Bitter – Page 128 – Shall Not Be Questioned

A Reminder

This has been a big news day.

As Sebastian mentioned, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s husband died yesterday. In the Senate, Robert Byrd died this morning. Certainly, these two events have added an obvious weight to today’s proceedings. Sen. Orrin Hatch’s words about the Ginsburg family were very sweet, and Sen. Jeff Sessions had a pretty funny story about Byrd doing a Friday morning floor speech lamenting how textbooks weren’t teaching the difference between a republic and a democracy.

Elena Kagan’s hearings started at 12:30, and I’m tuning in to cover them while Sebastian sticks with McDonald. Sen. Sessions has already brought up that Kagan’s previous work put her on the wrong side of history today. Regardless of what any gun groups do, I think the strength of the opinions issued today will make this a red meat issue for the Republicans. That’s actually a good thing. We don’t have to use any political capital, yet it remains a big issue. It really help drives home that the Second Amendment is becoming an 80% issue. That means we can use our political capital on other fights – specific policies, defeating candidates, and winning reforms legislatively.

Why the Democratic Leadership Wants to Shut us Up

Last night, I spent 2 1/2 hours making phone calls for Tom Corbett for Governor, Pat Toomey for Senate, and Dee Adcock for Congress. Â I assumed, when asked to help out, that we would be calling hardcore Republicans to recruit volunteers and get a general sense of how much they know about the specific candidates now that the primaries are over – not formal polling by any means, just a general view of the picture.

Except, I found out when I arrived that the call list was of “soft” Republicans. Â They don’t vote in primaries very often, if at all. Â They are registered with the party, but not active by any measure. Â A few undecideds here and there, a few who didn’t really know about the candidates (especially at the Congressional level, which isn’t a surprise given the district and the lack of a specific media market for that area), and a surprising number of people willing to volunteer for the candidates.

Really, the Democrats really could be in big, big trouble if this is a sign of the times. Â Of the 4 other people in the room with me, 2 had never volunteered for phone banks before. Â One was moving over into general Republican issues after having mostly volunteering for pro-life groups before. Â Keep in mind that it is June. Â It’s freakin’ June and nearly half the people in the room are new to volunteering, and I recruited several more from the soft Republican call sheet. Â (There were many more callers in the rest of the building, I just eavesdropped on those in my room so I could make more calls instead of chatting it up.) Â This can’t be good news for Democrats.

On Saturday, we’ll be doing a walk for the same candidates. Â I don’t know if that list is for hard or soft Republicans. Â I do know that Obama’s camp is already canvassing soft Democrats, particularly those who just registered last year and/or those who don’t vote in midterms. Â So we definitely need to be doing the same on our side.

If you’re in SE Pennsylvania and want an excuse to get a little exercise & help a good cause on Saturday, I’ve got locations for several events in Montgomery, Bucks, and Delaware counties.

I would also suggest to bloggers that helping a campaign out for a couple of hours a month is a great way to get a read on the pulse of your local voters. Â It’s absolutely fascinating at times. Â Great blog fodder, too. :)

Aiming to Shove DISCLOSE Down Our Throats

Well, it looks like the White House is putting its full weight behind DISCLOSE to get it back on the House calendar for a vote. This is bad news. When this story first broke, I left a comment at Joe’s about some of the writing on the wall that had to go into the decisions that any group was making on the bill (with additional notes):

From what I’m seeing out of other groups, this amendment could very well kill the bill. Here’s what we either know or can safely assume by the actions of this Democratic Congress so far:

They have a history of ramming things down the throats of the American people even when there is 50%+ opposition – even very loud and visible opposition.

Health care, anyone? Â Try getting people as worked up over campaign finance – an issue that few people know anything about. Â Hell, just look at the comments here and on other blogs to show how little people know about the issue. Â Besides, you’re also talking about competing with the millions that George Soros has pumped into a “campaign finance reform” public relations effort over many, many years.

They pretty much see the writing on the wall that this is their last stand in the House. They could back off to calm people down before the elections so they have a shot at holding on to power or they could try to get every little thing they can right now while they know they have it.

Talking to some DC folks this weekend, this point is even more important than I realized at the time. Â Everyone there knows that this won’t pass court muster. Â But that’s not the goal. Â The goal is to get this into law before this year’s elections so that angry groups are cut off from the voters. Â Whether it’s liberal groups turning against Democratic incumbents or conservative groups targeting Democrats, they want them all shut out of the campaign process. Â They are actually the ones who are just trying to live to fight another day here.

They wanted this bill, and it’s clearly a priority of the President who broke all standards of reasonable protocol by attacking the Supreme Court justices who attended his SOTU. Therefore, fact # 1 becomes more relevant to anyone working on this issue.

See above. Â The White House is now getting in to twist some arms. Â They are, however, conceding the big group exemption. Â My guess is that they are going to tell the far left members of Congress to shut the hell up and get in line – just like they did on healthcare. Â And they will do it. Â The House leadership & White House will probably promise that the bill will eventually be “fixed” someday, but they really know it won’t and that it will be struck down. Â That doesn’t matter, they just need some of it to work this year to try to minimize their losses.

NRA could make sure their members were taken of in the event they do ram this through Congress. It may only hold off the fight for another day, but come January, we’ll at least have a friendlier House – even if we don’t take full control of it back. In two more years, we may have a friendly White House & Congress to gut this thing.

The big group exemption makes sure gun owners can still be heard on Election Day. Â I hate it, but it at least makes sure our concerns don’t go down the tubes this year while we wait on the courts to (hopefully) throw the law out or a future Congress & president to gut it.

The side benefit to this kind of exemption is the added attention that could kill the bill in all forms. The outrage is there from the left. But, looking back at # 1, NRA donors are still safe for now. It’s just a matter of whether Pelosi, Schumer & Obama are so confident to stick their tongues out at the left and yell, “What are you going to do, vote Republican? Just take it with a smile and vote for us again in November.” Based on the “hell no” Van Hollen gave to any union exemption last night, I tend to think they’re going to try and ram it down everyone’s throats even over the objections of their base.

This is may still be the case. Â The opposition may be the reason the House cut their calendar by a week this year – always a good thing to get the politicians out of DC. Â However, with the White House making the noises they are about how it’s not a “perfect” bill, but they will take it, it does appear they are telling their base to shut the hell up and get out of the way.

Now, there is still room for those of you who fall in the general conservative category to fight this. Â If you live in a Blue Dog district, get on the damn phone right now. Â If you live in a far left district, get on the phone now and tell them to kill the bill – leaving them to assume you’re part of the base. Â If you live in a GOP district, there’s a good chance that they will oppose it, but get on the phone anyway because we can’t afford to have any stray. Â You know the Democrats can afford to have a few wander off the reservation, but the Republicans can’t afford it. Â And when you’re dealing with literally hundreds of millions invested into convincing the public that anything called “campaign finance reform” is a good idea, it could be a tough fight. Â Whether we like it not, that’s the political reality of the moment. Â We have to figure out how to beat them anyway.

Today is Nosy Neighbor Day

If you have kids, you might find you have a couple of nosy neighbors today. It’s National ASK Day. They like to say that it’s not about gun control, yet their “activists” say that this is about preaching to others about the dangers of owning guns. So, it’s not about taking your guns with force, just trying to be nannies who bother you into giving them up. Because that’s so much better – death by harassment and annoyance.

At least if we had kids, no one would have to ask. We’re pretty outspoken about our gun ownership in a very polite and “normal” way – whether it’s the NRA stickers, the political volunteer time, or the fact that we’d probably be shooting parents instead of soccer parents, I think we’d send the message pretty loud and clear while sending the right messages about gun ownership being a normal thing.

Semi-Autos Safe in Finland

Based on the comments in this article, I think they were trying to ban any gun that held more than one round at all.

Finland will not impose a full ban on semi-automatic weapons, the interior minister said Monday, rejecting an inquiry commission proposal following two deadly school shootings.

“I will not take this proposal forward as it is,” Interior Minister Anne Holmlund told national broadcaster YLE in a televised interview.

“I don’t really believe that the banning of one approach in weapons would be the way to ensure massacres are prevented,” she said, adding several different actions were needed, including giving police wider access to information about gun licence applicants. …

Finland’s parliament is currently debating a new gun law, and the so-called Kauhajoki inquiry commission had asked Holmlund to back its proposal for a total ban on semi-automatic handguns in the new legislation.

“Both the school shootings of recent years and the Sello massacre were carried out using semi-automatic weapons.

“It is clear that single shot weapons would not have created similar victim figures,” Pekka Sauri, chairman of the Kauhajoki commission told YLE.

Pro-Tip for Dan Onorato: Research

Sebastian noted that our Democratic nominee for governor is blaming the Republican candidate for a non-loophole that he declares to independently be a loophole – reciprocity. Unfortunately, he kind of got some big freakin’ facts wrong – but as any internet commentator knows, that won’t stop a blowhard from beating his chest indignantly.

First, there’s the fact that Onorato is specifically blaming Corbett for the Florida reciprocity agreement. Which is funny because the Florida reciprocity agreement was signed in 2001 – before Corbett took office in 2005.

Second, there’s the fact that under the law, the Attorney General actually has an affirmative duty to sign the agreements. So it doesn’t matter who is in the Attorney General’s office, they are supposed to seek out reciprocity opportunities with other states. The laws for issuance of the other states are all at least as strict as ours – and Florida actually has more requirements to obtain a license than Pennsylvania. So if they can do away with the Florida agreement, the anti-gun folks will just pick another state to target. And it won’t be long before all of our concealed carry agreements are gone.

MAIG Mayors Rising

In Pennsylvania, we defeated one official MAIG mayor in his Democratic primary. And yes, guns were an issue. He took major hits and lost votes when NRA endorsed his opponent and highlighted his anti-gun group membership. (I know because I talked to some of those Democrats while working a gun show not too far from the district a couple of weeks ago.)

Unfortunately, we’ve still got at least one more on the ballot for November to defeat. And yesterday we learned that a Bloomberg fangirl of a mayor may end up leading the entire Democratic Party.

As we noted yesterday, Pennsylvania Democrats meet in Camp Hill tonight to kick off two days of meetings that will culminate in the election of a new chairperson — possibly York Mayor Kim Bracey — on Saturday morning.

York has produced a few vehemently anti-gun politicians, and Kim Bracey is apparently one of them since she joined forces with the Mayors Against Guns coalition.

The fact is that MAIG is a serious threat to gun rights. The microstamping law they were pushing in New York recently was so outrageous that it was a defacto ban on semi-automatic handguns. That’s in no way a mainstream viewpoint, and we need to get those politicians out of all offices.

It remains to be seen how she would wield her influence over any pro-gun Democrats who want to run for office. But if you’re a Pennsylvania Democrat, I’d be raising a bit of hell over this with your county party leaders.

Anti-Gun is now the “Right Flank” of the Democratic Party for PA2010

Supporting gun bans, wanting to reargue Heller, and completely dismantling the state gun laws to overturn the Pennsylvania Supreme Court puts you on the pro-gun side of the Democratic Party in Pennsylvania, at least according to this article on PA2010.com. Really? That would be news to the many pro-gun Democrats in this state who actually support the rights of gun owners.

During the primary battle, we learned that the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Dan Onorato, was one of the farthest left candidates you could find on the gun issue. The only guy to his left was Joe Hoeffel. The only Democratic gubernatorial candidate who gun owners could come reasonably close to voting for if they were voting single issue was Jack Wagner.

We captured video from most of the Democratic forums before the primary and studied his statements on “public safety,” and those hit on a range of policy issues on the matter of Second Amendment rights:

	Onorato	Hoeffel	Wagner	Williams
Ending Preemption (overturning Ortiz)	Support	Support	Oppose	Support
Semi-Auto Ban	Support	Support	Support	Support
Mandatory Locks on Guns (overturned in Heller)	Support	Support	Oppose	Oppose
Castle Doctrine	Oppose	Oppose	Maybe	Oppose
Shut Down Gun Stores Near Homes, Schools, or Parks	Maybe	Support	Maybe	Support
Limit on # of Guns	Maybe (through local laws)	Support	Oppose	Support
Eroding Reciprocity	Support	Support	Maybe	Support
Ban Gun Ownership w/out criminal conviction	Support	Support	Support	Support

On this list of what I consider to be “big” issues right now, Onorato goes against gun owners 75% of the time. The other two issues are unknowns, or he would support other government officials in their quest for more gun control. That’s not what we usually consider “on our side” in the gun owning community. (Hoeffel strikes against us 100% of the time, Williams at 88%, and Wagner at 25% of the time with another 38% of the issues as possibly against us.)

If you want to look at the issue from the gun control handbook from CeaseFirePA, their big issues show a similar breakdown. Onorato is with them 85% of the time, and they classify the remaining 15% of the positions as unknown, not in opposition to their agenda. (Hoeffel is with them 100% of the time, Williams 85%, and Wagner 46%. In fact, Williams is actually against them with the other 15% of the proposals which actually makes him more solid on the issue with gun owners than Dan Onorato.)

For context on how Onorato’s positions compare to legislators who have recently voted on some of the policies Onorato is pushing or opposing, here’s another chart. I’ve broken these charts down by NRA grade. (It was too wide with all of them in one, so forgive the repetition, it’s to prove a point.)

	Onorato Not Rated	Lentz F	Manderino F	Vitali F	Wagner F
Ending Preemption HB 1044	Support	Support	Support	Support	Support
Semi-Auto Ban HB 1045	Support	Oppose	Support	Support	Support
Castle Doctrine HB 40	Oppose	Support	Oppose	Oppose	Support

This table shows that Onorato is farther to the left on recent gun rights policy debates than two of the four F-rated lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee.

	Onorato Not Rated	Waters D-	Brennan D	Caltagirone D	Shapiro D	Costa C
Ending Preemption HB 1044	Support	Support	Oppose	Support	Oppose	Oppose
Semi-Auto Ban HB 1045	Support	Support	Oppose	Support	Oppose	Oppose
Castle Doctrine HB 40	Oppose	Oppose	Support	Support	Support	Support

Let’s look at some who probably fall on the left of the issue, and another who falls squarely in the middle of the issue based on previous grades. Onorato’s policies fall in line with the D- lawmaker, but he’s exactly the opposite of two D legislators and our single C-rated guy on the committee. That doesn’t seem to be very “right flank” to me.

	Onorato Not Rated	Casorio A	Kula A	Pallone A	White A	Petrarca A+
Ending Preemption HB 1044	Support	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose
Semi-Auto Ban HB 1045	Support	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose	Oppose
Castle Doctrine HB 40	Oppose	Support	Support	Support	Support	Support

All of these lawmakers are probably the “right flank” of the gun issue for the Democratic Party since they are all A-rated or higher. Most of them carry the NRA’s endorsement. And Dan Onorato doesn’t agree with them on anything – from banning guns to gutting gun laws to even a law dealing with self-defense in your own home.

So, based on statements and specific policy plans, both gun owners and gun controllers agree that Dan Onorato is not on the “right flank” of the Democratic Party on gun issues. So I’m challenging the fine folks at PA2010.com to back up his claim that Onorato is in any way considered to be pro-gun. It would enlightening, especially to all of the Democrats I talked to this weekend who are planning to vote against their party on this specific issue in this race come November.

“Enuf is enuf. Enough is too much.”

These people are educators. They are teaching your children. Remember that as you read and cringe.

Four peaceful protesters, some dressed in full-length black and yellow bee costumes, represented the American Literacy Council and the London-based Spelling Society and stood outside the Grand Hyatt on Thursday, where the Scripps National Spelling Bee is being held. Their message was short: Simplify the way we spell words.

Roberta Mahoney, 81, a former Fairfax County, Va. elementary school principal, said the current language obstructs 40 percent of the population from learning how to read, write and spell. …

According to literature distributed by the group, it makes more sense for “fruit” to be spelled as “froot,” “slow” should be “slo,” and “heifer” â€” a word spelled correctly during the first oral round of the bee Thursday by Texas competitor Ramesh Ghanta â€” should be “hefer.”
Meanwhile, inside the hotel’s Independence Ballroom, 273 spellers celebrated the complexity of the language in all its glory, correctly spelling words like zaibatsu, vibrissae and biauriculate.

My guess is that these people are part of the movement to do away with red pens for grading, too.

When challenged by a 15-year-old on the issue, the principal said that if spelling bees were so important, the bees could just make up their own dictionary of new words that would be harder to spell.

A Gun Owner’s Paradise

Outdoor Life has put together the top 200 towns for sportsmen. I’m shocked that any Pennsylvania towns made it on the list, but they put Erie at number 82. On the other hand, my home state had towns to make the cut: Bartlesville at 71, Poteau at 156, Elk City at 184, and Enid at 189.

Yes, some of you will complain that the number of fishing holes near a city doesn’t matter for purposes of gun ownership. I will agree – to some extent.

The list does take into account gun laws when it ranks the issues that matter for sportsmen.

Outdoors-related subcategories, which combine to account for 60 percent of the overall score, include the gun-friendliness of each townâ€™s state, huntable and fishable species nearby, proximity to public land and waters, and the potential for taking a trophy-caliber animal or fish nearby.

It’s even the first thing they mention in the outdoor categories. I would also point out that the other factors can make a difference in the type of people you’re likely to have a neighbors – people who understand gun ownership as a tradition and a civil right who are more likely to vote against politicians who are anti-gun.

One of the best features of this list is that it also takes into account economic and quality-of-life issues. It’s great to be surrounded by pro-gun neighbors, but it’s also nice to have a job and be in a city where life doesn’t suck to raise your pro-gun children.

Socio-economic subcategories, which make up 40 percent of the overall score, include population percent growth since 2000, median household income, median home value, cost of living, unemployment rate, population density, mean commute time and amenities.

The magazine broke down several areas of interest – best for whitetail hunting, best for kids, best fishing, etc. I find one of the cities that tied for number one as best for kids is near the hometown of one of my best friends from college. She introduced me to shooting, and she has more hunting mounts than she knows what to do with. So I’d say she’s evidence that Evergreen, CO is very good for raising children with solid values – who also happen to be great marksmen. She’s also brilliant, so it speaks volumes about the school system.

For all of you curmudgeons who don’t want any neighbors nearby, they’ve got the list for you. (Tip: Look to Alaska.) If you’re winding down your time on the job, they’ve got lots of suggestions in Arizona and Florida for retirement. Your money will go furthest in these cities with the lowest cost of living and highest incomes.