Noted 2nd Amendment author, speaker, blogger, and talk radio guest, John Longenecker, has long-standing reputation for his revealing and thoughtful commentary on the role of how our 2nd Amendment Rights make for safer streets across the country. His book, Safe Streets in the Nationwide Concealed Carry of Handguns, in hardcover since 2004, is now available as an e-book. In addition, Mr. Longenecker has expanded on his findings in his recently published follow-up work, Even Safer Streets 2011—The 2nd Amendment As A Mainstream American Value.
I had the pleasure of questioning Mr. Longenecker regarding the state of our 2nd Amendment Rights here in California and across the country recently in a telephone interview and published Part I and Part II of my interview with him over the past two weeks. Here is Part III, the conclusion of my time together with John Longenecker.
YCC: The gun control lobby in the U.S. has been taking quite the beating over the past several years, even here in California, where 2nd Amendment advocates in the San Francisco Bay Area and also in Southern California were able to help stop every single gun control bill in the State Legislature cold in 2010. Why do you believe that this is the case?
JL: Since the election of President Obama, gun sales went up. Earlier, I spoke about right-brain content, right-brain writing, right-brain meaning to individuals. A very good example of that is what they feared or anticipated will happen under the Administration. Now, we are not talking about gun laws. We are not talking about confiscations because if you buy a gun, it doesn't matter if you own ten guns or if you own one. If they are going to confiscate guns, then they are going to take all ten of them. So buying a gun if you may have to surrender it later, well, there's no point to it.
What they were anticipating, in my belief, and in going over the news reports of "change", we are able to identify the early release of criminals, changes in funding of law enforcement, changes in the mission of law enforcement, crowding of the court calendars, changes in defining crimes, who is a criminal, who is not, and all sorts of practices that tend to favor the criminal over the individual tax-payer. In apprehension or anticipation of these changes, I think largely explains the increases in gun sales, elevating it maybe from 80 million to a lot closer to 90 million and that is a right-brain penetration into the mind of the tax-payer--this idea that everything that the gun owners have been predicting is now coming true.
YCC: It appears that, due to the gun control lobby's diminishing relevance in modern American politics, even the "mainstream" anti-gun elements appear to be moving towards a more radicalized base that touches the very edge of the extremist fringe, where death threats are not only being made publicly but also, recently, in a legislative setting. How do you believe these very public death threats are affecting their cause in the eyes of the general public?
JL: Well, they are out of touch with reality and they don't understand that what they say and do damages their whole purpose. In the case of Margo Davidson, who is a Pennsylvania public servant, when she made the statement that if she was going to blow a colleagues brains out, would she be in compliance with the law--if the gentleman from Butler County (a well-known 2nd Amendment advocate, Daryl Metcalfe) stood yelling--this reflects a hostility that has nothing to do with safety of a community. All liberalism in this country, all leftism that made its way to this country is pure contempt for this country and strives more for the personal satisfaction of canard and spitefulness and invective than almost any social change. It is manifested in the tone. It is manifested in the ridiculous, the unreasonable. It is manifest in the fact that they never rest. It is manifested in that they are never humiliated. It is manifested as some kind of energy that does not belong in our system. It is such a hostility that it doesn't even qualify as a legitimate political opinion. It's just a psychological impairment. Americans need to understand that this has no place. It is just absolute hate. For people who should shun hate and promote civility in all dialogue, they need to turn their backs on liberalism. All of America needs to say, "This does not belong in this country." It is extreme in itself and Americans need to participate as an exercise in self-rule because the professionals that we send to Sacramento or Washington are not going to do it because they have to work with these guys. We need them to do it as a matter of propriety.
YCC: Taking a look at the major and credible public opinion polls over the past several years on the subject of gun control, it is apparent that there has been a dramatic shift away from the message that the gun control lobby has been trying to promote. Do you believe that this momentum against the anti-gun movement will continue into the future?
JL: If the public stays involved, then they can direct this thing out of a controlled descent into a save. The gun control movement is going to break the law in this country. They already have broken the law. They've defied rulings on the law. They just don't care. They have something else going on. We don't even have to understand it. All we need to do is appreciate that it is wrong and incompatible with our liberty. The more that Americans begin to realize that gun control is connected to big government, as a cornerstone, the more they are going to be willing to learn about how this can be reversed.
The best way big government can be reversed, and I mean non-violently, and with due process, is the repeal of gun laws. Gun laws support all kinds of bureaucracies that will never work because Hegel, Marx, Engels, they all said the best way this thing works is for it to fail. The idea is that if you repeal gun laws, then one thing shines through that impeaches all of these bureaucracies and that is the personal independence and the authority of the sovereign citizen in this country. Once that shines, because this is the part that has been obfuscated, contained, and discouraged, once independence shines, crime will reduce and the need for these silly bureaucracies will evaporate. This regains control of our revenues, rebuilds government/governed rapport, and it means that brave people who would not ordinarily have run for public office will be more encouraged to run for public office--I mean people of integrity.
But the idea is, as long as crime thrives, it does the advance work of justifying immense bureaucracies and, as I said, once you get people to surrender control of their personal safety, they'll surrender anything. And now, they are starting to see the connection. If we can press that advantage and keep that momentum going, then we may save the day before 2012.
YCC: Well, thank you for your time, John. My readers and I truly appreciate all of the unique insight and wisdom you bring to this often controversial topic of gun control. This is the first time I've heard of most of these ideas and concepts that you've introduced and I know that my readers and I will be spending a good deal of time carefully considering your points. I want to wish you and your work great success here in the future.
JL: Thank you very much for thinking of me. I'm pleased to work with you on this. If we can generate enough comments, then I think we will be able to gauge the receptivity of non-gun-owner readers and who knows, this is what self-rule is. We are doing our duty.
YCC: Thanks again, John.
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