Tag Archives: idiot

Apparently I live in the wrong town

Obama at Dallas Police Memorial: Easier ‘to Buy A Glock’ Than a Book
“We flood communities with so many guns it is easier for a teenager to buy a Glock that [to] get his hands on a computer or even a book.”

Man, I wish. Where I live, there are a couple of libraries where I can check out free books at will. And get free Internet access.

But guns? The last two I bought, I had to fill out a 4473, show a DL and GWL, and undergo a background check. Not to mention paying for them.

Either there’s some wonderful place where ARs grow on trees, or our President is woefully ignorant of reality. I’m hoping for trees, but not holding my breath.

gun-tree

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“Hey, Moron”

EJ Montini hates it when people tell him the truth.

He is a moron, at least when he babbles about victim disarmament.

Montini: “Hey, moron, name one ‘common sense’ gun law”
“Hey, moron, name me one ‘common sense’ gun law, let alone a bunch. You can’t, can you? Because all you want to do is confiscate everybody’s weapons. That’s the only ‘common sense’ gun law liberal pissants like you want. Admit it! And by the way, I called you a moron earlier because I thought if I called you a (expletive) – which is what you are – you wouldn’t keep reading.”

Okay then.

Fisking time; let’s see how sensible his proposals are:

  • The one I mention most often is a universal, no loophole, no exception background check on every gun sale.
    That isn’t sensible until he proposes a way to enforce that on criminals who bypass universal preemptively-prove-your-innocence checks by purchasing stolen guns on the street from other criminals. They don’t comply now. And they don’t have to.
  • It’s been shown in poll after poll that a vast majority of Americans – up to 90 percent – support it.
    Except that when that 90+% claim was put to the test in an Washington [edited to correct state] referendum, only 60% voted for it. In New Hampshire, the claim was 94%, but the surveyors refused to release their raw data to prove it, and the folks there keep electing (and reelecting) folks who vote it down. (Oddly enough, I have never been polled on that subject, except by a couple of painfully obvious push polls in which I refused to participate. I never found anyone — not one, pro or anti — who claimed to have participated in the NH “survey.”)
  • We could ban the sale or possession of armor piercing and hollow-tip bullets, and we could limit magazines to 10 bullets.
    So he doesn’t want rounds that penetrate too much, but he doesn’t want rounds that limit penetration. “Sensible.” As stated, that isn’t going to fly with anyone. Pretty much any rifle round is “armor penetrating” (unless you only count Level 4+), and armor penetrating handgun ammunition is already banned at the federal level and in several states; it doesn’t seem to have had much effect on crime rates. Defenders and hunters want expansion because it’s more effective, generally, than solid rounds.
  • We could codify in law a wider access to mental health records in order to prevent individuals with serious illness from buying weapons.
    Oh, goody. Let’s start by looking at his health records. If he has nothing to hide, he has nothing to fear by putting his unredacted files on the Internet. In fact, we already have laws in place to handle the dangerously disturbed. Those who have been adjudicated a danger to self or others are prohibited persons. Or do you just want to do away with the due process part of depriving people of human/civil rights. Did he get a mental health exam before exercising his 1st Amendment right to write that column?
  • We could repeal the idiotic 1996 congressional budget amendment that prevents the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from doing studies on firearms ownership and the effects on public health.
    There is no such research ban to repeal. Wouldn’t it have been “sensible” for MorMontini to figure that out before spouting off?
  • We could expand gun-owning restrictions to more individuals convicted of crimes like domestic violence, stalking and more.
    Those convicted of domestic violence (and any crime punishable by a sentence of more than a year in prison) are already prohibited persons. You know, like the recent Kansas shooter, who was a convicted felon, under a restraining order, who bypassed PPYI checks. “And more…” Maybe we could add “practicing journalism without a license” to that list.
  • We could establish a national waiting period for gun purchases.
    Who could possibly object to that, right? Certainly not Ms. Bowne. Anymore. I wonder what Montini is planning to do, if he needs to be sure his friends and family can’t get a defensive tool quickly.
  • Finally, a law limiting angry impulse responses to news columnists might be helpful. At least to me.
    Well, it’s clear that he wants violations of 1st Amendment free discourse, so I guess he’s cool with the journalist licensing plan.

So long as Montini is determined to sound like an uninformed moron intent on destroying individual human/civil rights (obviously starting with the First and Second Amendments) people are bound to keep thinking he is one.

No.

Your move, Montini.

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How Do Those Shackles Taste, Lawson?

Lawson Clarke is an ad exec from Massachusetts and a “Gun Owner Who is Perfectly Comfortable With Gun Control.”

Translation: he’s a serf, who has no comprehension of the meaning of a right and thinks the Second Amendment protects his “right” to hunt.

In his article for NPR, he details the laborious process he underwent as a Massachusetts resident to get state permission to exercise his rights, and he apparently doesn’t mind the numerous forms, background checks, and exorbitant costs associated with being able to exercise a fundamental right, because MASS SHOOTINGS!

STEP 1: I enrolled in a four-hour firearms safety course registered with the state.

A safety course is always a good idea. Only four hours? Most gun owners I know train much more often and much longer with their self-defense tools. But when mandated by the state, it really becomes a perfunctory gesture. I won’t even get into the whole “registered with the state” thing!

STEP 2: I joined a properly licensed gun club to demonstrate I was merely interested in hunting and recreational shooting. While this was by no means mandatory, it was encouraged by my local police department.

I wonder how much the kickback is for said “encouragement.” And I wonder why this particular brand of stupid doesn’t consider paying to join a club “encouraged” by the police to “prove” that you are only interested in exercising your right to engage in activities that have little to do with the intent of the Second Amendment isn’t a gross violation of said right and a twisted perversion of freedom.

STEP 3: I then visited my local police station, where I presented my application for a license to carry, my firearm safety certificate and a letter from my gun club stating my membership was in good standing.

STEP 4: Along with my paperwork I had to pay a $100 application fee. NOTE: In Massachusetts a firearms license is only valid for six years, and the $100 application fee is due any time I reapply.

A $100 fee to exercise a right, eh? I have to wonder once again if this serf even understands the basic definition of a right.

I also have to wonder how poor people, who ostensibly don’t live in safe, often gated communities (unlike Boston ad executives), but want a means to protect their homes against armed thugs, can afford all these extra expenses in addition to the several hundred dollars for the purchase of the actual gun!

Why do you hate poor people, Lawson?

STEP 5: I sat through a face-to-face interview with a police officer and submitted to a preliminary background check.

STEP 6: My photo and fingerprints were taken and filed digitally with the Massachusetts State Police, along with the Massachusetts Department of Mental Health and the national criminal records database.

Are you applying for a top secret clearance or begging the “authorities” to allow you to exercise a fundamental right?

STEP 7: I made an appointment at the police firing range on Moon Island in Boston Harbor to demonstrate my proficiency with a firearm in front of a state trooper.

Hopefully it wasn’t this guy.

A Massachusetts State Trooper is expected to survive after accidentally shooting himself in the leg, State Police said.

Ooops!

STEP 8: I waited approximately 30 days for my license to be approved.

STEP 9: My class A license to carry arrived in the mail.

I’m sure if you ask any assailant trying to victimize you really nicely to wait until you get your state-sanctioned permission to own a firearm, they’ll oblige. No. Really! Stop laughing!

STEP 10: I visit a nearby gun store, which by law is registered with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms as well as the Massachusetts Firearms Records Bureau. After presenting my license to the clerk, I was then allowed to browse the store’s inventory.

It’s instructive that you need a license to even go shopping in the People’s State of Massachusetts! But apparently, that bit of statist ploddery doesn’t bother Lawson either.

STEP 11: I selected my very fist firearm: a 30/30 Winchester Model 94, a tried and true staple of New England deer hunting.

Because that’s what the Second Amendment is really about — deer hunting. It says so right there in the text. Wait… no? But… but… but… we in Massachusetts know what the Second Amendment is about! We KNOW freedom, darnit!

STEP 12: While in the store I submitted to yet another background check, this time over the phone with the FBI.

Sure! What’s another background check to make a constitutionally-protected purchase between master and slave?

STEP 13: I waited three days.

Luckily you weren’t a woman who was being stalked and needed a tool to protect herself, eh? But I’m sure if you asked very nicely, the stalker or a violent ex would wait for you to finally purchase your gun!

STEP 14: I returned to the store and picked up my Winchester 30/30, effectively adding my name to the list of over 250,000 legal gun owners in Massachusetts.

Good to know that you don’t mind being added to a state-maintained list of innocent people whose only crime was a desire to exercise their rights. How do those chains taste? Want a gold Star of David so you can be properly identified?

From start to finish, the entire process unfolded over the course of several months, but then again so did acquiring my driver’s license and first car. In fact, one could argue automobiles and firearms are equally lethal machines: each responsible for over 30,000 deaths per year in the United States; so perhaps there’s justification for requiring patience in this endeavor.

I’m willing to bet that acquiring your driver’s license took several months, because the state wanted to ensure that while you’re operating a machine weighing several tons on public roadways, that you are properly educated and trained to do so. I’m also fairly sure you didn’t have to sit down for an interview with law enforcement or undergo two background checks to buy a car or get a license to drive it.

Did you have to pass a background check to buy your car? Did you have to get fingerprinted like a common criminal? Did you have to wait several days before you could take your car home? I don’t think so, Sparky.

Don’t conflate purchasing a car with the months of bureaucratic hoops you had to jump through to purchase a gun. The auto purchase takes a couple of hours and the mere ownership of it does not require training, background checks, fingerprinting, or even a license! The mere purchase requires you have money or sufficient credit to pay for said vehicle. Purchase and operation of the vehicle are two separate things. Of course, I don’t expect someone who doesn’t comprehend or respect the plain language of the Second Amendment to understand that nuance.

As a gun owner, I’m perfectly comfortable with the notion of sensible gun control, and in the stark light of recent tragedies, I’d say the process of acquiring my first firearm in Massachusetts was exactly as difficult as it needed to be.

While we’re all thrilled that you’re “perfectly comfortable” – OK, we really don’t give a damn, but still… – let me ask you something, Lawson: Are the people who take the time to go through months of background checks, the training, the fingerprinting, and the waiting periods the ones committing violent acts with firearms? Are all these measures effective crime reduction techniques?

Nope.

Massachusetts has a national reputation as a bastion of gun control, but crimes and injuries related to firearms have risen — sometimes dramatically — since the state passed a comprehensive package of gun laws in 1998.

Murders committed with firearms have increased significantly, aggravated assaults and robberies involving guns have risen, and gunshot injuries are up, according to FBI and state data.

But… but… but… that’s because illegal guns are flowing from other states!

That’s not what I asked, Sparky. Are the people who are legally licensed to keep and bear arms in Massachusetts the ones committing the crimes?

gun stats

Judging by the records kept in these states, nope! The majority of people willing to undergo all that rigamarole will, in fact, never commit a single crime with that gun, so how is it, exactly, you think you’re helping mitigate violence by subjecting yourself to statist regulations?

Some vocal conservatives are quick to accuse Massachusetts of being a bastion for the liberal elite who are grossly out of touch with the fundamentals of the Second Amendment. It seems they’ve forgotten this is where the “shot heard round the world” was fired in the name of Independence; where simple colonists in 1775 formed a militia and rose up in arms against a formidable force of British Army regulars.

Do you think those colonists registered their weapons? You think they paid some gold to be able to keep a simple defense tool in their homes? They would have probably slapped you stupid at the thought, you quivering-lipped coward! I would submit that given your ardent willingness to submit yourself to onerous infringements of your rights, you are the one who has forgotten Massachusetts’ history of liberty. Not only that, but you spit in its face!

You’re welcome, by the way.

Oh, please shut your ignorant yap! If it had been you and your fellow vassal colostomy bags fighting the war for Independence, begging the government’s permission to allow you to own a simple firearm, we’d still be a British colony!

Trust me, in Massachusetts we know our history and we know the significance of the Second Amendment. However, we also understand that owning firearms is an immense responsibility, and we have carefully balanced our right to keep and bear them with what I would argue are an appropriate amount of institutional safeguards.

You keep referring to that knowing the significance of the Second Amendment thingy… I do not think it means what you think it means.

If you know your history and the significance of the Second Amendment, then you should also know that responsibility has nothing to do with paying bribes to petty statists to allow you to exercise a fundamental right.

And no, I don’t trust you when you tell me how much you respect the right to keep and bear arms, even as you gleefully submit to noxious infringements on said right! Thanks for playing.

Is it a perfect system everyone can agree on? Certainly not. But in a time when contentious shouting has largely supplanted meaningful debate, perhaps that’s too much to hope for. However, there is data to suggest our state gun ownership laws are working. Well, that is to say, they seem to work better than the gun policies of most other states. In a recent study, Massachusetts stands out as having one of the lowest rates of gun-related deaths, second only to Hawaii, a state with a population one-fifth our size.

Actually, no. And the statistics you cite for only one year are deceptive at best. If you refer to the Boston Globe article I cited above, you will see that gun-related deaths have nearly doubled from 1998 when your state first ushered in its tyrannical infringements on people’s rights!

In 2011, Massachusetts recorded 122 murders committed with firearms, a striking increase from the 65 in 1998, said Fox, the Northeastern professor. Nationwide, such murders increased only 3 percent from 1999 to 2010, the CDC says.

There were increases in other crimes involving guns in Massachusetts, too. From 1998 to 2011, aggravated assaults with guns rose 26.7 percent. Robberies with firearms increased 20.7 percent during that period, according to an FBI analysis conducted for the Globe.

So not only has gun-related violence increased in Massachusetts since the package of draconian gun control measures was passed, but said violence has increased at a higher rate than the rest of this country! How are those “gun ownership laws” working out for you, Lawson?

Clearly the epidemic of gun violence is an issue that needs to be addressed on a national level. For any gun owner or gun rights advocate to suggest otherwise is not only stubbornly myopic, but inhumane.

And here we have the emotionalist rhetoric we’ve so grown accustomed to from gun-grabbing freaks and their obedient chattel.

If you don’t support tyrannical infringements on your rights, you’re heartless.

If you don’t useless bureaucracy to make your right to self defense cost-prohibitive, you’re stubborn.

If you aren’t willing to submit yourself to a metaphorical anal probe in order to exercise your fundamental rights – an anal probe that has no hope of actually reducing violence – you’re myopic and inhumane.

Clearly you haven’t heard the news that overall, violence has been on the decline in the United States. So maybe, before you decide to spew another load of nonsense into the Interwebz, you’ll do some research, and also look up the meaning of the word “epidemic.”

So if we’re earnestly looking to take steps towards reducing the number of gun-related deaths in the United States while respectfully preserving our Constitutional right to legally own firearms, perhaps the rest of the country should, once again, look to Massachusetts to lead the way.

And watch our gun-related violence nearly double, as it did in Massachusetts? You’ve got to be kidding me!

Please keep your statist mitts off my rights. I can see you obviously enjoy your shackles, but the rest of us are just a bit smarter than that! So just go back to licking the boots of your masters and leave the rest of us alone.

Stick to advertising, Lawson. Obviously logic, basic research, and policy are not your strong points!

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They’re Finally Being Honest

The Washington Post editorial page editor is finally being honest about the liberals’ gun control agenda. This authoritarian swine named Fred Hiatt has penned… or I should say spewed his uninformed opinion entitled, “A Gun-Free Society.” Given the fact that this beta male has seen it fit to at least be honest about the gun grabbers’ ultimate goal, I figured he deserved a fisk, so here we go.

Maybe it’s time to start using the words that the NRA has turned into unmentionables.

This is how you know a leftard is about to soil his unmentionables – when he “courageously” challenges the big, bad NRA from the safety and comfort of his computer – while advocating what eventually would lead to civil war in this country.

Prohibition.

Mass buyback.

A gun-free society.

Let’s say that one again: A gun-free society.

Doesn’t it sound logical? Doesn’t it sound safe?

No. It sounds stupid, irrational, cowardly, and tyrannical.

Wouldn’t it make sense to learn from other developed nations, which believe that only the military and law enforcers, when necessary, should be armed — and which as a result lose far, far fewer innocent people than die every year in the United States?

You mean the countries that experienced increases in violent crime subsequent to banning firearms? No.

Yes, even saying these words makes the NRA happy. It fuels the slippery-slope argument the gun lobby uses to oppose even the most modest, common-sense reforms. You see? Background checks today, confiscation tomorrow.

Glad you can ascertain the emotions of millions of American gun owners. You must be psychic! Hell, personally, I’m just happy you’ve stopped being disingenuous invertebrates and have finally stated your final goal. It’s much easier to fight the enemy you know.

And yes, I understand how difficult it would be. This is a matter of changing the culture and norms of an entire society. It would take time.

Considering that gun ownership is on the rise and more Americans than ever support the right to keep and bear arms, how are you planning to implement this cultural shift, Freddie?

But the incremental approach is not succeeding. It sets increasingly modest goals, increasingly polite goals: close a loophole here, restrict a particularly lethal weapon there. Talk about gun safety and public health. Say “reform,” not “control.”

It’s not succeeding, because we can see right through you. We can see through your lies, and we’ve discredited your duplicitous statistics. The fact that you don’t want to admit how badly you suck at this promoting gun control thing doesn’t negate the sad reality that you do.

In response, a few states have tightened restrictions, a few states have loosened them. But as a nation — in Congress — we are stuck.

That’s because there’s this little document called the Constitution, and Congressleeches are a bit afraid to tread on it with too heavy a boot, lest the Great Unwashed figure out what they’re doing and kick them out of ofice.

Meanwhile the strategy of modest reform has its own vulnerabilities.

“Modest.” You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Every time there is a mass shooting, gun-control advocates argue again for legislation. But almost every time, opponents can argue that this shooter wouldn’t have been blocked from buying a gun, or that this gun would not have been on anyone’s banned list — and so why waste time (and political capital) on irrelevant restrictions?

Why, indeed? I’m sure you’ll tell us, Fredster.

To be clear, I believe the NRA is wrong on this, and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence is right.

What, REALLY? You don’t say! I couldn’t have guessed that from your assertion that a gun-free utopia sounds oh-so logical.

Modest restrictions can help and have helped. The one-gun-a-month law can reduce crime. The gun-show loophole should be closed, and closing it would prevent some criminals from obtaining weapons. Every gun in a home with children should have a trigger lock.

I note the deceptive wording here. “The one-gun-a-month law can reduce crime.” CAN? But hasn’t. Even the majority of law enforcement officials believe that law is useless, and there has been zero evidence that these handgun purchase limits reduce crime. Nice try at obfuscation, Freddie. And how long will you continue beating the “gun show loophole” strawman before you acknowledge that it does not exist and that your real aim is to eliminate private sales writ large?

Come on, Fred. You were doing so well at being honest! Why stop now?

Tell us why you think that criminals will just walk away dejectedly after failing a background check at a gun show and not get a cheap pistol from a drug dealer down the street? “Darn, I thought I could get a gun at a gun show. I guess I won’t go rob that liquor store at gun point. Darn that gun show loophole!” Go ahead! Try!

But how many members of Congress will risk their jobs for modest, incremental reform that may or may not show up as a blip on the following year’s murder statistics? We’ve learned the answer to that question.

“Modest.” You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. And repeating it again and again won’t make it any more true.

Fine, you say, but then why would those same members commit political suicide by embracing something bigger?

They won’t, of course. Congress will not lead this change. There has to be a cultural shift. Only then will Congress and the Supreme Court follow.

Oh, this ought to be good.

As we’ve seen over the past 15 years with same-sex marriage, such deep cultural change is difficult — and possible. Wyatt Earp, the frontier mentality, prying my cold dead fingers — I get all that. But Australia was a pioneer nation, too, and gave up its guns. Societies change, populations evolve.

I guess Fred hasn’t noticed that the cultural shift that’s been going on has headed in the direction of both gay rights and gun rights? And that Americans are beginning to realize in bigger numbers that giving up their rights to tyrannical, self-absorbed narcissists in Washington may not be the way to go?  And maybe giving up your rights for no appreciable decrease in crime is not the way to go? And maybe, just maybe, Australians didn’t give up as many guns as Fred thinks they did.

And people are not immune, over time, to reason. Given how guns decimate poor black communities every day — not just when there are mass shootings, but every day — this is a civil rights issue.

Wait! A progtard actually admits that black communities are decimated by violence? Oh, I shouldn’t get too excited. After all, it wold be politically incorrect to blame the actual people in those black communities for shooting one another! They’re not responsible! It’s those evil guns that are violating the civil rights of those black people who apparently aren’t shooting one another. /sarcasm

Given how many small children shoot themselves or their siblings accidentally, it is a family issue.

Small children… According to the CDC, 147 children ages 0-9 died by firearm in 2013.  Know now many drowned? 568.  Know how many died in a fire? 266. These are small children, and yet, I don’t see you soiling your unmentionables at these tragic, preventable deaths.

Given the suicides that could be prevented, it is a mental health issue.

Is that why gun-free Japan has a higher suicide rate than we do?

The Supreme Court, which has misread the Second Amendment in its recent decisions, would have to revisit the issue. The court has corrected itself before, and if public opinion shifts it could correct itself again. If it did not, the Constitution would have to be amended.

Apparently a reporter, who cannot comprehend the plain language of the Second Amendment, feels himself qualified to accuse people whose job it is to interpret the Constitution of misinterpreting said plain language. Well… alrighty, then. How pedantically quaint.

I suppose Freddie considers himself an even bigger language expert than the late Roy Copperud, and would arrogantly announce that Mr. Copperud, who was a newspaper writer on major dailies for over three decades before embarking on a a distinguished 17-year career teaching journalism at USC, who wrote a column dealing with the professional aspects of journalism for Editor and Publisher, who was on the usage panel of the American Heritage Dictionary, and was the winner of the Association of American Publisher’s Humanities Award, was also wrong on the plain meaning of the Second Amendment.

He was wrong because Fred FEELZ he was wrong! And GUNS ARE BAD! Because TEH FEELZ!

It sounds hard, I know. But it’s possible that if we started talking more honestly about the most logical, long-term goal, public opinion would begin to shift and the short-term gains would become more, not less likely, as the NRA had to play defense. We might end up with a safer country.

We’re certainly glad you’ve exhibited this bout of honesty, Freddie, and I hate to tell you this (not really), but we already knew what your long-term goal was. And guess what! The trend is still in favor of gun rights.

There are strong arguments against setting a gun-free society as the goal, but there are 100,000 arguments in favor — that’s how many of us get shot every year. Every year 11,000 Americans are murdered. Every year some 20,000 kill themselves with guns.

Hmmm, I assess with high confidence that 2.5 million annual armed self defense instances beat the 100,000 who Fred claims get shot each year. But Fred must have taken common core math in school.

Plus, see above about Japan’s suicide rates, genius.

Without guns — with only kitchen knives at hand — some of those people would die. Most would still be living.

Really? See again about that high suicide rate in gun-free Japan. And if you’re trying to claim that violent criminals will cease being violent because guns are illegal, I have this beachfront property… in Nevada.

Maybe it’s time to start talking about the most logical way to save their lives.

Perhaps we should, but you might want to sit out the conversation while adults are talking. Logic ain’t your strong suit.

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