In response to "California Attorney General Plays Games with Gun Law" by Angel Shamaya...

Angel, I just wanted to say that I have to disagree with the competitions pulling out of Kalifornia. I think every group in the nation that holds competitions should schedule them there. I think the militias should get together and hold a competition there. If this is making them look stupid then we should go out of our way to make them look more stupid not back off the battlefield when the enemy is showing obvious signs of true weakness.

Then the next one should be in New York state or Mass. On the way in to Mass. we should stop and take down those damned signs they have on their borders.

What are the Nazis going to do? Seal their borders? Constantly search every vehicle? How many patriots can their courts and prisons hold? How many Nazis can they afford to lose in this?

And lastly and most importantly, how many states are we going to back out of? It's not time to back up, it's time to advance. Damn the "Liberals", full speed ahead.

thanks,

Barry Bright

Barry,

I'm really glad you wrote for at least two reasons:

1. There are surely others who vehemently agree with you, especially active SASS shooters in California.
2. You're bringing up an explosive issue that strikes at the core of liberty, and it needs to be openly discussed in America.

Though I tend to have diarrhea of the keyboard, I'll do my best at brevity.  First, there is a difference between "leaving" the state and "withdrawing financially lucrative events" from the state. There is a difference between "leaving a state" and "not going into a state."  A big difference.

Next, a question. Are you suggesting that we take a position calling for people to "disobey gun laws entirely, go to Kalifornia with your guns to compete, take your self-defense arms to defend your person and property, and take your chances on going to jail or being killed when you resist imprisonment for breaking a 'law'?"  If so, that isn't something that we can do as an organization lest we wish to be shut down at once and unless I am prepared to go to jail for that aspect of the cause.  And what good would it be for me to go to jail for telling people to do something they'd only do if it was already in their hearts to do in the first place?

We can say we support people in being at choice to be civilly disobedient, and we do.  We support you, and anybody, in choosing life -- and in choosing to exercise your rights.  My life is more important than unConstitutional laws; isn't yours?

But I cannot and will not force our organization into closure just to make a statement about what individuals "should" do when the suggestion involves the potential loss of their own lives or freedom.  The right to self defense and liberty defense is intact for those who choose to exercise it.  That choice is not up to a government, even when that government believes they have that power.  Each individual must reckon within his or her own heart, mind and soul what is true and right to do. I cannot tell you to be a patriot; you either are one, or you're not.  (YOU are, Barry. Meanwhile, there are quite a few soft, weak, wimpy cowards in America -- many of whom own guns -- and all we can do is provide the stimulus for them to grow backbones -- if they even have the willingness to realize they don't have one.) 

But where is the sense in telling people from outside Kalifornia to risk their lives, their safety, their fortunes and their sacred honors to go compete for entertainment in another state when that state's own citizens are laying down on their backs and doing -- as a whole -- very little or nothing?  In other words, and I've had this question posed to me many times, why should a guy who lives in -- and works for freedom in -- a state like Montana throw down the gauntlet for that segment of gunowners in California who would turn in their guns tomorrow?  Telling people to enter the state armed and en masse would show up in a courtroom as inciting insurrection.  Should I go to jail inciting insurrection in California when California's own gun owners haven't even done so?  And what good would I be to the cause if I did? Martyrdom in the cases of the Weaver family, Mr. Koresh and his family, etc. etc. hasn't seemed to inspire anyone to do more than complain; why would my sending myself to jail or my grave over something as boring as mere words be any more productive?

It's a tough situation, Barry, and your letter brings up a lot of "stuff" to think about.  

Should people outside of a state be willing to die or go to prison in defense of that state's liberty?  We can ask the same of people living in Vermont.  Should Vermont citizens be willing to lay down their lives in defense of people's rights in Taxachusetts, when scads of those same folks in Taxachussets lick the boots of their masters in government?  We can say yes or no to that question and have it be true, because it's an individual choice -- and individual choice is where this entire movement rests.

Look at the FFL who was murdered in Wakefield. He had a "permit" to carry in his home state, but he didn't carry to his job across the state line.  The guy was a major donor to Ducks Unlimited, I'm sure he could put his lead where he wanted it to go at least as good as Mucko McDermott could, and yet he seems to have chosen a "law" over his life. And quite honestly, and this will surely sound brutal to some people, I don't feel sorry for him, either.  I certainly feel for the pain his family and loved ones are surely still feeling, and I got literally sick at my stomach when I found out one of the victims was one of our own, too.  (Had it been 7 Sarah Brady worshippers, I'd have found the whole thing morbidly funny -- a cosmic justice of sorts.)  

But he laid down his arms for some traitor in the capitol in Taxachussets -- and I don't respect that.  And he surrendered his life to some scumbag, took himself away from his family, and he disabled himself from taking action to save those other people, too, and I don't respect that, either.  In fact, I don't even understand it.  No criminal (in or out of government) should be able to catch We The People off guard. If we ALL took that stand, and acted upon it, a high percentage of those criminals that survived would be looking for real jobs, and quite a few oath-breaking nazis would be gone, too.  And that IS what it will take to set our country straight, and you and I both know it. Thomas Jefferson:

"No tyrannical government has ever been made to stop but by force."

Some people's fear of state retribution for disobeying "laws" is intense -- to them.  Quite a few people put their personal safeties at the whim of evil people out of fear that they'll go to jail, get fined, or have to face a choice that involves defending their own liberties against the government's nazis. Some people go out in the world without the gun they are highly qualified to use responsibly, risking getting killed or even watching their little children get killed.  Their priorities are all screwed up, from my point of view and obviously from yours, but that is their choice to make, not ours.  If people want to lay down their lives, their freedom, their families lives and freedom to protect a paycheck and a picket fence, that is their free will choice, abhorrent as it may be to those of us who side with Patrick Henry.

And for people who choose the weakling's path of submission in another state, I see little reason to go to jail or to my grave in defense of their unexercised right.  Interestingly, and this is what our movement needs a LOT more of, I'd do so if my own life or liberty were infringed upon. I know where my lines are drawn in the sand. (There are 3 things the government had better not do, or all rules go out the window.)  That statement could sound selfish if interpreted a certain way, and it could even be called a "stupid" statement for someone heading up an organization with members all across the state of Kalifornia to make, too, so please let me finish before jumping to that conclusion...

Am I willing to tell everybody else to die or go to jail for the people of another state that is overrun with slaves and tyrants?  No.  I know two things: there is a God, and I ain't Him.  I don't have or want the power to make decisions that strip other people of their lives or liberties.  Would I risk all in defense of my personal liberty?  If I'm in that state (or anywhere, any time) and some local criminal (in or out of government) tries to steal my property or liberty, yep. But it wouldn't so much be me defending the nebulous "right of the people," it would be me defending my rights -- in the moment -- and therein lies the truth about if and when a war will break out in America. And therein also lies a good portion of the "fix" to our national gun rights woes, ugly as it may be:  

When enough people choose life over "laws" and break "laws" to exercise their rights, some of them will get "caught." When enough people getting "caught" choose their liberty and their lives over submission to un-American oath breakers, we will be entering the first stages of the real, physical war. When word gets around about a few patriots taking out a few nazis in a few states -- in defense of their own rights, in personal ways -- more will say, "I've had enough, too," -- and join the party.

That is a prediction based on watching the history of this and many other nations.

But that dynamic will not play out by people outside of the major Tyrant Zones coming in to rescue the locals as you suggested. It sounds sweet and noble, and idealistically speaking, it's pure in heart and Spirit. But the truth is this: someone who doesn't live under that thumb doesn't have the same kind of personal motivation. For an extreme example to illustrate the point, a very patriotic friend of mine just returned from Britain. He hated what he saw, and he felt deeply for the people, but he's not about to lay his life down defending their pathetic state when the people there aren't even remotely rising to the occasion. It was a vacation, to him, just as the trip to End of Trail will be a vacation for those who travel behind Kalifornia's Iron Curtain to attend. His quote:  "It was an interesting experience being there, but there is no way in hell I would live there."

The government and the anti-rights mongrels are pushing so hard on so many fronts right now, but they are also being as cool as they can about it while they push their edges.  They know that if they push too hard in too many places, patriots will stop waiting for the battle to come to them, and that scares the hell out of tyrants, as well it should. That fear is the deterrent that the Founders intended when they drafted the Second Amendment. Unfortunately, as of yet, we as a community (gun owners, the only people who hold government's unbridled power in pseudo check) haven't given the true tyrants and all their minions enough to be afraid of. And that will only change when the hearts and mindsets of the people revert back to our founder's maxim: "Give me liberty, or give me death."

NOBODY should give up on Kalifornia, New York City, Taxachussets, Maryland, or any other place where we have good people behind enemy lines. And anybody behind those enemy lines waiting for people across a state line to rescue them is going to be waiting for a long, long time; the only way that would happen is if, under a genuine war, one state was emancipated by the people and they turned as a team to help a neighboring state. Emancipation within states will only be just that: emancipation from within. We can support, encourage, nurture, nourish, nudge, challenge, listen and reach for understanding, and lend filial love, ideas, insights, time, energy and money -- and let them throw off their own chains, if they intend to reclaim their freedom.  

You could send $500,000,000 to the gun rights groups of and for Kalifornia, and it wouldn't mean a thing or cause any positive change if the spirit of freedom was dead in the hearts of the people.  How we can spark that Spirit is something we must discover and employ.

Supporting the "saving of face" aspect of AG Lockyer's temporary, arbitrary suspension of the Civil War Gun Ban is like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound.  

Pretending everything is okay while your body is being eaten away with cancer is not the smartest path if you wish to remain alive. Everything is not okay in Kalifornia, and the cancer needs to be surgically removed.

The big question I hope some people are asking themselves and exploring is this: how can we rescue Kalifornia without having to resort to arms, and how can we do it the fastest? Refusal to submit, from an outsider's pocketbook, could be huge, indeed.  I don't have the figures on how much out-of-state money gets pumped into the state's economy on an annual basis, but I do know this for a fact: if ALL gunowners in the other 49 states flat out refused to offer a dime in California's direction, it would put a crunch on their numbers game, and we know how important money is to these socialist parasites who lord over our countrymens' lives.  Withdrawing all national or even regional shooting events from the state is but a small step in that direction, and a wake-up call to the shooters in the state who will otherwise sit on their asses and do nothing.

Angel Shamaya
KeepAndBearArms.com Founder