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August 2010
This is so great...
SAF and CalGuns Foundation are sponsoring the annual Firearm Rights Policy Conference, in San Francisco, on Sept.24-26. (Talk about marching into the teeth of the enemy!). They know that the San Fran public transit authorities have a rule against allowing advertising on bus shelters or buses that shows an image of a firearm. So they created one, and dared them to ban it ... thereby setting up a First Amendment challenge. Apparently the powers that be backed down, because here's a pic of the advertisement.
Thanks to reader jdberger ...
Surprise: Chicago rarely enforced it gun law
Story here, thanks to reader Joe Olson.
An interesting note toward the end of the article: Joyce Foundation gave the city $20,000 for its legal defense.
Permalink · Chicago aftermath · Comments (1)
Insiders' views of turmoil in BATFE
Over at Cleanup ATF. All sorts of things that outsiders would never think of. Treasury and Justice agencies have different outlooks, merging their functions results in friction. Having an acting director for years means nobody at the top who can make major organizational decisions (and everyone knows he'll be gone, soon, in agency terms). Further, in a turf war with other agencies looking to move into your turf, an acting head can't stand up to their moves. Rumors of moving alcohol and tobacco functions to FDA. Supervisors getting away with expense fraud (and with sexual ... well, to call it misconduct is like terming an axe murderer a misuser of a garden tool).
Permalink · BATFE · Comments (1)
Turf War!
These things can get nasty! ATF vs. FBI, fighting over explosives investigations. The division had been that FBI gets it if it involves terrorism; ATF gets it if it doesn't. But drawing that line in the real world is difficult. So with any high profile case, the investigation has to be preceded by the inter-agency battle.
"Glenn A. Fine, the Justice Department's inspector general, reported last year that battles were flaring at crime scenes from Baltimore to Houston, delaying witness interviews and impairing the government's ability to spot trends in bombings."
Permalink · BATFE · Comments (2)
Swords crossed in the challenge to NY's "may issue" permit system
Only Guns and Money has the update. It's the usual beginning to a test case: defendant files an "everything but the kitchen sink" motion to dismiss.
Permalink · Heller aftermath · Comments (1)
LEO seeks to reverse "no guns in parks" conviction
Story here. The quirk about DC area roads is that many are technically elongated national parks, so before the law was changed people could wind up charged with illegally having a gun in a park when they'd just seen it as driving down a highway in Virginia or Maryland, while in full compliance with State law.
Hat tip to XD Owner....
Permalink · arms law victims · Comments (3)
A lesson about visiting DC....
If you come to DC with handguns in the car, don't honestly answer if the hotel staff asks if you have a gun. Fortunately, charges were dropped.
Permalink · arms law victims · Comments (9)
Another reason to be glad I'm out here
Philadelphia is demanding that bloggers pay $300 for a business license.
A need met
For some years, Clayton Cramer had a very useful blog, The Armed Citizen. One of his contributors posted a story reported in the Las Vegas Review-Journal. And it turns out that that paper has sold the right to sue any copyright infringers to some scumbag outfit known as Righthaven. Here's where you can contribute to Clayton's defense.
As for this blog -- the Las Vegas Review-Journal is henceforth a nonentity. No links. No mentions.
Instapundit asks if anyone can come up with a plugin to ban viewing of papers owned by the Review-Journal's parent, and Clayton has a way to do it in Firefox.
National Matches underway!
A good report on them at SI.com.
Permalink · shooting · Comments (6)
South Korea proposes to sell US collectors M-1s, government objects
Story here. The reporter has the dates of issue wrong, and the prices are something we can only dream about, but the government position is pure nonsense.
Challenge to Chicago's shooting range ban
Motion for prelim injunction is here, in pdf. It points out that to get a handgun permit in Chicago, one must take at least an hour of range training, yet other provisions of the Chicago ordinances make this impossible -- shooting ranges are banned, possession of ammo for other than an already-registered gun is banned, etc., etc.
Hat tip to Gene Hoffman of CalGuns...
Permalink · Chicago aftermath · Comments (1)
Updates on Post-Chicago litigation
Only Guns and Money has the updates. Blogging has been a little slow here due to medical issues, work, and now my Comcast high speed is down after a lightning storm. Fortunately, I keep a dialup line as Plan B.
Permalink · Chicago aftermath · Comments (0)
Funny animated cartoon
Brady Campaign meets President Obama.
Hat tip to reader Joshua Berger....
Permalink · humor · Comments (5)
Wilmington public housing authority bails out on gun ban
Story here.
"The Wilmington Housing Authority suspended its ban on firearm ownership by tenants because of a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision and a National Rifle Association-funded lawsuit filed in May that charges the ban is unconstitutional, according to attorneys and officials."
More evidence of long term trends
I've said that we're probably seeing a long term trend relating to arms and attitudes toward them, and this seems to be the case. NSSF just released its July data on background checks. Unadjusted, the July 2010 figures were up 10% over July 2009, which itself was well into the timeframe when checks were skyrocketing. Adjusted to take out the checks for CCW permits and leave only those relating to gun sales, it's up 4.3% over 2009. I had read that there did seem to be a surge after the last election, focused on guns that could face bans, but that this faded away within three months. What's left is an enormous and sustained increase in new firearms purchases.
Someday historians may correlate that with changes in public opinion poll results, the near collapse of antigun legislative efforts, and even the judicial recognition of the right to arms. Americans historically loved firearms. US presidents were NRA members, government programs recruited and armed competitive shooters. Then in the 1960s that changed; the media in particular pushed the idea that gun owners were a dangerous, selfish, rather oafish lot. Perhaps fifty years later we've hit the end of that cycle?
Update: circulation of the NRA political mag America's First Freedom is up 20% over last year, and its Rifleman and Hunter are also in the top 25 fastest growing publications.
Antigun fanaticism in Australia
Gun Control Australia is upset that the Liberal Party (which is actually the more conservative of the major parties) isn't sufficiently antigun. Bear in mind the Liberal Party saw to the banning of semiautos and pump-action long arms....
Permalink · antigun groups · Comments (1)
Morale not high at Brady Center
Dennis Henigan is seems to be getting depressed, and understandably so.
Permalink · antigun groups · Comments (8)
Chicago
Chicago -- the city where criminals need not fear the police (and courts). And, if anyone obeyed its gun laws, they'd need not fear anyone else, either.
Via Instapundit.