Wednesday, November 26, 2003

Think you're safe from the Patriot Act on the net? Think again.

"A bill approved by Congress last week to extend the reach of the Patriot Act would expand the FBI's business document and transaction power to cyberspace stations like eBay, Internet logs, and Internet service providers, and without requiring a judge's approval."

I'm not that concerned about the Patriot Act itself, as it mainly just extends pre-existing powers in the name of terrorism. What concerns me is that government has those powers in the first place. So the Patriot Act is very similar to giving beer to teenage boys that already have whiskey & car keys. Still I hate to see anything expanded in the direction of the Net, as it will most likely have a chilling effect (to some degree) on activities that were previously thought to be beyond the reach of The Man.
Larry Pratt of GOA talks about the abuse of science at the FBI:

"Whitehurst also found that the FBI laboratory would often break a chain of evidence, thus making it impossible to prove that the "evidence" had not been planted. In some cases, it was planted. One example was that of the crime scene at Ruby Ridge, Idaho where U.S. Marshals and an FBI sharpshooter murdered a mother and her son and wounded two other family members. The physical record of the firefights did not support the depositions of the Marshals and FBI Agents, so one bullet was planted in a key spot to frame a family member and make it seem like he had been involved in the firefight when, in fact, he had not. Unfortunately for the government's case, the bullet was planted in two different directions in two different photographs."

"The bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City resulted in the conviction of two perpetrators. Excluded from the stand were any witnesses who could not be dissuaded from reporting that they had seen middle eastern-looking men with Timothy McVeigh. "Working backwards" by one of the FBI's incompetent bomb experts, Dave Williams, excluded any investigation into why columns of the building collapsed which could not have been toppled by a fertilizer bomb parked on the street."

There's more. Check it out for yourself.
Sen. Lautenberg is pushing a bill to make sure terrorists don't get firearms. Sounds okay, right?

"The Act would:
Require the maintenance of records for certain handgun transfers to coincide with the current Homeland Security Advisory System during heightened terrorist risk; and
Close loopholes that have allowed terrorists to acquire firearms Strengthen the regulatory controls and enforcement of gun dealers who violate gun laws Implementing this rational approach to gun regulations for the security of our Nation is of paramount importance and needs to be addressed now before another disaster occurs."


What the first part means is that while the Homeland Security Advisory System is at yellow or higher, then gun buyers would be subjected to greater scrutiny & the FBI would have 20 business days to conduct the background check. So it could take 4 weeks as oppossed to 3 days before they get back to you & unlike the current system where you can buy the firearm if they don't respond one way or the other within 3 days, you would not be able to make the purchase until they sent approval. Hell if you start the paperwork to purchase a firearm on February 1rst they could make you wait until March 1rst as february only has 20 business days in a non-leap year.

BTW, the Homeland Security Advisory System has not dropped below yellow since its inception & I doubt it ever will. So the chances of it staying at green for 180 days & allowing us to revert back to the current system are slim.

The second part just means he would outlaw all private transactions concerning firearms - or as many as he can get away with - while making it tougher for licensed gun dealers to stay in business.

So the same old spin is used to push a gun control bill. Nothing new here at all.

He goes on to list some reasons why this reform is so badly needed:

"An al-Qaeda training manual recovered in Afghanistan entitled 'How Can I Train Myself for Jihad,' advised terrorists to 'obtain assault weapons legally' in the United States because firearms are readily available and gun laws are enforced inadequately."

He doesn't seem to be concerned that there's a black market where they could obtain weapons much easier than going through the "legal" channels. Nor does he seem to recall that firearms don't seem to be the weapon of choice amongst terrorists. Car bombs & box cutters used to hijack planes & turn them into missiles have been much more common implements of terrorism.

"On the evening of the September 11th terrorist attack, a federal jury convicted Ali Boumelhem, a known member of the terrorist group Hezbollah on seven counts of weapons charges and conspiracy to ship weapons and ammunition to Lebanon."

Note the subtle reference to September the 11th. He doesn't go into detail about it as it would not support his case, but he wants you to get emotional at the thought & be more susceptible to his BS.

But the guy was being charged with shipping weapons overseas? I'd have thought Lautenberg would've been happy that guns were leaving the U.S.

"In 1997, Ali Abu Kamal bought a Beretta handgun from a gun shop which he used to open fire on tourists on the observation deck of the Empire State Building in New York City. Kamal killed one person and wound six others. Although he was not a U.S. citizen, Kamal was able to purchase the Beretta handgun only 37 days after his arrival in the U.S. by using a motel receipt as proof of residency."

He fails to point out that the Empire State Building - like the rest of NYC - is a victim disarmament zone. The reason Kamal did as much damage was that he had no opposition; his victims were disarmed by the same type of bastards as Lautenberg is. Nor does he mention that if Kamal had been denied a firearm at the gun store he could have purchased one on damn near any street corner.

"Last year, John Muhammad and John Malvo terrorized the Washington DC area for more than three weeks as they embarked on a shooting spree with a sniper rifle, murdering 13 innocent people before being caught. The sniper rifle was a Bushmaster XM15 rifle that was missing from the Bull's Eye Shooter Supply in Tacoma, Washington, but was never reported to local, state or federal authorities."

First of all, an AR-15 is a sniper rifle? Perhaps when compared to a flintlock musket.
Speaking of flintlocks, Iwonder if Lautenberg knows that they could have achieved the same rate of fire & the same level of accuracy had they used a flintlock with a rifled barrel? One shot per victim at a range of a little over 100 yards at most; almost any muzzleloading rifle can do the same thing. But to bring that up would blow the "sniper rifle" or "assault weapon" angle, wouldn't it?

& the firearm was stolen. What does he expect his bill to do; make stealing guns illegal again? Maybe if it's only illegal once that's not a deterent but if it's illegal twice then murderers will choose another weapon rather than doubke break a law? No; Lautenberg wants every gun store held ridiculously responsible for any crime that is committed with any weapon they sell even if that weapon is stolen. It's just a first step towards shutting down licensed gun dealers completely.

Here is the text of The Homeland Security Gun Safety Act of 2003.

In addition to what I've already pointed out, this bill would deal with explosives as well. Whereas under 50 pounds was the criteria in Section 845(a)(5) of title 18, United States Code, Lautenberg's bill would alter that to under 5 pounds.

& perhaps the most disturbing of all:

"There are authorized to be appropriated for fiscal year 2004--
(1) $50,000,000 to hire not less than 500 new inspectors within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, Department of Justice; and
(2) $100,000,000 to hire not less than 1000 new agents within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, Department of Justice."


500 BATF inspectors & 100 new BATF agents. At $100,000 a piece no less. Of course there salary would presumably be about half that & the rest would go into training & such. But spending $0.01 on a BATF agent is too damned much.

& yes, I know they're the BATFE now - but they'll always be tax boys with delusions of granduere to me so I omit the "E" on purpose.

So that's what happens when a state court disregards its own laws in order to allow a candidate they favor participate in an election. For those of you unaware, the NJ Supreme Court ruled that since it would deprive the people of NJ of a choice in the election, then Lautenberg could have his name on the ballot. This despite it violating NJ law for him to have enetered the race so late & despite the numerous third party candidates on teh ballot. But what do you expect from a state who views a .22 as an assault weapon?

So don't be fooled by Lautenberg's BS: this is simply more gun control under the guise of fighting terrorism. If they were serous about fighting terrorism then passengers wouldn't have been so disarmed that men with boxcutters could take them hostage & use their planes as weapons. So when they say it's about security, remember it's the government's security, not the people's that they are concerned with.