This little piece of witlessness made the rounds last week:
Can zoning laws settle the gun debate?
If there could be a “right” to be free of guns, the logical question is then how it should be asserted. The answer may be in zoning. Because gun rights are tied to personal security, there appears to be room for citizens to exclude guns in their immediate surroundings as one means of protecting themselves.
No.
The is no “right” to be free of guns owned by other people. Your rights do not extend to denying other people’s rights. One can choose to be free of guns by not owning one. One cannot choose to make anyone else not own a gun. You do not have a right to my property.
Because gun rights were tied to personal security, there appears to be room for citizens to exclude guns in their immediate surroundings as one means of protecting themselves.
Witkin cites Heller, and claims that a decision, which specifically ruled against firearms restrictions so onerous as to prevent possession, somehow supports… zoning laws that prevent possession.
For example, zoning at the neighborhood or even block level could allow people to assert a right to be free from guns. Zoning is a policy tool that courts have upheld even when it clashes with the constitutional rights of individuals, such as freedom of expression and the sale of guWill he volunteer to lead the stack in confiscation raids?ns.
And there he cites Teixeira to demonstrate that zoning laws can restrict Second Amendment rights. Wrongly:
The district court’s characterization of residentially-zoned districts” as “sensitive areas” is incongruous with Heller, which assumed that firearms could be restricted in sensitive places “such as schools and government buildings,” specifically in contrast to residences, where firearms could not be prohibited.
It seems unlikely that Witlesskin actually readTeixeira, any more than he read Heller. Teixeira did not uphold the restriction of 2A rights through zoning; it found that zoning which excluded a proposed gun store did not infringe upon a recognized right because there were other stores in the area where firearms could be purchased, and people could still possess firearms. That is the opposite of Witkin’s claim.
I repeat: Heller (and later McDonald) specifically ruled against firearms restrictions so onerous as to prevent possession.
No, you cannot zone away our rights.
Federal courts are pretty consistent in recognizing that one can’t simply wave away constitutional rights. Take a look at Winbigler v. Warren County Housing Authority, in which the plaintiff challenged a public housing lease provision banning firearms possession outright.
The Court hereby permanently enjoins and restrains Defendant WCHA from enforcing the following lease provisions:
5(h): The Resident, the Residents household members and household guests shall not: discharge or use firearms or fireworks, or store explosive or flammatory materials.
18(p): Any termination of this Lease shall be carried out in accordance with U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development regulations, State and local law, and the terms of this Lease. The Landlord shall not terminate or refuse to renew the Lease other than for serious or repeated violation of material terms of the Lease on the part of the Resident, all members of the Resident’s household and all visitors/guests of the Resident such as the following: Offensive weapons or illegal drugs seized in the Landlord’s unit by a law enforcement officer or to permit any member of the household, a guest, or another person under the Resident’s control to use, possess or have control over firearms (this includes keeping firearms on one’s body, in the dwelling unit, or in a vehicle which the Resident or a member of the Resident’s household as the use of or access to. Firearms are defined as any devices which will propel a projectile with sufficient force to injure, kill, or damage property regardless of whether it does so with an explosive charge, compressed gas, or by other means).
Georgetown University should be ashamed of publishing that ignorant drivel, and more so of the rights-violation advocacy.
You can’t do it. Not by zoning, not by lease, not by HOA restrictions. But ill-informed people like Witkin will keep trying, so let’s move on to the practical problem of enforcement, which he glosses over.
Ideally, enforcement of gun-free zoning laws should be generally light, such as civil forfeiture or forced sale of the firearm, but harsher on violent criminals who possess guns.
Compliance. He, as typically happens, left out the “How”.
Specifically, how Witkin would ensure everyone complied with his gun-free neighborhood laws. How will he locate and seize Grandma’s bedside table revolver? Door to door searches? With a warrant based upon, “Gee, judge; we just need to see if anyone might be breaking our law”? Perhaps he can pass a warrant-free zone law as well.
I wonder if he’s considered the implications of kicking in doors because he thinks the residents are well armed. When California legislators first considered their “assault weapon” ban, the head of the police union declared they’d see the largest outbreak of “blue flu” in history if they had to do door to door searches. Legislators immediately modified their bill.
Does Witkin believe everyone (law-abiding and criminal alike) will meekly turn stuff in? California got a 2.33% compliance rate with just registration. Connecticut thinks they might have gotten 13.44% compliance with their “assault weapon” registration scheme.
Will he volunteer to lead the stack in confiscation raids?
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RGI: Racial Grievance Industry SPLC: Southern Poverty Law Center
Before a drop of water fell from the skies, two outcomes were predictable with respect to recent hurricanes (Texas and Puerto Rico); looters would issue forth from the muck they inhabit and Leftists would grandstand commonplace weather events claiming manmade global warming as their cause. Now racism has been added to the mix. White journalist and author Sarah Jaffe declared on social media the Miami Police Department’s warning against looting demonstrates that; “The carceral (sic) [Spanish for jail or prison] state…is inseparable from white supremacy.”2 Aren’t assumptions by liberals that looters are black racist? In any criminal investigation police ask who had a motive, how would they profit? Ever wonder why shrill proponents of man-made global warming typically are socialists and enemies of the 2nd Amendment? Don’t see the connection? You should, they’re pounding this stuff into your kid’s heads at school. How would Leftists profit from American’s acceptance of manmade global warming? They say big problems require big government solutions but it’s really about surrendering individual liberty to the State and that mean’s them. Doesn’t anyone read anymore?3 The predictability of post-disaster looting these days is a sad commentary on societal degradation…like school shootings. After any major disaster, natural or manmade, can police protect people or are they on their own?4 Well, how are they doing now in the face of increasingly organized violence and riots? The Liberal Media, called “steno-pool typists for the Democrat Party” by radio talk show host Chris Plante, push narratives of police brutality against blacks causing inner-city “unrest” but are these narratives valid? In part one I began addressing whether or not it’s true the police, as charged, target black males for oppression and murder on behalf of the white race. This claim, dropped like napalm over inner-cities by the Left, ensures any encounter between police and blacks has the potential to explode into general violence and chaos.
Many in the Black community blame problems between races on the refusal of whites to even talk about race relations. Obama’s former Attorney General and international gun-runner Eric Holder (known in some circles as “Carlos the Jackass”) said America was a “nation of cowards” when it came to discussing race relations. Whites won’t discuss it. In addition, he claimed animus directed toward him and Obama was based on white racism.5 As a teacher, under a cloud of suspicion for being a, (cover your children’s ears) conservative, I was asked my opinion of Obama by students and colleagues. According to Holder, honesty and openness is the best way to promote race relations. Had I explained Obama, raised a communist, was waging a war against the principles contained in the Declaration of Independence and Constitution, was deconstructing America’s Judeo-Christian foundations, hated the traditional family, and was dismantling economic policies that made America wealthy, wouldn’t my honesty have been a step toward “openness”? No, instead I’d have been branded a racist.6 For Holder and Leftists, the only acceptable starting point for discussions of race, crime, and the police is their perspective otherwise you’re automatically deemed a racist. Recall Obama’s claim lethal interactions between the police and black males stemmed from racism on the part of white officers? Was he right? Are police really the gravest threat to black males in America?
Consider the work of liberal University of Chicago and Yale professors Steven Levitt and John Donahue, respectively, whose national best seller, Freakonomics claims aborting black babies reduces crime. They argue unwanted and children born to single moms are typically black and more likely to grow up to become criminals. They conclude the 1973 Supreme Court decision legalizing abortion, (Roe v. Wade) is responsible for reducing crime in the 1990s because aborted black babies weren’t around to turn 18 in 1991 and commit crimes.7 M.I.T. professor Jonathan Grueber, Liberal mover and shaver behind Obama’s socialized national healthcare, reached the same conclusion.8 Levitt, Donahue, Grueber, and others within the population control movement, Leftists all, argue America can save itself a lot of trouble and money by ensuring black babies are never born. Liberals are the ones fanatically pushing abortion which typically takes the life of unborn black babies at a rate four times that of white babies. Nine hundred black babies are aborted every day in the U.S which comes out to 328,500 per year. Considering black women make up around 7% of the U.S. population, and have 35.6% of all abortions,9 one has to wonder why its angry bitter middle-aged liberal white women pushing abortion so hysterically. The ghosts of Sudan and Rwanda cry out. And then there is the inner-city homicide rate. By 26 July 2017, Baltimore, my old stomping ground,10 had reached 200 homicides11 with 27 in a 30 day period between 11 August and 11 September, 2017.12 They weren’t shot, stabbed, or bludgeoned to death by the police. So who then is waging war against blacks? BLM insists its cops acting as executioners on behalf of the white race.
According to Black journalist and author Taleeb Starkes, perhaps as detrimental to race relations as white indifference, if not worse, is the “Racial Grievance Industry.” This “industry,” consisting of BLM, NBP, SPLC, certain black politicians, and white dominated Left-wing organizations blame everything from black on black violence, poor education, and unemployment on white racism. Starkes asks; how can this can be true considering municipal governments, schools, police, and social programs in Baltimore, Detroit, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and other cities have been controlled not by whites but by black Democrats for decades? But BLM-RGI dismiss this fact claiming all problems afflicting the black community are the legacy and consequence of white racism. Starkes calls this the “Theory of Exploitivity”; any conflict between races is, always was, and always will be the result of white racism. Leftist mouthpieces for BLM-RGI; white college professors and the liberal media, assert “Racism is the end-all-be-all explanation” for problems in the black community therefore “no fact finding mission is necessary.” Any effort, study, and or investigation of problems within the black community whose starting point does not begin with the presumption of white racism as the root cause, is racist. End of discussion.13 For example, economist Thomas Sowell is black but his observation of a correlation between fatherless homes and Baltimore rioters and looters is considered racist if uttered by a white person14 and treasonous heresy if uttered by members of the black community.15 This echoes my experiences with liberals coast to coast; the only reason anyone could disagree with them is because they’re narrow-minded, racist, a Nazi, and stupid. Before dialogue on race relations is possible, promoters of the “Theory of Exploitivity” demand whites accept that they are inherently racist from birth and the cause of all problems between the races, then we’ll talk.16 In tandem with the RGI, white Liberals promote the notion simply being born a minority, race, sex, culture, or religion automatically renders one a victim of discrimination and racism by the dominant group, white males. Critical analysis of this presumption is taboo especially on college campuses where students enjoy an environment supportive of the free exchange of ideas.17 When debate on racial issues must begin with a stipulation of white guilt as the singular cause for all problems, is it any wonder BLM shrieks with outrage when others say; “all lives matter?”
Today, suburban middle class whites are told their comfortable gold-plated golf and tennis country-club lives are the result of slavery, exploitation, and colonial oppression of black and brown peoples. Indoctrination begins in grade school where little white children are taught they’re members of a privileged class who ensure their status atop the social and political hierarchy by denying participation in the good-life to all but members of their own race. This explains why whites want to build the “wall.” Playing on guilt instilled through brainwashing, this Marxist world-view is heavily promoted by Hollywood, by comedians, professional athletes, pop-singers, and reinforced by the Liberal Media and their handmaidens, Leftwing public school teachers. It takes little effort by college professors to administer the coup-de-grace teaching because white prosperity is built on racist exploitation, blacks are justified in rioting and looting. They are simply re-appropriating what was stolen from them in the first place. In addition, they teach, because whites control all institutions of political power, any problem in non-white communities must be the fault of whites.18 Your tax dollars at work.
Do not mistake BLM for a traditional civil rights organization. They’re not. They clash often with the old guard of the civil rights movement rejecting the non-violence of Dr. Martin Luther King in favor of belligerent confrontation and mob violence. Yusra Khogali, co-founder of the Toronto, Canada, BLM chapter declared the movement rejects the goals and tactics of the “old-guard” who led the civil rights movement in the 1960s. They reject equality, integration, and assimilation into mainstream American culture and life. Instead, they want revenge obtained through violence. Even Left-wing black “leaders” from Al Sharpton to Oprah Winfrey are denounced for not embracing violent revolution and vengeance against the white race.19 As for young (big surprise) whites seen marching with BLM, regardless of how much they sacrifice to the cause, they’re still considered racists by BLM and similar organizations. Being Caucasian means sharing collective guilt for any act of racism ever committed by any white person who ever lived, at any time in history. Therefore Caucasians are irredeemably racist.
Read BLM’s words for yourselves: “We are working to (re)build the Black Liberation movement.”20 Liberation from what? During the 1960s, the “Black Power” movement and members of various “Black Liberation” organizations, led by Max Stanford, Stokely Carmichael, Jim Forman, Malcolm X, H. Rap Brown, Willie Ricks, Eldridge Cleaver, Huey Newton, Bobby Seale, and others broke away from Martin Luther King calling for violent confrontation and revolution against white power structures and rejected King’s notions of “universal brotherhood.” Living in Northwest Philly at the time, how could I forget their pernicious influence? Like BLM, they were black segregationists demanding nothing short of war, violence, revenge, and ultimate separation from the white race.21 In their minds because all aspects of American life; family, education, culture, law enforcement, and government comprise institutionalized racism, revolution and separation is the only answer to liberate and free the black race. The success, direction, and fate of black people must be wrested from the control of white hands.22 The goals of the Black Liberation movement, embraced by BLM and allies, are exclusive. Whites making common cause will be accepted, used, and discarded. No place exists for the white man in their brave new world.
BLM makes no bones about being at war with the white race. They declare their movement is an “ideological and political intervention in a world where Black lives are systematically targeted for demise.”23 Remarkably they are in a sense, correct. Black males are being targeted for extermination but, by other black males not the police or members of the white race! They claim Trayvon Martin’s “murder” (sic) by George Zimmerman was the catalyst for creation of BLM. Martin’s case was an example of police and white vigilantes on patrol looking for blacks to “murder.” BLM also attacks “black nationalism” and campaigns to “buy black” because it ignores “our sisters, queer and trans” blacks. They affirm “the lives of black queer and trans folks, disabled folks, black-undocumented folks” black felons and convicts, and blacks all “along the gender spectrum.”24 Their worldview, seen through a Marxist-Lesbian lens, claim poverty in the black community is the consequence of genocide executed through a government controlled by whites. Blacks are in prison not because they’ve committed violent crimes you see, but are innocent victims rounded up by the state for internment in concentration camps. They assert “Black queer and trans folk bear a unique burden from a hetero-patriarchal society that disposes of us like garbage and simultaneously fetishizes us and profits off of us, and this is state violence.” Does this sound like people organized simply to ensure fair treatment from the police or does a much larger agenda emerge? Their societal model is a female-led communal village, rejection of the traditional Western family (pre-1980s..ish), and their slogan is “justice, liberation, and peace” identical to the slogan of Soviet inspired Communist guerrilla movements of Africa, Asia, Southeast Asia, and Latin America in the last century. They promise to dismantle “cis-gender privilege” and free black society from the grip of heterosexuality.25 This is about Trayvon Martin?
Its clear reading BLM, NBP, and SPLC propaganda these movements aren’t about improving race relations or diffusing mistrust between blacks and the police. It’s about revolution. Communist revolution, baby. They want conflict, they want confrontation, and they want violent upheaval. Alleged white racism and police brutality are boogeyman myths effective in harnessing support in the black community, forming alliances with radical communist groups like Pantifa,26 guilt ridden whites, and neutering opposition by menacing them with being damned a racist. Bitter fruit has already been harvested in the ambush and assassination of police officers by suspects high on BLM propaganda and hatred. But what of all the stories about cops shooting unarmed innocent blacks? Stay tuned.
11 To streamline the discussion and avoid ponderous repetition, please refer to these abbreviations.
22 Fox News, “Prestigious author compares arrests of looters to ‘white supremacy,’ 2017/09/11, at https://www.foxnews.com/prestigiousauthor. Jaffe is a Nation Institute [“think” tank sponsored by the far Leftist magazine The Nation] fellow, and writes on labor, “economic justice,” social movements, “gender” and other causes on the far Left. She writes for The Nation. The correct spelling is carcel.
33 For scoffers, doubters, and the “Well you know Larry,” types, have you read: Environmental Overkill by Dixy Lee Ray and Lou Guzzo, Trashing the Planet by the same authors, The Satanic Gases by Patrick J. Michaels and Robert C. Balling, Jr., The Politically Incorrect Guide to Science by Tom Bethell, and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism by Christopher C. Horner? If not, get them, read them, free yourself from the lazy man’s brainwashing; pop culture. My acquaintance wouldn’t listen to me. After all, everyone says…
44 Hurricane Katrina and George Bush’s role in causing it came up during a SocialIST studies department in-service at Lee’s Summit High School. A liberal colleague from another but “attached” to the SocialIST studies department, who I knew well, admonished me not to use the term “looter” because it was de facto racist. How so, I asked. He said it conjured images of black people looting. I responded, “You’re the one associating race with looting. I never mentioned race.” For the Left, truth does not matter.
66 I replied that Obama seemed like an intelligent, passionate, honest, and very likeable guy. I made no references to his politics nor did I ever criticize him. Ever. Massive prohibition on free speech for conservatives in public education forbade otherwise.
88 Mona Charen, “Abortion-Distortion-and-Crime,” National Review (January 2, 2015) at http://www.nationalreview.com/article/395585/abortion-distortion-and-crime.htm.
99 Abortion and Race at http://www.righttolifeofmichigan.org Most of those abortions occur among teen and pre-teen cohorts in the black community so it’s much worse; roughly 2% of black Americans having over 35% of all abortions.
1010I attended Margaret Brent School #53, 100 East 26th Street, Baltimore, Maryland, 21218.
1313 Taleeb Starkes, Black Lies Matter: Why Lies Matter to the Racial Grievance Industry (Lexington, Kentucky, Createspace Independent Publishing Platform, 2016), 1-3.
1414 As part of the campaign to force me into retirement, because I “liked” a FB YouTube video of Professor Thomas Sowell making this statement, I was written up and accused of being racist. I was told my “like” was totally inappropriate and, because students could see it, I was in violation of a rather broad and vague (Union’s opinion) district policy. I had been on FB all of 3 weeks and was totally unfamiliar with how it worked. At issue was not the validity of Sowell’s observation. To paraphrase Tina Turner, With Liberals, what’s truth got to do with it, got to do with it? As an aside, the very white administrator who wrote me up never lived in Baltimore or Philadelphia’s inner city. I did…
1717 Ann Coulter, Guilty: Liberal “Victims” And Their Assault On America (New York, N.Y., Crown Forum, a Division of Random House, 2008), 1-2, 8-9, 13.
2121 Daniel J. Boorstin and Brooks Mather Kelley, A History of the United States since 1861 (Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, Prentice Hall, Inc., 1990), 437-439. I grew up in the inner cities of Baltimore and Philadelphia during the 1960s and witnessed the Black Power movement and its consequences first hand.
2222 David Horowitz, Hating Whitey And Other Progressive Causes (Dallas, Texas, Spence Publishing Company, 1999), 82-83.
CIS-Gender refers to people who insist in identifying their sex with their anatomy. For example, a girl looks down, see’s “girl parts,” and concludes she’s a, well, girl…imagine that. Even in my former high school, kids were being pressured in using these terms, crafted by homosexuals, lesbians, and transvestites, to remove deserved stigma and opprobrium and transfer it instead to heterosexuals, God’s design for mankind. Black Liberation refers to armed struggle and revolution promoted by the former Black Panthers. They issued a call for black people to take up arms against white people to win liberation.
2626Antifa is the self-styled name of a radial collection of anarchists and communists, which began in Europe, opposing fascism by being fascists themselves. They are dedicated to overthrowing all vestiges of Judeo-Christian based Western Society and its philosophy of freedom. Violent and extreme, they wear panties over their faces to hide their identities hence the name Pantifa.
Thanks to my brother Mike for suggesting this topic, providing sources, and help for this article. We are both survivors of Baltimore’s inner-city as well as Philadelphia.
“I am vocal about common-sense gun safety and gun laws,” she says. “For instance, I fully support an assault weapon ban, I fully support a bump stock ban.”
That doesn’t make her anti-gun, she clarifies. “I fully support the Bill of Rights. And fully support the Second Amendment. And have absolutely no problem with people owning firearms if they have been trained, licensed, a background check has been conducted, a pause button has been pushed to give time for that process to take place. And they have to renew their license just like we do with automobiles – which are weapons also.”
What is it with victim disarmers and cars? Let’s try that on other rights.
Voting:I am vocal about common-sense voting laws,” she says. “For instance, I fully support a straight party ticket ban, I fully support a independent voting ban.”
That doesn’t make her anti-voting, she clarifies. “I fully support the Bill of Rights. And fully support the First Amendment. And have absolutely no problem with people voting if they have been trained, licensed, a background check has been conducted, a pause button has been pushed to give time for that process to take place. And they have to renew their license just like we do with automobiles.
Searches:I am vocal about warrantless searches,” she says. “For instance, I fully support a stop & frisk, I fully support a no-knock warrantless drug raids.”
That doesn’t make her anti-privacy, she clarifies. “I fully support the Bill of Rights. And fully support the Fourth Amendment. And have absolutely no problem with people being searched if they have been trained, licensed, a background check has been conducted, a pause button has been pushed to give time for that process to take place. And they have to renew their license just like we do with automobiles.
Speech:I am vocal about common-sense speech laws,” she says. “For instance, I fully support a ban on public rallies, I fully support government censorship.”
That doesn’t make her anti-free speech, she clarifies. “I fully support the Bill of Rights. And fully support the First Amendment. And have absolutely no problem with people speaking up if they have been trained in acceptable opinions, licensed, a background check has been conducted, a pause button has been pushed to give time for that process to take place. And they have to renew their license just like we do with automobiles.
Gay Rights:I am vocal about common-sense marriage laws,” she says. “For instance, I fully support a ban on same-sex marriage, I fully support a sodomy ban”
That doesn’t make her anti-gay, she clarifies. “I fully support the Bill of Rights. And have absolutely no problem with straight people marrying if they have been trained, licensed, a background check has been conducted, a pause button has been pushed to give time for that process to take place. And they have to renew their license just like we do with automobiles.
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On the one hand, we have SAFE (Scrubs Addressing the Firearm Epidemic).
SAFE is naming gun violence for what it is – a health threat of epidemic proportion – in order to rally the medical community to fight for the interests of our patients. It is time for us to bring the same urgency and dedication to the task of eliminating gun violence as we have to exposing other health risks, such as cigarette smoking.
In the past couple of weeks, SAFE has been popping up all over the anti-rights media.
“Stanford doctors lead national effort to stop gun violence
If a virus, bacteria or cancer killed 35,000 people a year, there would be an outraged demand for a cure, they say.”
Wait. What? He’s sort of right about cancer. It doesn’t kill just 35,000 people per year. It kills 17 TIMES that many.
Do you know what else kills more people than guns?
1999: Institute of Medicine’s “To Err Is Human” report: up to 98,000 people die from medical errors in hospitals
2010: Office of Inspector General for Health and Human Services: 180,000 patients in Medicare alone
The tricky part of estimating doctor-related deaths is that — oddly conveniently for someone — there is no medical reporting code to indicate that a… drug overdose, for example… was, “Oops. My bad.”
Per CDC’s WISQARS: Firearms-related deaths, all intents:
1999: 28,874
2010: 31,672
2013: 33,636
2016: 38,658
You are 6.47 to 11.38 times more likely to die by medical professional than by gun. Those medical professionals who arrogantly deign to tell us firearms are the problem.
Medical reporting codes for firearms — yes, they code that — break it down by handgun, rifle, shotgun, accident, suicide, and homicide. Perhaps they need to break down their own killings by surgeon, resident, nurse, homicide, and accident. (Although I know of one hospital… choosing to go there might be classed as suicide.)
As for other numbers…
Estimates of gun owners range from 80,000,000 to more than 120,000,000. If each firearm-related death represented a single, discrete owner, then a mere 0.03% — three-hundredths of one percent — to 0.04% — four-hundredths of one percent — of gun owners killed someone with a gun.
There are an estimated 1,000,000 doctors in the US. If we similarly assume — just for giggles — that each medical death represents one doctor…
Whoa. 25% to 44% — forty-four; not point 44 — of doctors kill.
Statistically, that makes doctors 1,466.66 times more likely to kill than is a gun owner. (Interestingly, I ran this same analysis twenty years and came up with close to the same ratio: 1,400 times.)
Maybe they should change their name to Scrubs Addressing the Doctor Infestation.
DRGO educates health professionals and the public in the best available science and expertise about firearms, including gun safety and preventing injury and death through wise use and lawful self defense. We teach what science shows—that guns in responsible hands save lives, reduce injuries, and protect property by preventing violent crime.
DRGO has a little better understanding of the relative risks. I suspect they’re better doctors, too.
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So why is something this blatantly wrong — morally, constitutionally, and physically — going ahead?
“Why” is easy. 1) It’s the perfect lead-in for a complete ban on semiautomatic firearms. 2) Progressive Democrats and police-statist Republicans think they can get away with it.
The “how” do they think they can do this, how did a yammering pack of ignorami come to screech for it, is trickier.
Case in point: a Reuters article about Trump announcing the eminent rulefiat.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday his administration is just a few weeks away from finalizing a regulation that would ban so-called bump stocks, devices that allow semi-automatic weapons to fire like machine guns.
They led with a lie: “fire like machine guns.” Which they don’t. It can sound like a machine gun, but the operation is pure semi-auto. And they know it.
Because I told them.
A year ago in Las Vegas, gunman Stephen Paddock used bump stocks on 12 of his weapons in a mass shooting that killed 58 people and wounded hundreds.
I called them on that claim, as well. No official report — and oddly, not even any unofficial leak which I’ve found — states what firearms were used by the shooter, with the sole exception of the revolver he used on himself. No ballistics data tying rounds fired to any specific weapon have been released to the public.
I told Reuters to provide a source, or retract the claim.
While machine guns are outlawed in the United States, bump stocks
are not.
While machine guns manufactured after May 1986 are outlawed in the United States, bump stocks are not.
Yeah, I called them on that bit of stupidity, which seems to be one of the secret-squirrel-official talking points being pushed recently. Reuters did fix that one.
One outa three ain’t… good.
The media magically made gimmicky training wheels into the weapon of choice of mass murderers everywhere… in an alternate reality.
In this reality, someone involved in the Vegas investigation told reporters that at least one of the shooter’s weapons was an illegal full auto conversion, in addition to the bump-fire stocked rifles.
Which would go far in explaining why bipods would be mounted on “bump-stocked” guns, when that would prevent them being bump-fired.
Within three days, bump-fire stocks became the designated boogeyman. Full-auto dropped from the narrative. Dropped. Never mentioned again, not even to say the person “misspoke.”
And that would far in explaining why the ATF — the official arbiters -gag- all things allowed and/or regulated in the firearms world… was not allowed to examine the shooter’s weapons. Admitting that the scumbag somehow broke existing laws to use real machineguns, and that the silly bump-fire stocked weapons were only emergency backup, would diddle the official OMG-ban-bump-stocks (and lead in for a semiauto ban) bipartisan line.
Trump gives a 2-3 week time frame for his new infringement. By the formal process, it could be as much as 90 days. But it is coming. What now?
Hard to say until we see the exact form of the rule. It sounds like bump-fire stocks will be — as expected — declared to be machineguns, which makes them illegal as they were manufactured after May ’86.
But Trump has been known to exaggerate -roll eyes- so maybe they’ll get classed with short-barrel rifles and shotguns; pay your money, keep your stock.
All I can recommend at this point is that you consider… compliance. The more malicious the better.
For instance, if the stocks are banned, and have to be turned in or destroyed, one might assume obsessive-compulsive bureaucrats will have a way to document that. Probably forms. Everyone might want to order a few… for every 200 stocks you “have.” Don’t forget spare forms in case you make a typo.
As for the stocks themselves? Just remember what a bump-fire stock really is. And every foot-long piece of PVC pipe that will fit over a buffer tube is a bump-fire stock. Dear Bog, my local Lowe’s has thousands of stocks.
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I’ve been thinking about this the past few days. Last week I changed the battery in my pickup, went to a home improvement store and bought some things to make a Sukkah for Sukkot. I brought my supplies home, unloaded and set about building the sukkah with my handy pink drill, and a few other supplies. My greenery was already to go on the roof since I had cut down a evergreen tree and then cut off the branches. As I was doing all this, I was thanking G-d for having blessed me with the Dad he did. Dad never really treated me like “girls don’t do chainsaws, girls don’t work on cars, girls don’t _____” If I wanted to learn, Dad taught me. He also taught me the stuff he thought everyone should know how to do like change a tire. My parents took responsibility for me as a child, they raised me and trained me as best they could. When I became an adult, the responsibility for my behavior and choices fell on me.
When I decided I wanted to keep a gun in the house, Dad and I had a long talk about it. A very long talk about it, the responsibility it entailed and an idea of what would happen to my life if I ever had to kill an intruder. And then he loaned me one until he found what he felt would be a good one for me.
I ran across a couple of stories the other day that made me think about my folks in that capacity. One was about a older sister that had been out with her little brother practicing elk calls. I guess they must have sounded pretty good because on the way home the 16 year old girl saw a cougar about 3 yards from her 6 year old little brother. She told the brother to run to her and she shot the cougar behind the ear with an arrow. The cougar ran off and the kids made it home. The family dog and Dad went out with an AR-15, the ones with no defensive purpose, and killed the cougar. Apparently the parents believe in actually raising children and teaching them useful things, as opposed to say, just having children.
Another was of a 12 year old boy who used a Ruger .44 magnum lever-action rifle to protect his Mom from yet another domestic violence assault. There had been 5 previous calls to the residence for domestic violence none of which had ever resulted in charge. The say the 12 year old will most likely not be charged for defending his Mom. I’m thinking 5 calls? FIVE calls and no charges? Really?
This actually does happen in the real world, children using weapons to defend themselves or their families from nature’s miscreants, both two and four legged.
And then of course, we should all remember the case of Jessica Carpenter. When government gun control cost innocent lives.
Fear stalks Merced, California — fear of the government. Because of that fear, two innocent children died needlessly, victims of California’s “safe storage” gun laws. The mass media never told Americans what really happened in Merced. But the tale of the Merced Pitchfork Murders will not die.
See, those parents had taken responsibility for raising their children, those children knew how to handles guns safely. It was the state and a murderer that killed those children because they were unable to get to the one tool that could have saved their lives. California has mandatory safe storage.
The gun is inanimate, a tool its use in the hand. The death of a child is tragic, be it by gun, pitchfork, knife, swimming pool or attack by wild pigs. But it’s up to the parents to educate the children about guns, not toys, safe handling. That requires responsibility on the part of the parent and child.
It’s a responsibility thing. And it works best when parents and children know their responsibilities and carry them out.
At the other end of the spectrum of the “I have children” vs “I’m raising my children” are the people that are trying to take on tasks that really aren’t within their purview. Not withing the “scope” of their “practice” shall we say. Yeah, I’m kind of cracking myself up here with my humor.
Fair warning here, the source on this article is cnn #FakeNews, so you can take it for what it’s worth. But since they are obviously sympathetic to the point of view it’s what they want to put across anyway.
Your doctor already talks to you about sex, drugs and alcohol, but should they talk to you about guns, too? A newly-formed coalition of healthcare providers thinks so — and patient intervention is just one part of their plan to reduce what they call an “epidemic” of gun violence.
The organization, Scrubs Addressing the Firearm Epidemic, known as SAFE, is demanding an increase in federal funding for gun violence research, and is calling on lawmakers to implement “evidence-based policy” on guns.
At more than 30 medical schools across the country last week, students and physicians wore scrubs with SAFE’s bright red logo as they held demonstrations at their hospitals. According to Sarabeth Spitzer, a fourth-year medical student at Stanford who spearheaded the campaign, the group distributed about 2,700 of the special scrubs “to show the overwhelming consensus of health care providers that firearm violence is a public health crisis.”
Well Miss Sarabeth, heavens above please don’t ever let it be Dr. Sarabeth, there is indeed a medical crisis. And you in your little “special” scrubs aren’t doing diddly squat about it. You and your little sullen looking crew are all hat and no cattle. Seriously, look at the picture in the linked article. They all look either constipated or like little #MoneyHogg clones. Another great reason to look at the picture is if one of the little darlings ever walks into your treatment room you will know to request another doctor, a real one. One that is actually concerned about medicine. Because these knuckleheads aren’t.
Gee, here is a medical issue within their scope (stethoscope) of “practice”.
Medical malpractice deaths in the U.S. are over 500 times higher than accidental gun deaths.
A Johns Hopkins University study covering eight years of data found there are at least 250,000 malpractice deaths in the U.S. annually. CNBC reports the Johns Hopkins University study presents malpractice deaths on the low end, since other studies show malpractice deaths exceeding 400,000 a year.
On the other hand, accidental gun deaths hover around 500 a year.
For example, the Los Angeles Times reports there were 489 accidental gun deaths in 2015, making medical malpractice deaths over 500 times higher than deaths resulting from accidental firearm discharges.
The number of overall gun deaths in 2015—accidental, homicides, and suicides—was approximately 36,000, two-thirds of which were suicides. So 250,000 malpractice deaths is nearly seven times higher than gun deaths, even when counting intentional gun deaths.
Gee Miss Sarabeth and Co. this sort of thing doesn’t even seem to be on your radar!
So let old Auntie Sheila help you out a little bit here. GSW, Gunshot wounds, I don’t care if they are self inflicted, inflicted by the neighborhood gang banger, your spouse, your ex-spouse, your ex-spouse’s boyfriend, your ex-spouse’s girlfriend, your second cousin twice removed, you little sister, your little brother, your teacher, your teacher’s uncle, your teacher’s uncle’s dog, are all pretty much going to involve the same treatment protocols, and appear pretty much the same.
When I was in school I met a guy that had the same last name as mine, only he was in Doctor school. He’s the first one I ever heard use the phrase M. Deity complex, doctors that think they are G-d. He didn’t have it, and we wound up being good buddies.
I rather suspect Miss Sarabeth and friends are severely afflicted with M. Deity complex. I know how my buddy, and many of the other residents clawed their way through their residency phases and school and I’m unsure what it is Miss Sarabeth and Co. think they can afford to leave out to study more about the epidemic of gun violence, or perhaps she would like to extend the residency period? Do that Sarabeth, just do that, extend the residency period by a year or so. Let us know how living in hiding works out for you. And yes, I do want fries with that Southwest Salad.
Because whatever you do, don’t let that malpractice stat cause you to stop trying to shred the Constitution and affect my G-d given rights with your social justice drama. #BadMedicine
In 2015, Carol Bowne had a restraining order against an abusive ex-boyfriend. But she was wise enough to know paper isn’t a good shield, so she tried to lawfully obtain a defensive firearm.
She waited.
And waited. For New Jersey to deign to grant her permission to protect herself.
Carol Bowne was murdered while awaiting government permission to obtain a defense firearm.
The murderer killed himself later… with a firearm that he possessed unlawfully as a convicted felon. Unlike Carol, he simply ignored the government’s edicts; those just for honest people.
Federal delays of human/civil rights can be just as deadly and state and local violations. National instant criminal background checks (NICS) inherently delay rights. Maybe for a few minutes, maybe a few days, or possibly permanently.
Millions of firearms transaction have been denied by NICS. The Bradys and the victim-disarming confederates brag about it. But 93% of those millions of denials were false positives; violation of rights without cause. The false positive rate may be as high a 99.8%, if you judge by the lack of prosecutions for the remaining 7%.
The government doesn’t track false negatives; those incidents where some prohibited person somehow passes his NICS check. Take a look at the 4473. With name, address, place of birth, date of birth, sex, race, ethnicity, and a physical description, NICS can’t tell a prohibited John Smith from a law-abiding John Smith.
And while NICS is mandatory for us law-abiding types, who aren’t out there committing the crimes, the Supreme Court’s HAYNES decision says felons can’t be required to self-incriminate by reporting their attempt to unlawfully obtain a firearm with a NICS check.
NICS doesn’t work. And it only applies to the law-abiding; not simply because the law-abiding are the only ones who’ll bother, but because they are the only ones required to do it.
Kinda makes you wonder why the Brady Bill was pushed as an anti-crime measure, unless violation of rights was the intent.
18 U.S. Code § 922(t)
(6) Neither a local government nor an employee of the Federal Government or of any State or local government, responsible for providing information to the national instant criminal background check system shall be liable in an action at law for damages—”
(A) for failure to prevent the sale or transfer of a firearm to a person whose receipt or possession of the firearm is unlawful under this section; or
(B) for preventing such a sale or transfer to a person who may lawfully receive or possess a firearm.
Violating rights was the point from the beginning. Violators are specifically protected from any consequences of their unconstitutional acts (or inaction).
Let’s write that up formally.
18 U.S. Code § 922
(t)
Strike “(6) Neither a local government nor an employee of the Federal Government or of any State or local government, responsible for providing information to the national instant criminal background check system shall be liable in an action at law for damages—”
(A) for failure to prevent the sale or transfer of a firearm to a person whose receipt or possession of the firearm is unlawful under this section; or
(B) for preventing such a sale or transfer to a person who may lawfully receive or possess a firearm.
and replace with
(6) Any local government or employee of the Federal Government or of any State of local government, shall be liable in a civil action for damages—
(A) for failure to prevent the sale or transfer of a firearm to a person whose receipt or possession of the firearm is unlawful under this section; or
(B) for preventing such a sale or transfer to a person who may lawfully receive or possess a firearm.
Added: 18 U.S. Code § 922(t)
(7) It shall be a felony under 18 U.S. Code § 242 for any local government or employee of the Federal Government or of any State of local government to deny or impede the Second Amendment rights of any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District not prohibited from firearms possession under this section; and that offender shall be guilty as an accessory to the crime if the failure to prevent the sale or transfer of a firearm to any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District whose receipt or possession of the firearm is unlawful under this section results in a crime committed with the firearm.
It’s high time that those in government face consequences for screwing up, just as us little citizens must.
It occurs to me that someone might look up at the masthead at that, “No compromise” and think that I’m offering just that on preemptively-prove-your-innocence prior restrain NICS checks. Read that proposed text again.
Permits and licenses (which criminals bypass) impede rights.
Waiting periods (which criminals bypass) impede rights.
I’m not compromising. I’m giving the Second Amendment the teeth it lacks. Consider the “accessory” provisions of paragraph (7): that can allow for Felony Murder charges for violators.
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Ed. note: This commentary appeared first in TZP’s weekly email alert. If you would like to be among the first to see new commentary (as well as to get notice of new polls and recaps of recent posts), please sign up for our alert list. (See sidebar or, if you’re on a mobile device, scroll down). Be sure to respond when you receive your activation email!
It’s a very simple question, short, to the point, and critical to sane discussion of “gun control.” Yet, with very few exceptions, victim-disarming people controllers will not answer. And they’ll try to disavow the honest lunatics who do.
How?
That’s it. That’s the question. When the question isn’t just ignored, they deflect. “You’re just saying criminals don’t obey laws again. That isn’t worth addressing.” Or, “I told you; we’ll pass a law.”
“Pass a law” is the what. I want to know the how.
Stephany Rose Spaulding, “the underdog Democrat challenging incumbent Republican U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn for Colorado’s 5th District,” wants more gunpeople control.
That responsibility could come in a federal mandate that anyone seeking to buy a firearm would have to pass a background check, Spaulding said.
Spaulding, backed Moms Demand Victims’ Shannon Watts, purports to believe that universal background checks preemptively-prove-your-innocence (PPYI) prior restraint would cut the “number of suicides, domestic and police shootings across the country” in half.
I asked her, “How?” Specifically, when no more than 6% of criminals using firearms obtained them through lawful channels, how would you implement such a requirement to ensure compliance? How do you get those criminals to comply with NICS checks? (It seems to me that making them undergo NICS checks would necessitate eliminating the black market in firearms completely. Again, “How?”)
-crickets-
Spaulding wants a national “red flag” law, too.
How? How will her law work? Would this be the typical “red flag” legislation that allows confiscation before due process, and leaves this alleged dangerous person on the street, and now angered by the taking?
-crickets-
Spaulding also said she wants to expand the definition of domestic violence, a significant indicator of those who might commit gun violence. In tandem with that legislation, she wants to ensure that those convicted of domestic violence could not own firearms.
Expanded to include what? Those convicted of domestic violence are already prohibited persons, so what additional means would she implement to prevent tham possessing firearms? How?
-crickets-
“We have eroded the responsibility of what it means to be owners of firearms,” she said. “And for me that is not ‘Can I take away?’ or ‘Should I take away your guns?’ but asking people to be responsible.”
How? How is “responsibility” strengthened by taking the responsibility from the people and putting it in the hands of government?
-crickets-
Parroting talking points is easy. Policy is…
…actually not that tough. That’s how to end “gun” violence. Admittedly, implementing it will require hard choices that most politicians are incapable of making.
Carl is an unpaid TZP volunteer. If you found this post useful, please consider dropping something in his tip jar. He could really use the money, what with truck repairs and recurring bills. And the rabbits need feed. Truck insurance, lest I be forced to sell it. Click here to donate via PayPal.
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Oregon Rep. Brad Witt has a little accuracy problem.
Rep. Witt advocates for new gun legislation in Oregon
The state representative for District 31 confirmed Wednesday that he’s considering a package of bills that would, among other things, raise the age for purchasing semiautomatic weapons.
What about raising the age for other constitutionally guaranteed rights?
He’d also like to see bump stocks outlawed. Bump stocks — devices that can be attached to a semiautomatic weapons to increase their firing speed
“Bump stocks elevate the level of fire on a firearm to something very close and akin to an automatic weapon that was outlawed many decades ago during prohibition,” Witt said.
I emailed Witt to point out that he doesn’t understand bump-fire stocks, and to tell him automatic weapons are not “outlawed” federally or in Oregon. His reply:
Hey Carl…..absent a federal stamp, it’s illegal to carry a full auto in Oregon. You might want to check into the federal law.
Brad
He knows about tax stamps? Oh ho. So he knows about the NFA. That means he knows darned well that automatic weapons are regulated, not outlawed.
I haven’t determined if he’s a half-wit, but he just proved himself a liar.
Carl is an unpaid TZP volunteer. If you found this post useful, please consider dropping something in his tip jar. He could really use the money, what with truck repairs and recurring bills. And the rabbits need feed. Truck insurance, lest I be forced to sell it. Click here to donate via PayPal.
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Demonstrating brainwashing works if captured early enough, Trotskyite Munchkin victims of educational malpractice, surrounded by a sea of bitter angry middle-aged women, descended on the nation’s capital like flying malefactors from the Land Oz. Their demand? A federal Congress pound a “national” stake through the heart of an already liberal trampled Bill of Rights. Munchkin March observers reported crowds so tightly packed movement was all but impossible and Porta-Potties an unreachable oasis. Perhaps it wasn’t numbers causing kids to huddle so closely together but rather, fear. Among the March’s backers was Planned [un]Parenthood, you know, those reconstructed Josef Mengele organ harvesters, brain blenders in one hand, suction hoses in the other, ensuring as many unwanted kids as possible not survive the womb. Some of the marchers were young, very young. Considering on average abortionists take more lives weekly (21,069.484)1 than all school shootings combined, will marchers be protesting outside the doors of Planned [un]Parenthood?
An ecstatic liberal media heralded the March of the Mad Munchkins as a student-led protest, organized by Marjory Stoneman-Douglas High School survivors [I thought more than 10 survived]. In “cooperation,” of course, with Everytown For Gun Safety, a radical anti-2nd Amendment Michael Bloomberg front group.2 Was the March really a student-led grassroots movement?
March organizers, and liberal media cheerleaders, claimed attendance swelled to 850,000 including many high school teenagers. But Alex Pappas, writing for FOX News, reported only 10 percent of the marchers were teens, 90 percent were adults, the average age was just under 49, and the real attendance number was only 202,796,3 about the same number of people camping out at Walmart waiting to claw and tear out each other’s hair and eyes come Black Friday. Notions of unemployed high school kids organizing this gala event are preposterous. Instead, Hollywood actors and directors, pro-athletes, a motley crew of extremist leftwing organizations, and the Democrat Party elite organized and bankrolled the March. Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, using tax-payer dollars from a city sliding into decrepitude,4 bussed students, truant Monday through Friday, to D.C., that Saturday. The Marjory Stoneman-DouglasDuped Ten were merely props in a staged drama.5 Just like my lefty colleagues in public education, some will chortle you can’t trust statistics and reporting from FOX News. Well, let’s see what the Washington Post, daily talking points for liberals, had to say.
University of Maryland Professor of Sociology, Dana R. Fisher, writing for the Washington Post, conducted thorough research as to who, why, and how many attended the March. Relying on camera and satellite imagery, reports from police and other official authorities, and interviews with Marchers, she concluded most (70%) were women, educated, and slightly under 49 years old. Gun control was the driving issue for only 12% of Marchers. Peace causes drew 56%, hatred of trump brought out 42%, and 79% self-identified as “left-leaning” [Marxists]. As can be expected, 89% voted for Hillary Clinton.6 In order to transport, house, and provide nourishing earth-friendly food for the Mad Munchkins and Leftist rabble going to Washington, logistical and financial support was required. They had plenty.
For transportation, the New England [un]Patriots and owner Robert Kraft provided team Boeing 767s. Kraft even wrote a letter of support for the Duped Ten vindicating my rooting for the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl. Apparently abandoning any connection with the NRA wasn’t enough for Delta Airlines. Flaunting their recent self-castration, Delta also provided free flights to the nation’s capital and back for the Stoneman Ten and their handlers.7 In order to induce people to congregate in close proximity with so many raging feminists, a carrot was needed. It came in the form of celebrity appearances. Model Chrissy Teigen and Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon8 were joined by comedians Amy Shumer and Jason Sudeikis as well as singers Paul Simon, Willow Smith, Jennifer Hudson, Ariana Grande, Vic Mensa, Disney’s Miley Cyrus (Hannah Montana), Demi Lavato, Paul McCartney formerly of the Beatles (a group I liked before their Hash-and-Hindu days), and a slew of actors, including Reese Witherspoon,9 all calling for an end to your 2nd Amendment rights. But it had to be paid for.
Stepping into the financial breach with cash swollen wallets bigger than most people’s homes were the glitterati. Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney, Steven Spielberg and wife Kate Capshaw, and Jeffrey Katzenberg each ponied up $500,000 dollars with Taylor Swift donating an undisclosed amount toward abolishing the Bill of Rights.10 They were joined by Eli Broad, wealthy businessman who donated $1 million dollars to Bloomberg’s front group, Everytown For Gun Safety. Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff donated $1 million dollars, Italian fashion house Gucci coughed up $500,000, the Miami Dolphins tossed in $100,000, and Joshua Kushner, brother of presidential adviser and Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner, gave $50,000 dollars. AT&T, Office Depot, Ultimate Software, and Starbucks donated to a student victim’s fund.11 Not to be left out, support poured in from jocks including basketball stars, past and present, LeBron James, Bill Russell, Dwayne Wade (who donated $200,000 dollars), Chris Paul, Caron Butler, Dennis Rodman, and Carmello Anthony who helped bus the Baltimore kids to Washington. Moral support came from Golden State Warriors’ head coach Steve Kerr, L.A. Lakers president Jeanie Buss, baseball player Anthony Rizzo, soccer player Kyle Martino, and football player DeMarcus Ware.12 Actors, singers, and athletes typically have large followings on social media. It seems Americans determine the veracity of what stars say based on how much they like them. If not for huge amounts of money stars derive from those patronizing their careers, they’d have no platform. Stop patronizing them. Boycott.
Students did not plan, organize, or coordinate the March of the Mad Munchkins. Instead it was done by March for Our Lives (sic) an umbrella organization created by Everytown For Gun Safety, itself a Bloomberg front group with assistance from the Joyce Foundation. Everytown collected and disbursed cash and arranged for statements and appearances by stars. Everytown’s webpage answers the question the liberal media failed to ask; what specifically would you do to end “gun-violence?” Their answer; Congress should end the federal government’s ban on gun-violence research at the Center for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta.13 Like mosquitos that won’t go away, Liberals incessantly claim the CDC is banned from studying “gun-violence” (sic) which is a lie. In 1996, following publication of a CDC funded controversial study on so-called gun-violence, in reality political advocacy masquerading as science paid for with tax payer’s dollars, Arkansas Republican Jay Dickey attached an amendment to a CDC funding bill prohibiting studies done to “promote or advocate gun control.” It was signed into law by Democrat President Bill Clinton. The CDC could continue to study “gun-violence” but research couldn’t be tailored to achieve a political outcome. Like other “federal” agencies, CDC research is at times farmed out to universities which, in turn, are dominated by Leftist professors whose careers depend upon receiving federal grants. Grants are dependent on “finding” what benefactors are paying for. In 1996, CDC researchers wanted to declare “gun-violence” a “public health crisis” a designation which, to some degree, empowers the CDC to impose rules, regulations, and direct action to deal with a health crisis.14 Treating biological causes of epidemics and disease outbreaks means neutralizing the bacterial, viral, and other causes. In this case, the viral agent was firearms.15 Bill of Rights Tramplers also demand ending “absurd” restrictions on the BATF to “digitize records for all guns sales.” This would constitute gun-owner registration which is illegal under federal law. Rights are not registered with governments. Registration transforms rights to privileges dispensed by government. In addition, the Tramplers demand universal background checks meaning the .22 rifle parents give to sons or daughters as Christmas gifts would be illegal. It would have to go through government becoming part of an already existing (form 4473) registration list. Gun and gun owner registration has always been THE prerequisite to government confiscation. Ten-round magazine capacity limits are also part of their shopping list. Apparently it’s okay to shoot 10 but not 11 people. The Tramplers damn semiautomatic rifles as “weapons of war” and “assault weapons” (sic) declaring they have no place in any community and must be banned. At first, gun buy backs would be used to convince people to voluntarily hand them over. How can government buy back what it never owned? To maintain legal possession, gun-owners would have to register semiautomatic rifles with the government and transfers to anyone other than authorities prohibited.16 Why would they be allowed to keep “weapons of war” having no place in any community? They wouldn’t. Once registration was deemed complete, they would be banned. Turn them in or go to prison. During the colonial era, Great Britain never possessed the largest of armies but they were sufficient to execute what amounted to door to door searches for weapons in their colonies including Scotland, Ireland, North America, and later Asia and India. It’s necessary to point this out because anti-2nd Amendment organizations and activists deny they want registration and confiscation. History is the first to call them liars. I’m following suit.
Stoneman Ten students Emma Gonzalez and David Hogg, are too egocentric and full of youthful ignorance and hubris to disguise what they really want. Interviewed by Alisyn Camerota, a conservative before moving from FOX to CNN, she began with a question judges would throw out in a trial as “leading” to wit; could anything be done about gun-violence when needy politicians have no choice but to take campaign donations from the NRA? For some reason Camerota failed to put her question in perspective by noting the NRA has donated $3,533,294 dollars to current members of Congress since 1998, equivalent to Democrat comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s salary for three months.17 Labor Unions, including the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association, two of the most virulently Leftwing unions in existence, donated $1.7 billion dollars in 2016 alone, and almost all went to liberal Democrat candidates who want to ban and confiscate firearms and abolish the 2nd Amendment.18 Neither did Camerota note the NRA’s source of funds for campaign donations comes in small dollar amounts from members while unions typically confiscate their huge haul from the paychecks of workers voluntarily or not. It’s no surprise liberals lie, statists have done this throughout history. It’s alarming how easily they get away with it.
Seething with anger, Gonzalez replied to Camerota declaring: “The NRA should be disbanded and dismantled. Don’t you make a new organization under a different name. Don’t you dare come back here. We need to fix our country. Gun control is just the first thing. We keep telling them [politicians] that if you accept this blood money [from the NRA], you’re against the children. They are against the people who are dying. You are funding the killers [NRA] or you’re standing with the children.” Wow, if you belong to the NRA, and by extension, any similar civil rights organization like the WMSA, you’re a killer. You’re the ones shooting and killing kids! Gonzalez’s thinking is not merely an immature and grossly ignorant misunderstanding of history and the Constitution (she’s an Advanced Placement student, too), it is deranged, totally divorced from reality. Her partner in historical illiteracy, a constantly glowering angry pinch-faced almost trembling with rage David Hogg, made even more bizarre and irrational claims saying politicians took money from the NRA to “make it easier for these horrifying people to get guns. If you can’t get elected without taking money from these child murderers [the NRA], why are you running?”19 What are they teaching kids in public schools today? Emma Gonzalez, sporting a Cuban flag on her clothing, a communist dictatorship that tramples the rights of Cubans, starves kids, and murders people young and old, and David Hogg, who calls for revolution, damns the NRA as baby killers? The Left, which has schooled these sock-puppets, and once called American boys serving in Vietnam “baby killers,” now hangs this appellation around the necks of NRA members? Mental health officials, take note.
Piling on the NRA, Huggies Pull-Ups wetting Washington Post “journalist” (sic) Adam Weinstein complains the NRA are big mean bullies because they insist those writing about “gun-control” issues know something about the subject including use of proper terminology. Whimpering Weinstein condemns this as “Gun-splaining” adapting the term “man-splaining” invented by radical feminist college professors outraged by any hint of DNA dictated masculinity. Broadcasting from behind enemy lines (Washington, D.C.), radio talk show host Chris Plante wondered if, while other little boys were off playing the games little boys play, Weinstein was in his backyard playing with his Easy Bake Oven.20
Instead of indoctrinating American kids into a Leftist social, political, and economic worldview, instead of confusing them about the purpose of biological genitalia, instead of demonizing masculinity and traits like self-reliance and rugged individualism, principals should ensure kids are being taught every sentence doesn’t begin with “so” and the Constitution and history of our founders. Teaching for decades in a public high school socialIST studies department, I know it ain’t happening.
One cannot lend support or donate to a movement without also embracing its cause and the cause of gun control organizations is banning private possession of semiautomatic rifles. Handguns come next. Once ownership is no longer a right, its turn them in or go to prison. CVS, Dicks Sporting Goods, and Krogers’ are among those aiding and abetting the demonization of gun-owners. The following is a letter I sent to CVS Pharmacies:
“Dear Mr. Merlo, CEO, CVS Pharmacies
I’ve been a CVS customer 20+ years. Near the end of December, 2017, I noticed the usual wide variety of firearm related magazines had disappeared from your stores. I thought perhaps magazines were discarded at year’s end. Several weeks later a pharmacy employee told me CVS’s corporate office had decided to remove all such magazines. I confirmed this with Kristen, CVS Customer Relations, at your corporate office.
I am both a retired police officer and public high school teacher with an extensive background in firearms. As a member of the 2nd Amendment and sports shooting communities, I was chagrined by your decision. By removing these magazines, you deem something is wrong with them, that they are socially unacceptable. If true based on content, logic dictates the same be true of those who read them. In deciding to slander and discriminate against millions of law-abiding Americans and CVS customers, you have moved from the commercial to the political realm. In so doing, you have de facto allied yourselves with those whose political agenda is abolition of the 2nd Amendment and the individual right to keep and bear arms. If you were in my shoes, would you remain a customer?
To offer as a defense, striving for social responsibility, begs several questions; are you going to remove the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue featuring scantily clad girls? Women displayed in sexually provocative poses perpetuate notions that our wives, daughters, and sisters are sex objects playing a role in sexual harassment and rape. Considering negligent drivers murder 37,000-40,000 people each year and injure, main, and cripple 2-million more, will you remove car, truck, and ATV magazines? Since beer, wine, and liquor appear to be staples at your pharmacies, (is a statistical recitation of the misery and death caused by their misuse necessary?), will you remove alcoholic beverages from your shelves?”
In addition, I announced unless CVS changed their policy, I was initiating a boycott and transferring my accounts to Walgreens, which I did. Executive Support Coordinator Waldemar Kepa responded thanking me for my letter writing he would share my concerns with the merchandising team responsible for magazine selection. He didn’t answer any of my questions or address the boycott. Unless you fight back, gun owners will become as demonized as political conservatives and Christians holding to traditional morality; deemed socially unacceptable, marginalized, pariahs, and driven from the public square.21 “Ho ho, liberal indoctrination has got to go.”
22 Michael Bloomberg, with an estimated worth of $50.8 billion dollars, the 7th richest man in the U.S. and 10th in the world, was the virulently anti-2nd Amendment of New York City, 2002-2013. A Democrat before he became an liberal Republican, he remains, along with George Soros, the biggest financier of political efforts to abolish the 2nd Amendment. Income statistic from Forbes, January 6, 2018. In 2016, not only did he endorse Hillary Clinton for president, he spoke at the Democrat National Convention. At https://web.archive.org/web/2018106213340/https://www.forbes.com/profile/michael-bloomberg/.
44 I know whereof I speak. Compelled to attend Baltimore’s Margaret Brent School 53, the miseducation, and the wounds and injuries I suffered, should be presumptive grounds for a lawsuit. Don’t worry Mayor, Philadelphia was worse.
