Nancy Pelosi is stacking the deck, and changing the House Rules to shut out the GOP. This will make it much harder for Republicans to kill gun control bills. Giving Pelosi such a solid majority was going to have consequences. A lot of people gave me grief for fighting with the lesser of two evils last election, well, this is the evil I was fighting. The Bush years are going to look positively rosy compared to what’s coming.
Year: 2009
So, Um, You Know, How’s that, You Know, Listening Tour Working Out for You, You Know?
You know, it seems like once anti-gun Caroline Kennedy, you know, started talking to the people of, you know, New York, they stopped like liking her, you know.
PPP says Kennedy’s popularity “has taken a major hit as the result of her public campaign” to get the appointment of New York Gov. David Paterson. Although Kennedy is still regarded by a small plurality, 44 percent of voters say their opinion is less favorable than since she first stated publicly her desire for the seat, while 23 percent say they view her more favorably. Her favorable to unfavorable ratio is 44 percent to 40 percent, while that of Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is 57 percent to 20 percent.
Other articles I’ve seen indicate that her biggest support is coming from Baby Boomer women who believe she deserves it because she’s a Kennedy and just has the DNA to do the job – despite having never held elected office before or having any useful experience.
DC DMV Has Issues With “TRIGGER” Plate
Apparently there’s nothing about guns or the shooting sports that the DC City Government won’t hate on with a burning white passion. Here you will find a letter rejecting the tag “TRIGGER” because they deem it offensive, followed by a letter from one of NRA’s attorneys warning them that it’s a First Amendment violation. Looks like DC decided it wasn’t worth fighting a court case over, and issued the tags.
Be Ready
Another issue you’ll want to contact your Congress Critters about is this. I’m skeptical that anyone knows for sure at this point which direction they will attack us from, but one thing I’m fairly certain of is that an attack on our gun rights is coming. We need to be ready for anything, and writing your reps about opposing any gun control in the 111th Congress is as important as ever.
The last time we were in this situation I was eighteen years old, and there were no blogs, no forums, most people didn’t have e-mail, and the media wasn’t on the verge of going the way of the dodo. If we’re going to come out on top here, we have to use our natural strengths as a movement.
UPDATE: Robb has more. The ironic thing in all this is, if the Democrats were really interested in destroying the NRA, the smartest strategic thing to do would be nothing. It only helps NRA to become the monster that they said you were.
UPDATE: Thirdpower wonders why we’re all surprised. I wouldn’t say we’re surprised, but there has to be some hope we can mobilize against something, even if we expected it. I also had hoped Obama’s move to the center post-election indicated he wasn’t willing to tackle divisive cultural issues, and would govern as a pragmatic centrist. That’s still a key question: how much Obama will push gun control. We know he’ll sign anything Pelosi and Reid send him, so we can’t count on anything. Writing the Critter is important.
So It Begins: The 111th Congress
The blogosphere seems to be pretty effective at creating noise, and making people pay attention. Today is the first day of the 111th Congress, which is the new Democratic Congress that we elected along with Obama. Pretty shortly Congress will take up the issue of Obama’s nominations. Among those people is Eric Holder for Attorney General, who is no friend to gun owners. We’ve made a lot of noise over guys like Jim Zumbo, Dan Cooper, HS Precision, and the like. Let’s make some noise to stop the nomination of Eric Holder. You can contact your elected officials here.
Bad Luck With Plagarists
Marko seems to have the worst luck with people plagarizing his writing. I’d have mixed feelings about it, personally.  On the one hand, I’d be awfully pissy that someone is taking credit for my writing. On the other hand, someone apparently thought my writing was good enough to pilfer. Marko makes money off writing, though, so not at least offering attribution is pretty low.
New Server Ordered
I have ordered a new server to run the blog, and a few other things I also run on the side. The new machine will also be rather small. It’s a 1.6GHz Intel Atom based machine with 2GB RAM, a 7200RPM 500GB SATA hard disk and DVD-ROM. The little provisional server I’m on right now isn’t quite quick enough to handle my traffic peaks, but hopefully we’ll get past that. The cool thing about the new machine is it cost me about $250 bucks to put together, and consumes power like a laptop.
With luck, the new server will arrive tomorrow, and be ready for operation by Wednesday.
One-Gun a Month in New Jersey
The Philadelphia Inquirer is running a puff piece on it today, with Bryan Miller’s big mug plastered all over it. We’re also back to that “personal privilege” thing again:
“What we’re talking about here is some sort of balance . . . between the privilege of a tiny minority of handgun owners in the state and the common good of public safety,” Miller said. “We’re talking about a light burden, if any.”
Sorry Bryan. Heller is over, and we won. It’s not a privilege anymore. That means the burden is now on you to justify restricting my constitutional right. If you can provide any evidence at all that one-gun-a-month works, I’d be happy to listen, but the evience seems to suggest it has no effect on crime, just like every other gun control law. Governor Corzine also asks the wrong question:
“How many guns does somebody need to purchase in a month?” Corzine asked.
I don’t have to justify anything to you, Governor. Your job is not to treat all citizens as criminals because some people are irresponsible. The solution is to put violent people in prison, rather than to turn the society at large into a prison. This proposal does the latter.
Predictions for New York
Jacob links to some nasty predictions for New York Gun owners, including serious restrictions on the use of lead ammunition. It would be one thing if there were reasonable alternatives, but there isn’t.  At least not yet.
Importance of Cleaning
JR reminds everyone of the importance of cleaning your rifle after firing corrosively primed ammunition.  I can personally attest to this. I bought some corrosive 5.45×39 before I realized it was corrosive.  I found out the hard way. Didn’t take long either.  Fortunatly, no lasting damage, but yeah — corrosive ammo is nasty stuff if you don’t clean.