I’ll summarize this for you. The administration’s official position is that it wants the Assault Weapons Ban renewed. But the White House is not going to push for it in Congress. Too many other more important things. In the mean time, they’ll be improving the background checks, though they offer no specifics on how exactly they plan to do that.
Year: 2012
Real Heroism
The President of the Sikh temple died a hero, in my eyes. He tried to knife the attacker with his ceremonial dagger:
…The temple’s president, 65-year-old Satwant Kaleka, was shot dead by the attacker after trying to fight back.
His son Amardeep said that the community leader had attempted to ‘knife and tackle the shooter’, but was unsuccessful and died of his wounds while trying to hide in the temple.
He died trying to save everyone else. It’s a tragedy he was not successful. The Sikh community is also raising money to help the victims.
Gun Control, North Korea Style
From an article appearing in English in the Korean media:
Institutions, businesses, groups and the public are prohibited from possessing or transacting firearms according to the law, which also banned lending, smuggling, destroying and self-producing firearms.
Those who violate the rules, resulting in “stern consequences,” are subject to administrative and criminal liabilities, the North says in the law.
Experts say the establishment of such acts is part of Kim Jong-il’s efforts to tighten control of the society and maintain strict order following his nomination of his third and youngest son Kim Jong-un to be his successor in early 2009.
“North Korea appeared to have tried to strictly regulate firearms under the circumstances where former leader Kim’s stroke in 2008 could lead to a chaos in the society,” said Yang Moo-jin, a professor at the University of North Korean Studies.
We’re constantly told how utterly useless small arms and personal weapons are against governments that have planes and tanks, but its amazing how eager pretty much every despot has been to control who has firearms and for what. Certainly the despots themselves feel they have something to be concerned about with firearms in civilian hands, or in this case, even in non-civilian hands.
Also note the mention of homemade (“self-producting” in the badly translated article) firearms. If it’s a problem enough to mention, you can bet it’s being done. And this is in a totalitarian country where the state controls all aspects of life.
How do our opponents think it’ll ever work here? And do we even want it?
Philly DA Shocked at AK-47 on Subway
Blames the NRA. In this case, the guy didn’t have a permit for a pistol he was carrying, and had drugs on him. But it’s perfectly legal to tote any rifle on SEPTA if you’re going shooting, to or from your place of business, or for any reason at all if you have a License to Carry. In fact, I have a friend that lives in Philly, doesn’t have a car, and has a registered M16. How does the DA think he transports it? Maybe Seth Williams should spend more time prosecuting actual criminals for misusing firearms, and spend less time fretting that certain activities are legal, there might be some crime reduction in that City. This guy had drugs and guns. That’s a no no, so nail him for that. But there are firearms like this on SEPTA all the time, and it’s legal. Get over it.
UCMJ Prohibitions
Reports are emerging that the deranged murdering psycho (I shan’t name him) responsible for shooting up the Sikh temple was discharged from the military under less-than-honorable conditions. The Gun Control Act requires someone to have been discharged under dishonorable conditions, which is distinct from less-than-honorable, in order to be prohibited from purchasing or possessing firearms. You generally have to do something pretty serious, and be convicted via court martial, in order to qualify for a dishonorable discharge. I figured I’d mention this, because no doubt people will be claiming he was prohibited from owning a firearm on the basis of his military discharge, which if it’s less-than-honorable is not correct.
UPDATE: Sean in the comments:
This is partially true. A Dishonorable Discharge is a direct bar to gun ownership, but there are other ways.
Other Than Honorable discharge is a negative type of administrative discharge and is not a bar to gun ownership. Could happen due to drugs or getting caught being part of a white supremacist group.
Bad Conduct Discharge, however, can only be issued as a result of a Special or General Court Martial. Any conviction at Court Martial is a Federal felony, and is generally barring.
Starve the Beast
Looks like more and more Americans are cutting the cord. Four hundred thousand since the start of the year. We did it two and a half years ago and have not missed it. Les Jones is a cord cutter too, and is still getting basic channels because he’s a cable internet customer. I have a FiOS for Business circuit which powers the blog and my home office, but no TV service. When I cut the cord, I didn’t think it was worth 100 bucks a month. Now I don’t think it’s worth 50.
A Defense of Absolutism
An excellent article appearing in Town Hall by someone who understands the political process:
In view of this monolithic trend towards governmental expansion and commensurate limitation of individual rights, Mr. LaPierre has adopted a strict constructionist viewpoint. He may agree that it isn’t a good idea for people like James Holmes to get his hands on assault weapons, but he knows that whatever restriction is accepted will be just the beginning.
That’s largely what our opponents fail to understand, and what we need to understand. There’s no reason to reach out and work together to find solutions. That’s not how the process works. People who think politics is the art of everyone getting together to solve problems is naive. Politics is the art of living together without killing each other, and as Clausewitz famously said, killing each other is just politics by other means.
My position is absolute. I want less, not more gun control. I’m not going to compromise or work with them on any issue unless the other side gets me in a position where the only choices are bad and worse.
Progress on Wine Making
Last March I decided to take up trying to make wine. The first batch I made was OK — not great. The big mistake was my secondary fermentation done in the 6.5 gallon carboy I had for beer. The kit called for 6 gallon. I thought my carboy was 6, but remembered later it was 6.5, after I had followed the instructions that called for topping it off with water. The first result was watery, with little body. That was a combination of my fault and the fact that kits accelerate things too greatly and make mediocre wine.
After that I got enough Welch’s Niagara White Grape Juice concentrate to make a 5 gallon batch. I’m pleased to report that is going well, on a considerably prolonged schedule from the first batch of kit wine. It is now cellaring on oak, after several rackings and cold conditioning. My oak chips are a bit toasted, so I’m concerned about visual flaws if I leave it on too long. After reading a lot of advice online about how get oak chips sunk to the bottom, I found that in a dry white wine, the oak chips naturally tend to the bottom. No trouble there.
I also have smaller 1 and 2 gallon batches of blackberry wine and blueberry wine in the pipe respectively. The blackberry wine I made from actual frozen berries. The blueberry wine form blueberry juice you can get at Sam’s Club. No preservatives is the key — it allows for the growth of yeast. Blackberries don’t bring enough natural sugar to the table to avoid adding a lot of cane sugar. I think blackberries can make some fine wine, but as for blueberries, I’m less optimistic. While the early result is very raw, it still tastes like Tastykake tried to make their blueberry pie filling into cough syrup. The problem seems to be that a dry blueberry wine tastes too medicinal. It might be that the blueberry wine needs to be balanced with natural sugar. This can be done with modern winemaking techniques, and I have the preservatives on hand to try this. I will use some of the raw fruit juice to balance it out, probably with another helping of pectic enzyme to clear it up after the fact.
Part of me likes wine making better than home brewing, because I can find some fruit juice at Sam’s Club and think, “Hey, if I throw some Cote des Blancs into this, along with some pectic enzyme and acid blend, I think it’ll taste pretty awesome.” Because wine is such a broad subject, it is more about experimenting. Home brewing is more about perfecting technique. The latter probably fits my personality more than the former. Though I still plan to keep home brewing when I feel inclined.
The Next Deranged Mass Murderer
I have not much to say about what is now being dubbed by the media as the temple shootings. Robert Stacy McCain is compiling the facts as they come in. Expect the gun control groups to be exploiting this to the max for their political agenda. Expect the media to exploit this to the max for ratings and readership. Expect that to inspire another deranged lunatic to seek infamy.
Gun owners are paranoid …
…Â because no one is advocating we come to take away your guns. These types of sentiments are common enough in my Google alerts, I seldom comment on them. Given that they are far far outside the mainstream of American thought, I don’t feel a need to answer them. But every once in a while we need reminding that any gun control advocate who tells you that is trying to sell you a bridge, even if it’s only piece-by-piece.