Guns – Page 338 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Interpol to Establish Arms Tracing System?

ATF already maintains a database of lost and stolen firearms, so that if one is traced, they can identify the rightful owner. Now it seems Interpol will be establishing a database of its own:

Modeled after INTERPOL’s Stolen and Lost Travel Document System which today contains more than 33 million entries, iARMS will feature a hit alarm to the country of report when a match is detected. Replacing INTERPOL’s existing firearms tracing system, it will redirect users to trace firearms not found in the database, thereby linking the two processes of searching a database of reported lost, stolen, smuggled and trafficked firearms with firearms tracing. It will also enable states to capture their own statistics for crime-trend analysis and to assist them in meeting reporting requirements. iARMS will be piloted to 20 countries in September.

Think you’ll ever see your firearm again if Interpol traces it? Think your gun will come out of the database, if it is returned? I think the Arms Trade Treaty is practically guaranteed to expand in scope if it’s brought into being.

What Happens When a Coastal Elite Visits America

It’s always funny when they find America, which you know, has a lower violent crime rate than California, and doesn’t see guns as some kind of demonic curse in sorry need of an exorcism:

He went on to say I could buy as many of them as I wanted and walk out with my arsenal today. “These guns have helped our industry tremendously,” he said. “They’ve attracted a whole new generation…. Is there one you want to try?” He brought down a Colt AR15-A3 tactical carbine, slammed in an empty magazine, and handed it to me. It felt disappointingly fake, an awesome water pistol, perhaps, or a Halloween prop. I asked if I would need to tell him why I wanted to buy a gun like that or what I intended to do with it. He squinted and smiled and appeared politely speechless. “Would you have to do what, now?” he asked.

I’m not big on slamming magazines into a gun in a shop for effect, I’ll be honest.

“I have six handgunsâ€”bought five of them here,” an old man said to me. I was waiting for Ron, who’d gone to the back room to find a gun he thought I might like. “I have five rifles, got all of them here,” the man said. “I spend most of my time reloading shells. All my friends are dead.” He had thin white hair and a long, sagging face dotted with age spots. “Do you know what the biggest problem with divorce is? It’s the bedroom. And a lot of it’s the man’s fault. Like a damn rabbit, on and off.”

It felt like we should have had rocking chairs, perhaps a set of checkers between us. This was one of the things I liked most about Sprague’s: the general-store feel. Groups would form, strangers becoming neighbors, sharing stories. “I lost my wife in November,” the man said. “Sixty years. Now my kids keep trying to get me to go live with them in California. My doctor said, ‘What’s your lifestyle?’ I told him guns. He said, ‘Stay in Yuma.’ “

I guess it’s a bit late for Markey’s Law Monday, but it’s still Monday out on the west coast. You have to love it when they are subtle about suggesting interest in guns is a sexual dysfunction.

“I just got that same Smith for my kid,” he said.

I looked at him. He appeared far too young to have a grown son.

“Wait, how old is your kid?” I asked.

“Six,” he said.

Yeah, buying a .22 for a kid. The horror.

Richard Sprague, the owner of Sprague’s Sports, is a slender man in his fifties with a tapered face, coarse graying hair, and an easy smile. Other Arizona gun stores would not even entertain my request to visit and ask questions about selling guns and ammunition, but Richard without hesitation invited me to spend as much time as I wanted at Sprague’sâ€”behind the counter, in the back room, at the shooting range, anywhere I wished.

The other Arizona gun stores were smarter. I really wish gun shops would understand there is not much good that can come of speaking with reporters. I am definitely a fan of engagement, but there’s very little the media is going to report about several days in a gun shop that’s not going to end up being twisted like this horror. These people hate you. You don’t have to explain yourself. They are the barbarians, not you. If a reporter seems to try to want to understand you, the best defense is to walk away, because it’s probably a set-up. These people are not at all to be trusted.

The vampires among journalists will always feed to the greatest satisfaction off ordinary, good people, who honestly just want to talk and be understood. Don’t be tempted. They are out to get you. I think what bothers me the most is that this reporter is from Pennsylvania, which is still, last I checked, part of America when it comes to mostly respecting the 2nd Amendment. I grew up not 50 miles from where I live now, about 5 miles outside of Philadelphia, and I knew people who hunted, did target shooting, and carried guns for self-defense. Some of them I called family. It was not a novel or unusual concept for me. So I really have to wonder, if this reporter is from Pennsylvania, where exactly she’s from, because clearly she hasn’t seen much of her own state.

UPDATE: Someone pointed out the reporter was a woman, so the article has been updated accordingly.

For That Person Who Said We Needed Vision Tests

Congrats to Mr. Completely, for getting a positive article about shooting and shooters into the main stream media. And just a note to “Dog Gone” who suggested we all needed to pass vision tests, like keeping and bearing arms was some kind of privilege doled out by the likes of her:

Itâ€™s a trick heâ€™s learned pretty well. The nearly lifelong South Whidbey resident is undoubtedly the islandâ€™s quickest and greatest crack shot with a record in Steel Challenge competition shooting to prove it.

Heâ€™s also nearly blind.

Suffering from presbyopia, a condition in which the eye loses the ability to focus and makes it extremely difficult to see objects up close, Gallion is severely farsighted. His vision is roughly 20/400.

The condition forces him to wear three different pairs of glasses. Itâ€™s a hurdle few in his sport have to contend with â€” most of those who do well donâ€™t wear glasses at all. However, poor eyesight hasnâ€™t seemed to hurt Gallionâ€™s record.

Since he started a little more than a decade ago, the 67-year-old has secured about 100 first place finishes â€” at least five of which are state championships â€” including a gold medal at an international competition in Holland this past May.

If we put Mr. C into a head-to-head competition with successive members of the NYPD, I’d put big money on Mr. C besting all of them, and if I was going to be this guy, I’d certainly feel a lot better with Mr. C behind the trigger than most of the folks the gun control crowd says are “responsible and trained enough” to bear arms.Â People can find ways to deal with advantages and disadvantages. Bitter is nearly blind too, enough that if she loses her glasses, I’d have to help her find them. Enough that she can’t do well with skeet because the field of vision outside her glasses is so bad she can’t see the bird until it’s practically in front of her.Â Yet I’m fairly certain she could put 16 rounds into a man sized target at 7 yards, even under stress, without hitting 9 other people.

And “Dog Gone” wants to tell shooters that they need a vision test for exercising a right? I print this stuff because sometimes the nerve of these people appalls me.Â I’m sure that people like “Dog Gone” and Joan Peterson think themselves big advocates for the rights of people with disabilities in any other context, until they decide they want to exercise their Second Amendment rights, that is. Sure, maybe a disabled hunter would be fine by them, but the Second Amendment isn’t about hunting, and never has been.Â It’s hard not to walk away with the notion that they absolutely hate people that decide to exercise their rights. In that sense they are all for equality, whether disabled, black or white, rich or poor. They would have everyone equally disarmed and rendered powerless.

Sometimes They Are Honest, At Least

In at least one Brady supporter’s mind, what would be required for gun carrying and ownership gun?Â I point this out because it’s very rare for gun control advocates to elucidate detailed views of what policies they actually propose, once you get past whatever “common sense gun safety measures” that happen to be the cause du jure they feel like they might have a chance to ram through Congress. Instead of policy discussions, you get a lot of NRA evil, blah blah blah, for the children, blah blah blah, we have to do something, blah blah blah. So I tend to appreciate it when I see some honesty.

I have advocated for regular testing, including physical ability to be steady with a gun, eye testing the way we do for driving that would require someone to be wearing their glasses if they use their firearm – or even just carry it. Regular renewals, not a for life permitting (or non-permitting in the case of AZ). Peformance testing annually. Drug testing, including for alcohol abuse because of the links between violence and aggression, poor impulse control and judgment impairment. Some sort of psychology screening to keep the obvious, known dangerously mentally ill from acquiring firearms – like Ian Stawicki, Jared Loughner, James Holmes. A requirement of insurance for gun ownership and for carrying, so that there is guaranteed compensation for anyone shot in error or by accident or even by an evil intentional shooting. Repeal of all shoot first laws, and a reinforcement that if you shoot someone, and you are wrong, you are held fully legally accountable for doing so, not given an exemption from criminal or civil court proceedings.

Until that didn’t work, and then there were so few gun owners left, they didn’t have any power to stand up to outright prohibition. Which still wouldn’t work, just like prohibiting things people want has never worked anywhere it’s been tried, but hey, it makes people feel good.

We treat no other constitutional right this way, so my only offer on compromise here is to say “No f**king way!” and fight them every step of the way down that slippery slope, and continue to try to push the gun control movement back up, and then hopefully down the other side to somewhere around Carrie Nation Gulch.Â It’s a constitutional right. It has to be treated like one. Because of how we treat other constitutional rights, that still leaves a lot of room for measures I probably won’t like, just like I don’t agree with all the 1st Amendment or 4th Amendment jurisprudence. But most people, and the courts, still treat these Amendments as serious limits on governmental power, which by their existence proscribe certain policy choices (though that’s getting iffy for the 4th, but I digress). If you don’t like the implications of that, you can work to change the Constitution. But you have to start from there. There is no negotiating on that. You can’t just pretend that is not the case, and you can’t just reinterpret it, absent any historical evidence and against the understanding of the vast majority of Americans, to suggest it has no meaning.

To Crimp, or not to Crimp?

I’ve gotten 50 rounds of 6.8 Remington SPC loaded, and 100 round of .223 loaded. I have a progressive press a reader sent me a while back (a Lee, which he didn’t use anymore and wanted to get rid of), but I only have the necessary equipment to load pistol ammo with it, and the Lee progressive has a rough time with that, so I’d be worried with rifle ammo.

For rifle ammo, I’m loading on a single stage press. For practice ammo, I don’t weigh each charge, and I’ve actually found the Lee powder charger throws a pretty consistent load once you run it five or six times. I’m limited in speed mostly by press time. I do 50 at a time. My process is as follows.

Run 50 rounds through the tumbler to clean off the brass.
Stage them on my reloading block, after running them through the separator.
Spray them with some reloaders KY.
Decap & resize on the press & move to finish block.
Seat the primers, move back to staging block.
Adjust the powder throw, charge 50 cases, move to finish block.
Check all the cases for proper charge, seat the bullets.
Seat all the bullets, measuring the first few for overall length, moving to staging block.
Crimp bullets on the press.

The last part I’ve heard various advice on. Some people suggest you don’t need to crimp the bullets, and that the military only does it because they have to stand up to rough handling in machine guns. When I first starting reloading, I’m pretty sure I was over crimping, which can be dangerous. But I still tend to think a light crimp on the bullet is good for firing through a semi-auto, despite the extra cycle through the press it takes for each batch of 50. What do you think? To crimp or not to crimp?

It’s Reloading Time

Several days of ridiculously nice weather had me itching to take the AR-15 to the range, but suddenly realizing I’m way too low on .223 ammo interfered with my plans. Looking online, ammunition is still scarce and expensive, so it’s time to dust off the reloading bench. Fortunately, I still have plenty of Varget, plenty of 55gr bullets, and a metric crapload of once fired .223 brass. I’m going to fill up all my plastic containers, so my goal is 250 rounds.

I also figure as long as I’m getting everything together, I might as well finish off all my once fired 6.8 Remington SPC and get the rest of those loaded. It’s not more than 50 rounds, but I never really shoot the 6.8 AR. I don’t look all that favorably on boutique rounds these days, and I’d sort of sorry I made an investment in it. My remaining 6.8 once fired brass is stuff I brought back from the Gun Blogger Rendezvous in Reno, years ago, so it gives you an idea of how seldom I shoot that caliber.

I think the next AR I build needs to be a .22LR. It’s hard to have less than several thousand rounds on hand, and it’s cheap.

Embody Suit Dismissed by 6th Circuit

From the decision:

For his troubles, Embody has done something rare: He has taken a position onÂ the Second and Fourth Amendment that unites the Brady Center to Prevent GunÂ Violence and the Second Amendment Foundation. Both organizations think that theÂ park ranger permissibly disarmed and detained Leonard Embody that day,Â notwithstanding his rights to possess the gun. So do we.

This was a bad case taken forward by someone who doesn’t want to leave things to experts, so SAF went in with arguments that would kill the suit. The Court essentially concluded it was a legitimate Terry stop, so there was no 4th Amendment case to be made:

Embody does not quarrel with this accounting of what happened. To his mind, all thatÂ matters is that carrying an AK-47 pistol in a state park is legal under Tennessee law; the gunâ€™sÂ resemblance to an assault rifle, the conspicuous arming of it, his military clothing and theÂ concerns of passers-by add nothing. But the constitutional question is whether the officers hadÂ reasonable suspicion of a crime, not whether a crime occurred. Otherwise, all failedÂ investigatory stops would lead to successful Â§ 1983 actions. Having worked hard to appearÂ suspicious in an armed-and-loaded visit to the park, Embody cannot cry foul after park rangers,Â to say nothing of passers-by, took the bait. The officers stopped him only as long as it took toÂ investigate the legitimacy of the weapon and, at his insistence, bring the supervisor to the park.Â No Fourth Amendment violation occurred.

The court skirted the Second Amendment issue by upholding the qualified immunity of the officers in question:

To the extent Embody means to argue that the Second Amendment prevents TennesseeÂ from prohibiting certain firearms in state parks (and thus prohibited Ward from detainingÂ Embody on suspicion of possessing an illegal firearm), qualified immunity is the answer. SeeÂ Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). No court has held that the SecondÂ Amendment encompasses a right to bear arms within state parks. See District of Columbia v.Â Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008) (individual right to bear arms in the home); United States v.Â Masciandaro, 638 F.3d 458 (4th Cir. 2011) (upholding regulation prohibiting firearms inÂ national parks). Such a right may or may not exist, but the critical point for our purposes is thatÂ it has not been establishedâ€”clearly or otherwise at this point. That suffices to resolve thisÂ claim under the Courtâ€™s qualified-immunity precedents. See Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S.Â 223, 236 (2009).

The Bradys are, of course, treating this like some kind of victory, but the fact is we got what we wanted here, and in a pretty non-damaging way. The Brady folks could have hoped for a lot more from a suit as reckless as this. The standard for overcoming qualified immunity is pretty high, and this dismissal here does not mean what the Brady folks would like it to mean. I am sure, however, we have not seen the last of Leonard Embody’s one man crusade to ruin Second Amendment precedent in the 6th Circuit.

When addressing a crowd of gun bloggers, Alan Gura mentioned the biggest threat to our Second Amendment rights was these kinds of oddball pro se litigants, who take forward bad cases with no legal expertise, and proceed to establish negative precedent that is difficult to overcome. So far, I think we’ve seen less of that than I expected. I applaud SAF and Mr. Gura for intervening in this case, and crushing it like the cockroach in the kitchen that it was.

I Wish NRA Would Focus More on the Courts in Public Rhetoric

NRA President David Keene talks to the Washington Times down in Tampa about the need to get rid of Obama:

Notice one argument missing? Nowhere is the 5-4 thread the Second Amendment is now hanging by even mentioned. Maybe they’ve focused grouped this or something, and the fact is that people just don’t really grasp the enormity of the danger, unless you hit them withÂ “We see him as the most anti-gun president in modern times.” But I’m pretty skeptical that this message is going to be more effective. We all remember Clinton. We all remember him using the bully pulpit ever time there was a mass shooting. We remember eight years of nothing but more gun control. I’m not sure this rhetoric passes the smell test.

But the Supreme Court issue does. I know my biggest fear is spending the next four years hoping that Scalia, Kennedy and even Thomas have really good doctors. There’s also the proverbial bus. Not to mention, at some point that 5 justice majority breaks, and I honestly don’t want to find out where that is without another pick up. Have NRA members become so detached from the issue we can no longer level with them? I mean, we’re talking about the Second Amendment being repealed from the Bill of Rights by judicial fiat. If that’s not enough to scare gun owners, we’re doomed.

Women & Guns

If you weren’t watching the RNC speeches last night, you really missed out. The women knocked every single ball out of the park. The men, save Paul Ryan who brought a little fire to the floor, largely fell flat. Tim Pawlenty’s speech wasn’t a roaring excitement, but he got in one hell of a dig against Obama, noting that many people fail in their first jobs. The humor in the audience reaction was how it took them a second to realize what he said, and then they cracked up.

However, there were a few moments the audience absolutely roared in applause and cheers. One was when Condi talked about how she could grow up in Jim Crow-era Alabama with parents who told her she could be anything she wanted to be – even president – and that the same little girl would go on to become Secretary of State. Another came from New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez when she talked about how hard her parents worked to start a small business – a security business – that she also worked at as a teenager. While this video trims the response by the crowd, you do get the hint that the floor went nuts for her talk of knowing how to defend herself.

The video also cuts off her follow-up line – that the gun weighed about as much as she did. For all the talk about platforms in recent days, those don’t really matter much. The reaction to this kind of comment reflects far more about the motivation of the party members. It’s not about what a few select people who we don’t elect pick out for a party platform, it’s about actual elected officials and candidates seeking our votes representing what people really believe. And we already know that the American people really do believe in the right to self-defense, even with a firearm.

I might add, for the GOP portrayed as the uptight do-gooders, her swear line in prime time tv hours got huge applause. Continue reading “Women & Guns”

RAND Study on NYPD Firearms Training

Chris in Alaska has a link to a RAND study on the NYPD which confirms much of what was said here. From Chris’s conclusion regarding the RAND study:

As for the competency ofÂ civiliansÂ vs. police… Â It looks like best case a NYPD police recruit gets around two to four days at the range plus maybe up to 33 hours of classroom academics that could relate in some manner to weapons. Â Every six months they get one day at the range and 95 rounds of ammo for practice on a scripted known-distance target practice style range.

Alaska Tactical’s Defensive Handgun IÂ course is 24 hours of instruction over three range days. Â It also has pre-requisites, so applicants probably have some previous experience bringing them up to match or exceed the 33 hours at NYPD. Â Finally, the class size is small with a good coach to student ratio. Â Front Sight’s basic defensive pistol course is 4 days with 32 hours of instruction. Â That is clearly at least on par with if not exceeding the NYPD police academy requirements.

Furthermore, any civilian who attends IDPA or USPSA matches once every six months or more is getting more refresher training than NYPD. Â Heck, the civilian who goes to the range once every few months and puts a box or two of ammo through their pistol, alongÂ withÂ maybe a little dry fire at home, is doing WAY more than NYPD.

This is not to pooh pooh the profession, but to dispel the myth that a badge imparts magical gun handling competence. I think the officers in the NYPD case were correct to use lethal force, and everyone knows that firing under stress makes your groups go to shit. But a great way to inoculate against that effect is competition. Anyone know of any IPSC or IDPA matches run in New York City? I’d bet there’s not a one.