He was the White House staffer that was screaming at Sharyl Attkisson, and apparently Issa subpoenaed his butt too.
Month: October 2011
Drug Tests for Buying a Gun?
This idea would now seem to be endorsed by the Brady Campaign, as there is a White House petition for it as well. You can see the kind of juice the Brady Campaign has by the numbers appearing there. I’m wondering what other fundamental constitutional right requires you to pee pee in a cup before you can exercise it. It’s certainly interesting to see what new and strange ideas the Brady Campaign is supporting.
An additional 200 signatures have been added to the anti-HR822 petition since this morning. I’m becoming more convinced the White House may be using the e-mails they are collecting to get people to sign that petition. An intrepid reader has noted many of these folks track to individuals who are just generic lefties.
If you get anything from the White House, or anyone else, asking you to sign that petition, please forward it along to me. This could be a critical piece of evidence that could be used as a political club when the elections roll around. This is especially true if the e-mail is deceptive.
UPDATE: Welcome Instapundit readers. Just FYI, the pro-HR822 petition, which is the bill that create a national recognition scheme for concealed carry licenses, meaning states will recognize licenses from other states universally, can be found here. Please take some time to sign your name to it, so we can beat the forces of Obama and Mayor Bloomberg who are attempting to defeat it.
Recycling News?
I was surprised to come across this article about Wal-Mart caving to the gun control groups on “default proceeds”, because I thought most dealers had stopped doing that a while ago. Then I noticed this:
The new Wal-Mart policy on gun sale background checks has won praise from Michael D. Barnes, president of the Brady Campaign Against Gun Violence. He said the decision to err on the side of caution puts safety before profit — a policy that should be emulated by other gun dealers.
Barnes hasn’t been President since 2006. So is the media so hard up for news stories that they are recycling news now? For the curious, a “default proceed” is where the background check doesn’t come back. The law says in that case, after a three day waiting period, if the check still has not come back, you can proceed with the sale. Most dealers won’t process sales under these terms these days, so reading, I was surprised Wal-Mart hadn’t changed that policy long ago. Well, turns out they probably did.
More Restaurant Carry Hysteria Fail
Our opponents tried to argue that the “guns in bars” bill would hurt tourism in Tennessee. Turns out tourism there actually has gone up, and predictions of alcohol fueled shootouts has failed to materialize. It’s a good thing none of our favorite gun control advocates are in the fortune telling business. I don’t think they’d last very long.
Some Guerrilla Tactics to Use Against MAIG
For those of you familiar with the Wikipedia culture, it occurs to me that MAIG’s Wikipedia page is pretty poor. Wikipedia pages are supposed to be factual, not promotion material for the organization. Some changes I would suggest:
- It should be clear they are an organization that advocates gun control. Don’t let them get away with the “common sense” bullshit. What they propose is little different from the Brady Campaign or the other gun control groups.
- Is should have a criticism section, rather than just “Opposition from the NRA,” with NRA’s criticism included in that, but I’d also mention some of their members criminal tendencies.
- When it comes to what they advocate for, there should be a good mix of what they say, what we say, and what the facts are. They are not entitled to their own sets of facts. Be sure to find citations. For instance, it should be more clearly noted that police groups, including the ATF, oppose repealing Tiahrt.
Don’t let them turn their Wikipedia page into a propaganda tool. Wikipedia actually frowns on that, and if you keep things balanced, and factual, you can win. At the least, it forces MAIG to spend resources fighting with us and Wikipedia. Even if HR822 ultimately fails (given the makeup of the Senate, and the occupant of the White House, it probably will in this Congress), it’s forcing our opponents to spend significant resources. The more fronts we can engage them on, the less resources they will have when the final push comes. This is a clash of wills, and ours must be stronger for longer if we’re going to prevail in the end.
Getting Beaten in White House Petition Drive
Now there’s a petition at the White House site calling for the defeat of HR822, started by Philadelphia’s police chief, and it’s way ahead of ours. Nearly all the signatures are from California, which makes me wonder if the this was put out to a very large list. I questioned whether the Brady Campaign can have that kind of impact, which makes me wonder if OFA is using some of their reach. This was launched October 11th, and it already has double our number of signatures? I’ve been around this issue a long time, and I’ve never seen our opponents display that kind of grassroots power.
I’m not saying the signatures are necessarily bogus, but someone is a lot more powerful and with more reach than our opponents is either promoting this, or someone is playing games. Either way, we have to get our game on and counter this.
UPDATE: Judging from this, it looks like MAIG is behind this drive, and they are pulling out all the stops. This is quite good for us, because it means that our opponents have pulled out all the stops just to deal with our little guerrilla petition drive. It’s worth noting that NRA won’t throw its weight behind a White House push until there’s a bill on his desk. Surely we can think of other ways to spread our opponents thin as the debate on HR822 really heats up?
BTW, if this is all MAIG driven activity, that’s further evidence they are the real deal, and will be supplanting the hecklers at Brady, CSGV and VPC as our primary, and most dangerous opponents.
UPDATE: At the rate new signatures are being added, I’m really curious what method is being used to promote this. A quick search of the Internet only reveals the letter from Michael Nutter. Maybe they are hitting up people at the anti-gun range, and asking them to sign.
UPDATE: Bitter thinks it might be they are using e-mail lists, perhaps ones they rented or purchased. If you see one of these in the wild, please forward it to me.
Harrisburg, PA files for Bankruptcy
Only the second U.S. city to do so. Go Pennsylvania! Sounds like the city lost a lot of its money in a boondoggle. “Monorail! Monorail! Monorail!“
More Whittling Away at GCA ’68
SayUncle notes another bill is being introduced to allow people to buy handguns out of state from FFls, and significantly ease interstate transactions between FFLs. These restrictions were a cornerstone of the Gun Control Act of 1968. If this can be repealed, it will be a testament to how far we’ve come. The sponsors of this bill are Senator Orin Hatch of Utah, and Senator Mark Begich of Alaska.
Our opponents are duly focused on HR822. But I don’t worry about them. They are in great shape to fight a multi-front war against the likes of us.
Who To Vote For
I’m glad our opponents are busy helping make lists of politicians to vote for based on today’s mark-up session for HR822. That will save me some time:
GOP House Judiciary members were virtually unanimous in voting today to allow the following individuals to carry guns in public in states outside their home state: 1) Misdemeanant sexual offenders 2) Individuals on the Terrorist Watch List 3) Individuals with misdemeanor convictions for stalking. We really must have this bill. If the NRA says we need it, they will vote for anything without thinking through the real life consequences. Or maybe they have thought through the real life consequences which is even scarier and stupider!
I have a friend who’s a misdemeanor sex offender. Her offense? She did some modeling when she was younger, and did a topless photo shoot on what she thought was a secluded beach. Apparently not so secluded that someone didn’t notice, and called the police. She plead down to a charge that didn’t require registration, but it’s still a “sex offense.” Do you know what also is a misdemeanor sex offense? Getting a little too drunk in college and mooning someone. Being convicted of touching children is a prohibiting offense in every state that I know of, and touching children is exactly what our dishonest opponents want you think about when they mislead the public by proposing nonsense like this.
Individuals on the terror watch list we’ve long covered, but suffice it to say we don’t deny constitutional rights in this country without due process, which is precisely what our opponents advocate when they suggest this asinine idea.
I’m not even sure what a misdemeanor conviction for stalking is, as a matter of a “one-size-fits-all” rule. This is a new one. It’s always good to know the thinking of the gun control crowd when they are thinking of new ways to get more and more people prohibited from gun ownership.
I checked Pennsylvania’s statutes, and “Stalking” in Pennsylvania is a 1st Degree Misdemeanor, with a possible sentence of up to 5 years. This is a disabling offense federally. One thing to remember is that you’re a prohibited person under federal law if you’re convicted of any misdemeanor that has a possible sentence two years or more, even if you don’t end up serving any time in jail at all.
Given that HR822 only applies to individuals who are not prohibited under federal law, what classes of persons do our opponents mean to cover here? Once again they are being misleading and dishonest. Once again, they are hoping the American public doesn’t know better. And once again, I would like to point out, they are losing.
Bob Mensch Found Not Guilty
State Senator Bob Mensch got into some hot water over allegations of brandishing a pistol a while back during a confrontation with an aggressive driver along I-78 in Pennsylvania. He was found guilty, but vowed an appeal. On appeal his conviction was tossed, and he was found not guilty. His whole case seemed to be a “he said, she said,” kind of deal, in which case the uncertainty should break in favor of the defendant.