Right there she loses us and quickly. What about sport shooters, collectors and others? But then she takes the usual line of trying to interrupt the Second Amendment and offers this thought:

When that was written, the weapons of choice were the flintlock rifle, musket, and pistol. Once in awhile the saber.

This remains one of our favorite fallbacks because it is posted online, in other words on technology the Founding Fathers couldn’t have envisioned! Apparently that’s different to those who aren’t “fans of guns.” But let’s consider some other points.

China has strict limits on gun control.

That is true, but China has strict limits on Freedom of Speech too. Should we embrace that quality? And for the record, China has a crime problem, and there are many illegal guns. The control part isn’t working out as well as this editorial would have you believe.

She adds:

The Brady Center works for sensible federal and state laws, regulations, and policies to limit the number of deaths from guns. This group helped with the law that a buyer must wait five days and have a backround check to purchase a gun. The other problem is the large ammo clip, which allows a deranged person to kill many in a very short time. Why is this problem being ignored by Congress? One answer — the NRA, and money. No one wants to stand up to the TV commercials the NRA will run against them if they propose sensible controls and legislation.

That pretty much is the line in the sand. She supports the Brady Center and sees the NRA as the nefarious group with the money! Is this suddenly about the 1%. For the record most of the NRA’s money comes from the 99% types, and it is their voting power that is what isn’t ignored by Congress.

And here is the nut of it. Nut being the key word – she will argue that pro-gun types are nuts, while those for gun control are sensible. Logic has gone out the window in favor of passion.

So what is her answer:

What could we do, if we had the courage? Enforce the laws already on the books, get state to state co-ordination, foster a strict system for checks, prohibit large ammo clips. These are not used to hunt animals, only people. No backround [sic] check — no gun. No large ammo clips — period.

And in her view this would be the dawn of utopia. But it wouldn’t take guns out of the hands of criminals. It wouldn’t stop those who would steal or kill with guns. In other words it would harm the law-abiding, and as crime didn’t fall – and likely could rise – she’d call for more and more gun control. Because those who are “no fan of guns” can’t imagine anything but gun control.

Everyone over at the Brady Center knows that they are not called “clips”. Its a ploy… and they are manipulating us.

Yep, that’s the conclusion that I have come to. Its a ploy. It may not be the best one, but its gotten to the point that I don’t think it could be anything else. Why are they doing this? Well, I think that answer is very simple. They are trying to distract us, and they are trying to dictate our behavior.

Think about it. Every time they post on their website or release a statement or press release or something… what do we do? We all run to the forums and the blogs and spend all that time typing about how ignorant they are and how they just don’t know what they are saying. We spend countless hours laughing at them and conversing about what fools they are, but I am pretty sure that they are laughing at us on the other end of things.

They fully understand that the online gun community is a passionate grass roots group and that we have significant numbers. They know the impact that we have, so they are trying to sidetrack us. Each and every time that they use the word “clip” they are getting us to focus on something that is causing us to just spin our wheels. It causes us to spend a bunch of our time wrapped up in something that is completely unproductive and does nothing to further our cause. Consequently they are more than happy to gives us some red meat to occupy our time with. Plus, I really think they enjoy watching us dance. I’ve seen it so many times now that I just don’t think that it could be anything else.

How do I know they are doing this? First off, they are smart. Lets give them a little credit. They may be incredibly misguided, but they aren’t clueless idiots. If they were, they would have fallen flat on their faces a long time ago. Secondly, they read the stuff that we write. They keep up with the chatter in the forums, and at the blogs and websites. They troll our online hangouts and they have done their research. We all know that. They know how we think and how we respond to their statements. Lastly, they are very, very good at staying on message. They never waiver even when it is so disconnected from reality that its laughable. They stay on point and keep pounding no matter how wrong they are.

Call To Action
So here is my call to action… Can we please stop going on the endless diatribes whenever a leftist gun grabber uses the word “clip”? I’m not saying that we shouldn’t needle the new guy on the forum who is way too excited about the fact that his new Gen 4 Glock came with three “clips”. I’m just asking that we stop letting the far left push our buttons with this. We need to end the pointless debates on local newspaper and left wing websites. We need to stop running to the forums and blogs to endlessly bemoan how ignorant the left is about this.

That’s what they want us to do… and we need to stop playing their game.

Instead, how about we use this as a trigger to do something positive for the shooting community? Every time that the loony left uses the word “clip”, how about we do something like writing our congressman and letting them know (once again) exactly where we stand on gun rights? Or perhaps we could give a couple of bucks to the NRA or to your local/state level gun rights organization. Maybe you tell your kid to put down the video games cause you’re taking him/her to the range to do some shooting. It doesn’t really matter what it is, but lets all decide on something that each of us wants to do. Lets use this as an opportunity to make an investment in the shooting community and to furthering our gun rights. It doesn’t have to be one particular thing and its doesn’t really matter what it is, but lets all resolve to do something that benefits our side.

So, lets stop letting the Brady Bunch push our buttons and instead turn their little ploy against them. I promise you that they won’t know what to do with themselves.

About:
Eric at the Gunmart Blog – Eric is a gun blogger, firearms enthusiast, and sorry excuse for a hunter. He is also an AmmoLand Shoting Sports News Columnist. Leave him some comments on this article before you go. You can also follow Eric on Facebook, Twitter and at his blog, Gunmart. Visit: gunmart.blogspot.com

Colin Goddard, the misguided Virginia Tech shooting victim who has turned to the Brady Center to Promote Gun Violence for solace, said in a recent post about the Oslo Shooting: “Unfortunately, I was soon infuriated by the gun fanatics in America who immediately used this massacre to assert that strong gun laws, like Norway’s, don’t work.”

Well, if you look at the case of Anders Behring Breivik, Norway’s ludicrous “gun control” laws don’t and didn’t work.

So, the first question is: Who, Mr. Goddard, is actually the fanatic in this case? Is it common sense self defense advocates, or emotionally convoluted knee-jerk hysterics?

It is a statistical fact that mass shooters nearly always capitulate to armed resistance.

• It happened in 2007 with the Arvada Colorado Shooting, when Jeanne Assam confronted and shot a heavily armed attacker. The attacker then shot and killed himself. www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Assam
• It happened in 2002 at the Appalachian Law School Shooting, when two armed civilians stopped a killer on campus. www.thepriceoflibAnderty.org/04/01/13/lang.htm

Further, when Norwegian Anders Breivik was eventually confronted with deadly force by a SWAT team, he immediately surrendered. There is no reason whatsoever to believe that he would have done any less for a determined armed civilian.

Let me explain why the Brady Center’s poster boy, Mr. Goddard, embraces methods that are fanatical: He advocates for victim disarmament, in the face of irrefutable evidence that said disarmament actually allows for greater harm to innocent people. www.freestudents.blogspot.com/2007/04/when-mass-killers-meet-armed-resistance.html

What he advocates is a decreasing of arms in the civilian population. That’s exactly what gives free reign to evil doers who use guns unlawfully. Is that not the advocacy of a fanatic?

I have met Mr. Goddard at a screening of his “Living For 32″ movie at the University of Arizona in Tucson. A number of us from The Arizona Citizens Defense League attended his event.

Mr. Goddard was in the final room that The Virginia Tech Shooter attacked, and was present when Seung-Hui Cho ended the shooting spree by suicide.

Mr. Goddard described to us all in Tucson how his classmates at Virginia Tech heard the noise of the gun shots, and at first thought it was construction noise. They then heard the noise getting louder, and the teacher opened the door to look, suddenly slamming it shut and telling everyone to get on the floor and dial 911, that there was a man with a gun approaching. Mr. Goddard did so, opened his back pack, retrieved his cell phone, and got through to 911 before he was shot four times by Cho.

Just before the screening of his movie in Tucson, I asked Mr. Goddard: “If there had been a police officer, off duty with his gun sitting next to you, do you think he could have drawn and engaged the shooter with that amount of warning?” (Understand also that Mr. Goddard was an ROTC Cadet, familiar with arms and tactics, and experienced on the M-16 rifle.)

Mr. Goddard’s response to me was, “I have war gamed that over and over in my mind, and I just don’t know.”

It simply has to be said: Mr. Goddard, this is a truly pitiful response.

You seem to be under a hypnotic trance. Do you now actually embrace the lie that holds you hostage?

Think about Mr. Goddard’s reply. He does not know if a police officer could neutralize a deadly threat with about 50 seconds of warning? This from cover, with the assailant coming through a known and restricted entry point?

Or does Mr. Goddard KNOW, deep in his heart, that something actually might have been done to stop Cho? Instead of facing this harsh truth, has he slipped into delusional fanaticism? Is he now so hysterically committed to victim disarmament that he cannot admit that a gun in the hand of a righteous man or woman could have saved innocent lives?

Goddard asserts that the “gun lobby” says that the gun laws in Norway “did not work”?

Well, we at JPFO, a twenty-one-year-old civil rights advocate, and proud of it, point out that the gun laws in Norway worked all too well … in lunatic Anders Breivik’s favor. These deluded laws disarmed the victims, and completely enabled the perpetrator. That is what ALL “gun control” laws do.

Mr. Goddard asserts that the “gun lobby” is, in essence, dancing in the blood of the victims. The truth is that’s exactly what he, and his cohorts and handlers at the Brady Center To Promote Gun Violence, are doing. Just like their victim vulture response to the Giffords shooting in Arizona, it’s to their advantage to do so.

The strategy is called “transference,” a defense mechanism in which the user ascribes to his opponent the exact strategy which he, himself, is using.

Unknowing or unthinking readers, taking those statements – blatant lies -- at face value, will believe them, without questioning the framing bias of the person making the statement.

The fact is that Norwegian gun laws completely enabled Breivik’s agenda. Not one armed adult, moderator, or chaperone, was present with a gun to stop the unlawful violence with deadly force. Had the Norwegian socialist utopians not had their way, and there had been just a single armed protector on that island, that murdering monster might have been dead after getting off only one shot.

As it was, Breivik had NINETY MINUTES to work his blood lust. Now the Norwegian authorities have the gall to actually praise the bumbling efforts of the police? This is utterly upside-down thinking that verges on insanity!

Armed self defense works.

• It worked in 2008 at Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva, where a part time student and off duty soldier stopped a mass killing with a handgun. www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercaz_HaRav_massacre.
• It worked in 1997 in Pearl, Mississippi when Assistant Principal Joel Myrick used a gun at a school to stop a killer. www.davekopel.com/2a/othwr/principal&gun.htm
• We would also like to point out that the clamor for background checks has been heard far and wide. Well, Norway’s Anders Breivik had a very thorough one.
• So did Jared Loughner, the Tucson madman who shot Congresswoman Giffords and seventeen other people January 8th of this year.
• So did Seung-Hui Cho, the Virginia Tech attacker who put four bullets in Mr. Goddard.

Do we see a pattern here? Background checks don’t work. Madmen and criminals, no matter what gun laws exist, will ALWAYS be able to arm themselves.

We don’t think that Mr. Goddard of Virginia Tech has evil intentions, just wrongful methods. It is perhaps right to remind ourselves of the terrific trauma he suffered from both his wounds and the event itself. It would be absolutely normal for a thinking person to feel misplaced guilt at the horrific impotence of not being able to do anything in such a ghastly situation.

But how he was “turned” by the Brady Bunch, and made their poster boy, befuddles me. One would think that a man contemplating a military career (ROTC), and familiar with firearms, would have come out of that horror completely enraged at the impotence inflicted upon him by idiotic and dangerous “gun control” laws. As he was taken to the hospital, he must have been screaming to himself: “If I’d only had a gun!”

So there remains but one question, Mr. Goddard: Are you going to allow lawful citizens to shoot violent criminal actors, or are you going to continue to bury dead children, gunned down unchallenged because of “gun control”?

A curious world awaits your answer.

Respectfully,

About:
Jews For The Preservation Of Firearms Ownership Mission is to destroy “gun control” and to encourage Americans to understand and defend all of the Bill of Rights for everyone. Those are the twin goals of Wisconsin-based Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO). Founded by Jews and initially aimed at educating the Jewish community about the historical evils that Jews have suffered when they have been disarmed, JPFO has always welcomed persons of all religious beliefs who share a common goal of opposing and reversing victim disarmament policies while advancing liberty for all.

JPFO is a non-profit tax-exempt educational civil rights organization, not a lobby. JPFO’s products and programs reach out to as many segments of the American people as possible, using bold tactics without compromise on fundamental principles. Visit www.JPFO.org – Copyright JPFO 2011

The group’s vice president Dennis Henigan will serve as the acting president while the organization’s board of directors looks for a new president.

“…the gun lobby wants to prevent doctors from telling you the truth and prevent you from hearing it.”

Is this really a fair assessment? Why do doctors need to know why parents might have firearms? Henigan notes:

“Just as pediatricians have long advised parents on the best ways to reduce the risks of harm to children from household poisons, unsupervised swimming pools and riding bikes without safety helmets, they also have advised them how to best protect their kids from the lethal danger of firearms.”

This may be true, so why can’t guns just be lumped into the mix without requiring doctors to ask whether the household has a gun? Do doctors ask, “do you have household poisons?” How often do you hear the doctors ask, “do you have archery equipment?” What about power tools or lawn mowers?

This is an issue that is blown out of proportion. Why should guns be singled out? Except of course Henigan and his lot know that doctors can guilt parents by warning of the “dangers” of firearms. Isn’t that really the point?

She writes:

“Polls tell us that the majority of Americans — people who own guns and people who don’t, people who identify themselves as liberal and people who identify themselves as conservative — believe in reasonable restrictions on lethal weapons.”

And yet, the media and anti-gun zealots casually ignore other polls. This pick and choose attitude does no one any good.

But then she writes:

“As ‘We, the people’ press our demand for an America free of gun violence, Jim and I believe that the NRA’s mythological power will be consigned to the ash bins of time. Joyously, we may never know how many lives will be saved.”

This again shows a misunderstanding of the NRA. Part of the NRA’s power is not that it is mythological or even magical. It is that it is one voice of many in the so-called “gun lobby,” which supports law-abiding gun owners, who vote. Thus the “We, the people” want guns.

Finally, she offers an idealized view that shows why hers is a lost cause:

“There was a time when few in power believed women deserved the right to vote. It took courage to stand up, face humiliation and harassment, and fight for it. There was a time when few in power believed African Americans deserved full citizenship. It took audacity to stand up, face dogs, hoses and lynch mobs, and fight for it. Now is the time for our elected officials to stand up and lead the way to a nation free of gun violence.”

And we say LOST cause, not because we believe that guns will never be banned. No, this is our absolute worst fear, but rather it is a lost cause that this could ever be a nation free of gun violence. As long as there are drugs flowing from Mexico and into our country from other lands, as long as there is a terrorist threat, as long as there are criminals, there will be gun violence.

Disarming the law-abiding will only put more people at risk, not less.

Of course Henigan, a true anti-gun zealot, sees this as the beginning of the end of gun ownership. But it there are some points that Henigan makes that are truly interesting.

First, he actually labels himself as “gun control advocate.” This is contrast to the very way that gun control is addressed. Note that this is the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, as that sounds less threatening to gun owners than the Brady Center for Gun Control. Henigan writes:

“Although one gets the distinct impression that the president would prefer not to receive a positive reaction from gun control advocates like myself, I can’t do him that favor.”

But let’s look deeper into this piece. Again, Henigan specifically says things that gun control advocates have denied. Here is what drew our attention most:

“But the ‘gun show loophole’ is really part of a larger loophole: in most states private sales do not require a background check, whether they occur at a gun show or not. This means that criminals and other legally prohibited gun buyers may be turned away at a licensed dealer, only to ‘effortlessly’ purchase guns elsewhere. Significantly, the president did not mention gun shows in particular, but rather said ‘we can’t allow’ the broader private sale loophole to persist. The president clearly articulated the rationale for extending Brady background checks to virtually all gun sales. It is a reform the Brady Campaign has been advocating for many years.”

For years we’ve heard about the “gun show loophole,” but here Henigan makes it clear it is really about private sales in general. To end private sales would in turn create a national database of gun ownership, where every legally owned gun would be tracked. And yet criminals would still be armed. Can any law-abiding gun owner imagine a worse case scenario?

Of course according to Henigan this is what the American people want! He writes:

“As recent polling has shown, the proposal to extend Brady background checks to all gun sales is solidly in the middle of public opinion on this issue, receiving strong support even from gun owners. An astounding 86% of Americans, and 81% of gun owners, support universal checks.”

So who conducted the poll and who released the findings? Only Mayors Against Illegal Guns. Imagine the findings if the National Rifle Association conducted the poll?

Finally, Henigan says the problem with all this is, of course, the NRA. He writes:

“Far from being part of the solution, the NRA has shown, once again, that it is the problem. If President Obama truly wants a system that no longer allows countless violent criminals to ‘effortlessly’ avoid background checks, eventually he will have no choice but to confront the gun lobby, and defeat it.”

Here we agree – in a way – with Henigan. We feel that Obama should make gun control the cornerstone of his reelection campaign. The defeat of course won’t be of gun owners, but of the POTUS.

The California Pistol & Rifle Association and five individuals have sued San Diego County and its sheriff because California law used the wording “may issue” in its concealed carry permitting process. Under this law, law enforcement officers determine who has “good cause” to receive a permit allowing them to carry a concealed handgun in public areas. The Legal Action Project of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence filed an amicus brief today supporting the California law.

Brady’s brief argues that the recent Supreme Court decisions in Heller and McDonald only applies to the right to possess firearms in the home for self-protection, and that local government entities have great leeway in restricting carry permits in public areas.

“The people of California have made the reasonable decision to keep people from legally carrying loaded guns in their streets, parks, and businesses, unless law enforcement determines someone has good cause to be armed,” said Brady Center President Paul Helmke.  “The Constitution does not require people to be subjected to the grave risks of more loaded guns as they go about their daily lives.   The Second Amendment should not be rewritten as a mandate for the gun lobby’s ‘any gun, anywhere, for anybody’ agenda.”

The problem with California’s process is that it restricts a constitutional right through a highly subjective process. A police officer determines who has “good cause” to receive the permit but there aren’t any specific guidelines on how to determine good cause. Officers can easily come to different conclusion for the same application depending on the officers’ biases.

Other Constitutional Rights don’t require a government entity to determine if there is good cause to exercise a right. If they could, FirearmsTruth’s freedom of speech would be denied by cities like Chicago because we don’t have a “good cause” to criticize the city’s gun control laws. Imagine what would happen if police could determine if you have good cause to require a warrant during a search and seizure.

The Brady brief wants to limit the Supreme Court’s rulings to apply just to the home. But reading the decisions, it is clear that the right to self-protection is a universal one. It just happens that the two cases looked at by The Court involved the inability to possess a handgun in one’s home. It is ridiculous to argue that I have a right to protect myself in my home but that I can’t do so when I am out of my home.

“Coinciding with a surge in gun purchases that began shortly before the 2008 elections, violent crime decreased six percent between 2008 and 2009, according to the FBI. This included an eight percent decrease in murder and a nine percent decrease in robbery.

“Since 1991, when total violent crime peaked, it has decreased 43 percent to a 35-year low. The murder rate, less than half what it was in 1980, is now at a 45-year low.

“Throughout, the number of guns that Americans own has risen by about four million a year, including record numbers of the two types of firearms that the Brady (Campaign) folks would most like to see banned — handguns and the various firearms they call ‘assault weapons.’”

It is also interesting to us that the mainstream media was quick to point out a surge in gun sales, but usually is quiet on the fact that there are now more guns and yet less crime. Ironic isn’t it.

In his piece he states:

 
“That’s right, we don’t need it. If no one had guns, would we really be that bad of a country?

“According to the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, more than 100,000 people are shot and killed annually on average. The framers originally intended for militias to be created. With the number of city, county, state and federal law enforcement agencies, they should be able to round up every gun in America. We’re paying these people; so let them do what they do.

“If guns were banned totally, our crime rates would be similar to that of countries such as England; our gun-related homicide rate is 44 times that of developed countries England and Wales, says the Brady Center.”

Clearly Martin doesn’t see that crime is on the rise in England and Wales, and that guns aren’t even “banned totally” in those nations. In countries where guns are in fact “banned totally,” such as China, there are still plenty of illegal guns. Does Martin really believe that if guns are banned there wouldn’t be crime or illegal guns?

And is he serious when he asks, “would we really be that bad of a country?” But let’s consider what else Martin says. He also calls for dumping the 22^nd Amendment, which limits the term a President can serve in office. Of course Martin states, “Franklin Delano Roosevelt is consistently voted the best president in American history,” which is true according to who or what poll? Today FDR is being seen in a new light, as a president that had policies that probably extended the economic downturn of the Great Depression, and who caved to pressure from the Soviet Union, which resulted in the Iron Curtain across Eastern Europe.

But by getting rid of the 22^nd Amendment, and the 14^th Amendment, and by stating, “With the number of city, county, state and federal law enforcement agencies, they should be able to round up every gun in America,” Martin calls for essentially a dictatorship.

OK, at the end it is clear Martin doesn’t really believe all of this… the problem is that he did quote the Brady Center, a group that probably would like to see all the guns in this country gathered up. And the other problem is that there are some idealists who do believe that what is suggests wouldn’t be so bad. Let’s just hope they don’t get their wish.