“The defense of one’s self, justly called the primary law of nature, is not, nor can it be abrogated by any regulation of municipal law. This principle of defense is not confined merely to the person; it extends to the liberty and the property of a man … it extends to the person of every one, who is in danger; perhaps, to the liberty of every one, whose liberty is unjustly and forcibly attacked.” —James Wilson (1791)

 

At 0200 Sunday in downtown Sacramento, assailants fired weapons while in a crowd of partiers gathered on a street outside local bars and nightclubs. Six individuals were killed and 12 others wounded.

Police are looking for multiple suspects who may have been involved in a street fight in the area earlier in the evening, but at present, no motive has been determined, as if this is a mystery. It is not clear if any of those killed or injured were specifically being targeted by the assailants.

Two men have been arrested in connection with the incident. Dandrae Martin was arrested on the scene. On Tuesday, his brother Smiley Martin, who was released from prison in February — six years before his 10-year sentence was complete — was arrested. Both men have extensive criminal records and were arrested for possession of illegal weapons, but neither has been charged with the homicide pending further investigation.

A third criminal who was at the scene, Daviyonne Dawson, was arrested but released on $500,000 bond because the illegal weapon he had in his possession is not believed to have been used in the assault.

Before the blood had dried, Democrat politicos were serving up their usual big lies, blaming the deaths and injuries on “gun violence” in our nation’s urban centers, rather than the assailants.

Predictably, Joe Biden used the assault to advance his 2A deconstruction agenda. Biden claimed in a White House briefing: “America once again mourns for another community devastated by gun violence. … We know these lives were not the only lives impacted by gun violence last night. … We must do more than mourn; we must act. That is why my administration has taken historic executive action to implement my comprehensive gun crime reduction strategy.”

No, “gun violence” did not cause this devastation.

He used the attack as an opportunity to pitch his budget and try to put additional daylight between his Democrats and their deadly “defund the police” agenda, insisting, “Pass my budget proposal, which would give cities more of the funding they need to fund the police.”

What a “lying dog-faced pony soldier.” Not a single syllable about the police officers murdered this week.

Likewise, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg echoed Biden’s message: “Thoughts and prayers aren’t nearly enough. We must do more as a city, as a state, and as a nation. This senseless epidemic of gun violence must be addressed. How many unending tragedies does it take before we begin to cure the sickness in this country? Let us be honest, this is a sickness.”

But “gun violence” is not the problem; it is just a manifestation of the violent criminal problem the Democrats have propagated for seven decades.

If Demos want to “cure the sickness in this country,” they will have to start with the admission that the root cause of violence is cultural. But they will not touch that third rail of truth in regard to violence.

That is because urban violence is the direct result of generations of failed Democrat Party statist policies that have eroded our culture from top to bottom — including, most notably, families and the children who were once nourished by them. The devastating consequences of this erosion play out in an endless loop of daily tragedies — only the loudest of them, like mass assaults, ever make it into the news.

Those policies are the effluent of the Demos’ so-called “Great Society” social programs, which resulted in generations of poor Americans being enslaved on urban poverty plantations in every major city nationwide. These modern-day plantations are the locus of cultural devolution, most notably, the systemic disintegration of the American family and particularly the devaluation of fatherhood.

Most inner-city violence — in fact, most social degradation — is associated with the absence of effective fathering in the lives of young men and women.

So, what do the Sacramento assailants and victims have in common?

Earlier this week, before much was known about the Sacramento assault, I posted analysis titled “The Real ‘Epidemic of Violence’ in America?”

It was a response to an absurd Biden assertion, pandering to his gender-confused constituents, that he was going to “end the epidemic of violence against transgender” people. There is no such epidemic, but there most assuredly is an “epidemic of violence” against black citizens, and the vast majority of those assailants are black.

I noted: “If Biden wanted to address a real ‘epidemic of violence,’ he would make the epidemic of black-on-black assaults and murder in America his administration’s highest priority. … In the most recent year for complete data, there were far more black people murdered than white people — even though the black population in America is only 13%. Moreover, the suspect in 88% of black victims of murder is also black.”

I noted further, regarding Biden’s “white supremacy” bogeyman and the interracial crime disparity, “According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics survey of criminal victimization, black people commit about 90% of interracial felonies but adult black males who committed most of those crimes represent less than 3% of the population.”

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Again, what do the Sacramento assailants and victims have in common?   Well, as outlined above, race. Those identified as the assailants are black, and four of those killed were black. In addition, one victim was Hispanic and another was a homeless person who may be white. As usual, the race of the assailants and victims is not mentioned by the MSM because that would make the racial association between assailants and victims too obvious.

It will require at least a generation to seed corrections to the generational urban catastrophe that the Democrat Party has created, all in the name of keeping its most loyal constituency corralled.

Notably however, an increasing number of black Americans are not betting on those changes.

In the wake of the Demo-induced Black Lives Matter and antifa movement violence that consumed some Demo-controlled urban centers in 2020, compounded by the continuing criminal violence empowered by the Demo “defund the police” agenda, there has been a surge of firearm purchases by black citizens.

In fact, after the election of Biden, there were more than 18 million firearms purchased by all Americans in 2021. There has also been an significant increase of the issuance of carry permits.

Moreover, this week Georgia will become the 25th state to approve “constitutional carry,” meaning half our nation’s states have fully affirmed the First Civil Right “to keep and bear arms” as affirmed by the Second Amendment. Constitutional carry means that those who can legally possess a firearm can legally carry that firearm without the issuance of a permit. The other constitutional carry states are Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

There are 17 right-to-carry states, some of which are also constitutional carry states, that issue carry permits, and those include reciprocity to carry between states with reciprocity agreements. In Tennessee, for example, a concealed carry permit, which requires competence testing and legal knowledge, is recognized by 37 other states.

Further, an upcoming Supreme Court case, NYSRPA v. Bruen, may ensure those states that highly restrict firearms possession — including states like New York, Illinois, and California, which all have high rates of urban violence — are required to restore their citizens’ right to keep and bear arms. As we say, when firearms are outlawed, only outlaws will have firearms.

Finally, Biden’s bumbling blather aside, here is a reality check on both the violent assailants who use firearms and their victims: As we have documented consistently, if you don’t have a violent criminal record, and are not associated with the violent sociopathic thug, drug, or gang subcultures that commit the vast majority of crimes in America, your chances of being shot or killed by an assailant are extraordinarily low — as low as in most Western European nations, where handgun ownership is outlawed. Oh, and in Switzerland, which has a higher concentration of “assault weapons” per capita than any nation in the world, the murder rate is one of the lowest in the world.

If you’re a law-abiding citizen, your statistical probability of being killed by a drunk driver is much higher than being murdered by an assailant with a firearm. (Oddly, no one is organizing marches to ban automobiles or ask for a federal background check before purchasing a beer.)

Bottom line: Until Democrats begin to dismantle the policies that have spawned the culture of violence now besieging our nation, there will be no solution to the urban epidemic of violence — and no amount of leftists rhetoric about “gun violence” will solve anything.

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The First Civil Right is To Keep and Bear Arms. It is the “the palladium of the liberties of the republic,” as it is the ultimate assurance of all other rights. Making good people helpless won’t make bad people harmless.

FOOTNOTE 1: Regarding so-called “gun violence,” there were approximately 19,600 homicides involving firearms in the U.S. in the latest year of record, which you can view state by state. Fortunately there are indications that homicides may be declining after the significant surge of violence unleashed by Joe Biden and his Democrat agitators in 2020. The 2022 homicide rate was 30% higher than in 2019.

The Demos ubiquitously and falsely label the generational murderous contagion they have seeded, “gun violence,” and focus exclusively on the infrequent high-profile “mass shootings,” which account for only a tiny fraction of all homicides. More than 99% of murders in the U.S. are not the result of mass attacks. (Notably, guns don’t commit violence, thugs and sociopaths commit violence.) The oft-cited Gun Violence Archive defines a “mass shooting” as any incident that involves a “minimum of four victims shot, either injured or killed.” The vast majority of those violent attacks are the result of drug and gang violence committed in Democrat-controlled urban centers.

In a country and culture that ignores the rising generation of sociopathic murderers – mostly thugs in violent urban centers who are saturated with cultural violence and indoctrinated with mass-media glorification of violence – it is fortunate that the incidence of mass murder is not ten times higher. Arguably, the only thing keeping that number from being higher is that 125 million Americans are legal and responsible gun owners.

Democrats don’t focus on the vast majority of murders, particularly the epidemic of black-on-black murders on their decaying urban poverty plantations, because they want to avoid the “inconvenient truth” about race and violence, which is the direct result of failed Democrat social programs. In fact, black people (13% of the population), are twelve times more likely to be murdered per capita, than white people (62% of the population).

That gross racial disparity in murder rates isn’t useful for the gun control narrative Democrats invoke to evoke emotional reaction from mostly wealthy white suburban women, whom form the Demos’ largest voter constituency.

FOOTNOTE 2: Regarding so-called “mass shootings,” for the record, murders of multiple people by one assailant are very rare in our nation of 335 million people. Less than 1% of all murders nationwide are classified are “mass shootings,” and high-profile attacks, such as the 2017 mass murder in Las Vegas, are extremely rare.

The FBI defines “active shooter incidents” as “one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.” In 2022 the FBI reported 50 incidents resulting in 313 casualties (100 killed and 213 wounded). That number was up significantly from 2020, when the FBI reported 40 incidents resulting in 164 casualties (38 killed and 126 wounded).

A broader record of “mass shooting” data is maintained by the Associated Press and Northeastern University, which uses the Department of Justice definition of mass public shooting: “A multiple homicide incident in which four or more victims are murdered with firearms.” These numbers fluctuate significantly year over year, and range between 20 and 40 incidents, but notably over the last 30 years, the number of black mass assailants is almost as high as the number of what assailants.

Democrats only focus on these rare instances of multiple murders because these rare high-profile tragedies are political fodder to foment fear – most notably when they can toss out their oft-repeated but erroneous claim that “gun violence is the leading cause of death for children.” If by “children” they mean gang and drug associated murders of those primarily between the ages of 16 and 21, then yes. Democrats are experts at fomenting fear and division.

The fear and angst Demos are intentionally propagating is taking a toll on Americans’ mental health. Psychological researcher, Dr. Riana Elyse Anderson, observes: “Watching it time and time again on your phone or on the headlines can really impact you in ways that I don’t think we knew before to be as impactful. It’s so ‘in our face’ all the time and we have access to so much footage, so many pictures, so many videos, so many accounts that we’re ingesting it in ways that’s really unhealthy for us.” The result for many mothers in particular is an irrational fear that their children will be shot. That is precisely the fabricated fear Democrats want to perpetuate, especially among their female constituents, in order to advance their gun control agenda.

FOOTNOTE 3: Regarding what Democrats and their Leftmedia talkingheads and scribes ubiquitously and falsely label “assault weapons,” are not. An assault weapon, AKA “machine gun,” is a select-fire weapon that can cycle rounds in fully automatic fashion.

For much the same reason Democrats focus only on rare high-profile “mass shootings” to generate fear and angst, when those attacks involve a semi-automatic rifle versus a handgun, Demos call for an “assault weapon ban.”

In 1994, Bill Clinton banned the sale of “military style assault weapons,” but that ban was not renewed 10 years later because it was determined the ban had no effect on crime reduction. According to Rand Research, “We found no qualifying studies showing that bans on the sale of assault weapons and high-capacity magazines decreased any of the eight outcomes we investigated.”

Fact is, rifles and shotguns combined are used in less than 3% of all homicides, but Democrats never let facts get in the way of their “assault weapon ban” political agenda.

FOOTNOTE 4: Regarding firearms and violent crime, researcher John Lott reports, “Over 92% of violent crimes in America do not involve firearms.” Again, the only thing keeping that number from being much higher is that 125 million Americans are legal and responsible gun owners.

FOOTNOTE 5: Regarding firearms and suicide, almost 60% of all deaths involving firearms are suicide, most also involving drugs or alcohol abuse. But the big numbers promoted in “gun violence” reports do not distinguish between murder and suicide, thus implying that homicide rates are much higher. And does this mean that Demo support for assisted suicide is in conflict with their support for gun control?

FOOTNOTE 6: Regarding alcohol versus firearm deaths, if Democrats are serious about protecting Americans, they should outlaw alcohol. Alcohol abuse is far more deadly than firearm abuse. More than 178,000 people died from alcohol abuse last year – that’s NINE times the number homicides associate with fire arms. Drunk driving results in 37 deaths per day. And notably, it is estimated that alcohol is a key factor in at least 30% of homicides where the assailant uses a firearm. (Include drug dealing or use as a factor and that number jumps to about 60%.)

The problem is, the vast majority of alcohol users possess and use it legally and responsibly. Likewise, the vast majority of firearm owners possess and use them legally and responsibly. Enacting a prohibition on firearms is tantamount to enacting a prohibition on alcohol. In both cases, only law-abiding users obey the laws, while lawless users don’t.

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