Powerful Anti-Gun Control Polling Data from Front-Line Crime Fighters

Early in the year, I shared a powerful video about the right to keep and bear arms. It featured the Sheriff of Milwaukee County in Wisconsin, who made a public service announcement advising citizens that gun ownership was important for self defense.

That’s such a common-sense point that it presumably shouldn’t have merited any comment, but it was newsworthy because the establishment press frequently tries to promote the narrative that law enforcement officials are opposed to the Second Amendment.

But in virtually every instance, the “officials” are big-city police bosses who are parroting the views of the political masters who appointed them to their positions.

So what do regular cops think about gun control?

I’ve always assumed they favored the right to keep and bear arms. Simply stated, cops have a practical understanding that there are bad people in the world. Moreover, they know it’s impossible for them to be everywhere at once, so armed citizens are the first line of defense.

And the cops that I know are strong defenders of private gun ownership, but I haven’t wanted to extrapolate from that anecdotal evidence.

So I’m not surprised that police officers are against gun control, but I had no idea that cops were so overwhelmingly solid on the Second Amendment until I saw the polling data from this survey of 15,000 law enforcement officials.

Here are two of the most startling findings, beginning with a question on whether magazine limits will be effective in reducing crime. An astounding 95.7 percent of respondents say no.

Makes you wonder whether Andrew Cuomo and other sleazy politicians understand that they’re pushing policies that will have no positive impact? Or whether they even care?

Perhaps all lawmakers should be required to read Larry Correia’s article on the real-world impact of such policies.

But what about “assault weapons”?

Well, 91.5 percent of cops said a ban on these semi-automatic weapons would either be useless or the policy would have a negative impact on fighting crime.

Indeed, almost three times as many cops said the effect would be negative compared to those who thought a ban on these guns would have a moderate or significant positive effect!

In other words, cops understand instinctively and through practical experience what scholars such as John Lott have discovered through research.

Interestingly, it appears cops are even better on the Second Amendment than ordinary Americans. According to this polling data I shared back in January, “only” 58 percent of Americans understood that more guns would reduce crime.

But I’m still proud of these ordinary Americans. An overwhelming 65 percent of them said they would disobey laws designed to confiscate their guns.

P.S. While I’m very glad that police officers support the Second Amendment, there are some cops who deserve scorn because of what they do to me and what they do to innocent 10-year old kids.

P.P.S. If you enjoy anti-gun control humor, here are lots of amusing images and funny videos.

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According to Washington Post Exposé, People Who Utilize Tax Havens Are Far More Honest than Politicians

Using data stolen from service providers in the Cook Islands and the British Virgin Islands, the Washington Post published a supposed exposé of Americans who do business in so-called tax havens.

Another Research Trip to Cayman – One of the Sacrifices I Make in the Fight for Freedom

Since I’m the self-appointed defender of low-tax jurisdictions in Washington, this caught my attention. Thomas Jefferson wasn’t joking when he warned that “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.” I’m constantly fighting against anti-tax haven schemes that would undermine tax competition, financial privacy, and fiscal sovereignty.

Even if it means a bunch of international bureaucrats threaten to toss me in a Mexican jail or a Treasury Department official says I’m being disloyal to America. Or, in this case, if it simply means I’m debunking demagoguery.

The supposedly earth-shattering highlight of the article is that some Americans linked to offshore companies and trusts have run afoul of the legal system.

Among the 4,000 U.S. individuals listed in the records, at least 30 are American citizens accused in lawsuits or criminal cases of fraud, money laundering or other serious financial misconduct.

But the real revelation is that people in the offshore world must be unusually honest. Fewer than 1 percent of them have been named in a lawsuit, much less been involved with a criminal case.

This is just a wild guess, but I’m quite confident that you would find far more evidence of misbehavior if you took a random sample of 4,000 Americans from just about any cross-section of the population.

We know we would find a greater propensity for bad behavior if we examined 4,000 politicians. And I assume that would be true for journalists as well. And folks on Wall Street. And realtors. And plumbers. Perhaps even think tank employees. Anyhow, you get the point.

Citing a couple of anecdotes, the reporter then tries to imply that low-tax jurisdictions somehow lend themselves to criminal activity.

 Fraud experts say offshore bank accounts and companies are vital to the operation of complex financial crimes. Allen Stanford, who ran a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, used a bank he controlled in Antigua. Bernard Madoff, who ran the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history, used a series of offshore “feeder funds” to fuel the growth of his multibillion-dollar house of cards.

The Allen Stanford case was a genuine black eye for the offshore world, but it’s absurd to link Madoff’s criminality to tax havens. The offshore funds that invested with Madoff were victimized in the same way that many onshore funds lost money.

Moreover, there’s no evidence in this article – or from any other source to my knowledge – suggesting that financial impropriety is more likely in low-tax jurisdictions.

We then get some “hard” numbers.

Today, there are between 50 and 60 offshore financial centers around the world holding untold billions of dollars at a time of historic U.S. deficits and forced budget cuts. Groups that monitor tax issues estimate that between $8 trillion and $32 trillion in private global wealth is parked offshore.

So we have offshore wealth of somewhere “between $8 trillion and $32 trillion”? With that level of precision, or lack thereof, perhaps you now understand why the make-believe numbers about alleged tax evasion are about as credible as a revenue estimate from the Joint Committee on Taxation.

Speaking of make-believe numbers, the article mentions one of Washington’s worst lawmakers, a Senator who pushed through a law that has united the world against the United States.

Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.) has been holding hearings and conducting investigations into the offshore world for nearly three decades. In 2010, Congress passed the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act requiring that U.S. taxpayers report foreign assets to the government and foreign institutions alert the IRS when Americans open accounts.

He justifies bad policy by claiming that there’s a pot of gold at the end of the tax haven rainbow.

“We can’t afford to lose tens of billions of dollars a year to tax-avoidance schemes,” Levin said. “And many of these schemes involve the shift of U.S. corporate tax revenues earned here in the U.S. to offshore tax havens.”

But FATCA is predicted to collected less than $1 billion per year, and it probably will lose revenue once you include Laffer Curve effects such as lower investment in the American economy from overseas.

The most interesting part of the article, as least from a personal perspective, is that the Center for Freedom and Prosperity is listed as one of the “powerful lobbying interests” fighting to preserve tax competition.

The efforts by Levin and other lawmakers have been opposed by powerful lobbying interests, including the banking and accounting industries and a little-known nonprofit group called the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. CF&P was founded by Daniel J. Mitchell, a former Senate Finance Committee staffer who works as a tax expert for the Cato Institute, and Andrew Quinlan, who was a senior economic analyst for the Republican National Committee before helping start the center. …The center argues that unfettered access to offshore havens leads to lower taxes and more prosperity.

Having helped to start the organization, I wish CF&P was powerful. The Center has never had a budget of more than $250,000 per year, so it truly is a David vs. Goliath battle when we go up against bloated and over-funded bureaucracies such as the IRS and the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The reporter somehow thinks it is big news that the Center has tried to raise money from the business community in low-tax jurisdictions.

According to records reviewed by The Post and ICIJ, the organization’s fundraising pleas have been circulated to offshore entities that make millions by providing anonymity for wealthy clients, many of them U.S. citizens.

Unfortunately, even though these offshore entities supposedly “make millions,” I’m embarrassed to say that CF&P has not been able to convince them that it makes sense to support an organization dedicated to protecting tax competition, financial privacy, and fiscal sovereignty.

But maybe that will change now that the OECD has launched a new attack on tax planning by multinational firms.

Let’s close by returning to the policy issue. The article quotes me defending the right of jurisdictions to determine their own fiscal affairs.

Mitchell, the co-founder of CF&P, added that nations shouldn’t be telling other countries how to conduct their affairs and noted that the United States is one of the worst offenders in the world when it comes to corporate secrecy.

My only gripe is that the reporter mischaracterizes my position. Yes, there are several states that are “tax havens” because of their efficient and confidential incorporation laws, but that means America is “one of the best providers,” not “one of the worst offenders.”

This is something to celebrate. I’m glad the United States is a safe haven for the oppressed people of the world. That’s great news for our economy. I just wish we also were a tax haven for American citizens.

“The United States is one of the biggest tax havens in the world,” Mitchell said. “In general, the United States is impervious to fishing expeditions here, and then the United States turns around and says, ‘Allow us to do fishing expeditions in your country.’”

But I’m not a hypocrite. Other nations should have the sovereign right to maintain pro-growth tax and privacy laws as well.

Other nations shouldn’t feel obliged to enforce bad American tax law, any more than we should feel obliged to enforce any of their bad laws.

P.S. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that “onshore” nations are much more susceptible to dirty money than “offshore” jurisdictions. Which is why you have a hard time finding any tax havens on this map showing the nations with the most money laundering.

P.P.S. On the topic of tax havens, you won’t be surprised to learn that Senator Levin is not the only dishonest demagogue in Washington. If you pay close attention around 1:25 and 2:25 of this video, you’ll see that the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue also has an unfortunate tendency to play fast and loose with the truth.

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Another Honest Liberal Writes about Gun Ownership and Second Amendment Rights

Late last year, I shared a very powerful article by an admitted liberal who concluded that gun control was impractical and illogical.

Now I want to share a New York Times column from another leftist. Justin Cronin also supports the right of gun ownership, but he offers a more personal reason for his support of the Second Amendment.

Here are some of the key excerpts from his column.

I am a New England liberal, born and bred. I have lived most of my life in the Northeast — Boston, New York and Philadelphia — and my politics are devoutly Democratic. I am also a Texas resident and a gun owner. I have half a dozen pistols in my safe, all semiautomatics, the largest capable of holding 20 rounds. …I’m currently shopping for a shotgun, either a Remington 870 Express Tactical or a Mossberg 500 Flex with a pistol grip and adjustable stock. …I am my family’s last line of defense. I have chosen to meet this responsibility, in part, by being armed. It wasn’t a choice I made lightly.

A “pistol grip”? A gun that holds “20 rounds”? An “adjustable stock”? Gasp, the horror! I imagine Obama is probably sending the BATF after this guy. Heck, maybe even target him with a drone.

So why does this self-described leftist own guns and believe in the right to self-defense? The answer is common sense, based in part on what happened when Hurricane Rita was heading toward Houston.

My wife and I arranged to stay at a friend’s house in Austin, packed up the kids and dog, and headed out of town — or tried to. As many as 3.7 million people had the same idea, making Rita one of the largest evacuations in history, with predictable results. By 2 in the morning, after six hours on the road, we had made it all of 50 miles. The scene was like a snapshot from the Apocalypse: crowds milling restlessly, gas stations and mini-marts picked clean and heaped with trash, families sleeping by the side of the road. The situation had the hopped-up feel of barely bottled chaos. After Katrina, nobody had any illusions that help was on its way. It also occurred to me that there were probably a lot of guns out there… Here I was with two tiny children, a couple of thousand dollars in cash, a late-model S.U.V. with half a tank of gas and not so much as a heavy book to throw. …Rita made a last-minute turn away from Houston. But what if it hadn’t? I believe people are basically good, but not all of them and not all the time. Like most citizens of our modern, technological world, I am wholly reliant upon a fragile web of services to meet my most basic needs. What would happen if those services collapsed? Chaos, that’s what.

We’ve already witnessed real-world examples of societal breakdown caused by government incompetence and failure.

I wrote two years ago to celebrate the superiority of the American system, which allowed Korean shopowners to protect themselves during the Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, and the British system, which left immigrant shopowners vulnerable and defenseless to rampaging mobs.

That argument gets more relevant and powerful every year. Indeed, there have been riots all over Europe, and I suspect that we’ll see more chaos and social disarray as the welfare state continues to collapse. And as I discuss in this NRA-TV interview, only a fool (or a victim of bad government) is unarmed when the you-know-what hits the fan.

Simply stated, would you want to leave your family vulnerable, and rely on the callow and feckless political class for their safety? I hope not, which is why I’m surprised that “protection during a societal breakdown” only got about 13 percent of the vote in my poll asking the most important reason to oppose gun control.

Let’s return to the NYT column. Our liberal columnist naively wishes guns didn’t exist (as if a pack of young, male thugs need weapons to terrorize a family), but at least he recognizes that his anti-gun leftist friends don’t know what they’re talking about.

…in the weeks since Newtown, I’ve watched my Facebook feed, which is dominated by my coastal friends, fill up with anti-gun dispatches that seemed divorced from reality. I agree it would be nice if the world had exactly zero guns in it. But I don’t see that happening, and calling gun owners “a bunch of inbred rednecks” doesn’t do much to advance rational discussion. Thus, my secret life — though I guess it’s not such a secret anymore.

Here’s a final excerpt that is very heartwarming, and this picture reveals that I obviously share the same sentiments.

My wife is afraid of my guns (though she also says she’s glad I have them). My 16-year-old daughter is a different story. …she asked to take a pistol lesson. …the instructor ran her through the basics, demonstrating with a Glock 9-millimeter: how to hold it, load it, pull back the slide. “You’ll probably have trouble with that part,” he said. “A lot of the women do.” “Oh really?” my daughter replied, and with a cagey smile proceeded to rack her weapon with such authority you could have heard it in the parking lot. A proud-papa moment? I confess it was.

If you want more practical information on gun control, I strongly recommend the famous Larry Correia article. And for wisdom on the issue of so-called assault weapons, John Lott is the oracle.

And if you want to laugh at the dishonest (or naive) liberals, watch this amusing video to see how they think gun control works in their fantasy world.

Then give your leftist friends this IQ test on gun control and see if they can figure out the right answer.

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An Amusing Video Medley of Moral Preening on Guns from Piers Morgan

I’ve shared some very powerful videos that help explain why we should respect and celebrate the individual right to keep and bear arms.

• Ted Nugent talking about gun ownership and the right of self defense.
• A look at the Switzerland’s strong gun culture and the importance of self defense as a protection against oppression.
• And some very powerful testimony to some weasels on Capitol Hill (make sure to pay attention around the 5:00 mark).
• Ice-T talking about the real reason to defend and support the 2nd Amendment.
• A Reason TV video with five facts for Vice President Biden’s task force.
• A look at how a young woman can defend herself.

Here’s one that’s worth sharing just for entertainment value. It shows a British import desperately trying to gain visibility and ratings by engaging in a series of gun control debates.

I can’t vouch for the veracity of what’s being said by Ventura, Pratt, et al, but they obviously win the overall arguments about the right to self defense, the fight against crime, and having the means to resist tyranny and oppression.

But as much as I like all of these videos, the best arguments for the Second Amendment come from this conservative and this liberal.

Actually, I don’t even know if the author of the first article is a conservative. Or even libertarian. He just makes so much sense that I assume he’s on the side of freedom instead of the state.

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Thoughts on “Assault Weapons” and “Magazine Limits” from an Actual Gun Expert

I’m not a big gun owner and I’m not part of the gun culture. So why, then, do I frequently post about the issue of gun control?

Mostly because I believe in freedom and the Constitution.

But I also appreciate facts and analysis and I know that law-abiding citizens are safer and criminals face greater obstacles when good people have the right of self defense.

Last but not least, I think there’s a non-trivial possibility that the United States will suffer some sort of social chaos and/or breakdown of law and order because of the damage caused by reckless fiscal and monetary policies. As I explain in this interview on NRA-TV, that’s when firearms ownership can mean the difference between life an death.

But now it’s time to get some analysis from Larry Correia, a real expert. Here’s some of his background, which may help explain why his article has been viewed more than 1,000,000 times and attracted about 2,500 comments.

I owned a gun store. …that means lots and lots of government inspections and compliance paperwork. This means that I had to be exceedingly familiar with federal gun laws, and there are a lot of them. …When I hear people tell me the gun industry is unregulated, I have to resist the urge to laugh in their face. I was also a Utah Concealed Weapons instructor, and was one of the busiest instructors in the state. That required me to learn a lot about self-defense laws… I have certified thousands of people to carry guns.

Here’s what he has to say about stopping massacres. In this section, he’s specifically talking about the value of armed teachers, but the message obviously applies more broadly.

The single best way to respond to a mass shooter is with an immediate, violent response. The vast majority of the time, as soon as a mass shooter meets serious resistance, it bursts their fantasy world bubble. Then they kill themselves or surrender. This has happened over and over again. Police are awesome. I love working with cops. However any honest cop will tell you that when seconds count they are only minutes away. …cops can’t be everywhere. There are at best only a couple hundred thousand on duty at any given time patrolling the entire country. Excellent response time is in the three-five minute range. We’ve seen what bad guys can do in three minutes, but sometimes it is far worse. …So in some cases that means the bad guys can have ten, fifteen, even twenty minutes to do horrible things with nobody effectively fighting back. So if we can’t have cops there, what can we do? The average number of people shot in a mass shooting event when the shooter is stopped by law enforcement: 14. The average number of people shot in a mass shooting event when the shooter is stopped by civilians: 2.5. The reason is simple. The armed civilians are there when it started.

In this passage, you can see that he’s not overly impressed by “gun-free zones.”

Gun Free Zones are hunting preserves for innocent people. Period. Think about it. You are a violent, homicidal madman, looking to make a statement and hoping to go from disaffected loser to most famous person in the world. The best way to accomplish your goals is to kill a whole bunch of people. So where’s the best place to go shoot all these people? Obviously, it is someplace where nobody can shoot back.

Sort of the same message as this humorous video.

In all honesty, I have no respect for anybody who believes Gun Free Zones actually work. You are going to commit several hundred felonies, up to and including mass murder, and you are going to refrain because there is a sign? That No Guns Allowed sign is not a cross that wards off vampires. It is wishful thinking, and really pathetic wishful thinking at that.

You probably won’t be surprised to learn that the Aurora theatre was a gun-free zone.

The man that attacked the midnight showing of Batman didn’t attack just any theater. There were like ten to choose from. He didn’t attack the closest. It wasn’t about biggest or smallest. He attacked the one that was posted NO GUNS ALLOWED. …Over the last fifty years, with only one single exception (Gabby Giffords), every single mass shooting event with more than four casualties has taken place in a place where guns were supposedly not allowed.

He then deals with the issue of “semi-automatic” weapons. He first explains that these weapons are not machine guns, notwithstanding the inane/biased commentary in the press.

Semi-automatic means that each time you pull the trigger the action cycles and loads another round. This is the single most common type of gun, not just in America, but in the whole world. Almost all handguns are semi-automatic. The vast majority of weapons used for self-defense are semi-automatic, as are almost all the weapons used by police officers.  It is the most common because it is normally the most effective.

Anti-gun zealots often use “assault rifle” as a pejorative, and they probably are similarly clueless in thinking that such weapons are machine guns. Correia addresses some of the specific issues of these weapons.

…real assault rifles in the US have been heavily regulated since before they were invented. The thing that the media and politicians like to refer to as assault rifles is basically a catch all term for any gun which looks scary. …The US banned assault rifles once before for a decade and the law did absolutely nothing. I mean, it was totally, literally pointless. …And the reason was that since assault weapon is a nonsense term, they just came up with a list of arbitrary features which made a gun into an assault weapon. Problem was, none of these features actually made the gun functionally any different or somehow more lethal or better from any other run of the mill firearm. Most of the criteria were so silly that they became a huge joke to gun owners, except of course, for that part where many law abiding citizens accidentally became instant felons because one of their guns had some cosmetic feature which was now illegal.

Here are a couple of examples he discusses.

Does this make a gun more dangerous?

For example, flash hiders sound dangerous. …Problem is flash hiders don’t do much. They screw onto the end of your muzzle and divert the flash off to the side instead of straight up so it isn’t as annoying when you shoot. It doesn’t actually hide the flash from anybody else. …Barrel shrouds were listed.Barrel shrouds are basically useless, cosmetic pieces of metal that go over the barrel so you don’t accidentally touch it and burn your hand. But they became an instantaneous felony too. Collapsible stocks make it so you can adjust your rifle to different size shooters, that way a tall guy and his short wife can shoot the same gun. …Now are you starting to see why “assault weapons” is a pointless term? They aren’t functionally any more powerful or deadly than any normal gun. In fact the cartridges they normally fire are far less powerful than your average deer hunting rifle.

One of the big issues in the gun-control debate is whether there should be limits on the number of rounds in a magazines.

…why do gun owners want magazines that hold more rounds? Because sometimes you miss. Because usually—contrary to the movies—you have to hit an opponent multiple times in order to make them stop. Because sometimes you may have multiple assailants. We don’t have more rounds in the magazine so we can shoot more, we have more rounds in the magazine so we are forced to manipulate our gun less if we have to shoot more. …ten rounds sucks when you take a wound ballistics class like I have and go over case after case after case after case of enraged, drug addled, prison hardened, perpetrators who soaked up five, seven, nine, even fifteen bullets and still walked under their own power to the ambulance. That isn’t uncommon at all. …Also, you’re going to miss. It is going to happen. If you can shoot pretty little groups at the range, those groups are going to expand dramatically under the stress and adrenalin. …or the bad guy may end up hiding behind something which your bullets don’t penetrate. Nobody has ever survived a gunfight and then said afterwards, “Darn, I wish I hadn’t brought all that extra ammo.” So having more rounds in the gun is a good thing for self-defense use.

He then responds to the assertion that magazine limits will make life more difficult for bad guys.

…he’s not going to walk up right next to you while he reloads anyway. Unlike the CCW holder who gets attacked and has to defend himself in whatever crappy situation he finds himself in, the mass shooter is the aggressor. He’s picked the engagement range. They are cowards who are murdering running and hiding children, but don’t for a second make the mistake of thinking they are dumb. Many of these scumbags are actually very intelligent. They’re just broken and evil. In the cases that I’m aware of where the shooter had guns that held fewer rounds they just positioned themselves back a bit while firing or they brought more guns, and simply switched guns and kept on shooting, and then reloaded before they moved to the next planned firing position. Unless you are a fumble fingered idiot, anybody who practices in front of a mirror a few dozen times can get to where they can insert a new magazine into a gun in a few seconds.

So what will happen if the government imposes a new magazine restriction?

Magazines are cheap and basic. Most of them are pieces of sheet metal with some wire. That’s it. Magazines are considered disposable so most gun people accumulate a ton of them. All [the 10-round limit] did was make magazines more expensive, ticked off law abiding citizens, and didn’t so much as inconvenience a single criminal. …So you can ban this stuff, but it won’t actually do anything to the crimes you want to stop.

Correia closes with some remarks on the importance of self defense.

…the vast majority of the time when a gun is produced in a legal self-defense situation no shots are fired. The mere presence of the gun is enough to cause the criminal to stop. Clint Smith once said if you look like food, you will be eaten. Criminals are looking for prey. They are looking for easy victims. If they wanted to work hard for a living they’d get a job. So when you pull a gun, you are no longer prey, you are work, so they are going to go find somebody else to pick on.

Which then brings us back to the key question: If gun control does nothing to stop bad guys, and it makes life more dangerous for good people, why do so many politicians want to undermine our constitutional rights?

I don’t think American politicians have the same evil motives as some of the world’s most reprehensible dictators, all of whom supported gun control as a way of controlling – and in many cases slaughtering – their people.

Indeed, I suspect some of them simply are unaware of the facts that Mr. Correia provides in the article.

Last month, I posted an article by a leftist who openly admitted that gun control was impractical. Our goal should be to help more people on the left reach this logical conclusion.

But since life shouldn’t be totally serious, here’s some gun control humor – including links to several additional jokes about the issue.

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Milwaukee County Sheriff Promotes Self Defense and Gun Ownership

A lot of big-city police chiefs are political appointees who promote gun control, presumably to please their political masters.

They tell citizens that they should passively rely on government rather than take personal responsibility for self defense.

I have no idea if the numbers in this image are correct, but there’s no doubt that a gun is a lot quicker than the cops. Heck, just watch this video and ask yourself whether you would want your daughter armed.

And the cops I know – the ones who actually interact with the public and fight crime – are supportive of the Second Amendment, precisely because they realize they can’t be everywhere and they know there are bad people in the world.

But not all police chiefs and senior cops are mindless bureaucrats. In this video, the Sheriff of Milwaukee County not only acknowledges the right of self defense, but he’s also is willing to help train citizens to resist crime.

This doesn’t necessarily make him a libertarian hero. Indeed, his comments about layoffs and furloughs indicate that he’s also interested in maximizing the size of his staff.

And even though cops are probably my favorite government employees (at least when they’re fighting crime rather than giving me ridiculous traffic tickets), that doesn’t mean we should have too many of them or pay them too much (though, to be fair, they’re presumably not paid as much as cops in Oakland).

But I’ll forgive Sheriff Clarke for pursuing the interests of his staff, even if that conflicts with the interests of taxpayers.

P.S. Here’s a very good joke about what to say when you call 911.

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Expect Civil Disobedience if Politicians Try to Undermine the Second Amendment

I periodically share public opinion data, either because I’m encouraged by the results or because I think that the research helps show how to frame issues.

Examples include polling data on personal retirement accounts, the dangers of big government, support for spending caps, and viability of class warfare tax policy.

But I’ve been very narrowly focused. Just about all the polls I’ve shared have been about some aspect of fiscal policy.

So I was very interested to see a new poll about issues related to the Second Amendment, and I was particularly gratified to see that an overwhelming majority of gun owners would not surrender their constitutional rights if the jackals in Washington approved a gun ban.

For more information, here’s part of a Washington Times report on the new polling data.

Question 46 in the wide-ranging survey of more than 1,000 registered voters asks if there is a gun in the household. Overall, 52 percent of the respondents said yes, someone in their home owned a gun. That number included 65 percent of Republicans, 59 percent of conservatives, 38 percent of Democrats and 41 percent of liberals. But on to Question 47, addressed to those with a gun in their home: “If the government passed a law to take your guns, would you give up your guns or defy the law and keep your guns?” The response: 65 percent reported they would “defy the law.” That includes 70 percent of Republicans, 68 percent of conservatives, 52 percent of Democrats and 59 percent of liberals.

These results don’t tell us why people would defy the government, but the poll I conducted suggests that a plurality of Americans support the Second Amendment because they want the ability to resist tyranny.

I’m also happy to see that most Americans understand that gun bans are a very ineffective way of fighting crime. Heck, they realize that we need more guns in the hands of law-abiding people.

In other words, ordinary Americans have a lot more common sense than the buffoons in the media. They know that you get less crime when you increase the expected cost of criminal behavior.

P.S. If you want to enjoy some good gun control cartoons, click here, here, and here.

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In this Situation, Would You Want Your Daughter to Have a Gun?

Even though I’m first and foremost an advocate of limited government and that’s the primary focus of this blog, I’m also glad to have the opportunity to promote the right of free people to keep and bear arms.

And readers seem to agree. The 4th-most viewed post of all time is the famous dictators-for-gun-control poster, while this satirical video is the 11th-most viewed (other Second Amendment-related posts in the top 16 can be seen here, here, and here, with the last one being quite relevant considering what’s going to happen on Monday).

It’s a matter of taste, of course, but I actually prefer videos. Here are some of my favorites.

• Ted Nugent talking about gun ownership and the right of self defense.
• A look at the Switzerland’s strong gun culture and the importance of self defense as a protection against oppression.
• And some very powerful testimony to some weasels on Capitol Hill (make sure to pay attention around the 5:00 mark).
• Ice-T talking about the real reason to defend and support the 2nd Amendment.
• A Reason TV video with five facts for Vice President Biden’s task force.

Now I have a new one to add to the list. As you watch this video, imagine this is your daughter (or my daughter!). In this situation, would you want her armed?

The answer to my rhetorical query is obvious. Or at least it should be obvious.

And I think there’s at least one honest leftist who would give the right response.

Guns enable the weak and defenseless to protect themselves, as explained in this letter-to-the-editor. I don’t know if the letter is real, but the points it makes are accurate.

Let’s close with a few humorous videos on gun rights.

• A heartwarming adoption story.
• An amusing cartoon conversation between an anti-gun ideologue and a supporter of the Constitution.
• This Christmas greeting from the Second Amendment.

But if you like posters, bumper stickers, t-shirts, and other images, then here’s a post you’ll enjoy.

And don’t forget there’s still time to cast a vote for why you think the Second Amendment is worth defending.

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Gun Control, Crime, and Political Satire

I’ve shared several satirical signs, posters, videos, and bumper stickers on the topic of gun control, but surprisingly few political cartoons.

If my aging memory is correct, I’ve only posted a couple of Chuck Asay cartoons on concealed carry (here and here) and one Steve Kelley cartoon mocking the leftist tendency to focus on inanimate objects when a bad guy uses a gun.

So it’s time to correct this oversight.

Let’s start with this comparison of liberals and conservatives. As you can see, it’s sort of what you get when you mix this joke with this poster.

No wonder liberals and conservatives are contemplating divorce.

And with Obama proposing a bunch of executive orders on guns, this Scott Stantis cartoon is very timely.

After all, who cares about the Constitution and the democratic process!

And here’s a cartoon with the same theme found in this poster.

Now let’s shift to a couple of cartoons that look at causes of death, starting with one from Michael Ramirez that shows that so-called “assault rifles” are a statistical asterisk (and no more dangerous than other types of guns).

And here’s a specific comparison for 2011. Obviously we need hammer control.

While all these cartoons are amusing, the attack on our Second Amendment rights is not funny.

In my poll on protecting the right to keep and bear arms, a plurality of respondents said the Second Amendment was worth preserving so people had some ability to resist tyranny.

I personally think that the risk of societal breakdown is a more pressing concern, as I explained in this interview on NRA TV.

But all that really matters is that we all agree that freedom is worth defending. So let’s close with this inspirational powerpoint presentation on the Second Amendment.

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Some Much-Needed Anti-Gun Control Humor

Back in the early days of this blog, I shared a very amusing anti-gun control message on the back of a vehicle.

It made a good point about the fallacy of gun control (sort of like this photo as well), while also mocking a well-known opponent of the Second Amendment.

Now we have another photo, which also shows the back of a vehicle. It’s not directly on the topic of gun control, but I somehow suspect the driver is not a proponent of disarming innocent people.

And it does provide a lesson in the economics of crime. Let’s imagine you’re a thief. Not the kind that wields power in Washington, just a run-of-the-mill street thief. If you’re thinking about doing a bit of carjacking, would you be more likely or less likely to go after this vehicle?

Yes, this is like the IQ test that I posted for liberals and criminals. The answer should be obvious.

Sort of like whether you would go looting in the neighborhood pictured at the end of this post.

P.S. You can  see additional pro-Second Amendment posters here, here, here, here, here, here, and here. And some amusing images of t-shirts and bumper stickers on gun control here, here, and here.

P.P.S. You can still cast a vote in the online poll to identify the most important reason to defend the Second Amendment.

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Five Important Facts for Vice President Biden’s Anti-Gun Task Force

I asked yesterday for readers to weigh in on why they support (or don’t support) the Second Amendment. The poll is getting lots of responses, though some folks have complained that I should have included more answers, such as “To protect the rights of hunters.”

And I even had a few left-wing friends tell me I should have included more options for them, such as “The Second Amendment doesn’t mean military-style weapons” or “The Second Amendment doesn’t guarantee individual gun ownership.”

Speaking of our friends on the left, Vice President Joe Biden is overseeing an Administration effort to concoct new gun laws. In the interests of being helpful, I suggest the Veep’s team look at these four videos.

• Ted Nugent talking about gun ownership and the right of self defense.
• A look at the Switzerland’s strong gun culture and the importance of self defense as a protection against oppression.
• And some very powerful testimony to some weasels on Capitol Hill (make sure to pay attention around the 5:00 mark).
• Ice-T talking about the real reason to defend and support the 2nd Amendment.

We also have a brand new video from the folks at Reason TV. It provides five facts for Biden and his task force.

For some reason, I won’t be surprised if the Vice President doesn’t see this new video. Or any of the others.

Yes, you can call me a pessimist, but I think Biden’s task force has no interest in doing real research.

Their goal is to figure out (from the left’s perspective) politically feasible ways of undermining the Constitution.

So let’s gird our loins, which sounds like it might be fun, but it simply means prepare for a fight.

But, unlike the statists, we’re not humorless drones. So let’s enjoy some humorous gun control videos to put ourselves in the right frame of mind.

• A revealing look at how leftists think about gun control.
• A heartwarming adoption story.
• An amusing cartoon conversation between an anti-gun ideologue and a supporter of the Constitution.
• This Christmas greeting from the Second Amendment.

P.S. Don’t forget you can still cast a vote to explain why you support the Second Amendment.

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What’s the Most Important Reason to Oppose Gun Control?

I assume that most readers are sympathetic to free markets and small government.

But that doesn’t mean there’s universal agreement about how we solve various problems created by excessive government.

Last year, for instance, survey questions that I included with two posts generated very interesting results.

• In August, I reported on a guy who got pissed at the cops for screwing up his life with a marijuana arrest, so he responded by crushing some empty police cars with a tractor. I gave people four possible ways of responding to this story, and the results (based on my arbitrary division) showed a 60-40 split in favor of libertarianism.
• In November, I asked which candidate readers preferred. I was somewhat surprised by the results. Not only did Romney get nearly 70 percent of the total, but Obama wasn’t that far behind Gary Johnson. I’m not sure how to interpret those results, but they definitely suggest that anti-Obamaism was more powerful than pro-liberatarianism.

So now I’d like to get a sense of how readers view gun control.  Here’s a poll with five possible answers. Feel free to share it widely so we can get the broadest possible set of responses.

I’m not going to say how I would vote, but this interview with NRA-TV may give you a hint.

But I don’t include that link to sway the vote. I genuinely am curious about why people support (or don’t support) the Second Amendment.

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On Second Thought (and as a Second-Best Proposal), David Gregory Should Be Arrested and Prosecuted

I’ve never watched Meet the Press, so I obviously didn’t see David Gregory’s pathetic attempt to play gotcha by unveiling a magazine while interviewing someone from the National Rifle Association.

And even when it was revealed that Gregory had broken D.C. law by possessing this supposedly dangerous object (basically a metal box with a spring), I didn’t care.

After all, gun control is a foolish policy (as even some leftists and foreigners are slowly beginning to realize). And surely cops have better things to do, after all, than arrest a callow journalist for something that shouldn’t be against the law in the first place.

But I’m now beginning to change my mind. One of the core principles of a just society is that the law applies equally to all people. Heck, that principle is even etched above the entrance to the Supreme Court.

…unless you’re a member of the beltway elite

If misguided laws were never enforced, I wouldn’t want to target Gregory for discriminatory treatment. But I get very irritated when ordinary folks with no power or connections are persecuted while those with political connections get a free pass.

And that’s exactly what’s happening. Here’s an excerpt from a Washington Times report about a member of the non-elite who ran afoul of the same stupid law that Gregory broke.

Metropolitan Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier’s spokesman refused Monday to respond to whether Mr. Gregory had even been interviewed yet. This is a rather curious departure for a city that has been ruthless in enforcing this particular firearms statute against law-abiding citizens who made an honest mistake. In July, The Washington Times highlighted the plight of former Army Spc. Adam Meckler, who was arrested and jailed for having a few long-forgotten rounds of ordinary ammunition — but no gun — in his backpack in Washington. Mr. Meckler, a veteran of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, says he had no idea it was illegal to possess unregistered ammunition in the city. He violated the same section of D.C. law as Mr. Gregory allegedly did, and both offenses carry the same maximum penalty of a $1,000 fine and a year in jail. Mr. Meckler was charged with the crime and was forced to accept a plea deal to avoid the cost and time of a protracted legal fight.

After reading this outrageous story, my first reaction is to want the law repealed. My second reaction is to hope for a judicious and appropriate application of tar and feathers to certain D.C. officials.

But I’m also thinking that the high and mighty – including influential journalists – should be subject to the same bad laws as the rest of us.

Mark Steyn also has some reprehensible examples of government run amok. He starts with some sage comments on our over-legislated society.

…in today’s America there are laws against everything, and any one of us at any time is unknowingly in breach of dozens of them. And in this case NBC were informed by the D.C. police that it would be illegal to show the thing on TV, and they went ahead and did it anyway… David Gregory intended to demonstrate what he regards as the absurdity of America’s lax gun laws. Instead, he’s demonstrating the ever greater absurdity of America’s non-lax laws.

And then he lists examples of innocent people caught in the chainsaw of government harassment and persecution.

Not far away from David Gregory, across the Virginia border, eleven-year-old Skylar Capo made the mistake of rescuing a woodpecker from the jaws of a cat and nursing him back to health for a couple of days. For her pains, a federal Fish & Wildlife gauleiter accompanied by state troopers descended on her house, charged her with illegal transportation of a protected species, issued her a $535 fine, and made her cry.

Or how about this one.

Daniel Brown was detained at LAX while connecting to a Minneapolis flight because traces of gunpowder were found on his footwear. His footwear was combat boots. As the name suggests, the combat boots were returning from combat — eight months of it, in Iraq’s bloody and violent al-Anbar province. Above the boots he was wearing the uniform of a staff sergeant in the USMC Reserve Military Police and was accompanied by all 26 members of his unit, also in uniform. Staff Sergeant Brown doesn’t sound like an “obvious” terrorist. But the TSA put him on the no-fly list anyway. If it’s not “obvious” to the government that a serving member of the military has any legitimate reason for being around ammunition, why should it be “obvious” that a TV host has?

Here’s another outrageous example.

Three days after scofflaw Gregory committed his crime, a bail hearing was held in Massachusetts for Andrew Despres, 20, who’s charged with trespassing and possession of ammunition without a firearms license. Mr. Despres was recently expelled from Fitchburg State University and was returning to campus to pick up his stuff. Hence the trespassing charge. At the time of his arrest, he was wearing a “military-style ammunition belt.” Hence, the firearms charge. …He had no gun.

This next story is amusing, until you think about how the coercive power of government is making life difficult for normal people.

Ernest Hemingway had a six-toed cat. …descendants of his six-toed cat still live at the Hemingway home in Key West. Tourists visit the property. Thus, the Department of Agriculture is insisting that the six-toed cats are an “animal exhibit” like the tigers at the zoo, and therefore come under federal regulation requiring each to be housed in an individual compound with “elevated resting surfaces,” “electric wire,” and a night watchman.

So what’s going to happen with this David Gregory kerfuffle? Well, what should happen is that bad laws should be repealed.

In the corrupt world of Washington, though, we know that Gregory hasn’t been arrested even though he clearly broke the law and there’s obvious evidence of his “criminal” behavior.

My guess is that the matter will get quietly dropped, and Steyn also assumes something like this will happen.

Gregory can call in a favor from some Obama consigliere who’ll lean on the cops to disappear the whole thing. If he does that, he’ll be contributing to the remorseless assault on a bedrock principle of free societies — equality before the law. Laws either apply to all of us or none of us. If they apply only to some, they’re not laws but caprices — and all tyranny is capricious.

The moral of the story (though “immoral” is a better word) is simple.

Laws are for the little people — and little people need lots of little laws, ensnaring them at every turn.

That’s a good description of our corrupt tax code. That’s a good description of America’s regulatory morass. That’s a good description of much of what government now does.

If you want to be further depressed, peruse these horror stories of government in action.

• A story of vicious IRS persecution.
• A women jailed overnight because she let her kids play outside.
• Cops legally stole $17,000 from a man who committed no crime.
• Threatening to send a woman to jail because someone whistled at a whale.
• Two stories of innocent people who were victimized by the idiotic Drug War.
• A video about how the EPA tried – and fortunately failed – to destroy a family.
• A story about the Justice Department’s discriminatory attack on a hapless homeowner.
• The government treating child molesters more leniently than people who accidentally omit irrelevant info from forms.

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The Bad Results and Unjust Consequences of the United Kingdom’s Gun Ban

I wrote yesterday about a silly proposal in the United Kingdom to ban long kitchen knives.

Some people objected because the story was from last decade, but that misses the point. Proponents of the Second Amendment are vigilant against encroachments in part because we’re worried about the slippery slope.

I predicted in yesterday’s piece that at some point the Brits would resort to banning long knives. I hope I’m wrong, but my prediction is based on what the U.K. government has done with gun control.

Ever since 1920, the government has made it more and more difficult for law-abiding people to possess weapons. And in a perverse example of Mitchell’s Law, the failure of one policy is then used to justify the next policy.

That’s how proposals that sound radical and foolish sometimes get implemented many years later.

We don’t know if this will lead to a knife ban at some point, but we can look at evidence showing that gun control in the U.K. was a precursor for a gun ban. And we also know such policies don’t reduce crime.

Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm of George Mason University has a column in the Wall Street Journal, looking at the impact of anti-gun policies in the United Kingdom.

…the Firearms Act of 1998…instituted a nearly complete ban on handguns. Owners of pistols were required to turn them in. The penalty for illegal possession of a pistol is up to 10 years in prison. The results have not been what proponents of the act wanted. Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time.

By the way, it’s not just gun crime that has gone up. The U.K. has become a much more dangerous and violent society – almost surely in part because the thugs don’t have to worry about armed resistance.

Heck, if you are one of the few legal gun owners in the nation and you shoot a burglar, you get arrested instead of a pat on the back.

The U.K.’s draconian restrictions on individual liberty lead to some Orwellian consequences. Professor Malcolm offers up two examples.

Meanwhile, law-abiding citizens who have come into the possession of a firearm, even accidentally, have been harshly treated. In 2009 a former soldier, Paul Clarke, found a bag in his garden containing a shotgun. He brought it to the police station and was immediately handcuffed and charged with possession of the gun. At his trial the judge noted: “In law there is no dispute that Mr. Clarke has no defence to this charge. The intention of anybody possessing a firearm is irrelevant.” Mr. Clarke was sentenced to five years in prison. A public outcry eventually won his release. In November of this year, Danny Nightingale, member of a British special forces unit in Iraq and Afghanistan, was sentenced to 18 months in military prison for possession of a pistol and ammunition. Sgt. Nightingale was given the Glock pistol as a gift by Iraqi forces he had been training. It was packed up with his possessions and returned to him by colleagues in Iraq after he left the country to organize a funeral for two close friends killed in action. Mr. Nightingale pleaded guilty to avoid a five-year sentence and was in prison until an appeal and public outcry freed him on Nov. 29.

Amazing…and nauseating. I already had written about the unjust treatment of Mr. Clarke, but Mr. Nightingale’s legal nightmare is just as absurd.

Gun control laws are utterly perverse. They don’t work, just like prohibition didn’t work in the 1920s, and just like today’s Drug War is an unmitigated failure.

Gun bans turn law-abiding people into criminals, while simultaneously making life easier for the low-life scum of society.

And as the welfare state begins to fall apart and civil unrest becomes more common, the deadly impact of these bad policies will become even more apparent.

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When Gun Control Satire Becomes British Reality

Back in my less sophisticated days (shocking as it may seem, I wasn’t always the mature, statesmanlike figure I am today), I sometimes resorted to silly arguments when debating gun control, such as, “does this mean you want to ban knives since they also can be used to kill people?”

Smarter opponents would scoff and accuse me of knocking down straw men, assuming a non-existent slippery slope, or engaging in reductio ad absurdum.

I wasn’t even sure what the last one meant, but I secretly felt chagrined because I also thought the argument was nonsense. But it’s not like we had the Internet back in those days so I could quickly peruse the writings of John Lott or David Kopel.

Well, I no longer need to feel shame. It turns out that my straw man came to life and he’s sliding down a slope into a big pool of whatever that reductio thing is.

I kid you not. There’s a supposedly civilized nation that is seriously talking about banning long kitchen knives.

I’ll give you a couple of hints to help you figure out what country is considering this bizarre policy.

• It’s the country that wanted to prevent children from watching Olympic shooting events.
• It’s the country that arrested a man for finding a gun in his yard and turning it over to the police.
• It’s the country that imposed a prohibition on the use of starting pistols at races lest children get frightened by the noise.

Yes, I’m talking about our friends in the United Kingdom.

They make some decent movies and they have cute accents, but they seem totally clueless about how to fight crime and the notion of individual rights appears to be a totally alien concept.

So the nation that once ruled half the world actually has contemplated whether to ban certain kitchen knives. Here are some details from a 2005 BBC report.

A&E doctors are calling for a ban on long pointed kitchen knives to reduce deaths from stabbing. …The research is published in the British Medical Journal. The researchers said there was no reason for long pointed knives to be publicly available at all. …The researchers say legislation to ban the sale of long pointed knives would be a key step in the fight against violent crime. …Home Office spokesperson said there were already extensive restrictions in place to control the sale and possession of knives. “The law already prohibits the possession of offensive weapons in a public place, and the possession of knives in public without good reason or lawful authority, with the exception of a folding pocket knife with a blade not exceeding three inches. … A spokesperson for the Association of Chief Police Officers said: “ACPO supports any move to reduce the number of knife related incidents, however, it is important to consider the practicalities of enforcing such changes.”

Given my low opinion of and low expectations for Britain’s political class, I’m impressed that pocket knives are still legal. It’s probably just a matter of time before than changes. After that, the next step will be fingernail clippers.

And I’m glad that the ACPO person warned that there might be problems enforcing such a silly law.

But I fully expect to see that foolish proposal get enacted at some point. After all, this is the country where a women who was being threatened by thugs got in trouble with the police for brandishing a knife in her own home.

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Merry Christmas from the Second Amendment

Last year, I shared this heartwarming holiday adoption video.

Keeping with that tradition, here’s a Christmas greeting to warm your heart…and offend the delicate sensibilities of statists.

The extra flash at the end is a nice touch. Sort of reminds me of this joke about the difference between conservatives, liberals, and Texans.

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Gun Control Isnt’ the Answer, Even if You Don’t Like Guns

Last weekend, I wrote a post entitled “An Honest Liberal Writes about Gun Control.” The article was very powerful because the person didn’t like guns, but admitted that more guns in the hands of law-abiding people might be the best way to reduce crime.

Now we have a perfect follow-up article to analyze. It’s from the Wall Street Journal and it’s authored by David Kopel of the Independence Institute. He starts by acknowledging that random shootings have increased, but notes that these killing sprees were almost non-existent when we had no anti-gun laws.

Why the increase? It cannot be because gun-control laws have become more lax. Before the 1968 Gun Control Act, there were almost no federal gun-control laws. …Nor are magazines holding more than 10 rounds something new. They were invented decades ago and have long been standard for many handguns. Police officers carry them for the same reason that civilians do: Especially if a person is attacked by multiple assailants, there is no guarantee that a 10-round magazine will end the assault. The 1980s were much worse than today in terms of overall violent crime, including gun homicide, but they were much better than today in terms of mass random shootings. The difference wasn’t that the 1980s had tougher controls on so-called “assault weapons.” No assault weapons law existed in the U.S. until California passed a ban in 1989. Connecticut followed in 1993. None of the guns that the Newtown murderer used was an assault weapon under Connecticut law.

Kopel then makes the key points that there is no meaningful definition of an “assault weapon.” Oh, in case any morons from the media are reading this, it’s also worth noting that a “semi-automatic” is not a machine gun.

This illustrates the uselessness of bans on so-called assault weapons, since those bans concentrate on guns’ cosmetics, such as whether the gun has a bayonet lug, rather than their function. What some people call “assault weapons” function like every other normal firearm—they fire only one bullet each time the trigger is pressed. Unlike automatics (machine guns), they do not fire continuously as long as the trigger is held. They are “semi-automatic” because they eject the empty shell case and load the next round into the firing chamber.

Since gun controls have become more ubiquitous over time, what could account for the increase in random shootings? In addition to de-institutionalization of the mentally ill, Kopel suspects the media plays a role.

Since gun controls today are far stricter than at the time when “active shooters” were rare, what can account for the increase in these shootings? One plausible answer is the media. Cable TV in the 1990s, and the Internet today, greatly magnify the instant celebrity that a mass killer can achieve. We know that many would-be mass killers obsessively study their predecessors.

This doesn’t mean it’s the fault of the media, and it certainly doesn’t mean that we should undermine the First Amendment right of an unfettered press, but at least it helps to understand what could be causing some of these nutjobs to go on killing sprees.

The most important part of the column is his analysis of how “gun-free zones” are downright idiotic. The Chuck Asay cartoons here and here make the same point, as does this satirical video, but Kopel’s analysis provides substance.

Finally, it must be acknowledged that many of these attacks today unfortunately take place in pretend “gun-free zones,” such as schools, movie theaters and shopping malls. According to Ron Borsch’s study for the Force Science Research Center at Minnesota State University-Mankato, active shooters are different from the gangsters and other street toughs whom a police officer might engage in a gunfight. They are predominantly weaklings and cowards who crumble easily as soon as an armed person shows up. The problem is that by the time the police arrive, lots of people are already dead. So when armed citizens are on the scene, many lives are saved. The media rarely mention the mass murders that were thwarted by armed citizens at the Shoney’s Restaurant in Anniston, Ala. (1991), the high school in Pearl, Miss. (1997), the middle-school dance in Edinboro, Penn. (1998), and the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo. (2007), among others. At the Clackamas Mall in Oregon last week, an active shooter murdered two people and then saw that a shopper, who had a handgun carry permit, had drawn a gun and was aiming at him. The murderer’s next shot was to kill himself. Real gun-free zones are a wonderful idea, but they are only real if they are created by metal detectors backed up by armed guards. Pretend gun-free zones, where law-abiding adults (who pass a fingerprint-based background check and a safety training class) are still disarmed, are magnets for evildoers who know they will be able to murder at will with little threat of being fired upon.

Amen. I offered an IQ test on the issue for liberals and criminals, and this set of cartoons and posters takes an amusing look at the issue of gun-free zones.

But as much as I enjoy political humor, this is not a laughing matter. It appears Obama is trying to lay some groundwork for a new assault on the Second Amendment.

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Taking a Logical Step to Protect Students, a Texas School District Allows Armed Teachers

There’s a lot to like about Texas. The state has no income tax, for instance, which we know is a good recipe for faster growth and more prosperity.

That’s one of the reasons why the Lone Star State kicks the you-know-what out of California in the battle to attract jobs and investment.

But Texans also have a more sensible approach to thwarting crime. Some of them apparently took my IQ test, which asks whether murderers prefer armed victims or unarmed victims, and they wisely concluded that the ability to shoot back is a lot better than cowering in a corner (you can see the California mentality in the third image in this post).

So one school district allows teachers and staff to carry concealed weapons. Here’s some of what’s reported in the Fort Worth Star Telegram.

David Thweatt, superintendent of the tiny Harrold school district in northwest Texas, believes his staff is ready. Besides special locks and security cameras, an undisclosed number of staff members and teachers carry concealed handguns. Thweatt said the “guardian plan,” which drew international attention when it was implemented in 2008, definitely enhances student safety. “Is that 100 percent? No,” Thweatt said Friday in a telephone interview. “Nothing is 100 percent. But what we do know is that we’ve done all we can to protect our children.” At the time the plan was put in place, Harrold, about 150 miles northwest of Fort Worth, was the only known public school district in Texas and the U.S. that allowed staff members and teachers to carry concealed weapons. Thweatt said he knows of some other district that have since adopted similar policies, but declined to name them. …Board members approved the measure because the district is at least 20 minutes from the nearest station of the Wilbarger County Sheriff’s Department. …Thweatt said he wanted to minimize casualties that could quickly increase while waiting for deputies. He didn’t want a plan where you “lock yourself in your closet and hope that an intruder won’t hurt you.” …There has not been an incident on his campus, and Thweatt doesn’t expect one.

The last part of the excerpt tells you all you need to know. There have been no mass shootings and the superintendent doesn’t expect any.

Some leftists doubtlessly will fret that a crazy teacher might bring a gun to school and start shooting people. What they apparently don’t understand, though, is that a crazy teacher already has that ability. Or, as we tragically witnessed in Connecticut, some other nutjob can come to a school and engage in a killing spree.

But in Harrold, Texas, at least there are people who can shoot back.

I know I would rather send my kids to school in Harrold than to someplace that advertises itself as a gun-free zone.

And if this poster is correct, Israel puts common sense above anti-gun ideology.

You can enjoy some humor about so-called gun-free zones by clicking here.

And since this post is about Texans and the second amendment, this bit of humor is always popular. As is this example of a Texas police exam and this story of Texas, California, and a coyote.

Speaking of California, let’s engage in a bit more mockery of the Golden State.

P.S. Let’s allow Alabama to make a cameo appearance in this post since this image is entertaining in more  ways than one.

(h/t: Ben Domenech, via Erick Erickson)

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An Honest Liberal Writes about Gun Control

I wrote earlier this month about an honest liberal who acknowledged the problems created by government dependency. Well, it happened again.

First, some background.

Like every other decent person, I was horrified and nauseated by the school shootings in Newton, Connecticut.

Part of me wishes the guy hadn’t killed himself so that he could be slowly fed into a meat grinder.

And my friends on the left will be happy to know that part of me, when I first learned about the murders, thought the world might be a better place if guns had never been invented.

Sort of like my gut reaction about cigarettes when I find out that somebody I know is dying of a smoking-related illness or how I feel about gambling when I read about a family being ruined because some jerk thought it would be a good idea to use the mortgage money at a casino.

But there’s a reason why it’s generally not a good idea to make impulsive decisions based on immediate reactions. In the case of gun control, it can lead to policies that don’t work. Or perhaps even make a bad situation worse.

I’ve certainly made these points when writing and pontificating about gun control. But I’m a libertarian, so that’s hardly a surprise. We’re people who instinctively are skeptical of giving government power over individuals.

But when someone on the left reaches the same conclusion, that’s perhaps more significant. Especially when you get the feeling that they would like ban private gun ownership in their version of a perfect world.

That’s why I heartily recommend Jeffrey Goldberg’s article in The Atlantic.

Here are some of the most profound passages in the article, beginning with a common-sense observation that there’s no way for the government to end private gun ownership.

According to a 2011 Gallup poll, 47 percent of American adults keep at least one gun at home or on their property, and many of these gun owners are absolutists opposed to any government regulation of firearms. According to the same poll, only 26 percent of Americans support a ban on handguns. …There are ways, of course, to make it at least marginally more difficult for the criminally minded, for the dangerously mentally ill, and for the suicidal to buy guns and ammunition. …But these gun-control efforts, while noble, would only have a modest impact on the rate of gun violence in America. Why? Because it’s too late. There are an estimated 280 million to 300 million guns in private hands in America—many legally owned, many not. Each year, more than 4 million new guns enter the market. …America’s level of gun ownership means that even if the Supreme Court—which ruled in 2008 that the Second Amendment gives citizens the individual right to own firearms, as gun advocates have long insisted—suddenly reversed itself and ruled that the individual ownership of handguns was illegal, there would be no practical way for a democratic country to locate and seize those guns.

Which is why prohibition was a flop. Which is why the current War on Drugs is so misguided. And so on and so on.

The author then wonders whether the best way of protecting public safety is to have more gun ownership.

Which raises a question: When even anti-gun activists believe that the debate over private gun ownership is closed; when it is too late to reduce the number of guns in private hands—and since only the naive think that legislation will prevent more than a modest number of the criminally minded, and the mentally deranged, from acquiring a gun in a country absolutely inundated with weapons—could it be that an effective way to combat guns is with more guns? Today, more than 8 million vetted and (depending on the state) trained law-abiding citizens possess state-issued “concealed carry” handgun permits, which allow them to carry a concealed handgun or other weapon in public. Anti-gun activists believe the expansion of concealed-carry permits represents a serious threat to public order. But what if, in fact, the reverse is true? Mightn’t allowing more law-abiding private citizens to carry concealed weapons—when combined with other forms of stringent gun regulation—actually reduce gun violence?

He cites examples where armed citizens stopped mass killings.

In 1997, a disturbed high-school student named Luke Woodham stabbed his mother and then shot and killed two people at Pearl High School in Pearl, Mississippi. He then began driving toward a nearby junior high to continue his shooting spree, but the assistant principal of the high school, Joel Myrick, aimed a pistol he kept in his truck at Woodham, causing him to veer off the road. Myrick then put his pistol to Woodham’s neck and disarmed him. On January 16, 2002, a disgruntled former student at the Appalachian School of Law in Grundy, Virginia, had killed three people, including the school’s dean, when two students, both off-duty law-enforcement officers, retrieved their weapons and pointed them at the shooter, who ended his killing spree and surrendered. In December 2007, a man armed with a semiautomatic rifle and two pistols entered the New Life Church in Colorado Springs and killed two teenage girls before a church member, Jeanne Assam—a former Minneapolis police officer and a volunteer church security guard—shot and wounded the gunman, who then killed himself.

The author also punctures the left’s mythology about concealed carry laws.

In 2003, John Gilchrist, the legislative counsel for the Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police, testified, “If 200,000 to 300,000 citizens begin carrying a concealed weapon, common sense tells us that accidents will become a daily event.” When I called Gilchrist recently, he told me that events since the state’s concealed-carry law took effect have proved his point. …Gilchrist’s argument would be convincing but for one thing: the firearm crime rate in Ohio remained steady after the concealed-carry law passed in 2004.

Goldberg elaborates.

Today, the number of concealed-carry permits is the highest it’s ever been, at 8 million, and the homicide rate is the lowest it’s been in four decades—less than half what it was 20 years ago. (The number of people allowed to carry concealed weapons is actually considerably higher than 8 million, because residents of Vermont, Wyoming, Arizona, Alaska, and parts of Montana do not need government permission to carry their personal firearms. These states have what Second Amendment absolutists refer to as “constitutional carry,” meaning, in essence, that the Second Amendment is their permit.) Many gun-rights advocates see a link between an increasingly armed public and a decreasing crime rate. “I think effective law enforcement has had the biggest impact on crime rates, but I think concealed carry has something to do with it. We’ve seen an explosion in the number of people licensed to carry,” Lott told me. “You can deter criminality through longer sentencing, and you deter criminality by making it riskier for people to commit crimes. And one way to make it riskier is to create the impression among the criminal population that the law-abiding citizen they want to target may have a gun.” Crime statistics in Britain, where guns are much scarcer, bear this out. Gary Kleck, a criminologist at Florida State University, wrote in his 1991 book, Point Blank: Guns and Violence in America, that only 13 percent of burglaries in America occur when the occupant is home. In Britain, so-called hot burglaries account for about 45 percent of all break-ins. Kleck and others attribute America’s low rate of occupied-home burglaries to fear among criminals that homeowners might be armed. (A survey of almost 2,000 convicted U.S. felons, conducted by the criminologists Peter Rossi and James D. Wright in the late ’80s, concluded that burglars are more afraid of armed homeowners than they are of arrest by the police.)

That last bit of info is very powerful. The bad guys are more afraid of armed homeowners than the police. Surely, as I explained here, that tells us that gun ownership lowers crime.

Here’s another no-sh*t-Sherlock observation from the article.

It is also illogical for campuses to advertise themselves as “gun-free.” Someone bent on murder is not usually dissuaded by posted anti-gun regulations. Quite the opposite—publicly describing your property as gun-free is analogous to posting a notice on your front door saying your home has no burglar alarm. As it happens, the company that owns the Century 16 Cineplex in Aurora had declared the property a gun-free zone.

I recently mocked the idea of gun-free zones with several amusing posters. It’s unbelievable that some people think that killers care about such rules.

One place that isn’t likely to see any massacres is Colorado State University.

For much of the population of a typical campus, concealed-carry permitting is not an issue. Most states that issue permits will grant them only to people who are at least 21 years old. But the crime-rate statistics at universities that do allow permit holders on campus with their weapons are instructive. An hour north of Boulder, in Fort Collins, sits Colorado State University. Concealed carry has been allowed at CSU since 2003, and according to James Alderden, the former sheriff of Larimer County, which encompasses Fort Collins, violent crime at Colorado State has dropped since then.

I also recommend this video, which makes fun of those who support gun-free zones.

Here is Goldberg’s conclusion.

But I am sympathetic to the idea of armed self-defense, because it does often work, because encouraging learned helplessness is morally corrupt, and because, however much I might wish it, the United States is not going to become Canada. Guns are with us, whether we like it or not. Maybe this is tragic, but it is also reality. So Americans who are qualified to possess firearms shouldn’t be denied the right to participate in their own defense. And it is empirically true that the great majority of America’s tens of millions of law-abiding gun owners have not created chaos in society.

Goldberg’s article, by the way, doesn’t even mention the value of private gun ownership when government fails to maintain public order, as occurred after Hurricane Sandy and during last year’s British riots.

I have a couple of final things to share, including this this video about a woman who lost her parents because she decided to obey a bad government law. And here’s a great study from Cato about individuals using guns to protect themselves.

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You Be the Judge: Should Troublemakers Be Segregated from the General Population?

Let’s take a break from depressing posts about Obama’s fixation on class-warfare tax policy and the failure of Washington to enact genuine entitlement reform.

It’s time for another edition of “You Be the Judge.” I periodically come across stories that cause me internal conflict. Often my heart gives one answer and my head disagrees. Or I’m genuinely unsure of the right approach.

Previous editions of the game include:

• Is it appropriate to put politicians on trial for economic malfeasance?
• Is it excessive vigilante justice to set your daughter’s rapist on fire?
• Should prisoners with AIDS be segregated from other convicts?
• Which tax collection tactic is more brutal and unjust?
• When a wheelchair-bound guy uses a baseball bat to punish his granddaughter’s molester, what’s the right response?
• Should politicians set pay levels at government-owned firms?
• Is sharia law sometimes appropriate?
• What do you do about self-destructive behavior in a government-run healthcare system?
• Should there be laws against incest among consenting adults?
• Should motorists be allowed to warn other drivers about speed traps?
• Is jury nullification the right approach for victimless crimes?
• Was this angry father wrong to take matters into his own hands?
• Should drunk-rafting be a crime?

Lots of fun stories, as you can see.

Our latest example is about the Dutch are dealing with the “scum” of society. Here’s some of the story from the UK-based Telegraph.

A potential name for the new Dutch community?

Hollands’s capital already has a special hit squad of municipal officials to identify the worst offenders for a compulsory six month course in how to behave. Social housing problem families or tenants who do not show an improvement or refuse to go to the special units face eviction and homelessness. Eberhard van der Laan, Amsterdam’s Labour mayor, has tabled the £810,000 plan to tackle 13,000 complaints of anti-social behaviour every year. He complained that long-term harassment often leads to law abiding tenants, rather than their nuisance neighbours, being driven out. “This is the world turned upside down,” the mayor said at the weekend. …The new punishment housing camps have been dubbed “scum villages” because the plan echoes a proposal from Geert Wilders, the leader of a populist Dutch Right-wing party, for special units to deal with persistent troublemakers. “Repeat offenders should be forcibly removed from their neighbourhood and sent to a village for scum,” he suggested last year. “Put all the trash together.” …The tough approach taken by Mr van der Laan appears to jar with Amsterdam’s famous tolerance for prostitution and soft drugs but reflects hardening attitudes to routine anti-social behaviour that falls short of criminality. There are already several small-scale trial projects in the Netherlands, including in Amsterdam, where 10 shipping container homes have been set aside for persistent offenders, living under 24-hour supervision from social workers and police.

Part of me thinks this is a good approach. Not the part about expensive social workers, to be sure, but I’m sympathetic to the notion that there are “bad apples” that cause trouble and can ruin neighborhoods.

Why not put them all together and let them stew in their own juices?

On the other hand, this soft version of prison seems inappropriate if people haven’t been convicted of a crime. Surely the government could trump up some sort of charge, and even do it in a semi-legitimate fashion. These sound like the sort of people who could be nailed for all sorts of things, such as disorderly conduct, assault and battery, urinating in public, and so on.

But swinging back in the other direction, it sounds as if the “scum” are inhabitants of public housing. And while I think public housing shouldn’t exist, I have no problem with the government enforcing standards of behavior as a condition of living in one of these Moochervilles. So all that’s really happening is that the riff-raff of society is being shifted from one form of government-provided housing to another.

What do you think?

P.S. The Netherlands is a typical European welfare state in many ways, but it has a good school choice system and a very competitive corporate tax system (as shown in the second video in this post). But those few good policies won’t be enough since the nation’s long-run fiscal outlook is as bad as Greece and worse than Spain and Italy. And if the burden of government spending gets too high, it swamps any good policies in other areas.

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Question of the Week: “Have Your Views Changed on Anything?”

I’m almost too depressed to write anything today. The Georgia Bulldogs came within five yards on the final play of the game of winning college football’s national championship (the game against Notre Dame being a mere formality for the winner of the Southeastern Conference), but fell 32-28 to the Alabama Crimson Tide.

But if the Continental Army could survive a bitter winter at Valley Forge, then surely I can summon the intestinal fortitude to write a blog post while sitting in a warm hotel room (yes, perhaps I’m being a tad bit melodramatic).

So here comes the second edition of “Question of the Week.” Last weekend, I responded to a query about whether I hated Republicans.

The most interesting question this week comes from a German reader, who asks “Are there any issues where you have changed your mind since coming to Washington?”

I’m tempted to say no. I came to Washington guided by libertarian principles and I’m still motivated by a desire to increase human liberty.

But I’m not the same person I was 20 years ago. Here are three areas where my views have evolved (though I hate using that word since it usually is used to describe the views of certain Republicans who have been in town too long and have decided big government is fine and dandy).

1. I’m much more uncomfortable about the death penalty. As I explained in my post about the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords, I’ve become more distrustful about the integrity of prosecutors. I think some of these politically ambitious jackals would deliberately send an innocent man to his death if it advanced their political careers. That being said, I’m a big believer that cost-benefit analysis is appropriate for criminal justice, so the deterrent value of the death penalty presumably saves some lives. In any event, I’m torn on this issue, though it doesn’t stop me from mocking groups that claim America is a horrible country because we still have capital punishment. And I also confessed this fantasy involving the death penalty.

“The fiscal collapse will happen after I leave office, so why worry?”

2. I now think Washington is pervasively corrupt. When I first came to town, I figured there was a lot of sleaze and graft facilitated by big government. Nothing has changed about that assessment, but I now think that a bigger problem is moral and cultural corruption among the political elite. Washington is filled with people who know the system is a racket. They know that the country is on a very dangerous trajectory. Many of them even understand what needs to be done to fix the problems. But they often decide that their short-run personal and political interests are more important than the long-run interests of the nation. But it’s also important to realize that politicians almost always are a combination of good and evil. The same folks who routinely cast bad votes every so often can be persuaded to do the right thing for the right reason, as occurred when GOPers in the House voted for the Ryan budget and its desperately needed entitlement reforms.

3. I’ve learned to be more careful about being myopically fixated on fiscal policy. As I noted in this post about tax rates, there are many factors that determine a nation’s economic performance. That’s hardly a breathtaking revelation, but in the past I have sometimes neglected to incorporate that understanding in my analysis. I’ve written positively about Ireland’s corporate tax regime, for instance, but failed to include important caveats about other government policies that were a threat to prosperity. This is a disservice to readers, and it also makes it easier for critics to put forth arguments such as “you said Ireland’s low corporate tax rate was a key to growth and look what happened.” To be sure, most of those folks would make those accusation even if I produced comprehensive analysis of Ireland’s good and bad policies. But I now try to be more careful so I don’t have to engage in after-the-fact elaborations.

I’m sure there are probably other ways in which my attitudes have changed over the years, but these are the things that come to mind.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to find a dark room and curl up in the fetal position.

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Only the Media Is Baffled by the Notion that More Guns Lead to Less Crime

I don’t like to spend much time commenting on media bias. But every so often I find an example that cries out for attention.

In previous posts, I’ve discussed this slanted AP story on poverty, the Brian Ross Tea Party slur, this example of implicit bias by USA Today, and a Reuters report on job creation and so-called stimulus.

And I’ve also commented on a Washington Post story that turned a spending cut molehill into a “spending slash” mountain, a silly assertion in the New York Times that education spending has been reduced, and a Washington post claim that Germany is fiscally conservative.

The latest example comes from the Associated Press, which is mystified that crime is falling “despite” record firearm sales.

Gun-related violence has fallen steadily since 2006 in Virginia despite record firearm sales, according to a university professor’s analysis. Virginia Commonwealth University professor Thomas R. Baker compared state crime data from 2006 through 2011 with gun-dealer sales estimates obtained by the Richmond Times-Dispatch. Baker’s analysis shows the number of gun purchases soared 73 percent in the six-year period, while gun-related violent crimes fell 24 percent. Baker, who specializes in research methods and criminology theory, said the comparison seems to contradict the premise that more guns lead to more crime in Virginia.

Gee, there are more innocent people with guns and people are surprised that criminals are now more reluctant to commit crimes? I guess you have to be a reporter or an academic to be surprised by this common-sense observation.

John Lott, of course, wrote an entire book called More Guns, Less Crime. It’s very much worth reading. These posts will give you a flavor of his analysis:

• He punctures myths about so-called assault weapons.
• Lott explained how anti-gun laws facilitated the terrorist attack at Fort Hood.
• Writing after the Tucson shootings, Lott explained the benefits of concealed-carry laws.
• In the aftermath of the Heller decision, Lott explained how more guns resulted in less crime in DC.
• Lott explained how gun control made Jamaica a more dangerous country.

Shifting back to the topic of media bias, let’s close this post by sharing some amusing cartoons, which can be enjoyed here, here, and here.

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Even British Journalists Are Beginning to Acknowledge that Guns Deter Crime

While I have great admiration and affection for the English people, most of them are downright daft on the issues of guns. And the politicians are the worst of the lot, having imposed draconian gun bans.

But they’ve gone way beyond run-of-the-mill gun control.

This is the nation, for instance, that arrested a man for the “crime” of turning in a gun found on his property. Yes, you read correctly. I’m not making that up.

The government is so bloody clueless on this issue that we’ve seen mind-boggling examples of anti-gun political correctness.

• Disciplining children for making gun shapes with their hands.
• Banning starting pistols at races.
• Proposing to bar children from Olympic shooting events.
• A bookstore putting shooting magazines in the porn section.
• Arresting a woman for brandishing a knife to scare away thugs.

Okay, I cheated. The last example was about a knife rather than a gun, but I think it underscores the central point that the UK government believes in a helpless and passive citizenry.

But perhaps, in a small way, we’re seeing a bit of progress. It seems that a few people realize that this culture of surrender and appeasement isn’t always a good idea.

At least when it comes to thwarting pirates. Here is an excerpt from The Economist about a big decline in attacks off the Horn of Africa.

…the fall in the number of successful hijackings since the peak of 2009-11 has been dramatic. The International Maritime Bureau, a body that fights shipping crime, counted 219 cases of pirates trying to board a vessel in 2010 and 236 in 2011. This year’s total is just 71, against 199 for the same period last year. Successful seizures are down from 49 in 2010 to 28 in 2011 and only 13 this year.

Want to take a wild guess about the reason?

Five out of five pirates surveyed prefer unarmed victims

Yup, you’re right. Guns.

…the biggest game changer of all is…that more than a quarter of vessels now carry armed security guards. The shipping industry used to oppose this, fearing that armed guards would escalate violence. But not a single vessel with guards has been boarded. Usually a warning shot is enough to deter the pirates. Lieut-Commander Sherrif says: “The pirates go to sea to make money, not die in a firefight.” BIMCO, the biggest international shipping organisation, has recently produced a standard contract for the industry, known as GUARDCON. Most of the security firms supplying guards are British. Admiral Rix says that his company hires mostly former Royal Marines.

Let’s emphasize part of that passage. It says that “not a single vessel with guards has been boarded.”

That’s a perfect batting average. As John Lott might say, this is an example of “more guns, less crime.” What a novel idea.

Now for the bad news. I doubt that the writers at The Economist or the politicians at Westminster will draw the right lesson from any of this.

So we still have a long way to go before we liberate the British people from the anti-gun superstitions of the political elite. Maybe we should share these very clever pro-gun images (here, here, here, here, here, and here) with our friends on the other side of the Atlantic.

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An IQ Test for Criminals and Liberals

A lot of people say Obama is anti-business, but there’s one part of the American economy that is delighted that he got reelected.

No, I’m not talking about bankruptcy lawyers or corrupt lobbyists, though those would be good guesses.

The real winners from Obama’s re-election are America’s gun manufacturers and gun sellers.

Not that I’ve looked at any data. I’m just basing this on the comments I’ve heard over the past few years and the up-tick in such comments in the past 36 hours.

But I’m quite confident that the overall firearms industry has profited from Obama’s tenure.

Anyway, the great economist Frederic Bastiat teaches us to look at both direct and indirect effects (or, as he put it, the “seen” and “unseen”), so I want to highlight a disadvantaged group that will suffer as a result of the Obama-induced increase in gun sales.

Yes, I’m talking about criminals.

To understand the point I’m trying to make, we’re going to do a thought experiment.

Start by closing your eyes and thinking about someone you know who has worked hard, saved some money, bought a nice house, and filled that house with nice things for the family to enjoy.

Now tell yourself, “I want those things as well.”

But you also think, “Damned if I’m going to wake up early every day like that chump and bust my rear end to earn a good life.”

Instead, you decide it’s okay to take things that don’t belong to you, even if it involves some coercion.

So what’s your next step?

No, this isn’t a thought experiment about voting for Obama. Besides, the election is over.

Close your eyes again and think about how you would obtain things that don’t belong to you and without using the government as the middleman.

What would you do? Well, you might beg the person to give you things.

But that might be a bit awkward or demeaning, and the person might say no.

That leaves burglary as your only option. Sort of a private sector version of income redistribution.

Now we get to the key point in our thought experiment.

You sneak up to the house with the nice things and you suddenly see a sign.

Here’s a quiz. What do you do after seeing this sign?

a. break into the house because you once heard a politician or journalist assert that gun ownership doesn’t deter crime?

b. decide after a bit of reflection about potential costs and benefits that it might be more prudent to find another house to rob?

If you need some help with the answer, think about the meaning of this cartoon.

If you’re still having trouble grasping the concept, this Chuck Asay cartoon might be worth a look. Or this post has some signs that may help your understanding.

And if you still don’t comprehend, then congratulations. You deserve a starring role in this video.

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Just in Case You Need another Argument against Gun Control, Contemplate the Social Chaos and Government Incompetence Following Hurricane Sandy

After riots swept parts of the United Kingdom last year, I wrote about the moral argument for gun ownership. Simply stated, it is wrong to disarm law-abiding people, particularly when there is a risk of societal breakdown.

The same argument is equally applicable in the areas ravaged by the recent storm to hit the northeastern United States. As you can see from this report in the New York Post, the government is failing in its responsibility to provide law and order.

Hardened New Yorkers are ready to battle lowlife criminals to protect their homes and stores in storm-ravaged areas plagued by looting and break-ins. In Coney Island, several residents were loading up their guns, sharpening their machetes and brandishing other deadly weapons. Jacinto Gonzalez, 42, picked up a baseball bat and stood guard outside his two-story rowhouse on West 27th Street near Neptune Avenue with his family. Another Coney Island resident, Roberto Aviles, brandishing a rusty 3-foot machete and warning he has a gun, who has lived in Coney Island since 1995 with his wife, says he’s ready to take on phony burglars posing as Con Ed workers. “I’m prepared inside here,” the 76-year-old Aviles said, showing off his rusted, three-foot machete and warning he had a gun. Chris Lane, a 50-year-old resident of the Coney Island Houses, put together a small arsenal with his double pump action gun.

And here’s some coverage from the United Kingdom

…residents of the Rockaways in Queens continued to struggle without power, heat or food for a sixth day as their neighborhood slowly descended into chaos. ‘It’s chaos; it’s pandemonium out here,’ said Chris Damon, who had been waiting for 3.5 hours at the site and had circled the block five times. “It seems like nobody has any answers.” Added Damon: ‘I feel like a victim of Hurricane Katrina. I never thought it could happen here in New York, but it’s happened. ‘With little police presence on the storm-ravaged streets, many residents of the peninsula have been forced to take their protection into their own hands, arming themselves with guns, baseball bats and even bows and arrows to ward off thugs seeking to loot their homes. …’We booby-trapped our door and keep a baseball bat beside our bed,’ Danielle Harris, 34, told the New York Daily News. The woman added that she has been hearing gunshots likely fired in the nearby housing project for three nights in a row. Meanwhile, local surfer Keone Singlehurst said that he stockpiled knives, a machete and a bow and arrow.

Now ask yourself a basic question: Is it better to be armed with a baseball bat or a gun?

Last but not least, here’s a picture that was widely circulated last decade, presumably after a storm like Katrina. It’s amusing, but it also makes me very proud of the American spirit.

These guys were having fun, but they also made an important statement. Ask yourself another question: If you were a low-life thug, would you try to rob that neighborhood?

P.S. You can  see some amusing pro-Second Amendment posters here, here, here, here, and here. And some amusing images of t-shirts and bumper stickers on gun control here, here, and here.

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Should Governments Be Allowed to Steal Your Property?

I’ve already written about the despicable practice of “civil forfeiture,” which allows governments to confiscate the property of innocent people who have not been convicted of any crime.

And I’ve cited great columns on the issue from George Will and John Stossel., as well a sobering report on the topic from the Wall Street Journal.

Now the Institute for Justice has a video that should outrage any decent person.

It’s examples of government thuggery like this that make me a libertarian. You should be one as well.

If you need more convincing, check out these horror stories of statist abuse.

• A story of vicious IRS persecution.
• A women jailed overnight because she let her kids play outside.
• Threatening to send a woman to jail because someone whistled at a whale.
• Two stories of innocent people who were victimized by the idiotic Drug War.
• A video about how the EPA tried – and fortunately failed – to destroy a family.
• A story about the Justice Department’s discriminatory attack on a hapless homeowner.
• The government treating child molesters more leniently than people who accidentally omit irrelevant info from forms.

But let’s end on a happy note, with a few jokes about cops, one sympathetic, one mocking, and one political.

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An Amusing Look at Gun-Free Zones

I’ve shared a very clever Chuck Asay cartoon about gun-free zones, so let’s now enjoy four posters on the topic.

Let’s begin with a good jab at one of the anti-Second Amendment groups.

But remember the serious point. If you’re a bad guy and know that a potential victim is sure to be unarmed, does that make you happy or sad?

I realize that an anti-gun zealot will respond by arguing that they want a world where the thugs and crooks also will be disarmed, but how likely is it that such people will turn in their weapons? In any event, most criminals are young men and potential victims need guns to compensate for the inability to match the physical strength of their attackers.

Next let’s look at a poster showing the kind of instructions that statists such as Mayor Bloomberg should post in public places.

These clowns expect us to have blind faith in the ability of public authorities, but the odds of a cop being immediately available when trouble strikes are almost nonexistent.

Here’s a poster that captures the blind naiveté of anti-gun activists. I don’t think I need to add any commentary.

Last but not least, here’s a sign that all anti-gun leftists – assuming they have the courage to publicly celebrate their beliefs – should post outside their homes.

If you enjoy these posters, you can view previous editions here, here, here, here, and here.

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Another Disgusting Display of Government Thuggery

When I first read this story about a woman getting arrested because her kids were playing outdoors, I figured it would be a perfect addition for my ongoing series that tries to determine whether the United States or the United Kingdom has the most incompetent, stupid, and/or venal government officials making the most brainless and/or thuggish decisions.

And when you read these excerpts from a newspaper in Houston, you’ll agree that venal and thuggish are very appropriate words.

A stay-at-home mom from La Porte has filed a lawsuit against the city’s police department, an unknown officer and one of her neighbors. Tammy Cooper said she was wrongly accused of endangering her children and was even forced to spend the night in jail, all because she let her kids play outside. …her children, ages 9 and 6, were riding their motorized scooters in the cul-de-sac where they live while she watched from a lawn chair in her front yard just a few feet away. ..a La Porte police car pulled up in front of her home. …He proceeded to tell me he had received a call from one of my neighbors that my kids were riding their scooters unsupervised. Cooper said she was handcuffed, put in the back of a police car and forced to spend the night in jail. …The charges against her were eventually dropped but she still describes the ordeal as humiliating and said her children were even questioned by police and terrified. …”I hope that what I went through doesn’t go unpunished – that there are consequences for a bad decision,” Cooper said.

But as I thought about the story, I got more and more angry. Heck, it’s the kind of story that should get everybody upset. So maybe it belongs in the this-should-turn-everyone-into-a-libertarian category. Sort of like these horrifying examples.

• A story of vicious IRS persecution.
• Threatening to send a woman to jail because someone whistled at a whale.
• Two stories of innocent people who were victimized by the idiotic Drug War.
• A video about how the EPA tried – and fortunately failed – to destroy a family.
• A story about the Justice Department’s discriminatory attack on a hapless homeowner.
• The government treating child molesters more leniently than people who accidentally omit irrelevant info from forms.

Though I have to admit that I have a hard time understanding why any ethical person wouldn’t be a libertarian anyhow.

But I’m digressing. Returning to our topic, I very much hope that Mrs. Cooper wins her lawsuit. It’s not against the law for kids to play outside. Even if she was inside watching a soap opera, that shouldn’t matter.

If cops have nothing better to do in La Porte, then perhaps it’s time to downsize the police department. And a good place to start is by firing the thug that arrested a woman for no reason.

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Deciphering How Statists Think about Gun Control

Even though I don’t own that many guns, I’m an unyielding supporter of the 2nd Amendment. Indeed, I use gun control as a quick and simple of way of deciding whether politicians meet minimum standards of acceptability.

I’m not a single-issue voter, though, since politicians have to pass a number of tests (unwavering opposition to tax hikes, support for entitlement reform, etc) before receiving the Dan Mitchell Seal of Approval. I guess this is why 99 percent of them fail.

But I’m digressing. Back to the topic at hand, my support for private gun ownership and constitutional freedoms has motivated me to post several videos in the past few years.

• Ted Nugent talking about gun ownership and the right of self defense.
• A look at the Switzerland’s strong gun culture and the importance of self defense as a protection against oppression.
• And some very powerful testimony to some weasels on Capitol Hill (make sure to pay attention around the 5:00 mark).
• Ice-T talking about the real reason to defend and support the 2nd Amendment.
• A heartwarming Christmas story.

Here’s another video to add to the collection. It’s a bit snarky and not exactly subtle, but I’ve dealt with almost every one of the arguments you’ll hear from the “liberal.” Enjoy.

Oh, and how could almost forget to include a link to my interview on NRA-TV.

This message in my interview is particularly appropriate since I just gave a speech earlier today to the European Resource Bank conference and cited this OECD and BIS data to explain why it is just a matter of time before most nations in Europe descend into Greek-style fiscal crisis and social chaos. When that happens, it’s preferable to be one of the people with guns (unlike the unfortunate Brits when the riots struck the U.K.).

P.S. For those of you who appreciate humor, these gun control posters that have been very popular (here, here, here, here, and here). I’ve also posted amusing images of t-shirts and bumper stickers on gun control (here, here, and here).

P.P.S. If you want something that defends the 2nd Amendment in a simple, but inspirational, fashion, you’ll really like this powerpoint presentation.

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Wise Words on the Drug War from John Stossel

What do Mona Charen, Ron Paul, Cory Booker, Pat Robertson, Gov. Gary Johnson, and Sir Richard Branson all have in common?

Almost nothing, I imagine, but they do agree on one thing. It’s time to rethink the War on Drugs.

We can also add John Stossel to the list. Here’s some of what he wrote in his recent Townhall column. Let’s start with his powerful – and pragmatic – argument that the Drug War encourages criminal behavior.

The media (including Fox News) run frightening stories about Mexican cocaine cartels and marijuana gangs. Few of my colleagues stop to think that this is a consequence of the war, that decriminalization would end the violence. There are no wine “cartels” or beer “gangs.” No one “smuggles” liquor. Liquor dealers are called “businesses,” not gangs, and they “ship” products instead of “smuggling” them. They settle disputes with lawyers rather than guns. Everything can be abused, but that doesn’t mean government can stop it. Government runs amok when it tries to protect us from ourselves. Drug-related crime occurs because the drugs are available only through the artificially expensive black market. Drug users steal not because drugs drive them to steal. Our government says heroin and nicotine are similarly addictive, but no one robs convenience stores to get Marlboros.

Citing the work of a scholar at the Manhattan Institute, John also comments on the Drug War’s destructive impact on the black community.

John McWhorter, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, indicts the drug war for “destroying black America.” McWhorter, by the way, is black. McWhorter sees prohibition as the saboteur of black families. “Enduring prison time is seen as a badge of strength. It’s regarded (with some justification) as an unjust punishment for selling people something they want. The ex-con is a hero rather than someone who went the wrong way.” He enumerates the positive results from ending prohibition. “No more gang wars over turf, no more kids shooting each other. … Men get jobs, as they did in the old days, even in the worst ghettos, because they have to.”

I don’t reckon that the Drug War does as much damage to African-Americans as the crummy government-run school system, but it’s probably not too far behind.

Stossel closes by looking at first principles.

“Once the principle is admitted that it is the duty of the government to protect the individual against his own foolishness,” economist Ludwig von Mises wrote, “why not prevent him from reading bad books and bad plays … ? The mischief done by bad ideologies is more pernicious … than that done by narcotic drugs.” If we adults own our own bodies, we ought to get to control what we put in them. It’s legitimate for government to protect me from reckless drivers and drunken airline pilots — but not to protect me from myself.

This is right on the mark. The War on Drugs is misguided because it creates crime. It’s misguided because it hurts the black community. And it’s misguided since government shouldn’t be in charge of micro-managing our lives.

P.S. Also keep in mind that the Drug War is the main excuse politicians given when they impose bad asset forfeiture laws and costly anti-money laundering laws. And it’s the Drug War that is usually the motive when politicians and courts erode our Fourth Amendment liberties and trample our individual rights.

P.P.S. Would you rather agree with John Stossel or Hillary Clinton?

P.P.P.S. And I’m sure you want to side with these Montana patriots, right?

P. P.P.P.S. You don’t need to approve of drugs or use drugs to recognize the Drug War is misguided. You can be uptight and straight-laced like me, but still recognize that the Drug War does far more harm than good.

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