Anniversary of 9/11

I really can’t pass on mentioning today is the anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States. I’d like to take this time to remember those who died in the attacks, those who fought the terrorists and prevented another plane from killing even more people, and mention a few things.

Since 9/11 security theatre has been ever expanding. The people in the government has used the attack to throw more and more personal rights away. Our representatives, senators, and presidents used this tragedy to strip more and more of our personal liberties in the name of “security.” Now don’t get me wrong I’m not a truther but I will freely admit our government’s reaction to the attacks has established nothing that could secure us from further attacks. Let’s look at what has happened since 9/11 shall we?

1. The passing of the PATRIOT Act.

2. The banning of most liquids on air planes.

3. The banning of carrying anything that could be construed as a potential sharp or pointy weapon. Except knitting needles of course.

4. Gitmo was used to place prisoners somewhere where they didn’t get a fair hearing and trial.

5. We now require United State’s citizens to have a passport before traveling to Canada.

6. The secret “no fly” list.

7. A bill presented to prevent people on the secret “no fly” list from purchasing firearms.

8. “Random” further interrogation by TSA agents simply because you’re a person of muslim decent or a randomly selected sucker used to show the TSA isn’t racially profiling.

9. Warrantless wiretapping.

10. Trying to get a system of national ID cards passed under the names of REAL ID and now PASS ID.

Really is this how we want to honor those who died in the attacks by destroying the thing this country once stood for above all else, liberty? Let’s remember and honor those who died 8 years ago today by voting out those who used those deaths to pass their personal agendas and repealing those laws that not only go against our constitution but against personal liberty as well.

Awesome Gmail Feature

Yeah I’m probably behind the times as I’m a pretty vanilla e-mail user but I just discovered an awesome feature in Google’s Gmail.

If you want to sign up for an account or any other thing that you don’t want to receive e-mail from simple enter your Gmail address with a plus sign and extra junk at the end of the name. For example if my e-mail address was fakeaddress@gmail.com I could sign up for a web site using fakeaddress+anygibberish@gmail.com and the confirmation e-mail from the site would reach my fakeaddress@gmail.com inbox.

You can than block all mail sent to fakeaddress+anygibberish@gmail.com so it all gets sent straight to the spam folder. Many Google thinks up some amazing features.

Hypocrisy Today

Man I just love hypocrisy, especially when it comes from those who like to play the holier than thou card. Well I’m sure you’ve all heard about Representative Joe Wilson’s outburst during Obama’s recent speech. Well honestly the outburst really is a non-story but boy are those “progressive” liberals jumping on it as if it is.

See as I’ve stated many times I have a lot of liberal friends, some are just liberal while others are “progressive” liberals. They always harp on me when I start going against an elected official because they’re anti-gun. It’s mostly how adamant I become at getting the representative out of office that they distain. Well I’m looking at my Facebook page this morning and noticing a trend that seemed to start last night. Many of my liberal friends are calling for Mr. Wilson’s head. I’ve seen enough posts on the man who plans to run against him in the upcoming election to choke a horse. They’re becoming zealous in the mission to remove this man.

I guess I should just write it off as a do as I say not as I do thing. It’s funny to me watching the hypocrisy unfold.

Bloomberg Being Hysterically Stupid Again

Mayor Bloomberg is at his anti-gun rhetoric again. Snowflakes in Hell takes a look at Bloomberg’s accusation that carrying a gun while intoxicated is equally as dangerous as driving while intoxicated. From the blog:

Is it though? In 2006, 13,470 people were killed in alcohol related motor vehicle accidents. If you factor in other drugs, that number increases by about 7600 to 21,047. In 2006, there were a total of about 642 accidental deaths from guns. Even if you include intentional deaths from guns, that number only rises to the same level as the number of alcohol related traffic fatalities. That’s without even controlling for alcohol or other impairing substances being a factor. Clearly this is not as large a public safety issue.

Now I’m not advocating carrying a gun while drinking, in fact I’m against that exact act. But to compare drinking and driving which kills equally as many people as the total number of homicides with firearms each year to something that kills so few relatively is hysterics at best. This claim is being made in Mayor Bloomberg’s push to enact three new gun laws. The first of these is:

Carrying a licensed gun with a blood alcohol content above 0.08 percent — the legal limit for driving — would be punishable by a year in jail and a fine of up to $10,000.

I guess this would make some semblance of sense if people beyond the select elite few could actually carry guns in the state of New York. Remember New York state is a may issue state and New York city is unwilling to issue permits to almost anybody besides the politically well connected. Hence this really is a non-issue in New York city at the moment.

Possession of any ammunition that can piece cops’ bulletproof vests would be a felony carrying a minimum sentence of one year.

Let’s look at the law regarding the manufacturing of armor piercing ammunition shall we:

(a) It shall be unlawful –
…
(7) for any person to manufacture or import armor piercing
ammunition, unless –
(A) the manufacture of such ammunition is for the use of the
United States, any department or agency of the United States,
any State, or any department, agency, or political subdivision
of a State;
(B) the manufacture of such ammunition is for the purpose of
exportation; or
(C) the manufacture or importation of such ammunition is for
the purpose of testing or experimentation and has been
authorized by the Attorney General;

So really possession of armor piercing ammunition is also a non-issue since manufacturing it for civilians is a no-no. That means the armor piercing ammunition that is currently out there is the only armor piercing ammunition that will every be available in this country. Purchasing from a limited supply of something rare is exceedingly expensive, hence it’s self controlled. This law is bullshit being presented to build up fear among the populace that people are using armor piercing ammunition to kill police officers.

Knowingly putting a gun into the hands of a child would rise to a three-and-a-half-year minimum sentence.

Does this include a parent taking their child hunting or to the range while the child is under adult supervision? That’s a pretty big deal. Might want to mention an exception for that if it exists.

Just Owning a Gun Isn’t Enough

A great article found via Says Uncle reminds us that just owning a firearm isn’t enough in a self defense situation.

The article covers a few things. For instance the important question is asked, if you locked your gun up will you be able to get to his when you need it most? But most importantly are you prepared to use it. In a self defense situation your adrenaline will skyrocket and your fine motor skills will plummet. Things that are simple is a calm situation will become exceedingly difficult in a stress situation. For instance something as simple as reloading your pistol may become next to impossible when your under stress, and I’m not even going to mention the massive drop in your accuracy.

The only way to overcome these things is making the operating of your self defense weapon a reflex. The only way to make an activity a reflex is to practice, practice, and practice some more. Further you should practice under stress conditions if at all possible. This can be accomplished by practicing under something like a shot time to time yourself on drills such as failure and reloading drills. The idea would be to perform a failure drill or reload the gun than shoot at the target while timing yourself.

Another thing I like to point out is knowing your self defense weapon in and out. There are two types of people when it comes to gun owners, those who own many and those who own few. The ones who own few generally know those weapons very well and those who own many usually known each weapon in a general sense. The trick is to known at least one or two weapons very well. If you’re like me and own multiple firearms designate one or two as self defense guns and practice those every time you head to the range. For instance every time I go to the range I practice with my carry guns (My primary is a Springfield XD in .45 auto and my backup is a Ruger LCP). When at home my defense weapon of choice is a Remington 870 Marine Magnum shotgun. Finally my go gun so to speak is my M-14 SOCOM 16. Yes that’s more than two but I always put my focus on my carry guns since those are what I’ll most likely be using and they work for home defense situations as well. Knowing your defense guns is critical, knowing your other guns is just nice.

Another rule I like to practice is to keep things simple. My carry guns are bare minimum. They have no additional attachments that need to be operated. I simply pull them and shoot them. If your defense gun has things you need to do before shooting practice that. For instance I sometimes carry my 1911 which has an external safety. Although I always keep the gun cocked and locked in my holster I never engage the safety. Yet when I practice drawing it I always move the thumb to disengage the safety. If it’s already disengaged nothing happens but if it become engaged somehow I will instinctively disengage it under stress. You need to make every action needed to bring the gun into firing order pure reflex so keeping things simple is the best bet. Another thing to keep in mine is laser sights. They are great on self defense guns because they allow you to make quickly acquire the target and shoot. The downside is they use batteries. So if you have a laser equipped gun practice using it without the laser so you can operate the firearm should the battery die in the laser sight. Always know how to operate your weapon in it’s absolute bare bones setup.

But most importantly you must be willing to use your firearm should you need it. Many people have the mindset that they could never harm another human being. This is really a load of crap because most people have a self preservation desire that can override their moral standings. In other words you will harm or even kill somebody to protect yourself or those you love. The thing is you need to realize this because if you don’t you may hesitate at the time self defense is needed most. Even a second thinking you don’t want to harm that person can cost you your life so get over that mindset immediately. I’m not advocating saying you will wantonly kill anybody for anything, just engrain the idea that you will harm of even kill somebody if they posed a threat to your life or the lives of your loved ones.

Simply owning the gun isn’t enough you need the practice and mindset to use it. Always keep that in mind, it may save your life someday.

Britain Ensures Scouts Won’t Always Be Prepared

Well it looks like the British nanny states strikes again. Scouts in Britain will no longer be allowed to carry pen knives on camping trips.

Penknives may have formed as much part of the scouting experience as badges and campfires, but according to advice from the Scout Association they must no longer be brought on camping trips, except when there is a “specific” need.

Modern Britain’s knife culture, including the rise in fatal stabbings, has been cited by troop leaders — although some have countered that the code contradicts the tradition that Scouts are to be trusted for their honour.

Yes that’s right Britain doesn’t want scouts wielding those dangerous pen knives because of their new found fear of knife crime. After seeing how well the gun ban brought down the number of shootings it only makes sense to ban knives to bring down the number of stabbings… hey wait a minute! If banning guns didn’t stop shootings than why the fuck is banning knives going to bring down stabbings? It’s not. Especially considering they are taking knives away from scouts who have legitimate uses for them.

Just because the tool can be used as a weapon doesn’t mean it should be banned. But hey the first step in establishing a fascist government is to completely disarm the populace.

Wow Looks Like Somebody Used Rob Allen’s Guide Already

Funny and sad news. In the post directly below this one I posted a link to Rob Allen’s guide to firearm identification for the mass media. It stated everything except the AK-47 was an AK-47. Apparently somebody read it and took it to heart.

Somebody called 911 when they thought they saw somebody walking around with an AK-47. Five officers were let loose in the area to find the hypothetical offender of decency. Well they found nothing but were lead to believe storming the Bungie studio was going to find their weapon. Bugie, the creators of the Halo video game franchise, and police swarming their building. So what did they find?

A prop gun from the Halo video game series. Yes somebody spotted somebody from Bungie carrying a replica of the game’s sniper rifle and decided it was not only a real gun by an AK-47 to boot.

I’m Back

Well I’m back at a computer again. The funeral went as well as could be expected and my Grandpa was giving the best send off I think any family can give a dead relative. Anyways updates should continue as normal again.