What's Donald Trump's carry piece?

Lawrence has the details.

Forgotten Weapons on "Assault Rifles"

Lawrence has a good post up where Ian McCollum from Forgotten Weapons delves into the topic of just what an "Assault Rifle" is.   Everyone thinks they know all this (I sure did), but they - and I - don't.  For example: Assault Shotguns and Assault Pistols?  Defined by statute.  I did not know that.

Recommended.

Big 2A gun decision

Lawrence has a good post up about the recent win (for the Good Guys) striking down firearms prohibitions in Post Offices.  This bit is they key:

The big difference here is that previous anti-gun laws overturned in the wake of Bruen have been state laws, but this one is a federal law. Perhaps one slipped by while I wasn’t looking, but I believe that this is the first federal law overturned in the wake of Bruen.

Decision by decision, the Second Amendment is slowly being restored to its proper place in American jurisprudence.

Sure looks that way.

 

Courts smack down New Mexico Governor's gun ban

Lawrence has a great analysis. Key bit:

By actually applying the Bruen test, and using it to strike down half of the remaining decree, the courts have giving gun owners at east three-fourths of a loaf here.

We're winning.

A limit to anti-gun lawfare?

Lawrence finds an interesting case in Washington state:

Kirk: “Did the Attorney General bite off a little more than they could chew on this one?”

Serrano: “Oh absolutely…It was like here’s a gift from God. Or, you know definitely not God, but from Bob Ferguson. It’s [a gift] from Satan…He’s going to go into a rural small conservative county and sue someone who allegedly sold over a thousand of these magazines.”

In 12 years, Cowlitz County has gone from mild blue to deep red.

It may be that we are seeing the mainstreaming of gun rights in what has traditionally been a hostile judiciary.

 

Quote of the Day - Gun Control edition

This seems on-point for talking to gun controllers: a comment at Althouse:

Consider the white supremecy of keeping guns "off the streets." I've never seen a gun lying on "the streets." Seems like "the streets" is just a euphemism for some kind of people. But what kind of people do "the streets" describe?

White supremecy only matters when they say it matters. Which is the ultimate privilege when you think about it. You can just flip your concern switch off and on when it suits you.

Ponderings

Big Country muses on the war in Ukraine and how Russia is refurbishing mothballed tanks.  Quantity, he says, has a quality of its own, and it seems that it's surprisingly easy to refurbish old armor. 

That got me pondering.  Last light Dopey Joe gave his State Of The Union address and called for an Assault Weapons ban.  Vlad seems to be thinking that the future is now, and an old tank tomorrow is worth much more than a bunch of new stuff next year.  In this very same vein, doesn't that suggest that anyone who hasn't already bought an AR-15 should go out right now and get one?

Palmetto State Armory has an AK-47 pattern rifle for $619.

And ammunition should be bought by the hundreds (or thousands) of rounds.  Remember, a US Army combat load of ammo is around 200 rounds per soldier, and they get resupplied.  A thousand rounds today is better than more next year.

A 3D printed gun design gets past European regulations

That toothpaste isn't going back in the tube:

The FGC-9 stands out from previous 3D-printed firearms designs, in part because it was specifically designed to circumvent European gun regulations:

Thus, unlike its predecessors, the FGC-9 does not require the use of any commercially produced firearm parts. Instead, it can be produced using only unregulated commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) components. For example, instead of an industrially produced firearms barrel, the FGC-9 uses a piece of a pre-hardened 16 mm O.D. hydraulic tubing.

 

That's some Top Shelf mockery, right there

Seen at Western Rifle Shooters:

Also:

This is also pretty effective culture war insurgency.  Consider:

1. It's funny, and not just to us Deplorables.
2. The humor comes from an obvious core of B.S., recognized even by non-Deplorables.
3. It forces people to consider that the same sort of weak arguments are used for gun control.

Full marks for effective mockery.

[stands]

[clap] [clap] [clap]

I'm tempted to make one up myself, along the lines of "You can have my Viking Range when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands!"

 

Bump Stocks* no longer illegal?

Divemedic has the news.  Interesting.

And note that the President at the time this rule went into effect had an (R) after his name. 

* My opinion is that bump stocks are dumb and I don't want one, but I also don't want the Fed.Gov changing laws illegally either.

It's time for some Common Sense Media Control laws

So the Highland Park shooter recorded rap songs about doing a mass shooting.  Gosh, why would he rap about that?  Could it be all the media coverage about mass shootings?  Could he be motivated by the chance to be famous?

Every time there's a mass shooting, the media carpet bombs the airwaves with coverage.  It's easy to see why they do so - if it bleeds, it leads and all that.  It's about ratings, which means that they're in it for the money.

The Supreme Court has been clear that commercial speech has less First Amendment protection than political speech.  And we're constantly reminded by the liberals in every Second Amendment case that "no right is absolute".  Well, allrightee then.

It's high time to restrict the ability of the media to report on mass shooting events, because they are clearly encouraging this sort of behavior.  Some Common Sense restrictions seem to be pas due here.  For example:

• Waiting periods before publishing, to discourage "copy cat" killers.  A 1 or 2 week wait will allow information to get out to the public but will provide a "cooling off" period.
• A one story a month limit on stories will allow publishing the story to the public but will prevent the saturation of the airwaves that leads to copy cat events.  I mean, nobody needs an arsenal 24x7 never ending wave of stories.
• Licensing of news media, to include showing of "Good and Substantial" reason for publishing.

I could go on, but you get the idea.  I mean, no right is absolute - especially when it's not political speech but rather commercial speech.

Feel free to leave your suggestions for Common Sense Media Control laws in the comments.

Don't listen to "Studies" of gun crime

AWA over at Gunfreezone posts about a new study showing that increased Concealed Weapon permitting leads to increased gun crime:

Concealed-carry laws boost gun crime by a third, study finds

A new study finds concealed-carry laws lead to a boost in gun crime by between 29% and 32%, mostly by triggering a surge in gun theft.

The study comes on the heels of a Supreme Court ruling that struck down New York’s attempt to limit the ability to carry a gun outside their homes. That ruling was seen as particularly significant as other states have sought to restrict concealed-carry permits.

Oh, it isn’t people being shot. It is guns being stolen.

He recommends clicking through to read the whole thing. I don't. I've seen enough studies about gun control.  As the old saying goes, if you torture the data enough it will confess to anything.

Many years ago, Eric Raymond wrote a detailed post about how the gun control study sausage is made.  It was brutal, and is a must-read for everyone in our community.  He gives example after example of malfeasance in the academic literature, from "Arming America" which made up its data to the AMA "43 times more likely to die from a gun" that refused to release their data.  Go RTWT, but this sums up the top dirty tricks that they use:

I described the errors as “systematic” before the jump because there is a pattern of distortions in the anti-gun literature that have been repeated over decades even though they violate known good practice in the social and medical sciences. These include but are not limited to:

Failure to control for socioeconomic differences between star and control groups, even when the differences are known to correlate with large differences in per-capita rates of criminal deviance

Choice of study periods that ignore well-documented trends that run contrary to the study’s conclusions immediately before or after the period.

Selective use of suicide statistics, counting them only in star but not control groups and/or ignoring massive evidence that would-be suicides rapidly substitute other methods when firearms are not available.

Tendentious misapplication of Uniform Crime Report data, for example by ignoring the fact that UCR reports of homicides are entered before trial and therefore fail to account for an unknown but significant percentage of findings of misadventure and lawful self-defense.

And I described this pattern as “fraud” before the jump because the magnitude of these errors would be too great and their direction too consistent for honest error, even if we did not in several prominent cases have direct evidence that the fraud must have been intended.

My guess is that the new study falls into the second of his categories (selective choice of study periods) at the very least, and probably the misapplication of UCR data.  Quite frankly, the last 20 years simply do not show any obvious corollary of relaxed CCW laws and crime - or they show a corrolation between relaxed CCW laws and lower crime.  A 30% increase is simply not what I've seen at all.  My suspicion is that the data were tortured for a long time before they confessed to this.

Tagged "Junk Science" because, well, you know.

In praise of Mitch McConnell

No, really.

Long time readers will know that I don't have much use for Mitch.  But it is unlikely that today's gun control win - one that drives a stake in "May Issue" licensing - would have happened if he hadn't put Merick Garland's SCOTUS nomination on hold in 2015.  Today's 6-3 majority would have at a minimum been 5-4, and the case very well might never have made it to SCOTUS because the justices can also count votes.  This might not have been seen by the conservatives on the court as the hill to die on.

Yes, the GOP turn coats will see a new gun control bill passed, thanks to Mitch.  But today is without a doubt two steps forward, one step back.

Astute readers will see this as forward progress. 

UPDATE 23 JUNE 2022 14:25:  David Koppel thinks this ruling is a big deal, and doesn't seem very worried about the new gun control bill.  I hope he's right.  Clayton Cramer looks into his crystal ball and predicts how the new bill will play out.  I expect a lot of litigation on the vague parts, and suspect that Congress knows that most of this will be struck down but wants to be seen as "doing something".  Whatevs.

And quote of the day goes to Sebastian:

Long term it’s probably best not to rely on the Courts for protection. Just ask Planned Parenthood how well that’s working out for them. But we can use these reprieves to help repair the gun culture in these jurisdictions if the restrictions lighten things up a little. This is not over. There will never be a death blow to the desire of the nobility to control the serfs. Nonetheless we should use the circumstances presented to us for maximal advantage.

UPDATE 23 JUNE 2022 15:24: I haven't been feeling well, but that's no excuse for not pointing out that the hat tip to the article came in from Dwight via email. He's your go-to guy for obituaries and it sounds like more than a couple of The Usual Suspects will have aneurysms from this.

UPDATE 23 JUNE 2022 16:52: Carl Bussjaeger has a long post analyzing why this is likely a much bigger win for our community than many realize.  He seems to think that this may gut (or at least hobble) "Red Flag" laws.

Softness to traitors

Softness to traitors will destroy us all.

- Maximilian Robespierre

Texas GOP Senator Cornyn, leader of the Republicans playing Gun Control footsie with the Democrats, gets booed by Republicans at the Texas GOP convention.  And not just a couple of Boo birds, but a solid minute and a half before his speech.  It seems that the good Senator was surprised by the response.

Smartest kid in class, right there [rolls eyes].  Maybe he should have read Shakespeare.

But cruel are the times, when we are traitors,
And do not know ourselves; when we hold rumor
From what we fear, yet know not what we fear,

But float upon a wild and violent sea
Each way and none

- William Shakespeare, Macbeth

We know what Red Flag enforcement looks like

I've seen how this movie ends:

I've linked several times to posts over at the blog Dispatches from TJICistan.  TJIC is an outspoken (some might say extremely so) advocate of smaller government.  He's also a firearms owner in the People's Republic of Massachusetts.  While he owns guns, it appears that he's no longer allowed to possess any:

ARLINGTON (CBS) – A blog threatening members of Congress in the wake of the Tucson, Arizona shooting has prompted Arlington police to temporarily suspend the firearms license of an Arlington man. 

It was the headline “1 down and 534 to go” that caught the attention. “One” refers to Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head in the rampage, while 534 refers to the other members of the U.S. House and Senate.

Police are investigating the “suitability” of 39-year-old Travis Corcoran to have a firearms license

Let's ignore for the moment how many people were investigated for making similar comments about George W. Bush.  Let's look at the "logic" being exercised by the Arlington Po-Po, shall we?

They claim that Corcoran is so dangerous that, while he has done nothing more than put up a blog post, he must be restrained from possessing firearms.  However, it appears that it's not worth it for the police to follow him, or stake out his place, or arrest him.

Huh?

Look, guys, if you think that his speech rises to the level of an actual threat of specific harm to specific persons, he should be in jail.  If you're not sure, then do the leg work to establish whether it is or not.

Ah, I was so young and optimistic, 11 years ago.  After all, we had ferocious conservative Republicans ferociously conserving things.  But even then it was clear where this would go:

It would be one thing if the law were applied equally to all.  It's not, and it will be applied disproportionately to us, because we hold views considered by some in power to be Double Plus Ungood.

Divemedic says the same, in fewer words.  He also has some suggestions on a strategy you can use.

Thanks to the GOP, we're all TJIC now.

There's a reason that they're called the "Stupid Party".  And there's a reason that the Democrats are called the "Evil Party".

A Gun Control "Conundrum"

Since Miguel left Florida, there's been a noticeable drop off in local gun news.  Let me step into the breach.  The Miami Herald is upset about a Florida law that says if you sue a gun store or manufacturer for legally selling a gun to someone, you can get dinged with a bill for their attorney's fees:

The Guttenbergs have sought to pursue a lawsuit against Smith & Wesson and Sunrise Tactical Supply, a store that sold the Smith & Wesson-made gun used in the mass shooting. 

But as a precursor, the Guttenbergs went to court to try to get a ruling about whether a state law shields gun makers and sellers from such lawsuits. That is particularly important, they argue, because part of state law could force them to pay attorney fees and other costs if they pursue a lawsuit and ultimately find out that the gun businesses were shielded. A circuit judge, however, dismissed the Guttenbergs’ request for such a ruling, known as a declaratory judgment. That spurred them to go to the appeals court, with their attorney writing in a brief that the Guttenbergs are faced with a “conundrum.”

What "conundrum"?

“Plaintiffs’ declaratory-judgment action is a textbook request for an improper advisory opinion,” Smith & Wesson attorneys wrote in a March brief. “The claims seek answers to hypothetical questions that may possibly arise only in the future. The trial court correctly recognized that plaintiffs are not entitled to a legal opinion preemptively depriving defendants of a potential affirmative defense before plaintiffs even file the claims to which the defense may or may not apply.”

Remember, Nikolas Cruz passed a background check when he bought the gun he used in the Parkland school shooting.  The FBI admitted that they dropped the ball, and paid $125M to survivors because they didn't follow up on a tip that would have stopped the attack.  The Broward County school system also settled a lawsuit with survivors because they dropped the ball here too.  This is all public record (I know, Wikipedia, but even they say this).  The only conundrum is why the public officials responsible have not been flogged in the public square for their incompetence.

It seems that the conundrum facing the Guttenbergs is whether to leave Florida for a State with insane gun laws.  In the meantime, kudos to the Florida Legislature for passing a law that (a) protects lawful commerce in firearms, and (b) annoys all The Right Sort Of People like the Miami Herald.  In the meantime, don't New York my Florida.

LOLOL [snort!]

This is a single 9mm round, capable of tearing through the engine block of a school bus for disabled children. Tell me again why you need this to hunt ducks pic.twitter.com/yuONRtWDel

— Cirsova: Mongoose & Meerkat Kickstarter Live! (@cirsova) June 2, 2022

Via Don Surber 

Condolences to Glen Filthie

Man, that looks like one heck of an accident. 

So gun control is back on the menu

Color me skeptical that the Democrats can do much in the current political situation - their margins in Congress are razor thin and rely on a fair number of Democrats from gun friendly states like West Virginia.  But we're hearing the usual banging of the gun control drum, so it's time to dust this 4 year old post off.  I mean, it's on the right hand side bar for your convenience, but some things need to be said again, and again.

(originally posted March 2, 2018)

I confess. I'm not opposed to gun control.

Confession, they say, is good for the soul, so I confess.  Man, I feel better all ready.

I don't object to gun control.  What I object to is stupid and useless gun control.

Unfortunately, all we seem to hear are stupid and useless gun control proposals.  As a public service, here are two simple rules you can use to figure out whether a gun control proposal is stupid and useless:

Rule #1.  Can the person proposing the law state what they think the law will accomplish?  Most of the time it seems that they can't.  For example, what good would banning bump stocks do?  They were (maybe) used in one crime in the Republic's history.  Is the goal really to prevent something that has only happened once?  Really?

Rule #2.  Can the person proposing the law state how likely the law is to accomplish the goal from Rule #1?  Considering that you can make a bump stock from a string and a key ring, is it rational to ban bump stocks?

That's it - two simple rules to identify non-stupid and non-useless gun control laws.  So let's use these rules to look at some gun control laws and see if they're stupid or not:

1994 Assault Weapons Ban.  Stupid.  The law was supposed to stop people from buying military style semi-automatic rifles.  It didn't.  The AR platform is likely the most popular rifle in America, and was so during the "ban".  The Department of Justice said that the ban had precisely zero effect on gun crime.

Gun Free School Zones.  Stupid.  It was supposed to stop people from taking guns into schools.  That sure worked great, didn't it?

I could go on with this, but you can add your own.  My point, though, is that the gun control proposals (magazine size restrictions, one gun a month purchase limits, etc.) are stupid and useless.  I'm willing to leave open the possibility that some gun control proposals could be non-stupid, at least in theory.  But I sure haven't seen any yet.

UPDATE 2 March 2018 12:45: This line of reasoning continues in a second post.

School shootings are for pikers

95 years ago 38 children and 6 adults died in the Bath School Disaster. Andrew Kehoe hid hundreds of pounds of dynamite in the basement of the schoo0l in Bath Township, Michigan.  He rigged two timers, one for each wing of the school.  Only one detonated, and it's likely that the body count would have been higher if the other had also detonated.

All the while he sat in his truck outside the school.  When first responders appeared, he detonated the bomb in his truck, killing himself and wounding several of them.  In all, 58 were injured but survived.  Yeah, he had a gun.

Oh yeah, before he left in the morning he killed his wife.  Quite a guy.

I'd be more impressed with the gun control crowd if they would (a) also talk about other mass murders that didn't involve guns, and (b) knew about other mass murders that didn't involve guns.  They don't, and they don't.