Month: February 2012

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Committee Hearings Today On HR 4089 – Sportsman’s Heritage Act Of 2012

February 29, 2012 by 2 Comments

The House Natural Resources Committee is holding hearings today on H.R. 4089, the Sportman’s Heritage Act. Included in the bill are significant protections for access to Federally-owned public land for the purposes of recreational shooting.

The NSSF is asking people to contact the committee and urge the passage of this bill out of committee.

The U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources is expected to vote later TODAY on the “Sportsmen’s Heritage Act of 2012″ (H.R. 4089).

The bill combines four legislative priorities that will expand recreational hunting, shooting and fishing opportunities while also protecting the firearms and ammunition industries from detrimental regulations under the Environmental Protection Agency.

NSSF urges that you call the House Natural Resources Committee IMMEDIATELY and urge members of the committee to support H.R. 4089. Call the Republican Committee Staff at 202-225-2761. Call the Democrat Committee Staff at 202-225-6065. Readers can also help by sharing this blog post on Twitter, Facebook and other social media outlets.

Included in H.R. 4089 is the Hunting, Fishing, and Recreational Shooting Protection Act, which is the firearms industry’s top legislative priority. The bill amends the Toxic Substances Control Act to clarify the original intent of Congress to exclude traditional ammunition with lead components from regulation by the EPA, and also excludes fishing tackle from the EPA’s jurisdiction. The bill is a response to anti-hunting and fishing organizations, as well as extreme environmental groups, that are actively seeking to ban these products even though wildlife populations have not been negatively impacted by their use. Banning traditional ammunition will drive the cost of ammunition up by as much as 190 percent and curtail wildlife conservation funding supported by the sale of ammunition. For more information about the critical importance of this bill, click here.

H.R. 4089 includes other key legislative priorities of the sportsmen’s community:

The Recreational Fishing and Hunting Heritage Opportunities Act, which requires federal land managers to support and facilitate use and access for hunting, fishing and recreational shooting.
The Recreational Shooting Protection Act, which requires National Monument land to be open to access and use for recreational shooting.
The Polar Bear Conservation and Fairness Act, which will allow the importation of polar bear parts taken in a sport hunt in Canada, if legally harvested before certain dates.

In addition to calling the staff on both sides of the House Natural Resources Committee, it is important that you also call your Congressman/woman (202-224-3121) to urge them to support H.R. 4089.

My congressman, Rep. Heath Shuler (D-NC-11), is one of the co-sponsors of the bill. While there are a number of things I disagree with Heath about, he has always stood solid on Second Amendment issues as well as hunting and fishing. He is not going to seek reelection and I just hope the Republican contenders will be as solid on the Second Amendment as he has been.

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So Absurd I Don’t Know Where To Start

February 28, 2012 by 3 Comments

Yesterday afternoon, Edward McClelland, the Ward Room blogger for NBC Chicago, had a post entitled “Let’s Follow the Entire Second Amendment.” The post was so absurd, I really don’t know where to begin.

McClelland starts by attacking what he calls Second Amendment Absolutists.

Frequently, I hear gun owners describe themselves as “Second Amendment Absolutists.” By this, they mean they should be able to own any gun they want — a potato gun, a .22-caliber pistol, an elephant gun, a bazooka — and take it anywhere they want, hidden inside their pants. As justification, they point to a clause in the Second Amendment, declaring “the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”

McClelland says “Second Amendment Absolutists” cited this language in the McDonald case and in the suits against the State of Illinois concerning concealed carry. He accuses gun rights supporters of ignoring the complete language of the Second Amendment by leaving out the prefatory clause, “A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state”, regularly. He then goes on to state his understanding (or misunderstanding) of the Second Amendment.

As I read it, the amendment guarantees Americans the right to keep and bear arms so they can form a militia. Yet very few Second Amendment Absolutists belong to militias, or even look as though they’re in shape for combat.

He then takes this a step further and makes a proposal to Gov. Pat Quinn and Attorney General Lisa Madigan regarding carry laws in the State of Illinois.

if the Second Amendment Absolutists are going to hold you to the second half of the Second Amendment, hold them to the first half: tell them they can carry any gun they want, anywhere they want, as long as they join the state’s militia, the Illinois National Guard. It would require one weekend a month of training, plus the possibility of active duty if the United States becomes involved in a war.

McClelland undoubtedly thinks he is being smart. Or a smart ass. He even calls it a win-win for the State of Illinois as the “National Guard could solve both its manpower shortage and its firepower shortage. The new recruits would all bring their own guns. “
Of course, he ignores 10 USC § 311 which defines the militia – both organized and unorganized.

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

It also ignores the holding of the majority in District of Columbia v. Heller which found that the Second Amendment was an individual right and that the prefatory clause neither limited nor expanded the right in the operative clause.

Held:
1. The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a
firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for
traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.
Pp. 2–53.
(a) The Amendment’s prefatory clause announces a purpose, but
does not limit or expand the scope of the second part, the operative
clause. The operative clause’s text and history demonstrate that it
connotes an individual right to keep and bear arms. Pp. 2–22.

Fortunately, these is not one comment to the entire post that agrees with McClelland’s so-called interpretation of the Second Amendment. Yet, I can imagine some people who do read it will be shaking their heads in agreement and that is sad.

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Glock Is First Gold Level Sponsor Of SAF

February 27, 2012 by

Glock, Inc. has stepped up and become the first Gold Level Sponsor in the Second Amendment Foundation’s corporate sponsorship program. Unlike the Joyce Foundation who continues to throw their money away on the gun prohibitionists, Glock’s money is going to an organization that is actually winning. Of course VPC (and others) will be quick to call this “blood money” but I think Alan Gottlieb will be equally as quick to just laugh in their face over that claim.

From the SAF news release:

GLOCK FIRST GOLD LEVEL SPONSOR IN NEW SAF CORPORATE SPONSORSHIP PROGRAM

For Immediate Release: 2/24/2012

BELLEVUE, WA – The Second Amendment Foundation today announced that Glock, Inc. has joined the SAF’s new corporate sponsorship program at the Gold level. Glock’s continuing support of the Second Amendment Foundation and of SAF’s on-going litigation efforts in defense of firearms civil rights is rapidly becoming legendary.

SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb made the announcement, noting that Glock remains the largest corporate contributor to the Foundation – largely in recognition of the important legal efforts SAF has mounted and will continue to pursue.

“The generosity and dedication of management and ownership at Glock continue to impress me, and I want to thank them and all the Glock employees who make our partnership with Glock possible,” said Gottlieb.

“SAF’s victory in McDonald v. Chicago opened up many legal opportunities for us to move forward against a wide variety of unreasonable and often unconstitutional limits on firearms rights,” he continued, “and we must continue to expand our legal challenges with all possible speed. The substantial support of our corporate sponsors significantly broadens our ability to respond quickly and effectively to legal opportunity.”

“Glock’s latest support comes at an important time,” Gottlieb added. “Most of our members and supporters make contributions in the $10 to $25 range, and Glock’s significant additional support as a sponsor makes a major difference in our efforts to win back firearms freedoms one lawsuit at a time.”

Gottlieb urged SAF supporters and all Americans who are concerned about firearms freedoms to support Glock and other companies that support their Second Amendment rights.

“There are times in the history of any movement, and in the lives of every person, when it is important to stand up and be counted,” Gottlieb said. “Glock has, more than once, stepped up to the plate when it really does count, and we will be eternally grateful for their generosity and their unwavering dedication to the Second Amendment.”

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Cameras And Shooting

February 27, 2012 by

Andrew at the Vuurwapen Blog has just posted a video on using a camera to help improve your shooting. He gives some tips on what sort of video camera you should buy as well as technique. Capturing your shooting on video will let you see where you are making mistakes in technique.

Long before there were digital video cameras, I had been given the same advice by fly casting instructor Macauley Lord about using a video camera to improve my fly casting. Improving technique is improving technique. It doesn’t matter if it is handgun shooting or fly casting. It is interesting – long before I knew what dry fire practice was, I knew how to practice doing a double haul without a fly rod in my hand. It is still all about building muscle memory.

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Operation #EFAD

February 27, 2012 by

Those who have read Matthew Bracken’s Enemies Foreign and Domestic will understand when I say that when I first heard Operation Fast and Furious I thought of that book. It, too, featured an ATF operation aimed at increasing the call for gun control. Given that it was published in 2003, the author was remarkably prescient in his view of elements within ATF.

If you haven’t read the book, now is your chance as it will be offered FREE on Kindle from March 1st at 1:00am until Monday, March 5, 2012 at 11:30pm. Remember, even if you don’t own a Kindle (which I don’t), you can still read the books using a PC, an iPhone, an iPad, Mac, Blackberry, Android, or a Windows 7 phone.

Matt is explicit about his goal in offering the book for free on Kindle for the maximum five days allowed:

My goal is to make the spike in the number of free Kindle downloads for Enemies Foreign And Domestic so dramatic, that the national media will notice the passionate interest in this “dangerous and seditious” novel among the bitter clingers. But this is just the first step of a jiu-jitsu move. The light thrown on EFAD’s sudden nationwide surge in popularity will then be mirrored back onto the federal government’s most egregious usurpations and abuses, and on the mainstream media itself.

The idea is to force open a long overdue national conversation that the elite MSM very much wants to ignore. In large strokes, it is about our federal government morphing into a socialist tyranny before our eyes, a tyranny that is no longer soft, but getting harder with every passing month. Which is it to be: freedom, or tyranny?

About the book:

BULLETS RAIN DOWN UPON A PACKED FOOTBALL STADIUM, killing dozens, and triggering a panic stampede which leads to a thousand more deaths. A police marksman kills the sniper, a mentally unbalanced Desert Storm veteran holding a smoking assault rifle. It’s an open and shut case, or so America is led to believe…

In the aftermath of the stadium massacre, an outraged public demands an end to the threat posed by assault rifles, and Congress passes emergency legislation banning their private possession. American gun owners have one week to turn in their semi-automatic rifles, or face mandatory five year federal prison terms.

Jimmy Shifflett, the alleged stadium sniper, is linked to a shadowy “gun club” in southeastern Virginia, which the FBI believes is a cover for a secret right wing militia terror group. Those who knew Shifflett the best don’t believe he was a member of any militia, or that he was guilty of the horrific mass murder.

But if he didn’t fire the “assault rifle” into the stadium, who did, and why?

A small band of Virginians, thrown together by fate, is forced to undertake a desperate odyssey through a minefield of government blackmail, official deception and covert death squads, to discover the truth behind the stadium massacre, and save their own lives.

ENEMIES FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC is about one of the several fault lines dividing the world views that co-exist uneasily within the United States today. One side of this ideological divide believes that American gun rights are a dangerous anachronism, and that firearms ownership should be strictly regulated, and as far as possible curtailed by the government. This side of American society desires to see all firearms registered with the government, and many classes of firearms banned.

The other side considers the Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights to be an unbreachable wall, guarding the freedom of all Americans from steadily encroaching government tyranny. This side believes that it has learned a bitter lesson of history, and will never follow the tragic example of other peoples who have been disarmed, and then in many cases slaughtered by their own governments.

The firearms-intolerant side in America fails to appreciate that the God-given right to keep and bear arms is a bedrock core belief for tens of millions of Americans. This anti-firearms group seeks to elect those who would enact laws that may cross the constitutional point of no return for those millions of Americans who will not be disarmed without a violent struggle. The Americans who cherish the Second Amendment will refuse to be disarmed, regardless of what unconstitutional laws are passed, just as blacks would disobey any new laws which attempted to send them back into slavery.

The main thesis of Enemies Foreign and Domestic is that cynical manipulators, who understand both world views, could easily shape events to create a violent crisis in America between the two camps. This could easily be done as depicted in the Prologue, with a large-scale massacre blamed on a suitable villain, or by other means.

I have read all three books in the EFAD triology and like them all. I have also read his latest, Castigo Bay, as well. Bracken’s book are very much in the same vein as John Ross’ Unintended Consequences with ordinary Americans saying enough is enough. Giving that I liked them, I guess that makes me an insurrectionist.

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I Just Love Parody

February 26, 2012 by 2 Comments

In the last couple of weeks, a supposed gun blog appeared out of nowhere saying it was going to be the new paradigm. I think it was called Choke and Blunder or something like that. Part of the marketing campaign for this blog included insulting well-known bloggers, setting up “profiles” for nonexistent (and unwilling) participants, and posting many over-the-top comments when criticized. Suspicion has grown that this is a false-flag operation run by one of the gun prohibitionist organizations.

Thanks to some enterprising souls who shall remain nameless, a parody of this suspect blog has now appeared.

The parody blog, Smoking Blunder, can be found here. Share this link with your friends.

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The German – A Short Film

February 26, 2012 by 2 Comments

The Complementary Spouse’s uncle sent me this yesterday. Given that the Oscars are tonight, I thought the timing was appropriate.

It is a short film featuring aerial combat between an RAF Spitfire and a German ME-109 during WWII. What makes this film so unique is the surprise ending. That and the attention to detail including the Webley revolver and the SMLE rifles.

The short film is approximately 10 minutes long. If you want to know more about the movie and how it was made go here.

The German from Nick Ryan on Vimeo.

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Like I Said – An Attractive And Effective Spokesperson For Gun Rights

February 25, 2012 by 5 Comments

Emily Miller of the Washington Times was on Fox and Friends Weekend this morning to speak about the rise in gun ownership and gun use by women. I think she is correct when she attributes it to the desire for increased self-protection.

I think she did an excellent job in her interview. As I wrote earlier in the week, the unintended consequence of D.C.’s draconian gun laws was the creation of a new spokesperson for gun rights.

Watch the latest video at <a href=”http://video.foxnews.com”>video.foxnews.com</a>

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I Volunteer!

February 25, 2012 by

A legislator in the state of Utah, Rep. Brian Doughty (D-Salt Lake City), is proposing a law that would require that at least a minority of their Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control be drinkers. This currently would mean two of the five members would be imbibers. His concern is that the DABC doesn’t have a clue about their customers which I think is quite valid. Reportedly, his bill has been passed out of committee.

In any other state than Utah, this would not be an issue. However, Utah is not your normal state in this regard given the aversion to alcohol by the majority of residents due to their religious faith.

If they are having trouble finding qualified candidates, I will gladly volunteer if the price is right and if it includes moving expenses. I might have some trouble adjusting to their arid climate but given their gun friendliness, I’m sure I could manage it.