Gun Control, Politics

Gun Control Hysteria, GE Capital Drops Gun Dealers

Speaking of gun control hysteria, GE Capital stopped offering financing to retailers whose main business is selling guns. They say it affectsge_money_logo less than one percent of gun dealers and, as big as GE Capital is, dropping that market segment from their model is immaterial to them from a business standpoint. The spokesperson said that the decision was made in response to the “industry changes, new legislation and tragic events.” Tragic events like the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre I suppose, committed by GE Capital Vice President, Peter Lanza’s son.

This is purely a political statement, from the company that paid no taxes for 2010 on their $14 Billion in profits. Whose head of the company was on President Obama’s Jobs Council. You remember, that shovel-ready joke, har har, we spent billions and didn’t create any?

This isn’t the first move against firearm dealers and, by extension, citizens that support and believe in the Constitution. A couple of months ago Intuit Payment Solutions, a credit card processor and Lefty organization, dropped gun dealers from their client list too!

Neither will do much to negatively affect the industry. Their competitors will gladly get their business. It’s only important that you know who they are.

Updated 23:08, H/T Maggies Notebook

Gun Control, Politics

What Gun Control Hysteria Looks Like

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, in an effort to legislate some brotherly love, signed a bill that bans firearms from public parks and woman+handgunrecreation areas. Placing restrictions, and limiting the ability of law-abiding citizens to protect themselves is his idea of public safety.

Denying reality, bill sponsor Councilwoman Cindy Bass (D) said “There’s no reason to have a firearm at a public playground.” Oh really? Here’s one! According to police records, there have been more than 50 shootings at rec centers and playgrounds in Philadelphia since 2010.

What is so difficult for these Democrats to understand that it is the criminal, not the politicians, who decide whether there is a reason to have a firearm, as well as the capacity of your magazines?

Councilman David Oh (R), one of two (out of seventeen) council members who voted against the bill argued that the ban hurts legal handgun owners since all the shootings at city parks have involved illegal guns.

Mayor Nutter and the City Council are forcing law-abiding citizens to make a choice when it comes to using these city facilities. To use them and put your family in danger. Use them but break the law by carrying your otherwise lawful weapon in order to provide protection as may be necessary. Or, not use them and turn them over to the criminals.

Link: Philly Bans Guns in City Parks

Florida, Gun Control, Media, Politics

Scarborough’s Straw Man Argument For Gun Control

According to former Congressman Joe Scarborough (R-FL1), those House members (R’s and D’s) who voted against the gun control joe_scarborough1bill last week are “against background checks for criminals and terrorists” and “occupy the most extreme corner of American politics.”

I don’t know anyone who is against background checks for purchasing firearms, including the NRA. Background checks have been law for decades now. But that’s not the case from wherever Joe sits.

Only in the mind of the far Left is the 2nd Amendment in the “extreme corner of American politics.” Basically, it has nothing to do with politics. It is part of the Constitution that lawmakers are charged with protecting and defending. Second Amendment be dammed, Joe has made using 20 dead school children his cause for infringing upon the 2nd Amendment. Tugging on ones heartstrings is what Liberals do, and that’s what Joe is doing in this article. Creating his straw man argument for more gun control laws.

Could it be that Joe (Morning Joe) Scarborough isn’t aware that criminals and terrorists are already not permitted to buy or posses firearms?

Could it possibly be that Joe isn’t aware that the provisions in the bill that was defeated last week would have done nothing to stop the kind of violence that has brought “gun control” to the front page again, including the Sandy Hook Elementary school massacre and including the Boston terrorist bombers?

And could it be that Joe, like the President, wants an issue to use for political advantage (presumably for Democrats) than to insist on enforcing current laws before infringing on the rights of law-abiding citizens by calling for more laws that criminals and terrorists won’t obey anyway?

Jeri MacDonald on Joe’s facebook page said “Joe, i wish you’d come over to the left side!” Judging from his article in Politico, that is a redundant statement.

Gun Control, Politics, War On Terror

Boston Bombers Broke Gun Laws Too

According to Reuters, the two brothers suspected in the Boston Marathon bombings, who police say engaged in a gun battle with officers Boston-Bombersearly Friday after a frenzied manhunt, were not licensed to own guns in the towns where they lived, authorities said on Sunday.

Must be a little disheartening for the gun-grabbing lobby to learn that common criminals aren’t the only people who don’t obey gun laws. Islamic terrorists don’t obey them either.

Anyone still believe that making more restrictive laws on law-abiding citizens will take guns out of the hands of criminals and terrorists?

Like Jan Morgan said, “It seems the only people who adhere to the laws were those poor law abiding citizens who were forced to walk around defenseless while these murderous Islamic thugs were on the loose in their area looking for their next victims.”

Link: Boston Bombing Suspects Did Not Have Valid Handgun Licenses

Politics

Bill Ayers Visit Cost University Donor Money

ayers_poster
From Terrorist to University Organizer

This is rich. One can only hope that William Ayers’ rose is beginning to wilt. Not just because he is a bomb-throwing terrorist, but because of his Revolutionary (with a capital R) ideas about educational institutions being used more for engineering a “social justice” movement than anything else.

Minnesota State University Moorhead President Edna Szymanski said . . .

The university has lost a “significant amount” of donor money since William Ayers was there for a Feb. 26 speech and three days of meetings with faculty and students on how to incorporate social justice issues into curricula.

Link: Two months later, MSUM still facing fallout from Ayers visit

Florida, Gun Control, Politics

House Advances Cyber Security, Protecting Liberties

The House, in a bi-partisan fashion, passed H.R. 624, the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act.  H.R. 624 seeks to establish voluntary information-sharing links between the private sector and the government.  Rather than seeking to intrude on the private sector by mandating the sharing of information, this bill encourages companies to share cyber threat information by limiting the government’s use of the information and protecting the companies from liability.

The bill includes safeguards to our personal liberty which Democrats who voted against the bill (98 NO, 92 YES) thought we don’t need or deserve. Specifically, that the federal government may not make use of any records with personal identifiable information—such as firearms sales records, tax return records, and medical records—shared under the legislation. And, nothing in the bill authorizes the Department of Defense, National Security Agency or other Intelligence Community element to target an American citizen for surveillance. And that nothing in the bill authorizes companies receiving cyber threat information to sell the personal information of a consumer for marketing purposes.

Contrary to the Big Brother mentality that pervades Washington, the bill is constrained to limiting and combating cyber security threats only. Next step is for the Senate to do something with it. Or not.

Link: Congressman Jeff Miller’s (FL-1) Newsletter, 4/21/13

Florida, Pensacola

Respect For Law Day, A Bust?

Pensacolans missed a chance to show a little respect. I’m afraid our public servants and first responders may have felt a little like Rodney respect_for_law_day_promoDangerfield. Billed as “Respect for Law Day” by the Optimist Club, an event held by Optimist Clubs everywhere, Pensacola missed a chance to get tips on public safety, check out a fire engine, and see some beautiful horses. And they missed a chance to show some respect to our first responders. They are respected and appreciated here at The Lunch Counter.

I hope the rest of the event was better attended than it was when it began at 10AM. I took a few pictures and found this video. There was no mention in the News Journal about the 4-hour event. At the start there was no one there but willing and helpful volunteers and club members anticipating some folks. Hot dogs and refreshments were there. Everything was there except the public.

The Pensacola Police department, Fire department, and Sheriffs department’s Posse were all represented. Gulf Power had a representative and a display showing hazards and giving safety tips for electrical emergencies that occur during storms.

[flagallery gid=20 name=Gallery]

Organizer Chuck McCants posted some videos on YouTube at the event. Below is one of them.

Gun Control, Media, Obamacare, Politics, Whiners

Second Amendment Survives First Round

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The Obama administration’s first attempt at incrementally limiting the 2nd Amendment went down in bi-partisan defeat in the Senate. Walter and Joe Biden are visibly upset.

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To prey on the emotions of victims is standard operating procedure for bleeding-heart liberals. That goes without saying. But what’s interesting to me about this performance yesterday is the audacity and arrogance he displays, and whining, over losing his first attempt at putting limits on the second amendment.

But instead of supporting this compromise, the gun lobby and its allies willfully lied about the bill. They claimed that it would create some sort of “big brother” gun registry, even though the bill did the opposite. This legislation, in fact, outlawed any registry. Plain and simple, right there in the text. But that didn’t matter. And unfortunately, this pattern of spreading untruths about this legislation served a purpose, because those lies upset an intense minority of gun owners, and that in turn intimidated a lot of senators.

Making the gun lobby the bogeyman is expected. It is the American people who know, and have seen, what can be accomplished by incrementalism when it comes to legislation. This was but the first step. For him to accuse anyone of lying to the American people is the pot calling the kettle black when he says “this pattern of spreading untruths about this legislation served a purpose.” He should know, beginning with the so-called Affordable Health Care Act when he told the American people “I will not sign a bill that adds one dime to the deficit.” On Obama’s part, he knew he was lying. He knew that if it was repeated enough, with the support of the media, that the American people would believe his lies. They bought it. But since the Congress didn’t, states had to be bribed and the bill had to be forced through without a proper vote to get it enacted. Who’s to say he won’t try the same shenanigans with ‘gun’ control?

The only difference here is, gun rights folks know what Obama’s end-game is. It didn’t have to be spelled out in the legislation. Democrats have openly said they want to effectively disarm law-abiding citizens, since they can’t disarm criminals.

Below is the whiner and liar-in-chief  from The Rose Garden.

Statement by the President Transcript

Economy, Florida, Immigration, Obamacare, Organized Labor, Pensacola, Politics

What’s Next For Big Labor?

Labor unions today have unknowingly fulfilled a self-fulfilling prophesy. By leveraging unfair practices upon workers to build union Labor-Unionsmembership, they did such a good job that they have lost their only reason to recruit.  Now they are left with ancient history, the mid twentieth century, to fall back on. And for the most part, no longer have a reason to exist.

BIG LABOR advocates say “Without America’s labor unions, we wouldn’t have many of the protections and benefits that we have today.” That’s a true statement. It was true 30 years ago too! Thanks to the ‘wake-up call’ delivered to employers by organized labor decades ago, which was “treat your people right or lose,” the labor movement has successfully put itself out of business so to speak. Their usefulness has diminished due to their earlier success as shown by their decreasing member rolls.

  • Total percentage private sector and public sector labor union workers: 2002 13.3%, 2012 11.3%
  • Percent of private sector labor union workers: 2002 8.6%, 2012 6.6%
  • Percent of public sector, government, labor union workers: 2002 37.3%, 2012 35.9%
  • Total number of union workers, public and private sector: 2002 16,145,000, 2012 14,366,000

Continue reading What’s Next For Big Labor? →

Florida, Politics, Venezuela

Venezuela’s Election Day For Chavez Successor

It’s election day in Venezuela. Venezuelans in the United States are going to New Orleans to vote for their successor for the hemisphere’s idiot, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who his hand-picked successor claims was killed by cancer given to him by the United States Nicolas Madurogovernment. I know, Venezuela has their own low-information voters. It is what it is.

The opposition candidate Henrique Capriles said his opponent was “violating all the Henrique Caprileselectoral norms”. By closing, arresting, and otherwise bankrupting any TV and radio station that would carry their ads, I’d say he is right. No doubt tactics like that would meet with Jimmy Carter’s approval, who put his stamp of approval on Chavez’s first presidential election. Capriles’ response was to start an internet TV channel to try to get his message out. Beyond that, the opposition (to socialism) party is left with word-of-mouth campaigning.

Belly up to the counter. Politics are on the menu and Ross is on the grill.