Mike Vanderboegh: My Second Open Letter to Mike Lawlor -- On "Nightcrawlers" and Treason Played for Laughs.

My Second Open Letter to Mike Lawlor -- On "Nightcrawlers" and Treason Played for Laughs. We've already established that you are willing to sell out your country. Now we're just haggling about the price.

MBV Note to Readers: In my first letter to Connecticut's own Felix Dzerzhinsky, Mike Lawlor, we explored the subject of that tyrannical collectivist's KGB file. The response to that missive was very gratifying, as well as rewarding in terms of further clues and offers of assistance. I hope you like this letter as much as you liked the first.

From the Desk of Mike Vanderboegh

A man says to a woman, "Would you sleep with me for one million dollars?" She eyes him up and down. He is well-dressed, seems intelligent, urbane and sophisticated and might well have a million dollars to blow on a night of sex. She decides quickly and replies, "Sure." The man then asks, "Well, how about for ten dollars?" The woman is outraged. "What do you think I am?" The man smiles and says pleasantly, "My dear, we've already established what you are. All we're doing is bargaining about the price." -- An old joke.

Mike.Lawlor@ct.gov

Mike Lawlor

Under Secretary, State of Connecticut

Office of Policy and Management, Criminal Justice Policy and Planning Division

450 Capitol Avenue

Hartford, CT 06106

Dear Mike,

To take up where we left off, we were discussing the undoubted existence of your KGB file. In the meantime, I have been assured by sources recently (and not-so-recently) retired from the intelligence and counter-intelligence services of this country that you also have FBI and CIA files as well. One of those reminded me of the term "nightcrawler." As defined by Richard Bennett in his book Espionage: Spies and Secrets, a "nightcrawler" is a "talent spotter who prowls bars and nightclubs looking for government employees, military personnel, etc., who can be compromised using booze, drugs or sex."

LTC William Corson, USMC, Retired.

 He also reminded me that a mentor of his, Marine LTC Bill Corson (Yes, the same William Corson whose book I quoted in my first letter to you) once worked on a television documentary in the 80s with the legendary Washington, DC intelligence unit undercover cop Carl M. Shoffler. The documentary highlighted KGB recruitment tactics and techniques in the "gay bars" of the nation's capitol.

Shoffler was famous for having been one of the undercover cops who caught the GOP-sent burglars in the Watergate Hotel on 17 June 1972 but he never bragged about it. Indeed, he was much respected for the street smarts and hard work he brought to his intelligence unit work in the nation's capitol which always had ramifications far beyond the usual for a mere street cop.

For his part, Corson was even more highly regarded in the intelligence business. The novelist W.E.B. Griffin dedicated his work The Outlaws, in part, to "William R. Corson, a legendary Marine intelligence officer whom the KGB hated more than any other U.S. intelligence officer -- and not only because he wrote the definitive work on them."

One reason that the KGB hated him was that he was an effective anti-communist. His work in Marines' Combined Action Program in the I Corps area of South Vietnam was unorthodox, successful and nothing short of brilliant. (See also this out-take of a 1982 interview with LTC Corson on the subject.)

The documentary (I am seeking a copy of it as I write this) highlighted the operations of KGB assets called "nightcrawlers" in the D.C. area according to my source, who believes that such tactics were undoubtedly used against you during your time in the Soviet Union.

Of course I have already been accused of "homophobia" for dealing with this subject. That is, no pun intended, a red herring. My motivation here is tyrannophobia, if I may coin a term. But more of that in my next letter.

For now, I'd like to deal with some evidence out of your own mouth that several readers and one former intelligence officer brought to my attention since my first letter. Frankly, I'm a bit embarrassed that I missed it initially since the story raises even more questions about your early life with the words out of your own mouth.

I am referring, you may recall, to the story entitled A Giant Wait by Don Amore in the Hartford Courant of 26 December 1997:

Mike Lawlor was nearly out of George Washington University Law School and needed a job. Near the end of the lengthy screening process in 1983, he was face to face with a stern CIA recruiter.

The man in black wanted to know: Was there anything, anything at all, anything on this earth that would compel Lawlor to betray his country?

``I told him, `If the KGB could get me Giants season tickets, I'd think about it,' '' Lawlor recalled. ``I said, `Not just for one season. It would have to be a permanent thing. So all you'd have to do is get me Giants season tickets, and you'd never have to worry about me at all.'

``Well, the guy did not laugh. He did not smile. I never was offered a job.''

Sorry about that, Chief. The CIA went on to win its Cold War. Brothers Mike and Kevin Lawlor are still fighting theirs, waiting for the iron curtain to rise and the power behind it to grant them a pair of Giants season tickets.

``It is our white whale,'' said Kevin Lawlor, 29, a deputy assistant state's attorney in Milford. ``It is our obsession.''

I was instantly struck by your words as reminiscent of that old joke I quoted above. We've already established that you are willing to sell out your country. Now we're just haggling about the price. It is no wonder that the CIA man didn't laugh. But let us continue with the Mike Lawlor narrative of treason played for laughs:

Mike Lawlor (D-East Haven), 40, is a state representative and co-chairman of the House Judiciary Committee. But in the struggle for liberation from the waiting list, he is just another foot soldier. He gave the Giants his name in 1982 and was told the wait for seats would be about 50 years.

``You know, once you're on the list, they're always trying to find a way to get you off,'' he said. ``If you move, you're off. So I gave them my parents' address in East Haven; I figured they'd always be there. One year, I didn't get the newsletter they send, and I got worried.''

It turned out the Lawlors' postman had taken it upon himself to send a forwarding address to the Giants. After some pleading, Mike Lawlor got his place back in line.

``So maybe my children will get the tickets,'' he said.

There are small victories, won underground. The Lawlors scored three tickets for this season from a friend of a friend, who got better seats through a friend of a friend and put his up for sale. That's usually how it works.

Kevin Lawlor, Connecticut State's Attorney.

Of course your brother Kevin has carved a right smart career for himself, too: "Connecticut State’s Attorney Lawlor to be feted for work, heritage." What with you as Malloy's hatchet man on citizen disarmament and with a brother as a state's attorney, it isn't too hard to open an investigation on a troublemaker like me, is it?

So when you threaten Connecticut's hitherto law-abiding citizens with “You can either surrender the weapon to us, destroy the weapon, or sell it to a federal firearms licensee. After that date (January 1) that hasn’t been declared or register is banned and if you get caught, you’re going to get arrested." . . . Well, they had better take you damn seriously, hadn't they?

You know, it's the arrogance about you collectivist pricks that always strikes me as ironically misplaced. You're always the smartest guy in the room, dispensing orders from on high as if to the purple born, yet when it comes to the important things you really aren't all that bright.

Take that slip you made in the interview when you played the subject of treason for laughs. Of course you have long thought yourself safe from scrutiny of any questions about what you were up to back in the 70s and early 80s. But mentioning that a. you had tried to get a job with the CIA right out of law school and b. that they had turned you down, well, even to a guy like me who's nothing particularly special other than an amateur student of history, why, that's just plain stupid.

It raises so many questions and reinforces the ones I've already asked. Why would the CIA, at the height of the Cold War when it needed every trustworthy Russian speaker and analyst, turn you down? I guess the key word there is "trustworthy." The CIA, and not because of the bad joke, must have found compelling reasons to find you untrustworthy. That must have stung, huh? Not that you weren't accepted -- you would play that for laughs, for you are the smartest guy in the room and that just proves their stupidity, right? As a homosexual you already were struggling with issues of identity, loyalty, societal trust, etc. And again, homosexuality is not the issue. It is not now, nor was it then, grounds (by itself) for exclusion from employment by the CIA. According to my sources, the Agency knowingly hired many homosexuals from its inception onward as long as it was convinced of their loyalty, their trustworthiness. And, my sources say, as long as that was understood up front there was no blackmail risk and the Agency only very rarely was proved wrong about their pick.

So why did they turn you down, Mike? What was it that they spotted about you? I am told by sources who were once in a position to know that you have not only a KGB file and a CIA file, but an FBI file as well. We'll never get anything out of the CIA, but I wonder what a FOIA of the FBI might turn up? Have you got the juice to work your will upon the Fibbies as well?

And again, why apply to the CIA at all? Why did you change your career from Soviet Studies academic to zealous public prosecutor seeking the brass ring of political power? You are a public official. These are legitimate questions. Not that I expect an answer from you, at least not a written one.

Now if I lived in Connecticut and was asking these questions I would have already had my answer. You (or your brother) would already have seen to it that the slavish bully boys of the Connecticut State Police would have committed a dynamic raid on my ass, much as you threaten your state's citizens with official violence if they ignore your unconstitutional diktat.

As my friend John Longenecker has written about your collectivist kind, you are mostly all working out your anger at old wounds through power. He recently wrote me:

For a very long time, as you may already know, I have been a real believer myself in psychoanalysis. I have an old wounds theory of why officials are so sadistic. When old wounds meet political clout is when we see totalitarian abuses of due process and unending torment. The torment itself is the payoff for the sick office-holder. They are as clever as Satan in their words and conservative-friendly values on the stump, but in office, they are as cruel as Nazis.

Or, if you prefer, as cruel as Dzerzhinskys.

There is an exchange in the movie Tombstone between Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday when Earp is trying to figure out what made Johnny Ringo so evil that may apply here:

Wyatt Earp: What makes a man like Ringo, Doc? What makes him do the things he does?

Doc Holliday: A man like Ringo has got a great big hole, right in the middle of him. He can never kill enough, or steal enough, or inflict enough pain to ever fill it.

Wyatt Earp: What does he need?

Doc Holliday: Revenge.

Wyatt Earp: For what?

Doc Holliday: Bein' born.

So what did the KGB see in you to target you for recruitment? What did the CIA see in you to decline your much-needed services? How did that rejection make you feel? Why did the FBI open a file on you? How long will the Governor tolerate a man who may (or may not, only you and the KGB know for sure) have been a KGB mole as the public face of his firearm confiscation effort? Bad optics, that.

Questions, questions.

I'll have some more questions, and some answers, I think, as well, in my next letter. Have a nice day.

Sincerely,

Mike Vanderboegh

PO Box 926

Pinson, AL 35126

 Source

Constitutional Carry Considered in South Carolina

Photo courtesy of thegreenvillepost.com

In 2012 a constitutional carry bill died in a subcommittee in South Carolina.  In 2013, constitutional carry was taken on the road, and received major grassroots support.   That bill, S115, made it to the full committee, and is still alive.  In 2014, constitutional carry is bottled up in the South Carolina Senate Judiciary committee meeting.    WLTX reports:

Columbia, SC (WLTX) - A bill that would allow South Carolinian's to carry guns without a concealed weapons permit did not make it out of the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday.

South Carolina is one of five states that does not allow open carry.  This bill would restore legal open carry and concealed carry without a permit. 

Bright put forward the bill he says because requiring citizens to pay to carry a gun is an infringement on the second amendment of the constitution.

A move was made to kill the bill by tabling it, but that was defeated.

The committee voted in favor of a motion to carry the bill, meaning it will get further discussion in a future meeting.

Senator Bright, the sponsor of the bill, is reported to have said that he expects the bill to pass this year.   If it does, South Caroline would become the sixth state to restore constitutional carry.    Arizona, Alaska, Arkansas, Vermont and Wyoming current have constitutional carry.  Wyoming limits permitless carry to residents, but it is unlikely that the restriction would hold up to a court challenge.  Arkansas decriminalized concealed carry in 2013, but some jurisdictions are resisting the new law, citing a peculiar interpretation of the law by the Democrat Attorney General, Dustin McDaniel.

Constitutional carry is being considered by a number of state legislatures, including Ohio and Colorado.   South Dakota, Utah, Georgia, Montana, and Nevada all had constitutional, or permitless, carry bills pending in 2013.

 Senator Larry Martin is credited with killing S115 in South Carolina last year.  He had this to say, according to WLTX:

 "You can carry a weapon openly if this bill is adopted and I'm offended by that," said committee chair Sen. Larry Martin (R-Pickens). 

©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch 

SC:Governor Haley Will Sign Gun Law Reform

Governor Nikki Haley of South Carolina has said that she will sign the gun law reform, Bill 308.  The law has been widely touted as a "restaurant carry" bill that removes the state restrictions on people with concealed carry permits carrying their defensive firearms into establishments that serve alcohol.    Second amendment supporters have argued that they should be able to eat at the same restaurants as other citizens, without discrimination by the government.  The new law will prohibit legally armed citizens from consuming alcohol while in these establishments. 

Restaurants owners will be able to discriminate if they chose to do so, either by placing a sign indicating that armed citizens are not welcome, or by asking individuals to leave their establishments.

When the South Carolina reform is signed, only one state will have a blanket prohibition on carry in restaurants that serve alcohol.  That state, according to opencarry.org, is Louisiana.    Restaurant carry reform passed the Louisiana House 64-24 in 2013, but the bill did not make it through the legislative process. North Dakota passed restaurant carry reform in 2013.

 South Carolina Bill 308 reforms other parts of the State's gun laws as well.

The eight hour training requirement for a concealed carry permit is dropped, leaving a list of items that must be covered in the required instruction instead.  Former military and retired law enforcement are exempted from some of the training. 

Sheriffs no longer have the requirement to submit a recommendation about an applicant's fitness.   If the applicant for the concealed carry permit passes the background check, South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) must issue the permit.

Applications for the permit will now be accepted online.

The term of the permit is extended from four to five years.

Fingerprints will not be necessary for renewal applications.

Restrictions on where in vehicles firearms may be transported have been removed for permit holders.

The law will take effect upon the signature of the governor.


©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch

David Codrea: Andrews Police Chief Actions Speak Louder than Words

“Recently we've unearthed some sickening corruption in a nearby town and it's led to unlawful arrests and gun confiscations from two veterans that are also Oath Keepers,” a Friday Facebook message from James Franklin, Regional Director for Come and Take It Texas - West Texas Region, began. “Over the past week this issue has gotten even more complicated as the police in the town refuse to file police reports about one of their residents making terroristic threats against our group's members.”

Franklin was referring to a local resident who opposes lawful open carry of long guns to the point of pledging to inflict harm on people he calls “cowards.”
“Although there have been a few writers to pick up on this, we are entirely a grassroots organization and so we do our own PR, and local media is shy about calling out the local law enforcement,” Franklin explained as his reason for contacting Gun Rights Examiner. Readers of this column have seen time and again how selectivity on the part of “legitimate news media/Authorized Journalists/real reporters” results in sins of omission equally detrimental to a fully informed public as overt “agenda journalism” sins of commission. (All one needs do to validate that assessment is look at the early and continued history of Operation Fast and Furious “gunwalker” reporting.)

To that end, Franklin asked this column to “help us shine a light on this situation.” The best way to do that is to share what they’ve written to date, including a report about the arrest of veteran Joey Posey and another about the arrest of veteran Michael Keoughan. Of particular concern should be the conduct of Andrews Police Chief Bud Jones, whom activists say had “assured them that and understanding had been reached. He gave his word that he would do everything in his power to protect the legal rights of gun owners in the future.”

As CATI has already done pretty thorough reporting on this, there's not much more for me to add, and rather than reword their reporting, I figure the best way I can help with the request to shine a light is to share the above message and links with readers here, and ask you to join me in helping spread the word where establishment media will not.

What they’re saying and asking is pretty straightforward and easy to help with:

Come and Take It Texas will be holding another demonstration in Andrews, Texas on February 15th, 2014 as they continue to seek justice for these soldiers. However the struggle is far from over. If you would like to contribute to their legal defense, click on the following links for Joey Posey and Michael Keoughan. Please help this story go viral! Spread this link and these [one] [two] [three] to everyone you know including other news outlets. You can also contact Police Chief Bud Jones and help us respectfully educate him on the meaning of the oath that he swore to uphold.

 More here at Gun Rights Examiner

RI:Second Amendment Supporters Outspent 2-1 in Local Recall Efforts

This recall effort was always an uphill battle.  The town is reliably Democrat,and the issue was not as clear cut as first indicated.

A month and a half after the unsuccessful effort to oust four Exeter Town Council members, financial reports filed by both sides show that in the weeks leading up to the recall vote, the firearms-rights supporters who mounted the effort were badly outgunned in terms of campaign cash.

More Here

MI:Homeowner Shoots one of two Intruders

BLOOMFIELD TWP. (WWJ) - Police say a home invasion suspect is on the loose after his partner in crime was shot by a quick-thinking homeowner in Oakland County.

(snip)

 The man told police he agreed to give the intruders all of his money and took one of the suspects into his bedroom. Once in the bedroom, the homeowner grabbed a firearm and shot at the suspect, police said. A struggle ensued and the suspects ultimately fled the residence. The homeowner chased the suspects and fired one more round as they ran away, according to police.

More Here

KS:Man Who Defended Self, Home Arrested

The arrested man had a prior felony conviction, so he was not legally allowed to possess a firearm.  That is the infraction that he was arrested for.

Officers were called to the 2300 block of North Poplar shortly before 4 a.m. Monday. Officers say a 35-year-old woke up to a noise, then opened his bedroom door and saw a man inside his home. The men began fighting and shots were fired.

More Here

SC:Governor Will Sign Restaurant Carry

CHARLESTON, S.C. (WCIV) -- Gov. Nikki Haley said she's just waiting on the state Legislature to get a bill to her desk that would allow people with concealed weapons permits to carry their gun into restaurants and bars.

More here

GA:Woman Drives off Intruder with Gunfire

When a DeKalb County woman returned home early Tuesday to find two teenagers in her home, she knew she needed to protect herself.

(snip)

“Me and the bigger boy, we tussled and fell out the door together,” the woman told Channel 2.

The woman fired several shots toward the teens, but no one was injured, according to police. A neighbor’s security camera captured the teens, and the woman was able to lead police to the suspects.

More here

OH:Legislators learn how silencers affect guns

 This is the typical reaction when people experience reality instead of the fantasies they have been fed all their lives about guns.

When most people think of a gun silencer, they think it’s “Hollywood quiet,” said Eric Eesley.

You know how it goes — when the bad guy in the movies or TV fires a gun with a silencer, it often sounds as if someone just spit out his gum.

Eesley, a salesman at Black Wing Shooting Center in Delaware, said he sells plenty of silencers, but he often has to first educate people about the reality. A silenced gun still makes quite a bang.

More than 20 lawmakers or their aides gathered yesterday at Black Wing to learn a similar lesson and hear from an expert on how silencers, or suppressors, can affect the noise levels of hunting rifles. The event was organized by the Buckeye Firearms Association in an effort to gain support for House Bill 234, which would allow hunting with a suppressor.

“The reduction in noise is a little easier on the ears,” Eesley said, adding that it can also reduce recoil, making the gun more accurate. “It makes it quite nice to shoot.”

(snip)

 “It seems to me the noise is still fairly significant,” said Rep. Mike Curtin, D-Marble Cliff, who said he hasn’t fired a gun since his days of ROTC training in 1970. “For me, unless I hear serious reservations from law enforcement or the Farm Bureau Federation, I’m not sure who would have problems with this legislation.”

More here

Nullification: A Valid Second Amendment Strategy

The Wire recently published a story titled “The Revolution Will Not Be Authorized: Give Up on the Nullification Dream, GOP” written by Philip Bump. It is a typical collection of half-truths, smears, name calling and revisionist history trying to paint Georgia nullifiers as right-wing, childish crybabies who can’t handle not having everything their way.

It isn’t very good article, and is filled with legal mischaracterization of the Constitution, and the meaning of judicial review.

It seems Mr. Bump is bothered by the prospects of the state taking affirmative steps to protect the citizens of Georgia from federal violations of the Second Amendment. The bill he is criticizing is House Bill 732 authored by state Rep. Tom Kirby.

Although there are a great deal of silliness I could take issue with in the article, I would like to focus on one in argument in particular.  In the second paragraph we find this little gem :

“States can’t invalidate federal law on a whim, thanks to the very Constitution that people like Kirby often say that they’re defending. North Carolina can’t have a state religion and Louisiana can’t just ignore Obamacare.”
Nowhere in the bill does it say that the enforcement by federal employees of Second Amendment violations is illegal in Georgia. (Although a bill proclaiming this would still be Constitutional inasmuch as the Second Amendment violations are not “in pursuance’ of the U.S. Constitution, and thus the supremacy clause does not make them supreme.) The bill does not seek to block federal action. It merely makes it illegal for state employees to enforce federal Second Amendment violations. This means that the bill is not attempting to push back against the feds in the way that Mr. Bump says. But rather it is relying on the anti-commandeering  doctrine.

That the federal government cannot force states to help implement or enforce and federal act or program is well-established in the law. The anti-commandeering doctrine is based primarily on four SCOTUS cases: Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842), New York v. US (1992), Printz v. US (1997) and National Federation of Businesses v. Sebelius. The Printz case is the cornerstone.

“We held in New York that Congress cannot compel the States to enact or enforce a federal regulatory program. Today we hold that Congress cannot circumvent that prohibition by conscripting the States’ officers directly. The Federal Government may neither issue directives requiring the States to address particular problems, nor command the States’ officers, or those of their political subdivisions, to administer or enforce a federal regulatory program. It matters not whether policy making is involved, and no case-by-case weighing of the burdens or benefits is necessary; such commands are fundamentally incompatible with our constitutional system of dual sovereignty.”

In layman’s terms, this legal doctrine simply asserts that the feds cannot force the states to enforce federal laws. Federal law remains intact IF the feds can enforce it. Of course, in the grand scheme of things, this makes a much bigger impact than you might imagine. After all, there are always about five sheriffs deputies or local cops showing up on a raid with the one or two federal agents. If the feds had to make up for the manpower and materials, they would be scarcely able to police an entire state let alone an entire nation of 50 states.

Of course, this law would be a disaster for the gun control agenda in DC.  How hard would it be for the feds to come for guns without the help of all the sheriffs, the state police, the chiefs of police, the city police and other state agents?  It would be a herculean task that very few federal agents would relish.

If Mr. Bump is a gun control supporter, I can understand his desire to divert attention away from nullification or to cast it in a negative light, but he should be ashamed to have mischaracterized this particular bill like he did.

Source

MI:Machete-Wielding Suspect Gets a 2nd Amendment Lesson When He Targets the Wrong Woman

A Michigan woman was confronted last week by a machete-wielding, ski mask-wearing would-be home invader, forcing her to exercise her Second Amendment rights. As if that’s not scary enough, what alerted her to the intruder is downright terrifying.

The suspect, a 15-year-old teen who was also armed with a shotgun, woke up the Michigan woman at around 1:00 a.m. Friday as he repeatedly tried to break into her home.

(snip)

Her children asleep in the next room, the woman grabbed her gun, rushed to the top of the stairs and drew a bead on the teenage suspect.

“And I pointed my gun right at him, and he took a couple of steps back,” she said.

More Here

CT:Do it. Then we tell you if it is Legal or not.

Photo © Oleg Volk. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

 

Right out of Orwell's 1984

 The anti-gun jihadists of the Connecticut government, who boast that the state's ban of so-called "assault weapons" (recently upheld as "Constitutional" by a federal judge despite his admission that the banned firearms and magazines are "in common use," and thus deserving Second Amendment protection even under the narrowly written Heller decision) is now the most draconian in the nation, are not satisfied with mere compliance with every detail of the law. They demand abject, terrified worship of the law. This is illustrated by comments made in response to resident gun manufacturer Stag Arms' attempts to gain clarification from the Connecticut State Police on whether or not the company's new design for a .22 Long Rifle caliber rifle would meet the state's oppressive requirements.

The police are claiming that they are under no obligation to provide that clarity, which means that if Stag builds the new design, and the state determines that it is not in compliance (with a law that even the federal judge who upheld it admits that "several provisions of the legislation are not written with the utmost clarity"), the company will find itself in legal hot water. As the CT Post reports, Governor Malloy's office is unsympathetic:

"It's not the job of law enforcement to give a stamp of approval for a company or an individual's actions," said Andrew Doba, a spokesman for Malloy. "It's the job of law enforcement to protect public safety. Instead of trying to figure out ways to get around the common-sense gun laws that were passed last session, gun manufacturers should join the efforts of the vast majority of residents who support having safer communities, free of gun violence."

See what Doba did there? Stag's attempts to establish just what will be considered legal, and what will not--attempts, in other words, to find out how to comply with the law--have magically morphed into "trying to figure out ways to get around the common-sense [sic] gun laws . . . ." A board member of a local forcible citizen disarmament group makes a similar, but even more bizarre, argument:

"We hope that the gun manufacturers will comply with both the letter of the law and the spirit of the law and not attempt to make changes to firearms that have been used in mass shootings such as here in Sandy Hook," said Monte Frank, a board member and counsel of the Newtown Action Alliance, a local grassroots organization supportive of gun control reform.

First, as vague as the letter of the law is, Frank wants Stag to somehow divine the "spirit" of the law, as well--and then obey that "spirit." Secondly, now he's objecting to "changes to firearms that have been used in mass shootings"? The law requires that they be changed--that seems to have been what the "gun control" zealots wanted.

This is, of course, hardly the first time we have seen this "logic" from the gun ban zealots. This column noted that early in the controversy over "bullet buttons," for quick--but legal--magazine changes in the California market, CBS News characterized the development as yet another "loophole" to be closed. California Attorney General Kamala Harris (the one who so appeals to President Obama) offered a familiar argument, according to CBS:

More Here  at St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner
 

From Sipsey Street Irregulars: An Open Letter to Michael Lawlor, the CT Governor's Hatchet Man on Firearms Confiscation. "How's your KGB file hangin', Mike?

NOTE: The following letter was sent via email this morning to Michael Lawlor (Some biographical details here and here. Mr. Lawlor is Connecticut Governor Dannell Malloy's hatchet man on the current tyrannical enforcement of that state's Intolerable Act. I will send him an official hard copy via snail mail today.

“You can either surrender the weapon to us, destroy the weapon, or sell it to a federal firearms licensee. After that date (January 1) that hasn’t been declared or register is banned and if you get caught, you’re going to get arrested." -- Michael Lawlor.

Mike.Lawlor@ct.gov

Mike Lawlor

Under Secretary, State of Connecticut

Office of Policy and Management, Criminal Justice Policy and Planning Division

450 Capitol Avenue

Hartford, CT 06106

Dear Mike,

As Governor Malloy's volunteer hatchet man on the forcible disarmament of the Connecticut citizenry, it is appropriate that I write you directly on some issues raised by your personal collectivist appetites for control of your fellow citizens' liberty, property and lives, if for no other reason than to politely explain some ramifications of that dictatorial compulsion under the Law of Unintended Consequences and the principles of 4th Generation Warfare, under which the civil war that you seem eager to solicit will likely be fought. This is only good manners, I feel, and since the subject is rather vast will certainly take more than one letter. However, I trust that as a tyrannical collectivist in good standing you recall Ho Chi Minh's dictum:

"Cherish your enemies for they teach you the best lessons."

We do have a few things in common, you and I. I am a former collectivist while you remain one, and a rather nasty one at that, if you don't mind my saying. But as an ex-communist I am familiar with all of the known collectivist lies and more than a few of the unknown, personal, secret ones as well -- the kind that you tell to yourself when you're acting out the True Believer, as you are now.

We also each prefer to be called "Mike" rather than "Michael." It is little enough, perhaps, but it tells us something about each other. My good friend Bob Wright, the New Mexico militia leader, once told a federal policeman who was contemplating a raid upon him, "You know, in the 60s the left-wing in this country said that if the young men who fought the wars (as opposed to the old ones who started them) could sit down and talk things out, there would be no wars." He paused and then added, "We are here to test that theory." It must have worked, since there was no subsequent raid.

So I offer this letter and the ones to follow in the same spirit of mutual understanding in the hope of avoiding conflict.

You may be familiar with my name already, as I have been a leading advocate of resistance to your tyranny since my call during a speech in Hartford last April to "Resist, defy, evade and smuggle" in opposition to your new diktat.

In furtherance of that call, I have since led a smuggling campaign to provide standard capacity magazines to Connecticut citizens and I have recently received a bit of newspaper ink in your state with my Toys for Totalitarians program. This has apparently provoked a state police investigation and they have recently tried to contact me. It seemed only fair, then, that as I was a subject of your investigations it might prove profitable to make you a subject of mine. As one of the guys who broke the Fast and Furious scandal on the Internet (with the help of my good friend David Codrea) I am not without resources and contacts of my own. Why not apply them here? Why not, indeed. Turnabout is not only fair play but flattery. So consider yourself flattered.

You know it is quite ironic that on the morning I sit down to write this letter we discover that Adam Lanza (whose evil deeds were the supposed excuse for your Intolerable Act) was something of a twisted fellow traveler of collectivism being an apparently homosexual, environmentalist vegan who was anti-Christian enough to forbid his mother to put up a Christmas tree. "Gee," I thought when I read that, "This kid could have grown up to be a Connecticut Democrat politician." That he provided the bloody excuse for tyrant wannabes such as yourself is certainly the Devil's own joke -- send a collectivist killer to enable future collectivist power. Old Scratch must be laughing his ass off.

You know after just a cursory reading of your biography here and here, I realized that I owed you an apology. Previously I had described you as Malloy's "Eichmann." But Eichmann was a rather colorless bureaucrat, defining as Hannah Arendt spelled out, "the banality of evil." But you, sir, are no bureaucratic handmaiden of evil. No, to call you an Eichmann would require an apology to both you and Eichmann. You, sir, are a true believer -- more of a Heydrich than an Eichmann. Or, if you raise a Godwin's objection, shall we say a Felix Dzerzhinsky? Yes. Dzerzhinsky is certainly more fitting.

I note that while you were at UConn in 1977 you "participated in language studies in Russia in 1977" at Moscow and Leningrad. You then earned a Master's Degree in Soviet Area Studies from the University of London in 1981. You were, what, 20 when you first experienced the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War? It must have fascinated you early on in life. Yet after you got your Masters in Soviet Area Studies from the University of London at a time when that and other British universities were prime recruiting grounds for KGB "political warfare" assets, and you subsequently "received a Fulbright-Hays Scholarship to study economic reform in Hungary in 1982," you decided to change course and become, in quick succession, a lawyer, a prosecutor and then a Democrat Party politician.

Why the change, Mike?

Your KGB file might provide some clues along those lines, of course. I had a long chat with a former CIA Cold Warrior who is intimately familiar with the KGB infiltration and subversion tactics of the time of your stay in the Soviet Union. He says that you certainly have a KGB file and had a KGB officer assigned to your case with the object of making an asset of you. No one from the United States got into the Soviet Union back then without the close inspection of the KGB. NO ONE.

More here at Sipsey Street Irregulars

UT:Second Amendment Supporter Finally Prevails in Legal Fight Over Protective Order

Clark Aposhian stands with his arm on his truck

Clark Aposhian, an outspoken second amendment supporter, was arrested  on domestic violence charges on May 27th, 2013.   At the time, I thought it was likely a false accusation.  As a prominent constitutional rights activist who ran a business teaching concealed carry courses, in the middle of a divorce, Aposhian was clearly at risk of being hit with a domestic violence restraining order.  Such an order would take away his second amendment rights for an indeterminate period, and divert enormous time, resources and energy away from his political battles, right when they were needed the most, in early 2013.

It was what has become a classic ploy in divorce cases ever since the ill conceived Lautenberg amendment was passed in the Clinton administration.

Now, a long and painful eight months later, Aposhian has been vindicated.    From the sltrib.com:

Third District Judge Andrew Stone denied a protective order request from Aposhian’s ex-wife, Natalie Meyer, last Tuesday and ruled the woman has no reason to fear the gun lobbyist.

There are three cases that have been pending against Aposhian, all stemming from one incident in which he showed up to pick up his 11 year old daughter in a 2.5 ton surplus military truck.  In June, he was ordered to surrender all of his firearms within 24 hours.  Aposhian's lawyer has always contended that the charges were false.  Now, eight months later, a judge has ruled that no protective order is justified.  It seems likely that Aposhian will be vindicated in the ongoing domestic abuse case stemming from the same incident.

Aposhian still faces misdemeanor domestic violence charges in Holladay Justice Court, but his attorneys hope Stone’s ruling, which states there was no abuse or criminal trespassing on the Meyers’ property, will help them in fighting that case.

"The court’s recent ruling clearly vindicates Mr. Aposhian," defense attorney Morgan Philpot said in a written statement provided to The Tribune. "Mr. Aposhian now looks forward to resuming the process of clearing up the residue of false allegations and returning to focus on his family and relationship with his daughter."

These sort of actions have become expected by men who own guns in divorce cases.   Lawyers know that they have a large lever to make the lives of the opposition miserable.   I have had a lawyer friend tell me of instances where unscrupulous men have used the amendment to disarm their former wives and girlfriends as well.

The anti-second amendment press in Salt Lake City has had a field day with the incident, using it to smear Aposhian and by association, all gun owners in Utah.  it has clearly limited Mr. Aposhian's effectiveness as a lobbyist during the last eight months.

The court ruling is not completely unexpected.

Stone pointed out that Meyer never mentioned any ongoing emotional or verbal abuse in her divorce filings.

The judge also wrote that despite having a mutual restraining order that instructed both Aposhian and Meyer to communicate strictly through email, Meyer elected to waive those protections "for some time," interacted with Aposhian in person and maintained a joint-custody arrangement with their daughter.

 The judge was careful to let Aposhian's ex-wife, Natalie Meyer, who was remarried and living with her new husband when the original incident occurred, down gently:

"The Court accepts Ms. Meyer’s testimony that she has found her interactions with Mr. Aposhian since her separation upsetting, intimidating and annoying," Stone wrote in his ruling. "That does not lead to a conclusion that they will escalate to violence."

The question is: how does Clark Aposhian get his reputation back?

  
©2013 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch

CO:Armed Father Shoots Dog Attacking his Daughters

A father was forced to shoot a dog to death in front of a local grocery store to protect his daughters who were under attack, the Grand Junction Police Department reported.

(snip)

Herrera called to the dog, but Sugar did not stop. The dog began biting one of the girls and pulling at her coat, police reported.

“The little girl pulled away and Sugar bit her again,” a police officer wrote in a report.

At that point, the man drew a weapon and shot the dog in a hindquarter, according to police.

More Here

Miller:Bloomberg group blasts billboard ‘assault rifle’ as American as apple pie and baseball

Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense, which is funded by New York City billionaire Mike Bloomberg, wants billboards taken down for depicting “assault rifles” as being as American as apple pie and baseball. The ad for Slide Fire, a firearms parts manufacturer in Texas, is up in several cities, including Chicago.

Nicole Chen, the head of the gun-control group’s Illinois chapter, said she was “shocked” that the ad “removes ‘mom’ from the idiom ‘as American as baseball, apple pie and mom,’ and replaces it with an assault rifle.”

Ms. Chen added that, “It’s particularly upsetting that children in Chicago, a city that has struggled horribly with gun violence, are being exposed to such a harmful message.”

The billboard says “Pure American” under three photos of a baseball glove, a pie and an AR-type rifle. The ad copy and design was done in-house by Slide Fire.
The manufacturer deliberately chose President Obama’s hometown for one of its billboards because of the city’s high crime rate and extremely restrictive gun-control laws.

“Chicago is the number one place in the country that shows gun laws don’t work,” Laura Shackelford, the chief executive manager of Slide Fire, told me in an interview Monday.

More Here

IN:Homeowner Hold Intruder at Gun Point

 26 year old Shane Lee Corey was held for police by an armed homeowner who allegedly caught him in his garage at the home near CR 1200 N and 200W north of Brazil.

(snip)

 Police believe that Cory may be responsible for several other break-ins in the area.

More Here

Armed Pizza Delivery

Pizza delivery people have a very dangerous job.  I do not know that anyone has quantified how often they get in vehicle accidents, or how often they are held up, beat up, or killed by robbers, but it seems to be a regular occurrence.  A little known fact is that the modern bullet resistant vest was invented because of a pizza delivery holdup that turned into a shootout.   Richard Davis, who invented the Second Chance vest, and made a company and a fortune out of it, used to deliver pizzas.   He carried a gun in a spare pizza box under the one that he was delivering.   After the gun fight, he realized how vulnerable he was, and the modern bullet resistant vest was the result.

 I track as many defensive gun uses (DGU) as I can find on the blog Gun Watch.  It is not a comprehensive list, just those that come to my attention.  In 2013, I recorded pizza  DGUs in February, March,  August, September, and  October.  These mostly involve serious wounding or worse, so it seems likely that the most common kind of scenario, where the robber sees the gun and runs off, does not make the papers or the Internet.   I suspect that most of the time, it is not even reported.

Some pizza companies have "no gun" policies, but some are seeing the utility of defensive firearms and are supportive of their employees being able to defend their lives.   From wishtv.com:

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) – Bill Bruton spent Super Bowl Sunday delivering pizzas all over Indianapolis for Aunt Polly’s Pizza. But when Bruton hits the road to make a delivery, he’s carrying more than a pizza. He’s also carrying a gun.

“I’ve got a lifetime permit and I carry,” he said.

The manager at Aunt Polly’s said their drivers have carried for years.
“As long as they have gun permits,” said manager Jeff White.

Not everyone allows their employees to carry weapons. But restaurants are reviewing their safety policies after two pizza delivery drivers were shot and killed in Indianapolis in two weeks.

The trend is to allow employees, as much as any other human being, the right to defend their lives against the human and animal predators that would prey on them.

©2013 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch 


Update:  wdaz.com:

Two delivery drivers were shot and killed in Indianapolis over the last two weeks, now restaurant owners aren't taking any chances and are allowing drivers to carry a gun as long as they have a permit to do so.

Two delivery drivers were shot and killed in Indianapolis over the last two weeks, now restaurant owners aren't taking any chances and are allowing drivers to carry a gun as long as they have a permit to do so. - See more at: http://www.wdaz.com/event/article/id/22385/#sthash.vbyolLRS.dpuf

Two delivery drivers were shot and killed in Indianapolis over the last two weeks, now restaurant owners aren't taking any chances and are allowing drivers to carry a gun as long as they have a permit to do so. - See more at: http://www.wdaz.com/event/article/id/22385/#sthash.vbyolLRS.dpuf

NSSF:Shot Show to Stay in Las Vegas Through 2018

The Shot Show staying in Las Vegas through 2018 works well for me.  If anyone who has an interest in guns can wrangle a ticket to the show, I recommend that they do.   The show is for industry only, but vendors and retailers often need help setting up displays or canvassing the show.  It is simply too big for a person to cover with any amount of rigor in four days.  From an NSSF email:

SHOT Show^® to Stay at Sands Expo through 2018

LAS VEGAS -- The National Shooting Sports Foundation® (NSSF®) followed up its recently concluded, record-setting Shooting, Hunting and Outdoor Trade ShowTM (SHOT Show®) by adding another year to its agreement with Sands Expo in Las Vegas.

Under the new terms, NSSF will put on the SHOT Show at Sands Expo through 2018.

The 2014 SHOT Show, which ran Jan. 14-17, attracted more than 67,000 in total attendance, an all-time high, and was the fifth consecutive SHOT Show held at Sands Expo. NSSF had previously extended its stay at the venue for three years through 2017.

SHOT Show is the fifth largest trade show in Las Vegas and the largest trade show of its kind in the world.

"Sands Expo has spent millions of dollars evolving the venue in order to meet SHOT Show's needs and to make our attendees feel welcome," said Chris Dolnack, NSSF Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer. "We've been pleased with the improvements, and we look forward to continuing to work with them to build on our success here in Las Vegas."

"Everyone at Sands Expo enjoys having SHOT Show in the building. The team is wonderful to work with, and it's exciting to know that we've played a role in helping them grow," said Ashlyn LaPorte, Sands Expo Executive Director of Event Management. "We look forward to continuing this relationship, and can't wait to see what records will be broken in subsequent years."

Sands Expo recently completed a $37 million renovation that significantly upgraded its facilities, including redesigning and remodeling the lobby and adding escalators, new carpeting, Wi-Fi hotspots, food outlets, digital signage and other amenities that have enhanced trade-show experiences for exhibitors and attendees.

The SHOT Show generates more than $73 million for the Las Vegas economy.

-30-

About NSSF
The National Shooting Sports Foundation is the trade association for the firearms industry. Its mission is to promote, protect and preserve hunting and the shooting sports. Formed in 1961, NSSF has a membership of more than 10,000 manufacturers, distributors, firearms retailers, shooting ranges, sportsmen's organizations and publishers. For more information, log on to www.nssf.org.

I have attended a few times, and always found the show worthwhile.

Dean Weingarten, GunWatch

OK:Reward Poster Contains Elements of Advertisement for Glock

I have to admit being taken aback by this  reward poster at the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation website.   I can see the utility in grabbing a graphic from  the Internet that is unlikely to draw a complaint from the owner.  It may even be in the public domain.  But I find the juxtaposition of Glock Perfection with a double child murder case to be a little disturbing.

The pistol may be useful in the trial of Kevin Sweat, who has given a confession of sorts.   A hearing has been scheduled to determine if the video of the confession will be allowed at the trial.   The trial also includes the murder of Sweat's fiancée,  Ashley Taylor.  Perhaps a reader will have knowledge of this pistol and will be able to assist in this case.

©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch 

TX: Update, Insufficient Evidence to Charge Rookie Cops in Death of Homeowner at Wrong Address

Under Texas law, the homeowner would have been justified in shooting the intruders on his property, if he had believed they were involved in theft.  One of the rookie police officers has already been fired by  the department for filing a false statement in an unrelated arrest.

A grand jury in Tarrant County, Texas has decided not to indict the rookie police officer who shot dead a homeowner while investigating a burglary at the wrong address.

Last May, R.A. 'Alex' Hoeppner and his partner Benjamin Hanlon accidentally started searching 72-year-old Jerry Waller's property, confusing it in the dark for a house across the street. 
Waller was in bed with his wife Kathy at the time, and was stirred by the police officer's flashlights. Fearing a prowler was outside, he grabbed his .35-caliber-pistol and went to investigate.


More Here

From onlygunsandmoney:Concealed Carry vs. Homicide Rates

The gun prohibitionists are already saying that blood will run in the streets when the Illinois General Assembly crafts some form of concealed carry legislation in accordance with today's ruling by Judge Richard Posner of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals.

“As the dissenting opinion points out, the two judges who threw out Illinois' law did not take account of the danger to the public from stray bullets, and they ignored the Illinois legislature's determination that carrying weapons has been shown to escalate violence,” said Lee Goodman, an organizer with the Stop Concealed Carry Coalition.

If Lee had taken the time to examine the graphic below, he would see that there is no positive correlation between less-restrictive (legal) carry (shall issue and constitutional issue) and increased violent crime. Let's face it - Chicago already has concealed carry by thugs and criminals. The only ones prohibited from protecting themselves are honest, law-abiding citizens.

This was originally posted on Dec. 21, 2011.

In October, I posted a graphic developed by Rob Vance that showed the progress in the growth of firearms carry rights from 1986 through 2011 as a percentage of the U.S. population. In 1986, 90% of the U.S. population lived in states that severely restricted carry rights or had none at all. Today, over two-thirds of Americans live in states with either shall-issue carry or constitutional carry. The conclusion was that shall-issue is the new norm.

Recently, the FBI released its Uniform Crime Reports statistics. Rob generated a new graph plotting these violent crime rates against the growth of less-restrictive firearm carry rights over the period of 1986 through 2011.

The data used to generate this graph is available here in Google documents. As I said in the original post, unlike the gun prohibitionists, we publish our data for the world to see. The data used comes from three sources: the FBI Uniform Crime Reports, the U.S. Census, and www.gun-nuttery.com/rtc.php which tracked the changes in carry laws over time.

Rob had the following conclusions after examining the data:

Violent crime is a complex issue, but national data is clear that there is no positive correlation between liberalized concealed carry laws and increased violent crime.

The “blood in the streets” or “Wild West” scenarios just don’t play out. To be fair, state level data is highly variable, so some caution needs to be exercised in drawing conclusions.

Rob is very explicit that there is no positive correlation between violent crime and liberalized carry laws rather than a proven negative correlation. He feels that it will take more rigorous statistical analysis before this negative correlation could be said to be proven.

The results here are reinforced by the study done by Linoge at Walls of the City which compared violent crime rates and firearm ownership. In that study, Linoge did find a relatively strong negative (-0.605) correlation between violent crime and firearm ownership.
 
While violent crime did not go down as sharply as the progress in carry rights rose, one thing that needs to be kept in mind is that while shall-issue may be the new norm that right is not extended to all locations. Bars, restaurants, government buildings, post offices, and many parks are still off-limits to concealed carry. I think this will become the next battleground for concealed carry. Interestingly enough, restrictive states like California actually have fewer restrictions on where one may carry.

As an example of the battle for fewer restricted locations, one need look no further than here in North Carolina. This session of the General Assembly changed the law concerning concealed carry in state, municipal, and county parks. It is now allowed everywhere with the exception of a local opt-out for "recreational facilities". As might be expected, some locales are trying to push the limit on what is considered a recreation facility far beyond what was intended by the General Assembly.

Shall-issue may be the new norm but the fight will continue.

NOTE: If you click on the graphic, you can view it in its full original size. 

 

Source

CalGunLaw:Defining the Debate – Active Shooters and Mass Shootings

“Mass public shootings are on the rise!” “Mass public shootings are not rising!”
Oddly enough, both statements are correct, and misused by the gun control lobby to confuse and alarm the public. You need to know the difference, the truth and the oddly calming perspective.

Like the mythical “assault weapons”, everything depends on the definition. Across the nation there have been dozens of different “assault weapon” laws that sought to control anywhere from tens to thousands of different firearms. The definition changed from city to city, state to state and between the states and the federal government. Like in Alice in Wonderland: “It means what we say it means.”

Likewise with public shootings. The definitions are slippery, and depending on which one you choose you can prove or disprove nearly anything. So here are the two basic definitions that come from criminologists (and not propagandists):
Mass Public Shootings (MPS): “Slaughter of four or more victims by one or a few assailants within a single event, lasting but a few minutes or as long as several hours.”

Active Shooter Events (ASE): “One or more persons engaged in killing or attempting to kill multiple people in an area (or areas) occupied by multiple unrelated individuals. At least one of the victims must be unrelated to the shooter. The primary motive appears to be mass murder; that is the shooting is not a by-product of an attempt to commit another crime.”

Notice that MPSs require four or more dead people. ASEs require zero or more. MPSs have remained steady for decades, and in terms of per capita deaths, have fallen. ASEs have climbed moderately.

This is the critical difference, and an important distraction that gun control lobbyists avoid making. They promote the fact that ASEs are rising, while mentioning MPSs such as Sandy Hook to make it seem like MPSs are rising too. Let’s dig deeper into the numbers and make sense of all this, so you can talk sense into your representatives.

ASEs and the Slow Growth

Recently, the FBI released United States Active Shooter Events from 2000 to 2010, a report covering the decade since the Columbine massacre and every event in which a roving gunman took pot shots at people, regardless of the outcome. In their public summary, they listed the number of such events each year but not the number of victims (requests have been sent for more detail).
As noted above, the number of ASEs is indeed rising, though the number of such events and the likely damage from them is low. Indeed, if not for the two outlier years at the end of the study, the curve would be practically flat.

The report does give us the median number of people shot and killed (four and two respectively). So aside from the outlier years, the number of ASE deaths is between two and 12 people a year. Contrast this with the 11,078 firearm homicides in the latest reporting year. ASE deaths are 0.1% of all felonious gun homicides.

Conclusion: though we want to stop all homicides, those by disgruntled employees and random lunatics are the least of our worries.

Mass Public Shootings

MSPs are basically steady, and as a function of the population, are actually in decline.

James Alan Fox of Northeastern University has tallied MSPs from 1976 through 2011, or 35 years. His data is valuable, though incomplete in as much as it does not adjust for population growth, and hence the probability that you might be shot in a MPS. It also only lists deaths and not woundings, though we can safely assume woundings would not display a different trend.

There are a number of compelling aspects to this data. First, the number of incidents is rising slightly, but the number of deaths is declining in terms of our total population. But also the number of MPS deaths per 100,000 people is astoundingly low at less than 1% of all gun homicides.

Knowing Essential

The key points to remember are these.

1. In the more horrific type of event – mass public shootings – the per capita death rate is falling.
2. Even so, the deaths from either MPSs or ASEs is a fraction of one percent of gun homicides.

So as a public policy issue, should MPSs and ASEs be the least of our concerns? No, because we know that ASEs and MSPs occur in “gun free zones” created by spin-masters who manipulate statistics to serve their agenda. Your chances of dying in ASEs and MSPs are increased by civilian disarmament ideologues on the public payroll.

Tell them you want to help prevent ASEs and MSPs by being part of the mass murderer’s uncertainty principle, by being an armed citizen–and a constant violence deterrent.

Source CalGunLaw

SC:Robber Shot by Employee

GREENVILLE, SC (FOX Carolina) -
The search for a suspected restaurant robber out of Greenville County is over after a man showed up at Spartanburg Regional Hospital with multiple gunshot wounds, according to Greenville County deputies.

Deputies said a man with a gun came into Wings On The Run along East North Street in Greenville Thursday night and tried to rob the place.

That's when an employee at the restaurant pulled out his own gun and shot the suspect twice, according to deputies. They said the guy then ran away.

More Here

NC.:Old Federal Law Creates Weird Gun Trade Incentives, Causing Tommy Gun Controversy

Courtesy of Lauren Carroll/Journal myfox8.com

When politicians attempt to ban things with regulations and taxes, weird results follow naturally.   In this example, the stage was set with the bizarre National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934, which was upheld by the infamous U.S. v. Miller decision.  In the NFA of 1934, a $200 tax had to be paid, and full auto firearms had to be registered with the Federal government, if they had crossed state lines.  The "tax" was the equivalent of $4,000 today, on items that varied in value from 1/10th the amount of the tax to roughly equivalent for the Thompson.   The crafters of the act admitted that the idea of a "tax" was a way to subvert the second amendment through taxation rather than an outright ban.  Subsequent Supreme Court decisions gutted the meaning of the interstate commerce clause in the U.S. Constitution, rendering the requirement for interstate travel of the firearms moot.  Some states are attempting to restore that limit on federal power today.

The second part of the charade occurred in 1986, when a controversial vote on the 1986 firearms owners protection act was used to place a ban on the manufacture or import of full auto firearms for civilian use, effectively freezing the number of full auto firearms legally available to those registered with the BATF at the time the law went into effect.  Because of increasing demand, the price of legal full auto firearms sky-rocketed.   Thompson submachine guns, highly desired by collectors, rose more than most.   Today, legal Thompsons run from $30,000 to $50,000.

The Sheriff's Department in Forsyth County, North Carolina, owns a couple of legal vintage 1928 Thompsons.  They have engineered a trade of the Thompsons.   Most people would think that trading a couple of antique firearms for 88 brand new rifles would be a good deal.   From myfox8.com:

FORSYTH COUNTY, N.C. – Forsyth County Sheriff Bill Schatzman defended his department’s request to trade two vintage Thompson submachine guns for 88 new Bushmaster rifles as county commissioners reignited their debate on Thursday.

 Apprarently, some people in the county think it might be a good idea to hang onto the Thompsons, which have some historical value.   One commissioner considered a compromise:

 Commissioner Mark Baker asked if the board decided to keep one gun for historical purposes and trade the other, could the county get 44 rifles. Schatzman didn’t know.

Sheriff Schatzman mentioned that putting the guns on display involved serious costs of its own:

“What would you do with a diamond ring if it was worth $30 to $50,000? How would you display it? Would you put armed guards around it or just put it in an alarmed case?” Schatzman asked.

He was confused by the Tommy gun concerns.

“They’ve been in a dark room collecting dust and rust for the last 50 years,” Schatzman said. “Why are they so important today? I ask that question in all honesty. I don’t know the answer.”

Readers now know the answer to that question, at least in part.  They are so important today because those who want to undercut the second amendment have managed to put laws in place that create artificial shortages and weird economic incentives.  Like many of the gun laws in the United States, they do not make any sense.


©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch

VT:Bill to Restore Right to Own Silencers

Gun mufflers were available without restriction from 1902 (invented) to 1934.  No one knows why gun mufflers (silencers, suppressors) were included in the infamous national firearms act (NFA) of 1934.

MONTPELIER, Vt. -
A new bill introduced Friday would allow Vermont gun owners to use silencers.

Vermont currently bans the manufacture, sale, use or possession of gun suppressors. The bill would not allow their use while hunting.

More here

Book Review:Gun Control in the Third Reich

Author, attorney, and eminent Second Amendment scholar Stephen P. Halbrook has released an acclaimed new book that documents with painstaking detail perhaps the most diabolical gun control effort of the 20^th Century. Dr. Halbrook is also a research fellow as the Independent Institute, which published this latest volume in his considerable body of work.

Based on newly-discovered, secret documents from German archives, diaries and newspapers of the time, Gun Control in the Third Reich presents the definitive, yet hidden history of how the Nazi regime made use of gun control to disarm and repress its enemies and consolidate power. While voluminous scholarship has documented the Third Reich and the Holocaust, this is the first thorough examination of the laws restricting firearm ownership that rendered Hitler's political opponents, as well as the Jews, defenseless.  It also makes a compelling case that the National Socialist regime considered suppression of firearm ownership by disfavored groups a critical element of achieving its objectives.

Gun Control in the Third Reich spans the two decades from the birth of the Weimar Republic in 1918, through Kristallnacht in 1938. The book then presents a panorama of pertinent events during World War II regarding the effects of the disarmament policies. And even though in the occupied countries the Nazis decreed the death penalty for possession of a firearm, there developed instances of heroic armed resistance by Jews, particularly the Warsaw ghetto uprising.

While the United States remains free and prosperous after its pivotal role in defeating Nazi Germany in World War II, it cannot take for granted the safeguards built into its constitutional system to deter the rise of unchecked power.  Even if the threats to liberty that contemporary Americans face are different from those posed by the Third Reich, the lessons of history remain instructive.  Not every person who seeks disarmament is a dictator, but without question, dictators abhor an armed populace.

Gun Control in the Third Reich:
Disarming the Jews and "Enemies of the State"
By Stephen P. Halbrook, Ph.D., J.D.
Hardcover • 280 Pages • 8 Pages of Photographs • Index
Published by The Independent Institute

Source NRAILA

IL:Police Approve 99.3% of Concealed Weapons Permits

January 31, 2014 (CHICAGO) -- Police across Illinois have objected to just 236 applications from people seeking to carry concealed weapons out of 33,631 submitted to the state police.

More Here

Conversation with an Englishman on Silencers

Use of Silencers is encouraged in Europe Photo Courtesy Gun World

At the Shot Show in January of this year, I sat next to an Englishman who wrote for a UK hunting magazine.  We talked about gun laws in the UK and in the US, and the subject turned to gun mufflers, AKA silencers or suppressors.  I was interested to learn that gun mufflers were relatively easy to obtain, and were in fact encouraged by the police.   Having a suppressor for your rifle was considered to be polite, and a way to reduce noise pollution.   Virtually all air guns had suppressors.

My new British friend turned to me and said: "I never have understood the United States regulation of suppressors.  What is the purpose of making them so hard to obtain and own?

I could not answer him.  The best speculation that I have found is that there was some mention of suppressors being used for poaching, as a reason for putting gun mufflers in the same category as machine guns, but it was always only a hint.  I have never seen that purpose mentioned in the arguments for the National Firearms Act of 1934.

It is easy to see the purpose of the now completely irrational ban on short barreled rifles and shotguns.   When one of the major purposes of the original act was to make handguns illegal for most people, and registered and licensed for the  remaining few, it made sense to make the conversion of rifles and shotguns into pistols illegal.   But gun mufflers?  What was the point of that?

Maybe it was just legislative strategy, a trade-off item that was available to be taken out to allow some other provision to be included.   Maybe it was simply that the Roosevelt regime was grabbing for all the power it could.  Likely, we will never know.   Clearly, it was one of the greatest public health blunders by the federal government, ever.  Millions have lost hearing because of the extreme regulatory and financial barriers placed on gun mufflers.

Europe is ahead of the United States when it has come to the reasonable use of gun mufflers.   The Finnish Supreme Court has ruled that it is a constitutional right to make, buy, sell, trade and use gun mufflers in that country.

One would think, with the second amendment in the United States Constitution, the same would apply here.

But, as my British friend observed, it doesn't; and it does not make any sense.

©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch 

AL:Woman Shoots Man in Self-Defense

Investigators said Salena Turner was in fear for her life and shot Timothy Derrick in self defense the night of Jan. 24, based on evidence collected and discussed between police and the district attorney's office.

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David Codrea:Setback in Connecticut ‘only first battle in multi-year legal war’

A federal judge has upheld the State of Connecticut’s sweeping gun control laws enacted last year in response to the Sandy Hook “gun-free zone” shootings, the Associated Press reported Thursday. United States District Court Judge Alfred Covello at Hartford issued a 47-page ruling in the case of Shew v. Malloy admitting “While the act burdens the plaintiffs' Second Amendment rights," but then claiming "it is substantially related to the important governmental interest of public safety and crime control.”

Judge Covello, a George H.W. Bush nominee, reasoned the law should stand because “the legislation here does not amount to a complete prohibition on firearms for self-defense in the home.

“Indeed, the legislation does not prohibit possession of the weapon cited as the ‘quintessential self - defense weapon’ in Heller, i.e., the handgun. In other words, ‘the prohibition of [assault weapons] and large - capacity magazines does not effectively disarm individuals or substantially affect their ability to defend themselves,’” Covello elaborated, leaving the Constitutional mandate “shall not be infringed” unacknowledged.

“Brian Stapleton, the lawyer for a group of Connecticut organizations that support gun rights, pistol permit holders and gun sellers, said he will appeal,” the AP report advised, and another attorney has elaborated on those plans.

“Today's ruling from the U.S. District Court of Connecticut in the 2nd Amendment challenge to Connecticut's new firearms law was expected,” lawyer Martha Dean told her followers on Facebook. “As the legal team for the plaintiffs warned from the outset, the federal courts in this region of the U.S. are generally hostile to 2nd Amendment rights. The Second Circuit Court of Appeals is the next step, but the prospects for a more favorable decision are as bleak there as they were in the lower federal court in Hartford.

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CA-From 2008:Oakland’s Gun Buyback Misfires

On Feb. 9, Oakland police, led by state Sen. Don Perata, D-Oakland, offered to buy handguns and assault weapons for $250 each, “no questions asked, no ID required.” The “One Less Gun” buyback program attracted so many eager sellers that the money quickly ran out. But instead of closing up shop, the police handed out IOUs good for a future buyback. The Oakland police are now stuck with a bill for $170,000.

The buyback has been criticized as a poorly organized fiasco, but even the critics say it was “the right idea” and “a step in the right direction.”
On the contrary, the buyback was a bad idea from the beginning. Gun buybacks have been tried before, in cities from Seattle to Washington, D.C., and they simply don’t work.

In an authoritative study, the National Academy of Sciences reported that “the theory underlying gun buyback programs is badly flawed and the empirical evidence demonstrates the ineffectiveness of these programs.”

It doesn’t take much insight to understand why gun buybacks don’t work. Gun buybacks attract low-quality guns from people who aren’t likely to use them to commit crimes. The Oakland police, for example, bought a dozen guns from seniors living in an assisted-living facility. Are you relieved to know that Perata disarmed these dangerous senior citizens?

The Oakland buyback was especially absurd because of the high price offered: $250. Why didn’t anyone running the program think to look at the price of a new gun? In fact, the first two people in line at one of the three buyback locations were gun dealers with 60 firearms packed in the trunk of their cars.

One wonders why the police even bothered to buy the guns from Oakland residents. Why not buy directly from gun manufacturers?

Of course, buying guns from manufacturers is so obviously an absurd way to reduce the supply of guns that it has never been proposed.

Nevertheless, the idea is no less absurd when Oakland residents serve as the middlemen between the manufacturers and the police.

Buying a few thousand guns in Oakland is not going to make it more difficult for criminals in Oakland to get a gun.

There are 150 million to 200 million guns in the United States, so there are plenty of low-quality guns to be sold. An Oakland gun buyback is like trying to drain the Pacific—every bucket of water you take out is instantly replaced. Even large gun buyback programs are unlikely to have significant effects. Australia spent half a billion dollars buying guns, with no significant effect on homicide by firearms.

Imagine that instead of guns, the Oakland police decided, for whatever strange reason, to buy back sneakers. The idea of a gun buyback is to reduce the supply of guns in Oakland. Do you think that a sneaker buyback program would reduce the number of people wearing sneakers in Oakland? Of course not.

All that would happen is that people would reach into the back of their closet and sell the police a bunch of old, tired, stinky sneakers.

Gun buybacks won’t reduce the number of guns in Oakland. In fact, buybacks may increase the number of guns in Oakland.

Imagine that gun dealers offered a guarantee with every gun: Whenever this gun gets old and wears down, the dealer will buy back the gun for $250.

The dealers’ guarantee makes guns more valuable, so people will buy more guns.

But the story is exactly the same when it’s the police offering the guarantee. If buyers know that they can sell their old guns in a buyback, they are more likely to buy new guns. Thus the more common gun buybacks are held, the more likely they are to misfire.

Recognizing that gun buybacks don’t work is neither pro- nor anti-gun. We all want to reduce gun crime in Oakland. Yet the Oakland police and concerned private citizens have spent $250,000 on a policy that doesn’t work and that everyone who has studied the issue knows does not work.

The guns bought in this buyback are destined to be melted down to create a monument.

It’s a shame that this monument will be the only lasting effect of the buyback.

Source

From soldierssystems:Bill to make Gun Mufflers Legal in Iowa

Our friends at the American Silencer Association have asked us to spread the word on a pending bill that would allow citizens of Iowa to possess suppressors. As a native of that great state that values liberty, it’s something near to my heart. 

Last week, State Rep. Matt Windschitl, (R-Missouri Valley) introduced House File 384 to the Iowa State House. The purpose of the bill is to legalize the possession of suppressors for the law abiding citizens of Iowa who complete the proper Federal NFA transfer process.

Iowa is currently one of only 11 states that prohibit the possession of suppressors by civilians. For a full map, visit the ASA’s website.
Although HF 384 is moving through the General Assembly, it needs your support to pass.

Please contact members of the Iowa State House and Senate TODAY and urge them to support the legalization of suppressor ownership in Iowa. Contact information can be found below:

House: www.legis.iowa.gov/legislators/house

Senate: www.legis.iowa.gov/legislators/senate

Source

WI:Milwaukee Man Shot

According to police,  a 21-year-old male sustained life-threatening injuries and is being treated at a local hospital.

Preliminary investigation reveals that the injured person was likely involved in criminal activity when he was shot by his intended victim.

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MS:Stepfather Shoots Stepson Attempting to Break in House

Sheriff Moore says Pitts was attempting to break in his step-father's house through a window this morning, when the step-father shot him. Pitts was treated and released for the gunshot wound to his arm, then taken to jail. The sheriff says the homeowner was not charged in the incident because he was protecting his family and property.

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VA:Clerk Shoots Robber

Police tell WSLS the shooting happened after an attempted robbery. The store clerk told police that he saw the man pull a weapon, but was able to shoot him in self defense.

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MD:Off Duty Officer Fatally Shoots Son as Son Fatally Stabs his Mother

WASHINGTON - Police say an off-duty police officer shot and killed his son as the son fatally stabbed his mother, the officer's wife, at their Montgomery County home.

Montgomery County police spokesman Capt. Jim Daly says the officer James Stirkens fired at his 25-year-old son, Chris, Wednesday night after he saw him attack his mother, Denise, with a sharp object in the family's Gaithersburg home. Denise, 53, was critically injured and later died at a hospital.

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CO:Constitutional Carry Considered

Two legislators, Jared Wright (R-Fruita) and Chris Holbert (R-Parker) introduced HB1041.  The measure would remove the requirement to obtain a permit from the state in order to possess concealed weapons.   The same restrictions that now apply to concealed carry permit holders would also apply to people who would be eligible for the permit.

The permit system would be retained for those who wish a permit for purposes of reciprocity with other states.

Representative Wright said that a permit should not be required to exercise a constitutional right.  From gjsentinel.com:

“This is in essence allowing law-abiding citizens to carry a concealed handgun without being subjected to criminal laws,” Wright said. “Now let me tell you what this bill does not do. This bill does not authorize the carrying of concealed handguns by felons, the mentally ill, juveniles or anyone otherwise prohibited from possessing handguns under state or federal law.”

The reporting by the gjsentinal seems a bit confused.  They write:

The measure also wouldn’t do away with the concealed-carry permit system in case someone needs one to carry a weapon out of state. All other states that permit the practice honor concealed-carry, but only with a state permit.

But immediately following, they add this paragraph:

 Only five states — Wyoming, Arizona, Arkansas, Alaska and Vermont — don’t require permits.

If five states do not require a permit, then the statement "All other states that permit the practice honor concealed-carry, but only with a state permit."  is false.

It is a mistake that can be made by anyone who is not familiar with firearms law.


©2014 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice is included.
Link to Gun Watch