On this Friday morning, we are still recovering from something that never should have happened, the political assassination of an American activist who was not an elected or appointed official but a private citizen, who was doing nothing more than engaging people in conversation. But while the initial shock is wearing off, slightly, at least, we can start looking at the mechanics of the event, hopefully to learn from it.
And, we might take note that the usual suspects on the left are using Charlie's murder to shamelessly pivot to their pet causes. Like advocating for more stupid, senseless, ineffective gun control laws.
One of the most usual of the usual suspects is, of course, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY). Speaking to reporters recently, she started out talking about political rhetoric - then, as we might have expected, did a lateral arabesque into talking about gun control.
While speaking with reporters at the Capitol, Ocasio-Cortez was asked what message she would have to her fellow lawmakers about “the political environment and the rhetoric” that is permeating American political discourse.
“You know, beyond rhetoric, we need to talk about action,” AOC began. “And we need to talk about, yes, there are words, but most importantly, we are in a job of leadership, we are in a job of action, we are in a role and a position where the American people are looking to us to do something about this.”
The lawmaker pointed out that “every single day, people are dying due to gun violence in America” and that there “are people in this building that continue to vote against doing anything.”’
First, there's no such thing as "gun violence." There is only violence. A gun is a tool used by a person to commit violence, just as would be a knife (I might refer you to another recent horrendous murder in North Carolina), a hammer, a baseball bat, or bare hands. AOC and her ilk are far too fond of blaming the sword for the hand that wields it.
Second, yes, there are people in "this building" (The Capitol) who are against stupid, empty gestures, like yet another gun control law.
What's more, none of the usual laws proposed - like the "assault weapons" laws the left is so tiresomely ballyhooing - would have affected the rifle used to assassinate Charlie Kirk. But these laws are too often (always, or close enough) proposed by people who know little or nothing about firearms. Here's what we know about the weapon used on that horrible day in Utah.
The gun recovered by authorities in the assassination of Charlie Kirk was a bolt-action rifle — a common hunting weapon valued for its reliability but limited to a single shot before reloading.
Unlike a semiautomatic, the shooter must manually operate the bolt handle to cycle the weapon: lifting and pulling it back moves the spent cartridge, while pushing it forward chambers a new round from the magazine. Lowering the bolt locks the round and seals the chamber, making the rifle ready to fire again — a simple, durable design that has kept it popular among hunters and target shooters.
"This process limits the rate of fire, you can only take one shot at a time," explained retired Marine Lt. Col. Hal Kempfer in an interview with Fox News Digital.
Kempfer noted that with a bolt-action rifle, the spent cartridge often remains in the chamber rather than being ejected, meaning shooters don’t leave behind shell casings or "brass" that investigators can use for forensics.
Other than a nitpick - with a semi-auto rifle, one can still take only one shot at a time - that's a pretty good description of a bolt-action rifle.
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This is a basic design that has been around since the mid-19th century. The rifle Tyler Robinson used has been described in various outlets as an "older Mauser," and judging from the chambering (.30-06) I would guess that it is a surplus rifle, probably an M98 Mauser, that has been rebarreled. We don't yet know if any optics were mounted, but I would guess there are. The nature of the shot, made at between 150 and 200 yards (accounts vary), would indicate a scoped rifle. And while the nature of the shot indicates some level of practice, this isn't a military sniper-level of training; any half-way proficient hunter could have made a similar shot with that rifle.
Full disclosure: Most of my hunting rifles are just this kind of scoped, bolt-action weapon. It's my preferred platform, and I've fired tens of thousands of rounds through them, and have taken the majority of the 35-40 head of big game I've taken in my life with these arms.
Why does this matter? Because scoped, bolt-action hunting rifles are not only widely owned and used by American sportsmen all over the country, from Alaska to Florida, from Texas to Montana, but they are not the subject of any proposed gun control law. No existing law, other than the background checks and other provisions that cover all firearms, would restrict these ubiquitous hunting rifles. The left neither knows nor cares about this, and so they still yap about "assault weapons." These rifles are legal even in most of Europe, where gun laws are typically much tighter, and where there is no Second Amendment.
But wait. Just wait. When these technical details are fully known, just wait for the next call. I've been saying and writing for years that if the left succeeds in restricting handguns and "assault weapons," then look for these scoped hunting rifles to be next, and following Charlie Kirk's murder, that call may come sooner than expected. Watch for calls to restrict - wait for it - "sniper rifles," in which the clueless left attempts to round up most of the hunting rifles now owned by American citizens.
These laws are, always have been, and always will be useless. Not only do they defy elementary logic - a tool is never a cause - but they defy reality. The advent of 3-D printing and other small-scale manufacturing technologies makes these restrictions even more nonsensical. What's worse, just about the simplest weapon one can produce in a basement workshop is something along the lines of the American M-3 "Grease Gun" or the British Sten - a short, simple submachine gun that can spray a lot of lead in a very short time.
So, once again, we see the left descending into an irrelevant argument after a tragedy. It seems there is no horror they will not exploit in the name of the narrative, of the agenda, in the disarming of America.
