Looking through the Small Arms Survey’s gun stockpile info, I came across some eye-opening stats. http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/de/weapons-and-markets/stockpiles.html …

Takeaway #1: 41% of the world’s civilian-owned guns are in American hands.

Takeaway #2: In the U.S., civilians possess 70 times more guns than cops + the military.

Takeaway #3: American civilians possess 2½ times more guns than the world’s 20 largest militaries — combined. http://www.smallarmssurvey.org/fileadmin/docs/H-Research_Notes/SAS-Research-Note-34.pdf

Takeaway #4: Americans own 70 million more guns than all of the world’s militaries — combined.

Takeaway #5: American civilians own 11 times more guns than all the cops on earth.

Takeaway #6: American law enforcement agencies are outgunned by civilians 235 to 1.

Jennifer Mascia @JenniferMascia
Tweeted on August 29, 2017
[I think the number of guns in U.S. civilian hands is probably closer to 350 million 400 or 500 million (or perhaps even up to 660 million).

If my experience at matches is any indication private citizens are far better shooters than nearly all police officers and military as well.

At least it’s a start.

H/T Glenn Reynolds.—Joe]

The scientists who lead the national organization of ear doctors have no excuse for ignorance of how suppressors prevent hearing loss. The ignoble reason that they and other leaders of organized medicine have shirked their moral obligation to prevent human infirmity is prejudice, fueled by a willful ignorance.

Timothy Wheeler
July 18, 2017
Medicine’s shameful silence on silencers
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Where does anyone get off requiring a free citizen to get permission to exercise a right?

Who has legitimate moral authority to impose prior restraints on rights that, depending on your beliefs, are either “endowed by our Creator” or inherent to the condition of being human?

And where do they get off legally, since Supreme Court precedent acknowledges:

“This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second amendment declares that it shall not be infringed …”

The Cult of Statism is determined to impose faith in a monopoly of violence enforced by follower disarmament, even though all credible observations show its tenets to be superstitious nonsense. And we know what happens to non-believers, heretics, infidels…

David Codrea
September 6, 2017
Amish Photo Exemption Bill Raises Questions about Gun Owner Control Laws and More
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Banning certain types of firearms steps on the Second Amendment. Law abiding gun owners routinely use these firearms for self-defense or sporting. Such an unconstitutional act cannot stand.

Patrick Morrisey
West Virginia attorney general
August 29, 2017
Attorneys General From 21 States Ask Supreme Court to Hear Suit Against Maryland’s Assault Weapons Ban
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

There is little comfort—and there ought to be little comfort—in being told that your own death is worth the benefits that accrue to other people. In the sixth century, the Emperor Justinian presided over the compilation of the Digest of Roman Law, a core precept of which was, “that which someone does for the safety of his body, let it be regarded as having been done legally.” This notion was echoed by a host of British philosophers and legal scholars of the 17th and 18th centuries. In his Treatise, John Locke cast self-defense as a “part of the law of nature,” and insisted that it must not be “denied the community, even against the king himself.” William Blackstone concurred, holding that the right to protect one’s life and person was “justly called the primary law of nature” and cannot be “taken away by the law of society.” In most cases, Blackstone submitted, the courts were sufficient to resolve disputes between citizens. In the case of physical violence, however, he argued that it was tyrannical to deprive a man of the means “immediately to oppose one violence with another.”

Charles C.W. Cooke
August 9, 2017
Brits Vs. Guns
[I am of the opinion that a society which does not recognize the right of self-defense is in the process of committing suicide. They are mentally ill and a threat to themselves and others.—Joe]

Firearms made possible the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Charles Cobb’s excellent book, “This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible” describes how pacifist community organizers from the North learned to accept the armed protection of their black, rural communities.

The Deacons for Defense and Justice was an armed community defense organization, founded in 1965. With .38 Special revolvers and M1 carbines, they deterred terrorism in the “Klan country” region of Louisiana and Mississippi. When Dr. King led the “Meredith March against Fear” for voter registration in Mississippi, the Deacons provided armed security.

David Kopel and Joseph Greenle
August 22, 2017
The racist origin of gun control laws
[See also The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement and Negros with Guns. These books should be required reading in high schools.—Joe]