Illegal hands

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As I was reading this article I started out thinking this is another example of people creating a problem statement to arrive at their desired solution. While this is true, I ended up laughing at ambiguous wording:

Hopkins study evaluates BPD tactics for gun control

…

Beilenson said there was a 45 percent reduction in repeat offenses. He added that the biggest problem was simply the number of guns in Baltimore.

“[There are] literally as many guns as people in Baltimore, mostly in illegal hands,” he said.

We have sometimes wondered when they would get around to banning sticks, stones, feet and hands. Perhaps Beilenson thinks some hands are already banned.

Quote of the day—Gil G

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When you can’t get to shoot others there’s no freedom, right?

Gil G
February 2, 2018
Comment to Gun Rights Advocates Score Victory With Latest Illinois Supreme Court Ruling
[This is what some anti-gun people think of you.—Joe]

Cell phones are good for rats

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Back in the early 2000s I talked to a researcher who said he did tests which showed that rats exposed to satellite phone radio emissions had fewer cancers than rats not exposed to the radio emissions. Then about two years ago more research indicated the same thing with conventional cell phones.

Today, another study came out which reported:

The radiated rats somehow lived longer than comparison rats that were not exposed to cellphone radiation.

Okay, I’m convinced. If you want your rat to have a long and healthy life you should give it a cell phone.

New shooter report

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Kelsey recently joined my team at work. Like Caity, when she first joined the team full time, there was a minor flaw. Everyone else on our team knows how to shoot and enjoys guns. Kelsey is very quiet and difficult for me to read. I wasn’t sure whether to discuss this issue with her or not. Over the course of a few weeks it came out that she was interested in learning to shoot so I reserved the training bay for 12:00 –> 2:00 (they only do two hour blocks) today. It turned out our boss gave us all the afternoon off since we have to work part of Sunday this weekend so Kelsey and I weren’t rushed when we visited the range.

I started her out with a suppressed Ruger Mark III 22/45 with subsonic ammo at five yards.

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That went well. I didn’t take a picture of the target after the first eight shots, but here you can see the target after 18 rounds:

20180202_132021Cropped

The first eight shots were the three at the bottom, and then a vertical hole of five shots you could cover with a nickel. The one wild shot at the top was near the end of the second magazine.

I had forgotten to tell her to keep the front sight in focus. We talked about that a bit and then she went on to a .22 revolver. I had her fire it single action with CCI CBs:

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That went well:

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Okay, now a challenge, and the reason I seldom recommend revolvers. Shooting a revolver in double action mode:

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Again, a couple wild shots near the end of the string. But the rest of the shots are really rocking it for a new shooter with any handgun, let alone a double action revolver. She learns fast!

I gave her a choice, learning to shoot faster, move to a larger caliber gun, or more precision shooting with the Ruger. She choose more precision shooting with the semi-auto.

I was amazed. This is 10 rounds at five yards:

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These were shots 37 through 46 in her entire life. She only once even held a gun in her hands before (so she says).

This is after 20 rounds:

20180202_134056Cropped

Okay. She’s a pro. There is nothing I can teach her about this type of shooting. We have to move on to something else. She is going to get bored putting so many bullets through a single hole.

I put up a paper with four bull’s-eye targets and told her to put one round on each bullseye. Keep it in the black or smaller, but shoot faster. She did a couple strings of five shots each. She shot quite a bit faster, but about half the bullets were in the 10 ring.

Uhh… nice.

I told her she can go faster still, “Just keep them in the black. As soon as the sights are lined up somewhere within the black, squeeze off the last 20% of the trigger pull”. “Oh”, she replied, “I can do that.” And she did. Hmm… I need to push her more.

I pulled out the shot timer and went through the range commands with her: “1) Make ready. 2) Are you ready? 3) Standby…BEEP!” Got that? Good. Let’s try it.

And I finally pushed her into failure. With four shots, one bullet barely nicked the bottom of the paper, and one missed on the right side of the paper entirely. Ah! Now we have something I can teach her!

Shooting fast, particularly in competition, is a mind game. A little bit of stress can make everything fall apart. Don’t let the timer or the shooter next to you, with their own set of plates competing for the first to complete, affect how you shoot. You shoot your targets your way, just like you did in practice. Let’s try it again.

She got it. From the low ready she was able to get five shots into five targets (one of the targets twice) in six point something seconds. All her splits were less than a second.

We had used up all our range time so we cleaned up the range and as we returned to the lobby to wash up I asked her to walk slowly past the shooters in the next bay and look at the targets the other shooters were producing. I told her, “There won’t be any targets even close to what you did today”. I was right. There wasn’t a pattern on any of the targets I could have completely covered with both of my hands spread wide.

We went on to the lobby and I finished washing first. I grabbed her 20 round target and showed it to the range officer behind the counter. She was as amazed as I was and pulled up Kelsey’s profile in their database and made a note of something about “A legend has been reborn.”

Kelsey earned her new shooter smile and she is now a complete member of our team:

20180202_132018

Quote of the day—Chief Justice Karmeier

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Innocent behavior could swiftly be transformed into culpable conduct if an individual unknowingly crosses into a firearm restriction zone. The result could create a chilling effect on the second amendment when an otherwise law-abiding individual may inadvertently violate the 1000-foot firearm-restricted zones by just turning a street corner.

Chief Justice Karmeier
February 1, 2018
Ban on Carrying Guns Within 1,000 Feet of Park Struck Down
Complete decision: The People of the state of Illinois, Appellant, v. Julio Chairez, Appelle
[Chilling effect!!!!

I’ve been wanting to hear those words in a court decision in regards to the Second Amendment since before the Heller decision. I wish it was in a U.S. Supreme Court decision but I’ll take it as a first step.

Apply the legal concept of a chilling effect applied to the laws of New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland, New York, and California. This is one of the lanes on the road to victory.—Joe]

Anti-gun people say the strangest things

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Via the FPC:

TheThingsAntiGunPeopleSay

One might think this sort of thing was a “brain fart” or some slip of the tongue that occurs when under the stress of an interview or public speaking event. But I’ve seen these sort of things happen in written communication. They simply do not have the mental processes to handle rational thought. This happens so frequently we have a name for it. It is called Peterson Syndrome.

Quote of the day—TurtleDude

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I oppose stupid laws that are almost guaranteed not to apply to people causing problems.The people who push this crap … don’t even believe it will do squat about criminals. They want to pander to the slow witted sheeple and harass honest citizens whose voting patterns vex anti gun liberals.

TurtleDude
January 30, 2018
Post in the forum If gun control worked Mexico would be crime free.
[Well, those aren’t the only reason they do it, but it’s a couple of the reasons.—Joe]

Rounds in the last month

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The only caliber I reloaded this month was .223. I reloaded 418 rounds.

It was slow going with a lot of case prep on the used brass. I also loaded up a few test rounds of some new bullets. These were Berger 75 and 80 grain VLDs, and the Berger 82 grain Long Range BT. With my target AR I get good results with factory ammo with 77 grain Sierra Match Kings but the Berger’s have higher ballistic coefficients and if I get as good as accuracy from them as the factory ammo and the expected velocities then I will have more wind resistant ammo than the factory loadings. The problem with the two heavier bullets is they take up so much space that if you load them to max over all length you can’t get as much powder in the case as you can if you load them to significantly over the max overall length. But if you load them over length then you have to feed them into the chamber one at a time by hand because they won’t fit in the magazine.

I decided to load my test round to spec with reduced charges and see what I end up with. I’m expecting it will be disappointing. I’m more excited about the 75 grain VLDs. They have a G1 BC of .421 compared to the 77 grain Sierra Match King’s .362. That’s significant. And with a slightly lighter bullet I might be able to get a little higher velocity as well.

I haven’t fired any of them yet. I’m going to wait until I go to Idaho again so I can do some accuracy testing at the same time as the chronograph tests at about 200 yards.

This brings my lifetime reloaded ammunition totals to:

223: 3,138 rounds.
30.06: 756 rounds.
300 WIN: 1,591 rounds.
40 S&W: 80,258 rounds.
45 ACP: 2,007 rounds.
9 mm: 21,641 rounds.
Total: 109,391 rounds.

How’s that going to work out?

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I have to laugh at this:

Until recently, sheriff’s deputies notified offenders they weren’t allowed to possess firearms but gave them 24 hours to turn them in.

There was no mechanism, however, to make sure that the gun was actually turned in. Local law enforcement and state law enforcement officials would go house to house to enforce the laws as resources allowed, but the
process was expensive, slow and potentially dangerous.

…

The sheriff’s office is now working with the Office on the Status of Woman and others to develop a comprehensive plan for making sure everyone required to surrender their guns does so in a manner that’s safe for officers, according to Suzy Loftus, assistant chief legal counsel for the sheriff’s office.

So, going house to house and confiscating is considered dangerous? Who would have guessed?

So, now, they are going to “develop a comprehensive plan” where people surrender their guns “in a manner that’s safe for officers”.

Wow! These people are really stupid.

Apparently they are unable to conceive of the response, “No. Your move.”

How gun control works

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From Rolf:

HowGunControlworks

As I have said before:

How long does it take the average high school dropout to find a way around the ban? Yeah, that’s right, Einstein. The average high school dropout can get all the recreational drugs they want within an hour anytime of the day, any day of the week. So just how effective you think a background check would be in reducing the abuse of recreational drugs?

Now apply what you know about the recreational drug issue to firearms. A background check is totally pointless.

A similar argument can be made for nearly all gun control. Nearly all politicians know this. They have to have some objective other than reducing violent crime because it just doesn’t work and the data supports this conclusion.

Most people who have studied this believe the real objective is to increased the dependency on government and increase the political power of government officials. This line of reasoning can be extrapolated to “so they can implement a socialist state”. YMMV.

Operation Safe Store

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Seems like a reasonable idea:

“No one wants to prevent the theft of firearms more than the licensed retailers that sell them,” said Stephen L. Sanetti, NSSF president and chief executive officer. “There is no one-size fits all solution to helping prevent thefts from firearms retailers, which is why Operation Safe Store will provide access to information and training to allow retailers to make the decisions that are right for them.”

I strongly suspect there is more to the story than what we see here.

A bit of background with something slightly off the topic at hand.

At one point there was talk of “safe storage” laws at the Federal level and states were passing such laws with alarming regularity. They were poorly written at best and frequently obvious attempts to make it prohibitively expensive, increase the hassle of owning a gun, and make it difficult or impossible to use a gun for home self-defense.

“The industry” responded by including a lock of some sort with every new gun sold. Gun friendly legislators, lobbyists, and gun owners  could then use this to convince undecided legislators, “Gun owners already have ‘safe storage’ available to them.” The “safe storage” drive was stalled and in some states even turned against the anti-gun activists.Washington, for example, passed a law removing the state taxes from gun safes.

I suspect the NSSF is politically astute enough to see some writing on the walls and is “getting ahead” of legislation aimed at making life very difficult for gun stores.

Quote of the day—Jeff Snyder

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As the Founding Fathers knew well, a government that does not trust its honest, law-abiding, taxpaying citizens with the means of self-defense is not itself worthy of trust. Laws disarming honest citizens proclaim that the government is the master, not the servant, of the people. A federal law along the lines of the Florida statute — overriding all contradictory state and local laws and acknowledging that the carrying of firearms by law-abiding citizens is a privilege and immunity of citizenship — is needed to correct the outrageous conduct of state and local officials operating under discretionary licensing systems.

Jeff Snyder
2001
Nation of Cowards page 30
[This essay was originally published in 1993 by The Public Interest.

What he says we needed 25 years ago, while closer than ever before, is still not a reality. Let’s keep pushing and get this item checked off our list.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Firearms Policy @gunpolicy

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The anti-gun media has decided that it is more important to push their agenda than to tell the truth.

ConcealedCarryAndViolentCrime

Firearms Policy @gunpolicy
Tweeted on January 29, 2018
[The graph is a little difficult to understand so here is a bit of help. The shaded background colors are the CCW population coverage (units are on the right side of the graph), the maroon line with the 49% reduction label is the Violent Crime rate (presumably in per 100K people) with the units on the left side of the graph. The other crime types follow in a similar format.

We have the principles, the U.S. Constitution, many state constitutions, and the data. All of them supporting the pro-rights side. The anti-gun media, cannot innocently claim ignorance or even stupidity. It has to be maliciousness. You have to ask, “What’s the real reason they continue to push their anti-gun agenda? They are pro-criminal, probably always have been and always will be and for a “good” reason.—Joe]

Exercise of rights at a minimum

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This is very telling:

Wide-open policies on gun laws do not reflect the mood or makeup of most New Jerseyans. While they are not always successful, New Jersey gun laws are written to help keep the number of guns at a minimum. Fewer guns will make our law enforcement officers’ jobs that much easier, and make our streets that much safer.

What if the same principle was applied to other specific enumerated rights:

  • Keep books at a minimum (and ban the exceptionally dangerous ones such as The Communist Manifesto, Mein Kampf, The Little Red Book, and all religious books)
  • Keep political speech at a minimum (and ban the most dangerous speech—that which advocates the policies of the political left (see the books above)
  • Keep the right to a lawyer present while being questioned at a minimum
  • Keep people of color from voting at a minimum

There are no second class rights. All these rights must respected and preserved. Essentially all New Jersey politicians need to be either prosecuted and/or be declared varmints with no bag limits and a decent bounty paid.

Quote of the day—Divemedic

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I became a teacher after I retired from over 20 years as a firefighter and paramedic, where I spent part of my career working with the SWAT team. I spent years as an IDPA competitor, and I am a military veteran. I have carried a concealed weapon for more than 25 years. A permit that has allowed me to carry a weapon into McDonald’s, Disney, public parks, streets and sidewalks. Not once have I used that weapon in a threatening or illegal manner.

…

I would, if necessary, lay down my life in defense of the children that have been placed in my care. Even in Kindergarten. Possibly YOUR children, if you are reading this.

Except the politicians have declared that I am not permitted to do so, because they don’t trust me with a firearm once I cross an imaginary line and enter school property, even though they trust me to carry one everywhere else. So instead, I must sit in the dark, unarmed, unable to protect those children, hiding and waiting for help that may not come, wait with your children to die at the hands of a madman who didn’t obey your laws or your signs.

Divemedic
January 8, 2018
Comment to Quote of the day—James Comer
[The foolishness of the “gun free zone” laws is so obvious one must conclude the politicians are incredible ignorant, stupid, and/or evil. As the data and bodies stack up I’m more and more inclined to place my bet on “they are evil”. More bodies gives them more opportunities to accumulate power.—Joe]

Representative Adam Smith on reciprocity

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Almost a year ago I wrote my U.S. representative in Congress encouraging him to support concealed carry reciprocity. Here is his response:

AdamSmith20170323-0

AdamSmith20170323-1

A couple of things stand out. The first is that he says:

The responsibility of carrying a concealed handgun is massive, and ensuring the safety of the public at large by requiring background checks and training should be an absolute minimum.

People who have a Washington State concealed pistol license, CPL as it is called in Washington, should see something jump out at them over this.

Washington State doesn’t have a training requirement. Hence, if this were a problem, Smith should be able to show that Washington State CPL holders have more firearm accidents or engage in more illegal shootings than people from other states with a training requirement. No such data exists. Probably because it is so rare that such a thing happens.

I have to conclude that Smith was just rationalizing the decision he had already made.

Next, a twofer:

I will continue to advocate for putting policies in place that protect our children and communities while maintaining the rights granted by the Second Amendment.

His opposition to reciprocity is for “the children”! How many children in this country are shot each year by people with concealed carry licenses? My guess it is very close to zero. I’ve never heard of it happening. And I’m pretty sure the anti-gun people would make sure the mainstream media know about it. The same goes for someone with a concealed carry license shooting up a community. It has to be very rare. The data shows that, in Texas, compared to the police they are 10 times less likely to commit a misdemeanor or felon and over seven times less likely to commit a firearms violation of some sort. Other states show similar low rates.

Again, this has to be rationalization for his decision rather than rational thought to arrive at a decision.

“Granted by the Second Amendment”? This is a common “misunderstanding” but I expect my representatives in Congress to be informed. My guess is that there is a good chance this was deliberate rather than ignorance. It should be clear if you actually read the Second Amendment that it references a preexisting right rather than granting a right. This was made all the more clear in U S v Cruikshank:

The right there specified is that of ‘bearing arms for a lawful purpose.’ 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…

It is long past time for me to start educating my representative.

Update: I sent him an email:

In a letter you sent me on March 17th of last year you made claims which are not supported by, and/or are contrary to, the available evidence regarding people with licenses to carry concealed firearms and the Second Amendment. The full details are in my blog post here: https://blog.joehuffman.org/2018/01/28/representative-adam-smith-on-reciprocity. The short version is that since Washington State does not require training for a concealed pistol license those opposed to reciprocity between states regarding licenses and claiming training “should be an absolute minimum” should also be able to point to evidence showing Washington State concealed pistol license holders are more prone to misuse of their firearms. To my knowledge no such evidence exists.

Furthermore using this criteria to oppose the law adversely affects the civil rights of residents of Washington State when they travel to states that will not issue licenses to Washington residents. Blocking reciprocity has a lesser impact on the rights of people of other states who can easily obtain Washington licenses for their travels to Washington State. You are acting against the interest of your own constituents by taking this stand.

Please read my blog post and reconsider your stance on this important civil rights issue.

Thank you.

Regards,

Joe Huffman

Random thought of the day

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Progressives who demand gun control sometimes tell me they want to prevent crimes rather than rely on punishment of the perpetrators.

If crime prevention is their preferred approach to these sort of things then why don’t they advocate for building “The Wall”?

Quote of the day—Bernie Sanders 2020‏ @Bernie2020X

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You are literally promoting anti Semitism and white supremacy. Guns do not belong in the hands of private citizens. Shame on you.

Bernie Sanders 2020‏ @Bernie2020X
Tweeted on January 7, 2018
[This was in response to Maj Toure‏ @MAJTOURE tweeting the four rules of firearm safety.

Many anti-gun people literally do not have the ability to think logically. This is an example of that.

Don’t ever let anyone get away with telling you that no one wants to take your guns.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Jeff Cooper

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Personal weapons are what raised mankind out of the mud, and the rifle is the queen of personal weapons. The possession of a good rifle, as well as the skill to use it well, truly makes a man the monarch of all he surveys. It realizes the ancient dream of the Jovian thunderbolt, and as such it is the embodiment of personal power. For this reason it exercises a curious influence over the minds of most men, and in its best examples it constitutes an object of affection unmatched by any other inanimate object.

Jeff Cooper
1997
The Art of the Rifle Page 1.
[A “monarch of all he surveys” must cause a tremendous amount of anger in the authoritarian and collectivist. The possession of, and skill to use, a rifle makes an individual something much more than a peasant to be controlled. It gives them an opportunity to protect themselves, their loved ones, their property, and to have a say in their own destiny. This is part of Why Boomershoot.

Furthermore, the existence of Boomershoot gives people justification to acquire a rifle and skills to realize “the ancient dream of the Jovian thunderbolt”.—Joe]

D-DAY Through German Eyes

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My brother Doug told me he recently read D DAY Through German Eyes and really enjoyed it. I am almost finished with the second book now. It’s very good. There were a number of things I learned about the weapons the allies had but what I have enjoyed most was what the German soldiers believed they were fighting for.

I didn’t realize the allies had planes and ships that fired rockets. I thought the planes only had guns and bombs. And I thought the only weapons the ships could use against land based targets were their guns and planes from the aircraft carriers.

Some of the rockets had phosphorous warheads. There were also warheads with explosives and ball bearings which were used for anti-personal as well as anti-material. And amphibious tanks! This surprised the Germans too. Some of the tanks also had flame throwers. The Germans really didn’t like the flame throwers. Some refused to go back into battle facing the phosphorous and flamethrowers even though the alternative was an expedited court marshal and execution the same day.

There were Russians who defected on the Eastern Front and joined the Germany army who assigned them to the western front. When the allies took prisoners the Russians were separated from Germans and handed directly over to the Russians. The Russians executed them. There were thousands of them.

One soldier told of the “Browning Assassination Pistol”. From the description it has to be the FP-45 Liberator. What I found most interesting is that the soldier (a military policeman) who mentioned them said thousands of them were distributed in France and probably hundreds of German soldiers were killed by French civilians with them. This is in direct contrast to what Wikipedia says about them.

The MP was guarding a small group of Germany officers the night before D-Day. As the bombing started they went to a private residence set up as a small hotel for the officers. After dinner one of the waitress suggested to one of the officers that he looked tired and perhaps he would like to go to bed (it was implied the waitress went to bed with him). He did. Later the other officers wanted to speak with the “sleeping” officer and the MP went looking for him. He found him in the bedroom, a hole in his head, blood all over, and a “Browning Assassination Pistol” on the floor. All the hotel staff were gone.

Did you know that Germany was actually protecting France? They needed to be protected from the International Socialists to the East, so there was a partnership between the French and Germany governments. The Germans were National Socialists but that wasn’t a threat to the people of western Europe. Germany united Europe. This was good for people of Europe. Why would the Americans and Canadians have a problem with that? Sure, the British hated the French and wanted a piece of France, but the Germany was protecting France from the British and the secret societies (the Free Masons) to the west who were being manipulated by the international bankers.

At least that is what was believed by many of the German soldiers.