Chronicling the depravities of the State.
Wow the National Rifle Association (NRA) Convention this year is expected to have 65,000 people in attendance. The area tourism industry expects $23.7 million to be spent by these 65,000 people. How’s that for a stimulus plan?
How many people attended the last Brady Campaign event? Did it even break the double-digits? Who knows, they certainly aren’t bragging about their numbers. Yet another reason why we win, we far outnumber them. We’re also good for local economies to boot.
Regardless of what Josh Sugarman if the Violence Policy Center claim it appears as though gun companies are doing well. As Sebastian points out Smith and Wesson may appear to not be doing so well but it isn’t due to firearms:
Now to be fair, it wasn’t Smith & Wesson’s firearms division that misfired. In fact, revenue from the company’s primary division climbed to $79.2 million from $74.7 million a year earlier. The drag on Smith came from its perimeter security division, which saw a 38% drop in revenue as businesses and the government spent less on its perimeter security systems.
Oh and Ruger appears to be pretty happy as well:
In the case of Sturm Ruger, makers of the Ruger brand pistols, rifles and shotguns, the company has hit the earnings bullseye. In February, it posted fourth-quarter earnings of 30 cents a share on strong sales of $64.1 million. Both top- and bottom-line numbers bested Wall Street expectations.
And here Josh Sugarman promised all this anti-gunner buddies that the firearms industry was failing.
Let’s say you’re the head of an organization that has shown to be completely ineffective in its mission. You ineffectiveness has been demonstrated so often that you can no longer hide it and now donations from believers in your cause are drying up. What is one last desperate maneuver you can make in the hopes of staving off death? Well, if You’re the Brady Campaign you claim the President is passing super secret gun control laws:
During the meeting, President Obama dropped in and, according to Sarah Brady, brought up the issue of gun control, “to fill us in that it was very much on his agenda,” she said.
“I just want you to know that we are working on it,” Brady recalled the president telling them. “We have to go through a few processes, but under the radar.”
This could be an effective strategy to drum up money because it makes it appear as though the Brady Campaign has influence with the President and the results of this influence will go unnoticed but will accomplish a desired goal. Basically this strategy would allow the Brady Campaign to make up success. Instead of having to point at newly passed laws to demonstrate success the Brady Campaign could use changing Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) regulations as “under the radar” gun control measures influenced by none other than the Brady Campaign. This isn’t as hard to do either as the ATF is rather schizophrenic about their regulations and like to change them on a whim without actually telling anybody.
Unfortunately for them pro-gun people keep a constant eye on them and call their organization out when they try to make idiotic maneuvers like this. Sorry Sarah Brady but we caught this little attempt to appear relevant.
Miguel over at Gun Free Zone noted something kind of funny; the deceptively named Mayors Against Illegal Guns is being deceptive by claiming their truck would tour Miami at one time but showed up at another. Are they worried about a little counter-protesting or maybe the truck of truth pulling up behind them? Who knows but being deceptive certainly is par for the course with Bloomberg’s little organization.
Carry laws are in place in every state except Wisconsin and Illinois. To this day no evidence can be brought forth demonstrating these laws have lead to an increase in violent crime but much evidence exists demonstrating these laws correlate with a lowering in violent crime. Yet the Brady Campaign continues to warn about the “blood in the streets” that’s inevitable when carry laws are passed. Why are these people still clinging to their failed belief that guns are the problem? Because not doing so will cause them to lose their Joyce Foundation funding and then they would have to go find real jobs.
Now that Illinois is looking to life their pointless prohibition against allowing serfs citizens to carry handguns the Brady Campaign is throwing a tantrum:
Proponents of the legislation say concealed carry arms responsible, trained citizens and make people safer. But McCarthy says it would only put more guns in the street.
“It’s my personal feeling that the proliferation of handguns is not the way to go,” he told MyFox Chicago. “And I know the gang members will still get their guns and criminals will still get their guns. But remember in Illinois you can own a gun in your home, you just can’t carry it in your purse and in person.”
So McCarthy doesn’t even have an argument. He openly states that criminals will still carry guns and thus admits to the fact that this law only prohibits the law-abiding peasants. I also noticed he put forth no alternative solution that would allow a citizen to protect himself from a violent attacker. Perhaps he believes somebody being violently attacked should just call the police and hope they decide to come by before he’s murdered.
The bottom line is carry permits have been nothing but beneficial. There hasn’t been a single valid argument made against passing liberalized (in the classical sense of the word) carry laws. So far no “blood in the streets” instance have occurred and frankly the laws have been on the books in some states for decades. You would think the anti-gunners would wake up and realize nothing they’ve said has come true and thus their argument has no weight. Then again for most anti-gunners their argument is emotional and logic can go take a flying fuck and a rolling doughnut.
I wish I could make up terminology just like the anti-gunners. Take the following e-mail released by the Brady Campaign (yeah they’re still around):
Yup they’re calling standard capacity magazines “assault clips” now. First off I don’t know how well a 32 round clip is going to work. Most clips hold between 5 and 10 rounds because pushing more into a magazine is a bitch. Hell Looking at the M-14 Army manual they have a section on how to use clips to load magazines and none of them are all that easy.
Wait, now I’m confused because the e-mail says the Tuscon shooter used “high capacity ammunition magazines” but the Brady Campaign is calling for a ban on “assault clips.” Wow… if you’re going to call for a ban on something at least call for a ban on the thing you claim a bad person used.
My favorite part about a magazine ban is the fact law enforcement and military are exempt. Combine that with this quote from the e-mail:
The only people who want to shoot 32 bullets in 16 seconds are the last people who should.
I’m inclined to agree. I don’t think the police or military should have this type of firepower available to them. Therefore I’m making a decree that all magazines of an arbitrarily large size should be clearly stamped “For Civilian Use Only.” Since the police and military are exempt from the magazine ban bill they must want to shoot 32 bullets in 16 seconds and thus, according to the Brady Campaign, are the last people who should be able to.
I often accuse anti-gunners of making shit up and being overall disconnected with reality. These accusations are pretty easy to backup as well. Let’s take Josh Horowitz of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence who recently stated:
Following Hurricane Katrina, the NRA promoted a conspiracy theory about mass gun confiscations in Katrina and compared New Orleans officials to Mao, Stalin and Hitler.
As pointed out over at Self-Defense, Survival & Preparedness Daily it’s not a conspiracy theory when it has actually happened. After Hurricane Katrina struck the National Guard performed massive gun confiscations leaving many residents completely defenseless against the criminal entity of New Orleans. These guns have yet to be returned which is why the National Rifle Association has outstanding lawsuits to retrieve the property that was stolen by the government.
But the Horowitz has to find a way to drum up hatred of the “evil gun lobby” (you have to hold a lit flashlight under your chin when you say that) in order to get some inkling of funding for his failing enterprise of anti-rights propaganda.
Days of Our Trailers reports on the apparent removal of Peter Hamm from the Brady Campaigns list of employees. Are the rats fleeing the sinking ship? Can the Brady Campaign no longer afford to pay senior staff? Are senior staff members no longer able to cope with the complete ignorance of reality required for their job? Who knows but it’s not looking good for them.
The anti-gunners in Switzerland have been pushing to bar those performing militia service from keeping their issued rifle at home. Somehow these anti-gun prats were able to get a referendum on the ballot which failed:
Neutral Switzerland is among the best-armed nations in the world, with more guns per capita than almost any other country except the U.S., Finland and Yemen.
At least 2.3 million weapons lie stashed in basements, cupboards and lofts in this country of less than 8 million people, according to the Geneva-based Small Arms Survey.
On Sunday, Swiss voters made sure it stays that way, rejecting a proposal to tighten the peaceful Alpine nation’s relaxed firearms laws.
Unlike here Switzerland has mostly a homogeneous and wealthy population meaning their violent crime is quite a bit lower than ours. Due to this the anti-gunners there can’t make the claim that guns cause crime so they have to resort to a different tactic, claiming guns cause suicidal tenancies and trying to establish a connection between these guns and domestic abused:
Martine Brunschwig-Graf, a national lawmaker with the left-of-centre Social Democratic Party, blamed the defeat of the measure on women’s reluctance to vote on an issue she says affects them most.
Women are the main victims of domestic violence, and are also the ones left behind when their fathers, husbands or boyfriends commit suicide with an army weapon, she said.
About a quarter of Switzerland’s 1,300 suicides each year involve a gun, and those calling for tighter rules claim military weapons, such as the army-issued SG 550 assault rifle, are used in between 100 and 200 suicides a year.
Also apparently it’s the fault of Swiss women for not showing up and voting on this measure that caused it to fail. Of course only men perform mandatory service in the Swiss militia so it makes sense that a higher portion of men would show up to vote on this particular subject.
I’m glad to see the Swiss people are still willing to fight for their right to keep and bear arms. I love being able to point to at least one well armed European country. I like the fact that there exists a homogeneous and mostly wealthy population that’s well armed, it demonstrates that gun ownership rates do not have a correlation with violent crime.
Of course when I bring up Switzerland in an argument with an anti-gunner they always claim the country is a corner case just like Finland. I guess that’s what you have to resort to when your argument has no legs to stand upon.
Obama gave his State of the Union Speech last night and you know what he didn’t talk about? Gun control. Hey Brady Campaign and Mayors Against Illegal Guns… wah wah.
It’s OK though the only reason Obama isn’t addressing your issue is because he’s afraid of us gun owners all campaigning for the other guy next election season.