Report: Israelis Killed In Shooting Allegedly Shopped, Dined First
On a more serious note… there’s this report.
And then, this!
I, for one, do put the blame squarely on the political leadership currently in power (but not for the reasons claimed by MSNBC and their ilk). I shudder to think of how the Heavenly Court will rule, when they each stand begging for mercy, soaked up to their armpits in the blood of their brothers and sisters.
When I was a kid we often spent Sundays visiting my paternal grandparents. My grandfather had a huge collection of books and several subscriptions to magazines like The National Geographic, going back decades.
One day I spied a set of magazines that were very different from the others. It was called “The Cross and The Flag. The Publisher was one Gerald L.K. Smith.
The original mailing label was to someone whose name I had never heard. “From a former client of your grandfather.” I was told. Not one more word was said about it.
America has largely been free of the most vicious forms of Jew Hatred so common in “Christian” Europe for at least sixteen hundred years, and in the Islamic world, since the days of Mohammad. Mostly confined to exclusion from business, political and social circles, from time to time, or the occasional lynching, the unique character of America, as an idea, has tended to suppress such drives.
But America is made up of people. And, people have cultural baggage. And tribal jealousies. And the ingrained tendency to scapegoat.
But of all these frailties, Jew Hatred has a remarkable tenacity to span time, distance, language, religion (or lack thereof) nearly any other cultural or historic parameter. You don’t even need Jews in your midst to loathe them! It lies there, just under the surface. Like a nest of cockroaches. Until it bursts forth in a frenzy.
It is no secret that the moral paragons of our political leadership have shamelessly stolen our freedoms and run up a tab that is breathtaking in scope. They (and by our acquiescence, we) simply refuse to address this squarely. Nobody wants to be first. Most of us know that it will end very ugly. The more we stall, the uglier still will be the reckoning.
But then, there is that ancient excuse. The always-effective scapegoat resting on the shelf. Even here. Waiting. Waiting to be grasped and swung with ecstatic abandon into a human face.
So, with that in mind, I refer you to a thought provoking article by commentator, Vic Rosenthal, from his Abu Yehuda weblog, entitled, “America Crosses the Line“. Be sure to follow his links, especially those to Ms. Shrode’s Facebook page and the comments. Sobering.
The anti-gun punditry was all aflutter last week with the news that Larry Pratt had stated that in some near-future time, we might have to resort to “the bullet box” to preserve “proper constitutional balance.”
Speaking of November’s election and its possibile consequences, Pratt noted:
The courts do not have the last word on what the Constitution is. They decide particular cases, they don’t make law. Their decisions, unlike the Roe v. Wade usurpation, don’t extend to the whole of society, they’re not supposed to. And we may have to reassert that proper constitutional balance, and it may not be pretty. So, I’d much rather have an election where we solve this matter at the ballot box than have to resort to the bullet box.
Now I differ with Pratt on a number of points, including any poorly supported assumption that the R. candidate will appoint better justices than the D. candidate. And the item he mentions is historic piece of military equipment more properly called a cartridge box, not a bullet box (and you can still buy replicas of it, NFI). But I don’t see anything unusually incendiary in what he said.
Unlike the Usual Suspects in the media.
The Huffington Post (presumably just before writer Ed Mazza swooned into a deep faint) cried that:
Pratt’s organization is considered even more extreme than the National Rifle Association. The Southern Poverty Law Center claims Pratt has “ties to the militia movement, white supremacist organizations and Christian theocrats.”
The SPLC, of course, makes millions by claiming that everybody to the right of Hillary Clinton has similar eeeeeevil “ties.” Specific claims against Pratt have been long debunked, as anyone with 10 fingers and a search engine could discover. And don’t you always laugh at those little squeaks of horror about organizations “more extreme than the National Rifle Association”? After all these years, it’s amazing that hopolphobic journos haven’t realized that, within the gun-rights realm, most organizations (including ours) are “more extreme than the National Rifle Association”?
Oh well.
Ed Kilgore of the New Yorker has a better understanding of Second Amendment supporters and even compliments us (though I suspect he doesn’t consider it a compliment) by calling those of us who are beyond the NRA “Second Amendment ultras” rather than the usual “extremist” cr*p. I’ve never been an “ultra” before and I think I’d rather like being one.
He also makes the absolutely correct point that if conservative politicians and activists like Larry Pratt, Joni Ernst, Mike Huckabee, or Ted Cruz (all of whom have made statements compatible with the “bullet box” remark) heard rhetoric similar to Pratt’s coming from, say, a black-nationalist group, they’d be crying alarm.
But Kilgore seems to have no grasp of the concept of a constitutional republic and seemingly no understanding at all of limited powers, the Bill of Rights, or for that matter the plain truth that individuals have rights that no government or interest group has authority to abolish.
Bottom line, although his language is restrained and high-toned, Kilgore, like Mazza, seems to hold the common hoplophobe view that taking to the bullet box simply means “shooting anybody you disagree with.” Especially if you don’t like particular election results or the views of judges.
Of course, anyone can see by Pratt’s statement that he’d rather do just about anything rather than resort to shooting. And I wonder how many of the fainting pundits understand that Pratt was referring to the famous “four boxes of freedom” — soap, jury, ballot, and cartridge — and that the final item is only the very last resort of people who’ve been so tyrannized that the first three fail utterly to preserve freedom. Not “democracy.” Freedom. Individual rights. The soap box, the jury box, and (at least in theory) the ballot box are all tools of the individual. It’s only when government or perhaps powerful agents working with government take them away that the cartridge box legitimately comes into play.
On the other hand, we know where we stand with the first three boxes now.
The soap box has long been under threat from uppity presidents, self-righteous campus thugs (not to mention campus speech codes), political intolerance on any part of the spectrum, state governments, federal officials, and even petty local tyrants.
Between the over-criminalization of everything, the pressure to force us to incriminate ourselves (pdf), and other forms of courtroom tyranny, the jury box isn’t as free as it was supposed to be, either.
And the ballot box? Oh, please. At a local level, and sometimes even at a state level, voting may occasionally nudge government a little ways in the direction of greater respect for individual rights. But at the federal level, overreach, mission creep, corruption, secrecy, uber-surveillance, funny money, militarization, paranoia, unaccountable bureaucracy, and “stroke of the pen, law of the land” arrogance have gone so far that the ballot box has become nothing but a kind of “opiate of the masses” — a quasi-religious ceremony that encourages us to believe we can influence the far-off “gods” who — no matter whether they’re the gods of the Ds or the gods of the Rs — increasingly rule without regard to any limits on their power.
No, I do not know a single gun owner who believes in “shooting anybody you disagree with.” But then again, maybe those ardent advocates of unlimited “democracy,” those believers in the “anything-goes” power of unelected judges, justices, and bureaucrats really do have something to fear.
Not gun owners. We’re not their enemy. We’re not the enemy of any peaceable people, no matter how much we may dislike their opinions. What they have to fear are the inevitable — and now rapidly growing — consequences of the very policies they so lovingly or stridently or self-servingly or ignorantly support.
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Ed. note: This commentary appeared first on 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!
Yesterday was the 28th of Iyar, the day on the Hebrew calendar celebrating Jerusalem Day. One of the results of the Six-Day war, another attempt to wipe Israel and her Jews from the face of the earth. After the Arab attack on the new state of Israel Jerusalem had been divided. Access to holy sites under Jordan was non-existent for Jews.
Upon its capture by the Arab Legion, the Jewish Quarter of the Old City was destroyed and its residents expelled. Fifty-eight synagogues–some hundreds of years old–were destroyed, their contents looted and desecrated. Some Jewish religious sites were turned into chicken coops or animal stalls. The Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives, where Jews had been burying their dead for over 2500 years, was ransacked; graves were desecrated; thousands of tombstones were smashed and used as building material, paving stones or for latrines in Arab Legion army camps. The Intercontinental Hotel was built on top of the cemetery and graves were demolished to make way for a highway to the hotel. The Western Wall became a slum area.
In direct contravention of the 1949 armistice agreements, Jordan did not permit Jews access to their holy sites or to the Jewish cemetery on the Mount of Olives.
Before the start of the war, Israel sent a message to King Hussein (not barry) of Jordan, that it would not attack Jerusalem or the West Bank if Jordan stayed out of the fight. Jordan believing the false reports from Egypt couldn’t wait to join to be part of the pack ripping Israel to pieces. The result was the reunification of Jerusalem.
Jews once again had control of the holy sites, the strong voice of Motta Gur rang out
“We’re sitting right now on the ridge and we’re seeing the Old City. Shortly we’re going to go in to the Old City of Jerusalem, that all generations have dreamed about. We will be the first to enter the Old City…” and shortly afterwards, “The Temple Mount is in our hands! I repeat, the Temple Mount is in our hands!”
And about 15 minutes later Moshe Dayan gave it….ok, I’ll stop.
But to me, it seems G-d took this attack on Israel and turned it around for good. A miracle. That leads to other miracles. Because of the 1967 victory, people like me can take photos like this last week.
I can place a piece of paper in the Kotel with prayers on it. Prayers that include TZP, her team and her members and readers. Prayers that G-d will bless you all, abundantly.
I will not be shot by a Jordanian sniper from a state created by the Palestine Mandate by Great Britain in 1923, which achieved it’s independence in 1946, only two years before Israel. Despite the Falestinian Authority wanting to gain control of the Western Wall as well.
Yes, I believe in miracles.
Larry Pratt of Gun Owners of America stirred up controversy last week when he said he feared we might have to resort to the “bullet box,” specifically if this November’s presidential election resulted in Supreme Court justices who think that they, and not the Constitution as written, are the ultimate authority under (and over) U.S. law.
This week’s poll asks whether, and if so when, you think freedomistas in the U.S. might have to resort to that fourth box of liberty.
Although the poll asks only if and when, it would be even more interesting to hear what you think might bring us to the box of last resort — what policies, what catastrophic events, what seemingly small trigger event, what change in law or thinking could provoke armed opposition to tyranny? Or, if you think that can be averted, what would help us regain freedom while steering clear of violence? So please … comment away!
I’m virtually certain that our regular readers know about the current lawsuit filed by Sandy Hook families against Remington/Bushmaster. Their odd little legal theory — and seemingly bought by the judge — is that Remington is liable for the actions of Some Asshole because the company improperly marketed a military weapon to civilians (and precognitively knew that regions that buy guns may see thieves stealing them from honest folk).
Sensible people with some grasp of the law know that suit should have been immediately dismissed with prejudice under the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act. The PLCAA protects firearms business from imaginary liability for the misuse of a weapon by some end user…
…so long as the company obeyed all the myriad rules, regulations, and laws that govern the manufacture and sale of firearms. Companies are still liable for defective products and unlawful actions.
These misinformed moneygrubbers claim that marketing an arm commissioned by the military to civilians is “negligent entrustment,” another exception to PLCA immunity.
We could note that the military didn’t exactly “commission” the weapon design. It was marketed to the military some years after it was designed, and it was a heck of an uphill battle for the military to finally adopt it. So to speak.
[Informed folk can skip a paragraph or two.]
In fact, the military variant, the M16 family, is not the same as the AR family of semiautomatic arms sold to civilians. The military version has some specified modifications not in the original AR, and is is fully-automatic (legally speaking; some variants fired bursts, which the feds still class as “machine gun”).
Every time some ignorant, victim disarming crime-enabler calls semi-auto ARs weapons designed for soldiers in war theaters, I ask them to show the army that deliberately chooses to generally arm its troops with semiauto AR-15s instead of assault rifles or battle rifles.
And every time… –crickets–
Back to the lawsuit. Part of the plaintiffs’ claim is that Remington deliberately marketed ARs to teenage boys. (This ignore the fact that The Asshole didn’t buy the AR he used. He murdered the lawful owner, an middle-aged woman, and stole her gun.
Nonetheless, a moronic Yalie thinks she can prove that claim.
This historian just made it likelier that Sandy Hook parents will be able to take Remington to court
To support sales Winchester embarked on what it characterized as the “greatest commercial venture in the history of this country, probably in the history of the world.” They never lacked for ambition. In 1920 alone, they spent close to a million dollars on advertising.A centerpiece of this effort was the company’s boy plan. Winchester prepared a letter about the .22 caliber rifle to send to boys between the ages of ten and sixteen. They asked retailers to send a list of the names of boys in their towns, so the company could send the letter to them under the retailer’s name. The company intended to reach precisely 3,363,537 boys this way.
Yes. You read that correctly. TL;DR: The Sandy Hook Asshole was driven to murder, theft, and more murder by the fact that nearly a century ago Winchester did market firearms to boys (back when it was perfectly legal for boys to buy guns, generally unlike today’s legal environment.
Since children cannot purchase firearms from FFLs, it would be silly for Remington to spend millions marketing to them. In 1920, it made sense, but no longer. Much better, more profitable, to market to parents.
Once upon a time, Remington lawfully marketed to a profitable demographic. Now they don’t because that demographic is no longer lawfully accessible.
Can you think of an industry whose products are being provided to children legally too young to use the products as intended? And who is doing it?
Hint: Condoms, and other birth control products. By schools. To children below the age of consent.
I guess it’s OK to protect victims of statuatory rape from the consequences, but not right to allow them to defend themselves against the rape in the first place.
Ed. note: This commentary appeared first on 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!
If you’ve read any gun news this week, you know that “journalist” Katie Couric was caught faking part of a documentary to make gun-rights activists look stupid and ashamed of themselves. Fortunately, one of the participants had made an audiotape — a very damning tape for Couric and her methods.
Even anti-gun NPR thought what Couric and her team did was a huge, manipulative no-no.
So in this week’s poll we ask, What happens to Couric now?
It’s interesting to me, the more I study and the more I ask the more questions I end up having.
For instance, Judea and Samaria or “occupied territories”? Since I truly believe words matter I decided to do a little investigating.
So what all is in Judea and Samaria that might sound familiar if only vaguely? Well, first you might want to know that while the place remain the same, the names get changed.
A quick but by no means comprehensive list:
Palestine as a term for Israel. This was given by the Emperor Hadrian in around 135 A.D. after he put down the second Jewish rebellion under Bar Kochba. He most likely chose it because it was close to the ancient enemies of Israel, the Philistines who no longer existed at this time. As a by the by, the original Philistines were not Arabic, they were Europeans, from the Adriatic sea next to Greece. There is no “p” in the Arabic language. Why would you call yourself something for which there is no letter?
Shechem, now called Nablus by Arabs, is where Avraham and Sarah first entered the land of Canaan. When Jacob returned to Isaac and Rebecca from his uncle’s house, he settled his family there. Joseph is buried in Shechem. His tomb has been burned and ransacked by the pieceful palestinians. Historically, Avraham traveled through Shechem on his way to Canaan and here offered his first sacrifice to G-d. After the conquest of Canaan, Joshua assembled the Israelites here and encouraged them to follow the Mosaic laws. During the period of the Judges, Abimelech was crowned king here.
Biblical Shechem was destroyed by the Assyrians in the 8th century BCE.
Lots of Jewish history there for a town called Nabulus by the Arabs.
Nazareth? Arab town now, and thanks to Arab MK s Jews don’t feel so welcome there, but the Mayor of Nazareth doesn’t appreciate their influence.
So now let’s take a look at Judea and Samaria, or as called by the left and the “falestinians” (no “P” remember) the “West Bank” or “occupied territories”. You can find a more complete list of towns with familiar names here if you’re interested.
What’s there? Ariel University, for one thing. A lovely university! It has beautiful grounds and very clever students. To get there you will need to go through a checkpoint, and coming out? Oh yes, the same.
Because some of the Arab inhabitants have a nasty hobby of trying to kill Jews. I guess stamp collecting isn’t big in Arab villages there. The grounds are lovely, the Professors I met were very nice. Our hostess, a Professor is a wonderful person. I very much enjoyed visiting with her. The grounds were spectacular and she gives credit to the amazing gardener and his staff. The university is attended by Arabs and Jews. If you speak fluent Hebrew and want to teach engineering, you should take a look as well. But the leftist press would have you believe that Israel is oppressing the pieceful falestinians. No, they own land as well.
The difference is, you don’t see Jews normally carrying out stabbing attacks, on the falestinians. And the cases where Jewish youth were blamed for fires? The fires turned out to have been set by Arabs, knowing the world’s media would be more than happy to play the home version of the game “blame Israel.” If you want an idea of the attacks that take place weekly in Judea and Samaria you can find it (for this week) at http://www.terrorism-info.org.il/en/article/21009 That so many of these attacks were planned and carried out by very young teenagers is terrifying. The women and children barry says we have no need to be afraid of a perfectly capable and willing to kill.
So the world and the UN tell us that the violence is the result of the pieceful falestinians frustration with the lack of “piece talks” and a “two state” solution. They don’t want a “two state” solution. They want a “one state” solution and that “one state” doesn’t involve a little thing called “Israel”. The Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement, BDS, or as I call it BS? Interesting origins.
As to being “occupied”, according to this article, when there are more Israeli troops present, not only does it decrease attacks, it protects civilian women from being stabbed in the doorway of their homes in front of their children. The reasons for this success might surprise you, it may not work for the reasons you think. Israel does take their “purity of arms” code very seriously. It’s an interview with six current IDF Colonels. The sad irony of this is that the world then condemns Israel for having more troops there and urges them to remove them. Even though it will cost more lives, falestinians as well as Jewish. So it’s not really about being safe or saving lives, is it?
Here’s the thing people don’t understand, when they use terms like “occupied territories” or “West Bank” it lends credence to the anti-Antisemitism. How so? Because the pieceful falestinians claim Jews don’t belong there. But it’s not really about “where” the Jews are, it’s the fact there are Jews. An example of this was the recent rape of a 20 year old mentally disabled Jewish girl by 3 Arabs, 2 of them from Shomron. They also spit and urinated on her while shouting anti-Antisemitism threats to her and her family if she told. How so sure it was these pieceful falestinians? One of them filmed it. But this occurred in Tel Aviv. One of the rapists said she didn’t belong in his land. While Jerusalem is the capitol of Israel, the direction challenged US government claims Tel Aviv is. So even in the poorest scenario, Jews don’t belong in the Jewish capitol on the one Jewish state?
Words matter, they can give credence to Anti-Semitic hatred. The Arabs that hate Israel, and by all means, not all of them do, are certainly aware of this. We need to be as well and not play unwittingly into their very bloody hands.
The fact that there are major CHURCH denominations that have jumped on the BDS/BS bandwagon is unbelievable to me. Perhaps they need to go back and see where some of the major events took place in the book they share with the Jews. And then they should remember after Saturday? Comes Sunday. Useful idiots.
As to why live there, just enjoy the views.
It certainly appears that my last post generated a lot of controversy.
A number of commenters think I was mistaken, and that Trump will do a lot less damage to our Second Amendment rights than Hillary. Several pointed out that we are allowing the perfect to be the enemy of the good.
I have explained my rationale behind my opposition to Trump previously. Aside from his historic anti-RKBA views, which he has now conveniently changed now that he’s pretending to be a Republican, he’s an authoritarian weasel, who has no respect for basic human rights.
So I’m wondering what our members and readers really think about Trump.
Will you vote for him now that he’s the presumptive GOP nominee? Will you enthusiastically support him? Will you vote for Hillary Clinton, or the Libertarian nominee instead of Trump? Will you stay home on Election Day?
Let us know! Poll below.
The NRA just endorsed Donald Trump for president at its national convention.
This is what they endorsed.
I generally oppose gun control, but I support the ban on assault weapons and I support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun. With today’s Internet technology we should be able to tell within 72-hours if a potential gun owner has a record. — Source: The America We Deserve, by Donald Trump, p.102 , Jul 2, 2000
It’s often argued that the American murder rate is high because guns are more available here than in other countries. Democrats want to confiscate all guns, which is a dumb idea because only the law-abiding citizens would turn in their guns and the bad guys would be the only ones left armed. The Republicans walk the NRA line and refuse even limited restrictions. — Source: The America We Deserve, by Donald Trump, p.102 , Jul 2, 2000
Q: Do you support the California law allowing judges to confiscate someone’s gun if they are deemed to be a threat to themselves or others?
A: This is something to look into–people with mental health problems are on the streets who shouldn’t be. — Source: CNN SOTU 2015 interview series: 2016 presidential hopefuls , Sep 20, 2015
Q: You’ve talked about wanting to keep the terror watch list but, under current law, individuals on the terror watch list and the no-fly list have been allowed to buy guns and explosives. Are you OK with that?
TRUMP: We have to have a watch list, but we have the laws already on the books as far as Second Amendment for guns, if people are on a watch list or people are sick, this is already covered in the legislation that we already have,
Q: But under current law people on the watch list are allowed to buy guns.
TRUMP: If somebody is on a watch list and an enemy of state and we know it’s an enemy of state, I would keep them away, absolutely. –ABC This Week 2015 interviews of 2016 presidential hopefuls , Nov 22, 2015
So the NRA – an organization that is supposedly dedicated to preserving our Second Amendment rights – America’s First Freedom – endorsed a candidate who implied that the NRA is uncompromising and that Republicans are wrong not to bend on at least some restrictions.
The NRA endorsed a candidate who thinks it may be acceptable for a judge to confiscate the property of an individual with some nebulous concept of “mental health problems.”
The NRA endorsed a candidate who believes people placed on a secret no-fly list without due process should be relieved of their right to keep and bear arms.
The NRA endorsed a candidate who has publicly voiced his support for an “assault weapons” ban and who wants a waiting period before anyone is allowed to make a constitutionally protected purchase. Of course, now he claims he no longer supports the ban on those scary black rifles. Just in time to run for President as a Republican.
Congrats, NRA. You’ve endorsed a flip-flopping, tyrannical weasel, who has hoodwinked a plurality of Republicans into supporting him, and you fell right in line with the rest of those who care more about “winning” than they do about the direction this country is taking.
You care more about defeating the evil Hillary than you do about endorsing someone who has zero respect for basic human rights and believes they should be subject to the whims of politicians.
America’s first freedom, indeed.
Nauseating.
