“[Denying teachers, administrators, adult-students, and visitors the right to carry at the university] will help parents, students, faculty and visitors feel safe on our campus.”
– Virginia Tech VP Larry Hincker
This quote never fails to make my blood boil.
It is the perfect example of feel-good legislation that makes for good sound bites while actually harming those it purports to protect. And I have to believe that he knew it was less-than useless even as he was speaking. You will note that he was very careful to use the phrase “feel safe” rather than any assurance of actual safety.
Because it certainly didn’t make them “actually safe.” Just a little over a year later, on a cold, sad Monday in April, Virginia Tech senior Seung Hui Cho went on a rampage that cost the lives of 32 of the Commonwealth’s best and brightest young people and sent a nation into mourning.
One of those we lost was Leslie Sherman. Last year, on the 5th anniversary of Cho’s attack, Leslie’s mother Holly Adams courageously spoke out about what could have been done to protect her daughter and the other innocents at Virginia Tech that day. And she laid the blame squarely on the shoulders of those who denied the right to self-defense on campus.
“Because professors, staff and students are precluded from protecting themselves on campus, Cho, a student at Virginia Tech himself, was able to simply walk on campus and go on a killing rampage with no worry that anyone would stop him.”
And a jury agreed with her, holding that a university has a “special relationship” with students such that the students can expect to be reasonably protected. In such a case, forbidding such basic personal protection options to students will almost certainly give rise to future lawsuits against Virginia’s colleges and universities.
But despite the harsh lesson learned at Virginia Tech and the very real threat of future lawsuits, more and more of Virginia’s public colleges and universities have been passing regulations banning carry on campus after Attorney General Cuccinelli issued an opinion that university policies do not overrule state-issued concealed carry permits but properly promulgated regulations, which have the force and effect of law, do.
Since then, we have seen a flood of public colleges and universities passing regulations to the extent allowed under Digiacinto v. The Rector and Visitors of George Mason University. And it isn’t hard for them to do so. Virginia gives colleges and universities fast-track regulatory powers that they have used to great effect in ramming these regulations through with little or no due process or public comment.
And that brings us to today’s update. Sadly, last Friday, the Radford University Board of Visitors voted to join this trend. The vote was 9 to 5 with Rectors Linda K. Whitley-Taylor, Nancy Artis, Brandon Bell, Mary Waugh Campbell, Sandra Davis, Kevin Dye, Darius Johnson, Ruby Rogers, and Georgia Ann Snyder-Falkinham voting in favor of the ban.
The regulation will go into effect as soon as the final regulation is published in the Virginia Register.
“Judge Katherine B. Forrest should go down in history as having pulled this Republic away from the abyss of Hell.”
– Naomi Wolf
On New Year’s Eve, December 31, 2011, President Obama signed into law H.R. 1540, the National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2012 (NDAA). This innocuous sounding bill, a version of which is passed every year, contained something much different than previous versions. It contained a provision allowing the government to arrest anyone, anywhere, without a warrant, and to detain them indefinitely without trial or hearing.
For those who aren’t paying attention or who are willing to overlook mistreatment of foreigners in the name of the ‘War on Terror,’ this is one you shouldn’t ignore because it is directed at YOU. Let me repeat myself … this bill gives the federal government the draconian power to arrest American citizens … on American soil … without a warrant … and to detain them indefinitely … without trial or hearing. This is a law so destructive to our concept of due process that it has drawn criticism and concern from all corners of the political spectrum.
President Obama, in signing the bill, issued a signing statement in which he says that his administration has no intention of using the powers thereby granted. However, as the Young Turks illustrate in their January 2nd, 2012 report on the NDAA signing, once signed by President Obama, this became the law of the land and any future administration is free to use these powers.
But perhaps I, in my libertarian zeal, am merely exaggerating the implications of the NDAA. Let’s see what the ACLU has to say about it.
“President Obama’s action today is a blight on his legacy because he will forever be known as the president who signed indefinite detention without charge or trial into law.”
“For the first time in American history, we have a law authorizing the worldwide and indefinite military detention of people captured far from any battlefield. The NDAA has no temporal or geographic limitations. It is completely at odds with our values, violates the Constitution, and corrodes our Nation’s commitment to the rule of law.”
“Any hope that the Obama administration would roll back the constitutional excesses of George Bush in the war on terror was extinguished today.”
Nope … It looks like they agree with me. And they are not the only ones. In early 2012, a group of influential progressives and anti-war activists including Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Christopher Hedges, Daniel Ellsberg, Jennifer Bolen, Noam Chomsky, and Alexa O’Brien filed suit against the Obama Administration seeking an injunction against the indefinite detention provisions of the NDAA. That case is Hedges v. Obama.
Back in May, Judge Katherine B. Forrest of the Southern District of New York issued a temporary injunction in the Hedges case. In her injunction, she dismissed the administration’s argument that the powers granted under the NDAA were no broader than those already in place from the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF).
In a responsive pleading filed on July 23rd, the Obama Administration imperiously demanded that the court “must not” decide the constitutional questions put forward by the plaintiffs. Also, they noted, even if the injunction is made permanent, they will not consider themselves bound by it because in their opinion, it “would have ‘nil’ effect, for the government would continue to possess the identical detention authority under the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force.”
It never ceases to amaze me how much the left will tolerate from one of their own. If President Bush had tried to strong-arm a court and then declared that he would ignore the results in any case, there would have been round-the-clock ‘constitutional crisis’ media coverage and calls for impeachment. But in the case of the Obama Administration, despite the warnings from the ACLU, no one in the mainstream media seems willing to address the issue with the seriousness it deserves.
But Judge Forrest was not intimidated and on September 12th, made her injunction permanent. She made it clear that the stakes do not get any higher than the threat of indefinite military detention during a ‘war on terror’ that will probably not end in our lifetime and the vague, overbroad language in the NDAA doesn’t even come close to passing constitutional muster when measured against such a threat to liberty and due process.
I join a host of other civil libertarians in saluting her wisdom and courage but the battle over indefinite detention is far from over. It took less than a day for the Obama Administration to file an appeal with the Second Circuit Court of Appeals. As the ACLU has so aptly noted, “the final word belongs to the Supreme Court” and I suspect this case may ultimately end up before the high court.
I have to say … For a president who insists he will never use this power, he is certainly willing to spend an awful lot of taxpayer money defending it. It kinda’ makes you say ‘hmmm.’
Hot on the heels of yesterday’s column about Hollywood’s evolving take on gun rights, comes the tale of yet another star who profits greatly from glorifying guns in film while apparently embracing gun control for all us ordinary mortals.
The star in this case is New Zealand born actor Karl Urban. While not yet what you would call an A-list star, his career is definitely up-and-coming.
He is best known for two roles, Bones on the 2009 Star Trek reboot and Russian Secret Service assassin Kirill in The Bourne Supremacy. And on September 21, he will return to the big screen with his biggest role yet as Judge Dredd in a much-touted 3D reboot of the popular and gritty comic book franchise.
I say curse because, as a comic fan, I was quite looking forward to the Dredd reboot. In fact, it was while looking for the updated trailer featuring the song by La Roux that I discovered Urban was a proponent of gun control.
The story goes something like this. In the last week of August, Karl Urban and writer Alex Garland held a round table interview in London about the upcoming movie. There was a lot of light-hearted banter about the movie and then Urban was asked whether there is serious social commentary in the movie. His response is the impetus for this article.
“That’s the world Dredd is set in, it’s set in a society that is on the verge of chaos and collapse and it’s not that big a leap. We take our freedoms pretty much for granted; I think it’s really interesting to look at a society where all those freedom has been taken away … It certainly makes me appreciate that I live in a democratic country that has good gun control.”
And then he laughed. The bugger actually laughed!
I was floored when I read this. I mean … I really shouldn’t expect deep thought from entertainers but I find the fact that he can bemoan the loss of rights while simultaneously praising gun control to be utterly sickening.
Being born and raised in New Zealand obviously contributes to his support of gun control but that only strengthens the argument that we must be just as vigilant in fighting cultural attacks on gun rights as we are with legislative and judicial attacks.
Now … out of fairness, I should note that this comment is the only time I could find that Urban has spoken out about gun control and the NRA does not include him on their list of anti-gun organizations and celebrities so there may yet be hope for him.
Perhaps a little more time in America will help him come to understand that “chaos and collapse” can come for any family with a crash in the night and only the proper self-defense tools will allow them to prevail.
“America is a country founded on guns. It’s in our DNA. It’s very strange but I feel better having a gun. I really do. I don’t feel safe, I don’t feel the house is completely safe, if I don’t have one hidden somewhere. ”
In 1999, back when the Brady Campaign was upfront about their goals and called themselves Handgun Control, Inc., they ran a full page ad in USA Today entitled “Open Letter to the National Rifle Association.”
The letter called for a nationwide “one handgun a month” rule, waiting periods for handgun purchases, an end to private sales, and a complete and permanent ban on so-called “assault weapons” as well as normal capacity magazines.
Signing this “open letter” were dozens of Hollywood stars and media personalities. The list included many names that you would expect to see promoting gun control. Alec Baldwin was a signer, as was Candice Bergen. Other names included Cher, Kevin Costner, Phil Donahue, Richard Dryfus, and Spike Lee.
So why talk about this now? Well … the impetus for this article is the recent release of the movie Expendables 2. This movie is the perfect microcosm of the divide on gun rights in Hollywood. The movie stars some of the most pro-gun stars in Hollywood while simultaneously featuring some of the most anti-gun. And which stars are in which category might just amaze you.
On the pro-gun side we will start with Chuck Norris. Where gun rights are concerned, you can’t say enough about Chuck Norris. He is a truly dedicated supporter of gun rights, a celebrity spokesperson for the NRA, and the honorary chairman of the NRA’s “Trigger The Vote” campaign.
The next pro-gun star from the Expendables is Bruce Willis. In a 2006 interview, Willis made it clear that he supports the Second Amendment and considers gun-control bad public policy
“If you take guns away from legal gun owners then the only people who would have guns would be the bad guys.”
But now we must turn to the anti-gun stars. I will start with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Like many politicians before him, Arnold’s run for the governorship of California featured a promise that he “supports the Second Amendment” followed by a list of “responsibilities that gun owners must follow in owning a firearm”.
From Arnold’s perspective, those responsibilities included supporting the Brady Bill, submitting to the arbitrary ban on popular sporting firearms, giving up private sales, and complying with storage requirements that make self-defense virtually impossible. When pushed on the issue by reporters, he stated “I’m for gun control. I’m a peace-loving guy.”
And finally we turn to Sylvester Stallone. Stallone, living in the UK, was asked about US gun culture and made it very clear that he is no friend of gun owners, calling for door-to-door confiscation of all handguns.
“Until America, door to door, takes every handgun, this is what you’re gonna have. It’s pathetic. It really is pathetic. It’s sad. We’re living in the Dark Ages.”
But a new era appears to be dawning in Hollywood, with many stars voicing their support for gun rights. Recently, in an interview with the BBC, Ice T was asked about gun rights in the US and deftly defended the right to keep and bear arms in the face of hard questioning by the interviewer. I salute Ice T for his position and his debating skills.
And finally, the dynamic duo of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are apparently living the gun owners dream. Brad recently bought Angelina a private shooting range at their home in France valued at over $400,000. And why wouldn’t he? After all, Angelina is quoted as saying that shooting guns is a bit of an “aphrodisiac.”
Need I say more? Well played Mr. Pitt. Well played indeed.
But Brad’s love of guns doesn’t end there. In a recent interview with British magazine Live, he waxed somewhat poetic about his childhood with guns.
“I got my first BB (air) gun when I was in nursery school. I got my first shotgun by first grade. I had shot a handgun by third grade and I grew up in a pretty sane environment.”
Talking about the Aurora Colorado shooting, he went on to defend gun ownership by law abiding citizens as a bulwark against criminals.
“I absolutely don’t believe you can put sanctions or shackles on what is made. Nor do I want to pretend the world is different than what we witnessed that night.
America is a country founded on guns. It’s in our DNA. It’s very strange but I feel better having a gun. I really do. I don’t feel safe, I don’t feel the house is completely safe, if I don’t have one hidden somewhere.”
He ended the interview with a slap at those who would use such tragedies to promote their anti-gun agendas.
“To turn around and ask us to give up our guns … we’re going to give up ours and the bad guys are still going to get theirs. It’s just in our thinking. I’m telling you, we don’t know America without guns.”
The presidential race is entering it’s final phase and the rhetoric is really heating up. With all of the political doublespeak from both candidates, it is often hard for people to decide which party would best represent their interests.
But I have been trying to cut through the rhetoric and ideology to give you the real facts about the candidates beliefs and history where gun rights are concerned.
But President and Vice-President are just two of the offices that will be up for election this November. The two parties also have numerous House and Senate candidates who are competing for your vote and whose election will certainly impact your rights.
So let’s take a look at how the Second Amendment was treated at the GOP and DNC Conventions and in their official platforms.
We will start with the GOP Platform. They packed so much into their platform on gun rights that the Washington Examiner called it the “most pro-gun platform ever.” I have taken the time to emphasis those parts that I found most illustrative.
We uphold the right of individuals to keep and bear arms, a right which antedated the Constitution and was solemnly confirmed by the Second Amendment. We acknowledge, support, and defend the law-abiding citizen’s God-given right of self-defense. We call for the protection of such fundamental individual rights recognized in the Supreme Court’s decisions in District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago affirming that right, and we recognize the individual responsibility to safely use and store firearms. This also includes the right to obtain and store ammunition without registration. We support the fundamental right to self-defense wherever a law-abiding citizen has a legal right to be, and we support federal legislation that would expand the exercise of that right by allowing those with state-issued carry permits to carry firearms in any state that issues such permits to its own residents. Gun ownership is responsible citizenship, enabling Americans to defend their homes and communities. We condemn frivolous lawsuits against gun manufacturers and oppose federal licensing or registration of law-abiding gun owners.We oppose legislation that is intended to restrict our Second Amendment rights by limiting the capacity of clips or magazines or otherwise restoring the ill-considered Clinton gun ban.We condemn the reckless actions associated with the operation known as “Fast and Furious,” conducted by the Department of Justice, which resulted in the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol Agent and others on both sides of the border. We applaud the Members of the U.S. House of Representatives in holding the current Administration’s Attorney General in contempt of Congress for his refusal to cooperate with their investigation into that debacle. We oppose the improper collection of firearms sales information in the four southern border states, which was imposed without congressional authority.
The GOP platform really is impressive. Let’s break out what is included:
They called the right to keep and bear arms a ‘fundamental individual right’
They called the right to self-defense a ‘fundamental right’
They oppose any registration or limitation on the ownership of ammunition
They support pursuing national reciprocity
They oppose allowing frivolous lawsuits against manufacturers
They oppose any federal registration or licensing of firearms
They oppose any renewal of the so-called ‘assault weapons‘ ban
They oppose any restrictions on normal capacity magazines
They support sanctioning AG Holder for Fast and Furious
That is a really great platform. But let’s not jump to conclusions just yet. What about the Democrat Platform? As above, I have emphasized the parts I would like you to focus on.
We recognize that the individual right to bear arms is an important part of the American tradition, and we will preserve Americans’ Second Amendment right to own and use firearms. We believe that the right to own firearms is subject to reasonable regulation. We understand the terrible consequences of gun violence; it serves as a reminder that life is fragile, and our time here is limited and precious. We believe in an honest, open national conversation about firearms. We can focus on effective enforcement of existing laws, especially strengthening our background check system, and we can work together to enact commonsense improvements—like reinstating the assault weapons ban and closing the gun show loophole—so that guns do not fall into the hands of those irresponsible, law-breaking few.
There is no mention of ‘fundamental individual rights’ at all. Instead, our rights are merely “an important part of the American tradition.” Well excuse me! I didn’t realize that my right to keep and bear arms equates to having pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving.
They go on to say that they “will preserve Americans’ Second Amendment right to own and use firearms.” But apparently they meant to add “at least those we allow you” to the end because they go on to call for a renewal of the Clinton era ban on the most popular sporting firearms in existence today and insist on an opened-ended ability to enact “reasonable regulations.”
They also repeated the tired call for an end to private sales “so that guns do not fall into the hands of those irresponsible, law-breaking few.” When they say ‘guns’ here I can only assume they mean single-shot black powder rifles since they have indicated a willingness to snuff out most other forms of modern firearms.
In short, the 2012 Democrat Platform is a great big slap in the face for gun owners. But I know there are Democrats who are proud supporters of gun rights. I hope they received a warm welcome in Charlotte at the DNC Convention.
Ooooh …. I guess not. Apparently gun owners are not welcome in the Democrat tent at all at risk of severe verbal attack. Some of my favorite quotes that the Daily Show reporters were able to get:
“We are the big tent party and we will let ‘most anybody in, unless of course they are carrying guns.”
“Everyone’s welcome unless you are a hunter, or a gun owner.”
Other insults included “Gun totin’ hillbillies”, “gun nuts”, and “Yosemite Sam.”
As attendee after attendee is interviewed, gun ownership is attacked more than any other policy issue. Sadly, they seemed to imply that any true Democrat could never be a gun owner.
As for independent voters who are also gun owners, the Democrats want them to know that they are welcome to vote for Democrat candidates if they can find the time between brushing their one tooth and drinking moonshine.
The Well-Read Rogue is my attempt to share my love of books with other Libertarians and well-armed Americans. Each book or series I review is one I have personally read.
Since I introduced ‘The Well-Read Rogue‘ feature last week, I have been trying to decide which book to start with. In what can only be described as an act of karma, the decision has been made for me.
It happened like this … I logged onto Facebook this morning and saw a reminder that the next book in one of my favorite series is coming out this week. The series is Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter and if you haven’t discovered it yet then you are missing something freakin’ amazing!
The story behind the Monster Hunter franchise is truly an inspiring tale. For those of you who don’t know, Larry is one of us; a well-armed American. In addition to his day jobs as an accountant and best-selling author, he is also a firearms instructor, longtime shooter, and an active member of a number of internet gun forums. In short, his is an all-American success story.
The first Monster Hunter novel, Monster Hunter International, was actually initially self-published and only promoted on gun forums. But, in a tribute to the power of gun owners in the marketplace, it became so popular so fast that it made the bestseller list in 2008 prompting Baen Books to offer Larry a publishing contract. He has been with them ever since and his books are consistently best-sellers.
The series tells the tale of Owen Zastava Pitt who gets to throw his insufferable boss (who turns out to be a newly minted werewolf) out of a high window in the first few pages. Being a red-blooded and well-informed American, Owen was of course packing; but without silver bullets, he ultimately had to resort to main force and took a heck of a lot of damage while doing so. Thankfully, Owen is what we in the South call a ‘bigun’ and recovers from wounds that would have killed a lesser man.
The story only gets better from there as Owen discovers that all the monsters of humanity’s darkest legends are real. He also discovers that the only thing protecting an unsuspecting public from being overwhelmed by the forces of darkness are the companies who fight the monsters in order to claim the bounties offered by the government (known as PUFF … don’t ask … just read the series and you will understand).
Profoundly affected (and physically scarred) by his experience, Owen joins such a company, Monster Hunter International (MHI), and as the series progresses through Monster Hunter Vendetta and Monster Hunter Alpha, we learn more about Owen’s destiny, his awesomely cool and mysterious co-workers, how the government can screw up even monster hunting, and the true nature of the hidden world.
It goes without saying that we also get a lot of very cool, very accurate gun lore worked into the stories. Larry also misses no opportunity to gently ‘indoctrinate’ his readers in the benefits of a well-armed citizenry and the burdens of overbearing bureaucracy.
I can’t tell you much more without spoiling some of the storyline, but if you are a fan of sci-fi and fantasy then I guarantee that you will love this series as much as I do!
But don’t just take my word for it. MHI is a worldwide phenomenon. In the books, the MHI teams all wear patches designating the team. And the team Owen is assigned to has a patch featuring a distinctive horned smiley face and the year the company was founded, 1895.
The designing of patches has become a bit of a hobby amongst MHI fans but it is the originals that keep showing up on the sleeves of the men and women fighting for our country overseas. If this series can inspire real-life heroes then it surely deserves a chance to join your library.
Larry has asked for the help of all his fans in boosting the new book Monster Hunter Legion into the bestseller list by having strong first-week sales. And the link to the book I have included will get you a deeply discounted, limited signed edition. Please join me in adding this book to your collection.
Of course if you are new to the series, you will want to read the first three before starting your signed copy of Monster Hunter Legion. The easiest way to accomplish that is to buy the first three novels conveniently printed in a single volume called The Monster Hunters.
Finally, if you are a fan of audio books, as I am, then you will love the Audible productions of these novels. They are narrated by Oliver Wyman who does an amazing job of bringing the stories to life.
PS. As I mentioned above, designing your own team patch has become a bit of a hobby for fans and I am a bit embarrassed to admit that I have developed the following one myself.
“Deadly assault weapons … are not made for recreation or self-defense. They are instruments of destruction with the sole purpose of hunting down and killing people.”
– Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney
As the Republican National Convention comes to a close, it is time for me to live up to the promise I made when I wrote about Why gun owners should fear a second term for President Obama. That promise was to give the Republican nominee the same skeptical scrutiny that I gave to President Obama. And just as in that previous article, I am limiting my discussion to gun rights issues only.
I think it is only fair to note that, going into this article, I had some preconceived notions. Surely whoever the GOP nominated would be a sympathetic figure from a gun rights perspective wouldn’t they? After all, isn’t the GOP the gun-rights party? Well as it turns out, maybe not if you are a Massachusetts republican.
In her speech at the RNC, Ann Romney alluded to this, noting that “You may not agree with Mitt’s positions on issues or his politics. Massachusetts is only 13% Republican, so it’s not like that’s a shock.”
But wait … Is it really that bad? What exactly has Mitt Romney said or done that could be construed as anti-gun?
Perhaps most widely reported is the claim that he signed an ‘assault weapons‘ ban while Governor of Massachusetts. In 2004 he signed into law S.2367 which has been reported to be a state version of the federal ‘assault weapons’ ban. Now … signing a bill banning a large category of semi-automatic rifles, including the AR-15 which is one of the most popular rifles selling in America today, would definitely be a direct attack on the Second Amendment. But is that actually what Governor Romney did?
Actually no. Prior to S.2367, Massachusetts already had an ‘assault weapons’ ban in place. S.2367, which cleaned up a number of aspects of Massachusetts’ draconian gun laws, simply updated the existing law to include the definition from the federal ban instead of merely incorporating it since the federal ban was slated to sunset. The NRA goes into detail on their site about why the bill was in fact a victory for Massachusetts gun owners.
However, Governor Romney sullied the signing of this bill by making the comment that I opened the article with in which he parroted the words of the anti-gun forces and demonized so-called ‘assault weapons.’ He may have not signed a ban, but his words tell us that he probably would have signed such a ban if it were placed before him.
What else has he done? In 2003, he signed a bill to increase firearms license fees from $25 to $100. To be fair, he proposed that the fee be increased only to $75 and the legislature instead took it to $100. But that still means he proposed a 300% increase in the cost to exercise what he has stated he believes to be a constitutional right. And he ultimately signed a bill making the increase 400%. This may seem trivial to many but it is a huge burden on those living in poverty. For many working families, such a fee effectively denies them the right altogether.
Dan Gross,relatively new president of the Brady Campaign (formerly Handgun Control, Inc.), had glowing words for Governor Romney when his record for gun control is compared to that of President Obama; “In their time in office, I would say with a pretty strong degree of certainty that Romney did more [for gun control].”
Yet amazingly, in 2007 when speaking to the NRA via videotape, he made the astonishing claim that “As governor I worked closely with the NRA and The Gun Owners Action League to advance legislation that expanded the rights of gun owners in my state … We made it easier for people to exercise their constitutional rights.”
“Really? That’s what you think you did? Really?”
Because in the real world, forcing people to pay $100 to exercise a fundamental right is not making it ‘easier for people to exercise their constitutional rights!‘
In the real world, calling popular sporting firearms “instruments of destruction with the sole purpose of hunting down and killing people” is not ‘expanding the rights of gun owners!’
Governor Romney has known for some time that he needed to reform his image with gun owners if he ever wanted to have a shot at the presidency. His efforts in that regard have not inspired confidence.
He joined the NRA as a life member in the summer of 2006, stating that “I’m after the NRA’s endorsement … [and I] joined because if I’m going to ask for their endorsement, they’re going to ask for mine.” That sounded a little too mercenary for most NRA members who join not for personal benefit but rather because they want to protect the right to keep and bear arms.
And the stumbles continued. In 2007, in an interview with The Glenn and Helen Show, he claimed “I have a gun of my own” in response to a gun owner’s question only to have to admit days later that this was not in fact true.
In late 2007, in an interview with Tim Russert, he reiterated that were he president, he would sign a reauthorization of the federal ‘assault weapons’ ban if it made it to his desk although he quite seriously assaulted the english language in doing so.
“Just as the president said, he would have, he would have signed that bill if it came to his desk, and so would have I.”
More recently, in an interview with CNBC’s Larry Kudlow on July 23rd, 2012, he was asked about S.2367. Rather than clarifying the issue, he choose to give a political answer which only alarmed gun owners further (emphasis added):
“Well, actually the law that we signed in Massachusetts was a combination of efforts both on the part of those that were for additional gun rights and those that opposed gun rights, and they came together and made some changes that provided, I think, a better environment for both, and that’s why both sides came to celebrate the signing of the bill. Where there are opportunities for people of reasonable minds to come together and find common ground, that’s the kind of legislation I like. The idea of one party jamming through something over the objection of the other tends to divide the nation, not make us a more safe and prosperous place. So if there’s common ground, why I’m always willing to have that kind of a conversation.”
Given his earlier demonization of ‘assault weapons’ and his continued support for a reauthorization of the federal ‘assault weapons’ ban, this answer leaves gun owners wondering whether a ‘President Romney’ might not support significant future gun control legislation if it were pushed by a bi-partisan group. It certainly does not inspire the kind of confidence one would like in a presidential candidate that is asking us for money and grassroots effort on his behalf.
While the NRA has not officially endorsed Governor Romney, he has received the official endorsement of outspoken rocker Ted Nugent but not before Romney reportedly pledged over the phone that “there would be no new gun laws or restrictions on Second Amendment rights in his administration.” I must say that a phone pledge is not the kind of reassurance I would like before opening my checkbook and hitting the streets for a candidate.
Perhaps the only thing that could be said with some degree of certainty is that a ‘President Romney’ would almost certainly nominate more pro-gun judges than would President Obama. And that is no small issue. During his first term alone President Obama has appointed two Supreme Court justices, 35 Court of Appeals judges, and 139 district court judges.
And these judges affect our rights in very real ways and will continue to do so for years to come. As I noted in my article about Why gun owners should fear a second term for President Obama, Heller was only decided by a 5-4 majority. Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito were the majority.
McDonald v. Chicago was also only decided by a 5-4 majority with the same 5 conservative justices as the majority. Revealingly, President Obama’s first nominee to the Supreme Court, Justice Sotomayor joined the dissent characterizing the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense as “not fundamental”.
And here are some more numbers that should worry gun owners: Justice Scalia is 76 this year. Justice Kennedy is 75. If either of those justices decides to step down or suffers a health problem during the next four years then you can rest assured that any nominee President Obama puts forward will not vote the right way on the next gun rights case, many of which are already working their way up through the courts of appeal.
On the other side of the coin, Justice Ginsburg is 79 this year and Justice Breyer is 73. If either of these justices were to retire from the court, there would be an opportunity to shore up the slim majority that we currently hold in the Supreme Court.
I do believe that a ‘President Romney’ would likely be far better for gun rights than a second-term President Obama for the reasons laid out in my previous article about President Obama. But those reasons are all based on the anti-gun tendencies of President Obama rather than any significant pro-gun tendencies on the part of Governor Romney. I truly dislike rewarding someone for past bad behavior but politics is not an easy game and ‘choosing the lesser of two evils’ is the rule rather than the exception more often than not.
The potential federal judgeship appointments alone should be enough to get gun owners to offer their support to Governor Romney but I don’t think it is enough to truly energize them. After all, we are talking about a man who has the support of both Ted Nugent and Dan Gross of the Brady Campaign.
“A mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.”
― George R.R. Martin
I am often asked why I enjoy writing so much and I always give the same answer … “because I truly love the written word.”
Nothing in all of human accomplishment has the capacity to move us, to uplift us, to inspire us, and to simply and delightfully entertain us, more than the written word.
As a child, I grew up in a town of just over 300 people in the heart of the Appalachian mountains in Southwestern Virginia. We had a farm and a large garden and many of my non-school hours were spent with a hoe in my hand or a horse beneath me. But there were still plenty of free hours and I spent most of them with my nose in a book.
To be fair, there wasn’t much choice back then. On a good day, with the clouds just right, we could pick up one television station; WCYB 5 in Bristol. But the only time they had programming for children was Saturday morning when they ran cartoons. And I, like everyone else I knew, considered Saturday mornings sacred for just that reason. But the rest of the week, I was reading books; discovering pirate treasure, battling the monstrous remnants of forgotten aeons, or walking on the surface of other worlds.
My mother had worked hard to instill a love of reading in me. When I was very young, she got me hooked on comic books. In Marion Virginia, which at 20 miles across the mountains was the nearest medium-sized town, there was a second-hand store which had a huge bin of comics with the covers torn off that they sold for a dime each.
As I understand it now, that store had somehow came into possession of comics that had been returned to the publisher for return credit. But back then, all my mother knew was that she could get a bag of 100 comics for $10 and she bought me a bag every month when she went grocery shopping.
She never bothered to pick out specific comics. She just had them grab 100 and put them in a bag. If she had known that she was providing we with such reading material as “The Son of Satan,” she probably would have had a heart attack on the spot.
But the underlying theme of that particular comic was to become one of my favorite plot devices. To this day, I love stories of hard-won redemption; of men and women born to darkness who somehow fight their way back to the light.
But the comics were only a gateway ‘drug’ for the young John Pierce. I soon craved a more substantial fix and I found it in science fiction, fantasy, and gritty detective novels.
Here too, I have my mother to thank. The county library, located 30 miles away in Independence Virginia, ran a bookmobile into our town once a month. It was a large panel-van with bookshelves lining the back. It would park in front of the Post Office for a few hours and you could walk in and check out books. And since he only came by once a month, you could get a lot of books.
My mother would always take a Piggly Wiggly bag she saved from grocery shopping and have him fill it with whatever sci-fi and fantasy novels he might have. I read a lot of books that I might have otherwise not chosen that way and I am glad that I did.
I have never lost the love of reading that sustained and inspired and uplifted me as a child. These days, I travel a great deal, and I wouldn’t be caught dead without something to read while on an airplane or a good audiobook to listen to while driving. I still read a chapter of a good book to my son every night to put him to sleep and listen to audiobooks while mowing the lawn or putting up fence.
And one of the greatest things about being a voracious reader is sharing the books and worlds you have discovered with your friends. Nothing (outside of female nudity of course) gets me more excited than sharing a literary discovery with a fellow reader.
That is why I have decided to add a regular feature here on Monachus Lex called “The Well-Read Rogue” wherein I will share with you the books and series that I consider must-reads. I hope you enjoy these interludes between legal and gun-rights commentary as much as I expect to enjoy sharing them with you.
“Fairy tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed.”
– G. K. Chesterton
Yesterday morning a Fresno California woman came face-to-face with every mother’s worst nightmare. Just after 8:30 in the morning, a man wearing a ski-mask invaded her home while she and her child were inside. But the horror doesn’t end there. The man was there with a goal. He wanted her 2 year-old daughter.
This story is eerily similar to a 2003 kidnapping in San Jose California which I wrote about at the time. In both cases, the mothers fought fiercely but were ultimately beaten by the kidnapper. In both cases, the kidnapper grabbed the child despite the mother’s best efforts. But that is where the similarities end.
In the 2003 kidnapping, the mother was unable to stop the kidnapper from taking her child, who was eventually released by her kidnapper but only after being sexually assaulted.
Yesterday in Fresno however, the mother had a gun handy, and that gun made all the difference in the world for that family. Staring down the barrel of an enraged mother’s shotgun, the kidnapper put down the child and fled. The gun allowed her to accomplish what all of her fear-driven strength could not … save her child. Anti-gun advocates are fond of saying “Imagine a world without guns.” But for that mother … and that child … such a world would be a nightmare.
Samuel Colt is often cited for the poem “You never need fear a man, no matter what his size. When danger threatens, call on me, and I will equalize.” Remember the ‘equalization’ part of that poem when next you hear anti-gunners call for a ban on guns.
To paraphrase noted gun-rights photographer and writer Oleg Volk, those who make such a call are advocating for a return to a world in which the weak must submit to the strong, where freedom is only that which you can hold onto with your bare hands; a nasty, brutal, medieval world; a world in which this young child would not be with her mother right now.
In my 2003 article, I noted that my own daughter, who was much younger then, asked at the time, “… why didn’t she just use her gun to stop the bad man?” I didn’t have a good answer for her then and I ended that article by noting that “Those who are defenseless themselves can never hope to be the protector of their children.”
But the converse is also true. An armed and prepared parent can use the tools at their disposal to hold back the dark and keep the dragons in their place.
When I wrote last week’s Anti-Gun Wacko of the Week column about University of Colorado Professor Jerry Peterson, I chose the name of the column on a bit of a whim. I didn’t really expect that I would find that level of outrageousness on a weekly basis.
But by now, you would think I would know better than to underestimate the ability of bureaucrats to make blindly stupid decisions.
And that brings us to today’s story about 3-year-old Hunter Spanjer. Hunter is, by all reports, a happy and well-loved child who attends preschool in Grand Island Nebraska. Hunter is just like all the other boys and girls except for one thing … the school board wants to take away his name.
You see … Hunter is deaf and uses American Sign Language (ASL). And the ASL symbol for Hunter or hunting is shown in the video below. Hunter then crosses his fingers to show it is a formal name instead of the concept of hunting. It is the official sign for his name.
But the Grand Island School Board doesn’t care. They say that the sign runs afoul of their ‘Weapons in Schools’ policy which bans “any instrument … that looks like a weapon.” Forgetting for a second the ridiculousness of banning objects based upon mere looks, the level of stupidity and insensitivity that it takes to stretch such a rule to encompass a deaf child using official ASL signs is staggering.
As a matter of fact, it has been brought to my attention that math class will apparently have to be cancelled for all deaf students as well since the number 21 also looks like a ‘scary’ finger gun.
I personally believe that their stance is in violation of the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) as well as being an unconstitutional abuse of power and discretion. And I am not alone in that assessment. The National Association of the Deaf is providing legal services to help Hunter’s family fight this bigotry and stupidity.
I imagine that there are an awful lot of people who are thinking of other hand gestures that might be appropriate for the Grand Island School Board right now. I will leave you with that cheerful thought as we all wish Hunter’s family the best in fighting for his right to keep his very name.
UPDATE: The ACLU has reportedly also joined the fray and the school board, overwhelmed by the response, has issued the following statement which muddies the waters further without actually answering any questions.
“Grand Island Public Schools has not changed the sign language name of any student, nor is it requiring any student to change how his or her name is signed. The school district teaches American Sign Language (“ASL”) for students with hearing impairments. ASL is recommended by the Nebraska Department of Education and is widely used in the United States. The sign language techniques taught in the school district are consistent with the standards of the Nebraska Department of Education and ASL.
The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act prohibits the school district from disclosing personally identifiable information concerning any student without the prior written consent of the student’s parent. Therefore, the school district cannot discuss any particular student or identify any particular student.
Grand Island Public Schools is not requiring any current student with a hearing impairment to change his or her sign language name. Our mission remains: Every Student, Every Day, a Success!”
Hot on the heels of yesterday’s column about 
The presidential race is entering it’s final phase and the rhetoric is really heating up. With all of the political doublespeak from both candidates, it is often hard for people to decide which party would best represent their interests.
Since 
and if you haven’t discovered it yet then you are missing something freakin’ amazing!
, was actually initially self-published and only promoted on gun forums. But, in a tribute to the power of gun owners in the marketplace, it became so popular so fast that it made the bestseller list in 2008 prompting Baen Books to offer Larry a publishing contract. He has been with them ever since and his books are consistently best-sellers.
and 
, we learn more about Owen’s destiny, his awesomely cool and mysterious co-workers, how the government can screw up even monster hunting, and the true nature of the hidden world.
into the bestseller list by having strong first-week sales. And the link to the book I have included will get you a 
She never bothered to pick out specific comics. She just had them grab 100 and put them in a bag. If she had known that she was providing we with such reading material as “The Son of Satan,” she probably would have had a heart attack on the spot.
“Fairy tales do not tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that dragons exist. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed.”
When I wrote 