Saturday, November 27, 2010

Weer'd Beard's New Feature

On Weer'd's blog there's a new feature. He calls it "Gun Death," and then posts a story of a non-gun death. Here's an example. In his tireless pit-bull kinda way, he's repeating this over and over again.  I suppose it's a regular, perhaps daily feature now.

In trying to fathom the depths of the Weer'd mind, I wondered what could his point be.  Does he think gun control folks really don't care about other types of violence? I don't think that's it.  He knows we care about all that other stuff, we are after all bleeding-heart liberals for the most part.  I think he's trying to put the gun violence in perspective, which admittedly is sometimes lacking in the gun control rhetoric.

The problem with his approach though, is that it presupposes that gun control supporters are pushing their agenda at the expense of other initiatives. That's not the case at all.  We want non-gun crimes to be investigated and prevented.  We want poverty and unemployment and mental illness to be addressed.  AND we want sensible gun laws that would benefit everyone who is not a criminal.

My question is why would Weer'd and his friends so opposed to this?

What do you think?  Please leave a comment.

More on Gun Flow

In a Washington Post op-ed praising their recent investigative articles about where guns come from, Daniel Webster made this interesting observation.

While the stories you present illustrate common paths guns take, the data may be skewed because most guns in these shootings are not recovered. A felon who murders a police officer with a gun from a trafficker is likely to quickly discard the weapon. But when a police officer is shot when responding to an incident of domestic violence, the gun is typically found. This may explain the surprising finding that most guns that kill police were purchased legally by the perpetrator. Perpetrators of domestic violence are less likely to have convictions that disqualify them from gun ownership. 

That's a fascinating point with which I agree. Those numbers would be skewed. It reminds me of the claim that 90% OF THE GUNS TRACED in Mexico come from the States. If recovery of weapons in domestic violence cases is significantly higher than in street shootings, the numbers would be skewed.

Nevertheless, an important factor is unmentioned. In those cases in which the perpetrator himself was not the legal purchaser of the weapon used, someone else was. If the gun could be traced back, owner to owner, before long we'd arrive at a legal owner of the gun. He's the problem. That's why gun control laws are often aimed at lawful gun owners. They're the ones allowing guns to go to criminals.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Shooting Death in VERMONT

Even in Vermont they have gun violence.

The alleged shooter apparently tried to prank his sleeping friend by waking him up with the loud sound of an air rifle.

However, the man mistakenly used a real rifle in the prank.

Nicholas Bell, 23, was charged with manslaughter after the incident Thursday, Manchester.

"The accused fired the weapon, which was a loaded .22 cal rifle hitting the [victim] in the chest," a police statement said. "The victim died at the scene."

The victim was identified as 24-year-old Jeffrey Charbonneau.

Both men were guests at the Manchester home where the shooting occurred, police said.
They were both guests in a home with so many guns you can easily pick up the wrong one. That's your gun paradise Vermont for you.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

How to Convert Your AK-47

via FatWhiteMan, we have this fascinating article which perfectly illustrates the attitude of "lawful gun owners."

If you are in possession of a “POST-BAN” AK-47 rifle and want to bring it up to “no-ban” status, this article will take you through the steps to outfit you with a legal, “pre-ban” appearing rifle.
They say in Naples Italy, a city known for its lawlessness, when the seat-belt law came out the street vendors suddenly were hawking T-shirts with the image of a seat-belt stamped on them.

That's what gun owners are like. They obey the laws they agree with and find ways to circumvent the ones they don't, all they while claiming to be "law-abiding" and pointing their fingers at criminals.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Friday, November 26, 2010

More on the Lost Magazine on a Plane

Tam couldn't resist picking up on this story in order to mock and denigrate those who reported it.  In her supercilious arrogance she said people were acting like the magazine was made of "flaming radioactive kryptonite rattlesnakes." Of course that doesn't even have to make grammatical sense for her dedicated followers to get a big old yuckity yuck out of it. FatWhiteMan, for example.

Only Gerry, in comment  number 22, put the focus back where it belongs, on the owner of the magazine. That's the real story here, as I mentioned yesterday. Anybody stupid enough to leave a magazine with bullets on a plane, in these times with all the attention on security and scanners and all the rest of it, cannot be trusted to manage firearms safely. That's the point, not the silliness of the article with its hysterical tone, a point with which I agree.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Thanksgiving Day Traditions

Thanksgiving in the USof A:  Watching the Detroit Lions lose, eating turkey with all the trimmings, taking a nap at 5PM and, of course, gunloonery:
Both men were visiting the residence of a mutual friend for Thanksgiving celebrations when the shooting happened, police said.
More:


An argument over Thanksgiving plans led to a shooting in Burke County early Thursday that killed a man and has his stepson in jail charged with murder.  Deputies say Timothy Bumgarner didn't want to stay at his mother's house for Thanksgiving dinner, and then started arguing with his stepfather about it.
More:

A Thanksgiving gathering in northern Beaufort County turned into a gun battle which led to the death of a Florida man, Beaufort County Sheriff P.J. Tanner said.



There are literally a ton of these stories.  Note that these incidents explode many gunloon myths; these stories don't involve unknown intruders or assailants--they involve people who know one another or are related.  I'm guessing alcohol plays a factor as well.

Murder Suicide in Miami

Miami sure has been in the news a lot lately.  Here's your typical domestic murder suicide with a bit extra.

Evelina Jack was pregnant with her fifth child when she was gunned down by 37-year-old Mark Glinton Saturday night at their home in North Miami Beach. 

Three of Jack's four children were also shot in the rampage but police and family members said the only reason the fourth made it out unscathed is because his older brother took a bullet for him. 

Family members said Quentin Jack, 13, who was shot twice and is paralyzed from the chest down, jumped in the way as Glinton took aim at 2-year-old brother Christian.
If this domestic bully didn't have a gun, I don't think the results would have been quite this dramatic, do you?  I blame the lax gun laws in Florida and elsewhere. And I blame all those who fight for keeping those laws as lax as possible.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Goshen NY Man Faces 10 Years for Gun Possession

It's only the recommendation by the prosecutor, but it sounds a bit heavy to me.

The stepfather of a boy killed in an accidental shooting pleaded guilty Wednesday to having the gun illegally.

Prosecutors will ask that Robert Gooding get 10 years in prison for gun possession. Gooding was not present when the gun went off, killing 10-year-old Brandon Scandrett.

The shooting happened at about 6:30 p.m. Aug. 2, at an apartment at 51 Chambers St. in the City of Newburgh. Brandon and his stepbrothers, then aged 6 and 8, were inside the apartment; all of the adults had gone outside.
It's a tough call, this one. He doesn't sound like a criminal himself, indeed the reason for his being disqualified was not a violent crime.

He acknowledged he has no handgun permit, and his 2001 misdemeanor conviction for possessing stolen property makes it illegal for him to have a handgun.
Is that how they do it in New York? Even my one-strike-you're-out policy isn't that strict. It applies to gun misuse. What's your opinion? 

What exactly should be done with Mr. Gooding, I'm not sure.  But his sad story illustrates perfectly that guns in the home do more harm than good, that attempting to out-smart the curiosity of young children by properly storing the guns or by educatiing the kids Eddie-Eagle style, is foolish at best.

What do you think?  Please leave a comment.

Brazil Similar to Mexico

The Guardian reports on the tremendous violence taking place in Rio de Janeiro.

Triggered by a spate of attacks on police and drivers, the incursions began on Tuesday and involved hundreds of heavily armed police operatives, bulletproof vehicles and helicopters.

About 150 people were arrested during the sweeps by 17,500 officers while at least 22 people have been killed since Sunday, according to Rio's military police.
Did they say 17,500 police? That really is a war.

You know when the American press picks this up they'll be reporting on where all the guns down there come from. I can't wait. What about you?

Please leave a comment.

Inexplicable Shooting in Florida - 2 Dead, 4 Wounded

Six friends are sitting on the front porch the night before Thanksgiving.  They live in Ruskin, a nice suburb of Tampa. None of them was into drugs, carried a gun or had any enemies.  I guy pulls up in a van, gets out and as he approaches starts shooting.  

I know this can happen anywhere, and it does, but Florida seems to have more than its share.   Why do you think that is? Could it have something to do with the high availability of guns in the Sunshine State?

What's your opinion?  Don't you find it completely self-serving that pro-gun folks use incidents like this to justify why they need guns rather than why we need better gun control?  

Please leave a comment.

Feud Settled With a Gun

The all too common story is that two guys, accompanied by their friends, got together to settle some kind of dispute.  A gun came out and someone ended up dead.

Let's presume it was an illegally owned gun and these guys were already criminals.  Those are usually the reasons for pro-gun folks to disclaim all involvement and responsibility.  I say they're wrong to do that because the gun came from them. It started out legally owned by one of them.

Due to the patchwork of inadequate gun laws, which the pro-gun folks fight to maintain, the gun slipped over the line and eventually ended up in the hands of the wrong guy.

What's your opinion? Don't you think people who argue so hard for lax gun laws should be willing to take responsibility for the results of those laws?

Please leave a comment.

Thursday, November 25, 2010

A Case Against Motorcycle Helmets

Reason.com published a wonderful article.

After describing the controversy, namely that some say motorcycle injuries only hurt the rider and others say we all end up paying for the care of these injured guys, the author mentions a few fascinating benefits to the no-helmet-law idea.

At the risk of sounding macabre, let me note that a 50-year-old biker who dies in a wreck saves us money, since he won't be around to collect Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid in his old age. A 20-year-old fatality may yield a harvest of excellent organs for patients awaiting transplants.
What's your opinion? Is this a case of the government being too invasive? Should motorcycle riders make up their own minds and we'll let the pros and cons balance themselves out?

Please leave a comment.

Drinking Alcohol and Guns

I knew it was legal in Las Vegas to carry a drink around with you, but this is interesting.

The vast majority of U.S. states and localities prohibit possessing and/or consuming an open container of alcohol in public (i.e. on the street). Only seven states (Georgia, Louisiana, Virginia, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, and Pennsylvania) have no state law against general public possession and/or consumption of an open container by a person of legal drinking age.
I'll bet you noticed the same thing about those states that I did. Am I right?

Please leave a comment.

Gun Flow - NC to NY

The New York Daily News reports:

A Bloods gang member served as a personal shopper for gun buyers, taking text-message orders from Brooklyn and Manhattan and driving to North Carolina to fill them, prosecutors said.

Kyle Leonard, 25, sold the firepower - including an assault rifle - out of the trunk of his car, Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hynes said Tuesday.

Leonard was nailed by NYPD undercover cops who managed an introduction, texted orders to his cell phone and bought $17,500 worth of arms from him in a year.

"This is somebody who contributed to the carnage on our streets," Hynes said in announcing the indictment.
It must be a lot easier to get guns in North Carolina than in New York, dont't you think?
"Something ought to be done to tighten up the way guns are sold, particularly in the South," said the DA, who noted 111 people, including 34 teens, were shot to death in the borough this year.
Yes, we agree, Mr. DA.

What-s your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Soft on Criminals

via The High Definite. People accuse me of being soft on criminals, but even I draw the line at a certain point. Of course, he could be mentally ill and therefore not guilty of anything. I certainly wouldn't want him back on the streets, though.

Firearms Manufacturing Sector

It's still good news, down this year but still above the level of pre-Obama America.

KeyBanc Capital Markets analyst Scott Hamann said he sees growth for firearms makers, even though demand has fallen in some segments year over year. He said a KeyBanc survey of gun dealers, from big box retailers to wholesalers and more boutique operations, found that hunters are buying fewer rifles.

But more customers are purchasing the kind of smaller sidearms that can be easily concealed and carried for self-protection, Hamann said. While gun sales have fallen this year, they remain above levels before the election of President Obama, Hamann said.
You see, what more than makes up for the decline in hunting is the criminal black market. Gun manufacturers along with the NRA have been intimately involved in preventing the sensible gun laws which would minimize the flow of guns into the criminal world. They know know better than anyone how this works, it's built directly into their production and sales strategy.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

The Loaded Magazine on a Plane Caper

CNN reports on something you don't see every day, especially these days.

A federal law enforcement officer mistakenly left a loaded gun magazine that was found Tuesday on a Southwest Airlines plane, officials said.

The discovery was made after the flight from Burbank, California, to Phoenix, Arizona, landed, a member of a CNN crew aboard the plane said.

The head of the Transportation Security Administration said the unnamed law officer will be given remedial training.
Yeah, how about remedial training in job hunting? This is definitely a one-strike-you're-out kinda thing, don't you think? I mean, anyone could have picked that thing up and banged the back of one of the bullets with the seat belt clasp and killed someone.

That's a joke. The serious point is leaving behind a magazine with bullets in it on a plane is inexcusable. That kind of proven absent-mindedness indicates an inability to safely manage firearms. One strike you're out.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Miami Eviction Shooting

Miami's been in the news a lot lately for shootings.  This one was interesting to me because it reminded me of that old "molon labe" nonsense.
On Monday morning, an eviction team including Miami-Dade police, movers, a locksmith and a laborer, knocked on the door of Unit 211 to take possession of the apartment.

Police said Richer opened fire, fatally wounding laborer Carlos Alberto Gomez, 61, of Miami.
What do you think? Isn't it embarrassing for folks to bluster such nonsense as the pro-gun guys often do? The really hard-core claim to comprise 3%. I seriously doubt if it's even that high.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Andrew Johnston Takes on PETA

..and fails badly.

One of the hallmarks of gunloonery is to create a strawman and then beat it relentlessly. In this case, Andy Johnston claims the following:

1.)  Excess consumption of red meat doesn't contribute to disease or obesity;
2.) A vegan or  vegetarian diet doesn't taste good; and
3.) There are no benefits, whatsoever, to a vegan or vegetarian diet.

Of course, Andy Johnston attempts to tie this into gun control which is like trying to claim LeBron James has some underlying connection to North Korea.

It's pretty easy to debunk Andy Johnston.  The Mayo Clinic is pretty clear that excess consumption of red meat contributes not just to obesity but a host of diseases.

As to whether or not a vegan diet tastes good or not--it's subjective.  I've been to a number of vegetarian and Indian restaurants and I've been very satisfied. But--full disclosure, I'm not a vegetarian--I tend tend to like salads and tofu.

When Andy Johnston claims there aren't any benefits to veganism or vegetarianism,  he is just being silly. Aside from the documented health benefits--consider the economic bennies.  Even if you buy the cheapest cuts of meat--veggies cost less.

"I'm for the NRA and Tom DeLay."

"From my cold, dead hands."



"It isn't just our homes and selves that need defending," he said Saturday night while delivering the convention's keynote speech. "It is our freedom. ... God gave it. The Constitution preserves it. And together we will defend it."



A bit of advice for Tom: if you drop the soap, don't pick it up.  Don't offer to show anybody any "moves" you learned on 'Dancing With The Stars.' Don't wear the goofy Davy Crockett hat.

NRA Friend Headed to Big House

...and we don't mean the WH:

Tom DeLay, the former U.S. House majority leader whose name became synonymous with the Republicans’ controversial rise to power in the Texas House, was found guilty today of laundering money in connection with the 2002 elections.


Ahh, memories.

The Death of Gun Control

Since Roy Kubicek of Days of Our Trailers spends a great deal of time here (using a super-duper proxy), I thought I'd check out what he's bloviating about these days.  It's certainly not about his job prospects.

He has this really neat graph that he interprets as "proving" gun control is dead or, at least, on life support.

Roy's problem is that the gunloon population supports the darker green line that is in the single digit terroritory.  Those are the folks who want assault weapons legalized and little or no restrictions on firearms.

So, while Roy Kubicek claims gun control is dying--his own graph shows gunloonery is pretty much flatlining.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Say, This Won't Make for a Happy Thanksgiving

Ohh Shoot:
3-year-old Jesse Simpson was visiting his grandparents in Hemby Bridge, North Carolina. Jesse's father, 24-year-old Derek Simpson, was showing his 4-year-old brother how to fire an antique, muzzle-loaded rifle. The gun has to be filled with powder and can only fire one shot at a time.

Breda Von Schtupp



Meanwhile, in other movie-related news, I don't like Brad Pitt but this is ridiculous.

A Favorite Gunloon

I'd almost forgotten about Sebastian Sassi, a favorite gunloon of mine.

Sebby used to post on a blog called "Pro-Gun Progressive."  The site is dormant now.  Sebby was most assuredly pro-gun--but the progressive part, not so much.  After all, he actually campaigned for GOP candidate and he himself ran for the US Congress on a Libertarian ticket.  That didn't turn out so well as he became one of the few candidates in history not to get a single vote--not even his own.

Since giving up the gunloon blog, Sebby has posted intermittently on a blog which is designed to point out the hookers and johns in his neighborhood.  It's rather odd.  Sebby claims to be libertarian but is against prostitution which the Libertarian Party wants to legalize.

Breda's a Good Writer

Thanks to RuffRidr, I read the post that Breda wrote about me a couple weeks ago. I realize I just fell into the first trap by presuming it was about me, but most of the commenters seemed to be under that impression except Sebastian, who thought it was about Jadegold.

In this fairly slick essay, by referring to me and gun control bloggers in general as "trolls," she simply reversed the roles of pro-gun and gun-control writers by saying, for example, that "the majority of the time the ugliness is started by trolls."  That's really not been my experience. Another example is this: "They want a chance to call people names and be nasty to complete strangers." Does anyone who reads the gun blogs really think that applies to the gun control advocates and not the, as Breda herself said, very passionate gun bloggers?

The thrust of her post was that "I (they) want attention."  Her advice is to ignore us, but it was offered in a silly imitation of Fight Club.

By far the most interesting part was the comments. .Not one of the 35-plus commenters said, "I don't think Mike is a troll, he's just wrong. But he's got a right to his opinion just like everybody else."   Not one of them said, "Maybe this "troll" label applies to gun-control bloggers in general, but not Mikeb.  He's the one that Linoge wrote about at great length warning us that guys like Mike are dangerous because they're trying to take our rights away."  Linoge isn't the only one who has called for a united effort to fight against this "danger." That doesn't sound like a troll who just wants attention.

Some of the commenters, I suppose, desperately want Breda's approval.  There seems to be a good following of them on her blog.  Others tend to support each other against any gun control writer regardless of who's right or wrong.  What I don't believe is that any one of them really thinks I'm a troll.  They just think I'm the enemy and this is the latest battle cry.

Speaking of the comments, the one left by RuffRidr was interesting. Speaking to Breda he said, "...he really seems to concentrate his blog posts on you for some reason."  Twice he's said as much to me.  I don't know what he's trying to do, but anyone who reads the blogs can tell you I've written much more about Bob S., Weer'd Beard and Linoge.  And as usual, his insinuation kinda flips around the fact that Breda is the one who has a problem with me.  The reason is because I dared to challenge her on a couple videos she posted last year, one in which she demonstrated her lack of proficiency with a rifle, the other in which she broke at least one of the Four Rules.  More recently, the one I guess she was referring to in this post, "It has recently come to my attention that certain trolls have been writing about me," I suppose she didn't like my challenging her for posting about drinking beer on her gun blog which in my opinion is extremely irresponsible. She and her fans didn't like my pointing it out.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Pittsburgh Fireman Found Guilty

Michael D. Clark was found guilty on two counts of reckless endangerment and one count each of possession of marijuana and possession of drug paraphernalia.

He was found not guilty, though, of two counts of simple assault.
In other words, simple misdemeanors, which may send him to jail for a little while, but won't prevent him continuing to own guns.

What happened was a jealous husband attacked him at the Little League field and knocked him around pretty good. Ego bruised, he did what any manly man would do, he went to the car and got a gun.

What's your opinion? Should a guy like this own guns?

Please leave a comment.

Road Rage in St. Cloud Minnesota

No one was hurt, thank goodness.  In fact, after they plea bargain the charges down, the offender will be right back among the good guys.

Ortiz-Dones was taken to Stearns County Jail, where he could face charges of second-degree assault and terroristic threats.
Where he COULD face those charges, get it?

What's your opinion?  Do you think this qualifies for my new program of one-strike-you're-out?  As I explained to FWM the other day, this does not necessarily mean jail time, that would be an option.  What it refers to specifically is to disqualification to own firearms. One strike you're out.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

3 Dead in Boston Shooting

They say it's all gang related, which of course completely exonerates the entire world of legitimate gun owners. What could be further from them than gang-violence?

But, what if the gang members got their guns from a guy like Randy Goodwin? That would tend to blur the line between the good guys and the bad, wouldn't you say? 

Background checks on all transfers, among other restrictions, would put an end to much of this.  In other words, I say this for FWM, we should close the "private sale loophole."

What do you think?  Please leave a comment.

The Incomparable Jay-Z Schools the Young-uns

About the recent Jay-Z interview:

Jay-Z has revealed he shot his brother when he was just 12.

The rap superstar pulled a gun on his drug-addicted older sibling Eric after he discovered he had stolen his ring.
The hip-hop mogul - real name Shawn Carter - decided to get himself a firearm and take revenge.

He told The Guardian Weekend magazine: "I went to someone's crib, someone's house, and got a gun. Guns were everywhere. You didn't have to go far to get one. Just everywhere...

But after the shooting he admits he was fearful about would happen next, he added: "I thought my life was over. I thought I'd go to jail forever. It was terrible. I was a boy, a child. I was terrified."

However, Jay-Z's fears never came to anything, because Eric decided not to press charges and instead apologised to his brother for stealing and for being a crack addict.
Now there's social responsibility for ya. The most famous, richest, most revered man in hip-hop telling it like it is about guns in the ghetto.

What's your opinion? Some people focus on the gun and others say we need to focus on the criminals. I say the two are not mutually exclusive. But, what we don't often talk about is crap like this coming from superstars like Shawn Carter who glamorize and glorify guns.

What do you think? Is this a problem?

Please leave a comment.

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Harry Potter Kills Voldemort

via Digital Bus Stop.

Liberal vs. Conservative

via Liberality.

More on the Gun Show Loophole

Japete wrote a wonderful post and included the link to this wonderful video which clearly describes what is known as the "gun show loophole," and how it works in Arizona. 

But the gun lobby is in total denial about the problem.
To me, "denial" seems to indicate some kind of mental blind-spot, as if to say the gun lobby genuinely believes there is no problem.  Gun bloggers like to repeat "there's no such thing" referring to this phenomenon. After turning the argument into something beyond tedious, they often get us to agree that it's not limited to gun shows and the term "gun show loophole" would be better rendered "private sale loophole."

All that arguing about whether it exists or whether it's worded right is all a big smokescreen used to obscure what is the single most obvious lacuna in gun control laws in America.  This is one of the ways violent criminals and other prohibited people can and do get guns.  There are other ways, specifically by recruiting straw buyers, but this "loophole" way is one that can easily be stopped.

What's your opinion?  Do you think the gun lobby and individual gun-rights activists don't understand what we're talking about? Or do you think they only pretend to not understand? 

Why do they oppose so strongly the requiring of background checks on every transfer? All of the complaints I've seen add up to inconvenience and expense, which I would think are well worth it. Do some of those who oppose this fear a slippery slope?  What would be the next law they'd expect if they allowed this one? 

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Child Abuse in England


The minimum age at which people can apply for a gun licence should be lowered from 14 to 10, Britain's most senior firearms officer has suggested.

Assistant Chief Constable Adrian Whiting, the firearms spokesman for the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo), said that the age at which children can legally apply for a firearms certificate should be brought down to the same age at which they can apply for a shotgun licence – currently 10.
I'd like to know what kind of shotgun a 10-year-old can fire? It couldn't possibly be the normal weapon that adults use. The recoil is too much.

Bur, even if it were recoilless, it would still be child abuse in my opinion.

What's yours? Please leave a comment.

Mercy Killing

The 88-year-old husband shot and killed his 86-year-old wife.

I say, take his gun away and send him home.

What do you think?

Maine Gun Seller Gets 3 Months

A fascinating story:

When Randy Goodwin started buying and reselling guns, sometimes illegally to out-of-state residents, he was trying to earn some extra money to support his five children.
The Acton resident did not know he was breaking the law, and he never thought he could be putting other families at risk.
My first thought about the length of the sentence was that it was too light, a slap on the wrist. Then I saw why in the first paragraphs of the article. The poor guy had no idea he wasn't supposed to sell guns like that.  Plus he was really sorry about it.

I wondered how many guns he'd sold.  Everybody sells some, you know in the gun culture how guns can actually become a medium of exchange.  Selling a few guns every once in a while, how bad is that?

From September 2009 to January 2010, Goodwin sold nearly 100 handguns to Joseph Burns of Lynn, Mass., Assistant U.S. Attorney Darcie McElwee wrote in court summaries of the cases against both men.
In turn, Burns distributed the guns in Massachusetts. In the fall and early winter of 2009, several guns traced to Goodwin were seized by police during arrests in Lynn.
It turns out this Burns character "pleaded guilty in June to a federal charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm. He faces as much as 10 years in prison; his sentencing is scheduled for Jan. 18."
Now, that's quite a disparity, the seller gets 3 months and the buyer could get up to 10 years. How could they explain that?. Maybe Goodwin's father has some insight.

Randy Goodwin Sr. said the exchange of guns is "an everyday occurrence" in rural Maine, and there was no bad intent in this case.
"My son's a really good dad. He has never broken the law knowingly," he said.
What's your opinion? Please don't tell me "illegal transfer of firearms to an out-of-state buyer" is a misdemeanor in Maine. That would just be the icing on the cake, a slap on the wrist and right back in business. In fact, wouldn't he be right back in business anyway? Unless we believe all that nonsense about not knowing he was breaking the law, what we've got here is one of those pretend-legitimate gun owners who are really criminals in disguise. And as the pro-gun crowd always reminds is, criminals don't obey the laws.

So, next summer if you need to pick up a gun real fast in Maine, go look up old Randy, family man and black-market gun dealer.

Please leave a comment.

Warren Buffet on Income Taxes for the Rich

Mudrake has written a wonderful post based on a recent Warren Buffet interview. I love the Tea Party critique.
“If anything, taxes for the lower and middle class and maybe even the upper middle class should even probably be cut further,” Buffett said. “But I think that people at the high-end — people like myself — should be paying a lot more in taxes. We have it better than we’ve ever had it.”
Now that's something everybody should be able go get behind, don't you think?

Please leave a comment.

Monday, November 22, 2010

More on the Traver Nomination

Pajamas Media, in their typical bombastic and exaggerated language jumped on the bandwagon attacking the Traver nomination.  What I found interesting was this.

Traver was a participant in the 2007 Great Lakes States Summit on Firearm Violence, which generated a report titled “Taking a Stand: Reducing Gun Violence in Our Communities.”
Recommendations in the report involved a string of liberty-infringing proposals, including:
  • Requiring that all gun sales take place through federal firearms license (FFL) holders with mandatory background checks.
  • Enacting an effective ban on military-style assault weapons, armor-piercing handgun ammunition, .50 caliber sniper rifles, and other weapons that enable criminals to outgun law enforcement.
  • Repealing the Tiahrt Amendment, which hinders investigation of illegal gun trafficking.
  • Destroying guns that come into police possession once their law enforcement use has ended.
  • Mandating safe storage of firearms by private citizens and providing safe facilities where gun owners can store their weapons.
  • Mandating reporting of lost and stolen firearms.
  • Developing a best practices protocol for voluntary gun surrender programs.
  • Congress should restore funding for the Byrne Justice Assistance Grant Program for state, local, and tribal agencies to investigate and prosecute cases of gun trafficking and gun violence.
  • The federal government should increase funding to ATF for personnel and technical assistance to combat gun violence.
  • Congress should enact legislation to allow federal health and safety oversight of the firearms industry.
What's your opinion? Do you think these are "liberty-infringing proposals?"   I certainly don't.

The very use of the word "infringe" to describe this is an attempt at spinning the whole thing.  Take the first proposal, requiring background checks has nothing to do with the "shall not be infringed" concept, at least not unless you're a disqualified person.

Some of these ideas I could do without, like the mandatory destroying of guns, I'm not particularly into that. That's more for the guys who hate all guns.  Yet, there is a problem in places where the police are selling the guns back out to the very gun dealers who too easily let them go to the criminals in the first place.  But, basically, I'm not so hot on the destroying idea.

The mandatory safe storage laws and the increased funding to the ATF sound good to me.

What's your opinion?  Are you opposed to all of these becasue the "infringe" too much like the Pajamas Media folks say?  

Please leave a comment.

Thieves Rob Gun Store

All right, I say enough is enough, enough of the shoulder shrugging and the complacent accepting of this kind of nonsense.  The thieves, no geniuses really just movie goers, committed the bold crime of breaking through the wall of the gun store with a sledge hammer. Once inside, that had easy pickin's.

Jewelry stores and banks do not leave their product out in the open like that. What if gun dealers were required to do the same, to move their product to a vault at night?  What if gun stores which have too much inventory to fit into even a large walk in safe, must ensure their walls are not easily breachable. Don't the owners of the gun store watch the same action movies as those thieves?  Don't the owners know they're vulnerable? Shouldn't they?  Isn't that their responsibility?

It's no wonder there are too many guns in the wrong hands when gun shops allow them to flow out the front door during the day to straw purchasers and out the hole in the wall at night to the thieves.

What's your opinion?  Is it wrong to hold gun shop owners to a higher standard? Would that "infringe" upon their rights?

Please leave a comment.

The Armed Citizen

I can't wait.

Double Murder - Suicide in Westmont IL

The pro-gun voices who used to put so much stock in Clayton Cramer's now defunct blog of DGUs, often describe these stories as anecdotal and not worth all that much in the argument.  Consider this.  Clayton had a small army of followers scouring thousands of regional media outlets for his material. We're just scanning Google and Yahoo. Yet, a day doesn't go by in which we don't see one or more of these domestic murder - suicide stories.

Conclusion: too many guns in the wrong hands.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

The Problem with Stats

CQ Press, which is an independent publisher, listed St. Louis as the most dangerous city in America. Last year it was Camden NJ. St. Louis can be proud of an astounding 2,000-plus violent crimes per 100,000 residents.

Kara Bowlin, spokeswoman for St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay, said the city actually has been getting safer over the last few years. She said crime in St. Louis has gone down each year since 2007, and so far in 2010, St. Louis crime is down 7 percent.
What do you think? Is this a good illustration of how people can easily pick and choose the statistics they need to achieve what they want?

Would you say St. Louis is a dangerous city no matter how you look at it?

Please leave a comment.

The Common Goals of Gunloons and Criminals

Remember the Castle Doctrine?  Gunloons told us this was necessary so that they could sling lead in their homes at will.  Seems criminals like it as well:

Ohio prosecutors warned two years ago that the "castle doctrine" would add an unwelcome page to the playbook of criminal-defense lawyers.


The 2008 law, designed to protect the grandmother who shoots an intruder in her home in the middle of the night, increasingly is being used to defend murder suspects as not legally responsible for their deeds.



Guns, Murder, Suicide...the Usual

Miami, FL:

A man and a woman are dead, and three of her four children -- ages 10, 13, and 14 -- are fighting for their lives in critical condition after the man went on a shooting rampage in their North Miami Beach home Saturday night.







Why Gunloons Need Guns in National Parks

..to shoot at Park Rangers, of course:
The wounded ranger, 34-year-old Brody Young, is in critical but stable condition at a hospital in Grand Junction, Utah State Parks and Recreation spokeswoman Deena Loyola said in a press release issued late Sunday afternoon.



"Doctors, family members, friends and colleagues are cautiously optimistic," she said of Young, an enforcement officer with the Utah State Parks system for more than four years.



Sunday, November 21, 2010

Colbert on the TSA

Over on John Lott's site, as unbelievable as it is, he included this very humorous video in a post entitled, "Democrats like what the TSA is doing?"

Although John is famous for his pro-gun ideas, about which he's written a few fascinating books, his blog is really dedicated to Obama and Democrat bashing. And like most of your Obama haters, he sometimes writes bizarre things like this post.

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
TSA Full-Body Scanners - Jeffrey Goldberg
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes2010 ElectionMarch to Keep Fear Alive

Plano, Texas Cop - Accident or Murder?

To me it sounds like one of two things, either a summary execution of the suspect, or an inexcusable accident. The only way to prevent cops from acting like trigger-happy vigilantes is to make the sanctions for having an "accident" so severe that no one would consider it as an excuse, unless it were the truth, of course.

What's your opinion?  Is it plausible that he tried to switch on the flashlight and fired the gun instead? If that is what happened, is he the kind of guy you'd want carrying a gun for work?

Please leave a comment.

Cat Shot in Polk County Florida

In a news item you don't see every day, but one which tells the same old story of gun owners who are unfit to safely manage their weapons.  A woman in central Florida shot a cat to death in self defense.
Authorities are charging a woman with shooting a neighborhood cat to death after it attacked her, her pit bull and her sister.

Lakeland Police say 52-year-old Polly Boykin was charged Thursday with animal cruelty and discharging a firearm in public.

Police say a cat named Skeeter, which was owned by Boykin's neighbor, chased the dog, scratched the sister and attacked Boykin. Boykin told the Lakeland Ledger that she shot Skeeter with her .32-caliber revolver for protection. 

Boykin says her hand is infected because of the cat. She told the newspaper that she will fight the charges.
Of course she'll fight the charges, and she'll win too. In Florida they respect a person's Constitutionally-protected, God-given, natural human right to own and use guns.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Illegal Guns in Richmond

Laci provided the link to this interesting story of law enforcement attempts to combat the plague of illegal guns in Richmond CA, near Oakland.  One thing stuck out for me was this:

This year, police have confiscated over 200 guns. The majority of them are tied to a criminal investigation and the rest—about two dozen—were either found or taken for safekeeping. Police confiscated 476 guns in 2009, more than a gun a day..
I realize that's not a very solid statistic, but it seems things are improving there in a state with good gun laws, compared to what's happening in Austin Texas this year.

Police were hoping to find a pattern so they could disrupt any possible gun-trafficking rings in the city. “We kind of suspected that guns were coming from gun shows in Reno or Arizona, or from states that have lax gun laws—guys driving out there and bringing back carloads of guns.”

But those ATF resources revealed there was no pattern. “Most of the guns come from all over the place and they’ve been out there in circulation for three years and beyond.”
I don't think they intended it to be, but I find that a chilling statement. It means that the country is becoming so saturated with weapons that even in California, they are flowing into the criminal world from multiple sources.

The gun crowd seems to be saying that there's nothing we can do about this, that if gun control laws haven't worked in places like California, then they cannot work, period. I disagree wholeheartedly. Much stricter gun laws are required, laws that will inconvenience legitimate gun owners for the greater good.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

Gunloons Help Reduce Police Population

WaPo, once more, accidentally commits journalism:

Legal purchase was the leading source of weapons used to kill police officers. In 107 slayings, the killers acquired their firearms legally. In 170 deaths, The Post could not determine how the shooters got their guns, including 29 killings in which weapons were not recovered.
Read the whole article.