BATFE Study on Shotguns Now Available

H/T to TheHighRoad and Uncle.

Read BATFE's study here.

QOTD: Wife's Perspective on Cell Phones & Sink Holes

Between the weather, work, and recovering from skiing this past weekend, (and staying up to watch the SOTU and the Paul Ryan response), I'm a little out of sorts.  (Well, dear reader, perhaps you are learning that I am always a little out of sorts).

My wife, a civil engineer by trade, and the apolitical women that she is, actually watched 3/4s of the SOTU with me on Tuesday evening.  In doing so she made me LOL at this:

Great, so...let me get this straight?  What the President just said was that we are failing at maintaining our existing infrastructure and we are lagging behind in creating new infrastructure, but don't worry, we'll give you a free government cell phone so you can call for help when you fall into a massive sink hole?  How does that solve our infrastructure problem? 

Well, even the apolitical, sometimes liberal, sometimes conservative citizen can see through the smoke and mirrors of the big .gov.  I swear, there is hope to make her into a conservative / libertarian yet!  

Hughes Amendment Floor Vote Footage

A gracious hat tip to the folks over at MilitaryPhotos.net for digging up this footage!  13+ Minute clip of how the US gun world changed for forever (or seemingly forever).  This is an excellent lead into a few posts I have been planning and I will work to get them up later this week/end.

In the meantime, occupy yourself with the footage (but make sure you have a barf bag near by).  

Arguing with Idiots: Outdoor Girl's Take On High-Caps

The only reason to engage the idiots is to well, make them look like idiots.  Hence the reason, we can tag this blogger with the appropriate idiot tag.

 So, taking the advice of Joe Huffman, I'm hitting them back hard!  I penned a nice response that I thought was sure to not get published, and to my shock, actually did get published.  The contents can be viewed on the blogger's page, or here if you chose not to read through outdoors Girls' mindless rhetoric.

In your story, you do a wonderful job of contradicting yourself entirely on a multitude of fronts.

First, you say you are not an "absolutist" yet you talk about the one Amendment that is an absolute. "Shall not be infringed," is written in plain English, and is comprehensible for even a freshman journalism major.

You talk about being a hunter, yet as two recent Supreme Court cases have stated, the 2A is not about hunting. Most mainstream Americans will take that a step further and say that the amendment enumerates a right to defense not only from the lawless, but also lawless government. Lawless government also includes ones that would propose such regulations of magazine capacities and then exempt themselves from it for "compelling interest." If our overlords' compelling interest is so great, let them be the first to set the example and lead by turning in all expanded capacity magazines that are greater than those in "common & standard use," or as those in the media and pro-control movement have said, those in excess of 10 rounds. We can start by disarming our men in combat theater in Afghanistan first, followed by Iraq and then the BATFE and the FBI (both who have committed their own Mass-murders in the 90s).

Unfortunately, compelling interest here will serve absolutely zero purpose to achieving what you seek; crime reduction and lower mass murders. You admitted that the VT gunmen came prepared with TWO (emphasis added) handguns and 200 rounds of ammunition. I suppose that if someone is as motivated as that, he could merely purchase a chest rig, 20 magazines that each hold 10 rounds, or he could go all Neo on the Matrix and just drop empty guns, switching to those which are loaded (which, to a certain extent, is what that mass murder did).

Further, you commit the atrocity that the entire media has continued these past weeks by using poor terminology and understanding of arms. Calling a detachable magazine a "clip" shows ignorance of firearms knowledge, and calls to question your authority as a "gun owner." I would hope that you understand that most handgun rounds suck when it comes to stopping power of 2 legged predators hopped up on meth and other drugs. When sufficiently trained, a gun owner or a police officer understands to shoot until the threat is stopped (meaning to the point the threat can cause you no harm). If you choose to defend your home with your pump shotgun, I hope you use no less than No. 2 buckshot, and practice the same method of shoot until threat is neutralized (notice that until dead is not used). (For real world demonstrations of potential defense situations check out http://www.theboxotruth.com/ ).

Last, I must pose a question to you: Does the Constitution still mean anything, or would you prefer to exercise regulation of it to the point that it has no teeth, which as you say, is not an absolute? Unfortunately, unless we become a police type state replete with a KGB, no amount of firearms regulation will stop mass murders (not mass shootings, mass murders because that is the actual act of violence). Regulation of the free man will not compensate for the lawless, and the mere fact that people wish to push an agenda while the victims are still warm and then dare call their opponents to task is reprehensible. I didn't know freedom first was so out of vogue.

Final thought. Would a Molotov Cocktail or a suicide bomb style attack like that occurring in Russia this past weekend have been more horrific than the shooting? Would they have been easier to stop? Would Laughner simply have switched to $50 of gas, a polystyrene rag, a mason's jar and a match? To show that the anti-gun / anti-freedom crowd are one in the same, both of the suggested tools are neither legal to assemble or use (Petrol-bomb or actual bomb) yet motivated people still find materials to make and implement destruction.

Edit to Update:  Seems that the blogger was a bit put off by my "uncivil" comments.  Only when it doesn't suit the leftists does the discourse turn an "attack" on the message.  So, here is the response to her response (which I doubt will get published because a "two bit blogger like me" who doesn't get paid by a big media house like the Baltimore Sun, can actually go toe to toe with someone who supposedly has more creds. 

Heated rhetoric is the cop-out plea that is used to force others into conforming to one's way of thinking. Debate me on the facts and if you can't, yes, that is an atrocity, even if grammatically that usage is a bit over the top for effect.

Over the top for effect is no different than the satire and sarcasm you use yourself. So my apologies if I truly think that the portrayal of guns in the media is an atrocity because so much is either agenda driven or fake Hollywood that doesn't show a true representation as to the dangers and power (both good and bad) that firearms can be produce. If ignorance of proper training and terminology weren't so prevalent, perhaps then mainstream Americans wouldn't take issue with the attack upon their civil right.

The mere fact that you preface your whole article on absolutes is what doomed your article to failure. The whole Constitution is an absolute. It is an absolute enumeration of the things that the government CAN do in an explicit manner. So, yes, as you pointedly said, the TSA and Transit Authority police agencies that subject baggage to random searches does violate those civil rights.

Further, as we have seen with cases like the UMD beating of a student, we can't always trust police to know the law, so how can we expect them to know the specific terminology. It appears that you understand the difference between clip and mag, so why not take the time to add a paragraph and educate the pubic, rather than continue the heated, agenda driven rhetoric which ultimately puts more restrictions upon those who are free men.

If Giffords and company had been hit by a drunk driver, would we be talk about a new call for prohibition? Highly unlikely, and drinking is not even a Constitutionally Enumerated Civil Right.

Tribute: Navy Radio Man from Pearl Harbor Passes

As the Last Great Generation enters the final years of their worldly life, it is always said to see another member pass.

This time, the man who sent the signals from the attack on Pearl Harbor has passed away.  Military Times has the coverage. 

Simply, thanks!