The Ninth Circuit rules that California’s minor firearm advertising law likely violates the constitution, saying “the First Amendment demands more than good intentions and wishful thinking to warrant the government’s muzzling of speech.”
Category: Media
MEDIA WILL DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO BLAME FIREARM INDUSTRY
There’s peril when media sets out to confirm a narrative instead of reporting facts. Whether it’s criminal violence in America perpetrated by a deranged lunatic, or by violent drug cartels in countries beyond our borders, some media outlets will find the flawed logic to argue it is American companies that should be punished.
This results in a disservice to readers and erodes public trust not just in their subjects but also in the Fourth Estate.
The DailyKos (a rabid anti-gun pub) gets pwned by one of its own
Citizens Have An Individual Right to Keep and Bear Arms Unconnected With Service In a Militia
The Second Amendment speaks of two separate groups the Militia and the People. If the right to keep and bear arms was meant ONLY to apply to the militia it would read “The right of Militia members to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Or, it would read “The power of the States to maintain armed militias shall not be infringed.”
It reads “The right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” It calls for a “Well-regulated Militia” and not a well regulated populace, and all other references to “The People” in the Bill of Rights are also rights of individual citizens.
The Federal government, the States and their officials hold powers not rights. For example, Amendment IV “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated…” Amendment X “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
Article. I. Section. 1. “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.” Article. II. Section. 1. “The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.” Note that they read powers and not rights.
Held:
1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a
firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for
traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.
Pp. 2–53.
(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but
does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative
clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it
connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.
This decision wasn’t reached in a vacuum. The vast majority of law review articles dealing with the Second Amendment conclude that it protects an individual’s right to keep and bear arms. In fact, when Dr. Lawrence Tribe, the widely published Constitutional Law scholar, author of the Constitutional law textbook that is standard in many if not most of our nation’s low schools, and strong supporter of gun control, announced that he would conduct a study of the Second Amendment.
Citizen disarmament zealots, their organizations, their media allies, and their apologists were elated for they believed that at last a well respected Constitutional law scholar would finally proclaim that the Second Amendment applies only to the Militia and not individual citizens.
In the end they were disappointed. Like the Supreme Court Dr. Tribe determined that the framers of the Constitution intended that the Second Amendment confers the right of individual citizens to keep and bear arms unconnected with service in a Militia.
The Washington Post Calls for Reducing Free Speech to Improve Democracy
In very post-2016 fashion, The Washington Post last week published an article implying democracy might require curbs on freedom of speech. This unsettling approach suggests concerns around “misinformation” on social networks supersede freedom of speech, a move that has elicited intense debate and, rightly so; criticism.
In what appears to be a shift in public discourse towards further censorship, the widely-read Washington Post article critiqued Elon Musk’s reinstatement of former President Donald Trump on the social media platform, X, previously known as Twitter.
The article suggested that the proliferation of what it calls “political misinformation” disturbs democracy, sparking concern amongst proponents of free speech.
The perspective is reflected in the reporting by The Washington Post journalists Naomi Nix and Sarah Ellison. However, their piece lacks critical analysis of the ambiguity surrounding the term “misinformation” and fails to address the consequential question of how to moderate content in situations where politicians’ statements are arguably false or misleading.
The article’s glaring omission of any mention of the First Amendment – a core pillar of American democracy fostering media freedoms – also raised eyebrows amidst media and legal circles.
The Washington Post reporters worryingly suggest the retreat of social media companies from combating online falsehoods could impact the 2024 presidential election. They fault Musk, along with Facebook and YouTube, for taking a step back from reining in what they call misleading claims and conspiracy theories.
Nix and Ellison also critique X for permitting Tucker Carlson’s President Trump interview, which they deem as a platform for Trump to reiterate his allegations about the 2020 election. They contend that social media should only host political content if its accuracy can be proven, posing an unrealistic expectation that conceals underlying issues of censorship under the pretext of curbing “misleading” or “hateful” speech.
BLUF
Well, I generally believe that when government officials don’t want us to know something, it’s because they fear we would think or act in ways they wouldn’t like if we knew it.
It’s democracy in the dark without Nashville shooter manifesto’s release.
“Democracy Dies in Darkness” is the (sometimes ironic) slogan of The Washington Post.
But it’s also a fair description of what’s happening in Tennessee, as the state Legislature is being called to a special session even as local and federal officials withhold information that might be critical to its decision-making.
Gov. Bill Lee ordered the special session to begin Aug. 21 in response to a March 27 mass shooting in which three adults and three children at the Covenant School, a Christian school in Nashville’s Green Hills neighborhood, were killed.
The Nashville Tennessean article refers only to “a shooter.”
The shooter was a female-to-male transgender shooter named Audrey Hale, aged 28, who left a manifesto before being killed by police.
Hale had chosen to identify as a man, using the pronouns he/him.
The manifesto included detailed plans put together over months to shoot up the school, according to reports just after the shooting from police who had seen it.
Unfortunately, they’re the only ones who have seen it.
Local and federal authorities with access to the manifesto have refused to make its contents public.
Though Hale sent an Instagram message to a friend just before the shooting, saying, “One day this will make more sense. I’ve left more than enough evidence behind,” we haven’t seen that evidence.
Vivek Ramaswamy, running third in the GOP presidential primary, recently called for the manifesto’s release. He characterizes the government position as “stonewalled silence.”
Well, I generally believe that when government officials don’t want us to know something, it’s because they fear we would think or act in ways they wouldn’t like if we knew it.
They seldom keep things secret that would make them look good.
Instead it’s usually something that would reflect badly on them or someone they’re protecting.
What could that be in this case? I don’t know, and they seem determined to keep it that way.
But beyond that, the Legislature is in a curious position.
Lawmakers are being asked to debate and vote on legislative proposals being made only because of the March shooting, even as some of the most important facts are kept secret.
Gov. Lee’s office says he’s called for the release of the manifesto, and it’s the Metro Nashville Police and the FBI keeping the lid on.
BLUF
Maybe a few honest liberals might come out against this. But don’t hold your breath waiting on a major reaction from the Democratic establishment; unfortunately, this is the exact kind of thing they think the federal government should be doing. And that’s the truly scary part of this whole saga.
Leaked emails expose Biden White House’s attacks on the First Amendment
The “Twitter Files” reporting from last year exposed a disturbing collusion between Twitter executives and officials from the federal government to censor the public’s speech. But new revelations from Congress show that the Biden White House and Facebook have engaged in similar collusion.
On Thursday, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), who leads the House Judiciary Committee, released internal Facebook emails that show the Big Tech platform was explicitly pressured by the Biden administration to take down specific posts that the president’s allies disliked.
“Never-before-released internal documents subpoenaed by the Judiciary Committee PROVE that Facebook and Instagram censored posts and changed their content moderation policies because of unconstitutional pressure from the Biden White House,” Jordan alleged.The congressman brought receipts. He released one emailfrom April 2021 in which a Facebook employee writes that employees “are facing continued pressure from external stakeholders, including the [Biden] White House,” with the White House even asking them to take down one specific meme. In another email, a top Facebook executive recounts that Biden senior adviser Andy Slavitt was “outraged” in an interaction with company officials over the fact that they wouldn’t remove the meme.
Michael Bloomberg’s ‘Trace’ outed as just another gun-control group
Everytown and the Trace have stunning similarities.
The Trace, the propaganda arm of former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s gun control empire, wants the public to believe it’s an actual newsroom comprised of actual journalists. It’s a fiction they’ll go to great lengths to maintain.
The Trace calls itself “The only newsroom dedicated to covering gun violence.” Its staff refer to themselves as journalists, rather than anti-gun activists who are paid by Bloomberg to write propaganda.
Since the Trace was founded eight years ago, scores of newspapers, websites and other legacy media outlets have fallen victim to this ruse. Gannett’s flagship newspaper, USA Today, has collaborated with the Trace multiple times, and has even allowed Trace activists to produce and edit content, which appeared in the newspaper under a joint byline.
“We have partnered with more than 170 national and local media organizations,” the Trace says on its website. “We’re always looking to start new partnerships.”
One Trace activist, Jennifer Mascia, who describes herself as a “Senior news writer @TeamTrace,” bristled recently when her employer was compared to Everytown, another anti-gun group funded by Bloomberg.
“You know The Trace is not a gun control org. We don’t lobby. We don’t tell readers to support laws. We don’t publish our opinions. We are all journalists. None of us have ever worked in advocacy. Our backgrounds are easily searchable. Why do you persist with this myth?” Mascia tweeted Tuesday.
“Follow the bios. We all went to journalism school. The facts don’t support your claims,” Mascia tweeted when pressed.
Enter Rob Romano, an intelligence associate at the Firearms Policy Coalition.
Romano examined the IRS Form 990s for the Trace and Everytown and found a stunning similarity. Both nonprofits share the same president, John Feinblatt.
It would have led the news if they could have claimed it was a “white supremacist” attack.
So That’s Why the Media Has Barely Covered the Fargo Police Ambush.
Officers Jake Wallin, Andrew Dotas and Tyler Hawes were shot by Barakat from about 15 to 20 feet away before they could even reach for their guns. Wallin was killed with Dotas and Hawes were wounded. It has since been revealed Barakat is originally from Syria was allowed into the United States via asylum in 2012.
Nolte: NY Times Reports Coronavirus Deaths Overcounted by 30% … on Paragraph 17
The far-left New York Times quietly admitted this week that deaths from the coronavirus were overcounted by 30 percent.
Gee, another “right-wing conspiracy theory” is proven true…
The Times’ dishonesty is on full display even in the reporting of this breathtaking news.
Does this amazing revelation earn its own headline? Nope.
Does this amazing revelation sit at the top of the story? Nope.
Here’s how the propagandists at the Times bury the truth:
Headline: “A Positive Covid Milestone.”
Sub-headline: “In a sign that the pandemic really is over, the total number of Americans dying each day is no longer historically abnormal.”
And it is only after reading some 17 paragraphs where you will finally find the buried truth…
The official number is probably an exaggeration because it includes some people who had virus when they died even though it was not the underlying cause of death. Other C.D.C. data suggests that almost one-third of official recent Covid deaths have fallen into this category. A study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases came to similar conclusions.
One-third.
We shut down the country, we closed schools, we bankrupted people, we bankrupted small businesses, we destroyed our economy, we transferred enormous wealth to the top one percent… All based on data that was off by a full third.
Forbes Claims More than 330 ‘Mass Shootings’ This Year Using Misleading Data
Forbes pointed to misleading data and claimed on Monday there had been over 330 “mass shootings” in the United States so far in 2023.
They labeled their report “breaking” news.
Writing at Forbes, Ana Faguy relied on the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), a pro-gun-control database which abandoned the long-standing definition of a “mass shooting” as four or more deaths in a single incident by a single gunman and replaced it with “a minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed, not including any shooter who may also have been killed or injured in the incident.” GVA’s new definition allows drive-by shootings, targeted gang attacks, and other non-mass shootings to be counted as “mass shootings,” thus inflating the number of reported incidents.
For example, on Monday Baltimore WBALTV reported that GVA was still counting the April 15, 2023, Dadeville, Georgia, birthday party attack as a “mass shooting.” GVA is doing this although at least six people have been arrested in connection with the attack.
Yet Faguy quoted GVA numbers, saying, “There have been more than 330 mass shootings so far this year, according to data collected by the Gun Violence Archive.”
Breitbart News noted that The Hill relied on GVA numbers last year and ended up claiming over 600 mass shootings in the United States by Thanksgiving Day 2022.
On July 26, 2021, Breitbart News observed that the GVA is also able to report higher numbers of “mass shootings” because it lists defensive gun uses and officer-involved gun uses against criminals as “gun violence.”
Breitbart News pointed out on May 7, 2023, that GVA’s new definition allows drive-by shootings, targeted gang attacks, and other non-mass shootings to be counted as “mass shootings,” thus increasing the number of reported incidents. While President Joe Biden was claiming there had already been “roughly 200 mass shootings” in America for the year, a database maintained by the Associated Press/USA Today/Northeastern University showed there had actually been 19 such incidents in the United States from January 1, 2023, to May 2, 2023.
So, there was a mass shooting last night in Philly.
The suspect, who is in custody, is a BLM supporting transexual.
It disappears from the media in 5…4…3…2…1…https://t.co/EEpvA5me8z
— Shay Cormac (@SPCORMAC_1) July 4, 2023
What They Mean by ‘Civility’
The New York Times raises no objection to murderous, racist rhetoric at a Common Cause rally.
The New York Times editorial page, a division of the New York Times Co., on Saturday endorsed Common Cause’s personal attack on Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. As we explained Friday, Common Cause, a Washington-based corporation, is complaining about Scalia and Thomas’s having joined Justice Anthony Kennedy’s majority opinion in Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission, the 2010 decision that overturned a law criminalizing certain political speech by corporations.
As the Times explains, Common Cause implies that Scalia and Thomas had a conflict of interest:
The framers of our Constitution envisioned law gaining authority apart from politics. They wanted justices to exercise their judgment independently–to be free from worrying about upsetting the powerful and certainly not to be cultivating powerful political interests.
A petition by Common Cause to the Justice Department questioned whether Justices Scalia and Thomas are doing the latter. It asked whether the court’s ruling a year ago in the Citizens United case, unleashing corporate money into politics, should be set aside because the justices took part in a political gathering of the conservative corporate money-raiser Charles Koch while the case was before the court.
If the answer turns out to be yes, it would be yet more evidence that the court must change its policy–or rather its nonpolicy–about recusal.
The answer will not turn out to be yes, for Common Cause’s complaint is not only meritless but frivolous. Koch was not a party to the lawsuit. Citizens United, which brought the case to the court, is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit corporation, just like Common Cause.
Further, both Justices Scalia and Thomas, in joining the majority opinion, merely reaffirmed the legal positions that they, along with Justice Kennedy, had previously taken in dissenting from the precedents that Citizens United overturned: McConnell v. FEC (2003) and, in Justice Scalia’s case, Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce (1990, the year before Thomas joined the court). Thus it is preposterous to suggest that their purported association, years later, with “powerful political interests” influenced their decision in Citizens United.
Common Cause’s complaint does not even allege any actual impropriety on the justices’ part. In its letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, the corporation asserts that “it appears” the justices “have participated in political strategy sessions.” This is based on promotional material for a conference called “Understanding and Addressing Threats to American Free Enterprise and Prosperity,” which says that “past meetings have featured such notable leaders as Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.”
What exactly did Justices Scalia and Thomas do at the conferences “it appears” they attended? Neither Common Cause nor the Times offers any evidence bearing on the question. But the Times makes another accusation against Justice Scalia that may provide a clue:
Remember when Obammy’s communications office tried to pretend he was the anti-1984 guy?
Former President Barack Obama suggested in a new interview the development of “digital fingerprints” to combat misinformation and distinguish between true and misleading news for consumers.
Obama sat down with his former White House senior adviser David Axelrod for a conversation on the latter’s podcast, “The Axe Files,” on CNN Audio. During the interview, Axelrod noted he’s seen “misinformation, disinformation, [and] deepfakes” targeting Obama.
“As I’ve told people, because I was the first digital president when I left office, I was probably the most recorded, filmed, photographed human in history, which is kind of a weird thing,” responded Obama. “But just the odds are that I was. As a consequence, there’s a lot of raw material there.”
The former president added that the deepfakes — digitally manipulated images, audio or video that appear legitimate — started with a version of him dancing, “saying dirty limericks” and similar kinds of activity.
“That technology’s here now,” continued Obama, who warned about the issue getting worse moving forward. “So, most immediately we’re going to have all the problems we had with misinformation before, [but] this next election cycle will be worse.”
He then suggested “digital fingerprints” to discern truth from misinformation.
“And the need for us, for the general public, I think to be more discriminating consumers of news and information, the need for us to over time develop technologies to create watermarks or digital fingerprints so we know what is true and what is not true,” he said. “There’s a whole bunch of work that’s going to have to be done there, but in the short term, it’s really going to be up to the American people to kind of say.”
Obama and Axelrod went on to say that today many consumers are only viewing information from sources they are predisposed to agree with and will likely believe what they see.
“Obviously, we saw that during the vaccination stuff. So, I am concerned about it,” added Obama, referring to the COVID vaccine. “And I think the best we’re going to be able to do is to constantly remind people that this is out there.”
The former president said he thinks most people are now aware that “not everything that pops up on your phone is true,” but cautioned misinformation can be used to discourage people from voting by characterizing the system as rigged and corrupt.
“That can oftentimes advantage the powerful,” said Obama. “And I am worried about that kind of cynicism developing even further during the course of this next election.”
The interview came about six weeks after the Obama Foundation on World Press Freedom Day posted a recent video of the former president lecturing about “widespread disinformation” and the need for journalists to create “an information environment” to support democracy.
Last year, Obama announced that his foundation would be launching a new initiative to combat misinformation. Days later, Obama angered conservatives with a speech at Stanford University warning of the dangers of “disinformation.”
During the speech, Obama said, “All we see is a constant feed of content where useful factual information and happy diversions, and cat videos flow alongside lies, conspiracy theories, junk science, quackery, White supremacist, racist tracts, misogynist screeds.”
Critics were quick to point out that Obama promoted the debunked narrative that former President Donald Trump colluded with Russia to win the 2016 election and that Obama infamously won Politifact’s “Lie of the Year” in 2013 by telling Americans, “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it,” referring to the Affordable Care Act.
More recently, the Biden administration came under fire for trying to start the now-defunct Disinformation Governance Board under the Department of Homeland Security. Many Republicans argued such an initiative would act as a Ministry of Truth in a dystopian society by suppressing dissent under the guise of stopping misinformation.
BLUF
About this potential conflict of interest, retired Canadian colonel David Redman recently testified that legacy media outlets are “ministries of propaganda,” with multiple former mainstream media employees also making similar comments about their past employers.
Media blames ‘climate change’ for Canadian wildfires despite arrest of multiple arsonists
While the mainstream media continues to point to ‘climate change’ as the source of the wildfires, reports show that multiple people have been arrested in connection with dozens of intentionally set fires in the country.
(LifeSiteNews) — Despite the arrest of multiple arsonists, the mainstream media in Canada seems intent on attributing the nation’s recent wildfires to “climate change.”
As wildfires continue to spread across western, and now central and eastern Canada, burning forestland and homes, the mainstream media continues to imply that climate change is the main culprit, despite a growing number of reports showing that arsonists have been arrested for allegedly setting dozens of fires.
“Several arsonists have been arrested in the past weeks in different provinces for lighting forest fires,” People’s Party of Canada leader Maxime Bernier tweeted. “But the lying woke media and politicians keep repeating that global warming is the cause.”
Several arsonists have been arrested in the past weeks in different provinces for lighting forest fires. But the lying woke media and politicians keep repeating that global warming is the cause. https://t.co/rdZsnG9b6F
— Maxime Bernier (@MaximeBernier) June 7, 2023
The severe nature of the wildfires has caused Canadians to wonder why they have spread so rapidly, especially as many of the affected areas are not typically impacted by wildfires of this degree or at this time of the year.
In the past months, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) have arrested several arsonists who have been charged with lighting fires across several provinces including Nova Scotia, Yukon, British Columbia, and Alberta. The motive behind lighting the fires is unclear.
This is why no one has respect for today's "journalists."
— Mayor of Ancappalachia (@jaynarchy) June 12, 2023
CBS News shows why no one should take the media seriously
We here at Bearing Arms have no pretension of being unbiased. As a result, you folks reading this have an idea of where we stand on issues. For those who agree, that’s why you’re here. For those who don’t, you know to filter things through the appropriate lens.
But places like CBS News still want you to think they’re unbiased.
That gets harder and harder every single year. Especially with headlines like this: “Texas senator continues to call for common sense gun safety laws”
Now, let’s start by noting that a Texas state senator continuing calls for gun control is newsworthy to some degree, especially in light of the Uvalde anniversary.
The subject matter is arguably appropriate and as this is labeled as “local news” on the CBS News site, it makes sense. Yet that label also presents a bit of a problem.
See, one of the first things you need to do if you’re going to at least pretend to be neutral is leave your editorializing out of the headline.
For anti-gun folks, they don’t see an issue. Pro-Second Amendment folks, though, can see it plain as day. The phrase “common sense gun safety laws” isn’t an official term rooted in neutrality. It’s the exact way gun control organizations frame the laws they’re trying to push onto the American people.
Had the reporter for CBS News put the phrase in quotations, then he’s just repeating what the senator may have said. Instead, it’s presented to the world as if this is an established fact. I hate to break it to him, though. It’s not.
Take the policy measures mentioned in the piece:
At a 45-minute news conference Gutierrez hosted at the Capitol earlier this month he said, “Every time something happens it’s something else and he’s got a solution for this that’s not related to the common denominator which is guns.”…
In an interview with CBS News Texas earlier this month, Gutierrez told me none of his gun safety bills received a hearing in the Senate, including a raise the age bill, universal background checks, and red flag laws. “It’s very clear here the Republicans’ position on gun reform they don’t want to try.”
Raising the age to buy an AR-15 only looks like it might prevent something bad from happening in a case like Uvalde, but the truth is that most people in that age group who buy those rifles do so because they want something they can use to defend themselves. Raising the age limit won’t stop bad people from getting guns–how many mass shooters have we seen who were too young to own any firearm?–but it will stop these law-abiding adults from owning guns.
That’s just common sense.
Universal background checks only look like a common sense gun measure because the media has done such a near-universal job of making them look like one. They don’t discuss how this doesn’t actually impact black market gun sales, it only inhibits law-abiding citizens transferring guns to one another. That’s literally all it does.
Red flag laws have tons of problems, problems which the media refuses to challenge proponents on. Besides the oft-cited due process concerns, there’s the simple fact that you’re saying someone is too dangerous to exercise their constitutionally protected rights but is just fine walking around on the streets.
Where’s the common sense there?
CBS News editorializing these policy measures as common sense doesn’t change the fact that they’re not. All it does is make it impossible to take anything else they say seriously on the issue of guns.
Their lack of neutrality is clear; so clear that even those on the fence about whether the media is biased should be able to see it for themselves.
Want to know why the polls look to be against us? It’s because the entire media apparatus is doing stuff like this.
This is why the media will never understand gun owners
Most people who read stuff here are either gun owners or know someone who owns a gun. At the very least, they’re sympathetic to having one.
Not counting the hate readers, of course.
The media, however, is full of people who don’t own guns, don’t know anyone they know has them, and perhaps more importantly, don’t want to know anyone who is a firearm owner.
And yet, they routinely write crap like this:
The story of a Pennsylvania church blessing AR-15s made the rounds on traditional and social media last week. The ceremony at the World Peace and Unification Sanctuary ministry in rural Newfoundland, PA, was widely ridiculed as bizarre and out of touch, but once you take away some of the theatrics, how different are these worshippers really from millions of Americans and the NRA?
The answer, it turns out, is not that much.
WhoWhatWhy went to Newfoundland twice last week, attended the gun-blessing ceremony and saw some things that the rest of the media seems to have missed.
Now, the church in question is the Unification Church, whose members are often called “Moonies” after the founder, Rev. Hyung Jin (Sean) Moon.
Mendacious Media, but I repeat myself
NBC Pushing Lies About the Most Popular Rifle in America, ….Again
In their latest hit piece about an inanimate object, NBC News once again ignores facts, common sense and takes frequent liberties with the truth.
The story, which was somehow labeled news rather than opinion, was published Sunday, titled: “What makes the AR-15 so beloved and so reviled: A rifle with military origins has become one of the country’s most divisive consumer products.”
For the two reporters, problems began from the start. The headline is misleading – the military origins bit. Even the Poynter Institute, a journalism think tank infamous for its anti-gun stories and its liberal and laughable PolitiFact website, takes issue with this claim.
In a story published last year, Poynter tracked the origins of the AR-15 and found it was “first developed in the 1950s for civilian use.”
Poynter understands that today’s civilian semi-automatic AR has never been a military rifle. Eugene Stoner’s original AR-15 prototype, which later became the M16, was a select-fire weapon. The civilian version has always been semi-automatic. Thus, it was never designed for battle. It was designed for the civilian marketplace. No military has issued a semi-auto AR to their troops.
Gaslighting
In their story, NBC News gaslights its readers about the effectiveness of Bill Clinton’s “assault weapon” ban, which for ten years banned the manufacture, sale, or transfer of a large number of “assault weapons,” including several handguns and standard-capacity magazines. Joe Biden has frequently taken credit for the ban and falsely claimed it “brought down these mass killings,” which fact-checkers have repeatedly said is a false statement.
A media pretty incurious as to the motives and manifesto of the Nashville shooter have rushed past the Atlanta shooter, who did not use an AR-15 and was black, so that the media can focus on the Hispanic shooter in Texas who loved Nazis. We’re back to white supremacy as the angle with an AR-15.
They never did go back to the motives and story of the 32 people shot at the birthday party in Alabama. We’re going to spend days on the Texas shooter, though. Though Hispanic, we learned there are white and black Hispanics after George Zimmerman. The intersectional dynamics are going to be thoroughly exhausted and explored.
Meanwhile, back in Atlanta, the shooter’s mother said the shooter struggled with mental health, and the VA system forced the shooter off medicine that worked for him and onto another one that did not because the one that worked was addictive. People died. We had to rush to the gun control conversation and moved on so quickly that we could not pause and question the VA.
It’s like the other current in “gun control” stories we often move past quickly. I asked ChatGPT a question about that issue we are required to ignore and ChatGPT even danced around it. Here’s the exchange:
ABC News Accidently Admits AR-15s Aren’t as Dangerous as the Dems Pretend They Are
Santos co-sponsored a bill to name the AR-15 the “national gun of the United States.” ABC News stroked an article about voters protesters showing up at Santos’s office to protest the bill.
And now for my question: why do lefty jackpuddings regurgitate their avocado toast over AR-15s when so few people are killed by them?
Perspective
Let’s take a look at ways in which more Americans die every year than by AR-15s used in mass shootings:
- Twenty-eight people are killed every year by lightning.
- Roughly 2,167 Americans die annually from constipation.
- On average, 951 people are killed by their lawnmowers while another 4,193 are killed by farm tractors and other agricultural equipment.
- Murderous toasters kill 45 people per year.
- Eleven teenagers die every day while texting and driving.
- An estimated 40 people die every year while skateboarding.
- Roughly 10,206 are accidentally strangled to death while they sleep, and for those who survive the night, another 10,386 will die every year falling out of bed.
- As per the FBI, rifles of every variation — including but not limited to the scary AR-15 — killed 215 Americans in 2019. But another 1,533 were killed by knives, and 651 people were beaten to death by hands, fists, feet, etc.
- In 2015, 5,051 people choked to death while eating.
- Americans average 62 deaths per year by bees, wasps, and hornets.
What Have We Learned?
We’ve learned that if you want to cut down on needless deaths, you’re better off handing out prune juice than trying to purloin AR-15s, as we Americans are roughly 10 times more likely to die as Elvis did — on the toilet — than by an AR-15 in a mass shooting. We’re 50 times more likely to be beaten to death. We’re roughly 1,000 times more likely to be killed — either by accidental strangulation or falling — from our beds than by an AR-15.
BONUS LESSON: None of this info will help you in a debate against your liberal sister-in-law and her pink-haired, gender-uncertain boy?-partner freakshow because facts are useless against the bolshies who want us defenseless.
So why do the apparatchiks on the left want your A5-15? The same reason you want to keep it — it’s the best gun available to fight tyranny — either foreign or domestic. And with the terrifying number of military-aged Chinese men crossing the southern border, we might find ourselves fighting either, or both.