Subject: Re: [#7002486] Your Google AdWords Approval Status
From: Joe Huffman
Date: Wed, February 11, 2004 20:27
To:

Thank you for the clarification on keywords.  That helps a great deal.  I
will abide by your restriction more carefully in the future.

I realize this almost for certain isn't your personal decision, but I am
perplexed by the restriction.  Your restrictions on firearms sales brings
up a flurry of concerns about the ethics of your company and appears to be
significantly out of step with the majority of Americans.  For example in
a recent Zogby poll
(http://client.xntec.com/clientpages/oleary/report0104.html) 79% of
Americans surveyed supported the right of the people to carry concealed
firearms in public.  And all the major candidates for U.S. President agree
individuals have a right to keep and bear arms:

http://ww2.americansforgunsafety.com/31524155311.html

So what is the basis for Google to restrict people from supporting,
through sales of firearms, this constitutionally guaranteed right?  Are
there other Constitutionally guaranteed rights you restrict as well?  I
really don't see the difference between your restrictions on people
engaged in firearms and ammunition sales and someone trying to defeat
Constitutional protections against slavery.  Do you have restrictions
against selling property to Jews or blacks attending certain schools?
Just what sort of ethical framework does Google use to disapprove keywords
and phrases?

Again, I realize it's probably not your decision, but I would appreciate
it if you would pass my concerns on to those that do make the decisions.

Thank you.


Joe Huffman
Event Director
----
http://www.boomershoot.org/

AdWords Support said:
> Hello Joe,
>
> Thank you for your email. I understand that you would like to have more
> guidelines on constructing ads and keywords.
>
> At this moment, we do not have a public list of specific keywords,
> subject matter, or products that are unacceptable according to our
> policy.
>
> To clarify the issue of gun-related keywords, keywords that advertise
> guns or similar products, like 'tactical rifle' and 'sniper rifle,' are
> unacceptable. However, we do allow keywords such as 'rifle training' and
> 'rifle class' because they are specific keywords that are advertising
> for a service or event, but not actual firearms.
>
> Please feel free to email us at https://secure.lasthome.net/mail-lasthome.net/src/compose.php?send_to=adwords-support%40google.com if you have
> additional questions or concerns.
>
> We look forward to providing you with the most effective advertising
> available.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Charlene
> The Google AdWords Team
>
> Original Message Follows:
> ------------------------
> From: "Joe Huffman" <https://secure.lasthome.net/mail-lasthome.net/src/compose.php?send_to=joeh%40boomershoot.org>
> Subject: Re: [#7002486] Your Google AdWords Approval Status
> Date: Tue, 10 Feb 2004 20:13:00 -0000 (GMT)
>
> Do you have a list of these restricted keywords or subject matter that I
> could view?  It would help me to better construct my ad such that I
> avoid the embarrassment of having my keywords disapproved.  I am also
> confused by your statement that ads are not allowed with keywords
> related to guns or similar products but yet you suggest 'rifle training'
> and 'rifle class'.  A better understanding of your policy would help to
> save both you and me time and hassle.
>
> Thank you.
>
>
> Joe Huffman
> Event Director
> ----
> http://www.boomershoot.org/

I wonder if advertising products used in the exercise of other constitutionally protected rights are in violation of their guidelines.

------

Subject: Re: Your Google AdWords Approval Status 
From: "Joe Huffman" joeh@boomershoot.org
Date: Tue, February 10, 2004 0:45
To:  


I read your "Editorial Guidelines" prior to making making my ad.  I could
not find any restrictions on the product we are delivering, and even after
reading your letter below I am at a loss for your disabling of my
keywords.  We do not sell firearms or ammunition.  We offer training and
opportunity for practice to owners of long range precision rifles.  We
have police snipers, military, and former military personal attending and
teaching at our events.  How do you suggest we reach this audience through
Google AdWords without using some of the keywords you have disabled?


Regards,

Joseph Huffman
Event Director
----
http://www.boomershoot.org

> Hello Joseph,
>
> Thank you for advertising with Google AdWords. After reviewing your
> account, I have found that one or more of your ads or keywords does not
> meet our guidelines. The results are outlined in the report below.
>
> ----------------------------------------------
> Campaign: 'PPS Boomershoot,' Ad Group: 'PPS Boomershoot'
> ----------------------------------------------
>
> KEYWORD(S): 50 cal sniper rifle, 50 caliber sniper rifle, accurate
> rifle, competition rifle, high power rifle, long range rifle, precision
> rifle, rifle event, rifle range, sniper rifle, tactical rifle
>
> Action taken: Disapproved
> Issue(s): Unacceptable content as keyword
> ~~~~~~~~~
>
> SUGGESTIONS:
> -> Keywords: Google policy does not permit the advertisement
> of "firearms and ammunition". This content is not permitted as ad text
> or keywords. We have therefore disabled the keyword(s) listed above.
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------
> Please read below for definitions of the issues I found:
>
> Unacceptable content as keyword: In keeping with Google policy, we do
> not permit advertisers to use certain content as keywords for their
> Google AdWords campaigns. Google believes strongly in freedom of
> expression and therefore offers broad access to content across the web
> without censoring search results. Please note that the decisions we make
> concerning advertising in no way affect the search results we deliver.
>
>
> ---------------------
>
> If a keyword has been disapproved, your ad(s) will no longer be
> displayed for searches on this keyword.
>
> If an ad has been suspended, please edit it based on our suggestions,
> and then save your changes to automatically resubmit the ad for review.
> We're confident that these changes will improve your ad performance and
> increase your return on investment.
>
> Our goal is to help you reach your target audience and maximize your
> investment. All ads are reviewed by AdWords Specialists to ensure that
> our advertisers create successful, high-impact advertising in keeping
> with our program's Editorial Guidelines.
>
> For more information about our ad requirements, please read the AdWords
> Editorial Guidelines at:
> https://adwords.google.com/select/guidelines.html
>
> Please feel free to email us at adwords-support@google.com if you have
> any further questions or concerns. We look forward to providing you with
> the most effective advertising available.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> The Google AdWords Team

<heavy sigh>

If only the politicians and the reporters would be factual and accurate we could have a rational discussion on the topic.  But expecting people to be rational is irrational.

I'm probably jousting with windmills again.

----

Subject: Re: Assault weapons ban back in play.
From: Joe Huffman
To: eepstein@sfchronicle.com
Date: Tue, February 10, 2004 0:17

I just read your February 9th article:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2004/02/09/MNGH04S1DU1.DTL

I would like to point out some errors for your future reference:

1) There is no such thing as "automatic ammunition clips".  You probably
are referring to a "magazine" which is commonly, and mistakenly, called a
clip.  The law does refer to a "detachable magazine".  And this detachable
magazine is required for it to be an "assault weapon", not one of two
features from the list.  See
http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/laws/majorlaw/h3355_en.htm for more
details.

2) You make reference "the banned AR-15 assault rifle".  Again there is no
such thing.  An "assault rifle" is a fully automatic rifle.  The AR-15 is
a semi-automatic firearm.  See

http://www.boomershoot.org/general/ScaryWords.htm#AssaultWeapons or

http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/Assault.htm

for more details.

3) Feinstein and Schumer pick their words very carefully to avoid lying
but yet be deceptive.  The "guns recovered from crimes" is not the same as
what is implied in your article.  These are not guns that were used to
commit crimes because it includes guns that were recovered stolen
property.  The "assault weapons", as defined by Federal law are used in a
such a small portion of crimes that any measurable reduction in crime by
their complete removal from the planet would be lost in the noise of year
to year fluctuations.  The politicians pushing the "assault weapon ban"
know this and are careful to avoid the topic.

See also: http://www.clintongunban.com/


Regards,


Joe Huffman
Senior Research Scientist II
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

NRA Certified Firearms Instructor

Boomershoot Event Director
----
http://www.boomershoot.org
http://www.joehuffman.org

Ry showed me some neat stuff about the Google toolbar.  I generally don't install stuff like this, but this feature was cool enough to persuade me to do it on one computer.  The PageRank is Googles rating of the importance of the page on the web.  A page that has lots of links to it from “important” sites will have a high weight itself.  This PageRank is used in generating the sort order for web searches by Google.  Here are some numbers to give you an idea.  The top rank possible is 10.

http://www.google.com 10
http://www.msn.com 9
http://www.cnn.com 9
http://www.uidaho.edu 8
http://www.nra.org 7
http://www.jointogether.org/gv 6
http://www.bradycampaign.org 6
http://www.keepandbeararms.com 6
http://www.saf.org 6
http://www.ccrkba.org 6
http://www.moscow.com 6
http://www.orofino.com 5
http://www.sailorvsthemachine.com 5
http://www.modernballistics.com 5
http://www.boomershoot.org 4
http://www.lewistonpistol.org 4
http://www.joehuffman.org 3
http://www.whenprophecyfails.org 3
http://www.scottfamilyplace.org 3
http://www.palouseshooters.org 3
http://www.jameshs.org 2
http://www.kimhs.org 2
http://www.xeniahs.org 2
http://www.wontfix.com 0
http://www.uidaho.edu/~lisac 0 (new on the web, no links to it -- until now)

“Extreme sport” (and all the plurals etc of those words) has received 145 impressions and one click.  “Visit Idaho” got 14 impressions (a fair number of those were mine and Ry's) and one click (neither was Ry or I).   Neither of the click resulted in them going past the first page they received.

$5.15 spent so far.    No big loss but no return on it either.

The hits from Kim du Toit have trickled off, three on Thursday, three on Friday, and one today (all Universal time, so today is over).  Shotgun news is still going strong however.  10 on Thursday, five on Friday, and 13 today.  The average for all of this month is 10.3/day, so it's essentially level.

Barb's brother and sister in-law (Dow and Katy) were supposed to come in from Chicago tonight.  But poor weather back east is going to keep them out until tomorrow.  Sister Susan from Sacramento was supposed to ride from Spokane here with them.  So she is going to be stuck in Spokane until they get in about tomorrow noon.  And we are supposed to get up to three inches of snow here.

Xenia called from school today and said she was sick.  I picked her up and brought her home.  Said she is the Queen of Snot.  Lots of sneezing.  Hope we don't all get it and give it to all our guests.

Today I placed an ad on google for Boomershoot 2004.  I used some key words and phrases that didn't show the event in the search listing.  It turns out virtually no one was advertising with these words and I was able to get very cheap rates for at or near the top of the listings.  It's expected to only cost about $35/month for an estimated 25 clicks a day or so.  Shotgun news is costing me about $50/month and resulting in about 10 clicks per day.  In addition I only pay for actual clicks on google whereas I have to pay for the Shotgun news banner ad whether I get any clicks or not.  We'll see if they will pay for themselves or not.  The web logs give me pretty good tracking information so I can see how well each of the “Ad Campaigns” do.  The National Rifleman classifed ad will come out soon too.  I really need to fill up the Boomershoot this year to pay for the new explosives magazine.

Today it was reported in the Washington Post:

The highest court in Massachusetts declared today that the state legislature may not offer "civil union" instead of marriage for same-sex couples, in a ruling that guarantees that the first state-recognized same-sex marriages in U.S. history can take place beginning in mid-May.

As pointed out in the article this will be a big debate point in the coming election and cause further division in the politics of this nation.  But it is a major step forward for freedom.  The other states will have to deal with that pesky “full faith and credit“ clause in the constitution that says they must recognize the licenses of other states.  Which will bring up the issue of concealed carry licenses.  Lots of implications here.  Glad to see it.

Now if MA would just get rid of bunch of their draconian gun laws.  Why is it that people seem to only want one or two particular flavors of freedom at a time?  I can't help but think that people don't want freedom at all, or at least they only want it for themselves and not everyone else.

I got a call this morning from someone in Pennsylvania.  They were about to make their airplane reservations for Boomershoot 2004 and wanted to make sure there was still openings for the event.  I told him yes, there shouldn't be a problem if it gets here the next week or so.  Pennsylvania!  First time for that state to be represented.  Cool.

Entries are actually running a bit behind normal so I'm pleased to hear people are in the process of signing up even if I haven't received the entries yet.  I got a couple emails this week saying “the check is in the mail” so that should help get me to the point where I can order the rest of the materials needed for this year's event.

I got an email from someone suggesting the targets have various color stripes or other markings on them to aid in the spotter/shooter dialog.  Good suggestion.  We knew it was a problem and planned to put up colored or marked stakes of some sort in the target area to use as landmarks.  But this would be even further help.

Kim du Toit put a link on his blog to http://www.boomershoot.org and doubled the number of page views overnight.  A couple of other blogs put up links as well, apparently after reading Kim's post.  See http://web.tampabay.rr.com/coastwatcher/ for example.  I am very pleased.  Thank you Kim.  You will be our first representative from Texas.  And it was most pleasant listening to your South African accent when we talked on the phone.  I'm looking forward to seeing you and your family in May.

From the BBC News -- Blunkett plans tougher terror law

Home Secretary David Blunkett wants new anti-terrorism laws to make it easier to convict British terror suspects.  He has discussed lowering the standard of proof required by a court and introducing more pre-emptive action.

Just a couple of steps further.  They already given up the right to be confronted with charges and a speedy trial.  From the same article:

The Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 allows foreigners who are suspected international terrorists to be detained indefinitely without charge or trial in the event their lives would be in danger if they were dported.

Britain is holding 14 foreign terror suspects under this law, based on evidence which is tested in secret.

They are planning for secret trials and inability to confront your accusors, again from the same article:

Evidence in the new trials would be kept secret from the defendants to protect MI5, MI6 and GCHQ intelligence sources, Mr Blunkett said.

And they have already given up part of the right to remain silent, from the BBC guide to suspect rights: 

The previously important right of silence was amended by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994. Courts can now draw conclusions from your silence...

And of course everyone knows they gave up their right to keep and bear arms years ago.  It's likely that it won't be long before they realize the right to keep and bear arms is what guarantees the preservation of other inalienable rights.  Now would be a good time to review The Road to Serfdom by F. A. Hayek again.  Hayek spells out why socialism is a slippery slope whose inevitable conclusion is the loss of economic and person freedom resulting in tyranny.  It's not that the proponents of the socialist system were intending for that to happen, but that it is a necessary conclusion of it's implementation.  And that the good intentioned, probably trustworthy, early promoters, will be pushed out by those who crave the power and will abuse it.  It's excellent reading material.

I got a call from Barb today.  She was pretty upset.  The nursing home where her mother, Joy, lives was audited by the state of Idaho and was told they have too high a percentage of patients that have railing on their bed.  Barb's mom was one of the residents that would have their railings removed.  Joy has fallen out of bed three times and in one of those falls broke her hip.  A railing seems to be more than just a good idea, but the state has some sort of quota system and Joy was going to pay the price.  Barb called the state inspector and was told, “You are very hostile.  Calm down.”  Barb managed to get some of the anger out of her voice but she still expressed her view of what the inspector should do in regards to the stupid regulations.  The inspector told her that maybe her mother could have her bed on the floor instead of having a railing.  For some reason this helpful suggestion was not received with as much enthusiasm as might have been expected.  Another suggestion was that we take her out of the state licensed nursing home.  This is actually a rather good suggestion if it wasn't for the fact that the state takes so much of our money in taxes that we cannot afford private care for her.  We could have provided far better care for her if our tax rate was 1/2 of what it currently is.

I explained this is the sort of thing that happens with government “provided” anything.  They take our money from us because they know how to spend it better than we do.  They then spend it according to the whims of the “central committee” and the central committee in their infinite wisdom will come up with rules such as what we are experiencing in this case.  It happens all the time.  It's not just health care, it's nearly everything the central committee does.

Vote Liberatarian, the party of principle. 

I follow the politics of the anti-freedom movement in this country with particular attention paid to gun control.  One of my tools for doing this is google's news alerts.  It's a wonderful tool.  This morning I got a notice about Gun control reappears as political issue. Heavy sigh... It included this little nugget:

...the recently enacted omnibus appropriations bill rolls back the government’s timetable in tracking illegal guns. Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) sponsored in the provision in the House. It requires the FBI to destroy gun-buyer records 24 hours after a weapon is sold. The Brady law had required the FBI to retain such records for up to 90 days.

This is a commonly held belief but it is false.  The original Brady Act said:

(2) If receipt of a firearm would not violate section 922 (g) or (n) or State law, the system shall--
(A) assign a unique identification number to the transfer;
(B) provide the licensee with the number; and
(C) destroy all records of the system with respect to the call (other than the identifying number and the date the number was assigned) and all records of the system relating to the person or the transfer.

Item (C) was interpreted by the pro-freedom activists to mean they would be destroyed almost immediately.  This would allevate the concerns about creating a Federal gun owner database by default.  The Brady Act would not have passed without this provision.  The FBI didn't destroy the records.  Janet Reno said they were being held for “audit purposes“.  Unfortunately they were also being used for other things as well.  One would have thought that if they were by law to be destroyed then they could not be legally used for tracking down gun owners that passed the initial background check.  But this wasn't the case.  Law enforcement was using the records for far more than “audit purposes“.  The new law restores the original intent and the big fuss this created by the new law should be that law enforcement was violating the law to begin with and another law was necessary to curb them.

I wrote the author of the article a polite letter explaining things and suggested he should check any facts obtained from the gun control people carefully.  They are frequently misleading in their statements -- for example there is no such thing as a “Gun Show Loophole”.  All the laws and regulations that apply at a gun shop also apply at a gun show.