I love this guy. No namby-pamby, wishy-washy, “let’s all sing Kumbayah” and share our feelings with the group crap. Andrew Breitbart calls ’em as he sees ’em. And what he sees is an assault on gun rights, specifically because many of those in groups espousing gun “control” share an agenda that includes disarming the opposition. Wow. I sense a disturbance in the force. I can hear all those on the Left that read TTAG readying their tar and feathers. But wait a tick. I think there’s some middle ground here, and before we get into yet again another flame war, I think Breitbart’s position bears some examination . . .
It’s been said that fortune favors the prepared. Or to put it another way, “know thine enemy.” And make no mistake about it, there are people out there that are enemies of the 2nd Amendment, if not the entire Constitution. Gun rights? Pffft! For instance, the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence believes that the Heller Decision was (get this:) insurrection rhetoric. Um. Yeah. Right.
This gets into the same kind of logical fallacy that we all learned about in school: “All Dentists are Doctors, so that must mean all Doctors are Dentists.” Wrong. So when we find out that a vast majority of people that join groups like The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence align themselves with labels like “Liberal” and “Progressive,” it’s easy for those of us on the right to mistakenly get the idea that ALL Liberals and Progressives hate guns, want to squelch our rights to self defense, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
Which takes us back to Breitbart. Keep in mind, Andrew Breitbart is a target. A BIG target. He’s got (count ’em) FOUR websites (BigGovernment.com, BigJournalism.com, BigPeace.com and BigHollywood.com) that tweak the noses of the Progrescenti on a daily basis. As such, he’s set himself up as a target, and groups like the CSGV take the bait like a shark lapping up chum in the water. Many of these folks drop the mask every so often and reveal portions of their agendas that the ordinarily keep from the public.
One such revelation stated that Progressives “didn’t get it” when it comes to why Conservatives cherish and protect their 2nd Amendment rights – that the Conservatives realize that the last line of defense against Progressive and Socialist policies the the ability for the populace to defend themselves against the government.
You’ll get no argument from me on that one. Your results may differ. But Breitbart (more or less understandably) paints his pictures in black and white. In this, he’s no different in practice from member of the mainstream media – the only distinction is that his bias is on the Conservative, not Liberal side of things.
If you watch the video above, Breitbart is responding to yet again another hatchet job he’s received from the CSGV minions. In a nutshell, his response: Bring it on! As he aptly points out, Second Amendment supporters outnumber those against, and we have guns.
Let’s be realistic here. While Breitbart is correct that Americans that support private gun ownership outnumber those who do not, the idea that we’re all armed is just a tad bit overly-optimistic, I think. And we don’t need to get into the whole “does he really think it’s gonna come down to people defending their rights to guns with the “out of my cold, dead fingers” option? Maybe. Maybe not. Remember, Breitbart deals in media, and the first rule of media is to grab the reader’s/viewer’s attention. Nothing like a little bombast to stir things up, eh?
So what have we learned here today? That not all Liberals want to take our guns and enslave us. And not all Conservatives are knuckle-dragging rednecks, clinging to their guns and their religion. But as long as liberals that believe in gun rights remain silent in the face of those who claim to speak for all Liberals, few people will realize that gun rights are a bit more nuanced than just claiming that Conservatives are for ’em, Liberals agin ’em.
Class dismissed.
This video was posted on RealClearPolitics a day or two ago, but it was edited to leave the gun parts in the beginning out.
I never understood why so many left leaning counter culture types who hate and even fear the govt/military industrial complex, spurn the tools that could keep them and the country safe from those perceived threats.
If I was a liberal/progressive that would be my cause….sadly I am a libertarian…so everyone just thinks I’m nuts
A libertarian friend informed me that many of the far-left (or is it simply anti-establishment?) radical anarchists types are actually strong supporters of gun ownership.
Strong supporters of their own gun ownership. No one else’s.
Oh, so they’re LEO / members of the military? =)
Agreed. I posted my first comment on TTAG a couple of days ago, the gist being that on paper I don’t fit as an avid gun rights supporter: Born and raised in San Francisco, live in Berkeley, work in the arts, mixed race, 29 years old, moderate liberal, bachelor, no kids, etc.
Point being, I have the damnedest time trying to convince the many, many radical left people I come in contact with that disarmament of the people is one of the most fascist policies they could possibly support. I mean, I have literally heard, over dinner and drinks, people talk about overthrowing our “oppressive” government- and then have conversation turn to how it insane it is that anyone other than military and law officers are armed. Bizarre.
Somewhat ironically, I seem have a much easier time with the more moderate liberals whom I meet/know- especially the ones who are a bit “preparedness-minded”. I have friends who have Noam Chompsky on the bookshelf, but 50 gallon drums of water in the basement, and a Mossy 590 under the bed.
So basically what you’re saying is that you’re not really a straight-up political leftist, you’re just center-left.
In general, there are three kinds of people on the left with regards to guns; Center left (who generally understand the reasons for civilian gun ownership), far-left (who only want the military/police/government to have guns), and radical-left (who only differ from the far-left in that they want to be the military/police/government).
“They’ve got Jeanine Garafalo, and that freaks us out.” Hilarious.
Remember that the CSGV is the artist formerly known as the Coalition to Ban Handguns. Just saying…
Two things, you forgot bigpeace.com and your link for bighollywood is wrong. It should be http://bighollywood.breitbart.com/
Wow -someone actually clicked on the links individually – I usually just go to the first one and then use that home page as my launch pad.
Corrected. Thanks for the catch!
” So when we find out that a vast majority of people that join groups like The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence align themselves with labels like “Liberal” and “Progressive,” it’s easy for those of us on the right to mistakenly get the idea that ALL Liberals and Progressives hate guns…”
I agree with you. I’m happy to admit that not all liberals hate guns, I know some of them myself, but politically they have to be considered as a whole. People tend to think in packs. This is one of the maddening things about politics.
I think the great philosopher Kay sums it up best in Men in Black: “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals and you know it. “
The problem all goes back to our two party political structure forcing us to pick teams. It’s stupid that our entire nation is clumped into two very separate, very opposing groups. Because I don’t know a single person who agrees with everything Republicans or Democrats as a whole stand for. It’s about prioritizing your issues and voting based on what you think is most important. And that kind of system blows.
The American system, flawed though it may be, has worked for over two hundred years. That we have such great diversity within parties, as you point out, yet maintain unity is remarkable. Besides, many people vote Democrat or Republican alternately.
Exactly. Too bad that the media goes out of it’s way to ignore or bash any third party candidates.
“That not all Liberals want to take our guns and enslave us. And not all Conservatives are knuckle-dragging rednecks, clinging to their guns and their religion. But as long as liberals that believe in gun rights remain silent in the face of those who claim to speak for all Liberals, few people will realize that gun rights are a bit more nuanced than just claiming that Conservatives are for ‘em, Liberals agin ‘em.”
Amen.
I think there’s some middle ground here
Like “common sense gun control,” the middle ground is an illusion promulgated to steal our rights. The antigun goons will never support our rights against the all-powerful State, so taking the “middle ground” only inches them closer to their goal. Worse, if we take the middle ground, self-defense supporters will disown us as traitors, as they damn well should. So yes, there’s a middle ground. It’s where someone gets shot by both sides. I’ll pass.
Ralph – I think you know me well enough through my writing to know that “common sense gun control” is NOT the middle ground I was talking about. What I meant was that you can’t (or shouldn’t) stereotype someone, just because of a label. As I cited in the story, I know someone that is just this side of a Marxist. Hates Bush. Loves Obama. Loves every entitlement known to man and then some. But he’s not a fan of global warming, and while he doesn’t care for guns himself, he believes that Americans should have the right to private ownership of guns. So there is some “common ground” there for us. The rest of it is a knock-down, dragged-out fight. But at least we can agree on a few things.
What I’m trying to say is that there ARE people on the Left that agree with us about 2nd Amendment rights, and it would help our cause to welcome them into the fold, even though we may disagree with them in other areas.
Brad, I’m guilty of slamming you in the past about liberal/left/progressive generalizations. Good job and thanks for the post.
You’re welcome!
“…yes, there’s a middle ground. It’s where someone gets shot by both sides. I’ll pass.”
That pretty much sums up how I feel about politics in general.
The problem (as the author and others have pointed out) is black and white thinking.
I support gay marriage.
I support open carry.
I support single payer universal healthcare.
I support the right to carry concealed in any State if I have a permit for my State.
I believe our taxes are too low, and our spending is too high.
Most of us are neither red nor blue, and can’t easily be painted with broad brush strokes.
BTW – my Presidential votes have gone Regan, Bush Sr., Clinton, Clinton, Gore, Bush Jr., Obama.
“I support gay marriage.”
I don’t, at least not in the sense that your statement leads me to assume that you do. I don’t believe that the state should be in the business of certifying marriages. Should the state give tax statuses based on whom you live with (I.E., single, single with dependents, couple, couple with dependents)? Perhaps, but I don’t believe that the state should judge based on factors of age, race, sex, or sexual preference.
“I support open carry.”
I do too.
“I support single payer universal healthcare.”
I do not. It’s a complex issue, but apart from concerns of market-based issues (I.E. cost vs benefit), it again comes down to what is, and what is not, the government’s business.
“I support the right to carry concealed in any State if I have a permit for my State.”
I support the right to carry a firearm (or multiple) anywhere in the U.S.A. (the entire world for that matter), without the need to obtain a permit of any sort. Again, it comes down to the government not itself having the right to require a citizen to procure a government-issued license to exercise a fundamental natural right. A right, by definition does not require a license for one to legally exercise it. Requiring a license to carry a firearm is akin to requiring a license to operate a printing press.
“I believe our taxes are too low, and our spending is too high.”
I believe that our taxes are not FAIR, and our spending is too high. As we agree on the latter, I’ll just take it as a given and only detail the former. Taxes, by their very nature, are confiscatory. They are, to a degree, almost like a government-imposed fine. Thus, they can only act to discourage certain behaviors. Our current tax code taxes based on income, and again at death on after-tax savings, thus giving the 1-2 punch of discouraging both earning money and saving money. If we instead taxed based solely upon expenditures, it would LOWER the cost of compliance (for all parties), eliminate confusion (the current tax code is over 71,000 pages long and growing), eliminate the possibility to game the system to pay little in taxes while living an opulent lifestyle, and on the whole end up with a system that is as the founders of this country intended.
“And not all Conservatives are knuckle-dragging rednecks, clinging to their guns and their religion. ”
As a knuckle dragging redneck I would like to point out we all aren’t conservatives.
Noted.
I have friends who are largely liberal but own guns and shoot regularly. INBD.
Spend some time in anti-gun areas of this country , surrounded by the educated elite, and you’ll see a way of thinking that is really strange . A belief in protection by the police, aversion to hunting or sport shooting, a policy of fighting crime by restricting the sale of firearms, and a large indifference to the constitution. Overall, the left is very good at making arguments, it’s been said you can’t win an argument with them, but that doesn’t mean your wrong.
As someone born and raised in one of the most vehemently anti-gun places in America- San Francisco- I agree with this up to a point. What is facinating to me is that it seems like all of the “protection by the police, aversion to hunting or sport shooting, a policy of fighting crime by restricting the sale of firearms” minded people are transplants from other areas of the country.
Whereas the majority of my high school buddies own firearms, support 2A, and shoot often. Oh, and most of us diddnt shoot in high school- we werent raised with firearms, and most of us came around to them independently of the others. I just find this interesting.
I took two UK chaps to a range and let them fire handguns, shotguns, rifles and an AR-15. At first they were wallflowers, afraid to go near the machines they were taught are evil. 2 hours and 400 rounds later they were asking what time the ammo store closes so they could buy more. I erased 30 years of reeducation in one afternoon. One clip of .223 and I had to pry the empty gun from their hands.
Afterwards they silently sat in the back of my car and wondered aloud why they could not own and shoot guns in their own country. It was nothing like the movies they said. They felt a sense of freedom and empowerment. The other gun owners were ordinary folk, no criminal lunatics. One guy was a natural with a .38 special, he shot better than me. A quick stop at the gun store and they just drooled over the choices.
I think all liberals who oppose guns need a day at the range. Might change a few minds .
As a bleeding heart liberal who loves shooting a .22 and building AK-47s, I completely agree.
The reason it is so easy to tar all liberals and “progressives” with the anti- 2nd Amendment brush is that they tend to overwhelmingly support the Democrat Party, and the Democrat Party has been captured by the “progress beyond the Constitution” statist elements. When you hear the Democrat President of the USA tell La Raza that he would like to be able to rule without reference to Congress, you tend to believe his role models are Presidents-for-Life Hugo Chavez and Fidel Castro.
Those of us who took an oath “to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” tend to take this kind of rhetoric seriously, and we tend to believe that the 2nd Amendment is, in fact, about prevention of tyranny – not about duck hunting. The “reasonable middle ground” between liberty and slavery is what? Serfdom?
I fall in the John Adams camp, myself: “If you love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home and leave us in peace. We seek not your council, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you, and may posterity forget that ye were our country men.”
Quote is from Samuel Adams – sorry, didn’t mean to confuse the revolutionary with the politician.
Brad Kozak says: “I love this guy. No namby-pamby, wishy-washy, “let’s all sing Kumbayah” and share our feelings with the group crap. Andrew Breitbart calls ‘em as he sees ‘em.”
Personally, I don’t understand the current fascination with “calling ’em as you see ’em.” There’s no trick to that. Any fool can say what he thinks. Just open your mouth and start blabbering. Try and stop some people, that’s the hard part.
I’m more interested in people who actually have something to say — people with personal integrity who know what they’re talking about. Would that include Andrew Breitbart? Ha. He’s a proven liar and a media clown. If proscribed by law to recite only facts, he’d be struck dumb. We’d never hear another word from the jackass.
Ah, I wondered when/if you were gonna chime in. Now lets see…you’ve been grousing for the better part of a year, making comments that would lead us to believe you are only pro-gun for “elites,” military and police, yet you have said that you are a gun owner and pro-gun. You’ve also identified yourself as leaning Left, politically. In that same time, I’ve been slammed, repeatedly, for having a partisan, Conservative take on everything. So I write a piece, explaining that not all Liberals are gun-grabbing, tree-hugging, freedom-abhorring whack-jobs, and we should try and look for areas in which we agree, rather than just automatically gainsay what those on the other side promote. And what was your response? Not a word about, “Gee Brad, you almost sound reasonable,” or “Yes, as much as it pains me to say it, you’re right Brad, there are issues upon which we can agree.” Nope, you’re gonna focus in on your hatred for Breitbart.
Not that you care, but if you do wanna sound even marginally-reasonable to the TTAG Armed Intelligentsia, you kinda blew an opportunity there to reach across the aisle with an olive branch. The kind of rhetoric you trafficked in with your reply is not part of the solution – it’s part of the problem. Nice job.
If you are trying to find middle ground, don’t open with the rantings of Andrew Breitbart. He’s a sleazebag. Most right-wingers don’t even want to be associated with him.
One more time: I’m not a leftist. I’m to the left of you. Big difference.
I dream of the day Breitbart fills in for Rush. He’s going to knock it out of the park and Rush will have found his successor.
Here’s my joke about Breitbart ….. Do you know the difference between Rep. Weiner and Andrew Breitbart. Breitbart’s family jewels can’t be twitted because they are bigger than the entire internet.
Breitbart has to be the toughest guy in America. He’s fearless. God Bless him.
Magoo: It got you to read the post, didn’t it? And I think it was a valid way (albeit a somewhat sensational one) to make a point about finding common ground. I could have as easily started with Michael Moore (but I can’t stand looking at Pizza the Hut for as long as it would take to write the story) – but every Conservative I know think HE’S a sleazebag, and and a hypocritical one at that. But I don’t see a lot of those on the Left distancing themselves from him.
Your point about being a “leftist” is (well, MAY be) valid. I’d actually have to hear your thoughts on a host of other issues to really be able to determine that for my own satisfaction. But you are correct in that you self-identify to the left of me. (Of course, that goes for probably 75% of the country, so it’s not like you’re going out on a limb or anything.)
And I’m still waiting to hear you say “you’re right.” Come on…I know you can do it. The words may taste funny, but I have faith you can spit ’em out.
Right about what?
All you have shown us is how shallow you are.
If it thins anymore, we’ll have to measure in angstroms.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angstrom
Geez, do I have to do EVERYTHING for you?
The central theme of the post. The last paragraph. Look around.
That’s exactly why I asked. A “theme” is not a thesis. Can you tell me what is the salient point of these 700 words in 2500 words or less? Hmm, you’ve conceded that non-conservatives might be sentient beings as well. Is that what you’d like a pat on the back for? Ok, congratulations on the personal growth.
Apparently, you’re unfamiliar with the concept of “Statement – Development – Recapitulation,” as in the Sonata Bar Form. Re-read my last paragraph. Your fellow Liberals Gage and Jenny were gracious enough to acknowledge that this post was NOT demonizing either side. Since you, yourself have
whinedmentioned countless times that we tend to err on the side of Conservatism, I thought you might appreciate an acknowledgement from Yours Truly, that there are degrees of Liberalism, not to mention some common ground upon which we can all agree. But if you want to remain churlish, be my guest. I’m fine with you being rude and ungracious. Makes my job easier. And a little more fun.“People with personal integrity who know what they’re talking about.”
Would that be people like Dan Rather, Walter Cronkite, Babs Walters, perky Katie Couric, and other media talking heads? Or just the ones who get “a tingling down their legs” whenever Obama talks? Would you classify them under the heading of “media clowns”?
No, not all liberals support the anti gun insanity, I carry & would be pleased to see armed guards in malls & schools. I as well as many others voted Walker in because doyle had his head so far up his a$$ you couldn’t pull it out with a crane. It would be nice to be able to work with the brady’s on some limited issues, obviously they have only one objective though, so Breitbart is right here, bring it on, Randy