Cavalry Arms Update: "Seize Everything"

Comment poster Stephen asked:

David, do you have any contacts at Cavalry? If you do, can you get a copy of the search warrant and post it please?

I don't, but I've been corresponding behind the scenes and know Nicki is in contact with Oleg Volk, whose work is featured on the Cavalry Arms website, and Nicki tells me she and he have been in touch about this matter.

So I asked her to ask him, and just got this back:

Confirmed: nothing on the warrant other then: "Firearm law violations. Seize everything."

Does this sound like "particularly describing" to anybody?

I also found the following comment on the Newstalk KTAR Community Board. Treat it as raw information with no established credibility, meaning it may or may not be true, or parts of it may or may not be, and the poster may or may not have an agenda, and if so, we don't know what that is. For now though, it's important that we have as many pieces of the puzzle as we can find to try and picture what's going on:

More to this story!
Rose J. @ 10:11am - Thu Feb 28th, 2008

With regard to the recent ATF raid on Cavalry Arms, you might want to look into the connection between Cavalry Arms and the Phoenix Rod & Gun Club at 915 W. Olney Dr., Phoenix. Specifically, an employee by the name of Darrell “Bubba” Fretwell” who is also employed by PR&GC as their full time Range Master, President Don Reed, Treasurer Drew Pringle, and Practical Fire Arms Director Debra Fretwell (yes Darrell and Debra are related. Son and Mother), and how Cavalry Arms weapons were transferred through third party purchases intended to be door prizes for the Arizona State Action Shooting Championships and South Mountain Shoot-Out while laundering of the receipts to Cavalry Arms through the treasury of PR&GC to cover up the identity of the original buyer.

Posting this comment does not imply that I believe anything said about above-named groups or individuals is true. It's too soon to believe anything without further information.

Finally, the place where much discussion and the introduction of some original information appears to be AR15.com. I suggest those interested in breaking developments also keep an eye on that thread.

Downes' Syndrome

The criminal killing of an elk underscores the need to restrict the use of loaded guns in national parks, Chief U.S. District Judge William Downes said Tuesday.

Let's apply the same logic everywhere. If one criminal with a firearm breaks the law anywhere, the rest of us must be banned from having them everywhere.

At least according to this subversive nitwit.

A Strong Supporter of the Second Amendment

In a case now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis filed a brief in favor of the draconian District of Columbia gun ban. What is odd is that Dumanis is a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. We know this is true because she says so!

In other words, she's a liar.

We're the Only Ones Not Only Enough

Gun-toting toll collectors have been stripped of their sidearms by Mass Pike brass after secretly carrying them for decades without formal training, the Herald has learned.

“I didn’t want to have a wild west show out there,” said Massachusetts Turnpike Authority Executive Director Alan LeBovidge, who ordered the practice stopped. “I could find nothing to show that the employees had state police training that would make them qualified to carry guns.”

And as we've seen time and again, "The Only Ones" are...uh...the only ones "qualified to carry guns."

Welcome to the club, folks. I'd feel more sympathy, but it looks like the exclusivity you've been exploiting all these years finally caught up with you.

Now feel my pain.

[Via Mack]

Cimmerians for Thulsa Doom

From SaMaeL:

Jews for Hitler, blacks for Jim Crow, Clergymen for Atheism, and....

Republicans for Obama

The Cult of Set shows the GOP what a "Big Tent" really looks like.

Red's On Trial

From Ryan Horsley:

Red's Trading Post trial will begin in Boise on March 4th (Tuesday)...It will be at the James A. McClure Federal Building, ironically enough it was the McClure-Volkmer Act in 1986 that reigned in an abusive ATF at the time.

We just saw an example of what this man is facing, mostly alone. Instead of surrendering, he not only fought back but made himself the target of a vindictive agency backed by the full force of the government.

That's what I call brave.

It's not too late to help out.

Why Campus Safety Is In the Toilet

"Ultimately," correspondent MacEntyre writes about the Elizabeth City State University fiasco, "the president of the UNC system is to blame for this, especially since he chaired a committee to look into what they should change in response to VT.

"His name is Skipper Bowles. Heard of him before?"

Why, now that you mention it, yes. Yes I have.

(Actually, Skipper was the old man, but how could I pass on a set-up like this?)

The BATFU Horse and Pony Show

Federal agents raided a Gilbert gun store on Wednesday, seizing hundreds of high-powered and military-style weapons in the process, though authorities were silent as to why.

What did they say on the old Mickey Mouse Club?

"Why? Because we like you!"

And because they can.

Me, I'm interested in learning more about this "public/private partnership," the contractor partner in the raid, Forfeiture Support Associates. They, their relationship with the government and the people behind them deserve much closer scrutiny and should not be operating under the radar, as they will if we rely on "Authorized Journalists" to provide any kind of oversight.

They're too busy being shocked, shocked at a Cavalry Arms Internet spoof and consulting the Council on American Islamic relations about a perceived attack on "Muslim Men...for the purpose of selling a semiautomatic rifle!"

"12 News did some digging," reporterette Kevin Kennedy assures us somberly. He must not have dug too deeply, because the first thing you see when you click the video link on Cavalry Arms' website is the disclaimer:

This video is a work of satire, parodying 1950s style Public Service Announcements.

This video is not racist, as jihadists are not a race. Note, at no point do we say anything about Islam as a whole. The enemies in the video, and those our armed forces are currently fighting are radical islamic extremists.

We do not endorse the unlawful use of deadly force against anyone. All the jihadists in this video are armed, and would constitute a deadly threat in all 50 states.

But ol' Kevin and the rest of the 12 News Team apparently think the story here is about a "CONTROVERSIAL COMMERCIAL." Hey, when you're working hand-in-hand with the government on a story, you need to have a villain, and cast him in as unsympathetic a light as possible. What's a little propaganda manipulation among friends?

Never mind the staged media circus with tables full of evil, icky guns guaranteed to shock a public conditioned to disapprove why anyone needs "weapons of war." And never mind that the increasingly visible spokesjbt Tom Mangan lends his smooth telepresence to the scene.

And then never mind that not only does Cavalry Arms endorse the Second Amendment, they're not shy about using the First Amendment to promote it.

We'll find more in the coming days about the excuse behind the raid, but we do know this much: The purpose in conducting it this way was to send a message, and that message is that BATFU can and will crush a hub not only for supplying arms, but for providing training, education and information about arms use as well as the right to keep and bear them.

As with Waco and Ruby Ridge, both with strong publicity motives behind the way they were conducted, the agency is using a complicit media to shore up a reputation damaged by recent events, in this case the delaying of the "Maximum Mike" nomination.

In a sense, they've been stung and frustrated by people pushing back, and defiance is something they will not tolerate. As Star Trek's Captain Kirk said in "The Devil in the Dark" (how's that for an appropriate title?):

There's nothing more dangerous than a wounded animal.

MORE:

Ryan asks since when has money laundering been a BATFU concern?
Nicki hears there may be a disgruntled former employee somewhere in the mix.

This Day in History: February 28

Meanwhile, General Burgoyne was in London, trying to get appointed to an independent command in North America. He brought up a plan that had been discussed by various British generals since 1775: an attempt to divide the American colonies by an invasion from the province of Quebec. This had already been attempted by General Carleton in 1776, although he had stopped short of a full scale invasion. Carleton had been heavily criticized in London for not taking more advantage of the American retreat from Canada in 1776, and he was out of favor with Germain, which meant that Burgoyne was in a good position to get command of the 1777 Canadian campaign.

Asked to submit a plan, Burgoyne outlined the strategy in a paper entitled "Thoughts for Conducting the War on the Side of Canada", and submitted it to Lord Germain on February 28, 1777. The plan was approved with modifications. Burgoyne won appointment as leader of the expedition, beating out General Henry Clinton, who was also in Great Britain trying to get an independent command of his own. (As consolation, Clinton was given a knighthood, but otherwise he had to continue serving as General Howe's second-in-command.) Burgoyne was so confident of his success that he bet a friend 50 guineas that he would return victorious within one year. Richard M. Ketchum, Saratoga: Turning Point of America's Revolutionary War, pp. 79–83.