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Made in China

November 14, 2010 by

After a lapse of many years, I have started back to using a fountain pen regularly. In addition to writing smoothly, they have improved my handwriting. They have also stirred the inveterate collector in me which has led me to start checking out pen forums and blogs.

This morning I found this little tidbit about the pens that President Obama used to sign the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). PPACA is better known as ObamaCare. Obama used 22 custom pens with the Presidential Seal and his signature according to the Washington Post. One recipient of a signing pen confirmed that they were made by Cross.

Here is where it gets interesting. The Goldspot Pens Blog has identified the pens as the Cross Townsend Black Lacquer with silver trim rollerball pen. These pens sell at retail for $130 a pop and that is without the Presidential Seal and engraving.

True, it is custom-ized but not custom made. Another side note is that they mention Cross is an American company, which is true, but all Cross pens are made in China now. We owe China billions of dollars anyway, so what’s a few pens between friends?

So there you have it. A bill that will push the deficit to previously unheard heights which will probably be financed by selling Treasury Bonds to the Chinese was signed with American pens made in China.

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Free Classic Shooting Books

November 14, 2010 by

The AccurateShooter.com has a list of classic shooting books that are free to either read online or to download in PDF format. And as they say, free is good:

In today’s economy, Free is good. Here’s a list of older shooting books that can be downloaded for FREE from Google Books. This list, created by German Salazar, includes many classic treatises on marksmanship that still have value for today’s competitive shooters. In addition, we’ve included illustrated firearm histories, such as Townsend Whelen’s fascinating book, The American Rifle.

The list of books includes:

  • The Bullet’s Flight From Powder to Target, Franklin W. Mann, 1909, 384 pages.
  • Irish Riflemen in America, Sir Arthur Blennerhassett Leech, 1875, 216 pages.
  • The American Rifle, Townsend Whelen, 1918, 637 Pages.
  • Suggestions to Military Riflemen, Townsend Whelen, 1909, 243 pages.
  • Modern Rifle Shooting From the American Standpoint, W. G. Hudson, 1903, 155 pp.
  • Manual for Rifle Practice: Including Suggestions for Practice at Long Range, George Wood Wingate, 1879, 303 pages.
  • How I Became a Crack Shot — With Hints to Beginners, W. Milton Farrow, 1882, 204 pp.
  • The Gun and its Development, William Wellington Greener, 1907 (8th Ed.) 786 pages.
  • Cartridge Manufacture, Douglas Thomas Hamilton, 1916, 167 pages.
  • Description and Rules for the Management of the United States Rifle, Caliber .30, Model of 1903, United States Army Ordnance Dept., 1904 (5th rev. 1914), 72 pages.

Links to more free shooting and marksmanship books can be found here.

H/T Mark Vanderberg

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At the Eleventh Hour

November 12, 2010 by

Lest I forget to say it, thank you to all of our veterans, living and dead. Without you, we would not have the freedom we have today.

The Deceased

My father, 1SGT Paul Richardson, was an Army veteran of both WWII and Vietnam who was originally drafted in October 1940.

My Uncle John Sheridan was a WWII Navy vet who enlisted on December 8, 1941 and served aboard the aircraft carrier USS Bennington towards the end of the war.

My late wife’s father, Ray Lipe, was a WWI Navy vet. No, I didn’t forget the extra “I” – Ray really was a WWI vet. When the Selective Service called his mother to ask why he didn’t answer his Army draft notice, they were told that he was at boot camp at Naval Station Great Lakes. He tried to get the Navy to allow him to serve again during WWII but was told he was too old.

The Complementary Spouse’s father, Clarence, was a Korean War vet who served in the USAF’s Air Weather Service and was stationed in Japan providing weather briefings to pilots heading into North Korea. He served in the Air Force Reserve later in the 50’s and left as a Major.

The Living

My best friend’s son, Capt. John Rodriguez, is now serving with the 3rd Infantry, the Old Guard. Prior to that he spent a year in Afghanistan in the Korengal Valley with Viper Company, 1-26 Infantry, 3IBCT, 1st Infantry Division.

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An Idle Mind Is The Devil’s Workshop

November 11, 2010 by 2 Comments

There are a great many proverbs and quotes dealing with idle hands and idle minds. The title above is attributed to an old English proverb. I think they all must have had something like the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives – ATF – in mind when they first uttered it.

Last Friday, the ATF released  ATF Ruling 2010-4 dealing with AirSoft replica M-16’s. The key part of the ruling was its holding:

Held, air gun (i.e., a gun that expels a projectile using compressed air, carbon dioxide, propane, or similar gas) replicas of AR/M-16 variant firearms that provide housing for a hammer and firing mechanism with substantially the same design as AR/M-16 variant firearm receivers, and mounting points for attaching an upper assembly containing a barrel and bolt, are firearm frames or receivers, and are, therefore, firearms, as that term is defined by 18 U.S.C. 921(a)(3)(B), and its implementing regulation, 27 CFR 478.11.

This must have been considered so embarrassing by some in the Department of Justice that it has now disappeared from the ATF website. According to Google, it was there on November 9th when they cached it. However, it is now gone.

I don’t know any sane person who would try to put pot metal AirSoft parts together with an AR upper and then try to fire a live round. But then again this was the same Firearms Technology Branch which at one time had decreed that a shoestring was a machine gun. It is the same Firearms Technology Branch that decided the fake can or barrel shroud on the American Tactical Imports’ GSG-5 SD should be regulated under the National Firearms Act.

Perhaps a better quote regarding the ATF comes from British statesman and diplomat Lord Chesterfield – “Idleness is the only refuge of weak minds, and the holiday of fools.” If only they would go on a permanent holiday!

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Gura Calls Out NY AG’s Office – And Judge Agrees

November 11, 2010 by

In a letter sent Friday and filed on Monday, Alan Gura called out the New York State Attorney General’s Office for their attempt to vacate or set aside the previously agreed upon briefing schedule in the Kachalsky case. They asked that the briefing schedule be delayed indefinitely and have proposed no new schedule. Gura said this was “dilatory and lacks any basis.”

And it appears from her handwritten comments on the letter that Judge Cathy Seibel agrees with Gura.

In his 3 page letter, Gura reiterated what had happened in previous meetings and the September 7th status conference. He noted that all the parties had agreed to a briefing schedule prior to the September 7th status conference and that the Attorney General’s Office had backed out at the last moment. The Attorney General’s Office had decided that they didn’t want to consent to the plaintiffs filing a motion for summary judgment. Nonetheless, all parties had agreed to a briefing schedule as a result of the status conference with Judge Seibel on September 7th.

One bone of contention was that the denials of the pistol permits for Alan Kachalsky and Christina Nikolov happened before the McDonald decision was handed down. Gura proposed that the complaint be amended to add more plaintiffs who had been denied after the McDonald decision and this was accepted by the Court and all defendants. It was understood by all parties that the plaintiffs’ attorneys would only add new additional parties (both new plaintiffs and defendants) to the case but not make any substantive changes in their arguments or theories. The amended complaint filed last week with the District Court did exactly that – 3 new plaintiffs and 2 new defendants and no changes to the arguments.

Gura notes that the attorneys for the State Defendants have come back to the court repeatedly asking for more time to make their motion along with cutting the amount of time that the plaintiffs have with which to respond. Moreover, the Attorney General’s Office obtained permission as noted in a post here last week to submit a 50-page motion and memorandum to dismiss which is twice the normal size. As he notes in his letter to the court:

Notwithstanding the Attorney General’s Office’s previous lack of reciprocal courtesy on the summary judgment schedule, to accommodate that office, I agreed to a compromise that effectively cut our response time in half: the Attorney General’s Office would serve its brief on November 5 instead of October 22, and our opposition would be extended trom November 12 to the 15th. The Court subsequently adopted this modified schedule.

At no point during the conversations relating to this last modification did counsel indicate that he would want additional pages. But last week, counsel obtained permission to double the size of his brief. So we face the prospect of having agreed to half the time -to respond to double the brief, and we are already looking at having a responsive pleading served on November 5, for a case filed July 15 – 92 days versus Rule 12’s 21-day standard.

Westchester County also seems to be trying to play games and is called out as well. The County is now saying that they need to be served “officially” with the amended complaint even though they have gotten notice of each and every filing electronically. Gura states that if the “County would ignore the amended complaint, Plaintiffs would request entry of default.”

Gura ends his letter by saying he hoped that the Attorney General’s Office would accept service and appear on behalf of the new defendants (Lorenzo and Holdman) as there is no need to have duplicate cases. He notes that he has worked with opposing counsel to agree on a briefing schedule for this case and that time and time again they have come back asking for changes.

Judge Seibel, as I noted above agrees with Gura, and says in her handwritten notes (which are transcribed verbatim):

The Court understood the proposal in Mr. Tomassi’s (sic) 10/8/10 letter as Mr. Gura does – i.e., the parties contemplated an amended complaint concurrent w/ the motion to dismiss. The Court also does not see why the representations of the new Defendants cannot be formalized quickly. The original Defendants shall file their motion to dismiss on or before 11/9/10. Once the new defendants are represented, they may join the original Defendants’ arguments by submitting a letter stating the same, & may add any additional arguments unique to them & the amended complaint. This shall be done by 12/6/10. Plaintiffs may oppose the original Defendants’ motion on whatever date they would like, which they should provide to me by letter, & the same is true for opposition to the new Defendants submission if it contains new arguments. Defendants to reply 3 weeks thereafter, with plaintiffs reply on cross-motion 2 weeks thereafter. Plaintiff’s counsel should be mindful, in deciding when to oppose, that the Court has a long queue of motions & is unlikely to reach this case for some time in any event. So Ordered. Cathy Seibel USDJ 11/1/10

It is my impression from Judge Seibel’s Individual Court Practices that she likes to keep an orderly court and is thus none too happy with the games that the State of New York is trying to play in her court room.  Her handwritten comments are a distinct rap across the knuckles to the Attorney General’s Office and is a reminder that they need to shape up and fly right.

UPDATE: The State of New York’s Motion to Dismiss which Judge Seibel required to be submitted by Tuesday, November 9th is still not up on the Pacer.gov website. There have been no updates since November 8th so I don’t know if they have gotten an extension or not. If there are any changes, I’ll keep you posted.

Of course, it could be that a 50-page Motion is just too large and wordy for the on-line system.

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If The Cops Won’t Respond, The Residents Will

November 11, 2010 by

I’ll be honest. There are places around this world that just scare me and that I avoid like the plague. East St. Louis, Illinois is one of those places. When the phrase “urban decay” was first coined, the author had the image of East St. Louis in his or her mind.

However, when enough good people say enough is enough, it is a sign of hope. As the video below describes, one neighborhood in East St. Louis has gotten fed up with the level of crime in their neighborhood and the lack of police response. Rather than to be dependent upon the police for their protection, the residents have started to arm themselves.

Kurt Hoffman, the St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner, looks at the story here.

East St. Louis Mayor Alvin Parks, apparently hoping to be reassuring, tells us that the city “is investigating” the complaints of slow police response (when there is any police response), and assures us that “they have a plan to curb crime in that area.”

Well, Mayor–it seems some residents have a plan, too. Of course, one problem with the residents’ plan is that they are attempting to implement it in Illinois, where armed self-defense in public is utterly prohibited.

This is the same Mayor Parks that said a year ago that people don’t have the right to bear arms except within their homes.

You have the right to bear arms, but you have the right to bear them within your home, not on the streets, not in your cars, not inside stores.

One of the tragedies of the recent elections is that Pat Quinn was elected Governor of Illinois instead of Bill Brady. Quinn, who is anti-gun, has vowed to veto any law that would extend concealed carry to the citizens of the State of Illinois. Brady had said he would have signed such a law. One must wonder if Pat Quinn has enough courage to go alone, unarmed, and without his State Police escort to East St. Louis. I sincerely doubt it. However, I have no illusions that Governor Quinn, like Mayor Parks, will continue to tell these good people that guns are bad and that they should rely upon the police for their protection all the while tut-tutting about the level of crime in East St. Louis.

Frankly, if anything is going to done about crime and violent criminal actors in East St. Louis, it will be at the hands of a resident like Rowena Howard and not due to any efforts by a politician like Alvin Parks or Pat Quinn.

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ATF, the US, and Mexico

November 11, 2010 by

The Department of Justice Inspector General released its report on the ATF’s Project Gunrunner this week and the anti-gun media has jumped on it. As might be expected, the impression they seek to give is that virtually every weapon at the disposal of the narco-terrorist drug cartels is being smuggled across the border from the U.S. to Mexico.

Marko at the Munchkin Wrangler has done a great job in pointing out the lies, half truths, and other evasions in an article that the BBC published on the DOJ IG’s report. I urge you to go read his post on this. It is a great read.