Maybe it’s time to replace Reasoned DiscourseTM with National ConversationTM. I’ve been paying scant attention to what the Bradys and CSGV are up to, as I believe those organizations are just as swept up in greater forces and greater politics at work here as we are. They are along for the ride, not pulling the strings. Bloomberg and his Mayors are now the real, and dangerous enemy. Making fun of CSGV and their looniness was fun and entertaining in easier times, but the future of the gun control movement is elsewhere. Let us not lose sight of who we’re really up against.
Small Victory in This Long War?
This time it would seem to be our opponents who seem to be compromising. I think they want to take one of our issues off the table, because it’s getting in the way of them passing draconian gun control. They want that to recapture the narrative.
Via Glenn,who notes NRA 1, Obama 0. Let’s keep things moving in that direction.
Latest Registration Proposal from Illinois
But not on guns, on precious metals. Yeah, the tin foil hat crowd is going to love that one.
Kopel on Gun Free Zones
Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Dave Kopel opines on real gun free zones, and fake gun free zones. I wrote a similar article on how gun free zones might be constitutionally created back in 2010, borrowing the term “Practicing the Three S’s,” which in the usual context means “Shoot, Shovel, and Shutup,” an old saying coined by ranchers about how to deal with wolves (which were protected). In my substituted context, it stands for “Substitution, Screening, and Storage.”
(this post is called how we recycle content on a Friday when I’m in the office working the day shift) ;)
Left Attacking NRA Discounts
You know all those discounts we get as NRA members from hotels and rental cars? Apparently in the wake of Sandy Hook, those were attacked by the left. The Board is also not being considered off limits. These links are a bit old, but were ones I missed. I thought the left attacking NRA discounters was interesting enough to be worth a mention. They are attacking on all fronts. This isn’t any kind of probing action. These people mean to destroy us.
Dishonest Turds
That’s what I’d call Joe Biden, Obama and his panel. See this Tweet from Larry Keene of NSSF. Apparently they promised no media, and when NRA and NSSF showed up, there were cameras and media. You know, if you follow certain theories floating around out there, that can work two ways, Joe.
These Kabuki rituals are tiresome. I’d would be nice if we were the kind of country that valued honest interaction, and it was considered socially acceptable to drop a fresh deuce right there on the conference table, in response to what American gun owners thought of the Administration’s ideas. We used to be a country whose lawmakers would challenge each other to duels, and fist fights on the House floor were commonplace.
MAIG’s Response to NRA Member Increase
They got 400,000 people to sign a petition since Newtown. Did those people fork over $25 bucks for the privilege of signing up? How many would have signed up, do you think, if you had asked for that? MAIG has nearly 13,000 people on Facebook following them. NRA is starting to lick up on 1.9 million followers. So stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Bloomberg!
Tab Clearing
As usual, I get more stuff built up than I can possibly comment on, and I want to keep my posts more proactive and less reactive. But here’s what’s going on:
Hey, a mass killing stopped by an armed security officer you won’t hear anything about in the media. It’s partly bias, but also partly “No slaughter, no story.”
Here’s how do to an incremental backup with xtrabackup for MySQL. See, I hate it when I get work and blog tabs mixed up ;)
On Guns, like other issues, liberals are out of ammo.
John Richardson has a good line of argument to use against Obama. This guy has never given a rat’s ass about the American Economy.
A reader sent a link to this rule making petition, asking me about it. This is from Fall 2011, originally. It’s not new. It has to do with NFA trusts, and requiring individuals on trusts to go through background checks. It also would eliminate the CLEO signoff for individual NFA for making or transferring an NFA firearm or suppressor.
White House Misfires on Gun Control, from the… wait… the Boston Herald?
Generals and Gun Control. I guess military brass isn’t that different from police brass.
Tom Corbett has always had problems with Pennsylvania conservatives. Yeah, I’ve been too, but his refusal to politicize Sandy Hook, and standing firm against gun control erases any disappointment I might have been feeling. I’ll crawl over broken glass to help him out in 2014. Not having to worry as much about Pennsylvania is a tremendous help right now.
Who needs more than X rounds? Good thing there wasn’t two intruders. People who say that you don’t need more than 10 rounds watch too many movies and don’t understand how poor pistol rounds are at stopping bad guys. More here. Also, some people think shooting home invaders is horrible.
The guy on Biden’s task force had a son that was convinced of plotting a school shooting. Well, I guess he can at least claim direct experience with this sort of thing.
That was a lot, I know, but news is coming so fast I can’t really comment on it all, and I have a few more posts brewing in my head about how we got here, and what the left is hoping to accomplish and how.
NRA Statement on Biden Meeting
We were disappointed with how little this meeting had to do with keeping our children safe and how much it had to do with an agenda to attack the Second Amendment.  While claiming that no policy proposals would be “prejudged,†this Task Force spent most of its time on proposed restrictions on lawful firearms owners – honest, taxpaying, hardworking Americans.  It is unfortunate that this Administration continues to insist on pushing failed solutions to our nation’s most pressing problems.  We will not allow law-abiding gun owners to be blamed for the acts of criminals and madmen.  Instead, we will now take our commitment and meaningful contributions to members of congress of both parties who are interested in having an honest conversation about what works – and what does not.
What’s kind of laughable about it, is that I don’t think any of us seriously thought the Administration was interested in serious dialog. The “national conversation” was a farce from the beginning. This was planned “under the radar” to be executed the first pretext they had after the election. The only remaining option is to fight. Get writing your reps (and make them as sick of hearing form gun owners as I am of saying to badger them, and you probably are of hearing it).
In The Event Of Legislative Defeat, Next Steps
In fact, under the proposed bill, anyone who tried to enforce a federal gun ban could be charged with a felony. The Wyoming Attorney General’s office would also be permitted to defend any state resident against a federal gun ban.
What worries me is that I hear talk of civil war from otherwise sensible people if much of what is being spoken of comes to pass. I’m a firm believer in the rule of law, and I think actions should have the legitimacy of law, which means acting through state legislatures, and not a bunch of lone wolves shooting it out with the feds. This is still a union of 50 separate sovereigns, and there are further actions that can be taken even if the face of a devastating loss at the federal level.
But all law is ultimately force. Men with guns will be sent to enforce those laws. This isn’t any symbolic Firearms Freedom Act. Wyoming lawmakers here are proposing a law with penalties. Felony penalties. Penalties that will have to be enforced. Like all law enforcement actions, how it plays out depends on how serious the players are. What happens when the Wyoming State Police decide to go enforce this law against other men, men with guns, who think they are also the law? This doesn’t have to escalate to violence, but it could. People underestimate how much of our federal system is built upon willing cooperation. The Supremacy Clause of the Constitution doesn’t mean jack if the states are unwilling to enforce federal law, and not willing to allow the feds to enforce it. I fully support this idea as a next step in the event we take a devastating loss. But let us not let it come to that.