October 2015 – Page 3 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Hillary Clinton Endorses Mass Confiscation of Firearms

Mass confiscation now seems to be the official policy of the Democratic front runner. When asked about the Australian and British models, Hillary responded:

Australia is a good example, Canada is a good example, the U.K. is a good example. Why? Each of them have had mass killings. Australia had a huge mass killing about 20-25 years ago, Canada did as well, so did the U.K. In reaction, they passed much stricter gun laws.

In the Australian example, as I recall, that was a buyback program. The Australian government, as part of trying to clamp down on the availability of automatic weapons, offered a good price for buying hundreds of thousands of guns.

No, Mrs. Clinton, Australia offered $200 per firearm, often for guns worth thousands, and you either took the money and turned over your gun, or you went to prison. Australia forcibly confiscated every semi-automatic rifle in the country, and then offered a pittance in return, as a “so sorry.” Great Britain forcibly confiscated every handgun in the country, upon penalty of going to prison. And they were successful. Why? Because both countries had registration, so the police knew exactly who had them. Universal Background Checks are really universal registration. That’s not an exaggeration, it’s the truth, and it is the primary reason the gun control folks want them. How do we know this? Because every time we’ve offered a UBC system that doesn’t involve the registration component, they’ve rejected it. Registration is what they want, and look to where it lead in Britain and Australia. Now you have both the Democratic President, and Democratic front-runner endorsing the British and Australian model.

Folks, we are in real serious trouble if she wins in 2016. Real serious.

How’s That Gun Control Working Out For Ya Pat?

Toomey still narrowly leads his potential Democratic opponents, but in terms of approval ratings, his real trouble seems to be with Republican voters:

A big part of what drags down Toomey’s overall approval numbers is that he’s not very popular even with Republican voters- only 42% approve of him to 27% who disapprove. But most of those people will still vote for him in a general election even if they don’t approve of him, which is why he still leads the Democratic field.

That’s probably true, and likely will continue to be true as long as Democrats are howling at the moon mad. But what could it be that turned Republican voters off to Toomey? Gee, I wonder. How many gun voters are just going to not vote in that race? I volunteered for the guy in 2010. I will not be going forward, unless he makes it up to me and renounces the Manchin-Toomey fiasco, and votes for some things I want.

I get Toomey is trying to position himself as a moderate, but in a state with high levels of gun ownership, a strong hunting tradition, and about 1 out of every 7 adults citizens having a License to Carry Firearms, ours was not the issue to choose to go soft on.

Off topic:

If you look at that poll it shows Hillary losing to the GOP front runners in Pennsylvania. The prospect of losing The Keystone State should be putting Dems into a panic. If we go red, Ohio certainly will, and so will Florida. Where’s Hill’s path to the White House without those states?

Democrats All Over Embracing Gun Control

Embracing the new Democratic Zeitgeist on gun control, Governor Terry McAuliffe of Virginia shows he’s not going to be left out of the gun hatin’ gameÂ with a new Executive Order which supposedly outlaws firearms in some state-owned buildings. I’m not sure how he has the authority to do that absent action from the legislature. He’s also setting up a task force and hot line. Oooh. That’s action for you. All Virginia needs is for politicians to set up a few more task forces and problem solved, right? In his EO, he repeats the lie that 40% of all guns are processed through private transactions. We know, in fact, it’s a lie because the states that have banned private transfers of firearms have seen very little in the way of transactions going through their background check systems. So either people are ignoring the law, or this was a very small subset of transactions to begin with.

Obama stated the other day that it was easier to buy guns in this country than books. That’s funny, because I’ve never had to go through a background check and fill out federal forms to buy a book. I don’t even have to show ID to buy a book. There aren’t people out there trying to make it illegal for me to lend a friend a book. You don’t need a license to write, print, distribute, or sell books. I don’t need to show I’m literate to and have a license to carry a book in public.

It’s ridiculous. Obama knows it’s ridiculous. McAuliffe knows it’s ridiculous. So why do they lie? Because they know the needle of public opinion is swinging more toward people not wanting more gun control laws. They need that needle to start swinging back in their favor, and one way to accomplish that is to lie to the ignorant about what the current federal gun laws are. They need people to believe that the gun business is like some kind of free wheeling, third world open air bazaar like you’d fine in Somalia. If people understood what the gun laws really are, they might be satisfied, or even a little ticked off.

The only way we can stop these people is by punishing them at the ballot box. McAuliffe and Obama are both lame ducks, so punish their party. Tim Kaine was up there with McAuliffe on stage, cheering him on. Tim Kaine is up for re-election in 2018, a midterm. In 2014, Mark Warner barely got by Ed Gillespie, and Warner is far more moderate. Kaine is vulnerable with the right candidate.

Magazine Confiscation Initiative Proposed in California

Mr. and Mrs. America, turn them all in. Jerry Brown has vetoed a lot of gun control bills (and signed a few too), and it would appear that Gavin Newsom, who is planning to run for Governor, is determined to get some of these failed bills via ballot measures in 2016. The magazine confiscation measure isn’t everything. The initiatives would also mandate background checks and new licensing for buying and selling ammunition.

Don’t ever let anyone tell you they aren’t after your guns. First they came for the magazines. A ban on semi-automatic rifles entirely is coming. You can count on it. California is lost. The only thing that can save it is either Congress acting under the 14th Amendment or the Courts, and the Courts have pretty much left Heller and McDonald to the buzzards.

Pro-Gun Dems Should Rally Around Jim Webb

Jim Webb is the only Democrat in the race who isn’t after your guns. So how about it, Liberal Gun Club? Sanders has always been a mixed bag on the issue, and he’s been distancing himself from the parts of his records that are actually good. Every Democrat except Jim Webb basically declared open war on us in that debate. If Democratic gun owners can’t give Webb a bit of a bump, to be honest, what good are you to the cause? If you only start clubs of like minded people who will gladly vote your gun rights away to Clinton, Sanders or O’Malley, really, what good are you? I’m not issuing this challenge because I hate you guys. I’d be thrilled if the Democrats supported gun rights, or were at least not openly hostile toward it. I’d be thrilled to see an insurgency in the Democratic Party that favored gun rights. This is your chance. He might not be the best candidate in the world, but the contrast on guns is stark here.

I in no way expect Webb to be the nominee. He doesn’t have the chops to win. But giving Webb a bump would help tremendously. The election in 2016 is sure to be very close, and if in 2016 the nominee does eventually lose the general election, the party might start to wonder if maybe those Jim Webb Democrats could have been useful. What’s made gun rights successful are single issue and near single issue voters who are capable of swinging close elections. Increasingly, the Dems are believing those numbers are already baked into the GOP voting figures, and the NRA can’t come up with new voters that are going to help Republicans and hurt Democrats. What keeps me up at night is I’m not sure they are wrong.

The Dem Debate Still Convinces Me This is a Cartoon Race

I think Jim Geraghty has summed it up best, “America Now Has An Openly Socialist Party”, but he notes about Hillary:

With that in mind, Hillary Clinton is the class of the field on that stage, and the only real obstacle to the nomination that remains is a Joe Biden bid. Compared with everyone else, sheâ€™s polished and knows what sheâ€™s doing. Even when sheâ€™s being robotic and inauthentic, sheâ€™s remembering her talking points, pivoting to her preferred issues. The software upgrades to her personality may look awkward when sheâ€™s alone, but sheâ€™s still a much, much better candidate than anybody else on that stage.

Geraghty is absolutely right about his assessment of where the Democratic Party has ended up, as the party of Democratic Socialism. But Bernie Sanders struck me as a formidable candidate given the populist zeitgeist among both the right and left baseÂ in this race. Back to Geraghty:

In one of the few surprises of the night, Bernie Sanders did his best to try to save her on her troubles with her personal e-mail server. Heâ€™s an old fool if he thinks Hillary will return the favor when he needs it.

That struck me as an unwise move on the part of Sanders. What better way to sink her as an establishment candidate than to ride that hobby horse? But I don’t agree with the rest of Geraghty’s assessment of Sanders. There is a tendency to want to dismiss populism — I speak as someone who has that tendency. There is no denying it anymore. Nothing I saw in the Dem primary convinces me that this is anything other than a race between Bernie Sander’s left-populism and Hillary Clinton’s left-establishmentarianism, and I think Bernie’s populism is going to be more appealing to the Democratic base.

I do have to agree with Geraghty about Jim Webb, in that “Webb has a good chance of winning the Democratic nomination in 1948.” But I don’t think anything I saw tonight will help Hillary stop feeling the Bern, and for anyone else to put serious pressure on either candidate.

God help us. The stakes are very high, and I don’t honestly think anyone who’s a real contender, on either side, is really anything other than a cartoon.

Kicking the Brady Campaign Where it Hurts

Bloomberg is signing up vapid celebrities like there’s no tomorrow. This used to be Brady’s big schtick. The Brady Gala is still around, but it used to be star studded. This year they are featuring the Mayor of Los Angeles and his wife. Ooh. Who is the Mayor of LA? I seriously don’t even know. In 2013 the Brady Gala headlined Tony Bennett. Yeah, I didn’t think he was still alive either. Even Piers Morgan, who at the time was only mostly reviled, instead of being thoroughly reviled as he is today, managed to show up at the 2013 gala. Maybe they’ll luck out and he’ll show up in 2015.

It’s probably pretty rough to be working at the Brady Campaign these days, and to watch Bloomberg sweep in with all his money, and snatch away the few last crumbs on their plates. When you’ve lost Alec Baldwin…

Gun Control Talk Is Great for Selling Guns

John Richardson is reporting that September NICS checks are at record levels, meaning President Obama is still the world’s greatest gun salesman. A lot of gun folks really have the barest idea of how this politics stuff works, so when they hear about “executive action on gun control,” they have little idea of what Obama can and can’t do with that power. They get scared and panic buy. To be sure, Obama can do plenty of damage with executive action, but probably not as much as the people panic buying are imagining.

I’ve seen a lot of talk about the gun issue in my Facebook feed among left-leaning folks. Not much more than after Sandy Hook, but it’s there. I follow a lot of other media too through a web of Google Alerts. The left are out there pushing gun control, but there’s a sense of desperation about it. I see and read a lot of angry things, and I don’t think anger is a trait of a movement arguing from aÂ position of strength.

UPDATE: Trigger finger thinks it’s more about venting anger than panic: “…Â but there have been enough calls for gun control in Obama’s second term that did not go very far nationally that I doubt panic is really being felt.Â I think it’s more about anger at this point.” That could be. The best way to take out your anger on the media is to cancel the subscriptions and cut the cord. You can use the money you save to buy more guns!

Israel Considering Easing Gun Laws

From a CNN report (link auto plays video, like everything seems to these days):

Gilad Erdan, minister of public security, was contemplating a number of options, police said.

Among security steps were closing off the Palestinian suburbs of east Jerusalem and relaxing gun licensing.

Sounds like a good idea to me. This actually wouldn’t be the first time they’ve eased their gun regulations in response to attacks.Â This shows that societies facing existential threats, whoÂ cannot afford the luxury of magical thinking, seem to agree that firearms in the hands of ordinary good citizens make everyone safer. Israelis are even hitting the range because of the recent attacks. Sadly, things will probably only get worse for Israel since the Obama Administration has abandoned them as allies, and now the whole region is a mess.

Israel’s gun culture really centers around universal military service. It might be tempting to compare it to Switzerland, but the Swiss system is one of universal militia service. Switzerland’s gun laws are relatively permissive, whereas Israel’s are actually pretty strict. Not everyone is happy with that state of affairs, however.

Getting Back to Second Amendment Basics

Dave Kopel has an excellent article at the Volokh Conspiracy reminding us what the Second Amendment is really all about. He tells the story of the uprising at the Sobibor extermination camp on October 14, 1943, and at Treblinka on August 2, 1943, both in Poland.

I’ve seen a lot of talk about this topic recently around social media, probably because Dr.Â Carson opened the door last week, and the left went nuts. It’s a good discussion to have, especially given the cartoonish arguments you see plastered all over cable news and social media. I feel like this whole country has descended into cartoon arguments, on all parts of the political spectrum. Kopel notes:

Some people claim that firearms did not make, and could not have made, any difference in the Holocaust. Sobibor and Treblinka show the opposite. Once the formerly-unarmed Jews got their hands on firearms, the extermination camps were on their way out of business. There is a reason that people in death camps are not allowed to have arms. There is a reason why governments which intend to send people to death camps always disarm them first. Once the genocide targets are armed, genocide becomes much more difficult. Killing armed victims is much more difficult than killing unarmed ones.

We should not be afraid to discuss the original purpose of the Second Amendment, which was to assure the people would continue to have arms in order to resist tyranny should that become necessary. There are many examples of armed Jews resisting the Nazi regime to be found in the annals of World War II. They also were facing a government armed with rockets, tanks, planes, and artillery. Most of them expected to die resisting, and die they did, but they died on their own terms, and more importantly weakened the regime that was out to exterminate them and thus saved the lives of many others.

If this country were to continue its descent into madness, and many of us were to become labeled undesirable, I have no intention of getting into the cattle car. In such a circumstance, I would not expect to live. But my goal (I would even argue civic duty)Â in such a dire circumstance is to make sure I take at least a dozen of my potential killersÂ with me. Gun control groups keep labeling the philosophy of armed resistance “dangerous insurrectionism,” but I argue it is an important immune response that’s important to keep alive in the body politic. Only a fool would believe it could never happen here.

The founders originally established the Second Amendment because they were concerned about the distribution of military power within society, and believed that power should ultimately rest with the people. The new constitution had given the federal government the power to call the militia into federal service, and also to train and discipline it. This was met with great suspicion by anti-federalists. The fear was that Congress could let the militia wither on the vine. In fact, that is exactly what Congress has done!

But the founders were wise enough to ensure, through the Second Amendment, that while the people’s militia might end up neglected, it could never be disarmed. Through this neglect, Congress has left it up to all of us to ensure that the people’s militia remains “well-regulated,” and we need to be sure to pass these traditions and philosophies down toÂ future generations. Never let anyone try to tell you that this is a radical or nonsensical thing to do. Be prepared to argue. In that, you might find Kopel’s article very useful.