Month: March 2023

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NRA Moves Of Note

March 16, 2023 by 7 Comments

Two interesting developments concerning the NRA crossed my desk today. One was expected in the sense that the position had to be filled and the other has me wondering.

First, Randy Kozuch has been appointed to be the Interim Director of the NRA-ILA. The position had to be filled with someone after Jason Ouimet left as the Director of the ILA. There are boards and foundations within the NRA that specify the Director of the ILA must be a member. If I remember correctly, Kozuch was a candidate for the position when Chris Cox resigned. He had served as ILA head of state and local affairs.

According to the press release, Kozuch has been with the NRA for 29 years and had “overseen state lobbying efforts in all 50 state legislatures and served as the primary point of contact between NRA and the nation’s governors and state constitutional officers.” I will leave that statement there as is and refrain from any comments on his effectiveness in North Carolina.

The second development is of far more interest. A “Dear Director” email went out today from former NRA President David Keene. Under the current bylaws (Article V, Sec. 1 (a)), the president of the NRA “may not succeed himself or herself more than once, after being elected to serve a full term.” There is an exception made in the bylaws for the late Charlton Heston who was allowed to succeed himself up to four times.

A resolution is being submitted by Carol Frampton and Joel Friedman that would waive this limitation for current NRA President Charles Cotton and allow him to serve a third one-year term as President. The email from Keene is below:

Dear Fellow NRA Director.

This morning’s mail brought a copy of the resolution submitted by Carol Frampton and Joel Friedman to extend NRA President Charles Cotton’s term for another year. We will be asked to vote on this resolution at the Indianapolis Board meeting and it is my hope that you will join me in supporting it.

As a former NRA President, I can tell you that during challenging times, I know of no one in that job who would want an additional year on the firing line, but sometimes sacrifices are necessary for the good of the association membership and the Second Amendment. As a competent and careful attorney, himself, Charles has been a steady helmsman during the legal battles in which we have been enmeshed during his term. These battles should wind down over the course of the next year and he should be there to serve our interests during this crucial period. He deserves our thanks not just for what he’s accomplished thus far but for his willingness to allow us to ask him to carry on for another year.

David A. Keene

I find this quite interesting. It engenders a lot of questions as to the reasons behind this move. I don’t have any answers to them. Cotton’s term as President would normally end in April at the next Board meeting. At that time, First VP Willes Lee would be the successor to Cotton as President and David Coy would move into Lee’s position. A new Second VP would be selected at that time.

One potential reason, and the most innocent, is that the terms of office were interrupted during the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021. The Annual Meeting happened later in the year which screwed things up a bit.

It could also be that Wayne and Brewer prefer to keep Cotton in the position while the New York proceedings are active. As Brewer plays Rasputin to Wayne’s Czar Nicholas II, this is believable. The shots are being called by Brewer and the Board does what they are told to do by Wayne.

Another alternative is that there is a faction who want to prevent Willes Lee from assuming the position of President of the NRA. His past actions as the leadership’s number two hatchet man (Marion Hammer holds the number one position) are coming back to bite him. I have referred to Lee as the Spiro Agnew of the NRA in the past. While that might be an insult to Agnew, Lee has served that role as Agnew did Nixon.

In the end, if this email is being sent out now, it is a fait accompli or done deal. The overwhelming majority of the Board does what it is told like obedient children. There are only a few members who have rocked the boat and they will be off the Board come the Annual Meeting. The sad thing is I have more faith in NY Assistant AG Monica Connell to represent the members of the NRA than I do in the Board.

UPDATE: Here is a copy of the actual resolution. It is a screen shot.

The resolution has been added to the agenda of the Bylaws and Resolutions Committee.

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Pistol Purchase Permit Repeal Passes NC House

March 16, 2023 by 0 Comments

The North Carolina House of Representatives passed the omnibus SB41 yesterday by a vote of 70 aye, 44 nay, and 6 excused absences. Four of the excused were Republicans. The enrolled bill now goes to Gov. Roy Cooper’s desk. It is anticipated that Cooper will veto the bill in keeping with the wishes of his anti-gun masters. To override, all Republicans in the Senate must vote for the override and all House Republicans plus one House Democrat. An absent Democrat or two on the day of the override vote will work as well.

The bill, as noted earlier, repeals the Jim Crow-inspired pistol purchase permit, allows churches with attached private schools to allow carry when students are not present, and launches a statewide safe storage initiative for firearms that cannot advocate for gun control.

Paul Valone, President of Grass Roots North Carolina, issued this statement on the passage of the bill:

“In passing Senate Bill 41, today was a great victory for the Second Amendment. GRNC wishes to thank Senate President Pro Tem Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore, as well as sponsors and “main movers” of the bill including Sens. Danny Britt; Warren Daniel; and Jim Perry; and Reps. Destin Hall; Jay Adams; Hugh Blackwell; Allen Chesser; Kyle Hall; Bobby Hanig; Kelly Hastings; Neal Jackson; Keith Kidwell; Jeff, McNeely; Ben Moss; Mark Pless; Jason Saine; Carson Smith; plus Democrats who stood courageously: Marvin Lucas, Michael Wray, and Shelly Willingham, and finally the many others whose co-sponsorship and votes who made the victory possible. GRNC particularly thanks our members and supporters, whose thousands of emails and phone calls made this victory inevitable. We are confident that we will over-ride the inevitable veto by anti-freedom Governor Roy Cooper. Very soon, we will release more details of the vicious floor fight waged by Democrats to stop the bill, and the well-managed efforts Republican leadership used to stop it.”

There has been no whiny response as of yet from Everytown, Moms Demand Action, Giffords, NCGV, or the rest of the gun control industry. They are still reveling in the virtually meaningless executive actions by President Biden and Gov. Roy Cooper.

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Executive Order Establishes “Office of Violence Prevention”

March 15, 2023 by 2 Comments

I don’t know what it is with Democrats in the executive branch, both state and Federal, but they love their executive orders. On the same day that President Joe Biden released a new executive order on gun control, Gov. Roy Cooper (D-NC) released Executive Order No. 279 which established the North Carolina Office of Violence Prevention. While I have no confirmation that they were coordinated, I’d be very surprised if they were not.

Bloomberg’s North Carolinians Against Gun Violence (sic) was all a-twitter about this. They sent out a long gushing email and included a picture of Cooper signing the EO.

From NCGV’s missive:

North Carolinians Against Gun Violence and our coalition partners commend Governor Cooper for signing an Executive Order creating an Office of Violence Prevention (OVP) today. This is the first such office in the South. NCGV’s coalition partners include:  Community Justice Action Fund, Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, the Health Alliance for Violence Intervention, Giffords, Equal Justice USA, Gate City Coalition, Boots on the Ground, NC Black Alliance, MomsRising, and the North Carolina Council of Churches….

Becky Ceartas said, “Today the Governor further demonstrated his dedication to preventing gun violence by creating an Office of Violence Prevention. He is focused on promoting evidence based public health solutions. Preventing gun violence takes a multifaceted approach. Coordination among state agencies and supporting grassroots programs are critical to addressing this problem. We need to address the root causes of gun violence.”

I note that Attorney General Josh Stein (D-NC) who would like to be Cooper’s successor is in the picture on the far right. Ceartas of NCGV was relegated to the back row and you can see her peering over the shoulder of the bearded African-American gentleman.

The Executive Order establishes two new organizations. First, there is the Office of Violence Prevention which will be a part of the Department of Public Safety. Second, it also establishes a Community Violence Advisory Board. The former is charged with working with existing North Carolina agencies such as Department of Health and Human Services and the new Community Violence Advisory Board.

The EO states that the Office of Violence Prevention may engage in activities that align with its mission. These include “offering training and technical assistance; issuing best practice guidance and model processes; facilitating cross-jurisdictional information sharing; conducting public awareness campaigns; sharing data and collaborating with research institutions; and identifying and applying for funding from federal and philanthropic sources.”

I can easily imagine monies will be sourced from the various Bloomberg Foundations as well as the Joyce Foundation and others. In terms of research institutions, I am sure Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions and Garen Wintemute’s program at U. Cal. – Davis will seek to be involved. I could foresee this morphing into the establishment of a new research program at one of the UNC constituent institutions as well.

Insofar as the Community Violence Advisory Board is concerned, the way the Executive Order is written, it would seem to preclude any involvement by those with real expertise in gun safety and violence prevention such as NSSF’s Project Childsafe, John Lott’s Crime Prevention Research Center, and the like. It states that the members of the Advisory Board consists “of individuals dedicated to the mission of the Office.”

Much about this new Office of Violence Prevention is public relations fluff which will have no impact on either violence or policy. It is intended to make the gun control industry and its players happy. However, where it could be dangerous to our rights is through reports and advice used to provide support or window-dressing for gun control measures in the General Assembly. We need to keep an eye on them as well as their budget requests. Without money, they exist only on paper which is where they belong.

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Bleg On NRA Annual Membership Renewal

March 14, 2023 by 0 Comments

The Complementary Spouse has a five-year membership that will expire next month. On the assumption that there will be a NRA next year, I want to renew her membership so she will now be a voting member.

I seem to remember in the comments that she could get a discount through a NRA Recruiter. If this is correct and you are a NRA Recruiter, please contact me. I don’t want the membership to lapse and have to restart the five year clock all over again.

Thanks.

You can send the email to gunsandmoneyblog AT gmail DOT com.

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Follow-Up On Be Smart’s Gun Show Visit

March 12, 2023 by 9 Comments

If there was any doubt that Be Smart for Kids is anything other than a front for the gun control industry, the post below from Moms Demand Action – NC will remove it.

They posted on Friday:

Volunteers had a Be SMART for Kids table at a gun show in Fletcher, NC on March 4 and 5. They gave out postcards and had great conversations!

Learn more about safe firearm storage at BeSMARTforKids.org

Here are the photos that accompany it.

There is no mention of the Project Childsafe gun locks that they obtained under false pretenses. They can be seen in the bottom photo at the far left as well as on the right side of the table. Thanks to a note from Holly Sullivan of the Connecticut Civil Defense League, I found out that the box in which these locks are shipped specifically states that Everytown and Moms Demand Action are unauthorized groups.

Elsewhere, I find numerous mentions by Moms Demand Action of “our volunteers” manning Be Smart booths. Frankly, I think it is an effort reinforce the PR message that the Bloomberg groups are about “gun safety” as opposed to their real mission of gun control.

If Moms Demand Action, Be Smart for Kids, and Everytown were really serious about “gun safety” in the context of children, they would be partnering with actual gun safety efforts like the NRA’s Eddie Eagle, the NSSF’s Project Childsafe, and my friend Derek LeBlanc’s KIDS Safe Foundation. But that would force them to be serious about gun safety and not gun control.

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Dallas Safari Club Annual Meeting

March 11, 2023 by 0 Comments

The Dallas Safari Club held their annual general meeting by Zoom on Thursday. They elected new directors, new officers, and made a few bylaw changes.

From DSC:

DSC held its Annual General Meeting last night via Zoom. New Directors were elected, officers were confirmed for new terms and all bylaw changes were approved.YesElections supervised the electronic voting to ensure a fair and 100% secure process.
The three newly elected Directors are as follows:

  • Rick Warren
  • Knighton Sample
  • Joel Swan

Immediately following the AGM, the Directors elected the following officers:

  • Tim Fallon as President
  • Chris Sells as President Elect
  • Michael Vernone as Past President
  • Daniel McGehee as Treasurer
  • John Patterson as Secretary

The bylaw changes passed at the meeting by member vote included cleanup of grammatical errors in the current bylaws, giving the option to extend a Presidential term to include a second year at the Board’s discretion, and making the Chapter Liaison an officer.

Thank you to all members who participated in these important elections. 

While I am a member of Dallas Safari Club, I am not a voting member. I really had hoped to attend their convention this past January but I just could not make attending both it and the SHOT Show work. I did attend last year and enjoyed it tremendously.

I did get to meet Tim Fallon and enjoyed my chat with him at the SCI Convention. He owns FTW Ranch and the SAAM shooting school in Texas.

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See Something; Say Something

March 9, 2023 by 3 Comments

This past weekend I helped to staff the Grass Roots North Carolina booth at the Asheville Gun Show. Soon after setting up and the show opening, a couple in their 60s stopped by and started asking questions about GRNC. They were interested in our organization, what it did, and if we did anything about educating on gun safety. They then said they were with a gun safety organization for kids called Be Smart. After they left, I knew something didn’t seem right so I googled “Be Smart”. Turns out they are a project of Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety.

Now I was really suspicious about what they were doing at a gun show of all places. Shortly thereafter, another one of their members stopped by and started asking questions on how to purchase a handgun and then a long gun. I educated him on North Carolina and Federal law regarding both handgun and long gun purchases. In NC, to purchase a handgun, either from a dealer or a private individual, you must either have the Jim Crow-era pistol purchase permit or a NC Concealed Handgun Permit. I also said if he were to purchase a long gun from one of the dealers, he would have a NICS check. This lack of knowledge of NC gun laws really raised the warning flags for me. He left a couple of pieces of their literature with me.

While their card does acknowledge their affiliation with Everytown, you need a magnifying glass to read it. The disclaimer is in gray, ultra-tiny print at the bottom of the card. It is almost like they are trying to hide something.

Later that morning, I went by their booth and saw Project Childsafe gun locks. I asked how they obtained them and was told they got them from the sheriff’s department. Having donated to Project Childsafe in the past, I knew it was a project of NSSF and the gun industry. Given Bloomberg’s billions, that really irritated me so I tweeted about it.

That tweet has been seen over 12,000 times and was retweeted another 29 times. I also contacted NSSF and Project Childsafe to alert them that gun locks that they had bought for distribution by authorized groups was being handed out by Be Smart. I got a nice reply back from NSSF Communications Director Bill Brassard thanking me for alerting them to this. I thought that was the end of it.

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw a tweet from NSSF VP and General Counsel Larry Keane with a link to a story about it. The story on the NSSF news page is entitled, “Bloomberg-Backed Gun Control Swipes Project ChildSafe Kits to Pass Off as Their Own.” My initial tweet which included a picture of the locks provided the basis for their story and they credited me for it. The article by Matt Manda then gave some of the history of Project Childsafe including praise for it by politicians including then-VP Joe Biden.

This is not the first time that the anti-gun, anti-rights forces have been caught relabeling Project Childsafe gun locks and handing them out. Journalist Beth Bauman called them out on it last year. My guess we will see more of it in the future.

I did one other thing. I made sure the gun show promoter was aware of just who Be Smart was and their affiliation with Everytown. I found out they had gotten a free booth at the show by claiming they were “a local group promoting kid’s safety”. Guess who is not going to be allowed back to the gun show.

So, if you see an anti-gun organization handing out gun locks, stop and see how it is labeled. If it says “Project Childsafe” on it, call them out on it. As the saying goes, “See Something; Say Something.”

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Happy .308 Day

March 8, 2023 by 0 Comments

Today is March 8th or 308 Day!

Derived from the .300 Savage, the .308 Winchester was introduced as a commercial cartridge in 1952. It predated the similar but not exactly the same 7.62×51 NATO round by two years. The US Army’s Frankford Arsenal had been tasked with experimenting with a standard Cal. 30 bullet into a .300 Savage case. A change in powder had resulted in the .30-06 having excess pressure issues. This experiment eventually became the T-65 or .30 Light Rifle.

When Winchester introduced the .308 Winchester commercially in 1952, they offered it in their Models 70, 88, and 100 rifles. It has grown to become one of the most popular cartridges ever for hunting, law enforcement, and military (in 7.62×51). For hunting, it is suitable and has been used for most North American game animals as well as plains game in Africa.

By JHobbs – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=47849722

Winchester offers loadings for the cartridge in everything from 120 grain up to 180 grain bullets. Chuck Hawks states it has been loaded with everything from 100 to 200 grain bullets with the 150, 165, and 180 grain bullets being the most common. No longer just a Winchester product, virtually every ammunition manufacturer, both here and abroad, now offer one or more loads of the .308 cartridge.

Michael Dickerson, writing for Outdoor Life, said the .308 Winchester will probably never die. Its military roots helped it succeed much like its military predecessor the .30-06 Springfield.

There’s a certain poetic symmetry in this because the .308 Win. is, for all practical purposes, a shortened .30-06. The .30-06 can launch bullets a little faster, but the 308 Winchester can do just about everything the .30-06 can do in the field, using less powder and producing less recoil, while conveying the benefits of a cartridge that fits in a short action. It is, in some ways, a more efficient cartridge, and that’s just one of many attributes that helped make the .308 so popular.

Looking at my own collection of .308/7.62×51 rifles, they range from a Ruger Gunsite Scout Rifle to a FAL from Imbel parts mated with a DSA upper. Probably one day I’ll add a PTR-91 to the mix as I have 100 plus G-3 magazines purchased when they were dirt cheap. CMMG had experimented at one time with using G-3/HK-91 mags in an AR-10 but they unfortunately couldn’t solve the feed lip issues. Nonetheless, if anyone tries it again, I’m prepared!

Finally, the SAAMI spec drawing for the .308 Winchester is below.

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Congratulations To Paul Erhardt And The Outdoor Wires

March 3, 2023 by 1 Comment

Paul Erhardt starts today as the Managing Editor of the Outdoor Wire Digital Network. This is the network of newsletters that Jim Shepherd founded which includes, among others, the Shooting Wire, the Tactical Wire, and the Outdoor Wire. Paul had called me on Wednesday to give me a head’s up but I waited until it was officially announced to offer my public congratulations.

Jim Shepherd had this to say regarding the move:

Speaking of business, a bit of internal business to announce. I’m pleased to tell you we’re expanding our crew. Over the years you’ve read features from Paul Erhardt. You’ll be reading more of them going forward, because Paul’s joining the Outdoor Wire Digital Network as our Managing Editor. It’s a new position for us -and him – but reflects our commitment to continue our growth and maturing as a business.

We’re making other changes going forward this year, all part of keeping our twenty-year plus promise to you.

We’ll keep you posted.

This is a great move for Paul and a great move for the Outdoor Wire Digital Network. For OWDN, they are getting a seasoned professional who has served as marketing director for companies such as Apex Tactical and Sig Sauer as well as Director of Public Relations for NSSF. They are also getting someone who will take a lot of the day to day work load off of Jim Shepherd. For Paul, he is returning to the writing and editing that he loves as well as the opportunity for future advancement. I have no doubt that this is a win-win move for all involved.

Again, I want to offer my hearty congratulations to Paul, Jim, and the Outdoor Wire Digital Network.