Documentary film maker Michael Moore wants to “finish off the NRA.” You know, metaphorically. ‘Cause the “gun lobby” is all that stands between Mr. Moore’s desire for civilian disarmament and civilian disarmament. To that end, he wants the Connecticut police to release photos of the dead children shot at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown . . .
When the American people see what bullets from an assault rifle fired at close range do to a little child’s body, that’s the day the jig will be up for the NRA. It will be the day the debate on gun control will come to an end. There will be nothing left to argue over. It will just be over. And every sane American will demand action.
Yeah, who needs debate? Who needs perspective? Let’s decide public policy on the basis of pure, unadulterated, uninformed emotion. And because Mr. Moore can’t wait for that triumphant moment, his blog asks readers to imagine it.
Dr. Cyril Wecht, past president of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences, told me this:
The kind of ammunition used by the Newtown killer would have produced very extensive, severe and mutilating injuries of the head and face in these small victims. Depending on the number of shots striking a child’s head, substantial portions of the head would be literally blasted away. The underlying brain tissue would be extensively lacerated with portions of hemorrhagic brain tissue protruding through the fractured calvarium and basilar skull, some of which would remain on portions of the face…actual physical identification of each child would have been extremely difficult, and in many instances impossible, even by the parents of any particular child.
We also know this, according to Dr. Wecht:
In one case, the parents have commented publicly upon the damage to their child, reporting that his chin and left hand were missing. Most probably, this child had brought his hand up to his face in shock and for protection and had the hand blasted away along with the lower part of his face.
According to Mr. Moore, this is your fault. Well, our fault. Because we did “nothing” after the Columbine killing to prevent Adam Lanza—or evil loons like Lanza (my words)—from unleashing his murderous mayhem. We need to see what we—yes we—have done.
But I am telling you now, that moment will come with the Newtown photos – and you will have to look. You will have to look at who and what we are, and what we’ve allowed to happen. At the end of World War II, General Eisenhower ordered that thousands of German civilians be forced to march through the concentration camps so they could witness what was happening just down the road from them during the years that they turned their gaze away, or didn’t ask, or didn’t do anything to stop the murder of millions.
Comparing the Sandy Hook spree killing to the systematic slaughter of hundreds of thousands of defenseless children and millions of innocent adults is flat-out ridiculous and not a little insensitive. Suggesting that Americans who voted for politicians who defend their Constitutionally protected right to armed self-defense are culpable for Lanza’s killing spree is insane.
Crazy like a fox, of course. Moore reckons the same kind of “white guilt” that fueled the civil rights movement—assuming that’s a valid assertion—would undermine the influence of gun rights advocates and their standard bearer, the NRA. In this, I don’t think he’s wrong. Which means the opposite is also true. Well, almost.
Photos or film from the Nazi death camps [such as the ones featured in this British film deemed too gruesome for the general public at the time] wouldn’t convince 2A fence straddlers to develop an appreciation for their gun rights. Too depressing. Too . . . incomprehensible. “It couldn’t happen here.”
In the same sense, terrible images of mutilated Sandy Hook victims would not “convert” Americans to the anti-gun side. They’d harden both “sides” of the “debate.” Gun control advocates would be “inspired.” Gun rights advocates would say, see? This is what we must arm ourselves against.
Yes, someday a Sandy Hook mother – or a Columbine mother, or an Aurora mother, or a mother from massacres yet to come – will say, like the mother of Emmett Till, “I just want the world to see.” And then nothing about guns in this country will ever be the same again.
Pack your bags, NRA – you’re about to be shown the door. Because we refuse to let another child die in this manner. Got it? I hope so.
All you can do now is hope no one releases those photos.
We who cherish our Constitutionally protected right to self-defense have nothing to fear from agit-prop agitators like Mr. Moore. We know the truth hurts. It liberates you from comfortable illusions. Like the idea that gun control can stop madmen from carrying out their evil intentions.
Michael Moore is just Feinstein wearing a beard. Not even a good beard at that.
yes, its for the white suburban children. I am sure that will play well in the cities where kids are joining gangs and have been shooting each other for 30 years, and they are cutting funding for schools and police. The customers of a lot of those gangs are the suburbanites who drive into the city to get drugs and then drive out. but its for the C H I L D R E N
… and actually 18 months from now when the hysteria has subsided and dems have to explain why gun control didnt work, well there will be a backlash.
How come Bloomburg didn’t take away this obnoxious slob’s big gulp?
Because while Michael Moore would be treated the same as any other citizen in New York City, some citizens are more equal than others.
I have this suspicious feeling that the first responders might have run to the wrong school at first. It would explain why the first media coverage is from officers running across the parking lot at St.Rose of Lima School. It would also explain why they might find bystanders there that were by accident arrested. It might also explain why this was then totally covered up and never mentioned again, because that would be the fuckup of the century, giving the gunman more time to kill those kids if they might have been able to stop him earlier..if there were kids..and one gunman..
Moore is an anti-Semite and I find it appalling that people let him get away using Holocaust imagery for his anti-gun propaganda.
I’m not a ballistics expert by any means, but wouldn’t a .223 FMJ round do less damage than that of a .45 ACP hollow point or a 30-06? If this is true, this again, proves that these anti-gun clowns dont have a damn clue what they are talking about.
The way .223 tumbles makes it act like a buzz saw in soft tissue so these descriptions are not unplausible. Especially if there are miltiple wounds to the head and face.
Every report that I have read indicated that he was using hollow point/hunting ammo in that AR.
If that is the case – the crime scene at SH would have been more horrendious than most can honestly imagine…even more so with the age of the suspects.
I don’t believe the release of the pictures will do any good other than tramautizing the general public. Like mentioned it would only produce a very, very strong emotional response. I am staunh pro-2a but even I tear up just thinking about it.
High-velocity rifle rounds at relatively short range cause massive damage, even if they are FMJ. It’s a far cry from what one sees from even a fully-expanded large-caliber bullet at typical handgun velocities. I can damn well promise that those “little” .223 rounds didn’t leave neat quarter-inch holes.
Has anyone argued the following in court:
If the 2a is a right, then all the fees, taxes, training requirements etc. make it a disproportionately burden on young citizens, people of color, low-income families, people with disabilities, and the elderly?
Seems like a valid argument because depending on the ruling, it could mess up how other rights are applied so it force the courts to rule to remove some of those restrictions.
Read “Second Amendment Penumbras: Some Preliminary Observations” by Glenn Reynolds (aka Instapundit). The whole thing is 14 pages long ( 1 MB PDF ), but well worth the time.
Reynolds’s “Ham Sandwich Nation: Due Process When Everything is a Crime” ( 6 pages ), is also relevant.
Pretty awesome. Though I feel like I need a flow chart with manufacturer’s logos and pictures of the toys to follow all this new gear you’re getting kitted out with!
Even progressive-leaning NPR basically said that the numbers are difficult to assess, especially since gun ownership is something that is self-reporting. What is obvious though, is most gun owners own gun NOT to hunt, but to protect themselves and/or families:
http://www.npr.org/2013/03/12/174136074/pew-poll-most-american-gun-owners-say-they-own-a-firearm-for-protection
“BLOCK: I wonder if there would people who might not want to tell people they have a gun in the home, might be reluctant to divulge that information.
DIMOCK: I think it’s a possibility. I mean, there are stereotypes associated with gun ownership and there’s also a privacy issue. There may be some people who don’t want to talk about it.
BLOCK: Or if you have any concerns that your guns might be confiscated, maybe that would be one question you wouldn’t want to answer.
DIMOCK: That’s true.”
Too bad more news organizations haven’t picked up on TTAG’s “I Am a Gun Owner” series. I think this blog did a fantastic job proving that gun owners are more than just a bunch of cranky old white dudes.
Would you please make a blog post about all the gear you using? I mean everything backpack, clothes, guns with attachements. I just think it would be cool to see a pros setup.
Thanks
This guy is a joke, after seeing his movies and all the stupid shortcuts he takes to make a point I don’t get why people give him credit.
First exemple that pops in my head is in sicko, he sites France as a great country for medical care and try to prove that people there have a great medical system and still make a great living, his proof ? See that one family in Paris makes 8000€ a month! Geez one familly make that kind of money ? So let’s assume that all the people in France do too ! What a moron..
Clowns like Michael Moore are the life-blood of a Liberal Arts education because he so well demonstrates the need to study philosophy. The entire gun control movement shows us why Utilitarianism doesn’t pass the smell test.
If 4 children were killed at Newtown and the killer was armed with only a Biden special it would be no less tragic, in my view. Gun control advocates like Moore exercise classic utilitarian concepts and instead only look at HOW MANY lives were lost, rather than WHY these lives were lost. A utilitarian first looks to ban an assault weapon because it holds 30 rounds. After the next shooting he looks to ban handguns because they hold 15 rounds. And finally, after the next shooting he looks to ban all guns because even 2 rounds is too many. Never ONCE do these people address the true issues, which are providing protection for those who can’t defend themselves (children), and allowing those who can defend themselves to possess the adequate tools. Secondly, people like Moore drastically fail to address WHY sick f*cks like Lanza and Loughner exist in our society and why we’re producing so many degenerate gangbangers, psychopaths and criminals. Answers to those questions are of course politically incorrect and uncomfortable to the Castrati like Moore.
I don’t know if anyone caught it, but a 16 year old girl was stabbed to death by a random thug on a bus in the UK last week. And the comments below the article? “Why did he have a knife? No one needs to be carrying a knife!” Some people just don’t get it, and never will.
Never, ever let the responsibility shift from the perpetrator to the tool. After Newtown I could not have cared less about what weapons were used or how they were acquired. My first thought was, “Where did his father go wrong?”
Are these fire rated? I wasn’t able to find it on the website if they are.
They make a nice product, but they’ve always been overpriced for what you get, pretty much at every product level.
In this case, you have a well constructed middle level vault. It’s at the same price point as a vault of similar quality with the same type of steel, but 1/4 of the capacity for weapons and ammo, of similarly priced products by reputable safe manufacturers.
I’d love to own one of these as it’s perfect for me, but I wouldn’t pay more than $250 for the one without biometrics.
“But while Democrats fight against taxes on the poor…”
I had lunch the other day with a doctor and two co-workers, an RN and a paramedic. We had just finished a call on the critical care unit. The medic is above and beyond a bleeding heart liberal. So much so he uses food stamps. Funny, I make signifigantly less than him and support myself just fine without any assistance.
Anyways we started talking about Obamacare and he was praising it left and right, “This country has it and that one and that one, blah blah blah and it works for them.” The doctor started to say how busy they already are in hospitals and how this will basically be a free pass for more people to just start, at which point I added that doctors and nurses are heavily burdened with the work loads they already have and this will signifigantly decrease their quality of care. For the first time since I have known him, that medic shut up and had nothing to say.
“Why yes, it all makes sense, no guns, free healthcare, yes yes” Until it’s their @$$ on the line and someone’s shooting at them. Then a gun becomes a “defensive weapon” and that month-long wait to see a specialist is too long, so they decide to go with a private doctor.
I’m fine with that provided we also show pictures of dead children in places like Mexico where gun control works so well. I’d also include pictures of the piles of bodies found in places like the German concentration camps that demonstrate what happens under governments with unchecked power. Finally, I’d show some of the videos we have captured that depict the Jihadist training exercises conducted in burnt out schools to train for real school takeovers in places like America. Maybe even see if we can dig up some nice graphic footage of the Beslan school massacre with the bodies of children being hurled out of buildings. A gun ban did not prevent Beslan, but armed teachers/administrators probably would have.
Maybe they should create a similar photo of what some crazed shooter would look like had citizens been allowed the right to defend themselves against him saving a number of children from the slaughter. I wonder if Michael Moore would be will to put his fat ass in the path of a bullet to save a child. As recently stated, why sacrifice 20 kids to save one when you can save 20 at the sacrifice one.
I am standing up for victims. I am willing to help you defend yourself by giving you the choice own a tool for self defense.
When are people going to learn to just shut up! They tell you in black and white:
Merely being in a database of registered gun owners and having a “disqualifying event,” such as a felony conviction or restraining order, isn’t sufficient evidence for a search warrant, Marsh said March 5 during raids in San Bernardino County. So the agents often must talk their way into a residence to look for weapons, he said.
Learn the rules of police encounters. If this person had kept their mouth shut, this would have never happened. Am I under arrest? No, then am I being detained? No, GOOD BYE. If schools were really interested in educating our children, they would be teaching them these lessons, along with the inevitable results of compound interest coupled with fractional-reserve banking…
What’s does today’s stupid “ribbon color” mean?
It’s green, so I’m going to take a guess… “Save the Old Growth Trees?”
Oh NO my Chuck Grassley next to that Wicked Witch! Move Chuck before you catch something bad from it(her). If ya do don’t bring it home!
Also, make sure someone in the house is making a video of the encounter. If it gets to your word vs. theirs….
What conflict of interests? They want to keep their guns and they don’t want other people to keep theirs. I can see many circumstances where those interests compliment each other.
Not all gloom and doom no GOP Senators support the bill and 5 key dems already said NO to this we have a good chance in killing this fascist bill.
And Robert quit showing pics of theta nasty hag on your web sight a turd is a better pic then that hag!!!
It’s clear from this photo that Mrs. Giffords knows or knew at some point what an AR-15 is and how to use it safely. If she’s still a gun grabber at heart, knowing what she knows, I’d honestly prefer that over the ignorant fools spouting catch phrases who we usually hear from. If more politicians and lobbyists had personal experience rooted in practical firearms use and a deep understanding of the 2A, I think we’d have a lot fewer calls for gun control — or we could, at least, finally have this “debate” everyone is insisting we have.
Very nice. Excellent thinking.
“In gun control terms, since we can’t tell who’s crazy until they start acting crazy, we’d have to have regular mandatory psych evaluations. For everyone. Also not practical or possible. And even if it were, it’s a pretty scary thought experiment in the law of unintended consequences.”
Ladies and gentlemen, the Slippery Slope, indeed.
DEMAND A BODYGUARD!!
Since the NFA and before, gun laws have specifically targeted the poor. The “ruling class” has always wanted to make it so only the wealthy, intelligent, capable people are allowed to have firearms. The $200 NFA tax in 1934 is nearly $3,000 now. For years, San Francisco banned firearms ownership if you live in public housing, until it was overturned via lawsuit. The whole California Roster of pistols approved for sale and the testing process was designed specifically to make “saturday night specials” impossible to sell. The whole concept of “saturday night specials” was created to demonize inexpensive handguns. Some cities, like Los Angeles, Chicago, etc, have specific laws against these guns, even going so far as mandating a minimum price for a handgun and banning any guns with an MSRP under $x amount.
We know that the 2nd Amendment protects an individual right to own firearms, including handguns, and to use them for self defense. Poll taxes, printing/publishing taxes, etc, have been overturned by courts as an infringement upon various other rights. I would expect that any excessive taxes levied against guns and ammo or any onerous or expensive licensing requirements needed to purchase/possess firearms or ammunition would also get shot down. All people have this right, not just those wealthy enough to afford it.
The attempts to effectively prohibit people of lesser means from purchasing or carrying firearms is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. From minimum msrp for guns to CA’s “may issue” system, where in many counties ONLY those who are politically connected and/or very wealthy (which = politically connected), or are politicians/judges/etc themselves, are issued carry permits. Period. No permits are issued unless you pull political weight. That’s horrific and unjust. It’s an attitude of the ruling class that we should never accept.
62 grain barrnes varmet gernade bullets and Varget ,
created .50 inch groups at 200 yards.
out of my new .243 out of the box after sighted in .
these rifles are high quality and 50 year preformers.
I have a 270 and 3006 also.
on the down side the scope a bushnell/remington does not focus or clear well and only has les than a 2 inch eye relif witch is great for eye cuts
That may actually be better than a bullet button. In my mind a bullet button completely disqualifies a rifle from serious use. That though…certainly no worse than a lever action, and quite a bit better actually.
The “disease” hasn’t yet been specified. To say we want to inoculate against “gun violence” is to say we are looking for a cure for “disease” rather than a specific ailment.
That being said, lets assume the disease we ARE fighting is spree-killings, the first thing that would have to go are the gun free zones. As you said, this island of uninfected persons are vulnerable to infection from a single crazy-person. It also seems to me the more armed people (the inoculated) the less likely of the outbreak huge death toll – even if shootings on average increase, the incidence of mass shootings drops dramatically.
But I digress, the point is the use of the term “epidemic” is hyperbolic at best, an I agree. There is no talk about the child-drowning epidemic, or the car-accident epidemic. I wish the media and politicians got called on this more often.
My grandson can take this to school, RIGHT?
Amen! I will NOT buy ammo or firearms that are not part of the Firearm Equality Movement.
Interesting, it’s not enough for a judge to authorize a search warrant. So why are they even attempting this stupid game? It’s just the initial setup for a complete confiscation! If they show up at your door, tell them “not tonight, boys”, you are not welcome to come in for anything!
While her husband Mark Kelly is a lying hypocritcal sack o’ shit, I think the gun-owner community “jumped the gun” (pun intended) and over-reacted on the pictures of Ms. Giffords. The AR and AK rifles in the two pictures were not hers, but police and military PR photos. Charges of “hypocrisy” were unwarranted.
That being said, this part makes no sense and is pure bull shit:
> “I’m working to bring people together to support gun rights”
That is as much of a non sequitur as
* “I believe in protecting a woman’s right to choose. I have called on Congress to require waiting periods and ultrasound before abortion…”
* “I believe in protecting our First Amendment rights. I have called on Congress to regulate bloggers to prevent hate speech…”
* “I believe in protecting the rights of gays. I have called on Congress to strengthen the Defense of Marriage Act…”
* “I believe in protecting our right to worship freely. I have called on Congress to pass laws challenging the tax exempt status of churches who argue against science…”
(examples blatantly stolen from Michael Z. Williamson).