Tag: gunrights

Your Life Is Not Worth Defending

Every so often we get to hear politicians non-wordsmithed views on a given topic. Away from the speechwriters and handlers, their comments lend insight into how little they really care about their constituents. Thus was the reply of Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, the non-voting representative of Washington DC, to a question of allowing District residents to defend themselves with concealed carry permits in the wake of the shooting of Congressional members in Virginia.

The delegate’s at times laughing response on July 10, 2017 was:

“The city has taken the position that the best way to defend yourself is not to be armed. So, your notion…is an insult– quite an insult to the wards that have greater crime. They have not come forward to me and say, ‘Congresswoman we want to conceal and carry.’ So, I suggest that you approach the people you’re talking about.”

Washington DC has among the strictest gun control laws in the nation. It was the landmark case of District of Columbia v. Heller which overturned the District’s complete ban on handguns and the requirement that lawfully-owned rifles and shotguns be kept “unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock” when in the home. How strict was the law? The subject of the case, Dick Anthony Heller, a licensed special police officer for the District of Columbia was allowed to carry a firearm for work in federal office buildings, but was not allowed to have one in his own home.

What exactly was the District saying? Is it that the officer who is trusted enough to protect employees and visitors in a federal office building with a firearm isn’t trustworthy enough to protect his own family and home with one? Or is it what and who is being protected? A federal building and federal employees are worth protecting but an individual’s home and family isn’t.

Time and time again, gun control elitists have made it clear there is a caste system in place here. There are people worth protecting with firearms (them) and there are people who are not (everyone else).

Politicians and the economic elite work tirelessly to eliminate your right to self-defense, while simultaneously exempting themselves from any new restrictions they come up with. They say you don’t need a firearm to protect yourself while they are surrounded by heavily armed men and women who are expected to lay down their lives to keep them safe. In the Heller case, they denied the very people who are protecting them the right to protect themselves, right along with everyone else.

Concealed carry permits are now technically possible to obtain in the District, thanks to years of lawsuits and legal decisions against them. However with each step forward, the District raises the bar for demonstrating sufficient need even higher and enacts more costly, time consuming and discriminatory administrative practices to keep them from actually being issued.

So what does the District’s position on unarmed defense mean? It means you have a population with no effective means to fight back against armed perpetrators. That’s right, I said armed perpetrators. For all the effort the District puts into disarming law-abiding citizens, they still have yet to make an impact on those who are actually committing the crimes. Washington DC consistently ranks on the list of highest murder rate and highest violent crime rate in the nation. In other words, a District of victims.

I have no idea where Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton lives or what she has for personal security. Outside her secure federal workplace, her minimum Congressional salary of $174,000 is certainly sufficient to provide her a safe lifestyle. However that lifestyle sets her far above and apart from the average District resident she is supposed to be representing. I also don’t question that nobody is asking her for concealed carry permits. Like all good elitist politicians, no doubt she keeps herself surrounded only by those who think the same way she does.

Now take a look at your own congressional representation and see if they are doing the same thing. Are they working to keep you from defending yourself while enjoying the security and benefits of the office you elected them to? Is your life worth defending to them?

Bob

#oddstuffing, #SecondAmendment, #2A, #BillOfRights, #SelfDefense, #DCGunLaws, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

 

 

Shall Not Be Infringed

Time for a little rant. The last four words of the Second Amendment are “shall not be infringed”. Pretty simple and plainspoken, as are all of the Amendments comprising the Bill of Rights. Yet somehow, this clear and distinct phrasing has been bastardized by government entities small and large around our country in the name of ‘reasonable regulations’. If nothing else about the gun control elitists bothers you, those two words should. And it should scare the hell out of you.

Just to make sure we’re clear on the context, this is the text of the Second Amendment:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

It is short and sweet at just 27 words. Like all other parts of the Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment is not a limitation on what “the people” can do, but clearly states what the government cannot do.

So where does ‘reasonable regulations’ come from and why is it so important? It stems from the Supreme Court’s District of Columbia v. Heller case which reaffirmed the Second Amendment protects an individuals right to own a firearm outside of military service; the militia noted in the prefatory clause of the Amendment. But at the same time, the ruling held that like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. This is what has become known as ‘reasonable regulations’ or ‘reasonable restrictions’ and is now the mantra for every gun control / gun ban scheme being formulated.

As we saw in the 2016 General Elections where gun control elitist candidates were so proud to say that they ‘respect the Second Amendment’ but in the same breath say they also supported ‘reasonable regulations’. Naturally, it was a political ploy to convince those who were not paying close attention that they wouldn’t come after their guns. In reality, that’s just what their so-called ‘reasonable regulations’ intend.

What sort of ‘reasonable regulations’ do they support? Forced government confiscations colloquially know as gun buybacks, banning newly created categories of firearms by their cosmetic features as so-called “assault weapons”, restrictions on dangerous levels of magazine capacity, limitations on the type, make and model of firearms you can purchase as well as strict limitations on how many you can purchase at once, and how long you have to wait to purchase a firearm, regardless of how many you currently own.

The latest insult to reasonableness is restrictions on ammunition purchases. Even though they have been shown to be wholly ineffective as a means to reduce criminal activity, new licensing of buyers and sellers are being put in place. While initially just a simple license to allow purchases, this system also enables the long sought after mechanism to restrict the quantity of ammunition purchased as well as limit the purchases to only those calibers of firearms that have been registered with the government. In other words, it forces a complete gun registration system.

You have to wonder why the Supreme Court didn’t answer what was and wasn’t a ‘reasonable regulation’ as well as the question of bearing arms outside the home at the same time as Heller. To be fair, that wasn’t the case that was handed to them and the Supreme Court doesn’t always resolve cases to the degree we’d like to see. In limiting the scope of the ruling, the Court virtually guaranteed decades of conflict and litigation against unreasonable restrictions around the country, as we’ve already seen since Heller.

At the core of our argument to protect our rights, we have to go back and look at the Second Amendment and determine the intent of the Founding Fathers. Yes, it is a decidedly originalism form of interpretation and is something the gun control elitists abhor. But how else can you claim the rest of the Bill of Rights applies to modern day society as it did when it was written if you say the Second Amendment does not.

And for those working in back rooms hidden away from public scrutiny concocting the next set of ‘reasonable restrictions’, I have just one question. What part of SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED do you not get?

Bob

#oddstuffing, #SecondAmendment, #BillofRights, #RightToBearArms, #originalism, #reasonableregulations, #Heller, #ShallNotBeInfringed, #TheCheapPlace, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

To Serve Man

Ever since individuals came together to form societies, they have called upon some of their members to serve the public interest. Those who have heeded the call have provided everything from basic services like water and roads to safety and representation in larger groups. Public service was considered a calling and was never considered a lucrative life since they were paid by some kind of tax or assessment on the people they served. But what happens when those who serve do so for their own greed?

Every so often we’ll see a story about someone who has been living in the wilderness alone. These few hardy individuals are probably the only ones who are able to do everything for themselves. The rest of us rely on public servants for the essentials of modern living and beyond. For that mutual benefit, we pay a portion of our own earnings in the form of taxes. The more people, the more taxes, the more services needed and supported.

Our representative government used to be made up of citizen volunteers who served part time while continuing their regular jobs or businesses. When you look at our nation’s agricultural background, you can understand why legislative sessions traditionally run in the fall/winter months vs. the spring/summer growing seasons. Many state level governments continue to meet part-time and some not every year.

Somewhere along the line, the system was changed and those who serve are now taking the public for everything it can bear. Instead of representing the interests of the community they serve, they seem to primarily represent their own interests. How? They specifically exempt themselves from the laws they create for everyone else. They ignore rules, regulations and laws that do not meet their own immediate needs and create others that help them retain control and power.

If you need a current example, look no further than the California Legislature. The latest budget bill includes new requirements for qualifying a recall petition for ballot, specifically intended to help delay the recall vote of a member of the ruling party. This same budget bill even expands California’s list of persons prohibited from owning firearms. But then California is notorious for finding inventive new ways of sneaking law changes without public input or comment, a fact Second Amendment supports are well aware of. So-called ‘gut and amend’ laws completely change a bill at the end of the legislative cycle to bypass public hearing and comments. Rules for comments during hearings are suspended or ignored when dissenting opinions are brought up. Dramatic changes to statutes are submitted as administrative ‘file and print only’ regulations.

And what of our legislators themselves? Gone the way of the Dodo are the part-time, representative members of the community. Replaced now by full-time, professional politicians who have precious little in common with the people they are supposed to represent. This is especially true at the Federal level where our members of Congress enjoy salaries, benefits, retirement packages and perks of employment very few of their constituents can even dream of let alone acquire.

Our President campaigned on a platform to fix the federal government in a number of ways, including to “drain the swap”. A laudable goal, but I don’t believe he quite understood how strong the Swamp Side is. At the first sign of a sump pump, I fully expect the residents of the swap to simultaneously declare their swap a protected wetland as well as a National Historic Landmark. The residents, as the swamp’s indigenous inhabitants and preservationists of the swamp’s native culture, would be immune to any outside drainage.

This is of course our own fault. All of us, as the citizen, the taxpayer and the voter, have allowed the system to become so bastardized, so blatantly corrupt and so unaccountable to anyone. It didn’t happen overnight, but slowly, one little piece at a time so nobody would notice. Does all this sound familiar 2A supporters?

Can it be turned around? Can we return our government to the hands of the people? I’d like to believe so, but it’s going to take a lot more people caring about their country to make it happen. Even if we can’t drain the swamp, keeping it from getting any bigger would be a step in the right direction.

What happens if we don’t get involved? One of these days we’re going to wake up and realize they’ve really been writing a cookbook.

Bob

#oddstuffing, #toserveman, #corruptgovernment, #secondamendment, #draintheswap, #2A, #itsacookbook, #twilightzone, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

Gun Safety Laws – IT’S A TRAP!

Every time I hear about another round of so-called “gun safety” laws, I tend to go full Admiral Ackbar. What is it about gun control, gun confiscation and gun elimination groups coming up with “gun safety” laws that make me nervous? Perhaps it’s that they have nothing to do with safety and everything to do with control, confiscation and elimination.

A recent case in Massachusetts highlights the issue. Massachusetts law requires all firearms to be secured in a locked cabinet or with a trigger lock when not “carried by or under the control of the owner or other lawfully authorized user.”

Based on a tip, police obtained a search warrant for the house of a 65-year-old male who lived alone and had “dozens of improperly secured firearms inside”. 98 mostly vintage firearms including shotguns, rifles and pistols, including Mauser bolt-action rifles and lever-action Winchesters, were seized during the search along with cases of ammunition. According to police, “Most of the items were improperly stored, strewn about his home”. Also seized were five “military grade ordnance shells” reportedly from a Naval Depot that closed in 1962 and several brass grave markers from the cemetery across the street from the residence. Following the seizure, the town’s police chief proudly boasted, “All the weapons are out of the house, the neighborhood is safe,”

For the sake of today’s argument, let’s skip over the grave markers and the so-called “military grade ordinance” which were reported to have gun powder in them, but didn’t have to be disarmed before being removed, a.k.a. probably demilitarized collectables with a little bit of residue, and deal with the subject of the search, unsecured firearms.

How did this happen? Most likely someone visited this person, obviously a collector of classic arms, and reported it to police who obtained the warrant. Seized were all the “improperly secured” firearms as well as those that were properly secured AND all ammunition on the property, secured or otherwise. Note: Massachusetts law also places restrictions on the amount of ammunition you can legally possess, with and without a special storage permit. None of the reports I’ve seen indicated he had more than the allowable amount of ammunition, just “cases” of ammo.

So what is a properly secured firearm in Massachusetts? Apparently one that is stored in a locked cabinet, has a trigger or gun lock on it or is under the person’s direct control. Typically direct control means being in the same room with it. Your firearm on the kitchen table would not be under your direct control if you are upstairs in a bedroom. It doesn’t seem to matter if your house is a locked, alarmed, has 24-hour video surveillance or otherwise inaccessible to anyone but you, the house itself is not considered “secure”.

The theory behind the so-called “gun-safety” storage laws is that they prevent thefts and suicides. Well, yes and no. Having a state-approved trigger lock or cable on a firearm isn’t going to prevent its theft since you just take it with you. Even full sized safes can be cut open or, as they are in many cases, moved out of the house to be opened later, even if they are bolted down. Trigger locks or cables may slow down the curious toddler, but any age above that is going to figure out how to get it off. And if you already have access to the firearm and locks, well… how is this going to prevent suicide?

Many states mandate some form of locked storage. More recently, municipalities have jumped on the gun control bandwagon and mandated their own stricter versions, including requiring firearms be unloaded with ammunition stored separately.

First off, proper firearm storage is critical for everyone who owns firearms; it is the single most important aspect of responsible firearm ownership. Those who rely on their firearms for self-defense inside their home are especially acute of this.

One of the things we discuss in basic firearms classes is safe storage in the home, but most importantly is that it is not a one size fits all solution. What constitutes “safe” may be look radically different for someone who has children vs. someone who lives alone. There are a wide variety of security products designed for rapid accessibility combined with high safety, but these options become progressively expensive as the features increase and may be out of reach for everyone.

We often think of our homes as our castles, our private domain where we are protected from the outside world, including government interference. We believe that as long as we are safe within our walls, nobody will bother us. However this case in Massachusetts, and many others like it, illustrate otherwise. Under the guise of “gun safety”, it is just another tool to be used to take firearms from the otherwise law-abiding citizen.

 

Whenever you hear someone proposing more “gun safety” laws, rules to “make you safer”, think about what happens when you don’t measure up to someone else’s one-size-fits-all standard, even if it doesn’t make any sense in your situation. You might want to think about whom we allow inside our castle walls as well.

Bob

#oddstuffing, #SecondAmendment, #billofrights, #firearmsafety, #guncontrol, #gunconfiscation, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

Is California Too Far Gone To Save?

I met up with a very good friend a short time ago and we began discussing the current state of affairs in California as it relates to firearms. As optimistic as we tried to be, the outlook for law-abiding firearms owners here is dismal. Even with the shift in leadership at the national level and a new Associate Supreme Court Justice, can we reasonably expect anything to change here?

California, better known to us behind enemy lines as Kalifornistan, is infamous for infringing on the rights of law-abiding citizens while simultaneously granting more rights to those who break the law. For firearm owners and Second Amendment supporters, it’s the worst of the worst. New laws targeting “dangerous loopholes” in public safety inexplicably impact only the law-abiding and do absolutely nothing to reduce crime or punish criminals.

Perhaps you’ve seen the latest NRA ad for the West coast: Don’t Give Up On California—The NRA Hasn’t. The accompanying photo shows a massive NRA banner strung across the Golden Gate Bridge. Photoshop of course since this state would literally explode if that ever happened. The point of the promotion is that the NRA is fighting to restore our Second Amendment rights in the state. Sadly, the key word here is “restore”. So many of our firearm rights are already gone, whittled away bit by bit by fringe politicians, gun grabbing elitists and activist jurists who have no regard for the rule of law or the Constitution.

Many Californians are justifiably upset with the NRA and other national advocacy groups for seemingly abandoning the state in the run-up to the 2016 elections. Don’t get me wrong; I absolutely understand the need to focus on national races for the good of the entire country. It’s just a little hard for us living in occupied territory to feel the joy when nothing seems to trickle into our state. We see strong Second Amendment support all over the country including more states adopting constitutional carry and fortifying firearm ownership rights. Meanwhile, we can’t buy the latest and safest firearms, use or keep our standard capacity magazines and will have to surrender our modern sporting rifles or bastardize them beyond recognition in order to not register them on the pre-confiscation list. Never mind that soon we’ll need an ammunition-purchasing license for in-state only ammo purchases and point-of-sale background checks.

We are at a severe disadvantage in this state since we as firearm owners can’t seem to come together as a group to stop the laws before they are created. Those who wish to see every California resident disarmed (except the government, the elitists’ bodyguards and the criminals) own a super majority in the both the chambers of the state legislature as well as the Governor’s mansion. Opposition to any measure of gun control/gun elimination is dealt with swiftly and decisively. Rules and procedures are changed as needed to keep dissent – and accountability – out and ensure the party platform is enacted.

Our only recourse now is through the courts. As history has shown us, fighting a law AFTER the fact is always going to be more difficult, more time consuming, more expensive and far less certain than stopping a bad idea before it becomes law. Even the most egregious, Constitutionally infringing law is going to take years to wind its way through the state and federal courts. Each appeal costs more and more with no guarantee of even being granted a hearing much less a favorable outcome with the Supreme Court, no matter who sits on it.

The result is what you would expect. Just as more companies are leaving this state due to the unfavorable tax and regulatory environment here, Second Amendment supporters are leaving as well. And quite honestly, who can blame them? Why live in a state that treats you like the next mass killer in waiting – while apparently rewarding criminals for breaking the law? Even worse than losing their vote, we’re losing their ability to be a positive Second Amendment supporter role model in their community.

Is California too far gone to save? I certainly hope not. This isn’t some theoretical ideology from a bygone era we are fighting for; it’s about our ability to protect our lives and the lives of our loved ones, in a state that doesn’t care about our rights or our lives.

Bob

#oddstuffing, #2A, #SecondAmendment, #RightToBearArms, #GunRights, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

 

Twenty-Seven Words of Freedom

The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution is a mere 27 words long, yet it is unquestionably the most intensely debated, contested, misinterpreted and abused of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights. Recklessly maligned as being out of date in our modern times, it remains one of the fundamental protections for our nation, now as it was then.

Adopted on December 15, 1791 with the other nine initial Amendments, the Second Amendment reads:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

One of the most widespread misconceptions about the Second Amendment is that it grants the right to bear arms. In reality, it does nothing of the kind. It merely protects that right. The right to bear arms is considered a natural right, one that is not dependent on the laws or customs of any culture or government. Rights of this kind are also called inalienable or even god given rights, inherent to all persons.

If you read the text of the Bill of Rights, you will find that all of the Amendments are there to protect the individual rights, not to grant them. And, just as critical is who they protect these rights from; the government. The Bill of Rights are not a limitation on what the “people” can do, but on what the government cannot do.

The concept of the protection applying to the “people” is where the Second Amendment is often attacked. Since the prefatory clause says “A well regulated Militia”, it is argued the operative clause protecting the right only applies to the militia. However, as with the rest of the Bill of Rights, the rights protected are all individual – the people – rights.

It is also said that the Founding Fathers could never have foreseen the power of modern weaponry and that they only intended individuals to own muskets for hunting. In reality, muskets were the modern ‘weapons of war’ issued to the military and far more advanced firearms were already available. And just as our First Amendment protected rights today are not limited to what is expressed with a quill and inkwell or a hand-operated press, the Second Amendment is not limited to what was available at the time it was written.

My argument for the Second Amendment in modern times centers on the context of when it was written. Otherwise known as originalism or textualism, it is that the interpretation should be based on what the common understanding of the text to be at the time it was written. Naturally this view is hotly debated. Judges, lawyers, politicians, professors, legal scholars and even our own Supreme Court are not united on this view, much less how the Second Amendment protections should be applied.

I at least choose to believe the Founding Father’s vision for the nation and that for over 225 years, the Second Amendment protection of the right to bear arms, whether or not formally recognized by a court ruling, has applied to the individual, to the people.

The debate and the struggle over the Second Amendment will likely go on long after I am dead and buried. I don’t necessarily see that as a bad thing. As each new generation comes forward, it’s important to have a contemporary recap of the principles that brought us to this point as well as a reminder of how protecting these rights is essential in modern society.

We cannot take for granted the rights that our ancestors fought and died for. We cannot let our rights be stripped away by politically correct thinking or by the elite who are willing to sacrifice the populous so that they can have more power and control. We cannot let our lives or the lives of our families to be offered up to those who would do us harm without a fight.

This is why I fight for those twenty-seven words of freedom known as the Second Amendment.

Bob

#oddstuffing, #secondamendment, #2A, #Constitution, #BillOfRights, #27wordsoffreedom, #gunright, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

What Have YOU Done Lately To Support The Second Amendment?

The 2016 General Election let us all give a little sigh of relief. With a House, Senate and White House who are NOT actively trying to destroy law-abiding citizens right to own and bear arms, we are feeling a lot more secure about the Second Amendment’s survival. But this isn’t the time to stop our efforts. Every day around the nation there are those who would strip your rights away and it’s up to YOU to stop it.

Please note I’m not suggesting anyone drop everything in his or her life and become a full time lobbyist. That’s not even remotely possible for most of us . But just because we don’t advocate Second Amendment rights as our full time profession doesn’t mean we can’t make a meaningful impact.

Making a difference can be as simple as calling or writing a letter to your elected officials. Yes, some of us live in highly non-firearm permissive states where our elected officials are doing everything in their power to strip our rights away, but they still need to hear our voices. The NRA and most of the affiliated state organizations and advocacy groups make it as easy for you as can be. Just go to their website, fill out your information and hit send. It’s that easy.

Now, if you still think that writing a letter or placing a call will get you on a ‘list’, I’ve got some bad news for you. You’re already on that list. If you’ve ever bought a firearm, ammunition, a firearm related magazine, book, etc. etc. etc., no doubt you are on someone’s ‘list’. Among the approximately 320 million people in the United States, there are an estimated 350 million legally owned firearms, so embrace the ‘list’, you are in good company. And unless your last name is LaPierre or Nugent, writing a letter or calling your elected official to tell them to support the Second Amendment isn’t going to move you up.

No matter what, the most positive thing we can all do is to lead by example. For law-abiding firearms owners, that means acting responsibly with our firearms. Every stupid or inconsiderate incident a firearm owner is involved in becomes fodder for the gun-grabbing elitists. They use it as part of their false “no guns are safe” narrative and advocate for more gun control and ultimately gun elimination.

Be responsible and live the Four Rules of Gun Safety every day.

  • Treat all firearms as if they were loaded.
  • Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy.
  • Never place your finger on the trigger until your sights are on target and you have made the decision to fire.
  • Know your target, what is in front of it and what is beyond it.

If you haven’t taught your children about firearm safety, now is a good time. The NRA’s Eddie Eagle program (https://eddieeagle.nra.org) is great for Pre-K through 4th graders. The National Shooting Shorts Foundation’s (NSSF) Project ChildSafe Video on Talking to Kids about Gun Safety (http://www.nssfblog.com/new-project-childsafe-video-on-talking-to-kids-about-gun-safety/) is also a great resource.

Many of us live in a community or work in a job where even discussing firearms is taboo and could get you ostracized or fired. It’s not right, but it happens. If that’s your situation, you can still make a difference. You can donate to an advocacy organization or do something as simple as taking a friend to the range and showing them what a law-abiding firearm owner is all about. This simple demonstration of responsibility may be all it takes to change someone’s mind.

So I ask, what have YOU done lately to support the Second Amendment?

Bob

#oddstuffing, #2ndAmendment, #2A, #billofrights, #nra, #nssf, #gunrights, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

The Future of Gun Control in California

Like many who support the Second Amendment and live in an anti-Constitution / anti-firearm state, I tend to keep an eye on what is happening in the state capitol. Every little bit of gun control legislation brings us closer to their goal of complete civilian disarmament. So why I wondered are there so few gun control bills pending this year? The answer to what will be enacted in the future is what was proposed in the past.

Sure, there are a few pending slaps in the face like expanding the ‘one handgun per month’ limitation to ‘one firearm per month’ – which would include party-to-party transfers. I’m sure we’ll also see a few “gut and amend” surprises towards the end of the legislative session. Just enough to keep the pro-rights groups engaged in the here and now. But compared to past years, there seems to be very few new bills. Why? Remember, California is in this for the long haul, whittling rights away one-by-one. Last year’s Gunmageddon was only the setup for what is to come.

One previously proposed bill was for all center-fire, semi-automatic magazine fed long guns to be classified as so-called “assault weapons”. Why isn’t it being pushed now? Simple, the new bullet-button assault weapon law doesn’t go into full effect until the beginning of 2018. At that time, all bullet button firearms must be registered as “assault weapons”, have their evil features removed, be removed from the state or turned in to law enforcement. Since they have not published the administrative rules for this yet, law-abiding firearm owners are trying to decide whether to register their evil featured firearms or go featureless without the regulations to guide them.

My prediction is that in 2018 this dilemma will be solved for us. After the deadline for registering all bullet button firearms has passed, all center-fire, semi-automatic magazine fed long guns will then be classified as “assault weapons”, with the same mandatory registration or remove rules. As horrific as that sounds, rimfire will most likely be added to the “assault weapon” category following that like they are in other states. Only when the most comprehensive list of registered “assault weapons” is compiled will the final step be taken – the outright ban of all registered “assault weapons”.

What, did you expect they’d keep their promise that if you registered them you’d be able to keep them? Did you forget about all those pre-ban standard capacity magazines they said you could keep – and you now need to get rid of by July 1, 2017?

And if you thought Proposition 63’s and / or SB 1235’s ammunition buying license and background checks were bad, what it enables is worse. Previous proposals to limit the amount of ammunition you could purchase would have been impossible to enforce before. With a new central database of all ammo purchases, adding a limit will be a breeze and just another “common sense” restriction. These laws also enable limiting you to purchase ammunition for only those firearm calibers you have registered with the State. This helps to achieve the full gun registry the State wants AND limits the ammo you can buy to only what the State knows about.

California and other anti-firearm states have learned from their mistakes and are systematically restricting and eliminating our rights one piece at a time. Every law, every regulation, every rule is now designed to be built upon by the next level of Constitutional infringements.

Welcome to the future of gun control in California.

Bob

#oddstuffing, #guncontrol, #secondamendment, #constitution, #gunrights, #mewe, #medium, #instagram, #oddstuffing.com

More Gun Control, Cali Style

As if last year’s Gunmageddon laws and Prop 63 weren’t enough for California, they are back at it this year proposing even more draconian gun control measures which do nothing to fight crime or increase public safety, only punish the law abiding. As evidence, I give you Senator Anthony Portantino’s SB 497 changing the limit of one handgun a month to one firearm a month.

The Senator’s rational is this will close a so-called “loophole” by including long guns in a monthly buying limit. He argues there is no reason why someone would need to buy more than one long gun each month. The direct quote: “This is not the Wild West,” he said. “California’s in the 21st century, and you shouldn’t be able to walk into a gun store and come out with an arsenal.”

Here is my very personal reason why I oppose this.

My wife is the director for our county’s Women on Target program. For those of you who don’t know about NRA’s Women on Target, it is a program dedicated to providing women with a safe, friendly and fun introduction to recreational shooting. The program here is a small one; this will be its third year with three to four events per year. It is a 100% volunteer, bootstrapped effort. With materials from the Women of the NRA and together with a training company that offers its resources, our local range providing the facility and a local restaurant providing lunch for the participants and the many volunteers – oh yes, the wonderful volunteers! Men and women from the community who provide their time, expertise and kindness to help local women of all ages learn about firearms and safety.

Previously the program was able to borrow the firearms needed to run the clinics from friends and families. Now California says the only way you can loan a firearm to anyone other than a small list of immediate family members is for the loaner and loanee to go to the local gun shop, pay $35, the state mandated fee for a party-to-party transfer, and wait ten days just like a normal firearm purchase. Getting it back to the original loaner is $35 and ten more days.

Since borrowing under these circumstances is cost prohibitive and time consuming, and having a hodgepodge of whatever the instructors and volunteers can bring isn’t effective for education, it means acquiring them. The good news in this situation is a very generous grant pending from the Northern California Friends of the NRA. However since firearms in California must be registered to an individual, not a company, trust or non-profit, the plan for the program is for firearms to be registered to my wife. That way if she is ill, traveling or otherwise unable to attend a clinic, as one of the volunteers I can still ‘borrow’ them for the event using the family loaning exception.

On the list of pending purchases are 13 firearms, eight of them handguns. Under the current one handgun a month law, even splitting registration between the two of us will take four months, eight months if they are all in her name. Under the proposed one firearm a month law, seven months split, 13 months if they all are registered to her.

This Women On Target program isn’t the only one impacted. Even long running training and educational programs that have enough firearms still need to be sure the registered owner is with the firearms during training to not run afoul of the new loaning laws. Acquiring replacements or additional firearms puts them in the same position of having to wait months to years to replace or expand inventory.

It is already illegal to buy a firearm for someone else. It is already illegal to give someone a firearm without doing a legal transfer. It is already illegal to use a firearm in the commission of a crime, to say nothing about committing the crime in the first place and the host of other crimes that come along with it. How is making legal purchases illegal, going to make anyone safer?

If California spent their time and money enforcing the laws already in place, punishing those who break those laws and keeping them incarcerated instead of letting them out early to prey on the public, instead of creating new laws targeting law abiding citizens, the crime rate would actually go down.

What California is doing is obvious and inevitable. Each incremental, “common sense” gun control law that further restricts only the activity of law abiding citizens is another step towards the eventual goal of no firearms in private hands in California.

So congratulations California! You’ve made it more difficult to teach women in our county about safety and responsible firearms usage, as well as categorizing my wife’s volunteer educational activity as amassing an “arsenal”.

Welcome to Gun Control, Cali Style.

Bob

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