May 2018 – Page 3 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Russians! Everywhere!

You’re not going to believe this, but there are RUSSIANS exhibiting on the NRA floor. Hawking ammunition, those RUSSIANS are. Shifty bastards …

Tul Ammo is exhibiting on the exhibit floor at NRA’s Dallas Annual Meeting! Anything to keep the NRA/Russia narrative alive, I guess. But this is stretching. Yes, Russian Ammo manufacturers US distributors will exhibit where they can find shooters. Stunning, I know.

Whether an individual shooter feels OK about funding Tsar Vladimir’s military adventures I’ll leave up to individual shooters and the State Department, which even ABC has to admit has not slapped any sanctions on Tul.

I’ve seen other stories talking about how Torshin and his assistant have been seen at high-end events:

The pair has popped up at the Golden Ring of Freedom Dinner, an exclusive event for donors who have given $1 million or more, and hospitality suites for lifetime members. Butina has also attended the women’s luncheon hosted by the wife of Wayne LaPierre, the NRA’s executive vice president. Tickets start at $250 a head, according to sources familiar with the event.

You don’t necessarily have to donate a million or more to the NRA to get into these events. I’ve been to high-dollar events just through contacts who could get me in, and I’ve never donated anywhere close to that kind of money. I am not a big money donor to the NRA. To be a big money donor to the NRA requires having big money in the first place, which I don’t.

I suspect that NRA was interested in cultivating that relationship based on the fact that NRA and the Putin Administration have something in common: opposition to the UN Arms Trade Treaty. That was a significant issue when they started attending. It would not shock me if that was the common interest that made that relationship useful to both sides. I should note that this is rank speculation on my part. I have no direct information one way or another, because it’s not like people were running around screaming “The Russians are here! The Russians are here!” or were even talking about it. NRA has a handful of foreign attendees every Annual Meeting, and it’s not unusual.

NSSF Gives Dick’s the Boot

NSSF has given Dick’s the boot! Springfield stops doing business with them too.

This is a positive development. Every other NSSF member should likewise stop doing business with Dick’s. Springfield Armory is already on the ball. This step is unprecedented. In the time I’ve been involved in the issue, I can’t remember NSSF ever giving the boot to a member over their stance on gun control. Let Dick’s gun departments wither and die.

Also, a lot of hay is being made about Vista Outdoors looking to sell off its gun business. John has a lot of good details on his link. They are selling off a lot of brands, and are exiting the cycling, snow sports, and water sports markets altogether. They are keeping their ammunition brands (CCI and Federal), Blackhawk, and Bushnell, to name a few. I’ll agree the timing sucks, but I have to wonder if there aren’t financial and strategic considerations here more than “guns are icky,” especially given they are keeping the ammunition and accessory business. If you’re going to sell, you’d rather sell high, and if I were looking to get out of the gun making business, I can’t think of a better time to sell than when the public is in a panic buying mood.

I’m not saying Vista aren’t being cowards here, but before this latest bullshit, the gun business wasn’t doing so well after the post-Hillary panic failed to materialize. So I’m not quite ready to call for burning Vista to the ground without more evidence they are caving to pressure and not looking to unload an albatross when you might stand better odds of finding a buyer.

I Have No Words

The only thing that gives me hope for humanity is that he’s in 3rd place. And I guess in this era of female equality, we’ve revised the “chinaman” slur to “china people?” I guess we don’t want all those china ladies to feel excluded? That’s forward thinking!

What in the world did I just watch pic.twitter.com/4eudpGAxp0

— Liam Donovan (@LPDonovan) May 3, 2018

Thanks for letting everyone know you support the NRA dude. Thanks.

Gun Control in the Heartland

It looks like Democrats are looking to candidates from deep red districts to not give in on guns and to openly push their national gun ban agenda.

I received my home town paper today, and this is a full-page ad running in small town papers in Oklahoma from Fred Gipson who is running as a Democrat in Oklahoma’s 4th district which does have a college town, but is also largely rural.

click to enlarge

I wish I was back in town the day the candidate visited so I could introduce myself as a “female AR-15 owner, NRA Life Member, volunteer to fund programs that teach young people how to safely and responsibly use semi-automatic rifles & other firearms, and past Democratic pro-gun candidate volunteer.” All with a smile. Because even our insults back home are polite.

I think it’s safe to say that given the branding of his website and lack of events posted that he probably doesn’t stand a chance in a district where his incumbent opponent has consistently won with around 70% of the vote. But I don’t think it bodes well for us that one of the major political parties is running openly on gun bans even in pro-gun areas. It seems they don’t believe we’ll be around long enough to matter.

If you live in OK-4, it might be wise to let your local Democratic Party know that you expect them to find candidates who have a record of respecting the 2nd Amendment instead of running candidates who campaign on banning guns many local residents own and use responsibly. Telling the local leaders who have a voice at the state level that they are hurting down ticket races by pushing gun control candidates on the ballot can make a difference in how the political parties work with us instead of against us.

Dick’s Living Up to the Name

Dick’s Sporting Goods continues to be dicks …

They are hiring three gun control lobbyists. Fortunately for us, Dick’s Sporting Goods is circling the bowl as we speak. Dick’s is scheduled to report its Q1 2018 earnings on the 15th of this month, so that will be a key thing to watch. Their Q4 2017 earnings were not so good. Get Woke, go broke.

It’s very important that we spread the word to sportsmen not to shop at Dick’s. For anything. I still hear people around my club talking about Dick’s. I don’t know if they don’t know or just don’t care. But I’m thinking this is worth raising some awareness over.

We Go Through This Every Friggin’ Year

For the dozenth time already… NRA does not ban guns at its convention.

NRA bans guns at it’s convention, they say. For crying out loud, even Snopes, who often gets gun issues wrong or fails to grasp some nuance, has called this as the bullshit it was as far back as the Nashville convention. I don’t know if the Parkland kids are aware of this, because to be honest, they seem pretty ignorant, and the people handling them are unabashed liars when it comes to this kind of thing.

But for the benefit of those kids who probably don’t know better: The President and Vice President travel with heavy contingent of armed security. Their armed security, in the form of the Secret Service, insist on creating a security perimeter around the people under their protection. Within this perimeter, the Secret Service are the only people permitted to possess weapons. This is not NRA’s doing: when the President or Vice President come to speak to us, this is part of the deal. The Secret Service will insist on it.Â You can carry everywhere at the NRA Annual Meetings except where the Secret Service, State Law, or venue rules disallow it. I won’t attend events in venues that ban guns where the security is bullshit.Â Secret Service security isn’t bullshit. Is it perfect? No. But it’s reasonable given technological and sociological constraints.

Sadly, I can’t be at NRA Annual Meeting this year. But I have been in this security perimeter in past conventions. Since by default, they also protect me, I am somewhat OK with putting my personal security in the hands of the Secret Service when I have attended these kinds of events. I have noticed agents with bulges in their jackets that would indicate they are probably carrying a submachine gun. I can’t typically carry that kind of hardware, so I feel relatively sure these folks are capable of acting in my stead should the balloon go up in the vicinity. Also, everyone who enters the perimeter is screened. The venue is screened. Everything is screened. They meet two of my three S’s necessary for a hypothetical temporary constitutional disarm.

I don’t travel within a security perimeter everywhere I go, in ordinary life. Almost none of us who aren’t Important People do. Security is a luxury good. The richer and more powerful you are, the more of it you can afford.

Most of us live in the realm of no security, or security theater. There is a difference between this and real security. Mike Bloomberg might be able to afford armed security, and is probably even providing it for the Parkland Kids, but I and most other people I know can’t afford that kind of thing. Most security you see on a day to day basis is total bullshit and might as well not exist. I’ve been in situations where “security” went through Bitter’s purse, but missed the guy that was with her that walked in with a loaded gun. I don’t apologize. Your security is bullshit if that’s what the policy is. In fact, I’ve gotten so used to that bit of security theater I hardly sweat it when I realize that’s the situation. If you want to exclude weapons you need to work harder, because none of that is going to stop someone intent on hurting people. You know that. I know that. It might make people who don’t think feel better about the situation, but that doesn’t change it: your security is bullshit.

Thinking back, the last venue I can remember that banned guns was Charlotte, and NRA hasn’t been back there since. That was State Law at the time, and since then North Carolina has improved a great deal. I can’t remember the last time I was on the convention floor unarmed. So can we dispense with this piece of bullshit? No. I know we can’t. The lie is too useful. But it is a lie.

Banks Looking at Tracking Gun Purchases

I actually think we should consider filing suit against the banks and the State of New York under the Civil Rights Act. Even if it gets thrown out by the hostile 2nd Circuit, it’s still good PR. Plus, corporations really don’t like being sued. It might tilt the scales and convince them they’re better off leaving the issue be …

The Wall Street Journal, which is unfortunately paywalled, has an article that talks about how Banks are looking into ways to track gun purchases, presumably to shut them down. The problem we face is that the financial industry is essentially run out of New York City, and therefore it will have the cultural inclination to shut down sales, and will also be vulnerable to political pressure.

As I’ve said before, the strategy here is to put us in a position where we have to deal with this new threat, and put us in a position where we have to burn political capital to stop it. This is similar to what we had to do with PLCAA. We probably have the juice, at least in a Republican Congress, to get financial regulations, but it’ll probably cost us National Reciprocity and SAFE, which is the whole idea.

Joe Huffman notes this is criminal. I’ve had my differences with Joe on this issue over the years, but I believe this is an instance where civil rights lawÂ can be used, especially if we can show the financial industry is under pressure from state actors. This actually is a conspiracy to deny civil rights to Americans that goes beyond advocating for public policy. It would be nice if Sessions could sort this kind of thing out for us, or absent that, there are civil remedies in the Civil Rights Acts as well.

It would be unprecedented to use Civil Rights suits against banks and the State of New York for the Second Amendment, and the 2nd Circuit is among the most hostile in the country, but I don’t see why we shouldn’t try. If we can get to discovery, that alone would be pretty interesting.

UPDATE: In terms of putting pressure back on New York, if the whole industry did what Hornady is doing, it would put a lot of pressure on the worthless politicians (like Cuomo) pushing this crap.

Just So You’re Aware What’s at Stake

Senator Van Hollen is working with fellow Democrats to push handgun licensing as a major platform in their fight for more gun control …

Democrats want to make the 2018 election about gun control. To that end, Senate Democrats are working up a licensing regime for handguns.

Lawmakers have introduced a bill that would encourage states to do so by providing federal grants.

To qualify, states would have to require a gun purchaser be at least 21 years old, submit fingerprints and a photograph to local law enforcement, and undergo a background check.

“Just like you need a license to drive a car you should get a license to purchase a handgun,” Van Hollen said.

The Handgun Licensing Purchaser Act would motivate states through federal grants to require individuals to obtain a license before buying a handgun, something Maryland currently does.

I find it odd that Van Hollen would go after handguns. Going after rifles is the latest vogue in the gun control movement post-Heller. This harkens back to a movement more interested in restricting handguns. Of course, the reason the gun control movement switched from trying to restrict handguns to trying to restrict rifles is because they had almost no success trying to restrict handguns. Josh Sugarmann, ever the evil genius of the movement, realized that if the gun control movement went after a subset of rifle owners, those owners would be politically more vulnerable, especially given the confusion about AR-15s vs. M16s, etc.