It’s spelled D-e-o-d-a-n-d, and before the Normans invaded and gave us all those fancy French and Latin words, the Angles and Saxons called them banes. We’re not really any more enlightened as a society than the people who invented the concept in the first millennium, no matter how much we might want to kid ourselves or pat ourselves on the back for our modern sophistication.
NYS Trooper PBA: We Didn’t Pass SAFE
No, they didn’t pass SAFE. That we all agree on. I don’t blame New York State troopers for the law. But police front line when it comes to prosecutorial discretion. They don’t have to look, they don’t have to find, and even if they do find, they don’t have to arrest. If a trooper pulls someone over for a traffic stop, and that person comes back clean when your run their driver’s license, there’s no reason why “have a nice day, and drive carefully,” can’t be the end of that conversation. If they choose to enforce this law on otherwise good and law-abiding people they are as bad as the politicians who passed it.
Looks Like Another Shooting at Fort Hood
Since nearly everything that comes out in the next several hours is likely to range from mildly wrong to grossly wrong, I’m not going to report on facts until facts are in. I’d note that our opponents have not had much success in exploiting mass shooting tragedies at military bases.
Machine Guns & Public Television
I noticed this story about a Friends of NRA event in the midwest that gave donors the opportunity to shoot one of the Gatling guns that Teddy Roosevelt and his Rough Riders used at San Juan Hill plus some machine guns, and I had to say that I’m impressed a public television program actually aired the event in Milwaukee.
This is one of those opportunities that makes our anti-gun opponents cringe – men, women, and children have huge smiles on their faces as they fire round after round into the berm.
I Love Being Protested
Miguel reports on Moms Demand Action’s plans to protest the NRA Annual Meeting. Whether they will protest directly, or just do their own event nearby to try to draw media attention away from the convention remains to be seen. Last year in Houston, which wasn’t too long after Moms Demand got started, they managed a protest, but it wasn’t all that impressive. With more wind coming out of their sails every day, I can’t imagine they’ll do better at Indianapolis, but as Miguel mentions, this is her backyard. Also, with Bloomberg’s money, they can afford to pay for buses.
Media Priorities
It’s interesting to note that the only article that the Chicago Sun Times manages to publish on the Leland Yee indictment is really more about Shrimp Boy and the the Chinese underworld in San Francisco than about Leland Yee, but an NRA lobbyist gets a ticket for not having his crossbow cased while hunting on private land? Scandal city!
David Keene on Smart Guns
David Keene recently appeared on Fox Business to discuss the topic of smart guns, and NRA’s opposition to Vivek Murthy’s nomination to the post of Surgeon General. Keene is a great spokesman for NRA and the issue, so I’m happy to see he’s still on the news circuit speaking on behalf of the organization. Obviously this was a friendly interview, but I’ve also seen Keene handle himself well in hostile interviews.
NRA Finally Getting Social Media?
I was interested to see NRA actually jumping in to an online comment thread and defending their record on certain issues when it was attacked. As short as a few years ago, NRA didn’t really have a very effective new media game, and one thing I always thought is that they needed to be more engaged with defending their record. There are always going to be haters, and haters gonna hate, but I think most people can be reasoned with. I am very pleased to see them jumping in here. The era of mass media isn’t over, but it’s getting there, and the more it gets there the more you depend on reaching individual people. That’s how you stay relevant.
Colorado Gun Control on Trial
The case that challenges Colorado’s new gun control laws, including the magazine ban, goes to trial today, and is expected to continue for several weeks. The judge in this case is the Hon. Marcia Krieger, who was put on the bench by George W. Bush, which I would say offers some possibility the Second Amendment will be taken seriously. I think a magazine ban, especially one that sets the limit at 15, is going to be a tough sell to federal judges, but I’m going to hope she’ll see through the state’s smokescreen over public safety and properly declare it unconstitutional, since magazines that hold more than fifteen rounds are in common use for lawful purpose, and are also not restricted for the police.
Constitutional Carry on the Move
Iowa is looking at a Constitutional Carry bill. This has been tried before in Iowa and failed, but it’s good to see it being tried again. Constitutional Carry is also coming up in Maine, where a lot of Democrats seem to be unhappy about it. NRA has more details about the bill, LD222. Maine was one of the states I was worried about post-Sandy Hook, so it’s encouraging to see this. Upper New England would seem to still be pro-gun culturally.