Nobody Needs Ten Bullets...

• Nobody needs ten bullets when three thugs break down their door.  Surely you will be able to dispatch them all with only 3.33 bullets each.  They will stand there like ducks in a row; probably FOUR is more than you need!
• Nobody needs ten bullets when a pack of a dozen feral dogs decides you and your kids in the stroller look like lunch.  Maybe they will line up for you, so a few bullets can hit multiple dogs?
• Nobody needs ten bullets when one bad guy is ducking behind a wall and you keep barely-missing him
• Nobody needs ten bullets when they are in the middle of a firefight with federal agents coming to take their guns away.  Oh, wait that's what they don't want you to be able to do!

 Make no mistake: the people who want to limit you to certain kinds of guns and certain numbers of bullets would like very, very much to remove your guns from you - for your own protection, of course.  If the Police and Military are the only ones with guns, then the benevolent State will protect us from harm!

Nevermind the 300 million-odd guns already out there.  Surely every felon would turn in his gun, if only the dear leaders required it of him!  The guns already in the hands of bad people will evaporate like magic when gun control laws are passed, everybody knows that!

If you think
Limiting the number
Of bullets in a gun
Does anything
to protect
Anyone worth protecting,

Then

You are a fool
and an Historical Illiterate.

She shouldn't have been a jew.  Her fault, really.  The State will protect us from the Other!

Obama Can't Do Doodly Squat. Yet.

The press has whipped people into such a frenzy that they are buying $900 AR pattern rifles for $2400 at guns shows, just so they can have one.  I will refrain from commentary on the timing and prices in this mess, but my continuing commentary is that this is 'just a scare' for the time being.

President Obama can't change the law of the land by himself.  The supreme Court already said you have a constitutionally-protected right to have guns.  More importantly than either of those, the current Congress is against Obama on this subject.  Congressmen have one job: get re-elected.  After the 1994 'assault weapons ban' went in, a whole BUNCH of them went OUT.  This must never be repeated, comerades!  In that vein, I present to you Borepatch's well-said commentary on why gun control isn't coming any time real soon.

Sipsey Street Irregulars is the first place I saw a list of the 23 ideas presented today by The Obama. In short, it is as I said: No BFD, no bans, no taking away your guns.  He can't act unilaterally, because he's not King of America, he's President and subject to (at least most of) The Rules.  My commentary is the wider blocks of text between the numbered items.

From the Wall Street Journal.

1. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal agencies to make relevant data available to the federal background check system.

This should have happened already, what were they waiting for? After 9/11/11 we found out the intelligence community didn't tell itself to be looking out for the guys we KNEW were bad guys, who flew the planes into the buildings. We were supposed to fix the interagency communication, already - weren't we? Or was that just talk?

2. Address unnecessary legal barriers, particularly relating to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, that may prevent states from making information available to the background check system.

Translation: prevent crazy people from getting guns. Who disagrees with this? The standard disclaimer to "everybody should have guns" is "except for felons and the mentally deficient" so far so good. The only problem comes in when the State starts redefining who qualifies as crazy, but we're not quite to Soviet standards on that one. Yet.

3. Improve incentives for states to share information with the background check system.

Incentives? This sounds like "tie information mining access to federal transportation dollars" until further commentary is provided!

4. Direct the Attorney General to review categories of individuals prohibited from having a gun to make sure dangerous people are not slipping through the cracks.

This reminds me that, as a veteran and someone outspoken in my opinions, I am already considered a potential terrorist by my government. I don't like the sound of this, but only because of the people who will be implementing it, if any implementin' gets done at all.

5. Propose rulemaking to give law enforcement the ability to run a full background check on an individual before returning a seized gun.

This right here is onerous, but hard to argue with. If you don't qualify to BUY a gun, should we really GIVE you one? Sure it's your property. Compensation in return for seized assets needs to be at LEAST fair market value, but it is, again, not a horrible idea.

6. Publish a letter from ATF to federally licensed gun dealers providing guidance on how to run background checks for private sellers.

They do it already, if you ask - and if you pay $15 to $60 depending on the FFL. This is wasted time/money right here. Speaking to Bunkum!

7. Launch a national safe and responsible gun ownership campaign.

Eddie Eagle has been going for Decades. Give the NRA a few million dollars to promote it? Sure! Spend a few million to tell people not to have guns? No thanks! Again, the implementation will be the difference between this being a good or a bad idea.

8. Review safety standards for gun locks and gun safes (Consumer Product Safety Commission).

Because, of course, gun locks and safes keep criminals safe from homeowners with quick access to guns! But seriously, most quick-access gun safes can be defeated by dropping them on the floor . . . by a three year-old child. I've seen it. They suck, all of them. Not that it is any of Uncle Sam's business.

9. Issue a Presidential Memorandum to require federal law enforcement to trace guns recovered in criminal investigations.

As if they don't already.

10. Release a DOJ report analyzing information on lost and stolen guns and make it widely available to law enforcement.

This DOJ is pretty shady, but if we paid for the report, why not make it available to EVERYONE?

11. Nominate an ATF director.

Good luck with that. The BATFE is broken, and having a director (instead of an Acting Director) will not fix it. At least, not one that The Obama would appoint.

12. Provide law enforcement, first responders, and school officials with proper training for active shooter situations.

"Front sight, press!" is what they need to know, school officials included.

13. Maximize enforcement efforts to prevent gun violence and prosecute gun crime.

Enforce existing law. Let's see, who has been calling for this the whole time? Oh, that's right, GUN RIGHTS advocates! I am guessing this does not extend to prosecution of feloniously showing a television camera what a 30-round AR magazine looks like.

14. Issue a Presidential Memorandum directing the Centers for Disease Control to research the causes and prevention of gun violence.

Another case of "sounds good, but who's going to do the research, and what's their agenda?!"

15. Direct the Attorney General to issue a report on the availability and most effective use of new gun safety technologies and challenge the private sector to develop innovative technologies.

The private sector does anything innovative they can, and you sticking your nose in won't speed anything up, thanks.

16. Clarify that the Affordable Care Act does not prohibit doctors asking their patients about guns in their homes.

If a doctor asks about guns in your home, either get a new doctor or refuse to answer and ask them about guns in their own home. You never know you might just get a new shootin' buddy!

17. Release a letter to health-care providers clarifying that no federal law prohibits them from reporting threats of violence to law-enforcement authorities.

Duh? This is a question?

18. Provide incentives for schools to hire school resource officers.

Okay, so our kids are as worthy of protection as his? Great! How much does it cost to hire a guard for a few tens of thousands of schools at $40k/year? And who pays?

19. Develop model emergency-response plans for schools, houses of worship and institutions of higher education.

Once again, "front sight, press" is key.

20. Release a letter to state health officials clarifying the scope of mental-health services that Medicaid plans must cover.

This should also already have been done, but thanks.

21. Finalize regulations clarifying essential health benefits and parity requirements within ACA exchanges.

Two years after the law was passed, the rules for Obamacare are not finalized?

22. Commit to finalizing mental-health-parity regulations.

See 21, above.

23. Launch a national dialogue led by Secretaries Sebelius and Duncan on mental health.

SOME of us have been having this conversation already, thanks.

Gun Control: The Key Word Is Control

From someone who used to support gun control laws until they dug into the statistics, here is a very interesting page full of statistics about how gun control laws do not work to make people safer and reduce crime. At least half of it is graphs, so even YOU won't be bored by numbers!

 Hat tip: Instapundit

"The U.S. Will Have To Change."

Well excuse the [deleted] out of me, I think I will stay just the way I am.  The only thing that needed to change right before that school shooting was the order of killings: asshat first, then the kids.  He got the order wrong but at least he took himself out at the end.  President Obama, being both a Democrat and a Leftist, likes to clump people together in groups instead of thinking of individuals.  Well guess what?

I'm not going to kill anybody, and neither are you, and neither is the guy who shot up that school last week.  In fact, that will never happen again because he's dead as a door nail! 

Well, then again, President Obama is still in campaign mode.  He got elected and re-elected as a blank slate. People projected what they wanted him to be onto the vague platitudes he spoke, and elected what they wanted!  In the spirit of bipartisanship, I will project what I want onto His Vagueness also.

The U.S. will have to change.  Yes.  The USA should become more like Israel and have the Card-Carrying Good Guys wear guns in the schoolhouses across our nation.  No, not the Police . . . the TEACHERS.  How many school shootings like this have you heard about in Israel?

Let's take a guess as to whether CT's strict gun control laws or the likely Gun-Free Zone nature of this school campus gave the shooter even a moment's pause.  Yeah, they don't stop any CRIMINALS from doing bad.  They stop GOOD PEOPLE from being able to do good.  You know what stops a school shooter?  Here's a hint: it's not laws forbidding private gun ownership . . .


THIS

PREVENTS THIS

LOGIC:

RAISE YOUR HAND IF YOU WISH FOR ARMED AMERICAN TEACHERS!

Not Only-Onesey Enough

Seriously? A local sherriff's deputy* IN UNIFORM was not allowed to wear her duty weapon in the presence of the lightworker. I would have been p.i.s.s.e.d if that happened to one of my deputies.

********

Or was it just that they didn't trust a black woman with a gun, knowing Michelle's temper? (rimshot)

*or some such, the article is not clear

Hat tip: Uncle

California Unexpectedly Begins Confiscating Guns!

. . . oh, wait, that's the headline for a few years from now. The alternative headline is "california scraps long gun registry after it wastes billions of dollars, accomplishes bubkis" like they did in Canadanadia.

Registration of guns is only good for one thing: to make confiscation of guns (from people unwilling to use them) less of a logistical challenge. Just remember two key points, kiddos:

1. Never, ever, ever, but never put your guns on a government registry. Lie, if necessary, to accomplish this. The alternative is walking into the zyklon-b showers.
2. If someone shows up at your door and seriously demands your guns or your liberty, the time has come to give your guns up . . . to the last person alive and willing to demand them, after you demonstrate that the guns are functional. The expression is: "If you try to take our guns, we will kill you."

California, you suck for electing governor Brown. You DOUBLE-DOG SUCK BIG TIME for RE-electing Governor Moonbeam. You get what you pay for. Oh, and good luck getting your next set of LED gloves, partygoers.

Hat tip: Instapundit

What's That Noise?

This is the sound of a conspiracy falling into pieces. No wonder this was all over the news. ATF and Justice are going to be hurting pretty bad pretty soon. The list of demands in this new subpoena is both extensive and specific. The light apparently must also shine on the DEA.

To recap the cast of Project Fast & Furious/Gunrunner characters:

• ATF knew what they were doing, this is not a failed operation
• Multiple BATFE field offices were doing it (Tucson, Houston, Dallas, maybe some in Florida?)
• FBI was involved
• DEA was involved
• Secretary of Department of Justice knew or should have known

• . . . but the President was in the dark.
  

Riiiiiight.

Man With Gun At Local Park

Today, from 19:10hrs. to 20:30hrs., a man with a gun was seen riding a bicycle on local neighborhood streets, standing around at a city park, and then riding the bicycle again. The man was seen in close company with a woman and small children. No injuries were reported. No reports of shots fired were issued.

In related news, if it is legal to carry a concealed, loaded handgun in your car in Texas on the way to work, and you commute by bicycle, should you be able to carry on a bike? What about if you are going to the park with your children?

You might guess my answer.

WTH Young People?

Now in Philidelphia, they are taking a hint from Londonners Wisconsonites and just beating random people?

Now hear this: if a flash mob develops around and tries to beat me, depending on what I am carrying, there will be at least six, to as many as several dozens of perforated people beaters DRT before I go out.

Carry your guns, people.

Or you could just leave Phildelphia, which has a bit of a crime problem anyway, unrelated to guns. Oh, if only someone could have predicted rioting and looting in the streets of Philidelphia . . . oh, wait.

Philly: one more place not to go.

It Takes A Team to Play Ball

So it's bad enough that you spent stimulus money on the BATFE program that illegally smuggled guns into Mexico, right? Well, no, it's not. The Department of State was ALSO selling guns to Mexican drug gangs, but -here's the kick in the nuts- they did it directly.

Pajamas Media says we made large-scale MILITARY weapons sales to a company tied to the Zs.

To rephrase, we have TWO major organizations in the Executive branch under President Obama that knew or should have known that thousands and thousands of military weapons were being delivered to narco-terrorist gangs in Mexico, and they continued to let it happen. One might wonder what the People (and the government) of Mexico would think about that. One phrase that comes to my mind is "Crimes against Humanity."

This all, by the way, is allegedly tied to an effort by the Democrats in the USA to get more control over guns in the hands of law-abiding citizens in the U.S.

Wow.
********
Hat tip: Instapundit.

One For The "Malice" View?

5000+ guns were allowed to flow into Mexico, funded in part by the Obama stimulus package, and hundreds of Mexicans and a few Americans have died as a result.

The purpose? To get more-stringent gun control laws on the books in the USA. Allegedly.

First Reports: Maybe You'll Want to Hold Off There, Jimmy

Morning news report: 16th street locked down in the heart of downtown Austin, bomb squad responding to a "car full of guns"

Evening news report: Sumdood left a home-made safety device on the seat of his car* where it was parked on the top level of a parking garage. Dude now in trouble for not paying his making-a-metal-cylinder tax.

********

*Sound suppression: it's for safety.

Two Clicks

Two clicks, three text boxes, and you have fought fire with fire. You remember when I pointed out that there is a blatant spam/form letter for submissions in favor of an egregious thing the ATF wants to do?

Now there's a spam/form letter for submissions against it. Please do your nation a favor: click this link, fill in your name and email address, and hit the submit button. It takes less than a minute, and can make a real difference.

Further explanation here

Guns on College Campus: Controversial & Then Some!

Chief Acevedo started a shit storm this morning by saying he doesn't like the idea of CHLs carrying guns on campus. He moderated his position when somebody said 'what about grad students and professors' and he could consider that. Then for the next two hours until I got tired of the jackassery I was listening to people talk straight past each other. There are two camps of people, and apparently Reasoned Discourse has no effect on radio callers waiting to speak instead of listening to others speaking.

Camp 1) CHL Guns on campus means people who are less arrest-prone than Police are given the option to protect themselves without the fear of arrest for carrying a gun
Camp 2) CHL Guns on campus means drunk, depressed, hormones raging, barely-not-teenagers whipping out their guns to settle petty disputes
Camp 3) CHL Guns on campus is already an option - for the school. The school gets to say who carries, and most schools say "don't carry." This is arguably unfortunate, but there is a law on the books to defend the right of the school to say what will fly on their land.

The problem with crowd 2 is that Crowd 1 has the law and statistics on their side. But then crowd #2 comprises soft-headed liberruls who are swayed by emotion rather than reason, so there is no use in speaking to them. Act appropriately regardless and things will come out just fine. #3 is the crowd you need to sway, if you just HAVE to have an argument. The goal might be to convince them that a PUBLIC school ought to let people do things on campus they can do in a PUBLIC park. But good luck with that . . . the university policies are set by people who are 100% in crowd #2!

You Stay Classy, Texas.

If it gets all the way through the gauntlet and under the Governor's pen, former legislators, current legislators, and some State lackeys will be able to carry guns where you mere mortals can't legally, even with a CHL. A couple of new types of people become a special class all their own. Because they are better than you. Bow down and vote for them again.

Special, that's what they are. Their security is worth more than yours, you see. The arguments for the bill don't outweigh the one against: if it's good for the goose it's good for the gander. What do I want to see enacted into Texas law? Non-prohibited persons carrying everywhere the owners of the premises say they can, open or concealed as they prefer. Of course some people may be inclined to pack heat where it is a misdemeanor anyway, and the law be damned . . .

If You Do Not Speak Now . . .

Do you think your gun dealer needs to tell the ATF when you buy two rifles? Then comment against it, or they will be required to do so.

Hat tip: Uncle

You know who else liked to keep lists of gun owners?

Well, When You Put It That Way

The government of the United States, under the pretext of preventing guns going to Mexico, allowed guns to go to Mexico and into the hands of narco-terrorists. Hundreds (thousands?) of people died, and that includes two US Federal agents, by being shot with these guns.

Now there is an investigation. The BATFE is stonewalling as always, but Darrell Issa is not going to blink. I knew it was bad, but then Vanderboegh raised the point and he is right:

If the feds allow straight-up felonies and murder, and nothing happens to the "law enforcement agents" responsible, what use is the current system of government? We get 50% of our money taken in taxes to do things in the least efficient way possible, and they can't even not MURDER people? SRSLY? What use is a ballot box if this is what comes out the other side? Every. Single. Time.

One more reason we may not survive even the first term of an Obama Presidency. A second would have at least even odds of destroying the country in a way even the audience of American Idle would understand.

Bloomberg Sticking His Nose In/Neck Out Again

Mayor Bloomberg is at it again. He sent New York City agents to Arizona for a "sting" to try to show up how bad the gun law enforcement problem is in America. Problem is, the transactions were legal both on their face and in fact, and Bloomberg's gun problem is mostly because he tries to ban them in his town. Didn't he already get in trouble for this sort of thing?*

*He did, but the court says he didn't break the law. What he did was interrupt actual legitimate investigations by the agency whose jurisdiction he was trying to usurp. Best adjective of the day: Nanny Statist.

Quote of The Day 01/12/2011

Because the murder-free-zone law that protects the rest of us is just not working well enough. The high officials need a double layer of legal protection. -Ann Althouse

via Instapundit

That's it in a nutshell: "Murder-free Zone." The reason why gun control laws are all basically dumb*. If you're willing to wrongfully kill someone in cold blood, laws regarding who can have what bits of metal, wood, and plastic at particular times and places are extremely unlikely to be a deterrent.

*Gun control. It's not about the guns, no matter how much the law and legislator want to make it sound as if it were.

Mission Accomplished: Tucson Shooting Was Bush's Fault

I was listening to NPR this morning, and got another example of how their reasonable-sounding dulcet tones sometimes hide genuine weapons-grade leftist craziness. The person on the microphone was using words that sounded sane, but they were being coo-coo. The leftists have now tried to lay the blame for the killings last weekend at the feet of President G.W. Bush and his baaaaad-ol' Republican Congressional allies. They let the good and reasonably-restrictive weapons that look like assault weapons ban expire in 2004. Therefore it was easier to get the wicked evil awful 30-round magazine the crazy person used.

I immediately pointed out (to the radio and the empty air around me) that a) high-capacity magazines were available during the ban and b) nothing was stopping the crazy person from using two guns with normal-capacity magazines anyway. This canard has been noticed by others and there are a few more reasons the argument holds no water. Hat tip: Uncle.