USA Today is reporting on the ouster of Dan Cooper. Includes a link to Firearms and Freedom, and credits gun bloggers in helping generate the outrage.
Year: 2008
Chris Cox vs. Paul Helmke on Fox News
Well, at least the gun issue is getting some traction in this election. I know we kind of sneer as groups like the Brady Campaign grasp for relevance, but the silence on the gun issue has actually hurt us too. The media is burying it, largely because it hurts Obama more than it helps him.
You might think that any gun owner worth his salt knows Obama’s record, but trust me, they don’t. A lot of them are concerned about other issues this election, and hearing Obama say he supports the Second Amendment is enough for them to vote on other issues that are concerning them. This is a big problem in Pennsylvania, where the unions have been active conspirators in convincing their membership that Barack Obama is an OK guy on guns. In a state where a lot of gun voters overlap with union voters, that can hurt when combined with media silence.
UPDATE: Chris Cox has an editorial in the Washington Times as well.
The Globe’s Editorial
The Boston Globe seems to think we need to ban kids from touching guns:
Incredibly, there is no minimum age to fire a gun in Massachusetts. All that is required for someone under 18 is parental consent and the presence of a licensed instructor. That is a massive loophole that has to be closed, especially when parents show such poor judgment about their children’s well-being. In this case, many more children could have been accidentally cut down.
This would end the shooting sports and hunting within a generation if it was allowed to come to pass. Some of us got into shooting as adults, but most of us did not. If you’re going to have guns in the house, your children should know to respect them. When they are old enough, actually teaching them to shoot safely is probably among the best ways to do that.
The co-chair of the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Public Safety and Homeland Security, Michael Costello of Newburyport, hopes to hold hearings on the problem in November. He is wisely thinking about setting a minimum age of 15 for firing an automatic weapon, the same age a youth can obtain a license for a rifle or shotgun with a parent’s permission.
This would actually be an improvement over current Massachusetts law, which seems to ban automatics for anyone under 21. The problem is, the law they are actually looking at passing would appply to the types of semi-automatic rifles used in NRA HP competition, and CMP competition, which junior shooters often compete in. These firearms are not any more dangerous than other types of firearms that are generally considered age appropriate.
Cartooning Tragedy
I might lose my gun nut street creds over this one, but I agree with Dan Wasserman that his cartoon isn’t tasteless. I don’t think Wasserman and I would have much to agree with when it comes to “the gun lobby” or what kind of age limits should be put on what, or whether this is even something that needs to be legislated at all, but political cartoonists satirize society. That’s what they do. You can disagree with the message, but I think Wasserman is in the clear here when it comes to a charge of tastelessness.
Ruger LCP Recall
Good thing I bought a Kel-Tec I guess.  Of course, it would be nice if I could actually shoot my P-3AT at some point.  Why can’t Glock make a pocket rocket?
Calling Dan Cooper
Quote of the Day
From Tam, who is thinking of creating her own training method:
That way I make money, and they get to take home a certificate and tell their friends that they’re “trained”. And since the odds of them being in a shootout in suburbia are slim to frickin’ none, we’re all happy. It’ll be awesome. I just need to think up a name for my technique and order some shirts with epaulettes.
The Day After
Screwdriver Violence
Apparently one of the Writers on the HuffPo stabbed her former lover to death with an assault screwdriver (i.e. phillips head, or double vodka, depending on context). Two hundred and twenty two times! She then shot herself. I anxiously await her colleague at the HuffPo, Paul Helmke, to condemn this senseless act of screwdriver violence.
World Champions
Eat that suckas. To celebrate, Bitter and I got milkshakes from Wawa. In what the Obama campaign surely would classify as racism, Bitter got Vanilla. A long time coming is right. I barely remember the last World Series win in 1980. I remember 1983, where they went and lost, and 1993, where the same thing happened.