Tuesday, December 18, 2012

The professional mourners have arrived...

"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward." -Matthew 6:5

Dick's Sporting Goods has ostentatiously ceased selling Evil Black Rifles entirely.

NBC Sports Network is showing their concern for the victims of gun violence in America by cancelling all their shooting shows, including 3Gun Nation, effective immediately. I have been to a 3Gun match; there was a distinct lack of nutters and no injuries to any participant that couldn't be fixed with a band-aid. Meanwhile, Discovery has axed American Guns, despite nobody on the cast being accused of shooting anybody.

Cerberus Capital Management has announced that it is selling the Freedom Group, among whose holdings is Bushhamster, manufacturer of the deodand used by the nutter on Friday. Given the money spent to acquire Remington, Marlin, AAC, and DPMS recently, they may take a short-term bath to demonstrate their revulsion with the manufacturers of the Devil's Tools, but businessmen do not take decisions like this lightly and they obviously expect it to improve their bottom line down the road.

49 comments:

mikee said...

A deodand? Really? I thought we dispensed with that when King George II lost his ability to tax the colonists.

And I would vigorously argue that it was the person involved, not the object, that caused the deaths. Otherwise, I'd get a bigger gun safe and keep my firearms locked up even more tightly, to avoid them self-loading and coming for me in my sleep.

Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...

I think that's kind of Tam's point. It's there in the snark.

Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...

BTW, Tam, it appears from the front page of the WSJ this morning that there are some GOP presidential hopefuls who are going to regret opening their mouths about this.

Rubio's handlers certainly should have applied a lip clamp.

Boat Guy said...

No, they don't usually make these decisions lightly but that mostly means they are more afraid of leftist opprobrium than damage to the bottom line...
And CA State Teachers? That's delicious right there...

Bram said...

I will keep an eye on whoever buys Freedom Group - some of my investment dollars may follow.

Cormac said...

At least all this was done voluntarily (more or less).

The crazies are pushing censorship again...

http://nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/12/18/15977143-gun-control-offers-no-cure-all-in-america#comments

I guess they're eager to start the book burning before winter really gets its talons in.

Anonymous said...

+1 FC

Must be the season but just like Santa, I make a list of who's been naughty. Rubios on it now.

Gerry

montieth said...

Is NBC Sports going to drop the Dallas Cowboys from their coverage as well?

Dwight Brown said...

Wait, wait. Dick's sold EBRs? Seriously?

(No snark involved. When I was looking for an M&P15-22, I went to one of our local Dick's. They didn't have any. To the best of my recollection, they had no EBRs. I don't recall them even having any handguns. I haven't been back since.)

og said...

its what they do instead of something, as you always say.

Morons.

rickn8or said...

Went to Dick's once. Every last stinkin' longarm on display had a trigger lock on it. Even the pellet rifles. Haven't been back since.

mikee, sometimes Tam's snark is stealthy and subtle. You're just reading along and suddenly realize you're gobsmacked without really knowing how or why.

The Raving Prophet said...

Anon 10:13-

The best info I've seen yet says that yes, he did indeed use a Bushmaster AR-15 for his evil deeds. Initial reports it was left in the vehicle referred to a different long gun.


Regarding Cerberus, I wonder if they realize that a new AWB will result in a good chunk of their portfolio (AAC, DPMS, Bushmaster) losing tremendous value. Remington and Marlin will be OK, but I wonder if they're anticipating a huge shift out there that just isn't happening. Some who may have been on the fence or leaning pro-RKBA have been shifted across to being willing to support some kind of ban. Is that enough to get one passed? I don't know, we'll see. But I plan to bother my Representative and Senators to do my part.

Now is not a time to shrink back, now is a time to go forth boldly. The massive rush of buying tells me that the American people in general don't want a ban; the nutty leftists just have found a good tragedy they can use and they're getting airtime. Most people are still on our side. We just need to all make sure out politicians know it.

Tam said...

Anon 10:13,

"Tam this guy DID NOT use an AR-15,Or any other long gun,"

Not according to the guy who pulled the bullet fragments from the bodies, or all the spent 5.56 brass on the scene.

Divemedic said...

Interestingly enough, all of the shows on NBC that depict people MURDERING others with firearms will continue.

GunDiva said...

SHOT Show will be interesting this year, won't it? Can't wait to see how this all shakes out. I feel like this upcoming SHOT will be pivotal and that it is absolutely imperative for us gun owners to come together.

benEzra said...

CNN is carefully controlling the information they present, that's for sure...

http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/18/opinion/bergen-guns-national-security/index.html?hpt=hp_t1

"The number of deaths caused by semiautomatic pistols and assault rifles are not broken out in tabulations of the total deaths caused by guns in the U.S..."

Ummm, the FBI Uniform Crime Reports, Table 20, Murder, by State and Type of Weapon sets the upper bounds (all rifles combined account for between 2.5% and 3% of U.S. murders). Apparently the reading level of the FBI UCR is too high for the article's author to grok it.

I also see this bit of stunning ignorance in the same article:

"Semiautomatic handguns and semiautomatic assault rifles that fire many rounds in a minute were not envisaged by the founders nor do they do much more to enhance self-defense than an ordinary pistol or rifle."

Just how does an "ordinary pistol" function, O Authorized Journalist, if it's not semiautomatic? Pray tell. Apparently Wikipedia is above his reading level, too.

staghounds said...

As will trumpeting the killer's name, picture, and "motive".

I suspect that Cerebrus' fire sale bath will be less than they'd lose from all the institutional investor pullouts.

Tam said...

Divemedic,

"Interestingly enough, all of the shows on NBC that depict people MURDERING others with firearms will continue."

Yup. The only people using guns that are getting kicked off the boob tube are law-abiding citizens. The proposed reality show, World's Biggest Spree Killers, is still getting the green light at 30 Rock.

Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...

benEzra,

Whenever I see that argument spring from some pious anti-gunnie (like my father in law, whom I believe got it from Piers Morgan), I have to laugh. The Framers (not the Founders; CNN does not understand the difference) also did not anticipate the advent of high-speed automatic letterpresses, radio, television, or the Internet. So when will CNN acknowledge that and go back to using the hand-crank press and the town crier?

staghounds said...

Ruger is down 10%.

Caleb said...

To be fair, Discovery had been looking to axe that turd American Guns since season 2 ended.

Chas S. Clifton said...

Only the last item (Freedom Group) surprises me. Maybe Cerebrus thinks it's time to cash out and take their profits?

Anonymous said...

Called my local Dick's (sporting goods), they're relatively new here. I told them I'd been looking forward to checking them out but that I was calling not to announce a boycott, rather to tell them that I would never do business with them, and would you please pass that on up management. The nice young lady was pleasant, and didn't sound surprised at all, said she would do that.
-Erik from Seattle

Anonymous said...

One of my 3gun cohorts just got an awesome Troy AR with all appropriate accoutrements included. He showed up at our local Dick’s at midnight for their black Friday sale and snagged one of the four they had on hand for $700. That was one hell of a deal.

I guess we won’t see anymore of these sales anytime soon, politically correct bastards and all that…

Old NFO said...

Rats deserting the sinking ship comes to mind... sigh...

Anonymous said...

Re:Fuzzy @ 11:37'
Exactly!I always laugh when people say "The Framers didn't mention..x.. when they wrote the Bill of Rights".They didn't have a crystal ball,they couldn't envision what the future might bring,but they wanted us to have whatever the Gov't had,so we were on equal terms (they learned from living under King George what they needed to be prepared against)
Bill

Anonymous said...

BTW Tam,Thanks for adding "Molon Labe"to the header again.
It's so simple,yet powerful,I love that expression.That story is the embodiment of free men vs tyrants.
Bill

Charles Lee Scudder said...

Any info on Cheaperthandirt? All the guns are MIA, on their site.

KM said...

Caleb said...
To be fair, Discovery had been looking to axe that turd American Guns since season 2 ended

Maybe they're not as stupid as I thought they were.
Although they did put the show on in the first place - so yeah, I guess they are as stupid as I thought.

Anonymous said...

Most important essay on gun control in the last ten years: http://westernrifleshooters.wordpress.com/2012/09/11/what-i-saw-at-the-coup/ It's a must-read. Read it and more importantly share.

Ed Foster said...

What Bram said. And I'll know before you do, because we make all of Bushmaster's parts except the barrel and plastic.

Would it somehow have been more responsible if the obscene nutter had used a Winchester'94 carbine? There might have been a few less survivors.

Ed Foster said...

I'm thinking though, that this being Connecticut and all, I should go out and buy every 30 round PMag I can find before they get boogered up by the state.

Justthisguy said...

Aw shit. I voted for Rubio. To paraphrase the guy in "Animal House",

I f%&ked up; I trusted him.

Well, we excessively earnest and socially awkward folks may be pretty sharp in some ways and really hardly ever shoot up elementary schools, but we are also famously gullible.

Dammit.

RM said...

Terri: Cheaperthandirt has capitulated and stopped selling firearms online while they "review their policy". Take your guess about what that means. What's the chance they'll only start shipping to known franchises with FFL's?

staghounds said...

Well since they, and every other "online seller" of firearms already ships only to FFLs...

Tam said...

RM,

Apparently what happened is that the sudden demand spike has blown up CTD's middleman sales model in their face and so they wanted to pull their online firearms sales program so that they wouldn't be taking people's money for guns that the suppliers did not have in stock.

What caused this gaffe wasn't weak support of the RKBA but rather weak technical writing explaining WTF was going on.

I don't have any skin in that game and can only feel sorry for them, what with this coming on the heels of their cock-up in the whole "Babineaux Method" Charlie Foxtrot...

JD(not the one with the picture) said...

Tam, do you have info direct from someone at CTD about this? When I click on the gun ads in emails they have been sending me I see "Cheaper Than Dirt does not sell firearms" in red letters. As I said on Unc's comments, I am seriously pissed at them right now. If they are communications retarded, they need to say so now, otherwise it looks like they are cutting and running as the enemy attacks.

Brad K. said...

The founders of American might not have envisioned semi auto hand guns and auto and semi auto rifles, carbines, derringers -- oh, wait, they did know about derringers, and handguns.

And they knew about corruption and intrigue and how governments in the past had turned on people that weren't armed -- and they intended to avoid that kind of internal strife by avoiding the "people that weren't armed" part.

The founders knew about foreign adventures and they wanted to avoid the attraction to such adventures that a disarmed populace presents to the world.

Should we come face to face with such adventurers, foreign or domestic, government or union based or otherwise, then battlefield weapons would be kinda nice to have. It is a good thing that is what the 2nd Amendment lays out, so we don't look attractive for that kind of mayhem-monger.

And why is it that, since Columbine, school rooms *still* only have one easily seized entrance/exit? Surely someone should scratch their head, and think, "You know, maybe beating feet down the street would make more sense that squatting in the corner and waiting . . Hmm."

bob in Houston said...

Tam,
Its the bumping up in price say from the 4 PMAG pack for 59.98 last week to 1 PMAG for 59.98 today that really rustled my jimmies. Oh well, thats capitalism, I'll just mosey on over to a different vendor.

Anonymous said...

Fuzzy, Gerry, and Justthisguy:

Rubio went on my ****-list a long time ago when he publically said he believed in Anthropogenic Global Warming, and that we needed to do something about it. Anybody that stupid should never be trusted with the keys to 1600 P. Ave.

BSR

Tam said...

JD,

I have nothing other than third-hand backchannel chatter.

You gotta do what you gotta do.

Buzz said...

Nobody wants to use the proper term, fascist, but I suspect the administration that funneled guns to May He Coe to bolster Teh Narrative gave a little behind-the-scenes "advice" to certain businesses and investment groups.

"Nice business you got there. Shame if something were to happen to it. Look what we did to Catholic institutions..."

kx59 said...

I'd be willing to take one of those evil black rifles off Dick's Sporting goods hands to assuage their guilt...at a hefty discount of course. I mean, it does have the EBR stigma after all.

Ed Foster said...

Isn't a deodand supposed to be sold, with the proceeds being given to the damaged partie(s) as recompense?

I imagine there are sickoes in this world that would want the rifle badly enough to shell out a couple of hundred thousand for it.

Might help out the poor folks in Newtown a bit though. O.K., none of them are poor, it's a savagely big bucks place, but it would pay for a nice memorial.

Daughter Two is an elementary teacher with a shiny new baby, and lives only a few minutes up I-84 from the shooting. Her comment was "Let's get that pistol permit class hurried up". "I want my paperwork processed before the legislature does something stupid".

Geez, I wonder who's kid she is?

JohninMd.(help!) said...

Tam practices Snark-fu.

Ted N said...

Brad K. : And why is it that, since Columbine, school rooms *still* only have one easily seized entrance/exit? Surely someone should scratch their head, and think, "You know, maybe beating feet down the street would make more sense that squatting in the corner and waiting . . Hmm."

Side effect of the Global Warming/Climate Change/whatever term they're using now. I had a new high school in 1996, only ways out were at the corner staircases, windows were sealed shut, easy choke points everywhere. I imagine stuff hasn't changed, and anything new/remodeled is sealed up as tight as they can make it. Perhaps adding a glass breaking hammer next to the fire extinguisher would be a good idea.

If they're gonna blame us for this monster, I'm gonna blame Gore and the "OMG Climate Change!" crowd for helping prep his hunting ground.

(Guessing that the school was relatively new, and had the same sealed windows, otherwise teachers would have gotten at least the 1st floor kids out that way. Haven't seen much info on the school layout/floor plan.)

the pawnbroker said...

No ill toward Cerberus, it's strictly a business decision, as it should be. Whether right or wrong only time will tell but they are beholden only to their investors. It is not their place or burden to impose their will or prejudices on society at large...nor should we impose ours on them.

Would that the same could be said for the "business" of infotainment.

riverrider said...

cerberus is owned by george soros people. selling off bushmaster was just limiting their liability in the coming deluge of lawsuits. soros won't let anything get between him and profit.

markm said...

Ted, Brad: The edumacators don't like multiple exits since kids can sneak through them and be out of their control. However, almost every elementary school I've ever been in (for myself starting in 1958, and for my kids and grandkids) was single-story with big windows in every classroom. I think it was about the third kindergarten firedrill when I decided that if there really was smoke or flames in the hallway, I wasn't going to line up to go out there - my chair was going through the window, and then me. Unless Sandy Hook Elementary was quite uncharacteristic in architecture (and a multi-story building seems quite unlikely for a district with only 5,000 students K-12), the problem isn't that there weren't alternative exit routes - it's that either the teachers simply lacked the imagination to break a window, or that they were more afraid of losing track of the kids as they scattered than they were of the murdering psychopath in the hallway.