Author Archives: Joe

Quote of the day—William Jefferson Clinton

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The Brady bill will make the streets of America so safe that our nation’s police will not even need to carry guns anymore.

William Jefferson Clinton
On TV, while signing the Brady bill in 1993.
Quoted in Sheriff Richard Mack’s book, The Magic of Gun Control.
[Of course everyone knows now that President Clinton is a pathological liar and surely many people, including some of the supporters of the law, knew this was a lie at the time. What many probably didn’t know was that he even the chief advocates for the law who made far more modest claims about the law have a cultural and long history of lies.

But still there are people that believe the near equivalent of this even though just a little bit of rational thought will yield the conclusion that background checks cannot possible do any net good. People have a strong propensity to believe what they want to believe. And don’t get me started on the prior restraint of a specific enumerated right.

See also Robb Allen’s post on the Clinton quote from a couple of years ago.—Joe

Update: This quote may be one of those too good to be true things. Here is the signing speech.]

Quote of the day—Michele Washam

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Small penis huh? My goodness, an action-movie badass wannabe like yourself looks SO intimidating with that big gun…

Michele Washam
July 14, 2015
Comment to Judge Orders Anti-Obama Filmmaker D’Souza Receive Psychological Counseling
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]

Quote of the day—Daniel Greenfield

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These changes are a test of reason. If you can reason, you fail. If you can Doublethink, you pass.

Daniel Greenfield
June 30, 2015
No Truce With The Left
[Reason. I think of it as a test of someone trustworthiness. If they are unwilling or unable to reason I am uncomfortable being around them. I literally don’t have any idea what they might do or say next. Will they claim I attacked them when all I did was smile and say hello? Will they hit me in the head with a rock? I would rather be in the presence of a sociopath because I can model their behavior as looking out for their best interests and make it clear to them it would be irrational for them to cause me harm and in fact it would be in their best interests to have me as their ally.

But the irrational, non-reasoning, person is extremely dangerous. There is no loyalty. There is no mutual benefits. There is only unpredictability. There is only the prospect of chaos, suffering, and death.

Marxism, communism, socialism, whatever variety of leftism and you want to call it, has such a long proven history of poverty and death that only irrational people can support it. Venezuela is only of the most recent examples that went from an “economy was the strongest in South America” in the 1950s to the early 1980s to the massive shortages, unemployment, thriving black market, and the highest misery index score in 2013.

The USSR, mainland China, and many other countries learned their lesson the hard way with massive shortages, mind boggling corruption, and 10s of millions murdered by their own governments. Numerous experiments in the 20th century, on national scales, prove beyond any doubt the benefits of freedom and the hazards of adapting the ways of the leftists. How can anyone ignore the lessons of East versus West Germany? Or North Korea versus South Korea? China versus Hong Kong?

Freedom and capitalism has brought prosperity, and unbelievable technological advancement which benefits the entire world. Yet the political left continue to insist their way is “progress”. These are not rational people. They cannot be trusted. These people are incapable of rational thought and/or are evil. The correct diagnosis does not matter. Greenfield is right. There can be no truce with the left.—Joe]

Franklin Falls

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It is very hot this weekend and Barb went looking for a hike that wasn’t too long and with very little elevation gain. Franklin Falls met our criteria.

It was crowded and it is easy to see why. The trail was mostly wide and smooth. The trail was shaded and while it was 90 F at home it was 72 F at the trail head. Only at the very end was it a little bit sketchy with a steep drop off on one side:

WP_20150718_11_40_52_Pro

The actual falls were nice too:

WP_20150718_009WP_20150718_11_19_05_Pro

The bridge you see in the upper left of the picture above is the west bound lanes of I-90 just west of Snoqualmie Pass. As Barb said, “I had no idea this was here.”

Ammo matters

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I tested out some different .40 S&W ammo the other day. Although I usually use my reloads I like to know which factory ammo can also be used. I seldom have reliability problems with centerfire ammo but accuracy is frequently a problem.

I was very pleased to discover that Federal RTP40180 (RTP => Range Target Practice) did well in my STI DVC Limited. The two groups below are offhand at 10 yards and 25 yards:

WP_20150716_12_35_26_Pro

The groups are small enough I believe about half of the group size is due to user error. Compare this ammo to other ammo I have tested in the same gun here.

What I find odd is that I can’t find the ammo on Federal’s website although several websites have the ammo for sale at a good price.

Quote of the day—Anwar al-Awlaki

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If you have the right to slander the Messenger of Allah, we have the right to defend him. If it is part of your freedom of speech to defame Muhammad it is part of our religion to fight you.

…

Assassinations, bombings, and acts of arson are all legitimate forms of revenge against a system that relishes the sacrilege of Islam in the name of freedom.

Anwar al-Awlaki
From May Our Souls be Sacrificed for You in the July 11, 2010 issue of Inspire via Fanning the Flames of Jihad
[Someone doesn’t understand the concept of rights or freedom. Trying to explain them with ordinary words doesn’t seem to work very well. If someone attempts to exercise their “rights” in the manner suggested above I suggest you have bullets for back up of your words.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Suzyqpie

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Guns kill. The fork ate the cake. Same thinking.

Suzyqpie
July 16, 2015
Comment to Gun control activists call for probe of NRA’s political spending
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Decent pro-con comparison

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I found the gun debate presented here close to fair. I wish they would have done some fact checking on the claims of the people/organizations they quote. But overall it is pretty good. It has a collection of facts that could be useful. For example:

The most-recently available total annual spending budgets for gun control groups were $13.7 million collectively (4.7% of the NRA’s 2013 budget): including Everytown for Gun Safety ($4.7 million in 2012); the Brady Campaign ($2.7 million in 2012); the Brady Center ($3.1 million in 2010); Coalition to Stop Gun Violence ($308,761 in 2011); Sandy Hook Promise ($2.2 million in 2013); and the Violence Policy Center ($750,311 in 2012).

It includes a decent history of gun laws and gun organizations.

It’s worth a read.

Reasoning sounds

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Anti-gun people attempt to fake rational thought. Here is another example:

In the wake of the July 1 attack in which illegal alien Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez allegedly used a stolen gun to shoot and kill Kathryn Steinle, San Francisco supervisor Mark Farrell is pushing a new gun control law that will require every gun and ammunition sale to be videotaped.

This law will increase the focus on law-abiding citizens who buy guns and ammo–as those are the kinds of transactions that will be videotaped–while completely ignoring the problem of illegal aliens in sanctuary cities using guns, acquired via theft or otherwise, to harm citizens.

To top it off the gun was one in the possession of a Federal agent.

This is crazy talk. But as crazy as this is the sad/disturbing/scary thing is that many people accept and approve of this sort of thing.

It’s as if when confronted with lemons, water, and sugar some politician attempts to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Then a significant number of people want the government to force everyone to eat the sandwiches.

Quote of the day—bajacalla

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now we know exactly why Republicans hate gun control laws: it’s just tooooo haaaaaaaaaard!!!!!

bajacalla
July 15, 2015
Comment to Missing From New York’s Gun Control Law
[This is what they think of you.

In addition to reading comprehension apparently punctuation is too hard for this brainiac.—Joe]

Times are changing

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Winning:

The idea that guns provide protection appears to be quickly gaining currency among American blacks. In December, 54 percent of blacks polled by Pew said they believed guns were more likely to protect people than to put their safety at risk. That figure was up from 29 percent two years earlier. For whites, 62 percent said guns protect people, up from 54 percent in 2012.

Those are huge changes in a relatively short time.

It may seem odd to my readers that only about 60% of people think “guns protect people” (poor wording, but everyone should be able to extract the correct meaning from that). But if your only exposure to electricity was lighting bolts and electric chairs you might have a tough time believing someone extoling the virtues of electric lights, heat, and motors. That is essentially the case with people who have been living in “gun-free zones” for decades. The Heller and McDonald decisions, Shall Issue, and Constitutional Carry are having their effect in exposing the true nature of gun ownership. Or should I say exposing the true nature of the anti-gun people?

Quote of the day—Bruce Schneier

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It’s one thing to have dissatisfied customers. It’s another to have dissatisfied customers with death squads.

Bruce Schneier
July 7, 2015
More on Hacking Team
[If your business model involves customers who enforce their contracts without respect for the legal system I would seriously question the long term viability of your business. There are probably better long term career prospects. I would like to suggest shoveling fresh manure as a better option.—Joe]

Ted Bundy: King of Hearts

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Barb’s nephew, Tyler Brown, is a graduating senior at the University of Washington. As his thesis project he is making a short film about Ted Bundy. I’ve talked to him a couple times about the film. He’s been researching it for a couple years now and had some amazing stuff come together for it.

He was telling some other students about his project and one of them told him (paraphrased), “I live in the house Bundy used to live in. Would you like to film some scenes in it?”

Another person involved in the film has a VW Beetle of the correct color.

He discovered Bundy’s ex-girlfriend, who is extremely secretive, lives about a mile from where he lives. He visited her and gave her a copy of the script.

Bundy spent a lot of time at a bar in the University District and followed at least one victim from the bar. The bar is Dante’s. They still had the booth, in storage for 20 years, that Bundy frequently sat in. Tyler helped them get it out of storage and it is now back in service. Tyler will film part of the video in that booth*.

Tyler is raising money via Kickstarter to finish the film. See the trailer, learn more about the film, and donate.

* Although it was many years later Barb went to school at the U of W and spent time at Dante’s as well. She remembers the large L-shaped booth.

Good news, bad news

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Remember the big Ebola concerns about a year ago? We just had to be careful to avoid direct contact with body fluids and we wouldn’t get infected, right? Everyone knew that even though some people were saying there was evidence it could be airborne. But the airborne hypothesis was mostly dismissed.

Good news and bad news just came out. There is a vaccine which is working in the first primate trials. Inhalable Ebola vaccine effective in primates:

One dose of an inhalable Ebola vaccine was enough to protect monkeys exposed to 1,000 times the fatal Ebola dose from being infected by the disease, according to a new study.

An inhalable version of the vaccine means that highly trained medical personnel would not be necessary to distribute it, however researchers remain cautious because one vaccine this year already was shown to have no effect on humans despite working well in primates.

…

Researchers compared the effects of the aerosol and liquid forms as well, finding that the aerosol appeared to induce a stronger immune response in the respiratory tract than the liquid form. Because Ebola, which can be spread through the air, often enters the body through the lungs and respiratory system, the extra protection from the virus there is seen as important to its efficacy.

Emphasis added.

Quote of the day—Sebastian

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If the anti-gun movement had a patron saint, it would be Gladys Kravitz.

Sebastian
July 10, 2015
They Still Have No Idea What They Are Up Against
[While this is very close to true and very funny I’m surprised Sebastian is old enough to know who Gladys Kravitz is. I’m pretty sure he could have only see the reruns while I saw the shows when they first came out.

The part of the Kravitz character that well represents the anti-gun movement is she was a mostly ignored, shrill, annoying, busybody, attempting to get innocent people in trouble. Even her own husband didn’t much care for her. That’s a pretty good characterization of the anti-gun movement.

The aspect of Gladys Kravitz representing the anti-gun movement that is not true is that in the TV show Kravitz actually knew to within a small margin of error what was going on in her neighbors house and told the truth to anyone who would listen. Everyone, except the target of her campaign, thought she was a nutcase. The anti-gun movement is either totally clueless and/or is deliberately lying to the public.—Joe]

Steel Challenge match results

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Ry and I went to a steel challenge match yesterday. I shot both a .22 and my STI. The .22 ran perfectly. But with my STI I had one round with an oversized spot (0.434”, versus the specified 0.4241”) just above the extractor groove which locked up the gun hard. I had to grip the slide tightly and bang away on the grip with the palm of my hand to get the round extracted.

I had about 100 rounds of the polymer coated lead bullet cartridges left. About half of them would not fit in the case gauge. Last week I purchased the Lee Precision 40SW10-mm Carbide Factory Crimp Die and ran all the rounds through that die and tested about 20 or 30 cartridges. They all fit or were just a little tight. I tested the tight ones in my barrel and found they dropped in just fine. I didn’t bother to run all of them through the case gauge and paid the price for it. I think it may have come from an old batch of reloads from before I started putting all my brass through the Redding G-RX Carbide Push Thru Base Sizing Die. I had assembled thousands of rounds with that brand of bullet before I got the die. Some of the older rounds could have gotten mixed up with some of the newer ones. It didn’t matter as long as I was using my old gun, but it matters a lot with the new one.

Anyway… I finished off all of the existing rounds that might have the problem and should be fine for the future as long as I used both the specialized dies for the new gun with the tight chamber.

Here are the results:

Rimfire Pistol

Stage # SCSA ID Stage Name
1 ?? Go Fast
2 ?? In & Out
3 ?? Focus
4 ?? Speed Trap
5 ?? Saving Ammo
 
Place Name Comp SCSA Division Aggregate Total Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5 DQ Additional
1 Adam T 3 RFPI 49.74 49.74 7.95 11.28 11.81 12.19 6.51
2 Christian S 36 RFPI 51.41 51.41 7.30 10.66 10.56 9.86 13.03 Junior
3 Alexander W 31 3362 RFPI 53.20 53.20 8.24 12.70 12.72 11.46 8.08 Junior
4 Mark P 45 A75542 RFPO 53.30 53.30 9.41 13.41 11.50 9.61 9.37
5 Jerry F 58 RFPI 53.98 53.98 9.94 14.90 11.51 11.37 6.26
6 Zane C 2 RFPI 66.01 66.01 10.22 17.15 15.75 12.97 9.92 Junior
7 Joe H 14 TY29386 ISP 67.01 67.01 11.10 16.28 16.95 13.53 9.15 Senior
8 Myron S 12 RFPI 67.36 67.36 10.98 17.53 14.73 16.09 8.03
9 Connor P 33 A87260 RFPI 68.21 68.21 10.00 16.82 17.30 14.76 9.33 Junior
10 Jim C 10 RFPI 69.54 69.54 10.36 14.82 17.33 19.67 7.36
11 Bradley M 35 RFPI 70.25 70.25 7.68 11.20 12.67 10.63 28.07 Junior
12 Myron S 4 RFPO 73.51 73.51 14.25 16.46 14.39 15.17 13.24
13 Tristin D 1 RFPI 77.13 77.13 9.42 18.81 19.83 16.92 12.15 Junior
14 Hugh T 5 RFPO 81.70 81.70 18.45 18.59 16.81 16.99 10.86 Senior
15 Jen M 38 RFPO 82.50 82.50 11.15 23.77 20.39 16.53 10.66 Lady
16 Addison L 29 RFPI 84.86 84.86 12.04 21.80 15.96 17.70 17.36 Junior
17 Michael S 30 RFPI 85.86 85.86 11.03 20.98 18.13 18.45 17.27
18 Sara W 49 RFPI 118.59 118.59 13.80 29.43 32.12 23.47 19.77 Lady, Junior
19 Adrian C 59 RFPI 123.71 123.71 14.09 28.32 22.98 19.56 38.76 Junior
20 David M 55 RFPI 131.45 131.45 16.04 28.32 34.43 19.21 33.45 Junior
21 Montana F 53 RFPO 136.30 136.30 20.73 27.49 23.94 29.93 34.21 Lady, Junior
22 Sabrina W 54 RFPI 163.27 163.27 16.54 36.11 43.30 29.54 37.78 Lady, Junior
23 Chris B 40 RFPI 201.24 201.24 25.61 50.41 46.09 32.19 46.94
24 Ezzy A 50 5478 RFPI 220.02 220.02 18.45 68.17 41.63 51.51 40.26 Lady, Junior
25 Natalie F 51 5416 RFPI 267.15 267.15 38.52 69.24 54.48 54.34 50.57 Lady, Junior
26 Chet J 61 RFPI 534.27 534.27 120.00 120.00 120.00 80.60 93.67

Main Match

Stage # SCSA ID Stage Name
1 ?? Go Fast
2 ?? In & Out
3 ?? Focus
4 ?? Speed Trap
5 ?? Saving Ammo
 
Place Name Comp SCSA Division Aggregate Total Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4 Stage 5 DQ Additional
1 Greg V 46 PROD 77.51 77.51 11.65 19.32 18.92 15.28 12.34
2 Bob S 47 ISP 84.97 84.97 13.43 19.05 21.34 18.18 12.97 Senior
3 Cel A 48 TY54938 PROD 91.81 91.81 14.85 20.28 23.04 16.77 16.87
4 Alex P 8 ISP 92.12 92.12 12.97 21.39 22.14 19.40 16.22 Military
5 Connor P 32 A87260 PROD 96.58 96.58 10.99 21.35 16.88 16.30 31.06 Junior
6 Dan P 22 A87261 PROD 96.86 96.86 13.13 22.90 23.40 19.01 18.42
7 Bradley M 34 PROD 104.51 104.51 17.20 17.15 18.66 15.81 35.69 Junior
8 Joe H 15 TY29386 ISP 109.83 109.83 14.48 21.89 25.06 20.59 27.81 Senior
9 Heather S 39 TY86040 PROD 111.81 111.81 16.33 23.92 23.64 18.98 28.94 Lady
10 Jeffrey K 42 A84426 PROD 116.89 116.89 14.93 27.46 25.84 23.77 24.89 Senior
11 Tim R 7 ISR 128.76 128.76 18.94 29.50 25.23 32.29 22.80
12 Eric W 23 3362 PROD 133.94 133.94 15.94 25.89 27.48 24.82 39.81
13 Bob L 24 ISP 140.66 140.66 17.18 28.39 30.18 28.78 36.13
14 John W 9 A66667 ISP 151.42 151.42 15.45 29.00 30.06 29.49 47.42 Senior
15 Mark P 44 A75542 ISP 158.89 158.89 13.31 96.63 19.30 16.93 12.72
16 Brad M 25 ISP 159.75 159.75 16.77 32.39 28.16 25.77 56.66
17 Tod R 27 ISP 168.42 168.42 15.18 46.86 34.97 30.33 41.08
18 Susan E 19 PROD 169.82 169.82 21.57 28.27 42.37 29.45 48.16 Lady
19 Ry J 20 TY76202 PROD 182.86 182.86 23.74 42.26 37.14 34.35 45.37
20 James W 17 PROD 186.00 186.00 17.84 45.95 36.87 33.38 51.96 Senior
21 Ryan R 26 PROD 188.69 188.69 23.44 41.63 37.54 34.83 51.25
22 Taylor C 28 ISP 220.87 220.87 22.46 45.73 63.07 29.10 60.51 Lady
23 Jen M 37 ISP 303.69 303.69 48.28 67.54 60.24 54.46 73.17 Lady
24 Chris B 41 ISP 403.49 403.49 56.08 87.44 99.55 91.04 69.38

I’m pretty pleased with the results. I was top Senior in Rimfire and came in second Senior in the Main Match. If I had practiced a few times in the two weeks prior I might have done a little better but for the most part things were going pretty well for me. Ry took a few videos of me on stage 1 (see also here, here, here, and here).

Here is a video of four of Ry’s runs on a different, far more difficult, stage:

The most disappointing part of the match was that, as she vowed last time, Taylor didn’t hang out with me this time.

Quote of the day—Nancy Martineza

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True fax. #gunsense

NancyMartinezaMarkleysLaw

Nancy Martineza
Tweeted January 23, 2015
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday! Via a tweet from Linoge.

This is probably a fake Twitter account, but still someone, somewhere made the image.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Eric Brakey

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When someone with a credible death threat against them has to wait for months before they can carry legally and defend themselves with their jacket on, that says it is not working.

Eric Brakey
Maine State Senator (R-Auburn)
Maine State Police Support Rescinding Concealed Permit Requirement
[When you think about laws and regulations just a little bit you realize anything specific to guns, beyond a few safety rules, are nonsensical.

We have a lot of work left to do but making it easier for people to use their guns without getting into trouble is a step forward. The more people that have and use guns the easier it is for them to realize the magazine restrictions, background checks, registration, and “safe gun” rosters are stupid and infringing upon a specific enumerated right.—Joe]

The TSA’s 12 Signs You Might Be a Terrorist

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Just as you can rack up three felonies a day going about your business the TSA only needs to look at you to know you are a terrorist:

Have a nice flight.

If guns were phallic symbols

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From here:

If guns were phallic symbols, no man would ever buy one with a two-inch barrel.

Nor one with a barrel less than an inch in diameter.