Pastor Kenn Blanchard posted this video message yesterday. He is correct: you can’t fix broken people with a law. And the shooter in Newtown, CT was a broken person.
You should watch this entire message. Share it with your friends, family, and co-workers.
Michelle Malkin had an interesting commentary today regarding the witch hunt that this being conducted by the gun prohibitionists and their friends in politics, academia, and the media.
She concludes:
So, it’s come to this: Advocating beheadings, beatings and the mass
murder of peaceful Americans to pay for the sins of a soulless madman.
But because the advocates of violence fashion themselves champions of
non-violence and because they inhabit the hallowed worlds of Hollywood,
academia and the Democratic Party, it’s acceptable?
Blood-lusting hate speech must not get a pass just because it comes out of the mouths of the protected anti-gun class.
The website Legal Insurrection has more on U. of Rhode Island history professor Erik Loomis’ violent eliminationist rhetoric
Recognizing the time to act is now if we are going to stop any new gun control bills, Paul Valone of Grass Roots North Carolina sent out this alert last night. It says we need to meet the threat head-on. It proposes a three-prong approach consisting of contacting NC’s Congressional delegation, conducting public education, and reframing the debate. Earlier alerts this week have discussed the ineffectiveness of the Gun-Free School Zone Act.
The alert also gives contact information including phone numbers for the newly elected members of the North Carolina delegation. Given that they took a strongly pro-gun rights stance, it is important to remind them of that.
As we predicted, the battle is on.
Dancing in the blood of innocents slaughtered by the federal “Gun Free”
School Zones Act, Senator Diane Feinstein finally admitted to “Meet the
Press” thatshe will offer a ban on semi-automatic firearms on “the first day” of the new Congress.“I’m going to introduce in the Senate, and the same bill will be introduced in the House — a bill to ban assault weapons.”
“It will ban the sale, the transfer, the importation and the possession, not retroactively, but prospectively.”
“The purpose of this bill is to get… weapons of war off the streets.”
“Who
needs these military-style assault weapons? Who needs an ammunition
feeding device capable of holding 100 rounds?” Feinstein wrote on her
campaign website.These weapons are not for hunting deer — they’re for hunting people.”
Moreover, Barack Obama has finally come “out of the closet” on gun control. Says the White House press secretary:
“He
is actively supportive of … Sen. [Dianne] Feinstein’s stated intent to
revive a piece of legislation that would reinstate the assault weapons
ban.”Meeting the threat
As we have noted before, GRNC is reorienting its resources to meet federal threats. In coming weeks, we will:
- Meet with congressional representatives:
In coming weeks, GRNC will meet with US House representatives from
North Carolina to give them a little “spine injection.” Feinstein’s bill
will likely pass the Senate; stopping it will mean shoring up the
House;
- Conduct public education: Today, my column appears in“The Charlotte Observer”in order to get facts to the public. More will follow; and
- Reframe the debate: For ten of the worst years of school shootings, the last so-called “assault weapon” ban failed to make a dent in the problem. What has actually exacerbated such shootings is the 1996 federal “Gun Free School Zones Act,” which announces clearly to predators that victims in schools are disarmed.
Will the NRA Cave?
After five days of silence, the NRA has finally spoken, via an oblique statement in which it says it will “help to make sure this never happens again”. What
does that mean? The NRA has previously caved on things like
the“Disclose Act,” which would have muzzled gun rights organizations, or
the “NICS Improvement Act,” which institutionalized reporting private
medical information to the FBI. Whatever the NRA does, GRNC will be at the forefront of defending your rights!GRNC will need your help!
- Contact North Carolina congressional representatives, particularly our delegation to the US House, using the contact information below;
- Send letters and/or comments to “The Charlotte Observer” in support of my column which advocates arming teachers: http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2012/12/17/3732608/arm-the-teachers-to-reduce-school.html
- Finally, please consider joining or donating to GRNC:
We will be traveling to Washington, DC to meet with congressional
representatives, running radio spots and Youtube videos for pub lic
education, and doing all sorts of things that cost money. Please help by
going to: http://grnc.org/index.php/join-grnc/contribute
Congressional contact information
Senator Richard Burr (R- NC) 202-224-3154 http://burr.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.ContactForm
Senator Kay Hagan (D- NC) 202-224-6342 http://www.hagan.senate.gov/contact/
Representative G. K. Butterfield, Jr. (D – 01) 202-225-3101 https://butterfieldforms.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=68§iontree=368
Representative Renee L. Ellmers (R – 02) 202-225-4531 https://ellmersforms.house.gov/index.cfm?sectionid=58§iontree=358
Representative Walter B. Jones, Jr. (R – 03) 202-225-3415 https://jones.house.gov/contact-me/email-me
Representative David Price (D – 04) 202-225-1784 https://forms.house.gov/price/webforms/contact_form.shtmlRepresentative Virginia Foxx (R – 05) 202-225-2071 https://virginiafoxx.house.gov/forms/writeyourrep/
Representative Howard Coble (R – 06) 202-225-3065 http://coble.house.gov/contact/zipcheck.htm
Representative Mike McIntyre (D – 07) 202-225-2731 http://mcintyreforms.house.gov/contact/
Representative Patrick McHenry (R – 10) 202-225-2576 http://mchenry.house.gov/contact/zipauth.htm
Representative Mel Watt (D – 12) 202-225-1510 https://forms.house.gov/watt/webforms/zipauthen_contact.shtml
George Holding
george@georgeholdingforcongress.comOffice: 919-755-4083Mark Meadows
info@meadowsforcongress.com PHONE: 828.697.5012Robert Pittenger
info@RobertPittenger.com (704) 650-1722Richard Hudson
richard@richardhudsonforcongress.com 704-795-2012 PhoneWe
can stop the freight train rolling toward restrictions on your
individual freedoms, but doing so means pulling together. Please keep on
eye on future GRNC alerts as we keep you informed on how best to defend
your rights.
As was mentioned yesterday in relation to the announcement that Cerberus Capital Management is putting the Freedom Group up for sale, the threat of the California State Teachers Retirement System to remove $500 million in investments from Cerberus was a good part of their rationale. It appears that CalSTRS was itself reacting to the bad press it was getting regarding their investment in Cerberus and, by extension, the Freedom Group.
From Dan Primack of Fortune.com in his rather anti-gun screed about CalSTRS’s investment in Cerberus:
Do you know who owns more than a 6% stake in the maker of .223
Bushmaster rifles, like the one used last Friday to murder 20 first
graders and seven adults in Newtown, Connecticut? California public
schoolteachers.
The company in question is Freedom Group, a privately-held firearms
conglomerate formed by private equity and hedge fund group Cerberus
Capital Management. Cerberus created the platform in April 2006 via the
acquisition of Bushmaster, after which it added another 10 makers of
firearms, ammunition and accessories (including Remington, Marlin Arms
and Barnes Bullets).
The California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) committed to invest
a whopping $500 million into a $7.5 billion Cerberus fund that has
helped bankroll Freedom Group. That means that it effectively could own a
6.67% stake in the gun maker, which filed to go public in late 2009
before pulling the offering in early 2011. In fact, the figure could be
even higher since CalSTRS also committed $100 million to a $1.4 billion
predecessor fund, which likely made the original investment.
CalSTRS has an investment policy statement that reportedly takes into account a number of risk factors including “social injury” and “human health”. Primack thinks their indirect investment in the Freedom Group violated this investment policy statement. He then serves up this bit of codswallop:
But I also think that it’s time for our large nonprofit institutions to
put some of their money where their mission is. Profit should be the
primary goal of their investment offices, but not at the expense of
their broader purposes. If a schoolteachers union or university
endowment or nonprofit foundation truly cares about stopping the next
mass killing, then they should not provide capital that produces the
instruments of such destruction.
By Primack’s rationale, CalSTRS then should not invest in any company that makes or deals in petroleum products, agricultural fertilizers, metal hardware, garden tools, or any number of other products that could have been used to make improvised explosives or sharp pointy things.
Obviously, this sort of nonsensical criticism found its mark with the CalSTRS’s investment board. They released this statement regarding their investment with Cerberus and the pending sale of the Freedom Group.
WEST SACRAMENTO, CA – The California State Teachers’
Retirement System (CalSTRS) released a statement today regarding its
investments in private equity funds managed by Cerberus Capital
Management that are invested in the Freedom Group, which manufactures
firearms:
“The tragic and devastating acts that took place December 14 at Sandy
Hook Elementary School in Connecticut have prompted many in this
country to call for change: To determine what we can do differently to
help ensure the unthinkable never happens again.
“In our case, CalSTRS investment staff immediately began reviewing
our investments in private equity funds managed by Cerberus Capital
Management (Institutional Series Three and Series Four) that are
invested in the Freedom Group, which manufactures firearms. Our
investments staff also initiated discussions with Cerberus to learn more
about the facts surrounding the investments.
“This morning, Cerberus Capital Management issued a statement (External link) noting its intent to immediately engage in a formal process to sell its investment holdings in the Freedom Group.
“Cerberus is a multi-strategy private equity firm. They invest in a
wide variety of firms and strategies; Financial Services, Healthcare,
Consumer & Retail, Manufacturing & Distribution, Building
Products, Energy & Natural Resources, Apparel, Paper, Packaging
& Printing, Transportation, Industrial & Automotive, and Travel
& Leisure.
“CalSTRS first invested in Cerberus Capital Series 3 in 2003, and
again in 2007 in Cerberus Capital Series 4 as part of the core Private
Equity program. The Freedom Group represents a very small investment
within these funds. CalSTRS owns 2.4 percent of Freedom Group, not 6.67
percent as reported by some media outlets.
“CalSTRS has established a thorough vetting process for potential
investments that seeks to test not only their financial potential, but
their social, human and environmental impacts as well. In fact, current
policies require that the risks associated with products that pose
significant threats to human well-being be taken into account before an
investment is made by CalSTRS investment managers. They are outlined in CalSTRS 21 Risk Factors (PDF – 5.5MB), which we adopted in 2008 after our investments in Cerberus.
“Moving forward, CalSTRS will work to ensure that all of our
investments are taking these very important criteria into
consideration.”
The California State Teachers’ Retirement System, with a
portfolio valued at $154.8 billion as of October 31, 2012, is the
largest educator-only pension fund in the world. CalSTRS administers a
hybrid retirement system, consisting of traditional defined benefit,
cash balance and voluntary defined contribution plans, as well as
disability and survivor benefits. CalSTRS serves California’s 856,000
public school educators and their families from the state’s 1,600 school
districts, county offices of education and community college districts.
The Second Amendment Foundation and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has proposed a national commission to study the causes of violence. Rather than focus solely on the tools, i.e., guns, they are proposing to find the root cause of why you have people go so far off the rails as in Aurora or Newtown. I think this is a much more valuable approach to the tragedy in Newtown than passing more laws that will never stop a madman but might prevent the good people from defending themselves.
BELLEVUE, WA – Two leading national gun rights organizations are calling
for the creation of a national commission to study the causes of
violence in America, and offer possible preventive measures.The Second Amendment Foundation and Citizens Committee for
the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said that a national dialogue on
violence has already begun in the wake of the Sandy Hook school tragedy,
but that a national commission would be more able to address the
complexity of this dilemma.
“If we don’t identify and get at the root causes of
violence,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan M. Gottlieb of Bellevue,
Washington, “it won’t matter how many guns you ban, you will still have
violence. There were no guns around when Cain slew Abel, and throughout
recorded history, mankind has engaged in considerable violence. Only in
the past two centuries have firearms played a historic significance.”
“Connecticut already has laws regulating firearms and even
modern semi-automatic rifles,” noted SAF President Joseph Tartaro of
Buffalo, New York. “They did not prevent what happened in Newtown, any
more than Norway’s laws, or Germany’s or Russia’s prevented some of the
recent mass murders in those countries.
“If the public policy debate which is sure to follow,”
Tartaro continued, “focuses solely on gun law solutions and ignores all
the other key questions, we will have done a disservice to the memories
of all the victims of such madness in Connecticut, in Colorado, in
Oregon, or anywhere else.”
Both gun rights leaders noted that violence is a problem in the United States, and “we need to solve it.”
“Gun owners are like anyone else,” Gottlieb observed. “We
have families, we have children and grandchildren. We want to keep them
safe. We walk the same streets as any other citizen, and many gun owners
have decided to protect themselves and their families. Our rights as
gun owners should not be sacrificed in the interest of providing the
illusion that ‘something’ is being done.
“Any meaningful discussion on violence,” Gottlieb added,
“would need to include mental health, violent video games, television
shows and films, media malpractice that sensationalizes violence and the
dangerously false sense of security created by so-called ‘gun-free
zones’.”
“If we have a debate,” Tartaro concluded, “let’s make it a broad and meaningful one.”
The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Cerberus Capital Management plans to sell their firearms manufacturing arm in the wake of the Newtown tragedy. Their statement below says that they don’t want to be pulled into a national political debate concerning firearms.
Cerberus Capital Management Statement Regarding Freedom Group, Inc.
NEW YORK, Dec. 18, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — We were shocked and deeply
saddened by the events that took place at the Sandy Hook Elementary
School in Newtown, CT on December 14, 2012. We cannot comprehend the
losses suffered by the families and friends of those killed by the
unthinkable crimes committed that day. No words or actions can lessen
the enormity of this event or make a dent in the pain that was inflicted
on so many.
In 2006 affiliates of Cerberus Capital Management, L.P. made a
financial investment in Freedom Group. Freedom Group does not sell
weapons or ammunition directly to consumers, through gun shows or
otherwise. Sales are made only to federally licensed firearms dealers
and distributors in accordance with applicable laws and regulations. We
do not believe that Freedom Group or any single company or individual
can prevent senseless violence or the illegal use or procurement of
firearms and ammunition.
It is apparent that the Sandy Hook tragedy was a watershed event that
has raised the national debate on gun control to an unprecedented
level. The debate essentially focuses on the balance between public
safety and the scope of the Constitutional rights under the Second
Amendment. As a Firm, we are investors, not statesmen or policy makers.
Our role is to make investments on behalf of our clients who are
comprised of the pension plans of firemen, teachers, policemen and other
municipal workers and unions, endowments, and other institutions and
individuals. It is not our role to take positions, or attempt to shape
or influence the gun control policy debate. That is the job of our
federal and state legislators.
There are, however, actions that we as a firm can take. Accordingly,
we have determined to immediately engage in a formal process to sell our
investment in Freedom Group. We will retain a financial advisor to
design and execute a process to sell our interests in Freedom Group, and
we will then return that capital to our investors. We believe that
this decision allows us to meet our obligations to the investors whose
interests we are entrusted to protect without being drawn into the
national debate that is more properly pursued by those with the formal
charter and public responsibility to do so.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the families and communities impacted by this tragic and devastating event.
The Freedom Group which has been renamed Remington Outdoor Company, Inc. consists of Remington, Bushmaster, DPMS/Panther Arms, Remington Military, Remington LE, Parker Gunmakers, Barnes Bullets, Advanced Armament, Tapco, Dakota Arms, Marlin, Para-USA, H&R, Mountain Khakis, and Remington PMPD.
Among the upper management of Cerberus are such political figures as former VP Dan Quayle and former Treasury Secretary John Snow. Steve Feinberg, CEO of Cerberus, is reportedly an avid hunter and shooter. According to the Journal, Cerberus came under pressure from certain investors to sell the unit.
Cerberus’s statement comes shortly after it faced pressure Monday from
former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer as well as the California State
Teachers Retirement System, which said it is reviewing a $500 million
investment commitment to the New York-based private-equity firm.
I find the move by Cerberus to sell Freedom Group aka Remington Outdoor Company much more disturbing than the nonsense coming from the gun prohibitionists and their politician allies. To me it seem a great harbinger of the difficulties that lie ahead for us with regards to gun rights. Investment capital companies such as Cerberus are known to make decisions on numbers and fact without dealing in emotion. They obviously feel that the business environment for them will be difficult in the days ahead due to political forces. The Freedom Group companies manufacture a lot of AR-15s and these are the focus of the gun prohibitionists.
For the firearms industry, this move by Cerberus may actually be beneficial. If the new owners of Remington Outdoor Company are not beholden to public employee/union pension funds and other institutional investors, it will be a good thing. The unity of the firearms industry in the face of the threat of legislation is paramount. They don’t need the management of one of the major players to go wobbly such as is evident in the response of Cerberus.
Perhaps the gun prohibitionists would care to explain this and how any new gun control laws would have kept these guns off the street.
Truck driver Elliot Perez and his accomplice Michael Murphy were indicted in US District Court in Bridgeport, CT for stealing 111 firearms from Smith and Wesson.
According to the indictment against them, on November 8, Perez had a scheduled delivery of guns to pick-up at Smith & Wesson in Springfield. He was supposed to pick up five boxes of firearms to bring back, but ended up taking an additional three. Driving back down to Connecticut, he allegedly stopped at his Bridgeport home and met with Murphy before bringing the truck to his company’s warehouse in Stratford, where he unloaded only the five that he was supposed to deliver.
The indictment charges that on November 15, Perez and Murphy sold one of the stolen guns to another individual. Five days later, when questioned by ATF special agents, Perez allegedly lied and said that a “black male” at Smith & Wesson had instructed him on which boxes he was supposed to load onto the truck, adding that he had dropped off all of the cases of guns at the company warehouse.
At the time of the two men’s arrests days later, Stratford Police had only been able to recover 28 of the stolen guns.
Charges include conspiracy, possession of stolen firearms, trafficking, and making false statements to a law enforcement officer.
Perez was not an employee of Smith and Wesson. He worked for a trucking company contracted to handle transportation services for S&W.
That was then:
This is now. From MSNBC’s Morning Joe:
“I’m a proud outdoors-man and huntsman, like many Americans, and I like
shooting, but this doesn’t make sense,” Manchin said. “I don’t know
anyone in the sporting and hunting arena who goes out with an assault
rifle; I don’t know anyone who needs 30 rounds in the clip to go
hunting.”
I think Joe Manchin needs to be reminded that the Second Amendment has nothing to do with either duck hunting or deer hunting. It has everything to do with being able to protect yourself and your family. That includes protecting yourself from state-sponsored violence and a tyrannic government.
Manchin said that after the fiscal cliff is resolved, this will be a high priority.
Newtown’s shooting “has changed the dialogue and it should move beyond dialogue, we need action.”
With people like Joe Manchin who sways with the politically-expedient winds, is it any wonder that the country is in such trouble?
UPDATE: The West Virginia Citizens Defense League has scheduled a protest outside of Joe Manchin’s Charleston, WV office on Saturday, December 22nd. It is scheduled for 10am. The location is 300 Virginia Street East. See their Facebook page for more details.
H/T Sebastian
Tom Gresham of GunTalk Radio tweeted a link to this video this morning. I think it is a vivid reminder of the harm caused by gun control laws. Dr. Suzanna Gratia Hupp obeyed the law and saw her parents murdered in front of her with no means to help protect them.
It is no surprise that the gun prohibitionists and their politician allies have gone into a feeding frenzy after the murders in Connecticut. With a new session of Congress only weeks away, politicians are already announcing their plans for new draconian gun control laws egged on by the President who is calling for “meaningful action”.
The comment of the day comes from Frank James in response to a post by Tam on her View from the Porch blog.
I think up till now we’ve all been operating under condition ‘Orange’ and now it’s gone to ‘Red’.
When Congress reconvenes next year I look for the situation to go to condition ‘Black’. (No pun intended!)…
I think the good Colonel would approve of this use of his color code with regard to the intentions of the hoplophobes.
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