Articles by Herschel Smith

Take Action:

To: Florida Commission on Tourism and the Florida tourism industry

Florida is a favorite vacation destination for many families. But the state is now considering giving gun owners with concealed-carry permits the right to openly carry their firearms anywhere they want in public. Please stop the open-carry bill from moving forward, because families don’t want to vacation in a state where people are openly carrying their weapons.

Sincerely,

[Your name here]

Oh bullshit.  Open carry was commonplace with the bus drivers (and others in Wyoming) when we visited Jackson Hole for a week last winter.  There were plenty of families there, and women, children and effete men didn’t run for cover screaming, regardless of what the “Moms Rising” want you to think.

Hey, now that I think about it, given South Carolina State Senator Larry Martin’s opposition to S.C. open carry based on tourism in Charleston, he thinks just like a “Mom Rising.”  Or effete man.  Because he is.  An effete man, that is.

I said earlier that I’m no fan of bear spray unless backed up by a gun, but this little example shows why (via Uncle).  Of course, this isn’t something a 230-grain fat boy won’t stop.

Prior:

Is A Gun Protection Against A Bear?

Backpacker Shoots Grizzly In Denali: First Life Saved Since Firearms Became Legal In National Parks

When Can You Kill A Bear?

NJ.com:

A veteran city police officer was reassigned from his regular duties following an off-duty incident in Woodbridge that ended with his arrest on assault and weapons-related charges, NJ Advance Media has learned.

Newark Police Department Detective Andre Evans, 41, was arrested and charged on Oct. 25 by Woodbridge police after he allegedly pointed his service weapon at a civilian during an early-morning verbal confrontation, confirmed township police spokesman Capt. Roy Hoppock.

Newark police authorities were alerted to Evans’ arrest following the incident, and he has since been reassigned from his duties pending the outcome of an internal investigation of the incident, said department spokesman Sgt. Ronald Glover.

A fourteen-year police veteran, Evans rose through the ranks to eventually join the department’s Gang and Narcotics Enforcement Division, according to his Linkedin profile.

Reached by phone Thursday, Evans declined to comment on the allegations and referred questions to his attorney James Nolan. Attempts to reach Nolan for comment were unsuccessful.

According to authorities, the incident began at approximately 1 a.m. outside a township steakhouse in the 100 block of Oakwood Avenue.

Evans and a 54-year-old North Carolina man were arguing inside the restaurant parking lot when Evans allegedly pointed a firearm at the man’s face, Hoppock said. The weapon appeared to be Evans’s service weapon, Hoppock confirmed.

Witness statements provided to police indicate that an employee of the restaurant was able to secure the gun until police arrived at the scene, Hoppock said. Neither Evans or the man, whose name was not released, sustained injuries during the incident, he added.

Following the incident, Evans was placed under arrest and later charged with one count each of aggravated assault and possession of a weapon for unlawful purpose, Hoppock said.

A veteran city police officer was reassigned from his regular duties following an off-duty incident in Woodbridge that ended with his arrest on assault and weapons-related charges, NJ Advance Media has learned.

Newark Police Department Detective Andre Evans, 41, was arrested and charged on Oct. 25 by Woodbridge police after he allegedly pointed his service weapon at a civilian during an early-morning verbal confrontation, confirmed township police spokesman Capt. Roy Hoppock.

Newark police authorities were alerted to Evans’ arrest following the incident, and he has since been reassigned from his duties pending the outcome of an internal investigation of the incident, said department spokesman Sgt. Ronald Glover.

A fourteen-year police veteran, Evans rose through the ranks to eventually join the department’s Gang and Narcotics Enforcement Division, according to his Linkedin profile.

Reached by phone Thursday, Evans declined to comment on the allegations and referred questions to his attorney James Nolan. Attempts to reach Nolan for comment were unsuccessful.

According to authorities, the incident began at approximately 1 a.m. outside a township steakhouse in the 100 block of Oakwood Avenue.

Evans and a 54-year-old North Carolina man were arguing inside the restaurant parking lot when Evans allegedly pointed a firearm at the man’s face, Hoppock said. The weapon appeared to be Evans’s service weapon, Hoppock confirmed.

Witness statements provided to police indicate that an employee of the restaurant was able to secure the gun until police arrived at the scene, Hoppock said. Neither Evans or the man, whose name was not released, sustained injuries during the incident, he added.

Following the incident, Evans was placed under arrest and later charged with one count each of aggravated assault and possession of a weapon for unlawful purpose, Hoppock said.

One commenter says:

If a person is 6’8″ ,  athletic and points his fist at a short fat guy ,  is that also assault  in NJ?  In most states  assault begins when the fist is thrown or the gun is fired.

No, no, no, no, and a thousand times no!  Assault isn’t limited to the act of hitting, shooting, kicking or otherwise harming.  That’s battery.  Assault can and does include within its purview creating the perception that any of those things will occur.

… an intentional act by one person that creates an apprehension in another of an imminent harmful or offensive contact.  An assault is carried out by a threat of bodily harm coupled with an apparent, present ability to cause the harm.

This has broad implications for carriers, but if I was a betting man, I’d favor odds that the LEO will return to the beat with his rank and firearm.

Via Instapundit, the bravest man on earth.

White reopened St George’s church after the invasion of Iraq even though civil war raged and the diplomats and ex-pats who had once made up the congregation no longer dared to go there.

Iraqis came instead, and the congregation reached a peak of 6,500. They built a school, a clinic and food bank. White pledged to stay even as the sound of bombs grew louder. “We had Isis on the doorstep of Baghdad last year. I said to my people, ‘I will not leave you; don’t leave me.’ But many did leave me and they went to Nineveh and Mosul. Isis were there too. There was total mayhem.”

More than 1,200 men, women and children who worshipped with him have been killed in recent years, he says. Four boys he knew were beheaded because they refused to swear allegiance to Islam. The church caretaker was forced to watch as his five-year-old boy was cut in half.

There used to be 1.5 million Christians in Iraq but now there are only 260,000, he says. Some are calling it genocide. Surely he no longer believes that negotiations with Isis could work? White stares at me from behind owlish spectacles. “Can I be honest? You are absolutely right. You can’t negotiate with them. I have never said that about another group of people. These are really so different, so extreme, so radical, so evil. . . .

But surely there is only one logical conclusion to be drawn? He sighs, and answers slowly. “You are asking me how we can deal radically with Isis. The only answer is to radically destroy them. I don’t think we can do it by dropping bombs. We have got to bring about real change. It is a terrible thing to say as a priest.

“You’re probably thinking, ‘So you’re telling me there should be war?’ Yes!”

I am shocked by his answer, because this is a man who has risked his life many times to bring peace.

“It really hurts. I have tried so hard. I will do anything to save life and bring about tranquillity, and here I am forced by death and destruction to say there should be war.”

“It is a terrible thing to say as a priest.”  Well, not it’s not.  He needs to study Good Wars by Professor Darrell Cole.  And he also needs to think of this in terms of defending the image of God in himself and those over whom he has been given charge, including the children.

I am afraid there have been too many centuries of bad teaching endured by the church, but it makes sense to keep trying.  As I’ve explained before, the simplest and most compelling case for self defense lies in the decalogue.  Thou shall not murder means thou shall protect life.

God’s law requires [us] to be able to defend the children and helpless.  “Relying on Matthew Henry, John Calvin and the Westminster standards, we’ve observed that all Biblical law forbids the contrary of what it enjoins, and enjoins the contrary of what it forbids.”  I’ve tried to put this in the most visceral terms I can find.

God has laid the expectations at the feet of heads of families that they protect, provide for and defend their families and protect and defend their countries.  Little ones cannot do so, and rely solely on those who bore them.  God no more loves the willing neglect of their safety than He loves child abuse.  He no more appreciates the willingness to ignore the sanctity of our own lives than He approves of the abuse of our own bodies and souls.  God hasn’t called us to save the society by sacrificing our children or ourselves to robbers, home invaders, rapists or murderers. Self defense – and defense of the little ones – goes well beyond a right.  It is a duty based on the idea that man is made in God’s image.  It is His expectation that we do the utmost to preserve and defend ourselves when in danger, for it is He who is sovereign and who gives life, and He doesn’t expect us to be dismissive or cavalier about its loss.

And concerning John Calvin’s comments on this subject:

We do not need to prove that when a good thing is commanded, the evil thing that conflicts with it is forbidden.  There is no one who doesn’t concede this.  That the opposite duties are enjoined when evil things are forbidden will also be willingly admitted in common judgment.  Indeed, it is commonplace that when virtues are commended, their opposing vices are condemned.  But we demand something more than what these phrases commonly signify.  For by the virtue of contrary to the vice, men usually mean abstinence from that vice.  We say that the virtue goes beyond this to contrary duties and deeds.  Therefore in this commandment, “You shall not kill,” men’s common sense will see only that we must abstain from wronging anyone or desiring to do so.  Besides this, it contains, I say, the requirement that we give our neighbor’s life all the help we can … the purpose of the commandment always discloses to us whatever it there enjoins or forbids us to do” (Institutes of the Christian Religion, Vol. 1, Book 2, Chapter viii, Part 9).

He is a brave man doing what he believes is his duty.  But it is his duty to prosecute war, for the sake of the little ones.

David Codrea:

“Question 1” referred to in the docket means the Court is only taking on the “recklessness” question. They will not rule on whether a firearm ban due to a domestic violence conviction violated rights under the Second Amendment.

Unannounced at this writing is an even more eagerly anticipated question, whether the Court will grant cert in the case of Friedman v. City of Highland Park, a challenge to the city’s ban on militia-suitable firearms and standard capacity magazines. The docket notes the case was “DISTRIBUTED for Conference of October 30, 2015” on Monday, so word of whether or not the case will be heard was expected.

Let’s forget the issue of how or why the statute was broken (or in other words, the issue of “recklessness”).  This is a trivial question compared the databank of second amendment rulings, and the fact that they refuse even to consider the issue means that they are running scared on the issue of rights to gun ownership generally, not specific to this case.

Via Mike Vanderboegh, Marco Rubio’s new billionaire backer is a top funder of open borders.  Of course he is, because Rubio is an open borders freak.  Count me out as far as the elections go if the choice is Rubio.  I’ll walk the dog, grill steaks, clean my guns, and catalog my ammunition.

Via Mike Vanderboegh, Georgia becomes a border state for violent illegal immigrants.  Of course.  It’s all by design.  It’s all as it was intended to be.  You understand that, right?

Bear spray is harder to transport through the TSA than firearms.  Not surprising.  I’m no fan of use of bear spray anyway – or at least, not without firearms as a backup.

Firearms records languish at national tracing center.  Good.  Very good.  Let’ keep it that way.

This is what happens when you hate yourself and your heritage.

Report via David Codrea, and straight from Mr. Hildreth’s Facebook post.

Steven Hildreth, Jr.
So, I’m driving to my office to turn in my weekly paperwork. A headlight is out. I see a Tucson Police Department squad vehicle turn around and follow me. I’m already preparing for the stop.

The lights go on and I pull over. The officer asks me how I’m doing, and then asks if I have any weapons.

“Yes, sir. I’m a concealed carry permit holder and my weapon is located on my right hip. My wallet is in my back-right pocket.”

The officer explains for his safety and mine, he needs to disarm me for the stop. I understand, and I unlock the vehicle. I explain that I’m running a 7TS ALS holster but from the angle, the second officer can’t unholster it. Lead officer asks me to step out, and I do so slowly. Officer relieves me of my Glock and compliments the X300U I’m running on it. He also sees my military ID and I tell him I’m with the National Guard.

Lead officer points out my registration card is out of date but he knows my registration is up to date. He goes back to run my license. I know he’s got me on at least two infractions. I’m thinking of how to pay them.

Officers return with my Glock in an evidence back, locked and cleared. “Because you were cool with us and didn’t give us grief, I’m just going to leave it at a verbal warning. Get that headlight fixed as soon as possible.”

I smile. “Thank you, sir.”

I’m a black man wearing a hoodie and strapped. According to certain social movements, I shouldn’t be alive right now because the police are allegedly out to kill minorities.

Maybe…just maybe…that notion is bunk.

Maybe if you treat police officers with respect, they will do the same to you.

Police officers are people, too. By far and large, most are good people and they’re not out to get you.

I’d like to thank those two officers and TPD in general for another professional contact.

We talk so much about the bad apples who shouldn’t be wearing a badge. I’d like to spread the word about an example of men who earned their badges and exemplify what that badge stands for.

‪#‎BlueLivesMatter‬ ‪#‎AllLivesMatter‬

[EDIT: In my rush to post, I accidentally omitted that my wallet was in the back-right pocket, near my firearm. This was the primary motivation for temporary disarmament. The post has been modified to reflect that.

Again, I’d like to thank the TPD and their officers for their consistent professionalism, courtesy, and the good work that they do, both in this particular contact and every day.]

So let me get this straight.  The most unsafe times in any handgun evolution is unholstering and holstering your weapon (depending somewhat on the maturity of the one engaged in the action, and always subject to trigger and muzzle discipline).  The police decided to put Mr. Hildreth in danger by touching his weapon, in order to contribute to their own perceived safety?  Okay.  Got it.

Now for an assessment.  Mr. Hildreth is being to kind to the police.  No one should have been touching the weapon – not Mr. Hildreth, and not the police.  The weapon should have stayed holstered.  Period.  There is no tactical reason whatsoever to have unholstered and confiscated the weapon, not for a minute, not for a second.  Furthermore, let’s not pretend that negligent discharged don’t happen with the police.  We know they do.

So can anyone give me a single, solitary reason that the police, if they had wanted to see his identification, couldn’t have said, please reach into your pocket and produce your identification for us?  Is there any reason whatsoever to conclude that anyone was safer for the police having touched this weapon?  My bet is that no one can produce such a reason because there isn’t one.

Reince Priebus.  I heard him briefly a few minutes ago talking about what “they” are calling the Cruz Missile.  I didn’t have the debate on, but my wife entered the room and turned it on just in time for me to see Cruz upbraid the folks running the debate.

There is a lot of disapprobation over the internet concerning the CNBC hosts, and properly so.  They are worms, and always have been.  But that misses the bigger picture.  The GOP has an awful lot of candidates, and the field needs to be winnowed.  Cruz seized the opportunity with an outstanding extemporaneous speech.  Furthermore, a good spanking of the MSM is always meaningful for GOP voter morale.

Reince may not have know exactly how it would go down, but he knows that progressives just can’t contain themselves.  They must be who they are (“Can a Leopard change it spots?).  He only knew that at this point in the campaign, a good fight with the MSM to show America how worthless the media is would be in proper order.

CNBC obliged because they couldn’t not oblige.  Oh to be sure, he is publicly indignant (“I cannot believe the candidates were treated that way!”).  Behind closed doors, he is lighting cigars and giving high fives to his staff.  I never knew the names of the CNBC hosts, and if I ever did, I wouldn’t know them now.  They’ll go down in the dust bin of history as irrelevant dimwits.  Reince is the winner.  He played them like a drum, or if you wish, he used them like a cheap hooker and kicked them to the curb.

Hartford Courant:

Silence never solved complex national problems. Yet some spineless lawmakers put special interests ahead of the public even to the point of discouraging and shutting off discussion of important public issues.

This is nothing new. Congress imposed a gag order from 1836 to 1844 on the overriding issue of the 19th century, refusing to accept any and all “petitions, memorials, resolutions, propositions or papers relating in any way, or to any extent whatsoever, to the subject of slavery or the abolition of slavery.” It was unconstitutional, draconian and finally ended because a few congressmen fought it every day.

Gun violence in America is another critical public issue, but Congress has for nearly 20 years found a way to silence government researchers by using the power of the purse to intimidate the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. After the terrible murders in Newtown three years ago, President Barack Obama signed an executive order directing the CDC to resume gun research. The CDC still hasn’t, but it must — despite congressional threats from the majority Republicans.

The bullying started in 1996, when the CDC released studies that researched the risk factors that led to gun violence.

One study found that just having a gun in the home was associated with a nearly 300 percent increase in the likelihood that it would be used to murder someone in the house. The likelihood that someone in the house would use a gun to commit suicide was even higher — 500 percent.

Then the National Rifle Association swung into action, complaining that the CDC was using public funds to push gun control and ask political questions. The Republican-controlled Congress cut CDC funds by the exact amount used to study gun-related violence and prohibited researchers from using public funds to advocate for gun control.

This put researchers in a bind: If they did open-ended, scientifically sound research that, say, examined what local regulations were most effective in keeping guns out of the hands of criminals, Congress would accuse them of breaking the rules and would punish the CDC by slashing its budget.

The threats did what the weapons manufacturers wanted, dropping a curtain of silence on guns.

This is a piece of work.  Slavery and guns are brought up as if there’s some analogous feature.  Debunked “studies” are cited, emotional, draconian terms are invoked (silence, slashing, prohibited, etc.), and then finally, the NRA is blamed for it all.

Here are the facts.  Many NRA members lose patience with the NRA because we see it as too progressive and willing to compromise in its rating system.  The real enemy of progressives is gun owners, even though they don’t know it.  They still see gun owners as a monolithic group, controlled and told what to think by the NRA.  Independent-minded thinking never occurs to progressives because they don’t work that way.

No one has prohibited anyone from studying whatever they want.  What Congress did was prohibit the spending of tax dollars for studies that first of all, would likely be used to press for political ends, and second, should never be funded by the government anyway.  Many gun owners would assert that the government has a constitutional right to raise monies for the common defense, and not much else.  The only reason such a thing comes up with the CDC is because government spending is out of control.

I strongly recommend that the folks at the CDC – and anywhere else for that matter – study whatever they want, on their own dollars and on their own time.  There is no moratorium on such studies (they’re not illegal), just on using my money for them.  I don’t get to take your money and study how to make M855 ammunition more effective, and you don’t get to take mine and throw it away on “studies” I don’t sanction.  That’s fair enough.

I had pointed out almost three years ago that Paul Ryan was a gun controller.

“I think we should look into someone who is not legally allowed to buy a gun going to (a show), buying one, and let’s figure that out,” he said. “I think we need to find out how to close these loopholes and do it in such a way that we don’t infringe on Second Amendment rights.”

All controls of these kinds infringe on second amendment rights by their very nature.  Go ahead, I told Ryan.  Look into it.  He’s a collectivist and statist of the first order.  I was surprised that no one has brought any of this up when Ryan’s name was floated as the great savior of the House of Representatives.  But in fact they have brought it up.

Ryan’s 2014 gun control vote came amid the emotional outpouring that followed Elliot Rodger’s May 23, 2014, Santa Barbara attack. Although Rodger passed a background check, registered his guns with the state–as is required in California–and only used ammunition magazines of 10 round or less, Ryan voted for Representative Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA)’s (D-CA-5th) amendment providing $20 million to expand the amount of information states are putting in the National Instant Criminal Background System (NICS) database. Thompson’s House webpage showed that the amendment was supported by Gabby Giffords’ gun control control PAC Americans for Responsible Solutions, as well as “Everytown for Gun Safety, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, Sandy Hook Promise, Third Way, the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence… [and] States United to Prevent Gun Violence,” among others.

In addition to this, there was an example of Ryan showing an openness to more gun control in the wake of the heinous attack on Sandy Hook Elementary. Just over a month after Adam Lanza stole guns then used them to attack innocents in the gun free zone at Sandy Hook, Ryan told Meet the Press’s David Gregory that Congress needed to look at background checks and “[make] sure there aren’t big loopholes where a person can illegally buy a firearm.”

His running partner, Mitt Romney, was also a complete sellout, but this has an extra twist in it.

Conservative radio show host Rush Limbaugh revealed on his Monday program he had “been sitting on a story for almost a week” to see if members of the media would cover it.

“I wanted to see if this got any play anywhere,” Limbaugh said on his program, according to a transcript posted to his official website.

The story was posted to a conservative news website last week and detailed an interview Mitt Romney recently did for David Axelrod’s podcast. In the interview, the former Massachusetts governor suggested some of today’s divide in politics was because of the rise of online conservative and liberal media outlets.

“It was out there for everybody to see,” Limbaugh said of the story. “It was out there for everybody to react to. And honestly, folks, I didn’t see anything on it ’til yesterday. I’ve been holding this story.”

He added, “Mitt Romney is on record in the David Axelrod podcast as lamenting and complaining about the fact that there is now a conservative media, both on talk radio, in print, in broadcast, and on the World Wide Web. Romney told Axelrod that the demise of legacy media had empowered conservative insurgents like this show and others, which has prevented collaboration in Washington.”

Prevented collaboration in Washington.  Except he has no idea how serious this is, and neither does the GOP establishment.

I have no feeling for the electorate anymore. It is not responding the way it used to. Their priorities are so different that if I tried to analyze it I’d be making it up – John Sununu.

Here’s the deal fellows.  Trump’s popularity will fade when voters realize his sensibilities are anti-conservative.  Carson’s support will fade if and when voters realize he is a pro-immigration freak.  The GOP is in shambles, but the voters will not put forth an establishment candidate, one wholly-owned by the chamber of commerce, who supports immigration – legal or illegal – so that crony corporatism can benefit from low wages that can be paid to Hispanic workers because America has SNAP, welfare and free medical care for the poor, all on the taxpayer dime as corporate welfare.  Middle America won’t fund expensive cars, houses on the lake and the college educations for the children of the members of the boards of directors and corporate executives any more.

Animal Farm is alive and well, and we don’t care if our hard work is helping the poor or the rich.  Boxer won’t work harder.  Boxer will only work for his family – his children, and his children’s children.  As for me, I don’t care if the GOP ever fields another candidate.  It can cease to exist as far as I’m concerned.  There comes a time when it all has to end, when the reaper comes calling, when we’ve sowed the seeds of our own demise and it’s grown into a great, invasive pestilence.

If the GOP puts up another milquetoast candidate who thinks conservative insurgent media is a problem, universal background checks are a good idea, and it’s all going to be okay if we just get the illegals to be legal so we “know who’s here,” I’ll walk my dog, grill out and ignore the election returns.  But I won’t vote any more.  Ever.  I have long harbored doubts that America can stay together as it is.  It’s too diverse, too different, too ideologically divided, and too geographically far-flung.  It seems to me more likely that it will split into three or four countries anyway, so let it be now.

Burn it all down, burn it to the ground.  Bring on dystopia.  Bring the revolution.  The long delay is beginning to bore me.