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warnmar10 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:53 am

Keith B wrote: ↑Wed Mar 27, 2019 8:07 amNo need to, you already said it.

I know it, you know it and the American people know it.

Given how close Irish Bob O’Rourke came to beating Cruz in the midterm, with Cruz getting most or all of the 2nd Amendment vote, do either of you seriously believe that Trump is guaranteed to take Texas again, even with all 2nd Amendment hands on deck? I am not convinced. I’d prefer him to whomever the party of death and treason is running, but I’m not convinced that he will beat back those forces of darkness this time around. I’m a libertarian-leaning independent since 2012 in the wake of the GOP’s betrayal of its grass roots and the Tea Party; but I have tended to vote for GOP candidates for federal gov’t offices during those years. But I only did so as a bulwark against the fascist left. I mostly did NOT do it because I like the GOP - which itself has become an elitist brand very little concerned with either honoring promises, or giving the middle class a sense that someone is ACTUALLY in their corner. I no longer listen to what the GOP says. I only listen to what they do. Why? Because the GOP is no more acquainted with the integrity than is the DNC. They’re no longer about first principles, they’re about power; and they’ll happily betray their principles to get and/or hold onto that power.

Everybody here knows the list of campaign promises that went unfulfilled.....MOSTLY for lack of political courage or integrity. No need to list them here. I just submit to you that if you had been loyal to the same brand of vehicle lo these many years, and had bought several of that brand over those years; and then one day, the next new one turns out to not do ANY of the things the salesman promised; and the one after that and the one after that; you’d probably stop rewarding that manufacturer with your money - based entirely on a desire to no longer be fleeced. You’d transfer your loyalty.

It wouldn’t matter if the other major manufacturer was making vehicles that killed their owners....you’d find a third manufacturer, maybe smaller, maybe priced a little higher, but one that builds reliable and safe vehicles, that do exactly what the salesperson tells you they’ll do.

When it became evident to me (back in 2012) that the GOP wasn’t about integrity any longer, I changed brands. Both major parties are selling you something - an idea, a core set of values that they claim for themselves - and they promise to pass legislation to address problems, and fix them, according to their principles and values. Exactly NONE of them promises to create problems with their legislation....but that is what BOTH parties have done....and the ONE party that has stuck to its promises (although they are evil promises) is the DNC. Well I refuse to be suckered by the GOP again, and I won’t vote for any democrat, ever again so long as I live.

If Trump is even up in the polls on Election Day in Texas (or close enough to it), I’ll probably vote for him. But if he 10 or 15 pts behind whomever the commie on the other side happens to be on Election Day in Texas, then I’m not going to throw my vote out the window in desperation to try and push Trump over the top. I will vote my conscience for the first time in a long time.

I’m opting out of the game of thrones. I get it. I’m just one little voter. But I don’t have to be the pawn of an organization that makes me promises and then either leaves them unfulfilled, or actually betrays them. And I sure as hell don’t have to give them any more money ... so none of that from me either, ever again. I paid my dues, made my donations, and then got politically raped. Therefore, nobody can count on my vote anymore (that’s why I not an LP member either). All politicians will have to earn that vote going forward. And frankly, I no longer care what anybody else thinks about that.

If the federal courts do not invtervene and protect bumpstocks, I predict a rash of boating mishaps.

mojo84 wrote: ↑Mon Mar 11, 2019 5:55 pm

Bill Anderson wrote: ↑Mon Mar 11, 2019 2:19 pm

The Annoyed Man wrote: ↑Mon Mar 11, 2019 1:07 pm Here’s what I DO know: law enforcement’s investigation is either a crappy job that leaves more questions than it answers; or it’s a coverup of some kind. The ambiguity is not good for us.

Very bad for us when fingering the real culprits is called "bashing" by the supporters of anti-constitutional big government.

To whom are you referring to as "supporters of anti-constitutional big government"?

I would suspect that he is referring to the political left, and some of its squishier enablers on the “right” who are big-gov’t “conservatives”....people like Bill Kristol, for example, who is no longer really a conservative.

Ruark wrote: ↑Mon Mar 11, 2019 11:37 am You know, I gotta ask.... regarding the question of whether he used bump stocks.... as I understand it, the gunfire in that incident was very rapid and machine-gun-like. If he didn't have any full-auto weapons, how else could he have fired in that manner?

He very well could have used a bumpstocks. But, the “investigation” (in quotes, because it’s a joke) has yielded some, shall we say interesting possibilities - among them the possibility that Paddock was already dead on the floor, and someone else was firing the weapons. At the very least, there is a high probability that he had accomplices - some of whom have actually been named, but nothing has ever come of that. He (or whoever the real shooter/shooters was/were) fired multiple weapons in multiple calibers. And when you listen to the audio part of the various videos recorded, you can hear differences in caliber and rate of fire - the higher pitched “crack” of a 5.56 weapon, and the heavier “boom” of a .308 weapon. In fact, some .308 weapons were “recovered” from the hotel room the shooting allegedly took place from. Some people say that the rate of fire from one of the 5.56 weapons seemed to vary, as it might for a bumpfired weapon. Remember that, at the time, there were helicopters circling the event overhead, and some of the concert goers on the ground wondered if the shooting was coming from a chopper.

In this video, the first round of “automatic” fire sounds at one point almost like TWO guns firing:


About halfway though that video, the shooter pulls a full mag dump, the shooting pauses for not quite a second, and then there’s another burst of 3 or 4 rounds that follows, that sound different from the first dump, and are too quick to be a magazine change. It could be an interruption of bumpfire, and when it resumes his muzzle is pointed in another direction. Or it could be a second gunman.

Here’s what I DO know: law enforcement’s investigation is either a crappy job that leaves more questions than it answers; or it’s a coverup of some kind. The ambiguity is not good for us.

Liberty wrote: ↑Sat Mar 09, 2019 6:17 am

The Annoyed Man wrote: ↑Fri Mar 08, 2019 1:49 pm My personal prediction is that bumpfire stocks will still end up being banned - simply because even most of the GOP views an “armed and insolent” population as a threat to their hold on power. So if the Michigan court finds in favor of the plaintiffs, ATF attorneys will petition SCOTUS for a hearing. If SCOTUS strikes down the ATF’s attempt to rewrite the meaning of “machinegun” in the law, it will be on the grounds that ATF overstepped into Congress’s privileges. At that point, Congress will undoubtedly make bumpstocks illegal by legislatively adding them to the NFA.

The GOP has amply demonstrated, since 2016, that they will not save us from the abuses and overreaches by gov’t. I submit immigration and Obamacare as two obvious examples. Like democrats, they view us as their beasts of the fields to be managed, and they are more inclined to “benevolently save us from ourselves” than to proactively protect our liberties. Why? Because actually honoring our liberties in the breach means fewer DC cocktail party invitations. And veto-proof majority in Congress or not, it seems VERY unlikely that Trump would or could spend any of his dwindling political capital on keeping bumpstocks legal. He’s so beset on all sides by democrats and “principled” republicans, that he won’t have the energy or resources to fight off restrictions on bumpstocks.

And this is why the NRA won't only not into the fight, but actually seems to support restricting bumpstocks.

The NRA has a long and well-deserved reputation for gun-rights advocacy in DC. In my own small way, I helped pay for some of that advocacy. I am still a member and intend to remain one. I totally get the concept of political capital, and have posted about the concept many times on the pages of this website. What I don’t understand is why the NRA would take the position they have, when they could have said “We don’t take positions on firearms accessories”, and simply stayed out of the fight. I have had this actual conversation with someone representing the pro-abortion organization NARAL. When she told me that abortion is a constitutional right, I said, “so then, you support ALL constitutional rights, and you’re also pro-2nd Amendment, since it’s a constitutional right”. She said “we don’t take a position on the 2nd Amendment”. I don’t mention this to discuss abortion. I mention this to discuss political tactics. LOTS of advocacy groups - who are probably anti-2nd Amendment - do not take a public stand on issues that are not part of their core advocacy issue. The NRA’s advocacy issues are the right to keep and bear arms, and teaching firearms safety. If the NRA believes that a certain firearms accessory - in this case, bumpstocks - has zero chance of remaining legal, why enter the fight at all? Why take a position that is going to alienate some of your membership, and not really buy you any good behavior points in the rest of the swamp? It’s not going to change how most of the swamp views the NRA. It’s not going to change NRA critics into believers. It’s not going to suddenly place the NRA into good standing with the statists on the left. Why not simply say, “not our fight” and stay out of it? At least they might alienate fewer of the membership that way.

And it’s not about numbers either. The NRA is not advocating for the banning of REAL transferable machine guns. It seems to think that as long as the owner jumps through all of ATF’s hoops, that owning one is just fine. And yet legal owners of actual machine guns are probably a much smaller number of people than owners of bumpstocks. So I don’t necessarily buy the notion that the NRA is making a cynical calculation to sacrifice bumpstock owners because they are only a “tiny” part of the overall membership. If that were so, they would have thrown machine gun owners under the bus a long time ago.

IF, as the GOA points out, allowing the capricious reinterpretation of machine-gun definitions to stand places the legality of all semiautomatic rifle ownership in jeapordy, why isn’t the NRA taking the same position as the GOA? The whole “constructive intent” part of the GOA’s argument concerns me. The NRA obviously supports the ownership of semiautomatic rifles, including rifles like AR15s and other civilian versions of rifles that share some design features with military rifles; and they have more or less consistently defended that ownership in political outreach, in the courts, and in the court of public opinion right up to the present. Do they really believe that a President Kamala Harris (or Trump, for that matter) wouldn’t use the ATF’s expanded definition to make all such rifles illegal since pretty much all semiauto rifles can be bumpfired with a rubber band or a belt loop?

That whole “constructive intent” thing is going to rear up and bite us all on the butt if we don’t squash it right now. I’d really like it if the NRA would be part of that effort. I would really like it if the GOA would coordinate its efforts with the NRA, if the NRA can get on board with this. United, they are more powerful than they are separated. I would like both orgs to avoid playing the “stay out of my rice bowl” game, and focus instead on beating back the attacks on our rights in a unified front.

AndyC wrote: ↑Fri Mar 08, 2019 12:43 pm

The Annoyed Man wrote: ↑Fri Mar 08, 2019 12:35 pmWhat’s fascinating is that the gov’t lawyer refused to engage on the issue of the Vegas shooting. Here’s my SWAG tinfoil hat guess as to why .... They KNOW something about that shooting that they deliberately want to keep from the public eye.

That's the only reason I can think of.

Up until I read that, I simply figured that some lunatic went on a rampage and nobody knows why. Now that the above information is out, I'm having some empathy for the conspiracy theorists.

Paddock may well have been a deranged lone gunman, but as more and more knowledge of the facts emerge through back-channels, that looks increasingly in doubt. Some of Paddock’s rifles were photographed with bumpstocks installed; but he was done shooting and already dead when those pictures were taken. Furthermore, the pictures weren’t immediately released to the public. It doesn’t take very long for someone to install a bumpstock. My theory is that the bumpstocks were installed by corrupt law enforcement, after the fact, to try and build a case against their use. Further, I suspect that the reason the ATF attorney didn’t want to discuss Vegas, is because there is no financial data linking Stephen Paddock to the purchase of any bumpstocks.....but there is LOTS of financial data linking him to the purchases of the rifles.

Another possibility.... I don’t know whether or not bumpstocks come with a serial number - maybe for warranty purposes or something - but lots of things like appliances and mechanical devices DO, having nothing to do with requirements in the law. If bumpstocks have some kind of serialized product number, then the identity of an individual bumpstock buyer might be traceable data. If the bumpstocks on Stephen Paddock’s rifles have some kind of serial number on them, to whom will a purchasing trace of those individual bumpstocks be traceable? The ATF maybe? Or the FBI maybe? Or to someone else who is linked with the ongoing “investigation”? I put “investigation” in quotes, because it is patently obvious that an investigation is not what’s happening in Vegas.

I have not moved off of my personal position on bumpstocks. I neither want one, nor see a practical use for one in MY life. I don’t personally own any .50 BMG rifles either, for much the same reason. They don’t fit in MY life. But what I want or need has no relevance at all to what someone else wants or needs. And neither what I or someone else wants or needs in terms of personally owned firearms and/or their accessories has ANYthing to do with the original intent and wording of the 2nd Amendment.

My personal prediction is that bumpfire stocks will still end up being banned - simply because even most of the GOP views an “armed and insolent” population as a threat to their hold on power. So if the Michigan court finds in favor of the plaintiffs, ATF attorneys will petition SCOTUS for a hearing. If SCOTUS strikes down the ATF’s attempt to rewrite the meaning of “machinegun” in the law, it will be on the grounds that ATF overstepped into Congress’s privileges. At that point, Congress will undoubtedly make bumpstocks illegal by legislatively adding them to the NFA.

The GOP has amply demonstrated, since 2016, that they will not save us from the abuses and overreaches by gov’t. I submit immigration and Obamacare as two obvious examples. Like democrats, they view us as their beasts of the fields to be managed, and they are more inclined to “benevolently save us from ourselves” than to proactively protect our liberties. Why? Because actually honoring our liberties in the breach means fewer DC cocktail party invitations. And veto-proof majority in Congress or not, it seems VERY unlikely that Trump would or could spend any of his dwindling political capital on keeping bumpstocks legal. He’s so beset on all sides by democrats and “principled” republicans, that he won’t have the energy or resources to fight off restrictions on bumpstocks.

So even though the way GAO’s attorney is handling this suit in the Michigan court is very interesting, I hold out very little hope that things will ultimately end well for owners of bumpstocks.

I just read the email this morning, on MAC’s Patreon page. What’s fascinating is that the gov’t lawyer refused to engage on the issue of the Vegas shooting. Here’s my SWAG tinfoil hat guess as to why .... They KNOW something about that shooting that they deliberately want to keep from the public eye. Isn’t it fascinating that, in the nation’s single worst mass shooting, where law enforcement had access to the shooter’s body, his entire gun supply, his girlfriend, his house, etc., etc., etc., knowing pretty much everything about him, they STILL don’t want to share that knowledge with the public, a full year and a half later?

We knew more about the JFK assassination 18 months later (whether or not that narrative is true), than we know today about Vegas.

What’s worse is that, UNLESS there really IS some kind of nefarious gov’t coverup over Vegas, there simply isn’t any reason at all to bury the facts. IF the public portrayal of Stephen Paddock is true, you’d think that govt would WANT to lay it all out there for public view, because it would make it MUCH easier for gov’t to move toward things like banning AR15s. And yet burying the facts is exactly what the Security Branch of the DNC (AKA “FBI”) and the LV Sheriff’s office have done.

Why? There HAS to be a reason, beyond sheer incompetence. I do NOT believe that the FBI is that incompetent. What I DO believe is that they are very selectively competent. In other words, if the truth advances their power, they are extremely competent. If the truth puts them in a bad light, then they are totally incompetent. You can also read this as: “The FBI is a completely corrupted agency”. That may not be fair to some of the individual agents, but dang man, if you’re a person of integrity, it should be obvious to you whether your employer is corrupt or not; and if you think your employer might be corrupt, then you have a moral obligation to either get the heck out and go find some honorable work, or to arrest those responsible for the corruption.

We know THIS much..... we know that a gov’t attorney, representing a gov’t agency which is trying to impose an infringement upon the 2A, refuses to discuss what happened in Vegas, because discussing THAT truth would be detrimental to gov’t’s attempts at unconstitutional regulation. And that should make any reasonably minded person ill at ease about gov’t motives - in both the GOA suit, and in the Vegas investigation, but ALSO in a larger sense, about gov’t’s motives WHEREVER it concerns any part of the Bill of Rights.