The number of gun owning Americans drops to lowest number in 40 years, and yet more guns than ever are being sold. Wait, what?

Courtesy of the Washington Post:  

The percent of American households owning guns is at a near-40 year low in the latest CBS News poll released this month. 

According to the survey, which was conducted among 1,001 Americans in the aftermath of the Orlando nightclub shooting, 36 percent of U.S. adults either own a firearm personally, or live with someone who does. That's the lowest rate of gun ownership in the CBS poll going back to 1978. It's down 17 points from the highest recorded rate in 1994, and nearly 10 percentage points from 2012.

So that good news right?

Hold that thought.

But gun purchases, as measured by FBI firearm background checks, are at historic highs. And data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms shows that gun manufacturers are churning out record numbers of guns. Many gun rights advocates argue that these figures mean that the overall number of gun owners is growing: If more guns are being sold, more people must be owning guns.

So WTF exactly?

Well I think many of you are probably going to guess how both of these two facts can both be true, and it is more than a little troubling.

But the declining rates of gun ownership across three major national surveys suggest a different explanation: that most of the rise in gun purchases is driven by existing gun owners stocking up, rather than by people buying their first gun. A Washington Post analysis last year found that the average American gun owner now owns approximately eight firearms, double the number in the 1990s.

That's right, there are fewer Americans who now own guns, but the ones that do are often in possession of a small arsenal.

This is not indicative of your typical sports hunter or your average dad or mom worried about protecting their family.

No most likely these are the folks who really believe that the government is coming to take away our guns and who have convinced themselves that only they and their fifteen semi-automatic weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition stand between freedom and an Obama controlled police state.

In other words these are the folks who get their news from World Net Daily every morning, have Alex Jones blasting on their radio on the way to work, think Sarah Palin would have been the greatest VP in history, and who are anxious to cast their vote for Donald J. Trump in November.

They are also the folks who thought those UN vehicles in Virginia were a clear sign of the new world order, believe fluoride in our water is an attempt at mind control, and who spend several weekends a year running around the woods in their GI Joe Underoos preparing to repel imaginary invaders.

In short, they are exactly the kinds of people who we should NEVER allow to have access to guns.

And yet, they do.

Missouri "Doomsday Prepper" arrested after terrorizing neighborhood for weeks.

Courtesy of Raw Story:  

Police arrested a Missouri “doomsday prepper” who investigators said had been terrorizing his neighborhood for weeks. 

Neighbors began complaining in May about 36-year-old Roy McCool after he allegedly assaulted a woman in Springfield home, reported the Springfield News-Leader. 

Investigators said McCool forced his way into the woman’s home and punched, slapped, and choked her before firing three rounds from a handgun into her living room wall. McCool broke into the woman’s home two days later and stole a bank card and $35 in cash from her children’s piggy banks, police said. Neighbors said McCool’s behavior grew even more threatening about two weeks later, in late May, when he stood in his front yard with a gun and yelled threats toward other residents.

Apparently Mr. McCool, who has one of the most ironic names ever,  has also been getting into numerous confrontations with his neighbors, hit one man in the face with a wooden stake, and has been openly displaying firearms to passersby.

When the police arrested his ass he had 10 guns consisting of one AR-15, three other rifles, four handguns, and a shotgun. Not to mention the thousands of rounds of ammunition he had just in case the "gubmint" came after him.

Despite all of that preparation it sounds as if the local police had little difficulty apprehending the suspect, who has been charged with six felonies,  including three counts of burglary, two counts of unlawful use of a weapon and one count of domestic assault.

Well that is one less Sarah Palin supporter walking the streets at least. 

"Doomsday Prepper" planning last stand against the Federal government, decides instead to turn himself in for some burgers and fries.

Martin Winters.

Courtesy of Raw Story:  

The two-day manhunt for a Florida man ended Wednesday morning at the FBI office in Tampa, when 55-year-old “doomsday prepper” Martin Winters surrendered to authorities. According to the Tampa Bay Times, a wet, footsore and weary Winters gave up his freedom for the promise of some dry shoes, Gatorade, a couple of cheeseburgers and some French fries. 

Winters is the head of a group known as the River Otter Preppers, survivalists who believe in hoarding weapons and supplies ahead of an apocalyptic event foretold in the Christian Bible’s final book, the Book of Revelations. (Oh they sound like a fun group.) An undercover FBI agent infiltrated the group and spent months building a case against Winters, who the agent said was planning a bloody, heavily-armed “last stand” against law enforcement officials. 

“We’re glad to report that Mr. Winters did the right thing,” FBI spokesman David Couvertier told reporters. “We were hoping for a peaceful resolution, and today we got that.” A federal grand jury handed down an indictment two weeks ago naming Winters and five others on charges of designing and building destructive devices without a permit and other charges. Winters invoked his right to remain silent on Wednesday when he appeared before Magistrate Judge Thomas Wilson. 

Authorities attempted to apprehend Winters on Monday, but he fled the scene, prompting the offer of bounty money.

"Give it up Feds, you're never going to take me alive! Hey, are those fries I smell?"

If the real Founding Fathers, for which men of this sort express such admiration, had been this easy to lure into captivity we would all be drinking tea, referring to each other as "guv'nuh," and calling a car hood a "bonnet."

Honestly though I am glad this did not end with somebody getting shot. Hopefully the dozens of incidents just like it that are almost certainly coming in the near future will end in a similar, non-violent, fashion.

Of course that does not serve the purposes of those on the Right Wing fanning the flames of distrust and hatred toward our government who are hell bent on starting a conflict in which some poor bastard is gunned down by federal agents of one kind or another, so that they can be martyred and used to increase the level of anger and vitriol, until the country explodes in a newer, more violent, version of the Civil War.

"Doomsday Prepper," and convicted pedophile, gets arrested after appearance on National Geographic channel, because you are really not supposed to have weapons if you are an ex-con.

Courtesy of Raw Story: 

Sheriff’s deputies arrested a Washington state man who was shown firing two rifles on the “Doomsday Prepper” reality show. 

In the November episode of the National Geographic Channel program, Tyler Smith – a convicted felon who’s barred from owning guns — describes his plans to commit armed robbery and shots firearms on his property in Buckley. 

“His stated plan was not to defend himself but to use weapons he illegally possessed, to rob his neighbors at gunpoint,” said Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor in a statement. “Did he really think that this wouldn’t attract our attention?” 

The 26-year-old Smith was arrested Wednesday and charged with two counts of second-degree unlawful possession of a firearm. 

He was previously convicted of theft and a gross misdemeanor for communicating with a minor for immoral purposes.

Ever hear of a background check National Geographic? 

And you know it has always been my suspicion that these Doomsday Prepper assholes are less concerned with keeping themselves safe, and more concerned with having the firepower to take from others whatever they want once the government and law enforcement structure crumbles around them.

Essentially they are itching to bully and harass their neighbors once there is no way that they can be  held accountable. They are not afraid of the end of civilization, they are looking forward to it.

Fortunately for us that is as unlikely to happen as for this guy to receive an invitation in the mail to join Mensa.

Was there a Right Wing connection to the shooting in Connecticut?

Nancy Lanza, mother and victim of Sandy Hill shooter.

Courtesy of the Daily Mail:  

The mother of Newtown school massacre gunman Adam Lanza was a survivalist who was stockpiling food because she thought the world economy was on the verge of collapse. 

Nancy Lanza began hoarding food and water because she feared that the onging financial crisis was going to bring about the end of civilized society. 

She reportedly became 'obsessed' with guns and taught Adam how to shoot, but on Friday in a grim twist he blasted her to death while she laid in her own bed. 

The disclosure raises the prospect that Adam could have had the same apocalyptic views as his mother, and that she could have even encouraged them in him. 

The Mayan Apocalypse, which the ancient Mayan people thought would mark the end of the world, will supposedly take place on December 21, although it is not clear if Adam thought that was the case. 

In an interview the killer's aunt said Nancy Lanza was 'self-reliant' and indicated she was a 'prepper', or a person who prepares for Doomsday by learning essential survival skills - like how to shoot a gun. 

Speaking from her home near Chicago, Marsha Lanza, 57, said: 'She was stockpiling food. We talked about prepping a lot. She was getting ready for the economic collapse.

So where exactly does one get the idea that the economy is going to collapse, the world is going to become apocalyptic, and that the answer to survival is to stockpile weapons?

Much of that information comes courtesy of Fox News and Right Wing radio, which has stated emphatically that the reelection of President Obama would usher in the end of America as we know it and promoted the idea of safety as requiring possession of handguns and assault rifles.

Fox News is well known for trumpeting EVERY incident of a person defending their home or business by brandishing a gun, in order to reenforce the notion of handguns as a deterrence to crime, and of course the bread and butter of Right Wing radio is the constant relaying of Obama conspiracy theories.

However it is impossible to lay all of the blame on those fringe sources of information, since the National Geographic channel incredibly has a program dedicated to this, entitled Doomsday Preppers.

In case anybody wonders where the harm is in frightening people with a constant barrage of crazed conspiracy theories, well now we know.

I am going to tell you right now, that if we DON'T soon learn that Nancy Lanza was not a constant listener to Right Wing propaganda and Fox News it will because somebody is working to make damn sure that news does not get out.