Shall Not Be Questioned – Page 1155 – The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …

Is Philadelphia This Screwed Up?

This seems pretty screwed up if you ask me.Â My first question is why is a judge using a police roll call room as an impromptu courtroom?Â Shouldn’t a judge have their own courtroom?Â Or at least a courtroom shared among several judges?

And if you’re a judge, who has to hold hearings in a police roll call room, isn’t it understandable that the decorum, I don’t know, might more accurately reflect that of a police station rather than a court room, especially one that just lost an officer.

I can understand the desire to create an appearance of impartiality, but when the city apparently has no money for a proper court room, and you have to use a police station, it seems to be you should respect the people who primarily use the room.Â It’s not like the person appearing before you won’t understand he’s being arraigned in a police station.

Fixed Question Form

My apologies for those of you who tried to submit a question to our board candidates.Â I have fixed the problem with the form.

Anodized Obama

This is an AR-15 lower receiver I can believe in.

Downstate/Upstate

Tom King talks about the dichotomy that exists within the Empire State, and how it could play out for gun owners there.Â Things do not look very good in New York State right now, so now is not the time to be complacent.

NRA Board Candidate Interviews

We’re going to be conducting interviews with three of our endorsed NRA board candidates.Â I have created a form by which readers can submit questions.Â I decided to use a form, rather than the comments so that I can direct questions into folders I have created for the specific candidates in my mailbox.Â Plus, I don’t want the candidates to see the questions ahead of time.

I will narrow down the interviews to probably no more than six questions, with maybe a follow up or two.Â Keep in mind the different backgrounds of the candidates.Â I’d like to get some good shooting sports questions for Edie Reynolds, for instance, since that’s what she brings to the table.Â Scott Bach is President of ANJRPC, so some New Jersey questions would be good for him.Â Joe DeBergalis has a law enforcement background, so that’s an angle to explore there.

The DOJ Response in NPS Brady Suit

Some folks have asked about the DOJ response in the case the Brady Campaign have brought against the Department of Interior over the National Park carry rule.Â For those of you who are interested, here it is.Â I’ll update with later with any thoughts I have on it.

UPDATE: It appears that NRAÂ and Mountain States Legal Fund filed a Motion to Intervene.Â What this is, essentially, is NRA and MSLF asking to become a party to the lawsuit.Â DOJ, in this brief, is asking the court, that if they grant the motion, that they limit the intervention, so as not to “unduly multiply or delay these proceedings.”

I could be wrong about this, but it looks to me like DOJ would rather NRA and MSLF not be involved in the case, but don’t really have any legal grounds to argue they shouldn’t be.Â The consequences of the limits being asked for is that the NRA and MSLF will be limited from seeking “discovery or extra-record consideration,” basically meaning they won’t be able to demand documents and other items from the agency in an attempt to build a case.

Just Providing a Public Service?

This is what Commerical Appeal is claiming.Â In Pennsylvania, LTC information is restricted by law, fortunately, but that is not the case in all states.Â If this were done to me, my primary concern would be employers looking up to see how many of their employees have concealed weapons licenses, and then summarily dismissing all that do.

Yes, people have been fired just for being license holders, when their employers who did not understand have found out.Â Most people don’t understand why anyone would seek a concealed weapons license.Â Particularly where I am.Â Our HR person?Â From New Jersey.Â Along with about 1/3rd of my coworkers.Â If they found out I had an LTC, would they assume I was carrying at work?Â Would think they think I’m being stalked by ninjas assassins?Â Would they think I have paranoid delusions about the same?Â There would no doubt be a lot of misunderstanding about the law, and about why someone would have one.

And that is why they should be private, and why Commercial Appeal are shits for publishing this information.Â If they are truly concerned about exposing felons, which I’m sure the background checks do a pretty good job with, they don’t have to publish the names of every other permit holder, most of whom are normal people, who just want to get along in their lives without being harassed by pricks with media credentials.

DOJ Solicitor Doing Their Jobs on NPS Issue

According to the Washington Post:

In its reply, the Justice Department wrote that the new rule “does not alter the environmental status quo, and will not have any significant impacts on public health and safety.”

But Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has asked for an internal assessment of whether the measure has any environmental impacts the government needs to take into account, Interior spokesman Matt Lee-Ashley said yesterday.

It is the duty of the Solicitor to defend the Administration’s policies, rules, and regulations in court.Â Whether Obama likes it or not, with that rule change, carry in National Parks is among the regulations the Solicitor General’s office is obligated to defend.Â If Obama wants to fish this turd out of his punch bowl, he’s going to have to undertake more rulemaking.

Evan’s Crystal Ball

Evan Nappen makes some predictions about gun control, and he thinks Congressman Engel has provided the plan by which we will be attacked.Â I agree with Evan that this is almost a no brainier for Obama if he’s looking to pick a fight with NRA.

How it would work is Obama would direct the ATF to do something about it, then ATF would propose a rule to change the Federal Regulations that govern imported parts guns.Â There would be a period of public comment.Â During that period gun owners would need to do what we did in regards to the National Park Carry bill.Â In other words, flood them with comments opposing the rule change.Â The rule might get implemented anyway.Â We could, in that case, sue BATFE, just like the Brady’s are doing with the Department of the Interior, only we’ll have some better tools to use legally.

TD might be sorry he sold me that FAL :)

Finally Got to Shoot the FAL

I bought TD of the Unforgiving Minute‘s FAL about a month ago, but couldn’t get it to the range on account of not being able to find any inexpensive bulk .308 at my usual suppliers.Â Last weekend I was at the Bass Pro in Harrisburg, and they had 60 rounds of Remington .308 for a price that was only mildly outrageous, so I bought it.Â Today I managed to find some time to get it out to the range.

It was sitting in TD’s closet unfired for a number of years. He decided he wanted to add another large bore elephant killer to his collection just in case Michigan gets overrun by Cape Buffalo. So he sold it to me. It’s an Enterprise Arms STG-58 Standard FAL. Basically a parts kit gun. Worked pretty flawlessly at the range, except for the breech not wanting to close all the way a few times when I’d hit the bolt release. Nothing a little cleaning and lubricating won’t fix. Trigger is about what you’d expect on a military rifle. How does it shoot?

Had to shoot two strings of 5 (prone at an SR-1 target at 100 yards) because our club limits magazines to 5 rounds for some reason. First group was low and left. Too much compensation the off zero sights. Second string I adjusted up and left, and got pretty close. Not too bad for the sights being off and factory ammo. I think once I get the sights where I want them, it’ll be a good shooter. I will have to go to the local indoor rifle range to make sure all the mags I got will feed a full 20 rounds cleanly. Once I get some confidence in it, I will definitely bring it out this summer for a few matches.