NRA’s suit against the City of Pittsburgh has been dismissed due to lack of standing. It’s interesting that the Brady Campaign is pleased to preserve a gun law on the grounds that it hasn’t been enforced against anyone yet.
Category: Gun Rights
Commentary on New York Centered Hysterics
First, Assemblywoman Michelle Schimel:
“What’s good for Nevada isn’t good for New York,†said Schimel, a Democrat, adding, “We have rules specific to New York for a reason.â€
Yep, and that reason is because the Irish and Jewish mobsters running Tammany Hall in the late 19th/early 20th century did not want to compete with new Italian mafiosi immigrants who were moving into NYC at the time. So “Big†Tim Sullivan created the current “may issue†system of discretionary pistol licensing to keep anyone Tammany Hall deemed undesirable (i.e. average citizens) from legally having handguns for self-defense against criminals, including the criminals running Tammany.
The Latest on National Reciprocity
I called both Senators Casey & Specter. (If you follow my Twitter feed, you’ll have read my frustration & praise.) Shortly thereafter, our phone rang and it was a phone bank system. NRA ordered up a phone bank here in Pennsylvania calling for action for both Casey & Specter on the Thune/Vitter amendment.
If you haven’t called yet, call tonight and tomorrow morning!
Just because I know you guys will be interested, I’ll tell you about my fun exchange with Sen. Specter’s office. This isn’t word-for-word, but the information is all accurate.
Intern: Sen. Specter’s Office, please hold.
Bitter: *holding* *holding* *holding* *holding* Phone dies after 10 minutes on hold. *redialing from landline* busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy
Intern: Sen. Specter’s Office, please hold.
Bitter: Actually, you left me on hold so long before that my phone died. I’d rather not, thank you.
Intern: Uh…One second please.
Chipper Staffer: Sen. Specter’s Office, how can I help you?
Bitter: Can you tell me how the Senator plans to vote on the Thune Amendment for national reciprocity of concealed carry licenses?
Chipper Staffer: I’m sorry, the Senator hasn’t issued a statement on that topic yet.
Bitter: The vote is tomorrow.
Chipper Staffer: I can take a note for how you’d like him to vote.
Bitter: We’re two active NRA members, and we have been in touch with many sportsmen’s clubs around Bucks County about political issues. We want him to vote yes. If he does, regardless of political challenges he may be facing next year, it would make it more likely we can stand behind him.
Chipper Staffer: Okay, thanks!
Bitter: Um, I’d like a written response, please.
Not-Quite-as-Chipper Staffer: I’m sorry, we don’t offer written responses to phone calls. We just have no way to track them.
Bitter: I’m a constituent who happens to have done the Congressional internship thing a few years ago. I know you have software to do it. I know how it works.
Really-Not-as-Chipper Staffer: It’s office policy that we don’t respond to phone calls. You can mail us a letter if you want one.
Bitter: I’m a constituent, and the rest of my household would appreciate the courtesy of a response.
Definitely-No-Longer-Chipper Staffer: Look, it’s just office policy. We don’t respond to constituents who call. You’ll have to write in order to receive a written response.
Bitter: Thanks, I’ll make sure and let the other constituents know that. I appreciate the information.
Uh-Oh Staffer: Wait, I’m sorry, it really is just office policy. We just get so many phone calls. It’s very busy and we just don’t have time.
Really-Sneaky-Sounding Bitter: Well, thank you for the information about responses, I’ll make sure to share the information.
Unsure Staffer: Have a good day!?!?
I cannot believe that he set an office policy not to respond to constituents who call! The software I used when I did the internship was so easy to use. It didn’t take more than a couple of minutes to get the topic, ask if they had a bill number, get the up or down vote information, and take notes on the caller. At the end of the day, the information input from phone calls and letters was printed out, sorted, and handled as appropriate. If it was a simple “vote yes” kind of request, the staff had typically already done form letters on the relevant topics of the day for both sides. If they had, the letter was sent. If not, they would then create one. It’s really not that hard. Not to mention, it weeded out the constituent calls from the non-constituents.
On the contrary, when I called Sen. Bob Casey’s office, it was tough to get in touch. I tried DC, but the voicemail was full and there were busy signals. I tried his Philly office, but their phone line seemed to be acting up. I tried the Harrisburg office, and the staffer was friendly and helpful. She checked to make sure he hadn’t said anything on the topic during the afternoon, she said they didn’t have an easy process for responding by letter to phone calls, but she was more than happy to take my name and address to have someone get back to me. I told her that I appreciated it, and that it was a stark contrast to the other PA senator’s office. I also thanked her and also let her know that a member of our household was active in a large gun club, and hoped we looked forward to reporting good things about Senator Casey in the future. She also said she would look into the problems with the Philadelphia office phones. At the very least, that’s constituent service, even if I disagree with his vote.
Quote of the Day
Now, the German government does everything but probulate you before letting you buy a gun; it’s a less-involved process to buy a tripod-mounted belt-fed machine gun in most states in the US than it is to buy a deer rifle in Germany. Further, they have stricter storage requirements for skeet guns and .22 ammo than the IAEC has for Iranian weapons-grade plutonium. Yet apparently if this guy gets a hold of the little commie vest-puncher, he will be driven slowly mad by its mind-control rays and then run around popping gendarmes until they put him down like a mad dog, kind of like you or I would do if we took an extra inch off our shotgun barrels.
The PSH Is Thick: Call Your Senators
The Pant Shitting Hysterics is really overflowing on this National Reciprocity civil rights bill, so now is the time to call your Senator’s office and make sure our voice is heard on the Thune Amendment. This is going to be a tough vote, as this can be considered a major piece of legislation. Let’s take a look at some of the hysterics:
Critics, including police organizations, big-city mayors and gun-victims groups, decried the legislation as creating “a new national lowest common denominator” for ownership of firearms.
Ownership of firearms? Fact checking, it’s what’s for dinner.
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) said Monday that she would vote against the Thune amendment, noting that gun laws should remain a state issue. Liberal Senators hope McCaskill’s opposition is an indicator of how other independent-minded Members, such as Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), might vote.
I guess ASHA doesn’t want their girl giving us self-defense whakos any goodies.
And, of course, Chuck Schumer:
“This amendment is a bridge too far, and could endanger the safety of millions of Americans. Each state has carefully crafted its concealed-carry laws in the way that makes the most sense to protect its citizens. Clearly, large, urban areas merit a different standard than rural areas. To gut the ability of local police and sheriffs to determine who should be able to carry a concealed weapon makes no sense. It could reverse the dramatic success we’vie had in reducing crime in most all parts of America. In the past, the gun lobby has had as its rallying cry, ‘Let each state decide.’ With this amendment, they are doing a 180-degree flip. Whether you are pro-gun or pro-gun control, this measure deserves to be defeated. We will do everything we can to stop this poisonous amendment from being enacted.â€
Sorry Chucky, my rights don’t end just because I cross some arbitrary, artificial boundary known as “city limits.” Do any other rights work this way?
We also have editorial PSH eminating from the New York Times, New York Newsday, Miami Herald, New York Daily News, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. Notice a trend? I wonder which city’s elites are pissing themselves the most over this.
More One Gun a Month Trouble in New Jersey
People are starting to figure out just how smelly of a turd this law is. Corzine is promising his commission will do their best to polish it, though. Fred Madden doesn’t seem that worried. I still wonder what Corzine bought him off with.
I agree with Cemetery it’s rather surprising this wasn’t picked up by NRA or ANJRPC, but anyone who’s ever tried to decipher New Jersey’s gun laws knows how complicated and convoluted they are. Evan Nappen is one of the few real experts out there on the subject.
What Were You Expecting?
Reports from around the gun blogosphere about the ATF’s response to the Tennessee Firearms Freedom Act have been filing in. Now, as a symbolic middle finger to Congress, I support these kinds of bills. But what were we expecting ATF to do? Their response was entirely predictable, and is well within the legal framework that ATF operates in. Like it or not, the current Commerce Clause jurisprudence allows the federal government to regulate the sale and transfer of firearms as part of a national regulatory scheme (see Gonzalez v. Raich).
There are many examples of ATF abuse of discretion out there, but this is not among them. If we really want to limit federal power, we ought to concentrate more on Randy Barnett’s federalism amendment, and not merely just pass symbolic acts that have no real force of law behind them.
Lack of Prosecution
Son of Liberty makes some very astute commentary about the shooting in Jersey City which has its police chief calling for pump-action shotguns to be classified as assault weapons.
Hysterics Squared
You don’t get much more hysterical than this:
AS EARLY as this week, Sen. Arlen Specter could set the wheels in motion for a new civil war in this country.
That’s because a subcommittee on crime and drugs that he chairs could move an amendment that will allow pretty much anyone to carry concealed weapons pretty much anywhere they want – even to states that might have prohibited them in the past.
A new civil war, really? And they say we’re the crazy ones. Also:
his latest outrage from the NRA-controlled Congress is an egregrious trampeling of state’s rights that should not be allowed to stand.
States rights, let me think. Weren’t there people who used this as an argument against another civil rights bill? I seem to recall. Maybe I’m mistaken.
Obama Gun Protester Cleared on Disorderly Charge
Remember back during the campaign of 2008, a guy got picked up for disorderly conduct and causing a disturbance for openly carrying a gun outside an Obama rally? He was acquitted of all charges. Might not have been the smartest thing in the world to do, but it’s not illegal.