The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …
They are trying to raise money on the Second Amendment rally:
Today, on the anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing, there’s a Second Amendment march on Washington. They’re not allowed to bring guns onto the National Mall, but if they had their way, someday they could march into Washington with guns at their sides. Unless we stop them.
I’ll remember this one next time I hear accusations from the other side that NRA raises money based on fear and ignorance.
Blackwater officials enticed the local sheriff’s office to pose as the purchaser of 34 automatic weapons that would be stored on the company’s campus, something prosecutors called a straw purchase, according to the indictment. The Camden County Sheriff’s Office provided blank letterhead to the company, which then used the stationery to prepare letters ordering weapons.
They probably figured they were safe, since they had the local LEOs on board with their scheme and were cozy with the Bush Administration. Personally, I would go to jail for doing this, so I don’t think there should be exceptions. The law is the law.
Prosecutors also focused on Blackwater’s supply of short-barrel rifles, which dealers must register. The company purchased 227 short barrels and installed them on long rifles without registering them, and officials shipped the weapons with the barrels detached so that they could be reassembled overseas without facing the charge of exporting regulated weapons, according to the indictment.
Sounds like they bought a bunch of M4 uppers and put them on unregistered AR-15 lowers, which is definitely a no no. Even having them together is constructive possession. If you have an M4 upper, you better have a registered lower to go along with it. I’m sure that makes operating a private armory difficult, since you need spare parts, but that’s how ATF interprets the law for me. Corporations shouldn’t get a pass.
In a 2008 interview with the AP, Jackson and other Blackwater executives said the company provided the local Camden County sheriff’s office a place to store weapons, calling the gesture a “professional courtesy.”
“We gave them a big safe so that they can store their own guns,” Jackson said at the time. Added then-executive vice president Bill Mathews: “We give stuff to police departments all over the country, and we take particularly good care of our home police departments.”
It’s going to be an interesting case, for sure. Can a police agency contract out storage of their NFA stuff to a private third party? If they can, can the private third party use them for their own purposes? Does letterhead abuse amount to an illegal straw purchase? I can understand why Blackwater might have thought that the federal gun laws were a real problem for their business model, and I’m sympathetic to that argument, but the proper course of action is to lobby Congress to change the law, not to break it and hope for the best.
There seems to be a meme floating around right now that NRA is sitting out of fights. The big one appearing today in the Wall Street Journal, quoting from some of our leaders in the movement, and from Josh Horwitz, all along similar lines that NRA is, “no longer absolutely the 800-pound gorilla.” I worry when our people and their people start singing the same tune. But I think this pretty much says it all:
The NRA’s political action committee has taken in $10.25 million for the 2010 elections, and ranks sixth in terms of receipts among all federally registered PACs, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks Federal Election Commission disclosures. The NRA’s total revenue, including member dues, investment income and contributions, rose to $307 million in 2009, from $268 million a year earlier.
If the fragmentation is hurting NRA, they are laughing all the way to the bank. You want to know why no one is touching the gun issue on the Democratic side? That part I bolded. In D.C. money talks and bullshit walks (though in DC the you call the walking bullshit Congressman or Senator), and NRA is sitting on a boatload of money for the 2010 elections. That’s going to do more for the movement, in terms of achieving goals than a lot of the other activity you see going on.
That said, I’m not opposed to other groups joining in the fray. If Dudley Brown wants to form a PAC, more power to him. Forming a PAC is an example of engaging seriously in the issue. But it takes more than forming a PAC to fund one. GOA, for example, has a Political Action Committee, but currently has a balance of less than 30,000 dollars, and spent less than 140,000 dollars in the 2008 election cycle.
What I’d really like to understand from Marbut, Brown, and many of NRA’s detractors, is in what world is it a successful strategy to downplay the role of the one organization who spent more than 11 million dollars on the 2008 election. If MSSA and NAGR’s messaging were really that compelling or effective, they’d be able to raise serious money. But why can’t they? Back to the article:
But Ben Cannon, 29, of Healdsburg, Calif., a founding member of the board of Calguns Inc., an Internet-based organization founded in 2002, said some younger gun owners felt that because the NRA must cater to all gun owners, it didn’t embrace their own interests enough.
I think that one statement sums up why NRA shouldn’t be the only game in town, but also explains why it’s the biggest and most important. If you want gun rights to win, it has to be a big enough tent to attract the kind of PAC funding, membership numbers, and support that NRA can attract. Any effective side organization is going to understand and work within that reality. My problem with guys like Dudley Brown, Larry Pratt, and Gary Marbut is that they want to replace the big tent strategy of the NRA with a smaller tent that’s more emotionally satisfying because in the small tent you don’t have to compromise or coalition build as much. You can revel in your purity, and not have to dirty your hands with the unsatisfying work of trying to bring 70 and 80% allies along with you.
I look at younger, more professional groups like Calguns, which have formed a viable organization and strategy as a stark contrast to the ridiculous “no compromise” gun rights groups of the past. Calguns has not sought to displace the big tent, but to find a role within it. It’s never seemed to me to be smart strategy to purposefully make the movement smaller by not only trying to displace the big tent strategy, but by trying to burn down the big tent and everyone in it.
I see so much potential here for small-government creatives who have access to a camera and even minor video editing software:
President Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency is encouraging the public to create video advertisements that explain why federal regulations are “important to everyone.”
The contest, which ends May 17, will award $2,500 to the makers of the video that best explains why federal regulations are good and how ordinary citizens can become more involved in making regulations. The videos must be posted on YouTube and can be no more than 60-90 seconds in length.
In the current contest, each video must include the slogan “Let your voice be heard,†and it must direct viewers to the government’s regulatory website www.Regulations.gov. The winning video will then be used by the entire federal government to promote the regulatory process and enhance the public’s participation in it. …
As explained in the EPA press release announcing the contest, the purpose of the videos will be to remind the public that federal regulation touches “almost every aspect†of their lives and to promote how important those regulations are.
“The contest will highlight the significance of federal regulations and help the public understand the rulemaking process. Federal agencies develop and issue hundreds of rules and regulations every year to implement statutes written by Congress. Almost every aspect of an individual’s life is touched by federal regulations, but many do not understand how rules are made or how they can get involved in the process.â€
The videos should be designed to “capture the public imagination†and to “explain†why government regulations are “important to everyone.â€
“With a short 60 to 90 second video, citizens should capture public imagination and use creativity, artistic expression and innovation to explain why regulations are important to everyone, and motivate others to participate in the rulemaking process.†…
The videos must also remind viewers that regulations are the law and that they actually outnumber laws passed by Congress on the order of 10-1.
The contest is being run by Lisa Jackson who New Jersey readers might remember is the former DEP leader who cancelled the bear hunt, in part, because she thought bears were too “cute.” Yeah, this good government spending.
How to make it not suck. An article in Shooting Illustrated by some guy I know down South somewhere ;)
From the Brady Campaign on Twitter. Oh no! People with guns! Big guns! Let me ask this though, why is the Brady Campaign covering this march instead of the main one? Should we be thankful there’s probably as many reporters there as there are protesters? Think of all the public education that’s going on with all those slung rifles!
I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest none of the major news coverage of the sideshow march in Virginia is going to be positive, but it will distract greatly from the main rally in Washington. Why? Because it helps advance a narrative. I’ve never understood why people on our side are so willing to play into the hands of the people who want to destroy us.
Dave Kopel linked to a new law review article on Mexican Gun Laws, and also on the current controversy in regards to trafficking from the US into Mexico. You can find a PDF copy here. Let me quote from it:
In the middle of the twentieth century, Mexico was a popular hunting destination for Americans, and Mexican hunters invented a new shooting sport. ―Silhouette shooting—shooting at metal silhouette targets in the shape of game animals—originated in Mexico in the early 1950s. Mexican hunters were looking for ways to sharpen their eyes between hunting seasons, and so began shooting at live animals which had been placed on a high ridgeline, visible in silhouette from hundreds of yards away. Whoever shot the animal would win a prize. American hunters near the Mexican border—most notably the Tucson Rifle Club—adopted the sport, but used life-sized metal targets instead—hence the sport’s name of Siluetas Metalicas.
In Mexico as in the United States, civil unrest in 1968 led to important new restrictions on firearms. Before then, many types of rifles, shotguns and handguns were freely available. Anti-government student movements, however, scared the government into closing firearms stores, and registering all weapons. Compliance with the registration has been very low.
I had to include that one because I shoot that sports pretty regularly, and it’s a good bit of fun. I’m glad Dave included that bit of history. It’s also interesting that Mexico got restrictive at the same time we did. There’s also more meat:
An oft-repeated claim is that 90% of Mexican crime guns come from the United States. The more accurate statement would be that the Mexican police choose to give a selected minority of seized firearms to the United States BATFE offices in Mexico, and of those guns that are turned over the BATFE, a high percentage are traced to the United States, in the sense that the guns were at one point manufactured or sold in the United States.22 This does not mean that the guns were necessarily sold in the civilian United States market; for example, a gun might have been lawfully sold to a Mexican police agency and then stolen. Or the gun might have been manufactured for U.S. Army use during the Vietnam War, later captured by the communist government which currently rules Vietnam, and then exported on the international black market.
I read it last night and it’s worth your while if you want a deep understanding of the issues we’ve been having in regards to Mexico. One thing that strikes me immediately is how imprecise Mexican law is compared to American law. Very little seems to be defined under Mexican law, which I would have difficulty believing doesn’t lead to abuse, as agencies and police interpret the law from situation to situation so that it always goes against the accused. I have no idea whether Mexico has any equivalent to Administrative Law, like we have in the United States.
If you aren’t registered with a major party by the end of today, then you cannot vote in the May primaries. Â If you want to register, here is a list of places you can do so before the closer of business.
For those of you who like to “send a message,” the primary is the best time to do it.
Days of our Trailer links to more VPC Google Research that creates assumptions out of thin air. Unfortunately, it’s not just the other side that engages in this. Over the past few days I’ve noticed some folks in our movement struggling with the fact that NRA seems to have gotten behind and passed a Constitutional Carry bill in Arizona. Why is it so difficult to believe that NRA would actually support such a bill where it’s possible to pass it?
I don’t have any problem with informed criticism of NRA, or its actions, and I’ve often enjoyed conversations about the problems with NRA with people who actually know and understand the organization. But so much of the criticism out there is half-assed an uninformed, almost to the point that I think some accusations and opinions are made from whole cloth.
The fact is that NRA supported Constitutional Carry in Arizona. NRA has a lobbyist in Arizona, and he was supporting this bill from the beginning. Todd Rathner is also an NRA Board member, and will be up for re-election next year. I think we can all agree this is the kind of presence we like to have on the Board.
Shot an air pistol Silhouette Match this morning. Actually won the thing, surprisingly, with a 62 out of 80 in open sight pistol. I think I finally found sight settings I like for the IZH-46M I got earlier this year. After the match we had Long Runs, for National Records. I shot well but got 10 of no animal, but I was happy to be on a Jury to see two records fall. Both records were in Senior category.
The first to topple was Chickens, open-sights, previously set almost exactly a year ago on 4/19/2009 by Herbert G. Meyers of Pennsylvania, and was at 18 Chickens, and will now be held by Rowland Smith, also of Pennsylvania with 25 Chickens. The other record, for scoped Pigs, held since 1995 by E. Jones of  California standing at 40 pigs, will now be held by Fred Fischer of Pennsylvania with 51 pigs.
At first I thought Fred had beat Rowland’s own record, but Rowland is the current record holder for open-sight pigs, senior category. In fact, I marked his winning that record last year when it happened.
Overall a pretty damned good day considering it was cold, windy, and not quite an ideal day.