Tag: media

You Mean I CAN’T Buy Grenades At Muphy’s Guns?

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Well, it would appear that the MSM has finally decided to spread the blame around a little. The LA Dog Trainer had this piece in yesterday’s issue:

Drug cartels’ new weaponry means war

Narcotics traffickers are acquiring firepower more appropriate to an army — including grenade launchers and anti-tank rockets — and the police are feeling outgunned.

By Ken Ellingwood and Tracy Wilkinson
5:53 PM PDT, March 13, 2009

Reporting from Zihuatanejo, Mexico, and Mexico City — It was a brazen assault, not just because it targeted the city’s police station, but for the choice of weapon: grenades.

The Feb. 21 attack on police headquarters in coastal Zihuatanejo, which injured four people, fit a disturbing trend of Mexico’s drug wars. Traffickers have escalated their arms race, acquiring military-grade weapons, including hand grenades, grenade launchers, armor-piercing munitions and antitank rockets with firepower far beyond the assault rifles and pistols that have dominated their arsenals.

Apparently “assault rifles and pistols” are a ‘gateway drug’ to more powerful weaponry!

But here’s the kicker:

Most of these weapons are being smuggled from Central American countries or by sea, eluding U.S. and Mexican monitors who are focused on the smuggling of semiauto- matic and conventional weapons purchased from dealers in the U.S. border states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.

The proliferation of heavier armaments points to a menacing new stage in the Mexican government’s 2-year-old war against drug organizations, which are evolving into a more militarized force prepared to take on Mexican army troops, deployed by the thousands, as well as to attack each other.

These groups appear to be taking advantage of a robust global black market and porous borders, especially between Mexico and Guatemala. Some of the weapons are left over from the wars that the United States helped fight in Central America, U.S. officials said.

Yes, the “lax gun laws” in the United States were responsible for the (illegal drug) cartels’ armories, and by passing new gun control laws we were going to be able to NIP. IT. IN. THE. BUD! (So to speak.)

But instead, apparently, these scofflaws are buying military hardware from OTHER COUNTRIES.

And it’s STILL the fault of the United States!

Ah, I love the Blame America First, Last, and Always crowd!

Quote of the Day

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Quote of the Day

You could have used that same product and those same video to show what a great country we have. You could have shown what unique freedoms we have and how those freedoms are not being abused and I would have gladly given you permission to use my video. Seattle King 5 Evening Magazine did that with this video: http://www.boomershoot.org/2005/KING5.wmv. But you didn’t do that. You merely demonstrated you are a Puritan–afraid that someone, someplace, is having fun. – Joe Huffman, Cease-and-Desist letter to John Bachman of WSBTV

Damn. That whole letter was beautiful, but that last bit? Classic!

How Did I Miss This?

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How Did I Miss This?

I’ve mentioned author Orson Scott Card here before, most recently in October. Card writes mostly Science Fiction, but he also has an intermittent op-ed column called WorldWatch that I check on every now and then. Well, I missed this one, One Party Rule Forever! published in mid-February. (Granted, I was working 65-hour weeks at the time.)

Excerpt:

Obama has set himself up to rig all future American elections, not through any democratic process, but by fiat. Just like a dictator.

Remember how, when the Patriot Act was passed, we were flooded with outraged stories in the press about how Americans’ rights were going to be trampled on?

None of it came true.

But now we have a genuine attack on the roots of the Constitution and the principle of counting only people who can be proven to exist when apportioning the House of Representatives. It’s a naked grab for power. It’s a coup d’etat.

And the so-called freedom-lovers in the Leftist media are absolutely silent about it.

If Bush had put Karl Rove in charge of the Census without so much as asking Congress for permission, the howls and screams would have been deafening. Obama does the identical thing … and the freedom-loving Left is fine with it.

Because they don’t love freedom. They just love having their views prevail, without regard to democracy or human rights.

RTWT.

Same Tune, Different Band

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Instapundit links to a piece describing how reporters are being laid off, and then taking government positions working for the state agencies or officials they previously covered:

Many ‘Star-Ledger’ Reporters Turn to the ‘Other Side’ After Buyouts

At least 16 reporters and newsroom staffers at The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., most of whom left the paper in the past year’s massive buyout, are now working for public officials or state agencies the paper covers.

In several cases, writers who covered a specific beat are now working for individuals or agencies upon which they once reported.

With 151 newsroom staffers taking buyouts last October, out of 330 total, that figure represents about 10% of the departed reporters, although some left prior to that round of buyouts.

In January of last year I wrote The Church of the MSM and the New Reformation, a piece on how and why the media acts as it does. The essay was based on a very interesting book, The National Rifle Association and the Media: The Motivating Force of Negative Coverage by Associate Professor Brian Anse Patrick of the University of Toledo. Professor Patrick began his research for the book for his Doctoral dissertation, and completed it early in his tenure at the University of Toledo. He explains:

“I come from a background where my father and uncle were hunters. When I went into the professional world and started writing, I ran into a lot of educated people who were horrified of the NRA and guns in general. I had a completely neutral experience,” Patrick explained. “I realized a lot of people had this attitude about a thing that I regarded as a commonplace object, and it was against my experiences with gun culture. I thought it would be interesting to see what the media thought.”

Patrick researched media coverage of the NRA and several other social organizations, including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the American Civil Liberties Union, AARP and Handgun Control Inc. “Even though they have different purposes, they’re still roughly analogous in how they function — they have a large body of people, and they are more or less democratic in how they function. The idea was to study an array of groups. It was important to have a comparison, and I wanted some groups that were middle of the road, some right and some left,” Patrick said. He added that it would have been insufficient to only point to examples of negative coverage of the NRA; instead, it was important to compare the types of coverage with several organizations.

The most fascinating thing to come from his research, however, was his analysis of the news media and its front-line members. Patrick studied, in nearly infinite detail, how the “elite media” – defined as the New York Times, LA Times, Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report – dealt with the five different groups. He found there was very definite evidence of bias, but that bias wasn’t specifically “leftist,” or else how could you explain the predominance of negative coverage of the very Left-leaning ACLU?

No, what Professor Patrick found when he analyzed the data was that the bias in the media isn’t a Left-Right bias (though the overwhelming majority of people in the media do lean Left), it’s what he terms an “administrative control bias.”

People who make careers in the media love government. They love it even better when the “right people” are in charge, but, as one much earlier commenter at Instapundit expressed it:

Perhaps the most pervasive way in which journalists are different from normal people is that journalists live in a world dominated by government, and they reflexively see government action as the default way to approach any problem.

Joining the “other side”? Hardly. They’re just losing their vestments as the clergy of the Church of State and taking up lay positions.

Same tune, different band.

Machine Guns and Dead Nazis

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Machine Guns and Dead Nazis

My wife and I went to see Defiance yesterday afternoon. I was going to write a review, but – as is my wont – when someone else says something better that I can, I let them:

The basic plot (I won’t ruin it for you) is a gang of paranoid gun crazies who band together and terrorize a benevolent government that the crazies feel like are threatening them.

The crazies run off in the woods like crazies are prone to do, they don’t pay their taxes and are generally hostile to the various government folks trying to help them and solve their problems. It is set in the ancient past that no one cares about anymore. The crazies generally all have relatives that were justifiably killed by the benevolent government who was trying to help them, which makes them mad and what is a crazy if not mad about something.

RTWT, it’s not very long.

Here’s a Shocker

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Here’s a Shocker

An op-ed from the Richmond Times-Dispatch (via Instapundit):

Richmond Times-Dispatch
Published: January 24, 2009

Recently, the state Crime Commission deadlocked over whether to recommend closing the so-called gun-show loophole. The issue has become a perennial at the General Assembly, which is considering the matter once again this year. Once again, legislators should vote no.

Licensed firearms dealers — those who buy and sell guns as a business — are required to conduct background checks on prospective buyers.

The “loophole” in question refers to the fact that individuals selling guns from their own private collection do not have to — either within gun-show venues, or in the parking lot, or in their own homes.

Which is no “loophole” at all, but . . .

Gun-control advocates often muddy the issue by referring to “unlicensed dealers” at gun shows, of which there are indeed many. They sell holsters, flashlights, hunting knives, T-shirts, books, gun safes — even jewelry. But an unlicensed dealer who sold guns as a business would invite felony charges under federal law.

And some have. That’s part of the BATFE’s job – and one they don’t seem to do very well.

Gun-control advocates also suggest, albeit with scant evidence, that gun shows supply a significant share of the weapons used in crime.

Federal data indicate otherwise. (My emphasis.) According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics report, “Firearm Use by Offenders,” only about 1 percent of guns used in crimes come from gun shows. (Again.) In fact, most crime guns — 57 percent — come from just 1 percent of licensed dealers. Federal and state law-enforcement agencies should come down on those renegade dealers like a ton of bricks.

It would appear. Another thing the BATFE is tasked with, but they’d rather pursue companies like CavArms for technical violations that were A-OK on Wednesday, but verboten on Thursday. This is another topic unto itself, but to continue:

Another study, by the FBI concerning attacks on law-enforcement officials, found that 97 percent of the offenders had procured their weapons through illegal means. (Again, my emphasis.)

Private sales among the hunters and target-shooting enthusiasts who frequent gun shows are simply not a significant source of weapons used in crimes. Gun shows, then, are not the real issue — except to those who recoil viscerally at the sight of large numbers of firearms in one place.

Referring to a “gun-show loophole” muddies the issue by implying, falsely, that individuals can sell or buy guns freely and without background checks only at gun shows. In fact, they can do so many places.

The real issue, in fact, is incidental firearms sales by private individuals — whether at gun shows or anywhere else.

Now there is an argument to be made that any such sales should be more tightly regulated, perhaps even recorded and reported to the authorities — just as home and car sales are. Over time, that would amount to de facto firearm registration. Some gun-control advocates say that is not their wish.

But given the weaknesses in the case for closing the gun-show loophole, one has to wonder.

No we don’t. Not any more.

Remaining emphasis is also mine. And there’s your QotD in bright red. Kinda shocking to read in an MSM outlet, but it is Richmond, VA.

Another Invitation

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Another Invitation

Say Uncle linked to a David Codrea post at Gun Rights Examiner where a sportswriter showed his ignorance in the comments and was promptly smacked down for it. Feelings apparently hurt, the writer took his ball and went home after complaining about how nasty gun rights advocates were.

So once again I have decided to extend the olive branch and invite the sportswriter, Tom Ferda, to have an open, public discussion on the topic of gun rights right here at this blog or anywhere else he feels comfortable. Even though I’m up to my eyeballs with work for at least the next two weeks, I really want to engage Mr. Ferda. Here’s the text of the email I sent him tonight:

Mr. Ferda:

Welcome to the wonderful world of the gun rights debate! My name is Kevin Baker, and I live in Tucson, Arizona. No, I’m not Kevin Baker the award-winning novelist, I’m Kevin Baker the Professional Electrical Engineer who happens to run a blog by the name of The Smallest Minority, if you care to Google my name (which is how I found your email address).

Obviously you’re new to this topic, but don’t feel too bad – many are. On both sides. The problem is, there’s been a concerted effort for, oh, the past forty years or so to remove firearms from the public. It’s been described as a “decades-long slow-motion hate crime” against gun owners, and a lot of us are quite tired of it. So you were the recipient of some (very mild!) backlash when you demonstrated your ignorance the topics of firearms and Constitutional law.

I understand that you’ll find this difficult to believe, but when you wrote the words “semi-automatic machine guns” you basically punched nearly every hot-button most of us on this side of the aisle have. The ones you missed on that first pass you punched – emphatically – with the words “think about when these original right to bear arms laws were written.”

Mr. Ferda, I’m a calm, collected kind of guy. I started blogging with the intention of debating people like you in a public forum. Honestly, I don’t expect to change your mind, and I’m absolutely certain you won’t change mine (my position being the result of well over a decade of research, study, and consideration – I should have a PhD in the philosophy of gun rights) but I do believe that people LEARN when they discuss and defend their positions with people who DISAGREE with them. Hopefully, so do you, since you wrote: “Stay aggressive, call people with different opinions idiots and chase us all out of your area. You guys are doing a great job of forming a group where everyone can have identical opinions and keep anyone else out of the club.” And: “Good-bye and enjoy conversing amoungst yourselves without any more comments from people like myself who may differ in opinion.”

I earnestly wish to have a discussion with you – in a public forum! I will remain civil, factual, and I will give citations with links for you to follow and verify. (You’ll have to bear with me, however, as my day job at the moment is pretty overwhelming, so my responses will be necessarily slow.) I am willing to give you guest-posting privileges at my blog, and I promise not to edit anything you write (except possibly for readability – text size, font, etc. – never content) or you may email me your responses and I can post those – again, in total and without editing – or you may post your half of the discussion anywhere you’d like, so long as I can copy those posts to my blog for archival purposes.

I do have open comments. If you are as sensitive to the response of the readers as you appear to be at the Gun Rights Examiner post, I suggest you not read them. Oh, and this invitation is also being published at my blog.

I hope you do accept this challenge. I promise you, if nothing else you will come away much more knowledgeable about the topic.

Kevin Baker,
Tucson, AZ

Here’s hoping he accepts. Whatever the response, you’ll be the first second to know!

UPDATE, 1/19 8:00PM: No response from Mr. Ferda as of yet.