Articles by Herschel Smith

Breitbart.

Payment processor Visa Inc. said Saturday that it plans to start separately categorizing sales at gun shops, a major win for gun control advocates who say it will help better track suspicious surges of gun sales that could be a prelude to a mass shooting.

But the decision by Visa, the world’s largest payment processor, will likely provoke the ire of gun rights advocates and gun lobbyists, who have argued that categorizing gun sales would unfairly flag an industry when most sales do not lead to mass shootings. It joins Mastercard and American Express, which also said they plan to move forward with categorizing gun shop sales.

Visa said it would adopt the International Organization for Standardization’s new merchant code for gun sales, which was announced on Friday. Until Friday, gun store sales were considered “general merchandise.”

“Following ISO’s decision to establish a new merchant category code, Visa will proceed with next steps, while ensuring we protect all legal commerce on the Visa network in accordance with our long-standing rules,” the payment processor said in a statement.

Visa’s adoption is significant as the largest payment network, and with Mastercard and AmeEx, will likely put pressure on the banks as the card issuers to adopt the standard as well. Visa acts as a middleman between merchants and banks, and it will be up to banks to decide whether they will allow sales at gun stores to happen on their issued cards.

Gun control advocates had gained significant wins on this front in recent weeks. New York City officials and pension funds had pressured the ISO and banks to adopt this code.

Visa was the holdout, and they buckled.

I see a lot of firearms purchases being made in cash in the future.

Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit remarks.

SOCIAL CREDIT SCORING COMES TO AMERICA: Visa, Mastercard, AmEx to start categorizing gun shop sales.

Imagine if they were doing this about abortion. Or if legislatures tried to make them do so.

A reader comments: “Have you seen this yet? It sure feels like there is a very coordinated effort throughout the woke financial sector to create ‘private’ gun control. I wonder if it is being driven by interaction with the ATF, etc like the censoring of private speech by coordination between government and social media. Also, wouldn’t this enable the card companies to create a gun registry? The credit card transactions include our names and what we bought and the card company knows our addresses, etc. Seems like another example of actual fascism where government coerces private companies to do their bidding.”

Based on experience, the likelihood that this is happening without government encouragement is very low.

Government => Social Media => Censorship of speech.

Government => Financial Corporations => Censorship of products.

Government = Corporations.

Benito Mussolini would be very proud of his legacy.

If it’s determined that your gun isn’t an SBR, at least they have all of the information on it, including information on you.

If it’s determined that you are in possession of an SBR illegally, then what happens?  Do ATF agents come to your door, shoot your dogs and arrest you?  Or do they simply register your firearm, now putting that gun on a list of NFA items that cannot cross state lines without their approval?

You see, heads they win, tails you lose.

This is a gigantic buffalo jump, folks.

The Reload.

Another critic of National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre is being pushed out of the organization.

Judge Philip Journey, who has been at the center of several efforts to remove current NRA leadership, has not been renominated to appear on the ballot for next year’s board election. That makes his road back onto the board far more difficult.

“As an incumbent Director your name was submitted to the NRA Nominating Committee which met on August 27, 2022,” NRA Secretary John Frazer said in a letter to Journey on Monday. “I regret to inform you that you were not renominated.”

[ … ]

The NRA’s board members are picked by an election of the group’s voting members. Those generally include only lifetime members and those who’ve held a membership for five consecutive years. In the 2022 elections, that amounted to about half of the total membership. The NRA mails voting members ballots.

To appear on a ballot, anyone running for the board either has to get approval from the board’s nominating committee or gather enough signatures to get on by petition. The vast majority of the 76 board members make it on the ballot through the nominating committee. Only a handful of members at any given time make it on through the petition process.

Besides, as one of 76 members, how much can one man do?  How is Wayne doing these days?

A filing in the New York lawsuit shows how it began in December 2013 and steadily grew more lucrative until the last document in April 2018. This is not just a retirement golden parachute, this is one trimmed with diamonds.

2013: $1 to $1.1 million per year for five years, upon retirement. Total of $5.4 million. Good for a part-time retirement job.

2018: $1.3 to $1.5 million for seven years, total of $10.3 million of members’ money, with note that “safe lodging” (his mansion?) and “secure transportation” ( the private leased jets) are extras.

It’s all so simple.  Wayne isn’t finished looting the NRA coffers yet, and the board members aren’t finished looting the NRA firearms museum yet.

There’s more to be stolen.  No change can happen until the looting is complete.  In the meantime, stay out of their way.

Alloutdoor.

Crimson Trace has finally released the HRO or Heavy Recoil Optic that was announced during SHOT Show 2022. The HRO is intended to be used specifically on rifles chambered in bigger, heavier hitting cartridges like 308 Winchester, 300 Win Mag, 458 SOCOM, and the like. This makes the HRO specifically effective on what most people would typically call a “Hog Gun.”

It has automatic shutoff and gets 50,000 hours of run time with a battery.

This isn’t an advertisement – I do not have one.  They haven’t sent me one to test, unfortunately.

But I find this interesting for bigger bore guns.  Perhaps some enterprising reader wants to run a red dot on top of a Henry .44 magnum or Marlin 45-70.

Watch this video if needed.  BLUF: Don’t talk to the police.  That included federal police.

Crack the door open enough for them to hear you (don’t go outside, don’t invite them in).  Do not let your dogs out through the crack in the door – the ATF will shoot them dead.  They like to shoot dogs.  Say the following.  “Do you have a warrant to be on this property?”  If the answer is no, then say the following.  “Please remove yourselves from the property.  If you do not do so, I will call 911 and inform the local police that I have uninvited guests on my property and I need their assistance.”

The words uninvited guests is procedure-speak for the local police.  It means that there are trespassers, but at the moment they’re not threatening your safety and you prefer them to effect an arrest rather than use force to remove them yourself.  This is a way of informing the 911 operator that you’re not in a violent state of mind.  It de-escalates the situation with the local police before they ever show up.

Do not answer questions.  Do not engage in polite conversation.  Do not allow them to stay on your property or photograph or harass you.  Do not respond to their interrogatories.

This is all true if you did something wrong, or if you didn’t do anything wrong, or you didn’t do anything wrong and know it and intend to try to convince them of it — regardless of the specifics of the situation.

It’s not just me saying this.  Listen to lawyers say it to you yet again.

The whole affair might have been caused by moles within the gun community.  At least some people think so.

“These two scumbags are exactly the types that would happily and voluntarily turn over any customer information the ATF requested. Including exact payment method, descriptions of all transactions, shipping dates and personal information, etc. There’s no way in hell the ATF could have this information otherwise. These surprise visits to law-abiding citizens by ATF are a direct result of these inside snitches.”

On July 3, Raul Mendez was celebrating freedom with his family and friends when a man walked in and opened fire.

Raul was shot through the head, but still got up, pulled his concealed carry, and took out the shooter.

The media never covered his story. And we all know why. pic.twitter.com/fjWe8tlvcP

— NRA (@NRA) September 7, 2022

Full story is here.

This is yet another reason to have a gun close at hand, perhaps on your person, even at home.

Daily Kos.

The US army has adopted a new more modern and advanced assault rifle (I know gun nuts HATE that term!) to replace the half century old M 16 5.56mm design.

It fires a 6.8mm round csllef a.277 Fury designed to be much longer ranged, more powerful and capable of penetrating current issue standard military body armor at up to possibly 500 meters.

The new rifle itself is currently known as the XM5, soon be be shortened to M5, or “spear” and is designed to be extremely accurate at much longer ranges than any current assault rifle. With a good scope, say about 6-8x, it is purported to be able to hit a man sized target at 800, possibly 900, meters.

As with the M16 it replaces there will be a ‘civilian version’ of the M5 made available, along with its new ammo, tho at least the civilian version of the ammo will be a little weaker as the military version requires a special bi metal casing to withstand the pressures the new round requires to meet its military specs. The military round supposedly has a muzzle velocity of 3000 fps, the civilian version has a velocity of 2750 fps, about 11/12 the velocity of the military version.

Soon gunstores across america will be selling a military designed and styled assault weapon (Scream, gun nuts, scream!) that even as a civilian version will be more powerful than police and even national guard weapons, plus longer ranged and able to defeat police and national guard body armor at hundreds of meters range, and accurate enough to hit targets reliable at that range with the addition of an easily available scope the rifle has a mount to take.

While the AR 15, the civilian version of the M16, has reigned supreme as the weapon of choice for mass shooters for years, the new M5 civilian version is likely to give it some competition due to its greater power and lethality. Fewer people hit by one will survive, making it a preferred weapon for the mass shooter looking to set a record.

Of course it will be more expensive, at least at first, so the budget constrained mass murderer will still be stuck with the AR 15 as a preferred weapon. Then again at close range the AR15 will still be as effective as before.

The release of this new weapon could hardly come at a worse time as America faces a rising tide of aspiring fascists seeking to overthrow democracy and replace it with an cult of personality dictatorship. Making a weapon available to them that can be used effectively as both a close in assault weapon or an effective sniping weapon is all too likely to embolden budding “Earl Turners” into making attacks not just on crowds of people but LEOs as well. As a sniper weapon this would vastly outperform the 5.56mm rifle used by the beltway sniper in all respects.

I can only imagine the MAGA crowd saving up and drooling to get their hands on the civilian version of the M5 Spear and the 277 fury ammo.

What a silly and juvenile commentary.  It reads like a bad press release for the Sig rifle.  We’ve covered it before.

Meh.  Whatever.  Let it go through a half century of testing in deserts and jungles before I’ll comment on it.  Eugene Stoner rules.

Now.  As for the gun and what they think about it, the commentary reads like there was nothing available before this.  For instance, there was no such thing as a Savage AR-10 shooting 6.5 Creedmoor or a S&W AR-10 shooting .308.

The gun will have its drawbacks and downsides.  It’s a new high pressure cartridge design.  The higher pressures risk throat burnout and decrease in barrel life.  It’s heavier than the AR-15.  The shooter can carry less ammunition.  It’s bulkier.  No one will carry it into the woods or prairies to hunt with it in lieu of a bolt action rifle, especially when the better rifle manufacturers are looking for ways to cut weight such as carbon fiber barrels.  And finally, it won’t have the accuracy to hunt or do long range precision shooting.

I predict its market will be limited, but either way, if you wanted this sort of thing, you could have had it ever since Stoner designed his AR-10 before he ever designed the AR-15.

In a way it’s a good thing that collectivists are such awful gun writers.  They have no idea what they’re talking about, that that works to our advantage.

I wish I had his collection of 1911s.

Seen at Instapundit.

NATIONAL FOUNDATION FOR GUN RIGHTS IS SUING: NFGR FILES FIVE NEW LAWSUITS NATIONWIDE TO END MAGAZINE AND “ASSAULT WEAPON” BANS. “On September 7, 2022, the National Foundation for Gun Rights filed five new lawsuits in four federal court circuits to eliminate unconstitutional magazine and gun bans everywhere! Combined with our lawsuits in Colorado these represent nearly half of the country. This nationwide legal blitz aims to take out every single ban on semi-automatic weapons and standard capacity magazines for good.”

Drown them in a legal morass.  Never let them rest.

Well of course it doesn’t suck.  Whoever said it did?  That person is an idiot.  Avoid people like that.

Listen, you can like and shoot whatever you want to.  The 1911 is the best shooting and most ergonomic handgun on the planet, bar none.  There are legitimate reasons to choose something else, e.g., magazine capacity.  But there are other options, namely, a double stack 9mm 1911 design.

And yes, Tim is right.  There are 1911 designs now with optics cuts on the slides.  You can get what you want with a 1911, you just have to pay the money.  But remember, you get what you pay for.

And for the record, I don’t consider a commander size 1911 any heavier than any other carry gun, but it’s a lot narrower and easier to carry – for me.

You don’t have to spend 3K – 4K on a Wilson Combat pistol. You can spend much less and get a Dan Wesson (CZ currently owns Dan Wesson, and CZ is making fine products).