to replace former Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. of Illinois. Kelly has promised to be a “leader” in “banning guns.”
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In America we are now where Germany was in 1933, and where Russia was in 1917. God forbid that we continue on.
"This year will go down in history. For the first time, a civilized nation has full gun registration. Our streets will be safer, our police more efficient, and the world will follow our lead into the future!"
~Adolph Hitler, 1935,on The Weapons Act of Nazi Germany
(http://www.dogbrothers.com/kostas/gun_rights_hitler.jpg)
(http://www.dogbrothers.com/kostas/gun_rights_obama.jpg)
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http://www.examiner.com/article/universal-background-check-bill-is-designed-to-land-you-prison
======================
Also:
Schumer’s Transfer Tyranny
He wants you to get a background check if you lend your friend a gun for the weekend.
By Charles C. W. Cooke
Yesterday, S. 374, or the “Protecting Responsible Gun Sellers Act of 2013” as it has been inexplicably termed, passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee by ten votes to eight. If it were to become law, S. 374 would usher in what advocates refer to as a system of “universal background checks.” It would do a lot more, besides. As it stands in our ostensibly ghoulish status quo, a free American citizen may leave his guns with his unrelated roommate for more than seven days; he may lend a gun to a friend so that that friend is able to go shooting or hunting; he has more than 24 hours in which to report to the police if his guns are stolen; and he may even — shock, horror! — teach a friend to shoot on his own land. Most important, he may do all of these things without spending five years in prison in consequence. This, the Senate’s bill would change.
Until Senator Chuck Schumer crowbarred in his amendments at the eleventh hour, S. 374 was, as Kevin Drum characterized it, a pretty “meaningless law.” This pushed Drum to sigh that “post-Sandy Hook Washington DC . . . seems an awful lot like pre-Sandy Hook Washington DC.” Not now it doesn’t, for Chuck Schumer is on it. For good measure, Schumer added to his revisions a change in the transfer-fee details, telegraphing to watchful eyes the latitude that he would like to give to the state. The Fix Gun Checks Act of 2011, on which Schumer’s bill is based, would have set fees at a flat $15; the amended bill leaves the fee structure at the mercy of later regulations to be determined by the attorney general. Passing established rules through Congress, as Obamacare’s endless instances of “the secretary shall” demonstrated, is passé. Allowing the executive branch to make the rules on a whim? Much more convenient.
S. 374 represents a direct blow to Americans’ right to keep and bear arms without excessive government interference. The bill holds that any “transfer” of a firearm must be conducted via a middleman (in practice, a law-enforcement officer or the holder of a Federal Firearms License) and that a transferee is obliged to submit to a check under the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System. There are good-faith arguments in favor of and against this provision. But Chuck Schumer has narrowed the definition of “transfer” so strictly as to make his proposition absurd. If, for example, a gun owner leaves his home for more than seven days — leaving his firearms with his roommate, or gay partner, or landlord — he’ll be committing a felony that carries a five-year prison term. And while married couples are exempted from falling afoul of that provision, the family exemptions apply only to recorded “gifts” and not to “temporary transfers.” In order to avoid making felons of millions of couples, the government would, at the very least, need to spell out clearly what constitutes “gifting” a gun within a family and what constitutes a “temporary transfer,” thus regulating an area that has hitherto largely been left alone.
What else would change? Well, it would be illegal to lend a gun to a friend so that he can go shooting. Want to give your pistol to your neighbor so he can pop down to the range for a few hours but don’t have time to go with him? Sorry, better make sure you look good in orange. Need more than the allowed 24 hours to report a stolen gun to the authorities? What is this — Somalia? You’re a felon: Go straight to jail. Do not collect $200. Sharing guns between buddies on a hunting trip? Five years inside for you. But the real genius of Schumer’s bill is the permanence of its effects: Once you’ve proven yourself the sort of monster who might teach your neighbors’ children to shoot targets in the garden, you’re a felon, and you can’t own firearms without the explicit permission of the state.
S. 374 almost certainly has a long way to go. Some have indicated that waving it through the committee was simply a matter of process, a technical trick by which it could be indicated to the public that the Senate is serious about gun control. Others have noted that Harry Reid has promised not only that he won’t bring a bill that is unlikely to pass to a Senate vote but that he is keen to ensure that any proposal has a realistic chance of getting through the House. As the Washington Times reported yesterday, Schumer even conceded that his bill is “not the only way to do it.”
To these hesitations I say pish and posh! It is time, as Gabby Giffords keeps urging, to be “brave.” It is time to stand athwart the agenda of “special interests” — such as the Second Amendment, our free citizenry, the historical evidence, and basic common sense — and to raise our voices instead for the forgotten in America: the responsible gun sellers. For under the new law, they will inherit the earth. And all of the “transfer” business, too.
— Charles C. W. Cooke is an editorial associate at National Review.
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http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/289037-senate-gun-bill-wont-include-assault-weapons-ban
From the article:
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Tuesday a proposal to renew the federal assault weapons ban could not win even 40 votes on the Senate floor.
Reid said that is the reason he will not include the assault weapons ban, sponsored by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), in the gun-violence bill he plans to bring to the Senate floor after the Easter recess.
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No - I am not being paranoid. Read the following article by the excellent Brandon Smith, and judge for yourself if there is reason to be concerned:
The Real Reasons Why The Liberty Movement Is Preparing To Fight
Tuesday, 19 March 2013 04:19 Brandon Smith
Years ago while writing for Neithercorp Press I penned an article entitled “One Day Soon, We’ll All Be Homegrown Terrorists”. In that piece I described a not so far off future in which martial law, economic collapse, and the destruction of civil liberties stood imminent. I related my views on the propaganda rhetoric of the SPLC, and how they were using false association to tie liberty groups to any deviant organization they could think of, including racists and domestic terrorists, in order to condition the American public to react to our message with immediate contempt.
It became clear to me then that the SPLC, which had become the propaganda wing of the widely reviled Department Of Homeland Security, was helping set the stage for a paradigm shift in the U.S. This shift would obviously include economic and social disruption, as well as political turmoil beyond anything our nation has seen for over 150 years. But most importantly, it would pave the way for certain elements of the American populace, namely those who are awake, aware, and outspoken, to be labeled “enemy combatants” dangerous to the state.
Though posing as an anti-racist monitoring institution, the SPLC’s primary concern has never been the KKK or “White Identity”. Rather, the SPLC’s job has been and always will be to marginalize and defame those who stand against centralized federal power, regardless of how corrupt that power has become. They are not anti-racists, or liberals, or concerned citizens; they are STATISTS, who only care about maintaining the superiority of a government that has been bought and paid for many times over by a gaggle of international financiers with delusions of godhood.
The SPLC, of course, has so far utterly failed in their efforts to stop the rise of Constitutional activists. By their own admission, “patriot groups” have expanded exponentially since 2008, and continue to develop freely even in the face of wildly absurd character attacks taken from the amoral (immoral) guidebook of Saul Alinsky himself. The truth, once realized, is difficult if not impossible to stop.
Unfortunately, the establishment understands this as well…
Given a few more years, the Liberty Movement will indeed prevail in the struggle for the “infowar”. Naysayers who claimed we were merely an ineffective and irrelevant peripheral of society are now faced with a strong and growing minority which has the power to swing state and local elections, as we did in 2012, simply by refusing to vote for oath breaking Republicans, sending the message that if the Republican party ever wants to win again, they had better run honest Constitutionalists. Those who claimed our message was “insane conspiracy theory” must now explain the indefinite detention and rendition provisions of the NDAA, the government approved unleashing of 30,000 surveillance drones in American skies, the Obama Administration's assassination list which includes U.S. citizens, and the push for gun registration and confiscation which is already beginning to take place in some states.
How did we know what was coming? Was it intuition or lucky conjecture? Neither. All we had to do was look at the trends of the day and use logic to discern the most likely outcome.
Our concerns, which were once called “fringe”, are now going mainstream. We were right, they were wrong. Though, I wish we had been wrong…
Just as the public is on a shrinking timeline, so are the elites. For every burst forward in our efforts to wake up the population to the loss of their freedoms and heritage, they must speed up their plans to gain economic and political supremacy. The harder you pull on the ends of a frayed rope in opposite directions, the sooner it is going to snap.
Today, as never before, I believe our culture has reached the breaking point, which is why the SPLC has pushed their attacks on the Liberty Movement into overdrive with manipulative media hit pieces like this:
As well as their latest propaganda piece “The Year In Hate And Extremism”:
http://www.splcenter.org/home/2013/spring/the-year-in-hate-and-extremism
The SPLC plays the role of the frantic watchman, crying out at the approach of the Mongol hordes, but their childish and ill conceived methods continue to expose their true intentions. Is the Liberty Movement preparing for war? No, but we are preparing to defend ourselves. Here are the SPLC assertions of why we are ready to fight, followed by the real reasons behind our preparations…
1) Because Obama Is Half Black?
No. Obama could be neon green and we couldn’t care less. The SPLC attempts to equate the growth of “patriot groups” with the election of the first black president, while leaving out much more likely catalysts including our current economic spiral (which they often refer to as “conspiracy theory”), or the Obama Administration’s expansion and even application of numerous unconstitutional provisions, some of which were launched by the Bush Administration.
How does the SPLC explain the majority of the Liberty Movement’s staunch opposition to the Romney Campaign if all we cared about was race? How do they reconcile the fact that we are just as critical of the Republican elite as we are of the Democrats? What about the reality that many of our organizations (like Oath Keepers) are made up of numerous races and nationalities?
They never do. They simply ignore this information as if it is not pertinent to the issue. The truth is, Obama is a middle man, a mascot, an easily replaced muppet. He is not our primary interest, and his color is meaningless. The international banks that funded his campaign and whose members occupy numerous positions within the White House, though, ARE our primary concern.
2) Because We Are Afraid Of An Economic Collapse That Will Never Come?
The SPLC refers to almost everything as “conspiracy theory” because they hope that the average American is too stupid to question their rhetoric. Calling someone a “conspiracy theorist” is the modern equivalent of accusing a person of being mentally ill; the goal is to inoculate the public against anything they have to say before they say it, even if it is the unbridled truth.
The SPLC has consistently shrugged off economic concerns as “paranoia”, but they never qualify their statements. Years ago I openly challenged Mark Potok and the whole of the SPLC to a debate on the health of the U.S. economy, and I reassert that challenge today. If they think our concerns are unfounded and a source of paranoia, then they should be willing to defend their position. I believe our financial system is on the fast track to collapse for quite a few reasons, including the fact that:
Our official national debt stands at $16.6 trillion. In 2008, the national debt was around $10 Trillion, meaning, we’ve added over $6 trillion in only 5 years. (Gee, is it possible that this has pissed Americans off more than Obama’s ethnicity?)
Real national debt including entitlement programs and future obligations is estimated between $60 Trillion and $120 Trillion.
Our official debt to GDP ratio (the amount of capital our country generates versus what it owes) stands at 102%. Historically, when a country crosses the 100% mark in its debt to GDP, there is a marked chance of economic crisis. If you count all of the programs and entitlements that the Federal Government doesn’t include in its “official” arithmetic, our debt to GDP ratio is actually closer to 400%. This means an economic crisis is ASSURED.
The Labor Department, using what they call “adjusted numbers” places unemployment at 7.9%. Real unemployment including U6 measurements (those people who are underemployed, and those people who have been unemployed for so long they no longer receive benefits and are no longer counted by the government) stands at over 20%.
In 2009, 32 million Americans were enrolled in food stamps. Today, that number has grown to 48 million. That’s a 50% increase in only 4 years.
The number of people on standard disability has hit a record of 9 million, and has grown every month for the past 192 months.
For the past four years I have pointed out that China, our largest foreign creditor, only needs to do two things before dumping the dollar as the world reserve currency – find a consumer market source to replace the U.S., and, spread it’s own currency around the globe to create a viable alternative to the greenback.
Today, China has announced a full blown transition into a consumer based economy and has established bilateral trade agreements with enough developing nations to easily replace the U.S. as an export market.
This past month, China announced a massive “urbanization project” in which they will sell over $6 trillion in Yuan denominated bonds worldwide. China has also surpassed the U.S. for the first time ever as the world’s largest trade market, meaning, the Yuan will now be more sought after than the Dollar as a global trade mechanism. The Chinese are nearly ready to dump the dollar, causing an international chain reaction that will brutally devalue our currency.
I think our economic worries are clearly reasonable…
3) Because We Are Paranoid Over Unfounded Threats Of Martial Law?
In the calm before any great war, there is always an escalation of arms on both sides of the conflict. Anyone who has carefully studied the history of modern warfare KNOWS an escalation when they see one. At the same time, anyone who has studied the history of citizen disarmament knows that government restriction and confiscation of personal firearms almost always leads to genocide. Over the past decade, we have seen blatant indications that domestic agencies of the Federal Government are in the midst of arms stockpiling, and, in the past two months, they are pushing harder than ever before to reduce the defensive capabilities of the American public.
The Department Of Homeland Security has in only a few years placed orders for ammunition totaling at least 1.6 billion rounds, and new orders indicate they may be accumulating over 2 billion rounds. The DHS has initiated a disinformation campaign through the mainstream media claiming that this ammunition stockpile, which is to be delivered over the course of five years, is for “training purposes only”. Here is the reality…
First, by the department’s own numbers, training and qualification exercises taking place in three facilities nationwide use a total of 15 – 20 million rounds of ammo yearly. This means that if the DHS claims are true, they have ordered enough ammo to last a minimum of 75 years! No government agency plans this far ahead.
Second, the DHS and most federal and state law enforcement agencies DO NOT use hollow point pistol ammo and expensive Sierra Match King hollow point sniper rounds for “training”. Anyone who knows anything about combat simulation training knows that you use the cheapest plinking ammo you can find, and this includes the government. The ammo purchased by the DHS is used for one thing only; killing people.
Third, if this ammo is being used only for non-threatening purposes, then why is the DHS now redacting order requests in a ploy to hide what they are purchasing?
https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=311eb3ee003671285de8db1036b2b255&tab=core&tabmode=list&=
On top of this, why does the DHS need mine resistant armored vehicles?
Or bullet resistant road booths?
http://news.thomasnet.com/companystory/Shelters-Direct-Builds-Bullet-Resistant-Booths-for-Homeland-Security-612684
Why is the DHS using training targets featuring children and pregnant women? Why has the Federal Government put plans into motion to release 30,000 drones above our heads? Why have they instituted the passage of the indefinite detention provisions of the NDAA which can be used to revoke the civil rights of anyone deemed an “enemy combatant” by the executive branch, including American citizens? Why has Obama bypassed the Treason Clause of the U.S. Constitution in order to greenlight assassinations of American citizens? Why has Attorney General Eric Holder stated that predator drones have not been ruled out as a weapon against American citizens on American soil? Why has a branch of the military, Northcom, been deployed domestically in the U.S.? Who are they here to fight?
The government is telling us, right to our faces, that they plan to use extraneous force against us, and where else would this force be initiated on such a scale except during martial law? The extensive militarization of any domestic government agency requires as a response the extensive armament of the citizenry, otherwise, there is no deterrent to tyranny.
4) Because We Refuse To Accept That The World Is Changing Without Us?
This argument is based on a series of lies, the first one being that American culture needs to “progress with the times” and shake off the dead skin of old and “unpopular” principles. Let’s set the record straight…
Some principles, like the liberties embodied in natural law and outlined in the U.S. Constitution, NEVER become outdated. They exist in the heart of mankind, and will remain as long as humanity remains. They cannot be erased, and they cannot be undone. They are inherent and eternal.
They can, however, be oppressed by those who seek to dominate the lives of others. This is what the establishment today calls “progress”. Their version of social order is not new, nor is it even clever. It is archaic, and has taken many forms, including oligarchy, aristocracy, mercantilism, monarchy, totalitarianism, despotism, fascism, socialism, communism, globalism, etc., etc. The goal is always the same; centralize as much power as possible into as few hands as possible while making the enslaved population as collectivized and dependent as possible.
The Liberty Movement is not some dying vestige of America’s past clinging to an antiquated philosophy. We are the new wave; the messengers of an ideal of freedom that in the grand scheme of history has been around for only a blink of an eye. Constitutional liberty IS the progress that humanity has been waiting for. We have only been led astray by those who would sell us on our own bondage.
The SPLC and others within the establishment accuse the Liberty Movement of arming for conflict against the government. I am here to tell them that is EXACTLY what we are doing. We are arming because the establishment is arming against us. Yes, we are a threat, but only to political and corporate criminals who use subversion and violence to wrest freedom from the hands of good people. I am not afraid to openly admit it. I and many others will fight against any measure or man that seeks to undermine the rights of the people or destroy the founding principles of this nation.
We will not allow engineered economic collapse to go unpunished. We will not allow internationalists to subdue American sovereignty. We will not allow national gun registration or confiscation. We will not allow martial law to be instituted. We will not allow American citizens to be imprisoned or assassinated without trial. We will not allow any presidential administration, black or white, Republican or Democrat, to become a De facto dictatorship with no accountability to the public.
Regardless of what they might say about us in the future, these are the reasons why we will fight, and our pledges to resist are not empty assertions. We will stop the course of tyranny from completing in this country and in this era, one way or another. If this makes us “extremists”, or “terrorists”, then so be it. I, for one, am tired of the long running game of lies and reserved rhetoric. They know a fight is coming, and we know a fight is coming. Let’s just admit it and be done with it. Their greatest weakness is that they have to use deceit, propaganda, media monopoly, and false flag violence in order to convince the public that they are the “right side”. All we have to do is continue telling the truth, and stand fast…
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The SPLC is a bunch of dishonest lefty douchebags, however there are more than a few inaccurate points in the above article that have been debunked in several posts above.
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http://reason.com/blog/2013/03/19/savor-the-richly-deserved-defeat-of-fein
Savor the Richly Deserved Defeat of Feinstein's 'Assault Weapon' Ban
Jacob Sullum|Mar. 19, 2013 3:07 pm
Senate Judiciary CommitteeYesterday Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) revealed that her "assault weapon" ban will not be part of the gun control bill that Senate Democrats plan to offer next month. Although her bill still can be offered as an amendment, Politico reports, "its exclusion from the package makes what was already an uphill battle an almost certain defeat." At the risk of reading too much into this delightful development, I count it as a victory not just for the Second Amendment but for rationality in lawmaking.
As a comparison of the testimony pro and con readily reveals, supporters of Feinstein's bill never offered a plausible, let alone persuasive, explanation for the distinction she drew between the guns she deemed "legitimate" and the dreaded "assault weapons" she sought to ban. The closer you looked at the bill, the less sense it made, a fact that Feinstein tried to paper over by encouraging people to conflate semi-automatic, military-style rifles with the machine guns carried by soldiers. That flagrant fraud sufficed to win passage of the federal "assault weapon" ban that expired in 2004 (which was also sponsored by Feinstein), and it continues to influence public opinion. But this time around it was not enough to obscure the absurdity of Feinsten's attempt to distinguish between good and evil guns by reference to irrelevant features such as barrel shrouds and adjustable stocks. With no evidence or arguments to offer, Feinstein despicably invoked dead, "dismembered" children in a transparent bid to short-circuit logical thought. Her appeal to blind fear was familiar to anyone who has watched this authoritarian centrist rail against mythical drugs or kowtow to the national security state. I savor her richly deserved defeat.
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G.M. - I only know I've heard some news outlets attempt to soft-pedal the large ammunition purchases. Specifically, what do you think is inaccurate in Smith's article and why? I don't trust 95% of the media - who are in Obama's back pocket.
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http://hotair.com/archives/2013/03/05/nro-ammunition-purchases-by-government-not-a-conspiracy/comment-page-3/
NRO: Ammunition purchases by government not a conspiracy
posted at 3:21 pm on March 5, 2013 by Ed Morrissey
We have been getting plenty of e-mail about purchases and contracts for ammunition by government agencies, which seem to have prompted a run on ammunition by private consumers and the shortages that these runs usually entail. The e-mails usually express concern over the supposedly massive amounts of ammunition being stockpiled and the threat to American liberty that it represents. At National Review — not exactly a shill for Barack Obama — editor Charles C. W. Cooke looks at the actual numbers and debunks the conspiracy theories:
Nonetheless, one could reasonably ask why the Social Security Administration would need any ammunition at all. Are the elderly especially unruly these days? Jonathan L. Lasher, in the SSA’s external-relations department, explained to theHuffington Post that the ammunition is “for the 295 agents” in the outfit’s office of inspector general “who investigate Social Security fraud and other crimes.” Divide the rounds by the number of agents, and you get about 590 per agent; in a given year, that’s about ten rounds a week. “Most will be expended on the firing range,” Lasher continued.
Okay. And why does the USDA need 320,000 rounds? Because it runs the Forest Service, which covers “155 national forests” and “20 national grasslands” on a total of “193 million acres of land.” As well as agents in the field, the outfit has a law-enforcement unit based in Washington, D.C., whose responsibility it is to enforce federal laws and regulations. In context, those 320,000 rounds look a lot less threatening: If the U.S. Forest Service were to distribute ammunition at the same rate as the Social Security Administration, they would have enough for just 542 agents — not bad for an organization that covers an area the size of Pakistan (or twice the size of Japan or Germany).
It’s all about scale. Forty-six thousand rounds also sound like a lot for the National Weather Service. (Actually, the ammo was requested by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries Office of Law Enforcement, which is overseen by the same department.) In reality, it’s not that much. The service has only 63 armed personnel, which brings the purchase out at around 730 rounds per officer. This, suffice it to say, does not present a great threat to the Republic. As the NRA has noted, “more than a few NRA members would use that much ammunition in a weekend shooting class or plinking session.” There are enough risks to the right to bear arms and to American liberty in general, the NRA continued, without “inventing threats.”
Cooke also explores the more significant contracts of over 500 million rounds combined for the FBI and DHS, both obviously law-enforcement agencies, which have been the subject of other e-mails. The DHS contract runs for five years, Cooke explains, and doesn’t require DHS to make the purchases. It’s a pricing-contingency arrangement, one that makes a lot of sense for cost stability and control, that reserves as much as 450 million rounds over the period of the contract.
We get a lot of e-mail with various doomsday scenarios built on conjecture, and we don’t address most of them for the simple reason that we’d rather focus on actual issues. This particular meme has built up some staying power, however, and Cooke’s column should get wide distribution in order to set minds at rest and put them to more productive use. And Cooke has a suggestion where we can start:
Questions do still abound: Whether it is in possession of one bullet or 1 million bullets, should the federal Department of Education be armed in the first place? If so, why? Should its OIG be investigating external fraud rather than handing it over to the police or the DOJ or the FBI? For those federal departments that play no role in combating domestic and foreign threats — such as the DoE — what would constitute a threat requiring armed confrontation with malefactors?
Read this all the way through to see what happens when organizations without a criminal law-enforcement mission try to go it alone; it doesn’t end well. Shouldn’t agencies like the DoE work through the FBI or US Marshals in order to enforce the law? This seems like a ripe area for reform and consolidation within the federal government, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we couldn’t wring out some significant savings by eliminating duplication in law enforcement.
Update: Patriot Perspective addressed this a year ago, and has more thoughts today.
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/03/robert-farago/the-truth-about-the-dhs-mraps/
The Truth About the DHS’s MRAPs
Posted on March 6, 2013 by Robert Farago
There’s been a lot of internet buzz about the Department of Homeland Security’s “new” MRAPs (a.k.a., tanks). I’ve been holding off posting about the story; there’s a lot of bad intel out there about government gun grabbers. Just because gun owners are paranoid doesn’t mean Uncle Sam is as bad as they think it is. Sometimes, of course, it’s worse. But it appears that the report that the DHS has purchased 2700 new MRAPs is wrong. Here’s the 411 from the official spokesman for Das Vaterland. I mean, Homeland . . .
The MRAPs were transferred to DHS from the Department of Defense, free of charge. But despite recent reports, they have actually been in service since at least 2008.
“The MRAPs we have are not new,” Ross Feinstein, a spokesman for DHS, told Business Insider. “We have been using them for years.”
“[The vehicle] is used in the execution of high-risk warrants — including drug trafficking, smuggling, and contraband,” Feinstein told Business Insider. “We have 16 MRAPs nationwide.”
Sixteen is a lot less than 1700. But still . . . drug trafficking? Isn’t that the DEA’s deal? Or the ATF if it’s guns. Or the CIA if it’s foreign terrorists. Or is that the FBI? They do explosives too, right?
You know in all this excitement I lost track of all the federal agents with SWAT and SRT teams ready to enforce federal gun control laws of one sort or another. But I do remember that the DHS recently raided a New Mexico gun dealer, confiscated his guns and charged him with . . . nada.
So the DH is out there, grabbing guns. But they only have 16 heavily armored troop vehicles with which do it. Feel better now?
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I could have swore that the two pieces GM posts today have been posted somewhere on the forum previously. I know I did post the NRO piece on my FB page because I found it persuasive and felt honor bound to share it in light of previous posts that I had made.
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I urge both G.M. and Crafty to consider the following with regard to Brandon Smith's article, and notice each of his arguments. Don't simply take one statement and ignore those related to or supporting it:
This article clearly ignores the fact that the DHS alone
has ordered 1.6 billion to 2 billion rounds, and plays primarily on the
orders of agencies like social security. This is typical of so called
"debunkers". They like to twist the facts or shift numbers to fit their
argument. The bottom line is, the DHS does NOT use hollow point 40. cal
or .308 sniper rounds for training or qualifications. These are combat
rounds only. Also, the DHS has ordered at minimum 75 years worth of
ammunition if they only planned to use it for training, which is absurd.
No government agency plans that far ahead. Also, if they have no
nefarious designs for this massive stockpile, then why are they refusing
to answer the questions of various Congressmen on the issue?
http://www.prisonplanet.com/big-sis-refuses-to-answer-congress-on-ammo-purchases.html
I would also point out to your friends that there are plenty of
Republicans that have supported Obama in his power grabbing, including
using drones against American citizens. Just because a website (NRO) claims
to be Republican, doesn't mean they are anti-state power, or anti-Obama.
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Dashing about on a busy morning, but I will pause to note that prisonplanet.com., along with infowars.com, is on my list of do-not-read sites.
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Crafty - you need to check out these specific stories. They are sourced from DHS and Congress people, and even have a video of one Congressman discussing this issue, and how he cannot get any answers. I agree with you in general about the overall sites, but these stories are worthy of your time.
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"The bottom line is, the DHS does NOT use hollow point 40. cal
or .308 sniper rounds for training or qualifications."
Where did you get this? Because I can tell you that's incorrect.
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http://www.americanrifleman.org/blogs/where-has-the-ammo-gone/
Where Has All The Ammo Gone?
3/13/2013
In case you hadn’t noticed, we are in the midst of an ammunition, primer and propellant shortage. Stories are making both local and national news, and rumors abound on the Internet. I understand there have been large Federal contracts, but those cannot come close to explaining the increased demand for ammunition and components. There is more than a billion—that’s billion with a “B”—rounds of .22 Long Rifle produced in this country every year. One estimate puts it at closer to a billion and a half. The DHS has not bought a billion and a half rounds of .22 LR, so it cannot be pinned on them. Also, it is unlikely to me that Janet Napolitano is trying to corner the world market on Hodgdon Varget, even though it is one of my favorite go-to powders.
I have some anecdotal evidence of what is going on here. A friend called me from the parking lot of a gun store in Southwest Virginia, “Mark, I just scored 5,000 rounds of Federal .22 Long Rifle!” I cut his euphoria short by saying, “Tim, you have never bought more than 500 rounds of anything before.” To which he replied, “Yeah, but I bought all they had.” I believe Tim’s “score” is being replicated all across the country every time the UPS truck arrives.
In another instance, a colleague and her husband were traveling and stopped by a gunshop off the beaten track and managed to scoop up some .223 Rem. “The last five boxes we have,” the clerk told them. “It just came in.” Odds are my friend Tim had not passed through there yet. They were delighted, and for good reason. You can buy all the .257 Roberts you want, but .223 Rem. is difficult to find. Actually my somewhat cynical colleague speculated the store owner really had a shipping container of .223 out back, but was only selling five boxes at a time as sales tactic to increase store traffic. Perhaps.
There is a downstream effect of such purchasing behavior. When people are motivated by external political exigencies to purchase more ammunition than they customarily purchase, there is less ammunition for others. Friends of mine are hesitant to go to the range and shoot as they don’t know when they can replenish their ammunition supply. That goes for matches, too.
All the major ammunition companies have increased capacity and production over last year’s levels, which was a banner year. If the ammunition makers are producing more ammunition than ever before—regardless of government contracts—why is there no ammo on the shelf? Simply put, other people are buying it before you do. This is basic supply and demand. When demand is high and supply low, prices increase. And my friend Tim could not have bought it all.
Speculation has also played a role. Two of my editors are voracious readers of The Valley Trader, a convenience store newsprint classified for the Shenandoah Valley, where they both live. Usually The Valley Trader is full of great stuff, such as “FOR SALE: Men’s boots: $40.” It doesn’t say the size (which I regard as somewhat important) or what brand or style, but the good news is that they are only $40. My favorite of all time though is “TRADE: Will trade a lemur for a zero turn mower.” I haven’t priced lemurs recently (now that “Zaboomafoo” is off the air), but that does not seem like a trade I would want to make. Now sprinkled through its pages are ammo speculators. A definitive pattern is developing. Ammunition purchased opportunistically at larger retail outlets—which have not raised their prices to the gouge level—is going for three to five times the retail price. Again, supply, demand and scarcity. When a product is scarce, you can charge more for it. And those that have the product, often do so. Whether it results in an ammunition equivalent of the South Sea Company Bubble of 1720, remains to be seen. It is my belief as the political agitation slows, shelves will slowly start filling again.
Which begs the questions: How much Winchester white box 230-grain, .45 ACP can I get for a lemur?
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http://www.defensereview.com/sigarms-and-heckler-kochhk-defense-win-major-pistol-contracts-with-dhs/
SIGARMS and Heckler & Koch/HK Defense Win Major Pistol Contracts with DHS
Published by David Crane in Pistols on August 16th, 2005
by David Crane
david@defensereview.com
Sigarms, Inc. and Heckler & Koch, Inc./HK Defense) both recently won monster pistol contracts (in 9mm, .40 S&W, and .357 SIG calibers)–for up to 65,000 pistols, each–with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Sigarms’ pistol contract is worth $23.7 million. The SIG-Sauer pistols chosen by DHS are the SIG P226R-DAK, SIG P229R-DAK, and SIG P239-DAO (double-action-only). The DAK trigger system is also double-action-only, only it offers a relatively light, smooth 6.5-pound trigger pull. The Heckler and Koch (HK)/HK Defense pistol contract is valued at $26.2 million. The HK pistol models chosen are the HK P2000 US, HK P2000 SK Subcompact (a.k.a. HK P2000SK Subcompact), and the USP Compact/LEM (Law Enforcement Modification). The LEM trigger is basically HK’s version of SIG’s DAK trigger (or Glock’s Safe-Action trigger), and vice versa. According to the company, the LEM trigger allows for faster follow-up shots (repeat shots) on target than a standard double-action-only system, due to a lighter trigger pull (7.3-8.5 lbs) and shorter trigger reset than standard DAO trigger systems. The LEM trigger utilizes a two-piece "pre-cocked hammer" comprised of a cocking piece and an external hammer. The hammer is pre-cocked when a round is chambered (slide is cycled). The LEM system supposedly also provides for more reliable primer ignition, since it utilizes a stronger hammer spring.
The following is a reprint of the official Department of Homeland Security Press Release on it:…
"Department Of Homeland Security Awards Handgun Contracts
For Immediate Release
Press Office
Contact 202-282-8010
August 24, 2004
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security announced the award of two contracts today for handguns for all organizational elements within the department, including U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Transportation Security Administration, the U.S. Coast Guard and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center.
SIGARMS Incorporated and Heckler & Koch, Incorporated each received a contract award with a maximum quantity of 65,000 pistols that may be purchased over the next five years. SIGARMS Incorporated, a small business located in Exeter, New Hampshire, received a $23.7 million contract for 9 x 19 mm and .40 caliber pistols. Heckler & Koch, a large business located in Sterling, Virginia, received a $26.2 million contract for 9 x 19 mm, .40, and .357 caliber pistols.
The two contracts will enable DHS personnel to acquire handguns in three popular law enforcement calibers and a variety of sizes. These contracts represent the results of the department’s Strategic Sourcing Program that is designed to optimize cross-departmental acquisitions through collaboration of agency technical and acquisition experts. The Weapons and Ammunition Commodity Council, part of the strategic sourcing program, identifies and consolidates emerging firearms and ammunition requirements for all Homeland Security components. As part of this effort, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) released a Request for Proposals in February 2004 for the procurement of handguns. The ICE National Firearms and Tactical Training Unit led the ensuing evaluation.
“This type of multiple contract award will provide the government the flexibility it needs to enable the DHS entities to address their diverse operational missions, while still maximizing logistical efficiencies found through standardization,” said Thomas Trotto, Director of the ICE National Firearms and Tactical Training Unit.
The technical evaluation of the proposals included a comprehensive handgun test protocol involving a rigorous battery of environmental, reliability, durability, and other tests. Approximately three million rounds of ammunition were fired through 690 handguns of 46 different models during the testing, which took almost four months to complete. Aside from the actual live firing, additional testing was conducted through laboratory analysis and armory inspections. In all, each model was evaluated against more than 50 characteristics before arriving at a technical rating. This data was used in conjunction with past performance and pricing information to select the winning contractors.
The Homeland Security Weapons and Ammunition Commodity Council continues to analyze the department’s requirements for weapons, ammunition, and other officer safety products to identify additional strategic sourcing opportunities."
Click here to read the original/official press release (above) at the DHS website.
You can contact Sigarms, Inc. by phone at 603-772-2302, or by fax at 603-772-9082.
HK Defense Federal Operations can be contacted by phone at 703-450-1900 Ext. 246 or 289. Military Operations can be contacted at Ext. 272. The fax number for HK Defense is 703-450-8163.
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http://www.fletc.gov/training/programs/firearms-division/interesting-facts-about-the-firearms-division.html
Interesting facts about the Firearms Division
FAD has approximately 49 buildings that include indoor and outdoor firing ranges, offices, ammunition and weapons storage, equipment and supply storage spaces.
The indoor range complex and the outdoor ranges (to include 2 outdoor ranges currently under construction) have a combined total of approximately 384 firing points for live fire training.
These do not include the various scenario-based training ranges that FAD uses for tactical training.
FAD has approximately 9 training ranges used for scenario-based tactical firearms training.
There are approximately 150 staff members assigned to the Firearms Division including managers, support personnel and instructors.
The instructor cadre consists of former law enforcement and/or military personnel who now work for the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) and current law enforcement personnel detailed from many of the agencies who participate in training conducted at the FLETC.
Training requires the use of approximately 15 million rounds of ammunition annually.
The ammunition includes lead projectiles and reduced hazard (environmentally friendly) ammunition.
The reduced hazard ammunition accounts for approximately 70 percent of the ammunition expended for training.
FAD offers 8 advanced firearms training programs. These programs are open to Federal, state and municipal law enforcement personnel. Some international law enforcement personnel attend these programs when they are sponsored by one of the Federal partner agencies.
FAD offers approximately 120 firearms courses. Many of these are contained in FLETC basic, agency basic and advanced law enforcement training programs.
FAD conducts advanced export training (off site) at other Federal, state and municipal facilities around+ the country on an as-needed basis.
Fad Innovations Through The Years
1978- Developed first electronic Firearms Training Simulator for law enforcement utilizing a video player to project a scenario onto a screen for law enforcement “Judgment Pistol Shooting (JPS).” The unit was a Beta Vision video tape player that projected onto a white screen made of paper. Live handguns were used to fire special plastic projectiles that would put holes into the paper screen when fired at the video images. A special microphone picked up the shot sound and automatically paused the video scenario) allowing instructors to evaluate both judgment and accuracy of students involving the appropriate application of or restraint from the use of deadly force.
1985- Developed first computer controlled Firearms Training Simulator using laser video disks rather than video tape with laser equipped handguns to improve on the original “JPS” system.
1992- Assisted F.A.T.S. (Firearms Training Systems, Inc.) with the first commercially produced and sold Firearms Judgment Training System for Law Enforcement)
2000- Worked with major ammunition manufacturers to develop the first frangible and reduced hazard ammunition for firearms training.
2010- In conjunction with military and military contractors developed the first law enforcement Virtual Force on Force Firearms Judgment Training Simulator System. This system takes the training to the next level allowing tactile feedback to the student (simulator can fire non-lethal projectiles at the student for immediate feedback as to their use of concealment or cover while also allowing the student to utilize different job tools in conjunction with the simulations, e.g.: flashlight, pepper spray, taser device, etc. for less than lethal applications of force. Laser equipped firearms are still used when students must use deadly force based on the circumstances they are engaged with during the simulation. Students are critiqued on their decision making, articulation of the facts, and appropriate use of the law enforcement equipment provided as everything relates to the legal requirements placed upon them.
If you need additional information or have questions about the advanced training programs offered by FAD, please contact the Law Enforcement Program Specialist for Advanced Programs at FAD (See below for contact information).
Law Enforcement Program Specialist- FAD Advanced Programs
FLETC
FAD, Building 221
1131 Chapel Crossing Road
Glynco, GA 31524
Telephone: 912 267 2278
E-Mail : FLETC-FADPOC@FLETC.DHS.GOV
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G.M. - Did you actually read Smith's article? What you are posting does not in any way refute what he's saying.
He never said they don't use .40 cal weapons. He said most federal agencies do NOT use expensive .40 cal HOLLOW POINT rounds for training and qualifications. The DHS purchased hundreds of millions of rounds of COMBAT AMMO, not training ammo.
He also states quite clearly that DHS uses 15 million to 20 million rounds for training and qualifications per year (annually). So, again, why does DHS need 1.6 billion to 2 billion rounds of ammo for "training" when this would last them at minimum 75 years?
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At every level of law enforcement, you qualify with your duty ammo. I can say I've seen the feds shoot a large amount of the same ammo in training. Every Fed I know gets issued ammo for practice on their own time.
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G M - I don't want to get into a pissing match here, but you're avoiding the second part of my question below, as to the amount of the ammunition purchases, AND I know from a personal friend who works for DHS that they do NOT use anywhere near this amount of hollow-point ammunition. Most of what they use in training is conventional, or even "environmentally-safe" ammo, as you point out in your earlier post from DHS.
Until you can come up with acceptable evidence for refutation of the facts reported in Smith's article (not official DHS documents) I am not persuaded that these charges should be dismissed. Further - you have failed to address the issue with Congressional members asking for information about these purchases and receiving nothing. Something is not right here - and I don't think what you have posted effectively refutes anything argued in the original article.
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Sounds like some fairly presented questions to me , , ,
Tangent: A Rachel Maddow rant-- what the other side is hearing: http://front.moveon.org/everyone-should-know-about-these-new-details-emerging-from-the-sandy-hook-massacre/#.UUtnxVfrR5s.facebook
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While awaiting GM's response to Obj's questions, here's this priceless clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5GI8Dqmegnk
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Mayor Bloomberg Plans $12 Million Ad Blitz on Gun Control
Determined to persuade Congress to act in response to the shooting in Newtown, Conn., Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on Monday will begin bankrolling a $12 million national advertising campaign that focuses on senators who he believes might be persuaded to support a pending package of federal regulations to curb gun violence. The ads, in a dozen states, will blanket those senators’ districts during an Easter Congressional recess that is to be followed by debate over the legislation.
But in a telling sign of how much the white-hot demands for gun control have been tempered by political reality, the commercials make no mention of an assault weapons ban once sought by the White House and its allies, instead focusing on the more achievable goal of universal background checks.
The advertising, which will saturate television screens in states including Ohio, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Arizona, represents by far the biggest escalation of Mr. Bloomberg’s attempts to become a one-man counterweight to the National Rifle Association in the political clash over guns.
READ MORE »
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/24/nyregion/bloombergs-tv-blitz-on-guns-puts-swing-state-senators-on-the-spot.html?emc=na
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This just out today. I know of Crafty's disdain for infowars.com - but this is being reported from numerous reliable sources. To me, this is extremely concerning:
http://www.infowars.com/dhs-to-buy-360000-more-rounds-of-hollow-point-ammunition/
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Forgive the obvious snark here Obj-- use them instead of infowars!
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http://www.examiner.com/article/congressman-dhs-now-has-five-rounds-for-every-person-the-united-states
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http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2013/03/22/dhs-denies-massive-ammunition-purchase
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FWIW, I saw, I think it was on Bret Baier's Special Report on FOX yesterday or the day before, that DHS purchases this past year were somewhat less than in the previous two years. Of course by itself this proves nothing beyond a reasonable doubt.
By all means, lets keep an eye on this one. Between GM and Obj I think we are in good hands in our search for the Truth.
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Back to the original article:
"Second, the DHS and most federal and state law enforcement agencies DO NOT use hollow point pistol ammo and expensive Sierra Match King hollow point sniper rounds for “training”. Anyone who knows anything about combat simulation training knows that you use the cheapest plinking ammo you can find, and this includes the government"
I have been the Range Safety Officer where feds have shown up and shot duty grade ammo they were given for practice. I have been at shooting classes where feds showed us for a 4 day class with a 1000 + round count with Uncle Sugar supplied duty ammo for their sidearms. I was envious, to say the least. A friend that works for a DHS agency used to get up to 200 rounds a month for practice if he wished.
As to the assertion about "sniper training". Law enforcement precision marksmen/countersnipers or whatever term you prefer, train with ammo that duplicates the same ballistic characteristics as the ammo they'd use for an actual call out. The ideal is to buy a large amount of ammo from the same production lot and training with it so that when you have to take a precision shot from a cold bore you know exactly the point of impact. You can't get away with buying cheap "practice ammo" for training and save the 308 - 168 gr HP-BT - Federal Premium Sierra Match King Gold Medal for the day you've got to drop the hostage taker.
Let me show you what Blackwater, er... Academi requires for their Sniper class:
http://academi.com/training-courses/course-title/basic-le-military-sniper/overview
Introduction
This is an intensive five-day course for military and law enforcement candidates. This course is designed for individuals with minimal or no experience using a scoped firearm, and will give them a solid foundation on sniper skills for use with their department or unit. This is a pass/fail course that tests marksmanship abilities under a time requirement for a certificate of course completion. Students who are unable to successfully qualify will receive a certificate of attendance.
Aim
At the end of this course the successful graduates will be able to set up their own sniper firearm system, zero the scope to the firearm, be able to judge the distance to a target and successfully read the winds to effectively engage the target.
Topics
•Safety precautions
•Firearm maintenance
•Sniper equipment
•Ballistics
•Marksmanship principles
•Shooters log book
•Spotting methods
•Applying corrections (elevation and windage)
•Methods of judging distance
•Methods of observation, aids and procedures
•Sniper range card
•Methods of engaging moving targets
•Supported and unsupported shooting positions
Ammunition Requirements
400 rounds match-grade ammunition.
Gear
•Sniper firearm system (bolt action or semi-auto, .308 is recommended) including scope (mil-dot reticule pattern is recommended); a bipod mount for the firearm is highly recommended
•Complete firearm cleaning kit (push rod, brass jag, powder solvent, copper solvent, bore guide)
•Spotting scope with tripod (good quality scope with variable zoom settings and a reticule pattern is recommended)
•Ear and eye protection
•Backpack or equipment bag
•Calculator
•Range clothing appropriate to the season
•Rain gear
•A water bottle or other hydration system
•Sunscreen and insect repellant in summer months
•Sling for the firearm
•Shooting bag (bean bag, shooting glove or both)
Method
This course is a combination of classroom theory, practical field applications and live-fire applications.
Skill Prerequisites
Current law enforcement and active-duty military only.
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GM - I am well aware of what is required of snipers and am not disputing this. I have participated in classes such as the one for which you provide an outline.
You continue however, to evade the question of why the government is buying such HUGE QUANTITIES of this ammo. I can absolutely tell you that there are only a very small percentage of "sniper-trained" military and law enforcement. The average enlisted person or cop DOES NOT get this sort of training, and does NOT require or use this expensive ammo for this purpose.
You seem hell-bent on "debunking" the concerns being raised, and/or implying that there is nothing nefarious going on here. I have no idea why that is.
The facts remain as they are, and DHS has studiously avoided answering the very pertinent questions asked by several members of Congress. I don't believe this is "business as usual" for the government. Never in my life (and I am 50 years old) have I EVER seen ammunition shortages even close to what we have now. Walk into a Cabela's or a Bass Pro Shops (major retailers who are not going to artificially limit supplies if they can sell it at pretty much whatever they want to,) and you will see AISLES of bare shelves. I understand that many civilians are buying ammunition now, but government purchases take precedence by law. At the very least, the government is trying to minimize the supply available to the public. I suspect it's actually much worse than that.
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Because I'm interested in the truth. Remember how the "DHS was buying tanks" traveled like wildfire and is now obviously wrong.
Here is a link to DHS' response to Sen. Coburn, posted on his website:
http://www.coburn.senate.gov/public//index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&File_id=9cde768f-bb3a-4fd9-8176-1745c21519c2
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Sen. Reid Beefs up “Base Bill” to
Destroy Gun Ownership
"Unholy alliances" could become a concern
We now know a lot more about what's going to happen with gun control legislation than we did a few days ago.
First, the number of the bill we are fighting is S. 649. Harry Reid introduced it on Thursday and brought it directly onto the Senate calendar. This means the bill can now come up at any time — probably soon after the Easter recess is over.
Second, the bill is a lot worse than even we anticipated.
We expected it to contain the Veterans Gun Ban, which would mean that you would sell, gift, or raffle a gun in America at the risk of a 15-year prison sentence because of something you didn't know about the veteran/buyer.
But, surprisingly to us, the Far Left has convinced Reid to include the original Schumer version of the Universal Registry Bill. This would ban private sales of firearms, unless purchasers first get the permission from the government. If Senators can pass this de facto registration bill, they will be well on the way to confiscation (see, for example, Governor Andrew Cuomo in New York, who has a gun owner registry and has called for gun confiscation). If this bill is passed, Senators will claim that they "broke the back" of gun owners in America.
Third, there is still every evidence that Reid will move to proceed to the bill under "regular order," which means he will need 60 votes to advance to the "gun control buffet."
GOA has been talking and making our case with a host of Senate Republicans, and we would hope that everyone in the Senate understands the importance of stopping the "motion to proceed" to Reid's gun control legislation.
Fourth, as we predicted, anti-gun zealots have begun to use the "ObamaCare Paradigm" to threaten, bribe, and coerce senators into submission on the most far-reaching aspects of gun control, including Feinstein's proposal to ban shotguns, rifles and handguns that millions of Americans legally own. So if the "motion to proceed" to S. 649 is adopted with 60 votes, then Feinstein's ban could be passed in the Senate with only 50 votes (plus Biden). Click here for a more technical explanation as to how this would occur.
Already, articles are being published to intimidate any Democratic Senator who votes against any gun control and threatening them with the prospect of facing an anti-gun primary challenger — just like we saw on ObamaCare.
Fifth, there may be unholy alliances at work which could succeed in achieving a dangerous gun control compromise. One Capitol Hill newspaper is now reporting that "Sen. Joe Manchin and the National Rifle Association are quietly engaged in private talks on a proposal to broaden background checks on purchasers of firearms." We hope this is not true, however you should be aware of this report and use whatever contacts you have to prevent this from happening. Be assured, you can rely on Gun Owners of America to never engage in any compromises!
ACTION: The strategy remains: We need to defeat this bill by filibustering and voting down the "motion to proceed" to S. 649. Please contact your senators and distribute this alert far and wide.
Click here to send your Senators a prewritten email.
Show up at their offices with a delegation during the congressional recess. Rally and conduct demonstrations and call-a-thons and writing campaigns. Know that the anti-gun Left will be doing the same.
==============================================
Ten Reasons
Monday, 25 March 2013 15:39 Written by Michael E. Hammond
Ten Reasons Why Senators Should Vote Against the Gun Control Bribe-o-thon
-- And oppose the Motion to Proceed to S. 649
GOA opposes Harry Reid's gun control bill (S. 649)
You wouldn't jump into a cesspool because you were not absolutely sure what was in it.
Similarly, it would be insanity to vote to proceed to the gun control bribe-o-thon because you're not absolutely sure what will come out of it.
Unless Harry Reid wants to invoke a “special order” procedure which will be a disaster for him, he needs 60 votes to proceed to his gun control bill (S. 649) -- votes which Reid does not have if the GOP holds firm. If Republicans hold the line, in fact, Reid probably doesn't even have 50 votes.
And, for reasons which we can explain in a future memorandum, the “special order” procedure could cause horrific problems for Reid.
So with one vote, the GOP could kill all gun control. And, as for those “blue state” Republicans who are scared of the “gun issue,” here's a question: Why would you not want to limit your exposure to one vote which can be framed around opposition to the unpopular Feinstein amendment, rather than have Reid subject you to 20 votes on a variety of “gun issues” which he is crafting to make you easy to defeat?
In other words, if you can kill all gun control with one vote, why would you not want to do that?
Here are ten reasons why you should.
ONE: Feinstein's gun ban could be passed out of the Senate as an amendment to Reid's base bill (S. 649) with only 50 (that’s F-I-F-T-Y) votes. Here's how: Reid lays down Feinstein late in the process and files cloture on the bill. If (1) Republicans who were not willing to oppose the motion to proceed because Feinstein was not YET part of the bill similarly vote for cloture on the bill for the same reason, (2) Feinstein has FIFTY votes post-cloture, and (3) FIFTY senators vote that Feinstein is germane to the bill (increasingly, a "smell" test), then Feinstein clears the Senate.
TWO: White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough has said, "We're going to find the votes" for Feinstein. We know, from ObamaCare, what that means: They will use whatever threats, bribes, and coercion are necessary to get the FIFTY votes they need.
THREE: Even if it's not in the underlying package, universal gun registries will be subjected to the bribes, coercion, and tiny concessions necessary to get it added to the bill.
FOUR: Reid will control what amendments are offered or not offered. Anyone who votes to proceed because they think it will give them an opportunity to vote for THEIR proposal is an idiot. If you want to pass Boxer and Graham, GOA has no objection to McConnell standing up every hour and asking for unanimous consent that they be passed, unamended.
FIVE: We don't even have a finite list of amendments which could be offered. Amendments like Schumer's "watch list" proposal could allow Obama to take away guns from all NRA members by the stroke of a pen -- but would be hard to oppose.
SIX: The Veterans Gun Ban (S. 54), which will certainly be in the underlying bill, is horrible. It creates a 15-year prison sentence for negligent sales, negligent gifting, and negligent raffling of firearms. Given that 150,000 law-abiding veterans have had their gun rights taken away (without due process) -- and given that all marijuana smokers and medical marijuana smokers are prohibited persons whether or not on the NICS list -- you would sell, gift, or raffle a firearm only at your own risk. (Incidentally, the Veterans Gun Ban was reported out of Judiciary Committee with virtually unanimous Republican opposition.)
SEVEN: All of this comes at a time when Reid sits on legislation which would unify Republicans' base and hurt Democrats -- just as he demands that the GOP be complicit in bringing up an unopened package of amendments which Democrats' albeit-fraudulent polling suggests would destroy Republicans. Defeating a motion to proceed minimizes the utility of this strategy for Reid.
EIGHT: Conversely, even a losing vote on Feinstein, were it allowed to come up, would help secure Democrat control of the Senate in 2015 by allowing “red state” Democrats to say they were “pro-gun.” And Reid could get 50 votes, while allowing the most endangered of the “red state” Democrats to take a pass.
NINE: In addition, Sheldon Whitehouse has indicated that he intends to break out an as-yet-unseen floor-crafted “let's-make-a-deal” magazine ban. And we have no vote count on this indiscernible threat.
TEN: We all understand what this game is about. Rep. Nadler said it was important to “exploit” the Newtown tragedy. Democrat pundit Julian Epstein said the goal was to “break the back of the gun manufacturers' lobby.” Anti-gun MSNBC guest Hugo Lindstrom said gun control was a “long-term game” in which it was necessary to “get something passed” so that they could “put points on the board.” Former Gov. Ed Rendell said gun control advocates were “lucky” that Newtown was so horrific. The exercise is to exploit Newtown with gun control proposals which are irrelevant to Newtown -- all for the purpose of declaring a victory over Republicans.
If they succeed, four things will happen: (1) Their package will be nothing but a platform for the next set of gun control demands. (2) Saturation media will be encouraged by their “victory” and, as a result, more copycat shootings will occur and more children will die. (3) Democrats will have a vigorous new component of their “ground game” and the most significant remaining pillar of the GOP “ground game” will be demoralized. (4) Obama will have an aura of invincibility which will make it more difficult to stop the rest of his agenda.
For all these reasons, GOA encourages Senators to vote against the motion to proceed to S. 649. Gun Owners of America will be scoring this vote in its end-of-year rating.
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GM - the numbers they are supplying to Coburn do not match their order numbers. So, either they are lying, or doing some very creative accounting. I'm not seeing the order for 450 million rounds, or the order for 750 million rounds, which the DHS openly admits to. These tables are also useless because they do not specify what KIND of ammo they are purchasing. I see no orders here for the hollow point sniper rounds that they openly admit they purchased!
Also, even if the DHS used twice the amount of ammo for training that they claimed to use in the past (15-20 million rounds), they still have ordered enough ammo to last them 35-50 years. I'm sorry, but I don't see how you can overlook this.
Also, if the DHS has nothing to hide, why are they refusing to answer questions from Congress?
http://www.bizpacreview.com/2013/03/22/dhs-refuses-to-answer-congress-about-bullets-weapons-57042
And why are they trying to redact and hide ammo types and amounts on order forms:
https://www.fbo.gov/index?s=opportunity&mode=form&id=311eb3ee003671285de8db1036b2b255&tab=core&tabmode=list&=
Also, the ammo issue cannot be debated in a vacuum. What about the NDAA allowing the labeling of American citizens as enemy combatants? What about Obama's secret and unconstitutional assassination list? What about the militarization of law enforcement in general, including the issuance of APC's to local police? What about the legislation allowing 30,000 drones into U.S. skies? What do you have to say about all that in conjunction with the heavy arming of DHS?
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I see a lot of hype. Especially when I see the phrase "militarization of law enforcement". :roll:
I'd love to see Nappy drug in front of congress, but ammo buys by DHS are the least of my concerns.
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There's a lot of police looking a lot like soldiers to me , , , serving no-knock warrants in "the WAR on drugs" , , ,
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Anyway, though the following article advocates some things with which we here disagree, and misses a key one (the decline of crime accompanies an increase in legal guns) its central point is rather lucid nonetheless and can serve us well:
The Killing Chain
By DAVID BROOKS
Published: March 25, 2013 42 Comments
Let’s say you were writing a novel about a homicide. You’d want to describe the killer’s neighborhood and family background. You’d want to describe his school, his culture and his gang.
You’d want to describe how he got into crime, his prior arrests, his prison time, his drug use and his relationship with his probation officer. You’d want to describe how he got the murder weapon, what sort of police presence there was the night of the killing and what incited the murder.
In other words you’d want to describe a long killing chain, a complex series of links leading up to the ultimate homicide.
Over the last 25 years, American authorities have tried to interrupt that killing chain at almost every link except one. In a hodgepodge but organic manner, there have been vast changes in proactive policing, mentoring programs, gang eradication programs, incarceration rates, cultural attitudes and so on. The only step in the killing chain that we haven’t really touched is gun acquisition. Federal gun control laws have become more permissive over the last several years.
This de facto approach — influencing the whole killing chain except gun acquisition — has nonetheless contributed to a phenomenal decline in violence. Murder rates over all have fallen by about 50 percent, back to levels not seen since the Kennedy administration. There are thousands of people alive today because homicide rates dropped so precipitously.
Now we are in the middle of another debate about violence. If we lived in a purely rational society, this debate would have started with a series of questions: What explains the tremendous drop in violence? How can we build on recent efforts to bring the murder rate even lower? These general questions would have led to a series of more specific questions about police procedures, probably the most direct way to prevent shootings.
For example, as Heather Mac Donald of City Journal, published by the Manhattan Institute, points out, 75 percent of the shootings in Boston over the past 30 years have occurred in 4.5 percent of its area, while 88.5 percent of the city’s street segments had not had a single shooting. So how can we focus police resources on those few areas that host most of the killing?
Or as Robert Maranto of the University of Arkansas points out, in New York police chiefs and precinct leaders are held accountable for changes in the murder rate in their areas. New York has seen an 80 percent drop in the homicide rate. Why aren’t police officials held similarly accountable in many other cities?
But those questions are rarely asked. Instead, the national debate has focused on just one link in the killing chain, the acquisition of the gun.
Now I understand why the gun has taken center stage. The gun is the shocking fact at the moment of the murder. Also, many Americans are material determinists. In any moral question or frightening conflict, there are a lot of people who are uncomfortable with the human element and like to fixate on the material factor.
But the sad fact is that gun acquisition is probably the link on the killing chain least amenable to influence. We live in a country that already has something like 250 million guns floating around. It’s hard retroactively to get a grip on them.
Past efforts to control guns have not dramatically reduced violence. The Gun Control Act of 1968, the Brady Act of 1993 and the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 all failed to reduce homicides significantly. The Brady law, for example, led to a drop in suicides for those age 55 and older, but a 2000 study commissioned by the American Medical Association found that it did not lead to a reduction in the overall murder rate.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did an analysis of 51 studies of a series of gun control regulations. It could not find evidence to prove the effectiveness of gun control laws. A 2012 study conducted at Arizona State University and the University of Cincinnati found that waiting periods and background checks had little statistical effect on gun crimes.
Other studies have found more significant effects, but nothing like the impact we’ve seen from changing police procedures and other efforts up and down the killing chain.
If we could start the violence debate over, I’d begin with universal background checks. Acknowledge that on their own, these checks won’t accomplish much. (Drug dealers from Baltimore are not driving to West Virginia gun shows to acquire weaponry.) But use those checks as the first step in a series of policies to reinforce gun trafficking laws and reassert police control over the zones of concentrated violence.
We have a successful history of reducing violence by spreading efforts across the killing chain. We have a disappointing history of trying to reduce violence with a gun-obsessed approach. Let’s focus on what works.
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http://www.policeone.com/police-products/apparel/undergear/articles/99417-The-psychological-influence-of-the-police-uniform/
The police uniform is a tradition as old as the field of law enforcement itself In 1829 the first modem police force, the London Metropolitan Police, developed the first standard police apparel. These first police officers, the famous "Bobbies" of London, were issued a dark blue, paramilitary-style uniform.. The color blue was chosen to distinguish the police from the British military who wore red and white uniforms at the time. The first official police force in the United States was established in the city of New York in 1845. Based on the London police, the New York City Police Department adopted the dark blue uniform in 1853, Other cities, such as Philadelphia, Boston, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Detroit quickly followed suit by establishing police departments based on the London model, including the adoption of the dark blue, paramilitary-style uniform.
To this day, the majority of police uniforms in. the United States continue to have a paramilitary appearance and are generally of a dark color
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(http://www.policeny.com/bui/1930squad2CK%20(Custom).jpg)
Police in paramilitary uniforms with automatic weapons riding in an armored vehicle! :-o
http://www.policeone.com/police-products/apparel/undergear/articles/99417-The-psychological-influence-of-the-police-uniform/
The police uniform is a tradition as old as the field of law enforcement itself In 1829 the first modem police force, the London Metropolitan Police, developed the first standard police apparel. These first police officers, the famous "Bobbies" of London, were issued a dark blue, paramilitary-style uniform.. The color blue was chosen to distinguish the police from the British military who wore red and white uniforms at the time. The first official police force in the United States was established in the city of New York in 1845. Based on the London police, the New York City Police Department adopted the dark blue uniform in 1853, Other cities, such as Philadelphia, Boston, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Detroit quickly followed suit by establishing police departments based on the London model, including the adoption of the dark blue, paramilitary-style uniform.
To this day, the majority of police uniforms in. the United States continue to have a paramilitary appearance and are generally of a dark color
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http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cjs07.htm
SIR ROBERT PEEL'S INNOVATION
The history of modern law enforcement began 166 years ago with the formation of the London Metropolitan Police District in 1829. By creating a new police force, the British Parliament hoped to address the soaring crime rate in and around the nation's capital, attributed at the time to rapid urban growth, unchecked immigration, poverty, alcoholism, radical political groups, poor infrastructure, unsupervised juveniles, and lenient judges. The principles adopted by Sir Robert Peel, the first chief of the London Metropolitan Police, for his new "bobbies" have served as the traditional model for all British and American police forces ever since. These principles include the use of crime rates to determine the effectiveness of the police; the importance of a centrally located, publicly accessible police headquarters; and the value of proper recruitment, selection, and training.
However, perhaps the most enduring and influential innovation introduced was the establishment of regular patrol areas, known as "beats." Before 1829, the police--whether military or civilian--only responded after a crime had been reported. Patrols occurred on a sporadic basis, and any crime deterrence or apprehension of criminals in the act of committing crimes happened almost by accident.
Peel assigned his bobbies to specific geographic zones and held them responsible for preventing and suppressing crime within the boundaries of their zones. He based this strategy on his belief that the constables would:
* Become known to the public, and citizens with information about criminal activity would be more likely to tell a familiar figure than a stranger * Become familiar with people and places and thus better able to recognize suspicious persons or criminal activity, and * Be highly visible on their posts, tending to deter criminals from committing crimes in the immediate vicinity.
To implement fully the beat concept, Peel instituted his second most enduring innovation: The paramilitary command structure. While Peel believed overall civilian control to be essential, he also believed that only military discipline would ensure that constables actually walked their beats and enforced the law on London's mean streets, something their nonmilitary predecessors, the watchmen, had failed to do.
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If GM wants to keep his head in the sand regarding this situation, which as I mentioned before CANNOT BE VIEWED IN A VACUUM, that is his prerogative. Evidently I and several members of Congress are not the only ones concerned about what is going on with DHS. To view this as simply "hype" defies logic:
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/03/retired-army-officer-dhs-must-surrender-their-war-weapons-to-dept-of-defense/
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If GM wants to keep his head in the sand regarding this situation, which as I mentioned before CANNOT BE VIEWED IN A VACUUM, that is his prerogative. Evidently I and several members of Congress are not the only ones concerned about what is going on with DHS. To view this as simply "hype" defies logic:
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/03/retired-army-officer-dhs-must-surrender-their-war-weapons-to-dept-of-defense/
MRAPS are "weapons of war"? All 16 DHS has?
:roll:
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Weapons of war sighted on American city streets!
(http://www.dunbararmored.com/img/Dunbar-Armored-Truck.png)
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If you have better numbers, let me know. Off the top of my head, there are roughly 800,000 federal, state and local level law enforcement officers in the US. If I recall correctly, there are about 150 million gun owners in the US.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_law_enforcement_in_the_United_States
In 2004, federal agencies employed approximately 105,000 full-time personnel authorized to make arrests and carry firearms in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Compared with 2002, employment of such personnel increased by 13%.
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GM - I think I've made my points quite clearly in my previous posts, several of which you continue to refuse to address. Like I said - if you want to believe this is all 'hype,' that is your prerogative. I'll let readers of the forum decide for themselves after reviewing the numerous posts here, along with the links I've included. I am through arguing with you about this.
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a) that "weapon of war" is a private vehicle, not one being used as part of serving no-knock warrants by men in masks in the middle of the night
b) in so far as that cute old picture of the police from nearly 100 years ago goes, I would note that at the time submachine guns were legal for citizens too (rough parity between the unorganized militia and the state) and they aren't wearing masks.
c) the uniform is not the issue here, it is the weaponry and the anonymity
d) "“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve gotta (sic) have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded [as the United States military]”–Candidate Barack Obama, 2008"
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a) that "weapon of war" is a private vehicle, not one being used as part of serving no-knock warrants by men in masks in the middle of the night
Either something is a "weapon of war" or it isn't. An armored car isn't one, just as an AR-15 isn't either. The other side like to use inflammitory language to hide their lack of a compelling argument. We shouldn't do it either.No-knock warrants are lawful acts performed by law enforcement with the obvious approval of judges. The masks used are usually either protective maskes, either nomex and/or armor, and/or used by officers working in a U/C capacity to keep them viable in that tasking.
b) in so far as that cute old picture of the police from nearly 100 years ago goes, I would note that at the time submachine guns were legal for citizens too (rough parity between the unorganized militia and the state) and they aren't wearing masks.
The object of tactical teams is to rapidly gain the tactical advantage and resolve the situtation without firing a shot whenever possible. It's not a "fair fight", it's about preserving life whenever possible.
c) the uniform is not the issue here, it is the weaponry and the anonymity
Any anonymity is only temporary and discoverable in the legal process and through professional standards complaints and civil litigation. Why is the weaponry an issue? If an officer shoots someone with a Sharps Buffalo rifle used by a Deputy US Marshal in the 1880's, he'd probably be worse off than if he caught a single round from a modern AR variant.
d) "“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve gotta (sic) have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded [as the United States military]”–Candidate Barack Obama, 2008"
As much as it pains me to defend the worthless douche in question, let's look at the speech:
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/07/obamas_civilian_national_secur.html
July 20, 2008
Obama's Civilian National Security Force
By Lee Cary
Barack Obama's recent words to promote his image as Community Organizer in Chief were not about forming a paramilitary force of volunteer brown shirts. They were about turning America into one, giant, community organizer's sandbox at enormous cost to taxpayers.
Senator Obama was nearly 17 minutes into his July 2 speech (yet another one where naming Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was required) in Colorado Springs, Colorado when he deviated from his pre-released script and performed without the teleprompter net saying,
"We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded." (emphasis added)
The immediate context for that amazing statement was a preview of parts of his plan to vastly expand community service opportunities for Americans of nearly all ages. He said,
"People of all ages, stations, and skills will be asked to serve."
The range of his community service initiatives was outlined in an earlier American Thinker article. In his campaign document entitled "The Blueprint for Change: Barack Obama's Plan For America," Obama's "Service" section runs a close second to "Education" in complexity. But, with his Colorado Springs' statement, it grabbed first place in its projected costs to taxpayers. Obama did the cost projection himself.
He plans to double the Peace Corps' budget by 2011, and expand AmeriCorps, USA Freedom Corps, VISTA, YouthBuild Program, and the Senior Corps. Plus, he proposes to form a Classroom Corps, Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, Veterans Corps, Homeland Security Corps, Global Energy Corps, and a Green Jobs Corps. Here a corps - there a corps - everywhere a corps corps.
So it made sense in Colorado Springs when he said his call to community service "will be a central cause of my presidency." He couldn't be clearer in signaling his intentions, including a Social Investment Fund Network to link local non-profits with the federal government.
The entire plan is breathtaking in its scope. But it does not, as at least one internet writer has suggested, portend a "giant police force." It would be easier to rebut if it did. As it is, it's silly stuff born of naively fanciful dreams.
Senator Obama aims to tap into the already active volunteerism of millions of Americans and recruit them to become cogs in a gigantic government machine grinding out his social re-engineering agenda. It's Orwellian-like, with a novice social activist's mentality at the helm. In his speech he said,
"Now I know what the cynics will say. I've heard from them all my life."
Has he? Well, given his absence of noteworthy community organizational achievements, perhaps he might have done more listening to the "cynics" for constructive criticism.
It seems clear that he meant to say, in effect, that the security of the nation is as dependent on its unarmed community service providers as it is on its armed military personnel. Even the nomenclature "corps," as in Peace Corps, carries a martial connotation as does the name, Salvation Army. His point: national security begins with civilians. It's a message like the one America's home front heard throughout World War II. Except in his case, he means to marshal volunteers for social service and economic equality while saving the environment.
"Because the future of our nation depends on the soldier at Fort Carson, but is also depends on the teacher in East LA, the nurse in Appalachia, the after-school worker in New Orleans..."
That is, of course, true. But ultimate national security requires someone to carry, and, if necessary, discharge a deadly weapon with intent to kill. This is something teachers, nurses and after-school workers are typically unaccustomed to doing as part of their service obligations.
Voters haven't paid much attention to his "Service" plan because the old news media has ignored it. That will likely continue, even though Obama attached an approximate price tag to it in Colorado Springs. When Obama said that the "civilian national security force" would be just as "well-funded" as the Armed Forces, he stepped squarely into the giant sandbox and played with the big numbers. As the late Carl Sagan said, "billions and billions" of dollars. Here's how.
The FY 2008 Department of Defense (DoD) budget is about $482 billion. Obama has announced his intentions to cut "tens of billions of dollars in wasteful spending," including $9 billion per month spent in Iraq and expenditures for the missile defense system, while increasing the force size of the Army and Marine Corps.
Let's imagine "tens of billions" in cuts eventually adds up to a whopping $150 billion. That would be a near one-third cut in defense spending, taking the DoD budget down to $332 billion. Even in such an extreme case of DoD budget reduction, for his "civilian national security force" to be "just as well-funded" would mean funding his community service initiatives at an equivalent $332 billion.
Consequently, another $332 billion in addition to the Pentagon's reduced budget of $332 billion equals a net increase of $182 billion in the annual federal budget, assuming we sponge-up the already existing expenditures for the relatively meager, by comparison, existing service programs he plans to expand. That's $182,000,000,000 in new federal monies, and that means higher taxes.
In his entire life, Senator Obama has never managed an organization larger than a Senate staff, or that of a law school publication. And, he's never operated a for-profit business or been responsible for any profit center within one. So, while words matter to Senator Obama, it's not clear if math means anything to him at all.
Note: the author has experience in community organizing. For example, he organized one of the earliest Meals-on-Wheels programs in Illinois, in continuous service for over 30 years. He trained over a hundred Illinois non-profit organizations to resettle Vietnamese Refugees. He assembled three dozen congregations and a synagogue in a mid-sized Texas town to provide emergency assistance to low-income citizens, in continuous operation for 25 years. He was an expert witness at a Texas Senate hearing when legislation forming the state's Commission on Human Rights was being drafted.
on "Obama's Civilian National Security Force"
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"d) "“We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we’ve set. We’ve gotta (sic) have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded [as the United States military]”–Candidate Barack Obama, 2008"
"A civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded as the United States military" - it turns out the President-to-be was mocking the constitutional phrase 'well regulated militias'. He was actually proposing to expand the government workforce or, worse yet, make government service mandatory for young people. Unarmed but "just as powerful, just as strong" is an example of why people here came up with the phrase "cognitive dissonance - glibness'. Meanwhile he is disarming our military and canceling missile defense sites.
Tough words like unarmed civilians did not scare off the Benghazi attackers, just like gun free zone signs don't scare off criminals.
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Chicago leads the nation with lowest rate of prosecution for federal gun crimes. ?
http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2013/03/28/chicago-los-angeles-new-york-prosecuted-fewest-federal-gun-crimes
Good news I suppose that the strict local laws have chased away gun violence. ? Tell that to the victims:
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/02/15/chicagos-murder-epidemic-complicates-obama-gun-ban-pitch/
If only we had more laws - to further restrict the rights of the law-abiding.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=f1ULcGyCGTo
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/03/30/naked-homeowner-holds-burglar-at-gunpoint-until-police-arrive/
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http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/03/download-this-gun-3d-printed-semi-automatic-fires-over-600-rounds/
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http://www.guns.com/2013/03/28/fpsrussia-home-raided-by-atf/
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-12/california-seizes-guns-as-owners-lose-right-to-bear-arms.html
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http://capwiz.com/gunowners/issues/alert/?alertid=62562581
You will need to change the zip code from mine to yours.
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http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2013/04/03/co_democrat_doesnt_understand_high-capacity_magazines_can_be_reloaded.html
Epic stupid!
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Here she is in action again:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=WypFNHOl5_Q
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Good piece of propaganda for our side. Hat Tip to Growling Dog
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=B5ELyG9V1SY
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A good study of debating tactics and techniques
http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/03/29/dana-loesch-schools-piers-morgan-van-jones-on-gun-control/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-03-29_209829&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_209829_209837
ACLU with us?!?
http://gunssavelives.net/blog/gun-laws/unlikely-allies-aclu-speaks-out-against-new-universal-background-check-bill/
GOA getting strong enough that even POTH must take notice:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/04/us/politics/gun-owners-of-america-a-lobbying-group-grows-in-influence.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130404&_r=0
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http://offgridsurvival.com/missouridepartmentofrevenue-dhs-gunowners/
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Pro-Gun Laws Gain Ground
Since Newtown Massacre, More States Ease Regulations Than Bolster Them.
By JACK NICAS and JOE PALAZZOLO
President Barack Obama made another push Wednesday to build support for gun-control laws in the wake of December's mass school shooting in Connecticut. But since then, states have passed more measures expanding rather than restricting the right to carry firearms.
Arkansas eliminated prohibitions on carrying firearms in churches and on college campuses. South Dakota authorized school boards to arm teachers. Tennessee passed a law allowing workers to bring guns to work and store them in their vehicles, even if their employer objects. Kentucky shortened the process for obtaining licenses to carry a concealed gun.
Those laws, along with the long odds for major federal gun-control legislation, show how the march toward expanded gun rights in recent years has hardly slowed since Mr. Obama pledged to use the "full force" of his office to tighten limits after 20 children and six adult staffers were killed at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn.
This year, five states have passed seven laws that strengthen gun restrictions, while 10 states have passed 17 laws that weaken them, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, which tracks and promotes gun-control laws.
Gun-control advocates have scored some victories. In New York and Colorado, which was the site of a movie-theater shooting last July that left 12 dead, new laws require background checks for all firearm sales and limit the size of ammunition magazines. Early Thursday, Connecticut lawmakers approved legislation to expand the state's ban on certain semiautomatic weapons and require background checks for all firearm sales, among other restrictions. Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy, a Democrat, has said he would sign such a measure.
Kristin Goss, a Duke University professor of public policy who supports gun-control legislation, said these measures are more sweeping than the gun-rights expansions in other states, which she called "technical and incremental."
Still, gun-control bills have faltered in Congress and other states, while pro-gun-rights bills move along elsewhere. On Tuesday, an Indiana House committee passed a bill that would require an armed staffer in every school.
The pattern shows the power of the gun lobby in state legislatures, particularly compared with gun-control groups, which have typically focused on federal legislation. The National Rifle Association and other gun-advocacy groups spent $2.3 million on state legislative battles from 2007 through 2012, compared with $55,000 by gun-control groups over the period, according to the Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan government-watchdog group.
President Obama spoke about gun control at the Denver Police Academy Wednesday, saying "there doesn’t have to be a conflict between protecting our citizens and protecting our Second Amendment rights."
NRA spokeswoman Alexa Fritts said the group has been more concerned this year with blocking new restrictions than expanding gun rights. "Right now it's more of a defensive stance," she said.
The efforts have proved largely successful, advocates on both sides say, in part thanks to a conviction in much of the U.S. that access to firearms offers the best protection against crime and serves as a check on government. In Hartford, Conn., Wednesday, gun owners flocked to the capital and booed pro-gun-control lawmakers as they passed through the halls ahead of the vote on the state's firearms restrictions.
Backers of many of the bills since Newtown say arming school staff could prevent another similar tragedy. Gun opponents disagree, and a report released Wednesday by the liberal Center for American Progress said it found "a clear link between high levels of gun violence and weak state gun laws." However, economist John Lott, author of "More Guns, Less Crime," has concluded that state laws allowing people to carry concealed weapons have reduced violent crime. The National Research Council, part of the congressionally chartered National Academies, has disputed his findings.
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In Congress, the Senate is expected to soon consider legislation that would require background checks for all gun sales, but it faces resistance from most Republicans, who generally oppose gun restrictions, and some Democrats. It also lacks two measures championed by Mr. Obama: a renewed ban on certain semiautomatic weapons known as assault rifles, and new limits on high-capacity ammunition magazines. If the bill passes the Senate, it faces an even tougher vote in the Republican-controlled House.
Wednesday in Denver, Mr. Obama urged action, noting that more than 2,000 Americans had been killed by gun violence since the Newtown shooting. "Every day we wait to do something about it, even more are stolen from our lives by a bullet from a gun," according to the president's prepared remarks.
State lawmakers on both sides of the gun debate have each introduced more than 500 gun-related bills this year. But gun-control legislation has reached governors' desks in seven states, while legislation expanding gun rights has made it that far in 15, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. The center's tallies don't include legislation addressing penalties for gun crimes or exceptions in gun laws for law enforcement, among other areas.
Among the bills awaiting governors' signatures are a North Dakota measure that would eliminate prohibitions on carrying concealed weapons in churches and a Montana bill that would allow residents to carry a concealed gun without a permit. A spokeswoman for Montana Gov. Steve Bullock, a Democrat, said he was reviewing the bill. The office of North Dakota Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple said he would review the bill when he receives it.
Also helping the pro-gun-rights cause is that Republicans control 30 governorships and have full control of most state legislatures, easing the path for gun-rights measures. Of the 15 legislatures that have passed pro-gun-rights bills on to the governor, 13 are controlled by Republicans.
Democrat-controlled legislatures have failed to pass gun limits in some states, like Washington and New Mexico, and have had to weaken gun-control bills in others, including Minnesota. The Washington bill, to require universal background checks, failed last month despite Democrats' 55-to-43 advantage in the House and residents' 79% approval for the bill, according to a state poll.
Meanwhile, pro-gun bills have been defeated in Republican-controlled statehouses, including in Georgia and Utah, where Republican Gov. Gary Herbert last month vetoed legislation that would have allowed residents to carry a concealed gun without a permit. Utah also has enacted two laws that expand gun rights and two that restrict them.
Mark Glaze, director of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, the advocacy group co-founded by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, said the post-Newtown push for gun control is "promising but far from complete." He added, "Progress will come steadily but slowly, in a patchwork way."
Dave Workman, spokesman for the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, a lobbying group, said in the four months since the Newtown shooting, "gun-rights activists have been holding their own," and now he expects public sentiment to shift away from gun control because "the knees have stopped jerking."
That shift in sentiment may be happening. A CBS News poll taken in late March showed 47% of Americans supported stricter gun-control laws, down from a peak of 57% just after December's Newtown shooting.
Gun-control advocates are now largely focusing on seven states where they say there is still chance for significant gun-control legislation: California, Oregon, Delaware, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Maryland and Illinois.
California lawmakers will consider more than a dozen gun-control bills this month, including one that would ban rifles with detachable magazines and another that would require ammunition sellers to obtain permits and buyers to register.
Washington state Rep. Jamie Pedersen, a Democrat, said he would introduce his bill on background checks again next session, but its success depends on whether gun-control advocates can match the political fervor of their gun-rights counterparts.
"Did Newtown change the world in how people are going to engage on this issue?" he said. "Or is it one of those flashes in the pan, where after a few months Americans' attention will fade and turn to another issue?"
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second post
Government and Politics
Second Amendment: Bills and Treaties
"It shall be unlawful for any person who lawfully possesses or owns a firearm that has been shipped or transported in, or has been possessed in or affecting, interstate or foreign commerce, to fail to report the theft or loss of the firearm, within 24 hours after the person discovers the theft or loss, to the Attorney General and to the appropriate local authorities." So reads Section 123 of the Senate's gun control bill (S. 649). In plain English, that means anyone who fails to report a missing firearm to the local police and the U.S. attorney general within 24 hours becomes a felon and faces five years in prison. This is an outrageous and unreasonable requirement, and should doom the bill to failure. And that's not to mention other provisions such as prohibiting leaving your firearm at home for more than seven days with someone who isn't the owner.
Meanwhile, Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) is pushing the Firearm Risk Protection Act, which would require that gun owners purchase liability insurance or pay a $10,000 fine. "For too long, gun victims and society at large have borne the brunt of the costs of gun violence," Maloney said in a written statement. "My bill would change that by shifting some of that cost back onto those who own the weapons." We're going out on a limb by guessing that criminals won't be deterred by such a requirement, but fortunately the bill is unlikely to go anywhere.
In the states, the Constitution State became the latest one to trample its namesake document. Democrat Gov. Dannel Malloy signed legislation adding more than 100 firearms to its ban on semiautomatic rifles. It also bans standard-capacity magazines holding more than 10 rounds and creates eligibility rules for purchasing ammunition.
The good news, reports The Wall Street Journal, is that since December "states have passed more measures expanding rather than restricting the right to carry firearms."
Finally, the UN passed its Arms Trade Treaty with U.S. support. The Obama administration waited until it had post-election "flexibility" to announce that it would no longer demand passage by "consensus," which helped propel the treaty through. The treaty could subject, at least in part, U.S. sovereignty and Second Amendment rights to a corrupt world body full of anti-American despots and tyrants. The only good news is that the treaty has almost no chance of passing the Senate, where it needs a two-thirds majority for ratification but could fail to garner even a majority.
Today's BIG Lie Award Winner
"[Colorado] treasures its Second Amendment rights -- a state of proud hunters and sportsmen. ... Surely we can have a debate ... to do something to stop the epidemic of gun violence. There's no reason we can't do this unless politics is getting in the way." --Barack Obama, repeating his mendacious mantra that the Second Amendment is about "hunters and sportsmen"
Besides, the epidemic is not "gun violence" but "violence" -- almost all of it is the direct result of socialist polices creating urban poverty plantations where gangs thrive. Oddly, Democrats have yet to campaign against gang violence. The only "politics getting in the way" is Obama's political agenda, which has nothing to do with reducing violence and everything to do with reducing the capacity of the people to defend Liberty.
"The opponents of some of these common-sense laws have ginned up fears among responsible gun owners that have nothing to do with what's being proposed, nothing to do with the facts, but feeds [sic] into this suspicion about government. You hear some of these quotes: 'I need a gun to protect myself from the government.' 'We can't do background checks because the government's gonna come take my guns away.' The government's us. These officials are elected by you. They are elected by you, I am elected by you. I am constrained as they are constrained by a system that our founders put in place. This is a government of and by and for the people." --Obama
For the record, if Obama was truly "constrained by a system that our founders put in place," we would not be having this debate.
"t is possible for us to create common-sense gun safety measures that respect the traditions of gun ownership in this country and hunters and sportsmen, but also make sure that we don't have another 20 children in a classroom gunned down by a semiautomatic weapon -- by a fully automatic weapon in that case, sadly." --Obama, continuing to deliberately confuse the issue of semi-auto and fully automatic weapons
Furthermore, Obama often makes his pitches not just on the caskets of children, but backed by uniformed police officers -- as if these police departments support his anti-constitutional agenda. By now, we know that nothing is beneath this president, including the shameless use of children, the military and law enforcement officers as "human shields" for furthering his agenda. It's inexcusable, and we're glad to see some of Denver's finest balking at the practice.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DconsfGsXyA
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BREAKING: KS Gov Sam Brownback signs HB 21 – Recognizes All States’ Concealed Carry Permits
Added Apr 5, 2013, Under: News & Articles
Way to go Kansas! Their reciprocity will be the best in the nation!
SB 21 authorizes official recognition of any valid concealed carry permit from another state for individuals traveling through or visiting Kansas.
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The GOP's Gun Control Misfire
The filibuster threat is giving political cover to Senate Democrats..
'This is about these families and families all across the country who are saying, 'Let's make it a little harder for our kids to get gunned down,'" President Obama declared Monday, in unusually demagogic remarks even by his standards. He added, "What's more important to you: our children, or an A-grade from the gun lobby?"
Mr. Obama is lapsing into such crude appeals—support his gun-control agenda or suborn mass child murder—because he knows his real problems aren't the gun lobby. They're members of his own party who answer to law-abiding voters who support Second Amendment rights. So the political wonder is that some Republicans and conservative activists seem determined to convert the gun debate (such as it is) that Mr. Obama is losing into a 2014 Democratic advantage.
After Newtown, Mr. Obama endorsed such symbolic and constitutionally doubtful measures as magazine-capacity limits and reinstating the 1990s-era federal ban on certain "assault weapons." None of this would prevent the next massacre or even reduce gun violence—and the overreach means his ambitions may not pass even in the Democratic Senate.
California's Dianne Feinstein barely got the rifle ban out of committee, and then Majority Leader Harry Reid refused to include it and other White House provisions in the gun bill he had to be dragooned into backing. Mr. Reid still hasn't released the policy details about enhanced background checks for private gun sales, which is one of the few items that might cobble together a majority.
Enter a faction of Republicans led by Mike Lee of Utah and Ted Cruz of Texas, who late last month said they'll use the filibuster to prevent the Reid bill from coming to the floor. On Tuesday Minority Leader Mitch McConnell endorsed the gambit, and the Heritage Action for America PAC says it plans to "score" the filibuster as a key vote for election purposes.
In an instant, these GOP wizards have taken the onus off Senate Democrats and made Republicans the media's gun-control focus. Mr. Reid is now bellowing about Republicans blocking a vote, and Democrats such as Mark Pryor (Arkansas), Mary Landrieu (Louisiana) and Mark Begich (Alaska) don't have to declare themselves on provisions that might be unpopular at home.
Meanwhile, Mr. Obama can retreat to his favorite pose of portraying Republicans as obstructionists, which pressures GOP moderates like Maine Senator Susan Collins. "And yet, some folks back in Washington are already floating the idea that they may use political stunts to prevent votes on any of these reforms," Mr. Obama said on Monday—without mentioning that the "folks" who oppose his bill are Democrats.
The President's calculation seems to be that even if gun control fails, at least he'll have a keep-kids-safe political issue to help flip the House back to Democratic control in the next midterm. In that sense his inflammatory rhetoric is meant to bait Republicans, some of whom are biting.
If conservatives want to prove their gun-control bona fides, the way to do it is to debate the merits and vote on the floor. They can always filibuster the final bill if they want to, but it makes no sense to paint themselves into a political box canyon before even knowing what they're voting on.
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:x :x :x
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/09/a-form-of-gun-confiscation-has-reportedly-begun-in-new-york-state-heres-the-justification-being-used/
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:x :x :x
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/09/a-form-of-gun-confiscation-has-reportedly-begun-in-new-york-state-heres-the-justification-being-used/
Just wait until the national Obarkycare database can be datamined.
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Survey suggests law enforcement united against gun control
1:35 AM 04/10/2013
Spencer Amaral
A new online survey suggests that the vast majority of active and former police officers adamantly oppose President Barack Obama’s proposed bans on so-called “assault weapons” and high-capacity magazines.
The study, conducted by first-responder community website PoliceOne.com, included more than 15,000 self-identified active and retired law enforcement officers, with 99 percent of respondents saying that policies other than an assault-weapons ban are most important in preventing future mass shootings.
“The American people, and particularly the members of law enforcement, want politicians in Washington to stop pursuing a failed political agenda and get to work fixing our broken mental health system, improving school security, and getting criminals off the streets,” said the executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action, Chris Cox.
Here are the rest of the survey’s results:
•99 percent said policies other than an “assault weapons” ban are most important to prevent mass shootings.
•Almost 96 percent said that a ban on standard capacity magazines would not reduce violent crime.
•More than 91 percent stated that the use of a firearm in the commission of a crime should have stiff, mandatory sentences, and no plea-bargains.
•More than 91 percent stated they supported the Right-to-Carry by law abiding Americans.
•More than 81 percent said that “gun buy-backs” do not reduce gun violence.
•80 percent believe legally armed citizens can reduce casualties in incidents of mass violence.
•Nearly 80 percent said that a ban on private transfers of firearms between law-abiding citizens would not reduce violent crime.
•More than 76 percent indicated that legally armed citizens are important to reducing crime.
•More than 76 percent support the arming of trained and qualified teachers or administrators who volunteer to carry a firearm.
•More than 70 percent said that a ban on “assault weapons” would not reduce violent crime.
•More than 70 percent opposed the idea of a national registry of legal gun sales.
•Nearly 68 percent said magazine capacity restrictions would negatively affect them personally.
•More than 60 percent said that the passage of Obama’s gun control legislation would not improve officer safety.
The full survey can be found here. PoliceOne verifies that members are police officers by requiring them to submit a photograph or scanned copy of government-issued law enforcement identification. It is unclear whether only verified members could participate in the survey.
The online survey is not necessarily statistically indicative of the attitudes of law enforcement nationally.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/04/10/survey-shows-law-enforcement-united-against-gun-control/
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www.gunowners.org
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Obj:
What do you make of the WSJ editorial I posted earlier today?
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By KRISTINA PETERSON
WASHINGTON—Senate lawmakers were expected to vote Thursday on whether to bring a gun bill to the floor of the chamber, following a bipartisan deal reached a day earlier to expand background checks for firearms sales.
Wednesday's agreement bolstered support for one of President Barack Obama's top priorities following December's Newtown, Conn., school shooting, though the Senate could debate gun control through the end of April.
The deal, crafted by Sens. Joe Manchin (D., W.Va.) and Pat Toomey (R., Pa.) and backed by Sens. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.) and Mark Kirk (R., Ill.), would require background checks—and paper records of the checks—for sales at gun shows and over the Internet. The bipartisan agreement considerably boosts the chances of the Senate passing an expansion of background checks.
Still, immediate resistance from the National Rifle Association, the country's largest gun lobby, could make it difficult for some red-state Democrats and Republicans to embrace the deal. Democrats are optimistic most in their party will support the measure and think Mr. Toomey's support could bring on as many as a dozen Republicans, a Senate Democratic aide said.
Any measures that pass the Senate likely will face tougher resistance in the GOP-controlled House.
Messrs. Manchin and Toomey, both gun owners who carry "A" ratings from the NRA, cast their deal as a common-sense measure that wouldn't infringe on constitutional rights to own a gun.
"I don't consider criminal background checks to be gun control," Mr. Toomey said at a news conference with Mr. Manchin on Wednesday. "If you pass a criminal-background check, you get to buy a gun."
The deal announced Wednesday came together after a week of negotiations between Messrs. Manchin and Toomey, and after Mr. Manchin had spent months trying to reach an agreement with Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.). The NRA had pressured Mr. Toomey to not become involved in the deal, according to a Senate aide.
Mr. Manchin said the background-check agreement will be the first amendment offered to the main Senate gun bill. That measure includes provisions to improve school security and strengthen penalties for people buying guns for others who aren't authorized to purchase them. It also includes an expansion of background checks that is broader than the Manchin-Toomey deal, reducing its support among some Democrats and Republicans. (MARC: I'm guessing this would be the terrible Schumer provisions; if a bait-and-switch is pulled here it would be a REALLY bad thing)
The agreement would broaden background checks beyond what is required under current federal law, but it dialed back Democrats' initial hopes of establishing "universal" background checks.
Under the deal, all buyers would have to undergo a background check conducted by a federally licensed dealer when purchasing firearms online or at a gun show. The lawmakers agreed to exempt gun sales or transfers between family members, friends and neighbors. Licensed dealers are already required to conduct background checks and keep paper records of sales.
"If you're going to a gun show, you should be subjected to the same [checks] as if you went to a gun store," Mr. Manchin told reporters.
The NRA and other gun groups say the paper record could eventually lead to government confiscation of weapons. To address those concerns, the measure states that the federal government can't create a national registry of gun owners.
The NRA criticized the deal in a statement Wednesday. Referring to three mass shootings in recent years, the group said "no background check would have prevented the tragedies in Newtown, Aurora or Tucson." It called for efforts to address gun crimes in cities and to improve mental-health care.
Messrs. Manchin and Toomey appeared ready to split with the NRA, at least for one vote.
"My wife called me the other night, and she disagreed with something and I still love her," Mr. Manchin, a lifetime NRA member, said in an interview.
Some Republicans, including Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, said Wednesday they planned to review the new deal.
"They have made terrific progress in responding to a lot of the concerns that I personally had," said Sen. Susan Collins (R., Maine), who said she wanted to review the final language before deciding whether to support the measure.
A few Democrats also are undecided. Sens. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Mark Begich of Alaska—all from Republican-leaning states and all facing re-election next year—indicated this week they were closely following developments on background checks but hadn't yet decided whether to support a deal.
"I haven't seen the bill," Mr. Begich said Wednesday evening.
Nathan Gonzales, deputy editor of the nonpartisan Rothenberg Political Report, said the NRA's biggest influence in the congressional gun debate may have been in forcing Democrats to recalibrate which measures stood any chance of becoming law.
Among the measures unlikely to pass the Senate are a proposed ban on certain semiautomatic rifles known as assault weapons and limiting the size of magazines to no more than 10 rounds of ammunition. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) opted to exclude the most contentious measures from the main Senate gun bill but has said they would all receive votes as amendments.
Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) told reporters Wednesday the House would wait to review any gun-control bills until they clear the Senate.
At least one House Republican, Rep. Pat Meehan of Pennsylvania, said Wednesday he would support the background-check deal.
"This would create a consistent system throughout while protecting the rights of gun owners," Mr. Meehan said in an interview.
Under the deal, a buyer may purchase a firearm if a background check doesn't produce a "definitive response" from the national-records database within 48 hours, down from three business days under current law.
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Hat tip to Michael Lynch:
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If I am reading this correctly, there were 62 prosecutions with 13 convictions out of 153,000 illegal applications for guns.
https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/bjs/grants/239272.pdf
Question presented, for what do we need more background checks?
Also see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNgcBTAMm4M
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/14/us/politics/us-may-focus-more-on-gun-background-checks.html?hp&_r=1&
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/lindsey-grahams-claim-that-no-fugitives-have-been-prosecuted-after-gun-background-checks/2013/04/03/5d20c1fa-9ca9-11e2-a941-a19bce7af755_blog.html
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Crafty,
What I make of this is as follows: Quoting the author: "In an instant, these GOP wizards have taken the onus off Senate Democrats and made the Republicans the media's gun-control focus." Excuse me? Since WHEN has the media EVER made Democrats the villains in the gun-control debate? This legislation needs to be nipped in the bud, and the Republican ball-less wonders who are so afraid of the media need to grow a set, and make the case - forcefully and clearly - WHY this is a bad idea - which they have so far failed miserably to do.
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Thank you.
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http://pjmedia.com/blog/obamas-lying-problem-about-firearms/?singlepage=true
Almost from the moment he walked into the Oval Office, Barack Obama has had a serious lying problem when it comes to firearms.
The 44th president has a near pathological predilection for using defective, invalid, and flat-out dishonest statistics in his quest to restrict the 2nd Amendment rights of American citizens, a fact first pointed out here at PJ Media in the summer of 2009.
At that time, the president, then-Secretary of State of State Hillary Clinton, and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder were heavily invested in promoting the deceptive theory that the supermajority of firearms being used by Mexican drug cartels were being purchased at gun stores in the United States and shipped over the border. The facts, however, didn’t come close to supporting the administration’s preposterous claim.
The automatic weapons being used by cartel gunmen and recovered at crime scenes — selective-fire AK-pattern assault rifles, M16 and M4 selective-fire assault rifles, hand grenades, 40mm grenade launchers, and more than a few heavy machine guns — are heavily regulated in the United States, and have been since the National Firearms Act was passed in 1934.
Purchasing such firearms requires extensive and in-depth background checks, registration, finger-printing, a $200 tax stamp, and other onerous regulations. This has kept the number of these so-called “NFA” weapons to just roughly 250,000 in the United States. The Hughes Amendment tacked on to a federal bill in the mid 1980s means that no new NFA selective-fire weapons or machine guns have been released to the qualified general public for 27 years. The result is that these firearms are now cost-prohibitive collectors’ items, costing tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. The president was attempting to sell the absurd claim that a civilian M16 worth $20,000 was being used once and discarded, when the firearms recovered were those stolen or sold by corrupt Mexican officials to the cartels, along with AK-47 and AKM assault rifles that can be picked up around the world for as low as $25 and moved in the same smuggling routes used by the cartels to move their drugs.
The 90-percent lie was gutted by officials of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) in sworn testimony before Congress.
The myth that legal guns sales in the United States are responsible for Mexican drug cartel violence took another serious blow last week when an ATF official testified in Congress that only eight percent of weapons recovered in Mexico came through licensed U.S. gun dealers.
This figure is far lower than the 90 percent claim made previously as an appeal to reinstate ineffective gun laws that expired in 2004. The claim — still active among the less informed or serially dishonest — officially became myth during congressional testimony last week when Bill McMahon, deputy assistant director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, revealed the eight percent figure, how it was calculated, and where the 90 percent myth arose from.
Of the 100,000 weapons recovered by Mexican authorities, only 18,000 were determined to have been manufactured, sold, or imported from the United States, and of those 18,000, just 7,900 came from sales by licensed gun dealers.
Despite being called out on these lies, both the administration and the mainstream media continued to propagate the 90-percent lie, apparently attempting to embed the false statistics in the public consciousness. It was only later that we discovered that this lie was being sold by the Obama administration at the same time as Operation Fast and Furious was smuggling more than 2,500 firearms to drug cartels.
The same Obama administration dynamic that created the 90-percent lie is repeating in what is easily titled the “40-percent lie,” a false claim made by the president that 40 percent of the gun transfers in the nation are conducted without a background check. The president and many members of the mainstream media have uncritically repeated this claim to bolster support for the Senate’s attempt to pass a law for universal background checks that the National Rifle Association views as a gun-registration scheme.
The problem is that claim isn’t supported by facts, as even the Washington Post was forced to admit:
There are two key problems with the president’s use of this statistic: The numbers are about two decades old, yet he acts as if they are fresh, and he refers to “purchases” or “sales” when in fact the original report concerned “gun acquisitions” and “transactions.” Those are much broader categories of data.
As we noted before, the White House said the figure comes from a 1997 Institute of Justice report, written by Philip Cook of Duke University and Jens Ludwig of the University of Chicago.
This study was based on data collected from a survey in 1994, the same year that the Brady Act requirements for background checks came into effect. In fact, the questions concerned purchases in 1993 and 1994, and the Brady Act went into effect in early 1994 — meaning that some, if not many, of the guns were bought in a pre-Brady environment.
Digging deeper, we found that the survey sample was just 251 people. (The survey was done by telephone, using a random-digit-dial method, with a response rate of 50 percent.) With this sample size, the 95 percent confidence interval will be plus or minus six percentage points.
…
The Police Foundation report did not break out gun purchases, so in January we asked Ludwig to rerun the data, just looking at guns purchased in the secondary market. The result, depending on the definition, was 14 percent to 22 percent. That’s at least half the percentage repeatedly cited by Obama. (In a recent article for National Review, Cook and Ludwig wrote “we don’t know the current percentage — nor does anyone else.” But they say if the percentage is lower it actually strengthens the case for expanding background checks because it would be less expensive to implement.) Since our initial report on this statistic appeared, The Washington Post in February included a question on background checks on a survey of Maryland residents, asking whether they went through a background check during a gun purchase in the past 10 years. The result? Twenty-one percent say they did not.
Coincidentally or not, 21 percent falls within the 14-to-22 percent range for gun purchases without background checks in the 1994 survey.
Obama is making his claim using a statistically insignificant sample size, with data nearly 20 years old, collected under a different set of laws than those we’ve been operating under since Brady made NICS background checks the law of the land. It is irrelevant, invalid data, intentionally misrepresented as being current and relevant.
In short, the president has been caught in yet another lie attempting to support controversial firearms legislation that he would like to see passed. Barack Obama demanded a “national conversation” about gun control.
Then he filled it with lies.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVJ_lA7Q6Xw
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High Noon Over Guns
Posted By Arnold Ahlert On April 12, 2013 - www.frontpagemag.com
Yesterday, the Senate voted 68-31 to begin debate on a gun control package that will initially focus on three issues: expanded background checks for the purchase of firearms, harsher penalties for gun trafficking, and increased aid for school safety. ”The hard work starts now,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) after the vote.
The vote was a defeat for the 29 Republicans and two Democrats who were intent on filibustering the bill, arguing that the restrictions would would constitute a violation of the Second Amendment. ”This bill is a clear overreach that will predominantly punish and harass our neighbors, friends, and family,” said Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) prior to the vote. Despite their defeat, gun control opponents were threatening to invoke a procedural rule that would force the Senate to wait 30 hours before beginning any consideration of amendments.
Whenever the debate actually begins, it is likely that the first amendment to be considered is the agreement reached Wednesday by Senators Joe Manchin (D-WVA) and Pat Toomey (R-PA), scaling back the call for universal background checks contained in the current bill. The universal background checks were authored by Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY). Sen. Reid expects to replace Schumer’s efforts with the compromise.
Yet that tradeoff reveals part of the problem with the process, in that the bill the Senate is debating will be changing substantially as time goes on — so much so, that many senators opposing yesterday’s vote contended that what they are actually voting on remains a mystery. They further noted that while the Manchin-Toomey deal represents a compromise, it is Schumer’s stricter provision that remains part of the bill. ”Because the background-check measure is the centerpiece of this legislation it is critical that we know what is in the bill before we vote on it,” Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY) Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Mike Lee (R-UT), said in a statement. “The American people expect more and deserve better.”
Currently, background checks are limited to transactions conducted by the nation’s 55,000 licensed gun dealers. Gun control advocates insist that such a limitation allows too many sales to take place without checks, making it easier for criminals and the mentally ill to obtain firearms. The Manchin-Toomey plan would expand background checks to cover unlicensed dealers at gun shows, and all sales conducted on the Internet.
It would also expand some rights of gun owners, allowing those who have undergone a background check within the last five years to obtain a concealed-carry permit allowing them to buy guns in other states. It would also make it easier for hunters carrying guns to travel through states that prohibit such weapons, and allow active military members to purchase firearms in their home states. They are currently prohibited from making such purchases when they are stationed somewhere else.
Despite such concessions, the National Rifle Association (NRA) and other Second Amendment supporters remain leery, saying the proposal is still too restrictive. ”While the overwhelming rejection of President Obama and Mayor Bloomberg’s ‘universal’ background check agenda is a positive development, we have a broken mental health system that is not going to be fixed with more background checks at gun shows,” the NRA said in a statement. “The sad truth is that no background check would have prevented the tragedies in Newtown, Aurora or Tucson.”
Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) took the argument one step further. On the Senate floor Wednesday, he warned that universal background checks could lead to a national gun registry that “would allow the federal government to surveil law-abiding citizens who exercise their Constitutional rights,” further noting that the government has no business monitoring any exercise of those rights. ”You see, the federal government has no business monitoring when or how often you go to church; what books and newspapers you read; who you vote for; your health conditions; what you eat for breakfast; and the details of your private life–including your lawful exercise of your rights protected by the Second Amendment and other provisions of the Bill of Rights,” he explained.
Even though this compromise ostensibly waters down such checks, National Review’s Charles Cook explains that gun control advocates will eventually demand more. “Within a few weeks of the bill’s passage, the eerie progressive silence that has marked this tortured process will be broken, and when it is, legions of prominent gun controllers will take to their feet in order to argue that it makes ‘no sense’ for there to be ‘exemptions’ to the almost universal background-check system,” he warns.
His warning is too late with regard to some states. In New York, the state police initially forced ”David,” a 34-year-old college librarian, to turn in his guns after his pistol permit was suspended because he had taken anti-anxiety medication at some point in the past. The NY SAFE Act requires mental health professionals to inform the state when permit holders or would-be permit holders are ”likely to engage in conduct that would result in serious harm to self or others.” A day later, the state was forced to backtrack, when they discovered they had the wrong man. ”Today, we all look like fools,” said Erie County Clerk Chris Jacobs.
“Fools” is putting it mildly. New York is not only forcing mental health professionals to be de facto agents of the state, it is making an utter mockery of the doctor-patient relationship, in which privacy ought to be the foremost concern. If such checks are implemented nationwide, a 2011 survey by Medco reveals that as many as one-in-five Americans, the number currently taking “mental-health-related medications,” could be affected. Furthermore, as the case in New York reveals, due process is hardly an impediment: David’s guns were confiscated prior to a hearing. ”Due process should come before the suspension,” said David’s attorney Jim Tresmond. ”That’s where due process comes in. Before your rights are taken, due process must occur. That’s our constitutional right, not the reverse.” David’s guns remain in police custody until a judge removes the suspension.
In Washington, gun control advocates remain determined to push, as well as expand, their agenda. Harry Reid has promised to re-introduce the assault weapons ban, dropped from the bill last month, as well as a ban on high-capacity magazines. President Obama brought the families of the Newtown shooting victims from Connecticut to Washington, D.C. aboard Air Force One on Tuesday to help push the legislation. And Freshman Senator Christopher S. Murphy (D-CN) gave his first speech on the Senate floor on gun violence Wednesday, displaying large photos of some of the children killed in the massacre to emphasize his efforts.
Bringing Newtown family members to Washington did not sit well with some gun rights supporters. “See, I think it’s so unfair of the administration to hurt these families, to make them think this has something to do with them when, in fact, it doesn’t,” Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) told the Huffington Post. He further contended that the families believe gun control is now a personal issue “because they’ve been told that by the president.” Senator Ted Cruz accused the Obama administration of “really playing on emotions. What it is not focused on are actual policies that will stop violent crime,” he added. The editorial board of Investors Business Daily, who decried the abuse of presidential power in bringing the Newtown families to the nation’s capital, wondered if Republicans can “now give Fast and Furious victims’ families taxpayer-funded flights to Washington?”
It wouldn’t matter if they could. The mainstream media chose to ignore that controversy. That would be the same mainstream media that has circled the wagons around gun control advocates, so much so that CNN has devoted two full days to pushing gun control legislation, even as Second Amendment supporters are ignored.
Yet whatever agreement the Senate reaches may all be for naught. The Republican-controlled House isn’t likely to allow a more restrictive gun control package to pass, even though House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) reiterated his intention to remain noncommittal prior to the Senate reaching an agreement. ”It’s one thing for [Manchin and Toomey] to come to some agreement. It doesn’t substitute the will for the other 98 members,” he told reporters.
Nonetheless, Joe Manchin expressed his hope that something would be accomplished. “Today is the start of a healthy debate that must end with the Senate and House, hopefully, passing these commonsense measures and the president signing it into law,” he said. “The event of Newtown, truly the events at Newton, changed us all. It changes our country, our communities, our town and it changed our hearts and minds.”
What hasn’t changed is the reality that nothing being proposed would have stopped Adam Lanza. Thus, this latest effort is nothing more than an unseemly attempt to use a horrific tragedy as a springboard to infringe upon the rights of law-abiding Americans to bear arms. Therein lies the other fatal flaw in any gun control bill: only law-abiding people will be affected. Furthermore, those well-versed in the American left’s template of using incrementalism to get what they want, understand that concessions made now will lead to demands for further, and far more onerous, concessions later.
In short, the Second Amendment is under assault. It remains to be seen if America is still a nation of laws, or one that can be manipulated into surrendering constitutional rights for the illusion of safety. Here’s a video released yesterday showing a Chicago shopkeeper fighting off two armed assailants with a baseball bat. As you watch it, remember that Chicago has some of the toughest gun control laws in the nation.
What’s going on in this video is real life. What’s going on in Washington is a farce: one hundred senators with armed security details are deciding how much more difficult they will make it for ordinary Americans to enjoy a similar measure of personal security. It doesn’t get more hypocritical than that.
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http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/345307/why-are-feds-trying-identify-all-gun-owners-missouri-andrew-c-mccarthy
http://www.examiner.com/article/york-arms-cancels-all-orders-from-new-york-police?fb_action_ids=148758805300749&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%22148758805300749%22%3A214076372068036%7D&action_type_map=%7B%22148758805300749%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map=%5B%5D
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http://www.dickmorris.com/stop-the-atf-database-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/?utm_source=dmreports&utm_medium=dmreports&utm_campaign=dmreports
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http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/M/MO_DRIVERS_LICENSES_CONCEALED_GUNS_MOOL-?SITE=MOCAP&SECTION=STATE&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/345307/why-are-feds-trying-identify-all-gun-owners-missouri-andrew-c-mccarthy
http://www.examiner.com/article/york-arms-cancels-all-orders-from-new-york-police?fb_action_ids=148758805300749&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%7B%22148758805300749%22%3A214076372068036%7D&action_type_map=%7B%22148758805300749%22%3A%22og.likes%22%7D&action_ref_map=%5B%5D
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Good follow up BD, thanks.
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Comments gents?
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The want ads posted by the anonymous buyer on Armslist.com, a sprawling free classified ads Web site for guns, telegraphed urgency.
Feb. 20: “Got 250 cash for a good handgun something.reliable.”
Feb. 27: “I got 200 250 cashlooking for a good handgun please let me know what u got.”
Feb. 28: “Looking to buy some 9 mm ammo and not at a crazy price.”
The intentions and background of the prospective buyer were hidden, as is customary on such sites. The person posting these ads, however, left a phone number, enabling The New York Times to trace them to their source: Omar Roman-Martinez, 29, of Colorado Springs, who has a pair of felony convictions for burglary and another for motor vehicle theft, as well as a misdemeanor domestic violence conviction — all of which bar him from having guns. Yet he was so determined he even offered to trade a tablet computer or a vintage Pepsi machine for firearms.
When questioned in a telephone interview, Mr. Roman-Martinez said he ultimately decided not to buy a weapon. He also insisted that a 9-millimeter handgun he posted for sale on the Web site last month belonged to someone else.
“I’m a felon,” he said. “I can’t possess firearms.”
The mere fact that Mr. Roman-Martinez was seeking to buy and sell guns on Armslist underscores why extending background checks to the growing world of online sales has become a centerpiece of new gun legislation being taken up in the Senate this week. With no requirements for background checks on most private transactions, a Times examination found, Armslist and similar sites function as unregulated bazaars, where the essential anonymity of the Internet allows unlicensed sellers to advertise scores of weapons and people legally barred from gun ownership to buy them.
The bipartisan Senate compromise under consideration would require that background checks be conducted through federally licensed dealers on all Internet and gun show sales. Gun control advocates argue that such checks might have prevented shootings like that of Zina Haughton, 42, who was killed in October with two other women by her husband, Radcliffe, even though a restraining order barred him from having guns. Mr. Haughton simply contacted a private seller on Armslist and handed over $500 in a McDonald’s parking lot for a .40-caliber semiautomatic pistol and three magazines.
Seeking a glimpse into the largely hidden online gun market, The Times assembled a database and analyzed several months of ads from Armslist, which has become the dominant player in the arena, and examined numerous smaller sites.
Over the past three months, The Times identified more than 170,000 gun ads on Armslist. Some were for the same guns, making it difficult to calculate just how many guns were actually for sale. Even so, with more than 20,000 ads posted every week, the number is probably in the tens of thousands.
Notably, 94 percent of the ads were posted by “private parties,” who, unlike licensed dealers, are not required to conduct background checks.
Besides Mr. Roman-Martinez, the Times investigation led to Gerard Toolin, 46, of Walterboro, S.C., who is a fugitive from the Rhode Island police and has two outstanding felony warrants as well as a misdemeanor warrant. His legal status bars him from owning guns, but he was recently seeking to buy an AK-47 assault rifle on Armslist and was also trying to trade a Marlin rifle. He posted photos to his Facebook account of an AK-47 he had already purchased, along with a variety of other guns.
There was also Martin Fee, who has a domestic battery conviction in Florida and other arrests and convictions in Florida and New Jersey, including for drug possession, burglary and larceny. He was selling a Chinese SKS rifle on the classified section of another Web site, BudsGunShop.com.
The examination of Armslist raised questions about whether many sellers are essentially functioning as unlicensed firearms dealers, in contravention of federal law. The law says that people who “engage in the business” of selling firearms need to obtain a license and conduct background checks on customers. While the definition of engaging in business is vague, The Times found that more than two dozen people had posted more than 20 different guns for sale in a several-month span.
Among them was Joshua Lovejoy, 32, who since November has advertised more than 100 guns on Armslist, mostly in Canton, Ohio, ranging from AR-15 assault rifles to Glock 19 semiautomatic pistols. He once listed more than 20 guns in a single ad. He insisted in a telephone interview, however, that he had sold only a few.
Then there was Ron Metz, 49, who has advertised more than 80 guns from Anderson, S.C., since February. Mr. Metz said in an interview he had needed money, so he started selling some guns and trading for others. He also bought other guns, which he turned around and sold as well. He said he had no real idea how many he had sold, guessing that it was more than a dozen. He never keeps any records and does not do any background checks, explaining: “I can just sort of read people.”
“You think I broke a law?” he asked.
‘A Gun Show That Never Ends’
Armslist was the brainchild of Jonathan Gibbon and Brian Mancini, friends who attended the United States Air Force Academy and then transferred to the University of Pittsburgh.
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Page 2 of 4)
Mr. Gibbon, who did not respond to requests for comment, said in a 2010 interview with Human Events, a conservative Web site, that he got the idea for Armslist during the summer of 2007 when he saw that the classifieds Web site Craigslist.com had decided to ban gun-related ads “because a few users cried out for it.” Mr. Gibbon, who went on to law school at the University of Oklahoma, where he founded the Second Amendment Club, said he had been inspired to “create a place for law-abiding gun owners to buy and sell online without all of the hassles of auctions and shipping.”
Gerard Toolin is a fugitive from the Rhode Island police and has two outstanding felony warrants, but has engaged in transactions on an online gun site. Background checks are not required for such sales.
Bearing Arms
Omar Roman-Martinez, 29, of Colorado Springs, has a pair of felony convictions for burglary and another for motor vehicle theft. He nevertheless sought a weapon on a Web site and earlier posted one for sale.
Mr. Mancini, who designed the site, recently left the company. Mr. Gibbon remains the site’s owner, while also practicing law in Pennsylvania, according to his profile on LinkedIn. Armslist LLC, registered with the Oklahoma secretary of state, lists an office suite in Pittsburgh as its business address.
When asked by Human Events to describe the site, Mr. Gibbon said: “Imagine a gun show that never ends.”
Gun shows have long been a source of concern for gun control advocates and law enforcement officials, because many allow unregulated sales without background checks. Web sites make such transactions far more widely available, with just a few clicks of a mouse.
A 2011 undercover investigation by the City of New York examined private party gun sellers on a range of Web sites, including Armslist, to see if they would sell guns to someone who said that they probably could not pass a background check. (Federal law bars sales to any person the seller has reason to believe is prohibited from purchasing firearms). Investigators found seventy-seven of 125 online sellers agreed to sell the weapons anyway.
Armslist posts a disclaimer on its home page, urging users to “comply with local, state, federal, and international law.” But it also makes clear that the site “does not become involved in transactions between parties.”
What the site does do is make it simple for anyone seeking to buy a gun without a background check, enabling users to filter gun ads in their state by ones being sold by private parties.
Federal law places one significant restriction on transactions among private parties, barring people from directly selling guns to people in other states who are not licensed firearms dealers. Licensed dealers must act as intermediaries in transactions across state lines and perform background checks. But an examination of ads on the Web site shows that illegal interstate transactions can occur.
An ad for a “new in box” Ruger rifle posted on April 1 in Indianapolis stated that if the buyer was out of state, the seller would ship to the buyer’s “front door,” “person to private person.”
A seller on another ad, posted April 2, in Brighton, Colo., vented about repeated no-shows in his previous attempts to sell the gun, so he made clear, “No more out of state.”
Many ads simply require the transactions occur “face to face.” Some even provide assurances: “no questions asked” and “no paperwork.”
The loose online atmosphere was evident in the case of an Arizona gun dealer, Walter Young, who pleaded guilty last week to a federal gun charge stemming from an investigation into his sale of a .50-caliber rifle, dozens of gun kits and thousands of rounds of ammunition to an anonymous buyer who contacted him on Gunbroker.com.
Mr. Young — a Tea Party activist who posted a YouTube video in February suggesting he was being persecuted for criticizing the government — told federal agents he shipped everything to an address in Texas near the Mexican border, without even knowing the identity of the recipient, according to court records. After initially lying to investigators, he admitted looking the other way in his online dealings, records show.
“Young stated there was a general ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy in the gun world when it came to wanting to know why a person was purchasing a particular item, and for that reason he did not question people he sold items to,” federal prosecutors said in a court filing.
Other cases have had deadly consequences.
In 2011, Dmitry Smirnov, a Canadian resident, contacted Benedict Ladera, from Kent, Wash., via Armslist, expressing interest in a Smith & Wesson .40-caliber pistol that Mr. Ladera had posted for sale.
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Page 3 of 4)
Mr. Ladera, who had sold about 20 guns on Armslist over the previous year, agreed to meet at a casino but increased the price of the handgun to $600, from $400, because he was from out of state, according to court records. After buying the gun, Mr. Smirnov drove to Chicago, where he stalked Jitka Vesel, a woman he had briefly dated a few years earlier, and on April 13, 2011, shot and killed her. Mr. Smirnov turned himself into authorities and was later sentenced to life in prison.
Federal authorities also arrested Mr. Ladera, who pleaded guilty to making an illegal transfer of a firearm to a nonstate resident and was sentenced to one year in prison. Last year, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against Armslist on behalf of Ms. Vesel’s family.
In the case of Radcliffe Haughton, the Wisconsin man who killed his wife, the person who sold him the gun on Armslist told federal investigators that he had checked Mr. Haughton’s driver’s license to make sure he was a Wisconsin resident. He also said he asked Mr. Haughton if he was prohibited from having firearms, but he indicated he was not.
Despite these cases, it appears that prosecutions of people who illegally buy and sell guns on the Internet are relatively unusual. A review of nearly 100 court cases in which federal authorities seized guns over the last year found that in very few instances were Internet transactions the focus of the investigations.
Anonymity Is the Rule
Identifying the people who buy and sell guns on these online forums is impossible in most cases because the sites protect the anonymity of their users.
On Armslist, potential buyers can contact sellers directly through the Web site, without making their contact information public. In some cases where people included phone numbers in their ads, The Times tried to trace them — a task made more difficult because most were unlisted cellphones — and determine if the people had criminal records or other firearms prohibitions.
Many numbers led nowhere. Among the ones that were traceable, most people examined had clean records, or had only misdemeanor convictions that did not disqualify them from having weapons. In some cases that raised questions, it was impossible to conclusively verify identities. But several people emerged who clearly should not be buying or selling guns.
Omar Roman-Martinez spent a little more than a year in prison, getting out in 2010, after pleading guilty to second-degree burglary for breaking into a car with some friends, taking a key and an address, and then going to the person’s house, where they made off with jewelry, a safe and electronics. He had prior felony convictions for burglarizing an auto-parts store and for stealing a car from a car dealership, and a misdemeanor assault conviction for biting and repeatedly using a telephone receiver to hit the woman he was living with, according to court and police records.
Mr. Roman-Martinez initially posted general inquiries on Armslist, looking to buy a handgun for cash and then ammunition. He also tried to sell a Jimenez Arms 9-millimeter handgun. In mid-March, he offered to trade a tablet computer that “has the works” for a handgun or pistol grip shotgun. Later, he posted an ad offering a “working condition 1970s pepsi machine” for “nice firearms or one nice one.”
He explained in the ad: “These machines are very wanted and most dont work mine does shot me an offer.”
When queried, Mr. Roman-Martinez initially acknowledged the ads but tried to sidestep, saying that he never acquired a gun and that the one he was trying to sell was not his. By the end of the conversation, however, he denied he had anything to do with the ads.
“I’ve heard of Armslist,” he said. “Of course, everybody has. I don’t have anything posted on there.”
The conversation unfolded similarly with Gerard Toolin, the man with outstanding felony warrants from Rhode Island who is now living in South Carolina. The charges against Mr. Toolin, which date to 2002, relate to allegations he defrauded people through his heating and cooling business. He skipped out on court appearances and fled the state, records show.
He posted an ad on Armslist on April 9, in which he wrote, “I am looking to buy A ak-47.” Initially unaware of who was calling, Mr. Toolin eagerly explained to a reporter that he already had one and was looking to acquire a second.
After the reporter identified himself and asked about his warrants, Mr. Toolin said, “Who says I’m buying a weapon for myself?”
==================
Page 4 of 4)
But Mr. Toolin had also posted several ads in March, seeking to trade a Marlin 336SC rifle for a 12-gauge tactical shotgun — a combat-style weapon. Pictures posted on Mr. Toolin’s Facebook page, in which he “likes” Armslist’s Facebook page, made clear that he possessed an array of weapons. He posted a picture of an AK-47 in mid-March, saying: “I would like everyone to welcome the newest member of my family ... I adopted her yesterday.” Another photo posted in late November showed him loaded down with weapons, including an assault rifle and several pistols strapped to his body. He captioned the snapshot: “I don’t think I have enough maybe one or two more.”
When asked about the photographs, Mr. Toolin said: “You sure they’re real guns? How do you know they’re not reproductions?”
Minutes after the conversation, he took his Facebook account offline.
The Times also found Martin Fee, of Vero Beach, Fla., while examining a listing for a Chinese SKS rifle on Budsgunshop.com. In the ad, Mr. Fee said he would not sell to anyone living in New York, New Jersey or “the People’s Republic of California.” A Twitter account belonging to “Marty Fee” of Vero Beach is filled with vitriolic postings about President Obama and liberals, including one that says the president and attorney general “should be chained n shot.”
Mr. Fee, 45, has an arrest record dating back decades, and it is difficult to verify which charges resulted in convictions. But a domestic battery conviction from 1999, resulting from a dispute between Mr. Fee and his then-wife that turned physical, appeared to disqualify him from possessing firearms.
Reached by phone last week, Mr. Fee said he had sold the gun and had it shipped to a licensed dealer. When a reporter asked him how he could own a gun with his domestic violence conviction, he backpedaled, insisting that the SKS rifle was not actually his, and that he “posted it up there for a friend of mine.”
“I never saw the weapon, I never touched the weapon,” he said, declining to identify the friend. He then ended the call. Shortly thereafter, his ad disappeared from the Web site.
When Is a ‘Seller’ a ‘Dealer’?
Under current law, the question of when a background check must occur depends on who is selling the gun. Federal regulations require licensed dealers to perform checks, but the legal definition of who must be licensed is blurry. Regulations define a dealer as a “person who devotes time, attention, and labor to dealing in firearms as a regular course of trade or business with the principal objective of livelihood and profit.” People engaged in only “occasional sales” for their personal collections, or for a hobby, are exempted.
But precisely how many guns it takes for the “occasional” seller to become a dealer is not specified.
The design of the Armslist site makes it difficult to tie together all of the ads of individual sellers in order to identify the most active. Again, a phone number makes the task easier. Using phone numbers, as well as computer analysis, The Times connected all the ads for some sellers, including Mr. Lovejoy, who has advertised scores of guns for sale on Armslist over the last few months. One ad in January listed more than 20 guns, including several AR-15 assault rifles and an array of AMD-65s, a Hungarian variant of the AK-47.
In a telephone interview, Mr. Lovejoy, who is a paramedic and is studying to become a nurse, described his buying and selling of guns on Armslist and other sites as a “hobby.”
“A lot of times when I get rid of something that I have, I don’t make a penny on it,” he said.
Mr. Lovejoy said he always made sure to look at buyers’ driver’s licenses to check that they were Ohio residents and that he would occasionally record a bill of sale, with phone numbers, but no names and addresses. He said he supported proposals to require background checks on Internet sales.
“It would give me more peace of mind,” he said.
While Mr. Lovejoy was willing to discuss his ads with a reporter, other Armslist sellers reacted differently. Noel Lee Velarde, who has advertised more than 30 guns out of Flint, Mich., on Armslist dating back to late January, twice hung up on a reporter.
Bob Vivona, 69, who describes himself as an Army veteran and retired police detective sergeant, has advertised more than 20 guns on Armslist out of Missouri going back to February. Even though it is not required by law, he said, he takes it upon himself to look people’s names up in a statewide online court database. He said he was simply getting rid of guns he had bought but found he did not like, insisting there was nothing wrong with the number of guns he was selling.
“It’s not an issue,” he said. “It’s the Second Amendment.”
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http://www.westernfreepress.com/2013/02/16/united-nations-data-show-america-has-high-gun-ownership-but-a-low-murder-rate/
From the article:
You’ll also notice that many of the countries with higher rates of gun ownership have lower rates of homicide. The correlation is not 100%, but there is more correlation with more gun ownership = fewer homicides and less gun ownership = more homicides than the reverse.
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http://www.rollcall.com/news/senate_torpedoes_background_check_deal-224103-1.html?ET=rollcall:e15499:105450a:&st=email&pos=epm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2013/04/17/the-gun-amendments-need-60-votes-to-pass-but-why/
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BD:
Good finds. Nice explanation of the 60 vote tactics, very useful map on gun/homicide rates.
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I'm glad you liked them, Guro.
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Some specifics here amongst the self-congratulations:
We Won a Stunning Victory Today!
“Schumer’s spokesman Brian Fallon took note of Gun Owners of America’s role in the debate, tweeting a link to the [New York] Times profile and saying the group ‘is making deal on even background checks extremely hard.’” - TPM Media, “Democrats Blame Gun Owners of America for Gun Control Setback,” April 8, 2013
You guys did it. We all did it - together!
For four months, the laughing hyenas on MSNBC and in the White House have been cackling hysterically about the "bitter clingers" who actually own guns and value the Second Amendment.
Well, who’s laughing now?
The TPM quote above indicated - more than a week ago - that things weren’t going well for anti-gun Democrats. The New York Times also lamented on April 3 that:
The group [GOA] has already been successful in both freezing senators, particularly Republicans, who have appeared to be on the fence about supporting bills to expand background checks.
Have you ever wondered if your activism makes any difference at all? Well, today, you saw a dramatic answer to that question, as we won an incredible victory.
You guys scorched the Senate offices with phone calls. Many of you reported to us that their phones were ringing endlessly (as they were busy handling other calls) ... that in many cases your Senator's mailboxes were full ... and in some cases, that they even hung up on you.
Today was a textbook example of how grassroots activism makes a difference! But even still, you can be sure that the gun grabbers will be back soon, trying hard to resurrect this issue.
And that’s why your GOA will remain ever vigilant and will alert you to any proposed infringements of your liberty.
Here are the highlights of what happened today:
(1) The most important vote was the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer national gun registry proposal. With 60 votes needed for passage, the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer amendment was shot down by a vote of 54-46.
GOA and NRA strongly opposed the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer amendment. But we were surprised to see that another gun group - not only said they supported the Toomey language, but - said they helped write the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer text. Thankfully, their support for this gun control language was not enough to get it passed.
(2) The Cornyn-Vitter-Thune amendment - pushed hard by Gun Owners of America - received a 57-43 vote (so we fell three votes short since 60 were needed). This provision would have allowed concealed carry holders and persons in constitutional carry states to carry nationwide. The overwhelming vote on this amendment sets the stage for bringing it up again and again on must-pass legislation.
(3) As predicted, the Feinstein gun ban lost by a vote of 40-60 - falling far short of a majority - and the magazine ban lost by a vote of 46-54.
Today is a day to celebrate! We thank God for all of you and for all the Help that we have received in this long struggle to stop infringements of our liberties.
Here’s what is still left for tomorrow.
Harry Reid’s bill (S. 649) is still on the floor of the Senate, and there are two scheduled votes that will take place tomorrow. Eventually, the Senate will vote on whether to end debate on the bill (known as cloture), but that vote won’t necessarily take place tomorrow. The Senate will need 60 votes to end debate, but if they can’t reach that threshold, the bill effectively dies.
So GOA is telling Senators to vote AGAINST cloture on the bill, whenever that vote comes.
ACTION: We think that we can defeat cloture on final passage of the bill. But, to be safe, GOA is encouraging activists to contact their Senators and urge them oppose cloture! You can reach them at 202-224-3121.
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Sens. Grassley and Cruz roll out alternative gun control bill
By Jonathan Easley - 04/17/13 12:27 PM ET
Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) unveiled an alternative gun control bill on Wednesday.
The announcement comes on a day when the Senate appears likely to block further debate on a bipartisan background checks bill.
“Rather than restricting the rights of law-abiding Americans, we should be focusing on keeping guns out of the hands of violent criminals, which this legislation accomplishes,” Cruz said. “While the Obama Administration continues to politicize a terrible tragedy to push its anti-gun agenda, I am proud to stand beside my fellow senators to present common-sense measures that will increase criminal prosecutions of felons who try to buy guns, criminalize straw purchasing and gun trafficking, and address mental health issues.”
Grassley and Cruz, along with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Dan Coats (R-Ind.) introduced the bill at a press conference Wednesday morning, just hours before the Senate will vote on it and other gun control measures.
One of the primary criticisms Republicans had before a vote to move forward on a background checks bill last week was that they didn’t have time to read it before the vote.
Cruz said that despite the late hour, his legislation has 20 co-sponsors and had been circulated among Republicans and Democrats with no negative feedback. He predicted that despite the small window before the vote, the bill would garner bipartisan support.
The bill would increase the resources available to prosecutors for violators of gun laws, and creates a “Cruz Task Force” to prosecute those who fail criminal background checks. The task force is funded through an Asset Forfeiture Fund.
The bill criminalizes straw purchasing and trafficking, measures Grassley supported in committee hearings on the gun control bill that will go before the Senate later this month. It also seeks to increase safety at schools, keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill, and increases accountability for prosecutions at the executive level by requiring the Department of Justice to submit reports to Congress.
The senators were particularly critical of the Obama administration’s record of prosecuting background check violations, saying it only took up a small portion of such cases.
The bill does not expand background checks, but rather “focuses on making the backgrounds system work better…by encouraging states to report mental health records,” Cruz said.
The National Rifle Association said it supports the bill.
The bill includes provisions making it easier to purchase and transport firearms across state lines.
The bill would allow for the interstate sale of firearms, and for the interstate transportation of firearms providing certain conditions are met. Guns transported across state lines will have to be unloaded, locked in a vehicle or kept in the trunk.
Another pro-gun provision of the bill will allow military members to buy guns in the states where they’re stationed.
Grassley said the bill was the result of “the combined efforts of many members of the Senate,” and called it “a sensible alternative” to Democratic gun control reform efforts that “addresses problems we’ve seen without burdening law abiding citizens.”
Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/294499-sens-grassley-and-cruz-present-alternative-gun-bill#ixzz2Qp8PG3Kd
Follow us: @thehill on Twitter | TheHill on Facebook
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/02/01/Newtown-Votes-To-Put-Armed-Guards-In-Schools
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It's too bad the left is unwilling to have an honest debate on anything, in this case guns. There is an argument to be made (see 28 internet pages with 162,000 reads in this thread) that the right of law abiding citizens to bear arms makes us safer. One armed citizen positioned near her might have ended the shooting sooner. The would be confiscators would do well to read this as well:
"... the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
I didn't shoot Gabby Giffords. I feel compassion for what she went through. I don't care less than she does about the other victims. I was once mowed down by a car. I didn't see her visit me or run out to ban vehicles, and I don't impugn her humanity for that oversight. Having our motives constantly impugned is sickening. Only the people oblivious to the clause above care about the victims and the tragedies, she believes. I've had it with that brand of self righteous drivel. Aren't you lucky, Gabby Giffords, to have "every reasonable American" on your side. Win over some of the unreasonable and uncaring people and you might have a working majority. James Taranto picks apart her atrocious logic quite well here:.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324493704578430771447679726.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_MIDDLETopOpinion
Giffords's 900-word jeremiad should be included in every textbook of logic and political rhetoric, so rife is it with examples of fallacious reasoning and demagogic appeals. Let's go through them:
• The argumentum ad passiones, or appeal to emotion. She leads with this one: "Senators say they fear the N.R.A. and the gun lobby. But I think that fear must be nothing compared to the fear the first graders in Sandy Hook Elementary School felt as their lives ended in a hail of bullets. The fear that those children who survived the massacre must feel every time they remember their teachers stacking them into closets and bathrooms, whispering that they loved them, so that love would be the last thing the students heard if the gunman found them."
• The appeal to motives. Giffords claims that the senators who voted against the measures "looked over their shoulder at the powerful, shadowy gun lobby" and "made their decision based on political fear and on cold calculations about the money of special interests like the National Rifle Association." She also asserts that "their decision was based on a misplaced sense of self-interest" and on "cowardice." These characterizations are mutually inconsistent--can a senator's decision have been based on both unreasoning fear and a cold (but erroneous!) calculation of self-interest?--and they are also entirely unsubstantiated. So is her assertion that "the status quo" is "desperately protected by the gun lobby so that they can make more money by spreading fear and misinformation."
• Guilt by association. See the references to the "gun lobby" in the preceding paragraph.
• Poisoning the well. She reveals that some of the senators who voted against the amendments "have met with grieving parents" and that some "have also looked into my eyes . . . and expressed sympathy" for her and other Tucson victims. Her purpose in citing these facts is to impugn the senators' sincerity: "And still these senators decided to do nothing. Shame on them." In reality, they didn't "do nothing"; they rejected particular legislative proposals. It does not follow, and indeed it seems unlikely and is boorish to assert, that their expressions of sympathy were not heartfelt.
• Begging the question. Giffords characterizes the proposed amendments as "common-sense legislation" that "could prevent future tragedies." She also describes them as "these most benign and practical of solutions." She pretends that the central matter in dispute--whether the benefits would outweigh the costs or indeed whether the proposals would have yielded the benefits their advocates promised at all--has already been settled in her side's favor.
• The no-true-Scotsman move. "These senators have heard from their constituents--who polls show overwhelmingly favored expanding background checks," Giffords writes. She ignores the possibility that those polls are flawed and that the senators are hearing a different message from their constituents. Then she qualifies her claim of public unanimity: "I am asking every reasonable American to help me tell the truth . . ." See what she did there? (The switcheroo to every reasonable American reminds us of a probably apocryphal tale about Adlai Stevenson. A woman is supposed to have said to him, "Governor, you have the support of every thinking American," to which he replied: "But madam, I need a majority.")
• The argumentum ad baculam, or argument from the club. This consists in attempting to persuade by making threats. Giffords urges "mothers to stop these lawmakers at the grocery store and tell them: You've lost my vote" and in other ways for those who agree with her to work for the lawmakers' defeat--a call to action, not an argument. There is, of course, nothing objectionable about citizens in a democratic republic engaging in such action, but that goes for those on the other side as well. And it's worth recalling that the "civility" hypocrites back in the day proclaimed themselves troubled and outraged by the phenomenon of citizens confronting their elected representatives at public meetings.
• The argumentum ad misericordiam, or appeal to pity. "Speaking is physically difficult for me," she writes. "But my feelings are clear: I'm furious." It should be obvious that this in no way speaks to the merits of the legislation or even the character of its supporters and opponents.
• The false dilemma. This is Giffords's closing gambit: "To do nothing while others are in danger is not the American way."
• The appeal to authority. That would be Giffords's own authority as a former lawmaker. "I was elected six times to represent southern Arizona, in the State Legislature and then in Congress," she writes. "I know what a complicated issue is; I know what it feels like to take a tough vote. This was neither." Perhaps her legislative experience gives her some insight into the senators' state of mind, but if so, she does not share it with readers, whom she expects to accept her conclusion unquestioningly.
(more at the link)
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Note the date this was written:
http://youtu.be/E9UMox1WoTw
Dateline April 12 2013 – Portland Oregon – by Dan Sandini: You might have to wait for Monday to read about it in the Wall Street Journal but you can read about it here right now. An influential gun rights advocate actually helped write the Background Check Bill coming up before the Senate this coming week.
Alan Gottlieb, Executive Vice President of the Second Amendment Foundation, speaking candidly at a GOP gathering on Friday claimed that his staff had actually helped write the bill. He went on to describe how the bill would be a step in the right direction for gun control advocates.
“Unfortunately some of my colleagues haven’t quite figured it out yet because they weren’t standing in the room writing it. My staff was. I’ll be perfectly candid about it. This will probably break on Monday in the Wall Street Journal. “
Lacking two cameras I could not catch the multitude of jaws dropping in between bites of succulent sirloin at the Persimmon Country Club where the event was held. If some shutter bug caught the look on former State Chair Allen Alley’s face please facebook it to me. I’m imagining him looking like Marty Feldman.
Gottlieb was discussing Measure Number S.649 (Safe Communities, Safe Schools Act of2013 ): “A bill to ensure that all individuals who should be prohibited from buying a firearm are listed in the national instant criminal background check system and require a background check for every firearm sale, and for other purposes.”
This is the same Bill which Senator Rand Paul sought unsucessfully to fillibuster in order to protect the Second Amendment Rights of American Citizens. I could go on but watch the video (above) and see it for yourself, or read the transcript below. But remember … shhhhhh … it’s a secret.
Here’s the transcript
When it comes to the Background Check Bill, some of you might not like what I’m gonna say, but I spent hours and hours, in Senator Manchin, with Senator Manchin and Pat Toomey going over what’s in that Bill. And, I’m a little upset with the one … this whole debates gotten so polarized that it’s really hard for anybody to be intellectually honest about what any of the Bills say. [unintelligible] I’ll be candid, unfortunately with the background check that’s really what the case is right now.
The initial background check bill that Schumer put in was horrible. There’s no way that any of us could support it. It was gun registrations, there’s no two ways about it, The Manchin-Toomey Bill despite some of my colleagues in the Gun Rights Movement talking about that it’s registration, it is not registration. Ahhh .. To be perfectly candid about it, it states in it that no guns can be registered. It also carries a section in it that any federal or any state or any gun dealer with access to the NICS Check Records who misuses those records for registration purposes commits a felony with a 15 year … up to a 15 year prison term. That’s really great protection for us.
Right Now? Any gun sold through a dealer that goes through a background check: there is no protection. If someone were to misuse that list nothing happens to them. Now they will serve 15 years … up to 15 years in prison for misusing that list, if in fact they do so. That’s great protection. It’s the first time we’ve had protection. Other things in that bill which my sides not talking about? We’re not taling about it for a reason.
If we talk about it too much, the other sie’s gonna find out about it and they’re gonna realize we’re gonna win off of this thing. The back ground check is not even a Universal Background Check. It’s at gun shows, commercial venues, or the internet. And, to be candid about it, it doesn’t cover family members, of any kind, or any friends, or any gun transaction, that’s not done at a gun show or basically on the internet. It gives protection, if you do go through the background check, you as an individual will now get both civil and criminal liability protection that you don’t have now. If somebody sold a gun to somebody who’s misused it, nobody can sue you even in a civil court for damages. That’s great protection that you don’t have right now.
There’s about 10 other important things in there. One of them them that some of you have read in the newspapers that a lot of Veterans are being disarmed so to speak once they come back from combat in Iraq and Afghanistan and all of a sudden because they were out processed and had stress problems the VA now puts their name into the NICS system they can’t own a gun, this new bill, this Background Check Bill has a provision in it to eradicate that. Their Rights will be restored.
It goes on and on. Traveling across the country. It gives you more protection so that you can take your gun from state to state than you have now.
Another important one, you cannot now legally buy a handgun in a state that you don’t live in. If you’re not a resident of the state you can’t buy a handgun. Under the so-call “Background CHeck Bill,” you’ll be able to buy a handgun in all 50 states, as long as you buy it from a licensed dealer you can buy it from anywhere you want.
There’s a Million other things in there it’s a Christmas Tree. We just hung a Million Ornaments on it. We’re taking the Background Check and making it a pro-gun bill. Unfortunately some of my colleagues haven’t quite figured it out yet because they weren’t standing in the room writing it. My staff was. I’ll be perfectly candid about it. This will probably break on Monday in the Wall Street Journal. So your getting a little of “Inside Baseball.” …
http://daylightdisinfectant.com/gun-...nd-check-bill/
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Anyone think she actually wrote this?
I'd guess her attention-whore husband or one of his Soros funded staffers for their astroturf anti-gun group did.
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Following up on my prior post (the Dan Sandini one):
While fascinating inside baseball stuff, it seems to me there is a fundamental flaw with the logic in that it seems to find it acceptable that congressional voting be done when virtually no one actually knows what is in the bill. This is not how a democratic republic should be run.
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The mass murderers of Massachusetts may be in some real trouble as it turns out the guns used to hijack a car, kill a police officer, and have a firefight with other law enforcement officers were not legally registered.
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/5_constitutional_issues_raised_by_Boston_bombings.html
"The brothers reportedly had a stockpile of ammunition and exchanged hundreds of rounds with police."
It would seem that strict gun laws only deter people who strictly follow gun laws.
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https://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fkontradictions.wordpress.com%2F2013%2F04%2F20%2Fdear-democratic-gun-control-lobby-how-to-get-better%2F&h=lAQHGlm6a
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http://www.examiner.com/article/after-senate-setback-obama-quietly-moving-forward-with-gun-regulation
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DHS Denies Ammo Purchases Aimed at Civilians
By Elizabeth Flock
April 25, 2013
House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif. questioned the reasoning for the Department of Homeland Security's massive ammunition purchase.
Officials at the Department of Homeland Security denied Thursday that its large-scale ammunition purchases were an effort keep bullets out of the hands of private citizens.
At a hearing on Capitol Hill Thursday, top DHS training officer Humberto Medina said he could "say categorically that was not a factor at all" in the purchases. He also noted that ammunition DHS purchased would be used for both operations and training purchases.
The Associated Press reported in February that DHS was planning to buy more than 1.6 billion rounds over the next five years, a number that sparked fears of government stockpiling – which DHS previously denied to Whispers. Officials told lawmakers DHS actually was planning to buy only up to 750 million rounds.
But Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said it still looked like the government was unnecessarily amassing ammunition.
"The idea that you have to have excess rounds, year after year, flies in the face of common sense," Issa said. Medina argued that DHS keeps a reserve of ammunition because of market fluctuations and because of past problems with vendors.
In fiscal year 2012, DHS purchased more than 103 million rounds of ammunition, to be used by about 70,000 DHS officers who are currently authorized to use weapons. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said Thursday that "the math" didn't make sense, pointing out that this means an average 1300-1600 rounds per DHS officer – some 1000 rounds more than the average for an officer in the Army.
DHS agents and officers need extensive training because they are "exposed to a variety of situations" and "only have that weapon to protect their lives," Medina said. "They can't contact air support [like an officer in an army could.] They have to be proficient at a very high level."
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Also known as the food stamp President, no one has sold more guns in America than Pres. Barack Obama:
(http://i.imgur.com/PfjuDn4.jpg?1)
http://blogs.wsj.com/corporate-intelligence/2013/04/25/after-the-obama-surge-a-new-rush-on-gun-stores/
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-29/barack-obama-gun-salesman-of-the-year.html
Funny how policies have unintended consequences. Who knew?
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http://www.dickmorris.com/backdoor-gun-control-ammo-purchases-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/?utm_source=dmreports&utm_medium=dmreports&utm_campaign=dmreports
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http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18563_162-20039031.html
ATF agent testifies on camera
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http://www.iowastatedaily.com/opinion/article_1c144792-b36d-11e2-8ac6-001a4bcf887a.html?TNNoMobile
Snell: Waking the dragon — How Feinstein fiddled while America burned
Posted: Friday, May 3, 2013 12:00 am | Updated: 12:48 am, Fri May 3, 2013.
By Barry Snell, barry.snell@iowastatedaily.com
Along with bombs and bombers, guns seem to be all the media wants to talk about these days. Death is sexy to our miscreant media, especially when people are killed on purpose. And when that happens, it’s all the newspapers and news stations will print and broadcast, in turn making these events appear worse than they are in reality.
To understand this, one need only look at the difference in coverage between the Texas fertilizer plant explosion, which killed at least 14 confirmed people and injured 200 more at the time of writing this, versus the coverage of the Boston Marathon bombing, which only killed three and injured a hundred others. Texas was on TV for a day, tops, while we’re still hearing about Boston and will for many weeks to come.
Where the media really didn’t care too much about the Texas incident, once a kid was killed at a race, the Boston bombing is now a foil for everything from gun control to immigration in the wake of Sandy Hook, with both sides of the political spectrum using it against the other. What about Texas, you ask? Nothing but crickets chirping from the mainstream media at the moment. Recent studies have shown that people who consume large amounts of mass media often feel more insecure, are less informed, or can’t distinguish between news and what passes as news, what with all the opinion you’ll find in news today.
But when it comes to something as deadly serious as guns and crime, Americans can’t afford the media hyperbole, misinformation and disinformation.
We have a lot of liberal columnists working for the Daily. As a conservative, I’m fine with that; they’re the ones who apply for the job, and conservatives usually don’t. Free market, baby, deal with it. But many of our liberal columnists are my friends, with whom I have spent time outside of work, too. And they, along with everyone else it seems, have an opinion about guns, as you can see by glancing through the last few weeks of the Daily’s Opinion section.
It’s been an eye-opening experience for me. As assistant opinion editor and friend, my columnists are important to me both professionally and personally. It’s all the more clear to me now after doing this job that people often opine a whole lot about stuff they don’t have any personal experience with or expertise on. Like guns.
Every time a gun issue comes up in conversation around Daily people or during a Daily editorial board meeting, opinion editor Michael Belding almost always tells me, “you should write a column about that!” I hesitate in doing so and have so far resisted the urge mostly; I wrote three gun-related columns back in 2011 and early 2012, and that was enough to brand me the “gun guy” by some folks who use such terms as epithets.
The desire of others for me to write gun columns is reasonable, though, and I understand it. I’m as much of a “gun expert” as you’re likely to find around here, so having me write about guns in the paper is perfectly rational. I won’t bore you with my “gun resume,” but suffice it to say that prior to coming to Iowa State in 2011, I made a living with firearms in one way or another for several years of my life, and have a few pieces of paper laying around that say I know a bit about them, too.
Today, however, I’m going to break my silence on the gun issue and speak out once more — and for the last time. This is my final column for the Iowa State Daily.
No experience necessary
In the gun debate, I’ve discovered that one cannot be expert enough about guns. Indeed, when it comes to the gun issue, opinion rules. There doesn’t seem to be any opportunity for any genuine, honest debate on guns, and even liberals would agree with that. I’ve often wondered about this over the years. Is it because my side of the debate is actually loony? I don’t think so; at least, I think I’m pretty normal. Sure, we’ve got some oddballs we all wish would go away, just like any group does.
But all the pro-gun people I know are normal people too — people so normal that nobody knows they’re gun people until they’re told. In fact, there are so many gun owners that if we are all crazy like some suggest, the daily crime rate in America would look more like our crime rate for the entire decade combined, and CNN would actually have something to report on other than the latest gossip.
That is to say, there’s a hundred million of us, owning a few hundred million guns combined, and we contribute to society peacefully every day. Many of us even literally protect society for a living, or used to.
I’ve come to realize after the Sandy Hook shooting that the reason we can’t have a rational gun debate is because the anti-gun side pre-supposes that their pro-gun opponents must first accept that guns are bad in order to have a discussion about guns in the first place. Before we even start the conversation, we’re the bad guys and we have to admit it. Without accepting that guns are bad and supplicating themselves to the anti-gunner, the pro-gunner can’t get a word in edgewise, and is quickly reduced to being called a murderer, or a low, immoral and horrible human being.
You might think that’s hyperbole too, but I’ve experienced it personally from people I considered friends until recently. And every day I see it on TV or in the newspapers, from Piers Morgan to the Des Moines Register’s own Donald Kaul, who among others have actually said people like me are stupid, crazy or should be killed ourselves. YouTube is full of examples, and any Google search will result in example after example of gun-owning Americans being lampooned, ridiculed and demonized by the media and citizens somewhere.
Hell, it’s even gotten so bad that a little kid was expelled from school recently for biting a Pop Tart into the vague shape of a handgun during lunch break (it looked more like Idaho to me).
Liberals always make the common plea, “We need to get some experts to solve this problem!” for any public policy issue that comes along, which is a good thing. But when it comes to the gun issue, gun expertise is completely irrelevant to the anti-gunner — people who probably have never fired a gun or even touched one in real life, and whose only experience with guns is what they’ve seen in movies or read about in bastions of (un)balanced, hyper-liberal journalism, like Mother Jones. That a pro-gun person might actually know a lot about their hobby or profession doesn’t stand up against the histrionic cries of the anti-gunner.
How can we “gun people” honestly be expected to come to the table with anti-gunners when anti-gunners are willfully stupid about guns, and openly hate, despise and ridicule those of us who own them? There must first be respect and trust — even just a little — before there can be even the beginnings of legitimate discussion of the issue.
Death by a thousand cuts
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because anti-gunners always talk about 90 percent of Americans supporting this gun control measure, or 65 percent supporting that one, as if a majority opinion is what truly matters in America. We don’t trust anti-gun people because you think America is a democracy, when it’s actually a constitutional federal republic. In the American system, the rights of a single individual are what matters and are what our system is designed to protect. The emotional mob does not rule in America.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they keep saying they “respect the Second Amendment” and go on about how they respect the hunting traditions of America. We don’t trust you because you have to be a complete idiot to think the Second Amendment is about hunting. I wish people weren’t so stupid that I have to say this: The Second Amendment is about checking government tyranny. Period. End of story. The founders probably couldn’t have cared less about hunting since, you know, they just got done with that little tiff with England called the Revolutionary War right before they wrote that “little book” called the Constitution.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they lie to us. President Obama directly says he won’t tamper with guns or the Second Amendment, then turns around and pushes Congress to do just that. We don’t trust anti-gunners because they appoint one of the most lying and rabidly (and moronically) anti-gun people in America, Vice President Biden, to head up a “task force” to “solve” the so-called “gun problem,” who in turn talks with anti-gun special interest groups instead of us to complete his task.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they tell us they don’t want to ban guns, only enact what they call “common sense gun laws.” But like a magician using misdirection, they tell everyone else they want to ban every gun everywhere. While some are busy trying to placate us with lies, another anti-gunner somewhere submits a gun ban proposal — proposals that often would automatically make us felons for possession. Felons, for no good reason. And you anti-gunners can roll up your grandfather clauses and stuff them where the sun don’t shine. If it ain’t good enough for our grandchildren in 60 years, it ain’t good enough for us right now.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they make horrifying predictions about how there will be blood in the streets, gunfights on every street corner and America will become the Wild West again if citizens are allowed to carry concealed firearms. We don’t trust anti-gun people because we know that despite the millions of Americans who have carry permits, those who carry guns commit crimes at a much lower rate than people who don’t. We know because we know ourselves and we’re not criminals. We know because concealed carry is now legal nearly everywhere, and guess what? Violent crime continues to go down. What a shocker.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they say gun control is about crime control. Anti-gunners claim that ending crime and “saving children” is why they want to ban so-called “assault weapons.” Yet our very own government says that assault weapons are used in less than two percent of all gun crimes and Department of Justice studies say the last assault weapons ban had little or no effect on crime. Other studies suggest gun control may even make crime worse (one need only look to high crime rates in places where there’s a lot of gun control to see the possible connection).
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because when it comes to their “We need gun control to save the children” argument, many of us can’t understand how an anti-gun liberal can simultaneously be in favor of abortion. Because you know, a ban on abortion would save a child every single time. I’m personally not rabidly against abortion, but the discongruence makes less sense still when the reason abortions are legal is to protect a woman’s individual rights. That’s great, but does the individual rights argument sound familiar? Anti-gunners think that for some bizarre reason, the founding fathers happened to stick a collective right smack dab at the top of a list of individual rights, though. Yeah, because that makes sense.
Truth, treason and the empire of lies
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they are purposely misleading to rile the emotions of the ignorant. We don’t trust anti-gunners because they say more than 30,000 people are killed each year by guns — a fact that is technically true, but the key piece of information withheld is that only a minor fraction of that number is murder; the majority is suicides and accidents. We don’t trust anti-gunners because we know accidents and suicides don’t count in the crime rate, but they’re held against us as if they do.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because suicide is the only human-inflicted leading cause of death in America, and that violent crime has been on the decline for decades. We also know that 10 people die daily in drownings, 87 people die daily by poisoning, more than 20,000 adults die from falls each year, someone dies in a fire every 169 minutes, nearly 31,000 people are killed in car accidents annually and almost 2,000 are stabbed to death. People even kill each other with hammers. Yet fewer than 14,000 people are killed by guns of any kind each year.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because not only is the violent crime rate approaching historic lows, but mass shootings are on the decline too. We don’t trust anti-gun people because they fail to recognize that mass shootings happen where guns are already banned — ridiculous “gun-free zones” which attract homicidal maniacs to perpetrate their mass shootings.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because school shootings have been happening forever, but despite them being on the decline, the media inflates the issue until the perception is that they’re a bigger problem than they really are. We don’t trust anti-gunners because they’re busy riling up the emotions of the ignorant, who in turn direct their ire upon us, demonizing us because we object to the overreaction and focus on the wrong things, like the mentally ill people committing the crimes.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they look down on us for defending the Second Amendment as vigorously as they defend the First Amendment — a fight we too would stand side-by-side with them on otherwise. We don’t trust anti-gunners because someone defending the First Amendment is considered a hero, but a someone defending the Second Amendment is figured down with murderers and other lowlifes. Where the First Amendment has its very own day and week, both near-holy national celebrations beyond reproach, anti-gunners would use the First Amendment to ridicule any equivalent event for the Second Amendment, like they did for a recent local attempt at the University of Iowa.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because anti-gun people put us down with dismissals like “just another dumb redneck with a gun.” We are told all over the Internet that we deserve to be in prison for being awful, heartless people; baby-killers and supporters of domestic terrorism, even. We don’t trust anti-gun people because even our own president says people like me are “bitter” and “cling to our guns and religion.” One need only go to any online comments section of any recent gun article in any of the major newspapers to see all this for themselves.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they seek to punish us for crimes we didn’t commit. We don’t trust anti-gunners because we know that the 100 million of us are peaceful, law-abiding citizens who love this country and our society as much as the next liberal. Yet when one previously convicted felon murders someone with a stolen gun five days after his release from prison, or things like the Newtown shooting happen, guns are blamed — and therefore lawful gun owners too, as there is guilt by association, apparently.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because when things like the Boston Marathon bombing happen, everyone correctly blames the bomber, not the bomb. Nobody is calling for bomb control because killing people with bombs is already illegal — just like killing people with guns is illegal too.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they’re fine with guns protecting the money in our banks, our politicians and our celebrities, but they’re against us using guns to protect ourselves, our families, or even our children in schools. Legislative trolls like Dianne Feinstein cry havoc about me protecting my life, while standing comfortably behind armed guards —and the .38 Special revolver she got a California carry permit for. We don’t trust anti-gunners because they tell us our lives aren’t important, or at least are less important than the life of some celebrity like Snooki, who can have all the armed guards her bank account can afford.
A dangerous servant and fearful master
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they completely ignore the fact that true conservatism is about, in part, the preservation of traditions and long-standing principles. We don’t trust anti-gunners because the American Revolution was kicked off by an attempt at gun control when the British marched to Concord to seize the colonists’ muskets and powder. Since the shot heard ‘round the world was fired on Lexington Green, the possession of a firearm has been the mark and symbol of a citizen, distinguishing them from a subject of a monarchy or tyrannical government. We don’t trust anti-gunners because they prefer the post-modern world where anything means anything, and they therefore don’t understand the power of or need for the preservation of traditions — or at least, ones of which they don’t personally approve.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because in a single breath they tell us that the Second Amendment is irrelevant today and should be repealed because semi-automatic weapons didn’t exist when the Bill of Rights was written, then turn around and say the First Amendment protects radio, television, movies, video games, the Internet, domain names, Facebook and Twitter. Carrying liberal logic on the Second Amendment through to the First Amendment, it would only cover the town crier, and hand-operated printing presses producing only books and newspapers, and nothing else. Even anything written with a No. 2 pencil or ballpoint pen would not be included. And those of you belonging to religions that formed after the 1790s? You’re screwed under liberal logic, too.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because, while liberals seek to expand government regulation and services — things that may not be bad or ill-intended on their own — they simultaneously try to curtail the Second Amendment. We don’t trust anti-gun people for this reason because history shows us that every genocide and democide is preceded by expansion of government power and gun control. We don’t trust anti-gunners because here in America, gun control is rooted in slavery and racism, with some of America’s modern anti-gun laws being direct copies of former Nazi laws that banned gun possession for Jews, blacks, gays and other “undesirables.”
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because anti-gunners tell us that the police and military are the only people who should have guns (which is a joke in itself), and that we need to give up our own guns and trust the government. We don’t trust anti-gunners because we know that hundreds of millions of people have been killed by their own governments in the last century, and not a single law seeking to ban the government from possessing guns has ever been submitted. Yet when but a few thousand people are killed by civilian criminals, tens of millions of American citizens like myself who did not commit any crimes at all are subjected to gun restrictions and personal persecution at the hands of emotional anti-gun bigots.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because anti-gunners insult us for our opposition to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (aka the “ATF”). We don’t trust anti-gunners because we know the ATF is hardly a law enforcement agency but is really a glorified tax collection agency that has abused, ruined the lives of, or murdered dozens of innocent gun owners through overzealous enforcement of gun-related tax and paperwork regulations. Just ask Louis Katona, Patty and Paul Mueller, John Lawmaster, Tuscon Police Lt. Mike Lara or any of the dozens of other victims of criminal ATF agents. Where was the ACLU for all that? And it doesn’t help that President Obama tried to appoint known anti-gunner Andrew Traver to be the ATF director. Check out the ATF’s “Good Ol’ Boys Roundup,” “Project Gunrunner” scandal and their loss of department guns for a little F-Troop entertainment sometime, too.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because they always bemoan the NRA, claiming the NRA is the source of all their anti-gun legislation problems. We don’t trust anti-gunners because it never occurs to them that perhaps it’s not the NRA per se that has the power, but the millions of members that belong to it, and the millions more Americans who otherwise support it and its mission. The NRA is probably the largest private organization in America; maybe that has something to do with its influence...? We also don’t trust anti-gunners because they’re too ignorant to understand that the NRA only represents a minority of us anyway.
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because while they were crying about the victims of 9/11 or Aurora or Sandy Hook, and thanking God they weren’t there, I and many other gun people like me were crying because we weren’t there, and asked God why we couldn’t have been. Many of us wish we were on one of the 9/11 airplanes, and not because we have a death wish but because we have a life wish. Because when we sit in silence and the world’s distractions fall away, the thought creeps in: Could I have made a difference?
Gun people don’t trust anti-gun people because I and many of us are what they call “sheepdogs” and we’re proud of that. Yet anti-gunners make fun of us, calling us “cowboys” and “wannabes” for it. Wanting to save lives and being willing to sacrifice one’s own to do it used to be considered a virtue in this country. Anti-gunners think they have the moral outrage, but the moral outrage is ours. I have never expressed any of these feelings openly to anyone because they are private and deeply personal. Screw you for demeaning us and motivating me to speak them.
Do unto others
No, anti-gunners, we don’t trust you. And you’ve given us no reason to, either. We gun owners obey the law each and every day, same as you. We defend your nation, protect your communities, teach your children, take care of you when you’re sick, defend you when you go to court or prosecute those who do you wrong. We cook and serve your food, haul and deliver your goods, construct your homes, unclog your sewers, make your electricity, and build or fix your cars.
We are everywhere and all around you, and we exist with you peacefully. You are our friends, neighbors and countrymen, and we are these things proudly. We mourn with you when radicals crash airplanes into our buildings, when hurricanes destroy the lives of our people, or when the criminal and mentally ill kill dozens of our school children. We cheer with you when USA wins the gold medal, when terrorists like Bin Laden are brought to justice, or when we land a machine built by American hands on Mars.
So what more can we do to earn your trust, your love and your acceptance other than surrender our rights, bow down to you and take your non-stop attacks?
Anti-gunners label people like me “gun nuts” even though we're anything but nutty. Our enjoyment of firearms doesn’t define us; it is but a single value and right we enjoy and cherish, among many other rights and values we enjoy and cherish — including the very same ones anti-gunners do too — like the First Amendment and the rest of the Bill of Rights.
No, anti-gunners are absolutely right: There can be no rational debate on this issue anymore. Anti-gunners don’t understand guns, they don’t understand crime, they don’t understand American history and traditions, they don’t understand gun owners and don’t care to understand us, and they reduce people like me to a debasing label or a number they’ve got no clue about.
Anti-gunners reject our passions, our traditions, our knowledge, our experiences, our beliefs, our wisdom, our rights. Anti-gunners reject our very individuality by reducing us to labels, stereotypes and false or distorted statistics. Screw you for destroying that individuality and denying our humanity.
I am proudly one of many: a caring, friendly, loyal and loving human being. I am an educated and intelligent person, and while I may not be the best-looking guy, friends tell me I have a great personality (yay?). Perhaps more importantly though, I am a proud citizen of this country, and I’d perform any sacrifice for others so that they may not themselves have to sacrifice.
And unlike most anti-gunners, it seems, I have served my community and nation in various roles throughout the years — roles that, ironically, often entailed guns. Where I was once given a uniform and a gun, and trusted with it to ensure the safety and security of others, I am now a pariah among many of the very people I sacrificed for. I am sadly one of many here, too. What a terrible, hurtful insult and betrayal!
An anti-gunner reads a book though, or sees a documentary on TV — or perhaps worst of all, gets a degree — and suddenly they have the almighty authority and expertise to tell us how we ought to live our lives, replying to our objections to their onslaught by throwing pictures of dead kids in our faces and commanding us to shut up, because we’re just a bunch of stupid radicals and liberals alone know what’s best for America.
You anti-gunners out there will lead us down a path you do not want to go down. Your lack of care and understanding of those who abide by America’s oldest and deepest-rooted tradition will cause a social rift in this country of the likes we have never seen in America’s young history. Your lack of understanding chances causing a civil war — a civil war that will be far worse, more acrimonious, more prolonged and more deadly than the last one.
Anti-gunners may think the military could prevent such a thing — an argument often used against us pro-gunners — but with only a few million people in the military, and with the United States containing 300 million citizens spread across nearly four million square miles, many of whom are themselves veterans, well, military occupation of this country is impossible. It doesn’t help that most street cops (opposed to their politician bosses) are pro-gun, too. And what happens when the civilian industries that support the military stop producing the supplies our military needs?
The rift is already beginning. We must mend fences...Now.
Sleeping dragons and terrible resolve
I do not want to live through a war in my own backyard. I do not want our children to grow up in such an America, either. So anti-gunners: Please stop, I beg you. See the writing on the wall before it’s too late.
Yes, there is a terrible crime problem, and yes, that problem sometimes involves guns — but it is the perpetrator that is the problem, not the instrument. Yes, there is a great divide between liberals and conservatives on the issue of guns. And while I will be the very first person to criticize the Republican Party on its many and frequent mistakes, and even stand with my democratic friends in my disfavor of those things, on the gun issue it is not the conservatives who are mostly in the wrong this time.
We want the crime and killings to stop as much as you do, so to my fellow citizens who are anti-gun I say: So long as you deny our humanity, so long as you malign our dignity, intelligence and wisdom, so long as you seek to shade us under a cloud of evil that we do not partake in or support, so long as you tell us that because we own guns we are terrible people, you will prove yourselves absolutely right in that we won’t come to the table to talk with you.
And there will be no hope for resolution but through victory by force initiated by one side or the other, God help us, for we will not plow for those who didn’t beat their swords into plowshares.
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Barry Snell is a senior in history and political science from Muscatine, Iowa.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/07/us-usa-guns-study-idUSBRE94611020130507
http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-gun-crimes-pew-report-20130507,0,3022693.story
http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/05/07/gun-homicide-rate-down-49-since-1993-peak-public-unaware/
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http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/05/09/dod-forces-3d-gun-printer-defense-distributed-to-pull-weapon-specs-off-website/
The world's first 3D-printed handgun, The Liberator, has had its liberty taken away by the government.
Plans for the working handgun were posted online by Cody Wilson, founder of Defense Distributed, potentially allowing anyone with access to a 3D printer to make a firearm from plastic. The plans, which had been in the works for months, caused alarm among gun control advocates but were seen by some Second Amendment advocates as a breakthrough. More than 100,000 copies of the plans were downloaded before the federal government took the files.
“[Defense Distributed's] files are being removed from public access at the request of the U.S. Department of Defense Trade Controls," read a banner atop the website. "Until further notice, the United States government claims control of the information.”
Wilson told FoxNews.com that he decided to comply with the request to remove the gun specs from his website while he weighs his legal options.
"They asked that I take it down while they determine if they have the authority to control the info," he said. "It's clearly a direct response to everything we did this week. 3D printing is clearly not the best way to make an effective weapon."
"Until further notice, the United States government claims control of the information.”
- Defense Distributed website
Wilson says he has complied with most laws on the books and feels that the request from the agency, a branch of the Department of State, may be politically motivated.
"If this is an attempt to control the info from getting out there, it's clearly a weak one," he said, adding that the CAD design for the weapon has already spread across the Internet at downloading sites like the Pirate Bay.
All 16 parts of the controversial gun, called the Liberator, are made from a tough, heat-resistant plastic used in products such as musical instruments, kitchen appliances and vehicle bumper bars. Fifteen of the components are made with a 3D printer while one is a non-functional metal part which can be picked up by metal detectors, making it legal under U.S. law. The firing pin is also not made of plastic, though it is easily crafted from a metal nail.
The weapon is designed to fire standard handgun rounds and even features an interchangeable barrel so that it can handle different caliber rounds.
Defense Distributed is a not-for-profit group founded by Wilson, a law student at the University of Texas. He said the Liberator project was intended to highlight how technology can render laws and governments all but irrelevant.
"I recognize that this tool might be used to harm people," Wilson told Forbes. "That’s what it is -- it’s a gun. But I don’t think that’s a reason to not put it out there. I think that liberty in the end is a better interest."
His publishing of the printable blueprints online instantly sparked outrage in the U.S.
Using the file, anyone with access to a 3D printer could theoretically print the gun with no serial number, background check or other regulatory hurdles.
U.S. Rep. Steve Israel, D-N.Y., has already called for national legislation to ban 3D-printed guns.
"Security checkpoints, background checks and gun regulations will do little good if criminals can print plastic firearms at home and bring those firearms through metal detectors with no one the wiser," Israel said.
"When I started talking about the issue of plastic firearms months ago, I was told the idea of a plastic gun is science-fiction," he added. "Now that this technology is proven, we need to act now to extend the ban on plastic firearms."
Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story listed the Department of Defense as the source of the take-down request. It came instead from the Department of Defense Trade Controls, an arm of the Department of State. The corrected story is above.
Sky News contributed reporting to this story.
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http://dcclothesline.com/2013/05/13/colorado-voters-fight-back-attempt-to-recall-socialist-gun-grabbers/
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This seeems legit; can someone verify? GM?
Dear Friends,
Several of you have asked me why so many gun owners are against the
"Background Checks" that have been proposed in Congress? Why did the Senators
not pass the bill? Doesn't background checks screen out the bad guys from getting a gun? I pass the following information on to you for a more careful look at the "Background Checks" bill that failed in the Senate.
Jim Tarro
BACKGROUND CHECK BILL
The "most popular" part of the defeated-but-sure-to-come back Senate gun control bill (background checks) sounds like a good idea at first but is more restrictive than anyone anticipated and will have significant unintended consequences.
There is a huge push to get it through Congress before the public has a chance to consider its contents.
Common activities that we take for granted will become federal crimes.
These are not irresponsible exaggerations. Please take a moment to review the requirements of the bill.
Here are a few examples of the restrictions in the bill:
EXAMPLE #1
Loaning your buddy a shotgun for a duck hunting trip will be considered a transfer. If the following requirements are not met, YOU HAVE BOTH COMMITTED A FEDERAL CRIME.
1. He must have already purchased his hunting license
2. Season is already open (and will not close before he returns it)
3. He cannot travel with the firearm through a county where season is not yet open or any area where hunting is prohibited and certainly not across a state line.
He CANNOT stop by your house on the day before season opens, pick up the shot gun, go to the sporting goods store to buy a license and shells then drive out to the hunting lease. In this scenario, YOU BOTH WOULD HAVE COMMI TTED MULTIPLE FEDERAL CRIMES, YOUR WEAPONS WILL BE FORFEITED AND YOU WILL LOOSE YOUR RIGHT TO BUY OR OWN A FIREARM.
EXAMPLE #2
It appears that only you may relocate your weapons. If your weapon leaves your home without you, the new legislation considers it a transfer of possession. ALL transfers require going through a firearms dealer, paying the transfer fee and a background check for the transferee.
Putting the weapon, even temporarily in someone else's possession, requires a transfer through a dealer. There is no exception for putting them in a friend's truck while moving to your new house or packing them unloaded, locked in a gun safe into a moving truck.
Any scenario in which your weapon leaves your home without you is considered a transfer. Failure to properly transfer the weapon is a federal crime which can result in a prison term AND WILL RESULT IN THE FORFEITURE OF YOUR WEAPON.
In the scenario above, your buddy's truck was used to commit a federal crime and WILL BE CONFISCATED just like with current Fish and Game violations.
EXAMPLE #3
Infractions as above which involve 2 guns of any type are considered weapons trafficking. You will be prosecuted under the same federal laws as a terrorist arms dealer.
EXAMPLE #4
Any of the infractions above (or hundreds of other routine scenarios) may result in federal charges, confiscation of ALL your weapons and being prohibited, like all felons, from ever owning a weapon again.
Please read the text of the bill yourself. Most of it is boring legalese but the sections on transfers and trafficking are critical.
Take a minute to think about all the routine activities like those above that will make you a federal criminal and result in prison time plus the confiscation of your weapons and other property.
A link to the bill is included below on the official Senate website. See Section 122 "Firearms Transfers".
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c113:S.649:
Read it and call your congressman's office. Talk to their staff. Tell them how you feel about this.
Keep in mind, none of the above would have stopped the tragedy's in Columbine or Newtown . The proposed law makes you a criminal and opens the door for confiscation of your weapons and property for otherwise routine activities.
Think and act. Congress is hoping that you will do neither.
If you found the patience to read the entire text, you also learned that exactly $100 million per year of your tax money is set aside to enforce these restrictions.
*****
Molon Labe...
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/03/foghorn/breaking-details-of-shumers-mandatory-background-check-bill-s-374/
BREAKING: Details of Schumer’s Mandatory Background Check Bill (S. 374)
Posted on March 12, 2013 by Nick Leghorn
We’ve finally gotten a look at Chuck Shumer’s proposed mandatory background check bill, and the truth is that this thing is ridiculous. The bill is overly broad, has some crazy penalties, and cracks the door WIDE open for government abuse. The full text of the bill is here, and since it’s in that terrible bill-speak legalese, I’ll try to summarize it for you . . .
The main provision of the bill is that any transfer of a firearm, no matter how fleeting, needs to go through an FFL and the transferee needs to have a background check performed through the NICS system. There are some exceptions, but they aren’t very good ones. Page 11 starts off the meat and potatoes for those following along at home.
In order to qualify for an exception to the rule of all transfers going through an FFL, the following requirements must be met:
1.The temporary transfer takes place at the owner’s house
2.The gun can’t be moved from the property
3.The transfer must last less than 7 days
There’s also a poorly worded exception for hunting and “sporting purposes,” as well as gifts to family members. What that means is if you go on a trip for more than 7 days and leave your guns at home unattended with a roommate, its now a felony under this law. And if I’m reading this right, this applies if you leave your guns with your spouse, but don’t transfer them as a gift.
There’s also no exception for lending guns to friends for the afternoon on the range. I regularly loan out my older competition guns to friends who want to compete in local matches, as the guns can be expensive and its easier to figure out if competition shooting is right for you if you can give it a try. Under this new bill, that would be illegal.
It also appears that it would be illegal to hand a firearm to someone other than the owner, effectively killing range trips with friends.
I quote from the bill the definition of “transfer” includes:
shall include a sale, gift, loan, return from pawn or consignment, or other disposition
Broad much? The only exception appears to be handing a gun to a potential buyer to evaluate and lending guns at a shooting range but ONLY IF:
at a shooting range located in or on premises owned or occupied by a duly incorporated organization organized for conservation purposes or to foster proficiency in firearms and the firearm is, at all times, kept within the premises of the shooting range;
So, only facilities where the stated purpose in the incorporation documents is conservation (hunting) or firearms proficiency. And if you’re shooting on your own private property, or on BLM land, ANY lending of guns EVEN IN THE PRESENCE OF THE OWNER for recreational shooting would be illegal.
As one of the provisions designed to “alleviate the fears” of the gun-owning public, it looks like there’s a provision in here that permanently sets the price of all FFL transfer fees to the same amount. That number will be set by the Attorney General, which these days is still Eric Holder. The current speculation is that this FFL fee will be used to do what the NFA tax was originally designed to do — make buying or transferring a gun so expensive that almost no one can do it.
In addition to the transfer requirements, it also makes it a federal felony to fail to report a lost or stolen firearm. If the gun isn’t reported to the authorities within 24 hours, that’s a 5-year stretch in a federal pokey you just earned yourself.
The bill also specifically removes the ability for people with state permits to skip the NICS check. Currently in Texas, those with a concealed handgun license can purchase a gun without a NICS check as they’ve already passed a more stringent background check than NICS provides. This puts more strain on the FFL as well as the NICS system.
As written, this bill is a trainwreck. It creates felons out of people who may not have been aware that their roommate (on their month long trip through Asia) even owned a firearm, much less that there was one in the house. It allows the government to regulate the price of background checks, enacting a mandatory fee (read tax) to be paid every time you want to exercise a right guaranteed by the Second Amendment, and lets the government set the fee at whatever level they choose with no recourse. It also creates de facto registration through the NICS checks as well as the paperwork preservation requirements already in place.
You don’t have to pay a fee to vote, as the supreme court ruled that unconstitutional. But for Chuck Shumer, its okay to charge a fee to exercise your Second Amendment right. And he’ll tell you how much to pay.
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/gun-laws/breaking-new-guns-essentially-banned-in-california-as-microstamping-law-takes-effect/
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http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/05/20/if-your-doctor-asks-you-about-guns-do-you-have-answer
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*Watchdog report says DOJ official retaliated against ‘Furious’ whistle-blower, lied about it
* (http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/20/watchdog-report-says-doj-official-retaliated-against-furious-whistle-blower/#ixzz2TslkF1En)
By William La Jeunesse
Published May 20, 2013
FoxNews.com
The former U.S. Attorney for Arizona could be disbarred, after an investigation found he lied to the Justice Department about his role in trying to discredit the federal whistle-blower who exposed the botched gun-running scheme known as Fast and Furious.
An Office of Inspector General report showed that Dennis Burke -- the former chief of staff for Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano appointed as U.S. Attorney for Arizona by President Obama in September 2009 -- lied when asked if he leaked sensitive documents to the press meant to undermine the credibility of ATF whistle-blower John Dodson.
The IG report also said Burke likely leaked the memo in retaliation for Dodson's whistle-blowing, and challenged the credibility of statements he made to congressional investigators. Dodson first went to Congress in 2010 after his own agency and the Justice Department refused to investigate his complaints that Operation Fast and Furious, an anti-gun-trafficking effort, was out of control.
"We also concluded that Burke's disclosure of the Dodson memorandum was likely motivated by a desire to undermine Dodson's public criticisms of Operation Fast and Furious. Although Burke denied to congressional investigators that he had any retaliatory motive for his actions, we found substantial evidence to the contrary," the IG report, released Monday, said.
Dodson appeared before Congress in June 2011. At the time, the Department of Justice denied his claim that the federal government approved a plan to knowingly assist criminals in smuggling thousands of guns to the Mexican drug cartels.
Dodson's credibility was crucial since nearly everyone above him denied the allegation. The report found that Burke leaked information that sought to undermine Dodson's story to a Fox News producer.
"The report brings into question, yet again, the treatment that whistle-blowers receive from this administration," Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said Monday. "Instead of examining the allegations that came forward, the Justice Department almost immediately began to attack the credibility and good name of a dedicated federal agent upset with what he was ordered to do."
Burke used his private email account to leak the information to a friend in Washington who then hand-delivered the information to the Fox producer. The IG said in its report it used an "administrative subpoena" to identify the personal email of relevant Department employees to confirm the leak.
Once contacted by IG staff, Burke admitted he was the source. The IG's office had asked 150 Justice Department employees to affirm they were not the leak.
But the report said he gave misleading information to congressional investigators. Asked about the issue by congressional investigators, Burke said: "I was under the impression that (the Dodson memo) had gone to the Hill and that I was basically giving (the Fox producer) a time advantage."
He also allegedly misled his own superior in Washington, Assistant Attorney General James Cole.
At the time, Cole had seen a New York Times story about Fast and Furious. In it, the paper published a picture which showed the document had been faxed from the U.S. attorney's office in Arizona. When confronted, the report said Burke told Cole, "I don't think we have a fax machine."
The IG report claims Burke was "admonished by Deputy Attorney General Cole for lying to him ... and had been put on notice such disclosures should not occur."
After speaking with Burke, Cole wrote "another horrible incident of bad judgment." The following day, Aug. 13, Burke resigned.
Fox News tried unsuccessfully to contact Burke, who recently formed a security and lobbying firm with former Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan, Chicago White Sox and Chicago Bulls Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf and Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano's Chief of Staff Noah Kroloff.
The Office of Inspector General is an investigative arm that monitors the Justice Department. It tried to interview Burke, but he resigned.
The IG said Burke violated numerous federal and professional rules of conduct and it would forward a copy of its report to the Arizona State Bar Association for disciplinary conduct.
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/reason-number-7452-to-stay-out-of-nj-tx-man-transporting-unloaded-firearms-through-nj-doing-3-5-years-in-prison/
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An English friend posted this elsewhere: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22275280 This clearly contradicts my sense of things. I thought crime was going up after guns were banned?
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An English friend posted this elsewhere: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-22275280 This clearly contradicts my sense of things. I thought crime was going up after guns were banned?
As much as crime stats are manipulated for political reasons, I'd take that with a grain of salt.
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But to say that does not give me a reply to my English friend. I could swear we have several posts in this thread citing data of British crime rates rising considerably but a hotel lobby connection in Buenos Aires is not quite the spot to do the searching. Anyone inspired to give me a hand with this will be appreciated.
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I doubt many jihadists would feel safe beheading someone on a public street in Arizona or Texas as opposed to Londinistan.
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That is a separate point. Right now I am hoping to put my hands on data (perhaps to be found somewhere in this thread about whether crime has gone up or down in the wake of the gun confiscation and new gun and self-defense laws.
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/5712573/UK-is-violent-crime-capital-of-Europe.html
UK is violent crime capital of Europe
The United Kingdom is the violent crime capital of Europe and has one of the highest rates of violence in the world, worse even than America, according to new research.
By Richard Edwards, Crime Correspondent
7:00AM BST 02 Jul 2009
Analysis of figures from the European Commission showed a 77 per cent increase in murders, robberies, assaults and sexual offences in the UK since Labour came to power.
The total number of violent offences recorded compared to population is higher than any other country in Europe, as well as America, Canada, Australia and South Africa.
Opposition leaders said the disclosures were a "damning indictment" of the Government's failure to tackle deep-rooted social problems.
The figures combined crime statistics for England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
The UK had a greater number of murders in 2007 than any other EU country – 927 – and at a relative rate higher than most western European neighbours, including France, Germany, Italy and Spain.
It also recorded the fifth highest robbery rate in the EU, and the highest absolute number of burglaries, with double the number of offences recorded in Germany and France.
Overall, 5.4 million crimes were recorded in the UK in 2007 - more than 10 a minute - second only to Sweden.
Chris Grayling, shadow home secretary, said: "This is a real damning indictment of this government's comprehensive failure over more than a decade to tackle the deep rooted social problems in our society, and the knock-on effect on crime and anti-social behaviour.
"We're now on our fourth Home Secretary in this parliament, and all we are getting is a rehash of old initiatives that didn't work the first time round. More than ever Britain needs a change of direction."
The figures were sourced from Eurostat, the European Commission's database of statistics. They are gathered using official sources in the countries concerned such as the national statistics office, the national prison administration, ministries of the interior or justice, and police.
A breakdown of the statistics, which were compiled into league tables by the Conservatives, revealed that violent crime in the UK had increased from 652,974 offences in 1998 to more than 1.15 million crimes in 2007.
It means there are over 2,000 crimes recorded per 100,000 population in the UK, making it the most violent place in Europe.
Austria is second, with a rate of 1,677 per 100,000 people, followed by Sweden, Belgium, Finland and Holland.
By comparison, America has an estimated rate of 466 violent crimes per 100,000 population.
France recorded 324,765 violent crimes in 2007 – a 67 per cent increase in the past decade – at a rate of 504 per 100,000 population.
The Home Office says there has been a downtrend in overall violence for the past decade.
But last October it emerged that levels of violent crime in England and Wales had been underestimated for more than a decade because of a blunder in recording methods.
Ministers admitted that some police forces had not been recording offences of grievous bodily harm with intent as serious violent crime. When the offences were included violent crime figures immediately increased by a fifth.
Separate figures disclosed in May showed that the number of people requiring hospital treatment after being seriously hurt in street fights or assaults has risen 50 per cent in five years.
More than 20 people a day were taken to hospital accident and emergency departments in England last year after being hit, kicked, scratched or bitten. Alcohol is blamed as a factor in half of the incidents and raises further questions over 24-hour drinking.
Researchers admit that comparisons of crime data between countries must be viewed with caution because of differing criminal justice systems and how crimes are reported and measured.
A Home Office spokesperson said: “These figures are misleading. Levels of police recorded crime statistics from different countries are simply not comparable since they are affected by many factors, for example the recording of violent crime in other countries may not include behaviour that we would categorise as violent crime.
“Violent crime in England and Wales has fallen by almost a half since a peak in 1995 but we are not complacent and know there is still work to do. “
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GM, you are amazing. I can always count on you to come through.
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http://www.guns.com/2013/05/28/district-attorney-wont-prosecute-man-for-violating-ny-safe-act-magazine-limit-video/
PS: My British friend challenges your citation on the basis that the increase is due to changes in counting methodology.
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http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/05/ak-47-semi-automatic-rifle-building-party
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<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010>
Marc,
Last month, with a lot of help from Barack Obama, the United Nations
passed its global gun ban treaty.
And now, Obama is expected to sign this freedom-crushing disaster as
soon as June 3rd — just days from now!!
The only way you and I can stop the Obama-U.N. collusion from
trampling our Second Amendment freedoms is through the U.S. Senate.
Only the Senate can ratify treaties. So I need your help to convince a
strong majority of our Senators to vote NO on the U.N. Arms Trade
Treaty by signing this petition today.
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010>
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010>Your signed petition is the best tool we have against
this attack on our gun rights and our national sovereignty. We need to
line the halls of the Senate with boxes and boxes of these petitions — *and
every petition counts, starting with yours!*
We need to send a clear message to every Senator that they have only
two choices: Side with us and stop the U.N. gun ban treaty...or start
looking for a new job at election time.
So please, sign your petition today
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010>...we have zero time to lose. And after you do, I hope
that you'll make a much-needed contribution to NRA-ILA so we can WIN
THIS FIGHT.
We need to hammer key battleground states with hard-hitting radio and
T.V. ads. We need to blanket the Senate with millions of these
petitions. We need to put our grassroots boots on the ground and win
every last vote we need to stop this dangerous treaty before it
becomes the law of the land.
But all of this costs money, and our resources are stretched thin
right now. This year, we've been forced to spend more than we've ever
spent ...because the attacks we're facing have been bigger than
anything we've ever faced before.
So please, sign your petition
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010> and then make an emergency contribution of $15, $25,
$50, $100, or any other amount you can afford to NRA-ILA today. Every
dollar counts, and every dollar will be spent stopping the Senate from
ratifying the U.N. gun ban treaty.
Again, we have no time to lose...June 3rd is only DAYS away!
Working together, I know we can save our freedom from this
unprecedented attack.
*Please take action now.* Thank you.
In Liberty,
Chris
*Chris W. Cox*
Executive Director
www.NRAILA.org <http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/1590/0/>
P.S. *President Obama is threatening to sign the U.N. gun ban treaty
as soon as June 3rd*. You have to ACT NOW if you want to stop him and
the U.N. from trampling your constitutional Right to Keep and Bear
Arms.
So please, sign this petition as soon as you can. And when you do,
please make an emergency contribution to NRA-ILA to help us win this
fight!
NRA-ILA is putting every last ounce of our strength and energy into
stopping the ratification of the U.N. gun ban treaty. *But our efforts
could fall short unless you help today.*
I know we can win with your support. Thank you.
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/26284/0/
ek=1330E10010>
National Rifle Association - Institute for Legislative Action * 11250
Waples Mill Road * Fairfax, VA 22030
Please do not reply to this email. If you no longer want to receive
future Chris Cox notifications, please click here
<http://www.nramedia.org/t/1648714/79123757/107/0/?90482085=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5ucmFtZWRpYS5vcmcvdT9pZD03OTEyMzc1Ny4xMDFiNWUwZTk0ZDQwMDE4MTRiMzJiZWQ0NTMxODZlZCZuPVQmbD1ucmFpbGFfY2hyaXNfY294Jm89MTY0ODcxNA%3d%3d&x=80b5e438>,
and
you will be removed immediately! Thank you!
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Gun Owners of America
________________________________________
Nevada's Governor Vetoes Universal Background Checks!
While Biden set to jumpstart push for gun control next week
“One of the few who do know what they are doing is Gun Owners of America and Larry Pratt.” -- Peter Moss, “Who is Winning the Gun War?” AmmoLand, June 5, 2013
Stunning victory for gun rights in Nevada!
You guys did a tremendous job bombarding Governor Brian Sandoval’s office with phone calls, and he has listened to your appeals.
Governor Sandoval vetoed the Universal Background Check bill yesterday, and now, the anti-gun Left is in full-mourning.
The Associated Press reports that, “It is a significant defeat for New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's gun control advocacy group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns [MAIG]. The organization spent hundreds of thousands of dollars working to get the bill passed through to the governor.”
Despite Bloomberg’s fortune, his anti-gun MAIG simply doesn’t have the grassroots behind it.
GOA was joined by other groups on Tuesday, June 4, in asking Nevada gun owners to urge Sandoval to veto the legislation.
The next day, reports the Las Vegas Review-Journal, “2,200 people called his office between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m.... Four out of five calls [were] for the veto.”
According to the Journal, this onslaught was one of the chief reasons that the Governor set up a hotline number. His office simply couldn’t get work done as they were being “bombarded by calls from people who want the governor to veto the gun control bill passed by the Legislature.”
Once the Governor set up a hotline number -- and Bloomberg started running ads urging people nationwide to call it -- GOA urged gun owners nationwide (last Friday) to call Sandoval’s office.
As of this past Tuesday, more than 100,000 calls had already been placed to the Governor. And this just underscores how important it is for gun owners to join GOA’s email service.
Every new person you encourage to sign up for our free email alerts or for a new GOA membership gives us a louder voice in Washington and in states across the country!
The Governor was inclined to veto the gun control bill all along, but gun owners can be sure that -- had the poll results gone the other way -- he could have been easily persuaded to bow to Bloomberg’s pressure.
Nevada is a key state as it is home to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D) and to “swing vote” Senator Dean Heller (R). Defeating Universal Background Checks in the Silver State -- with overwhelming numbers of callers opposing it -- sends a powerful message from a Purple State, that Americans do NOT want additional gun control!
Thanks to everyone who emailed our alerts ... who made phone calls ... and who registered their opinion with the Governor’s office.
Your activism makes a difference ... and your continued support helps keep us in the fight.
Double-barrel Joe Biden set to jumpstart push for gun control
Meanwhile, at the national level, the Vice President is planning an event where he will push gun control next week.
While he’s keeping the details of the event hush-hush, Biden said, “I personally haven’t given up [efforts at gun control], nor has the President.”
GOA will keep you posted on all the latest news and efforts in Washington to restrict our gun rights.
Thanks again for your support. And remember:
Every new person you encourage to sign up for our free email alerts or for a new GOA membership gives us a louder voice in Washington and in states across the country!
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http://therightscoop.com/if-there-ever-was-an-argument-for-owning-a-gun-this-is-it/
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Gun Owners Foundation
________________________________________
Taking on Zero Tolerance in Schools
supporting Jared Marcum against overzealous prosecutor
Gun Owners Foundation has come to the defense of a West Virginia teenager who is actually being prosecuted (a.k.a., persecuted) for his pro-gun views.
Jared Marcum wore a T-shirt to his Logan County middle school in West Virginia on April 18 -- a decision that has since sparked a national controversy.
No, Jared’s T-shirt did not depict a Muslim beheading a victim while shouting Alahu Akhbar! Such depictions of violence would violate the school’s dress code.
Jared’s T-shirt depicted a hunting rifle with the message: “Protect Your Right.” And now, he faces up to a year in jail for doing so!
The outrageousness of this case has prompted the involvement of Gun Owners Foundation, which has agreed to help Jared pro bono.
People can help Gun Owners Foundation assist Jared Marcum by going to our foundation’s site and giving a contribution.
It all began on April 18. Everything was fine for the morning classes, but then the day went goofy when an anti-gun teacher confronted Jared in the lunch line and told him to turn his shirt inside out.
Jared pointed out that his shirt did not violate school policy.
The teacher sent Jared to the office where the same back and forth was repeated with the administration. Then a police officer was summoned who ordered Jared to turn his shirt inside out. Jared told the officer and the administration that he was doing nothing wrong.
According to the officer, Jared’s shirt constituted a terrorist threat. He did not put that in his written report, but instead charged Jared with obstructing an officer (apparently Jared interrupted the officer while he was talking to the administration).
Jared was cuffed, charged and told that he could be fined up to $500 and spend up to a year in jail. The prosecutor decided to press the charge, and a judge allowed the prosecution to proceed.
In a town of less than 2,000, what are the odds that at least five adults are this insane? And all on the same day?
Zero Tolerance can be better understood as Zero Judgment.
Jared was suspended for a day. When he returned to school, around 100 students wore similar shirts, and Jared wore the same shirt that fried the brains of five grownups two days earlier. Nothing happened. None of the students heard a word about their T-shirts.
Jared and his stepfather, Allen Ladieri, are to be commended for not backing down, and Gun Owners Foundation is actively supporting the case.
Usually, Gun Owners Foundation supports individuals appealing convictions on firearms charges that involve constitutional issues. But we think that Jared’s case warrants special attention, as it involves both First and Second Amendment freedoms.
If we are not allowed to make pro-Second Amendment statements -- all because somebody is offended -- then we can count the days to when we’ll lose the freedoms enshrined in both Amendments.
If Jared prevails in this case, we may have finally reached a turning point regarding Zero Tolerance, which is one of the most insidious policies being inflicted on the nation’s young people.
ACTION: While GOF is helping defend Jared Marcum pro bono, there are obviously significant costs involved. So please help by making a tax-deductible contribution to Gun Owners Foundation. You can assist in the Jared Marcum defense by giving a contribution to GOF here.
To read more about Gun Owners Foundation, click here.
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http://infobrodcast.blogspot.com/2013/06/major-recall-of-thompsoncenter-rifles.html
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/06/foghorn/bottom-drops-out-of-ar-15-market/
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/06/foghorn/bottom-drops-out-of-ar-15-market/
Good,I need a few more. Now, once ammo drops I can go shooting again...
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/06/24/atlanta-crook-makes-fatal-mistake-by-thinking-patrons-in-line-for-180-shoes-wont-exercise-2nd-amendment-right/
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http://michaelbane.blogspot.com/2013/06/michaels-rant-de-jour.html
We live, for at least a little while longer, in an open marketplace of ideas. A key point of living in that open marketplace of ideas is that the individual is responsible for sorting through those ideas. Gosh, doesn't that sound just like what we say about self-defense, that the individual is ultimately the only person responsible for his or her self-defense? Do both those responsibilities put more pressure on the individual? You betcha!
Never trust "gate-keeprs," including me. The problem with gate-keepers — people who ostensibly want to steer you toward those blogs/experts/products/whatever that are "certified" (by said gate-keeper) — is first that they want to be gate-keepers at all. LOL! Use your own brain!
The second meme that is irritating me to death is the seemingly endless tripe about how the ammo shortage is the result of "hoarders." I have written and talked about on DOWN RANGE Radio my thoughts on the ammo shortage (here's the short list), to wit, that it is the result of a "perfect storm" that includes increased demand from the flood of new shooters (Gun Culture Ver. 2.0) and the changing shooting habits of existing shooters, the increased demand caused by the very real attempts by the state and federal government to restrict ammo purchases/possession, increased world-wide tensions resulting in preparatory ammo purchases by numerous governments, the continued U.S. war footing (including a depletion of the National Reserve of ammo) that guarantees massive Dot.Gov ammo purchases for the foreseeable future, the exhaustion of the massive WW2 and Cold War surplus ammo caches in Europe, the drastic increase in demand for baseline manufacturing commodities like lead and copper, necessary for ammunition production, from countries like China and India and probably a couple of other factors I have totally overlooked.
Whenever I read that everything would be just ducky if we all only bought only what ammo we needed instead of a case, it reminds me of where that thinking comes from: "Jeder nach seinen Fähigkeiten, jedem nach seinen Bedürfnissen!" That rollicking Karl Marx! What a card! But in the last couple of weeks I read forum posts where shooters who always picked up a single box of ammo at Wally-World on the way to the Saturday match now bitterly attack "hoarders" who have made this stupid practice impossible; other shooters who explain how they have refused to take up reloading because it is 1) expensive, 2) boring and 3) takes a lot of time and now those damn hoarders have ruined it for them.
I have said this before...my definition of a "hoarder" is someone who was smarter than you. Given the current vicious meme about ammo hoarders, what does this tell us should the feces really hit the Schumer (as Jim Rawles says)? How quickly do you think your neighbors, your friends, your relatives, will turn on you about the "hoarded" food in your basement, your "hoarded" medical supplies, that "Hoarded" Big Berkey water filter you bought to guarantee your family's fresh water or the solar panels you're "hoarding" on your roof? We are a nation of grasshoppers who like to tell ourselves we're ants right up until the point that we're tested on the very things that ants do. And keep in mind that a horde of locust can quite literally overwhelm a country.
For years I and many other people have talked about the necessity of taking responsibility for the safety of ourselves and those under our care. We have urged you to simply follow the Boy Scout motto: Be prepared!
For those of you bemoaning those damn ammo hoarders, what did you think "Be Prepared!" actually meant?
Finally, Niels Bohr's other great quote:
Some subjects are so serious that one can only joke about them.
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http://knco.com/four-department-of-justice-arrests-in-nevada-county/
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second post
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/06/25/study-using-guns-for-defense-leads-to-fewer-injuries
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http://www.youtube.com/embed/9RABZq5IoaQ?feature=player_embedded
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NRA-ILA Legal Update June 2013
It has been several months since the last edition of Legal Update, but not because these have been slow times for Second Amendment supporters. While most of our attention (and the media's) has been focused on legislative battles, there has been plenty of action on pending court cases-and, unfortunately, new litigation has become necessary in several states.
Suit Filed to Strike Down New York's "SAFE" Act
On February 28, NRA President David Keene addressed a rally gathered in Albany, N.Y. to protest the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms (SAFE) Act, telling the crowd of more than 10,000, "We'll help you overcome these statutes in court." On March 21, the NRA made good on that promise, assisting the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, the Westchester County Firearm Owner Association, the Sportsmen's Association for Firearm Education and the New York Amateur Trap Association, along with several businesses and individuals, in filing suit. The defendants are Governor Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, and other state officials.
For those unfamiliar with New York's most recent foray into gun control and bad governance, here is a rundown. After several days of closed-door meetings and deal making, on Jan. 14, Gov. Cuomo sprung the SAFE Act bill on the state Senate only twenty minutes before a scheduled vote. The Senate passed the measure, the House approved it the following day and Cuomo signed it immediately. To bypass any legislative debate, Cuomo invoked a "message of necessity," eliminating the three-day waiting period before legislation may receive a vote, as required by the state constitution. The whole process was described in the New York Times as "classic Cuomo" where "Eggs are broken, speed rules, an open process is sacrificed, and results are achieved—sometimes triumphant, often jagged and imperfect."
"Imperfect" was right. The Times went on to explain, "Before New York's new gun control law was even passed, lawmakers were acknowledging that they would have to pass a second measure to clean up some of its errors." The law's wide-ranging attack on the rights of gun owners had many significant flaws. The complaint in the case tackles many of the most offensive parts of the new law, including the prohibitions on many popular magazines and semiautomatic firearms, the registration of previously "grandfathered" semiautomatics, and prohibitions on ammunition transfers.
READ MORE >>
Colorado Sheriffs Launch Challenge to Magazine and Private Transfer Ban
While anti-gun legislation rarely comes as a surprise in the Northeast, anti-gun activists were especially proud to pass New York-style gun control in Colorado. What they may not have counted on was determined opposition in the courts-led by most of the state's top elected law enforcement officials.
On May 17, 54 of 64 Colorado county sheriffs, joined by several other groups representing gun owners, filed a complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief to halt the enforcement of HB 1224, a ban on magazines holding more than 15 rounds, and HB 1229, which restricts the ways in which gun owners may lawfully transfer firearms. Signed into law by Gov. John Hickenlooper (D) on March 20, the laws are set to take effect on July 1. NRA counsel is providing assistance to our fellow gun rights advocates and working on behalf of the rights of the disabled plaintiffs.
HB 1224 bans the sale and transfer after July 1 of magazines capable of holding more than 15 rounds of ammunition. Complicating matters is the problematic wording of the law, which can be interpreted to ensnare nearly all magazines-even those permanently attached to a firearm. The legislation prohibits any magazine that is "designed to be readily converted" to a capacity greater than 15.
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Suit Forces Maryland to Clarify Gun Transfer Rules
With Maryland residents forced to wait up to 10 weeks for the approval of an application for the transfer of regulated firearms" (handguns or certain semi-automatic long-guns), in mid-June the Maryland State Police and Attorney General finally clarified their position on the state law governing the transfer process. The state was forced to do so by an NRA-sponsored lawsuit filed on behalf of several Maryland residents, along with groups including Associated Gun Clubs of Baltimore, the Maryland Licensed Firearms Dealers Association and Maryland Shall Issue.
Like many of their counterparts in the rest of the country, in late 2012 and into 2013, Maryland residents--rightly fearful of new restrictions on their right to keep and bear arms--purchased firearms in record numbers. But unlike in most states, purchases of handguns or certain semi-automatic long-guns in Maryland require a seven-day waiting period, during which a background check is conducted by the state police. Unprepared for such demand, the Maryland State Police soon became backlogged with applications, forcing prospective gun buyers to wait months to have their purchases approved in some cases.
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State Organizations Lead Charge Against Connecticut Gun Law
On April 4, Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy (D) signed the inappropriately named "Act Concerning Gun Violence Prevention and Children's Safety." On May 22, a coalition of law-abiding gun owners led by the Coalition of Connecticut Sportsmen and the Connecticut Citizen's Defense League, along with businesses and individuals, filed suit to strike down this new burden to lawful gun ownership. As explained in the complaint, the suit seeks to "vindicate the right to the people of the State of Connecticut to keep and bear arms under the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution." The NRA is assisting in this litigation.
The "Constitution State's" unconstitutional legislation is a wide-ranging attack on the Second Amendment that seeks to burden law-abiding gun owners in every facet of exercising their rights. The law immediately bans the sale and transfer of all magazines with a capacity greater than 10 rounds; bans more than 100 semiautomatic rifles and pistols by name; bans those under 21 from purchasing semi-automatic centerfire rifles; and criminalizes the transfer of any firearm that is not conducted through a federally licensed dealer and subject to federal paperwork. Additionally, those using magazines with a capacity greater than 10 rounds for self-defense are barred from loading more than 10 rounds into the magazine, and a magazine cannot be carried for self-defense if it extends below the bottom of the pistol grip—language that potentially encompasses the vast majority of pistol magazines.
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Illinois Right-to-Carry: Litigation Leads to Legislation
While recent state attacks on popular firearms and on firearm transfers have been the focus of attention, another major front in the battle involves Right-to-Carry litigation. The epicenter of this litigation is in Illinois—still, as this edition of Legal Update goes out, the only state with no law on the books to provide a legal way for residents to carry firearms for self-defense outside one's home or business for self-defense. But that may be changing, in a way that shows the complex relationship between legislation and litigation.
First, in a major victory for the right of self-defense outside the home, on Dec. 11, 2012 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit struck down Illinois' ban on carriage. In a decision covering the NRA-backed case of Shepard v. Madigan and a similar non-NRA case, Moore v. Madigan, the court rejected the often-heard claim that the Second Amendment's protections apply inside the home but not outside, calling such a distinction "irrational."
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Hall v. Chicago Right-to-Carry Case Moves Forward
On January 18, following the Seventh Circuit decision striking down Illinois' ban on carrying firearms outside the home, another NRA-supported lawsuit was filed to ensure that Chicago abides by the Seventh Circuit ruling and offers Chicago residents the opportunity to protect themselves outside their homes.
In the Hall v. Chicago complaint, the lawyers for plaintiffs Michael Hall and Kathryn Tyler make clear that Chicago's carry ban should be voided as it is even more restrictive than the state ban struck by the Seventh Circuit. They note that Chicago's ban extends to anywhere outside the walls of one's residence or place of business, including an unattached or attached garage, and "any space outside the dwelling unit, including any stairs, porches, back, side or front yard space." Additionally a person would be unable to take a firearm to and from his home and business as a firearm registration certificate "shall only be valid for the address on the registration certificate."
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Coast-to-Coast Action in Right-to-Carry Cases
Just a week before December's NRA victory in Shepard v. Madigan, the San Francisco-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit heard arguments against the abuse of California's permitting structure by local authorities. The NRA-backed case of Peruta v. County of San Diego targets San Diego County, and Richards v. Prieto (a non-NRA case) challenges the practices of Yolo County.
At issue in both cases is the California law that says a resident may only receive a carry license if he or she shows "good cause." Issuing authorities such as county sheriffs or police chiefs have significant leeway in how "good cause" is interpreted, with some officials granting nearly every permit when the applicant passes a background check, and others imposing a nearly impossible standard. Further burdening the right, in 2011, California banned the unlicensed open carry of unloaded handguns, making it impossible to legally carry a handgun in any condition for self-defense outside the home without a license.
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NRA and CRPA Orange County Carry Suits Lead to Appeal
Opening another front in the Right-to-Carry battle, on Sept. 5, a lawsuit backed by the NRA and the California Rifle and Pistol Association was filed against Orange County, Calif. and Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The suit (McKay v. Hutchens) was filed on behalf of several Orange County residents who have been denied carry licenses and seeks to remedy Sheriff Hutchens' discriminatory licensing practice of requiring "good cause," which the complaint defines as "a special or contemporaneous 'need' to defend oneself—something more than 'general concerns about personal safety.'"
The complaint argues that bans on the open carry of unloaded handguns and long guns without a license, combined with a discriminatory licensing procedure for concealed carry, infringe on "the right of law-abiding, competent adults to 'possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation,'" as stated in Heller.
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Part-Time Residents' Gun Possession
Addressing a longstanding injustice that affects retirees and others who divide their time between different states, the case of Osterweil v. Bartlett challenges New York's refusal to issue handgun permits to part-year residents. The plaintiff lives part of the year in Louisiana and part of the year in upstate New York, where local authorities denied him the permit that is required to possess any handgun in the home under New York law.
Mr. Osterweil (a retired lawyer) sued, rightly arguing that the right to keep arms in one's home is not limited to full-time residents. Unfortunately, in May 2011, a federal district judge rejected his claim. Relying on decisions handed down before Heller, the court ruled that because it's harder for New York to track the eligibility of part-time residents, licenses can fairly be limited to "those people who have the greatest contacts with New York."
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Fifth Circuit Wrongly Upholds Ban on Young Adults' Handgun Purchases and Right-to-Carry
On Oct. 25, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld the federal law that bans dealer sales of handguns to law-abiding adults between the ages of 18 and 20. The decision, in the case of National Rifle Association v. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, involved a challenge to the law by several young adults, joined by the NRA on behalf of its members in the same age group.
In our briefs, we pointed out that the age limit is inconsistent with the laws America's founders passed—such as the Militia Act of 1792, which required 18-year-olds to arm themselves for militia service. The age limit is also in conflict with court decisions interpreting other constitutional rights such as the First Amendment's protection of free speech, as seen in a Second Circuit ruling that barred New York City from restricting the retail sale of spray paint and permanent markers to those under 21 in an attempt to combat graffiti.
Most important, though, is that the age limit is inconsistent with the Supreme Court's decision in Heller, which found that the Second Amendment protects the right of "all Americans" to keep and bear arms—handguns in particular—for self-defense.
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Federal Court Upholds Obama/Holder Gun Registration Scheme
On May 31, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld the Obama administration policy that requires federally licensed firearms retailers in states bordering Mexico to report multiple sales of certain semi-automatic rifles. The case, National Shooting Sports Foundation v. Jones, was brought by two NRA-backed firearms retailers and the National Shooting Sports Foundation acting on behalf of its members in the Southwest.
The requirement imposed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives forces all licensed firearm dealers in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas to report all sales of two or more semi-automatic rifles within five consecutive business days, if the rifles are larger than .22 caliber and use detachable magazines.
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Florida Firearm Owners' Privacy Act Under Review
On June 29, 2012 a federal district court in Florida blocked enforcement of several provisions of the state's Firearm Owners' Privacy Act, resulting from the case Wollschlaeger v. Governor State of Florida.
The 2011 law was enacted to stop activist doctors from pushing an anti-gun agenda upon the residents of Florida by unnecessarily inquiring about patients' gun ownership, and to protect patients' privacy by making sure doctors cannot record gun ownership information in a patient's medical file. Under the law, medical professionals and insurance companies are also not allowed to discriminate against patients based upon gun ownership. The law also makes clear that patients have a right to refuse to answer health practitioners' questions about gun ownership. The legislation was inspired by the experiences gun owners have faced while receiving medical treatment from anti-gun doctors.
The law is not an outright ban on doctor-patient speech, as has been portrayed in the media. It provides clear exceptions for gun ownership information that is "relevant to the patient's medical care or safety," and for medical personnel to inquire about gun ownership or possession in an emergency. It also does not stop interested patients from inquiring with their physician about firearms.
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Appeals Under Way in Challenge to San Francisco Laws
On Nov. 26, a federal judge denied the plaintiffs' motion (in the case of Jackson v. City & County of San Francisco) for a preliminary injunction to prevent San Francisco from enforcing its locked-firearm-storage requirement and its ban on the sale of popular ammunition that "serves no sporting purpose."
The storage provision requires the locked storage of all handguns inside the home unless "carried on the person." In opposition to the requirement, the motion cited Heller's recognition that defense inside the home is the core of the Second Amendment right and argues that the storage requirement clearly conflicts with this finding. Quoting Heller, the motion said, "'whatever else [the Second Amendment] leaves to future evaluation, it surely elevates above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home,'" which should make restrictions like the storage law "subject to the highest level of scrutiny."
On the ammunition ban, the motion pointed out that ammunition is clearly protected under the Second Amendment, and no historical justification exists for curtailing the sale of certain types of ammunition. Therefore, under the view of the Second Amendment adopted in Heller, San Francisco's ban must be invalid.
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Judge Throws Out One Suit to Ban Traditional Ammunition, While Another Continues
On May 23, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia threw out a case brought by the Center for Biological Diversity, which sought to force the Environmental Protection Agency into overstepping its congressionally designated authority by banning lead ammunition.
The suit began in 2012, following the EPA's rejection of a CBD petition urging the EPA to regulate traditional ammunition. Throughout the dispute, the radical anti-hunting group relied on an incorrect reading of the Toxic Substances Control Act, arguing that the EPA has the authority to regulate lead bullets as components of ammunition. In fact, in 1976 pro-gun lawmakers foresaw exactly this type of problem and added language to the legislation specifically exempting ammunition from its terms. Despite these repeated rebuffs and the plain language of the TSCA, CBD has continued its campaign against hunters and shooters.
Undeterred by their failure with the EPA, CBD is now trying to get the United States Forest Service to ban lead for hunting under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, known as RCRA.
READ MORE >>
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/06/27/gun-manufacturers-big-act-of-defiance-ahead-of-new-magazine-ban-in-colorado/
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Permits Soar to Allow More Concealed Guns
Proponents Say Practice Cuts Crime; Police Raise Concern
By JACK NICAS and ASHBY JONES
A growing number of Americans are getting permission to carry firearms in public—and under their clothes—a development that has sparked concern among some law-enforcement authorities.
Applications for "concealed-carry" permits are soaring in many states, some of which recently eased permit requirements. The numbers are driven in part by concern that renewed gun-control efforts soon could constrain access to weapons, along with heightened interest in self-defense in the wake of mass killings in Newtown, Conn., and Aurora, Colo.
Bob McGinty, a small-business owner in Minnesota, obtained a permit this year to carry his pistol concealed.
Since July 1 of last year, Florida has granted more than 173,000 new concealed-carry permits, up 17% from the year before and twice as many as five years ago, for a total of about 1.09 million permits in the state.
Ohio, meanwhile, is on pace to nearly double last year's total of 65,000 new permits, which would be nearly three times as many as in 2007. And Oklahoma, Tennessee, Wyoming and Nebraska all have nearly matched or surpassed last year's totals with half of 2013 still to go.
A dozen states surveyed for this article, including Texas, Utah and Wisconsin, issued 537,000 permits last year, an 18% increase compared with a year prior and more than double the number issued in 2007. Early figures for 2013 show many states are on pace for their biggest year ever.
About eight million Americans had concealed-carry permits as of last year, the Government Accountability Office said in what it called a conservative estimate.
"I suppose it's the same reason people are reporting gun sales are up and ammunition sales are up," said Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine, referring to concern among gun owners about the recent push for gun control. "It's nothing unique in Ohio.…It seems to be a consistent trend across the board."
States across the U.S. have loosened restrictions amid a spate of mass shootings in public spaces, making it easier to get concealed-carry permits and allowing concealed weapons in more places, including schools, churches and bars.
Some leaders in law enforcement call the increasing requests for concealed-carry permits unwelcome, citing safety concerns. Thomas Dart, sheriff of Illinois's Cook County, which encompasses Chicago, said that although the effect on crime is disputed, more people carrying guns "makes our job more difficult."
"Without the gun, it's a fistfight. With the gun, it's a shooting," he said.
Craig Steckler, president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, said he could remember only "one instance in which someone effectively defended himself" with a firearm during his 21 years as police chief in Fremont, Calif. Otherwise, "it's a whole lot of cases of guns being used not in ways they're designed: kids shooting themselves, gun-cleaning accidents, crimes of passion, that sort of thing."
Research is split on whether more armed citizens deter or exacerbate gun violence. Economist John Lott, a conservative commentator and author of "More Guns, Less Crime," said data show concealed-carry laws reduce violent crime.
But the National Research Council, part of the congressionally chartered National Academies, has disputed links between concealed-carry laws and drops in crime. And the Violence Policy Center, a nonprofit group that advocates for gun control, said that since 2007, concealed-carry permit holders have fatally shot about 500 people, that 128 of them have been convicted of manslaughter or homicide, and 36 have committed murder-suicides.
In 2008 and 2010 rulings, the U.S. Supreme Court found that the Second Amendment to the Constitution grants broad license to keep and bear arms in the home. But the court left unclear whether and to what degree the right to carry a weapon extends outside the home, leaving states largely free to set up their own rules.
In 2002, seven states banned concealed-carry, according to the GAO. By later this year, every state will allow it.
Ten states require applicants to show "good cause" to get a permit. But 39 states—10 more than in 2002—grant permits to anyone who meets a few basic requirements, such as a clean criminal record and proof of residency.
Residents of Alaska, Arizona, Wyoming and Vermont don't need permits to carry a concealed weapon. In 2002, that was the case only in Vermont.
The surge in applications in recent months is linked at least in part to the Newtown tragedy, which rekindled a national gun-control debate at state and federal levels. Many permit holders say they feel safer carrying a gun, or knowing they could bring one into a potentially dangerous situation.
"Everyone has the right to be responsible for his or her own personal safety," said Bob McGinty, a small-business owner in Golden Valley, Minn., who obtained a concealed-carry permit earlier this year, after Minnesota made them cheaper and easier to get.
While Connecticut, Colorado, California, New York, Delaware and Maryland have tightened gun restrictions this year, at least 20 states have loosened laws on concealed-carry, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, which tracks and advocates for gun-control laws. States have streamlined the permit process, made concealed-carry records confidential or lifted bans on carrying concealed firearms in many public places.
Texas stopped requiring concealed-carry permit holders to undergo training to renew their licenses, West Virginia stopped requiring background checks for permit renewals, and Louisiana introduced lifetime permits.
Andrew Arulanandam, a spokesman for the National Rifle Association, said: "Crime can happen anywhere, and it's reasonable for people to have an effective means of defending themselves and their loved ones."
Write to Jack Nicas at jack.nicas@wsj.com and Ashby Jones at ashby.jones@wsj.com
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/08/gun-confiscation-bill-introduced-in-california-we-can-save-lives/
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second post of day
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/07/05/the-scandal-that-keeps-on-giving-police-chief-murdered-with-rifle-lost-in-operation-fast-and-furious/
et another gun lost in the ATF’s disastrous federal gun-walking operation known as “Fast and Furious” has reportedly been used in a murder.
A high-powered rifle from Fast and Furious was used to kill a Mexican police chief in the state of Jalisco earlier this year, according to internal Department of Justice records. The new revelation suggests “that weapons from the failed gun-tracking operation have now made it into the hands of violent drug cartels deep inside Mexico,” the Los Angeles Times reports.
Police Chief Murdered With Rifle Lost in Operation Fast and Furious
This Tuesday, Jan. 25, 2011 picture shows part of a cache of seized weapons displayed at a news conference in Phoenix. (AP Photo/Matt York)
More from the LA Times:
Luis Lucio Rosales Astorga, the police chief in the city of Hostotipaquillo, was shot to death Jan. 29 when gunmen intercepted his patrol car and opened fire. Also killed was one of his bodyguards. His wife and a second bodyguard were wounded.
Local authorities said eight suspects in their 20s and 30s were arrested after police seized them nearby with a cache of weapons — rifles, grenades, handguns, helmets, bulletproof vests, uniforms and special communications equipment. The area is a hot zone for rival drug gangs, with members of three cartels fighting over turf in the region.
A semi-automatic WASR rifle, the firearm that killed the chief, was traced back to the Lone Wolf Trading Company, a gun store in Glendale, Ariz. The notation on the Department of Justice trace records said the WASR was used in a “HOMICIDE – WILLFUL – KILL –PUB OFF –GUN” –ATF code for “Homicide, Willful Killing of a Public Official, Gun.”
The ATF allowed hundreds of guns to walk across the border into Mexico with supposed intentions of tracking them to Mexican cartel leaders.
The ATF declined to discuss the murder of the Mexican police chief. Officials told the LA Times that they are still creating an inventory of all the lost firearms for a complete account of the Fast and Furious operation. The operation was started in 2008.
At least 211 people have been killed or wounded by Fast and Furious guns, according to Mexican authorities. This, of course, includes slain U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was gunned down by Mexican traffickers in 2010.
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third post of day
http://godfatherpolitics.com/11605/south-dakota-becomes-first-state-to-allow-armed-teachers/
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http://www.policeone.com/Gun-Legislation-Law-Enforcement/articles/6311527-Sheriffs-under-fire-over-gun-control/
Sheriffs under fire over gun control
Some critics say that stance against issue by some sheriffs is stifling debate over what violates, doesn't violate 2nd Amendment
By Andrew Knapp
The Post & Courier
CHARLESTON, S.C. — When Charleston County Sheriff Al Cannon talks about the right to bear firearms, he doesn t just talk about citizens defending themselves against home invaders, carjackers, robbers and murderers.
He talks about the Founding Fathers and the Revolutionary War. He talks about Americans need to oppose tyranny and about Nathan Hale, a colonial spy who died for such a cause when British soldiers hanged him in 1776.
To Cannon, the people's power to resist an overbearing government is what the Second Amendment is all about. That s why, he said, he spoke out this year against any new federal gun-control measures that he thinks would suppress that option, and he vowed to take no role in enforcing them.
Nothing has occurred since (colonial times) that suggests we need to be any less concerned about a central government that's too powerful, he said. The Second Amendment is a fail-safe that protects the country from that government.
He was one of the first South Carolina sheriffs to take such a stance in the wake of the mass shooting at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school in December. Nearly a dozen sheriffs in the state, including all three in the tri-county area, and more than 470 nationwide have expressed such resistance.
Chief Greg Mullen of the Charleston Police Department said that he supports the Second Amendment, but that not every measure would violate it.
"No matter what you propose, there's always one group that thinks it's against the Second Amendment," Mullen said.
"That prevents us from having a reasonable and intelligent discussion about this."
Analyze and disobey
The movement among sheriffs is thought to have started in Colorado.
On the day President Barack Obama announced plans for new gun control after the Sandy Hook Elementary massacre, Larimer County Sheriff Justin Smith vowed on his Facebook page not to enforce unconstitutional laws.
That same week in mid-January, Cannon stood before journalists, tipped live rounds out of a revolver's cylinder and said he would ignore new federal laws that he thinks are unconstitutional.
He caught flack for the display. In an interview weeks later, Cannon said he fielded calls from people who thought he shouldn't so publicly express his personal beliefs, and from others who thought it wasn't his job to deem laws unconstitutional.
An online petition calling for him to resign garnered 599 signatures, short of its goal of 750.
He said he doesn't regret the move. His position as an elected sheriff isn't a popularity contest, but a struggle to do what's right, he said.
That he's not alone bolstered his stance, Cannon said.
The Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association assembled a list of 474 sheriffs and 18 sheriffs associations nationwide who took up the cause. Their arguments were similar: Sheriffs swear an oath to defend the state and federal constitutions, and enforcing a law contrary to those documents would break their pledge.
Cannon, who has a law degree, said that his reading of history texts during the past two years has strengthened his position. On his desk he keeps a copy of the Federalist Papers, letters written by forefathers expressing how best to protect rights and liberties.
The sheriff likens his refusal to enforce new gun-control laws to an Army soldier disobeying a commander. He said he would expect the same from one of his own deputies.
"He has an obligation to analyze and disobey an unlawful order," Cannon said. "Included in my oath is an obligation to uphold the Constitution and, to some extent, evaluate whether laws break it."
A day after Cannon spoke, Berkeley County Sheriff Wayne DeWitt issued a statement invoking the wishes of the nation's founders. He left it to lawmakers to draft legislation consistent with the U.S. Constitution. DeWitt declined to further discuss his stance.
Sheriff L.C. Knight in Dorchester County was not on the list published by the national organization, but he said he played a role in drafting a statement by the S.C. Sheriffs Association. That statement mentioned modern Americans distrust of government, and that sheriffs don't have the authority to enforce federal laws anyway.
Knight, a board member for the state group, added that efforts should instead focus on boosting penalty enhancements for firearm crimes.
"Taking a gun isn't going to stop violence," Knight said. "We've got laws against drinking and driving, but they still do it. We ve got laws against marijuana, but that doesn't stop people from using."
'Pretty daring'
Cannon spoke out, he said, partially in response to Charleston Mayor Joe Riley, a consistent proponent of gun control who later was depicted in an advertisement for Mayors Against Illegal Guns.
A police chief working under a politician such as Riley, the sheriff said, is less likely to speak up against gun control.
Cannon cited research by PoliceOne.com indicating that many of the 15,000 police officers surveyed think new laws would do little to quell violence. Ninety-five percent, for example, thought limiting high-capacity magazines would not affect the crime rate.
Mullen, the Charleston police chief, cited statements from the International Association of Chiefs of Police indicating support for new measures.
He countered viewpoints about sheriffs' hesitancy to help enforce federal laws. Local law officers have a duty to contact federal authorities when they find violations of federal laws, Mullen said. His department, he added, works "hand in hand" with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Police officers may not directly enforce federal laws, Mullen said, but they cannot turn a blind eye because of their personal beliefs.
That practice backfired this spring for one sheriff in Florida.
Liberty County Sheriff Nick Finch ordered the release of a man arrested for carrying a concealed pistol without a license because Finch believed in Second Amendment rights, published reports stated.
Last month, Florida's governor suspended the sheriff, who was jailed on a felony charge of official misconduct.
"If any laws are passed, ultimately the Supreme Court will determine whether or not they should be enforced," Mullen said. "I don't think that s a decision that law enforcement should make."
The issue of having local law officers do the federal government's work has popped up before.
In 1997, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a provision in the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act requiring state law officers to conduct criminal background checks. It violated the Constitution's concept of dual sovereignty, justices said.
Armand Derfner, a Charleston attorney who specializes in constitutional law, said sheriffs should recognize federal law as supreme.
"It's possible that a particular law may be held unconstitutional," Derfner said. "But it's pretty daring that an officer decides on his own that he s going to do that."
Debra DeShong Reed, a spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, declined to comment on the issue, but local advocates have been outspoken.
Margaret Kelly of Mount Pleasant, a member of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, said opponents of new gun control tend to "throw the Second Amendment at me when explaining their position on legislation."
To Kelly, their argument says little: It doesn't explain, for example, why they think people have the right to carry a concealed firearm into a bar.
"There are other people who think the government is going to take their guns and destroy them," Kelly said. "They need to hide in the hills with all the paranoid people."
During her organization's recent march on Washington, Kelly said staffers from only one member of South Carolina s congressional delegation agreed to speak with her. The worker for Republican Tim Scott didn t help explain the senator's position on gun control, she said.
<"He believes in the Second Amendment," she said, referring to what was said during the brief meeting. "That's it. That s all I learned."
Reach Andrew Knapp at 937-5414 or twitter.com/offlede.
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We've seen these before, but I'm not sure that we have had all of them in one place:
http://www.policymic.com/articles/51135/8-best-left-wing-quotes-on-guns-so-far-this-year
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Second Amendment Revoked: The Unbelievable Reason Why This Army Vet Can’t Own a Gun
Jul. 10, 2013 9:47pm Jason Howerton
Army Vet Unable to Buy Guns Due to 42 Year Old Pot Conviction
An Army veteran in Texas is fighting for his Second Amendment rights after learning that a misdemeanor pot conviction from 1971 has disqualified him from ever owning a gun.
Ron Kelly, who retired from the Army in 1993 after 20 years of service, was recently turned away when he tried to buy a .22-cal rifle at a Wal-Mart in Tomball, Texas, after a computerized background check flagged the 42-year-old arrest. The story was on the front page of the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday.
Kelly said he had forgotten about his minor pot violation from high school — the federal government, on the other hand, has not.
The Army vet spent one night in jail and was given one year of probation. Though he didn’t realize it at the time, he was also apparently stripped of his Second Amendment rights for a lifetime.
“According to the FBI, which runs the background checks known as the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, the law states that a person can be prevented from owing a gun if they are convicted of a misdemeanor in which they could spend more than two years behind bars,” the Houston Chronicle’s Dane Schiller writes.
“I am ashamed of the way my government has treated me,” Kelly told the Chronicle. ”The government may have the greatest of intentions with the [law], but they messed it up.”
The outraged veteran, who spent two decades of his life using firearms to defend his country, has since reached out to U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) for help in resolving the issue. He says he’d be happy with a waiver so he can regain his right to own a firearm.
As an infantryman in the Army, Kelly has fired “perhaps 100,000 rounds of government ammo over his 20 years of service,” Schiller notes.
Meanwhile, officials in North Carolina, where he was born and raised, were unable to even find records of the conviction because it is so old.
The story is reminiscent of two others on TheBlaze in recent years. In 2011, we brought you a story from Ohio where a man faced felony weapons charges because he obtained a gun after having a misdemeanor marijuana charge in 2006:
Back in 2006, Paul Stone was convicted of simple marijuana possession, a “minor misdemeanor” under Ohio law. There is no jail time possible for the offense. The maximum penalty is a $150 fine, plus some community service. It is not treated as a criminal record for the purposes of employment or licensing questions about an individual’s past. But in Ohio, the legislature has placed a specific limit on the 2nd amendment related to substance possession. Specifically, Ohio Rev. Code § 2923.13 prohibits gun possession by any person who “has been convicted of any offense involving the illegal possession … in any drug of abuse.”
In February, we reported on Navy vet Jeff Schrader, whose story closely resembles that of Kelly’s. Schrader, too, was convicted of misdemeanor as a young man (for a fight). He paid a $109 fine and went on with his life. But when he tried to buy a gun 45 years later, the law had changed: the misdemeanor penalty for his crime back then, now caries with it a possible penalty of up to two or more years in jail. Because of that, he has been disqualified from owning a gun.
This story has been updated.
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http://tpo.net/anti_gun_senator/#.Ues_Tg5BqAA.facebook
Anti-gun senator shoots intruder :roll:
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http://tpo.net/anti_gun_senator/#.Ues_Tg5BqAA.facebook
Anti-gun senator shoots intruder :roll:
The left isn't anti-gun, it's anti us having guns. Gun control is for the little people.
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http://www.guns.com/2013/07/22/farmer-loses-gun-permit-after-being-accused-of-attempted-murder-for-shooting-at-thief-video/
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http://youngcons.com/epic-houston-man-arms-neighborhoods-ravaged-with-crime-with-free-shotguns/
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/07/foghorn/chicago-firearms-confiscation-begins/?fb_source=pubv1
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/07/28/sheriffs-team-working-to-seize-guns-from-thousands-in-illinois/
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http://www.guns.com/2013/07/27/gun-ownership-in-hawaii-continues-to-climb-while-gun-violence-continues-to-drop/
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/video-buckeye-firearms-foundation-lawyer-crushes-piers-morgan-in-interview-on-donation-to-zimmerman-for-guns/
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http://www.scotusblog.com/2013/07/new-plea-for-gun-rights/
From the article:
The National Rifle Association and two individuals under the age of twenty-one have asked the Supreme Court to strike down a federal law that bans licensed gun dealers from selling handguns to minors. A federal appeals court upheld that law, ruling that Congress was justified in believing that easy commercial access to pistols for teenagers leads to violent crime.
The new case, NRA v. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (docket 13-137), raises one of the broadest challenges to a gun control law to reach the Court in the five years since the Second Amendment was interpreted to protect a personal right to have a gun, at least for self-defense.
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21 and over seems a reasonable restriction to me. Of course I get the cognitive dissonance of being able to buy from family members etc but I suppose this can be explained as an adult who actually knows the young person is making the judgment that he/she is up to it.
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I admit to being a little more than a bit uneasy at the notion of open carry in political meetings, but OTOH the unilateral disarmament folks need to understand that gun grabbing will lead to open civil war.
http://www.examiner.com/article/armed-citizens-force-officials-to-back-down
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=N30TagPCNE4
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rZMmPWTwTHc
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2013/08/robert-farago/nyc-dept-of-ed-bans-the-word-gun-in-tests/#comments
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/08/04/Violent-Crime-Drops-As-Gun-Sales-Rise-In-Virginia
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http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/06/business/wooed-by-gun-friendly-states-some-manufacturers-pull-up-stakes.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20130806
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Keeping track of how the disarmers think:
The Iron Pipeline Thrives
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Published: August 6, 2013
When somebody pulls a gun and commits a crime in New York City, that weapon almost certainly comes from somewhere else. Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced last week that 90 percent of the guns used to commit crimes were purchased in other states, according to the latest data from 2011, compared with 85 percent in 2009. This “iron pipeline,” as this illegal trade is called, is a booming and deadly business.
With Washington’s failure to impose needed background checks on gun sales — even after the slaughter of children in Newtown, Conn. — the states will have to lead the change. But, so far, only a few states — including Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland and New York — have acted this year to stanch the flood of illegal guns.
Other states, like Virginia, are making the gun trafficking even worse. More than 320 of the guns recovered in New York City in 2011 came from that state, which requires no background checks for private gun sales. Virginia’s lawmakers compounded the problem last year when they revoked their “one-gun-a-month” limit. With no background check and no limits, it is easy for anybody to buy guns in a parking lot, fill up the trunk and sell their wares to criminal clients in New York City — no questions asked. Illegal weapons from the Carolinas, Florida, Georgia, Ohio and Pennsylvania also end up on New York streets.
Mr. Bloomberg has worked hard over the years to organize Mayors Against Illegal Guns, and nearly 1,000 mayors and their police departments are on board to help rid their streets of these firearms.
The big problem for many mayors is their own state governments. In most states, laws pre-empt cities from enacting local gun control measures, which makes it easier for groups like the National Rifle Association to defeat sensible controls since state legislators tend to be terrified of the gun lobby.
Unless Congress cracks down on gun trafficking, guns will continue to be exported from states with weak laws to places with tough laws, like New York City. John Feinblatt, the city’s criminal justice coordinator, has been working to get more states to tighten their laws on background checks. Until they do, he said, New Yorkers are “at the mercy of laws beyond our borders.”
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Appeal to emotion, not logic. This is a great get-to-know-the-left piece that happens to focus on gun control politics and messaging. Same techniques also apply to all other issues and causes of the left. Your rights and the constitution itself are subordinate to their agenda - always. For a perfect example of this please see the previous post in this thread, the latest NY Times editorial supporting the Bloomberg-disarm agenda.
Shot to the Heart
A how-to book about inciting a moral panic.
By JAMES TARANTO, WSJ
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323477604579000731721030424.html
Paul Bedard of the Washington Examiner has uncovered a fascinating document: an 80-page "talking points" monograph titled "Preventing Gun Violence Through Effective Messaging," written by a trio of Democratic political operatives.
http://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/748675/gun-violencemessaging-guide-pdf-1.pdf
The document, as Bedard writes, instructs politicians and advocates "to hype high-profile gun incidents like the Florida slaying of Trayvon Martin to win support for new gun control laws." Essentially it's a how-to book on inciting a moral panic.
"The most powerful time to communicate is when concern and emotions are running at their peak," it advises. Antigun advocates are urged to seize opportunistically on horrific crimes: "The debate over gun violence in America is periodically punctuated by high-profile gun violence incidents including Columbine, Virginia Tech, Tucson, the Trayvon Martin killing, Aurora, and Oak Creek. When an incident such as these attracts sustained media attention, it creates a unique climate for our communications efforts."
The booklet explicitly urges foes of the Second Amendment to abjure rationality in favor of the argumentum ad passiones, or appeal to emotion. "When talking to broader audiences, we want to meet them where they are," the authors advise. "That means emphasizing emotion over policy prescriptions, keeping our facts and our case simple and direct, and avoiding arguments that leave people thinking they don't know enough about the topic to weigh in."
The do's and don'ts are consistent with this advice. "Examples of power language" include: "It breaks my heart that every day in our country (state or city) children wake up worried and frightened about getting shot." "Just imagine the pain that a mother or father feels when their young child is gunned down." "The real outrage--the thing that makes this violence so unforgivable--is that we know how to stop it and we're not getting it done."
And here are examples of "some ineffective language to avoid": "There's a clear body of research demonstrating the high social cost of gun violence." "The policy outcomes we're after are the ones that can have the most beneficial impact on the rates of violence among the most affected populations." "Of course, gun violence affects people's lives. But, it also has a devastating economic impact to the tune of over $100 billion a year. That's a number that should get every American taxpayer's attention."
The monograph was published before the December massacre at Newtown, Conn., and its advice, as Bedard puts it, was "likely followed by top Democratic leaders including President Obama." Whether the post-Newtown campaign was propter hoc or merely post, there's no question that the book describes with great accuracy the approach Obama and his fellow antigun zealots took. The paradigmatic example, as we noted in April, was a New York Times op-ed carrying the name of Gabrielle Giffords, which was a model of unreasoning vehemence.
The campaign proved remarkably ineffective. A few states--Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, New York--enacted new antigun laws amid the post-Newtown panic. But it was hardly a national trend: Democratic Party dominance of state government was a necessary condition. On Capitol Hill, the big gun-control effort ended with a whimper in April, as even the mildest measures failed to win approval in the Democratic Senate. In fact, that Giffords op-ed was a reaction to that outcome, not an attempt to prevent it.
Why didn't these cynically manipulative tactics work? Maybe because the antigun zealots aren't as cynical as they imagine themselves to be--which is to say that they themselves are the most susceptible to these sorts of emotional appeals.
After all, Obama was genuinely furious when he appeared at the Rose Garden in April and raged impotently against the Senate for thwarting his efforts. No doubt the president was, as the monograph advises, trying to manipulate others by playing on their emotional weakness. He ended up playing on his own weakness instead.
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http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113292/nras-end-real-gun-control-movement-has-arrived/?zem=105#
BTW, that datum about the decreasing number of homes owning guns (from 1/2 to 1/3) is worth noting.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5deUAF3af4Q&feature=youtube_gdata
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Gun Crimes Plummet Even As Gun Sales Rise
INFOGRAPHIC . . . NSSF has released a new infographic designed to counter the false impression many Americans have that gun-related crime has increased over the past 20 years, even though it has actually fallen dramatically. Fifty-six percent of Americans think crime with firearms has increased, according to a recent Pew Research Center survey. However, data show that homicides with firearms have declined by 39 percent from 1993 to 2011 and other crimes committed with firearms have fallen by 69 percent during the same period. Meanwhile, firearm sales in recent years have reached record-high levels, demonstrating that more guns do not equal more crime. Also declining while gun sales have been rising are firearm-related fatal accidents, which have plummeted 58 percent in practically the same period (1991 to 2011).
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Use gunbot.net to search by price/in stock.
Ammoman.com is also a good resource.
I've confirmed from several retailers that the prices will be going up soon, so buy in bulk now.
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http://www.newrepublic.com/article/113292/nras-end-real-gun-control-movement-has-arrived/?zem=105#
BTW, that datum about the decreasing number of homes owning guns (from 1/2 to 1/3) is worth noting.
And lie as usual. Who bought all these guns and ammo the last few years? Sure, some who already were owners, but lots of new gun owners emerged from the gun grabbing attempts, including those icky black rifles. The NRA has record numbers and a fire has been lit under many who might have sitting politics out for a while.
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White House responds to “Gun Free Zone” petition – politicians need armed security
2:56 PM 08/13/2013
By Dan Cannon, GunsSaveLives.net
A petition on the formal White House petitions website called for “gun free” zones to be extended to politicians, saying if it’s good enough for children in schools and other places where otherwise legal firearm carry by private citizens is prohibited, then it should be good enough for our country’s leaders, right?
Wrong.
Here is the original petition language:
Eliminate armed guards for the President, Vice-President, and their families, and establish Gun Free Zones around them
Gun Free Zones are supposed to protect our children, and some politicians wish to strip us of our right to keep and bear arms. Those same politicians and their families are currently under the protection of armed Secret Service agents. If Gun Free Zones are sufficient protection for our children, then Gun Free Zones should be good enough for politicians.
Here is the response of the White House:
Working to Keep Everyone Safe
Thanks for your petition.
We live in a world where our elected leaders and representatives are subject to serious, persistent, and credible threats on a daily basis. Even those who are mere candidates in a national election become symbols of our country, which makes them potential targets for those seeking to do harm to the United States and its interests. In 1901, after the third assassination of a sitting President, Congress mandated that the President receive full-time protection, and that law is still in effect today. Because of it, those who are the subject of ongoing threats must receive the necessary and appropriate protection.
At the same time, all of us deserve to live in safer communities, which is why we need to take responsible, commonsense steps to reduce gun violence, even while respecting individual freedom. And let’s be clear: President Obama believes that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to bear arms. You can see him talk about that in a previous petition response.
But the common-sense steps the President has proposed don’t infringe in any way on our Second Amendment rights. We ought to be able to keep weapons of war off the streets. We ought to close the loopholes in the background check system that make it too easy for criminals and other dangerous people to buy guns — an idea that has the support of 90 percent of people in the United States.
That’s why the President and an overwhelming majority of Americans are calling on Congress to pass gun safety legislation that closes loopholes in the background check system and makes gun trafficking a federal crime.
A minority in the Senate is blocking this common-sense legislation to reduce gun violence, but President Obama is already taking action to protect our kids with executive actions. He is taking the steps available to him as President to strengthen the existing background check system, give law enforcement officials more tools to prevent gun violence, end the freeze on gun violence research, make schools safer, and improve access to mental health care.
You can learn more about the President’s positions on this issue at WhiteHouse.gov/NowIsTheTime.
So, there you go, the White House turned the petition into a chance to lobby for more gun control. Surprise, surprise.
So, just remember your children face no threat, which is why they’re protected by signs, but politicians face constant threats, which is why they’re protected by a heavily armed, technologically advanced police force.
—–
Thanks to Dan Cannon at GunsSaveLives.net for his ever vigilant watch for Second Amendment rights. Visit http://gunssavelives.net.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2013/08/13/white-house-responds-to-gun-free-zone-petition-politicians-need-armed-security/
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More Fast and Furious guns surface at crimes in Mexico
By Sharyl Attkisson / CBS News/ August 14, 2013, 12:54 PM
Three more weapons from Fast and Furious have turned up at crime scenes in Mexico, CBS News has learned, as the toll from the controversial federal operation grows.
According to Justice Department tracing documents obtained by CBS News, all three guns are WASR-10 762-caliber Romanian rifles. Two were purchased by Fast and Furious suspect Uriel Patino in May and July of 2010. Sean Steward, who was convicted on gun charges in July 2012, purchased a third. The rifles were traced yesterday to the Lone Wolf gun shop in Glendale, Ariz.
During Fast and Furious and similar operations, federal agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) encouraged the Lone Wolf and other gun stores to sell massive amounts of weapons to questionable purchasers who allegedly trafficked them Mexican drug cartels.
Patino is said to have purchased 700 guns while under ATF's watch. Ever since, a steady stream of the guns have been recovered at crime scenes in Mexico and the U.S. But the Justice Department has refused repeated requests from Congress and CBS News to provide a full accounting. An estimated 1,400 guns are still on the street or unaccounted for.
Last November, a Fast and Furious weapon was found at a shootout between a Mexican drug cartel and soldiers where a beauty queen was killed. Two weapons used in the murder of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent Jaime Zapata in Mexico on Feb. 15, 2011 also came from suspects who were under ATF watch but not arrested at the time. And two Fast and Furious AK-47 type rifles were recovered from the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry in December 2010; he'd been shot by illegal immigrants who were smuggling drugs.
ATF special agent John Dodson blew the whistle on his agency's gunwalking in an interview with CBS News in 2011.
The government first denied any guns had been allowed to "walk" into criminal hands. Later, the Justice Department acknowledged using the strategy, claiming it was intended to see where the weapons ended up in hopes of capturing a major cartel leader. But the agency ordered an immediate halt to the practice calling it highly improper.
The Justice Department's refusal to turn over certain Fast and Furious documents led to a bipartisan vote in the House of Representatives in June 2012 to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress. Then, the Obama administration used executive privilege for the first time, to withhold requested documents from Congress. The Republican-led House Oversight Committee is suing for release of the material.
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http://www.smallgovtimes.com/article/harvard-study-reveals-gun-control-counterproductive/
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Second Amendment: Gun Use Doesn't Fit Narrative
In January, Barack Obama was leading the charge for federal gun control measures, standing on the caskets of the children killed at Sandy Hook Elementary in December. He asked the Centers for Disease Control to "research the causes and prevention of gun violence." His objective, of course, was to reinforce the leftist narrative that guns were to blame for acts of evil. Instead of blaming the perpetrator, the Left focuses on the implement.
The CDC passed the job to the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, which completed the study in June. But because it didn't follow BO's preferred BS storyline, it's only now seeing the light of day. One inconvenient truth for the Left is that guns save lives. According to the report, "Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals." Indeed, while there were "about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008," most by gang bangers on the Democrats' inner city poverty plantations, defensive gun use incidents ranged "from about 500,000 to more than 3 million per year."
The study elaborated on the benefits of defensive gun use: "Studies that directly assessed the effect of actual defensive uses of guns have found consistently lower injury rates among gun-using crime victims compared with victims who used other self-protective strategies." On the other hand, gun buy-backs, a favorite of leftists to reduce "gun violence," were found to be "ineffective." Obviously, in a culture as debased as ours has become, guns will be used for evil purposes. But that makes it all the more important for the good guys to have them.
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Here ya go Bamster read this and LEARN:
****Harvard Study: No Correlation Between Gun Control and Less Violent Crime
by AWR Hawkins 28 Aug 2013 1545 post a comment
A Harvard Study titled "Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide?" looks at figures for "intentional deaths" throughout continental Europe and juxtaposes them with the U.S. to show that more gun control does not necessarily lead to lower death rates or violent crime.
Because the findings so clearly demonstrate that more gun laws may in fact increase death rates, the study says that "the mantra that more guns mean more deaths and that fewer guns, therefore, mean fewer deaths" is wrong.
For example, when the study shows numbers for Eastern European gun ownership and corresponding murder rates, it is readily apparent that less guns to do not mean less death. In Russia, where the rate of gun ownership is 4,000 per 100,000 inhabitants, the murder rate was 20.52 per 100,000 in 2002. That same year in Finland, where the rater of gun ownership is exceedingly higher--39,000 per 100,000--the murder rate was almost nill, at 1.98 per 100,000.
Looking at Western Europe, the study shows that Norway "has far and away Western Europe's highest household gun ownership rate (32%), but also its lowest murder rate."
And when the study focuses on intentional deaths by looking at the U.S. vs Continental Europe, the findings are no less revealing. The U.S., which is so often labeled as the most violent nation in the world by gun control proponents, comes in 7th--behind Russia, Estonia, Lativa, Lithuania, Belarus, and the Ukraine--in murders. America also only ranks 22nd in suicides.
The murder rate in Russia, where handguns are banned, is 30.6; the rate in the U.S. is 7.8.
The authors of the study conclude that the burden of proof rests on those who claim more guns equal more death and violent crime; such proponents should "at the very least [be able] to show a large number of nations with more guns have more death and that nations that impose stringent gun controls have achieved substantial reductions in criminal violence (or suicide)." But after intense study the authors conclude "those correlations are not observed when a large number of nations are compared around the world."
In fact, the numbers presented in the Harvard study support the contention that among the nations studied, those with more gun control tend toward higher death rates.
Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins.****
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Obama's two new executive orders on guns, relying on the media's ignorance of guns
The Associated Press has this very poorly done piece on the proposed changes. These executive orders rely on the typical ignorance of the media regarding guns.
Quote:
One new policy will end a government practice that lets military weapons, sold or donated by the U.S. to allies, be reimported into the U.S. by private entities, where some may end up on the streets. The White House said the U.S. has approved 250,000 of those guns to be reimported since 2005; under the new policy, only museums and a few other entities like the government will be eligible to reimport military-grade firearms.
The Obama administration is also proposing a federal rule to stop those who would be ineligible to pass a background check from skirting the law by registering a gun to a corporation or trust. The new rule would require people associated with those entities, like beneficiaries and trustees, to undergo the same type of fingerprint-based background checks as individuals if they want to register guns. . . .
1. The only "military weapons" that are affected by this are old M-1 Garand 30-06 rifles used in the CMP program, available to collectors mainly. No other US-made military rifles are being imported. And more importantly, how is this semi-automatic rifle functionally different than any semi-automatic deer hunting? The only difference that I know is that these old Garands tended to be pretty heavy. I know of no cases when any imported US-made military weapon has been used in a crime.
2. The only "corporate" registration I'm aware of is for Class III (machine guns) weapons. I've never known an individual to use a corporation to register a handgun or other firearm to bypass a background check. Corporations are used (primarily) to obtain fully-automatic machine guns, as they are usually out of the price range of most citizens (minimum of $20,000 each). Yes, when registered to a corporation any officer is allowed to posses the machine gun, but my understanding that at the point that the transfer occurs there has to be a NICS check for the person actually picking up the gun. What happens under current law is that if a gun is registered to a corporation, then anyone who is an officer in the corporation would be allowed to use the gun I don't see how he can make this change without these rules without congressional action. I know of no case where someone who was barred from getting a gun was able to obtain a gun through the mechanism that the president is pointing to. No crime has occurred as a result of this loophole.
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Colorado recall election is today in Colorado Springs and Pueblo.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-colorado-gun-recall-20130910,0,4800258.story
Colorado recall election is a referendum on guns
Two lawmakers linked to sweeping gun control laws are targeted in Colorado's first recall election, whose results are expected to reverberate nationwide.
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COLORADO SPRINGS — Colorado Senate President (Democrat) John Morse thanked and urged fellow lawmakers to continue fighting Tuesday as voters ousted him from office for his support for stricter Colorado gun laws.
http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_24064007/colorado-recall-morse-says-turnout-lower-than-he
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The Democrat incumbent is losing in the Pueblo race too.
http://www.denverpost.com/breakingnews/ci_24064647/sen-giron-has-theoretical-advantage-going-into-recall
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/files/elections/2013/by_state/CO_Page_0910.html?SITE=AP&SECTION=POLITICS
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Suck it, dems!
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Yes. They overstepped. If Republicans come up with a worthy opponent, Gov. Hickenlooper will fall next. Gun control is NYC and DC politics and legislation in a (formerly) mountain west state.
The Pueblo contest was most impressive. The Democrat incumbent lost by 12 in a district Obama carried by 20 points, a 32 point swing. About half of Pueblo’s population is Latino.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/11/colorado-recall_n_3907655.html
http://nbclatino.com/2013/07/16/in-colorado-first-term-latina-state-senator-faces-recall-over-gun-control-support/
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Guro, you posted about Missouri's gun law veto session, though I can't find it anywhere to link to your original post.
Here is an update: http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt-and-politics/missouri-legislature-fails-to-override-vetoes-of-tax-cut-gun/article_9e4aedb4-71de-5df7-b407-e80179a71a54.html
In a word, the veto override failed.
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BD: Sorry, do not remember.
http://gunssavelives.net/blog/gun-laws/california-assembly-passes-semi-auto-firearms-ban/#
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http://www.kxxv.com/story/23405676/fort-hood-issues-new-policy-after-soldiers-protest-for-open-carry-rights?clienttype=generic&smartdevicecgbypass
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/09/12/unlucky-thugs-target-texas-man-with-heightened-sense-of-awarenessand-a-concealed-carry-permit/
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/video-black-gun-owners-defend-nra-in-multiple-videos-after-sarah-silverman-mocks-black-nra/
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Because we don't want those facts getting in the way, right?
A gentle reminder:
Firearm-related homicides declined 39 percent and nonfatal firearm crimes declined 69 percent from 1993 to 2011, the Justice Department's Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. Firearm-related homicides dropped from 18,253 homicides in 1993 to 11,101 in 2011, and nonfatal firearm crimes dropped from 1.5 million victimizations in 1993 to 467,300 in 2011.
Since you'll inevitably begin hearing about the "gun show loophole" whether or not the shooter at the Navy Yard got his gun from a gun show . . .
In 2004 (the most recent year of data available), among state prison inmates who possessed a gun at the time of the offense, fewer than two percent bought their firearm at a flea market or gun show. About 10 percent of state prison inmates said they purchased it from a retail store or pawnshop, 37 percent obtained it from family or friends, and another 40 percent obtained it from an illegal source.
And, of course, the shooter violated plenty of laws on the books before he fired his first shot:
By just being in the city with a loaded firearm, regardless of whether he was the legally registered owner, the suspect Aaron Alexis would be in violation of D.C. law. Carrying a concealed firearm or carrying a firearm openly in D.C. are both against the law. Bringing a firearm from out of state without registering it in D.C. is illegal. Assault-style rifles are banned. And even traveling through D.C. with a firearm is illegal.
In addition, the Navy Sea Systems Command headquarters is a federal facility that is subject to federal law, which prohibits carrying a firearm onto the premises (except by law enforcement or members of the armed forces).
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http://www.wzzm13.com/news/article/268289/14/Enraged-drivers-shoot-kill-each-other
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/10/01/see-the-chilling-moment-a-man-rolls-down-the-window-pulls-a-gun-and-allegedly-fires-at-a-fellow-driver-while-moving/
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http://hotair.com/archives/2013/09/30/federal-judge-to-doj-no-you-may-not-dismiss-this-fast-furious-just-because-you-feel-like-it/
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This post could go many places. For reasons that will be clear if you read the article, I place it here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/02/world/africa/during-siege-at-kenyan-mall-government-forces-seemed-slow-to-respond.html?_r=0
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Second Amendment: Gun Crime Is Way Down
Given the recent clamoring from Barack Obama and his cadres on gun violence, you would think violent crime levels were astronomical relative to past decades. Far from it. In fact, the latest statistics from the FBI reveal a substantial decline. Unsurprisingly, the mainstream media and this administration dedicated to gun confiscation have greeted the encouraging news with deafening silence.
With gun ownership in American at an all-time high, violent crime, according to the FBI's most recent national crime report, is at its lowest level in more than four decades. The rate of homicides in which murderers use guns has decreased almost 50%, from a high of 6.62 per 100,000 to 3.27 in 2012.
But why are mass shootings rising, you ask? A recent Wall Street Journal report helps explain one of the primary reasons: "One theory is the proliferation of public areas where guns are outlawed. 'Since 1950, almost every single public shooting in the United States in which more than three people have been killed has taken place in what are commonly known as "gun-free zones,"' reports the Washington Examiner. Recent shootings at schools and movie theaters illustrate this point. The Navy Yard shooting is another example. A policy implemented 20 years ago effectively banned people other than security guards from carrying guns on military bases. The shooters go where it's less likely that someone will fire back."
Imagine that: It's leftist policies that are behind the overall rise. The Left's fantasy "gun-free zones" effectively encourage perpetrators to pick the point of least resistance.
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http://www.realfarmacy.com/gun-wielding-homeowner-successfully-protects-property-from-corrupt-electric-company/#qY6MDuqm2dF80dvS.01
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http://www.tpnn.com/man-arrested-for-owning-firearms-in-nj-banned-from-seeing-his-son-for-four-years/
Respect to Christie for commuting the sentence; nonetheless the agony of being denied seeing his sons , , , :cry: :cry: :cry:
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I remember being angry when President Clinton moved review of rocket technology export from State to Commerce in order to facilitate business for his donor Bernie Schwartz -- who then promptly gave away some rocket technology to the Chinese.
I can't say that the logic of Pravda on the Hudson here is wrong:
=====================================
Shortsighted Arms Deregulation
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
Published: October 18, 2013
President Obama has rightly earned praise for signing the international Arms Trade Treaty, which seeks to keep many kinds of conventional weapons out of the hands of terrorists and other criminals who fuel conflicts around the globe. He now risks undercutting that treaty, as well as American laws and national security interests, by loosening regulatory controls on many of America’s own military exports.
Early in his administration, Mr. Obama began an effort to reform export control laws that nearly everyone agreed needed to be simplified and updated. But the new regulatory regime, which started to take effect this week, has raised fears that it could increase sales of American-made military parts to conflict zones and make it harder to enforce arms sanctions, including on Iran.
For decades, the United States, primarily through the State Department, evaluated arms exports case by case to ensure that they did not contribute to human rights abuses and could not be transferred to terrorists and other prohibited users. The new system shifts responsibility for thousands of military components to the business-friendly Commerce Department under more flexible controls. In some cases, companies no longer will have to obtain a license to export certain items.
The first group of American-made equipment affected by the regulation changes includes gas turbine engines and thousands of parts for military aircraft, like propeller blades, brake pads and tires, which could be sold even to countries subject to United Nations arms embargoes, according to the news organization ProPublica, which analyzed the changes. In January, other revisions will be announced that will affect military vehicles and submarines.
The White House has said that the old system strained resources by trying to protect all items on the control lists instead of focusing on the most militarily significant ones. It also said that the system disadvantaged American companies competing with foreign enterprises not subject to rigorous controls. Those are not strong arguments. The United States already dominates the international arms market, with nearly 80 percent of the sales, and the State Department denied a mere 1 percent of the arms export license requests from 2008 to 2010.
The deeper reason for the relaxed controls is that American defense companies, which lobbied heavily for the weaker rules, are scrambling for new markets in an era of plummeting Pentagon budgets. Before going ahead with the next round of revisions, the administration and Congress need to step back and see how the new rules work out. If it appears that military items are falling into the wrong hands, the rules should be redrawn again.
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http://bearingarms.com/we-arent-here-to-start-a-war-alamo-open-carry-starts-off-as-a-media-disaster/
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/20/us/gun-sentiments-and-guns-on-display-at-alamo-rally.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20131020
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http://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2013/11/what-happens-when-ammo-burns-saami-video-reveals-truth/
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Worry - if you hear your President say, if you like your gun you can keep it.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/nov/20/dc-gun-registry-forces-fingerprinting-police-stati/?page=all#pagebreak
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http://allenbwest.com/2013/12/backdoor-gun-control-lead-means-bullets/
I am one who steers very clear of tinfoil hat conspiracy theories. I often believe progressives plant stories in order to distract and disrupt, enabling them to pursue their true goals and objectives. That’s why I stress the importance of staying focused on the modern liberal socialist policies of the Obama administration, not the sideshow antics.
However, as a former combat commander, I have been trained to look for trends. And I believe we’ve found a very disturbing one. it seems that back door gun control is in full effect in the United States. Why? Thanks to Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), we can no longer smelt lead from ore in the United States.
The first contact the EPA made with The Doe Run Lead Smelter in Herculaneum, Missouri (population 2,800) was in 2008 but it was in 2010 that the EPA finally forced Doe Run to plan a shut down. This plant has been in operation since 1892 but will finally close its doors this month. It was the last lead smelting plant in the US.
The closedown is due to new extremely tight air quality restrictions placed on this specific plant. President Obama and his EPA raised the regulations by 10 fold and it would have cost the plant $100 million to comply.
In response to the Doe Run lead smelter shutdown, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said the Doe Run Company “made a business decision” to shut down the smelter instead of installing pollution control technologies needed to reduce sulfur dioxide and lead emissions as required by the Clean Air Act.
Of course this is why we need serious regulatory reform that precludes executive agency fiat, especially regulation implementation that exceeds a certain adverse financial impact to a private sector business.
Of course the canned progressive socialist response is “For years families with children near Doe Run’s facilities have been exposed to unacceptable levels of lead, one of the most dangerous neurotoxins in the environment,” said Cynthia Giles, assistant administrator for the EPA’s Office of Compliance and Enforcement Assurance. There are a few auxiliary lead processing plants remaining in the USA but their function is to re-claim lead from old batteries.
What this all means is that after December 2013, any ammunition that will be available to US citizens will have to be imported, which will surely increase the price and possibly come under government control. It seems this is fully in concert with the US Military and Homeland Defense recent purchase of large quantities of ammunition.
The effect is chilling: you can own all the guns you want, but if you can’t get ammo, you are out of luck. Remember when President Obama promised his minions that he was working on gun control behind the scenes? Welcome to it. The result is that all domestically mined lead ore will have to be shipped overseas, refined and then shipped back to the US.
Not only will ammo be even harder to come by, the demand and the process of supply will cause the price to skyrocket even more. And ponder this, there is an excellent chance that Obama will rig the market to where all ammo has to be purchased from the government instituting an ammo registration.
There hasn’t been a peep about this in the major news outlets, but it’s done. With the US no longer producing lead, all supplies will now have to come from China, Australia or Peru, with the overwhelming emphasis on China.
China is the largest miner of lead and the largest importer of scrap lead in the world. The highly progressive state of California recently passed a law that lead ammo is banned for sporting use. There is an alternative, copper ammo, but it is hugely expensive to make, and pure copper bullets are frequently labeled ‘cop killers’ so they can’t be sold.
So America, back door gun control is moving forward and while we are all distracted with Obamacare and Iran nuclear negotiations, our Second Amendment rights are undergoing an assault by clandestine infiltration. Remember we reported on this website the gun registration actions being undertaken in Washington DC. Barack Obama and his progressive socialist acolytes are quite savvy at political chess. He is seeking to outflank, envelope, and destroy the Second Amendment. Now it’s our move in 2014.
Read more at http://allenbwest.com/2013/12/backdoor-gun-control-lead-means-bullets/#zOUWet7mv6zXX8Vh.99
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WSJ
Plastic-Gun Measure Passes House
Move Targets Weapons That Can Elude Metal Detectors Amid Rise in 3-D Plastic Gun Technology
By Kristina Peterson
Updated Dec. 3, 2013 7:20 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON—The House on Tuesday passed legislation extending a ban on guns that can't be spotted by a metal detector, but held back from expanding it to address all-plastic guns made possible by 3-D printer technology.
The bill, passed on a voice vote, would extend for 10 years a law dating back to 1988 that makes it illegal to manufacture, sell or possess a gun that could elude metal detectors, which are used for security screening at government buildings, schools and airports. Under the law, gun makers must include a certain amount of metal, even if it is unnecessary for operating the weapon and can be removed.
To prevent the law from lapsing, the Senate must also pass an extension before it expires at midnight Monday. The chamber returns from a Thanksgiving holiday break next week.
Senate Democrats, worried about 3-D printers' ability to produce plastic guns, are hoping to beef up the current law.
Last year, a firearms dealer posted online instructions for how to use a 3-D printer to make a plastic gun with a metal component that can be easily removed, a manufacturing process that is allowed under the current law. Some Democrats, including Rep. Steve Israel (D., N.Y.) and Sen. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.), want to tighten the law to require plastic guns have metal parts that can't be removed, so metal detectors could still spot such weapons.
When the law was introduced in the 1980s, that notion was "a matter of science fiction. The problem is that today it is a reality," Mr. Israel said on the House floor Tuesday. He introduced legislation requiring firearms to have two or three pieces of metal that can't be removed, depending on the type of weapon, but House GOP leaders haven't announced plans to consider it.
In the Senate, Mr. Schumer said he would press to quickly pass legislation requiring firearms to include at least one irremovable metal component. But if his bill doesn't secure the support of all 100 senators, he said the Senate would try to pass the House's 10-year extension.
It is unclear how much opposition the tougher bills would face within each chamber. The National Shooting Sports Foundation Inc., a trade association for the firearms industry, supports extending the current law, but has signaled resistance to changes that could make it difficult for manufacturers to create prototypes or conduct other research with new technology, including 3-D printers.
"We are always concerned that laws and regulations do not hamper the ability of our members to take advantage of technological advancements," Larry Keane, the group's senior vice president, wrote in a Nov. 19 letter to House leaders.
The National Rifle Association's lobbying arm also said it opposed any changes to the law. "We will continue to aggressively fight any expansion of the [bill] or any other proposal that would infringe on our Second Amendment rights," it said in a statement Tuesday.
To date, there are no known instances of a person being shot with a plastic gun in the U.S., according to officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
Advocates of tightening the legislation said it was designed to be updated regularly to respond to changes in technology. "We're not just talking about what the threat is right this second, but what the threat would look like after 10 years," said Lanae Erickson Hatalsky, director of social policy and politics at Third Way, a centrist Democratic think tank.
—Devlin Barrett
contributed to this article.
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http://reason.com/archives/2013/12/04/the-three-most-important-ongoing-second
From the article:
Here are three of the most relevant active cases involving the Second Amendment, ones that promise to expand Second Amendment liberty, and resolve some of the core issues left unresolved by Heller and McDonald. Two of them will likely be considered for certiorari by the Supreme Court (though whether they will take them up is always hard to predict).
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http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2013/12/05/gun-confiscation-underway-in-new-york-n1758137?utm_source=thdailypm&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl_pm
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CRS: More Guns, Less Crime
A new report from the Congressional Research Service affirms a point 2nd Amendment advocates have long argued: Despite the massive growth in the number of firearms obtained by Americans through the decades, the homicide rate has fallen dramatically -- more than 50% since 1993. Breitbart's AWR Hawkins gives the breakdown: "According to the report, the 'firearm-related murder and non-negligent homicide' rate was 6.6 per 100,000 Americans in 1993. Following the exponential growth in the number of guns, that rate fell to 3.6 per 100,000 in 2000. This rate rose from 2004 to 2005 and got as high as 3.9 in 2006 and 2007, but it then resumed falling in 2008... This figure fell to 3.2 per 100,000 by 2011." Given the Left's rhetoric, you'd think the homicide rate has never been higher. Far from it.
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/12/03/Congressional-Research-Service-More-Guns-Less-Crime
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http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/16/us/sheriffs-refuse-to-enforce-laws-on-gun-control.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20131216&_r=0
By ERICA GOODE
Published: December 15, 2013 459 Comments
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GREELEY, Colo. — When Sheriff John Cooke of Weld County explains in speeches why he is not enforcing the state’s new gun laws, he holds up two 30-round magazines. One, he says, he had before July 1, when the law banning the possession, sale or transfer of the large-capacity magazines went into effect. The other, he “maybe” obtained afterward.
He shuffles the magazines, which look identical, and then challenges the audience to tell the difference.
“How is a deputy or an officer supposed to know which is which?” he asks.
Colorado’s package of gun laws, enacted this year after mass shootings in Aurora, Colo., and Newtown, Conn., has been hailed as a victory by advocates of gun control. But if Sheriff Cooke and a majority of the other county sheriffs in Colorado offer any indication, the new laws — which mandate background checks for private gun transfers and outlaw magazines over 15 rounds — may prove nearly irrelevant across much of the state’s rural regions.
Some sheriffs, like Sheriff Cooke, are refusing to enforce the laws, saying that they are too vague and violate Second Amendment rights. Many more say that enforcement will be “a very low priority,” as several sheriffs put it. All but seven of the 62 elected sheriffs in Colorado signed on in May to a federal lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the statutes.
The resistance of sheriffs in Colorado is playing out in other states, raising questions about whether tougher rules passed since Newtown will have a muted effect in parts of the American heartland, where gun ownership is common and grass-roots opposition to tighter restrictions is high.
In New York State, where Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed one of the toughest gun law packages in the nation last January, two sheriffs have said publicly they would not enforce the laws — inaction that Mr. Cuomo said would set “a dangerous and frightening precedent.” The sheriffs’ refusal is unlikely to have much effect in the state: According to the state’s Division of Criminal Justice Services, since 2010 sheriffs have filed less than 2 percent of the two most common felony gun charges. The vast majority of charges are filed by the state or local police.
In Liberty County, Fla., a jury in October acquitted a sheriff who had been suspended and charged with misconduct after he released a man arrested by a deputy on charges of carrying a concealed firearm. The sheriff, who was immediately reinstated by the governor, said he was protecting the man’s Second Amendment rights.
And in California, a delegation of sheriffs met with Gov. Jerry Brown this fall to try to persuade him to veto gun bills passed by the Legislature, including measures banning semiautomatic rifles with detachable magazines and lead ammunition for hunting (Mr. Brown signed the ammunition bill but vetoed the bill outlawing the rifles).
“Our way of life means nothing to these politicians, and our interests are not being promoted in the legislative halls of Sacramento or Washington, D.C.,” said Jon E. Lopey, the sheriff of Siskiyou County, Calif., one of those who met with Governor Brown. He said enforcing gun laws was not a priority for him, and he added that residents of his rural region near the Oregon border are equally frustrated by regulations imposed by the federal Forest Service and the Environmental Protection Agency.
This year, the new gun laws in Colorado have become political flash points. Two state senators who supported the legislation were recalled in elections in September; a third resigned last month rather than face a recall. Efforts to repeal the statutes are already in the works.
Countering the elected sheriffs are some police chiefs, especially in urban areas, and state officials who say that the laws are not only enforceable but that they are already having an effect. Most gun stores have stopped selling the high-capacity magazines for personal use, although one sheriff acknowledged that some stores continued to sell them illegally. Some people who are selling or otherwise transferring guns privately are seeking background checks.
Eric Brown, a spokesman for Gov. John W. Hickenlooper of Colorado, said, “Particularly on background checks, the numbers show the law is working.” The Colorado Bureau of Investigation has run 3,445 checks on private sales since the law went into effect, he said, and has denied gun sales to 70 people.
Page 2 of 2)
A Federal District Court judge last month ruled against a claim in the sheriffs’ lawsuit that one part of the magazine law was unconstitutionally vague. The judge also ruled that while the sheriffs could sue as individuals, they had no standing to sue in their official capacity.
Still, the state’s top law enforcement officials acknowledged that sheriffs had wide discretion in enforcing state laws.
“We’re not in the position of telling sheriffs and chiefs what to do or not to do,” said Lance Clem, a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Public Safety. “We have people calling us all the time, thinking they’ve got an issue with their sheriff, and we tell them we don’t have the authority to intervene.”
Sheriffs who refuse to enforce gun laws around the country are in the minority, though no statistics exist. In Colorado, though, sheriffs like Joe Pelle of Boulder County, who support the laws and have more liberal constituencies that back them, are outnumbered.
“A lot of sheriffs are claiming the Constitution, saying that they’re not going to enforce this because they personally believe it violates the Second Amendment,” Sheriff Pelle said. “But that stance in and of itself violates the Constitution.”
Even Sheriff W. Pete Palmer of Chaffee County, one of the seven sheriffs who declined to join the federal lawsuit because he felt duty-bound to carry out the laws, said he was unlikely to aggressively enforce them. He said enforcement poses “huge practical difficulties,” and besides, he has neither the resources nor the pressure from his constituents to make active enforcement a high priority. Violations of the laws are misdemeanors.
“All law enforcement agencies consider the community standards — what is it that our community wishes us to focus on — and I can tell you our community is not worried one whit about background checks or high-capacity magazines,” he said.
At their extreme, the views of sheriffs who refuse to enforce gun laws echo the stand of Richard Mack, a former Arizona sheriff and the author of “The County Sheriff: America’s Last Hope.” Mr. Mack has argued that county sheriffs are the ultimate arbiters of what is constitutional and what is not. The Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, founded by Mr. Mack, is an organization of sheriffs and other officers who support his views.
“The Supreme Court does not run my office,” Mr. Mack said in an interview. “Just because they allow something doesn’t mean that a good constitutional sheriff is going to do it.” He said that 250 sheriffs from around the country attended the association’s recent convention.
Matthew J. Parlow, a law professor at Marquette University, said that some states, including New York, had laws that allowed the governor in some circumstances to investigate and remove public officials who engaged in egregious misconduct — laws that in theory might allow the removal of sheriffs who failed to enforce state statutes.
But, he said, many governors could be reluctant to use such powers. And in most cases, any penalty for a sheriff who chose not to enforce state law would have to come from voters.
Sheriff Cooke, for his part, said that he was entitled to use discretion in enforcement, especially when he believed the laws were wrong or unenforceable.
“In my oath it says I’ll uphold the U.S. Constitution and the Constitution of the State of Colorado,” he said, as he posed for campaign photos in his office — he is running for the State Senate in 2014. “It doesn’t say I have to uphold every law passed by the Legislature.
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CO School Shooting Review
The student who shoot and wounded two in a Colorado high school before killing himself did so with a legally purchased shotgun, not an "assault weapon," and he had no criminal background. (Joe Biden has been known to recommend shotguns from time to time.) There are already calls to "do something" again about "gun violence," especially since we just observed the one year anniversary of Sandy Hook, but as National Review's Charles C.W. Cooke writes, "Everything that the shooter did ... was already illegal. He walked into a school with a firearm. That's illegal. He shot at people with intent to kill and maim. That's illegal. He attempted to commit premeditated murder. That's illegal." Two final notes: 1) He was stopped by an armed resource officer at the school, and 2) this was no Tea Party crazy; one fellow student described the perp as "very proud of being a socialist."
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http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/22/us/when-the-right-to-bear-arms-includes-the-mentally-ill.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20131222&_r=0
What do we make of this?
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/01/us/fewer-murders-in-chicago-this-year-after-a-brutal-2012.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20140101
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https://www.opendrive.com/folders?NV84MDI3MzcwXzRjU3pF
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03XEUPfD0qM
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/04/unexpected-detroit-police-chief-says-armed-law-abiding-americans-translates-into-crime-reduction/
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/01/06/Illinoisans-Flood-Online-Conceal-Carry-Application-Site
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/01/06/Illinoisans-Flood-Online-Conceal-Carry-Application-Site
More than obamacare!
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http://arts.nationalpost.com/2014/01/14/charlize-theron-convinces-new-boyfriend-sean-penn-to-destroy-his-gun-collection-jeff-koons-to-immortalize-cowardly-killing-machines-in-new-work-of-art-bought-by-anderson-cooper/
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GhzkR6Vg5HY
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/01/19/federal-judge-shoots-down-chicago-gun-sales-ban/
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Gun Owners of America
________________________________________
The Omnibus Appropriations Bill:
Pro-gun or Anti-gun?
Dear Marc F.,
On Friday, Congress sent a $1.1 trillion government funding bill to the President, who promptly signed the legislation into law.
Like every "omnibus," the bill has a number of gun-related provisions -- some pro-gun, some anti-gun. And we suspect that a majority of our members will probably oppose this bloated monstrosity.
That being said, there were some key victories in this bill. So briefly, here are the pros and cons.
THE PROS
THE "OMNIBUS" KILLS THE ARMS TRADE TREATY. In the 113th Congress, we believe we have about twenty votes more than we need to stop ratification of the UN Arms Trade Treaty. This is extremely important because, if implemented, this treaty -- signed by the Obama administration -- could, without further legislation, result in massive semi-auto and handgun bans, magazine bans, gun registration, and microstamping.
Even though we felt comfortable that we could stop the treaty's ratification, we were concerned that Obama would attempt to implement it by administrative fiat. For this reason, we drafted language defunding its implementation. With your help, we have spent the last year pushing incessantly for the adoption of this amendment defunding the ATT.
That language is contained on the "Omnibus." For many of our members, killing the ATT is more important than any other issue.
IT CUTS A LITTLE OBAMACARE MONEY. This is a good thing, since the anti-gun ObamaCare mandate threatens to centralize our medical data, thus resulting in gun bans for millions of people (similar to what’s already been done to more than 150,000 military veterans). While some cuts are certainly welcome, by and large, we are relying on our amendments to bills like the unemployment bill to put a stake through the heart of ObamaCare.
IT CONTAINS A HOST OF (GENERALLY BOILERPLATE) PROVISIONS DEFUNDING OBAMA'S ANTI-GUN ACTIONS. These include a repudiation of the shotgun import ban, other import bans, and changes in various definitions (such as "curios and relics") which have been eyed by the ATF.
It outlaws programs like Fast & Furious and requires the Congress to report on alleged efforts by our federal government to buy up ammunition.
Finally, while it does contain more money for the Center for Disease Control's violent crime studies, it continues to prohibit this federal health research money from being used to advocate gun control.
THE CONS
FUNDING FOR ANTI-GUN AGENCIES. The bill contains increased money for a number of programs we don't like, including:
* $60 million more for NICS (although we succeeded, last year, in preventing the FBI from using NICS to screen every gun purchase in the country);
* $58.5 million for states to submit NICS records;
* $70 million more for the ATF.
CONTINUATION OF ANTI-GUN BOILERPLATE. The bill continues anti-gun boilerplate such as the Senator Schumer amendment defunding the McClure-Volkmer disabilities relief program. This means that thousands upon thousands of Americans who are disqualified from owning firearms because of non-violent federal felonies have no way to get their gun rights back.
REFUSAL TO STICK IN SOME PROVISIONS WE WERE FIGHTING FOR. We would have liked to see language defunding HHS's new regulations that repeal the HIPAA privacy laws that protect gun owners. This Executive Action means that tens of millions of Americans could lose their gun rights without a court order.
We also would have liked to see a provision defunding the ATF’s efforts to register multiple handgun purchases in the Southwest.
The HIPAA issue is fairly new, and we will continue to fight for these on the regular appropriations bills when they begin to move in May.
THE BOTTOM LINE
Gun control fanatic Michael Bloomberg is trying to do a "victory lap" on the "Omnibus." In the narratives we have seen, Bloomberg carefully ignores the provisions of the bill which go against him, particularly the provision killing the ATT.
This is certainly a desperate effort by a defeated man to appear "relevant," rather than a legitimate assessment of who won or who lost.
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/01/22/supreme-court-weighs-gun-rights-challenge/?intcmp=latestnews
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http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/23/justice/us-background-check-fraud/index.html?hpt=hp_t2
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The propagandists over at ABC are out with a new investigative report on the dangers of firearms inside the home: "7,391 children [are] rushed to the hospital every year with ... gun injuries," mused anchor Diane Sawyer, citing a new study from the journal Pediatrics, and "453 of those children die at the hospital." As usual, however, the report leaves out some important disclaimers: The study's definition of "children" includes anyone under the age of 20. Apparently when it comes to exploiting the dangers of gun ownership, you're considered a child halfway through college. (Yet those in puberty are considered "adult" enough to make coherent decisions regarding sex, birth control and sexual orientation?) Secondly, Sawyer failed to mention that 2,149 of the incidents were from accidental or negligent discharges, 270 were attempted suicides, and the remaining 4,559 were criminal assaults (gangs, anyone?). Talk about a gross distortion of the facts
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Does anyone know why all these government agencies are trying to buy up all the ammo?
http://www.infowars.com/u-s-postal-service-announces-giant-ammo-purchase/
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I disrespect infowars as a source, but this matter of these massive purchases of ammo are really getting to me. The fg POST OFFICE?!? Hard to not conclude that there is a mass governmental conspiracy going on :x :x :x
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I disrespect infowars as a source, but this matter of these massive purchases of ammo are really getting to me. The fg POST OFFICE?!? Hard to not conclude that there is a mass governmental conspiracy going on :x :x :x
The USPS actually has3 law enforcement entities under it's umbrella They are the Postal Inspection Service the Inspector General and the Postal Police that actually provide uniformed police services at certain postal facilities.
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So answer me this: Why the massive ongoing ammo shortages like we never had seen before?
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http://www.youtube.com/embed/_T-F_zfoDqI?rel=0
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So answer me this: Why the massive ongoing ammo shortages like we never had seen before?
Millions of new gun owners and both old and new are caching ammo like never before.
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OTOH, there is this:
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2014/02/05/
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2014/02/06/
http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2014/02/07/
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http://www.policeone.com/Gun-Legislation-Law-Enforcement/articles/6183787-PoliceOnes-Gun-Control-Survey-11-key-lessons-from-officers-perspectives/
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second post
Our meme about Hitler and gun registration is challenged.
Though much of the reasoning is specious, is there merit here as well?
http://www.salon.com/2013/01/11/stop_talking_about_hitler/
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second post
Our meme about Hitler and gun registration is challenged.
Though much of the reasoning is specious, is there merit here as well?
http://www.salon.com/2013/01/11/stop_talking_about_hitler/
Remember how the British crushed those American rebels with their primitive muskets?
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Salon make huffpo look honest and credible in comparison. Look up Steven Halbrook's response to these bogus claims.
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You have the citation? There's someone on FB I'd love to stuff with it :-D
http://gunsnfreedom.com/the-new-ar-15-design-is-compliant-with-safe-act-and-has-gun-control-activists-in-a-tizzy/
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You have the citation? There's someone on FB I'd love to stuff with it :-D
http://gunsnfreedom.com/the-new-ar-15-design-is-compliant-with-safe-act-and-has-gun-control-activists-in-a-tizzy/
HALBROOK: What made the Nazi Holocaust possible? Gun control
By Stephen P. Halbrook
Thursday, November 7, 2013
This week marks the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht, or the Night of the Broken Glass, the Nazi pogrom against Germany’s Jews on Nov. 9-10, 1938. Historians have documented most everything about it except what made it so easy to attack the defenseless Jews without fear of resistance. Their guns were registered and thus easily confiscated.
To illustrate, turn the clock back further and focus on just one victim, a renowned German athlete. Alfred Flatow won first place in gymnastics at the 1896 Olympics. In 1932, he dutifully registered three handguns, as required by a decree of the liberal Weimar Republic. The decree also provided that in times of unrest, the guns could be confiscated. The government gullibly neglected to consider that only law-abiding citizens would register, while political extremists and criminals would not. However, it did warn that the gun-registration records must be carefully stored so they would not fall into the hands of extremists.
The ultimate extremist group, led by Adolf Hitler, seized power just a year later, in 1933. The Nazis immediately used the firearms-registration records to identify, disarm and attack “enemies of the state,” a euphemism for Social Democrats and other political opponents of all types. Police conducted search-and-seizure operations for guns and “subversive” literature in Jewish communities and working-class neighborhoods.
Jews were increasingly deprived of more and more rights of citizenship in the coming years. The Gestapo cautioned the police that it would endanger public safety to issue gun permits to Jews. Hitler faked a show of tolerance for the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, but Flatow refused to attend the reunion there of former champions. He was Jewish and would not endorse the farce.
By fall of 1938, the Nazis were ratcheting up measures to expropriate the assets of Jews. To ensure that they had no means of resistance, the Jews were ordered to surrender their firearms.
Flatow walked into a Berlin police station to comply with the command and was arrested on the spot, as were other Jews standing in line. The arrest report confirmed that his pistols were duly registered, which was obviously how the police knew he had them. While no law prohibited a Jew from owning guns, the report recited the Nazi mantra: “Jews in possession of weapons are a danger to the German people.” Despite his compliance, Flatow was turned over to the Gestapo.
This scenario took place all over Germany — firearms were confiscated from all Jews registered as gun owners. As this was occurring, a wholly irrelevant event provided just the excuse needed to launch a violent attack on the Jewish community: A Polish teenager who was Jewish shot a German diplomat in Paris. The stage was set to instigate Kristallnacht, a carefully orchestrated Nazi onslaught against the entire Jewish community in Germany that horrified the world and even the German public.
Under the pretense of searching for weapons, Jewish homes were vandalized, businesses ransacked and synagogues burned. Jews were terrorized, beaten and killed. Orders were sent to shoot anyone who resisted.
SS head Heinrich Himmler decreed that possession of a gun by a Jew was punishable by 20 years in a concentration camp. An estimated 20,000 Jewish men were thrown into such camps for this reason or just for being Jewish. The Jewish community was then held at ransom to pay for the damage done by the Nazis.
These horrific events were widely reported in the American media, such as The New York Times. After Hitler launched World War II, the United States made preparations in case it was dragged into the conflict. Just before the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, Congress passed a law noting the Gestapo methods and declaring that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms may not be infringed by such measures as registration of firearms.
Kristallnacht has been called “the day the Holocaust began.” Flatow’s footsteps can be followed to see why. He would be required to wear the Star of David. In 1942, he was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp, where he starved to death.
One wonders what thoughts may have occurred to Flatow in his last days. Perhaps memories of the Olympics and of a better Germany flashed before his eyes. Did he have second thoughts about whether he should have registered his guns in 1932? Or whether he should have obediently surrendered his firearms at a Berlin police station in 1938 as ordered by Nazi decree, only to be taken into Gestapo custody? Did he fantasize about shooting Nazis? We will never know, but it is difficult to imagine that he had no regrets over his act of compliance.
Today, gun control, registration and prohibition are depicted as benign and progressive. Government should register gun owners and ban any guns it wishes, Americans are told, because government is inherently good and trustworthy. The experiences of Hitler’s Germany and, for that matter, Stalin’s Russia and Pol Pot’s Cambodia, are beneath the realm of possibility in exceptional America. Let’s hope so.
Still, be careful what you wish for.
Stephen Halbrook is research fellow with the Independent Institute and author “Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and ‘Enemies of the State’” (Independent Institute, 2013).
Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/nov/7/halbrook-the-key-to-this-german-pogrom-is-confisca/
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This reminds me of a great line I saw posted elsewhere:
"I saw a movie where only the military and police had guns, it was called "Schindler's List".
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The Halbrook piece was exactly the sort of thing I was looking for GM. Thank you very much.
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Ohio
Ohio National Guard Training Envisions Right-Wing Terrorism
By: Jesse Hathaway | February 10, 2014
• Organizations Ohio National Guard 52nd Civil Support TeamOhio National Guard 52nd Civil Support Team
Documents from an Ohio National Guard (ONG) training drill conducted last January reveal the details of a mock disaster where Second Amendment supporters with “anti-government” opinions were portrayed as domestic terrorists.
20130502_OHIONATIONALGUARD_52CST
The Ohio National Guard’s Civil Support Team practices in a May 2013 drill at Put-in-Bay
The ONG 52nd Civil Support Team training scenario involved a plot from local school district employees to use biological weapons in order to advance their beliefs about “protecting Gun Rights and Second Amendment rights.”
Portsmouth Chief of Police Bill Raisin told NBC 3 WSAZ-TV in Huntington, West Virginia that the drill accurately represented “the reality of the world we live in,” adding that such training “helps us all be prepared.”
Internal ONG documents provided to Media Trackers after repeated delays provide further context to what WSAZ-TV reported last winter.
In the disaster-preparedness scenario, two Portsmouth Junior High School employees poisoned school lunches with mustard gas, acting on orders from white-nationalist leader William Pierce.
The ONG team discovered biological weapons being produced in the school, requiring activation of containment and decontamination procedures.
Participants in the disaster drill located documents expressing the school employees’ “anti-government” sentiments, as well as a note identifying Pierce as the fictional right-wing terrorists’ leader.
ONG’s 52nd Civil Support Unit participated in a similar drill involving left-wing terrorists with Athens County first responders last year; public officials apologized for that training the next day in response to complaints from local environmentalist groups.
No apology to Ohioans who support limited government and the Second Amendment appears to be forthcoming.
Scioto County Emergency Management Agency director Kim Carver refused to comment, telling Media Trackers she was “not going to get into an Ohio Army National Guard issue that you have with them.”
Ohio National Guard Communications Director James Sims II suggested Media Trackers was “inferring” from the ONG document’s contents as opposed to “what’s actually in the report.”
After excerpts of the report were read to him, Sims said it was “not relevant” to understand why conservatives may feel unduly targeted by ONG’s training scenario.
“Okay, I’m gonna stop ya there. I’m going to quit this conversation,” Sims concluded. “You have a good day.”
Buckeye Firearms Association spokesman Chad Baus told Media Trackers that “it is a scary day indeed when law enforcement are being trained that Second Amendment advocates are the enemy,”
“The revelation of this information is appalling to me, and to all citizens of Ohio who are true conservatives and patriots, who don’t have guns for any other reason than that the Second Amendment gives them that right,” Portage County TEA Party Executive Director Tom Zawistowski said in a separate Media Trackers interview.
Media Trackers reached out to Portsmouth-area state legislators Representative Terry Johnson and Senator Joe Uecker for comment about the drill, which took place within their respective districts. Neither replied to phone calls or emails in time for publication.
ONG’s January 2013 training exercise is one of many instances where government officials have identified those with limited-government or pro-Second Amendment opinions as potential terror threats.
In 2009, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned law enforcement agencies that a predicted rise in“right-wing extremism” would be fueled by “proposed imposition of firearms restrictions and weapons bans” and “the election of the first African American president.”
Throughout modern history, groups and individuals associated with left-wing causes have proven far more likely to commit acts of domestic terror.
In 2012, members of the anarcho-socialist Occupy Cleveland movement were arrested and prosecuted for attempting to destroy the Brecksville-Northfield High Level Bridge with explosives, to commemorate International Workers’ Day.
Last year, leftist groups Earth First and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) claimed responsibility for the sabotage and property destruction of businesses in Washington and Van Wert counties.
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Any muslim terrorists up on the training rotation? Next time, right?
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http://constitution.findlaw.com/amendment2/amendment.html
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WSJ:
By
Jason L. Riley
Feb. 19, 2014 5:52 p.m. ET
A new FBI report says that violent crime continues to fall nationwide, which might annoy liberals because gun purchases continue to rise.
In the first six months of 2013, murders fell by nearly 7 percent, compared with the same period in 2012. Aggravated assaults fell by 6.6 percent, and robberies are down 1.8 percent. "All of the offenses in the violent crime category—murder and non-negligent manslaughter, forcible rape, aggravated assault, and robbery—showed decreases when data from the first six months of 2013 were compared with data from the first six months of 2012," according to the FBI. Overall, violent crime in the U.S. fell by 5.4 percent. Burglaries, larceny and auto thefts also decreased.
The left likes to link violent crime to the proliferation of guns in the country, so it's worth noting that the crime reductions described in the FBI report correlate with a steady increase in firearm sales. "Gun records checks, fueled by a post-Newtown boom of gun sales, hit a new high in 2013, and industry analysts expect ammunition to be the big seller this year as consumers catch up to all of those firearms purchases," reported the Washington Times last month. "More than 21 million applications were run through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System last year, marking nearly an 8 percent increase and the 11th straight year that the number has risen."
It's also worth noting that gun-ownership rates in the Midwest (39 percent) and South (50 percent) far exceed gun-ownership rates in the Northeast (22 percent), yet violent crime is down more in the Midwest and South than it is in the Northeast, according to the FBI statistics. And rural areas, where gun-ownership rates also are higher than average, saw a larger reduction in violent crime that metropolitan areas, where gun-ownership rates are lower than average.
Not that gun-control zealots, who are so certain of a causal link between firearms and violent crime rates, care about such details.
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"violent crime continues to fall nationwide"
Of course. The money is cyber crime. A lot less risk. Almost zero chance of getting caught and far less consequences even in the very rare case anyone does get caught.
Some criminals are far smarter than law enforcement. OTOH, I do recognize that law enforcement hands are often tied and the same laws that protect us from law enforcement abuse also protect the crooks.
And it only takes a few corrupt law enforcement officials to ruin the ability of those who are with integrity to be successful.
Crime is rampant. Period.
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Report Dramatizes Shootings
A new report released by Michael Bloomberg's anti-gun groups Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in American (MDA) and Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) claims that, "In the fourteen months since the mass shooting in Newtown, CT, there have been at least 44 school shootings including fatal and nonfatal assaults, suicides, and unintentional shootings -- an average of more than three a month. These school shootings resulted in 28 deaths and 37 non-fatal gunshot injuries." This data however is highly misleading. "Included in the numbers are [11] suicides," explains columnist John Lott. "Also included are late night shootings in school parking lots, on other school grounds or even off school property, often involving gangs. As 'shootings,' they also include any incident where shots were fired, even when nobody was injured." They also fail to mention that the overall number of school shootings continues to decrease.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/feb/23/trial-mark-witaschek-washington-dc-one-shotgun-she/?page=all#pagebreak
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/feb/23/trial-mark-witaschek-washington-dc-one-shotgun-she/?page=all#pagebreak
Must be nice to have the David Gregory free pass.
Laws are for the little people.
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When gun control succeeds: http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/33-dead-130-injured-china-knife-wielding-spree-n41966 (http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/33-dead-130-injured-china-knife-wielding-spree-n41966)
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I surely hope none of legislators will be hurt, but they would be wise to take this as a warning shot across the bow.
http://www.conservativeinfidel.com/2nd-amendment-2/retaliation-home-addresses-ct-legislators-voted-favor-gun-registration-posted-patriot-activist/
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http://www.conservativeinfidel.com/2nd-amendment-2/new-jersey-bill-outright-gun-ban-22-caliber-rifles-leads-confiscation/
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Third post
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/03/03/0000672-percent-why-concealed-carry-permit-holders-will-want-to-hear-about-such-a-small-number-from-a-former-navy-seal/
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I'm seeing a lot of people saying things that , , , hard to envision in America but are we about to see some armed resistance?
http://bearingarms.com/connecticut-gun-group-issues-ultimatum-to-government-molon-labe-or-repeal/
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http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/politics/item/15386-open-mic-catches-dems-plot-to-confiscate-guns-diss-owners
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Group Calls Conn. Bluff
Patriot Post
After the Connecticut legislature reacted to Sandy Hook by criminalizing scary
firearms, thousands -- perhaps tens of thousands -- of gun owners have refused
to register their firearms (http://patriotpost.us/posts/23380) with the state,
while the state isn't yet doing much about it. Connecticut Carry, a pro-gun
group, called the legislature's bluff, issuing a press release
(http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/372426/second-amendment-group-connecticut-put-or-shut-charles-c-w-cooke)
demanding that the state "enforce the tyranny they passed or repeal it
entirely." The group calls the laws "foolishly conceived," "insufferable" and
"an affront to every law-abiding citizen." Furthermore, "Every official who
supports such legal foolishness mocks our State and the Constitution they
swore to uphold." Just so, and this may mean that things are about to get
interesting in Connecticut.
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Funny how the left insists that we can't enforce immigration laws and deport millions of illegals, but they think they can forcibly disarm the American people.
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Very well, and very pithily put!
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http://www.brennerbrief.com/wyoming-leads-19-states-challenge-new-jerseys-concealed-handgun-law/
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http://nation.foxnews.com/2014/03/09/obama-nominee-surgeon-general-says-banning-guns-part-medicine
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http://nation.foxnews.com/2014/03/09/obama-nominee-surgeon-general-says-banning-guns-part-medicine
We can be as healthy as everyone in Chicago!
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I've been seeing some of this in the medical journals.
Doctors trying to make the case gun laws has anything to do with medicine.
There is something self aggrandizing and narcissistic about these types.
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/03/10/officer-reportedly-tells-citizen-i-give-my-left-n-to-bang-down-your-door-and-come-for-your-gun/
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http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2014/03/09/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+daybydaycartoon%2FkUnt+%28Day+by+Day+Cartoon+by+Chris+Muir%29#007302
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/03/14/feds-demand-owner-of-gun-parts-store-turn-over-customer-listbut-this-former-marine-and-ceo-is-not-complying/
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I think Clint Eastwood would look good in another Dirty Harry movie with this tiny gun:
http://www.vincelewis.net/60magnum.html
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http://madworldnews.com/green-berets-open-letter-second-amendment/
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/03/28/Gun-Control-Groups-Fear-Sen-Yee-s-Indictment-Will-Make-Gun-Control-More-Difficult-To-Pass
Almost like there is a lack of credibility...
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/03/26/high-court-bolsters-domestic-violence-gun-ban-law/
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http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?aid=%2F20140409%2FNEWS%2F140409722
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Obama Budget Lays Groundwork
for Universal Gun Registry
And ATF makes the import ban on 5.45x39 ammo official
________________________________________
Last Friday, Attorney General Eric Holder testified before a House appropriations subcommittee on behalf of his department's proposed budget for FY2015.
Apparently, Holder didn't think anyone would read his written submission, because he all-but-admitted that Obama intends to implement a Universal Gun Registry by executive fiat. He also asked Congress to help fund so-called “smart gun” technology, which would prevent a gun from firing unless the shooter is wearing an accompanying bracelet or ring.
“Smart guns” are a dumb idea
Given that “smart gun” technology only works about 80 percent of the time -- according to the New Jersey Institute of Technology -- gun owners almost universally consider this a “dumb” idea. Even police have rejected the “dumb gun” approach for themselves. Currently, there are no such guns on the market in the United States. One gun store did briefly offer an Armatix .22 caliber earlier this year, but public outrage forced them to pull the handgun from the shelves.
Holder pushes a Universal Gun Registry
This year’s Obama budget shows how the administration is trying to quietly create the infrastructure for a universal gun registry.
In proposed “Program Increases” for the FBI, Holder has this to say:
“This program enhancement will double the capacity of the existing NICS [National Instant Check System] system. These expansions are vital in ensuring that the NICS system can support a Universal Background Check requirement, which is expected to double gross NICS transactions.”
Huh?
It may have escaped the Attorney General's notice, but the Democrat Senate defeated his Universal Background Check requirement.
So, in effect, Holder's asking for $100 million and 524 personnel to implement a program Congress rejected.
But that's not all.
Holder seeking more ATF agents to copy to 4473 forms
In the section on ATF “Program Increases,” Holder demands $51.1 million and 255 agents and other personnel for enforcement and inspections. In case anyone has forgotten, these are the people who are going to the FFL's in connection with “annual inspections” -- and physically copying all the 4473's and bound book entries. GOA has reported on these efforts before, and one can read first-hand accounts from gun dealers here and here.
So under Holder's proposed budget, many more 4473's would be copied and fed into ATF's de facto registry. At the same time, Obama's illegal Universal Background Check -- implemented, presumably, by executive fiat -- would ensure every gun transaction would have to go through an FFL. And this, of course, would guarantee that every American gun owner would have a 4473 which can be copied.
Think about it. With Republicans expected to take the Senate this fall -- and Obama stymied legislatively -- he has every incentive to go "full tyrant." And that, apparently, is exactly what he intends to do.
But we have no intention to sit back and let Holder take away our Second Amendment rights. We have drafted legislation to prohibit ATF from copying 4473's -- and to require it to destroy any 4473's it currently has.
UPDATE: GOA recently alerted you that an import ban on certain ammunition could be forthcoming from the ATF. Well, it’s official now -- the ATF just declared that Russian-made 7N6 5.45x39 ammo is armor piercing. This lawlessness represents another reason that Congress needs to cut t he ATF’s budget.
ACTION: Click here to Contact your Representative. Demand that the Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations bill contain language to prohibit ATF from compiling a national gun registry by copying and retaining the 4473's of every American.
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https://www.atf.gov/press/releases/2014/04/040714-special-advisory-test-examination-and-classification-7n6-545x39-ammunition.html
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GOA Slams Bloomberg and Justice Stevens for their Idiotic Ideas on the 2nd Amendment
While gun owners dramatically winning the culture war
“The founders did not establish a right to bear arms,” GOA’s Erich Pratt was quoted as saying to Newsmax. “They assumed it already existed [and] said that it ‘shall not be infringed.’ [But] gun-control advocates frequently want to skip over those words.” (MARC: Excellent point!)
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Not a GOA member yet? Click here to join Gun Owners of America!
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Gun Owners of America joined a chorus of pro-gun organizations in slamming idiotic comments made recently by former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens.
In a newly released book, Justice Stevens said the Second Amendment should be altered to say that people only have the right to bear arms “when serving in the militia.”
GOA blasted the comments, adding that gun owners would welcome the opportunity to demolish Stevens’ arguments in the court of public opinion.
“Bring on the debate,” said GOA Communications Director Erich Pratt in an interview with Newsmax over the weekend. Gun control advocates are always “pushing for draconian gun restrictions” while hiding behind words like “gun safety.”
But to a gun banner, those words are code for, “We just want the military and the police to have guns,” Pratt said. “So let’s get them out of the closet.”
Gun owners need not worry about Stevens’ idea gaining traction. Even an anti-gun liberal, like Professor Alan Dershowitz, opposes Stevens’ proposal.
“You don't amend the Magna Carta,” Dershowitz said. “You don't amend the Bill of Rights. There are certain things that you just leave pristine.”
GOA agrees. And increasingly, so do the American people.
Polls show more Americans opposing gun control
Remember all the phony polls which were used by Obama last year in order to push gun control?
Remember the unrelenting unilateral media pressure to ban guns -- pressure reflected in even the “conservative” media?
Well, who's laughing now?
Tuesday, the liberal USA Today was forced to concede that even liberal pollsters have found a massive, cataclysmic shift by Americans in favor of the right to keep and bear arms.
We bet that USA Today trolled all of the polls for some evidence that Americans embraced gun control to the same extent as their editorial board. What they found was a liberal Pew poll -- conducted immediately after last year's Newtown vote in April -- that found that Americans were statistically evenly divided between pro-gunners and anti-gunners. Okay, it's a liberal poll.
But what was even more interesting is that, in 2000, the same poll, asking the same questions, had found Americans supporting gun control by a margin of 66% to 29% -- a 37% gap in favor of gun control.
And Pew is not alone.
Later in 2013, Gallup found that 51% of all Americans do not support stricter gun control. In 2000, that number was 38% -- with 62% of Americans supposedly favoring more anti-gun laws.
Of course, 2000 was the year when gun owners confounded the pollsters and elected George Bush as president, over the anti-gun Democratic candidate, Al Gore.
Hence, you shouldn’t trust the polls. But when liberal gun grabbers are forced to concede that the polls are against them, that tells you something really interesting.
So, guess what, in this Easter week, we note that even Satan quotes scripture when he has no choice.
Bloomberg gets it really, really wrong
Speaking of the forces of darkness quoting Scripture, anti-gun former Mayor Michael Bloomberg chose this Easter week to try his hand at some biblical exposition.
But before we tell you about his whopper, Bloomberg made headlines on Wednesday after announcing his “threat” to spend $50 million to change people’s hearts and minds in favor of gun control.
Never mind the fact that Bloomberg has anything but the Midas touch when it comes to pushing gun control, as he’s lost almost every battle where he’s spent his millions.
“I guess he’s free to do so; he’s got money to waste,” said GOA Executive Director Larry Pratt on MSNBC. “But frankly, I think he’s going to find out why his side keeps losing.”
Indeed, Bloomberg lost in Nevada last year, where he tried to get a universal gun registry and universal background checks enacted.
He lost in Colorado, where he tried to rescue two state senators from being recalled because of their gun control votes.
And he lost in the U.S. Senate, where a concealed carry amendment actually garnered more Senate votes than did his proposal for expanding background checks on guns.
But it’s not just on guns where he gets it wrong. Obviously proud of his efforts in pushing firearms restrictions, Bloomberg said this week that:
“If there is a God, when I get to heaven, I’m not stopping to be interviewed. I’m heading right in. I’ve earned my place in heaven. It’s not even close.”
Wow, if he thinks he’s blessed because of his efforts to disarm the public, he should consider passages like I Samuel 13:16-22, where arms control was considered a curse; and Luke 22:36, where Jesus told His disciples to sell their cloaks and buy a sword (if they didn’t already have one).
And as for breezing right through the pearly gates, without an interview, and gaining entrance on the basis of his own very tainted efforts? Does he really think that he can buy his way into heaven because of the millions he’s spent on “social issues”?
Most people would find that disgusting.
Sadly, it appears that Bloomberg has no idea what this Easter weekend is all about. And so on that note, we here at Gun Owners of America hope that you and your family will have a blessed holiday.
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HIDDEN LEGAL TRAP WARNING: Even if your state allows you to legally be prescribed medical marijuana, the feds haven't officially changed their position on this and you could be "fried like a chicken gizzard on a hot, sticky Sunday night in the Deep South (Pancho Vilos)" for possessing a firearm and marijuana at the same time or admitting to being a user of marijuana, even for medicinal purposes. Never forget, BATF also stands for Ban All the Fun (also, by Pancho Vilos).
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/04/18/gun-ban-for-medical-pot-users-dropped-from-illinois-proposal/?intcmp=latestnews
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http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/May-2014/Chicago-crime-rates/
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http://www.politicalears.com/blog/bombshell-va-to-veterans-if-youre-late-paying-bills-we-will-prohibit-you-from-ever-owning-a-firearm/?utm_content=buffer6f982&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
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http://www.politicalears.com/blog/bombshell-va-to-veterans-if-youre-late-paying-bills-we-will-prohibit-you-from-ever-owning-a-firearm/?utm_content=buffer6f982&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
Some of that fundamental change we were promised.
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http://aattp.org/open-carry-texas-terrorizes-concerned-911-callers-threatens-to-release-their-private-info-video/
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http://patriotpost.us/articles/25433
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http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/breaking-news/index.ssf/2014/05/dad_73_whose_son_killed_sherif.html
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/us/in-wake-of-mass-shooting-a-gun-bill-is-pushed-in-california.html?emc=edit_th_20140529&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=49641193
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In case your local pravdas failed to cover these cases , , ,
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2014/06/01/Media-Silent-As-Guns-Used-To-Save-At-Least-Seven-Lives-Since-May-25
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/05/us/nra-backs-away-from-criticism-of-open-carry-advocates.html?emc=edit_th_20140605&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=49641193&_r=0
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Activist #SCOTUS. Federal Government regulations trumps Bill of Rights. http://start.toshiba.com/news/read/category/US%20News/article/afp-us_top_court_rules_straw_gun_purchases_are_illegal-afp …
Washington (AFP) - The US Supreme Court ruled Monday it was illegal to buy a gun on behalf of someone else who did not go through the background check.
The ruling comes on the heels of a spate of US shootings that have again sparked debate over gun control, with President Barack Obama calling for national "soul searching" over gun violence.
The top court ruled five to four against a former Virginia policeman, Bruce Abramski, who made a so-called "straw purchase" of a handgun for his uncle, who was in Pennsylvania.
Although both men were legal gun owners, Abramski had indicated on a federal form that he was the gun's actual buyer.
During the January 22 oral arguments, Abramski's lawyer, Richard Dietz, contended the transaction was legal because the men's legal and mental background allowed either of them to purchase a firearm.
But justice Elena Kagan responded at the time: "It doesn't matter if the ultimate transferee is Al Capone or somebody else."
"The purpose is to take away guns from (persons with) mental illnesses."
Kagan responded again Monday in giving the court's majority decision, summarizing the opinion of the court's four progressive justices alongside more conservative justice Anthony Kennedy, who has often been a swing vote.
"No piece of information is more important under federal firearms law than the identity of a gun’s purchaser," Kagan emphasized, saying it was "fundamental to the lawfulness of a gun sale" to respond truthfully on the federal form.
But in their dissent, the four more conservative judges said it was enough that the buyer and the eventual owner were both legally eligible to own guns.
This is the second Supreme Court ruling this year on gun control issues. In March, the court upheld a federal law barring anyone convicted of even a minor domestic violence charge from ever owning a gun.
P.C.
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https://www.gunowners.com/abramski.htm
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/terror-group-isis-declares-guns-illegal-in-parts-of-iraq-they-control/
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http://gunssavelives.net/blog/terror-group-isis-declares-guns-illegal-in-parts-of-iraq-they-control/
Totalitarians hate armed victims.
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Ever get tired of Americans being called gun nuts? Me too. This from Australia.
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster’s
http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/national/man-who-wore-colander-on-his-head-for-gun-licence-photo-says-it-is-part-of-church-of-the-flying-spaghetti-monsters-religion/story-fnii5yv8-1226961620238 …
AN Adelaide man who had his gun license photo taken with a colander on his head says it is significant to his religion — the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster — and he should not have had to undertake a psychological test.
Guy Albon, a 30-year-old disability worker in Adelaide, said his four guns and license were confiscated by police after their attention was drawn to his firearms license photo, which shows with him the colander.
Mr Albon, of Port Noarlunga, successfully argued he should be allowed to wear the pasta draining utensil in his license photo because it was a religious head piece.
When he had his license renewed last year, Mr Albon declared himself a Pastafarian and member of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster , a movement that promotes a lighthearted view of religion.
“I thought it would be a bit of fun,” he told The Advertiser
“As far as I know I’m the first person to do it (in Australia). I’ve copped quite a bit of flack from the police firearms branch and I’ve told them as far as I know — my legal knowledge is limited — but as long as the piece was a religious head piece it was going to be okay. They don’t have a qualifying list of religions not allowed to wear them.”
Mr Albon said the Service SA attendant was surprised to learn of the religion but allowed the photo to be taken.
“When I lined up for the picture — I popped it on my head and I told her I’m Pastafarian,” he said.
“She looked at me a little perplexed and I explained it to her and she was quite impressed and said she would like to look into it. I’m hoping she became a member actually.”
Mr Albon’s story has travelled around the world and, despite a psychiatrist confirming he was safe to own weapons, the photo with the colander had been destroyed.
He said he had been told he would have to be photographed again, this time without the cooking utensil on his head.
“I was told I was mentally competent and I have never misused my guns or intend to do so. So it’s a real kick in the guts that I was told if I went to get another photo with the colander, my guns would once again be confiscated.”
Mr Albon has to renew his driver’s license in the coming months and has vowed to wear a colander on his head once again.
“What are they going to do — take my car away?,” he said.
The 30 year-old has declined to seek legal action over the incident
P.C.
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http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Journalism/2014/06/24/CNN-Don-t-Blame-The-NRA-For-Mass-Shootings-Blame-Failed-Mental-Health-System?utm_source=e_breitbart_com&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Breitbart+News+Roundup%2C+June+25%2C+2014&utm_campaign=20140625_m121079119_Breitbart+News+Roundup%2C+June+25%2C+2014&utm_term=More
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http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2013/05/14/disarming-realities-as-gun-sales-soar-gun-crimes-plummet/
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/23/despite-rhetoric-gun-prosecutions-plummet-under-ob/
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http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0465033105/reasonmagazineA/
"Visiting Martin Luther King Jr. at the peak of the Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott, journalist William Worthy almost sat on a loaded pistol. “Just for self defense,” King assured him. It was not the only weapon King kept for such a purpose; one of his advisors remembered the reverend’s Montgomery, Alabama home as “an arsenal.”
Like King, many ostensibly “nonviolent” civil rights activists embraced their constitutional right to selfprotection—yet this crucial dimension of the Afro-American freedom struggle has been long ignored by history. In This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed, civil rights scholar Charles E. Cobb Jr. describes the vital role that armed self-defense played in the survival and liberation of black communities in America during the Southern Freedom Movement of the 1960s. In the Deep South, blacks often safeguarded themselves and their loved ones from white supremacist violence by bearing—and, when necessary, using—firearms. In much the same way, Cobb shows, nonviolent civil rights workers received critical support from black gun owners in the regions where they worked. Whether patrolling their neighborhoods, garrisoning their homes, or firing back at attackers, these courageous men and women and the weapons they carried were crucial to the movement’s success.
Giving voice to the World War II veterans, rural activists, volunteer security guards, and self-defense groups who took up arms to defend their lives and liberties, This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed lays bare the paradoxical relationship between the nonviolent civil rights struggle and the Second Amendment. Drawing on his firsthand experiences in the civil rights movement and interviews with fellow participants, Cobb provides a controversial examination of the crucial place of firearms in the fight for American freedom."
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Excellent find!
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http://alangura.com/2014/07/victory-in-palmer-v-d-c/
From the article:
"...the Court finds that the District of Columbia’s complete ban on the carrying of handguns in public is unconstitutional."
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http://alangura.com/2014/07/victory-in-palmer-v-d-c/
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http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/07/29/cop-loses-robber-after-good-guy-with-gun-tries-to-help-shoots-wildly-towards-him/
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2704715/Multiple-injuries-reported-shots-fired-Pennsylvania-hospital.html
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Missouri Further Secures Right to Bear Arms
On Tuesday, Missouri voters pushed aside the concerns of law enforcement, particularly from urban areas, and approved a ballot measure revamping their state constitution to strengthen gun rights in the Show Me State. The measure passed with 61% of the vote, carrying all but three jurisdictions: St. Louis City and County, and Boone County, which encompasses the university town of Columbia. The move is a step towards changing how the right to bear arms is seen.
The ballot measure was important to legal analysts because it made Missouri just the second state to adopt the "strict scrutiny" standard for gun laws. When interpreting a law with "strict scrutiny" a court has to find that a law furthers a "compelling government interest," is narrowly tailored to achieve that interest, and utilizes the least restrictive method to achieve it. It's the highest standard among the three categories of scrutiny in legal doctrine. It is also how the First Amendment and the Fourth Amendment are interpreted in the U.S. Constitution. Some argue the Supreme Court majority adopted "strict scrutiny" in its DC vs. Heller decision, even though it wasn't specifically mentioned there. This could be the new trend in Second Amendment interpretation and a significant upgrade from the "rational basis" standard often used, the lowest of the three.
"Strict scrutiny is a big da-- deal," said St. Louis attorney Chuck Hatfield, an opponent of the ballot issue. "Right now, the law is that the state has the right to regulate
guns and arms in a reasonable exercise of police power. Strict scrutiny is a whole other game."
But the legislator who introduced the measure argued that his intent was to make the Second Amendment "just as viable as other constitutional rights." The measure also extended the right to bear arms already in the state's constitution and added ammunition and "the accessories typical to the normal function of such arms," while eliminating a prohibition on concealed carry.
"The Missouri Constitution is now the gold standard for the protection of the individual right to keep and bear arms," added state Senator Kurt Schaefer.
To most, the Missouri vote was just an extension of the common sense found in most areas of what's called "flyover country" by denizens of the coasts. By further spelling out the open-ended provisions of the Second Amendment, Missouri has taken a step toward the founders' intent by leaving the options for self-defense as open as possible.
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http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_26292645/san-jose-rep-honda-announces-bill-ban-civilians
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/08/06/missouri-state-constitutional-right-to-keep-and-bear-arms-strengthened-by-a-61-39-vote/
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http://www.contracostatimes.com/news/ci_26292645/san-jose-rep-honda-announces-bill-ban-civilians
Wait, how did that bad guys get "assault weapons"? Weren't those already banned in CA?
It's almost like those laws only work on the law abiding....
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http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2014/08/armed-guards-at-strip-mall-save-north-st-louis-businesses-from-looters/
Funny how that works.
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Hat tip to Big Dog
http://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?topic=1336.msg83063;boardseen#new
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http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-DJ-KA2WhhLo/UNZr8agpVqI/AAAAAAAAFH4/f6rrTVN7q6I/s1600/Screen+Shot+2012-12-22+at++Saturday,+December+22,+9.26+PM.png
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/aug/24/chicago-crime-rate-drops-as-concealed-carry-gun-pe/
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California wait period doesn't apply to gun owners
http://start.toshiba.com/news/read/category/Top%20News/article/the_associated_press-california_wait_period_doesnt_apply_to_gun_owners-ap
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A federal judge has overturned part of a California law requiring a 10-day waiting period for gun buyers, ruling that it does not apply to those who already own firearms.
U.S. District Judge Anthony Ishii of Fresno ruled that "10-day waiting periods impermissibly violate the Second Amendment" for gun-buyers who already passed background checks or are authorized to carry concealed weapons.
Californians buying their first firearm will still be subject to background checks and the 10-day waiting period under the ruling, dated Friday.
A spokesman for the state attorney general, Nick Pacilio, said Monday that officials are reviewing the ruling as they decide whether to appeal.
Two gun owners and two gun-owner rights groups, The Calguns Foundation and the Second Amendment Foundation, sued over the state waiting period in 2011.
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http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20140716/METRO01/307160034
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/08/31/take-a-gander-at-americas-most-heavily-armed-counties-the-ones-that-arent-on-the-map-might-surprise-you/
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http://viewer.zmags.com/publication/ed8ad5eb#/ed8ad5eb/65
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http://gunssavelives.net/why-i-carry/video-why-i-carry-clerk-shot-in-head-after-complying-with-all-of-armed-robbers-demands-in-ga/
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http://defund.com/mob-of-teens-try-to-violently-rob-concealed-carry-holder-get-shot/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook
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http://defund.com/mob-of-teens-try-to-violently-rob-concealed-carry-holder-get-shot/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook
"He fatally shot one of the robbers, a 15-year-old known gang member who was already the victim of another non-fatal shooting on August 1. The teen had previously been charged with armed robbery, auto theft, theft, and fleeing. Police have arrested another two 14-year-old males, a 16-year-old male, a 17-year-old female... Police say this particular group is responsible for multiple armed robberies that have recently hit Milwaukee. Police say the group may be responsible for dozens of robberies over just the past three days. ...The Daily Caller reports that a “similar incident involving a Milwaukee robbery gang occurred in July. A nurse carrying a concealed carry permit shot a 15-year-old assailant as he and a 17-year-old accomplice attempted to steal her car. "
Examples of what the mainstream media, in another context, call "unaccompanied children". Maybe Homeland Security could help them locate their parents.
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http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/senator-feinstein-study-shows-she-misleads-on-value-of-assault-weapon-ban/
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second post of day:
I notice the data starts in 2001. I wonder what it was in prior decades?
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/25/us/25shooters.html?emc=edit_th_20140925&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=49641193&_r=0
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FBI Used Bogus Numbers in Mass Shooting Report
Last month, the FBI released a study on mass shootings since 2000. We looked at the underlying cultural problems, but gun researcher John Lott dug deeper into the actual numbers the FBI used. What he found is astounding. "The FBI counted 160 'mass' or 'active' shootings in public places from 2000 to 2013," Lott wrote. "Worse, it said these attacks rose from just one in 2000 to 17 in 2013. Media outlets worldwide gave the 'news' extensive coverage. Too bad the study is remarkably shoddy -- slicing the evidence to distort the results. In fact, mass public shootings have only risen ever so slightly over the last four decades. While the FBI study discusses 'mass shootings or killings,' its graphs were filled with cases that had nothing to do with mass killings. Of the 160 cases it counted, 32 involved a gun being fired without anyone being killed. Another 35 cases involved a single murder. It’s hard to see how the FBI can count these incidents, which make up 42 percent of its 160 cases, as 'mass killings.'" In other words, it appears the FBI produced a deceptive report that just happens to bolster the gun-grabbing agenda of the Obama administration
more at http://nypost.com/2014/10/12/the-fbis-bogus-report-on-mass-shootings/
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FBI Used Bogus Numbers in Mass Shooting Report
Last month, the FBI released a study on mass shootings since 2000. We looked at the underlying cultural problems, but gun researcher John Lott dug deeper into the actual numbers the FBI used. What he found is astounding. "The FBI counted 160 'mass' or 'active' shootings in public places from 2000 to 2013," Lott wrote. "Worse, it said these attacks rose from just one in 2000 to 17 in 2013. Media outlets worldwide gave the 'news' extensive coverage. Too bad the study is remarkably shoddy -- slicing the evidence to distort the results. In fact, mass public shootings have only risen ever so slightly over the last four decades. While the FBI study discusses 'mass shootings or killings,' its graphs were filled with cases that had nothing to do with mass killings. Of the 160 cases it counted, 32 involved a gun being fired without anyone being killed. Another 35 cases involved a single murder. It’s hard to see how the FBI can count these incidents, which make up 42 percent of its 160 cases, as 'mass killings.'" In other words, it appears the FBI produced a deceptive report that just happens to bolster the gun-grabbing agenda of the Obama administration
more at http://nypost.com/2014/10/12/the-fbis-bogus-report-on-mass-shootings/
It's almost like Obama is trying to destroy all faith in American institutions.
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Maybe my friend Dr. Donald Miller, with whom I have discussed variations of this, can chime in:
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/nyregion/mental-reports-put-34500-on-new-yorks-no-guns-list.html?_r=0
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http://www.examiner.com/article/anti-gun-missouri-dem-arrested-with-9mm-pistol-refuses-breathalyzer-test
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http://bulletsfirst.net/2014/10/20/police-ny-demand-facebook-profile-password-applying-permit/
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http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/03/us/gun-control-groups-blocked-in-washington-turn-attention-to-states.html?emc=edit_th_20150103&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=49641193&_r=0
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Gov. Rick Snyder of Michigan on Thursday vetoed gun legislation that was supported by the National Rifle Association and approved by wide margins in the state’s Legislature, dominated in both chambers by Mr. Snyder’s fellow Republicans.
Mr. Snyder, who was endorsed by the N.R.A. as he sought a second term as governor last fall, had received a flood of pressure from both sides on the two-bill package in recent days, including letters of opposition from Gabrielle Giffords, the former congresswoman from Arizona who was shot in 2011, and Representative Debbie Dingell, a Democrat of Michigan.
Mr. Snyder said the package could allow people accused of domestic abuse to obtain concealed pistol licenses. “We simply can’t and won’t take the chance of exposing domestic abuse victims to additional violence or intimidation,” Mr. Snyder said in a news release. “There are certainly some reforms that can improve the way Michigan issues concealed pistol licenses and we support the rights of law-abiding firearm owners, but it’s crucial that we leave in place protections for people who already have endured challenges and abuse.”
Under current Michigan law, a person who is the subject of a personal protection order may not receive a concealed pistol license, the governor’s office said, while the new measures would have barred such licenses only in cases where that was specifically required by the courts.
Mr. Snyder has irked those in his party before on other issues, at one point urging that the state quickly set up a health care exchange and, at another, vetoing several voting measures including one that called for photo identification to get an absentee ballot.
Mr. Snyder said that he supported some elements of the package, which was aimed at turning the duties of concealed weapons licensing boards over to county clerks and law enforcement authorities. He urged lawmakers to seek new measures to further those elements. Generally, the governor’s spokeswoman said, he considers gun issues an “important balancing act — making sure we’re vigilantly protecting the constitutional rights of the state’s law-abiding firearm owners while also ensuring public safety and security, especially for vulnerable Michiganders.”
Gun rights supporters criticized the decision, saying the new measures had been widely mischaracterized, while advocates for gun control and for victims of domestic violence said the governor had made an essential choice on a question of safety, not partisanship.
Chris W. Cox, executive director of the N.R.A.’s Institute for Legislative Action, said the measures did not expose victims to any additional risks of violence. Under the new measures, someone applying for a personal protection order could check a box seeking that the subject of the order be barred from having a firearm, he noted.
“The fact is that this bill would have provided victims of domestic violence increased protections against would-be abusers, while protecting our constitutional rights of self-defense and due process,” Mr. Cox said in a news release.
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http://start.toshiba.com/news/read/category/US%20News/article/afp-130yearold_gun_that_won_the_west_found_in_us_park-afp
Los Angeles (AFP) - US experts are scratching their heads after finding a more than 130-year-old Wild West rifle leaning against a Juniper tree in a remote area of a national park.
The Winchester Model 1873 firearm was found in Great Basin National Park in Nevada by a park employee, Eva Jensen, who happened to be working in the area with an archaeology team.
Exposed for years to the elements, the rifle's cracked wood stock was "weathered to gray," while the brown rusted barrel "blended into the colors of the old Juniper tree," officials said.
Tucked into a remote rocky outcrop, the rifle appeared to have remained "hidden for many years," they added in a statement.
The gun's serial number indicates that it was made and shipped in 1882. But beyond that it remains a mystery.
"Who left the rifle? When and why was it leaned against the tree? And why was it never retrieved?" the statement said, adding that experts were poring over old newspapers and family histories to search for where it may have come from.
The Winchester Model 1873 rifle holds a prominent place in local history -- referred to as "the gun that won the West."
Some 720,610 were manufactured between 1873 and 1916 when production ended.
The gun was not loaded when it was found, but would have held .44-40 caliber ammunition when in use.
P.C.
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Good to see you posting here again 8-)
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What say we to this?
======================
BOULDER, Colo. — JUST after Christmas, Veronica Rutledge of Blackfoot, Idaho, took her 2-year-old son to a Walmart store to spend holiday gift cards. As they strolled by the electronics section, according to news reports, the toddler reached into his mom’s purse and pulled out a handgun that she legally carried. He pulled the trigger once and killed her.
The previous month, a 3-year-old boy in Washington State was shot in the face by a 4-year-old. Earlier, a 2-year-old boy in Pennsylvania shot and killed his 11-year-old sister.
About 20 children and teenagers are shot daily in the United States, according to a study by the journal Pediatrics. Indeed, more preschool-age children (about 80 a year) are killed by guns each year than police officers are killed by guns (about 50), according to the F.B.I. and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. This toll is utterly unnecessary, for the technology to make childproof guns goes back more than a century. Beginning in the 1880s, Smith & Wesson (whose gun was used in the Walmart killing) actually sold childproof handguns that required a lever to be depressed as the trigger was pulled.
“No ordinary child under 8 years of age can possibly discharge it,” Smith & Wesson boasted at the time, and it sold half-a-million of these guns, but, today, it no longer offers that childproof option.
Doesn’t it seem odd that your cellphone can be set up to require a PIN or a fingerprint, but there’s no such option for a gun?
Which brings us to Kai Kloepfer, a lanky 17-year-old high school senior in Boulder, Colo. After the cinema shooting in nearby Aurora, Kloepfer decided that for a science fair project he would engineer a “smart gun” that could be fired only by an authorized user.
“I started with iris recognition, and that seemed a good idea until you realize that many people firing guns wear sunglasses,” Kloepfer recalls. “So I moved on to fingerprints.”
Kloepfer designed a smart handgun that fires only when a finger it recognizes is on the grip. More than 1,000 fingerprints can be authorized per gun, and Kloepfer says the sensor is 99.999 percent accurate. A child can’t fire the gun. Neither can a thief — important here in a country in which more than 150,000 guns are stolen annually.
Kloepfer’s design won a grand prize in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair. Then he won a $50,000 grant from the Smart Tech Challenges Foundation to refine the technology. By the time he enters college in the fall (he applied early to Stanford and has been deferred), he hopes to be ready to license the technology to a manufacturer.
There are other approaches to smart guns. The best known, the Armatix iP1, made by a German company and available in the United States through a complicated online procedure, can be fired only if the shooter is wearing a companion wristwatch.
The National Rifle Association seems set against smart guns, apparently fearing that they might become mandatory. One problem has been an unfortunate 2002 New Jersey law stipulating that three years after smart guns are available anywhere in the United States, only smart guns can be sold in the state. The attorney general’s office there ruled recently that the Armatix smart gun would not trigger the law, but the provision has still led gun enthusiasts to bully dealers to keep smart guns off the market everywhere in the U.S.
Opponents of smart guns say that they aren’t fully reliable. Some, including Kloepfer’s, will need batteries to be recharged once a year or so. Still, if Veronica Rutledge had had one in her purse in that Idaho Walmart, her son wouldn’t have been able to shoot and kill her.
“Smart guns are going to save lives,” says Stephen Teret, a gun expert at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “They’re not going to save all lives, but why wouldn’t we want to make guns as safe a consumer product as possible?”
David Hemenway, a public health expert at Harvard, says that the way forward is for police departments or the military to buy smart guns, creating a market and proving they work.
An interfaith group of religious leaders is also appealing to gun industry leaders, ahead of the huge annual trade show in Las Vegas with 65,000 attendees, to drop opposition to smart guns.
Smart guns aren’t a panacea. But when even a 17-year-old kid can come up with a safer gun, why should the gun lobby be so hostile to the option of purchasing one?
Something is amiss when we protect our children from toys that they might swallow, but not from firearms. So Veronica Rutledge is dead, and her son will grow up with the knowledge that he killed her — and we all bear some responsibility when we don’t even try to reduce the carnage.
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I am all for it if it is not forced via more regulations to all gun owners.
So if demand is so great why does not S & W make a modern version?
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When seconds count, your smart gun is onlyminutes away from functioning.
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"When seconds count, your smart gun is onlyminutes away from functioning."
Yes. One could only hope you grip the handle correctly so it "reads" you prints. Or you have your wireless device near you to unlock the electronic safety like keyless entry into one's vehicle.
Doesn't sound so smart to me......
Eighty children dying a year is sad. But I don't see the logic behind making 100,000,000 gun owners risk their lives and jump through regulatory hoops to say reduce this number to say 40.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51clP7JRqv8
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http://www.mississippigunnews.com/interstate-transportation-of-firearms-and-ammunition-bill-introduced/?utm_content=bufferd395b&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
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http://coloradopeakpolitics.com/2015/02/03/peak-feed-chinese-immigrant-explains-gun-control-means/
Speaking from experience.
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/feb/11/federal-court-rules-residency-requirements-pistol-/
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http://controversialtimes.com/news/atf-is-attempting-to-ban-popular-ar-15-ammo/
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http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2013/01/16/here-are-the-23-executive-orders-on-gun-safety-signed-today-by-the-president/
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shallnot.org/tennessee_bills_would_block_federal_gun_control … Tennessee Bills Would Block Federal Gun Control
Tennessee Bills Would Block Federal Gun Control
posted by Scott Landreth | 1939sc
February 17, 2015
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (FEB. 17, 2015) - Two bills filed last week in Tennessee would effectively block a proposed new ATF ban on the popular M855 AR-15 round and other federal gun control measures within the state. The bills make the state the tenth to consider such legislation so far this year.
Introduced by Rep. Terri Lynn Weaver and Sen. Richard Briggs, House Bill 1341 (HB1341) and Senate Bill 1110 (SB1110), prohibit the state from carrying Uncle Sam's water by implementing or enforcing federal gun "laws," rules, regulations and orders.
If passed, Tennessee law would be amended by adding the following as a new section:
(a) On or after July 1, 2015, no public funds of this state, or any political subdivision of this state, shall be allocated to the implementation, regulation, or enforcement of any federal law, executive order, rule, or regulation regulating the ownership, use, or possession of firearms, ammunition, or firearm accessories.
(b) On or after July 1, 2015, no personnel or property of this state, or any political subdivision of this state, shall be allocated to the implementation, regulation, or enforcement of any federal law, executive order, rule, or regulation regulating the ownership, use, or possession of firearms, ammunition, or firearm accessories.
EFFECTIVE
Based on James Madison's advice for states and individuals in Federalist #46, a "refusal to cooperate with officers of the Union" is an extremely effectively method to bring down federal gun control measures because most enforcement actions rely on help, support and leadership in the states.
Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano agreed. In a recent televised discussion on the issue, he noted that a single state taking this step would make federal gun laws "nearly impossible" to enforce.
This is because a vast majority of federal enforcement actions are either led or supported by law enforcement - and other agencies - on a state level. As noted by the National Governor's Association during the partial government shutdown of 2013, "states are partners with the federal government on most federal programs."
"A partnership doesn't work too well when one side stops working," said Michael Boldin of the Tenth Amendment Center. "By withdrawing all resources and participation in federal gun control schemes, the states can effectively bring them down."
LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL
Refusing to participate with federal enforcement is not just an effective method, it has also been sanctioned by the Supreme Court in a number of major cases, dating from 1842.
The 1997 case, Printz v. US serves as the cornerstone. In it, Justice Scalia held:
The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the States’ officers, or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program.
As noted Georgetown Law Constitutional Scholar Randy Barnett has said, "This line of cases is now 20 years old and considered well settled."
MOMENTUM
Introduction comes at a time when several other states are considering similar bills, building momentum and support for the effort to block federal gun control at the state level. Similar bills have already been filed for 2015 in Texas, Oklahoma, Arizona, Montana, Minnesota, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Carolina and New Hampshire and several more states are expected to do the same. Since 2013, Idaho, Alaska and Kansas have already passed into law legislation that pushes back at federal gun control measures with this same strategy.
TAKE ACTION IN SUPPORT
In Tennessee: Follow the steps to support this bill at THIS LINK
ALL OTHER STATES:
Urge your state rep and senator to introduce a similar bill. Send them the link the model legislation at this link:
http://shallnot.org/legislation
contact info here: http://openstates.org/find_your_legislator
**WE NEED YOUR HELP TO CONTINUE THIS WORK. PLEASE CHIP IN HERE:http://shallnot.org/donate
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Good. It's not a federal law, and shouldn't have the force of one.
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From the Patriot Post:
Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) is re-introducing the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act to allow gun owners with concealed carry permits to bring their firearms to any other state with concealed carry laws. All 50 states and the District of Columbia have some version of concealed carry in place, but the laws and reciprocity vary significantly from one state to the next -- a patchwork that has landed law-abiding citizens in trouble for years.
"The current patchwork of state and local laws is confusing for even the most conscientious and well-informed concealed carry permit holders," explained Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA's Institute for Legislative Action. "This confusion often leads to law-abiding gun owners running afoul of the law when they exercise their right to self-protection while traveling or temporarily living away from home."
The most prominent recent example of this is the case of Shaneen Allen, a single mother from Pennsylvania threatened with 10 years in jail for inadvertently bringing a concealed gun into New Jersey. Fortunately, sanity prevailed in that instance. But this type of case will only become more common in the coming years now that every state has a concealed carry law and the legal purchase of firearms is on the rise.
Cornyn said his legislation seeks to eliminate these "gotcha moments," but, naturally, the gun control crowd is warning of the apocalypse.
Michael Bloomberg's gun-grabbing group, Everytown for Gun Safety, released a report on concealed carry reciprocity, claiming, "Some states do thorough criminal background checks on applicants, while other states have such ineffective permitting systems that they inadvertently issue permits to felons." Everytown and other anti-Second Amendment groups argue this bill will negate strict gun control laws in favor of states with weaker laws in place.
It's almost comical to see the Left fly the flag of federalism. Leftist dogma dictates all power belongs to the central government -- health care, school lunches, same-sex marriage, etc. But this time they have found a convenient use for states' rights by arguing that it's wrong for Washington to establish a uniform system for recognizing the gun laws of other states.
Leftist hypocrisy aside, Cornyn believes such a scenario is not possible under his proposed legislation. The bill upholds laws currently in place in individual states by providing that weapons conceal-carried by one state's residents must be carried in the same manner as residents in the host state. The legislation also does not allow concealed carry in states that do not allow the practice for their own residents. This last point seems irrelevant considering all states currently have concealed-carry, but it does signal the bill is not designed to roll back or in any way change existing state laws.
The federal government will not be empowered to force a national minimum concealed-carry standard under this bill. It will merely protect state residents from being unduly harassed by other states with stricter concealed carry laws.
The bill likely passes constitutional muster on grounds that no state can violate the rights guaranteed by the Bill of the Rights or the 14th Amendment. But there is a difference of opinion about which constitutional clause is the best vehicle. Some say the Commerce Clause offers the best argument because it is in the federal government's interest to see that citizens can freely engage in interstate travel and commerce. If citizens fear undue punishment or harassment in certain states because of unreciprocated concealed-carry laws, then travel and commerce between states will be deterred.
The Commerce Clause is too often used to justify ever more regulatory power in the hands of the federal government, and thus many conservatives argue the Full Faith and Credit clause is more appropriate here.
According to the Constitution: "Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records, and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof."
Consider a driver's license. Any state's driver's license allows its holder to drive in any other state, subject to the laws of the state in which he or she is driving. Concealed carry reciprocity already works in a similar manner and Cornyn's bill wouldn't change that.
The anti-Second Amendment crowd doesn't want to see Cornyn's concealed carry reciprocity bill pass because it will further confirm what they already fear -- they are losing the gun control fight. A large majority of Americans embrace the right to possess firearms. And it is a right, not a privilege.
The leftist argument that Cornyn's bill will ultimately lead to a loosening of concealed carry restrictions in certain states is not entirely off base. It may very well do that, since the loosening of gun laws in this country has been trending for at least 20 years with positive results. That trend will likely continue, no matter the fate of Cornyn's bill.
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The Florida Court of Appeal held Wednesday in Norman v. State that the Second Amendment protects the right to carry a firearm outside the home. "After Heller I, McDonald, and [other recent rulings]," the court ruled, "it is clear that a total ban on the public carrying of ready-to-use handguns outside the home cannot survive a constitutional challenge under any level of scrutiny." The ruling quoted Peruta v. County of San Diego, in which the Ninth Circuit Court (yes, that Ninth Circuit) said a right is essentially "destroyed [if the] exercise of [that] right is limited to a few people, in a few places, at a few times." The Florida court did uphold the right of states to determine the manner of carry (open or concealed): "The Legislature is permitted to regulate the manner in which arms are borne for the purpose of maintaining public peace and safety, so long as any such regulation leaves available a viable carry mode." The court also didn't handle the question of limits to where a gun can be carried -- only that the overall right extends outside the home. We're glad to see another court rule in favor of the Second Amendment -- it's an encouraging trend
Also see:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/02/18/second-amendment-protects-carrying-guns-outside-the-home-but-state-may-require-concealed-carry-rather-than-open-carry/
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Democrats Reload on Ammo Ban
After 90,000 comments and condemnation from congressional Republicans, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives backed away from its proposal to ban the 5.56 M855 "green tip" ammunition. But congressional Democrats have taken the idea, expanded the breadth of the proposed ammo ban, and run with it. In a letter to the ATF, Democrats encourage the bureau to move fast and use its "existing authority" to limit any rifle cartridge that can be fired from a handgun. Democrats wrote, "We hope that the Bureau will swiftly review comments on the proposed framework and issue a revised proposal that will address the danger posed by handguns that fire 5.56mm and other rifle ammunition." They have introduced legislation in the House to ban the green-tipped rounds, and Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) said she would introduced a broader bill to ban even more forms of armor-piercing ammunition. Because cops wear light body armor and there are some unique pistols out there (Thompson Contender pistol chambered in 30-30, anybody?), Democrats are opening the door for potentially banning all center-fire rounds. And the ATF welcomes this lobbying. Its director, B. Todd Jones, said "any 5.56 round" threatens the safety of police officers -- a distorted fear if ever there was one.
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Democrats Reload on Ammo Ban
After 90,000 comments and condemnation from congressional Republicans, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives backed away from its proposal to ban the 5.56 M855 "green tip" ammunition. But congressional Democrats have taken the idea, expanded the breadth of the proposed ammo ban, and run with it. In a letter to the ATF, Democrats encourage the bureau to move fast and use its "existing authority" to limit any rifle cartridge that can be fired from a handgun. Democrats wrote, "We hope that the Bureau will swiftly review comments on the proposed framework and issue a revised proposal that will address the danger posed by handguns that fire 5.56mm and other rifle ammunition." They have introduced legislation in the House to ban the green-tipped rounds, and Rep. Jackie Speier (D-CA) said she would introduced a broader bill to ban even more forms of armor-piercing ammunition. Because cops wear light body armor and there are some unique pistols out there (Thompson Contender pistol chambered in 30-30, anybody?), Democrats are opening the door for potentially banning all center-fire rounds. And the ATF welcomes this lobbying. Its director, B. Todd Jones, said "any 5.56 round" threatens the safety of police officers -- a distorted fear if ever there was one.
Law enforcement faces serious threats from being struck by cars. Time to ban cars!
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http://downtrend.com/travis/california-begins-confiscating-legally-purchased-guns
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http://downtrend.com/travis/california-begins-confiscating-legally-purchased-guns
That's the new tactic. Turn everyone into a prohibited person.
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http://insider.foxnews.com/2015/04/05/gun-toting-good-samaritan-thwarts-carjacking-georgia-car-wash
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The Tennessee governor's mansion is occupied by a Republican, and the GOP owns supermajorities in both the House and Senate. The result has been a wave of pro-gun measures, including a "Guns in Parking Lots" law approved in 2013 that gives employees the legal right to store a firearm inside personal vehicles even if it's against an employer's inclinations. The move was a good one; the problem is that "an attorney general's opinion later found that while the law decriminalized the actions of those who ignored posted gun bans on private property, employers could still terminate workers for violating company firearms policies," explains WTVC News Channel 9. Last week, the legislature passed and Gov. Bill Haslam signed a fix that allows fired persons the ability to take legal action. Now, even some Republicans contend the new law infringes on employers' rights. But that's misguided — businesses still have the right to ban firearms, but vehicles don't belong to the employer. As Hot Air blogger Jazz Shaw concludes, "This law seems to me to have been a good compromise. The employer can bar carrying weapons in the workplace, but the employee's car is not the workplace. And punishing them for such storage is an unreasonable burden on their constitutional rights." Tennessee hit the bull's-eye on this one. More...
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The Tennessee governor's mansion is occupied by a Republican, and the GOP owns supermajorities in both the House and Senate. The result has been a wave of pro-gun measures, including a "Guns in Parking Lots" law approved in 2013 that gives employees the legal right to store a firearm inside personal vehicles even if it's against an employer's inclinations. The move was a good one; the problem is that "an attorney general's opinion later found that while the law decriminalized the actions of those who ignored posted gun bans on private property, employers could still terminate workers for violating company firearms policies," explains WTVC News Channel 9. Last week, the legislature passed and Gov. Bill Haslam signed a fix that allows fired persons the ability to take legal action. Now, even some Republicans contend the new law infringes on employers' rights. But that's misguided — businesses still have the right to ban firearms, but vehicles don't belong to the employer. As Hot Air blogger Jazz Shaw concludes, "This law seems to me to have been a good compromise. The employer can bar carrying weapons in the workplace, but the employee's car is not the workplace. And punishing them for such storage is an unreasonable burden on their constitutional rights." Tennessee hit the bull's-eye on this one. More...
A good law would be to make the employer liable to protect employees they disarm.
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What say Rahm to this?
http://bearingarms.com/uber-driver-concealed-carry-permit-drops-chicago-gunman/
Chicago Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy loathes concealed carry, and so it must be particularly painful for him today to deal with the fact that it was a concealed carry permit holder who stopped a madman firing into a Chicago crowd.
A Logan Square man was ordered held on no bail Sunday after prosecutors said he fired a handgun into a crowd of people Friday night.
But 22-year-old Everardo Custodio wasn’t in Cook County bond court to hear Judge Peggy Chiampas deny him bail.
He was at Advocate Illinois Masonic hospital, being treated for gunshot wounds to the shin, thigh and lower back.
As Custodio was allegedly opening fire on the crowd Friday, an Uber driver with a concealed-carry permit picked up his own firearm and shot Custodio multiple times, according to prosecutors and court records.
The Uber driver, a 47-year-old Little Italy resident, has a firearm owner’s identification card and acted in self-defense and the defense of others, Assistant State’s Attorney Barry Quinn said Sunday in bond court.
No charges have been filed against the Uber driver, police said.
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Very nice.
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http://defendandcarry.com/fbi-director-says-concealed-carriers-are-law-enforcement-officers-best-backup/
FBI Director Testifies He’s Never Had Problems With Concealed Carriers
via Chuck Ross at The Daily Caller
FBI director James Comey testified in front of a House panel on Wednesday to discuss the agency’s 2016 budget, but he ended up making a profound point about the issue of concealed carry. At the end of the two-hour budget hearing, Texas U.S. Rep. John Culberson, chairman of the Appropriations Subcommittee on Justice, asked Comey about the nature of his interactions with legal concealed carry permit holders.
Before his stint as head of the FBI, Comey worked for more than two decades as a federal prosecutor.
“You mentioned earlier about criminals with guns, I doubt you’ve ever had a problem with a concealed carry permit holder who is licensed with a background check using their good judgment,” Culberson said at the end of Comey’s two-hour testimony. “Could you comment on that as a law enforcement officer?”
“I haven’t had situations where there has been problems with that,” Comey said.
“With a concealed carry permit holder?” Culberson asked.
“No, not that I can remember,” Comey said.
“That’s a law enforcement officer’s best backup, particularly if he’s a Texan,” Culberson said.
The best line from this whole piece is the last one here, suggesting that a concealed carrier is law enforcement’s best backup. If only more elected officials understood that.
For the most part concealed carriers understand that their permit is not a badge, and that the police should be called for most non-life threatening issues.
However, having a concealed firearm, and being trained with it does provide permit holders to step in and stop a crime in progress or assist police officers in dire situations.
Kudos to the FBI Director Comey for his astute comments.
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http://concealednation.org/2015/05/suspect-dead-after-armed-citizen-intervenes-in-carjacking/
OREM, UTAH — A suspect is dead after a concealed carry permit holder shot and killed him during a carjacking.
The incident happened a ways away from the beginning of the story when a group of people were seen fleeing in a vehicle from a reported fight. During their getaway, they hit a curb. The suspects got out of the vehicle and ran, and one of them decided to steal a pickup truck.
He then drove the truck to a grocery store named Maceys and left it there. He then went on to attempt to steal a car from a person in the parking lot. An alert –and armed– passerby noticed the confrontation and decided to get himself involved.
The armed citizen, identified as a 31-year-old man, told the suspect to get out of the vehicle. When the suspect got out, he immediately lunged at him. It is at this time that the armed citizen felt threatened and fired his handgun.
The suspect was hit with a single bullet and was transported to the hospital, where he later died of his injuries.
Police say the suspect had numerous felony warrants.
Based on the storyline above, do you feel that you would have involved yourself in a similar situation?
========================
From Mitch Vilos' FB Self Defense Law page:
MV: "Thanks for the comments Jay and Laron. Of course, the biggest thumbs down factor we hear all the time, even with the police, is that the "victim" was unarmed. Yes, Jay, it is not justifiable to use deadly force to defend property. So as long as the woman in the car was safe, even though her car was being stolen, the safe option would have been to get a good ID and call in the car theft. This legally safe counsel is in line with our policy of keeping you as far from the "edge of the cliff" as possible in your use and threats of deadly force. That, however, does not mean the shooter here does not have several very good theories of defense of self and others. First, it's one thing to just steal a car - deadly force is not justified. However, when you steal a car by force or threat, it becomes a robbery which then justifies the use of deadly force under the Utah forcible felony clause. Furthermore, by going for the shooter's gun, the "victim" is still using force in the course of the robbery - i.e. the robby is still in progress, it hasn't terminated. There is a self-defense aspect to protecting your firearm. But never forget, that is what the defendant contended in Chapter Two of our book, that he thought the "victims" were rushing him to get his gun. He was convicted of first degree murder and attempted murder."
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/05/19/teen-startled-awake-by-noise-sees-two-faces-at-his-window-grabs-a-gun-and-shoots-the-tragedy-is-who-they-were/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Firewire&utm_campaign=Firewire%20-%20HORIZON%205-19-15%20Build-TUES
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/05/19/teen-startled-awake-by-noise-sees-two-faces-at-his-window-grabs-a-gun-and-shoots-the-tragedy-is-who-they-were/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_term=Firewire&utm_campaign=Firewire%20-%20HORIZON%205-19-15%20Build-TUES
Target identification. Was the subject at the window an immediate threat of serious bodily injury or death?
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http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/politics/item/19083-the-racist-origin-of-america-s-gun-control-laws
http://countercurrentnews.com/2014/07/lawsuits-filed-as-chicago-denies-black-people-concealed-carry-licenses/
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http://patriotpost.us/posts/35510
Obviously, much here to be concerned about, but I'm not seeing my way to saying that keeping people convicted of domestic violence from owning guns is a bad thing.
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http://controversialtimes.com/politics/congress-votes-to-restore-gun-rights-for-non-violent-felons/
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http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/nra-gun-blogs-videos-web-forums-threatened-by-new-obama-regulation/article/2565762
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http://conservativetribune.com/lynch-assaults-gun-owners/
second post
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third post
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/us-top-court-rejects-challenge-to-san-francisco-gun-regulation/ar-BBkPW85?ocid=sf
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By
Jason L. Riley
June 9, 2015 7:28 p.m. ET
107 COMMENTS
Last September the Obama administration produced an FBI report that said mass shooting attacks and deaths were up sharply—by an average annual rate of about 16% between 2000 and 2013. Moreover, the problem was worsening. “The findings establish an increasing frequency of incidents,” said the authors. “During the first 7 years included in the study, an average of 6.4 incidents occurred annually. In the last 7 years of the study, that average increased to 16.4 incidents annually.”
The White House could not possibly have been more pleased with the media reaction to these findings, which were prominently featured by the New York Times, USA Today, CNN, the Washington Post and other major outlets. The FBI report landed six weeks before the midterm elections, and the administration was hoping that the gun-control issue would help drive Democratic turnout.
Opinion Journal Video
Crime Prevention Research Center President John Lott says there is no evidence that crime is rising or that arrests are down nationwide. Photo credit: Getty Images.
But late last week, J. Pete Blair and M. Hunter Martaindale, two academics at Texas State University who co-authored the FBI report, acknowledged that “our data is imperfect.” They said that the news media “got it wrong” last year when they “mistakenly reported mass shootings were on the rise.”
Mind you, the authors did not issue this mea culpa in the major news outlets that supposedly misreported the original findings. Instead, the authors published it in ACJS Today, an academic journal published by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. “Because official data did not contain the information we needed, we had to develop our own,” wrote Messrs. Blair and Martaindale. “This required choices between various options with various strengths and weaknesses.” You don’t say.
John Lott of the Crime Prevention Research Center—who has studied FBI crime data for three decades—told me in an interview that the FBI report is better understood as a political document than as a work of serious social science. For example, the authors chose the year 2000 as their starting point “even though anyone who has studied these trends knows that 2000 and 2001 were unusually quiet and had few mass shootings.” Data going back to the mid-1970s is readily available but was ignored. How come? Over the past 40 years, there has been no statistically significant increase in mass shootings in the U.S.
Another problem with the study: The data used seemed selectively chosen to achieve certain results. The researchers somehow “missed 20 mass-shooting cases,” Mr. Lott said. “There’s one case where nine people were murdered. You just don’t miss that.” Also, the omissions helped create an “upward trend, because they were primarily missed at the beginning of the period.” This, he said, “is disturbing.”
Mr. Lott told me that he had reached out repeatedly to the FBI and to the authors for an explanation after the original report came out, but none was forthcoming until last week. The Journal recently described Mr. Obama’s tenure as the “least transparent administration in history,” and the White House seems to have no interest in proving its critics wrong.
Following the high-profile mass shootings in 2012 at a cinema in Aurora, Colo., and an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., the White House pushed hard for more gun-control legislation. Congress, which at the time included a Democratic-controlled Senate, refused to act. This surprised no one, including an administration well aware that additional gun controls wouldn’t pass muster with enough members of the president’s own party, let alone Republicans.
But the administration also knew that the issue could potentially excite Democratic base voters in a year when the party was worried about turnout. Hence President Obama’s vow in his 2014 State of the Union address “to keep trying, with or without Congress, to help stop more tragedies from visiting innocent Americans in our movie theaters, shopping malls, or schools like Sandy Hook.”
Ironically, this scare-mongering likely inspired more gun purchases. The Washington Times reported last year that record checks for gun sales hit a new high in 2013: “More than 21 million applications were run through the National Instant Criminal Background Check System last year, marking nearly an 8% increase and the 11th straight year that the number has risen.”
Since liberals like to link violent crime to the proliferation of guns, it is worth noting that, according to the Justice Department, the violent-crime rate in 2013 fell by 4.4% from 2012 and was 14.5% below the 2004 level.
Mr. Riley is a Manhattan Institute senior fellow and Journal contributor.
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Unfortunately the phrases he uses will resonate and are hard to debate:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/18/obama-calls-gun-control-wake-senseless-sc-church-m/
How do we effectively answer them?
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Unfortunately the phrases he uses will resonate and are hard to debate:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/18/obama-calls-gun-control-wake-senseless-sc-church-m/
How do we effectively answer them?
You can ask the staff at Charlie Hebdo how well French gun control laws work.
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Looks like you are on the right track:
http://www.gunowners.org/news06182015b.htm
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9 black people murdered? That's a slow weekend in Chicago.
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Now THAT is how to sound bite an answer!!!
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A National Tragedy and a Partisan Response
Posted By Daniel Greenfield On June 19, 2015
Why do black lives only seem to matter when white people take them? Why does the president of the United States think it’s proper to take a horrible racial tragedy in Charleston South Carolina as an excuse to bash America as the violence capital of the “advanced” world, and a prop for Democrats’ lust for gun control legislation in a state that already has it?
Last year 82 people were shot over the Fourth of July weekend in Chicago. 16 of them died [2]. The victims and the shooters were black.
Now two 15-year-olds [3] have already been shot in a single Chicago neighborhood in two days.
These are tragedies every bit as terrible as what took place in a church in Charleston, but the mass shootings of black people doesn’t attract much national attention when white people aren’t involved.
Chicago’s bloody weekends show us that the politicians and reporters haven’t turned their attention to Charleston because they care about dead black people.
They are there for the psychotic killer, Dylann Storm Roof, not for his victims. They are there for a Southern state with a Republican governor who can be safely blamed the way that their Mayor of Chicago can’t. They are there to use the voiceless dead as convenient props in their campaign for gun control – in a state that already has [4] some of the toughest gun control laws in the South. They don’t care about black people. They care about their political agendas.
Obama made that clear when he blamed Republicans for the shootings in his statement. The formatting of the statement [5] on the White House website with its paragraphs about healing and the church in small print and the call for gun control and accusations of racism set out in giant bold type show with stark clarity what the president’s priorities are.
His priority is not, “Now is the time for mourning and for healing.” It is, “Someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun” and “this type of mass violence does not happen in other advanced countries” to impose his burden of collective guilt on all Americans.
By complaining that “the politics in this town foreclose a lot of those avenues”, Obama blamed the Charleston shootings on Republicans even as he was hypocritically calling for “mourning and healing.” Six and a half years of divisive politics and disregard for representative government should show that the last thing Barack Obama wants is a national healing.
It is a shameless new frontier in the political exploitation of a human tragedy diminishing both the black victims and their black and white mourners alike. But for Obama, politics is the priority. The mourning is secondary. And forget about the healing.
Obama and Hillary insist that the country needs gun control, but what it really needs is a coming together of its ordinary citizens. It isn’t just Charleston that needs a new unity. It’s Democratic cities Chicago, Baltimore and Detroit – all centers of violence, all zones where strict gun laws rule that need it as well.
The world’s worst mass shootings have happened in other advanced societies – not America as Obama claims. They happen in countries like Norway, a social democracy, France, a country ruled by anti-gun socialists and South Korea. Making guns hard to get does not stop a determined killer. It prevents his victims from stopping the rampage. Dylaan Roof stopped to reload his gun 5 times in the Charleston AME Church. If only one of the bible study members had possessed a firearm, most of the victims would still be alive. The demonization of firearms takes place in societies that let go of personal responsibility. It leaves even law enforcement helpless down to the disarmed Paris police officer cringing before the heavily armed Charlie Hebdo Jihadists and the fumbling Norwegian police who let Breivik kill 69 people in one shooting before he was stopped.
Despite Obama’s slander of the country of which he is the putative president, the difference between America and the rest of the world is not that they have mass shootings and we don’t. Mass shootings have taken place in European countries with very tough gun laws. The difference is that when two terrorists with assault rifles dressed in body armor came for the Mohammed cartoonists in Texas, they were stopped by a middle-aged man with a handgun. Or when a jihadist beheaded a woman in Oklahoma and was slicing off the head of another, he was stopped by an individual who appeared with a rifle and took the law into his own hands.
America is a country where it is easier to buy a gun and where it is easier to stop an armed gunman. The victims in the church followed the law in South Carolina [6] and didn’t bring their guns into the church.
The gunman didn’t follow the law and killed them.
America is a nation with a boundless generosity of spirit as we have seen in Charleston and with leaders who are unworthy of their people as we have seen in Washington D.C.
Hillary Clinton decided to use the tragedy in her stump speech, insisting, “In the days ahead, we will again ask what led to this terrible tragedy and where we as a nation need to go. In order to make sense of it, we have to be honest. We have to face hard truths about race, violence, guns and division.”
The hard truth that Hillary does not want to face is that our division does not come from disturbed lone gunmen, but from politicians like her who turn every tragedy into a campaign speech. Hillary, who ran a divisive racial campaign against Obama, now wants to lecture the country on race and division.
Obama and Hillary managed to pull off a divisive racial campaign within their own party and now they sound as if Dylann Storm Roof represents a racist nation that needs their hypocritical lecturing.
While people in Charleston, black and white, have generously come together, Obama and Hillary selfishly pursue a divisive attack on the Second Amendment and their usual divisive racial program.
Obama paints America as a terrible place of mass shootings that is, as usual in his skewed view of the country, substantively worse than the rest of the world. Unlike the mass shootings in Europe, our mass shootings are a burden of collective guilt that he uses to reinforce a negative image of America. And, unlike the mass shootings in Chicago or Detroit, they are also a burden of collective racial guilt.
The solution to gun violence won’t be found in waging war on the Bill of Rights. The Second Amendment does not kill people. America is not a violent place because of the Constitution.
And the solution can’t be and won’t be found in the rejection of personal responsibility.
Personal responsibility means accepting that Dylann Storm Roof was responsible for his actions, as the gang members in Chicago are responsible for their actions and as we are all responsible for our actions.
And it also means believing that black lives and all lives matter everywhere; not just when they’re convenient for scoring political points.
The life of a black woman killed in a church by a white gunman should not matter any less than the life of a black woman taken by a black gang member in Chicago over another bloody weekend.
To send any other kind of message is divisive and only contributes to the problem.
No group of worshipers should ever be massacred in a church, but the best way to fight violent bigots is not by pursuing divisive political programs. It is by uniting law abiding citizens against violence and hate.
True leaders do not respond to tragedy by dividing the nation along the lines of race or into the camp of those who believe in the Bill of Rights and the camp of those who do not. These divisive instincts have only helped lead to a fractured society in which violent killers filled with anger and hate proliferate.
There was a time when Americans looked to Obama for unity. Unfortunately he chose the path of division. Hillary had the opportunity to urge unity among Americans after this horrible massacre, chose instead to put her own agenda first and subordinate the tragedy to the talking points of her political campaign.
Again.
If the politicians exploiting the Charleston shootings really care when black people are murdered, they will have the opportunity to show it this weekend in Chicago. And if they remain silent and unheeding, then they will have demonstrated that they don’t really care about the victims in Charleston. At least not that much.
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Isn't a legal gun in the hand of a law abiding citizen, in the right place at the right time, the only way this shooting could have been stopped?
If the Glibster was in the room, he could have talked the delusional mass murderer down.
What is the point of calling this a hate crime? Softer penalty if the shootings were not done with some kind of group hate, if they were same race, mixed race, etc.? Really? Isn't killing by definition a hate crime? How do you get other than the maximum penalty for a premeditated andnintentional mass murder? Rehabilitate and look for the good in someone like this? The politics of this are quite frustrating and ought to be unnecessary.
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/4257966.stm
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Black lives matter, when the left can use them to push their agenda for disarming the law abiding citizenry.
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This seems to me a big deal. Lott is one of the big guns on our side.
http://www.armedwithreason.com/shooting-down-the-gun-lobbys-favorite-academic-a-lott-of-lies/
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This seems to me a big deal. Lott is one of the big guns on our side.
http://www.armedwithreason.com/shooting-down-the-gun-lobbys-favorite-academic-a-lott-of-lies/
Well, that explains why places with lots of gun control are crime free and states with shall issue are filled with firefights.
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Sorry, that's not an answer. Lott is someone our side likes to quote a lot, but the question presented is whether he has been honest.
===========================
http://www.ijreview.com/2015/06/348197-obama-said-mass-shootings-dont-happen-in-advanced-countries-like-in-us-one-chart-proves-him-wrong/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=Partners&utm_term=PRM7&utm_campaign
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I really don't have the time or energy to try to dive into the research. I know enough to feel confident in my position based on crime stats and common sense.
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As the left asserts that guns are useless for self defense, I await the various political and popular figures that advocate for gun control to publicly disarm their protective details.
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Crafty's liberal friends have come across a summary of a "massive" 47 page missive claiming to "debunk" the work of economist John Lott who wrote books that include "More Guns, Less Crime". From this, conservatives and gun rights advocates can learn to be careful not to make claims like that in all cases, more guns equals less crime. More guns always means less crime however was not the title or the premise of Lott's work.
For example, if you add one more gun to the otherwise gun free zone in a church in South Carolina, and the one gun happens to be in the hand of a deranged, mentally ill, racist nut with a premeditated plan to shoot up the place, the incidence of the crime mass murder goes up. Add a second gun in the hands of a law abiding, well-trained, well-positioned parishioner that day and the incidence of crime that day would potentially go down. So it isn't that simple, more guns, less crime.
The real question is upside down IMHO. We already have an explicit constitutional right to own and bear arms. The issue we are debating in the political world is not more guns, but the right to limit the right to bear arms. In our state (and in 50 states now) that came up as a right to apply for and receive a permit for a concealed carry permit. The issue also comes up as to whether or not making a specific location a "gun free zone" adds or takes away from public safety.
The anti-gun lobby in our state against "shall issue" concealed carry legislation argued that we would become the wild west. They portrayed an environment where nearly everyone would carry and people would be settling their disputes with their guns.
Let's ask the questions forward instead of backward. Did the issuing of more concealed carry permits make crime go up. By all accounts, the answer is no. Does the designation of gun free zones make crime go down? Once again no. Where in the debunk did they debunk THAT? From my reading of it, they didn't.
Permit holders are roughly 10 time less likely to commit crimes than the general population. In the rare incidence of a criminal taking the time to get a permit and then commit a crime, why do we think the safety class and the legal registration played any role in causing the crime? It didn't. There are 300 million guns already in America. Criminals have access to guns and by definition, they don't limit their activities based on laws passed.
Gun free zones like Chicago have the worst violent crime in America. Mass shootings including the latest one in SC keep happening in "gun free zone". Also not debunked.
The alleged debunker sheds more fog than light on the subject as he shows his own anti-gun cherry picking. He claims guns don't significantly prevent crime because so few actually carry, while the argument against carry was that so many would carry. He ignores the deterrent effect that people might be carrying - except in the gun free zones where these mass shootings keep occurring. The shooter who chooses a church or a gun free theater for his mass murder does not seem to ignore that fact.
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http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/33-dead-130-injured-china-knife-wielding-spree-n41966
33 Dead, 130 Injured in China Knife-Wielding Spree
A group of knife-wielding men attacked a train station in southwestern China on Saturday, killing at least 29 people and injuring more than 130 others in what Chinese officials called a terrorist strike, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
Four of the attackers were also shot dead and only one was captured alive after the mayhem, which broke out about 9 p.m. (8 a.m. ET) at the Kunming Railway Station in the capital of southwest China's Yunnan Province.
1:45
The Kunming government said the "serious violent terrorist attack was planned and organized by Xinjiang separatist forces," Xinhua reported.
Ethnic Turkish Uighur separatists have been sporadically fighting for an independent state in Xinjiang, in northwestern China, home to about 10 million Uighur, who are predominantly Muslim. More than 100 people have been killed in protests in Xinjiang in the past year.
Yang Haifei, a resident of Yunnan, told Xinhua that he was attacked and sustained injuries on his chest and back. Yang said he was buying a ticket when he saw a group rush into the station, most of them dressed in black, and started stabbing people.
"I saw a person come straight at me with a long knife, and I ran away with everyone," he said, adding that people who were slower were severely injured.
"They just fell on the ground," he added.
Yunnan province Vice Gov. Gao Feng held an emergency meeting at No. 1 People's Hospital, where the injured are being rushed, and said hospitals have received 162 people.
State-run Yunnan News said that the men were wearing uniforms when they stormed the railway station and that gunshots were heard after police arrived.
Image: Police investigate after a group of armed men attacked people at Kunming railway station, Yunnan province
Police investigate after a group of armed men attacked people at Kunming railway station in China's Yunnan province on Saturday. Reuters
Photos circulating online showed scattered luggage and bodies lying on the floor in blood.
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http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/miss-police-open-carry-laws-kept-us-from-arresting-shotgun-toting-man-who-terrorized-walmart-shoppers/?utm_content=buffer62f47&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
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http://www.rawstory.com/2015/06/miss-police-open-carry-laws-kept-us-from-arresting-shotgun-toting-man-who-terrorized-walmart-shoppers/?utm_content=buffer62f47&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer
If someone is handling weapons in public, feeding shells in and running the action, they will be in serious jeopardy.
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(http://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/admin/ed-assets/2015/06/Guns-Drugs-copy.jpg?resize=580%2C581)
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John Lott's latest contribution:
http://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=168089005022002069069119031078098108046069006038058066023091083111116007118099010123122025060038021096117066105112107119006094014008073002058071067070124101079023055073017071087117072089098104126004001118083118097064087031105007025102066078118&EXT=pdf&TYPE=2
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http://www.salon.com/2015/08/19/dont_paint_us_as_hillbillies_man_guarding_muslim_free_gun_range_bends_over_drops_weapon_accidentally_shoots_self/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=socialflow
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http://us7.campaign-archive2.com/?u=7b69d67922f8e32ca499bb6b7&id=86aa126d2c
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DC is again facing a rising murder rate, blamed on guns, which for some odd reason isn't replicated on the west side of the Potomac, Virginia, which permits concealed carry and whose citizens own a lot of firearms. Rather than deduce that sundry social pathologies are responsible for this turn of affairs--having a large, poor, unarmed class of citizens being primary among them--DC mavens have again decided that the guns that aren't jumping out of holsters and indiscriminately killing people a few miles to the west are responsible for what is occurring in the District.
Which makes this piece all the more ironic. This is not the first time DC has legislated itself into a ballistic corner:
http://www.jngibson.com/militia-files.html
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DC is again facing a rising murder rate, blamed on guns, which for some odd reason isn't replicated on the west side of the Potomac, Virginia, which permits concealed carry and whose citizens own a lot of firearms. Rather than deduce that sundry social pathologies are responsible for this turn of affairs--having a large, poor, unarmed class of citizens being primary among them--DC mavens have again decided that the guns that aren't jumping out of holsters and indiscriminately killing people a few miles to the west are responsible for what is occurring in the District.
Which makes this piece all the more ironic. This is not the first time DC has legislated itself into a ballistic corner:
http://www.jngibson.com/militia-files.html
They should make murder illegal.
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http://buzzpo.com/study-learns-chicago-criminals-dont-buy-their-guns-legally/
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http://www.gunlawpress.com/2012_2013Update.html
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Pontificating assbama just spoke about the Oregon shooting. Going for new laws, not mentioned, and standing up against the NRA.
Why doesn't he go after the black on black gun violence in Chicago?
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A bit of an update on the shooter in Oregon............
He had the people in a classroom stand up and asked them what their religion was.
If Christian, he shot them in the head, otherwise in the leg.
A Coincidence?
Remember Alex, the Oregon Reservist who helped take down the France Train Shooter?
Alex was from Roseburg, and went to the same college.
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URL?
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Greta is reporting this, as well as CNN and others.
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2015/10/update-umpqua-shooter-targeted-christians-ordered-victims-stand-up-and-state-your-religion/ (http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2015/10/update-umpqua-shooter-targeted-christians-ordered-victims-stand-up-and-state-your-religion/)
http://nypost.com/2015/10/01/oregon-gunman-singled-out-christians-during-rampage/ (http://nypost.com/2015/10/01/oregon-gunman-singled-out-christians-during-rampage/)
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With the bodies still warm and the facts still unknown, yesterday the President called for politicizing the issue. Choose carefully what you ask for , , ,
http://www.gunlaws.com/GunshotDemographics.htm
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With the bodies still warm and the facts still unknown, yesterday the President called for politicizing the issue. Choose carefully what you ask for , , ,
http://www.gunlaws.com/GunshotDemographics.htm
Bitter, fanatical loser targets Christians....
But enough about the president....
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http://pamelageller.com/2015/10/here-is-the-oregon-shooters-profile.html/
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http://pamelageller.com/2015/10/here-is-the-oregon-shooters-profile.html/
If Obama had a son....
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I hate to comment before I know facts (so please correct me), but...
1) Once again, shooter chooses a gun free zone.
2) Shooter is a Muslim extremist. Based on another discussion, that should be listed ahead of paranoid schizophrenia as a disqualifier for owning a gun.
3) Oregon already has the law that Obama wants passed. (Go figure.)
4) Gun violence down overall, but up where we have the most restrictions. (cf. Chicago)
5) If a shooting comes to my daughter's college, I hope the Prof in her classroom and the kid next to her are both law abiding concealed carry holders.
6) How many other wrongful and violent deaths were there in America and the world yesterday. The media fixates on this one type, and - voilà - we keep getting more of them.
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Doug,
You can ensure that your daughter is trained and carrying concealed.
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Doug,
You can ensure that your daughter is trained and carrying concealed.
I can't even ensure she won't lean to the liberal side of thinking. ( Time will tell.
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/10/02/how-to-stop-mass-shootings/
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http://controversialtimes.com/issues/constitutional-rights/12-times-mass-shootings-were-stopped-by-good-guys-with-guns/#ixzz3nRmPCRQM
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https://www.facebook.com/nationalreview/videos/10156192238750093/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pELwCqz2JfE&feature=youtu.be
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Second post
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a30024/mass-shooters-1014/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pELwCqz2JfE&feature=youtu.be
Excellent presentation of the data. Bill Whittle is a very persuasive speaker. Over 1 million views for that video.
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http://crimeresearch.org/2013/12/murder-and-homicide-rates-before-and-after-gun-bans/
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http://www.nationalreview.com/article/425156/second-amendment-repeal-gun-rights-supreme-court?UCgw6aIQ6QebCvbi.01
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Clinton Misfires on Gun Control
By Nate Jackson
You can always rely on leftists to offer the wrong solution to a problem. Hillary Clinton's gun control proposals are typically off the mark. Anything to get the focus off her private email server, right?
“We need universal background checks," Clinton says of her first "brilliant" idea in her newly released stance on gun violence prevention. "We know that they will work." Unfortunately, a background check didn't stop the murderer in Oregon. Nor did it stop the man who killed two journalists on live TV in Virginia, or the sociopath who killed six and wounded Rep. Gabby Giffords in Tucson, or the movie theater killer in Aurora. All four men passed background checks and bought guns legally.
As for the Charleston murderer, Clinton blamed a “loophole in the Brady Bill.” But as we've noted previously, that particular case was due to human error, not a "loophole." Clinton repeated the claim that 40% of guns are bought without a background check, though that statistic originates from a 1994 survey of 251 people — hardly definitive evidence of anything.
Nevertheless, Clinton took a page out of Barack Obama's playbook and says "if Congress won't act," she'll take "administrative action to close" the supposed loophole by reclassifying anyone who sells a “significant number of guns” as someone “in the business of selling firearms.”
But as The Federalist's Sean Davis points out, "[T]he federal government already has the statutory authority to define who does and does not qualify as an individual 'in the business of selling firearms.' It derives that authority from 18 U.S. Code § 921."
Anyone who sells more than very occasionally is considered a dealer by existing law, so Clinton's "loophole" users are already criminals. As Davis adds, "The only federal background check exemption that exists is for transactions between private, non-FFL individuals who reside in the same state. That’s it."
To be clear, we have little problem with requiring background checks to own firearms (as current law does for the vast majority of transactions), with the caveat that they are not a fix-all solution and, as with any law, effectiveness depends on proper enforcement.
Naturally, Clinton's proposal only gets worse. She wants gun manufacturers to be liable for how their products are used. It's typical of Democrats to take away individual accountability. Of course, if this violation of due process was ever allowed, it would put gun manufacturers out of business — as it would any other industry where such an absurd standard was applied.
Even Bernie Sanders criticized Clinton's notion, saying, "If somebody has a gun, and it falls into the hands of a murderer, and that murderer kills somebody with the gun, do you hold the gun manufacturer responsible? Not any more than you would hold a hammer company responsible if somebody beats somebody over the head with a hammer. That is not what a lawsuit should be about."
Another of Clinton's proposals is re-banning certain cosmetic features on some rifles, dubbed with the deliberately nefarious misnomer "assault weapons." But whether a rifle has a pistol grip or a collapsible stock has no bearing on the deadliness of the weapon, and a ban would not (and did not while it existed) save a single life in any mass shooting. Rifles of any type accounted for just 248 murders in 2014 — that's fewer than are committed with "hands, fists, and feet." As much as Clinton would love to relive the "glory years," her husband's 1994 "assault weapons" ban was completely ineffective (unless you count costing Democrats the '94 election) and unconstitutional.
There is one thing, however, that could reduce mass shootings: Ending the phony idea that a "gun free zone" sign will deter anyone from a murderous rampage.
Whether it's Sandy Hook, Aurora, Virginia Tech or Umpqua Community College, the most frequent common denominator in mass shootings is that they take place in locations where potential victims have been prohibited from defending themselves.
Which leaves gun confiscation — something Obama implied he'd like. But in a nation with 300 million guns and the acknowledged God-given right to self-defense with firearms woven into our Constitution, gun confiscation is never going to happen. Nor should it.
Still, there is hope. While the number of guns in the U.S. has increased 62% since 1994, violence with guns has fallen nearly 50% in the same time period. In other words, it's not a gun problem.
Of the 30,000 gun-related deaths in the U.S. every year, more than two-thirds are suicides. Democrats not only don't ever make the distinction (because 30,000 gun deaths sounds far worse than 8,500 murders), they push assisted suicide laws like the one Gov. Jerry Brown just signed in California.
A final point. Clinton and the gun-grabbing Left operate from the errant notion that the Second Amendment applies primarily to hunting or sport shooting. Clinton said, "Ideally, what I would love to see is gun owners, responsible gun owners, hunters, form a different organization and take back the Second Amendment from these extremists," a reference to the NRA. Indeed, there are calls to brand the NRA a "terrorist organization."
Of the Heller and McDonald rulings that followed an originalist interpretation of the right to keep and bear arms, Clinton also said recently, “[T]he Supreme Court is wrong on the Second Amendment. And I am going to make that case every chance I get.”
The nation's first chief justice, Joseph Story, offered the perfect rebuttal way back in his 1833 “Commentaries on the Constitution”: “The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic."
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http://thisisafrica.me/gun-ownership-among-african-americans-rise-given-birth-several-african-american-gun-clubs/
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. . . In a constitutional manner that will likely lead to far more gun deaths:
https://reason.com/reasontv/2015/10/07/how-to-create-a-gun-free-america-in-5-ea
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. . . In a constitutional manner that will likely lead to far more gun deaths:
https://reason.com/reasontv/2015/10/07/how-to-create-a-gun-free-america-in-5-ea
That would be the 2nd civil war. We are already in a cold civil war now.
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Not familiar with this site. Sure hope this is true!
http://www.beliefnet.com/News/Articles/Harvard-University-Study-Reveals-Astonishing-Link.aspx?p=1#wkxIfmhhRK2fHgZC.01
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I amuses me to know end to see this published in the WaPo--blood vessels are surely contending with spiking pressure in sundry "progressive" craniums--and the team assembled for this amicus has stellar second amendment credentials. Pardon me while I purchase a truck load of popcorn:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/10/09/amicus-brief-on-history-of-right-to-carry-in-wrenn-v-dc/
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http://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/battle-of-athens?utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=facebook-referral-traffic&utm_source=watm-facebook-fan-page&utm_content&utm_term
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http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/10/court_decision_paves_the_way_for_australianstyle_gun_ban.html
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http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2015/10/court_decision_paves_the_way_for_australianstyle_gun_ban.html
Court decision paves way for second civil war.
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3291978/Shotguns-virtually-sold-Austria-citizens-rush-buy-arms-amid-fears-massive-influx-migrants-dealers-claim.html
Shotguns have 'virtually sold out' in Austria as citizens rush to buy arms amid fears of a massive influx of migrants, dealers claim
There are now thought to be estimated 900,000 firearms in Austrian homes
Police say around 70,000 guns have been sold this year alone in Austria
Dealers say shotguns have almost sold out because you don't need permit
Women are driving the sales rush as fears grow amid influx of refugees
By ALLAN HALL
27 October 2015
Weapon sales are soaring in Austria as citizens of the small Alpine nation become paranoid over the numbers of refugees crowding into their country.
In a country of 8.5 million people, there are now an estimated 900,000 firearms in homes.
And gun dealers report that it is women driving the sales rush. This year
Police say 70,000 guns have been sold.
'Virtually all shotguns are currently sold out, because you need no permit for them', said Thomas Ortner, spokesman for an arms dealer in Upper Austria.
Migrants wait for buses after crossing the border between Slovenian and Austria in Spielfeld, Austria. Weapon sales have reportedly soared in Austria as citizens of the small Alpine nation become paranoid over the numbers of refugees crowding into their country
Migrants wait for buses after crossing the border between Slovenian and Austria in Spielfeld, Austria. Weapon sales have reportedly soared in Austria as citizens of the small Alpine nation become paranoid over the numbers of refugees crowding into their country
For every other type of weapon, a licence is required.
Licence courses, in which applicants must demonstrate knowledge of firearms, used to take place every five weeks but they are now held weekly because of spiking demand.
In cities like Salzburg, a line of people outside the necessary government office to get the paperwork to buy a gun is now an everyday sight.
Broadcasters and local media say the numbers of refugees - coupled with a fear of break-ins as a result - is fuelling the arms race.
'Because of the social change, people want to protect themselves,' one arms dealer told the broadcaster oe.24. He said 'many women' were among his customers.
The flood of 'refugees' into Austria is continuing without interruption.
The Hungarian route has become less active, and traffic is now flowing at a rapid rate through Slovenia instead.
Hundreds of migrants wait to enter a camp in Spielfeld, Austria. Thousands of people trying to reach central and northern Europe via the Balkans often have to wait for days in the cold rain and mud at the borders
Hundreds of migrants wait to enter a camp in Spielfeld, Austria. Thousands of people trying to reach central and northern Europe via the Balkans often have to wait for days in the cold rain and mud at the borders
Czech Independent TV also reported on the arms upsurge. As of Monday most rifles in the country are out of stock.
The daily paper Heute reported recently: 'The cash registers are currently ringing loud at local gun dealers.
'Figures of the Ministry of the Interior prove it: more and more people are buying guns and rifles.'
A Central weapon register was introduced in June 2014 to record all legal firearm sales.
This year over 14,000 new weapons have been purchased.
Dealers reported that women are also driving up sales of pepper spray because of their fears for personal security in the midst of the great migration of refugees heading to Germany.
'We cannot complain about a lack of demand,' said Stephan Mayer, a gun merchant.
'People want to protect themselves.
'The most common purchasers of arms are primarily Austrian women who are also buying tear [pepper] sprays, which are much in demand.
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Res ipsa loquitor!
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http://crimeresearch.org/2015/11/nine-more-defensive-gun-uses-by-permit-holders-during-october-bringing-total-number-of-cases-covered-by-the-news-to-18/
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http://barbwire.com/2015/10/28/second-amendment-foes-target-the-sovereignty-of-the-american-people/
Second Amendment Foes Target the Sovereignty of the American People
[IMG]
Dr. Alan Keyes
on 28 October, 2015 at 11:00
If we are to secure our right to liberty and decent self-government, it’s imperative that people read the Second Amendment and base their views on its words and logic. Instead they reason from whatever happens to be their own preoccupation, and use the result as an excuse to stand for or against gun control laws, 2nd Amendment rights, etc. But, as worded, the amendment is not simply “against government” or “for guns”. Its logic begins from the premise that “a well-regulated militia” is “necessary to the security of a free state.” Anyone familiar with the background its authors’ took for granted will realize that the word “state” is used in the sense of “condition, or state of being”, as in the phrase “state of nature”, which was used (for diverse purposes) by English theologians and political philosophers like Robert Filmer, Thomas Hobbes, Richard Hooker and John Locke.
Used in this way, the “security of a free state” refers to the human condition, and how human beings safeguard themselves and their belongings in light of its vicissitudes. In this respect, the naturally free condition of human beings is held to be a mixed blessing, ever inclined to produce a condition of violent injustice in which human individuals are hardly “free” in any objective sense. Hobbes famously described it as a condition in which the life of man is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.”
Though he takes a somewhat more optimistic view of its overall character, Locke sees that “the inconveniences of the state of nature… must certainly be great, where men may be judges in their own case…” He admits that, in the absence of civil government, whereby people in society are “subjected to the fair determination of the law”, the state of nature is a condition “wherein every the least difference is apt to end” in war.
But war is the state in which people must live constantly in bondage to fear, injustice and/or righteous indignation. Or else, without reference to justice and right, they are prey to a thirst for vengeance or self-satisfaction arising from some self-adjudged perception of disrespect to their persons or other belongings. According to Locke, a state of civil government, wielding powers derived from “the consent of the government” (i.e., their own individual commitment to lend themselves to a government instituted to uphold right), is therefore the only state that frees human beings from this oppressive bondage.
Obviously, in this sense of a free state, it is right for people to keep and bear arms because their arms are the source and means of their civil government’s actual power justly to maintain peace, the power that removes them from the nature’s state of bondage, which is perpetual war. In this regard, the right to keep and bear arms is clearly the consequence of their duty to lend themselves to the defense of freedom, thus rightly understood.
Of course, when individuals in government, by abusing their authority, make themselves a threat to the right the government is instituted to secure, the arms of the people are necessary to oppose them. But in this opposition the people do not act against just government. Rather they act to defend just government against abuses that threaten the rightful peace that is the goal and key of their free condition.
The reference to “a well-regulated militia” points to the fact that, though its aim is to secure freedom, the exercise of right the 2nd Amendment aims to secure is not just about each individual’s freedom to keep and bear arms. It is also about their obligation to employ the arms thus preserved in their possession to defend the just peace (i.e., peace arising from respect for justice) that corresponds to the state in which human beings are objectively free (i.e., not bound by fear or passion to perpetrate or endure violence and/or injustice.)
Obviously, this sense of the root of obligation involved in the right to keep and bear arms illustrates the logic of every one of the other unalienable rights. The freedom involved in each and every such right is not some absolute good, worthy in and of itself simply because it expresses the power of individual human will and preference. Rather rightful freedom has to be respected, and preserved inviolate, because it accords with the ultimate standard of right, which is God’s will for the existence and perpetuation of human nature, i.e., the good of all.
This is the logic of God-endowed unalienable right succinctly summarized in the American Declaration of Independence. But the Providential genius of American liberty was never more strikingly displayed than in the 2nd Amendment’s evocation of that logic in the phrase “a well-regulated militia”. As a matter of history this refers to the fact that, in New England and elsewhere, able bodied men who possessed and were capable of bearing arms in the defense of their local community were required by law to participate in periodic exercises, conducted in order to prepare such members of the militia for organized action in case of an emergency.
Anyone who thinks this through will realize that the current debate over the Second Amendment has been speciously framed to legitimize false doubts about each individual’s God-endowed unalienable right to keep and bear arms. But, unless someone is mad enough to suggest that individuals be deprived of their arms in the literal sense, can there be any real doubt of God’s natural provision with respect to this right? After all, with the right training, the human hand is a lethal weapon, quite capable of producing the kind of mayhem characteristic of the episodes of violence anti-gun activists exploit to fuel the demand that private ownership of guns be eliminated.
However when we ponder the implications of the Constitution’s reference to a “well-regulated militia”, it becomes clear that the left’s tendentious focus on the need for gun-control laws distracts from the truly egregious absence of legislation that actually updates and applies the 2nd Amendment’s logic to the very real threats we presently face.
In a series of articles on my blog entitled The Security of a Free State I discussed at length how and why, when properly updated, the 2nd Amendment concept of a “well-regulated militia” should be the basis for achieving a locally rooted response to the threat of violent attacks against soft targets (schools, offices, churches, etc.) throughout our country, whether by individual rogues or organized terrorist cells. But instead of studying and applying the practical wisdom derived from appreciating the duty that is at the heart of our 2nd Amendment rights, people have promoted a government monopoly of arms with the lie that we must sacrifice liberty for safety.
What is the real purpose of this lie? To rouse and exploit the fear most likely to be fatal to a free people, which is the fear of themselves. Come what may, it is a lie that must be countered with the truth, at all costs
For people…convinced that they cannot be trusted with the deadly power of arms will soon be persuaded that they have no right to control the power of government, which includes, by necessity, control over arms in their most organized and destructive form. So, in the end, by inducing Americans to accept the abrogation of their right to keep and bear arms our would-be tyrants prepare the people to endure the abdication of their Constitutional sovereignty.
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by Ashby Jones
Nov. 19, 2015 2:42 p.m. ET
132 COMMENTS
Both sides of the national gun debate are poring over history books to try to bolster their case on whether residents of the nation’s capital can more freely carry guns on the street.
On Friday, in a possible preview of a U.S. Supreme Court showdown, a federal appeals court in Washington will hear a challenge to a law that restricts who can legally carry a handgun outside the home.
A key question in the case is whether such regulations have “long-standing” precedent. That has led lawyers to comb through historical documents for examples of how guns were used during the colonial era and earlier, in England during the Middle Ages.
The lawyers are taking the unusual step with the U.S. Supreme Court clearly in mind. No matter the outcome in the case on appeal, many legal experts think the high court will soon have to step in to more clearly settle whether and to what degree the Second Amendment protects the right to carry handguns outside the home—a question the justices have yet to address.
The emphasis on historical events makes sense given how “deeply the current Supreme Court considers history in some of its rulings,” said Adam Winkler, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, and an expert on gun laws.
The issue of guns, and limits on their use, is under fresh scrutiny in the wake of the recent terrorist attacks in Paris. Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.) and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D., Calif.) this week reiterated their support for a bill, introduced in February, that would grant the U.S. attorney general the authority to ban gun sales to anyone suspected of terrorism-related activities.
The National Rifle Association and many lawmakers oppose the legislation, partly on grounds that it sweeps too broadly. “Pretty much anyone can end up on a terrorist watch list,” said NRA spokeswoman Jennifer Baker.
Open-carry gun activists gathering Monday in Ferguson, Mo.
Open-carry gun activists gathering Monday in Ferguson, Mo. Photo: Michael B. Thomas/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
The majority of states largely allow anyone who wants a concealed-carry permit and meets a few qualifications to get one. Illinois in 2013 became the last state to do away with a total ban on concealed carry.
In Washington, D.C., and nine states, people can carry handguns outside the home only if they can show a specific need to do so, for instance if they have recently been threatened with bodily harm. At issue in the case, Wrenn v. D.C., is whether this more stringent type of permitting regime violates the Second Amendment.
The Supreme Court, in its landmark 2008 decision Heller v. D.C., struck down Washington’s total ban on handguns, ruling that under the Second Amendment individuals have the right to keep handguns in their homes. Justice Antonin Scalia, the author of the majority opinion, wrote that certain “long-standing” gun restrictions were permissible under the Second Amendment, which protects the right “to keep and bear arms.”
But the opinion otherwise said little to help guide lower courts, especially in regard to one’s right to carry a gun outside the home. Nor did the court specifically define “long-standing.”
In the current case, parties that want to keep Washington’s gun-control rules in place—lawyers for both the city and Everytown for Gun Safety—are pointing to a 1328 English law passed during the reign of Edward III, decades before guns existed anywhere in the British Isles.
The law expanded on a 1285 statute that made it a crime “to be found going or wandering about the Streets of [London], after Curfew…with Sword or Buckler, or other Arms for doing Mischief,” according to a brief filed in September by lawyers for Everytown, a gun-control group backed by former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
A collection of historians and the California Rifle and Pistol Association, a group associated with the NRA, filed their own understanding of the 700-year history of Anglo-American arms regulation. That brief, as well as one filed by the plaintiffs in the case, argues that the jury acquittal in 1686 of a man, “Sir John Knight,” who brought to a church in Bristol “a gun, to terrify the King’s subjects,” serves as evidence that the 1328 law wasn’t meant to apply broadly.
Lawyers for Washington and gun-control groups argue that officials in densely populated areas should be allowed some say over who can carry guns outside the home. Since the Heller ruling, that argument has held sway in appeals courts in New York, Philadelphia and Richmond, Va.
Gun-rights advocates and lawyers for the plaintiffs say the Second Amendment confers an ironclad right. A federal appeals court in San Francisco last year agreed, striking down permitting rules in two California counties. A larger, 11-judge panel has since decided to review that decision.
The three-judge opinion in San Francisco last year wrestled deeply with guns and history, and sent a message to those who work on gun cases that rulings of future courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court, might hinge on historical precedent.
“It’s very tricky to use history like this in a contemporary legal argument,” said Priya Satia, a history professor at Stanford University.
Still, judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, in addition to several Supreme Court justices, frequently look to history for help in interpreting parts of the Constitution. And the Wrenn case is no exception.
“The lawyers and their teams have dug up a lot of new historical material,” said UCLA’s Mr. Winkler. If the case goes to the U.S. Supreme Court, “I’m betting we’re going to see a lot more.”
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David Kopel has done some great work digging into the constitutional origins of the second amendment, following threads that that first appeared in 1600s England, for example. Might be too inside baseball for some, and it makes me giggle that this appeared in the WaPo, doubtless causing heads to explode, but those interested in the genesis of the second tenth of the Bill of Rights will likely enjoy this piece:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/11/20/the-second-amendment-versus-anti-catholicism/
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Sen. Feinstein has proposed that the No Fly List become a No Gun Buy List. Apparently the NRA and Reps disagree.
I must say that on its face her bill has a certain obvious logic AND opposing it may well be profoundly stupid politically.
Yes, yes, lots of people on the list don't belong there, but given what we know about how porous we are to bad people getting in, do we really want them sashaying in to the local gun store and arming themselves for major hits on America? What would be left of the wonderful pro-gun political consensus that we have built in the last twenty years?
Discuss.
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Sen. Feinstein has proposed that the No Fly List become a No Gun Buy List. Apparently the NRA and Reps disagree.
I must say that on its face her bill has a certain obvious logic AND opposing it may well be profoundly stupid politically.
Yes, yes, lots of people on the list don't belong there, but given what we know about how porous we are to bad people getting in, do we really want them sashaying in to the local gun store and arming themselves for major hits on America? What would be left of the wonderful pro-gun political consensus that we have built in the last twenty years?
Discuss.
Perhaps Lois Lerner could be coaxed from retirement to administer it?
We have given up on the rule of law, who needs due process?
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Good piece about the folly of current "gun control" efforts:
http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/costs-consequences-gun-control#full
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/10/03/do-civilians-with-guns-ever-stop-mass-shootings/?tid=pm_opinions_pop_b
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(http://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2015/12/Gun-Chart-1-copy.jpg?resize=580%2C392)
(http://i1.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2015/12/12342789_10153184192710334_902551629793939870_n.jpg)
http://www.aei.org/publication/chart-of-the-day-more-guns-less-gun-violence-between-1993-and-2013/
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Strikes me as a basic examination, but it provides compelling reasons why the rate of defensive gun uses are likely undercounted by the FBI:
http://poseidon01.ssrn.com/delivery.php?ID=325026118089093121098091074085084010034050058012070082112080118071107005085088088099038035127124020121002005068022077099126126105060069010052119003089105096007008030073037024085029000026030071025005024069020094087068065073028115104118116016020085008&EXT=pdf
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Our G M has been saying buy (canned goods) and ammo for at least 7 years. Now Obama is banning certain types of ammo by Executive Order and the price is skyrocketing. I should have acted when he first said that. I wonder if Wesbury called this 'market' move. http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/2560750
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http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2014/09/24/how-gun-control-made-england-the-most-violent-country-in-europe/
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http://concealednation.org/2015/05/armed-citizen-pulls-gun-on-suspect-who-was-brutally-beating-police-officer-with-baton/
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http://concealednation.org/2015/05/armed-citizen-pulls-gun-on-suspect-who-was-brutally-beating-police-officer-with-baton/
As it should be.
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https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10208338704645575&set=a.10200272884125103.2201021.1243332336&type=3&theater
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http://thefederalist.com/2014/11/11/knives-kill-more-people-each-year-than-rifles-time-for-knife-control/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8mgAgf3UOc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qCg15ChCZo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLtFWOU0NvE
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http://www.agirlandagun.org/discoveries-of-an-anti-gunner-my-conversion-to-the-other-side/
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http://controversialtimes.com/issues/constitutional-rights/judge-order-anti-gun-group-to-pay-ammo-companies-legal-fees-after-dismissing-lawsuit/
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/01/20/rifle-capable-taking-down-helicopter-found-at-el-chapo-hideout-purchased-through-fast-and-furious-program.html
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http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2016/01/20/rifle-capable-taking-down-helicopter-found-at-el-chapo-hideout-purchased-through-fast-and-furious-program.html
Something poetic about that.
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http://patriotpost.us/alexander/40303
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https://www.facebook.com/NYPost/videos/10157083489025206/
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http://abcnews.com.co/obama-signs-executive-order-limiting-us-gun-owners-to-three-guns/
WTF?!?!?!?!??!?!!??!?!!??!!??!
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http://abcnews.com.co/obama-signs-executive-order-limiting-us-gun-owners-to-three-guns/
WTF?!?!?!?!??!?!!??!?!!??!!??!
Really got my blood pressure elevated there for a moment. Realistic looking hoax site.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/assault-weapons-constitutional-protection_us_56b38ec7e4b08069c7a65c21
People Have A 'Fundamental Right' To Own Assault Weapons, Court Rules
Certain semiautomatic firearms deserve the highest level of protection the Constitution allows, says appellate court.
02/04/2016 06:06 pm ET
Cristian Farias
Legal Affairs Reporter, The Huffington Post
Jae C. Hong/Associated Press
A federal appeals court on Thursday said Maryland's 2013 assault weapon ban, passed in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, must be held to a stricter constitutional standard.
In a major victory for gun rights advocates, a federal appeals court on Thursday sided with a broad coalition of gun owners, businesses and organizations that challenged the constitutionality of a Maryland ban on assault weapons and other laws aimed at curbing gun violence.
A three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit said the state's prohibition on what the court called "the vast majority of semi-automatic rifles commonly kept by several million American citizens" amounted to a violation of their rights under the Constitution.
"In our view, Maryland law implicates the core protection of the Second Amendment -- the right of law-abiding responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home," Chief Judge William Traxler wrote in the divided ruling.
Provisions that outlaw these firearms, Traxler wrote, "substantially burden this fundamental right."
Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who recently suspended his Democratic presidential campaign, signed Maryland's Firearm Safety Act of 2013 in the wake of the school massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, which spurred similar initiatives in other Democratic-leaning states.
The legislation mostly targets specific kinds of semi-automatic firearms -- such as AR-15s and AK-47s -- and large-capacity magazines, and adds certain registration and licensing requirements.
But gun rights advocates, including the National Rifle Association, quickly moved to challenge these laws in the courts, claiming that the restrictions they imposed on lawful gun ownership were overly broad and weren't proven to save lives.
"This case was a major victory for the NRA and gun rights advocates." Adam Winkler, UCLA law professor
The legal attacks have largely failed. Last October, a federal appeals court in Manhattan upheld the most iconic of these laws -- those passed in New York and Connecticut in direct response to the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown. And in December, the Supreme Court declined to review a ruling out of Illinois that upheld a similar ban on assault weapons.
The high court's reluctance to intervene in these disputes has left the Second Amendment in a bit of a state of flux. Since the Supreme Court established in 2008 and 2010 that the amendment protects a personal right to keep and bear arms for self-defense within the home, judges have struggled to apply those decisions to the newer spate of gun legislation. And inconsistent rulings and standards across the country have left the scope of the law unclear.
When the Supreme Court refused to take up the Illinois case, Justice Clarence Thomas complained that the Second Amendment was being relegated to "a second-class right."
"If a broad ban on firearms can be upheld based on conjecture that the public might feel safer (while being no safer at all), then the Second Amendment guarantees nothing," he wrote, and added that those earlier decisions enshrining the right to gun ownership shouldn't be expected to "clarify the entire field."
X
The lack of clarity since then underscores why Thursday's decision may be a boon to those who want to see a broader interpretation of the Second Amendment, setting the stage for the next Supreme Court confrontation.
"This case was a major victory for the NRA and gun rights advocates," said Adam Winkler, a law professor at UCLA who specializes in Second Amendment law. "This opinion is an important one because it subjects important gun control laws to the most strict form of judicial scrutiny."
Indeed, the biggest surprise in Chief Judge Traxler's 66-page opinion is the words "strict scrutiny," a stringent constitutional test that most government laws and regulations fail. Other courts have applied more forgiving standards to similar gun legislation and upheld it.
The 4th Circuit's decision didn't outright strike down the Maryland legislation. Instead, it instructed a lower court to subject the provision to the higher legal standard, meaning more litigation and the possibility of a future showdown at the Supreme Court -- though maybe not yet, according to Winkler.
As if to illustrate the volatile politics and legalities of gun control, dissenting Circuit Judge Robert King all but declared that the court's ruling would lead to the next mass shooting.
"Let's be real," King wrote. "The assault weapons banned by Maryland's [law] are exceptionally lethal weapons of war."
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Expanding upon Crafty's post above, the recent ruling and its "strict scrutiny" standard is bad juju for folks like Mikey Bloomberg who want to smoke and mirror the second amendment out of existence:
http://legalinsurrection.com/2016/02/big-2a-win-4th-circuit-applies-strict-scrutiny-to-maryland-gun-control-law/
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/02/26/we-have-three-different-definitions-of-mass-shooting-and-we-probably-need-more/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IC4owhBrEtw&feature=youtu.be
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The Supreme Court’s Eight Gun Salute
A unanimous rebuke to legal resistance to the right to bear arms.
The Supreme Court building in Washington on Feb. 19. ENLARGE
The Supreme Court building in Washington on Feb. 19. Photo: Associated Press
Updated March 21, 2016 10:36 p.m. ET
195 COMMENTS
The Supreme Court decides many cases unanimously, but not often regarding the Second Amendment. That rare occasion happened Monday when the eight sitting Justices threw out a Massachusetts ruling that the right of individuals to bear arms doesn’t include stun guns.
Jaime Caetano began carrying a stun gun as protection against an abusive ex-boyfriend who remained a threat despite restraining orders (Caetano v. Massachusetts). When officers found her stun gun during a search, she was arrested and convicted for possessing an unlawful weapon. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld her conviction on grounds that stun guns are “not the type of weapon that is eligible for Second Amendment protection” because they weren’t around when the Second Amendment was written.
The Supreme Court’s brief per curiam (unsigned for the court) opinion dismissed that reasoning, as well as the Massachusetts’s court’s argument that stun guns were not meant to be protected because there is “nothing in the record to suggest that [stun guns] are readily adaptable to use in the military.” That’s irrelevant, the Justices noted, because the U.S. High Court’s 2008 Heller precedent explicitly “rejected the proposition ‘that only those weapons useful in warfare are protected.’”
The Caetano ruling, however brief, is an important legal brushback to the many politicians and judges who are still engaging in guerrilla legal resistance to Heller and the follow-up McDonald v. Chicago case that applied Heller to the states. The Massachusetts judges cited Heller, but they willfully misread it to reach the anti-gun rights conclusion they wanted. We’re glad to see even the liberal Justices stand up to that.
In a concurring opinion joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice Samuel Alito also put a finer point on the absurdity of the lower court’s position that the Second Amendment protects only guns in common use at the time of the Founders.
“Electronic stun guns are no more exempt from the Second Amendment’s protections, simply because they were unknown to the First Congress, than electronic communications are exempt from the First Amendment, or electronic imaging devices are exempt from the Fourth Amendment,” he wrote. This would have been a stronger message had Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Anthony Kennedy also joined the concurrence, but at least two Justices made the case in detail.
The timing of Monday’s ruling is notable because Heller and the individual right to bear arms will be major progressive targets if there is a new left-leaning majority on the Supreme Court. Progressives will at the very least try to blow major holes into Heller by narrowing its limits on gun regulation. But for now the ruling is a reminder that Heller is a landmark that needs to be enforced, not resisted.
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Nice to see such clear and well reasoned opinions!
The Supreme Court’s Eight Gun Salute
A unanimous rebuke to legal resistance to the right to bear arms.
The Supreme Court building in Washington on Feb. 19. ENLARGE
The Supreme Court building in Washington on Feb. 19. Photo: Associated Press
Updated March 21, 2016 10:36 p.m. ET
195 COMMENTS
The Supreme Court decides many cases unanimously, but not often regarding the Second Amendment. That rare occasion happened Monday when the eight sitting Justices threw out a Massachusetts ruling that the right of individuals to bear arms doesn’t include stun guns.
Jaime Caetano began carrying a stun gun as protection against an abusive ex-boyfriend who remained a threat despite restraining orders (Caetano v. Massachusetts). When officers found her stun gun during a search, she was arrested and convicted for possessing an unlawful weapon. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld her conviction on grounds that stun guns are “not the type of weapon that is eligible for Second Amendment protection” because they weren’t around when the Second Amendment was written.
The Supreme Court’s brief per curiam (unsigned for the court) opinion dismissed that reasoning, as well as the Massachusetts’s court’s argument that stun guns were not meant to be protected because there is “nothing in the record to suggest that [stun guns] are readily adaptable to use in the military.” That’s irrelevant, the Justices noted, because the U.S. High Court’s 2008 Heller precedent explicitly “rejected the proposition ‘that only those weapons useful in warfare are protected.’”
The Caetano ruling, however brief, is an important legal brushback to the many politicians and judges who are still engaging in guerrilla legal resistance to Heller and the follow-up McDonald v. Chicago case that applied Heller to the states. The Massachusetts judges cited Heller, but they willfully misread it to reach the anti-gun rights conclusion they wanted. We’re glad to see even the liberal Justices stand up to that.
In a concurring opinion joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, Justice Samuel Alito also put a finer point on the absurdity of the lower court’s position that the Second Amendment protects only guns in common use at the time of the Founders.
“Electronic stun guns are no more exempt from the Second Amendment’s protections, simply because they were unknown to the First Congress, than electronic communications are exempt from the First Amendment, or electronic imaging devices are exempt from the Fourth Amendment,” he wrote. This would have been a stronger message had Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Anthony Kennedy also joined the concurrence, but at least two Justices made the case in detail.
The timing of Monday’s ruling is notable because Heller and the individual right to bear arms will be major progressive targets if there is a new left-leaning majority on the Supreme Court. Progressives will at the very least try to blow major holes into Heller by narrowing its limits on gun regulation. But for now the ruling is a reminder that Heller is a landmark that needs to be enforced, not resisted.
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"A strong body makes the mind strong. As to the species of exercises, I advise the gun. While this gives moderate exercise to the body, it gives boldness, enterprise and independence to the mind. Games played with the ball, and others of that nature, are too violent for the body and stamp no character on the mind. Let your gun therefore be your constant companion of your walks." —Thomas Jefferson (1785)
Bureaucrats Strip Vets' Gun Rights
Congressional lawmakers want answers. Senators Charles Grassley and Johnny Isakson sent a letter to the Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs asking why the agency reports any veteran who is assigned a fiduciary trustee to the FBI as mentally defective, thus stripping the veteran of their right to keep and bear arms. So far, the VA has reported to the FBI 260,000 individuals — equivalent to a quarter of the number of people in Texas who have a license to carry. While all federal agencies are required to report "mentally defective" individuals to the FBI so they can be noted in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, the VA refers an astounding 99.3% of such cases. All other agencies account for just 0.7%. With ruthless "efficiency" like that coming from the same bureaucracy guilty of the wait-time scandal, does anyone suspect abuse of the system?
In a statement, Grassley said, "Our military heroes risked their lives to protect and defend this country and all that we stand for, including our most basic constitutional rights. Now the very agency created to serve them is jeopardizing their Second Amendment rights through an erroneous reading of gun regulations. The VA's careless approach to our veterans' constitutional rights is disgraceful."
No one wants someone with serious mental health issues to become a danger to themselves or others because they had access to firearms. But before basic constitutional rights are denied, the question is what constitutes mental illness? And who decides?
A bureaucracy with no due process is most certainly not the answer. Yet the gun-grabbing Obama administration wants to institute a similar policy as the VA within the Social Security Administration. Our hope is that this new bureaucratic scheme won't survive the increased scrutiny that was established through the Supreme Court's Heller decision.
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42,000 Sign Petition to Allow Republicans to Bring Guns to G.O.P. Convention
It may have been created in jest, but the conservatives in favor of open-carry laws are deadly serious
Tina Nguyen
With the potential for a convoluted, multi-round fight to determine its presidential nominee (and the threat of riots if Donald Trump loses), this summer’s Republican National Convention is shaping up to be a historic, if not historically messy, spectacle. As if to make matters worse for a party that is already trying to fend off Trump’s takeover bid, the G.O.P must now contend with a new petition that calls for attendees, already in a high-pressure environment, to be allowed to “recognize our constitutional right to open carry firearms at the Republican National Convention at the Quicken Loans Arena in July 2016.”
More than 42,000 people have signed the petition, which appeared on Change.org last week and originally set a goal of just 5,000 signatures. Signatories are asking the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, the R.N.C.’s convention venue, to override its no-gun policies and allow attendees to open-carry approved weapons. While people are legally allowed to openly carry firearms in Ohio, the stadium itself does not allow guns inside. Security protocols for the presidential candidates, who are protected by the Secret Service, would also likely prohibit attendees from bringing weapons within their proximity.
But people supporting the petition, begun by someone listing his or her name as “N.A.,” according to USA Today, and backed by a group that the Akron Beacon Journal has found no evidence of outside the petition itself, argue it would be dangerous not to allow guns inside the venue. “This is a direct affront to the Second Amendment and puts all attendees at risk,” he or she writes, citing the National Rifle Association’s belief that gun-free zones are “the worst and most dangerous of all lies.” Without people openly showing off their guns, N.A. argues, attendees will be vulnerable to a terrorist attack or even the people of Cleveland, a city “consistently ranked as one of the top ten most dangerous cities in America."
It's possible that the petition began as a prank, judging by the Twitter account allegedly run by the petition’s creator, who describes him or herself as “speaking truth to stupid.” Said troll seems to enjoy retweeting people who support the poll, if only to participate in the trolling itself...
• https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/714205589388156929
• https://twitter.com/AoDespair/status/714317939554422784
• https://twitter.com/LewSOS/status/714214435628261377
But the argument underlying the petition is deadly serious for many conservatives, whether or not its creator meant to mock them. Republican lawmakers have routinely decried gun-free zones as a risk, especially in the wake of mass shootings at U.S. schools and universities. In Texas, a new gun law requires people with concealed handgun permits to begin taking their firearms with them to college beginning August 1. Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Oregon, Utah, and Wisconsin also have laws on the books allowing concealed weapons on campus, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Donald Trump has often argued that the deadly terrorist attacks in Paris last November could have been prevented or mitigated if the victims had been armed.
Asked Sunday on ABC’s This Week about allowing convention attendees to bring guns, Trump told host Jon Karl that while he hadn’t read the petition, “I want to see what it says [and] read the fine print” before making a statement.
“I’m a very, very strong person for Second Amendment. I think very few people are stronger. And I have to see the petition,” Trump, known for accidentally accepting support from Klan members and fascists, said.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QbwRNXACTR4
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A similar petition for the dems has all law enforcement, secret service and personal security details being disarmed at their convention, since guns are icky.
42,000 Sign Petition to Allow Republicans to Bring Guns to G.O.P. Convention
It may have been created in jest, but the conservatives in favor of open-carry laws are deadly serious
Tina Nguyen
With the potential for a convoluted, multi-round fight to determine its presidential nominee (and the threat of riots if Donald Trump loses), this summer’s Republican National Convention is shaping up to be a historic, if not historically messy, spectacle. As if to make matters worse for a party that is already trying to fend off Trump’s takeover bid, the G.O.P must now contend with a new petition that calls for attendees, already in a high-pressure environment, to be allowed to “recognize our constitutional right to open carry firearms at the Republican National Convention at the Quicken Loans Arena in July 2016.”
More than 42,000 people have signed the petition, which appeared on Change.org last week and originally set a goal of just 5,000 signatures. Signatories are asking the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, the R.N.C.’s convention venue, to override its no-gun policies and allow attendees to open-carry approved weapons. While people are legally allowed to openly carry firearms in Ohio, the stadium itself does not allow guns inside. Security protocols for the presidential candidates, who are protected by the Secret Service, would also likely prohibit attendees from bringing weapons within their proximity.
But people supporting the petition, begun by someone listing his or her name as “N.A.,” according to USA Today, and backed by a group that the Akron Beacon Journal has found no evidence of outside the petition itself, argue it would be dangerous not to allow guns inside the venue. “This is a direct affront to the Second Amendment and puts all attendees at risk,” he or she writes, citing the National Rifle Association’s belief that gun-free zones are “the worst and most dangerous of all lies.” Without people openly showing off their guns, N.A. argues, attendees will be vulnerable to a terrorist attack or even the people of Cleveland, a city “consistently ranked as one of the top ten most dangerous cities in America."
It's possible that the petition began as a prank, judging by the Twitter account allegedly run by the petition’s creator, who describes him or herself as “speaking truth to stupid.” Said troll seems to enjoy retweeting people who support the poll, if only to participate in the trolling itself...
• https://twitter.com/pmarca/status/714205589388156929
• https://twitter.com/AoDespair/status/714317939554422784
• https://twitter.com/LewSOS/status/714214435628261377
But the argument underlying the petition is deadly serious for many conservatives, whether or not its creator meant to mock them. Republican lawmakers have routinely decried gun-free zones as a risk, especially in the wake of mass shootings at U.S. schools and universities. In Texas, a new gun law requires people with concealed handgun permits to begin taking their firearms with them to college beginning August 1. Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Mississippi, Oregon, Utah, and Wisconsin also have laws on the books allowing concealed weapons on campus, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Donald Trump has often argued that the deadly terrorist attacks in Paris last November could have been prevented or mitigated if the victims had been armed.
Asked Sunday on ABC’s This Week about allowing convention attendees to bring guns, Trump told host Jon Karl that while he hadn’t read the petition, “I want to see what it says [and] read the fine print” before making a statement.
“I’m a very, very strong person for Second Amendment. I think very few people are stronger. And I have to see the petition,” Trump, known for accidentally accepting support from Klan members and fascists, said.
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Violent Criminals and Holsters are Seldom Found Together
http://www.ammoland.com/2016/05/violent-criminals-holsters-seldom-found-together/#ixzz48G9ZoI7x
Police have long understood that violent criminals almost never use holsters. The obvious reason is that a gun is readily abandoned by tossing it from a car, in a dumpster, down a drain, or off a bridge. A holster, normally worn on a belt, is much harder to discard, and can result in embarrassing questions when found in a search. Having a holster on ones person when you are not allowed to carry or possess a firearm becomes rather problematic.
From a comment: “95% of criminals carry their guns on their strong side, mostly stuck in the front of their bodies, inside the waistband without a holster.” – From a US Secret Service Seminar on detecting concealed weapons
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Violent Criminals and Holsters are Seldom Found Together
http://www.ammoland.com/2016/05/violent-criminals-holsters-seldom-found-together/#ixzz48G9ZoI7x
Police have long understood that violent criminals almost never use holsters. The obvious reason is that a gun is readily abandoned by tossing it from a car, in a dumpster, down a drain, or off a bridge. A holster, normally worn on a belt, is much harder to discard, and can result in embarrassing questions when found in a search. Having a holster on ones person when you are not allowed to carry or possess a firearm becomes rather problematic.
From a comment: “95% of criminals carry their guns on their strong side, mostly stuck in the front of their bodies, inside the waistband without a holster.” – From a US Secret Service Seminar on detecting concealed weapons
It is very true.
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http://thefederalist.com/2016/06/03/katie-courics-anti-gun-producers-repeatedly-violated-federal-gun-laws/
:lol: :evil:
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http://thefederalist.com/2016/06/03/katie-courics-anti-gun-producers-repeatedly-violated-federal-gun-laws/
:lol: :evil:
Lucky for her, the dem get out of jail free card is in effect. Laws are for the little people.
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I confess I am not real enthused about ISIS people buying guns. What, if anything can be done?
http://www.alloutdoor.com/2016/06/03/obama-proposes-taking-away-constitutional-rights-based-browser-history/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=2016-06-04&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
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I confess I am not real enthused about ISIS people buying guns. What, if anything can be done?
http://www.alloutdoor.com/2016/06/03/obama-proposes-taking-away-constitutional-rights-based-browser-history/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=2016-06-04&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
You can make a case against them and prosecute them for actual violations of the law. Also, he could secure the border and stop importing jihadists if he really cared.
(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/mail-attachment-2.jpeg)
https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2016/06/mail-attachment-2.jpeg
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:-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o :-o
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/10/03/do-civilians-with-guns-ever-stop-mass-shootings/
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http://10news.dk/?p=760
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O'Reilly caves. So instead of simply keeping those on TERROR watch lists from purchasing weapons because we may OFFEND THEM the Left"s and now OReilly's answer is to restrict EVERONE ELSE'S rights! I am sick of the BS:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/bill-oreilly-takes-stunning-stance-154449244.html?nhp=1
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:x :x :x
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20160615/nra-statement-on-terror-watchlists
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More on O'Reilly here, debate with Jon Stewart. I have to listen more closely but he seems to defend gun rights, crack down on crimes committed with guns, asks Congress to declare war on radical jihad.
It was Stewart conflating the issue, gun control when the violence is radical Islam declaring and executing a war against the US and we fail to take steps to fight back.
The FBI investigates but finds a guy who hasn't committed a crime. I am traveling and don't have the facts but wouldn't or shouldn't two trips to Saudi to meet with or train with enemies of the US constitute a crime, if that is what happened and if we had any way of knowing that?
I don't want China's censorship of internet where opposition to the state even in words is banned. But isn't recruitment of radical Islam, on the internet or in the Mosques, to take up arms against the US and against innocent US civilians a form of speech that is NOT protected by the first amendment? Isn't a denial of gun sales to people siding with those who have declared war against the US a reasonable restriction not in conflict at all with the second amendment? Isn't the monitoring of some of these groups and tracking of movements and activities a normal and necessary part of national security not in violation of our privacy rights? Doesn't a person give up some expectation of privacy and being free of surveillance when they make association with sworn, violent, mass shooting, mass beheading enemies of the United States?
Slippery slope stuff perhaps and some of the answers need to go in the other threads, but I would pose this question here on the well armed people thread:
What stopped this shooter? Someone with a gun shot him.
What do you wish would happen if you were trapped in this massacre while it was happening? You wish someone would pull out a gun and shoot him.
When would be the best time to stop the shooter? Before he entered the club ideally, but more realistically the need to shoot him was clear as soon as he first shot at innocent people.
Would the strictest gun laws possible stop radical Islam from killing us? Couldn't he have also used a bomb or a poison gas? Didn't the 911 hijackers use box cutters? you won't convice the left, but the gun is not the enemy, the enemy is.
We are at war, in the sense that the enemy has declared it. Why not identify the enemy and fight back?
The enemy isn't our own right of self defense. The enemy in the current fight is radical Islam, wherever it rears its ugly head. If the immediate threat came from Timothy McVeigh types, then that is where our focus should be, but our immediate threat is coming from radical Islam. The need for law abiding citizens to take up arms and defend themselves only grows when those elected to protect us don't take the most obvious steps to protect us.
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Doug everything you post is true. But the media goes after Trump and Obama as always seems off the hook. Hardly one peep about how THIS guy was working as a contractor for DHS.
Obamster is now going to Orlando to make give a political lecture to the world.
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http://kdvr.com/2016/06/14/gun-sales-surge-after-orlando-shooting/
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Separate from politics and talk, this kind of thing indicates people get it. If someone is shooting at you or at your loved ones, you would wish that you or someone with you could shoot back and end the carnage.
It is war, a 'gun law' does't stop a criminal or enemy combatant. Mass beheading are just as gruesome as mass shootings.
(Unless the count has changed) there were 49 victims killed. The shooter was not a victim.
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http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/06/16/heres-everything-wanted-say-islam-yesterday-couldnt/
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https://www.firearmspolicy.org/petitions/ab1673/?mc_cid=cc77fd32d4&mc_eid=c42be3e26b
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Fund my department or organization and if you don't you are a disgrace. :roll: Of this is not about the 2 nd amendment. :roll: Of course you are not biased from day #1. :roll:
Of course it is all about helping Blacks who are shooting themselves up worse then Dodge CIty :roll: A waste of $5 million.
http://www.breitbart.com/california/2016/06/20/ca-lawmakers-designate-5-million-gun-violence-research/
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Leftism and guns, the goal is restrict something, anything, just get restrictions passed on guns. The latest is the terror watch list, ban the sale of guns to people on the "terror watch list", whatever that is. 1.1 million people. Makes sense. Unless you examine it.
A couple of points on that. First is the trick question, which is your favorite right in the Bill of Rights? Hopefully ALL of them! In this case, not just the second amendment applies but also due process, the 5th (and 14th).
"[N]or shall any person . . . be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law"
I am against selling weapons to terrorists. Are the 1.1 million people on the terror watch list terrorists?
If you go back to the due process clause, the ones we know are terrorists aren't out buying guns; they are in prison or dead.
Was Omar dumbshit, the gay hating gay Muslim ISIS surrogate (don't want to know his name) on the terror watch list? No. He was taken off the list. Why? I don't know. Bureaucrats make mistakes. Law enforcement missed something. He hadn't committed a crime. People who manage lists of a million people don't get everything right. Maybe it was 4:00 in a government office when his name should have been re-entered. Some didn't want to speak up against him because he was Muslim. Whatever the reason, this wouldn't have stopped him. Does that change the minds of liberals? No. Their goal is restrict something, anything, just get some restrictions passed on guns. (I repeat myself. So do they.)
I am for declaring war on Radical Islam in all its iterations. If that were the case and if law enforcement and military intelligence were on it, the man who was communicating with, visiting and training with the enemy would be in jail, so would all his mentors, all with due process, and they would not be out buying guns.
A person on the terror watch list can't fly but can't buy a gun. Why? One is an enumerated right. One is not a recognized right. In law we have all kinds of standards. preponderance of evidence, proof beyond a reasonable doubt, rational basis, strict scrutiny, intermediate scrutiny, etc. etc. What standard goes into putting a person on the terror watch list? No one knows. All we know is they aren't right or dertain enough to arrest them and they miss people all the time.
Meanwhile our border is open and while you were reading this more terrorists and illegal guns came in. I recommend keeping the right to defend yourself.
And for the areas where the constitution has it wrong or times have changed, I recommend the constitutional amendment process, not governing by the willy nilly whims of leftists.
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http://gunsnfreedom.com/17-years-after-gun-bans-in-australia-police-say-gun-crime-is-out-of-control/1010
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http://gunsnfreedom.com/17-years-after-gun-bans-in-australia-police-say-gun-crime-is-out-of-control/1010
Shocka!
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If one were to believe the liberal leftist mantra in all these.shootings stories that the underlying problem is too many guns, you would still vote them out because their policies accomplished exactly the opposite.
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The trucker in France had guns, but the larger point remains, he didn't need guns or assault rifle to commit mass murder. We can ban trucks, limit weight and horsepower on trucks, sue the truck manufacturers for the unintended use if we want. Will that stop mass murder?
The enemy is the ideology that makes us their enemy, and the terrorist following it, not the device used.
There are IEDs, dirty bombs, pipe bombs, poison gas in enclosed spaces and homemade nuclear devices. There are guns, airplanes and trucks and who knows what else? Ban all of them and we will learn which ones we missed, maybe serial beheadings with a kitchen knife, ban that too.
Guns have a specific use in self defense and crowd defense in some of these same situations.
Strangely, we only want to ban the one that is a constitutional right, and the only one widely used in self defense.
Ban mass murder, declare war on ISIS and hunt down their sympathizers, but don't ban self defense or the most obvious way to end a mass murder in process.
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Truck and car attacks have happened in Israel and it was reported that Israeli police or citizens with guns actually stopped the attack.
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"Ban all of them and we will learn which ones we missed, maybe serial beheadings with a kitchen knife, ban that too."
China has had mass stabbings by adherents to the religion of peace. China does try to restrict access to knives. It doesn't work, funny enough.
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"Ban all of them and we will learn which ones we missed, maybe serial beheadings with a kitchen knife, ban that too."
China has had mass stabbings by adherents to the religion of peace. China does try to restrict access to knives. It doesn't work, funny enough.
Restricting anything will never work. Some people will not be controlled. Death sentences will not stop them, because they are prepared to die, and they are growing in number.
Oddly enough, one of the best places to get weapons, is by taking them from the people that have them, even if it is the military or police. Everything has a soft spot.
It makes everyone being responsible for their own saftey all that much more relevant.
By the way, anyone halfway worth their salt, already has a handwritten list, of Black Panther Party Huey P. Newton gun club jerks, with their addresses, written down somewhere. Weapons laws? That's funny.
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http://edition.cnn.com/2016/07/17/politics/cleveland-police-baton-rouge-security-open-carry/
They cannot suspend Constitutional rights without serious consequences. Also, if they do not suspend them, they open the door for violence (which is present with out without suspending rights).
I'll add, that the only thing it will take to start a serious, not easily remedied low scale war in the US, is for someone to start killing people at the Republican convention.
We have arrived at the fork in the road. There is no avoiding it. Theynow are willing to take anyone's right to carry, or risk mass casualties.
Also, the police (for the most part) are poorly trained and lack any realworld experience unless they are prior military, proof of that being a reservist schooling 12 police officers in Dallas, a Marine veteran, schooling 7 officers in Baton Rouge.
To be clear, I'm not cheerleading for BLM. In fact, I loathe them. I am on the side of COMPLETE freedom, but it is also clear, that the police and government cannot win this. Anyone doubting that should study the Vietnam war, the US campaign in Iraq and especially Afghanistan, or read on the Soviet-Afghani conflict, in each case, a larger, wealthier, stronger opponent, defeated by a smaller force, with less training, finances, or inferior weapons.. Guerrilla wars cannot be won. That is where this all goes.
For the record, Kasich has denied the idea:
"On Sunday afternoon, Stephen Loomis, the president of the Cleveland Police Patrolmen’s Association, said that Mr. Kasich should temporarily suspend “open carry” for the sake of security. Mr. Loomis said in an interview with CNN that he did not care “if it’s constitutional or not.”
Mr. Kasich’s office rejected the idea as legally impossible."
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Ambushes usually hold the upper hand. Long guns vs. handguns, the advantage goes to long guns.
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I have always had a leery feeling about open carry, especially long guns.
In the context of the RNC it may be a really bad idea.
Prayers for all of us.
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I have always had a leery feeling about open carry, especially long guns.
In the context of the RNC it may be a really bad idea.
Prayers for all of us.
The dems are funding and planning for what is coming to the RNC. This is a Soros/DNC/Obama admin operation. Don't be surprised.
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Ambushes usually hold the upper hand. Long guns vs. handguns, the advantage goes to long guns.
After working here, i-ve almost lost any fear that I may have had previously when having ceramic plates and being armed with a FAL, Negev, ARX160, M-4, etc. A glock at that point is a pea shooter. Anyone facing someone armed witht he aforementioned, doesn't have a snowball's chance in hell, and even less, when ambushed, especially if range and accuracy, as well as amount of rounds down range are taken into acount.
As for anyone carrying long rifles or anything else, I'm wary of placing any limits, because when limits are allowed (felons for example), then all kinds of laws can be allowed, as with Mr. Loomis' comments today (someone who supposedly swore to protect the Constitution), talking about suspending YOUR rights, because HE thinks it's a good idea.
Cynthia and I had a shootout at our house here, with cartel hitmen at the door (10 dead). That is the second time I have had something like that happen at my house, and both times, lucky we didn't wind up hurt or worse. Any legislation regarding one's right to self defense is a bad idea and should NEVER be respected, especially when the ones pushing the laws, demand that they need to be armed, but others don't. I'll never agree with that. Not ever. I want every single one of you armed, even if you're mentally unstable, because my safety is MY responsibility, not YOURS. Your safety is YOUR responsibility, and there is NO ONE that can protect you....ever.
Edit: To be fair, I admit that I am a total anarchist and that most people don't want true freedom, as it is rather chaotic, so I will always be in the minority view on this. The elctricity went out here today. I liked it. A lot of people did not. I missed a few hours on the computer and know where to get my own water if I really had to. Big whoop. I'm hoping this all goes downhill and back a couple of centuries. It would be good for all of us. BLM would quit bitching and either work to feed themselves or die, as would every other non hacker. Nothing bad in that.
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http://dailysignal.com/2016/07/25/knife-rights-the-unseen-side-of-the-second-amendment/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=tds-fb
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http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/07/foghorn/breaking-obama-issues-executive-order-may-drive-gunsmiths-business/
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http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2016/08/04/judge-napolitano-says-obama-admin-is-breaking-federal-law-prohibiting-govt-from-compiling-gun-owner-list/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Firewire%20-%20HORIZON%208-4-16%20FINAL%20-%20no%20ad&utm_term=Firewire
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20160727/just-in-time-for-his-party-s-convention-obama-administration-releases-latest-executive-gun-control
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2016/07/foghorn/breaking-obama-issues-executive-order-may-drive-gunsmiths-business/
Is the preceding accurate in light of this?
http://pmddtc.state.gov/compliance/Applicability%20of%20the%20ITAR%20Registration%20Requirement%20to%20Firearms%20Manufacturers%20%28Publish%29.pdf
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http://ijr.com/2016/01/510415-10-charts-that-put-obamas-gun-violence-town-hall-in-perspective/
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/06/new-york-city-confiscating-rifles-and-shotguns/
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/06/new-york-city-confiscating-rifles-and-shotguns/
WOW.
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/06/new-york-city-confiscating-rifles-and-shotguns/
WOW.
I'd be more concerned if I hadn't lost my gun collection in an unfortunate canoe accident.
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/09/07/1950-to-2010-not-one-mass-public-shooting-where-citizens-could-be-armed/
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http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/06/new-york-city-confiscating-rifles-and-shotguns/
WOW.
I'd be more concerned if I hadn't lost my gun collection in an unfortunate canoe accident.
You have to be careful in those canoes... they're so unstable. :-D
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/09/07/1950-to-2010-not-one-mass-public-shooting-where-citizens-could-be-armed/
There are principles that transcend the law of man, the right to defense of self being one of them. John R. Lott Jr.'s use of the word "could" is something I take issue with, due to the fact that people can do just about anything they want. Whether or not they choose to do so, is another matter. I refuse to live somewhere, where the government and citizens think that we don't have the right to protect ourselves. I will never submit to that; job, roots, friendships be damned. I won't do it.
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I think the role of gun confiscator would be a very dangerous one in large swaths of the US.
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http://www.wsj.com/articles/gun-show-customers-license-plates-come-under-scrutiny-1475451302
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http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/10/04/texas-store-employee-uses-ak-47-stop-4-armed-robbers/
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http://freebeacon.com/issues/european-criminals-and-terrorists-have-67-million-guns-to-choose-from-despite-strict-gun-control/
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http://freebeacon.com/issues/european-criminals-and-terrorists-have-67-million-guns-to-choose-from-despite-strict-gun-control/
But Europe is supposed to be what we aspire to!
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https://pjmedia.com/trending/2016/11/11/trump-to-support-nationwide-concealed-carry/
Trump to Support Nationwide Concealed Carry
BY MICHAEL WALSH NOVEMBER 11, 2016
Leftist heads now exploding like popcorn kernels:
Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump -- who said he has a concealed carry permit -- called for the expansion of gun rights Friday, including making those permits applicable nationwide. In a position paper published on his website Friday afternoon, Trump called for the elimination of gun and magazine bans, labeling them a "total failure."
"Law-abiding people should be allowed to own the firearm of their choice. The government has no business dictating what types of firearms good, honest people are allowed to own," Trump wrote.
It's not a departure from what he's said on the trail this year, though it does mark a shift from a position he took in his 2000 book "The America We Deserve," where Trump stated that he generally opposes gun control but that he supported a ban on assault weapons and a longer waiting period to get a gun.
"Opponents of gun rights try to come up with scary sounding phrases like 'assault weapons', 'military-style weapons' and 'high capacity magazines' to confuse people," Trump wrote Friday. "What they’re really talking about are popular semi-automatic rifles and standard magazines that are owned by tens of millions of Americans."
Liberals have long argued that guns should be regulated like automobiles. So what's not to like?
Trump said in the paper he has a concealed carry permit. The permits, which are issued by states, should be valid nationwide like a driver's license, Trump said. "If we can do that for driving -- which is a privilege, not a right -- then surely we can do that for concealed carry, which is a right, not a privilege," Trump said.
Trump just called their bluff. Hoo boy.
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Under LEOSA (HR218) I can and have carried a concealed handgun in Los Angeles. Why not all law abiding citizens?
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I LOVE the idea of being able to legally carry here in Los Angeles.
OTOH, as a matter of intellectual integrity, I'm seeing a couple of issues:
a) States Rights: Under the Tenth Amendment, don't the individual states have sovereignty in matters pertaining to the "police power"?
b) Laboratory of Democracy: Is not a key ingredient of federalism that we have a laboratory of democracy, which allows us to try different approaches and compare the results? Are not the various States different? Why impose a one size fits all approach?
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I LOVE the idea of being able to legally carry here in Los Angeles.
OTOH, as a matter of intellectual integrity, I'm seeing a couple of issues:
a) States Rights: Under the Tenth Amendment, don't the individual states have sovereignty in matters pertaining to the "police power"?
b) Laboratory of Democracy: Is not a key ingredient of federalism that we have a laboratory of democracy, which allows us to try different approaches and compare the results? Are not the various States different? Why impose a one size fits all approach?
Exactly the problem with the States currently, in regard to everything from abortion, religion, weapons, or anything else that's been legislated, that is not clearly spelled out as a federal power.
The problem in that the Constitution, like anything, is left to interpretation. It shouldn't be that way. Law needs to be clear, and the Federal government, passing Commerce Code, or any of the any other things they use to justify their overreach, needs to be rescinded, and given back to the individual state.
The fact that the ATF even exists is ludicrous.
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http://bearingarms.com/bob-o/2016/11/10/three-gun-laws-reform-president-trump/
Freedom!
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For what it is worth studied in Jama are there because the New England Journal of Medicine did not accept them. There are a lot of liberals with an agenda publishing in medicine these days.
Perhaps I was simply not paying attention but I don't recall doctors and medical researchers getting into social issues so much. OTOH that is where the money was for research grants under the Obama rule.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/442217/guns-stand-your-ground-law-journal-american-medical-association-study-fatally-flawed
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https://thelibertyzone.us/2016/11/28/ohio-state-stabbing/
A gun-less gunman armed with only a car and a edged weapon, and a really peaceful belief system.
Motive unknown It's Trump's fault!
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https://pjmedia.com/trending/2016/11/28/five-libs-who-pushed-gun-control-narrative-on-twitter-after-ohio-state-stabbing-attack/?singlepage=true
Control.
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https://pjmedia.com/trending/2016/11/28/five-libs-who-pushed-gun-control-narrative-on-twitter-after-ohio-state-stabbing-attack/?singlepage=true
Amazing. Not just obscure liberals either. Tim Kaine!
The knee jerk reaction to this is not more stupid than the other situations where the rules and laws they propose (gun free zones?) are either already in place or wouldn't have prevented the carnage. This one is just more obvious! Gun control to prevent knife and vehicle attacks! How about Somali-control? Or radical-Somali-control. The knowledge of this vulnerability swayed the election. For the left, nothing learned.
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http://www.tacticalshit.com/atf-clarifies-whether-marijuana-users-can-by-guns/
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/with-obama-leaving-republicans-target-dcs-gun-laws-abortion-funding-assisted-suicide-and-marijuana/2017/01/18/fd4eed14-dda0-11e6-918c-99ede3c8cafa_story.html?tid=ss_fb-amp&utm_term=.dfd8a638ce99
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http://apps.washingtonpost.com/g/documents/national/read-the-white-paper-on-firearms-regulations/2325/
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DESIGNATION OF MILITIA RIFLES
By the authority vested in me as President and Commander in Chief of the Militia by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to ensure the ability of citizens of the United States to defend themselves, their communities and their States, as well as to ensure the safety and security of our Nation, I hereby order as follows:
Section 1. Purpose. Both individual and community safety are critically important to the national security of the United States. Terrorism, transnational criminal activity and potential acts of war by foreign nations present a significant threat to national security and our citizens, who have the right and the duty to defend themselves, their communities, their States and the Nation.
Section 2. Policy. It is the policy of the executive branch to:
(a) Support and defend the Constitution, including the Second Amendment right of citizens to keep and bear arms for Militia purposes,as well asself-defense.
(b) Encourage citizens to be prepared to act as members of the Militia to defend communities, States and the Nation, as part of the common defense contemplated by the Constitution of the United States.
(c) Discourage restrictions by States and political subdivisionson individual possession of firearms suitable for Militia purposes by citizens of the United States.
Section 3. Definitions.
(a) “Militia” has the meaning given the term in Title 10, Section 311 of the United States Code to include the Unorganized Militia, as well as the meaning given to the term “Militia” under equivalent State statutes.
(b) “Self-Defense” shall mean the actions of citizens to defend themselves and their families from physical attack.
(c) “Communities” shall mean neighborhoods, towns, cities, counties and other political subdivisions of citizens who live in distinct geographic areas within a State.
(d) “State” shall mean one of the fifty States of the United States.
(e) “Militia Purposes” shall mean training, practice and preparedness which could improve the ability of a citizen to act,and to be armed in case of a need to act, as a member of a local, State or National organization commanded by government officials and responsive to a physical threat. Appropriate organizations include those commanded by an elected county or city Sheriff;those commanded by the Governor of a State through officers of that State’s Defense Force as authorized by Title 30, Section 109 of the United States Code, or through officers of that State’s National Guard;and organizations commanded by the President through officers of the Active or Reserve components of U.S. Armed Forces.
(f) “Militia Rifles” shall mean the firearms designated in Section 4 that are made in America and suitable for use in self-defense, community defense, defense of States and defense of the Nation.
Section 4. Designation of Militia Rifles. That the following firearms and accessories are authorized and appropriate for individual citizens to keep and bear for Militia purposes under the Constitution and the laws of the United States:
(a) The AR-15 and similar semi-automatic rifles, to include flash suppressors and bayonet lugs, magazines of up to thirty round capacities, M-7 bayonets, and ammunition in 5.56 NATO or .223 Remington, in all quantities.
(b) The M1A and similar semi-automatic rifles, to include flash suppressors and bayonet lugs,magazines of up to twenty round capacities, M-6 bayonets, and ammunition in 7.62 NATO or .308 Winchester, in all quantities.
(c) The M1 Garand and similar semi-automatic rifles, to include flash suppressors and bayonet lugs, M-5 bayonets, and ammunition in.30-’06 Springfield, in all quantities.
(d) Bolt action rifles in the calibers of .30-’06 Springfield; 7.62 NATO or .308 Winchester; 5.56 NATO or .223 Remington; or any substantially equivalent caliber, and ammunition appropriate for the rifles, in any quantity.
(This list could easily be expanded.)
Section 5. Pre-emption. This Executive Order is intended to pre-empt the laws of States or political subdivisions that infringe upon the rights of citizens to keep and bear the arms designated in Section 4.
Section 6. Judicial Notice. That the judges of all State and Federal Courts are hereby given notice that possession of the designated Militia Rifles and accessories by citizens should not be restricted or infringed upon by State laws or the laws of a political subdivision of a State and any such law should be reviewed under the strict scrutiny standard to determine whether it is a violation of the Constitution of the United States after judicial consideration of this Order and the fact that it was issued by the Commander in Chief of the Militia.
Donald J. Trump
THE WHITE HOUSE
March __, 2017
PROPOSED EXECUTIVE ORDER DESIGNATES MILITIA RIFLES FOR CITIZEN OWNERSHIP
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http://us5.campaign-archive2.com/?u=10f1b2be1fbee7acd9ac7bb79&id=f0a795bb19&e=0332f322fa
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3/7/17:
http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2017/03/obama-doj-failed-stop-mexican-cartel-murder-ice-agent-smuggled-guns/
10/23/14
http://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-obtains-key-fast-furious-information/
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My take. Let this be a lesson to would be burglars:
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/alleged-getaway-driver-instructed-slain-teen-burglary-suspects-185005591--abc-news-topstories.html
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https://patriotpost.us/alexander/48626
I make an annual donation to this group.
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https://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/costs-consequences-gun-control#full
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http://www.thedailyliberator.com/facts-neither-side-wants-admit-gun-contro/#rJBkvchs2mX8u3RZ.99
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http://news.stanford.edu/2017/06/21/violent-crime-increases-right-carry-states/
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http://news.stanford.edu/2017/06/21/violent-crime-increases-right-carry-states/
If John Lott is right, it is hard to believe a study out of respected institution can be so narrow and biased. Lott also has a bias; his name is synonymous with more guns less crime. But his data and studies are wider in scope.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/07/10/stanford-law-prof-gets-it-wrong-on-guns-right-to-carry-reduces-crime-not-other-way-around.html John Lott:
"Would you rely almost exclusively on trends in Hawaii to predict violent crime rates in Idaho, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, and Utah? Would you look at Illinois to predict changes in Louisiana and South Carolina? Illinois has a drastically difference crime landscape, with half of its violent crime occurring in Chicago.
Though it wouldn’t pass the laugh test for most people, an unpublished report making just these sorts of comparisons has been all the rage in the media. Lead author John Donohue, a professor at Stanford Law School, makes a claim which goes against existing national research: that right-to-carry laws increase violent crime."
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On a related matter, the congressional shooter could have and would have been stopped sooner if not for DC prohibit carry laws.
https://www.ammoland.com/2017/07/congressional-staffer-could-have-stopped-baseball-field-attack/#axzz4mXVEWVlg
"Read more: https://www.ammoland.com/2017/07/congressional-staffer-could-have-stopped-baseball-field-attack/#ixzz4mXW7eA1X
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution
Follow us: @Ammoland on Twitter | Ammoland on Facebook
Rep. Loudermilk said. “If this had happened in Georgia, he wouldn't have gotten too far. I had a staff member who was in his car, maybe 20 yards behind the shooter. Back in Georgia [he] carries a nine millimeter in his car. I carry a weapon. He had a clear shot at him. But here, we're not allowed to carry any weapons here."
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http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449754/concealed-carry-permits-increasing-good-america
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http://www.recoilweb.com/california-magazine-ban-stopped-in-its-tracks-128765.html?wc_mid=4035:7935&wc_rid=4035:28484361&_wcsid=3310334D3D21814928E35DA2B24DB22F354971D4291FADA0
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Washington Post! Today. She worked for Nate Silver's "538". Not a conservative group!
She makes the case against sweeping gun control laws without even mentioning the defensive role of guns.
----------------------------------------
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/i-used-to-think-gun-control-was-the-answer-my-research-told-me-otherwise/2017/10/03/d33edca6-a851-11e7-92d1-58c702d2d975_story.html
I used to think gun control was the answer. My research told me otherwise.
By Leah Libresco October 3 at 3:02 PM
Leah Libresco is a statistician and former newswriter at FiveThirtyEight, a data journalism site. She is the author of “Arriving at Amen.”
Before I started researching gun deaths, gun-control policy used to frustrate me. I wished the National Rifle Association would stop blocking common-sense gun-control reforms such as banning assault weapons, restricting silencers, shrinking magazine sizes and all the other measures that could make guns less deadly.
Then, my colleagues and I at FiveThirtyEight spent three months analyzing all 33,000 lives ended by guns each year in the United States, and I wound up frustrated in a whole new way. We looked at what interventions might have saved those people, and the case for the policies I’d lobbied for crumbled when I examined the evidence. The best ideas left standing were narrowly tailored interventions to protect subtypes of potential victims, not broad attempts to limit the lethality of guns.
After a shooting in Las Vegas left at least 58 people dead and injured hundreds, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) on Oct. 2 said Congress’s failure to pass gun-control legislation amounts to an “unintentional endorsement” of mass shootings. (U.S. Senate)
I researched the strictly tightened gun laws in Britain and Australia and concluded that they didn’t prove much about what America’s policy should be. Neither nation experienced drops in mass shootings or other gun related-crime that could be attributed to their buybacks and bans. Mass shootings were too rare in Australia for their absence after the buyback program to be clear evidence of progress. And in both Australia and Britain, the gun restrictions had an ambiguous effect on other gun-related crimes or deaths.
When I looked at the other oft-praised policies, I found out that no gun owner walks into the store to buy an “assault weapon.” It’s an invented classification that includes any semi-automatic that has two or more features, such as a bayonet mount, a rocket-propelled grenade-launcher mount, a folding stock or a pistol grip. But guns are modular, and any hobbyist can easily add these features at home, just as if they were snapping together Legos.
As for silencers — they deserve that name only in movies, where they reduce gunfire to a soft puick puick. In real life, silencers limit hearing damage for shooters but don’t make gunfire dangerously quiet. An AR-15 with a silencer is about as loud as a jackhammer. Magazine limits were a little more promising, but a practiced shooter could still change magazines so fast as to make the limit meaningless.
As my co-workers and I kept looking at the data, it seemed less and less clear that one broad gun-control restriction could make a big difference. Two-thirds of gun deaths in the United States every year are suicides. Almost no proposed restriction would make it meaningfully harder for people with guns on hand to use them. I couldn't even answer my most desperate question: If I had a friend who had guns in his home and a history of suicide attempts, was there anything I could do that would help?
However, the next-largest set of gun deaths — 1 in 5 — were young men aged 15 to 34, killed in homicides. These men were most likely to die at the hands of other young men, often related to gang loyalties or other street violence. And the last notable group of similar deaths was the 1,700 women murdered per year, usually as the result of domestic violence. Far more people were killed in these ways than in mass-shooting incidents, but few of the popularly floated policies were tailored to serve them.
By the time we published our project, I didn’t believe in many of the interventions I’d heard politicians tout. I was still anti-gun, at least from the point of view of most gun owners, and I don’t want a gun in my home, as I think the risk outweighs the benefits. But I can’t endorse policies whose only selling point is that gun owners hate them. Policies that often seem as if they were drafted by people who have encountered guns only as a figure in a briefing book or an image on the news.
Instead, I found the most hope in more narrowly tailored interventions. Potential suicide victims, women menaced by their abusive partners and kids swept up in street vendettas are all in danger from guns, but they each require different protections.
Older men, who make up the largest share of gun suicides, need better access to people who could care for them and get them help. Women endangered by specific men need to be prioritized by police, who can enforce restraining orders prohibiting these men from buying and owning guns. Younger men at risk of violence need to be identified before they take a life or lose theirs and to be connected to mentors who can help them de-escalate conflicts.
Even the most data-driven practices, such as New Orleans’ plan to identify gang members for intervention based on previous arrests and weapons seizures, wind up more personal than most policies floated. The young men at risk can be identified by an algorithm, but they have to be disarmed one by one, personally — not en masse as though they were all interchangeable. A reduction in gun deaths is most likely to come from finding smaller chances for victories and expanding those solutions as much as possible. We save lives by focusing on a range of tactics to protect the different kinds of potential victims and reforming potential killers, not from sweeping bans focused on the guns themselves.
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From 538, this appears to come out of the same study as the previous post by a former 538 researcher. Again, strong case made without even mentioning the positive role of guns.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/mass-shootings-are-a-bad-way-to-understand-gun-violence/
Mass Shootings Are A Bad Way To Understand Gun Violence
It’s impossible to say when the first mass shooting in America took place. Plant your shovel in the internet and you’ll find one event described that way, and then another. Deeper and deeper. Back and back. The 13 residents of Camden, New Jersey, killed by a neighbor in 1949. The eight Winfield, Kansas, concertgoers murdered when a man fired into a crowded intersection in 1903. The 60 to 150 African-Americans shot and hanged by a mob of white men in Colfax, Louisiana, in 1873.
There is something distinctly American about this way of death. Mass shootings1 happen in other countries, but they are far more common here. Between 1966 and 2012, there were 90 such incidents in the U.S. The next four countries with the most mass shootings had 54 combined. There is also something distinctly American about how we respond to these events, the way they become tangled up in the national debate about guns — this question of how to reduce deaths attributable to a weapon protected in the founding documents of our land. No other country has that particular challenge. So mass shootings become a symbol of gun violence in general. The deaths of dozens become a window into the death of one, and a separate one, and a different one over there.
This, of course, has already happened with the mass shooting on Sunday in Las Vegas that left at least 58 people dead and hundreds more injured.
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And this is a problem. What we know about mass shootings suggests that they are different from the everyday deaths that happen at the end of a gun. The weapon is the same. So much else is different. And the distorted image we get by using one as a lens through which to view the other has consequences for our understanding of the problem and the policies that might address it.
Last year, we produced a series of stories on American gun deaths and the people behind the statistics. From that reporting, and other sources, we know mass shootings are different from other kinds of gun deaths in several ways.
First, they’re rare, and the people doing the shooting are different. The majority of gun deaths in America aren’t even homicides, let alone caused by mass shootings. Two-thirds of the more than 33,000 gun deaths that take place in the U.S. every year are suicides (click through the graphic below to see how gun deaths break down):
And while people who commit suicide and people who commit mass shootings both tend to be white and male, suicide victims tend to be older. The median age of a mass shooter, according to one report, is 34, with very few over 50. Suicide, however, plagues the elderly as much as it does the middle-aged.
Second, the people killed in mass shootings are different from the majority of homicides. Most gun murder victims are men between the ages of 15 and 34. Sixty-six percent are black. Women — of any race and any age — are far less likely to be murdered by a gun. Unless that gun is part of a mass shooting. There, 50 percent of the people who die are women. And at least 54 percent of mass shootings involve domestic or family violence — with the perpetrator shooting a current or former partner or a relative.
The historical trends for different kinds of gun deaths don’t all follow the same course. While data suggests that the number of mass shootings similar to the Las Vegas event has gone up, particularly since 2000,2 homicide rates have fallen significantly from their 1980 peak and continued on a generally downward trajectory for most of the 21st century. Meanwhile, suicides are way up, with the biggest increases among women. The trends are different because the situations are different and the people are different. Maybe different solutions are warranted, as well.
You could, theoretically, cut down on all these deaths with a blanket removal of guns from the U.S. entirely — something that is as politically unlikely as it is legally untenable. Barring that, though, policies aimed at reducing gun deaths will likely need to be targeted at the specific people who commit or are victimized by those incidents. And mass shootings just aren’t a good proxy for the diversity of gun violence. Policies that reduce the number of homicides among young black men — such as programs that build trust between community members, police and at-risk youth and offer people a way out of crime — probably won’t have the same effect on suicides among elderly white men. Background checks and laws aimed at preventing a young white man with a history of domestic violence from obtaining a gun and using it in a mass shooting might not prevent a similar shooting by an older white male with no criminal record.
If we focus on mass shootings as a means of understanding how to reduce the number of people killed by guns in this country, we’re likely to implement laws that don’t do what we want them to do — and miss opportunities to make changes that really work. Gun violence isn’t one problem, it’s many. And it probably won’t have a single solution, either.
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Not to minimize the deaths of 58 perhaps going on a hundred in a crowd of 22,000, but imagine for a moment that the gun control crowd succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, completely unrealistically, and eliminated every gun of every type in America forever. There are trucks and knives but also weapons available and under development that could kill all 22,000 and more, made from readily available sources. Same mass murderer possessed ammonia and fertilizer for example. Neutron bomb, Cuban sonic attack and so many other possibilities if mass destruction is your aim. Same crowd ironically favors open borders so no matter what is illegal here it will be brought in under their system of non-enforcement.
The killing will end when we identify killers before they kill, and each episode ends when someone shoots the shooter. In every mass murder we can say that was not soon enough.
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Courtesy of Daniel R. Martinez.
There are 30,000 gun related deaths per year by firearms, and this number is not disputed. The U.S. population is 324,059,091 as of June 22, 2016. Do the math: 0.000101851851852% of the population dies from gun related actions each year.
Statistically speaking, this is insignificant! What is never told, however, is a breakdown of those 30,000 deaths, to put them in perspective as compared to other causes of death:
• 65% of those deaths are by suicide, which would never be prevented by gun laws.
• 15% are by law enforcement in the line of duty and justified.
• 17% are through criminal activity, gang, and drug related or mentally ill persons – better known as gun violence.
• 3% are accidental discharge deaths.
So technically, "gun violence" is not 30,000 annually, but drops to 5,100. Still too many? Now let's look at how those deaths spanned across the nation.
• 480 homicides (9.4%) were in Chicago
• 344 homicides (6.7%) were in Baltimore
• 333 homicides (6.5%) were in Detroit
• 119 homicides (2.3%) were in Washington D.C. (a 54% increase over prior years)
So basically, 25% of all gun crime happens in just 4 cities. All 4 of those cities have strict gun laws, so it is not the lack of law that is the root cause.
This basically leaves 3,825 for the entire rest of the nation or about 75 deaths per state. That is an average because some States have much higher rates than others. For example, California had 1,169 and Alabama had 1.
Now, who has the strictest gun laws by far? California, of course, but understand, it is not guns causing this. It is a crime rate spawned by the number of criminal persons residing in those cities and states. So if all cities and states are not created equal, then there must be something other than the tool causing the gun deaths.
Are 5,100 deaths per year horrific? How about in comparison to other deaths?
All death is sad and especially so when it is in the commission of a crime but that is the nature of a crime. Robbery, death, rape, assault are all done by criminals. It is ludicrous to think that criminals will obey laws. That is why they are called criminals.
But what about other deaths each year?
• 40,000+ die from a drug overdose–THERE IS NO EXCUSE FOR THAT!
• 36,000 people die per year from the flu, far exceeding the criminal gun deaths.
• 34,000 people die per year in traffic fatalities(exceeding gun deaths even if you include suicide).
Now it gets good:
• 200,000+ people die each year (and growing) from preventable medical errors. You are safer walking in the worst areas of Chicago than you are when you are in a hospital!
• 710,000 people die per year from heart disease. It’s time to stop the double cheeseburgers! So what is the point? If the liberal loons and the anti-gun movement focused their attention on heart disease, even a 10% decrease in cardiac deaths would save twice the number of lives annually of all gun-related deaths (including suicide, law enforcement, etc.). A 10% reduction in medical errors would be 66% of the total number of gun deaths or 4 times the number of criminal homicides ................ Simple, easily preventable 10% reductions! So you have to ask yourself, in the grand scheme of things, why the focus on guns? It's pretty simple:
Taking away guns gives control to governments. The founders of this nation knew that regardless of the form of government, those in power may become corrupt and seek to rule as the British did by trying to disarm the populace of the colonies. It is not difficult to understand that a disarmed populace is a controlled populace.
Thus, the second amendment was proudly and boldly included in the U.S. Constitution. It must be preserved at all costs. So the next time someone tries to tell you that gun control is about saving lives, look at these facts and remember these words from Noah Webster: "Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed."
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/10/05/vegas-shooter-originally-wanted-attack-chicagos-lollapalooza/
Reminds me of the endless decades of theories about Lee Harvey Oswald having help. He could not have killed Kennedy alone. Grassy Knoll etc.....
I predict we will not find any one else .
I predict this will start a whole new cottage industry of books, a movie or so articles and theories.
AS for why the country crowd. Maybe just a Willie Sutton, because that is where the crowd was .
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http://freebeacon.com/issues/d-c-decides-not-to-appeal-decision-striking-down-restrictive-gun-carry-law-provision/
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I wrote my complaints from the media thread to Fox News Sunday and added this, something everyone here already knows:
If fewer guns is your safety point, look at what escalated gun sales in America more than anything else, the perception that guns will be taken away or not available to buy later.
Obama is the best gun salesman in America
http://money.cnn.com/2016/01/06/news/obama-gun-control-sales/index.html
Gun Sales Have Dropped Since Trump's Election
http://fortune.com/2017/08/04/trump-gun-sales-obama/
Once again and as always, liberalism involves first level thinking. Nothing would contain gun sales like running our government like the Founders intended, securing the country and enforcing all of our constitutional rights. Nothing scares people into arming, building fortresses and stocking ammunition like threatening to take our rights away, without a constitutional amendment and without due process.
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(http://ace.mu.nu/archives/liberals%20guide%20to%20the%20ak-47.jpg)
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/liberals%20guide%20to%20the%20ak-47.jpg
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http://monsterhunternation.com/2017/09/26/an-opinion-on-suppressors-and-the-hearing-protection-act/
An Opinion on Suppressors and the Hearing Protection Act
September 26, 2017 correia45
I have not written an article on gun control in a while, but since people have something new that they don’t actually understand to freak out about, it’s time once again to take off my Writer hat and put on my Gun Nut hat.
Today’s topic is suppressors, also known as silencers, which are basically car mufflers but for guns. Some folks are having a giant hyperbolic come apart because Congress is thinking about making suppressors easier for people to own. Note, they are already perfectly legal to own, but the process to get one is convoluted and stupid. This law would just get rid of the convoluted and stupid part.
For full disclosure, my gun related resume is listed at the beginning of this article. http://monsterhunternation.com/2015/06/23/an-opinion-on-gun-control-repost/ I own a whole bunch of suppressors, I’ve used dozens of different types of suppressors, and I owned a gun store that sold NFA items. Basically I’ve shot more rounds in a single burst than most of the people I’m arguing with have shot in their lives.
So when I see posts like the one copy and pasted below, I know how doctors must feel when some anti-vaxxer is “educating” them about how their healing crystals and essential oils will rebalance their chakras to prevent autism.
The following post is from author Elizabeth Moon, who is an extremely good science fiction writer, but who apparently knows jack shit about guns. Which is kind of sad, since she was a Marine. There is so much wrong with this post that later on I’m going to have to break it down and fisk it line by line, but here it is first in all its magnificence.
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So the House is once again trying to sneak through a bill that deregulates silencers on personal weapons. Yes, they really want us all dead…they really want to make it easier for their right wing goons to shoot us and not be heard doing so. Their excuse is that firearms are noisy and the noise can damage a shooter’s (or their hunting dogs’) hearing.
Uh huh. And can keep people from knowing there’s someone going around shooting people, so they’re easier to shoot, and nobody knows it’s happening. No witnesses, no investigations, no prosecutions. Enabling careless irresponsible hunters (the kind who shoot people “by accident” without being noticed. Enabling assassins and terrorists, who shoot people on purpose for political or personal ends.
Because seriously, people have been hunting with noisy rifles and shotguns a long time and seem to be able to get along quite well by sticking those earplugs or headgear on before they actually shoot. People in this country are not going hungry because they can’t kill enough deer or rabbits or quail or elk to survive. And game is spotted visually more often than heard (migratory waterfowl perhaps excepted.)
No, guys, this is not reasonable. This is stupid and serves only to enrich the firearms industry which is already rich enough to pay a huge amount lobbying you. They’re making a profit already. Let this alone.
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Wow… Okay. There is so much nonsense in there that it is going to take some time to refute it all. This is a perfect example of Brandolini’s Bullshit Asymmetry Principle, in that it takes an order of magnitude more effort to refute bullshit than to create it.
First off, it’s education time. How do suppressors work and why do we use them? When a cartridge is fired, the gun powder burns extremely rapidly, and this creates pressure which forces the bullet down the barrel. When those hot expanding gasses escape into the atmosphere, it is rather energetic and extremely loud.
If you’ve ever been around a really loud bang, you may have noticed that afterwards your ears ring. I’ve got some bad news for you, that ringing means you’ve permanently damaged your hearing. When that fades you will have lost some measure of hearing, and hearing damage is permanent and cumulative. The more of these loud bangs you are exposed to, the greater the damage. It will never get better. It will only continue to get worse.
I was a firearms instructor for about a decade and spent a lot of time running ranges and teaching people. I was religious about wearing my hearing protection, but if you spend enough time on the range you will be caught unaware eventually and somebody is going to touch something off right after you take your muffs off.
I have tinnitus. Basically, there is literally no sound of silence in my world. For me it is a constant ringing noise that’s about the same pitch as my lawn sprinklers. I also can’t pick up a lot of things in higher ranges, like for many years, my daughters’ voices. If you’ve ever spoken to me in the dealer’s room of a con, you’ll notice that I tend to lean over the table to get close to the speaker. That’s not because I’m being weird, it’s that I can’t understand you, especially in a room with background noise that aggravates the perpetual ringing.
I’m not alone. I’m sure audiologists love old gun nuts because they sell a lot of hearing aids that way.
Guns are loud, but are also incredibly useful. If you want to be proficient with a firearm, you must practice with it. So we put up with the loudness and put things in or over our ears in order to mitigate the damage as much as possible.
However, muffs slip. It is really easy to break the seal of an ear muff when you place your cheek on the stock of a rifle. Boom. Hearing damage. Or that little foam plug in your ear isn’t squished in quite right, or deforms and falls out? Boom. Hearing damage. I used to hate when I came home from a long day teaching a class, and I’d hear that ring that told me that at some point I’d screwed up. Because there’s no going back.
Suppressors were invented to mitigate that danger. You can call them silencers too, that’s fine, but Silencer was a brand name, not a particularly true description. It’s like Xerox or Kleenex. Many of us gun nuts just refer to them as cans, because that’s basically all they are.
I wasn’t joking when I said they work exactly like the muffler on your car. As those expanding gasses from the burning gun powder escape the muzzle, instead of flying outward to bombard those delicate little hairs in your ears, the gasses are trapped in a can screwed onto the end. That’s basically it.
Cans are usually filled with something that increases the interior surface area that gives the sound waves more things to bounce off of. In the olden days we used things like rubber gaskets, steel wool, grease, and all sorts of other stuff. Nowadays since good precision machine tools are common and cheap, most of them use metal baffles. The hardest part about building a can to last is dealing with the temperature. That energy which would normally escape as noise gets trapped as heat. Cans get hot fast.
So if you screw a suppressor onto the end of your gun, usually it isn’t going to make it silent. Not even close. The actual noise reduction is going to vary greatly depending on a whole bunch of different factors. The quality and construction of the can is secondary to the power level of the gun. The more powerful the boom, the more can required to contain it. It’s all about the amount of expanding gasses escaping that muzzle.
Also, most bullets are supersonic. Just like a fighter jet, when that bullet breaks the speed of sound it is going to make a sonic boom. Though since bullets are much smaller, it is more of a sonic crack. The baffles in a modern can never actually touch the bullet, so they do nothing about the bullet breaking the sound barrier.
I won’t get into decibel ratings (which are indecipherable gibberish to most folks anyway) but if you slap a suppressor onto a standard rifle, shooting standard ammunition, it is still pretty loud. It is still noticeable by anybody nearby. Everybody is still going to hear the sonic crack of the bullet. Only for the shooter is doesn’t feel like you’re getting hit in the ear canal with a hammer.
Regular pistols with regular ammo aren’t movie gun quiet. Not even close. In the movies the hit man shoots somebody with his 9mm and the people in the next room don’t hear it. Bullshit. A suppressed 115 grain standard 9mm sounds like taking a big ass dictionary and slamming it down as hard as you can flat on a hardwood floor. WHUMP. Bystanders are still going to hear, it’s just not as sharp.
There’s also the mechanical action of the gun working. On a semi-automatic firearm, the action is still going to cycle, and that also makes a pretty distinct noise. Bullet impacts are surprisingly loud, especially when they land close to you.
Can you get a gun movie quiet? Yes. It is possible, however it means using slow, subsonic ammunition that never breaks the sound barrier, a high quality can, on a manually operated firearm like a bolt action. The easiest way to do it is with a weak little .22, though there are bigger specialty subsonic calibers (not cheap, but fun), but There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. All of those are going to suck over any kind of distance because slow bullets drop fast, which means you can’t hit crap because you have a trajectory similar to a rainbow.
Basically, cans aren’t magic. All this stuff is just basic physics.
Suppressors are also perfectly legal at the federal level, and legal in most US states right now. The law regulating them dates back to the 1930s (the National Firearms Act) and it doesn’t make a lick of sense. The NFA is like the poster child for silly pointless government inefficiency.
Quick version, in order to purchase a suppressor you need to get it from a special kind of gun dealer (an SOT Title 3 or 7, which I was). Then you fill out some special federal paperwork and pay a special tax ($200) to the BATF. This paperwork (the Form 4) is actually pretty simple, the kind of thing that could be done over a website, or processed by a private company with a couple days turn around, but the BATF takes about a YEAR (not a typo) to cash the check, stamp the paper, and mail it back to you, so that you can take possession of your suppressor.
The last can I bought it took the ATF nine months to approve it, which is actually pretty good. I’ve had them come back in as fast as four months, and as long as eighteen. I’ve got two stamps that I’m waiting for right now. It’s not like they’re doing a rigorous background check that whole time or anything. That’s all done instantly with a computer database. It is literally just a year of waiting for a government employee to work through the stack, to stamp your paper and put it in their registry. (yet somehow people still thought the government was going to improve healthcare? Go figure)
Basically, these things are already legal, and lots of us already own them. I’ll get back to just how many of us later.
The thing that congress is talking about doing is moving suppressors from the NFA, to treating them like they were regular guns. The NFA is bloated, inefficient, slow, and basically a useless relic requiring 1934 level tech. We have a National Insta Check System already for firearms purchases, so there’s no reason they couldn’t just use it instead. Personally, I think they’re just glorified pipes, so even treating them like a firearm is kind of silly, but it’s an improvement over our current archaic system.
Now let’s break down Elizabeth Moon’s hyperbolic silliness, line by silly line.
So the House is once again trying to sneak through a bill that deregulates silencers on personal weapons. Yes, they really want us all dead…
That’s just stupid. If congress wanted us all dead it would be easier to just put the democrats from Flint in charge of our water supply.
they really want to make it easier for their right wing goons to shoot us and not be heard doing so.
That’s right. Congress wants roving bands of redneck ninja death squads, silent but deadly, offing delicate Bambi-like progressives who were just standing on the corner minding their own business.
It was that stupid line which caused me to write this blog post. I like Moon’s books, but that line took the gold in the thousand meter moron.
Their excuse is that firearms are noisy and the noise can damage a shooter’s (or their hunting dogs’) hearing.
Nope. That’s perfectly true. Already detailed above. A single gun shot will cause hearing damage, and all hearing damage is permanent and cumulative. I mentioned how suppressors are already legal here, but they are considered normal safety equipment in some European countries, and it is considered rude to shoot at a range without one.
That is my excuse. I’ve shot a lot, but I’ve never even joined a single right wing murder squad… I must be doing this wrong.
Plus, deaf dogs? That’s just sad. I didn’t even think of that. Poor things. HPA now! Won’t someone think of the puppies?
Uh huh.
Yeah huh.
And can keep people from knowing there’s someone going around shooting people, so they’re easier to shoot, and nobody knows it’s happening.
Sure, if you’re dealing with TV assassins using action movie physics. Those Redneck Ninja Death Squads are elite operators.
No witnesses, no investigations, no prosecutions.
“What do we have here, Sergeant?”
“Well, Detective, we’ve got a body with multiple gunshot wounds, there’s shell casings over there, we’ve got eye witnesses, security camera footage from the surrounding buildings, cell phone footage from the bystanders, and a bunch of other pieces of forensic evidence… But nobody actually HEARD the gunshots due to the whopping 28 decibels of reduction. So we’ve got no case.”
“Okay, cool. I’m just going to call it a day. Praise Trump.”
“Praise Trump.”
Enabling careless irresponsible hunters (the kind who shoot people “by accident” without being noticed.
Following that logic we should take the mufflers off of cars so that drunk drivers don’t get away.
Plus, I like how she puts by accident in quotes, because you know how it is out here in red state flyover country, with us constantly getting away with outlandish murders and nobody ever notices. All I have to do is tell my local sheriff, “aw shucks, I totally thought he was a cow” and we all have a good laugh.
Enabling assassins and terrorists, who shoot people on purpose for political or personal ends.
Yes. Because even though there are millions of suppressors already in circulation, and anybody with some basic mechanical knowledge can improvise one, a professional hit man never would have thought of using a suppressed weapon before now. Sure, we’ve got drug cartels who manufactured their own submarines, but that $200 tax is just too hefty. And I can just imagine all those terrorists who’ve been thwarted by the NFA. “Oh no! I have not done the proper tax paperwork on my silencer! Abort the mission!” They must be from those same terrorist groups who obey Gun Free Zone signs.
Because seriously, people have been hunting with noisy rifles and shotguns a long time and seem to be able to get along quite well by sticking those earplugs or headgear on before they actually shoot.
This is stupid because it makes a few shockingly ignorant assumptions. Hunters don’t walk around wearing plugs, because they are annoying, and make it hard to hear what’s going on around you. Even electronic amplification muffs start to suck pretty fast when you’re doing anything other than actively shooting (and your ears get hot). So most hunters don’t wear earpro while hunting. When they see a deer, they don’t suddenly stop and pull out their plugs. Like hang on a minute Bambi, I’ll be right with you. Hell no. They take the fucking shot.
And once again, boom. Permanent and cumulative hearing damage.
People in this country are not going hungry because they can’t kill enough deer or rabbits or quail or elk to survive.
What a derpy straw man. I’m deaf, not hungry.
And game is spotted visually more often than heard (migratory waterfowl perhaps excepted.)
Moon has obviously never been hunting. And if I’m wrong and she has, I’m guessing she was remarkably bad at it.
What a stupid thought. Like the ONLY possible thing a hunter would need his hearing for is spotting animals, and not all of that normal hearing stuff we use our ears for every single day, like hearing somebody calling for help, or somebody shouting a warning about that bear that’s about to eat you, or the most likely danger, that dumb ass mountain biker flying down a trail about to run into you. Or shit, Elizabeth, maybe I just want to listen to the birds sing or the wind whistle through the trees and that’s none of your fucking business.
No, guys, this is not reasonable.
Nope. It’s perfectly reasonable. I can’t help it if you are emotional and terribly ignorant about the topic. (Originally I was going to be polite, but when she got to the part about right wing death squads murdering with impunity, I said fuck it, let’s go)
This is stupid and serves only to enrich the firearms industry which is already rich enough to pay a huge amount lobbying you. They’re making a profit already.
I’ve talked about the myth of the ultra-powerful gun lobby on here before, but it’s crap. The gun industry lobby is comparatively tiny. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) is nothing compared to any of the big industry or union lobbying machines. The NRA is big, but its dues are paid by regular people. Regular people like not being deaf.
The part about enriching the firearms industry is exactly ass backwards. Last year suppressor sales were up big time. Then this year when congress started talking about the Hearing Protection Act, suppressor sales cratered. Why? Because all of their customers thought if that there might be a chance they could buy the same thing without paying an additional tax and waiting a year, why buy now? So they crossed their fingers and waited.
Customers want cans, but they hate the NFA so much, that if there is any chance they don’t have to get a government proctologic exam, they’ll hold off. So until the HPA passes/fails, it’s actually hurting the industry.
I know of a couple different suppressor manufacturers who have had to lay off workers since rumors about the HPA started up. Some of the layoffs have been huge. They need congress to either act or not, because right now the wait is killing their business.
Also, if it passes, if you remove the NFA requirements then it becomes a whole lot easier for more manufacturers to get into the suppressor business. Which would increase the existing manufacturers’ competition. Right it requires an SOT7 to make a can, which is another specialized hoop to jump through. So I don’t know what the hell she thinks they’re lobbying for, starving their business, until they can add more suppliers to compete against? Brilliant.
Let this alone.
Make us.
You’re talking about bullshit like right wing death squads murdering people with impunity right now, but your side keeps getting this stuff embarrassingly wrong. You were wrong about “assault weapons”. You guys ranted about Uzis in the streets, yet the ban went away and nothing changed. You were wrong about concealed carry. You predicted wild west shoot outs over every parking space, but now its super common in most states and we’re fine. You’ve been wrong about gun free zones. They’re shit and killers love them. You’ve been wrong about every fucking thing. But you guys keep on lecturing us, aggressively certain that this time your doom and gloom will come true.
But it won’t, because it’s stupid.
Let me break down why moving suppressors from the NFA won’t result in a sudden upswing of right wing death squads creeping through your windows at night in their confederate flag ninja pajamas and MAGA hats.
We already have lots and lots of silencers.
number_of_nfa_firearms_processed_by_fy
That’s not all guns. That’s just NFA items. Regular firearms transfers are way, way bigger. Here are the stats from the BATF. https://www.atf.gov/resource-center/data-statistics
NFA items include legal machine guns (yes, those exist too!), short barreled rifles, short barreled shotguns, and suppressors. I couldn’t tell you how many of that are of each kind, but based upon my own time selling this stuff, suppressors are a big honking chunk.
There were 2.5 million NFA transfers last year alone. A ton of those were for suppressors. We’ve been making these things forever, and good ones don’t really wear out. But no right wing death squads have been murdering with impunity. Go figure. These right wing death squads must be constrained by something other than a supply of suppressors, oh, like maybe THEY ARE FUCKING IMAGINARY.
I could write a post in favor of a border wall because it would keep out the Loch Ness Monster and it would be about as realistic as Moon’s post. Because fuck you, Nessie. I’ve got my eye on you.
But wait, there’s more. Let’s suppose that our country has fractured to the point that we now have roving Redneck Kill Teams picking off caring liberals (why? Maybe they’re mad liberals made it so their poor hunting dogs are all deaf). So we’ve got this massive break down of law and order to the point murder is unremarkable, who gives a shit about the NFA? What’s to keep Bubba from going to Home Depot and putting together a functional suppressor out of some pipe and tubing? Hell, we can make these things out of oil filters. It ain’t rocket science.
Meanwhile, back on planet Earth, all those millions of transfers weren’t conducted by elite TV hit men, they were purchased by regular guys like me who are trying to protect what hearing we have left.
Excuse me, your highness, but if it pleases the crown, I would like to have the ability to teach my children to use firearms safely, in such a manner that they don’t end up hearing perpetual lawn sprinkler noises for the rest of their lives.
People like me, who have a clue about this topic, think it is dumb that sticking a pipe on the end of a gun is a felony. People like Moon are worried that if people were free to put pipes on the end of their guns, it will somehow lead to roving death squads and a complete breakdown of law and order. But they said the same thing about CCW and the AWB, so I wouldn’t hold my breath.
Suppressors are great, but they’re basically just another tool, and they’ve got their pros and cons like any other tool. I would encourage anybody who isn’t familiar with them to find their local range that offers NFA rentals, and try one out. Trust me, it’ll be a whole lot more educational than watching hit men on TV.
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(https://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2017/10/Schinlders-List.jpeg)
https://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2017/10/Schinlders-List.jpeg
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http://nypost.com/2017/11/06/sharpshooting-plumber-fired-shot-that-took-down-texas-church-gunman/?utm_campaign=iosapp&utm_source=facebook_app
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http://www.4029tv.com/article/man-who-shot-texas-church-gunman-shares-his-story/13437943
https://pjmedia.com/video/hero-johnnie-langendorff-describes-going-95-mph-catch-sutherland-springs-shooter/
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(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/dn9nmntxcaa_l62-jpg-large.jpeg)
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These folks are in the US!
http://www.chron.com/news/us-world/border-mexico/article/New-report-shows-how-Mexican-cartels-are-12320888.php
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There was a serious state decision (Connecticut?) that we posted somewhere on the forum (this thread?) a couple of years ago on knife rights under the second amendment-- but I have no idea how to search for it.
Edited to add:
Found it!
http://jud.ct.gov/external/supapp/Cases/AROcr/CR315/315CR113.pdf
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(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2018/02/screen-shot-2018-02-16-at-9-28-48-am.png)
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-43071710
https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/06/13/vennochi/MyMQCrKJ4JpasZhgHNPGiO/story.html
http://www.sentinelsource.com/news/national_world/fbi-agent-indicted-charged-with-lying-about-shooting-during-encounter/article_7f0ed153-b4b1-5c0f-a4cc-85c1494b7783.html
https://www.dallasnews.com/news/crime/2017/05/26/victim-garland-terror-attack-tormented-belief-fbi-knew-isis-plot
The FBI can't do it's job. Quick! Everyone give up your guns!
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Please post those here as well: https://dogbrothers.com/phpBB2/index.php?topic=1135.0
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http://ace.mu.nu/archives/373889.php
Someone Close to Nikolas Cruz Called the FBI On January 5th To Warn Them About Cruz's Gun Ownership, His Threats to Kill People, and His Disturbing Social Media Posts, but the FBI Failed to Investigate
"If you see something, say something" is pointless if the authorities don't actually do something.
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http://ace.mu.nu/archives/373889.php
Someone Close to Nikolas Cruz Called the FBI On January 5th To Warn Them About Cruz's Gun Ownership, His Threats to Kill People, and His Disturbing Social Media Posts, but the FBI Failed to Investigate
"If you see something, say something" is pointless if the authorities don't actually do something.
In a world of divided media I wonder if we have finally gotten past the knee jerk reaction to mass shootings that we should therefore disarm innocent people.
-----------------
I had a hard time finding the link to this through all their leftism, but I agree with this 2015 VOX story:
https://www.vox.com/2015/8/28/9217935/mass-shooting-fame
Mass shooters want fame. Here's why we should stop giving it to them.
These school shootings are copycats of Columbine. It's hard to say how we should stop glamorizing them, but the point is valid. Publish the shooter's name once, then just refer to him as , shooter, killer, asshole, deranged individual, etc. The victims, not the perp, deserve our attention.
----------------
A question for death penalty opponents, this individual deserves his own life preserved, why?
As Danny Pearl's widow characterized his beheader to Jim Lehrer with understatement, "a nuisance for humanity".
https://www.pakistanpressfoundation.org/pearl%E2%80%99s-widow-has-no-problem-with-death-penalty-to-sheikh-omar/
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/02/16/sen-chuck-grassley-folds-open-gun-control-discussion-post-parkland-attack/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=daily&utm_content=links&utm_campaign=20180216
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/02/16/sen-chuck-grassley-folds-open-gun-control-discussion-post-parkland-attack/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=daily&utm_content=links&utm_campaign=20180216
I think the Dems should run on gun control for 2018 and 2020.
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http://www.nationalreview.com/article/456510/gun-control-republicans-consider-grvo?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202018-02-16&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives
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https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cdc-study-use-firearms-self-defense-important-crime-deterrent
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http://i.imgur.com/uPzKR.jpg
(http://i.imgur.com/uPzKR.jpg.)
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Well this is going to be an upfront and center issue for the DEms in this election.
Every Rep will be cornered and asked about this and it will be all over the airwaves
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Example of Category 3 from GM's post above
http://i3.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/175/667/7ad.jpg
Hat tip GM, naturally :-D
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I ran across this by accident, chasing down a different story, and then I heard the same data and arguments made on liberal radio. I'm more on the John Lott side, more guns, fewer crimes.
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/2/16/17016168/marco-rubio-florida-school-shooting
"The research backs this up: A 2016 review of 130 studies in 10 countries, published in Epidemiologic Reviews, found that new legal restrictions on owning and purchasing guns tended to be followed by a drop in gun violence — a strong indicator that restricting access to guns can save lives.
In Australia, for example, the gun homicide rate and gun suicide rate plummeted by 42 and 57 percent, respectively, in the seven years after the country enacted new firearm restrictions, which included a ban on certain weapons and a buyback program."
https://epirev.oxfordjournals.org/content/38/1/140.abstract
http://www.vox.com/2016/2/29/11120184/gun-control-study-international-evidence
http://www.vox.com/2015/8/27/9212725/australia-buyback
Someone here should summarize these arguments and refute them.
----------------------------------
Along the other line, more guns less crime, is this: Powerline writer Scott Johnson (who took down Dan Rather) notes the 'Fox Butterfield' angle (more incarcerated, lower crime conundrum):
CBS Minnesota affiliate WCCO introduces Pat Kessler’s story on gun ownership with this classic of the genre: “More people are carrying guns than ever before, but the crime rate remains relatively low.” Kessler himself reports: “Minnesota’s violent crime rate hit a 50-year low in 2016, according to the FBI. And in 2017, the state set a new record for firearms background checks.”
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/02/fox-butterfield-is-that-you.php
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2018/02/15/reality-check-gun-permit-background-checks/
-------------------------------
Last, John Hinderaker challenges opponents of the Founders to go ahead, repeal the Second Amendment - if you think you can, do it: http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2018/02/repeal-the-2nd-amendment-yes-please-try.php (Bret Stephens, NYT wrote of spmething in that direction.)
- Besides that you would need support from 38 states,
- "between 20 and 30 million Americans who would rather fight a civil war than let you into their houses."
- "there is no historical precedent in America for the mass confiscation of a commonly owned item — let alone one that was until recently constitutionally protected. "
- "odd that you think that we can’t deport 11 million people but we can search (and confiscate out of) 123 million homes!"
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Examples of the AR and similar long guns in action
http://articles.latimes.com/1992-05-02/news/mn-1281_1_police-car
https://www.facebook.com/likeiowagunowners/videos/1855684231122445/?hc_location=ufi
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https://steemit.com/anarchy/@thepholosopher/3-common-gun-control-myths-debunked
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Like I told you . The medical organizations now have taken this banner up as their cause of the day. They don't represent me. To my knowledge they have never checked with their members what their opinions are. We don't matter. These orgs are now run by all libs. I am only a member of the ACP and only for educational materials or I would likely can them too.
To claim this kid Cruz was NOT MENTALLY ILL is beyond the pale. The vast majority of mentally ill do not harm others or go out and murder people though picking those then will do it from those who may seem scary is not easy. A psychiatrist at St Elizabeths in DC once told me 40 yrs ago most patient "inmates" are not getting out because of the liability and the inability to often tell who is bluffing and who is the real dangerous deal. That said lets *not* blame the kid , but instead lets blame the FBI, lets blame the local police, lets blame the drug companies who make
the prozac ( or whatever he was on), lets blame the politicians who do nothing, lets blame the adults who were there and didn't do enough, lets blame the entire Republicans, the NRA, Hollywood for glorifying violence, lets blame the flu that took his (was it his adoptive) mother, but God forbid we blame the lunatic who did the shooting.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/doctors-blast-trumps-mental-illness-focus-fight-violence-171839946--politics.html
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJ2fMeer5Mw&feature=share
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http://thefederalist.com/2014/11/11/knives-kill-more-people-each-year-than-rifles-time-for-knife-control/#.WoqDrO2uIlI.facebook
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https://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/sorry-despite-gun-control-advocates-claims-u-s-isnt-the-worst-country-for-mass-shootings/
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second post http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3562714/Australians-guns-did-1996-Port-Arthur-massacre-revealed-country-imported-record-number-firearms-year.html
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https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/cnns-town-hall-on-guns-and-the-unmaking-of-marco-rubio?mbid=nl_Daily%20022218&CNDID=50142053&spMailingID=12987725&spUserID=MjAxODUyNTc2OTUwS0&spJobID=1342038135&spReportId=MTM0MjAzODEzNQS2
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/27396/we-have-do-something-okay-here-are-some-things-we-ben-shapiro?utm_source=shapironewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=022218-news&utm_campaign=position2
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fourth post
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/10/20/london-now-dangerous-new-york-crime-stats-suggest/
https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-police-struggling-to-recruit-firearms-officers-to-tackle-terror-attacks/
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/27491/every-single-government-authority-failed-parkland-ben-shapiro
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http://www.speroforum.com/a/SYGVDYPVIA55/82919-Survey-shows-what-majority-of-Americans-think-about-gun-control-and-federal-enforcement?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=KOAJVWUHNU37&utm_content=SYGVDYPVIA55&utm_source=news&utm_term=Survey+shows+what+majority+of+Americans+think+about+gun+control+and+federal+enforcement#.WpD7j3rcCqA
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http://dailycaller.com/2018/02/23/msnbc-handguns-are-too-slow-to-stop-a-school-shooter/
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People can spin this either way, but a majority of 54% believe that tighter gun control laws will either do no good or make things worse.
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http://dailycaller.com/2018/02/23/msnbc-handguns-are-too-slow-to-stop-a-school-shooter/
It’s almost cute when lefty soy boys try to talk about man stuff.
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What say we?
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/02/gun-control-republicans-consider-grvo/
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What say we?
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/02/gun-control-republicans-consider-grvo/
No. If someone is a threat to self or others, there are already legal mechanisms to address that. Just because the FBI and the coward county sheriff failed to do their job doesn’t mean they need new powers.
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" there are already legal mechanisms to address that. "
What are they?
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" there are already legal mechanisms to address that. "
What are they?
As an example from Colorado:
(1) Emergency procedure may be invoked under either one of the following two conditions:
(a)(I) When any person appears to have a mental illness and, as a result of such mental illness, appears to be an imminent danger to others or to himself or herself or appears to be gravely disabled, then a person specified in subparagraph (II) of this paragraph (a), each of whom is referred to in this section as the “intervening professional”, upon probable cause and with such assistance as may be required, may take the person into custody, or cause the person to be taken into custody, and placed in a facility designated or approved by the executive director for a seventy-two-hour treatment and evaluation.
(II) The following persons may effect a seventy-two-hour hold as provided in subparagraph (I) of this paragraph (a):
(A) A certified peace officer;
(B) A professional person;
(C) A registered professional nurse as defined in section 12-38-103(11), C.R.S ., who by reason of postgraduate education and additional nursing preparation has gained knowledge, judgment, and skill in psychiatric or mental health nursing;
(D) A licensed marriage and family therapist, licensed professional counselor, or addiction counselor licensed under part 5, 6, or 8 of article 43 of title 12, C.R.S., who by reason of postgraduate education and additional preparation has gained knowledge, judgment, and skill in psychiatric or clinical mental health therapy, forensic psychotherapy, or the evaluation of mental disorders; or
(E) A licensed clinical social worker licensed under the provisions of part 4 of article 43 of title 12, C.R.S.
(b) Upon an affidavit sworn to or affirmed before a judge that relates sufficient facts to establish that a person appears to have a mental illness and, as a result of the mental illness, appears to be an imminent danger to others or to himself or herself or appears to be gravely disabled, the court may order the person described in the affidavit to be taken into custody and placed in a facility designated or approved by the executive director for a seventy-two-hour treatment and evaluation. Whenever in this article a facility is to be designated or approved by the executive director, hospitals, if available, shall be approved or designated in each county before other facilities are approved or designated. Whenever in this article a facility is to be designated or approved by the executive director as a facility for a stated purpose and the facility to be designated or approved is a private facility, the consent of the private facility to the enforcement of standards set by the executive director shall be a prerequisite to the designation or approval.
(2)(a) When a person is taken into custody pursuant to subsection (1) of this section, such person shall not be detained in a jail, lockup, or other place used for the confinement of persons charged with or convicted of penal offenses; except that such place may be used if no other suitable place of confinement for treatment and evaluation is readily available. In such situation the person shall be detained separately from those persons charged with or convicted of penal offenses and shall be held for a period not to exceed twenty-four hours, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays, after which time he or she shall be transferred to a facility designated or approved by the executive director for a seventy-two-hour treatment and evaluation. If the person being detained is a juvenile, as defined in section 19-1-103(68), C.R.S ., the juvenile shall be placed in a setting that is nonsecure and physically segregated by sight and sound from the adult offenders. When a person is taken into custody and confined pursuant to this subsection (2), such person shall be examined at least every twelve hours by a certified peace officer, nurse, or physician or by an appropriate staff professional of the nearest designated or approved mental health treatment facility to determine if the person is receiving appropriate care consistent with his or her mental condition.
(b) A sheriff or police chief who violates the provisions of paragraph (a) of this subsection (2), related to detaining juveniles may be subject to a civil fine of no more than one thousand dollars. The decision to fine shall be based on prior violations of the provisions of paragraph (a) of this subsection (2) by the sheriff or police chief and the willingness of the sheriff or police chief to address the violations in order to comply with paragraph (a) of this subsection (2).
(3) Such facility shall require an application in writing, stating the circumstances under which the person's condition was called to the attention of the intervening professional and further stating sufficient facts, obtained from the personal observations of the intervening professional or obtained from others whom he or she reasonably believes to be reliable, to establish that the person has a mental illness and, as a result of the mental illness, is an imminent danger to others or to himself or herself or is gravely disabled. The application shall indicate when the person was taken into custody and who brought the person's condition to the attention of the intervening professional. A copy of the application shall be furnished to the person being evaluated, and the application shall be retained in accordance with the provisions of section 27-65-121(4) .
(4) If the seventy-two-hour treatment and evaluation facility admits the person, it may detain him or her for evaluation and treatment for a period not to exceed seventy-two hours, excluding Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays if evaluation and treatment services are not available on those days. For the purposes of this subsection (4), evaluation and treatment services are not deemed to be available merely because a professional person is on call during weekends or holidays. If, in the opinion of the professional person in charge of the evaluation, the person can be properly cared for without being detained, he or she shall be provided services on a voluntary basis.
(5) Each person admitted to a seventy-two-hour treatment and evaluation facility under the provisions of this article shall receive an evaluation as soon as possible after he or she is admitted and shall receive such treatment and care as his or her condition requires for the full period that he or she is held. The person shall be released before seventy-two hours have elapsed if, in the opinion of the professional person in charge of the evaluation, the person no longer requires evaluation or treatment. Persons who have been detained for seventy-two-hour evaluation and treatment shall be released, referred for further care and treatment on a voluntary basis, or certified for treatment pursuant to section 27-65-107 .
Danger to Self & Others/Grave Disability CRS 27-65-102 Information
New Title 27, Article 65
On May 16, 2013, Governor John Hickenlooper signed into law HB13-1296, creating the Civil Commitment Statute Review Task Force under C.R.S. §27-60-102.
Pursuant to C.R.S. §27-60-102 (3), the Civil Commitment Statute Review Task Force studied the definition of “danger to self or others” as set forth in section C.R.S. §27-65-102 (4.5) and, considering the civil liberties and public safety concerns of that definition, ratified the definition by a majority vote.
C.R.S. § 27-65-105, the section that governs mental health emergency procedure, continues to read “imminent danger to others or to himself or herself…”
“Danger to self or others” has been further defined to read:
“With respect to an individual, that the individual poses a substantial risk of physical harm to himself or herself as manifested by evidence of recent threats of or attempts at suicide or serious bodily harm to himself or herself; or”
“With respect to other persons, that the individual poses a substantial risk of physical harm to another person or persons, as manifested by evidence of recent homicidal or other violent behavior by the person in question, or by evidence that others are placed in reasonable fear of violet behavior and serious physical harm to them, as evidenced by a recent overt act, attempt, or threat to do serious physical harm by the person in question.”
Additionally, the Civil Commitment Statute Review Task Force informally considered the definition and application of the term “imminent” in C.R.S. § 27-65-105. The plain language meaning of “imminent” should be applied, and can be found here. In section 105, the term “imminent” applies to the proximity in time of the dangerousness. More specifically, the term “imminent” applies to a determination of whether the danger to others or himself or herself is current; it does not apply to how soon in time a specific dangerous act may be undertaken.
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https://www.city-journal.org/html/how-did-parkland-shooter-slip-through-cracks-15741.html
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https://www.justfactsdaily.com/how-often-do-citizens-use-guns-to-stop-violence/
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Dick’s Sporting Goods, Major Gun Retailer, Stops Selling Assault-Style Weapons
By JULIE CRESWELLFEB. 28, 2018
The gun department in a Dick’s Sporting Goods store in Paramus, N.J., in 2012. The retailer is taking a stance in the national debate on gun control by ending sales of all assault-style rifles in its stores. Credit Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg
One of the nation’s largest sports retailers, Dick’s Sporting Goods, said Wednesday morning it was immediately ending sales of all assault-style rifles in its stores.
The retailer also said that it would no longer sell high-capacity magazines and that it would not sell any gun to anyone under 21 years of age, regardless of local laws.
The announcement, made two weeks after the school shooting in Parkland, Fla., that killed 17 students and staff members, is one of the strongest stances taken by corporate America in the national gun debate. It also carries symbolic weight, coming from a prominent national gun seller.
Late last week, after coming under attack on social media for their ties to the National Rifle Association, a number of major companies, including Hertz car rental, MetLife insurance and Delta Air Lines, publicly ended those relationships, issuing brief, carefully phrased statements.
But Edward Stack, the 63-year-old chief executive of Dick’s whose father founded the store in 1948, is deliberately steering his company directly into the storm, making clear that the company’s new policy was a direct response to the Florida shooting.
Continue reading the main story
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Companies Cut Ties to the N.R.A., but Find There Is No Neutral Ground FEB. 23, 2018
Recent Comments
Mark 4 minutes ago
Since the AR15 is not an assault rifle, Dick's never sold them in the first place, but let's not bother ourselves with facts.
Ann G 5 minutes ago
Thank you for your setting an example of what a rational approach to the 2nd Amendment should be. The approach you are taking is what most...
Bill 5 minutes ago
H.R.2951 - To allow Members of Congress to carry a concealed handgun anywhere in the United States, with exceptions.Congress is taking care...
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“When we saw what happened in Parkland, we were so disturbed and upset,” Mr. Stack said in an interview Tuesday evening. “We love these kids and their rallying cry, ‘enough is enough.’ It got to us.”
He added, “We’re going to take a stand and step up and tell people our view and, hopefully, bring people along into the conversation.”
Mr. Stack said he hoped that conversation would include politicians. As part of its stance, Dick’s is calling on elected officials to enact what it called “common sense gun reform’’ by passing laws to raise the minimum age to purchase guns to 21, to ban assault-type weapons and so-called bump stocks, and to conduct broader universal background checks that include mental-health information and previous interactions with law enforcement.
This is not the first time Dick’s has made changes in response to a school massacre. In 2012, after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School that killed 26 people, Dick’s removed assault-style rifles from its main retail stores. But a few months later, the company began carrying the firearms at its outdoor and hunting retail chain, Field & Stream.
This time, Mr. Stack said, the changes will be permanent.
Mr. Stack said the retailer began scouring its purchase records shortly after the identity of the suspected Parkland shooter, Nikolas Cruz, became known. The company soon discovered it had legally sold a gun to Mr. Cruz in November, though it was not the gun or type of gun used in the school shooting.
Graphic
With AR-15s, Mass Shooters Attack With the Rifle Firepower Typically Used by Infantry Troops
When a gunman walked into a Florida school on Feb. 14, his rifle let him fire in much the same way that many American soldiers and Marines would fire M16 and M4 rifles in combat.
OPEN Graphic
“But it came to us that we could have been a part of this story,’’ he said. “We said, ‘We don’t want to be a part of this any longer,’” said Mr. Stack.
That decision raised rounds of discussions with top executives inside the company as well as the directors, all of whom backed the decision to take a stance, said Mr. Stack.
As of Wednesday morning, the company said all AR-15s and other semiautomatic rifles would be removed from its stores and websites.
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Mr. Stack said Dick’s remained a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment and will continue to sell a variety of sport and hunting firearms. Although he has never been a member of the N.R.A., Mr. Stack said he is, in fact, a gun owner and enjoys trapshooting clay targets.
But when it comes to selling guns to individuals under 21 years of age or stocking assault-style rifles, Mr. Stack said his company was done. “We don’t want to be a part of a mass shooting,” he said.
Dick’s informed its employees of the new policy in an internal note Wednesday morning, shortly after Mr. Stack appeared on “Good Morning America” to discuss the decision.
Dick’s is not the first retailer to stop selling the semiautomatic guns. In 2015, Walmart said that it would no longer sell high-powered rifles in its stores in the United States. But Walmart sidestepped any controversy involving gun politics, attributing its decision to lower customer demand for the military-style rifles.
It is unclear what financial impact the decision will have on Dick’s business. Neither Dick’s nor its competitor, Cabela’s, now owned by Bass Pro Shops, have broken out firearm sales in their financial reports. But last August, Dick’s shares plummeted after it said weak results from its hunting segment resulted in its missing Wall Street’s second-quarter earnings estimates.
Over all, firearm sales for retailers and gun manufacturers have slumped since Donald J. Trump was elected president, as fears of stricter gun regulation receded. Firearm sales data for the United States is not readily available, but background checks tumbled more than 8 percent last year, the largest fall since the F.B.I. began keeping track in 1998.
Mr. Stack said he and his company expected there would be mixed response — including fallout — to its new policy.
“The whole hunting business is an important part of our business, and we know there is going to be backlash on this,” said Mr. Stack. “But we’re willing to accept that.”
He added, “If the kids in Parkland are being brave enough to stand up and do this, we can be brave enough to stand up with them.”
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Is he right about the dates of the AW ban? For some reason I thought it ended in 1994 , , ,
https://www.dcstatesman.com/gop-rep-just-ended-every-argument-assault-weapons-ban-1-indisputable-fact/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=ptc&utm_campaign=n3218
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http://dailysignal.com/2018/03/01/rubio-backs-gun-violence-restraining-orders-measures-boost-school-safety/?utm_source=TDS_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MorningBell%22&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiWVRVM01UazNOMkV6TkRZNSIsInQiOiJxYVArSlYyWWdzR0dEUnNOelZrd2FwQStMVFo5am01NDR2TFBpY292QTZ6MXBBbGRreUtKbSthN09OSG10VU1vajV0NkUzXC9LVko2bWt3YTJUQVl1bTE4MjQ0MXhNbE9JMnU2bDU2blYycGtONitKY1B4dVFYQjdnSGpXQ0NLSlAifQ%3D%3D
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http://www.breitbart.com/video/2018/03/01/condoleeza-rice-guns-helped-father-protect-family-segregation/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=daily&utm_content=links&utm_campaign=20180301
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https://hotair.com/archives/2018/03/01/poll-82-dems-favor-banning-semiautomatic-weapons-evenly-split-banning-guns/
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Look at the critic score vs the audience score:
https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/death_wish_2018
question answered
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http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-stokes-assault-weapon-ban-20180301-story.html
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https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2013/02/17/the-nation-toughest-gun-control-law-made-massachusetts-less-safe/3845k7xHzkwTrBWy4KpkEM/story.html?event=event25
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/02/25/ex-calif-state-sen-leeland-yee-gun-control-champion-heading-to-prison-for-weapons-trafficking/?utm_term=.610e4bff5ca0
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second post
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/assault-weapons-not-protected-second-amendment-federal-appeals-court-rules-n724106
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Is WA an open carry state? What say we about this?
http://www.alloutdoor.com/2018/03/07/seattle-police-first-seize-handgun-mental-health-law/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=2018-03-13&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
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http://www.intellectualtakeout.org/blog/sword-hunt-why-ancient-ruler-confiscated-all-swords-japan
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http://www.intellectualtakeout.org/blog/sword-hunt-why-ancient-ruler-confiscated-all-swords-japan
The first gun control laws in the US (that I am aware of) were passed in the post-reconstruction south to keep freed slaves from owning guns.
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/28317/bombshell-obamas-doj-forced-deletion-500000-ryan-saavedra?utm_source=cnemail&utm_medium=email&utm_content=031618-news&utm_campaign=position2
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/28317/bombshell-obamas-doj-forced-deletion-500000-ryan-saavedra?utm_source=cnemail&utm_medium=email&utm_content=031618-news&utm_campaign=position2
Of course. I wonder why... :roll:
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https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/05/07/181998015/rate-of-u-s-gun-violence-has-fallen-since-1993-study-says
What is the data since then?
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https://www.themaven.net/bluelivesmatter/news/breaking-sro-engaged-in-gunfight-with-school-shooter-5LRMkF0iaEKNo3E63KKkIA?full=1
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https://americanmilitarynews.com/2018/03/two-nj-high-school-students-suspended-after-posting-pics-at-gun-range-after-school/
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/28721/former-supreme-court-justice-repeal-second-ben-shapiro?utm_source=shapironewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=032818-news&utm_campaign=position1
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/28721/former-supreme-court-justice-repeal-second-ben-shapiro?utm_source=shapironewsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=032818-news&utm_campaign=position1
Former Justice Stevens is right in terms of process. Those who think the second amendment is obsolete in terms of need and meaning should amend the constitution, not walk all over it. More astute liberals could tell Stevens the math of changing the constitution. They would need to win the 38th most liberal, 13th most conservative state in the union to prevail, South Dakota to ban guns, good luck with that!
http://news.gallup.com/poll/203204/wyoming-north-dakota-mississippi-conservative.aspx
And then go around to the gun owners across the fruited plainwith a big basket and ask for their weapons...
I like that Shapiro takes Stevens to task on Heller and other cases. The debate is healthy. Stevens, author of Kelo, never was a very precise reader or serious interpreter of the constitution.
https://www.economist.com/blogs/lexington/2010/04/kelo_john_paul_stevenss_worst_decision
But give him political credit for giving his seat up to a younger woman just before Republicans should have taken the Senate. Elena Kagan was confirmed 63-37 in August 2010, and here is Stevens still active in politics 8 years later.
I wonder what gun sales would do while repeal of the second amendment was working it's way through the states... Nice to see unintended consequences work against the Left for a change, instead of against the country.
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don't watch Hogg speak - watch the infowars comparison to Hitler speech. I was laughing out loud. He does absolutely remind me of Hitler in his appearance , angry demeanor and the fist in the air:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5551787/Parkland-shooting-survivor-David-Hogg-compared-Hitler.html
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don't watch Hogg speak - watch the infowars comparison to Hitler speech. I was laughing out loud. He does absolutely remind me of Hitler in his appearance , angry demeanor and the fist in the air:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5551787/Parkland-shooting-survivor-David-Hogg-compared-Hitler.html
Yup.
(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/dzzzzvfv4aai52f-jpg-large.jpeg)
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http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/03/29/corporate-warfare-nutrish-jumps-aboard-david-hoggs-advertiser-boycott-laura-ingraham/
"time to luv thy neighbor" he advises Laura and this coming from a young man who just finished telling anyone and everyone who disagrees with him, "f...you"
Too bad Ingraham apologized
The left is training the twirp to be a good soldier .
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for offensive language
for saying FU to half the country:
https://pjmedia.com/trending/microsoft-vows-crack-private-accounts-offensive-language/
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(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2018/03/dzikmjiu8aao_lf.jpg)
It didn't turn out well.
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quite an impressive entry for this man. NOtice his DOB is missing . He is likely 18 yrs old and no longer a "child". But that would remove the protective label "child"
he has more written about him and unbelievable number of footnotes more then many *truly important* historical figures
What racket. They forgot to cite that Soros et al likely published this Wikipedia entry:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Hogg_(activist)
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https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2018/03/31/florida-high-school-students-walk-out-guns-second-amendment/475486002/
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http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/380918-dems-turn-sights-to-gun-control-in-midterms?rnd=1522361502?userid=188403&utm_source=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=14497
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dems use gun control as fund raiser.
yes , the little band of Hogg pranksters will be used as fund raisers.
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posted here for its apparent implications for gun policies:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/london-stabbings-knife-crime-deaths-murders-three-days-teenagers-statistics-a8281756.html
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/as-britain-cracks-down-on-weapons-criminals-turn-to-acid-attacks/2017/08/25/5f36616f-908c-4354-961a-bb01e46de204_story.html?utm_term=.9d02a3523225
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https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/oklahoma-man-uses-ar-15-kill-three-teen-home-intruders-n739541
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https://www.dcstatesman.com/awkward-usa-today-discovers-students-really-are-not-down-with-gun-control-after-all/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=ptc&utm_campaign=n4218
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https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2018/03/29/the-nice-girl-who-saved-the-second-amendment/
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A surprising place to find constitutionally illiterate Americans is in the club of current and foreign Supreme Court members, one of whom, Stevens, suggests repealing the Second Amendment as a way of ending the right to keep and bear arms. But is that so?
In part, the second amendment says:
"...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,
shall not be infringed."
That right was already there? Is the right of self defense a natural right, including the right to keep and bear arms, the right to fight off an armed attack on your family or to fight back against an oppressive, unconstitutional government? Isn't that a pre-existing right, a right that existed before and without the Bill of Rights?
Hamilton argued against a Bill of Rights: ... bills of rights “are not only unnecessary in the proposed constitution, but would even be dangerous.” In his mind, if the government is prohibited from doing certain things but isn’t prohibited from doing everything it isn’t expressly told it can do, then the danger is in its implications. That is, the government can then do anything it’s not expressly forbidden to do.
http://www.libertyday.org/institute/2015/12/15/is-the-bill-of-rights-dangerous-alexander-hamilton-thought-so/
In this case, if we already had a natural right of self protection and the constitution did not grant the government the power to take that right away, saying that in an amendment is not necessary could be used to misconstrue people about the meaning of the constitution. "Government can then do anything it’s not expressly forbidden to do"? No. Government can do nothing it is not specifically granted constitutional authority to do. This is made clear in the 9th amendment: "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." To take away guns after repealing the Second, they would have to repeal this too, but this limit was already true before and without its passage and ratification, so repealing this too would still not empower the federal government to take away your pre-existing right. The country would also need to pass and ratify a new amendment specifically granting Congress the power to "infringe" on "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms", granting the power to deny any or all sales and to take away without warrant all owned weapons. And that STILL wouldn't give them the power to search for those weapons. They would further have to repeal the Fourth Amendment, the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects.
Let's put that on the ballot in South Dakota and see who turns out to vote.
Taking away rights from a free people is hard, usually requires a war.
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Doug's post makes a profoundly important point.
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A word about Bump Fire and Bump Fire stocks
I would like to share with you on the topic of bump fire and bump fire stocks because I am in the middle of writing a response to the ATF comment period for the proposed ban on "bump stocks" (ATF docket number ATF 2017R-22), and I have come to recognize there is a lot of disinformation out there, including in the text of the proposed rule change that would classify "bump fire devices" as machine guns. Not having seen a prior post that went through it in detail, it occurred to me some of you might be interested in what's at the heart of the current debate. My apologies if this rather lengthy post generates offense, but I do not maintain a separate blog to otherwise post this original synthesis. I provide a summary at the end in case the wall of text provided is intimidating. What grammatical errors may occur I confess are due to this being a first draft of a work to be further refined for submission to the ATF.
Key points/opinions to share:
- What is bump fire?
- What is a bump fire stock?
- Can a "bump Fire Stock" be deemed a "Machine Gun" under existing Law?
- Final Remarks
What is bump fire?
Bump fire is a shooting technique that is generally applicable to most semi-automatic firearms. In the standard shooting technique only the trigger finger is used to release the hammer, allow the bullet to be fired, and the action cycled by the firearm's gas system. The off-hand simply holds the firearm and keeps it on target. In the bump fire technique, the shooter uses their off hand to pull the firearm forward on to their trigger finger, keeping the trigger finger somewhat rigid in space. After the trigger is actuated the recoil of the weapon pushes the firearm back off the trigger finger, resetting the trigger. Forward pressure from the off-hand then quickly brings it back into contact with the rigid trigger finger leading generally to a high rate of fire. This can be accomplished with nearly any semi-automatic firearm.
By way of example, in some of the earliest instances shooters discovered that they could hook their finger through the trigger and their belt loop in order to keep it steady in front of the trigger, and used a combination of forward pressure from the off-hand and the recoil of the firearm to operate the trigger at high speed. Demonstration of this technique here: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-SnqKOXqbM until youtube censors it). Subsequently shooters discovered that the same firing technique was possible without any support from things like sticks, belt loops, etc. With a carefully held trigger hand the same effects can be reproduced here as shown on an AK-47, (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZ-FV_VRlXU), and here as shown on a semi-automatic pistol (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qL2oKEu_MFo). It should be obvious but I'll point out that this method of fire is not accurate and for a pistol rather dangerous. This shooting technique has long been considered at best novelty and little else but potentially dangerous and hard on the firearm.
What is a bump fire stock?
As awareness of the bump fire technique grew, some folks realized that if a standard multi-position stock were allowed to slide freely, and that slide were affixed to the pistol grip, and the pistol grip like wise was allowed to travel freely, bump fire could be performed while still retaining some measure of control via the stock in contact with the shooter's shoulder. An example of the sort of workmanship involved in the early attempts is here (https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qM1WVYMynmM/UTpEJsc0dmI/AAAAAAAAADc/k3W0M6irWDU/s1600/IMG_4787.JPG)
It is important here to be clear that there is no spring installed in the bump stock. Depending on which politician, activist, or media personality is speaking you may hear that the stock uses "energy from the recoil of a weapon to generate a reciprocating action" (this is part of how a bump stock is defined in a recent Massachusetts law). That is not what a bump stock does. No energy from the recoil is harnessed in a bump stock or used for reciprocation. It is only the forward offhand pressure willfully applied by the shooter that generates reciprocation, and this is done independent of the attachment of a bump stock or traditional stock. The sliding stock merely helps guide and control the rifle during the reciprocation that normally occurs during bump fire. An example of a device that DOES use the energy of recoil for reciprocation is the "Atkins Accelerator", which ATF previously has previously deemed a Machine Gun. More can be read about this here: (https://www.usconcealedcarry.com/mr-bill-akins-and-the-akins-accelerator/).
Another key point to understand is the question of whether or not a bump fire stock "increases the rate of fire achievable" by a semi-auto rifle (the 2nd criteria under the recent Massachusetts law which defines a bump stock in MA). To answer this one must answer "what is the maximum rate of fire of a semi-automatic rifle?" The rate of fire for a car is a function of how much gas is applied to the engine, air resistance, road incline, and the mechanical operation of the power train. Placing a brick on the gas pedal of a car does not "increase the rate of travel achievable" by the car, it merely operates the car toward its limit. Similarly, the rate of fire for a semi-automatic rifle is "as fast as the trigger can be pulled". Nothing about the addition of a sliding stock changes the mechanical speed at which the fire control group and bolt group can complete their cycle of fire. So in point of fact, the MA law that purports to ban "bump stocks", by it's own definition does not apply to the devices marketed as bump stocks since they neither harness recoil energy for reciprocation, nor increase the rate of fire achievable by a firearm. Not that this will matter for people in MA served with a letter saying turn it in or else (http://blog.goal.org/ma-demands-bump-stock-surrender/). The saying "justice is blind" can be taken in a dark way.
So what is going on inside a bump fire stock? Until youtube censors it, a good animation explaining the operation can be found here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SrLM8MKXVg). As before, it is simply the already achievable bump fire technique except it now has a manual guide to provide more stability and accuracy. This was brought to arguably its highest practicality in a construction called the "BumpSaw" which leverages a bump stock and a forward bi-pod to offer greater stability (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRXZx3M6bd0 and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYt6UYLD83k). This firearm is arguably intimidating and leads many to question "should the average Joe have access to such a thing?" More on this later, but remember, all semi-automatic firearms are capable of this rate of fire without modification. In the Las Vegas shooting, the shooter appears to have used bump stock equipped firearms, but could have achieved the same effects without such devices. For practical demonstration I refer you to a sort of Paul Bunyan vs. the Steam Saw challenge where renowned shooter Jerry Miculeck shoots essentially as fast and more accurately than a bump stock equipped rifle (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTb6hsSkV1w).
Can a "bump Fire Stock" be deemed a "Machine Gun" under existing Law?
The designers of bump stocks, not wanting to be imprisoned for manufacturing and selling "machine guns" wrote letters to the ATF with their designs to ask if they were acceptable to construct market, or if they were prohibited. The ATF reviewed the designs, and the letter of the law, and determined that attaching a bump fire stock to a semi-automatic firearm did NOT create a machine gun according to the law as written. Video interview of the ATF reviewer who developed the ruling is here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kryIJIrD5eQ). Contrary to outlandish claims by certain political figures and organizations, the Obama administration did not let something slip through here. The ATF merely followed correct and logical analysis of the design and the law as written and came up with the appropriate logical conclusion. Given Obama's recurrent statements against "weapons of war" and calls for "assault weapons bans", to suggest that the Obama administration improperly favored the approval of bump stocks is, in the classical definition of the term, purely fabulous.
Why was the bump stock not considered a machine gun? The national firearms act defines a machine gun as follows:
Any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger
In congressional testimony during the passage of the 1936 national firearms act (http://www.keepandbeararms.com/nra/nfa.htm), it was made clear that this definition is intended to separate semi-automatic firearms from machine guns based on semi-auto firearms firing a single bullet per single function of a trigger, and machine guns firing continuously on a single function of the trigger. In particular, the example of a traditional semi-auto pistol such as a 1911 being distinct from a machine gun is provided. Thus existing law defines machine guns only in terms of more than one shot being fired per single function of the trigger. It has nothing to do with the maximum rate of fire achievable by a gun, nor its furniture so long as it fires only one bullet per pull of the trigger. Some may dislike the wording of this law, but the correct remedy to unfavorable law is to amend or replace it, not skirt around it by administrative innovation.
Mr. FREDERICK. ... The definition which I suggest is this:
[“]A machine gun or submachine gun as used in this act means any firearm by whatever name known, loaded or unloaded, which shoots automatically more than one shot without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger.[”]
The distinguishing feature of a machine gun is that by a single pull of the trigger the gun continues to fire as long as there is any ammunition in the belt or in the magazine. Other guns require a separate pull of the trigger for every shot fired, and such guns are not properly designated as machine guns. A gun, however, which is capable of firing more than one shot by a single pull of the trigger, a single function of the trigger, is properly regarded, in my opinion, as a machine gun.
Mr. HILL. May I ask you a question there?
Mr. FREDERICK. Yes, sir.
Mr. HILL. Suppose your definition were adopted. Would it be practicable to manufacture a gun that would be classed either as an automatic or semiautomatically operated gun, even with more than one function of the trigger, and still answer the purpose, in a large way, of a machine gun which requires only one function of the trigger?
Mr. FREDERICK. I do not think so. For purposes of example, you may look at the automatic pistol which is the standard weapon of the United States Army. That has an automatic discharge of the empty cartridge and a reloading principle which is operated by the force of the gas from the exploded cartridge. But with a single pull of the trigger only one shot is fired. You must release the trigger and pull it again for the second shot to be fired. You can keep firing that as fast as you can pull your trigger. But that is not properly a machine gun and in point of effectiveness any gun so operated will be very much less effective than one which pours out a stream of bullets with a single pull and as a perfect stream.
The current rule in debate (https://www.regulations.gov/comment?D=ATF-2018-0002-0001) as I write this within the ATF, after being pressured by the president and AG to "deem bump stocks to be machine guns" is thus:
...the Department proposes to exercise its delegated authority to clarify its interpretations of the statutory terms “single function of the trigger,” “automatically,” and “machinegun.” Specifically, the Department proposes to amend 27 CFR 479.11 by defining the term “single function of the trigger” to mean “single pull of the trigger.” The Department further proposes to amend these regulations by defining the term “automatically” to mean “as the result of a self-acting or self-regulating mechanism that allows the firing of multiple rounds through a single pull of the trigger.” Finally, the Department proposes to clarify that the definition of a “machinegun” includes a device that allows semiautomatic firearms to shoot more than one shot with a single pull of the trigger by harnessing the recoil energy of the semiautomatic firearm to which it is affixed so that the trigger resets and continues firing without additional physical manipulation of the trigger by the shooter (commonly known as bump-stock-type devices).
As we have already covered. While a stock or similar device equipped with a spring such as an Atkins Accelerator materially harness the recoil energy of the semi-automatic firearm to which it is affixed, the devices commonly owned and soled as "bump stocks" do not harness recoil energy at all. If you fire a bump stock equipped rifle without an offhand providing forward pressure, only a single shot results. This rule does not apply, to semi-automatic firearms equipped with the devices sold as bump stocks, yet, it purports to ban the devices that materially do not conform to the definition, and enforcement actions would be expected to commence based on this ruling against devices to which the rule does not apply. This is certainly a very uncomfortable situation to have in a republic that intends to operate under the rule of law. It is inappropriate and unacceptable for the executive to simply define things not covered under prohibitions in congressional law (leaving aside the arguable unconstitutionality of firearms prohibitions), as covered under those prohibitions and then subject to DOJ action. The correct and only acceptable procedure for an administration that adheres to rule of law is to submit the issue back to congress for legislative update to the plain letter of the law, which does not appear to be the expected path forward here. Again we leave aside for a moment the appropriateness of general firearms prohibition given the text and intent of the 2nd amendment.
Final Remarks
If you've stuck with me this far I commend you on your stamina and curiosity. As a summary:
- Bump fire is a technique, not a piece of hardware.
- Bump fire stocks do not generate bump fire, but merely assist a shooter performing the bump fire technique in keeping the platform more stable.
- Current laws and proposed legislation mistakenly or falsely assert that bump fire stocks increase the rate of fire of a semi-automatic firearm, or harness the recoil of a firearm to generate a reciprocating action
- The original ATF ruling is correct that bump fire equipped rifles do not generate sustained fire on their own, and do not fall under the definition of a machine gun as described in the national firearms act
- Rather than submit the issue to congress for change in law, the Executive is pressuring the ATF to deem bump fire stocks as "machine guns" and conduct enforcement against bump fire stock owners despite these devices materially not being covered under the current law
It is to point out this last issue that I am writing and including the previous material to the ATF during the comment period on the new ruling. This ruling should not go forward as it is improper, and will lead to litigation and potential injustice and tragedy if it enforcement is attempted, which we could well do without as a nation. The purpose of this post is to help increase general knowledge of this issue and the material facts for persons who are interested in self defense in general, and interested in upholding the rule of law in the United States, which recognize as an interest to many posters here. I would encourage persons wishing to get involved on either side of the debate to search online for discussion about what makes a good comment to the ATF, and consider leaving calm, reasoned, and to-the-point comments with their comment system, which must be adjudicated before the rule goes into effect (so long as it isn't a form letter). ( https://www.regulations.gov/comment?D=ATF-2018-0002-0001 )
As to points I've left out of this discussion regarding the relevance or appropriateness of such devices in the hands of the American public, there is much to discuss about balancing the needs of public safety with the essential safeguards enshrined by the founders of this nation ensure the capacity of the people in general to resist violence rising from insurrection, usurpation, or invasion. I do not propose to address this balance in this already very long post, indeed, the discussion could exhaust pages. I'll suggest however that history has shown that use of NFA registered machine guns in violent crime is all but unheard of. Hundreds of thousands of such arms are lawfully owned today with no incident. Based on this it seems to me there is a balance between public safety and, as Tench Coxe says the "...swords and every terrible implement of the soldier" which he says are "the birthright of Americans" which does not require general prohibitions against any particular class of arms. The devil is in the details but, as I'm sure many of you have observed, our civic discourse no longer seeks to get to the bottom of issues, find ideal balances, and understand details. I might suggest that the malady at the root of this shortcoming in our civic reasoning is far more a cause of our current public safety concerns than any particular class of arms. With that, I return you to your regular discourse.
Very Respectfully,
-Cruces
Edited to fix title
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/29119/watch-black-gun-owner-slams-government-trying-take-ryan-saavedra
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/29119/watch-black-gun-owner-slams-government-trying-take-ryan-saavedra
Logic and emotion nicely combined. I have been calling on our side to communicate with more clarity. He's got it. A future Senator or President, I hope. That is quite an articulate, passionate and persuasive message delivered without teleprompter or referring to notes. Respectful and unapologetic.
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My favorite line:
"I don't think that even Rod Serling could come up with a better script"
This can be extrapolated to the entire LEFT:
Listening to CNN is like watching or having a bad nightmare like twilight zone episode that I cannot wake up from.
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Cruces:
Excellent post!
This forum prides itself on its efforts to have a superior level of effort in pursuit of the Truth.
I am sure I am not alone in encouraging you to post more.
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Cruces:
Excellent post!
This forum prides itself on its efforts to have a superior level of effort in pursuit of the Truth.
I am sure I am not alone in encouraging you to post more.
Very excellent post! I would point out as a retired LEO who keeps close watch on firearms training, that I am not aware of any credible trainer that that considers the bump stock as anything but a range toy that converts money into noise.
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(https://i1.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2018/04/JFK-in-2nd-Amend.jpeg?w=948)
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http://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/381957-federal-judge-upholds-massachusetts-assault-weapons-ban?amp (http://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/381957-federal-judge-upholds-massachusetts-assault-weapons-ban?amp)
U.S. District Judge William Young said in his ruling that the firearms and large magazines banned by the state in 1998 are “not within the scope of the personal right to ‘bear Arms’ under the Second Amendment.”
The features of a military-style rifle are "designed and intended to be particularly suitable for combat rather than sporting applications," Young wrote.
I'm sure most of you are well aware that the ratifiers of 2nd amendment were not preoccupied with preventing the new federal government from infringing on a right to keep and bear arms related to "sporting applications". Despite the well documented history of the 2nd amendment pertaining to protecting the preexisting rights to arms relevant to defense against invasion, usurpation, or insurrection, this "sporting purpose" clause has been used as a convenient cover for broadly ignoring and and circumventing the protections intended by the 2nd amendment. Not only does this innovation violate the original intent and history behind the 2nd amendment, but it also ignores established precedent regarding arms of military character. In 1939, in US vs. Miller the SCOTUS indicated that protected weapons were of "relation to the militia" and "part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense". Taken together these are akin to saying "you may carry a firearm so long as it is not concealed, or displayed openly" in that it creates a nullity where the right ceases to exist (for a time, Alabama firearms law left people in just this state).
While probably a majority of Democrats, Republicans, Judges, Business Leaders, and even regular folks would really like this "sporting purposes" to honestly be the intent of the 2nd amendment, to the extent they will carry on as if they myth were true, there is a serious risk in entertaining the delusion. As we read in the federalist papers, the purpose of the 2nd amendment is to primarily serve as a check on usurpation at the federal level, but also to ensure the people can defend against invasion and insurrection. To the extent that upholding this intent of the 2nd amendment is prevented, the people become increasingly vulnerable to these scourges (as we see in the gun free zones where mass shootings occur and people are unable to provide the defense they are responsible for). Worse, a goodly portion of the population (though decreasing under the steady pressure of generations of culture war in media, schools, etc.) still recognizes the original intent, and is not inclined to join in this delusion. And there in lays the greatest danger, because it puts us in an unfortunate condition well stated by Frederic Bastiat in "The Law":
No society can exist unless the laws are respected to a certain degree. The safest way to make laws respected is to make them respectable. When law and morality contradict each other, the citizen has the cruel alternative of either losing his moral sense or losing his respect for the law. These two evils are of equal consequence, and it would be difficult for a person to choose between them.
To the extent that rule of law is abandoned, the compliance of the populace with law declines, and such a state can only progress so far before the resulting increasingly destructive corruption of the society is irreversible. We are in effect in a race between wiping out history and understanding of liberty in the minds of each generation so that they do not know or mind whatever chains and concealed hazards are laid upon them (witness the cries of the Parkland media elect for increased subjugation), versus the increasing discontent, non-compliance, and eventual confrontation that occurs when laws are no longer in accord with justice and rights. Would a magic wand could be waived to reverse this condition instantly and remove the danger by restoring a culture of reasonableness and rule of law.
I'll admit this is why my wife raises an eye brow at me and says "Who are you arguing on the internet with now" all too often. It is because failure to to trying to encourage as many people as possible to see and follow the path of reasonableness and rule of law would be an admission that the cause of liberty is lost, and a surrender to a society of increasing chaos and destructiveness. Whittaker Chambers, when he defected from the US communist apparatus and worked for the FBI said he was probably joining "the losing side of history", but nevertheless did what he thought was right, and did not give up while had any strength to support what was right. And therein lays the animation of anyone who also fritters away hours trying to turn the Titanic of society by its bow in discussion and debate. The unwillingness to give up so long as there is any spark yet, and who can say that seeds planted today will not bear fruit at a point in the future, especially compared to an alternative where no seed is sown out of despair. Never let go of that spark, fan it with all your strength.
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https://www.funker530.com/graphic-machine-gun-crowd/
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https://www.funker530.com/graphic-machine-gun-crowd/
What a wonderful people! They should definitely have their own country.
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Looney London mayor
now confiscating knives !
:-P
what an ass:
well London you got what you voted for . Happy now? Hammers and screwdrivers are next:
https://www.dailywire.com/news/29179/londons-mayor-declares-intense-new-knife-control-emily-zanotti
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"Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of." —James Madison (1788)
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http://ew.com/books/2018/04/18/hogg-family-parkland-book/
I heard 100,000 copies advance orders:
4999 to Soros
4999 to Steyer
1 lawrence Odonell
1 Madcow
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I wonder if his 14 year old co-author knows that the title comes from the Holocaust aftermath where the government banned guns and then exterminated millions who could no longer fight back.
A more logical and empirical approach would be to ban gun-free zones.
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"I wonder if his 14 year old co-author knows that the title comes from the Holocaust aftermath where the government banned guns and then exterminated millions who could no longer fight back."
Good point. The title is obviously reminiscent of the Holocaust cry .
And yes the many who were carted off to camps Jews and non Jews could not really fight back except in limited cases like temporarily in the Warsaw ghetto
I like you response Doug.
Hogg is NO Elie Wiesel . :roll:
Nor is he courageous
narcissistic yes
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He is a teenager.
I am reminded of the riff I annoy my son with from time to time:
"Go out and make your fortune while you still know it all.."
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/29790/breaking-anti-gun-control-parkland-survivor-kyle-daily-wire?utm_medium=email&utm_content=042418-news&utm_campaign=position1
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/29790/breaking-anti-gun-control-parkland-survivor-kyle-daily-wire?utm_medium=email&utm_content=042418-news&utm_campaign=position1
So, the Coward County SO isn't so good at running towards gunfire, but they sure can fcuk with the law abiding...
:roll:
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michellawyers.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Complaint.pdf
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NRA and CRPA Attorneys File Federal Lawsuit Challenging California’s Ammunition Sale Restrictions
Today, April 26, NRA and CRPA attorneys filed an important lawsuit challenging California’s restrictions regarding the sale or transfer of ammunition. These restrictions, enacted in 2016 as part of the “Gunmageddon” bills and Proposition 63, require all ammunition sales and transfers to be conducted via face-to-face transactions at California licensed firearm dealers or licensed ammunition vendors. And beginning July 1, 2019, all ammunition purchasers will be required to pass a background check before taking delivery of any ammunition.
Leading the lawsuit is Kim Rhode, a six-time Olympic medal winner who uses specialized ammunition approved by the International Shooting Sport Federation during the competitions she participates in. Joining her are several other law-abiding California gun owners and the following out of state businesses who can no longer ship ammunition directly to their California customers:
• Able’s Sporting, Inc. (also known as “Able Ammo”)- Located in Huntsville, TX, Able Ammo specializes in discount hunting supplies, shooting supplies, hunting firearms, discount ammunition, and other firearm related accessories. Visit their website at https://www.ableammo.com/.
• Ammunition Depot- Located in Boca Raton, FL, Ammunition Depot was founded by freedom-loving Americans who know that 1) It is every American’s right and responsibility to defend themselves, their family, and country; and, 2) without ammunition, none of that is possible. Visit their website at https://www.ammunitiondepot.com/.
• Sam’s Shooters Emporium- Located in Lake Havasu City, AZ (just outside of California), Sam’s Shooters Emporium celebrated 20 years of business as the largest indoor shooting range in Arizona. The owners of Sam’s Shooters Emporium, Sam Scarmardo and his wife, are dedicated supporters of the Second Amendment and both NRA Life Members. Visit their website at http://www.samsguns.com/.
The lawsuit, titled Rhode v. Becerra, challenges California’s new ammunition sales restrictions as a violation of the Second Amendment and Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution.
The filing of Rhode marks the fourth lawsuit filed by NRA and CRPA attorneys challenging the provisions of Proposition 63 and the other “Gunmageddon” bills. Once such lawsuit, titled Duncan v. Becerra, has already succeeded in obtaining an important injunction against Proposition 63’s ban on the possession of magazines capable of holding more than ten rounds. The other two lawsuits, titled Rupp v. Becerra and Villanueva v. Becerra (both of which challenge California’s “assault weapon” restrictions and registration requirements), are also seeking injunctions while those lawsuits are pending.
Continue to check your inbox and the California Stand and Fight web page for updates on the Rhode case, as well as the other “Gunmageddon” lawsuits and important Second Amendment issues in California and throughout the nation.
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20180427/act-now-join-pro-gun-lawmakers-seeking-answers-and-accountability-from-anti-gun-banks
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20180427/act-now-join-pro-gun-lawmakers-seeking-answers-and-accountability-from-anti-gun-banks
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20180511/hard-times-for-dicks-as-second-amendment-supporters-respond-to-companys-anti-gun-bent
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20180511/the-nra-sues-new-york-governor-andrew-cuomo-new-york-state-department-of-financial-services-over-alleged-attack-on-first-amendment-rights
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20180511/fbi-acknowledges-life-saving-potential-of-armed-citizens
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https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/246
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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/2nd-amendment-protects-knives-long-theyre-not-made-cooking-180957718/
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https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/2nd-amendment-protects-knives-long-theyre-not-made-cooking-180957718/
Arms obviously includes edged weapons.
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http://www.constitution.org/mil/mil_act_1792.htm
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/31077/breaking-armed-citizen-kills-mass-shooter-oklahoma-ryan-saavedra?utm_source=cnemail&utm_medium=email&utm_content=052518-news&utm_campaign=position1
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http://concealednation.org/2018/05/father-carrying-child-is-attacked-by-4-thugs-pulls-gun-and-fires-multiple-rounds/?trk_msg=E5JPTSAQSLJKF7O81REEGRJKD4&trk_contact=MI8SP2KSH5US050JF0MHBHODLG&trk_sid=396BAAVE1DI4EPE6JSJUKNUAP4&utm_source=Listrak&utm_medium=Email&utm_term=Father+Carrying+Child+Is+Attacked+By+4+Thugs%2c+Pulls+Gun+And+Fires+Multiple+Rounds&utm_campaign=Concealed+Nation%3a+Top+Stories+Of+The+Week
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second post
http://www.speroforum.com/a/RUMTOCRYXN11/83393-United-Airlines-CEO-cuts-ties-with-NRA-and-gunowners-for-personal-reasons?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=FLNLZENFQQ22&utm_content=RUMTOCRYXN11&utm_source=news&utm_term=United+Airlines+CEO+cuts+ties+with+NRA+and+gunowners+for+personal+reasons#.Wwj0uXrcCmA
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second post
http://www.speroforum.com/a/RUMTOCRYXN11/83393-United-Airlines-CEO-cuts-ties-with-NRA-and-gunowners-for-personal-reasons?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=FLNLZENFQQ22&utm_content=RUMTOCRYXN11&utm_source=news&utm_term=United+Airlines+CEO+cuts+ties+with+NRA+and+gunowners+for+personal+reasons#.Wwj0uXrcCmA
They are just maintaining United's long established policy of alienating it's customer base.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/03/us/atf-gun-store-violations.html?nl=top-stories&nlid=49641193ries&ref=cta
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https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/03/us/atf-gun-store-violations.html?nl=top-stories&nlid=49641193ries&ref=cta
Well, then I am sure they'd support the dissolution of the ATF.
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https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2018/06/04/hogg-effect-may-was-a-record-breaking-month-for-gun-sales-n2487345
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https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2018/06/04/hogg-effect-may-was-a-record-breaking-month-for-gun-sales-n2487345
The Left is so sure they are smarter than us with their ivy league credentials and college degree demographics yet they fail every time to see the very first level of unintended consequences of every one of their policies.
If he knew 2 cents worth of honest, recent history he would know Obama sold more guns than anyone.
Generous homeless programs consistently increase the number of 'homeless'.
Extending unemployment programs consistently and measurably prolongs unemployment.
Regulate the hell out of investment banking and it keeps getting more profitable. for the biggest ones
Increase school funding and test scores go down.
Raise minimum wage and the people you are 'helping' lose their jobs.
Give the government total control over production and pollution is far worse.
Tax penalize the most expensive of yachts and yacht owners save money while shipbuilders lose their jobs.
Over-tax wealthy corporations and they leave.
Or the Ferguson-effect, stop policing troubled neighborhoods because of largely false or unfair racial accusations against police officers and the murder rate of black victims skyrockets.
When Hogg turns 18 (he already is?), can we start calling him out on his buffoonery?
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David Hogg
Activist
David Miles Hogg is an American student who survived the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting on February 14, 2018, and afterward became a gun control advocate and an activist against gun violence in the United States. Wikipedia
Born: April 12, 2000 (age 18 years), Los Angeles, CA
Nationality: American
Education: Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School
Parents: Kevin Hogg
Residence: Parkland, Florida, U.S
Books: #NeverAgain: A New Generation Draws the Line
Siblings: Lauren Hogg
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quote author=ccp
David Hogg
Activist
Born: April 12, 2000 (age 18 years)
-------------------
I don't want to criticize him or name call the little twerp but isn't it strange to think that someone with near zero information and experience would have all the answers that none of the people older than him, 19-99, have been able to figure out. He is going to persuade hundreds of millions without first understanding their view. Good luck.
Get rid of the guns? Great idea for criminals, terrorists, mentally unstable, but their main purpose of guns is self defense. To take away guns you take away rights and would have to tromp all over the constitution and or repeal the constitution and still fail to get guns from criminals.
Already mentioned, the 38th most liberal state needed to repeal the Second Amendment and all gun rights is South Dakota. I wonder what percent of voters in S.D received a gun from a parent for their 16th birthday. I'm guessing David Hogg has never been there or held a focus group there to learn views perhaps different than his. He can just call all of them accomplices in the latest mass shooting and woo their votes that way. (
If the right to bear arms could be repealed and it can't, an estimated 10-20% of the population who may or may not own 80-90% of the guns and ammunition would not give up their weapons or right of self and family defense without a fight. Visualize that, David Hogg. Are you going in with a nuclear weapon to enforce the new law? Have you studied Waco 1993, Ruby Ridge 1992? You were how old then? Have you read John Lott's books? Would you like to fact check or debate his points? Do you know how often a brandished gun PREVENTS a crime? Or do you just repeat liberal drivel of your elders and think it's all your own new idea?
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https://www.prageru.com/courses/political-science/gun-rights-are-womens-rights
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.
How Will They Confiscate Your Guns?
by John A. Sutter
in California
For decades I have heard gun owners claim that the government would never be able to confiscate our firearms because the government would lose too many men. The implication being, of course, that gun owners would actively resist confiscation, even to the point of shooting back. But I believe this thinking is outdated and doesn’t align very well with reality. But before you tell me how big your honor guard in Hell will be when that day comes, let’s think about how the government could really do it.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, the government bans all civilian possession of firearms at the end of this month. Congress passes a total ban and the President cuts his own re-election throat by signing it. Gun owners get some grace period to turn them in, even beyond the deadline, without being charged with a crime. If we use Australia and Britain as examples there will still be a significant number of firearms that are not turned in. Some estimates put the Australian turn-in at less than 25% and the British faired only about 28%. But Australians and the British have long been used to obeying almost every gun control law. Not so the Americans. When laws are passed that we don’t like, we bite. We scratch. Wevote. So here we sit after the guns have been collected and the amnesties have run out. Now what? Send out the personnel carriers, swat and shock troops to seize the guns from those militia “terrorists” who refused to turn them in? Don’t be silly.
The government has lots of records about you. If you purchased a firearm since 1968, chances are that they have some record of it somewhere. Most likely, it will take quite some time for them to compile all the serial numbers of “surrendered” guns (surrendered essentially at gunpoint) and cross off the ones you turned in. It’ll take more time for them to attempt to “clean up” their data. Say, about two years, maybe three. Add to that the hordes of people keypunching in hundreds of thousands of sales and registration records from hundreds of gun stores forced out of business. At some point the government decides they have something approaching a “good” database of unaccounted-for guns.
The next thing you’ll get from the government is an official looking notice that they think you still have a firearm. Their information will probably include all the information from registration forms, right down to the serial number. That notice will tell you that you’re in violation of the law, subject to prosecution and imprisonment. It will give you some period of time to surrender the gun. It will also give you a very limited number of days to return the form with an explanation of why you don’t have the gun, any proof you have, and your signature that the gun was lawfully disposed of. For many people the idea that the government “knows” they didn’t turn in that pistol or rifle and they have the detailed information about it will be enough to get them to surrender the gun. Some people will ignore the letter, others will scrawl a note that “I sold this in 1982 in a private sale”. After some time, the government will figure out how many guns are still out there and what the “compliance rate” is with the gun ban. More importantly, they’ll start sorting their database by the number of guns someone supposedly has “unaccounted”.
If you think they’ll come at these multiple-gun owners with a swat team, guess again. Their most likely tactic will be yet another letter (maybe two more) that generate what they’ll call “insufficient responses”. That means they can’t track a gun after you owned it. This they’ll use as fodder for a search warrant and/or perjury charges at a later date if they can. My guess is that the time between April and August will be a bad time for a lot of “former” gun owners. Remember that the BATF is an arm of the Treasury department and they control theIRS. You’ll probably get a notice in the mail that the IRS has some questions about your taxes or wants to audit you. When you make the appointment to visit the IRS they will pass that information to the BATF. While you are sweating over your deductions, the BATF and local police will execute a search warrant and search your home looking for guns. With you safely off site and distracted, essentially forced into “the royal presence” of the IRS they will snag your guns. Expect them to use slow-scan and ground penetrating radar to search walls, yards, under the patio or deck, the basement, etc. You might even find your hot tub has been drained and moved. Yes, they’ll search your car in the IRS parking lot too.
If you are one of the those people they suspect of having multiple guns and they don’t find any guns at your home, expect them to find and search storage facilities, safety deposit boxes and other places you might use. Warn your relatives who live nearby that they can expect a visit too, even (or perhaps especially) if they never owned a gun. If they are thorough, I’d expect the government agents to check your neighbors to see which of them previously owned a gun and perhaps search their homes, arguing that your neighbor could have held your guns while agents searched your home. Remember that at this point the government authorities don’t have much to fear from the general population. And by the time your complaints are run through the mill, rejected and turned into lawsuits, they’ll have changed the rules.
But you only have one gun you say? Fine. They won’t come looking for it. But they will make sure that possession of ammunition is also a serious crime. Don’t leave any loose cartridges around and where will you hide that case of ammo you rushed out to buy? Expect any “gun parts” to be made illegal at some point in time too. Spare magazines, maybe even old cleaning kits. Anything that says “gun” will be interpreted as “probable cause” to search your entire home. Also expect that you can never use that gun without becoming a serious felon in the eyes of the government. Even if some thug has repeatedly stabbed you with a large knife and threatened to rape your six year old daughter, they won’t forgive you for having the gun. They may even give you extra penalties for using it to save your family. Especially if you are one of the first few hundred people caught this way, they will use you to “set an example”. This will cause people to “bury” their guns away in hiding places, making them all but useless. If the government does come to confiscate it, you won’t be able to get to it fast enough and they will probably find it.
You’ve moved several times since you bought a gun? Remember showing your ID when you bought a gun? Remember writing down your place of birth? Why do you think the government has so many computers? Linking you to your new driver’s license in another state shouldn’t be too hard. Besides, the Treasury folks know where you work. Think you’re safe because you had unregistered guns? Think again. I would expect that the government’s database will contain a lot of old data. Some of it might indicate that a gun was sold to a resident at your address. If they can tie you to ammo sales or range use with your credit card in the previous 2 years you might get a surprise visit. Or that seller might have remembered you bought that gun from him and filled out his gun notice to get “off the hook” for that gun.
The point of this article is that by thinking in limited terms of a “raid” to confiscate guns we lose sight of the alternative methods the government can use. Put yourself in the government’s position and think of your own methods to avoid a conflict. Meanwhile, let’s ensure that every gun owner votes for gun rights this year and the next. You can think of a thousand excuses not to vote, not to help a campaign, not to help another gun owner register to vote. I can think of one important reason to do all of those.
Liberty!
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http://joshblackman.com/blog/2018/07/10/doj-second-amendment-foundation-reach-settlement-in-defense-distributed-lawsuit/
DOJ, SAF REACH SETTLEMENT IN DEFENSE DISTRIBUTED LAWSUIT
For Immediate Release Contact: Alan Gottlieb (425) 454-7012
BELLEVUE, WA – The Department of Justice and Second Amendment Foundation have reached a settlement in SAF’s lawsuit on behalf of Cody Wilson and Defense Distributed over free speech issues related to 3-D files and other information that may be used to manufacture lawful firearms.
SAF and Defense Distributed had filed suit against the State Department under the Obama administration, challenging a May 2013 attempt to control public speech as an export under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), a Cold War-era law intended to control exports of military articles.
Under terms of the settlement, the government has agreed to waive its prior restraint against the plaintiffs, allowing them to freely publish the 3-D files and other information at issue. The government has also agreed to pay a significant portion of the plaintiffs’ attorney’s fees, and to return $10,000 in State Department registration dues paid by Defense Distributed as a result of the prior restraint.
Significantly, the government expressly acknowledges that non-automatic firearms up to .50-caliber – including modern semi-auto sporting rifles such as the popular AR-15 and similar firearms – are not inherently military.
“Not only is this a First Amendment victory for free speech, it also is a devastating blow to the gun prohibition lobby,” noted SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “For years, anti-gunners have contended that modern semi-automatic sport-utility rifles are so-called ‘weapons of war,’ and with this settlement, the government has acknowledged they are nothing of the sort.
“Under this settlement,” he continued, “the government will draft and pursue regulatory amendments that eliminate ITAR control over the technical information at the center of this case. They will transfer export jurisdiction to the Commerce Department, which does not impose prior restraint on public speech. That will allow Defense Distributed and SAF to publish information about 3-D technology.”
The Second Amendment Foundation (www.saf.org) is the nation’s oldest and largest tax-exempt education, research, publishing and legal action group focusing on the Constitutional right and heritage to privately own and possess firearms. Founded in 1974, The Foundation has grown to more than 600,000 members and supporters and conducts many programs designed to better inform the public about the consequences of gun control.
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Thanks for that GM. I will be forwarding it to an attorney friend interested in these things.
====================
And now a bit of a change of pace for this thread, Llloyd de Jongh endorsing my knife:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzv7g2cSwNE&feature=youtu.be
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/32872/doj-settles-landmark-gun-suit-safeguarding-second-amanda-prestigiacomo?utm_medium=email&utm_content=071118-news&utm_campaign=position2
The big takeaway here is that the federal government, in the language of the settlement, stated that semi-automatic firearms below .50 cal are not inherently military in nature.
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https://bearingarms.com/tom-k/2018/07/10/seattle-passes-firearm-storage-requirement-law/
The Seattle City Council unanimously approved two gun control regulations Monday, originally proposed by Mayor Jenny Durkan, that require safe storage of firearms. Seattle residents now face penalties if they do not safely store their firearms or report lost and stolen guns.
“For me it’s very simple,” said Council President Bruce Harrell. “We are just trying to save one life at a time. Whether this law or any law drastically changes the needle, that concerns me less. We are trying to save one life at a time.”
Of course, neither of these laws will save anyone’s life. While mandatory storage laws might make it more difficult for non-approved people to get their hands on a firearm, that’s countered by the difficulty people will have in accessing the gun when needed.
Mandatory reporting laws do nothing to prevent violence, nothing at all. At best, they’ll simply let police know another gun is on the street. That’s it.
To make matters worse, it appears that the law will basically make gun owners guilty until proven innocent.
Seattle’s safe storage regulation, and the rules on reporting lost and stolen guns, state:
Safe storage: Guns should be stored in a locked container, and rendered as unusable to any person other than the owner or authorized user.
Unauthorized access prevention: It will be a civil infraction if a minor, at-risk, or prohibited person obtains a firearm when the owner should have reasonably known they would have access to it.
Violation of the safe-storage law, or the unauthorized access regulation could result in a fine between $500 and $1,000.
If a prohibited or at-risk person, or a minor obtains a firearm and uses it to commit a crime, injure or kill someone (including themselves), the gun owner could be fined up to $10,000.
If a civil case results from prohibited access, it will be “prima facie evidence” that they are negligent. That means it is immediately a fact, unless proven otherwise.
The new gun law will go into effect 180 days after it passes and Mayor Durkan signs it.
Now, that little tidbit of prohibited access to a gun will be taken as prima facie evidence of negligence may ultimately end up being a poison pill for the whole thing. While it’s a civil case, it’s still requiring people to prove their own innocence rather than the other way around. As a general rule, that’s not how the American court system is supposed to work.
Then again, it’s not like Seattle gives a flying flip about anyone’s constitutional rights or anything else.
8-21-2015
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http://www.speroforum.com/a/KTFPPCICBF11/83756-Trump-joins-NRA-to-oppose-3D-firearms-fed-judge-blocks-sharing-blueprints?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=KQWSGJCZOB41&utm_content=KTFPPCICBF11&utm_source=news&utm_term=Trump+joins+NRA+to+oppose+3D+firearms+fed+judge+blocks+sharing+blueprints#.W2E4cnrcB2A
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/07/3d-printed-guns-truth-from-fiction/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202018-07-31&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives
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NRA ILA
APPEARS IN Legal & Legislation News
Divided Appeals Panel Upholds California Ban on Post-2013 Pistols
Friday, August 10, 2018 Divided Appeals Panel Upholds California Ban on Post-2013 Pistols
Support NRA-ILA
Imagine if California, to combat what the legislature considered the serious problem of manmade global warming, required all new vehicles sold by car dealers in the state to run on grass clippings, rather than fossil fuels.
Would it be fair to say that California was legitimately addressing serious environmental problems and promoting innovation?
Or would the more obvious conclusion be that California simply wanted to ban the sale of new cars?
If you agree with second option, you’d likely be in the minority of a recent Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel that found another non-existent technology – in that case, a microstamping requirement that applies to newly-introduced semiautomatic pistols – to be consistent with the Second Amendment.
In other words, two out of three judges ruled design requirements that no manufacturer can satisfy nor that are useful enough to be in development by any manufacturer can still be a prerequisite for the lawful commercial sale of constitutionally-protected handguns in the state.
The third judge, Jay S. Bybee – a George W. Bush appointee – dissented from the majority’s ruling on the microstamping issue. “[W]e must,” he wrote, “take Plaintiffs Second Amendment claims seriously.”
The case is Pena v. Lindley.
The dispute stems from California’s so-called “Unsafe Handgun Act” (UHA). The UHA purports to promote public safety by weeding out “unsafe” handguns from commercial sale by a series of design requirements for semiautomatic pistols that must be met by the manufacturer. These include a “chamber load indicator,” a “magazine detachment mechanism” (to prevent firing of the pistol with the magazine removed), and a requirement that the pistol legibly imprint an array of information (including the firearm’s make, model, and serial number) on two locations on each fired cartridge case. The microstamping requirement took effect in 2013, when then-attorney general Kamala Harris determined “that the technology used to create the imprint is available to more than one manufacturer unencumbered by any patent restrictions."
To offer new models of pistols for sale in the state, manufacturers must submit three samples to a state-certified laboratory for testing, as well as pay for the testing and other administrative costs. All three pistols must meet standards established in regulations by the California Department of Justice (CDOJ) in multiple repetitions of required tests. Significantly, CDOJ’s dual microstamping standards were not designed around proven, existing technology. Rather, they were purposely designed to force manufacturers to develop and adopt technology that was not yet available in the commercial sphere.
To date, however, no manufacturer has done so, and as far as industry representatives involved in the case were aware, no manufacturer has no plans or intentions to try. This is manifestly because of an industry-wide belief that any microstamping that could satisfy CDOJ’s standards is technically infeasible and even if developed would be ineffective, easily defeated, and economically impractical.
The upshot is that the only firearms that may be commercially sold in the state are designs that existed before the date in 2013 on which the microstamping mandate took effect. Such models are “grandfathered” under the law, provided the manufacturer continues to satisfy the bureaucracy and fees necessary to keep them on the California’s roster of “not unsafe” handguns. Any changes to the design – including non-mandatory safety features that weren’t incorporated in 2013 – requires the model to be retested and to meet the current standards, including those pertaining to microstamping.
The irony is that California’s law effectively deprives state residents of market-driven changes in design available to residents of other states that improve the safety and utility of modern pistols. And as the dissenting judge noted, the all-or-nothing nature of the requirements means that few pistols sold in California even have chamber load indicators and magazine detachment mechanisms – which are now technically feasible – because few designs in 2013 incorporated them. Thus, a law that is supposedly intended to force innovation in pistol “safety” actually confines state residents to increasingly dated technology.
Indeed, the law virtually ensures that there will come a time when the only semiautomatic pistols lawfully available for sale in California will be used models that are many years old.
None of that, however, bothered the two judges in the panel’s majority, who breezily concluded that even if the law burdened conduct protected by the Second Amendment, the state’s “public safety” interest and legislative “fact-finding” satisfied the low bar of “intermediate scrutiny.”
Yet even by the standards of politically-motivated judicial activism, the majority did not – as the dissent indicated – “take Plaintiffs’ Second Amendment claims seriously.” Indeed, the majority opinion written by Clinton-appointed Judge Mary Margaret McKeown is riddled with errors that have nothing to do with legal opinion or judicial philosophy but that simply misstate or misrepresent plain facts. The following are just a few examples.
First, the opinion stated that the Second Amendment question must be “framed by a two-step inquiry established in [District of Columbia v.] Heller,” i.e., the determination of “whether the Act burdens conduct protected by the Second Amendment,” and if it does, the application of an “appropriate level of scrutiny” (internal quotation marks omitted).
The Supreme Court’s opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller, however, established no such two-part test. The court there found that the text, history, and tradition of the Second Amendment would not countenance a handgun ban. In doing so, it expressly declined to apply a level of scrutiny analysis, rejecting the dissent’s call for an “interest-balancing” inquiry.
In fact, Judge Brett Kavanaugh – President Trump’s current nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court – opined when dissenting from the application of the “two-step” method in another case that Heller actually forbids such a test. “Heller and McDonald rejected the use of balancing tests – including, therefore, strict or intermediate scrutiny – in fleshing out the scope of the Second Amendment right,” he wrote.
Whether or not Judge Kavanaugh is correct about what Heller’s mode of analysis permitted in subsequent cases, and even if the majority were following the method established in other Ninth Circuit cases, Judge McKeown’s claim the Supreme Court “established” a two-step inquiry for resolving Second Amendment cases in Heller is plainly false.
Also false is her suggestion that Heller would allow for modern handguns popularly chosen for self-defense to be banned in a certain jurisdiction because the jurisdiction has chosen other types of firearms to remain available. Among the arguments the District made in Heller to salvage its handgun ban was that the right to armed self-defense was satisfied because rifles and pistols were still (at least theoretically) available.
This reasoning was squarely rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court, however. “It is no answer to say, as petitioners do, that it is permissible to ban the possession of handguns so long as the possession of other firearms (i.e., long guns) is allowed,” Justice Scalia wrote for the majority. “It is enough to note, as we have observed, that the American people have considered the handgun to be the quintessential self-defense weapon.”
Justices Thomas and Scalia later made the same point when dissenting from the Supreme Court’s refusal to review a lower court decision upholding a broad ban on semiautomatic firearms. “The question under Heller is not whether citizens have adequate alternatives available for self-defense, Thomas noted. “Rather, Heller asks whether the law bans types of firearms commonly used for a lawful purpose—regardless of whether alternatives exist.”
Thus, even if the majority in Pena v. Lindley could rely on prior lower court precedent to make the “adequate alternatives” argument, a court that wanted to be consistent with the controlling precedent of the nation’s highest court would not.
Perhaps most embarrassingly, Judge McKeown seemed unaware of the difference between bullets and cartridges cases when analyzing the strength of the state’s interest in enforcing its microstamping requirement. Judge McKeown cited a prior case from another circuit that held the ability to conduct serial number tracing on firearms constituted an important state interest. “The same logic applies to recovered bullets, and counsels the conclusion that limiting the availability of untraceable bullets serves a substantial government interest,” she wrote.
Yet the law does not require fired bullets to be microstamped. Rather, it requires fired cartridge cases to be microstamped. While a criminal investigator might be able to tell which firearm ejected a particular cartridge case, that would not necessarily determine whether a bullet, even of the same caliber recovered at the same scene, came from the same gun. Indeed, cunning criminals could switch firing pins between guns of the same make and model or drop previously fired cartridge cases at a crime scene specifically to confuse criminal investigators.
Thus, Judge McKeown apparently didn’t understand to which component of a round of ammunition the microstamping requirement applies or she didn’t understand the difference between a fired bullet and a spent cartridge case. These differences, however, are crucial in understanding why people who are knowledgeable about firearms are so skeptical about microstamping’s utility. Microstamping could produce a lead in a case. Or it could just as easily be used to plant an intentional red herring.
The dissent also takes issue with the information the legislature used and the majority relied upon to determine that microstamping, as eventually required by the law, would be feasible. In particular, the state relied on tests conducted by the inventor of microstamping that used different protocols than the testing standards later implemented by CDOJ. For example, the inventor’s testing used far more powerful microscopes than can be used in the CDOJ protocols to examine the imprints on spent casings and did not specify whether dual markings or only one set of markings consistently remained legible. This, plus testimony from industry experts that they could not feasibly meet the CDOJ standards, meant that the case was inappropriate for summary dismissal as a purely legal dispute. “I do not see how the majority gets to decide at summary judgment what ‘the reality is’ when there is conflicting evidence in the record,” Judge Bybee wrote. He also implied that it strained credibility that major manufacturers would give up the opportunity to sell “their new generations of handguns in a major market like California” if they had any choice.
Regarding the state’s certification in 2013 about the “availability” of the technology, Judge Bybee noted this "this certification confirms the lack of any patent restrictions on the imprinting technology, not the availability of the technology itself."
“If the requirement is impossible to comply with,” the dissent concluded, “it imposes a burden without advancing any state interest.”
Finally, Judge Bybee rejected the majority’s suggestion that the microstamping requirement is “presumptively lawful” because it is a “condition and qualification on commercial sales” of firearms, a category of laws that Heller suggested was compatible with the Second Amendment. “Whatever the contours of the commercial sales category, Heller cannot mean that the State can ban the sales of arms—whether it does so directly or indirectly by imposing conditions on features that commercially sold firearms must possess,” he stated.
Reduced to their essence, the facts of the case strongly suggest that the state’s real goal is simply banning modern pistols, which of course is an outcome that any fair reading of the U.S. Supreme Court’s prior Second Amendment cases would prohibit.
Needless to say, that precedent is not getting a fair reading in most decisions of lower courts, with Pena v. Lindley being just the latest and among the more egregious examples.
President Trump’s nomination of Judge Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court could mean that help is on the way. In the meantime, however, lower courts are continuing to thumb their noses at the Second Amendment and the Heller majority, even to the extent of sanctioning broad bans on firearms that law-abiding people overwhelmingly choose for self-defense.
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https://www.dailysignal.com/2016/08/09/these-gun-owners-are-least-likely-criminals-report-finds/
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I say to Hollywood celebrities who call for the end to the second amendment that they give back every cent . That is every cent they profited from entertainment that has guns in it.
That goes for Alyssa Milano , Morgan Freeman and the thousands of others.
every cent . donate it to the national debt.
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I say to Hollywood celebrities who call for the end to the second amendment that they give back every cent . That is every cent they profited from entertainment that has guns in it.
That goes for Alyssa Milano , Morgan Freeman and the thousands of others.
every cent . donate it to the national debt.
They aren't anti-gun, they are against the unwashed masses owning guns.
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https://nypost.com/2018/08/30/america-doesnt-actually-lead-the-world-in-mass-shootings/
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https://nypost.com/2018/08/30/america-doesnt-actually-lead-the-world-in-mass-shootings/
I was told the science is settled.
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Doug's post of the Lott article is a very important one!
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second post
https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-school-shootings-that-werent?utm_campaign=storyshare&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/09/krissy-noble-self-defense-miscarriage-justice/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=WIR%20-%20Sunday%202018-09-09&utm_term=VDHM
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second post
https://www.alloutdoor.com/2018/08/13/parkland-bombshells-top-cop-staff-shouldve-armed-shooter-used-5-round-magazines/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=2018-09-08&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
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second post
https://www.alloutdoor.com/2018/08/13/parkland-bombshells-top-cop-staff-shouldve-armed-shooter-used-5-round-magazines/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_content=2018-09-08&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
Well, he could have had a single shot weapon if no one will fight and law enforcement waits outside.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/09/police-shootings-david-french-changed-writing/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202018-09-12&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives
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https://chicago.suntimes.com/news/cicero-police-officer-shot-during-investigation-on-southwest-side
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hhttps://www.ktnv.com/news/national/a-ban-on-bump-stocks-is-coming-president-trump-says (http://hhttps://www.ktnv.com/news/national/a-ban-on-bump-stocks-is-coming-president-trump-says)
Trump brought a ban on bump stocks to the news again 1 year after the Las Vegas shooting.
"In order to eliminate -- terminate -- bump stocks, we have to go through procedure. We are now at the final stages of that procedure," [Trump] said.
"We are knocking out bump stocks. I have told the (National Rifle Association) -- bump stocks are gone. But to do that, you have to go to public hearings, which we have had. You have to go through all sorts of regulatory control systems."
Trump added that the process should be wrapped up in "two or three weeks."
I pointed out in detail earlier the severe problem here. The rule which ATF has proposed to meet Trump's demand to "line out" bump stocks, names bump stocks as a banned item, but the definition they propose doesn't represent the devices people own. The ruling defines bump stocks as device that continuously fires without additional conscious manipulation of the trigger by the shooter. But bump stocks only continue to fire if the shooter consciously manipulates the trigger by pushing it forward onto their resting finger. Without this conscious manipulation, you get one bang and that's it. Clearly not a machine gun even with the proposed new ruling.
The proposed rule rewrites the definition of machine gun, as written by, voted on, and passed by congress to satisfy a policy decision of the current administration. In doing so it even fails to properly cover the devices it seeks to prohibit. Ultimately opens the door to largest uncompensated, non-grandfathered, no registration ban of firearms or firearms accessories in US history.
The worst part is few people understand what's happening, and many people if not in favor of it, are complacent, engaged, or resigned to a future in the US where separation of powers, and clearly defined law are irrelevant.
For reference, the new rule:
...the Department proposes to clarify that the definition of a "machinegun" includes a device that allows semiautomatic firearms to shoot more than one shot with a single pull of the trigger by harnessing the recoil energy of the semiautomatic firearm to which it is affixed so that the trigger resets and continues firing without additional physical manipulation of the trigger by the shooter (commonly known as bump-stock-type devices)
Linked here is a gif demonstrating that continuous fire does not occur automatically, it harnesses no recoil energy, additional physical manipulation is required to resent the trigger and initiate the next shot. Not a machine gun even by ATF's new rule. But they'll be expected to enforce against the items people own as if they were banned.
https://i.imgur.com/upm3SiP.gif (https://i.imgur.com/upm3SiP.gif)
Edited to add pertinent video about why ATF ruled bump stocks as non machineguns before pressure from the executive:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kryIJIrD5eQ (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kryIJIrD5eQ)
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I am told this may well pass:
https://www.washingtonpolicy.org/publications/detail/citizens-guide-to-initiative-1639-to-enact-new-restrictions-on-firearms-ownership-in-washington-state?fbclid=IwAR1g7AOvL4tchtkrLI8XtZk62Rf0BCgIewVcvppRe_86192k-DxXIdew0bE
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https://govtrackinsider.com/no-red-and-blue-banks-act-would-end-government-contracts-with-banks-with-lending-restrictions-on-ab3f57d8ce2b
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20181026/cnn-denies-reality-of-gun-confiscation-to-attack-president-trump
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Vote no on I-1639: Don’t criminalize self-defense
Originally published October 22, 2018 at 3:16 pm Updated October 22, 2018 at 3:27 pm
I-1639 mandates blatant age discrimination, requires additional costly firearm registration, increased waiting periods, costly mandatory government training, draconian firearm storage requirements and an unfair purchase tax.
Share story
By Alan Gottlieb
Special to The Times
The Washington State Sheriffs Association, Washington Council of Police & Sheriffs, Washington State Law Enforcement Firearms Instructors Association and the Washington State Patrol Troopers Association are all opposed to Initiative 1639.
Don’t underestimate the importance of having all these law-enforcement groups that serve and protect actively working against this initiative disguised as “gun safety.” It won’t make schools or communities safer, but it will treat more than a million gun owners like criminals.
Law-enforcement professionals recognize the extreme nature of I-1639. Not only does the initiative discriminate against gun owners, it classifies common recreational firearms as semiautomatic assault rifles and requires gun buyers to surrender their medical privacy in order to exercise a constitutionally-protected right.
Pro-Con package on Initiative 1639, gun measures
Pro 1639: Vote yes on I-1639: Help keep our schools and communities safer
I-1639 is not about so-called “assault weapons.” I-1639 targets all semi-automatic rifles, including commonly owned rifles used for self-defense, home protection, hunting and target shooting.
I-1639 places Washingtonians at risk by restricting access to firearms for lawful self-defense while doing nothing to increase security in schools or target violent criminals.
The strict mandated requirement of this initiative will force individuals to lock up their firearms and render them useless in a self-defense situation, or face criminal prosecution.
It goes even further to state that if an offender does break into your house, and they steal your unsecured firearm, you may be held liable for the criminal’s actions, victimizing you twice — once by the criminal and again by the state.
This initiative would also prohibit all of Washington’s law-abiding adults aged 18 to 20 from exercising their constitutional right to self-defense. Current law already restricts them from purchasing handguns, and Initiative 1639 would restrict them from rifles as well, even though rifles are very rarely used to commit crimes.
In fact, according to the FBI Uniform Crime Report for 2017, Washington state recorded only a single confirmed homicide involving a rifle.
Nationally, rifles of any kind are involved in 2 to 3 percent of all murders, and Washington state experiences fewer homicides than single cities like Chicago, Baltimore or Washington, D.C., which have harsher restrictions on the constitutional and civil rights of individuals to keep and bear arms.
Washington’s law-abiding adults aged 18-20 are legally responsible enough to vote, get married, purchase a home, sign a contract and serve in our military. Yet I-1639’s proponents want you to believe these same adults cannot be trusted to defend themselves or their families and are attempting to use the crimes of a few as a justification to curtail the rights of many.
Washington deserves real solutions to keep our communities safe, solutions that will rightly target criminals, not you, your family and your law-abiding neighbors.
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Delivered bright and early weekday mornings, this email provides a quick overview of top stories and need-to-know news.
This extreme initiative mandates blatant age discrimination, requires additional costly firearm registration, increased waiting periods, costly mandatory training, draconian firearm storage requirements, unfair purchase tax, and more — none of which will stop criminals or protect our Washington schools.
This initiative is being bankrolled by a handful of out-of-state and wealthy Seattleites who are only concerned with pushing a failed California-style gun control agenda instead of real solutions that will keep all of Washington’s schools and communities safe.
Please vote no to reject this false security that only restricts your, your family’s, and friends’ and neighbors’ right to self-defense.
Alan Gottlieb is the founder of the Bellevue-based Second Amendment Foundation and chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
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I don't know why they just HAVE to comment and make position statements on firearms:
https://acpinternist.org/weekly/archives/2018/10/30/1.htm?utm_campaign=FY18-19_NEWS_INTERNIST_DOMESTIC_103018_EML&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua
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I don't know why they just HAVE to comment and make position statements on firearms:
https://acpinternist.org/weekly/archives/2018/10/30/1.htm?utm_campaign=FY18-19_NEWS_INTERNIST_DOMESTIC_103018_EML&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua
As the left infiltrates and rots institutions from within, the institutions are used to push the left's agenda in any way possible. Remember, gun control is all about CONTROL of the serfs.
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https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/gun-regulations-initiative-1639-takes-lead-in-washington-state/
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(http://ace.mu.nu/archives/free%20people.jpg)
Learn to drive a rifle, or accept a ride in the boxcar the left has planned for you.
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https://www.westernjournal.com/ct/begins-house-democrats-introduce-bill-ban-certain-guns/?utm_source=push&utm_medium=conservativetribune&utm_content=2018-11-13&utm_campaign=manualpost
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https://www.westernjournal.com/ct/begins-house-democrats-introduce-bill-ban-certain-guns/?utm_source=push&utm_medium=conservativetribune&utm_content=2018-11-13&utm_campaign=manualpost
Buy and build now.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2013/12/how-nazis-used-gun-control-stephen-p-halbrook/
How the Nazis Used Gun Control
By STEPHEN P. HALBROOK
December 2, 2013 9:00 AM
The Weimar Republic’s well-intentioned gun registry became a tool for evil.
The perennial gun-control debate in America did not begin here. The same arguments for and against were made in the 1920s in the chaos of Germany’s Weimar Republic, which opted for gun registration. Law-abiding persons complied with the law, but the Communists and Nazis committing acts of political violence did not.
In 1931, Weimar authorities discovered plans for a Nazi takeover in which Jews would be denied food and persons refusing to surrender their guns within 24 hours would be executed. They were written by Werner Best, a future Gestapo official. In reaction to such threats, the government authorized the registration of all firearms and the confiscation thereof, if required for “public safety.” The interior minister warned that the records must not fall into the hands of any extremist group.
In 1933, the ultimate extremist group, led by Adolf Hitler, seized power and used the records to identify, disarm, and attack political opponents and Jews. Constitutional rights were suspended, and mass searches for and seizures of guns and dissident publications ensued. Police revoked gun licenses of Social Democrats and others who were not “politically reliable.”
During the five years of repression that followed, society was “cleansed” by the National Socialist regime. Undesirables were placed in camps where labor made them “free,” and normal rights of citizenship were taken from Jews. The Gestapo banned independent gun clubs and arrested their leaders. Gestapo counsel Werner Best issued a directive to the police forbidding issuance of firearm permits to Jews.
In 1938, Hitler signed a new Gun Control Act. Now that many “enemies of the state” had been removed from society, some restrictions could be slightly liberalized, especially for Nazi Party members. But Jews were prohibited from working in the firearms industry, and .22 caliber hollow-point ammunition was banned.
The time had come to launch a decisive blow to the Jewish community, to render it defenseless so that its “ill-gotten” property could be redistributed as an entitlement to the German “Volk.” The German Jews were ordered to surrender all their weapons, and the police had the records on all who had registered them. Even those who gave up their weapons voluntarily were turned over to the Gestapo.
This took place in the weeks before what became known as the Night of the Broken Glass, or Kristallnacht, occurred in November 1938. That the Jews were disarmed before it, minimizing any risk of resistance, is the strongest evidence that the pogrom was planned in advance. An incident was needed to justify unleashing the attack.
That incident would be the shooting of a German diplomat in Paris by a teenage Polish Jew. Hitler directed propaganda minister Josef Goebbels to orchestrate the Night of the Broken Glass. This massive operation, allegedly conducted as a search for weapons, entailed the ransacking of homes and businesses, and the arson of synagogues.
SS chief Heinrich Himmler decreed that 20 years be served in a concentration camp by any Jew possessing a firearm. Rusty revolvers and bayonets from the Great War were confiscated from Jewish veterans who had served with distinction. Twenty thousand Jewish men were thrown into concentration camps, and had to pay ransoms to get released.
The U.S. media covered the above events. And when France fell to Nazi invasion in 1940, the New York Times reported that the French were deprived of rights such as free speech and firearm possession just as the Germans had been. Frenchmen who failed to surrender their firearms within 24 hours were subject to the death penalty.
No wonder that in 1941, just days before the Pearl Harbor attack, Congress reaffirmed Second Amendment rights and prohibited gun registration. In 1968, bills to register guns were debated, with opponents recalling the Nazi experience and supporters denying that the Nazis ever used registration records to confiscate guns. The bills were defeated, as every such proposal has been ever since, including recent “universal background check” bills.
COMMENTS
As in Weimar Germany, some well-meaning people today advocate severe restrictions, including bans and registration, on gun ownership by law-abiding persons. Such proponents are in no sense “Nazis,” any more than were the Weimar officials who promoted similar restrictions. And it would be a travesty to compare today’s situation to the horrors of Nazi Germany.
Still, as history teaches, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
STEPHEN P. HALBROOK — Stephen P. Halbrook is a senior fellow at the Independent Institute, in Oakland, Calif., and the author of The Founders’ Second Amendment: Origins of the Right to Bear Arms, Gun Control in the Third Reich: Disarming the Jews and “Enemies of the State,” and the forthcoming Gun Control in Nazi-Occupied France: Tyranny and Resistance.
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https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-nra-will-have-its-day-in-court-1542234647
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https://www.crpa.org/crpa-news/gun-show-attendees-subjected-government-monitoring/
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second post-- from a well regarded friend:
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http://www.vuurwapenblog.com/general-opinion/lies-errors-and-omissions/de-facto-gun-registration-exists-in-the-united-states/
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From the Giffords gun control site:
Laws regulating the purchase and possession of ammunition help limit access by dangerous individuals. Law enforcement agencies in Sacramento and Los Angeles, California, for example, successfully used local ammunition recordkeeping ordinances to identify and prosecute criminals by comparing records of ammunition sales against records from California’s database identifying convicted felons and other prohibited people.
Between January 16 and December 31, 2008, the Sacramento ordinance led to the identification of 156 prohibited persons who had purchased ammunition (124 of whom had prior felony convictions), 48 search warrants, and 26 additional probation or parole searches. In addition, the ordinance led to 109 felony charges, 10 federal court indictments, 37 felony convictions, and 17 misdemeanor convictions. The law allowed law enforcement to seize a total of 84 firearms, including seven assault weapons, and thousands of rounds of ammunition.6
Similarly, the Los Angeles ordinance led to 30 investigations, 15 search warrants, nine arrests, and the confiscation of 24 handguns, 12 shotguns, and nine rifles that were illegally possessed between 2004 and the first half of 2006. It also resulted in 39 investigations in 2007, and at least 24 investigations in 2008. Id. at 10-11. A two-month study of Los Angeles’ ordinance found that prohibited purchasers accounted for nearly 3% of all ammunition purchasers over this period, acquiring roughly 10,000 rounds of ammunition. The study noted that a background check at the time of the transaction would have largely eliminated sales at retail outlets to these individuals.7 For further details, see the description of Sacramento’s ordinance below.
How were these investigations initiated?
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https://www.speroforum.com/a/KMTSZSFFNQ46/84324-Sheriff-requests-sanctuary-for-gunowners-after-voters-pass-most-restrictive-antigun-law-in-nation?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=GHIYLZRZNK7&utm_content=KMTSZSFFNQ46&utm_source=news&utm_term=Sheriff+requests+sanctuary+for+gunowners+after+voters+pass+most+restrictive+antigun+law+in+nation#.W_RM6eJRfcs
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/supreme-court-second-amendment-rights/?fbclid=IwAR1hRCHO3SrKVntaMBqx3WqXlWP3k92aL8jb3hj9gVt86YBWT0Hkdzeu3F8
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https://thefederalistpapers.org/opinion/parkland-shooting-investigators-say-armed-teachers-work?fbclid=IwAR0g59pMlXNAqx5n_8fz1hXe2Cq9aXwn1slH7mC0mHFhS-aC45zgPsA2zaY
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for legal ownership of guns. My response is if they don't like they should leave:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2018/12/01/harvard-grad-student-evicted-over-legally-owned-and-stored-firearms/
How is Harvard pronounced in Cambridge? HAVAD?
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http://fortune.com/2016/09/01/medical-marijuana-gun/?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=social-share-article&utm_content=20181208&fbclid=IwAR1PL32GXoS0fwaDqjG-qXcHyIEjRbqs9UTtJVyZMlSI1F6Ro9sn5ylwXa0
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https://www.conservativereview.com/news/new-jersey-invites-in-violent-criminal-aliens-while-stripping-citizens-of-the-right-to-self-defense/
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Forgive the nitpick, but if I have it right the ex post facto of the article is not sound. There is no punishment sought for possession prior to the new law, only after.
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http://fortune.com/2016/09/01/medical-marijuana-gun/?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=social-share-article&utm_content=20181208&fbclid=IwAR1PL32GXoS0fwaDqjG-qXcHyIEjRbqs9UTtJVyZMlSI1F6Ro9sn5ylwXa0
Wow, this was bound to happen. Put yourself on a government list, medical marijuana or CCW or both, and bad things happen.
In Colo, personal use is a (state) constitutional right, not just a law. If you exercise your state constitutional right you lose a federal constitutional right?
Reminds med of the "constitutional right" (abortion) that one President (Wm Jefferson Clinton) wanted to be "safe, legal and rare".
http://harvardpolitics.com/united-states/safe-legal-and-rare-the-democrats-evolving-stance-on-abortion/
The Left wants your gun right to be rare, or none.
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http://tennesseestar.com/2018/12/09/californias-background-check-law-had-no-impact-on-gun-deaths-johns-hopkins-study-finds/?fbclid=IwAR1hQaAX2in7d0PebtikGAGdim_4oomlZK0NzkW1YlfqE0IHShVnDxEFKuw
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http://thefederalist.com/2018/12/12/top-10-reasons-ar-15/?utm_campaign=ACTENGAGE&fbclid=IwAR3lABgsyLi7oNSJ5iFlIxm1QYcZjjTsQke5BVkbCzmfmemP5uM4DS8246k
Some good points made here, civic duty, most useful firearm, easy to maintain, hunting, markmanship, defense, help to make them "in common use". Be prepared to fight off tyranny as envisioned by the Founders.
A nation fully prepared to fight off tyranny won't need to do it.
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http://thefederalist.com/2018/12/12/top-10-reasons-ar-15/?utm_campaign=ACTENGAGE&fbclid=IwAR3lABgsyLi7oNSJ5iFlIxm1QYcZjjTsQke5BVkbCzmfmemP5uM4DS8246k
Some good points made here, civic duty, most useful firearm, easy to maintain, hunting, markmanship, defense, help to make them "in common use". Be prepared to fight off tyranny as envisioned by the Founders.
A nation fully prepared to fight off tyranny won't need to do it.
They are also incredibly inexpensive right now. Fun to shoot as well.
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Great article Doug. I will be spreading that one around.
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Magazine that gets sent to me for free as it is one of my alma maters :
http://rwjms.rutgers.edu/news_publications/publications/RURWJMedicineF18_Animated/index.html
GW University mag where I also got a degree is even more clogged with progressive ideology.
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http://www.capoliticalreview.com/capoliticalnewsandviews/new-york-times-pressures-credit-card-giants-to-blacklist-gun-purchasers/
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https://www.fresnobee.com/news/state/california/article224372145.html?fbclid=IwAR2zx8wnfLs0jEVmNRGwjvUOD-oO86yfGvsEZj3djGOUrUySXZshuZSkyk0
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second post
https://fee.org/articles/are-ar-15-rifles-a-public-safety-threat-heres-what-the-data-say/?utm_source=zapier&utm&fbclid=IwAR0MWK_2_y81Yjr2z7nuIs092_mDo5TzVW-Lbvt9sCIiw5W1S7EbVbovOp0
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https://www.wusa9.com/article/opinion/editorials/off-script/dc-political-comedian-robbed-at-gunpoint-changes-stance-on-guns/65-509608926?fbclid=IwAR1UCS82R6xT2zjOvrk-lBogsG_eZ2WweDVDfzRCiWVMioHzEgHRTvjtkBI&utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com
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https://freebeacon.com/issues/south-dakota-becomes-latest-permitless-gun-carry-state/
SD is the 38th most liberal state that the Left needs to repeal the 2nd amendment, the electoral college, etc. They will not be turning far Left anytime soon.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=105&v=bUd3YBrfoR4
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=40&v=AoFxSBbiVJM
e.g. 5 round mags
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=40&v=AoFxSBbiVJM
e.g. 5 round mags
The coastal lefties can pass whatever they want. Enforcing such laws in the eastern part of the state is going to be quite difficult and dangerous.
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Practicing without ammo is going to be a real trick. Use of any gun with more than 5 shot capacity would set one up for felony charges.
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Practicing without ammo is going to be a real trick. Use of any gun with more than 5 shot capacity would set one up for felony charges.
Who is going to make the arrest? Who is going to prosecute? Outside of the blue hive areas, you won't see much enforcement, if any.
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https://thefederalist.com/2018/12/12/top-10-reasons-ar-15/?fbclid=IwAR2KVZcVo-dSM6Mg_U5zAyPna33Lk8fXIgcS9rY4g4JMx0yQfAl9nRP22LE
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/02/gun-culture/554351/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR1rlMT2GcQozffwTabZyoHYhKVQrYzSVRTsWYFnWhsjilfnaloNP6IN6hI
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https://news.northeastern.edu/2018/02/26/schools-are-still-one-of-the-safest-places-for-children-researcher-says/
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https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/washington-sheriffs-unconstitutional-rule-of-law/2019/02/11/id/902195/?gdpr_consent=&gdpr=false
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http://www.cdh2a.com/press-release-3-22-18-youtube-bans-2nd-amendment-advocacy-group/?fbclid=IwAR25NI90E926rkF2UwZRb5POwIBz2RJzJ5KQeAwd5wlsHcRv9C9R_bzk0Us
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/new-mexico-county-votes-to-become-second-amendment-sanctuary-in-protest-of-gun-control-legislation?fbclid=IwAR0udv7QkInKZ0MusShGLverYMcUx8g1kyhBx3-mzdlR287ViB5Hxkr2joc
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/new-mexico-county-votes-to-become-second-amendment-sanctuary-in-protest-of-gun-control-legislation?fbclid=IwAR0udv7QkInKZ0MusShGLverYMcUx8g1kyhBx3-mzdlR287ViB5Hxkr2joc
Dems can pass gun laws, but enforcing them is a different matter.
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From 2018
https://nypost.com/2018/08/30/america-doesnt-actually-lead-the-world-in-mass-shootings/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR3VFzI05Nb1n_KseHqt1wF3vqamSE1foLxo-J8MiwTS2ifv3ycacxAg5lM
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https://www.theblaze.com/news/2017/04/02/grandfather-of-oklahoma-teen-killed-by-homeowner-in-burglary-says-ar15-made-for-unfair-fight?fbclid=IwAR1R-833v1FEroS0whlb08ZKTQtqUnPAoYOiU-p9sIeP5GbvmzWvEH6lAjw&utm_campaign=theblaze&utm_content=bufferd3e12&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com
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https://www.theblaze.com/news/2017/04/02/grandfather-of-oklahoma-teen-killed-by-homeowner-in-burglary-says-ar15-made-for-unfair-fight?fbclid=IwAR1R-833v1FEroS0whlb08ZKTQtqUnPAoYOiU-p9sIeP5GbvmzWvEH6lAjw&utm_campaign=theblaze&utm_content=bufferd3e12&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com
One should always aspire to have an unfair advantage over those who come to your home with criminal intent.
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https://lex18.com/news/2019/03/01/permitless-concealed-carry-bill-moves-forward/?fbclid=IwAR3t8oYWHJbKNuj7d4w5JPIN0Dd9rHwxn1sUZ73URE1Xcvf9M674nprnKlk
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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/feb/22/washington-state-county-sheriffs-refuse-to-enforce-gun-laws?fbclid=IwAR0zXXd_c4SZRaGWaBqwqeX5uAvZhurMJnfF4rTmOY3TYl29DyYTzg8qbM0
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https://www.denverpost.com/2019/03/06/weld-county-second-amendment-sanctuary-resolution/
Pass all the laws you want, dems. Try enforcing them
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Sanctuaries where the Second is defend are great, but I suspect willingness to go shooting and stay sharp with your skills declines. Also, there will be concerns about getting on to the radar screen due to ammo purchases.
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Sanctuaries where the Second is defend are great, but I suspect willingness to go shooting and stay sharp with your skills declines. Also, there will be concerns about getting on to the radar screen due to ammo purchases.
Colorado has no way of tracking ammo purchases, unlike the PRK. This is still true of most states.
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https://nypost.com/2016/05/21/the-scandal-in-washington-no-one-is-talking-about/?utm_source=facebook_sitebuttons&utm_medium=site+buttons&utm_campaign=site+buttons&fbclid=IwAR3EOl3VQWZiCel0UxnMAUGKfoe0NCY8acmDZmZ5-mauThJqyuYu7fpxK2Q
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second post
https://www.gunsamerica.com/digest/levi-strauss-end-gun-violence/?fbclid=IwAR1r-WdR-ZcHCQ6_WYd7pLP-iJbkFW-ton1UZbzhrsDeY7IRHLO_Lb1mIbI
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkeZzLL6LRc
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Second post
"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any..." —James Madison (1788)
Also see
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/09/opinion/sunday/gun-ownership-blacks.htm
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U.S.
Manufacturer of AR-15 Can Be Sued Over Sandy Hook Massacre, Court Rules
Connecticut Supreme Court allowed victims’ suit to move forward over its marketing of the gun
A Bushmaster AR-15 gun found at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in photo provided by the Connecticut State Police
A Bushmaster AR-15 gun found at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., in photo provided by the Connecticut State Police Photo: Connecticut State Police/Reuters
By Jacob Gershman and
Cameron McWhirter
Updated March 14, 2019 6:31 p.m. ET
The gun industry suffered a potentially significant legal setback Thursday when the Connecticut Supreme Court said a leading maker of AR-15 rifles could be held legally responsible for marketing practices that allegedly made the semiautomatic gun the weapon of choice for mass shooters.
The Connecticut Supreme Court ruled that Remington Outdoor, the maker of the AR-15 style rifle used in the Sandy Hook Elementary shooting, can be sued over the deaths of children killed there. In this video from March 2018, WSJ’s Spencer Macnaughton explains how parents of the victims are using a 1977 lawsuit about a slingshot to argue that gunmakers are liable. Photo: AP
In a 4-3 ruling, the court overturned the dismissal of a wrongful-death lawsuit brought by families of victims killed in 2012 at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. The suit was brought against Remington Outdoor Co., the maker of the weapon Adam Lanza used to kill 26 people, most of them young children.
The ruling allows the plaintiffs to move forward with claims that Remington’s marketing campaigns violated Connecticut’s consumer-protection law, which prohibits advertising and marketing that is “immoral and unscrupulous.”
The plaintiffs alleged that Remington unlawfully promoted the rifle to young, civilian men as a weapon with awesome power and ideal for combat.
A representative for Remington didn’t respond to requests for comment. Remington had argued the claims were barred by a 2005 federal law that grants the gun industry expansive immunity from liability claims over gun violence. That law, however, has an exception, under which manufacturers may be liable for injuries resulting from violations of state laws dealing with the marketing of their products.
The trade association for the firearms industry called the ruling a disappointment. “The majority’s decision today is at odds with all other state and federal appellate courts that have interpreted the scope of the exception,” the National Shooting Sports Foundation said in a statement.
Legal experts said the outcome could have broad ramifications. The decision could give victims of other shootings a legal road map for establishing liability against an industry that has faced little legal threat for more than a decade.
“This ruling has basically blown a very large hole in federal immunity for firearms manufacturers in lawsuits against them that arise out of the criminal misuse of the weapons they sell,” said Georgia State University law professor Timothy Lytton, author of a book about gun litigation.
The plaintiffs might now also be able to use the lawsuit’s discovery process to pull the curtain back on Remington’s internal marketing strategy. In recent years, courts have largely thwarted such efforts.
Josh Koskoff, a lawyer for the Sandy Hook families, said Thursday’s decision was a “critical step” toward shedding light on “Remington’s calculated and profit-driven strategy to expand the AR-15 market and court high-risk users.”
In its ruling, the court upheld the dismissal of several claims brought by the plaintiffs, finding them barred by the 2005 Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. But the court found the marketing claim to fall outside the reach of the law.
“[T]here is no indication…that Congress intended to restrict the power of the states to regulate wrongful advertising, particularly advertising that encourages consumers to engage in egregious criminal conduct,” wrote Connecticut Justice Richard Palmer for the majority; Justice Palmer was nominated to the court by former Republican Gov. Lowell Weicker.
Barring an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, the case now goes back to a trial court to determine the merits of the lawsuit’s wrongful marketing claims.
Lanza, who acquired a Bushmaster XM15-E2S from his mother, killed 20 school children and six educators in the shooting at the school on Dec. 14, 2012.
He shot himself to death as first responders arrived at the school.
AR-15-style rifles have been used in several mass shootings in recent years, including Las Vegas, Sutherland Springs, Texas, Parkland, Fla., and Pittsburgh.
First developed in the 1950s, AR-15-style rifles are light, gas-powered, semiautomatic weapons that can be fired rapidly with ease. The gun was marketed initially as a military weapon, and the military renamed it the M16, which can fire automatic and semiautomatic.
While no one keeps records of exactly how many AR-15 and similar rifles are sold in the U.S., the National Shooting Sports Foundation estimated that from 1990 to 2016 more than 11.4 million were produced to be sold domestically.
Plaintiffs alleged that Remington’s marketing campaigns were geared toward young video-game playing, military-obsessed young men and linked the AR-15 to macho vigilantism and military-style insurrection.
The company, the lawsuit claims, touted the gun’s “military-proven performance” and declared it “the ultimate combat weapons system.”
“Remington may never have known Adam Lanza, but they had been courting him for years,” a lawyer for the plaintiffs told the Connecticut high court during oral arguments in November 2017.
Legal experts say the most controversial part of the decision is the judges’ interpretation of the 2005 immunity law.
In the late 1990s and early 2000s, particularly after the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo., the gun industry faced a wave of lawsuits from shooting victims and municipalities alleging criminal misuse of its products.
Gun groups who lobbied for the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act trumpeted its passage as a death knell for such lawsuits.
But the Connecticut high court concluded that the immunity spelled out in the law wasn’t broad enough to throw out the Sandy Hook lawsuit.
Central in the dispute is an exception in the statute that says manufacturers can be liable for actions that violate state statutes “applicable to the sale or marketing of the product.”
The Connecticut Supreme Court said the immunity exception can cover a general consumer-protection law that’s not specifically about firearms.
Judges also rejected defendant arguments that the lawsuit was time-barred by statute of limitations and that the plaintiffs lacked standing to sue because they lacked a business relationship with Remington.
Connecticut Supreme Court Chief Justice Richard Robinson, nominated to the court by former Democratic Gov. Dannel Malloy, wrote a dissenting opinion.
He said Congress intended for the exception in the 2005 law to cover state laws that “relate specifically to the sale and manufacture of firearms.”
Other states have consumer-protection laws like Connecticut’s. Mr. Lytton, the Georgia State University law professor, said the precedent in Connecticut could help victims of other shooting sprees persuade courts that the manufacturing, distribution, advertising and sales practices of firearms manufacturers constitute unfair trade practices.
Remington’s lawyers had argued that plaintiffs’ interpretation of the 2005 law would “severely undermine congressional intent.”
“The crimes that occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School were horrific, and the losses suffered by the plaintiffs were immense,” the company argued in a brief. “But basic principles of law should not be discarded simply to serve the exigencies of particular cases.”
Write to Jacob Gershman at jacob.gershman@wsj.com and Cameron McWhirter at cameron.mcwhirter@wsj.com
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"plaintiffs alleged that Remington unlawfully promoted the rifle to young, civilian men as a weapon with awesome power and ideal for combat"
Doesn't that almost perfectly describe the words and intent of the constitution, for defensive purposes, or do they still think it was a hunting amendment? Isn't that rifle exactly what you wished a security officer, janitor, teacher or principal would have pulled out on him before his first shot at the children?
If a terrorist intentionally drives a Mercedes delivery van into a crowd of innocent people do we sue Mercedes if ads say awesome power and acceleration. If fertilizer is used in bomb, sue the fertilizer maker? Ads say high nitrogen content. Hostages tied up with rope, sue the rope manufacturer? Ads say 1000 pound test strength. How could they not foresee that misuse? Require a warning label, do not duct tape over mouth and nose simultaneously, breathing could cease.
Meanwhile govt and big corps steal and read all the innocent people's communications and movements and seem to connect the dots on none of the bad ones.
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Sandy Hook shooter: https://www.thedailybeast.com/we-already-know-what-adam-lanzas-real-motive-was-at-sandy-hook
Lanza’s equivalent of kiddie porn was a five-second dramatization of children being shot that was found among this things at home.
He also had a POV video game called School Shooter that allows the player to gun down students with gruesome results.
In the game, the shooter wears fingerless black gloves, just like Dylan Klebold did at the Columbine High School massacre that the report says Lanza was fixated on.
Only Lanza went after much younger victims at Sandy Hook, a choice the report indicates cannot be easily explained by any particular unpleasant experience, real or imagined, that Lanza seems to have had when he was at student there.
In preschool before he arrived at Sandy Hook, Lanza is said by the report to have exhibited such worrisome signs as “repetitive behaviors, temper tantrums, smelling things that were not there, excessive hand washing and eating idiosyncrasies.”
But of his time at Sandy Hook, the report says: “The early school years have him portrayed as a nice kid, though sort of withdrawn. He loved music and played saxophone.”
“He would attend play groups and parties,” the report says.
The report—which calls Lanza “the shooter,” just like in his game—adds, “The shooter indicated that he loved the school and liked to go there.”
One thing that seems notable in retrospect is the book Lanza made as part of a class project in the fifth grade. He titled it Big Book of Granny. The hero has a cane that is really a gun and uses it to shoot numerous people, children among them.
As he proceeded on to sixth grade and middle school, he was said by a teacher who was interviewed by the detectives to have gotten As and Bs, done his homework, and had at least some friends. He was never in any trouble of note.
The big change seems to have come in the seventh grade. A teacher described him as “intelligent but not normal?” He was said to have had “antisocial issues,” withdrawing and refusing to participate in class. He appeared to have a violent nature. His writing assignments were filled with “a disturbing level” of mayhem, war, and death.
During this same period, his mother, Nancy Lanza, noted that her son had given up sports and stopped riding his bike and climbing trees and playing the saxophone in the school band. He did join the tech club in high school and even had a LEN (pizza and computer games) party at his home.
And while he continued to write about violence, the report notes that he also wrote about “human nature, perception, judgment, morality, lack of control, prejudice, empathy, suicide, mental illness, existential crisis, urban exploration of abandoned areas, hiking and cookies.” He turned unexpectedly lyrical when he was asked to write a poem.
But school was becoming ever more a struggle, and he was becoming ever more withdrawn. The report waxes clinical as it says: “His school issues related to his identified emotional and/or Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD) spectrum behaviors. His high level of anxiety, Asperger’s characteristics, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) concerns and sensory issues all impacted his performance to a significant degree, limiting his participation in a general education curriculum. Tutoring, desensitization and medication were recommended.”
The report goes on, “The shooter refused to take suggested medication and did not engage in suggested behavior therapies.”
He was extremely picky about what he ate and insisted that foods be arranged in a particular order on his plate. He would only eat certain things with certain utensils. He washed his hands again and again, just as he had in preschool, and he repeatedly changed clothes, leaving his mother to do his laundry every day. Nobody was allowed in his room, where the windows were covered with black garbage bags secured with duct tape.
Deliverymen were asked not to ring the doorbell lest the noise disturb him. He required others to open doors for him because he so abhorred touching the knobs or other metal objects.
“Often going through a box of tissues a day to avoid contact,” the report says.
He also did not like birthdays or holidays, and he refused to let his mother put up a Christmas tree, which she took as a sign that he lacked emotion. He did not like the family cat, so the mother gave it away.
“When the shooter had his hair cut, he did not like to be touched and did not like the sound of clippers, so they were not used much,” the report says. “He would sit with his hands in his lap and always look down, giving one-word answers if the cutter tried to engage him in conversation.”
The mother told people that because her son had Asperser’s he was unable to experience emotion. She asked him if he would feel badly if something happened to her.
“No,” he said.
He had a cell phone, but he neither made nor accepted calls, apparently using it only for emails and texts. He ceased speaking to his mother in person, communicating with her only by email even when they were both in the house.
Somewhere in there was a warning sign. Maybe don't give this kid a gun instead of shutting down the constitution and all self defense products.
I don't know what was known about the New Zealand shooter(s). Trying to avoid the misinformation phase of the reporting.
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http://thefederalist.com/2019/03/18/the-dishonest-campaign-against-the-ar-15/?fbclid=IwAR1_7KPslOFEa1l8em_6_BliiTUZksWulEOMiqbJodnWOAkWnhuAswz5lmw
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https://mises.org/wire/mistake-only-comparing-us-murder-rates-developed-countries?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR3qW1qErFnk9BrFdp667WVMKMZuyU69msPSnz2dsjV08uJ4zg4UA8ps6D8
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https://www.newyorkupstate.com/news/2017/07/deputies_confiscate_a_cny_veterans_guns_they_were_wrong_what_happened.html?fbclid=IwAR34ECIxVJ0_3X6Xo_U7iCtEG2leb1q5dolaFa22zKdWvL4-_WdX-6q33Nw
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WECw0fDkZFo&fbclid=IwAR03gmke-GaW0GKICBoU9O-08n7fbIU58si_We9Zerd_wRwWjrnmdpOJ2c0
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20190329/breaking-federal-court-finds-california-magazine-ban-violates-the-second-amendment?fbclid=IwAR1AiMGaMWuCED7FalyD0nEDotvuAL2vLiTEyCydrnZ887KjCR_MveHQruk
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https://www.salon.com/2010/10/21/buying_gun_protect_from_stalker/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR0UTBL9A0iTxz7BXnEAeVBgLhUymQzImdaBbiY4hmP6CgzUA-QzCmpqe-c
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I know I've posted this here, but I confess the lesson(s) to be drawn are not necessarily clear to me:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2018/04/03/londons-murder-rate-higher-than-new-york-citys/480860002/?utm_content=88957620&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-225612270801893&fbclid=IwAR1_UQqc7vGEh-ZKPhSb0_7Q6GCvQ4RekTSJ5CmfhrhMDyViBxkwBiZp7Ak
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2018
https://thefederalist.com/2018/08/13/former-gun-control-candidate-charged-shooting-campaign-treasurer/
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2018
https://thefederalist.com/2018/08/13/former-gun-control-candidate-charged-shooting-campaign-treasurer/
They aren't anti-gun, they are anti you having a gun.
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https://www.westernjournal.com/congress-passes-pro-gun-target-practice-marksmanship-training-support-act/?utm_source=push&utm_medium=westernjournalism&utm_content=2019-04-30&utm_campaign=manualpost
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https://nypost.com/2018/08/30/america-doesnt-actually-lead-the-world-in-mass-shootings/?utm_source=facebook_sitebuttons&utm_medium=site+buttons&utm_campaign=site+buttons&fbclid=IwAR3_3BURHt9yLiBY4Apvbed-X_HZt2Oo0MLQ4COf-WMK0it29gIx4QIa-UU
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https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/murders-are-at-a-record-low-and-falling-in-the-us
Point made to me: Things are not that simple, see this:
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-are-shootings-deadlier-in-some-cities-than-others/?fbclid=IwAR2UZUbGdnu64HWGgtSjr1Ymj2axFXQiMcp48mdsoWahgd25NJw5DMGJfjI
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From my FB page:
"In 2017, there were an estimated 1,247,321 violent crimes. The estimated number of robbery offenses decreased 4.0 percent, and the estimated number of murder and non negligent manslaughter offenses decreased 0.7 percent when compared with estimates from 2016. The estimated volume of aggravated assault and rape (revised definition) offenses increased 1.0 percent and 2.5 percent, respectively. The combined violent crime rate fell 0.9 percent when compared with the 2016 rate.
https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/fbi-releases-2017-crime-statistics?fbclid=IwAR28hqKL331dlfjUX39iWPkK5slQzLqnnalclUQt04MCcMBXiA7WOkDO73g
"Death by guns continues to climb, but what isn't known by the majority is that the largest numbers of gun deaths in the US comes from self inflected gun shots, not crimes. So, do nations with fewer firearms have lower rates of suicide. Well, the US ranks better than nations like Poland, Finland, Switzerland, Belgium, France, Russia, India and Japan."
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http://concealednation.org/2019/04/son-saves-family-of-6-takes-out-armed-home-invader-with-head-shot-while-sisters-hide-in-closet/?fbclid=IwAR2Pz5_y4rtR89IUdnrKsypr3xlBeoWPPeE5yPFnu52-NKVvLi-2RrKmEMk
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http://concealednation.org/2019/04/son-saves-family-of-6-takes-out-armed-home-invader-with-head-shot-while-sisters-hide-in-closet/?fbclid=IwAR2Pz5_y4rtR89IUdnrKsypr3xlBeoWPPeE5yPFnu52-NKVvLi-2RrKmEMk
Nice!
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https://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2016/10/14/connecticut-judge-dismisses-sandy-hook-massacre-lawsuit-against-remington/?fbclid=IwAR1dQGSAlhuam7ztT1mbw-tRQcRzjPm-aYFJyrdL-EayOEz40YlWel4AxSo#c561adb4fc6f
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http://concealednation.org/2015/10/here-are-5-times-concealed-carriers-have-stopped-mass-shootings/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR2S5cXzDndQdGV4S3RZ4DdHMCZgl_BsVN__SxTaUxsVR8tfzna9SknGQQI
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https://www.yahoo.com/news/las-vegas-police-fire-officer-044941448.html
What is your take? I presume he had a glock and would be up against at least semi automatic rifles .
I don't know if the security guards with him were armed or not.
Is it too much to ask all law enforcement people to be willing to die on a seconds notice?
And of course only fire back if the criminal is white...............
And remember while the moment of truth comes to think to turn on the camera!
This is getting crazy if you ask me .
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Being a cop means being willing to run to the sound of the guns. It means that when innocents are being murdered, you engage the threat, even if that results in a flag draped coffin and bagpipes. If you are willing or able to do that, you need to do something else.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/las-vegas-police-fire-officer-044941448.html
What is your take? I presume he had a glock and would be up against at least semi automatic rifles .
I don't know if the security guards with him were armed or not.
Is it too much to ask all law enforcement people to be willing to die on a seconds notice?
And of course only fire back if the criminal is white...............
And remember while the moment of truth comes to think to turn on the camera!
This is getting crazy if you ask me .
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"Being a cop means being willing to run to the sound of the guns. It means that when innocents are being murdered, you engage the threat, even if that results in a flag draped coffin and bagpipes. If you are willing or able to do that, you need to do something else."
fair enough.
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https://thelawdogfiles.blogspot.com/2019/08/let-me-stop-you-right-there-scooter.html
Let me stop you right there, Scooter ...
Over the years I have picked up some ... fans?
These are folks what don't like me for various reasons -- because I'm a cop, or I'm conservative, or a gun-owner, or former military, or whatever -- but who don't have the common courtesy to sod off to someplace else that they'll be more appreciated.
Most of these folks catch the ban-hammer and expire quietly in my spam-box and an IP block with no fanfare, but a couple of them have slipped through the cracks.
Mostly because I don't hear from them until some deviant no-account little pismire decides to cash in his voucher for 15 minutes of fame, said voucher being backed and guaranteed by the US Mainstream Media.
Sure enough, some pathetic little scrote-scraping decided to be famous in El Paso, and sure as the gods made little green apples the Media oiled up their stiletto-heeled leather blood-dancing boots and squeezed into their Christian Dior hair-shirt corsets and Made Him Famous. Just like the contract promises.
And -- again, gods and little green apples -- my inbox comes up with emails starting with: "It's time for ..." or "Common sense ..." or "You have to agree ..."
Let me stop y'all right there.
The answer is "No."
No, I'm not going to give up my guns.
I don't care. I'm not giving up my guns.
I didn't murder anyone. My guns didn't murder anyone. My friends haven't murdered anyone. My friends guns haven't murdered anyone.
80 million American gun owners didn't murder anyone.
I am not going to be punished for some pustulent little bridge-troll deciding to vomit his evil into a Wal-Mart in El Paso.
And, yes, taking my guns away is punishing me. I will not be punished for the evil of someone else; evil that I had NOTHING TO DO WITH.
This is not up for debate. We've tried debate at the national level and the only thing debate got us was incremental chunks of our gun rights taken away by you faithless dacoits.
I am no longer going to engage in a debate in which I lose every time. Sod that for a game of soldiers.
So, let me stop you right there, Scooter. The answer is "No."
Done.
LawDog
-
guns are only the first thing the LEFT wants to take away.
our gasoline vehicles, health care choice, what words we can and cannot use , our beliefs, our religion , make us pay for others free stuff all day long, reparations, illegals , others education ,
and more.
Frankly *some* of the stuff in the murderer's written piece IS EXACTLY RIGHT but by making it famous through cold blooded murder he made his points something to be ignored and impugned and allowed attention to be focused away from his points and on to "guns" "hate" and "white supremacy".
What is actually in his essay is not even discussed. (yes I get it we can't let his blood shed allow his views to be aired as it promotes more people doing the same thing etc)
Now more than ever anyone who is angry about the hoards of invaders from all over the world flocking here illegally is now more easily called all the LEFT'S favorite attack names.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=188&v=WviXhkj8u-o
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2013/12/how-nazis-used-gun-control-stephen-p-halbrook/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com&fbclid=IwAR00OnSiaS9KbF8tYcop6QH_Sx7WAmgQpEW9UrXSn7BJMSgYVVxqCvWKfP8
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=AJW5fB8xOG4
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=AJW5fB8xOG4
Exactly. And a 5.56 HP or SP or ballistic tip round is much less likely to overpenetrate and become a threat in a densely populated area.
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https://www.theblaze.com/news/2017/04/05/man-who-killed-three-home-invaders-with-an-ar-15-will-face-no-criminal-charges?fbclid=IwAR0Dq_P811-QBUwFwrXwHLuqKJ1OfVFN24VKpy_7Fmke0kJVAFxxla7AZlE
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https://www.outdoorlife.com/gun-news-week-atf-says-assault-rifle-is-bogus-term/?2aW3zsS8SypAMOA2.01&fbclid=IwAR2WL_bmHlUANnuh9en7a_k0JVYjczy94oewouNlWmvXdTXpR7E2vTNs25A
-
(whisper - over 50 yrs)
https://www.conservativereview.com/news/wapos-mass-shooting-numbers-wont-tell-murders-america/
Tucker's point is valid though I think he could have gone one step further in qualifying it.
-
https://www.conservativereview.com/news/red-flag-supporting-ivanka-trump-now-putting-behind-scenes-efforts-gun-control/?utm_source=cr-content&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=newsletter-default&utm_term=cr&utm_content=cr-ivanka-trump-gun-control-link-081419-cr-content
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https://fee.org/articles/studies-find-no-evidence-that-assault-weapon-bans-reduce-homicide-rates/?utm_source=zapier&fbclid=IwAR26KThtRYq6VTk62M_rtajUSVGUZYDePTdEovuU9R-RTva2Gy1oLOkeEh8
-
https://fee.org/articles/studies-find-no-evidence-that-assault-weapon-bans-reduce-homicide-rates/?utm_source=zapier&fbclid=IwAR26KThtRYq6VTk62M_rtajUSVGUZYDePTdEovuU9R-RTva2Gy1oLOkeEh8
The left knows that. It’s not about fighting crime, it’s about disarming traditional Americans so we can be easily rounded up for re-education camps and/or mass graves.
-
https://fee.org/articles/studies-find-no-evidence-that-assault-weapon-bans-reduce-homicide-rates/?utm_source=zapier&fbclid=IwAR26KThtRYq6VTk62M_rtajUSVGUZYDePTdEovuU9R-RTva2Gy1oLOkeEh8
The left knows that. It’s not about fighting crime, it’s about disarming traditional Americans so we can be easily rounded up for re-education camps and/or mass graves.
I hate to use or misuse Nazi analogies. It isn't that we will become them but it is because there are reasons we won't, one being the Second Amendment. If the purpose of the amendment guaranteeing that right is that a government can never become oppressive because the people are armed, then it makes no sense to give the potential oppressors the exact numbers and locations of the arms.
Even if we agree to take away from the dangerously mentally ill, that should not diminish the right of anyone else other than those being adjudicated for their dangerous mental state.
---------------------------
https://www.nationalreview.com/2013/12/how-nazis-used-gun-control-stephen-p-halbrook/
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Doug,
The left is churning out their mass murder fantasies. It’s not accidental.
http://longisland.news12.com/story/40889590/death-camps-for-trump-supporters-now-posters-spark-outrage-in-patchogue
https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/the-hunt-horror-film-cancelled-trump-craig-zobel-a9070236.html
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https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/171576/america-doesnt-have-gun-problem-it-has-gang-daniel-greenfield?fbclid=IwAR2Xq1ZG9bpVzYrXnB6uHusHYp18i44D23eCfN6PTdgQ6jfyzLjDqj69bUg
-
https://dailycaller.com/2019/08/08/hong-kong-protesters-extradition-china-second-amendment-video/
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https://www.alloutdoor.com/2016/08/31/democrats-will-never-confiscate-guns-instead-youll-hand/?fbclid=IwAR1ZFFlgYVdz_Z8PQpppweuIjLQl5iHf7KOlaKbNKlNGyWgCLsEp15I7DgQ
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https://www.alloutdoor.com/2016/08/31/democrats-will-never-confiscate-guns-instead-youll-hand/?fbclid=IwAR1ZFFlgYVdz_Z8PQpppweuIjLQl5iHf7KOlaKbNKlNGyWgCLsEp15I7DgQ
Hardly.
It's called massive non-compliance.
https://hudsonvalleyone.com/2016/07/07/massive-noncompliance-with-safe-act/
Fredo's big brother has the NY State Police and other state law enforcement agencies under his direct control AND the NY Army and Air National Guard. Their fusion centers have a damn good idea who isn't complying. Where are the mass raids and arrests?
-
(https://i2.wp.com/freedomandprosperity.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Aug-29-19-Sanctuary-guns.jpg?zoom=2)
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https://www.infowars.com/trump-administration-considering-social-credit-score-system-to-determine-who-can-buy-a-gun/
to consider anyone who is not a liberal or Democrat to be dangerous and not deemed "fit" to buy a gun.
thus we get disarmed and they do not.
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https://www.infowars.com/trump-administration-considering-social-credit-score-system-to-determine-who-can-buy-a-gun/
to consider anyone who is not a liberal or Democrat to be dangerous and not deemed "fit" to buy a gun.
thus we get disarmed and they do not.
This is how this works:
"Turn in your guns"
"No. Your move".
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The source there is Infowars, IMHO a thoroughly scurrilous site. Let's look for and use other confirming sources instead of them please.
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https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2019/09/06/exclusive-feds-demand-apple-and-google-hand-over-names-of-10000-users-of-a-gun-scope-app/#4acb2fe52423
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http://www.stephenhalbrook.com/article-nazilaw.pdf
History lessons.
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From his PTSD, to his studies at Harvard , to his grooming for political office, to the American genocide, the women of color who started the gun control debate, to white supremacy , to "common ground" . ( as long as we move more and more to total gun confiscation) and peace, love, his definition of patriotism and more :
https://www.breitbart.com/clips/2019/09/06/david-hogg-todays-mass-shootings-stem-from-americas-ingenious-mass-shootings-and-white-supremacy/
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https://www.forbes.com/sites/nicksibilla/2019/08/28/california-supreme-court-closes-fourth-amendment-loophole-that-let-cops-seize-guns-without-warrants/?fbclid=IwAR0zDss66bhYC_QrOsYp5Ac7NRHpfDoXhbtJr4uqQg-C7V8BIcGRPwDp_6U#695735015c64
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https://thefederalist.com/2019/09/13/not-nra-stopping-gun-control-americas-100-million-gun-owners/
Come and take them.
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https://thefederalist.com/2019/09/13/not-nra-stopping-gun-control-americas-100-million-gun-owners/
Come and take them.
I'm not armed [yet] or member of the NRA but in the possibility of a new civil war I would like be on the side of the armed.
Remarks by Beto in the debate, hell yes we will take your rifles, make me want to go out and make that purchase previously discussed.
The gaffe was that Dems aren't supposed to say aloud in public the word of their intent, confiscation. He was more careful in Texas.
https://www.redstate.com/brandon_morse/2019/09/13/hes-fraud-texas-senate-candidate-orourke-presidential-candidate-orourke-disagree-ar-15-ownership/
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The clock is ticking, buy now and start learning to run a rifle. The left has plans for us that include re-education camps and mass graves.
https://thefederalist.com/2019/09/13/not-nra-stopping-gun-control-americas-100-million-gun-owners/
Come and take them.
I'm not armed [yet] or member of the NRA but in the possibility of a new civil war I would like be on the side of the armed.
Remarks by Beto in the debate, hell yes we will take your rifles, make me want to go out and make that purchase previously discussed.
The gaffe was that Dems aren't supposed to say aloud in public the word of their intent, confiscation. He was more careful in Texas.
https://www.redstate.com/brandon_morse/2019/09/13/hes-fraud-texas-senate-candidate-orourke-presidential-candidate-orourke-disagree-ar-15-ownership/
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/09/18/report-colt-to-cease-ar-15-production-for-the-civilian-market/
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/09/18/report-colt-to-cease-ar-15-production-for-the-civilian-market/
Buy lowers, at least 3 or more.
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/09/18/report-colt-to-cease-ar-15-production-for-the-civilian-market/
Buy lowers, at least 3 or more.
https://palmettostatearmory.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=lower
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https://www.mvtimes.com/2019/10/11/crossing-guard-relieved-duty-guns-seized/?fbclid=IwAR2U0WnJU0zzh5ghwpH6xorYF6dFHwVcUrHuxynmHLOwMlcTtQkiplwgMrk
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https://www.mvtimes.com/2019/10/11/crossing-guard-relieved-duty-guns-seized/?fbclid=IwAR2U0WnJU0zzh5ghwpH6xorYF6dFHwVcUrHuxynmHLOwMlcTtQkiplwgMrk
At least we still have the constitution...
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https://www.ammoland.com/2016/03/supreme-court-confirms-second-amendment-applies-bearable-arms-common-use/?fbclid=IwAR3SRDCUQZcQJgZbE1mTSyXxyB9i84KnFhPC8Esa6QHwf-fLUY24CzQGLWE#axzz62wjcakii
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https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2019/10/28/dave-chappelle-receives-mark-twain-award-prize-kennedy-center/2482692001/
"Man, it's not that serious. The First Amendment is first for a reason. Second Amendment is just in case the First one doesn't work out."
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(https://westernrifleshooters.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/ashley_sword_5630.jpg)
It needs to disarm you so it's safe for Antifa/MS13/jihadists to come to you house and kidnap/kill you and your family.
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https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/pregnant-florida-woman-uses-ar-15-to-fend-off-burglars-attacking-her-family?fbclid=IwAR3rjnjApBRa6ERrejM9D7yVLSV1HEOlqprzWobSAItni2Sym_ySNFvxv1s
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https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/supreme-court-allows-families-of-sandy-hook-victims-to-sue-maker-of-rifle-used-in-shooting?fbclid=IwAR0hhuwletmck7rxtAdAwh-fJo8G8fU1c7Fq91RmmPOIFl1X_0Plu8TwSoo
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second post
https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/ca-governor-signs-broadest-red-flag-laws-in-america/?utm_campaign=shareaholic&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=socialnetwork&fbclid=IwAR3fQnEo2KCDLcjco6DyCX1TsglmgoyDQVhaIeYAvZTO1Ia7D2rVbE7P6ys
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https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/supreme-court-allows-families-of-sandy-hook-victims-to-sue-maker-of-rifle-used-in-shooting?fbclid=IwAR0hhuwletmck7rxtAdAwh-fJo8G8fU1c7Fq91RmmPOIFl1X_0Plu8TwSoo
They declined to hear the case which lets the lawsuit in CT proceed. My understanding: Their protection from this kind of thing has an exception for marketing practices. The arguments in the case will be important as the debate over the second amendment continues.
To the opponents of the second, they see the marketing of AR15 for civilians to shoot humans in a military style to be genocidal and don't contemplate defensive situations. Remington should be able to prevail in court depending on the bias of the jury and the content in these ads, and whatever else influences the outcome.
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https://mises.org/wire/why-we-cant-ignore-militia-clause-second-amendment?fbclid=IwAR2rhYFdRRJnUZ6CFrvRcsN_YmMLWNyn29UvdAaXOa7n7Am3ZcxGbLp7vk8#.Xd5imCeIrah.facebook
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https://www.dailysignal.com/2019/12/02/4-key-exchanges-as-supreme-court-hears-nyc-handgun-case/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=4-key-exchanges-as-supreme-court-hears-nyc-handgun-case?utm_source=TDS_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MorningBell&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiT0RkbU5UUmtZMlpoWVdSaSIsInQiOiJZcG50dkFHK2lnNWxCdU9ZQ3pQUk03YngycVVjdElvREJxN1VDVzBqRGxuaWVwXC9nN0V0RjVcL0VqXC8rZFBoQkVwN0lzRndCWlR0aExHNUlhZk9FNDZnTUUwTjRlRkhvMEJEb1VxaHkxSmxKYnJIMWNEcVQxRHJzWVBQQ3lkY3BWWCJ9
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https://www.secondamendmentdaily.com/2019/12/virginia-sheriff-i-will-deputize-thousands-of-citizens-to-protect-their-gun-rights/?fbclid=IwAR1hkuVXUQqKIgKeatVdE8KelInVQt13aUfM4x8I4fr6UjOZcEu0QGW2Xm8
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https://www.secondamendmentdaily.com/2019/12/virginia-sheriff-i-will-deputize-thousands-of-citizens-to-protect-their-gun-rights/?fbclid=IwAR1hkuVXUQqKIgKeatVdE8KelInVQt13aUfM4x8I4fr6UjOZcEu0QGW2Xm8
Virginia may be where things go kinetic.
Dems: Turn in your guns!
The gun owners: No. Your move.
Reminder, even in deep blue NY State, Big Fredo dares not try confiscation.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/news/fedex-driver-fatally-shoots-suspect-during-philadelphia-robbery/
:-D
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https://www.nationalreview.com/news/fedex-driver-fatally-shoots-suspect-during-philadelphia-robbery/
:-D
FedEx will fire him, of course.
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https://americanmilitarynews.com/2019/10/fbi-stats-show-5-times-more-murders-by-knives-than-rifles-in-2018/amp/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rk_md3j5YZg&feature=youtu.be
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https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/national-guardsman-we-will-not-comply-if-ordered-by-virginia-governor-to-arrest-police-confiscate-guns/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mhYRSy8pE8
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https://fee.org/articles/california-s-background-check-law-had-no-impact-on-gun-deaths-johns-hopkins-study-finds/
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second post
https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/sheriff-i-might-not-like-the-law-but-ill-still-confiscate-your-guns/
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https://gellerreport.com/2019/12/gunman-opens-fire-in-texas-church-courageous-armed-parishioners-take-him-out.html/
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very impressive
church member .
Looks like about 15 feet away stopped the shooter with one shot from what I can tell .
Walked right toward him.
Either he saw something was about to happen or he reacted near immediately.
-
either he has been well trained in military or law enforcement or
has taken training and a natural born hero:
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/juliorosas/2019/12/30/hero-security-guard-speaks-out-on-texas-church-shooting-n2558681
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https://vosizneias.com/2019/12/29/watch-orthodox-jews-stand-guard-with-assault-style-rifles-in-monsey/
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https://vosizneias.com/2019/12/29/watch-orthodox-jews-stand-guard-with-assault-style-rifles-in-monsey/
Those rifles and magazines appear to be in violation of t
NY State's SAFE act. Will Big Fredo enforce the law?
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I was wondering the very same thing :evil:
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Leaving aside the tragedy of the two parishioners lost, the Texas incident provided “wins” for almost every group.
Starting big picture with government, Texas politicians felt pretty smart for having passed legislation allowing an armed defense that clearly averted worse tragedy here. Trump likes it because it is consistent with his view on guns, and is supported by his base. Republicans like it because they believe guns are good. Democrats like it because they believe guns are bad. Even Joe Biden, not our brightest thinker, remembers how he was “for shotguns” before the Beretta 1301, and a dedicated sub forum here, made them cool again.
Old shooters love it, because the good guy prevailed using a modified Weaver, showing how the Weaver is a “fighting stance,” and mind set trumps fancy shooting skills every time. They excuse Mr Wilson not having a proper caliber, .45, and a proper pistol, a 1911, but no doubt are setting up a Go Fund Me to solve the 1911 oversight.
Red dot shooters like it, because they know the shoot was at the limit of iron sights, and if it was just three pews further, a red dot would have been necessary to save the day. Does get them thinking about the proper distance for a red dot zero, and BUIS, given the piss poor reliability of optics — it would really suck to draw your gun to save the day and have no dot. No doubt, the Modern Samurai will cover all this in an upcoming class.
USPSA shooters love it, because even though the draw doesn’t matter much in USPSA, their skills shooting PCC and Open guns would have come in darn handy that day. Plus, that first shotgun blast was pretty close to the beep from a Pocket Pro II with a fresh battery. IDPA hasn’t been this excited since the Kenya intervention by an IDPA shooter there. The good guy, Mr Wilson, had a proper IDPA vest, and no doubt this scenario will be done as a stage at the next indoor IDPA Nationals. Even the hero had the right IDPA name — “Wilson.”
Technical Timmies are in heaven. Poor guy got himself killed because he didn’t have even a dark pin draw. A turbo draw from the hero might have gotten the bad guy with no good guy fatalities. If only there was an appendix holster on the security team, a draw from sitting would be cake (of course no sitting reholstering unless SCD equipped). There are probably a half dozen drills of the week possible from this event.
Ammo makers like it, because sales of .357 Sig will likely double, from the 2019 weekly average of 18 boxes of 20 cartridges, all the way to 36 boxes, at least for a few weeks. Sig USA is thrilled, because the last time anyone said anything positive about the P229 — well, it has been so long, not even Sig can remember. Also how nice for Sig to be in the news for their product dropping the bad guy instead of being dropped by the good guy, and then shooting the good guy.
Gun forum owners love it, because it has spawned pages of new discussion, keeping things active until the Glock 44 starts shipping and we can discuss what sights regulate and what rimfire ammo has the fewest misfires.
Evangelicals love it because it proves people still go to church, and church is important enough to shoot up. It probably helps male attendance, as guys that would go to the range on Sunday now kit up and head to church hoping to see the elephant. It also reinforces why the ladies need to look their best at church, since they can end up on national TV when least expected.
Mexico loves it, because it shows crazy stuff happens places other than Mexico. Not even a suggestion a wall would have prevented this event. Muslims appear to have dodged a bullet with this event. Even the FBI looks like they didn’t miss preventing this — unlike that darn last Texas thing or two.
So, as they say, success has many parents, and only failure is an orphan. I hope Mr Wilson drinks, because he won’t be buying a drink for the rest of his days on earth.
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We don't let them have ideas. Why would we let them have guns?
- Joseph Stalin
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/joseph_stalin_388500
[Note the us / them distinction in so-called socialism. His rulers had guns. The ruled didn't.]
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We don't let them have ideas. Why would we let them have guns?
- Joseph Stalin
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/joseph_stalin_388500
[Note the us / them distinction in so-called socialism. His rulers had guns. The ruled didn't.]
That's how it works. Hard to load people onto boxcars if they are busy shooting you.
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https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/virginia-gun-store-says-firearms-ammunition-and-magazines-flying-off-the-shelves-upswing-on-buying-by-cash
Just to turn them in next month!
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https://www.wnd.com/2020/01/virginia-governor-requests-18-officer-team-enforce-gun-ban/
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https://www.wnd.com/2020/01/virginia-governor-requests-18-officer-team-enforce-gun-ban/
That's a job that better pay better than a pro football player. Are they going to provide a secure compound for the officers and their families to live in?
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https://www.daybydaycartoon.com/comic/dips/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+DayByDayCartoon+%28Day+by+Day+Cartoon+by+Chris+Muir%29
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https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/thousands-of-cops-veterans-supporters-pledge-to-join-militia-in-virginia/?utm_campaign=shareaholic
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Is zip tie and gorilla tape control next?
Couldn't have done this premeditated brutal murder without it. After that and putting her in the truck, the weapon of choice was of no significance.
http://www.startribune.com/activists-to-hold-news-conference-to-decry-murder-of-28-year-old-woman-in-north-minneapolis/566682431/
I have already proposed background checks for certain items sold at Minneapolis North End Hardware.
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Gun control has never been about preventing crime.
Is zip tie and gorilla tape control next?
Couldn't have done this premeditated brutal murder without it. After that and putting her in the truck, the weapon of choice was of no significance.
http://www.startribune.com/activists-to-hold-news-conference-to-decry-murder-of-28-year-old-woman-in-north-minneapolis/566682431/
I have already proposed background checks for certain items sold at Minneapolis North End Hardware.
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https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/breaking-virginia-vows-to-shut-down-all-gun-ranges-not-owned-by-the-state/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTW7OF4k55Q
Time to buy a 3D printer!
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https://nj1015.com/nj-gave-texas-church-gunman-plea-deal-that-wiped-out-gun-felony/
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https://nj1015.com/nj-gave-texas-church-gunman-plea-deal-that-wiped-out-gun-felony/
Gun control is about disarming Americans so they can be preyed upon by the dem voting blocs.
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https://www.secondamendmentdaily.com/2020/01/tazewell-county-va-formed-a-militia-what-does-that-look-like-can-we-have-one-too/
Off the top of my head I like their articulation.
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https://concealednation.org/2020/01/armed-citizen-shoots-and-kills-suspect-who-ambushed-and-shot-state-trooper-on-highway/
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http://ace.mu.nu/archives/385290.php
Dibs on the top bunk at the Gulag.
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20200114/virginia-bill-filed-to-eliminate-right-to-carry-permit-reciprocity?utm_source=email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=ila_alert
https://www.westernjournal.com/virginia-gun-confiscation-bill-pulled-huge-pro-gun-crowd-shows-legislature-protest/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=conservativetribune&utm_content=2020-01-14&utm_campaign=hottakes
Gov. counters with this
https://www.dailywire.com/news/breaking-virginia-democrat-governor-ralph-northam-to-declare-emergency-banning-all-guns-from-state-capitol-grounds?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=benshapiro
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https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/akwv4k/why-antifa-is-siding-with-thousands-of-pro-gun-conservatives-in-virginia?utm_campaign=sharebutton
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https://nationalfile.com/west-virginia-plans-to-accept-virginia-counties-that-secede-over-gun-control-concerns/
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https://nationalfile.com/west-virginia-plans-to-accept-virginia-counties-that-secede-over-gun-control-concerns/
Peaceful separation is our only remaining option to avoid CW2.
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https://www.westernjournal.com/virginia-gun-confiscation-bill-pulled-huge-pro-gun-crowd-shows-legislature-protest/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=westernjournalism&utm_content=2020-01-17&utm_campaign=topweekly
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https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/nm-sheriffs-force-lawmakers-to-abandon-red-flag-bill-we-refuse-to-enforce-unconstitutional-laws/
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Third post
https://rare.us/rare-politics/rare-liberty/when-mlk-wanted-to-protect-his-family-from-terrorists-he-was-denied-his-second-amendment-rights/
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https://www.lawenforcementtoday.com/nm-sheriffs-force-lawmakers-to-abandon-red-flag-bill-we-refuse-to-enforce-unconstitutional-laws/
New Mexico in this case, but this could happen in almost every state. Trump carried 78 of 87 counties in Minnesota in a close loss. Driving across northern, central and western Wisconsin last summer (where Trump won) I couldn't help noticing that all the political yard signs were for Sheriff with the name changing every time you go into another county. Out in the heartland, they care deeply who is Sheriff. For all the political study I do, I couldn't figure out the meaning of that.
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https://keepva2a.com/news.php?pid=336
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https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/washington-post-calls-out-nancy-pelosi-for-repeated-lies-about-gun-deaths-in-the-us/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=agora&utm_term=ttagfeed&utm_campaign=ttagfeed
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https://bongino.com/virginia-begins-advancing-gun-ban/
-
https://www.ksl.com/article/46715179/utahns-rally-against-gun-control-legislation
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/virginia-gun-ban-fails-in-senate-committee-marking-legislative-blow-for-gov-northam?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=benshapiro
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/how-a-grassroots-effort-shaped-a-surprise-win-in-virginia-for-gun-owners_3241856.html?ref=brief_News&utm_source=Epoch+Times+Newsletters&utm_campaign=38b3498df8-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_02_19_06_09&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_4fba358ecf-38b3498df8-239065853
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https://www.concealedcarry.com/news/armed-citizens-are-successful-95-of-the-time-at-active-shooter-events-fbi/
-
https://crimeresearch.org/2018/08/new-cprc-research-how-a-botched-study-fooled-the-world-about-the-u-s-share-of-mass-public-shootings-u-s-rate-is-lower-than-global-average/?utm_campaign=meetedgar&utm_medium=social&utm_source=meetedgar.com
vs.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/12/mass-shootings-mother-jones-full-data/
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https://freebeacon.com/issues/researchers-schools-shootings-not-rise-schools-safer-90s/
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https://tennesseestar.com/2017/05/15/constitution-series-the-second-amendment/
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second post
The husband of LA DA vs. BLM visitors on their porch:
https://newsone.com/3906406/jackie-lacey-husband-aims-gun-blm-video/
Oh the irony!
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/03/21/illinois-governor-lists-gun-stores-as-essential-exempts-them-from-forced-shutdown/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_term=todays_hottest_stories&utm_campaign=20200321
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The world retains its ability to surprise:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/fully-armed-rally-goers-enter-kentuckys-capitol-building-with-zero-resistance-946606/
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The world retains its ability to surprise:
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/fully-armed-rally-goers-enter-kentuckys-capitol-building-with-zero-resistance-946606/
It's a good way to see if you are in a free state.
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https://www.secondamendmentdaily.com/2020/05/whistleblower-trooper-says-maine-state-police-were-collecting-storing-gun-owners-data-illegally/
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I passed through South and North Minneapolis without any trouble today, but after two nights of violence today this might have been a day when a person didn't want to helpless if trouble came your way.
It was hard for me to know when I would carry if I held a permit to do so. When you need to go back into a trouble area on the day or the day after big trouble, that might be among those times. It takes time to learn marksmanship and safety, to get a permit and to buy what you need to be ready. When you need it, it is too late to start the process. Lesson almost learned.
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"Intelligence is the amount of time it takes to forget a lesson."
This may be one of mine :-D
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It is always better to have a gun and not need it rather than need a gun and not have it.
I passed through South and North Minneapolis without any trouble today, but after two nights of violence today this might have been a day when a person didn't want to helpless if trouble came your way.
It was hard for me to know when I would carry if I held a permit to do so. When you need to go back into a trouble area on the day or the day after big trouble, that might be among those times. It takes time to learn marksmanship and safety, to get a permit and to buy what you need to be ready. When you need it, it is too late to start the process. Lesson almost learned.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/american-gun-sales-at-near-record-levels/amp/?taid=5ed78a6c4b7b8500011e94c1&utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&__twitter_impression=true
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I am so sick of saying it. Our G M was right. Must I write that in every topic?? :wink:
What does disband, de-fund the police mean? Arm yourself. Arm your home. Arm your store.
Crafty and DBMA were right along too. Learn to defend yourself and the ones you love. "Die Less Often".
What surprises me most about all this is that the message is coming from the anti-gun side of the aisle. Wait for your emergency. Call 911 and no one from police or fire will be coming out to help you. You are on your own. "Plan accordingly".
My photo (from SJW thread), looking out to the neighbor's property from a garage we built:
(https://i.ibb.co/V2Yrqgs/West-Broadway-building-behind-Sheridan-house.jpg)
No fire department called or came, apparently. Still no police tape up. No file opened. No investigation. No suspects. No arrests. No convictions. No one gives a rat's ass. Soon there will be no property insurance sold. Does your city provide police and fire protection? No? Then we don't write policies there.
On the nicer side of town in Uptown where young professionals want to live, we have our nicest property we call Lake Calhoun View in our rental ads, right behind the Lake Calhoun Pavilion. Lake Calhoun is (was) the largest of the Minneapolis lakes that the NBA champion Minneapolis Lakers were named for, now the LA Lakers. My mom went to Clalhoun elementary school but it is no longer called Lake Calhoun because Calhoun was a slavery supporting Vice President. Now it is Bde Maka Ska as the more politically correct Sioux Indians called it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_War_of_1862, and the Pavilion was burnt to the ground by Islamic terrorists last year. https://www.startribune.com/fire-damages-pavilion-and-restaurant-at-bde-maka-ska/510005182/ https://www.startribune.com/pair-caught-on-camera-at-bde-maka-ska-lake-calhoun-pavilion-before-fire-id-d/510304872/
And the building on our corner of Lake Street was vandalized in the riots last week. Great neighborhood.
No Police or fire dept and a government that supports Anarchy means arm yourself. Not just guns but smoke masks and who knows what else.
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Welcome to the Burning 20's.
This is the American Kristallnact. It only gets worse from here.
I am so sick of saying it. Our G M was right. Must I write that in every topic?? :wink:
What does disband, de-fund the police mean? Arm yourself. Arm your home. Arm your store.
Crafty and DBMA were right along too. Learn to defend yourself and the ones you love. "Die Less Often".
What surprises me most about all this is that the message is coming from the anti-gun side of the aisle. Wait for your emergency. Call 911 and no one from police or fire will be coming out to help you. You are on your own. "Plan accordingly".
My photo (from SJW thread), looking out to the neighbor's property from a garage we built:
(https://i.ibb.co/V2Yrqgs/West-Broadway-building-behind-Sheridan-house.jpg)
No fire department called or came, apparently. Still no police tape up. No file opened. No investigation. No suspects. No arrests. No convictions. No one gives a rat's ass. Soon there will be no property insurance sold. Does your city provide police and fire protection? No? Then we don't write policies there.
On the nicer side of town in Uptown where young professionals want to live, we have our nicest property we call Lake Calhoun View in our rental ads, right behind the Lake Calhoun Pavilion. Lake Calhoun is (was) the largest of the Minneapolis lakes that the NBA champion Minneapolis Lakers were named for, now the LA Lakers. My mom went to Clalhoun elementary school but it is no longer called Lake Calhoun because Calhoun was a slavery supporting Vice President. Now it is Bde Maka Ska as the more politically correct Sioux Indians called it, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dakota_War_of_1862, and the Pavilion was burnt to the ground by Islamic terrorists last year. https://www.startribune.com/fire-damages-pavilion-and-restaurant-at-bde-maka-ska/510005182/ https://www.startribune.com/pair-caught-on-camera-at-bde-maka-ska-lake-calhoun-pavilion-before-fire-id-d/510304872/
And the building on our corner of Lake Street was vandalized in the riots last week. Great neighborhood.
No Police or fire dept and a government that supports Anarchy means arm yourself. Not just guns but smoke masks and who knows what else.
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https://freebeacon.com/courts/justice-thomas-accuses-supreme-court-of-dodging-gun-cases/
-
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/03/19/maine-gun-tattoo/6624731/
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https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/local/2020/07/02/sheriffs-office-investigating-orion-township-parking-lot-altercation-caught-on-video/
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Question:
Son is looking to upgrade the 9mm's that we have. Looking for a Beretta 9mm. Online stores all are out of stock. Has tried calling sporting goods stores and are out of stock as well.
Anyone know of a place he can buy one and get shipped to CA licensed dealer?
Thanks.
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What model of Beretta 9mm?
Question:
Son is looking to upgrade the 9mm's that we have. Looking for a Beretta 9mm. Online stores all are out of stock. Has tried calling sporting goods stores and are out of stock as well.
Anyone know of a place he can buy one and get shipped to CA licensed dealer?
Thanks.
-
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/police-seize-rifle-from-st-louis-couple-who-waved-guns-at-protesters
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https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/wesley-chapel-homeowner-shoots-kills-armed-robbers-surviving-suspect-faces-murder-charges?utm_campaign=trueanthem&utm_medium=trueanthem&utm_source=facebook
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https://www.captainsjournal.com/2020/07/13/the-progressives-problem-with-guns-blm-and-police/
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https://www.ar500armor.com/news/from-where-does-authority-come
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Our Second Amendment: A rejection of nobility
BY JOHN M. DEMAGGIO, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 07/18/20 04:00 PM EDT
The argument over the Second Amendment routinely centers on guns. But our Second Amendment right to “keep and bear arms” has just as much to do with casting off the stratification of the social class system and buttressing religious freedom.
The Bill of Rights solidifies a number of beliefs and rights discussed in the body of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
The Declaration of Independence cites “the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God” plus the famous words “they are endowed by their Creator,” and Article VI of the Constitution states “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” These religious beliefs and freedoms are solidified in the Bill of Rights First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
Two grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence are “For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury” and “For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences.” While the Constitution under Article 1 sec 9.2 states “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended.” These rights are solidified in the Bill of Rights Fifth Amendment — “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on presentation or indictment of a Grand Jury” — and Sixth Amendment: “the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.”
One cannot discuss the Bill of Rights independently but must consider it within a broader discussion encompassing two other pillars of our system of government: the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
Today people immediately consider “arms” to be guns. But in the long run-up to American independence — in medieval, pre-colonial and colonial times — arms for “bearing” were usually edged weapons, especially swords.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art tells us that in medieval times “generally speaking only noblemen were allowed to carry a sword in public.”
Plinio Correa de Oliveira writes in “What is the Symbol of Nobility and Power? And Why?” that “The people of the Middle Ages regarded the sword with a certain profundity, esteeming it as a symbol of man’s God-given nobility.”
French nobility prerogatives after 1440 included the right to “wear a sword.” The sword was used during the noble “dubbing ceremony,” still practiced by today’s British Crown.
In “Warrior Pursuits: Noble Culture and Civil Conflict in Early Modern France” Brian Sandberg writes “The early seventeenth century jurist Charles Loyseau points out that ‘all nobles except those of the long robe have the right to bear the sword as the insignia and mark of nobility."
As guns became more prevalent, swords took on even greater symbolism of higher class.
Ben Miller in “Fencing in Colonial America and the Early Republic: 1620 – 1800” makes repeated reference to fencing as “the noble art’ or “the noble science.” He also tells us that the Virginia fencing master, Edward Blackwell stated: “In fine, Air in Wearing, and Skill in Using a SWORD, are such additional Accomplishments to a Gentleman, that he is never esteem’d polite and well bred without them.”
Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defining arms notes that “for common soldiers a sword is not necessary.”
There was often religious — as well as class — restrictions on such “arms.” As far back as 1181, the English Assize of Arms required freemen to maintain a lance for defense of the King, but specifically restricted Jews from maintaining arms. In District of Columbia et al. v. Heller Justice Antonin Scallia, delivering the majority opinion, discussed other historical instances of access to arms denied based on religious affiliation.
The prerogative to “bear arms” of the day, specifically the sword, was a right, privilege and symbol of nobility denied to the commoner and often subject to a “religious test.”
There is no reference to citizen’s arms in the Declaration of Independence or the body of the Constitution — but there is ample evidence regarding equality and prohibitions against nobility. Our Declaration of Independence reflects all men have an “equal station” and “all men are created equal…” while the United States Constitution declares under Article 1 Sec 9.8 “No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States” and in Sec 10.1 forbids the states from granting “any Title of Nobility.”
Pelosi remembers John Lewis as 'a titan' whose 'bravery transformed...
Under the Second Amendment, while “keep… arms” bolsters the First Amendment’s guaranteed religious freedom, the right to “bear arms” solidified the Constitutional rejection of “Titles of Nobility” and reaffirmed that “all men are created equal” with an “equal station” as stated in the Declaration of Independence.
I wonder if opposition to the Second Amendment’s right of people to “bear arms” might also be — at some level — a rejection of the “equal station” of all people, a reaffirmation of a sort of “Nobility,” a sense of privilege by an established “professional political class?”
John M. DeMaggio is a retired Special Agent in Charge for the U.S. Postal Service Inspector General. He is also a retired Captain in the U.S. Navy, where he served in Naval Intelligence. The above is the opinion of the author and is not meant to reflect the opinion of the U.S. Navy or the U.S. Government.
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"I wonder if opposition to the Second Amendment’s right of people to “bear arms” might also be — at some level — a rejection of the “equal station” of all people, a reaffirmation of a sort of “Nobility,” a sense of privilege by an established “professional political class?”
Throughout human history, different times and different cultures a clear line between serf/slaves and those that ruled over them was the ability to possess weapons.
Our Second Amendment: A rejection of nobility
BY JOHN M. DEMAGGIO, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 07/18/20 04:00 PM EDT
The argument over the Second Amendment routinely centers on guns. But our Second Amendment right to “keep and bear arms” has just as much to do with casting off the stratification of the social class system and buttressing religious freedom.
The Bill of Rights solidifies a number of beliefs and rights discussed in the body of the United States Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
The Declaration of Independence cites “the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God” plus the famous words “they are endowed by their Creator,” and Article VI of the Constitution states “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.” These religious beliefs and freedoms are solidified in the Bill of Rights First Amendment, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”
Two grievances listed in the Declaration of Independence are “For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury” and “For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences.” While the Constitution under Article 1 sec 9.2 states “The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended.” These rights are solidified in the Bill of Rights Fifth Amendment — “No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on presentation or indictment of a Grand Jury” — and Sixth Amendment: “the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.”
One cannot discuss the Bill of Rights independently but must consider it within a broader discussion encompassing two other pillars of our system of government: the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
Today people immediately consider “arms” to be guns. But in the long run-up to American independence — in medieval, pre-colonial and colonial times — arms for “bearing” were usually edged weapons, especially swords.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art tells us that in medieval times “generally speaking only noblemen were allowed to carry a sword in public.”
Plinio Correa de Oliveira writes in “What is the Symbol of Nobility and Power? And Why?” that “The people of the Middle Ages regarded the sword with a certain profundity, esteeming it as a symbol of man’s God-given nobility.”
French nobility prerogatives after 1440 included the right to “wear a sword.” The sword was used during the noble “dubbing ceremony,” still practiced by today’s British Crown.
In “Warrior Pursuits: Noble Culture and Civil Conflict in Early Modern France” Brian Sandberg writes “The early seventeenth century jurist Charles Loyseau points out that ‘all nobles except those of the long robe have the right to bear the sword as the insignia and mark of nobility."
As guns became more prevalent, swords took on even greater symbolism of higher class.
Ben Miller in “Fencing in Colonial America and the Early Republic: 1620 – 1800” makes repeated reference to fencing as “the noble art’ or “the noble science.” He also tells us that the Virginia fencing master, Edward Blackwell stated: “In fine, Air in Wearing, and Skill in Using a SWORD, are such additional Accomplishments to a Gentleman, that he is never esteem’d polite and well bred without them.”
Webster’s 1828 Dictionary defining arms notes that “for common soldiers a sword is not necessary.”
There was often religious — as well as class — restrictions on such “arms.” As far back as 1181, the English Assize of Arms required freemen to maintain a lance for defense of the King, but specifically restricted Jews from maintaining arms. In District of Columbia et al. v. Heller Justice Antonin Scallia, delivering the majority opinion, discussed other historical instances of access to arms denied based on religious affiliation.
The prerogative to “bear arms” of the day, specifically the sword, was a right, privilege and symbol of nobility denied to the commoner and often subject to a “religious test.”
There is no reference to citizen’s arms in the Declaration of Independence or the body of the Constitution — but there is ample evidence regarding equality and prohibitions against nobility. Our Declaration of Independence reflects all men have an “equal station” and “all men are created equal…” while the United States Constitution declares under Article 1 Sec 9.8 “No Title of Nobility shall be granted by the United States” and in Sec 10.1 forbids the states from granting “any Title of Nobility.”
Pelosi remembers John Lewis as 'a titan' whose 'bravery transformed...
Under the Second Amendment, while “keep… arms” bolsters the First Amendment’s guaranteed religious freedom, the right to “bear arms” solidified the Constitutional rejection of “Titles of Nobility” and reaffirmed that “all men are created equal” with an “equal station” as stated in the Declaration of Independence.
I wonder if opposition to the Second Amendment’s right of people to “bear arms” might also be — at some level — a rejection of the “equal station” of all people, a reaffirmation of a sort of “Nobility,” a sense of privilege by an established “professional political class?”
John M. DeMaggio is a retired Special Agent in Charge for the U.S. Postal Service Inspector General. He is also a retired Captain in the U.S. Navy, where he served in Naval Intelligence. The above is the opinion of the author and is not meant to reflect the opinion of the U.S. Navy or the U.S. Government.
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https://www.redstate.com/nick-arama/2020/07/22/mccloskey-gun-inoperable-when-police-seized-it-but-prosecution-ordered-crime-lab-to-make-it-operable-and-lethal/
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https://www.redstate.com/nick-arama/2020/07/22/mccloskey-gun-inoperable-when-police-seized-it-but-prosecution-ordered-crime-lab-to-make-it-operable-and-lethal/
https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/local/gardner-staffer-ordered-crime-lab-to-reassemble-patricia-mccloskeys-gun/63-be112149-d06c-4f54-a225-6545e74b5c2d?utm_campaign=snd-autopilot
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https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b99a228ede63d04e2bbe6ac4b838b2c464985203dc34e60fee4850fffe6db46f.jpg
(https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/b99a228ede63d04e2bbe6ac4b838b2c464985203dc34e60fee4850fffe6db46f.jpg)
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it is their first amendments rights. :-(
peaceful protesters ( he was not aiming his gun it was pointed down when he approached the vehicle) my behind
https://www.yahoo.com/news/garrett-foster-brought-gun-austin-114325700.html
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/armed-minneapolis-residents-are-patrolling-their-own-neighborhoods-as-city-moves-to-defund-police?
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https://trudreadz.com/2020/07/10/organized-black-militias-are-forming-everywhere-because-america-wont-stop-oppressing-and-killing-black-people/
https://reason.com/2020/07/29/the-second-amendment-is-not-restricted-to-white-conservatives/
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https://m.theliontimes.com/politics/missouri-ag-eric-schmitt-will-dismiss-case-against-st-louis-couple-charged-with-brandishing-gun.html?t=wk8796ec
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https://m.theliontimes.com/politics/missouri-ag-eric-schmitt-will-dismiss-case-against-st-louis-couple-charged-with-brandishing-gun.html?t=wk8796ec
They should use this opportunity to get properly trained and equipped.
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'The first rule of gun safety,
don't let the government take your guns'.
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'The first rule of gun safety,
don't let the government take your guns'.
Yup.
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'The first rule of gun safety,
don't let the government take your guns'.
Yup.
Just social distance.
Just wear a mask.
Just shut down the economy.
Just don't resist when you are the victim of violent crime.
Just turn in your guns.
Just get into the boxcar.
Just go into the showers.
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https://dailycaller.com/2020/08/10/nyc-gun-permit-applications-rifle-handgun/
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https://dailycaller.com/2020/08/10/nyc-gun-permit-applications-rifle-handgun/
"New York City Rifle Permit Applications Surge by 340%"
Famous people caught reading the forum. Someone here wrote, "Plan accordingly".
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http://ace.mu.nu/archives/389609.php
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https://pjmedia.com/columns/victoria-taft/2020/09/02/exclusive-case-of-portland-man-who-defended-himself-against-antifa-mob-heads-to-supreme-court-n876896
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Our ‘Orphan’ Constitutional Right
The Roberts Court can’t duck the Second Amendment forever.
By The WSJ Editorial Board
Sept. 3, 2020 7:11 pm ET
The Third Circuit Court of Appeals this week upheld a New Jersey ban on “large capacity magazines” for guns—i.e., those that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. The ruling, by a three-judge panel, comes some two weeks after a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit reached the opposite conclusion about a similar California ban. This is what happens when the Supreme Court, in the words of Justice Clarence Thomas, treats the Second Amendment as a “constitutional orphan.”
Justice Thomas offered his complaint in 2018 after the Court failed to hear a case challenging California’s 10-day waiting period to buy a firearm. This June the Supreme Court passed on 10 more gun-related cases, another sign it is reluctant to end the confusion by delineating how far the government can go in regulating firearms and ammunition. One of the declined cases involved a Massachusetts law that also bans magazines of more than 10 rounds.
In the Ninth Circuit opinion finding California’s ban unconstitutional, the panel noted that “firearms with greater than ten round capacities existed even before our nation’s founding, and the common use of LCMs for self-defense is apparent in our shared national history.” In contrast, the Third Circuit, while agreeing that these magazines are “typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,” nonetheless ruled the ban “does not burden the core Second Amendment guarantee.”
The reason for these competing judgments is that despite two landmark Supreme Court cases upholding gun rights—District of Columbia v. Heller in 2008, McDonald v. Chicago in 2010—there is still no clear standard for evaluating Second Amendment claims. Courts upholding bans and restrictions generally rely on lower levels of scrutiny that allow courts to balance interests. But this erodes the individual right to bear arms case by case. As Third Circuit Judge Paul Matey argued in his dissent, following “the direction of the Supreme Court” should mean a focus on the Second Amendment’s “text, history and tradition.”
The best way to look at these dueling rulings is as a signal to Chief Justice John Roberts that he can’t duck the issue forever.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2RJ-iv2VyQ
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https://americanmilitarynews.com/2020/10/supreme-court-refuses-to-hear-2nd-second-amendment-case-this-year-first-this-session/?utm_campaign=DailyEmails&utm_source=AM_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Master+List&utm_campaign=0726517d7f-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2020_10_05_09_28&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9c4ef113e0-0726517d7f-61658629&mc_cid=0726517d7f
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https://townhall.com/columnists/joshpinho/2020/08/07/joe-bidens-gun-violence-plan-is-bad-news-for-gun-owners-n2573885
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I'll try this question a third time. Is there any reasonable restriction on the right to bear arms that is constitutional? How extreme do we need the example to be in order to agree there is a line - somewhere?
From NK thread: "NK has 15 to 60 nuclear weapons and hundreds of missiles"
Can Jeff Bezos have this (in America), private stock on private property? Is any law that restricts this an unconstitutional abridgement of an absolute right?
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I'll try this question a third time. Is there any reasonable restriction on the right to bear arms that is constitutional? How extreme do we need the example to be in order to agree there is a line - somewhere?
From NK thread: "NK has 15 to 60 nuclear weapons and hundreds of missiles"
Can Jeff Bezos have this (in America), private stock on private property? Is any law that restricts this an unconstitutional abridgement of an absolute right?
No. There is no reasonable restriction.
Also, the Constitution has no inherent authority. It never has..
Fundamentally.... Bezos having nukes is no different than Soros, Rothschilds et al and their connections.
There can never be "reasonable" restrictions because the right to defend one's life is always greater than someone else's right to their idea of "safety;" in that, "safety" is intangible, or even a fabrication....a lie.... whereas the ability to protect oneself against tyranny, is not.
One of the root causes of this problem, is the view that the Constitution ever had any validity.
The first constitution..."the Articles of Confederation," stipulated a unanimous vote. There was never a unanimous vote, nor a public debate...in the adoption of a new Constitution or creation of an executive branch of government....so we have fruit of the poisonous tree.
You know it.
Even if the Constitution did carry weight... It still isn't the origin of our Rights. The Declaration of Independence makes that clear.
Then... The entire implied, tacit, and explicit consent arguments....
There is no reasonable gun control. Ever.
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Thank you for the direct answer. I would like to invite Crafty and GM to answer same question. What say you and others about any restrictions on private arms up to literally nuclear weapons on private property?
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No right is absolute. IMHO, the intent of the founders is clear by what was privately owned at the time of the founding, which included warships and artillery.
https://www.guns.com/news/2020/06/30/biden-fails-fact-check-on-revolutionary-war-cannon-ownership
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I think of it as what a Minuteman Militia man was expected to bring when called to defend the nation i.e. the kit of an infantryman.
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Thank you for excellent answers. It gives us something to ponder of what it means today.
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If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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So, if there is an absolute freedom of speech, then would that include the freedom to publish child exploitation media?
In my LE career, I deal with more than a few individuals who were in the system for such things. One individual was charged for possessing images of a 4 year old being violently sodomized. Was this individual wrongly imprisoned?
If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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Not to repeat myself, GM....but to repeat myself.... Is the right to life absolute? A simple "yes" or "no" will suffice.... The smoke cloud attempting to distract a clear act of aggression and pawning it off as freedom of speech isn't what we're discussing here.
We're discussing defense of self. I'm confident that you can grasp that without attempting to twist it into child porn.
Is the right to life absolute? Yes or no?
So, if there is an absolute freedom of speech, then would that include the freedom to publish child exploitation media?
In my LE career, I deal with more than a few individuals who were in the system for such things. One individual was charged for possessing images of a 4 year old being violently sodomized. Was this individual wrongly imprisoned?
If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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If someone murders your loved one, do they have an absolute right to their life?
Not to repeat myself, GM....but to repeat myself.... Is the right to life absolute? A simple "yes" or "no" will suffice.... The smoke cloud attempting to distract a clear act of aggression and pawning it off as freedom of speech isn't what we're discussing here.
We're discussing defense of self. I'm confident that you can grasp that without attempting to twist it into child porn.
Is the right to life absolute? Yes or no?
So, if there is an absolute freedom of speech, then would that include the freedom to publish child exploitation media?
In my LE career, I deal with more than a few individuals who were in the system for such things. One individual was charged for possessing images of a 4 year old being violently sodomized. Was this individual wrongly imprisoned?
If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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You don't like answering questions, do you?
If someone murders your loved one, do they have an absolute right to their life?
Not to repeat myself, GM....but to repeat myself.... Is the right to life absolute? A simple "yes" or "no" will suffice.... The smoke cloud attempting to distract a clear act of aggression and pawning it off as freedom of speech isn't what we're discussing here.
We're discussing defense of self. I'm confident that you can grasp that without attempting to twist it into child porn.
Is the right to life absolute? Yes or no?
So, if there is an absolute freedom of speech, then would that include the freedom to publish child exploitation media?
In my LE career, I deal with more than a few individuals who were in the system for such things. One individual was charged for possessing images of a 4 year old being violently sodomized. Was this individual wrongly imprisoned?
If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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At least as much as you do, it seems.
You don't like answering questions, do you?
If someone murders your loved one, do they have an absolute right to their life?
Not to repeat myself, GM....but to repeat myself.... Is the right to life absolute? A simple "yes" or "no" will suffice.... The smoke cloud attempting to distract a clear act of aggression and pawning it off as freedom of speech isn't what we're discussing here.
We're discussing defense of self. I'm confident that you can grasp that without attempting to twist it into child porn.
Is the right to life absolute? Yes or no?
So, if there is an absolute freedom of speech, then would that include the freedom to publish child exploitation media?
In my LE career, I deal with more than a few individuals who were in the system for such things. One individual was charged for possessing images of a 4 year old being violently sodomized. Was this individual wrongly imprisoned?
If no right is "absolute," then a constitution, illegally drafted, and never consented to, by anyone other than the authors....even less.
Edit: great article GM.
To me... Rights are absolute...to the individual. Im fairly certain that everyone views their right to life that way, regardless of what another might think. I know I do. You don't view your right to life as "absolute?" Doug? Crafty? Your wives' lives?
Fair question. Is their right to life absolute? Because... If theirs and your right to life is absolute.... then so is your right to defend it, against any enemy, including when that enemy is dressed in a uniform, pretending to have dominion over you.
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Maybe something we picked up at work. Maybe not.
At least as much as you do, it seems.
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How can one use deadly force in self defense if the other party has an ABSOLUTE right to life?
Maybe something we picked up at work. Maybe not.
At least as much as you do, it seems.
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The right is absolute until you give it away....by attempting to deprive another of theirs.
Still absolute.
Modifying this to cite an example that others also hold this view.
https://www.ag.gov.au/rights-and-protections/human-rights-and-anti-discrimination/human-rights-scrutiny/public-sector-guidance-sheets/absolute-rights
Really any government position is meaningless, as all governments require a consent that in practice, is absent; which, is why I earlier stated that the rights are absolute to the individual, because any wolf will quickly justify why the sheep's life doesn't matter, so long as they retain the upper hand. This, is a given.
Rights are absolute, or they aren't "rights," and they remain that way, until one attempts to take another's, and are only surrendered to that other, while the moment of aggression exists. As soon as the aggression is over, so os the offering of the right that was being surrendered.
I've no doubt that others will disagree, but that goes to prove my point.... Lysander said a lot about this...
If you're already saying that rights are not absolute... Then why even bother using the term? To do so is dishonest. Call them what you think they are - privileges given to the subjects of a ruler.
:D
How can one use deadly force in self defense if the other party has an ABSOLUTE right to life?
Maybe something we picked up at work. Maybe not.
At least as much as you do, it seems.
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While GM and Tordislung are busy being snarky with each other, I would like to add to my answer above:
As the military/police power of the State increases, so too must the the ability of the people so as to maintain their ability to overthrow it should it become necessary.
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While GM and Tordislung are busy being snarky with each other, I would like to add to my answer above:
As the military/police power of the State increases, so too must the the ability of the people so as to maintain their ability to overthrow it should it become necessary.
Wholeheartedly agree.
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Yes, lots of discussion already but I'll answer what is asked of me. My view: No. Right to life is wonderful, crucial, sacred, paramount, but not absolute.
Taking another run at this, take a look at the right to self defense or other instance of justifiable homicide (yes there is such a thing). If I'm the perpetrator in your self defense act, let's say charging at you or your child or spouse with a spear and you have a gun and are willing to use it and justified in law and logic and morals to shoot to kill me to stop me, I lose my right to life. It's an exception or limitation on an important right.
https://definitions.uslegal.com/j/justifiable-homicide/
To me, that makes it not absolute. Maybe it's just definitions...
I asked about falsely hollering fire in a crowded theater endangering lives and safety. It's a widely agreed exception to freedom of speech. The danger presented rises above the right of speech in that instance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_theater
GM's example, exception to freedom of press is also a good analogy IMHO. First amendment, second amendment.
Back to arms: Private ownership of cannons, private ownership of warships, that is amazing. But a private party owning nuclear warheads and missile delivery systems and all levels of government blocked from restricting that - and it's all protected in the constitution - is pretty far out there. I tried to take the example to the point of absurd. I don't believe it's what the Founders intended and I don't think you'll find one in a hundred persuadable to that view. That doesn't make it wrong, but perhaps impracticable.
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"The right is absolute until you give it away....by attempting to deprive another of theirs."
So, then it's not absolute, by definition.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/absolute
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It's about dividing power between entities and individuals, so that no one can ABSOLUTELY dominate the others.
Yes, lots of discussion already but I'll answer what is asked of me. My view: No. Right to life is wonderful, crucial, sacred, paramount, but not absolute.
Taking another run at this, take a look at the right to self defense or other instance of justifiable homicide (yes there is such a thing). If I'm the perpetrator in your self defense act, let's say charging at you or your child or spouse with a spear and you have a gun and are willing to use it and justified in law and logic and morals to shoot to kill me to stop me, I lose my right to life. It's an exception or limitation on an important right.
https://definitions.uslegal.com/j/justifiable-homicide/
To me, that makes it not absolute. Maybe it's just definitions...
I asked about falsely hollering fire in a crowded theater endangering lives and safety. It's a widely agreed exception to freedom of speech. The danger presented rises above the right of speech in that instance.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_theater
GM's example, exception to freedom of press is also a good analogy IMHO. First amendment, second amendment.
Back to arms: Private ownership of cannons, private ownership of warships, that is amazing. But a private party owning nuclear warheads and missile delivery systems and all levels of government blocked from restricting that - and it's all protected in the constitution - is pretty far out there. I tried to take the example to the point of absurd. I don't believe it's what the Founders intended and I don't think you'll find one in a hundred persuadable to that view. That doesn't make it wrong, but perhaps impracticable.
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https://www.firearmspolicy.org/biden-transition-team-atf-secret-gun-control-meeting
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I posted this in the Tax thread already and I post it here with the coming Biden gun tax proposals in mind.
https://fee.org/articles/the-power-to-tax-is-the-power-to-destroy/
The additional variable present here is that the subject of the taxation is a fundamental constitutional right.
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I posted this in the Tax thread already and I post it here with the coming Biden gun tax proposals in mind.
https://fee.org/articles/the-power-to-tax-is-the-power-to-destroy/
The additional variable present here is that the subject of the taxation is a fundamental constitutional right.
Say, what would be the line in the sand for millions of Americans?
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That would appear to be THE key question.
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I posted this in the Tax thread already and I post it here with the coming Biden gun tax proposals in mind.
https://fee.org/articles/the-power-to-tax-is-the-power-to-destroy/
The additional variable present here is that the subject of the taxation is a fundamental constitutional right.
Say, what would be the line in the sand for millions of Americans?
Agree. I would add these questions:
Is there a right of privacy attached to your right to bear arms and defend yourself? Aren't arms as private as birth control? Griswold v. Connecticut
Isn't it a taking or partial taking of a right to require you to disclose the exact number, type, quantity, capability and location of all the arms you bear - to your potential adversary? You've lost part of the ability to defend yourself when you disclose what you have and where you keep it.
Doesn't this (also) have both intent and capability to take your arms through tax evasion? By exerting your of privacy on what you own, you've evaded a tax, committed a crime, and if caught and charged could lose the right to bear arms - all for the crime of exerting a fundamental right.
We could postpone a civil war by striking down clearly unconstitutional laws quickly.
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Mmmm , , , that feels a bit muddy to me.
I would say that there is a Ninth Amendment right to self defense though.
That said, the issue at hand in this moment is the taxation issue.
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https://www.sccgov.org/sites/da/newsroom/newsreleases/Pages/NRA2020/CCW-Undersheriff-Sung-.aspx
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https://247wallst.com/consumer-products/2020/10/28/these-are-the-states-where-people-are-buying-the-most-guns/
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https://dailycaller.com/2020/12/11/atf-agents-raid-polymer80/?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2680&pnespid=l7Q8r.VSCwON49XmyFyppuQ1lfPY58hjr0BR5ILB
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https://dailycaller.com/2020/12/11/atf-agents-raid-polymer80/?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2680&pnespid=l7Q8r.VSCwON49XmyFyppuQ1lfPY58hjr0BR5ILB
I wonder when Antifa will be raided?
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https://www.americanrifleman.org/articles/2020/12/1/ammo-shortage-will-last-deep-into-2021?fbclid=IwAR0qKALO_1EPr8LqCcjoQohI2DUYc5yWcHBjXFoFj4sT4IRfHCgErfED-4s
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https://i2.wp.com/www.powerlineblog.com/ed-assets/2020/12/KiQSgjp.jpg?resize=396%2C600&ssl=1
Federal agents on Thursday raided one of the nation’s largest manufacturers of ghost-gun parts, a sign that federal law enforcement is cracking down on kits that allow people to make weapons at home.
The raid target, Nevada-based Polymer80, is suspected of illegally manufacturing and distributing firearms, failing to pay taxes, shipping guns across state lines and failing to conduct background investigations, according to an application for a search warrant unsealed Thursday after the raid took place.
The probe focuses on Polymer80’s “Buy Build Shoot Kit,” which includes the parts to build a “ghost” handgun. The kit, which Polymer80 sells online, meets the definition of a firearm, ATF investigators determined according to the warrant application. That means it would have to be stamped with a serial number and couldn’t be sold to consumers who haven’t first passed a background check.
Polymer80 chief executive David Borges didn’t return phone calls or texts seeking comment Thursday evening.
Agents seized records and other evidence in Thursday’s raid in Dayton, close to Carson City, a law-enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation said. No Polymer80 employees were arrested and no charges have been filed.
The raid by agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives comes after ghost guns have been used more frequently in high-profile attacks. In September, two Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department deputies were shot while sitting in their patrol vehicle by a man using a handgun built from Polymer80 parts, according to the documents. Last year, a 16-year-old killed two fellow students and wounded three others at Saugus High School in Southern California with a homemade handgun.
Thursday’s raid is the most significant action against a ghost-gun company to date, according to the law-enforcement officials, and suggests the federal government is scrutinizing the growing industry.
Homemade ghost guns have grown in popularity in recent years and can’t be traced in criminal investigations because they lack serial numbers. Law-enforcement officials say they appeal to people who can’t pass background checks.
When people buy fully made guns from dealers, the weapons have serial numbers and purchasers must go through a background check.
Approximately 10,000 ghost guns were recovered by law enforcement in 2019, according to the warrant application. As part of the investigation, the ATF identified multiple Polymer80 customers who were prohibited from buying guns because of prior criminal convictions.
The starting point for building a ghost gun is an “unfinished receiver,” a metal or polymer piece that houses the firing mechanism. It can be purchased without a background check, because the ATF doesn’t classify the part as a firearm. Buyers can finish the receiver with a drill press or a computerized metal-cutting machine and then add the remaining pieces to complete the gun.
The ATF previously gave Polymer80 permission to sell unfinished receivers. But the Buy Build Shoot Kits, which are advertised as having “all the necessary components to build a complete...pistol” weren’t submitted to the agency for approval, according to the application for the search warrant. These kits can be “assembled into fully functional firearms in a matter of minutes,” the warrant application says.
Write to Zusha Elinson at zusha.elinson@wsj.com
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second post
https://www.ammoland.com/2020/12/polymer80-refuses-californias-subpoena-to-turn-over-customer-information/?fbclid=IwAR0FchFzIq3ZlhYoYkG-Ab21Oql8H-Ar0QWpK5vmoyMa3YahKh8deaLgKxs#axzz6gjKEkIGE
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https://crimeresearch.org/2020/12/defensive-gun-uses-where-people-legally-carrying-concealed-guns-have-stopped-crime-cases-from-mid-to-late-november-2019/?fbclid=IwAR36IWyunVs6ii-bTQbfjWVSmkfkm6-orA8sugIqqqMf8V6im5DVhuBERWg
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https://www.huckmag.com/perspectives/reportage-2/inside-americas-lgbtq-gun-rights-groups/?fbclid=IwAR1wB1GmUmVlWc-L5XfSGuas5g-ob9XHYlyPZx2rHvdz7WHMNYqv5a1eHY0
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https://coloradosun.com/2021/01/11/colorado-gun-control-laws-2021-preview/
planning to introduce at least three pieces of gun-control legislation this year, including a measure that would require a waiting period — potentially of five days — between when someone purchases a firearm and when they can access that weapon.
The other two bills would require gun owners to safely store their weapons and to report to authorities if one of their firearms is lost or stolen.
“This isn’t going to end the crisis of gun violence in our society,” said state Rep. Tom Sullivan, a Centennial Democrat whose son, Alex, was murdered in the 2012 Aurora theater shooting. “But it will help to curtail it.”
While other gun-control policies run by Colorado Democrats in the past decade have been focused on mass shootings, the bills this year mainly are aimed at reducing accidental shootings and suicides, the legislative sponsors say.
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/063/246/592/original/ef5147ffba7a6572.jpeg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/063/246/592/original/ef5147ffba7a6572.jpeg)
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y9qUxaTikuc&feature=emb_logo
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https://www.foxnews.com/us/south-carolina-invader-elderly-woman-dies-scuffle-husband
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https://www.nola.com/news/crime_police/article_b143eb5a-73c3-11eb-8e00-038ccf3489c1.html
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https://www.dailywire.com/news/sheriffs-can-arrest-feds-who-violate-citizens-gun-rights-new-missouri-county-ordinance-says?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=benshapiro&fbclid=IwAR0fjwJWRNWRw0RLuutGaw2_McXJ-keCbdsNhAmo5SsXe1pz6WO6dYy_b5M
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/067/170/909/original/21d0b2010a33b313.jpeg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/067/170/909/original/21d0b2010a33b313.jpeg)
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/1-democrat-joins-nearly-all-republicans-in-voting-against-gun-control-measure_3730121.html?utm_source=morningbrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mb-2021-03-12
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disarm the law abiding citizens
(while freeing those prisoners who would be more inclined to sympathize with the your side)
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https://www.feinstein.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?id=0763FFE7-8E3F-4F57-B1C7-E09E161C83D7&fbclid=IwAR3z6HxXCqsW25X3q2tQ4GsXOBdZz-FwEllqBrtKy0ZBp9pjyOufQzdfsX0
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/bill-to-expand-new-mexicos-red-flag-gun-laws-hits-hurdle_3730915.html?utm_source=morningbrief&utm_medium=email&email=craftydog@earthlink.net&utm_campaign=mb-2021-03-13
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second
https://amgreatness.com/2021/03/12/house-passes-two-major-gun-control-bills/
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https://www.ammoland.com/2021/03/fbis-shadow-gun-bans-threaten-first-and-second-amendment-rights/?utm_source=Ammoland+Subscribers&utm_campaign=373a6de6d9-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_6f6fac3eaa-373a6de6d9-7181749#axzz6pwb3hAAg
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Remember that language in our Constitution about "letters of marque"?
At the time our Founding Fathers wrote our Constitution, privateering was a thing, so talking about how it does not apply to a rifle while they were all about private warships is rather ignorant.
=========================
https://constitution.org/1-Activism/mil/lmr/lmr.htm?fbclid=IwAR2xheNYcIFwK83Y0eSdIqdBJGkLCN8my4BRwO9DdwhBwsu01ZP1Gr_I3e8#:~:text=Letters%20of%20Marque%20and%20Reprisal%20%20%20,exceed%205250%20marks.%20%2024%20more%20rows%20
==============================
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvCX3xjTMPg&t=16s
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https://patriotpost.us/alexander/79160?mailing_id=5769&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.5769&utm_campaign=alexander&utm_content=body
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/04/17/nj-gov-phil-murphy-pushes-ammo-purchase-database-50-caliber-rifle-ban/
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/biden-calls-for-ban-on-assault-weapons-high-capacity-magazines/ar-BB1friLo
"There's no reason someone needs a weapon of war with 100 rounds, 100 bullets, that can be fired from that weapon. Nobody needs that, nobody needs that," Biden said in the Rose Garden.
- Further information on this found in the 'needs' clause of the Second Amendment. [hat tip Glenn Beck]
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The general public doesn't 'need' a gun. That should be left to the first responders, trained professionals who know how to handle a weapon and when to use it.
Now this: "I don't believe officers need to necessarily have weapons every time they're making a traffic stop", said Mayor Mike Elliot, Brooklyn Center MN
- How would they have it ready in that rare situation when they need it if they don't have a weapon on every stop? Maybe have it loaded and ready, sitting on the front seat and holster up only when you run across a guy like Daunte, charged with armed robbery and history of running from police and warrants. If the cops don't carry, then don't the homeowners and residents need to? Or are the bad guys disarming simultaneously - in their imaginary world?
[Every topic in this forum could be called cognitive dissonance of the Left.]
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https://www.ignatius-piazza-front-sight.com/2021/04/29/the-epidemic-of-gun-violence-in-the-us-is-bs-heres-the-stats-from-the-who-that-gun-grabbers-never-want-you-to-see/
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/may/11/nra-bankruptcy-case-dismissed-judge-harlin-hale/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=evening&utm_term=evening&utm_content=evening&bt_ee=6N9eAE4xmO4uQyfC%2F1KcO6%2FA%2Bemjn6AuvmHvE%2FmoXAkpGruXE1R9SsPMnQvpdF6q&bt_ts=1620764761385
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https://washingtontimes-dc.newsmemory.com/?token=c1c61677a00221fc2c8e9ee2411c0e89_609bd661_6d25b5f&selDate=20210512&goTo=A03&artid=0&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=washingtontimes-E-Editions&utm_source=washingtontimes&utm_content=Read-Button
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https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/20-157_8mjp.pdf?fbclid=IwAR2uW5wb7VRR6wpCC8hQY1NOdfrPS-oo5pFT8OMbCH7iUDZlOGW9OzPAU9o
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_Acts_of_1792
The statute itself:
https://constitution.org/1-Activism/mil/mil_act_1792.htm
https://tenthamendmentcenter.com/2019/08/26/what-does-the-militia-act-of-1792-tell-us-about-the-second-amendment/
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/246
https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution-conan/article-1/section-8/clause-15-16/the-militia-clauses
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Militia_Act_of_1903
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https://www.cbs17.com/news/national-news/armed-teacher-stops-attempted-kidnapping-in-utah-police-say/?fbclid=IwAR0G_-8784MVaHUYzLILnQET-ElFeWHuZXuCtJwubPJjgqZcLmFpBfr193w
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_morningbrief/mark-mccloskey-explains-guilty-plea-by-god-i-did-it-thats-what-the-guns-were-for_3864449.html?utm_source=Morningbrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mb-2021-06-19&mktids=039af16e1b036edcdfda3bac9f3b78d2&est=zcNuasBRRN5pk15vYvdpXEmDlo5r1KFO54weAk1uYUV%2B%2BLahVo3cqX%2FFVdZ2iefqSb4d
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9770529/Louisiana-boy-12-shoots-kills-armed-burglar-broke-home-threatened-mother.html
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https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2021/07/24/czech-senate-approves-amendment-granting-right-to-bear-arms-in-constitution/
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For the elite left, opposition to gun rights is in part a cultural statement of antipathy to red-state values. Yet a small but important part of the progressive coalition—criminal-defense lawyers—can’t afford to treat gun laws as one more culture-war bludgeon. Hence a remarkable amicus brief by a coalition of defense lawyers for the indigent, led by the Black Attorneys of Legal Aid, asking the Supreme Court to expand gun rights in the Second Amendment case it will decide next term.
The case concerns New York state’s stringent gun restrictions. The plaintiffs in New York State Rifle and Pistol Assn. v. Bruen say New York all but prohibits ordinary adults from obtaining a license to bring a firearm outside their home or business, even if they fear for their safety, complete training courses, and have a clean background. They want the Supreme Court to affirm that the Constitution protects that right.
The media are framing the case as a conservative versus liberal clash. Readers remember that Rhode Island’s Sheldon Whitehouse and other Democratic Senators sent the Justices a threatening brief in 2019 suggesting the Court might need to be “restructured” if it accepted a previous gun case out of the Empire State. Now President Biden has empaneled a court-packing commission.
Yet the brief from the criminal defense lawyers, which includes the Bronx Defenders and the Brooklyn Defender Services, argues against the state’s gun laws from a progressive position. “In 2020, while Black people made up 18% of New York’s population, they accounted for 78% of the state’s felony gun possession cases,” the brief says.
It notes that for a defendant, separately having ammunition makes a gun loaded—and that possessing a “loaded” gun without a permit, even if not used, is a “violent felony” that carries a 3.5 to 15-year prison sentence. These lawyers see a reality of gun control that Mr. Whitehouse’s donors don’t.
While the plaintiffs in the case mainly attack New York’s gun “carry” rules, the defense lawyers also argue that their indigent clients have been wrongfully punished for having guns at home. The state’s application process for keeping a gun at home is less restrictive.
America’s gentry progressives figure that gun control should unite their base. Don’t only rural conservatives have guns anyway? Yet more may be realizing the contradiction between gun-control cultural politics and the left’s new criminal-justice priorities. A fissure on gun politics could be coming
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https://www.yahoo.com/gma/one-nation-under-fire-weeks-132236894.html
therefore to them the problem
is the guns. :wink: :-(
we still need "better policing"
we just need gun laws
etc etc
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Must be those white supremacists we keeping hearing about doing all these shootings!
Disparities in gun violence
While no part of the country is immune to gun violence, as ABC News dug into the data, it found that the violence occurs disproportionately in poorer, urban areas -- from Los Angeles to Chicago to New York City.
More than two-thirds of all the gun violence incidents reviewed unfolded in census tracts across the nation, where more than 50% of residents are nonwhite.
Over half of the incidents occurred in the nation's poorest census tracts, where the median household income is $40,000 a year or less. About 17% of shootings occurred in census tracts where people make more than $60,000.
https://www.yahoo.com/gma/one-nation-under-fire-weeks-132236894.html
therefore to them the problem
is the guns. :wink: :-(
we still need "better policing"
we just need gun laws
etc etc
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https://summit.news/2021/08/17/taliban-immediately-moves-to-confiscate-firearms-from-civilians/
What comes next?
If only there were lessons from history we could learn from...
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https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-BqW43FR4q_U/YSL8c9QpgkI/AAAAAAAAtik/myHXFB77T5Qp3QvZGIXuX9-3vlM-lo3FACPcBGAsYHg/s800/Meme%2B-%2Bfree%2Bgun%2Bzone.png
(https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-BqW43FR4q_U/YSL8c9QpgkI/AAAAAAAAtik/myHXFB77T5Qp3QvZGIXuX9-3vlM-lo3FACPcBGAsYHg/s800/Meme%2B-%2Bfree%2Bgun%2Bzone.png)
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Could somebody please confirm this is a spoof? We aren't really this stupid, are we?
https://www.oann.com/temporary-knife-control-in-new-zealand-after-stabbing/
OAN Newsroom
UPDATED 6:04 PM PT – Sunday, September 5, 2021
Knives and scissors have been removed from supermarket shelves in New Zealand after a recent stabbing attack. Supermarket chain Countdown said on Saturday, a partial “knife control” would be in effect for several weeks to prevent stabbing attacks going forward.
This decision came after a Sri Lankan national injured six people at a Countdown location in Auckland last Friday. Authorities said the attacker was inspired by the Islamic State to carry out the attack.
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srewdrivers are next
Wasn't Gordon Liddy who said he could kill someone with a pencil
( I presume by driving it through the nose through the cribiform plate into the brain)
If there is a another way from experts here I am all ears,
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I once dealt with a inmate who shoved a golf pencil through his cell mate’s eye and into the cell mate’s brain.
I have seen many stabbing with golf pencils in custody environments.
srewdrivers are next
Wasn't Gordon Liddy who said he could kill someone with a pencil
( I presume by driving it through the nose through the cribiform plate into the brain)
If there is a another way from experts here I am all ears,
-
".I once dealt with a inmate who shoved a golf pencil through his cell mate’s eye and into the cell mate’s brain.
I have seen many stabbing with golf pencils in custody environments."
-----
I have not seen so many :-o
That said making the point about how ludicrous it is to take knives off the shelves
so behind screw drivers are pencils pens
corkscrews?
sharpened chop sticks?
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Guns are used more in self-defense than in crimes
The frequency of defensive gun uses significantly strengthens gun ownership
By Tim Hsiao
The latest research confirms that guns are used more in self-defense than they are in crimes. According to the National Crime Victimization Survey, there were around 480,000 criminal uses of guns in 2019. Although this number might seem significant when viewed in isolation, existing research has consistently shown that the number of annual defensive gun uses vastly exceeds criminal uses.
A 2013 review of the literature by the National Research Council found that “almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million.” At the time of the 2013 report, there were nineteen surveys on the frequency of defensive gun uses. All found that defensive gun uses were prevalent. The vast majority of these surveys indicated that there are at least a million annual defensive gun uses. Of these, the most reliable survey found at least 2.1 million defensive uses of guns each year.
Confirming this scholarly consensus, two recent studies lend strong confirmation to the idea that defensive gun uses vastly outnumber criminal uses, with one finding that there is 1.67 million defensive gun uses each year.
The 2021 National Firearms Survey, directed by William English of Georgetown University, surveyed more than 54,000 Americans and identified 16,000 gun owners. They were then asked a battery of questions related to their ownership of firearms. Five methods were used to ensure truthful answers. Mr. English’s survey utilized the largest sample size of any study that has ever been conducted on defensive gun use, being nearly ten times greater than that of the next largest survey. Mr. English found that “guns are used defensively by civilian firearms owners in approximately 1.67 million incidents per year. Handguns are the most common firearm employed for self-defense (used in 65.9% of defensive incidents), and in most defensive incidents (81.9%), no shot was fired.” Mr. English found that more than half of defensive gun uses occurred in situations involving two or more assailants, highlighting guns’ importance as equalizers. Besides producing an estimate of defensive gun uses, Mr. English also found that: 81.4 million adult Americans own guns. 57.8% of gun owners are male, 42.2% are female. 25.4% of Blacks own firearms. Handguns are the firearm most commonly used in defensive incidents (65.9%), followed by shotguns (21.0%) and rifles (13.1%). A majority of gun owners (56.2%) indicate that there are some circumstances for which they carry a handgun for self-defense. About a third of gun owners (34.9%) have wanted to carry a handgun for self-defense in a particular situation, but local rules prohibited them from doing so. 30.2% of gun owners, about 24.6 million people, have owned an AR-15 or similarly styled rifle. 48.0% of gun owners have owned magazines that hold over ten rounds.
The second study, published by Gary Kleck in the American Journal of Criminal Justice, analyzes three CDC surveys conducted in 1996, 1997, and 1998. These surveys collected information about defensive gun uses as part of the CDC’s Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. However, for unclear reasons, the results were never published by the CDC.
Mr. Kleck analyzed the raw data and found that these three surveys each yielded estimates of defensive gun uses that were far greater than the number of criminal uses. According to Mr. Kleck, “these three CDC-based estimates average 1,109,825 DGUs per year for the period 1996–1998.” These results are consistent with other survey research for that time period.
Why didn’t the CDC publicize the findings of its surveys? We can only speculate, but one plausible answer is that the survey results would have been against the stated goals of the Clinton administration. Further gun control measures would be a hard sell if the government’s surveys showed that guns are used more in selfdefense than they are in crime.
Mr. Kleck is also the author of another study published this year in the Archives of Suicide Research, which found that gun ownership does not affect the number of overall suicides. Although gun availability does relate to how people choose to kill themselves, it does not affect the number of people who commit suicide.
Defenders of gun control frequently argue that defensive gun uses are infrequent. They will often appeal to the federal National Crime Victimization Survey findings, which yields estimates of around 70,000-100,000 annual defensive gun uses. However, these results are at odds with more than 20 surveys on the frequency of defensive gun use. Indeed, the NCVS estimates are the sole outlier. How could the NCVS yield such a low number? The problem with appealing to the NCVS is that it never actually asks respondents about defensive gun uses. Instead, respondents have the option to volunteer this information if they indicate being the victim of a crime. As such, it is hard to take the NCVS seriously as being a reliable estimate of defensive gun use, given that it doesn’t even field a single question about that topic. All other survey research explicitly designed to measure the frequency of defensive gun uses has shown that defensive gun uses are much more common than criminal uses. The latest research hammers in more nails in the coffin for the rare DGU thesis. The three CDC survey results are particularly telling, as it is from a source that is commonly perceived as anti-gun.
Mr. English’s survey results provide insights into the nature of gun ownership that is useful in shaping the direction of policy debates over gun ownership. In particular, his findings that nearly onethird of gun owners possess an AR-15 style rifle and that half of gun owners have owned magazines holding over ten rounds (which some states classify as “large-capacity”) shows that they are in common use, contrary to those who claim that they should be restricted because they are unusual and limited to military applications.
His finding that 80% of defensive gun uses do not involve a shot being fired. More than half include situations with two or more assailants, shows that guns function as a vital force multiplier that equalizes disparities between victims and their offenders. The fact that guns are rarely fired in self-defense situations also shows that they are safe for both victims and offenders.
While the latest research provides further reasons to oppose gun control measures, the ultimate basis of the individual right to own a gun is not a balancing test of costs and benefits. The point of a right is to offer protection against competing interests, especially when these interests involve a majority against a minority. As such, the basis of rights cannot be a cost/benefit analysis, nor can such studies ordinarily override rights, especially rights that are a direct means of protecting the most important right: the right to life.
The right to own a gun does not depend on the number of defensive gun uses, but the frequency of defensive gun uses significantly strengthens gun ownership.
Tim Hsiao is Assistant Professor of Phi-losophy and Humanities at Grantham University. His popular writings have appeared in The Federalist, Human Events, Quillette, Public Discourse, and the Foundation for Economic Education. His website is https://timhsiao.org
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DISTRICT
Resident sues city again over ‘ghost gun’ law
Man says ban violates Second Amendment right
BY EMILY ZANTOW THE WASHINGTON TIMES
A D.C. resident who won a 2008 landmark Supreme Court case to stop the city from banning all handguns is back in with another lawsuit over a new law prohibiting “ghost guns.”
Dick A. Heller, who lives in Southeast Washington, argues the law barring so-called ghost guns, or homemade polymer-based guns without serial numbers, is too far-reaching.
“The District legislation in question is so poorly thought out and written that the city council has managed to criminalize the possession of a vast array of popular, common handguns that it regularly allows residents to register, including the very handgun it issues to its police officers,” according to the suit.
The D.C. Council lauded the law as a way to tamp down on unserialized guns used by criminals that cannot be traced by police. In 2019, the Metropolitan Police Department reported it recovered 116 ghost guns, which it said “have become more prevalent” because the parts can be purchased online and assembled in a person’s home.
Mr. Heller, however, says the law violates his Second Amendment right to bear arms. He made the same argument in a previous lawsuit targeting the city’s blanket ban on handguns, and the high court eventually ruled 5-4 in his favor.
The District’s elected officials, he said, have long “adhered to a cynical policy of ‘self-government for me, but no self-defense for thee.”
The city’s legislation defines a ghost gun as “a firearm that, after the removal of all parts other than a receiver, is not as detectable ... by walk-through metal detectors.” When all parts besides the receiver are removed from a gun, all that is left is the polymer frame — which is not made of metal. Thus, the suit claims the city “has apparently unwittingly made ... existing polymer frame handguns illegal.”
“It may very well be the case that the District City Council and the District Government are so lacking in knowledge of firearms technology that they simply do not know what they have done,” the suit states.
Mr. Heller is joined by two other D.C. residents in the suit, Andrew Hanson and Elby Godwin, who both claim they are worried their polymer-based guns are now illegal. They are represented by George Lyon of the Virginia-based law firm Arsenal Attorneys.
Polymer-based guns are popular among both civilians and police because they do not have a metal frame, which makes them less heavy and easier to carry, according to the suit. It points to an article at guns.com that states the top 10 pistols sold in 2020 were all polymer based.
The new law adds to a 1976 ban on manufacturing guns in the city without a dealer’s license and Mr. Heller says the statutes prevent him “from making a firearm which is otherwise lawful to register.”
Unfinished handgun frames or rifle receivers for guns are also banned under the new law, which Mr. Heller believes is the reason the gun kit he ordered and had shipped to a city federal firearm licensee for registration was sent back to the manufacturer in April.
“The right to manufacture an arm is equivalent to the right to acquire an arm,” the suit states. “If Mr. Heller cannot acquire the precursor parts for a firearm, such as an unfinished receiver, whatever that is under District law, he cannot make a firearm.” He is seeking damages for the inability to construct a firearm.
The suit also notes the D.C. law is stricter than that of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. The ATF has ruled that the parts do not qualify as firearms because the components, alone, cannot be used to shoot a projectile.
A coalition of nearly 20 state attorneys general sued the ATF in December, arguing its interpretation has caused an uptick in the untraceable guns. Less than three months later, President Biden vowed to direct the Justice Department to issue new regulations for ghost guns as a way to “tackle gun violence.”
Meanwhile, the D.C. gun owners want a judge to declare that the city’s law is unconstitutional and to block its enforcement.
The defendants named in the suit filed last month in D.C. District Court include D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, Attorney General Karl A. Racine and Police Chief Robert J. Contee, III. The Washington Times sent them requests for comment on Monday.
The city officials must respond to the suit by Oct. 18
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRtVgsHiWyA&t=120s
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https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/alec-baldwin-tears-rust-movie-set-shooting
we need legislation to outlaw all gun props in Hollywood!
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https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/alec-baldwin-tears-rust-movie-set-shooting
we need legislation to outlaw all gun props in Hollywood!
https://nationalfile.com/alec-baldwin-accidentally-kills-woman-with-prop-gun-once-tweeted-about-how-it-must-feel-to-wrongfully-kill-someone/
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/088/429/982/original/d3bb713abb19eafd.jpeg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/088/429/982/original/d3bb713abb19eafd.jpeg)
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/alec-baldwin-tears-rust-movie-set-shooting
we need legislation to outlaw all gun props in Hollywood!
https://nationalfile.com/alec-baldwin-accidentally-kills-woman-with-prop-gun-once-tweeted-about-how-it-must-feel-to-wrongfully-kill-someone/
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https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/20/20-843/184351/20210720115439756_20-843%20Amici%20Curiae%20Brief.pdf
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https://freebeacon.com/biden-administration/biden-admin-amassing-millions-of-records-on-u-s-gun-owners-amid-new-crackdown-on-firearms/
BIDEN ADMINISTRATION
Biden Admin Amassing Millions of Records on US Gun Owners Amid New Crackdown on Firearms
Biden's ATF obtained more than 54 million gun owner records in 2021 alone
The Biden administration in just the past year alone stockpiled the records of more than 54 million U.S. gun owners and is poised to drastically alter gun regulations to ensure that information on Americans who own firearms ultimately ends up in the federal government's hands, according to internal Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) documents obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
The ATF in fiscal year 2021 processed 54.7 million out-of-business records, according to an internal ATF document obtained by the Gun Owners of America, a firearms advocacy group, and provided exclusively to the Free Beacon. When a licensed gun store goes out of business, its private records detailing gun transactions become ATF property and are stored at a federal site in West Virginia. This practice allows the federal government to stockpile scores of gun records and has drawn outrage from gun advocacy groups that say the government is using this information to create a national database of gun owners—which has long been prohibited under U.S. law.
The ATF obtained 53.8 million paper records and another 887,000 electronic records, according to the internal document that outlines ATF actions in fiscal year 2021. Gun activists described this figure as worryingly high and said it contributes to fears that the Biden administration is trying to keep track of all Americans who own firearms, in violation of federal statutes. The procurement of these records by the ATF comes as the Biden administration moves to alter current laws to ensure that gun records are stored in perpetuity. Currently, gun shops can destroy their records after 20 years, thereby preventing the ATF from accessing the information in the future.
"As if the addition of over 50 million records to an ATF gun registry wasn't unconstitutional or illegal enough, the Biden administration's misuse of ‘out-of-business' records doesn't end there," Aidan Johnston, the Gun Owners of America's director of federal affairs, told the Free Beacon. "Instead of maintaining the right of [licensed firearm dealers] to destroy Firearm Transaction Records after 20 years, buried within Biden's proposed regulations is a provision that would mean every single Firearm Transaction Record going forward would eventually be sent to ATF's registry in West Virginia."
The ATF's registry site has long been a battleground between gun advocates and the federal government. Those in favor of more restrictive gun measures want the ATF to digitize this registry and create a federal database of U.S. gun owners, a move opposed by groups such as the Gun Owners of America and the National Rifle Association. The ATF has so many records stored in its West Virginia site that several years ago the floor collapsed, according to the New York Times.
An ATF spokesman declined to comment on internal agency records but told the Free Beacon that the agency's "National Tracing Center processes millions of out of business records each month." However, "those out of business records do not constitute an initiation or continuation of any federal gun registry," the spokesman said.
The Gun Control Act of 1968 mandates that licensed firearm dealers that go out of business provide the ATF with their records. They are then processed into images, though the ATF maintains this database cannot be searched by a purchaser's name. Physical records, the agency says, are then destroyed.
The record-keeping issue has received new scrutiny as the Biden administration readies to implement several new restrictions on firearms and owners, including a proposed ban on anywhere from 10 to 40 million pistol braces, which are used as stabilizers on popular weapons such as AR-15s. Under these guidelines, gun owners would be ordered to register or destroy these pistol braces.
The ATF's proposed regulations would also require gun parts to be regulated with background checks, meaning that if an individual assembled a legal homemade gun, he may be forced to submit to up to 16 different background checks.
Gun advocates, including the Gun Owners of America, accuse the Biden administration of abusing the rule-making process to ensure these regulations are put into effect in record time, possibly before the end of the year.
"The Biden administration has forced ATF to undertake the rule-making process in record time—resulting in faulty argumentation and demonstrating that neither ATF nor Biden's anti-gun appointees know anything about the firearms and accessories they seek to regulate," said Johnston.
The ATF, through its spokesman, maintained that its rule-making process allows for gun advocates, experts, and others to offer comment on proposed regulations well before they go into effect. "Congress and the Government Accountability Office have an opportunity to review any final rule prior to its effective date," the spokesman said. "The process is anything but ‘speedy.'"
Published under: ATF, Biden Administration, Gun Control, Gun Stores, Guns, Regulation
Related Articles
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Doesn't make me want to get on a federal gun buyer list.
"Biden Admin Amassing Millions of Records on US Gun Owners Amid New Crackdown on Firearms
Biden's ATF obtained more than 54 million gun owner records in 2021 alone"
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Trust me, you are already on a couple.
How many ATF Agents are there? How many feds of every stripe? How many law enforcement officers of every stripe, from small town cops to highway patrol? Less than a million, and rapid aging and declining in number. Eve if they were all 100% onboard with gun confiscation (Very unlikely, especially in rural areas) vs. how many millions of armed Americans?
Doesn't make me want to get on a federal gun buyer list.
"Biden Admin Amassing Millions of Records on US Gun Owners Amid New Crackdown on Firearms
Biden's ATF obtained more than 54 million gun owner records in 2021 alone"
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/090/173/311/original/fdb8c4994ab6893f.png
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/090/173/311/original/fdb8c4994ab6893f.png)
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https://www.ammoland.com/2021/11/oral-arguments-in-second-amendment-case-show-supreme-court-justices-split/#axzz7C0p7gGXG
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https://www.ammoland.com/2021/11/virginia-incorrectly-adds-46000-citizens-to-fbis-nics-prohibited-person-list/#axzz7C18Bz769
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/republicans-atf-groundwork-backdoor-federal-gun-registry?fbclid=IwAR2UH0sc0Lvy-sAj4uW2TKFOcbSgnjwJBEIWphjgjfKq7tkC0JH2zl7-dwQ
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Paintball re-engineered and repurposed for pepper spray and self defense.
https://byrna.com/collections/non-lethal-self-defense-byrna-sd
Comments, Crafty, G M?
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Well, apart from justifying shooting you , , , running it by some experienced friends , , ,
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https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/12/us/politics/newsom-texas-abortion-law-guns.html?fbclid=IwAR0xdOWQaqUEgsmCgqh5exTv0un-edKUkOEDUBbvYcsPZ68_m8owJHJcf-M
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GUN CONTROL
Voters: Gun laws make ‘no difference’ in crime wave
BY SEAN SALAI THE WASHINGTON TIMES
A new poll finds that more than eight of 10 U.S. voters believe strict gun control laws in major cities either make no difference in the current retail crime surge or make it worse.
The survey by the Trafalgar Group revealed that 47.1% of respondents from all political affiliations said that “the strict gun laws in most major cities” make “no difference” in the current retail crime surge and 37.3% believe they make it “worse.” Just 15.6% of voters said they believed the gun laws make the retail crime surge “better.”
Pollster Robert Cahaly, who founded Trafalgar Group in 2016, said the findings echo a recent polling trend that shows a growing voter backlash against progressive police reform policies.
“There seems to be a growing consensus among urban residents that less police, releasing criminals and failure to prosecute are making them feel less safe,” Mr. Cahaly said. “They are frustrated that unlike most who live in rural and suburban areas, city residents don’t feel they have the right to protect themselves due to gun restrictions that only hurt law-abiding citizens.”
The poll showed that large numbers of likely Democrat, Republican and independent voters find strict gun laws ineff ective, although Democrats proved likeliest to find them helpful.
While 30.1% of Democrats said strict gun laws make the retail crime surge “better,” only 9.8% of independents and 7.3% of Republicans said the same.
The survey echoes recent polls that show a sharp slide in support for gun control laws.
A Quinnipiac poll released Nov. 19 found that 47% of registered voters support stricter gun laws and 48% oppose them — the lowest level of support for stricter gun laws since late 2015 in Quinnipiac’s annual polling.
On Nov. 17, a Gallup poll found that 52% of Americans say that the “laws covering the sales of firearms” should be stricter — down from 57% in 2020 and 64% in 2019. This was also the lowest level of support in Gallup’s annual poll since 2014.
“This year’s decrease is driven by a 15-point plunge among independents,” Gallup said in a press release, adding that support for stricter gun control laws often drops while Democrats control the White House.
An ABC News/Ipsos poll conducted Dec. 10-11 found that only 33% of Americans approve of how President Biden is handling the issue of gun violence, with 66% disapproving.
This year’s drop in voter support for stricter gun control laws has not come with a drop in incidents of mass shootings. According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have been 683 mass shootings with at least four victims injured or killed this year as of Dec. 27.
Rick Green, founder of the Patriot Academy program that trains young conservative leaders, attributed the sagging support for stricter gun control laws to conservative messaging on crime.
“Restrictive gun laws have never worked and never will because they empower the criminal who ignores them, while disarming the citizen who becomes a victim,” Mr. Green said. “Government should be encouraging gun ownership and training, rather than making it harder for citizens to defend themselves.”
Mirroring likely voter turnout demographics, 39.3% of respondents in the new Trafalgar poll identified as Democrats, 35.6% as Republicans and 25.1% as independents. The margin of error was plus or minus 2.99% at the 95% confidence level.
The firm distributes its survey questionnaires using a mixed methodology of live callers, integrated voice response, text messages, emails and two other proprietary digital methods that it doesn’t share publicly.
According to Trafalgar, the survey of 1,076 likely general election voters was conducted Dec. 17-21. The poll was conducted on behalf of the nonprofit Convention of States Action, which advocates for returning federal powers to the states
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Paintball re-engineered and repurposed for pepper spray and self defense.
https://byrna.com/collections/non-lethal-self-defense-byrna-sd
Comments, Crafty, G M?
OC spray has it’s place. I carry it every day, but when you need a gun, you need a gun.
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If it ain't a gun but looks like a gun my thought is you can get shot for looking like you have a gun.
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If it ain't a gun but looks like a gun my thought is you can get shot for looking like you have a gun.
Happens all the time.
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https://www.theblaze.com/news/lyft-driver-concealed-carry-carjacking?utm_content=buffer30042&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=fb-glennbeck&fbclid=IwAR0MrBgdz8yEAbfERRbG_Pj6eepGge5g0GfnR9pnEvEAhTcg7CK2vxw24CA
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jan/17/40-guns-traced-crimes-central-america-came-us/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=J%2Bo3V8u4DZSIkqYLVemz0fatLXMP5JcuMUlSH%2FstpAPbIK0PnORIlRnrcJTXlZf8&bt_ts=1642449938753
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/096/201/204/original/8b300c82fe91a2b0.jpg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/096/201/204/original/8b300c82fe91a2b0.jpg)
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of course,
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/01/22/nyc-mayor-calls-for-more-gun-control-after-felon-allegedly-shot-2-officers/
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of course,
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/01/22/nyc-mayor-calls-for-more-gun-control-after-felon-allegedly-shot-2-officers/
(https://i.imgflip.com/62dqzv.jpg)
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Court rules shutdown of gun stores for pandemic was unconstitutional
BY STEPHEN DINAN THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The coronavirus pandemic cannot be an excuse to shut down gun stores, a federal appeals court ruled last week, delivering a belated spanking to a California county that shuttered stores and firing ranges in the early days of the virus.
Los Angeles County and Ventura County both imposed shutdown orders in 2020, with Ventura’s closure lasting 48 days and Los Angeles’ lasting 11 days.
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, in two rulings last Thursday, said those orders left gun owners without a way to obtain ammunition or practice at firing ranges and denied those seeking to be owners a chance to obtain weapons — all in violation of the right to bear arms under the Constitution’s Second Amendment.
“Neither pandemic nor even war wipes away the Constitution,” wrote Judge Andrew J. Kleinfeld, an appointee of President George H.W. Bush, in a concurring opinion.
The shutdowns happened even as the counties allowed other business. Ventura County, for example, let hardware stores, bicycle shops and boatyards remain open, and the county allowed people to go golfing. The county never explained why those activities were more “essential” than firearms purchases or practice, the appeals court said.
Those who violated the shutdown orders faced arrest and jail.
The ruling comes as the U.S. enters its third year of dealing with the coronavirus pandemic. The shutdowns of the early days sparked massive legal battles with houses of worship, in particular, arguing that closing their doors was a violation of Americans’ religious rights.
In the case of the California gun orders, lower courts had upheld the county policies, finding they were a fair approach to a fast-moving health crisis.
The appeals court, in its ruling, said policies infringing on core constitutional rights must meet a higher standard than that. The policies must be narrowly tailored to meet a compelling government interest. The court ruled that neither county offered that kind of justification.
The ruling was 3-0. All three judges were appointed by Republican presidents — a rarity on the famously slanted 9th Circuit.
Indeed, Judge Lawrence Van-Dyke, who wrote the chief opinion for the panel, also wrote a separate opinion predicting that his colleagues will demand what’s known as an en banc review of the panel’s decision and will eventually vote to overturn the ruling.
“Our circuit has ruled on dozens of Second Amendment cases, and without fail has ultimately blessed every gun regulation challenged, so we shouldn’t expect anything less here,” Judge VanDyke wrote.
He said that’s a result of the 9th Circuit’s convoluted jurisprudence on gun-rights issues, which makes it easy for judges to justify any gun control measure policymakers come up with.
To prove the point, Judge Van-Dyke then wrote a very tonguein- cheek 15-page opinion coming to the exact opposite conclusion of the court’s ruling this week. The mock opinion caricatured the arguments he expects the court’s more liberal members to make the case justifying the gun shutdown orders.
Judge VanDyke peppered his “alternative draft opinion” with mocking footnotes.
“Guns are dangerous, after all, so the government’s interest in ameliorating such danger is always important. At first we were worried this case might be a problem, because the regulations here don’t really have any nexus to the dangerousness of guns. But COVID-19 is dangerous too, so that substitutes in nicely,” the judge wrote in one of his blistering footnotes.
He ended the mocking draft with a sign-off to his opposing colleagues: “You’re welcome.”
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https://www.dailysignal.com/2022/01/12/14-examples-of-defensive-gun-use-at-end-of-2021/
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https://www.nationalreview.com/news/sandy-hook-families-gun-manufacturer-remington-reach-73-million-settlement/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=breaking&utm_campaign=newstrack&utm_term=26718919
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https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/newtown-shooting-gun-maker-sandy-hook-remington/2022/02/15/id/1056894/
does this open the lawyer flood gates?
I can only imagine the lawyer listers sharing this information
(OR NOT)
as they try to be the first in the long lines of people who are happy to find deep pockets to go after - any deep pockets.
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https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/newtown-shooting-gun-maker-sandy-hook-remington/2022/02/15/id/1056894/
does this open the lawyer flood gates?
I can only imagine the lawyer listers sharing this information
(OR NOT)
as they try to be the first in the long lines of people who are happy to find deep pockets to go after - any deep pockets.
---------------------------------------------------
As I understand it, the case was allowed to go forward as it had to do with the marketing of the product. A gun owner uses a gun to stop and deter crime. The ads should emphasize that. Mass murder is mis-use of the product.
Use of a car as a getaway car in a bank robbery is not Ford or GM's fault - unless they promoted that use.
I don't know what the content of the marketing in question was. I doubt they promoted mis-use or crime, but if so, there is liability.
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https://www.guntalk.com/post/nssf-sandy-hook-settlement?fbclid=IwAR2-m-KsjSfRpPKW7oX-rTlIxsfs40eZmQxiiZZs9AWrhY4fAci-k6foSHM
Yesterday it was announced that the insurance companies representing the former Remington Outdoor Company* had settled the lawsuit brought against it by families of the victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary shooting. The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), which is the trade association for the firearms industry released a statement providing important details that will mostly likely not be reported on by most media outlets.
The decision to settle in the Soto v. Bushmaster case was not made by a member of the firearms industry. The settlement was reached between the plaintiffs and the various insurance carriers that held policies with Remington Outdoor Company (ROC), which effectively no longer exists.
As part of bankruptcy court proceedings, the assets of ROC were sold at auction in September of 2020. Remington Outdoor Company, which owned the Bushmaster brand, effectively ceased to exist as a going concern. The lawsuit, however, continued against the estate of the Remington Outdoor Company, essentially ROC’s insurers and their insurance policies in effect at the time.
The settlement also does not alter the fundamental facts of the case. The plaintiffs never produced any evidence that Bushmaster advertising had any bearing or influence over Nancy Lanza’s decision to legally purchase a Bushmaster rifle, nor on the decision of murderer Adam Lanza to steal that rifle, kill his mother in her sleep, and go on to commit the rest of his horrendous crimes. We renew our sincere sympathy for the victims of this unspeakable tragedy and all victims of violence committed through the misusing of any firearm. But the fact remains that modern sporting rifles are the most popular rifle in America with over 20 million sold to law abiding Americans and rifles, of any kind, are exceedingly rarely used in crime.
The Connecticut Supreme Court wrote in its Soto v. Bushmaster (4-3) opinion, “[T]he plaintiffs allege that the defendants’ wrongful advertising magnified the lethality of the Sandy Hook massacre by inspiring Lanza or causing him to select a more efficiently deadly weapon for his attack. Proving such a causal link at trial may prove to be a Herculean task.” NSSF believes the Court incorrectly allowed this one claim to go forward to discovery. We remain confident ROC would have prevailed if this case proceeded to trial.
Finally, this settlement orchestrated by insurance companies has no impact on the strength and efficacy of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), which remains the law of the land. PLCAA will continue to block baseless lawsuits that attempt to blame lawful industry companies for the criminal acts of third parties.
*Vista Outdoors is the current owner of the Remington brand and was not involved in the lawsuit or decision to settle.
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https://apnews.com/article/business-texas-lawsuits-california-gun-politics-b0a3cd6c9061e1ba37d6c52ae093e6c0
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From ccp Ukraine post, Charles C.W. Cooke from National Review:
"Here is what I would like to happen in Ukraine: Outraged by Russia’s aggression, armed Ukrainians in both the country’s military and its spontaneously formed civilian militias are able to fight hard enough in all regions that the demoralized and confused Russian army retreats with its tail between its legs."
- Teachable moment: Isn't that exactly what we should be preparing for here as our central government slips from the world's greatest power to a country less interested in economic and military strength? Isn't that exactly what the Founders insisted on preserving for the ages, the ability for citizens to 'spontaneously form armed civilian militias all across the land that would be, in aggregate, more powerful than either a foreign invading force or a threat from within?
The gun control people ask something like this, why do you need more than x bullets to hunt a squirrel?
Answer: A squirrel, deer or single attacker is not the largest potential threat we face. An invading army is.
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From ccp Ukraine post, Charles C.W. Cooke from National Review:
"Here is what I would like to happen in Ukraine: Outraged by Russia’s aggression, armed Ukrainians in both the country’s military and its spontaneously formed civilian militias are able to fight hard enough in all regions that the demoralized and confused Russian army retreats with its tail between its legs."
- Teachable moment: Isn't that exactly what we should be preparing for here as our central government slips from the world's greatest power to a country less interested in economic and military strength? Isn't that exactly what the Founders insisted on preserving for the ages, the ability for citizens to 'spontaneously form armed civilian militias all across the land that would be, in aggregate, more powerful than either a foreign invading force or a threat from within?
The gun control people ask something like this, why do you need more than x bullets to hunt a squirrel?
Answer: A squirrel, deer or single attacker is not the largest potential threat we face. An invading army is.
The second amendment has zero to do with hunting.
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quote author=G M
"The second amendment has zero to do with hunting."
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Well he said it. Joe Biden at SOTU: "magazines that hold a hundred rounds, what are the deer wearing Kevlar vests?"
I guess he didn't read G M's post, or the Founding Fathers or the constitution.
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"Answer: A squirrel, deer or single attacker is not the largest potential threat we face. An invading army is" e.g. Mexican cartels.
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https://www.uslawshield.com/key-second-amendment-supreme-court-cases/
Key Second Amendment Supreme Court Cases
March 17th, 2022|Tags: National, Nonvideo|0 Comments
Second Amendment Supreme Court Cases
The Second Amendment protects and reinforces your right to bear arms. But what exactly is that right? How is it defined by the law? As the ultimate interpreter of American law, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) tells us what the Second Amendment does—and doesn’t—protect.
Here’s a simplified breakdown of Second Amendment Supreme Court cases and their impact on our self-defense rights.
New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen (Pending)
The Problem
Robert Nash and Brandon Koch were denied a New York concealed carry license because they failed to show “proper cause.” New York’s licensing requirements define proper cause as a special need to defend yourself beyond the general desire to always be prepared. The two men, joined by the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (a gun rights group), argued that denying the right to carry handguns outside the home for self-defense goes against the very purpose of the Second Amendment.
The Ruling
The Supreme Court heard arguments for this case in late 2021 and has not yet announced a decision. Whatever they decide, it’ll be the first time they’ve directly addressed a major issue regarding an individual’s right to bear arms since McDonald v. City of Chicago in 2010. And it could fundamentally alter how our self-defense rights may be regulated in the future.
As soon as this Second Amendment Supreme Court case is decided, we’ll give you a full breakdown on what it means for your rights.
United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542 (1875)
The Problem
A group of individuals partially responsible for the 1873 Colfax Massacre in Louisiana were convicted under the Enforcement Act of 1870 for depriving other citizens of their First and Second Amendment rights.
The Ruling
In this Supreme Court case, every conviction was overturned. The Court noted that the Second Amendment protected individual rights only from the federal government. And the Fourteenth Amendment protected certain rights from state governments, not other people. Because individuals had infringed upon the rights of others, neither protection applied. It was the responsibility of the state government to protect its citizens from other citizens.
This ruling acknowledged that the Constitution doesn’t give us the right to bear arms, it simply protects it from Congress. This left states free to ignore the protections of the Bill of Rights and potentially restrict the rights of entire populations. Although it took 135 years, this was eventually overturned in McDonald v. City of Chicago.
Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252 (1886)
The Problem
Herman Presser led a group of roughly 400 men brandishing guns and other weapons (including a sword) in a military-style parade through the streets of Chicago. Presser and the men were part of a social club that supposedly trained people for the duties “expected” of them as citizens, including military practices. However, it was illegal (and still is) in Illinois not only to form private military organizations, but also to do any kind of military drills in the city without permission from the governor. Presser argued this infringed upon his Second Amendment rights because it prevented the people from being prepared to “answer the call of the nation” and protect liberty.
The Ruling
The Supreme Court held yet again that the Second Amendment applied only to the federal government, not state governments. (This ruling was also overturned in McDonald v. City of Chicago.) But there was a small win in this Second Amendment Supreme Court case. SCOTUS noted that there IS a limit to how far states can restrict gun ownership; states can’t ban the people from owning weapons, “so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security…”
United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939)
The Problem
Jack Miller and Frank Layton were prosecuted for transporting a 12-gauge shotgun with a barrel length of less than 18 inches from Oklahoma to Arkansas without the registration or tax stamp required under the National Firearms Act (NFA). The two men argued that the NFA and restricting or taxing specific types of firearms violated the Second Amendment.
The Ruling
The Supreme Court held that the NFA, which places registration requirements on machine guns, short-barreled weapons, destructive devices, and other unique firearms, does not violate the Second Amendment. SCOTUS reasoned that the weapons regulated by the NFA aren’t reasonably related to maintaining a “well regulated Militia,” so aren’t protected by the Second Amendment.
Some things to note in this Second Amendment Supreme Court case are that Miller’s court-appointed attorney never showed up because he was never paid and, unfortunately, Miller was shot to death before a decision was given. So, no one was able to argue why they believed the law was unconstitutional. This means SCOTUS heard only the government’s side of things.
Barrett v. United States, 423 U.S. 212 (1976)
The Problem
Pearl Barrett, a previously convicted felon, was charged with violating the Gun Control Act of 1968 (GCA) after purchasing a gun that was involved in interstate commerce before reaching the retailer’s shelf. Barrett believed this charge didn’t apply to him because he had nothing to do with the gun before it showed up at his local federally licensed dealer.
The Ruling
The main takeaway of this Second Amendment Supreme Court case is that the Court again upheld gun control laws. SCOTUS said the section of the GCA barring felons from receiving any gun through interstate commerce applied to any firearm that had ever moved in interstate commerce, regardless of if that was before the felon purchased it; the GCA was meant to “keep firearms away from the persons Congress classified as potentially irresponsible and dangerous.” But applying Barrett’s logic would essentially create a loophole, preventing felons only from purchasing guns directly from retailers located in other states. At the end of the day, Barrett was a convicted felon, and his purchase of a firearm was illegal.
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United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995)
The Problem
Alfonso Lopez, Jr. was convicted of violating the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 after bringing a revolver (unloaded) and cartridges to his Texas high school. Lopez argued that regulating or banning guns in local schools was well outside the power of Congress under the Commerce Clause and was unconstitutional. But the federal government argued that bringing a gun to school would cause more gun violence and crime, which would lead to economic problems.
The Ruling
This case was actually a major Commerce Clause case, but it’s in this list of Second Amendment Supreme Court cases because when SCOTUS ruled the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990 unconstitutional, they further limited how the federal government could regulate (or restrict) gun rights.
District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008)
The Problem
Special Policeman Dick Heller and several other residents of the District of Columbia all wanted a gun for self-defense. At the time, D.C. prohibited the carrying of any unregistered firearms yet barred all handgun registration. D.C. also required all lawfully owned guns to be kept unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock, including in a person’s own home, with few exceptions. Heller felt this ban prevented someone from properly defending themselves at home and violated the Second Amendment.
The Ruling
In this Second Amendment Supreme Court case, the Court made several rulings upholding our constitutional right to keep and bear arms. It found that:
The Second Amendment protects an individual right to own firearms for the purpose of self-defense, unrelated to militia or military activity. And because handguns are today’s primary defensive weapon of choice, they’re also protected.
The phrase “bear arms” meant: “to wear, bear, or carry . . . upon the person or in clothing or in a pocket, for the purpose . . . of being armed and ready for offensive or defensive action in a case of conflict with another person.”
A “well regulated Militia” is not the state’s military forces.
The D.C. regulation effectively banning handgun possession and the law requiring firearms in the home to be kept inoperable at all times, both violated Second Amendment protections.
The Second Amendment is not unlimited or absolute. Reasonable restrictions may be upheld (such as limits on firearm possession, carrying in schools and government buildings, and “dangerous and unusual” weapons).
Unfortunately, the District of Columbia is under the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress and the federal government, not a state. So, while SCOTUS made several key decisions on what the Second Amendment means and protects, the case shed no light on whether states could regulate and/or ban firearms.
McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010)
The Problem
Otis McDonald, a 76-year-old man from Chicago, wanted a handgun for self-defense but was not able to get one under local law. A city ordinance required all handguns to be registered, yet Chicago refused all handgun registrations after a 1982 citywide ban. McDonald argued that the Second Amendment applied to the states as well as the federal government and that this ban was unconstitutional based on the rulings in Heller. The City of Chicago argued that states should be able to regulate firearms based on local conditions.
The Ruling
The Supreme Court held that Second Amendment protections apply at the state level through “selective incorporation” under the Fourteenth Amendment. SCOTUS repeated that individual self-defense was at the core of the Second Amendment. Meaning, the constitutional right to bear arms (and its protections as stated in Heller) prohibits states from enacting bans on handguns for self-defense in the home. This Second Amendment Supreme Court case decision overturned the Second Amendment rulings in Cruikshank and Presser.
Caetano v. Massachusetts, 136 S. Ct. 1027 (2016)
The Problem
Jaime Caetano was charged with owning an illegal weapon after displaying a stun gun during a dangerous encounter with her abusive ex-boyfriend in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) upheld the state prohibition on stun gun possession, stating stun guns weren’t protected by the Second Amendment because they were:
“Not in common use at the time” of the amendment’s enactment;
Dangerous and unusual as a “modern invention”; and
Couldn’t be easily adapted for military use.
The Ruling
This Second Amendment Supreme Court case is often left off most lists because it didn’t impact any gray areas. When SCOTUS took the case, the facts were so clear they were able to issue a per curiam decision (issued by the court rather than a specific justice) without even having to hear oral arguments. To put it in perspective, from 1946 to 2012, SCOTUS issued a per curiam decision in only 7% of cases.
The Court made it clear the SJC’s reasoning for upholding the Massachusetts law violated the Second Amendment, based on both the decisions in Heller and McDonald. They repeated that the Second Amendment protects weapons for self-defense purposes and not just for military reasons, and it applies to weapons “that were not in existence at the time of the founding.” SCOTUS also clarified that simply being a “modern invention” did not make it dangerous and unusual.
Justice Samuel Alito, joined by Justice Clarence Thomas in a concurring opinion, also scolded Massachusetts for failing to protect its citizens from others who are dangerous, reminding us that the Second Amendment protects our right to defend our lives when the states “are unable or unwilling” to do so:
“If the fundamental right of self-defense does not protect Caetano, then the safety of all Americans is left to the mercy of state authorities who may be more concerned about disarming the people than about keeping them safe.”
Second Amendment Supreme Court Case Silence
In the years since McDonald, there were over 75 federal court opinions upholding state restrictions on the Second Amendment that the U.S. Supreme Court refused to review.
For example, in April 2021, the Supreme Court refused to hear challenges to a lifetime ban on firearm possession for those convicted of a non-violent misdemeanor. And before that, in June 2017, the Court declined to review a case involving San Diego County’s strict concealed carry permit requirements. But not all the justices agreed with this silence. Justice Thomas, joined by Justice Neil Gorsuch, commented:
For those of us who work in marbled halls, guarded constantly by a vigilant and dedicated police force, the guarantees of the Second Amendment might seem antiquated and superfluous. But the Framers made a clear choice: They reserved to all Americans the right to bear arms for self-defense. I do not think we should stand by idly while a State denies its citizens that right, particularly when their very lives may depend on it.
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President Biden on Monday will announce new firearm regulations to require serial numbers and background checks for so-called “ghost guns,” while also picking a new nominee to lead the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, senior administration officials said.
Mr. Biden will name Steve Dettelbach, a former U.S. attorney from Ohio, to lead the ATF after the president’s previous nominee, David Chipman, was forced to withdraw.
Officials said Sunday that the Justice Department will publish a final rule on “ghost guns” — untraceable weapons made from kits — that would classify the components used to make them as firearms requiring serial numbers to aid in tracking them.
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Manufacturers who sell the kits would need to be licensed and would be required to run background checks on potential buyers of the kits.
The moves come as violent crime is at or near record levels in many cities across the U.S., and ghost guns increasingly are used in crimes. Mr. Biden’s job-approval ratings have plummeted as voters increasingly express concern about issues such as inflation and crime.
But Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has said the administration’s focus on ghost guns will have “little to no effect on violent crime” that has risen nationwide.
SEE ALSO: White House paints rosy picture as recession fears increase
“Despite this continued rise in violent crime, the DOJ has decided to follow the president in focusing its time and taxpayer resources on policies that will not work, including addressing the so-called ‘Iron Pipeline,’ ghost guns, and lawful firearms dealers,” Mr. Grassley told Attorney General Merrick Garland in February.
Mr. Grassley cited data from the ATF and the FBI to indicate that “ghost guns” were used in less than 0.36% of homicides between 2016 and 2020. He also has said the Justice Department’s statistics show that just 7% of firearms used in a crime are acquired from legal firearms dealers.
Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat, called for a crackdown on ghost guns on Sunday and blamed Republicans for blocking gun legislation.
“I am calling on the administration to go all after ghost guns, by putting out regulations that will stop them,” Mr. Schumer said at a press conference. “The federal government has the ability through regulation to stop these ghost guns.”
Last week, Maryland joined Washington, D.C., and 10 other states in curbing or banning the use of ghost guns.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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can anyone imagine any harvard grad heading the ATF?
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/04/11/biden-nominates-obamas-harvard-law-school-classmate-to-head-atf/
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Dettelbach
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https://www.atf.gov/rules-and-regulations/definition-frame-or-receiver
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second
The Ghost in the Machine Gun
Welcome to the Tuesday, a weekly newsletter about big guns and small points of English usage. To subscribe to the Tuesday — and, please do that! — follow this link.
The Problem Is Ordinary Killers, Not Exotic Guns
Finding a really nice classic Mustang is not always easy and is never cheap, and, for years, a handful of very committed car enthusiasts have been making an end-run around the classic-car market and the restoration industry both by more or less building entirely new cars from the parts catalogue. This is something that is a lot easier to do with very popular classics such as the Mustang than it would be with (alas!) the 1966 Volvo P1800 I very stupidly bought as a broke college student. In reality, building a new Mustang from the catalogue entails a lot more than ordering the parts and putting them together — there is a reason most cars are built in factories rather than in artisans’ workshops. But you can do it, if you really want to.
You can build a gun from scratch, too, if you have the inclination and the skills. Contrary to what a great many people seem to think, there isn’t any law against it. There never has been, at least at the federal level. There are many kits you can buy to build old-style black-powder muskets and Kentucky rifles — a relatively easy project whose main challenges are related to woodworking rather than mechanics. But you can build sophisticated modern firearms, too. If you are a skilled machinist and have the right equipment, you can build one entirely from scratch. If that is too much for you, then you can build one from commercially available parts that simply need to be assembled — but you will have to pass a federal background check when purchasing the “receiver,” which is what the ATF considers a firearm when it is complete or almost complete.
The distinction between firearm and firearm parts is necessary in that firearm parts often are replaced or modified. For example, regular shooters eventually have to replace their rifles’ barrels, which simply wear out. Buying a new barrel for an old rifle is not the same as buying a whole new rifle, legally or practically. Likewise, some shooters will change the stocks or “furniture” on their weapons, change the grips or sights, upgrade certain mechanical parts (especially triggers), etc. At its simplest, a firearm is just a length of pipe that is closed at one end. Because it would be impractical to classify all of these the various parts as firearms under federal law, a more sophisticated distinction has to be made.
A gray area — and here I mean a political gray area; the law at this time is reasonably clear — is the issue of receivers that are sold incomplete. A receiver becomes a firearm under federal law only when it has reached a certain stage of completion. Finishing an unfinished receiver is not like snapping together LEGO bricks — it usually requires some basic machining equipment and skills, though in some cases 3D printing can be used as a workaround. A firearm made from an unfinished receiver, like one made entirely from scratch, never has to go through the background check required by a retail sale, because, as far as federal law is concerned, there never was a retail sale of a firearm at all — only the sale of some firearm parts that were used in the production of a homemade firearm.
These homemade guns, which do not have serial numbers and which require no background check to acquire, are what is meant — purportedly meant, anyway — by the scary-sounding and imprecise term “ghost guns,” the latest terror totem of the anti-gun lobby. I write purportedly because many of the firearms reported as “ghost guns” are not homemade firearms at all but ordinary commercially sold firearms that have had their serial numbers removed or obscured. As often is the case when it comes to crime in the United States, good national data are difficult to find because of inconsistent reporting practices across jurisdictions.
When I first started reading about the upsurge in “ghost guns,” my first thought was to wonder why a criminal would go to the trouble of relying on a process that involves drill presses and mechanical skill rather than do what U.S. criminals have been doing for generations; i.e., using stolen guns or guns bought in criminal transactions. As it turns out, that is pretty much what our criminals are still doing, though some cities and states report significant increases in ghost-gun seizures. There have been a few murders involving ghost guns, and those cases predictably have received a disproportionate amount of attention. To give you an idea of the situation on the ground, the gun-control group Everytown conducted a review of federal “ghost gun” cases — 114 of them over a decade, a number that should tell you something — and found that there were 2,513 such firearms connected to criminal activity. But — and these are Everytown’s findings, not mine — the crime associated with those 2,513 firearms was illegal manufacturing or dealing in 2,200 cases, not robbery or murder or assault. Put another way, almost all of the crimes associated with so-called ghost guns were, in Everytown’s review of the data, the crime of simply possessing such a weapon in the first place or selling one.
That is not surprising. Consider a point of comparison: Contrary to what many people think, it is legal to own a fully automatic weapon in the United States, provided it was manufactured before 1986, though the process of acquiring one is closely regulated and the supply of such weapons is relatively small. Almost all of the crimes associated with legally owned fully automatic weapons in the United States are violations of firearms regulations. The number of murders committed with legally owned fully automatic weapons in the United States in the past 80 years or so could be counted on your fingers. (And, in every case that I have found, those crimes were committed not by civilian owners of machine guns but by police and military personnel using service weapons. It is possible I have missed one or two.) The same is true for many other exotic armaments and accessories, such as sound suppressors, which also are legal to own and increasingly common, especially among the very busy hunters working to keep the feral hog population under control here in Texas.
(The fear of “silencers” is a largely American thing probably driven by Hollywood; in many European countries, suppressors are sold over the counter, and some European firing ranges go as far as to require them as a courtesy to other shooters. I envy this every time I am at the range next to a guy firing a .458 Winchester magnum rifle with a muzzle brake, a device that reduces recoil but makes a firearm about twice as loud. Apparently, my corner of Texas is rife with guys who are dealing with problem elephants.)
For most periods in U.S. history — and ours is no different — the most common firearm used in a crime is whatever the most common handgun of the day happens to be: A generation or two ago, it was .38 revolvers, and now it is 9mm pistols. We spend a great deal of time (and political energy) worrying about so-called assault rifles, which are used in murders only exceedingly rarely — all rifles put together, from AR-type firearms to Elmer Fudd deer rifles, account for about 3 percent of the firearms used in murders. We also are for some (probably cinematic) reason preoccupied with particular unusual weapons that are seldom if ever used in violent crimes: For example, California went bananas a few years ago over .50-caliber rifles, which are now banned in the state. I have been able to find no case in which a .50-caliber rifle was used in a murder in California, and their use in violent crimes is pretty rare everywhere else. (Don’t take my word: Check the Violence Policy Center’s review.) There is a pretty good reason for that, of course: There’s a very nice .50-caliber rifle on the shelf of my local firearms dealer — it is almost six feet long, weighs almost 50 pounds, and costs $13,000.
The more you know about the ballistic facts on the ground, the sillier these scaremongering stories sound. The anti-gun lobby talks in fearful terms about the so-called military-style rifles available to the American buying public, but there are some pretty common hunting rifles that fire cartridges that are five to six times as powerful as the standard 5.56mm used in AR-pattern rifles. This makes perfect sense when you consider that it takes a lot more oomph to kill a Cape buffalo or a bull elk than it does to kill a Russian, which is what the 5.56mm round was designed to do. (Hence its full formal name, 5.56×45mm NATO.) The gun-grabbers who proclaim that they have no interest in taking away granddad’s deer rifle are being pretty silly, from an empirical point of view.
The supposed allure of “ghost guns” is that they are “untraceable.” Which they are — like pretty much every other firearm in the United States. We do not maintain a national gun registry, and, in spite of what you see on television, there isn’t really any such thing as a “registered” or “unregistered” firearm as a matter of federal law and the laws of almost all the states. When police find a firearm that they believe to have been used in a crime, they can, if they choose, consult federal records that will show them which federally licensed firearms dealer sold that gun. Criminals are not as a class of people very intelligent, but even so there are not very many who: (1) are eligible to buy a gun legally from a dealer; (2) actually do so; and (3) leave that gun at the scene of a crime. But that is the only way in most cases that government records could be used to trace a gun from a crime scene to its owner. (Most cases: A couple of states maintain legally questionable databases that might provide more information.) Most firearms change hands at least once — and often several times — before they end up at a crime scene or in the hands of investigators. The thing about career criminals is — they’re career criminals. They don’t buy criminal implements from federally regulated providers. In many cases, they can’t: A large share of our murders are committed by people who already have at least one felony conviction.
Once you start looking at the statistics, you’ll notice a lot of small percentages and weak correlations — a tiny share of “assault rifles” used in murders, Hollywood-style machine guns practically nowhere in evidence, “ghost guns” more common than I would have expected (9 percent of the firearms confiscated by police in Philadelphia, for example) but still pretty rare, etc.
Where you will see much stronger correlations is in who is shooting the guns: About 90 percent of murder suspects in cities such as New York and Chicago have prior arrest histories; in Charlotte, half of the murder suspects have had prior gun charges dismissed, which is a genuine scandal; the No. 1 thing people being convicted of violent felonies have in common is a prior arrest for a violent felony, which is the case for two-thirds of violent felons.
(For context, be aware that the majority of murder victims are criminal offenders, too, a finding that has held true in the big cities for half a century. A 2012 survey of New York murder victims found that 20 percent of them were on probation or parole or had an active arrest warrant, 10 percent were confirmed gang members, 71 percent had prior arrests, etc. Only one in five male murder victims in New York did not have a prior arrest.)
If prior offenders make up 90 percent of our murderers, and “ghost guns” are involved in less than 1 percent of our murders, why are we concentrating on the “ghost guns” rather than on the murderers?
The tripartite answer is politics, theater, and cowardice.
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https://www.captainsjournal.com/2022/04/12/preliminary-assessment-of-atf-rule/
President* Biden calls it the AFT, so why not?
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https://gatesofvienna.net/2021/11/a-handgun-against-an-army/
The second amendment wasn't about deer hunting or plinking at cans.
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Disarm and prepare to die
As crime rises, armed citizens stop more violence than cops
By Tony Shaffer and Tim Wilson
There is a growing body of evidence that law-abiding citizens reduce violent crime. As data continues to be gathered by the FBI, CDC and interested parties from both sides of the firearms discussion, it is becoming ever more apparent that the Second Amendment, where fully implemented, does far more good than harm. The latest revelation to appear in FBI data from 2020 would seem to indicate that armed citizens now stop more crimes than law enforcement, something that should provoke those who advocate gun control to consider whether their policies do more harm than good.
As violent crime rates have risen dramatically in many big cities, another surge in gun sales has also occurred, with many millions of new gun owners realizing that, if law enforcement cannot protect them, their Second Amendment rights provide the best form of selfdefense. At the same time, data is now emerging to show the benefits to society of having armed, law-abiding citizens carrying their weapons.
The lawmakers in the large cities, mostly progressive Democrat-led, want you to disarm — to do the opposite of what your best interests are. They are not interested in data. They are not interested in science, technology or facts. They want you disarmed and don’t care if, as a result, you can die.
Let’s review the facts of why it is important to follow the data and ignore the political rhetoric.
First, we are finally seeing admissions that Defensive Gun Use, which is incredibly hard to measure due to an understandable reticence to even admit to such events, especially in light of such high profile legal attacks as those made on the McCloskey’s in St. Louis in June 2020 by the local district attorney. The CDC now estimates Americans use their guns defensively between 500,000 and 3,000,000 times each year, that is to say from anywhere over 1,300 times per day to over 8,000 times each day. The vast majority of DGUs do not involve shooting, with display alone usually being sufficient to deter would-be criminals.
Second, we see violent crime rising mainly in major cities, with little or no such rise occurring in suburban and rural areas with less gun control. To give this some perspective, the seven worst cities for murder account for more than 15% of all the murders occurring in the U.S. And these cities, which all have strict gun control laws making possession by lawabiding citizens much more difficult than elsewhere, have seen murder rates rise by 30 to 50% in one year (from 2019 to 2020). Meanwhile, the rest of the country has seen little increase in the number of murders, with about half of all counties still not registering a single murder in 2020.
Third, we now have a significant piece of data from the FBI on Justifiable Homicide. In 2020, justifiable homicides by civilians exceeded those by Law Enforcement for the first time, by 343 to 298. This implies that lethal force was used for self-defense by law-abiding citizens who also convinced authorities they were genuinely in fear of their lives when they fired their firearms and took the life of others. In consequence, it is also possible to imply from these numbers that armed, law-abiding citizens stopped more violent crimes than police, and it is further likely that they also stopped many other crimes such as rape and car-jacking.
Finally, we have seen constitutional carry spread from Vermont (historically always liberal towards the Second Amendment) to 18 other states over the last 20 years (with five more states now considering bills favoring constitutional carry). Despite all the rhetoric and emotional claims of opponents and advocates of increased gun control, we have seen violent crime in all these states decrease consistently and persistently (except in some large cities in those states which maintain strong gun control measures, all of which happen to be controlled politically by Democrats).
President Biden has declared, absent of supporting facts of any sort, that gun violence is a public health epidemic. His solution to the observed rise in criminal violence is to ban and/or severely limit access to firearms by law-abiding citizens.
His so-called “commonsense” policies will decrease the ability of all Americans to exercise their Second Amendment right, claiming that this one part of the Bill of Rights is “limited.” Solid data on murder, homicide and violent crime plus the experience of decades of relaxing gun controls at state levels suggest he is completely wrong. There are no limitations to the right of self-protection or self-defense. Any infringement cannot be tolerated.
Self-defense is a fundamental right of every human being. In order to protect themselves, Americans are uniquely blessed to have the right to keep and bear arms enumerated as the Second Amendment. Constitutional carry needs to become the national standard. Anything less is un-American!
Tony Shaffer is president of the London Center for Policy Research, a retired U.S. Army officer and a former senior intel-ligence operative. Tim Wilson is a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research, a retired British Army officer and a proud American citizen
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On This Day in History > April 3, 1776:
Congress authorizes privateers to capture British ships
"On April 3, 1776, Congress authorizes privateering vessels to capture British ships during the American Revolution. Because of the heavy dependence on shipping in the 18th century, it was immediately necessary for Congress to create its own navy after the Revolution began. Congress created the Continental Navy in the fall of 1775. Several states created their own navies as well, but these small navies were no match for the gigantic British Royal Navy which had the largest naval force in the world.
To help in the fight against the British Navy, Congress and several states authorized privately owned merchant vessels to combat and capture British owned naval or merchant vessels. This practice was called "privateering" because the vessels were privately owned. Privateering was essentially the same as piracy, but privateers were not considered pirates by the authorizing nation. Privateering vessels would be outfitted with guns and cannons by their owners and could capture vessels flying an enemy flag.
Privateers were issued a "Letter of Marque and Reprisal" which authorized them to engage in privateering. After an enemy vessel was captured, the vessel was brought to an American port and presented to a judge who would look over the Letter and see that the capture had been handled according to the law. If all was well, the spoils captured on the ship were sold and the proceeds split between the ship's owners and crew, with a small percentage going to the American government as well. The splitting of the spoils in such a capture made privateering quite lucrative, so lucrative in fact that sailors were much more likely to want to serve on a privateer than on a ship run by the Continental Navy.
The contribution of privateers during the American Revolution cannot be overestimated. While the Continental Navy had about 60 ships with 3,000 soldiers during the course of the war, there were two to three thousand privateers with more than 70,000 sailors aboard! Continental Navy vessels carried around 2,800 guns on board, while privateers carried more than 20,000 guns!
With this massive firepower, privateers captured over 3,000 British vessels during the war, while the Continental Navy captured around 200. In addition to the captured vessels and their cargoes, privateers captured more than 10,000 British sailors. Primary locations for privateering included Long Island Sound, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the coasts of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, the Caribbean and even British waters off the coasts of England and Ireland.
How lucrative was privateering? Some estimates put the spoils of American privateers during the Revolution at around $300 million dollars. Clearly, many fortunes were made from the practice. Britain estimated that 10% of all the cargoes it shipped to America were captured by the privateers, earning the privateers the honor of being one of the most influential forces giving America it's victory in the Revolutionary War."
2020 Revolutionary-War-and-Beyond.com
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My comments:
Some very interesting implications for Second Amendment theory here-- it sure sounds like the Founding Fathers envisioned calling upon citizenry owning ships capable of acting as ships of war against the British navy! After all, they were already defending themselves from the Pirates of the Caribbean (attempt at humor here) and the Spanish. What else can the Letters of Marque language mean?
Similarly, the American Revolution began at Lexington and Concord when the British came to confiscate our guns. A little mentioned historical fact is that this included the Colonialists' cannons.
Why would they have had cannons? Because they were left over from them having to defend themselves from the French in the French Indian Wars because the British Crown was not around to defend them.
Nothing has changed. Today we have the quasi-military level of the Narco Cartels claiming our border regions-- and our government-- Federal, State, and Municipal is nowhere to be found.
Our Second Amendment and Ninth Amendment say that as Americans we have the Natural Law Right of effective Self-Defense.
'Murica!
Marc
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https://thenationaldesk.com/news/americas-news-now/atf-sees-rise-in-quarter-sized-glock-switch-that-turns-handguns-into-machine-guns-bureau-of-alcohol-tobacco-firearms-explosives-bullets-semi-automatic-weapon
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https://thenationaldesk.com/news/americas-news-now/atf-sees-rise-in-quarter-sized-glock-switch-that-turns-handguns-into-machine-guns-bureau-of-alcohol-tobacco-firearms-explosives-bullets-semi-automatic-weapon
"It is an officer safety situation because if they came up against someone who was firing a gun like this, that has this kind of power, they aren't going to be outmatched necessarily because they are very well trained, but they are definitely out-gunned. They don't have that kind of firepower and it's scary," said Taylor.
LIE.
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Posted previously, but for some reason the Search command has a hard time finding it so posting it again:
https://jud.ct.gov/external/supapp/Cases/AROcr/CR315/315CR113.pdf?fbclid=IwAR0lYyk5nyw9lSutNaf7kRWQuEyuSjfX-grwJ8BZ7UgMNqDG-MGLpJ1ONt0
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https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg)
They want you disarmed and helpless.
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/832/005/original/a779857d7e933785.png
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/832/005/original/a779857d7e933785.png)
https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg)
They want you disarmed and helpless.
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https://www.nationalreview.com/the-tuesday/what-the-gun-debate-misses/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=TUE_20220531&utm_term=Tuesday-Smart
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https://www.nationalreview.com/the-tuesday/what-the-gun-debate-misses/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=TUE_20220531&utm_term=Tuesday-Smart
Paywalled.
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/800/376/original/ba9221d42efb7308.jpeg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/800/376/original/ba9221d42efb7308.jpeg)
https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/832/005/original/a779857d7e933785.png
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/107/832/005/original/a779857d7e933785.png)
https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/107/797/781/original/6899e98c6b972b2a.jpg)
They want you disarmed and helpless.
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https://www.sandiegonewsdesk.com/2022/05/new-ca-bill-would-no-longer-require-schools-to-report-bad-student-behavior-to-police/
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By KEVIN D. WILLIAMSON
May 31, 2022 6:30 AM
Welcome to the Tuesday, a weekly newsletter about thus and such. To subscribe to the Tuesday, follow this link.
The 2 Percent Solution
On Sunday, I answered as briefly as I could – which in many cases was not very briefly at all – some common questions about the gun-control debate. I have a few even-less-brief observations for Tuesday, but I think you will find them useful.
I begin with what seems to be a mystifying paradox at the center of our gun-control efforts: We only want to enforce the law on the law-abiding, while we ignore the law-breakers almost entirely in our gun-control debate.
Almost every single substantive gun-control proposal put forward by our progressive friends is oriented toward adding new restrictions and regulatory burdens to federally licensed firearms dealers and the people who do business with them: what they can sell and what they cannot sell, to whom they can sell, under what conditions they may sell, etc. But, as I often remark, gun-store customers are just about the most law-abiding demographic in the United States, even accounting for situations such as that of the Uvalde killer, who was able to purchase his firearms legally because he had no prior criminal record. The best information we have comes from the Department of Justice, which found in 2019 that less than 2 percent of all prisoners had a firearm obtained from a retail source at the time they committed their crimes. A different 2013 study by researchers at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins found that only 13 percent of the offenders in the state prison population obtained their firearms from a retail source.
Criminals mostly don’t get their guns at gun stores — because they mostly can’t.
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In contrast to those modest figures of 2 percent or 13 percent, the great majority of murders committed in the United States — upwards of 80 percent — are committed by people with prior arrest records, often by people with prior convictions for violent crimes or prior weapons offenses — and almost none of our gun-control proposals is targeted at this group.
If you have not bought a gun from a gun dealer, then you might not appreciate just exactly how law-abiding and how i-dotting and t-crossing you have to be to make the purchase: Not only are you excluded for a felony conviction, you also are excluded for misdemeanor convictions involving domestic violence or any other misdemeanor for which you could have been sentenced to more than one year in jail, irrespective of the sentence you actually received; you are excluded if you are a “fugitive from justice,” meaning someone with an active arrest warrant who has left the state to avoid arrest; you are excluded if you have been dishonorably discharged from the military; you are excluded if you are a drug addict or a user of illegal drugs; you are excluded if you are an illegal alien or an alien legally present on a nonimmigrant visa; you are excluded if you have been judged mentally deficient by a court of law or committed to a mental institution; you are excluded if you are subject to a restraining order; you are excluded from purchasing a handgun if you are not a resident of the state in which the purchase is being made; you are excluded if you are buying a gun for anyone other than yourself; you are excluded if the information on your government-issued identification does not match current records and the information on your application, a provision that is enforced with such exactitude that an application may be rejected if it says “111 Main St.” instead of “111 Main Street.”
Democrats who complain that it easier to buy a gun than it is to vote are lying for partisan political purposes and should be dismissed with contempt.
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That being said, there are some deficiencies in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) that should be part of the conversation. One is that NICS depends on a variety of agencies for reporting, and these agencies are not always reliable. For example, the shooter in the Sutherland Springs church attack should have been excluded from buying firearms, but the U.S. Air Force neglected to report his criminal history to the FBI, which manages NICS. (A judge has held the Air Force partially responsible for the deaths in that case.) Other problems: Non-federal fugitives are not often reported as such, and in the majority of cases the state with the warrant does not know whether the fugitive has left the state; some localities are slow or negligent in reporting restraining orders or misdemeanor convictions, and some apparently don’t even know what needs to be reported; mental-health reporting has long been slow and desultory — the number of mental-health records in the NICS database jumped from 234,628 in 2005 to 3.8 million in 2014 not because of some sudden spike in mental illness in the United States but because the feds made a priority out of it and put money into helping states and municipalities meet their reporting obligations; the United States does a notoriously poor job of tracking illegal aliens and enforcing immigration law; the process basically relies on self-reporting for illegal drug use.
That lattermost issue is dramatically illustrated by the case of Hunter Biden, who almost certainly violated federal law by lying about his longstanding drug problems when purchasing a handgun in 2018, but was never charged — and, let’s be frank, never will be charged and knew he was never going to be charged, even if caught — under the very law his father boasts of having “shepherded through Congress.”
These are real shortcomings in the system. But, even with that being the case, I should reiterate here that the data very strongly suggest that people who buy firearms from firearms dealers very rarely commit crimes of any kind with those firearms — less than 2 percent of the prisoners in the federal system and about 13 percent of those in the state systems had a firearm obtained from a retail source when they committed their crimes. (And even those figures may overstate the prevalence of retail-sourced firearms in that they probably include some straw purchases and firearms stolen from retailers.) Given the very weak statistical relationship between buying a gun from a gun dealer and committing a crime with that gun, why is there so much focus on federally licensed firearms dealers and the people who do business with them?
The answer is that this conversation has almost nothing to do with violent crime, and almost nothing to do with policies aimed at reducing violent crime.
The gun-control debate is first and foremost a culture-war issue for Democrats. There is a great deal of violent crime in the United States, and that crime is concentrated in big cities over which Democrats enjoy an effective monopoly of political power. The people who commit most of the murders in the United States — and the people who most often die in those murders — check a lot of Democratic-voter demographic boxes: They are very disproportionately low-income African Americans in urban areas. Democrats are desperate to put a more Republican-looking face on the violent-crime problem, preferably one that is older, white, middle-aged, rural, southern, and Evangelical. That is the reason for the focus on the National Rifle Association in particular and on gun dealers and “gun culture” in general. As is so often the case in our contemporary politics, what we are talking about matters mostly because it is a way of not talking about something else.
I am not particularly an admirer of the National Rifle Association. The NRA once was a very effective — and notably bipartisan — single-issue advocacy organization, focused on the legal rights and interests of U.S. gun owners. Contrary to the myth that has grown up around it, the NRA has never been powerful because it throws around a great deal of money — which it doesn’t do: In the 2020 cycle, the NRA was not among the top 1,000 political donors or among the top 250 in lobbying outlays. It is true that the NRA is currently in a weakened condition after a series of self-inflicted wounds, but even back in 2012 it was No. 301 among campaign contributors and only No. 181 on lobbying outlays. The NRA’s strength has never been its pocketbook — it has always been the fact that it represents millions and millions of American gun owners who prioritize Second Amendment issues when they go to the polls. The NRA’s political clout has always been of the most genuine kind — the kind you cannot purchase. If you think clout like that can be bought, ask Mike Bloomberg about his efforts on the gun-control front.
The NRA went wrong when it made itself into a subsidiary of the Republican Party and allowed itself to be taken over by people who wanted to be Fox News pundits — a textbook example of Yuval Levin’s observation about self-interested people who use institutions as platforms. (I do not and never have given a fig about Wayne LaPierre’s million-dollar salary and his natty Zegna suits — frankly, I am surprised that he isn’t paid more: Very effective nonprofit executives do pretty well.) The NRA was better off — and Americans’ gun rights were more secure — when the group still had a few high-ranking Democrats on its side, and when its employees were not famous. You probably can’t name one employee of Squire Patton Boggs, a Washington lobbying powerhouse, and that suits the firm and its clients just fine. It is true that the NRA’s position as culture-war lightning rod was not entirely a matter of the organization’s own choosing, but it has leaned into the role more than it had to.
If this were a matter of public policy, the thousands of people who were standing outside the convention center in Houston to shout obscenities at the NRA would be standing outside the office of the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Chicago and raising absolute hell about the failure — about the refusal – of the federal government and most big-city DAs to prosecute straw-buyer cases. If this were about policy, Joe Biden would be in New York with Kathy Hochul in a headlock demanding to know why career criminals arrested on murder charges are being released — without bail! — into the streets of our largest city. Or, short of that, President Biden could take a brief walk down the street to the ATF headquarters and find out why the agency won’t even bother to go around and pick up guns in sales that it knows were wrongly approved. But none of that happens.
The reason none of that happens is that this is not about crime — it is about culture war and cultural enemies.
Don’t take my word for it: Ask Charles Blow of the New York Times, who demands that “Gun Safety Must Be Everything That Republicans Fear,” as the headline puts it — not what is effective, not what is reasonable or prudent, but whatever it is that Republicans don’t want. Blow is unusual only in that he is relatively open about the fact that this is a culture issue for him: “Gun culture,” he writes, “is a canard and a corruption.”
(Set aside, for the moment, that a marquee columnist for the New York Times apparently does not know what the word “canard” means.)
The Democratic Party and the progressive movement more generally are dominated culturally and financially by college-educated, affluent, white metropolitan professionals, mostly living in those two-thirds of U.S. households in which there is no firearm present. They present themselves as the champions of poor, black, urban communities about which they know almost nothing, and understand themselves as the enemies of lower-income, aging, white, rural communities — the stereotypical NASCAR crowd — about which they also know almost nothing. Never mind that much of the increase in gun ownership in recent years has been driven by women, African Americans, and recreational shooters in urban areas — the eggbound snake-handling hayseeds and would-be militiamen of Georgia and Alabama, whose cultural prominence is almost exclusively a matter of the progressive imagination, simply must be the face of gun ownership, at least for the purposes of culture war. Never mind that most of the violent crime involving guns in this country is carried out in zip codes where the voters elect Democrats almost exclusively, and never mind that the reason we do not act on those “common sense” gun-control measures on which almost all of us notionally agree — such as prosecuting straw-buying and other everyday weapons offenses — is the fact that doing this would irritate important Democratic constituencies in the big cities and among unionized government workers.
Even if we read the data in the way that is most generous to the gun-control cause, fewer than one in five criminals uses a gun acquired from a gun dealer, while more than four out of five murderers have prior arrest records. If we go by the DOJ findings, the share of criminals who use guns from gun dealers is more like 2 percent. And yet almost all of the new proposals from Democrats are new regulations and restrictions on firearms dealers, while almost none is focused on the relatively small body of prior offenders who carry out most murder and other violent crime. The progressives are protesting the NRA in Houston and not in front of city hall in Philadelphia or St. Louis.
Among the few proposals that are targeted at someone other than licensed gun dealers and their customers is the idea of so-called universal background checks, also known as “closing the gun-show loophole.”
According to the DOJ, the share of prisoners who obtained guns through gun shows was — commit this figure to memory — 0.8 percent.
Like I said, this isn’t about crime — it is about Kulturkampf.
A Few More Thoughts about This . . .
After nearly 3,000 Americans died in the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, nobody — nobody sane, anyway — said: “But the real killer is heart disease!” Terrorist attacks are consequential not only because of the numbers killed but also because they change the nature of public life — that is, after all, what they are intended to do. Likewise, the number of Americans who die in massacres such as the ones recently carried out in Buffalo and Uvalde represents a tiny share of the total number of Americans who die in homicides, most of those deaths being the result of ordinary, quotidian crime. An American public-school student is considerably more likely to die in a school-bus accident than in a mass shooting. But those homicidal spectaculars change the nature of school life, and of public life in general.
It is for this reason that they deserve our attention, not because they tell us anything about the lethality of any particular class of firearms or the prudence of changing the regulation of such firearms. The killer in Uvalde was armed with a semiautomatic 5.56mm rifle, not exactly a “weapon of war” (that phrase itself presents a complicated question; see below) but a very effective firearm, and, not coincidentally, the most common rifle sold in the United States. But the killer was barricaded in a room full of fourth-graders for an hour — he could have been armed with a revolver, a kitchen knife, or a brick and achieved the same results. Most of the victims at Sandy Hook were six or seven years old — it is difficult to imagine how magazine-size restrictions would make much of a difference in such a situation. The worst school massacre in American history was carried out nearly a century ago by a killer who used bombs rather than firearms. These kinds of crimes are not going to be prevented by the sorts of measures being put forward.
But surely it is the case that we could, if we were serious about this — which, as I argue above, we really aren’t — walk and chew gum at the same time, using straightforward law-enforcement methods to reduce the numbers of ordinary criminal murders while also working on new data-driven techniques to try to identify mass killers and prevent their crimes before they happen, while also taking commonsense measures to improve security at schools and in other public places.
One thing we are going to have to do is decide whether we still think 18-year-olds are adults. Some gun-control advocates would like to see all firearms sales restricted to those who are at least 21 years of age. This is not an isolated idea: Increasingly, our colleges are organized around the belief that students as old as 22 years of age are, in effect, children who require “safe spaces” and “trigger warnings” and other measures by which school staff members act in loco parentis. In certain situations, a person can be charged with a felony sexual crime for having consensual sexual relations with an 18-year-old or a 20-year-old, even in places where the formal age of sexual consent is less than 18 years of age. And, of course, we generally forbid alcohol sales to legal adults younger than 21 years of age.
I am not what Michael Oakeshott would have called a rationalist, in that I am perfectly comfortable with some measure of organic inconsistency in the law, but I do not think that it probably is tenable in the long run to have an explicitly guaranteed constitutional right denied to people who are old enough to vote. Nor do I think that it is tenable to have people who otherwise enjoy the full rights of adulthood treated as though they were children in the context of higher education. What this means — although the notion is practically taboo — is that it is time to reconsider not the Second Amendment but the 26th Amendment, which forces the states to enfranchise 18-year-olds. If we are going to proceed as though adulthood starts at 21, then we need to raise the voting age to 21, too — because we don’t give children the vote.
Of course, we’ll have to do something about all those child soldiers in our military, with the median age of new Marines hovering around 19.
‘Weapons of War’
As I have pointed out many times, the 5.56mm semiautomatic rifles that progressives like to call “weapons of war” are not really that, inasmuch as they are not generally issued to troops in the United States or elsewhere. But do you know what is a weapon of war? Granddad’s deer rifle. The ubiquitous Remington 700 bolt-action rifle has long been a favorite of hunters, and it also is the go-to sniper rifle for military services around the world. Earlier American wars were fought with bolt-action .30-06 rifles functionally identical to what most American hunters used for generations.
Gun-control activists insist that AR-style rifles are not hunting rifles. A typical tirade found on the Internet: “An AR-15 is not a hunting rifle. Do you really need a high-powered rifle round and high-capacity magazine to take down Bambi? Last time I checked, Bambi wasn’t wearing a bullet proof vest or hiding behind cement barriers.” That isn’t Joe Biden, but it could be.
This is, of course, wrong on every count: The rifles in question not only are hunting rifles; they are today the most common hunting rifle in the United States. But they are not rifles that typically fire a “high-powered” round — in fact, the standard 5.56mm round has long been considered insufficiently powerful for humane deer hunting and has been prohibited at various times in various places for that purpose for that reason. Hog-hunting is one of the most popular kinds of pursuit in the United States, and many outfitters will not allow a hunter to use a 5.56mm rifle for hogs — because it is not powerful enough. The idea of shooting through concrete (Not cement! See below) barriers and body armor with that round is an uncertain proposal at best. You’d be better off with a traditional big-game hunting rifle, which is four or five times as powerful as the “higher-powered” 5.56mm. But, in any case, most of the popular hunter cartridges either began as military rounds (such as the .30-06) or still are military rounds (such as the .308 Winchester). As a practical matter, you aren’t going to find a rifle that is good for killing elk that isn’t also good for killing people.
And that fact matters . . . almost not at all, since rifles are almost never used in murders in the United States, accounting for only 2.5 percent of homicides. What murders in 2022 have in common with murders in 1922 is that the gun most commonly used in a murder is the most common handgun. Once upon a time, it was the Colt Single-Action Army revolver, and then it was the .38 Special, and now it is the 9mm pistol. In 20 years, it may be something else — but the shooters probably will be the same people, i.e., habitual criminals with prior records.
And gun-control advocates will still be focused on the 2 percent of criminals who buy guns from gun dealers, or possibly the 0.8 percent who get them from gun shows.
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https://zelmanpartisans.com/?p=50228
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https://edition.cnn.com/2013/08/27/world/americas/operation-fast-and-furious-fast-facts/index.html?fbclid=IwAR3oysIT1pST2RST_WNc7RC7KYbIDWp1FrrzzU5fe-yM3j6syjIkI8WpV1g
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dBJUifMtTA&t=2s
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https://i0.wp.com/politicallyincorrecthumor.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/germany-collected-guns-before-collecting-all-the-wedding-rings.jpg?resize=519%2C397&ssl=1
(https://i0.wp.com/politicallyincorrecthumor.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/germany-collected-guns-before-collecting-all-the-wedding-rings.jpg?resize=519%2C397&ssl=1)
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2022/06/stop-lying-about-the-historical-understanding-of-gun-rights/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202022-06-01&utm_term=NRDaily-Smart
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reminder
without a subscription
NR only lets a person into a few articles then they block that person
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Noted.
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Stop Lying about the Historical Understanding of Gun Rights
An attendee views a gun on display at the NRA annual convention in Houston, Texas, May 28, 2022. (Callaghan O'Hare/Reuters)
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By CHARLES C. W. COOKE
June 1, 2022 11:23 AM
It has never been ‘mainstream’ to interpret the Second Amendment as guaranteeing anything other than an individual right to bear arms.
If it will please the court, I will happily fall onto both my knees, throw my arms up into the air, shake my head plaintively, and plead with America’s journalists, in the name of all that is good and right, to stop doing this:
The interpretation that the Second Amendment extends to individuals’ rights to own guns only became mainstream in 2008, when the Supreme Court ruled in a landmark gun case, District of Columbia vs. Heller, that Americans have a constitutional right to own guns in their homes, knocking down the District’s handgun ban.
This claim was made yesterday in the Washington Post, by a staff writer named Amber Phillips, under the tag “Analysis.” It is, of course, a ridiculous, contemptuous, malicious lie, a myth, or, if you prefer to use a phrase that has become popular of late, disinformation. It has never — at any point in the history of the United States — been “mainstream” to interpret the Second Amendment as anything other than a protection of “individuals’ rights to own guns.” The decision in Heller was, indeed, “landmark.” But it was so only because it represented the first time that the Supreme Court had been asked a direct question about the meaning of the amendment that, for more than two centuries up to then, had not needed to be asked.
Three months before Heller was decided, 73 percent of Americans believed that “the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees the rights of Americans to own guns,” with just 20 percent contending that it “only guarantees members of state militias such as National Guard units the right to own guns.” That 73 percent supermajority (we might call it the “mainstream”) included a majority of non-gun-owners — which, well, of course it did, given that the alternative interpretation represents a preposterous conspiracy theory. To be within that 20 percent minority, one must ignore all of the history before the Second Amendment’s passage; all of the contemporary commentary as to its meaning; James Madison’s intention to insert it into the Constitution next to the other individual rights in Article I, Section 9, rather than next to the militia clause in Article I, Section 8, clause 16; the 45 state-level rights to keep and bear arms, many of which predated the Second Amendment; the meaning of “the people” everywhere else in the Bill of Rights; the fact that it would make no sense at all to give an individual a “right” to join a state-run institution from which the federal government could bar him; and all evidence of what the United States was actually like prior to 2008.
Writing in 1989, the progressive law professor Sanford Levinson explained in the Yale Law Journal that the theory that Amber Phillips is now laundering “is derived from a mixture of sheer opposition to the idea of private ownership of guns and the perhaps subconscious fear that altogether plausible, perhaps even ‘winning,’ interpretations of the Second Amendment would present real hurdles to those of us supporting prohibitory regulation.” Or, as Adam Liptak put it in the New York Times in 2007, the theory that Phillips has shared is based on “received wisdom and political preferences rather than a serious consideration of the amendment’s text, history and place in the structure of the Constitution.” Once one undertakes that “serious consideration,” one recognizes immediately that the “collective right” claim is, and always has been, a cynical, dishonest, outcome-driven farce. There is a good reason why even Barack Obama responded to the Heller decision by confirming that he had “always believed that the Second Amendment protects the right of individuals to bear arms”: The alternative is a joke.
Phillips’s attempt to rewrite history isn’t new, of course. Back in 2000, the historian — “historian” — Michael Bellesiles wrote a ridiculous book called Arming America, in which he claimed that American “gun culture” was invented in the mid 19th century, and that prior to that, gun ownership in the United States had been rare. For this contribution to the canon, Bellesiles won the Bancroft Prize . . . and then lost it, after his argument was exposed as a ridiculous fraud. Clayton Cramer, one of the men who brought the hoax to light, noted that the reason so many “historians” had “swallowed Arming America’s preposterous claims so readily is that it fit into their political worldview so well. . . . Arming America said things, and created a system of thought so comfortable for the vast majority of historians, that they didn’t even pause to consider the possibility that something wasn’t right.”
Neither, it seems, has Amber Phillips. “How did we get here?” she asks, before proposing that “historians attribute it to a relatively recent political push by gun rights groups to reinterpret the Constitution” and blaming the “appointment of judges and funding of scholars who would interpret the Second Amendment more broadly.” One must ask to what Phillips’s “relatively recently” modifier applies? Does it pertain to the 1982 Senate report that concluded that it was “inescapable that the history, concept, and wording of the second amendment to the Constitution of the United States, as well as its interpretation by every major commentator and court in the first half-century after its ratification, indicates that what is protected is an individual right of a private citizen to own and carry firearms in a peaceful manner”? Is that when this started? If not, how about in 1960, when Hubert Humphrey — the man who invented the Peace Corps and Medicare, and was a tireless opponent of nuclear-weapons testing — insisted casually that “one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms,” and submitted that “the right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible”?
Perhaps Phillips’s “gun rights groups” went back in time a little earlier, to 1880, when the most famous legal scholar of the era, Thomas Cooley, observed that the meaning of the Second Amendment was “that the people, from whom the militia must be taken, shall have the right to keep and bear arms, and they need no permission or regulation of law for the purpose”? Or to 1868, when, during the debate over the 14th Amendment, Senator Jacob Howard listed the “right to keep and bear arms” among the “privileges and immunities” that would now be extended to freed blacks? Perhaps they helped draft the 1857 Dred Scott decision, in which the disgraceful Justice Taney warned that if black Americans were to be regarded as citizens, they would enjoy “the full liberty of speech in public and in private upon all subjects upon which its own citizens might speak; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went”?
Am I still underestimating it? Did this dastardly plot to read the English language plainly start even earlier? Was St. George Tucker on the Federalist Society payroll when he wrote in 1803 that “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; . . . and this without any qualification as to their condition or degree, as is the case in the British government”? Did it begin in 1791, when Representative Roger Sherman described the Second Amendment as protecting “the privilege of every citizen, and one of his most essential rights, to bear arms, and to resist every attack upon his liberty or property, by whomsoever made”? Or 1789, when the Philadelphia lawyer Tench Coxe observed of the unamended Constitution that “the unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people,” and of the Second Amendment specifically that “the people are confirmed by the article in their right to keep and bear their private arms”? Surely, the scheme cannot have reached as far back as 1776, 15 years before the Second Amendment was ratified and 232 years before Heller, when Pennsylvania became the first state to affirm in law that “the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the state”?
I could go on, but I won’t, because it’s not necessary. Instead, I will reiterate my plea to the press: Please, stop it. You’re not fooling the American public. You’re not fooling the courts. You’re just making fools of yourselves, and of the handful of motivated reasoners whom you’re misinforming. Democracy, Darkness — you know the rest.
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https://twitter.com/stillgray/status/1534298076227465216
Right?
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https://www.nationalreview.com/2022/06/enforce-the-gun-laws-we-already-have/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202022-06-06&utm_term=NRDaily-Smart
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/06/08/protesters-outside-justice-brett-kavanaugh-home-assassination-threat/
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/06/08/democrats-block-bill-providing-additional-security-for-supreme-court-justices/
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Why Black Americans Are Buying More Guns
The people who bear the brunt of rising violent crime are taking steps to protect themselves.
By Jason L. RileyFollow
June 7, 2022 6:13 pm ET
“The issue we face is one of conscience and common sense.” So said Joe Biden last week in a prime-time plea for more Second Amendment restrictions. The president is right on both counts, just not in the way that he and other gun-control enthusiasts imagine.
Voters have noticed that cities where shootings occur almost daily also have some of the strictest gun laws. Using common sense, they’ve concluded that more gun-control legislation probably isn’t the solution because criminals by definition don’t respect laws. Many of the same people likewise find it unconscionable that elected officials would make it more difficult for law-abiding residents of high-crime neighborhoods to arm themselves for protection.
Someone might remind Mr. Biden that the past two landmark Supreme Court rulings on gun control were fueled by black plaintiffs who simply wanted to defend their homes and their families. Moreover, they hailed from cities controlled by liberals who have done an extraordinarily bad job of protecting low-income minorities from criminals. In a 2008 case, District of Columbia v. Heller, the court affirmed that the right to bear arms is an individual right and that you don’t need to be part of a militia to exercise it. One of the initial plaintiffs was Shelly Parker, a black computer-software designer who decided to challenge the district’s handgun ban in court after a 7-foot-tall neighborhood drug dealer tried to break into her home one evening and threatened to kill her. “What I want is simply to be able to own a handgun in my home, in the confines of the walls of my home—nothing else,” she told National Public Radio.
Two years later, in McDonald v. Chicago, the high court expanded on Heller. The lead plaintiff was Otis McDonald, a black Chicago retiree who wanted to own a handgun for protection from the gangs that terrorized his low-income neighborhood. Ruling in his favor, the court said that the Second Amendment applies with equal force to federal, state and local governments alike. When McDonald died in 2014, the Chicago Tribune obituary described him as “the man who brought down Chicago’s gun ban.”
It’s well known that gun sales have surged in recent years, but less well known is that blacks have led the trend. Retailers in an online survey conducted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade group, reported that they sold 58% more guns to black customers in the first half of 2020 than a year earlier, the highest increase for any ethnic group. Personal safety tops the list of why people decide to buy a firearm. In a 2021 Gallup survey, 88% of respondents said they own a gun “for protection against crime,” which is up from 67% in 2005.
Social conditions have convinced more Americans that they need a gun, yet the political left has spent little time reassessing woke policies that lead to such thinking. Violent crime has been rising. Homicides in major cities have reached levels not seen in three decades. Meanwhile, liberal policy makers treat criminals like victims and police officers like criminals. Antigun police units tasked with keeping illegal weapons off the streets have been disbanded. Felonies have been downgraded to misdemeanors, and misdemeanors go unpunished, which only emboldens miscreants. Low-income minorities feel the brunt of these so-called reforms because they are by far the most likely crime targets.
The same “defund the police” progressives who have spent most of the past decade undermining the ability of law enforcement to combat crime are now using sensational but statistically rare mass-shooting tragedies as a pretense for curtailing the ability of people in vulnerable communities to defend themselves. The president wants to ban “assault weapons,” raise the purchase age to 21, and expand background checks. There’s no evidence that any of this will address the day-in-day-out gun violence that has driven so many Americans to become first-time gun owners.
The question is whether more restrictions on ordinary Americans in a nation that already has more guns than people will reduce the number of lives lost. Most mass shooters in recent decades have been over 21. The assailants in Buffalo, N.Y., and Uvalde, Texas, passed background checks and purchased their weapons legally. And from 1994 to 2004, we had a federal assault-weapons ban in place. The reality is that most gun crimes don’t involve such weapons, and a RAND Corp. assessment of these efforts found “inconclusive evidence for the effect of assault weapon bans on mass shootings.”
The source of the problem is the failure or inability of the government to protect us. Common sense dictates that we do what is necessary to protect ourselves in the meantime. Only a fool or an ideologue could believe that the best response to people who commit crimes with guns is launching a holy war against people who respect gun laws.
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BLM has resulted in many more black people being murdered.
But some people got paid and lots of lefties got to virtue signal on social media.
Why Black Americans Are Buying More Guns
The people who bear the brunt of rising violent crime are taking steps to protect themselves.
By Jason L. RileyFollow
June 7, 2022 6:13 pm ET
“The issue we face is one of conscience and common sense.” So said Joe Biden last week in a prime-time plea for more Second Amendment restrictions. The president is right on both counts, just not in the way that he and other gun-control enthusiasts imagine.
Voters have noticed that cities where shootings occur almost daily also have some of the strictest gun laws. Using common sense, they’ve concluded that more gun-control legislation probably isn’t the solution because criminals by definition don’t respect laws. Many of the same people likewise find it unconscionable that elected officials would make it more difficult for law-abiding residents of high-crime neighborhoods to arm themselves for protection.
Someone might remind Mr. Biden that the past two landmark Supreme Court rulings on gun control were fueled by black plaintiffs who simply wanted to defend their homes and their families. Moreover, they hailed from cities controlled by liberals who have done an extraordinarily bad job of protecting low-income minorities from criminals. In a 2008 case, District of Columbia v. Heller, the court affirmed that the right to bear arms is an individual right and that you don’t need to be part of a militia to exercise it. One of the initial plaintiffs was Shelly Parker, a black computer-software designer who decided to challenge the district’s handgun ban in court after a 7-foot-tall neighborhood drug dealer tried to break into her home one evening and threatened to kill her. “What I want is simply to be able to own a handgun in my home, in the confines of the walls of my home—nothing else,” she told National Public Radio.
Two years later, in McDonald v. Chicago, the high court expanded on Heller. The lead plaintiff was Otis McDonald, a black Chicago retiree who wanted to own a handgun for protection from the gangs that terrorized his low-income neighborhood. Ruling in his favor, the court said that the Second Amendment applies with equal force to federal, state and local governments alike. When McDonald died in 2014, the Chicago Tribune obituary described him as “the man who brought down Chicago’s gun ban.”
It’s well known that gun sales have surged in recent years, but less well known is that blacks have led the trend. Retailers in an online survey conducted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade group, reported that they sold 58% more guns to black customers in the first half of 2020 than a year earlier, the highest increase for any ethnic group. Personal safety tops the list of why people decide to buy a firearm. In a 2021 Gallup survey, 88% of respondents said they own a gun “for protection against crime,” which is up from 67% in 2005.
Social conditions have convinced more Americans that they need a gun, yet the political left has spent little time reassessing woke policies that lead to such thinking. Violent crime has been rising. Homicides in major cities have reached levels not seen in three decades. Meanwhile, liberal policy makers treat criminals like victims and police officers like criminals. Antigun police units tasked with keeping illegal weapons off the streets have been disbanded. Felonies have been downgraded to misdemeanors, and misdemeanors go unpunished, which only emboldens miscreants. Low-income minorities feel the brunt of these so-called reforms because they are by far the most likely crime targets.
The same “defund the police” progressives who have spent most of the past decade undermining the ability of law enforcement to combat crime are now using sensational but statistically rare mass-shooting tragedies as a pretense for curtailing the ability of people in vulnerable communities to defend themselves. The president wants to ban “assault weapons,” raise the purchase age to 21, and expand background checks. There’s no evidence that any of this will address the day-in-day-out gun violence that has driven so many Americans to become first-time gun owners.
The question is whether more restrictions on ordinary Americans in a nation that already has more guns than people will reduce the number of lives lost. Most mass shooters in recent decades have been over 21. The assailants in Buffalo, N.Y., and Uvalde, Texas, passed background checks and purchased their weapons legally. And from 1994 to 2004, we had a federal assault-weapons ban in place. The reality is that most gun crimes don’t involve such weapons, and a RAND Corp. assessment of these efforts found “inconclusive evidence for the effect of assault weapon bans on mass shootings.”
The source of the problem is the failure or inability of the government to protect us. Common sense dictates that we do what is necessary to protect ourselves in the meantime. Only a fool or an ideologue could believe that the best response to people who commit crimes with guns is launching a holy war against people who respect gun laws.
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/108/499/166/original/28d0f813e9d71c38.jpeg
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/108/499/166/original/28d0f813e9d71c38.jpeg)
BLM has resulted in many more black people being murdered.
But some people got paid and lots of lefties got to virtue signal on social media.
Why Black Americans Are Buying More Guns
The people who bear the brunt of rising violent crime are taking steps to protect themselves.
By Jason L. RileyFollow
June 7, 2022 6:13 pm ET
“The issue we face is one of conscience and common sense.” So said Joe Biden last week in a prime-time plea for more Second Amendment restrictions. The president is right on both counts, just not in the way that he and other gun-control enthusiasts imagine.
Voters have noticed that cities where shootings occur almost daily also have some of the strictest gun laws. Using common sense, they’ve concluded that more gun-control legislation probably isn’t the solution because criminals by definition don’t respect laws. Many of the same people likewise find it unconscionable that elected officials would make it more difficult for law-abiding residents of high-crime neighborhoods to arm themselves for protection.
Someone might remind Mr. Biden that the past two landmark Supreme Court rulings on gun control were fueled by black plaintiffs who simply wanted to defend their homes and their families. Moreover, they hailed from cities controlled by liberals who have done an extraordinarily bad job of protecting low-income minorities from criminals. In a 2008 case, District of Columbia v. Heller, the court affirmed that the right to bear arms is an individual right and that you don’t need to be part of a militia to exercise it. One of the initial plaintiffs was Shelly Parker, a black computer-software designer who decided to challenge the district’s handgun ban in court after a 7-foot-tall neighborhood drug dealer tried to break into her home one evening and threatened to kill her. “What I want is simply to be able to own a handgun in my home, in the confines of the walls of my home—nothing else,” she told National Public Radio.
Two years later, in McDonald v. Chicago, the high court expanded on Heller. The lead plaintiff was Otis McDonald, a black Chicago retiree who wanted to own a handgun for protection from the gangs that terrorized his low-income neighborhood. Ruling in his favor, the court said that the Second Amendment applies with equal force to federal, state and local governments alike. When McDonald died in 2014, the Chicago Tribune obituary described him as “the man who brought down Chicago’s gun ban.”
It’s well known that gun sales have surged in recent years, but less well known is that blacks have led the trend. Retailers in an online survey conducted by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade group, reported that they sold 58% more guns to black customers in the first half of 2020 than a year earlier, the highest increase for any ethnic group. Personal safety tops the list of why people decide to buy a firearm. In a 2021 Gallup survey, 88% of respondents said they own a gun “for protection against crime,” which is up from 67% in 2005.
Social conditions have convinced more Americans that they need a gun, yet the political left has spent little time reassessing woke policies that lead to such thinking. Violent crime has been rising. Homicides in major cities have reached levels not seen in three decades. Meanwhile, liberal policy makers treat criminals like victims and police officers like criminals. Antigun police units tasked with keeping illegal weapons off the streets have been disbanded. Felonies have been downgraded to misdemeanors, and misdemeanors go unpunished, which only emboldens miscreants. Low-income minorities feel the brunt of these so-called reforms because they are by far the most likely crime targets.
The same “defund the police” progressives who have spent most of the past decade undermining the ability of law enforcement to combat crime are now using sensational but statistically rare mass-shooting tragedies as a pretense for curtailing the ability of people in vulnerable communities to defend themselves. The president wants to ban “assault weapons,” raise the purchase age to 21, and expand background checks. There’s no evidence that any of this will address the day-in-day-out gun violence that has driven so many Americans to become first-time gun owners.
The question is whether more restrictions on ordinary Americans in a nation that already has more guns than people will reduce the number of lives lost. Most mass shooters in recent decades have been over 21. The assailants in Buffalo, N.Y., and Uvalde, Texas, passed background checks and purchased their weapons legally. And from 1994 to 2004, we had a federal assault-weapons ban in place. The reality is that most gun crimes don’t involve such weapons, and a RAND Corp. assessment of these efforts found “inconclusive evidence for the effect of assault weapon bans on mass shootings.”
The source of the problem is the failure or inability of the government to protect us. Common sense dictates that we do what is necessary to protect ourselves in the meantime. Only a fool or an ideologue could believe that the best response to people who commit crimes with guns is launching a holy war against people who respect gun laws.
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/13/laws-targeting-mentally-ill-make-red-flag-laws-unn/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=%2BKi08ztP88WaSaRvW5uV67cOhtLH8D0v9NyMmcEDM7Js0LM9LGkLC%2FOPGNh3m%2BOT&bt_ts=1655201357441
Gun rights advocates say so-called red flag laws that aim to stop mass shootings aren’t needed because states already have laws that allow mentally ill people to be confined against their will and lose the right of firearm ownership for life.
Florida has the Baker Act, which allows the hospitalization of people against their will for mental health evaluations. California and other states have similar laws that allow institutionalization for up to 72 hours for evaluation.
In California, a person who has been involuntarily committed would be prevented from possessing or purchasing a firearm for five years. In Florida, an involuntarily committed individual could lose the right to purchase firearms after confinement.
Aidan Johnston, director of federal affairs for Gun Owners of America, said federal law bans mentally ill people from owning guns.
“People who are disqualified for being what is legally known as ‘mental defective,’ they receive a lifetime gun ban when Congress never contemplated they would receive a lifetime gun ban. That’s a problem for Gun Owners of America,” Mr. Johnston said.
“We are early in the life of these policies to really be able to say with rigorous research methods what the effects of these laws are,” said Shannon Frattaroli, a professor and core faculty member of the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “We certainly have descriptive studies that [extreme risk protection orders] are being used to intervene when someone is identified as being at risk of committing a mass shooting, committing a suicide.”
A bipartisan Senate deal on gun control calls for giving states incentives to enact red flag laws, among other provisions. The agreement, reached Sunday, resolves a decades-long impasse on gun policy.
Red flag laws, or extreme risk protection orders, vary from state to state. Police, family, coworkers, neighbors or friends typically can petition a judge to have someone’s gun taken away when they feel the person is at high risk of hurting themselves or others. Depending on the particular law, the person can lose a firearm for a few days to as long as a year.
Nineteen states and the District of Columbia have red flag laws, and the majority of them were enacted from 2018 to 2020 after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
In 2020, red flag laws were used about 5,000 times to temporarily confiscate firearms. Florida is the state that used its red flag law the most, according to a Wall Street Journal report last year.
It’s unclear how many people have their firearms returned.
An NBC affiliate TV station in Denver reported that 146 guns had been confiscated under Colorado’s red flag law since it took effect in 2020 and 116 eventually got their firearms back.
John R. Lott Jr., president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, said he is unaware of national data about how frequently firearms are returned to their owners but noted that about one-third of protection orders are overturned once a hearing is held.
“The rate should actually be much higher because few people who go through the hearing process actually have legal counsel,” Mr. Lott said. “The taking of the guns is also usually just temporary, but there is no real national data on how long those takings last.”
He said red flag laws run afoul of due process.
He noted that mentally ill people can be involuntarily committed to hospitals and have their guns confiscated — sometimes for life — under state laws.
“People who truly pose a clear danger to themselves or others should be confined to a mental health facility or be required to seek treatment. Laws used to confiscate guns are typically enforced when dealing with suicidal people,” Mr. Lott said. “However, if someone is suicidal, there are many other ways they may choose to kill themselves. Simply taking away a gun isn’t the answer.”
Ms. Frattaroli said red flag laws aren’t about mental health but instead focus on behavior or words that indicate someone might do harm.
“From all that we know about violence, the best predictors of [violence] are past violent behavior and threats of violence,” she said. “Mental health isn’t a good predictor of future violence. It’s a very different sort of set of criteria.”
She suggested that states and localities that use the laws have more consistency and awareness.
“What’s really important is that attention and resources be paid to implementation,” Ms. Frattaroli said. “When we look across the states, there is tremendous variation across states and within states with regard to how frequently they are being used.”
Last week, the House passed the Federal Extreme Risk Protection Order Act, which would allow courts to take guns from people deemed dangerous and bar them from purchasing firearms.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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Red flag laws aren’t about protecting the public, they are about disarming dissidents.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/13/laws-targeting-mentally-ill-make-red-flag-laws-unn/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=%2BKi08ztP88WaSaRvW5uV67cOhtLH8D0v9NyMmcEDM7Js0LM9LGkLC%2FOPGNh3m%2BOT&bt_ts=1655201357441
Gun rights advocates say so-called red flag laws that aim to stop mass shootings aren’t needed because states already have laws that allow mentally ill people to be confined against their will and lose the right of firearm ownership for life.
Florida has the Baker Act, which allows the hospitalization of people against their will for mental health evaluations. California and other states have similar laws that allow institutionalization for up to 72 hours for evaluation.
In California, a person who has been involuntarily committed would be prevented from possessing or purchasing a firearm for five years. In Florida, an involuntarily committed individual could lose the right to purchase firearms after confinement.
Aidan Johnston, director of federal affairs for Gun Owners of America, said federal law bans mentally ill people from owning guns.
“People who are disqualified for being what is legally known as ‘mental defective,’ they receive a lifetime gun ban when Congress never contemplated they would receive a lifetime gun ban. That’s a problem for Gun Owners of America,” Mr. Johnston said.
“We are early in the life of these policies to really be able to say with rigorous research methods what the effects of these laws are,” said Shannon Frattaroli, a professor and core faculty member of the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. “We certainly have descriptive studies that [extreme risk protection orders] are being used to intervene when someone is identified as being at risk of committing a mass shooting, committing a suicide.”
A bipartisan Senate deal on gun control calls for giving states incentives to enact red flag laws, among other provisions. The agreement, reached Sunday, resolves a decades-long impasse on gun policy.
Red flag laws, or extreme risk protection orders, vary from state to state. Police, family, coworkers, neighbors or friends typically can petition a judge to have someone’s gun taken away when they feel the person is at high risk of hurting themselves or others. Depending on the particular law, the person can lose a firearm for a few days to as long as a year.
Nineteen states and the District of Columbia have red flag laws, and the majority of them were enacted from 2018 to 2020 after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
In 2020, red flag laws were used about 5,000 times to temporarily confiscate firearms. Florida is the state that used its red flag law the most, according to a Wall Street Journal report last year.
It’s unclear how many people have their firearms returned.
An NBC affiliate TV station in Denver reported that 146 guns had been confiscated under Colorado’s red flag law since it took effect in 2020 and 116 eventually got their firearms back.
John R. Lott Jr., president of the Crime Prevention Research Center, said he is unaware of national data about how frequently firearms are returned to their owners but noted that about one-third of protection orders are overturned once a hearing is held.
“The rate should actually be much higher because few people who go through the hearing process actually have legal counsel,” Mr. Lott said. “The taking of the guns is also usually just temporary, but there is no real national data on how long those takings last.”
He said red flag laws run afoul of due process.
He noted that mentally ill people can be involuntarily committed to hospitals and have their guns confiscated — sometimes for life — under state laws.
“People who truly pose a clear danger to themselves or others should be confined to a mental health facility or be required to seek treatment. Laws used to confiscate guns are typically enforced when dealing with suicidal people,” Mr. Lott said. “However, if someone is suicidal, there are many other ways they may choose to kill themselves. Simply taking away a gun isn’t the answer.”
Ms. Frattaroli said red flag laws aren’t about mental health but instead focus on behavior or words that indicate someone might do harm.
“From all that we know about violence, the best predictors of [violence] are past violent behavior and threats of violence,” she said. “Mental health isn’t a good predictor of future violence. It’s a very different sort of set of criteria.”
She suggested that states and localities that use the laws have more consistency and awareness.
“What’s really important is that attention and resources be paid to implementation,” Ms. Frattaroli said. “When we look across the states, there is tremendous variation across states and within states with regard to how frequently they are being used.”
Last week, the House passed the Federal Extreme Risk Protection Order Act, which would allow courts to take guns from people deemed dangerous and bar them from purchasing firearms.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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Republicans consider paring down gun control deal
GOP backers have concerns about key provisions
BY HARIS ALIC THE WASHINGTON TIMES
Republicans are getting antsy about Congress’ bipartisan gun deal, with GOP supporters expressing reservations about the package’s key provisions.
Sen. John Cornyn, Texas Republican, said negotiators had encountered obstacles when translating the deal’s framework into legislation.
“I’m starting to get a little concerned, though, that there are a couple of issues that need to be settled before we can reach an agreement,” said Mr. Cornyn, a lead GOP negotiator.
Fault lines have emerged over the proposal’s incentives for states to adopt “red flag” laws and its broadening of restrictions on gun ownership for people accused or convicted of domestic violence.
Republicans say that since some states will choose not to adopt red flag laws, which allow courts to prohibit people deemed threats from buying or possessing guns, the deal should take that into account. They note that states without red flag laws often have crisis intervention and mental health programs that should be eligible to receive funding under the deal.
“I just don’t think anything that funds 19 states for their programs, but ignores other states that have chosen not to have a red flag law but have other ways to address the same problem, is going to fly,” said Mr. Cornyn.
GOP lawmakers are also concerned about the proposed new restrictions on gun ownership by those accused of domestic violence. Federal law already prohibits individuals from owning or purchasing guns if they have been convicted of domestic violence against a spouse or someone they lived with or had a child.
The law does not cover individuals convicted of domestic violence against people with whom they were engaged in romantic relationships.
Republicans say that they support closing the so-called “boyfriend loophole,” but worry about how to properly define non-married relationships under law.
“We have to come up with a good definition of what that actually means,” said Mr. Cornyn. “It’s got to be clear and it’s got to be something that can be actually applied because we’re talking about pretty serious consequences.”
The impasse comes as the Senate races to finalize a gun deal before departing Washington next week for the July 4 recess.
At the moment, more than 20 lawmakers have signed on to support a framework agreement that would boost funding for school security and mental health, subsidize state red flag laws, close the “boyfriend loophole” and include juvenile records in background checks for gun purchases.
While at least 11 Republicans are backing the agreement in principle — an important number since most legislation requires at least 60 votes to pass the evenly split Senate — their support is tenuous.
Negotiators fret that if they cannot properly craft the legislation to keep GOP support on board, then they will have to be forced to cut out provisions or risk tanking the whole deal.
“At some point, if we can’t get to 60 then we’re going to have to pare some of this, some of it down,” said Mr. Cornyn.
Democratic supporters say, however, that there is still time to find a compromise.
“The problems and issues are fixable,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut Democrat. “The timeline is tight, but it is achievable.”
===========================
===========================
Red-flag laws raise red flags
They would not be necessary if existing legislation were fairly enforced
By David Keene
Analysis of the gun control “deal” Senate Republicans and Democrats struck last week will focus on the so-called red-flag laws that have become flavor of the week favorites of politicians and gun control activists.
Red-flag laws sound good in concept. Who would disagree with the wisdom of disarming those in the midst of a psychic break or mentally unhinged as to represent an immediate threat to themselves or others? As always, however, the devil lurks in the details. What about due process? What sort of threat justifies suspending one’s rights even temporarily?
Who gets to determine whether an individual is dangerous enough? Red-flag laws can be easily abused by those who get to decide who represents a real danger. How will this law avoid the fact that laws such as these will almost inevitably cast a wider and more dangerous net than originally intended? What remedies exist to avoid or at least minimize such abuse? What happens when the crisis triggering the “temporary” seizure of one’s firearms has passed?
When such proposals were first gaining popularity, I was asked as an NRA officer if there were any circumstances where the NRA or other pro-Second Amendment organizations could support such a law. A proposal designed narrowly enough to accomplish its goal and incapable of being abused by those administering it might well win approval, but I warned that the concerns above had to be addressed satisfactorily and any such law would have to include real due process protection.
The advocates of these various proposals since have since largely ignored these fundamental questions. During the Obama years, some states including Maryland considered adopting red flag laws that would allow virtually anyone to call police on someone they considered a “danger” and empower the police to confiscate the accused’s guns without anything resembling due process. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia have since enacted red-flag laws, or what they call “Gun Violence Restraining Orders.” Some are better than others, but none are perfect. Too many people under many of these laws can force police action, although most local authorities seem to have acted with restraint thus far.
Laws adopted by individual states from California to Florida to Indiana are enforced at the state and local levels. President Biden and Congressional Democrats want a federal one-size-fits-all law enforceable in the federal courts and executed by federal law enforcement officials. Fortunately, Senate Republicans forced Democrats to abandon this approach or even a nationwide mandate requiring states to pass such laws in favor of financial incentives to “encourage” them to do so. A few more states might, but many of those who don’t have them now aren’t likely to do so.
What’s more, even though 20 senators have signed on to “a framework,” the legislative language on which the Senate will eventually have to vote has yet to be written. A top Senate aide told Politico, “One of these principles could be dropped if text is not agreed to.” Gun owners, Second Amendment supporters and those who represent them must insist that any “text” that is agreed to must answer the questions above in an acceptable way. If not, the text and the framework should be scuttled.
Most states can already temporarily detain or disarm anyone deemed dangerous. As in so many instances, new laws would not be necessary if existing laws already on the books were fairly and uniformly enforced. The same can be said about the “framework” agreement to toughen laws against “straw purchasers” buying firearms for others. This is already illegal and is one of the least enforced of all firearms laws; enhancing it will do little other than allow politicians to say they’ve done “something.”
Democrats also wanted to outlaw anyone under 21 from buying a gun. That is off the table and the compromise “framework” would instead somehow allow background checks to include sealed mental health and juvenile criminal records for younger potential purchasers. This may make some sense as most school shooters fall into this category, and a few may have been prohibited from legally acquiring a gun if this could be done now. Getting the states to agree to allow access to these records, however, is likely to be far more difficult than anyone suspects. Not only do state requirements limiting access to such information vary widely, but the proposal will stir up juvenile rights advocates and mental health advocates along with their elected allies.
Still, the belated recognition by Congress of the importance of enhanced school security and the way in which a flawed mental health system has allowed those who even under existing law shouldn’t have access to firearms is good news. Senate Republicans didn’t do badly in getting Democrats to take some really bad ideas off the table and the substance of what they agreed to in principle isn’t all that bad, but slippery slopes are dangerous places to be and opening the door to far worse restrictions if a package based on the agreement makes it to the floor could prove disastrous.
These Senators have not “sold out” gun owners — yet — but they have put them in real danger. They will be judged by millions of gun-friendly voters on whether what makes it to the Senate floor meets the concerns of gun owners and whether they make it clear that they will oppose any additional restrictions. If they don’t, they will have abandoned their principles to stand before the cameras with their anti-gun colleagues to claim they’ve “done something.”
David Keene is editor-at-large at The Washington Times.
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https://twitchy.com/samj-3930/2022/06/16/lying-to-your-face-twitter-law-school-thread-on-red-flag-laws-and-how-they-will-absolutely-be-abused-an-infuriating-must-read/
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https://www.acponline.org/advocacy/acp-advocate/archive/june-17-2022/acp-strengthens-advocacy-to-prevent-firearm-violence-amid-recurrence-of-mass-shootings?utm_campaign=FY21-22_NEWS_ACPADVOCATE_061722_EML&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua
funny . I don't recall them making a stink about all the inner city gang violence .
wonder why that is.
just like I never in 38 yrs heard anything that would be construed as pro LIFE [corrected]
or unborn baby rights.
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/16/street-brawls-gang-gunfights-dominate-causes-267-m/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=V9zHQXPVefqjzx14bnVFluaRipgTtauWPL0a7E4odUS%2BdM0qrtrZMOJwlvPTpZpe&bt_ts=1655404399133
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An example of why I hesitate with Mercola. Is the 98% number really true? Only 2% of mass shooting occur in black gang fights?
https://www.theepochtimes.com/97-8-of-mass-shootings-are-linked-to-this_4537542.html?utm_source=Health&utm_campaign=health-2022-06-18&utm_medium=email&est=WV9sXCkADyIXENwDLHTR%2BqqfXyVeTcsrafuiJycekmVbR%2F69kfHkWuQvSnso%2FrQJB2nU
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https://www.9news.com/article/news/local/next/colorados-red-flag-law-used-to-target-officer-involved-in-fatal-shooting/73-f52ddaca-893d-493b-983c-db9ecf250ad3?fbclid=IwAR2HZdH6vKJlsQjXCgMLzJebXV0UR25SPdIGdza5Ib_Tb-XwQwpIPH_yfuA
https://www.app.com/story/news/local/public-safety/2019/11/22/gun-control-nj-red-flag-law-tested-case-between-middletown-man-and-doctor/4253289002/?fbclid=IwAR288XczToZpwGy69dQ9ItHchfxMWMgYVRKX_iAGIvVLHHfIW2KkmYPeY2o
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https://www.nraila.org/articles/20220616/treachery-white-house-moves-to-strangle-us-ammunition-supply
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Was on the road for 12 hours today. Heard we won on the SCOTUS Second Amendment case. Anyone have the citation for the case?
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Was on the road for 12 hours today. Heard we won on the SCOTUS Second Amendment case. Anyone have the citation for the case?
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/historic-win-gun-rights-scotus-rules-ny-draconian-restrictions-are-unconstitutional
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https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/21pdf/20-843_7j80.pdf
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This is shorter than the decision haha
The Supreme Court Strikes a Historic Blow for Second Amendment Rights
Justice Clarence Thomas speaks at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., October 21, 2021. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
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By CHARLES C. W. COOKE
June 23, 2022 2:19 PM
In New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, the Court affirmed that gun rights are due the same protection as all other constitutional rights.
Today’s Supreme Court decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen is not only the most important Second Amendment ruling since D.C. v. Heller, it is potentially the most important Second Amendment ruling in American history.
For all the brouhaha, the question at hand in Bruen was rather straightforward: Can the state of New York require that applicants for gun-carry permits “demonstrate a special need for self-protection distinguishable from that of the general community,” or is New York obliged by the Constitution to offer a “shall issue” regime of the sort that 43 of the other 49 states have adopted? By a 6–3 vote, the justices decided that the latter approach is required. In the United States, Clarence Thomas’s majority opinion concluded, “authorities must issue concealed-carry licenses whenever applicants satisfy certain threshold requirements, without granting licensing officials discretion to deny licenses based on a perceived lack of need or suitability.” Moreover, while there is nothing illegal about America’s existing state-level permitting systems, those systems may not be mere smokescreens for outright prohibition, unequal protection, or unacceptable delay. “We do not rule out,” Thomas added in a footnote, any “constitutional challenges to shall-issue regimes where, for example, lengthy wait times in processing license applications or exorbitant fees deny ordinary citizens their right to public carry.”
As Justice Alito was keen to note, this “holding decides nothing about who may lawfully possess a firearm or the requirements that must be met to buy a gun. Nor does it decide anything about the kinds of weapons that people may possess.” It concludes solely that:
The exercise of other constitutional rights does not require individuals to demonstrate to government officers some special need. The Second Amendment right to carry arms in public for self-defense is no different. New York’s proper-cause requirement violates the Fourteenth Amendment by preventing law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their right to keep and bear arms in public.
Bottom line: New York is allowed to exclude carry-permit applications on a categorical basis (e.g., the applicant has a felony conviction), but not on a subjective one (e.g., the applicant doesn’t “need” a gun in the view of the determining officer).
To get there, the majority first determined that “nothing in the Second Amendment’s text draws a home/public distinction with respect to the right to keep and bear arms.” Indeed, “to confine the right to ‘bear’ arms to the home,” the majority observed, “would nullify half of the Second Amendment’s operative protections.” This, Thomas explained, would not do, because “the constitutional right to bear arms in public for self-defense is not ‘a second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.’”
Next, the majority examined the relevant history. In its brief, the state of New York offered up three objections to the claim that broad gun-carry rights have a long historical pedigree in the United States: the existence of “common-law offenses” prior to the Second Amendment’s ratification; the existence of “statutory prohibitions” before, during, and after the late 18th century; and the existence of “surety statutes” that required Americans who carried guns in public to post bond before doing so. As in Heller, the majority made short work of all three contentions.
The “common law” in question is primarily the Statute of Northampton, an English law that was passed in the 14th century and adopted by many American colonies in the 17th century. But, as Thomas noted in what is a thorough and much-deserved fisking, even if one believed that the meaning of the Statute of Northampton (1328) could somehow limit the meaning of the Second Amendment (1791), the interpretation presented by the plaintiffs would still be wrong. (And probably deliberately so: During oral arguments, Justice Alito chided one of the state’s lawyers for cutting out some of the Statute’s key words.) By its plain text, the Statute of Northampton prohibited the carrying of arms in order to terrify others or to breach the peace; it did not prohibit the carrying of arms per se. That being so, the Court concluded that there is “no evidence indicating that these common-law limitations impaired the right of the general population to peaceable public carry.”
The same problem pertained to the “surety statutes” that were offered up in New York’s defense. As Thomas noted, such laws did indeed require people who “could not prove a special need for self-defense, to post a bond before publicly carrying a firearm,” but — and this is crucial — only in such cases as those people were deemed “reasonably likely to ‘breach the peace.’” To explain this, Thomas cited William Rawle, who explained at the time of the Constitution’s ratification that the carrying of arms was “sufficient cause to require [the carrier] to give surety of the peace” only when it was “attended with circumstances giving just reason to fear that he purposes to make an unlawful use of them.”
The final area of inquiry was into the various statutory prohibitions and limits on carry that have been in force throughout American history. This area of the law is a little more complex — especially given that, under Thomas’s judicial approach, “historical evidence that long predates or postdates” the passage of the Second Amendment and the 14th Amendment “may not illuminate the scope of the right” — but, on balance, Thomas was correct to note that, historically, “concealed-carry prohibitions” have been “constitutional only if they did not similarly prohibit open carry.” Or to put it another way: Even if one believes that statutes regulating carry are important to ascertaining the original public meaning of the Second Amendment, one has to reckon with the fact that New York prohibits open carry completely, that it refuses to permit concealed carry on an equal basis, and that it is therefore in violation of the plain meaning of the “bear arms” provision within the Second Amendment as incorporated via the 14th.
Summing up his approach, Thomas submitted that “when the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct, and to justify a firearm regulation the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.” In so doing, he clarified many of Heller’s loose ends, and took a great stride toward ensuring that recalcitrant lower-court judges are unable to wiggle out of its terms. “Since Heller and McDonald,” Thomas noted, “the Courts of Appeals have developed a ‘two-step’ framework for analyzing Second Amendment challenges that combines history with means-end scrutiny. The Court rejects that two-part approach as having one step too many.” Heller, Thomas confirmed, “did not invoke any means-end test such as strict or intermediate scrutiny, and it expressly rejected any interest-balancing inquiry akin to intermediate scrutiny.” Message: Going forward, those courts must stop playing games.
This clarification evidently infuriated Justice Breyer, who began his dissent by recording that “in 2020, 45,222 Americans were killed by firearms,” and then insisted that, “when courts interpret the Second Amendment, it is constitutionally proper, indeed often necessary, for them to consider the serious dangers and consequences of gun violence that lead States to regulate firearms.” “In my view,” Breyer wrote, “the question of firearm regulation presents a complex problem—one that should be solved by legislatures rather than courts.” A few paragraphs later, however, he gave the game away. By defending New York’s law on the basis that “there is nothing unusual about broad statutory language that can be given more specific content by judicial interpretation,” he made it clear exactly why Thomas is so committed to the idea that, while “historical analysis can sometimes be difficult and nuanced . . . reliance on history to inform the meaning of constitutional text is more legitimate, and more administrable, than asking judges to ‘make difficult empirical judgments’ about ‘the costs and benefits of firearms restrictions,’ especially given their ‘lack [of] expertise’ in the field.”
“Much of the dissent,” Justice Alito wrote in concurrence, “seems designed to obscure the specific question that the Court has decided.” And, indeed, it does. At various points, Breyer lists mass shootings, shares suicide statistics, and discusses domestic violence, as if the Court were a legislature, as if the Second Amendment didn’t exist, and as if the presence of evil in American life magically negated the law. But it doesn’t, as Thomas was keen to point out. “That,” he wrote, “is not how the First Amendment works when it comes to unpopular speech or the free exercise of religion. It is not how the Sixth Amendment works when it comes to a defendant’s right to confront the witnesses against him. And it is not how the Second Amendment works when it comes to public carry for self-defense,” either.
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One point on the so called compromise bill, the Left and Democrats are completely open about the slippery slope tactic. 'We will get all we can get now, in pieces and pieces, and keep coming back until we get all of what we want', which is presumably no guns whatsoever in the hands of law abiding citizens.
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One point on the so called compromise bill, the Left and Democrats are completely open about the slippery slope tactic. 'We will get all we can get now, in pieces and pieces, and keep coming back until we get all of what we want', which is presumably no guns whatsoever in the hands of law abiding citizens.
Hard to put armed people into camps.
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/109/576/980/original/f25867360d85118b.png
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/109/576/980/original/f25867360d85118b.png)
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Pithy.
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https://www.foxnews.com/lifestyle/gun-laws-story-right-keep-bear-arms?fbclid=IwAR11GYEchzeRGxkJ4uGDVkufSl3VRD5vZJ8j3F4a-mWeGmVo0ZkRO6c5UWw
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https://gunmagwarehouse.com/blog/stephen-hunter-the-assault-weapon-massacres-of-1964/?goal=0_0d355b7f6d-e01f6f802c-424032021&mc_cid=e01f6f802c&mc_eid=1954b5d655
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third
More Legal Guns Reduced Crime in Brazil
Homicide fell 34% after Bolsonaro made firearms permits easier and cheaper.
By John R. Lott Jr.
June 26, 2022 5:35 pm ET
‘Lives are on the line,” President Biden said after the Supreme Court held New York state’s restrictive gun-permit regime unconstitutional last week. Gov. Kathy Hochul warned: “This could place millions of New Yorkers in harm’s way.” Brazil’s experience suggests otherwise.
In 2018, the year before Jair Bolsonaro became president, Brazil had one of the highest homicide rates among developed countries: 27.8 per 100,000 people, compared with 5 per 100,000 in the U.S. Mr. Bolsonaro’s solution: “Give guns to good people. Let people have guns so that they have the chance to defend themselves.”
In Brazil black-market firearms are widely available to criminals, and 70% of murders in 2019 involved guns. When Mr. Bolsonaro took office, there were about 330,000 licensed firearm owners in Brazil. At the time, according to the BBC, “only strictly defined groups of people, including police and security officials are able to obtain a gun license.” In 2019, when Mr. Bolsonaro’s many changes began taking effect, Brazil added more than 400,000 licensed firearm owners.
During his presidential campaign, critics said he had it dangerously wrong. A Bloomberg Opinion writer scoffed: “It’s hard to buy the current proposals championed by gun lobbyists and a few political yahoos who aim to make Brazil safer by slackening controls.” The New York Times wrote in a news story that his proposals were “worrying some experts who argue that more guns fuel more violence.”
Brazil’s pre-2019 laws looked like the wish list of American gun-control advocates. Owning a gun without a license carries a four-year prison sentence. By comparison, almost no state in the U.S. requires a license to own a gun, and 25 states don’t require a license to carry a gun.
In Brazil aspiring gun owners have to be at least 25, undergo psychological and technical aptitude screening, show proof of employment, and explain why they want a firearm. Mr. Bolsonaro eliminated the psychological and other screening requirements.
By November 2021, Mr. Bolsonaro had made 32 changes to ease Brazil’s gun laws. Brazilians were allowed to own more and more-powerful guns—up to six guns and up to .50 caliber, the same maximum caliber as the U.S. He raised the maximum annual ammunition purchase to 5,000 rounds a year from 50. He made it easier to carry concealed handguns in public.
Before Mr. Bolsonaro, Brazilians had to pay $260 for a new gun license and $25 every three years to renew it. This put legal gun ownership out of reach of the poor. The initial license fee has fallen to around $18.50, and licenses are good for 10 years.
Instead of surging, crime declined sharply in Brazil. In three years under Mr. Bolsonaro, the homicide rate has fallen 34%, to 18.5 per 100,000.
The media and gun-control advocates were wrong about Brazil. Mr. Biden and Ms. Hochul should take note.
Mr. Lott is president of the Crime Prevention Research Center and author of “More Guns, Less Crime.”
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https://gunsandgadgetsdaily.com/why-new-gun-control-bill-sucks-collapsing-star/?trk_msg=3358AQ3UIUJKTAALDS5J683DOS&trk_contact=TQFOPF6JEA41M3NTU7L8UHB7GG&trk_sid=PUFJ3HRD87AG38TT6BG3BO4TTK&trk_link=FECFGTVLMDR4RC1TBK0JA6EFJG
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Forget whether I posted this previously:
On This Day in History > April 3, 1776:
Congress authorizes privateers to capture British ships
"On April 3, 1776, Congress authorizes privateering vessels to capture British ships during the American Revolution. Because of the heavy dependence on shipping in the 18th century, it was immediately necessary for Congress to create its own navy after the Revolution began. Congress created the Continental Navy in the fall of 1775. Several states created their own navies as well, but these small navies were no match for the gigantic British Royal Navy which had the largest naval force in the world.
To help in the fight against the British Navy, Congress and several states authorized privately owned merchant vessels to combat and capture British owned naval or merchant vessels. This practice was called "privateering" because the vessels were privately owned. Privateering was essentially the same as piracy, but privateers were not considered pirates by the authorizing nation. Privateering vessels would be outfitted with guns and cannons by their owners and could capture vessels flying an enemy flag.
Privateers were issued a "Letter of Marque and Reprisal" which authorized them to engage in privateering. After an enemy vessel was captured, the vessel was brought to an American port and presented to a judge who would look over the Letter and see that the capture had been handled according to the law. If all was well, the spoils captured on the ship were sold and the proceeds split between the ship's owners and crew, with a small percentage going to the American government as well. The splitting of the spoils in such a capture made privateering quite lucrative, so lucrative in fact that sailors were much more likely to want to serve on a privateer than on a ship run by the Continental Navy.
The contribution of privateers during the American Revolution cannot be overestimated. While the Continental Navy had about 60 ships with 3,000 soldiers during the course of the war, there were two to three thousand privateers with more than 70,000 sailors aboard! Continental Navy vessels carried around 2,800 guns on board, while privateers carried more than 20,000 guns!
With this massive firepower, privateers captured over 3,000 British vessels during the war, while the Continental Navy captured around 200. In addition to the captured vessels and their cargoes, privateers captured more than 10,000 British sailors. Primary locations for privateering included Long Island Sound, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the coasts of Newfoundland and Nova Scotia, the Caribbean and even British waters off the coasts of England and Ireland.
How lucrative was privateering? Some estimates put the spoils of American privateers during the Revolution at around $300 million dollars. Clearly, many fortunes were made from the practice. Britain estimated that 10% of all the cargoes it shipped to America were captured by the privateers, earning the privateers the honor of being one of the most influential forces giving America it's victory in the Revolutionary War."
2020 Revolutionary-War-and-Beyond.com
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My comments:
Some very interesting implications for Second Amendment theory here-- it sure sounds like the Founding Fathers envisioned calling upon citizenry owning ships capable of acting as ships of war against the British navy! After all, they were already defending themselves from the Pirates of the Caribbean (attempt at humor here) and the Spanish. What else can the Letters of Marque language mean?
Similarly, the American Revolution began at Lexington and Concord when the British came to confiscate our guns. A little mentioned historical fact is that this included the Colonialists' cannons.
Why would they have had cannons? Because they were left over from them having to defend themselves from the French in the French Indian Wars because the British Crown was not around to defend them.
Nothing has changed. Today we have the quasi-military level of the Narco Cartels claiming our border regions-- and our government-- Federal, State, and Municipal is nowhere to be found.
Our Second Amendment and Ninth Amendment say that as Americans we have the Natural Law Right of effective Self-Defense.
'Murica!
Marc
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https://www.conservativereview.com/california-leaks-gun-owners-names-home-addresses-in-massive-privacy-breach-2657577590.html
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Red Flag Laws: What Are They & How Do They Work?
March 24th, 2022|Tags: National, Nonvideo|0 Comments
Over the past few years, “Red Flag” laws have been one of the hottest topics in the gun control debate. Ever since 17 people lost their lives during the 2018 tragic school shooting in Parkland, Florida, there’s been a massive push for lawmakers to “do something” and prevent weapons from falling into the hands of the mentally ill. But Red Flag laws are not a new concept, and the issue of how to keep guns out of the hands of mentally unstable individuals is one that gun rights advocates and politicians have been debating long before the media sensationalized it.
If you’ve ever listened to anyone talk about gun control, you’ve probably heard the term “Red Flag law” more times than you can count. But what actually are these laws? What do they accomplish that existing regulations don’t? Most importantly, how do Red Flag laws affect law-abiding people like you?
What Are Red Flag Laws?
Red Flag laws are intended to preemptively disarm people who show warning signs that they could be dangerous to themselves and/or others. The term “Red Flag law” is actually a collective nickname for the various court orders states have in place, including: Extreme Risk Firearm Protection Orders (ERFPO), Risk Protection Orders (RPO), Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), Gun Violence Restraining Orders (GVRO), and risk warrants. When information emerged that the Parkland shooter had documented mental health issues, legislators across the country began pushing for laws that would take guns away from individuals whose unstable behavior raised a “red flag.”
Many states with Red Flag laws allow a court order to not only remove someone’s current firearms, but to also prevent them from owning, purchasing, possessing, or transporting firearms and ammo for a specified period of time. Generally, there’s an initial temporary firearm restraining order that lasts for several weeks, but this initial order can last even longer in some states. And most jurisdictions allow the extension of these orders if the person is still “deemed a threat.”
How Do Red Flag Laws Work?
The Red Flag law process begins when a law enforcement official, family member, or household member petitions a state court to temporarily remove firearms from someone they believe to be a danger to themselves or others. In some states, the list of eligible petitioners can include school officials, health care workers, or even coworkers!Preponderance of the evidence
After a petition is filed, the court will hold a hearing where the concerned party provides evidence to support their claim that the person in question (the “Respondent”) is a threat. States use two main standards of proof in these hearings:
Preponderance of the evidence, or
Clear and convincing evidence.
(For context, these standards are both lower standards of proof than “beyond a reasonable doubt,” which is the standard required in a criminal trial.)
If the order is granted, the judge may issue a warrant allowing law enforcement officials to search the Respondent’s property and confiscate weapons, sometimes without any prior notice. At that point, most states require the police to arrange safe storage of the firearm(s) for the duration of the order.
Sometimes, the initial hearing is conducted “ex parte,” meaning the Respondent is not present to defend themselves. If the hearing is ex parte, then the court will schedule another hearing to take place within the following weeks, giving the Respondent the chance to fight the claims. If they’re successful in their defense, the temporary order is dismissed, and the seized firearm(s) will be returned. But if the Respondent is not successful (meaning, the judge rules against them), the order is typically extended up to one year (depending on the state).
Clear and Convincing Evidence
What Happens if You Violate a Red Flag Law?
If a “Red Flag” order has been issued against you, then you’re prohibited from possessing firearms and ammo for as long as it’s active—even during the initial temporary period! If you come into possession of any prohibited items, you are in violation of the court order. Most states with Red Flag laws impose criminal penalties for both the unlawful possession of a firearm and the violation of a court order. These penalties differ by state but can include felonies.
For example, under California’s Red Flag law (a Gun Violence Restraining Order), a person could be prohibited from owning, purchasing, possessing, or transporting firearms and ammo for anywhere between one and five years, with the potential for the order to be renewed and extended indefinitely.
How Do You Fight a Red Flag Law?
Unfortunately, there isn’t much you can do to fight a Red Flag law order. As mentioned earlier, the initial hearing is usually an ex parte hearing, so you’re not able to defend yourself or give your side of the story (because you’re not there). Also, it’s highly unadvised (not to mention dangerous) to try and fight a Red Flag order by not cooperating with the police officers sent to execute it. In fact, a Maryland man tried to fight police officers over a Red Flag order in 2018 and was fatally shot in the process. Beyond the physical danger, interfering with law enforcement’s duties can lead to numerous different criminal charges.
That means the time and place to fight against a Red Flag law order is in court, during the second hearing. This is when the judge will determine whether to extend the order, and you have the chance to present your side of things and fight the petition. Sadly, this does mean you’ll have to give up any weapons initially when police officers come to execute the order. But if your defense is successful, they will be returned!
What States Have Red Flag Laws?
As of 2020, there are 19 states (plus D.C.) that have some sort of Red Flag law in place:
California
Colorado
Connecticut
District of Columbia
Delaware
Florida
Hawaii
Illinois
Indiana
Maryland
Massachusetts
Nevada
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Oregon
Rhode Island
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
Several other states have proposed Red Flag law measures of their own but haven’t been successful.
Oklahoma & the Anti-Red Flag Act
Of the states without Red Flag laws, Oklahoma is the only one (at the time of this writing) that has gone so far in the other direction that it has an anti-Red Flag law. The Anti-Red Flag Act (SB 1081) was signed in May 2020 amidst the flurry of Red Flag laws passed by other states in reaction to the school shooting in Parkland. State Sen. Dahm (Senate author of the measure) said the reason he wanted this kind of law was because he’s concerned the federal government may try to offer grants to states or municipalities to enact Red Flag laws, but “these types of laws are a serious abuse of constitutional rights.” Likewise, State Rep. Steagall (House author of the bill) said Red Flag laws “[strip] American citizens of their rights to due process under the law.”
Oklahoma state legislators have also argued that the current Oklahoma Victim Protective Order procedure is effective enough at keeping firearms out of the hands of those deemed dangerous. And Oklahoma courts have the authority to remove a person’s weapons and freedom if there is evidence that person is a threat to the public. The courts also maintain a mental health docket and if someone is suicidal, unable to care for themselves, or is a danger to others, the courts can—and do—intervene.
Maine & the Yellow Flag Law
In 2019, Maine passed a sort of Red Flag law compromise that has come to be known as a “Yellow Flag” law. It’s essentially a Red Flag law, but with an additional requirement that has made it significantly more popular than the standard Red Flag laws and extreme risk protection orders. Before a court order to confiscate weapons may be issued, there must be an assessment by a medical practitioner specifically finding that the person in question poses “a substantial risk in the foreseeable future of serious physical harm” to themselves or others based on recent behaviors. In practice, this requirement makes it considerably more difficult to successfully petition the courts to have someone’s firearm(s) removed.
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Is There a Federal Red Flag Law?
As of this writing, there are currently no federal Red Flag laws in place. However, there have been several bills introduced at the federal level over the years that have proposed one. In fact, both Trump and Biden presidential administrations publicly supported Red Flag law policies.
President Biden made a federal Red Flag law attempt part of his early agenda, while former President Trump urged Congress to consider Red Flag policy and formed the Federal Commission on School Safety(which openly endorses Red Flag laws). In an even rarer display of bipartisanship, Senate Judiciary Committee members from both parties have stated their support for the Red Flag law and Extreme Risk Protection Order movement. And when high-profile members of the Republican party (like U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, and Mitch McConnell) back Red Flag law policy, it makes other party members much more willing to compromise on various versions of these laws. But, despite these efforts and all the attention these laws have attracted, attempts at a federal Red Flag law have been unsuccessful so far.
What Amendments Do Red Flag Laws Violate?
According to rulings and precedents set by various courts (including the U.S. Supreme Court), Red Flag laws don’t inherently violate any constitutional amendments. The courts have recognized that the Second Amendment does not create an absolute right to possess firearms that can’t be restricted under any circumstances. For example, convicted felons and persons determined mentally incompetent are prohibited from possessing firearms. But in that example, individual rights are taken away only after due process of law. Meanwhile, Red Flag laws allow someone’s rights to be restricted without any prior knowledge or opportunity for defense. So, aren’t Red Flag laws a clear violation of our constitutional rights? Not exactly…
While the U.S. Constitution guarantees us “due process” as a protection from the arbitrary denial of life, liberty, or property by the government (in both the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments), SCOTUS has noted that due process requirements depend upon the circumstances:
“‘[D]ue process’ is a flexible concept—the process required by the Clause with respect to termination of a protected interest will vary depending upon the importance attached to the interest and the particular circumstances under which the deprivation may occur.”
This means—in respect to Red Flag laws and ex parte hearings—the state’s interest in preventing you from harming yourself or others (in theory) is of enough importance to allow flexibility with the due process requirement.
Do Red Flag Laws Work?
Now that you know how Red Flag laws work, you’re probably wondering do they work? If they’re intended to reduce and prevent violence caused by potentially unstable gun owners, do they accomplish that? Are they reducing the number of mass shootings or suicides? Are they saving lives?
First, despite Red Flag laws often being advocated as a way to prevent future mass shootings, they’re mainly used to combat suicide rates. Take Connecticut for example, the first state to enact a Red Flag law. Passed because of the mass shooting incident at the state lottery building (and enforced much more heavily after the Virginia Tech tragedy), the law hasn’t had a huge impact on the state’s homicide rates. However, one study found that from 2007 to 2015 (after the law was enforced more), the rate of gun-related suicides dropped by 13.7%. Similar results were also seen in Indiana, the second state to enact a Red Flag law. Other studies estimate that for every 10-20 gun confiscations, one life was saved.
Then Red Flag laws must work, right? Not quite… Although there was a nice drop in gun-related suicides seen after these states passed a Red Flag law, there was also a spike in non-firearm suicides. Not to mention, mass shootings still happened (like the 2012 tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut). So, what does this mean? It means the underlying roots of the issue—such as mental health—are not being addressed. States would rather slap a cheap band-aid over the problem than put in effort to actually solve it. Leaving law-abiding, responsible gun owners to pay the price with their self-defense rights and freedoms.
**Suicide is a serious subject and impacts gun owners far beyond the scope of Red Flag laws. Learn more about what gun owners can do here.**
How Do Red Flag Laws Work?
Future of Red Flag Laws
What is the future of Red Flag laws in America? Surprisingly (or maybe not, depending on your view of the game of politics) there’s been more bipartisan support for Red Flag laws than one might think. Former Presidents Obama and George W. Bush both advocated for various “common sense” gun control measures during their term, and the Biden and Trump administrations have both publicly endorsed Red Flag laws specifically. Why? To please their constituents, of course…
A 2019 study showed that 77% of Americans support family-initiated Extreme Risk Protection Orders, and 70% support police-initiated Red Flag laws. Even more surprising, it reported that 67% of gun ownerssupport ERPOs. Why would gun owners be in favor of something that could take away their rights? Well, the specific wording of the questions asked tend to pose risk orders as simply “temporary removals” and only for those with mental health risks. And who doesn’t want to help solve the mental health crisis?
Despite the massive outcries for “something to be done” after another mass shooting incident makes headlines and all the bipartisan support Red Flag laws are getting on Capitol Hill, no federal Red Flag laws have succeeded. Why? While pro-gun legislators have repeatedly stated their willingness to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous individuals by way of Extreme Risk Protection Orders, those against guns have refused to accept anything not paired with mandatory, universal background check legislation. Because their goal isn’t actually to address mental health, it’s to take away your guns and your rights.
Red Flag Laws & You
How can a gun owner protect themselves against Red Flag laws? Although there’s not much you can do to stop the process, you can prepare for it. U.S. LawShield® members can have peace of mind knowing Extreme Risk Protection Order and Red Flag law coverage is included in every base membership. So, if you’re a member and fall victim to an unlawful, unwarranted, or improper Red Flag law action, you don’t have to fight it alone. You’ll have U.S. LawShield by your side at every step of the process to help you fight for your constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
Because, honestly, the best thing (and just about the only thing) you can do to counter a Red Flag law order is to know your local laws and come prepared with a strong and solid defense.
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Own ghost properties. Store some guns/ammo there.
Reminder to the left, this is what turns things hot.
Red Flag Laws: What Are They & How Do They Work?
March 24th, 2022|Tags: National, Nonvideo|0 Comments
Over the past few years, “Red Flag” laws have been one of the hottest topics in the gun control debate. Ever since 17 people lost their lives during the 2018 tragic school shooting in Parkland, Florida, there’s been a massive push for lawmakers to “do something” and prevent weapons from falling into the hands of the mentally ill. But Red Flag laws are not a new concept, and the issue of how to keep guns out of the hands of mentally unstable individuals is one that gun rights advocates and politicians have been debating long before the media sensationalized it.
If you’ve ever listened to anyone talk about gun control, you’ve probably heard the term “Red Flag law” more times than you can count. But what actually are these laws? What do they accomplish that existing regulations don’t? Most importantly, how do Red Flag laws affect law-abiding people like you?
What Are Red Flag Laws?
Red Flag laws are intended to preemptively disarm people who show warning signs that they could be dangerous to themselves and/or others. The term “Red Flag law” is actually a collective nickname for the various court orders states have in place, including: Extreme Risk Firearm Protection Orders (ERFPO), Risk Protection Orders (RPO), Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), Gun Violence Restraining Orders (GVRO), and risk warrants. When information emerged that the Parkland shooter had documented mental health issues, legislators across the country began pushing for laws that would take guns away from individuals whose unstable behavior raised a “red flag.”
Many states with Red Flag laws allow a court order to not only remove someone’s current firearms, but to also prevent them from owning, purchasing, possessing, or transporting firearms and ammo for a specified period of time. Generally, there’s an initial temporary firearm restraining order that lasts for several weeks, but this initial order can last even longer in some states. And most jurisdictions allow the extension of these orders if the person is still “deemed a threat.”
How Do Red Flag Laws Work?
The Red Flag law process begins when a law enforcement official, family member, or household member petitions a state court to temporarily remove firearms from someone they believe to be a danger to themselves or others. In some states, the list of eligible petitioners can include school officials, health care workers, or even coworkers!Preponderance of the evidence
After a petition is filed, the court will hold a hearing where the concerned party provides evidence to support their claim that the person in question (the “Respondent”) is a threat. States use two main standards of proof in these hearings:
Preponderance of the evidence, or
Clear and convincing evidence.
(For context, these standards are both lower standards of proof than “beyond a reasonable doubt,” which is the standard required in a criminal trial.)
If the order is granted, the judge may issue a warrant allowing law enforcement officials to search the Respondent’s property and confiscate weapons, sometimes without any prior notice. At that point, most states require the police to arrange safe storage of the firearm(s) for the duration of the order.
Sometimes, the initial hearing is conducted “ex parte,” meaning the Respondent is not present to defend themselves. If the hearing is ex parte, then the court will schedule another hearing to take place within the following weeks, giving the Respondent the chance to fight the claims. If they’re successful in their defense, the temporary order is dismissed, and the seized firearm(s) will be returned. But if the Respondent is not successful (meaning, the judge rules against them), the order is typically extended up to one year (depending on the state).
Clear and Convincing Evidence
What Happens if You Violate a Red Flag Law?
If a “Red Flag” order has been issued against you, then you’re prohibited from possessing firearms and ammo for as long as it’s active—even during the initial temporary period! If you come into possession of any prohibited items, you are in violation of the court order. Most states with Red Flag laws impose criminal penalties for both the unlawful possession of a firearm and the violation of a court order. These penalties differ by state but can include felonies.
For example, under California’s Red Flag law (a Gun Violence Restraining Order), a person could be prohibited from owning, purchasing, possessing, or transporting firearms and ammo for anywhere between one and five years, with the potential for the order to be renewed and extended indefinitely.
How Do You Fight a Red Flag Law?
Unfortunately, there isn’t much you can do to fight a Red Flag law order. As mentioned earlier, the initial hearing is usually an ex parte hearing, so you’re not able to defend yourself or give your side of the story (because you’re not there). Also, it’s highly unadvised (not to mention dangerous) to try and fight a Red Flag order by not cooperating with the police officers sent to execute it. In fact, a Maryland man tried to fight police officers over a Red Flag order in 2018 and was fatally shot in the process. Beyond the physical danger, interfering with law enforcement’s duties can lead to numerous different criminal charges.
That means the time and place to fight against a Red Flag law order is in court, during the second hearing. This is when the judge will determine whether to extend the order, and you have the chance to present your side of things and fight the petition. Sadly, this does mean you’ll have to give up any weapons initially when police officers come to execute the order. But if your defense is successful, they will be returned!
What States Have Red Flag Laws?
As of 2020, there are 19 states (plus D.C.) that have some sort of Red Flag law in place:
California
Colorado
Connecticut
District of Columbia
Delaware
Florida
Hawaii
Illinois
Indiana
Maryland
Massachusetts
Nevada
New Jersey
New Mexico
New York
Oregon
Rhode Island
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
Several other states have proposed Red Flag law measures of their own but haven’t been successful.
Oklahoma & the Anti-Red Flag Act
Of the states without Red Flag laws, Oklahoma is the only one (at the time of this writing) that has gone so far in the other direction that it has an anti-Red Flag law. The Anti-Red Flag Act (SB 1081) was signed in May 2020 amidst the flurry of Red Flag laws passed by other states in reaction to the school shooting in Parkland. State Sen. Dahm (Senate author of the measure) said the reason he wanted this kind of law was because he’s concerned the federal government may try to offer grants to states or municipalities to enact Red Flag laws, but “these types of laws are a serious abuse of constitutional rights.” Likewise, State Rep. Steagall (House author of the bill) said Red Flag laws “[strip] American citizens of their rights to due process under the law.”
Oklahoma state legislators have also argued that the current Oklahoma Victim Protective Order procedure is effective enough at keeping firearms out of the hands of those deemed dangerous. And Oklahoma courts have the authority to remove a person’s weapons and freedom if there is evidence that person is a threat to the public. The courts also maintain a mental health docket and if someone is suicidal, unable to care for themselves, or is a danger to others, the courts can—and do—intervene.
Maine & the Yellow Flag Law
In 2019, Maine passed a sort of Red Flag law compromise that has come to be known as a “Yellow Flag” law. It’s essentially a Red Flag law, but with an additional requirement that has made it significantly more popular than the standard Red Flag laws and extreme risk protection orders. Before a court order to confiscate weapons may be issued, there must be an assessment by a medical practitioner specifically finding that the person in question poses “a substantial risk in the foreseeable future of serious physical harm” to themselves or others based on recent behaviors. In practice, this requirement makes it considerably more difficult to successfully petition the courts to have someone’s firearm(s) removed.
Enjoying this content? Find out how you can get more sent straight to your inbox.
Is There a Federal Red Flag Law?
As of this writing, there are currently no federal Red Flag laws in place. However, there have been several bills introduced at the federal level over the years that have proposed one. In fact, both Trump and Biden presidential administrations publicly supported Red Flag law policies.
President Biden made a federal Red Flag law attempt part of his early agenda, while former President Trump urged Congress to consider Red Flag policy and formed the Federal Commission on School Safety(which openly endorses Red Flag laws). In an even rarer display of bipartisanship, Senate Judiciary Committee members from both parties have stated their support for the Red Flag law and Extreme Risk Protection Order movement. And when high-profile members of the Republican party (like U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham, Marco Rubio, and Mitch McConnell) back Red Flag law policy, it makes other party members much more willing to compromise on various versions of these laws. But, despite these efforts and all the attention these laws have attracted, attempts at a federal Red Flag law have been unsuccessful so far.
What Amendments Do Red Flag Laws Violate?
According to rulings and precedents set by various courts (including the U.S. Supreme Court), Red Flag laws don’t inherently violate any constitutional amendments. The courts have recognized that the Second Amendment does not create an absolute right to possess firearms that can’t be restricted under any circumstances. For example, convicted felons and persons determined mentally incompetent are prohibited from possessing firearms. But in that example, individual rights are taken away only after due process of law. Meanwhile, Red Flag laws allow someone’s rights to be restricted without any prior knowledge or opportunity for defense. So, aren’t Red Flag laws a clear violation of our constitutional rights? Not exactly…
While the U.S. Constitution guarantees us “due process” as a protection from the arbitrary denial of life, liberty, or property by the government (in both the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments), SCOTUS has noted that due process requirements depend upon the circumstances:
“‘[D]ue process’ is a flexible concept—the process required by the Clause with respect to termination of a protected interest will vary depending upon the importance attached to the interest and the particular circumstances under which the deprivation may occur.”
This means—in respect to Red Flag laws and ex parte hearings—the state’s interest in preventing you from harming yourself or others (in theory) is of enough importance to allow flexibility with the due process requirement.
Do Red Flag Laws Work?
Now that you know how Red Flag laws work, you’re probably wondering do they work? If they’re intended to reduce and prevent violence caused by potentially unstable gun owners, do they accomplish that? Are they reducing the number of mass shootings or suicides? Are they saving lives?
First, despite Red Flag laws often being advocated as a way to prevent future mass shootings, they’re mainly used to combat suicide rates. Take Connecticut for example, the first state to enact a Red Flag law. Passed because of the mass shooting incident at the state lottery building (and enforced much more heavily after the Virginia Tech tragedy), the law hasn’t had a huge impact on the state’s homicide rates. However, one study found that from 2007 to 2015 (after the law was enforced more), the rate of gun-related suicides dropped by 13.7%. Similar results were also seen in Indiana, the second state to enact a Red Flag law. Other studies estimate that for every 10-20 gun confiscations, one life was saved.
Then Red Flag laws must work, right? Not quite… Although there was a nice drop in gun-related suicides seen after these states passed a Red Flag law, there was also a spike in non-firearm suicides. Not to mention, mass shootings still happened (like the 2012 tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut). So, what does this mean? It means the underlying roots of the issue—such as mental health—are not being addressed. States would rather slap a cheap band-aid over the problem than put in effort to actually solve it. Leaving law-abiding, responsible gun owners to pay the price with their self-defense rights and freedoms.
**Suicide is a serious subject and impacts gun owners far beyond the scope of Red Flag laws. Learn more about what gun owners can do here.**
How Do Red Flag Laws Work?
Future of Red Flag Laws
What is the future of Red Flag laws in America? Surprisingly (or maybe not, depending on your view of the game of politics) there’s been more bipartisan support for Red Flag laws than one might think. Former Presidents Obama and George W. Bush both advocated for various “common sense” gun control measures during their term, and the Biden and Trump administrations have both publicly endorsed Red Flag laws specifically. Why? To please their constituents, of course…
A 2019 study showed that 77% of Americans support family-initiated Extreme Risk Protection Orders, and 70% support police-initiated Red Flag laws. Even more surprising, it reported that 67% of gun ownerssupport ERPOs. Why would gun owners be in favor of something that could take away their rights? Well, the specific wording of the questions asked tend to pose risk orders as simply “temporary removals” and only for those with mental health risks. And who doesn’t want to help solve the mental health crisis?
Despite the massive outcries for “something to be done” after another mass shooting incident makes headlines and all the bipartisan support Red Flag laws are getting on Capitol Hill, no federal Red Flag laws have succeeded. Why? While pro-gun legislators have repeatedly stated their willingness to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous individuals by way of Extreme Risk Protection Orders, those against guns have refused to accept anything not paired with mandatory, universal background check legislation. Because their goal isn’t actually to address mental health, it’s to take away your guns and your rights.
Red Flag Laws & You
How can a gun owner protect themselves against Red Flag laws? Although there’s not much you can do to stop the process, you can prepare for it. U.S. LawShield® members can have peace of mind knowing Extreme Risk Protection Order and Red Flag law coverage is included in every base membership. So, if you’re a member and fall victim to an unlawful, unwarranted, or improper Red Flag law action, you don’t have to fight it alone. You’ll have U.S. LawShield by your side at every step of the process to help you fight for your constitutional right to keep and bear arms.
Because, honestly, the best thing (and just about the only thing) you can do to counter a Red Flag law order is to know your local laws and come prepared with a strong and solid defense.
-
quote author=G M
Own ghost properties. Store some guns/ammo there.
Reminder to the left, this is what turns things hot.
----------------------------------------------------------------
A friend had his things stolen in a situation like this.
Red flag laws run straight into a conundrum. These mass shooters have given warning signs short of being convicted murderers, makes us wish we could keep just these future mass shooters from getting g + a. But red flag laws will hurt good people too, even if well intended, AND we know these laws and enforcement will all not be well intended.
Some here are more anonymous than others. Probably none perfectly so. If targeted by a not so well meaning govt, what we write here can and will be used against us, out of context etc.
I would be very interested in being a fly on the wall in a more secure setting on some of these topics, such as a proton mail group.
If our govt became as tyrannical as Russia or China, some argue it already is, how are we going to communicate?
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quote author=G M
Own ghost properties. Store some guns/ammo there.
Reminder to the left, this is what turns things hot.
----------------------------------------------------------------
A friend had his things stolen in a situation like this.
Red flag laws run straight into a conundrum. These mass shooters have given warning signs short of being convicted murderers, makes us wish we could keep just these future mass shooters from getting g + a. But red flag laws will hurt good people too, even if well intended, AND we know these laws and enforcement will all not be well intended.
Some here are more anonymous than others. Probably none perfectly so. If targeted by a not so well meaning govt, what we write here can and will be used against us, out of context etc.
I would be very interested in being a fly on the wall in a more secure setting on some of these topics, such as a proton mail group.
If our govt became as tyrannical as Russia or China, some argue it already is, how are we going to communicate?
In person.
ALL comms via technology are vulnerable.
Understand that the actual power of the Feral Gov is a mile wide and an inch deep. The left and their pawns and useful idiots don't live in fortified green zones. I was working with a recently retired Fed not long ago, we had hours to discuss CW2 scenarios. He agreed with my assessments, including red flags setting things off.
American law enforcement can't even perform baseline services now. Even at it's peak, it was never structured to fight a domestic insurgency.
I expect that LEOs that serve red flag orders will find that the danger only starts after the guns are taken
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEa2lMXismw&t=3s
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Fresno County Sheriff's Office
16h ·
CA DOJ's CCW Permit Holder Data Breach is Worse than Previously Expected
On Wednesday, the California Department of Justice issued a press release outlining preliminary details of its investigation. The first paragraph describes the type of personal information that was exposed. Some of which came as a surprise to us at the Fresno County Sheriff's Office.
Wednesday, June 29, 2022
Contact: (916) 210-6000, agpressoffice@doj.ca.gov
SACRAMENTO – The California Department of Justice has announced that personal information was disclosed in connection with the June 27, 2022 update of its Firearms Dashboard Portal. Based on the Department’s current investigation, the incident exposed the personal information of individuals who were granted or denied a concealed and carry weapons (CCW) permit between 2011-2021. Information exposed included names, date of birth, gender, race, driver’s license number, addresses, and criminal history. Social Security numbers or any financial information were not disclosed as a result of this event. Additionally, data from the following dashboards were also impacted: Assault Weapon Registry, Handguns Certified for Sale, Dealer Record of Sale, Firearm Certificate Safety, and Gun Violence Restraining Order dashboards. DOJ is investigating the extent to which any personally identifiable information could have been exposed from those dashboards and will report additional information as soon as confirmed.
“This unauthorized release of personal information is unacceptable and falls far short of my expectations for this department,” said Attorney General Rob Bonta. “I immediately launched an investigation into how this occurred at the California Department of Justice and will take strong corrective measures where necessary. The California Department of Justice is entrusted to protect Californians and their data. We acknowledge the stress this may cause those individuals whose information was exposed. I am deeply disturbed and angered.”
On the afternoon of June 27, 2022, DOJ posted updates to the Firearms Dashboard Portal. DOJ was made aware of a disclosure of personal information that was accessible in a spreadsheet on the portal. After DOJ learned of the data exposure, the department took steps to remove the information from public view and shut down the Firearms Dashboard yesterday morning. The dashboard and data were available for less than 24 hours.
In the coming days, the Department will notify those individuals whose data was exposed and provide additional information and resources. California law requires a business or state agency to notify any California resident whose unencrypted personal information, as defined, was acquired, or reasonably believed to have been acquired, by an unauthorized person.
DOJ asks that anyone who accessed such information respect the privacy of the individuals involved and not share or disseminate any of the personal information. In addition, possession of or use of personal identifying information for an unlawful purpose may be a crime. (See Cal Penal Code Sec. 530.5.)
We are communicating with law enforcement partners throughout the state. In collaboration, we will provide support to those whose information has been exposed.
In an abundance of caution, the Department of Justice will provide credit monitoring services for individuals whose data was exposed as a result of this incident. DOJ will directly contact individuals who have been impacted by this incident and will provide instructions to sign up for this service.
Any Californian may take the following steps to immediately protect their information related to credit:
• Monitor your credit. One of the best ways to protect yourself from identity theft is to monitor your credit history. To obtain free copies of your credit reports from the three major credit bureaus go to https://www.annualcreditreport.com.
• Consider placing a free credit freeze on your credit report. Identity thieves will not be able to open a new credit account in your name while the freeze is in place. You can place a credit freeze by contacting each of the three major credit bureaus:
o Equifax: https://www.equifax.com/.../credit-report.../credit-freeze/; 888-766-0008
o Experian: https://www.experian.com/freeze/center.html; 888-397-3742
o TransUnion: https://www.transunion.com/credit-freeze; 800-680-7289
• Place a fraud alert on your credit report. A fraud alert helps protect you against the possibility of someone opening new credit accounts in your name. A fraud alert lasts 90 days and can be renewed. To post a fraud alert on your credit file, you must contact one of the three major credit reporting agencies listed above. Keep in mind that if place a fraud alert with any one of the three major credit reporting agencies, the alert will be automatically added by the other two agencies as well.
• Additional Resources. If you are a victim of identity theft, contact your local police department or sheriff’s office right away. You may also report identity theft and generate a recovery plan using the Federal Trade Commission’s website at identitytheft.gov. For more information and resources visit the Attorney General’s website at oag.ca.gov/idtheft.
Link to article: https://oag.ca.gov/.../california-department-justice...
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Democrats middle finger ->
https://www.theepochtimes.com/new-york-gov-hochul-signs-law-limiting-concealed-carry-guns-after-supreme-court-ruling_4572849.html?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=BonginoReport
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A key element of Anarcho-tyranny is keeping the public disarmed, while street thugs and government thugs are armed.
Democrats middle finger ->
https://www.theepochtimes.com/new-york-gov-hochul-signs-law-limiting-concealed-carry-guns-after-supreme-court-ruling_4572849.html?utm_source=partner&utm_campaign=BonginoReport
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https://scontent-iad3-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/291030050_10159957104454803_5505981892123134627_n.jpg?stp=dst-jpg_s640x640&_nc_cat=102&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=730e14&_nc_ohc=UdJJkLbd-cwAX84jGto&_nc_ht=scontent-iad3-2.xx&oh=00_AT-wS9uc2wt7DPYmRN_XBqx5SSXpv0bZaX9CvnWs-e_3Pw&oe=62C699A7
-
https://thegunwriter.substack.com/p/breaking-ups-cancelling-gun-dealers
-
in working diligently to deflect away from gun laws
we hear this :
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2022/07/05/highland-park-shooter-was-known-to-law-enforcement-n2609739?57
I disagree with blaming law enforcement who might have had previous contact with a shooter blaming them for his actions .
You cannot say it is the fault of law enforcement for not interceding prior to an action that might or might not have occurred before it does
then at the same time
bitch about the new gun law that allows for police to investigate someone for even the slightest inference of violence reported by anyone who knows him
You can't have it both ways
I am not for confiscating guns but if you say this person was known that person was known by police then complain they did not put him in a straight jacket before he makes the gun lobby look bad
then don't bitch about a gun law that allows for an acquaintance
to call the police and report a suspicion that he is a future shooter.
We need to maintain logic folks
or we sound just as stupid as the LEFT.
-
That is a very fair point.
That said, there is a legit problem with the absence of Due Process in most of the Red Flag laws. There ARE laws about dealing with crazy people that do have Due Process.
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".There ARE laws about dealing with crazy people that do have Due Process."
problem is who defines "crazy"
and how can you know the exact ones who will go on to shoot up a place
from the 99+ % who do not
not easy to do
unless you have someone who explicitly documents their plans or fantasies in writing in advance police can pay that person a visit
but then what do they do?
lock up
confiscate guns etc
put ankle monitor on ?
lock the person up?
it is someone else's word against another
a secret service agent told me the SS stop mostly people who make threats to do harm to the president
but said anyone who is not telegraphing their exact intent to do so
would be easy to get through and he told me plan to do it
of course that was back in '78 or '79.
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My thought:
There ARE due process procedures for declaring people crazy and being crazy is a reasonable basis for denying guns-- no need for explicit threats.
-
we can flood the courts even more
I guess:
https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-14/05-procedural-due-process-civil.html
I don't think there is a good answer; if there was we would have heard it by now
we have sick world
internet clearly makes it 100 x s worse
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".There ARE laws about dealing with crazy people that do have Due Process."
problem is who defines "crazy"
The general legal standard is "Gravely disabled, or a serious threat to self or others". Every state has a law that allows for law enforcement to place individuals that meet that standard into custody for a psych eval. The state of IL. has this:
https://www.oflaherty-law.com/learn-about-law/involuntary-commitment-to-a-mental-health-facility-in-illinois
Emergency admission by certification: In a true emergency situation, an individual may be admitted to a mental health facility against his or her will; however, if the person with mental illness proposes immediate harm to himself or herself or others, a court order is not necessary. If local authorities are contacted first due to immediate danger, they can escort the respondent to a mental health facility for treatment. Once the patient is out of immediate danger, the police can take it upon themselves to initiate the petition filing process with a quick certification.
and how can you know the exact ones who will go on to shoot up a place
from the 99+ % who do not
not easy to do
unless you have someone who explicitly documents their plans or fantasies in writing in advance police can pay that person a visit
but then what do they do?
lock up
confiscate guns etc
put ankle monitor on ?
lock the person up?
it is someone else's word against another
a secret service agent told me the SS stop mostly people who make threats to do harm to the president
but said anyone who is not telegraphing their exact intent to do so
would be easy to get through and he told me plan to do it
of course that was back in '78 or '79.
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A sick culture.
It didn't used to be this way.
we can flood the courts even more
I guess:
https://law.justia.com/constitution/us/amendment-14/05-procedural-due-process-civil.html
I don't think there is a good answer; if there was we would have heard it by now
we have sick world
internet clearly makes it 100 x s worse
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The presumed killer wanted to arrest all Congressmen involved in J6:
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/multiple-people-shot-during-4th-july-celebration-chicago-suburb?utm_source=&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=755
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https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
-
https://www.revolver.news/2022/07/just-in-picture-of-highland-park-july-4th-parade-shooter-bobby-crimo-wearing-womens-clothing-after-attack/
Here’s a few more things we know about the shooter:
-He was an isolated marijuana smoker who lost touch with reality.
-He was ‘known’ to law enforcement.
-Watch his weird, bizarre, psychotic videos and see his face tattoos…
Very strange developing story…
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
-
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2022/07/local-pds-fbi-hide-information-july-4th-killer-crimo-connected-antifa-progressives-occult/
https://www.revolver.news/2022/07/just-in-picture-of-highland-park-july-4th-parade-shooter-bobby-crimo-wearing-womens-clothing-after-attack/
Here’s a few more things we know about the shooter:
-He was an isolated marijuana smoker who lost touch with reality.
-He was ‘known’ to law enforcement.
-Watch his weird, bizarre, psychotic videos and see his face tattoos…
Very strange developing story…
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
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"-He was an isolated marijuana smoker who lost touch with reality."
this could be the key
This marijuana craze is really bad for an already sick country
maybe do once in a while on vacation ...
but for young active working people it is not helpful
as for pain control I don't really buy it
for depression or anxiety I doubt it is good
I have not seen the latest "studies "
but the last time I looked it up the "experts" would say there is a dirth of studies and none really any good.
-
If I'm reading this right, we already had a red flag law.
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
-
OK, would Crimins III
have been subject to the laws on the books?
-
"-He was an isolated marijuana smoker who lost touch with reality."
this could be the key
This marijuana craze is really bad for an already sick country
maybe do once in a while on vacation ...
but for young active working people it is not helpful
as for pain control I don't really buy it
for depression or anxiety I doubt it is good
I have need seen the latest "studies "
but the last time I looked it up the "experts" would say there is a dirth of studies and none really any good.
Right. The pain relief thing is over-rated, at least with THC. Maybe CBD works some there. If it does work, then it's safer than opioids.
Like you suggest, fine for most as a mild and occasional recreational or relaxant alternative to alcohol or worse drug.
But there is significant connection between marijuana and psychotic break within the very small percentage who have psychotic breaks. Probably because it's the most commonly used psycho-active drug. Any talk that it is "completely harmless" overlooks this. It's not for everyone. A psychotic break is dangerous.
-
It's not a red flag law, it says that any person who is prohibited to possess a firearm by federal law and does is guilty of a felony. Proving the shooter was using illegal drugs and ALSO possessed so much as a single round of ammunition would be simple, if the feds actually wanted to do something to stop it. NOTE all the Antifa associates who are drug users and/or prior felons brandishing weapons who AREN'T being arrested by the ATF.
Why not?
My money says this is Operation Fast and Furious, part II, active shooter.
If I'm reading this right, we already had a red flag law.
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
-
Do any of these tripwire the Illinois shooter?
-
Do any of these tripwire the Illinois shooter?
1. Plenty of school shooter imagery connected to him on social media. Start investigation.
2. Determine if he has, or has access to firearms.
3. Any drug use? Nod your head yes. Once you develop evidence of drug use, obtain search warrant for drugs, firearms and ammo.
4. Serve search warrant, seize drugs, guns and ammo.
5. Subject in jail, facing federal charges. No mass shooting.
-
Do any of these tripwire the Illinois shooter?
1. Plenty of school shooter imagery connected to him on social media. Start investigation.
2. Determine if he has, or has access to firearms.
3. Any drug use? Nod your head yes. Once you develop evidence of drug use, obtain search warrant for drugs, firearms and ammo.
4. Serve search warrant, seize drugs, guns and ammo.
5. Subject in jail, facing federal charges. No mass shooting.
That is what they would be doing ... if they weren't busy prosecuting Republicans and parents at school board meetings.
-
Do any of these tripwire the Illinois shooter?
1. Plenty of school shooter imagery connected to him on social media. Start investigation.
2. Determine if he has, or has access to firearms.
3. Any drug use? Nod your head yes. Once you develop evidence of drug use, obtain search warrant for drugs, firearms and ammo.
4. Serve search warrant, seize drugs, guns and ammo.
5. Subject in jail, facing federal charges. No mass shooting.
That is what they would be doing ... if they weren't busy prosecuting Republicans and parents at school board meetings.
If he wasn't being primed to do the shooting by the feds.
"Tear up Texas".
https://theintercept.com/2016/08/09/fbi-agent-goaded-garland-shooter-to-tear-up-texas-raising-new-alarms-about-bureaus-methods/
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https://www.ammoland.com/2022/07/goa-sues-atf-over-final-rule-on-privately-manufactured-firearms/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7YG9IsKWp
-
https://ace.mu.nu/archives/399885.php
We need to RED FLAG harder!
-
https://ace.mu.nu/archives/399885.php
We need to RED FLAG harder!
(https://westernrifleshooters.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/172a0eef1a6d1931.jpeg)
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ny-highland-park-shooting-suspect-guns-threats-red-flag-laws-20220706-aaen6yjbdzba5ixtloaashzhdq-story.html
-
https://i.imgur.com/4ShTHgJ.png
(https://i.imgur.com/4ShTHgJ.png)
https://ace.mu.nu/archives/399885.php
We need to RED FLAG harder!
(https://westernrifleshooters.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/172a0eef1a6d1931.jpeg)
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ny-highland-park-shooting-suspect-guns-threats-red-flag-laws-20220706-aaen6yjbdzba5ixtloaashzhdq-story.html
-
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ny-highland-park-shooting-suspect-guns-threats-red-flag-laws-20220706-aaen6yjbdzba5ixtloaashzhdq-story.html
Blocked.
-
second
https://www.mass.gov/news/ags-office-eopss-advise-law-enforcement-officials-about-application-of-scotus-gun-licensing-case-to-massachusetts-law
-
https://www.michaelmoore.com/p/the-28th-amendment?fbclid=IwAR39tf9HTj4krXki-wt-IPWfJ0xJl6-x36tvtCIjfwKLQG4anvrW6FBOkEo
-
https://www.michaelmoore.com/p/the-28th-amendment?fbclid=IwAR39tf9HTj4krXki-wt-IPWfJ0xJl6-x36tvtCIjfwKLQG4anvrW6FBOkEo
https://www.saf.org/bodyguard-bust-proves-michael-moore-is-less-than-honest-about-gun-laws/
-
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/clearwater-man-and-his-daughter-confronted-by-neighbor-with-rifle-over-parking-spot/ar-AAZy7do?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=68f842ff95d943dcbb387566afd419be
-
https://www.foxnews.com/world/countries-with-strict-gun-control-hit-recent-mass-shootings-gun-violence
-
https://www.ammoland.com/2022/07/census-bureau-requesting-sales-records-gun-holster-companies/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7ZDf9RYgI
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Of course they are.
https://www.ammoland.com/2022/07/census-bureau-requesting-sales-records-gun-holster-companies/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7ZDf9RYgI
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jul/18/indiana-good-samaritan-who-took-out-mass-shooter-m/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=vZ9sNzMdAZ8FGD2tEojsrgEARYO8%2FZRZoN7tuo8QIUMr%2BvuzY%2F%2BZ2FWYqeX3gcck&bt_ts=1658185877328
-
https://www.rightjournalism.com/weve-made-a-rendering-of-the-40-yard-shot-that-took-down-the-indiana-mall-shooter-this-guy-is-jason-freaking-bourne-photos/
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Impressive!
-
https://bittercenturion.blogspot.com/2022/07/the-right-software.html#more
https://www.rightjournalism.com/weve-made-a-rendering-of-the-40-yard-shot-that-took-down-the-indiana-mall-shooter-this-guy-is-jason-freaking-bourne-photos/
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Sheriff: Residents should tell warrantless agents to leave
Says ATF must answer for ‘illegal’ inspection of homeowner’s guns
BY KERRY PICKET THE WASHINGTON TIMES
A Washington state sheriff advised residents in his county Friday that if agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) come to their homes without a search warrant asking to inspect their firearms, they can tell them to leave their property.
Klickitat County Sheriff Bob Songer said in a press statement that agents are “making surprise home visits of persons who have purchased two or more firearms at one time. To my knowledge, these ATF visits have not occurred in Washington State yet.”
Mr. Songer told The Washington Times he became concerned about the Second Amendment rights of the residents of Klickitat County after viewing a doorbell video that showed a firearms owner who ATF agents coerced, without a warrant, to inspect his firearms.
“I’m a constitutional sheriff. I got a lifetime membership with the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association,” he said. “And I believe strongly in the fact that my duty as sheriff is serving the citizens that put me in office to protect their constitutional rights and liberties.”
Mr. Songer, who is running for reelection to a third term in office, said that if residents are contacted by an ATF agent or any other federal agent lacking a search warrant to inspect firearms they have purchased, residents do not have to cooperate with the authorities and should contact his office if the agents refuse to leave their property.
“The ATF must answer questions on why they decided to conduct an illegal search, especially since the homeowner had done nothing wrong,” Mr. Songer said in the statement. “These actions by the federal government are unsettling, and they have no business going door-to-door to see who owns firearms. I fear that there will be more illegal inspections to come as the Left continues its assault on our 2nd Amendment rights. Congress should investigate this immediately.”
The ATF defended itself in a statement to The Washington Times, saying the agents’ actions were “entirely appropriate.”
“Ask the agents to show you their search warrant to inspect your firearms,” Mr. Songer said, advising his constituents to make sure a warrant is signed by a judge. “Ask them if the sheriff is aware of them contacting people in our county.”
The sheriff then suggests telling the agents to leave the property. If they refuse, “they are trespassing,” he said. Mr. Songer said they should then call the Klickitat County Sheriff’s Department and report the incident, which could lead to the arrest of the federal agents.
“If the ATF agents do not have a search warrant signed by a judge, and you have told them to leave your property and they refuse to do so, call me, and I will make contact with the agents,” Mr. Songer said in his statement. “If they still refuse to leave, I will personally arrest the ATF agents for Criminal Trespass and book them into the Klickitat County Jail.”
“In my opinion, these surprise visits by ATF Agents are nothing more than a fishing expedition to see what guns you have in your possession,” Mr. Songer said.
The sheriff warned that agents are looking for “straw purchases,” in which a legal gun buyer purchases two or more firearms, and then gives or sells the gun to someone who cannot pass a legal background check.
“It appears at this time, ATF agents are making surprise home visits along the I-95 corridor [and] in the states of Indiana, Nevada and Arizona,” he said.
Attorney General Merrick Garland announced last year in late July that the U.S. attorney’s offices and ATF agents were targeting straw purchasers in metropolitan areas and neighboring towns, including within these particular states.
Mr. Songer says he is not concerned about angering state or federal officials.
“I really don’t care what the FBI or the ATF or the Biden administration has to say. One thing about an elected chair, his only boss is the people that elect him — not the county commissioners, not the governor, not the city, state attorney general, not the president or anyone,” he said. “So, I don’t really worry too much about what they have to say.”
Mr. Songer’s press release came out one day after a recent doorbell video recording from a Delaware resident showing ATF agents and a state police trooper asking a legal firearm owner for his weapons’ serial numbers without a warrant.
The video, which the ATF defended as “entirely appropriate,” caused an uproar among Second Amendment advocacy organizations, including Gun Owners of America, which said the U.S. “background check system has turned into a de facto registry, allowing the federal government to check up on who owns what firearms because of the ATF unlawful actions.”
Rep. Matt Rosendale, Montana Republican, called for an investigation into the incident, saying that he fears “that there will be more illegal inspections to come as the Left continues its assault on our Second Amendment rights. Congress should investigate this immediately.
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https://twitter.com/capeandcowell/status/1553709678089146368
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https://www.ammoland.com/2022/08/polymer80-ordered-pay-washington-dc-4000000/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7bqHGTLYA
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https://www.steamboatradio.com/2022/08/15/a-steamboat-man-shot-and-killed-a-bear-that-was-in-his-home-early-saturday-morning/
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https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-59499237
I though safety was a big advantage with revolvers
you need to pull the trigger usually within the trigger guard
you can drop them throw them they won't fire.
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/08/15/exclusive-smith-wesson-fights-back-against-democrat-subpoena/
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https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-59499237
I though safety was a big advantage with revolvers
you need to pull the trigger usually within the trigger guard
you can drop them throw them they won't fire.
This is true of modern double action revolvers.
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https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-59499237
I though safety was a big advantage with revolvers
you need to pull the trigger usually within the trigger guard
you can drop them throw them they won't fire.
This is true of modern double action revolvers.
https://ace.mu.nu/archives/400505.php
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https://www.heritage.org/firearms/commentary/these-11-defensive-gun-uses-show-protective-benefits-second-amendment
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What do we have on this?
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/crackdown-on-ghost-guns-amid-surge-in-violence/#x
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What do we have on this?
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/crackdown-on-ghost-guns-amid-surge-in-violence/#x
As usual, criminals can get guns through the black market so let's target the freedoms of American citizens!
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Specifically, what does the rule say?
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Specifically, what does the rule say?
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/qa/does-individual-need-license-make-firearm-personal-use
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Firearms Home
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Firearms Forms
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Firearms Q&As
Does an individual need a license to make a firearm for personal use?
No, a license is not required to make a firearm solely for personal use. However, a license is required to manufacture firearms for sale or distribution. The law prohibits a person from assembling a non–sporting semiautomatic rifle or shotgun from 10 or more imported parts, as well as firearms that cannot be detected by metal detectors or x–ray machines. In addition, the making of an NFA firearm requires a tax payment and advance approval by ATF.
[18 U.S.C. 922(o), (p) and (r); 26 U.S.C. 5822; 27 CFR 478.39, 479.62 and 479.105]
Last Reviewed March 17, 2020
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Thank you.
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Thank you.
1. Defund and demoralize law enforcement.
2. Violent crime skyrockets.
3. It's the guns!
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https://michaelyon.locals.com/upost/2639960/wild-hogs-to-the-rescue
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https://ace.mu.nu/archives/FBI%20irs.jpg
(https://ace.mu.nu/archives/FBI%20irs.jpg)
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https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2022/08/29/militants-with-assault-weapons-stand-guard-outside-family-friendly-drag-show-in-texas/?bcid=cf101f61ec0fe7d1fa21a354141e5e631cf7b7e79c49a572c416f8573a81eb62&utm_campaign=nl&utm_medium=email&utm_source=twtydaily
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https://nypost.com/2022/07/11/lawsuits-take-aim-at-new-yorks-new-gun-control-rules-for-carry-permits/?utm_medium=SocialFlow&utm_source=NYPTwitter&utm_campaign=SocialFlow
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https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/114/977/977/original/d12cf59889b18200.png
(https://media.gab.com/system/media_attachments/files/114/977/977/original/d12cf59889b18200.png)
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https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2022/08/29/militants-with-assault-weapons-stand-guard-outside-family-friendly-drag-show-in-texas/?bcid=cf101f61ec0fe7d1fa21a354141e5e631cf7b7e79c49a572c416f8573a81eb62&utm_campaign=nl&utm_medium=email&utm_source=twtydaily
https://raconteurreport.blogspot.com/2022/09/let-it-ride.html?m=1
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I get the emotion, but please let's avoid things that might give the impression that this forum is a place calling for giving people a third eye.
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I get the emotion, but please let's avoid things that might give the impression that this forum is a place calling for giving people a third eye.
It wasn’t this forum threatening half the country with F15s a few days ago, or nukes a year ago.
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I don't want to go around the Mulberry Bush on this.
Of course, we have our Constitutional/Natural Law rights to protect ourselves if/when the State slips its Constitutional bonds, but regardless of what the anti-American senile, compromised, corrupt President might say, pieces referencing giving a third eye the armed Antifa loons at the kiddie drag queen show are not the tone for this forum. I would not weep should such happen to them, but this forum is not for venting such emotions.
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I don't want to go around the Mulberry Bush on this.
Of course, we have our Constitutional/Natural Law rights to protect ourselves if/when the State slips its Constitutional bonds, but regardless of what the anti-American senile, compromised, corrupt President might say, pieces referencing giving a third eye the armed Antifa loons at the kiddie drag queen show are not the tone for this forum. I would not weep should such happen to them, but this forum is not for venting such emotions.
If/when?
You don’t think that already happened? The deep state junta pulling Biden’s strings openly declared war on us a few days ago.
The false flag is coming that will be used to justify open war on us, you know. Not just burning down American cities, shooting republicans at baseball games or trying to assassinate SCOTUS judges.
Unless you are planning on passively loading your family on the boxcars, you better be planning.
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None of which is to my point-- this forum is not a place for advocating "giving third eyes".
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None of which is to my point-- this forum is not a place for advocating "giving third eyes".
I didn’t see any advocacy, just food for thought.
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OK, I just reread, but please keep my thoughts in mind when selecting material for posting here.
If/when oppression comes, I don't want my forum to be used in smear campaigns against me by zealous FBI/DAs/political opponents.
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OK, I just reread, but please keep my thoughts in mind when selecting material for posting here.
If/when oppression comes, I don't want my forum to be used in smear campaigns against me by zealous FBI/DAs/political opponents.
Don’t worry, they’ll fabricate any evidence they need.
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Sorry, but that doesn't mean I should make it easy.
Take the hint please.
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https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/5-great-pepper-spray-options/
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https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/5-great-pepper-spray-options/
You'll want a flip top type of canister, not one where you have to rotate the spray mechanism. I strongly suggest using a brand that is in common use by LE.
Fox Labs and Def Tec would be at the top of my list. When I got OC'ed at a Corrections Academy many years ago, Fox Labs kicked my ass, despite having lots of firsthand experience/exposure to OC.
I edc this: https://www.copsplus.com/def-tec-5069-first-defense-mk-6-0-68-oz-stream
I carry this when in blue hives: https://www.copsplus.com/def-tec-5039-first-defense-mk-3-1-47-oz-stream
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https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/5-great-pepper-spray-options/
You'll want a flip top type of canister, not one where you have to rotate the spray mechanism. I strongly suggest using a brand that is in common use by LE.
Fox Labs and Def Tec would be at the top of my list. When I got OC'ed at a Corrections Academy many years ago, Fox Labs kicked my ass, despite having lots of firsthand experience/exposure to OC.
I edc this: https://www.copsplus.com/def-tec-5069-first-defense-mk-6-0-68-oz-stream
I carry this when in blue hives: https://www.copsplus.com/def-tec-5039-first-defense-mk-3-1-47-oz-stream
Great info. Thank you.
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https://www.tampafp.com/ccrkba-fbi-report-says-armed-citizens-killed-more-criminals-than-police/?
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https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2022/09/11/17-year-old-retrieves-shotgun-shoots-two-masked-intruders-dead/
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GUN CONTROL
Credit card companies to categorize gun shop sales
BY KEN SWEET ASSOCIATED PRESS NEW YORK | Payment processor Visa Inc. said Saturday that it plans to start separately categorizing sales at gun shops, a major win for gun control advocates who say it will help better track suspicious surges of gun sales that could be a prelude to a mass shooting.
But the decision by Visa, the world’s largest payment processor, will likely provoke the ire of gun rights advocates and gun lobbyists, who have argued that categorizing gun sales would unfairly flag an industry when most sales do not lead to mass shootings. It joins Mastercard and American Express, which also said they plan to move forward with categorizing gun shop sales.
Visa said it would adopt the International Organization for Standardization’s (ISO) new merchant code for gun sales, which was announced on Friday. Until Friday, gun store sales were considered “general merchandise.”
“Following ISO’s decision to establish a new merchant category code, Visa will proceed with next steps, while ensuring we protect all legal commerce on the Visa network in accordance with our long-standing rules,” the payment processor said in a statement.
Visa’s adoption is significant as the largest payment network, and with Mastercard and AmEx, will likely put pressure on the banks as the card issuers to adopt the standard as well. Visa acts as a middleman between merchants and banks, and it will be up to banks to decide whether they will allow sales at gun stores to happen on their issued cards.
Gun control advocates had gained significant wins on this front in recent weeks. New York City officials and pension funds had pressured the ISO and banks to adopt this code.
Two of the country’s largest public pension funds, in California and New York, have been pressing the country’s largest credit card firms to establish sales codes specifically for firearmrelated sales that could flag suspicious purchases or more easily trace how guns and ammunition are sold.
Merchant category codes now exist for almost every kind of purchase, including those made at supermarkets, clothing stores, coffee shops and many other retailers.
“When you buy an airline ticket or pay for your groceries, your credit card company has a special code for those retailers. It’s just common sense that we have the same policies in place for gun and ammunition stores,” said New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a former police captain who blames the proliferation of guns for his city’s deadly violence.
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https://www.ammoland.com/2022/09/democrats-intimidation-letters-pressure-shipping-companies/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7erle3dvh
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https://www.ammoland.com/2022/09/24-state-ags-warn-credit-card-ceos-consumer-protection-antitrust-on-table/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7fc9sF8bx
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https://www.westernjournal.com/canadian-rebellion-spreads-like-wildfire-three-provinces-openly-defying-trudeaus-gun-surrender-order/
why Canadians keep voting for this privileged dandy I guess I will never know.
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Hat tip CCP
https://jamanetwork.com/collections/5650/firearms
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https://www.zerohedge.com/political/man-3d-prints-guns-new-york-buyback-event-makes-whopping-21000
Genius!
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"$21,000 in $500 gift cards"
what a riot :-D
8-)
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Supreme Court Overturns Ruling on Massachusetts Gun Law, Leaving Constitutionality in Question
By Matthew Vadum October 3, 2022 Updated: October 4, 2022biggersmaller Print
The Supreme Court reversed a federal appeals court decision on Oct. 3 that upheld one of Massachusetts’ tough gun laws, months after the high court expanded Second Amendment rights.
The Massachusetts law in question, the constitutionality of which is now in doubt, imposed a lifetime ban on purchasing handguns—but not possessing them—on anyone convicted of a nonviolent misdemeanor that involved the possession or use of guns.
The high court remanded the case, Morin v. Lyver (court file 21-1160), to the U.S Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit “for further consideration in light of” the Supreme Court’s landmark June 23 decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen.
Massachusetts was previously added to Morin v. Lyver as an intervenor to defend the constitutionality of the state law.
The order was unsigned and no justices indicated they were dissenting from it. The justices didn’t explain why they granted the order.
In Bruen, a 6–3 ruling, the high court recognized a constitutional right to bear firearms in public for self-defense and struck down New York’s law that required an applicant to demonstrate “proper cause” to obtain a license to carry a concealed handgun in public.
The court also found that gun restrictions must be deeply rooted in American history if they are to survive constitutional scrutiny.
Massachusetts requires individuals to obtain licenses in order to possess or purchase handguns, and it disqualifies people with certain criminal convictions from obtaining licenses.
State law also provides that an individual convicted of a nonviolent misdemeanor that concerned the possession or use of a gun can obtain a license that allows him to possess a handgun at home, but only after five years have passed.
The same person can never obtain authorization to purchase a handgun—meaning that the only way he can obtain one is if someone leaves it to him at death, according to court documents.
Petitioner Alfred Morin’s legal troubles began in October 2004 when he traveled from his home state of Massachusetts to Washington with a handgun.
At the time, he possessed a valid Massachusetts License to Carry Firearms but was unaware that District of Columbia laws prohibited him from carrying his gun, despite having the Massachusetts license.
At the American Museum of Modern History, he saw a sign prohibiting firearms and approached a guard to inquire about checking his gun.
Police arrested Morin and charged him with carrying a pistol without a license, possession of an unregistered firearm, and unlawful possession of ammunition.
On Nov. 8, 2004, Morin pleaded guilty to attempting to carry a pistol without a license and possession of an unregistered firearm, both misdemeanors.
The Superior Court of the District of Columbia sentenced Morin to 60 days imprisonment on each count, three months of supervised probation, and 20 hours of community service. The court suspended the imprisonment portion of the sentence.
Morin later applied to police in his home state for a Firearms Identification Card and a permit to buy a firearm in February 2018. Respondent William Lyver, chief of the Northborough, Massachusetts, police department, denied Morin’s application for a permit to purchase on April 4, 2018.
The Supreme Court summarily disposed of the pending case, simultaneously granting the petitioner’s request seeking review while skipping over the oral argument phase at which the merits of the case would have been considered. Some lawyers call this process GVR, which stands for grant, vacate, and remand.
The order came after the Supreme Court issued a series of rulings on June 30 reversing federal appeals court decisions that upheld gun restrictions in California, Hawaii, Maryland, and New Jersey, as The Epoch Times reported.
The Epoch Times reached out for comment to Morin’s attorney, David Jensen, of Beacon, New York, but didn’t receive a reply as of press time.
Chloe Gotsis from the office of Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey told The Epoch Times by email, “We are declining to comment on the record as this is ongoing litigation.”
Healey, a Democrat, is running for governor in her state.
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Annals of Internal Medicine
Dear Dr. Price,
Annals of Internal Medicine and the American College of Physicians (ACP) are excited to announce a special upcoming Annals Story Slam focusing on firearm injury and prevention as a public health issue. We are cohosting the program with WHYY, Philadelphia’s local NPR station, and WHYY’s health and science program, The Pulse (whyy.org/programs/the-pulse). We are reaching out to you because we are looking for speakers to participate in this event, and we think you may be able to help.
Story Slams are events that celebrate the art of storytelling. Annals of Internal Medicine held its first “On Being a Doctor” Story Slam in November 2015. Since then, Annals and ACP have hosted a number of these events, and you can view the stories shared at Annals.org/storyslam.
We are seeking health care professional storytellers from the greater Philadelphia area who are interested in sharing stories of their experiences related to firearm injury and are available to do so on the evening of December 7 at WHYY’s building at 6th and Race Streets in Philadelphia. The format will be in-person, oral stories that are a maximum of 5 minutes in length. WHYY is seeking nonphysician storytellers, so the program will include a variety of perspectives from Philadelphia.
We are especially interested in personal stories related but not limited to the following topics: suicide, the experience of having to inform someone that their loved one has succumbed to a firearm injury, discussing firearm safety with patients and others, taking action to remove access to guns from someone you were concerned was at risk for harming themselves or others, caring for patients who have survived a firearm injury, caring for patients who have lost loved ones to a firearm injury, perspectives of physician gun owners, and the impact of the fear of firearm violence on the well-being of your patients and their communities.
If you would like to participate in this event as a physician storyteller, please complete this brief form, which will include your contact information and a short description of your story. The description need not be polished or convey the entire story. We can schedule a brief phone call to fill in any holes or answer your questions.
Please share this information with Philadelphia-area colleagues who you think might also be interested in participating in this event.
Sincere regards,
Christine Laine, MD, MPH, FACP
Editor in Chief, Annals of Internal Medicine
Senior Vice President, ACP
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https://www.aier.org/article/a-well-regulated-militia-is-necessary-to-the-security-of-a-free-state/
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https://youtu.be/ipafibUmnFM
Babylonian Bee video.
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11449337/Five-dead-25-injured-gunman-opened-fire-inside-gay-club-Colorado-Springs.html
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Vet hero
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/21/us/colorado-springs-shooting-club-q-hero.html?fbclid=IwAR3S7RXPXQF_aQNbyF0nw6m4KgD_utNSyFOZpKuNutK6ILY33hndb1OIiuw
=================
Killer's history
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/colorado-shooting-suspect-purchased-gun-despite-2021-bomb-threat-arrest/ar-AA14q6ZJ?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=f0fc8cdf8f51498ebec91e3375e7bfdb
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https://www.ammoland.com/2022/11/woman-calls-911-for-help-has-firearms-confiscated-by-police/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7lT79GOFN
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https://thereload.com/emails-cdc-removed-defensive-gun-use-stats-after-gun-control-advocates-pressured-officials-in-private-meeting/?fbclid=IwAR1si_TMDFZBHWXJO9-xHYY3bhaXDuAQWyYQi5G1_Mobfgs6tF9CZKoF1ac
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https://citizenfreepress.com/breaking/omnibus-includes-12-hidden-gun-grabbing-rules/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsTISDI1S4E&t=2s
-
Beginning around 02:40
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bhex7ZaXnvU&t=172s
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WSJ:
Judge Fires at New Jersey’s Gun Law
A federal court blocks enforcing key provisions of the state statute.
By The Editorial Page
Jan. 15, 2023 3:04 pm ET
Massive resistance used to be a phrase associated with Southern opposition to the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education ruling on racial integration. These days it describes how progressive institutions resist the Supreme Court’s rulings on guns, race and regulation.
In June the High Court ruled that the ability to carry a firearm outside the home is fundamental to the Second Amendment. New Jersey politicians responded by declaring a host of public places from state parks to theaters off-limits to guns—and last week federal Judge Renée Marie Bumb called foul on the state by blocking enforcement of specific provisions that have been challenged in lawsuits. The temporary stay will last until a hearing and ruling on the plaintiffs’ request for a preliminary injunction.
The challenge was brought by gun-rights groups and three New Jersey gun owners who had concealed-carry permits before the law was passed. The bulk of their case revolved around the law’s designation of “sensitive places” where carrying a gun is prohibited.
The plaintiffs challenged the gun bans in public libraries and museums, as well as bars and restaurants that serve alcohol and entertainment facilities. They also questioned provisions of the law barring guns from being carried on private property without first getting the permission of the property owner, as well as one prohibiting guns in cars unless they are unloaded, locked and in the trunk. As the judge noted, “state restrictions that are so extensive and burdensome” effectively nullify the ability of gun owners to exercise their constitutional right.
Which is the intent of the New Jersey law. Judge Bumb noted that while the state has had six months since New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen to identify historical analogues the Court said could justify banning guns in a given space, it has failed to provide them. All of which means confusion for the law-abiding gun owner. “The court,” the judge wrote, “knows of no constitutional right that requires this much guesswork by individuals wanting to exercise such right.”
Justice Clarence Thomas has noted that, since the Supreme Court’s 2008 landmark Heller decision upholding an individual right to bear arms, many lower courts have also resisted its commands. It’s encouraging to see Judge Bumb make sure New Jersey politicians don’t do the same to Bruen.
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https://gun-rights.org/news/dozens-of-illinois-sheriffs-vow-to-defy-governors-assault-weapons-ban/
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https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2023/01/26/illinois-bill-would-require-every-gas-station-and-grocery-store-in-chicago-to-have-an-armed-guard/?bcid=&utm_campaign=nl&utm_medium=email&utm_source=twtydaily
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https://www.law.georgetown.edu/constitution-center/constitution/marque-and-reprisal/
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https://www.reuters.com/world/us/ban-marijuana-users-owning-guns-is-unconstitutional-us-judge-rules-2023-02-04/
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https://masondixonsurvivalistassociation.wordpress.com/2023/02/13/how-some-states-will-screw-you-even-if-you-try-to-comply-with-the-atfs-overreach-on-pistol-braces/
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https://twitchy.com/samj-3930/2023/02/14/robert-reich-gets-his-clock-cleaned-after-tweeting-melodramatic-mass-shootings-in-the-us-tweet/?bcid=a6adb9cee2603db9de1b130a2a735514dd4634f7b1a7a7044877377a0ad6ec3b&utm_campaign=nl&utm_medium=email&utm_source=twtydaily
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0Qw_sDMySs
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0Qw_sDMySs
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2023/02/17/msu_shooting_the_blame_game_148876.html
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32oJPiAm2MA&t=99s
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32oJPiAm2MA&t=99s
Australian: why do you Yanks need guns?
Me: So my government can’t just throw me in a camp for not getting the ClotShot.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-59486285.amp
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WWWOOOFFF!
======================
https://www.nationalreview.com/2023/02/mass-shooting-inflation-a-real-problem-is-being-clouded-by-completely-inaccurate-figures/?bypass_key=aEFsWW1CRnRxK2VUZnU2bTIwa0h3UT09OjpObE5uT1UxSlpXUkVaVGRSVjBzeVR5OVFSMDgyZHowOQ%3D%3D&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Monday%20through%20Friday%202023-02-17&utm_term=NRDaily-Smart
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2023/02/17/msu_shooting_the_blame_game_148876.html
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32oJPiAm2MA&t=99s
Australian: why do you Yanks need guns?
Me: So my government can’t just throw me in a camp for not getting the ClotShot.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-59486285.amp
https://www.skysports.com/tennis/news/12110/12776054/novak-djokovic-says-he-cant-forget-australia-2022-deportation-as-he-prepares-for-2023-australian-open
https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2023/01/29/novak-djokovic-wins-australian-open/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l9_kBd4eAZI
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https://www.wsj.com/articles/old-racist-gun-laws-enter-modern-day-legal-battles-ed7a0206?mod=hp_featst_pos5
Historical, racist gun laws are taking on new relevance in legal battles over modern-day gun regulations, following a Supreme Court ruling that expanded the right to bear arms.
In the 1700s and 1800s, states across the country passed laws to keep guns out of the hands of slaves, free Black people, Native Americans and Catholics. Such discriminatory gun restrictions would be unconstitutional today, but they have entered the gun-rights debate as judges look to apply the Supreme Court’s decision last June that said gun restrictions must be anchored in historical traditions.
In recent months, federal and state government lawyers have cited the historical laws, garnering a mixed reception so far. They have argued that racist gun laws are evidence of a historical tradition of legislative bodies denying access to firearms for public safety.
“Some of these classifications—such as those based on race or religion—are abhorrent,” U.S. prosecutors told a federal appeals court last fall in a brief defending the disarmament of convicted domestic abusers. “They nevertheless show that the Framers understood that legislatures could make such judgments to categorically disarm groups of people deemed to be dangerous.”
The Justice Department, which didn’t respond to a request for comment, made similar arguments in recent weeks in other criminal appeal cases involving gun bans imposed on accused and convicted felons.
It is a distasteful but unavoidable argument, legal scholars say, a consequence of the upheaval in Second Amendment litigation ushered in by the Supreme Court’s expansion of gun rights.
The 6-3 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen, written by Justice Clarence Thomas, struck down New York’s strict handgun permitting rules and upended how courts are expected to review the constitutionality of gun regulations.
Before the ruling, the government could defend a gun law by citing the importance of preventing mass shootings and other gun violence. The Bruen decision stripped away that defense and substituted a test rooted in historical precedent.
Government defendants must show commonalities between a modern gun law and statutes that existed in the 1700s and 1800s when the Second Amendment and 14th Amendment, which made certain constitutional rights binding upon states, were ratified.
“It is almost inevitable that courts will have to confront the history of racist gun laws,” said UCLA constitutional law professor Adam Winkler, who wrote a recent Harvard Law Review article on the issue. “The Supreme Court says that gun laws today must be consistent with gun laws from the 17- and 1800s, and many gun laws from the 17- and 1800s were motivated by racism.”
In lawsuits challenging California’s gun laws, the state attorney general’s office submitted spreadsheets of historical gun statutes that it says are relevant to its case.
Among dozens of racist laws it cited is a 1792 Virginia statute—passed one year after the Second Amendment was adopted—dictating that “no negro or mulatto” except for housekeepers “shall keep or carry any gun, powder, shot, club, or other weapon whatsoever, offensive or defensive.”
The state also referred to an 1833 Florida law, enacted in the aftermath of Nat Turner’s bloody slave rebellion, that authorized white citizen patrols to “search negro houses” for firearms. Anyone found in possession could be summarily whipped.
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“These laws are morally repugnant and would obviously be unconstitutional,” the office of California’s Democratic attorney general, Rob Bonta, said in a legal brief filed with U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez in San Diego. “But these laws are part of the history of the Second Amendment and may be relevant to determining the traditions that define its scope, even if they are inconsistent with other constitutional guarantees.”
Before Bruen, California had been mounting a largely successful defense of its gun laws, which are among the nation’s toughest.
The state is now confronting the Supreme Court’s requirements in a series of lawsuits, including cases challenging its ban on semiautomatic firearms classified as assault weapons, its prohibition on high-capacity gun magazines and its background-check requirements for ammunition buyers.
In December, Judge Benitez, a President George W. Bush appointee considering legal challenges to several state restrictions, ordered California to draw up a list of any “relevantly similar” historical laws.
In the ammunition background-check case, the state listed more than 100 laws from the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. More than three-quarters of them explicitly targeted slaves, free Blacks, Native Americans and Catholics.
“I was kind of in shock when they first sent us the spreadsheets,” said Konstadinos Moros, a lawyer with Michel and Associates PC, which represents the California Rifle and Pistol Association, a plaintiff in several lawsuits against the state. “We found these racist laws they were citing that were clearly not relevant to the case.”
Lawyers for California disagree, saying their survey of statutes buttresses their assertion that the state’s background-check law is “rooted in the historical tradition—dating back to the founding—of disarming groups of people perceived to be dangerous or unvirtuous.”
Other courts have considered the applicability of discriminatory gun laws. At least two judges have cautioned the government against relying upon them. U.S. District Judge Alan Albright, a President Donald Trump appointee from Texas, ruled in January that a federal law banning those under felony indictment from obtaining guns is unconstitutional. He wrote that he was “skeptical of using historical laws that removed someone’s Second Amendment rights based on race, class, and religion to support doing the same today.”
In August, however, U.S. District Judge Irene Berger, a President Barack Obama appointee from West Virginia, upheld a federal law prohibiting people convicted of domestic violence misdemeanors from possessing guns, finding it relevant that states historically excluded minorities from the right to bear arms.
Judge Berger, noting that she herself is Black, wrote: “Common sense tells us that the public understanding of the Second Amendment at the time of its enactment, which allowed for disarmament of Blacks and Native Americans based on their perceived threat, would have accepted disarmament of people convicted of misdemeanor crimes of domestic violence.”
Sorry for the wall of text, folks.
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Gun purchase tracking suspended: Following blowback and threats of litigation from Second Amendment advocates and nearly two dozen states writing up legislation to counter, Visa and Mastercard have paused their plan to adopt the International Organization for Standardization's new merchant category code. The new code effectively creates a gun registry of sorts, as all firearm and ammunition purchases are filed under a code that identifies them as such. "There are bills advancing in several states related to the use of this new code," Visa explained. "If passed, the result will be an inconsistency in how this ISO standard could be applied by merchants, issuers, acquirers and networks," so "we have decided to pause work on the implementation of the firearms-specific MCC." In celebrating this win for Americans' Second Amendment rights, Senator Bill Hagerty (R-TN) contended, "This politicization of our financial sector must stop."
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https://www.breitbart.com/2nd-amendment/2023/03/15/democrats-senators-urge-doj-action-after-credit-cards-refuse-track-gun-purchases/
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https://thereload.com/judge-blocks-feds-from-enforcing-ghost-gun-ban-against-polymer80/
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DC_Draino:
Let me tell you about a dark secret of the Left
They don’t actually want to stop school shootings w/armed guards & armed teachers
They know it works
But if they allow it, they’d lose their biggest emotional argument for banning *all* guns every time 1 of these tragedies occur
Exhibit A
Quote Tweet
David Hogg ☮️
Good morning. Two things.
1. It’s the guns
2. Fuck the NRA
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https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/04/san-antonio-man-uses-apple-airtag-to-track-down-thief-who-stole-his-truck-then-fatally-shoots-him/
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https://www.theburningplatform.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/FsfZ9owX0AYMvbB.jpg
(https://www.theburningplatform.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/FsfZ9owX0AYMvbB.jpg)
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www.ammoland.com/2023/03/ban-on-2a-rights-by-civil-restraining-order-unconstitutional/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7wyQ0Mrns
ICYMI 5 Circuit: Ban on 2A Rights by Civil Restraining Order is Unconstitutional
Ammoland Inc. Posted on March 24, 2023 by Dean Weingarten
Second Amendment
U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)-— In the Fifth Circuit, the entire Court has ruled, en banc, that mere civil restraining orders may not infringe rights protected by the Second Amendment. The unconstitutional infringement was placed into law by the infamous Lautenberg Amendment in 1996. Hundreds of thousands of lives have been turned upside down and ruined by this infamous and unjust law.
In the opinion published by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, Circuit Judge James C. Ho writes a particularly well-argued and presented concurrence. The concurrence is worth reading. It is quoted below, without the footnotes:
James C. Ho, Circuit Judge, concurring:The right to keep and bear arms has long been recognized as a fundamental civil right. See, e.g., Johnson v. Eisentrager, 339 U.S. 763, 784 (1950) (describing the First, Second, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments as the “civil-rights Amendments”); Konigsberg v. State Bar of Cal., 366 U.S. 36, 49–50 n.10 (1961). Blackstone saw it as essential to “‘the natural right’”of Englishmen to “‘self-preservation and defence. ”District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570, 593–94 (2008)(quoting 1 William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England139–40 (1765)).
But the Second Amendment has too often been denigrated as “a second-class right.”McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 780 (2010). In response, the Supreme Court has called on judges to be more faithful guardians of the text and original meaning of the Second Amendment. See N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111 (2022). Our court today dutifully follows the framework recently set forth in N.Y. State Rifle. It recognizes the absence of relevant historical analogues required to support the Government’s position in this case. I am pleased to concur.
I write separately to point out that our Founders firmly believed in the fundamental role of government in protecting citizens against violence,as well as the individual right to keep and bear arms—and that these two principles are not inconsistent but entirely compatible with one another.
Our Founders understood that those who commit or threaten violence against innocent law-abiding citizens may be arrested, convicted, and incarcerated. They knew that arrest and incarceration naturally entails the loss of a wide range of liberties—including the loss of access to arms.
So when the government detains—and thereby disarms—a member of our community, it must do so consistent with the fundamental protections that our Constitution affords to those accused of a crime. For example, the government may detain dangerous criminals, not just after conviction, but also before trial. Pre-trial detention is expressly contemplated by the Excessive Bail Clause and the Speedy Trial Clause. And it no doubt plays a significant role in protecting innocent citizens against violence. See, e.g., United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739, 755 (1987) (permitting“the detention prior to trial of arrestees charged with serious felonies who . . . pose a threat to the safety of individuals or to the community”).
Our laws also contemplate the incarceration of those who criminally threaten, but have not (yet) committed, violence. After all, to the victim, such actions are not only life-threatening—they’re life-altering. See, e.g., United States v. Ackell, 907 F.3d 67 (1st Cir. 2018)(upholding criminal stalking law); United States v. Gonzalez, 905 F.3d 165 (3rd Cir. 2018)(same); United States v. Osinger, 753 F.3d 939 (9th Cir. 2014)(same); United States v. Petrovic, 701 F.3d 849 (8th Cir. 2012)(same); see also People v. Counterman, 497 P.3d 1039 (Colo. Ct. App. 2021) (same), cert. granted, _ U.S. _ (2023).
In sum, our Founders envisioned a nation in which both citizen and sovereign alike play important roles in protecting the innocent against violent criminals. Our decision today is consistent with that vision. I concur.
Judge Ho says what many Constitutionalists have been saying for decades. If a person is too dangerous to have arms, they are too dangerous to be on the streets. At present, the Biden administration has chosen not to appeal this Fifth Circuit decision to the Supreme Court of the United States.
Fast Forward to March 2023: The Epoc Times reports ‘Biden DOJ Asks Supreme Court to Fast-Track Case That Could Reinstate Federal Gun Ban’
“The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is asking the Supreme Court to overturn an appeals court ruling that struck down a federal law preventing people under domestic violence-related restraining orders from having guns.
The Biden administration asked in its new petition (pdf) for the high court to hear the case on a “highly expedited schedule” because of the “significant disruptive consequences” of the lower court’s ruling. The petition was reportedly filed with the court on March 17th, 2023 but had not been docketed as of press time….”
Opinion:
Many times more people have their rights infringed with a civil restraining order than are ever convicted of domestic violence. People have had their lives destroyed by this evil and unconstitutional law. If you are willing to have your blood pressure raised with pure injustice, read of the case of Tim Emerson, M.D. Emerson was the first federal case since Miller to affirm the Second Amendment as an individual right. However, because of the Lautenberg amendment, Emerson was unjustly convicted, impoverished, jailed, put on a sex offender list, and denied the most basic rights.
This was a decade before the Heller decision when Progressive judges still dominated the courts.
About Dean Weingarten:
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.
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https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/134/923/738/original/fc80b0a4b45050e4.png
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/134/923/738/original/fc80b0a4b45050e4.png)
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/04/pa-home-invasion-multiple-robbers-shot-7-times/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz7znl1jEQq
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oot-vqgGWjI&t=80s
https://www.ammoland.com/2023/05/what-the-media-doesnt-want-you-to-know-about-its-mass-murder-narrative/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz81JDbYfZw
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12074301/Adults-age-18-20-barred-buying-handguns-licensed-dealers-judge-rules.html
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https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=852,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/138/940/945/original/7953b89afcc522aa.png
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=852,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/138/940/945/original/7953b89afcc522aa.png)
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Playing this forward!
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remove DC Chicago Detroit St Louis Phila [not LA NYC Houston?]
we know it is not white supremacy doing this
but that does not stop Biden FBI NAACP DOJ celebrities and hustlers from ignoring
and blaming anyone, anything , else they can
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IIRC over the decades NYC crime states have been lower than the other cities mentioned.
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Gun Rights Supporters:
I am passing on a desperate plea from our brothers and sisters at the Oregon Firearms Federation, which is forced to fight the state’s far left agenda, particularly its attempts to end lawful gun ownership. There is a donation link to OFF at the bottom. GRNC doesn’t get a dime of this one. Please help keep west coast lunacy from migrating here.
From Kevin Starrett, Executive Director, Oregon Firearms Federation:
“In 2022 the voters in the bluest counties in Oregon passed Measure 114 by a whisker thin margin.
“In January, Oregon Firearms Federation went to Federal Court to block the measure.
“Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, refused to issue an emergency or temporary injunction, but a suit filed in State Court by Gun Owners of America has temporarily blocked the measure pending a trial in September. However, no matter how that goes, the fight will be Federal Court.
“The measure bans virtually all firearms magazines and most tube fed shotguns because of the way the measure was written.
“The measure also requires a ‘permit’ to purchase a firearm but the requirements cannot be legally met.
“In addition to requiring a class that only police can teach, it requires fingerprint checks by the FBI.
“The FBI has refused to provide them, which means the county sheriff or local police who are tasked with providing the permits would have to violate the rules in the measure to issue the permit the measure requires.
“The required ‘class’ also mandates live fire training, but virtually no police or sheriff’s departments in Oregon have the facilities to provide for live fire. Furthermore, there is no provision for people who do not already own guns to acquire the guns they would need to take the class since they would not have permits.
“The state has argued that magazine are not protected by the Second Amendment because they are not “arms”. The state claims they are ‘accessories’. But of course, they are components, not accessories, because firearms cannot function as intended without them.
“If some magazines are not protected then all magazines can be banned as can other parts like stocks and trigger groups.
“The state is also claiming that the measure is constitutional under Bruen because it is ‘shall issue.’ But it is not. Sheriffs are NOT required by the measure to issue and some have already said they will not because they cannot. If your county sheriff does not issue, you are not allowed to request a permit from any other sheriff.
“Measure 114 will essentially end the legal sale of firearms in Oregon and place hundreds of thousands of Oregonians at risk of criminal penalties for owning magazines. Many distributors have already refused to send any magazines into Oregon for fear of violating the Measure.
“Closing arguments are Friday June 9th and the Judge does not seem predisposed to finding in favor of Gun Owners. She has denied OFF’s attorneys request to provide mountains of discovery from the Oregon State Police which demonstrated they are not even completing the background checks they are tasked with now and this measure will triple required background checks for a gun purchase. She has allowed the state to make arguments that the Supreme Court has deemed off limits.
“Oregon Firearms Federation has faced staggering legal bills fighting this measure. Whatever the outcome of this trial there will certainly be an appeal. This case will have national implications. Any support you can give to OFF and its Educational Foundation would be greatly appreciated.”
https://www.oregonfirearms.org/
Secure donations can be made online here.
https://oregonfirearms.ejoinme.org/MyPages/DonationPage/tabid/70447/Default.aspx
Armatissimi e liberissimi,
F. Paul Valone
President, Grass Roots North Carolina
Executive Director, Rights Watch International
Radio host, Guns, Politics and Freedom
Author, Rules for ANTI-Radicals: A Practical Handbook for Defeating Leftism
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https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/new-0-handgun-shows-bidens-atf-losing-control-over-regulating-2nd-amendment
May have to look at the Sig 320 now.
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Nice find.
I just posted it on DBMA FB with this description for our substantial foreign audience there.
===============================
For our foreign friends:
The issue here is that powerful forces within our federal government and many of our state governments want to have knowledge of all guns-- a prelude to general disarmament. Witness Australia; witness most of Europe.
Ghost guns are guns about which the goverment does not know because the law does not restrict guns made by the individual himself-- I'm thinking this probably because the Constitutional basis for Federal action here is the "Interstate Commerce Clause."
Thus a key question presented is how the parts out of which the gun is built are defined. Are they a "readily assembled into a gun" or are they "parts" requiring work by the would-be gun maker to qualify under law to have "made" a gun and thus not subject to federal law?
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Nice find.
I just posted it on DBMA FB with this description for our substantial foreign audience there.
===============================
For our foreign friends:
The issue here is that powerful forces within our federal government and many of our state governments want to have knowledge of all guns-- a prelude to general disarmament. Witness Australia; witness most of Europe.
Ghost guns are guns about which the goverment does not know because the law does not restrict guns made by the individual himself-- I'm thinking this probably because the Constitutional basis for Federal action here is the "Interstate Commerce Clause."
Thus a key question presented is how the parts out of which the gun is built are defined. Are they a "readily assembled into a gun" or are they "parts" requiring work by the would-be gun maker to qualify under law to have "made" a gun and thus not subject to federal law?
https://reason.com/2018/05/31/how-to-legally-make-your-own-o/
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https://washingtontimes-dc.newsmemory.com/?token=1bbc291ec07c58e48febbdb68812e89f_64886f11_6d25b5f&selDate=20230613
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https://washingtontimes-dc.newsmemory.com/?token=1bbc291ec07c58e48febbdb68812e89f_64886f11_6d25b5f&selDate=20230613
https://www.atf.gov/firearms/identify-prohibited-persons
Identify Prohibited Persons
The Gun Control Act (GCA), codified at 18 U.S.C. § 922(g), makes it unlawful for certain categories of persons to ship, transport, receive, or possess firearms or ammunition, to include any person:
convicted in any court of a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year;
who is a fugitive from justice;
who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act, codified at 21 U.S.C. § 802);
who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or has been committed to any mental institution;
who is an illegal alien;
who has been discharged from the Armed Forces under dishonorable conditions;
who has renounced his or her United States citizenship;
who is subject to a court order restraining the person from harassing, stalking, or threatening an intimate partner or child of the intimate partner; or
who has been convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.
The GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(n) also makes it unlawful for any person under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship, transport, or receive firearms or ammunition.
Further, the GCA at 18 U.S.C. § 922(d) makes it unlawful to sell or otherwise dispose of firearms or ammunition to any person who is prohibited from shipping, transporting, receiving, or possessing firearms or ammunition.
The Arms Export Control Act (AECA) prohibits the issuance of licenses to persons who have been convicted of:
Section 38 of the AECA, 22 USC 2778;
Section 11 of the Export Administration Act of 1979, 60 USC App. 2410;
Sections 7903, 794, or 798 of Title 18, USC, relating to espionage involving defense or classified information;
Section 16 of the Trading with the Enemy Act, 50 USC App. 16;
Section 30A of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, 15 USC 78dd-1, or section 104 of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, 15 USC 78dd-2;
Chapter 105 of Title 18, USC, relating to sabotage;
Section 4(b) of the Internal Security Act of 1950, 50 USC 783(b), relating to communication of classified information;
Sections 57, 92, 101, 104, 222, 224, 225, or 226 of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, 42 USC 2077 2122, 2131, 2234, 2272, 2275, and 2276;
Section 601 of the National Security Act of 1947, 50 USC 421, relating to the protection of the identity of undercover intelligence officers, agents, and other sources;
Section 371 of Title 17, USC, when it involves conspiracy to violate any of the above statutes; and
International Emergency Economic Powers Act, 50 USC 1702 and 1705.
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https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/3-teens-try-to-light-dynamite-inside-philly-grocery-store-police-say/3589237/
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https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/3-teens-try-to-light-dynamite-inside-philly-grocery-store-police-say/3589237/
"Teens" with no description given.
:roll:
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Federal law makes it a crime to lie on a gun application of course
The question are you addicted or using illegal drugs is there for a reason
hunter answered no, thus lying and breaking the law
Rudy points out the whole reason this is part of gun laws is to keep drug users from acquiring guns - not to excuse them with , 'well he was an addict at the time',
and we should feels sorry for him and excuse his behavior since he has a disease .
That approach totally defeats the purpose of the law - by dismissing the application of the law breaking because he is an addict was the exact opposite of the intent Congress had for putting this as part of gun applications
I answer the same question every time I get or renew a state medical license
doubt very much if I lied they would feel sorry for me and forget about it and drop the charge
I imagine police officers , as well all of us who own a gun have answered this .
An analogy would be to excuse a drunk driver because they had a disease
therefore lets drop it.
Not to mention making even more complicated is the FACT THAT HUNTER IS A LAWYER who cannot claim he did not know better .
but all this does not matter
since we are in reality a nation of lawYERS
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https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1136,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/140/956/728/original/4a1c5179a17c2879.jpg
(https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1136,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/140/956/728/original/4a1c5179a17c2879.jpg)
Federal law makes it a crime to lie on a gun application of course
The question are you addicted or using illegal drugs is there for a reason
hunter answered no, thus lying and breaking the law
Rudy points out the whole reason this is part of gun laws is to keep drug users from acquiring guns - not to excuse them with , 'well he was an addict at the time',
and we should feels sorry for him and excuse his behavior since he has a disease .
That approach totally defeats the purpose of the law - by dismissing the application of the law breaking because he is an addict was the exact opposite of the intent Congress had for putting this as part of gun applications
I answer the same question every time I get or renew a state medical license
doubt very much if I lied they would feel sorry for me and forget about it and drop the charge
I imagine police officers , as well all of us who own a gun have answered this .
An analogy would be to excuse a drunk driver because they had a disease
therefore lets drop it.
Not to mention making even more complicated is the FACT THAT HUNTER IS A LAWYER who cannot claim he did not know better .
but all this does not matter
since we are in reality a nation of lawYERS
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ccp, yes very strange that Democrats want gun laws relaxed (in this case), but always want more
gun l aws. Drug addicts and felons and red flag people should have access, or not? Same with the tax law. Do you think I would get the slap on the wrist if I failed to declare millions? At the same time they want more taxes on high earners punishable by jail on the rest of us.
I suppose the prosecutors empathized with Hunter's predicament. He couldn't declare income from his foreign agent work because it's a felony punishable with prison time (ask Paul Manafort) to lobby for a foreign government without registering under FARA, Foreign Agent Registration Act.
https://www.justice.gov/nsd-fara/recent-cases#:~:text=Manafort%2C%20Jr.%2C%20pleaded%20guilty,justice%20by%20tampering%20with%20witnesses.
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https://services.brid.tv/previews/index/1335291/6077/#cp
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https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/judges-find-supreme-courts-bruen-test-unworkable
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https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/judges-find-supreme-courts-bruen-test-unworkable
This just in, statist judges don't like the second amendment!
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Good to know what the arguments on the other side are so that one will not wind up like Hannity whiffing at Newsom.
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Good to know what the arguments on the other side are so that one will not wind up like Hannity whiffing at Newsom.
Bottom line: Want them? Come and get them.
The would-be confiscators all have names and addresses.
The founders were very clear in their intent. It wasn't about deer and duck hunting.
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Better to beat them in the courts before it comes to that and that means being able to articulate sound Natural Law Second and Ninth Amendment theory.
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Better to beat them in the courts before it comes to that and that means being able to articulate sound Natural Law Second and Ninth Amendment theory.
The courts are corrupt, as is the federal government.
Think you can disarm us?
One way to find out.
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Better to beat them in the courts before it comes to that and that means being able to articulate sound Natural Law Second and Ninth Amendment theory.
The courts are corrupt, as is the federal government.
Think you can disarm us?
One way to find out.
https://westernrifleshooters.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/image0000045.jpg
(https://westernrifleshooters.us/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/image0000045.jpg)
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Should we lose in the courts then that question will be presented.
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Should we lose in the courts then that question will be presented.
The courts are corrupt. Filled with judges that are leftist activists in black robes.
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Some yes. Not all.
In case you have not noticed, we have had some rather big wins of late , , ,
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"in case you have not noticed, we have had some rather big wins of late , , ,"
thank God we voted hard enough to get Trump in '16 and because of that 3 strict interpreters on the SCOTUS ! it pays to vote hard at a Federal level :-D 8-) :wink:
We CAN do it again!
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"in case you have not noticed, we have had some rather big wins of late , , ,"
thank God we voted hard enough to get Trump in '16 and because of that 3 strict interpreters on the SCOTUS ! it pays to vote hard at a Federal level :-D 8-) :wink:
We CAN do it again!
Trump wasn’t supposed to happen.
2020 is the template going forward.
As far as the wins, the article makes it clear that they won’t rest until the wins are overturned.
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"As far as the wins, the article makes it clear that they won’t rest until the wins are overturned."
that I agree with
see my post under education.
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Which is precisely why giving up now will guarantee the end of our C'l Republic.
BTW, note this win for us:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AAMi6CyI3U&t=24s
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The American Republic was overthrown by the one true branch of government via a "color revolution" soft coup in 2020.
The people responsible will never voluntarily give up power.
Which is precisely why giving up now will guarantee the end of our C'l Republic.
BTW, note this win for us:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AAMi6CyI3U&t=24s
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Dammit GM, please stop farting over every thread with this!
We know your point. Indeed in great part we share it-- WHICH IS WHY WE FIGHT NOW.
WE ALREADY KNOW that it may be as you predict, but at least we can look ourselves in the mirror knowing that we did what we could.
Should (y)our fears be realized, , , , well then , , , the Adventure continues , , , albeit in new ways..
AND it may be that we WIN.
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Dammit GM, please stop farting over every thread with this!
We know your point. Indeed in great part we share it-- WHICH IS WHY WE FIGHT NOW.
WE ALREADY KNOW that it may be as you predict, but at least we can look ourselves in the mirror knowing that we did what we could.
Should (y)our fears be realized, , , , well then , , , the Adventure continues , , , albeit in new ways..
AND it may be that we WIN.
Win or die. That's the only choice. No one is coming to save us, and anything but focus on that is wasting time and energy.
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Winning the election would be a good thing in that regard.
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https://gunfreezone.net/france-is-a-lesson-in-not-giving-up-your-guns/
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I should have kept my baseball bats.
:-o
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The following is a slightly modified version of something I posted on my Ass'n forum this morning:
=====================================================================
Using this footage as a study in dealing with a CCSS without firearms:
Rather, the point here is to observe what humans under these conditions do.
What would you do?
For example, would you like to have a good foundation:
A) ST FOOM combos?
MARC: This is an acronym for Stay The Fuck Off Of Me.
B) And Snake movement from which to launch them?
MARC: Meaning the movement of the weapon between actual interactions.
C) Integration of 360 degree footwork with them?
D) One hand, double force, and Dos Manos skills so you could use a wide variety of sticks, pipes, clubs, staves?
MARC: Double Force means placing one's complementary hand on the wrist of the hand holding the weapon. This allows handling a weapon too heavy for one hand without surrendering the dexterity of the wrist. Dos Manos means Two Hands e.g. like a baseball bat.
E) Might it be a good idea to have some familiarity moving and hitting with a 2x4? Just how does the shape affect your grip upon impact?
F) Would you have like to have had some sort of conversation with your family about teamwork? For example, as we saw in Die Less Often-1, an untrained wife could know to stand behind you and grab your belt as you blast a path for the both of you through the CCSS?
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Be sure to train to do all this after having been tear gassed by government forces!
:roll:
Sorry, this would have been great in the last dark ages. Now, you better have guns and be skilled with them and have lots of friends with guns and have interlocking fields of fire.
The following is a slightly modified version of something I posted on my Ass'n forum this morning:
=====================================================================
Using this footage as a study in dealing with a CCSS without firearms:
Rather, the point here is to observe what humans under these conditions do.
What would you do?
For example, would you like to have a good foundation:
A) ST FOOM combos?
MARC: This is an acronym for Stay The Fuck Off Of Me.
B) And Snake movement from which to launch them?
MARC: Meaning the movement of the weapon between actual interactions.
C) Integration of 360 degree footwork with them?
D) One hand, double force, and Dos Manos skills so you could use a wide variety of sticks, pipes, clubs, staves?
MARC: Double Force means placing one's complementary hand on the wrist of the hand holding the weapon. This allows handling a weapon too heavy for one hand without surrendering the dexterity of the wrist. Dos Manos means Two Hands e.g. like a baseball bat.
E) Might it be a good idea to have some familiarity moving and hitting with a 2x4? Just how does the shape affect your grip upon impact?
F) Would you have like to have had some sort of conversation with your family about teamwork? For example, as we saw in Die Less Often-1, an untrained wife could know to stand behind you and grab your belt as you blast a path for the both of you through the CCSS?
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https://www.theburningplatform.com/2023/07/04/images-of-france-not-seen-in-western-media/
Think those AK pattern rifles came from a French gun shop?
Be sure to train to do all this after having been tear gassed by government forces!
:roll:
Sorry, this would have been great in the last dark ages. Now, you better have guns and be skilled with them and have lots of friends with guns and have interlocking fields of fire.
The following is a slightly modified version of something I posted on my Ass'n forum this morning:
=====================================================================
Using this footage as a study in dealing with a CCSS without firearms:
Rather, the point here is to observe what humans under these conditions do.
What would you do?
For example, would you like to have a good foundation:
A) ST FOOM combos?
MARC: This is an acronym for Stay The Fuck Off Of Me.
B) And Snake movement from which to launch them?
MARC: Meaning the movement of the weapon between actual interactions.
C) Integration of 360 degree footwork with them?
D) One hand, double force, and Dos Manos skills so you could use a wide variety of sticks, pipes, clubs, staves?
MARC: Double Force means placing one's complementary hand on the wrist of the hand holding the weapon. This allows handling a weapon too heavy for one hand without surrendering the dexterity of the wrist. Dos Manos means Two Hands e.g. like a baseball bat.
E) Might it be a good idea to have some familiarity moving and hitting with a 2x4? Just how does the shape affect your grip upon impact?
F) Would you have like to have had some sort of conversation with your family about teamwork? For example, as we saw in Die Less Often-1, an untrained wife could know to stand behind you and grab your belt as you blast a path for the both of you through the CCSS?
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"Think those AK pattern rifles came from a French gun shop?"
Good point.
Similar question for the light machine gun!
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For the umpteenth time I am searching for but not finding a really good decision out of Conn. affirming knife rights. I KNOW it is here , , , somewhere.
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https://www.cga.ct.gov/2015/rpt/2015-R-0026.htm#:~:text=In%20its%20unanimous%20ruling%2C%20the,those%20weapons%20there%E2%80%9C%20(id.
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https://firehydrantoffreedom.com/index.php?topic=95.msg108468#msg108468
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THANK YOU!!!
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/07/vermont-range-owner-to-be-held-in-state-prison-until-his-range-is-destroyed/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz86sZcDGw7
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https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bidens-gun-control-backfires-after-fifth-circuit-ruling-ghost-guns-legal-once-more
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/aug/8/supreme-court-lets-feds-regulate-ghost-guns/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=Xy5kq%2FTwdI8MqISBnD63vMsv5mJWjFAuOIIWLcOetcEaX0loHQZS%2FtxHEoIUxNj9&bt_ts=1691518430030
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From an Obama appointee yet!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfBcpiUm4kQ&t=2s
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second
https://www.oann.com/newsroom/indiana-woman-fatally-shoots-man-holding-a-gun-to-her-husbands-head/
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/08/study-shows-gun-ownership-may-be-double-previous-estimate/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8AMtxwDLN
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/08/bidens-doj-asks-scotus-gut-2nd-amendment/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8AkHBntOc
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is this guy fast...
https://twitter.com/i/status/1692794902009032714 (https://twitter.com/i/status/1692794902009032714)
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVXsX5M2gzA&t=167s
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https://thereload.com/massachusetts-judge-rules-law-against-carrying-guns-across-state-lines-unconstitutional/?fbclid=IwAR3Tq_zxSEdiPbSP9kWMKJ6zzVp4YZEbI0moUvs-98eeK6DGYGpYxRFkw2Q
https://www.ammoland.com/2023/08/judge-drops-case-against-new-hampshire-man-charged-for-not-having-a-massachusetts-license-to-carry-a-firearm/?fbclid=IwAR1ox_Y4tapb3ktVmcOgBiXn11MCFvPOQjAVVSh46WcnXAqdOI44m1oTcAo#axzz8BqisrZ6C
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/08/federal-judge-blasts-atf-for-its-heavy-handed-exercise-of-revocations/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8BsVN44Tb
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https://twitchy.com/dougp/2023/09/09/local-law-enforcement-responses-to-nm-govs-gun-edict-are-ring-hollow-for-dana-loesch-n2387018
I confess that I was stunned to see on FOX this morning that Cong. Ted Lieu, who was my Congressman when I was a Californian, and who is as loathsome a Woken Dead Prog as can be found in Congress, said that this was unC'l.
Then, to top it off that self-righteous little cunt David Hoag said the same thing.
The world retains its ability to surprise.
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An honest person who hates the second amendment must admit this is a clear violation. This is why people who think 2A is wrong for our time need to repeal, or rewrite and re-ratify it, unless they just don't believe in the binding power of a constitution in a constitutional republic.
What holds us together if not the constitution?
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIu7cGlbTOo
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https://www.nationalreview.com/news/democratic-new-mexico-ag-refuses-to-defend-governor-in-gun-order-lawsuits/?utm_source=email&utm_medium=breaking&utm_campaign=newstrack&utm_term=32688772
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annie_Oakley_(1894_film)
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https://www.paragonpride.com/forum/threads/second-amendment.12171/page-41
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/10/federal-judge-rules-gun-cad-files-are-not-protected-speech/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8FMUFftek
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Forced reset triggers are not “machine guns.”
https://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2023/10/13/forced-reset-triggers/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss
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https://assets.nationbuilder.com/firearmspolicycoalition/pages/5381/attachments/original/1697737480/2023.10.19_175_OPINION.pdf?1697737480&fbclid=IwAR1YR-Lqy_8op6joMmf73z8Wixjhoh1AlN9nK54gJvsWj-KPW-vczAtzy84
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State of my childhood rules onerous carry permit requirements are kosher. As sundry other People’s Republics of Ameristan seek to find just where the SCOTUS will draw 2nd amendment lines post-Bruen will be interesting:
https://reason.com/volokh/2023/10/20/illinois-appellate-court-upholds-90-day-waiting-period-for-concealed-carry-permit-150-fee/
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Judge strikes down the very subjective “good moral character” clause of NY’s CHP process:
https://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2023/10/victory_in_new_.php
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https://patriotpost.us/articles/101670-the-maine-manhunt-and-bidens-bogus-ban-plan-2023-10-27?mailing_id=7871&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.7871&utm_campaign=digest&utm_content=body
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second
https://www.ammoland.com/2023/10/nys-crusade-against-homemade-guns-backfires-unintentional-masterclass-ghost-gunsmithing/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8HNwRhHAL
NY’s Door-to-Door Crusade Against Homemade Guns Backfires, Unintentional Masterclass in Ghost-Gunsmithing
Ammoland Inc. Posted on October 26, 2023 by John Crump
Privacy Invasion: New York State Police’s door-to-door checks based on eBay pistol part purchases raise serious privacy concerns.
Misguiding Guide: NYPD’s leaked “ghost gun” handbook, riddled with legal inaccuracies, unintentionally becomes a detailed DIY firearm-making manual.
Unwitting Advertising: NYPD’s guide inadvertently promotes gun part manufacturers and DIY firearm assembly, including 3D printing and CNC machining details.
Ghost Gunner Gun Making CNC Machine
Ghost Gunner Gun Making CNC Machine
New York State declared war on citizens making their own firearms. To crack down on privately manufactured firearms (PMF), the New York State Police (NYSP) are showing up in force at people’s doors. The reason for the informal visit seems to be an inquiry related to purchased pistol parts from the website eBay. Ammoland News has learned from Law Enforcement Sources that the New York Police Department released a “ghost gun” handbook explaining PMFs and how to identify them.
Two weeks ago, NYSP “Ghost Gun” Team members began visiting citizens in the New York City area requesting information about parts purchased from eBay. The parts were purchased from multiple sellers across the auction platform.
Most disturbing, the officers had printouts of everything purchased by the individuals from the website, leading to the question of how the State Police came into possesion the item list.
When the officers show up at New York residents’ doors, they show up in force with between nine and twelve officers. Only two to three officers will speak to the person while the others stand far back in the yard looking bored. The police will ask about the parts and ask to see any firearms that the resident owns. The New York Police are knocking on doors requesting to see the individual’s firearms.
AmmoLand News spoke to several of the residents that the State Police visited. None of the individuals allowed the police to inspect their firearms. The officers would state, “We know what you have.” When the residents still refused to hand over any information, the State Police let them know they could turn in anything violating New York law to the State Police. None of the residents we spoke to were threatened with legal action, and the interactions were between five and fifteen minutes.
Could eBay be handing over private transaction information to the police?
Since the task force had a complete list of the items purchased on eBay, eBay is the most likely source for the information. AmmoLand News reached out to both the New York State Police and eBay, but neither would confirm or deny what information was shared. All interactions AmmoLand News was able to track down are from the greater New York City area. We also have not identified any visits within the city’s five boroughs.
At the same time the New York State Police are going door to door, the New York Police Department (NYPD) released a handbook to identify “ghost guns.”
This guide was leaked to AmmoLand News but is now being widely circulated across the internet.
Ghost Guns: Past, Present, and Future NYPD Intelligence Division Major Case Field Intelligence Team
Ghost Guns: Past, Present, and Future NYPD Intelligence Division Major Case Field Intelligence Team
The guide comes from the NYPD Intelligence Division and aims to help officers identify PMFs. Although the intention is to help police identify PMFs, it reads like a “how-to guide” to firearms building. It lists all the parts needed, where to get them, and examples of homemade guns.
The guide lists a gun’s parts and gives an example of a lower receiver. According to the guide, “all lower receivers need to be serialized” because the federal government considers them firearms. Next to this statement is a picture of an 80% AR-15 receiver. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Final Rule on frame and receiver is very clear on this topic.
The ATF has never and still does not consider 80% AR-15 receivers to be firearms.
The document also incorrectly states that all lower receivers must be serialized under federal law. Once again, the document is incorrect. The ATF says a frame or receiver must only be serialized when transferred. According to federal law, it is legal to have an unserialized firearm unless it previously had a serial number. Many are concerned that these inconsistencies between the law and the guide could lead to false arrests. AmmoLand News contacted the individual contacts listed in the document to see if the misinformation would be corrected, but none responded.
The guidebook calls out several manufacturers, including Polymer80, Glock Store, Strike Industries, 80 Percent Arms, Lone Wolf, Geisler, and JSD Supply. The guide includes a handy list of the companies’ websites and their products.
In addition to those retailers, the guide also covers the Ghost Gunner. The Ghost Gunner is a tabletop CNC machine that allows users to mill a firearm. It also lists the sites that sell the device and shows a picture of the founder of Ghost Gunner and Defense Distributed, Cody Wilson. The document references Defcad, which is another Defense Distributed project.
AmmoLand News spoke to Cody Wilson, who found the New York Police Department handbook to identify “ghost guns” document hilarious. He believes it is an excellent advertisement for his company.
“New York has produced the best getting started guide on the market,” Wilson said. “We will be emailing it to all of our customers.”
The document also explains how to 3D print a gun. It breaks down the printers needed, including the Creality Ender 3, and lists the filament types. It also gives an overview of the most popular slicing software. A current bill in the New York Legislature would require background checks to purchase a 3D printer.
The document also lists the most popular sites for downloading “gun CAD” files. Even if someone were to download the files, they would be unable to turn that 3D-printed model into a working firearm without certain parts. Fortunately for the building community, the NYPD documentation lists the parts and links to sites selling everything a person could use to finish the homemade firearm.
Oh No! Crypto!
The documentation touches on Glock switches purchased off of Chinese sites. These are auto sears and turn a regular Glock into a machine gun. In addition to auto sears, the document also worries about importing solvent traps to make suppressors.
The handbook also states they will attempt to get postal data to track shipments. The NYPD will also try to get Micro Center and Amazon data to track 3D printers and supply purchases. The police attend gun shows in other states to follow the selling of firearms parts.
The document also states that many who print guns are involved in cryptocurrency. The NYPD points to several gun-part retailers that accept BitCoin as a payment option. Many non-gun sites accept cryptocurrency as payment.
It also lists items to look for when executing a search warrant. These include packages, pre-paid credit cards, invoices, gun parts, storage locker keys, 3D printers, flash drives, cell phones, and micro SD cards.
The NYPD will offer a one-hour class to officers to help them identify PMFs. The content of the class has yet to be released, but when made available by the department, AmmoLand News will publish it.
Neither the NYPD, NYSP, nor eBay responded to requests for comment for this story.
LEAKED: Ghost Guns: Past, Present, and Future NYPD Intelligence Division Major Case Field Intelligence
About John Crump
John is a NRA instructor and a constitutional activist; he has written about firearms and interviewed people of all walks of life. Mr. Crump lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.
John Crump
Some of the links on this page are affiliate links, meaning at no additional cost to you, Ammoland will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/supreme-court-ruling-means-nycs-restrictions-on-gun-licensing-are-unconstitutional-federal-judge-5518686?utm_source=News&src_src=News&utm_campaign=breaking-2023-10-28-2&src_cmp=breaking-2023-10-28-2&utm_medium=email&est=MvazoYB6S%2FZtl7JNn%2Fi%2FTfZpsffEjFryXYAiQ2KZnbyzbcg7CrN%2F3MZvQn5k5lv6Rnqx
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Second
HT CCP:
the only gun taken for the Lewis and Clark expedition.
would pump up to 800 lbs of pressure, and could load 22 balls.
was used by Austrian army.
very revolutionary for late 18th through early 19th century:
https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=Girandoni%20air%20rifle%20youtbue&mid=DB491C06B0B038F434C1DB491C06B0B038F434C1&ajaxhist=0
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https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/as-the-maine-shooting-showed-once-again-gun-free-zones-kill/
Apparently Mass Shooters do pay attention to these signs.
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https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/as-the-maine-shooting-showed-once-again-gun-free-zones-kill/
Apparently Mass Shooters do pay attention to these signs.
We firearms trainers refer to the signs as denoting “criminal empowerment zones.”
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Oh look, the ATF has an agent running guns to Mexico … and the DOJ et all appears uhinterested.
Hey, maybe we can nail another Democratic Attorney General for contempt of Congress for failing to investigate the matter and answer Congress’s questions.
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20231030/more-atf-linked-gunrunning-to-mexico
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Shared this with my BP friends.
-
Shared this with my BP friends.
British Petroleum?
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Border Patrol. They knew and worked alongside Brian Terry.
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Ah, shoulda guessed, Marc.
Meanwhile back at the thwarted ranch, can’t win in court? Well then let’s hit gun and ammo manufacturers in the pocketbook instead:
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-halts-exports-most-civilian-firearms-90-days-2023-10-27/
Dear fellow shooters: save your pennies as the cost of ammo in the US looks like it’ll be dropping soon….
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https://armsandthelaw.com/archives/2023/10/good_times_in_t.php
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/10/dissent-in-ninth-circuit-magazine-ban-case-exposes-severe-anti-constitutional-bias/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8HjaRc9NN
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second
https://www.ammoland.com/2023/10/no-justice-barrett-is-not-traitor-second-amendment/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8HjaRc9NN
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The Justices Are Bad Gun Historians
The Supreme Court’s recent rulings on gun rights play fast and loose with the country’s traditions of owning and regulating firearms
ILLUSTRATION BY DANIEL DOWNEY
By Jack Rakove
Nov. 2, 2023 1:00 pm ET
In the distressing wake of the recent mass shooting in Maine, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments next week in U.S. v. Zackey Rahimi, the latest case to test its emerging jurisprudence on gun rights. In these cases, the key text for the justices is, of course, the Constitution’s Second Amendment. Ratified in 1791, it reads in its entirety: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
As the court’s conservative majority has made clear, its current interpretation of the amendment depends decisively on its view of the nation’s long history of firearms ownership and regulation. If the most urgent question for ordinary citizens is how these rulings affect their ability to live securely in their homes, schools and public spaces, the narrower question for historians is how well the historical evidence cited by the court holds up. Where those concerns intersect is in the tragic fact that, on this issue of such importance to public safety, the justices are very poor and tendentious historians.
At issue in U.S. v. Zackey Rahimi is a federal statute prohibiting individuals subject to domestic-violence restraining orders from possessing firearms. Rahimi is no peaceful citizen. A convicted drug dealer, he has fired AR-15 rounds into a client’s home and in a fast-food restaurant and has physically threatened his ex-girlfriend, thus prompting a restraining order.
Rahimi initially pleaded guilty to holding arms in violation of the order, but he and his lawyers filed an appeal against his sentencing. The appeal drew on the two cases that have thus far set out the conservative justices’ reconstruction of the Second Amendment: D.C. v. Heller (2008), which held for the first time that the amendment protected a personal right of self-defense in one’s own home, and New York Rifle Association v. Bruen (2022), which extended that right to public places, leaving open the question of what places, if any, could be insulated from firearms.
Bruen is also noteworthy for another reason. In the aftermath of the Heller decision, courts around the country had developed a “two-step test” for resolving Second Amendment cases. They would first ask whether the activity in dispute fell outside the original historical understanding of the right to keep and bear arms. If no clear answer to this question emerged, courts would then ask whether some important public interest justified the proposed regulation. In pursuing that question, they would balance an individual’s right of self-defense against a communal interest in collective security in public places or sensitive locations.
The court’s ruling last year in Bruen created a new rubric. In the majority opinion, Justice Clarence Thomas rejected the two-step balancing framework and held instead that the government had to show that a given gun law was “consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation.” The modern regulation in dispute did not have to find a “twin” in the past, he wrote; lawyers and jurists could reason by analogy as they engaged in this historical inquiry.
Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in a Supreme Court ruling that gun laws should be ‘consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearms regulation.’ PHOTO: J. SCOTT APPLEWHITE/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Critics argue that Bruen failed to provide clear criteria for assessing this evidence or establishing standards of proof. As a recent article in The Wall Street Journal explained, these loosely drawn instructions have created chaos in lower courts. Any well-trained jurist or lawyer is capable of drawing either broad or narrow analogies, as the legal situation dictates. Nor did the Bruen majority help matters by eliminating as “outliers” historical examples that seemed to contradict its decision to extend the right of self-defense to public places.
The court’s reasoning was circular: Whether a regulation was consistent with the country’s “historical tradition of firearm regulation” seemed to depend not on the record established by historians but on whether it conformed to the court’s own recent rulings. Indeed, many of the supposed outliers rejected by the conservative majority show that state and local governments have long been comfortable limiting the public carrying of dangerous weapons.
In his dissenting opinion in Bruen, Justice Stephen Breyer complained that the majority had replaced the familiar balancing test with “a laundry list of reasons to discount seemingly relevant historical evidence.” Some of the historical examples that New York had offered in defense of its legislation were dismissed as being “too old” while others were “too recent.” Some “did not last long enough” while others “applied to too few people.” If there was some Goldilocks rule that could illuminate the court’s rationale, Breyer could not discover it.
Where does this leave historians? Any scholar who reviews the history of firearms regulation in Anglo-American law has to wrestle with the Statute of Northampton of 1328. Here Parliament imposed rather strong limitations on the ability of Englishmen to carry arms in public places. In his opinion in Bruen, Justice Thomas went to great lengths to dismiss the precedential authority of this statute. After all, firearms did not exist in the 14th century; knives were the weapon of choice. “We cannot put meaningful weight on this solitary statute,” Thomas concluded.
And yet soon after the Second Amendment was ratified, Massachusetts and Tennessee enacted laws that strongly echoed the language of the Statute of Northampton. The justices of the peace who were chiefly responsible for law enforcement in individual communities also followed those English norms. The most important of these was to restrict arms-carrying that worked to the “terror” of the general public. If one indeed wants to reason by analogy, as the court’s ruling in Bruen instructs, who would say that the public and open carrying of firearms has not become a “terror” to many Americans?
Or consider whether restrictions on military-style weapons like the AR-15 or large-capacity magazines are consistent with the country’s historical regulation of firearms. Opponents of these restrictions argue that antecedents of these powerful weapons existed in the founding era and were not regulated, which means that restrictions should not be imposed today.
But the analogy is fallacious. As historian Brian Delay of the University of California, Berkeley, has noted, 18th- and 19th-century efforts to produce large-capacity firearms rarely succeeded, and none of these ingenious experiments were ever produced in large numbers. Some of these weapons have survived in museums as curiosities—isolated examples of mechanical ingenuity—but not because they were commonly used. And that is precisely why governments saw no need to regulate them.
A deeper historical problem is that our modern assumptions about the protective value of firearms presuppose facts that the adopters of the Second Amendment would not have shared. As Randolph Roth, the leading historian of American homicide, has demonstrated, firearms were not the weapon of choice for anyone needing to protect himself or his family from some imminent danger. The primitive guns of the founding era were unreliable and hard to use. Only in the late 19th and early 20th century would revolvers and then semi-automatic weapons acquire their terrifying effectiveness.
Even more problematic historically is the proposition, sanctified in court’s ruling in Heller, that the purpose of the Second Amendment was to protect an individual right of self-defense with firearms. That view would have flabbergasted Americans of the founding era. True, a handful of references in the voluminous records documenting the ratification of the Constitution do conceive of gun ownership as a right belonging to private citizens.
But public debate at the time was completely focused on the future status of the state militias under a federal Constitution that empowered Congress to oversee their organization, armament and discipline. No one ever publicly proposed that the purpose of bearing arms was to protect a common-law right of self-defense, nor did anyone explain what constitutional purpose such a private right would protect.
It is a tragic irony that the minuscule evidence ostensibly supporting the Supreme Court’s recent decisions on gun regulation are the real outliers in the historical record. This is a tradition that the Supreme Court has largely invented, not one it has discovered, and it is sadly consistent with the evolution of the U.S. into a nation uniquely vulnerable to gun deaths of every kind, from suicides to mass shootings. Future generations of historians will have the depressing duty to study the social and legal origins of this dire reality.
Jack Rakove is the William Robertson Coe Professor of History and American Studies Emeritus at Stanford University. His many books include “Original Meanings: Politics and Ideas in the Making of the Constitution,” which won the Pulitzer Prize in history, and “Revolutionaries: A New History of the Invention of America
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https://www.thecannabiscommunity.org/cannabis-gun-rights/
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Texas Man With History of Wantonly Firing AR-15 Could Gut Gun Laws Nationwide
Supreme Court to consider whether Second Amendment trumps law prohibiting gun ownership by those under domestic-violence orders
By Jess Bravin
Nov. 6, 2023 9:01 am ET
WASHINGTON—Zackey Rahimi pulled a gun on his ex-girlfriend in a parking lot and shot at a witness who saw them arguing, prompting a Texas family court to issue a protective order in 2020 temporarily forbidding him from possessing firearms.
Rahimi ignored the order, authorities say, going on to threaten another woman with a gun, fire an AR-15 into the house of one of his narcotics customers, and shoot into the air at a Whataburger drive-through after his friend’s credit card was declined. That led to his conviction under a 1994 federal law prohibiting people under domestic-violence orders from possessing guns—and set up the latest chapter in the modern history of the Second Amendment.
Earlier this year, a federal appeals court in New Orleans struck down the 1994 federal law for violating the constitutional right to keep and bear arms. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court will consider the Biden administration’s appeal in U.S. v. Rahimi, which argues that the law—and similar measures in nearly every state—not only is constitutional, but has helped protect vulnerable women, children and bystanders from deadly violence.
“The presence of a gun in a household with a domestic abuser increases the risk of homicide fivefold,” according to research cited by the Justice Department’s brief. “Abusers also use guns to threaten, pistol-whip, and shoot their partners or their partners’ children, relatives, and pets,” the brief argues, enabling them “to perpetuate their pattern of abuse.”
Rahimi’s lawyer, federal public defender Matthew Wright, says the system lacks enough safeguards to ensure that only people who are genuine threats are disarmed. The Second Amendment takes policy choices like the 1994 law off the table, he argues. The constitutional approach to domestic abusers is to “prosecute and jail people who commit violence” rather than take away their guns before they are convicted of a crime, Wright asserts.
There is little dispute that felons can be stripped of their gun rights, but the 1994 law was aimed at people like Rahimi, who courts considered dangerous but hadn’t been convicted of crimes.
Absent such a conviction, Rahimi remained “among ‘the people’ entitled to the Second Amendment’s guarantees, all other things equal,” the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said in a March decision striking down the law disarming domestic abusers. The court said its ruling was compelled by a 2022 Supreme Court precedent placing new limits on government’s power to curb gun violence, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. The majority opinion, by Justice Clarence Thomas, declared that only laws analogous to weapons regulations common during America’s founding era can pass constitutional muster.
A 2022 Supreme Court ruling declared that only laws analogous to weapons regulations common during America’s founding era can pass constitutional muster. PHOTO: KEITH SRAKOCIC/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Bruen was the court’s widest expansion of Second Amendment rights since 2008, when for the first time the justices found the provision entitles an individual to armed self-defense within the home rather than simply maintaining the right of state governments to maintain militias akin to those they had organized before the Union.
Gun-rights advocates set up test cases like Bruen and District of Columbia v. Heller, which kicked off the 21st century revolution in Second Amendment law to demonstrate how regulations could frustrate law-abiding, responsible citizens interested in self-defense and recreational shooting. But public defenders also have been watching legal developments closely, and have quickly moved to apply the Supreme Court’s more permissive approach to firearms on behalf of suspected criminals who often run afoul of gun laws.
That is how Rahimi, whom the Fifth Circuit acknowledged was “hardly a model citizen,” became the unlikely face of the gun-rights movement. After the parking-lot argument, where Rahimi threatened to take away the child they shared, the ex-girlfriend sought a restraining order from the family court in Fort Worth. The court, finding that he had “committed family violence” and that it was “likely to occur again in the future,” issued an order that among other provisions suspended his handgun license and forbade him from possessing firearms for two years.
Rahimi, authorities say, quickly flouted the order. He was arrested for approaching the woman’s house in the middle of the night, threatened another woman with a gun, and was involved in at least five shooting incidents. Police investigating the shootings searched Rahimi’s house and found a .45 caliber Glock pistol, a .308 caliber semiautomatic rifle, magazines and ammunition, along with a copy of the protective order.
Charged in federal court with violating the 1994 law, Rahimi argued that he had a Second Amendment right to possess the weapons. The trial judge rejected the argument, and, on June 8, 2022, the Fifth Circuit, applying precedent then in force, affirmed that decision. Rahimi, who after his constitutional argument was rejected had pleaded guilty to violating the 1994 law, was sentenced to more than six years in prison.
But when the Supreme Court issued its Bruen decision 15 days later, Wright asked the Fifth Circuit to reconsider the case. The circuit court withdrew its previous ruling and threw out Rahimi’s conviction.
The appeal before the Supreme Court argues that the domestic-abuser law fits within the government’s traditional authority to keep weapons out of untrustworthy hands. PHOTO: SARAH SILBIGER/BLOOMBERG NEWS
The question “is not whether prohibiting the possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining order is a laudable policy goal,” wrote Judge Cory Wilson. Rather, it was whether the 1994 law violated the Second Amendment.
Under the Bruen rule, he wrote, it did, because no analogous laws disarming violent domestic partners were applied in 1791, when the Second Amendment was ratified, or in 1868, when the 14th Amendment, which prohibits states from violating federal rights, was adopted.
On appeal to the Supreme Court, the Justice Department argues that the domestic-abuser law fits within the government’s traditional authority to keep weapons out of untrustworthy hands.
“Different legislatures have disarmed different groups at different times: loyalists and rebels in the 18th century; underage individuals and persons of unsound mind in the 19th century; and felons, drug addicts, and domestic abusers in the 20th century,” the department’s brief argues. “But those disqualifications all reflect the same enduring principle: The Second Amendment allows Congress to disarm individuals who are not law-abiding, responsible citizens.”
Rahimi’s brief says the government’s argument generalizes the historical analysis Bruen requires into irrelevance.
SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS
To what extent should the founding era of the U.S. determine who can possess a gun in contemporary times? Join the conversation below.
The Second Amendment right is addressed to “the people,” it says, a term “originally understood to include every citizen who held civil and political rights, e.g., the rights to vote, hold public office, testify in court, and own property.”
It is true that at various times, enslaved and free Black people, Native Americans and—during the French and Indian War in the 1750s and ’60s, Catholics—have been prohibited from possessing weapons, the brief observes. But in such instances, the firearm prohibition was part of a broader scheme to exclude them from full membership in society, it argues.
“People outside the political community were sometimes treated as though they had no rights, including the right to possess firearms,” the brief says. But “no member of the body politic was punished for keeping arms.”
Even if he wins the case, it may be some time until Rahimi gets his hands on a gun. He currently is being held at the Tarrant County Jail on several charges, including aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
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second post
https://www.thecannabiscommunity.org/cannabis-gun-rights/
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https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=youtube%20video%20of%20curly%20spin%20gun&mid=78F7487A30CD6A8612D278F7487A30CD6A8612D2&ajaxhist=0
has ties to Wild Bill Hickock, Tom Hardin, Wyatt Earp, Clint Eastwood
Now that is the Wild West :-)
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second post
https://www.thecannabiscommunity.org/cannabis-gun-rights/
Don’t get me started. THC was a godsend during chemo. Contending now with chemo induced neuropathy I’ve let me Virginia medical THC card lapse lest I become a gun owning felon. They are from the government and here to help, don’tcha know?
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12762001/LA-father-gun-firearm-permit.html
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https://reason.com/volokh/2023/11/21/half-of-respondents-in-nbc-poll-of-voters-say-they-live-in-household-with-a-gun/
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/11/new-yorker-with-questionable-credentials-trying-to-stop-unlicensed-carry-in-florida/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8K4ys924h
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I had concealed permit in the 90s and early 2000s
Had to take a few classes.
Permit vs License does NOT seem importantly different
The main difference between permit and license is that 12345:
Permits are official or legal documents that are issued to administer safety issues.
Licenses represent permission to do or use something, and they are given more generally than permits.
A permit is a temporary authorization that allows someone to perform a specific activity, such as building construction or driving.
A license is a permanent authorization that grants someone the right to engage in a certain profession or activity, such as practising medicine or owning a firearm
requirements under new law to carry via license:
To obtain a concealed weapon or firearm permit in Florida, you must meet the following requirements 1:
You must be at least 21 years old, unless you are a current or former member of the armed services.
You must show competency with a firearm and complete an approved Florida concealed carry class.
You must reside in the US and be a US citizen or permanent resident alien.
You must pay a fee of $97 and submit a completed fingerprint card.
Please note that there are several disqualifying conditions that may prevent you from obtaining a concealed weapon or firearm permit in Florida. These include, but are not limited to, a felony conviction, a record of drug or alcohol abuse, and being
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkYjnY9nbyw&t=79s
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https://www.ammoland.com/2023/12/atf-drops-revocation-of-a-florida-gun-stores-ffl-after-lawsuit/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8LJ2EZSHQ
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12856731/america-guns-pipeline-mexico-cartels.html?ico=related-replace
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https://news.sportsmans.com/article/can-i-legally-wear-a-mask-while-carrying-a-firearm
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A well-argued piece w/ a ton of supporting links:
https://reason.com/volokh/2023/12/20/how-magazine-bans-thwart-self-defense/
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https://reason.com/volokh/2023/12/20/how-magazine-bans-thwart-self-defense/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK5zXEu_Qt4
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… while tracking associated semantic gymnastics & absurdities:
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/01/25/second-amendment-roundup-agency-guidance-interpretive-regulations-and-chevron/
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Yes, good to see sleeves getting rolled up to fight this type of bureaucratic tactic. Overturning Chevron is vital to the functioning of our C'l Republic. Congress may not abdicate its legislative function to the Administrative State of the Executive Branch!
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https://rumble.com/v48tmxz-lott-new-analysis-shows-stats-on-mass-shootings-inaccurate.html?mref=6zof&mc=dgip3&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=One+America+News+Network&ep=2
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https://rumble.com/v48tmxz-lott-new-analysis-shows-stats-on-mass-shootings-inaccurate.html?mref=6zof&mc=dgip3&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=One+America+News+Network&ep=2
Something most don’t know is that EVERYONE on the anti second amendment side of the debate won’t debate or engage Lott, putatively because his data and conclusions are false, but in reality because he makes hash of them. Indeed, if his conclusions were so clearly false one would want to debate him and make hash of HIS arguments. They don’t. And can’t.
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https://www.amazon.com/Fast-Furious-Bloodiest-Shameless-Cover-Up/dp/1596983213/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=M5AJXXE3Z8MAM7ESKHW2
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The constitutional contortions embraced by the anti-gun side not only speak for themselves, but demonstrate the willing embrace of tin ears. Citing 18th and 19th century statutes discriminating against blacks and Native Americans to demonstrate early American embrace of “gun control” laws ought to cause the heads of anyone believing in our Constitution to explode but no, it’s all they got so it’s what they use. Damn the irony: full speed ahead.
“What are the 50 historical laws dating from 1789 to 1868 that the Attorney General has compiled as potential historical analogues? One would expect to find laws or ordinances that required a gunsmith to check with the local sheriff before selling a firearm. Or one might expect to find laws that restricted gunsmiths from selling to any customer who was a stranger in his community. Or perhaps there would be historical laws uncovered requiring a customer’s proof of citizenship before a merchant was allowed to sell him gunpowder. These could be apt analogues to demonstrate a related historical tradition of constitutional regulation.
Nothing like this appears in the State’s compilation of laws. The State’s compilation lists 48 laws which made it a crime to possess a gun and ammunition by Negros, Mulattos, slaves, or persons of color, and two laws that prohibited sales to Indians. For example, the Attorney General lists a 1798 Kentucky law which prohibited any “Negro, mulatto, or Indian” from possessing any gun or ammunition. An 1846 North Carolina law offers another example wherein it was prohibited to sell or deliver firearms to “any slave.” This is the third time the Attorney General has cited these laws in support for its laws and restrictions implicating the Second Amendment. These fifty laws identified by the Attorney General constitute a long, embarrassing, disgusting, insidious, reprehensible list of examples of government tyranny towards our own people.”
and,
“In the end, the State has failed to carry its burden to demonstrate that the ammunition background check laws “are consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” as required by Bruen. Bruen cautions, “courts should not ‘uphold every modern law that remotely resembles a historical analogue,’ because doing so ‘risks endorsing outliers that our ancestors would never have accepted.’” 597 U.S. at 30. A sweeping background check requirement imposed every time a citizen needs to buy ammunition is an outlier that our ancestors would have never accepted for a citizen. Therefore, California’s ammunition background check system laws are unconstitutional and shall not be enforced.” – U.S. District Judge Roger T. Benitez, from his 32-page ruling in Rhode v. Bonta, January 30, 2024
https://survivalblog.com/2024/02/05/editors-quote-day-2370/
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Very interesting post on background of gun regulation.
BEFORE I understand the meaning today of the 2nd amendment, I saw it as a test of process. IF the gun control people had a valid point, 'it was written for a different time', they needed to take it through the process of amending the amendment, and they didn't (and they won't). Otherwise they were (are still are) just stomping on the constitution, and weakening the significance of all of it.
"...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" is kind of clear.
Even Republicans were selling it as a feature for "sportsmen", apparently meaning hunters. We had bumper stickers that said 'Sportsmen for Bush', I guess meaning we wanted hunters to jump over to the Republican side (right when we needed suburban women's votes who could care less about hunting. The northern Minnesota 'Sportsmen' did eventually jump Republican, for other reasons, Democrats were trying to take their jobs and economy away.
Meanwhile now I get the real meaning of it and it is more needed now than ever. The sum total of the firearms in the hands of the citizens should be greater than those held by the government, just in case...
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Very interesting post on background of gun regulation.
BEFORE I understand the meaning today of the 2nd amendment, I saw it as a test of process. IF the gun control people had a valid point, 'it was written for a different time', they needed to take it through the process of amending the amendment, and they didn't (and they won't). Otherwise they were (are still are) just stomping on the constitution, and weakening the significance of all of it.
"...the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" is kind of clear.
Even Republicans were selling it as a feature for "sportsmen", apparently meaning hunters. We had bumper stickers that said 'Sportsmen for Bush', I guess meaning we wanted hunters to jump over to the Republican side (right when we needed suburban women's votes who could care less about hunting. The northern Minnesota 'Sportsmen' did eventually jump Republican, for other reasons, Democrats were trying to take their jobs and economy away.
Meanwhile now I get the real meaning of it and it is more needed now than ever. The sum total of the firearms in the hands of the citizens should be greater than those held by the government, just in case...
Well said Doug! You can tell a lot about the quality of an argument by its accuracy, the smoke and mirrors embraced, the falsehoods it purveys. One bit of misdirection, as you note, that constantly annoys involves attempts to associate the 2nd amendment with hunting. “No hunter needs X number of rounds in his gun to kill a deer,” they proclaim, as Doonesberry shows hunters in duck blinds blasting away with ARs (uh, Gary, no one hunts ducks with “modern sporting arms”).
Their omissions speak volumes too, such as their relentless examination of the societal costs of guns (turn on a news program that doesn’t recite the “gun violence” mantra. I’ll wait) but utter omission of benefits such as how much better armed victims fare than unarmed ones. Hell, “armed victim” is a contradiction in terms better described as “victors.” And note how rarely “gun control” advocates debate those well versed in 2nd amendment issues, mostly because it’s easy to make hash of their arguments. Instead they rely on the MSM to carry their water and slosh it around inside of the media echo chamber.
If you have an actual effective argument none of this is needed. And if they were willing to press their goal by means other than deceit they’d start the constitutional amendment lift.
If you ever seek a quick read placing the 2nd amendment in historical context, one written by a constitutional scholar, i can’t recommend this highly enough:
https://www.amazon.com/That-Every-Man-Armed-Constitutional/dp/0826307647/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1EMTEB724RI2R&keywords=that+every+man+be+armed&qid=1707235929&sprefix=That+every%2Caps%2C107&sr=8-3
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https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1755451947979882886
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/bill-maher-gets-basic-gun-fact-wrong-after-kansas-city-shooting/ar-BB1iCpdE?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=9757712b3131410d911999673d41f502&ei=17
Clarification : all "licensed" dealers in the US require background checks.
Not clear what it means to buy gun from someone not licensed in MO and why that might be ok.
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https://www.ammoland.com/2024/02/potential-charges-over-childs-toy-gun-in-school-zoom-class/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8STPY5Fhd
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Perhaps this should go under constitutional law, but given the concealed carry implications I’ll drop it here:
Second Amendment Roundup: D.C.'s Magazine Ban Argued Again in D.C. Circuit
The Volokh Conspiracy / by Stephen Halbrook / Feb 20, 2024 at 11:16 PM
[It was déjà vu, but this time post-Bruen.]
The District of Columbia's ban on firearm magazines that hold over ten rounds was the subject of oral argument in the D.C. Circuit on February 13. The case is Hanson v. District of Columbia, and the appeal concerns the district court's denial of a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the ban. The circuit panel included Judges Patricia Millett ('13) and Justin Walker ('20), and Senior Judge Douglas Ginsburg ('86).
The argument should have turned on one, and only one, question: are the banned magazines commonly possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes? As Professor Mark W. Smith has explained, under District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) and N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen (2022), that is the only relevant question in an arms ban case. See Smith, "What Part of 'In Common Use' Don't You Understand?" Harvard JLPP (2023). That is because the common use test is the product of the text first and then history approach the Supreme Court has applied in this context. In Heller, the Court examined the Second Amendment's language to determine that as a matter of plain text "arms" includes (but is not limited to) all firearms. It then examined history to determine that only dangerous and unusual firearms can be banned. It follows that citizens have a fundamental right to possess firearms that are in common use today, because if they are in common use, they cannot be "dangerous and unusual."
The answer to the common use question in this case is a resounding and unequivocal yes — there are hundreds of millions such magazines lawfully owned for lawful purposes by Americans today. By any measure, that's common possession. To be sure, magazines are not themselves firearms, but they are key components of all modern semiautomatic firearms, as they are the part of the firearm that holds and feeds the ammunition. And the practical effect of the magazine ban is to prohibit an entire category of firearms; i.e., firearms that are capable of firing more than 11 rounds (one in the chamber, 10 in the magazine) without reloading.
Instead, the oral argument was a bit of déjà vu all over again. In Heller, the Supreme Court held that firearms "in common use" for "lawful purposes like self-defense" may not be banned. After Heller, I was part of a team challenging D.C.'s ban on such magazines (as well as on semiautomatic rifles) in a case that came to be known as Heller II. In the D.C. Circuit, oral argument was conducted before Judge Douglas Ginsburg (yes, the same Judge Ginsburg) together with then-Judge Brett Kavanaugh and Judge Karen Henderson.
In a 2-1 opinion in Heller II (2011), Judge Ginsburg conceded that the subject magazines are in common use, but upheld the ban based on an interest-balancing, intermediate scrutiny analysis, despite Heller's express rejection of interest-balancing. That was the first opinion to uphold a magazine ban following Heller. As I've shown elsewhere, most other appellate courts deciding such cases copied Heller II's approach, despite that approach being contrary to Heller. Indeed, then-Judge Kavanaugh dissented in Heller II to explain that the intermediate-scrutiny approach adopted by the court could not be squared with Heller.
Justice Kavanaugh's Heller II dissent was vindicated by the Supreme Court in Bruen, which made clear that Heller had rejected any levels of scrutiny analyses in Second Amendment cases. Bruen reiterated that the Second Amendment protects arms that are "in common use," as opposed to those that "are highly unusual in society at large." In doing so, the Court cited favorably to Justice Kavanaugh's Heller II dissent several times.
That's the context in which oral argument in Hanson was held. With intermediate scrutiny eliminated, the outcome of the case should be straightforward—the banned magazines are in common use for lawful purposes, and therefore they cannot be banned. While Judges Millett and Ginsburg asked several questions that appeared to challenge this result, it is inescapable under a proper application of Heller.
Plaintiffs' lawyer Edward Wenger was first up. Right away, Judge Millett jumped in with the observation that Bruen did away with intermediate scrutiny, but common use remained an issue. Was the court's observation in Heller II that magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds are in common use binding on the court now? The answer is yes—Bruen did nothing to undermine a holding that the banned magazines are in common use. Regardless, those magazines have only gotten even more numerous since Heller II was decided over a decade ago, so whether that aspect of the decision is binding is of little import.
Judge Ginsburg pointed out that while the court in Heller II stated that the banned magazines are in common use, it reserved decision on whether those magazines are commonly used for lawful purposes. While that technically is true, it ultimately does not matter. The government cannot prove that the tens of millions of Americans who own these magazines are criminals who possess them for unlawful purposes. The leading survey we have on use of magazines capable of holding more than ten rounds is the 2021 National Firearms Survey by Professor William English of Georgetown University. That survey found that approximately 39 million Americans have owned as many as 551 million magazines capable of holding over 10 rounds of ammunition. And they own them for a variety of lawful purposes, including recreational target shooting (64.3%), home defense (62.4%), hunting (47.0%), defense outside the home (41.7%), and competitive shooting sports (27.2%).
Judge Millett asked if "there's some level of magazine that could be prohibited as not in common use or not in common use for self-defense." (Again, "for self-defense" is not included in the test under Heller.) While theoretically that could be true, any such level would be well north of D.C.'s limit of 10 rounds. Again, tens of millions of Americans have owned hundreds of millions of these magazines.
Responding to the correct assertion that D.C. bears the burden under Bruen to show that the banned magazines are not in common use, Judge Millett commented that it is the plaintiffs who wish to change the status quo and that doing so would inflict irreparable harm on the District. It is true that the plaintiffs are challenging the status quo, but under Bruen the District has the burden to show that its law is consistent with the Second Amendment. And since it is not, there is no harm to the District from being precluded from enforcing an unconstitutional law. Instead, the irreparable harm in the case is being inflicted on the plaintiffs and the other residents of the District of Columbia who are being deprived on their fundamental right to keep and bear arms.
In any event, there is no plausible scenario in which the tens of millions of Americans who have owned magazines that are banned by D.C. are predominantly criminals. Indeed, given that there are hundreds of millions of these magazines, it is clear that only the tiniest percentage of them will ever be used in crime. As Judge Walker commented, this line of questioning seems to promote "a dim view of the American public." It simply cannot be the case that the tens of millions of Americans who choose these magazines are not using them for lawful purposes.
Next up was Ashwin Phatak, counsel for the District. Phatak argued that because there are 700,000 registered machine guns in the United States, the common use inquiry "can't just be a numerosity analysis." But Phatak's numbers are too high, because according to ATF data there are only about 176,000 registered machine guns owned by civilians in the country. See Hollis v. Lynch (5th Cir. 2016). The remaining machine guns are owned by state and local law enforcement or by licensed firearm manufacturers. Regardless, whether the true number is 176,000 or 700,000, that is a far cry from the "500 million high-capacity magazines" cited by Judge Walker as a comparison.
Phatak looked for historical precedent in three states that during the Depression era restricted semiautomatic rifles with certain magazine capacities. Of course, as Judge Walker pointed out, per Bruen, "three is not enough." And even if it were 30 it wouldn't matter: the question under Heller is whether the banned magazines are in common use today, not 100 years ago.
Phatak hypothesized that "if the National Firearms Act had been passed in 1954," and "far more machine guns had circulated," the plaintiffs would be arguing Second Amendment protection through common use. But as Judge Walker explained, "If it's dangerous, unusual, we would expect our legislators to step in and ban them before they become dangerous and usual." And the flip side of that is that if the American people determine that an arm is valuable for lawful purposes, we would not expect bans to persist across the country over a substantial period of time.
Judge Millett attempted to come to the rescue: "Manufacturers put out higher magazines, I need a higher magazine. It's like, new iPhone comes out, I got to have a new iPhone, new magazine comes out, I got to have a new magazine." Same for machine guns and grenade launchers. Phatak's response: "I totally agree, Judge Millett."
But consumers don't buy types of weapons just because they are legal and available on the market. Machine guns were a commercial failure before being restricted in the NFA in 1934. Grenade launchers weren't restricted until the 1968 amendments to the NFA, under which they are still lawful on registration with ATF and payment of the $200 tax. How many consumers have them? And the reality that neither marketers nor advertising budgets can dictate to consumers is not limited to the marketplace for firearms. Our history is littered with failed consumer products, from the Ford Edsel to New Coke to Google Glass to countless Hollywood big budget busts.
Phatak rejected a standard of "what people feel they need," arguing that Heller looked at "the actual characteristics of handguns that make them useful for self-defense," such as "they can be held with one hand while you call the police." But the portion of Heller Phatak referenced here actually is devastating to his position. That is because immediately after discussing reasons why citizens may prefer handguns, Heller concluded that, "whatever the reason, handguns are the most popular weapon chosen by Americans for self-defense in the home, and a complete prohibition on their use is invalid." The focus of the Heller analysis is on what law-abiding Americans choose; judges and legislators are not authorized to second-guess those choices.
More softball questions from Judge Millett: "When did manufacturers start selling magazines over 10 with the semi-automatic handguns?" Phatak: Not "until at least the 1980s." Wrong – e.g., the Browning Hi-Power with its 13-round magazine was introduced commercially in 1935. And in any event, it does not matter – they are in common use for lawful purposes today.
Phatak referenced statistics showing that the average number of shots fired in self-defense is two, and argued that "nobody needs the firepower where they can fire 11 rounds." But again, what is appropriate for self-defense is for the American people to decide, and they have decided that more ammunition capacity is better. And in any event, the most frequent number of shots fired in defensive gun uses actually is zero, since typically only brandishing a gun is required to deter a criminal attack. Does that mean the government could limit citizens to guns that fire blanks? Of course not.
The bottom line is that once it is evident that an item is a bearable arm, the government has the burden to show that it is not in common use. If it cannot do so, the arm may not be banned. That's the Heller-Bruen rule for arms-ban cases.
Judge Ginsburg is a capable and experienced jurist. It was brought out clearly in Hanson that the common use test provided by Heller is straightforward and easy to apply. One hopes and expects that he will faithfully apply that test. But if we get another 2-1 déjà vu on D.C.'s magazine ban in Hanson, the Supreme Court ultimately will have to reverse Judge Ginsburg yet again.
The post Second Amendment Roundup: D.C.'s Magazine Ban Argued Again in D.C. Circuit appeared first on Reason.com.
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/02/20/second-amendment-roundup-d-c-s-magazine-ban-argued-again-in-d-c-circuit/
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https://www.nssf.org/articles/congressman-asks-i-buy-ammo-am-i-on-a-list-somehow/
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https://www.nssf.org/articles/congressman-asks-i-buy-ammo-am-i-on-a-list-somehow/
:x :x :x
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https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/ghost-gun-maker-agrees-cease-sales-maryland-residents-part-lawsuit-settlement
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Bump stocks are stupid. If I ever have to stand downrange from someone annoyed with and shooting at me, I hope they have a bump stock hung on their gun as they will be less accurate and hence less likely to shoot me. With that said, the BATFE, anti-second amendment zealots, and sundry other bedwetters and handwringers don’t get to make the law. That is congress’s job and not that of those who believe they don’t need to be bothered by any stinking separation of powers whenever they seek to abridge the second tenth of the Bill of Rights:
Preview of Supreme Court bump stock case
Supreme Court to decide bump stock legality
•The Volokh Conspiracy / by David Kopel / Feb 27, 2024 at 8:25 PM
[In Cargill v. Garland, the Court should apply the National Firearms Act text that Congress did enact, and not the text that gun control advocates wish had been enacted. ]
Tomorrow, February 28, the Supreme Court will hear oral argument in Garland v. Cargill; the case challenges the administrative prohibition on bump stocks imposed by the Trump and Biden administrations, via interpretation by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE). The Supreme Court docket is here.
I co-authored an amicus brief in the case. The brief is on behalf on 9 U.S. Senators, led by Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), 10 law/history professors, and the Independence Institute (the Denver think tank where I work).
Garland v. Cargill v. is not a Second Amendment challenge. The case is about administrative law: is BATFE's new interpretation of the relevant federal statute (the National Firearms Act of 1934) correct?
Despite the procedural posture, some gun prohibition advocates have been sending frantic emails to prospective donors, warning that if Cargill prevails, all of the bump stock laws enacted by state and local governments will be overturned. This is false. Presuming that the state and local laws were enacted according to proper procedures by state legislatures or city councils, a decision in favor of Mr. Cargill would have no effect on these laws.
The right to arms appears in the case only by implication, as explained in an excellent brief by the Second Amendment Law Center and other civil rights organizations: if BATFE in Cargill can get away with an egregious misinterpretation of the National Firearms Act, then BATFE's next step could be to declare that all semiautomatic firearms are "machineguns."
There are two main issues in Cargill v. Garland: first, principles of statutory interpretation. Second, interpretation of the statute at issue. The Senators' amicus brief addresses both.
Regarding principles of interpretation, the Senators are, unsurprisingly, much in favor of Article I of the Constitution, especially regarding federal criminal laws. Because criminal laws are so consequential, they should be clearly authorized by Congress, and should be clearly written so that citizens can obey them.
In two other cases this term, the Supreme Court is currently considering what do with the Chevron doctrine. (Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo; Relentless, Inc. v. Department of Commerce.) As applied by lower courts, this doctrine holds that any reasonable interpretation by an executive branch of an ambiguous statute is lawful. The Senators argue that even if the Court decides to retain Chevron for certain matters, such as business regulation, Chevron should not be applied to criminal law. Citizens should not be made criminally liable for changing whims of regulatory agencies; here, for example, BATFE ruled 10 times that bump stock devices like those at issue in Cargill are not machine guns. Then, on orders from the President, BATFE adopted a completely contrary, novel interpretation.
Before the Supreme Court, the Solicitor General is not relying on Chevron deference. However, BATFE invoked Chevron deference when announcing its anti-precedential new interpretation, and several lower courts in other circuits upheld the new interpretation on the basis of Chevron.
A second interpretive rule is the Rule of Lenity: in criminal law, an ambiguous statute should be construed against the government. As the Senators argue, Congress has a duty to write clear laws, and enforcement of the Rule of Lenity provides an incentive to do so.
According to the Senators' amicus brief, once all the normal rules of statutory interpretation have been applied, if the statute is still ambiguous, then the Rule of Lenity controls.
However, some (not all) Supreme Court precedent suggests that the Rule of Lenity applies only if there is "grievous" ambiguity. The amicus brief argues that the traditional standard (any reasonable doubt as to statutory meaning) is better rooted in the Anglo-American legal tradition, starting with the universally-accepted principle of the Founding that criminal statutes must be strictly construed.
The Supreme Court followed this approach in a 1992 case involving the very same section of the U.S. Code at issue in Cargill, 26 U.S.C. sect. 5845. See United States v. Thompson/Center Arms Co., 504 U.S. 505 (1992). There, the plurality (Justice Souter) and the concurrence (Justice Scalia) both applied the standard rules of statutory interpretation, found that the statutory subsection was still ambiguous, and then immediately applied the Rule of Lenity, without considering whether the ambiguity was "grievous."
As for the statutory language at issue in Cargill, the National Firearms Act defines a "machinegun" as a that firearm fires "automatically more than one shot … by a single function of the trigger." 26 U.S.C. § 5845(b). Later, the Firearms Owners' Protection Act of 1986 outlawed the acquisition of new machine guns (manufactured after May 19, 1986) by persons other than government employees, and also treated machine gun conversion kits the same as machine guns.
A bump stock does not fit within the statutory definition. A bump stock device makes a firearm operate much more rapidly; like a machine gun, an ordinary gun with a bump stock can fire about four times as fast as an ordinary semiautomatic. However, a gun with a bump stock still fires only one shot per "function" of the trigger.
The Solicitor General and her amici argue at length that "single function of the trigger" should be interpreted to mean "single pull of the trigger." But, obviously, this is not what the statute says. If Congress had enacted a statute that instead said "single pull," then the statute would have exempted the WWI-era Maxim and Vickers machine guns, whose trigger is pushed rather than pulled.
As a fallback, the Solicitor General and amici claim that Congress meant for the National Firearms Act to apply to all rapid-fire guns. But this plainly is not true. The Gatling gun, first patented in 1861, could fire 300 rounds per minute, and by the 1880s could fire 1,200 per minute. It is undisputed that the National Firearms Act does not apply to traditional Gatling guns, which are operated by a hand crank. (Electric-powered Gatling guns are another matter.) The BATFE has twice so ruled.
Notably, neither the Solicitor General nor her amici address the contradiction between their claims of what they want the NFA mean versus the undisputed fact that rapid-fire Gatling guns are not covered by the NFA. If Congress in 1934 had meant to restrict firearms that have more than a particular rate of fire, Congress could have enacted a statute that did so. Given the words of the statute that Congress actually did enact, Cargill v. Garland ought to be an easy case.
The post Preview of Supreme Court bump stock case appeared first on Reason.com.
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/02/27/preview-of-supreme-court-bump-stock-case/
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Agreed that bump stocks are wildly inaccurate.
OTOH when it comes into shooting into a large group of people they get a lot of bullets flying in the general direction. Witness Las Vegas. To most people in effect this looks like a machine gun.
In our conversation with the American people, we need to engage with this.
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Agreed that bump stocks are wildly inaccurate.
OTOH when it comes into shooting into a large group of people they get a lot of bullets flying in the general direction. Witness Las Vegas. To most people in effect this looks like a machine gun.
In our conversation with the American people, we need to engage with this.
I’m sorry Marc, but much of what we know about that incident doesn’t pass the stink test if you understand guns and indeed bump stocks. “Nine rounds per second,” for instance, is a claim regarding the rate of fire via those bump stocks in Las Vegas. Horseshit, impossible.
I generally HATE conspiracy theories for reason I can expound upon if need be. Alas, in view of all the ill-framed reporting et al regarding Trump, Biden, etc. I can’t help but suspect there is more to the story when a politically convenient incident occurs, particularly one where so many gaps in the record exists such as the Las Vegas shootings. I am certainly will to engage with whomever there, and my initial point will be “if the gun control people have sought in the wake of this incident indeed so critical to the safety of this nation why do those who favor it embrace so many lies and half truths?”
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I don't disagree.
That said, not directly responsive to my intended point.
Before going further, first a question:
"OTOH when it comes into shooting into a large group of people, they get a lot of bullets flying in the general direction."
True or False?
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I don't disagree.
That said, not directly responsive to my intended point.
Before going further, first a question:
"OTOH when it comes into shooting into a large group of people, they get a lot of bullets flying in the general direction."
True or False?
True. And the largest mass murder in NYC was caused by a guy dumping a couple of quarts of gas on the only egress of an after hours night club.
Fuel can be used to ignite structures in a manner that can kill a lot of people. True or False (sic)?
It’s what follows the trail of bread crumbs the interlocutor has laid: therefor we should ban the sale of gasoline [or the containers they are sold in, or wooden stairways, or illegal after hour clubs {which are already illegal}, or whatever the fornication someone is seeking to impinge upon in a major way by disingenuous methods]. Just because a statement is true doesn’t mean I have to buy in to whatever conclusion someone is trying to lead me by the nose to, and I’ve been involved in second amendment debates long enough to know what’s coming and hence can’t see a reason to NOT cut to the chase.
Can you?
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My point is this: Ordinary people of good intent see the bump stock as creating a machine gun/genuine assault rifle-- something from which we have vociferously distinguished our AR-15s. So now they experience us as speaking with cognitive dissonance if/when we defend bump stocks.
And now, to muddy the waters further, here is this:
https://washingtonstand.com/news/china-funnels-machine-gun-parts-into-us-while-expanding-space-weapon-arsenal
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My point is this: Ordinary people of good intent see the bump stock as creating a machine gun/genuine assault rifle-- something from which we have vociferously distinguished our AR-15s. So now they experience us as speaking with cognitive dissonance if/when we defend bump stocks.
Which is exactly what those who seek to abrogate the second tenth of the Bill of Rights by extraconstitutional means intend. You seem to expect me to participate in that process by respecting it to some degree, rather than by saying—as I did—that bump stocks are silly, do anything but enhance accuracy, but should not be banned via disingenuous methods and smoke and mirrors.
Again, I am not aware of ANY anti-gun argument that does not rely on half-truths and outright falsehoods, yet for some reason I’m supposed to treat these consistent means the antis embrace as something deserving of anything but contempt? No thanks. I’ll take someone to the range instead—and I’m probably into low four digits where shooting students are concerned—and teach them how silly the antis are instead.
Indeed, I think a recent poll I saw confirms that’s the way to treat this as mid-30 percent of Dems now have a gun in the house and IIRC it was around 40 percent for blacks. We are winning the argument. Why the fuck would I want to debate this stuff on my enemy’s terms?
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A good examination of the involved statute:
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/02/29/second-amendment-roundup-cargill-bump-stock-argument-in-supreme-court/
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CA sites racists laws banning blacks, Indians, etc. from gun ownership (among other folly) while arguing for this ammo purchasers licensing scheme:
How This California Ammunition Law Fell Over Itself
by CLAYTON CRAMER posted on February 4, 2024
NEWS
Support NRA America's 1st Freedom
For the second time, a federal judge has struck down a California law requiring background checks for purchasing ammunition. U.S. District Judge Roger Benitez of San Diego said the law, which took effect in 2019, “treats all citizens as if they do not enjoy a right to buy ammunition. It forces Americans to entreat and supplicate the state for permission.”
California voters, in 2016, approved Proposition 63, which required Californians to acquire a purchase permit and present it in order to buy ammunition. It was supposed to cost $50 and was good for four years. But the California legislature amended Proposition 63 before it could be implemented with a more complicated system, requiring a background check for every ammunition purchase. To pay for the background checks, a fee also had to be paid each time someone bought ammo.
The law also prohibited purchasing ammunition by mail or bringing ammunition in from other states. You could avoid this when buying ammunition at a commercial range, but the ammo could not leave the range.
In this case, the plaintiff who sued was Kim Rhode, the Olympic trap and skeet shooter who won medals in six consecutive Olympics. Rhode is a Californian. To compete, she has to practice; a lot. If she competes outside California and buys ammo there, she cannot bring any of it home, nor can she mail order it by the ton, as she needs to do. (It takes a lot of practice to win gold.) The case is Rhode v. Bonta (S.D.Cal. 2024).
The background-check law was a mess. In 2019, during the system’s first seven months, over 100,000 law-abiding citizens were rejected—about 16% of the purchase attempts. These were almost entirely recordkeeping errors or mismatches on names (“Bobby,” not “Robert”; a misspelled middle name; or a person having a similar name as someone who is prohibited from owning firearms).
By 2023, California had made some improvements to its system, as only 11% of the law-abiding were rejected. Theoretically, these erroneous rejections can be fixed, but more than a third who first tried to buy ammunition had not done so six months later. It is unknown what percentage of these people were law-abiding citizens who just gave up.
Okay, the system rejected a lot of apparently lawful buyers, but what about the bad guys it rejected? In the first seven months, 770 people were rejected as “prohibited persons.” Sixteen, at least, were not really prohibited persons. Those remaining 754 led to 51 investigations, 15 arrests and six criminal convictions. These must be the prohibited who thought the background check was not smart enough to catch them or had forgotten they had a felony conviction. So, all this cost and trouble was to take away ammunition from a tiny number of possible criminals who didn’t think the teeth of the justice system would sift them out and chew them up.
In Rhode v. Bonta, Judge Benitez writes that the obvious flaw in the ammunition-background-check law was that it disregarded the Second Amendment. The right to keep and bear arms is meaningless without the right to buy ammunition. Think of the freedom of the press if you needed government permission to buy ink and paper.
Judge Benitez compared this law to a Texas state law requiring identification documents to vote. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that Texas denying 4.5% of the population the right to vote violated the Fifteenth Amendment and that law was therefore unconstitutional. A California law that then denies 11% of its population from lawfully purchasing ammunition violates the Second Amendment.
The U.S. Supreme Court’s Bruen (2022) decision requires states that wish to defend a gun law must show that there was some similar law in the Founding Era. If a similar law existed between 1791 and 1868 (from when U.S. Bill of Rights was ratified to when the Fourteenth Amendment was passed), then it just might be constitutional.
California’s historical examples were bad. The state produced a list of 148 laws. Some dated from the 1400s, which Bruen specifically rejected as too far removed from the Founding Era. At least 40 laws were passed after 1868 and some were from the 20th century—way too late. None of the laws from the relevant date range required a background check to buy ammunition. Therefore, those 148 laws California presented were not relevant to the constitutionality of this law.
For this case, I produced a rebuttal to their “expert” witnesses. Many of the witnesses for the state were embarrassingly bad; their experts actually cited laws that prohibited white traders from buying guns (not ammunition) from Native Americans.
The best part of Benitez’s decision was:
The State’s compilation lists 48 laws which made it a crime to possess a gun and ammunition by Negros, Mulattos, slaves, or persons of color, and two laws that prohibited sales to Indians. For example, the Attorney General lists a 1798 Kentucky law which prohibited any “Negro, mulatto, or Indian” from possessing any gun or ammunition. An 1846 North Carolina law offers another example wherein it was prohibited to sell or deliver firearms to “any slave.” This is the third time the Attorney General has cited these laws in support for its laws and restrictions implicating the Second Amendment. These fifty laws identified by the Attorney General constitute a long, embarrassing, disgusting, insidious, reprehensible list of examples of government tyranny towards our own people.
California and its experts have been defending California gun laws for several years by citing racist laws as evidence that gun control is part of the American history and tradition. This is so inconceivably hypocritical that I would sound like an extremist by just quoting them.
Judge Benitez also pointed out that the U.S. Constitution grants Congress the authority to pass laws regulating interstate commerce. For the first few decades, the courts recognized this as a limit on the authority of states to regulate interstate commerce; the federal government was the only level of government that could prohibit a company in Oregon from selling goods in California. This is called the Dormant Commerce Clause. Judge Benitez pulled this out to hold that banning shipments of ammo to California is unlawful.
Finally, he brought out the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986 (FOPA). You likely know that if you are travelling from one state where your firearms and ammunition may be lawfully possessed to another state where your firearms and ammunition may be lawfully possessed that you can travel with those guns, as well as the ammunition for them, if the firearms are unloaded, locked in a case and not accessible to passengers or driver. Should you travel through an area while on your journey where the\\re are restrictions on transporting or possessing your particular firearms or ammunition, FOPA offers protection against prosecution for violating those laws and, thus, overrides California’s law because it is not a restriction on possessing the ammunition, but on transporting it.
Unlike some other decisions where judges (even Benitez) have granted California a “stay,” or delay in the ruling going into effect to give the state time to appeal, this decision took effect immediately.
It is safe to assume that the state of California will file an appeal to challenge this ruling.
https://www.americas1stfreedom.org/content/how-this-california-ammunition-law-fell-over-itself/
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Those of us in the firearms training biz call areas where no guns are allowed “criminal empowerment zones” as criminals ignore ‘em while the law abiding are deprived of effective self-defense. This info packed series of graphics help demonstrate “gun control” laws are not effective w/ the data implying they are indeed counterproductive:
https://ammo.com/articles/gun-free-zones-and-school-shootings?utm_source=Bloggers&utm_campaign=d5e77d5e3a-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2024_01_25_09_37_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-80e2853e7e-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D
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2nd post. Got yer “common use” right here:
https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/more-than-28-1-million-modern-sporting-rifles-in-circulation/
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https://www.ammoland.com/2024/03/nra-wayne-lapierre-cost-gun-rights-movement-north-of-billion-dollars/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8TiW0rLsf
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https://www.ammoland.com/2024/03/nra-wayne-lapierre-cost-gun-rights-movement-north-of-billion-dollars/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8TiW0rLsf
[Doug] Is there another organization of support that manages it's money a little better?
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I belong to Gun Owners of America.
Also look for Gun Rights orgs dedicated to your particular state.
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https://www.ammoland.com/2024/03/nra-wayne-lapierre-cost-gun-rights-movement-north-of-billion-dollars/?ct=t(RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN)#axzz8TiW0rLsf
[Doug] Is there another organization of support that manages it's money a little better?
Second Amendment Foundation has done some great work, as has Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership.
Have no experience with ‘em, but there is a Minnesota specific org too: https://www.minnesotagunrights.org/ I belong to the Virginia equivalent.
I’m an NRA Endowment member, which means I’m a Life Member with some garnish on it Seems like every time I up my membership level it turns out there is yet another level I was unaware of. However, ever since Wayne stepped on his weenie I’ve not given ‘em a dime and will be watching reform efforts closely to see if it does indeed take root. I am a voting member and always throw all my votes behind reform candidates and hope it is indeed a new day.
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I'm done with NRA and have been for quite some time.
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I'm done with NRA and have been for quite some time.
Alas, my instructor credentials (well, some of ‘em) are under the NRA, where I’m what’s known as a Training Counselor, meaning someone who can mint new NRA rifle, pistol, shotgun, or CCW instructors. Though it’s changing, those creds are specifically accepted as ones needed to meet the CHP/CCW requirement of many states. I’ll also note that, at least until freaking Wayne started selling the store so he could fund his legal defense guised as defending the NRA, the Education and Training unit was staffed by some great folks, most of whom who quit when things nose dived around the NRA.
As that may be, my response to Waynes antics were to stop contributing, send every beg-a-thon solicitation back stating not one thin dime until Wayne was gone, without tossing the baby out w/ the bathwater by renouncing my training creds and hence my ability to mint like-minded instructors and provide students with training needed to receive their CHP.
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… responsible and hence liable for any injuries that occur where CHP holders are precluded from carrying their guns:
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/ga-bill-would-make-property-owners-liable-for-injuries-in-gun-free-zones/
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"without tossing the baby out w/ the bathwater by renouncing my training creds and hence my ability to mint like-minded instructors and provide students with training needed to receive their CHP."
Fair point!
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Love that GA bill!
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/governor-declares-state-of-emergency-over-police-officer-shortage-and-legalizes-permitless-carry/ss-BB1jq6RM?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=8baf1c2131da4a50a91ca528fb61a0f5&ei=40
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And likely don’t have sense enough to be embarrassed due to it:
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/atf-director-faces-the-nation-with-his-ignorance-of-firearms/
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/federal-judge-strikes-down-bid-to-block-gun-restriction-bill-in-washington-state-5604292?utm_source=Goodevening&src_src=Goodevening&utm_campaign=gv-03-10-2024&src_cmp=gv-03-10-2024&utm_medium=email&est=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAYvAqcwcVzc7PzLYPrHFRB710wA0AIj31kx5JTWZu9FddhEg4S8RP
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One gun a month law struck down:
https://bulletin.accurateshooter.com/2024/03/big-gun-rights-victory-in-california-one-gun-a-month-challenge/
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Scary black AR rifles get treatment similar to bump stocks, yet have far more utility. This piece speaks to an Amicus brief filed on behalf of plaintiffs taking issue w/ MD’s AR ban:
Law Enforcement Trainers File Scotus Amicus Brief against Maryland Rifle Ban
The Volokh Conspiracy / by David Kopel / Mar 18, 2024 at 5:38 PM
[Citizens should be able to choose the same high-quality defensive arms that peace officers choose]
Last week the International Law Enforcement Educators & Trainers Association filed an amicus brief in a U.S. Supreme Court case challenging Maryland's ban on many common semiautomatic rifles. The case is Bianchi v. Brown, and it has an unusual procedural posture; it is a petition for certiorari before judgement. Yet the case is one on which the U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled.
This post will first summarize the amicus brief, and then provide the procedural background, which is detailed in the Bianchi plaintiffs' cert. petition.
The facts about the banned rifles
As detailed in the amicus brief, the semiautomatic rifles banned by the Maryland General Assembly fire only one shot each time the trigger is pressed. This is the same rate of fire as the most common semiautomatic handguns, such as those made by Glock, Smith & Wesson, or Ruger.
The claim by gun prohibition advocates that such guns fire 300 to 500 times per minute has no basis in fact, and is contrary to common sense. It would take a superhuman trigger finger pull a trigger at the rate of 5 to 8 times per second, let alone do so for a full minute.
Nor are the banned rifles, including those based on the AR-15 platform, more powerful than nonbanned rifles. To the contrary, their standard ammunition is .223 inch or 5.56mm bullets that are small compared to most other rifle ammunition. Accordingly, their kinetic energy is lower.
Because the banned rifles are more powerful than handguns, but less powerful than most other rifles, the relatively low wounding power of this ammunition has been confirmed by decades of study by the US Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory.
Moreover, as documented in police training manuals, the banned rifles are the safest for defensive use within buildings, because their ammunition is especially unlikely to penetrate a wall.
The deadliest firearms in mass shootings are handguns. Researchers led by Dr. Babak Sarani, founder and chief of the Center for Trauma and Critical Care at George Washington University Hospital, examined the relationship between the type of firearm used, wounding characteristics, and probability of death in mass shootings. Babak Sarani, et al., Wounding Patterns Based on Firearm Type in Civilian Public Mass Shootings in the United States, 228 J. Amer. College Surgeons 228 (Mar. 2019). They studied firearm types and autopsy reports for 232 victims from 23 mass shootings, including high-casualty shootings with "assault weapons" at Orlando and Las Vegas.
Surprisingly, the researchers found that mass shootings with handguns are more lethal than those with rifles because handguns result in more wounds per victim and more injuries to vital organs. Id. at 228-29, 232-33. "All of us were shocked," Dr. Sarani said. "We came to the table with our bias that an assault weapon would be worse." Carolyn Crist, Handguns More Lethal Than Rifles in Mass Shootings, Reuters (Dec. 31, 2018).
Law enforcement perspectives
Because the banned rifles are relatively low-powered, their recoil is lower, and hence they are more accurate. Additionally, the rifles are replete with features (outlawed by Maryland) that enhance accuracy.
For example, a telescoping stock can adjust for a precise fit to the user's size. The customizable forward grip provides stability. Surrounding the barrel are rails (sometimes called the handguard or forend) that make it easy to add optics, such as scopes, red dots, and/or flashlights – all for greater accuracy.
So it is no wonder that these semiautomatic rifles are very commonly chosen by law enforcement officers to carry in their patrol cars. Law enforcement officers choose their patrol rifles for only one purpose: lawful defense of self and others. It is preposterous for a legislature to claim (falsely) that these rifles are "weapons of war," are useless for self-defense, and are made only for mass killing. This is a libel against law-abiding law enforcement officers.
Prudently, American citizens have always looked to law enforcement for guidance in choosing defensive firearms, because law enforcement firearms are selected with care. Officers choose their duty arms for one purpose: lawful defense of self and others.
The most important reason why citizens often do and should copy law enforcement officers' firearms selections is to ensure that citizens will have reliable firearms for defense. Officers' arms are well-suited for defense against violent criminals; and they are appropriate for use in civil society.
Law enforcement officers are not soldiers wielding weapons of war, and their interactions with citizens are not governed by rules of engagement for the battlefield. The challenged statute implicitly denigrates peace officers by treating them like an occupying army. Such negative attitudes make the public less willing to cooperate with law enforcement and damage community relations.
Procedural background
In 2013, the Maryland General Assembly enacted a sweeping ban on many semiautomatic rifles, particularly targeting those that are most useful for lawful defense of self and others. The ban was promptly challenged in Kolbe v. Hogan, a case which went through the complete discovery process.
At the time, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, like most but not all other Circuits, evaluated Second Amendment cases under a "Two-Part Test," which was similar to the three tiers of scrutiny that had been used for free speech and equal protection cases. The district court applied a weak form of intermediate scrutiny and upheld the ban. Kolbe v. O'Malley, 42 F. Supp. 3d 768 (D. Md. 2014). Then, a three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit held that—because the statute banned many common arms—strict scrutiny was the proper standard. Kolbe v. Hogan, 813 F.3d 160 (4th Cir. 2016)
Before the remanded case could be decided the the District Court, the Fourth Circuit took the case en banc, and the majority ruled hat the banned arms are not even covered by the Second Amendment. By the en banc majority's theory, lightly premised on a tendentious reading of the Supreme Court's District of Columbia v. Heller, arms that are mainly suitable for military use are not part of the Second Amendment. Kolbe v. Hogan, 849 F.3d 114 (4th Cir. 2017).
The majority rationale was out of touch with current facts, since no military in the world uses semiautomatic-only rifles. The U.S. military and others choose service rifles that are capable of automatic fire. More fundamentally, the Kolbe majority rationale would deny Second Amendment protection to the very arms with which Americans won their War of Independence—namely the personally-owned muskets and rifles that American Patriots brought to service, because those were the arms that the States and the colonies had specified by statute were the best arms for the militia.
When plaintiffs petitioned for certiorari, Randy Barnett, Ilya Shapiro, Joseph Greenlee, and I wrote an amicus brief on behalf of the National Sheriffs' Association and other organizations. Certiorari was denied in 2017. At the time, the Supreme Court was refusing to take almost any case involving the Second Amendment. (The only notable exception was Caetono v. Massachusetts, a 2016 challenge to the now-defunct Massachusetts ban on electric stun guns.)
A new case, challenging only the gun ban (and not other 2013 items, such as a magazine ban) was filed in 2020. The District Court quickly dismissed the case based on Kolbe, and a Fourth Circuit panel tersely affirmed. Plaintiffs petitioned for certiorari.
A few days after the Supreme Court decided New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, the Court granted, vacated, and remanded three cases for reconsideration in light of Bruen. One of them was the Maryland firearms ban case, now known as Bianchi v. Frosh. 142 S. Ct. 2898, 2899 (Mem.) (2022). (The other two cases were magazine bans from the Third and Ninth Circuits.)
The June 2022 remand led to oral argument before a three-judge Fourth Circuit panel in December 2022. The panel took over a year to write an opinion. Then, while the draft opinion was presumably being circulated among the Circuit's other judges, the Fourth Circuit sua sponte took the case away from the panel, and in January 2024 took the case en banc. The iron rule of Fourth Circuit jurisprudence has always been that no decision in support of a Second Amendment plaintiff can survive the process of appellate review. See Kopel, Data Indicate Second Amendment Underenforcement, 68 Duke Law Journal Online 79 (2018) (also noting same problem in Second and Ninth Circuits).
The Bianchi plaintiffs, represented by David Thompson of the D.C. constitutional litigation boutique Cooper & Kirk, petitioned for certiorari before judgement. They argued that the Fourth Circuit's dilatory procedures are an obvious attempt to evade Supreme Court precedent, which clearly dictates a ruling against the Maryland ban.
Perhaps as result of the cert. petition, the Fourth Circuit has scheduled a prompt en banc oral argument, on March 20.
Shortly after the Bianchi petition for certiorari before final judgement was filed, similar petitions were filed for several cases involving an especially draconian gun ban enacted in Illinois in 2023. The results in the district courts on preliminary injunction motions had been mixed, and the Seventh Circuit considered them all together. In Bevis v. City of Naperville, 85 F.4th 1175 (7th Cir. 2023), a three-judge panel led by Judge Easterbrook relied on Kolbe, and held that the banning of a vast number of common firearms had nothing to do with the Second Amendment. In his view, the Second Amendment does not apply to arms "reserved to the military."
Judge Easterbrook's opinion would have been doctrinally solid if he had been interpreting the Mexican Constitution's right to arms, which states:
Article 10. The inhabitants of the United Mexican States have a right to arms in their homes, for security and legitimate defense, with the exception of arms prohibited by federal law and those reserved for the exclusive use of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and National Guard. Federal law will determine the cases, conditions, requirements, and places in which the carrying of arms will be authorized to the inhabitants.
See Kopel, Mexico's Gun Control Laws: A Model for the United States? 18 Texas Review of Law & Politics 27 (2013). But even if the U.S. constitutional right to arms had copied Mexico's, Judge Easterbrook still would have been wrong on the facts, because the arms banned in Illinois are not used by the U.S. military. And despite what Judge Easterbrook claimed, the banned firearms do not function like machine guns.
The post Law Enforcement Trainers File Scotus Amicus Brief against Maryland Rifle Ban appeared first on Reason.com.
https://reason.com/volokh/2024/03/18/law-enforcement-trainers-file-scotus-amicus-brief-against-maryland-rifle-ban/
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Nice find.
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for an
undocumented illegal:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/undocumented-immigrants-have-right-to-own-guns-judge-rules/ar-BB1kal26
this is almost as though the leftist judge is cynically bastardizing
existing law to protect citizens gunrights to extend to people who are in the US illegally,
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NY fiscal regulator tried to stop financial companies based in NY (meaning most of ‘em nationwide) from doing business w/ the NRA. ACLU joins (!?!) the NRA in this first amendment filing expected to be decided by June:
NRA Defends Freedom in Supreme Court Argument
TUESDAY, MARCH 19, 2024 NRA Defends Freedom in Supreme Court Argument
The NRA’s commitment to freedom was on full display again this week.
On Monday, March 18, the Court heard oral arguments in the NRA v. Maria T. Vullo case – one of the nation’s most important First Amendment matters. Vullo is the former financial regulator in New York who tried to “financially blacklist” the NRA in 2018.
The NRA argues that Vullo, at the behest of former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, took aim at the NRA and used the regulatory power of the Department of Financial Services (DFS) to financially blacklist the NRA – coercing banks and insurers to avoid ties with the Association in order to suppress its pro-Second Amendment speech.
The NRA argues that Vullo’s actions were meant to silence the NRA – using “guidance letters,” backroom threats, and other measures to cause financial institutions to “drop” the Association.
In response, on May 11, 2018, the NRA filed suit to enjoin the campaign and for money damages. After winning in the trial court, the NRA's case was dismissed by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York. Thereafter, the Association took its case to the highest court in the land. The NRA is joined by the ACLU, legal experts, constitutional scholars, and 25 states in opposing Vullo’s actions.
ACLU National Legal Director and NRA counsel David Cole argued on Monday that Vullo and other New York officials abused their authority in violation of the First Amendment, telling the justices: “There's no question on this record that they encouraged people to punish the NRA." Cole said, “It was a campaign by the state’s highest political officials to use their power to coerce a boycott of a political advocacy organization because they disagreed with its advocacy.”
The U.S. Department of Justice also sided with the NRA, as Assistant to the Solicitor General Ephraim McDowell argued that the court should find that New York officials violated the NRA’s First Amendment rights.
Twenty-two amicus briefs representing more than 190 individuals and organizations were filed in support of the NRA’s position, including a filing by several of the nation’s foremost First Amendment scholars. The amicus briefs also include a joint filing by dozens of congressional Republicans and filings by 25 state attorneys general. The support came from across the political spectrum.
“This is the moment of truth for the NRA and its millions of members," says NRA interim EVP & CEO Andrew Arulanandam. "We were honored to be before the Supreme Court – protecting our First Amendment rights to defend Second Amendment freedom. We will never shrink from the fight to defend the values and freedoms of America."
NRA counsel William A. Brewer III said, “This case is important to the NRA and all advocacy organizations who rely upon the protections of the First Amendment. Every advocacy group will benefit if the Court reminds government officials that they cannot use intimidation tactics, backdoor censorship, or regulatory blacklisting to silence those with whom they disagree.”
George Washington University Law School Professor Jonathan Turley has said NRA v. Vullo “could prove to be one of the most important free speech cases of the decade.”
A ruling is expected this June.
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20240319/nra-defends-freedom-in-supreme-court-argument
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https://lawreview.gmu.edu/print__issues/the-second-amendment-and-citizenship-why-the-people-does-not-include-noncitizens/
https://harvardlawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/02/vol126_the_people_in_the_constitution.pdf
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Though I’ve plenty of qualms where the NRA is concerned, here’s one where membership pays off:
https://www.nraila.org/articles/20240401/nra-scores-legal-victory-against-atf-pistol-brace-rule-enjoined-from-going-into-effect-against-nra-members
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https://washingtontimes-dc.newsmemory.com/?token=fd2468925b7dc45a22722e457d019074_6613edab_6d25b5f&selDate=20240408
Migrants’ gun rights at issue in appeal
U.S. urges reversal of case’s dismissal
BY STEPHEN DINAN THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The federal government is appealing a judge’s ruling that found the Constitution allows some immigrants without documentation to possess guns, plowing new ground in the quickly evolving debate over Second Amendment rights.
The Justice Department filed its notice of appeal Thursday with Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman, whose ruling last month dismissed charges against an undocumented immigrant who’d been prosecuted for gun possession after he started blasting away at cars driving by him in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood.
Judge Coleman said that a 2022 Supreme Court case upended away a longstanding federal ban on immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally possessing guns, effectively erasing the case against Heriberto Carbajal-Flores.
She’s the second judge to rule that way, following a similar case last year in Texas. Most judges who have grappled with the issue have come down on the other side, setting up a legal clash that will play out.
The Illinois and Texas cases are now with appeals courts, testing new frontiers in both gun and immigration law.
Pratheepan Gulasekaram, a law professor at the University of Colorado Bounder said it wasn’t surprising the feds appealed.
“It can be a highly impactful ruling and I’m sure the government has a significant interest in wanting to get a ruling that maintains the integrity of the federal firearms regulation system,” he told The Washington Times.
Under existing law, the migrants are one of a series of categories of what’s known as “prohibited purchasers,” or individuals who are not allowed to obtain or possess a gun. Among the other bans are felons, those with intellectual disabilities, drug users and those dishonorably discharged from military service.
But things got complicated two years ago when the justices issued their decision in a case known as Bruen, where they struck down a state law that severely limited who could obtain a concealed-carry permit. In his majority opinion Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that for firearms restrictions to survive Second Amendment scrutiny, they must have been the type of law countenanced at the time Congress wrote and the country ratified the amendment.
Judge Coleman said the key analogy in early history was a bar on British loyalists, and even that was not categorical. They could regain gun rights as long as they swore a loyalty oath, in effect signifying they weren’t untrustworthy or dangerous.
For Mr. Carbajal-Flores, she said she could find no evidence that he was dangerous, and so despite his unlawful presence he isn’t automatically barred.
“The Court finds that Carbajal-Flores’ criminal record, containing no improper use of a weapon, as well as the non-violent circumstances of his arrest do not support a finding that he poses a risk to public safety such that he cannot be trusted to use a weapon responsibly and should be deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense. Thus, this Court finds that, as applied to Carbajal-Flores, Section 922(g)(5) is unconstitutional,” she wrote.
Judge Coleman’s ruling only applies to Mr. Carbajal- Flores and doesn’t purport to strike down the law, though that could be the result as his case, and the one in Texas involving Antonio Sing-Ledezma, an immigrant who is in the country illegally, wind through the appeals process.
“What you see in Carbajal-Flores and also Sing-Ledezma, the other case, is a real focus on Bruen’s methodology and the question of gun regulation,” Mr. Gulasekaram said, “It’s not going to treat the regulation of noncitizens differently and it’s arguably a faithful application of Bruen.”
Mr. Carbajel-Flores’ case is just one of a series of gun cases winding their way through the courts in the wake of Bruen.
They cover challenges both to types of weapons and so-called “prohibited purchasers” who, under existing law, are banned from buying or possessing a weapon.
Hunter Biden, son of President Biden, has argued that the prohibition on drug users purchasing guns is unconstitutional, which would negate some charges against him.
And the Supreme Court is currently deciding whether a prohibition on domestic violence suspects is constitutional under Bruen’s framework. Legal experts figure that ruling will shed light on the other challenges.
Indeed, the Sing-Ledezma case out of Texas has been put on hold by a circuit appeals court pending the justices’ decision in the domestic violence case.
Two federal appeals courts, meanwhile, have heard arguments recently in cases challenging California’s ban on high-capacity ammunition magazines and Maryland’s ban on some semiautomatic rifles such as the popular AR-15-style rifle.
The Sing-Ledezma and Carbajal-Flores cases are, for now, outliers. Other courts have revisited undocumented immigrants and guns in the wake of the Bruen ruling and concluded that the categorical bar is still valid.
Those judges have focused less on the Second Amendment and more on the immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally, finding that they are outside the definition of “the people” that the amendment grants the right to bear arms.
That argument resonated with Aidan Johnston, director of federal affairs at Gun Owners of America.
“Illegal aliens, people who are unlawfully president in the United States, are not part of ‘the people,’” he said.
He said Judge Coleman was “anti-gun” and was “willfully misinterpreting” the Supreme Court’s cases to try to upend the Second Amendment.
But Mr. Gulasekaram, whose research focuses on immigrants and constitutional rights, said he can find no basis in the Constitution to say that the Second Amendment wasn’t intended to apply to everyone, including noncitizens here unlawfully.
If the courts were to draw those lines, he said, it would be “quite dangerous” in terms of where the end-point would be and whether immigrants would also be exempt from the right to a jury or the right to remain silent in a criminal proceeding.
“What you’re essentially countenancing is a twotier constitutional system, one for citizens, one for noncitizens,” he said.
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(2) BIDEN APPEALS IMMIGRANT GUN CASE AMID WORK PERMIT SURGE: The Department of Justice filed a notice to appeal Illinois Judge Sharon Coleman’s ruling that illegal immigrants can legally possess firearms after the landmark Supreme Court case New York Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen.
A Department of Homeland Security (DHS) spokesperson said the Biden administration has “taken many steps to make sure that individuals who are eligible for employment authorization are informed, and, where possible, to accelerate the processing of employment authorization documents.”
Why It Matters: The Supreme Court will likely take up this appeal to resolve a circuit split. Illinois Judge Coleman is likely setting up a Supreme Court decision that will allow DACA and federal work permit-holding state and local police to possess their service weapons while off duty, removing the primary obstacle to police agencies hiring illegal immigrants. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (BATF), Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), and federal work permit holders can be issued firearms for duty use by government police agencies without violating the Gun Control Act. – R.C.
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https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1778424106033225778
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https://pjmedia.com/catherinesalgado/2024/04/11/chinese-immigrant-wrecks-gun-control-argument-with-one-question-n4928093
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I’m a firearms trainer and generally stay in my lane by teaching beginning and intermediate transitioning stuff. I’ve taken my share of advance training, though, and intend to take a vehicle based class this year. I think those that carry a firearm need to be at least acquainted w/ this material:
https://www.recoilweb.com/vehicle-cover-concealment-183950.html
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""generally stay in my lane by teaching beginning and intermediate transitioning stuff."
- Thanks for this BBG. I just want to add that beginner-intermediate level material is appreciated as well. I can attest, not all here are experts.
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I have done such training at PSR:
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/finland-s-bold-new-firearm-policy-sets-global-standard/ss-BB1lNEKx?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=0dcae7a613144f789ad4dd086007f58b&ei=3
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/finland-s-bold-new-firearm-policy-sets-global-standard/ss-BB1lNEKx?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=0dcae7a613144f789ad4dd086007f58b&ei=3
Wow! Pretty easy to imagine how this could be successful.
"a proactive strategy to enhance national security..."
A few thoughts come to mind.
Mass shooters and other criminals love unarmed venues and unarmed citizens. Even the suicidal ones seek out places where they unlikely to see immediate return fire.
An invading force, Russia for example (or Sweden?) might not want to go house to house against a heavily armed citizenry.
And of course, protecting people against the possibility of their government becoming tyrannical, as they watch that happen in so many other places.
We don't want the government owning our gun ranges, but... there certainly could be more classes offered at the community ed level.
Instead our government does everything it can to hinder our preparedness.
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"We don't want the government owning our gun ranges, but... "
Historical note:
When the Bill of Rights was passed it did not apply to the States. That process began only after the passage of the Civil War Amendments.
At the time the term "well-regulated" meant "smoothly running" e.g. a well regulated watch was an accurate watch. What was envisioned was regularly training of the militia by the individual States. In their failure to do so, the militia(s) became "the unorganized militia" see Title 10 Section 331 and related sections.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cenwYbQyXCY&t=30s
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/supreme-court-will-take-up-the-legal-fight-over-ghost-guns-firearms-without-serial-numbers/ar-AA1ns5uQ?ocid=msedgntp&pc=DCTS&cvid=71e3eecb5c07487bbd7e86f9a7a8f756&ei=18