I fly out to Las Vegas on Sunday to attend the SHOT Show. Monday will be Industry Day at the Range. Unfortunately, the weather forecast is calling for rain. Ugh! It rained last year and I ended up with a nasty cold after Range Day.
I will be at the SHOT Show itself on Tuesday through Thursday. If there is a product or service that you would like me to check out, please let me know in the comments.
I do plan to attend the Governors’ Forum as well as the state Attorney Generals’ Forum. Both events are on Wednesday afternoon. I hope to get some good information from both of those events.
The gun control industry would have you believe that a code “microstamped” on the head of a firing pin will be at the forefront of crime solving. It is their panacea to “gun violence”.
The Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence (sic) put together a whole page on microstamping arguing that it ” is a powerful crime-solving tool that can help law enforcement quickly solve gun crimes”. They also assert that it will build trust and prevent gun violence (sic) “within communities most impacted by unsolved shootings and daily gun violence.”
Their page featured this infographic.
You may remember that the state of Maryland thought having a fired piece of brass from every new pistol sold would lead to solved crimes. It was supposed to be the “magic fingerprint”. After spending millions of taxpayers’ dollars over a period of 15 years, Maryland ditched the program without solving one crime. In other words, they bowed to reality and cut their losses.
While the gun control industry and some politicians still hold on to microstamping, the reality is stronger than the myth.
I found this infographic this morning on Reddit and it illustrates the reality of microstamping.
Infographics are powerful tools for conveying ideas and thoughts. To be effective, the information presented does have to be valid. While microstamping sounds good in theory to the uneducated, the reality is that it is a myth being used to promote more gun control.
The smallest I attended was in 1996 in Dallas. Tactical and military was looked down upon back then. Those vendors were placed in an out of the way location of the Dallas Convention Center. One of the biggest vendors was Columbia Sportswear. I even got to see the late Gert Boyle, CEO of Columbia, when I walked the floor.
The largest SHOT Show for me will be this year. While the Caesar’s Forum was open last year, many vendors canceled over pandemic concerns. This year I anticipate both the Venetian Sands Expo Center and the Caesar’s Forum will be full.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation which puts on the SHOT Show has produced an infographic showing just how big an event it is. If you’ve followed this blog for any amount of time, you know I love my infographics!
I was reminded of that analogy recently when I saw his infographic which put this analogy into pictorial form. It came up with regard to our recent demonstration outside of Sen. Thom Tillis’ office in Raleigh. Tillis was one of the prime architects of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act which saw those of us who are pro-rights get nothing and the other side get “a good first step”.
I have to agree with LawDog. We have been reasonable for much too long. The urge “to do something” never results in either good policy or one that is actually effective. With the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Bruen, we need to go on the offensive which it appears groups like the Second Amendment Foundation and the Firearms Policy Coalition have started to do.
Since I’m speaking of LawDog, I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that he published an anthology this spring called Ghosts of Malta. In addition to LawDog, it has stories by Jim “Old NFO” Curtis and Kelly “Ambulance Driver” Grayson in it. I’ve read it cover to cover and highly recommend it. The anthology is available in both book and Kindle format on Amazon.
There is no better way to distill the argument against gun confiscation orders aka red flag law than with good infographics.
First, we have the mythical argument for them as posted by Gov. Tom Wolf (D-PA).
In the mythical view, you have the words “cryptic”, “temporarily”, and “evidence”. It would have you believe that Randy made serious threats, that the police had evidence of it, that Randy was given due process, and that the judge determined beyond a reasonable doubt that removing Randy’s weapons would resolve the danger posed by Randy. Unfortunately, this is only a myth.
Now let’s look at two different versions of the reality of gun confiscation orders. The first version shows the political approach that many gun prohibitionists would take. If you have ever read some of the anti-gun posts in that cesspool known as Twitter, you know this could happen. It has been threatened many times in many tweets.
If Randy decides to fight this infringement of his civil rights, it will cost him in the neighborhood of $10,000 in attorney’s fees and court costs. Those are not made up numbers. They come from many posts by attorneys stating what they have charged to actually defend someone in such a hearing. This presupposes that Randy is even made aware of the court hearing and given a chance to fight it.
Longtime blogger and podcaster Sean Sorrentino has long made the argument that if the person is such a danger to himself/herself or others that they have their firearms removed then why are they still freely walking around on the street. Should not such a dangerous person be involuntarily committed for a period of observation and evaluation?
Sean created the infographic below illustrating this reality.
Courtesy of Sean Sorrentino
Crazy Randy has his firearms removed by the court. Unfortunately, there are a number of items still available to Randy to take his revenge on Jane and her family. Looking around the average person’s suburban home, you will find sports equipment, kitchen knives, lawn equipment, pool and cleaning chemicals, and gasoline for the lawnmower. Any of these can be misused to cause harm to others.
They perceive that red flag laws will be the be all and end all solution to mass murder. We identify the disturbed people and take away their firearms and all will be right with the world. Sorry it just doesn’t work that way.
Politicians are looking for a panacea and there just is not one. The sooner that Republicans in the Senate acknowledge this reality, the better.
You know I love my infographics. I found this one today on Facebook. It was produced by the Proactive Response Group which is a training company out of Chapin, South Carolina. Thanks to North American Rescue for reposting it which is how I found it.
This infographic goes over what is the best method to stop the bleeding by area of the body. What you do for an extremity is not what you would do for the abdomen.
If you’ve read my blog for any amount of time, you know I love infographics. The Babylon Bee, a Christian satire site, has come up with an explanation for “assault rifles” (sic) which is a hoot.
If you’ve followed this blog for any amount of time, you know I love infographics. I found a very appropriate one that helps put June 6, 1944, D-Day, the invasion of Normandy into perspective.
Stephen Green gives another perspective on the numbers involved.
I want you to imagine picking up every resident of a medium-sized city, everything they’ll need to eat and drink and rest for a few days, any vehicles they might need, gasoline, of course, plus lots of guns and ammo — did I mention this was a hunting trip? — and then moving them all in a few short hours a distance of anywhere from 30 to 125 miles or so.
Now imagine you have to move all those people and all that stuff partly by air, but mostly across heavy seas in foul weather.
Under enemy fire.
I should also mention that if you messed up any of the big details, a lot of your people are going to die, and then you’re going to have to figure out how to move them all back without getting too many more of them killed.
And all that is just the beginning. Because once you’ve done all that, those men on that “hunting trip” are going to have to take and widen a beachhead big enough and secure enough that you can rebuild (or build from scratch!) the ports and roads necessary to bring another million men over… plus all the additional stuff all those additional men will need.
I came across a very interesting infographic that compares actual causes of death, what people find in Google searches, and how the media treats the various causes of death. The media was represented by examining coverage in the New York Times and the UK’s Guardian for the period 1999 to 2016.
If you only relied upon the media, you would believe that over 50% of deaths were the result of either terrorism or homicide and that very few were due to heart disease. The reality is that heart disease followed by cancer are the first and second causes of death in the US. Moreover, the two combine to account for almost 60% of deaths.
This comes from OurWorldInData and you can get the data behind these charts here. You can read more analysis of the data here.
Josh “I invented the term Assault Weapon” Sugarmann’s Violence Policy Center is taking note that the NRA Annual Meeting starts on Friday. They have come up with a graphic asserting the Annual Meeting is showcasing “manufacturers of mass shooter’s weapon of choice”.
Normally, I appreciate a good infographic. This is just weak stuff.
More interesting is what they fail to show. I believe the terrorists who killed 130 concert goers at the Bataclan Theater in Paris used AK-47s. Likewise, I believe the Islamic terrorists that attacked the Taj Hotel in Mumbai and killed 165 and wounded over 300 used AKs. This does not even begin to approach the total number of people who have been killed in mass murders with bombs and arson.
More importantly, this graphic fails to take in account the number of defensive gun uses using the firearms produced by these manufacturers. I’ll be gracious and even include Hi-Point in that list.
The graphic also fails to specify which of these locations was an officially gun-free zone. Just glancing over the list I see that most of them qualify.
They put this graphic under their “Investigating the Gun Lobby” banner which is devoted to the National Rifle Association. The actual official gun lobby is the National Shooting Sports Foundation which represents manufacturers. Moreover, if you want to get more expansive, every one of us who supports gun rights is the gun lobby. It isn’t only an organization in Fairfax, VA.
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