Emily Miller reports on the nomination of Dr. Vivek Murthy. Well, to be fair, I’m not sure we’ve had a pro-gun Surgeon General. But some of the positions taken by his organization are troubling, nonetheless. Though, does anyone really give a crap what the Surgeon General says anymore? They are basically political hacks. Koop was the only Surgeon General I think that had any notoriety, and he was still an insufferable busybody. I’m not sure even if he’s confirmed, it’ll change the state the debate much.
Year: 2014
Opposing Gun Control in Oregon
Several readers have sent me this, which has been making its way around the blogosphere. It’s worth watching, if you haven’t seen it yet:
Is it just me, or does that guy look an awful lot like Johnathan Rhys Meyers who plays King Henry VIII on the Showtime series “The Tudors.”
Tuesday News Links
If you live in Eastern Pennsylvania or New Jersey, bend over, because here it comes again. Aunt Em! Toto! It’s a Nor’easter! it’s a Nor’easter! (that’s Naweasta for those of you in New England). I suppose this god awful winter just wouldn’t be complete without one. One disadvantage to having an office in the middle of the hobby farming and horse breeding bedroom community in Chester County is that it’s hard for people get in during any inclement weather, so this winter has been a real killer for us. But that’s not to say there hasn’t been gun news:
Rifle OC isn’t about attention whoring. No sir.
This is how such things would be handled in a more ideal world.
We now have a SAFE act legal AR-15. I’m sure the removal of the pistol grip will make it less deadly. The Coalition Against Gun Ergonomics will no doubt be pleased. Could we file suit against SAFE using the American’s With Disabilities Act? Anyone in NY have arthritis?
An exodus from MAIG. That’s OK, since they don’t seem to be big on maintaining a list of members these days. That’s been nothing but a boon for us when some of them inevitably get convicted of crimes.
Andrew Cuomo is trying to buy some gun votes by spending money on ranges. Hate to tell you, buddy, but ranges are useless when you banned all the guns that were popular.
Shot detection seems to be a waste of money.
There’s a new book in the works about guns and the civil rights movement. The carefully constructed progressive narrative is coming apart. Groups like CSGV, MDA and the increasingly irrelevant Brady organization have to be coming apart at the seams.
Concealed Carry on Campus in Idaho introduced. Clayton is looking to organize some students.
Restricting guns to prevent suicide? Clearly what we need are more background checks.
Ohio Court of Appeals panel rules that the Second Amendment applies to carrying firearms in cars.
Another Third Amendment case. For two hundred years we’ve had one or two Third Amendment cases. But thanks to the modern police state culture that is overtaking American law enforcement, this is the third such case I’ve seen as of late.
Restricting handgun possession to those 17 and under passes strict scrutiny in Louisiana.
I was hoping to have more to say about a federal judge upholding Connecticut’s new gun control laws, but I just don’t. It’s the intermediate scrutiny two step again… with judges treating the Second Amendment as an inferior right.
“Nothing ails the pain a family has to be suffering due the accidental death of a child like sending a parent to jail.” We’d never think about doing such a thing with a parent who left a gate open by accident on a pool, despite pools killing far more children each year.
Joe notices CSGV’s flexible fundraising goals. Their finances were not in the best of shape pre-Newtown. I suspect they had a boot post-Newtown, but people’s attention has moved on since.
Bob Owens highlights some epic ignorance on parade.
NSA spying undermines separation of powers.
Caleb is upset that NAGR highlights a sausage sack holster in one of its ads.
Lineage & Guns
As most of you know from occasional posts, Sebastian & I have been into studying family history since last summer. I joined Daughters of the American Revolution last fall based on the research, and I’m finding even more patriots with practically every family line that I open up. But just this morning, I found I have a new goal. I want to find a gunsmith in my family tree. Why? Because of this qualification for designating a patriot in DAR:
Those who rendered material aid such as furnishing supplies with or without remuneration, lending money to the Colonies, munitions makers, gunsmiths, etc.
I’ve found a politician (state representative from Kentucky in 1800) who is the grandson of a sometimes hard-to-prove female patriot, several refugees fleeing religious wars whose families ended up supporting independence, and a patriot documented as supplying whisky to the troops, but no gunsmiths or munitions makers for the Revolution yet. And you know I want one if I can find one.
So, this is a bit of a bleg to anyone who knows about quality historical research. Where is one likely to find sources on gunsmiths & munitions makers from that era? I assume my best bet is to try and find wills and other legal records that may make mention of an occupation, but I wanted to ask if there were potentially other sources since I know this is an audience that loves guns, gun rights, and history.
I’ve got known patriots and family lines in Maryland, Virginia, South Carolina, and North Carolina during the war. Afterwards, some ended up in Kentucky simply because that’s the county they were in when it was divided and then those broke off to become a state, so gun makers in those areas are more likely to be of value for this purpose.
Self-Defense Calibers
Exurban Kevin notices that what’s considered to be a good self-defense caliber has been getting ever smaller. When I first started carrying, back in 2002 or so, .380 was considered where self-defense rounds started, but 9mm was the generally popular self-defense caliber. Then everyone said it had to start with a .4 or it wasn’t good enough. The .40S&W became pretty popular, especially among law enforcement. Now we’re back to the smaller calibers being popular again. My guess is because more people are carrying, and it’s just much much easier to carry and conceal smaller firearms. I tend to think anything is better than harsh language. The best caliber is the one you’ll carry. A pocket .380 you have is better than the .40S&W left at home.
Empty Brass in Your Home is a Crime
When I lived in Massachusetts and took women who had never shot a gun before to the range, they would frequently ask me if they could keep an empty piece of brass as a souvenir from their first trip to the range. I hated to tell them that possession of that brass without a license was a crime. I did tell them, and they usually opened up to the idea that maybe the extreme gun control measures of Massachusetts were not actually serving the public good.
Unfortunately, a DC man is headed back to court for at least the eighth time to defend himself against the charge that he possessed an empty shotgun hull.
Nick Johnson on NRA News
Sorry for somewhat of a prolonged absence. While we recovered from the ice storm fine here, our office was not so fortunate, and so we had to relocate a lot of equipment to get things up and running again and the business functioning. That takes a few long days. Our Internet finally came this Sunday, just in time for me to come down with a stomach flu. I can’t seem to win this winter. Here’s an interview between Nick Johnson and Cam Edwards I thought you’d enjoy:
I’ll try to post a few things later, if I have the energy.
NRA’s Sportsman’s Show “Way Over Reed’s Head”
“This is way over Reed’s head.” – Woman who worked with Reed to put on the Eastern Sports Outdoor Show & now works with NRA to put on the Great American Outdoor Show
Reading this article that talked to vendors from gun shops, fishing lure retailers, boat dealers, hunting outfitters, and more, the overwhelming response appears to be that NRA knows how to put on a bigger, better sportsman’s show than what Reed put on previously.
I find it interesting the vendors who attend other shows said this is one of the best they have attended, and NRA plans to release exact numbers on how many people attended which is something that Reed was never willing to do. Perhaps the end of the old show will really end up being better for everyone in the community.
Good News for Hunting & Ultimately Guns
I realize that most readers of this blog aren’t hunters. But, if you’re like Sebastian, you may have been invited to go hunting once or twice, but couldn’t give it a try alongside the experienced hunter who invited you because you didn’t pre-plan and sit through an 8+ hour hunter safety course in order to get a license.
Pennsylvania was an early adopter of an apprentice hunting program that allowed experienced hunters to take children out to the woods on a limited license that didn’t require the pre-planning hassle of finding an available hunter ed class. It was wonderful, but it didn’t solve the problem for those who were over 18 and would like to give hunting a try. Recently, the legislature and the Game Commission have set out to fix that problem, and final approval to new regulations is scheduled for April.
It’s great to see some roadblocks to growing the sport coming down, especially when you add in that the Game Commission has been rolling out online hunter ed with only a few hours to do in an actual classroom.
Stories like this don’t just make me think about great news for hunting, but they should get all gun people thinking about barriers to entry for any of their favorite shooting sports and what they can do to help knock them down.
Anti-Gun Advocate Arrested for Gun Felonies
An outspoken New York advocate for gun control laws that made it a felony to possess a firearm on school property (instead of the misdemeanor it was prior to the SAFE Act) decided to carry his gun to an elementary school this week. It ended with him walking out in handcuffs and facing two counts of criminal possession of a weapon that may carry up to four years in prison thanks the law he so publicly supported. Oops.