Another Fuddite Steps Up to His Petard...

...and, as Josh so eloquently put it, says, "Please, martyr me next."
(emphasis mine -- ed.)

The speed with which Zumbomania spread, the number of comments it drew, and the rabid nature of same were a revelation. Overnight, this thing became as big as Janet Jackson’s clothing failure or—dare I say it?—Britney Spears’ shaved head. Jim Zumbo is now as employable as the Unabomber, and Sarah Brady will no doubt adopt his comments to her own gun-control purposes.

For the last several days I’ve been visiting all manner of blogs and chatrooms, which has reminded me of when I used to deliver used clothing to the local mental hospital. I’ve tried to make some sense of it all, but because the waters are still full of blood and body parts continue to rain from the sky, I haven’t come up with any Great Truths. Lacking that, here are some Lesser Truths.

What Jim said was ill-considered. He’s entitled to his beliefs, but when a writer of his stature comes out against black guns, it sure as hell does not help our cause.

Even so, Jim made an immediate apology. He did not equivocate, or qualify, or make excuses. He acted like a gentleman and said he was wrong, and he was sorry. Apparently this is not enough anymore. We now live in the era of one strike and you're out.

For 40 years, Jim has been a spokesman and ambassador of good will for hunting. Through his tireless efforts as a teacher and lecturer on hunting and hunting skills, he has done more for the sport than any 250 of the yahoos who called for his blood.

Jim has paid dearly for what he said. He has lost his blog and his association with Remington. Cabela’s has suspended its sponsorship of his TV show; and Outdoor Life has accepted his offer to sever ties. To all the chatroom heroes who made him unemployable, I have a word of warning: You’ve been swinging a two-edged sword. A United States in which someone can be ruined for voicing an unpopular opinion is a dangerous place. Today it was Jim’s turn. Tomorrow it may be yours.

If Sarah Brady is smart—and she is very smart—she will comb through the same blogs and chatrooms I’ve been reading, excerpt some of the most vicious and foul-mouthed entries, print them up, and distribute them to Congress. Then it will be interesting to see how the men and women who wrote that stuff enjoy seeing their efforts being put to use by every anti-gunner in America.

How nice. Zumbo called the black rifle owners terrorists, and now David Petzal's likening those who rightfully called for his sacking to mental patients. To be fair, he's not characterizing all those who disagree with Zumbo as such, but I've said it before and I'll say it again -- when you propose to limit people's rights, for whatever reason, for good or bad that's basically the kind of reaction you get. The persecution of the American gun owner didn't start yesterday; it's been a low-level but sustained campaign over the last several decades, since at least 1934. First they clamped down on full-auto, then they threw a tangled web of federal regulation down on the gun business as a whole, then they tangled it more with background checks and waiting periods, then came that odious ban on semi-autos, and all the while none of that, none of that has accomplished the goal the gun-haters claim they want -- crime reduction. (We all know what they want away from the cameras & microphones, though...)
It seems to me that we're screwed either way as far as the antis' reactions are concerned, though. My money says Sarah Brady would be using our reaction against us no matter what it was. If we were silent, she'd say we pretty much agree that the black rifles have no legitimate sporting purpose (or she and her evil minions will at least try to spin it that way).
Some will say that the negative reaction could have been a little more mild, but I don't agree. This was basically one of our own selling us out. He can claim ignorance all he wants, but I said this in earlier comments and I'll say it now:

I'm sure hunters are a fine lot, and I don't begrudge them their sport, but I do fully expect them to know that owning any firearm is in and of itself a political statement and that we're all in this together -- especially after more than 40 years of being involved in an industry of which firearms have been such a big part. There was no excuse whatsoever for what Jim Zumbo said. Not one. "Fine and great things which Mr. Zumbo and his sponsors and publishers have brought to the hunting fraternity" be damned.

And that's where this comment comes in: "A United States in which someone can be ruined for voicing an unpopular opinion is a dangerous place. Today it was Jim’s turn. Tomorrow it may be yours."
An unpopular opinion. Zumbo basically called millions of black rifle owners terrorists, and Petzal boils that down to an "unpopular opinion." But it's bigger than that, even. One more time, no gun is safe, even the All-American deer rifle that sits in the gun rack. And whoever hasn't figured that out is just, flatly, willfully blind, and has no business being within ten miles of any business involving firearms. We can only hope that Michael Bane is right when he says "for the first time in years, hunters and shooters are on the same page." There's no excuse by now for us not being. There never has been. We should have been hanging together all along.

Zumbo's Favor to Gunnies and the Industry, and Other Observations

Via AlanDP comes this, from The Shooting Wire. Read it all, and you might want to do it today, for as Alan says, they probably don't archive past articles....

...we might find that we owe Jim Zumbo.

We don't owe him our loyalty, our support, or our forgiveness, but we owe him for motivating us to tell the industry they'd better start paying attention to the silent majority.

...
Even if you call us "shooters" or "paper punchers" or "plinkers" or whatever, there are many more of us than there are hunters. And we're neither terrorists nor fools.

When I made the decision to begin The Shooting Wire, some outdoor writers questioned why I would start a "shooting" wire instead of a "hunting" wire.

Today, they know why.

The in the firearms industry, is not in hunting rifles. It is in those "terrorist" black guns (in a growing variety of calibers, further reflecting the platform's many useful applications) and the military-style handguns that accompany them. Ditto ammo and accessories. There are many, many manufacturers in the "black rifle" space - and more of them are coming.
...

So what have we learned, I asked Doug Painter of the National Shooting Sports Foundation?

"The important perspective from our side of the street," Painter said, "is that whether you hunt or shoot in competition or for sport with a primitive muzzleloader or the latest high-tech rifle, what links us is more important that what divides us. We may shoot cowboy, skeet, practical or whatever, but our common belief has to be the Second Amendment - everything else is just a matter of style."

He also had a sobering reminder.

"The flip side," he said, "is to remember our opponents have all of us in their crosshairs."

And he's right. Long after the Jim Zumbo controversy is over (it will probably never be forgotten - or forgiven), we will still face the ongoing assaults on our Second Amendment rights.

Now that we've discovered our voice - we must continue to apply it to our opponents.

--Jim Shepherd

Here's hoping he's right about the discovery of our common voice and thread. They are indeed after all of us, and after some 42 years of writing, Zumbo should have figured that out by now. The writing was on the wall long ago, with NFA '34 and GCA '68, and if Zumbo didn't see that, he had absolutely no business being in any kind of industry having anything to do with firearms. It's bad enough there are still people out there who think their hunting guns are safe from the insidious spin the antis use to demonize private firearm ownership, but for someone in his position to spout such malevolent rhetoric is absolutely inexcusable. He deserves exactly what he's getting.

A Good Idea

Yes, friends, Lady Tam has the right idea...

I may have mentioned that I buy a box of .22LR ammunition pretty much every day.

I think that today I'll be buying some Remington.

I can't do it till later in the week, but one o' them big ole 250-round value packs of .45acp is in my immediate future. Remington deserves to be rewarded; they stepped up in a big way for gun owners today.
And as Fits reports, it looks like Mr. Zumbo might just lose yet another sponsorship:

While we fully support Mr. Zumbo’s First Amendment right of free speech, we believe his opinions on this matter are counter to those shared by Cabela’s and many of our customers. Cabela’s Legal Department is currently reviewing contractual obligations and commitments regarding our sponsorship of the Jim Zumbo Outdoors television show.

No doubt it's been a hell of a Monday for Mr. Zumbo. It'll be interesting to see how long he stays in the Outdoor Life stable. Anybody wanna put a wager? By the end of the week, maybe even next?

Monday Morning Levity

Via SayUncle & NK, comes this...funny stuff!

Zumbo Goes Down: Assorted Thoughts

Looks like Jim Zumbo has already taken at least one huge hit, on a holiday weekend, no less!
David Codrea requested & received confirmation that Remington Arms was terminating its business relationship with Zumbo due to his outrageous remarks, notwithstanding the pathetic attempt to cover his tail after the firestorm of criticism his remarks generated. He has more business relationships as well, all of which are arguably in an equal amount of danger.
It just goes to show, you better watch what you say -- especially when you have such a bully pulpit as Zumbo did. Some would no doubt cast the urged boycotts as an infringement on Zumbo's free speech rights, but to me that shows quite a short-sighted perspective, because the fact is Zumbo did more or less the same thing Charlie Meyers did -- and Zumbo works for an outlet that is largely dependent on our continued right to keep and bear arms for any and all legal purposes! You can't separate the hunters from the shooters, no matter how much the traditionalists like Zumbo would like to think you could, because once again the fact is that the antis ultimately want ALL our guns -- not just the defensive sidearms & homeland defense ("assault") rifles.
I don't know how many more hunters recognize that this fine sunny morning, but I do know that what's happened here is quite a testament to the power of the shooting community. To an extent once upon a time it was a bit harder to mobilize in a timely manner when it came to situations like this, but with the practically instantaneous nature of the Internet, our power has been magnified perhaps immeasurably -- as evidenced, once again, by the fact that the wheels were already turning before this morning at Remington.
A proud moment for us, indeed -- and if we'd direct that power towards Congress as we did this hidebound hunting scribe, all sorts of good things could happen. Something to ponder...

UPDATE: Via Tam, we have this e-mail from Tommy Millner, the CEO of Remington Arms, to the site administrator of GlockTalk:

You may feel free to advise your people of the following.

Remington is shocked and dissappointed by the comments of Jim zumbo which have been widely circulated on the web. These comments do not reflect either my own feelings or those of my company!

Accordingly we are severing all business ties with Mr zumbo and any of his companies effective immediately and will make a formal release tomorrow to this effect.

We appreciate the passionate support of our right to bear arm arms by all in the shooting sports.

Sincerely

Tommy millner
CEO

Heh. Cobra in the sleeping bag, indeed. ;-)

Well, That Didn't Take Long...But Oh, the Damage Is Done

Looks like The Fuddite of the Year, Jim Zumbo, recognized the hornet's nest he stepped in and is now backtracking...

I was hunting coyotes, and after the hunt was over and being beat up by 60 mph winds all day, I was discussing hunting with one of the young guides. I was tired and exhausted, and I should have gone to bed early. When the guide told me that there was a "huge" following of hunters who use AR 15's and similar weapons to hunt prairies dogs, I was amazed. At that point I wrote the blog, and never thought it through.

Maybe not, and he might well be sorry, but it seems to me like he was saying he was sorry for speaking his mind on something he knew nothing about, as opposed to insulting and alienating millions of black rifle owners with his commentary -- which is only furthered by his whine about being insulted himself and his half-hearted attempt to establish his pro-liberty bona fides:

I never intended to be devisive, and I certainly believe in United we Stand, Divided we Fall. I've been an NRA member for 40 years, have attended 8 national NRA conventions in the last 10 years, and I'm an advisory board member for the United States Sportsmen's Alliance which actively fights anti-hunters and animal rights groups for hunter's rights.

What really bothers me are some of the unpatriotic comments leveled at me. I fly the flag 365 days a year in my front yard. Last year, through an essay contest, I hosted a soldier wounded in Iraq to a free hunt in Botswana. This year, through another essay contest, I'm taking two more soldiers on a free moose and elk hunt.

As some others have said, what does it matter what he did yesterday if he stabs other gun owners in the back today, as he did? He might well fly that flag, but he seems to be perfectly content to take a big, steaming crap on what it stands for, which speaks a hell of a lot louder than any kind of symbolic gesture. More hollow words follow:

Believe it or not, I'm your best friend if you're a hunter or shooter, though it might not seem that way. I simply screwed up.

Not hardly. A best friend wouldn't throw you under the bus in a short-sighted attempt to protect his own interests, which is what Zumbo did. I agree completely with Xavier:

You have shown unequivocally who you are. You cannot drop enough names, attend enough conferences or pay enough dues to the NRA to change your words. These were your words. They were spoken when you thought you were unopposed, and you thought your Elmer Fudd readership would fawn over your elder gun writer wisdom. Wake up Zumbo! It's a new world! The internet ain't a damned gun rag!

When you said "I'll go so far as to call them 'terrorist' rifles", you called every American serviceman a terrorist. Now I don't care if you fly a thousand flags in your yard, paint your whole damned house red, white and blue, and take the entire 82nd Airborne to a free hunt in Botswana, you cannot change that. Those are your words, and they reflect your thoughts and character.

Abso-freakin-lutely. This clown has potentially set the movement to regain our rights back for years, if not decades. And he should be canned. Pronto.

(More thoughts from Michael Bane, Kevin Baker, and Yosemite Sam.)

Fuddite Alert

Via THR and a few other places, we have yet another camo-clad anti-gunner -- Jim Zumbo, who apparently is the hunting editor for Outdoor Life magazine spouting off the same old anti-anything-but-hunting crap:

The guides on our hunt tell me that the use of AR and AK rifles have a rapidly growing following among hunters, especially prairie dog hunters. I had no clue. Only once in my life have I ever seen anyone using one of these firearms.

I call them "assault" rifles, which may upset some people. Excuse me, maybe I'm a traditionalist, but I see no place for these weapons among our hunting fraternity. I'll go so far as to call them "terrorist" rifles. They tell me that some companies are producing assault rifles that are "tackdrivers."

Sorry, folks, in my humble opinion, these things have no place in hunting. We don't need to be lumped into the group of people who terrorize the world with them, which is an obvious concern. I've always been comfortable with the statement that hunters don't use assault rifles. We've always been proud of our "sporting firearms."

I wouldn't call him a traditionalist. I'd call him an enemy of freedom.

...hunters don't use assault rifles.

How about sniper rifles? Do they use those? Mr. Zumbo might not want to call them that, but I guaran-damn-tee you, that's exactly what those who would ban, confiscate and/or otherwise restrict the use of AKs and ARs are going to cast his precious deer rifle as before they come after them. No doubt the hacks at the Brady Center & the VPC are reading this and thinking, "that whole divide-and-conquer strategy of ours is working like a charm..."
I absolutely do not think any free person deserves to be disarmed -- but there are fleeting moments, such as when I read missives like this from the hook-and-bullet writers, when I think that if the people were disarmed who thought like this character does, that they'd be getting exactly what they deserved for throwing all the other gunnies under the anti-freedom bus. It's encouraging to see so many of the commenters to the piece upbraiding him for his craven, hidebound perspective, but I shudder to think of how many hunters agree with him. It'll be interesting to see how many subscriptions and sponsors Outdoor Life loses for it, though -- not to mention the potential losses that at this point I'd say will be taken by various companies Zumbo's affilliated with, such as Polaris & Remington, and others.
UPDATE:
As I said at JR's place, I was looking through Zumbo's Outdoor Life blog, and it seems this particular post has generated more feedback from readers than any of his other recent blog posts -- almost 1,400 reader comments as of 11:01 am East Texas time, with at least 100 of those in the last 30 minutes alone. The second-most-commented on post from Zumbo got 45 comments. If this is any indication, the shite has definitely hit the fan here.

Comment count as I check in...
Sunday, 2-17-07, 12:00 pm East Texas time: 1,552
Sunday, 2-17-07, 1:01 pm East Texas time: 1,748 -- and with that, for right now I'm gonna go enjoy the beautiful, sunny Texas day!
Sunday, 2-17-07, 7:50 pm East Texas time: 2,816

(More commentary from Xavier, David Codrea, Kim du Toit, the Layabout Sailor, the GeekWithA.45, AlanDP, Kevin Baker, JR, Fits , 45superman , Civis Proeliator, Joe Lemire @ Cold Fury The Freeholder, Dave Markowitz, LawDog , Michael Bane, SayUncle, Shooter , Porta's Cat & Tam; more links to come as I find them)

In Defense of the "Gun Lobby"

Cruising The High Road the other day, I found this statement attributed to New York Rep. Carolyn McCarthy on her introduction of the renewal of the Federal Ban On Scary-Looking Weapons (emphasis mine -- ed):

In Philadelphia, a gunman opened fire on his colleagues using an AK-47 assault rifle he legally purchased....
...The unfortunate situation in Philadelphia could have been avoided if Congress stood up to the gun lobby in 2004.

It seems we hear rantings about the eeevil "gun lobby" all the time from anti-gun politicians at pretty much every level of government. The antis rant about the "gun lobby" almost like certain anti-Semitic figures and organizations rant on about how they think the Jews supposedly run the world through various organizations like the media, the banks or what-have-you. And Lord knows it's gotten quite long in the tooth. I've thought about this now and then, and the more I think about it, the more angry I get as a gun owner.
Why? Because I AM the "gun lobby." I buy as many guns as I can, I am a card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association and unequivocally support the right of all Americans to bear arms (from the smallest to the largest, from single-shot boltie to full-auto) in defense of themselves and this great nation. And the same could be said for anyone who reads the above and nods his or her head in agreement. The antis act like we're some massively funded organization that lurks mysteriously in the shadows when really, that applies a lot more to the antis than it does the so-called "gun lobby".
Who is The Evil Gun Lobby? It's (in all likelihood) you, me, and everybody else who owns, buys, and shoots guns on a regular basis and votes for those who would not abrogate our natural right of self-defense. We are not a bunch of Mafioso types who throw cash or goodies to those who would further our interests and send those who wouldn't to sleep with the fishes.
Who is the Evil Gun Lobby composed of? It's composed of all the hard-working, tax-paying, moral, upstanding, armed citizens who just want to be left the hell alone to our own devices to protect our familes and our society in good times and bad, as opposed to leaving it up to certain governmental organizations who, the courts have ruled on numerous occasions, have no obligation to protect us as individuals (which, I would argue, drastically undermines the concept of collective (societal) protection, but that's another post entirely).
I can only speak for myself, but I'm tired of being demonized by leftist asshats like Carolyn McCarthy, Teddy Kennedy and Chuck Schumer. A pox on all their houses. It's been said the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, and that is true, but it irks me immensely that certain politicians can get away with so vehemently demonizing us...

She Almost Got It...

Every Sunday, Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mary Mitchell's column runs in the Beaumont Enterprise. She seems pretty reasonable and evenhanded, but she really missed the target in her most recent column...

First they asked the 17-year-old rider his name. Next they asked about his high school. Then the three teenagers jumped him on a crowded CTA Red Line train in the heart of afternoon rush hour, causing injuries serious enough for him to be taken away by an ambulance.

But apparently, no one pushed the emergency button to alert the conductor of the assault.

*snip*

the mother of the 17-year-old beating victim, is afraid her son's case will fall through the cracks.

"We thought his nose and jawbone were broken, but he doesn't have any broken bones. His face is swollen and his eye is closed shut and there is a lot of bruising. I haven't been able to send him back to school," she said.

Whether the police find her son's attackers, the incident has sparked a fire within Trussell.

"I've called Ald. Howard Brookins (21st) to make a report, and I called Ald. Dorothy Tillman (3rd) since the school my son was coming from is in her ward," Trussell said. "And I just got off the phone talking to U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's office."

I asked, "What do you expect these people to do?" <

"We should feel secure," she said. "We should feel that we are not at risk when we ride the train. There is no sort of security. The driver is the only person on the train. That is ridiculous. He doesn't see anything. He doesn't hear anything," Trussell said. "When we step on a train, there should at least be a warning: 'Enter at your own risk.' "

*snip*

...at what point do we begin to fight back?

The decent, law-abiding people in the black community outnumber the thugs, but the same thugs are allowed to victimize the community over and over.

Maybe it would help if we got off the cell phones, unplugged the iPods, took our noses out of the books and paid attention to what is going on. Police should have been at 47th Street waiting for the train to pull in.

CTA did what it could. It gave riders an emergency cal button.

Riders had better learn how to use it.

Given Mitchell's earlier admissions that the police can't be everywhere at once, and that the Chicago police are not going to put the case on the front burner, I'd argue that was not the best solution. What the riders should be doing is calling their legislators and raising hell about the fact that they're being denied the most basic right, that of self-defense. Maybe if those thugs had known they might be facing lethal force if they started beating up on innocent people, then maybe they'd give their plans a second or third thought, and as Dr. Gary Kleck's studies showed, many times the threat of lethal force is just as good as the lethal force itself. (Can you see something like that happening on one of the Dallas Area Rapid Transit trains?) And it didn't even have to be a gun that people use to fight the thugs off with...could be a pencil, a knife, anything sharp...or heavy, for that matter. Granted, situational awareness will go a long way, but as has been proven in Britain, when you deny people the means, and basically the right, of self-defense, they more or less turn into cowering sheep, and this was on display on that Chicago subway train. And until the Illinois people rise up and assert that they are indeed citizens and not subjects, until they get reacquainted with the combat mindset and defending themselves (and their fellow citizens), this sort of thing will continue to happen.

Any Port In A Storm...

From the Boston Globe :

The music-business insiders who gave the Dixie Chicks five Grammy Awards Sunday night -- including three for their song "Not Ready to Make Nice" -- aren't the same people who shunned the Texas trio four years back. But the Chicks' resurgence, coupled with other rumblings of discontent within the world of country music, shows how much the nation's mood has shifted since March 2003.

I have to wonder, just how these folks would define "resurgence." The Chicks' album sales did indeed fall off after Natalie's remark, although they did remain respectable, and their airplay on country radio pretty much ceased to exist. The latest album has gone platinum, which is nothing to turn up one's nose at, but compared to the pace at which the Chicks' last studio album, Home, flew off the shelves in the 7 months after it was released, that's pretty anemic. I would say the Globe (or the Glob, as Bruce and others have called it) is really reaching here. Only in the insulated world of the Northeastern establishment media would the opinions of a bunch of music industry executives -- whose world is arguably as insulated -- represent the opinions of the American people as a whole. No big surprise, I guess, considering this is the same newspaper that employs a columnist who compares global warming skeptics to Holocaust deniers, but rather vexing nonetheless. More reaching follows:

Meanwhile, (Trace) Adkins, who describes himself as a conservative, recently told the San Bernardino Sun that Republicans deserved to lose last fall's midterm elections.

This is probably news to those Northeastern elitists too, but there are a hell of a lot of conservatives who feel the same way. I hope we don't have to find out how much more dissatisfied the Republican base is going to be if Giuliani is the candidate in 2008. God only knows how they'd spin that.

A Leopard Can't Change His Spots

You know, I really don't think this horse is gonna be dead till Rudy Giuliani's candidacy is...

Rudy Giuliani addressed a potentially troublesome issue with conservative voters, saying his policies as mayor to get handguns off the street helped reduce crime in New York.

"I used gun control as mayor," he said at a news conference Saturday during a swing through California. But "I understand the Second Amendment. I understand the right to bear arms."

He said what he did as mayor would have no effect on hunting.

Really now, I could give a damn about hunting...
In all seriousness, I'd love to get back into hunting. I haven't done it in ages, and I know very well that it sharpens valuable skills and teaches all sorts of valuable lessons. And Lord knows I love any kind of game prepared any kind of way. But there's not much argument in my mind that the surest sign that a politician is going to go after the people's guns, or at least look the other way when others go after them at the lower levels of government, is when said politician trots out the whole "not gonna take yer deer rifle" bit. The GOP had nigh well better wake up to the truth of the matter. No matter what Rudy says about our natural right to arms -- and "I used gun control...(but) I understand the Second Amendment" is a contradiction if ever I heard one -- he understands the Second Amendment and the Right to Keep and Bear Arms about as well as the average toddler understands nuclear physics. What I for one would love to see is one of those front-runners get up there and defend things like shall-issue CCW laws (or, better yet, Vermont & Alaska-style open carry), civilian full-auto possession, potmetal poodle-poppers (aka "Saturday Night Specials"), ARs, AKs and .50BMGs. That would, I think, be a hell of a much better sign of understanding what the Second Amendment protects, as opposed to muttering platitudes about deer hunting. Sadly, figuratively speaking, that would take balls of solid steel, and that criterion has weeded out all but a precious few when one gets to national-level politics.
Jim Kenefick over at Right Thoughts had this to say, though:

Yes, he’s flawed on gun control, but he’s also learning how guns and gun politics work on a national stage as opposed to the second most liberal state in the union.

He also said this over at Right Thinking:

Rudy is already changing his tune from the hard-line gun control stance he used to have. The NRA is hard at work teaching him why NYC gun policy doesn’t fly in the rest of the country. he’s already moderated his views - the more he’s exposed to good, honest gun owners without being inundated - and responsible for as mayor - the worst parts of gun culture the more he learns how we feel and the more he understands us.

No offense to Jim, but I think that's a crock. I honestly don't think the NRA is going to teach Rudy Giuliani a damn thing. I applaud them for at least trying, but I think it's also an indisputable fact that Giuliani believes in more gun control -- prohibition, even -- just as ardently as the Bradys, the Violence Policy Center, IANSA and all the rest of the national and international gun prohibitionists. Evidence of this lies in his feeble attempt to cover his arse with the hunting remark, and his record as mayor, even going so far as to file one of those frivolous suits against firearm manufacturers in 2000 (press release here, video here).
And there's another reason I think the NRA is wasting its time. The lessons of gun control as a political failure have already been taught, at least twice -- in the 1994 midterms, and in the 2000 presidential election, when Southern Democrat Al Gore failed to carry a single Southern state due in part to his radically anti-gun views. One would think people like him and Bill Clinton (who, of course, started out as governor of another Southern state) would have known or figured out the gun control bird wouldn't fly outside the coasts and the major metro areas, yet still they pushed ahead with their nefarious agendas. (And Gore did so after the Dems took their '94 thumping!) I shudder to think of what Clinton could have gotten passed in the way of gun control if he'd had a Democratic Congress for any more of his term.
If Rudy had not believed in gun control, he wouldn't have pursued it as he did while he was mayor of New York City. He does, though, and I for one don't have any doubt that he'd advocate it just as ferociously as he did in the Big Apple. This latest story is nothing but a display of Giuliani just being a pandering politician. May enough figure that out before it's too late.

More Double-talk from the Antis

Via Firehand and David Hardy comes this excellent rebuttal from Dr. Stephen Halbrook to what has to be the most asinine tactic I've seen yet from academia:

A revisionist view now has been boldly asserted that Hitler was
friendly to perhaps the most dangerous freedom in the Bill of
Rights. The Fordham Law Review recently published a provocative
Second Amendment Symposium issue which included three
articles suggesting that Nazi Germany had liberal policies toward
firearm owners and that the National Rifle Association (NRA)
promotes a myth of Nazi repression of firearms owners as part of
a cultural war.

One of the aforementioned articles' authors, a Bernard E. Harcourt, apparently tried to say that the Nazi regime was more pro-gun than the Weimar Republic, "as evidenced by the overall relaxation of the laws regulating the acquisition, transfer and carrying of firearms
reflected in the 1938 Nazi gun laws." As Dr. Halbrook points out, the Nazis were "pro-gun" for everyone they agreed with and everyone who was helping to carry out their evil agenda, but of course they were anti-gun for "Jews, political opponents, and any and every person who might not march lock step with the National Socialist program." (Not to cause the invocation of Godwin's Law here, but it would seem to me upon reading all this, that one could use the same lines of reasoning to say that people like Dianne Feinstein, Richard Daley and Rosie O'Donnell were pro-gun as well. Sure they are, if you define pro-gun as favoring armed self-defense for yourself but leaving everyone else up the creek.) Some choice passages:

Recognition of a right such as this anywhere in the world in any historical epoch must acknowledge that "the people" must mean the peaceable populace at large without regard to race, religion, or creed. However, Professor Harcourt embraces American neo-Nazi William L. Pierce, who asserts, "German firearms legislation under Hitler, far from banning private ownership, actually facilitated the keeping and bearing of arms by German citizens . . . ." Harcourt asks, “How is it, you may ask, that I . . . would end up agreeing with a white supremacist leader of the National Alliance and National Vanguard?" Harcourt further concluded that "the Nazis were relatively more pro-gun than the predecessor Weimar Republic . . . ." If the Second Amendment’s "right of the people to keep and bear Arms" is the postulate, the above reference to the "German citizen," or more accurately under the Third Reich, the incredibly shrinking "German citizen," has little bearing on the meaning of "the people" at large.
...
A regime that would disarm and murder an entire segment of the population hardly could be said to support, if the language of the Second Amendment can be
applied, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms." Indeed,
that is the very kind of regime this right is meant to provide the
means to resist.
...
Professor Harcourt’s suggestion that the Nazis supported
Second Amendment-type values assumes as insignificant that the
Nazis disarmed, intimidated, threw into concentration camps, or
exterminated all of "the people" they identified as inferior by
reason of race or religion, or as otherwise untrustworthy by
reason of politics or any other reason whatsoever. Other than
that, Professor Harcourt surmises, Hitler was a disciple of a
liberal arms policy.

As they say, read the whole thing.

Another Small Victory

Via David Codrea, SayUncle, David Hardy and just about every other gun blogger comes this happy news:

The federal government will not file criminal charges against any of the 15 out-of-state gun dealers accused by Mayor Bloomberg in a federal lawsuit of selling guns illegally, the Daily News has learned.

In a stern rebuke to the city's high-profile crusade against illegal guns, the feds warned the Bloomberg administration that it could face "potential legal liabilities" if it continues to conduct sting operations that fall within the jurisdiction of federal agents.

Mr. Codrea, being the brilliant snarkmeister he is -- and David, if you're reading this I mean that in only the most complimentary way! -- says, "Looks like the Feds don't want the Iotians muscling in on their territory. What were we just saying about gangland turf wars?"
At first I didn't quite agree with his somewhat negative take on Bloomberg's rebuke from the federales, but on second thought I understand and do indeed agree. From what I remember about Bloomberg's crusade, he was sending his henchmen into certain gun shops with instructions basically to coerce the dealers into making straw sales, which more or less constitutes entrapment; in fact, again, from what I remember, some of this entrapment was actually caught on tape. Michael Bloomberg and his hired thugs should be thrown in jail and made an example of how not to go about one's business as a public official, but I'm betting they won't be, which will only illustrate Mr. Codrea's contention that the federales are just ticked off that Bloomie's intruding on their turf. I like to think of Bloomie's rebuke as a small victory, but even so it's probably just going to be symbolic more than anything else, and that's a damn shame.

Circling the Party Wagons

Via Fits at Shooting the Messenger, we have this, from the New York Post's John Podhoretz:

Past "liberal" GOP candidates and would-be candidates have sought the nomination by taking strong stands counter to the views of the party's conservative base - like Elizabeth Dole opposing handguns in 2000. Those candidates, that is, were engaging in battle against the social conservatives. They were fighting a culture war within the GOP, trying to rally the party's more socially liberal elements - women and suburbanites in particular - to defeat the hard-line element.

Podhoretz was trying to draw a contrast between Giuliani and these past lefty GOP candidates, but it should be noted that he put "liberal" in quotes, and he calls people like me the "hard-line element." (And to think the New York Post is more or less touted as the Big Apple's conservative paper!) Call it nitpicky, but to me that says a lot about how Mr. Podhoretz and his ilk view a lot of conservatives. I guess living in a place like New York really warps one's views, but for someone who sees himself as a member of a party and/or a subscriber to a political philosophy that supposedly calls for limited government and more personal freedom, this is absolutely inexcusable. (Incidentally, it should also be noted -- yet again -- that the Democrats have lost more than a few votes in the last 13 years' elections due to their positions on the gun issues. Bill Clinton himself said the Ban on Scary-Looking Weapons was a large part of the reason his party took the beating it did in the 1994 midterms, and more than a few have said that Al Gore lost the Southern states largely because of his stance on "gun control.") I'd love to see the GOP retain the presidency in 2008, but what good is having a Republican in the White House if he or she is going to implement an agenda contrary to the above principles?
And Podhoretz doesn't think this fight for the soul of the GOP is still being waged? His column is prima facie evidence that it indeed is, and it likely will be escalated as we go into the 2008 election season. At least it better be. I'd hate to think we lovers of liberty would just roll over. I could be wrong here, but I'm betting Bob Owens over at Confederate Yankee speaks for a lot of people with these observations:

A lot of folks seem thrilled that Guiliani's throwing his hat in the ring, but I'm not one of them. His 9/11 leadership was extraordinary (compare his inspired performance to Ray Nagin's quivering collapse after Hurricane Katrina for juxtaposition), but his personal failures and his overtly liberal positions on a whole raft of issues leave me cold.

The only thing that Rudy brings to the table over our current President is his ability to articulately explain why he won't enforce or borders while increasing the bloat of the federal government.

Factor in his pro-gun control views, and Guiliani's a Republican candidate not worth having... one of many.

And this question from a commenter desperately needs to be asked, early and often:
"Do you get the feeling the choice for Republican nominee is being made by the media, the pundits and the political class, everybody but the majority of the people themselves?"
My answer? Absolutely. The power in this country has basically gone from the masses to the mass media and the political class (and really, when you get to the Boston-New York-Washington level, those two get to be more and more one and the same), as they inherently have the power to shape public opinion and this power has only grown as the media has, albeit only to the extent the American people believe what they read. No matter to what extent that is, though, it's profoundly discouraging, because people like Tom Tancredo and Ron Paul are going to get the short shrift. They're either not going to get any coverage, or they're going to be painted as some sort of whackjob (John Hawkins, call your office). I try to retain some optimism, but every now and then I just can't help but think that things are going to get a hell of a lot worse before they get any better.

Giuliani Is Not Our Friend -- 2-6-07 Edition

Via David Hardy and Captain's Quarters comes this little snippet from Hannity & Colmes in which Sean Hannity interviews Rudy Giuliani:

HANNITY: You inherited the gun laws in New York.

GIULIANI: Yeah. And I used them to help bring down homicide. We reduced homicide I think by 65, 70%. And some of it was by taking guns out of the streets of New York City. So if you are talking about a city like New York, a densely populated area like New York, I think it's appropriate. You might have different laws other places and maybe a lot of this gets resolved based on different states, different communities, making decisions. We do have a federal system of government in which you have the ability to accomplish that.

HANNITY: So you would support the state's rights to choose on specific gun laws?

GIUILANI: Yeah. A place like New York that is densely populated or maybe a place that is experiencing a serious crime problem like a few cities are now. Thank goodness not New York but some other cities. Maybe you have one solution there and in other place more rural, more suburban, other issues you have a different set of rule.

HANNITY: Generally speaking do you think it's acceptable if citizens have the right to carry a handgun?

GIULIANI: It's part of the constitution. People have the right to bear arms. Then restrictions have to be reasonable and sensible. You can't just remove that right. You got to regulate consistent with the second amendment.

From this exchange, it would seem that Giuliani is a proponent of federalism and at least a small bit of decentralization in that he says gun laws should be left up to the states.
However, that's about as much credit as I am willing to give him; because the fact of the matter is that in his city, and in Washington and Chicago to name but two other locales, the right of the people to keep and bear arms is and has been being blatantly infringed upon, either by:
1. Outright bans on possession of certain types of arms, and laws stating the arms you CAN possess have to be disassembled & locked up, thereby effectively preventing legal self-defense with those arms; or
2. Licensing requirements so stringent that regular people like you and me just might as well not even bother, because those requirements are enforced by government agencies staffed with people who are, for all practical intents & purposes, dead-set against private citizens owning arms for their defense.
Federalism is great, but by no means should it be used to justify in any way infringements on people's rights, as it is here. Granted, the difference between the rural & urban environment is different, but only to the extent that there's more crime and general mischief in the urban environment. And not even that justifies any kind of ban, or licensing as Giuliani would advocate, because the crime problem goes a lot deeper than the availability of weapons. I find it infuriating that those root causes -- for example, the forsaking of values such as respect for human life, an honest day's work for an honest day's pay, personal responsibility & accountability, and remorse for the wrong one does -- are never talked about. No, it's always about the eeevil guns...
Going hand-in-hand with this, of course, is the fact that Giuliani was the first mayor of a major American city to file suit against the gun manufacturers in what seems to me, in hindsight, to be a blatant attempt to cover up for the fact that the gun control he and too many others espouse turned out to be a dismal failure -- surprise! -- in his city and pretty much everywhere else. I have yet to see him being called out on that particular blot on his record.
As far as "regulat(ing) consistent with the Second Amendment," once again I do not think the Second Amendment means what Mr. Giuliani thinks it means. Not that that's any big surprise, of course, but I find it quite offensive to hear people like Giuliani and Mitt Romney professing support for the 2A and the RKBA when even a cursory glimpse of their records shows the exact opposite. I'm not stupid, and neither are the rest of my fellow gun owners. (I might make an exception for some of the Fuddites, but then again anyone who thinks hunting is the only legitimate reason to own a gun is worse than stupid in my book. They're just flat evil.) Giuliani's pandering notwithstanding, he's still not someone I would ever vote for, and I know I am not alone.
UPDATE: It seems I was wrong about Giuliani being the first big-city mayor in American to file suit against the firearms makers. According to this press release from the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the suits were first filed in the late 1990s, but Giuliani was the only Republican mayor to do so.

A Few Words on Molly Ivins

As everyone who keeps up with politics in general and Texas politics in particular knows, Texas leftist icon Molly Ivins died Sunday at the age of 62 from breast cancer. I remember reading her columns in my hometown paper once upon a time, and looking back on it, she always seemed to come off to me as Maureen Dowd from Houston. Which, to my mind, is something not to aspire to being. Anyway, being the self-professed gun nut that I am, I wondered exactly what she thought of firearms. I wasn't going to say anything here at first, but thanks to E.J. Dionne's excerpt of it in his Washington Post column reprinted in the Houston Chronicle, I found this column. I'm sure most of us won't find it surprising:

Guns. Everywhere Guns.

Let me start this discussion by pointing out that I am not antigun. I'm proknife. Consider the merits of the knife.

In the first place, you have to catch up with someone in order to stab him. A general substitution of knives for guns would promote physical fitness. We'd turn into a whole nation of great runners. Plus, knives don't ricochet. And people are seldom killed while cleaning their knives.

As a civil libertarian, I, of course, support the Second Amendment. And I believe it means exactly what it says:

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Fourteen-year-old boys are not part of a well-regulated militia. Members of wacky religious cults are not part of a well-regulated militia. Permitting unregulated citizens to have guns is destroying the security of this free state.

I am intrigued by the arguments of those who claim to follow the judicial doctrine of original intent. How do they know it was the dearest wish of Thomas Jefferson's heart that teenage drug dealers should cruise the cities of this nation perforating their fellow citizens with assault rifles? Channeling?

There is more hooey spread about the Second Amendment. It says quite clearly that guns are for those who form part of a well-regulated militia, that is, the armed forces, including the National Guard. The reasons for keeping them away from everyone else get clearer by the day.
...


In truth, there is no rational argument for guns in this society. This is no longer a frontier nation in which people hunt their own food. It is a crowded, overwhelmingly urban country in which letting people have access to guns is a continuing disaster. Those who want guns—whether for target shooting, hunting, or potting rattlesnakes (get a hoe)—should be subject to the same restrictions placed on gun owners in England, a nation in which liberty has survived nicely without an armed populace.
...
For years I used to enjoy taunting my gun-nut friends about their psychosexual hang-ups—always in a spirit of good cheer, you understand.
...

I do think gun nuts have a power hang-up. I don't know what is missing in their psyches that they need to feel they have the power to kill. But no sane society would allow this to continue.

Ban the damn things. Ban them all.

You want protection? Get a dog.

Virtually all the anti-gun stereotypes and tired arguments promoted by the leftists and their ilk for the last 40-plus years -- the National Guard lie, "power hang-ups," "psychosexual hang-ups," you name it. (And I certainly beg to differ with the thought that Lady Liberty has "survived nicely" in merry olde England.) Molly Ivins applied this mean-spirited, foul, ignorant invective to pretty much any topic she wrote about. I keep thinking about how Jonah Goldberg described Maureen Dowd's columns in the wake of the 2004 presidential election:

...her op-ed page real estate hits your desk like a bucket of vomit with some Body Shop potpourri sprinkled across the surface.

I'd say that pretty much described Molly Ivins' scribblings to a tee. She was just another link in the long chain of people who have proved that education doesn't necessarily lead to intelligence or enlightenment, and how hateful, ignorant and mean-spirited you can get away with being when you couch your rhetoric in faux down-home "humor." I hate that she died the way she did, and I don't want to sound cruel and uncaring, but I shed no tears for her passing either.
More here...

Advocacy of a Failure, from an Unlikely Source

I read John Hawkins' blog every day almost, and I agree with just about everything he says, but he laid a huge goose egg last week with this column for Human Events Online in which he defended the War On Some Drugs (link is to un-edited piece on Hawkins' blog -- ed.) There are some pretty good fiskings of Hawkins' misguided piece already, but I do have some things to say in response to some of the assertions he puts forth....

...Some people certainly argue that if illicit drugs were legalized, their usage would drop. However, the fact that drugs are illegal is certainly holding down their usage. Just look at what happened during prohibition if you want proof of that. Per Ann Coulter in her book, "How to Talk to a Liberal if you Must:"

"Prohibition resulted in startling reductions in alcohol consumption (over 50 percent), cirrhosis of the liver (63 percent), admissions to mental health clinics for alcohol psychosis (60 percent), and arrests for drunk and disorderly conduct (50 percent)." -- P.311

That's what happened when alcohol was made illegal. However, on the other hand, if we make drugs legal, safer, easier to obtain, more societally accepted, and some people say even cheaper as well, there would almost have to be an enormous spike in usage.

I'll admit I like a lot of what Ann Coulter writes, but still I can't help but shudder to see her being cited as if she was some kind of authority. Perhaps that's irrelevant, perhaps she actually got her statistics from a reputable source, but even the statistics are irrelevant in light of the utter overall failure Prohibition was. How much of the American people's money went down THAT pit before we admitted that maybe that particular nanny-statist idea wasn't such a good one after all? I don't advocate partaking of any kind of illegal drug -- personally, that's money better spent on gun stuff for me -- but if people want to spend a bit of their hard-earned money on a dimebag, then really, what business is it of mine? And I would think that's what a big part of the funds burned in the War On Some Drugs goes to eliminating -- the demon weed. Whatever the proportion might be, here's a piece of the commentary from Lee at Right-Thinking from the Left Coast:

I’ll admit that I like drugs. When I was a young man (late high school, early college) I used to do a SHITLOAD of drugs. I’ve never smoked crack and I’ve never injected anything, but I’ve used various combinations of marijuana, LSD, ecstasy, and cocaine....Now, as an adult, I might smoke a little marijuana, but I also like drinking Jack Daniel’s. They help me relax after a stressful day at work. I come home, make a drink or smoke a bowl, lay on my couch and watch TV.

But here comes the money shot:

Now, according to John’s calculus, I should be some strung-out drug-addled loser who breaks into houses to get money to feed my drug habit. The reality of the situation is that this year I’ll make over $100,000, I have a job with an enormous degree of responsibility in a highly technological field (right now I’m supervising 16 people), and I’m about as normal a guy as you’ll ever meet.

Not only have I done drugs in the past, but I’ll admit that I liked the effect they had on me. (I’m not going to cop out like politicians and talk about how it was a valuable learning experience. I got high and liked it, period.) Now I have enough money to where I could buy all the drugs I like in any amount I choose. I wouldn’t even have to get in my car to find drugs, I could walk. And yet, mysteriously, I’m somehow able to control my base animal impulses to try harder and harder drugs....

I know a lot of people who recreationally use drugs. These are educated, intelligent people with families, who run businesses, respect the law, pay their taxes, and contribute to society. They also like to put intoxicants in their bodies. In fact, during my life the vast majority of the people I have known have, at one time or another, done drugs. Out of these people, I can count on one hand the number of times any of them had serious problems because of doing so.

How Lee's experience could be extrapolated to the entire population, I don't know, but I suppose there are those out there who can lead normal lives while they do cocaine, heroin, or what-have-you. I hate to sound like I am advocating drug use, because I'm not. Like I said, that's money better spent on other things for me, and I know that very bad things can happen when cocaine or heroin is introduced into someone's life. But the same goes for tobacco and alcohol too, and again, if I am not mistaken, Prohibition is widely regarded across the political spectrum to be an unmitigated disaster. And it's beyond argument, in my mind, that the War On Some Drugs has been the same, a complete and utter failure, in more ways than one. Does the name Kathryn Johnston ring a bell to John and his fellow apologists? How about Cory Maye? Were their lives worth taking or irrevocably ruining so your neighbor couldn't light one up? I daresay it's just this sort of thing that leads to a totalitarian state, and I think that is directly attributable to the welfare state that Mr. Hawkins talks about next...

But, some people may say, "so what if drug usage does explode? They're not hurting anyone but themselves." That might be true in a purely capitalistic society, but in the sort of welfare state that we have in this country, the rest of us would end up paying a significant share of the bills of people who don't hold jobs or end up strung out in the hospital without jobs -- and that's even if you forget about the thugs who'd end up robbing our houses to get things to pawn to buy more drugs. Even setting that aside, we make laws that prevent people from harming themselves all the time in our society. In many states there are helmet laws, laws that require us to wear seatbelts, laws against prostitution, and it's even illegal to commit suicide. So banning harmful drugs is just par for the course.

As Lee so brilliantly put it, "John supports the nanny state when the nanny state mentality provides justification for his own anti-drug position. He says these things are "par for the course." There’s been a whole lot of stuff in this country that has been par for the course which we subsequently recognized were moral and societal evils. Slavery, for one."

As for the "welfare state"? A welfare state it may be, but when you take personal responsibility away from people, when they make mistakes and you use the public dime to bail them out, whatever the cost may be, then a welfare state is what you get. I don't particularly agree with the assertion that we should keep drugs illegal because of the bills we'll incur due to those who misuse those drugs to the point they can't function. Call me a heartless libertarian, but people deserve to lie in the bed they've made for themselves. A free society is ultimately going to falter and crumble under the burden of a welfare state such as the one we have here. We're already seeing it now.
And possibly the most infuriating snippet of Hawkins' screed goes to this:

There's probably not a person reading this column who doesn't know someone who has faced terrible consequences in his life because of drug use.

That's right, ladies and gentlemen, the tried-and-true, appallingly effective appeal to emotion the gun-grabbers trot out every time they unveil another infringement on our rights. "There's probably not a person reading this column who doesn't know someone who has faced terrible consequences in his life because of 'gun violence.'" I don't know if I've said it before, but I'll surely say it now: Policy based on emotion, or more on emotion than logic, can only lead to denial of rights and loss of liberty. I really expected better from one who calls himself a conservative, but given that hint of an authoritarian streak, I guess I know better now.

It's Not Paranoia If The Mountain Lion's Really Out To Get You

Something to think about here, the next time you hear leftist asshats like those on the New York Times editorial board lambasting the advocacy of things such as carrying weapons in national parks...

A Northern California hiker attacked by a mountain lion last week was airlifted to a San Francisco hospital Sunday, where he will likely undergo more surgery.

A spokesman for Mad River Community Hospital in Arcata said doctors wanted to send 70-year-old Jim Hamm to a major research hospital in San Francisco after they performed emergency surgery on his scalp and downgraded his condition from fair to serious.

Hamm first underwent surgery Wednesday after a female mountain lion ambushed him at Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park. He and his wife, Nell, were hiking when the lion scalped him, mauled his face, ripped off part of his lips and inflicted other puncture wounds and scratches.

This man was almost killed, and he had absolutely no way to effectively defend himself, being as it was he was banned by California law from carrying a firearm in the park (thanks to JR for the link):

LOADED FIREARMS AND HUNTING are not allowed in units of the State Parks System. Possession of loaded firearms or air rifles is prohibited. Exceptions are for hunting in recreation areas that have been designated by the State Park and Recreation Commission.

Yet ivory-tower elitist media hacks at places like the New York Times and Washington Post will sit there in those air-conditioned offices of theirs and carp about the NRA "nationalizing...armed paranoia." God help us if their warped mindset gains any more traction than it already has in the halls of power...

Sunday Morning 1911 Musings: Kimber vs. Springfield Armory?

I was looking for data this morning on 1911 market share in the United States, and I couldn't find any hard stuff, but from what I've heard it's largely divvied up among three manufacturers: Springfield Armory, Kimber and Smith & Wesson.
Many would probably say that among the three, Kimber is the best, the cream of the crop. I know people who would say that; when I was in the market for a 10mm 1911, the folks at the gun store (Shooters Supply, Beaumont, TX) mentioned the Dan Wesson Razorback and had nothing but good things to say about them, even though they recommended the Kimbers. I mentioned this to a friend as I was showing off the Kimber I eventually picked up, and he said something to the effect of, "don't buy a damn knockoff! Kimber's the best there is!"
He'd been touting the virtues of the Kimbers for a while, and there's no doubt in my mind they're both very good guns. Hell, I have two of them. And I plan to get more -- when, though, I don't know. (Next up, incidentally, for BAG Day, is the aforementioned Dan Wesson Razorback.) But I had been lusting after one of the Springfield full-size Loaded 1911s for a while, I guess ever since I got a look at it on their website. Skeletonized hammer & trigger, match-grade everything, ambi safety & three-dot fixed tritium night sights, all wrapped up in a beautifully low-key, understated Parkerized package. It was quite pricey, though, as any quality 1911 would be. Shooters quoted me $750 before tax. I ended up getting it from my normal FFL for $763 and change out the door; it would have been about $30 or so less than that, were it not for the higher-than-normal shipping charges.
And here's where Kimber comes in. The Springfield did indeed come Loaded, with just about everything one could want on a 1911, most notably the ambidextrous safety (good for lefties) and fixed night sights. This is just another wild-arsed guess, but a Kimber -- say, the Custom II -- with those same features (the ambi safety would probably have to be added at the Custom Shop) would probably run close to $900-950. And as I say, Kimber (in my experience) makes a fine pistol. I don't know why the Springfield isn't just as good of a pistol as the Kimber for ~$150 less, though no doubt there are some out there who would still try to say that if you don't get a Kimber you're settling for less. And if anyone tried to tell me that, I'd just ask them if they wanted to pony up the dough for my next Kimber.
Incidentally, when I got the new Springfield, I told my FFL, "I bet you, when I show this to (mutual friend who made the "knockoff" comment about the Dan Wesson), he'll say, 'you shoulda bought a Kimber!'" I really thought for a while that the friend had, well, drunk the Kimber Kool-Aid. I showed it to him, though, and he said I made an excellent choice...

So Much For 'Never Again'

Rather frightening news, via THR, from Yahoo/Agence France-Presse...

Forty-one percent of Britons believe that an event like the Holocaust could happen in the country today, given the depth of intolerance and prejudice, according to a new survey.
Furthermore, 36 percent thought that most people would do nothing about it if it did happen, in a poll released ahead of Holocaust Memorial Day on Saturday.

Well, my guess as to why those figures are what they are, would be the fact that the British have by and large not only been disarmed, but emasculated -- which, really, is a consequence of disarmament, if you think about it. Their government basically tells them, "if somebody breaks in your home, give him what he wants, don't hurt him." And, of course, God help you if you actually do anything to try to defend yourself. And it's only natural that effects of the laws preventing self-defense over there would extend to other threats, such as, for example, yet more crazy fundamentalist Muslims, who the smart money says would be the ones perpetrating this genocide. It's a sad state of affairs over there indeed, but what's really infuriating is this...

"As genocides in Europe, Rwanda and Bosnia have shown, it doesn't take much to turn these negative conditions into something far more calamitous.

"We need to be constantly on our guard against this, which is why we are asking the public to show their support by lighting a candle to commemorate those killed in past genocides."

No, sir, what you need to be doing is your level best to restore the right of self-defense to yourself and your fellow benighted subjects, and arm yourselves... I suppose lighting candles and all that might make you feel good, but it isn't going to do a damned thing to keep yet another genocide from happening. It's one thing to be "aware" that you're about to be beaten to death with a crowbar or something like that, but it's quite another to do something like, say, pull out a gun and shoot the goblin dead where he stands before he makes that first critical swing with the aforementioned crowbar. (I would argue that the firearm option would be a hell of a lot more effective, but I'm just a crazy, warmongering, violent Texan and American, what the hell do I know? /sarcasm) I keep thinking of what Judge Alex Kozinski said in his dissent to the decision denying appeal of Silveria v. Lockyer:

...A revolt by Nat Turner and a few dozen other armed blacks could be put down without much difficulty; one by four million armed blacks would have meant big trouble.

All too many of the other great tragedies of history--Stalin's atrocities, the killing fields of Cambodia, the Holocaust, to name but a few--were perpetrated by armed troops against unarmed populations. Many could well have been avoided or mitigated, had the perpetrators known their intended victims were equipped with a rifle and twenty bullets apiece, as the Militia Act required here. If a few hundred Jewish fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto could hold off the Wehrmacht for almost a month with only a handful of weapons, six million Jews armed with rifles could not so easily have been herded into cattle cars.
My excellent colleagues have forgotten these bitter lessons of history....

Many others have forgotten those lessons as well. The law of unintended consequences cannot be repealed, though, and it looks like some of those consequences might make for yet more killing fields...and streets, too.

Now Why Didn't I Think of That?

If you're not reading Alexandra von Maltzan over at All Things Beautiful, you really should be, and her latest post is but one reason why (emphasis mine -- ed.):

"Our two revolutions are at heart the same", Chavez said, comparing Iran's overthrow of the Shah with his self-styled socialist movement.

Such statements always intrigue me.

Could Chavez really be so ignorant and not only fail to grasp the difference, but the sheer enormity of it?...Is it possible, that he doesn't know any better? Or does he choose to ignore the Mullahcracy's all-important emphasis on it being an Islamic revolution; that they couldn't care less about all the worldly and material promises inherent in the western ideology of 'revolutions'.

Back in the dusty streets of Tehran, critics are quick to attack the obvious:

What are our bounds with Venezuela, Nicaragua or Ecuador and Bolivia? Are we neighbors? Do we share the same faith?

Of course not. Chavez is just another Infidel; yes, one of use temporarily, but Infidel none the less. Much in the same vain as Infidel members of the MSM are temporarily praised when promoting Islamofascist propaganda.

In other words, Hugo Chavez is little more than a useful idiot to Ahmadinejad and his merry band of fundamentalist Muslim crazies. Their revolutions at heart the same? More like diametrically opposed, as von Maltzan so very astutely points out, and how ironic it is that the Iranians are pointing out that Emperor Chavez is as naked as the day he was born. To be fair, though, I suppose more than a few Venezuelans have figured that out; their viewpoint's just likely as not going to get any exposure in the international media.
Chavez always seemed to me to be, if you'll pardon the expression, to be just another leftist blowhard, only with a lot more power than most leftist blowhards. We've all heard of the promises he's made to the people of his nation. And we all know that those promises will go unkept due to all the inherent, fatal flaws of socialism. You'd think these morons would finally figure out that their better mousetrap's been proven to be a dismal failure. Based on the fact that he is deploying that failed mousetrap in Venezuela, I suppose Chavez might just be too ignorant or stupid to figure that out...and that in the end, all his alliance with Ahmadinejad means is that Ahmadinejad is gonna slice Chavez's head off last. I hope we never get to that point, though, because if we do it'll mean that much blood has been shed, at least if von Maltzan's hypothesis is correct:

...our Thug-In-Chief is most likely promising nukes to each and every one who will support his struggle against all of those nasty nations trying to stop him from fulfilling his promise of a nuclear Holocaust. What a dream scenario: the US surrounded by hostile nuclear powers, giving hell to the great Satan in the North. That ought to buy our Thug-In-Chief some time to sort things out in the Middle East - or so he hopes.

Dream scenario, indeed. We do live in interesting times...

Still Standing in Line?

From Ken Hoffman's Q&A Sunday column in this morning's Chron (Hoffman's reply in plain text -- ed.):

I stood in line (eighth person) at the Fiesta on Fannin to get tickets to celebrate Hannah Montana's birthday at the Hannah Montana show. It took me 45 minutes to get to the window. I was told that only single tickets were left. The first person in line was recognized to be a scalper. He took 20 minutes to buy tickets with a big wad of cash. Ticketmaster needs to pull the plug on these guys. Don't they know it is illegal? I refuse to pay big bucks for tickets that I should have been able to buy myself. How can we teach our kids to be reasonable consumers and still enjoy shows when this is allowed to go on? I'm ticked.

Jane Cominsky, Houston

We have been trying for 12 years to buy tickets to a George Strait performance at the rodeo. We have gone early to stand in line and have called as soon as we could. Is it impossible or is there something else I can try? Would appreciate your advice.

Susanne Miller, Houston

Any time you're dealing with George Strait at the rodeo, it's a crapshoot. You might as well buy a lottery ticket. There are tens of thousands of tickets left for other country stars, though. Scalping tickets is not illegal in Texas.

Hoffman's certainly right about George at the rodeo being a crapshoot...actually, you could probably say that about a George Strait show just about anywhere in this part of the country. I snagged a ticket for the Jan. 11 show at the Cajundome in Lafayette (and it was GREAT!), but that particular engagement sold out in 15 minutes, according to the Lafayette newspaper. Long ago I gave up on standing in line, though; since I got my high-speed Internet connection, it's just a whole lot easier to go to the Ticketmaster website and go from there. Had I stood in line at any of the local Ticketmaster outlets for Lafayette, I am certain I'd have been up the creek. And the same goes for George's show at the Houston rodeo; even via ticketmaster.com, I managed to get just two upper-level seats, somewhere in the fourth level, I think -- and it took me about 20 minutes to get those. I'm happy just to be there, though; that just goes to show how popular the Strait man still is here. It surprises me that there are still those who haven't figured out that the Internet is probably the best way to get tickets for high-demand shows like this now. I'd still go to the Macy's or wherever else the local outlets are, but only if I absolutely had to.

...But It Still Has A Horrible Trigger And Feels Like A Brick...

Via Mr. Chaffin comes this torture test of a Glock 21, and he comments, "My opinion of the plastic gun from Europe goes through the roof."
I don't hate the Glock, really, I don't. Deep down, despite my overwhelming preference for John Moses Browning's exquisite creation, I think all guns are great, except for maybe the pawnshop potmetal poodle-poppers. Notwithstanding the flaws I see in Gaston's plastic pistol, I've considered getting a Glock 20...I've said it before and I'll say it again, over twice the firepower of a .357 Magnum (before a reload) is mighty tempting.
Invariably, though, somebody's going to point to a test like the one here and say, "Ah bet your slabside hunnerd-year-old jam-o-matic can't do thay-ut!" Well, maybe it can't, but to those who would point that out, I would only ask, "What's YOUR point?" No, a 1911 probably wouldn't withstand much past the sand test, even one built to JMB's original specs, but then, I don't suppose he ever thought of designing it to withstand any kind of Glock-type torture test; anyone who has any idea of the original tests the 1911 withstood before the Army adopted it all those years ago, though, knows the Army put Ole Slabsides through quite a test, still. (Some pretty good tests of a Springfield GI 1911 can be found here and here.) You build it to combat specs, and it'll function in a combat environment...you build it to match specs, as a lot of 1911s are built, well, maybe not so much.
I know that's pretty much a given with a lot of people, and maybe this is just the old contrarian coming out in me, but I just don't see much point in doing that to a gun. Just for the hell of it, maybe, if I had the money to burn, but other than that, I think I'd just rather read about other folks doing it...entertaining reading, if nothing else.

Letter To A Gun-Hater

JR did a pretty good fiskage of this, so I pretty much let that stand, but still I had to pull a Kevin Baker and write a letter to the author of this hysterical, rather offensive piece of dreck...

Dear Ms. Heller:
Regarding your recent screed, "Where's the outrage about gun violence?"
My belief is that your outrage is badly misdirected. 406 deaths is a tragedy indeed, but what you really should be asking yourself and your readers is, "How many of those 406 people ended up meeting their demise due to their own bad choices?" and "How can we put people on the path to making better choices?"
Those bad choices have been made since, well, practically the dawn of man, and they'll continue to be made, and people are going to continue dying on the streets of your fair city and every other city by whatever means their killers can manage, whether it's guns, knives, garrotes, Molotov cocktails or what have you. Many have argued that the natural state of man is one of violence, and even a cursory observation of history validates that argument in spades -- yes, even before the invention of firearms.
(Ask the folks in the UK how well that whole gun ban thing is working, by the way. As one intrepid blogger states, "the UK has uniform gun laws, IT'S A FREAKING ISLAND and guns still flow across its borders.")
I could cite statistics and so could you, but the statistics are completely irrelevant either way. You might not agree, but the fact is the first law of nature states that it's every human's right to defend himself by any means he can manage, whether it's a knife, a can of OC, nunchucks or a .45-caliber pistol. If people are denied the means of self-defense, as you apparently would like them to be, then they are denied the right of self-defense. Period. Full stop. End of story. Instead of endless cliches about "too many guns," "gun culture propaganda," "kissing the long barrel of the NRA," "values of the Wild West," ad nauseum ad infinitum...for once, how about some original commentary that would point the way to some real solutions, solutions that don't punish those who have done nothing wrong? Your readers would be much better served and you might find some enlightenment along the way yourself.

Signed,
A law-abiding, eminently peaceable Texas gun owner

Not as long as something Mr. Baker would have done, but then, I always tried to stay short & to the point. Future correspondence will be posted and bumped. If, that is, I get any. We'll see.

Mexico Points The Finger at US for Violence

Well, well, well...via THR, it seems the Mexicans are blaming the United States for the fact their country's such a crime-ridden shithole, and they want a new Ban on Scary-Looking Weapons on top of that!

Combat-style rifles are pouring into Mexico, aided by the end of the U.S. Assault Weapons Ban in 2004 and an arms race among several Mexican cartels battling for control of lucrative drug routes.
The weapons are purchased at stores and gun shows, then smuggled into Mexico under car seats or tucked into suitcases.
...
At a gun show in Tucson, Tom Myers of Phoenix hefted a jet-black AR-15 with all the extras: short barrel, telescoping stock, 30-round magazine and a menacing-looking flare launcher.
"I can sell this to you for 9½ ($950)," he said. "And there's no paperwork at all."
Because Myers is a private seller, he is not required to do a background check on the buyer or keep any records. The gun he was selling was a semiautomatic, meaning each pull of the trigger fires one round.
When asked if he had any of the deadlier automatics, he led a reporter to a nearby table.
There, James Ramey of Little Rock, Ark., was selling Hellfire and Autoburst trigger activation devices, $30 gadgets that turn any assault rifle into a rat-a-tatting machine gun.
Ramey works about 50 gun shows a year. He explained how the Mexican gangs buy their weapons at weekend shows in border cities.
"They send over a scout on Saturday to see if there's anything they want," he said. "Then they show up on Sunday with a big wad of money and somebody who's got a clean record, who's legal to buy."
...
Reimposing the U.S. Assault Weapons Ban would go a long way toward stemming violence long the border, Santiago Vasconcelos said.
"These weapons come from your country, we know that for a fact," he told The Republic.

Vasconcelos! Hey, buddy, guess what? People and things go both ways with the currently porous borders we share! You and your government wanted open borders, you basically have them for now...ain't it a bitch to find out that's a double-edged sword?
But I must admit it really burns my tail as a peaceful gun owner to find out you want my rights to be clamped down on because your government can't keep the drug cartels at bay. I am sensing a pattern here...you want us to keep out borders open so your people can come north to partake of our milk and honey that you can't seem to produce yourself, threats to OUR sovereignty and security be damned, and now you want basically to go in the direction of disarming us, too? My, but you folks are astoundingly arrogant south of the Rio Grande. I can only say, this is yet another thing we should most assuredly keep in mind when our own President calls your government and its leaders a friend and partner of America.

Musings on a Couple of Media Snippets

First up, via TFS Magnum, we have this (emphasis mine -- ed.):

Burglar Sheldon Reece, 32, was shot in the abdomen by homeowner Abel Sisneros in Fort Worth, Texas, in December. According to a report in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, to enter the house, Reece had to boldly disregard two signs outside: "Warning. Nothing inside is worth risking your life for. Owners of this property are highly skilled to protect life, liberty and property from criminal attacks" and "No trespassing. Violators will be shot. Survivors will be shot again."

Really, that's pretty funny that someone would actually put those signs up in their yard, but on a serious note, I hear it advised all the time via Internet gunboards and other gun folks that one should never advertise the fact that one is armed to the teeth. It might well deter some burglars, but it might advise others that you have really cool, not to mention expensive, stuff (guns) worth breaking in and stealing when you're not at home. Granted, a safe would surely slow many of them down, but I've heard it said over and over that a determined criminal could break in given enough time, which the odds are higher of them having when you're at work or wherever. And then there's the possibility that by advertising the fact that one is armed, it would drive any potential burglars to get armed themselves for a pre-emptive strike of sorts -- that is, the burglars would come in with guns blazing to get a bigger element of surprise. It's a dicey situation either way, I guess, but I'd rather have a home invader come as unprepared as possible, so the fact of my armament has thus far gone unadvertised and will continue to do so. Mr. Sisneros got lucky this go-round...his number might come up next time, though.

Next up, from an AP dispatch in this morning's Chron on a San Antonio policeman killer's impending execution (emphasis mine -- ed.):

HUNTSVILLE — San Antonio police officer Fabian Dominguez was on his way home after working his overnight shift when he noticed a car parked backward in a driveway in his neighborhood.
It didn't belong there.
He pulled behind it, drew his .40-caliber service revolver and ordered the three young men inside the car to get out. When they refused, he walked over and took the keys from the driver, then went around to the other side.
"I could see that this guy was wearing a police uniform," Johnathan Moore, a passenger in the front seat, later would say.
...
"I got the officer's gun and shot the officer three times in the head," Moore, then 20, said in a written statement after his arrest.

I know that what I'm about to say might sound a little nit-picky here...but why is it that so many times, when referring to police sidearms, various media people always use the term "service revolver" when in fact it's a semi-automatic? Maybe I am extrapolating way too much from the article, but I don't think there was any kind of .40-caliber revolver issued or permitted for use by any police agency, let alone a major department like San Antonio. My memory may be failing me here, but the only .40 wheelgun I know of is the Smith and Wesson 610, which could only take .40S&W cartridges because it was chambered for the .40's bigger brother, the 10mm Auto. I don't think this was malicious media mis-labeling a la the "assault weapons" debate; I'll give the AP that much. But is it too much to ask for the media to do a little more research as opposed to just using anachronistic stock terms like "service revolver"? It might have been inserted by some copy editor at the AP's Texas office, but either way, it's a contribution to the perception that the media neither know anything about firearms nor are willing to learn, and thus yet another contribution to the cause of so many gunnies' distrust of the media.
As well as is this, now that I think about it (emphasis mine -- ed.):

A shooting in Lynn sends five teenage boys to the hospital with gunshot wounds.
...
Investigators found evidence of a possible exchange of gunfire during the incident. Nine-millimeter and 22-millimeter shell casings were found at the scene.

22mm? You mean a fraggin' 20mm M61 Vulcan wasn't enough? Sweet Bleedin' Jeebus, these modern-day hoodlums ain't kiddin' around...

More Northeastern RINO BS

Pull out the hip waders, folks, 'cause it's just gettin' deeper and deeper...
Via David Codrea comes this, from the Boston Globe:

Former governor Mitt Romney, who once described himself as a supporter of strong gun laws, is distancing himself from that rhetoric now as he attempts to court the gun owners who make up a significant force in Republican primary politics.
In his 1994 US Senate run, Romney backed two gun-control measures strongly opposed by the National Rifle Association and other gun-rights groups: the Brady Bill, which imposed a five-day waiting period on gun sales, and a ban on certain assault weapons.
"That's not going to make me the hero of the NRA," Romney told the Boston Herald in 1994.
At another campaign stop that year, he told reporters: "I don't line up with the NRA."
And as the GOP gubernatorial candidate in 2002, Romney lauded the state's strong laws during a debate against Democrat Shannon O'Brien. "We do have tough gun laws in Massachusetts; I support them," he said. "I won't chip away at them; I believe they protect us and provide for our safety."
Today, as he explores a presidential bid, Romney is sending a very different message on gun issues, which are far more prominent in Republican national politics than in Massachusetts.
He now touts his work as governor to ease restrictions on gun owners. He proudly describes himself as a member of the NRA -- though his campaign won't say when he joined. And Friday, at his campaign's request, top officials of the NRA and the National Shooting Sports Foundation led him around one of the country's biggest gun shows.

And via THR, we have this from Newsmax:

Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney touted his conservative credentials at a gun show in Orlando, Fla., Friday, where he met with a GOP-friendly crowd in an effort to garner support for his 2008 campaign.
"I support the right of individuals to keep and bear arms as guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution," said Romney, former governor of Massachusetts.

Granted, I don't really find any of this surprising, as we all know by now that politicians will say just about anything to get elected. I do, however, find it quite insulting. It seems like just about every leftist politician who tosses his (or her) hat into the ring every four years pulls crap like this.
"I support the Second Amendment."
Once again, we have a politician mouthing empty platitudes, as even a cursory glance at Mr. Romney's record, and his rhetoric, clearly shows he favors all sorts of infringements on our right to keep and bear arms. He supports the Brady background check and the "assault weapons" ban, even going so far as to sign a bill passing such a ban in Massachusetts that pretty much mirrored the now-expired federal AWB. As the Globe quotes Romney as saying as the GOP gubernatorial candidate in 2002, during a debate against Democrat Shannon O'Brien, "We do have tough gun laws in Massachusetts; I support them. I won't chip away at them; I believe they protect us and provide for our safety." I do not think the Second Amendment means what Mr. Romney thinks it means.
Why, oh why do these elitists continue to insult our intelligence so? Contrary to the media-driven perceptions, gun owners are not stupid. We do keep up with the issues, and we are quite politically astute. We know empty platitudes and pandering when we hear them, and here's a clear-cut case of just that.
I may well be preaching to the choir here, but Mitt Romney sure as hell is not a supporter of the right to keep and bear arms as envisioned by our Founding Fathers in accordance with the laws of nature and the principles of true liberty and freedom. As Bruce said, with friends like these, who needs enemies?
And, like David Codrea, I'd like to know -- what in the bloody hell is Wayne LaPierre doing escorting him around? Somehow I think I already know the answer, and it's quite disheartening to say the least.

Best News of the Young Year!

Via JR over at A Keyboard and a .45, and several other bloggers, comes this excellent, excellent news:

Ron Paul, the iconoclastic nine-term congressman from southeast Texas, took the first step Thursday toward launching a second presidential bid in 2008, this time as a Republican.

Talk about the answer to a real conservative Republican's prayers. Between the Northeastern leftists Rudolph Giuliani and Mitt Romney and the Constitution-trashing, power- and -attention-hungry John McCain, the GOP field for 2008 was looking positively nightmarish. I don't know what kind of chance Mr. Paul is going to have, but you can be damn sure he'll get my money, and my vote if he gets that far. As the article says, his candidacy is a long-shot, but then once upon a time no one ever thought a California movie star could ever be elected to that office, but Ronald Wilson Reagan proved them wrong -- twice -- and he was a long-shot candidate, too. Don't give up, Mr. Paul. We need you...dear God, do we ever.