USA – -(AmmoLand.com)- The critical Nov. 8th 2022 midterm elections are only days away. As people continue talking about a “red wave” sweeping across the U.S. landscape to wash anti-gun Democrats from Congress and state legislatures, the “gun vote” could be the decisive factor in many of these races.
According to Fox News, “The discussion surrounding gun control in the United States is a core issue for some voters heading to the ballot box this November.”
The critical factor is whether gun owners—who often are guilty of lethargy and/or election season apathy—will turn out in adequate numbers to swing the vote. They did last year in Virginia, putting solid pro-gunners in statewide offices, but will they repeat that performance on a national scale?
Take a look at Massachusetts, where the Gun Owner’s Action League just released a report showing how homicides in the Bay State have increased 110 percent since the passage of the 198 Gun Control Act in that state. GOAL Executive Director Jim Wallace, in a telephone conversation with AmmoLand News, said the report speaks for itself:
“The Commonwealth’s decades old gun control scheme has been an unmitigated disaster.”
The law failed to reduce gun-related homicides. It failed to reduce accidental firearms fatalities, and it has done poorly in efforts to reduce gun-related suicides.
Call it the “October non-surprise” since gun control laws have also failed in other regions.
Out in Oregon, Fox News is reporting on Ballot Measure 114, an extremist initiative that would add Oregon to a list of states currently requiring a permit to purchase a firearm. [government permission silps]
According to Fox, “Oregon’s law would be the only one that mandates a live-fire safety class approved by the state police and administered by local law enforcement.”
The proverbial fly in the ointment is that nearly all police agencies do not have the facilities to provide the required training.
The story further notes, “The Oregon State Sheriff’s Association opposes Measure 114, citing the burden it would place on financially-strapped law enforcement agencies. Officials say it would delay law-abiding citizens from being able to purchase guns by months or even longer.”
Kevin Starrett, director of the Oregon Firearms Federation, told Fox News essentially the same thing he told AmmoLand News months ago: “The measure is designed to absolutely guarantee that people will not have the means to protect themselves and to dox anybody who attempts to comply with the permit process.”
In Georgia, it’s gun owners versus an avowed anti-gunner in Stacey Abrams, whom Fox News described as “one of the most significant advocates of gun control in a battleground election against Republican Incumbent Gov. Brian Kemp.”
The Fox report also pointed to Ohio, where anti-gun Democratic State Representative Tim Ryan is squaring off against Republican JD Vance.
It is against this backdrop that Friday’s attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi—another perennial gun control proponent on Capitol Hill—was so shocking. Pelosi was brutally attacked in his own San Francisco home. He was seriously injured by a suspect who wielded a hammer, demonstrating that blaming guns and penalizing gun owners for violent crimes is a false flag.
Reacting to the attack, Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, said the nature of the attack “should preclude any effort by Speaker Pelosi’s Democrat colleagues to exploit this horrible incident for the purpose of advancing their extremist gun control agenda.
“This is the kind of violent crime against which average citizens, including Speaker Pelosi’s constituents, must be prepared to defend themselves on a daily basis in an environment where the far left has pushed ‘defund-the-police’ efforts and adopted policies which have allowed dangerous individuals to roam our streets and neighborhoods,” Gottlieb added.
In Gottlieb’s home state of Washington, there is also an energetic challenge of 30-year-incumbent Democrat Sen. Patty Murray—a dependable anti-gunner—by Republican Tiffany Smiley, a political newcomer who has been waging a remarkably effective campaign. A strong turnout of Evergreen State gun owners could provide a nasty surprise to Murray, who critics say has never represented their interests in Congress.
The only thing that will make the “gun vote” a reality to be reckoned with, not just now but in elections to come, is for gun owners actually to turn out in the millions to cast ballots.
They must understand a couple of things:
- The political party with the majority calls the shots; that is, the majority party sets the legislative agenda, and historically, gun control measures are championed by Democrats.
- Those who oppose Joe Biden’s gun control agenda have only one way to derail it: to take Congress and state legislatures away from his party.
- In cities across the nation, “defund police” schemes have resulted in rising violent crime, and only one party has supported this approach.
In 1994, gun owners outraged by the Clinton semi-auto ban and passage the year before of the Brady Handgun law turned out by the millions and threw out more than 50 anti-gun Democrats, including then-House Speaker Tom Foley. Because of that, gun control was essentially a non-starter for at least a dozen years.
A strong “gun vote” could make that happen again.
RELATED:
Beaver State Battle: Grassroots Gun Owners Fight Extremist OR Ballot Measure
About Dave Workman
Dave Workman is a senior editor at TheGunMag.com and Liberty Park Press, author of multiple books on the Right to Keep & Bear Arms, and formerly an NRA-certified firearms instructor.
I am an independent voter and I will be voting a strait republican ticket here in Montana . FJB and all Democrats !
Yup, you’re right. We must vote pro life, pro second amendment, pro constitution, pro GOD back in schools, government etc., against critical race theory, against lgbtqrx…, against same sex marriage etc. Very simple for me; right and wrong, good and evil are defined by GOD through SCRIPTURE, the very same SCRIPTURE this nation is founded upon. Look at the declaration of independence for example. We can, we must and we will vote righteously, our nation, our families, our children and grand children, maybe even the rest of the world, depends on it. There are just three boxes to choose from;… Read more »
Washington hasn’t had a red state legislature since 1998, it hasn’t had a red governor since 1985, it hasnt had a red federal senator/representative since 2001, it hasn’t had a red unified federal senate/house seat since 1923, and it hasn’t submitted a red electoral vote since Reagan. While I will continue to vote, and implore all my fellow firearms owners of any state to do so, I hold little faith that we will see a change in my state. Our citizens are too easily swayed by the media and political party smear campaign bordering on defamation and fearmongering, and our… Read more »
Thanks for the well conceived article Mr. Workman.
Thanks for reading and sharing this AMMOLAND report.
“The law failed to reduce gun-related homicides. It failed to reduce accidental firearms fatalities, and it has done poorly in efforts to reduce gun-related suicides.”
Laws NEVER stop or prevent anything, they are only reactionary to provide punishment after the crime has been committed, and they don’t even do that well. Notice how there are laws against murder, but that has not slowed down murder one tiny bit.
The long game task is to convince the millions of new gun owners to understand the long game of the Progressive New Left against their right not only to keep and bear arms but to exercise any natural, God Given right. Folks with progressive educations and mindsets are more than willing to jump through hoops to exercise their rights and are not willing to stand up for those who are denied equal access and fair treatment. There is a very special ‘kewl kids’ mentality among progressives. They think they are an entitled class, university educated and immune from the restrictions… Read more »
Bill, you speak a lot of truth. But I fear that we, as a nation, have lost sight of “truth.” If we could return to the Biblical heritage that gave us our written Constitution, there would be little trouble answering the “what is a woman” question. There would be no same sex marriage. The right to life would still be a “right.” LGBTQRWXYZ would just be letters in our alphabet. But the equivalent of Pandora’s Box has been opened and we can not put all that evil back in its box until the trumpet shall sound. And once again, I’m… Read more »
…Assuming the Commiecrat Party doesn’t rig another election!!
Commiefornia is already ruined beyond repair via Ziowood – MIBC & Medical Complex by the too big to fail doctrine & cultural idiom. Way too many people competing for crumbs to survive there. Migrating or Importing ignorant Commiefornia political ideology that is a metastasized mental fungus into more Oregon & Washington populace continually reveals failed policy after policy. Rigged voting system fraud was already proven but hey might as well continue the entropy rather than fix it eh.