Under Civil Rights groups they support they list Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. I’m almost surprised the don’t list the KKK too. I’m certain one could make a better case that the KKK supports civil rights (of whites) more than the Brady Bunch supports civil rights for anyone. The Brady Bunch is like the KKK in a lot of ways.
Category Archives: Gun Rights
Quote of the day–Chris Rock
Gun control? We need bullet control! I think every bullet should cost 5,000 dollars. Because if a bullet cost five thousand dollar, we wouldn’t have any innocent bystander.
Chris Rock
[I love sick humor.–Joe]
Mental problems
The first and only thing that comes to mind is mental problems when I read something like The Racist Origins Of the Second Amendment. Pure projection. The truth is gun control has racist origins. Here is just a small sample of the evidence:
Quote of the day–Michael Nutter
We cannot have freedom, we cannot have safety as long as these types of weapons are on our streets.
Michael Nutter
Philadelphia Mayor
May 27, 2008
Mayor Nutter takes gun control fight to Harrisburg
[Nutter is refering to “assault weapons”. What Nutter doesn’t understand or, just as likely fully understands but thinks we won’t, is that if the government is allowed to restrict these firearms the people will have neither freedom nor safety. Just ask some of the worlds other beneficiaries of gun control. Gun control has never delivered the promises made to the common person, only to the tyrants.–Joe]
Quote of the day–Wayne LaPierre
Senator McCain is the only one in the race that has a pro-gun record of any kind. I think the mouthing of a pro-Second Amendment stance by Senators Clinton and Obama and pandering to gun owners is an embarrassment and I don’t believe it will work.
Wayne LaPierre
May 13, 2008
Q & A with the NRA’s executive vice president–Gun-rights lobby to meet in Louisville this week
[The problem is that it doesn’t have to work with all gun owners. It just has to work with enough gun owners to win the election.–Joe]
Knife Rights
Most people in the U.S. would offer you a shiny aluminum foil hat if you were to claim our knife rights are in danger. I know even the most enthusiastic supporters of gun control I have talked to express extreme skepticism when I have brought up the regulations on knives in the U.K. “That’s just silly”, they say. Yup. It is silly. But it’s also true. Today’s QOTD was just one hint of what is going on in the U.K.
And even if you are up to speed on the sad state of affairs in the U.K. one may reasonably claim we don’t need to worry about that in this country because the ninnies who would take away our knives must first take away our guns. That claim sounds reasonable but is it?
While at the NRA convention I stopped by a booth with an intriguing banner:
I barely spoke to them as I took a picture of their banner, picked up a business card, and hurried on. But I knew at the time it was going to be a blog post.
Visiting their website I discovered a link to this WSJ article: Deadly pocketknives become a $1 billion business. It’s every bit as one sided and Chicken Little like as any Brady Campaign media release.
So what about someone who claims we don’t need to worry about knives when we are at least holding our own in the trenches on the gun rights front? My response is, “They are flanking us.” What is going to be your response when some hysterical activist or legislator says, “We already outlaw tactical knives why can’t we get rid of the guns as well?”
So, beyond the obvious commercial airplanes and John McCain public appearances, where are our defensive knives currently restricted? You know that switchblade knives are outlawed in many jurisdictions and the public opinion on them is roughly equivalent to that of machine guns. That battle is essentially lost. I don’t know for certain on the “assault weapon” analog–the locking blade, one handed opening knives, but the WSJ article linked to above reports that Atlanta prohibits people from carrying pocket knives in public with blades longer than two inches. Yet, according to the article this isn’t restrictive enough. Knife Rights could do those of us who carry defensive knives and pro-freedom activists a big service by compiling a list of political jurisdictions that are hostile to people even defending themselves using even a knife.
Another thing Knife Rights could do is work for preemption at the state level to remove the patchwork of laws that might trip of a visitor to some city that has no idea Chicken Little clones have taken over the city council. It would also be nice to see some D.C. versus Heller like cases involving knives and citing either/both state and federal constitutional protections for the right to keep and bear arms.
Here is what the Knife Rights Foundation [501(c)(3)] and Knife Rights [501(c)(4)] organizations have as their mission statements:
Knife Rights Foundation is dedicated to:
- Encouraging safe and responsible use of knives and edged tools through education and outreach;
- Educating knife owners, public officials and the general public about the history of knives and edged tools;
- Educating knife owners, public officials and the general public about knife and edged tool related laws and regulations
Knife Rights is dedicated to:
- Providing knife and edged tool owners an effective voice to influence public policy and to oppose efforts to restrict the right to own, use and carry knives and edged tools;
- Encouraging safe, responsible and lawful use of knives and edged tools through education and outreach, enhancing positive perceptions of knives and edged tools and their owners and users;
- Encouraging the marketing of knives and edged tools in a responsible manner conducive to the organization’s goals;
- Cooperating with advocacy organizations having complimentary interests and goals;
- Providing knife and edged tool owners with services that they will find valuable in order to build membership to enable success in our primary objectives.
I wish them success not just because its the right thing to do but because they are defending my flank on the gun rights issue.
Quote of the day–Mark Lawson
…the only solution is to try to drive knives from society. Already, stop-and-search squads have been put on the streets of London in a version of the contentious old “sus” laws. This, at least, is something practical that can be attempted: there is no good reason to carry blades.
Mark Lawson
May 16 2008
Weapons we can’t handle
[This is the path the anti-gun people want us to take. This is the future if the anti-gun bigots are allowed to succeed.–Joe]
Always Think Forfeiture resolution
I have been wondering about this for a while and even asked a few people what was, if anything, going on. It turns out the case has been resolved. Not to my satisfaction but good enough. I would have preferred the ATF be disbanded and the guilty be given life sentences and sent to the prison labor lead mines to help reduce the cost of ammunition–but then I’m a perfectionist in cases like this.
Here is the best story on it I have found so far:
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is dumping the “Always Think Forfeiture” motto it’s used for more than a decade to help combat crime.
U.S. Rep. Bill Sali, R-Idaho, and others complained that multipurpose tools engraved with the slogan could be seen as encouragement to seize property, including guns, of law-abiding citizens.
The pocket tools were to be given to federal, state and local law-enforcement agents participating in the agency’s asset forfeiture training programs, as a reminder of one way to disrupt or dismantle criminal organizations.
None of the engraved tools, stored in the agency’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., have so far been distributed. And now they won’t be, at least until the engravings have been removed.
The agency will no longer use the slogan on materials given out during its training programs, said Robert Browning, chief of ATF public affairs in Washington, D.C., adding it was never intended to undermine lawful gun rights.
Sali had said that the ATF “through its engraved motto, sends a message that these rights are secondary to the government’s apparent goal to ‘always’ seek forfeit of private property.”
The tools also included the words “ATF – Asset Forfeiture.”
Update: In the comments Jed points out the Idaho Stateman article. I have to agree it’s better because of this:
That changed March 19, when a blogger looking at ATF contracts on a government-purchasing database found an order for 2,000 Leatherman tool-kits engraved with the slogan.
The blogger wrote about it on www.freedomsight.net, and the issue took on a life of its own in the blogosphere. Gun owners and private property rights activists seized on the phrase as a sign that the agency was biased toward law-abiding gun owners.
As I said before, Jed did good. Real good.
Boomershoot Gun Blogger Day
At the NRA convention last week I told several bloggers I was contemplating having a special Boomershoot for gun bloggers*. I have had time to think about this quite a bit more.
The following is tentative so if you have suggestions let me know before I finalize it in the next week or so.
Boomershoot 2009 is currently scheduled for Sunday April 26th with Friday and Saturday the 24th and 25th being the Precision Rifle Clinic. Nearly all of the gun bloggers who have never attended Boomershoot I have talked to expressed concern their long range rifle skills were deficient so I think participating in at least one day of the clinic is a good idea for them. Partially for this reason I have decided combining the gun blogger event with Boomershoot 2009 is a good idea.
What I think is one of the more interesting part of the event is the making of the targets prior to the event. We have repeatedly invited the mainstream media to observe and/or participate and only once had them accept. I’m guessing gun bloggers will be more inclined to take me up on this invitation. Hence I have decided to make Thursday April 23rd 2009 Boomershoot Gun Blogger Day. On this day gun bloggers will be given media credentials and a special behind the scenes tour of and participation in Boomershoot 2009. If the individuals involved want to actually mix explosives and package the targets they will need to fill out some paperwork at least a couple months in advance. This paperwork will be submitted to the ATF and if the ATF approves it these individuals will be allowed to actually make explosives and reactive targets. If individuals do not wish to submit the paperwork then they will still be allowed to observe target manufacturing and participate in all the other activities.
Other activities planned for Gun Blogger Day will include discussions of explosive chemistry, alternate materials for explosives, target detonation theory, fireball target construction, the history and future of Boomershoot, Boomershoot safety, Why Boomershoot, “entertainingly close” detonation of targets by the participants and almost any other safe and legal activity related to guns and explosives the participants can think of.
Do you want to blow something up? Toilets, laptop computers, and hard disk drives are just some of the things we have subjected to “Idaho Hardware Testing” (also sometimes called an Idaho Stress Test). If you have something you want subjected to Boomerite let me know and we’ll figure out how to make it happen safely. The only catch is that you need to clean up (or pay for) the mess afterward.
Gun bloggers who are attending Boomershoot for the first time will also get free admission to the main event on Sunday April 26th.
* For the purposes of this special offer a gun blogger is defined as someone who has an active blog with frequent posts about gun use or politics. “Active blog” means someone who has made 100 or more posts in the previous year as of April 1, 2009. This definition potentially and intentionally includes the anti gun blogs such as the Gun Guys and the Brady Blog. “Frequent posts about gun use or politics” will be defined at my whim on a case by case basis. Submit your blog to me for inclusion prior to April 1 and I’ll get back to you with my decision within a day or so.
Gun trace data for 2007 is available
I haven’t looked at it much but the ATF trace data for 2007 is available here for those that have the time and the interest.
Bloomberg is an ignorant bigot
An article by Joseph P. Tartaro (who I saw at the NRA Convention but didn’t talk to) spells out what many of us have suspected. Bloomberg is an ignorant anti-gun bigot and beyond that is willfully ignorant:
NSSF noted that perhaps the mayor’s insults stems from his self-professed ignorance of our nation’s firearms laws and regulations, business practices of firearms retailers and the duties of the ATF. “I don’t know what the law is and what procedures are,” responded the mayor to a deposition question on illegally purchased firearms, NSSF quoted him. “I have no knowledge of what appropriate safeguards are for a dealer to comply with the law or what standard practices are in the arms business,” they quoted him.
In the same deposition Mr. Bloomberg admitted he did not know that ATF conducted inspections of firearms retailers. “I didn’t even know they had inspections,” the bewildered mayor offered and Bloomberg also noted that he did not know what a Federal Firearms Transaction Record, commonly known as a Form 4473 was or a NICS background check.
A settlement between Red’s and ATF
I would prefer the Feds ended up in jail and reimbursing Red’s for all expenses but I can’t complain a whole lot if this goes down as described:
An Idaho gun shop that went to federal court to keep the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives from stripping it of its gun license has reached a tentative settlement with the government.
Attorneys on both sides told U.S. District Court Judge Mikel H. Williams on Wednesday that they had likely agreed on how to end the case.
Mark Geston, an attorney representing Terry and Ryan Horsley of Red’s Trading Post, said he could not yet release details, but said the proposal would allow the Twin Falls gun shop to continue operating.
“I think everybody’s reached a cooperative and constructive agreement,” Geston said Thursday. “The judge said to have it finalized in 10 days and we’ll just do our best to do that. The agreement allows Red’s Trading Post to continue as a gun shop in Twin Falls.”
I tried to check out Ryan’s blog but Blogger reports:
Sorry, the blog at redstradingpost.blogspot.com has been removed. This address is not available for new blogs.
This is entirely speculation on my part but my guess is pulling the blog down is part of the settlement. Stepping even further into baseless speculation one could say it’s a sad day when you have to give up your 1st Amendment rights to exercise your 2nd Amendment rights.
They should put Brady and company on the byline
This article, from the headline:
Relaxation on gun control, unlicensed sales contribute to gun violence in Oakland
to the last section:
‘Every day I hear gun shots’
Fourteen-year-old C.J. described that paranoia, and sometimes the lack of it, in an interview. The West Oakland youth has come to live with the sound of gunshots.
“Every day, I hear gun shots — well, not every day, but most days of the week,” C.J. said. “When we play, we hear gunshots. If they get closer and closer, then we run inside.”
One night when he and his brother were walking home from a party at a cousin’s house on Eighth Street, “the guns started going off and we ran,” he said. “Everybody was screaming and running. I was just running different ways trying not to get hurt. I jumped into someone’s back yard and waited.”
When the gunfire stopped, he went looking for his brother and found him waiting inside someone’s house.
Still, C.J. said he does not expect to get shot. He said it is usually people arguing who shoot at each other, and he avoids arguments.
C.J. said this with conviction, having accepted that gunfire is a part of daily life and figured out a way to avoid it. He lost his father to gunfire in Oakland a decade ago and seems to have thought carefully about how to avoid that fate.
“They keep going back and forth killing each other,” he said. “It’s not scary to me because I’m not in those arguments.”
It is nothing but falsehoods, speculation, misleading information, and anecdotes designed to alarm and frighten.
This wasn’t written by journalists. This was written by people that should be on the Brady Campaign payroll.
Paul Helinkski of Guns America
On Saturday night (Sunday morning), at the NRA Convention, I stayed up until 3:00 AM socializing and blogging. I arrived at the Press Room a few minutes before 9:00 the next morning and found I was the first one there for the meeting with Paul Helinkski of Guns America. Wimps. Even the NRA staff hadn’t arrived to unlock the door early after being late the day before. If it hadn’t been for the wheelbarrow full of cash I received on arrival I would have been a little bit annoyed with the NRA for dropping the ball in this regard two days in a row.
About 9:00 other bloggers and press people showed up to wait. Bitter had no explanation:
More people showed up–and waited:
Then Helinkski showed up and waited with the rest of us:
Finally, about 15 or 20 minutes late, the NRA staff (names withheld to protect the guilty) showed up, let us in, and we all sat down to listen to Helinkski:
He gave us his background and while interesting from a technical aspect most of my readers aren’t going to care about that. What probably is interesting is what he had to say about the future of gun sales on the Internet.
Helinkski is of the opinion that gun are a very unique product that cannot be sold like other products. The required FFL for shipment and NICS checks for most sales is the reason. That “speed bump” could be smoothed out by “dealers” that do not stock firearms but simply do the transfers and charge $20 or $30. But, according to Helinkski, this would be the very bad for gun owners. Sure we could get guns a few dollars cheaper if we did our purchases that way but having the gun store down the street on the corner is more important that those few dollars. The public visibility is important and having the customer service locally available is important.
So what is the future of Internet gun sales? Helinkski has an innovative web product that addresses that. Check out GunsAmerica.com. His website allows dealers to post their inventory on the web and the customers to comparison shop. You can search for guns within X miles of your zip code and then if the dealer makes a sale because you found what you liked on the website Helinkski makes a flat fee on the deal. You still have to visit the dealer and purchase the gun face-to-face but what Guns America has done is make the comparison shopping much easier.
CCRKBA News Release
I can’t find an online version to link to so I’m just posting the email version I received from the Citizens Committe for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. The short version is what Uncle said, “Ald. Richard Mell…like you and me only better.”
CCRKBA SAYS CHICAGO ALDERMAN SHOULD SUFFER LIKE OTHER GUN OWNERS
BELLEVUE, WA – Chicago Alderman Richard Mell ought to be prosecuted like any other negligent gun owner for failing to re-register his firearms under an ordinance he helped pass, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today.
“I don’t care if anti-gun Mayor Richard Daley supports giving Mell a break, and it doesn’t matter that Mell is the father-in-law of Gov. Rod Blagojevich,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “For years, the draconian ordinance supported by Mell and enforced by Daley has terrorized Chicago gun owners. It’s time for Mell to face his own music, and it’s time for Daley to just shut up.”
Mell has proposed an amendment to the existing law that would allow gun registration to re-open for a month, giving him amnesty. Mell and Daley are claiming that this is for other gun owners in the city as well who may have let their registrations lapse.
“For years, the Daley Administration has engaged in goon squad demagoguery against gun owners,” Gottlieb observed, “but now all of a sudden, just because Alderman Mell finds himself on the wrong side of a law he supported, he and Daley want to do Chicago gun owners a favor. This magnanimity is a flimsy sham, and law-abiding firearm owners all over Illinois should be outraged.
“It is equally outrageous that Mell is blaming this lapse on an aide,” he added. “How stupid is that? Mell knows that gun owners are personally responsible for re-registering their firearms, and over the years, the city has shown no mercy for others who have failed to comply with the law. This guy shouldn’t be on the city council, he ought to be in an unemployment line, and even more than that, he ought to be facing charges in court for possession of unregistered guns inside the city.
“The sad fact is,” Gottlieb concluded, “that this proposed amnesty amendment would never be on the table if it weren’t designed specifically to help Alderman Mell. That anyone else might benefit is an accident, and both Mell and Daley know it. Other gun owners should be allowed to re-register, but Mell should lose on this sweetheart deal. Perhaps then he will fully understand just how insidious Chicago’s gun laws really are, and he will lead the fight to abolish them.”
GRPC registration is open
Today I received notice from the Second Amendment Foundation that registration is now open for the Gun Rights Policy Conference September 26, 27, and 28th.
I have attended GRPC twice before and was very impressed. If you are into the political/academic side of the 2nd Amendment then you will benefit a great deal from attending.
Todd Jarrett, guns and explosives
Last Friday night Michael Baine hosted a social event for us bloggers. Todd Jarrett reported that 10 bloggers would get training from him at Blackwater and then take home a Paraordinance gun at the end of the training. Bitter has some details.
I spent probably 15 minutes talking with Jarrett and he got really interested in Boomershoot and told me he wanted to blow up a car. He wants to be able to shoot bullets into it and have it lift about four feet off the ground. I gave him my card and told him I thought I could do that. He seemed interested in exploring that further. Cool!
I cheated and won
Despite thousands of people walking around carrying guns and even drinking while armed the only shooting I saw was the air gun stuff going on at the convention hall. Rick from Traction Control challenged Kevin and I to a little friendly shooting. The targets are below.
I cheated. Something Greg Hamilton of Insights teaches his students–the goal is to win. In a gun fight winning is the only thing that matters. Playing fair is for losers.
Rick and Kevin shot first and reported the gun was shooting low and right. So I aimed high and left. I scored a 49 and won.
Quote of the day–Rob Allen
We have a long, hard road ahead of us. I feel more comfortable knowing you all will be there by my side as we battle the forces of stupidity and take comfort in the knowledge that each of you will do everything they can to retain our rights as citizens of the free world. And, if God forbid it all goes south, at least we have Joe Huffman on our side.
Rob Allen
May 20, 2008 in an email he sent to bloggers he met at the NRA convention.
[Rob is Sharp as a Marble, but for some reason he wasn’t the only person that has been saying things like that about me. I would like to think it was because of my target from the friendly little air-gun competition we had. But there were hints that wasn’t it. It was before that and/or in a completely different context Kevin said the same thing and numerous others that said the same or something similar. Bitter, for example, said she would never look at powdered sugar the same way again. I appreciate all the nice things people are saying but aren’t you just moving me to the top of some list I really don’t want to be on?–Joe]
Quote of the day–Glenn Beck
It comes down to Larry, Curly, and Moe?
Glenn Beck
NRA Annual Convention
Keynote speech
May 17, 2008
[He was referring to the remaining three viable candidates for president in 2008.
He showed us his cummerbund decorated with a skull and crossbones, said he was going plunder, rape, and pillage this evening. He did not disappoint.
After McCain had given a speech here the previous day with lots of favorable things said by the NRA. The Three Stooges reference above was just one of many negatives toward the Republican candidate. Across the table from me Bitter Bitch covered her mouth with her hands and her eyes bugged out as Beck ragged on McCain as well as the Democrats who “sold their soul to Karl Marx”.
I have more great quotes from Beck (and some pictures) but right now I have to get ready for dinner and then prepare for a 7:00 AM flight tomorrow.–Joe]