Archive for the 'Gun Control' Category

In what will surely be many to come, the New York gun ban has claimed its first victim.

It was only a matter of time before New York’s draconian new gun law, the obscenely misnamed “SAFE Act,” claimed its first victim Since the oppressive new law was forced through with such haste (and “under a veil of secrecy in the dark of night,” as the NRA put it), and signed by Governor Cuomo (who is already scrambling to change this “Most Stupid Gun Law Ever Made“) into law immediately (because the required three-day public comment period apparently frightened supporters of the law), it ends up not having been much time for that first victim.

Our alleged “gun criminal” is Benjamin M. Wassell, and his supposed “crime” is selling both an AR-15 pattern rifle and a (similar, but larger) AR-10 pattern rifle, both of which had supposedly been upgraded by Mr. Wassell with such now-verboten “assault features” as a pistol grip …

Read it all at Examiner.  The question now is what will New Yorkers do?  You know, the riflemen?  You have a fellow rifleman who has been charged under the new communist law, so what will you do now?

Ever to be late to the debate and wrong with the facts, Fluffington Post discusses Hitler and guns.

When the president of Ohio’s state school board posted her opposition to gun control, she used a powerful symbol to make her point: a picture of Adolf Hitler. When a well-known conservative commentator decried efforts to restrict guns, he argued that if only Jews in Poland had been better armed, many more would have survived the Holocaust.

In the months since the Newtown, Conn., school massacre, some gun rights supporters have repeatedly compared U.S. gun control efforts to Nazi restrictions on firearms, arguing that limiting weapons ownership could leave Americans defenseless against homegrown tyrants.

But some experts say that argument distorts a complex and contrary history. In reality, scholars say, Hitler loosened the tight gun laws that governed Germany after World War I, even as he barred Jews from owning weapons and moved to confiscate them.

Advocates who cite Hitler in the current U.S. debate overlook that Jews in 1930s Germany were a very small population, owned few guns before the Nazis took control, and lived under a dictatorship commanding overwhelming public support and military might, historians say. While it doesn’t fit neatly into the modern-day gun debate, they say, the truth is that for all Hitler’s unquestionably evil acts, his firearms laws likely made no difference in Jews’ very tenuous odds of survival.

“Objectively, it might have made things worse” if the Jews who fought the Nazis in the 1943 Warsaw ghetto uprising in Poland had more and better guns, said historian Steve Paulsson, an expert on the period whose Jewish family survived the city’s destruction.

It’s difficult to imagine how it could be worse than gas chambers and ovens to commit genocide, but they aren’t reluctant to cite an absurd comment like that because it’s a failing organization.  It’s a wonder anyone will write for or talk to them.

The record is clear.

… the Nazi seizure of power in 1933 was consolidated by massive searches and seizures of firearms from political opponents, who were invariably described as “communists.” After five years of repression and eradication of dissidents, Hitler signed a new gun control law in 1938, which benefitted Nazi party members and entities, but denied firearm ownership to enemies of the state.

Furthermore, regarding the specifics:

… control over weapons that have collapsible or telescoping capabilities, easy take-down and modularity, lights, no so-called “sporting purpose,” and magazines more than a pre-determined amount has its roots in Nazi Germany.

Again, the record is clear.  Today, potential enemies of the state includes everyone except law enforcement, and the controls that the current administration advocates are to be found in Nazi Germany.

No one has ever claimed that either the Obama administration or Adolf Hitler wanted the disappearance of all guns.  They just want guns in the “right hands.”

Reuters:

New York state lawmakers are considering amendments to the state’s sweeping new gun control law, including repealing a ban on magazines that hold more than seven bullets, Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Wednesday, describing most of the changes as technical.

The law, passed January 15, a month after the massacre at a Connecticut elementary school, also requires gun owners to register most guns with the state and requires universal background checks.

[ … ]

Cuomo and legislators have been discussing “technical corrections” to the law, the governor told a news conference.

A provision banning magazines that hold more than seven bullets beginning April 15 would likely be repealed, as magazines generally hold 10 bullets.

“There is no such thing as a seven-bullet magazine,” Cuomo said.

Under the proposal, gun owners would be barred from loading more than seven bullets at a time, he said, unless they are at a shooting range or participating in a competition.

First of all, regarding this issue of seven cartridges in the magazine, Kimber makes plenty such magazines for their 1911’s.  Second, please stop saying that bullets go in magazines, you ignorant moron.  Complete cartridges go in magazines.

But to the substance of the report, take careful note again what the Governor said.  At shooting competitions (we can guess they mean IDPA or 3-gun competitions or some similar event), shooters could load more than seven cartridges in their magazines.  Likewise for ranges.  But if they’re home preparing to defend their families at night, it would presumably mean that gun owners would be committing a felony by loading more than seven cartridges.

This assumes that anyone would be willing to defend themselves from a home invasion and then rather than unloading the balance of the magazine, they admitted to law enforcement that they had more than seven loaded.  Of course, it might take more than seven to defend against the home invasion, which is the point of this ridiculous dance anyway.

Note again.  Voluntarily acquiescing to load no more than seven cartridges in your magazines when you need them, and loading them up to capacity when you don’t.

This has to be the most stupid law ever proposed by the most stupid people on earth.  But of course regarding the people, we knew that already, didn’t we?

Denver Post:

Gov. John Hickenlooper signed bills Wednesday that place new restrictions on firearms and signaled a change for Democrats who traditionally shied away from gun control debate in Colorado – a state with a moderate streak and pioneer tradition of gun ownership and self-reliance.

Hickenlooper’s signature of the bills comes exactly eight months after dozens of people were shot in a movie theater in suburban Denver, the day after the executive director of the state’s Corrections Department was shot and killed at his home.

Police were searching for the person who killed Tom Clements, and trying to figure out if the attack was related to his job.

The bills require background checks for private and online gun sales and ban ammunition magazines that hold more than 15 rounds.

Hickenlooper was surrounded by lawmakers who sponsored the bills at the signing ceremony. Before signing the first bill, which requires purchasers to pay fees for background checks, he looked around with a solemn look on his face and then began signing it.

Every time he signed a bill, applause erupted from lawmakers and their guests …

So be it.  It’s now time for Magpul to leave and take its revenue and jobs with them.  When laws like this are implemented it’s always the duty of every individual to study the bill itself, sometimes including case law that ensues from the bill.  Gun forums don’t do justice to the complexity of most gun control bills, and every visitor to the State of Colorado is in danger of some sort of new violation of their laws, which most of the time would be felonies.  It just isn’t worth my time to study the law.

I have visited Colorado only once to ski in Breckenridge.  It was a wonderful experience, and sadly, one that will not be a recurring trip.  Not only will I not risk any sort of violation of their new law, but I won’t reward Colorado for their actions today.  I have friends and readers in Colorado and I don’t wish them ill.  But now that Colorado has been proven to be an anti-gun state, they will feel the wrath of gun owners and gun manufacturers.  They should consider their future through the lens of firearms at a time when their chief of the department of corrections was just gunned down.  Will the criminals have such a hard time getting what they want?

My treatment of Colorado won’t be any different than my treatment of other gun-control states.  I steadfastly refuse to drive through or even fly over New York, New Jersey, Illinois, or Maryland.  If I drive through with a weapon I must know their idiotic laws.  If I fly over with a weapon I might have to make an unscheduled landing in one of their cities.

I don’t take pleasure in seeing friends suffer under totalitarianism.  But when we look for work-arounds and fill in the gaps for others, we prevent the learning experience that comes from bad decisions.  Consequences bring the gift of wisdom.  For half a century now America has raised its children to avoid consequences, and partly for that reason we are where we are.

In this case, may Colorado get exactly what they have asked for, and exactly what they so richly deserve.   Tonight I will go home and order some Magpul hats, clothing and accessories (I already have their AR-15 magazines).  I will never again visit Colorado, and depending upon what other manufacturers do (Remington has made their bed, are you listening, Colt?  Rock River Arms?  Kimber?  Springfield Armory?), I will look for ways to reward the faithful and punish the wicked.  And there are millions of gun owners just like me.

Good grief.  Heritage again.

On February 26, the American Bar Association’s (ABA) Center for Human Rights issued a white paper on the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), which concludes that “the proposed ATT is consistent with the Second Amendment.” This conclusion neglects important facts about the treaty and the processes surrounding it, which we have explored in this four-part series.

We have shown that while we agree with several of the ABA’s contentions, it ignores the fact that the ATT—like many treaties—is not designed for a nation with a federal structure like the U.S. The ABA also ignores the fact that the ATT goes beyond import restrictions on firearms by requiring signatories to prevent the domestic diversion of imports. The treaty may also invite the executive branch to take executive actions to restrict and control the import of firearms into the U.S., imports which comprise about 35 percent of the new firearms market.

Finally, the treaty raises broader concerns about the application of transnational law to the U.S. These concerns are heightened by the fact that both foreign nations and some prominent legal scholars have identified treaties like the ATT as a mechanism to pressure the U.S. to change its domestic policies, and even to change the interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, including the Second Amendment.

The question, then, is what the U.S. should do about this. The U.S. is sensitive to allegations that it is failing to fulfill treaty commitments, and it rightly takes its treaty obligations seriously. Because the ATT is a process that is designed to evolve and grow, it is impossible to know where it will lead.

A new ATT conference begins today in New York, and we will be blogging from the conference.

Supporters of the ATT frequently defend it as entirely unrelated to the Second Amendment. Some opponents of the ATT criticize it as a nefarious plot against the Second Amendment. The truth is more complicated …

Listen carefully.  No, the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty isn’t really that complicated.  It is a nefarious plot against the second amendment.

We’ve covered this in detail before.  All that rubbish and claptrap about the treaty excluding civilians because it excludes civilian arms is a ruse.  What it does is what Feinstein and Obama want to do within the framework of U.S. law, and distinguish between so-called “military weapons” and “civilian weapons.”  Again – it doesn’t distinguish between you and a member of the professional military, it distinguishes between military arms and civilian arms.

It would make illegal all sorts of firearms currently in circulation, as well as subject you to a set of rules, licensing and governmental checks that would make what Obama has proposed look like free utopia.

Some things really are as they seem.  Can Heritage at least try to get it right next time?  Otherwise, it’s just wasted space and bandwidth.

David Codrea:

“Marcus Hook mayor under investigation over gun incident,” a Saturday Philly.com report revealed.

“The mayor of tiny Marcus Hook, who just last year was a guest at the President’s State of the Union address, is under investigation for allegedly shooting a gun in his house and giving alcohol to a 20-year-old whom he threatened to hold hostage,” the report continues.

On top of that, the report says Mayor James D. Schiliro “ordered a borough police officer to pick up the 20-year-old, who was at a friend’s home, in a police vehicle and bring him to Schiliro’s home.”

But David, don’t you understand?  Gun control is like all other laws.  It is all intended for the little people, not the special people.  You are little and the special people, well, they are special.  Understand?

Read the rest at Examiner.

The Obama administration is planning never before seen intrusions into the private affairs of U.S. citizens.

The Obama administration is drawing up plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive database that contains financial data on American citizens and others who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document seen by Reuters.

This will split our fiber backbone signals and dump every 1 and 0 that transverses it into government computers.  Every detail of life of all citizens is now subject to inspection and assessment by government overlords who can and will make decisions as to so-called “terrorist activity,” which could be al Qaeda or perhaps unorganized militia who prepare for any threat against the U.S., foreign or domestic.

This knowledge should be coupled with another stunning intrusion into our God-given rights we learned about today.  Bob Owens has a report for us.

Chuck Schumer’s S. 374, the Orwellian “Protecting Responsible Gun Sellers Act of 2013,” has been an empty shell… until he slipped in Amendment ALB13180 (PDF) today, which shows the “teeth” of the bill.  It is an extremely aggressive attempt to destroy the Second Amendment by isolating and criminalizing extremely common behaviors among gun owners.

Doubt me?

Take a looking at a sampling of what it Sebastian notes it would outlaw:

• If you leave home for more than 7 days and leave anyone at home, that becomes a felony illegal transfer. 5 years in prison for each of you.

• if you take a friend shooting and allow him to fire your gun, that is a felony illegal transfer. 5 years in prison for each of you.

• If you have a gun lost or stolen and don’t report it within 24 hours, you’ve committed a felony. 5 years in prison.

• If you lend a gun to someone for to try out at the range, provide a loaner for a student in training, let your son shoot a rifle you purchased while hunting, or provide a gun to a woman for self-defense, you’ve committed a felony. 5 years in prison for each of you.

Bob ends his assessment with the following almost desperate interdiction.

It’s inching closer.

May God have mercy on us all.

See also reaction at WRSA.  It’s possible, of course, to forestall such an eventuality, even if unlikely.  For example, the states who are currently considering or have passed laws against enforcement of federal gun laws could actually take their state laws seriously.

If such a federal law were to pass, a state could decide to confiscate and immediately destroy all form 4473s in all FFLs in their state, and warn FFLs to contact state police if any ATF agents enter their premises.  State police could arrest any federal agents who attempted to enforce federal gun laws and place them into the general prisoner population in state penitentiaries.  Threats to arrest state police or stop these actions could be met with National Guard troops to further effectuate the arrest of federal agents and enforce a cease and desist action to all federal employees, including federal judges who moved against such actions.

But this would have to happen all across the nation for it to be effective, and I find it unlikely that a governor would take these actions, regardless of the posturing that we currently see by the states.  The concept of States’ rights has fallen too hard and too far, and federalism has lost its appeal in the U.S.

Short of something like this, I am becoming increasingly pessimistic about a possible recovery of our national character.  When the people demand cradle to grave security and overwatch, the state responds with cradle to grave demand for omniscience for itself and cradle to grave compliance by the people.  It’s a deal with the devil for our soul, and America has made it a long time ago.

If this sounds judgmental, then I plead guilty.  Based on religious doctrine, which the epistemologists might call strongly held truth value, or incorrigible beliefs, I hold that gun control is evil.

The Bible does contain a few direct references to weapons control. There were many times throughout Israel’s history that it rebelled against God (in fact, it happened all the time). To mock His people back into submission to His Law, the Lord would often use wicked neighbors to punish Israel’s rebellion. Most notable were the Philistines and the Babylonians. 1 Samuel 13:19-22 relates the story: “Not a blacksmith could be found in the whole land of Israel, because the Philistines had said, “Otherwise the Hebrews will make swords or spears!” So all Israel went down to the Philistines to have their plowshares, mattocks, axes, and sickles sharpened…So on the day of battle not a soldier with Saul and Jonathan had a sword or spear in this hand; only Saul and his son Jonathan had them.” Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon also removed all of the craftsmen from Israel during the Babylonian captivity (2 Kings 24:14). Both of these administrations were considered exceedingly wicked including their acts of weapons control.

Gun control is like control over everything else.  The key word here is control.  It is at one and the same time a function of wicked rulers and a benchmark, or barometer or gauge, to measure their wickedness.  God doesn’t cede or relinquish rule over His creation for mankind, and totalitarian governance usurps the authority He demands over the actions of mankind.  God will not be mocked – He does the mocking.

God sits in the heavens and laughs and scoffs at the designs of man (Psalm 2:4).  Here is a warning to totalitarian rulers.  “Do homage to the Son, lest He become angry, and you perish in the way.”  Judgment will come, here or in the hereafter, and perhaps sooner and more unexpectedly than you think.

The only explanation for Senator Schumer’s totalitarian dictates is that he believes that Americans will go along with it.  To be sure, there are many who will … who will take measure of the situation and decide that they value peace and security over measurements of right and wrong.

But there are many who will not go along with such laws.  They will not allow themselves or their children or their friends or loved ones to be imprisoned for failing to take their weapons to a public armory when they go on trips, or loaning a rifle to their son to learn to shoot at the range.

We have covered this ground before.  Bob reacted the way he did because he understands in a way that the totalitarians and wicked rulers in Washington do not.  These measures will not stand.  They will fall, one way or the other.

Will our wicked rulers turn back before it’s too late?  Only God knows, but only time will tell us.  Here is a final warning: do not cross lines from which there is no return.

In the mean time, this isn’t your father’s country.  Welcome to Amerika!

UPDATE: Thanks to David Codrea for the attention.

David Codrea:

Dear Capt. Kelly,

Houston, we have a problem: Your story makes no sense.

You’re against rifles like the semiautomatic AR-15, which look like weapons of war, when you know full well the military doesn’t use them, but instead uses the select fire-capable M16. Yet you go to a dealer to buy a .45, a sidearm, which was actually, in your words, “designed for the military.” I’m not following your logic here.

You say as you were leaving the gun store, you noticed a used AR-15 and bought that, too. You then complain about your background check, and use that to attack private sales which don’t undergo background checks. I’m not following your logic here.

Consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.  Or at least this is so for progressives.  Recall:

Yes, the left still loves guns.  There is no other reason for the fawning acceptance of the vulgar SWAT raid tactics in which innocent men like Mr. Eurie Stamps get shot and killed.  These tactics are repeated all across America every day. The left just doesn’t love guns in the wrong hands, and anyone who isn’t an agent of the state is the wrong hands.

Read the rest at Examiner.  Mr. Kelly doesn’t feel the need to be consistent like he demands for the little people.  He’s special and we’re not.  We’re the little people.  We look to the government for our protection, but he decided that he can do better than that for himself.

So thinks and lives our elitist rulers.

Ammoland has two extremely depressing reports.  We already knew that Eric Cantor and Paul Ryan were pretend conservatives with plans to cave on universal background checks.  This first report makes it sound even worse.

[The] Republican Majority Leader is leading the charge to cut a deal with President Obama.

The following are just some of the threats to innocent school children and our God-given 2nd Amendment liberties that Republicans are about to shove down our throats:

1.The NRA is cutting backroom deals to centralize gun owner data collection into the Obama/Holder massive government data base.

A centralized system is less costly to fight and far more lucrative for the NRA to appear to be “fixing“.

Like all establishment political lobbies the key to their job security is assisting in making problems they end up being called upon to “fix“.

2. Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor is leading the charge to give Obama and Holder what they want in exchange for appearing to be “fixing” the problem of innocent children being butchered in our public and private schools.

3. Newly appointed Republican Judiciary Chairman, Bob Goodlatte R-VA 6th District, is providing political cover for the sneaky back room gun control deals and gun grabbing sell outs that his political masters – – John Boehner and Eric Cantor – – are cutting with Obama and his corrupt Attorney General, Eric Holder.

Political insiders have confirmed to me,  that Goodlatte earned his brand new chairmanship by ignoring the constitutional demands and grievances of every Republican Unit Chairman in his own 6th district.

And for the second report.

You might think that with Republicans in control of the US House of Representatives there would be no way ANY gun control legislation could reach the floor.

But sadly we are already beginning to see so-called “conservative champions” folding to pressure from the anti-gun media to sell-out gun owners.

Former Vice Presidential candidate, Congressman Paul Ryan, has stated that he would support legislation that bans private sales at gun shows.

In the House, Majority Leader Eric Cantor, along with the help of Rep. Scott Rigell (VA), Patrick Meehan (PA) and others, have stated openly that they will work together with anti-gun Democrats from Maryland and New York to tighten restrictions on private firearms sales and expand background checks.

Possibly even more upsetting has been Senator Tom Coburn’s willingness to work alongside anti-gunner Chuck Schumer (NY) to propose “bi-partisan” anti-gun legislation in the Senate.

Make no mistake, so-called “expansion” of background checks is little more than a blatant attempt by anti-gunners to register all firearms and gun owners in America.

That is why Representatives Steve Stockman (TX-36) and Paul Broun (GA-10) have drafted a letter to Speaker Boehner and the Republican leadership urging them to require the support of the majority of Republican members in the House before bringing any anti-gun bills to the floor.

This so-called “Hastert Rule” would mean that 117 Republicans would have to support a particular bill before it had any chance of getting a floor vote, not just the support of the anti-gun elitist in leadership.

Such political ploys would be unnecessary if the GOP weren’t filled with such weasels.  I cannot vouch for the accuracy of these reports, but I have followed Cantor and Ryan for a while now on firearms freedoms and gun rights, and it doesn’t surprise me in the least.

It’s fascinating that the GOP leadership would be willing to sacrifice their careers on the altar of political correctness.  And it will cost them their careers.  I don’t know how else to say it other than to keep repeating myself.  The gun owners who recently waited in lines for three or more hours to pay exorbitant prices for guns were not repeat buyers (long time gun owners like me already had most of the firearms we wanted and so we are purchasing ammunition now).  They were first time buyers.

I’ve watched them at the ranges.  I have overheard their conversations, I have watched them at the gun stores and gun shows.  I have heard their relatively ignorant questions (not ignorant because they’re stupid, but because they’re in the process of learning).  They are not us.  We already have guns.  These are new gun owners.  The polls they are trotting out to show the number of gun owners  decreasing are all lies.

I don’t know whether the questions aren’t being honestly answered or what other source there could be for the error.  But the polls are in error.  Don’t believe them.  And as for older gun owners like me, and even the newer gun owners like I have monitored for the past half year, we have made it clear with our voices and wallets.  No new gun laws.  None.  Period.  Not one more inch.  Not one.

Is this so hard to understand?  Note to legislators.  Tread carefully.  Don’t cross lines from which there is no return.

UPDATE: Sebastian believes that this is weak tea.  Whatever.  Look, I said that I could not vouch for the source of this information.  What I did say is that Cantor and Ryan are essentially dead to me.  They have both advocated universal background checks before, and that fact is undeniable.  Coming to their defense is strange and not at all something I would do.  What I also said is that the general thrust of the reports doesn’t surprise me based on my previous work to follow these two sellouts (and I do mean to say that Paul Ryan and Eric Cantor are sellouts – you simply cannot convince me otherwise because you don’t have the evidence).  Also, not that I dislike Breitbart.com, but I have never read anything they had to say about this issue.  What is the source behind the Ammoland reports?  They will have to answer that.  Finally, I note that Sebastian didn’t interact with me on this issue, just Ammoland.

Kurt Hofmann deals with this silly notion in the MSM these days that the number of gun owners is declining.  It’s a false assertion, but after addressing it, Kurt observes:

The gun prohibitionists want lowered gun ownership not only because they dislike guns and gun owners, though. The NYT article cuts to the chase:

“It also raises questions about the future politics of gun control. Will efforts to regulate guns eventually meet with less resistance if they are increasingly concentrated in fewer hands — or more resistance?”

The notion that gun ownership is declining is an article of faith among advocates of oppressive gun laws, because it is, after all, easier to trample the rights of minorities, as we have discussed before. As noted in that column, this is likely the reason that groups like the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence so often describe the U.S. as a “democracy,” rather than acknowledging that we live in a republic.

Yes, and here is another article that describes an analogous concept, where local LEOs are in charge of deciding who may have a concealed handgun permit (or even permit to purchase) in lieu of “shall issue” statutes.

South Carolina is currently considering legalization of open carry.  Texas is also considering such a law, and while there are all kinds of irrational fears that grip legislators when they consider this kind of thing, I can assure them that nothing they fear comes to pass.  I live in an open carry state, and the sky does not fall every day.

These are Jim Crow laws, and the idea behind them is the same as the one behind demonization of gun owners in general that Kurt analyzes.  The difference here, and something that the legislators should consider, is that we won’t be easy to trample underfoot.  We have guns.

Note to legislators.  Tread carefully.  Don’t cross lines from which there is no return.