Chattanooga Defenders Exemplify Civil Disobedience 

By Jeff Knox

(August 4, 2015) When former congressman Allen West reported that the Navy planned to bring charges against Lieutenant Commander Timothy White for possessing and using his personal firearm against the terrorist who attacked his Chattanooga, Tennessee Naval Reserve Center last month, the story went viral.  On Monday, the Navy denied the story, first insisting that no charges had been filed, then allowing “unnamed officials” to make statements that charges are unlikely in the case.

Whether the Navy ever planned to bring charges, or if their apparent decision not to do so was motivated by the public outrage to the idea, will probably never be known.  In either case, West’s raising of the issue, and the public loudly weighing in on it, was useful and productive.  It serves as a good reminder to the Washington elites that there are some lines that they had better not even think about crossing.  Unfortunately, it will take years to know how Lt. Cmdr. White’s brave choice – to be armed in defiance of regulations – and bold action – exchanging gunfire with the terrorist – will affect his military career.  Odds are that, even if the Navy doesn’t prosecute, or even issues some sort of commendation for his actions that day, there will also likely be some official reprimand that will derail his naval career.

Lt. Cmdr. White was apparently not the only military member present who chose to ignore orders to disarm.  Reports say that one of the Marines killed by the terrorist was also armed with a Glock 9mm.  Whether either White or the Marine actually hit the terrorist with their shots is unknown.  It is likely that the local police, who were credited with finally killing the terrorist, were also using 9mm handguns, so positively identifying which guns fired the bullets that struck the terrorist could be impossible.  But whether Lt. Cmdr. White or the Marine hit the terrorist or not, their actions almost certainly disrupted and slowed the terrorist, very probably saving lives.  Had the terrorist not fired at the recruiting station before driving to the reserve center, initiating pursuit by the police, he would have had plenty of time to execute everyone at the center, with only White and the Marine, with their unauthorized weapons, to stand in his way.

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No One Wants to Take Our Guns!

By Jeff Knox

(July 29, 2015) If you follow the rights issue at all, you have undoubtedly seen claims from members of the anti-rights crowd insisting that “No one wants to take your guns!”  We’ve heard this for years – decades – as enemies of liberty have leveled a ceaseless barrage of attacks on our rights.  The drum-beat got particularly loud during Obama’s first presidential election, and has continued to gain volume and intensity since then.  Included in the meme is the idea that gun owners are paranoid, being misled by the “gun lobby,” usually misidentified as the NRA.  The “gun lobby” is accused of irrational fearmongering, seeing threats where none exist, and fighting against “reasonable, common-sense, gun violence prevention efforts,” all for the sake of protecting the outrageous profits of the massive firearms industry.

I’ve recently read several pieces from very different sources all repeating the exact same talking-points, loudly proclaiming this “truth,” and berating “gun huggers,” “ammosexuals,” and good old-fashioned “gun nuts” for intransigence in the face of the prohibitionists’ self-declared non-threat.  The language they use is much too similar to be coincidence.  They are clearly working from the same playbook, but some can’t help allowing some actual truth to slip into their rants.

In recent pieces, several writers insistently repeated the mantra: “No one wants to take away your guns,” or “Obama isn’t trying to take your guns,” in bold-faced capital letters with plenty of underlining and exclamation points for emphasis, followed by some statement that all they want to do is “keep dangerous weapons away from dangerous people,” and ban “assault weapons,” automatic and semi-automatic firearms, “high-capacity magazines,” and other weapons most frequently used by mass murderers and criminals.

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No Guns for Social Security Recipients?

By Jeff Knox

The Los Angeles Times reported in July that the Obama administration is pushing a plan to submit the names of up 4.2 million recipients of Social Security benefits to the FBI’s National Instant Check System.  People in NICS are not just barred from purchasing firearms, they are “prohibited persons” for whom possession of firearms and ammunition is illegal under the Gun Control Act.  It is a felony for them to be in possession or have access to firearms or ammunition under any circumstances, and it is a felony for anyone to knowingly allow a prohibited person access to a firearm or ammunition.

The law regarding “prohibited persons” has become increasingly broad since its adoption in 1968.  It was originally intended to restrict violent felons, fugitives, people with dangerous mental disorders, and others who pose a significant threat to public safety, but in fact took away the rights of many non-violent offenders and people who would not be considered dangerous.  With the addition of the Lautenberg Amendment in the 1990s, the prohibition was expanded to include anyone convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence.  Under this provision, a wife fined $25 for slapping a cheating husband’s face is barred from possession of firearms for life.

The law (USC Title 18, Section 922, subsection g.) says anyone “who has been adjudicated as a mental defective or who has been committed to a mental institution,” is prohibited from possessing firearms or ammunition. 

Continue reading No Guns for Social Security Recipients? →

Christie Courting Gun Voters
But he’s not getting much traction.

By Jeff Knox

(July 8, 2015) Was anyone surprised when Chris Christie officially announced his candidacy for President of the United States?  Christie has been prominently featured as a possible presidential contender for years, and in all of that time, I and others in the rights movement have been saying that Christie could never get the support of gun voters, and without gun voter support, a Republican presidential win is unlikely – just ask John McCain and Mitt Romney, and George H.W. Bush, Bob Dole, and Gerald Ford.  

Just as the media and gun control activists make the mistake of thinking that the National Rifle Association is “the gun lobby,” so too do most Republican politicians think that an NRA endorsement is all they need to seal up gun voter support.  The reality is that, even with some five million members, the NRA is only able to significantly impact an election if the activist core of those members, along with the activist core of various other rights-focused firearm groups, actively get behind the candidate.  The overlap among these activists in the various groups is extensive, and these are people who are paying attention to politics all year long, not just in the three months leading up to an election.  While an NRA endorsement can help reinforce, and fuel the work of the serious activists, these folks make their own decisions.  If the year-round core activists aren’t willing to get behind a candidate they don’t trust, no amount of NRA praise is going to change their minds, and without their support, the NRA is only able to sway the least-active, and least informed of their membership.  In a state with 50,000 NRA members, maybe 5,000 of those will be politically active, and most of those will also be members of a state grass roots group.  Politicians might be able to cajole an endorsement out of the suits at NRA HQ, but unless they can convince the guys who actually do the work on the ground, they’re just spinning their wheels.

Continue reading Christie’s Part of the Problem →

Only Police Should have Guns?

By Jeff Knox

(July 2, 2015) Humans are complicated and confusing creatures.  We often cling to misguided beliefs and self-destructive philosophies, even as we decry the impacts and results of those beliefs and philosophies.  One of the most confusing examples of this is when a minority that has suffered oppression and abuse advocates for policies that enable that abuse and remove options for protecting against future abuse.

The right to arms has long been recognized as a core distinction between a citizen and a subject, a free man and a slave.  Virtually all gun control laws in the U.S. prior to the 1970s were aimed primarily at Blacks, first in fear of slave rebellions, then in fear of retribution from freed slaves, then in fear of “Black crime.”  California’s ban on open carry of long guns was a direct result of members of the Black Panther Party legally carrying guns out on the streets and actually into the State Capitol.  The Ku Klux Klan, which was a recognized political force in the 1920s and ‘30s, helped pass gun control laws in several states as a way of keeping Blacks defenseless.  Many of those laws remain on the books today, including in North Carolina where a bill to repeal a Jim Crow-era Purchase Permit law fell to heavy-handed political maneuvering this year.

For decades African Americans struggled for the unencumbered right to arms.  It was one of the core liberties identified in the early days of the civil rights movement, and was one of the central objectives of the NAACP.  The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. preached pacifism and non-violence as a tactic for advancing the cause of equality, but he did so surrounded by armed men prepared to defend him and his followers.  The Deacons for Defense and Justice not only guarded Black leaders, Black churches, and Black neighborhoods, they represented an ominous shadow in the background behind Dr. King.  Though they maintained a strictly defensive posture, many political leaders new about the Deacons, and they feared what would happen if the civil rights movement ever shifted from Dr. king’s doctrine of non-violence to the Deacons’ philosophy of armed resistance.  Whites were more willing to negotiate with Dr. King in order to avoid having to negotiate with men like the Deacons.

Continue reading No Guns for You! →

The Exploitation of Mother Emanuel

By Jeff Knox

(June 24, 3015) Last week a deranged coward joined a Bible study group in Charleston, South Carolina, sat with them for about an hour, and then pulled out a gun and started shooting people, killing nine.  He then drove away, only to be captured without incident a few hours later.

Reports say the demented little troll declared his need to kill the people because they were “raping our women and taking over our country.”  How sick and detached from reality did this vile creature have to be to take these nine innocent lives – six women and three men –on such a pretext?

The answer to that was summed up very accurately by Dr. Michael Welner, a forensic psychologist who appeared on FOX and Friends a few days ago.  During his brief interview, Dr. Welner stressed several things. “The mass killer is an irrelevant person […] who is looking for relevance,” he said.  “Of course this is a hate crime.  Of course it’s a racist crime, but the mass killer is about himself, and is about getting attention for himself, and he knows that if we have this ‘national dialog,’ ultimately we’re talking about him.”  He goes on to say; “This was a cultural crime.  It is happening in the United States much more than elsewhere, but it’s not a gun issue, it’s because we socially incentivize it.”  Dr. Welner suggests that these murderers are seeking fame and attention, and that the media and politicians reward them by giving them that fame and attention.  He said that rather than focusing on the infamy-seeking perpetrator, we should instead focus attention on the victims and what remarkable people they were.  He offered up coverage of the murder of Chris Kyle as an example of a better way to handle these situations.  In the Kyle case, the attention focused primarily on Kyle and his life and accomplishments.  Dr. Welner pointed out that few people remember the name of the man who murdered Kyle because the media and politicians didn’t focus their attention and agenda on the murderer, instead focusing on the victims.

Continue reading Crying for Mother Emanuel →