Due to pressure from gun control activists, Evanston, IL has decided to take no action on its gun ban. Better lawyer up, Evanston. This won’t be cheap or easy.
Hat Tip to Carl in Chicago
Category: Guns
EVC Goodie Bag Has Arrived
I have obtained my EVC packet from the Evil League of Evil in Fairfax, which contained various gun nutty trinkets, scads of bumper stickers, a DVD which does not work with my Mac, a completely list of instructions, a list of contacts, secret decoder book, locations of safe houses, and cyanide tablet in the event of capture.
Now I just have to await the transmission from headquarters, which outline NRA’s political priorities for my district, along with endorsed candidates, and determine which campaigns we’re supporting, and who we can direct volunteers to
Politically Incorrect Toys
Can you imagine them producing anything like this today?  Interestingly enough, my neighbor worked for this very toy company, and they made all manner of politically incorrect toys, which we got to play with. One, which I got to take home with me, was an automatic firing water pistol in the shape of an IMI Uzi. It took batteries, because the stream was propelled by motorized action. But it would fire as long as you held the trigger down, or until the (detachable) magazine ran dry. That was back before parents were advised not to let their kids play with realistic looking guns, lest the police shoot them mistaking them for some crazed eight year old mass shooter. You could even turn it into a flamethrower by putting various flammable liquids in the magazine, and holding an ignition source on the stream as it came out. Not that I would ever do such a thing, mind you.
In terms of water guns, the super soakers the kids have today are probably a hell of a lot better than anything I ever had, but I probably would have burned my neighborhood down if I had had access to one.
Judge Upholds Florida “Guns at Work” Law
A federal judge has ruled there’s no unconstitutional property taking involved in Florida’s law allowing employees with Concealed Weapons Permits to carry to work. He also ruled that the law does not violate OSHA standards. I’ve said before that I don’t agree with the NRA’s push for these laws, both on pro-liberty grounds, and because I think resources would be better spent elsewhere, but I found the notion that OSHA regulations mandate a gun free workplace to be silly, and I’m happy to see that reasoning rejected.
News Flash
According to the Brady Campaign, the church shooter in Knoxville used a super-deadly high powered common bird gun to carry out his deadly rampage.  Far cry from what they were saying yesterday, which implied it was one of those super-scary Saiga-12s which, you know, fire the exact same shell.
Heller v. DC
That’s right, it’s not DC v. Heller. Dick Heller is suing the District of Colombia once again over their new gun laws. We wish Mr. Heller the best of luck.
UPDATE: You can see a copy of the complaint here.
UPDATE: Now that I’ve had time to read, it looks like they are basically asking for an injunction against:
- The ballistics testing nonsense which requires an undefined fee.
- The nonsense about not being able to register a semi-automatic pistol under DC’s ridiculous definition of “machine gun”
- They ask for any further relief the court may want to offer.
What they are not asking for an injunction on is whether semi-autos that can shoot more than 12 rounds from a magazine. Also, again, they aren’t challenging the registration itself. That’ll all be later cases. Pick the low hanging fruit first.
Brady Donations to Patrick Murphy
I have obtained a Federal Election Commission filing from the Brady Campaign’s Political Action Committee. You will notice a $1000 donation to Patrick Murphy for Congress dated October 13th, 2006. Right before the election.
Little doubt here that Murphy is trying to get some political cover on the gun issue in a county full of gun owners. That way when people raise his anti-gun record, he can point other pro-gun measures he’s signed on to as proof that he’s really not against us. He has to triangulate on this issue. I am not the only car with an NRA sticker on it in this neighborhood, and there’s a gun shop within walking distance. My local club has 1200 members, and there are more than a dozen other ranges and clubs in the county, many of which are also rather large.
Pro-gun forces in Southeastern Pennsylvania have largely been unorganized. NRA has a presence here, but few are standing up and getting involved. Hopefully, we can start turning that around. Pennsylvania’s future as a pro-gun states absolutely depends on the Philadelphia suburbs. We can see what the result is of the suburbs voting in lock step with the city in Ed Rendell’s governorship. By contrast to Rendell, Barack Less Filling, Tastes Great Obama failed to take the suburbs, and failed to take the state.
Gun owners in other parts of Pennsylvania are quick to dismiss the Philadelphia suburbs as a lost cause, but by doing so, are sowing the seeds of their own doom. We have a shooting culture here. It’s showing some health problems, but it does exist. Hopefully we can show people in the rest of the state that we’re worth saving.
Lots of Camp Perry News
Looks like Breda paid a visit to Camp Perry this weekend, where the National Matches are taking place as we speak. No word on whether she managed to steal any pens, but I do have to say, that AR-15 looks nice on her. I think she needs to get one. If she does, she can shoot in our gun blog matches.
Bitter offers a pretty snarky assessment of NRA’s Camp Perry Live blog. This is their first year trying anything like this.
Patrick Murphy Signs on to National Concealed Carry
Patrick Murphy has cosponsored H.R. 861, the National Right-to-Carry Reciprocity Act. According to Thomas, he signed on as a cosponsor on July 22nd. That’s a few days after we got a visit from one is his perky volunteers. I should note that Congressman Murphy has used his concealed carry license as political cover on this issue before. Hell, even I bought it before I had idea what his record would be.
But the fact of the matter is the guy signed on to a pretty serious and draconian ban of most semi-automatic firearms, including the most popular target rifles that are sold in the US today. He also is conspicously absent from the Congressional Amicus Brief supporting Mr. Heller in overturning the ban on guns in Washington D.C. Patrick Murphy was one of only six members of the Pennsylvania Congressional delegation who did not sign on to the brief.
One wonders how Congressman Murphy thinks we’re supposed to carry guns, when he doesn’t seem to have any issue with guns being banned.
EVC Site
We have established a web site for our EVC activities in Pennsylvania’s 8th Congressional District. Obviously one of the main things we wanted to highlight was Congressman Patrick Murphy’s record on guns. We will be developing fliers to distribute to clubs, ranges and gun shops, to make sure folks know that Patrick Murphy would like to make sure folks like this find it difficult or impossible to compete in their chosen sport. No doubt that many clay shooters and bird hunters would be interested to discover the poor wording in HR1022 bans all semi-automatic shotguns as well.
We will be as ready as we can hope to be once the endorsements come out.