Words
I've been saying for years that controlling the language is where gunowners get their ass kicked. The anti's effectively distort a name or phrase and use that to wedge public opinion against us, or political opinion in some cases. So in light of that:
Statetriot: noun One who loves his/her government. Rhymes with patriot but is its antonym.
Law abiding gun owner: Gun owners who obey even the most burdensome, immoral, unconstitutional laws. Often concurrent but not necessarily synonymous with American.
Gunowner control: A more accurate, if somewhat awkward description of efforts to impose and hinder the Right to own and carry weapons, specifically firearms.
Stormtrooper Logic
I've often heard gunowners say that they don't mind licensing or permit systems. When it's pointed out that those are often the tools use to create a registry the reply usually is some form of denial "they'll never do that" or a shrugging off of the danger. To wit, their argument goes something like, "They can register me, just as long as they don't register my guns. See, that way if they do come to my house I'll just tell them I lost the one gun I owned in a boating accident. since the gun ain't registered there's no way they'll know".
Here's the problem - it's not that they wouldn't believe ya - they. wouldn't. care. If it came down to confiscation, door to door, and your name was on a list they wouldn't be looking to just take away your guns; they'd be looking to take away you. If such a situation occurred, where government employees were using a list to disarm everyone who wasn't a government employee, all that would matter would be that your name is on a list. Sure, it'd be nice if they went all Imperial Stormtrooper on ya ("This one's locked; move on to the next one") but that'd be just as likely as a cop today letting you go despite the warrant with your name on it just because you told him "Those parking tickets aren't mine - I sold that car and I guess they didn't get their own license plates yet".
Out-Democrated
On the potential banning of certain loadings of 5.56x45 ammo (Legal Insurrection has a good summary of this situation if you've somehow missed it): you cannot work with these people. ATFEIEIO, Million Moms, Bloomie the Hut, et al, They can't be appeased. There's been a suggestion of a simple fix involving just inserting a few words into the section of united states Code that contains the GCA of 68 (from whence all this mess comes from). Son, you just can't out-democrat a democrat.
Look at this post from David Hardy. He points out that the GCA as it's written and codified right damn now would not give the ATFEIEIO the power to ban this particular loading of 5.56x45. Yet, they're trying to do it anyway. Last I heard it was illegal for a tax agency to use its authority to punish groups based upon political leanings. I hear tell it's not permissible to have an international arms smuggling ring without the approval of congress. I could go on, but you get the idea - the government does illegal things all the damned time. So changing a few words will result in them magically towing the line? Nope. As long as there are words giving them power to do something, they'll distort it to serve their interests.
Changing a few words won't do a damn thing but give their P.R. team a few hours overtime that week as they explain why doing whatever the hell they wanted to do in the first place is still legal. The only way to stop them legislatively is to use an eraser, not a pen. Repeal the damn GCA of 68. Anything less means you're about to be out-democrated.
It's Massey's Fault
If Ohio Ordnance decides to make a B.A.R. pistol, and the ATFEIEIO uses that as an excuse to ban ALL .30-06 ammo, then it's the ATFEIEIO's fault, not Ohio Ordnance. "But, they knew if they made that pistol it'd be used as an excuse...".
Pizza delivery drivers can only carry so much cash, like $20 (in theory - this is never the case in practice). The idea is that if a driver gets robbed, the thief only gets away with a Jackson. If the pay-off were more, then robberies would increase. Or, so the logic goes. So, if a driver gets robbed and has a fresh Benji on him is he putting other people at risk?
Nope. A wrong action is the fault of the wrong actor or actors. Both thieves in each of those situations is wrong - the ATFEIEIO for depriving anyone the use and possession of arms, and the private sector thief for taking property without the owners' consent. If a slave mouths off about not liking slavery all that much, and the massey whips all the slaves using that as an excuse it. is. not. the. slaves. fault. It's the massey's fault, for A: being a massey and B: using force in a punitive manner without the other person's consent. Blame the damn massey, and those that try to emulate him, not whomever they use as an excuse to validate their wrong doing.
By all means, live in what you solidly proclaim as reality and deride folks for being too principled to accomplish anything, but don't fall for that collectivist earworm that tells you that if you annoyed the teacher by asking for help with your macaroni art and she makes the whole class take a nap cause she's hungover and just not in the mood to deal with a bunch of whiny kids that somehow this is anything less than out and outright wrong. In other words, someone doing something wrong is never justifiable by blaming the actions on someone else. It is likewise wrong to blame the person whom the bad actor uses as justification.
To put it yet another damn way (cause this is an important enough point that I'll risk annoying both my readers by hammering it in) the proper response to an increase in the number of rapes occurring in a public park is to catch or kill the rapists - not necessarily in that order. An improper response is to deride any young lady for her choice of attire, no matter how skimpy, as she strolls through said park.
Re: ciprocity
The idea of national reciprocity for concealed carry permit holders (which I've written about here) may be tempting to some, but it's another example of out-democrattng a democrat (see above) - it just won't happen like ya hope. Obama won't sign a clean bill for that. The only thing that may - may - get it through would be something pallatable to the other side. I'm sure Obama, no matter how much he'd put on a public grimace, would really dig signing a national reciprocity bill into law if it contained a national Universal Background Check amendment. See, the anti's don't care about reciprocity. They say they do, and some probably do, but very few would turn down a chance at a national registration scheme. Reciprocity for permit holders? Pfff. That's gunowner registration, wrapped up in a neat little federal package. Hell, there's a chance some antigunowners would dig having the reciprocity bill by itself, as that would be the groundwork for a federal register of firearm carriers. They'd be halfway to their goal with that alone. A UBC would just be icing on the cake.
It'd work like this - to better facilitate communications, so some New Jersey cop wouldn't have to call Alabama at 3 a.m. when he's mid-traffic stop, a national database of CCW holders would be established. That way, the cop just pings the feds database to make sure a permit is valid. States would enter the data into the federal system and keep it updated much like the way most states do so with their own state based system.
And what you have is a federal database of gunowners. Not all, but it's a start. A damned good one. the theory being (at least from the confiscationist's viewpoint) that the more serious, politically active gunowners would be the ones who jumped through the hoops, bowed their knee to the state, paid the
So national reciprocity isn't the holy grail some gunowners act like it is. In fact it can be dangerous in the long run. And let us not forget, we have the Right to own and carry weapons. The 2nd article in the Bill of Rights enumerates that. It does not say a permit or license is required. So since states have long ignored the carry provision in the 2nd amendment, what makes you think that they'll act any damn different when ti comes to a federal law saying they can't make a permit holder not carry in their territory? Didn't the FOPA of 86 say states couldn't arrest someone for peaceably passing through with guns in their luggage? Yet how many nightmare stories have we heard of from NJ and NY because some gunowner got arrested and convicted while under FOPA protection?
Want national reciprocity? Then demand national constitutional carry. You know, like what's in the constitution.
Show Nuff
A person may write letters to their congresscritter. They may do research in some area. They may give money to some organization or fund.They may organize a petition. They may sign a petition. They may testify before a committee. They may show up with or without a sign to protest or support some effort. Most people can't do all that. While it's important to encourage folks to do more, it's good to realize that if a person does something it's much better than nothing. If they only do one of those things, instead of getting frustrated at them, be kinda grateful that they're at least doing that one thing, instead of nothing. By all means, encourage them to do more, but encourage has a much different flavor than trying to guilt or shame folks into doing what you think they should be doing. One will be just as effective or ineffective as the other approach, but the former is far less stressful on you than the latter.
It's Massey's Fault - House Retro Iced Tea Rub A Dub Step Mix
If a bill did not pass out of a committee, it is not the fault of someone whose actions you disapprove of. If a law that further imposes upon our Rights gets enacted, it is not the fault of someone whose words you thought did not wax poetic enough. It's the fault of the damn legislators. No one else's. Group punishment is a very old model, and one that gunowners should not fall for. So if Person A, whose goals and methods bear a passing resemblance to Person B, gets negative attenmtion somehow and is used as an excuse to deny Person B his Rights, then why the hell don't ya blame the person that is actually responsible - the legislator! - instead of said politicians scapegoat (Person A)?
Whatever open carrier is used as an excuse for not passing a pro-gunowner law or for passing an anti-gunowner law, it's the legislature to blame, not the open carrier. If you don't like his tactics, then talk with him and try to change his mind. If that fails, then accept that different people approach problems in a different manner. Also accept that we ain't all in this together. I know a lot of gunowners who'd leave me on the side of the road if they got national reciprocity, a guaranteed low permit fee, and maybe sound suppressors being a $5 tax and instant background check away. I know some that would settle for far less. Whereas I want an end to all prior restraint based gunowner control laws. No restrictions on owning or carrying anything. So my goals are different than the goals of other gunowners. I think this same difference is at the heart of the folks blaming other gunowners for this or that. After all, a different method is used to get 5 yards to the 50 yard line than one used to get to the end zone that's 55 yards away. Some folks are happy on the 50. Others want the end zone.
Blame the legislator. Or legislature. That guy with a gun yelling about treason and his Rights being infringed - he didn't do anything to you, other than become used as an excuse by folks who weren't really your friends anyway (that'd be the legislators, btw). If you want to deride him for being "not politically smart" or for "not helping" I can't stop you. Though, I see no reason for one gunowner to turn on another if they both want the same thing, that thing being freedom. But if you just want the army to show up and stand there until you've negotiated like a bunch of Scottish lords from a badly a-historic Mel Gibson flick, then perhaps you shouldn't be so appalled when someone with less politically savvy (and a few more vertebrae) than you have shows up, wanting to pick a fight and maybe, just maybe win back his freedom.
In closing, just in case it slipped anyone's mind:
Appeasement is for chumps.
1 comment:
-slow clap-
Bravo.
Post a Comment