April 2007 – Page 13 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Federal Agent Killed in New Jersey

An FBI agent was killed in a shootout with bank robbers in New Jersey. Not much in the way of details yet, as the agents family has yet to be notified.

UPDATE: It’s looking like the agent may have been killed by friendly fire.Â That’s a real tragedy.Â The death of an agent is bad enough, but the other agent who shot him will have to live with that for the rest of his life.

“Special Agent Bush and his team were in pursuit of heavily armed serial bank robbers who are believed to be responsible for four bank robberies,” according to a statement from the bureau. “In two of those robberies, the suspects, armed with assault weapons, fired rounds while inside the bank.”

I had heard about these robberies. Â All the suspects were from New Jersey:

Prosecutors filed charges in federal court Thursday night against three people in the attempted robbery. Wilfredo Berrios, 28; Michael Cruz, 21; and Francisco Herrera-Genao, 22, all of New Brunswick, New Jersey, were charged with attempted armed bank robbery and with use and carrying of a firearm during a crime of violence.

These guys need to go away for a long time. Â I question how they were able to get assault weapons, when they are illegal in New Jersey, and illegal for a New Jersey resident to buy anywhere.

Stick to Guns Guys

I have to second Bitter’s statement that the NRA-ILA needs to lay off the unrelated-to-guns political statements. The NRA is about gun rights, it’s not a clearing house for various other kooky or non-kooky right wing thinking. Do you really want to alienate the more progressive gun rights folks? It’s not good politics for our issue, and whoever is doing it needs to stop.

Knife Talk

Ahab has a good post up on Knife Carry:

With regards to the self-defense needs of carrying a knife, I do still carry a knife when I’m not carrying a pistol. However, carrying a knife changes my self defense strategy quite significantly. While a knife certainly qualifies as a force multiplier, it also requires me to get right up on top of my attacker. If my attacker is armed with a knife, we are both going to get cut. That’s what happens. You always get cut.

I carry a Leatherman on me at all time, which has a 3 inch blade.Â I don’t carry it with self-defense in mind, though I suppose it could be used that way in a pinch.Â When it comes to force less than a firearm, I prefer Fox OC spray.Â I don’t carry OC all the time with me either, but it’s useful to have options all the way up the force continuum.Â I’d much rather OC an attacker than get into a knife fight.Â Faced with a knife wielding attacker, and having only my Leatherman, I think I’d take Ahab’s run like a little girl option. Â I’m not too proud for that.

What are we supposed to use, harsh language?

From Slashdot, the Brits are talking about installing CCTV which can scold scofflaws through a loudspeaker.

Home Secretary John Reid told BBC News there would be some people, “in the minority who will be more concerned about what they claim are civil liberties intrusions”.

“But the vast majority of people find that their life is more upset by people who make their life a misery in the inner cities because they can’t go out and feel safe and secure in a healthy, clean environment because of a minority of people,” he added.

I don’t know about you, but having a camera who can lecture an attacker doesn’t exactly help me feel more safe.Â When you surrender your safety and security to the government, this is the kind of result you can expect.Â We need to make sure this idea never makes it across the pond.

Good News for the NRA

Pew released their latest poll:

Each year since its occurrence in 1999, the April 20 anniversary of the Columbine High School tragedy renews debate about the desirability of stricter controls on firearms. Recent surveys, however, find Americans less disposed to gun control than they were in the years surrounding the shootings.

For example, Americans have a better opinion of the National Rifle Association these days than they did in the mid 1990’s. Over this same period, public calls for stricter gun-control laws have also quieted somewhat. A recent Pew nationwide survey found a 52%-to-32% majority of respondents holding a favorable opinion of the NRA, which will hold its massive annual convention on April 13-15 this year in St. Louis. While this is the first time since 1994 that the favorability rating of the group has crossed the 50% mark, positive views of the NRA have been inching upward in Pew polls in recent years.

I’m not generally one for touting poll numbers, because you can make a poll say whatever the hell you want, but at least according to Pew, the NRA seems to be doing something right. Read the whole thing.

Sign the Petition

State Rep Sam Rohrer is asking Pennsylvania residents to sign his petition to oppose any new gun control laws in the Commonwealth.Â I would ask everyone to do so, if you are from Pennsylvania.

Plus, if my family is to be believed, this guy is a relative of mine.Â I don’t know him from Adam, but according to them, anyone with a name derived from “Rohr” is somehow related.Â Good to see I’m not the only gun nut in my “family”.

Fear The Stache!

Turns out we have a fun keynote speaker for the NRA banquet next week.Â I’m lookin forward to it.

Registration in Pennsylvania

Kim du Toit, or one of his readers, rather, points to a bill that would bring gun registration to the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.Â This bill doesn’t stand a chance, but there’s something everyone in Pennsylvania should be aware of.

The Pennsylvania state police already operate handgun registration in conflict with the Uniform Firearms Act. Â Last year Pennsylvania Supreme Court heard a lawsuit bought against the state police over this section in the Uniform Firearms Act:

Notwithstanding any section of this chapter to the contrary, nothing in this chapter shall be construed to allow any government or law enforcement agency or any agent thereof to create, maintain or operate any registry of firearm ownership within this Commonwealth. For the purposes of this section only, the term “firearm” shall include any weapon that is designed to or may readily be converted to expel any projectile by the action of an explosive or the frame or receiver of any such weapon.

The Supreme Court ruled that the State Police database wasn’t, in fact, a firearms registry, even though they can easily find out what hanguns I own, but merely a record of sale.Â Because it was created from the sales data the state police collects, and wasn’t a comprehensive registry, it was no registry.

This surprised everyone, including legislators, who were pretty sure they had passed a prohibition on exactly this. Â I was told by my state representative that there would be aÂ legislative solution, but it didn’t make it through last year. Â My guess is there’s no way it’s going to get past Ed Rendell.

So I hope Kim’s reader will not only write his state represenative and state senator about this registration bill, but ask that the legislature act to end the de-facto gun registry currently being operated by the state police.

Caroline vs. Hamm – SMU Prize Fight

Well, OK, it wasn’t a boxing match.Â Â If it had been, it would have been worth the drive to see it.Â But it was a debate, and the SMU Daily Campus has some balanced coverage of it.

Looks like the Brady Campaign is most worried about castle doctrine, which make sense given it’s one of the NRA’s priorities.

It’s Politics

Bob Levy asks via Instapundit:

Nobody at the NRA has provided a credible answer to this simple question: Why is the NRA pushing the DC Personal Protection Act? If the NRA were to say, “You’re going to lose, so we want to kill the litigation,” I would understand that argument — although I would dispute the premise. Instead, we’re hearing that the NRA wants the Supremes to review Parker. There’s a disconnect somewhere.

I’m not speaking with any special insider knowledge. I really like to know more too, and I don’t discount the possibility the NRA is just being stupid. But I think the disconnect is politics.

The NRA can’t really afford politically to ignore pro-gun legislation that’s being introduced in Congress and leave it’s pro-gun allies in Congress high and dry on a bill they’ve been pushing for a while. I suspect originally, the NRA’s attitude was “you’re going to lose, so we want to kill the litigation”, as Levy mentioned. I can’t blame them, because originally I didn’t think Parker would win either, and there’s a lot of “the courts are too risky” sentiment in the pro-gun community, and for good reason.

But now Parker won, and the NRA is in a pickle. It won’t want to derail Parker, but at the same time it can’t just pull the plug on the D.C. Personal Protection Act either. Do one, and you piss off membership who would like the Supreme Court rule on the second amendment, do the other and you piss off the lobbyists, staffers and politicians who have been working hard on the legislative side. Plus, there’s a not insignificant chance that Parker will fail. Any direction they go, the NRA is screwed. So what to do? Talk out both sides of your mouth, and try not to piss anyone off too much. It’s politics, and politics is ugly.