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The 2nd Amendment is My Concealed Carry Permit

AmmoLand Gun News

Washington DC - -(Ammoland.com)- When Obama was running for president in 2008, he promised to “fundamentally change America” – a phrase which lucid Americans took as meaning he was going to bring his leftist agenda to bear on us all.

And if Obama has had any success as president, it’s certainly been his success in changing us fundamentally from a nation under law to a nation that often looks lawless. From a nation in which one feels secure into a nation in which more and more people are feeling that their security is in their own hands (literally). And this has led not only to record breaking gun sales since Obama’s election, but also to changes in state laws around the country to make it easier for law-abiding citizens to carry a handgun for their own protection.

As a result of this, Wisconsin, which was one of the few states to not have some form of concealed carry law within its borders, now has one thanks to their much maligned Republican legislature and Gov. Scott Walker. With the stroke of a pen in July of 2011, Walker made Wisconsin the 49th state in the union to allow the concealed carry of handguns. (Only Illinois, Obama’s old stomping ground, continues to deny its citizens this option right.)

Costitutional Carry
And while I don’t want to take away from what Walker has accomplished in Wisconsin, during the last few years the momentum has shifted from seeking to allow licensed citizens to carry concealed handguns to allowing all citizens without a felony in their criminal record or mental health problems to carry concealed without a license or a permit. In other words, the growing push abroad is to recognize the 2nd Amendment as a sufficient permit for concealed carry and go from there.

After all, the 2nd Amendment does say we have the right not only to keep but also to bear arms.

Arizona’s Gov. Jan Brewer espoused this view on April 16, 2010, when she signed legislation recognizing the right for Arizonans to carry a concealed handgun without a permit.

Said Brewer upon signing the legislation: “This legislation not only protects the Second Amendment rights of Arizona citizens, but restores those rights as well.”

At the time, Arizona joined Vermont and Alaska as the only states recognizing what many have come to refer to as “Constitutional Carry”: so named because the foundation of the right to bear arms is spelled out in the Constitution’s Bill of Rights. But since Arizona took that step, Wyoming has followed suit and Kentucky state legislator Mike Harmon has been pushing for Constitutional Carry in the Bluegrass State as well. Moreover, there have been similar bills put forward in at least six other states.

America has a gun culture, which historically speaking, is closely intertwined with our recognition of the God-given duty to preserve our own lives and our own liberty. And as it seems that more and more citizens are realizing this, perhaps we’ll be fortunate enough to see more and more states follow Alaska, Vermont, Arizona, and Wyoming down the path that recognizes not only our right to keep arms, but our right to bear them without infringement as well.

As Ted Nugent put it: “The 2nd Amendment is my concealed carry permit.”

AWR Hawkins

About:
AWR Hawkins writes for all the BIG sites, for Pajamas Media, for RedCounty.com, for Townhall.com and now AmmoLand Shooting Sports News.

His southern drawl is frequently heard discussing his take on current events on radio shows like America’s Morning News, the G. Gordon Liddy Show, the Ken Pittman Show, and the NRA’s Cam & Company, among others. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal (summer 2010), and he holds a PhD in military history from Texas Tech University.

If you have questions or comments, email him at awr@awrhawkins.com. You can find him on facebook at www.facebook.com/awr.hawkins.

Filed under: Gun Rights News by Ammoland No Comments »

Don’t count on it!

Can the 2nd Amendment Survive Four More Years of Obama?

AmmoLand Gun News

Washington DC - -(Ammoland.com)- A politician is described as a “lame duck” once he or she has been defeated or announced their retirement, and is simply finishing out the remainder of their term in office.

And even after Nov. elections are over and a large number of Senate and House members are voted out, the lame duck Senators and House members are usually just that – lame.

But occasionally, they are fierce because the defeated office holder is bitter and has approximately two months to wreak havoc with his or her vote before leaving DC.

When this happens, ideologues will use the time where they’re completely accountable to voters to score points for their side. We saw this after the Nov. 2010 elections when defeated Senators and House members banded together in late Dec. to repeal “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” so homosexuals could serve openly in the military. Yet as bad as this is, the opportunities for a lame duck office holder to attack our freedom grows exponentially when said office holder is in the White House, and when he’s an ideologue who hates private gun ownership, the right to self defense, and the 2nd Amendment.

And this brings us to a crucial point. Namely, that if Obama wins re-election in 2012, he will be awarded four years of lame duck status in which to do anything and everything he wants to lessen our ability to own and use guns.

He knows he won’t have to answer for it because he will not be running for re-election in 2016.

What would four years of a lame duck President Obama mean for gun owners?
The only way to know is to gauge it by the things Obama has done already. In 1995, when pursuing a state level office in Illinois, Obama “endorsed a complete ban on all handguns.” At that time, he also expressed his support for waiting periods for handgun purchases. A “waiting period” is a set period of time, usually 5 to 10 days, which has to elapse between the time an individual buys a gun and is actually allowed to take it home. In other words, customer “X” would pay for a gun on Monday of this week, but would not be allowed to pick it up at the store until Monday of next week.

(The foolishness of this scenario is evident when one considers what that waiting period might mean for a female who is being threatened by a violent criminal or sexual predator. She would have to buy her gun then spend the next week, the “waiting period,” hoping the criminal or predator would be willing to wait a week before attacking as well.)[or conversely the gun owner that already has been background checked and finger printed for multiple gun purchases in the past and now has to "cool off" for 10 days to own another gun]

As a state senator in Illinois, Obama supported a ban on the use of handguns for self defense: he literally supported laws that made it a crime to use a gun to defend yourself even if you did so in your own home. He also supported Illinois H.B. 2579, which prohibited law-abiding individuals from purchasing more than one gun a month; he opposed laws that permitted law-abiding citizens to carry firearms for self-defense (i.e., he opposed concealed carry permits); he supported a ban on “junk guns” (cheaper guns that poor people could actually afford to buy and use for self defense). And as a U.S. Senator, Obama supported the reintroduction of the assault weapons ban, a ban on high capacity magazines, and he voted with Ted Kennedy on ammunition bans (that included hunting ammunition).

Add to these things Obama’s assurances to his ardent followers that he’s working “under the radar” to pass more gun control and four years of lame duck status for him should make every gun owner nervous as a cat.

While I don’t pretend to know what working for more gun control “under the radar” means, I do know that there’s no limit to the damage that can be done by a man who hates guns, freedom, and the constitution as much as Obama does. (Especially if he knows he doesn’t have to answer to voters again.)

AWR Hawkins

About:
AWR Hawkins writes for all the BIG sites, for Pajamas Media, for RedCounty.com, for Townhall.com and now AmmoLand Shooting Sports News.

His southern drawl is frequently heard discussing his take on current events on radio shows like America’s Morning News, the G. Gordon Liddy Show, the Ken Pittman Show, and the NRA’s Cam & Company, among others. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal (summer 2010), and he holds a PhD in military history from Texas Tech University.

If you have questions or comments, email him at awr@awrhawkins.com. You can find him on facebook at www.facebook.com/awr.hawkins.

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