Tag: gun rights

Democrats blame lack of gun control for knife and bomb attacks

8:30 am

You can’t make this stuff up. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) told reporters on Tuesday that the Islamic knife and bomb terrorist attacks this past weekend in Minnesota, New York, and New Jersey were the fault of Republicans for blocking new gun control legislation.

Nor was Durbin alone. Harry Reid (D-Nevada) joined him in blaming Republicans and the lack of new gun control rules for the terrorist attacks.

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Obama goes after gunsmiths

8:43 pm

The constitution is such an inconvenient thing: A new Obama executive order has redefined the work of gunsmiths to define them as manufacturers so that they can be much more heavily regulated, and likely put out of business.

The president’s executive order, which Obama signed on July 22 — around the beginning of the Democratic National Convention — conveys to the State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (DDTC), which is primarily in charge of managing the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and establishing its rules, the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR).

DDTC now names commercial gunsmiths as “manufacturers” for relatively simple tasks as threading a barrel or duplicating a small custom part for an older firearm.

The law would require gunsmiths to spend thousands to meet the regulations, and would likely put most out of business, or force them underground into a black market.

The worst part of this, beyond the fact that it is a naked attack on law-abiding citizens because they do work Obama and liberals hate, is that if this executive order stands, it will grant the federal government unlimited power to destroy almost anyone in blue collar work that they don’t like Repair a car, install a carpet, fix a home’s air conditioning system, replace some plumbing, and you suddenly can be declared a manufacturer that no longer can afford to be in business.

Posted from the south rim of the Grand Canyon.

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Tennessee makes owner responsible for harm caused by gun-free zone

9:15 am

Want to make your property a gun-free zone? In Tennessee, a new law now makes you legally and financially responsible should anyone be hurt because of it.

As of July 1, if a handgun carry permit holder in Tennessee is injured, suffers bodily injury or death, incurs economic loss or expense, property damage or any other compensable loss on a property posted as a gun-free zone, they can sue the person or entity who stripped them of their right to self defense.

Makes sense to me. If you are a law-abiding citizen well-trained in the use of firearms and have the ability to defend yourself, and that ability is denied to you because some property owner wants to create an imaginary gun-free zone, that owner certainly shares some of the responsibility should you get injured because you were unable to defend yourself.

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Trump softens tone on gun restrictions

9:59 pm

In a television interview today Donald Trump softened his position on the use of terrorist watch lists to deny Americans their second amendment rights under the Bill of Rights, aligning his position more closely to that of the National Rifle Association which endorsed him.

This whole kerfuffle illustrates once again the importance of surrounding Trump with trustworthy conservatives who can influence him. Trump is not trustworthy, but he will bend to the will of those who advise him, and he has made it clear that he wants the NRA’s advice.

Thus, it is crucially important to elect a lot of conservative Republicans this November. Such people in Congress, and only such people, can prevent the worst abuses coming from what will likely be a generally confused Trump administration, or a decidedly leftist Clinton one.

Posted from Washington, D.C.

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Trump affirms support for denying Americans their second amendment rights

11:10 pm

Update on the November Democratic primary: Donald Trump today repeated his support for the idea of allowing the FBI or a bureaucrat in Washington to decide whether Americans will have the right to own or buy guns, essentially denying them their second amendment rights.

Donald Trump reaffirmed his stance on restricting individuals on the terror watch list from being able to purchase firearms, despite Republican objections. “We have to make sure that people that are terrorists or have even an inclination toward terrorism cannot buy weapons, guns,” Trump told ABC’s White House Correspondent Jonathan Karl in an interview that will air Sunday on “This Week.”. [emphasis mine]

So now, according to Trump it is even reasonable for the government to deny you your rights, based merely on what they think you think. Gee, what could possibly go wrong with that idea, especially when such power is handed to government bureaucrats whose political bosses crave power above all else?

I must admit I have been toying with the idea of voting for Trump, because Hillary Clinton is going to be far worse. Trump however is doing his damndest to convince me that this would be a mistake, and a third party vote makes more sense, even if Gary Johnson has his own problems..

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Democrats work to abolish 2nd amendment merely because the FBI suspects you

10:37 am

Fascists: Senate Democrats are teaming up with a handful of Republicans to re-introduce a bill that would allow the federal government to instantly suspend the second amendment constitutional rights of anyone the FBI happens to declare a suspect.

If the FBI believes there’s a reasonable chance someone is going to use a gun in a terrorist attack, it should be able to make that determination and block the sale,” Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told a conference call on Monday.

No due process, no conviction, no actual evidence of wrong-doing is needed. Though the law tries to define what the FBI’s determinations should be based on, all the FBI and the federal government would really have to do is declare you a suspect. In other words, if they don’t like you — for example you happen to be a member of a tea party group that opposes Barack Obama, or you happen to be an Occupy Wall Street protester who opposes Donald Trump — they can cancel your second amendment rights and bar you from owning guns.

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Connecticut moves to ban 2nd amendment

11:52 am

Gun control fascists: Connecticut’s Democratic legislature has have passed a new law, which the Democratic governor has signed, allowing the government to confiscate the firearms of anyone placed under a temporary restraining order.

Temporary restraining orders are routinely granted with little or no examination of the underlying facts and based wholly on one-sided testimony.  Such a process is certainly appropriate in cases of domestic abuse, stalking, and the like.  But with the implementation of this new law the subject of the restraining order is punished without ever having his day in court.  In fact, they are punished without ever even being accused of, let alone convicted of, a crime.  The TRO does not require a crime to have been committed – just a feeling of danger.

Now, if you hate guns and you live in Connecticut, all you have to do is say that you feel threatened by someone, and the government can take that person’s guns. No trial, no evidence, no Constitutional rights. The feelings of a person trumps all!

Note the pattern. Almost all of the people trying to ban free speech and our Constitutional rights are leftists, be it either Democratic politicians, leftwing academics, or communist student groups. Yet, these same people are going to claim that no one should vote for Donald Trump, because he, in league with the Republicans, is going to take away our Constitutional rights.

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Lexington proposes gun confiscation

10:18 am

Fascists: The town of Lexington, Massachusetts, where the American Revolution was started by Minutemen armed with rifles, has proposed confiscating legally owned firearms from its citizens.

One such town meeting member, a Harvard professor named Robert Rotberg has taken it upon himself to enact, what he hopes will be “a movement against assault weapons that would capture the state and therefore maybe explode to reach the country.” He has seized upon the recent ban enacted in Highland Park, IL, and has modeled his own ban, almost copying the language verbatim. Filing it to the town meeting warrant as Article 34.

Among other things, Article 34 includes any firearm that is semi-automatic and can accept a magazine that will hold more than 10 rounds. It also includes any magazine that holds more than 10 rounds. The article also has a provision in which Lexington’s licensed gun owners who own firearms included in the ban would be forced to sell, render inoperable, or have them seized and destroyed by the police department

It doesn’t seem to occur to this Harvard professor that this ordinance would violate both the second amendment (“the right to bear arms shall not be infringed”) and the fifth amendment (“nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation”). But then, who cares about some old document called the Bill of Rights written by some white guys more than 200 years ago? We are Progressives! We know better!

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No security at Homeland Security

9:44 am

Does this make you feel safer? Homeland Security has lost 165 firearms and more than 1,300 security badges in the past three years.

The people running Homeland Security are generally the same people who want to prevent ordinary citizens from possessing guns. I would say instead that we all would be safer if we owned the guns and they were banned at Homeland Security.

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The Democratic Party’s disconnect from reality

12:07 pm

Three stories today once again illustrate better than anything the leftwing Democratic Party’s profound disconnect from reality:

The first story is a new poll of the public’s opinions on the subject of gun control and the idea of banning “assault weapons” (whatever those might be). Not surprisingly, the public opposes future bans, and the trend lines show a continuing and nonstop shift away from gun control and towards gun rights that has been on-going since the 1990s.

A majority of Americans oppose banning assault weapons for the first time in more than 20 years of ABC News/Washington Post polls, with the public expressing vast doubt that the authorities can prevent “lone wolf” terrorist attacks and a substantial sense that armed citizens can help. Just 45 percent in this national survey favor an assault weapons ban, down 11 percentage points from an ABC/Post poll in 2013 and down from a peak of 80 percent in 1994. Fifty-three percent oppose such a ban, the most on record.

Indeed, while the division is a close one, Americans by 47-42 percent think that encouraging more people to carry guns legally is a better response to terrorism than enacting stricter gun control laws. Divisions across groups are vast, underscoring the nation’s gulf on gun issues.

The second story describes how, despite the above very broad and obvious poll numbers, ninety-one House Democrats today introduced a bill to ban the sale and manufacture of “assault weapons”. In announcing the bill, its lead sponsor, David Cicilline (D-Rhode Island), made this vague effort to define “assault weapon”:
» Read more

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The murder rate on U.S. islands with strict gun laws

9:32 am

A comparison of the murder rate on U.S. islands that have very strict gun control laws with the average U.S. murder rate finds that gun control has no effect on reducing violence, and in fact might help increase it.

The article finds that the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico have far more murders per person than the U.S., while Hawaii has less. The research does demonstrate, however, that the argument used by places like Chicago, New York, and Washington, DC (that the access to guns in nearby communities causes their gun laws to fail) is bogus. It doesn’t matter if guns are available nearby, as shown above. Instead, as the author correctly notes,

A major problem with trying to lower murder rates with gun laws aimed at restricting the entire population’s access to firearms is that only a tiny number of guns are needed to supply those involved in violent crime. From an economic perspective, it does not matter much if you attempt to fill a bucket from a small pond or an ocean; filling the bucket is easy in either case.

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Boxer cites California gun laws to stop California terrorist attacks

5:28 pm

The reality-challenged Democratic Party: Today Senator Barbara Boxer (D-California), in demanding new gun control regulations in response to yesterday’s terrorist attack in California, noted that “sensible gun laws work. We’ve proven it in California.”

You can’t make this stuff up. The so-called sensible but very restrictive gun control laws in California did nothing to stop the murderers yesterday, but they did do a good job of making sure the innocent people there were unarmed, helpless, and easy targets. (The attack also took place in a government facility that is a gun-free zone.)

So of course, Boxer and the Democrats want to disarm everyone else, so that these killers won’t have as hard a time at killing us.

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Arm yourself

9:38 am

As usual, yesterday’s mass shooting in California caused President Obama and the entire left to go into spasms demanding more gun control. A gunman shows up at a random site and begins shooting innocent unarmed people, and the first instinct of the left is to disarm more people so that vicious murderers will have more unarmed people to nonchalantly murder.

I say, it doesn’t matter whether yesterday’s killers were Islamic madmen, right-wing madmen, left-wing madmen, or plain-old madmen. What matters is that they had an easy time killing lots of people, because those people decided to remain unarmed and helpless in the face of violence.

I say, arm yourself. Get prepared so that if you find yourself in such terrible circumstances you can fight back and possibly survive, and in the process maybe save a lot of other lives as well. The likelihood that there will more such killers, most of whom will likely be Islamic terrorists because that is whom we are presently at war with, is quite high. To sit helpless and not prepared for battle is the height of foolishness.

You are personally responsible. You cannot depend on the police or government to defend you. You need to be prepared to defend yourself.

Arm yourself. The next time a killer shows up there should be ten free Americans capable of stopping him or her in their tracks, before anyone innocent dies.

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Israel eases its restrictions on gun use

11:45 am

Faced with rising violence from Islamic and Palestinian terrorists, Israel this month has eased its gun control rules so that more citizens can own and use guns.

Under the new policy, all IDF officers above the rank of 2nd lieutenant and non-commissioned officers from the rank of first sergeant and up can obtain a permit, even if they hold those ranks in the reserves. Parallel ranks in the police and other security services have been given the same access.

This doesn’t help those who came to the country later in life and never served in the military, but it is still a step in the right direction. The Palestinians wish to live by the sword. They then face the increasing possibility that they will die by it.

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Police steal a citizen’s guns and ammo

3:53 pm

Theft by police: After securing a citizen’s home after a burglary, police then forced their way into a secure room to seize nine guns and the ammunition for them, all without a warrant.

Officers asked Mr. Bilzerian’s assistant and security guard for permission to break into the room but the aides declined, but the officers accessed it anyway, Mr. Bilzerian said. “They broke into our closet and took them after we were burglarized,” said Mr. Bilzerian’s assistant Jeremy Guymon. “It’s not like we were doing anything wrong.”

The responding officers confiscated nine firearms supposedly under the premise that they wanted to secure the home in case the burglars attempted a second break-in, Mr. Bilzerian said. But strangely, the officers left behind an arsenal of shotguns and a high-powered semiautomatic carbine rifle like the ones used by special operations troops. “The officers told my assistant that they took the handguns because they didn’t want the suspects to come back and get them on a second break-in even though they were unsuccessful at opening the steel reinforced door the first time,” Mr. Bilzerian said. “Essentially they were ‘trying to protect my property and people’s safety.’ This is hard to grasp, when they left my $21,000 FN SCAR17 with thermal optic and shotguns unsecured in that same room.”

After several months, the guns were finally returned but the ammo remains missing, essentially stolen by law enforcement. Read the whole article, as it describes a number of other examples of this kind of theft.

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170 million guns purchased, crime drops by half

10:10 am

More guns, less crime: According to federal government data Americans have purchased more than 170 million guns since 1991, and in that time violent crime has dropped 51 percent.

This evidence strongly suggests that the presence of guns in the hands of honest Americans helps to reduce violence. And while there are many factors contributing to the fall in crime, many which have nothing to do with the purchase of guns by Americans, the statistics here should not be ignored. Gun control advocates always argue that if gun limits are reduced, a blood-bath will follow. This claim has always been proven false, and these statistics do so again.

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State Department proposes fines for writing about guns without permission

11:31 am

New regulations being proposed by the Obama administration would require anyone writing on the web about guns to get approval first from the State Department or face serious fines.

In their current form, the ITAR do not (as a rule) regulate technical data that are in what the regulations call the ‘public domain.’ Essentially, this means data ‘which is published and which is generally accessible or available to the public’ through a variety of specified means. These include ‘at libraries open to the public or from which the public can obtain documents.’ Many have read this provision to include material that is posted on publicly available websites, since most public libraries these days make Internet access available to their patrons.

The ITAR, however, were originally promulgated in the days before the Internet. Some State Department officials now insist that anything published online in a generally-accessible location has essentially been ‘exported,’ as it would be accessible to foreign nationals both in the U.S. and overseas.

With the new proposal published on June 3, the State Department claims to be ‘clarifying’ the rules concerning ‘technical data’ posted online or otherwise ‘released’ into the ‘public domain.’ To the contrary, however, the proposal would institute a massive new prior restraint on free speech. This is because all such releases would require the ‘authorization’ of the government before they occurred. The cumbersome and time-consuming process of obtaining such authorizations, moreover, would make online communication about certain technical aspects of firearms and ammunition essentially impossible. [emphasis mine]

In your wildest dreams did you ever think we’d come to a time in the U.S. where the federal government thought it acceptable to require citizens to get their permission before they could publish something?

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The ATF does not have the legal right to ban AR-15 ammo

3:44 pm

The law is such an inconvenient thing: The Obama administration’s attempt to ban from public sale the most popular ammo used with AR-15 rifles is not based on any law on the books.

Even though the ATF currently claims that the round was always covered under the 1986 law defining armor-piercing ammunition and that the agency only temporarily exempted it from regulation and prohibition, that is also false. ATF never had that authority. It was the clear language of the statute, not the ATF’s good graces, that excluded M885 ammo from its definition. The ATF didn’t have the authority then, and the Obama administration doesn’t have the authority now, to ban this ammunition. It is a lawless power grab that should be treated as such by each court that is given an opportunity to review it.

The author does a careful analysis of the actual law, and finds the Obama administration in clear violation of it.

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New Jersey prosecutor drops prison threat against Pennsylvania gun-carrying mom

10:45 am

How nice of him! A New Jersey prosecutor has dropped the treat of imprisonment for a Pennsylvania mother who mistakenly brought her legally purchased gun into New Jersey.

Allen was arrested last October after she was pulled over on the Atlantic City Expressway for a minor traffic violation and volunteered to the state trooper that she had a gun in her purse. She erroneously believed that her Pennsylvania carry permit was good in New Jersey, and for that mistake McClain was prepared to put her behind bars for years, separating her from her two young sons. McClain’s predecessor and prosecutors in other counties took a more lenient approach, commonly approving PTI for defendants like her. But until now McClain had argued that New Jersey law did not allow such exceptions.

As a general rule, it is wise to avoid entrance to fascist states. This mother has discovered why in a very blunt manner.

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New York gun shop raided by SWAT team, without a warrant

8:55 am

Fascism: A New York gun shop was raided by a SWAT team, without a warrant, and forced to turn over customer sales records.

This raid was supposedly legal under New York’s newest gun control law dubbed the SAFE act. However, under the Constitution no raid can be legal without a warrant. In addition, the store owner has repeatedly requested clarification of the law from officials in his attempt to be cooperative and legal and was still raided. He is suing.

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11-year-old threatened with expulsion for virtual gun

11:04 am

Madness: An 11-year-old has been threatened with expulsion for bringing a virtual gun to a virtual school.

In listening to the audio of the talk radio report, the school demanded the boy change his avatar because it included an image of a pistol, and is now rushing to craft a policy that would outlaw gun images in the future. Not only is this insane, it would be a violation of the first amendment.

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Woman scares off attackers with gun

1:02 pm

The right kind of gun control: An Ohio woman with a concealed carry license scared off two bat-wielding attackers when she pointed her gun on them.

This is not that unusual a story but I wanted to highlight it because of this quote:

The men took off and so far have eluded police. Dinah posted about the incident on Facebook to alert friends and neighbors, to criticism by some. “Most of the males’ opinion was, ‘Why didn’t you shoot them?'” [emphasis mine]

The highlighted quote above, nonchalantly advocating that she should have fired the gun, is incredibly stupid. Life is not a modern Hollywood movie, where idiots shoot their weapons indiscriminately without thought. This woman made exactly the right decision. She used her weapon to stop the attack, and then proceeded on her way. Had she fired she would made things very messy for herself, for no reason.

Guns in the hands of good people are without question the best defense against bad people. However, if you use that gun unwisely or without cause you make yourself a bad person. Stay good and stay safe. Arm yourself, but don’t use your weapon unless you really really really have to.

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Crime rate plunges in Chicago as concealed carry applications surge

7:02 pm

Surprise, surprise! Since Illinois began issuing concealed carry permits last year, the crime numbers in Chicago have plunged steeply.

Since Illinois started granting concealed carry permits this year, the number of robberies that have led to arrests in Chicago has declined 20 percent from last year, according to police department statistics. Reports of burglary and motor vehicle theft are down 20 percent and 26 percent, respectively. In the first quarter, the city’s homicide rate was at a 56-year low. …

As of July 29 the state had 83,183 applications for concealed carry and had issued 68,549 licenses. By the end of the year, Mr. Pearson estimates, 100,000 Illinois citizens will be packing. When Illinois began processing requests in January, gun training and shooting classes — which are required for the application — were filling up before the rifle association was able to schedule them.

Actually, this shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone. In every single case, when the number of gun-toting law-abiding citizens was allowed to increase because of an easing in gun restrictions, the number of crimes has dropped.

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Another DC gun ban ruled unconstitutional

10:29 am

Victory for freedom: On Saturday a federal judge ruled that the DC ban on carrying handguns outside your home was unconstitutional and must no longer be enforced.

Expect the crime rate in DC to finally begin declining.

Update: DC’s police chief today announced that they will no longer arrest anyone who has the legal right to carry a gun, concealed or otherwise, in DC or in any other state. This means they now recognize the gun laws of the rest of the country.

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The woman whose pistol was seized by the local government in Colorado will finally have it returned next week.

8:57 am

The woman whose pistol was seized by the local government in Colorado will finally have it returned next week.

Happily, involving the press made an immediate difference. After Warren contacted the Loveland Reporter, a journalist named James Garcia called the city attorney’s office to ask what was going on. He was told that the gun had been scheduled for return on May 21. “I think that they immediately realized that they needed to find a date . . . so they made one up.” She laughs: “They realized that they needed to get this woman to shut up!” Despite this, the attitude remained. After Garcia’s piece was published, Warren called the office to confirm that the information the reporter had received was accurate. Petulantly, the CA continued to refuse to talk to her. When she pressed, the date was acknowledged but details remained thin on the ground.

Basically, the stupid gun law that Colorado passed last year has created a situation where petty bureaucrats can confiscate your gun on a whim and require you to make a media stink to get them to give it back.

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