Legalizing Marijuana!! The Medical Perks for some, and The Grand Goal for the Gun Grabbers?

 

ATF say medical-marijuana patients are prohibited from owning guns

 

By John Ingold
The Denver Post

Posted:   10/03/2011 01:00:00 AM MDT

Everybody who buys a gun must fill out ATF Form 4473, which asks: "Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance?"
Answer yes, and you don't get the gun. Falsely answer no, and you've just committed a crime.
The ATF's letter, sent out Sept. 21, clarifies that the bureau includes medical-marijuana patients in that group of prohibited buyers because their marijuana use is inherently illegal federally.
The letter also tells gun sellers that they could be in line for punishment if they knowingly sell to medical-marijuana patients.
"Any person," bureau Assistant Director Arthur Herbert writes in the open letter to all gun sellers, "who uses or is addicted to marijuana, regardless of whether his or her State has passed legislation authorizing marijuana use for medicinal purposes, is ... prohibited by Federal law from possessing firearms or ammunition."

SB 941 closes marijuana-user gun purchase loophole

by In the news Saturday, April 11. 2015

 

20 Years Ago Ruby Ridge carved niche in history as Sara Weaver found God and forgives the Feds.

Ruby Ridge.

Who would have thought 20 years ago this week that those two words would become an icon, a reference point in American culture?

THE RANDY WEAVER CASE

BY JIM OLIVERAnother Federal Fiasco! BATF's entrapment of Randy Weaver led to the violent deaths of three people. Says his defense attorney, Gerry Spence: "What happened to Randy Weaver can happen to anybody in this country."

More than a deadly siege in North Idaho that claimed the lives of a mother, her son and a federal marshal, the standoff at Ruby Ridge became a rallying point for the extremist movement and made Randy Weaver, the white supremacist at the center of the event, a hero to those groups. It also changed the way federal law enforcement handles standoffs with fugitives.



Historians and extremism experts offer varying assessments of the 11-day siege that was named Ruby Ridge after a mountain crest near Naples, Idaho, not far from the hand-built cabin of Weaver and his family.

It took years, including a congressional hearing in 1995, to sort out the sequence of events, and there are still points of disagreement.

A midwife for militia movement

The sparks of anti-government anger that Ruby Ridge ignited in August 1992 grew much larger six months later when federal agents engaged in another siege in Waco, Texas. That event left four federal agents and 83 members of the Branch Davidian religious sect dead.

Those back-to-back events, experts generally agree, fueled the anti-government movement that lingers today, erupting in occasional violence and deadly threats against law enforcement.

The events in North Idaho in August 1992 became “the opening shot in what would soon become a more or less open war between the American radical right and its government,” said Mark Potok, a senior fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center and editor of its Intelligence Report, a magazine that tracks extremism.  >>>MORE<<<

Ruby Ridge siege survivor Sara Weaver forgives feds

Kalispell, Mont. — When Sara Weaver saw her father Randy struck in the shoulder by a government sniper's bullet in the Idaho wilderness in August 1992, she began to sprint back to the family's cabin on a mountaintop called Ruby Ridge.

As the 16-year-old closed in, her mother, Vicki, opened the cabin door and stood behind it, holding Sara Weaver's 10-month-old sister in her arms. Just then, a sniper's bullet struck her mother in the head, killing her.

For the next nine days, the surviving Weavers holed up in the cabin while hundreds of federal agents laid siege in a standoff that helped spark an anti-government patriot movement that grew to include the Oklahoma City bombing.

Today, 20 years later, Sara Weaver has left the anger behind, finding religion — and forgiveness. "I went 10 years without understanding how to heal" until becoming a born-again Christian, she said. "All bitterness and anger had to go," she said. "I forgave those that pulled the trigger."

From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20120820/NATION/208200330#ixzz2496VWANd

edited post at 11:01 pm est.

Congressman Paul Gosar (R) Ariz; to Holder: We’re not interested in ‘Kumbayah,’ drop your ‘rhetoric’ and resign immediately!!!

Rep. Paul Gosar jabbed back at Attorney General Eric Holder after he swiped at him and other congressional Operation Fast and Furious investigators in a late Friday letter. Gosar also added his name to the short but growing list of those in Congress calling for the attorney general’s immediate resignation.

“It [Holder’s letter] is rhetoric. I think it’s funny that that’s the heat we take now when we’re in the focus of hearings and the focus of calls for his resignation,” Gosar told The Daily Caller. “[He says] ‘ooh, we want to sing Kumbayah and bring everybody together so that we can diffuse that.’ It’s also interesting that he and leadership in the Justice Department didn’t really exercise that in Arizona by reaching out and really trying to work on issues ?“ they just continue to dictate accordingly.”

“We’ve seen this over and over again ?“ accused of political posturing that the administration is really guilty of,” Gosar added. “It’s false rhetoric.”

Gosar is the third member of Congress to publicly call for Holder’s immediate resignation, joining Reps. Blake Farenthold and Raul Labrador.

House oversight committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa hinted that he also thinks Holder should step down, saying on Fox News’ Hannity on Friday night that he’s hoping for a “change we can believe in” at the Justice Department. Congressman Issa, however, hasn’t made an outright call for Holder’s resignation.

Gosar adds that he doesn’t “want him just to resign.” He wants Holder to “comply fully with the subpoena” and offer up all the details of what happened.

Holder specifically targeted Gosar in his Friday letter. Holder wrote the reason he’s finally talking about Fast and Furious is because “the public discourse concerning these issues has become so base and harmful.” The attorney general claims he planned to wait until the inspector general at DOJ concluded an investigation before talking. But, because of comments Gosar made to TheDC earlier in the week, Holder said he’s opening up now.

The comments Gosar made were a suggestion that Obama administration officials responsible for Fast and Furious could be considered accessories to murder.

“I simply cannot sit idly by as a majority member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform suggests, as happened this week, that law enforcement and government employees who devote their lives to protecting our citizens be considered ‘accessories to murder,’” Holder wrote. “Such irresponsible and inflammatory rhetoric must be repudiated in the strongest possible terms.”

Gosar said that he considers the attorney general’s account of his comments inaccurate and distorted —just like what the congressman says Holder’s testimonies and dealings with Congress on the issue have been all along.

Gosar wants the political decision-makers and people responsible for Operation Fast and Furious held responsible, but isn’t vilifying law enforcement and government employees in general. He commends ATF Mexico attaché Carl Canino, for instance, for testifying and helping with the investigation.

edit***  added 

Gosar said, as TheDC had originally reported, that he wants the administration officials responsible for this to be held to the same standards as regular, Main Street Americans would be if they did it.

“In Main Street America, you’d never get away with this,” Gosar said. “The people who’ve been responsible would’ve already been in jail. There is something wrong and there is something right. This crossed the threshold of what was wrong.”

Gosar wouldn’t say whether he thinks criminal charges should or will be brought against administration officials for this operation, but compared the scandal to Watergate.

“I think we need to find out all the facts because this is wrong,” Gosar said. “We’ve clearly gone astray. We broke into a hotel and burglarized in Watergate, and those people were held to criminal charges ?“ and they went to jail. How do you define this to the [Border Patrol Agent Brian] Terry family?”more

Wiped Clean Law limiting release of gun-trace data

As a candidate, Barack Obama promised to get rid of a law – quietly passed by Congress – that hides information from the public about guns used in crimes and the stores that sell them.
Instead, President Obama has embraced most of the law and added even more rules that could make it harder for law enforcement to crack down on dealers and stores selling guns to criminals.
While supporters of the secrecy law say shielding crime-gun data and dealer violations protects police officers, Milwaukee Police Chief Edward Flynn labels that notion “a crock.”
Before the law passed, it was easier to see such trends and Badger Outdoors ranked at the top, according to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. In 2005 alone, the store sold 537 crime guns – most in the nation.
As public pressure mounted on gun dealers, a little-known congressman from Kansas slipped sweeping secrecy rules into a giant federal budget bill, protecting law-breaking gun stores from scrutiny and making it harder for law enforcement to get information it considers vital.
U.S. Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.), who is the second-largest congressional recipient of National Rifle Association cash, said his legislation – commonly referred to as “Tiahrt” (pronounced TEE-heart) – is intended to protect undercover officers.
Flynn called the congressman’s rationale for the law “a cynical fig leaf.”
Campaign literature read: “Obama and Biden would repeal the Tiahrt Amendment, which restricts the ability of local law enforcement to access important gun trace information . . . .”
However, in his first budget, Obama included much of the Tiahrt limits. He cut out a line saying police and prosecutors need an investigative reason to get the data.
The president’s supporters said that change means police chiefs can get all the gun-trace data they want, but ATF officials don’t see it that way. ATF is considering a new system for police to share more data, but even then it won’t be the unfettered access Flynn and others want, ATF officials said.

New restrictions

Obama also added new restrictions, saying the data couldn’t be released if it jeopardized a criminal case or undercover officers and made it illegal to release the information publicly, for any reason.
In a statement, White House spokesman Matt Lehrich said the changes to the Tiahrt Amendment delivered on Obama’s priority to address law enforcement’s need for information.
The Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence blasted the president.More

Officials see rise in militia groups across U.S.

Militia groups with gripes against the government are regrouping across the country and could grow rapidly, according to an organization that tracks such trends.

The stress of a poor economy and a liberal administration led by a black president are among the causes for the recent rise, the report from the Southern Poverty Law Center says. Conspiracy theories about a secret Mexican plan to reclaim the Southwest are also growing amid the public debate about illegal immigration.

Bart McEntire, a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, told SPLC researchers that this is the most growth he's seen in more than a decade.

"All it's lacking is a spark," McEntire said in the report.

Last October, someone from the Ohio Militia posted a recruiting video on YouTube, billed as a "wake-up call" for America. It's been viewed more than 60,000 times.

"Things are bad, things are real bad, and it's going to be a lot worse," said the man on the video, who did not give his name. "Our country is in peril."

The man is holding an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, and he encourages viewers to buy one.

While anti-government sentiment has been on the rise over the last two years, there aren't as many threats and violent acts at this point as there were in the 1990s, according to the report. That movement bore the likes of Timothy McVeigh, who in 1995 blew up a federal building in Oklahoma City and killed 168 people.