CCRKBA Blasts NY Governor Cuomo’s Proposal For Closing Prisons And More Gun Control

In a speech given at the kickoff breakfast for the African-American Day Parade in New York City’s Harlem, Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) called for shutting down some prisons in order to save money. He also called for more Federal gun control.

Cuomo also pushed for stricter gun control laws from the federal government.

“It has been decades where we have been fighting Washington for sensible laws controlling guns and we need those laws passed and we need them passed now. We’re losing too many people out in the streets,” he said.

Lest it be forgotten, when he was Bill Clinton’s Secretary for Housing and Urban Development, Cuomo was responsible for pushing extortion-like lawsuits against gun manufacturers and for signing the infamous agreement with Smith and Wesson that allowed the government to mandate many so-called safety features. That agreement was signed only after the government essentially said “sign or we’ll sue you out of business.” It was later repudiated by the new owners of Smith and Wesson.

The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has responded to Cuomo’s new call for gun control with a blistering response.

BELLEVUE, WA – New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s call for more gun control laws while advocating the closure of prisons in a Sunday speech proves he is “drinking too much of Michael Bloomberg’s Kool-Aid,” the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.

Gov. Cuomo made his comments during a Harlem breakfast prior to the African-American Day parade, according to the New York Daily News. He reportedly said closing some prisons would release more funding for local programs.

“If Andrew Cuomo thinks keeping thugs out of prison, so he can pump the money into some community program while pushing for further disarmament of potential crime victims makes sense,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb, “he’s been breathing too much of the same air as the mayor of New York City. The other day, Bloomberg was babbling about riots in the streets if the government doesn’t ‘do something’ about creating jobs. It now appears Andrew Cuomo wants to keep hoodlums working, in the neighborhoods, in the convenience stores, on the streets; anywhere they can rob and steal from honest citizens.”

Gov. Cuomo also complained that we could send a person to Harvard University for the same amount it costs to incarcerate them.

“Well,” Gottlieb said, “that certainly makes sense. Let’s just move thugs to college campuses. Maybe the governor thinks criminals will climb the ladder of success by robbing a more affluent class of victims.

“Andrew Cuomo and Michael Bloomberg apparently live in the same fantasy world,” Gottlieb said. “They want to throw government money around, either to invent make-work jobs that accomplish nothing, or to pad some social program at the expense of much-needed jail space, while working overtime to disarm law-abiding citizens. They’re not in the State of New York; they’re in a state of confusion.”

Cultivating The Local Media

We as gun owners need to stop seeing the media as a monolithic entity and, more importantly, always assuming that they are against us.

There is the elite media consisting of the networks, the cable news channels, and the major urban daily newspapers. Then there are local TV and radio stations along with the hometown newspapers. While the former is full of those who wish our Second Amendment rights were curtailed, the same can’t be said for the latter.

The local media is always on the lookout for a good story and they can be cultivated. If they say something stupid on the air about guns, it is most likely out of youthful ignorance rather than malice. Rather than jumping down their throats when they say the stupid stuff, seek to educate them. The results can be worthwhile.

A case in point. Sean Sorrentino of An NC Gun Blog has become friends with NBC-17 Raleigh’s Jackie Faye. After he did a blog post last week on the increase in Concealed Handgun Permits in North Carolina, he sent it along to her. The result was the on-camera story below.

I think Ms. Faye did a very fair story on the topic. If Sean hadn’t established a relationship with her earlier, the story about the double digit growth in Concealed Handgun Permits probably would not have been aired.

Thanks are due to Sean for taking the time to build that relationship with a local reporter. More stories like this one is what it will take to re-normalize firearms in American society.

Where Is Rose Mary Woods When Holder Needs Her?

Rose Mary Woods was President Richard Nixon’s personal secretary. She was the one officially responsible for the infamous 18-minute gap in the Watergate tapes. Whether she was the one who accidentally erased the tape or whether it was really an accident will remain one of the unsolved mysteries of the Watergate affair.

Woods demonstrating how she accidentally erased the tape.

Given the newest batch of recordings released by Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News of ATF Agent Hope McAllister and gun store owner Andre Howard, Attorney General Eric Holder is probably wishing that a Miss Woods or a modern equivalent had erased these tapes.

Quote Of The Day

The quote of the day comes from David Codrea. In his National Gun Rights Examiner column, he looks at the extreme reluctance of the elite or mainstream media to even acknowledge Operation Fast and Furious as a scandal. According to Dartmouth College political scientist Brendan Nyhan, it isn’t officially a scandal until it makes the front page of the Washington Post and the reporter uses the word scandal.

So—if the only “official” media outlets willing to call “Gunwalker” a “scandal” are some jerkwater paper in racist, anti-immigrant Arizona, the Teabagger/Troglodyte-appealing Faux News and a CBS blog that isn‘t even getting air time on the actual network news program anymore (hey, I’m just trying to get into the mindset of the elite information gatekeepers), what chance do we flyover knuckledraggers have of getting the mighty Pravda on the Potomac to call an international criminal conspiracy resulting in untold human deaths and reaching across bureaus, agencies and departments and layers of lawyers at least to the Cabinet level a “scandal”?

Watergate Redux

It was under questioning by Minority Counsel Fred Thompson at the Watergate hearings that presidential aide Alexander Butterfield revealed the existence of tape recording devices in both the Oval Office and the President’s office in the Executive Office Building. These tapes provided the nail in the coffin to Nixon’s presidency.

Now more tapes are leaking out of the conversations between ATF agents and the owner of Lone Wolf Trading Company Andre Howard. These tapes seem to indicate a strong effort to conceal the details of Operation Fast and Furious as well as a strong disdain for Senator Grassley. The one item that was mentioned that I find particularly interesting was the assertion by ATF Agent Hope McAllister that she had a file that would cover her if the operation went sour. I wonder if she is still in possession of that file and, if so, have copies been provided to Congressional investigators.

The more  I see and read of Project Gunwalker the more it reminds me of Watergate. Of course, no one died in Watergate nor was the press complicit for the most part in hushing up the scandal.

The excerpts of the tape and transcript are from CBS News.
 

EXCERPT 1

Dealer: Question: do your people have any confidence that you can forestall subpoena? Or is it still up in the air?

Agent: No, my understanding is person, the only people that can request a congressional hearing has to be a majority party. Grassley is a Republican.

Dealer: I know.

Agent: And as of right now…

Dealer: In the Senate right.

Agent: Yeh. And as of right now we don’t have any interest from anybody in the majority party to the extent that he’s shown interest. So even if you wanted to at this point unless he gets CUTS OUT somebody from the majority party to jump on board, he can’t…

Dealer: Not on his own no but you know Leahy and rest of ’em these people are snakes, they’ll do anything they can…

Agent: My understanding also is that the Attorney General’s office is supposed to come out little bit stronger…um…

Dealer: I understand that.

Agent: position…which may or may not, um, you know, help.

Dealer: I’ll tell you what I’ll give him that, he’s got f—ing b—s making that statement. I don’t wanna even go there.

EXCERPT 2

Dealer: Until something else happens they’re not stupid, Hope, they connect the dots.

Agent: No and you know and all that’s fine if Senator Grassley wants to come in and tell us show us how to work these cases more efficiently more effectively by all means.

Dealer: Don’t think Grassley, think Leahy.

Agent: Well, him too. I… I welcome him to come down and work…

Dealer: He’s an arrogant b—–d

Agent: So is Grassley though

Dealer: Chuck probably and I don’t know a thing about him other than from somebody else I’ve heard seems to be just somebody who’s hitching his wagon to any star to.. for his own aggrandizement.

Agent: Yeh

Dealer: You know that. He’s an arrogant

Agent: Yeh

Dealer: individual. Look he’s a United States senator there it is right there.

EXCERPT 3

Agent: That’s kind of what my suggestion but nobody thought that was funny like if I were a P.I. I’d put him on Grassley, I’m sure there’s a lot would go away. Actually my one suggestion was just tell him in a registered Republican. I’m sure if he knew that everything would be fine, they didn’t like that either.

Dealer: Well.

Agent: Alright.

Dealer: You gotta be, watch your back. I don’t trust these people around you one bit. You’ve been very lucky so far.

Agent: Again I’ll be more than happy to talk to somebody, they won’t let me, but more than happy to talk to anybody about the decisions we made.

Dealer: Hope, stay off the screen. You don’ t need this sh–. Neither does your husband.

Agent: Believe me I have…

Dealer: You gotta have a f—–g life man.

Agent: I have a file and…

Dealer: shhh

Agent: It’s all, it’s all public stuff I dont’ care.

Dealer: Well don’t even convey it in that. I’m sure you do. Hopefully this thing will subside…

Agent: You keep saying that but ?

Dealer: I know.

Dealer: You and I both know how bad it’s gonna get I won’t bull—t you you don’t bull—t me

Agent: Ha ha.

Dealer: my a– is up here and yours is here here but you’re covered I’m out in the open

Agent: Ha ha.

Dealer: God.

Project Gunwalker – Let’s Go To The Tape

Andre Howard of Lone Wolf Trading Company in Glendale, AZ is not stupid. After being forced to cooperate with the ATF agents runnings Operation Fast and Furious, he took the smart step to record some of his conversations with one of the lead agents in the operation, ATF Agent Hope McAllister.

These tapes have been turned over by Mr. Howard to the Justice Department’s Office of Inspector General and to Congressional investigators. In the tape below obtained by Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News, Howard and McAllister are discussing the third firearm that turned up at the scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry’s murder. The transcript of the tape can be found on the CBS News website above.

If you may recall, President Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder, and Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich have all said that that the DOJ Office of Inspector General should be the lead investigator into whether there was any wrongdoing in Operation Fast and Furious. Sharyl Attkisson reports today that the OIG is reported to have passed these tapes along to one of the subjects of the investigation – the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Arizona.

Law enforcement sources and others close to the Congressional investigation say the Justice Department’s Inspector General obtained the audio tapes several months ago as part of its investigation into Fast and Furious.

Then, the sources say for some reason the Inspector General passed the tapes along to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona: a subject in the investigation. It’s unclear why the Inspector General, who is supposed to investigate independently, would turn over evidence to an entity that is itself under investigation. The Inspector General’s office had no immediate comment.

I am speculating here but one explanation as to why OIG turned over evidence to the U.S. Attorney’s Office would be so as to coach their testimony whether before OIG investigators or before Congressional investigators.

The role of OIG in this investigation is and has been tainted from the very start. Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) recognized this early on which is why he called for an assignment to an outside Inspector General in a letter to the head of Integrity Committee of the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency back in March.

UPDATE: The DOJ OIG sent a response to CBS on why the tapes were given to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona:

A spokesman from the Office of the Inspector General today said, “The OIG officially provided the United States Attorney’s Office with a copy of the recordings in question so that the USAO could consider them in connection with the government’s disclosure obligations in the pending criminal prosecutions of the gun traffickers. Prior to receiving the tapes, the OIG made clear that we would have to provide a copy of the recordings to the United States Attorney’s Office because they would need to review them to satisfy any legal disclosure obligations.”

Do You Twitter?

Do you use Twitter to follow the news and blogs? If so, you may want to consider adding me to your Twitter follow list.

I leave Friday for the Gun Rights Policy Conference in Chicago. I intend to both blog and Tweet extensively from the conference. Given the lineup of speakers, signing up for Twitter would be a great way to follow the action if you can’t be in Chicago.

If you look in my sidebar, you will see a section near the top that says “Subscribe to this blog”. Among the methods for subscribing is Twitter. You click on the button that looks like the one below and it will take you to my Twitter page. My Twitter ID is @jpr9954.

Thanks and I hope to have lots to report from Chicago in the never-ending fight for gun rights.

It Is Only Fitting

Copyright trolls Righthaven LLC and its owner Steve Gibson are in the crosshairs of Wayne Hoehn’s attorneys. Seems that Righthaven has an unpaid judgment against them and Hoehn’s attorneys are asking the U.S. Marshalls Service to seize their bank accounts for non-payment.

Attorneys representing Wayne Hoehn filed a motion Sunday asking the court to issue a writ of execution for Hoehn’s judgment against Righthaven after the group defied the court ordered payment due date last week. The motion states, “No stay prohibiting Hoehn’s execution of his judgment is in place, nor would any such future stay have retroactive effect.” It also states that the “Court is entitled to authorize the U.S. Marshalls to execute Hoehn’s judgment” through seizure of bank accounts.

That would be sweet justice because Righthaven’s campaign against bloggers was always about money and never about seeking justice.

H/T Sebastian