Month: October 2017

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Official Statement On Decision Not To Appeal Wrenn Case

October 5, 2017 by

As reported earlier today, Karl Racine, District of Columbia Attorney General, has decided not to appeal the Court of Appeals decision in Wrenn v. DC. His official statement is below:

WASHINGTON, D. C. – Below is a statement from Attorney General Karl A. Racine regarding his decision, in consultation with other District leaders, not to petition the Supreme Court of the United States for a writ of certiorari to review the decision in Wrenn v. District of Columbia and Grace v. District of Columbia by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit:

“Public safety is, and has always been, my paramount concern. I continue to believe the District’s ‘good reason’ requirement is a common-sense, and constitutional, gun regulation. However, we must reckon with the fact that an adverse decision by the Supreme Court could have wide-ranging negative effects not just on District residents, but on the country as a whole.

“In consultation with Mayor Bowser, Chairman Mendelson, Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Allen and multiple stakeholders, and after careful consideration, we reached consensus that abiding by the D.C. Circuit’s ruling was the wisest course of action to protect public safety in the District and nationwide. Therefore, I have decided not to appeal to the Supreme Court.”

Background
A loss in the Supreme Court could affect similar gun regulations in other jurisdictions – including in nearby states like Maryland, New Jersey, and New York. The proliferation of guns in those places can have spillover effects for the safety of District residents.

While the good-reason requirement will sunset upon the D.C. Circuit’s issuance of its mandate effectuating its ruling, the rest of the District’s reasonable regulations on who may obtain a permit to carry a concealed firearm and the circumstances in which one may carry in public remain in place.

The Office of Attorney General has issued a FAQ regarding eligibility for obtaining a DC concealed carry permit. They are still going to make it as hard as possible to obtain but if you have a clean record and no mental health issues then you should qualify.

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DC Won’t Appeal In Wrenn Case

October 5, 2017 by

It is being reported by District of Columbia new station WTOP that the Attorney General of DC has decided not to appeal the Court of Appeal’s decision in Wrenn v. DC. The decision overturned the District’s “good reason” requirement to obtain a carry permit. The last time the District of Columbia lost in a major Second Amendment case they appealed. That case was DC v. Heller.


From WTOP:

After days of consulting with the mayor’s office and city council members, D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine has reportedly decided not to fight a ruling that effectively strikes down the District’s strict law that makes it difficult for gun owners to get concealed carry permits.

Sources told WTOP’s broadcast news partner NBC Washington that Racine made the decision not to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court and will formally make an announcement later on Thursday.

This cements the win for carry in DC. Conversely, an appeal to the Supreme Court might have provided the opportunity to overturn negative decisions on carry such Peruta in the 9th Circuit and Kalchalsky in the 2nd Circuit. Whether or not the Supreme Court will ever take up a carry case still remains to be seen.

H/T Sebastian

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Firearms Policy Coalition Statement On Las Vegas Shooting

October 5, 2017 by

The Firearms Policy Coalition released the statement below yesterday. I think it makes some very pertinent points about civil liberties, civic virtue, trust in government, and opportunistic politicians.

It is not a short statement meant to be a sound bite. It is a serious response that needs to be read and digested and then read again.

FPC-Logo-black-OL.png

Our hearts break for the
victims of the heinous mass murder in Las Vegas and our prayers are
with them, their families, and everyone affected by this
incomprehensible act of evil. While it is impossible to measure the
loss suffered in Sunday’s tragedy, the sting from this senseless
violence will doubtless be felt for years to come. 

We are deeply grateful for the law enforcement officers,
firefighters, paramedics, nurses, doctors, blood donors, and countless
volunteers who stood tall and delivered aid to the innocent in a time
of great need, as Americans do. 

Sadly, opportunistic politicians who prey on tragedies like this
one have already begun to suggest that our response should be to
abandon our constitutional principles in favor of policies that would
ban more guns, disarm more victims, and further expand “gun free
zones” — spaces shielded by nothing more than invisible lines and
wishful thinking. 

Such policies are not only irrational, but outright dangerous. As
every attack in what was purported to be a ‘gun-free’, ‘bomb-free’, or
‘vehicle-free’ zone proves, there is no set of laws that will prevent
evil people from monstrously plotting an effective means to harm
others. 

In a cruel and potentially dangerous irony, many—if not most—of the
same people who assert that we cannot possibly trust the government
under someone like President Donald Trump also claim that it
is only the government that we should trust to safely and
responsibly possess weapons like the most common semi-automatic rifle
in America, the AR-15. 

We know that the privileged and wealthy elite will purchase
paramilitary protective teams armed with the very firearms they so
desperately wish to put out of the reach of the common man, but the
rest of us would be left to hope and pray. 

That is why the Second Amendment’s guarantees are not a matter of
convenience, nor of need, nor even of want. The basic
human right to armed self-defense against unjust force
is precisely why our Founders enshrined it into our Constitution—to
protect it against the capricious nature of popular opinion, the
momentum of the mob, and those who would seek to limit it to a
watered-down, second-class privilege for some. 

Thankfully, as the Supreme Court correctly noted in the
landmark Heller decision, the “very enumeration of the right
takes out of the hands of government—even the Third Branch of
Government—the power to decide on a case-by-case basis whether the
right is really worthinsisting upon.” 

Nearly 15 years ago, the Ninth Circuit’s then-Chief Judge Alex
Kozinski aptly wrote that the “prospect of tyranny may not grab the
headlines the way vivid stories of gun crime routinely do. But few saw
the Third Reich coming until it was too late. The Second Amendment is
a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare
circumstances where all other rights have failed — where the
government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who
protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no
one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies
may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get
to make only once.” 

Every day, evil people and governments around the world employ
tools ranging from clenched fists to combat aircraft to perpetrate
unspeakable and unjustified crimes upon others. But objectivity and
reason compels us to recognize that those instruments are but the
means to the end, and not the end itself. Indeed, the span of human
history shows that such arms are also used to liberate the oppressed,
establish order and justice from anarchy, and defend innocent life
from cruel despots. 

The American people will not be bullied by killers or politicians
and neither will we cower against attacks on our most important civil
rights. We reject the notion that good, peaceable people and our basic
rights must suffer for the crimes of the wicked.
There is no more pure a victory for evil than for our society to
assault or eliminate the rights of good people in response to things
we did not do. And so a just world must hold accountable the writers
of history for their deeds, not the mere quills through which it is
written. 

We law-abiding people of America do not accept responsibility for
the evil, cowardly acts of the deranged and hateful among us, nor do
we accept blame for their unconscionable and cowardly uses of
instruments that can and do serve as instruments of self-defense and
justice. 

A great champion of individual liberties once said that if civic
virtue does not reside in the people, no constitution, no bill of
rights, no legislative body, and no court will be able to preserve our
liberties. 

That is why, in troubled and troubling times like these, we are
honor-bound to stand united in defense of fundamental, individual
liberties, in all cases, and in spite of the incalculable grief we
feel for the victims of Las Vegas as fellow human beings. 

Firearms Policy Coalition takes seriously our chartered duty to
protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, especially
the fundamental, individual Second Amendment right to keep and bear
arms 

FPC and our allies will continue fighting to defend and advance our
Constitution’s protection of fundamental human
rights.


Firearms Policy
Coalition (www.firearmspolicy.org)
is a 501(c)4 grassroots nonprofit organization. FPC’s mission is to
protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, especially
the fundamental, individual Second Amendment right to keep and bear
arms.

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Time For Letters And Faxes To Congress

October 4, 2017 by 1 Comment

I wasn’t sure if I should post this to the blog or not. It is a copy of a letter that I wrote yesterday to Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC) who is my congressman. McHenry is also the Chief Deputy Majority Whip so he is also part of the Republican leadership in the House.

My friend Rob Morse also wrote his congressman along with Paul Ryan and posted his letter on his SlowFacts blog. His is a little shorter and more to the point.

I am putting a link to my letter in Google Docs as well so that anyone can use it as the basis for their own letter or fax. McHenry has three offices in the district in addition to his one in DC. I faxed each and every one that had a published fax number.

Hon. Patrick McHenry
Member of Congress
By Fax

Dear Rep. McHenry:

I have written to you in the past urging passage of the Hearing Protection Act. It has now been incorporated into HR 3668 – the Sportsmen’s Heritage and Recreational Enhancement Act of 2017 – as Title XV of the SHARE Act.

Hearing is one sense that once lost can never be regained. I know as I suffer from both hearing loss and tinnitus. To those who say just use ear plugs or shooting muffs, neither deals adequately with the concussive wave of the exploding gases of the gun shot. I have attached the executive summary from a position paper in favor of suppressors by Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership. As they note, restricting suppressors is an obstacle to hearing safety.

A suppressor on a firearm is like a muffler on a lawn mower. It doesn’t make it silent; it merely reduces the noise level to a safer decibel level. To say as Hillary Clinton did the other day that it would have made the tragedy in Las Vegas even worse is to merely to show ignorance. Police, the average citizen, and “shot spotter” software could all have detected the gunfire by sound as well as its location.

HR 3668 has passed out of all committees and is now on the Union Calendar of the House as number 224. There are reports that Speaker Ryan is now determined to sit on the bill and not let it come up for a vote. As you are a member of House leadership in your role as Chief Deputy Majority Whip, let me make one thing perfectly clear to you and to the rest of the GOP.

THIS IS UNACCEPTABLE.

Republicans would not hold a majority of both houses of Congress, Donald Trump would not be President, and there would not be a Republican supermajority of the North Carolina General Assembly if it were not for us in the firearms community. We have been given too many promises over too many years that Republicans are our allies in the fight for gun rights. We have given our votes and we have been continually disappointed. It is always there are more important things to handle and we’ll get to it “next year”. We are treated like Lucy treats Charlie Brown.

No more! While I can’t speak for everyone in the gun rights community, my vote will not be forthcoming unless I see good bills like HR 3668 and Rep. Hudson’s HR 38 brought up for recorded votes and passed in the House.

I attended and spoke at the 2017 Gun Rights Policy Conference held this past weekend in Dallas, Texas. Both the SHARE Act and HR 38 were discussed. A resolution was adopted on Sunday that demanded a recorded vote on both of these bills. Collectively, we have made the decision to stop playing “Charlie Brown” to the GOP’s “Lucy”.

I remain,

Sincerely yours,

John P. Richardson

Attachment: Executive Summary: Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership Position Paper in Favor of Firearm Suppressors to Prevent Hearing Loss

You can get the executive summary of DRGO’s position paper here. I would suggest including it with your fax or letter.

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“Be Like Kim Kardashian” – My Presentation At 2017 Gun Rights Policy Conference

October 3, 2017 by 1 Comment

I teased people before my presentation on the Using New Media To Advance Gun Rights panel at the 2017 GRPC that I would be talking about Kim Kardashian.

And I did.

You can read and see my whole presentation below. I do think it is important that we adopt all forms of social media to inform and persuade the Millennials and iGeneration about freedom and the Second Amendment.

Hi. I’m John Richardson.

I have the gun blog No Lawyers – Only Guns and Money and I’m a co-host of the Polite Society Podcast.

In past years I’ve spoken about how bloggers have worked to advance gun rights, how they’ve exposed gun walking in the Obama Administration, and also how we can use new media as a tool to fight the enemies of freedom ranging from the Mainstream Media to the well-funded gun control lobby.

This year when I was putting together my notes for this talk I thought about things like fake news, the bias of the mainstream media, how balanced in their lexicon means always quoting a gun banner in reference to crime, and how ridiculous it is that the media takes anything Gabby Giffords says seriously.

However, last Saturday morning while I was sitting in bed drinking my coffee I watched a report on CBS Saturday which encapsulated what we in the gun rights community need to do: we need to become Social Media Influencers.

Put another way, we need to become like Donald Trump and Kim Kardashian. I know you are probably saying right now that you can maybe understand Trump but a Kardashian? Really?

Think about this – you have a young woman with virtually no discernible talents, with no education past high school, and no employment history to speak of who got upwards of $1 million for merely attending a party due to the attention she draws.

That is social media influence. We may think it is absurd but it is the new reality.

Big business understands this. They have made it a $1 billion annual industry because it conveys authenticity and because it goes around the gatekeepers to put their message directly into the pockets of Millennials and Gen. Z aka the iGeneration.

The reason I care and you should care about reaching the Millennials and the iGeneration is that we are in the long war. If we don’t reach them with the message that gun rights are important, that the shooting sports are fun, and that our opponents are the enemies of freedom, then the Second Amendment will be effectively dead within our lifetimes.

The Millennials and the iGeneration don’t read newspapers. They don’t watch network news. Half the time they’ve replaced cable with Netflix and Amazon Prime. They don’t have landlines and their cell phones are more often used to text than to talk to friends. More importantly, they don’t trust traditional media and they value authenticity. This means they give greater weight to user-generated social media than virtually anything else.

The other thing to understand is that there is New Social Media and Old Social Media. The latter would include things like blogs, podcasts, Facebook, and, to some extent, Twitter. New Social Media is centered on things like Instagram, SnapChat, and Periscope with YouTube somewhere in between the two. To give you an idea of the reach of Instagram as a means of social influence, the Kardashian-Jenner daughters have 410 MILLION followers combined.

So how do you use it?

Number one – download the app to your smart phone and register an account.

Number two – start posting pictures when you take a new shooter to the range. Or alternatively, post pictures from GRPC. Just make sure to put hashtags with them. You know – those little cross-hatched number signs with a word or two after them. Stuff like “#newshooter” or “#grpc2017”.

Number three – if you feel this is beyond what you can do, enlist your kids and grandkids. Take them shooting and have THEM post the pictures to their accounts.

Finally, keep it fun and keep it light. If we need serious, we have people like Alan Gura for the legal stuff, Dr. John Lott to challenge the anti’s statistics, and my friend sociologist David Yamane for studies on GunCulture 2.0.

We can win at this because we are the real grassroots. Social media influence comes from below and not from above. But we need to start doing it NOW.

I will be posting my notes and associated video from the 2017 Gun Rights Policy Conference throughout the week.

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Outside His Area Of Expertise

October 3, 2017 by

Former FBI Assistant Director Chris Swecker was interviewed on CNBC on Monday regarding the mass casualty event in Las Vegas. Swecker was the former number three person in the FBI and was probably called upon by CNBC’s John Harwood because of that.

Listen to what he has to say about suppressors and semiautomatic rifles with ugly cosmetics.

Swecker said that civilians – that’s you and me in his LEO-speak – have no need to own suppressors. He also said fully automatic weapons are illegal and that AR-15s are way too easy to convert to full auto. He wondered “what rational purpose is there for 10 different ‘assault weapons’ (sic) in the hands of one person.”

One must wonder how someone with this level of ignorance rises to the level he did at the FBI. Fully automatic weapons are legal if made before the May 19, 1986 (Hughes Amendment) so long as they are registered under the NFA and the owner paid the tax and underwent the requisite background checks. Furthermore, ARs are not easy to convert to full auto unless you have a machine shop and the proper parts. Bumpfire is still not full auto no matter how fast you can dump a mag.

You also have to wonder where his law enforcement expertise lies. Was he a street guy infiltrating motorcycle gangs and fighting violent crime on the streets?

If his LinkedIn page is any indication, his law enforcement expertise lay in white collar crimes and especially financial and cyber crime. From his LinkedIn page where he lays out his expertise both in the FBI and in his subsequent career.

Experience

 In my field it is unethical to practice outside the area of your competence. Given his entire career is and was devoted to white collar crime, financial irregularities, fraud, and the like, Swecker is outside the area of his competence when talking about firearms and violent crime. If he dealt with terrorism, it was regarding the funding of terrorism and not how to rescue someone being held hostage.

If I were to guess why CNBC called upon Chris Swecker to talk about the events in Las Vegas, it is because they knew of him from his role in investigating and prosecuting financial irregularities and thought they could parlay his old position as No. 3 at the FBI into something newsworthy.  In my opinion, they failed.

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Can You Still Hear A Suppressed Rifle From 500 Yards Away?

October 3, 2017 by 3 Comments

The answer to the title question is yes.

Rebel Silencers made an ad hoc video on the level of sound suppression on a suppressed rifle. It was done quickly and the production values are not pristine. The microphone picks up wind like nobody’s business. That said, it does a good job of illustrating that a suppressor only lowers the db level and doesn’t eliminate it.

Here was their setup. One guy shot an AR, both unsuppressed and suppressed, from a ridge about 500 yards away from the person listening. The guy listening was a shop machinist who probably didn’t have the world’s best hearing. He stood in the bed of a pickup, closed his eyes, and turned around many times so he didn’t know if was facing or not facing the shooter. He was asked to in the direction of the heard shot. He did it both times with reasonable accuracy.

Is this a perfect test under controlled laboratory conditions? Absolutely not. Does it illustrate that you can both detect the sound and the direction of the suppressed gunfire? Absolutely yes.

Those who have an axe to grind against guns and/or the Hearing Protection Act will say this video proves nothing. I would disagree and say that it shows that the average untrained person can indeed detect suppressed gunfire and that any “shot detectors” would also be able to detect the direction of the gunfire.

You know your member of Congress is under pressure from the anti-gun, anti-suppressor forces to kill the SHARE Act in the wake the mass casualty event in Las Vegas. Now is the time to make your voice heard again and again in favor of passage of these bills.

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The Need To “Act”

October 2, 2017 by 4 Comments

I received a text this afternoon from the Brady Campaign regarding the mass casualty event in Las Vegas. They are urging people to contact Congress and ask for more gun control. You can see the screenshot of it below.

Let’s look at what we know and what we don’t know.

Do we know the name, age, and race of the murderer?

Yes. However, I make it a policy of this blog never to grant mass murderers the pleasure of having their name become infamous. He was a white male aged 64.

Do we know the number of victims?

Yes. According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, the latest count is 58 killed and at least 515 wounded.

Do we know why the murderer did this?

No. As far as it has been reported, there has been no manifesto, no suicide note, and no indications as to why the murderer decided to commit this evil act.

Is it terrorism related?

While ISIS has claimed responsibility for this calling it a lone wolf attack by someone who had recently converted to Islam, the FBI has discounted this. However, as Andrew McCarthy at the National Review noted, the murderer did terrorize the community.

Do we know what type of firearm or firearms he used?

No. They have been variously reported as .223 and .308 caliber rifles along with the AK-47.

How many firearms did he have?

Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo told the press officers found 10 rifles in the murderer’s room. The Wall Street Journal reports, however, the number at 18-20.

Did he have fully automatic rifles?

The best answer is maybe. He may have had a full-auto rifle or he may have had a bumpstock or GAT crank. There is debate on this and no one has reported conclusively on this issue. He was reported to have been a multi-millionaire with multiple homes and two airplanes. He could have afforded to buy legal NFA machine guns but we don’t know.

Do we know how the murderer obtained his firearms?

No. Update: ABC News reported on their evening news that at least some of the firearms were purchased from a gun store in Mesquite, NV after the requisite NICS check. They are not a Class 3 dealer.

Do we know how the murderer died?

Yes. He committed suicide as the police were breaching the door to his room.

Did the murderer have a criminal record?

No. His late father, however, was a convicted bank robber and had been on the FBI’s Most Wanted List. The father had escaped from Federal prison and did try to run down FBI agents with a car. He died in 1998.

What firearms law would have prevented this?

Put bluntly, none. The killer had a clean record and had no reported history of mental illness. He would have passed even the strictest of background checks including those required to purchase NFA items. Moreover, given his financial resources, he could have obtained any sort of weapon on the black market. A determined lone wolf with his resources will always be able to cause death and destruction. In this case it seems the killer put a good deal of planning and money into getting the right location at the right time.

Policy made in haste rarely is good policy. We should resist any and all efforts to use this tragedy as the basis for new gun control laws. The Rahm Emanuel “never let a tragedy go to waste” days should be over and they should stay over.

Ben Shapiro at the Daily Wire puts it very well in this post from earlier in the day.

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Video Of The 2017 Gun Rights Policy Conference By Panel

October 1, 2017 by

Matt of LFD Research has been doing really great work of putting together videos of each individual panel at this year’s Gun Rights Policy Conference.

Given their large size and the slow and costly internet at the Westin, they are going up bit by bit (no pun intended). So far he has most of the Saturday morning panels uploaded and more should be coming soon.

You can find all the videos on his LFD Research YouTube page. The link to it is here.

I am embedding the one featuring Dr. Jennifer Stuber of the University of Washington School of Public Health. Her organization, ForeFront, has partnered with SAF, the NRA, mental health professionals, gun dealers, and more on ways to prevent suicide. She, herself, became a widow at age 38 when her husband committed suicide with a firearm.