Steve at the Firearms Blog covers what appears to be the firearms bubble bursting. In any bubble you will tend to have speculators. If many of the people buying up AR-15s were doing it in anticipation of selling at higher post-ban prices, then the industry will go through some very tough times as those speculators sell their inventory and cut their losses. If they were mostly new shooters, well, one thing about AR-15s is they are like Lays Potato Chips. You can’t just have one. If I were betting money (also known as investing) I would probably err on the side of believing there were speculators, and there will be a lot of guns and ammo on the market as people cut their losses. I think the firearms industry will be in for some tough times, though I expect parts of it to continue doing well.
Month: March 2010
Constitutional Amendment Time
I think freedom loving people need to start thinking about amending the constitution. We’re fast approaching a point where that might even be possible if people get angry enough. I’m glad to see Randy Barnett already thinking about it over at Volokh. He’s proposing an amendment hat goes like this:
The legislative power of Congress shall not be construed to include mandating, regulating, prohibiting or taxing the private health insurance of any person; nor shall the power of Congress to make all laws which are necessary and proper to regulate commerce among the several states be construed to include the power to mandate, regulate, prohibit or tax any activity that is confined within a single state and subject to the police power thereof, regardless of the activity’s economic effects outside the state, whether it employs instrumentalities therefrom, or whether its regulation or prohibition is part of a comprehensive federal regulatory scheme.
My feeling is that a proposed amendment needs to be a very simple idea, boiled down into a few issues as possible. I also think it needs to avoid tying the issue of the day (now HCR) up into it. I would simplify it a bit:
The power of Congress to make all laws which are necessary and proper to regulate commerce among the several states shall not be construed to include the power to mandate, regulate, prohibit or tax any activity that is confined within a single state and subject to the police power thereof, regardless of the activity’s economic effects outside the state, whether it employs instrumentalities therefrom, or whether its regulation or prohibition is part of a comprehensive federal regulatory scheme.
I’d just cut the health care issue out of it. That would make the individual mandate pretty clearly unconstitutional, and leave the issue of HCR out of it. It’s probably better of people don’t think about what the effects are, because this would also weaken a lot of popular federal legislation. The other thing I might consider is that I believe it would be appropriate for federal regulation of commerce among the several states to allow Congress to prevent states from discriminating against products which met a federal standard. For instance, if Congress passes a law that suggests if you do X, Y, and Z, you can call it organic food, California can’t then come in and ban those products because they want Q, R, and X to be done too. Otherwise states could do significant damage to the interstate market in goods by creating ridiculous regulatory requirements. California is quite good at this.
Also, someone in the comments suggests we ought to amend the constitution to allow for referendums, but only on the subject of repealing laws or treaties. If it were so limited, I would agree that’s not a bad idea.
Gun Blogging Highlighted on Guns America
Steve from The Firearm Blog did a piece on gun blogging for Guns America that interviewed Caleb and me. It’s an excellent introduction to the gun blogosphere, and our interview covers the state of the gun blogosphere today.Read what I say in the interview, but overall, I would have to say the state of the gun blogosphere has declined in terms of health in the past five years. I don’t think we’re as vibrant a community anymore. Much of that is just that blogging trends have generally been toward consolidation, with traffic circulating more and more among top blogs, and not making its way down nearly as much as it used to. The other reason is that the gun issue just isn’t as much in the public mind these days, and virtually nothing is happening in Congress right now. It hasn’t been as good for the community. The past couple of months have been a tough time for covering Second Amendment politics, save for a few days where we had McDonald, and a few other things. Right now everyone is pissed off about HCR and other fiscal issues.
Mid 30s
The thing about a decade is it doesn’t evenly divide up into a neat third. Typically you hear people say “Early X0’s, Mid X0’s, Late X0’s.”  So what do you do with the extra year? When I turned 33, I said “Well, that’s the last year of my early 30s.”  Now as I enter the last year of what is undisputedly my “Mid 30s,” I think I am going to reserve the right to transplant that floater year to 37, so that becomes the last year of my “Mid 30s” delaying “Late 30s” for the remaining years of 38 and 39. But still, you have to figure “Late 30s” is still better than “Early 40s,” which is still yet better than “Early 50s,” which is definitely better than being dead. Though lately I’ve been feeling dead, but it’s probably the long hours I’m working. Of course long hours are better than unemployment. So I guess despite the fact that I hate getting old, I’m happy to be mid-30s and employed (for now).
Arizona House Passes Permitless Carry
Apparently now all’s left is a formal roll call vote and approval by Governor Brewer. Here’s hoping to see this as law soon.
Great News
The Second Circuit has ruled that a person has a clear liberty interest in carrying a firearm, and that there are due process interests within the permitting process. At issue would seem to be the claim that the permitting process couldn’t repeatedly demand proof of citizenship (you had to do it to get the permit, so what’s the need to do it repeatedly?). Also it would appear to hinge that the delays are unnecessary and don’t serve any compelling state interest.
Dave Hardy adds, “Amazing how this legal field has turned around in a year or two.” This is a big deal, because this is going to play very much against the City of New York’s entire system of licensing even ownership of firearms, and New York State is part of the Second Circuit. It might be that the courts will allow licensing of the right to own a gun, much like they’ve done with the right to marry, but with significant judicial oversight as to what’s allowed and what’s not. They will only be able to do what is needed to determine your qualification, and nothing more. They won’t be able to put in requirements intended to frustrate the ownership or carrying of firearms.
Ideally, I’d like there to be no licensing, and that’s entirely possible to achieve, but even the allowing of a relatively easy and unobtrusive licensing provision would be a major weakening of the licensing regime for the most restrictive states, to the point where I’m not sure how many jurisdictions are going to bother with them. The entire point of licensing was to frustrate people from exercising their rights. If they can no longer do that, I wouldn’t be shocked to see the requirement start to become viewed as arcane, and for it to be politically easier to remove them entirely. That’s actually been able to happen in a few states that had relatively meaningless permit requirements, namely Missouri and Nebraska. North Carolina also has such a permit, but we’ve not gotten much traction on that issue there, largely because North Carolina has been swelling with population fleeing the northeast and maintaining their voting habits from back home. But the precedent is there.
Is the Sullivan Act appealing once its primary purpose of frustrating the right is no longer served? We might find out.
A Boner of a Tactic
Tam is upset about the Coburn Amendment that wants to cut out viagra coverage for sex offenders. This isn’t your run of the mill social conservative paranoia at work. There’s a method to Coburn’s madness. This is one of those things a politicians really doesn’t want to vote against. If the Dems vote it down, the Dems just voted for stiffies for kiddy rapists. If they vote for it, it forces the measure to go back to the House for another vote. The latter part is the real intention of this, and there’s some very good reasons why we want to do this. There’s no reason to give the Dems an easy victory.
The more votes there are on Health Care, the more Pelosi burns the political capital of the Democratic Party. Republicans can try repeatedly to have votes on the most ridiculous and unpopular things in the bill, and the Democrats will be continuously forced face what’s actually in the bill they voted for without reading. This keeps the public mind focused on the monstrosity headed into November.
It ties up the business of Congress on Health Care, and prevents the Dems from moving onto Amnesty for Illegals, or Cap and Trade. It also prevents the Dems from moving any gun control forward. This is a remote possibility, but this is also, oddly, a very dangerous time. The Dems have little to lose with all the retirements at the end of the term, and with many blue dogs in firm belief they will lose their seats.
This keeps the issue, and the anger alive, and puts the Democrats on the defensive. That’s a very good thing headed into November. Currently, 55 percent of likely voters want repeal, and even more want the Republicans to keep fighting this. Those are good numbers. If the Republicans landslide going into November and these numbers hold or increase, that makes repeal a more attractive proposition. But if we’re going to have a shot at repeal, those numbers have to stay that high into November, and into 2012 when Obama is up. Making public debates about the ridiculousness of probably dozens and dozens of provisions in the bill is a great way to shoot those numbers up and get a mandate for repeal. I don’t put the likelihood of outright repeal to be all that high. I’d only give it 30%. But I sure don’t mind having a go at it, and I’m pretty sure Coburn is one of the guys who will be pushing repeal if given the opportunity.
Special Education
The Belmont Club has an interesting piece covering how Chicago political elites game the public education system, and how Daley uses this as a means of consolidating power.
Daly discovered the great rule of demagoguery. Convince those who’ve never eatenpâté de foie gras that the swill they are eating is it. Serve the real pate to those who already know what it tastes like. It was a system that would have been instantly familiar to former Soviets. World class academies for the nomenklatura, shacks on the banks of the Volga for those on the outs. Mayor Daley has indignantly denied the special list was used for playing favorites. He argued that just because there was a VIP entrance doesn’t mean anyone actually used it. The Chicago Sun Times reported that “Daley said there was nothing wrong with former Chicago schools chief Arne Duncan’s office maintaining such a log because ‘no favoritism’ resulted from it.†One official, Office of Compliance Chief Anthony Boswell, whose children qualified for a magnet school after moving in from Denver said that while it made him look bad, he didn’t actually know if he received preferential treatment.
As Richard Fernandez points out, these are the same people who just took over our Health Care System. God Help us! All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.
Good News, Bad News
First the bad news. The Democrat controlled house in New Hampshire appears to have defeated an initiative to repeal the ban on firearms in the State Capitol. The headline is “House sends gun ban repeal packing.” I say gun owners in New Hampshire ought to send the Democrats packing in November.
Good news, though, is that Kansas is moving a relaxation of carry laws along:
The House voted 65-57 in support of a bill that would allow the carrying of concealed weapons in municipal and state agency buildings unless the facility has enough security measures in place to ensure no weapons are permitted in the building. The bill would exclude school districts and would require that the carrier have a concealed-carry permit.
Sounds a lot like my “Three S” strategy.
Brady Campaign – Trading Scones for Toast
It looks like poor hysterical Abby Spangler and her stuck CAPS LOCK key pulled the Brady Campaign into a fight they could not win with Starbucks. And so now, their campaign against the company, for their own sake, should be considered toast.
I subscribe to some food industry news sites, and yesterday I kept a close eye on anything related to the Starbucks shareholder meeting coming across those wires. Not a peep about guns. No one who cares about the bottom line cared about the fact that Starbucks wasn’t caving to the Brady Campaign. I didn’t even see a mention of it any industry news source or business article on the meeting.
If you want to know what investors are most excited about, it’s their instant coffee brand Via, the drastic expense cutting, and another brand of coffee they acquired in 2003, Seattle’s Best Coffee. In fact, the retailer is going to start growing again, this time being a little smarter about the process. Several analysts were quoted saying they expect very good outcomes for Starbucks based on all of the news coming out of this meeting. This year, their stock was upgraded to Buy from neutral. In other words, people just don’t care about their carry policies.