April 21, 2017 Newsletter by Jeff Pittman
Legislation
Several states are currently working on passing permitless/Constitutional carry. Of course requiring a government permission slip to peaceably exercise your Constitutional rights is patently unconstitutional. I just love watching this active map:
I saw a report this month that ATF officials generally take the position that state “firearms freedom acts” laws which purport to make federal firearms laws inapplicable for strictly intrastate firearms (made, sold, used, and kept strictly within that state) are invalid “because they conflict with federal firearms laws.” But the conflicting federal laws are themselves invalid because the US Constitution specifically prohibits such infringement. Anyone ever think of that?
NRA Meeting
President Trump will speak at the NRA meetings in Atlanta this month. He’s the first sitting president to do so since Ronald Reagan in 1983.
Good luck with that carry thing….
- Yes, Guns Are Welcome At The NRA Annual Meetings
- Knife Check Offered By Knife Rights For NRA Leadership Forum
NRA’s 2016 LEO of the Year
More on the Fast & Furious arrest
New York Times = Terrorist Rag?
CCW for Employees
About those suppressors
Note where suppressed gunshots fall on the chart. I have tinnitus and my ears are ringing as I write this. I blame the government.
About those gun-free zones
A new report from Scotland Yard reveals that a “significant spike in knife and gun offenses” has occurred in the United Kingdom, specifically a 42% increase in so-called “gun violence” and a 24% rise in “knife offenses” during the 2016-2017 financial year.
So much for those British gun and knife bans.
You’ve heard about the jihadist Muslim attack in Fresno, CA this week in which some black Muhammad guy, a convicted felon, went around killing three white people while shouting “Allahu Akbar.” Â We note that some lamestream media outlets (AP) have since scrubbed mention of Islam or the quote from their reports, meaning it didn’t happen I suppose. But California has very strict gun laws.
Once again this week in the gun-free utopia of Paris, France, an ISIS killer murdered a policeman and wounded 3 other people with an AK before being fatally shot by police. The perp was a known extremist arrested 2 months ago for trying to buy weapons “to kill police” and had served 20 years for trying to murder two officers. Probation officers noted that the perp became radicalized during that sentence. Police have arrested 3 of his family members and are hunting for a second suspect.
DC’s Handgun Ban and Homicides
It finally happened — shootout at the OK Corral
Not really. It was the Rocking V Ranch.
Dept. of Idiocy
Alabama — The Autauga County Board of Education expelled at 16-year-old girl from Prattville High School and all schools in the county and she was banned from school property and any extra-curricular activities, for having a water gun on campus. The girl was given the gun at school by a male classmate, who was not punished. It was reportedly at least his second offense with a water gun on campus.
Farnam on federal fools. Federools?
Enemies
George Kennedy, a former managing editor at the Missourian newspaper and professor emeritus at the Missouri School of Journalism, still writes a weekly column for the Missourian. He wrote this week that the NRA is more dangerous to us than is ISIS.
Friends (they ain’t the Republicans)
The Only Ones
An unidentified off-duty Philadelphia, PA, police officer was taken into custody after she allegedly shot her husband in the groin during a domestic incident in their driveway in Northampton Township Tuesday. The unidentified officer is reportedly a 10-year veteran patrol officer and has not yet been charged.
Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department Officer Michael Price accidentally shot himself in the leg at his house when he was attempting to clear his .40-caliber mini Glock. He had it on his lap when he shot himself.
Off-duty Santa Monica police officer Noelle Grant boarded a flight from Los Angeles International Airport to Taiwan with a forgotten personally-owned handgun in her carry-on bag. After Grant notified airport authorities in Taiwan, she was initially detained and then released to travel within Tapei but cannot leave Taiwan until the matter is resolved. The TSA acknowledged that Grant went through LAX security with the handgun. (pun intended)
A new policy by the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners will now require LAPD officers to try to defuse a tense encounter by using time, communication and distance before shooting. According to the LAPD chief, officers who do not follow the new policy could face consequences, “depending on the situation.” Not having actually seen the policy, I wonder if officers who DO follow the new policy could also face consequences, namely death. Kinda like England.
Politics
Ted Nugent had supper with President Trump this week. Life is good.
Caliber wars
“I’ve seen bad guys ventilated by both these calibers [9 & .40] on my doctoring side of the house. Invariably, the unfortunate rapscallions receiving the .40-caliber slugs always seemed to fare more poorly, faster.” — Will Dabbs, MD
Mississippi’s own Dr. Dabbs
The US Army’s new “non-sniper” rifle
Meanwhile, the Military Times is reporting that SOCOM is in the preliminary stages of exploring a sniper rifle chambered in 6.5 mm.
Norway’s Jegertroppen (“Hunter Troops”) — the world’s first all-female military special forces unit
Powder Warning
John Barsness reports that Hodgdon advises us NOT to use IMR-4895 for reduced loads.
Products
- The Truth About Knives, like TTAG, only sharper
- Taurus has the new polymer-frame T Series of hammer- (TH) and striker-fired (TS) pistols available in service-size and compact variants chambered in 9mm, .40 S&W, and .380 ACP. They feature ambidextrous controls, interchangeable backstraps, underbarrel Picatinny rails, and loaded chamber indicators. Gone are the 800 and 24/7 series pistols.
- Fuchs Fine Guns of Austria has double barreled bolt action rifles, both side-by-side and over/under. .17HMR to .470 Capstick.
- Norma’s EcoStrike bullets are copper-alloy based with a proprietary plating that nearly eliminates copper fouling. Available in various 7mm, 8mm, 9.3mm and .30 rifle loads and will also be sold as components.
- Standard Manufacturing’s S333 is essentially a 25 caliber 6-barrel pepperbox that fires two barrels simultaneously with each trigger pull. $300
- Kongsberg Target Systems has high-tech targets
- Lasermax’s GripSense light/laser module uses automatic touchless proximity sensors to switch on and off when your hand grips your gun. Backup button switches as well.
- Blackhawk!’s (did I punctuate that right?) new Omnivore holster reportedly provides fit for 150 different railed handguns from a single holster. Buy one of these and throw away that box in your closet I suppose.
- The Comp-Tac Trojan Horse Long Gun Concealment Case is 36″ x 4-15″ x 4″ and is claimed to hold a 20″ barreled rifle with a collapsible stock. Only $45.
- Crafted Ballistics has ammo-themed knick-knacks. I’m kinda partial to the Black Talon.
- DSG Technology has developed ammunition for use underwater with projectiles that cause supercavitation that creates a void in the water in front of the bullet as it travels, resulting in significantly increased range (10-22 m instead of 2-3 m). I’m sensing some demand in the Deep South…
Quote of the Week
“The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits.” — Plutarch
Patriots Day
Patriots Day was Wednesday. Did you remember?
CELEBRATE PATRIOTS DAY, APRIL 19th
By E. James Adkins
We don’t celebrate the 19th of April anymore. It was never celebrated in a big monumental way, but we once celebrated that day.
“Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.”
— so wrote Longfellow in his poem that begins:
“Listen my children and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,”
Revere and others went forth on the night of April 18, 1775 with the alarm, “The redcoats are coming!” They rode all through the night.
“It was one by the village clock,
When he galloped into Lexington.”
“It was two by the village clock
When he came to the bridge in Concord town.”
Why was it so immediately important, on the night of April 18, 1775, for all of the people to know that the “redcoats are coming?”
It was the practice in our colonial period for each village to have a “common” or “village green” that was used for public gatherings. The most significant use of the “common” was as a mustering point and drill field for the village militia, “every able bodied man between the ages of 16 and 60 years.” The militia was trained (as they termed it, “disciplined” and “well regulated”) in the use of arms, here at the village green. The militia provided protection for individuals and property of the village against all threats. A man would spend some time in the “gaol” if he missed a militia call. The militia, each man, was required to keep and bear his own arms. It was common for the militia to maintain a community armory for the storage of shot, powder, flint, additional small arms and any heavy arms that it might afford. Individuals could draw from these supplies as needed, as well as acquiring their own private supplies.
On the night of April 18, 1775, Governor Gage (British Governor of fortress Boston) ordered British “redcoats” to march to the many surrounding villages, to seize and destroy all stores of munitions and to arrest the country leaders, the “arch-conspirators.”
British Major Pitcairn led the march into the countryside. The prime objective was to still the voice of the people, disarm them and make them more servile. Rebellion must stop, they said.
So, Revere took to horse to give the alarm: “To arms, to arms, the redcoats are coming!”
Early on the morning of the 19th of April, 1775, Major Pitcairn’s “redcoats” arrived at Lexington and met Captain John Parker’s company of colonial militia drawn-up on the meeting house green.
“By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Hence once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.”
— so wrote Emerson in 1837.
Some colonials were wounded and some were killed. Resistance to the larger British force proved futile. Pitcairn’s return march to Boston became a humiliating rout as our colonial militiamen, Minutemen and individual countrymen harassed the British column from behind stone walls, rocks and trees, every step of the way.
The shot heard round the world, the first shot in our fight for independence from King George’s slavery, was fired to protect and defend the natural right of men to protect themselves, to keep and bear arms for the purpose of preserving liberty. This right to keep and bear arms was codified on the 15th of December 1791 when it became the Second Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America.
We don’t celebrate the 19th of April anymore. Perhaps we should.
“That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free.”
— Emerson, 1837
The redcoats are coming! Our enemies even today call this patriotic event an act of treason.
“We won’t be happy until you’re not happy.” — liberals