2008 – Page 278 – Shall Not Be Questioned

More on the New Jersey Issue

Armed and Safe doesn’t like the legislation either, but mentioned one thing I wanted to talk about:

The amendments also remove language specifying that the legal owner of a lost or stolen firearm who complied with the reporting requirements would not be civilly liable for any damages resulting from a crime.

Yep–the bill initially contained language that would protect the owner from liability stemming from his being the victim of a crime, but the legislators, in their infinite wisdom, removed that provision.

That’s actually a bit we wanted them to remove. Currently there is no tort that exists for a person being held responsible for the criminal misuse of property that was stolen from them. By removing liability on the part of a gun owner who reported a lost or stolen firearm, the legislature would have been implying a tort did exist for those gun owners who failed to report a lost of stolen firearm under this statue. Therefore a gun owner in violation could not have only been fined, but also could be sued by the victims.

Not too Late for New Jersey

The vote is today.Â Call your senators and ask them to oppose this legislation.

Gun Safety Is Back!

Joe is right that it’s old news, but I hadn’t seen it in the media for a while.Â Now it’s back just in time for the elections.

The families say they want to make sure guns are not allowed on college campuses. And they want lawmakers to require that everyone who purchases a gun in Virginia first go through the FBI’s instant background check system that blocks felons and the mentally disturbed. Although federal law requires background checks, it applies only to federally licensed firearms dealers. No checks are required when a private dealer sells weapons at a gun show. Fifteen states have closed what gun safety advocates call the “gun show loophole.”

Emphasis mine.Â Can you get any more biased than that?Â At least they were kind enough to call us gun-rights advocates rather than the “gun lobby”.

I don’t doubt that these folks are undergoing a serious grieving process over the loss of their loved ones, but none of the bills they are proposing would have stopped Cho from being a murderous asswipe.Â We have already fixed that problem.Â I feel for these people, but once they choose to enter a political scuffle, the laws they are advocating should not be beyond debate, nor should their position be given absolute moral authority.Â We should not decide public policy based on grief and emotions.Â The family members of Virginia Tech victims are advocating removing liberty from their fellow citizens, and that should create the utmost burden for them in terms of defending that position in the public sphere.Â A pity the Washington Post doesn’t seem to feel that way.

It Was One Year Ago Today …

… that Bitter said to me in a text message “You should really be blogging”, which got me started on this whole thing. Ironically the first post was about taking another girl shooting. A lot has happened since I posted about that. Wow. We’re at 2288 Posts, 8468 comments, 173,000 visits, and more than half a million page views, all in the last year. What kind of things am I proud of this year?

Well, starting to date Bitter is something to be proud of, though, hopefully no one hates me too much for taking her off the market. Hopefully everyone thought our April Fools Joke was funny. I was shocked our readers thought we had that bad a taste :)

I got people’s attention with a feature I called “Full Auto Day“, in honor of Congressman William J. Hughes, who ruined that bit of fun for all of us. That got a lot of people to notice me, and got me a lot of Google love, that is still coming in to this day.

There was the infamous Zumbo incident, where I think the new media demonstrated it had developed real power. That’s the point where I first noticed the anti-gun folks like to believe we take marching orders from the NRA. The NRA didn’t weigh in until after it was all over.

I got the Brady Campaign’s attention first here. Peter Hamm’s appearance later provided a lot of amusement as well. I helped expose one of their board members as a sock puppet.

Virginia Tech was an awful tragedy, that a certain anti-gun group wasn’t above using for fund raising. NRA, fearing threats from Democrats on new gun control, hijacked Carrie McCarthy’s NICS bill and turned it into something good for gun owners. Other groups saw opportunity to take NRA down a few pegs, and begin spreading nonsense about the bill. I was happy to refute much of that on more than a few posts.

Philadelphia City Councilman Jim Kenney telling me “F*** you” was one of my highlights of the year.

Bitter and I attended the NRA Annual Meeting and Exhibits in St. Louis. We got to meet a lot of good people in the pro-gun rights movement, like Dave Kopel, Dave Hardy, and Robert Cottrol. I found myself at one point sitting across from Joaquin Jackson. The annual meeting was where the idea that NRA and bloggers needing to work together more was hatched in a conversation between some bloggers. We didn’t know at the time that NRA was getting the same idea.

Which brings me to perhaps my proudest blogging accomplishment for the year was showing up at the fall NRA board meeting as Scott Bach’s guest, and ending up in a room talking to Chris Cox about how NRA could work with blogs. While the end result of this was not wheelbarrows full of cash coming our way, or bloggers getting marching orders from the NRA, Chris was kind enough to send out his Director of Grassroots and Media Liaison out to the Gun Blogger Rendezvous in order to get ~~barbecued~~ asked difficult questions by gun bloggers for an hour or so. The relationship with NRA has been progressing along nicely, and we hope to really further it with the Second Amendment Blog Bash in Louisville this May.

The year 2007 was pretty good for this blog. I am very thankful that you all read, comment, and support me in this endeavor. I hope you will all stay tuned in 2008, where we’ll have an election, and plenty of other activity. 2008 will be a nail-biting, pivotal year for gun owners, because this will be the year we either start settling this issue politically, or we begin the process of losing our gun rights, and probably any measure of a constitutionally limited government along with it.

Hold on to your seats folks, 2008 is going to be a bumpy ride.

Losing in New Jersey

Looks like those bills are passing. Here’s how they think of honest gun owners in The Garden State:

Failing to report a loss or theft could result in fines of $500 for a first offense and $1,000 for all subsequent offenses.

Assemblyman Louis Manzo, D-Hudson, said the intent is to force straw purchasers to either risk large fines and exposure to lawsuits or report to law enforcement they’re losing handguns in bulk.

“Taken alone, as they would be for an honest firearms owner, the fines are not financially devastating. But for straw purchasers, who would have to report 10, 20 or even 50 guns at or near the same time, problems quickly start to arise,” Manzo said.

Yeah, I mean, it’s only a few thousand dollars for you honest gun owners who get a gun stolen but don’t know about New Jersey’s onerous reporting requirement. It’s not a big deal right? Not to mention the humiliation of being put through the ringer by the legal system. Louis Manzo can go to hell.

I do want to make a point that a lot of folks over in New Jersey, particularly Scott Bach of the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs, have worked very hard to try to defeat these bills. It’s worth pointing out that the bills that eventually passed are far less bad than they would have been had it not been for the efforts of ANJRPC. Why don’t you drop Scott a note and thank him for the effort he’s put into this. It’s New Jersey, so we won’t always win, but we have to fight there, and it helps those people who decide to stay and do that on our behalf to know their efforts are appreciated.

Heller Brief

Looks like DC filed it on time.Â I guess you have to hand it to their attorney, who’s timeliness was rewarded by a sacking.

Hat Tip to Dave Hardy

Moralistic Vandalism

Eric has a post about eco-loons who run around keying SUVs.

People who are moralistic about their evil are worse — far worse — than ordinary criminals. As far as I’m concerned, those who think it is right to vandalize a stranger’s car for political reasons have shown themselves to be completely lacking in conscience.

I couldn’t agree more. I wonder if Eric knows about our friend Lynn Hoffman’s book “Bang! Bang!” where the protagonist engages in an act of this kind of vandalism against members of a fictional pro-gun rights organization. Anything is justified as long as it happens to the right people I guess.

A Letter to Mike Sullivan

I’m glad to see this is happening, at least.Â As I’ve said before, there’s a big difference between grassroots opposition to Sullivan and the NRA coming out officially against him.Â It seems they have decided to take the route of trying to engage Sullivan, rather than try to defeat his nomination.Â Combined with the hold placed on his nomination, will this be enough to get his attention and do something?Â I hope so.Â We’re stuck with Sullivan for another year, even if he never gets confirmed officially for the job.Â Who we have after that is anyone’s guess.Â The only long term solution to this problem is to pass HR4900.

Can Britney Own a Gun?

With all the talk about the Iowa Caucuses, we can’t, of course, forget about the important matters.Â It looks as if Britney Spears has been committed!Â Now, while I’m not one worry too much about whether celebrities live or die, I wouldn’t be particularly unhappy if we could end this huge national trauma by Britney offing herself.Â Â But as Bitter was wondering earlier, can she even buy a gun?

It has now emerged that she is reportedly being held under a so-called “5150 hold” within a unit at Cedars Sinai hospital in Los Angeles, according to TMZ.com.

A “5150” order means staff believe there’s evidence she is a danger to herself or others. The California order allows a clinician or officer to involuntarily confine a person, and requires signs of mental disorder and/or grave disability.

5150 holds are observational, and thus don’t qualify you for a firearms prohibition under federal law, but California law is different.Â Under California law, you are not permitted to possess or purchase a firearm for a period of five years after your commitment, unless you request a special hearing to have your rights restored.Â Now, if it is determined that Britney is mentally disturbed, and the state decides to pursue a 5250 commitment, that is considered an involuntary commitment under federal law, and she would be barred for life (until HR2640 becomes law, that is, and there is a process for restoration of rights).Â California law doesn’t treat 5150 or 5250 commitments differently for the purposes of firearms possession.

Of course, that’s just the law.Â Would you sell that nutty woman a gun if you had a gun shop? Â I wouldn’t either.

Compromise

Robb Asks:

Waiting periods for firearms purchases will be waived if the person purchasing the firearm has, on their possession, a firearm (unloaded, of course).

Because waiting periods are to “cool off”. If you already own a gun (and simply having it on you means you have plenty of access to it) then there is no reason to make you wait for another.

Any takers on why this would be a bad / non workable idea?

In California, or any other jurisdiction that already has a waiting period, this would be a good compromise to make.Â In a situation where the passage of a waiting period is a political inevitability, it would be a good compromise to make.Â Absent that, don’t make it.Â The only time you ever offer a deal is when there’s a good chance you’re going to lose anyway, or you’ve already lost, and you’re just trying to make things less worse.