“Born and raised on a cotton farm in deep-red Tennessee, a son of the South, I grew up hunting and fishing with my father, who was reputed to be the finest quail shot in Crockett County,” self-professed “redneck” Joe McLean writes at thedailybeast.com. “As a younger man, I was forced to defend my home in the middle of the night with a firearm. The burglar was a career criminal, just out of prison after robbing a liquor store with a sawed-off shotgun. The cops knew him by name when they came to get him. I was lucky.” But we’re not. McLean is one of the increasing number of pro-civilian disarmament gun owners emerging from the media miasma to FUD fence straddlers. To wit . . .

So let’s be clear: first, nobody is going to take our guns away. Not mine, and not yours. Nobody has even suggested that. Frankly, nobody thinks it’s possible anyway, with millions of firearms in circulation . . .

. . . everybody understands this carnage isn’t just the fault of guns. Blood-soaked movies and videogames, mental illness, school bullying, and maybe even our national glorification of the lone cowboy dispensing frontier justice with his trusty six-shooter all have a role.

But regardless of the causes, the actual instruments of destruction are firearms, specifically assault weapons. These rifles are wonderfully engineered tools built for only one purpose: to kill and maim as many human beings on the battlefield as quickly and efficiently as possible. So we should not be surprised when they are used for the exact job for which they were created.

Americans overwhelmingly support our right to defend our own homes, but “assault” rifles are by definition offensive, military weapons. They’re not made for defense and, frankly, not terribly useful for that. Ask any police officer.

At the risk of being crude, are you shitting me? No one wants to take away your guns but it’s OK to take away your “assault rifle”? And cops don’t use AR-15-style rifles for self-defense? So what DO they use them for? Wait, don’t answer.

Just tell me that American gun owners aren’t as stupid as the stupid people who think they’re stupid. Please.

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88 COMMENTS

  1. I’m getting more than a little tired of “These guns have no purpose other than to kill” argument. Any gun can be used to kill and ANY gun can be used for defense. There is nothing special about an AR-15 or even a M4 that says it cannot be used for defensive purposes.

    There is also nothing other than narrow and close off minds that says an AR-15 cannot be used for hunting. It’s a stupid logical fallacy and I wish there was a way to get the message out there to expose it as the fallacy that it is.

    • I’m sick of the ‘other purpose’ argument too. I suppose they do that so cars, fire, etc. aren’t up for banning as well, but it’s a terribly weak argument. Maybe we should all get railed bottle openers for our rifles? That way we just say, “See, it’s just to crack open a Coke, but if I have to, I can also defend my family with it”.

    • I embrace the AR-15 argument the same way some of my liberal friends try and make it. When they tell me, “those weapons [“assault” weapons] are just killing machines, and they’re only made to kill people.” I respond, “yes, they are killing machines and can kill a lot of people in a short period of time. Sounds like a pretty good choice for home defense, doesn’t it?” They usually try and tell me that the AR-15 is overkill for home defense, until I remind them that home invasions often involve multiple assailants.

    • “. . . everybody understands this carnage isn’t just the fault of guns. Blood-soaked movies and videogames, mental illness, school bullying, and maybe even our national glorification of the lone cowboy dispensing frontier justice with his trusty six-shooter all have a role.”
      I can’t be the only one who noticed he blamed everything but the guy pulling the trigger, can I? Do these people propose we put a $4 Peckinpah DVD on trial, with Asperger’s as an accomplice?

    • & thats the entire problem. There is nothing wrong with killing a man that has broken into your home to harm you./// Its not that they can’t squeeze the trigger, they can’t hold the gun./// So when they say its only purpose to kill people I say, what part of “bad guy” don’t you understand? some people need killin, Randy

    • First, I want to smash this mans jaw with a ball peen hammer.
      Boyz and girls, please repeat after me: There is no such thing as an effing ‘assault weapon’, its a made up libtard strawman used to smear SEMIAUTOMATIC guns by marrying them in an unholly union with ‘assault rifles’ which are AUTOMATIC military machine guns that have been mainly banned since 34′, period. Rifle magazines that hold 20-30 rounds and pistol magazines that hold 11-20 rounds are STANDARD capacity. I suppose the 50-100 round drums are ‘high capacity’, but the evil libtards are not REALLY after those, are they.
      Finally, if ANY SOB starts talking about hunting or sports shooting with regards to gun laws or the second amendment, you IMMEDIATELY stop listening to them, they are gun grabbing turds who are doing the ol’ “divide and conquer” routine.
      Liberalism is a mental disorder.

      • How is your blood pressure? You might want to go out and take a walk, clear your head. You’ve mentioned twice here that you want to take a hammer to someone. That isn’t healthy or productive. Look at Dorner – he is an example of what happens when you let the rage consume you.

        You need to realize that these jerks are going to lie and cajole and distract people to get their ridiculous laws passed, but you can’t let it eat you up. You need to focus on improving the situation – that involves influencing people who are not on our side to come to our side. This could involve calling or writing letters to representatives, countering their arguments and lies on other websites, or taking fence sitters out shooting. Whatever it is, you have to learn to let their attacks roll off your back. The antis love it when find a button that can hurt you.

        • Get real and lighten up. Like I REALLY would (unless his evil scheme succeeded and thugs were kicking in peoples doors, then he would be held accountable).
          If they really are ‘lying and cajoling’ to distract us so they can remove our liberty and freedom (effective tools to protect the 2nd amendment), then yes, I WANT to smash.

  2. They’re not made for defense and, frankly, not terribly useful for that. Ask any police officer.

    Yes, this is CLEARLY the case when virtually every law-enforcement agency in the nation has replaced pump shotguns with AR-15 “patrol rifles”. Because they’re not at all useful in a defensive shooting where a suspect charges towards a LEO.

    • No…No…NO. Remember Chief James told us guns aren’t defensive weapons, they are used by police to intimidate and show power!

      LINK REMOVED – Sorry it screws up some browsers

    • Man, If the bradys want to cry about something they can cry about the bad guy hit with a 1oz home defense slug out of a 870. They have been told the AR .223 is top of the heap power wise. Its a joke compared to the aformentioned slug, Randy

  10. Semi-off-topic, but sorta under the false flag heading…. Anyone else see that CTD just gave 100K to the SAF? I think I like them a little more, but still want them to ESAD. Lol

  11. “At the risk of being crude, are you shitting me?”

    Feel around your neck, is there an a$$hole there? (I just had to throw that out there….)

  12. Well here is a police officer who thinks an AR-15 is excellent for self defense, but he didn’t ask me. If you have his contact info, if be more than happy to tell him. I’ll also clue him in that Feinstein / Bloomberg et all are after all of our guns. This guy may well be past the point of having a clue, but its still worth a shot.

    • And if they were so useless, why did nearly every cop in SoCal searching for Dorner either have an AR type weapon or a shotgun? Why does every SWAT team in the US have them? Oh, I forgot, Chief James esplain’d it–they are offensive weapons used to intimidate. [Quite frankly, if someone breaks into my home, I sure as hell WANT to intimidate the SOB!]

      • Given the reckless behavior of the LAPD, I’m not sure that’s the argument you want to go with to show that AR’s aren’t just for spray-and-pray.

  14. I am getting tired of anti-gun groups ridiculing nervous gun owners by using the “no one is going to take your guns away” argument to promote an assault weapons ban. There is no explicit confiscation terms written in to the federal proposals (so far), but it seems like these people have never heard of states like CA and NY, NJ (now apparently MI too) where the proposed (or current) bills make it a felony to own an ‘assault weapon.’ How can you say “no one is going to take your guns away” and then pass law that makes you a felon for possessing them?

    Hey Joe Maclean, no one is going to take away your Mustang/Camaro/Corvette/etc, just get over it….oh but it we find you driving one its straight to prison for a minimum of 7 years, but don’t worry no on is coming to your house to confiscate it!

    Cognitive dissonance at its finest.

  15. But regardless of the causes, the actual instruments of destruction are firearms, specifically assault weapons.

    No, actually, no they aren’t. Did he miss the memo about just how rarely so-called “assault weapons” are used in actual crimes?

  17. I’m starting to think the best comeback against this kind of thing is to start calling AR15 rifles what they really are: Varmint rifles.

    It fires a .22 caliber bullet at high velocity, ideal for taking out things like groundhogs and coyotes. The design is modular and parts like the barrel can be swapped out for different roles, so you can protect your chicken coop with a shorter barrel or cull nuisance animals from your fields with a long bull barrel.

    The AR15 or any firearm like it is a rancher’s best friend. The totalitarians think they have found a winning strategy by referring to it as a tool exclusively designed for killing humans, but that is simply not true, which makes it a lie. Don’t let them lie to the masses, tell the truth about what your rifle is good for.

    In practically all self defense situations a handgun is preferable to a carbine, rifles are best utilized outdoors at significant distances. They are trying to use the tactical marketing and imagery that many gun owners love against us – we need to spread the word about what these rifles are most likely to be used for instead of letting them use fantasy to justify the seizure of our rightful property.

    • I like that. No doubt about it, the only thing that 99% of civilian-owned ARs (and similar weapons) ever actually kill are critters. And money.

    • For the benefit of the current struggle against anti-2A forces, I think your arguments are too specific, and though reasonable to some here, are not germane to the issue as it really is. The title of this post is False Flags Fluttering….” It is a waste of breath to battle on these spots.

      We are up against a group who is using every kind of disingenuous argument and logical fallacy they can grab and toss our way. Unfortunately, though they would never say it out loud, their goal really is to disarm us. This is the stuff wars are made of.

      We can argue about whether AR’s make good varmint guns for ranchers, but we really ought to be saying to them, “You know, bearing arms is a right we are willing to die for. You sure you want to try to take them? We need to at least consider escalating our rhetoric, because when it comes down to it, tyrants understand only one counter and that is violence.

      I haven’t fully thought this through, but I just can’t shake the feeling that unless we, the freedom loving, unite behind a shout of “Back Off!” with sufficient conviction and more than a little threat; then we will lose our arms. And after arms the rest is sure to fall.

      Man, gun grabbers are dangerous.

      One another note. Maybe it’s because I’m not a great pistolero, but unless I’m clearing my house (may God forbid it), I want my rifle at any distance over 25 feet.

  18. There’s a whole lot of people that keep telling me I have to compromise my stand on the 2a. I tell them, ya well Rosa Parks could have sat in the middle of the bus too. The Bill of Rights defines our civil rights and too many people have died to protect them for me to compromise. Those that try to stir up fear, uncertainty, and doubt about guns and try to demonize me for my exercise of my civil rights are bigots. The sooner we all start pointing that out the sooner we get to the core of this issue. There is a segment of American society that just doesn’t feel comfortable with another segment of American society and the first segment is trying to suppress the second. Ready for the “special” drinking fountains and bathrooms all you “clingers”.

    • Here are a couple compromises:

      1. teach safe handling of firearms and marksmanship in high schools at the same time as driver’s ed in return for universal background checks.

      2. institute either a national concealed carry permit, or a system where all states recognize another state’s permit, in return for a higher level of proficiency and training required to keep a permit (has to be better than whatever the nypd requires of their officers, in the name of safety).

      3. allow firearms to be purchased with pre-tax dollars AND introduce a tax credit (for decreasing the cost of law enforcement) for firearm ownership in return for registration of all new guns sold or transferred.

  19. I’m surprised the old media isnt adopting this tactic in a pitiful attempt to rescue their papers and magazines.

    They could drag out “journalists” to tell us all emotional stories about growing up with well-known reporters on well-known networks, writing for well-known outlets and follow it up with cautionary tales of the reckless “high capacity” garbage that clogs the interwebs on blogs and feeds.

    What good is a thousand Tweets from no-name press when we can wait 24 hours and get a beautifully worded, safely filtered, report of yesterdays events delivered to our doorsteps set to an easy to read fifth grade level?

  20. Is it inherently wrong to own a weapon? No.
    Can a weapon by itself harm anyone? No.
    Does it take a person to harm someone with a weapon? Yes.

    Clearly the answer is to ban assault weapons and hire a wizard to remove the ones already in existence from the streets with his magic spells.

  21. Let’s hope the number of hunter-on-hunter accidents spikes up drastically. Worthless scum, all of them.

  23. From his article:

    You could certainly hunt with an AK-47, but why would you want to? My hunting rifle, an old Hawken muzzleloader, is a beautiful thing, finely crafted and wonderful to shoot. Using a “smoke pole” makes you a better marksmen and a better hunter.

    Clearly, it also makes you an elitist.

    Assault rifles are light and accurate, but no sportsman is going to pour a barrage of hot lead into a deer. And nobody needs a 30-round clip of high-velocity, steel-jacketed, armor-piercing ordnance for target shooting.

    Maybe not a deer, but a whole herd of feral hogs? Sure. The fact that he called it a clip tells me he knows very little about what he speaks, despite being a self-professed “redneck.”

    • Steel jacketed? Armor piercing? Ordinance?

      1) i didn’t know they made copper colored steel. you learn something new every day i guess

      2) isn’t just about any rifle round capable of piercing at least modest body armor?

      3) i sure would like to be able to shoot explosives from my scary adjective rifle!

    • “but no sportsman is going to pour a barrage of hot lead into a deer”

      EVERY ONE OF THESE MORONS keeps yapping on about unloading 30 rounds into a deer when there are mag limits for hunting. I’m getting so goddam sick of those patently false assertions. AZ has a 5 round limit on semi-autos – the same capacity as most bolt actions. Hunting javelina was the only time my Mini-14 has ever had the factory 5-round mag in her.

  24. “Americans overwhelmingly support our right to defend our own homes, but “assault” rifles are by definition offensive, military weapons. They’re not made for defense and, frankly, not terribly useful for that….”

    Didn’t BHO just award a Congressional Medal of Honor?

    According to Yahoo News:
    “Obama, at a ceremony in the White House’s East Room, detailed the heroism Romesha displayed on Oct. 3, 2009: 300 Taliban fighters had descended upon 53 Americans at Army outpost Keating on the border of Pakistan under ‘almost unbelievable conditions,’ Obama said.

    ‘That’s what these soldiers were asked to do—defend the indefensible,’ the president said of the outpost, which was situated at the bottom of a steep valley that left the soldiers open to attack.

    ‘Explosions shook them out of their beds’ that morning…”

    So where is the commentary about the M4’s or M16’s or whatever other “Assault Weapns” they used were “Offensive Weapons”. I think even BHO clearly stated that they were used for defense, and rather effectively.

  25. Not surprising, yet it’s never-endingly surprising at the same time. YOU NEVER KNOW your next traitor!!!

    This MF is effin’ SCUM, and how many names can I call this effer? MISERABLE COLLABORATOR. STINKIN’ TURNCOAT. SKUNK WALLER. P.O.S.

    BACK-STABBER. SCUM OF THE EARTH.

  26. Ask any police officer…

    Funny, my instructor is a Sheriffs Deputy and member of the SWAT team in his home county. He was impressed by my first AR purchase. Granted my PSA has nothing on his LWRC. He also teaches classes to use them. ANY police officer huh? Oh yea and since you seem to think your home state justifies your means, Im speaking of a LEO here in Tennessee. Your argument is invalid.

    • Same here.

      Back in ’91/’92 my community college had firearms courses taught by a senior officer on Glendale PD. He took us on a VIP tour of Gunsight up in Paulden and on the last day of class we all met up at the police shooting range and this dude brought a half dozen full autos and a .50 cal rifle. I went straight for the M-3 grease gun!

      He was one of the coolest fellas I’ve ever met and he was 100% behind folks carrying. I’ll never forget he offered to sell me his old school (not so old school back then) Sig 220 with the heel mag release and to this day I well and truly mourn the fact I couldn’t come up with all the cash.

  27. “30-round clip”

    Nice of him to say the C-word just in case we weren’t already positive he had no credibility.

  29. I agree, assault rifles are military weapons.

    …Using the factual definition of what an assault rifle actually is…a full auto or select fire rifle firing an intermediate cartridge. These are already Class 3 machineguns. Not news to anyone here.

  30. “These rifles are wonderfully engineered tools built for only one purpose: to kill and maim as many human beings on the battlefield as quickly and efficiently as possible.”

    NOT SO! If that were the case, they would be select-fire weapons, capable of full automatic operation. This joker calls them “assault rifles” because they LOOK like M-16s.

    Besides, the American Revolution was not a hunt — it was a war. Grapeshot and canister were used on both sides precisely for the reason given above. The issue here is NOT SELF DEFENSE, and it’s NOT HUNTING. It’s about preserving freedom, and it’s about a Constitutionally guaranteed right for every citizen to keep and bear arms equivalent to those used by the military as a last-ditch means for resisting a tyrannical government (whether foreign or domestic).

    Folks, if we let this come down to an issue of hunting or self-defense against muggers, we’ve already lost the battle, and we’ll be beaten up by gun-grabbers screaming endlessly “you don’t need that for hunting” and “you don’t need that to prevent a mugging.”

    “Americans overwhelmingly support our right to defend our own homes, but “assault” rifles are by definition offensive, military weapons.”

    This is stupid beyond repair. Show me one, just ONE modern soldier armed with a Bushmaster semi-auto. I don’t think you’ll find one, precisely because it is NOT an “assault weapon” — it lacks full-auto capability.

  31. These rifles are wonderfully engineered tools built for only one purpose: to kill and maim as many human beings on the battlefield as quickly and efficiently as possible.

    This must be why all the assault weapons bans include a law enforcement exemption, because as we all know, the function of the police is to kill and maim as many human beings on the battlefield that is our nation as quickly and efficiently as possible.

  32. Man, I gotta say…tacticool has jumped the shark, though. And, was promptly attacked and torn to shreds by said shark.

    As other commenters have said above, I think the obsession with mil-spec accessories is really provoking a lot of fear in people that don’t know much about firearms.

    • There’s some truth to that, but anybody who pees their pants at the sight of a surefire mounted on a rail probably owe it to themselves to read a book or two.

  33. Well you can be killed just as easy with a bat or a knife. In some parts of the world, weapons of war are still sticks and stones. I guess it all just depends at how you look at everyday household items now doesn’t it.

  35. We know the 15 year old Hadiya Pendleton was shot by a young adult male who’d been picked up recently for a “gun possession offense,” then sentenced to…? Some probation. As in Chicago, so in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and on: The city judges don’t enforce the gun provisions and prosecutors plead them down. Of course they have illegal gun use problems. The entire barrage of gun confiscation measures is a red herring to keep our eyes off the Chicago Gang’s failure to focus resources in their own hometown. Tried and true tactic. Citizens often fall for it if the accompanying video is engaging enough. GWB used the tactic brilliantly after 9/11: Don’t look at how the CIA, FBI, and DoD screwed up before the fact. Just look at all our Hero Worship speeches and fabulous new anti-terrorism laws. Worked.

    • “We know the 15 year old Hadiya Pendleton was shot be young adult who’d been picked up recently for a “gun possession offense,” then sentenced to…? Some probation.”

      I couldn’t parse this sentence. Was the part about being picked up directed at Hadiya, or the guy(s) who shot her? If the former, got a source? I’m asking because I just blew through a half dozen articles about her and saw no mention of it.

  37. So What Is an ‘Assault Rifle’ Really? We Look at the Definitions and How the Term Is ‘Demonized’

    http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/01/11/so-what-is-an-assault-rifle-really-we-look-at-the-definitions-and-how-the-term-is-demonized/

    “Make a promise to yourself that you will stop calling rifles ‘assault weapons.’”

    That’s what Glenn Beck said on his morning radio show Thursday as he discussed AR-15s. But why? Is an AR-15 not an assault rifle? Does the “AR” in AR-15 not stand for “assault rifle”?
    It doesn’t. In fact, it doesn’t mean “automatic rifle” either, as many might think. AR actually stands for ArmaLite rifle, which is the company that first developed it in the 1950s.

    It seems that there is a lot of confusion as to the difference between military rifles and those designed for civilian ownership, especially because of the language often used to describe the latter. The most popular terms to describe the weapons at the center of the recent gun control debate are “military-style” and “assault.” These words have long been used to to describe civilian firearms like the AR-15, but some consider it an inappropriate association that is deliberately being made to “demonize” the guns.

    As Beck radio producer Stu Burguiere put it on the show Thursday, “they are targeting these weapons because they think the public is confused enough that they can get away with it — and they are.”

    With what seems to be little understanding or agreement on the definition of what constitutes an assault rifle and the difference between civilian and military arms, TheBlaze went searching.

  38. In Viet Nam I was not a grunt, but I did have and used an M-16. I never used it for assault, only defense. Seems the military generals and Department of Defense seem to think the M-16 was a defensive weapon since that is what I was issued for defense.

  39. The single greatest accomplishment of the left in this debate is the almost de facto division in popular thought that hunting is cool and the true spirit of the Second is the realm of whack jobs. I hate to give them credit for anything but they played that hand hard and they played it well.

  40. I find it interesting that the liberals are so willing to describe bloody scenes of carnage, rampant madness, the crazy folks who lack a soul… when describing those who support the 2nd Amendment. They talk ceaselessly about the victims who never realized their dreams, lives snuffed out in their prime. For a moment there you’d think they were talking about abortion!

  41. That may be the most ignorant piece of writing I’ve seen from the anti’s in at least a week. Okay, maybe a day.

    The gun was designed to kill people but isn’t good for home defense? Hell, the way he describes it you only have to show it to the perps before they disappear in a white-hot flash leaving nothing but tiny piles of ashes behind

    No one’s trying to take our guns away? Guess he doesn’t ever check in on the Daily Kos.

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/12/21/1172661/-How-to-Ban-Guns-A-step-by-step-long-term-process

    Or maybe the New Republic:

    http://www.newrepublic.com/blog/plank/105264/can-we-please-drop-the-gun-rights-pc-ness

    The fact is they’ve been coming for our guns, all of them, since the late 60’s, early 70’s when Massachusetts tried to ban all handguns.

    As for the 2nd Amendment, how come all the rednecks I know understand that the whole damn purpose of the 2nd, is to put military grade weapons (no, Piers Morgan, not tanks, missiles, full auto weapons, and nuclear bombs) in the hands of the citizenry. We’re supposed to be able to defend the nation against tyranny, after all. An AR-15 is a handy tool for that sort of thing.

  42. Tired old argument. Guns were designed to kill blah blah blah.

    Actually a gun is made to shoot a projectile. It doesn’t matter if it is a paper target, a deer or a human. It’s not designed to kill. Just like a knife is designed to cut. It doesn’t matter if it’s a piece of paper, a chicken or a human.

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