Schumer Pushes For Military To Report Applicants’ Drug Use to Prevent Gun Purchases
Charles Schumer
Thanks to Chris W. for sending this along, commenting, “Admit you’ve used illegal drugs? You may be disqualified if Senator Chuck Schumer has his way” (reported by Fox News):
If someone admits to a federal official that he’s used illegal drugs, that information should be sent to the FBI so that person can be disqualified from purchasing a gun, Sen. Chuck Schumer said Sunday.
Noting that the alleged shooter in the Tucson massacre had admitted to military recruiters that he had used drugs on several occasions, Schumer said he is proposing to the Justice Department and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that the military be required to notify federal officials about such admissions. The New York Democrat said such a process does not require new legislation.
Jared Lee Loughner is charged with five federal counts in the killing of a federal judge and shooting of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. The…
Would You Have Sold Bullets to Jared Loughner?
I am sure this post will spark, the perennial “Guns Kill People” Vs. “People Kill People” debate we have in the United States, and my interest is to further the discourse, not draw an opinion in this debate as related to what happened in Tucson yet. Here are some things I’ve noticed reported by the media:
- The Wall Street Journal has revealed Arizona shooting suspect Jared Loughner was actually turned away at one Wal-Mart but able to buy bullets at another Wal-Mart just hours before the attack. To the right is his mugshot, released from the Pima County Sheriff’s Office.
- There is also some debate as to whether the Federal Assault Weapons Ban that expired in 2004 would have prevented (or lessened the number of victims in) the shooting.
- Furthermore, it’s a bit of a mystery how Loughner was able to buy an expensive pistol in the first place.
Thanks for your thoughts.
BU ACLU: ‘When Criticizing Rhetoric, Remember Freedom of Speech’
Today I received an interesting email from the Boston University ACLU (text below). It’s also on their Facebook Page:
Jared Lee Loughner, charged with Saturday’s shootings, has invoked his right to silence, leaving us ignorant of his motives. Sources disagree on his politics — an acquaintance calls him an “extreme” liberal; a government memo links him to a “racial-realist” journal (one that denies any ties to him). His online writings point to an unhinged mind. But though much remains unclear, people are withdrawing some of their first theories, which rashly labeled the shootings a Tea Party / Republican plot.
Replacing those accusations is a broader look at how the shooter may have responded to intense political rhetoric. Critics again blame the right-wing, mainly Sarah Palin, whose PAC last year produced an image with crosshairs on congressional seats such as Giffords’. It was only a slight escalation from the usual manner of treating politics…
Jared Loughner Pre-Planned Assassination Of Rep. Giffords
T
he only story that matters as we start the week is the Giffords shooting, for which a nationwide moment of silence is about to begin as I post this story. The New York Times is reporting that the attack was premeditated:
TUCSON — Prosecutors charged Jared L. Loughner, a troubled 22-year-old college dropout, with five federal counts on Sunday, including the attempted assassination of a member of Congress, in connection with a shooting rampage on Saturday morning that left six people dead and 14 wounded.
Evidence seized from Mr. Loughner’s home, about five miles from the shooting, indicated that he had planned to kill Representative Gabrielle Giffords, Democrat of Arizona, according to documents filed in Federal District Court in Phoenix.
Special Agent Tony M. Taylor Jr. of the F.B.I. said in an affidavit that an envelope found in a safe in the home bore these handwritten words: “I planned ahead,” “My assassination” and “Giffords.”
Mr.…
Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Shot By Gunman
Via NPR:
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head by a gunman at a public event in Tucson on Saturday. There are conflicting reports about whether she was killed.
The Pima County, Ariz., sheriff’s office told member station KJZZ the 40-year-old Democrat was killed. A hospital spokeswoman said Giffords was in critical condition and undergoing surgery.
At least eight other people, including members of her staff, were injured. There also were conflicting reports on the number of deaths at the scene, but President Obama, in a statement, said “we know that some have passed away” and that Giffords was “gravely wounded.”
Giffords, who was re-elected to a third term in November, was hosting a “Congress on Your Corner” event at a Safeway in northwest Tucson when a gunman ran up and started shooting, according to Peter Michaels, news director of Arizona Public Media.
The suspect fired indiscriminately from about four feet away, Michaels said. A…
The TSA Let a Loaded Gun Get on an Airplane (Video)
Kevin Quinn reports for ABC KTRK-TV:
HOUSTON (KTRK) — TSA checkpoints at airports are at the front lines of preventing terrorism. When you go through security, you expect to be scanned and searched. And you expect TSA to prevent contraband from getting on planes, but as we’ve learned, that doesn’t always happen.
Houston businessman Farid Seif says it was a startling discovery. He didn’t intend to bring a loaded gun on a flight out of Houston and can’t understand how TSA screeners didn’t catch it.
Nearing the height of last year’s Christmas travel season, TSA screeners at Bush Intercontinental Airport somehow missed a loaded pistol, one that was tucked away inside a carry-on computer bag. “I mean, this is not a small gun,” Seif said. “It’s a .40 caliber gun.”
Florida Truck Dealership Gives Out Free AK-47s With Vehicle Purchases
Ah, America, where machine guns are dispensed like party favors. Via Aol News:
A truck dealership in Florida is firing up sales with the promise of a rapid-fire machine gun.
Customers have been streaming into Nations Trucks in Sanford, near Orlando, purchasing two dozen vehicles since the sale campaign began on Veterans Day last week. Each new truck owner also walks out with a free AK-47. “We’ve tripled our business,” general sales manager Nick Ginetta told AOL News. “We knew it would be controversial, but it’s been a phenomenal response.”
An image of the semiautomatic rifle is taped to the showroom’s window to lure shoppers. Buyers receive a $400 voucher good for one Kalashnikov at Shoot Straight, a weapons dealer with several locations in the Sunshine State.
All prospective gun owners must meet state and federal gun-control laws, but Ginetta has still drawn fire from anti-gun activists and alarmed neighbors. “I’ve had calls from…
Amtrak To Allow Guns On Most Trains
Want to travel through the country with your firearms, but can’t get through airport security? No worries, take the train! Amtrak will soon allow passengers to transport their firearms, unloaded and stored away. The Sacramento Bee reports:
Reversing a near decadelong ban, Amtrak will allow passengers to bring guns on most trains starting next month, including several that stop in Sacramento.
The change, pushed by gun rights advocates and ordered by Congress, aligns Amtrak’s firearms policy with air travel rules that allow unloaded guns to be stored in locked baggage holds.
Federal Homeland Security officials on Monday said they are OK with guns being on trains as long as security protocols are enforced.
“It’s deemed safe and appropriate,” federal Transportation Security Administration spokesman Nico Melendez said. “If people follow the rules, it’s pretty simple.”
[Continues at The Sacramento Bee]
Carving a Halloween Pumpkin … With A Gun? (Video)
YouTube user Hickok45 demonstrates his method for carving a pumpkin:
Basil Marceaux: He Wants Everyone in Tennessee to Have a Gun, and He’ll Fine You For Not Having One
Stephen Colbert sums up the candicacy of Basil Marceaux much better than I ever could. Remember Tennessee voters, that state has an open primary system … so anyone can vote!
Thought Control On Modern American College Campuses
In April of 2009 I designed and printed fliers for the group Students for Concealed Carry on Campus at a Pittsburgh community college. I included facts such as “The Supreme Court ruled that police have no obligation to protect the people.” These fliers earned me a meeting with the Dean of Student Development, Yvonne Burns, who angrily promised that the club would never be allowed on “her” campus, and ordered me to destroy all related literature.
I had been in a public quad handing out informational pamphlets–and had asked for permission to do so! Dean Burns told me I was soliciting; she had obviously been fed that line by a superior without thinking about it. When I told her that the legal definition of “solicitation” involved trying to sell something, she told me I was trying to “sell an idea.” Wait, isn’t that… college?
The SCCC website, concealedcampus.org, contains a link to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE; www.thefire.org), which recognized the violation of my First Amendment rights and worked with me to restore them — not because it supports gun rights, but because it supports free speech on campus. FIRE throws a wrench into the system of disinforming entire generations of college students — who are treated like children in need of supervision and protection from wayward improper ideas — with one simple tool: publicity. So, even if you hate guns or just don’t like me – please take a moment to look at www.thefire.org. You’ll be shocked by some of the things that college administrators do when they think no one’s watching. The moral outrage you feel after reading a few cases might inspire you to want to help FIRE restore liberty to our campuses…
Jesus, Sodomy, and Glocks
Via the First Church of Mutterhals:
That sounds like a Warren Zevon song from hell, but it’s not. It’s what I saw on someone’s car on the way to work today. Three bumper stickers, right in a row; the first one said Jesus Saves, Obama Spends. The second said Obama is Socializing and Sodomizing America. The third said Body Piercings by Glock.
Let me pull up my favorite arm chair and give this guy a go. I think his choice in bumper stickers has less to do with his distaste for Obama and his policies and more to do with his fervent desire to get reamed long and hard by a Jewish hippie. Of course, that’s really none of my business. But is it appropriate to put your deep seated sexual fantasies on the back of your car?
Also, I thought christians were supposed to be anti-sodomy? I distinctly remember a ‘no spilling…
Make My Day Pastor: Bring Your Gun Into Church in Louisiana
Thou Shall Not Kill. Unless it’s Time for Worship. The Times-Picayune reports:
Gov. Bobby Jindal has signed into law one of the more controversial bills from the recent legislative session, one allowing guns to be carried into houses of worship.
Jindal’s office said Tuesday the governor acted on the bill in the past few days after receiving it June 20.
Including the “gun-in-church” bill, House Bill 1272 by Rep. Henry Burns, R-Haughton, Jindal has signed into law 940 of the 1,067 bills the Legislature sent him, vetoed 12, and used his pen to line-item spending measures in four different budget bills.
Burns’ bill would authorize persons who qualified to carry concealed weapons having passed the training and background checks to bring them to churches, mosques, synagogues or other houses of worship as part of a security force.
Supreme Court Extends Handgun Rights
Handguns. Photo: Joshuashearn (CC)
What do you think – was the Supreme Court right to uphold U.S. citizens’ right to carry handguns, even in major cities? I can appreciate both sides of the argument, but as a New York City resident I’d prefer not to see handguns in an urban environment. David G. Savage reports for the Los Angeles Times:
The Supreme Court reversed a ruling upholding Chicago’s ban on handguns Monday and extended the reach of the 2nd Amendment as a nationwide protection against laws that infringe on the “right to keep and bear arms.”
The 5-4 decision appears to void the 1982 ordinance, one of the nation’s strictest, which barred city residents from having handguns for their own use, even at home.
The ruling has both local and national implications.
Two years ago, the high court ruled in a case from Washington, D.C., that the 2nd Amendment protects the rights of individuals to…
United Nations Wants To Take Guns Away From Americans
I’m not sure who made this video but it’s quite an effective piece of anti-UN, pro-guns propaganda (no editorial slant intended – let us know in the comments if you agree or disagree with the filmmaker):
Chicago’s Pointless Handgun Ban
From Reason.com:
When Chicago passed a ban on handgun ownership in 1982, it was part of a trend. Washington, D.C. had done it in 1976, and a few Chicago suburbs took up the cause in the following years. They all expected to reduce the number of guns and thus curtail bloodshed.
District of Columbia Attorney General Linda Singer told The Washington Post in 2007, “It’s a pretty common-sense idea that the more guns there are around, the more gun violence you’ll have.” Nadine Winters, a member of the Washington city council in 1976, said she assumed at the time that the policy “would spread to other places.”
But the fad never really caught fire—even before last summer, when the Supreme Court struck down the D.C. law and cast doubt on the others, including the Chicago ordinance before the court Tuesday. The Second Amendment may kill such restrictions, but in most places, it wasn’t needed…
U.S. Supreme Court Set To Extend Gun Rights
Handguns. Photo: Joshuashearn (CC)
The Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in a landmark gun rights case that could apply the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms to both cities and states. Warren Richey reports for the Christian Science Monitor:
The US Supreme Court appears to be on verge of extending the constitutional protection of the Second Amendment’s right to keep and bear arms to every jurisdiction in the nation.
During an hour-long oral argument at the high court on Tuesday, several justices exhibited a willingness to enforce their landmark 2008 gun-rights decision at the state and local level.
If they do so, the decision may doom not only the Chicago handgun ban at the center of Tuesday’s case, but other handgun bans and some of the toughest state and local gun-control laws in the country.
The only remaining question in McDonald v. Chicago was which constitutional mechanism the majority justices might use to apply…
Guns at Starbucks? Pushing the Right to Bear Arms in Public
Don’t be “flashing your piece on the lanes,” kids. These Starbucks cowboys have every right to carry those pistols, but does anyone really want to live in a community where they’re always reminded that people have the ability to easily murder each other? It makes me a bit uneasy, but I would rather be uneasy than lose the right to be a cowboy myself.
From The Christian Science Monitor:
Small groups of armed Californians have been turning up at cafes and coffee shops with handguns holstered to their belts to raise awareness about gun rights and what they call unfair limits on concealed weapon permits.
The loosely organized “Bay Area Open Carry Movement” will gather in the Presidio, a national park in San Francisco, on Saturday, just days after a new law took effect allowing weapons to be carried in national parks and wildlife refuges.
David LaTour, a student at San Jose State University, has been…
67-Year-Old Grandpa Holds Off Three Marijuana Robbers
Thanks to disinfo.com reader Steve Elliott for the news tip! Steve Elliott writes on Toke of the Town:
If you plan on stealing James Tillman’s marijuana, you’re going to need more than three guys. They’re not going to get James Tillman’s weed.
Tillman, 67, on Sunday shot and wounded one of three burglars who broke into his Sacramento, California home to steal his medical marijuana, reports Elyce Kirchner of CBS13.com:
The other two fled and haven’t been seen since. Mr. Tillman was definitely having none of their nonsense. After all, his grandkids were at home.
Dirty Harry’s Favorite Gunmaker’s Punk Move
From TheStreet.com’s Five Dumbest Things on Wall Street:
Something dirty is going on at Dirty Harry’s favorite gunmaker.
Amaro Goncalves, Smith & Wesson’s vice president for sales, was one of 22 individuals indicted by the U.S. Justice Department Tuesday for violating federal bribery laws involving the sale of firearms. Goncalves and crew were charged with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and conspiracy to commit money laundering involving the sale of guns and body armor.
The indictments were filed in December after agents worked undercover last year to expose the ring. The individuals were arrested on Monday in Las Vegas and Miami.
Go ahead and make our day, because a Dumbest entry rarely gets cooler than this.
According to the indictment, an unidentified business associate who was a former executive for an arms manufacturer set up a meeting between Goncalves and two representatives of an unnamed African country’s minister of defense. Little did he know, however,…
