The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …
Well, at least not in Philadelphia.
Robberies have made the recycling business so dangerous for David Geppert, shot two years ago during a holdup, that he gave his blessing to employees who said they wanted to carry guns to work. Yesterday morning, Geppert said he felt blessed that none of his employees at his Germantown facility was injured during a gun battle between a robber and two employees. The robber was shot and died.
Good show.
I feel bad that I haven’t linked Ryan in a while, so what do you think about taking the Red’s Trading Post Challenge? One of the issues we brought up with Glen and Ashley at the GBR was getting hearings on ATF abuses. I don’t know whether that’s something that would be possible to get out of Nancy Pelosi’s Congress, but letting them know how you feel can’t hurt.
What is the biggest obstacle we face in our efforts to preserve our gun rights? Apathy among gun owners is certainly a big one, but I don’t think it’s the biggest. In my experience, apathy can be easy to overcome once you get someone to understand what’s at stake, and what the other side is really trying to do. The biggest issue we face is that most people are simply completely unfamiliar with firearms.
A small minority are downright afraid of them. They are harder to reach, but they are a minority. The vast majority of people simply have little to no experience with guns, and don’t understand much about them, or the greater political issues involved. Combine that with a media establishment that’s only too happy to misrepresent everything about the gun issue, and you have a recipe for disaster.
That’s why I’m happy to read this:
The other librarians at work have found out about my new hobby. Some of them are curious, some are excited and wanting to join me at the range, but most are silent on the matter. My manager has been curious, asking questions about how it feels to shoot, if you need to be strong physically, if it’s loud, that sort of thing.
That’s a good start. If you want to know what I think the best thing folks can do for our movement, it’s get new people to the range. Demystify the totem that the media has made the gun to be, and make them see it for the tool that it is. If you take ten new people to the range, and only one of them becomes pro-gun, and if everyone did that, we just went from 4 million, to 8 million.
Just to illustrate what you have to deal with out there, while I was at the GBR waiting for someone with a key to come down and unlock the Hospitality room, we were sharing the hallway with the National Weather Association. One of the NWA chicks asks me, kind of shyly “What’s going on in there?” referring to our hospitality room. “You guys are gun bloggers? What is that about?” So I explain that we’re basically a diverse bunch. “Some of us are competitive shooters. Others of us blog about the political aspects of the gun issue. We talk about gear, collecting. All kinds of things.” She latched on to the competitive shooting issue “You mean like those clay birds?” I answered “Well, yes. That’s a shotgun sport. We don’t have any people who do that competitively here, but [Mr. Completely] is a steel plate and pin shooter” She immediately became curious as to what you would shoot a bowling pin or steel plate with, so I answered “Generally a pistol.” She seemed shocked by that: “Really?” Another NWS guys said “Oh yeah, you generally do that kind of stuff with pistol.”
Do you see how successful the media has been? She had no idea pistols were used in sport at all. I can promise you she had no idea that evil “assault weapons” had any sporting use as well. Now, I’ll be the first to tell you that we won’t win this on sporting uses. Self-defense is an important component of the debate, but when people who accept the sporting use argument don’t even know what they are, we have a long way to go.
Ignorance of firearms is, without a doubt in my opinion, our biggest obstacle.
… at least has the courtesy of giving us the reach around:
California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed into law National Rifle Association (NRA)-backed legislation to prevent the confiscation of firearms from law-abiding Californians during a future state of emergency or natural disaster, as happened in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Assembly Bill 1645 was introduced in the General Assembly by Assemblyman Doug LaMalfa (R-2).
“In passing this law, Assemblyman LaMalfa and California’s General Assembly acted to protect the rights of law-abiding gun owners when their rights are most vital,†said Chris W. Cox, NRA’s chief lobbyist. “During a time when there is no 9-1-1 or police upon which to rely, honest citizens will never again have to worry that their only means of self protection from looters or thugs will be taken away by the government.â€
After Hurricane Katrina, the New Orleans Police Superintendent issued orders to confiscate all firearms- including those from law-abiding residents. With that single order, he stripped the only means of self-protection innocent citizens had during a time of widespread civil disorder. This legislation guarantees those actions will never happen in California.
That’s good news for Californians, provided there are still guns to be had to defend themselves with by the time the politicians there are finished screwing gun owners.
This doesn’t make up for signing the microstamping bill and lead ammo bans.  Hey Governor Arnold: If you buy me a drink one minute, and then turn around and punch me in the face the next, don’t get upset when I don’t want to sit next to you at the bar. Gun owners in California should demand more than an abusive relationship with their Governor.
Assemblyman LaMalfa deserves our praise, however. It looks like he did some serious work to get this bill passed through what is arguably the most anti-gun legislature in the country.
I came across this post today, that looks like it got picked up on by the anti-NRA types.  There are a lot of angry, pissed off folks out there on Al Gore’s internets that will tell you the NRA has sold us out, and will be happy to go on a litany of grievances going nearly all the way back to 1871.
I’ve never claimed the organization is perfect, but they are what we have to deal with. I’m glad to have you aboard. A lot of folks make some good points that we’re tired of compromising away our gun rights, and I’m tired of it too, to be honest. But the only way we’re going to stop compromising is to organize, mobilize, and win. As much as I agree with GOA and JPFO’s goals, they don’t have a winning strategy, and aren’t going to move the ball forward. They also lack the members and political influence. I have no issue with folks joining the smaller groups, but I think everyone should be in the NRA. If they do something that pisses you off, tell them about it! Vote in the elections for board members who’s ideas are most in line with your own. In short, participate. Don’t just be angry.  Welcome aboard Dustin, it’s good to have you.
I figure you spend some days with folks at GBR, they ought to be on your blogroll. Several were already, but a few I have been reading, but hadn’t gotten around to adding, so here we go:
Much to my surprise, I didn’t have The View From North Central Idaho on my blogroll. I thought I had added Joe months ago.
Anthroblogology
I also thought I had AnarchAngel on there already as well, but that’s another one I missed.
She didn’t attend the GBR, but she’s impressed me in a short amount of time, so I’ll add The Breda Fallacy as well.
I’d add Rob’s blog if he started blogging again :)
Ahab doesn’t think the EU should be butting into the sovereign affairs of certain countries to regulate hunting.  I agree, but with the caveat that it does sound like Malta isn’t engaging in sound wildlife management practices here.
Glad to see John Sigler in the area saying what needs to be said:
“Philadelphia doesn’t need any new anti-gun laws to combat the lawless,” said John C. Sigler, a Delaware lawyer who was appointed president of the firearm-advocacy organization this year. “They simply need to enforce the laws they already have.”
Speaking to students at the Widener University School of Law, Sigler, a former Dover police captain and Navy submarine veteran, delivered a hard-line argument: He said gun-control laws don’t work and are not the solution to violent crime.
“If Philadelphia wants to stop the killing, they’ve got to make criminals pay the penalty,” he said.
Even from my point of view, the NRA has not been very visible in Pennsylvania.  I hope this is a sign that’s about to change. The Philadelphia politicians have, for too long, pushed the easy solution:
“They need to step up to the plate and say enough is enough, my constituents are dying and we need to stop that. And to stop that, you need to take the bad guys, put them in jail and you leave them there. If they come back out, and do it again, you put them back in again for twice as long,” he said.
He said the public must accept the cost of fighting crime.
“If it means building more prisons, then build more prisons,” Sigler said.
Gun control is easy.  It’s a way for cowardly politicians to pretend like they are doing something. It’s a lot harder to actually fight crime. The politicians must be held to account, and not permitted to take the easy road.
As if the universe felt the need to compensate me for my lack of luck on the slot machines in Reno, today I get to work, put a buck twenty-five in the soda machine to get a Dr. Pepper, and it spits out two instead of one. I win!
Our guest of honor for the GBR was Chuck Ziegenfuss who was representing Project Valour-IT. Here’s a little about the project:
Project Valour-IT, in memory of SFC William V. Ziegenfuss, provides voice-controlled software and laptop computers to wounded Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines recovering from hand and arm injuries or amputations at major military medical centers. Operating laptops by speaking into a microphone, our wounded heroes are able to send and receive messages from friends and loved ones, surf the ‘Net, and communicate with buddies still in the field without having to press a key or move a mouse. The experience of CPT Charles “Chuck” Ziegenfuss, a partner in the project who suffered hand wounds while serving in Iraq, illustrates how important this voice-controlled software can be to a wounded servicemember’s recovery.
I plan on donating more to this charity over the next couple of months, and I will encourage others to do so here. If you make a donation, say so in the comments. You will have my gratitude.