Gun owners had a few brief hours of elation after the release of the Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association vs Bruen.
They were quickly whipsawed back to reality mere hours later when the Senate passed sweeping new gun restrictions. The US House joined the Senate the following day to send the legislation to Joe Biden for his signature.
The left immediately, and predictably, lost its collective mind and declared the ruling the end of the world. It was only the decision on Roe v Wade, released the following day, that distracted them from their hyperbolic hyperventilating on guns and how blood would run in the streets.
(They quickly promised that indeed, blood would run in the streets.)
The new attack on gun rights is S 2938. The bill was cheered by Democrat Senator Chuck Schumer as a victory, but, as he has been saying for about 40 years, is only a “first step.”
Republican Senator John Cornyn, one of the masterminds behind this latest attack on your rights and the US Constitution would have cheered the passage of the bill, but his lips were glued to Schumer’s backside and hence he was silenced.
Once again, Republicans have snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. At a time when the Democrats are panicking about coming elections because their policies have America teetering on the brink of total destruction, the Republicans throw them a life line and spit in the face of the people who elected them.
It’s as predictable as congressional sex scandals.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell called the bill a victory and claimed it protected the 2nd Amendment. Clearly the Senate bar is still open and free.
The bill bribes states to impose unconstitutional, “pre-crime” red flag laws which, in spite of the flaccid assurances to the contrary, will be misused against people who have committed no crime.
It further complicates failed background checks. In Oregon, the State Police, who are tasked with conducting background checks, do such an abysmal job that many have come to conclude it is the single role of OSP to prevent law abiding people from legally obtaining guns.
The bill also creates new obstacles for 18-20 year olds when trying to purchase firearms.
It adds new and confusing regulations on who must now obtain an FFL.
That’s what the Democrats got. In exchange for their fealty, the Republicans, and America’s gun owners got… nothing. Another brilliant deal expertly negotiated by the brain trusts wearing the Republican Jersey.
But at least gun owners got some good news in the Supreme Court decision on gun rights. Right?
Well SCOTUS did strike down one element of New York’s arcane, byzantine, elitist, and incomprehensible pistol license law.
They said New York’s rule that licenses to carry would only be granted to those who could successfully bribe a NYPD official was unconstitutional.
In the brief moments before the next day’s Roe v Wade decision was made public, the taking heads and idiot politicians were calling the ruling “seismic” and predicting that it would have unimaginable effects on gun laws in many states.
Tina Kotek, the Democrat candidate for Oregon Governor, was apoplectic.
“Just weeks after 19 children were murdered in an elementary school in Texas, the Trump-dominated Supreme Court has issued a ruling that will increase the number of guns on the streets in cities and towns across the country. It will make communities less safe.”
Her comments were bizarre even for her. According to Kotek, the ruling will “make communities less safe” by requiring New York to have concealed handgun license laws that are more like…Portland’s.
While the two other “leading” candidates for governor, both of whom have pretended to be “pro-gun,” did weigh in on the abortion ruling, they were nowhere to be found on the SCOTUS decision about firearms.
New York’s Governor immediately promised to do all she could to undermine the ruling by crafting legislation that would create insurmountable obstacles to getting a permit in New York, or to put it another way, continuing to do what they are doing now.
New York’s mayor declared that his town was not the “wild, wild west.”
“We’re still analyzing the bill, but it’s clear New Yorkers and Americans are unsafe due to gun violence because of that ruling,” he said.
Oh. It’s because of “that bill.” It wasn’t a “bill” but in deference to his limited attention span we’ll let that go.
But he wasn’t finished.
“When you are in an environment such as New York City — highly densely populated, 8.8 million people — simple disputes can elevate into gunplay.”
Yes we know. That was actually known to happen before the court’s ruling. From time to time.
State and city overlords are seeking to turn as many places as possible into “sensitive locations” where they hope to ban concealed carry, within a thousand feet.
That would include government buildings, schools, bars, libraries, restaurants and even cemeteries, which across the country have regularly been the scene of shoot-outs between people with concealed handgun licenses. Of course, they also want the subways to be off limits. Because we certainly don’t want people to be fearful in now bucolic NY subways.
While certainly welcomed, if for no other reason then to watch the earth-scorching melt down of the leftist bed wetters, gun owners should not consider this court ruling a massive victory. The courts made it clear that states can still keep a long list of restrictions on concealed carry licenses. The decision essentially validates the entire concept of prior restraint on a fundamental right.
While the court commented on the fact that no other right comes with a requirement for prior government approval, its validation of the permit process undermines the very concept they promoted in the ruling.
And by making clear that impediments like training requirements, fees and “sensitive location” restrictions were allowed, they created a road map for tyrants, like the governors of New York and New Jersey, to continue to make the right of self defense unattainable by most people.
If the state says a permit is $1000.00 a month, requires 100 hours of training by police and live fire, in a city where that is all but impossible, the court’s ruling will have little practical effect on the disarmed and endangered serfs of New York.
Here are the Senators who sold out.
- Sen. Roy Blunt (R-MO)
- Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC)
- Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV)
- Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA)
- Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
- Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX)
- Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA)
- Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)
- Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
- Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
- Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH)
- Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT)
- Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC)
- Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA)
- Sen. Todd Young (R-IN)
