Right now the big news in the firearms world should be the wonderland that is the SHOT show and all the wonderful goodies that will soon be available from the manufacturers displaying their wares there. I haven’t yet made it to SHOT, but it’s a magical place. Imagine a big venue filled to the brim with small businesses started by people with an entrepreneurial spirit and a passion for bringing the best products they can make to the market.
The firearms industry isn’t like, say, the automotive industry. Most of the firearms industry is made up of very small businesses, and even those that aren’t all began as very small businesses. We’re familiar with brands like Smith & Wesson and sometimes I think we can confuse a familiar brand with corporate behemoths in other industries like tech or automotive. The firearms industry isn’t anything like the size of other industries in terms of the size of the market and the typical rewards. It’s certainly possible to make a good living in the firearms industry with a lot of hard work and a good bit of luck, and it’s even possible to get into the top tax bracket…but it’s highly unlikely anyone in the industry will ever be elbowing Bill Gates or Warren Buffet out of the top spots on the rich guy list.
Small businesses are the backbone of our economy, and in the firearms industry you’ll see some of the most dedicated, hard working, passionate, innovative small businesses in existence. John Noveske is a good example of the kind of person you find in the firearms industry. Intelligent, passionate, hard working, exceptionally skilled…
…and that’s why it frustrates me to no end to see politicians behaving as if these sorts of people are what’s wrong with America. During the week of the SHOT show a bunch of politicians in New York got together and started negotiating about just how much freedom they were going to snatch from the citizens they’re supposed to serve, and settled on a number of infringements including banning magazines that hold more than seven rounds. This all happened very fast. Then again, those who know they are doing evil generally do want to move really quickly, don’t they? There’s a reason why the phrase “like a thief in the night” was coined and applied to politics.
So while we should be talking about the magnificent products brought to market by remarkable individuals like John Noveske, instead our focus is on just how much freedom we’re about to lose thanks to a bunch of scoundrels splashing their agenda and prejudices in the blood of dead children in an effort to cram the whole thing down our throats. And you know something?
I’m sick of it.
I think it’s high time the firearms industry started fighting back. I don’t just mean sending the NRA-ILA and grassroots organizations like the Virginia Citizens Defense League money…although those organizations are magnificent and should be considered one of our best hopes for protecting our freedom. We need them badly and I’m a member of both…but maybe we need to take this a step further.
Let’s be blunt about the situation: We’ve always mentioned that the ultimate aim of the anti-gunners is complete abolition. They talk about “reasonable” all the time, but when you get right down to it they don’t believe in the idea that we should have firearms for any serious purpose like self defense. Just ask Senator Manchin. With the election having put their guy in office (Obama, after all, supported Washington DC’s gun ban) and, to them anyway, the irresistible opportunity presented by some dead children, they dropped pretense and went for the brass ring. Legislators in New York actually went on record saying that their inane new laws “protected” the second amendment because they don’t include a provision for confiscation, which was apparently on the table at one point. That’s like saying you negotiated someone who wanted to kill you down to only cutting off one of your legs and holding that as a victory.
The mask is off. “Reasonable” means you can’t own it, you can’t sell it, you can’t carry it. Period. They’re taking whatever ground they can at every opportunity and if we don’t stop it pretty soon we’ll have some dingus making statements to the press about how the 2nd amendment was protected because they banned double barrels but decided to leave single shot muzzle-loaders alone for the time being.
Enough.
We either stand together now, or we watch this erosion continue. Certainly get involved in the political process and make the politicians remember that we “bitter clingers” show up to the polls even in off-year elections and delight in the opportunity to throw obstreperous politicians out of office. Certainly contribute to the aforementioned organizations that do such a splendid job of working to protect our rights in the legislatures. But there’s something else we can do.
Now I didn’t come up with this idea, but I think it’s brilliant: Shortly after the news of the betrayal in New York broke, the owner of Old Grouch Military Surplus announced on one of the forums that he cancelled orders from New York government agencies and would no longer do any business with any government agency in New York. I think he’s on to a fantastic method of fighting this nonsense.
The argument being made is that “nobody” needs X gun or Y rounds in a magazine, right? Well if that’s the case, then by gum nobody needs them. Including government agencies. “But cops need guns!” Yes. They do.
So does the poor schlub on the street who doesn’t get issued body armor and a radio to call for priority backup. The bad guys that the police send a SWAT team to go deal with victimize some poor person who doesn’t have level IV body armor and a machine gun long before anyone dials 911. But the guys that the cops need AR-15′s, suppressors, and 30 round magazines to go deal with the ordinary joe is supposed to handle using only a 911 call?
Baloney.
Instead of carving out special exceptions for agents of the government who are going to be enforcing these ridiculous laws, how about the firearms industry gets together and decides in unison that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander: If the citizens of New York can’t be trusted with more than seven rounds in a magazine or with a rifle that has a pistol grip, neither can the police. After all, in the old days police didn’t need high-capacity assault pistols of doom that journalists argue are invisible to xrays to get the job done. They used to do it with 6 shot revolvers. Heck, legendary law man Jim Cirillo spent most of his career toting a wheel gun, and he didn’t seem to have any trouble. If no honest man needs more than seven rounds in a magazine, then surely no honest police officer in New York has any need for more than a S&W Model 10 and a Remington 870.
Wouldn’t it be lovely to see the entire firearms industry refusing to sell demonized products to the agencies that use armed agents to protect some of the most anti-gun whackjobs in the country? What if Mayor Bloomberg actually had to live with a protective detail that was limited to the same weapons that New Yorkers are now stuck with?
People like Bloomberg are dedicated to destroying the firearms industry…and as history shows, he’s not above breaking the law to do it. Perhaps his tune would change if everybody in the firearms industry used their freedom to refuse service to leave him as helpless as he wants to leave the average Joe in New York city?
The people who are negotiating away our rights in dark corners aren’t going to stop, folks. They will keep pressing whenever they feel they have the advantage. Why, then, should the people who are blamed for dead kids sell their pet agencies so much as a single round of ammunition?
My modest proposal is this: That everyone in the firearms industry uses their economic freedom to impose the same restrictions on the government of New York that the crooks in Albany have placed on the citizenry. The criminals that police deal with are the same criminals that victimize the citizens of New York. If they need a fully loaded Glock 19 to arrest a murderer, then by God his intended victim has every bloody right to the same weapon to try and prevent becoming a statistic in the first place.
The second isn’t about deer hunting. It isn’t about punching holes in paper. It’s about preventing tyranny, be it from the government or from our fellow man. If the firearms industry unites to stop selling anything forbidden to the citizens to government agencies, it makes the point that our society actually needs those products the dimwits on television are so busy demonizing and that maybe we shouldn’t be trying to destroy an industry that helps protect freedom and keep order.
Imagine the impact of an anti-gun mayor with a protective detail that can’t get anything more than a J frame and Barney’s single bullet to defend him…or anti-gun Hollywood actors who have to run around on screen pointing their fingers at each other and yelling “BANG!” because they can’t get any of those evil, nasty, baby-killing guns to make their next buckets-of-blood-gushing-out-of-people’s-head movie.
These sorts often whine and moan about a world without guns…well, maybe it’s time the industry unites to give them a taste of what they want: A world where they can’t get a gun. A world where they’re treated just like the little people. Let’s see how they like them apples…
