The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …
Larry Pratt, head of GOA, does a pretty bang-up job of handling Piers Morgan:
I think every time you get discouraged, or think this struggle is too difficult, or too time consuming, just watch yourself some Piers Morgan. He’ll fire you right back up.
UPDATE: Dave Weigel on Twitter: “Piers Morgan is doing Mike Bloomberg a favor by becoming the new most insufferable gun control advocate.”
Yeah, really.
Apparently means they get to lie and we just have to shut our mouths and let our betters enlighten us:
Don’t get angry. Get even! Everyone can joint the fight.
Posting was light today because it’s an office day, and unlike the professionals in the gun control movement, I have to make a living. But there was also other business to attend to today. Earlier this week I received the OK from the Board of Trustees of my 1200 member club to speak on its behalf to lawmakers. And speak we have. I took any district where we had substantial members and wrote a letter. I’ve been working on this in the background since Monday.
Each one of those represents a fax transmission report for a letter to a single lawmaker, some state and some federal. The first letter is just really an introduction and an appeal to oppose all gun control measures proposed in either the House, Senate, State House or State Senate. When we’re facing threats from specific bills, I will follow up for those specific bills. But introducing us, I wanted just to be firm on no gun control. I will also follow up in my personal capacity, but I wanted to make sure our club was heard first.
I remember one of my first votes cast in a gubernatorial election was a vote for Mike Fisher is the GOP Primary because I was angry at Tom Ridge for supporting an Assault Weapons Ban as a Congressman. He backed away from that when he decided he wanted to be governor, but now we see he was never really any friend.
Something like this maybe? This is traffic to my blog.
It has more than doubled since last Friday. I’ve seen people in the comments I haven’t seen in years coming back and commenting. Welcome back. After a good night’s sleep, I no longer feel so gloomy. Let share with you something I keep being reminded of:
As the Army moved into the field on its expedition, it was operating with incorrect assumptions as to the number of Indians it would encounter. The Army’s assumptions were based on inaccurate information provided by the Indian Agents that no more than 800 hostiles were in the area. The Indian Agents based the 800 number on the number of Lakota led by Sitting Bull and other leaders off the reservation in protest of US Government policies. This was a correct estimate until several weeks before the battle, when the “reservation Indians” joined Sitting Bull’s ranks for the summer buffalo hunt. As one historian wrote: “The (US) Army’s strength estimate didn’t change, because the civilian Indian agents on the reservations didn’t tell the Army that large numbers of Indians had left.” Nor did the agents take into account the many thousands of “reservation Indians” who had “unofficially” left the reservation to join their “uncooperative non-reservation cousins led by Sitting Bull”. The latter were those groups who had indicated that they were not going to cooperate with the US Government and live on reservation lands. Thus, Custer unknowingly faced thousands of Indians, in addition to the 800 non-reservation “hostiles”. All Army plans were based on the incorrect numbers. While after the battle, Custer was severely criticized for not having accepted reinforcements and for dividing his forces, it must be understood that he had accepted the same official Government estimates of hostiles in the area which Terry and Gibbon also accepted. Historian James Donovan, states that when Custer asked Gerard his estimate on the opposition, he estimated the force at between 1,500 to 2,500 warriors.
This is not our last stand, it is theirs. If we beat them back now, if we deny them their agenda and keep the lawmakers in line, we will sweep these people from the field. They will, like Custer, have underestimated our numbers and our ferocity. We will dog our lawmakers. They will be sick of hearing from us by the time this is over. Obama’s historical legacy will be a lousy economy, and an ineffective and bumbling second term. It is our time to show the weak and pitiful Republicans how this is done, and how you beat Obama.
Hardly surprising, because I’ve seen kittens that have more fight in them than Boehner. The Republicans can always be counted on to not be counted on. This is what we reap from making our rights dependent on a single party:
Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio) noted the change on Tuesday, telling The Hill that the mood in the conference among “even the strongest gun supporters” is that they “don’t object to having a conversation about it — which is a big shift.”
We have to put the fear of God us into the GOP. Obama didn’t win by a landslide, but the GOP is acting like he did. The Democrats would never make this kind of mistake if they were in our position. As one of Glenn’s readers noted “I am puzzled why the Republicans continue to want John Boehner to remain speaker. He is genuinely not good at his job.â€
Clayton Cramer has an article on the subject in the National Review. Also, see this Cato Unbound paper on addressing involuntary commitment. More from Dave Hardy. Clayton also discusses Involuntary Outpatient Commitment.
Apparently the mother of the child murderer tried to have him committed, according to a member of a local church congregation in Newtown, and who also is coincidentally a Twitter follower of mine, known around these parts, and someone the anti-gun folks decided to put into the Twitter gulag while his congregation is dealing with members who lost children (way to be classy guys). I’m sure, like most of us, he was too bent out of shape this past weekend to organize protests to start off the week.
Glenn Reynolds is a happier warrior than I am, and has had some real gems, and good rhetorical comebacks to the anti-gun crowd.
Like this one about what the gun community is going to do about this tragedy. Apparently the answer has been a problem for the sarcasm challenged.
So if we’re going to have a “National Conversation on Guns,” here are some openers.
A USA Today piece from Glenn talking about the fallacy of gun free zones. Shame the governor of Michigan didn’t read it, or didn’t care.
Hey, Mayor Bloomberg: What kind of guns does your security detail carry? Same goes for celebrities.
In 1994, there was considerable effort to try to make the federal assault weapons ban less impactful, which required a lot of compromises. But because of that we got a sunset provision, and nothing nearly as bad as what California has.
To what extent should we, using the Courts as a backstop, be more unyielding this time? Would we be better off with a more draconian ban under the theory the Courts may more easily reach its unconstitutionality? Personally, I think that’s very risky, because I don’t know if I believe the Courts would throw out such a ban, even one as broad and horrid as California’s. It’s a tough call. I’m not sure the Courts honestly buy us much right now on this issue.
Thirdpower notes that the local gun show near him broke records. This weekend around here, the Oaks gun show was absolutely swamped. I just hope all these people panic buying are planning to join the fight, because there’s no guarantee you’re going to get to keep what you panic buy if you don’t. Voting with your wallet is part of the picture, but only part.
But we also need to make the Obama Adminstration sorry they decided to fuck with gun owners, and make sure lawmakers and policy makers can’t take a dump without running into some gun owner asking them to vote against more gun control. We have to hold feet to the fire, of Democrats and Republicans alike. So what do we do?
I believe our opponents response was planned and coordinated, and they were ready to execute the moment the awful news hit the airways. I don’t know about you, but I’m not sure where I would have found professionally made signs late on a Friday ready for noon Monday delivery. I don’t know how so many of the same outlets were right on message. We were told by anti-gun groups in the weeks approaching that change was coming, and that the writing was on the wall for our day in the sun being soon over. That smacks of someone who knows of a brilliant plan, and who were just waiting for a moment to execute.
Our side is not quite so coordinated. We are composed of a great many more people than our opponents have ever given us credit for. We take time to mobilize, but the Powder Alarm has sounded, and we’re seeing signs of it. The petition at the White House is getting close to 40,000Â (it was 18,000 when I posted yesterday about it). The NRA’s plan was radio silence. We did this without them. If Joe Manchin, who is backpedaling a bit, think what they are facing right now is scary, well, sir, I think you ain’t seen nothing yet. Today I’ve been focusing dark clouds on the horizon, and make no mistake, we’re in the fight of our lives. We emerged from the 1994 AWB beaten up, but our strength renewed. If we fight them back now, this will be it for them. They will no longer be able to keep up the narrative of the NRA, and gun voters as a paper tiger. But that depends on what we’re willing to do.