Month: June 2009

More Terrorist Watch List Bull Shit

Via Snowflakes in Hell we have another bullshit story on the terrorist watch list as it relates to people buying guns…

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_watch_list_guns

Apparently 800 people who are on the watch list have purchased firearms. Oh my God it’s time to start shitting your pants people that’s 800 people! Wait a minute there are 400,000 names on that list. So less than one percent (in fact .2 percent) of people on the list have been allowed to buy guns.

Further thinking led me to look up the population of the United States which, according to Google, is roughly 304,059,724 people. With 400,000 names on the terrorist watch list that means .1 percent of the entire population of the United States is on this list. That number doesn’t look like much but considering one tenth of one percent of the entire population of this country is suspected of being a terrorist that’s significant.

Anyways back to the bullshit here as pointed out on Snowflakes in Hell the FBI is supposed to destroy all NICS data. So this information shouldn’t even be attainable.

Furthermore I want to point out that this list is supposed to be secret for “national security” reasons. But apparently you can get the number of names and the number of people on that list who bought firearms. I wonder how much other information you can coax out of the government on their secret list. Given enough statistical information you can start to find out who is likely on that list.

Source: http://www.snowflakesinhell.com/2009/06/23/800-gun-buyers-on-terror-list/

Smith and Wesson 22A Recall

Somebody let me know that there is a recall on some Smith and Wesson 22A pistols…

http://www.smith-wesson.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/CustomContentDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10001&catalogId=10001&content=750501&sectionId=10506

Recall information as posted by Smith and Wesson…

Smith & Wesson has identified a condition that may exist in certain model 22-A pistols. Based on our ongoing product review, we have determined that the slides of certain pistols manufactured from August 1, 2008 to February 19, 2009, may not meet the design specification. This can create a situation where insufficient headspace exists creating a risk of unintended discharge.

And what pistols are being recalled…

This recall applies only to 22-A pistols manufactured from August 1, 2008 to February 19, 2009. Affected pistols fall within the following serial number range:

UBW0000 – UBW9999
UBY0000 – UBY4104

I’m rather glad that the 22A I recently purchased isn’t on that list.

Moorhead, Minnesota Resident Shoots Invader

I have mixed feeling about this self defense story brought to you by The Red Start…

http://www.startribune.com/local/48680082.html

Vernon Allen of Moorhead, Minnesota shoot and killed an intruder in his apartment on June 20, 2009. That’s the good part now for the part I’m rather concerned about…

Police say a Moorhead man shot and killed an intruder who walked into his unlocked apartment.

Yes he shot and killed an intruder who entered his unlocked apartment. Here in Minnesota a lot of people love to boast how friendly everybody is. They say this friendliness is so strong that there is no need to even lock your doors. Bullshit. You should always have your door locked whether you’re at home or away.

Locking the door offer cheap prevention against unknown individuals entering your domicile. And no matter what a locked door needs to be dealt with whether by kicking through the door or finding an alternative means to gain entry into the building. This gives you time. The next part of this story that bothers me is the following…

He says when he didn’t leave, a fight ensued. The resident then allegedly got his shotgun, which went off during a struggle.

From how the story is written I am to believe that the man entered the fight before retrieving his shotgun. If somebody you don’t know enters your home you should assume ill intent. Upon this assumption you should arm yourself then confront the intruder. Falling out of this order and confronting the intruder before arming yourself is putting you at a disadvantage. Now it could be such a thing where the man was unable to get to his shotgun without going through the intruder but in that case it sounds like his home defense plan needs some tweaking.

Update: Here is a link with more information…

http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/244383/

Mr. Allen was not charged with any crime which is good. Some people are making a stink that the intruder was only 17 but in my book if you’re old enough to enter a person’s home without permission and fight him you’re old enough to deal with the consequences.

More on Stripping the Right of People on the Terror Watch List

I mentioned earlier about the proposed bill which would prevent anybody who is on the secret “terrorist watch list” from buying firearms. Well Sharp as a Marble posted a good story where morons who don’t know what they are talking about try to spread hysteria through lies…

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/22/AR2009062201766.html?hpid=topnews

From the article…

People named on the government’s terrorist watch list have successfully purchased firearms hundreds of times since 2004, government investigators reported yesterday. In one case, a known or suspected terrorist was able to buy more than 50 pounds of explosives, the Government Accountability Office reported.

So people who are on a secret list that contains everybody from 70 year old ladies to politicians has no ability to stop people from buying guns and explosives? And this is surprising why?

If these idiots would critically think for just a few minutes they would realize a couple of things. First of all this is a secret list which means nobody outside of the higher echelons of government know who is on it. If you started preventing people who are on it from doing things they previously had no problem doing that might tip them off that they are on this secret list. I know if ended up passing and all of the sudden I got turned down by the NICS system I’d be pretty sure I was on that list.

The second idiotic thing about his list is that no court process has to be done to put somebody on the list. What the supporters of this bill are saying is they support stripping the rights of citizens without due process. Are people who are willing to strip your rights just because somebody put your name on a secret list really the kinds of representatives you want? Do they really represent you? I hope the answer to both questions is a resounding no.

Make no mistake this isn’t about saving guns or keeping guns out the hands of terrorists. This bill is about control and disarming the citizens of America. Remember just because somebody is on this list doesn’t mean they’ve actually done anything illegal. In fact we don’t even know if anybody on this list has done anything since it’s secret.

Finally although I’m not much for conspiracy theories who is to say that people won’t be placed on this list after they buy “too many” guns. After all it’s a list of “suspected” terrorists. And by suspected I mean there isn’t enough evidence to even get a search warrant on the person. Tie this with the recent paper describing right-wing extremist terrorists, which included proponents of the second amendment, and you have a recipe for government terrorism against its citizens. Who knows maybe if you buy two guns in a month you automatically get placed on this list, you just don’t know.

Source: http://blog.robballen.com/2009/06/22/p3524-secret-lists-cannot-stop-firearm-purchases.post

BATFE Harassing Gun Owners in Border Towns

Scary news being reported by the NRA-ILA…

http://www.nraila.org/Legislation/Read.aspx?ID=4990

Several NRA members in border cities are saying they’ve had BATFE (I’m still wondering when the Hell the B and the E were tacked onto ATF) agents coming to their door and asking to be let inside so they can get the serial numbers off of their guns.

Remember everybody unless an agent has a warrant do not let them into your home. No matter what threats they make or what they say without a warrant they can not legally enter your residence. Law enforcement agents are allowed to lie to you so they can say things like they will report you or bring you down to the precinct but without legal grounds they can’t do anything.

If this is actually happening I encourage everybody to stand up for their rights and tell the BATFE no they can not enter and it’s none of their business how many guns you own.

Just Because the Bad Guy is Armed Doesn’t Mean They’ll Win

At least if you’re also armed. From Robb Allen’s blog we have this story…

http://www.myfoxtampabay.com/dpp/news/local/hillsborough/concealed_weapons_permits_rise_061709

The anti-gunners always spout the fact that if you are attacked you’ll be at a disadvantage. This is true but they claim this disadvantage is so great due to your foe being armed and already having their weapon at the ready that you’ll have no chance in Hell of getting to yours. This story flat out destroys that argument…

TAMPA – About a month ago, Audry Sauceda was carjacked and fought back.

He stuck a gun in my side and told me to get out of the car,” Sauceda said while sharing her story with FOX 13 on May 15. “And I pulled out my gun and stuck it in his face, and told him, he needed to get out. He screamed and jumped out of the car.”

Even though the attacker had a gun at the ready the owner of the car was able to get her gun out and into the would be high jacker’s face.

The bottom line is most criminals prey on what they perceive to be easy targets. They want easy money and objects that’s why they are stealing instead of working. To them it’s easier to rob an unarmed person than it is to go to work everyday like the rest of us. But once in a while they find a person who is armed and it turns their life to shit. Not wanting to die most criminals will run at the sight of a gun in the hands of the law abiding.

Of course there will be somebody who says if the woman would have just surrendered her car then she wouldn’t have had a chance of ill happening to her. The problem is you can’t make a deal with a person who is robbing you because you can’t trust them. Just because a criminal says they won’t kill you if you give them your stuff doesn’t mean they won’t kill you.

Source: http://blog.robballen.com/2009/06/19/p3516-getting-the-jump-on-things.post

Having the Government Control Our Lives Costs a Lot

I found an eye opening post over on Bob Barr’s blog…

http://blogs.ajc.com/bob-barr-blog/2009/06/19/federal-regulatory-burden-hits-117-trillion/?cxntfid=blogs_bob_barr_blog

He brings up the cost of Federal regulation which is right around $1.17 trillion. From the blog…

The cost of federal regulations to American citizens, businesses and state and local governments has reached $1.17 trillion, according to a report just published by the Washington, D.C.-based Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). This equates to some $3,849 for each man, woman and child in the country.

That’s a lot of my tax money going to regulate my life. Personally I think I can regulate my life for much cheaper by doing it myself. Furthermore regulatory code is expansive…

The same report found that the “Federal Register,” the government publication that is the compendium for federal rules, now stands at a staggering 79,435 pages!

No human being is going to be able to read through 79,435 pages of regulatory code. Hell you’d need a lot of people knowing small parts just to have a group of people who know it. This means that there are regulations that are probably not usually enforced until they need something to nail somebody to the wall with.

Personally I’m of the idea where if your laws are so numerous and expansive that no person can possibly know them all you need to cut down the number of laws. I should be able to read all the laws in a specific area, understand them easily, and know exactly what I can and cannot do. With our current setup I can guarantee everybody in the United States will break multiple laws this year without even knowing it.

But the best quote is this one…

But not to worry. President Barack Obama admits he “loses sleep worrying about the deficit.” Sort of like an alcoholic worrying that he drinks too much, as he reaches for another drink to drown his worries.

Simply hilarious. I’m rather glad I voted for this guy during the election.

Don’t Place Your Cameraman Downrange

Although I’m more late to posting this than any other gun blogger at least I’m posting it (yeah this was a failure to bring breaking news). The people at Tactical Response shot a video that showed a cameraman down range while students were shooting.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqboR6gjOi8&e]

This is such a bad idea I don’t know where to begin. Let’s face it you don’t put a man down range when people are shooting. This is just asking for trouble. All it would take is a slight miss and you’d have on injured or dead cameraman. And anybody could make such a slip up no matter who good they are.

Source: http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2009/06/17/highly-controversial-training-video/

But James Yeager posted a video response on YouTube as well. Here is the video…

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1R3t0wuLDWQ&e]

Personally all he makes are excuses trying to justify a bad idea. The statement that really irks me is where he says nobody can be completely safe. I’ll give him the truth in that but there are easy and common sense things you can do to make something safe. For instance not placing somebody down range while people are actively shooting. This isn’t hard to do and it greatly increases safety. It’s akin to ensuring your gun is unloaded before you start cleaning it.

Seriously this guy is an idiot. When you fuck up don’t try to justify it just admit you’re only human and you made a mistake.

Source: http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2009/06/19/james-yeager-responds-to-the-controversial-training-video/

Germany will Sensor the Internet

But of course it’s “for the children.” Germany passed an Internet censorship bill under the guise of stopping child pornography…

http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,4406608,00.html

This is always the first set in full government censorship. Find something almost everybody decries, make a law banning it, and further use that law to censor all free information exchange where that now illegal item can be obtained.

The bill as it stands right now doesn’t prevent a person from viewing a site deemed to contain child pornography it just makes them click through a displayed stop sign (and I’m sure record their IP address for government agents can come arrest them).

The problem I have with a bill involving any kind of censorship is this. If you give a government an inch they’ll take a mile. This is true of every government. Right now they will only censor child pornography but next it will be anything deeming sexually abnormal and eventually it will involve anything that speaks badly about the German government.

I Guess We Now Tax Based on the Value of Money’s Material

Found on Say Uncle the Feds are trying to tax a man’s independent contractors via the value of what the money was made from not the government’s set value of the money…

http://www.lvrj.com/news/46074037.html

This may sound odd but alas the employer paid his employees in $50.00 gold coins…

Kahre contends his workers had agreed to be independent contractors, so he did not have to withhold taxes for them. His six businesses are in the trades of painting, drywall, tiling, plumbing, heating-cooling and electrical work.

Further, the $50 gold coins and the silver dollars Kahre used for payroll are designated by Congress as legal tender, so people are entitled to value them at their stamped denominations, he also contends. Taken at face value, each defendant’s annual coin income placed him below the threshold for filing a federal tax return.

So the coins are legal tender according the Congress whom I hear has some say in the value of money. But alas being the greedy people they are the IRS wants to tax based on the value of the precious metals the coins are made from not the legal value Congress set for them.

“It’s not whether what Mr. Kahre did was legal under the law,” defense attorney Michael Kennedy told the jury in his opening statement. “It’s whether he believed what he did was legal,”

So now the law is based off of what you believe is right or wrong? In that case I don’t believe anything I do is wrong and therefore should be innocent of any crimes committed. Fuck the taxation system in this country is off the wall. If Congress sets the value of those coins at $50.00 they should be valued for tax purposes as $50.00

It’s not like the employees can legally melt down the coins for the material. Destruction of money is a federal crime.

Source: http://www.saysuncle.com/2009/06/19/capital-idea-2/