The Smallest Minority |
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The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities. - Ayn Rand "I don't just want gun rights... I want individual liberty, a culture of self-reliance....I want the whole bloody thing." KdT
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Wahabism Delenda Est   
Hey, FEC!  BITE ME! I'm a Member of the McCain-Feingold INSURRECTION!   "Jeez, Kevin... calling you an asshole would be a huge understatement, wouldn't it?" -Jack Cluth, The People's Republic of Seabrook (Coming from you, Jack, it's an honor.)  email: gunrightsAT comcastDOTnet INVITATION: If you have never shot a firearm, regardless of your position on the right to arms, and if you live near or visit the Tucson, AZ metropolitan area, I invite you to go shooting for a day. I will provide the arms, ammunition, targets, safety equipment, range fees and instruction. All you have to do is show up. 4 Takers To Date DO YOU LIVE SOMEWHERE ELSE and want to try shooting? Click HERE  Proud Gun-blogging member of the Pajamahadeen since May, 2003!
Debates: "The Commentary" A OLD discussion on gun control between me and an Irishman living in London Start here. UPDATED! Now with archive! Post #1 by Alex, a Guest A multi-post discussion hosted here at TSM My short exchange with Professor Saul Cornell of the Second Amendment Research Center Best Posts: The "Rights" Discussion: What is a "Right?" What is a "Right"? Revisited, Part I Part II Rights, Morality, Idealism & Pragmatism, Part I Part II Part III Part IV The United Federation of Planets Is the Government Responsible for Your Protection? Part I & Part II 1975 in Washington, D.C. vs. 2004 in Canton, Ohio Go Ahead, Rely on the Government for Your Protection The Other Side Liberal vs. Conservative: Both are Necessary The Blog that Ate Poughkeepsie Updated and restated as: Of Laws and Sausages Militias A Mistake a Free People Get to Make Only Once This is NOT What I Wanted to Read TRUST The Lying "News" Media, Pt. II Say WHAT? Bias? What Bias? Agenda? What Agenda? The Church of the MSM and the New Reformation Let's See if I Can "Germinate an Intelligent Thought" Here The ACLU Hasn't Changed its Tune They Never EVER Stop It is Not the Business of Government Five Reasons Why It ISN'T They Keep Making Better Fools Five Month Investigation, 10 Tracer Rounds, Two Felony Convictions That Sumbitch Ain't been BORN! On Guillotines and Gibbets England Slides Further Towards Bondage Pressing the "RESET" Button Freedom's Just Another Word for Nothin' Left To Lose A Terrible Resolve The Courts Will Not Save Us Trilogy: The Road to Hell is Paved with Good Intentions "Game Over, Man. Game Over." An Important Question And the denouement: Hudson Was Wrong The Dangerous Victims Trilogy: "(I)t's most important that all potential victims be as dangerous as they can" Violence and the Social Contract Governments, Criminals, and Dangerous Victims In the same vein: Those Without Swords Can Still Die Upon Them The True Believers Trilogy: True Believers March of the Lemmings Reasonable People Also in the same vein: Tough History Coming Technical Dissertations Why Ballistic Fingerprinting Doesn't (And Won't) Work Spin, Spin, Spin Speaking of Teddy Kennedy... This is the Kind of Thing That REALLY IRRITATES ME Questions from the Audience?
BLOGROLL:
PROTESTWARRIOR Some people who are taking the fight to the Left. And some GREAT T-shirts, too. DAILY READS I need a longer day! Day by Day InstaPundit Lileks' The Bleat Kim du Toit Mostly Cajun View from the Porch Of Arms and the Law TFS Magnum Ravenwood's Universe Irons in the Fire Say Uncle TRUE EXCELLENCE American Digest The Belmont Club The Volokh Conspiracy Michael Yon Varifrank Eject!Eject!Eject! Eternity Road Oleg Volk Personal Effects ON INDEFINITE HIATUS USS Clueless The Safety Valve Ipse Dixit The Lopsided Poopdeck Acidman (RIP) Skywritings Publicola D.C. Thorton Smoke on the Water OTHER GUN/RIGHTS BLOGS Airborne Combat Engineer AlphaPatriot Alphecca American Dinosaur A Day in the Life of an Ambulance Driver The Anarchangel The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler Argghhh! The Bitch Girls Boots and Sabers The Breda Fallacy Call Me Ahab Carnaby Fudge Clayton Cramer Cogito Ergo Geek Countertop Chronicles Cowboy Blob Critical Mastiff Cryptic Subterranean FreedomSight From the Heartland Fun Turns to Tragedy!!! The Geek with a .45 Gunwatch Heartless Libertarian Hell in a Handbasket Individ Justin Buist's Blog The LawDog Files Lead and Gold Les Jones Mad Ogre The Michael Bane Blog Moral Flexibility Mr. Completely Murdoc Online The Munchkin Wrangler Ninth Stage No Looking Backwards No Quarters Oscar Poppa Outrageous Malfunction Pass the ammo Posse Incitatus Random Nuclear Strikes Reasonablenut Resistance is Futile! Sandcastles and Cubicles SlagleRock's Slaughterhouse Snowflakes in Hell Surly Curmudgeon Texican Tattler The Ten Ring South Park Pundit Triggerfinger The View From North Central Idaho Vox The War on Guns Weck Up To Thees! Wince and Nod Xavier Thoughts .45 Caliber Justice BLOGGERS I'VE MET Cowboy Blob Kim du Toit Mrs. du Toit Serenity Smoke on the Water The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler On the Patio Fodder of Ride Fast & Shoot Straight Rivrdog Say Uncle JimmyB, The Conservative UAW Guy KeeWee Mr. Completely Og the Neanderpundit USCitizen of Traction Control World Examiner Joe Huffman Chris & Mel John and Beth Donovan Sebastian of Snowflakes in Hell DirtCrashr of Anthroblogogy Rob of The Kitchen Maj. Chuck Ziegenfuss of From My Position... On the Way! Matthew of Triggerfinger Sarah of Carnaby Fudge KevinP who maintains this excellent Wikipedia entry on the Joyce Foundation Dave Hardy Clayton Cramer Primeval Papa FURRINERS Kiwi Pundit The Policeman's Blog Free Market Fairy Tales Samizdata Musing The Second Version OTHER GOOD READS Baby Troll Blog The Winds of Change Sense of Events The Everlasting Phelps Knowledge is Power QandO Blog Radio Blogger THE PSYCHE BRIGADE Dr. Sanity Dr. Helen One Cosmos ShrinkWrapped Neo-Neocon Sigmund, Carl, and Alfred OTHER AZ BLOGS Useful Fools Zonitics Jackalope Pursuivant Primeval Papa DEPT. OF OUR COLLAPSING SCHOOLS Joanne Jacobs EducatioNation Teacher, Teacher The Irascible Professor OTHERS KIND ENOUGH TO BLOGROLL ME Adding to the Noise America's North Shore Journal Anthroblogogy Atomic Nerds Baboon Pirates Bad Dogs and Such The Bastidge Blognomicon Charming, Just Charming Chublogga! Classical Values Common Sense and Wonder Combs Spouts Off Conservative Scalawag The Crazy Rants of Samantha Burns damnum absque injuria David Drake Digital Retrograde The Dougout The Emigre with a Digital Cluebat Empire of Dirt Ether Mind The Fabulous Mint 400 The Freeholder Heinleinblog Impearls Interested-Participant Isaac Schrödinger Josh's Weblog Keith Devens Kill Righty Libertopia The Liberty Zone The Liberty Papers Living in the Surreal World Mike's Eyes Miss O'Hara The Mind of Mog The Ministry of Minor Perfidy MonkeyWatch Adam Lawson NashvilleFiles Near the Salty City PervasiveLight Pierre Legrand's Pink Flamingo Bar Practical Penumbra The Passing Parade Right As Usual Rough Diamond Rules for Rulers Sharp as a Marble She Who Will Be Obeyed! The Speculist Sperari Striderweb A Trainwreck in Maxwell Upbeat Cynicism (Ian Hamet) The Warren Warthog's Rants Wasted Electrons Wheels within Wheels Wicked Thoughts  
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Wednesday, October 08, 2003 Five Reasons Why it ISN'T The Consumer Federation of America (which, as far as I can tell is a bunch of trial lawyers interested in suing anyone that can make them rich) has this nifty little two-page handout on why you should support the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act. Let me fisk: The Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act would give the Department of Justice consumer protection authority to regulate the design, manufacture, and distribution of guns and ammunition.Right. Regulate them right out of existence. Here are the top five reasons why this bill is good for America’s gun consumers:The user's manual specifically recommends leaving the chamber under the hammer empty - precisely for this reason. I'd imagine that was an old-model Single-six. Gun enthusiasts know it, the instruction manual is pretty clear about it. And the manufacturer has since changed the design - voluntarily - and converted all of the older models that customers have sent in for conversion - for free. It's not the gun's fault, it's user error. • Mike Lewy was unloading his Remington Model 700 rifle in his basement apartment. As he moved the safety to the fire position in order to lift the bolt handle to eject a chambered cartridge, the gun discharged. The bullet went through the ceiling and struck his mother, who was shot in the upper left leg and required hospitalization for more than a month.User error again. Mike's an idiot. Rule #1 - always keep a firearm pointed in a safe direction. He didn't. Rule #5 - don't trust mechanical safeties - they can fail. He should have cleared the weapon outdoors, safely and not tried to do it where it wasn't safe. • Carlton Norrell was changing a tire when a close friend, William Kerr, accidentally dropped his .41 Magnum Old Model revolver. The bullet struck Mr. Norrell in the temple and drilled in a straight line across the front of his skull. Mr. Norrell died eight days later.A .41? I'm amazed he wasn't dead on the spot. These guys really have it in for Ruger single-actions, don't they? (And what's with the dropsies?) It's a design characteristic of old revolvers. ALL old revolvers. Ruger has since changed the design voluntarily (much to the disgust of purists, many of whom did not have theirs converted.) The modern copies of the Colt Single Action Army will do the same thing if you have a live round under the hammer. The transfer-bar ignition system and the hammer block are relative newcomers to gun design. Frame or hammer-mounted firing pins are found on all older revolvers (single or double-action), and there are a huge number of revolvers out there without either. It's not a design flaw, and you cannot convince me that a Federal bureaucracy would have accelerated the implementation of the design change. But this legislation could force, for example, Smith & Wesson to retrofit literally millions of old guns at their own expense, thus bankrupting the company. But we're not supposed to understand that. This bill would give the Department of Justice authority to set safety standards; require gun manufacturers to repair, replace, recall, or refund the purchase price of defective guns; and to mandate warnings.And the Department of Justice is qualified to set those standards, why? The gun industry already repairs, replaces, and recalls defective guns voluntarily. Read some of the gun magazines sometime. The recall notices are not common, but they are there. For example this recall of the Vektor pistol. Now THAT's a defective gun, and why the CFA didn't use it as an example is beyond me (unless, of course, no one was actually SHOT with one accidentally.) Now, why is it necessary for the Justice Department to get involved again? This bill would also require that all guns be labeled to ensure that defective guns could be identified and traced.They are already. By federal law all firearms are marked with a serial number that is recorded with the BATFE. But you're not supposed to know that. Currently, the only protection gun consumers are afforded against manufacturers of defective guns is to file a lawsuit after the victim has been injured or killed.Excuse me, but isn't that "the only protection" consumers have for defective products now? You're not changing anything except adding another layer of bureaucracy on top. But that's the point, isn't it? 2) This bill would provide gun consumers with much-needed information.Yes, I'm sure that would be it's only purpose. Let's spend a few hundred million to find out that most gun deaths are attributable to old Smith & Wesson .38's and inexpensive 9mm automatics (homicide and suicide), and that most accidental gun deaths are hunting related. That'll be swell. 3) This bill would give gun consumers a voice in the regulatory process.Um, I'm a "gun consumer" and the last thing I want is a bill allowing the general public "a voice in the regulatory process." We're outnumbered by the general population and this is an open door to regulating firearms out of existence. Maryland, for example, is doing exactly that with its performance requirements that restrict what guns can be sold there. The requirements have cause Beretta, for example, to stop selling there. You know - Beretta. The company that makes the sidearm carried by US military forces worldwide. Not safe enough for Maryland. 4) This bill would shield gun consumers from unreasonably unsafe products.(Deep breath:)THEY'RE FIREARMS! THEY ARE DEVICES DESIGNED TO HURL SMALL METAL PROJECTILES AT HIGH VELOCITY IN THE GENERAL DIRECTION THE BARREL IS POINTED! Now, define "unreasonably unsafe." I'd imagine that, for the Department of Justice, that would eventually end up meaning "going BANG! when the trigger is pulled." Currently, gun manufacturers get around federal limits by cosmetically altering restricted guns to pass a basic “sporting purposes” test. This bill authorizes the Department of Justice to set uniform standards for guns with legitimate sporting purposes to distinguish them from guns prone for criminal use, such as modified assault weapons.THERE we go! Let me translate that for you: "The legislature wasn't able to pass a bill that really outlawed those eeeeevil assault weapons, so we need to set up a bureaucracy that can, without legislative oversight, ban any gun they decide looks too eeeeeevil. " For instance, the recently introduced Smith & Wesson X-frame .500 S&W Magnum revolver that got so many gun-grabbers panties in a wad would be fodder for this kind of "uniform standards" restriction. 5) This bill would safeguard access to guns with legitimate sporting purposes.And last I checked, the Second Amendment doesn't say a damned thing about "sporting purposes." Just say "NO" to the Firearms Safety and Consumer Protection Act. It's not about safety, and it's not about protecting firearm consumers. It's about restricting the right to arms some more. Labels: fisk, gun control, law | | |
