Executive order on firearms: what are they thinking?
Wednesday, January 9th, 2013The part of me that still believes the civics lessons I learned in school wonders what Obama and cronies think they can accomplish with an executive order about firearms. Because of course, no EO restricting gun ownership or sales in any way would be constitutional. Not even remotely.
The older, wiser, large part of me remembers that EOs have been used to tighten the noose around guns before. And, of course, used for even worse things.
Ironically, our best hope is that they’ll go too far, too fast — and make the line in the sand very clear.
Any thoughts on what they’ll try to accomplish via EO this time? ADDED: Will it really be something as blatant and drastic as classifying our semi-autos as Title II weapons? Man, talk about a line in the sand …
January 9th, 2013
The normal. Ban the importation of certain features and hi-cap magazines. They might try to include banning the manufacture of weapons capable of holding more than 10 rounds or semi-auto with a removable magazine. I’d guess they will try to include semi-auto rifles on the NFA registry as well.
The problem with an EO is overturning one requires the federal court system or specific legislation from congress. I wouldn’t hold my breath on either.
January 9th, 2013
All it’ll accomplish is give us a few more “felonies” to commit everyday.
January 9th, 2013
“The problem with an EO is overturning one requires the federal court system or specific legislation from congress. I wouldn’t hold my breath on either.”
Ultimately, there’s one more way to overturn a tyrannical fiat. Two, really. But neither relies on waiting for government to do it.
January 9th, 2013
What Matt, another said.
The purpose of this EO, if it came down, is to put another nail in the coffin against firearms. Simply that. It doesn’t matter what they’re striving for, they will push until enough somebodies push back, add another anti-gun notch to their belt, and wait for the next horror story from school or theater to activate another EO/law.
One accomplishment (if not a purpose) of EOs has been to get people used to the idea of their legitimacy. Bush used it freely (ironic, that word) until many people stopped questioning his right to EOs. Obama has continued in the same vein. Both men have stated that, as President, they have the right to do whatever they please (as if they were King). No doubt others, such as Roosevelt, felt the same way. It may be why candidates run for office; never mind that they don’t have the ability, or knowledge, or even the stamina or guts, to lead a nation – it’s their agenda and ego that sucks them in.
January 9th, 2013
Those in DC would do well to remember the last time a tyrant came for our guns
http://www.nps.gov/mima/index.htm
January 9th, 2013
I don’t know if you’ve ever read the book “Enemies, Foreign and Domestic”, Claire (I’m sure some of the commentariat have), but in it Matt Bracken outlines what could happen if such an EO came to pass; and he does it very convincingly, I might add.
Without spoiling it for anyone who has not read it yet, I’ll just say that the “trigger event” (pardon the pun here) was slightly different; the reaction from politicians and antis, however, is exactly what we’re experiencing right now: Make everyone who even thinks so much as to try and have a real conversation on the issue look like the most hardened criminal ever.
I certainly hope it does not come to this, but if our dear leader sees fit to role out an EO that includes confiscation (pardon my misspeaking: it would of course be called a “Buyback Program”) Mr. Bracken might very well be predicting the not-so-distant future.
January 9th, 2013
What I expect (perhaps only in my fever dreams) would be an immediate petition to the Supreme Court to issue an injunction, on the grounds of usurpation of Congressional power, and violation of the 2nd Amendment. No idea whether such a process even exists. But then there’s the Jacksonian question of enforcing such an injunction.
January 9th, 2013
“Thinking? We don’t need no steenking thinking.”
The more I listen to the chattering heads the more I believe they’re convinced that the NRA blew their credibility with gun owners by being too hardline, that there’s only a few bitter clingers left, and that the vast majority of people in the U.S. really want to get rid of all the icky guns that caused the school shooting.
They have a BAD case of ear-lock.
January 9th, 2013
Who knows what those ghouls are *thinking*.
But realistically, as far as an EO goes, I am guessing that they will get significantly more draconian with the FFL procedures. Tighten up on imports. Add more databases to the Brady check. So what if it gives out a false denial. Its a hassle to try to get that reversed. Put the screws down on F Troop. Go after any and all firearms violations, no matter how petty. Anything he can do with the power of the executive branch. He (they) just aren’t stupid enough to try something like confiscation or registration with an EO.
My guess is that what they really want is for one of US, a real gunnie to snap and heap up a gi-hugic body count. Lets face it….the so called mass shootings are being done by amateurs. If a real gunnie snaps, the body count will be more than a dozen, and it won’t be little kids and silly bleating moviegoers and students. THEN they can have their mandate for congressional action. THEN they can go for the registration-confiscation thing. They need a reichstag-kristallnacht scenario to do what they REALLY want to do.
I really sincerely *hope* they aren’t maneuvering for that. But…this is the worst batch of rats I’ve ever seen running the show, and I surely wouldn’t put it past them.
January 9th, 2013
It’s not the rats that we can see, it is the rats behind the scenes we have to worry about.
January 9th, 2013
I would expect incremental steps, beginning with a voluntary turn-in. Incrementalism has worked well for them over the years.
January 10th, 2013
One possible response by the NRA and all gun-rights organizations to any attempts to misuse executive orders to circumvent the Second Amendment:
http://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com/2013/01/a-suggestion-for-nra.html
Just one idea. It could work . . .
January 10th, 2013
I basically would have agreed with what most have already posted here. That is I *would* have agreed, a couple of days ago.
It now occurs to me watching the rhetoric ratcheting up, and the emotions on both sides, that this is EXACTLY the response the Community Organizer was hoping for – indeed, counting on.
He knows only one thing – to stir up conflict and strife by dividing. He wants chaos, a crisis. This will then give him license (he believes) to accelerate his agenda of turning America into a North American version of North Korea.
My two cents.
January 10th, 2013
Peter — Thanks for the link. If one cares about elections, proportionality makes sense avoid disenfranchising the reds in the blue states and the blues in the red. Now, if there could only be a system to count the implied “none of the above” v*tes of the non-v*ters.
But I’m not sure what that plan would work to accomplish. How would it protect firearms rights?
And if gun-rights groups threw themselves into working on it wouldn’t they be neglecting more important and immediate issues?
Actually, I wouldn’t care if the NRA wanted to put all their energy into something like that since they’re not doing much worthwhile to support our rights in any case. But a group like JPFO has a very specific mission (which, BTW, is non-political; they couldn’t put their support behind something like this even if they wanted to because of their 501(c)(3) status) and a very specific something they’re good at (keeping the “guns save lives” and “gun control enables genocide” messages going).
I can’t see asking every gun-rights group to abandon its established mission to pursue something that isn’t actually firearm related. Maybe I’m misunderstanding what you’re getting at?
January 10th, 2013
Claire, I’m simply trying to find ways to retaliate against those who are trying to demonize and penalize us. If they can find ways to hurt us, we need to find ways to hurt them – but ways that are as legal and non-violent as possible, at least until they move the goalposts to make that no longer an option. My proposal was one approach to that. I’m sure there are others, and I hope we’ll hear some of them emerge in days to come.
If they’re going to bring the fight to us, we need to take it to them – on their turf, not ours.
January 10th, 2013
Peter: I think the regime is deliberately painting us into a corner. They will do whatever it takes to try and break us. Like you and many others, I would much prefer a non-violent solution to the problem, but alas, short of some sort of miracle, I don’t really believe it’s in the cards any longer.
The regime doesn’t care if there is violence – in fact, I think they would welcome it. Either violence will be reciprocal in the short term, or unilateral in the much longer run. I’ve known survivors of the holocaust. I’ve known people who have survived and escaped totalitarian regimes. I even knew a Ukrainian woman who had survived the Holodomor. For my own part, I’ve never experienced anything quite on that sort of level, but it suffices to say, I’ve spent my fair share of time living in fear of death as a child.
I for one will not go out looking for a fight, but I won’t be rolled either. I understand the trajectory of events and where that could lead. It occurred to me many years ago that if even 10% of the Jews slaughtered by Hitler had resisted, and if each one of those people had taken one Nazi life, that would total 600,000 dead Nazis. But the reality was the vast majority went to their slaughter hoping in vain that some miracle would save them from death. Most were wrong. That is what this regime is counting on – the same complacency. The same temptation to appease the crocodile in the hopes he will eat you last. I just can’t buy into that fantasy.
They say some things are worse than death. Believe me, they are right.
January 10th, 2013
“If they’re going to bring the fight to us, we need to take it to them – on their turf, not ours.”
I agree with that in the abstract. I don’t agree that diverting all pro-gun resources with the goal of retaliating against them politically after they’ve already done their dirty deeds is an effective strategy.
I think we need to use our own best tactics and resources — now — to stop what they’re trying to do and, if they succeed in imposing their fiats and bad laws anyway, resist their gun grab.
Besides, your map (even if all 50 states went along in the next couple of years — unlikely) shows nothing more than that we’d have gotten a President Romney in the 2012 election — which even you admit is no big leap toward freedom. It can’t predict anything about 2016, except another chance of putting an unknown R into office. But that R could be a theocrat or someone else who doesn’t give a crap about our rights.
You’re right that there will be lots of different ideas. And of course I’m biased toward ones that are both non-violent and non-political because I don’t think politics is a freedom-enhancing activity. But I sure don’t have any grand strategy.
January 11th, 2013
Isn’t it always baby steps with them?
All metals will be treated the same:
“A bill to register gold and silver coins: It had to come. It has been introduced in Illinois, …”
http://thedailybell.com/28559/Gold-and-Silver-Registration-in-Illinois
January 11th, 2013
IAM — I read that this morning and definitely found it worrisome. I won’t worry too much, though, until similar plans escape into other states.
But frankly I’ve wondered for a long time why we’re still “allowed” to trade in PMs without government supervision or permission — particularly when some of those PMs carry a potential 28% “collectibles” capital gains tax that you just know the feds would love to get their greedy mitts on.
January 11th, 2013
For that matter, why is there still trade in cash?
What the banners are planning is that most people will be good little citizens and turn ‘em all in when so duly ordered.
I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for the statists to be proven wrong in their plans.
January 12th, 2013
Myself, I’ve wondered for a long time why we were ever allowed to buy them again in the first place in, when was it, 1982? Why? Benevolence?
The more I know, the more I forget, and the more I feel like a puppet,… er, let’s say, someone(s) is pulling everyone’s stings.
The jerking is irritating and hurts.
… But it’s better to some of the why’s and such.
January 12th, 2013
I can’t multi-task, it seems.
I meant:
… But it’s better to KNOW some of the why’s and such.
Rather than to be in the Dark.