Newtown: Hey, it worked so well last time!

Newtown schools chief: Teachers will never carry guns in town schools -

Superintendent of Schools Joseph Erardi Jr. stood before about 100 people at Newtown Middle School on Thursday night and vowed he would never sign an agreement allowing teachers to carry guns in the town’s schools.

The declaration came a day after Jason Adams, an eighth-grade science teacher with a valid pistol permit, was arrested after bringing a pistol into the middle school. Adams, who has taught at Newtown Middle School for 10 years, was charged with possession of a weapon on school property, a felony offense. He is on administrative leave with pay.

I'm sorry.  Somebody tried.

If it saves just one ...  

Oh, You don't want to hear about that, either.  Do you?

It's funny how the shoe pinches, when it's on the 'other' foot,
Isn't it?

Senior Incompetence: Sorry NRA, you're full of sh*t. I quit!

(Because the NRA doesn't have an "unsubscribe with comments" option (and now I know why), I'm posting this on my own blog page.  With any luck, it will eventually filter back to the NRA.  You know them; that bunch of paternalistic losers?       Yeah, that's them!)

Dear NRA:  I quit!


In response to the recent snide comment that "Sorry Old People, you're incompetent" (or words to that effect), the NRA chose to defend what I suppose it considers its' Senior Membership by offering tips on"techniques." that members (feeble old farts that we are) can use when trying to remember how to shoot a firearm .. with supposedly limited success sans coaching ... rather than refer to the "Experience" or "Competence" which shooters learn over the years.

America's 1st Freedom | Carry Life | Senior Competence:
We also believe that genuine maturity—as opposed to patronizing intolerance, however glib—illuminates a larger front in the fight against such sneering. Those of us living in some part of a second half-century of liberty know nothing will preserve and strengthen the Second Amendment like the calm, confident, competent practice of same. The willed ignorance that frames every subjugational flavor of the “you’re incompetent to defend yourself!” argument cannot withstand the radiance of this uniquely American truth.

NRA, you bunch of  nanny doofus nerds.   why the f**k do you choose to "defend" us against an idiot?  You rail against 'patronizing intolerance' and 'sneering', and then on your website you patronize your members and sneer at the concept that we might just might be competent.  WT?  By your words, you have painted us with the broad brush of incompetence. 

Again, please excuse the word "IDIOT" in the ensuing monologue.  I'm trying to be polite, but sometimes it's just a helluva lot easier to say the work I'm thinking than to try to conjure up a more "politically acceptable" word.  Like .. Fuck and Idiot are really hard to avoid.  Y'know?

We don't need to be 'defended'.  Just f**k off and leave us alone.  If we were offended by that pimple-faced IDIOT, we would have smacked the little douche-bag down ourselves.  But he wasn't worth the effort, so we were willing to allow him to die a lingering death of indifference.

When you 'choose' to "defend us', you made "Senior Citizen" look like the synonym for "Alzheimer"!   And you made HIM look like someone whose opinion mattered.

Cheeze and Rice, who asked you?  This response from YOU makes it seem as if you believe the jerk-off's screed that "old people are incompetent", and somebody ought to be taking care of them so they don't forget to eat every day, or maybe they might shoot themselves in the foot.

Thank you VERY much for telling US how we should rack the slide on a pistol.  My guess is that I've racked more slides, cleared more jams, and fired more shots downrange in the past 30 years than your top three Senior Staffers have. 

 And you think it's 'a nice thing to do' when you DEIGN to tell me how to shoot a f&cking (sic) 1911?  You ... ********************* (well, never mind.  I'll calm down real soon now. Maybe.  Or not.  But I still think you should take shooting lessons from Tex Graber.)

I would bet my annual social security against your NRA annual paycheck (take me up on it .. please .. I need a new refrigerator Rolls Royce!) that I can perform any malfunction-response better and quicker than you can.  And I've done it more often than you have, in my 30+ years of IPSC competition.

United Methodist Church works to end gun violence | The United Methodist Church

United Methodist Church works to end gun violence | The United Methodist Church: By Kathy L. Gilbert April 7, 2016 | UMNS
 Guns don’t kill people, people kill people. 

              (EVERYTHING AFTER THIS POINT IS BULLSHIT!)

 The National Rifle Association has that as its slogan and taken literally, it is true. But according to statistics from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, every day in America, 297 people are shot — 89 die and 55 of those were suicides. “Whether it happens in the towns of northeastern Nigeria, a suburb in the United States, the streets of Australia, or an office in France, gun violence has become an all-too-often frightening phenomenon,” states a revised resolution going to the 2016 United Methodist General Conference. “Our Call to End Gun Violence” cites Micah’s “prophetic dream” of turning weapons into plows. (Micah 4:1-4) “We need the reality of Micah’s vision more than ever,” states the proposal coming from the United Methodist Board of Church and Society, the denomination’s social action agency.

An HONEST evaluation of statistics relevant to Firearm Deaths vs CAUSE

Okay, I'm asking you ... everybody ...
exactly HOW MANY PEOPLE DIED FROM FIREARMS IN 2015?

I'm guessing it depends on whose statistics you like.
(You know the Mantra: Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics!  Don't forget that.)

So, just as an EXERCISE, I'm going to survey the top THREE statistical results from Google, and report them here.

I'll let YOU decide who you believe.  Okay?
First question: how do we qualify the statics?

• Deaths by Firearms
• Homicide by Firearms
• Death from Gun Violence

Okay, before I even LOOK at statistics, I'm going to give you MY definition of the three terms (and I warn you ... I don't expect that these three terms are going to cover the gamut of statistics; and I don't expect any of the statisticians to agree with my terminology. But I think that MY definitions are probably going to be very close to YOUR definitions.

Here are MY (entirely amateur, not affiliated with anyone who claims to know what he's talking about) definitions:

DEATH  BY FIREARM:

"ANY DEATH where a Firearm is determined to be the ultimate instrument of termination-of-life will be defined as Death By Firearm; death at the hand of a Law Enforcement Officer; Death at the hands of Serving Military within or without the Continental United States are included.  Also included; suicide, accidental death, including those deaths of 'innocent bystanders' in a situation which, lacking intent to murder, would be considered a Homicide .. as specifically included here.  It may seen redundant, but to be clear: the categories "HOMOCIDE BY FIREARMS" and "DEATH FROM GUN VIOLENCE" are specifically included here.

Homicide by Firearms:

"ANY DEATH where a Firearm is determined to be the ultimate instrument of termination of life, and which cannot be defined as "accidental" or "suicide" or "justifiable" (including "killed by a Law Enforcement Office", but rather is defined as "death by firearm at the intentional hand of another person", is defined as a HOMICIDE by FIREARM.

The intention to kill another person is specifically included here.
Death from Gun Violence is specifically NOT included here, unless the determination to kill is a primary OR SECONDARY motivation to shoot a living person during a "Shooting Incident".
.  Note that "homocide" defines intent.  Note also that 'accidental shootings" may fall under this vaguely defined category, if there is no clear determination of intent, but the circumstances have not been adjudicated as "other than intentional".  Thus, the numbers in this category may change hourly as new decisions are made and new judges are seated..

Death from Gun Violence:

A death where a firearm is determined to be the primary instrument of termination of life will be defined as "Death From Gun Violence", as long as the following limitations are observed:

• The person wielding the firearm MAY BE the person who dies:  which is to say, suicides are specifically included in this count.
• For the specific purpose of this survey, death by a Law Enforcement Officer and death by a private citizen who fires to terminate a murder or violent crime (which itself involves a gun, and therefore is Ipso Facto a potential "death by gun violence" situation) are two specific instances where "death by gun" are not included.

Okay, here are the results!:

Guns, Liability and Politics

Oh, I'm not sure  If I was a democrat, would I vote for Bernie or The Bitch?

Clinton slams Sanders's 'unimaginable' position on guns | TheHill: 

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton on Wednesday ripped rival Bernie Sanders for his "unimaginable" position on guns.
 Clinton pointed to the front page of Wednesday's New York Daily News, which exclaimed "Bernie's Sandy Hook shame," describing it as dealing with an issue that is among her "biggest contrasts" with Sanders.
 "That he would place gun manufacturers' rights and immunity from liability against the parents of the children killed at Sandy Hook is just unimaginable to me," Clinton said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." 

Oh.  Okay.  Not an issue any more.

"Anybody But  Hillary!" remains the mantra for anyone who knows anything about ....
... anything.

Cheeze and Rice ... computers are more complicated than the Texas Star !

I tried to respond to a 'tutorial' about "how to shoot the Texas Star" a few minutes ago, and I was looking for a video among the dozens I've saved ... and it took only a moment for me to get so swamped with the latest version of "look up your video files" thingies that I just bailed out.

I KNOW how to shoot the Texas Star.  Start at the top and shoot the top descending plate.  That's all there is to it, and done correctly (which I COULD have demonstrated) it's so easy that a child do it.
(I might even can do it faster than HE can!)

And somewhere in my complex file structure, I have a few (several) videos which show exactly how to most efficiently knock the top-falling plates off to get the star out of my way so I can go on to shoot the rest of the stage.

But my current computer software version won't just show me what I have in each folder.  Oh no, it wants to second guess me.  It wants to help me.

It wants to "Help me" to find my files .. but it doesn't want to let me make my own decisions. It no longer wants to show me exemplars of what I have in each volume, so I can decide which folder I want to access.

(Even while I type, it corrects my spelling because it thinks it knows better than I do, what I want to say!)

Is there anyway I can revert back to .. oh, I don't know .. DOS V5?

Is this what I have been relegated to?  Am I doomed to spending my mornings out on the patio, listening to the disgustingly cheerful birds tweeting Good Morning! to the sun?

Is it no longer sufficient that I spend all night blogging about things which are important to ME?

Do I have to spend the rest of my life, in a world which is defined by ...
Chirp! Chirp!

I HATE "Chipper"!

And my buddy Barney feels the same way!

American Territories and Gun Control

GUN WATCH: CNMI* Senate Passes one of the Most Restrictive Gun Laws in the U.S.:

Dean Weingarten of GunWatch is keeping track of firearms-related legislation in the American Territories, and his news is .. not good.

According to his April 08, 2016 report, "The United State District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands recently ruled that existing gun laws, written by a peace corps volunteer in the 1970's, are unconstitutional, and violate the Second Amendment, in several provisions."

My understanding that the local charles-in-charge folks rewrote the firearms laws to suit themselves, drawing on the most draconian laws from several Continental municipalities .. eg: Chicago
(No, I have no reference to previous/other/current firearms laws in CNMI*)

The restrictions he describes refers to include provisions which most American states have already accepted as 'unconstitutional':

Here are some provisions which are included in the recent rulings, according to Weingarten:

• Caliber limitations: (.22 rimfire, .223 centerfire and 410 shotgun; nothing else, I guess) 
• "Gun Free Zones" so extensive that, in a small island, it seems impossible to legally transport a firearm because the 'zones' overlap, or nearly so
•  a $1,000 "temporary tax" on the importation of any pistol into the CNMI* within one year of the statute being passed. 
• exemptions for a 'privileged few' (members of the court, etc.)
• *(Incidently, "CNMI" refers to the "Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands". which  is an "American Territory".

Apparently, this American "territory" has become nothing more than a local Satrapsi, ruled by a clique which feels comfortable with defining local firearms laws with no reference at ALL to the accepted American laws regarding the Second Amendment.

I would write my own congress-critter asking for an investigation of the high-handed legislation.  Given that my own state and local critters are Democrats, I have no high expectations of their willingness to initiate an investigation.  If you have a more constitutional-friendly congressman, you might draw their attention to this situation.

Nobody else seems to have noticed, and the best I can do at this moment is to ring the bell. For the moment,  I leave it up to someone else to take immediate action.

Dean Weingarten is an excellent researcher who has gathered the information.  Now it's up to us to act on it, and to do whatever is possible to apply "common sense gun controls" permissions on the ruling warlords.

Flamethrowers .. are not QUITE the BEST thing you've ever had in your hand ..

Flamethrower In Super Extra Ultra HD Slow Motion .... but they can be fun!

The article says that a flamethrower is the best thing you've ever had in your hand.  Well, I've used a flame-thrower, and I admit they are fun.

In Christmas week of 1969 (yes, this is a war story) my Company Executive Officer noticed that I had bamboo poisoning over so much of my body that I needed immediate medical attention.  So he pulled me out of the bush and put me into the Company Area on "Medical Profile" for two weeks.

Talk about a great Christmas Present!

Since I was "light duty" and was required to walk about the Division Base Camp with my pants legs rolled up. wearing only shower shoes and NO BLOUSE (shirt) ON, I was of no use to anyone.

The thought was the the more sunshine I got on my running sores on legs, arms, face and neck, the faster I would heal and the faster I could get back to running my platoon ... I was the platoon sergeant, not the Platoon Leader ... (but we know who really runs a platoon. ).  And I damn sure would never heal up while I was wading through bamboo thickets, bogs, creeks, and sleeping on the ground with leeches.

But officers .. ah, officers.  They HATE to see an Enlisted man walking around in a Tropical War Zone looking COMFORTABLE!

The company leadership soon tired of watching me slouch around the company area, so they decided to find "light duty" which was appropriate to my rank and medical profile.

The thing they had me do was to evaluate weapons.

I tested a four-round semi-automatic rocket launcher, first.  This was a weapon which fired missiles similar to the M72 Light Anti-Tank Weapon (LAW).  It was a piece of shit; too heavy for use in the jungle, and it required a separate person to carry the reloads .. both the launcher (loaded or unloaded) and the reload weighed on the order of 40 pounds, and had no redeeming qualities.  I told them so.  If the rocket couldn't do the job in one shot, what the HELL was the use of having four shots .. especially since you couldn't reload the one rocket used, but instead had to carry a 4-round rocket launcher and that was the ONLY reload option possible!  (I admit to a little sarcasm snark here.)

Then they had me test ... I swear I am telling the truth .. a flame-thrower!

Again, too heavy, no redeeming qualities in an infantry unit where every man is already carrying a full load of ammunition and supplies; absolutely useless in a Jungle environment except (as was the case with the rocket launcher) if you wanted to neutralize an enemy bunker.  In the jungle.  Which was wet all the time.

Still, I got to fire one, and it was ......... heavy.

Not that it wouldn't have been fun, but who wants to carry forty pounds of fuel that blows up and burns your ass off if somebody puts a bullet in the tank.  Yeah, I had seen all the WWII movies.  But I got to burn up a couple gallons of fuel and discovered that the point of the thing is this magnesium match.  And before you can get the fuel to burn, you have to pull this lever to strike the match.  (Oversimplification alert!)

Once you strike the match, there's no way to put it out.  You can only unscrew the mechanism and drop it.  And then you have to put the new match in, which is a total pain in the ass because it has to go in JUST RIGHT!

(When you drop the match, remember that you have fuel dripping out of the nozzle, unless the flame thrower valve is in top-notch condition. Which puts you at the mercy of the guys in the Arsenal bunker, who maintain the equipment; I've partied with those guys back at Division, and none of them were sober 2 hours out of 24.  So no, I didn't trust the technical expertise of people who were only sober when they were passed out asleep!)

On the third hand, flame throwers are nothing if not dramatic!  There's this slight hesitation when you pull the lever, and then ... WHOOOOOSHHH!!!!!

As the referenced video shows, this great red-and-black Dragon dives out of the muzzle, grows to immense size immediately, and absolutely eats up everything in its path!  (As long as it's within 30  or 40 feet of the nozzle, which is well within the range of an AK47, so it's Not All Good.)

<sigh>

Yes, those were The Good Old Days.  When you could spend a couple of hours on an idle Thursday Afternoon testing 30 year-old equipment and had no more responsibility than to say: "Yep, it still works .. but who cares?"

Oh.  There is suppose to be a point to these little snippets, isn't there?

Let's see, we're talking about (a) 4-round semi-automatic back-pack rocket launcher, and a flame thrower.  Right?

Nope.  No point to them.  No point at all.

The "Thumb Over Wrist" Grip, and Why I Will Kick Your Ass If You Try This!

The Captain's Journal  Do Not Hold The Gun This Way

Captain O Captain, thank you so much for providing a photo of this 'grip'.

I've talked about it from time to time, in reference to the training regimen I conduct monthly under the name "INTRODUCTION TO USPSA".

But, about three times a year I run into the following scenario.  Assume the standard USPSA/IPSC range commands have been given.  Here is the sequence of events which sometimes follows:

RO:  Are you ready?
(three second delay, then the timer buzzer is sounded to signify that the shooter should commence shooting)

(three to five second delay, then ...)
RO:  STOP!  STOP STOP STOP!

STUDENT: (still holding pistol facing downrange, finger on the trigger, feet too close together, elbows locked, leaning too far back, looking over his shoulder with a quizzical expression):  "What?"

RO:  Finger off the trigger. 
Unload and show clear. 
If clear, hammer down and holster.  
The Range Is Clear.
Now ...Your thumb.  Your support hand thumb.  It's ... it's ... it was locked over your wrist!

STUDENT:  Uh .. yes, I suppose it was.  So what? 

RO: That's not a safe grip. You can't hold your gun like that.

STUDENT:  Why not? 

The girl dances a helluva lot better than I ever did ...

Video of girl with Down syndrome doing dance routine goes viral | Fox News:

A 6-year-old girl with Down syndrome didn’t let rejection from a local dance studio get her down. Instead, Ana Malaniuk found a new space that welcomed her. A video of the Canadian girl dancing went viral, gaining over 11,000 views since being posted in late March.

... and she's more personable, too.

To Protect and to Serve ... whom?

No First Amendment Right To Film Police - Law Officer:
(April 97, 2016)

 Lower federal courts have generally said that the First Amendment protects a right to record and photograph law enforcement in public view. Some restrictions may be constitutional, but simply...

... the author continues:

But that may have changed last Friday in the case, Fields v. City of Philadelphia. That case takes a different, more narrow approach.  There is no constitutional right to video-record police, the court says, when the act of recording is unaccompanied by “challenge or criticism” of the police conduct. 

REFERENCES:

• Fields v. City of Philadelphia
• Glik v. Cunniffe

I'm as staunch a supporter of Law Enforcement Officers as anyone in this room, and I completely understand the stated argument that photographing LEOs during the performance of their duty may seem a threat to officers because their face (and often their name) may be publicized to a degree with which they feel personally uncomfortable.


It's a tough job.   I couldn't do it!

But the men and women who have chosen the Law Enforcement profession have accepted that obligation; although sometimes it seems as if they are often castigated for their lapses, rarely lauded for their accomplishments, and for their devotion to duty.

There's that word again:

DUTY!

When LEOs are 'at work', they refer to it as 'duty'.

The word, in several contexts, is synonymous with 'obligation'.

A 'duty', or an 'obligation', cannot be fulfilled anonymously.   Which is why I'm disappointed when police object to being photographed while doing their duty ... as if there was something wrong with what they do.

Back in The Day, if 'they' didn't know who you were ... if you didn't have a duty to perform ... you were not a Servant of The People; you were just some anonymous bully who sometimes arrested another bully.

So, when did policemen become ashamed of doing their job?
There was a time when the local policeman was known by name.   "The Cop On The Block" was often a neighborhood figure ... a foot patrolman, who had a pistol, a billy-club night stick, a whistle, and a call-box key.  (I'm channeling  Sean Connery in "The Untouchables" here.)

Ness: [looking at a gold chain Malone is holding] What is that?Malone: Ah, I’m among the heathen. That is my call box key, and that… is my St. Jude medallion.Ness: Saint who?George Stone: Santo Jude. The patron saint of lost causes.Malone: And policemen.Ness: Well, which are we, gentlemen – policemen, or lost causes?

... and if we have this day moved beyond the cop on the block, then our society is much the poorer for it!

Not sure how to tag this one... but it's "inflammatory"

From the Casper (Wyoming) Star Tribune? A still small voice from the wilderness:

Here's the catalyst

Townsend: Tired of Clinton's 'gun control' refrain | Letters | trib.com:

I am tired of Hillary Clinton's constant refrain of "gun control." This candidate can't even control her own emails, much less a gun. When will she ever address the problem of controlling gangbangers, druggies and criminals who misuse firearms and maim and kill the innocent? Where is her endorsement of the NRA's Project Exile which would sentence a criminal to ten years of hard time for any crime while using a firearm?

Good Question!

However, the responses seem to veer off dramatically different ... and much more intriguing .. directions.

Small sample:

billy Apr 6, 2016 7:18amI got rid of all my guns and ammo so we would all be safer. No reason to come looking here. 
Alces alces Apr 6, 2016 8:08am
Have you ever noticed those that advocate for gun control only come up with laws that keep reasonable, law-abiding people from owning guns but never address how to keep them out of the hands of the bad guys?
WhereTFisOT Apr 6, 2016 6:30pm
"gun control" Gov coming for yer guns...
300 million guns......the fearmongers, the hatemongers of the gop and a simple use of words is amazing...
gun control in a nation "founded" on spilling blood....
not many dems came out in the past 20 years and called bs on the lies...
nevermind that past 7 + years when the insane bullies/liars of the nra, the gop, the faux news trash was pushing (24/7/365) that the Muslim Kenyan anti Christ President was coming for yer guns...
and now the issue of suing gun manufactures is a contentious issue...
not a word about jailing the idiots that allow toddlers to shoot eachother...
after all the billions that have been raked in from out right lies and fear fear fear...

One thing you gotta admire about Casper:  When the wind blows, it blows hard and you can NEVER tell what direction it's gonna come from next.

Trust the word of a man who hunted Pronghorns there for three years running and never kept a tent upright for two days in a row.

"I want my CDC"

Medical Groups Urge Congress to Restore Funding for CDC Gun Violence Research:

A coalition of 141 medical organizations sent a letter to four senior members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees on Wednesday urging them to restore funding for gun violence research at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Medical professionals and our communities work to address the devastating and long-lasting physical and emotional effects of gun violence on victims, their families and their friends, but are hampered by the insufficient body of evidence-based research to use to point communities toward proven gun violence prevention programs and policies,” the letter reads.

These guys, who can't get the public and charitable donations to finance their 'gun violence research' projects, want the Feds to remove the restrictions on CDC studies.

You remember the CDC?
They're the folks who used YOUR tax money to 'prove' that "GUNS ARE EVIL!"

The thing is ...

A 'Gun Violence Study" with an agenda

Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home — NEJM:

The New England Journal of Medicine has studied gun violence and has 'confirmed'  the hypothesis that ...

The use of illicit drugs and a history of physical fights in the home are important risk factors for homicide in the home. Rather than confer protection, guns kept in the home are associated with an increase in the risk of homicide by a family member or intimate acquaintance.

How did they arrive at this 'conclusion'?

First they identified 'neighborhoods' in 'counties', and tried to match them so they represented similar 'characteristics'.

They found residences occupied by junkies, loners or violent families, and rarely home owners.
They found residents who had been arrested, hit, wounded.

They found that the injured were often victims of family fights ... imagine that, in such a nice neighborhood?   Either that, or an 'intimate acquaintance'.  Would that include their drug dealer, or perhaps a couple of drug-dealing families fighting over gang turf?

During the study period, 1860 homicides occurred in the three counties, 444 of them (23.9 percent) in the home of the victim. After excluding 24 cases for various reasons, we interviewed proxy respondents for 93 percent of the victims. Controls were identified for 99 percent of these, yielding 388 matched pairs. As compared with the controls, the victims more often lived alone or rented their residence. Also, case households more commonly contained an illicit-drug user, a person with prior arrests, or someone who had been hit or hurt in a fight in the home. After controlling for these characteristics, we found that keeping a gun in the home was strongly and independently associated with an increased risk of homicide (adjusted odds ratio, 2.7; 95 percent confidence interval, 1.6 to 4.4). Virtually all of this risk involved homicide by a family member or intimate acquaintance.

The study didn't say the gun in the home was used in the studied 'gun violence', or  that a gun was necessarily involved in the violence.

Vox vs Crowder: view of Gun Violence in America (LONG VIDEOS)

This post includes two video presenting opposite viewpoints.

The first, by VOX, takes about 7 minutes.
The second, by Crowder, takes about 20 minutes.
So the total time required to view both videos verges on a half-hour.

YOU may not want to watch this.  I watched it all (a couple of times) and I found that the divergent viewpoints made for ED TV.

But Crowder includes a lot of film test from VOX, so if you're only marginally interested in the topic, you might want to .. oh, no, I'm not going to suggest that you do not view the VOX version.
Nahhhh .. go watch the whole thing.  You don't have to watch it all in one sitting, but you might decide that you have learned to see both sides of the same subject.

And isn't that "A Good Thing"?

Oh, just shoot me now!

Clinton visits Brooklyn churches to talk gun violence - NY Daily News:

Hillary Clinton stumped at black churches in Brooklyn Sunday, touting her tough stance on guns as she sought support in her home state’s primary against Bernie Sanders. Clinton also vowed to improve strained relations between police and black communities — and was joined by Nicole Bell, the fiance of police shooting victim Sean Bell, who endorsed her Sunday. “I have been privileged to meet with so many family members who have lost loved ones to gun violence sometimes at the hands of police, most times senseless random terrible violence,” Clinton said ,,,

E-O-E-O-AY-AY AY! (Hey, Bro, did you see where that shot hit?)

U.S. Special Operations units are using faulty rifle sights - The Washington Post:

U.S. Special Operations forces are using rifle sights that are supposed to help shooters accurately hit their targets but instead have a defect, acknowledged by the manufacturer, that potentially endangers the lives of service members in combat, according to court records and military officials.

If the glove sight don't fit ....

... I'm sure I glad I was using Iron Sights when I was last in a War Zone!

Gun control in Oregon; Ginny Burdick

Gun control: Stymied in 2016, Oregon Democrats vow to try again in 2017 | OregonLive.com:

... And Senate Majority Leader Ginny Burdick, D-Portland, at a forum hosted by the Oregon Alliance for Gun Safety, reiterated her support Wednesday for enacting gun-violence restraining orders. That idea, already in place in California, would create a court-sanctioned mechanism for removing guns from people believed to be at risk of harming themselves or others.

In case I didn't make myself clear in an earlier post ....

... any Oregon measure which Ginny Burdick supports is certain to be a measure which undermines the constitutional freedoms of Oregonians.  Or, in other words, a lie.

Just Saying.

And I'm not the only one.

What we have here ..

Gun control: Stymied in 2016, Oregon Democrats vow to try again in 2017 | OregonLive.com:

Unable to pass new gun-control bills this year, months after the state's deadliest shooting, Oregon Democrats are diving into campaign season with promises to try again in 2017. House Majority Leader Jennifer Williamson, D-Portland, wants to revive a measure that would limit default gun sales when background checks take longer than expected, after the bill earned tepid support and died in the Senate last month.

No. Actually, it is an attempt to bypass the 'default' protection previously afforded to firearms owners who purchase firearms.  But the NICS (National Instant Check System) cannot always provide a response in a timely manner,   When this happens, the DEFAULT is to allow the firearms transfer to go through.

This FEATURE (not a "bug") protects the firearms purchaser; independent interests would be required to 'allow' the purchase of a private citizen if they (NICS) could not find just cause to DIS-allow it within a reasonable period of time.    (For the "gun grabbers", there are no independent interests; there are merely PEOPLE WHO DON'T LIKE GUNS, and PEOPLE WHO MUST BE DENIED THE RIGHT TO BUY GUNS.)

Oh, POOP!

Oak Harbor police chief loses gun in grocery store bathroom | KOMO:
(March 31, 2016)

OAK HARBOR, Wash. -- Oak Harbor Mayor Bob Severns has reprimanded the city's chief of police for losing his gun in the bathroom of a local grocery store. On the night of March 4, Police Chief Edgar Green informed department officials that he had misplaced his personally-owned Glock .40 firearm. He said the last time he remembered having the gun was roughly an hour and a half earlier in the bathroom at a SAAR's Market on State Route 20. Green said he might have "errantly left it on a towel container," according to a city news release. Green noticed the gun was missing when he got home and immediately contacted the store's manager. Store workers searched the bathroom but didn't find the gun.

[emphasis added]

Right.

Personal comments deleted.
Except to mention that Oak Harbor is on Whidby Island, in the Puget Sound, in the state of Washington.

And I may or may not have a family member assigned to a military facility in that general area, and if he did something like that ... not only would his Military Unit severely chastise him, but I would personally kick his ass.  (Not really .. the alleged family member is would be bigger, tougher and smarter than me.)

The funny thing is, I've been going to IPSC/USPSA matches for 30 years and during that time I have often been obliged to obey the call of dirty, but I've never left my Kimber in the Can.

Why is it that civilians can remember that they don't have a pistol on their hip, but "Professionals" cannot?

Google: "law enforcement officers who have left their pistol in the bathroom"
The results may surprise you!

Freakin' SF Mayor still wants to regulate ammunition sales

Gavin Newsom draws crowd to gun-control speech near Rohnert Park | The Press Democrat:

Gavin Newsom is nonplussed that he couldn't buy Sudefed without Identification,

 “But interestingly, you can buy ammunition anywhere,” the former San Francisco mayor told gun control supporters Friday night.

Apparently, Newsom is conflating dangerous and habit-forming drugs with ammunition.

Can he do that?  (Oh, shut my mouth .. he's the mayor of SF; he can do anything!)

But still ... what's the difference?

Dangerous Drugs are habit forming, and while they have the palliative effect of alleviating pain and medical symptoms, they are subject to abuse.

Ammunition is not habit forming, but while they (cartridges) do have the palliative effect of defending one's person, property, home and family, they are subject to abuse.

The difference is that Ammunition is 'protected' under the Second Amendment.

No, that's not JUST my opinion.  The Supreme Court says so.

Washington D.C. Ammunition Ban Violates Second Amendment-

The District of Columbia Court of Appeals has declared D.C.’s ammunition possession ban unconstitutional in the case of Herrington v. District of Columbia. -
The court therefore reasoned that although neither Heller nor the subsequent Supreme Court case McDonald v. Chicago specifically addressed ammunition, “it logically follows that the right to keep and bear arms extends to the possession of handgun ammunition in the home; for if such possession could be banned (and not simply regulated), that would make it “impossible for citizens to use [their handguns] for the core lawful purpose of self-defense.”

Did I mention that this article about the Supreme Court Decision was published November 8, 2010?
(Which suggests that Newsom should have been aware that the question about the right to keep and bear firearms, and the right to buy ammunition, are equally protected by Federal Law.)

But Newsom finds it anomalous that Ammunition Sales don't require identification.

Never mind; if San Francisco hasn't YET made it illegal to buy ammunition, it soon will.

Let's call it the "San Francisco Loophole".

In the meantime, it's still legal for San Francisco to require "identification" to purchase ammunition .. along with firearms themselves.

Because they are not 'Prohibiting' the purchase of ammunition, but they may still 'regulate' it.

This is just one more reason why Americans should avoid residing in the State of California, generally, and the City of San Francisco, specifically.

Tony Bennett, eat your heart out.



(Oh .. Tony Bennett is against the second amendment; never mind)

Boomershoot Philosophy vs Gun Registration

Why Boomershoot? | The View From North Central Idaho:

The politics of this country in regards to gun control have changed.  The turning point has been reached and we have a winning endgame in front of us.  There are still a lot of bigots out there that are trying to make gun owners into second class citizens and politicians that try to use fear of guns to increase their power.  But Federally things have improved in the last five years  And even in some states like Washington where the Democrats got control of both houses and the governor’s mansion no further restrictions have been implemented recently.   The war is being won.  We need to keep up the pressure and push the bigots into political extinction rather than let them build up strength and attack us again but if we choose our battles carefully and don’t slack off the victory is ours if we want it...

[emphasis added]

Joe, I'm not saying you're wrong, but you're not entirely RIGHT, either.
(But you are certainly not naive!)

The thing is, the gun-grabbers haven't given up ... they're just taking smaller nibbles in their step-by-step plan to confiscation.

Registration - Confiscation:

Sanctity of the home

No, you can’t carry concealed weapons into our child-proofed, gun-free home - The Washington Post:  (March 15, 2016)

My curious children freely play in a home environment I have worked hard to ensure is safe. To that extent, I am adamant about keeping guns outside our doors.

This mother has strong opinions on the measures which are necessary to protect her children.  I don't blame her.   I don't even disagree with her.   My family wasn't raised that way (there were ALWAYS guns in our homes) but that has nothing to do with the way she wants to raise her family.

But looking at the comments attached to the article, it appears that a lot of people take their disagreement personally.  Some folks went as far as to say "why don't you put a gunfree zone sign on your door and see what that gets you?" or words to that effect.

Apparently, the old Heinlein mantra that "An Armed Society Is A Polite Society" isn't valid when anonymous trolls spill their guts online.

The whole population of civilian firearms owners are tarnished by this kind of vicious response.   The author of the article will not only keep firearms out of her home, but people who own firearms will now seem dubious to her.

It does no good for us to say "hey, that guy is not representative of our community".

I tought another firearms class yesterday, and I was impressed by the humanity and good nature of the 'new friends' I was privileged to meet.

I wish I could have introduced them to the author.   She deserved the opportunity to meet the true face of our Band of Gun Nuts.

Hashtag This!

Local groups try to stop handguns with hashtags | WBNS-10TV Columbus, Ohio: COLUMBUS, Ohio -

... six women representing a handful of different anti-gun organizations in the state of Ohio ... (are) voicing opposition to House Bill 48, also known as the “Guns Everywhere Bill,” that would allow concealed carry at places like day cares, school zones, airports and police stations. The bill was already passed in the House. “The guns everywhere bill would put guns in places where they simply don’t belong,” Jennifer Thorne said. Thorne is the executive director with Ohio Coalition Against Gun Violence. To try to stop the bill from moving any further through the Senate, the coalition and about 10 other organizations are having a “virtual lobby day” Tuesday, April 5.

[emphasis and link added]

If the 'virtual lobby day' is successful, the only people who have guns "where they don't simply don't belong belong" would be the people who go there to shoot up infants, school kids and cops.

You know, the typical 'Gun Free Zones' which have already proven themselves to be a mecca for gun violence.