Anti-Gun Folks – Page 100 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Compromise Happens

Referring again to the discussion thread previously, and over at Weer’d World, and Common Gunsense, in regards to compromise: I think it’s important to understand the nature of compromise to know why it can’t really work even if we could find some. This is a topic I’ve covered before, or at least I feel like I have, but it’s worth renewing the conversation, I think.

You have to start with the base assumption that neither side wants to give up anything. This is a true state. We’d obviously just like to get, say, suppressors deregulated, without having to give up anything. Our opponents, meanwhile, would love to pass, say, a ban on all private transfers of firearms, without having to give up anything. The art of compromise is figuring out what’s most important to you, and seeing if you can trade something you don’t care that much about for something you do. If what you don’t care so much about is something your opponent values highly, then a deal can be struck, especially if what they are giving up is something important to you. In that case a deal is quite likely. The problem is that doesn’t happen too often.

One of the rare cases of something that was at least somewhat close to a true, brokered compromise was HR 2640, where we agreed to funding to improve state reporting to NICS for mental health, in exchange for some important easing of the prohibited persons laws, especially as it applied to people adjudicated of mental illness. The Bradys, in my opinion, actually gave up more in that deal than we did, because what was really important to them at the time was being able to tout a legislative victory. But if Brady could have rammed that bill through without making any concessions, it surely would have.

Most of the time compromise happens through struggle rather than agreement.Â You start with what you really want, which may not have the votes to pass, and then agree to change it to something less than that to pick up votes. If you’re still looking at improvement once you get to a majority, you have something that can pass. This happens on both sides. HR822 today does not go as far as the effort in the Senate a few years ago. That’s because the Senate effort failed by a few votes, so you need to make changes to pick up the extra votes. On the other side, the Assault Weapons Ban never would have had a sunset provision in it if it wasn’t necessary for our opponents to concede that to pick up needed votes for passage.

So any collaborative effort of a democratic nature is going to tend to, by the nature of the beast, be a compromise. It won’t be something forged on blogs, or by discussion between the sides. It’ll happen through the political process of either trying to pass or defeat a piece of legislation. Both sides will struggle for their own interests, and through lobbyists, will do what they need to achieve a victory, and to scuttle the other side’s best laid plans. The Brady folks don’t want to compromise, and neither do we. That’s why we’ll never be marching, hand in hand to Congress, embracing us each giving up something.

“Lalalalalalalalalala! I can’t hear you!”

Tam opines on the topic of compromise, and how our gun control supporting proponents see it. It’s really struck me too. There are reasonable discussions that can be had in regards to the topic. I’ve argued previously on this blog that one can think of licensing regimes that would actually be less restrictive than we have now, but would successfully deal with some of their purported concerns in regards to criminal access, background checks, and the like.

But they’ve never seemed all that interested in give and take, only really the take, because guns are icky, and so are the people who own them. The only good gun owner, in their eyes, is one who agrees with their agenda of the eradication of the right. That’s why we have to be dedicated to their political destruction, and nothing less.

Bloomberg’s Fraud – Signing a Dead Man’s Name

Did you know that Freeland Borough, PA’s Mayor Tim Martin died from esophageal cancer on September 2, 2010? Yet, amazingly, Mike Bloomberg’s anti-gun coalition still claims him as a member on their website as of November 8, 2011.

In fact, not only do they claim him as a member, but the deceased mayor has signed his name to at least two advertisements, three letters to Congress, and one letter to the President sent by Michael Bloomberg’s office. Now, just how on earth is Bloomberg getting a dead man to sign his letters? And why are media outlets running advertisements that are clearly fraudulent?

In a miracle, Tim Martin’s name appears on this letter to the US Senate on December 10, 2010 – 3 months and 8 days after his death.

Magically, Mayor Martin signed this Washington Post advertisement on January 25, 2011 – 4 months and 23 days after he passed.

Amazingly, Bloomberg snagged Martin’s signature on this letter to the US Congress on May 11, 2011 – 8 months and 9 days after his last breath.

Bringing him back to life again, Bloomberg placed the Mayor’s John Hancock on this letter to the US Congress on July 6, 2011 – 10 months and 4 days after he died.

Two days later, Bloomberg used the dead man’s name in a letter to the President – 10 months and 6 days after he passed.

Not stopping there, Mayor Martin’s name turned up on this USA Today ad on October 20, 2011 – 1 year, 1 month, and 18 days after Martin was declared dead.

How are Bloomberg’s PA Mayors Holding Up?

Most of tonight’s elections in Pennsylvania are municipal races, and many of the county governments don’t do any form of electronic reporting for their election results. Regardless, this is my attempt to keep up with those races where we can find information online. I’ll update this post regularly as we add more races.

Keep checking in for updates to this post.

Good News for Gun Owners

Aliquippa Bloomberg Buddy Anthony Battalini lost his primary handily 2-1 earlier this year. So, clearly he’s out today. Aliquippa residents should let mayor-elect Dwan Walker to support their rights.
Reading‘s Tom McMahon who welcomed Bloomberg’s bus tour is stepping down and did not run for re-election.

Bad News for Freedom & Liberty

Parker City‘s Bloomberg-backed mayor William McCall was unchallenged today. He is a Republican who is standing against our rights.
Whitehall‘s Edward Hozza managed to win both the GOP & Democratic ballot earlier this year, so he didn’t have any competition today.
In Wilkes Barre, Tom Leighton who takes pride in his anti-gun credentials won re-election tonight. On the upside, his anti-freedom efforts are limited to MAIG activities since his failed campaign for a seat in the state legislature a couple of years ago.
As mayor of Farrell, Ollie McKeithan, was unchallenged and will serve another term.
Results in Montour County aren’t actually available right now, but since Bloomberg supporter Ester Cotner won her primary unchallenged on both sides with a whopping 13 votes – total cast – she will win again tonight in Washingtonville.
Easton‘s mayor Sal Panto handily won re-election to continue advancing his anti-gun agenda.

We’re Not Sure

In Freeland Borough, MAIG still lists a mayor who died more than a year ago on their website. In fact, they’ve been signing his name to ads & letters as recently as last month. More on this in a minute. In regards to the election, his wife was running and took the lead with 50% of the precincts reporting.

Repeal the Second Amendment

Looks like at least one gun control group, the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, is getting on board with this idea. I’m not all that surprised. They’ve consistently refused to acknowledge Heller was correct, in stark contrast to the Brady Campaign accepting the ruling, provided it means being limited to having a gun in the home.

Dear Amy

From an advice column over at the Minneapolis Star Tribune, a woman asks what to do about “When our family gets together for any holiday, my niece’s husband has to bring a gun with him.” The husband in question has a valid permit to carry, and she has requested that he leave the gun at home. The husband said either she accepts it, or he won’t be coming over for the holidays.

Of course, Dear Amy consults those noted gun experts at the Brady Campaign and dispenses their advice, which if they had any power, would probably be to call social services on the guy and have his children taken away. But since we don’t live in Brady world, they just yammer about how guns are just going to cause tragedy, reciting long debunked studies about how guns are more likely to kill family members than intruders.

Personally, I’ve never had to deal with anything like this. My first question to the husband would be how these people know he’s carrying? I’ve always found discretion is the best policy in situations with sensitive family. Really, what they don’t know won’t hurt them. It’s always been my policy to neither confirm nor deny the presence of firearms.

If I were the husband, I’d just stay home, unless it was important to my wife to go, in which case I’d abide by the wishes of the aunt who does not approve of firearms in her home. It is her home, at the end of the day, and she can make the rules. But I’d probably also try to talk to her about her irrational fears if the wife was OK with that. Bitter and I have never had this problem, however, because neither of us have had issues with relatives of this nature. I have relatives who probably would not approve of firearm carriage, but I never saw any reason to broach the topic.

Gun Control Crowd Still Harassing Caren Merrick

Our opponents are telling Caren Merrick to release her NRA questionnaire, or they shall taunt her a second time. You can see why they areÂ doing anything they can to turn the pressure up, because the polling in this district. But gun control is just not an issue that energizes people to get to the polls, no matter how much our opponents want to make it appear to work that way. They can get a lot of attention from a sympathetic media, but when it comes to putting people in the voting booth, they come up empty. Nonetheless, the Democrats are trying to scare voters on social issues in an election that looks increasingly likely to hinge on economic issues.

I guess after tomorrow we’ll see how things go. If you’re a gun owner in Northern Virginia, I’d go see whether Caren Merrick, or any of the other GOP Senate candidates need any help on election day tomorrow. This is going to be an important election for gun owners. Not only is lowering Virginia’s Brady score at stake, but so is giving Bloomberg a boost if he’s able to eke out some victories, and the Democrats are able to retain control of the Virginia Senate.

UPDATE from Bitter: I realize that some folks are confused by this post. Merrick is rated A- and running against an F-rated opponent. Winning in the state Senate is particularly important for gun owners, according to previous reports we’ve heard from Dave Adams with the VSSA. Anti-gunners have been harassing volunteers for this candidate because they claim she hasn’t released her NRA questionnaire to them in order to use to attack her.

Caught Astroturfing

Thirdpower has uncovered that one “I’m a gun owner… but” article was actually written by the former Mayor of Madison, WI, who is actually a member of the anti-gun group Â Mayors Against Illegal Guns, going by the name of “Citizen Dave.” You see, when they don’t actually have grassroots, they will manufacture them. I would be reluctant to call these people “Fudds.” A more apt word would be “Frauds.” These folks are anti-gun forces masquerading as sportsmen. Kudos to the bloggers who uncovered the true identify of this bozo.

This is really no match for our grassroots resources. Our opponents’ duplicity is too easy to uncover, and, after all, they take the weekends off.

Disarming Our Soldiers (For Their Own Good)

As the Brady Campaign descends to new depths of madness, here’s just one other objective our opponents are supporting:

The article they link to is here:

“Multiple studies indicate that preventing easy access to lethal means, such as firearms, is an effective form of suicide prevention,” authors Harrell and Berglass wrote.

They are urging Congress to repeal the restriction on the military interfering with the private firearm ownership of soldiers. Understand what they are saying here: we have to prevent “easy access” to “lethal means” for our nation’s soldiers.

If any police or military folks thinks these people won’t eventually disarm you, think again.

Brady Campaign to Prevent Shooting Ranges?

Looks like Miguel had a run in with a Brady supporter on Facebook, where the supporter claimed to be facing continuous 50 caliber fire for ten hours straight. Miguel was skeptical of such a claim, since a 10 hour firefight on the streets of Orlando would surely make the papers. Turns out she bought a house near a gun range and doesn’t like the noise. Miguel notes, “It’s called the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, not the Brady Campaign to Prevent Loud Noises.”