October 2011 – Page 6 – Shall Not Be Questioned

On House Clearing

Up-start gun blog “When the Balloon Goes Up” has an interesting example of how caution should be exercised in house clearing. Convention wisdom says this is a job best left to the police. I tend to agree, but I can’t tell you I’ve never been moving around my house with a drawn gun. I think it depends on circumstances. If I know someone is in my home, or there’s pretty strong evidence, I’ll call the police and let them deal with it. But much of the time, the evidence is going to be less than that. I’ll use a few examples from my experiences.

Back when I first put in my lighting system, I had no idea the rings that hold the bulb in untwisted and fell off over time due to expansion and contraction from heating up and cooling. When I hear that sound now, I don’t think anything of it. But let me tell you, the first time you hear a piece of metal fall on a tile floor when you’re upstairs in bed, your first instinct is not that the ring worked its way off your lighting fixture. Gun comes out. I don’t hear any other noises downstairs, so I go to check it out. If I had called the police thinking someone was in my house, I would have been sheepish.

Another situation, I came home to the house door being wide open. I was out with someone else, so my thought was “OK, did we just forget to close the door, or is someone in the house?” I don’t see any evidence of forced entry, but the person I’m with swears they closed the door behind them. Entrance way looks clear, so I go in gun in hand. I hear nothing, so I checked the rooms and closets, not hearing any sounds of someone moving. “OK,” I think, “she probably just forgot the close the door behind her, or didn’t pull it hard enough for the latch to catch, and the wind got it.” Again, another scenario where I didn’t have enough evidence that there was someone in the house to warrant calling the cops.

So I think house clearing is probably something gun owners should think about, because there’s plenty of situations that rank below calling the cops. Absolutely, if you come home, the door is wide open, and the window pane is broken, call the cops and let them do the clearing. But I think everyone has been in situations where something is amiss, but you’re not sure enough to waste public resources, and look like an ass to boot.

Latest in Fast and Furious

If these allegations turn out to be true, and they did indeed try to frame one of the whistle blowers for a crime, then someone needs to go to jail. I think they really need to name a special prosecutor to look into this. Orin Hatch was on NRA News last night, and was being wishy washy on the subject of naming a special prosecutor, but it has to be done in this case. There’s too much we just don’t know, and the DOJ is likely not to be cooperative. Hatch’s reluctance is based on the history of special prosecutors, which is not a remarkably good one, and that’s understandable. But sometimes it’s the right tool for the job, and this is one of those times.

“It began, as it so often does, with a drum circle.”

This is too rich:

All occupiers are equal â€” but some occupiers are more equal than others. In wind-whipped Zuccotti Park, new divisions and hierarchies are threatening to upend Occupy Wall Street and its leaderless collective.

As the protest has grown, some of the occupiers have spontaneously taken charge on projects large and small. But many of the people in Zuccotti Park aren’t taking direction well, leading to a tense Thursday of political disagreements, the occasional shouting match, and at least one fistfight.

Read the whole thing. You’d think the big downside to a bunch of dirty hippies camping out in your neighborhood would be the smell. But no, apparently it’s the drumming. That damned incessant drumming. Hippie drum circles, and hippies themselves really, are a modern phenomena. I’m sure they’ve always existed in some form or another, but I have to wonder if their current culture can survive because we’re too polite a society. How long do you think the New Yorkers from this New York would have tolerated this before the drummers and there drums were enthusiastically re-loacted?

The Tea Party movement actually went through similar tribulations, as groups formed, and people tried to anoint themselves into leadership positions in the movement. That’s still going on, and it’s human nature. But I would point out that the Tea Party movement managed to do this while most of them were holding down jobs, and not ruining a park.

Kagan Goes Hunting

Apparently Elena Kagan has been on several hunting trips with Justice Scalia. We knew from before she had visited a range, but looks like she’s dove deeper. While I consider this positive news, a few trips hunting and to the range is a long way off from tossing a ban on carry, or assault weapons. That said, with the game as close as it is, I’d settle for just having one more vote that may not want to go so far as to overturn Heller and McDonald.

Rebranding Tacticool and Camo as Halloween

Found this in my mailbox this morning. Looks like this company decided to take its normal product line-ups and put them together in halloween packages. Creative, I have to say, but mostly made of fail. Watch the neighborhood dogs run in fear, or impress the guys on the range in July with the SWAT Halloween costume. I call this one, “Everyone thinks I’m Cousin It, but I’m really a bad ass sniper, dammit!“. This might be a good costume to trick or treat at Occupy Wall Street in, since the gas mask might help with the smell. How about the Lara Croft costume? Of course, many of these costumes are useless if you’re not open carrying a rifle or a pistol down the street. Thinking of attending “Booty Camp” this year? We have the costume for you. This year, with ol’ Morromar getting all Sic Semper Tyrannised recently, Libyan Rebel is certain to be the hot costume. Given the price of food in Libya these days, I’m not sure they’ll be making that one in XL. But if you want to pull off Fidel in his later years, they do make that costume in XL, and they’ll trade you the Keffiyeh for a nifty hat. I don’t know if the picture of Che in the background comes with it.

CSGV Puts Pressure on Casey and Toomey

Ladd Everitt at CSGV puts out a press release trying to apply the same pressure to our Senators that is currently being applied to Scott Brown in regards to HR822. CSGV is pretty much outright lying about the bill by suggesting HR822 is “legislation that would force Pennsylvania to let individuals from around the country carry concealed, loaded firearms in publicâ€”even when those individuals have a history of domestic violence and would not qualify for a concealed carry permit under Pennsylvania law.”

It’s not exactly a lie, because they say “history of domestic violence,” and if you beat your wife, but have never been prosecuted for the act, this is technically true. But it’s certainly disingenuous. Anyone who’s been convicted of domestic violence will no more be able to carry under HR822 than they can today, which is to say they can’t. HR822 does not apply to people who are federally prohibited from possessing firearms. Period.

I really have to wonder how our opponents can live with themselves knowing that the only way they can win is to mischaracterize their opponents, and essentially lie. I couldn’t stay in a movement where the only way I could win is to do that day in, and day out. CSGV might be wise to put pressure on Senators in swing states, but their efforts ring hollow, much like poor Lord Helmet in the caption I have chosen for this post. At the least we’re forcing our opponents to spend money and grassroots energy they don’t fundamentally have. The only group I truly worry about is MAIG, who is doing everything right. They may be getting stronger for the next fight, but I doubt that is true of CSGV.

Crimson Trace Lightguard Review

The big problem with flashlights attached to your gun is that they make the gun bulky and heavy. Crimson Trace came up with a solution to that problem. The stairwell the light is illuminating in that review looks strangely familiar.

More on Gun Culture 1.0 and 2.0 in Clubs

Willshoot.com, who started the whole thread with his post here, has some more good points on the whole subject Gun Culture 1.0 and 2.0 in clubs:

The solution would be simple: vote the board out and remake the club in the image that you desire.

However, in practice, the issue is that the GC1.0 can make the environment so undesirable for members of GC2.0 that they simply decline to participate.Â If ranges weren’t so monopolized, it’d be easy for members of GC2.0 to start their own.

That’s one of the problems with the aging of clubs. If those clubs close, or go belly up, they won’t ever be replaced. We can’t easily make more shooting clubs, especially in urban and suburban areas. My own club was founded in 1958, at a time when this guyÂ was busy fueling the post-war construction boom, and transforming Bucks County from a more rural county with a lot of open space into this. Our club moved in the 80s, due to encroachment by development, and was relocated at the cost of the developer. It is highly doubtful that today, someone could find land to create a new club at a price anyone could reasonably afford.

Because of this, I think it’s important for clubs to change hands from one generation to another, so that they don’t die with their members. That is actually not that remarkably hard to execute a complete takeover of a club if you look at elections results. The reason it doesn’t happen is largely the following factors:

Most members don’t vote in club elections. This seems especially true of younger shooters who would be most likely to be brought up in GC 2.0.
Very few younger people have the time to serve as officers, or if they do have time, lack the willingness. A desire for change won’t do any good if you’re not able or willing to step up to do the work of running a club, most of which is mundane and unglamorous, and has little to do with a club’s cultural direction.
Younger GC 2.0 people are less likely to join clubs to begin with, or try out GC 1.0 shooting sports, which means many clubs have no pool of shooters who would even be interested in something different.
Many GC 1.0 are too old to do GC 2.0 run-and-gun tactical stuff and be competitive. IPSC and IDPA are more athletic sports than bullseye shooting, trap, or silhouette. Even if they don’t harbor any misconceptions or prejudices against practical/action shooting, they might not feel great about those kinds of competitions competing match and range times at their club, and may resist those kinds of matches.

So if you have a local club, my advice is to join. If you want to run a more practical-style match, take your match idea before the Board. Be prepared to make concessions to deal with their concerns. Once you have a match, you’ll start building a constituency. Once you have a constituency, you’ll get people engaged with the club, and from those people, you can draw candidates for the club’s Board.

My club has 1100 members. Even at that size, 50 people showing up on club election night could elect an entire slate of new candidates if it was committed. Most clubs are smaller than mine, and the only practical match I know of around here was drawing 60 or so people even in the dead of winter with snow covering the ground. Change is difficult, but it is not impossible. If you want to change a local club, it can be done, but you need a plan, and you have to be prepared to make concessions. Maybe shoot from ready instead of holster, or limit the run-and-gun action in your early stages. This might mean your matches won’t be sanctioned for a while, but as long as people are still having a good time, and you’re drawing people in, that’s all that matters. If they are dedicated to more of what you’re offering, you’ll start flipping club leadership quickly, and once you start doing that, you’ll find yourself needing to make fewer concessions.

More Odd Grassroots

I have observed previously that our opponents seem to be whipping up some real grassroots opposition to HR822, as evidenced by the high rate of signatures in opposition to the bill. The problem is, I’m not convinced that our opponents are capable of whipping up this kind of opposition, and it has to be coming from somewhere. I have found some more evidence that something is certainly very odd about the opposition here. Take the continued success of this latest Twitter hash tag campaign featuring Newark, NJ Mayor Cory Booker. Except I’m unconvinced this campaign has its genesis on Twitter itself. Take a look at some of the re-tweeters:

This person only has a handful of Tweets. 30 to be precise. This Twitter handle also only follows 5 people, none of whom tweeted about Booker’s video. This is not the only example I’ve found. I’ve found numerous examples, such as this person, this person, and this person. These are not people who spend much time, if any time at all, on Twitter. I believe, however, that they are real people. I’m not suggesting someone is creating users for the sake of astroturfing, since several of the accounts are personalized. So the question is, who’s prompting all these people who normally aren’t Tweeting to suddenly Tweet? Is it Cory Booker’s magnetic personality? Is MAIG really growing as a force?

One thing is certain, the campaign MAIG has put together is doing everything right. Under Booker’s video, you’ll note all the standard social networking buttons. The site is very well done, and it’s pretty clear they are using professionals. At some point we were going to push far enough to fire up the other side. HR822 is pretty clearly it. Whether the opposition they are whipping up is going to be thinking about HR822 on election day is another matter, but it does seem MAIG has been successful at gaining some grassroots support that can at least make some noise on their issue. The big question is whether they are getting help from some of the major left-wing outfits like MoveOn, or Obama for America. It seems hard for me to believe this much activity is happening just on people sharing Booker’s video in a viral manner.

What Happens When You’re No Longer Needed by the 99%

The Occupy Charlotte statement from their consensus group kicking out a member is an eerie reminder of a classic Twilight Zone episode – “The Obsolete Man.”

Sister Toldjah has done a great job and covering her local Occupy group on Twitter, and the result is finding this gem – an illustration of what happens when the Consensus decides you are no longer tolerated.

We the people of Occupy Charlotte and the General Assembly thereof, wish it to be hereby known that Thomas C. Shope has been exiled from the Occupy Charlotte movement and is to no longer be used as a source for communication and/or donations. He has been separated from this organization due to his consistent and willful actions against the will of the people and the decisions of the General Assembly. Any and all communications to the media and any donations from the people that support us, are to be made and accepted by and from the members of the occupation at 600 E. Trade Street in Charlotte, NC.

At least one person came on to question this decision since it doesn’t seem very inclusive or 99%-ty. Their response came right out of the Twilight Zone. I’m not kidding. All I could hear is the opening from “The Obsolete Man” playing in my head as I read through their declaration. When people question the decision or the statement, the response from the organizers is that they need to move on, there’s nothing else to see here. There may be legitimate issues with the guy, but their manner of “kicking him off the island” is beyond creepy.

Click to read the full statement that seemingly came right out of the episode. Continue reading “What Happens When You’re No Longer Needed by the 99%”