The good folks who manuf
acture and sell firearms have mixed emotions when it comes to Hillary Clinton’s defeat. Mrs. Clinton maintained she would enact “common sense gun control;” that is one of those mantras that sound good and tell us nothing. It is all in how you define “common sense;” whose common sense, hers, mine, yours?
Before the election when all the smart media and political types were predicting a President Clinton and that the Democrats would win in a landslide, guns of certain types sold out. Ammunition of a few high-demand calibers sold out, reloading supplies were getting hard to find and prices were not so slowly rising.
President Barack Obama was named the gun salesman of the year twice at the National Shot Show (the largest trade show for firearms manufacturers) because shooting enthusiasts, scared he would ban several types of firearms and munitions, stocked up. .22 rimfire was not available at any price for a very long time; one Internet store got 2 million rounds of .22 Long Rifle and sold it out in less than two hours. Some lower-priced weapons based on the AR 15 platform were very hard to find, as were semiautomatic pistols. Weapon sales during President Obama’s tenure were numbered in the many millions.
Mrs. Clinton’s presidency would have been a short-term boom for the firearms industry; sales would have been counted in the tens of thousands per week and ammunition could not be manufactured fast enough to keep up with demand.
Well, we will have a President Donald Trump and he is not an enemy of the Second Amendment.
The National Rifle Association got on the Trump train early and ran several anti-Clinton adds along with pro-Trump spots. President-elect Trump, along with a Republican House and Senate, will not attempt to ban guns, ignore the Constitution or enact dumb laws like the assault weapons ban. A Republican Senate and House will not play fast and loose with the Second Amendment.
Some types of firearms and some calibers of munitions are still hard to find, but that will change. Those of us who are into the shooting sports need not worry that we will be turned into criminals for the next four years. Firearms and ammunition will remain reasonably available and at a reasonable cost.
The Supreme Court just may have a majority who read the Constitution as written, and not invent some tortured new-age currently vogue interpretation. “Original intent” is the test for Supreme Court nominees — what was the intent of the drafters of the Constitution, not what is the politically correct cause of the day. President Trump will have at least one Supreme Court nominee, and before his term is up just may have another.
Margaret A. Ryan would be an outstanding choice; she has been a judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces (COMA). It is an appointment that requires a legal scholar to think outside of the normal box into which lawyers are indoctrinated to lock their minds. Judge Ryan served in the Marine Corps through deployments in the Philippines and the Gulf War (yes, Mr. Basura she is a Leatherneck and a Devil Dog).
She then attended Notre Dame Law School through a military scholarship, a very competitive program, and served as a Judge Advocate General Corp officer for four years. Judge Ryan has clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas on the Unites States Supreme Court. Even if she is a Marine, she would be my first choice for the Supreme Court.
