Gun parts seller: ‘Obama’s Blaster’ a joke

An Oceanside gun parts maker, selling a pistol part he calls “The Obama’s Blaster,” has gotten the national attention he wanted.

Dimitrios Karras, owner of Ares Armor, says it’s all a joke, meant to stir up controversy, not to encourage anyone to use it on the president.

“The whole purpose is so we can talk about it,” Karras said Thursday. “We stirred up a very liberal hornet’s nest.”

Karras said they are selling the upper gun receiver part for an AR-15 pistol as “The Obama’s Blaster,” a subtle distinction from calling it an “Obama-Blaster.”

“We’re pretty creative with our names,” Karras said. “Obviously it’s a joke. It’s funny ... We would not want anyone to blast Obama.”

A spokesman for Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Alpine, said the "so-called joke" was in poor taste.

"It doesn’t matter what you think about the President or any elected official, or whether generating laughs or controversy was the intent," Joe Kasper, Hunter's deputy chief of staff, said in an email. "There’s no place for this. And it’s just a really bad idea to make that type of association, period."

The question of whether the "blaster's" name is a veiled incitement to violence against the president has caught the ear of the Secret Service.

“The Secret Service is aware of this and will conduct the appropriate follow-up,” said agency spokesperson Brian Leary in Washington, D.C.

Kasper added that the issue "has no bearing whatsoever on the validity of the Second Amendment."

The company posted a promotional video on YouTube, with dramatic music while the pistol part, which includes the gun's barrel, is shown from all angles.

The video prompted a variety of responses, ranging from “Gonna get my hands on about 50 of these,” to “So you’re making not so subtle hints at killing the President. Congrats! You’re right up there with ISIS, you unpatriotic ...”

Karras said he’s had a flurry of hostile phone messages too, “like I’ve committed some kind of blasphemy.”

He said one commenter called him and his colleagues “ammo-sexuals.”

“I don’t know if that’s an insult but I kind of like it,” he said.

Karras said he's gotten requests for interviews across the country, including by The Washington Post.

The gun parts manufacturer, in business for five years, has store outlets in Oceanside and National City for gun parts, accessories and tactical gear such as body armor.

Federal agents with the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives raided the business locations on March 15 and said they seized evidence in a criminal investigation.

Karras said they conducted the raid because he refused to turn over a list of customers who bought a polymer plastic gun part made by EP Armory. The part, called a lower receiver, holds a rifle’s trigger mechanism and magazine port. At issue was whether the part was considered a firearm that falls under federal regulation.

An ATF spokeswoman on Wednesday declined to talk about the propriety of naming a gun part “The Obama’s Blaster.”

She said the agency doesn’t regulate a la carte sales of barrels if they aren’t attached to a rifle. However, it is regulated as a firearm once a barrel is fitted to a rifle, and it must be at least 16 inches long, according to the law.

Karras filed a federal lawsuit against ATF over the raids. He previously asked Hunter and Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Vista, to look into ATF's actions in seizing customer information and rifle parts.

At Hunter's office, Kasper said, "The question is still unanswered about whether the ATF overstepped. More likely than not, they did."

“The Obama’s Blaster,” made of high-carbon steel, sells for $550 on the Ares Armor website. Karras said other upper receivers have sold better, but this part is fairly new.

On the site, the company misspells the president’s first name — again, Karras says he thought it was funny to do so — in promoting the weapon part.

“We would like to thank President Barrack Obama for being the distinguished firearms industry spokesman and salesmen of all time. We are now producing what we believe he would really want in an 'Blaster,'” the ad said.

The ad continues in rambling fashion to compare Obama to cartoon character Marvin the Martian, saying the President “is believed to be an alien.”

Karras said the reference to the cartoon Martian is “poking fun at Birthers” who contend Obama was not born in the United States.

“We’re not conservatives here,” Karras said. “Out there, they’re talking like we must be racist.”

The ad ends with a parenthetical remark: “(We do not think Barrack Obama actually endorses this product and the entire write up is a very clear case of Parody for the purpose of symbolic speech).”

Another ad offers a muzzle concussion redirection device, which directs the gases and flash from a gunshot forward, that is called "Obama's Flash Can." That ad contains no other mention of the president.

The story on Thursday became a popular share on Twitter, with many poking fun at the ad's poor grammar. Others weighed in on a more serious note.

"This is sickening and I bet they have the audacity to call themselves patriots," posted Bennett Kelley, a political columnist and Internet lawyer based in Santa Monica.

"And we worry about the extremists abroad," quipped retired Col. Morris Davis, a former chief prosecutor at Guantanamo.

Karras said he hasn’t named weapons parts after a living person before. “The majority are after Greek and Roman gods,” he said.