Category Archives: Gun Rights

‘Expert’ on police arms at the Violence Policy Center

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I guess it’s not surprising that Tom Diaz at the VPC would say something like this:

”Because the bad guys have assault rifles, law enforcement officers
should?” asks Tom Diaz, senior policy analyst for the Violence Policy
Center, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization that advocates
gun control.

“I don’t see the rationale behind that type of thinking. What’s
next? Cops in armored cars and tanks? This is moving toward the
militarization of law enforcement.”

The problem for Diaz is that if he concedes police have a
need for rifles to defend themselves and other innocent life then he is
put in the uncomfortable position of private citizens making a claim
for the need of similar defensive tools.  But what annoys me is
that the Miami Herald would preface the Diaz statement with:

 But some experts say arming officers with rifles is a knee-jerk reaction.

Diaz is an expert on gun control and victim disarmament in
general–not on the equipment needs of police officers.  If he is
the expert then let him take point on the arrest of the next criminal
armed with rifle to show everyone how it is done.  In that same
article is a prime example of the type of person I would like Diaz to
demonstrate on:

Deputies point to Ralston Davis as an example of the potential danger police can face when they aren’t adequately armed.

Davis, accused of killing three people, sent officers a chilling
message when he was arrested Dec. 2 with a knock-off version of the
high-powered AR-15 rifle:

”Hand me my [rifle] and a bullet, and I will kill you all,” Davis
told BSO deputies.  “Stand in front of me, and I’ll put a bullet
in your face.”

Here are your handcuffs and pepper spray–you’re The Man Tom.  Show us how it’s done.

Security and freedom blogging

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I recently received an email telling me they liked my little detours into security.  I haven’t touch security recently for a number of reasons.  Primarily my research in that area has be temporarily thwarted by PNNL defying the Freedom of Information Act.  A FOIA request I made back in June which only required they make a duplicate of some of the files on a DVD and send it to me.  I told them who had possession of the DVD, the project name, and the markings on the DVD.  Very simple.  None of the material I requested was classified and although it was originally considered Official Use Only that restriction had been lifted before I left and the material used on a proposal for a a completely open project which we won a contract for.  They are in defiance of the law and my FOIA attorney is working on the problem but my involvement in security issues gets sidetracked by my anger over PNNL illegal activities.  Unfortunately FOIA is a law that doesn’t have any enforcement teeth.  It’s against the law from them to do what they are doing (or rather not doing) but there is no penalties for their illegal activity.  Sort of like making it against the law for you to steal but if you get caught nothing happens–you don’t have to give back what you stole and you don’t get punished for your crime.

Anyway… sidetracked by my anger again…

Alphecca posted this about Bush authorizing eavesdropping on American citizens and wondered why a lot of the people on the libertarian/conservative side of the Blogosphere quiet or indifferent about it.  I haven’t read any news reports that indicated anything of real news.  From my readings (try The Puzzle Palace) and a few hints from other sources the NSA has been doing this for years if not decades.  You shouldn’t act as if your electronic traffic is anymore private than if you were to have a conversation on a crowded elevator.  Encrypting your traffic might make it as private as a conversation on a city street.  I try to encrypt a fair portion of my email and encourage others to do the same.  Most of my web browsing travels, at least part way, via encrypted channels.  This is not because anything in the email or my browsing would be a problem for me if it were decrypted but because it raises the cost for the people doing the surveillance.  The more people that do that the more likely they are to concentrate their limited resources on the people that are high probability threats to our national security.  I talked about this at the Gun Rights Policy Conference in 2000 (do a search for “Huffman” on that page).  If I had the time I would work on some other projects that would further consume resources and release them to the public.  Basically, as others have pointed out, you can’t legislate restrictions on the government and expect them to obey the law.  Government entities rarely obey the law (see here, here, here, here, and the first paragraph of this post for example) if it’s inconvenient for them to do so.  Remember the famous Henry Kissinger quote?  Of course this is the real reason for the 2nd Amendment–a last ditch resort for prevention of tyranny.  But there are other things we can do to help that are much lower cost to us and exact at least a moderate cost from the agents of tyranny.  Encrypting your electronic traffic is one of those things.  It costs them far, far more computing resources to decrypt it that it does for you to encrypt it.

I spent some time catching up on my security reading and came across this on Bruce Schneier’s blog:

According to the three-page document, to preserve the openness that characterizes today’s Internet, “consumers are entitled to run applications and use services of their choice, subject to the needs of law enforcement.” Read the last seven words again.

What the FCC is now saying is that people cannot use encryption technology unless law enforcement has the back-door keys to it.  Of course they have to know encryption is being used before they can stop you from using it or demand you give them the keys to the back-door.  I covered that in my GRPC talk and I already distributed a tool to circumvent them to hundreds of people.  What I haven’t done is tell all those hundreds of people about the hidden feature set in the tool–just the ones that paid money for the product.

I should work on some of my other tools.  The price of liberty is eternal vigilance and I need to pay my share of that price.  When the next tool is up and running I’ll talk about it more.  In the mean time check out PGP and Thawte.  The cost to you is low and the cost to “them” is high.

Quote of the day–Toyotomi Hideyoshit

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The people of the various provinces are forbidden to have in their possession any swords, bows, spears, firearms, or other types of arms. The possession of these elements makes difficult the collection of taxes and dues, and tends to permit uprising. Therefore, the heads of provinces, official agents and deputies are ordered to collect all the weapons mentioned above and turn them over to the government.

Toyotomi Hideyoshit
Shogun
August 29, 1558
Japan
[I admire his honest and forthrightness.  If only present day politicians would be so when they demand we turn over our personal protection tools.–Joe]

Ellensburg decision posted

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Fish Or Man has it posted on his blog now.  It’s a worthwhile read.  I’m pretty pleased with it.  Thank you so much Jason.  I know this was a great burden to bear.  We all owe you a big thanks.

This is what happens in places without guns–Case II

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In the U.K. where they are ‘more civilized’ than we are in the States no one really needs a gun, right?  Wrong:

Four teenagers were “worse than a pack of wild dogs” when they beat a man to death outside his Chinese takeaway, a court was told yesterday.

Michael Chen, 41, was kicked, punched and stamped upon during the attack in a shopping precinct in Wigan.

His assailants struck him on the head so hard with a stake it sounded like a cricket bat striking a ball.

The gang left him dying in the arms of his girlfriend. His life support system was turned off the next day.

Yesterday the teenagers were jailed for up to 10 years at Manchester Crown Court. None showed any reaction as they were taken from the dock.

…

Passing sentence, Mr Justice Royce told them: “You acted far worse than a pack of wild dogs. The sheer savagery and brutality of the attack… aggravates the offence. It is the sort of street violence that should not be tolerated in any civilised society.”

…

Frightened by the youths gathering in the precinct, Mr Chen, his girlfriend, Eileen, and the restaurant’s chef armed themselves with a spade, a wooden stake and sticks.

But they were quickly outnumbered and cornered by about a dozen youths, including the four who would eventually conclude the attack.

They needed to arm themselves with rifles and/or shotguns not sticks.  Firearms, of course, are severely restricted in the U.K.  The U.K. politicians who committed the crime against humanity by taking guns away from the victims should have also been on trial and sentenced here.

The next step

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Now that Canada is planning a near complete ban on handguns (the police and maybe some target shooters will be allowed to keep them) what’s next?  We didn’t have wait long before finding out.  From the Hamilton Spectator (Ontario):

Think we’ve got too many gun-control laws in this country? I don’t think we have enough.

Not with the news that the man accused of shooting Laval police Constable Valerie Gignac on Wednesday morning may have had legal access to a hunting gun capable of taking down an elephant.

…

Wendy Cukier, a Ryerson University professor of information technology, and co-founder of the Coalition for Gun Control, agrees. “It reinforces our continued theme about the implementation of the law, and belies the notion that plain old hunting rifles are not a problem.

“Many don’t know they can pierce body armour and shoot bullets 2 km — after all, the Tories say, they are just tools!”

In fact, misinformation about gun crime is rife. Think police are shot by city gangs with handguns from the U.S.? The last police officer shot in Toronto was shot by a disturbed man with his legally owned shotgun, while four RCMP constables were shot dead in Mayerthorpe, Alta., last March by a man on a farm who reportedly had a military-style assault rifle, a hunting rifle and a pistol when he was found dead — despite a 10-year firearm prohibition against him.

Cukier should be a familiar name to readers here.  Do a search for “Cukier” on this blog for more info on her.

They are “priming the pump” for the obvious next step–banning firearms used for hunting.

Quote of the day–Brian Schweitzer

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I guess I kind of believe in gun control: You control your gun, and I’ll control mine.

Brian Schweitzer
Governor of Montana
An avid hunter who has “more guns than I need but not as many as I want.”
The Boston Globe December 17, 2005
[For a Boston paper this is an excellent article on guns.  My only criticism is they seem to think guns are only about hunting.–Joe]

Amazing! Fish Or Man WON!!!

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Details are here but the short version is that without the help of a lawyer or any gun rights organization Fish Or Man won his appeal against Ellensburg for carrying a pistol openly in public (in a Fred Meyer store).  I’m not a lawyer and I’m not about to test it tomorrow, but I think this means we can openly carry a handgun, without a CPL, in Washington state.

Way to go!!!!!

Quote of the day–Senator Orrin Hatch

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What the subcommittee on the Constitution uncovered was clear — and long lost — proof that the Second Amendment to our Constitution was intended as an individual right of the American citizen to keep and carry arms in a peaceful manner, for protection of himself, his family, and his freedoms.

Senator Orrin Hatch
Chairman, Subcommittee on the Constitution,
Preface, The Right to Keep and Bear Arms.

Any idea what this is about?

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From the clueless Gun Guys:

 It’s not like we ever took anything CCRKBA said seriously (after all, it is run by Alan “Tina” Gottlieb)…

“Tina”?  A play on “tiny” because Alan is rather short?

Probably it’s because they can’t think of anything factual or rational to say about the CCRKBA.  They have to resort to name calling to make themselves feel better.

Deceitful news reporting

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The Seattle PI reports:

In an effort to drum up support for a proposal requiring background checks on those who buy firearms at gun shows, a gun control advocacy group reported a survey strongly supporting the idea. 

Washington Ceasefire conducted the survey, asking 403 registered voters whether they would be more or less likely to support candidates who wanted to close a loophole in state law that allows gun sales without background checks at gun shows.

…

Current state law allows people to buy firearms at gun shows without a background check, although federal law requires such checks when the firearm is sold at a store.

There is a problem with this article.  This last sentence is false.  And I’m willing to bet (an extremely rare thing for me to do) the survey takers worded their question(s) in such a way that they mislead the people being surveyed in a similar manner. 

The truth is Federal law does not even define a gun show let along make some sort of exception for them.  The laws that apply at a gun store apply at a gun show, the parking lot at the mall, and your backyard.  There is a reason these people lie–the truth is painful to them.  They cannot hope to get their way if they stick to the truth.

Gay marriage lawsuit in Iowa

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I’m surprised this is occurring in Iowa.  California, Massachusetts, and even Washington state.  But Iowa?  Apparently the Iowa constitution looks friendly to the pursuit of gay marriage via the courts. 

DES MOINES — A gay rights group filed a lawsuit on behalf of six gay and lesbian couples Tuesday in Polk County District Court, asking for the right to marry for same-sex couples.

Lambda Legal, which has spearheaded the same-sex marriage drive across the country, said it wants full recognition of the civil rights of same-sex couples.

I’m all for gay marriage but I’m not comfortable with it being implemented via the courts.  I would prefer that it happen legislatively or via a popular vote of the people.  Particularly when it is indisputable that the original intent of the constitution or law being utilized was that marriage only be for men and women.  The original intent may have been wrong but there is a procedure for changing it that should be utilized.  Changing the meaning via the courts is just wrong.  Freedom of the press could just as easily come to mean the government printing office has the freedom to print the news but private or corporate “press” is not.  You think it couldn’t happen?  Look at what has happened with the Second Amendment.

Quote of the day–Cullen Hightower

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Our laws can be friendly to those who obey them, and too often useful to those who don’t.
    
Cullen Hightower
[Among the most useful laws to those that disobey them are the laws that attempt to ban or restrict goods or services.  The black market always finds a way whether it is something physical like booze, guns or recreational drugs or some service such as high interest loans (loan sharking), gambling or prostitution.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Adolf Hitler

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Through clever and constant application of propaganda, people can be made to see paradise as hell, and also the other way round, to consider the most wretched sort of life as paradise.

Adolf Hitler
[For my readers, see Dan’s comment, that don’t “feel” people living under restrictive gun laws are oppressed.–Joe]

This is what happens in places without guns–Case I

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If this had been in a gun friendly state in the U.S. these scumbags would be suffering from acute lead poisoning after about the second “unannounced visit” and the expected winners of the next Darwin awards.  Instead they invaded several homes before getting caught and will get another chance to invade homes after they get out.

A Dublin man was tonight sentenced to nine years in jail for trying to force a young woman to have sex with her flatmate and then cutting her with a knife.

Stephen Phelan, 20, from Poddle Close in Kimmage was found guilty of aggravated sexual assault and assault causing harm to the woman by a jury in June.

At the sentencing hearing, Judge Phillip O’Sullivan also imposed concurrent sentences ranging from three to seven years for 17 other offences carried out on the same night.

On February 11 2003, Phelan and an accomplice began a spree of burglaries which led to the sexual assault, the stabbing of a student nine times and the crashing of a car into a Dublin Bus.

Judge O’Sullivan said Phelan had been involved in a series of violent incidents and outlined the impact on his victims: post traumatic stress disorder, the loss of power in an arm, permanent scar wounds and a fear of sleeping alone at night.

“No summary of mine can do justice to the trauma suffered by these people,” he said.

He imposed a five-year probation sentence on Phelan to commence on his release, after hearing from a psychiatrist who said he had serious reservations about him getting out into society again under the influence of drugs.

Phelan had been spending €1500-€1600 euro a day on crack cocaine and had been using robberies to fund his habit.

Detective Sergeant George McGeary said Phelan and his accomplice, who has since fled the jurisdiction, had broken into a house in Harold’s Cross, where four people were living, including the young woman.

They armed themselves with a screwdriver, a Stanley knife, a Swiss army knife, a dumb-bell and a hacksaw.

After searching the house for property and money, Phelan went into the bedroom of a 24-year-old tenant. She screamed when she saw him and shouted at her flatmate to get her trousers.

The court heard he came into the room and told her: “Give us what we want or we’ll cut you.”

He was unable to find her ATM card and told her to take off her clothes, where he believed she was concealing it.

Later in the burglary, he came back into her room and told her to lie down on the bed or he would cut her nipples.

She refused several times to take off her clothes but then Phelan came back, held a knife to her throat and told her to ’take off her f*****g clothes’.

Detective Sergeant McGeary told the court that she was crying while she took her trouser bottoms off.

He used his knife to cut off her underwear and then told her to have sex with one of her two male flatmates.

He refused, saying “She’s my friend” but was then cut twice on the upper arm in a X shape.

The young woman was then ordered into the bedroom of another flatmate, who had been forced to lie naked on the bed.

Phelan told them to have sex together and they kissed, pretending to have sex.

Phelan then cut the woman’s buttocks with a knife and also made a cut running from the top of her back to the base.

Detective Sergeant McGeary told the court that the flatmates had been terrified by Phelan’s threats.

Home invasions are rare where people’s rights to defend themselves are not infringed by oppressive governments.  And this is just a hint of some of the things that happen.

Heads up!

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I don’t know if this is something to be looking out for or if it’s
just some random event. But from watching my sitemeter I discovered the
following. The ATF (“Executive Office of the Asset Forfeiture” no
less!) just did a web search for the words {exploding targets}. 
Regardless of their intent I doubt that it will affect Boomershoot much
since we don’t sell them just provide the opportunity to shoot at
them.  But it might affect Tannerite
and others.  Or it could just be they wanted to purchase some for
their own amusement.  Further conjecture on my part would be
unwarranted.

Domain Name   atfonline.gov ?
(United States Government)
IP Address   199.196.144.#
(Executive Office of Asset Forfeiture)

199.196.144.17
ISP   Executive Office of Asset
Forfeiture
Location  
Continent  :  North America
Country  :  United
States  (Facts)
State  :  Virginia
City  :  Dulles
Lat/Long  :  39.0853, -77.6452 (Map)
Language   English (United
States)
en-us
Operating System   Microsoft Win2000
Browser   Internet Explorer 6.0
Mozilla/4.0
(compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.0)
Javascript   version 1.3
Monitor  

Resolution  :  1024 x 768
Color Depth  :  32 bits

Time of Visit   Dec 12 2005 11:28:00 am
Last Page View   Dec 12 2005 11:29:42 am
Visit Length   1 minute 42 seconds
Page Views   2
Referring URL http://www.dogpile.c…7/top/-/Moderate/0/1
Visit Entry Page   http://blog.joehuffm…ploding
Targets.aspx
Visit Exit Page   http://blog.joehuffm…merite
II Tests.aspx
Time Zone   UTC-6:00
CST
– Central Standard Time
CDT – Central Daylight Saving Time
Visitor’s Time   Dec 12 2005 1:28:00 pm
Visit Number   52,344

Quote of the day–Robert Fulford

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My generation of Canadians grew up believing that, if we were very good or very smart, we would someday graduate from Canada.

Robert Fulford
[Particularily relevant now with the proposed ban on handguns in Canada.–Joe]

Fuel depot blast in England

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It’s too early to know for certain if it was an accident or if it was terrorism.  And even if it was determined to be terrorism there is a good chance that knowledge would be restricted.  In any case, it sure was a big explosion (latest news here):

A series of explosions rocked a major oil depot just north of London just before dawn Sunday, injuring 36 people.

Huge balls of fire shot into the sky and the area was filled with clouds of thick, black smoke.

People living nearby have been forced to leave their homes in Hemel Hempstead.

Some residents said they heard a small plane flying overhead just before the first blast. But Hertfordshire police said rumours that the aircraft was involved were unfounded.

Witnesses said there were three explosions at the Buncefield fuel depot. The blasts were heard as far away as the Netherlands.

Some firefighters said that this was the biggest fire they’ve ever tackled.

Thick clouds of smoke were spreading to the southeast and southwest, but were not believed to be toxic.

The oil depot supplies fuel for a large part of southeast England. However, a spokesperwosn for oil giant BP said there would be no problems with fuel shortages.

And if it does happen that it was a terrorist attack the VPC and Brady Bunch should take note that this sort of thing happens even where .50 BMG’s are banned.  It’s the people not the guns.

Exporting the gun culture

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It’s not much, but it’s a start:

READING, England — During his training to become a British police
officer, Ben Johnson recalled, an instructor told him and other
recruits, “If you ever see somebody carrying a gun, turn and run away
as quickly as possible.”

“It was a bizarre situation,” said Johnson, 34, a former police
officer in Garland, Tex., and U.S. Army soldier who moved here with his
British wife three years ago and became this country’s first
non-British police officer. He said running from trouble was exactly
the opposite of what he learned as an American cop.

Now Johnson is publicly challenging one of the great traditions of
law enforcement in Britain, what he calls the “old-fashioned idea of
the unarmed bobby on the beat.” He has written to his chief asking for
permission to carry a gun, arguing that Britain is no longer safe for
unarmed and under-trained police officers. He says he will resign if
the chief refuses.

Johnson’s case has caused a media furor here, partly because an
American — a Texan no less — is claiming he feels less safe as a
police officer in Britain than he did on the beat in the United States,
which is routinely portrayed here as a gun-drunk Wild West.

…

Britain has some of the world’s toughest gun-control laws, and
violent crime, while increasing, is still far less common than in the
United States. There were 184 murders last year in London, a city of
more than 7 million people, compared with 572 in New York City, which
has 8 million people.

…

“The U.K. is changing rapidly, and the police have been slow to
adapt,” said Johnson, 6-foot-4 and razor thin, cradling his infant
daughter in his lap in the dining room of his neat row house. “We
should value the lives of police officers enough to properly equip them
and train them to do the job — even if that means getting rid of some
old-fashioned notions.”

He said he had 36 weeks of academy training and
supervised field work to become a police officer in Texas. But at
Thames Valley he said he received less than half that, and most of the
instruction involved how to fill out paperwork.

Johnson said British officers are instructed to retreat if they see
a gun and call for backup from armed officers, but that can give
suspects time to escape.

I love how they compare the entire U.K.
London, with tough gun control laws, to NYC also with tough gun control
laws.  Why not compare it to the states of Washington and Idaho
combined?  Those states are almost friendly to gun owners and the
right to self defense.  They have about the same population and a good mix of urban and rural areas.  Why?  Because it’s the Washington Post and they have an agenda.  Here is a comparison they could have done:

Washington and Idaho Population according to the 2000 census: 5894143 + 1293953 => 7188096
Washington and Idaho murders and non-negligent manslaughter (FBI Year 2000 UCR): 196 + 16 => 212.

So, even with the “gun-drunk” Wild West states of
Washington and Idaho the number of murders is comparable.  Could
it be that something other than rate of gun ownership is the dominate
factor?  Any sane person would conclude that, but the anti-gun bigots aren’t sane.�
That there is even a debate about keeping policemen disarmed in the
U.K. is further proof of that nationwide case of Hoplophobia.  Fortunately there is help–if they would just take advantage of it.

Update: My mistake.  The Washington post
comparison was London to NYC, not the entire UK to NYC.  I’ll
update with city to city murder rates when I have more time.

Help Washington Ceasefire

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It’s an exceedingly rare event when I encourage people to help Washington Ceasefire rather than Washington Ceasefear.  But this is one of those rare times.  Ceasefire is conducting a poll.  The question of the poll is: “How serious do you think handgun violence is in Washington?”  Currently the results of the poll (on the main page, this may not last long) are:

Answer Votes Percentage
Not at all serious: 14 60.%
Very serious: 6 26.1%
Somewhat serious: 2 8.7%
Not very serious: 1 4.3%
A little serious: 0 0.0%

There are so few votes it’s not a good statistical sample.  Why don’t we help them out?  And just to be fair–only vote once.

Update (04:20, December 12, 2005): Analog Kid posted about the poll and his readers helped out too.  Thanks to everyone that participated. Here are the latest results:

Answer Votes Percentage
Not at all serious: 425 77.6%
Not very serious: 83 15.1%
Very serious: 27 4.9%
A little serious: 11 8.7%
Somewhat serious: 2 0.4%