Two new alien species of Bidens were found in Bulgaria. Someone needs to e-mail these researchers and point out there’s alien Bidens in Delaware and Washington D.C. too.
h/t Volokh
Month: April 2010
Problems with Sheriffs and LTC Law
Looks like Luzerne County has some issues following the law in regards to notifying LTC holders that their license is about to expire. This is a frequent problem in Pennsylvania. Many sheriffs in Pennsylvania are wont to liberally interpret the background check clause of the Uniform Firearms Act, which establishes Licenses to Carry, and also the Sheriff’s Fee Act, which stipulates what sheriffs are permitted to charge for certain services. As a result the process of getting an LTC isn’t as standardized as it should be. Fortunately there’s an effort to do something about that.
Memo to Hollywood: Recruit from Texas More
According to a tidbit found by Wyatt, actress Amber Heard – originally from Austin – is a big fan of guns.
I’m a good shot and I love guns – I own several. I don’t have children in the house, so I sleep with my gun in a place that’s close enough that if I needed to protect myself, I could. It’s not in bed with me, though; it’s in a safe location. I’m fully trained and I’m an active member of a gun club. I’m definitely pro-gun.
You may not have heard of Heard, but those of you who love zombie flicks may remember her as 406.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKgObejVRb8[/youtube]
Does it Matter if the GOP Doesn’t have a Frontrunner?
I keep seeing all of these headlines about the lack of a clear frontrunner for the 2012 GOP nomination. But every time I read one, I roll my eyes and wonder why it even matters. Consider the timeline for the Democratic & Republican primaries in advance of the 2008 election.
April 17, 2006 – Former Senator Mike Gravel announces his candidacy for President. Given that he was unable to reach even half a percent in any state where he was on the ballot, it’s clear he was never a really a frontrunner.
Gravel was the only candidate at the point where we are now in the race for 2012. The earliest any serious candidate would consider declaring would be after 2010 elections. Even then, I would say that they should hold off until early 2011. You’ll see why I suggest that based on history.
November 7, 2006 – Midterm elections that give the House to the Democrats.
November 13, 2006 – Rudy Guiliani announces his exploratory committee. Though he made another announcement that he would run for the office in February, we knew in November that he was a serious candidate.
Some might classify Rudy as a frontrunner, but I don’t think so based on actual results. He bombed in Iowa and New Hampshire, and he couldn’t even deliver in Florida where he put all of his campaign hopes.
November 30, 2006 – After Democratic gains, then-Governor Tom Visack announces his candidacy for the office. He would drop out less than 3 months later.
So even when the pundits start chattering about GOP frontrunners the morning after the election in November, ignore them. Remember that we will still be more than a year out from the earliest of the caucuses. And that the last time around, not even the freakin’ Governor of Iowa was able to compete.
December 4, 2006 – Sam Brownback announces an exploratory committee & makes his run official the next day. He wouldn’t make it to the first caucus.
December 12, 2006 – The Elf announced shortly and couldn’t even draw more than 2% of the vote in any contest.
December 28, 2006 – Leave it to the adulterer cheating on his cancer-stricken wife who filmed himself screwing his mistress while she was pregnant with the child he would later disown to ruin your holidays with political announcements.
Now, you could argue that because John Edwards did finish second in Iowa and third the next four contests, he was a frontrunner. But, given that he announced during the holidays and just days before 2007, he’s the exception to the rule.
January 3, 2007 – Mitt Romney announces an exploratory committee. His formal kick off would come just over a month later.
January 7, 2007 – The Biden announces his candidacy without insulting anyone. However, that would not remain the case on the campaign trail. And when it comes to frontrunner status, he does maintain the honor of becoming our national embarrassment. His campaign would end in less than a year.
January 10, 2007 – Jim Gilmore creates an exploratory committee, though he will hold off to formally launch a campaign until April. He would end the campaign in July.
January 11, 2007 – Chris Dodd launches the campaign that he will end in less than a year. Ron Paul also announces his exploratory committee, though his kickoff wouldn’t take place until March. I think it can be safely said that regardless of what the internet polls said, Paul was never a frontrunner.
January 14, 2007 – Duncan Hunter announces an exploratory committee.
January 20, 2007 – Hillary enters the race. Considering she would lead a campaign that was so successful it damn near split the party, I’d say she was a frontrunner.
January 21, 2007 – My birthday! And the day that Bill Richardson announced. He would drop out after New Hampshire.
January 28, 2007 – Mike Huckabee announces his run for president. I personally would not consider him a frontrunner. However, he did win some states, so I’ll go ahead and include him.
February 10, 2007 – Barack Obama enters the race. Considering he won, I guess he gets default frontrunner status, too.
February 28, 2007 – John McCain enters the race. Considering he was the only other candidate on the November 2008 ballot, I guess we’ll consider him a frontrunner, too.
April 1, 2007 – No, I’m not joking. Tommy Thompson announced a presidential run on April Fool’s Day. I guess only fools thought he would make it to the first primary contests.
April 2, 2007 – At least Tom Tancredo thought better about his announcement date than Thompson.
June 1, 2007 – Fred Thompson begins his months-long tease with the formation of an exploratory committee.
September 14, 2007 – Alan Keyes begins his run for the top seat – again. He would ultimately run campaigns to secure the nominations of 3 parties, 2 of which voted no.
While I know the press isn’t looking for actual announcements right now, this is just a reminder that we’re still 9 months out from any serious news about the 2012 campaign. There can be no frontrunner for the nomination if there are no candidates. A scandal could erupt that would send any of the popular names you see today into political oblivion. If that happens, they will never file for an exploratory committee or announce a run. Of course, it might not even take a scandal. Considering that Mitt was the architect of the health care reform that is crippling Massachusetts, the change in focus on issues now makes him a huge liability for the GOP. They can’t run on a real repeal/reform message with him at the helm. However, just a year ago, he had a great background in business and financial experience to lead the discussion on bailouts and a recovering economy.
The point is that we honestly have no idea. Don’t get discouraged or frustrated, or even feel like you should have a favorite for 2012 picked out in early 2010. Based on past results, we probably won’t even have a good idea of potential options until the very end of this year. There’s no need to rush it.
Engaging Political Candidates from the Comfort of the Couch
Because there isn’t EXCEPTIONALLY MAJOR OMG-HIT THE PANIC BUTTON gun news hitting every single day in Pennsylvania, I will often post about general political engagement opportunities that are non-gunnie specific on PAGunRights.com. Obviously, most people are not single issue voters. But even when they are, there’s no reason we shouldn’t be engaged with politicians in the same way as other citizens. This last week, it just happened that three “filler” stories just happened to line up to create the perfect example of how gun owners can stand out with lawmakers from the comfort of their couches.
First, I posted the social media homes of all of the candidates. I follow all of them, and I suggest that anyone who wants to stay up-to-date on what the candidates are doing should do the same – at least until the primary election weeds it down to two candidates. (For example, Sen. Tony Williams was saying he could find a way to respect the Second Amendment while trying to get illegal guns off the street. That’s great except that his proposal involves making our carry permits worthless…) On Twitter, you can sometimes even get them to respond when you argue back or cheer them on.
Then, I found out that NUGUN managed to engage his local lawmaker on Castle Doctrine and get him on the record through an online townhall that he found out about via new media. Questions for the townhall were submitted in advance and via email during the event. How wonderfully convenient to do that before the big rally in Harrisburg this month! It now means that NUGUN doesn’t really need to spend much time in Rep. DePasquale’s office other than to introduce himself & thank him for his support. He can now spend more time on other things during the rally.
Finally, the Morning Call‘s John Micek announced a series of live lunchtime chats with all six gubernatorial candidates over the next couple of weeks. If you’ve got a computer and internet access near lunchtime on Monday, you can tune in to ask Rep. Sam Rohrer questions. On Wednesday, you can do the same for Attorney General Tom Corbett. If you decide to ask any gun- or hunting-related questions, let us know either in the comments or via Twitter @PAGunRights or @bitterb. Actually, even if you plan to tune in to ask non-gun questions, feel free to chime in through the comments. I’d be curious to find out if any readers are going to step up their political engagement on any issue with this opportunity.
(On a completely personal note, I probably will tune in, but I doubt I’ll ask anything. I’m pretty up-to-date on most of the issues because I follow this stuff so closely. For my personal preferences, I’ll probably vote for Rohrer in May as a protest vote, volunteer for Corbett between May and November, and cheer for Jack Wagner on the Democratic side in May. The latter is because he’s by far the least problematic for gun owners. He has given a squishy answer on a gun ban question before, but it was squishy enough that he could probably be convinced to change his mind and would not be likely to make it a priority if he managed to win. The other Democratic candidates were all solidly in the “end preemption” and basically tear down anything pro-gun about Pennsylvania category.)
NRA Insurrectionist Agenda Infecting Our Past!
I’m going to join with Dennis Henigan for a minute in denouncing dangerous and inflammatory political rhetoric. So says Dennis Henigan:
It is too easy for politicians and political commentators to treat our increasingly incendiary political atmosphere as a product merely of disparate extremist individuals and groups on the fringes of our political system. Treating the problem as the product of a relatively few misguided individuals with bizarre violent fantasies misses a far more troubling reality. What we are seeing is the acting out of an ideology of violence as a tool of political power that has long had a home on the American right – particularly in the “gun rights†movement dominated by the National Rifle Association.
Bravo! Monsignor! Bravo! I heartily agree this ideology of violence, but have you ever looked at how far and deep the rot has run, Mr. Henigan? NRA’s inflammatory rhetoric is everywhere. In fact, I have fairly good evidence that NRA rhetoric is not only inflaming our present political situation, but must, somehow, be making its way to the past. For instance, take a look at this dangerous insurrectionist, going by the name of George Washington:
The very atmosphere of firearms anywhere and everywhere restrains evil interference – they deserve a place of honor with all that’s good.
Clearly this man has been brainwashed into NRA’s “guns everywhere” mentality. But he’s not the only crazy wingnut preaching insurrectionist thinking from the past. Let’s look at a man who goes by the name of Thomas Jefferson:
“The oppressed should rebel, and they will continue to rebel and raise disturbance until their civil rights are fully restored to them and all partial distinctions, exclusions and incapacitations are removed.”
The horror. This Mr. Jefferson is full of seditious blather. Mr. Henigan is surely right about the right about this crazed militia nut. He even wrote a document that had the audacity to propose a framework by which it was even acceptable to wage violent war against one’s own government. Let me read a passage from it:
“Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and, accordingly, all experience [has] shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But, when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce [the people] under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.”
This is crazy! How far off are we from blowing up federal buildings with maddening drivel like this floating around!?!?  Language like this only enables domestic terrorism. Let’s look at another dangerous militant known as John Adams:
“The right of a nation to kill a tyrant in case of necessity can no more be doubted than to hang a robber, or kill a flea.”
I think the Secret Service should consider paying this Mr. Adams a visit, before he gets any ideas. Same with his buddy John Hancock:
“. . .In defence of the freedom that is our birthright. . .we have taken up arms. We shall lay them down when hostilities shall cease on the part of the agressors, and all danger of their being renewed shall be removed, and not before.”
If this isn’t strong evidence of NRA’s message affecting even our past, I don’t know what is. Our nation never experienced any kind of armed revolutionary overtones before NRA started drilling their insurrectionist nonsense into the American Body Politic back in the 70s. I’m glad there are good Americans like Mr. Henigan out there exposing this dangerous undercurrent emerging in our political discourse, because clearly it is not just affecting our present, but our past as well.
Hat tip to Joe Huffman for the inspiration.
UPDATE: I’m told the first quote by George Washington was bogus. Thanks to Clayton Cramer for catching it. I have removed it.
Obama Gets Another Court Pick
Stevens has announced he’s retiring. He was appointed by Ford, and is 90 years old this April 20th. This is actually a pretty significant blow to the folks who voted against us in Heller, and likely in McDonald too. Stevens was widely regarded as the intellectual leader of the left-leaning side of the Court. It’s widely expected that Obama will get a third pick for the Court when Justice Ginsberg retires. The 2010 elections are only increasing in importance.
Obama will, of course, replace Stevens with a similar lefty, but it’ll be hard to replace his leadership on the Court.
Why Are MAIG Mayors so Violent?
White Plains Mayor Adam Bradley is in big trouble over domestic violence allegations against his wife.  Now he’s been rearrested on witness tampering charges after trying to persuade his wife to recant her accusations and say she is mentally ill and lied to police.
Stay classy, Bloomberg Mayors. Stay classy.
MAIG Mayor Defeated in Wisconsin
One of the MAIG Mayors who stood with Bloomberg against the Thune Amendment for National Concealed Carry has been defeated. Good news. We need more of this, especially here in Pennsylvania.