by Bob Barr | Dec 20, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller For more than half-a-century, Uncle Sam has been giving banks the legal tools to snoop into the otherwise-private affairs of their customers. Now, they are monitoring the exercise of their Second Amendment rights. Thanks to a recent move by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO, headquartered in Switzerland), U.S. banks are starting to build databases on their customers’ purchases of firearms and ammunition. And, of course, they are ready and quite willing to share that information with federal law enforcement in the name of providing a public service to identify “mass shooters.” This invasion of privacy began in earnest with enactment of the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970, which mandated that banks assist federal law enforcement in uncovering, investigating, and ultimately prosecuting violations of federal law. Banks have long complained about the burdens of compliance with the 1970 law and several related laws signed since then due to the multi-faceted regulations they spawned. But the trove of data these procedures have allowed banks to gather and database has more than paid for the costs of compliance. These laws’ main focus, according to the Treasury Department, which has primary responsibility to their enforcement, has been money laundering. Over the years, however, the many-headed hydra we call the system now includes virtually any banking customer activity that a bank employee might consider to be suspicious. In fact, banks’ primary tool in this regard is a document called a “Suspicious Activity Report” or “SAR.” Then there is the USA PATRIOT Act, passed in the immediate aftermath of the 911 attacks. The vast reach of the Patriot Act has been a shot of adrenaline to bank “secrecy” laws,...
by Bob Barr | Dec 13, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris appeared giddy last Thursday as they surrounded a phone in the Oval Office and announced that basketball player Brittney Griner was “on her way home” from Russia. Quite a different scenario would have presented itself had White House photographers been present as the family of former U.S. Marine Paul Whelan learned that he would not be coming home from a Russian prison. Viktor Bout’s family also celebrated as the convicted arms dealer arrived in Russia after being released from prison in the United States. He received a hero’s welcome from President Vladimir Putin, who negotiated his release for the motherland. Griner is portrayed by the Biden Administration and its friends in the media and on Capitol Hill as a heroic victim, with her release illustrating the strength and resolve of the President and his Team. Nothing could be further from the truth. There was nothing heroic about the facts surrounding Griner’s predicament, and the Biden Administration in reality was beaten like a drum in this prisoner exchange, which depicts, if anything, its abject weakness in handling matters of diplomacy and national security. The White House, of course, claims that in securing the release of the basketball player, the United States got everything it could out of the Russian government. This very well may be the case, but it is hardly cause for celebration. It is, if anything, a tacit admission that America no longer carries the weight it used to in international politics, especially when it comes to playing hardball with our adversaries, and that Washington now is forced to settle for the...
by Bob Barr | Dec 6, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Big city mayors from across the country are again calling on Uncle Sam to address a problem they are unwilling to tackle – in this case, violent crime in cities under their control. This week, some six dozen mayors belonging to the United States Conference of Mayors sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Schumer and Senate Minority Leader McConnell, demanding that the “lame duck” session of the Senate pass two pieces of extreme gun control legislation that were adopted by the House in early 2021. The mayors, of course, do not refer to the bills – H.R. 1808 and H.R. 8 – as “gun control” legislation; that would be too honest. For them, the measures, which would dramatically restrict the type of firearms that can be lawfully owned and sold, are “gun safety” measures. In these mayors’ pinched view of the Second Amendment, such limitations do “not in any way infringe on Second Amendment rights”; in much the same way that to others, restricting what books one might read would “not in any way infringe on First Amendment rights.” Such hypocrisy aside, the two “gun safety” bills which passed the House almost completely along party lines, have nothing whatsoever to do with the “safety” of firearms, and everything to do with outlawing certain firearms and firearms accessories. The legislation also mandates that virtually every transfer of a firearm, including between private individuals, be run through the FBI database known as the National Instant Check System or “NICS.” Both H.R. 8 and H.R. 1808 are purposefully convoluted, drafted in such way so as to confuse all but the...
by Bob Barr | Nov 29, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the anthrax scare shortly thereafter, the federal government urged Americans to prepare for possible future attacks by, among other things, sealing the windows of their homes with plastic sheeting and duct tape. More recently, in the aftermath of violent incidents involving armed criminals targeting “soft” targets such as students in schools, shoppers in malls, or worshipers in churches, Uncle Sam has pressed two similarly unhelpful strategies: “run, hide, fight” and gun control. Neither of these strategies, which Washington has repeatedly promoted, has prevented or even minimized deaths or injuries caused by criminals targeting students, shoppers, co-workers, or church goers. Still, as Sonny and Cher declared in their 1967 hit, “the beat goes on.” As with other advice proffered by federal agencies — whether about what car to drive or foods to eat — the pointers about responding to active shooter incidents is not only unhelpful, but counterproductive. This has been demonstrated repeatedly in cases where individuals chose to confront armed perpetrators rather than run away from them, and in so doing saved lives. Whether it was the armed and trained church security parishioner at the West Freeway Church in White Settlement, Texas in December 2019, the armed and trained young man at the Greenwood Park Mall in Greenwood, Indiana last July, or the individual at the Club Q in Colorado Springs, Colorado earlier this month, taking action against armed criminals bent on murdering innocent victims is a strategy far superior to one that advocates running and hiding. Even when a passive response plan appears to make sense, as when a murderous...
by Bob Barr | Nov 22, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Many of the compliments being heaped on Speaker Nancy Pelosi in the wake of her announcement that she is stepping way from leading the Democrat Party are well-deserved, including the fact that throughout her tenure as Speaker, she maintained a high degree of intra-party discipline. Republicans should take heed as they prepare to assume the majority in the House when the 118th Congress convenes in January, but if recent history is a guide, they probably will not. The fact that Pelosi was able to keep her at-times very small majority marching in the same direction, is a testament to her skills and leadership style. Often overlooked in analyses of Pelosi’s successes in the Congress, however, is the fact that, unlike Republicans, there is broad agreement among congressional Democrats that Party and individual Member discipline is essential if the goal is to achieve meaningful results. In today’s political environment, with the American electorate and its representatives in the Congress evenly divided, both aspects of discipline are essential in order to succeed at actually legislating. Speaker-in-waiting Kevin McCarthy, with a bare-bones majority in the coming 118th Congress, already is finding this out, as the far-right Freedom Caucus and a few of the most conservative members of his caucus already are reducing his flexibility to manage not only his conference but the administration of the House generally. For example, it appears that the Republican majority intends to strip several Democrat members of their committee assignments, in retaliation for the Democrats doing this to Georgia’s Marjorie Taylor Greene in 2021. When the Democrats inappropriately punished Taylor Greene in this way, they broke with long-standing House tradition...
by Bob Barr | Nov 15, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller As much trouble as Republican leaders in the Congress might have accepting the brutal fact of their candidates’ poor performances in last week’s mid-term elections, “fixing” the problem will take more than post-election tinkering. Sure, there were major problems affecting the outcomes of last week’s results that were unique to this cycle – foremost among them, the quality of several Republican Senate candidates, and the barrage of early votes by Democrats – but there are far more consequential problems facing the GOP. Even accounting for such problems as candidate quality, uneven funding, and questionable polling, the failure of the Republican Party to develop and communicate a coherent and positive message to the electorate stands as a major shortcoming now and moving forward. History shows it need not be that way. In the 1994 mid-term election, the White House occupant was the widely unpopular President Bill Clinton. The House of Representatives had been under Democrat control for 40 years. The stage was set for change. To take advantage of that momentum, then-Minority Whip (and future Speaker) Newt Gingrich broke with Republican tradition, and articulated a substantive, specific, and positive message to the electorate. The 1994 Contract With America did not mention, much less attack Bill Clinton, though he was vulnerable to such charges. That would have been the politically easier course. Instead, the Contract listed ten pieces of legislation the GOP promised to bring to the floor of the House for a vote within the first 100 days of being awarded a majority. Importantly, it did not overpromise. The widely publicized document promised only what we could guarantee. It worked. By running on a...
