As part of the 2019 legislative agenda, the Pittsburgh city council has decided to use the Tree Of Life shooting as an excuse to ban all the popular guns.

That’t not really an over-statement.

Pittsburgh gun safety proposal would ban semiautomatic rifles

Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto was joined by Gov. Tom Wolf, members of City Council and state Democratic lawmakers Friday in proposing legislation that would ban semiautomatic rifles and certain ammunition and firearms accessories within city limits.

Citing the 11 people killed in the Oct. 27 mass shooting at Squirrel Hill’s Tree of Life synagogue, Peduto said the ban is necessary to protect the safety and welfare of Pittsburgh residents. He vowed to build a coalition among municipalities and residents across the nation to fend off legal challenges from gun rights activists that are certain to come. Peduto said he’s written letters to more than 100 cities seeking support.

Legislation proposed in Pittsburgh would ban the manufacture, sale, purchase, transportation, carry, storage or possession of assault weapons within the city. A second bill would ban certain ammunition for semiautomatic rifles, including explosive and armor piercing bullets. It would ban accessories, including large magazines and bump stocks that allow rapid fire similar to automatic weapons.

According to CNN:

Among the weapons that would be banned are any rifles with a pistol grip, folding stock and detachable magazine. The legislation specifically bans several AR-15 style weapons by name. The weapons — semi-automatic variants of the M-4 and M-16 type weapons issued to US troops — have been used in a plethora of shootings in the past few years, including the October 27 attack on the Tree of Life synagogue.

The proposals will also limit ammunition capacity in detachable magazines and most semi-automatic firearms to 10 rounds.

Here is the thing, Pennsylvania has preemption on gun rights as part of the state constitution and a state DA wants to use it.

Pittsburgh council members could face charges over gun restrictions, DA says

Pittsburgh City Council’s proposed gun legislation might be unconstitutional and could result in criminal charges against members of council, Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala Jr. said in a letter to the councilman who introduced the bills.

Good, charge those bastards.

Zappala alluded to the fact that passing such legislation could result in criminal charges against council members, referring to a Pennsylvania law that states, “No county, municipality or township may in any manner regulate the lawful ownership, possession, transfer or transportation of firearms, ammunition or ammunition components when carried for transported for purposes not prohibited by the laws of this Commonwealth.”

“While I certainly see the desire for such type of legislation at the state and federal levels, I believe that city council does not have the authority to pass such legislation,” Zappala said in a letter dated Jan. 9 and posted to his office’s Twitter account Tuesday.

He cited previous failed efforts undertaken by former Mayor Luke Ravenstahl’s administration, as well as case law regarding the issue.

“I am certain that you have sought the legal advice of your law department as to whether (state law) would permit a criminal complaint to be filed against an individual member of council who violates (state law) by voting to adopt these regulations,” Zappala wrote.

“Likewise,” he wrote, “I am sure you have discussed the due process implications of enacting any legislation reviewed by your law department and found to be unconstitutional.”

He continued in the same vein: “I am also certain that you realize that if such legislation passes, there is sure to be a resident of Allegheny County who seeks to file a private criminal complaint alleging a violation of (state law).”

Zappala said those are all issues that would come before his office, noting that his letter was “not intended to express my opinion” on the legislation.

“I mention the matters just to ensure their consideration by you and council,” he wrote.

Yeah, boy!!!

Pennsylvania is still has a Republican controlled state legislature.

Lets be honest, the Pittsburgh Democrats are just using the Tree of Life shooting to push a bill to ban guns that they hate.  It’s not about saving lives, it’s about having a recent incident that they can use to manipulate people emotionally.

These Blue strongholds in Red or Purple states love to act like their own little fiefdoms and they need to be reigned in.  There is little the law abiding gun owners of Pittsburgh could do to chance the city council’s min but preemption can stop them dead in their tracks.  That is why it is so important and why it is under attack in Florida.

US President Donald Trump on Monday signed into law bipartisan legislation named for the late Holocaust survivor and Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, the White House announced in a statement.

The Elie Wiesel Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act aims to improve the US response to emerging or potential genocides and passed final votes last month in the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Trump signs into law genocide prevention act named for Elie Wiesel

But we were told a couple of years ago that he is Hitler!

Do you think that maybe 100 years in the future, historians are going to look back at this era and say “what the f*** what wrong with those people? What kind of mind-stupidifier drugs were they consuming?”

I am still owed the concentration/re-education camps and the gay electrocutions the Left say we were going to get if Trump was elected.

“Shooter Ready?…Stand By!”

You may remember when I posted about an IDPA shooter going in Westgate Mall when it was subject of a terrorist attack back in 2013.

Back then I could never find out his name and I even emailed the only IDPA club in Kenya without a response. But just now I found out the gentleman’s name is Inayat Kassam and he, once again stepped up to the plate and got involved in the latest attack in Nairobi’s Dusit D2 Hotel rescuing victims.

He is being called the Nairobi superhero and I reckon he earned the title.

Some heroes do not wear capes but shooting vests with IDPA logos.

Well done Mr. Kassam. You make all of IDPA proud.

My mom went on vacation to Universal Studios to see the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

No, she did not take the grandkids.  She’s there with friends.

She has been texting us about the number of people there who show up in robes doing Harry Potter cosplay.

Wizard cosplay at Universal Studios is, apparently, a huge thing.

If you haven’t figured it out by now, I hate the politics of Harry Potter.  The books are entertaining and well written, but God damn, is it an awful universe.

It is a world in which your status is entirely the result of genetic determinism.  You are a wizard or you are not, and you are a great wizard or not, as a result of your birth.  Effort has only a marginal effect on your abilities.  Non wizards are untermensch, looked down upon by the wizard world, who refer to them constantly by way of a slur.

The only disagreement in the wizarding world as what to do with non-wizards is between the wizards who advocate for apartheid vs. those who advocate for wizard domination of non-wizards.  Peaceful, mutually beneficial trade is never considered.  Even when wizards take and modify non-wizard technology, e.g., trains, cars, plumbing, etc.

Even Hermione’s non-wizarding parents were never shown Hogwarts or Diagon Alley.  Imagine not being able to see where your daughter goes to school for most of the year because you are a [slur].

Pretty much all wizards are tantamount to Nazis.  The “good wizards” are just the Nazis who want to see the muggles put in ghettos and the “bad wizards” want to see muggles put in work camps.

It’s perhaps for this reason, that the Progressive Left has glommed onto Harry Potter so much.  They love a story where they can be both the good guys AND the superior ubermensch, secure in their place of rightful power because they went to a special, super exclusive school.

I also find Harry Potter cosplayers to be fucking insufferable.

But I digress…

I know that I will be taking the kids to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter when they are the right age.

I love Universal Studios and there is no way we can go to that and not see Harry Potter.

So…

When in Rome, as they say.  If you go to Harry Potter you go in costume.

I have picked my costume.

The Wichfinder General.

I want to see how many people get it and are offended by it.

People with more legal instruction will probably be better at explaining why surrendering an open smart phone to a police officer is a bad idea when it comes to giving evidence that can be used against you in a court of law and all that.  And if your phone is set to automatic lock down after so many minutes of inactivity or being away from your safe area, then you may be accused of tampering with the evidence or some other stuff, I don’t know.

But for me, a person that carries concealed and understands that informing an officer is both a good strategy and potentially dangerous, I will stick to the procedure I decided upon after a bit (lot) of thinking: I just hand the initial batch of documents and advise the officer without having to say anything out loud.

Drivers license, insurance and CWP stay together in my wallet and come out together in case of need. I leave the insurance in the middle in case I just need to present the DL for some reason and the insurance blocks the view of the CWP.

Will I keep a copy of my license and insurance in my phone? Probably, but that is just in case of emergency, not first choice if I get pulled over or challenged by a LEO.

I saw this on Twitter:

https://twitter.com/DavidRutz/status/1085538576408948742

I had to read the whole Washington Post interview.

Transcript: Ocasio-Cortez says the conservative right is ‘losing the war’

That may be, but I don’t trust her analysis of the topic.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) has been a member of Congress for less than two weeks, and already she has become a favorite target for the right.

That’s because what she says is either straight out of the Socialist handbook or factually wrong – usually both.

The Post: Some people would say there is a flavor of misogyny to how you’ve been treated on the right. Do you agree?

Ocasio-Cortez: Absolutely. Absolutely. I think it’s interesting because what I consider to be my greatest strength, which is the intersectionality of our message, is I think the thing that triggers them the most.

It’s now misogyny to point out the she’s factually wrong on what she says, vague on the details of how to push her economic ideas, and likes to hang out with radical Jew haters.

And yes, the fact is Intersectionality is poison.  The rise of Trump was evidence of that.  Americans are getting tired of the oppression Olympics and being called out for their privilege while they try to make ends meet.

The Post: I was talking with Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), and he said that he feels like conservative media is setting you up to be another boogeyman on the left.

Ocasio-Cortez: Absolutely. They need a foil because they have nothing that they advance on their own. When you actually think about what the Republican agenda is, they have no vision for America. The Republican vision for America is dystopic. The Republican vision for our future is negative. It’s saying, ‘All of the people who are not like you are a danger and we need to protect ourselves from the danger. We need to build walls, we need to lock ’em up, we need to lock everything down.’ But there’s nothing about the Republican ideology that is about wealth-building or prosperity for the working class.

First of all, I think that’s wrong.  That is the point of view of the Leftist who sees the Conservative position as motivated entirely by hatred because Conservatives are inherently evil.  This will make it impossible for her to ever negotiate in good faith or compromise.

The Post: Why would they see you personally as a threat?

Ocasio-Cortez: Because I fight back. I don’t know what they say, but I think they are attracted to conflict. They need a foil. I don’t think they see that they’re losing the war. They’re making all these battles, but they’re losing the war. Because they’re playing old-school politics, like, “Oh, I’m sorry, you think that faking a nude photo is going to take a woman down in 2019? Think again, brother.”

I had to look the nude thing up.  An anonymous user dumped a fake nude of her on Reddit.  I couldn’t find one Republican politician who talked about it, let alone posted it on social media.

Keep in mind, this was done by the Left to Dana Loesch to delegitimize her after the CNN two-hour hate.

The Post: How did you feel when that hit yesterday?

Ocasio-Cortez: I was surprised and I was annoyed because it was a new tack. They’ve been for a very long time focusing on taking quotes out of context or manipulating them or making it seem as though I said things that I didn’t say. This was different in that it was an outright fraudulent thing. You can tell that they’re getting into hysterics because now you’re getting into my actual body, which is definitely crossing a level, definitely crossing a line.

Some anonymous Reddit user is now the whole of the GOP.  Boy that is a victim complex.

I also think it’s encouraging because this is my sixth day in Congress and they’re out of all their artillery. The nude is supposed to be like the bazooka. You know, like, “We’re going to take her down.” Dude, you’re all out of bullets, you’re all out of bombs, you’re all out of all this stuff. What have you got left? I’m six days into the term, and you already used all your ammo. 

What?  The only “attacks” I’ve seen of her from elected Republicans or reputable Conservative pundits is in regards to her friendly pictures with radical Jew haters or the fact that she is pushing a technologically infeasible, economically impossible, Green New Deal that would cost America trillions without any way of actually paying for it. That and imposing a tax rate on people that would only serve to quash investment.

So enjoy being exhausted for the next two years while we run train on the progressive agenda.

To run [a] train is a sexual act in which multiple men have intercourse with a woman in a row, one right after the other.

What she said here was pretty clear “We Congressional Progressives are going to take turns fucking America raw with our Progressive agenda and there is nothing you can do to stop it.”

That is a hell of a statement from a Member of Congress, especially a freshman.

Also, if Trump said the same thing, every Progressive would be hysterical, screaming that he admitted to being a gang rapist.

I’m feeling very #MeToo right now, being told that I am going to be gang banged against my will by people who don’t see me as a person.

If it weren’t for double standards, they’d have no standards at all.

I saw this headline in The Wall Street Journal.

Gun Use Surges in Europe, Where Firearms Are Rare
Growing insecurity spurs more people to clear high bars for ownership

Really?

When hundreds of women were sexually assaulted on New Year’s Eve in several German cities three years ago, Carolin Matthie decided it was time to defend herself. The 26-year-old Berlin student quickly applied for a gun permit, fearing many women would have the same idea and flood the application process.

“If I don’t do it now, I will have to wait maybe another half year,” she recalls thinking.

Wow, Europe sucks for gun permits.  It takes less time for the ATF to approve the paperwork to put a suppressor on your short barreled cannon.

I hope nobody in the California legislature reads this article, they might get the idea of requiring a 547 day waiting period.

Gun ownership is rising across Europe, a continent that until recently faced far less gun crime and violence than much of the globe. Not long ago it was rare to see armed British police.

The uptick was spurred in part by insecurity arising from terrorist attacks—many with firearms, and reflects government efforts to get illegal guns registered by offering amnesty to owners.

I’m confused by that.  Gun ownership is rising.  Are Europeans buying more guns?  Or, are is the number of guns in private hands being legalized by getting people to apply for permits for the guns they already have?  The wording here is very awkward.

All that aside, I don’t want to skip over the broader point from the first few paragraphs.  At least some small segment of the European population is realizing that the great bloated bureaucracy of European governments can’t protect them from the dangerous migrants entering the country, many at the best of the leaders of the great bloated bureaucracy.  They feel the need to be able to defend themselves.

This is going to require a titanic shift in the ideology of Europeans.

From The Daily Mail.

Swiss woman is charged with assault after slapping Afghan migrant who kept groping her during New Year’s Eve celebrations

A Swiss woman has been charged with assault after slapping an Afghan migrant who allegedly groped her during a New Year’s Eve street party.

The unnamed woman, 21, was said to have left the man with a broken nose when he reportedly groped her during a party at the City Hall in the Austrian capital Vienna.

Local media alleged that a 20-year-old Afghan suspect was part of a migrant gang who were allegedly assaulting women in the crowd during the New Year celebrations.

According to the Vienna Police, the Swiss woman reacted angrily when she was fondled by the migrant and smacked him full in the face.

He was taken to hospital to be treated and a criminal charge for sexual harassment was filed against the 20-year-old Afghan, and a criminal complaint against the victim for GBH.

Under Austrian law, the police have a duty to file a criminal complaint when the alleged offence is of such severity that prosecutors have no choice but to pursue it.

Feudalism has never really left Europe.  The pedantry worked the land and in exchange they were defended by the feudal lord and his professional army (slightly romanticized but accurate).  The peasants were not allowed to bear arms just in case they got sick of being serfs (land slaves) and decided to fight for their independence.  Eliminating self defense and putting all protections in the hands of the nobility was a means of controlling the peasantry.

The Japanese did the same thing by the way, for all that pop culture thinks about the Katana, a Japanese peasant was prohibited from owning or even touching a sword.  The penalty for violating that was death.  Only the Shogunate were allowed to poses swords.

In America, where there is no history of feudalism, we (for the most part) believe in the right to self defense.  Living in an unsophisticated, redneck state like Alabama, had said groper ended up being taken to the hospital gushing blood from one or more entry or puncture wounds, the general attitude by all, including the police would be “the fucker deserved it.”

Europeans may be buying more guns with the intent of self defense, but the European governments need to legalize self defense.

Back to the WSJ.

Europe is still far from facing the gun prevalence and violence in Latin America or the U.S., which lead the world. World-wide civilian ownership of firearms rose 32% in the decade through 2017, to 857.3 million guns, according to the Small Arms Survey, a research project in Geneva. Europe accounts for less than 10% of the total.

Fuck you WSJ.  The rate of US gun violence vs gun ownership is radically different than the rate of Latin American gun violence vs gun ownership.  The US has a culture and legal protection of civilian gun ownership so most US gun owners are law abiding.  Latin America has cracked down more and more on legal gun ownership, so more and more guns are possessed only by criminals.  Moreover, the corruption and political instability in Latin America has lead to the rise of paramilitary gangs unrivaled by anything in the US.

But Europe’s shift has been rapid, and notable in part because of strict national restrictions. In most European countries, gun permits require thorough background checks, monitored shooting practice and tests on regulations. In Belgium, France and Germany, most registered guns may only be used at shooting ranges. Permits to bear arms outside of shooting ranges are extremely difficult to obtain.

Strict registration requirements don’t account for—and may exacerbate—a surge in illegal weapons across the continent, experts say.

No shit.

Europe’s unregistered weapons outnumbered legal ones in 2017, 44.5 million to 34.2 million, according to the Small Arms Survey. Many illegal weapons come from one-time war zones, such as countries of the former Yugoslavia, and others are purchased online, including from vendors in the U.S.

I’ve heard of guns coming into Europe from recent Eastern European war zones, as well as Russia, and even being carried in by migrants from the Middle East.  It’s not hard to get an AK in Syria, and carry it through Turkey into Central Europe.  I just want to know how someone orders a gun from Gun Broker and gets it shipped to Germany illegally, that I don’t see happening.

With more weapons comes more gun-related violence. National police statistics in France, Germany and Belgium show an uptick in gun law violations since 2015. Europe doesn’t have current continentwide statistics.

Now I am really confused.

Are we talking about Europeans buying legal guns and getting permits for self defense?

Are we talking about Europeans buying illegal guns for self defense because they can’t get them legally?

Are we talking about criminals getting illegal guns to commit more gun crime?

This article seems to be all over the map on this.

Armed robbery and similar crimes often entail illicit guns, while legally registered firearms tend to appear in suicide and domestic-violence statistics, said Nils Duquet of the Flemish Peace Institute, a Belgian research center.

“It’s clear that illegal guns are used mostly by criminals,” he said.

No shit (in French).

In Germany, the number of legally registered weapons rose roughly 10%, to 6.1 million, in the five years through 2017, the most recent year for which statistics are available, according to Germany’s National Weapons Registry. Permits to bear arms outside of shooting ranges more than tripled to 9,285, over the same five years.

Permits for less lethal air-powered guns that resemble real guns and shoot tear gas or loud blanks to scare away potential attackers roughly doubled in the three years through the end of 2017, to 557,560, according to the registry.

Ms. Matthie first bought an air gun, which her permit allowed her to carry with her.

She has since become a sports shooter, using live ammunition at shooting ranges, and is now applying for a firearm permit. She posts a daily video blog where she advocates armed self-defense.

In Belgium, firearm permits and membership in sport-shooting clubs has risen over the past three years.

So now we’re back to legal Europeans buying legal guns and other self defense items legally because they are afraid because of what has been happening in their own countries.

I have noticed that I cannot go to The Daily Mail, The Sun, or The Spectator and not read about another rape of a European woman by a migrant on a daily basis.

Belgian applications for shooting licenses almost doubled after the terrorist attacks by an Islamic State cell in Paris in Nov. 2015 and four months later in Brussels, offering “a clear indication of why people acquired them,” said Mr. Duquet.

We see the same thing in the US after a terrorist attack.  Maybe relying on the goverment to protect you under all circumstances doesn’t work.

In Paris, the suicide bombers also used machine guns to mow down restaurant and nightclub patrons—weapons they acquired on the black market and were tracked to a shop in Slovakia.

Now we’re back to illegal guns again.

Belgium has for years tightened regulations in response to gun violence, such as a 2006 killing spree by an 18-year-old who legally acquired a rifle.

“Before 2006, you could buy rifles simply by showing your ID,” recalled Sébastien de Thomaz, who owns two shooting ranges in Brussels and previously worked in a gun store.

“They used to let me shoot with all my stepfather’s guns whenever I joined him at the range,” said Lionel Pennings, a Belgian artist who joins his stepfather at one of Mr. De Thomaz’s shooting ranges on Sundays.

Mr. Pennings recalled that in the past he could easily fire a few rounds with his stepfather’s gun. “Now it’s much stricter,” he said. “You can only use the guns you have a permit for.”

This will be the democrat gun policy in 2020.

A Belgian would-be gun owner must pass almost a year of shooting and theory tests, plus psychological checks, said Mr. De Thomaz.

Proposed New York and California gun policy 2019, after they get the right to read your Facebook history.

The gun-range owner questions the impact of that policy. “With each terror attack, the legislation gets stricter,” he said. “For the black market, everything stays the same.”

No shit.

This article seemed like it wanted to be an anti-gun article by conflating gun crime, illegal guns, and legal gun purchases.  As such it was poorly written for a WSJ article.

The important take away is that Europeans are scared and some are trying to guy legal guns to defend themselves.

We saw the same thing in Israel during the Knife Intifada.  Israeli gun stores were sold out.

The difference is that Israel encouraged its citizens to be part of the solution to stabbings by defending themselves and loosening the restrictions on gun permits.  Israel has more of a culture of self defense than Europe.

That will be the big hurdle for Europe to clear.  Understanding that when someone tries to sexually assault a person, stab them, beat them from the back of a scooter, or break into their home to rape and rob them, said person has the right to fight back with force, including legal force.