The only thing I care about, politically, is guns.
Well, that's not completely true, but it's close enough. As L. Neil Smith wrote:
The issue of guns is "an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician-- or political philosophy-- can be put. If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash -- for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything -- without producing ID or signing a scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you."
That is The Truth.
Trump hasn't yet taken office and is already failing the test. He's nominating anti-gun bigots to his administration. I'm neither shocked nor disappointed. Business as usual.
A patriotic blogger thought Trump's anti-gun Attorney General nominee, Pam Bondi, was a great choice. I commented that everyone who seemed to know about her called her a disaster on the Second Amendment. He replied, in part:
...It is fair to say that she has defended State laws that do impose some restrictions on gun ownership. However, I think most of us agree that some restrictions are applicable...Then "most" of you are wrong, just like when "most" people believed slavery was natural and necessary. No restrictions on purchasing, owning, or carrying firearms are "applicable". None of them are legal, ethical, or right.
If someone respects the right to own and to carry weapons, then other rights are probably safe from them. If that right is violated ("restricted"), then all rights are in danger. Even if you believe "some restrictions are applicable".
No one violates your right to own and to carry weapons for your benefit. They do so in order to do things to you that you would not tolerate if you were able to effectively refuse. It's as true for Trump as it would have been for Harris. Authoritarians do what authoritarians do.
Trump could partially reduce the damage by putting Brandon Hererra in charge of the ATF, to dismantle it and destroy its records. I'm not holding my breath. He seems to like the statist quo.
