Category: Anti-Gun Folks

Based on the criminal dockets of our five clergy, who are by now certainly hoping to be forgiven for their trespasses, some are being charged with more than defiant trespass.  Let us now open to the book of “court”, chapter “docket”, verse “summary” and read the great words:

1. Mimi Copp
2. Melissa DeLong
3. Isaac Miller
4. Phil Jones
5. Yitzahk Nates

Going a bit far?  Maybe.  But consider these people set out for headlines, in order to smear a man’s reputation and destroy his business.  They are trying to intimidate him into turning on his customers.  So for these five, I am happy to lend my Google-fu to making sure anyone who searches on them finds their arrest record.

Yitzhak Nates, Melissa Delong, and and Isaac Miller are being charged with three counts.

1. Defiant Trespassing Posted, Third Degree Misdemeanor
2. Criminal Conspiracy to engage in Defiant Trespass, Third Degree Misdemeanor
3. Disorderly Conduct, Third Degree Misdemeanor if defiant, Summary offense otherwise.

Mimi Copp and Phil Jones are only being charged with Defiant Trespassing.  I guess sometimes it pays to be a follower rather than a leader. Now, I would note these folks are innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law, but is Colosimo really enough of a bad guy to defecate on his property rights in such a manner?  Generally it’s a bad idea to provoke a confrontation with police when the police are customers of the guy you’re protesting.

The clergy group that was lead the other day by Right Reverend Bryan Miller apparently heeded God’s call to defiantly trespass on the property of another:

Supporters outside the store’s entrance applauded and thanked protesters as police carted them off, one by one, in handcuffs.

“You couldn’t talk them out of getting locked up,” said Lt. Joseph O’Brien, of the Civil Affairs Unit. “Usually you could talk them out of it.”

Others weren’t so impressed.

“It’s trespassing,” said Capt. William Fisher. “I gave them three warnings to protest on the sidewalk.

“They feel they have an issue and they feel this is how they can get the most attention,” he said.

The demonstrators spent the night in jail and are facing charges of defiant trespassing.

You know what me, the evil gun owner has never been arrested for?  If you guessed a third degree misdemeanor, you’d be correct.  Here’s an interesting thing, the headline says five were arrested:

Other activists who were arrested and charged yesterday include the Rev. Isaac Miller, of the Church of the Advocate, Rabbi Yitzhak Nates, of Narberth Havurah, Mimi Copp, 34, of the Circle of Hope Church and Melissa DeLong, 28, of Camden.

Let me see, that’s one, two, three, four.  Who was the first activist arrested?  Did I miss something?  Was it Bryan Miller and they conviently forgot to tell us?  I doubt Bryan is that stupid, but we’ll look into this for sure!

UPDATE: Nope… Not Bryan Miller.  That would have been too good.

Mayor Gary Becker of Racine, Wisconsin has been arrested.  Seems he is alleged to enjoy touching children.  Maybe we should require background checks and video surveillance on Mayors before they join Bloomberg’s organization.  Pretty clearly there would be some significant public benefit to this move.

Shelia Dixon of Baltimore.  Accused of stealing 12 counts of stealing money from the homeless and needly children.

Yesterday we talked about the sources of political capital for gun control organizations. If we understand the sources of the Brady Campaign’s political power, then we would also be remiss if we did not discuss ways it can be undermined.  There are a few ways we have done, and are already doing that.

Heller is perhaps the newest tool that we have won in order to attack one of the core sources of Brady’s political power, and how powerful it will be has not yet played out.  But for the first time, it gives us a tool to attack infringements on Second Amendment rights that exist in parts of the country where our political power has been utterly destroyed, and there is no culture of responsible, legal gun ownership to speak of.   Even though Heller has been embraced by Brady, because it takes the fear of confiscation off the table, as Dave Hardy pointed out to us a few nights ago, if Brady thinks Heller is so great then certainly incorporation of the Second Amendment would be fifty times better.  But they are smart enough to know spin from reality.  They will fight incorporation tooth and nail, because it will give people in the areas affected by these bans or near bans the opportunity to legally procure firearms.  It will mean gun shops and pistol ranges opening up in places like Chicago and New York City.  Exposure to firearms makes their fear mongering and disinformation considerably less effective.

The biggest damage that gun owners have done to the Brady Campaign over the past two decades is enhanced our own political reputation at the expense of theirs.  The Brady Campaign has not made any significant progress on gun control at the federal level since 1994.  It’s made very little at the state level too.  In the period since then, they’ve been losing ground on many fronts.  Their lack of effectiveness, and lack of ability to keep gun control in the political spotlight has hurt donations and media relationships.  Even though this past election offers Brady the opportunity to flip the tables, the Democrats won because the media largely did the Democrats a favor by ignoring gun control entirely.

But Brady’s media relations started very strong, and still are.  Media is one area I think the NRA is sadly deficient.  It is a challenging environment, because it’s ground that The Brady Campaign owns.  It would be difficult for them to make inroads through a direct attack, but that’s not to say there’s no way to make inroads.  There are many things NRA does get right.  NRA-ILA’s new media outreach efforts, so far, have been pretty good, and traditional media sees them as a resource on gun control issues.  Folks in advancement has been doing some pretty impressive work using social networking. But NRA as a whole organization has no unified media strategy, and it needs one.  NRA cannot just think of media as a resource for supporting/opposing the issue or legislation du jour.  There needs to be an overall strategy for helping the story of responsible gun use infiltrate its way into media circles.

Fortunately, the changes in technology offer a prime opportunity, and are reshaping the media landscape to be less favorable to Brady, and more favorable to us.  The Internet is doing the same thing to the media establishment in the early part of the 21st century that the personal computer did to the computing industry in the late 20th century.  Just like personal computing made computing available to the average person, undermining the large computing oligopoly enjoyed by companies like IBM, Honeywell, Unisys, and Siemens, the Internet has made the means of publication and distribution effectively free, undermining large media giants like The New York Times, The Chicago Tribune, The Boston Globe, and the LA Times.  Network TV newsrooms have fared little better.  Cable news is doing better, but is seeing some losses, and isn’t growing like it once did.

Democratization of news doesn’t necessarily mean all old forms of media disappear, but it does mean things will change.  In many ways, NRA is in a much better position to capitalize on this moving forward, because it has actual grass roots which can participate in this democratization.  But NRA is not perfectly oriented in this regard.  The next few years will likely see some big media giants fall, and Brady’s political capital along with it.  We ought to be in there picking up the pieces.  You can bet Brady will be.

Since we talked about NRA and political capital here and here.  It’s an interesting exercise to think about what the Brady Campaign’s sources of political capital are.  I think they look a lot different than NRA.

1. Media relationships.  Without a doubt, Brady would be nothing without this.  Their access to media, their ability to shape their public message, and to ultimately shape the public debate is unbelievably strong.  I can think of few other issue advocacy groups that play the media game better than The Brady Campaign.
2. Existing laws. The existing gun laws are actually a significant source of their political power.  Outright bans or severe and heavy restrictions in several of America’s largest major metropolitan areas have so severely depressed gun ownership in these areas that no one has any familiarity with guns, or their responsible use.  Few middle class people own guns themselves, or have even fired one.  This makes them very fertile soil for Brady to plant their seeds of disinformation with help from a friendly media.
3. Political reputation.  The Brady Campaign was responsible for the third major change in federal gun control laws, and had a strong influence on the laws of a few states.  The third major change in those laws even bears the name “The Brady Act.”  Even though they were called Handgun Control Inc. when the Brady Act passed, they were smart enough to change their name.  They have a reputation for passing gun control, which no other gun control organization out there can claim.
4. Donors.  Brady doesn’t have a concept of membership in the same manner than NRA does, in large part because it has its roots in issue advocacy, whereas NRA has its roots in promoting the shooting sports.  The Brady Campaign has a much smaller grass roots presence, but maintaining healthy media relationships isn’t as resource intense as lobbying and political activity, which they also do, but with very powerful help from the media establishment.
5. Issue expertise.  We know they are full of shit on guns, but the media doesn’t.  They are the go-to group when it comes to gun control topics.

It’s pretty clear that the core of the Brady Campaign’s political power is their media relationships, while NRA’s core is their membership.  The great thing about Brady’s sources of political capital is they aren’t easily exhausted.  They can maintain a high degree of media activity without much cost, which can serve to publicly embarrass politicians that oppose gun control, and publicly support those who do.  Because of their ability to shape elite cultural opinion through the media, they can basically make gun ownership a net social liability; where at a polite dinner party you’re about as likely to want to talk about a gun collection as a porn collection.

Don’t know how I missed this, but here is the laundry list of issues the Brady Campaign presented to the President Elect back before the holidays.  Just because they ask doesn’t mean they will receive, but needless to say, they have a more receptive President and Congress than they’ve had in two decades.

Thanks to reader RuffRidr

The Brady Campaign has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to enjoin the Department of Interior from changing its rules to allow concealed carry in National Parks.

The rule will allow guns in rural and urban national park areas around the country, from Wyoming’s Yellowstone and California’s Yosemite to Philadelphia’s Independence National Historical Park, home of the Liberty Bell. The suit was filed on behalf of the Brady Campaign and its members, including school teachers in the New York and Washington, D.C. areas who are canceling or curtailing school trips to Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty and the National Mall in Washington, D.C. now that the Bush Administration will be allowing guns in these national park areas.

Carrying firearms is still prohibited on the National Mall and at Ellis Island, because the states they are in prohibit carrying of firearms.  Hell, even Independence Hall in Philadelphia will still be off limits, because while Pennsylvania allows for licensed concealed carry, access to Independence National Historical Park is through a a federal facility, where guns are still illegal.  This is fear mongering, pure and simple.  As usual with the Brady folks, these claims are patently false.

UPDATE: Dave Hardy, who worked in the DOI Solicitor’s office as an attorney for a number of years, has some thoughts on this as well.

Part CCLXI

So says the Brady Campaign:

“In this season of hope, however, we should not despair and say this kind of violence is inevitable. We should not tolerate the steady drumbeat of gun deaths and injuries that tears our families and communities apart. We can and should do all that is within our power to find solutions to gun violence.

“In the New Year, we hope that our nation’s leaders have the courage and conviction to take steps that will help protect our families and communities from gun violence.”

How?  This guy lived in California, which is the Brady #1 rated state for gun laws.  If the “reasonable” laws they advocate that every state should have were so effective, how did this happen in the first place?  You can’t make laws to stop all evil acts.