Tag Archives: Second Amendment

The Gun Bill Has Passed The Senate

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On Wednesday, The Daily Wire posted an article about the gun bill that was rammed through the Senate on late Tuesday.

This is the list of the Republicans who voted to end the filibuster (from The Hill):

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) 

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) 

Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) 

Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) 

Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) 

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) 

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.)

Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) 

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) 

Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) 

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) 

Sen. Todd Young (R-Ind.) 

Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) 

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) 

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) 

It should be noted that most of these Republicans are not running for re-election. I suspect the polling on restricting gun rights shows that voting to move forward with this bill does not reflect popular opinion. All of these people should be voted out of office for not protecting the U.S. Constitution.

The Daily Wire posted a list of problems with the current bill as detailed by the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC):

Red Flag Laws

  • Incentivizes local disarmament proceedings, of which many states currently employ secret ex-parte hearings.
  • Calls only for standards equivalent only to civil court.
  • For all the bluster in the measure about protecting due process and the constitutional rights of the subjects of the hearings during the “appropriate phase,” it implies that states will still be able to hold secret ex-parte hearings to deprive the People of their rights.
  • Entitles the subject to an attorney “at the appropriate phase,” but it must be at the subject’s expense.

Private Sales

  • Expands the definition of “engaged in the business” by striking “with the principal objective of livelihood and profit” in the current definition and replacing it with “to predominantly earn a profit.”
  • This confusion could lead to new and successful prosecutions of private sellers who may fall under the broad and vague definition of “engaged in business” and therefore the need to be licensed.

New Misdemeanor Firearms Prohibitions

  • By expanding the definition of a prohibiting misdemeanor domestic violence in such a vague, broad, and subjective way it invites confusion, and potential firearms prohibitions.

Transfers and Straw Purchases

  • Prohibits the government from arming drug cartels, unless the government exercises more oversight on said drug cartels, thus allowing the free flow of arms to these cartels to continue in perpetuity.

Employer Background Checks

  • Allows all employers to ask for a firearms background check prior to employment or during current employment, regardless of its connection to job duties.

Americans need to wake up and realize that this bill is an infringement on our rights as Americans.

 

If You Had Any Doubt…

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There may be (or not be) some good ideas in the current gun legislation moving through Congress. However, those of us who believe in the Second Amendment need to be very wary of what is happening. On Monday, Townhall posted an article that should give all of us pause. Public Safety may not be the goal of the Democrat Party.

The article reports:

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy (D) praised the details of the bipartisan framework from the Senate on the issue of gun control but noted this should be used to pursue even more aggressive restrictions.

In a statement on Sunday, Murphy said the framework is a great step “in restoring sanity to our national dialogue” on firearms and “while this agreement is only a narrow first step, it is recognition that the ability of the gun lobby to block any and all common sense gun safety laws by its mere presence is waning and reform is possible. The door has cracked open. We must open it wider.”

One of my main concerns in this debate is the acceptance of ‘red flag laws.’ These laws are unconstitutional as they deny the person whose guns are confiscated his day in court. The only way I would support a ‘red flag law’ would be if it came with a promise of an appearance before a judge within 4 hours of the guns being seized. Even then, the constitutionality of the law is questionable.

Section I of the Fourteenth Amendment states:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

The Second Amendment is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, how can it be denied without due process?

A Disturbing Statement

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On Thursday, The Washington Examiner reported a troubling quote from President Biden.

The article reports:

President Joe Biden said Thursday that his gun violence prevention strategy is necessary to combat rising violent crime in cities across the country and that preventing the sale of certain firearms “doesn’t violate anybody’s Second Amendment rights.”

“Making sure that people who are not allowed to have a gun, don’t get the gun in the first place,” the president said of his push to institute stricter background checks for firearm sales. “This doesn’t violate anybody’s Second Amendment right. There’s no violation of the Second Amendment right to talk like there’s no amendment that’s absolute.”

“There’s no amendment that’s absolute.” What? Didn’t this man take an oath stating, “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States”?

The article reports:

Biden, speaking alongside Attorney General Merrick Garland, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, and New York City Mayor Eric Adams, additionally outlined new measures the Justice Department was taking on Thursday to clamp down on the illegal sale of “ghost guns” and other “assault” weapons. Those actions include:

    • Directing every U.S. Attorney’s office nationwide to increase resources dedicated to district-specific violent crime strategies.
    • Cracking down on the “Iron Pipeline,” an illegal flow of guns sold in the South, transported up the East Coast, and found at crime scenes in cities from Baltimore to New York City.
    • Launching a National Ghost Gun Enforcement Initiative, “which will train a national cadre of prosecutors and disseminate investigation and prosecution tools to help bring cases against those who use ghost guns to commit crimes.”
    • Pursuing “unlawful gun sellers that put firearms in the wrong hands by taking steps such as prioritizing federal prosecutions of those who criminally sell or transfer firearms that are used in violent crimes, including unlicensed dealers who sell guns to criminals without the required background checks.”

The president also called on Congress to approve $500 million in new funding “for proven strategies we know will reduce gun crime,” including $300 million to expand the COPS Hiring Program and $200 million for evidence-based community violence interventions.

Why is the President focusing on the guns rather than focusing on arresting criminals with guns and keeping them in jail? How many gun crimes in America are committed by repeat offenders? What does the President consider an assault weapon? These are questions that need to be answered.

This Does Not Sound Like “Shall Not Be Infringed”

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The Epoch Times is reporting today that Democrats in the Pennsylvania legislature have proposed legislation to tax and encode ammunition sold in the state.

The article reports:

A 5 cent per bullet tax will be proposed in Pennsylvania as part of legislation to be brought forth by two state House Democrats, Rep. Manny Guzman and Rep. Stephen Kinsey.

The tax would fund a state police database of ammunition sold in Pennsylvania.

The planned legislation would require ammunition manufacturers to encode ammunition provided for retail sale in Pennsylvania, and to provide ammunition serial numbers to the Pennsylvania State Police for the ammunition database. The plan was revealed in a joint memo to the state legislature by Guzman and Kinsey.

“Since 2015, only 21% of the nearly 8,500 shootings that Philadelphia has endured have resulted in an arrest or conviction,” the memo said. “Far too often, all that is left for the police to find is a victim and a bullet. By making the bullet a more useable piece of evidence, independent from the associated firearm, we can give our law enforcement officers the tools that they need to solve more of these heinous crimes.”

“By maintaining a record of purchases of ammunition,” the memo continues, “our law enforcement officers will be able to easily trace the ownership of any ammunition involved in a crime. This proposal is a much more reliable method of forensic tracing than current systems like ballistic fingerprinting, since determination of a bullet’s code does not require any special skills or equipment, and it serves as an objective identifier.”

Has it occurred to anyone that cause of the problem of shootings in Philadelphia might not be ammunition?

This is ridiculous. It would set up a situation where people living near the border with other states would simply drive into a neighboring state to purchase ammunition. It would also task the state police with keeping a database of ammunition–which would be time-consuming, expensive, and probably not particularly helpful. How much time would be wasted registering ammunition that people were firing at rifle ranges? What is the percentage of ammunition purchased that is actually used to commit crimes? Does anyone actually believe that criminals with evil intentions would purchase ammunition that they knew would be tracked?

Hopefully common sense will prevail in the legislature. If not in the legislature, at least in the courts. This is simply another attempt to infringe on the constitutional rights of Americans. It needs to be stopped in its tracks.

This Is An Alarming Statement

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Yesterday Breitbart posted an article about a statement made by President Biden while introducing his executive action on gun control.

The article reports:

President Joe Biden declared Thursday that “no amendment is absolute” while unveiling a series of executive actions targeting American citizens’ Second Amendment rights.

“Today, we’re taking steps to confront not just the gun crisis, but what is actually a public health crisis,” Biden announced in a speech at the White House’s Rose Garden, claiming: “Nothing, nothing I am about to recommend in any way impinges on the Second Amendment.”

The President contimued:

“No amendment, no amendment to the Constitution is absolute,” the president continued. “You can’t yell ‘fire’ in a crowded movie theater — recall a freedom of speech. From the very beginning, you couldn’t own any weapon you wanted to own. From the very beginning that the Second Amendment existed, certain people weren’t allowed to have weapons.”

Let’s review this a minute. If no amendment to the Constitution is absolute, then what good is the Constitution? The Second Amendment is part of the Bill of Rights. The intention of the Bill of Rights is to limit the power of the government. The Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution so that states who feared an all-powerful central government would vote in favor of adopting the Constitution. The Second Amendment was intended to keep the government in check–not to keep the citizens in check. The Bill of Rights was in no way intended to limit the rights of Americans.

The Second Amendment states:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

President Biden’s executive order does infringe on the rights of Americans to bear arms, and therefore should be declared unconstitutional.

This Doesn’t Look Good For The Future

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Yesterday One America News posted an article about what has happened since Colorado implemented red flag laws a year ago.

The article reports:

According to the report released on Thursday, over 100 red flag protection orders were filed in 2020.

Police reportedly removed firearms from the homes of 66 people who were flagged by family members, legal guardians or law enforcement officers. Under the new law, a judge can approve firearm confiscation if there is a belief a person could be a threat to themselves or others.

One of the most recent instances of the order in action is in the case of Bryce Shelby, a man accused of making threats against the state’s attorney general and several other government officials.

Denver Police alleged Shelby’s behavior was escalating and through the red flag laws, they forced him to surrender his two rifles. Though the state’s attorney general chose not to press charges against Shelby, he will not regain possession of his firearms for a total of 364 days.

Several of the year’s emergency Extreme Risk Protection Orders were placed against law enforcement, but were shut down by the courts.

For example, early on in 2020, an inmate tried to claim Weld County Sheriff Steve Reams was a threat. The order request was sent to a judge who quickly threw it out for lack of evidence, which allowed some to say the law worked. However, Reams argues it showed the law can be used frivolously.

The article concludes:

Reams is among those who are the most skeptical of the new law due to its vague guidelines, which allow weapons to be confiscated even without criminal charges.

“But to go in and conduct a search warrant on someone’s home based on the word of a third party, I think that’s a huge overreach of the Constitution,” Reams stated. “And that’s where I’d have to draw the line.”

There has been a lot of debate over the constitutionality of red flag laws. The President has said he supports them at the federal level, but gun advocates argue the orders contradict the Second Amendment.

Andrew Napolitano, who served as a New Jersey Superior Court judge from 1987 to 1995,  said: “The concept of a red flag law violates both the presumption of innocence and the due process requirement of proof of criminal behavior before liberty can be infringed.”

Heading into the New Year with an incoming Democrat majority in the new Congress, many proponents of the right to bear arms worry about future restrictive gun laws.

Losing the Second Amendment while the First Amendment is on life support does not portend good things for the future of America.

Creating A Government That Hasn’t Read The Constitution

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Yesterday Sara Carter reported the following:

“We are actually the only campaign with a plan…that supports mandatory buybacks of weapons of war,” Jennifer O’Malley Dillon, recently nominated as Joe Biden’s incoming deputy chief of staff, says in the video.

The Biden-Harris transition team announced Tuesday, that O’Malley Dillon will join incoming administration as a deputy chief of staff.

At the time of recording this video, O’Malley Dillon was working for Beto O’Rourke’s 2020 campaign. She estimated that the mandatory buyback would affect “15 or 16 million” guns.

“An assault weapon ban is very, very important, and we need to have it. But that only takes weapons of war off the streets in the future. It does nothing for weapons of war that are currently out there.”

The obvious questions here is who determines what is an assault rifle. Some of the plans to force Americans to give up their guns include registering those guns and taxing the owners at a high rate. Other plans include allowing liability lawsuits against the companies that manufacture guns, eventually drying up the supply. One of the hallmarks of a potential Biden administration is the total disregard for the God-given rights of Americans enshrined in the Constitution.

We Have Seen The Video

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Yesterday Just the News posted an article about Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis couple shown on video defending their home.

The article reports:

Al Watkins, an attorney for the couple, confirmed to the Associated Press the indictments against Mark McCloskey, 63, and Patricia McCloskey, 61. A spokeswoman for Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner declined comment.

Joel Schwartz, a McCloskey attorney, told Just the News on Tuesday night that the indictment is called a “suppressed” indictment and that he’s unaware of what it states.

…Gardner, a Democrat, charged the McCloskeys with “flourishing” a weapon in connection with the June 28 incident in which social justice protesters entered the couple’s private, gated community during a demonstration and marched past their home.

The McCloskeys have said they each went outside with a gun because they feared for the safety of themselves and their home.

The article concludes with some information on Attorney Gardner:

As previously reported by Just the News, Gardner’s campaigns have received tens of thousands of dollars from a political action committee financed by billionaire political philanthropist George Soros. 

Gardiner has had several controversies since she assumed office.

In January 2017, she opened a criminal investigation into the then-Missouri GOP Gov. Eric Greitens. Several months later, she was forced to drop the charges for lack of evidence. In the aftermath, the out-of-state former FBI agent she hired to conduct the Greitens probe has been indicted on seven felony counts counts in connection with perjury and evidence tampering.

There are a few things to note in the video of the incident. First of all, the ‘protesters’ broke down a gate to get to the McCloskey’s house. At that point they were trespassing. Second of all, the ‘protesters’ threatened the McCloskeys. I truly believe that if the McCloskeys had not been outside their house with guns we would be reading their obituaries. Their Second Amendment rights need to be protected.

Losing Our Constitutional Rights

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Fox News posted an article today about the Missouri couple seen defending their home from rioters on June 28th.. Although Missouri’s Castle Doctrine allows you to use deadly force to defend property, authorities acquired a warrant to search the McCloskey’s home and seized the rifle that Mark McCloskey was shown holding during the June 28 incident.

The article reports:

There was no immediate indication the McCloskeys were arrested or charged with a crime. The warrant applied only to a search for the guns, KSDK reported.

On Monday, the McCloskeys appeared on Fox News’ “Hannity” and disclosed that protesters had returned to their neighborhood July 3 – but the couple was alerted in advance and hired a private security company to protect their residence.

…In the June incident, Patricia McCloskey said, the couple was startled just before dinnertime when “300 to 500 people” entered the gated community where they live.

“[They said] that they were going to kill us,” Patricia McCloskey told Hannity on Monday night. “They were going to come in there. They were going to burn down the house. They were going to be living in our house after I was dead, and they were pointing to different rooms and said, ‘That’s going to be my bedroom and that’s going to be the living room and I’m going to be taking a shower in that room’.””

The article notes:

The couple’s attorney at the time, Albert Watkins, said in a statement that the couple did not arm themselves until after they began feeling threatened.

“My clients didn’t sit on their front stoop with guns. … No firearms were on them at the time that they, were, as property owners standing in front of their home,” Watkins said at the time. “It was not until they basically were in a position of seeing and observing violence, recklessness, lawbreaking, and knowing that the police were not going to be doing anything.”

Were they supposed to just sit there and be attacked? The police were not in sight. Until the police deal with people who are not protesting peacefully but looting and rioting, Americans need to be armed to defend themselves. There was absolutely no reason to take the rifle away. Since the house has been targeted more than once by rioters, how are the McCloskeys supposed to defend themselves? Thank God they were able to hire a security group to protect their home and themselves. The seizing of the rifle not only violates their Second Amendment rights, it puts them in danger. They are lawyers, and I would love to see them sue the person responsible for the search warrant and the seizing of the rifle.

When Government Ignores The Constitution

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Yesterday The Washington Free Beacon posted an article yesterday about an incident in San Jose, California, that should give us pause.

The article reports:

In 2013, Lori Rodriguez called San Jose police to her home because her husband was having a mental health crisis and making violent threats. Seven years later, she is petitioning the Supreme Court to force the city to return her guns.

“It’s not right. I shouldn’t have to do this to get back what’s mine,” Rodriguez told the Washington Free Beacon. “They violated several of my constitutional rights.”

Rodriguez claims police ordered her to open the couple’s gun safe so they could seize all of the weapons in the home after her husband was detained for making threats that the city says included “shooting up schools.” Cops seized not only her husband’s weapons but also the guns that were personally registered to Rodriguez. The city has repeatedly rebuffed her requests to return her property.

The suit is now the sole case with Second Amendment implications remaining before the Court after the justices rejected 10 other gun-rights cases on June 15. Rodriguez’s legal challenge comes as the federal government and a number of states debate “red flag” bills that would allow authorities to deny gun rights to citizens. It has the potential to clarify the extent to which the Second Amendment protects individuals from seizures of firearms.

San Jose city attorney Richard Doyle did not respond to a request for comment. The city defended its actions, saying that authorities were within their rights to confiscate the guns, calling Rodriguez’s claim “borderline frivolous.”

“If the government has lawful authority to effect the forfeiture and observes the requirements of due process in so doing, it has complied with the Constitution,” Doyle said in a brief submitted to the Supreme Court on Wednesday. “The forfeiture does nothing whatever to impair the previous owner’s right to buy, possess, or use firearms, and notwithstanding that the owner may recover the full market value of the guns through their transfer and sale.”

The article continues:

Several of the guns confiscated from Rodriguez by San Jose police have special sentimental value, according to Rodriguez. Police confiscated not only handguns that she and her husband purchased but also a war souvenir inherited from a family member.

“One of them is a gun my great uncle brought back from WWII,” she said. “I really want that one back. You can’t replace that one, obviously.”

Don Kilmer, Rodriguez’s lawyer, said that while the case implicates the 2nd Amendment, in addition to the 4th and even 14th Amendments, it ultimately comes down to an undisputed fact: Lori Rodriguez is not prohibited from owning the firearms San Jose took from her house.

“Her mental health has never been at issue,” Kilmer told the Free Beacon. “The law that the city is holding these guns under says that you can confiscate weapons of people who are mentally ill. Lori is not mentally ill.”

In the years since the initial police call, the Rodriguez family continues to live together, but Lori has taken steps to ensure she can legally own the confiscated firearms. She has transferred all of the firearms into her name and she is the only family member who knows the combination to the gun safe. Her lawyers argue that she is in compliance with all California gun laws—including those for individuals who live with people who can not own firearms themselves.

If her husband was the problem and he had no access to the gun safe, how can the city justify taking her guns away? This is definitely overreach.

A Subtle Way To Infringe On A Constitutional Right

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“America’s 1st Freedom” is a magazine distributed by the National Rifle Association. I am not including a link to the article I am posting about because I can’t find the article electronically although it is in the April 2020 issue of the magazine.

The title of the article is “The New Gun-Control Activism.” It deals with the strategy those who oppose the right of Americans to own guns are using to limit the availability of guns to Americans.

The article notes:

Last year, for example, Connecticut State Treasurer Shawn Wooden, who commands $37 billion in public pension funds, announced plans to pull $30 million worth of shares from civilian firearm manufacturer securities. Wooden also intends to prohibit similar investments in the future and to establish incentives for banks and financial institutions to adopt anti-gun protocols. The proposition was immediately praised by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and other Connecticut politicians who view the divestment from five companies–Clarus Corp., Daicel Corp., Vista Outdoor Inc., Olin Corp., and ammunition maker Northrop Grumman–as a step toward reducing gun violence.

…Wooden also requested that financial bodies disclose their gun-related portfolios when endeavoring to wok with the treasurer’s office. Wooden subsequently selected tow firms, Citibank and Rick Financial Product (both had expressed the desire to be part of the “solution on gun violence”), to take on the roll of senior bankers in Connecticut’s then-forthcoming $890 million general obligation bond sale.

Technically I guess this is legal. It is a very subtle infringement on the Second Amendment and would be very difficult to prove in court. It is also not a new approach. During the Obama administration, the administration put in place guidelines that prevented gun dealers from getting business loans from banks.

On May 19, 2014, The New American reported:

Following the Obama administration’s “Operation Broken Trust,” an operation that began just months into his first term, the Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force was created initially to “root out and expose” investment scams. After bringing 343 criminal and 189 civil cases, the task force began looking for other targets.

The task force is a gigantic interagency behemoth, involving not only the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI, but also the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the U.S. Postal Service, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the U.S. Secret Service.

The next target for the task force was credit card payment processors, such as PayPal, along with porn shops and drug paraphernalia stores. In 2011, it expanded its list of “high risk” businesses to include gun shops. Peter Weinstock, an attorney with Hunton & Williams, explained:

This administration has very clearly told the banking industry which customers they feel represent “reputational risk” to do business with….

Any companies that engage in any margin of risk as defined by this administration are being dropped.

In 2012, Bank of America terminated its 12-year relationship with McMillan Group International, a gun manufacturer in Phoenix, and American Spirit Arms in Scottsdale. Said Joe Sirochman, owner of American Spirit Arms:

At first, it was the bigger guys — gun parts manufacturers or high-profile retailers. Now the smaller mom-and-pop shops are being choked out….

They need their cash [and credit lines] to buy inventory. Freezing their assets will put them out of business.

That’s the whole point, according to Kelly McMillan:

This is an attempt by the federal government to keep people from buying guns and a way for them to combat the Second Amendment rights we have. It’s a covert way for them to control our right to manufacture guns and individuals to buy guns.

With the Obama administration unable to foist its gun control agenda onto American citizens frontally, this is a backdoor approach that threatens the very oxygen these businesses need to breathe. Richard Riese, a senior VP at the American Bankers Association, expanded on the attack through the banks’ back doors:

We’re being threatened with a regulatory regime that attempts to foist on us the obligation to monitor all types of transactions.

All of this is predicated on the notion that the banks are a choke point for all businesses.

How you vote matters.

I Think He Needs To Do Some Work On His People Skills

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Ed Morrissey posted an article at Hot Air today about a recent Joe Biden event in Detroit.

The article reports:

Say what you want about the inevitable Joe Biden presidential nomination, but at least it will be entertaining. At least, it will be as entertaining as arrogant ignorance ever gets, a combination that Biden has mastered over long decades in the public eye. Biden went stumping for votes in a Detroit auto plant today, a natural venue for campaigning thanks to the Obama administration’s rescue of GM and Chrysler.

Instead, Biden got caught up in a gun-control argument with a worker who accused him of “actively trying to end our Second Amendment right.” Biden offered a pungent reply — “You’re full of s**t!” — and then things got really testy:

…Biden denies in this clip that he wants to confiscate anyone’s guns. One week ago, though, Biden publicly proclaimed that he would put Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke in charge of his gun policy, a former presidential aspirant who explicitly called for gun confiscations by law enforcement following an assault rifle ban.

The Second Amendment may be a problem for Democrat candidates. Recent statements by all of the presidential candidates and many legislators have advocated gun buy-backs (a polite word for gun confiscation). There are a lot of people in America who value their Second Amendment rights either for hunting or for self-protection. I think most voters are smart enough to see the writing on the wall–that we will lose our Second Amendment rights under either a Democrat President or a Democrat Congress. And I do think Joe Biden needs to work on his people skills.

This Could Get Interesting

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Hot Air is reporting today that Everytown for Gun Safety, a Mike Bloomberg-backed gun-grabbing group, is setting its sights on Texas.

The article reports:

Everytown for Gun Safety, a Michael Bloomberg-backed group that pushes for expanded background checks, red flag laws and other measures, is plotting what its political director calls an “unprecedented financial and grassroots effort” to flip the Texas House, defend vulnerable freshmen Democrats in Congress and help Democrats take congressional seats in the suburbs. A memo detailing the plan, the group’s biggest state investment to date, was shared exclusively with Hearst Newspapers.

“We believe that Texas, as it becomes younger and increasingly diverse, can be the next emerging battleground state with gun safety as the tipping point,” Chris Carr, the group’s political director wrote in the memo. “We believe there are opportunities to elect gun sense candidates up and down the ballot, from the statehouse to the U.S. Congress — and potentially even statewide.”

I will admit that I don’t know a lot about Texas politics, but it seems to me that the basic culture of Texas might make this planned gun grab a little more difficult.

The article concludes:

While Shannon Watts (founder of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, a group of activists affiliated with Everytown) uses hyperbole in comparing Texas to Virginia, she should know that Texas is not like most other states. There are plenty of Democrats in elected office who are strong supporters of the Second Amendment and are gun owners themselves. This is not as partisan issue as it is in other states.

“I would say anyone running for office in Texas should look to Virginia,” Watts said. “Six months after a shooting in Virginia Beach, all of the elected officials who refused gun sense were voted out of office.”

Everytown is supporting freshmen Democrats like my own congresswoman – Rep. Lizzie Fletcher, who is vulnerable. The district was a strongly red district – the reddest in Houston – and fell into Democrat hands for the first time in 2018 when she was elected. She is facing a tough battle to retain her seat. I’m counting on my district moving back into the red column in November.

Everytown is also planning to go on the offensive against Republican U.S. Reps. Dan Crenshaw, Michael McCaul, Chip Roy and John Carter, and it’s planning to spend big in districts left open by retiring Republicans, including U.S. Rep. Will Hurd.

As is said in Texas, come and take it.

Let’s hope Texas voters are awake enough not to repeat what happened in Virginia. One thing to keep in mind when looking at Virginia is that a lot of the Democrat candidates ran unopposed. Hopefully that won’t happen in Texas.

Yesterday In Virginia

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There was a Second Amendment rally in Richmond, Virginia, yesterday. 22,000 Second Amendment supporters showed up on Martin Luther King Day to support the Second Amendment. The media was predicting riots. On Sunday I posted an article based on a Canada Free Press story that predicted a ‘false flag’ operation by Antifa. That did not materialize.

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line Blog posted a few observations about the rally. The headline on his article was, “Pro-Gun Rally In Richmond Is Peaceful; Liberals Hardest Hit.”

The article notes:

Today an estimated (by police) 22,000 people demonstrated at the Virginia capitol in Richmond in favor of Second Amendment rights, which are being threatened by the newly-elected Democratic majority in that state’s legislature. Liberal news outlets were hoping the rally would turn violent, and their disappointment when it didn’t was palpable.

The article includes this picture and comment from The Washington Post:

The Babylon Bee probably had the best headline and article:

The Babylon Bee headlines: “Media Offers Thoughts And Prayers That Someone Would Start Some Violence At Gun Rights Rally.”

Somber members of the press offered their thoughts and prayers that someone would start some violence at the gun rights rally in Virginia today.

Reporters expressed their grief and condolences as the violence they hyped has so far failed to materialize.

“Nobody has so much as fired a shot. This is an unbelievable tragedy,” said one teary-eyed MSNBC reporter, clearly caught up in the anguish of the moment.

The article cited one possible reason Antifa decided to stay home:

Antifa threatened to show up at the rally, and likely would have created violence if it had done so. But for some reason, the group’s leaders changed their minds. Maybe they focused on the fact that the 2x4s, pipes and baseball bats with which they are used to beating up innocent bystanders might not fare so well in this crowd. One young guy who looked suspiciously like a leftist advocated jumping the fence and killing people. The genuine demonstrators denounced him as an “infiltrator”–which I suspect he was–and told him to “get the f*** out.”

The article concludes:

Virginia’s Democrats are unabashedly in favor of gun confiscation. Why is it that when Democrats take control of a legislative body, they instinctively move to confiscate legally-owned firearms from law-abiding citizens, in violation of the Second Amendment? It would take a psychiatrist to answer that question. Certainly a student of crime statistics wouldn’t be able to explain it. Whatever the cause, the Democrats’ move against the citizens’ constitutional rights is manna from Heaven for Republicans, many of whom mingled with the demonstrators and endorsed their cause.

I would also like to note that those who attended the rally cleaned up after themselves before they left. It is also interesting to me that when so many ‘good people with guns” are in one place, there is no violence.

Some Wise Words From A Friend

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Thoughts on today’s Civil Rights March in Richmond, Virginia.

Folks the Governor of Virginia (AKA King Ralph) has lost control of the situation and declared a state of emergency. He is using this as an excuse to suspend the Constitution and Civil Rights of the People of Virginia.

The National Guard has basically told him they are not playing his silly game, the county Sheriff’s have sided with the people.
This should tell you something really important. The National Guard General I guarantee you had a bunch of JAG lawyers backing him up when he said “No”.

Antifa has publicly sided with the people and pro 2nd Amendment groups calling the Governor a fascist and a tyrant (I did not see that coming and I am not ruling out a false flag or trouble here, but at least they are calling the Governor out for being a Tyrant and acting like a Fascist).

The West Virginia Legislature has already publicly offered counties to come on over to the Mountain State.

The Governor now backed into a corner has tried to hire private military contractors. Which also have said “No”.
(This should also set off major warning bells)

Virginia State Senator Amanda Chase warns all Patriots to remain calm and keep their heads on a swivel and not to take any action that allows the Governor to set this up to look like anything other than what this is, his fault, his listening to the Liberal echo chamber and not the average citizens of his state.
Some anti-gun lobbyists got paid a lot of money for helping set this in motion and filled a lot of campaign coffers.
Part of the reason this situation came up is several of the Democrats now elected ran unopposed. (We can never let this happen again)

Be smart out there folks. This needs to be about the 1st and the 2nd Amendments.
Freedom of Speech,
Freedom of Thought,
Freedom to Assemble,
The Right to Self Defense can never be Denied.

The Primary reason for the 2nd Amendment is so the Citizens may resist Tyranny. However we are no where near that point yet. Attending today’s Civil Rights march with a long gun and dressed anything less than your Sunday best is counter productive.
The Governor of Virginia wants an excuse. He wants to excuse his egregious abuse of power and abuse of the Constitution. Do Not Under Any Circumstances give him an excuse for his over reach of power. Do Not give him an Excuse to grab for more power. He will use egregious behavior on the part of the protesters to try to claim his Tyranny was “only doing what was necessary”.

This is a time to follow the wisdom of Dr Martin Luther King, Jr he knew a thing or two about showing resistance to tyranny with dignity:

Show up dressed in your Sunday best and have dignity, display your dignity for all to see.
Walk proudly with your head held high, be solemn, be respectful, be reverent, you can even be silent when you walk in protest of tyranny.
Let your presence, you reverence shout for you.
Do not under any circumstances act undignified. This March is above all about Dignity and Freedom. We are Free men and women, and we will resist Tyranny, displays your Dignity and show the Governor and his Liberal Masters you are unbowed and you are upright and not on bended knee.

Liberal protest marches are usually a spectacle, a clown show.
Do no sink to that lack of dignity, lack of self respect, and most of all respect for others. When you act like offensive clown, you do not further the cause. You alienate supporters and potential supporters. Worse you offend and impose upon the disinterest that just wanted to go about their daily life and make them worse than disinterested, you make them an opponent.

Your cause is just.
Do not sully the cause with egregious behavior. Do not tolerate your fellow marchers and protesters acting improperly.
Police each other so the Police can stand and observe the Parade and remain unengaged and unmolested.

The Nation and the World are watching you!
(And so are a lot of drones and intelligence services)
We will resist Peacefully, until Peace is no longer an option.

As General Mattis would say:
“Be polite, be Professional, but keep your head on a swivel and never ever lower your guard”

Written and posted on Facebook by Herbert Clayton Bollinger

Prepare For A False Flag Operation Tomorrow

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My source for this article is the Canada Free Press, but I have come across this story elsewhere.

The article at the Canada Free Press reports:

The Internet is rife with rumors that antifa will march shoulder to shoulder with pro-gun protesters about to descend on Virginia’s capital tomorrow—including one claiming that it will be antifa activists wearing red MAGA caps and NRA garb this time.

If true, pro-gun protesters should take lots of pictures for uploading to the ‘Net during the event—because it will be the first time the anarchists appear anywhere without their signature masks:

…On Friday State Senator Amanda Chase issued a warning to those attending the Monday rally.

“We are being set up!” (Gateway Pundit, Jan. 18, 2020)

“Senator Chase wrote this on her Facebook page.

“I want you to be aware of how we are being set up.

“If people show up wearing any kind of uniform, patch or other symbol on their clothing signifying they belong to a militia and something goes wrong, you could/will be held as a domestic terrorist.

“If anyone steps out of line, all it takes is one person, it may even be a government plant….if that plant does anything to disrupt the rally, you could/will be arrested as a domestic terrorist.”

“They have labeled us as potential domestic terrorists for a long time now.

“…The groundwork has been laid to brand you as a domestic terrorist.

On January 16th, The Daily Caller reported:

“I think it’s been pretty important for us to focus on the fact that gun control in America has a legacy of racist enforcement,” an Antifa Seven Hills spokesperson called James, a self-identified anarchist who withheld his real name for fear of getting doxxed, told Vice. “Like taking guns away from black people, because black people were perceived as a threat to property and the sanctity of the state.”

“This is our fight as much as anyone else’s,” James continued. “It’s our state, and we are left largely out of the debate. The presence of an armed left is not discussed, it’s not understood.”

To the “armed left,” gun control represents the rise of a police state and the oppression of minorities made powerless by disarmament, but it’s a class issue as well.

When people fail to study the intention of the Founding Fathers in writing The Bill of Rights, they become very confused about what the Second Amendment represents. The Second Amendment was put in place to arm citizens against the type of tyrannical government they had just fought a revolution against. Every American is covered by the Second Amendment–there is no race involved. The charge of a legacy of racism needs to be looked at in context. America has made some mistakes in the area of race, but race does not define our country. America was one of the first countries to end slavery, and unfortunately slavery continues today in some of the countries that have oddly enough been named to the United Nations Human Rights Commission.

Be very careful about what news you believe about Virginia in the next week. The possibilities of media mischief and false flags abound.

Some Wise Words From Walter Williams

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On Saturday, Breitbart posted an article quoting Walter Williams on the new gun registration measures being instituted in Virginia. Walter Williams is a columnist and a George Mason economics Professor.

The article reports:

On December 10, 2019, Breitbart News reported that Northam changed his position from supporting an across-the-board ban on possession of such weapons to supporting a ban only in a situation where a person refuses to register the firearm with the government. The Virginia Mercury quoted Northam spokeswoman Alena Yarmosky saying, “The governor’s assault weapons ban will include a grandfather clause for individuals who already own assault weapons, with the requirement they register their weapons before the end of a designated grace period.”

On December 27, 2019, Walter E. Williams used a Fox News op-ed to warn Virginians “not to fall for the registration trick.” He said, “Knowing who owns what weapons is the first step to confiscation.”

In the article, Walter Williams quoted James Madison in Federalist Paper No. 46:

James Madison, in Federalist Paper No. 46 wrote that the Constitution preserves “the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation … (where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.”

Thomas Jefferson wrote: “What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.”

Too many Americans believe the Second Amendment grants Americans the right to own firearms only to go hunting and for self-protection. The framers of our Constitution had no such intent in mind.

The article concludes:

Eighty-six of Virginia’s 95 counties have declared themselves Second Amendment Sanctuaries in which future gun controls passed by Northam and his Democrat colleagues will not be enforced.

Stay tuned.

Respecting The Constitutional Rights Of Americans

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Yesterday John HInderaker at Power Line Blog posted an article with the following headline, “Schiff Obtained Phone Records of Nunes, Journalist, Others.”

How in the world did Adam Schiff get access to those phone records?

The article notes:

The mainstream media is abuzz with stories about Nunes communication with “Rudy Giuliani during key aspects of his Ukraine pressure campaign.” Nunes was in touch with John Solomon around the times he published major articles. And on and on. The telephone records don’t include the actual conversations. They identify who was calling whom and how long they spoke.

Schiff has crossed the line of decency with this move. Once again, he has abused his power. Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton tweeted that obtaining these records is a remarkable abuse of President Trump’s constitutional rights. I would argue that it’s an abuse of the constitutional rights of all of the above. These are KGB tactics.

Well, fair is fair. Republicans should obtain Schiff’s phone records, those of the so-called whistleblower, Eric Ciaramella, and the colleague with whom he had a “bro-like” relationship, you know, Sean Misko, the one Schiff hired as an aide the day after the whistleblower’s complaint was submitted.

The repellent Adam Schiff has managed to reach a new level of depravity.

This is not something that should be happening in America. It is a total disregard for the constitutional rights of the people involved. However, this is not a new tactic by the political left.

In October 2014, I posted an article about Sharyl Attkisson. She was fired from CBS for her reporting on Operation Fast and Furious. As you remember, that was President Obama’s gun-running operation that was supposed to bring Americans to the point where they overturned the Second Amendment.

The article from rightwinggranny noted:

Attkisson says the source, who’s “connected to government three-letter agencies,” told her the computer was hacked into by “a sophisticated entity that used commercial, nonattributable spyware that’s proprietary to a government agency: either the CIA, FBI, the Defense Intelligence Agency or the National Security Agency.”

The breach was accomplished through an “otherwise innocuous e-mail” that Attkisson says she got in February 2012, then twice “redone” and “refreshed” through a satellite hookup and a Wi-Fi connection at a Ritz-Carlton hotel.

The spyware included programs that Attkisson says monitored her every keystroke and gave the snoops access to all her e-mails and the passwords to her financial accounts.

“The intruders discovered my Skype account handle, stole the password, activated the audio, and made heavy use of it, presumably as a listening tool,” she wrote in “Stonewalled: My Fight for Truth Against the Forces of Obstruction, Intimidation, and Harassment in Obama’s Washington.”

But the most shocking finding, she says, was the discovery of three classified documents that Number One told her were “buried deep in your operating system. In a place that, unless you’re a some kind of computer whiz specialist, you wouldn’t even know exists.”

“They probably planted them to be able to accuse you of having classified documents if they ever needed to do that at some point,” Number One added.

It’s time to charge people with a crime when they violate the civil rights of an American citizen. I hope this will happen (but I am not optimistic).

Really Bad Advice

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I don’t watch The View. I watched a few minutes once and realized instantly that it was simply not something I wanted to spend time watching. However, occasionally the ignorance of our Constitution illustrated on that television show is simply astounding.

Fox News posted an article today that illustrates that ignorance.

The article reports:

Politicians seeking to confiscate guns from Americans shouldn’t share their plans with the public beforehand and should seek to maintain an element of surprise, Joy Behar said on “The View” Monday.

Behar was discussing former 2020 presidential hopeful Beto O’Rourke, a Democrat from Texas, and said it was foolish of him to announce his plans for gun confiscation before he was elected. She advised all politicians to go after the country’s guns after they’ve assumed office.

Co-host Meghan McCain also weighed in on the issue and said O’Rourke has poisoned the well and scared off independent voters from the Democratic party.

“They should not tell everything they’re going to do. If you’re going to take people’s guns away, wait until you get elected — then take the guns away,” she said. “Don’t tell them ahead of time.”

“I will also say that his stance on gun buybacks — Mayor Pete said it was a shiny object that distracts from achievable gun reform,” she said earlier in the interview. “That clip will be played for years… with organizations that try and scare people by saying that Democrats are coming for your guns.

“[Beto] also made some statements about religious institutions getting their tax-exempt status removed from them because they didn’t support same-sex marriage,” McCain continued. “He did a lot of, like, battleground culture war, and he ran as the most left, most woke candidate and look where he ended.”

The Second Amendment is not a cultural issue–it is an integral part of the Bill of Rights, a document written to limit the power of government–not the power of citizens. The ladies on The View need to take a basic civics course.

They Did Get Some Of It Right

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Yesterday The National Review posted an article about the decision by Colt to halt production of AR-15 rifles.

The article reports:

This, from ABC, is a nice example of a news organization deliberately bending the truth in order to advance a narrative that it wishes were true but is not:

Venerable gun manufacturer Colt says it will stop producing the AR-15, among other rifles, for the consumer market in the wake of many recent mass shootings in which suspects used the weapon.

Wow. Sounds dramatic. ABC continues:

“At the end of the day, we believe it is good sense to follow consumer demand and to adjust as market dynamics change,” Dennis Veilleux, president and CEO of Colt, said in a statement. “Colt has been a stout supporter of the Second Amendment for over 180 years, remains so, and will continue to provide its customers with the finest quality firearms in the world.”

So the story is that, although it still respects the Second Amendment, Colt is going to stop producing AR-15s after a series of mass shootings in which they were used. Right?

Wrong. That’s actually not the story at all, as ABC notes further down:

The company did not mention mass shootings in its statement about stopping production and instead blamed the indefinite pause in making the weapon on a “significant excess manufacturing capacity.”

And that is how you take truth and twist it until it leaves a totally false impression. That is the way the current mainstream media operates.

Searching For The Truth Regarding Guns

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Yesterday American Greatness posted an article detailing some of the lies the American people are currently being told about guns.

The article reports:

There’s a lot to unpack here about so-called “assault weapons.” The first challenge is the absence of any fixed legal definition of what constitutes an “assault weapon.” Numerous state laws have defined the phrase as everything from paintball guns to all semiautomatic firearms to Remington 11-87 shotguns, the latter famously used by former presidential candidate John Kerry (D-Mass.) on Labor Day in 2004 to demonstrate his legitimately good trap-shooting skills.

The vague term “assault weapon” is distinct from an assault rifle, however, which refers to a rapid-fire, magazine fed rifle that allows the shooter to select between semiautomatic (requiring you to pull the trigger for each shot), fully automatic (hold the trigger and the gun continuously fires) or three-round-burst modes. Assault rifles are, for all intents and purposes, already banned in the United States. More on that shortly.

The next lie is that the assault weapons ban worked:

Except it didn’t. “There is no compelling evidence that it saved lives,” according to Duke University public policy experts Philip Cook and Kristin Goss. A 2004 Department of Justice study found no evidence the ban had any effect on gun violence, stating “should it be renewed, the ban’s effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best and perhaps too small for reliable measurement.” Other studies have found no statistically significant relationship between “assault” weapons or large-capacity magazine bans and homicide rates.

There is also substantial misunderstanding surrounding what the Assault Weapons Ban, which passed in 1994 and sunset in 2004, actually did. It didn’t ban anyone from owning an “assault-style” (again, an undefined term) weapon. All magazines and weapons produced before the ban were grandfathered in, and some companies actually ramped up production of the soon-to-be-outlawed firearm components, drastically increasing ownership of what lawmakers were seeking to reduce.

The article mentions:

Also, given the frequently cited claim that “assault weapons lead to more murder,” it’s worth pointing out that at least 730,000 AR-15s (not an assault rifle, but more on that in a bit) were manufactured and legally sold while the Assault Weapons Ban was in effect, and the national murder rate declined.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. We are being sold a bill of goods by people who want to take our Second Amendment rights away.

The article concludes with information about the shooting that recently occurred in Odessa, Texas:

The shooter was also prohibited under federal law from owning a firearm because a court previously had found him mentally unfit. He evidently had tried to purchase a gun in January 2014 but failed because the nationwide criminal background check system had flagged the mental health determination.

The federal Firearms Transaction Record, form 4437, required for all gun purchases, asks “have you ever been adjudicated as a mental defective or have you ever been committed to a mental institution?” Falsifying the form is a crime.

It was later revealed the shooter had a criminal record that included pleading guilty to criminal trespassing and evading arrest, both of which are misdemeanors in Texas. He did not receive jail time, but instead got two years of probation.

The Odessa shooting was a horror. But existing laws prevented it from happening sooner. And the fact that he got a gun at all tells us what common sense already teaches: motivated criminals don’t abide by laws.

As my boss, former U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) said recently, the breakdown of the culture is more responsible for mass shootings than the availability of the guns themselves. There are myriad reasons for this, but lawmakers, he noted, need to set a better example for how to treat people before rushing to strip Second Amendment rights from the rest of us.

If guns are illegal, people who follow the law will not have them. If guns are illegal, people who do not follow the law will have them. It’s that simple.

Ignoring Our God-given Rights Enumerated In The U.S. Consitution

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Yesterday Townhall posted an article that illustrates the problem with the ‘red flag’ laws currently being discussed by gun-control advocates. The article tells the story of Jonathan Carpenter, a Florida resident.

The article reports:

According to Ammoland, Jonathan Carpenter received a certified letter from the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services saying his concealed handgun permit had been suspended for “acts of domestic violence or acts of repeat violations.”

Carpenter was forced to go to the Osceola County clerk’s office to have a form filled out stating he wasn’t the person law enforcement was looking for. At that point, the clerk instructed Carpenter to speak with the sheriff’s office.

Ammoland reports:

The Sheriff’s office supplied Carpenter with a copy of the injunction. In the statement, the plaintiff stated that she rented a room out to a “Jonathan Edward Carpenter” and his girlfriend. She alleged that this Carpenter was a drug dealer who broke her furniture and sold her belongings without her permission. He had a gun, and she feared for her life. She was not sure if the firearm was legal or not.

Carpenter had never met the woman in question and never lived at the address listed in the restraining order. Moreover, other than being white, he looked nothing like the man the terrorized the woman.

The man in question is 5’8. Carpenter is 5’11. The alleged drug dealer is 110lbs. Carpenter is over 200. The man has black hair. Carpenter is completely bald. Last but not least, the man in question is covered in tattoos, and Carpenter only has a few.

Even though it was evident they had the wrong man, Carpenter was forced to hand over his firearms. There was no hearing or any kind of court proceeding.

Read those last two sentences again.

The article concludes:

Carpenter’s firearms had to remain in police custody until the plaintiff can say, in court, that he’s not the man that she filed a complaint against. He’d then have to petition the court to get his firearms back…and he would have to bear the cost. Carpenter will get his day in court later this month. 

What’s happening to this man is the exact instance Second Amendment supporters have worried about. This very instant is what we’ve talked about, time and time again. What if Carpenter needed to defend himself between now and his court date? He couldn’t, because the government failed him. He’s having to prove himself innocent in a country where everyone is supposed to be innocent until proven guilty.

The ‘laws’ used to confiscate Mr. Carpenter’s firearms are not constitutional. This nightmare scenario would be frequently repeated if ‘red flag’ laws are passed. Mr. Carpenter is innocent until proven guilty. He was not treated that way.

Watching The Slippery Slope

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Every time a criminal or a crazy person shoots people, the Democrats decide that the gun was the problem. They just don’t seem to be able to focus on the person doing the shooting. There is a total disregard for the purpose and history of the Second Amendment.

Townhall posted an article today about some recent comments by a Democrat candidate for President regarding Americans who own guns.

The article reports:

New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand is one of them and said earlier this week she’s open to putting gun owners who refuse to comply with bogus government “buybacks,” which is simply government confiscation, in prison.

“You don’t want to grandfather in all of the assault weapons all across America. We’d like people to sell them back to the government,” Gillibrand said during an interview with MSNBC. “The point is you don’t want people using assault weapons so the point is ff you’re arrested for using an assault weapon you’re going to be arrested for an aggravated felony. The whole point is when you make it a crime to own an assault weapon then if you are found using it, that would be the issue. It would be part of law enforcement.”

Let’s put this into context. The semi-automatic AR-15 is the most popular rifle in America. The left considers it an “assault rifle.” There are more than 20 million of them owned by Americans across the country. Gillibrand wants to turn every single person who has one into a felon and institute a police state for enforcement.

The article also notes that candidate Kamala Harris is also talking about taking away the right of Americans to own guns. This is obviously unconstitutional, but there are some real questions as to whether our courts are following the Constitution. This is a critical time for gun rights in America.

 

Moving The Goalposts When They Aren’t Winning The Game

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The Democrat loved the Supreme Court before President Trump appointed two Justices. They are concerned now because their allies on the Court are not young, and President Trump is still President despite their best efforts. So, since they can’t seem to get what they want honestly, they are trying to change the rules.

CNS News posted an article today with the headline, “Five Democrats Warn Supreme Court It Could be ‘Restructured;’ Urge It to Drop 2nd Amendment Case.” Wow. Talk about arrogance.

The article reports:

Five Democrat senators have filed a brief with the U.S. Supreme Court, urging it to stay out of a pending Second Amendment case and warning it that a majority of Americans now believe the “Supreme Court should be restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics.”

The case, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. City of New York, is the first major challenge to gun laws since 2010, the senators said.

According to SCOTUS blog, the New York State Pistol and Rifle Association, representing gun owners who live in the city, are challenging the city’s ban on transferring licensed, unloaded guns anywhere outside city limits — including to a weekend home or to a shooting range.

The lower courts upheld those restrictions, so the gun owners took their case to the Supreme Court.

The article continues:

The senators argue that the National Rifle Association and The Federalist Society have “engineered the case” so the Republican-appointed majority will rule in their favor.

“[C]ourts do not undertake political ‘projects.’ Or at least they should not,” Whitehouse, Hirono, Blumenthal, Durbin, and Gillibrand wrote. “Americans are murdered each day with firearms in classrooms or movie theaters or churches or city streets, and a generation of preschoolers is being trained in active-shooter survival drills.

“In the cloistered confines of this Court, notwithstanding the public imperatives of these massacres, the NRA and its allies brashly presume, in word and deed, that they have a friendly audience [on the Court] for their ‘project.’”

Further, the Democrats argue that the gun-transporting restrictions have now been rescinded, making the case moot, yet the plaintiffs “soldier on” with their case.

“The judiciary was not intended to settle hypothetical disagreements,” the brief says. “Rather, the Framers designed Article III courts to adjudicate actual cases and controversies brought by plaintiffs who suffer a real-world harm.”

The Democrats also argue that the Supreme Court is increasingly “political” (now that it has an “engineered” Republican-appointed majority).

“Today, fifty-five percent of Americans believe the Supreme Court is ‘mainly motivated by politics'(up five percent from last year); fifty-nine percent believe the Court is ‘too influenced by politics’; and a majority now believes the ‘Supreme Court should be restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics,'” the brief says.

The senators conclude their brief with a warning about “restructuring” the court, an idea advocated by some of the Democrats running for president:

“The Supreme Court is not well,” they wrote. “And the people know it. Perhaps the Court can heal itself before the public demands it be ‘restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics.’ Particularly on the urgent issue of gun control, a nation desperately needs it to heal.”

Presumably, the court will not be “healed” until a majority of the justices are appointed by Democrats.

When they are out of power, Democrats tend to act like spoiled brats.

The Professionally Offended Often Have No Idea What They Are Talking About

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Yesterday The Daily Wire posted an article about a recent dust-up over a shirt worn by Chris Pratt. The shirt depicted the Gadsden Flag, a Revolutionary War flag.

An article at Yahoo News reported:

The Marvel star’s top shows the American flag with a coiled snake over the top and a message underneath which reads “Don’t Tread On Me.”

The writing and snake combo on its own is depicted on the Gadsden flag; a symbol created by Christopher Gadsden, a Charleston-born brigadier general in the Continental Army.

It came to prominence during the Revolutionary War of the US by colonists who wanted independence from Great Britain.

Although it is one of the symbols and flags used by the U.S. Men’s Soccer Team, over the years the flag has been adopted by Far Right political groups like the Tea Party, as well as gun-toting supporters of the Second Amendment.

It has therefore become a symbol of more conservative and far right individuals and, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission of the US, it also is “sometimes interpreted to convey racially-tinged messages in some contexts.”

Wait a minute. Since when is it far right to support the U.S. Constitution and want smaller government? Note the subtle criticism of those who support the Second Amendment. Also, there is nothing racial about the Gadsden flag. Race was not part of the equation at the time it was designed. The Yahoo News story is injecting opinion into its reporting, giving some basic facts, but misleading the reader.

Aside from the fact that the professionally offended are again trying to put a negative spin on a symbol of our history, Chris Pratt was wearing the shirt to support a pro-veteran nonprofit called the Brain Treatment Foundation.

The article at The Daily Wire reports:

On Facebook, Brain Treatment Foundation posted a photo of Pratt in the T-shirt and said that they were “honored” by the support.

“We are honored to work with the silent warriors who sacrifice greatly so that others may live free, who defend our freedom, who live with honor and by the word of God. These warriors hunt evil to protect our peace, while those who disparage their sacrifices and our nation from behind a computer screen, pretend it doesn’t exist,” the organization said. “We are proud of the American flag and all symbols that represent the freedom brave men and women have shed blood for since the inception of our great country.”

This is another example of the political left criticizing something they know nothing about. Hopefully fewer people are falling for the antics of the professionally offended.