by Whoever is the social media specialist at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives is clueless. Their Facebook page is evidence of that.
Often their posts seem more like an effort to tee up negative comments than anything else. They go on about straw purchasing which tees up questions about Project Gunwalker aka Operation Fast and Furious. They talk about arson which tees up responses dealing with the raid on the Branch Davidian compound. Indeed, on February 28th, the anniversary of the ATF raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas, they memorialize the agents killed in the raid. You can imagine the comments that engendered!
Today’s post was celebrating the enactment of the National Firearms Act on June 26, 1934. I am posting a screen shot of it below.
Umm. The NFA Handbook says on the length of rifle barrels, “A rifle subject to the NFA has a barrel or barrels of less than 16 inches in length.”
I think ATF’s Facebook page needs to have a disclaimer on it. Something like, “This page is for entertainment purposes only. Do not rely on it for regulatory or legal issues because we will get it wrong.”
I admit the primary reason I even pay attention to the page is to read the comments by well-known libertarian Spike Cohen. His comment today is representative of them.
88 years of doing nothing but violating people’s rights, criminalizing and murdering peaceful people, and government agencies trafficking guns to cartels and terrorists.
And all because, instead of just admitting that alcohol prohibition had led to massive gang violence, government decided to blame the guns. The same guns that had been available for sale at stores and in magazines by mail for anyone, with no regulation whatsoever, and with no previous massive violence.
Turns out government has a long, proud history of making everything it touches worse.
Happy Birthday. May it be your agency’s last one.
I don’t know how many of our tax dollars go to support the person or persons responsible for handling social media for ATF but I know that it is money wasted.