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“When Did We Set Usage Requirements On Our Rights?”

January 22, 2014 by 1 Comment

In his latest commentary for NRA News, Billy Johnson takes apart the argument propagated by the New York Times and the gun prohibitionists that a so-called declining gun ownership rate in America is grounds for imposing more gun control. The New York Times is basing its argument that gun ownership has declined from 49% to 34% over the past 30 years on a survey conducted by the University of Chicago.

This decline in self-reported gun ownership comes in the face of all-time high gun sales. The University of Chicago’s 2012 General Social Survey results are contradicted by other surveys. As Billy points out, many gun owners are not going to tell a survey taker that they own guns and will lie about it if asked.

Even if the survey results accurately reflect the level of gun ownership in America it is irrelevant: constitutional rights do not come with usage requirements.

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A Sad Day For North Carolinians – Amazon To Collect NC Sales Tax

January 21, 2014 by 12 Comments

It is a sad day for North Carolina consumers who patronize Amazon.com. On Monday, Amazon.com announced that they will be collecting sales tax for purchases in North Carolina effective February 1st.

Amazon.com will begin collecting sales tax in North Carolina beginning Feb. 1, a company official confirmed Monday.

The move will make North Carolina the 20th state in which the online retailer collects sales tax, according to Amazon’s website. It’s unclear why Amazon decided to make the change now. A spokesman didn’t respond to questions about the timing of the move and whether the Seattle-based company would begin collecting sales tax in other states besides North Carolina on Feb. 1.

The North Carolina Department of Revenue was slapped down in 2010 when they tried to force Amazon.com to give them the names of customers residing in North Carolina. This demand was found to violate the First Amendment.

The General Assembly passed a law in 2009 that said if a company had an affiliate program it has “nexus” in the state. When a company has nexus or a physical connection to a state, it can be forced to collect sales tax for that state according to the Supreme Court in Quill v. North Dakota. In response, Amazon.com closed their Amazon Associates program for North Carolinians and it remains closed to this day.

I did speak with a customer service representative with the Amazon Affiliates Program this morning. She said she didn’t know when the Affiliates Program would be reopened to North Carolinians. I probably will apply when it does reopen.

To summarize, we in North Carolina are now going to have to pay sales tax on our Amazon purchases but we might get the opportunity to be Amazon Affiliates again. Frankly, I’d trade the Affiliates Program for not having to pay sales tax anyday.

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Naming ATF Headquarters After Eliot Ness Might Actually Be Appropriate

January 18, 2014 by 1 Comment

There is a move to name the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives headquarters in Washington, DC after Eliot Ness of Untouchables fame. This move is supported by both Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL).

Jonathan Eig, author of Get Capone, thinks this is a lousy idea. In his article in today’s Wall Street Journal, Eig lays out his reasoning.

Naming ATF headquarters after Ness is a lousy idea. It would be like naming Wrigley Field after the former Cubs outfielder Alfonso Soriano, a hot dog who never lived up to his hype.

Capone was actually brought down by President Herbert Hoover, U.S. Attorney George E.Q. Johnson and Internal Revenue investigators Frank Wilson and Elmer Irey, among others. Want to name a building after one of them? Go for it. They did heroic work; it isn’t their fault that their stories were never made into TV shows or movies. Most government employees (senators not included) do their best work quietly and without looking for attention—just ask any of the attorneys, scientists and investigators working today at the ATF’s unnamed headquarters building.

Eliot Ness was little more than a nuisance to Capone. The lawman raided some of the gangster’s breweries, helped disrupt his cash flow and built evidence that led to Capone’s indictment for violating prohibition. But in the end, prosecutors decided they couldn’t win with that evidence and dropped the charges. They wisely chose a more conservative approach: going after the gangster for income-tax evasion.

Moreover, Eig writes that Ness played around on his wife, tried to cover up an accident in which he was involved while driving drunk, he drank too much, and ended up selling frozen hamburger patties in the last years of his life because he was strapped for cash.

To summarize, Ness didn’t get his man, he had questionable morals, he probably was an alcoholic, he covered up a crime, he couldn’t manage his money, and he was prone to wild exaggeration about his accomplishments.

When you look at that summary of Ness’ life and career, who better to represent the modern day ATF?

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2014 SHOT Show – Day Two With Gunblast.Com

January 18, 2014 by 1 Comment

In his overview of Day Two at the 2014 SHOT Show, Jeff Quinn starts out by interviewing Rob Leahy of Simply Rugged leather. I have one of his pancake holsters for my Colt Detective Special along with a belt pouch for a speed strip which is truly ingenious.

Among the others also shown is Caracal which has introduced a chassis-based rifle. Unfortunately, they didn’t discuss the problems with the Caracal pistols which resulted in a total recall.

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2014 SHOT Show – Two On Morakniv

January 18, 2014 by

I love Mora knives. I must have well over a dozen in various shapes, sizes, and blade steels. They range from an old Mora #1 with its carbon blade, to a few with the triflex laminated blades, to a Mora 2000 survival knife with a stainless blade. Morakniv makes great blades at a very reasonable cost.

What I don’t have are any of the new Mora Bushcraft series with coated blades. These seemed to be a big hit with some at the the SHOT Show.

First up is this video from Dave Petzal of Field and Stream who is looking at the the Morakniv Bushcraft Black with the new molle sheath.

Next up are the folks from Going Gear who look at both the Morakniv Bushcraft that Petzal examined as well as one with a 6 inch blade along with some other gear from the new US distributor Industrial Revolution.

My favorite dealer for all things dealing with knives made in Scandinavia is Ragweed Forge. “Ragnar” has been carrying knives from Sweden like the Moras, from Finland like puukko knives, and the Helle knives from Norway for a long time. He knows their ins and outs as well as anyone on this side of the Atlantic. By the way, that Bushcraft Black without the molle sheath can be had for $39 from Ragweed Forge which is a lot less than the $80 that Dave Petzal quoted.

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Ruger CEO Mike Fifer Clarifies Why They Are Leaving California Market

January 17, 2014 by 7 Comments

As I reported yesterday in the infographic on the California Handgun Roster, Ruger is reportedly going to let all their semi-automatic pistols drop off the approved Handgun Roster. Today, Ruger CEO Mike Fifer clarified this in an interview with Guns.com.

“We’re being forced out of the state by the California Department of Justice,” explained Fifer. “This insistence on microstamping, which doesn’t work, is denying you your rights to have access to these guns.”


“We’re not abandoning the [California] market at all, we are trying our hardest to stay in the market,” he continued. “We’re committed to California and we’re fighting this every inch of the way.”


In other words, they’re not abandoning their fans, enthusiasts and customers in California. They’re going to do whatever they can to see that this inane law gets struck down.

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An Infographic That Illustrates The Anti’s Endgame In California

January 17, 2014 by 1 Comment

The CalGuns Foundation has released the infographic below that show the end result of the Handgun Roster and the microstamping requirement in California. The end result is no handguns available which would please the gun prohibitionists no end. Moreover, they will say they didn’t outlaw these guns but merely demanded that they be safe. It is the “fault” they will say of a firearms industry that didn’t care about either their customer’s safety or of being able to “assist” police supposedly solve crimes through microstamps.

CalGuns has put together an abbreviated history of the Handgun Roster as well as the microstamping requirement. For even more info on the Roster, go here.

1/1/2001: CA laws (SB 15 – 2000) creating a Roster of “not unsafe” handguns certified for sale are enforced.


1/1/2006: CA law (SB 489 – 2003) requiring loaded chamber indicator or magazine disconnect for all new semi-automatic centerfire handguns added to Roster is enforced; CA law (SB 489 – 2003) requiring magazine disconnect for all new rimfire semi-handguns added to Roster enforced.


1/1/2007: CA law (SB 489 – 2003) requiring both loaded chamber indicator and magazine disconnect for all new semi-automatic centerfire handguns added to Roster enforced.


4/30/2009: During a short period of time in which the United States Constitution’s Second Amendment applied to states and local governments within the federal Ninth Circuit through a case called Nordyke v. King, The Calguns Foundation and 5 other plaintiffs — including the Second Amendment Foundation — filed a federal civil rights lawsuit called Peña v. Cid (now Peña v. Lindley) against the California Department of Justice that challenged the constitutionality of the state’s “Handgun Roster” laws. The Peña case, helmed by civil rights attorneys Alan Gura, Donald Kilmer, and Jason Davis, was argued at the trial court on December 17, 2013, on cross motions for summary judgment and is currently pending decision.


5/17/2013: CA law (AB 1471 – 2008) requiring “microstamping” for all semi-automatic handguns to be added to Roster enforced by CA Attorney General Kamala Harris (CA DOJ).

It also appears that Ruger is sick and tired of kowtowing to the California rules and will let their semi-auto pistols drop off the California Handgun Roster. Given that a significant portion of Ruger’s sales growth comes from new introductions and given that new pistols must be microstamped under California law, I frankly don’t blame Ruger. I see it as a reasonable business decision on their part.

From C. D. Michel’s CalGunLaws.Com:

In perhaps one of the more shocking discoveries at the 2014 SHOT Show, Ruger spokesperson Kevin Reid revealed that Ruger was going to let it’s entire California Semiautomatic pistol roster “…drop off…” the CA Department of Justice Approved Handgun List.

It seems that in Ruger’s slavish dedication to the concept of “continuous improvement”, and that California is milking some $ 200 per pistol per year to stay on the list AND that microstamping is now the rule, Ruger has already let some 60+ semiautomatic pistols drop off the approved handgun roster with the rest shortly to follow. (Note to the legal beagles out there: NSSF Governmental Relations/State Affairs Director Jake McGuigan did announce at an early morning seminar that NSSF had filed suit on or around January 9 regarding the microstamping issue in California.).

How this effects Ruger Sales of revolvers and rifles in the Fool’s Paradise of Kalifornia remains to be seen. While Ruger continues to produce excellent revolvers, California gun owners are notorious for voting with their feet against businesses that desert them when the chips are down. Hopefully this won’t too badly effect the roll-out of the latest GP-100.