Shall Not Be Questioned – Page 782 – The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …

Laying the Ground Work

The Brady Campaign is pretty clearly laying the ground work for their push to get the Democrats to abandon the NRA post-election, by saying the 1994 elections were never really about guns, and that the Democrats who do not take NRA money (and who are also, conveniently, in safe, heavily lefty Democratic urban districts) are going to fare better than those who do.

The real lesson for the Democrats is that you can’t expect to win your majority back with pro-gun Blue Dog Democrats, then twist their arms to vote for Pelosi and Obama’s radical agenda, and then expect the gun vote to save you. The gun vote is powerful, but not that powerful. Being pro-gun is still going to win those candidates more than it will cost them, and in some of those districts it’s necessary to get elected at all.

Concealed Carry Ban Unconstitutional

In Wisconsin, a judge has ruled it violates the Second Amendment.

Weird Blog Reading Habits

Based on a recommendation from another blogger, I decided to add bevlog to my regular reads to see what they had to offer. If you read their “about” section, you might find it’s a very odd topic to follow: “bevlog reviews almost all of the 100,000+ beer, wine and spirits labels approved by TTB each year. We try to bring you the most noteworthy.”

If I didn’t find the topic strangely intriguing, then I would have missed their coverage of Intercourse Blue Ball Porter. And, yes, that image is from the label. Click through the link to see the full label – for fascinating research purposes only, of course.

Social Issues in a Crumbling Economy

If you want to appear out-of-touch with voters, the fastest way to do that is to send the kind of flyer I received from Democratic Rep. Patrick Murphy yesterday.

Background: According to the lists they have, I’m a Republican woman and have only been registered in Pennsylvania as a Republican. (This is unusual for me, as I haven’t been formally affiliated with either party since I was a teenager and initially registered in Oklahoma.) On paper, I’m dedicated enough to have voted in the Republican primary, and the last time I voted in a general, the GOP swept all of the county races. In other words, there’s nothing about my Pennsylvania voting history that indicates I’m open to their messages on either fiscal or social issues.

Every Democrat running in this state has been hammering on the economy. They know it’s what people want to hear. Yet, Murphy decided to send me a mailer that has women’s faces plastered on one side telling me that Mike Fitzpatrick will ban abortion. The other side says, “We’ve been here before.”

My response to Sebastian when I showed him the mailer this morning: “No, I’ve never been there before. I’m a Republican woman who is iffy on the abortion issue at best, and I’ve never been sitting on a dirty street with my head between my knees in a trashy looking dress.” There is literally nothing on the flyer that I can identify with – women having sex on the street, women getting abortions left and right, the fact that I know the Supremes are not going to change Roe, and there’s no serious threat to abortion in the political world right now.

Sebastian then pointed out that while there’s not a huge pro-life movement here in our district, the chances are extremely high that a woman who has registered with the Republican Party and votes in their primaries is actually an abortion opponent. He’s right about that, especially given the highly Catholic population around here. While many might overlook Murphy’s votes to fund abortions with their money, having his pro-abortion stance thrown in their face will almost certainly turn them off.

We can’t find one thing about this flyer that is remotely relevant to the issues that local voters are talking about this year. There’s nothing that’s on message to my voter file at all. I can’t even fathom what made him do this.

What Do You Do if You’re Dan Onorato?

As I was running errands yesterday, I couldn’t help but notice a very lonely Dan Onorato for Governor sign sitting in a median – no owner, no signs of friends posted immediately around it. And I got to thinking, what should a candidate like Dan Onorato do?

Last month, the County Executive had a whooping $3.3 million in the bank. When you consider we have one of the most expensive media markets in the country, and the rest of the state is spread out among a bunch of different markets, that doesn’t go terribly far in buying television advertising when you factor in all the other normal expenses in a campaign – including the “street money” to buy votes in Philly.

His opponent, Attorney General Tom Corbett, reported $7.7 million on hand. To top that off, in every single poll, he’s trouncing Onorato from 7-15 points.

So, Onorato clearly doesn’t have state recognition or voter approval, even after running a general campaign since he won a contested primary in March that gave him lots of coverage over Corbett and his lack of a serious primary. He doesn’t have enough enthusiasm to rally the base to open their wallets. Unless we end up with a live boy/dead girl scenario, this race is in the bag.

With that in mind, do you spend the money in the areas where you need high Democratic turnout to have any shot of winning? Or, do you effectively give up on the Governor’s mansion and spend in areas where you are polling poorly in an attempt to simply build name recognition for a future run for some other statewide office? What would you suggest for Onorato?

Good News on Castle Doctrine

Castle Doctrine has passed the Senate. Apparently they tried to amend a bill to close this bogus “Florida Loophole”, which failed 20-29. I have no news yet on what other amendments may or may not have been added. I had an election tonight at my gun club which left me unplugged for most of the evening.

I’ll be honest, I’m not happy that the reciprocity issue got 20 votes, including Tommy Tomlinson (my state Senator, who has always been friendly), and Stu Greenleaf, who was friendly most of the time.

We’re losing the Philly suburbs folks, and if we do that, Pennsylvania does not stay pro-gun. Tomlinson and Greenleaf ultimately voted with us on Castle Doctrine, which I do appreciate, but the vote to weaken reciprocity, with no concern for addressing our issues with the LTC system, is unconscionable in my book.

Brady Head Bashing

I highlighted this article at the end of the previous post, but I thought it was interesting enough to point it out in a separate one. I absolutely love reading passages like this:

“I think the Obama administration has been loathe to act on anything — or say anything — related to guns,” Chad Ramsey of the Brady Campaign told TPMMuckraker. “The administration has said almost nothing about the gun issue since Obama took office.”

Despite several attempts last week, TPMMuckraker was unable to get a White House official to respond to requests for comment about their priorities on gun control. Likewise, the Brady Campaign has tried to have a number of meetings with Obama administration officials, but “hasn’t had much luck,” Ramsey said.

So the Administration won’t even meet with them. No wonder they are upset. In other news, this is the first I’ve heard of Chad Ramsey. He must be a new hire, perhaps to replace Doug Pennington, a previous Brady spokesperson, who I think left to go work with unions. We wish him luck, as we do all Brady staffers who move on to other issues.

We legitimately did fear the worst from Obama, but it seems clear his passion for gun control was an inch deep, and not that much more wide. It has been one pleasant surprise from this Administration. Nontheless, he still put Kagan and Sotomayor on the high court at a time when increasing pro-Second Amendment votes on the Court is critical. In that respect, I think the Brady folk have been unduly harsh on him. We’re still one heart beat away from Obama being able to indirectly undo the worst thing that has ever happened to the gun control movement.

More on GOA’s Grades

A commenter last night pointed me to GOA’s Political Victory Fund and this web site here where tÂ offer a voting guide.Â But it still does not shed light on how GOA justifies such low grades for pro-gun Democrats. Thirdpower brought up the matter of Debbie Halvorson last week, and yesterday we had an attack on Walz. Halvorson has a longer record than a lot of newer Democrats. But what does GOA have on her?

She voted for the bailout, which has exactly nothing to do with guns.
She voted for three motions to recommit, which has about as much to do with voting against guns in national parks as the “no” votes on the final bill of GOA favorites Tom McClintock, Ron Paul, Michelle Bachmann, and Paul Broun and Â vote against the final bill did. These people are all legitimately pro-gun, but it makes no sense to count Democrat procedural votes on the bill, and not count these votes on final passage.
She voted on Obamacare, which has exactly nothing to do with guns, especially after Harry Reid (another favorite GOA whipping boy) got language inserted that protected the interests of gun owners.
She voted for DISCLOSE, which I’ll give GOA dinging her on, since they weren’t exempted from it. But I will point out the only pro-gun organization that would have been affected by DISCLOSE is the NRA had it not gotten itself exempted. GOA spends practically nothing on independent expenditures, and groups likes SAF have a tax status that does not allow for them to participate in elections. This isn’t a big enough gun issue to throw all the other pro-gun Dems under the bus for. If you’re willing to sacrifice those relations to preserve an activity you don’t participate in materially, I question your political judgement as a single-issue organization.

Taken together, this says that GOA is not strictly a gun rights organization. It is a conservative organization that markets itself as a gun rights organization. It’s fine if that’s how they want to play the game, but I don’t consider it an effective way of protecting the Second Amendment.

As a citizen, I am certainly not happy with Obamacare, bailouts, or DISCLOSE, but as an NRA member I’m very pleased they are seeking a bipartisan consensus on the Second Amendment that works across ideological lines. Ultimately, that’s the only way to protect rights in the long term, and it’s been very successful to date. I’m hoping to see the Bradys bashing their heads against the wall for a long time to come.

Castle Doctrine Being Held Hostage

Apparently by the animal rights people. According to NRA they have attached the pigeon shooting ban to HB 1926. Â This means that HB40 is now our only hope of passage of a clean bill.

Just to clarify, HB40 is the Castle Doctrine bill passed by the House last week, and now pending in the Senate. HB 1926 is another House Bill to which the Senate attached its version of the Castle Doctrine. There are currently two bill containing Castle Doctrine in the Senate, HB 40, and HB 1926. We’re looking to get a clean bill, no bad amendments, out of the Senate. Right now HB 40 is the only hope for that, since HB 1926 has been amended with undesirable language.

Crying Wolf Sexism

A Democratic candidate in a solidly Republican district in Virginia has had older photos of her, uh, boyfriend’s Halloween costume in her mouth. And his Halloween costume just happened to be a bright red sex toy and a leash.

Unfortunately, she’s screaming sexism. She’s convinced the media would never cover these photographs at all if she only had a penis. I would do quite a rant about why it’s not sexist to cover a political scandal, but I think the folks at Gawker said it best:

She continues: “I’m angry at the way women in this country are unfairly treated in this regard when they step up and run for office.” Because if a man sucked a rubber dick attached to the nose of another man, we would never publish that picture.

That link is also where you can find the pictures that include her posing in her revealed thigh highs, lace skirt, and drink in hand.

For the record, I realize that most reasonable people are going to have embarrassing skeletons in the closet. With the rise of digital photography and the ease of taking and storing pictures on devices that slide into your pocket, more of these types of photos will naturally be taken than they were before. These pictures don’t disqualify her for the office. They were apparently shortly after she graduated college, so it’s not surprising to see these kinds of antics among most people that age.

What I think makes her unqualified for my vote (if I had one there) is her screaming sexism where none exists. The fact is that these photos would be plastered around if she was a man. Oh, and her C rating from NRA doesn’t help her case to voters, either.