Previous Post
Next Post

 Sniper (courtesy strangemilitary.com)

-@Packetknife writes:

A “side-channel attack” is a computer hack that attacks security implementation issue rather than attempting to compromise the system head-on. In other words, it’s a sneak attack. Through the years, government agents intent on civilian disarmament have mastered this concept. Rather than attacking our firearms freedom head-on—amending the Second Amendment or creating laws that mandate outright confiscation—they’re sneaking up on it. They call it “common sense regulation,” “consumer safety” or sometimes even “gun safety.” It’s a cancer on our liberty . . .

New York readers reeling from the dead-of-the-night disarmament legislation known as the SAFE Act don’t need me to tell them that the registration requirements—for newly defined “assault rifles” and all ammunition sales—are working to reduce the number of gun owners in the state.

The SAFE Act’s privacy opt-out form is just one of many provisions that make it increasingly difficult for New Yorkers to exercise the right to keep and bear arms. Because acceptance is not automatic, because it is subject to judicial review, it add risk to the gun ownership, which decreases its likelihood.

The same can be said for the state’s vow to integrate mental health records, which scares away anyone who’s ever been treated for any mental illness. Or wants to have that option open in the future.

The federal push for so-called “Universal Background Checks” is another side-channel attack. As in New York, it can be used to “screen out” anyone who’s ever had any mental health treatment [ED: Some 4om Americans take anti-depressants.] It will add another layer of cost and delay and scrutiny to otherwise simple transfers.

A right delayed is a right denied. And don’t the disarmament advocates know it. If you want to see the chilling effect of a side-channel attack, just look at Massachusetts Gun Control Act, which dictates that every firearms transaction of any kind must go through an FFL. Even the recent “surge” in gun sales can’t make up for its disastrous effect. massgunlawreform.com:

According to a July 2002 House Post Audit and Oversight Committee report on firearm license numbers, there were approximately 1,500,000 licensed gun owners in the Commonwealth before the Gun Control Act was passed.

This number has been reduced to approximately 240,000 – a decrease of 84%.

A side-channel attack doesn’t have to be successful to be successful. At least not initially or on its face. For example, the Senate would never ratify the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty. But the federal government will be “free” to implement its provisions, such as “regulating” the import of small arms into the U.S. civilian market according to its terms. The move would drive-up prices and reduce innovation, which would make firearms ownership less attractive to millions of Americans.

There’s the “training requirements” so popular with lawmakers “trying to protect the public.” Training requirements add to the cost and complication of carrying a firearm without any scientific evidence that they increase public safety. As the post-Heller regulations in Washington D.C. and post-McDonald regulations in Chicago prove, red tape and bureaucratic foot-dragging can be just as effective as an outright ban.

Gun-free zones? Cooling off periods? Lead ammo bans? Need I go on? Government gun grabbers don’t come after your guns or ammunition head-on—they just make it harder to acquire them, keep them or use them. They “de-incentivize” potential gun owners to prevent the exercise of their gun rights and slowly decrease their population. It is an insidious and effective strategy that must be countered.

Gun owners be politically active and try to prevent side-channel attacks from going on-line. They must work to highlight and delete legislation that’s created side-channel attacks. And they must work to get people through the system as it exists. Ultimately, it’s a Tron-like battle between an evil mainframe (government) and liberty-minded users (gun owners). We must be vigilant, engaged, determined and effective. In fact, we shouldn’t rule out stealth, either. We have to be their side-channel attack.

Previous Post
Next Post

21 COMMENTS

  1. We must remain vigilant at this time, even though the death of the AWB has been proclaimed in the media. I have pledged to contact my reps weekly, last week I contacted a committee of 12 or so state reps by phone on a state level issue.

    I ask you all to join me, I know it does take some time but with e-mail it is not much of a burden, in fact take the time you would ordinarily spend at the range and do it, I know you are low on ammo.

    We must keep this going until we are back on the attack and moving forward again with campus carry, constitutional carry and national reciprocity like we were a year ago!

  2. “According to a July 2002 House Post Audit and Oversight Committee report on firearm license numbers, there were approximately 1,500,000 licensed gun owners in the Commonwealth before the Gun Control Act was passed.
    This number has been reduced to approximately 240,000 – a decrease of 84%.”

    I think that stat needs to be updated. I live in Massachusetts and my shooting range is always packed now and I just renewed my license without a lot of BS which totally surprised me. According to the Officer in Boston, permits are way up. Here’s a story to back it up at the end of my post. I think people may be waking up and overcoming whatever the government wants to throw at them as far as regulations go. The need to have a weapon is worth the inconveniences. Well, it is to me, since I am an honest law abiding person who wants the freedom to carry. Although, I am not happy about how others are treated in this state, since the permitting is from town to town and one Police Chief with an agenda can deny a person for whatever reason. It is a State Permit after all. So there is “Gun Control” in certain towns such as Cambridge and Brookline. (Big surprise to anyone who knows these towns.) If the day comes that they deny me in Boston, I will move to another town. Ironically, Boston is too big to have just one person controlling the licenses, so they’ve been straight with me for 25 years now, as long as I play by their rules and regulations.

    http://www.wcvb.com/news/investigative/Number-of-gun-licenses-in-Massachusetts-shoots-up/-/12520878/17217164/-/pen6nf/-/index.html

    • Good sir,

      The statistic quoted does not need to be updated. The article you linked to quotes an almost identical number of licensed gun owners as what the author’s link stated (240000 vs 254000). It also states approximately, and a difference of 6% fits that.

    • I’d like to know how many of the 1.26M Marylanders that “disarmed” after the ’92 GCA actually did. I’m sure a percentage left the state but I refuse to believe the vast majority just turned in their weapons and bent over.

  3. They have no choice but to keep on, most have said they are all in. They can’t appear weak to the sheep. They look like a dog swimming after a duck in a lake to me. We will have losses, the more rabbid they become though the more middle of the roaders will see the ghouls for who they are. Happy easter,lol, Randy

  4. One correction. A MA owner may sell up to 4 handguns, rifles or shotguns each year in private transactions with a non-FFL (unlimited number if selling to an FFL). Both buyer and seller need to have the proper permit or FOID. Like all gun transactions, the transfers must be reported on Form FA-10 to the Firearms Records Bureau. More than four annual sales to non-FFLs and the Commonwealth will consider you an unlicensed dealer, which is a major no-no.

    FYI, while MA is “may issue” for carry permits, it is “shall issue” for the long-gun FOID — which does not cover “assault weapons.” You can get things done in MA, but you’d better know the system inside and out. It’s a trap for the unwary.

  5. Take 2 weeks of ammo/range expense and donate to a cause or politician that supports your interests. $$$ well spent.

    • Well, it’s money spent. Whether it’s well-spent or not depends in part on how close we nip at their heels, and for how long.

  6. An even better side attack is what’s happening in our education system. Young kids getting punished for “playing soldier”, a zero tolerance stance on anything that might even remotely associate to a firearm or other weapon. All to create docile followers with an engrained fear of firearms.

    Don’t worry, it’ll be a decade or 2, maybe 3, until we see a majority to repeal the 2nd Amendment constitutionally. And you might say “that won’t pass through SCOTUS”. Well, let’s just wait another generation until that bench has been cleared and replaced with the fruits of this effort as well.

    • But I wonder what happens when they’re NEEDED as soldiers? Maybe I should have said, “NEEDED”, because they’re dead set on having a robot military in the foreseeable future.

      By which I mean ACTUAL ROBOTS. It’s all over their position papers and think tanks. They want an army that CANNOT disobey their orders to kill.

  7. I’ve also wondered about the drastic reduction in the number of “gun owners” in MA in what looks like a very short span of time. Their Gun Control Act seems to have been adopted in 1998, and the reduction cited was noted in 2002. What exactly happened to the million and a quarter in four years? Were they all old guys who suddenly died? How exactly did they know the number of gun owners under the previous laws?

    Perhaps a lot of folks who were technically gun owners merely had a late grandpa’s shotgun lying around in the attic they never touched and didn’t want to bother with the new permit. So, they either sold the shotgun or kept it quietly and illegally(?).

    Perhaps several family members used to have FOID’s where now only one would get it to keep all the guns in the house legally.

    It would take a local with an intimate knowledge of MA guns laws and the situation in general before and after their 1998 Act to even begin to speculate productively.

  8. Coming to a gun store near you! The all new and improved “Chili pepper” ghillie suit. Be the first on your block to get one! You’ll be able to sneak and hide in any jabanero patch. And for those long waits before you put a Taliban to sleep permanently, you can spice up your MRE right from your suit!

    That picture was just dying for a caption. Had to inject a little levity and I know those aren’t peppers. Are they?

    • Looks like ice plant to me. That’s what I’ve heard it called. It was used a lot to landscape public roadways in california.

  9. Also needing mention is the refusal of any of the big investment banks to represent Cerberus in its sale of Freedom Group. Since when do JP Morgan or GS give a piss about public opinion? I don’t buy for a second that a bulge bracket bank would turn down Cerberus and a $1 bil sale for any PR reasons. My suspicion is that some of these fine institutions were given a warning by the Obama administration to stear clear of any business with the firearms industry or risk getting the book thrown at them for some of their other nefarious activities. The whole thing stinks.

  10. Another one: Mental health diagnosis.

    Anybody who has ever been treated or prescribed medication for depression, PTSD, ADD/ADHD, etc., will have a history of mental illness. Perhaps even if a parent or grandparent had it.

    The governments are taking over the health care industry. How long will it be before a medical diagnosis constitutes “due process”?

  11. In my area, “Crime control” is the reason for enacting harsh and unworkable restrictions on firearm owners. I am yet to hear a logical explanation about how people owning rifles are contributing to crime committed with handguns, and often by outlaw motorcycle gangs.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here