No, sqweels, “they” (you do know that you’re painting with a 4-million-plus person paintbrush, yes?) don’t go ballistic at every proposed piece of gun control legislation; “they” go ballistic at every piece of legislation proposed by the Brady Bunch (good term, I’ll use it) that places the onus on the law abiding citizen, instead of upon law enforcement to apprehend, prosecute and incarcerate people who criminally misuse firearms, or traffick in them to restricted parties.
“They” go ballistic when another piece of crap proposed bill that’s nothng more than a thinly disguised attempt to put legitimate, law-abiding gun owners over the barrel for another round of administrative anal rape. The founders of HCI boasted publicly in the late 60’s ('68 or '69) after the passage of the Gun Control Act (thank you again, King George!) that it was only a matter of time before they had done away with public ownership of firearms in the USA.
After severe public backlash from grassroots Americans and the American Government (all three branches), they publicly boasted that they would incrementally whittle away at gun ownership with moderated words “couched always as reasonable” to do away with public gun ownership.
That “somebody is lying” jab is correct: it’s the Brady Bunch, Rosie, Susan, Schumer, Feinstein and a few more, and they’re doing it through their teeth.
CaptMurdoh’s sarcastic jobe at gun owers is just one more example of ignorant public perception gone awry. He seems to be implying that only rural militants own guns and would be willing to use them against “government gone awry.”
As a member of the “gun culture” for 29 years, I’ve met more lawyers, scientists, engineers, military personnel (commissioned and noncommissioned officers) and MBAs in gun clubs, gun shows, shooting ranges and NRA meeting than Cletus McRednecks. Polls and surveys be damned, I’ve lived, breathed and fired guns in and around other gun owners more than most other Americans; I know the “truth” about guns and gun owners.
We are to the greatest degree (easily 99% +) peaceful, law abiding, tax paying citizens; we salute the flag, respect law enforcement officers and public servants, and believe fervently in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. We believe and practice safe, responsible gun ownership.
We also believe that the government is limited in what it is supposed to, and can, do. It has no business dictating excessive, increasingly restrictive infringements in our rights as citizens; especially when it’s thinly disguised PC pablum to appease a few hand-wringing, bed-wetting hoplophobes.
CaptMurdoch does make an excellent point that a stand-up fight against the American military would end in a quick and ignomious death for any nominal “freedom fighters,” and that alternative tactics wouls also be in order to compliment traditional guerilla tactics. But just look at what a few dozen poorly armes, scarcely trained Jews did in the Warsaw Ghetto against the might of the Third Reich. Yes, they perished; what they undertook was too little, too late. But the impact! Tying up an entire Army for three weeks! Think of what they could have done with decent carbines and rifles, with a stockpile of ammo, some training, and time to plan. Neither Guderian or Rommel could’ve taken Warsaw w/o making it look like Dresden after the 8th got done with it.
Which kind of defeats the purpose, but not if you don’t mind fighting the fight and maybe sacrificing yourself for what you believe in, as most good soldiers do.
But to preclude such an unpleasant state of affairs, I, and 3,999,999+ of my fellow NRA members (plus the good folks at the Second Amendment Foundation, The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Jews for the Preservation of Firearm Ownership, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, oh, the list goes on-and-on) resist the incremental encroachment of our right to keep and bear.
We are not averse to any and all gun control legislation; we are against any and all guin control legislation that further erodes our rights; right to privacy (registration and licensing), mandatory storage (4th amendment, anyone?) and so on.
Contrary to the liberal establishments unflattering portrayal of gun owners as ignorant, dirty, vicious rednecks (who wants their wimmin’s docile, barefoot and pregnant; who wants the darkies and other mud people “in their proper place;” who think that the Masons/Illuminati/Trilateral Commission/Space Aliens/Elvis are behind some One World New World Order conspiracy), almost every gun owner I’ve met in the last 29 years of my life were fairly libertarian in their general outlook, favoring personal liberty generally, inspite of personal views.
Like I am generally against abortion (just on general principle) but support the pro-choice groups; I find most pornography distasteful, but I support the right of Hugh Heffner and Larry Flynn (?) to publish their magazines; I don’t do drugs, and don’t particularly like them on principle (I’m talking things like cocaine and heroin), but believe that our War on Drugs is more dangerous to our liberties than the drugs and their users themselves are.
And I am NOT unique as a gun owner.
What I find interesting (both AZCowboy and author John Ross got me to thinking about this) is that anti-gunners cite U.S. v. Miller as the definitive personal right/collective right ruling on the issue, when in reality it simply didn’t recognize Jack Miller’s claim that his sawed-off shotgun was for militia purposes, as it wasn’t within their judicial notice that such an implement was part of any ordinary military equipment. This would imply that for a weapon the be kept and bourne by a private citizen under the 2nd, it would have to have a military application of some form or another (and I won’t even address how much short-barreled shotguns had been used by military and law enforcement prior to 1939!).
This seems to stand the National Firearm Act of 1934 right on its ear! The $200 tax and registration on automatic weapons are clearly an infringement, and unreasonably exceeded Congress’ authority under the Commerce Clause.
Then the Gun Control Act of 1968 tried to establish a “sporting purpose” definition on firearms, in blatatnt violation of both the individual and collective right interpretation of not only the 2nd, but of U.S. v. Miller!
Then in 1986, along came the Volkmer-McLure Act, later known as the Firearm Owners Protection Act, which tried to repeal the dumbest aspects of the GCA '68 by allowing unrestricted interstate travel and transport of firearms for private owners on legitimate business (such as hunting out-of-state). Some jackass named William Hughes from New Jersey jumped up in the last 30 seconds of discussion with an amendment, and inspite of not being on the agenda, was recognized and his silly amendment was added, contrary to floor procedure (gotta love those Democrats).
If Hughes had been a little smarter, he could’ve done some real damage; what he wanted was to permanently ban all future private transactions of Class III firearms, and if he knew how to write a bill, he would’ve got it. What he did manage to do was ban any private manufatcure of Class III weapons, even to those previously licensed to do so, including private companies like Browning!
King George I fucked us in 1989 by signing the prohibition against importation of “Assault Weapons,” starting the trend in legislation against “assault weapons;” a ill-defined category of guns that in an average intepretation is used so seldom in crime that the FBI and Justice Dept. don’t even bother to track it.
I can’t say that that cost him the election in '92, but he sure as fuck didn’t get my vote, and if my fellow memebers of the “gun culture” are any indication, he didn’t get their’s, either.
Those ignorant of their firearms history wouldn’t know it, but every decent machinegun made for the U.S.A. came from the workshops of privately owned companies and individuals: people like John Browning, Hiram Maxim, and Eugene Stoner.
Those of us who are familiar with the legislative, judicial and administrative history of the 2nd and various gun control laws are getting very PO’d at the schizo nature of gun control and various proposed gun control laws. We feel as if we’re being hit from every angle just about all of the time.
Armor Piercing Bullet Bans target hunting ammunition; Assault Weapon Bans target guns made with late-19th Century technology; Handgun Bans target the most effective self-defense tool for the weak and infirm as well as honest citizens; Environmental “regulations” target hunters with “lead bullet/shot” bans and “noise pollution;” animal rights groups routinely attempt to disrupt state-sanctioned hunting grounds, interfering with licensed, law-abiding citizens in the course of a long-established and recognized sport; News Media routinely give disproportionate and often inaccurate coverage to gun crimes and anti-gun issues; The BATF changes their adminstrative routines so often that they make “criminals” of legitimate licensed firearms dealers, then arrest them and use asset siezure laws to bankrupt them into plea bargains; the list goes on…
ITR Champion: your attitude scares me. I have two recent personal examples of “our government” oppressing me. I was assaulted at work by an African-American. I shoved him off of me, and the altercation was broken up by fellow co-workers. This jackass called the police on me! The officer took our story, and declined to arrest either of us, but advised us both of the procedures to undertake if eithe rof us wnated to press charges against the other.
The jackass told our African-American supervisor I attacked him. In spite of witnesses in my favor, I was “let go.” The jackass pressed charges, and I went to trial for misdemeanor assault. The DA dismissed the charges against me before it went to a grand jury. I pressed charges against the jackass, and they stuck. He now has a criminal record.
My former employer tried to block my unemployment claim, but lost, badly. The Texas Workforce Commission granted my benefits, ruling that I was terminated for causes other than the one stated (that I was fighting at the worksite), as the person who attacked me (verified by court documents and witness statements) was convicted of misdemeanor assault in that “incident” and yet my former employer took no action against him.
However, when I went to the EEOC to file a grievance against my former employer, with court records and witness statements from my coworkers (many of them Afircan-American, as well) in my favor, the African-American case worker said there was “insufficient evidence” to open a case against my employer.
Then, to top it all off, the VA cut off all of my education benefits last Novemeber. They recently (98 or 99) enacted an arbitrary ruling that if you haven’t used all of your benefits within 10 years of separation from the service, you lose them. Never mind that that was not made a part of my agreement in enrolling in those benefits when I enlisted, nor were they part of my agrement when I separated from the active duty miltary in 1991, or the Reserves in 1994.
They just decided they wanted to keep my money (yes, my money; I paid into the program out of my own pocket as an investment while in the Army) and wrote a “regulation,” or “administrative policy,” or whatever you want to call it, to do so.
Hi-Ho! Fuck you, Tank!
Don’t tell me, Champ, that our own federal government’s greay, money-grubbing hands can’t rest heavily upon the people. Tell the people of Wounded Knee; tell every Native American and African-American that it can’t; tell the Mormons out in Utah; tell it to every Vietnamese that lived through America’s involvement in Vietnam; tell the Branch Davidians at Waco, tell it to Vikki and Sam Weaver.
Take heed: gun owners are just the next batch of “niggers” The Man is lining up to take a crack at. Being a civil, civic minded kinda guy, I limit my activities to the legal, democratically-approved methods of garnering grass-roots support to enact legislative change, as do all gun owners. So far.
