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Posted on 11/03/2013 5:56:29 AM PST by 2nd amendment mama
Click here to download a pdf of Guns & Ammo‘s column Let’s Talk Limits. Technical Editor Dick Metcalf [above] penned the editorial for the December issue. Metcalf, a writer whose technical knowledge (or lack thereof) has earned him brickbats before, bases his editorial on a distinction between “infringement” and “regulation.” “I bring this up,” Metcalf writes, “because way too many gun owners still believe that any regulation of the right to keep and bear arms is an infringement. The fact is that all Constitutional rights are regulated, always have been, and need to be.” That, dear reader, is a major WTF moment. One of many . . .
Metcalf’s dietribe [sic] turns to the antis’ favorite justification for infringing on our natural, civil and Constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms: you “Can’t yell ‘FIRE!’ in a crowded theater.” Yes. Yes you can. It’s just that you’re legally responsible for what happens next. And what happens next in Metcalf’s editorial is bizarre—especially for an article that appears in a gun magazine:
Many argue that any regulation at all is, by definition, an infringement. If that were true, then the authors of the Second Amendment themselves, should not have specified “well-regulated.”
You’re kidding, right? Metcalf doesn’t know that “well-regulated” is “referring to the property of something being in proper working order“? That it has nothing to do with government regulation? No way!
Way. Sure Metcalf’s bone-headed, uninformed, patently obvious misinterpretation of the Second Amendment’s introductory clause isn’t as bad as the antis’ assertion that the 2A only applies to Americans in a militia, but it’s the next worst thing. Coming from a gun guy, a man who trumpets the fact that he co-wrote The Firearm Owners Protection Act and taught college seminars on Constitutional law, well, I’m speechless.
Too bad Metcalf isn’t. Once again, he turns to the antis’ well-worn fundamentally flawed pro-regulation arguments to advocate gun control. He deploys ye olde auto analogy to defend state-issued carry permits against readers who believe that Second Amendment is the only authority they need to bear arms.
I wondered whether those same people believed that just anybody should be able to buy a vehicle and take it out on public roadways without any kind of driver’s training, test or license.
I understand that driving a car is not a right protected by the Constitution, but to me the basic principle is the same. I firmly believe that all U.S. citizens have the right to bear arms, but . . .
I’m going to stop there. Anyone who says “I believe in the Second Amendment but–” does not believe in the Second Amendment. They are not friends, they are not frenemies, they are enemies of The People of the Gun.
More than that, whether or not these nominal gun rights supporters (e.g., President Obama, Senator Charles Schumer) “believe” in the Second Amendment is irrelevant. As stated above, the right to keep and bear arms is a natural right, stemming from our natural right of self-defense. It doesn’t require belief, faith or political justification.
Equally, the right to keep and bear arms is a civil right. Wikipedia defines the term thusly:
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals’ freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one’s ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.
Civil rights include the ensuring of peoples’ physical and mental integrity, life and safety; protection from discrimination on grounds such as race, gender, national origin, color, sexual orientation, ethnicity, religion, or disability; and individual rights such as privacy, the freedoms of thought and conscience, speech and expression, religion, the press, assembly and movement.
I have a major issue with the word “unwarranted” (wikipedia won’t let me delete it). But the point is made: Americans have a civil right to keep and bear arms guaranteed by . . . wait for it . . . the Constitution. Specifically, the Second Amendment. This despite the fact that . . .
Civil and political rights need not be codified to be protected, although most democracies worldwide do have formal written guarantees of civil and political rights. Civil rights are considered to be natural rights. Thomas Jefferson wrote in his A Summary View of the Rights of British America that “a free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.”
So civil means natural, and natural means inviolable. Except by people who support their violation. People like Dick Metcalf, who ends his pro-gun control polemic by asserting that Illinois’ new carry law—mandating that citizens must complete 16 hours of training to “earn” the right to bear arms— is not “infringement in and of itself.”
“But that’s just me . . .” Metcalf closes. Yes it is. And I believe that anyone who supports a gun magazine that prints this kind of anti-gun agitprop is supporting the diminution and destruction of our gun rights. Or is that just me? [h/t b0b]
Having spent a significant portion of my career in Advertising for a major brand advertising and media buying agency, I can tell you point blank that Company X doesn't really care why an individual stops using their product or cancels their subscription. They really don't. They care more about detecting the shifts in their markets and catering to that shift.
Now you and I may not agree with Guns and Ammo taking the positions they do, and may in fact respond to them and let them know why we're cancelling. Fact is, they won't really care. It's a "cost of business" to them. As long as they make more money catering to the shifting sands, they really could care less.
As for me, I won't be renewing. If they start sending me postage paid renewal notices, they'll get them back with a nasty message to incur the cost to their postage. Probably the best that can be done.
Amazing, so you think that Guns and Ammo magazine is merely shifting to grow their market share of their magazine subscribers by becoming anti-gun, because their readers have/are become anti-gun?
Guns and Ammo will NOT be increasing their market share from this stance.
If we don’t buy... they die!
“Cancel your subscription to Guns & Ammo!”
Never had one, and I don’t believe I have ever bought an issue of this mag.
I get “American Rifleman” and “American Hunter” from the NRA. I do not need anything else.
ping to your observation about G&A
Thermal Event!, Thermal Event!
I believe that, in the sense that the training doesn't have to come from the government. My Dad taught me how to drive. And having driven in the Washington D.C. area for several years (and somehow surviving despite the best efforts of these imbeciles to kill me) I cannot buy the notion that having a driver's license proves that its bearer is competent to operate an automobile.
Nowadays the only purpose a driver's license serves is as an identification card. Why don't we quit pretending otherwise?
WTF? Do they WANT to go out of business?
Well, actually, I didn’t.
Uh—should I care?
No, not really. Discovered this while reloading back in the 70's.
Nowadays the only purpose a driver’s license serves is as an identification card. Why don’t we quit pretending otherwise?
Big BUMP
My Dad taught me too. He also taught me to shoot and gun safety! With the number of "accidental shootings" by the supposed professionals (law enforcement) I certainly don't believe that they are qualified to instruct people.
Didn't these guys learn anything from Zumbo?
I have handled and shot both the KSG and PMR. Definitely not vaporware, though they sell out fast when shipments arrive at the local gun shops.
I know they aren’t vaporware, but a 1-2 year ‘wait’ after paying for it up front comes damned close to it. (I’m not pulling those wait times out of my keester, EVERY supplier in the metro Atlanta area for 100 miles quotes that as experienced delivery.)
You can get your hands on one if you go to GunBroker and pay somebody 150-200% of what they sell for in the shops.
They should quit advertising if they cannot deliver in a reasonable time.
I’d guess it be stolen. He made sure you couldn’t see a S/N on it.
Well.. they just booted half their audience.
Nice going, idiots.
Just because there’s a long lead time is no reason to stop advertising. The wait time on some Ferrari models is over 18 months - should they stop advertising? The only gunsmith in the entire world who can properly free float a FAL barrel has a 6-plus-month waiting list just to get a slot for him to even look at your rifle - should he stop advertising his services? If you want some 1911s these days, the wait time is now out over 3 years. Should their makers also stop advertising and promoting them?
Kel-Tec is a small company with a number of exceedingly popular products of late; they have a finite production capacity and these days it’s damn near impossible for a small gun maker to get financing to expand. They’re doing the best they can, and I say that as someone who doesn’t own one.
I would point out that they do seem allocate production based on past sales for the most part. If your area wasn’t a big KT purchasing area before, you’re going to get less units than an area that has consistently sold out in the past and continues to do so - like Texas. I have friends in AZ that have te same ‘can’t find one’ complaint you do, whereas here in Dallas they do become available every so often, if only briefly.
You provide excuses for a company that is doing more damage to its image with these two products than they can possibly imagine. And please don’t tell me about howthey ‘allocate’ and how some markets don’t have ‘experience’ or history in selling Keltec products.
I have personally spoken with multiple counter people and with sales management people at Adventure Outdoors in Smyrna GA. They have over 10,000 guns in stock and the largest store for such in the entire southeast, probably in the country.
THE problem is with nearly ALL the stores in my area is you have to tie up several hundred dollars for over a year to get one.
And, please don’t give me the rich boy ‘Ferrari’ example. We’re talking about weapons for the citizen, not Donald Trump. Geesh...
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