Way back in 2000, Charlton Heston stood up at the annual meeting of the NRA, raised a plastic version of a flintlock musket over his head and vowed that in order to take away his gun, the government would have to take it from his “cold, dead hands.” I was at that meeting, but I didn’t attend Heston’s speech. What I do remember is that after the speech, lots of kids and even some adults went walking past my booth with a clenched fist in the air and shouted, “from my cold, dead hands.”
The use of a musket to represent what makes America ‘great’ has been a fixture of American culture for years. After all, it’s how Davey Crockett ‘kilt’ him a bar when he was only three.’ Or maybe he was six. I don’t remember which was which.
Then of course there was the Alamo where Crockett, James Bowie and William Travis held off Santa Anna’s Mexican Army for almost two weeks with their trusty flintlock guns.
But time moves on and things change. And one of the things which appears to be changing is the use of AR-15 rifles as prop in campaign ads for candidates from both sides.
As of last week, six Republicans have announced their intention to run in the 2022 election to replace Missouri’s retiring GOP Senator, Roy Blunt. One of those candidates is none other than Mark McCloskey, the idiot who stood in front of his house and waved an AR-15 at some BLM protestors who were marching by. He and his wife, who was waving a pistol at the crowd, copped a misdemeanor plea last week so McCloskey immediately went out and bought himself another AR-15.
How do we know he now owns another AR-15 to replace the gun taken from his ‘cold, dead hands’ as part of his plea deal? Because he immediately posted a pic of himself with the gun on his Twitter page, where else?
It goes without saying, of course, that McCloskey’s Senate campaign will probably be based on trying to get every gun-nut in Missouri to show up and vote to protect their 2nd-Amendment ‘rights.’ I mean here’s a guy who used a gun to defend himself, his wife, and his home from a Black ‘mob.’ Which trigger-head in Missouri wouldn’t vote for him?
But let’s not sit back, my fellow members of Gun-control Nation, shake our heads in dismay and assume that only members of the red team believe that using a gun as a stage prop is a quick and easy way to pile up the votes.
Back in 2017, Montana held a special election to fill a House seat vacated by Ryan Zinke who was picked to run the Interior Department for Trump. Both candidates ran TV ads showing them shooting guns. But the guns in their ads were old-style, lever-action rifles right out of the Old West. You don’t see guns around like that anymore. Those lever-action guns are just as old-fashioned as the flintlock that Charlton Heston held over his head.
Don’t make the mistake of assuming, however, that it’s usually a GOP candidate like McCloskey who runs campaign ads featuring what the gun industry calls a ‘modern sporting rifle,’ even though it’s really just an assault rifle known as the AR-15.
Pennsylvania’s 17th Congressional District is currently represented by a Democrat named Conor Lamb. The 17th District is about as rural and country as you can get. What kind of TV ads did Lamb run when he won his Congressional seat in 2018? An ad showing him banging away at a shooting range with his trusty AR-15.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with using a gun as a prop in ads for political campaigns. But that doesn’t mean we have to let civilians own those guns. After all, nobody who saw Charlton Heston raise a flintlock over his head at the NRA show went out and bought one of those guns to keep around the house for self-defense.
What Is An Assault Rifle?: Weisser, Michael R.: 9798728410980: Amazon.com: Books
Don’t make the mistake of assuming, however, that it’s usually a GOP candidate like McCloskey who runs campaign ads featuring what the gun industry calls a ‘modern sporting rifle,’ even though it’s really just an assault rifle known as the AR-15.
Pennsylvania’s 17th Congressional District is currently represented by a Democrat named Conor Lamb. The 17th District is about as rural and country as you can get. What kind of TV ads did Lamb run when he won his Congressional seat in 2018? An ad showing him banging away at a shooting range with his trusty AR-15.
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with using a gun as a prop in ads for political campaigns. But that doesn’t mean we have to let civilians own those guns. After all, nobody who saw Charlton Heston raise a flintlock over his head at the NRA show went out and bought one of those guns to keep around the house for self-defense.
Jun 21, 2021 @ 09:22:46
And don’t forget the picture released by the White House in August 2012, of Mr. Obama shooting at the Camp David range. The photograph was published nearly 2 months after Sandy Hook shooting.
Wonder how many people who saw the photograph went out and bought one of those guns to keep around the house for self-defense?
Jun 21, 2021 @ 14:03:58
Where do we draw the line? What do we do with the M1 Garand, M1A1’s or the M1 Carbine? M1911 or Beretta 92’s? Mini-14’s, which I think are a miniature M1A1? We’ve always owned full on military guns. Heck, the government sells “weapons ‘o war” to us as part of the Civilian Marksmanship Program, which was designed to ensure newly conscripted Americans knew the muzzle from the breech.
With the NFA, as a response to the Roaring Twenties booze wars, the government put its foot down and said full auto required a special Federal stamp, but you could still get one of those. So civilians can still own actual machine guns, if you can get one of the pre-’86 ones. It works. The folks with NFA stamped machine guns don’t run around shooting up grade schools.
Gun Control Nation can put forward a cogent argument that modern military style rifles have gotten too lethal to trust to any old Joe Billybob who can walk out of Danny’s Feed, Tackle, and Smokepoles with an AR or equivalent. Given the rare but catastrophic use of these weapons when trusted to the hands of anyone who can sign a 4473 (or bum one from someone who can), one can propose a middle ground. In keeping with tradition, one can define (as Mr. Chipman refuses to do) a class of weapons requiring a special stamp and chalk it up to what we in the nuke facility world call “taking reasonable precautions against rare but catastrophic events”. Example, Las Vegas.
The usual rhetoric about “weapons of war” and “only one purpose, to kill as many people as possible…” that is used to advocate for bans on military style rifles is a lot of political hot air and flies in the face of legislation, law, the Constitution, and history.
I’ve yet to see someone in authority trying to seriously split the difference. I thought Old Joe had mentioned something about expanding the kinds of firearms where you needed that two hundred buck stamp. I’m glad to write a check. Once. Its good insurance against having to be tarred with the same brush as the next Stephen Paddock, James Holmes, Adam Lanza, et al. Give Uncle Sam two or three years to write and enact legislation and put forward a path to full implementation and get it done.
Jun 21, 2021 @ 14:48:30
Exactly,,,where do we draw the line? Most if not every firearm was designed for or similar to military weapons.
If I understand your position, Mike has over 60+ firearm/guns/weapons. I don’t know, but I would guess that most if not all of those firearms/guns/weapons were designed after military firearms and/or have similar features of military firearms. If my math is correct, for him to keep those 60+ firearm/guns/weapons he would have to write out a check to his favorite three letter government agency for more than $1,200. Sounds good…I’m sure Mike could afford that and would be happy and willing to pay. But what about people who live in poverty and low-income communities?
You can make numbers say most anything but I have heard that half of all crime is believed to go unreported to local law enforcement. When people live in households that are struggling with poverty, they also have a higher rate of violence that involves a firearm at 3.5 per 1,000 people compared to 0.8-2.5 per 1,000 people in middle-to-high income families. (these are crimes that are reported) Those people in middle-to-high income families may be able to pay the $200 stamp. And they may also be able to afford a $200 stamp for each of their firearms. However, what about those people who live in low income and crime-ridden communities and find it very difficult to make rent and put food on the table, etc. Now they would have to pay an additional $200 for a firearm stamp. And that is if they could afford the firearm to start with.
Jun 21, 2021 @ 17:25:04
Not sure how I would do it, Alan. Even that so called expert, David Chipman, claims he doesn’t know how to define what he wants to ban. Frankly, I think he is lying and wants to ban whatever he can get away with. That’s another issue. I hope at least a couple of Dems (such as Sen. Manchin) flush that nomination down the political commode.
I would prefer not to ban anything. Perhaps we could have a national “shall issue” permit that lets you own any bleeping semiauto rather than trying to split hairs. Maybe stop at standard issue government magazines. 30 rds or less without that special stamp. The idea of the Well Regulated Militia was that we would call into service every able bodied man (well now, “person”) to defend the nation. I would argue that one doesn’t want to be in a foxhole with someone who is as likely to flame out and mow down his own platoon because his breakfast burrito was cold rather than shoot at the enemy. You don’t want the lunatic fringe covering your back.
I think there might be a solution here but I freely admit its beyond what I could come up with in a comment on Mike’s blog. But we should start thinking about it. And your point about finances is a good one. The idea of a poll tax was to keep poor (especially Blacks) from voting. Places like NYC use an exhorbitant permit fee (and “may issue” permitting) to deny people the opportunity to own a firearm. That is just as wrong as a poll tax.
Jun 21, 2021 @ 15:08:20
Can government have it both ways.
It is common cause that objects cannot influence human behaviour, yet millions of deluded people believe guns or more correctly firearms are responsible for all sorts of falsely coupled events. We see phrases that show this time and again repeated in the media and all social media. False constructs generated by a propaganda organisation seeking to instil this impossible notion in peoples minds. Phrases like “gun violence” or “gun crime” which clearly indicate falsity and the intention to mislead and lie. Quite obviously all firearm control laws are based on this physically impossible lie. This includes stacking figures of crime and firearms as if they are connected when they obviously are not. Ministers, police and gun control all make statements that imply or confirm this claim that guns cause crime. They play with words like make it easier, accessible, available…. and government must control the guns. There is no other justification offered for taking property from innocent people who have committed no crime or done no wrong based entirely on a suspicion and a lie. That is deliberately endangering the peoples lives.
Yet we have a perfect example of this government and legal hypocrisy in our courts. A plea for leniency based on diminished or absent responsibility for the use of a firearm in crime will be rightfully rejected by all courts. Our courts are not fooled by government or propaganda organisations spreading lies. Since courts are owned and run by government and government must abide by its own courts rulings, that implies all gun laws are illegal as no provision is made for diminished responsibility and no proof is offered of causality to justify the law. Laws based on suspicion, guesses or unproven relationships and government “need” are null and void. Every firearm control law exists entirely based on a false claim crimes are caused by firearms. This may be stated or implied but it still exists. Many words are used to avoid this causality and nothing illustrates that better then phrases like “gun violence” or crime. Even a claim of public safety must fail as this implies firearms reduce public safety a totally false and impossible claim. Both the police and government would not give up their firearms to make them safer as gun control claims.
One cannot simply have laws based on peoples delusional demands especially if they are driven by ideological hate organisations like those who subscribe to gun control. Why have the legal scholars not attacked these illegitimate laws based on the hypocrisy of false claims that will not stand up in court and provide diminished responsibility. Government cannot have it both ways or can it?
Jun 21, 2021 @ 15:05:41
Mike Weisser “But that doesn’t mean we have to let civilians own those guns.”
And that is his attitude to firearm owners.
Watch out for those who try to be reasonable but have no intention of doing that. They are not sane people but delusional gun control lunatics. As certainly insane as people claiming to be driven by voices speaking to them. These nut cases see guns making people commit crimes.
We stupidly let them drive on our roads… and influence the public as well as law makers.
Jun 26, 2021 @ 08:36:12
1. Heston was holding an actual, hand-made flintlock rifle, not a “plastic musket”.
2. An assault rifle is: A light-weight, magazine-fed, SELECT FIRE shoulder arm, firing an intermediate-power cartridge. An AR15, or any other semi-auto, is NOT an assault rifle.
When the first sentence of your post is a lie, you lose all credibility.
Jun 29, 2021 @ 11:28:32
If you want to disagree with me, that’s fine. But if you call me a ‘liar’ because you believe one thing and I believe another, you’ll be banned from this website. I do not permit profanity or personal insults. Get it?