2022 - Will 2022 Be the Year of the Restoration of Gun Rights?

There are several court cases against the various firearms restrictions implemented by States against their People. 2021 and 2022 have the potential to be ruinous for the forces of Authoritarianism in states like California, New Jersey and New York who, for decades, have labored yearly to envision new ways to regulate firearms and infringe on the Second Amendment. It's like these states are a think tank for an infringement strategy.

The Supreme Court has opted to take several of the most important cases from these states such as a magazine ban limiting magazine capacities to 10 rounds, restrictive issuance policies regarding pistol carry permits and the ever hated but incredibly popular "Assault weapons" that are available in 90% of the rest of the US.

This could be so ruinous for Authoritarians such as Michael Bloomberg that the current President Joe Biden has created a commission to "investigate" changing the number of Supreme Court justices. Basically, the idea is to add something like four more justices to the Bench so that Biden can pick all four, stacking the deck against any "Conservative" ideals. Can't win? Cheat.

Concealed Carry Permits

New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen is the case from New York state that is changing the restrictive concealed carry permit issuance policy that has been in place for decades. For me, this is the most important case since it will impact the average everyday Citizen in these Slave States the most. The unhindered ability for the People to exercise their Right to self-defense in those Slave States will help drive down the wildly out of control crime rate in said places.

When I did the math on this, a favorable vote for the People and the Right to Keep and Bear Arms would potentially add an additional 4 to 7 million concealed carrier permits in the areas where No Issue is the policy. The US is reportedly to have around 19 to 21 million carry permits. I'm looking forward to an additional bolstering of those numbers.

Magazine Bans

This and the AWB are the darlings of gun control in the US. They are low hanging fruit and easy to target with cheap propaganda and media manipulation. Association of N.J. Rifle PistolnClubs, Inc. v. Attorney Gen. of N.J is one of the cases that is dealing with a blanket ban on magazines with capacities over 10 rounds. Previously, a person could posses previously acquired magazines but the newest law and a similar one in CA require disposal or modification of those magazines. 

"Assault Weapons" Ban

Assault weapons is a term created by gun control advocates based on the same term for a different weapon. Generally, assault weapons are semi-auto firearms that have specific features, those guns are bad according to may Authoritarians and need to be banned. They claim it's about making it harder to commit mass shootings but these are the same people who track incidents with BB guns as shootings and ANY mass shooting with something like a traditional handgun under the guise those incidents are Sandy Hook repeats. You can commit a mass shooting with a cowboy cap and ball revolver but that doesn't really matter does it? The magazine ban case is James Miller v. Bonta. A win in the Supreme Court for the People would immediately crush the push for gun control in the US on the Federal level pretty much whole-stop. There just simply isn't much more that is as big as semi-auto firearms with those banned features that gun control advocates have pushed. 

I know I said that the carry permit case is the most important case and it is because it impacts more people on a daily basis. There are literally 10s of millions of American's who can't exercise their rights because they live in CA, HI, NY, NJ, MD, etc. Most people don't care about magazine capacity or semi-auto rifles until they need one. If it really came down to it and I needed to fight for my Rights, I can make a featureless goblin of a substitute for an AR-15 pattern rifle work. If I had to fight with a muzzle-loading rifle or club, I'd do it. Screw your anti-American, anti-Republic, Authoritarianism and your gun control.

03 OCT Update: The NY case for concealed carry is getting huge. The list of groups both pro-freedom and anti-freedom who have filed briefs is LONG. See the below page for the list.

https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/20-843.html

09 NOV Update: The Supreme Court has listened the oral arguments for the NY carry permit case. According to folks who know more about this sort of thing than I do, it isn't looking good for New York. We shouldn't expect to hear back from the Justices until sometime around summer 2022.

07 DEC Update: The California magazine ban case was upheld in the 9th Circuit which isn't a surprise. No details on if the Supreme Court has opted to pick it up yet.

Mental Health is Where We Are Failing - Just My Opinion

I'm tired people shooting up people. I'm tired of hearing how banning semi-automtic rifles will stop mass shootings, I'm tired of hearing the political term "Assault Weapons," I'm tired of crazy people and domestic terrorists committing atrocities and I'm tired of hearing "+30,000 people die from gun violence."

Your Red Herring

Banning AR-15's and similar center-fire semi-automatic rifles along with other proposed "assault weapons" is absolutely a red herring and will not prevent someone from using a firearm such as a pump-action shotgun and/or a handgun to commit a mass shooting. My cherry-picked evidence of this comes in the form of the Charleston, SC church shooting and Virginia Tech shooting where those persons committed their crimes with handguns. In another attack that occurred in Germany in 2002, a person with a pump-action shotgun (an extremely ubiquitous firearm here in the US) and a handgun attacked a school, killing teachers. With this information, it's very clear that an AR-15 is not the only firearm that can be used in a mass shooting. This is your evidence that banning these touted "assault weapons" will prevent mass shootings is a "red herring."

So what will?

Nothing.

As long as people have a basic understanding of what a firearm is and how it works, a motivated person can fabricate a firearm easily and commit a mass shooting (the FBI defines a mass shooting as when 4 or more are shot but not necessarily killed). Yes, banning guns and strictly controlling their access and limiting those who would have access to said firearms will reduce mass shootings assuming you were able to confiscate the ones here in the US one wanted to prohibit (good luck with that blood bath). In parallel, if you ban alcohol the number of DUI's would probably drop since the substance is less prevalent. Though this is the US and we literally have a sport that was born from running illegal alcohol (NASCAR). So again, good luck with that. That's where that similarity ends but the basic idea is that if there is more of something that exists, you are more likely to run into it being used inappropriately. This goes for everything that exists including Free Speech. All in all, you will never see control like you see in Japan and Germany as long as the Supreme Court says the Heller case is canon.

So how can we MINIMIZE mass shootings.

The reality is that we need to analyze the various attacks but from what I can tell, the most common denominator is mental health. Other reasons exist such as a non-violent person breaking down and attacking in a fit of passion/anxiety or a terrorist attack but those are going to be difficult to stop and require a different approach.

My opinion is that the mental health infrastructure is what should be addressed. An analysis of the laws on the books will be needed to see where we can create a precision law, and not a shotgun blast like a ban would be, that would protect people's rights AND lives. Personally I feel that life without freedom is slavery.

It appears that law enforcement dropped the ball with the Parkland shooting and could have prevented it by putting this kid on the NICS list prior to his 18th birthday. It appears they had several opportunities. Remember that we do have a system in place but if we don't use it correctly then there isn't really a point in having it.

If we can improve our mental health infrastructure, we befit from not only in helping reduce these attacks but we also stand to improve some of the lives of those 44,000 people that commit suicide every year.

But "30,000+ people die from gun violence every year!"

The people who push this number clump the 19,000 people who would commit suicide with a firearm in with people who murder the other 11,000. I feel this is inappropriate and unhelpful if not down right disrespectful to those people suffering from depression and anxiety that choose to end their life. By sorting out how to better handle the mental health issue and narrowly tailoring our laws, we stand a chance of not only saving a few of the 11,000 from being mowed down during a mass shooting, we can also save some of the 44,000 who choose to kill themselves, all while protecting our rights.

H.R. 38 - The Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017 - Do it. Just do it.

Recently, one of the House committees voted in favor of a very important bill. While I'm not pleased with the method of execution, states like New Jersey and Maryland are the reason this is happening. If those states had bothered to recognize their citizen's rights, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

 As a Georgia resident, I am not directly impacted by this legislation. The reason for that is because the states that surround Georgia and that states that I regularly travel to and through, all have reciprocity with Georgia. The only state that I have traveled into since moving to Georgia is Maryland and that was on my way to the Canaan Valley. I've also skirted D.C.

When I passed through Maryland (Oakland specifically) I stowed my sidearm until I got into the Canaan Valley. The funny thing I noticed on my drive was the small amount of signage that indicates that you've entered Maryland on those back roads. It would be easy to make a wrong turn and end up in an unfriendly state.

The way this bill benefits me is through requiring Maryland to recognize my permit. This would make it so that as I drive through Oakland from Morgantown down to the Canaan Valley, I would not be in violation of Maryland law by carrying my legally owned handgun and not having an impossible-for-the-average-citizen-to-acquire permit.

That is the main benefit of this law.

From what I understand, however, is that this bill may also make it so a resident of Maryland or New Jersey that isn't otherwise prohibited in another state, could receive a non-resident permit (provided they pass the background checks and meet the requirements) from another state (such as Utah or Virginia) and could still carry in their hyper-restrictive home state. If that is true, this finally gives those residents a much needed vector to exercise their natural rights.

It also, allegedly, protects you from magazine and ammunition limitations.

This needs to pass immediately. If it does, I would actually consider visiting states like New York for vacation.