Number of Americans seeking to buy guns/ammo spiked before election

From the NY Times:

Mr. Pruett said that sales last Saturday, just before Election Day, ran about seven times higher than a typical good Saturday.

A spot check by reporters in four other states easily found Mr. Pruett’s comments echoed from both sides of the counter.

David Nelson, a co-owner of Montana Ordnance & Supply in Missoula, Mont., said his buyers were “awake and aware and see a dangerous trend.”

Colorado saw a record set on the Saturday before the election in the number of people requesting background checks to permit them to buy a gun. A spokesman for the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, the agency responsible for the checks, had this to say:

“We’re not really sure who is promoting the concept that a change in federal administrations might affect firearms possession rights,” said an agency spokesman, Lance Clem, “but we do know that it’s increased business considerably.”

Well, Lance, let me clue you in on who might be promoting that concept, OK? How about we look at the record he’s amassed on pushing gun control:

    FACT: Barack Obama voted to allow reckless lawsuits designed to bankrupt the firearms industry.

    FACT: Barack Obama wants to re-impose the failed and discredited Clinton Gun Ban.

    FACT: Barack Obama voted to ban almost all rifle ammunition commonly used for hunting and sport shooting.

    FACT: Barack Obama has endorsed a complete ban on handgun ownership.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports local gun bans in Chicago, Washington, D.C., and other cities.

    FACT: Barack Obama voted to uphold local gun bans and the criminal prosecution of people who use firearms in self-defense.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports requiring law-abiding gun owners to register their firearms.

    FACT: Barack Obama refused to sign a friend-of-the-court brief in support of individual Second Amendment rights in the Heller case.

    FACT: Barack Obama wants to eliminate your Right to Carry.

    FACT: Barack Obama was a member of the Board of Directors of the Joyce Foundation, the leading source of funds for anti-gun organizations and “research.”

    FACT: Barack Obama supported a proposal to ban gun stores within 5 miles of a school or park, which would eliminate almost every gun store in America.

    FACT: Barack Obama voted not to notify gun owners when the state of Illinois did records searches on them.

    FACT: Barack Obama voted against a measure to lower the Firearms Owners Identification card age minimum from 21 to 18, a measure designed to assist young people in the military.

    FACT: Barack Obama favors a ban on standard capacity magazines.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory micro-stamping.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory waiting periods.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports repeal of the Tiahrt Amendment, which prohibits information on gun traces collected by the BATFE from being used in reckless lawsuits against firearm dealers and manufacturers.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports “one-gun-a-month” sales restrictions.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports a ban on inexpensive handguns.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports a ban on the resale of police issued firearms, even if the money is going to police departments for replacement equipment.

    FACT: Barack Obama supports mandatory firearm training requirements for all gun owners and a ban on gun ownership for persons under the age of 21.

Or, perhaps, we can take note of his stance on the unconstitutional DC weapon ban and his attempt to reverse himself without anyone noticing:

ABC News’ Teddy Davis and Alexa Ainsworth Report: With the Supreme Court poised to rule on Washington, D.C.’s, gun ban, the Obama campaign is disavowing what it calls an “inartful” statement to the Chicago Tribune last year in which an unnamed aide characterized Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., as believing that the DC ban was constitutional.

“That statement was obviously an inartful attempt to explain the Senator’s consistent position,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton tells ABC News.

In short, it’s because people are taking Obama at his word that they’re concerned for their 2nd Amendment rights. The reaction to get armed before this man takes office is completely understandable and justified.

Glenn Reynolds now wants someone who’s tech-enthused?

Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds writes:

BILL JOY TECH CZAR? I think there are better choices. Some thoughts on Joy and tech from 2000 are here. I had dinner with him once, and he’s a nice guy, but I’d rather have someone who’s a bit more enthusiastic about technological progress.

This from the guy who thinks paper ballots are the only way to go? Who disses advances in election technologies at every turn? Pfffft.

Malkin: Palin backstabbers are cowards

Michelle Malkin has a column up at the National Review Online about the recent “leakers,” supposedly insiders of the McCain campaign, who are throwing around as much spiteful gossip about Sarah Palin as they can generate. There’s no better word for people like these so I won’t even try. But I’ve also been listening to the post-election chatter among my fellow Republicans and conservatives about Palin and some of them are approaching shrillness themselves.

Sarah Palin did not doom the GOP ticket this election year. She suffered attacks that were just uncalled for. Malkin says it nicely in her article:

Hollywood savaged Palin. Journalists mocked her. Liberal blogs slimed her. Opponents cursed her, Photoshopped her, hacked her e-mail, hanged her in effigy, called her bigot, Bible-thumper and bimbo, and attacked her husband and children. But nothing Palin endured during the election season compares to the treatment she’s receiving from these backstabbing blabbermouths who worked on the same campaign she poured herself into over the last three months.

Sarah Palin worked her heart out. She energized tens of thousands to come out when they would have otherwise stayed home. She touched countless families. I didn’t agree with everything she said on the campaign trail. But she vigorously defended the Second Amendment and the sanctity of life more eloquently in practice than any of the educated conservative aristocracy. And she did it all with a tirelessness and an infectious optimism that defied the shameless, bottomless attempts by elites in both parties to bring her and her family down.

Sarah Palin was the kind of politician we Republicans need more of, not less. Bright, energetic, and connected with the everyday American in a way very few of our recent candidates have been. This constant drone of Palin-bashing, most particularly when it descends into the personal invective I’ve seen around various allegedly conservative blogs these past few days, is hurting the party and any chances of attracting the kind of fresh faces the GOP is going to need in the coming years.