Tag: guns

Categories
general freedom ideological culture Second Amendment rights

Another Disability for Paralympians

Olympics, shooting, guns, Instagram

The Paralympic Games, being held this year from August 28 to September 8, in Paris, are a “major international sports competition for athletes with disabilities.” 

We should cheer their efforts — not undermine them.

Meta’s Instagram apparently disagrees. In mid-​July, Instagram restricted the account of McKenna Geer, member of the American shooting team, so that it could be viewed only by current followers.

The “problem” seemed to be that she had posted photos of herself in competition. With firearms. For similar reasons, Instagram has also censored the accounts of other athletes. (Skittishness about pics of guns may be why an Olympics​.com photo of an Indian athlete “shooting” shows only head and arm.)

When the restrictions were imposed, Geer observed that she and other athletes use social media to spread the word about their sport and firearm safety, “build our personal brand, and connect with potential sponsors.” Her livelihood and ability to continue shooting competitively were thus at stake.

Geer’s Instagram account is again accessible to non-​followers. But the problem has not been resolved permanently. As aaronalvarado asserted at her account, “a bad AI program with no monitoring” may be to blame. “We appeal and the program shadow-​bans everything.”

If so, at least a human being is not consciously choosing to censor Geer or other athletes because they shoot competitively. But somebody wrote the programming. And Meta must be aware of these problems. 

It’s time to remove the “guns bad, context irrelevant” line of code.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts

Categories
defense & war general freedom Second Amendment rights

Of 15s and the Man

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time,” Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1787 regarding Shays’ Rebellion, “with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

Earlier this week, “in a mocking tone,” reports The New York Post, President Joe Biden asked, “How much have you heard this phrase, ‘the blood of liberty … washes those’” — before exclaiming, “Give me a break!”

Biden continued, “No, I mean it. Seriously. And, by the way, if they want to think they can take out government if we get out of line, which they are talking again about, well guess what, they need F‑15s.”

Hmmm. Our commander-​in-​chief has obviously contemplated whether or not ‘We, the People’ are capable of replacing or “tak[ing] out” the current regime, should Mr. Biden and his administration “get out of line.”

He doesn’t think we can do it.

Because Joe has F‑15s at his disposal and … well, we do not.

As with many issues, however, our president is sorely mistaken. You see, unlike the citizenry of most countries, Americans united have a firepower advantage over our government. That is the way it should be — how, with the Second Amendment, our founders designed the system.

The truth is, the president’s F‑15s cannot strafe us into submission. Nor will his bombers and nuclear weapons. Provided modern-​day patriots have the AR-​15 — today’s musket — and sufficient numerical support among 300-​million-​plus American citizens, the people could and would defeat any president’s high-​tech weaponry.

Without a fight if the president has any sense, citizen control of government prevails.

And there is also November. It’s an imperfect world.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

Illustration created with PicFinder and Firefly

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts

Categories
crime and punishment general freedom Second Amendment rights

Concealed Carry and the Careful Criminal

prison, TLC, 2nd Amendment

Crime is the most basic of problems. But across the political spectrum we see different strategies. 

On the right, the go-​to solution has always been to ramp up policing, to make the basic function of the state — crime-​fighting — stronger and more effective. 

On the left, a leading idea has been to disarm the populace so people cannot do as much harm, and also to “rehabilitate” troubled folks with government TLC.

I grew up in the ’70s, when the failures of benevolent leftism (which we called “liberalism”) were becoming clear. So there was a reaction: Lock more people up.

That reaction fizzled in recent years, and, perhaps not wholly coincidentally, crime on a city-​by-​city case, as well as nationally, has increased. 

Nevertheless, during this period another policy has gained a huge momentum: instead of disarming the populace, arm them!

How’s that going? The most recent case study is in Maine, which in 2015 allowed permit-​less concealed carry of firearms.

“While rates of violent crime increased nationally from 2015 to 2020,” writes Steve Robinson in “Maine Crime Fell Following 2015 Repeal of Gun Control Law” (MaineWire, December 29, 2022), “the rate of violent crime in Maine fell steadily beginning in 2015, after a slight increase from 2014 to 2015, according to data collected by the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program.”

Robinson notes that while the Maine experience doesn’t prove that “an armed society is a polite society,” it falsifies, quite clearly, the catastrophic predictions made by gun control advocates back in 2015.

I hazard it does much more. It shows that distributed power (in this case, firepower and defensive capacity) in the peaceful population is a separate, non-​left/​non-​right solution to the age-​old problem of crime.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

Illustration created with DALL-​E2

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts

Categories
general freedom Second Amendment rights too much government

The Gun-​Toting Ruling Class

elites

How to tell if you are part of the favored ruling class? If it is easy for you, but not most others, to obtain a concealed carry permit in your gun-​controlling state.

It’s extremely difficult to carry firearms for protection in states like Illinois, California, New Jersey and New York — except for certain Very Special Persons — rich enough or connected enough for special treatment.

Thankfully, the judicial system — which has the benefit of various guiding principles from a long-​gone time when the rulers wore red coats — is disallowing some of the nonsense.

Still, it’s a struggle to “de-​class-​ify” Second Amendment rights — that is, take gun rights from being a class issue favoring the rich and famous and allowing all peaceful citizens legal access to firearms.

“Two weeks ago, a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order against many of the restrictions on public possession of guns that New York imposed after the Supreme Court upheld the right to bear arms last June,” writes Jacob Sullum in Reason. “Unfazed by that warning, New Jersey legislators this week advanced a strikingly similar bill that includes a subjective standard for issuing carry permits and sweeping, location-​specific restrictions that make it legally perilous even for permit holders to leave home with guns.”

Politicians in these blue states remain resolute: they aim to unconstitutionally restrict access to guns. They strongly resist the current individualistic (as opposed to class-​based) trend in judicial interpretation of the Second Amendment. 

Their idea seems to be: guns for us, but not for them.

And we’re the Them.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts

Categories
crime and punishment general freedom Second Amendment rights

Cannabis and Carry

guns, gun control, marijuana

The Biden Administration wants to make sure that marijuana users do not own guns. 

Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Nikki Fried, a Democrat, is not with the administration on this matter. Her department oversees concealed carry permits as well as some cannabis regulation, and she “argues that prohibiting all cannabis consumers from owning guns violates the Second Amendment” as well as violating “a congressional spending rider, known as the Rohrabacher-​Farr Amendment, that bars the Justice Department from interfering with the implementation of state medical marijuana laws,” explains Jacob Sullum for Reason magazine. Fried has sued the federal government to allow Florida to grant concealed carry permits to marijuana users — something the federal government disallows.

The Justice Department has now asked the courts to dismiss the case.

This is especially rich, since President Biden himself has been on the liberal side of marijuana regulation — though certainly not with guns, where he’s on the tyrants’ side.

Among many inconsistencies, current law does not prohibit people addicted to legal psychoactive drugs from owning guns, as Sullum notes, nor make a big deal about alcohol, the abuse of which has a well-​understood linkage with violence, while marijuana does not.

One could go through all the inanities, here, but we should not assume government makes sense on these issues. The federal government should generally not be in the business of regulating either gun ownership or drug usage.

States that recognize “constitutional carry” show how Florida could advance beyond the current mess of too much government interference in this realm. 

It wouldn’t be an issue were Florida to get out of the concealed carry permit racket.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts

Categories
crime and punishment local leaders Second Amendment rights

A Constitutional Sheriff

ATF, guns, Sheriff, 2nd Amendment

For residents of Klickitat County, Washington, it’s an easy two-​step process. 

Well, optimally, one step. Two only if necessary.

County Sheriff Bob Songer tells gun-​owning constituents that if agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives come to their door wanting to inspect their guns but have no warrant, they should tell the agents to go away.

ATF agents have started to make “surprise home visits of persons who have purchased two or more firearms at one time.” The sheriff was alerted by video of such a visit to a home in Delaware.

Republican Congressman Matt Rosendale of Montana has called for an investigation into the intimidatory practice.

Although Sheriff Songer knows of no such incidents yet occurring in the Evergreen State, he wants his county to be prepared. So he also provides a second step: if the agents don’t leave when asked, the resident should call Songer. He will then “make contact with the agents. If they still refuse to leave, I will personally arrest the ATF agents for Criminal Trespass and book them into the Klickitat County Jail.”

All other sheriffs, please make the same announcement.

Songer belongs to the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association and regards protecting the constitutional rights of his constituents as part of the job.

When it comes to respect for the Constitution, there really shouldn’t be more than one type of sheriff. But if there are going to be more than one, “constitutional sheriff” is the type you want to be.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

PDF for printing

—

See all recent commentary
(simplified and organized)

See recent popular posts