Jim Shepherd On Cam And Company

Cam Edwards interviewed Jim Shepherd at the SHOT Show on a number of topics. Jim is the publisher of the Outdoor Wire, the Shooting Wire, and the Tactical Wire among other things. He also was involved in the founding of CNN with Ted Turner. He is a very astute observer of the gun industry and of politics.

The entire interview is worth listening to. At the 3:45 mark he describes an encounter he had with an anti-gunner who was at SHOT incognito and what he said to him after the anti said no one needs an assault rifle.

You are all emotion and no fact. You don’t understand history. You don’t have perspective on what you’re doing. It is all about what I feel and not what I know. You don’t know enough to have the discussion.

What a wonderful thumbnail description of the problem we face when we try to discuss, debate, or argue guns and gun rights with the gun banners and their fellow travelers. We have fact and they have emotion.

Backpedaling A Bit

Well, that didn’t take long. Senator Dick Lugar is now backpedaling from statements he made in an interview with Al Hunt on Bloomberg TV saying he would support a renewed Assault Weapons Ban.

As reported in the Indianapolis Star, he is now saying that he isn’t pushing for a renewal of the Assault Weapons Ban that expired in 2004.

“I was innocently trying to say that I voted for this in the past and probably would do so again,” the Indiana Republican said. “But there was absolutely no chance, zero, that we’re going to have such debate.”

Let me be blunt – a politician who has been in Washington as long as Lugar never innocently says anything.

He goes on to say that discussing it now when it has no chance of passing will only spur people to go on a buying spree.

OK, so he isn’t pushing for a renewal and he doesn’t think there will be a debate will happen BUT he would vote for it if it came up again. Somehow that doesn’t inspire me and I hope it doesn’t inspire the voters of the Hoosier State to reward him with a seventh term.

I am TJIC

A Massachusetts gun blogger, Travis Corcoran, has had his firearms license suspended over a blog post he made after the shooting of Gabriele Giffords. His blog, Dispatches from TJICistan, is down. Borepatch and JayG have much more on the story and you should read them.

To lose your Second Amendments rights because you used your First Amendment rights to write something insensitive – but not illegal – puts a damper on the exercise of both constitutional rights.

Grandfathering and HR 308

HR 308, Carolyn McCarthy’s bill to outlaw standard capacity magazines and other feeding devices, does not allow any currently owned magazines above 10 rounds to be transferred. The Assault Weapons Ban (sic) of 1994 did allow for existing magazines to be sold, traded, or transferred. The new bill makes it a felony.

Sebastian at Snow Flakes in Hell has an excellent analysis of this provision. To understand just how radical a bill this is, you must read it. As he notes:

McCarthy’s bill contains no such exemption (as in AWB of 1994 regarding proof of ownership), which puts the burden on you to prove you fall under one of these two exemptions. Carolyn McCarthy has been on NPR saying that the things bloggers have been saying about her bill aren’t true. She knows damned well they are true, and so do the anti-gun groups. The purpose of this bill is to try to get more of us thrown in federal prison.

I am not naive enough to believe that they merely don’t know how to draft laws. Dennis Henigan is not a fool or an idiot. He knows federal guns laws, and I would be very surprised if McCarthy’s staffers didn’t consult with the Brady Center on this bill. By removing the original grandfathering and protections that were in the original 1994 ban, the effect is vastly different than what we lived under with that regime. Under this law, you may really only possess 11 round or greater magazines, unless you have proof you possessed them prior, at the arbitrary discretion of the authorities. How many magazines do you have documentation for?

 When you have RINO dinosaurs like Dick Lugar coming out in favor of a ban as well as the comments by Dick Cheney, it tells you two things: most don’t understand the difference between the law in 1994 and what McCarthy proposes AND we are going to have a fight on our hands to stop this monstrosity.

NSSF 50th Anniversary Video

The National Shooting Sports Foundation, sponsor of the SHOT Show, released this video today in honor of their 50th anniversary. You know you are getting old when you have a hard time conceiving that something started (or a person born) anytime in the Sixties could be 50 years old! It just doesn’t seem right.