alan
Member
If you have question re the position of JPFO on this matter, as some no doubt will, look into it for yourself. Having done that, you might want to contact your U.S. Senators
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PEOPLE OF AMERICA
From Aaron Zelman, Executive Director
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
www.JPFO.org
Dear friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens:
Most of us remember vividly the way that an entire church full of
people, including more than two dozen children, were burned to death
in 1993, or died in other ways, while under seige by the Federal
Bureaus of Investigation, and Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and
Explosives.
In the wake of that and many other BATFE abuses of the unalienable
individual, civil, Constitutional, and human rights, in essence, of
every man, woman, and responsible child in America, Congress has
rebuked this rogue agency often, and often, reforms of various kinds
have been promised. Yet somehow, these reforms never quite seem to
materialize.
For the past year, for example, a man named Michael Sullivan has
been Acting Director of the BATFE, and has made no effort to curb its
abuses. Indeed, he has promised to "work with" notorious anti-Second
Amendment politicians like Senator Edward M. Kennedy on "gun control"
issues.
Judges are complaining of sloppy briefs and missed deadlines in
Sullivan's office, but the situation is vastly darker than that. U.S.
District Court Judge Mark Wolf, to name just one example, castigated
Sullivan recently for tying up the courts with penny-ante
street-crime
cases.
Unimaginably worse, U.S. District Court Judge William Young has
hammered Sullivan's office for evincing "a moral code more suited to
the alleys of Baghdad than the streets of Boston" and for adopting a
mindset that "reveals such callous indifference to innocent human
life as would gag any fair-minded observer." One can't help thinking about
Waco.
Sullivan has often stated with typical arrogance, that he doesn't
care if he annoys judges. By his reckoning, the more cases one has
gotten to trial, the more successful one has been, so he just keeps
on pushing more and more cases through each year, in the process racking
up some of the longest average sentences of any U.S. attorney in the
country.
These days, that's regarded as a good thing.
Go to: http://preview.tinyurl.com/yo8zfb
Full URL.........
http://www.bostonmagazine.com/articl...to_washington/
In at least one recent case, when a licensed firearms dealer
contacted Sullivan regarding BATFE management practices, the Acting
Director responded by sending a pair of armed inspectors to do a
"thorough inspection" of the man's records. Even if this inspection
had been a legitimate operation, rather than the fascistic
retaliatory exercise that it apparently was, inspectors are not supposed to be
armed. Except, of course, as a naked, brutal, authoritarian threat.
Acting Director Sullivan has been fully aware, since taking over
at BATFE, of the bureau's use of illegitimate evidence on a scale
that surpasses even the bullet-testing and DNA scandals of the FBI, yet he
continues to countenance these corrupt practices. Is this what
"working with Kennedy on gun control issues" consists of? How can a
citizen conform his behavior with the law when no objective test
standards exist to see if non-conformance with the law has actually
occurred?
Sullivan has also continued a Clinton-era policy of eliminating as
many firearms dealers and manufacturers from the rolls of federal
licensees as possible. Confronted with the number of dealers being
shut down in this manner, he stated, "There is no correlation between
the dramatic decrease of nearly 150,000 licensees, and BATFE
revocation actions." This, despite the fact that revocations are up
nearly six-fold from the 2001 to 2006 period, according to the
March/April 2007 issue of _Shooting Sports Retailer_ magazine, page 19.
Meanwhile, Sullivan has ignored requests from Congress and the
Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General to implement
fines and suspensions, rather than just revoking dealers licenses
outright.
Why should anyone -- especially members of the non-shooting public
-- be concerned over this? Because, as more and more individuals have
armed themselves and taken to carrying concealed weapons over the
past 30 years or so, America's violent crime rate has plummeted. This
means that those individuals who do carry weapons -- as well as those who
provide them -- are "net social benefactors". Shutting down firearms
dealers is exactly like machinegunning firefighters or paramedics -- a stupid, evil, insane, and antisocial policy, being carried out in your name. And at your expense.
Sullivan -- who has also been criticized by _judges_ for "going
for the jugular" as a U.S. Attorney to establish his career, rather
than take plea bargains to avoid tying up the courts and wasting the
taxpayers' money in the process -- now continues an old police state
tradition by disobeying court orders to return confiscated property
and ignoring recurring requests to speak with him about that and
other issues.
Here at JPFO, we're curious. Is the head of BATFE fully aware of
the Nazi origins of the principal law he is enforcing, and under the
aegis of which, he justifies the excesses of his agency, the Gun
Control Act of 1968 -- rammed through Congress with the help of the
mass media by the corrupt and discredited Senator Thomas Dodd? Does
Sullivan approve of that law -- and its origins -- or will he announce
an investigation into the sleazy details and circumstances of its passage?
Three guesses and the first two don't count.
Perhaps worst of all, while Sullivan tells representatives of
groups like the National Rifle Association one thing -- recently that
he would not share "trace request data" with other individuals and
agencies -- at the same time, he tells known enemies of the right to
keep and bear arms, like Senator Charles Schumer, "I'm optimistic
that there will be even more information available than provided in the
past."
Even one of the man's former colleages says about him, "If
anything ever happens that requires leadership at the BATFE, and Mike
Sullivan is at the helm, it's going to be a sad day." A sad day, indeed.
Now, Sullivan's nomination -- by supposedly "gun-friendly" George
W. Bush -- to a permanent appointment as the head of the BATFE, is up
for U.S. Senate consideration. We are extremely fortunate, thus far,
that it has been put on temporary hold by one courageous Senator, but
pressure is mounting for him to relent, and to permit the nomination
to proceed. Believe it or not, Jews of the Preservation of Firearms
Ownership is forbidden by law from suggesting what you should do about
this.
It is more than a little ironic that while the government claims
to be protecting Americans from terrorists and something they call
"Islamofascism" -- significantly, by increasingly curtailing our
individual rights and civil liberties -- it is subjecting all of us,
through individuals like Michael Sullivan and through agencies like
the BATFE, to state terrorism and fascism entirely of the homegrown
variety.
When you have to ask yourself who's the greater threat to life,
liberty, and property, Al Qaeda or your own government, things are a
mess.
Sincerely,
Aaron Zelman Executive Director
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
www.jpfo.org
AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PEOPLE OF AMERICA
From Aaron Zelman, Executive Director
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
www.JPFO.org
Dear friends, neighbors, and fellow citizens:
Most of us remember vividly the way that an entire church full of
people, including more than two dozen children, were burned to death
in 1993, or died in other ways, while under seige by the Federal
Bureaus of Investigation, and Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and
Explosives.
In the wake of that and many other BATFE abuses of the unalienable
individual, civil, Constitutional, and human rights, in essence, of
every man, woman, and responsible child in America, Congress has
rebuked this rogue agency often, and often, reforms of various kinds
have been promised. Yet somehow, these reforms never quite seem to
materialize.
For the past year, for example, a man named Michael Sullivan has
been Acting Director of the BATFE, and has made no effort to curb its
abuses. Indeed, he has promised to "work with" notorious anti-Second
Amendment politicians like Senator Edward M. Kennedy on "gun control"
issues.
Judges are complaining of sloppy briefs and missed deadlines in
Sullivan's office, but the situation is vastly darker than that. U.S.
District Court Judge Mark Wolf, to name just one example, castigated
Sullivan recently for tying up the courts with penny-ante
street-crime
cases.
Unimaginably worse, U.S. District Court Judge William Young has
hammered Sullivan's office for evincing "a moral code more suited to
the alleys of Baghdad than the streets of Boston" and for adopting a
mindset that "reveals such callous indifference to innocent human
life as would gag any fair-minded observer." One can't help thinking about
Waco.
Sullivan has often stated with typical arrogance, that he doesn't
care if he annoys judges. By his reckoning, the more cases one has
gotten to trial, the more successful one has been, so he just keeps
on pushing more and more cases through each year, in the process racking
up some of the longest average sentences of any U.S. attorney in the
country.
These days, that's regarded as a good thing.
Go to: http://preview.tinyurl.com/yo8zfb
Full URL.........
http://www.bostonmagazine.com/articl...to_washington/
In at least one recent case, when a licensed firearms dealer
contacted Sullivan regarding BATFE management practices, the Acting
Director responded by sending a pair of armed inspectors to do a
"thorough inspection" of the man's records. Even if this inspection
had been a legitimate operation, rather than the fascistic
retaliatory exercise that it apparently was, inspectors are not supposed to be
armed. Except, of course, as a naked, brutal, authoritarian threat.
Acting Director Sullivan has been fully aware, since taking over
at BATFE, of the bureau's use of illegitimate evidence on a scale
that surpasses even the bullet-testing and DNA scandals of the FBI, yet he
continues to countenance these corrupt practices. Is this what
"working with Kennedy on gun control issues" consists of? How can a
citizen conform his behavior with the law when no objective test
standards exist to see if non-conformance with the law has actually
occurred?
Sullivan has also continued a Clinton-era policy of eliminating as
many firearms dealers and manufacturers from the rolls of federal
licensees as possible. Confronted with the number of dealers being
shut down in this manner, he stated, "There is no correlation between
the dramatic decrease of nearly 150,000 licensees, and BATFE
revocation actions." This, despite the fact that revocations are up
nearly six-fold from the 2001 to 2006 period, according to the
March/April 2007 issue of _Shooting Sports Retailer_ magazine, page 19.
Meanwhile, Sullivan has ignored requests from Congress and the
Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General to implement
fines and suspensions, rather than just revoking dealers licenses
outright.
Why should anyone -- especially members of the non-shooting public
-- be concerned over this? Because, as more and more individuals have
armed themselves and taken to carrying concealed weapons over the
past 30 years or so, America's violent crime rate has plummeted. This
means that those individuals who do carry weapons -- as well as those who
provide them -- are "net social benefactors". Shutting down firearms
dealers is exactly like machinegunning firefighters or paramedics -- a stupid, evil, insane, and antisocial policy, being carried out in your name. And at your expense.
Sullivan -- who has also been criticized by _judges_ for "going
for the jugular" as a U.S. Attorney to establish his career, rather
than take plea bargains to avoid tying up the courts and wasting the
taxpayers' money in the process -- now continues an old police state
tradition by disobeying court orders to return confiscated property
and ignoring recurring requests to speak with him about that and
other issues.
Here at JPFO, we're curious. Is the head of BATFE fully aware of
the Nazi origins of the principal law he is enforcing, and under the
aegis of which, he justifies the excesses of his agency, the Gun
Control Act of 1968 -- rammed through Congress with the help of the
mass media by the corrupt and discredited Senator Thomas Dodd? Does
Sullivan approve of that law -- and its origins -- or will he announce
an investigation into the sleazy details and circumstances of its passage?
Three guesses and the first two don't count.
Perhaps worst of all, while Sullivan tells representatives of
groups like the National Rifle Association one thing -- recently that
he would not share "trace request data" with other individuals and
agencies -- at the same time, he tells known enemies of the right to
keep and bear arms, like Senator Charles Schumer, "I'm optimistic
that there will be even more information available than provided in the
past."
Even one of the man's former colleages says about him, "If
anything ever happens that requires leadership at the BATFE, and Mike
Sullivan is at the helm, it's going to be a sad day." A sad day, indeed.
Now, Sullivan's nomination -- by supposedly "gun-friendly" George
W. Bush -- to a permanent appointment as the head of the BATFE, is up
for U.S. Senate consideration. We are extremely fortunate, thus far,
that it has been put on temporary hold by one courageous Senator, but
pressure is mounting for him to relent, and to permit the nomination
to proceed. Believe it or not, Jews of the Preservation of Firearms
Ownership is forbidden by law from suggesting what you should do about
this.
It is more than a little ironic that while the government claims
to be protecting Americans from terrorists and something they call
"Islamofascism" -- significantly, by increasingly curtailing our
individual rights and civil liberties -- it is subjecting all of us,
through individuals like Michael Sullivan and through agencies like
the BATFE, to state terrorism and fascism entirely of the homegrown
variety.
When you have to ask yourself who's the greater threat to life,
liberty, and property, Al Qaeda or your own government, things are a
mess.
Sincerely,
Aaron Zelman Executive Director
Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
www.jpfo.org
