… but put them in the hands of government officials, they suddenly become “personal defense weapons.” that are “suitable for personal defense use in close quarters.†Additionally, Feinstein’s gun ban exempts any government official. Remember folks, the laws, they are for the little people. Know your place, serf!
New Hobby Bleg
OK, so I’m starting out learning to fly very cheap and simple RC helicopters. My current one is showing here. A basic v911 fixed-pitch heli which can be flown indoors or outdoors in light wind:
I am looking to upgrade, at some point in the not so distant future, to a collective-pitch model. I am looking at the Blade mCPX v2, or debating whether I want to jump to something bigger. If I’m careful, the wind isn’t too bad, and don’t hot dog very much, I can avoid crashing.
My eventual goal is to work up to a larger bird, capable of lofting a video camera, transmitter, and possibly flying autonomously if necessary. I’m not sure how much bird I’d need to loft that much gear, but that’s more in the distant future. My sometimes co-blogger Jason (owner of the CNC and 3d Printing hardware) was working on a quad-rotor design a bit back with more advanced capabilities than typical RC helis, so at some point I might talk to him about reviving that, but for now I am just enjoying learning to operate these things and harassing the neighborhood bird population.
So any transmitter advice anyone can offer would be appreciated. I’m probably thinking a six channel, like the Spektrum DSX6i, and if anyone has any experience with the Blade mCPX as a beginner collective-pitch heli, I’d be happy to have advice or warning there too.
Women are Part of the Debate
Courtesy of John Richardson on Twitter, I came across this post which supports a claim that pro-gun women’s voices haven’t been heard in the current debate on gun control. They argue that gun control is all they hear out of women’s voices at the moment. I totally disagree with this premise, but unlike the CBS article and accompanying blog post, I’ve going to back my argument up with evidence.
As I tweeted back to John, there was the highly publicized feature of Jessie Duff on Fox News where she was featured as the expert on firearms. In next week’s Senate hearing on gun control, a woman will be one of the pro-Second Amendment speakers. I also immediately thought of the coverage here in Pennsylvania of the big pro-gun rally last Saturday which featured a female NRA board member. They also interviewed another woman in the audience who supported Second Amendment rights.
But I’ll concede that’s just what I could think of off the top of my head. To do a little more research on the gender divide of pro-gun versus anti-gun, I went through several pages of Google News results on the term “gun control” and selected random articles on different gun law-related news from the last day and a half. Here’s what I found:
- Letter to the Editor, Peoria Journal Star – anti-rights; written by a man
- Report on DC gun control march, New York Daily News – 2 anti-rights protestors; both men
- Report on gun show attendance, NBC Los Angeles – 3 pro-rights, all men
- Expectations for gun control hearing, Hartford Courant – 2 pro, 2 anti; all men
- Report on gun show attendance, ABC Lincoln, Nebraska – 3 pro-rights; 2 men, 1 woman
- Gun rights rally report, Indiana – 4 pro-rights; 1 woman, 2 men, 1 unidentified
- Report on pro-rights rally, Atlanta Constitution-Journal – 1 anti-rights, 3 pro-rights; 1 woman (anti), 3 men
- Letter to the Editor, Portage Daily Register – anti-rights; written by a man
As you can see from this quick and dirty survey of outlets around the country, there are more men quoted and writing to newspapers in support of gun control than women, and women are often featured as being pro-gun nearly as much as men. Is it perfectly balanced? No. But, considering that the shooting sports and gun ownership have been pretty overwhelmingly male-dominated for a long time. That’s changing, and I actually do think that is reflected in the media narrative.
In fact, I think that the growing visible involvement of women in the Second Amendment movement is why you don’t see us getting steamrolled right now. There’s a little secret that politicians already know. That secret is that once women get involved with something, they often get loud and visible about it, and the bring the whole family on board. In all of the pro-gun political volunteer work I’ve done, the offices are full of predominantly women. So, while there may still be more men quoted in all of the articles, whether for our rights or against us, the fact that there are still quite a few female pro-Second Amendment voices being heard speaks volumes.
Correlation and Causation
Google Chrome saves lives. Ban Internet Explorer! If it saves just one life.
Anti-Gun Bills Moving in the Senate
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) plans to mark up a gun control bill in his panel as early as February, aides said. Leahy, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), and Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) — who will play a leading role on the issue — hope to send the bill to the floor soon after that.
My guess is they want to get a bill to the House before the State of the Union, so President Obama can dare the Republicans not to pass it. What will be in the bill? I don’t know. But we’ll have our people there testifying. Interesting that a movement supposedly made up of old white guys has three people testifying, and only one of them is an old white guy.
Did Katie Glueck of Politico Even Think of Consulting Gun Experts?
This photo show is so bad I don’t even know where to begin, and even basic facts and understanding about guns and gun regulations are completely missing. . I will endeavor to educate Ms. Glueck, so let’s start with the first slide. Go ahead and pull that puppy up, and we’ll go through slide-by-slide:
1st Slide
A big photo of Mikhail Kalashnikov holding what is definitely not a Chinese-made semi-auto AK. That’s a full auto AK old Mikhail is holding. The actually Poly-Technology AK is not in danger of being “banned again,” because it has never been unbanned. There’s an embargo against Chinese military goods entering the US that’s been in place since the 90s.
2nd Slide
Semi-automatic versions of the Galil are sold on the US market, but they do not shoot “630-750 rounds a minute.” Machine guns do that, and we know that civilians can’t own machine guns. Full-auto Galils have never been lawful to import into this country for civilian use. They were introduced in 1972, four years after the Gun Control Act banned importation of new machine guns for civilians.
3rd Slide
Hey, she got one right. That looks like a carbine version of the Uzi, with the requisite 16 inch barrel, to make it lawful to have a shoulder stock on it. The should stock shown looks to be a collapsing stock, which would have made it an “assault weapon” under the 1994 law.
4th Slide
The Beretta AR70. There was a “Sport” model that was briefly available on the US market, but I don’t think Beretta ever resumed production, and they are rare as hens teeth. So yes, it was banned, a straight up renewal of the 1994 wouldn’t change anything because it’s not manufactured currently.
5th Slide
That looks about what the Colt AR-15 looked like when it was introduced in the 1960s, but unless you buy one of the totally retro models on the market today they don’t look like that. And the M203 40mm Grenade Launcher is a destructive device and highly restricted, and so is its ammunition. You can certainly, as a civilian, mount a coast guard approved flare launcher to your AR, because it looks badass and all, but you’re not getting a hold of a grenade launcher at Joe’s gun shop.
6th Slide
This is a Styer AUG. With a straight up renewal of the federal assault weapons ban, this particular rifle would not be banned. No bayonet lug, no flash hider. Good to go. Under a one feature test, it would be covered, which means this gun would be banned for the first time. It was never banned, ever. Imported AUGs are currently banned, and have been since the 90s, but they are being manufactured domestically now. So any way you look at this, it’s wrong.
7th Slide
She apparently did not know that the firearm she linked to is a restricted NFA item. It is a transferrable machine pistol, which have been banned form new production since 1986. No one is proposing eliminating the NFA grandfathering for machine guns (yet).
8th Slide
Total FAIL! What’s pictured is an FN P90, not a FAL. This does not even look like the civilian legal semi-auto PS90, as the barrel is too short. This is a fully automatic firearm that has never been available to civilians. She notes that the gun pictures is “one member of the FN family,” as in FN makes the gun pictured. But it is in no, way, shape or form related to the FAL.
9th Slide
When reporters speak of semiautomatic and “spray bullets” in the same sentence, they only reveal a glaring ignorance. And the TEC-9 is no longer being produced. The semi-automatic variants that fire from a closed bolt weren’t that reliable.
10th Slide
Total FAIL! Revolving cylinder shotguns were reclassified as destructive devices in the 1990s. They are NFA items and not easily available to civilians. As far as I know they are no longer being manufactured.
Why Gun Rights and Hating on Gays Don’t Mix
It can get you sued, and discovery is a bitch. I’m glad I’ve never had anything to do with NAGR or RMGO.
Gun Control March
I have been looking for true crowd shots to verify the media claims that thousands packed DC to call for more gun control. The closest I can find is one from NBC that shows a few hundred at most.
Interestingly, the organizers are trying to say that it was a completely grassroots event, yet it had the backing of the Obama Administration with the presence of a Cabinet member who spoke.
I also find it notable that for political purposes, it seems rather silly to have hosted their march the day after the March for Life which really does draw thousands to march on DC. Of course, I won’t interrupt the anti-gunners in their attempts to make their own numbers look even smaller than they really are.
Anti-Gun Folks Still Want to Believe NRA’s Numbers are BS?
NRA reaches 2.1 million “Likes” on Facebook:
Not bad for a movement composed of a bunch of old fat white guys, eh? So either the antis have to believe that a lot of OFWGs are on Facebook, or that perhaps this movement is a bit more diverse than is often credited.
We Bring You This Public Service Announcement…
A Democratic Sheriff is running a PSA in Milwaukee on the need to be ready to defend yourself. From Firearms & Freedom, who actually heard the ad yesterday, we get this kind of message:
Consider taking a certified safety course in handling a firearm so you can defend yourself until we get there.
You have a duty to protect yourself and your family.
Go read the entire transcript.
UPDATE: You can also go listen to the whole PSA.