A collectivist on "The Tea Party's Gun Problem." Motivating me to embrace my inner extremist.

Adam Winkler, firearms totalitarian at UCLA.

On the same day as our RTC rally at Horse Pens 40, Adam Winkler, an alleged "constitutional law professor" at UCLA, published this Daily Beast column on "The Tea Party's Gun Problem."

The article began with this squib:

As the Tea Party gears up for big wins on Tuesday, Adam Winkler sounds the alarm on an overlooked part of their radical agenda to overturn gun control laws in America — and their ties to revolutionary militia.

MBV Observations:
A. There is no one "Tea Party" buy many, many Tea Parties.
B. Only a collectivist boob would characterize the Tea Parties' desire for smaller, safer government as a "radical agenda." (Remember TEA stands for "Taxed Enough Already.")
C. This "revolutionary militia" is a new pejorative. Actually, the constitutional militia movement that I have been a part of for almost twenty years has a restoration goal. The "revolutionaries" seeking to overthrow the Founders' Republic are the collectivists.
D. As for the alleged "ties" to the constitutional militias, keep reading.

A traditionally hot topic in election season, gun control has been conspicuously absent from the recent candidate debates. This would not be of note if the candidates themselves had no designs on changing the nation’s gun laws. Yet many of the Tea Party candidates, who portray themselves as focused on economic issues like excessive government bailouts and lower taxes, have a radical gun agenda. They seek an extreme roll back of the nation’s gun laws.

MBV: There's that "extreme" word again. Wikipedia says:

Extremism is a term used to describe the actions or ideologies of individuals or groups outside the perceived political center of a society; or otherwise claimed to violate common moral standards. In democratic societies, individuals or groups that advocate the replacement of democracy with a authoritarian regime are usually branded extremists, in authoritarian societies the opposite applies.

Ah, OK, so it is Winkler, as the representative of authoritarian federal government restrictions on firearms in the hands of citizens who is calling us, the advocates of greater liberty, "extremists." Got that? It is sort of like the Gestapo calling the Jewish resistance fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto "extremists." OK, I guess that makes sense. One man's extremist is another man's freedom fighter. We disagree with the collectivist dialectic, so therefore we are "extremists." So, if true, I am proud to embrace my inner extremist.

In state after state, Tea Party candidates like Rand Paul in Kentucky and Joe Miller in Alaska advocate for the adoption of radical “Firearms Freedom Acts.” These laws, which declare that the federal government has exceeded its constitutional authority by regulating gun sales, are intended to nullify the federal Brady Act, which requires background checks for most gun purchases. Eight states in the throes of Tea Party fervor, including Arizona, Utah, and South Dakota, have already enacted such laws—even though, as a federal court held last month, these laws are clearly unconstitutional.

MBV: "In the throes of Tea Party fervor." Winkler makes the Tea Parties sound like a 72-hour virus. He wishes.

The insurrectionist motive behind these laws is most obvious in Wyoming’s version of the Firearms Freedom Act. If a federal official tries to enforce federal gun laws in that state, he faces up to a year in jail.

MBV: Note the adoption of the "insurrectionist" term. Like extremist it sounds scary. We scare Winkler. Good.

Despite gussying up their arguments in the language of federalism and states’ rights, these laws are intended to eliminate gun control. Advocates have no intention of pushing state legislatures to require background checks. And the impact of these laws, if upheld, would be far broader than background checks. Federal bans on the possession of firearms by drug users and domestic batterers could also be undermined, as would basic gun dealer record-keeping laws used to solve gang crime.

MBV: "(T)hese laws are intended to eliminate gun control." Well, not entirely, but it is a good start. In any case, we differ on the meaning of the term "gun control". As Winkler defines it he means citizen disarmament. We define "gun control" as marksmanship training -- hitting our target.

Rand Paul showed his true colors with a campaign promise that, if elected, he “will fight all attempts at gun control in the U.S. Senate.” He didn’t say “all attempts at ineffective gun control” or “all attempts other than those well designed to keep criminals from having guns.” He was unambiguous: no gun control period.

MBV: Gee, whiz. What's this guy's beef. That a politician actually made an unambiguous statement about citizen access to firearms? Schumer, Feinstein and Company have made very unambiguous statements of their own over the years.

Many of the Tea Party candidates claim to carry the mantle of Ronald Reagan’s policies. But their approach to gun control couldn’t be more different. Reagan vigorously endorsed the Brady Act, which was named after his press secretary, who was seriously injured by a bullet intended for Reagan.

When Ronald Reagan was Governor of California, he supported a law banning people from carrying loaded weapons on public streets. “There’s no reason why on the street today a citizen should be carrying loaded weapons,” he told reporters. Although touting Reagan on his website, Joe Miller apparently believes that everyone should be carrying a loaded weapon on the streets today. In July, he asked his supporters to attend a parade with their guns openly displayed. Video of the rally shows rows of men with military-style rifles slung over their shoulders, handguns strapped to their belts, and Joe Miller for Senate signs in their hands.

MBV: Yeah, well I'm not a worshiper of Ronaldus Magnus when it comes to firearms freedom. He signed a lot of bad firearm legislation, including most egregiously the 1986 machine gun ban. And the people carrying loaded guns that RR and every white liberal who supported the GCA 1968 were worried about were armed black folks like the Deacons for Defense and Justice and the Black Panthers. Firearms restrictions have always been first and foremost a racist response to black folks being able to defend themselves from the Klan and bigoted cops.

Make no mistake: when it comes to guns, they’re talking about a revolution.

MBV: No, you collectivist anal sphincter, we're talking about resisting a revolution against the Founders' Republic.

Another key sign of the Tea Party candidates’ gun rights extremism is their endorsement by Gun Owners of America, the second most prominent gun rights organization behind the NRA. GOA founder Larry Pratt argues that the NRA doesn’t support gun rights strongly enough and GOA touts itself as the “only no-compromise gun lobby in Washington.” GOA has backed Tea Party candidates nationwide, like Christine O’Donnell and Sharron Angle—candidates shunned by the NRA and the Republican Party establishment.

MBV: And the NRA backs Democrats, so maybe when Larry says the NRA doesn't support firearm rights enough, he happens to be right.

Now a major player in the Tea Party, Pratt is also usually credited with starting the crazed patriot militia movement in the 1990s.

MBV: Bullshit. A. Larry Pratt couldn't have "started" the broad-based popular movement that was the constitutional militia movement if he tried and, B. like "extremist, "insurrectionist," and "revolutionary," "crazed" is in the eye of the beholder.

Although the militias lost their luster after one of their supporters, Timothy McVeigh, bombed the federal building in Oklahoma City in 1995, they’re seeing a comeback under the Obama Administration — despite the fact that the President has shown no interest in new, restrictive gun laws. Obama has actually loosened rules on guns in national parks and on Amtrak, disappointing activists in his party and earning the President an “F” rating from the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. In the world of the Tea Party, however, facts don’t matter. They seem to know for certain that Obama is coming to get their guns.

MBV: Again bullshit. McVeigh was thrown out of the only militia meeting he ever went to. He ended up hanging with the Aryan Republican Army racists at Elohim City Oklahoma -- the same place that the FBI told the ATF to keep "hands off" when the ATF wanted to raid it BEFORE the bombing (February 1995) because Elohim City was "our operation." (See the case of Carol Howe and the journalism of J.D. Cash.)

Insofar as Obama showing "no interest" in more gun restrictions, that was (at the insistence of Rahm Emanuel) a simple matter of timing. Emanuel told the Brady Bunch and others that they would get around to it in the second term because they didn't want a repeat of the 1994 backlash. And we can see from the current ATF scandal about the reversal of the importation of Korean Garand rifles just how pro-firearm this administration is. The fact that the Obamanoids screwed up on the politics and the timing is not our fault, nor does it exculpate them.

In mainstream gun rights circles, firearms are valued primarily as a means of self-defense against criminals. For militias and Tea Party candidates, however, guns are for revolution. In Nevada, Sharron Angle gave voice to the militia movement’s views in January when, in a radio interview, she warned if elections don’t force officials like Harry Reid out of office, the people may be forced to turn to “Second Amendment remedies.”

MBV: If Winkler has a gripe with firearms as "Second Amendment remedies" for tyranny, he should take up his bitch with the Founders. They didn't craft the Second Amendment to fight petty crime or to secure the right to kill fuzzy animals.

Angle’s statements would be easier to dismiss as the ranting of a fringe candidate were she, well, fringe. Her views are shared by other Tea Partiers favored to win in November. Joe Miller, for instance, has been called “a friend of patriots” by Norm Olson, commander of the Alaska Citizens Militia. Ken Buck in Colorado refused to prosecute gun store owners who violated federal law when he was a U.S. Attorney, believing the federal government had no authority to regulate gun sales.

MBV: Maybe because it doesn't have that authority. Thomas Jefferson wouldn't argue with Ken Buck on THAT point.

The Tea Party candidates want Americans to believe they’re only interested in economics or federalism. Make no mistake: when it comes to guns, they’re talking about a revolution.

MBV: Winkler is both wrong and wrong. He is wrong about the revolution bit, because it it the Obamanoids and their Clintonistas forebears who are the "revolutionists" against the Founders' Republic.

He is also wrong about ascribing our adamant opposition to his "government monopoly of force" argument to all the Tea Partiers.

In the first place, the Tea Parties are engaged in the political process and are saying "please."

We of the constitutional militia movement and especially the Three Percenters have dispensed with "please." We say "or else."

That Winkler is allegedly a "constitutional law professor" indicates the truth of Billy Beck's warning, All politics now is merely dress rehearsal for civil war. At least Winkler seems to get that much, as he tries to tar the Tea Parties with the Three Percent using such pejoratives as "extremist" and "crazed."

I guess he hasn't heard about the 1999 Clinton Rules of Engagement as applied to Serbia.

Oops.