Poll: Majority of Young Americans Against Banning 'Assault Weapons'

[Gordon Ray Kissinger]

You know President Obama and his allies are losing the gun argument when his greatest supporters are against him: Reason/Rupe released a scientific poll which found the majority of Americans--particularly young Americans--support the right of people to own so-called “assault weapons.”

Of the 1,000 adults surveyed, 51 percent of respondents support the private ownership of “assault weapons,” while 44 percent were opposed. It may come as a shock to the public that the strongest advocates for private ownership are young Americans, the same age demographic that overwhelmingly supported the President in his reelection. 

The poll found that 70 percent of young Americans ages 18-24 agree that Americans “should be allowed” to own "assault weapons," while only 27 percent believe they should be prohibited. A recent study conducted by American University also showed that 60 percent of young Americans either already plan to or are considering purchasing a firearm for their home in the future.

The Reason/Rupe poll showed that the majority of respondents under the age of 54 believe that Americans should be able to own “assault weapons,” while older Americans believe they should be prohibited (58-36 percent).

The results of this poll were significantly different from those reported by the mainstream media; Reason/Rupe  attributes the divergent results to the wording of the question in each poll.

Reason/Rupe asked a straightforward question, "Do you think people should be prohibited from owning assault weapons, or should people be allowed to own them?"; other outlets, however, muddled the issue with misleading information, such as a CNN poll that used an AK-47 as an example of a "semi-automatic" weapon and an AP poll that asked if "military-style, rapid-fire guns" should be banned.

Below is Reason's comparison of the results of polls taken in the last month on the ownership of “assault weapons” dependent upon their wording:

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/02/01/Poll-Young-Ameri...

[Gordon Ray Kissinger]

Doctor warns: Obama taking over psychiatry

Exclusive: Dr. Lee Hieb explains dangerous weapon in hands of state

In the administration’s latest push to limit the Second Amendment rights of its citizens, the term “mental health” is being bantered about and used as common ground between anti-gun activists and staunch defenders of gun rights.

Sen. Roy Blunt, Missouri Republican and NRA backer, objected to President Obama’s proposals but agreed the “focus should be on mental health.” Others, while proclaiming support for the Second Amendment, propose “a meaningful conversation about mental health,” or that we should “identify people who are mentally ill.” After all, how could anyone support guns in the hands of the mentally ill?

Wait … not so fast. The problem is one of definition: Who is mentally ill?

The use of psychiatry against dissidents in the Soviet Union was one of the major human rights scandals of the 1970s and 1980s. Overt tyrants don’t need to employ psychiatry as a weapon, but establishing a dictatorship that pretends to be a republic requires a stealthy way of silencing opponents. As the Soviets discovered, not everyone is afraid to speak out, and when dissidents are perceived by the public as speaking truth, they must somehow be discredited.

What better way than to be labeled mentally ill? That accomplishes two things: First, the mentally ill person can be silenced and secreted away into a mental institution. And secondly – this is especially important for prominent people who may have left behind their written statement – it discredits the person’s beliefs. If the dissident is determined by “great medical men of learning” to be “mentally ill,” then people will be less likely to take his words seriously.

Nuclear Physicist Andrei Sakharov was sent into interior exile in Gorky for his “peace of mind” after being diagnosed by psychiatrists at the Leningrad Institute as a “talented but sick man.” His sickness came to light when he published a tract in the U.S., recommending build-up of the nuclear arsenal.

Soviet psychiatry in the Brezhnev era and beyond was predicated on the concept of “heterodoxy.” If you didn’t believe the official dogma, you must have been ill. Under the politburo, this meant not believing in Marxism, or having some form of God-centered religious belief.

In 1974, neurophysiologist and political activist, Vladimir Bukovsky and the incarcerated psychiatrist Semyon Gluzman wrote “A Manual on Psychiatry for Dissenters,” in which they provided potential future victims of political psychiatry with instructions on how to behave during inquest in order to avoid being diagnosed as mentally sick.

Even after the fall of the Soviet Union, political opponents, human rights activists and psychiatrists who did not believe in punitive psychiatry were incarcerated in mental institutions. Gluzman himself spent seven years in the Gulag, and 3 years in Siberian exile for refusing to diagnose a mental illness in a human rights activist.

One of the factors that allowed psychiatry to become so entwined with the totalitarian authority, according to Yuri Savenko, the president of the Independent Psychiatric Association of Russia, was the total nationalization of the psychiatric profession. In other words, the psychiatrists all worked for and were paid by the government. They no longer were employed by their patients.

Thomas Szasz in his 1984 book “The Therapeutic State,” says the collaboration between government and psychiatry results in a system in which disapproved thoughts, emotions and actions are repressed (“cured”) through pseudomedical interventions. Thus illegal drug use, smoking, overeating, gambling, shoplifting, sexual promiscuity, pederasty, rambunctiousness, shyness, anxiety, unhappiness, racial bigotry, unconventional religious beliefs and suicide are all considered diseases or symptoms of diseases – things that happen to people against their will. This attitude, Szasz concludes, can lead to unwanted treatment being forced on someone – just for his beliefs.

So back to the NRA. I see this one coming. This is a one-two sucker punch let loose in the name of civil society and treatment of poor mentally ill people. The government lets us Second Amendment people keep guns, but only if we are not mentally ill – and it is the government which will define “mentally ill.”

Recently, the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, in returning Vets has been mentioned in the context of gun permits. Of course the government makes a great show of concern for our returning injured vets, making sure that mental health facilities are expanded to insure timely care. And of course, unless the vet has a solid diagnosis of PTSD or some other mental diagnosis, he or she will not be eligible for care. But once given the diagnosis, the veteran is at risk of losing constitutionally guaranteed rights under the rubric of making gun ownership conditional on “mental health.”

Brandon Raub, USMC veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan, made quite colorful anti-war and anti-administration remarks in a Facebook page. He was subsequently drug away in handcuffs by local authorities purportedly at the request of mental health workers.

Col. Thierry Dupuis, county police chief, acted under the state’s emergency custody statute which allows a magistrate to order civil detention and psych evaluation of anyone considered potentially dangerous – i.e., he was hauled off and jailed for a “pre-crime.” He hadn’t hurt anyone. He hadn’t done anything overt except express his beliefs on paper. And anyone with a three-inch kitchen knife is “potentially dangerous.”

You out there worried about Agenda 21? Crazy!

Have fervent Christian beliefs that leads you to wear long dresses? Crazy!

Homeschooler? Obvious agoraphobic.

Dr. Charles Sell, DDS, was confined in federal prison for five years and nearly subjected to forced anti-psychotic drugging. He was deemed “paranoid” and thus incompetent to stand trial. After serving many years, he was sprung finally after an arduous legal battle was waged in his defense. Initially charged with defrauding Medicaid, at the end he was found to have “defrauded” the Medicaid system only about $35. His paranoid delusion? That the government was “out to get him.”

Psychiatry is a dangerous weapon in the hands of the state. We cannot cede to the government authority to define mental health, nor allow mental health “experts” to decide our fitness to exercise our constitutional rights. And we must be vigilant as more people disappear into the mental health system.

http://www.wnd.com/2013/02/doctor-warns-obama-taking-over-psychiatry/

[Gordon Ray Kissinger]

State fights back against feds on guns

Lawmaker: 'No authority for federal government to impose restrictions on us'

While President Obama and some of his allies on Capitol Hill prepare for a major push on gun-control legislation, state lawmakers are preparing to resist new federal restrictions.

Texas officials and sheriffs around the nation have announced they don’t intend to enforce any new gun laws, and now there is a push in Wyoming specifically designed to protect gun owners in that state against any crackdowns on semiautomatic firearms or efforts to limit magazine capacity.

Wyoming State Rep. Kendell Kroeker is leading this charge. He told WND there is already a law on the books in his state that protects any firearm manufactured and possessed in the state from being subject to federal gun laws. His changes to that law offer residents even more protections.

“We extended that bill this year by adding a clause that said any future ban by the federal government that would put bans on semiautomatic rifles or magazine size would not be allowed to be enforced in Wyoming. We would have misdemeanor penalties for anyone who tried to enforce it, and we expanded it to apply to any gun that is owned in Wyoming and remains exclusively in the state of Wyoming,” said Kroeker, noting his proposal would remove the requirement that the guns be manufactured in the state.

Kroeker said he’s not sure how courts would rule if the Wyoming law were to conflict with a new gun-control law from Washington, but he’s very confident which side the Founding Fathers would choose.

“People say that but the Constitution says that the Constitution itself is the supreme law of the land and the federal government can only pass laws that are in pursuance with the Constitution,” Kroeker said. “Because this is an intrastate matter and not interstate commerce, we believe that there’s no authority for the federal government to impose its restrictions on us.”

Kroeker’s bill has passed the Wyoming House of Representatives but he said he’s not sure how an unpredictable state senate will vote on it. Kroeker said the public feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, with 700 emails backing his changes to the law and just 13 opposing it.

Kroeker is very concerned about the way the gun debate is unfolding in Washington.

“We’re very concerned,” he said. “I truly believe that Obama and Feinstein would go as far as they feel they could get away with as far as taking guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens.”

The GOP lawmaker also urged Congress to resist the urge to impose a one-size-fits-all approach to guns. He said the issue should be left up to the 50 states to decide what’s best to the people of that state.

[Gordon Ray Kissinger]

Anti-Gunners’ Wish List: Ban Private Gun Sales, Ban Gun, Ban Magazine

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(Info Wars) – While banning guns and magazines is being actively promoted by the anti-gunners (as evidenced by introduction of Sen. Feinstein’s S. 150), the criminalization of private firearm transfers is the centerpiece of their anti-Second Amendment efforts.

This is part of a strategy to chip away at our Second Amendment rights under the guise of being “reasonable.”

SPECIAL: Join TeaParty.org to Fund “Youth Firearms Training Initiative”

But if you understand exactly what the anti-gunners are really talking about, you’ll understand that the restrictions they’re proposing are anything but reasonable.

While we don’t know the final form this legislation will take, these checks no doubt would require background checks for firearm transfers between lifelong friends, and maybe even between family members.  It would also be a step toward national gun registration.   As we mentioned in an article last week, “universal” background checks are background checks on EVERY transfer, sale, purchase, trade, gift, rental, and loan of a firearm between any and all individuals, minus whatever exceptions our opponents will stand for.

Does anyone really think that these checks will be conducted between drug dealers on a Chicago street corner or gang members in an L.A. alley?  Of course not.  You know that’s ridiculous and so do the anti-gun politicians, but they don’t care.

And where and how would these personal checks be done?  Would you and your friend, or grandson, or mother have to drive to some government office at the state capital?  Or travel several hours to the government-approved, federally licensed dealer in another part of your state?  What happens when the instant check system isn’t functioning?  How will the government monitor and enforce these checks?  Obviously, this proposal raises more questions than it answers.

Furthermore, “universal” background checks are unnecessary.

It is already a federal felony to be engaged in the business of buying and selling firearms without having a federal dealer’s license.  It is already a crime for a federally licensed dealer to sell a gun without doing a background check–that’s all dealers, everywhere, whether at retail stores or gun shows.  Further, it is already a federal felony to sell, trade, give, lend, rent or transfer a gun to a person you know or should know is not legally allowed to own, purchase or possess a firearm.

It is even a federal felony to submit false information on a background check form for the purpose of purchasing a firearm, though Vice President Biden does not think it’s worth the government’s time to prosecute these criminal acts.

NRA does NOT support “universal” background checks and will continue to oppose, “universal” background checks and registration schemes. We do believe that records of those who are prohibited by law from purchasing firearms (including those whose mental health history puts them in this category) ought to be included in the federal instant check system.

Please continue to contact your U.S. Senators and tell them to oppose “universal” background check legislation AND S. 150, Sen. Feinstein’s gun and magazine ban.  To identify and contact your elected officials in Washington, D.C., use the “Write Your Reps” feature at www.NRAILA.org, or you can reach your member of Congress by phone at 202-224-3121.

http://www.infowars.com/anti-gunners-wish-list-ban-private-gun-sale...