The front lines of the war over the second amendment are New York, California, Maryland, Illinois, and New Jersey. What ever victory we have will be won here... not in Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Virginia, New Hampshire, or Vermont.
Nope. California is already a lost cause. You, my friend, are merely unable to see it. In fact I recall you defending more than one action, any one of which alone guaranteed California's inevitable fall into surrender disguised as compromise.
California had a real opportunity to try to work the public. This
has worked in other states, and I
saw it begin to work there.
When Calguns shut all that down, with promises they cannot keep of, in some distant future,
shall-issue licensure, of all the intolerable affronts! I knew California was doomed.
When Bigtoe was hindered instead of helped, I knew CA was doomed.
The proof is in the pudding: no amount of legal wrangling by a select few, elite, "the right people", can hold back a tide. It will always be too little, way too late. You'll barely manage to scrape out a space to "live" in the aftermath.
If you're lucky, you'll see shall-issue for semi-automatic handguns of capacity less than 10 rounds (looks like revolvers are on their way out because they're scary "new technology" like the evil "1990s street sweeper", but
Heller does protect semis), and you'll get to keep your bolt rifles and shotguns. That's it. You'll never get anything else back, not until (and unless) the rest of the nation has won the war for you, and liberty once again has real political influence nationally.
In fact,
you should support
us. And not just over guns – it will take a broader pro-liberty attitude becoming nationally popular to mobilize people in states like yours. Do something to help libertarianism spread, or support the LP, or other independent parties. That's your only option. You've already permanently thrown away the chance to win directly, in California, focusing purely on gun rights.
That will never happen.
Once upon a time, I was right there with you. I know how it feels to be you. It sucks. But your fellow Californians, pro- and anti-gun, have betrayed you.
I lost my sympathy when Calguns threw away a chance at victory for pitiful scraps – the privilege to do no more than meekly
beg for permission to do
that which is your right, and for you specifically when you uttered a word in their defense. What Calguns did, and is doing, in California is indefensible. As the primary face of RKBA advocacy in California, they have given the entire state up in a compromise which is in reality complete surrender. Victory can never be won by lurking in the shadows, trying to manipulate behind the scenes (most especially when the scenes are controlled by manipulators better than you). You do not assert
right by concealing its exercise. In fact, to do so only reinforces the impression that you at wrongdoers are heart, seeking to get away with something under the public's nose. It is an approach necessarily, unavoidable, and predictably doomed to failure. I've called it in the past, I'm calling it now, and the future will continue to confirm my prediction.
To put it plainly: when a group claims a monopoly on RKBA advocacy, the entire state grants it to them, and that group proceeds to irrevocably discard any claim to
right, and instead seeks nothing more than to ensure privilege for those motivated and knowledgeable enough to pursue it (in practice, as we both damn well know, upper-middle-class white guys), the cause is lost. There is literally nobody in California to advocate
right. (You may now claim you do, but you've disproved this claim permanently with past words). With literally nobody asserting
right, or seeking to exercise
right, right cannot be meaningfully said to exist – it is no more than a philosophical construct, as when I argue there is a
right to drive.
Your state is no longer worthy of support or defense. I maintain only sympathy, and only for those who have never affiliated themselves with Calguns or the CGF, or spoken in the defense of those despicable entities.
I'm sorry for my harsh language. But if I'm consistent in one thing, it's calling it like I see it.
