Articles by Herschel Smith

The communists’ favorite thing, a new AWB, passed the House.  It did so with the support of two republicans.

It’s likely doomed in the Senate.

But in the 50-50 evenly-split Senate, the bill is unlikely to pass despite a political breakthrough last month in bringing the bill forward. In that chamber, it would require support from at least 10 Republicans. Nor is it certain that all 50 Democrat senators are on board.

I’m certain that Ted Cruz and Jim Jordan would filibuster the bill, perhaps with the help of others (I’d like to think Rand Paul would help, but he’s just weird enough that no one can predict what he’ll do on any given thing).

Anyway, the Senate needs 60 votes for this, so this is probably just showmanship and blustering.

At least two republican congress-critters showed themselves as needing to be thrown out.

CNN.

The case was just the latest example of how red states, supported by Republican-appointed judges, are engaging in a multi-front offensive to seize control of national policy even while Democrats hold the White House and nominally control both the House and Senate. The red states are moving social policy sharply to the right within their borders on issues from abortion to LGBTQ rights and classroom censorship, while simultaneously working to hobble the ability of either the federal government or their own largest metro areas to set a different course.

Right out of the gate, the author makes the same mistake all progressives make.  Since they are mostly comprised of flunkies and lackeys who await instructions from their “leaders” on what to believe, what to say and what to do, they assume the entire world behaves that way.

The problem the author never points to because of his bias is the root of the issue.  More on that momentarily.

To a degree unimaginable even a decade ago, this broad offensive increasingly looks like an effort to define a nation within a nation — one operating with a set of rules and policies that diverge from the rest of America more than in almost any previous era.”

The only time I can recall in American history even remotely like this [divergence] was after the Civil War when the separate but equal doctrine began to emerge” across the South as a backlash against the attempts of the 13th, 14th and 15th Constitutional amendments to ensure equality for the freed slaves, says Donald Kettl, the former dean of the public policy school at the University of Maryland and author of the book, “The Divided States of America.” He added, “It’s a multifront war with very sharp swords.”

The elements of the red state offensive include a flurry of lawsuits seeking to block actions from Biden’s administration on issues from the environment to civil rights to immigration; other lawsuits, such as the case around a Mississippi law that prompted the Supreme Court to overturn the right to abortion, aimed at providing states more leeway to deviate from previously nationally guaranteed rights; a flurry of red state laws that advance the cultural priorities of the GOP’s predominantly White Christian electoral base; and a steady flow of red state statutes blocking Democratic-leaning large cities and counties from setting their own policies on everything from police budgets to recycling.

The willingness of so many red states to adopt these common approaches testifies in part to the energetic organizing efforts of many conservative groups, from Heritage Action and the American Legislative Exchange Council to the Republican Attorneys General Association. But even more profoundly, the alignment of so many red states behind this shared agenda and strategy underscores how many of them are being shaped by a common set of economic and demographic trends.

You see, by finding no right mentioned in the constitution to abortion, the Supreme Court is denying “civil rights,” while failing to mention the one most significant right discussion, that of the RKBA which underlies all of the others.

And don’t fail to note that the author mentions formalized groups such as the AG association.  He fails to understand that these AGs are elected and are doing the bidding of their constituency.  In other words, this is as grass roots a movement as any in the history of the country.  The people are deciding to seek distance from FedGov.  The author doesn’t like it, but cannot seem to understand the root cause.

On everything from gun ownership and religious affiliation to reliance on fossil fuels and participation (or not) in the 21st century information economy, most red states are following similar tracks, while diverging more sharply from the experience in blue states. Broadly speaking, blue states are more heavily exposed to the big demographic, cultural and economic forces reshaping American life, while red states are less exposed, and to the extent they are, those changes are centered overwhelmingly on their large metropolitan areas, which are trending Democratic and often — like in Austin or Atlanta — are a target for the Republicans controlling state government.

“It’s not at the level of Jim Crow, or certainly the difference between slave states and free states, but the differences are major,” says Jake Grumbach, a University of Washington political scientist who studies divergence among the states. And like Kettl, Grumbach believes the economic and political differences between the red and blue states are on track to only widen.

Once again, those concerned for sovereign borders and the RKBA are compared to Jim Crow.  In other words, they are racists.

Yet the real threat in the red state effort to set their own course may be less an advantage for one side or another than a challenge to the nation’s underlying cohesion. As red states grow more aggressive about going their own way, while working to preempt challenges from above (the federal government) or below (blue local governments), they are testing how much divergence the nation’s fundamental cohesion can take before it begins to unravel.

“You have a very dangerous situation,” said David Leopold, a former president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association and legal adviser to the immigration advocacy group America’s Voice. “This is a direct threat to the nation as a unified entity. This is one step closer to the country dividing into two separate countries.”

It isn’t the progressives pushing open borders, spending money we don’t have, engaging in globalism, pushing worldwide wars, pushing fake pandemics, and pressing for abortion on demand, who are “testing how much divergence the nation’s fundamental cohesion can take before it begins to unravel.”  In their world and life view, it’s anyone who doesn’t share their goals and seeks others.  You see, it’s your fault, not theirs.

And finally, note that the author and his “experts,” while laudably noting that there are massive problems afoot, still miss the boat on the magnitude of them.  They see the current events as a precursor to the beginning of the unraveling.

Here’s a news flash for them.  The great unraveling began long, long ago, and is proceeding apace today.  It has just become so obvious now that they cannot ignore it.

Yes, the country may divide into two separate countries if the opposing forces seek a peaceful divorce.  That would be best for all parties.  Without that, their worst fears will obtain.

My money is on the fact that they don’t even having an inkling of what that would look like.  That doesn’t bode well.

This is a really good and informative discussion.

Sent from reader Fred, this lawyer does a fine job of explaining some overlooked aspects of the Bruen decision.

In the case of New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, the Court ruled that law-abiding citizens have the right to carry firearms outside the home for self-defense. The Supreme Court explicitly affirmed that the Second Amendment protects twin rights: “to keep and bear arms,” with “keep” meaning to own or possess and “bear” meaning to carry outside the home.

But here’s the crucial part of the Bruen ruling that has escaped notice. Writing for the majority, Justice Clarence Thomas emphasizes that the proper test of constitutionality—which the Supreme Court established in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008)—“requires courts to assess whether modern firearms regulations are consistent with the Second Amendment’s text and historical understanding.”

Simply put, first you need to see what the text of the Second Amendment does (and does not) mention, and then you must look at what firearm regulations were in place at the time of the American Founding. Justice Thomas gives an example: “[W]hen a challenged regulation addresses a general societal problem that has persisted since the 18th century, the lack of a distinctly similar historical regulation addressing that problem is relevant evidence that the challenged regulation is inconsistent with the Second Amendment.”

The Founders knew all about mass killings which were part of the American experience dating back to the Jamestown colony. On March 22, 1622, Native tribes of the Powhatan Confederacy killed 347 English settlers—men, women, and children. Indian raids represented a serious threat for more than two centuries after the Jamestown Massacre. Two mass killings occurred in 1755 alone. In July, Shawnee Indians attacked Draper’s Meadow, a Virginia settlement. They killed at least five people, including an infant. Then, in October, the Lenape raided a settlement along Penn’s Creek in Pennsylvania, killing fourteen.

In 1774, Mingos and Shawnees launched a series of raids on Virginia settlements. Thousands of settlers were forced to flee. In a letter dated July 1, 1774, James Madison concluded that the attacking Indians were “determined in the extirpation of the inhabitants.”

Likewise, John Adams declared the need for armed self-defense. The next year, Adams described how “hardy, robust” people throughout the colonies had become “habituated” to carrying “their fuzees or rifles upon one shoulder to defend themselves against the Indians.”

Nor did Indian raids present the only danger. During the Revolutionary War, New Jersey’s Pine Barrens offered a haven for robbers, who would plunder, burn, and murder. One historical account explains, “The inhabitants, in constant terror, were obliged for safety to carry their muskets with them into the fields, and even to the house of worship.”

The Founders enshrined the right of the people to keep and bear arms in part because they knew of this history of mass killings. As the testimonies of Madison and Adams illustrate, the Founders recognized the importance of firearms to self-defense.

I’ve always claimed that if the founders wanted to word the 2A differently, they could have.  If they had wanted to repeal it, they could have.  If they had wanted to refrain from toting weapons around themselves (which they did all the time), they could have.

They didn’t, not on any account.

The second amendment is about self defense.  Some will claim that it’s about ameliorating tyranny.  Those folks are thinking small in my opinion.

Yes, it is, but the amelioration of tyranny is a subset of self defense.  Self defense is about defending the person, family, neighborhood and community against individual attackers, gangs, or the state if tyrants want to rule you.

It isn’t either-or.  It’s both-and.

Tim at MAC does a comprehensive review of the 460 Rowland.

I would suggest that the comparison of personal defense rounds is irrelevant, and I would have expected it to turn out the way it did (it just disintegrates).  On the other hand, the penetrator performs wonderfully.

Both the 460 Rowland web site and Brownells has 460 Rowland conversion kits.

Short of a conversion, using just a new recoil spring in a 1911, I like the 450 SMC.  But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen the 450 SMC available at Double Tap.  I sent them a note to find out why they stopped producing it, and if they intend to start again.  I’ll keep you posted on what I find out.

Reason.

“If I knew in 2020 what I know now, we would do a lot differently,” said Fauci in an interview on Monday. “The insidious nature of spread in the community would have been much more of an alarm, and there would have been much, much more stringent restrictions in the sense of very, very heavy encouragement of people to wear masks, physical distancing, what have you.”

He is a foul, loathsome little swine who looks more like a Ferengi instead of a pig.

What he’s saying out loud is that he would push more of the same that didn’t work to do anything positive for the health of America.

But the health of America was never the goal.  The subjugation of America was.  What he really means, but isn’t saying out loud, is that the subjugation didn’t work like they wanted it to, because people began to ignore them.  The science was so bad that even the most idiotic couldn’t ignore the fact that it’s unrelated to health.

Masking and distancing were school-child ideas, never worthy of serious consideration.  Not being taken seriously meant that their goals of mass population control was a failed experiment.

Queue up the next issue.

David Kopel.

Today U.S. District Judge Raymond P. Moore issued a temporary restraining order against the ban on so-called “assault weapons” recently enacted by the town of Superior, Colorado, in Boulder County. The case is Rocky Mountain Gun Owners v. Superior.

Lead attorney for the plaintiffs was Barry Arrington, one of Colorado’s top lawyers on education law, and now the victor in a major Second Amendment case. Arrington previously served in the Colorado House of Representatives, and as a trustee of the Independence Institute, where I work.

Judge Moore formerly was a corporate lawyer (Davis, Graham and Stubbs, Denver), and then head Federal Public Defender for Colo. and Wyoming. He was appointed to the bench by President Obama in 2013, and confirmed unanimously.

Like several other towns in Boulder County, Superior recently outlawed semiautomatic centerfire rifles that have at least one supposedly bad characteristic, such as an adjustable stock; various semiautomatic shotguns; various semiautomatic handguns; and magazines with a capacity of over 10 rounds.

It was obvious that such arms are “commonly used by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,” which is the Supreme Court’s rule from District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) for which arms are protected by the Second Amendment. First, the Colorado Attorney General and plaintiffs in an earlier case challenging the state of Colorado’s ban on magazines over 15 rounds had so stipulated. Colorado Outfitters Ass’n v. Hickenlooper, 24 F. Supp. 3d 1050, 1068 (D. Colo. 2014), vacated in part on other grounds and remanded, 823 F.3d 537 (10th Cir. 2016). (I represented 55 Colorado Sheriff plaintiffs in the case, which ended up with the 10th Circuit declaring that neither the Sheriffs nor the many other individual and organizational plaintiffs had standing.) Commonality was also found in the undisputed facts set forth in Fourth Circuit Judge Traxler’s dissenting opinion in Kolbe v. Hogan, 849 F.3d 114, 153-55 (4th Cir. 2017). The opinions of many other Circuit Courts provide additional, irrefutable proof of commonality; the banned firearms number in the millions, at least, and the banned magazines comprise over half of all magazines.

Pursuant to the Supreme Court’s recent decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, courts are supposed to decide Second Amendment cases on text, history, and tradition. Judge may not decide based on their own opinions about good policy, nor should they defer to legislative policy judgements. The policy  balancing was already conducted by the American people when they adopted the Second Amendment.

[ … ]

The Colorado plaintiffs also challenged Superior’s ban on open carry of handguns. Judge Moore denied the TRO motion against the open carry ban. As he accurately stated, Bruen affirms the right to bear arms, but also allows governments to decide whether the mode of carry shall be open or concealed. Since 2003 in Colorado, concealed carry permits have been available to adults with safety training who pass a fingerprint-based background check. A system that bans open carry while allowing concealed carry does not violate the Second Amendment.

At least one aspect of the ruling was correct.  All the judge can do is follow Bruen, and that decision allowed for bans on mode of carry as long as some mode of carry was allowed.

Of course, I disagree with that part of it as you know.

This article at Task & Purpose provides some interesting information, as well as this one at Guns & Ammo.