Monthly Archives: October 2009

Gun control is patriotic

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Sometimes you have to just shake your head and call for the guys in the white uniforms and the butterfly nets:

The more people own guns, the more likely guns are to be used. If Cody wants to do something genuinely patriotic and helpful to her country, she should support gun control legislation.

I suppose it depends on how you define “patriotic”. If “genuinely patriotic and helpful to your country” means enabling genocide then she is absolutely correct:

Update: Daughter Kim reminded me:

patriot, n. and adj.
 
1. a. A person who loves his or her country, esp. one who is ready to support its freedoms and rights and to defend it against enemies or detractors.
In early use, as in French and Dutch, chiefly with ‘good’, ‘true’, ‘worthy’, or other commendatory adjective: cf. ‘good citizen’. ‘Patriot’ for ‘good patriot’ is rare before 1680. At that time often applied to a person who supported the rights of the country against the King and court.

Quote of the day–Benedict D. LaRosa

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The headlines in India and across the world should have read, “Terrorists and Gun Control Claim More Victims.” Instead, the complicity of the various Indian governments – national, state, and city – was ignored and their inability to protect the victims of that tragic event was barely questioned. The truth is that, except for a few policemen on the scene, all the victims were unarmed by public policy. India has among the strictest gun-control laws on Earth, which, according to gun-control advocates, should have made Mumbai one of the safest cities on the planet. So it shouldn’t surprise anyone with common sense or a historical perspective that disarmed citizens and visitors had no way of defending themselves and were, once again, the victims not only of terrorists, but of the misguided, immoral policy of their governments.

Benedict D. LaRosa
October 17, 2009
The Horror of Gun Control in Mumbai
[I’m doing my part to help remedy the situation by teaching some of the Indians I know how to shoot. The students have enjoyed the lessons, are continuing them, and are contemplating purchasing their own firearms.–Joe]

truth and falsity

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This post originally appeared here but will go away as of June 1, 2015. I am therefore, with permission, making a copy here on my blog.

by Linoge, formerly of ‘walls of the city’ – Sunday, October 18, 2009

Given that Kevin will be forced to upgrade/change his commenting system in the near future, I figured this needed to be preserved for posterity’s sake: MikeB,

I may be getting a glimmer of what it going on here too.

Could you please explain how it is that you determine the difference between truth and falsity?

What is the process you use?

I don’t think you know how to do it. This is a common problem and leads to all sorts of conflicts. Both internal and external. Many of which are exhibiting themselves in your writing.

Joe Huffman | 06.08.09 – 7:37 am | #

——————————————————————————–

Joe, I honestly don’t know what you’re talking about, truth or falsity. Unix-Jedi pulled my comments apart, exposed a bunch of contradictions and really ripped me a new one. Good for him. But really my points have been simple enough. Maybe I didn’t express them precisely enough.

I say some DGUs are bogus. That’s the whole point. The one’s we’ve highlighted in our blogs are examples of the millions if you believe Prof. Kleck. I don’t, I believe the ones who say they’re more like 100,000 per year. But, in these examples we can see the mechanism by which a shooter can do something wrong and then cover it up.

The truth or falsity of it would only be known to the shooter. For example, let’s say, hypothetically, because I realize none of us knows for sure, but let’s say the OK pharmacist saw that the kid was down and out, but was still so furious with so much adrenalin pumping that he said the hell with it, and shot the kid five more times.

Now comes the trial. His lawyer encourages him to say the kid was shot in the head but was still moving for his gun and was still a threat. The trial ends in acquittal, the DGU list gets one more entry, and only the pharmacist knows the truth.

Do you think that kind of thing doesn’t happen? Do you think it’s so rare as to be negligible? mikeb302000 | 06.09.09 – 3:09 am | #

——————————————————————————–

My question is much more general than just relating to guns. It’s about the basics of your understanding of the world around you, “How do you determine if a statement/hypothesis is true or false? What is the process by which you make this determination?”

If you cannot articulate this then, in the most literal sense, you don’t have a clue as to what is true or false, right or wrong, good or evil. This is a common problem with many, many people that I debate guns with. They literally do not know how to figure out if something is true or false. One person said, “It depends on how I feel.” Another said, “Some people figure it out based on logic and facts and others do it based on feelings. Both ways are equally valid–it’s been proven.” So tell us, step by step, how do you determine truth from falsity?

Joe Huffman | 06.09.09 – 7:55 am | #

——————————————————————————–

I’m a little bit offended by the question, Joe. It sounds incredibly condescending of you to speak as if you and your gun buddies are trained logisticians, philosophically speaking, and I and the antigun folks “cannot articulate this” simple idea.

I try to be objective and open minded. I try to inform myself of the necessary information. I take things with a grain of salt, but not excessively so. I use my best common sense and logic.

I guess there’s more, but that’s the idea.

How’d I do? mikeb302000 | 06.10.09 – 5:45 am | #

——————————————————————————-I’m sorry.

You failed.

No expression of the process. Not even the slightest clue.

You might try reading up on the Scientific Method (and here).

Joe Huffman | 06.10.09 – 6:48 am | #

MikeB302000 had some more things to say concerning the nature of truth and falsehood over at Tam’s weblog, but Joe Huffman has that preserved for the future, so I am not too worried about it.

Remember – these are the people who would strip us of our rights. These are the people who would turn us into criminals (like them) for daring to exercise those rights. These are the people who aid and abet criminals on a daily basis. These are the people who have no respect or regard for the sanctity of human life or the self-defense measures necessary to preserve it. …People who cannot even tell fact from fiction.

Scary, nyet?

Quote of the day–Sarah Brady

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Our task of creating a socialist America can only succeed when all those who would resist us have been totally disarmed.

Sarah Brady,
for Handgun Control Inc.,
To Senator Howard Metzanbaum.
National Educator 1994, page 3.
[Nice quote. Except it’s totally bogus. I once spent several hours trying to verify it without success and concluded it probably was bogus. I thought I would try again today and almost immediately found what I expected.–Joe]

Failure to listen?

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One could imagine the Los Angles Times just hasn’t been listening when they say things like this when referring to requiring a background check for all firearm transactions:

None of these measures would restrict the 2nd Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens; their intent is solely to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous individuals. Though the gun lobby raises a hue and cry whenever such proposals arise, it has yet to explain why it wants to make it easy for murderers, armed robbers and other criminals to obtain the tools of their trade. Bloomberg’s gun-show expose has the whiff of a political stunt, but if it gets politicians and the public talking about gun control again, it’s a stunt we can applaud.

The gun lobby “has yet to explain” why they oppose such restrictions? That is total B.S. The reason we don’t want all transactions to go through licensed gun dealers is because it leaves a paper trail of each and every gun. When makes confiscations like those that happened in New York City, New Jersey, and California (not to mention England, Cuba, and Nazi Germany) more likely and much easier. I have to conclude that it’s not about a failure to listen on their part. I believe it is because what we are concerned about is precisely their goal.

We need to put the challenge to them instead of allowing them to challenge us. We are the ones that are defending a specific enumerate right against their proposed infringements.

The way to do it is to demand they justify the restrictions. Do people have to register with the government before they can exercise their rights to free speech or exercise their religions? Government registration and oversight of the exercise of a right is a chilling effect on that right. In addition the proponents of such paper trails have yet to show where the proposed laws have made people safer. They cannot answer Just One Question.

NP3 for your gun

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Robar calls their NP3 process “the ultimate firearms finish”. I don’t have enough data points to confirm or deny that claim but I have to admit I have been very happy with it on my STI Eagle 5.1 (link is to a 5.0, the 5.1 is obsolete). The bluing on my Ruger P-89 wore off after a few years of use and the baked on black finish on my customized Remington 700 is easily scratched. The black anodized aluminum on my AR-15 appears to hold up well although it hasn’t been exposed to nearly as much abuse as my pistols have.

After I got my STI back from being repaired it looked like one of those cars you see sometimes with a the hood a different color from the rest of the body and a door or two with still different colors. I took it to the range a put a few rounds through it to verify the functionality and the very next day sent it and several of my magazines to Robar for an NP3 make over.

When I called and asked how long it would take before I would get my gun back they said “we are currently running five to six weeks”. It took four weeks to the day.

They disassembled the gun, stripped all the old finish off, and treated most of the internal parts as well as the external. Here is what they say about it:

What is NP3?
NP3 is a surface treatment for steel and metal alloys that combines sub-micron particles of PTFE (polytetrafluoroethylene), otherwise known as Teflon, with electroless nickel.

NP3 – THE PROCESS
The application of NP3 is auto-catalytic, that is, not requiring any form of electricity. This process is preferable to standard electrolytic plating as all active surfaces are evenly plated, which is not the case with any electrolytically deposited coating. With Robar’s well-equipped laboratory, coating thickness can be maintained to within .0002″ or two ten thousandths of one inch, guaranteeing consistent quality coatings. With the PTFE evenly distributed and locked into the nickel-phosphorus matrix, NP3 is a true composite. If wear occurs, fresh particles of PTFE are exposed to keep the opposing surfaces lubricated throughout the life of the coating.

NP3 – THE ADVANTAGES

  • Very accurate and even coatings on all activated surfaces.
  • No lubrication is needed on opposing surfaces.
  • Cleaning is minimal, usually requiring only a soft cloth.
  • Permits firing for longer periods of time between cleaning, as dirt and powder residue has no wet or oily surface to cling to.
  • NP3 has a micro hardness of 48-51 Rockwell as plated (nickel matrix).
  • NP3 is very corrosion resistant, a 1 mil (.001) coating exceeding a 240 hour salt spray test.
  • NP3 has a high lubricity and low friction co-efficient; therefore, the life expectancy of a firearm will be greatly increased due to reduced friction wear.
  • The coating is strippable with no effect on the base metal, allowing other coatings to be applied or a new coating of NP3 to be applied, if necessary.�
  • NP3 plated onto stainless steel guns will prevent galling, a problem common with stainless steel.
  • NP3 is a satin gray, non-reflective color ideal for all firearms.
  • NP3 can be plated to all internal parts giving a smoothness to the action not found with any other coating.
  • In cases where the NP3 has been perforated, the corrosion shows no tendency to spread or migrate under the coating.
  • NP3 is guaranteed against corrosion, peeling or flaking for the lifetime of the firearm.

I think it looks great:

Before I use it for carry or competition I will take it to the range and do some more functional testing. When I got the gun back after getting the original NP3 finish I discovered the gun had a tendency to go full auto on me. I had to take it back to the gunsmith for some minor tweaking of the fire control system. I don’t know if it was a disassembly/assembly error or the slick Teflon on some critical surfaces that caused it to misbehave.

If you have a gun in need of a new finish I strongly suggest you consider the NP3.

Painted Ordnance*

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I carry a gun with me everywhere I can without getting in trouble. Since I sometimes work and play in some extremely dirty environments my carry gun gets very dirty as well (story for the picture below is here):

My Gun Blog 45 has been my carry gun while my STI was being repaired (see also here) and it has been exposed to my daily life. Perhaps I’m expecting too much or the dirt was too much but I’m disappointed in the finish. The paint is wearing off in a number of places:

It took 10 years to get a similar amount of wear in the NP3 finish (custom enhancement, not the default configuration) of my STI. To be fair there was another variable that may have contributed. Most of the holster time for my STI was spent in a leather holster. It may be that the hard plastic Blackhawk holster for the last two months contributed to the excessive wear on the Para gun.

* I didn’t invent the phrase “Painted Ordnance” to mock Para Ordinance (now Para USA). I first heard that phrase from another blogger (who will remain nameless unless I have permission to reveal their name) who may or may not have stopped using it out of politeness. Since I, obviously, don’t worry all that much about being polite I thought it appropriate to use the phrase for a blog post title.

Quote of the day–Benjamin Franklin

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‘Tis a common observation here that our cause is the cause of all mankind, and that we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.

Benjamin Franklin
[Although our fight for the right to keep and bear arms is just a small part of the total “liberty package” it is the essential liberty that enables all the others to be realized and to be held. For that reason our fight is like that of Franklin’s day. It is a fight for the liberty of all mankind. Our cause is just and our cause is not just for the residents of D.C., Chicago, or New York. It is for the future of mankind. Will mankind be forever in fear of the next tyrant or thug or will the individual be able to defend themselves and their community against perpetual servitude?–Joe]

Why aren’t they screaming about this illegal act?

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So even though I don’t pay much attention to them it was hard to avoid hearing about “the criminals in the White house” and all the “criminal acts” and the charges of treason against the Bush administration. But what I don’t get is why I don’t hear anything about Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels when he does stuff like this:

A new city of Seattle gun ban takes effect this week – prohibiting firearms in places like city parks and community centers.

But the law is already generating controversy with many asking is this new rule truly enforceable? Washington state Attorney General Rob McKenna and some community gun advocates say, no.

“What this does is put Seattle on a collision course with state law,” says Dan Sytman, the Attorney General’s office spokesperson.

The questionable deeds that Bush administration did at least had prior approval from the U.S. Attorney General’s office. Nickels is doing something that all legal advisers, except the city lawyer who found a contorted rational, say is illegal.

So where is the outcry from the left?

Apparently they don’t really care about politicians engaged in illegal acts. They just wanted to remove their political opponents by whatever means possible. Having their own politicians commit illegal acts on their behalf is just fine.

See also what Ry has to say on the topic.

Quote of the day–Suresh Parameshwar

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So, do you still give chemistry lessons on the white-board in your office?

Suresh Parameshwar
October 15, 2009
[See also another time when I quoted Suresh.

Suresh was my mentor at Microsoft when I first started working there full time. Almost two years ago he left Redmond to go back to India (still working for MS). He was back in Redmond this week on business and stopped by to visit friends. A bunch of us had dinner at our old boss’s house last night and stay up talking until almost midnight.

Before he went back to India on more than one occasion Suresh and I had discussions about explosives and I explained the chemistry to him on the white-board.

The above question was one of the first things he said to me when I saw him last night.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Bill Wilson

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The tepid response by Missouri to this episode is frankly appalling. If no record of who produced and approved this trash exists, then the entire leadership who was working at MIAC at the time of this report being drafted and issued should be fired and barred from future law enforcement service.

Bill Wilson
President Americans for Limited Government
October 15, 2009
ALG Blasts Missouri Information Analysis Center For Retaining No Records of Erroneous MIAC “Modern Militia Movement” Report
[H/T to Dave Hardy.

Remember the “Modern Militia Movement” document that came out last February? Well via a Freedom of Information act request they say the don’t know who wrote it or approved it. They don’t even have anything but a draft version of that document.

Typical. I have FOIA requests to Pacific Northwest National Labs that were supposed to be answered within 20 days and it’s been, what, 2+ years and they haven’t done anything but acknowledge receipt of the requests. Then there was the one request I involved my congressman, a lawyer, and the DOE on and documents that I originally wrote which were completely open suddenly became For Official Use Only. But in order to tell my lawyer that they revealed material that was classified as Secret — without telling him it was classified.–Joe]

Boomershoot infrastructure work

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Last Saturday daughter Kim, her husband Caleb, and I went to the Boomershoot site to deliver the last of the supplies (we still need a few thousand rubber bands but I’ll wait on those) for Boomershoot 2010.

We only needed a couple more concrete blocks but I bought a bunch extra. It turned out we used all the extras and then some when I thought of a new project we could do while there.

Caleb finished up setting the steps down to the “well” in concrete. We had originally thought the hard dirt was sufficient footing but in the wet spring the steps became unsteady. This should fix the problem:

I soldered and taped the electrical connections to the new solar panel. Kim and Caleb put in the new screws that hold the panel to the side of the shed while I went and got the bulldozer.

Kim also folded several hundred more target boxes:

We now have 1595 boxes folded and ready for the event. All of our crates are full (except for one):

 

The plan is to fold another 500 or so after we use up targets on the Friday and Saturday evening High Intensity shoots.

I pointed out to Kim and Caleb where I had cleared some brush a few weeks ago to make a “parking area” and then later thought it would be better used as a tent site if I had only thought of it sooner. They thought the tent site was a great idea and Kim said she might even go out there camping “just for the fun of it”. Caleb suggested a fire pit would be a good idea too. That was when I decided I didn’t really have a choice anymore. I had to go get the cat and make the tent site.

The ground was incredibly dry. At times it was like working with flour (or as Caleb said, “Sifted potassium chlorate”) and very dusty.

Kim and Caleb make a fire ring with nearby rocks in the area I had cleared which was the proper ATF specified distance from the explosives magazine:

I then thought of another thing we could do. I could make a toilet out of the extra concrete blocks we had! I dug a hole with the cat around the corner behind some trees and brush. Even down about four feet the ground was dry as a bone.

We will probably put up a tarp for better privacy when we have our entire Boomershoot crew or a private event out there. I plan to plant some trees or shrubs to make the tarp unnecessary.

We then stacked the concrete blocks into the proper shape:

We filled in around it and planted grass everywhere we had dug up the ground. I’m hoping we get some rain soon so the grass will get started a little bit this fall.

The other things we got done was that Caleb replace few broken stepping stones and added some more to our work area outside the shed and I winterized the pump and repaired the sabotage we blame on “The Dwarf” who lives nearby.

I wanted to call the simple toilet “Kimberly’s Throne” but for some reason I was vetoed on that. She said I could build her a real throne if I wanted. But a “[deleted] cold concrete” toilet didn’t cut it.

Quote of the day–Alan Korwin

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Note that L.A. gangs are notorious for rejecting diversity and multiculturalism, according to LAPD estimates. The most numerous gangs are Latino, with 22,309 non-diverse members, and blacks (Crips and Bloods), with 14,515 non-diverse members. Rumors that white, oriental and other gangs will be filing Title VII discrimination charges could not be confirmed at press time.

Alan Korwin
October 13, 2009
1,400 arrest 46
[If such a lawsuit were actually filed it would probably cause me to spontaneously break out into giggle fits for a month.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Edward Abbey

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No tyranny is so irksome as petty tyranny: the officious demands of policemen, government clerks, and electromechanical gadgets.

Edward Abbey
[I’m not so sure about the electromechanical gadgets but the other stuff strikes a nerve with me.

I’m reminded of this by the ammo sale restriction bill just signed into law in California. It’s more than just irksome, but it isn’t so dangerous or infuriating that it’s worth starting a civil war over.–Joe]

The “stopping power” debate will never end

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John Fogh offers this advice from John Holschen:

Believing that the 5.56 “stopping power problem” is solved by a different bullet and/or cartridge is likely delusional in my opinion.

This statement doesn’t stand on it’s own because I’m pretty sure a 16″ shell from the Missouri is an instantaneous (for all practical purposes) man stopper. Just the muzzle blast will kill. But that’s the nit-picky engineer in me. And besides, Holschen qualifies it as referring to handheld firearms:

The stopping power “problem” is based on the misconception that there exists a hand-held firearm which can instantly terminate hostile behavior (reliably and repeatedly).

But the most interesting part to me was the conclusive evidence that:

…[A] BG was hit 12 times with an AR at a range of 9-12 yds.

  • 10 rounds struck his torso producing fatal damage to his liver, spleen, heart and both lungs.
  • 1 round struck his right femur fracturing same (and starting his fall toward the ground.)
  • 1 round entered through his left eye and destroyed a significant portion of his brain (this was the last shot according to forensics but they noted the BG was already falling at the time this round hit him.)
  • The shooting was captured on both video and (separate) audio recordings. The elapsed time from the LEO’s first shot to his 15th shot (total rounds fired) was just under 5 seconds.
  • During those 5 seconds the BG continued to fight, firing 6 rounds from a .357 revolver.

The LEO fired three rounds per second and got 12 of his 15 shots on target and one of those was a head shot, all while being shot at by the bad guy. Impressive. Had he been shooting a .30 caliber rifle I doubt he could gotten near as many shots on target in that time frame. What this may mean is that in a similar event the .30 caliber rifleman would have put only two or three shots in the target and the BG stopped his attack in the same amount of time.

So which caliber has more “stopping power”? Remember, you can double the effectiveness of any bullet by putting another round through your target.

Quote of the day–Michael Beard

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I often find that true wisdom comes from simple stories, and one of the great story tellers was the one called Jesus of Nazareth.

According to the writer known as Luke, Jesus was traveling through the borderlands of Samaria and Galilee on a journey to Jerusalem. He stopped in a village and told his listeners a story about a widow and an unjust judge.

He said that in a certain town there was once a judge who cared nothing for God or man. There was a widow in that same town who constantly came before the judge demanding justice against her opponent.

For a long time the judge refused to grant the widow justice. But in the end he said to himself, “True, I don’t fear God or care about men, but this widow is so great a nuisance that I will see her righted before she wears me out with her persistence.”

In this simple story there is a great political lesson that is often easy to overlook. The persistent widow is a reminder to those who seek justice that we should never lose heart. We must continue to press on, and will be rewarded if we do so.

Michael Beard
October 12, 2009
Wear Them Out
[Good advice. The anti-gun bigots have nothing but hate and fear to sustain them. That is very draining. It saps their energy. It is depressing. It is lonely. It is a very anti-social mindset. They are very unhappy people.

Freedom loving people have a myriad of social outlets and rejoice in competitions. They acquire new skills. They learn about the mechanics and physics of simple but incredibly clever and precise machines that can propel small pieces of metal at Mach 3+ across distances that take you 10 minutes to walk and hit objects that are impossible to see at that distance with the naked eye. They hunt and bring food home to their families. Guns are part of the Olympics. What do the anti-gun people have to show to compete with the thousands of competitive events each year and the Gold, Silver, and Bronze metals that are recorded in the permanent history of mankind? Nothing but news releases that dance in the blood of innocents killed and maimed by criminals.

The People of the Gun know history is made with guns and love to learn that history. They know it is guns in the hands of everyday people that keep the would be tyrant from attempting to gain power and brutalize them, their family, and their neighbors because they happen to have the wrong skin color, the wrong religious beliefs, wear glasses, or own property. They know the gun is civilization and although it can and has been used for evil it is far more often used for the protection of innocent life and property against those that do not respect life or the property of others.

Because gun ownership is a positive thing it makes it easier for us to be persistent over the long haul. The Million Mom March was founded in August 1999, reached their peak in May of 2000 with, according to their own (probably inflated) numbers consisted of nearly one million people. Now they don’t even have a website of their own — http://www.millionmommarch.org/ redirects to the Brady Campaign. They were a flash in the pan because it’s hard to hold onto hate for very long. The Brady Campaign is 35 years old but even after merging with the MMM have so few adherents they don’t even bother to have a way to join their organization. They have nothing to offer prospective members except hate and fear. The NRA is 138 years old and has thousand of instructors, millions of members, a history of competitions, they helped blacks protect their communities in the darkest days of the KKK, they teach hunter safety, and helped Great Britain prepare for the expected invasion from Germany in WW II.

Make the most of that persistence. The other side frequently has an unfair advantage with the assistance of a duplicitous press and their own willingness to twist the truth and ignore the facts but our numbers, our love of people and freedom, and our righteousness give us the long term advantage. They made a big play for the win during the Clinton years and many or even most gun owner rights activists thought the bigots had won. But they ran out of steam and we are now winning.

Let’s keep doing what we do best. For some people that will be a great gun blog, mocking those that hate freedom, playing the political game, teaching new shooters, teaching experienced shooters to be better than they ever thought was humanly possible, getting good press for gun owners, or it might be just being a proud and responsible gun owner who takes a new shooter to the range every once in a while.

Michael Beard is right that persistent is important and that characteristic will enable our eventual win. But I suspect it was some sort of Freudian slip that resulted in that recognition of his. Michael Beard is on the losing side of this epic struggle for freedom. He recognized the persistence of his opposition and envies it.–Joe]

Ambush ahead?

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Sometimes when your battles are going too well you have to wonder if there is an ambush being prepared. We won Heller, incorporation looks like a shoe-in, we (will soon) be able to take guns in National Parks, and the police, in some jurisdictions, can be sued if they even temporarily detain someone for openly carrying a gun. Except for Heller all of that occurred since “the most anti-gun administration in U.S. history” took power.

As thrilled as I am about all the progress we have been making it also makes me a little bit paranoid. Certainly the administration has lots of other high priority tasks facing it. The economy, the war, and the self-flagellation of advocating more government control of health care probably does distract from their campaign promise of attacking gun owners. And certainly a case could be made for incompetence for accomplishing anything other than getting elected. But could it be the administration have some clever, nefarious plan to make all our civil rights gains moot?

If so, it probably can’t be through the legislature and the courts. It would have to be something like martial law, emergency powers, or possibly an international treaty. Such a treaty is being discussed again:

Seven countries have launched a campaign for the U.N. to start negotiations on a new treaty regulating the global arms trade to help prevent the illegal transfer of guns that kill and maim thousands every day.

…

According to a report published this week by the British relief agency Oxfam and 11 other non-governmental organizations, some 2.1 million people — overwhelmingly civilians — have died either directly or indirectly as a result of armed violence since the General Assembly first voted in December 2006 to work toward a treaty regulating the growing, multibillion dollar arms trade.

This is the equivalent of more than 2,000 people dying every day — worse than one person killed each minute, the report said.

“There is an overflow of government sponsored and private illegal armies, ethnic militias and non-state guerrilla forces,” former U.N. humanitarian chief Jan Egeland, who now heads the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, said in a forward to the report.

“And they are supplied as never before with lethal weapons by reckless states,” Egeland said. “Only a forceful, unambiguous and verifiable convention can control transfers and do away with the networks of illegal arms brokers that supply our generation’s weapons of mass killings and mass misery.”

Duncan said that after three years of discussions, Britain, Argentina, Australia, Costa Rica, Finland, Japan and Kenya have proposed a resolution establishing negotiations to draft and agree on a treaty.

The idea of a treaty “is still contentious,” Duncan said. But supporters are hoping the disarmament committee will support the resolution and the 192-member General Assembly will approve the measure later this year. That would pave the way for negotiations leading up to an international conference in 2012 that would hopefully adopt the new treaty.

Last year, the assembly overwhelmingly endorsed a working group to move toward negotiations by a vote of 147-2, with the U.S. and Zimbabwe casting “no” votes. Others were either absent or abstained.

Whether President Barack Obama’s administration will now back negotiations remains to be seen.

Gun control is a hotly contentious issue in the United States, where the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees citizens the right to “keep and bear arms,” and powerful lobby groups routinely oppose almost every effort to restrict gun sales and ownership — and usually win.

Supporters of a new treaty stress that it will not interfere with legal arms sales but will target illegal weapons transfers.

What these people apparently fail to consider is the number of people that are killed because of gun control. Even in their own numbers above they are including deaths by governments intent exterminating people because of racial and/or religious differences which could have been prevented had the oppressed been able to defend themselves.

Probably the biggest risk of the treaty to U.S. gun owners is such a treaty will almost certainly require that guns be registered so their movement can be carefully tracked. Registration must never be allowed. The risk is just too high. Remember my Jews In The Attic Test and just say no until you are out of ammo.

Quote of the day–Lyle @ UltiMAK

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In reality, you either do or you do not advocate government control over the right to keep and bear arms, you either do or do not support the second amendment, and you either do or you do not advocate a nanny state– you either do or do not embrace the principles of the Left. Any attempt to place yourself “in the middle” puts you in agreement with the basic principles (rationalizations) of those who would violate your and your neighbors’ rights.

Why can’t we all just get along? Because some people want their liberty and others want to control everyone. Are you going to stand on the side of liberty or on the side of the aggressors? Pick one, or stay the hell out of the way.

Lyle @ UltiMAK
October 10, 2009
Comment on Quote of the day–John Hardin
[Actually I put myself “in the middle”. But that is because Lyle is using a different definition of “the middle” than the one I use. In actuality a strict and literal interpretation of the Second Amendment is “the middle ground“.–Joe]

Word substitution game

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I played the word substitution game in this opinion piece in hopes it communicates how my blood pressure rises when I read about repression of gun ownership:

A preview of the argument is made in a case making its way through the federal courts. It challenges the District of Columbia’s gun ni**er law, which was revised after the Supreme Court’s prior action. It allows handgun ni**er permits only for residents who intend to use the guns for self-defense at home allow them to visit in their homes. It still bans people from carrying guns ni**ers around the nation’s capital, where each year millions of tourists, schoolchildren, visiting officials and foreign dignitaries come to conduct business, immerse themselves in history or celebrate spring amid the splendor of cherry blossoms.

…

“They want to establish a constitutional right to take any gun ni**er, anywhere, at any time,” says Dennis Henigan, vice president of law and policy at the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Ni**er Violence. “They want to force that into every nook and cranny of American society.”

Many Americans were unnerved at the sight of gun-toting ni**er protesters at health care discussion forums and even outside of events where Obama was appearing in the summer. The cheerless truth is that the gun ni**er lobby, with the probable blessing of the Supreme Court, proudly promises more of the same.

Quote of the day–RWB

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Uh,huh. And no supporter of abortion should ever make a decision over abortion, or a supporter or illegal immigration should make a decision over amnesty for illegals, or a gay person should make a decision over gay issues, and on, and on…

Show us Mr. Henigan why the judge’s judgment has been impaired and then we can talk. Until then your opinion smells of bigotry.

RWB
October 10, 2009
In response to Dennis Henigan saying, “I don’t think gun dealers should be deciding the constitutionality of gun laws”. From the comment section of the article Justice who wrote gun decision is a gun dealer.
[This comment wouldn’t normally make the cut for my QOTD but the bigotry meme made me smile. It’s the proper state of mind for dealing with the anti-gun people.–Joe]