The View From North Central Idaho

Why is it that every printer ever made has User Frustrator Tabs (UFTs) built into the paper tray?  Their only function is to prevent the user from sliding a new stack of paper into the paper tray.  They're there to catch the corners of the paper as you're trying to get it into the machine, thus causing one or more sheets to bunch or shift inside the tray.  Often it's the bottom sheet that gets hung up, and of course it's impossible to slide the bottom sheet forward under the stack, even without UTFs, unless you remove the whole stack and try again.  UFTs work especially well when you have an important customer on the phone and you're in a hurry to print something.  Of course the printer never knows that you've just installed a new, crumpled stack of paper in it, so while you're on the phone you have to find the right button to push, telling the printer it is now time to jam and wad a new sheet in its mechanism.

I can just see Butters, in his aluminum foil Professor Chaos uniform, evil grin on his face, as he builds the CAD file for the new HP paper tray; "He he he heeee.  Now the world will know the pain and frustration...."

Hey guys; ever though of having, you know, flat, smooth surfaces inside the paper tray?

#876,394.2;

Why is it that the printer and camera manufacturers actually hire (and presumably pay) extra people to write software, and then actually include it in their product packaging, just to take over my computer, turning it into an All-HP Fun House, or the Wonderful, Lollipop World of Cannon, instead of the computer I actually liked and paid for?  It's like putting dog turds in your product packaging.  You hire people to search for dog turds, you hire people to wrap those dog turds, and then you pay to ship those dog turds with each camera or each printer, so that I'll stick one in my optical drive and ruin everything, permeating my whole computer.  Gee, thanks.  All I wanted to do was print stuff, OK?  How hard is that to understand?  All I want to do is take pictures and put them on my computer.  Why does that require special dog turd software?  You know what I do?  I pull the card from the camera and use a damned card reader, 'cause that way I know I'm not sticking yet another dog turd in my optical drive.

(go ahead-- ask me how I feel about it)

Via an email from the Apex of the Triangle of Death:

For more info go to TriggerTheVote.org.

My lawyer friends tell me it's going to be good for a laugh to see the Feds twist and turn a little bit but not much more. I hope they are wrong but I do enjoy laughing. Have your popcorn and soft drinks ready by October:

The man who helped write the bill that exempts federal regulation of Montana made firearms says that the idea is gaining support around the country.

The state legislature passed the Montana Firearms Freedom Ac during its last session and now the Montana Shooting Sports Association plans to file a lawsuit on October 1st.

The suit will challenge the authority of Congress to regulate Montana manufactured guns, accessories and ammunition that stays in the state according to Montana Shooting Sports Association President Gary Marbut.

Last month the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms sent out a letter stating that the federal law still applies in Montana.

Marbut says that ATF acknowledgment will help the Montana Shooting Sports Association gain standing in its lawsuit.

From The Scotsman:

HAVING sex without a condom is good for your mental health, according to controversial research conducted by a leading Scottish psychologist. Professor Stuart Brody concludes that unprotected heterosexual sex can significantly boost men and women's mental wellbeing.

Conversely, Mr Brody claims that heterosexual sex with a condom is associated with poorer mental health, problems with dealing with stress and even conditions such as depression.

...

Mr Brody said: "Evolution is not politically correct, so of the very broad range of potential sexual behaviour, there is actually only one that is consistently associated with better physical and mental health and that is the one sexual behaviour that would be favoured by evolution. That is not accidental."

I hope he took the basic precaution of trying to compensate for things such as marital status, economic situation, education, drug (including alcohol) use, etc. If he did then his finding are very interesting. If he did not then his "study" is complete crap.

According to the research, gun violence is most likely to occur in those places where guns are more accessible—small towns and rural areas. Given the stats, I can’t help but be grateful that I live in an urban rather rural location. Gun violence is a huge problem in some cities, notably Chicago. But to argue more guns equals more security makes no sense. Taken as a whole, however, gun violence is a greater threat in rural settings.

Robert V. Thompson
August 3, 2009
Guns and the dark side--Gail Collins gets it right
["No sense"? How about that paragraph? He says gun violence (note that he talks about GUN violence, not violence as a whole) is more likely to occur where guns are more accessible but gun violence is a huge problem in Chicago (unmentioned is Washington D.C.) where guns are banned. He can't remain coherent for three consecutive sentences.

I'd love to see the research showing violence (not just "gun violence") is a greater threat in rural settings that in urban settings. I doubt that it is a oversight that he doesn't mention it. I don't think it exists.

And even in the article he links to (registration required) Thompson apparently overlooked this sentence or read it completely backward, "In general, homicide gun deaths in the United States are more of an urban than a rural problem."

As for claiming there is no sense in guns enhancing security perhaps he can convince our police and military to turn in their guns. Would he, or anyone else sharing our reality, think that would make the U.S. a more secure place to live?

Thompson is either living in an alternate reality or has some strange version of dyslexia where facts are reversed by the time they are registered in his brain.--Joe]

There are multiple reasons that I fear the thought of government controlled health care.

1. Your choices will be taken away from you. The government programs does not take into consideration individual needs, they make decisions only as a general rules that apply to each person despite what is best for the specific person--except for themselves. I am sure they will always be able to get around the rules they make for other people. They are already making decisions for you, not the health care person who knows what the situation is.
2. I have worked with nurses and doctors from Canada. Each nurse at our hospital takes care of 4-5 people at a time plus they have aides. Nurses are your first line of defense in the hospital, they are the ones that are there to make important decisions for you--call the MD, send you to the critical care unit, etc. The Canadian nurses said that they may have more than 10 patients and not enough aides. One nurse said that she is sure that people died because they didn't have time to assess the situation for the patients in critical need. Plus the ER was flooded with patients with sore throats and ear aches so that the ER Staff didn't have time to assess who had the critical needs. After all, health care is free so why not just go to ER and not wait until the next day?
3. It appears to me that people who have free health care take advantage of it. The big example is welfare/Medicaid patients. They have poor health habits, little carry through on instructions. In home health we disliked getting Medicaid patients, not because they were poor, but because of their "give me attitude". Give me the best of care because "I" am just as good as you and I want everything but I don't want to take care of myself. These patients are often "frequent fliers" who come in to get their COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease), diabetes or drug and alcohol dependencies under control. We clean them up, "save" them, send them home, and they are back in a few months. These people burn up so much money for health care but, hey, its "free" so no problem for them. In contrast, people on Medicare, they earned it by working all their lives--no it's not a great system either but people did earn it--just want to get better and get out of the hospital or out of home health because they have a life they want to go back to. They generally follow instructions better and don't return to the hospital over and over again. In general they are a pleasure to care for because they appreciate their health care.
4. The government screws up so many things. They hire more and more layers of administration and they still can't get it right. Plus there will always be people who learn how take advantage of the system so they will have to hire more and more non-medical people to police the system but they usually only hurt the people who are trying to follow the rules. You can't imagine how much paperwork we have to fill out to see Medicare and Medicaid patients plus the charting that is required on all patients.
5. Good MDs and health care workers are the frogs that are starting to boil. You don't know the early and late hours these rural MDs are working or the piles of paperwork sitting on their desks. They are not making big money but they work the "big" hours. Government will not run this system efficiently. There will not be incentives for the really bright people to go into medicine--nope they are not that stupid. Seriously I think that will we will have an even greater shortage of MDs and other medical staff. But don't worry they are accepting people--minorities--into medical programs who actually need remedial help passing tests. Now that makes me feel better about our health care.

When the government takes over we can look forward to poor health care for everyone.

Part I was here. You really should read all the comments if this topic interests you even a little bit.

I got a response back from Benjamin who gave me permission to use his name:

I think I'm picking up what you're putting down, and it all makes sense. I do have some counter questions though.

First question.
If the cost of healthcare is too high to provide adequate healthcare to all through a government run system, is there a way to encourage healthcare to cost less?

When I got what was left of my appendix out, it cost me roughly $12,000 (This was 1999 and so I just don't remember exactly) but included an overnight stay, and extensive surgery to get the poison out of my belly. Five years later I broke my arm and had outpatient surgery to have two screws put in my elbow so I would regain full range of movement, which I never got back. That surgery cost me $6,000, and both times the anesthesiologist cost around 60% of the total cost.

While I understand that medical costs are high because the penalty for failure is high. If I lose and arm because it gets infected, the surgeon doesn't get all the poison out of my belly and I die, or the anesthesia isn't administered properly I might die. But it seems like the amount that it costs to get basic or complex medical procedures done is disproportionate to their difficulty or cost in materials. My $12k and $3k bills, as well as lesser bills over the years have made me believe there is a lot of waste involved purely by the number of people I have to pay. Burning through 14 checks to pay for a single outpatient surgery is not reasonable.

Second question.
You state that immortality or close to it will be achievable soon.
First by the rich and then later by the middle class. But what mechanism (Similar to supply and demand or some-such) is in place to drive the prices down and make it achievable?

It seems to me that in the small window of time I have been an alert adult, medical costs have only seemed to go up and not down. I've been paying for my own medical care for 11 years. The cost of stitches, X-rays, and CT scans has gone up, and not down. While I know that the medical field stretches far beyond emergency and trauma related care, my view point is not showing a drop in cost.

Discrimination
I want to try and say that race, socioeconomic status, what gender you choose to love, how much of an asshole you are, or church you attend (or don't), won't have any impact on the quality or duration of healthcare you receive. But it really hurts me to say that I know that I would be full of shit and wrong with every single syllable I strung together, no matter how beautifully I managed to do so. America rocks. I fucking love this place. But americans are ignorant, self centered, asshole cowards, on the whole. Fearful of what they don't or choose not to understand.

Benjamin

P.S. Thanks for being informed and opinionated. I really like knowing that there are people out there who have an opinion for a reason, know how to share it, and do. I spend some time nearly every day listening to the two local conservative and an one liberal AM radio talk stations. Glenn Beck, Rush Vicodin, Randi Rhodes, Lars Larson, and whoever else sort of scare me.

My response:

Barb says she will write up something for me to post on my blog soon as well. She has a lot of experience with government run health care.

First Answer:
Basically, I don't have any knock-out good answers.

Getting the government out of the health care business will help some. The price of drugs is probably 20 to 100 X what it would be without the FDA being involved. Just like anti-gun people only citing the costs of guns in society and not mentioning the benefits the FDA costs are seldom mentioned. Not only in the incredible expense to get a new drug to market but the number of lives lost because of the delays.

Requiring hospitals to give free health care to those that can't pay raises the prices for everyone. All the paperwork required raises the price a bunch as well. This isn't just the governments though. Insurance fraud has contributed a great deal as well. Insurance also raises the cost not just because of the extra documentation required but because they put a lot of pressure on providers to reduce the price and providers give them discounts of something like 40% over what an individual would pay.

A looser pays court system would help but I'm not entirely comfortable with that concept either.

Another thing that makes the comparison from 10 or 20 years ago to now difficult is that the quality isn't the same. MRI's weren't available. Many of the drugs available now did not exist then. Lots of people that would have died or been permanently disabled a decade or two ago now go home and have many more healthful years left.

Second answer:

There will be lots of research, engineering, and failures going into the first efforts. Think of Microsoft Office--the first copy costs many millions, the second copy costs pennies. It won't be that dramatic but drugs really aren't that much different. The costs are weighted very, very heavily on the front end.

I hope Barb will be able contribute more.

It's the county's position that the panel did not need to reach the issue of whether the Second Amendment is incorporated to apply to state and local governments. It's the county's hope that that's what attracted the court's attention.

T. Peter Pierce
Of Richards, Watson & Gershon
July 30, 2009
9th Circuit Giving Gun Case Another Look
[In other words, "We hope the Second Amendment only applies to people residing in Washington D.C." If he had said a similar sort of thing about the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth or 13th Amendments he would have been, and justifiably so, told he needed to find new employement as a janitor, santitation engineer, or Chinese target stand. But he didn't. He was talking about the Second Amendment which is somehow "different". I wonder why...

There are people on our side of the issue that are quite anxious about what this might mean as well. David Hardy, Sebastian, and Eugene Volokh have a few words to say about it. Oral arguments will occur the week of September 21^st and we might get a clue as to the outcome.--Joe]

I just ordered 1750 cardboard boxes for Boomershoot targets. Combined with what we already have that is over 2400 boxes. That includes a few extras but still... I'm planning on a LOT of targets for next year.

Including miscellaneous other supplies that one order was nearly $760. That doesn't include the ton (literally) of chemicals, wooden stakes, and numerous other things. But do you know what?

It will be so awesome it will be worth it!

I occasionally post about the adverse results of socialized medicine but probably haven't said much about what I think about it. A friend asked the following via email:

I have been meaning to ask you for a more detailed explaination of your stance on universal government run health care as it is being proposed right now. I understand you oppose it, but as someone who is poor and hasn't had healthcare for 11 years and has used the emergency room for most of my healthcare needs, why it is bad.

I know there is no free lunch.
I know that someone is paying for it.
I want to know why YOU are opposed to it and why.

My response (except for a few personal things that were deleted to protect privacy):

Health care... Big, big topic.

I understand the no insurance situation. [details deleted]

I have tried to express this in a "Just One Question" format but haven't quite been able to do it. Here's my best attempt:

If it were possible to keep someone alive and robust essentially forever (baring catastrophic injury) but it cost $1M/year per person should the "government" supply it for everyone?

Of course the answer is "we can't afford that".

The thing is we are rapidly approaching the point where immortality may be achievable for some people. I suspect age-wise I am just above the cutoff line where it will be technically feasible. My kids (and probably you) have a good chance at that.

All government health care plans equalize (for the most part--people in power typically are more equal than others even if the law says otherwise) the care. There simply isn't budget for everyone to get "the best". Care will be rationed or it will be substandard. Look into what happened in the UK. The waiting lists cause people to die. Too old, too fat, or smoke? You don't get the knee replacement or other care because that money would be "better spent" on someone younger or healthier.

Government bureaucrats will make the rules and/or review cases deciding who gets care and who dies. It WILL be abused. It might be on racial or religious lines or it might be on the basis of who you know. Whatever the case it won't be on the basis of what you and/or friends and family think you are worth or can afford. When someone pulls the plug on me I want it to be because I and/or my family decided it was time or couldn't afford the cost rather than some government official that decided they didn't like my skin color or I had been just a little too uppity with some of my blog postings.

If Bill Gates and other extremely wealthy people are allowed to pay for whatever the free market can come up with immortality will probably be achieved soon. It will be extremely expensive and only a few will be able to afford it. But the price will come down and someday it will be affordable by the middle class. If equality of care is enforced we may never have that available to us.

See also what Alan Korwin has to say about it:

http://pagenine.typepad.com/page_nine/2009/07/dangerous-health-care-insanity-spreads.html

After the flap about PayPal being anti-gun I decided to put renewed effort into dumping them for doing Boomershoot and Modern Ballistics credit card transactions then tell them why. The problem was finding a good alternative.

I can't find the email or comment that recommended them but someone suggested I try a particular bank. It didn't work out. Here is what their policy says:

NO ADULT SITES OR MATERIAL

The Merchant agrees that CartSquare's services will only be used for lawful purposes. Furthermore, Merchant agrees not use CartSquare products, online shopping carts, or services provided through or in connection with CartSquare to

...

d. sell, distribute, disseminate or link to any sites for marketing, sales or distribution of: adult materials, firearms, explosives, ammunition, liquor, tobacco products, food that is not packaged or does not comply with all applicable laws for sale to consumers by commercial merchants, pharmaceuticals and controlled substances, counterfeit, pirated or stolen goods, any goods or services that infringe or otherwise violate a third party's rights, registered or unregistered securities, goods or services that (i) you cannot legally sell, (ii) are misrepresented, and/or (iii) if sold via CartSquare or Your Web Site would cause CartSquare to violate any law, statute or regulation;

That's right. I wouldn't be able to even link to a site that marketed or sold firearms, explosives, or ammunition. In their minds that is in the same as category as "controlled substances, counterfeit, pirated or stolen goods, any goods or services that infringe or otherwise violate a third party rights".

What about the people that want to exercise their specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms?

I wrote them an email asking abou their policy:

From: Joe Huffman
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 8:25 AM
To: 'support@nmbancard.com'
Subject: Question about agreement terms.

In the terms of agreement (https://www.cartsquare.net/administration/uplinks.php3 ) I found the following:

Furthermore, Merchant agrees not use CartSquare products, online shopping carts, or services provided through or in connection with CartSquare to

…

d. sell, distribute, disseminate or link to any sites for marketing, sales or distribution of: adult materials, firearms, explosives, ammunition, liquor, tobacco products, food that is not packaged or does not comply with all applicable laws for sale to consumers by commercial merchants, pharmaceuticals and controlled substances, counterfeit, pirated or stolen goods, any goods or services that infringe or otherwise violate a third party's rights, registered or unregistered securities, goods or services that (i) you cannot legally sell, (ii) are misrepresented, and/or (iii) if sold via CartSquare or Your Web Site would cause CartSquare to violate any law, statute or regulation;

My business is a long range precision rifle event with explosives as the targets (http://www.boomershoot.org/). I have an ATF license to manufacture high explosives. I could, but do not, legally sell explosives. I sell people the opportunity to shoot at the explosives I make. I do link to firearms, ammunition, and explosives vendors who legally sell their products. Do you consider this a violation of your agreement?

If so then I will have to find a different bankcard vendor who is more tolerant of people exercising their specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms.

Please let me know.

Joe Huffman
208-301-4254
-----
http://blog.joehuffman.org/
http://www.boomershoot.org/
http://www.modernballistics.com/

Their reply:

From: Merchant Support
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 12:28 PM
To: joeh@boomershoot.org
Subject: Your Merchant Account Application

Hello Joe Huffman,

According to Visa/MasterCard, your business is considered a High Risk Business  After reviewing your application we can not continue processing your application through Cardservice International.   However, we have found you another company that can approve your application.  Please click on this link below or copy and paste the link into your browser exactly how you see it to qualify for our special offer.
http://www.durangomerchantservices.com/Applications/apply_for_free.php?agentid=rwolf@ecommercemg.com
The rates are slightly different, however this could be the solution that you are looking for.

Thank you,

Merchant Account Support
support@merchantlane.com
Phone: 1-866-295-5264

Merchant accounts have fees that typically are on the order of $50/month whether you have any business or not. Boomershoot has essentially zero sales 11 months out of the year and Modern Ballistics is shareware and only gets a donation about once every couple of months. Plus the contract terms typically demand third party audits and intrusions rivaling that of a colonoscopy (been there, done that, don't want to do it again).

Chet, a friend from work, suggested I look at Amazon's Simple Pay.

It looks as if my businesses just skate by their acceptable use policies but not my friends selling ammunition or a gun raffle for charity (although this might work for charities):

Prohibited Items and Activities:

...

• Firearms and Weapons - includes ammunition, guns, rifles, shotguns, pistols, other firearms, knives (automatic, spring-loaded knives, throwing, etc.), brass knuckles, or other weapons.
• Gambling Businesses - includes online gambling (including poker), lotteries (including sale of lottery tickets), games of chance (including sweepstakes and raffles), sports forecasting, or odds-making.

Chet also suggested Yahoo! but from what I could tell they require PayPal, a Merchant account, or $40/month whether you have any sales or not.

I'm going to spend some more time on the Amazon site and maybe convert over to them from PayPal.

"Guns don't kill people. People kill people."

I think that's a good argument for keeping people away from guns. The two just do not mix well.

thinkagain2
July 31, 2009
Comment to Taking Gun Laws Seriously.
[I'm of the opinion "thinkagain2" is unable of thinking or making a good argument.

His, or her, thesis overlooks the possibility that some people need to be killed. Those men herding the naked women and children to the trenches prior to being shot... they needed to be killed. Right then and there. Keeping guns away from the people that needed them enabled evil.

It also overlooks that guns are used to stop violent attacks on innocent people--most of the time without anyone getting killed.

And just who is going to keep people away from guns? I'm betting it will be other people with guns.

No thanks. In addition to having a serious logic flaw that would violate my Jews in the Attic Test.--Joe]

Linoge put a lot of work into showing the data with a pretty picture. I would like to think our opposition is able to read and understand raw numbers but time has shown even though I think they are mentally ill bigots with crap for brains I have far too high of an opinion of their skill set. So if your opposition needs to see a picture to understand what you are saying Linoge has it.

Data is always a good thing. Presenting it so it is understandable on such an intellectual level, that even the most stupid of those towards whom it is directed will understand it is even better.

[I]f you're in favor of welfare programs, for example (allowing some people to live at the expense of others, by threat of force, i.e. to acquire value without having earned it) then what moral or intellectual tenet is going to stop you from saying those same people should never be arrested? If they can receive goods and services they didn't earn by work or productivity, why then, exactly, shouldn't they have freedom they didn't earn through respecting other people's rights? If you favor forced redistribution, you've thrown out the concept of rights at that point, so what basis do you have for punishing property crimes that would be intellectually or morally consistent with forced redistribution? Is there some huge difference between the government robbing you to support a layabout, and said layabout robbing you directly? Seems to me the latter would accomplish the same thing far more efficiently, leaving out the middle man as it does.

Lyle @ UltiMAK
July 31, 2009
Comment to Fearsome firearms or crap for brains?
[But the "man in the middle" is the main beneficiary and may, in fact, be the entire point of the theft.--Joe]

I don't really know where to begin on this mess. They messed their pants so badly even hip waders couldn't hold it all. This is not reporting. This isn't even editorializing. They don't check their facts and I have doubts if they even know how to recognize a fact. It's the rantings of people with severe mental problems. It starts with the title "Brazen weapon fire chills police". It doesn't let up for an instant:

The gang shoot-out that rained gunfire and smoke on a quiet Dorchester street this week disturbed police on many levels: the seemingly new height in disregard for neighborhood safety, the fact that a 12-year-old girl watching TV inside a nearby house was shot through the leg.

Since when do gangs have any regard for "neighborhood safety"? Do they expect them to meet at a gun range to have their shoot-out? Gangs, in the common usage of the word, are criminals. Do they think criminals care about memorizing and following the gun safety rules that the rest of us do?

But even more alarming: At least one of the weapons used in the gunfire was an AK-47 assault rifle, the fourth time in three weeks that one had been found or used in Boston and the seventh time since last July, when a 32-year-old man was shot dead with one.

Police say they are noticing more of the fearsome firearms on Boston streets than last year and, in particular, are concerned that there have been so many in the past three weeks. Tomorrow afternoon, Mayor Thomas M. Menino will meet with ministers in Roxbury to discuss crime in the city and the sudden proliferation of the rifles.

But more alarming than there are criminals among us is that there are "fearsome firearms on Boston streets". Well then, why doesn't someone go out there and pick them up and take them home? Oh, that's right. That's not what they meant. They meant criminals are using the firearms on the streets. And, I say this having not lost a single bet in the last 35 years, I'm willing to bet than none of those rifles were actually assault rifles. They are intentionally using words to inflame emotions.

“This [weapon] can lay down a lot of fire in an urban area where there is basically no cover from it,’’ Commissioner Edward F. Davis said yesterday. “You can conceal yourself from these weapons, but they’ll rip through a car. They’ll rip through a telephone pole. They can rip through just about anything in an urban environment.’’

What he doesn't say is that common hunting rifles such as a 30.06 have far greater penetration than these rifles.

“Everybody understands when they read the morning paper that you have to push as much as you can to get these guns off the street,’’ he said.

Only those that believe the morning paper. And this article is a very illustrative example of why more and more people don't believe the "morning paper".

Nine assault rifles have been confiscated so far this year, compared with four seized in 2008. Eighteen assault rifles were found in 2007.

Want to bet?

But police worry about the attractiveness of assault rifles to gangs. AK-47s are much more powerful than handguns, capable of firing at least 100 yards, and can be easily converted into automatic weapons.

The range of the AK-47 on human sized targets is much greater than 100 yards. With common ammo it's about a 4 MOA gun. This makes it capable of first round hits, with a skilled marksman, at about 300 yards. So what? Common hunting rifles chambered .308 Winchester, 30.06, or .300 Win Mag, in skilled hands, can reach out and touch someone at 600 yards and beyond. They can't be "easily converted into automatic weapons" for two reasons; 1) Assault rifles ARE automatic weapons and these, almost for certain, are not assault rifles; and 2) Firearms that are "easily converted" into automatic weapons are not allowed on the market and haven't been for decades.

The guns have surfaced as Boston police have pushed to provide more of their own officers with M16s, high powered semiautomatic rifles.

In May, the Globe reported that police had ordered about 200 M16s free of charge from the US military and made plans to train dozens of officers and arm them with the rifles.

M-16s obtained from the military are NOT semi-automatic. They are fully automatic. Facts? What do facts matter to these mentally deranged writers? That's right, they don't. (Update: As pointed out in the comments the M16s were converted to semi-auto by the Boston Police Department. The article was written by the same writer. She was careless with the facts in this article even though she knew them.)

Community leaders and gun control advocates yesterday said many of the illegal guns in Massachusetts likely come from states like Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont, where private gun owners can sell their weapons to anyone without requiring background checks.

Bruce Wall, the pastor of the Global Ministries Christian Church in Codman Square, said he is planning to hold a prayer summit on the steps of the New Hampshire State Capitol in Concord, N.H., to get the attention of public officials and call on them to tighten their laws.

“We’re going to pray for the trafficking of guns to stop,’’ he said. “Those gun shows in those states are making a lot of money off people in Massachusetts. Now the criminals are using weapons that can outpower what the police have.’’

Let's see... violent crime rates (FBI stats for 2007 that I just happened to have on my computer):

• Massachusetts: 431.5/100K
• Maine: 118.0/100K
• New Hampshire: 137.3/100K
• Vermont: 124.3/100K

Blaming the laws in states with low crime rates for the high crime rates in their state proves that logical thinking doesn't even rate a place holder in their brains. If it was private sales of guns increased crime then why is the crime rate lower, by at least a factor of PI, in those states than in Massachusetts? Massachusetts should look to the laws and policies of states with low crime rates, see what is different, and emulate those other states. NOT insist that those other states adopt their failed polices.

What do you think? Are the authors correct that it's all about "fearsome firearms"? Or is it that the authors have crap for brains?

Author Maria Cramer can be reached at mcramer@globe.com let her know what you think. I sent her a link to this post and a link to Just One Question.

Update: I received a response from her:

From: MCramer@globe.com
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 7:59 AM
To: Joe Huffman
Subject: Re: Brazen weapon fire chills police

 

Thanks for your note.

 

 

Maria Cramer

Reporter

Boston Globe

w: (617) 929-3169

c:  (617) 291-6008

This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as when the baby gets hold of a hammer.

Will Rogers
[Well, I certainly feel that way. But apparently it's not a universal feeling because we still have a Congress that has sessions.--Joe]

Via email from Ed:

Jul 28, 2009 6:06pm
Eastside Harley and Wades Guns in Bellevue will be starting a promo via the internet. When a customer purchases a new 2009 big twin Harley from now through the end of July (could go into August), they will get a $500 voucher towards a purchase of a firearm or merchandise at Wades Guns. This offer is internet-only promotion, share and pass this audio file along. We are also posting a video to www.eastsideharley.com.

Bellevue Washington, near Seattle.

I'm tired of gun-bigots. PayPal needs to hear from US - the law-abiding gun owners of this country - that we're no longer willing to just roll over when we're abused by the companies we "trust" just because we believe in and practice the rights guaranteed to us under the Second Amendment.

Kevin Baker
July 29, 2009
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
[Read it and follow his suggestions. If anyone has a good suggestion for an alternative I'd love to hear it. I reluctantly use PayPal for Boomershoot and Modern Ballistics and would love to have a viable alternative.--Joe] 

I tried this before, but the camera/recorder I used then was equipped with AGC circuitry, and the extremely wide dynamic range of gunfire made for an unsatisfactory result.  This time I used a dedicated, stereo sound recorder with no compression.

Because the sound of live fire, even from the 400 yard distance in this example, has such a wide dynamic range, you need to crank up your speaker volume very high.  You'll need a high quality sound system, or some good headphones with good frequency response, from low bass to the upper highs.  You should be able to clearly hear the sound of the rushing creek in the distance between shots, and the high-frequency bullet crack should almost hurt your ears.  Warning;  Make absolutely sure your computer or other device isn't going to make any other sounds (chimes, alarms, etc.) or it will blow your head off.  Be sure to turn the volume down when you're done.  When I play these files on the Altec speaker system with sub woofer, it sounds like it did when I was standing there making the recording.

We fired an AR-15 (.223) from 400 yards at plastic water jugs.  You can hear the sound of impact, but it's not as loud as the bullet's sonic "crack" or the low frequency muzzle blast that follows.  I was holding the recorder at a position behind a hill from the shooter, about 20 yards off to the side of the bullet path, and about 20 yards up-range from the targets.  This is the same recording in both WMA and MP3 formats;

01 223FireWMA.wma (1.4 MB)

223FireMp3.mp3 (584.91 KB)

Note that you've probably never heard this sound in movies or television, with the possible exception of Quigley Down Under, but in that case Quigley's bullets were sub sonic well before impact at long range and we can forgive the "whoosh-boom" as being probably accurate enough.

Dateline: July 27, 2009.

[There is a man at the register who just swiped his ATM card through the reader. He is wearing a ParaUSA hat and a t-shirt that says, "There are very few personal problems that can't be solved with a suitable application of high explosives." Not seen is the STI Eagle 5.1 in a Kramer IWB holster behind his right hip loaded with 19 rounds of high performance .40 S&W hollow point ammunition. Also not seen is on the other hip is a spare loaded 18-round magazine and a Surefire 6P flashlight. There is an Asian woman behind the register who just put a 50 pound sack of Boomerite mystery ingredient #4 into a cart.]

Woman: What are you going to do with 50 pounds of <mystery ingredient>? Are you a baker?

[Man waits a few seconds for the transaction to go through and the receipt to start printing out.]

Man: No. I'm going to make explosives with it.

[Man grabs the receipt and takes control of the cart with the 50 pound sack in it.]

Woman: How do you do that?

Man: You mix it with Ammonium Nitrate, Potassium Chlorate, and Ethylene Glycol.

Woman: Why do you do that?

Man: For recreational purposes. I make about 2000 pounds of explosives each year.

Woman: What do you do with it?

Man: I put them in targets, place them from 375 to 700 yards away and people from all over the whole world come to shoot at them.

Woman: That sounds really interesting! There must be a website for this, right?

[Man breaks out into a smile.]

Man: Yup. Boomershoot.org.

[Man, pushing cart, leaves the building. No guns were brandished, no cops arrived on the scene, and no shots were fired.]

Update: I forgot about the two Spyderco knives the man was carrying.

Ry points out:

The April 2009 edition of the NFA Handbook has removed pin & weld from the methods that are allowed to extend barrels to the minimum (16″ rifle, 18″ shotgun) length to avoid paying an SBR/SBS tax.

And asks:

What happens to the millions of barrels out there that were pinned and welded?

It's possible that 100s of thousands of criminals were just created by a simple regulation change without even a whisper of notice in Congress. Is it tin-foil hat time? Or are they really out to get me?

Ayn Rand indeed.

We shouldn't worry about the Thune Amendment failing last week. Soon there will be something better than Thune's Amendment and more likely to get passed.

Tell your Brady Campaign friends (do they have friends?) it's their turn to stock up. Gun owners have been emptying the shelves of guns and ammo and now it's their turn to empty the shelves--of Depends.

All gun control seeks to obfuscate your authority over violence against you or another. All gun control seeks to obfuscate the legal authority of a whole community. All gun control challenges our supreme authority over our servants.

John Longenecker
July 1, 2009
BOOK REVIEW: Lethal Logic by Henigan, Part II.
[What kind of person allows their servants to tell them only servants are allowed to own guns? Such servants need to be dismissed.--Joe]

A few days ago I reported I might have a chance to ask Mike Lux a a question or two. I got my chance last week and reported via Twitter here, here, here, here, here, and here.

The Twitter posts are below, indented, and in italics:

At the meeting room to hear Mike Lux speak. He should show up in a few minutes. Wearing my Rearden Steel t-shirt. World War Z on my Zune.

Rearden Steel is a little obscure. But it has a very significant meaning. I chose that shirt very deliberately. I'm pretty sure it was lost on everyone at the meeting but it made me smile.

World War Z just happened to be what was next in my queue for listening material but I thought it appropriate listening when about to subject myself to such a "progressive".

Lux says, "I believe the economy is fundamentally broken." "We are on the verge of a great change if we embrace it."

He talked of great moments in history such as the 1930s with the "New Deal" and the 1960s with the "Great Society" and civil rights legislation. He was disappointed with the Clinton administration that they didn't seem to have an real direction or make any progress. Now we have a chance to make some progress if we can just get our act together.

I still get a chill going through me when I think about this. Could it be our financial crisis was very deliberately brought on to make it more likely that socialism will be accepted by U.S. citizens? I had sort of half thought that this might be the last straw and people would have their complete fill of socialism and embrace the free market and our constitution as a result of our current situation. Can't people see that the Obama administration is only making things worse? Or will they be convinced that only he and socialism can save them?

Brrrrr... the chills that gives me.

He talked for quite a while about all the Bill of Rights violations by the Bush administration and expressed some concern President Obama wasn't moving fast enough to correct them.

I asked him to address his concerns over BOR violations by conservatives versus progressives ignoring the 2A and 10th.

I was the last person called upon. There were to be no more questions after mine.

His response was, "We just have a different interpretation of the BOR."

He also said the the government has the "right" to "invest" in the economy and "reform" health care via regulating of interstate commerce.

I corrected him on rights versus powers and he said he didn't know the difference.

Wow, just wow. He thinks mandated health care falls under the regulation of interstate commerce? I think that justification was lost on nearly everyone in the room. After this and my little email exchange with Senator Patty Murray how can a "progressive" claim to have any concern for the BOR or the constitution? How can they claim to have any principles?

...“Brady PAC Illinois” has just released its first semi-annual report of contributions and expenditures.

Their first fund-raiser was held in Chicago, which makes sense; Chicago is one of only a few pockets of serious anti-gun sentiment in Illinois. 91 out of 102 Illinois counties have now passed a “Pro 2A Resolution” that clearly states their opposition to all future gun control efforts in the state. Obviously Cook County is one of the 11 lagging behind on gun rights; the same fund-raisers held anywhere else in Illinois would likely have lost money. The question is, how well did they do in Chicago?

It can be hard to tell from the minimum information available in such reports, but here are the highlights of the Brady report:

• Brady PAC Illinois reported that it raised $27,150 in its first six months.
• Brady PAC Illinois further reported that it paid out $26,517.14 in expenses during the same period.
• This leaves Brady PAC Illinois with $632.86 to show for its first six months.

Don Gwinn

Last night when Barb came home from work she told me that Mrs. Petersen was in the hospital. She was Barb's patient and she had talked and talked about how much her late husband had loved guns and how much being able to host the Lewiston Pistol Club on a small patch of their land meant to him. He loved to shoot and he knew it was important to have a safe place to shoot. The Lewiston Pistol Club, and before that the Palouse Practical Shooters, have been using his land at no charge for over 10 years now.

Barb suggested I bring some flowers and a card to the hospital and stop and chat for a while. Since there was a steel match out at the range today I bought a card before I headed out.

Just as I turned off the engine at the range Barb called and asked, "Have you left yet?" "Uhh... yes", I answered. "Do you have your camera with you?" Again I answered "Yes." "Mrs. Petersen would like a picture of the range sign that mentions her husbands name." I was relieved. Nothing tough or involving a trip back into town causing me to be late for the match.

I took my gear, camera, and the card to the group of people prepping for the match and told them the story. Most of them knew her husband and everyone knew how much having access to that land means to the shooting community. They signed the card and some agreed to pose for the picture after the match.

I took pictures of people shooting (and without me knowing it someone used my own camera to take a picture of me when I was shooting! Thanks to whoever you are!) and the sign.

When I got back into town I had four 8"x10" prints made and delivered them and the card to Mrs. Petersen. It was the first time I had met her. As Adam (Club President for several years) had said many times, and Barb told me just today, she is a very sweet woman. She was appreciative of the card and picture and told me about her daughter who loves to shoot and her grandson who now has one of her late husbands rifles and needs someone to teach him to shoot since he lost his father and both grandfathers. I'll be forwarding the contact info on to the instructors in the club.

Here are the pictures I made prints of:

Adam and Jackie (new shooter at her first match!)

Don B., K.W.H., and Mike B.

The range in use.

Don B., K.W.H., Mike B., Adam M., Don W., Josh A.

I didn't make a print of this picture but since I don't get that many pictures of myself shooting I include it here.

K.W.H. and Joe Huffman

The US forest service has done extensive study on bear behavior, OC for bears, and guns against bears. I have been involved in all aspects of that from the beginning.

Almost everything you hear or read is personal opinion based on either no or very limited data points.

Looking at all the data for 100 years presents a very different story.

For bear defense it cannot be shown that the type or caliber matters, people that shoot back with anything win, people that don't shoot back many times lose. All calibers and action types have been used. Handguns are almost always used at mauling distance. Longarms at 25 yards to dead at your feet.

There is no evidence to support 44 over 357, revolvers are more reliable at contact distance but people have won with semi-autos (but the data pool is very small, as it grows we would at some point start to see malfunctions).

A good revolver in 357 or 44 with powerful solids made to go deep and not deflect is probably the best answer for carry. The pump shotgun still has more kills of grizzly than anything in defense, believe it or not with OO buck, though common wisdom nowadays is use brenneke slugs. Pre WWII 90%+ of the kills were OO.

Greg Hamilton
June 04, 2009 5:15 PM
Handguns for Bear?
Email to the Insights Training List.
[Very interesting! Data is always better than speculation. But I have to wonder how many "lost" data points there are. Cases where someone shot the bear and still ended up as snack food might not be represented in the data set.--Joe]