You’d think that at least her clerks would have prepared her better than this.
And here’s Justice Jackson: “And when, you know, ‘function’ is defined, it’s really not about the operation of the thing. It’s about what it can achieve, what it’s being used for. So I see Congress as putting function in this. The function of this trigger is to cause this kind of damage, 800 rounds a second or whatever.”
Maybe there’s a quad gun that can approach that rate, but still, 4500 RPM × 4 = 18000, and 18000 RPM / 60 seconds per minutes = 300 RPM. So, I don’t know of anything that can accomplish 800 rounds per second.
Can you imagine trying to hold a gun on target at that rate of fire?
Justice Kagan says that with a bump stock, you can hold the trigger and bullets come out. Cargill says that's incorrect; bump stocks don't alter the trigger at all
Justice Kagan says that with a bump stock, you can hold the trigger and bullets come out. Cargill says that's incorrect; bump stocks don't alter the trigger at all
Justice Jackson is asking why the chemical reaction after the trigger is pulled isn't the single function that causes the gun to fire automatically. Like all of Jackson's other arguments, Cargill says that is also incorrect
I listened to the arguments in Cargill before the SCOTUS for a few minutes. I’m out of time with this and cannot devote more to it. I’ll embed Mark Smith when he comes out with an analysis of it.
They’re focused on procedural issues, and nothing more. There is nothing in the arguments or even the attorney presentations dealing with the legality of the ATF just making up rules out of whole cloth.
Prediction: They will issue a ruling addressing the minutia of the procedural rules and punt this back down to the lower courts. They will avoid the issue entirely and thus free and exonerate themselves of holding anyone in the FedGov accountable.
Finally, the attorney for the plaintiff absolutely blew it. His presentation was awful, his speech stammering and stuttering, and he was slow on the responses, wasting time in his presentation.
And never forget. You have Trump to thank for this.
I don’t know what the SCOTUS will do. I suspect the two “conservative” women on the court, Roberts and Barrett, will side with the FedGov. If that’s the case, then there’s pain ahead because the ATF will use this to reinterpret semi-automatic weapons as machine guns and demand registration, tax stamp, and ATF approval of all semiautomatic firearms, which is what they want anyway.
Oh, and never forget that you have Trump to thank for this. And also, never forget that the FBI wouldn’t let the ATF examine the weapons after Las Vegas and it was never demonstrated that Paddock used bump stocks.
Recall that I said that the SCOTUS is running from semiautomatic weapons ban cases like a screaming scared little girl? Right. This panel has no problem running roughshod over Heller and Bruen. They couldn’t care less what the SCOTUS has said.
Instapundit links an analyst who says it isn’t as clear as folks are making it out to be that the SCOTUS has given the final word on anything.
“The Court’s order vacated an injunction previously entered by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals that had prohibited the Government from damaging or destroying Texas’ wire. The Supreme Court’s order has been the subject of widespread and sometimes fiery commentary. However, the press and commentators are misanalysing the order. Governor Abbott and Texas are still free to prevent the feds from cutting their wire. The Supreme Court’s order does not forbid that. The press is misleading you. . . . The reason that the press and other commentators and critics are incorrect is that they apparently fail to understand the limited effect of vacating an injunction. After the Supreme Court’s order vacating the injunction, the status quo was the same as it was prior to the TRO ever being entered: There is no court order prohibiting the Government from taking down the wire AND there likewise is no Supreme Court order or opinion saying that the Government had a right to take down the wire. Nor is there an order by any court that Texas cannot protect its own property, namely the concertina wire.”
I don’t think it much matters. Either Texas will fold or they will hold fast. As for the SCOTUS, I expected nothing different from them. With AWB laws being enacted nationwide by the blue states, the SCOTUS has been running from semi-automatic weapons ban cases for months now. The two establishment women on the court – Barrett and Roberts – will nearly always side with the progs as we have now seen. The lower courts are running roughshod over Heller and Bruen and the SCOTUS doesn’t seem to care enough to stop it.
If that’s true, then why should Texas listen to the SCOTUS on this matter? The FedGov only wants control over this area in order to facilitate the foreign invasion.
As for the NG troops, here’s a warning. Be armed or go home. And that means be under arming orders, with weapons an ammunition and the authority to use them.
I had previously told you that I had as much use for the fourth circuit as I do for the muck between my toes.
And just to be clear, there is no reason at all for the supreme court to wait to hear a case like this since it’s going on all over the country now. As I said before, they’re running from it like little girls. Or maybe they want to do the bidding of the communists and wait for the makeup of the supreme court to change. To accomplish that, they would need the help of the two supposedly constitutional women on the court – Barrett and Roberts.
So here is Mark Smith. He takes a fairly realistic view of things.
Here is Washington Gun Law, where he takes a slightly better view of what’s possible, perhaps too rosy.
Here is Jared in an inexplicably optimistic view of things.
So I set each up with the little preview because I think Jared may miss the point. This was a case seeking a preliminary injunction, and no final ruling has been made. I think the other two analyses are a bit closer to the truth.
I think it will be hard to get SCOTUS review of this because they are just that stolid and slow to react – and also because of the chief justice. To be sure, this was seeking a preliminary injunction, but it must be remembered that the decisions already written on this assesses the probability of success before these courts.
They may delay the final rulings for another two or three years, or more, but there won’t be another outcome than the one you’ve already witnessed. So even if they don’t, it makes perfect sense for the SCOTUS to take this up now. One wonders what they’re waiting for – perhaps another supreme court justice to die with a pillow over his face like Scalia?
Judge Frank Easterbrook is a so-called “law and order conservative.” Let me translate for you. That’s the same thing as the communists on the alleged other side of the isle. Just like AG Barr, who argued in defense of Lon Horiuchi.
In America, it’s always easy to detect a communist. Just look at his position on the second amendment.
It’s an American tradition for as long as there has been an America – making your own firearms. And back when individuals contracted skilled tradesmen and craftsmen to do it for them, the government had no say in the matter.
But here we are. I told you the ladies on the court, including Barrett and Roberts, would side with the communists, didn’t I?
8 months, 3 weeks ago
