Local non-compliance with restrictive state laws

[Bartholomew Roberts]

You think universal background checks are A-OK; but don’t support the bump stock ban? Or you don’t like the guy who supported the bump stock ban and just enjoyed the opportunity to remind his supporters of it?

 

[USNRet93]

Whatever makes ya happy(?)....
Out

 

[TDL]

Remind me again, who did the bump stock ban?

The executive order sucked the oxygen out of a much more broadly restrictive legislative effort that had massive public support. There is good evidence this would have been a veto override that would have been a gigantic mess for 2A advacy. Sure, we see lots of polls and surveys that are cherry picked snapshots, or don't mention oscillations and/or ask leading questions. But bump stock ban support was uniquely intense and sustained and at such high numbers that it was not about polling methodology. The support for such a ban was there and huge. I've got former interns that are now full time on the Hill and this is one where the calls and letters in ran virtually 1000:1.

As far as citizens exercising non-compliance if you end up with a certain number of citizens who don't comply, it will be beneficial to gun control culture since some will be caught, they will be prosecuted and publicized to support the idea that the some scary marginal types need to be proactively dealt with.

I give to NRA, SAF, I was secondary tier plaintiff pool in an important appeal and I have given money to federal and state elected representatives that are strong and articulate on 2A. I've got my bonafides in strongly supporting the 2A. But I would not be taking a chance on breaking the laws. The guys I know who imply they would "resist" illegally tend to be vocally hard line, and yet when I query them on who their state assembly member is, they do not know. They don't even know the vote distributions. Many don't even know their US Rep.

I mean we are talking about substantial risk of imprisonment, loss of job, loss of career, loss of all firearms rights. As Glenn mentioned you even crank up civil liability risk. Who knows what your umbrella policy or specific firearms liability insurance is going to do if there is a per se crime involved in an event, be it marginally material, and who knows what bias a jury may be swayed by if the issue involved an illegal firearm instead of a legal one.

The tragedy is that the supposed gun friendly political party and president show no real interest in stopping such bans but they still want your check as 'defenders' of the 2nd. Amendment.

The GOP the last couple of years has fought more gun control bills, more consistently than in the past. That is the objective data, and it is contrary to the narrative that they are doing so less. Just look at relative party distribution of the ten thousand or so data points the last few years of legislators' co-sponsorship, committee votes, and full votes in local, state level and federal legislative efforts. I see people citing red flag, and really let’s be honest that is a very difficult one for an elected official in a purple state or district. And in purple or light blue states the clear evidence the GOP side attempts to and sometimes manages to get impact reducing amendments. Pone has to look at the totality.

In the case of Mr. Trump the bump stock was such a gigantic wave that it could have caused a veto override and we have to also look at who he has been appointing to the federal courts. On top of all that Trump comes from NYC where the starting point on views on the 2A are very different.

As far as money, total spending by the constellation of gun control lobby, gun safety c3 charities , gun safety c4 non-profits, 523s and other dark money, direct contributions by highly identified issue people like Bloomberg -- dwarfs spending on our side. And it all now affects campaigns even though most of it is not campaign contributions from a legal perspective, but is electioneering specifically done right up to the margin of control by FEC or lobbying right outside the line of trigger IRS issues.

For decades we had the money advantage, now the other side has it and at multiples of what we do, and has institutionalized raising and spending it for the benefit of Democrat candidates to extreme levels of sophistication. I’ve got a former employee who works for one of the major Soros groups and they have their c4/c3 mix strategy down to a science that is legal virtual money laundering of raising c3 and spending c4 and it is 100% partisan effect.

There is simply, in political terms, with gun control, as close to a virtual binary on party positions and voting records as it gets. That it is 95% and not 100% doesn’t change that. (Not to mention the trend as it used to be 80%.) Out of the top 50 political issues, can we even name one that shows more of a partisan divide? Other social or wedge issues like abortion, climate, gay rights, don’t even come close to the level of partisan divide on 2A. Neither does tax policy, budget policy, any issue related to foreign policy nor Medicaid expansion.

Look at the Manchin UBC vote and compare it to this from a generation earlier:
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/103-1993/s394
twenty years ago that was a vote that was “weakly partisan” to "somewhat partisan.” A couple of years ago the main close legislation was rated as strongly partisan. More votes are strongly partisan rated than ever.

On top of that just look at the several hundred professionals working for the gun control lobby and its ancillaries. That is a DNC revolving door. I can’t even find a Republican at any level, whereas it is chock full of ex-DNC staff, ex-State Dem party staff, ex-Dem elected official office or committee staff, people who worked for PR or Public Affairs helmed and aligned with Democrat partisans. As the door revolves many of the workers in those adovacy groups move to Dem staff jobs. On the funding side it is virtually all Democrat bundlers and donors. They d so because giving to gun control adovacy is giving to the Democrat party and when it is c3 money, the taxpayer pays half in subsidizing the charitable deductions or foundation endowment.

I get the idea of voicing some criticism and pushback on any GOP official’s missteps. But I've heard people go rabid on Mrs Collins, who we need to remember voted for Kavanaugh, without any consideration for the fact she is is not operating under the same electoral conditions as a senator from Kentucky, nor any consideration for the fact that these are exceptions and clearly not the rule.