Archive for the 'Guns' Category

David Codrea:

Per The Omaha World-Herald, “Bruning was one of 18 state attorneys general who signed a letter sent by the National Association of Attorneys General, urging the Senate to confirm Holder’s nomination.” He also, per that report, declined to talk about Fast and Furious “gunwalking” that happened on Holder’s watch.

“Mr. Holder is a known quantity to some of us,” the 2009 letter sent to then-Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy and then-Ranking Member Arlen Specter stated, as if that was a good thing, especially considering Mr. Holder was indeed a known quantity to gun rights proponents at the time the letter was written.

Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning is in the middle of a controversy – he always seems to be – on the denial of weapons rights to a long standing legal Mexican resident.

This is a detailed and involved articled by David, one that you really need to read, both to be educated and to understand my response.

First of all, the NRA has absolutely got to do better at ranking politicians than they do.  On the other hand I have talked to them via phone and to their credit they do a fair to good job of keeping abreast of issues and politicians.  Oftentimes a politician is disingenuous and cites an NRA ranking that was done well before a given candidacy in which they claim that it applies.  So the NRA needs to do better (of course they do), and politicians need to stop lying (like they ever will).

Now let’s get to the issue of guns and Mexicans.  If you read David’s prose and the accompanying comments from well-educated readers, you will see that they all support gun rights for legal residents.

Here is a news flash.  So do I.  I wonder from time to time about going abroad on short term mission trips and also lament the fact that most of the locations to which I would go do would not allow a weapon to be brought into the country.  And then I think hard about my God-given duty to protect myself.  Ultimately, if you do something like that you must be cognizant of the fact that you are sustaining a certain risk that you cannot ameliorate.

In fact, I even favor the restoration of guns rights for non-violent felons, and I do not believe in the rehabilitative power of prisons (indentured servitude is the best way to pay debts, since a debt is not to society but to individuals).  But I need to discuss some caveats.  God gives us our rights, the state merely recognizes them.  One commenter observes that the Second Amendment nowhere says that it applies only to citizens.  True enough, that’s beside the point.

The Second Amendment doesn’t grant us a right.  It says that the federal government cannot impinge on that right.  And it doesn’t speak to state governments.  That’s why – in my opinion – listen carefully here before you ascribe to me something I am not saying – state constitutions also need clearly to outline a man’s right to weapons, and the local laws clearly need to support that doctrinal stand.  As advocates of states’ rights and tenth amendment advocates, we need NOT to turn to the federal government for delineation of our rights, even on the state and local level.  The constitution and bill of rights doesn’t delineate our rights, it restricts the federal government from impinging on certain rights.  Those rights also must be protected at lower levels of government.  Here I strongly recommend reading Clarence Thomas And The Amendment Of Doom.

Regarding illegal aliens (or residents if you want to call them that), I strongly oppose such rights (that is, right to have guns).  Just as God grants them a right to self defense, He grants us a right to protect our borders.  His right to self defense doesn’t outweigh our right to national sovereignty as long as there is a remedy available to him that doesn’t also impinge on any other rights, i.e., becoming legal.  These are carefully thought-out stipulations and explanations – do you need to read them and think about them again before reacting?

These are all controversial issues, but ones that we needed to discuss.  You may disagree with my take on the Second Amendment (and believe that it speaks to states), and I accept that disagreement.  But if you turn off your interest knob after reading the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution, I continue my interest to the State Constitutions.  I have more work to do than you.  But I strongly believe that governance is best when the political fight happens first and foremost at the local and state levels.  Our founding fathers saw a much weaker central government than do we, and the notion that they would have had to turn to a national document to show their rights is preposterous.  Our founders believed that they were stipulating behavior and framing in the centralizers.

I was noticing the nice, new weapon this Syrian jihadist was toting around, and especially that high powered glass he is sporting.

If I was a Muslim jihadist, who has vowed to slaughter Christians once the U.S. “liberates” Syria and who likes to kill babies, maybe I could get some of that U.S. taxpayer love Obama has promised.

Instead, I’m a Christian.  But I sure would like to have another gun and some high powered glass, so I’ll have to work and pay for mine myself rather than use U.S. handouts.  Somebody has actually got to work and hold down a job these days.

Business Insider:

Bad idea: holding up a store clerk who happens to be proficient in firearms.

Worse idea: holding up a store clerk who is not only proficient in firearms, but who also happens to be an Iraq war veteran and a former prison guard and private investigator.

Jon Lewis Alexander, 54, is no ordinary store clerk. He has worked several “high risk” jobs and served four tours of duty in Iraq during his 30 years in the U.S. military.

And his training shows.

Video surveillance from Saturday night captures the moment a would-be thief entered the Marionville, Mo., store where Alexander works. The thief hesitates for a moment and pulls a gun — but not fast enough to dissuade Alexander from pulling his own Walther PPX 9 mm handgun and sticking it in the hapless thief’s mouth.

[ … ]

Alexander said the man walked in smoking a cigarette, which he was promptly told to put out. The thief then reached for his gun and demanded “all the (expletive deleted) money,” News-Leader.com reports.

The veteran reacted quickly, throwing down the thief’s arm. Alexander then drew his own weapon and, according to the report, threatened to “blow his (expletive deleted) head off.”

Pistol at his side, the thief backed away slowly and then bolted from the store. The store clerk remembers being amused by the fact that he “didn’t even bother holstering his weapon.”

Seriously.  In the dude’s mouth.  “Here boy.  Taste the business end of the gun.”  On a serious note, he responded very quickly to the threat.  His actions were seamless, fast, determined and confident.  I hope I react the same way to any potential threat.

Fox News:

A pair of Democratic lawmakers are proposing steep new taxes on handguns and ammunition, and tying the revenues to programs aimed at preventing gun violence.

Called the “Gun Violence Prevention and Safe Communities Act,” the bill sponsored by William Pascrell, D-N.J., and Danny Davis, D-Ill., would nearly double the current 11 percent tax on handguns, while raising the levy on bullets and cartridges from 11 percent to 50 percent.

“This bill represents a major investment in the protection of our children and our communities, and reflects the long-term societal costs of gun and ammunition purchases in our country,” Pascrell said.

The lawmakers say the bill would generate $600 million per year, which would be used to fund law-enforcement and gun violence prevention.

Critics predicted defeat for the measure.

“What the anti-gun interests can’t ban, they want to tax it out of existence,” Alan Gottlieb, chairman for the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, told FoxNews.com. “It’s nothing more than confiscatory taxation.

“I doubt this bill will pass, but we will lobby against it if need be,” he added. “This is simply another shot against gun owners in this country.”

The bill would exempt all federal, state and local agencies, including police departments, from paying the tax.

The bill would also increase the transfer tax on all weapons (except antique guns) covered under the National Firearms Act (which excludes most common guns) from $200 to $500 and index to inflation and  increase the transfer tax for any other weapon from $5 to $100.

I don’t care much about the increase in fee for the tax stamp, since I will never, ever register a firearm with the ATF or pay a tax stamp.  But the philosophy is that if we cannot beat them at an outright ban, then we can tax them to the point that they cannot afford to own weapons or ammunition.

This approach is both irrational and unconstitutional, not to mention immoral.  But something must source the massive expansion of the federal Leviathan, and the Congress has figured out that we will not give up our guns or our shooting.  Feed the beast, even if it makes use of what they loath so much – our freedoms.  It sure must seem a Faustian bargain to them.

Business Insider:

A recent poll suggests Americans will consider the gun debate a pivotal point in the 2014 elections. So we wanted to explore how Americans kept the right to bear arms in the first place. As it turns out, grammar is the culprit.

Take a look at 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.”

That little, red comma caused the Supreme Court to strike down D.C.’s ban on handguns, the country’s strictest gun control law to date.

Before the Supreme Court heard the case, the D.C. circuit court of appeals nixed the ban, too. “According to the court, the second comma divides the amendment into two clauses: one ‘prefatory’ and the other ‘operative.’ On this reading, the bit about a well-regulated militia is just preliminary throat clearing; the framers don’t really get down to business until they start talking about ‘the right of the people … shall not be infringed,'” The New York Times reported.

Gun control proponents argue the founders used commas more frequently than common English today, Ross Guberman wrote in his legal writing blog. Some historians even claim that many states ratified a version of the Second Amendment with only two commas, not three. The extra commas don’t mean much in that context, the argument goes.

Straining at a literary gnat to swallow a camel.  This is what happens with you superimpose literary criticism over the inherent rights of mankind.  The title of the commentary is telling: “How a comma gave gave Americans the right to own guns.”

The author, poor Christina, believes that rights are granted by the state, as she was no doubt taught by her college professors.  Nay, Christina.  God gives us rights and you cannot take them away.  Neither can any state – all a state can do is formally recognize what God has granted.

As for the silly argument over commas, let’s hurry the death of this debate by a simple observation.  Rather than turn to grammar to understand how the colonialists thought, recall how they saw weapons in their day.

In the colonies, availability of hunting and need for defense led to armament statues comparable to those of the early Saxon times. In 1623, Virginia forbade its colonists to travel unless they were “well armed”; in 1631 it required colonists to engage in target practice on Sunday and to “bring their peeces to church.” In 1658 it required every householder to have a functioning firearm within his house and in 1673 its laws provided that a citizen who claimed he was too poor to purchase a firearm would have one purchased for him by the government, which would then require him to pay a reasonable price when able to do so. In Massachusetts, the first session of the legislature ordered that not only freemen, but also indentured servants own firearms and in 1644 it imposed a stern 6 shilling fine upon any citizen who was not armed.

Whatever else you might find significant in one comma, two commas or three commas, and whatever else you think the second amendment means, it cannot possibly mean something contrary to the way the colonialists believed and behaved.  And thus it cannot possibly mean that they intended to garrison all weapons in an armory controlled by the state.

Christina needs to do some historical reading, as do most Americans.  A comma cannot take away your God-given rights any more than it can grant them to you.

Missoulian:

A federal appeals court on Friday ruled against state laws designed to buck federal gun rules — but advocates welcomed the court’s decision for leaving open the possibility of an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday agreed with a lower court’s decision against the 2009 Montana Firearms Freedom Act, which also has been adopted in other pro-gun states. The laws attempt to declare that federal firearms regulations don’t apply to guns made and kept in that state.

The Justice Department successfully argued that the courts have already decided Congress can use its power to regulate interstate commerce to set standards on such items as guns. Some gun control advocates sided with the federal argument, saying that “firearm freedom acts” would allow felons to obtain guns without background checks and make it harder to trace guns used in crimes.

The Montana Shooting Sports Association said it had expected the appeals court would rule against the law.

The group’s president, Gary Marbut, argued in the case that he wanted to manufacture a small, bolt-action youth-model rifle called the “Montana Buckaroo” for sale in Montana. The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms pre-emptively told Marbut such a gun would be illegal under Montana law.

“This was about as good of a ruling as we could have expected from the 9th Circuit. We must get to the U.S. Supreme Court to accomplish our goal of overturning 70 years of flawed Supreme Court rulings on the interstate commerce clause,” Marbut said in a release. “Only the Supreme Court can overturn Supreme Court precedent.”

The state of Montana has intervened in support of its law. The case also attracted the support of Utah, Alaska, Idaho, Michigan, Nebraska, South Carolina, South Dakota, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Marbut said the federal government has become a “monster,” that abuses the interstate commerce clause to intrude on states.

Yes.  The federal government has become a monster.  Justice Clarence Thomas is said to be the modern day jurist of the tenth amendment.  But he may be alone, and turning to the monster to slay the monster is bad form and unwise.  It is more likely that they will simply bow to stare decisis and make matters even worse by giving the commerce clause more modern legs, or refuse to hear the case, letting the Ninth Circuit’s decision stand.

And this notion that the Ninth Circuit only did what they could do is ridiculous.  The Ninth Circuit has come down with many a decision that was overturned by the Supreme Court.  For once, when it actually had to do with liberty and freedom the Ninth Circuit had the chance to do something right – and failed again because they’re all losers.

As I’ve said, nullification laws have the legs under them that the states put there.  Montana could have incorporated the company (perhaps they already have) and then arrested federal employees who attempt to enforce federal laws (and thrown them in with the general prison population).

The monster will never admit that he is a monster.  He wants you to fear him and bow to his monstrous intentions and behavior.

No, that’s not my preferred title, but the one used by Adam Winkler:

Adam continues, “The idea that the Second Amendment gives people the right to revolt against government is broadly shared among gun rights extremists” (Adam is referring to people like me – Adam would have been a loyalist during the revolutionary war, I would have charged up King’s Mountain against the loyalist troops) … “The insurrectionist understanding of the Second Amendment fails to account for two other features of the Constitution. First, the Second Amendment itself includes a preamble referring to the necessity of a “well regulated militia.”

Here Adam continues with the well-worn and tired claptrap about well-regulated meaning controlled by the state.  Bob Owens has the must-read defeater argument on this, but since Adam won’t care about this I won’t spend time recapitulating what Bob says.  Adam can continue to wring his hands and worry over things, and we can move on to one salient observation about Scalia.

I have long lamented what I perceive to be the weakness of Heller versus D.C.  But perhaps Scalia really does understand that the Second Amendment has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with hunting or self defense, and has everything to do with ameliorating tyranny.  And perhaps Scalia knows that the Supreme Court had to bite this off in chunks.  If so, this is a welcome evolution in Scalia’s thinking – at least as it pertains to what he feels free to say out loud.

And oh, by the way, the Hughes amendment was an unconstitutional obscenity.

UPDATE: Kurt Hofmann writes me, observing that: ” … Mr. Constitutional Law Professor is already lost, when he talks about any bill in the Bill of Rights giving rights.  Besides, my position has always been that the Second Amendment does not protect “the right to revolt,” but protects the right to the means of effective revolt.  When revolt becomes necessary, a Constitutionally protected “right to revolt” wouldn’t matter, even if there were one, because by then, the Constitution will no longer be relevant.”  Good points.

Thanks to David and Mike for the attention.

The Tennessean:

One of the nation’s largest gun manufacturers, Remington Arms, has looked at sites around Nashville for a potential corporate relocation or expansion that would likely include hundreds of manufacturing jobs.

The Madison, N.C.-based company, which is part of the nation’s largest firearms company and has its largest plant in Ilion, N.Y., has scouted sites near Nashville’s airport, Lebanon and in Clarksville, Tenn.

Remington is among a growing number of gun manufacturers nationwide that have been courted by states pitching themselves as more gun-friendly. The wooing came after a handful of states, including New York, passed tougher gun control laws in the aftermath of last December’s shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., which claimed the lives of 20 first-graders and six educators.

Remington’s roughly 1,200-employee plant in Ilion makes rifles such as the Bushmaster semiautomatic weapon, which is now banned under New York’s Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act, the first law passed by any state post-Newtown.

In addition to the much stricter definition of assault weapons, which now includes semiautomatic pistols and rifles with detachable magazines and one military-style feature, the New York SAFE Act banned magazines that contain more than seven rounds, required instant background checks on all ammunition purchases at the time of the sale and required mental health professionals to report concerns about a gun-owning patient who posed a risk of harming himself or others.

Quick passage of that law upset not only the gunmakers, but also residents of that state who own certain guns, said Erin Crowe, office coordinator for the Mohawk Valley Chamber of Commerce in Utica, N.Y. “Ilion, New York, is Remington — if it wasn’t for Remington, Ilion wouldn’t exist,” she said. “There’s not a lot of new industries coming to central New York, so if you take a huge company like that and they leave, our unemployment rate is going to skyrocket.”

People familiar with Remington’s exploration of sites said the company looked around the Nashville area as recently as within the past month …

In Middle Tennessee, firearms maker Barrett already has 100 employees at its headquarters and manufacturing plant in Murfreesboro. And the National Rifle Association booked Nashville’s Music City Center convention hall for its 2015 annual convention with about 5,000 delegates.

Analysis & Commentary

This would be a welcome change.  Cerebus / Freedom group, as we’ve seen, purchased numerous smaller gun manufacturers and closed out business while moving said manufacturing to Ilion.  They conglomerated and centralized, and that is good neither for small businesses nor the communities they serve.  There is a difference between buying to make businesses more efficient from business model changes, and buying in order to close down the competition.

Furthermore, in spite of the silly, fawning article National Review did on the plant in Ilion, gun owners never forgive and never forget.  As we’ve discussed, see the Smith & Wesson boycott for a lesson in payback.  Doubtless, Remington Arms didn’t support the recent New York gun laws.  Nevertheless, at least a fraction of money going to purchase Remington products made in Ilion goes towards taxation for a totalitarian state to continue to do their thing.

In the end, I would have preferred that Remington relocate based on principle.  But as I have previously remarked, I am in the market for a good bolt action rifle and was looking at the Remington 700 series.  I am no longer considering Remington at all (for a 1911 either) because of the fact that Remington is primarily located in New York.  Some of my readers weighed in similarly.  With this change, if Remington indeed relocates its plant in Ilion, perhaps I’ll reconsider.  If principle cannot force Remington to move, then perhaps market pressure can.  Ruger is already ahead of the game.

Finally, I would prefer that Remington consider South Carolina.  Remember, anywhere in S.C. is no more than several hours from one of the best beaches on earth and some of the most beautiful mountains on earth.  Then again, Middle Tennessee ain’t bad.  Remington should be encouraged to move.  Their employees can enjoy the vista at Mount Le Conte and Clingman’s Dome within a few hours drive from where they will live.  They will find good churches, and the people are warm and friendly.

Make it happen without delay.

CNN:

… a 12-year-old girl jogging in Michigan is among the latest victims in a spate of bear attacks that have left seven people mauled in five states since Thursday.

Abby Wetherell was out on her nightly jog when she was ambushed by a black bear Thursday outside her home in Cadillac, Michigan. She tried to run at first, but, “It just took me down,” she told CNN’s Piers Morgan Live.

“It clawed me and it was growling,” she said. “It was scary.”

Eventually, she said, she played dead, hoping it would go away. It did, but not before inflicting cuts and scrapes to her face and deep gashes on her legs that required dozens of stitches.

“I just thought I was going to die,” she said. “It was very terrifying.”

After the bear left, Abby ran toward a neighbor’s house, screaming for help. The bear came after her once again, but neighbors were able to scare it away, she said.

Her father, Chris Wetherell, heard her screams and ran out of the house with a gun, but the animal was gone by then, he said.

Authorities also reported attacks in Alaska, Colorado, Wyoming and Idaho …

“The common belief that surprising a mother bear with cubs is the most dangerous kind of black bear encounter is inaccurate, the University of Calgary said in a summary of the study. “Instead, lone male black bears hunting people as a potential source of food are a greater cause of deadly maulings and related predatory attempts.

Other recent incidents include:

A hunter mauled by a bear in Alaska survived 36 hours in the remote wilderness before rescuers found him using night-vision goggles, the Alaska National Guard said Saturday.

A bear clawed its way into a tent and bit a sleeping camper on her arm Thursday night, CNN affiliate KCNC reported.

Two hikers at Yellowstone National Park were injured Thursday after the encountered a female grizzly bear and a cub. The sow charged the hikers, leaving claw and bite marks on one, park officials said.

Two habitat technicians collecting data in Shotgun Valley, Idaho, were injured Thursday when a grizzly bear charged, the Jackson Hole Daily reported.

Or how about 15 stray dogs in Houston, Texas, mauling a woman, or maybe 8 or 9 dogs in Fargo, North Dakota and the man they mauled?  Hey, smart boy, tell me the story one more time about how we don’t need high capacity magazines.  It’s my favorite fairy tale.

Prior: Backpacker Shoots Grizzly In Denali, First Life Saved Since Firearms Legal

As if we could take any more, Piers Morgan and Bob Costas talk guns.

As part of an hour-long conversation conducted in front of a live audience, the man who’s hosted a record nine Olympic games shares his stance on gun control and firearm legislation, offering a response to those that suggest assault weapons with high-capacity magazines are necessary as a means of self-defense:

“They always present this theoretical – ‘well, what if there’s not one or two invaders to my home, what if there’s 10 or 12 and after I’ve killed the first eight or nine, I need to reload?’,” quotes Costas. “Yes, let me know when that happens. And between now and when that happens, sadly, there’s going to be another Aurora, there’s going to be another Newtown.”

We all know that Piers Morgan is a liar, so there’s no need to rehearse that.  But Bob wants us to let him know when someone actually needs a high capacity magazine to defend his life.  Well, here you go Bob.  It happened before you ever did this stupid interview.  It has to do with Mr. Stephen Bayezes.

We may suppose that Costas wants it to happen this way instead (via David Codrea).

I never really had any respect for Costas as a sportscaster anyway.  I think he is an amateur.