Category: Anti-Gun Folks

From Marion Hammer:

DATE: April 20, 2018
TO: USF & NRA Member and Friends
FROM: Marion P. Hammer
USF Executive Director
NRA Past President

For years YETI Coolers have been a hot item for sportsmen at the Friends of NRA Foundation Banquet and Auction events around the country.

These Foundation events raise money to support youth programs and educational programs nationwide. The youth of America who benefit from these programs are the future hunters, hikers, fishermen/women, bikers, campers, wildlife photographers, mountain climbers, sportsmen/women and conservationists who will protect our natural resources and recreational lands.

Suddenly, without prior notice, YETI has declined to do business with The NRA Foundation saying they no longer wish to be an NRA vendor, and refused to say why. They will only say they will no longer sell products to The NRA Foundation. That certainly isn’t sportsmanlike. In fact, YETI should be ashamed. They have declined to continue helping America’s young people enjoy outdoor recreational activities. These activities enable them to appreciate America and enjoy our natural resources with wholesome and healthy
outdoor recreational and educational programs.

The NRA Foundation is 501(c)(3) non-profit, charitable organization.

In this day and age, information is power. We thought you needed this information.

https://www.yeti.com/contact-us.html

YETI
CORPORATE OFFICE

7601 Southwest Parkway
Austin, TX 78735
1-512-394-9384

Seems pretty foolish of them. Not quite as foolish as a gun or accessories maker turning, but foolish for an outdoor product used by a lot of hunters. Oh well. Get woke, go broke.

The next domino has fallen:

On Tuesday, Finucane said, “We have had intense conversations over the last few months. And it’s our intention not to finance these military-style firearms for civilian use.” She said the reaction has been mixed.

“These are clients we have enjoyed a relationship with,” she said. “There are those I think will reduce their portfolios and we’ll work with them and others that will choose to do something else.”

The amount of damage Bank of America and Citi can do pales in the amount of damage already done to the US Firearms business by Cerberus Capital via Remington Outdoors. The gun business is better off as a highly distributed cottage industry, and I suspect with changes in technology, that’s where it’ll be headed. Such an industry is going to be less vulnerable to pressure from big banks and the financial industry.

Personally, I think the banks need to be broken up. Both Citi and Bank of Americans eagerly lapped up trillions of our tax dollars. Never again. Break them up.

Wells Fargo has, so far, resisted a tremendous amount of pressure from these left-aligned groups to stop doing business with the NRA and legal gun manufacturers and sellers. A major national Teachers Union is now threatening to end a mortgage program with Wells Fargo, or else.

“We’re issuing Wells Fargo an ultimatum—they can have a mortgage market that includes America’s teachers, or they can continue to do business with the NRA and gun manufacturers,” Weingarten said in the statement. “They can’t do both.”

Hopefully 20,000 mortgages isn’t a huge amount of money for a bank as large as Wells Fargo. I bank with Wells Fargo, having started with Core States Bank, and then gone through all the mergers over the years. I will send them a note saying that I appreciate them staying out of this political battle and not caving to pressure to take a position in the gun debate.

I really don’t get this new fad of people needing the companies they do business with to affirm their politics. I mean, if you’re selling fair trade coffee, I think it’s reasonable to expect that the brand would promote the idea of fair trade. Or if you’re selling guns, the business would promote the idea of gun rights. Some products are lifestyle products, and you can’t get around that. But banking and financial services are not among those. I don’t need my beliefs on, say, the non-delegation doctrine affirmed by my bank when I make a deposit. I don’t need a lecture about Big Ag when I go to buy a burrito. Personally, if you think that way, you probably need to get a life.

I’ve argued with several people that, say we agreed to give up our AR-15s and other semi-automatic rifles, the next time there was a public mass shooting, would they and all the other pro-gun control folks throw up their hands, “Well, you know, we tried. But we’ve done enough,” and eschew any further gun control? I don’t know anyone who believes that the case. They certainly know that’s not the case.

And proof positive, I give you the reaction to the YouTube shooting in California.

Thoughts and prayers for the San Bruno YouTube headquarters. You know the drill…

We don’t have to live this way. We sure as hell don’t have to die this way. Text ACT to 64433 and help @MomsDemand defeat the gun lobby and their deadly agenda. https://t.co/CJp6rrTUsd

— Shannon Watts (@shannonrwatts) April 3, 2018

What more do you want in California, seriously? They have everything you could dream of federally and more. But it’s apparently not enough. That should tell you everything you need to know.

Head of Louisiana Dems wants to repeal the Second Amendment:

The chairwoman of the Louisiana Democratic Party is the most high-profile Democratic official in the country to date to call for a repeal of the Second Amendment.

Karen Carter Peterson on Tuesday shared a New York Times op-ed by former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, who argued that the Second Amendment should be repealed because the initial reasons for its creation are “now a relic of the 18th century.”

Thank you Justice Stevens, that gift is continuing to give. You see, the issue in building a coalition that includes working class whites is that they are historically unreliable voters. But I can’t think of anything that will get them out to the polls more than making 2018 a referendum on gun control with prominent Dems calling for repealing parts of the Bill of Rights.

I just listed factors working against us. Crazy ass shit like this coming from our opponents very much works in our favor. The mask is off. They don’t support the Second Amendment. It’s always been very apparent when they say it, it’s disingenuous. Now they are putting their cards on the table.

Humans are programmed in their brains to apply religious qualities to weapons. We do it, they do it. For many people on our side, it’s a talisman that wards off all evil. The attitude of “it’s just a tool,” is held by a very small group of people. I’ve found the tendency to view it as “just a tool” tends to roughly correlate to one’s level of training and experience. Experience and training demystifies the magic.

I believe this debate probably goes back as far as we do. No doubt Ogg was once pissed off that members of his tribe demanded he burn the shaft of his spear, and smash its point, because while he was out hunting one time, he had to kill Moog from the other tribe with it. The tribe shaman insisted the spear was now possessed of evil. Ogg’s hunting buddies insisted the spear was possessed of good Mammoth killing spirits, and only a fool would insist it be broken. Ogg shrugged it off and thought, “It’s a good mammoth spear, but I can make another.” Chances are if you’re reading this, you’re Ogg, and now that we have the technology, we’ve taken this ridiculous religious argument to the tribe of our entire country, even world. Ogg would probably think: “The more shit changes, the more shit stays the same.”

Probably because Johnny Doc’s brother Kevin, Justice of the State Supreme Court, along with his partisan allies, illegally and and flagrantly usurped legislative prerogative to make us a Democratic district*, Brian Fitzpatrick, who I’d note is a former FBI agent, the agency that utterly failed those kids in Florida, is jumping on board with shifting the blame to gun owners.

“We have to be willing to stand up and be willing to have the courage and say that if prohibiting the sale of these military-style assault weapons will solve the problem, we need to get on board with it,” he said.

I’m done with the Fitzpatricks. When Mike retired, it was a prime chance to get a new face out there, but the Party decided to pull a switcheroo and hope no one would notice. I’d note that there is a primary challenger. Usually my first question to a primary challenger is “Can they win?” Too many people ask “Does he agree with me?” Or if you’re a Republican, they’ll ask “Is he a True Conservative?” If your candidate can’t win, that doesn’t matter very much now, does it? You have to run people that can win in the district, and with the fresh addition of a bunch of Dems into District Eight One, any Republican will have an uphill climb. The truth is, I have no idea whether Dean Malik can win, and I don’t frankly care. My overriding desire now is to see Fitzpatrick sent packing, even if it means sacrificing that seat to the Dems. I will vote for Dean in the primary. I seem to recall I was favorably impressed by him at a political beauty pageant a local group held a few years back. I will not vote a single more time for Brian Fitzpatrick, or any other Fitzpatrick, for Congress ever again.

Ordinarily, I am very much reluctant to not hold my nose, because the Dem is almost always guaranteed to be worse on guns and other things. But some stench is just too much, and you can’t get much worse than endorsing a ban on semi-automatics (and make no bones about it… read that CNN poll… it polled banning semi-autos categorically). That Fitzpatrick delivered this message to the sycophants at the Chamber of Commerce is just icing on the cake. The idea that Fitzpatrick is going to give a pass to his buddies at the FBI for failing to act, and instead is going to jump on board with punishing me? Fuck no, and fuck off.

* <rant>
Don’t get me started on this. They claimed a power in the state constitution that simply isn’t there. They basically rewrote the PA constitution to their liking unilaterally, then claimed legislative powers to actually rewrite the districts. I’m really hoping Alito delivers on an injunction, because the elections clause of the federal constitution says state legislatures (and recent precedent allows a function of law to assign redistricting to a commission) draw districts, and Kevin Doc and his buddies are not my fucking legislature and no function of law gives it to them. But no one else in this state seems to believe process matters. Hell, no one believes rule of law is important anymore. We’re warring camps and it’s “Ra! Ra! Go team!” Except my team sucks.
</rant>

Local municipalities in Pennsylvania are preempted from enforcing any ordinance relating to guns. This is pretty well-established under our law. But that doesn’t stop them from passing ordinances, and a popular thing to do is for Boards and Councils to use their positions to lobby state lawmakers to let them have a go at gun regulation, or lobbying on behalf of some legislation or another that the majority of the Board or Council would like to see. It’s like what we do, only they get to do it with taxpayer dollars.

On a rumor, I dragged a bunch of club people out our township meeting with the belief that they might try to pass something like they did after the Vegas shooting. It was shot down after Vegas, because the three Republican Supervisors could outvote the two Dems. However in November, the Dems flipped a seat, and took control of the Board. The Dems this time were assuring members who e-mailed that no gun issue was on the agenda, and they would be taking no action. Even though they are preempted, I like my politicians to learn early about the gun voter. Also, getting them on the record is helpful if they try to run for higher office.

Last night we get through most of the meeting and nothing comes up. Good, that’s victory. But now I’m worried about having a dozen or so people questioning why I dragged them out to a meeting to hear a retirement speech, watch a few appropriations votes, and hear the Chief of Police give his report. Then, at the end, right before adjournment, the big anti-gun Dem on the Board decides he can’t help himself and opens his yap. Wonderful! Thanks for pulling my ass from the fire there! I was starting to worry they might begin to think I cry wolf, and I won’t be able to rally troops the next time I need them. But then again, if he had let the meeting just adjourn, he probably wouldn’t have gotten hisself in the papers.

This could pretty much sum up what we’re all seeing on social media lately:

Well, I don’t know about you guys, but her well reasoned post wishing for my brutal murder totally makes me want to give up my guns!

All I can say is that in 2018, get out and vote. I’m pissed off that the GOP hasn’t done anything either, but I’ll take nothing over rewarding people for this kind of behavior by putting them back in power.

Bloomberg’s bought and paid for propaganda wing has an article on firearms lost during shipping. No one, of course, wants to see firearms end up in the hands of people who would misuse them. But notice what they focus on:

Security experts said the new rules were likely too weak to capture the extent of the problem, and that shipping companies might avoid disclosing guns lost in transit in hopes of warding off negative publicity

“A lot of people don’t want to talk about it, so they don’t report it, don’t go public with it,” said Keith Lewis, vice president of operations for CargoNet, a firm that tracks and helps investigate cargo thefts. “It’s all about brand protection.”

• Raise the cost of shipping firearms to cover regulatory compliance. A win for gun control; higher price, lower demand.
• Get the big common carriers to bow out of shipping firearms due to compliance costs. Manufacturers and distributers would then have to use specialized carriers which will be very expensive. Win for the gun control crowd; higher price, lower demand.

Remember the what, as a whole, inoculates people from supporting gun control, and you’ll understand what I mean. You see the same thing with the gun violence restraining orders. Who wants to stand up for crazy people with guns? Or wife beaters with guns? People like easy, simple to understand solutions. They don’t like complexity. Our ultimate argument is due process, and to be honest, most people don’t even know what that is. Regulation, any regulation, is a win for them. And once you start losing, you tend to keep losing.