Articles by Herschel Smith

This guy finds it “disturbing that people feel they need to be armed against the government.”

He tore up his AR (Armalite Rifle, not “assault rifle”) in order to prevent nut jobs from getting hold of it.  He’s a nut job alright.  I’d say he succeeded in his goal.  One less nut with a gun.

Kurt Hofmann has a must-read article on the connection between gun confiscations and gun registration (or so-called universal background check).  It’s an issue I have been discussing for some time.  Kurt begins his article this way.

St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner is a frequent and vocal critic of the NRA (see here and here for recent examples), often wondering if the organization’s leadership is merely naively optimistic, à la Neville Chamberlain, in its dealings with the forcible citizen disarmament extremists, or actively collaborationist, à la Vidkun Quisling. Honesty requires, however, acknowledgement of effective steps the NRA does take in defense of gun rights.

Read the rest at Examiner.  Taking off on this honesty though, I have also been a critic of the NRA before, begging, as it were, the NRA to put its full force behind educating the public to the dangers of universal background checks as a pretext for and necessary precondition to a national gun registry, which is itself a precondition for gun confiscations.

Today I received a flyer in the mail from the NRA where they said exactly that.  The NRA might be frustrating at times, but they are still the largest and most powerful gun rights organization in America, and it matters what they say.  I don’t partake in pitting one organization against another.  That’s a loser’s proposition, and it’s what the enemy wants us to do.  I sincerely appreciate each organization that protects gun rights and stands against the totalitarian state.  I will correct them when they wander, and praise them when they do well.

Moving on to Wayne, he is under criticism these days, most notably for his belief in a coming apocalypse and the prudence of guns to address it at a personal level.

National Rifle Association head Wayne LaPierre is again under fire after penning an op-ed that claimed Americans need guns to fight off rampant gangs, terrorists and psychotics.

LaPierre, the NRA’s executive vice president, claimed the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy showed what the future would hold, and why every law-abiding citizen needs to arm themselves.

“We saw the hellish world that the gun prohibitionists see as their utopia,” he wrote in the Daily Caller. “Looters ran wild in south Brooklyn. There was no food, water or electricity. And if you wanted to walk several miles to get supplies, you better get back before dark, or you might not get home at all.”

Immediately LaPierre was attacked. Former GOP congressman Joe Scarborough said, “He has lost his mind,” on his MSNBC show Morning Joe, while President Barack Obama’s strategist David Plouffe called the NRA head “delusional.”

In his argument against new gun control laws, LaPierre described a world where Americans would be defenseless without guns and fall prey to everything from terrorists and Latin American drug gangs to civil unrest and looters in the wake of natural disasters. He said Americans would, in effect, be crazy not to arm themselves against the coming calamity and to rise up in protection of their Second Amendment rights.

Well, Joe Scarborough is a moron and so the balance of what he said is unimportant, but let’s consider the state of the union for a moment.

Pakistan is now our enemy.  We are withdrawing forces from Afghanistan after having lost the campaign because we wanted to wage nation-building instead of war.  Libya is now a disaster, and we left our men to perish in Benghazi with forces available to respond to their need.  Iran is headed towards a nuclear weapon and Israel is alone in her quest for self preservation.  War is coming to the Middle East, and we won’t be energy independent when it happens mostly because of the EPA.

Russia is reasserting itself unopposed in its “near abroad,” and China owns 1.17 trillion in U.S. Treasury Securities.  Our Southern border may as well not exist, and MS-13 is in every major city in the U.S., and most smaller cities, while some in the border patrol and law enforcement across America are bought off with drug money.  The cartels South of the border have morphed into transnational warlords who kidnap, extort, murder, traffic, and torture, and they’re moving North.

We’re in horrible national debt, and our unfunded liabilities reach a staggering $87 trillion.  Within ten years, the interest on the national debt will reach $10 trillion per year, the unemployment rate is still hovering around 8% or higher, the under-employment rate is still around 18% or higher, a recovery is nowhere in sight and won’t be until we get spending and entitlements under control, half of the American people don’t pay federal taxes, 47 million people rely on food stamps and that roll is growing at the rate of 11,000 per day, and the U.S. Marines are set to lose 20,000 men.

We are too broke to refuel our aircraft carriers, the administration has – for now – gotten away with walking guns across the Southern border in an effort to bolster support for gun control in America, food prices may soon soar, and amidst it all, the administration is working hard on that currently critical need to take guns away from the American people, which would of course be the catalyst for fourth generation warfare in America.

I think Wayne is on solid ground here.  In short, good flyer in the mail, good call on a former ally turned enemy, and keep it up.  As for the apocalypse, I don’t have to be told by anyone.  I’m doing my best to prepare for it.  Are you?

UPDATE: Thanks to Mike Vanderboegh for the link.

UPDATE #2: Thanks to David Codrea for the link.

UPDATE #3: Thanks to David Hardy for the link.

David Codrea scoops the story (before the MSM) on a lawsuit just filed by the parents on behalf of deceased Immigration And Customs Enforcement Agent Jamie Zapata.  I don’t blame them.  I wouldn’t let this go either.  It’s because of corruption that guns were walked across the border in the failed U.S. attempt to side with drug lords in their war against each other while also giving the state an excuse to enact new gun laws.

The corruption might be exposed by this lawsuit, although whether this brings it about won’t effect long term probabilities.  Long term, I just don’t believe that it’s possible to hide the truth.  The sooner everyone confesses, the better it will be, but everyone’s role will ultimately be made known.  It’s just a matter of time and light.

As a warning shot over the bow, South Carolina is poised to take action to protect the rights of its citizens.

Congratulations, you are a member of South Carolina’s “unorganized militia.” Now that you know that, state Sen. Tom Corbin, R-Greenville, wants to make sure you have access to guns in case the governor ever calls on you to defend the state.

Corbin has proposed a new state law — unanimously approved Wednesday by a Senate subcommittee — that would guarantee all members of the unorganized militia “shall have the right, at his own expense, to acquire, possess, keep, and bear all firearms that could be legally acquired or possessed by a citizen of South Carolina as of December 31, 2012.”

Translated that means — barring an almost certain constitutional challenge if the proposal becomes law — you can buy an assault weapon, regardless of whether the federal government bans them, as President Barack Obama and others have proposed.

The proposed law is based on a state law, dating back to 1881, that refers to an “unorganized militia” made up of “all able bodied persons over 17 years of age.”

“All of us here can sit back and go, ‘Finally, I don’t have to worry about giving up my shotgun or giving up my Ruger pistol or whatever. It’s over,” Corbin said. “This bill just simply says it is now part of our unorganized militia’s weaponry, therefore it is protected. … It can’t be changed by anyone outside of South Carolina.”

We had previously discussed this as a possibility, but it’s good to see that this had the unanimous support of the Senate subcommittee.  Perhaps it will pass with ease.  But wait, pointy-head has to get involved.

Nice try, but it won’t work, said Thomas Crocker, an associate professor of law at the USC School of Law who specializes in constitutional law.

It is true, Crocker said, that South Carolina can specify weapons for its unorganized militia — a concept dating back to the 18th century, when states did not have modern police forces or National Guards. States then had laws requiring everyone to own a musket and be ready to fight against outlaws or attacking Native Americans.

“The trick is if the federal government enacts an assault-weapons ban, making it illegal to have the AR-15, that will trump automatically any state law,” Crocker said. “It doesn’t matter if the state statute says that is an approved weapon. It is an illegal weapon under federal law and federal law trumps.”

Really?  Is it just that simple?  The federal government can pass any law imaginable and it trumps state laws regardless of any other considerations?  Perhaps pointy-head has been educated beyond his intelligence level.  He may be smart, but he doesn’t have a lick of common sense and he doesn’t know the very state in which he works.  I do.

Here’s a suggestion, send some federal agents to Pickens, Travelers Rest and Marietta, and up around the Jocassee Gorges, Devil’s Fork and Gap Creek areas to collect guns – that is, after you get all of the local Sheriffs to cooperate with you.  Write me a note and tell me how that goes.

Phoenix New Times:

It also wasn’t ironic that Kelly and Giffords, who overnight became the country’s two most famous gun-control advocates, are honest enough to admit that they both own guns. Giffords, as was widely reported before she was shot, owns a semi-automatic Glock similar to the one used by her assailant.

This is rich.  The country’s premier face of gun control has her own gun.  Next, consider David Codrea on Bill Maher on guns.

“The NRA should just change its name to the assassin’s lobby, because that’s what they are” TV personality Bill Maher told Tonight Show host Jay Leno on Tuesday when asked about his take on the Tucson shootings (watch segment in sidebar media player).

“I’m so tired of hearing about the Second Amendment and the Constitution,” he continued.

“If you love guns, just admit it — like it’s a vice. It’s like alcohol or drugs or sex addiction or gambling… It’s not good for you or anyone else, but you like it.”

Nice. Good, responsible men and women who as a matter of course exhibit self control are equated with degenerates who exercise none. Typical.

Finally, look who else owns a gun.

Appearing on Conan last night, Bill Maher said that enacting gun-control legislation would have little effect because Democrats are as attached to guns as Republicans. Even though he favors universal background checks and placing a limit on clip sizes, Maher, who said in the interview that he is a gun owner, concluded, “it’s not really going to change much in this country.”

Gun control for thee but not for me.  Hypocrisy is always fun for the special people.

Examiner:

Conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, decrying America’s demonization of guns, is predicting that the parade of new gun control laws, cheered on by President Obama, will hit the Supreme Court soon, possibly settling for ever the types of weapons that can be owned.

Scalia, whose legacy decision in the 2008 case of District of Columbia vs. Heller ended the ban on handguns in Washington, D.C., suggested that the Constitution allows limits on what Americans can own, but the only example he offered was a shoulder-launched rocket that would bring down jets.

And the wily judge suggested to an audience of Smithsonian Associates at George Washington University’s Lisner Auditorium Tuesday night that he is not just preparing for a new gun control challenge, but that he’s softening up one of his liberal colleague on guns.

The long-time duck hunter revealed that he’s taken Obama appointee Elena Kagan hunting several times, the last being for big game in Wyoming where she shot a whitetail doe. “She dropped that doe with one shot,” he said during an event that featured questions from NPR’s court reporter Nina Totenberg.

[ … ]

Scalia explained why he wrote Heller, but wouldn’t discuss current gun control limits in Congress and the states. “There are doubtless cases on the way up,” he said, adding that limits on what weapons can be owned will likely be part of any new decision. “There are doubtless limits, but what they are we will see.”

Commentary

Good.  Let’s rock.  Let’s get on with the preservation or diminution of our rights and freedoms.  Time is wasting.  It’s time to revisit the decisions in Heller and McDonald, not because, as Justice Ginsburg thinks, there might be a reversal of Heller on the horizon with a “future, wiser court,” but because Heller didn’t go far enough.  The Supreme Court recognized our right to ownership of firearms, but didn’t specifically broach the issue of “bearing” those arms, i.e., carrying them for personal defense.

This relationship that appears to be developing between Scalia and Kagan is, I’m sure, very sweet and and all of that, but I wouldn’t count on her vote.  Furthermore, the whole issue of duck hunting concerns me.  The Second Amendment, as Scalia knows, isn’t about duck hunting, or deer hunting, or any other “sporting purpose.”  The sporting purposes test imposed by the last round of onerous firearms laws, and enforced by the ATF, is entirely unconstitutional.  I have said before that I think the test is misapplied, and that if it is a firearm, it has a sporting purpose.  But proliferation of this test through the judiciary (from some future decision) is cowardly because it doesn’t formally recognize the truth, and that is that the second amendment exists in order to ameliorate tyranny.

But for the courts, just remember that we firearms owners aren’t likely to have any more respect for confiscatory policies (or anything that can enable confiscation such as universal background checks), onerous policies (such as counting the number of cartridges I can put in my magazine), or unconstitutional tests (like sporting purposes) coming from the courts than we would if it came from the Congress or the President.  And just for the record, the Supreme Court became a laughingstock over the decision on Obamacare.  You wouldn’t want to put the final nail in the coffin holding your honor or respectability, would you?

Be very careful.  Think wisely.  Don’t start things you cannot stop.

UPDATE: Thank you for the visit on this article.  It is timely and important.

Tampa Bay Times:

Pasco SWAT team members on Tuesday broke down the door and searched an older couple’s home for their grandson. They searched for hours for Aaron Vineyard and the guns and stolen goods he allegedly was keeping, but didn’t find him or his loot in the home.

Carl Stark, 71, and his wife Juanita, 73, said they are furious that SWAT members broke into their house at 9808 Sholtz St., and shouted orders at them to get on the ground, breaking several decorations and a window in the process. They said their grandson, Vineyard, 36, lives in a trailer next door at 9812 Sholtz St., and they rarely see or speak to him.

At a news conference on Friday, Pasco Sheriff Chris Nocco said he stands behind his deputies’ actions. Before the Tuesday night SWAT raid, he said, investigators were working with an informant to bring down a 12-man crime ring of which they believe Vineyard is a member.

Nocco said his men weren’t taking chances when they decided to search the home Tuesday night. The SWAT team got the house they meant to, he said.

“I have no regrets in the operation that was performed,” Nocco said. “The fact that we put safety first, we’re not going to apologize for that.”

[ … ]

Sheriff’s spokesman Doug Tobin said SWAT members’ actions “ensured the safety of all of those inside the house and deputies executing the search warrant.”

Safety first.  Whose safety?  The safety of his officers.  In fact, the spokesman is lying.  This wasn’t safe for anyone.  No one benefited from these tactics, no one was caught, no evidence was flushed down the toilet, the police don’t know that the parents were connected in any way to the son’s activities regardless of what they say, and a lot of home wares were broken.

The better approach would have been to position detectives to find out when the son left his home, arrest him out in the open daylight, and execute a search warrant on the parent’s home by uniformed officers.  The fact that a SWAT team was used to do this is a testimony to stupidity and thuggery.

Moving West, the following home invasion has some instructive value for us.

Ten armed men stormed into a home early Sunday morning demanding money and drugs.

The home invasion happened at a home in Edinburg around 1:30 a.m.

According to Edinburg Police, the gunmen demanded money and drugs.

An eyewitness told Action 4 News that the suspects were dressed in black shirts that said “S.W.A.T.” on the front.

This is a continuation of what we have observed before.  Home invasions are increasingly being perpetrated by multi-man teams.  Furthermore, they are frequently impersonating police officers.

Listen, LEOs (Ahem, I know you like to be called operators, but you’re not really operators.  My son was an operator when he engaged in combat operations in Fallujah, Iraq.).  I have no idea who you are when banging starts on my front door in the middle of the night.  That’s one reason I have guns.  Even if you dress and act like law enforcement, I cannot trust that because you might be a multi-man team impersonating law enforcement.

Do you see why I must return fire?  Do you understand that if you ever do this to my home you will enter to a hail of bullets that your Kevlar won’t stop?  Do you understand why it isn’t safe for you or me to conduct such stupid operations?  Do you understand why you should see yourself as a peace officer and use detective work instead of this kind of thuggery to enforce the law?  Do you understand that I cannot simply lay prostrate and allow anyone to do anything in my home because you have guns?  It is my duty to protect my family.  Do you understand that the safest approach is for you to return to being peace officers and leave room clearing in my home to me?

Do you understand?

UPDATE: Thanks to Mike and David for the attention.

UPDATE #2: Want an example of the attitude I’m talking about?  Take a look at Law’s comment on this article.  Near the end of the comment thread.

Via Instapundit, Joe Manchin in his words:

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said Monday that he opposes an assault weapons ban.

Speaking on MSNBC, Manchin, who has an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association and in December called for federal action to reduce gun violence, said he thinks there’s a better way to reduce mass shootings without introducing new restrictions for gun owners.

“I do not support an assault weapon ban because the definition of assault weapon is still hard to come by,” Manchin said. “So I am not going to comment on people’s legislation. I do not support that approach right now.”

Manchin is part of a quartet of legislators working to tighten background checks required to purchase a gun. The other members of the group are Sens. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), and Tom Coburn (R-Okla.).

Of course, the fact that the definition of assault weapon is itself defined in the legislation (an example of circular reasoning) is a ridiculous reason for not supporting it.  But of course, Joe is lying.  The real reason that he isn’t supporting a new AWB is because it cannot pass.  The real reason he should oppose it is because it is unconstitutional and immoral, though Joe isn’t too worried about trivialities like that.

What Joe is doing is working with totalitarians to enact universal background checks, thus setting up a national gun registry.  I expect this out of Joe.  I am saddened to see it out of Eric and Paul.

Part I: Mental Health Checks Are Not The Answer To Gun Violence

Part II: Guns And Crazy Men

The Capital Times notes that Ann Althouse weighed in on the issue of gun violence and mental health checks.  Her blog “lights up” on this issue, according to the report.  In fact Ann does have a smart and whimsical style of writing, interspersed with humor, and so one must usually read her thoughts more than one time in order to make sure that you’re not misinterpreting her prose.

But I think I’ve got what she says this time around, and I have some difficulty with her views.

Bonavia implies that we ought to make policy based on the percentages. But then she says, make a pervasive law that applies to everyone, without mentioning the very small percentage of perpetrators of gun violence within the truly vast category of Americans who buy guns. And by the way, the category “gun violence” lumps things together. Gun control has become a hot issue because of a few massacres. If you make a category out of the set of incidents that has inflamed present-day opinion, people suffering from mental illness seem to be 100% of the perpetrators! You only get your very small percentage if you throw in other types of incidents, such as gangsters wiping each other out. Wake me up when 90% of Americans want to do something about that. And explain to me how background checks have any curative power over that problem.

The appeal to statistics and reason falls flat when you shape it to suit the policy you already want.

“Only 4 to 5 percent of violent crimes are committed by people with mental illness,” Dilip Jeste, the president of the [American Psychiatric Association], says in a statement. “About one quarter of all Americans have a mental disorder in any given year, and only a very small percentage of them will ever commit violent crimes.”See what I mean? Questions for Dr. Jeste: 1. What percentage of school shootings are committed by persons with mental illness? 2. If we cut the category “violent crimes” down to massacre-type shootings where the motive isn’t robbery and the victim isn’t someone with whom the shooter has a personal dispute, what percentage of those crimes are committed by persons with mental illness? 3. If we break the category “mental disorder” into subparts, so that depression and schizophrenia aren’t lumped together, is there any category within which you cannot say that only very small percentage will ever commit violent crimes? 4. In your effort to shield the mentally ill from unnecessary stigma, are you giving cover to a set of persons who could and should be identified as dangerous?

Ann might be affirming the consequent, where given some mental malady, since some shooter (or several shooters) commit[s] a mass killing, therefore killings will be committed only by those with the identified mental malady.  But this error in propositional logic is too fundamental and I don’t think Ann is arguing in this way.

More likely, Ann is arguing (or has argued) in a probabilistic manner herself, that the preponderance of mass shootings have been committed by those with some identified mental malady.  Therefore, prohibiting people with that specific malady from owning weapons will decrease the number of mass shootings.

If I have interpreted Ann correctly, take careful note of the unstated presuppositions in her argument.  First, she is assuming that mental health professionals can correctly identify that malady, and second, she is assuming that only persons with that specific malady (or perhaps one or two others) will commit mass shootings.

Neither appears to bear the weight of scrutiny.  The mental health professionals I cite in the earlier reports on mental health checks and gun ownership state categorically that they cannot identify illness in many circumstances.  They also state rather categorically that violence of all kinds – mass shootings or not – are not a function of specific mental illnesses.

I usually roll my eyes at the lack of scholarship and honesty when I read Huffington Post.  But today there was refreshing honesty from yet another mental health professional concerning what his own profession cannot accomplish.

As we debate the steps to reducing gun violence in the society a couple points need to be understood: 1. The link between violent crime and mental illness is weak, and 2. Mental health professionals are poor at predicting anyone’s propensity for any specific behavior, including homicide.

Although it is mass shootings, particularly the massacre of school children in Newtown, that capture our attention and have accelerated the current discussion, Americans for the most part kill each other with guns in ones and twos. Of the total number of gun deaths in this country, around 30,000 a year, the majority are not the result of mental illness, but of ordinary human emotions like anger, hate, greed, and despair. In fact, about half of all shootings are suicides.

[ … ]

The only real predictor of future violence in anyone turns out to be a past history of violent behavior. Absent this, professionals are little better than the average citizen at identifying those likely to harm others. Many people report violent fantasies (remember your reaction to the last person to cut you off in traffic); few act on them.

[ … ]

As we confront the reality of these systemic deficits, however, we ought not to do so under the illusion that we are responding to the problem of gun violence. These are separate and largely unrelated issues, both of which deserve our immediate attention and informed response.

It is true that mental health checks can be abused and thus rights denied for incorrect reasons, and it is true that mental health professionals often disagree, and it is true that given a reason to deny rights, a totalitarian state will usually find a way to use it for totalitarian purposes.  All of these things concern me and in fact militate against such checks being a necessary prerequisite for gun ownership, in my opinion (See earlier discussions of the checks we must go through in my own county to obtain a concealed handgun permit, which I do have, and also the “fitness for duty” program and managerial observation we must go through having unescorted access to nuclear power plants – both checks being pretty much worthless in my view, and yet subject to unconstitutional denial of rights).

But the objection raised by the mental health professionals goes beyond my own objections.  In every case, they are saying that there is no identity between those who commit violent crime and any specific mental malady, and beyond that, they are little better than the average person at identifying propensity to violence anyway.

Laws only imperfectly supply incentive for certain behavior and disincentive for the opposite.  But what laws cannot do is ensure that certain behavior does not obtain.  That is a burden too far for legislation and ethics.  These issues ensconce squarely in the domain of morality, and laws do not change that.  Evil cannot be legislated (or medicated) away, and the best amelioration of risk associated with gun violence is to be prepared for self defense (including elimination of gun free zones).

Similarly, mental health professionals have weighed in telling us that their profession cannot possibly hope to shoulder the burden we wish to place on it.  It’s more than simply it is subject to abuse, which it is, or that the doctor-patient relationship is invaded, which it is.  It is that the “science” – if it can be called that at all, is simply incapable of sustaining the burden of gun violence, or any other form of violence, for that matter.  They cannot prevent it, regardless how much we may wish them to.

Washington Post:

Switzerland has the world’s third-highest number of privately held guns per person, after the United States and Yemen, an outgrowth of its unique military culture. Service is mandatory for young men, though the national military is a little bit like a collection of local militias. That militia-tinged military culture blurs the line, just a bit, between an “on duty” time, when it’s normal to carry a gun, and “off-duty”; the result is that it’s not considered crazy, as it might be in the United States, for a service member to carry his or her assault rifle home.

[ … ]

Philip D. Jaffe, a forensic psychologist, said Switzerland’s military draft and annual weapons training have historically fostered national unity among the confederation’s cultural groups, which include French, German and Italian speakers. Even though the citizen militia may be outdated in modern military terms, he said in an interview in Lausanne, it has long fit in with the national image of small, self-reliant Switzerland maintaining its independence while being surrounded by much larger countries.

“They drill this into you; there’s something idealistic about it,” Jaffe said. “They hand you a big, bulky machine gun, and it’s yours. You get to keep it.”

This is all written from the perspective of someone who doesn’t believe in the unorganized militia in America.  I wouldn’t consider it “crazy” at all for unorganized militia members (such as me) to own machine guns, and I don’t believe that the notion of a citizen-militia is outdated at all.  I should be able to own the same kind of weaponry that I have to use my tax dollars to purchase our military forces.

Driving South for a few hours, the world view changes a great deal.  South Carolina is currently considering protections for the unorganized militia (via Mike Vanderboegh).

Senate Bill 247 was introduced on January 16, 2013 by state Senators Tom Corbin, Tom Davis, Kevin Bryant, and Lee Bright and sources indicate that a companion measure will soon be offered in the South Carolina House of Representatives.

The bill reads:

(A) Pursuant to the provisions of Section 25-1-60, an able-bodied citizen of this State who is over seventeen years of age and can legally purchase a firearm is deemed a member of the South Carolina Unorganized Militia, unless he is already a member of the National Guard or the organized militia not in National Guard service …

(2) A militia member, at his own expense, shall have the right to possess and keep all arms that could be legally acquired or possessed by a South Carolina citizen as of December 31, 2012. This includes shouldered rifles and shotguns, handguns, clips, magazines, and all components.

(3) The unorganized militia may not fall under any law or regulation or jurisdiction of any person or entity outside of South Carolina.

This bill seems like obvious low hanging fruit.  It should have an easy time being ushered through the legislature.  But beware, it does in fact lend protections to the unorganized militia from the intrusive federal government.  The totalitarians will be furious.

This kind of state law is a good and necessary thing only insofar as the state is willing to enforce it with the power of law enforcement and the unorganized militia themselves.  As long as the state is willing to throw agents of the federal government in state penitentiary for enforcing intrusive federal laws, the state’s word means something.  Otherwise, the state is just inviting scorn from both the federal government and its own citizens.

Federal laws concerning firearms are unconstitutional – every one of them, without exception.  State laws are too if they infringe as prohibited in the Second Amendment.  This South Carolina law places them squarely in the totalitarian line of fire coming out of Washington, D.C., and decidedly in the corner of the people.  But being righteous doesn’t end the story.  Totalitarians never decide to go away.  They must be defeated.