If I were mad enough at someone to kill them I wouldn’t use a gun. They might wink out on me before I wanted them to. I would want them to know who it was and I would want them to feel the pain.
Eric Engstrom
[Probably said sometime in ’96 or ’97. I responded by saying “I wouldn’t use a gun either. I’d use a propane torch and a wire brush.” — Joe]
Last week I ordered some new boxes for possible use as reactive target containers for Boomershoot 2006. They arrived today. This year there were some indications the targets were failing to detonate because of they were very thin (some of them were only one inch thick). The new ones have inside dimensions of 6″ x 6″ x 3″. I’ll be doing some tests soon. Perhaps this week sometime. Or if I get an email from someone that wants to help out I might do the tests on an upcoming weekend if that would work out better for someone.
I spent part of the weekend cleaning out enough of the garage to make a path to my reloading bench and finding enough of my stuff to reload some 40 S&W ammo. I reloaded about 50 rounds yesterday and 400 today. There is an IPSC match next Sunday and I needed some ammo.
I’m expecting I will have some bad news to report soon. I can’t really talk about it until it shows up in the papers. I’ve been depressed enough lately and this only makes things worse. I really should go make some explosives and detonate it at both “entertainingly close” and long range just to get me out of my depression.
Those who have command of the arms in a country are masters of the state, and have it in their power to make what revolutions they please. [Thus,] there is no end to observations on the difference between the measures likely to be pursued by a minister backed by a standing army, and those of a court awed by the fear of an armed people.
Aristotle
Quoted by John Trenchard and Walter Moyle
“An Argument showing That a Standing Army is Inconsistent with a Free Government, and Absolutely Destructive to the Constitution of the English Monarchy.”
As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, and as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed by the article in their right to keep and bear their private arms.
Tench Coxe
1755–1824
From a KABA alert:
FEDERAL JUDGE HALTS NEW ORLEANS GUN SEIZURES
BELLEVUE, WA – The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana this afternoon issued a temporary restraining order on behalf of the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and National Rifle Association (NRA), bringing an end to firearm seizures from citizens living in and around New Orleans.
District Judge Jay Zainey issued the restraining order against all parties named in a lawsuit filed Thursday by SAF and NRA. Defendants in the lawsuit include New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and Police Chief Edwin Compass III.
“This is a great victory, not just for the NRA and SAF, but primarily for law-abiding gun owners everywhere,” said SAF founder Alan M. Gottlieb. “We are proud to have joined forces with the NRA to put an end to what has amounted to a warrantless gun grab by authorities in New Orleans and surrounding jurisdictions.
“Over the past three weeks,” he continued, “residents who had lost virtually everything in the devastation following Hurricane Katrina had also essentially been stripped of something even more precious, their civil rights, and their right of self-defense, because of these gun seizures.
“SAF and NRA had no alternative but to take action,” Gottlieb added. “If these gun confiscations had been allowed to continue without challenge, it would have set a dangerous precedent that would have encouraged authorities in other jurisdictions to believe they also could suspend the civil rights of citizens in the event of some other emergency.
“What must happen now, and quickly,” said Gottlieb, “is for authorities in the New Orleans area to explain how they will return all of those firearms to their rightful owners, and do it promptly. What this ruling affirms is that even in the face of great natural disasters, governments cannot arbitrarily deprive citizens of their rights. Thanks to some great teamwork between SAF and the NRA, this sort of thing will hopefully never happen again.”
PS Click here to make a contribution to help fund this lawsuit.
It’s just a small step. But it’s certainly a step in the right direction. From here we need to proceed to get one more more convictions on charges stemming for the violation of laws such as these:
If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same; orIf two or more persons go in disguise on the highway, or on the premises of another, with intent to prevent or hinder his free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege so secured—They shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, they shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or to different punishments, pains, or penalties, on account of such person being an alien, or by reason of his color, or race, than are prescribed for the punishment of citizens, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both; and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.
It’s a stretch, but if someone lost their life due to these jerks confiscating their firearms then some bigots could be facing the death penalty.
See also:
SAF and the NRA to file suit
SAF needs New Orleans info
Searching for survivors
This is the way it will always happen
See also: Random Nuclear Strikes.
We have a blogger up and running full speed over at the Nation of Rifleman. He calls himself The Gun Guy. He immediately got added to the blogroll. This is no relation whatsoever to Gun Guys which is very anti-gun.
See also my post Nation of Riflemen is up now.
Thanks to Analog Kid at Random Nuclear Strikes for the heads up.
I don’t understand how they can say this without causing their head to explode:
Currie has been a strong advocate for civil liberties and women’s rights in the state legislature. She also has pushed for major reforms in the state’s property tax-reliant funding of public schools. Additionally, she’s been a leading advocate for gun control and an opponent of the death penalty.
[Emphasis added. — Joe]
It makes just as much sense as if the following occurred:
Why doesn’t the press laugh them them all the way to the funny farm?
For those who are not members or have a bad email address with them. “Under new management”:
From a Keep and Bear Arms alert I just received. Tomorrow morning they will file suit:
SAF, NRA ASK FEDERAL COURT TO HALT NEW ORLEANS GUN SEIZURES
BATON ROUGE, LA (Sept. 22) – The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and National Rifle Association (NRA) joined with individual gun owners in Louisiana Thursday morning, filing a motion in United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana seeking a temporary restraining order to stop authorities in and around the City of New Orleans from seizing firearms from private citizens in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Click here to make a contribution to help fund this lawsuit.
Arbitrary gun seizures, without warrant or probable cause, have been reported during the past three weeks since the Crescent City was devastated by the hurricane. In cases reported to SAF, police refused to give citizens receipts for their seized firearms. Earlier, SAF insisted that police account for all seized firearms, disclose their whereabouts, and explain how they will be returned to their rightful owners. Authorities have not responded.
Gun confiscations have been highly publicized since the New York Times quoted New Orleans Police Superintendent P. Edwin Compass III, who said, “Only law enforcement are allowed to have weapons,” and ABC News quoted Deputy Police Chief Warren Riley stating, “No one will be able to be armed. We are going to take all the weapons.”
For example, a San Francisco, CA camera crew from KTVU filmed one incident in which visiting California Highway Patrol officers tackled an elderly woman identified as Patricia Konie, to seize her pistol and forcibly remove her from her home. An ABC news crew accompanying an Oklahoma National Guard unit filmed another incident in which homeowners were handcuffed and disarmed, then released but without their firearms.
“We are delighted to work jointly with the NRA in an effort to bring these outrageous gun seizures to a halt,” said SAF founder Alan M. Gottlieb. “Our inquiries about these confiscations were cavalierly ignored, as were our demands for a public explanation from the police and city officials about why citizens were being unlawfully disarmed, leaving them defenseless against lingering bands of looters and thugs.
“New Orleans officials left us with no recourse,” Gottlieb observed. “It was bad enough that Big Easy residents were victims of the worst natural disaster in the nation’s history. That they would be subsequently victimized by their own local government, taking their personal property without warrant, is unconscionable. These illegal gun seizures must be stopped, now.”
Today I checked on the status of a couple of the “blunt instruments” I’m using on Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. Since I hadn’t heard back on them for weeks I sort of guessed they had been dropped and I wasn’t going to get anywhere with them. I was wrong.
The first person I talked to said the issue was still VERY much alive it was just that he had been buried in stuff and was reluctant to share the work load with others. He has a couple of hard deadlines to meet and couldn’t work on it this minute. My project had received some attention a couple days ago and would be getting more attention soon. I felt pretty good about things. He asked a few more good questions which I gave short answers to and then followed up with detailed email answers.
The second person I talked to said I had gone about things in the wrong manner. No big deal–the person in the appropriate channel will be contacting me soon. I got the feeling that it wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t called back twice to find out the story. I was very pleased with this. I was afraid I would just be told to “go away.” That could still happen but at least I believe I will get a chance to present my findings and have a reasonable chance of convincing them to take action.
One “blunt instrument” should be in there hands by now. That is the appeal of their denial of my Privacy Act request on all the information they have in their files, email, etc. about the “investigation” they did on me. I hired a lawyer in D.C. that specializes in FOIA/Privacy Act requests. They claimed the Privacy Act didn’t apply to them, but both my and the lawyer’s read of the Act is that it specifically says it applies to contractors that perform a government agency function–so “hand it over!” Nothing back on the appeal yet.
And since PNNL has received the FOIA request I talked about the other day by now I might as well reveal it here. I asked for:
A list of all Pacific Northwest National Laboratory computer programs that use the FlashTek software library or rely on derivations of the FlashTek software library and/or it’s source code.
A list, complete with contact information, of all PNNL customers and contacts that have copies of those programs.
Most, perhaps all, of these programs will have been produced in the Cyber Security Group at PNNL. The source code can be easily identified by a copyright notice similar to the following:
/////////////////////////
// Copyright FlashTek
// Joe Huffman
// Joe@joehuffman.org
/////////////////////////
In case the name “FlashTek” doesn’t mean anything to you, that is the name I use for all my private business stuff. From software to explosives FlashTek is my dba (Doing Business As) name. To speed up development of several projects at PNNL my coworkers and I used some of my previously developed code. PNNL never bothered to obtain a written license for that and I never bothered to ask for one. The implied threat with the FOIA request is that I will now ask for a license and/or demand they and all their customers stop using my previously developed software. This is a really nasty thing to do and I don’t really want to do it. If they would give me all the information I asked for via the Privacy Act request then I, almost for certain, would not bring up the software license issue.
There is one more “blunt instrument” that I haven’t checked up on. I’ll just wait a while for that one.
Previous posts:
Blunt instrument number five
Case blown open–maybe
Reconsideration
The second printing of this book is coming out next month. For gun geeks this is a great book. Lots of math and experimental results to back up the theory. I have a copy of the first printing someplace. I got it probably 7 or 8 years ago and immediately went out and did some of my own experiments to verify things. The results looked good. From the web page:
Bullet Penetration describes the analysis and testing of a model of bullet penetration dynamics; this model is a significant technical advance over what has been heretofore available. This penetration model is directly related to understanding the production of an incapacitating wound by the bullet parameters (velocity, weight, shape, diameter). Incapacitation from wound trauma is a complex subject that has been controversial for many decades, and all aspects of this subject are discussed in detail in Bullet Penetration. The new results in this book are described in a style and vocabulary that make the basic principles and results understandable to the layman. This outstanding book should be read by everyone who is critically dependent on handgun bullet performance as well as all those with an interest in any aspect of wound ballistics.
The topics covered in Bullet Penetration include physiological and psychological effects in incapacitation from wound trauma, modeling of bullet penetration, and modeling of bullet expansion. The realities associated with the desired “one shot stop” and the ignorance and/or fraud in “combat data” claims are discussed in detail. The primary focus is on handgun ammunition, but the principles and many of the results are also applicable to rifle ammunition. The book has 303 pages, including 69 pages of bullet photographs and graphs of test results.
No one has the right to destroy another person’s belief by demanding empirical evidence.
Ann Landers
Nationally syndicated advice columnist and Director of Handgun Control, Inc.
[I would claim than in matters that adversely affect other people one has the obligation to demand empirical evidence. But so many moonbats agree with Landers philosophy that it is rather depressing at times. — Joe]
The annual Gun Rights Policy Conference is this weekend. If I had a job and it wasn’t in California (spit, spit) I would have seriously considered going. I was a speaker at GRPC 1999 and 2000 and was very impressed with the entire event. I just received this Keep and Bear Arms alert:
WATCH LIVE FEED FROM GUN RIGHTS POLICY CONFERENCE
BELLEVUE, WA – Gun rights activists unable to attend this weekend’s 20th annual Gun Rights Policy Conference in Los Angeles can still get in on the action via a live internet video feed from the event, according to Alan M. Gottlieb, founder of the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA).
Gottlieb announced today that by visiting the SAF website at www.saf.org, the CCRKBA website at www.ccrkba.org, or KeepAndBearArms.com, and clicking on the link, activists may watch the action unfold on their computer screen.
The live feed is being accomplished through the courtesy of the Freedom Broadcast Network, both Saturday and Sunday.
In addition to Gottlieb, scheduled to appear during the conference are U.S. Senator Larry Craig (R-ID), National Rifle Association President Sandra Froman, NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, SAF President Joseph Tartaro, UCLA Law Prof. Eugene Volokh, national syndicated talk radio hosts Larry Elder, Michael Reagan, author and Professor John Lott of the American Enterprise Institute, Larry Pratt with Gun Owners of America; John Burtt, chairman of the Fifty Caliber Shooters’ Institute; Dr. Timothy Wheeler, director of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership, and many others.
Cool. Very cool. You won’t get a chance to do all the networking (I met Stephanie at GRPC 2000–she does all the publicity for Boomershoot) but you will get a chance to listen to some awesome speakers.
On probably the second day of class this year Xenia told me she needed ten minutes of video to take into her English class that would “get people talking.” She asked me for suggestions. It’s 58 minutes, not 10, but we came up with Innocents Betrayed. She said she could just select 10 minutes of the video to show. We watched it together and timed various segments. She decided just the first ten minutes would work. I wanted her to skip one of the genocides and show the part about the kids in California who were killed by a guy with a pitchfork in their home. All the kids knew how to shoot but couldn’t get access to any of the guns because California state law requires “safe storage” to keep guns away from unsupervised kids. But it was Xenia’s decision and she figured showing a few more million dead because of gun control would be sufficient to start people talking without getting into little kids with hundreds of stab wounds.
Her class should be over by now and I haven’t got any calls from the school to pick her up so my guess is things couldn’t have gone too badly for her. I’ll update this posting later today when I get a full report from her.
Next on our list of projects is to take my picture from the fair and the KING 5 Boomershoot video to her chemistry teacher and suggest a field trip on “exothermic reactions”. In an “isn’t it a small world” twist her chemistry teacher’s husband supplies the portable toilets each year for Boomershoot. Also, Barb and I graduated from Orofino High School with him.
Update 1: Xenia called a few minutes ago on another topic and I asked how the English class went. She said when she turned off the video it was silent for 30 seconds. They didn’t know what to say. She didn’t have much time and I’ll get a further update after school. She seem pretty happy with the results though.
Update 2: Xenia reported most people didn’t talk. The instructor didn’t commit himself either way. Many of the kids didn’t get the connection between lack of guns and genocide, “The government would have just done it anyway.” One suggested that taking of the guns was as much a symbolic thing as much as anything, “Maybe because they didn’t have guns they were more likely to feel helpless.” Even if they weren’t totally convinced at least they had some doubt put in their minds about the wisdom of gun control. Video can be a much more powerful media than the written word and JPFO did a great job on this video, although I do agree that the “gun-control enables genocide” could have been expressed better than just giving examples of when that happened. They should also of said that genocide has never happened without there being gun control in place. And more examples of where a relatively small number of private citizens with guns saved themselves (or at least significantly delayed their demise) from government sponsored murder would be welcomed.
Kim du Toit (his site still down at the current time) once posted that he was frequently surprised at what posts got the most attention. Something he thought was very ordinary would get a lot of attention and something he thought was really special would end up being no big deal. In the case of my postings nearly everything is “no big deal”. Virtually nothing makes a big splash on my blog. However last night Keep and Bear Arms posted a link to my simple reposting of an email alert I received from them. Traffic jumped. Probably half of my traffic came from their referrals. Then this morning Outdoors Unlimited linked to the same posting. About 80% of my traffic is now from that one site. About 10% is now from KABA.
It’s not my writing, it’s not my insights, it’s not my leaking of privileged information (hah! As if I would ever do that), it’s that I posted an email that went out to thousands of other people.
I’ve had a couple people ask me if I had any clues what was going on with Kim duToit’s site, why it was down, etc. I also saw a lot of people visit my site via search engines with query strings about Kim. About all I could determine without given him a call (which I was hesitant to do because I don’t really know him that well) was that a connection could be made to the machine but it was refusing requests–someone had turned the site off.
AnarchAngel has the story, the essence of which is:
I have communicated briefly with Connie Du Toit, and there is a business issue requiring Kim and Connie to take the site down right now, and without any notice. They can’t provide details yet but expect some information in a few days.
The last few months have had a very sobering effect on me. Think about this:
Q: How many gun bloggers openly use their real names?
A: Not many.
Q: What percentage of those have had “problems” of some sort because of that?
A: A lot.
Q: How many anti-freedom bloggers do you know of that have “had problems?”
A: None that I know of. But I don’t “travel in those circles.” Anyone that you know of?
If you have to “stay in the closet” to be safe then how safe are you? Did the Jews in Nazi Germany increase their safety by “keeping their heads down”? It’s a predator/prey type situation. If you go into hiding then you are saying, “I am the prey.” You embolden the enemies of freedom. They become the full time predators. They are at the top of the food-chain. If we don’t bring a few of those predators down, feed on them, and scatter their sun-bleached bones on the range among our empty brass shell casing we have nothing but fear and hiding in our future.
Careful now. Think about this. Who are our true predators? They aren’t just someone that advocates for their own imagined safety at our expense. The predators are those that attempt to harm us personally (socially, financially, etc. as well as physically–which is unlikely) because they do not want our voices heard in open debate. If you were to target someone for the loss of their job just because they advocated some new restriction on firearms then you are no better than those that targeted me or Kim for our activism. In essence you cannot initiate “force”–you can only respond when they have initiated the use of “force” against you or another innocent party. Don’t think this means you have to “play nice”. Don’t just whine about things for a while. If they initiate “force” they have given you the signal for you to transform into a ferocious predator. You aren’t done until you are napping in the sun with a full belly and the vultures are feeding on the remnants of the carcass.
Also on this topic:
The closet
CCRKBA blasts bigotry
Fred of Fred’s M14 Stocks on being on a list
Thoughts on coming out of the closet
Coming out of the closet has it’s price
Coming out of the closet
You’ve just dumped a scumbag. Don’t put your gun away. You scan the area. Jackals and lions travel in packs. You probably will never be involved in another shooting in your entire life. This is it! Make the most of it. This is a target rich environment. See if there is someone else that needs to be shot.
Greg Hamilton
Self Defense Instructor
Nov. 19, 1995
From a KABA alert I just received:
SAF INVESTIGATING NEW ORLEANS GUN SEIZURES; NEEDS TO HEAR FROM YOU
The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) is calling on members and supporters living in the New Orleans metropolitan area who have had firearms confiscated by police, federal officers or National Guard units to contact SAF headquarters at once.
Over the past three weeks, since the New Orleans and surrounding area was devastated by Hurricane Katrina, there have been disturbing reports about warrantless searches and seizures of privately-owned firearms.
“SAF, in cooperation with the National Rifle Association, has investigators on the ground and has retained legal counsel in preparation for possible action,” said SAF founder Alan M. Gottlieb.
SAF wants to speak directly with individuals who have actually had their firearms confiscated. If you, or someone you know, has had a firearm seized by authorities in the New Orleans area in the days following the hurricane, SAF needs to hear from you.
Contact SAF via e-mail at safalert@liberty.seanet.com. Please provide us with your full name, address, current working telephone number and the date and time of the firearm(s) seizure. Please also let us know the best time of day for us to reach you at that number.
Sincerely yours,
Alan M. Gottlieb
President, KeepAndBearArms.com
Kevin, over at The Smallest Minority, received a letter from one of his readers today. I read it a little while ago. A contributing factor is that I’m really tired right now but I started crying when I got to this part:
My dad, however, was a survivor of Auschwitz. My grandparents were murdered there. And it is now a cliche, but it’s true, the ‘average’ Jew could not defend themselves. So that got me to thinkin…and then seeing how it starts to look like America could end up like many S. American countries, with gated communities and barbed wire or broken glass up on the walls of the compounds…and I used to think this was the siren song of the Cassandras, but New Orleans showed that ain’t necessarily true…well, all this speaks of the need to have some protection.
This is the part that has to make Kevin really puff up in justifiable pride:
You’ve helped me understand a great deal of things I otherwise might not have. I had a lifetime bias against guns…still won’t say I like ’em, but that’s that cultural bias I mentioned, and having one for self-defense is not the same as enjoying killing.
Although it scares some people he should now understand my post Why Boomershoot? And although many people think I’m paranoid for my Jews in the Attic Test I doubt he is one of them.
He’s looking for someone in the St. Louis area to take him shooting for the first time. I would go and supply an assortment of firearms and the ammunition if someone wants to cover my travel expenses. I’m a certified NRA instructor, I’m a high class B IPSC shooter, I do pretty good with a long range rifle, and further credentials are here.
Thanks for sharing Kevin. That was really great.
Update: I have a pledge to cover the air travel with excess frequent flyer miles. If I could get a little bit more to cover a couple nights in a cheap motel I’ll cover my meals.
Update2: I now have pledges to cover all my expenses. Now it just depends on if Kevin’s reader wants to accept or not.
I’ve seen this done before but never quite as well done as this site: Myths About Gun Control. But of course I’m a geek and like lots of notes and references.
