Posts Tagged ‘Gun Rights’

Scott Walker shakes hands with Democrat challenger Mary Burke. While the two may have differed on guns, their agreement on amnesty means the long game is in her favor.
Scott Walker shakes hands with Democrat challenger Mary Burke. While the two may have differed on guns, their agreement on amnesty means the long game is in her favor.
Photo by Darren Hauck/Getty Images

On the surface, Scott Walker seems like a gun owner’s dream candidate for president. The Wisconsin governor is backed by the National Rifle Association, which lauds his signing into law concealed carry and castle doctrine legislation. The “On the Issues” political leadership website notes Walker opposes restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms.

It’s unsurprising then, that NRA Director Grover Norquist has co-authored a piece for Reuters explaining “What makes Wisconsin’s Republican Governor Scott Walker a good choice for 2016.” But in this case, Norquist is wearing a different hat – that of president of Americans for Tax Reform, teaming with ATR’s director of state affairs, Patrick Gleason.

So what’s not to like? Don’t both issues track with greater freedom? Where’s the conflict?

Wearing that different hat, Norquist campaigned for and endorsed Bob Dold for Congress, in spite of the “Republican’s” support for restricting gun purchases and possession which was known at the time. The unsuitability of Dold’s Democrat opponent notwithstanding, NRA Director Norquist chose his priorities and endorsed a known gun-grabber who went on to accept an award from the Illinois Council Against Handgun Violence.

There’s an issue besides taxes Norquist has yet another hat for: immigration. Just like Barack Obama, Norquist endorses rewarding alien nationals who have broken U.S. law by entering and remaining in this country illegally with a “pathway to citizenship.”

And Walker agrees with him. Again, per “On the Issues,” he endorses that pathway reward. He wants to increase the legal influx of foreigners as well, and has flip-flopped on an Arizona-style bill that would allow police to stop suspected illegal immigrants. And while he has also supported Arizona’s attempts to deny state benefits to illegals, his pathway policy would soon render that a moot point.

So what does that have to do with gun rights?

Data compiled by the Pew Research Center shows overwhelming preference among “unauthorized immigrants” for the Democrat party. And the Democrats, as part of their official party platform, call for “strengthening our background check system … reinstating the assault weapons ban and closing the gun show loophole.”

“Immigration reform will add over 8,000,000 anti-gun voters to the voting rolls,” Gun Owners of America warned its members and supporters in a January 24 alert. “There may be as many as 11.5 million persons illegally in the United States … [I]f illegal immigrants were given citizenship, they would vote for liberal, anti-gun candidates by an 8-to-1 margin.”

Is it any wonder Obama’s Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson insists all illegal aliens “have earned the right to be citizens”?

The problem is, GOA is alone among national gun rights advocacy organizations to make the connection, and to insist it be a factor in determining whether or not a politician truly supports the right to keep and bear arms. Why the “gun control” groups keep quiet about illegal immigration is understandable. Those in it for the long haul, who hope and believe Americans can be disarmed within a generation, recognize that this can give them an unbeatable political majority within a decade or two, to remake the legislatures and courts and reverse all the legislative and judicial victories gun owners have gained to date. But why the National Rifle Association has avoided recognizing and warning members of this real threat, opting to avoid it altogether with a “single issue” explanation, is harder to understand.

http://www.examiner.com/article/scott-walker-trial-balloon-from-nra-director-ignores-amnesty-danger?CID=examiner_alerts_article

Pay attention to the last paragraph-why is it that only GOA is advocating for pro gun politicians to also be opposed to amnesty,and allowing illegals to remain here,and become citizens.

Anyone with just a bit of common sense knows that these “new citizens” will vote predominately Democrat-and allowing over 5 million of them to become citizens is simply adding 5 million more Democrat voters to the rolls-this is EXTREMELY dangerous to gun rights.

The ONLY reason more gun control schemes have no become law is because of the GOA and similar groups-although with JPFO being taken over by Gottleib-both they and the Second Amendment Foundation could end turning into a mini NRA,and giving up gun rights in “compromises” with lawmakers-

FUCK THAT!
We need to have pro-gun groups who do not compromise,who do not surrender ANY part of our right to keep and bear arms. No retreat-no surrender-we do not give up ANY part of our gun rights in ANY “compromise”.
Gov. Malloy's latest "report" confirms he's not interested in any information that does not promote an incremental citizen disarmament agenda.
Gov. Malloy’s latest “report” confirms he’s not interested in any information that does not promote an incremental citizen disarmament agenda.
Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images

Unsurprisingly, a report released Friday by the Connecticut Office of the Child Advocate prioritizes placing the blame for the “Shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School” on ownership of firearms, with particular emphasis on the semi-automatic kind that can accept standard capacity magazines. The “findings” are the result of direction from the Connecticut Child Fatality Review Panel “to prepare a report that would focus on Adam Lanza [and] develop any recommendations for public health system improvement that emanated from the review.”

That administration functionaries concluded impeding the right to keep and bear arms would be a “public health system improvement” is also unsurprising. An advocacy role in itself is telling, along with the office’s allegiance to Gov. Dannel Malloy though his appointment of “primary author” Sarah Eagan to head a state agency that holds powers of intervention and subpoena.

“Access to assault weapons with high capacity magazines did play a major role in this and other mass shootings in recent history,” the government polemic masked as authoritative study results declares, in the first of 13 references to the term “weapon” contained in the report. “Our emphasis on AL’s developmental trajectory and issues of mental illness should not be understood to mean that these issues were considered more important than access to these weapons or that we do not consider such access to be a critical public health issue.”

That “conclusion” is restated several times, along with several side trips obviously intended to further demonize private gun ownership.

Along with “gun-related homicides in Australia … The firearm-suicide rate dropped 65 percent,’” the advocates claim, citing a 2010 “study” in the American Journal of Law and Economics This was after meaningful gun control regulations which outlawed possession of assault weapons were passed following a mass shooting.”

Interestingly, the much-touted Australian experience is not all those with an agenda to advocate for defenselessness would have us believe. No less an authority than The British Journal of Criminology observed “The Australian situation enables evaluation of the effect of a national buy-back, accompanied by tightened legislation in a country with relatively secure borders. AutoRegressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) was used to predict future values of the time series for homicide, suicide and accidental death before and after the 1996 National Firearms Agreement (NFA). When compared with observed values, firearm suicide was the only parameter the NFA may have influenced, although societal factors could also have influenced observed changes.”

http://www.examiner.com/article/connecticut-child-advocate-report-on-newtown-argues-for-gun-bans?CID=examiner_alerts_article

Barely two weeks after Washington State voters approved Initiative 594 — a measure the NRA warned was “deeply flawed” — our predicted consequences are beginning to emerge.

Under I-594’s restrictive language, a person simply handing his or her firearm to another is presumptively required to broker this “transfer” through a gun dealer.  This also necessitates the accompanying background check, fee, paperwork, taxes and, in the case of a handgun, state registration.

Proponents of the initiative had assured voters that fears of this overreach were exaggerated.  Prior to the vote on I-594, Geoff Potter, spokesman for 1-594 proponents Washington Alliance for Gun Responsibility, said I-594 “simply applies the current system of background checks to all sales.”

As recounted in a Washington State news report, however, the Lynden Pioneer Museum has opted to pull eleven loaned WWII rifles currently on display and return these firearms to their collector owners before the “transfer” requirement in I-594 takes effect next month.  The reason?  The law contains no exemptions for firearms loaned for museum displays, or loaned for similar educational or cultural institution study or uses.  Once the law takes effect, the firearms could not be returned to their owners without the mandatory background checks and all the logistics and expenses that entails.

The museum director in Washington came to this decision reluctantly but unavoidably.  “I read through the law about 10 different times looking for a loophole,” he said.  He found none.  Unfortunately, there is no guidance at the state level because Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson has reportedly not formed an opinion about I-594, and no authoritative interpretation of the initiative is available to the public, apart from the text of I-594 itself.  In the meantime, the museum’s attorney has stated he would welcome assurances from the state that it would not enforce the law to the detriment of the museum or the owners of the firearms on display.  To date, however, no such assurances have been forthcoming.

http://www.nraila.org/news-issues/articles/2014/11/ill-conceived-washington-state-background-check-initiative-already-causing-absurd-outcomes.aspx

Earlier this month, an accused white supremacist in Florida named Marcus Faella was sentenced for two counts of the “crime” of “paramilitary training.” The sentence he must serve is six months in prison–vastly less than the 30 years he might have received. From WFTV 9:

The man found guilty of leading a white supremacist group in Osceola County has been sentenced to six months in jail.

Marcus Faella could have faced up to 30 years in prison after being found guilty on two counts of paramilitary training, but he instead got only a few months.

The “white supremacist” accusation, if true (and there appears to be some question about that, according to witnesses called by the defense) paints Faella as an unsavory, and indeed reprehensible, individual. But it does not–cannot, in a free society–make him a criminal. As National Gun Rights Examiner David Codrea notes in his online journal War on Guns:

As for the guy being a racist, if he hurt anybody, prosecute him. If he didn’t, life is full of distasteful people. Tolerance doesn’t mean approval, as much as some insist otherwise.

But rather than Faella’s specific case, let’s look at the Florida law he was convicted of violating (one count of “paramilitary training by teaching,” and one count of “paramilitary training by participation”). Couldn’t, after all, any kind of training intended to make a militia more effective (or “better-regulated”) be considered “paramilitary training”? Well, the law is a bit more specific than that:

(3)(a) Whoever teaches or demonstrates to any other person the use, application, or making of any firearm, destructive device, or technique capable of causing injury or death to persons, knowing or having reason to know or intending that the same will be unlawfully employed for use in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder within the United States, is guilty of a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

(b) Whoever assembles with one or more persons for the purpose of training with, practicing with, or being instructed in the use of any firearm, destructive device, or technique capable of causing injury or death to persons, intending to unlawfully employ the same for use in, or in furtherance of, a civil disorder within the United States, is guilty of a felony of the third degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084.

Well, OK, then–the training is only illegal if intended to prepare people to engage in civil disorder. Who could object to that?

Well, anyone who thinks to ask who gets to define what constitutes “civil disorder,” and determine the intentions of the teachers and participants in the training. The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, after all, designates as “insurrectionists” anyone who dares utter that the purpose of the Second Amendment is to guarantee the people’s means of resisting a tyrannical government. That list includes even mild-mannered gun rights advocates.

The Brady Campaign expressed outraged indignation when National Public Radio profiled the Southeast Michigan Militia as a benign organization that prepares to help maintain civil order, rather than reinforce the anti-gun groups’ preferred narrative of militias as terrorist groups.

And the Florida “justice” system is definitely on board with a wide open interpretation of what constitutes paramilitary training intended to foment “civil disorder.” According to another WFTV 9 article about the Faella case, a conviction for the “crime” of “paramilitary training” does not even require the prosecution to prove any specific plans on the part of the accused:

http://www.examiner.com/article/does-florida-outlaw-a-militia-becoming-well-regulated

A New Mexico Op-Ed says citizens do not have a right to own guns under the Second Amendment.
A New Mexico Op-Ed says citizens do not have a right to own guns under the Second Amendment.
Dave Workman

Anyone who honestly believes that the battle over firearms rights is finished could consider an Op-Ed in the Saturday edition of the Santa Fe New Mexican on-line to be the proverbial splash of cold water, as author Hank Bahnsen insisted that “There is no Second Amendment right to own guns. So intended the founders!”

Bahnsen’s 481-word essay elicited only three reader comments yesterday, but more importantly, illustrated the continued divide between firearms owners and gun prohibitionists. No amount of Supreme Court language in the Heller and McDonald rulings will change things, apparently. While Bahnsen is entitled to his opinion, it is likely to rub a lot of his fellow citizens the wrong way.

It may explain why one California sheriff seemed compelled the other day to explain in a website post that his agency will apparently need to be dragged kicking and screaming, as the Calguns Foundation put it, into compliance with the recent Peruta decision. Calguns quote from that decision, noting, “[T]he Second Amendment does require that the states permit some form of carry for self-defense outside the home,” Peruta v. County of San Diego, 742 F.3d 1144 (9th Cir. 2014) at 1172 (emphasis in original), because “carrying weapons in public for the lawful purpose of self defense is a central component of the right to bear arms” (Id at 1175).”

But Sheriff Stanley Sniff’s public information officer reminded readers that, “Residents are reminded that California CCW issuance is discretionary by the police chief or sheriff, and is based upon both reason of (1) self-defense or self-protection, AND (2) good moral character.” (Emphasis in the original document.)

Question: Who defines “good moral character?” Where in the job description of a county sheriff can that authority be found?

If there is “no Second Amendment right to own guns” and only people of “good moral character” can be allowed to carry firearms with government permission in California, what does that say about where the country is, and where it may be headed? Perhaps one answer could be found over the weekend in a two-part treatise by John Richardson at “No Lawyers, Only Guns and Money.”

Richardson first examined the passage of Initiative 594, the 18-page gun control measure, in Washington earlier this month. In the second installment, he made some predictions about where similar efforts, apparently to be supported by anti-gun billionaire Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown For Gun Safety lobbying organization, might pop up next.

One reason Richardson identified some states as ripe for the kind of gun control in I-594 is explained thusly: “The next factor that I thought would have an impact was the proportion of the state’s residents that were actually born there. I call this the ‘Californication’ factor. In other words, people move from California to other states such as Nevada, Oregon, and Washington and bring their California attitudes with them. We see a similar pattern in the East as in-migrants from states like New York, New Jersey, and Massachusetts have altered the politics of states like Florida and Maine.”

http://www.examiner.com/article/there-is-no-second-amendment-right-to-own-guns-says-n-m-man

Nevadans for Background Checks submitted a ballot measure petition with over 246,000 signatures as the next step emulating a successful effort in Washington State, Dave Workman noted Thursday, citing a KTNV News report. That move, Workman recalled, had been predictable, along with expected efforts in other states.

The Nevada effort was warned against in this column last August, in its revelation that, far from being a group springing up from the grassroots, Nevadans for Background Checks is a front group backed by Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety organization. The corporation name was reserved with the Nevada Secretary of State by the same New York law firm that represented Everytown’s trademark registration. The Political Action Committee was headed by the Everytown treasurer, who also directed the I-594 Action Fund in Washington State.

That was all part of a well-planned and funded effort to expand “action group” efforts to the states reported in this column, initially in July of 2013, and warned of again in December of last year because no one else seemed to be noticing. It’s hard to organize against developing threats if the existence of where they are and how they’re structured is unknown.

Significantly, the KTNV “legitimate news media / real reporter” story mentioned none of this. I guess letting Nevadans know outside special interests are trying to buy an election isn’t newsworthy and/or doesn’t help advance the agenda.

http://www.examiner.com/article/bloomberg-background-check-expansion-to-nevada-part-of-warned-against-plan?CID=examiner_alerts_article

A court ruling that dramatically loosened California’s restrictions on concealed firearms came closer to taking effect Wednesday, as an appeals court quashed legal maneuvering that might have staved it off.

As a result, sheriffs all over California — including the Bay Area, where many are reluctant to grant concealed-carry permits — could soon have to hand them out based on nothing more than the applicant’s stated wish to carry a gun for self-defense.

Currently, some sheriffs require applicants to prove a specific threat to their safety requires a concealed weapon while other sheriffs don’t. Those in most urban counties hand out permits by the dozens; those in many less-populated rural counties hand them out by the thousands. The court ruling involved a San Diego sheriff’s restrictions.

The state is one step closer to removing the concealed weapons permit decision from police chiefs and sheriffs, said Sam Paredes, executive director of Gun Owners of California. “We’re starting to smell the hint of freedom in the air, and it smells good,” he said.

http://www.mercurynews.com/california/ci_26923154/concealed-gun-ruling

COLUMBUS — In the few weeks remaining in the legislative session, lawmakers may send Gov. John Kasich a bill eliminating the legal duty of Ohioans to retreat from danger before using deadly force to protect themselves.

“A person facing a life-threatening situation should not have a duty to flee and hope for the best,” Rep. Terry Johnson (R., McDermott) told the Senate Civil Justice Committee weighing his bill containing numerous changes to Ohio gun laws.

“They should have the right to protect themselves and protect their loved ones.”

House Bill 203 passed the House nearly a year ago by a bipartisan vote of 63-27. It has drawn comparisons with Florida’s controversial “Stand Your Ground” law.

Florida’s law was tried in the court of public opinion but not in the actual courtroom when George Zimmerman was accused but acquitted in the 2012 shooting of unarmed teen Trayvon Martin.

But Dr. Johnson noted that Ohioans in such situations would still have to show they acted in self-defense and did nothing to escalate the danger. Under Florida’s law, the prosecutor bears the burden of proving the shooter did not act in self-defense.

“Ohio is one of the toughest states in the union to prove self-defense,” Dr. Johnson said. “In other states you don’t have nearly that barrier to get across.”

“Nevadans for Background Checks collected about 250,000 signatures, according to Kayla Keller, a spokeswoman for the group. It currently takes 101,667 signatures from registered Nevada voters to qualify an initiative for the ballot”

We all know the following is bullshit-numbers produced by wording questions so those who take the poll provide a predetermined answer.

As usual-the anti-gun zealots pushing this garbage are using lies,half-truths, and obfuscation.

There is no way in hell that even 50% of the people of Nevada support this crap-no gun owner I know would support giving the government even more control over our right to keep and bear arms. Lies,false and misleading question on polls-and likely on the ballot initiative-are how these leftist tools produce their false numbers of supporters-wonder how many dead voters signed their petition?

“On the gun issue, polls show that more than eight out of 10 Nevadans support expanding gun background checks to private sales, including over the Internet and at gun shows, advocates say. Now, such checks are required only by licensed gun dealers to prevent felons, the court adjudicated mentally ill and domestic abusers from legally buying guns.”

“The gun background check initiative is supported by the Everytown For Gun Safety Action Fund, a group launched by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg who is spending tens of millions of dollars on efforts to influence elections and ballot measures in states. He spent some $40 million in the recent election, according to Politico.

If enough signatures are found to be legitimate, the initiatives would first go to the Legislature, which has 40 days to act on such measures. If lawmakers pass it and the governor signs it, the measure becomes law. If the Legislature does nothing or if the governor doesn’t sign it, an initiative goes on the ballot.

If lawmakers amend the measure, both the original version and the amended measure would go on the ballot. If both pass with more than 50 percent of the vote, the one with the larger number of “yes” votes becomes law.”

http://www.reviewjournal.com/politics/elections/pot-gun-control-measures-could-be-headed-nevada-ballot

Bellicose Demanding Moms have proven as easy to dupe and exploit -- by pushing emotional buttons and letting their ignorance do the rest -- as Obamacare supporters.
Bellicose Demanding Moms have proven as easy to dupe and exploit — by pushing emotional buttons and letting their ignorance do the rest — as Obamacare supporters.
Photo by John Moore/Getty Images

Employing the same cynical political strategy and contemptuous duping of “stupid” voters as Obamacare promoters, Michael Bloomberg’s Moms Demand Action relied on deception to exploit ignorance, prejudices and fears in the midterm elections, a Gun Rights Examiner analysis of social media messages on TPM Livewire demonstrates. The professionally-produced “Explain Your A” campaign featured in the story targeted three Republican candidates who had received high marks from the National Rifle Association: Carl Domino of Florida, Paul Chabot of California, and Larry Kaifesh of Illinois.

“Does your A grade from the NRA mean you support gun rights for suspected terrorists?” the attack on Domino read. Along with his picture, the Moms included a photo of Al Qaeda’s American-born propaganda tool, Adam Gadahn, whose previous affiliations in the “gun control” debate were with anti-gunners shamelessly exploiting another lie, that full-auto weapons could be bought without background checks and IDs at U.S. gun shows.

“Does your A grade from the NRA mean you support the rights of felons to buy and own guns?” the hit piece on Chabot asked. His portrait was paired with a heavily tattooed prisoner behind bars.

“Does your A grade from the NRA mean you oppose taking guns from domestic abusers?” the smear against Kaifesh insinuated. Accompanying his picture was the image of a distraught, heavily-mascaraed woman with her fists clenched against her cheeks suggestive of both Edvard Munch’s “The Scream” and MacCaulay Culkin in “Home Alone.” For some unexplained reason, the model in the staged photo shoot has what appears to be masking tape across her mouth — either that or she’s wearing a turtleneck like Mort from “Bazooka Joe” comics. With these crazy MILMs, who the hell knows?

“If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don’t have to worry about answers,” novelist Thomas Pynchon noted in “Gravity’s Rainbow.” In this case, the minds behind the Moms ask those questions for us in order to manipulate emotions and suppress critical examination. After all, who wants terrorist, gangbangers and wife-beaters shooting victims?

The targets of the misleading Bloomberg hit pieces are enabling nothing of the sort, of course. And nothing being demanded would stop the bad guys anyway.

If a person is a known threat, public safety demands he be apprehended. If he’s only a suspected threat, there’s this little protection we’re supposed to have called due process, where people get a trial, are proven guilty and are sentenced. What they’re going for here is a “terror watch list” for guns, as if tipping off those who are under surveillance makes for smart intelligence work. What they’re also going for is people who are not in custody being stripped of fundamental rights and liberty, not that the Bill of Rights means anything when you‘re a “progressive” with an agenda to shove down throats. Besides, there’s another, bigger deception going on: These people are using fear of an Al Qaeda boogeyman to justify deprivation of liberties they really want extended to those they paint as domestic terrorists – that is, anyone who believes the right to keep and bear arms is a legitimate deterrent to tyranny, and in a last-resort right to rebellion.

OK, but what about felons, that is, people who have already received their due process? We’ll put aside my longstanding contention that anyone who can’t be trusted with a gun can’t be trusted without a custodian, and focus on the way things are. Such criminals are already prohibited by law from having a gun – for all the good that does at stopping them. What the Bloombergians want here is to end all lawful (!!!) private sales and transfers, done under another deception as we’re seeing unfold in Washington State, so-called “universal background checks.” And yes, of course they’re aware that the National Institute of Justice produced a “Firearm Violence Prevention Strategies” report in which it concluded “Effectiveness depends on the ability to reduce straw purchasing, requiring gun registration…”

So of course what they really want is gun registration (something the gun-grabbers know felons are exempted from, because requiring it of them would violate their right against self-incrimination). If all they really intended was to ensure recipients of firearms transfers were legally eligible, “common sense gun safety advocates” would be promoting a Blind Identification System, which could verify no legal impediment to a transfer exists but record no information identifying either gun buyers or what they purchased. And, again of course, the real reason they want registration is to facilitate confiscation.

http://www.examiner.com/article/bloomberg-moms-political-spots-relied-on-deceptive-voter-manipulation?CID=examiner_alerts_article