By Ben Langlotz
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December 30, 2024
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Business, Firearms Industry Advice, Opinion Pieces
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0 Comments
THE GOLDEN AGE
How to Get Ahead of the Rest at the Dawn of the Trump/Musk Era
Can you feel it? Since the election things are VERY different. Overnight, things have changed profoundly. Most people, even most business owners are slow to act on these changes. Everyone feels it, but most wait until they get proof with their own eyes, and end up missing out on the best opportunities.
A friend is a Dallas property developer, and days after the election I was ready to tell him what I’m telling you. With uncharacteristic restraint, I simply asked him how things feel since the election. He said that in days, activity is “up 300-400%” in his business, with everything being unleashed, especially funding. It proved to me that the smartest money is always way ahead of the rest of us.
In six months, everyone else will probably have all the proof they need, but those who start early with the hiring, and investing, and product development will have an edge over their competition that will be hard to beat. By then, the new CNC machines may be backordered, the top candidates hired, and material supplies already contracted.
My observation on Trump is that his political effectiveness is greatest with psychology problems. Economic sentiment, even war and peace negotiations, are all about human psychology. In contrast, viral epidemics aren’t especially swayed by his power of persuasion, as we saw four years ago.
But consumer sentiment, and the sentiment of your leading competitors, will probably drive immediate opportunities and justify important investments.
The Elon Factor: Tech Smarts Trump the Elites
As you’ve read here before, I’m an Elon fan and an enthusiastic Tesla owner. As an attendee of Tesla’s annual Shareholder meeting in May at Gigafactory Texas, I had the opportunity to ask Elon a question that was rather ahead of its time, and I like to think was a small element of an historic path. I secretly intended to influence shareholders in favor of Trump, and stood at the shareholder microphone and asked Elon:
“Donald Trump has been a big critic of electric vehicles [Elon cackles], but last week he surprised us by saying he’s a ‘big fan’ of Tesla, and a big fan of…YOU. [Audience applauds and cheers] [Pause] WHAT DID YOU TELL HIM?!”
After the audience finished laughing, Elon replied to me:
“Well, you know, I can be persuasive. So yeah.
“Actually, I don’t exactly know why he… that’s a good question. I mean, I have had some conversations with him and he does call me out of the blue, for no reason. I don’t know why, but he does. And it’s like, he’s very nice when he calls. And you know, I was like, “You know, electric cars, I think are pretty good for the future. America’s the leader in electric cars, you know. Buy America and stuff.”
“Oh, and I think he actually, a lot of his friends now have Teslas and they all love it, and he’s a huge fan of the Cybertruck. So, I think those may be contributing factors.”
Two months later, immediately after the Trump assassination attempt, Elon provided his full-throated endorsement of Trump and went on to campaign for him in critical swing states, and now is part of the Trump family.
Side note: it’s OK to buy a Tesla now – you don’t need to be a granola-munching coastal virtue-signaler to justify what this old engineer has come to conclude is the superior choice for comfort, safety, convenience, economy and fun for most car owners (unless you don’t have electricity where you park at night or live more than a half day from the nearest service center). I’m not selling because I’m a shareholder; I’m a shareholder because I’m sold on the technology.
A Golden Age for the Firearms Industry?
With Elon and other free-market advocates getting Trump’s ear this time around, the business environment should thrive. The days of Ivy League think tanks and corrupt contractors setting policy should soon end.
Gun rights are unlikely to be an early priority, but Trump’s pick of JD Vance telegraphs some powerful potential. He has floated the abolishment of the ATF, and there is speculation of repeal of the National Firearms Act. National carry rights would vastly expand that market, as would repeal of state rifle bans. I don’t think the gun community could look forward to a better candidate in 2028, but the good news is that there are other excellent contenders to test JD in a spirited primary race.
My Reform Proposal That Might Just Pass – For a Reason Trump Might Really Like
We know that so-called “Gun Safety” advocates don’t really care about public safety, and it’s easy to prove that all they really fear is an armed populace who opposes their political agenda. Here’s the deal: They could have the “Universal Background Checks” (UBC) they’re fighting for, if they made just one small compromise.
Now, Second Amendment supporters understandably cringe at the word “compromise” because for generations the GOP dictionary has defined it as: “Giving the Democrats half of their ridiculous demands and then hoping they say nice things about us on TV for a few days.” But that’s not real compromise, it’s capitulation. And I hope it’s extinct under Trump II.
An artful deal gives each side what it most wants, with concessions that shouldn’t be painful for either side.
Gun-controllers claim to worry that many states allow individuals to sell firearms privately without background checks, and they say that this puts guns in the hands of “prohibited persons” who’ll use them criminally. They probably figure that a background check requirement would mean some of these criminals are turned away by law-abiding sellers. Maybe. But we needn’t debate whether this happens often enough for UBC laws to have a meaningful effect on public safety. They say yes, we say no. But with the right deal it doesn’t matter – let’s let them have their way. Almost.
We gun rights advocates actually believe that Universal Background Checks can enable tyranny. The other guys think that’s crazy and paranoid. But our logic is that if the would-be gun banners in government knew exactly who has what guns, a ban becomes more tempting because it’s easy to enforce – just knock on the listed owners’ doors. But when, say, 20% of all the semi-auto rifles are in unknown hands, a ban must rely on voluntary compliance, and they know that’s never going to happen. Nancy Pelosi knows there’ll still be millions of ARs and AKs out there even after the confiscation raids she might envision, so enforcement of a ban becomes a waste of political capital and pointless bloodshed –why bother? Tyranny averted.
If they don’t think gun confiscation can enable tyranny, they forget what real Democrats like Hubert Humphrey argued on the presidential campaign trail not too long ago (and never got a peep of criticism from extremists in their own party): “the right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible.”
It doesn’t matter whether they’re nuts to think that Universal Background Checks will meaningfully help public safety. Or if we’re nuts to think that we can prevent tyranny by having guns the government doesn’t know about. With true compromise, it simply doesn’t matter.
All we ask in exchange for Universal Background Checks is this: Stop collecting data about who’s buying what guns. It’s like HIPPA privacy for gun owners. A background check doesn’t require a database on gun owners and serial numbers any more than liquor laws require the government to know how often I buy my preferred spirit.
For ten bucks, any seller could phone in a buyer’s driver’s license number to find out whether the buyer’s prohibited from buying a gun (appallingly, the current check system is off limits to responsible private sellers wishing to conduct a check). The new system could even be used by anyone to check out a babysitter or contractor. THIS is the secret that dovetails with a Trump immigration policy that motivates millions of voluntary self-deportations when everyone hiring day labor insists on seeing ID and calling it in to avoid criminal penalties and asset forfeiture.
This system would record only that the ID was checked and issued a confirmation number. The seller can keep the confirmation as a defense to a false charge of selling to an unqualified buyer. The system knows only that someone was checked but has no idea if they even bought a gun, let alone what model or serial number.
Stop there, and that’s the compromise we usually get: They get most of what they want, and we get nothing. So here’s the real compromise: even firearms dealers would no longer have to keep a record (known as Form 4473) of who bought what – those eventually end up in government hands for databasing. The dealer verifies his customer by ID, (just like a liquor retailer who cards a customer) but gun purchases are private.
Win-win. We win our tyranny insurance, and they win the public safety they swear is their goal. But their opposition to this type of genuine compromise belies their true goal of political control that requires their opponents to be disarmed.
Cue the crickets.
This proposal was first published several years ago at the Townhall website, and got lots of comments in many venues. One of my favorites was to include national carry reciprocity. But the real point is less optimistic, and that’s that proposing real compromise will reveal the left’s true agenda, and this “compromise” simply won’t happen. Until now with GOP control of all branches of government.
Some comments missed the point, but hopefully impressed their Facebook friends at the awesome purity of their understanding of your liberties: “The compromise is the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Similarly: “All gun laws are an infringement. Want to save lives? Ban abortion.”
I liked the style of one comment by someone who obviously hadn’t read the column and missed the point: “Ben needs to wear a hat more in the sun. Gun grabbers would need to collect data on who is buying guns. With universal background checks, they would achieve their Holy Grail, a national gun registry. There would be no need to collect data. They would already have it.”
Back when this was first published, I tried to promote it on Facebook to reach a bigger audience. To my surprise, Facebook rejected my “political advertising” (the link to the column) without my jumping through major hoops. These included them mailing a letter to my residence with a code number I had to enter. And then giving them an image of both sides of my driver’s license! I honestly wonder whether anyone advocating for gun control faces the same scrutiny, and I haven’t had the time to run a test (nor am I interested in spreading views I disagree with).
Thankfully we now have Elon’s free speech haven of X, which probably helped and maybe takes credit for the election of Donald Trump.
Enjoy the Golden Age and let us know what plans you’re making and how we can help!
