Fifty? Fifty!

Everybody swing on by Kim du Toit's and wish him a happy birthday! And don't forget to pick up a hundred rounds of ammo before the weekend is done to celebrate National Ammo Day Week, too. If you're so inclined, toss him a little B-day cash to help offset the cost of his present to himself, a very nice FN-49 semi-auto rifle.

Remember Hale DeMar?

In other good news out of Illinois, the Illinois legislature overrode Gov. Rod Blagojevich's veto and enacted a law that exempts people who use a firearm in self-defense from being prosecuted if they violate local anti-gun ordinances in the process. According to the Pioneer Press Online:

Senate Bill 2165, which creates a self-defense exception to local gun bans, passed the House of Representatives on Tuesday afternoon with a vote of 85 to 30, with one "present" vote. It needed 70 votes to override the veto and came close to the 90 votes which first passed it out of the chamber in May.

State Reps. Elizabeth Coulson, R-17th, Julie Hamos, D-18th and Karen May, D-58th, voted against the override, supporting the concerns of area villages officials who believe the law would undermine local gun control measures.

Hamos, of Evanston, said the legislation was a backdoor attempt by the National Rifle Association to usurp a municipality's right to establish its own gun laws.

"This is really about local control," she said. "And the Illinois legislature took that away from them."

In the Senate, the veto override passed Nov. 9 with a 40-18 vote. Sen. Jeffrey Schoenberg, D-9th, continued his opposition to the bill.

Yes, the evil NRA controls even the Illinois legislature! So, as I said, remember Hale DeMar?

It became known as the DeMar bill after a Wilmette homeowner, Hale DeMar, shot and wounded a burglar in his home late last year. DeMar was not charged in the shooting itself, but Wilmette moved to enforce a 1989 ordinance banning handguns, which could result in the loss of his two handguns and a fine.

That case is still pending in court, though DeMar faced a legal setback when a court ruled against a constitutional challenge of the law.

Schoenberg said gun rights groups have long worked to eliminate or curtail local gun control, and were able to cast DeMar as a hero who was unjustly punished.

"The NRA spotted an opening and they ran with it. So as a result of this one case where the charges were dropped, a whole sweeping change in state law is about to take effect," Schoenberg said.

"I spoke forcefully against the bill, on a variety of counts, but unfortunately, the die was cast. I'm deeply disturbed at the outcome," he said. "It certainly doesn't reflect the overwhelming majority view in my community and I believe in most other communities in the state."

So Mr. Schoenberg apparently isn't deeply disturbed by representative democracy? Read those numbers again - 85 to 30 in the House, 40-18 in the Senate. Well, obviously those 125 legislators are all in the pocket of the eeeeevil NRA.

So what's the reaction of the municipalities?

(Wilmette Village President Nancy) Canafax said the Village Board may look at ways the Wilmette ordinance can be rewritten and strengthened against challenges under the new law.

"We haven't talked about that specifically, only very generally. Yes, there probably is something we can do, but as to what, we haven't taken that step," she said.

Canafax said she is concerned that the law's self-defense exception would be used in situations much different then DeMar's, and that it could effectively prevent villages from ever enforcing a gun ban. Gun owners could claim self-defense in a variety of situations, and might take more aggressive action than they otherwise would.

"My fear on the bill as far as it impacts that ordinance is it actually encourages use of the gun," Canafax said.

And that's the idiot argument always made when the law restores the citizen's right to the use of a firearm for self-defense. It's the same old "BLOOD IN THE STREETS!" argument - that never happens. Will these people ever learn that laws that prohibit the law-abiding from effectively defending themselves are counter-productive? Read what Ms. Canafax implied: the gun ban was designed to keep people from using firearms. But it only succeeds in disarming the ones who obey the law. Hale DeMar wasn't a threat to anybody - except a burglar. I'm glad he decided that the protection of himself and his family was more important than obeying Wilmette's idiot ordinance, and I'm glad the Illinois legislature recognizes the injustice done to him.

I congratulate the residents of Illinois for this and the recent Illinois Supreme Court decisions mentioned below.

More Good News!

Bill Whittle's SILENT AMERICA: Essays from a democracy at war will be available soon!

The 6x9 paperback came to a mere 232 pages; each volume must be delivered by forklift. I plan to send this softcover out to a few well-known folks, and with luck, I'll be able to get one of them to write an introduction, which I will then put in a commemorative hardcover, along with some biographical notes and other goodies. But right now I'm completely focused on getting out a paperback for the stocking stuffers.

Now, looks like PayPal purchases can start as soon as this weekend or very early next week. It should be available on Ingram and Barnes and Noble by December 6th, but won't get to Amazon until the end of December. Paypal copies will ship within 2-4 days of the order being received, and there will be priority shipping if you so desire. The price is $29.95, and then whatever shipping options you choose. It will all be finalized in the next day or so.

Yeaaaa!

I think I'll be introducing a lot of people to Bill's writing this Christmas.

Better news?

And when this is out of the way, we start with the book I've been wanting to do for a year now: a citizenship book, one that's more timeless and universal, less about Republicans and Democrats and Liberals and Conservatives -- and especially, less about Iraq -- and more about the values and perspectives a good citizen needs for the 21st century if we are to hand this proud country on to the next generation in better shape than we found it.

I'm willing to wait.

OK, I'm Ready for the Shoot on Saturday

I have 260 rounds of .30-06 loaded (200 neck-sized only for the 1917 Enfield, 60 Korean milsurp for the Garand), 500 rounds for the AR-15, 200 rounds for the Kimber .45, 150 rounds of 9x18 for the Mak, a couple hundred rounds of .22 for the Single-Six and the 10/22.

I've also got 100 rounds of 5.7x28 and 60 rounds of 5.45x39. One of the guys coming to the shoot has a full-auto FN P90 submachine gun and a Krinkov. He'll let you shoot his guns if you bring your own commercial ammo. That's one magazine apiece for my wife and me.

I've got five 9"x11"x1" AR500 swingers (thirty-two pounds each!), and my old standby odd-shaped freestanding 3/8" AR400 plate targets. My swinger stands will be finished tomorrow. All I've got to do is load all the steel up tomorrow evening and all the guns and ammo Saturday morning and head out.

This is going to be fun!

How do you Convert a Gun-Phobe? Put One in Her Hands!

Zendo Deb of .357 Magnum points to this OUTSTANDING Slate piece on a woman who takes up shooting as part of her job of, as she describes it, "human guinea pig." Emily Yoffe takes up challenges, and then reports on the results. As the invitation at the bottom of her column puts it,

Is there something you've always wanted to do but were too scared or embarrassed to try? Ask the Human Guinea Pig to do it for you.

This time it was shooting. Her piece is subtitled "How I Learned to Love Guns." It begins thus:

I pressed the Beretta AL391 Urika deep into my shoulder and against my cheek, as if gripping a shotgun stock were as natural as holding the strap of my purse. I said, "Pull," in a firm yet casual way, to convey that, sure I drove here in a Volvo, and the radio in the Volvo is tuned to NPR, but I'm actually the kind of woman who loves the smell of cordite in my hair. Two weeks ago I was so ignorant about firearms that I thought shotguns discharged bullets and I didn't know the difference between a revolver and a semiautomatic. But here I was shooting trap, in which clay disks, the moving target simulating a bird in flight, are released at unpredictable angles from a small trap house. As the "pigeon" flew on my command, I swung the shotgun to follow its arc and pulled the trigger. My instructor called out, "Oh, yeah!"

"What happened?" I asked.

"You hit it," he said.

If you're going to get an introduction to shooting, clay pigeons is a damned fine way to do it. Instant gratification when you hit!

I'm not going to reproduce the whole piece, but I do want to hit some of the more interesting highlights. Like this one:

So anathema are guns among my friends that when one learned I was doing this piece, he opened his wallet, silently pulled out an NRA membership card, then (after I recovered from the sight) asked me not to spread it around lest his son be kicked out of nursery school.

Want to know what it's like to be a second-class citizen? Own a gun in an extremely Blue state or area.

Then there's this:

Before I slinked back to my now-embarrassing Volvo, I stopped to watch two men shooting. They were fast and fluid and the targets shattered one after another. I am happily married, but I found myself thinking these two—whose faces I couldn't even make out—were awfully attractive. It brought to mind a newspaper article from a few years back. After the death of Hugh Culverhouse Sr., the owner of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, his various entanglements caused his widow to sue his estate. During the court proceedings, it was revealed that Culverhouse had an affair with the wife of a now-deceased television anchor. Culverhouse's son testified that the caretaker of his father's ranch told him that the caretaker would escort the anchor's wife and Culverhouse "into the woods and they would shoot guns and basically have sex." I thought the article was hilarious at the time. Now I understood.

Yet gun-phobes tell us that we have guns to compensate for a deficiency in our *cough* equipment.

Not hardly.

How about this?

After my trap-shooting triumph with the shotgun, Ricardo was going to teach me to shoot pistols. They terrified me.

--

A few days later I met Ricardo at the pistol range at the bucolic Izaak Walton League in Damascus, Md. Along to record the event was Dianna Douglas, a producer from NPR. I had asked her if she had any experience with guns, thinking she might want to do some shooting. "No, no, no, no, no," she replied with a laugh. "I'm not going to want to shoot any guns. No, no, no, no, no."

I stepped up to the line and looked at the target—a paper plate with a 3-inch black bull's-eye—Ricardo had stapled to a pole 21 feet away. A few days before I had taken a yoga class, and during the breathing I envisioned myself aligning the gun's front and back sights and slowly squeezing the trigger. Now I held the revolver, cocked the hammer, and shot. I hit the plate just southeast of dead center. Ricardo told me to keep going, and I start to punch a hole in the target. Maybe I could teach yoga at the NRA!

I switched to a Beretta 92FS 9 mm Parabellum semiautomatic and again I punched a decent hole. Ricardo then let me try his Sig Sauer P226 9 mm with the crimson trace laser-grip. With this gun, when you put your finger on the trigger a red laser dot illuminates your target. Ricardo had me load the magazine with 15 bullets. (From watching movies, I had thought magazines came already loaded, which I realized was like thinking candles came already lit.) After a few shots around the center of the plate, Ricardo told me to get in a faster rhythm, and I found myself hitting with greater accuracy. "Go ahead, paper plate, make my day."

After I emptied the semi, Dianna came up hesitantly. "Umm, how hard would it be for me to umm, shoot a few rounds?" she asked Ricardo. I said, "I told you so."

"Well, you look like such a badass doing it, I want to try," she explained.

Yes, yes, yes, yes, YES! Another convert! See?

Do us all a favor, take someone shooting this weekend who's never tried it before. Be low-pressure. Make it safe and fun for them. Chances are, next thing you know they'll be out buying a gun for themselves. And maybe they'll join the NRA.

UPDATE 11/19: HAH! I scooped Instapundit. Well, Zendo Deb did, actually, but Glenn picked one of the same excerpts I did. Still no Instalanche, though.

Dammit.

It's UNANIMOUS!

The Illinois Supreme Court announced two interrelated decisions today, both on gun manufacturer and distributor liability when the product they manufacture and sell is used criminally. Both decisions were unanimous. Both decisions threw out the lawsuits against the manufacturers and distributors. Both decisions have some interesting points. The first, City of Chicago v. Beretta contains the following:

Plaintiffs' specific allegation against the named dealer defendants is that they "sell firearms even when they know or should know that the firearms will be used or possessed illegally in Chicago." This allegation is supported by assertions that dealers know some of their customers are residents of Chicago and that it is illegal for those customers to use or possess these weapons in the city; that dealers make sales even when the words or behavior of the buyers indicate an intention to use the weapon illegally; that dealers sell handguns designed to be carried as concealed weapons, even though state law prohibits the carrying of concealed weapons; and that dealers make multiple sales to individuals whom they know or should know intend to resell the guns in the city. The second amended complaint identifies the dealer defendants as part of a "core group of irresponsible dealers" who attract the business of gunrunners and other criminals, as reflected by ATF trace data. The complaint also includes factual assertions regarding numerous undercover "sting" operations carried out by police officers at the various dealer defendants' stores. Plaintiffs further assert that the dealers' practices "have caused a large underground market for illegal firearms to flourish in the City of Chicago," and that they "know that many of the firearms they sell are used or possessed illegally, and put into the underground market." Finally, the complaint states that the dealers' "actions and omissions in selling firearms to Chicago residents that are illegal in the City of Chicago unreasonably facilitate violations of City ordinances, and contribute to physical harm, fear and inconvenience to Chicago residents, and are injurious to the public health and safety of Chicago residents."

--
We have found no Illinois case recognizing a public right to be free from the threat that members of the public may commit crimes against individuals.

And you won't, because that would raise the specter of making the State liable for not protecting individual citizens - and that won't happen.

Leaving aside for a moment the costs incurred by plaintiffs, which we determine, below, are not recoverable as damages, we query whether the public right asserted by plaintiffs is merely an assertion, on behalf of the entire community, of the individual right not to be assaulted.

Understand the difference here: You have a right not to be assaulted. From that right comes the power of the State to arrest and punish such an assailant. It's not a carte blanc to allow the State to do whatever it feels necessary to prevent you from being assaulted, it's a recognition that actually assaulting someone is a criminal act. The plaintiffs here are trying to stretch the law, and the court recognizes the enormous problem inherent in that Pandora's Box, and they illustrate it here:

By posing this question, we do not intend to minimize the very real problem of violent crime and the difficult tasks facing law enforcement and other public officials. Nor do we intend to dismiss the concerns of citizens who live in areas where gun crimes are particularly frequent. Rather, we are reluctant to state that there is a public right to be free from the threat that some individuals may use an otherwise legal product (be it a gun, liquor, a car, a cell phone, or some other instrumentality) in a manner that may create a risk of harm to another.

For example, the purchase and consumption of alcohol by adults is legal, while driving under the influence is a crime. If there is public right to be free from the threat that others may use a lawful product to break the law, that right would include the right to drive upon the highways, free from the risk of injury posed by drunk drivers. This public right to safe passage on the highways would provide the basis for public nuisance claims against brewers and distillers, distributing companies, and proprietors of bars, taverns, liquor stores, and restaurants with liquor licenses, all of whom could be said to contribute to an interference with the public right.

But they shut that line of reasoning down, hard and emphatically

We conclude that there is no authority for the unprecedented expansion of the concept of public rights to encompass the right asserted by plaintiffs. Further, because we conclude, below, that plaintiffs' claim does not meet all of the required elements of a public nuisance action, we need not decide whether to break new ground by creating such precedent.

--
Plaintiffs concede that their public nuisance claim, based on the alleged effects of defendants' lawful manufacture and sale of firearms outside the city and the county, would extend public nuisance liability further than it has been applied in the past. Nevertheless, they, and the amici in support of their position, argue that extending the doctrine of public nuisance in this manner is a proper exercise of this court's inherent authority to develop the common law.

And they cite previous case law that argues against this line of reasoning:

Cases from other jurisdictions in which reviewing courts have rejected public nuisance claims against the gun industry offer more analysis of this question. In Spitzer v. Sturm, Ruger & Co., a New York appellate court observed:

"[G]iving a green light to a common-law public nuisance cause of action today will, in our judgment, likely open the courthouse doors to a flood of limitless, similar theories of public nuisance, not only against these defendants, but also against a wide and varied array of other commercial and manufacturing enterprises and activities.

"All a creative mind would need to do is construct a scenario describing a known or perceived harm of a sort that can somehow be said to relate back to the way a company or an industry makes, markets, and/or sells its non-defective, lawful product or service, and a public nuisance claim would be conceived and a lawsuit born." Spitzer, 309 A.D.2d at 96, 761 N.Y.S.2d at 196.

Citing an earlier case rejecting a theory of negligent marketing against a gun manufacturer, the Spitzer court observed that " 'judicial resistance to the expansion of duty grows out of practical concerns both about potentially limitless liability and about the unfairness of imposing liability for the acts of another.' " This concern, the court, noted, "is common to both negligent marketing and public nuisance claims."

Similarly, a federal court of appeals, applying New Jersey law, concluded that:

"Whatever the precise scope of public nuisance law in New Jersey may be, no New Jersey court has ever allowed a public nuisance claim to proceed against manufacturers for lawful products that are lawfully placed in the stream of commerce. On the contrary, the courts have enforced the boundary between the well-developed body of product liability law and public nuisance law. Otherwise, if public nuisance law were permitted to encompass product liability, nuisance law 'would become a monster that would devour in one gulp the entire law of tort,' [citation]. If defective products are not a public nuisance as a matter of law, then the non-defective, lawful products at issue in this case cannot be a nuisance without straining the law to absurdity."

In addition, a Florida appellate court affirmed the trial court's dismissal of Miami-Dade County's action against firearms manufacturers, trade associations, and retailers, saying:

"The County's request that the trial court use its injunctive powers to mandate the redesign of firearms and declare that the appellees' business methods create a public nuisance, is an attempt to regulate firearms and ammunition through the medium of the judiciary."

A Florida statute expressly reserves the field of regulation of firearms and ammunition to the state legislature (Fla. Stat. §790.33 (1999)). In Illinois, cities and counties are free to impose gun regulations within certain limits (see 720 ILCS 5/47-5 (West 2002)). Nevertheless, we agree with defendants that the Florida court's observation is worthy of consideration.

Defendants' position is that the legislative and executive branches of state and federal government are better suited than this court to address the societal costs that flow from the illegal use of handguns, particularly given that the commercial activity at issue is already highly regulated. Further, defendants argue that plaintiffs' "frustration" at their inability to effectively regulate gun possession in the city cannot be "alleviated through litigation as the judiciary is not empowered to 'enact' regulatory measures in the guise of injunctive relief. The power to legislate belongs not to the judicial branch of government, but to the legislative branch."

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is a resounding legal slapdown.

More:

In the present case, the question is whether dealer defendants, given the nature of the product they sell, their awareness of Chicago ordinances regarding firearms, and their knowledge that some of their customers are Chicago residents, could reasonably foresee that the guns they lawfully sell would be illegally taken into the city in such numbers and used in such a manner that they create a public nuisance.

We conclude not. We agree with the conclusion of the appellate division of the supreme court of New York in Spitzer: "defendants' lawful commercial activity, having been followed by harm to person and property caused directly and principally by the criminal activity of intervening third parties, may not be considered a proximate cause of such harm."

This result is consistent with other Illinois cases in which a defendant's conduct was found to be so remote from the resulting injury that legal cause was not established.

And here's an example case:

Although we have found no reported cases in which a nuisance claim has been dismissed at this stage for lack of legal cause, the case of Watson v. Enterprise Leasing Co., 325 Ill. App. 3d 914 (2001), in which the theory of liability was negligent entrustment, offers some interesting parallels to the present case. The defendant was a merchant who furnished a condition by which the injury was made possible. Specifically, Enterprise leased a vehicle to one party with the knowledge that it was likely to be driven by one or more third parties. The lessee entrusted the vehicle to a friend, from whom it was taken by yet another person. Eventually, an intoxicated minor took the keys from that person and caused an accident resulting in the death of his passenger. Affirming the trial court's grant of summary judgment for the defendant, the appellate court noted that the element of cause in fact had been satisfied. Absent the leasing of a car to the first individual, the death would not have occurred-at least not in an accident involving this particular vehicle. The intoxicated driver would either not have driven at all and there would have been no accident, or he would have obtained the keys to another vehicle and the accident would have occurred, but would not have involved the defendant's vehicle. Thus, the appellate court concluded, the "crux of the issue" was "legal cause, which revolves around foreseeability." The driver who caused the fatal injury, the court noted, was at least two steps removed from the person to whom Enterprise directly entrusted the car. In addition, the accident was caused by the criminal act of a third party. These events were not reasonably foreseeable. Although the defendant furnished a condition that made the resulting injury possible, the creation of this condition was not the legal cause of the fatal accident because the defendant's conduct was too remote to constitute legal cause. As the appellate court observed, to "impose foresight on defendant under the particular circumstances present in this case would render it liable for anyone who drove the car, thus making it strictly liable."

The parallels to the present case are obvious. Dealer defendants, like the car rental company in Watson, are in the business of providing a lawful product that may be used in unlawful ways, causing injury or death. Both the possession and use of firearms and the driving of motor vehicles are highly regulated by state law. In the present case, the existence of the alleged nuisance in the city of Chicago is several times removed from the initial sale of individual weapons by these defendants, just as the intoxicated driver was at least twice-removed from the defendant in Watson.

The appellate court in Watson found it unreasonable to expect the car rental company to foresee a single accident caused by an intoxicated teenage driver who took the keys to the car without the permission of the person who had rented the car. In the present case, the claim of negligent entrustment has been dismissed and its dismissal has not been appealed. Thus, we are not faced with the question of whether a gun dealer might be held liable for negligently entrusting a weapon to an individual buyer when it is foreseeable that the buyer might allow a third party to possess or use the gun illegally. Instead, plaintiffs argue that it is foreseeable to these defendants that the aggregate effect of numerous sales transactions occurring over time and in multiple different locations operated by businesses with no ties to each other will result in the creation of a public nuisance in another city.

Here's the part I like, because they spell out their thinking explicitly:

Finally, although these dealers' sales of weapons create a condition that makes the eventual harm possible by putting these weapons in private hands, it is not at all clear that the condition would cease to exist even if these particular defendants entirely ceased selling firearms. Just as in Watson, in which the intoxicated teenager managed to gain access to a set of car keys, those who intend to illegally possess and use firearms in the city of Chicago would still be able to obtain them. The manufacture and sale of firearms is legal. There is a market for these products that is served by thousands of dealers all across the country. The sales that would otherwise have been made by these dealers would be made by others. Ultimately, there would be a shift in market share between these dealers and others and, perhaps, an increase in the price of illegal weapons "on the street" as those intent on illegal gun ownership had to go further afield in search of weapons to buy.

--

Plaintiffs and the amici supporting their position advocate expansion of the common law of public nuisance to encompass their novel claim. They anticipate our reluctance to expand nuisance liability in an area highly regulated by both state and federal law and urge that it is not only within our inherent authority, but it is also our duty, to construe the common law to aid a local government's effort to protect its citizens from gun violence.

To do so, we would have had to decide each of the issues raised in this appeal in plaintiffs' favor. In effect, we would have had to resolve every "close call" in favor of creating an entirely new species of public nuisance liability. Instead, after careful consideration, we conclude that plaintiffs have not stated a claim for public nuisance. Even granting, arguendo, that a public right has been infringed, we conclude that their assertions of negligent conduct are not supported by any recognized duty on the part of the manufacturer and distributor defendants and that, under the Gilmore rule (Gilmore, 261 Ill. App. 3d at 661), their allegations of intentional conduct are insufficient for public nuisance liability as a matter of law. In addition, we hold that proximate cause cannot be established as to the dealer defendants because the claimed harm is the aggregate result of numerous unforeseeable intervening criminal acts by third parties not under defendants' control.

And here's the kicker:

Any change of this magnitude in the law affecting a highly regulated industry must be the work of the legislature, brought about by the political process, not the work of the courts. In response to the suggestion of amici that we are abdicating our responsibility to declare the common law, we point to the virtue of judicial restraint.

We, therefore, reverse the judgment of the appellate court and affirm the judgment of the circuit court, which properly granted defendants' motion to dismiss.

Pretty good decision. (I've excised some of the legal references and selectively edited for better readability. If you're legally inclined, go to the link and read the decision in whole.)

The second decision released today was Young v. Bryco Arms, and it leaned on today's City of Chicago decision pretty heavily, since the arguments were essentially identical. I won't quote from it (however much I'd like to,) since this piece is long enough as it is, but I want you to consider something: Yes, the gun-rights side "won" and most people would expect that the gun-ban forces would be seething to have lost in their favorite forum, the courts. To, in fact, have been slapped down - and hard - in that forum, for trying to legislate through the judiciary.

But that's not the aim. Consider how much it has cost Beretta et al. to fight this all the way to the Illinois Supreme Court. While the gun-ban forces have been using TAX DOLLARS. The Brady Bunch didn't file this suit - the CITY OF CHICAGO did. In Young I'm certain that the lawyers were probably acting pro bono with their expenses picked up by Brady, at most.

The purpose of these lawsuits isn't actually to get the court to make new law - they'd love it if that happened, but I don't think even they are that delusional. No, what they're trying to do is bleed the gun manufacturers and especially their distributors to death. They love the appeals process. That means it's going to be more expensive!

This is why the gun-rights forces tried so hard to get the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act passed in the last session of Congress. That's the bill that got killed after Feinstain attached a renewal of the "Assault Weapons Ban" to it. As UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh explained last year, and the Illinois Supreme Court echoed in City of Chicago:

"Why does the gun industry deserve special protection?" asked Dennis Henigan, legal director of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, about the bill that would limit gun manufacturer tort liability, which it seems, might be enacted by Congress. Because the gun industry is under special attack.

If when someone drunk on Coors crashes his Mustang into me, I were able to successfully sue Coors and Ford for selling their products knowing that they cause death, or for recklessly and wantonly refusing to (for instance) install breathalyzer ignition overrides that would (maybe) help prevent drunk driving, then I'd see the bill as being about "special protection" (though then I'd just want it broadened to cars and alcohol, too). But right now, the bill is simply aimed at making sure that the tort liability system treats guns like other lawful but dangerous products.

We need to get that bill passed. Overlawyered reports that its chances of getting through the Senate this time are considerably better:

Gun pre-emption looking good

Last time up, Sen. Dianne Feinstein's poison-pill amendment passed 52-47, dooming the urgently needed bill although it enjoyed the support on paper of a wide majority of Senators. Now five Democrats among those 52 votes are going to be gone. "Conservative Republicans, all of whom were endorsed by the NRA, will replace all five Democrats." (Jim Snyder, "Gun lobby, GOP have lawsuits in their crosshairs", The Hill, Nov. 17).

Unfortunately, Sen. Feinstien was not one of the replaced.

This time we'll need to push and push hard to kill whatever "poison pill" the gun-grabbers can come up with in their attempt to derail this legislation. Because if we don't, depend on it - the lawsuits will just keep coming.

Here's an Outstanding Testimonial to Product Quality

From the New Bedford, MA Standard-Times back in October:

Rusty old gem finds a new life

A professional hunter in Southern Austria inadvertently performed the longest, most realistic, environmental test on a rifle scope in history. A Kahles (pronounced kah-less) scope, lost in the high mountain region of the Austrian Alps in the late '70s was found recently in technically perfect working condition.

In September, 1977, on a chamois stalk, a jaegermeister (professional hunter) from Carinthia climbed to the top of "Kometeralpe", a 2,500-meter picturesque mountain. After shooting a chamois with his Mannlicher Luxus 6.5x57 topped with a Kahles Helia 6x42 riflescope, the jaegermeister rested his firearm against a boulder and ascended to where the game was taken.

After field dressing his animal, he returned to the spot where he believed his rifle to be. Unfortunately, the hunter spent the entire afternoon searching the mountainside for his gear but didn't find it. In the ensuing days and weeks, he regularly returned to the area to search for his rifle but was unsuccessful.

That was one EXPENSIVE chamois!

Months, years, and a quarter century passed. High above the timberline, rifle and scope rested upright against the boulder -- being abused by the harsh elements of nature at this high elevation. Summer heat and dust, followed by strong storms and heavy showers of ice and snow tested its durability.

Almost three decades later, Hannes, a young jaegermeister from Obervellach, a small village in the Austrian Alps, ascended the same mountain, stalking a chamois. After making a good shot, Hannes proceeded down the slope to his animal.

To his amazement, next to the chamois and just barely visible, leaning against a gray stone boulder, was an old rifle. The stock was rotten and bleached by the elements, and all of the steel parts were rusted throughout -- a sad resemblance of what once was a hunter's pride.

The rifle was in poor, unusable condition, but when Hannes looked through the scope he couldn't believe his eyes: the image quality was like that of his new modern scope, with the crosshair standing out crisp and clear against a sharp, brilliant and extremely bright image. The steel surfaces were rusty, yet all of the aluminum parts were unharmed. The mechanical parts, including both elevation and windage adjustments still worked perfectly, and even after all those years in the most extreme of elements, the scope remained waterproof.

After contacting the original owner, Kahles purchased this "environmentally tested" rifle and scope. X-ray analysis showed that the rifle was still loaded and cocked but on safety (shame on the jaegermeister -- it should've been unloaded). The action was locked up by corrosion and was made moveable only after burning the powder in the chamber.

This rifle and scope, a testament to the durability of Kahles optics, will be displayed at future major trade shows. This scope still remains in its original condition after being discovered in the high mountain regions of Austria.

Kahles, founded in 1898, is the oldest rifle scope manufacturer in the world.

Kahles scopes are mucho dinero, but apparently worth the price!

I Just Got a Call from The Second Amendment Foundation

Is it too much to ask when you're begging for money that the beggars know something about what they're begging for?

The elderly lady on the phone called to advise me that "a case" was going to the Supreme Court from the 9^th Circuit "having to do with the 2^nd Amendment." She just couldn't tell me which one. Or anything about it.

I gave the SAF $100 back when they were running the appeal of Silveira v. Lockyer, and at the time I couldn't really afford it. Now the SAF is worse than the NRA at begging. Letters, phone calls, emails, it's non-stop. The case going before SCOTUS now is US v. Stewart. I don't think it's anywhere near as strong as Silveira was.

No, you don't get my money right now. At least let's see if SCOTUS grants cert. first.

Two Via Instapundit

(Since some of you admit to not reading Prof. Reynolds much.)

The first one is over at Power Line - a letter from a Marine, that is, as the Professor said, a must-read.

The second is another piece from the London Times. Here's an excerpt:

Mutilated bodies dumped on Fallujah's bombed out streets today painted a harrowing picture of eight months of rebel rule.

As US and Iraqi troops mopped up the last vestiges of resistance in the city after a week of bombardment and fighting, residents who stayed on through last week's offensive were emerging and telling harrowing tales of the brutality they endured.

Flyposters still litter the walls bearing all manner of decrees from insurgent commanders, to be heeded on pain of death. Amid the rubble of the main shopping street, one decree bearing the insurgents' insignia - two Kalashnikovs propped together - and dated November 1 gives vendors three days to remove nine market stalls from outside the city's library or face execution.

The pretext given is that the rebels wanted to convert the building into a headquarters for the "Mujahidin Advisory Council" through which they ran the city.

Another poster in the ruins of the souk bears testament to the strict brand of Sunni Islam imposed by the council, fronted by hardline cleric Abdullah Junabi. The decree warns all women that they must cover up from head to toe outdoors, or face execution by the armed militants who controlled the streets.

Two female bodies found yesterday suggest such threats were far from idle. An Arab woman, in a violet nightdress, lay in a post-mortem embrace with a male corpse in the middle of the street. Both bodies had died from bullets to the head.

But the "insurgents" aren't bad guys, they just disagree with us and are just "fighting us in their own country" according to the esteemed (by whom, I don't know) Chris Matthews.

Like hell. (Too bad Zell Miller couldn't go through with challenging him to a duel.)

Read both pieces.

At Least THIS Fucknugget ADMITS THE TRUTH

Albeit anonymously. Via From the Heartland (through a myriad of links) comes this example of the "compassionate Left." Read it and have a RCOB™ moment on me.

DEAR OSAMA BIN LADEN

I'm sorry. You were right. We deserve to be blown up.

After last Tuesday, well... what can I say? You had us pegged dead-on the first time--although I was in denial and refused to believe it up until now. We as a nation obviously ARE a bunch of mindless sheep, grown fat with consumerism and easily led down the primrose path into corruption. After what happened November 2, there's just no denying it anymore. I'm ashamed that I was so blind for so long.

After 60 percent of eligible voters turned out and 51 percent of those voted for Bush, I can't do anything but concede your point: There are no innocents left in America. We've brought this on ourselves. Go ahead and do your worst. We've got it coming--in a big way. All I ask is this: Give New York a break, okay? And leave New England, California, and the rest of the West Coast out of it as well. We're on your side already! Please, stay focused and plan your next attack against the real enemy: those "red states" in the middle of the map. Fly a Cessna into the stands of a NASCAR rally. Put a suicide bomber on the Arch in St. Louis. Drive a truck-bomb into the Grand Ole Opry. Release anthrax at an Astros game. It's all good! They've got it coming. I'm just sorry it took me so long to figure out how very right you were. Can you ever forgive me?


--Anonymous

What this self-absorbed walking rectum doesn't seem to understand is, all he has to do for Osama to "forgive him" is to embrace Wahabist Islam. Screaming "Allahu Ackbar!" while detonating a bomb belt in a Wal*Mart would guarantee this "Blue State" slimeball his 72 virgins! Short of that, though, Osama wants him dead, too!

But at least he admits that the moonbats aren't the "loyal opposition." They're THE ENEMY. Especially when they start PICKING TARGETS.

Good thing he's "Anonymous." If he weren't, I'm sure the FBI would be knocking at his door shortly.

If there was any justice in the world, all they'd find is his beheaded corpse.

It is ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIAL to Keep the Hands of Fucknuggets Like This OFF the Levers of Power

I was in a quandary over the title for this post. I had several. I'm open to your suggestions, but I'm going to leave this one up.

Here's another little missive from the frothing moonbat left, a bit perturbed over their recent election losses. I'm quoting the piece in full for future archivists, as an exhibition of a full-rant temper-tantrum. Note that this is what they're willing to print. One cannot help but wonder what they've rejected.

Check your blood pressure before engaging this charming screed from The Providence (RI) Phoenix:

Screw you, America
Sometimes the fish in the barrel deserve to die
BY CLIF GARBODEN

America speaks with one voice. Unfortunately, it emanates from its ass.

— Barry Crimmins

DON’T FORGIVE my anger. All this needs to be said. And I know that as soon as that stiff-faced to-the-manure-born right-wing lackey in the White House tries to appoint a 21st-century counterpart to Roy Bean to the Supreme Court in a few weeks, more people are going to wish they’d said it sooner. John Kerry fucked up. More important, America fucked up. And the people who fucked up the most — you infamous red-staters — are going to suffer along with the rest of us. To put it in lingo a NASCAR devotee would understand, "Y’all deserve a good talkin’-to."

John F. Kerry, you’re first.

In your befuddling concession speech, you actually called for unity and healing. Sounds good, clown, but can’t you even imagine for a second that the people who supported you so zealously for the past five months might just see that insincere gesture of good sportsmanship as a betrayal? See, unlike you pols, we voters actually believe in shit. We believe that George W. Bush and his henchpeople are a real threat to the survival of democracy. We believe that they’re killing people for profit. And we believe that they don’t have a goddamn clue about forfending terrorism on US soil.

That’s not a position gap; that’s an ideological gash. And it’s not going to heal, because, unlike you expedient professional truth-manipulators, I’m not prepared to meet the enemies of freedom halfway just because you lost the election. Your speechwriters might see the Bush administration’s failings as nothing more than convenient fodder for your campaign blather, but the GOP junta’s sins don’t go away just because decrying them no longer serves your ambitions. Last week they were the imperialist pigs who misled us into war and you were the savior. Now we’re the goddamn Getalong Gang?! Screw that. Fight back or shut up.

Now, the rest of you ...

A lot of us effete Easterners want to know: what the fuck is wrong with you?! You voted against your self-interest at every turn (you dumb-asses in South Dakota deserve special credit for voting out one of the most powerful Democrats in the Senate) and re-elected an ignorant cowboy who can’t be trusted to remember a lunch order, never mind run a country. What in the name of God ...?! Wait, it was in the name of God, wasn’t it? Rendered weak and ignorant by a spoon-fed climate of fear, you slack-jawed inbred flatlanders have sought refuge in the traditional twin towers of mindlessness — jingoistic patriotism and fundamentalist religion. God’s on your side. Like hell. Jesus loves us, dammit.

Okay, you want God? Let’s talk about God. Your religion is bogus. Fundamentalism, the facile belief in the unexplained and un-researched, is something you born-agains (couldn’t get it right the first time, huh?) share with Al Qaeda, whose ideologues doggedly adhere to religious misinterpretations every bit as silly and dangerous as yours. Just like you, Muslim fundamentalists long to impose an unrealistic and intolerant pseudo-Calvinist morality on the world. In fact, America’s religious right has so much in common with the Shiah, it’s a wonder you guys don’t invite them to join the Rotary. Born-againsters look for the face of Christ in the wallpaper; fundamentalist Muslims hallucinate the voice of the 12th Imam; but aside from that (and extremely divergent attitudes toward pork), you both hate the same stuff — homosexuality, pacifism, Jews, education, uppity women, enlightenment, short skirts, gangsta rap, tattoos, infidels ... (They also share your love of super-lethal weaponry.)

Well, sorry to burst your holy bubble, Jesus freaks, but God did not create the world in seven days; that’s just ignorant. Like a lot of stuff in the Bible, it didn’t happen. And Moses looked more like Jeff Goldblum than like Charlton Heston. Jesus didn’t hunt; he fished. Jesus wouldn’t want you (or anyone else) to have an assault rifle. What would Jesus do if he met you? He’d ask you to stop ruining his hard-won good reputation. (Y’know the guy died to redeem your sorry ass; you might at least show a little respect for what he was really about.)

What else is bothering you self-destructive morons? What other overwhelmingly urgent issue caused you to vote yourselves into the retirement poorhouse and sacrifice the four freedoms? Gay marriage? Dig it. Right at this moment in your little picturesque insular East Silage-for-Brains, USA, there are gay and lesbian couples walking around — possibly even copulating. Really. It’s been going on around you all your lives, and you’ve never been hurt by it. Now, if these same couples were "married" in any legal sense, they’d still walk and copulate as usual and it still wouldn’t make any difference to you. You don’t like or understand homosexuality? Fine. Nobody’s asking your permission. But it’s not your problem. And hiding it won’t make it go away. Nor will persecuting gays change anybody’s sexual preference. So, to put it aptly, go fuck yourselves and leave other people alone.

Anything else? Education deform ... er reform. Some of you weren’t even born the first time when, in 1968, legendary secular-humanist prophet Frank Zappa wrote: "All your children are poor unfortunate victims of lies you believe. A plague upon your ignorance that keeps the young from the truth they deserve." We repeat, creationism is absurd. Yet in the name of protecting this ridiculous and irrelevant belief, you toothless crank-heads are willing to eschew all science and learning this side of Copernicus. (Or do you still think the sun orbits the earth?) The Bushies really are on your side here. Leaders like G.W. and (yes, it’s a fair comparison) Hitler rise to power by exploiting the support of the weak and stupid, so it’s in their interest to encourage weakness and stupidity. That’s where universal education becomes a threat. Education encourages creative thought. Creative thought empowers people. Fascists hate creative thought. So it’s incredibly convenient for the GOP that you folks actually want your kids to be dumb. Which is why the No Child Left Behind initiative you endorse has, in fact, done nothing! Happy? Perhaps ignorance really is bliss.

What else is on your hate-laden Limbaugh-laid table? Flag burning? It’s just cloth, guys. Sex ed? Heaven forbid your daughters learned the facts of life in time to prevent having to avoid an abortion.

Gun control? We said "control," not confiscation. And there are high-powered automatic weapons most civilians really do not need. Even moose tend to come at you one at a time. "But shooting’s fun!" you argue. "It’s a sport." Breaking windows and driving 100 miles an hour are fun, but they’re legally controlled activities. "But," you object, "how do I defend my family when the nigras and the Jews and the Communists from Harvard come on my property?" Right. Lock the gate; everybody covets your Tupperware and your chard. We’ll be right over.

Does it really bother you cornpone chuckleheads that "we" think you’re under-educated, culturally limited, and ignorant? Well, how about proving us wrong? For starters, get this straight: there were no weapons of mass destruction; the Iraqis did not attack the World Trade Center; lots of children (including many of yours) are left behind every day; the greenhouse effect is for real; and the Dixie Chicks were right. Pin down a few of those basics and then perhaps we’ll talk.

Am I being elitist here? Disrespectful of the dignity of the masses? I fuckin’ hope so, because 51 percent of the masses have had their say and it doesn’t make sense. Besides, when I think about people being tortured while they’re held without representation at Guantánamo and Iraqi families crawling out of the rubble of their own homes, I’m not too worried if I insult some Bible-sucking insurance salesman or a possum-breathed saw sharpener.

TOO HARSH? I know (because I’ve been so chided) that there are lots of good, right-thinking/left-leaning liberals out there who feel it’s my responsibility to "understand" you. These are good people; unlike you assholes, they voted the right way. But this is why in true progressive circles the word liberal attracts adjectives such as "wishy-washy," "self-serving," and "useless."

In its own well-intentioned way, liberalism is, when you think about it, almost as big a problem as fundamentalism is. See, as much as I disagree with you and am disgusted by the shallow and pathetic pawns you’ve become, I respect your potential. That’s why liberal Democrats can’t bring themselves to do what the Republicans do so well — cynically lie to you for selfish gain. (Do you really think Kerry would have banned the Bible?) We nice people actually expected reasoned arguments, logic, and incontrovertible evidence to convince you that Kerry was the better candidate. Turns out that the GOP’s double whammy of fear and loathing is a more powerful vote-getting tool.

Of course they, not we, laid the groundwork there. And that’s the real shocker you fly-over chicken-rubbers are going to realize just before the end (of freedom, that is; I don’t mean the Rapture, which is something else you believe in that’s not going to happen): you’ve been duped, and the Bushies are laughing at you behind your spineless backs right now. The Republicans don’t care about you; they just wanted your vote so they can stay in power and make their oil-and-blood-soaked cronies even richer. They’re going to send your job overseas and destroy Social Security. In the name of catching terrorists, they’re going to make sure you don’t read any interesting books or travel without permission. They’re going to toss you a minuscule tax cut in exchange for under-funding public education and social services, so there will be more poor people around to bother you. Perhaps you will become one of them.

They’re going to shower the pharmaceutical companies with excess profits while denying you life-saving medical attention. They’re going to let corporate conglomerates fill the air you breath with carcinogens while they discourage clean-energy research. They’re going to insist the ozone layer’s okay until y’all bake your little red asses off. They’re going to alienate the rest of the Western world and any portion of the Eastern world that isn’t willing to supply Wal-Mart with cheap labor. They’re going to throw more Saddam-esque bogeymen in your face while tacitly supporting Saudi terrorists and ignoring nuclear-armed Korean dictators. They’re going to rig the system so that even you law-abiding yahoos won’t be able to get a fair trial. And worst of all, they’re going to dehumanize your children and send them off to kill or be killed in the name of oil profits.

And you bought into it all because you’re afraid. And you’re afraid because they scared you. And it was all so unnecessary. You don’t have to be frightened. You (okay, most of you) aren’t really stupid or helpless. I know you at your worst and best. I grew up with you; I shared outdoor plumbing with you; I complimented the dead deer hanging on your front porches. You can open your minds and accept or reject things on their merits instead of on their reputations in small-minded circles. You can think for yourselves.

And some day, you might figure that out. Meanwhile, you deserve what we all got thanks to you, you bastards.

Now, tell me - if people like this got to be in charge, what would they do for to us, that portion of the population that hasn't partaken of their Kool-Aid? I mean, since they know better than the 51% who didn't vote for their own self-interest (which seems to be the only thing Leftists understand: personal self-interest.) We "self-destructive morons." We blissfully ignorant. We "cornpone chuckleheads." We disgusting, shallow and pathetic pawns (but not pawns of the Left). What, oh, what would they have to do, should they regain power?

I keep thinking "re-education camps."

For people like me, college educated and armed, I think "re-education" would be via a bullet behind the ear.

And he wants to know why we oppose "gun control."

Interesting News from Falluja

From the London Times

Final steps of dead men walking
From James Hider in Fallujah
Fleeing rebels are tracked by aircraft and killed by US troops

THE last hours of the mujahidin are terrifying. With the city they once ruled with the absolute authority of medieval caliphs now overrun by American and Iraqi troops, they have to keep moving. To pause even for a few minutes can mean instant death from an unseen enemy.

A group of 15 fighters dressed in black and carrying an array of weapons ducked into a two-storey house in war-torn southern Fallujah yesterday morning. Their movement was picked up by an unmanned spy plane that beamed back live footage to a control centre on the edge of the city. Within minutes, an airstrike was called and the house disappeared in a giant plume of grey smoke.

From a house across the road, the explosion flushed out another group of guerrillas. Deafened by the blast, they stumbled out into the street, formed a ragged line and started off on the marathon to postpone their deaths, the drone dogging their every step.

“The rats are trying to move about,” Major Tim Karcher, of the Second Battalion, Seventh Cavalry, said as the figures flitted from street to street, seeking cover close to walls.

Sometimes they can throw off the drone, ducking out of sight of the men in whose power it is to summon FA18 fighter-bombers or 155mm artillery strikes. But they have no way of knowing. And, increasingly, as they run they are coming into the crosshairs of American snipers, crackshots such as Sergeant Marc Veen and his long-barrelled rifle, Lucille. Yesterday morning he spotted a black- clad man with an AK47 assault rifle peering round a corner 500 yards from the villa where Cougar Company of the Seventh Cavalry has set up a forward base.

He shot the man in the stomach: he fell, but kept crawling, so Sergeant Veen shot him again in the shoulder. Still the man tried to move away, so the sergeant blasted him with his 50-calibre machinegun.

“There’s pretty much no feeling,” the 24-year-old from Chicago explained, perched on the parapet of the house, the shell of the killer bullet tucked as a trophy into his flak jacket. “If I didn’t get that guy, that guy would get one of my buddies some time later.”

Lucille. Gotta love it. Bombs from 10,000 feet. Artillery shells from 20km, or a rifle bullet from 500 yards. You can run, but you can't hide (for long.)

The battle for Fallujah is all but over. The main north-south road in the once-dreaded Jolan district is a US military highway. Any guerrilla who could make his way back up from the last pockets of resistance in the south would see the mujahidin graffiti — “Jihad, jihad, jihad, God is Greatest and Islam will win” — replaced by slogans daubed by the US-backed Iraqi Army, posted the length of the route.

Standing on a street reeking of decomposed bodies, the ruins of a five-floor building silhouetted behind him, Lieutenant Fares Ahmed Hassan said that the destroyed city would send a strong message to a nation where force has long been the lingua franca of government. “When the people of Fallujah come back and see their houses, they will kick out any terrorists. This will be an example to all Iraqi cities,” the Kurdish officer said.

One can but hope.

Apart from a few women and children, the only civilians he had seen were men of fighting age, about 500, detained for vetting. He said that some civilians had said that insurgent snipers had shot anyone trying to leave their homes. As US troops sweep through the houses, they are unearthing the insurgents’ horrifying secrets — more akin to the handiwork of serial killers than guerrillas or even terrorists — that have shocked the world and explain why this offensive has met with so little opposition from the Arab world.
In the south of Fallujah yesterday, US Marines found the armless, legless body of a blonde woman, her throat slashed and her entrails cut out. Benjamin Finnell, a hospital apprentice with the US Navy Corps, said that she had been dead for a while, but at that location for only a day or two. The woman was wearing a blue dress; her face had been disfigured. It was unclear if the remains were the body of the Irish-born aid worker Margaret Hassan, 59, or of Teresa Borcz, 54, a Pole abducted two weeks ago. Both were married to Iraqis and held Iraqi citizenship; both were kidnapped in Baghdad last month.

US and Iraqi troops have discovered kidnappers’ lairs filled with corpses or emaciated prisoners half-mad with fear, and piles of bodies of men who had refused to fight with the insurgents. As the guerrillas run their last sprint from death, sympathy for their cause is running out among Iraqis.

Good. Let's see if that spreads. And why aren't we hearing about THAT on "Hardball"? Instead, we get Chris Matthews stating:

I mean they're not bad guys especially, just people who just disagree with us, they are in fact the insurgents, fighting us in their country

No, Chris. They are bad guys - and the fact that you can think that they're "just people who disagree with us" is so illustrative of the pathology of the Leftist mindset it ought to be in a textbook.

At least Matthews didn't call the murdering, butchering monsters "Minutemen."

(That's called "damning with faint praise.")

More Legal Stuff

The NRA is still attempting to overturn the DC gun ban in Federal court via their suit Seegars v. Ashcroft which is to shortly come before the Appeals Court for DC. Matt over at Triggerfinger has the complete scoop.

Personally? I think the NRA is going to lose - again. The courts have figured out how to "dodge the bullet" on the 2^nd Amendment for decades. And SCOTUS just needs to deny cert - if it gets that far.

I wish Ms. Seegars luck, but I expect in the end it will be "Close, but NO, Seegars."

(I really should restrain myself....)

I LOVE My Readers!

Reader Sarah just sent me the following interesting tidbit:

Kevin,

Thought you might find this interesting, I read the following on Ebert's website today (Movie Answer Man). Here we have a genuine Illinois liberal coming to terms with reality: for all of Canada's gun restrictions and lovely social benefits, Canadian crime rates are actually worse than in shoot 'em up USA, which you probably already knew. I knew it, too,because I lived in Vancouver for ten years and saw a lot of it with my own eyes. Not to mention that shootings (with those heavily restricted handguns) occur with alarming frequency in Vancouver.

Admirably, Ebert posts the statistics comparison on his website.

http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/section?category=ANSWERMAN

Best,

Sarah

Then she provided the pertinent excerpt from the page:

Q. In your Ebert & Roeper review of Michael Wilson's "Michael Moore Hates America," you blurted out an erroneous opinion, expressing your doubts about the film's claim that the Canadian crime rate is double the U.S. rate.

I checked with http://www.statcan.ca/, listed as "the official source for Canadian social and economic statistics and products," and with the U.S. Department of Justice Bureau of Justice Statistics. The bottom line: These sites agree with Wilson's assertion that crime in Canada is much worse than inthe USA.

James Elias, Highland Ranch, Colo.

A. Astonishing. For the year 2003, per 100,000 population, Canada had 8,530 crimes, and the U.S. 4,267. For crimes of violence, 958 vs. 523. For property crimes, 4,275 vs. 3,744. Michael Wilson, director of the film, tells me: "There was originally a comedic segment in the film that attributed this to the proliferation of Tim Horton's doughnut franchises, but I could not make it work."

Yes, astonishing.

Now, Roger, care to hazard a guess why?

Thank you, Sarah!

MAN I Hate Cosmoline!

It's just now 7:45. I have just finished reassembling my Garand. I used three large cans of brake cleaner, a toothbrush and a large coffee can, and all the cosmoline is STILL not off the metal. But it is cleaner. I'm leaving stripping the stock for another day. And scrubbing the bore 'till it's sqeaky, too. I may do that tomorrow.

I have learned how to field-strip the Garand, and detail strip the feeding and operation assembly. And put it back together again. (Correctly, the second time.)

Rifle condition: Fair. No finish left, but the metal is OK with very minor pitting. The trigger is not bad at all for a military rifle. The wood looks OK but the upper handguard is (of course) cracked. I think I'll end up replacing the stock with a new Boyd's walnut one. I wouldn't be surprised if the rifle needs a new barrel, too. Then I can take all the metal parts, strip and clean them, and finish everything with Norrell's Moly Resin in the greenish-gray Parkerized finish. That should look very nice when it's finished.

And shoot pretty good, too!

I love my hobby!

SWEEEET!!

I just received an email that my Garand (Danish, rack grade) has shipped FedEx Priority Overnight. I'll have it THIS MORNING!!

Damn, now THAT'S SERVICE!

Now I've got to get some en bloc clips and some ammo. And I can take it to the Saturday shoot!

Posting Will Be Limited

I'm currently busy as hell at work, my Comcast connection at home is intermittent (again) and I'm doing prep work (in my copious spare time) for a shoot this Saturday. Sorry for the lack of posting, but real life has reared its ugly head again.

In the mean time, go read Say Uncle, who is right on top of current events in gun control safety, Jeff at Alphecca who has this week's check on bias in the media, and Zendo Deb over at .357 Magnum has an interesting article from the New York Times???

And, of course, there's always the archives.

Thanks for visiting!

The Supreme Court's Impending Dilemma

The Heartless Libertarian has done an outstanding job of collating the pertinent posts around the Blogosphere concerning the possible hearing by the Supreme Court of the recent 9^th Circuit decision in US v. Stewart, which I wrote about in "Game Over, Man. Game Over". In Stewart, my favorite 9^th Circuit Justice Alex Kozinski (and no, I'm not being snarky - I mean it) wrote the majority opinion that the defendant could not be charged with possession of a machinegun because he had made the machineguns himself, and not purchased them in interstate commerce (basing the decision on the limiting power of the commerce clause of the Constitution.) You need to read the decision to understand the reasoning - and it's eminently logical.

There was a dissent to the ruling, one based upon a previous Supreme Court decision, Wickard v. Filburn from 1942 - a decision that, for a layperson such as myself, appeared to be a Federal power-grab of unprecedented blatancy and scope. In Wickard the Court proclaimed that a farmer was in violation of interstate commerce law by growing wheat for his own personal use because it meant he wouldn't be purchasing it in interstate commerce. Essentially the ruling said that everything anybody did or grew or made or mined "affected interstate commerce" and was therefore legally subject to Federal regulation.

Anyway, Heartless Libertarian's post on the topic, Extremely Important Supreme Court Cases, is comprehensive. Go read and be enlightened as to the crack that decades of flawed legal decisions have wedged SCOTUS into. I expect they'll have to be very creative to dodge this one.

Of course, like they did with US v. Emerson and Silveira v. Lockyer, they could just deny certiorari, but it's the Justice Department asking that the case be heard.

Should be interesting.

More Freakin' Fascinating Reading from Eric S. Raymond

Eric put up a new essay yesterday, Islamofascism and the Rage of Augustine, inspired by a comment at the Belmont Club. I don't have sufficient historical or religious study to judge the overall accuracy of Eric's premise, but it rings true to me from the knowledge I do have. Interesting excerpts:

It was Augustine's theology of sin and grace that sharpened that tool into a blade. In a nutshell, it reduces to this: (1) We are all sinners, broken and wrong. (2) To escape this condition, we must not only obey authority but internalize it. (3) Even if we succeed at (2), only the whim of divine authority can save us, and that whim is beyond human ken. The tyrant can never be called to account, and to act against him is to be damned.

Worse: in Augustinean theology, the intention to sin is as bad as the act. It is not sufficient to behave as though we believe when we really don't. It is not even sufficient that we allow authorities to coerce us into believing absurd things or performing atrocities in God's name. We must conform not only outwardly but inwardly, become our own oppressors, believing because it is absurd. The God-tyrant can never be rejected even in our own minds, or we are damned.

--

The alliance now forming between the Islamo-fascists and the hard left should surprise nobody who understands the deep structure of either belief system. Both are, fundamentally, designed as legitimizing agents for tyranny — memetic machines designed to program you into licking the boot of the commissar or caliph that stomps you. But outside of a tiny minority of the brave (Robert Ingersoll) or the crazy (Nietzsche) Western intellectuals have averted their eyes from this truth, because to recognize it would almost require them to notice that the very same deep structure is wired into the Gnosticized Christianity of "Saint" Augustine — and, in fact, historically derived from it.

Hence the shared Christian/Islamic propensity for putting unbelievers to the sword for merely unbelieving. You will search in vain for such behavior among post-Exilic Jews, or Taoists, or animists, or any other world religion. Only a religion which is totalitarian at its core, fundamentally about thoughtcrime and sin and submission, can even conceive of a need to murder people wholesale for the state of their unbelief. The massacre of St. Bartholomew's Eve and Stalin's liquidation of the kulaks were of a piece, both jihads against thoughtcrime.

RTWT. Discussion would be appreciated. I do wonder where Protestantism comes into play here, because with the rise of Luther, as one of Eric's commenters said,

(T)he Roman Catholic church was basically an institution that had been developed to enforce European feudalism. After Martin Luther it tried for a century to exterminate Protestantism with military force, but failed. Since the mid 17th Century it has not known what to do with its self.(sic)

Protestantism, in my mind, is a much more "live-and-let-live" form of Christianity, though it does have a tendency to fall back on fire-and-brimstone-burn-in-hell-heathens! mode from time to time. Reader Sarah has commented here several times on the cultural benefits of Protestant Christianity in the move towards individual rights and freedom, and I am, in general, in agreement with her.

I wonder, do any of the Islamic sects represent a "protestant" form?

Post-Modernist Youth Rebellion - the 'Neckie' Movement

Beverage Warning - don't drink and read this at the same time.

Via Instapundit, please go read the comic genius of Iowahawk in his post, Blue State Blues as Coastal Parents Battle Invasion of Dollywood Values

Trust me, it's worth your time.

Oh, and when you're done with that one? Read Orthodox & Heterodox's Red state, blue state, me state, you state, too.

How does Glenn find all this stuff?