My friend D and I talk almost every day on the phone, and of course we talk most days about guns and ammunition and inevitably we talk about the newest Illinois laws regarding guns and ammunition and the status of the legal actions trying to right that wrong-headed law enacted 1 year ago.
Laughably it was called something like “Protect Illinois Communities, oh and get liberals reelected for doing something Act” when in fact it has no provisions to punish any of the murderous gang bangers or protecting any community…just makes law abiding citizens criminals if they don’t register certain firearms which were open and legal when obtained in years past. Coupled with the law dropping bail for most crimes in Illinois, these firearms ban laws should more appropriately be called the “Protecting Criminals in your Communities Act.” And “Best of Luck to the Rest of You.”
Our fave data source, HeyJackAss.com, reliably reports 3,077 people were shot and 646 murdered in Chicago in 2023 alone. In fact, 18,150 humans have been shot in Chicago in the last 5 years…and not a single case would have been prevented by registering legally procured and possessed “assault weapons”. Zip. Zero. Nada.
So, while D and I chew over how we got to this sorry state of affairs, and how someone ought to do something about it, I came up with my $10 Idea.
What if everyone in the state of Illinois who is effected/threatened by this new registration law sent in $10 to a site or organization that would work to repeal this legislation or pass new less onerous law, or fund the legal fights in court, or even just worked to sponsor legislators for election or reelection. Ten bucks.
The Illinois State Police web site says there are 2,415,481 FOID card holders. No one knows how many guns or “bad assault kind of gun things” each FOID card holder possesses. Some national sources suggest law abiding gun owners have about four guns on average. Four? What if they sent in $10 per gun they are protecting? Four. Meh. Those of course are rookie numbers…
So what if those almost 2.5 million FOID card holders sent in $10 to an organization(s) which would support them directly? I asked my Executive Secretary Alexa to do the math, and she figured it would result in $25 million dollars-not an amount to sneeze at, and don’t blame me for the math. Blame Alexa.
Even if each FOID card holder only sent in a single dollar, suddenly a pile of two and a half million dollars could be used to directly fix/change/influence better laws. A dollar each.
Many times, the old “whose Ox was gored” spurs on complaints from the owner of the wounded Ox. Well, every FOID card owner has been wounded and their rights curtailed. Why not contribute to make it better? Most of us seem fairly inactive and are just waiting to see (1) What’s Next from the ultra-liberals in power and (2) I hope some court system- throws it out someday.
Well, what if that $10 idea took off and we wielded $25 million dollars? Kind of like a Go-Fund Me for the 2nd Amendment in our state.
I have joined several pro-gun initiatives in the last couple of years. In fact, I am not sure how many I am a member of-I just keep paying the renewal dues, but only to organizations who are challenging things in my state. If your organization has sponsored lawsuits to fight for my 2nd Amendment Rights I think it has become critical for me to support your efforts. I encourage you to do so as well. Pick your own organizations to support, not mine.
A lot of organizations beg for my money, but if they can’t show me real action they have taken, they don’t get my elusive sponduits. There is one real big organization I don’t pay any more. There are lots of reasons why, to include seeing the top dog live a life as espoused by the Grappling Philosopher Ric Flair – “Stylin, profilin, limousine riding, jet flying, kiss-stealing, wheelin and dealin son-of-a gun!” But more importantly, leading up to the new PICA act and after the PICA act I did not see that organization out in front or filing any sort of legal challenges or battles. Just did not see it. (Wait, what? That one guy retired last week? Well as Flair would say…”WOOO!”)
Well once you see the number of gunners in play, how about getting them all to vote? The Illinois governor only garnered 2,253,000 votes last time out to win an election he and his party spent $171 million dollars to win. 2.4 million FOID card holders who have families and friends who vote, vs 2,253,000. Working together, gun owners in Illinois could handily win any popular state election.
This governor only won 11 counties out of 102. Can you imagine gun owners getting out the vote, hanging together and winning? I mean, I mean…well it could rival the Alice’s Restaurant Anti-Massacree Movement! (Alice’s Restaurant? Geez how old are you Mike?)
I admit I have no idea how to pull off the $10 Idea. How to or where to have FOID card holders send money that would have direct impact. If you have ideas sound off. Maybe John Boch would weigh in, but D and I have our $20 ready to go.
Mr. Keleher, thank you for the thoughtful article. Over the past year, I have made online legal defense donations to the organizations listed in Gun News that are fighting the Illinois PICA Law. In particular, Michel & Associates’ The Second Amendment Law Center (2ALC) is mentioned as backstopping the FFLIL and SADEC Legal Teams. When you donate online to 2ALC, under the Illinois tab, the current (01/13/2024) level of contributions for the Illinois effort is listed as $10,888.71. How many lawyer hours would this buy? This sum is from a mere 128 donations since the Law was passed. Back in August 2023, 7 months into the Law, their donation total was between $7 and $8 thousand. The online listing doesn’t mention if donors have made repeat donations. It seems that out of 2.4 million FOID card carriers, only 128 felt the need to fight the PICA Law with a donation. So where was everyone? While your “$10” idea is great, I hold out little hope of any meaningful money coming in, if the 2ALC is any indicator. Anyway, for those who will, keep fighting! “No cause is lost, if there is but one fool left to fight for it.” (Will Turner).
Excellent points Patrick. I am unfamiliar with 2ALC but sounds like a great cause. Damn shame they haven’t garnered more $$$. Lots of “Hope somebody does something” out there right now.
I sent this article to my friend a Mr T. Nugent. He wrote back “Spread it everywhere!”
May be on to something here.
“Walk right in, it’s around the back, just a half-a-mile from the railroad track, you can get anything you want, exceptin’ Alice”,
Mike, you are bringin’ back memories, haha.
Great 10$ idea, I’m in.
Ted Nugent shared it on his X feed.
Ted did put it up on his X feed…that is 17,000 more people who saw this article idea since yesterday! Thanks Amigo!
Might be a lot of wishful thinking for many of the FOID holders. How many of them regularly vote for the DemocRATS to begin with? How many of them were totally clueless about the registration requirement? How or where are you going to even contact them to get them informed?
We could hire Taylor Swift to do a commercial.. or may be a Kardashian…and Taylor Swift. Instant headlines for some odd reason.
John includes in his missives which of our support groups are also tax-deductible for our receipts.
Good point Kevin.
It’s getting a little difficult to justify donating any more money (and it has been way more than $10 in my case) when all I see from our vaunted team of lawyers is loss after loss in Illinois. I’d like to see something actually go our way for a change here, instead of an endless parade of denials by court after court upholding various aspects of PICA, or dismissing procedural challenges.
Frankly, I am beginning to question just how talented this team is when all they do is lose. There was a lot of build up over the last year, but it apparently only takes one billionaire shithead buying courts to thwart the US Constitution these days. Just what are my continued contributions buying exactly? I am getting pretty jaded by the whole process at this point. I see a lot of lawyers collecting money. What I don’t see is jack shit for ROI here. PICA is in place, the registration deadline has passed, and a whole lot of gun owners are now felons while the courts and lawyers fellate each other. I am quite sick of this bullshit. Donate more? How about showing me something FOR that donation?
And while we are on the subject, why haven’t we been able to get the FOID card tossed yet? The lawyers have been jacking off over this for about four solid years now, and we are still saddled with that unconstitutional piece of shit. In what universe do I need to buy a license to exercise a Constitutional right, and why has this not been sued out of existence yet?
I don’t suppose anyone took notice that the communists just filed a new bill that is intended to revoke a gun owners’ drivers license here in Illinois if their FOID card is revoked, and they don’t surrender ALL their guns. Still think the FOID is just a nuisance? How long before they match up failure to register with PICA to this, and revoke your DL over that, too? There isn’t a damned thing to stop them from doing this here, and all the lawyers do is collect our donations and fuck us up the ass without benefit of a reach around. They are laughing at us while using our donations to buy drinks for their fellow lawyers who sit on these courts. It’s one big game to them, at our expense.
If you are a diseased, third-world piece of shit here in our country illegally, you will be given all the freebies we can muster, including that drivers license. Citizen gun owner? Fuck you. You are the enemy, and we will take away your right to drive right along side your rights to own guns, on whatever trumped up bullshit we can cook up. No worries though, since the lawyers are all over it.
Yep.
https://www.thecentersquare.com/illinois/article_f31c540e-b196-11ee-9ba3-a3055373c0db.html#:~:text=Senate%20Bill%202720%2C%20filed%20by,driver%27s%20license%20could%20be%20suspended.
https://ilga.gov/legislation/billstatus.asp?DocNum=2720&GAID=17&GA=103&DocTypeID=SB&LegID=151398&SessionID=112
I’ve donated several times last year. I do what I can. Every dollar helps. In Illinois, we can’t vote our way out of this. SCOTUS is our only hope.
Diggin that Mark. Keep punching. I think John Bosch hit the nail right on the head last year when he said we could not count on the state government or the legislature to do right in this matter and our only hope was the court system. Now when the GOV contributes a million dollars each to two IL S. Ct Justices reelection campaigns and they say it doesn’t influence their decisions even a blind man can say “I see it”
Dead on MarkB
FWIW It’s -10F in my world this A.M., similar to that of Gen. Washington’s world during the battles of their time. I am confident that he and his troops also thought “this sucks,” such as we do now. However, I too will not give up, or give the bastards the satisfaction of stealing my joy / happiness. I’ll send another $10+.
Me too Kevin. -8 with -24 wind chill here. So cold I saw a Democrat Politician with his hands in his own pockets!
I’m all in for donating to local, pro gun, organizations. But, as some will not donate to a large national organization, I won’t donate to a large state organization. My reasoning is simple. It has nothing to do with assumptions about lifestyle or wardrobe, but rather their previous activity of negotiating us into the place we are at now. We are where we are today because that large state organization assumed they would have a “place at the table” by negotiating our civil rights away. That leadership is still in place and needs to resign.
I’ll be happy to give more money, but only to legitimate people for specific work. A donation to a 2A cause is donating to yourself.
I get it. My simplistic idea to give to someone effective may be fanciful, but I still want my money to count just like yours. Represent us!
I don’t think the ‘losses’ within the state court system have as much to do with talent of the legal team as opposed to the unbelievable number of 2A hating Communist judges elected by the useful idiots in northern Illinois. Then one must look to the IL appeals and supreme court. There lies the answer. At the federal level the core problem is the Federal appeals courts that are overrun by communist judges. Look at the bullshit being shoveled in the 2nd, 4th, 7th, and 9th Federal appeals circuits. The organizations and attorneys arguing these cases are talented, the bench is corrupt.
I don’t think it’s ever been this way, where judges have so openly decided issues along political lines alone, accompanied by total disregard for decisions they don’t like handed down in other jurisdictions up to and including the U.S. Supreme Court. Sorry sorry state of afairs.
Certainly an honorable and well intentioned idea. However, you overlook the judicial corruption that we are up against. $10,000,000 in Lawyer fees aren’t going to win any cases where the judge panel is stacked against you unless of course, $3,000,000 is set aside for the judges (each, probably. Maybe more because the guv will just up his ante). Todd Vandermyde is right, we need to change tactics and play their game. The big question is, how the hell can we get the lame stream media on our side???