Day By Day Nails OFA And Their Blood Dancing

Chris Muir of Day by Day Cartoon nails Obama’s continuing campaign arm Organizing for Action which is encouraging people to hold “Newtown anniversary events”.

These ghoulish events are meant to push Obama’s gun control agenda reports The Hill.

Organizing for Action (OFA) says it intends the events to be a “powerful reminder of what we lost a year ago, and a reminder that we as a nation need to do more to prevent gun violence and keep our communities safe.”

OFA says that the events will be held in towns and cities across the country and will be used to “call on Congress to finally take action to make our communities safer.”

Following the mass shooting that left 20 schoolchildren and six school employees dead, Obama called for legislation that would expand background checks on firearm purchases, create new penalties on straw purchases and include new funding for school security.

Noting that The Hill characterized OFA as Obama’s “campaign arm”, Glenn Reynolds said “it’s super-creepy that a term-limited president has one.” To me, OFA seems like something one might have seen in Mao’s China, Hitler’s Germany, or Mussolini’s Italy. In other words, an organization whose sole purpose is to be an extra-governmental, extra-political party organization providing cult-like followers to the man in power. That goes beyond creepy in my opinion; that is scary.

Courtesy of Chris Muir

Interesting Graphic On Gun Sales

A stock investing website, The Wall Street Cheat Sheet, had an article yesterday discussing the financial results for Ruger. The author of the article was looking at the impact of proposed gun control laws on gun sales.

The law of unintended consequences is hitting its mark with politicians and gun owners. Amid a push for tighter gun control laws over the past year, an increase in firearm sales is boosting the nation’s leading gun manufacturer.

 The article concluded that the big push for gun control post-Newtown was a big factor in the growth of gun sales.

The graphic below is from a presentation that Smith and Wesson made to stock analysts. It plots the monthly NICS checks for each calendar year from 2008 to the present.

And then there is this:

According to an analysis of the gun industry by the Associated Press, the federal government has conducted roughly the same number of background checks for gun owners and prospective buyers under Obama’s first term, as it did under George W. Bush’s first six years of presidency. For the first time since 1993, the number of federally licensed retail gun dealers in the U.S. increased in 2010 and 2011, adding 1,167 more licensed dealers.

I guess Obama really is the world’s best gun salesman. 

Obama Cancels Safari To Tanzania

I know the thought of Barack and Michelle going on safari in Tanzania conjures up confusing images. It does for me. I just can’t see the anti-gun metrosexual president stalking a lion or shooting a charging Cape Buffalo with his Holland and Holland or Westley Richards double rifle in .500 Nitro Express while being urged on by both Michelle and his professional hunter.

According to the Washington Post, the White House decided to cancel the safari part of his African trip due to “costs”. Those costs would include snipers to kill any lion or cheetah that got too close to the First Family.

The president and first lady had also planned to take a Tanzanian safari as part of the trip, which would have required the president’s special counterassault team to carry sniper rifles with high-caliber rounds that could neutralize cheetahs, lions or other animals if they became a threat, according to the planning document.

But officials said Thursday that the safari had been canceled in favor of a trip to Robben Island off the coast of Cape Town, South Africa, where Nelson Mandela was held as a political prisoner.

When The Post first asked White House officials about the safari last week, they said no final decision had been made. A White House official said Thursday that the cancellation was not related to The Post’s inquiries.

“We do not have a limitless supply of assets to support presidential missions, and we prioritized a visit to Robben Island over a two-hour safari in Tanzania,” said spokesman Josh Earnest. “Unfortunately, we couldn’t do both.”

Internal administration documents circulated in April show that the Obama family was scheduled to go to both Robben Island and the safari park, according to a person familiar with the plans.

 I’m sure President Theodore Roosevelt is spinning in his grave. After all, when he went on safari it was for more that two hours and, by God, he carried his own rifle which was a Winchester 1895 in .405 Winchester.

Celebrating The State Run Media

President Barack Obama’s Twitter feed is celebrating the role that his campaign organization spin-off Organizing for Action and its supporters have played in getting media attention for gun control.

It really shouldn’t be that hard for them as the mainstream media – both nationally and locally – is just an extension of the White House’s Communications Office.

Is it just me or does having a personal propaganda organization outside of the normal channels seem a bit too reminiscent of the cult of personality that was built up around Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, and others of their ilk?

Headline Of The Day



The headline of the day comes from the National Journal on a story about today’s win for gun rights (or defeat of gun control depending upon your perspective).

At Pivotal Point in Presidency, Obama Routed on Gun Control

What makes this headline even more sweet is that it was written by the National Journal’s Ron Fournier who has been vehemently anti-gun. He tries to salvage this defeat by saying that the win could backfire if it empowers those backing gun prohibition.

I sincerely doubt that will happen given the differences in intensity between those who support rights and those who want to take them away. Even Fournier recognizes this. That said he still has high hopes for Obama’s version of the Young Pioneers.

What if the fledgling OFA unlocks the key to converting Obama’s
reelection machine into a million-member lobbying force? What if voters
who support the Second Amendment and commonsense gun regulation
get angry at Congress for ignoring them? What if these voters realize
that the same social and technological forces that democratized 21st century media and commerce—as well as enabling revolutions in the Middle East—also empower individual Americans to change Congress?

To which I would say, dream on.

“It’s Not About Keeping Kids Safe In School” – Wayne LaPierre

Wayne LaPierre, NRA CEO and Exec. VP, gave the NRA’s response to the State of the Union address at the 37th Annual Convention of the National Wild Turkey Federation. He discussed how the emphasis has shifted from keeping kids safe in school to the gun control agenda. As he pointed out, President Obama made no mention of school safety in the State of the Union address.

“Less than two months after saying we had to look at our schools, the
president made not one mention, in his entire speech, of the need to
improve security for our schoolchildren.” says NRA CEO and EVP Wayne
LaPierre in response to President Obama’s State of the Union Address
from the 37th Annual Convention and Sport Show of the National Wild
Turkey Federation in Nashville, Tennessee. “They only care about their
decades old agenda — ban every gun they can, tax every gun sold and
register every gun owner.”

I think Wayne did a decent job in this address. He got the point across and that’s what matters.

OK, We’ve Seen The Picture

So the White House has now released an actual photo of President Obama firing a shotgun that isn’t photoshopped. Big deal!

I prefer the one below that Scott posted on Facebook.

I doubt the release of the photo will assure any of us that Obama really cares about gun rights, the Second Amendment, or anything else related to us bitter clingers. I think the cartoon below by Hope n’ Change captures that doubt.

Comment Of The Day

SayUncle links to a story in the New Republic in which Barack Obama says when asked if he has ever fired a gun, “Yes, in fact, up at Camp David, we do skeet shooting all the time.” To which Tam replies:

Yeah, he was busting clays with Mantei’s girlfriend.

Pics or it didn’t happen, Urkel.

Just like Joe Biden saying he isn’t going to give up his Beretta O/U, Obama saying this to suck up to hunters and skeet/trap shooters just doesn’t ring true. Like someone else commented, the White House Press Office would have released pictures of this a week or two before his press conference outlining his gun control plans.