February 2015 – Page 4 – Shall Not Be Questioned

It’s Still Funded By Taxpayers

It looks like the media is trying to give the City of Lancaster some cover for the fact that they are spending a lot of tax dollars to defend keeping laws on the books that have been illegal for the past forty years. The argument presented is that the city’s insurance is covering the legal costs, though taxpayers are still on the hook for the $25,000 deductible. But who pays the insurance premiums? And who will pay when the insurance premium goes up because the underwriter decides that a city passing illegal laws is a greater risk, and therefore needing to pay a higher premium?

The fact that they are running articles like this is indicative that they may be taking heat for wasting taxpayer money on these suits to defend laws that were never legal in the first place. If that’s true, we need to turn the heat up.

New Brady Study on Gun Suicide

To be honest, with crime dropping as precipitously as it has been, suicide is about the only argument they have left, so I can’t blame them for using it. Suicide is also a pretty big pool of grief from which a gun control group can mine funds from. Suicides affect families more broadly across the income spectrum, so not everyone affected by it has a thin wallet. This may seem cynical, but regardless of how much our opponents might really believe they are trying to usher in a better world, at the end of the day if you run any non-profit organization, bills must be paid, and paychecks written, and that means thinking about where to get money.

I have little doubt that people who commit suicide by firearm tend to be more successful than those who, say, swallow a handful of sleeping pills. But the fad among kids in my area these days seems to be throwing themselves in front of an Acela, which is probably even more sure than a gun. Indeed, that is a popular means of suicide in Japan, which has a far higher suicide rate than the United States, despite largely prohibiting firearms.

News Links for Monday 02-09-2015

Not much gun news that’s very exciting today, so it’ll have to be news links today for the lot of you. The latest trend in media sites working to ensure no one bothers to read them is now playing 20 questions before you can read an article. I’m not going to play, and won’t make any of you, so if you see that, it’s a mistake. But I will do my best to weed that out. The list of sites so annoying, that I won’t link to them, continues to grow and grow:

Rosa Parks’ experience with firearms: “Very late in the process, the leadership of civil rights groups became concerned that groups like the Black Panthers were damaging their brand, and so swept all that under the carpet.” Sound familiar?

When A+ rated politicians are getting extra DPS protection because of death threats, in Texas, something has gone seriously off the rails.

Eric Holder is a sad, sad panda. I am very happy to disappoint him.

Maryland gun rights groups are having their Second Annual Second Amendment day tomorrow in Annapolis. It seems Minnesota already had a successful lobby day.

Campus Carry advancing in MontanaÂ and Wyoming.Â though the bill looks to be dead in the Virginia Senate.

Idaho is now considering Constitutional Carry. We need to pass this in another state to keep the momentum going.

They’ve never had the numbers to amount to anything. Without Bloomberg’s money the movement would be nothing. It would already be in the dustbin of history.

I think these sites just make up facts when they write stories. Case in point: “The ease of availability of small arms is driving growth in the US guns market. The gun-related incidents of crime and violence are on the rise whilst the convenience and economic factors of smaller arms are making them the weapon of choice for law enforcement agencies.”

This writer is clearly under 40, “I never heard of a kid getting shot by a cop because his Star Trek phaser was mistaken for a real gun. It was an era in which toys looked like toys.” Back in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and even as late as the 80s, manufacturers were making realistic looking toys guns, and somehow we all managed to survive.

â€œEvery time the gun lobby attempts to weaken our existing laws, we will show up,” which is why we also need to show up. Never let them own the field. The laws that were passed in Colorado in 2013 absolutely need to be repealed, even if it takes a decade.

SAF is filing a new suit against DC’s new concealed carry laws while Palmer is still in the works. I believe contempt is still an option for the judge in the Palmer case.

“We donâ€™t have to guess how hardened criminals will get their guns if universal background checks are passed, because we already know how they get them now: through theft, black market purchases, criminal associates, and straw purchasers. Background checks cannot and do not stop any of these things.” All background checks did was force criminals to use straw buyers.

This gun condom less-than-lethal looks like a magnificently bad idea.

Miguel talks about some misconceptions our opponents have about LEO training.

A man is charged for shooting at DEA agents in a raid. He is claiming self-defense.

Taser Madness!

An enhancement of the FOPA safe-travel provision would be the perfect kind of bill to put on Obama’s desk to dare him to veto. Out them for being the radicals they are.

Joe Huffman takes a close look at Operation Choke point. Dave Hardy notes: “Now, if someone whose bank spurned them would file a Federal Tort Claims Act claim, citing tortious interference with contract, things might get quite lively, especially during the discovery process.” I absolutely believe we should try to file suit over this.

Off Topic:

I always thought hotels that had hourly rates were something of a legend. Apparently not in Philly.

Ian did a post on vaccines here a bit ago, my own view is closer to Ace’s, though, I’d add that epidemics are kind of like fire. It can go from being a not so serious problem to a crisis right quick. Also this.

More Racist Rhetoric From the Anti-Gun Movement

Late yesterday, we learned that gun control was for the benefit of rich white people, which makes one ponder what exactly makes rich white people so anxious? Well, Mike Bloomberg provides us with the answer:

Bloomberg claimed that 95 percent of murders fall into a specific category: male, minority and between the ages of 15 and 25. Cities need to get guns out of this groupâ€™s hands and keep them alive, he said.

So no Second Amendment rights if you’re young black man, Mr. Bloomberg? A picture is emerging here; gun control proponents believe that we need to disarm young minority men for the benefit of rich white people. And they have the audacity to call us the racists?

Gun Control is for “Wealthy, White Individuals”

Wow. Just wow. One of the former city officials who backed the Bloomberg/CeasefirePA effort to enact local gun control laws said that his city needs to fight on behalf of gun control because he wants to keep the city safe for “white, wealthy individuals.”

Michael Donovan, a former member of city council who supported the lost and stolen gun law, said Allentown should be joining other prominent Pennsylvania cities in their fight against the state law.

“Allentown is the third largest city in the state,” he said. “It is claiming a renaissance for wealthy, white individuals who wish to be safe. I believe the mayor has a responsibility to join the fight against this law.”

No, I’m not kidding. The gun control ally really did say that out loud to a reporter. But, it got buried at the bottom of the story. Do you think if he was a Republican that this would be at the very bottom of the story?

Norway Looking to Repeal Lead Ammo Ban

They banned lead shot in 2005, now they are re-examining it:

The organisation criticised the ban on the grounds that it lacked a solid evidential basis and that the use of alternative ammunition posed animal welfare risks. Non-lead ammunition does not kill as cleanly or as efficiently as lead, and therefore causes unnecessary suffering to quarry, the JI has argued. It also maintains that the potential adverse effects of such substitute materials on health and the environment have not been studied in sufficient detail.

The typical substitute for lead is bismuth, which is nearly as dense as malleable as lead. The problem is that almost all the bismuth production is the world today is a byproduct of lead production. It’s only about twice as common as gold is. There is essentially no way for the shooting sports to function solely on lead substitutes. While Norway may be poised to repeal its law, we’re going backwards here, with Oregon considering a ban on lead ammunition.

Training for the Hoosier Carry Permit?

At least one Indiana lawmaker thinks this is necessary. Currently, Indiana does not require training for their carry permits. I think it’s always hard for our opponents in the gun control movement to wrap their heads around our assertion that, “Yes, training is a good idea. Everyone who carries a gun should seek training,” and “No, the government should not mandate training.” Part of the disconnect is they don’t realize what we mean by “training.”

I’ve used this analogy before, but for the sake of new readers, I’ll repeat it; mandating a training class to carry a gun in the name of public safety is like mandating a violin lesson before playing a violin in the name of the public’s ears. Sure, someone who’s taken an violin lesson might, on average, be off to a better start than someone hasn’t, but let’s not pretend one lesson is going to turn anyone into Itzhak Perlman.

The kind of people who will benefit from a training class probably aren’t the kind of people you really need to be worried about. They are likely the kind of person who would have sought training on their own anyway, will pay attention in class, and be committed to regular practice thereafter. The Cletuses of the world aren’t going to get much of anything out of the training,Â in the same manner aÂ kid forced to take violin lessons by his parents, and never practices, probably isn’t ever going to rise above a level of playing that makes everyone in earshot want to stab out their own eardrum.

Overall, I don’t think the amount of benefit derived from a training requirement is high enough to justify the not insubstantial costs it places on the exercising of a fundamental right. This equation also doesn’t change if you just require more training, as the burden scales with the amount of training mandated.

The standard is so good, we should double it

An article in Slate is just fine with saddling gun owners with hefty legal fees to get a charge based on an unlawful ordinance thrown out, but not with making the towns pay legal fees to defend them. And the article even links to an analysis (and judgement) that the harassment laws are “unenforceable.” But the laws are still on the books, because there’s no real cost to the municipalities. To be fair to the author (though not to the headline writers) the article references a couple of real incidents where law-abiding gun owners were harmed. On the other hand, it takes uncritically and without support statements by the anti-gun side that the laws are effective, unused, and harmless.

These kinds of municipal ordinances designed to harass gun owners are primarily signalling mechanisms, intended to show that the municipality doesn’t want “those kind” of people here, and were expected to be risk-free; because they would only be used against those not able to defend themselves either in the courtroom of law or public opinion. Funny how laws violating civil rights work out that way. But now that the state is making them put up or shut up, most are folding.

It’s a bit of a shame that the enabling language had to be tacked onto a different bill, giving the deep-pocket municipalities a chance to strike down on the “germaneness” grounds. Sebastian probably has a better idea of how that’s going to fly in PA courts than I do.

Incidentally, the article claims the NRA refused requests for an interview. Good for them, there’s not a chance in the world that an interview with a Slate reporter with an axe to grind would have helped. And as usual, the comments section is rather more pro-gun than not, which is another indication of how little grass-root the other side has left.

Local NPR Debate Over Enhanced Preemption

On one side, the attorney representing the NRA in its suits against Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, Jonathan Goldstein. On the other, Shira Goodman, Executive Director of CeaseFirePA.

I’m Sure This Will Help to Get Open Carry Passed in Texas

Treason! You keep using that word, I do not think it means what you think it means:

â€œWe should demanding these people give us our rights back or itâ€™s punishable by death. Treason. Do you understand how serious this is Texas?â€ Watkins asks. â€œThis is treason against the American people. You donâ€™t sell my right back to me. Youâ€™re going to find trouble.â€

But wait, it gets even better:

â€œI donâ€™t think they want to mess around with us too much longer. They better start giving us our rights or this peaceful non-cooperation stuff is going to be gamed up. We are going to step it up a notch. I think here in Texas we are tired of jacking around with people in suits,â€ Watkins said.

Apparently all the videos are getting pulled down, including the one linked to in the article. Now he’s saying he meant nothing violent by his statements, but the damage has already been done.

UPDATE: More commentary here, though it’s important to note that this is OCTC, and not OCT behind this. OCT has condemned stuff like this.

UPDATE: Bearing Arms has the video back, and this: “At this moment, I think that there is an argument to be made that Kory Watkins is the single most effective advocate for gun control in the United States. I hope heâ€™s smart enough to ask Mike Bloomberg for a check.”