NRA News: New York Governor Cuomo Announces Initiative to Fight Gun Violence
Cam Edwards talks to Tom King – President of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association
New Jersey Second Amendment Society: Please Sign The New Jersey CCW Shall Issue Petition
New Jersey Second Amendment Society:
We would like to make a point to the New Jersey Legislature that we can continue to work together to further the right to keep and BEAR arms in New Jersey. Please sign the following petition.
Why This Is Important
Please support the right to Conceal Carry in New Jersey so we can save lives. Read more
Chicago Sun-Times Offers Praise to Gun Fee Regristy
Last Friday The Chicago Sun-Times offered a story titled, “Rahm Emanuel proposes $65 per-gun fee and registry” and essentially cheered for the mayor’s efforts. The story began:
Illinois handgun owners would be required to register their weapons with the state — and pay a $65-per-gun registration fee — under a mayoral plan proposed Thursday to arm police with the information they need to solve crimes and reduce illegal firearm transfers.
Is offering the city’s talking point as fact really reporting? How would this reduce illegal transfers? This is never explained of course. But consider the next passage:
Even as he picked up the gun control mantle from former Mayor Richard M. Daley, Mayor Rahm Emanuel acknowledged that he’s facing an uphill battle.
It comes at a time when the National Rifle Association and its allies among Downstate lawmakers are making a major push for concealed carry legislation. Illinois is the only state in the nation that does not allow its residents to carry concealed weapons.
“Facing an uphill battle” – could this be more biased in its reporting? Maybe, as it noted:
Former Mayor Daley spent 22 years beating his head against the wall on gun control issues, only to be stymied repeatedly in Springfield.
In 2005, Daley scored a rare victory when the General Assembly agreed to close a loophole by requiring anyone who buys a firearm at a gun show to pass a criminal background check.
This story truly borders on editorial, and yet still presents some facts:
His proposal would require all handgun owners to obtain a certificate of registration from the State Police for every handgun they own — at a cost of $65-per-weapon — and to renew that registration every five years.
They would be required to provide: their name, address and telephone number; the manufacturer of the gun, its model type and serial number; and the date and source of the purchase.
Whenever a handgun is sold, the seller would be required to report the sale to the State Police “no less than 48 hours prior to delivery.” Handgun buyers would have 20 days to file for a new certificate of registration. Anyone caught carrying or possessing an unregistered handgun would face a Class 2 felony.
And yet again, it seems as if the writer is actually happy about these hoops that gun owners would have to jump through. Imagine if this sort of requirement was made on birth control, abortion or other hotbed issues. We doubt any reporter could get away with this level of biased opinion in a “news story.”
But let us also consider this – so to own a gun you have to pay $65 every five years (and for each individual firearm), and provide all your personal information. Failure to do would result in a Class 2 felony!
In other words this is a way to scare some people from bothering, and no doubt is meant to catch others who fail to do so to essentially take away their rights. Felons can’t own guns, so why not try to criminalize gun ownership as it offers excellent gun control it seems. And sadly the local media supports this.
But in a town as corrupt politically as Chicago what more can we say?
Today/MSNBC Report Offers Misleading Facts
This week Today/MSNBC offered a story titled “Rossen Reports: Anyone can buy guns, no questions asked,” which attempted to suggest that we need stricter gun laws because of so-called loopholes. The article begins simply enough:
Some say it’s a major loophole in the law. At gun stores, you have to get a background check before you can buy a weapon. But online in most states, anyone from law-abiding citizens to dangerous criminals – even terrorists – can get just about any weapon they want, no questions asked. Our hidden camera investigation shows the deals going down in broad daylight, in suburban mall parking lots.
No, this isn’t true. This isn’t a loophole because any gun sent through the mail needs to be from a Federal Firearms License holder to another when sales occur, and depending on the local laws a permit might be necessary. This point is lacking, so in these cases the law is actually being broken – so it isn’t technically a loophole in the law.
The article adds:
We bought everything from a police-grade pistol to a semiautomatic assault rifle. We did it over and over again, even hinting that our buyer is a criminal.
Within 12 hours, we bought eight dangerous guns – even a 50-caliber weapon so powerful it could take down a helicopter.
We agree that this is a problem, one we’ll address in a minute, but let’s first note that this is typical biased reporting. What exactly is a “police-grade pistol,” as we’re not sure? This is an attempt to make it seem like something that wouldn’t be available to the average consumer. Additionally, the point about the .50-caliber (it should read .50 not 50) being able to take down a helicopter is only partially accurate. The truth is this weapon still needs someone with some level of experience and training to be able to hit a helicopter. So while there is always the chance someone could get very lucky, in most cases without proper training and skill it would just be a heavy gun where the shooter couldn’t hit the side of a barn!
There was more on this weapon:
The online ad was for a 50-caliber sniper rifle, the most powerful gun legally sold in the U.S.: bullet range 5 miles. It can pierce armored vehicles, even bring down a helicopter. But the seller was so laid-back, you’d think he was hocking a used bicycle.
All these points are only semi-true. It really doesn’t have a range of five miles, and it can “bring down a helicopter” but so can a .22 if you shoot at the right place!
The article then adds:
So what’s the government doing about it? It turns out there’s a bill that would close this loophole, and require background checks for all gun sales, even online. But that bill has been tied up in committee for nearly a year. Its sponsor, New York senator Chuck Schumer, told us: “The NRA is one of the most powerful lobbies in Washington, and despite the overwhelming evidence that we should do something … the odds of us being able to do something are not high.”
Again this is a half-truth. Online sales are NOT except from background checks. This isn’t so much a loophole as it is people just disregarding the law. So a law that bans the sales and puts background checks on all gun sales only works if people follow the law – and in most cases the law was already being broken in the examples noted.
Finally the article concludes with this point:
This is legal, and lots of people in this country support private gun sales without background checks. They say it’s not about making money; it’s about individual rights. As for the eight guns we bought, we turned them over the the [sic] Phoenix police department… where they will be destroyed.
This isn’t just about money. There are points missing in this reporting. First, who is going to pay for the background checks on ALL sales? Does this mean ALL guns need to be registered? Because unless EVERY gun is registered the background check system wouldn’t work, and if ALL guns need to be registered there is the issue of who will pay for it? There are reasons for fighting this, as the first step to banning guns is knowing who has them – in other words many citizens might be wary of having to register their guns, and in essence any law would turn them into criminals.
Who Guards the Guards: NYPD Officer Pleads Guilty of Gun Smuggling
This past weekend New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg made his case for stricter gun laws, but we ask would they do any good if those trusted to have guns break the law? The Associated Press via The Wall Street Journal noted this week that Brooklyn NYPD officer William Masso could face five to six years in prison for gun smuggling!
He reportedly attempted to a cache of firearms that included “three M-16 rifles, one shotgun, 16 handguns,” as well as slot machines and “thousands of cartons of cigarettes, along with counterfeit merchandise.” But even worse, is the fact that Masso was “recruiting other law enforcement officers to join the scheme.”
This makes us wonder if Mayors Against Illegal Guns shouldn’t look closer to home instead of targeting distant gun shows?
New York Daily News Gives Bloomberg Platform to Rant
While the story this week in The New York Daily News wasn’t entirely biased, it did basically just parrot New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. It offered this passage:
“Federal laws say you can’t get a gun if you have a drug problem, psychiatric problem, criminal record or [are a\] minor, and yet Congress doesn’t give monies to make sure that we can have a background check,” Bloomberg said on “Meet the Press.”
Criminals seeking guns can take advantage of “too many loopholes,” the mayor said.
“The background database isn’t up to date, private sector sales of guns is something like 40%, and they don’t do background checks,” he said.
The problem with this argument is that it basically blames the loopholes and not the criminals. It also tries to suggest that those 40 percent are 100 percent of the illegal gun problem, and there is no evidence this is the case. Once again it seems clear that Bloomberg isn’t just part of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, he’s a mayor against all guns.
Who Guards the Guards: “Guns missing from Pine County Sheriff’s Office”
So far the year started off without stories like this one, but this week The Duluth News Tribune and other local outlets offered another story we hate to hear about – “Guns missing from the Pine County Sheriff’s Office.” The paper paints an even worse picture:
The ongoing firearms investigation is one of 11 internal investigations involving 15 sheriff’s office employees conducted over the past year. The investigations included complaints of domestic violence, sexual harassment, excessive force, abuse of authority, failure to follow policies and order, and failure to perform assigned duties. The investigations produced disciplinary actions ranging from oral reprimands to termination.
All of this is very upsetting, but the issue of the guns is the one we find very disturbing as it sort of takes aim at the argument that only police should have guns. In this case at least a dozen or so guns would now be in the hands of the bad guys near Duluth if “only the police” had guns.
Pantagraph Reporter Changes Opinion on Guns
This past weekend writer Edith Brady-Lunny offered personal experiences on the issue of firearms for Pantagraph. But consider how this piece starts out:
Personal bias is something journalists are trained avoid [sic] when they cover the news.
When I started working on a story about the controversial issue of concealed carry of weapons in Illinois, I was forced to face my own bias. I have never lived in a home with guns and considered myself the quintessential anti-gun nut.
First, we congratulate Brady-Lunny, not for the article that follows – where she describes her experience at the gun range – but rather that she admits she has her own bias. Too many journalists, for reasons that we don’t truly understand, have a natural bias against guns. At least Brady-Lunny admitted of such.
But let’s look at one other statement she makes:
My aversion to guns and my long-held belief that less is better when it comes to firearms in the hands of anyone other than peace officers or soldiers is rooted in my experience as a journalist. I have witnessed firsthand the harm and carnage that comes from people wielding guns. The images of a heart or a head riddled with bullets and stories of the aftermath of gun violence have always stayed with me.
And here is the root of the bias, which we don’t understand. Brady-Lunny is clearly an idealist, someone who believes cops are always the good guys, soldiers only protect the innocent and only bad people would want a gun otherwise. Clearly this journalist hasn’t watched the world news – where it took guns from Libyan rebels (and help from NATO in the way of air support) to take down a dictator, or where the military in Syria retains control despite attempts to start a revolution. Clearly this journalist doesn’t follow the news that SWAT team guns were stolen in Los Angeles, or read that a police chief in New Mexico helped arm criminals. And there was the soldier smuggling guns into the U.K.
Clearly those examples that we show that this idealistic view can be far from ideal in the real, cold, hard world. But she also notes the “images of a heart or a head riddled with bullets,” and yet does she not think of the 18-year old mother who defended her home and infant son on New Year’s Eve? Just something to think about.
But again, at least this journalist admitted to her bias. And as with addiction, the first step is admitting there is a problem.
Misleading Patch.com Headline Suggests “Gun Control” Effective
Read this headline:
Efforts to Control Firearms Aim to Help Overall Safety
This headline makes it sound like “gun control is working.” But this story in Patch.com offers this dek (that’s what editors call the secondary headline) noting that this issue is really “illegal firearms” so where does the “gun control” part come in?
According to the LA County Sheriff’s Department, the Century Station’s efforts to stop illegal firearm possession are helping to reduce overall violent crimes in the area.
The story itself is far from being about guns, but rather crime. However, here is yet another example of a media story that blames crime on guns.
New York News Website Shows New York Arrogance
Ask a New Yorker to name the capital city of Alabama and most probably wouldn’t know. Ask a New Yorker what a “Michigan U-Turn” is when driving a car, and they probably wouldn’t know. Ask a New Yorker about laws for purchasing alcohol in Utah and chances are they might not know. Yet the New York City media seems to question why tourists don’t understand New York’s gun laws.
Website Gothamist for example noted:
Who believes that carrying a firearm into iconic, highly secured New York landmarks is a good idea? Metal detectors are designed to expose weapons, not belt buckles, yet clueless tourists keep getting hauled into court for packing heat at the Empire State Building. Now some Marines are claiming that Indiana native Ryan Jerome, himself a Marine who was arrested for trying to check his .45 Ruger with authorities in September, is more equal than others who have made the same mistake.
Is it necessary o describe these people as “clueless tourists,” especially in the case of Ryan Jerome, who was actually in New York City on business. But of course this is par for the course from the New Yorkers.
