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Tag: 2nd Amendment

Obama goes after 2nd Amendment rights

by | 0645, 5 Jan 1616 | , , | 30 Comments

My column for the West Bend Daily News is online. Here you go:

Previous presidents were rightly relegated to lame duck status in their final year of office as members of Congress begin to look ahead to the next president’s priorities. Fresh off his annual vacation in Hawaii, President Barack Obama has found a way to overcome his lame duck status by simply usurping Congress and unilaterally taking action on his priorities.

After months of study on how to undermine federal law and centuries of constitutional protections, the president is planning to roll out a series of executive actions designed to undermine Americans’ Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. While Obama has not revealed the specifics yet, anti-Second Amendment zealots close to the administration are saying that he will take executive action to enact regulations on the private sales of firearms and dump more money into enforcement agencies.

Obama is justifying his executive overreach by complaining that Congress has failed to act on gun control in the wake of highly publicized murders committed with firearms over the past few years. There are two things wrong with Obama’s justification. First, Congress did act. In the wake of the killings in Newtown, several gun control bills were offered and, after consideration and debate, Congress said no. What Obama is frustrated by is not that Congress failed to act, but that they did not do what Obama wanted.

The second problem with Obama’s justification for action is that it is no justification at all. Nowhere in our Constitution does it allow the executive branch to make law because the Legislative branch decided not to. In fact, our Constitution intentionally set up a process that requires both houses of the legislative branch and the executive branch to all act to pass a law. That system of checks and balances was designed by our founders to protect the liberties of Americans from the ravages of tyrannical rule. In this case, Obama’s agenda was checked. He did not like it, so he is planning to act unilaterally. Such are the actions of a tyrant.

The main action Obama plans to take is to manipulate rules and legal definitions to require background checks on the private sale of firearms. Obama will spin this action by saying he is “closing the gun-show loophole.” The so-called gun-show loophole is an invention of the anti-Second Amendment zealots to stir up opposition.

There are only three types of firearms sales. The first are sales by licensed firearms dealers. These sales are already heavily regulated and the sellers are required to conduct a background check before releasing the firearm to the buyer. Incidentally, the vast majority of sellers at gun shows are licensed dealers that already conduct background checks — as are online sellers.

The second kind of firearm sales are the illegal ones. Even in private sales, it is illegal for felons and crooks to purchase a firearm for the purpose of committing a crime, but it happens all the time. The vast majority of the crimes committed with guns are committed by a relatively small minority of repeat criminal offenders using firearms that are obtained illegally, possessed illegally, or both. The executive action Obama is planning to make will have absolutely no impact on these kinds of sales.

The third kind of firearm sales are private sales. These sales are anything from the investor who sells the occasional firearm out of her collection to the guy who trades his old shotgun for his neighbor’s snow blower. The law does not require a background check in these sales, but the anti-Second Amendment activists want to change that. The executive actions Obama is planning to make are targeting these kinds of sales with more regulations and cost, even though guns used in crimes are rarely obtained in these kinds of sales.

The reason that anti-Second Amendment folks target private firearm sales for regulation is because it would create a de facto national gun registry. Americans have rightly opposed efforts to create a national gun registry in the past because it is a precursor to all kinds of onerous restrictions, including outright gun confiscation. It is vastly more difficult for the government to confiscate what it does not know people have.

Lest we forget, the founders did not write the Second Amendment into our Constitution to preserve our right to hunt or protect ourselves. The reason for the Second Amendment is written right into the Declaration of Independence: “But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” The Second Amendment is one of those new guards.

In a nutshell, the actions Obama wants to take will not actually do anything to combat the problem of crimes committed with firearms that he cites as the reason for acting. And we have a president who is acting to unilaterally and unconstitutionally restrict the people’s constitutional right that was specifically put in place to protect the people from presidents acting unilaterally and unconstitutionally.

Obama may only have a year left in office, but he can do immeasurable damage to our nation and our liberties in that time that will take years to undo — if ever.

Speaker Ryan Weighs in On Obama’s Gun Lawlessness

by | 0840, 4 Jan 1616 | , | 1 Comment

He’s spot on here.

“While we don’t yet know the details of the plan, the president is at minimum subverting the legislative branch, and potentially overturning its will. His proposals to restrict gun rights were debated by the United States Senate, and they were rejected. No president should be able to reverse legislative failure by executive fiat, not even incrementally. The American people deserve a president who will respect their constitutional rights – all of them. This is a dangerous level of executive overreach, and the country will not stand for it.”

In related news, watch for my column tomorrow.

Obama Usurps Congress

by | 1028, 2 Jan 1616 | , , | 3 Comments

Let me be clear… to use one of Obama’s favorite schoolmarm quips… the fact that Congress has chosen not to do something the president wants is not a justification for the executive to act alone.

“All across America, survivors of gun violence and those who lost a child, a parent, a spouse to gun violence are forced to mark such awful anniversaries every single day,” Mr. Obama said. “And yet Congress still hasn’t done anything to prevent what happened to them from happening to other families.”

And for you lefties cheering him on, consider how you will feel in about 14 months if a Republican president decides to act unilaterally on things like abortion, unions, immigration, etc. This is a tyranny that swings all ways, which is why our Founders designed our government to have the checks and balances it does. Obama doesn’t like the fact that he has been checked, but that does not justify unilateral action on his part.

Lawless President to Act to Undermine 2nd Amendment

by | 1152, 31 Dec 1515 | , | 6 Comments

I fixed CNN’s headline for them.

(CNN)President Barack Obama is expected to announce in the coming days a new executive action with the goal of expanding background checks on gun sales, people familiar with White House planning said.

Described as “imminent,” the set of executive actions would fulfill a promise by the President to take further unilateral steps the White House says could help curb gun deaths.

Planning for the action are not yet complete, and those familiar with the process warn that unforeseen circumstances could delay an announcement. But gun control advocates are expecting the new actions to be revealed next week, ahead of Obama’s annual State of the Union address, set for January 12.

Obama appears to be focusing on two things. One is to spend more money on enforcing existing gun laws. I’m cool with that. The second would be to change the definitions of things to expand background checks for private sales or the so-called “gun show loophole.”

Here’s the issue in a nutshell… businesses that sell guns are required to conduct a background check before selling it. Private sellers are not. So if Uncle Ben wants to trade his ol’ shotgun for a snow blower with his neighbor, he is not required to do a background check on the neighbor. The gun show aspect is a farce that liberals use to drum up anti-gun sentiment by showing pictures of gun shows with their rows and rows of guns for sale. But in reality, the vast majority of sellers at a gun show are businesses and conduct background checks just like everyone else. So what the anti-gun folks are really after is requiring background checks for the private sales of guns.

Why is this a problem? There are three reasons. The first is that it creates an additional expense and hassle for people who haven’t done anything wrong. Uncle Ben is not the problem. The second reason is that while inconveniencing law-abiding folks, it will have virtually no impact on crooks. The bad guys will still sell guns illegally to each other. Many of them are already felons and not allowed to have a gun and that’s not stopping them. Why would this? So it’s a measure that imposes cost ant inconvenience on good guys while not deterring the bad guys at all. No thanks.

The third reason folks like me oppose requiring background checks for private sales is because it is a path to a gun registry, and a gun registry is an instrument used by tyrants throughout modern history to disarm the citizenry. Instead of forcing people to actually go down the court house and register their guns, background checks get there through the side door by creating a record of every time a gun is transferred. It would take a generation for almost every lawful gun in the country to be registered – just the lawful ones, because the crooks’ guns would still not be cataloged.

Remember that the 2nd Amendment is not about hunting or self-protection… it’s about an armed citizenry maintaining the capacity to violently overthrow their government if it becomes necessary. As the Declaration states:

But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

That’s hard to do if the people are arming themselves with plastic garden rakes.

So in the end, what Obama and his anti-liberty cohorts are wanting to do is impose additional costs and restrictions on law-abiding people that will have no impact on actually reducing crimes committed with guns while creating a precursor for a future tyrant to disarm Americans.

As I said before… no thanks.

Virginia AG Shreds Reciprocity Agreements

by | 2106, 22 Dec 1515 | , | 0 Comments

Consider this paragraph:

RICHMOND — Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring announced Tuesday that the commonwealth will no longer recognize out-of-state concealed handgun permits, part of a national push to circumvent legislatures opposed to tightening gun laws.

So this is part of an effort for anti-gun zealots to usurp the duly elected representatives of the people. It’s lawless.

 

Rep. Gannon Advocates for Concealed Carry

by | 1828, 21 Dec 1515 | | 5 Comments

Representative Bob Gannon has stirred some controversy with this press release today:

The shooting this weekend at the East Town Mall in Madison makes clear that the leftist theory that a gun symbol inside of a circle with a line through it does not make the citizens of this state safer. It is evident that the criminal whom shot off his pistol at the mall either couldn’t read the gun ban sign or he didn’t comprehend the universal symbol that is now referred to as a “target rich environment”?

Personally I’ve never been in East Town Mall, as I refuse to spend my money at any business that believes my second amendment rights have to be left in my car. I’ve been unable to get a safe and secure feeling with the extra mall security that is now in place, yes, those individuals carrying nothing more lethal than a flashlight and maps explaining how to get to the coffee shop. I’m sure these employees are there to help clean up the mess, as an unprotected shopper gets caught in the criminal cross fire.

Currently our university students are as unprotected as the shoppers at this mall. Unfortunately, these students don’t have the option of studying at a different state college, as I have the option of shopping at other retailers, as all state universities have implemented the “target rich environment” theory.

AB 363 is in process in the state legislature at this time, and needs to get passed quickly so that students have a fighting chance if a criminal element picks their campus as the location of their next shootout. This bill allows students, faculty, and visitors, the same rights of self-protection as are enjoyed by state residents throughout this fine land.

Wisconsin does not have a death penalty law, but with significant practice and careful aim, law abiding citizens can help clean our society of these scum bags. Criminals no longer have any fear of our courts or our prisons, so it’s time that the citizens of this fine state stand up and fight back. A gang banger in the mall with a gun is going to think twice if there could be a law abiding CCW holder standing behind them fully prepared to shoot center mass, as this is how you’re trained to eliminate the threat these creeps pose to you, your family, and all law abiding citizens unwillingly dragged into their public crime spree.

He had me up until that last paragraph. I agree that gun free zones merely serve to disarm the good guys while having, at best, no deterrent effect on the bad guys. I also agree that allowing people to legally carry weapons on campus, if they so choose, is a good thing.

But then we get to that last paragraph. I believe that Gannon is trying to express the common sense idea that good guys with guns deter, or limit the damage of, bad guys with guns from behaving badly. Unfortunately, his rhetoric comes off as advocating violent vigilantism.

As someone who often carries a weapon, I pray that I never, ever, have to use it. And if I do, it will only be as a last-ditch effort to preserve my life or the life of someone else. Encouraging people who carry weapons to use them to “fight back” is reckless and dangerous for everyone involved. No, don’t use your weapon to “clean up our society.” Only use them to as a last resort to preserve a life.

Furthermore, as a passionate supporter of exercising our Right to Bear Arms, Gannon’s comments are frustrating because they damage the cause by playing to the worst emotions of those who oppose our rights. It feeds their fear that 2nd Amendment supporters are a bunch of yahoos looking to shoot someone. The fight to protect and expand our 2nd Amendment rights has come a long way in the last 20 years by saying and demonstrating that armed, law-abiding citizens are a net positive to our society. Gannon’s rhetoric is not helpful. I fear that his last paragraph may have torpedoed the campus carry bill for which he advocates.

Obama Meets with Special Interests While Preparing to Break Law

by | 2148, 16 Dec 1515 | , | 1 Comment

Congress, schmongress.

Washington (CNN)As his administration prepares an executive order tightening access to guns, President Barack Obama met Wednesday with former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a proponent of new gun laws who has become the chief enemy of the National Rifle Association.

[…]

Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s senior adviser who also attended the meeting with Bloomberg Wednesday, said this week that the executive orders would be reveled in “short order,” but refused to offer any more detailed timelines.

Time to Ban Guns

by | 1113, 13 Dec 1515 | , , | 0 Comments

So says a writer at the collapsing New Republic.

Ban guns. All guns. Get rid of guns in homes, and on the streets, and, as much as possible, on police. Not just because of San Bernardino, or whichever mass shooting may pop up next, but also not not because of those. Don’t sort the population into those who might do something evil or foolish or self-destructive with a gun and those who surely will not. As if this could be known—as if it could be assessed without massively violating civil liberties and stigmatizing the mentally ill. Ban guns! Not just gun violence. Not just certain guns. Not just already-technically-illegal guns. All of them.

I always appreciate it when anti-liberty folks are honest about their position on guns. At least we can have an honest discussion.

Nation’s Sheriffs Advocate Armed Defense

by | 1934, 12 Dec 1515 | | 1 Comment

Yup.

In Brevard County, Florida — less than an hour’s drive from Disney World — Sheriff Wayne Ivey was one of the first to post a video on Facebook. In it, his message was clear: “The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun.”

Though he repeatedly cautioned against vigilante justice, Ivey made sure gun owners knew he wanted them to “proactively engage anyone who threatens harm through terrorism or mass killings.”

Ivey is confident that responsible gun owners with concealed weapons permits will partner with them in stopping an active shooter before police arrive on the scene, he told CNN.

“We want you to be prepared to defend yourself, to protect you and your family,” he said.

Ivey’s video has been viewed by more than 4 million people — among them, Marion County Sheriff Chris Blair, whose jurisdiction is about 100 miles northwest of Ivey’s. He, too, decided to post an online video with a similar message: “If you are certified to carry a gun, I would like to encourage you to do so.”

In Arizona, the controversial top cop of Maricopa County, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, was even more direct.

“My goal of utilizing 250,000 citizens with concealed weapons is to stop the carnage, stop the killing before cops arrive,” he said.

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