2009 – Page 65 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Heeding God’s Call Feeling Vindicated

One of the members of the group that protested outside of Colosimo’s is feeling vindicated with the arrival of federal charges:

Little did we know that while we were meeting the U.S. Attorney’s office was charging Mr. Colism with falsifying statements and failing to keep accurate records. On a practical level, it appears that our activities may have called attention to this particularly notorious gun dealer, and moved the process along in bringing him to justice. On another level, today feels like a vindication of our efforts, and an affirmation that God is indeed working in and through our efforts.

Is he being brought to justice though? I’ll one up you, Professor. I’m going to suggest the US Attorney is going easy on this guy rather than throwing the book at him. I would like to understand why. The accusation is that he knowingly sold a firearm to a person he knew not to be the actual buyer of the firearm, and that those firearms were later recovered from criminals. In the reports, he’s accused of doing this not once, but ten times over the course of five years. Yet the US Attorney’s office isn’t pressing charges against Mr. Colosimo himself, but rather against Colosimo, Inc, the corporate entity. This basically puts the maximum penalty at a fine and probation for the corporation, which means a judge gets to oversee the operation of the corporate entity. Â There’s no jail time involved. I would argue that if Mr. Colosimo knowingly sold firearms to straw purchasers, he ought to be facing charges himself.

The US Attorneys office seems to be proceeding with a Prosecution by Information, which means that Colosimo’s has waived its right to have the evidence in the case presented to a Grand Jury. Usually a defendant will not do this unless they intend to plead guilty to the charge. This leads me to believe the US Attorney likely cut a deal with Colosimo, either because they didn’t see any use in prosecuting an old man, or because they weren’t confident in taking a case forward against Colosimo himself, and cut a deal where the corporate entity agreed to plead guilty.

But I don’t just meant to question the US Attorney’s office over why they are going after the company and not the man, I also think the ATF needs to explain, if the US Attorney has had evidence that Colosimos was knowingly selling to straw buyers, why it allowed Colosimos to continue operating? I would assume ATF has inspected this dealer in the past? What did they find? If it warranted charges, why was his FFL not revoked?

Lots of questions still in this case. Hopefully we’ll get answers as more information comes to light.

New NSSF Video

Over at SayUncle, he’s highlighting a new video from the National Shooting Sports Foundation on AR-15s.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqj23j7smVU[/youtube]

Caleb has also highlighted it as good work. I think how good it is depends on the intended audience. Is this something aimed at general media, or outdoor media who mostly write about hunting? Â Because which audience this is targeted to depends on whether or not I think it’s a good video.

If this is a video aimed at educating general media, I’m not a big fan. It’s certainly not a bad video, but I think it underestimates how unfamiliar many journalists are when it comes to hunting and shooting issues. We all know that no one would hunt with a machine gun, but how many journalists know that? I think the video’s big problem is failing to address the fact that an AR-15 is not a machine gun. Any time you present this issue to laymen, this needs to be stressed. You don’t even really need to say it in this context — just showing an animal being taken by a single shot from an AR-15 would be sufficient to get the point across.Â I would also question why the hunting context would be used? I fully recognize that the public views hunting as a legitimate use of firearms, but NSSF’s own research has shown public perception of the shooting sports is better than hunting, and AR-15s are ubiquitous in several types of popular competitive shooting sports. But that’s assuming the target audience is general media, which it might not be.

If the target audience is outdoor media, basically the Jim Zumbos of the world, in an effort to help them understand the issue, I think it’s a pretty good video. Those folks will know the difference between a semi-auto and a machine gun, and will know no one hunts with the latter. In that instance they really just need to understand how technology and the culture is changing, and I think this video accomplishes that goal.

I guess another question is, what kind of outreach we need to be doing more of? Reaching the outdoor community or reaching the general public? I’m generally of the opinion that the latter is more important, and I hope to see more good work from NSSF targeted at that audience, particularly in relation to the shooting sports.

I Don’t Think This Will Help Obama …

… keep the hippy vote. Remember kids, the Democrats are the party of choice.

Colosimo Facing Gun Charges

Looks like the U.S. Attorney’s office in Philadelphia is bringing charges against James Colosimo of Colosimo’s gun shop. According to another source, the charge is related to false statements and bad record keeping:

Patty Hartman with the US attorney’s office says that Colosimo’s, the well-known Philadelphia gun dealership, is being charged with knowingly selling guns to people who would not be the actual gun owners:

“The information alleges that there were 10 firearms that were “straw purchased” from Colosimo’s Inc. from on or about August 4th, 2004, through on or about April 18th, 2007.”

We’ve previously been supportive of Colosimo’s when they were targeted by overzealous activists, but a US Attorney is a different matter. Â If they are indeed guilty of what is alleged here, I have no problem with harsh punishment, but it will be up to a grand jury to decide whether the prosecution has enough evidence for this to proceed to a trial.

UPDATE: Maybe not:

Jim Colosimo, the owner of Colosimo’s Gun Center on Spring Garden Street near Ninth Street, was not personally charged. He could not be reached for comment last night.

The charges against the business were contained in a criminal information, which means the defendant waived the right to have the case heard before a grand jury. A criminal information can mean the defendant will plead guilty, though that is not always the case.

The information charges the gun dealership with making false entries in gun-sales records by listing three buyers as the firearms purchasers “when the defendant knew or had reason to believe that each person was not the actual buyer, but was a straw purchaser.”

That seems to be really unusual to me. Why didn’t ATF pull his FFL if they were aware of this? Plus, they are charging the corporation rather than Colosimo himself, even though the law allows for him to be prosecuted personally? If he’s selling guns to criminals, knowingly, and it can be proved, shouldn’t the US attorney want to put Colosimo in federal prison? It seems to me that would be appropriate. Why charge the company? I will definitely keep abreast of developments in this case.

Added Some New Media Bling

I decided to try out the Tweet This plug-in for WordPress, so folks can more easily share my posts via other new media. Â Well, really mostly so I can publish select links to my Twitter account, but if you want to use the links, I won’t complain about the extra traffic and exposure.

Making a Difference

It’s amazing what you can do for the Second Amendment in just a few minutes. As you all know by now, Sebastian and I are NRA Election Volunteer Coordinators that assist pro-gun candidates in finding NRA members who want to be politically involved to help keep Pennsylvania pro-gun. It’s not a terribly time consuming task, and it pays off when we hear that candidates specifically recognize gun owners as making a difference to their campaign.

I had a phone conversation today with a State Senate candidate and his Campaign Volunteer Coordinator who are gearing up for a special election next week. Rep. Bob Mensch is running for the open Senate seat in district 24, and yesterday we announced NRA-PVF’s endorsement in the race. Rep. Mensch’s opponent has been dodging debates and interviews, and she doesn’t exactly seem to be up on relevant state issues – something important for those who want state office. I haven’t seen her say a word about gun rights, only a friend of hers claiming in one interview that she used to hunt. So this could be potentially bad news for gun owners if this seat goes from an A rated candidate to an unknown who, at best, has her friend pay a simple platitude to hunting.

But back to that phone call. Knowing that they have the endorsement of NRA-PVF is huge news to Rep. Mensch’s campaign. Even though they are polling ahead of the Democratic candidate, it’s a seat that her party wants to win. In a special election where people may forget to vote, it’s vitally important that we make sure gun owners and other friendly-to-the-cause voters show up. So that is where Rep. Mensch needs our help. I’m about to put out an email to all of our contacts up here with the call to action, and information on how they can at least get a sign up in their yard even if they can’t help on Election Day.

I can’t tell you how excited the campaign staffer was over that offer to get the word out to those willing to volunteer. Just knowing that they have the NRA endorsement and then to have us call the very next day offering to try and scrounge up volunteers, they were so appreciative. The volunteer coordinator couldn’t express enough how much it meant to have a gun owner call and ask how to make the biggest difference for the campaign. Ultimately, these are the actions that make things go smoothly for us at the State House. These are the things that you can do to make a difference in your state – a tangible difference.

As easy as it is to just pound away on the keyboard, and as much as I do think new media is useful, these types of activities – picking up the phone and offering to help, and getting involved at the local level – are what make the most difference when it matters on an important vote. So with that in mind, I’m going to head up to the district on Tuesday and help with the GOTV operation. I may even poke Sebastian and see if he wants to go up this weekend and contribute a few hours. I think even he was rather amazed in November when at the end of a two hour calling shift, you could look down and realized you just reached 200+ voters, or in doing on precinct walk, you hit 50 households of voters. That kind of local reach is hard to do with a new media, so these kinds of traditional local political activities ought not be discounted by those who spend time in the internet world.

Don’t Let MAIG Get Away With This Snow Job

It’s been in media reports from around the country. Â MAIG isn’t a gun control group. Â They are only opposed to illegal guns. See the comments by Lancaster Mayor Rick Grey:

Gray, a Democrat running for a second term, spoke of a push by the National Rifle Association to pressure mayors to quit the Mayors Against Illegal Guns group. He said he would not be bowed by the NRA, and he affirmed the group’s efforts to curb illegal guns, while calling on his election opponent, former mayor Charlie Smithgall, to do the same.

Or Boyertown Mayor Marianne Deery:

Deery said the National Rifle Association has distributed postcards that read, â€œYour mayor, Marianne Deery, joined a national anti-gun group.â€

â€œThat can be no further from the truth,â€ the mayor said. â€œI am against illegal guns.â€

â€œI will always stand up to fight for the second amendment of our Constitution,â€ Deery said. â€œI do believe that we have the right to own and bear arms.â€

She said MAIG also supports the second amendment.

Let me show for you a graphic originally presented to me by our friend Carl in Chicago. It’s undisputed that the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violent is a group that advocates for more gun control and advocates for gun bans. Â Let us take a look at MAIG’s positions versus the Brady Campaign positions:

Position on Federal Legislation	MAIG	Brady
Prohibit National Carry Reciprocity	x	x
Repeal Tiahrt Amendment	x	x
Criminalize private gun transfers	x	x
Prohibit gun sales to those on terrorist watch list	x	x
Prohibit gun dealers to liquidate inventory	x	x
Oppose BATFE modernization	x	x

Position on State Legislation
Require lost or stolen reporting	x	x
Support regional data-sharing on gun owners	x	x
Support microstamping requirements	x	x
Prohibit carry on city-owned public property	x	x

Click on the links on the “x” for attribution of the organizations respective positions. There is no doubt folks, MAIG is a gun control group trying to hide behind the shield of only advocating getting rid of illegal guns. They just fail to mention to their prospective mayors that they favor making a lot more things illegal when it comes to guns. If you have a MAIG Mayor in your town, don’t let them get away with parroting this nonsense of only being against illegal guns. Make them own up for the gun control group they are a member of.

Why We Don’t Negotiate With Anti-Gunners

And also, really, why we call them anti-gunners. Â What’s being proposed in Massachusetts is an outrage:

If adopted, the regulations would prohibit machine guns at all public sporting club events, and require clubs to obtain special licenses, hire a police detail, and have one certified firearms safety instructor for every 20 people in attendance (or one for every five attendees if children are present) at all public events. The regulations would also require clubs to submit a safety plan to their local police department 30 days before each event.

I’m an officer at our local club, and I can tell you that if we had to do this every time we had a match open to the public, we wouldn’t open our matches up to the public. Public events and matches are a big part of what shooting clubs do, and this would effectively make them too costly to conduct. Over time, it would essentially destroy the shooting culture, and make the existence of clubs relatively pointless.

What happened was indeed a tragedy, and the people responsible for it are already being prosecuted under the laws that already exist. But instead of just accepting that, Governor Patrick has chosen to propose regulations that would effectively shut down the shooting club culture in Massachusetts. Why? Because you can’t let any good crisis, or tragedy in this case, go to waste.

You can’t negotiate with someone who’s end goal is to destroy your way of life.

The Globe reports that the Ayer Gun and Sportsmenâ€™s Club hosts an annual Military Demonstration Day featuring World War II machine guns. It may cease to exist, according to the clubâ€™s assistant range officer, Dan Damato. This event is held to honor veterans. Only one person is allowed to shoot the machine gun, while everyone else stands behind, Damato told the Globe. If Patrick’s machine gun ban takes effect the tradition will end.

Yes, the tradition will end, which is exactly the point.

I’ll give you two guesses …

… who’s behind this, despite what they say.

Security Theater Quote of the Day

From Joe Huffman, on the TSA’s new attention on powders aboard aircraft:

I wonder ifÂ my post contributed to that. I know it got some attention by “government employees”.

If it was my fault I’mÂ not going to say I am sorry. One of the ways you get people to rethink their security systems is to overload them with false positives. If I could only demonstrate that it were relatively easy to bring down a plane by grinding up you hair into a fine powder and making an improvised explosive device out of it using a couple coins as tools…

What Joe is getting at is there’s really no way to adequately protect against the level of threat TSA is trying to protect against. It’s quite impossible to successfully screen for these kinds of items without a body cavity search. It was pointed out by science fiction writer David Brin not too long after 9/11:

Despite the yammerings on TV, a lack of security measures did not cause this tragedy. No, the failure on 9/11 was almost entirely one of DOCTRINE — a policy on how to deal with hijackers that was taught to pilots, flight attendants and the public for forty years.

He goes on to suggest what did work that day — individual initiative — that it was the passengers abroad flight 93 that changed the doctrine within an hour of the WTC attacks after they heard of it on their cell phones.

The doctrinal transformation â€“ or change in the rules of engagement â€“ took place swiftly and decisively, without deliberation by sober government agencies or sage committees. Three average men changed it upon hearing news via their own â€˜intelligence networkâ€™. They acted as soldiers, heroes, without waiting for permission. Itâ€™s called initiative, a civic virtue, part of our national character that doesnâ€™t get enough attention. Not from leaders and certainly not from our enemies.

You can’t defend against the level of threat Joe speaks of, and it’s probably not even worth it to try. Â TSA should concentrate on the obvious threats, that can be easily screened for, and not worry so much about the threats you can’t screen for. Air travel is already miserable enough with all the security theater. The last thing we need is more of it.