Chronicling the depravities of the State.
Apparently some anti-gunner tried to claim most gun owners weren’t law abiding citizens by pointing out the fact that criminals who use guns are technically gun owners. Robb Allen pulls out the facts and does that math thing to show even considering criminals who use guns most gun owners are still law abiding citizens.
Aren’t facts a bitch? Logic truly is the anti-gunner’s worst nightmare.
An unsurprising story from Africa appeared on the BBC today. Apparently there’s violence in South Sudan. I know what a shocker right? Of course this next part doesn’t make sense:
This is why the south’s semi-autonomous government has launched an ambitious initiative to control the violence.
In Jonglei, the biggest and most violent state in the south, teams of officials have been touring remote areas for the past three months, telling cattle-herders to hand in their guns.
So there’s massive violence and the solution is to… disarm the cattle herders. Yeah because disarmament has worked so well in other countries to curb violence. Wait a minute that’s a complete crock. Disarmament only makes live easier on the lawless who refuse to turn in their arms. That does beg the question why would any of the cattle herder turn in their means of self defense against the lawless? Well because:
Those who refuse face five years in prison or a fine of 20 cows.
The classic government mechanism for disarmament. Give us your guns or we’ll take them and either send you to jail or steal even more of your property. Of course:
“We found people were already fed up with these arms, so they co-operated with the civil authorities,” said Jonglei State Governor Kuol Manyang.
I’m guessing the reason you’ve found co-operative people isn’t because those people are sick of their guns but because you’re forcing them to turn in their guns. When citizens do this in place of government it’s called theft.
Holy shit! According to Days of our Trailers it’s actually possible to commit mass murder in places that ban guns. No I’m not talking through the usual mechanism of illegally obtained guns but through the mechanism of other weapons. A man in Beijing murdered eight children with a knife.
I thought the anti-gunners said this kind of thing is only possible because of easy access to firearms.
Days of our Trailers demonstrates the difference between a real protest and some homeless anti-gunners standing around.
Good news fellow Minnesotans! Representative Paymar’s bill to eliminate your right to sell your personal firearms without begging the government for permission was shut down with a five to three vote by the Crime Victims/Criminal Records Sub-Committee. Of course HF1396 was able to move through.
Now we get to wait yet again for Paymar to get a bug up his ass about Minnesotans have the right to private property. He’ll try to get his bill through again one way or another. Unless of course he gets voted out which will hopefully happen this election.
No not for the usual reasons such as Japan’s overly strict gun laws. But when I read this article on a Cold War era treaty Japan had that allowed nuclear armed United State’s naval units to port the following exert struck me:
The secret pact is controversial because after World War II and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan adopted the three “non-nuclear principles” – not making or possessing nuclear weapons, nor allowing them on to its soil.
Now I’m the first person to say nuclear weapon proliferation is a bad idea (Although we in the United States have no right to tell other countries they can’t build or own them). The things are vicious but if everybody else has them you really need to as well less you get nuked and not have a method of retaliation (Mutually assured destruction is the only reason I believe the Cold War stayed cold).
But Japan’s mentality mirrors that of some anti-gun and anti-self defense advocates. The idea is to blame the devices not those who are wielding it. For instance some people who are mugged at gun point becomes advocates for banning firearms since they incorrectly believe that will disarm the criminals and make streets safer. Japan seemed to develop the same attitude towards nuclear weapons. Since they got nuked they decided that ensuring there are no nukes in their country will prevent them from getting nuked again.
I just found that interesting since I’d imagine the only country to be nuked in a time of war would like a means of ensuring it doesn’t happen again (Once again mutually assured destruction). But of course this piece was also interesting:
The secret deal was sealed in the 1960s between US and Japanese diplomats, who agreed that the transit of nuclear arms through ports did not constitute the introduction of weapons into Japan, and so did not require prior consultation on the US side.
Much like anti-gunners are willing to call the police to be a proxy of violence Japan seemed just fine with our nuclear capable ships being in their waters. If Japan was so dead set against nukes you would think they would be angry about anybody having them. But it’s easier to take the moral high road when you can decry violence while still having somebody defend you if somebody brings violence upon you.
What do you do if you don’t have facts and logic on your side? Claim the other side has a small penis of course! Now that’s showing tact.
Just a funny thing that happened this weekend. It was one of my friend’s birthdays. This friend is also adamantly anti-gun. Of course the topic of guns briefly came about and eventually the following paraphrase was said:
Burg I’m not going to debate you. You argue with facts and I’d need to prepare for a debate with you.
That made me feel pretty good. Remember kids learning your facts is important because anti-gunners don’t know what to use to combat such terrible things. They need time to prepare for such frontal assaults.
Yes this is a pretty pointless post but hey it’s my site and I get to make pointless posts if I want to.
I’m been harping about Representative Paymar’s attempt to destroy the property rights of gun owners here in Minnesota. Well since my place of business gets a subscription to the Star Tribune I thought I’d check the Letters to the Editor section and see if anybody wrote about it. Two people did and they obviously don’t understand private property either. The first was written by Stephen Harlan-Marks of Robbinsdale:
Before gun lovers get the idea that state Rep. Michael Paymar’s gun show bill would take rifles from hunters or even handguns from those who feel they need them for protection (“Effort to tighten Minnesota’s gun law getting folks riled up,” March 3), let’s be clear about the bill’s objective. How many Minnesotans think anyone who wishes should be allowed to walk into a gun show and buy 10 AK-47s without a background check, much less a look at the terror watch list? I can’t imagine anyone needing sort of firepower to shoot pheasants or even to ward off a would-be burglar.
The second letter was penned by Peter Clark of Roseville:
Interesting and shocking: On the front page, an article about how upset some people would be if they had to get a permit to buy a gun at a gun show. Then on the first page of the Twin Cities section, the headline “‘Please don’t kill nobody else'”. Maybe gun advocates should pause and think about what they would say if one of their family members were shot down. Remember, guns don’t kill people — people with guns kill people. Thank you, Rep. Paymar, for wanting to set things right. It’s far too easy to get guns today.
So to counter the ignorance I sent the following letter:
After reading a couple letters to the editor dealing with Representative Paymar’s “gun show” bill I believe several facts need to be stated. First and foremost this bill isn’t about gun shows it’s about private sales. Here in Minnesota if I want to sell a firearm, my personal property, I may do so without going through a federally licensed dealer. Paymar’s bill is an attempt to eliminate that right. Private individuals are not allowed to use the FBI’s NICS background check system therefore, if this bill passes, anybody in Minnesota who wants to sell a firearm would have to pay a federally licensed dealer to perform the background check and do the transfer.
The reason gun shows are brought into this is because people will go to gun shows to sell their firearms. However a massive majority of people selling firearms at gun shows are federally licensed dealers and therefore must perform background checks. Additionally a private individual can only sell so many firearms before the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) considers that person to be “in the business” and thus must obtain a federal firearms license. So you will not have private individuals selling “10 AK-47s” at a gun show.
Let’s look at a few other facts. The ATF did a study where they concluded that less than 2% of firearms obtained by criminals were purchased at gun shows. Furthermore background checks do not prevent anything. The killers at Virginia Tech and Fort Hood both used legally purchased firearms from federally licensed dealers. This means background checks were performed on both killers.
Finally the number of guns being purchased by Minnesotans has skyrocketed while our rate of violent crime has been plummeting. In this environment why is there a need to add further government interference and burden to the lives on Minnesotans?
Of course being the paper’s nickname is the Red Star for a reason I doubt mine will ever get printed.
A couple of sources are releasing summaries of the oral arguments today. The first one is Business Week’s write up which can be found here. SCOTUS Blog also has a write up.
Both seem to come to the same conclusion. It appears that incorporation though the privileges or immunities clause of the 14th amendment isn’t likely. On the upside it seems likely incorporation will happen but through the due process clause of the same amendment.
Getting incorporation period is a huge victory and I’m not going to be to picky on how we do it.