Posted on 08/17/2005 10:57:12 PM PDT by SWO
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (BATFE), who seem to go out of their way to alienate gun owners with their heavy-handedness, behaved in a shameful manner this last weekend at the Showmasters' gun show in Richmond.
I had reports from members of police going to their houses while the member was waiting for their approval to purchase a gun at the show! The police asked the spouse and other family members questions about the purchases and filled in a survey! "Did you know your husband was going to a gun show today?" "Did you know your husband was going to buy a gun today?" and many other such questions.
If no one was home at the gun purchaser's house, the police went to the neighbors! "Did you know that your neighbor was buying a gun today? How do you feel about him doing so?"
One member, who was carrying a personal gun to sell, was approached by BATFE and taken to a car while they checked him out. The officer said in front of Showmasters' management, "Did you know you need a business license to sell a gun at this show? I have seen you at a lot of shows - are you in the business of selling guns? I think you are." That's called a fishing expedition and intimidation. In the end they let the VCDL member go because their fish hooks came up empty.
They had over 17 BATFE agents at that show. Richmond and Henrico had a large number of officers running to the homes of anyone purchasing a handgun to ask questions.
I guess Mayor Wilder is flush with cash all of a sudden. Too bad he didn't use that money to put all those cops into the rougher neighborhoods of Richmond, instead of harassing the decent citizens who buy guns at a gun show.
And, if you are sitting down, the main BATFE agent at the show told Showmasters' management that Richmond was going to be the model for this kind of behavior across the nation!!!
BUT, THERE IS GOOD NEWS.
Steve Elliott, who heads up C&E Gun Shows and is affiliated with Showmasters, along with Annette Gelles, who heads up Showmasters, went to Washington with some lawyers to get this straightened out on Monday. (BTW, Steve told me that he has spent in excess of $10,000 this year on legal fees fighting this kind of abuse.)
Steve and Annette were told by the BATFE in DC that BATFE would no longer be sending officers to people's houses who were purchasing a firearm and that what happened in Richmond should not have happened.
We will be watching carefully to see if BATFE keeps its word or not. Report any such abuse immediately to VCDL, along with the officer's name, badge number, and department.
*************************************************************************** VA-ALERT is a project of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, Inc. (VCDL). VCDL is an all-volunteer, non-partisan grassroots organization dedicated to defending the human rights of all Virginians. The membership considers the Right to Keep and Bear Arms to be an essential human right.
VCDL web page: http://www.vcdl.org
Incredible.
Especially that part about telling the neighbors.
I think it wise for gun owners to keep the fact they have guns in their house a secret from their neighbors, lest the word get out around the neighborhood, and burglars target their houses to steal guns for criminal purposes.
let me add my personal "holy hell!" alert to the banglist keyword...
yo!
your neck of the woods.
wtf?!?
That sounds like ...Canada! Except in Canada, they phone. They do that when someone applies for a FAC (firearm acquisition certificate). They call your wife, your neighbors.
wow!
If you think that's bad, try buying a handgun in Canada.
you can't walk into a store and buy one, even if you have a valid 'restricted weapons permit.
it is delivered to the local police department, cataloged, balistic tested, and you have to pick it up from there, providing you have a permit to transport it from the police station to your home.
Then you need a transport permit to take it to your gun club, and you better not stray from the route that is listed on the permit.
Bad Attitude Towards Freedom =NAZI's
This will never happen if Republicans are in charge of the federal government!
And people get pissed when I tell them I don't feel for the BATF @$$holes that got shot up in Waco. No knock and announce, just break in stormtrooper tactics.
Typical.
"And people get pissed when I tell them I don't feel for the BATF @$$holes that got shot up in Waco. No knock and announce, just break in stormtrooper tactics. "
"jackbooted thugs" - Wayne LaPierre
Incremental Communism at work
ping
Libertarian ping.To be added or removed from my ping list freepmail me or post a message here
Actually, "jackbooted thugs" was the comment first used by (pro-gun) Congressman John Dingell (D-MI) and then repeated by Wayne and others...
bump
On the other, isn't there a cheap shot at Mayhor Wilder here? Does the BATFE answer to the mayor of a city? I was under the impression it was a federal agency ...
The problem is the Republicans are not in charge of the federal government. For the most part bureaucrats run the federal government. And if they can just get Term Limits enacted for every elected office, they will have very little fear elected officals could actually take charge.
If they can just get term limits enacted, by the time any elected representative can figure out how the bureaucrats work, they will be required to leave office.
It works like this. Washington bureaucrats send field workers to take our rights. If they get complaints they blame it on the local agents and promise to investiagate.
They stall until the complainer goes away. They do the same thing to elected officials. They stall the "investigations" of agents misdoings for years. By the time the elected official figures out he is being conned he is out of office.
That is the deal with presidents and members of congress.
Of course many on the right play right into the bureaucrats hands by demanding term limits.
Under the guise of preventing presidents from appointing party hacks to govenment jobs, we have vested control of our lives in unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats. The funny thing is party hacks did a pretty good job of responding to peoples needs. Every party hack knew that if his party was out of office, they were out of a job. They were very reluctant to do something that would tick off voters. Ticked off voters could and did cause them ot lose their jobs.
Today the government workers are almost impossible to even repremand. They do as they please and voters can do nothing about it.
IF the day a Republican took office, he could fire all the Democratic bureaucrats and the day a Democrat took offic he could fire all the Republicans, bureaucrats would be busting their butts to keep their party in office.
IF we still had the spoils system of government workers BATFE workers would not dare hassle law abiding citizens. They would be fired with in minutes of a few citizens calling their local party headquarters.
In our current system, all elected officials can do is beg the BTAFE to be good. The BTAFE people just do their con act and essentially ignore elected officials.
Just for the record, it was a Republican president, Teddy Rooservelt, who ended the spoils system in our national government. Public workers unions, ended it on the state and local level.
Until we change back to a system where bureaucrats can be fired for any reason by elected officials, we are going to be little more than serfs of the bureaucrats.
Precisely.
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