Bitter – Page 147 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Local DA Candidate has Gun Control Connections

One candidate for Bucks County District Attorney has deep ties to an outfit that pushed such extreme gun control that it would create a database of gun owners and also risk putting ammunition manufacturers out of business.

Democratic candidateÂ Chris Asplen is the Vice President of Gordon, Thomas, Honeywellâ€™s Governmental Affairs Division (GTH), a position he has heldÂ since 2002. In 2007,Â Asplenâ€™s office was hired to manage the legislative strategy of Ammunition Coding Services, the company that created a patent for bullet serialization, but could not make the technology work. Instead of finding a consumer for their technology, the companyâ€™s founders â€“ lead by investor Russ Ford â€“ hired GTH to pass laws in more than a dozen states to mandate the unworkable technology.

TheÂ â€œmodel legislationâ€ pushed by Asplenâ€™s office would have been a nightmare burden for ammunition makers and serious shooters. Â The price hikes and lack of supply would all but kill off casual shooters.

The technology is so complex that the companyâ€™s founder Russ Ford even agreed with Cam Edwards during an NRA News interview in 2008 that they had been unable to do large scale testing, the only test examples were created by hand, and they didnâ€™t even have evidence it would work to support the needs of not only the civilian market, but also police and military.

Cam Edwards: People have said, people in the know, people in the industry have said this is unworkable. Thatâ€™s it. That is their answer. It doesnâ€™t work. Now, if you think that it does, itâ€™s up to you to prove it. But you have been unable to do so. And youâ€™re pushing legislation that would again mandate this, legislation that ammunition manufacturers say would cause them to either go out of business or stop selling to the states that pass this. Thatâ€™s you doing this.

Russ Ford of Ammunition Coding Systems: Thank you for highlighting that, Cam.

The legislation that Ford hired Asplenâ€™s company to push would have not only mandated these markings that the industry said it cannot produce, but it also would have required gun owners to forfeit all non-encoded ammunition in their possession by making possession of regular ammunition illegal. For precision shooters or even casual plinkers trying to save a few dollars, reloading would have been completely outlawed if GTH had their way in Harrisburg.

Currently, shooters go through about 8 billion rounds of newly manufactured ammunition a year. But the Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturing InstituteÂ estimates it would take three to four weeks to produce ammunition currently produced in a single day. Supplies would dwindle and prices would skyrocket.

Interestingly, Asplenâ€™s client Russ Ford admitted in an interview that as the holder to the patent for the process, his goal was to make money off of these new mandates on the backs of lawful sport shooters & hunters.

Cam Edwards: On the Ammunition Accountability website, and on the Ammunition Coding Systems website, you mention a license fee, per round that would be charged to the manufacturerâ€™s and then passed on to the consumers. What type of license fee are you looking at per round?

Russ Ford: Uh, we have discussed, uh, with, and this is where the, the wheels come off, huh, of the capitalist society. We have been entertained by financial planners, stock brokers, bond brokers, uh, business valuation people, and quite frankly, for me for me, itâ€™s like looking at hieroglyphs on the side of a pyramid. I donâ€™t understand all these parameters. We have talked about, uh, a tenth of a penny to a fifth of a penny a round for royalties. Whether that pans out is completely in speculation.

Itâ€™d be, Itâ€™d be nice to make money on this. It really would. This is America, we believe in capitalism, uh, uh, it would be nice to have a return on the investment and for the years weâ€™ve put in on this.

Mr. Fordâ€™s candor in admitting to make untold fortunes off of the backs of gun owners every year is refreshing, if not humorous in the NRA News interview. Â However, at one point he justifies such â€œhonestyâ€ as an effort to be transparent and have a real discussion about gun control issues. Â Cam Edwards calls him out on the fact that the lobbying website GTH created to promote the mandates,Â AmmunitionAccountability.org, has no link or public connection to the companyâ€™s for-profit site,Â AmmoCoding.com. Â Rather than addressing the point, Mr. Ford tries to pick an argument over links with Cam during the questioning. Â But, as SebastianÂ pointed out at the time, the lack of transparency in the operation is a much bigger problem:

And to think, Russell Ford said on Camâ€™s show he wants this whole thing to be as transparent as possible.Â Transparent as in we hire a lobbying firm to anonymously set up a web site to push for model legislation, and to lobby key legislators that have been quietly bought off, in order to be able to skim off the top of every one of the eight billion rounds of ammunition produced each year.Â You have to admit, thatâ€™s quite an ingenious scam, that would make even the most talented con artist jealous.

There is certainly nothing illegal about the actions, but it is hardly a model of transparency.

Though Asplenâ€™s group tried to make the argument that ammunition registries would be an important tool to law enforcement, a hearing in California cleared up that misconception very quickly. Â The Law Enforcement Alliance of America, California Police Chiefsâ€™ Association, California Peace Officersâ€™ Association, Association of Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs and Los Angeles Police Protective League all urged lawmakers to vote it down. Â In Hawaii, the Attorney General called the system â€œunduly burdensomeâ€ and unworkable.

In fact, according to Mr. Ford, the only support that Chris Asplenâ€™s company could find for the laws came from gun control groups such as the Brady Campaign and their Million Mom March division.

As a leader at GTH, it is fair to ask whether Mr. Asplen continues to support his clientâ€™s goals, especially in light of the public confessions that the technology is unproven, unworkable, and even detrimental to law enforcement.

NRA does not typically endorse in local races, so it is unlikely we will see a firm grade issued for either candidate in the Bucks County District Attorneyâ€™s race. Â But consider this post an opportunity for Mr. Asplen to clarify his support for gun owner registries, ammunition encoding, and bans on reloading for competitive shooters.

Think Decent Cold Medication is Tough to get Now?

Many of us look fondly upon the days when you could go to the drug or grocery store and pick up a decongestant while plugged up and just be done with it after handing over your cold-contaminated cash at the register. Now, in your foggy, miserable state, you have to find a pharmacist who will take down your license information before handing over the powerful stuff. Ugh, more people and details involved in the equation. Suddenly the transaction costs go up, and I know I’m more likely to say “F*ck it, I’ll keep sniffling.”

But at least I still have the choice to find immediate relief at a reasonable price if I’m willing to jump through the hoops. These hoops, which we were promised would reduce meth labs, shockingly, have had no impact other than inconveniencing consumers and getting grandmothers arrested. So what are law enforcement groups calling for as the next step in the drug war? Requiring a prescription for decongestants.

Lord, I wish I were kidding. The representative of a Missouri law enforcement group says we need to battle the big, bad “pharmaceutical companies that make more than a billion dollars a year from cold relief medicines containing pseudoephedrine.” Oddly enough, he also claims that cold relief pills are comparable to chocolate chip cookies. God help him if he tries to go after Tollhouse cookie makers. Mothers will send all of their sniffling, sneezing rugrats after him.

Hollywood & Congress: Neither can be Taken Seriously

Members of Congress don’t really seem to get why we hate them as a group. No matter how many times we re-elect incumbents, the approval numbers for Congress as a whole generally remain in the bottom of the toilet. I suspect it has something to do with the stupidity and vapidity that comes out when we put a group of these leaders together.

For example, yesterday the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee held a hearing on legislation to combat foreign violence against women through “humanitarian relief efforts” and more aid to local groups working on the issue in these countries. While the cause might be noble, convincing the public we need to spend more right now may be a tough sell. So what do they do? Call in the celebrities!

And with that, Nicole Kidman was hauled before the subcommittee to talk about the issue. Instead, Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher of California wanted to know if she thought Hollywood was to blame for violence. Nicole Kidman, in all of her expert knowledge on the roots of violence, said they probably were responsible.

Nicole Kidman conceded Wednesday that Hollywood has probably contributed to violence against women by portraying them as weak sex objects.

The Oscar-winning actress said she is not interested in those kinds of demeaning roles…

Clearly, Kidman’s character in Practical Magic where she plays a party girl who falls prey to an abusive boyfriend before becoming possessed by his spirit who has to be saved by witches in her family, is a demonstration of a strong woman. Or perhaps she’s referring to the kind of strong female role she took on in Dead Calm where she refuses advice to prepare to defend herself & then sleeps with her captor as her husband tries to rescue her. Or maybe she’s remembering the story behind her character in The Others – a woman who was so distraught over her husband’s death in war that she smothered her children to death and then shot herself. And who can forget the remake of Stepford Wives where women are reprogrammed to always sexually service their husbands while being good little `50’s wives. While we don’t know what kind of strong woman Kidman will play in her upcoming project, How to Marry a Millionaire, I’m sure there will be absolutely no references to women willing to do anything for the security of a monied man. None. At all.

It is obvious that Nicole Kidman steers clear of those weak women, especially those who are treated as a sex objects. So obviously, she is not part of any problem which she condemns Hollywood to partially creating. And clearly Congress needs to open an investigation into these sexually demeaning roles in order to debate a spending program for abuse against women in countries where they have likely never seen a movie.

The Specifics of HSUS’s Federal Attack on Hunting

Weâ€™ve known that HSUS CEO Wayne Pacelle has had his eye on shutting down hunting since at least 1991 when the Associated Press reported him saying, â€œIf we could shut down all sport hunting in a moment, we would.â€ In the Obama-themed â€œChange Agenda for Animals,â€ HSUS outlines their plans to stop hunting step-by-step in the first term in of the new administration.

First and foremost, Pacelleâ€™s organization has called for an end to expansion of hunting activities on federal lands. However, his call goes one step further and asks the Obama administration to close down hunting on National Wildlife Refuges and, eventually, all other public lands. In Pennsylvania, we only have two Refuge properties, and only one currently allows hunting. However, shutting down this federal property will close the Erie National Wildlife Refugeâ€™s 8,260 acres to hunters. Nationally, that would close 370 Refuges open to hunting from Alaska to Florida.

HSUSâ€™s leaders are intelligent folks, and they know that shutting down access is one of the fastest ways to reduce the number of hunters nationwide. In Michigan, they figured out how to divide hunters and passed a dove hunting ban as a ballot initiative. The group has also been instrumental in hurting the hunting culture in New Jersey as one of the largest opponents of the stateâ€™s historic bear hunts.

In addition to closing down the National Wildlife Refuge Systemâ€™s hunting opportunities, HSUS has set a goal of defeating all Congressional attempts to better equip National Park wildlife managers with hunting options. Specifically, the Rocky Mountain National Park and Theodore Roosevelt National Park have severe elk population problems in need of control measures such as a restricted hunt.

For those hunters looking to go west, HSUS wants to make sure you have fewer species to hunt. After the wolf populations of western states recovered enough to be taken off the threatened or endangered species list, hunts were opened to keep the population balanced with other animals they prey upon. HSUS is actively fighting to shut down those hunts, going so far as to put the wolves back on the endangered species list regardless of recovery status.

If any American hunters hope to head overseas for a hunt, it might be time to book the trip before hunting is shut down. HSUS proposes ending aid to African countries that promote trophy hunts to American hunters. They hope to use dollars meant for economic development and assistance in order to shut down lawful industries abroad. These same hunts actually support the conservation programs for African species.

Finally, HSUS has already seen success with another agenda item. HSUS wants the government to end all permits for polar bear hunters headed to Canada. Similar to African species, these polar bear hunts support not only the conservation programs for the species, but also native populations and local environmental projects. HSUS asks the Obama administration to maintain the current ban on import of polar bear trophies, a success they won at the end of the Bush administration.

As just five of the 100 action items, this list should strike fear into the hearts of hunters across the country. Even if a hunter never plans to head off across the ocean to hunt exotic species in Africa, HSUS has made clear that they want to shut down access to public lands in everyone’s home state.

Philly ACORN Caught Lying

Today Andrew Breitbart released video and audio from the Philadelphia ACORN office sting. It did not just prove that ACORN staff were lying to cover their butts, but it also proved David Gambacorta of the Philadelphia Daily News didn’t really investigate the local office’s claims before publishing a full fledged defense of the organization.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKZykXm-23Q&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

I don’t believe that being invited to come back for a housing workshop to help a declared prostitute evade the law is being “shown the door,” a claim made by Mr. Gambacorta. Nor does hearing the staff argue that it doesn’t matter how many underage illegal sex slaves are brought in cause any kind of disturbance, another claim published by Gambacorta without evidence.

And they honestly wonder why no one is buying their papers anymore? They don’t do any kind of reporting, just a little reorganizing of the ACORN press releases and they call it a day at the Daily News!

HSUS Attacks 1st & 2nd Amendments

Yesterday, I mentioned the outrageous power grab that the Humane Society of the United States was making in the name of the animal rights. With new government divisions, agency liaisons, and a White House czar proposed, their agenda is far-reaching and a threat against many issues, not just animal production & far-flung animal rights concerns like whaling.

In their “Change” agenda, HSUS specifically calls for a ban on handgun carry for self-defense, using poaching of big game as an excuse.

Hunting in National Parks â€“ in order to protect wildlife from poaching and ensure public safety, reverse final rule by Bush Administration that undid a longstanding ban on carrying of loaded, concealed weapons in National Parks; continue the historic prohibition on sport hunting in national parks, and prevent attempts to allow private sport hunters to target elk in Rocky Mountain National Park and Theodore Roosevelt National Park; oppose legislation like H.R. 1179, S. 917, and S. 684 in the 110th Congress that would open National Parks to sport hunters

In Pennsylvania, the National Park Service controls 24 popular recreation areas. That means in order to defend against poaching, HSUS believes you should be disarmed while visiting Gettysburg, stopping at the memorial in Valley Forge, or even walking across the lawn in front of Independence Hall in downtown Philadelphia.

Fortunately, pro-gun leaders in the US Senate & House have made the case against carry in these areas much harder. HSUS would now have to overturn legislation signed into law earlier this year to ban lawful carry again. With our friends in Congress, that will be much harder to do.

Beyond the Second Amendment, HSUS also called for the White House to defend a law that makes hunting photos & outdoor media illegal. And defend, they did. Obama’s administration went to the Supreme Court to protect the law to restrict the First Amendment. Fortunately, Court observers say that it appears not a single Justice agreed with the positions of HSUS & the administration.

If the law is overturned on Constitutional grounds, HSUS indicates it would like to be involved in writing a replacement speech-restriction law. While lawmakers would be expected to try and limit such a law to ban pictures of extreme acts such as so-called “crush videos,” but HSUS could try to expand it to again target outdoor media, photos, and videos.

For those gun owners who don’t believe that the Humane Society of the United States isn’t a significant threat, consider their resources. When they decide to pick a fight with gun owners, they have funds that far surpass those of the Brady Bunch. In 2007, the Brady Center reported total revenue of $3,863,596. Their net assets at the end of the year totaled $3,013,211. On the other hand, HSUS has far more flexible income. In the same year, HSUS reported total revenue of $101,826,190 with net assets at the end of the year totaling $204,868,764. Once they turn their sights on us, it will be a well-funded fight.

HSUS’s Radical Agenda

HSUS is once again trying to play the general public in exchange for donations withÂ commercials featuring abused animals and shelters even though they give only a pittance to the local shelters. Â Most of the money raised actually goes to support theirÂ legislative agenda. And if you are a hunter or gun owner, you should be concerned.

In their Obama-themed â€œChange Agenda for Animals,â€ HSUS spells out their goals for the first term of the current administration. The changes reflect an all-out assault on agriculture, meat production, hunting, and even gun rights. The 100-item list doesnâ€™t even include the summary outline of new agency divisions, liaisons, and yes, even a new czar.

In the opening notes, HSUS calls for a new White House specialist, a so-called czar, for animal rights issues. The specialist would work with liaisons on animal rights in at least 20 agencies and departments, including:

Department of Agriculture
Department of Interior
Department of Commerce
Environmental Protection Agency
Department of Health & Human Services
Department of State
Department of Transportation
Department of Housing & Urban Development
Department of Defense
Federal Trade Commission
Department of Education
Department of Justice
US Agency for International Development
US Trade Representative
National Institutes of Health
Food & Drug Administration
Centers for Disease Control
Department of Treasury
US Postal Service
Consumer Product Safety Commission

All of this is in addition to a new proposed division of the Department of Justice to prosecute all of these new animal rights crimes, including the taking & sharing of hunting photos, provided the Supreme Court doesn’t step in to stop that particular infringement on the First Amendment.

I guess this agenda fits right in with the administration’s attempt to consolidate decision-making in the White House. Â The specifics, which I’ll break down tomorrow, are pretty horrifying.

Attacks from the West

When I was updating the Bloomberg Pennsylvania anti-gun mayors map to reflect the challenges to preemption, I was again amazed at the geographical breakdown of the cases.

View Bloomberg’s Anti-Gun Mayors in Pennsylvania in a larger map

Notice that these attacks are not coming from Philadelphia and its suburbs – the area most gun owners believe to be the hot bed for gun control in Pennsylvania. Of the 10 cities that have passed a lost-and-stolen ordinance in violation of state preemption laws, 4 of the 5 in Western PA are in Allegheny County. If West Mifflin enacts their proposal tonight, that will make 5 of 6 (out of 11 total cities).

But sticking to the 10 that have actually passed as of this afternoon, 6 of those are west of the Philadelphia metro area. In fact, 3 of the 4 I am willing to consider in the Philadelphia metro area are not at all considered suburbs of the city. They aren’t even in the same media market, but I opted to be extremely generous in defining Mayor Nutter’s reach with this one.

I’m sure that some will point to the fact that I haven’t mapped York and Scranton, but I have good reasons for those two exceptions. In the case of York, they didn’t actually pass an ordinance. They knew it would be illegal and just passed a resolution. In Scranton’s case, the matter has been tabled.

So for those of us in the Philadelphia area, we’re the ones who need to take cover from the gun control assault being launched by the rest of the state. Isn’t that interesting, if not a little unexpected?

Bloomberg Mayors Continue to Break State Laws

West Mifflin, Pennsylvania’s mayor is the latest to try and break state law by supporting municipal gun controls. Supported by his membership in Michael Bloomberg’s anti-gun group, the Borough Council will take up a proposal tonight to mandate that gun owners report their lost or stolen guns within an arbitrary time period, putting the burden of proof on the accused rather than the state. These ordinances are currently being challenged by the NRA in courts across the state.

Recently, Homestead Borough did the same thing, becoming the 10th city in Pennsylvania to violate the state preemption laws and the state Supreme Court’s Ortiz v. Commonwealth decision. Last night, Clairton became the 11th, though the first non-MAIG-mayor-lead city to do so. However, the proposal was pushed by extremely anti-gun Rep. David Levdansky who has recently taken up the charge of CeaseFirePA.

View Bloomberg’s Anti-Gun Mayors in Pennsylvania in a larger map

I’ve updated the map to reflect the mayors who are pushing Bloomberg’s agenda in violation of state law and the Supreme Court’s decision. At this point, it’s not enough to just track members and former members of the group. Bloomberg is hiring out from the Brady Campaign to try and undermine our state legislature and state courts.

Creigh Deeds was Better as a Moderate

After Jim Geraghty wrote about the Deeds campaignÂ doubling down on the negative campaign â€“ and being called out in the media for it â€“ I really started to think about why Deeds seems to be flailing so much more now than he was in 2005. Sure, there are national trends to consider, but Iâ€™m not sure thatâ€™s it. The more I think about how I would be voting if I still lived in Virginia, the less convinced I am that it is playing a huge role.

Full disclosure, I voted for Creigh Deeds in 2005. So did most other voters since he onlyÂ lost by about 325 votes in a statewide election with nearly 2 million voters. At that time, he not only had the NRA endorsement, but I knew he was willing to step up as a Democratic leader for sportsmen. He was running on his own record, one that a non-affiliated, Republican-leaning, little-l libertarian, could generally get behind. I realized that we may not agree on everything, but for the issues I cared about, he was slightly better than McDonnell at the time.

By the time the 2009 primary rolled around and he had run a little left. He didnâ€™t run far left, mind you, but a little left. Deeds threw gun controllers a bone while McDonnell had strengthened his record â€“ a feat hard to do in the position of Attorney General where you generally shy away from policy. DeedsÂ canâ€™t keep it straight when it comes to tax policy.

Needless to say, this kind of stuff turns independent/crossing-the-aisle voters off. On a few issues, he has gone just far enough to the left without going far, far left to make Bob McDonnell the preferred candidate. And now, rather than being within a polling range of ~325 votes,Â heâ€™s falling far behind McDonnell for Round 2 of their match-up.

TheÂ NYT believes if Democratic votersÂ would have chosen a more liberal Terry McAuliffethat he would stand a better shot against McDonnell. I would venture to say that if Creigh Deeds stayed true to himself, history shows that he might be better off for a more competitive race. Sure, there are other factors to consider like a general backlash against Democrats, but some of those factors were in play in 2005 against McDonnell. Thereâ€™s also a money game. But I do have to consider that there are people like my mom and grandmother who were willing to back Deeds in the primary, hoping for the candidate of 2005 once the primary was over, but who are now voting McDonnell because of the slight swerve to the left by Deeds and all of the negative commercials.