Lies and bad research from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Ownership.
Can’t say as I’m surprised or anything.
Giuliani developments
Rudy has hired Bush’s first campaign manager, Joe Allbaugh. Allbaugh managed Bush’s first presidential campaign, and served as Director of FEMA until 2003.
While all that is very interesting, the part that I’m most interested in is that Allbaugh is on the NRA Board. For Rudy, it’s a pretty shrewd move if you ask me; not only does he got someone with experience at running a national campaign, but it’s another way to reach out to the gun owning community.
I still don’t trust him, though.
Go big or go home
When it comes to offending animal rights activists, anyway. Way to set the example, Sharon Stone!
Pink is the new Tacticool Coyote Brown
Remember all those guns that came out in Coyote Brown (fancy name for “tan”) a while back? Well, forget about them. Pink is the new Coyote Brown. Gander Mountain is expanding its line of pink firearms which had previously included the pink Remington 870; they are now also carrying the pink Taurus Millennium Pro pistols, as well as a pink Remington 597 rifle.
I am 100% in favor of this. This is what they call “smart marketing”. Sure, some “hardcore” gun guys will complain about “sissy guns”, but I have a newsflash. It’s not for your. It’s for your daughter/wife/mom/woman in general that likes pink and wants a snazzy looking gun. It’s also for these guys, I guess.
And honestly, pink is a way better color for a gun that olive drab.
View from the Outside
This editorial ran in The People’s Daily Online, one of the state-run Chinese news agencies. Honestly, it’s a telling view of how our Constitution is viewed from the outside looking in; as well as the lack of regard for personal liberty held by the Chinese government.
Each shooting triggers intense community debate for a time. People will ask the government to tighten controls on firearms. These arguments rush in like a monsoon: stay for a while, and then leave. However, the United States has not truly banned individual possession of firearms.
Which are of coursed effectively banned in the PRC. The author seems genuinely confused at this point, as she expounds further below.
The number of privately owned firearms in the United States ranks first in the world: almost one firearm per person. There is an argument that says guns – like hamburgers, hot dogs and rock and roll – are an inseparable part of US culture. The harsh life in early period of immigration to North America might be one reason for this particular culture. But even nowadays, when the United States has become the world’s richest and most developed country, the American people’s “gun complex” remains unchanged.
It is not that the “harsh life” of early Americans entrenched a gun culture in the nation, but rather a culture of liberty. And while she seems to grasp the concept of “firearms = civil right” as an academic idea in America; she doesn’t seem to quite have it down.
In the United States, the freedom to possess guns is regarded as a human right. The first article of the Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees the freedom of speech. The second determines the rights of citizens with guns.
But that’s not what the 2nd Amendment does. Yes, it enshrines civilian ownership of firearms in the Constitution, held in equal regard with the right to free speech. But it’s primary purpose was to prevent tyrannical governments from oppressing the people; tyrannical governments like your very own leaders, Ms. Xiaoning.
That’s the disconnect – the American belief that the individual often carries more value than the collective as a whole; our nation is founded on the concept of personal liberty. That concept is (brutally) suppressed even today in China.
What’s the deal with Richard Feldman?
Apparently, he used to work for the NRA, and now, while he ostensibly is still pro-gun, seems to spend a lot of his time trashing the NRA. Honestly, the first time I heard about him was after the VA Tech shootings, when he did this interview with US News. Honestly, I didn’t think too much of it at the time, and I certainly didn’t blog it, because it basically reads like “rororor t3h NRA sux I am the best” – so I pretty much skipped it to something that was more newsworthy.
Now, he’s got another hit piece out, this time in the UK Independent, which is again nothing but criticism of the NRA. All the research that I can turn up keeps leading me back to the conclusions that Feldman is still pretty pissed at the NRA for the political intrigue that caused his ouster back in the mid 90’s.
As a note, I’m not passing judgment on the guy here; I’m honestly asking the question. I can assume that my readers who are drinking the NRA Hateraede will expound on the issue further. I’m also going to admit that I’m a bit biased – frankly, all the documents I’ve read from Feldman in his post NRA years make him sound like a whiny kid. Right now, that’s the interpretation I’m going with. He got in a power struggle at the NRA, lost, and now he’s kicking rocks at them in revenge. But I’m also willing to admit that I could be wrong.
Read this post
From Sebastian. I’ve actually addressed the issue of the drug/gun wars in Mexico, and how the media is trying to blame it on the US’ gun laws. Some blogger decides to blame the NRA for all the crime in Mexico, and does it in a pretty vile way.
I don’t really have a lot to say, other than the NRA seems to be under attack a lot lately; and it’s generally for things that they’re not actually responsible for.
Fred on Guns
So now the UN wants to disarm civilians? Where was the UN when the massacres in Rwanda occurred? What did the UN do to protect the victims of ethnic massacres in Bosnia? Disarming civilians under the guise of international human rights law will only lead to more such genocides by ensuring that civilians can never defend themselves! It would be funny if it weren’t so perverse.
I really, really, really want Fred Thompson to be The Real Deal. This sort of statement makes me happy, because like Unc said, he addresses some of the real reasons for the 2nd Amendment without scaring whitey.
I did not know this
In a follow up to yesterday’s post critiquing another op-ed about guns, I found out from Bruce that the author of said op-ed has a bit of a history of violence. (Bruce, how ’bout them Sox? CHAMPIONSHIP – ed.) Back to matters at hand, the only thing I can deduce from this is that Stanley Crouch is projecting his own lack of self-control issues on law-abiding gun owners.
Stanley, just because you can’t control yourself and go around punching people who disagree with you doesn’t mean that everyone else shares your lack of self-control. Don’t project your own inadequacies onto a population of over 80,000,000 law abiding citizens.
Tell me this is a joke
It’s either the most repugnant thing ever, or the best idea ever. You decide if Pancake in a Can is a good idea or an abomination.
The fact that it’s called “BatterBlaster” isn’t winning it any points.