I’ve been America three weeks and I’ve shot four different guns. This is so cool!
Ian
January 21, 2010
[Ian is from Toronto and is an intern at Microsoft. He said the above after going to the range, touching, and shooting a gun for the first time. Freedom is very cool.
Pictures to follow.–Joe]
The headline reads, “Groups rally for, against gun control in Va.” I kept looking in the article for how many were on each side. I’ve commented on this before, but the recap is short. In the past when I have been to protests and rallies the pro-gun people outnumber the anti-gun people up to 1000:1 and always at least 10:1. But the article didn’t say what the numbers were. It just said:
Later in the day, far fewer gun control supporters wrote the names of those killed or injured in gun violence on hearts made from construction paper and placed them into a basket before lying on the grass outside the Capitol for three minutes to signify the time it takes to purchase a gun.
A commenter gives us the answer:
2,400 v 24… For every one person against the bill of rights, there was 100 for it…
On a logarithmic scale that was about average.
One has to wonder why the votes in the legislatures don’t have similar ratios. The bigots/special interest groups apparently have pull far beyond their representation in the people at large. And it is the MSM failing to report the facts that help them get away with that.
I’m surprised. Very surprised. I am also pleased with this:
The justices overturned Supreme Court precedents from 2003 and 1990 that upheld federal and state limits on independent expenditures by corporate treasuries to support or oppose candidates.
The decision was a victory for a conservative advocacy group’s challenge to the campaign finance law as part of its efforts to broadcast and promote a 2008 movie critical of then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. She later became President Barack Obama’s secretary of state.
The justices appeared at a special Thursday session to summarize the ruling and issued a total of five separate opinions exceeding 175 pages.
Writing for the majority, Justice Anthony Kennedy said the limits violated constitutional free-speech rights. “We find no basis for the proposition that, in the context of political speech, the government may impose restrictions on certain disfavored speakers,” he wrote.
Pullman Washington is just over the border from Moscow Idaho. Moscow has numerous stores that sell guns and used to have a few dedicated gun shops. It’s down to one gun shop now but Pullman has zero stores that sell guns and only for a year or two had a gun shop. Who, Kevin I. says, “the city fathers chase him out”.
This makes it a bit of a hassle for Pullman and surrounding residents to buy a handgun. It is illegal to go next door to Moscow and directly buy a handgun from someone in Moscow. You need to transfer the gun across state lines via a FFL. In this case it means a trip to Spokane–75 miles away. Just one more stupid infringement on our specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms.
But that recently changed. We now have a FFL in Pullman again.
Palouse Operational Supply is now in town and FFL transfer are only $25.00 ($20.00 for law enforcement, fire, and military). They also provide quotes on whatever toy and accessory you have an interest in and promise “You won’t find a better deal, period!” for some manufactures.
Five gets you ten his new company has nothing to do with fruity “LDA” triggers.
It must have been physically painful to have been contractually obligated to pimp those things.
Tam
January 21, 2010
Comment to Todd Jarrett Leaving ParaOrdnance.
[Similar, but far less succinct and articulate, thoughts went through my head when I read the news.–Joe]
If gun people and libertarians want to reject the benefits of American society and live freely, independently and unfettered on their own, they should look for caves in Montana and, if they’re full up, Afghanistan probably has vacancies. They’ll definitely need their guns there.
Daniel Johnson
January 20, 2010
The Second Amendment Fantasy and How Americans Have Been Taken In
[I find it interesting that Johnson and his ilk cling to their beliefs after all nine of the U.S. Supreme Court Justices found that the right to keep and bear arms was and is an individual right. And then they want us to leave when the facts don’t suit them. But then, what else can you expect from bigots?–Joe]
If you don’t use the proper words in an advertisment for a gun New Jersey you are a “disorderly person”.
If I were somehow persuaded to sell guns to the victims of New Jersey it would be on such a scale and for such purposes that it would go much beyond being a “disorderly person”. They would think of me as they did those that sold guns to the Indians 150 years ago.
I do not believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.
Thomas Carlyle
[Nor do I.
However you will frequently read of the anti-gun people proclaiming with great satisfaction that such and such a poll shows “the people” want “assault weapons” banned or the “gun-show loophole” closed.
So what is it? Do they believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance?
I am quite sure that is not the case. We have direct evidence the anti-gun people deliberately prey on the collective ignorance of people. Like other con-artists their success depends on coming up with new scams with which to fool their victims as their old scams are exposed.–Joe]
I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.
Francois-Marie Arouet Voltaire
To M. le Riche, February 6, 1770
It was not Voltaire, but his biographer, S. G. Talentyre in The Friends of Voltaire, who originated the famous remark, “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.”
From The Great Thoughts (link is to the 2nd Edition, mine is the 1st Edition–1985) compiled by George Seldes.
[I sometimes think of deleting a comment on my blog from someone too stupid to know how to determine truth from falsity. They may be so pig-headed as to continuing insisting the righteousness of their cause despite uncountable instances of them presented with overwhelming evidence their cause is at best ill-advised and I feel some frustration at their inability or refusal to follow even the simplest of logic trains. But then I think of what Voltaire said.
I wouldn’t directly give my life to enable him or her to continue pushing their agenda. Indirectly I suppose it is possible via my pursuit of liberty but that would be a side effect rather than in direct support of such an individual. I think I might consider looking the other way rather than risk my own life in defensive of theirs should I know harm to them was imminent.
I sometimes wonder if in a fight to the death if adhering to principles is a luxury only affordable when you are winning. Does the other side abandon their principles when they are loosing? Or do they adhere to them until the end? If so then perhaps those principles are best known by their examples of Reasoned Discoursetm (see also here and here). Is their insistence that you should be silenced or put to death a sign they have abandoned principles because of the hopelessness of their cause? Or is it insight into the true nature of their principles?
I don’t know for certain.
At least for now I exercise loyalty to my principles by not deleting their comments.–Joe]
I know there’s a perception that in Israel, by golly, practically everyone has guns and that makes for great security. They may have an effective military. I don’t know. When was the last time it was really tested?
From our friend in Israel, we get a more accurate picture of how the government treats private gun ownership there;
Friends:
Something new has been inserted into the firearms regulations here.
When your rifle (includes all .22 caliber rifles, even Olympic small bore .22s and air-guns) license comes up for renewal, if you are not an active member of the new Israeli Rifleman Association– a new branch of the Israeli Shooting Federation arisen out of the ashes of the Civil Guard Sharpshooters Association in 2009 – you must turn your rifle into the police or get a licensed firearms dealer to carry it on his “books” for you or sell it.
1. Since no one can obtain a rifle license, you can’t find anyone entitled to buy your rifle.
2. I know of almost no gun dealer who wants the headache, even for a fee, of having to deal with the Ministry of Interior inspectors about having “your” gun on his book. Even though it is “kosher.”
3. Turning your rifle(s) into the police, because your license to possess (even exclusively in your home) your private and valuable property is not renewed because of an administrative decision not to renew it, is confiscation.
And they will send the anti-terror unit of the Border Police to knockdown your door and destroy your home in the process of taking your rifle and you will be arrested and carted away – the TV cameras will be rolling and the newspaper photographers will be snapping photos of the event – you can be sure that the police will invite the media.
If you are a member of the new Rifleman Association you must be “active.” The Ministry of Interior regulations define active as you participating in a minimum of 5 national competitions per year.
GOD BLESS THE SECOND AMMENDMENT and the entire Bill Of Rights! Things Israel lacks.
Enjoy the Shot Show.
Howard
This resembles the UK more than it does our popular ideas of what Israel is supposed to be.
NRA News video on the U.N. plans for gun control.
The destruction of those firearms I find as, or more, disturbing as I would the burning of books.
As I have said before I regard this as one of the largest threats to our specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms. And contrary to what some people say I don’t think the response by people will involve actively resisting. The first steps, should such a treaty get passed would be registration of firearms. I don’t think people would take up arms on a large scale to oppose this. It would be more like Canada where they, in a large part, ignored the law.
This would mean that ammo sales would go down, practice would go down, recruiting of new shooters would go down, and within a generation or two the game would be over. Registration must be vigorously opposed and defeated in the legislatures and in the courts. Should such a treaty passed the enforcement of the treaty must be resisted with all the enthusiasm you would any other law that violates my Jews In The Attic Test.
What we’re looking for is good enough and on time. By short-circuiting the big questions and providing ready answers, religion makes decision-making fast. In this sense, a good, rigid ideology works the same way. Judgements can be made fast. Your OODA loop is tighter. Your observations are colored, but you can decide and act faster than someone who is weighing all the facts carefully and checking himself for bias. It’s sort of like why CoreWars was short-lived. It turned out that the winning strategy was to have a tight loop that shat all over memory at random.
Obviously there are limits to my argument. Components of Islam and Taoism stunted the development of science and later on put those cultures at an evolutionary disadvantage vs the West. It remains to be seen if the West has become too rational for its own good in the long term.
Sean Flynn
January 15, 2010
Comment to Environmentalism as a religion.
[With that bit of insight the comment thread completely stopped. I think everyone else realized they were out of their league.
Nice job Sean.–Joe]
The anti-gun bigots sometimes accuse us of irrational fears. I can’t immediately think of any cases where there isn’t at least some truth to the fears expressed but I suppose the accusation could be valid in some cases.
However the anti-gun mind is overflowing with fears that are so numerous and totally lacking in a rational basis they are not only laughable but they are being slapped down in court about it:
When Tarrant County College denied a student the right to stage an empty holster protest in April 2008 at the South Campus, officials feared someone would use the event to bring a weapon on campus.
“There was certainly the expectation that someone was going to show up with a gun in a holster,” TCC interim Chancellor Erma Johnson Hadley said under cross examination during a trial in federal court Thursday.
School officials had the concern even though they had no evidence that anyone would, and U.S. District Court Judge Terry Means told her — when she couldn’t provide any proof of why she thought someone planned to do so — that free speech cannot be limited on the basis of an “undifferentiated fear.”
“I can’t see any tangible basis for this fear,” Means said.
I am sometimes not nearly so gentle with bigots like this. I insist they inhabit the real world and the leave their lunatic ravings at the funny farm. I say something like, “Facts. It’s what reality is made of. I suggest you check it out.”
People fashion their God after their own understanding. They make their God first and worship him afterwards.
Oscar Wide
From Hesketh Pearson, Oscar Wilde, His Life and Wit (1946) via The Great Thoughts (link is to the 2nd Edition, mine is the 1st Edition–1985) compiled by George Seldes.
[Although the list is essentially without limit my favorite examples are socialism, environmentalism, and gun control.–Joe]
Via IM from son James we have a philosophy professor explaining how environmentalism is a substitute for more traditional religions:
Feeling unworthy is still a large part of Western religious culture, but many people, especially in multicultural urban centers, are less religious. There are still those who believe that God is watching them and judging them, so their feelings of guilt and moral indignation are couched in the traditional theological furniture. But increasing numbers, in the middle and upper classes, identify themselves as being secular or perhaps “spiritual” rather than religious.
Now the secular world still has to make sense out of its own invisible, psychological drama—in particular, its feelings of guilt and indignation. Environmentalism, as a substitute for religion, has come to the rescue. Nietzsche’s argument about an ideal God and guilt can be replicated in a new form: We need a belief in a pristine environment because we need to be cruel to ourselves as inferior beings, and we need that because we have these aggressive instincts that cannot be let out.
Instead of religious sins plaguing our conscience, we now have the transgressions of leaving the water running, leaving the lights on, failing to recycle, and using plastic grocery bags instead of paper. In addition, the righteous pleasures of being more orthodox than your neighbor (in this case being more green) can still be had—the new heresies include failure to compost, or refusal to go organic. Vitriol that used to be reserved for Satan can now be discharged against evil corporate chief executives and drivers of gas-guzzling vehicles. Apocalyptic fear-mongering previously took the shape of repent or burn in hell, but now it is recycle or burn in the ozone hole. In fact, it is interesting the way environmentalism takes on the apocalyptic aspects of the traditional religious narrative. The idea that the end is nigh is quite central to traditional Christianity—it is a jolting wake-up call to get on the righteous path. And we find many environmentalists in a similarly earnest panic about climate change and global warming. There are also high priests of the new religion, with Al Gore (“the Goracle”) playing an especially prophetic role.
We even find parallels in environmentalism of the most extreme, self-flagellating forms of religious guilt. Nietzsche claims that religion has fostered guilt to such neurotic levels that some people feel culpable and apologetic about their very existence. Compare this with extreme conservationists who want to sacrifice themselves for trees and whales. And teachers, like myself, will attest to significant numbers of their students who feel that their cats or whatever are equal to human beings. And not only are members of the next generation egalitarian about all life, but they often feel positively awful about the way that their species has corrupted and defiled the whole beautiful symphony of nature. The planet, they feel, would be better off without us. We are not worthy. In this extreme form, one does not seek to reduce one’s carbon footprint so much as eliminate one’s very being.
It appears many people have a religious gene. They are, in essence, programmed to feel as they do toward “something greater than themselves”. As science made the unknown more knowable and more under the control of man it reduced the domain of possibility and probability of god(s) controlling people’s lives. And people had to have a substitute. This professor proposes environmentalism fulfills this need for many people.
I would like to suggest that an all powerful state fulfills that need for far too many other people–socialism can be thought of as a religion. It is a belief in the goodness of something without, or in spite of, evidence. Compare that to traditional religious faith.
This has serious implications for society and even the entire human race. If we are condemned to believe in things contrary to the facts how can we make the best decisions for ourselves let alone justify the forcing of others to adhere to the will of the majority?
The administration is trying to act as though this is really just a treaty about international arms trade between nation states, but there’s no doubt – as was the case back over a decade ago – that the real agenda here is domestic firearms control.
There’s never been any doubt when these groups talk about saying they only want to prohibit illicit international trafficking in small arms and light weapons, it begs the whole question of what’s legal and what’s not legal. And many of the implications of these treaty negotiations are very much in their domestic application. So, whatever the appearance on the surface, there’s no doubt that domestic firearm control is right at the top of their agenda.
After the treaty is approved and it comes into force, you will find out that it has this implication or that implication and it requires the Congress to adopt some measure that restricts ownership of firearms. The administration knows it cannot obtain this kind of legislation purely in a domestic context … They will use an international agreement as an excuse to get domestically what they couldn’t otherwise.
John Bolton
Former Permanent U.S. Representative to the United Nations
Quoted by J.D. Longstreet January 15, 2009 in The UN To Take US Guns?
[I don’t know if this is a real threat or not. My initial inclination is that the current Senate would refuse to ratify it. But I just don’t know for certain.
Long term I do fear this sort of approach to gun control because it requires fewer people to agree to it. Just the President and 2/3s of the Senate. But how would that work if the treaty said “You must register and track all guns” but the House of Representatives refused to pass a law requiring that? How could a treaty be enforced against individual citizens without U.S. legal code defining the offenses and the punishments?
Would the U.N. send in troops to enforce it? If so I know some people who refer to this sort of situation as having unlimited license to hunt “blue helmeted elk”.–Joe]
A recent email from RivrDog contained the following:
The Rivrdog/Rockett Boomershoot camp (camped at #75/76) issues the following Challenge to those coming to this year’s Boomershoot, INSTRUCTORS INCLUDED!
- Pick any off-the-shelf HUNTING rifle out of your safe (or buy one, except no Fifties at this end of the range). Custom rifles OK, if they are custom HUNTING rifles. I’ll have a scale, your rifle needs to weigh less than 10# to qualify, or you need to prove you actually tote that 17# monstrosity in the field and not just shoot it off a bench (photo of you with the elk and heavy rifle will do). I’ll be firing a WIN70, myself.
- Put any glass on it you desire.
- Load/buy any ammo for it you desire (that doesn’t conflict with Joe’s rulz).
- On Field Fire days/hours (Friday and Saturday), come on down to the Rivrdog/Rockett camp and use MY shooting table & rifle rests. The rests are elevation adjustable front and sandbag rear. Coordinate your rifle -moving to be legal during cease-fires.
- Bring your spotter or go solo.
- Fire 10 rounds, slow fire, at the right-end steel ON THE 380-YARD BERM. Number of hits on it is your score.
Winner receives a (new, sealed!) bottle of 12-year old Scotch, my choice (which guarantees it’s quality!). As in war, no second place prizes. My guess is that it will take no less than a 9 to win, so put in some practice time. You likely will be shooting against some professionals. The steel will be about 2 MOA, if it’s like last year. I may bring a 1 MOA steel for tiebreakers. Award ceremony after Field Fire/Cleanup on Saturday. I will take photos during the contest.
If I had the time that day I would show up with my 17.5 pound Spud Gun that I used the one and only season I went hunting (and got a deer). It can do this at 200 yards and hitting 2 MOA (about 8″) at 375 yards is pretty easy if the wind isn’t bad. I’d do it just to be pushing the envelope on the rules and winning, not because I’m interested in a bottle of Scotch. I’ve never tasted the stuff and am not particularly interested in trying. Besides I have two bottles of the stuff on the shelves (Xenia, you still have that one bottle, right?) given to me by friends that I haven’t touched.
If you happen to think of some nifty addition to the proposal suggest it to RivrDog. This is his baby.
I’ll probably get around to emailing this to all the participants sometime this weekend.
I posted a little something on it yesterday and last month I told you why it is DOA. But I’ve been getting email (thanks Carl and Barron) and I decided to dig into it a little bit more.
From the bill itself (emphasis mine):
(20) “Assault weapon” means:
8 (a) Any semiautomatic pistol or semiautomatic or pump-action rifle
9 or shotgun that is capable of accepting a detachable magazine, with a
10 capacity to accept more then ten rounds of ammunition and that also
11 possesses any of the following:
12 (i) If the firearm is a rifle or shotgun, a pistol grip located
13 rear of the trigger;
14 (ii) If the firearm is a rifle or shotgun, a stock in any
15 configuration, including but not limited to a thumbhole stock, a
16 folding stock or a telescoping stock, that allows the bearer of the
17 firearm to grasp the firearm with the trigger hand such that the web of
18 the trigger hand, between the thumb and forefinger, can be placed below
19 the top of the external portion of the trigger during firing;
20 (iii) If the firearm is a pistol, a shoulder stock of any type or
21 configuration, including but not limited to a folding stock or a
22 telescoping stock;
23 (iv) A barrel shroud;
24 (v) A muzzle brake or muzzle compensator;
25 (vi) Any feature capable of functioning as a protruding grip that
26 can be held by the hand that is not the trigger hand;
27 (b) Any pistol that is capable of accepting a detachable magazine
28 at any location outside of the pistol grip;
29 (c) Any semiautomatic pistol, any semiautomatic, center-fire rifle,
30 or any shotgun with a fixed magazine that has the capacity to accept
31 more than ten rounds of ammunition;
32 (d) Any shotgun capable of accepting a detachable magazine;
33 (e) Any shotgun with a revolving cylinder;
34 (f) Any conversion kit or other combination of parts from which an
35 assault weapon can be assembled if the parts are in the possession or
36 under the control of any person.
37 (21) “Detachable magazine” means a magazine, the function of which
is to deliver one or more ammunition cartridges into the firing
2 chamber, which can be removed from the firearm without the use of any
3 tool, including a bullet or ammunition cartridge.
4 (22) “Barrel shroud” means a covering, other than a slide, that is
5 attached to, or that substantially or completely encircles, the barrel
6 of a firearm and that allows the bearer of the firearm to hold the
7 barrel with the nonshooting hand while firing the firearm, without
8 burning that hand, except that the term does not include an extension
9 of the stock along the bottom of the barrel that does not substantially
10 or completely encircle the barrel.
11 (23) “Muzzle brake” means a device attached to the muzzle of a
12 weapon that utilizes escaping gas to reduce recoil.
13 (24) “Muzzle compensator” means a device attached to the muzzle of
14 a weapon that utilizes escaping gas to control muzzle movement.
15 (25) “Conversion kit” means any part or combination of parts
16 designed and intended for use in converting a firearm into an assault
17 weapon.
Notice that some pump action guns are considered “assault weapons” by these bigots.
Notice that the firearm has to have a detachable magazine and any of the evil characteristics. In the 1994 Federal AWB it had to have two of the additional characterisitics.
Notice that muzzle breaks and compensators are considered evil enough to make a firearm an AW. That would appear to make all Glock “C” models outlawed under this proposal.
And people like Dennis Henigan (Lethal Logic chapter 3) claim there is no slippery slope.
The line about “any tool, including a bullet or cartridge” appears to be in severe need of rewriting. I can’t make sense of it as it stands. I’m sure the Seattle bigots heard the California bigots whining about the manufactures making “California legal” firearms with a receiver that allows the magazine can be removed with a cartrige used as tool and hence complies with the law. I guess they didn’t hear about the ring worn on your finger than does the same thing.
Also of note is that the grandfathering of existing ownership is more than little harsh:
16 (5) In order to continue to possess an assault weapon that was
17 legally possessed on the effective date of this section, the person
18 possessing the assault weapon shall do all of the following:
19 (a) Safely and securely store the assault weapon. The sheriff of
20 the county may, no more than once per year, conduct an inspection to
21 ensure compliance with this subsection;
22 (b) Possess the assault weapon only on property owned or
23 immediately controlled by the person, or while engaged in the legal use
24 of the assault weapon at a duly licensed firing range, or while
25 traveling to or from either of these locations for the purpose of
26 engaging in the legal use of the assault weapon, provided that the
27 assault weapon is stored unloaded and in a separate locked container
28 during transport.
So in order to exercise your specific enumerate right to keep bear firearms in common use (most of my firearms would be illegal by this definition) you have to allow the sheriff to annually inspect your firearm storage–with no guidance on what is considered “safely and securely”.
A person would not be allowed to transport the firearm under any number of important situations such as to the gunsmith, a hunting trip, out of state for sale or as a gift. Let alone carry one on a daily basis as I do.
And what is it with “duly licensed firing range”? A search of the Washington State Department of Licensing website turned up nothing.
Also note that a couple of the bigots who proposed the law wrote an error filled opinion piece in the Everett Herald.
As other have said–we win because the other side is stupid. They are apparently nearly completely blinded by their own bigotry. But isn’t that nearly always the case with bigots?
As you might have noticed I haven’t done much blogging recently. I am spending a lot of time at work and working while at home.
Earlier this week we learned something we had designed and implemented months ago works for simple cases but in real use it is easily broken. It had to do with some user interface stuff that we didn’t really want to do (our team is working fairly deep down in the O/S). We just didn’t have any UI experience and the UI coding model is something very new and had virtually no documentation and was in a great state of flux at the time we designed our little widget. Now it needs to be redone–essentially from the ground up.
It only showed up when some of the other teams started calling into our UI and problems showed up if you didn’t do things precisely the way it was intended to work. These other teams are partially blocked by this bug on my plate and it is my number 1 priority to get this fixed ASAP. No pressure there…
My boss says he starts getting into heart attack territory when we have an average of 10 bugs per developer. We currently have an average of something like eight and I have 16 on my plate. No pressure there…
So I was digging into the samples (which don’t work) on how do this thing when the PM stopped by to give my officemate and I some “encouragement”. In his heavy East German accent he said, “Yah! You should know that in just
I think I need a caffeine IV drip.
If you read my blog directly you probably noticed a few cosmetic changes today. Mostly it was a side effect of me fixing the comment text entry box which was all messed up. I had to learn a bunch about Cascading Style Sheets to fix the problem and tweaked a few things along the way.
I moved the “Bloggers I Have Met” list to a different page because it took up so much real estate on the sidebar. I also updated the list. If I have overlooked someone please let me know. It wasn’t intentional to ignore anyone–except for wife Barbara.
Yes, she has a blog–with three posts since it was created on September 13, 2009. I refuse to link to it until she posts a little more frequently. Currently she has had a total of 13 visits. I think all of those visits were by me.
