You can’t buy an AR-15 at Just Guns on Harford Road in Parkville. The store just doesn’t have them.
“Sales are going very well,” said Patrick Loughlin, who works at the gun store. “Sales are going so well some items are now virtually unavailable.”
The AR-15, a semiautomatic rifle gun owners can buy that’s similar to the fully automatic M-16 used by the military, is one of the weapons that are now out of stock. The run on the gats happened the day after Nov. 4, 2008, when Sen. Barack Obama was the first black American — who is also one of the few genuine “African-Americans” — to be elected president.
Loughlin said some of those buying the AR-15 rifles specifically mentioned Obama’s election as the reason they were stocking up on the weapons.
“A lot of people, with the change in party, they’re afraid a lot of the [former President] Clinton junk is gonna come back,” Loughlin said.
The “Clinton junk” would be the 1994 assault weapons ban Democrats rammed through Congress — which they controlled that year — and which Clinton signed. The act expired in 2004 and has yet to be renewed. But with Democrats controlling both houses of Congress again and with a Democrat poised to enter the White House in two months, it’s open season on the Second Amendment.
That’s bad news for those who believe in gun rights, and who believe the Second Amendment says what it says: That “the people” have a right to keep and bear arms. Not some of the people cherry-picked by elected officials. Not the National Guard, which Second Amendment restrictionists think is the “militia” referred to in the amendment.
“The people” refers to every law-abiding one of us. Any law-abiding citizen wishing to own a rifle or firearm should be allowed to do so. Any public official, elected or appointed, who worries about law-abiding citizens owning firearms should be removed from office.
Obama is one of those officials, if his Web site origin.barackobama.com/issues/urban_policy truly expresses his views. Under the section “Crime and Law Enforcement,” the Web site says Obama and Vice President-elect Joseph Biden Jr. will “address gun violence in cities.”
How? Read on.
“Barack Obama would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment, which restricts the ability of local law enforcement to access important gun trace information, and give police officers across the nation the tools they need to solve gun crimes and fight the illegal arms trade. Obama and Biden also favor commonsense measures that respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals who shouldn’t have them. They support closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof. They also support making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent, as such weapons belong on foreign battlefields and not on our streets.”
Allow me to clear up this Dem-speak for you. First, you notice the Obama-Biden promise to “address GUN VIOLENCE” in cities. Not to put away violent criminals who use firearms in the commission of a crime. But “gun violence,” which could mean that a law-abiding citizen who uses a firearm in a legitimate act of self-defense might find himself prosecuted, convicted and slapped behind bars.
Next comes the almost-obligatory reference to “keeping guns away from criminals who shouldn’t have them.” (They should not be confused, I suppose, with the criminals who SHOULD have them.) Then you notice how Obama and Biden — in classic Dem-speak fashion — whip out the “it’s for the children” card.
Then there’s the claim about how they respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners right before the clincher: The AR-15 and other “assault” rifles, and whatever Democrats feel are assault rifles, will be banned permanently.
And it’s because such weapons “belong on foreign battlefields,” Obama and Biden tell us. Such a battlefield could never happen here, the president-elect and vice president-elect suggest, because they assure us government will always protect us.
I wonder if those Asian-American merchants who used firearms to defend their stores against rioters during the 1993 civil disturbance in Los Angeles — because the city, county, state and federal governments could not or would not protect them — feel the same way.
Gregory Kane is a columnist who has been writing about Baltimore and Maryland for more than 15 years. Look for his columns in the editorial section every Thursday and Sunday. Reach him at [email protected].
