Posted on 01/11/2013 2:42:50 PM PST by RoosterRedux
Forgive me for choosing a colleague and friend, but I've been waiting for exactly this kind of media appearance from someone -- anyone! -- on our side to make this point with, and it just so happens that last night it was Breitbart editor-at-large Ben Shapiro who delivered as perfect an example as one could ever hope for. This is a must-watch for the rest of this column to make any sense whatsoever.
As one of our Founding Fathers once said, "Facts are stubborn things," and when faced with facts, calm logic, and someone fully prepared for the encounter, after a fifteen minute appearance last night with our own Ben Shapiro, CNN's Morton Downey Jr. Piers Morgan was left gasping for air. This was Morgan's worst nightmare realized and, for a whole host of reasons, something we need to see happen more often all across the media landscape.
What made Shapiro's appearance last night especially worthy of note had nothing to do with the fact that a left-wing media demagogue had his head handed to him. It's not enough anymore to simply win the media moment. For example…
Throughout the presidential election, we saw John Sununu regularly kick all kinds of butt on MSNBC. But how many minds did he change? How many votes were swayed? Calling Andrea Mitchell out as an Obama partisan might make the choir cheer (it did me), but this is a hearts and minds campaign.
*snip*
When it comes to Piers Morgan and his gun control mania, we've seen more than a few Sununu moments created by our side that might have made the choir cheer but did little to change many minds. In the end, it's all noise; it's all flash; it's all a meaningless game of checkers.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
I wish someone would ask these talking heads how many armed guards they have around them at all times and how many armed guards there are in the studio. And ask them if it’s easy to get into their gated neighborhood or appartment.
Why do they always gather around Gabrielle Gifford? Have they forgotten the conservative judge and CHILD who were actually murdered?
It’s unfortunate the author at Breitbart engages in gratuitous Todd Akin bashing.
Oh they trot out the child all the time. Judge Roll doesn’t count in their eyes because he was male, Caucasian, Christian, and conservative. They’re probably pleased because 0bama gets to appoint a life term leftist psychopath in his place.
Some of Morgan's energy has been spent and Shapiro has had a chance to study all the faux arguments.
In other words...timing helps.
SOME OBSERVATIONS REGARDING BEN SHAPIRO, PIERS MORGAN AND MORGAN’s PREVIOUS GUEST — ALEX JONES....
Shapiro states correctly that the Second Amendment is written specifically for the American people to be well armed. They are to form a militia in times of crisis and will be used to protect the people of these united States. Folks this is about your property rights. It is also to have the effect of a counterweight; a deterrent to a government that becomes tyrannical.
It is not to be infringed.
Piers Morgan weaves a familiar script where he insisted on Shapiro to answer his question. If you noticed, the trap is set when Morgan doesn’t allow the guest to answer. He will intentionally interrupt the guest with another question or allegation. He will continue stacking the questions and allegations.
Indeed, Piers Morgan’s strategy is to paint a tapestry of the guest being “insensitive and absurd”.
In legal circles, such tactics would be a form of “leading the witness”, which would not be allowed in a court of law. Granted, the Piers Morgan show is not a court of law. Nevertheless, in any public debate there are rules of engagement. Each side is allowed to respond without constant interruption. Piers Morgan has an annoying habit of not letting his guest finish his point.
Alex Jones was adept in recognizing that the Piers Morgan Show is not a stage for a “fair” debate. Jones did not allow Piers Morgan to weave a web of questions and allegations. Each time Alex Jones fired back with a library of published statistics and facts.
In this regard, Alex Jones took Piers Morgan to the wood shed.
Unfortunately, Jones came off as a ranting, raving loon and his insistence that the US government had something to do with the destruction of the NY twin towers did him no favors.
It is also important noting that Piers Morgan and other anti-gun pundits ask repeatedly:
“Why does anyone need a military assault rifle like that of a AR-15?”
How many times was this question answered by the guests in those interviews?
Ben Shapiro answered it TWICE. It is to have the effect of a counterweight; a deterrent to a government that becomes tyrannical. Our government might not be tyrannical like Stalin or the Nazis now, but there is no guarantee that it won’t slowly evolve that way. THAT is why we need a means of protecting ourselves and DETERRING Tyranny.
Shapiro, being a Jew, effectively informs Piers of how his ancestors were affected in Europe under the Nazis because they had no means of protecting themselves.
Piers Morgan was given this answer and never responded to it.
If the author said that, I'm with him.
It's like the old schoolchild's joke:
The "need" for assault rifles is in its presence.
"Why are you waving your arms like that?""To keep the elephants away!"
"I don't seen any elephants."
"Then it's working!"
The simple fact that people keep and bear them is enough to keep the government from descending into tyranny.
It's a red-herring to suggest that we don't need them because the government has never turned on us in 236 years. The truth is that the government has been successfully deterred from turning on us all this time because we are armed.
-PJ
How fetching that Mr Nolte extols the performance of his boss(!) on the P. Morgan show!
Nolte is a fine guy, but this article on Shapiro is parallel to MSM puff pieces on leftists.
First, Shapiro was very weak from a Second Amendment point of view, as he was ceding ground left and right, to wit:
1. He is fine with banning the private sale of weapons without an intrusive Government background check. (Where is that in the Second Amendment?)
2. He wants laws requiring people to lock up their own weapons in their own homes. (Where is that in the Second Amendment?)
3. He is in favor of a Federal Government gun registry, provided it is not made public. (That would be a secret gun registry, Harvard Law Grad Shapiro.) (Where is that in the Second Amendment.)
4. He appears to fail to understand the definition of an “assault rifle.”
5. He favors stronger background checks and mental-health screening. (This guy is supposed to be on our side?)
6. He indicated that he is comfortable with a military veteran friend of his owning an AR-15. Obvious implication: He is not comfortable with the current 1Million-item backlog on ARs.
7. He says he lost relatives in the Holocaust, and he is this willing to cave and make concessions? Mind boggling.
Resolved: The time for being defensive about the Second Amendment (and what it REALLY means) is over. We need to go on offense in the public square. No more “fig leaves.” No more “reasonable concessions.” No more flirting with gun registries, background checks, or “Mother may I buy a gun.” The Left never makes concessions — only hudna (temporary concession pending preparation for the next round of battle). Ask Liberals, “Just WHOSE Second Amendment is it that you are attacking and despising?” Answer: It is MY Second Amendment. Get the hell off my founding-documentary lawn!
And precise how would you have responded to Morgan on national TV on Morgan’s show?
Someone needs to take that idiot Brit to where the US Internment camps for Japanese where located. Then ask him if he still thinks that it is absurd to assume that the US government could turn against its own law abiding citizens.
I am not sure if Mr. Shapiro just needs some more seasoning or if he really holds these unacceptable concessions as acceptable. I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt that he just needs some additional stage practice, but if he really does support what he says, then I’m off the Shapiro bandwagon.
Absolutely NO registry of any kind, under any circumstances!
You make some good points. I thought the praise a bit over the top, too. But, in all fairness, I found Shapiro's defense of gun rights to be one of the more eloquent that I've heard from anyone under fire from a lefty TV personality.
He didn't relent and, by bringing up the resistance-to-tyranny argument, he let a big cat out of the bag. When we stop talking about hunting and self-defense and stress that, the left will go absolutely ballistic [is that a pun?].
Shapiro was great.
He did indeed...and then tossed in a head fake (the 40 or 50 years point) before any on the Left could raise the issue of whether or not the Conservatives believe it is Obama himself who is trying to tyrannically overthrow the U.S.
Obama is the point man of the CPUSA and CPWorld...he is leading this effort to overthrow our Constitution and Government. But Shapiro slip loose from that accusation with lawyerly if not poetic aplomb.
Did it seem disingenuous to those of us on the Right? Well, yes.
But did it work as a debate tactic.
Yes!
But that was not a concession...it was a stratagem to expose the illogical, even hypocritical, nature of the Left's position.
After all, you can buy a 30 round clip for a Glock 26.
Nothing was ceded in this debate. Confusion was sown among the Left.
Even the usually pushy Piers Morgan looked sheepish.
He will not sleep well tonight.
It has been said that the modern reason why Switzerland has not been invaded is not the Alps...but the weapons owned and loved by the citizenry.
That is what Shapiro was trying to say...we are trying to defend our freedom, our independence from those who would take it away.
And Obama definitely wants to take it away!
Good question. To be honest, I don’t know. However, I hope that I would at least start by not ceding ground as he did.
You think giving concessions is helpful? You give them an inch, they will gladly take a mile.
In my view, Alex Jones did better. After watching Shapiro, I think I better understand why Jones never shut op. (With Shapiro, Morgan never shut up.)
I think the answer needs to be along these lines: This is my Second Amendment. Stay the hell away from it.
No more “defending” the Second Amendment. Time to go on offense. Get in their faces for wanting to subvert/overturn it.
Yeah, that was brilliant. I'd have gone all Obama at that point [even had I maintained Shapiro's composure] and Morgan would have zoomed in for the kill.
I watched the interview. While being interrupted, he was attempting to interject the qualifier "If there is a mentally disturbed family member" into that particular condition. It, of course, got talked over by the odious Redcoat Morgan.
That said, Shapiro was calm (almost) and collected in his response. He didn't concede so much as refuse to argue points which were extraneous to HIS argument (i.e. he didn't let Morgan drag him off target and fog his message).
Shapiro pounded home one point...and I believe it worked (Morgan was deflated)...
Shapiro's point was that the 2nd Amendment is our defense against tyranny (uh oh, new tag line alert;-)). It worked against King George (in that we refused to disarm)...and will work against Obama and his successors.
As a follow-on point, Obama took an oath to defend the Constitution...not to destroy it.
He is tyranny personified.
Same here...I would have jumped up and punched Morgan (numerous times) screaming "are you daft...can't you see we are presently under attack!!!!!"
New tag line alert.;-)
If a person has a mentally unstable person in the house...for God's sake, lock up your weapons.
How hard is that, Ms Lanza? Put them in a frikken safe or find yourself shot in the face in the morning.
Have an Windham Weaponry AR-15 (MPC) on order from a good friend who owns a local gun shop/hardware store combo...but may never see that thang (if the Dem's get their way).
“The beauty of the 2nd amendment is that you won’t need it until they come to take it away” Thomas Jefferson
Her lack of responsibility bordered on insanity.
Check out “The Battle of Athens, TN”
http://voxvocispublicus.homestead.com/Battle-of-Athens.html
Reality is a rapidly moving target...none of us is rational in our interpretation of it.
This is why those who society defines as insane are often, in clinical terms, the sanest.
And those who conform to society are those who are the most insane.
Hey, I like that.
;-)
I think I just pronounce myself "sane."
Conservatives didn't bash Todd Akin for his pro-life beliefs.
Akin was deservedly bashed for his inability to coherently defend them.
The best response is a question-to-a-question:
"Why does anyone need a .22 rifle?"
That is, after all, what an AR-15 is.
I would add that the 2nd Amendment is our defense against both tyranny and anarchy (criminals).
Thanks RoosterRedux.
G26 is the best handgun I have ever owned. I have a G17 too, but the 26 beas everything.
Mr Laz,
You are correct: He did attempt to insert that qualification.
Nonetheless, that is hardly reassuring. From requiring those with mental patients in their home to lock up their weapons, to requiring ALL of us to lock up our weapons... is a very short reach indeed.
Shapiro made me very uneasy when he said (more than once), “we need to calibrate our laws....” Remember: Shapiro is a Harvard-trained l-a-w-y-e-r.
So, I respectfully disagree with you. No more laws. We have more than enough laws on the books already. Actually, we need LESS laws on the books, with genuine enforcement of laws against murder, theft, etc (not against inanimate objects).
Going further (logically), as I have said elsewhere: No more “defending” the Second Amendment. To borrow a phrase used by our Chief Justice (about the odious Roe v Wade decision), it is “settled law.” It needs not to be defended. We need to demand of its detractors that they respect it or risk of being called subversive traitors, enemies (whether foreign or domestic).
I agree we need to calibrate our laws. We need to roll every gun law back except the background check and we need to get crazy people listed on the database.
The problem I have with this is the simple fact that if someone wants to find an idiot in any group consisting of thousands they will find that idiot.
There is no way we could possibly train every Conservative to preform as perfectly as Ben Shapiro did. This is true for the same reason we can’t all play professional football. Talent, knowledge, skill, and interest in any given area are by no means uniform charcherist in any given population.
Ben Shapiro did an excellent job of studying his target and coming prepared to address its particular form of attack. (Something I think many if not most of us are capable of doing.) Indeed if every conservative was so well organized and prepared I think you would find the left never interviewing them, and that in itself is the problem.
They don’t try to pick people capable of defending their point of view, they try to arrange confrontations in favorable conditions against favorably weaker opponents. This is the art of war, and they have a decisive advantage with control over the microphone.
What Ben Shapiro successfully did was make them think he was weak when he was really quite strong, thus bring the fight to a field he was prepared for. A field they would have avoided had they known.
Who is to decide who is “sane” enough to be armed?
There are perhaps many standards that we might agree upon but there are also many others that we most certantly don’t agree upon.
I could never trust this “judgement” to Washington. Do you not recall the way Federal authorities were trying to frame Tea partiers just a few years ago?
Your comments are correct, but the caveat for every conservative is “in my view”. We already agree on the imporatance of liberty and the 2nd Amendment. It is the mushy middle that needs to be corralled.
Sadly, the mushy middle consists of white women who would otherwise side with us, but voted Obama in. It is in their view that our arguments make sense.
The call for “common sense gun laws” are a fight for the mushy middle. We won’t win it without arguments that convince them. Then as the heat turns down simple legislative manuvering kills the rest off.
Our error is in responding to direclty. Better to get back to Benghazi, Fast and Furious, and the ongoing corruption of the Obama Admin. Stop fighting on their terms, turn their flanks and attack.
Your comments are correct, but the caveat for every conservative is “in my view”. We already agree on the imporatance of liberty and the 2nd Amendment. It is the mushy middle that needs to be corralled.
Sadly, the mushy middle consists of white women who would otherwise side with us, but voted Obama in. It is in their view that our arguments make sense.
The call for “common sense gun laws” are a fight for the mushy middle. We won’t win it without arguments that convince them. Then as the heat turns down simple legislative manuvering kills the rest off.
Our error is in responding to direclty. Better to get back to Benghazi, Fast and Furious, and the ongoing corruption of the Obama Admin. Stop fighting on their terms, turn their flanks and attack.
T Jefferson gunquote bump
Of course one sure way to beat the media would be to encourage our kids to enter that profession. We might also want to explore investing in computer driven home schooling programs and start pulling our kids out of the public education propaganda meat grinder. The fact that we face a hostile press means that we did something wrong back then, eh.
"Sandy Hook."
Ben Shapiro is a new American hero. He stood straight and strong and made the case for inividual sovereignty under the Bill of Rights! Bravo Mr. Shapiro and Semper Fi! This limey fop, Piers Morgan, is a statist, a self-absorbed narcissist in search of higher ratings. The only criticism I offer is that WE MUST REJECT THE LANGUAGE OF THE LEFT! NEVER REFER TO THESE WEAPONS AS “ASSAULT RIFLES.” I have never assaulted anyone with my rifle. My rifle is a HOME DEFENSE RIFLE! To win the battle, we must command the high ground of language. Never again use the canard, “ASSAULT RIFLE.” It’s a trap. This is where we are defeated time again by the left. They assume the terms and we go along. I will never relinquish my HOME DEFENSE RIFLE, under my constitutional right to bear arms; under my Natural Right to defense of my Life and Property. Hey Piers...it’s not up for debate!
Very good post. Great food for thought. Thank you.
Why the exception? I do not see “background check” in the Second Amendment.
Moreover, someone has to make the rules for the background checks.
And, then, someone needs to “interpret” those rules.
And, then, someone needs to “enforce” them.
If you have faith in our current Administration to operate “background checks” in a reasonable, equitable manner, you are far more trusting than I am.
Liberty has risks. I’ll take mine undiluted, thank you.
We had no “background checks” when I was a kid.
Face it: They are the creation of liberals after our guns.
It grates me to hear our “friends,” such as Shapirio, Ted Cruz, and CCRKBA singing the praises of “background checks” in order to ingratiate themselves to the media and the Left.
Go ahead and ingratiate all you like: They will still hate you, plot to take your guns, and enslave you.
Relying on “background checks” simply gives them more rope to hamstring and — ultimately — to hang us.
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