When Seconds Count, The Police Are Nearly An Hour Away...

Joseph in IL sent in a local story that really illustrates why we need to take charge of our own defense.

Jurors hear 911 call in Darien slayings: ‘I’m in my house. There’s shooting’

The 911 call begins with a gunshot.

Then Angela Kramer softly pleads for help as the gunman who killed her parents and brother seconds earlier searches for her inside the family’s Darien home.

“I’m in my house. There’s shooting,” Kramer tells the operator in a low voice immediately after the loud gunshot.

Okay, got that? The 911 call begins with a gunshot and the person who called 911 telling the operator that someone is in her house shooting. She's hiding in a closet. The person doing the shooting would later be determined to be a mentally ill friend of the woman's ex-boyfriend, allegedly armed by the ex-boyfriend and tasked with killing the woman so that the ex-boyfriend would get custody of their child.   That's not the critical part. This is:

Kramer’s 911 call lasted for more than 55 minutes until police searched the darkened house and rescued her from her hiding place.

FIFTY FIVE MINUTES.

The call STARTED with a gunshot and a frantic person claiming that there was an active shooter scenario, and it took police 55 minutes to get to the location. Darien is a suburb of Chicago, folks. This isn't a remote town in upstate Maine or in BFE Wyoming. This is a small city near a very large city. For it to take an hour for police to respond to an active shooter scenario is unconscionable. The police could WALK to my house in 10 minutes in my town, and we're about a third the size of Darien.

Regardless of what actually happened - whether it was the friend who did the shooting or a completely separate third party - the police response is the issue. This is the sort of situation that is every good person's worst nightmare - an unknown intruder is in your house and is actively doing harm to people inside the house. Those that oppose the best tools for defense would have you call the police - and wait nearly an hour for them to show up long after the shooter has left.

Those of us who support freedom feel you should have the option of responding to such a threat with the best tool possible. In this case, Joe Biden's double barrel shotgun would have worked. In other cases - read through the Dead Goblin Count and count up how many of the nearly 400 cases involve multiple attackers - something with more ammunition might be preferable. We don't get to choose the manner in which our homes will be violated. We don't get to tell the criminals "one crook per house".

Why should we be limited to the tool we use for defense when the bad guys are not?

That is all.

Credit Where Credit Is Due...

Brad_in_MA sent in this story of strange political bedfellows: the NRA and the ACLU...

EXCLUSIVE: ACLU says Reid’s gun legislation could threaten privacy rights, civil liberties

As Senate Democrats struggle to build support for new gun control legislation, the American Civil Liberties Union now says it’s among those who have “serious concerns” about the bill.

Those concerns have the capacity to prove a major setback to Sen. Harry Reid’s current gun bill, which includes language from earlier bills introduced by Sens. Chuck Schumer and Barbara Boxer.

I know I've badmouthed the ACLU on more than one occasion over their willingness to stand up for all civil rights except the 2nd. While I wish they would fight as tirelessly for gun rights as they do for the rights of people to never see religion anywhere, I do want to point out that, at least for one shining moment, they are on our side in this fight.

You see, even the ACLU sees the danger in allowing the government to build a monstrous database on citizens simply because they happen to purchase an item - or write something inflammatory. Once the incursion into our liberties has been made - that the government can keep a dossier on who owns what - it raises the stakes in the privacy game to a level where we may not be able to get that privacy back.

"Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples' liberty's teeth." Take a guess who said that. Ted Nugent? Charleton Heston? Nope. George Washington. Once we have given up our G-d-given right to keep and bear arms, maintaining any of the rest of our rights becomes exponentially more difficult. It's a shame more can't see that. A government that faces a well-armed (well-regulated) body of people is much less likely to herd said people onto cattle cars.

A disarmed people can only hope that the armed forces don't start rounding them up.

That is all.

Funny How This Isn't Front Page News...

Remember last year, when the president of Chik-Fil-A spoke out against gay marriage? That got a fair amount of press, from my recollection. How come, then, this story isn't getting wider air play, then?

California Chick-fil-A gives free meals to gay marriage supporters at rally

A California Chick-fil-A surprised gay marriage supporters at a rally by passing out free meals coupons, despite the fast food chain's COO's outspoken stance against same-sex marriage.

The Los Angeles Daily News reports Corey Braun, the owner and operator of a franchise in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., says he felt the gathering was an opportunity to show hospitality to members of his community, regardless of their beliefs.

You know, that's a pretty decent move right there. A pity it's not as widely disseminated as the previous interaction between Chik-Fil-A and gay marriage supporters. I guess it's only news when an organization with right-leaning tendencies runs counter to the media's pet projects, and not the reverse. In any case, good on Chik-Fil-A for being decent despite having received a large helping of grief from this same group of folks.

We discussed the gay marriage debate last night on Squirrel Report. I didn't really get much into it, because, honestly, it's a non-issue IMHO. You see, there are plenty of states that recognize gay marriage, so if a gay couple wants to get married, they can just move to that state. Problem solved. You don't like the laws regarding gay marriage in your state? There's plenty of states that are more accommodating.

That sounds ridiculous, right? They should uproot themselves from the community they're in so  that they can move to a more tolerant state, rather than agitate for common sense in their current state? Who finds that acceptable? Well, a good number of gun control supporters do, if you listen to their arguments. If I want to own a new Glock, I should move to New Hampshire, because NH does not have the ridiculous "Approved Firearms Roster" that says Glocks can't be sold to MA gun owners - but can be issued to police officers.

I know, I know, beating the dead horse and all, and it's not exactly applicable to the current fight for gay marriage rights. It's just interesting to see so many people - including many on the pro-gun side - standing up for gay marriage as a general human right. Especially considering that marriage is a purely social construct, whereas the right to self-defense is an innate right, but I digress. It's unfortunate that couples that wish to join together are prevented from doing so in many locations - it's even more unfortunate that the government is even in the marriage business to begin with.

And it's sad to see many of the same people screaming about "basic human rights" also agitating for more "gun control" - seems THEIR rights are sacrosanct, while mine can be discarded...

That is all.

Changing Tools, Changing Tactics...

Gerry sent in an e-mail exchange from John Farnam's DTI regarding the recent change in New York law regarding magazine capacity. It was a question from a New York resident with a NY carry permit asking for thoughts on how tactics would change for the armed citizen in New York, and I thought it was worthwhile to kick around as a thought exercise.

For folks used to carrying a double stack mid- to full- size pistol with 15 - 18 round capacity, the new law will necessitate a chance in tactics, no question. If your standard routine is to fire 4-5 shots, move, fire another string, etc., you're empty halfway through the first string. And that's not even training for scenarios involving multiple attackers, failures, etc. Those of us who carry single-stack firearms or revolvers won't have to change tactics too much, but it's still worth thinking about.

One thing that I haven't seen discussed is the "New New York Reload". I wonder if the new law in New York will cause New York concealed carry holders to start thinking about multiple firearms? Sure, it's only one extra round, but hey, every advantage you can get, right? It is positively mind-numblingly stupid that we have to think this way, but if you can only load 7 rounds into your magazine, why not carry an extra firearm, ideally one that takes the same magazines as your primary?

Isn't this stupid? You can carry as many handguns as you can carry - you can have as many magazines as you can carry - but you can't have more than seven rounds in a magazine. Does anyone with an IQ higher than planaria think that criminals are only going to load their magazines with 7 rounds? Really? There's a lovely bridge in Brooklyn that I'll sell you if you buy that claptrap. They don't care that the gun is stolen - even if they're breaking Federal laws - they're certainly not going to give a hairy rat's patoot that they're putting too many bullets in the magazine.

When I first heard about the change in the law, I thought it was a joke. Surely this idiocy couldn't be for real. It just had to have originated in the Onion, right? I mean, you can still buy and own a 10 round magazine, but if you load 8 rounds in it you're a felon? What the bloody hell is the purpose in limiting it to a 10 round magazine, then? If you're expected to limit yourself based only on the written law, why can't you have a 15 round magazine rather than a 10? Or a 30 round magazine?

If we're relying on the law-abiding people to remain law-abiding no matter how stupid the damn law, maybe we should rethink the law, no?

That is all.

Big Brother Will Keep You Safe...

Or, you know, not.

Witness: Mom grazed by bullet didn’t know what hit her

A Dorchester mother who was grazed by a bullet in the head Saturday night as she walked her teenage son and nephew home from the movies didn’t appear to realize at first how narrowly she cheated death, a witness who knows the 44-year-old woman told the Herald yesterday.

The witness, who gave his name only as Isaac, said he and his wife had just returned home from dinner and were “just coming out to go to the store to get some soda” shortly after 8:30 p.m.

The woman in question is recovering and appears to have suffered no lasting wounds. It appears to have merely grazed the side of her head and did not penetrate, so the story has a happy ending (well, as happy an ending a story about someone getting shot in the head can have). She ought to go out and buy a lottery ticket once she recovers, though.

What got me was this part:

The woman was walking home when she was hit next to a city ShotSpotter device — used by Boston police to zero in on shooting incidents — mounted on a telephone poll at Norton and Stonehurst streets.

Yet the police were on the scene after she had already started receiving treatment from people already there, and no arrests were made. In other words, the "ShotSpotter" device was completely and utterly useless. It alerted the police that someone in that area had been shot - you know, like the dozens of 911 calls made once the woman got hit. The system costs about a quarter of a million dollars - see this article for the figure - and the makers of the system tout it as a way to get police on scene faster.

Now, here's the thing. This is a system that has been in place going on seven years. Since one of the devices was placed  right where this woman was sitting, it stands to reason that this is one of the areas in which gun shots were common enough to warrant dropping $250K on one of these devices. Since these devices are supposed to assist police officers in getting to the scene of a shooting faster, there is obviously a direct link from the SpotShotter to the local PD. Even with all that in place, the police didn't show up in time to catch the person responsible.

Gun control, as Uncle Says, is what you do instead of something...

That is all.

Going Out On A Limb...

Just got this story in fresh off the BLNN:

Police arrest suspect they say shot 4, 1 fatally, in NYC shooting Friday

NEW YORK – New York City police have arrested the man they say fatally shot a man and wounded three other people in Brooklyn's Coney Island section.

Authorities say 29-year-old Joseph Brown was arrested Saturday morning. He allegedly shot four people inside an apartment in a public housing development on Friday.

Allow me to make a few predictions here:

1. Brown does not have a valid NY pistol permit.

2. Brown is in fact a prohibited person.

3. Brown did not obtain the firearm used in this shooting legally.

4. Brown has a long criminal record and should have been in jail at the time of the shooting.

The story doesn't get into any details, but I'll bet the four predictions above are accurate. All of the gun control rules that the forces against freedom claim we need won't stop these shootings. Only good, old-fashioned criminal justice - where career criminals are sent to jail and kept there - is going to put a stop to this sort of thing. The grandstanding over mass shootings like Newtown gloss over the real crime issue, where violent thugs are repeatedly slapped on the wrist over and over again.

But going after career thugs doesn't give you a scary-looking rifle to wave around, does it Senator Feinstein? Mayor Bloomberg would rather influence the Colorado legislature than address the failing of his own city to protect its citizens from violent criminals. All the assault weapons bans and magazine bans in the world aren't going to stop a gangbanger who has never served more than a month in jail for violent crime from shooting his next victim. At the very best those are charges pleaded away, often times they are completely ignored.

Unless of course you're a service member who happens to get caught with a 30-round magazine in New York City, that is...

That is all.

Get. The. Needle.

There's no other way to put it in this story.

Baby shot dead in stroller; 2 Georgia teens charged with murder

Brunswick, Georgia (CNN) -- Two teen boys in this coastal city were charged with murder Friday, accused in the fatal shooting of a 13-month-old boy who was in a stroller being pushed by his mother.

Aided by a description and a check of school attendance records to determine who was not in classes Thursday, officers searched for the young suspects and took them into custody, police said.

They approached a woman pushing her 13 month old baby in a stroller. At nine o'clock in the morning. They demanded money. When she told them she didn't have any money, they opened fire on her, striking her superficially. Then the animal shot her baby in the face at point blank range.

Yeah. We need gun control so that 17 year old animals don't shoot babies in the face. You know, on top of all the other laws that piece of shit broke.

Listen to this:

"A boy approached me and told me he wanted my money, and I told him I didn't have any money. And he said, 'Give me your money or I'm going to kill you and I'm going to shoot your baby and kill your baby,' and I said, 'I don't have any money,' and 'Don't kill my baby.'"

The boy tried to grab her purse and opened fire when she said tried to tell him she had no money, West said, with the shot grazing her head. She said the boy then shot her in the leg.

West continued, "And then, all of a sudden, he walked over and he shot my baby in the face."

Over her purse. He executed a thirteen month old child because his mother didn't have any money. I'm sorry. You forfeit your right to exist after that.

I'll wager they'll get the younger boy to testify in exchange for letting him go at 18. More than likely, this will get plead down to second-degree murder or manslaughter, and he'll be out in 10 years. This family has lost their child, he'll get a slap on the wrist, and when he gets out he'll be the badass stone-cold killer. He'll get another gun - because gun control laws are complete and utter failures - and he'll kill again. Mark my words.

Strap him into the chair and give him the needle and he'll never harm another human - put him down like the rabid animal that he is.

That is all.

And Then, Beating The SAME Dead Horse...

Joseph in IL sends in another story that is, again, both hysterical and infuriating.

Teen Playing With Gun Shoots Himself In Groin On NW Side

(side note: Really? This is a headline? Where, praytell, *is* the NW side of one's body?)

CHICAGO (STMW) – A 17-year-old boy suffered a gunshot wound Friday night when the gun he was handling as he rode around the Northwest Side Dunning neighborhood with some female friends went off and struck him in the groin.

The boy had earlier told police that he was shot by two masked men in the 3300 block of North Harlem Avenue.

The "boy" - really, are they honestly referring to a 17 year old gang member as a "boy"??? - shot himself while fooling around with a loaded weapon. He's damn lucky it didn't hit his femoral artery and killed his stupid ass. I was going to say he's lucky he didn't kill someone else, but someone like this isn't going to give a hairy rat's ass about killing someone else - in fact, it'd more than likely up his street cred.

There is a part of me that would just LOVE to see video footage from this incident. I'll wager he went from stone cold killah to crying like a baby when that gun went off. One second, he's Ice-T, driving around the 'hood with his women; the next second he's bleeding and in pain and he's friggin' Bobby Brady falling out of the treehouse and breaking his arm. Bet that video would go a lot further towards taking the street fight out of him than any jail time.

Here's the infuriating part, though:

It was not yet known as of Saturday morning what charges, if any, the boy faces.

REALLY? What charges, if any? ARE YOU S**TING ME??? A) He's 17 years old - too young to own a handgun in the state of IL; B) He's carrying a concealed weapon in a state that still does not permit carry of any kind; C) Illegal discharge of a firearm; D) Theft charges on the handgun - even if he got it out of his mama's sock drawer, he still stole the firearm; and E) Making a false report to the police. Just because he finally 'fessed up after telling conflicting stories doesn't make him any less culpable. That's the laws we KNOW he broke. If the gun was stolen from elsewhere - like, say, an FFL - there are plenty of other FEDERAL charges that could be tacked on.

But no, they're not sure if he'll be charged. I mean, he only broke a bunch of laws that should put him away for ten or more years; why on earth would they want to punish him? I mean, it's not like he committed the unpardonable sin of putting his son's picture on Facebook holding a 22 rifle, right? Why on earth would you want to punish a gang member for illegally carrying a stolen gun and discharging it within city limits? I mean, then you might have to go to court and prosecute him, in which case he might have to go to jail. Imagine what that would do to his self esteem.

If there's any justice, he shot his nuts off so he can't reproduce...

That is all.

Beating A Dead Horse of A Different Color...

Heh. Brad_in_MA sends in yet another green success story...

Mass Megawatts continues on downward spiral, reports net losses

Mass Megawatts Wind Power Inc. (OTC: MMMW) in Worcester, Mass. reported no revenues and a net loss of $149,000 for the three months that ended in January, the company’s third quarter.

...

Founded in 1997, the company has incurred an operating loss every year since, totalling $6.8 million to date. The company said in the filing that it is “soliciting additional equity investors through private placement offerings and is obtaining funding from Mass Megawatts’ CEO to fund these losses; however, no assurance can be given as to the success of these efforts.”

Got that? They have been in business since 1997 and have never turned a profit. Now, I'm curious. I thought that, in order to be considered a business - as opposed to a hobby - an entity had to turn a profit at least once every three years. Now, I have never claimed to be a business guy (I'm a biochemist working in sales who writes on the side. Go figure), but it would seem to me that after a period of time - say, five years - it would become evident to even the most diehard green that this business model is not working.

Here's the kicker:

The company had total assets of $26,961 as of Jan. 31.

I have that in my truck and my motorcycle, folks... How on earth can a business continue to call itself a business, when, after nearly 16 years they have never made a profit, have stock that sells literally for pennies, and have net assets equivalent to a small SUV? Now, I applaud their commitment - they have 14 employees, and have managed to stay afloat for the better part of a generation. But unless they have a comptroller with the financial-fu of Larry Correia, it's hard to see how they've managed to walk the fine line between barely staying afloat and going the way of the dodo for sixteen years.

But, hey, if they've managed to do it without taking stimulus money or bailouts, good for them!

That is all.

A Quick Thought...

So, the magazine ban in Colorado is a done deal, right? And as part of the rationale behind the ban were the Columbine school shooting and Aurora movie theater shooting, right?

So tell me, if you can. How does limiting the number of rounds a magazine can legally hold to 15 stop shootings - both of which happened in "gun-free" zones - which saw 13 and 12 deaths, respectively?

Honestly, I don't get this. Both the Columbine shooting, where 13 people were killed, and the Aurora movie theater shooting, where 12 people died, could just as easily have been accomplished with a 15 round magazine as a 30. The Aurora movie theater shooting, utilized an AR-15 pattern rifle and a pump-action shotgun, with the shotgun seeing more use after the AR-15 jammed from a high capacity magazine. The Columbine shooting happened right in the middle of the Federal Assault Weapons ban.

In the Aurora shooting - which was mentioned heavily by CO Governor Hickenlooper - there were 12 deaths and more than 50 people wounded. Even with a 30 round magazine (which, by the way, *IS* standard capacity, not high capacity), that's two reloads. If the people being shot were unable to stop the attack when he stopped to reload twice, why is there any indication they could stop the attack if he had to reload four times?

The forces against freedom can't answer this simple question because all they have on their sides is emotion and rhetoric. They would have you believe that there is a magic number that will automatically stop all mass murders, as though someone bent on killing a large number of people is going to care that their magazine is banned. They don't care about gun-free zones or laws against murder, but by gum they're not about to break that ban on magazines! We know that it takes a second or two at most to change a magazine - or to simply switch to a second firearm - and I suspect the forces against freedom know this as well.

They rely on ignorance and fear to push their agenda - when they're not outright lying; what does that tell you about the strength of their argument?

That is all.

They Didn't Care About The Tobacco Companies, Did They?

Reader A. sends in this story for our consideration:

Colt shuts plant, workers talk to Conn. lawmakers

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) -- The president of one of the nation's oldest gun manufacturers closed down his Connecticut factory Thursday morning and bused 400 of his workers to the state Capitol so they could personally urge lawmakers not to pass gun control legislation that they say could risk their livelihoods.

Dennis Veilleux, president of the Hartford-based Colt's Manufacturing Co., said even though he has spoken with legislators and Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's staff about his trepidations several times, he believes they don't truly understand the financial ramifications of the legislation being proposed in the wake of the deadly Dec. 14 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown.

Now, it's great that Colt did this, don't get me wrong. I think it is important that the folks passing these laws realize that their actions affect more than they realize. Should Colt decide to leave Connecticut - or simply shut their doors - there are hundreds of families without jobs. There's tax revenue that will be lost. The impact of making rash legislative decisions about a perfectly legal business is more than simply some faceless gun nut somewhere not being able to put a folding stock on a rifle.

However, like I mentioned in my title, it's not like they cared very much when they sued the tobacco industry into oblivion...

"These are the faces of the jobs at Colt," Veilleux said in an interview with The Associated Press while riding on a bus back to the factory. "Each of these people represents other people in the state. They represent the community and, in a lot of cases, they're the breadwinners of their families. And more and more, manufacturing jobs are hard to come by."

Colt has been operating in Connecticut for the past 175 years. 

Yep. And Connecticut - like MA with Smith & Wesson - is counting on that storied history to keep Colt in-state. I think, here, that Magpul has a strong chance to really blaze a trail if -  no, when - they make good on their promise to move out of Colorado.  As more information comes to light about the true nature of the current gun control bills proposed on the federal level - like the criminalization of lending someone a firearm for the afternoon - it becomes less likely that these regulations will pass. This means it's up to the individual states to pass gun control legislation, as we've already seen in New York.

If the states are made to feel the ramifications of passing feel-good, do-nothing gun control like magazine capacity bans or "assault weapon" bans, perhaps the focus can be turned towards the real issues. Instead of trying to ban the tool used, perhaps we might have a dialog on mental illness. Rather than blaming Glock for selling pistols with standard capacity magazines, we can look at why gang members and other criminals don't think twice about firing randomly into crowds like the gunfire that killed the young girl in Chicago who sang at President Obama's inauguration.

But then again, it's so easy to blame an inanimate object than the people that misuse them, isn't it?

That is all.

Sorry, I Had To Use This Title: Up In Smoke...

Marijuana Growing Operation Uncovered After Worcester Fire

WORCESTER (CBS) – Firefighters uncovered a marijuana growing operation in Worcester after a fire broke out in a first floor apartment on Cargill Street Thursday morning.

Firefighters were worried the fire had spread when they detected heat coming out of the second floor apartment. They broke down the door and found 15 to 20 pot plants growing inside.

When asked for comment, the Worcester Fire Chief simply replied, "Dude, I really need some Twinkies and Fritos right now"...

You know, I'm tempted to make an analogy between the failed War on Drugs and the proposed War on Guns they're pushing on us right now. Point out that marijuana is illegal for recreational use, that it has been illegal for decades, and yet folks still risk jail time and fines to procure it for their own use and to sell at a profit to others who would like to indulge. And that's for a recreational drug that, functionally, really isn't a hell of a lot different than alcohol in the end result: You use the product, your reality is altered for a few hours, you sleep it off.

These operations are generally easy to discover - as the article states, there was a steady stream of less-than-desirable characters coming out of the apartment. Not to mention that the equipment used to grow MJ in northern climates tends to use a disproportionate amount of electricity - basically, look for the electric meter whose needle is spinning like a airplane propeller and you've got a good chance there's a pot growing operation therein. Or just look for the stacks of pizza boxes and Twinkie wrappers.

And yet, this enterprising young gentleman risked a not-inconsequential amount of jail time to grow his own illicit substance.

What's the likelihood that - once the forces against freedom finally get their way and the Second Amendment is completely forsaken - guns will magically cease to exist? Forget, for a moment, that most firearms are durable goods and quite often will outlive their owners (speaking, as I am, as someone who owns several firearms older than my own father - and grandmother); making a working firearm really isn't that terribly difficult (making them very well, like the good folks at York Arms, mind you, takes lots of skill, knowledge, and I believe a touch of sorcery...)

Or, you know, they'll just import firearms from the same places they get heroin and cocaine?

That is all.

A Marine Is Never Unarmed...

Fortunately, in this case, this Marine was carrying the best tool for the job...

Marine with concealed carry permit stops man from beating woman

WEST ALLIS (WITI) — A Marine Corps veteran was able to stop a man early Tuesday, March 12th from nearly kicking a woman to death. It happened near 102nd and Lincoln, and Wisconsin’s concealed carry law made his efforts possible.

Charlie Blackmore was driving home from work at 4:00 a.m. along Lincoln Avenue when he saw something on the sidewalk. Blackmore didn’t realize it was a woman on the ground being kicked in the head and stomach until he got closer.

The Marine got out of his car, ordered the aggressor to stop, and pulled his concealed weapon when the man threatened him. Something tells me that, despite the man's size, that handgun saved him a lot of pain from the ass-whupping he'd have received if that Marine hadn't had a gun on him.

This is one of those really tough calls. The smart thing to do, from a purely legal standpoint, would be to remain in your car, honking the horn, while on the phone with 911. Draw attention to the situation, let it be known that you are alerting the authorities, but not get directly involved. If the aggressor turns his attention directly to you, you are in your vehicle and can leave, and you have the added bonus of drawing him away from the victim, giving the victim time to escape if possible.

This is a lot easier to type out than to do, though...

I've got to give that Marine a HUGE hand here. He managed to balance stopping the attack, keeping the victim from receiving any further injury, *and* not bashing the SOB into an unrecognizable pulp even though he had every right in the world to do just that. He handled that situation about as perfectly as he could have - although a part of me wishes the jackass had attacked him so he'd have been justified in either shooting him or beating the ever-loving snot out of him.

The remainder of the article, though, is in furiating. The cops demand to see his concealed carry permit? Are you serious? This guy intervenes in a felony assault, saving this woman further injury, and all the cops care about is that he has the proper permit? Really? The next part about the cops not condoning the Marine's actions don't surprise me - we hear this in the majorty of citizen-involved crime thwarting - but that they felt the need to both check his permit and include that in the article as though it meant anything... What if he had been open carrying, which is legal in WI without a permit?

In any case, we have a clear-cut case of a defensive gun use where not a single shot was fired. I don't expect this story to make the nightly news; I don't expect anyone outside of the gun blogosphere to even notice it. But when the forces against freedom tell you that there are no instances of this happening - which they will do - here's yet another story where a good guy with a gun saves someone's life. Not the police, not the state, but an ordinary joe on his way home from work.

Semper fi, Marine; job very well done.

That is all.

Thanks to Joseph in IL for the story!

Why Do You Need a Gun? You Can Just Call 911...

Because sometimes they don't care that your violent ex is kicking in your door after threatening to kill you...

911 call reveals last moments of woman's life; case prompted array of changes by Dallas police

DALLAS – A television station has broadcast a leaked copy of a terrified woman's call to 911 last summer just before she was killed in a case that has prompted widespread changes in the way police respond to reported domestic disturbances. 

The lack of urgency by police to 32-year-old Deanna Cook's Aug. 17 call caused a public outcry and led to the punishment of dispatchers and the review of police procedures.

While she begged for her life, the 911 dispatcher was on the line. The dispatcher did not relay the urgency to the responding police officers, who took over an hour to reach the residence. They didn't find anything out of the ordinary, so they left, only to come back a few days later for a wellness check at the request of the family. The operator who failed to pass on the urgency of the request to responding officers was suspended.

Boy, it's too bad she didn't have a double barrel shotgun she could fire into the air, right Uncle Joe?

So, let's recap. This woman had an abusive husband. There had been repeated 911 calls regarding him and violent behavior. The call comes in, she can be heard pleading with another person, and yet this still isn't given priority. Woman with a violent ex, repeated calls, no urgency relayed. Responding officers show up when they're in the area nearly an hour later - and leave. Now, maybe she was still alive at that point. Maybe she was dead seconds after the call was completed.

The fact is, she relied on 911 and she died. If she'd relied on 1911, she might still be dead, true, but she'd certainly have done no worse than what happened. Maybe she'd have had a fighting chance. Instead, she relied on the system that the forces against freedom tell us we should use rather than owning guns, and she paid a steep price for delegating responsibility for her own safety to others. I don't mean to bash 911 or dispatchers in general here; it's just a reaction to the concept that I should rely on a stranger miles away when someone is threatening me or mine to which I object.

You are your own first responder. I don't know why this concept is so hard for people to grasp. No one bats an eye at the thought of having a fire extinguisher in their house - it's common sense that if a small, manageable fire breaks out, having the tools to quickly and effectively battle that fire handy prevents massive loss later. It certainly doesn't mean you want to pretend you're a firefighter. Ditto having a good first aid kit - if something happens, even in the best circumstance help is going to be a few minutes away, and having tools to handle minor medical emergencies is part of a good safety net. It doesn't you think you're an EMT or a doctor.

Yet you mention having a firearm for self-defense and all of a sudden you're a vigilante or a cop wanna-be. I have yet to have anyone on the anti-freedom side explain to me why having a firearm handy in case of a violent encounter is any different than having a fire extinguisher in case of fire or a first aid kit in case of accident. The fiream is a tool for a specific scenario; it is not a magic talisman to prevent violent encounters from happening but to assist you in surviving the encounter with - ideally - minimal injury to yourself.

Why do we treat self-defense as less important than fire safety or first aid?

That is all.

Ouch, Said The Dead Horse, Stop Hitting Me!

Right. We have a gun problem.

Search continues for mob of teens who attacked MBTA bus driver

Transit police say the attack on a Route 16 bus driver began with a fare dispute with a female passenger.

"(A) female threw her pass at the operator,” MBTA Transit Police superintendent Joseph O’Connor said.

Then 15-20 teenagers assaulted the driver, police said. It happened at 1:15 a.m. Saturday at Columbia Road and Geneva Avenue.

The article later states that, on average, three bus drivers are assaulted every week. What's not stated, and would be nice to know, if it's because of stories similar to this one, where a group of people attack at once, or if it's typically a single aggressor. I'd imagine that group attacks are less common, but not uncommon. There's a "pack mentality" or "mobthink" at play that comes into play here, with the individual shielded from repercussion as a result of being part of a larger group.

Now, here's a couple of follow-up thought questions. First off, what's the percentage of offenders who are caught? I would imagine that the buses are monitored by surveillance camera; it seems like it should be straightforward to catch at least some of the people assaulting bus drivers. More importantly, what's the average sentence handed down for assaulting a bus driver? I'd wager that the time served is measured in days - if not hours.

You see, we clutch our chests and bleat about the "easy availability of guns" that can "hunt people" according to Senator Feinstein, when the real issue is that we have a large portion of the population that simply will not abide by the law. The reason they won't abide by the law is that we don't enforce the laws we already have - as witnessed by the recent attempt to make straw purchases of firearms illegal - even though they've been illegal for 45 years.

Unless and until we start enforcing existing laws and start putting criminals in jail, these sorts of attacks will happen no matter what tools are - or aren't - available.

That is all.

Another Couple Swings At That Horse...

Yankeefried sent this one in. Yet more proof that those gun free zones work so well...

Teacher Robbed At Gunpoint Inside Boston School

BOSTON (CBS) – An armed robber held up a teacher at gunpoint inside a small arts school in a Jamaica Plain neighborhood Wednesday night. The incident, along with a second robbery in the area Thursday night has police stepping up patrols in the area near Eliot Street, an area considered a walking neighborhood near Monument Square.

On Wednesday night, a suspect described as a black man in his 20′s, about 5-feet-8 inches to 6-feet-1 inches tall, medium build and wearing a hoodie made his way to the second floor of the Eliot School of Fine and Applied Arts.

Now, I'm going to go out on a limb here. I'm going to guess that our budding young wealth redistribution artist didn't have an unrestricted MA License to Carry Firearms. I'll go even further our and guess that he probably didn't have a permit of any kind. I'd wager the gun was not purchased at a local gun shop - and probably not even at a gun show, loophole or not. Unrestricted permits are given to the very wealthy and well-connected, not the hoi polloi, in Boston, so he was almost certainly carrying without a permit and definitely breaking the prohibition against guns in schools.   Oh, and there's the armed robbery part, too, lest we lose sight of the crimes committed...  

What got me most, though, was the comment about the teacher knowing how to "give stuff away" after having lived in the city his whole life. The assumption there is that he's been robbed multiple times and is prepared for such an eventuality - perhaps a spare wallet with a handful of bills and an old cell phone? It makes a lot of sense if you're in a victim-rich environment like an inner city in a "may issue" state where the criminals have guns and knives and you're disarmed, I suppose.  

I'll add in this story from Scott in MI here:

Gun thief from Illinois sentenced after helping steal 455 firearms

EAST ST. LOUIS • Denis M. Joiner, 20, of Chicago, was sentenced in federal court here Friday to nine years in prison for a series of thefts from gun stores in Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana, prosecutors said.  

Joiner and three other Chicago men stole a total of 455 guns, prosecutors said, including 124 from a Salem, Ill., store known as “Hunting Stuff,” that they then sold in Chicago.

Nine years. If Federal is anything like state, he could be out in as little as 6 years if he keeps his nose clean. That's for being part of a multi-state crime syndicate that broke Federal gun laws HUNDREDS OF TIMES. Think about the sheer volume of FEDERAL charges that should have applied here: transporting stolen goods across state lines, stealing from FFLs, selling firearms without a license, selling to unlicensed individuals; I would imagine there should have been enough charges to put this guy away until the sun burned out and the earth became a lifeless ball of ice.  

Here's the kicker: He got the BIGGEST sentence out of the ring. Two other men were sentenced to six and six and a half years in prison. The fourth member of the firearm theft ring was killed, so we have no idea what kind of pitiful sentence he would have received. The three sentences COMBINED add up to 21.5 years, for crimes that carry a minimum sentence of 5 years - PER FIREARM.  

This.  

This is exactly what we're talking about. This is what makes those of us on the pro-rights side absolutely apoplectic with rage. Here we have a textbook example of people breaking the existing gun laws and incredibly light sentences handed out. If I were to cross the line into NH and buy a new P-Mag, I could go to jail for five years - more than half what the biggest sentence was for stealing literally hundreds of firearms. If Zercool loads 8 rounds into his 10 round 10/22 magazine, he's looking at a stiffer penalty over in New York.  

But you set up a crime spree across several midwestern states where you steal hundreds of guns from licensed FFLs and sell them on the street and you get sentenced to six years? This is supposed to stop criminals from being criminals? The laws aren't stopping them. The punishments are laughable. So what's the response to the growing criminal element? Let's ban the shoulder thing that goes up! Let's limit magazines to seven rounds! Let's make sure that good, honest, law-abiding people are so confused and scared about the byzantine gun laws that they just give up altogether. Couple this with a psychotic vice president exhorting people to break laws left and right - as well as the rules of gun safety - and it's hard not to see this as deliberate.  

We've got crooks robbing teachers in a gun-free zone in a city that doesn't give out gun permits. We have a crime wave spanning multiple states and hundreds - if not thousands - of felonies committed and a sentence that can't even be called a slap on the wrist. The honest-to-goodness criminals are being coddled with kid gloves, being sentenced to jail times more suitable for passing bad checks than arming half the criminals in the midwest, and the honest people of IL can't even get carry permits yet. Your average person working in Boston can't get a license to carry for any reason, but the crooks have nothing to fear when they get caught, because that's one of the first charges to get tossed in a plea deal.  

Unless and until the forces against freedom show us that they're willing to start enforcing the tens of thousands of gun laws already on the books, we shouldn't even be thinking about adding a single one.  

That is all.  

That Horse Is Dead Jim.

I intend to keep saying this as long as they keep claiming we have gun problem: We have a criminal problem, not a gun problem.

Chicago man, 72, shot dead on way to dialysis treatment

CHICAGO – A 72-year-old man waiting for a ride to his dialysis treatment has been shot and killed outside his home on Chicago's South Side.

William Strickland was waiting to be picked up for kidney dialysis treatment around 3:30 a.m. Saturday in the Roseland neighborhood.

Middle of the afternoon. In front of his own home. Shot dead, allegedly in a robbery, in a city that had until very recently banned handguns in the only state in the union with no legal carry of firearms. But we need a ban on "assault weapons". We need a ban on "high capacity" magazines. We need to cap purchases to one gun a month. Would any of these proposals stop a vicious thug from murdering an old man for the few dollars in his pocket?

Why is it that we all know the answer to that, yet our politicians push the same tired, failed arguments over and over? How on earth is anything they're proposing going to do a damn thing about a criminal element that fears neither judicial punishment nor effective defense from their victims? "Ban Assault weapons!" "High capacity magazines!" - they're like twisted parrots, spewing out their bumper sticker slogans without ever stopping to think about what they're saying.

I mean, they can't tell a barrel shroud from a folding stock - how on earth are they ever going to know what might help gun violence?

That is all.

Another dispatch from...

(image courtesy of Robb Allen)

The Problem, In A Nutshell...

We don't have a gun problem. We have a criminal problem. I know I've made this statement before, and I will continue to make it unless and until people start paying attention. Last week there was a high-profile shooting in Las Vegas, right on the strip, where a man in one vehicle opened fire on a man in another vehicle, killing that man and causing a crash that claimed the life of two other people - as well as shutting down the Las Vegas strip for an entire day.

Here's some more information about the shooter:

Vegas murder suspect brags online about fast life

LAS VEGAS — Las Vegas triple murder suspect Ammar Harris has a smirk on his face in a 90-second YouTube video that shows him flashing a thick stack of $100 bills.

The video is just one of many online displays of bravado being examined by police in which Harris boasts of a high-rolling lifestyle of luxury cars, prostitutes and boat trips with scantily clad women. The 26-year-old is the subject of a multi-state manhunt after a Maserati driver was shot dead on the Las Vegas Strip last Thursday and a taxi driver and passenger died in the fiery chain reaction crash that followed.

There's speculation that Harris is a drug dealer and a pimp, and has openly bragged about his illegal escapades. He's obviously doing well, living in a gated community and driving a six-figure SUV; as well as posting videos of himself counting out stacks of money. Obviously, the thug life pays well.

But here's the issue:

Harris was arrested last year in Las Vegas in a 2010 prostitution case using the name Ammar Asim Faruq Harris. He was charged with robbery, sexual assault, kidnapping and coercion with a weapon, and police sought charges of pandering by force and felon in possession of concealed weapon. Court records show that case was dismissed last June.

Now, I will readily admit to not knowing the specifics of the case. Perhaps this was a trumped-up framejob that no prosecutor wanted to touch, there is always that possibility. But the "felon in possession of a [concealed] weapon" charge should have been a slam-dunk. He had been convicted of trying to sell a stolen handgun some six years prior. He's a prohibited person. That's a federal offense right there, a prohibited person being in possession of a firearm.

Yet the case was dismissed.

We are not serious about crimes committed with firearms, plain and simple. Politicians - either because they are evil or stupid - propose laws that will not do a damned thing to keep guns out of the hands of people like Mr. Harris here. He's a prohibited person. He has - at least twice - demonstrably gotten his hands on a firearm since becoming a prohibited person. What's another law or 50? Does anyone honestly think that:

a) Mr. Harris is going to limit himself to 7 rounds?
b) Mr. Harris is going to pin the stock on his AK-47?
c) Mr. Harris gives a flying rat's ass about a carry permit?
d) Mr. Harris worries about "gun-free" zones?

Why should he? He's been shown, time and time again, that the court system is a broken joke, a travesty where he commits all kinds of crimes and then is shown the door, free to commit more. He has repeatedly broken the laws of the state without any apparent effect on his persona or his personal life - living a lifestyle that many aspire to, all because the judicial system refuses to punish him for the crimes he commits.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Obviously, he's gone too far this time and will certainly face jail time over these killings, especially where a tourist was killed. It's pretty even odds that some politician somewhere will try to use this case as an example of why we need more gun control; I mean, as my good friend Weerdbeard is fond of saying, if we make guns as illegal as murder, then no one will be murdered with guns, right? They'll ignore - with the help of the compliant media - the fact that this felon has broken countless gun laws and not been punished.

Unless and until we get serious about our criminal control, anything and everything we attempt over gun control will fail. Miserably. Look, here's the thing. You pass UK-style gun laws. Second Amendment is repealed, all we have left are our double barreled shotguns (since Joe Biden says they're okay). Does anyone honestly think that Mr. Harris is not going to have a modern semi-automatic firearm? If there's money to be made, does anyone think that Mr. Harris would pause - even for a second - to sell a modern semi-automatic firearm to another felon or a crazy person?

Punish criminals, not inanimate objects.

That is all.

Speechless.

But the media's not biased my hairy Italian ass.

NRA uses Justice memo to accuse Obama on guns

WASHINGTON — The National Rifle Association is using a Justice Department memo it obtained to argue in ads that the Obama administration believes its gun control plans won't work unless the government seizes firearms and requires national gun registration — ideas the White House has not proposed and does not support.

The NRA's assertion and its obtaining of the memo in the first place underscore the no-holds-barred battle under way as Washington's fight over gun restrictions heats up.

Read the rest of the article. The plans outlined by the Obama administration can only work if there is registration and confiscation - yet simply because the Obama administration has not come out and admitted this, the NRA ad is misleading? This is a NEWS article? This is NOTHING more than raw, naked propaganda put out in a pathetic attempt to discredit the NRA.

I am sickened by what passes for "news" today, especially considering how easy it is to refute and fact-check these biased @$$holes.

Notice, mind you, that there is no refutation of the claims of the NRA. There is absolutely ZERO mention of how the government plans to go from millions of "assault weapons" in private hands to any sort of meaningful reduction in crimes committed with so-called "assault weapons. There are millions of these rifles in private hands. There are, quite simply, enough semi-automatic rifles and standard capacity magazines out there to last for centuries.

There is, quite simply, no way to keep these out of the hands of gangs and the mentally unbalanced without widespread confiscation, and this memo acknowledges this fact. 

And the media has come un-freakin'-glued. They know that the vast majority of American people will not stand for confiscation, and while the media is quick to dismiss the thought of registration, that's exactly what the "gun show loophole" is. The "loophole" is that in some states it is legal to sell a firearm to someone else without recording the sale with the government. Forcing every state to record the sales is *precisely* registration, and calling it anything else is nothing more than doublespeak.

Notice, too, that the administration isn't commenting on the memo. There's nothing discrediting the memo - which, as damaging as it is, would be trumpeted on every newspaper were there any information that it was falsified or incorrect. Taking the memo, then, as correct and having come from the Obama administration, there's little else to conclude other than what the NRA is claiming.

The more I read the article, the angrier I get. Look at this nonsense:

The administration has not proposed gun registration, buybacks or banning all firearms. But gun registration and ownership curbs are hot-button issues for the NRA and other gun-rights groups, which strenuously oppose the ideas.

This is allegedly a "news" article, folks, and they are deliberately attempted to obfuscate what's going on - the NRA has never accused Obama of wanting to ban all guns, plain and simple. The administration *HAS* proposed gun registration in the form of "universal background checks" - if you want every transfer to go through an FFL - who are bound by law to keep records of every transfer - there's no other way to have "universal" checks. As for buybacks, the administration hasn't proposed gun buybacks, that is true - but the NRA hasn't said that they have.

And excuse the living bejeezus out of me, but saying I can't own a rifle with certain features - a *BAN* if you will - MOST CERTAINLY IS AN OWNERSHIP CURB.

Dear lord. We are living in George Orwell's 1984. War is peace. Freedom is slavery. The NRA is out of line for claiming that the Obama administration wants to curb gun ownership - yet the proposals put forth include A BAN ON CERTAIN WEAPONS. There is, quite simply, no other way to put this - the Obama administration wants to curb the kinds of weapons you can own. There's no putting lipstick on this pig, yet the media blindly flails along, trying their best to pretend that "all is well".

If it wasn't my constitutionally enumerated rights at stake, I'd laugh at the Baghdad Bob-like approach to "news" that our Fifth Column seems to be taking...

That is all.

Democracy In Action

Brad_in_MA sent in this heartwarming story about an overzealous town selectman and the democratic process.

Westford Selectmen Withdraw Proposal To Ban Assault Weapons

WESTFORD (CBS) – A thunderous round of applause and a standing ovation greeted the news Wednesday night that a proposed town bylaw to restrict some assault weapons was going to be officially withdrawn.

The overwhelming majority of the close to 400 people who packed a special meeting of the Westford Board of Selectmen opposed the idea.

You know, it's funny. The article takes it upon itself to fact-check NRA President David Keene's comment that "hammers kill more people than guns" (they made sure to correct his statement to rifles only), yet they failed to properly assess the number of people at the meeting in opposition to this plan (well in excess of 7-800, easily, based on folks who were there). They also neglect to mention that this was the re-scheduled meeting, caused when the first meeting had so many people in attendance that the fire marshal had to close it down.

If you read into the article, Selectman Jeffries is whining about outside forces that helped stop this ban. What's especially ironic is that the ban was so poorly and hastily written (other bylaw changes for 2012 written in 2011 have not been discussed yet) that it could have affected people outside of Westford driving through the town (including your humble host). In his zeal to sieze upon the Newtown tragedy and make a power grab against certain firearms, he tried foisting a bill on the town that could have affected anyone in the state of Massachusetts.

And let's recap, shall we? There are only a couple hundred thousand gun owners in Massachusetts to begin with. We have an "assault weapons" ban, where collapsible stocks, flash suppressors, and bayonet lugs are already illegal. We are limited to 10 round magazines unless those magazines are 20 years old or older. We have an "Approved Firearms Roster" for handguns. We have "may issue" licensing, whereby your constitutionally enumerated right to keep and bear arms is left to the whim of the local licensing authority, who can approve - or deny - your license for any reason whatsoever.

These measures are not sufficient?

No, Selectmen Jeffries, what you saw Wednesday night was pure democracy in action. Your poorly constructed, hastily enacted proposal was roundly rejected by the people of your town and the surrounding communities that would also be affected. Gun owners in Massachusetts are tired of being treated worse than criminals. The folks that would be affected by this bylaws are only the good, honest, law-abiding folks, not the criminals and insane that might misuse them. Your proposal was fatally flawed, and you didn't enjoy having those flaws put on display for the entire state to see.

You wanted your town to be the first to pass such a bylaw, in the hopes that other towns would follow suit. Thank you for that - because now, having seen the incredible wave of opposition, it's very unlikely that other towns will attempt such poorly thought out measures. We are watching, very carefully, for other crude assaults on what are left of our Second Amendment rights, and we will attend as many town meetings as we have to, in however many cities and towns as needed, to make sure our voices are heard and our rights remain intact.

Well, "intact" is a misnomer for the Second Amendment in Massachusetts - perhaps "stopped from further infringements" would be more correct.

That is all