July 9: National Firearm Purchase Day

Submitted by Bill St. Clair on Wed, 01 Aug 2001 14:28:40 GMT

For every action there is an equal and opposite government program. -- Bob Wells

After signing the American Declaration of Independence, the new Congress appointed a committee to design a great seal of the United States. Committeeman Thomas Jefferson suggested the seal should include the children of Israel in the wilderness, led day and night by cloud and fire. Committeeman Ben Franklin suggested a more fitting image would be Moses, dividing the Red Sea, and Pharaoh in his chariot being swamped by the returning waters.

And the motto: "Rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God."

and:

"Isn't our choice really not one of left or right, but of up or down? Down through the welfare state to statism, to more and more government largesse accompanied always by more government authority, less individual liberty, and ultimately, totalitarianism, always advanced as for our own good. The alternative is the dream conceived by our Founding Fathers, up to the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with an orderly society. We don't celebrate dependence day on the Fourth of July. We celebrate Independence Day." -- Ronald Reagan (Remarks on accepting the GOP Presidential Nomination, Dallas, Texas, August 23, 1984)

My thanks to Mark Paschal for the link on July 4:

Merry 4th. Your new weblog for today is Bill St Clair's End the War on Freedom.

Mike Krus'es NewsIsFree site recently added a channel for EtWoF. Thanks, Mike. NewsIsFree is an RSS aggregator. It provides an HTML front-end to the RSS of the sites it tracks.

Second Amendment Sisters of New York State has posted commercial.mp3 (939K), a radio commercial that I've heard on WROW 590AM in the Albany area. It advertises the TRT-NY rally on July 14 outside the commU.N.ist building in NYC. The web page has travel directions including some chartered bus trips. Remember, Monday is National Firearm Purchase Day. I can't decide. Should I buy a shotgun or a .22 rifle? The former works much better as a personal defense weapon. But I'll have a lot more fun shooting the latter.

Ronald Reagan - What July Fourth Means to Me - This was sent out by NewsMax. They asked us to forward it, so I saved a copy. [max]

There is a legend about the day of our nation's birth in the little hall in Philadelphia, a day on which debate had raged for hours. The men gathered there were honorable men hard-pressed by a king who had flouted the very laws they were willing to obey. Even so, to sign the Declaration of Independence was such an irretrievable act that the walls resounded with the words "treason, the gallows, the headsman's axe," and the issue remained in doubt.

The legend says that at that point a man rose and spoke. He is described as not a young man, but one who had to summon all his energy for an impassioned plea. He cited the grievances that had brought them to this moment and finally, his voice falling, he said, "They may turn every tree into a gallows, every hole into a grave, and yet the words of that parchment can never die. To the mechanic in the workshop, they will speak hope; to the slave in the mines, freedom. Sign that parchment. Sign if the next moment the noose is around your neck, for that parchment will be the textbook of freedom, the Bible of the rights of man forever."

He fell back exhausted. The 56 delegates, swept up by his eloquence, rushed forward and signed that document destined to be as immortal as a work of man can be. When they turned to thank him for his timely oratory, he was not to be found, nor could any be found who knew who he was or how he had come in or gone out through the locked and guarded doors.

klamathbasincrisis.org - Klamath Basin Headgates Re-Opened During Peaceful Rally - On July fourth a group of about 300 asssembled at the head gates to the Klamath Project. About half the group trespassed on the fenced in area, and some of them liberated the locking mechanism and opened the gate. It has since been closed. [sierra]

James Buchal - Independence Day Issue: A Blow for Liberty at the Klamath Project - Good commentary on civil disobedience in the Klamath Basin.

The act of opening the headgates will tend to polarize the community, because action threatens efforts at consensus. But that is a good thing. Many in the Klamath Basin have urged compromise, conciliation, and consensus with federal officials and their environmentalist allies at every step of the way. Margaret Thatcher has accurately described "consensus" as "the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies in search of something in which no one believes, but to which no one objects; the process of avoiding the very issues that have to be solved, merely because you cannot get agreement on the way ahead.". "What great cause," she asks, "would have been fought and won under the banner 'I stand for consensus'?"

...

It has been reported that the Sheriff of Klamath County, Timothy Evinger, retains his common sense. He is reportedly refusing to cooperate with federal officials. This is a good first step. Perhaps the Sheriff can go further, instructing his deputies to tail federal officials, and publicly post their whereabouts. Perhaps he can arrest federal officials who violate local laws, say, by going 26 mph in a 25 mph zone. Indeed, the entire community should shun the federal officials. Where do the federal employees eat lunch? Where do they buy gas? None should sell to them, and those that do should be picketed. If the Klamath community cannot deter collaborators within, it has little hope of influencing the powers without.

Don Feder at WorldNetDaily - A letter from the Founding Fathers - A letter from "Continental heaven" concerning the state of the republic. It ain't good. (the state of the republic, that is. The letter is good) [sierra]

Benjamin Franklin said we gave you a republic "if you can keep it." From our vantage point, it does not look promising. Were we alive today, we'd raise another rebellion.

Gordon S. Jones of UPI via Sierra Times - Clear Thinking On the UN - Ron Paul's H.R.1146, the American Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2001, which ends the membership of the United States in the United Nations, may have hope for passage this congressional session. Henry Hyde has announced his support for it. [sierra]

Scott McNealy at The Washington Post - The Case Against Absolute Privacy - an article from the end of May by the CEO of Sun Microsystems. Says that many of us would benefit from having personal information, i.e. medical records, available on-line to the right people. I agree with what he says. The problem is restricting access to "the right people". Once information is out, it's out. Maybe the solution is considering personal information to be property that can be licensed to companies and/or government. Violate the license, go to jail. Or maybe McNealy is right and the market will take care of this. [kuro5hin]

Any company that doesn't properly safeguard people's personal information will suffer the same fate as a bank that doesn't safeguard people's money. It will go out of business. But privacy is not always desirable -- and absolute privacy is a disaster waiting to happen.

Kuro5hin comments here, including this from "dr k":

Someday soon you could find yourself in a strange city and your Web-enabled wireless phone will be able to recommend a nearby restaurant based on your fondness for French, Italian or Mexican cuisine...

Or maybe you'd be in the mood to eat a big pile of shit? The hypothetical situation above is very troubling, because [in my opinion] the main implication is: with the New Technology, you will no longer have to worry about living your own life.

What will you eat for lunch? Why, the phone company has already decided for you. What will you do today? Kraft has decided that you should see the new Sony film. Want to indulge in a victimless crime? The police are on their way.

Maybe someone like McNealy could enjoy a life like this - I'm sure he finds himself alone in a strange city quite often. His life must suck, no friends, no interests, just lots of shiny things.

Will Cate - just say no to Windows XP - Mr. Cate just read an article by Walter Mossberg in the for-pay WSJ. He has been convinced to continue using Windows 2000 "until 2010 if I need to." [will]

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Quotes

Government doesn't work. Never did. Never will. Can't. But there are lots of good people. Love them.

-- Bill St. Clair

The Atlanta Declaration

Every man, woman, and responsible child has an unalienable individual, civil, Constitutional, and human right to obtain, own, and carry, openly or concealed, any weapon -- rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- any time, any place, without asking anyone's permission.

-- L. Neil Smith

Reread that pesky first clause of the Second Amendment. It doesn't say what any of us thought it said. What it says is that infringing the right of the people to keep and bear arms is treason. What else do you call an act that endangers "the security of a free state"? And if it's treason, then it's punishable by death. I suggest due process, speedy trials, and public hangings.

-- L. Neil Smith

A Penalty Clause for the Bill of Rights

Any official, appointed or elected, at any level of government, who attempts, through legislative act or other means, to nullify, evade, or avoid the provisions of the first ten amendments to this Constitution, or of the Thirteenth Amendment, shall be summarily removed from office, and, upon conviction, deprived of all pay and benefits including pension, and sentenced to imprisonment for life.

-- L. Neil Smith

Based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, and some of its own empirical work, the panel couldn't identify a single gun control regulation that reduced violent crime, suicide or accidents.

-- John Lott, commenting on the National Academy of Sciences report on gun control laws.

Who is a libertarian?

Zero Aggression Principle ("Zap")

"A libertarian is a person who believes that no one has the right, under any circumstances, to initiate force against another human being, or to advocate or delegate its initiation. Those who act consistently with this principle are libertarians, whether they realize it or not. Those who fail to act consistently with it are not libertarians, regardless of what they may claim."

-- L. Neil Smith

(Formerly called the "Non-Aggression Principle", or "NAP")

Why Did It Have to be... Guns?

Make no mistake: all politicians -- even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership -- hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician -- or political philosophy -- can be put.

If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.

If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.

What his attitude -- toward your ownership and use of weapons -- conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?

-- L. Neil Smith

Concise

"Tell me," I was once asked, "What do you think about gun control? Give me the short answer." To which I replied, "If you try to take our firearms we will kill you."

-- Mike Vanderboegh

Also from The Atlanta Declaration:

... like going to the bathroom, breathing, eating, sleeping, or making love, it turns out that self-defense is a bodily function one cannot safely or effectively delegate to a second party.

-- L. Neil Smith

This does not mean that "Marijuana should be available by prescription." It means that morphine sulfate should be available in five pound bags at the supermarket for a couple of bucks, like sugar... but probably in a different aisle, to avoid confusion.

-- Vin Suprynowicz

If you refuse to pay unjust taxes, your property will be confiscated. If you attempt to defend your property, you will be arrested. If you resist arrest, you will be clubbed. If you defend yourself against clubbing, you will be shot dead. These procedures are known as the Rule of Law.

-- Edward Abbey

The state can only survive as long as a majority is programmed to believe that theft isn't wrong if it's called taxation or asset forfeiture or eminent domain, that assault and kidnapping isn't wrong if it's called arrest, that mass murder isn't wrong if it's called war.

-- Bill St. Clair