Archive for the 'Firearms' Category

Stars and Stripes:

The Army is hunting for a new universal assault rifle to arm infantrymen with a lighter, more powerful weapon as a potential replacement for systems ranging from carbines to light machine guns.

The Next Generation Squad Automatic Rifle would fill capability gaps at the infantry squad level, the Army said in a federal contract posting last week.

The planning is in the early stages and no formal contract has been awarded, but the Army’s solicitation for concepts is part of a broader push to modernize the force.

In July, defense contractors asked about the ultimate purpose of the new rifle, which was initially billed as a replacement for the M249 Squad Automatic Weapon, or SAW.

The Army answered that during the next two years, the government will decide whether a next-generation weapon should be able “to fulfill additional roles such as that of the squad designated marksman, medium machine gun, and the carbine,” according to the advisory posted on the government’s main contracting website.

The Army also has been at work developing a new cartridge to replace the 5.56mm round used by the M4 and M16. The aim is to develop ammunition that would be interchangeable with a next-generation weapon.

So the Army is saying, “We want a carbine that is also a light machine gun, capable of shooting any caliber, able to fill virtually any role we ask, with a larger bullet than 5.56mm, and oh, also serving as a designated marksman rifle for long distance shooting, even though we, the Army, have no such role or training as designated marksman.”  While they’re at it, let’s throw in ammunition that is just as light at the 5.56mm even though the bullet diameter is larger, so that women can carry the load.

I want … I want … I want … gimme gimme gimme … everything in one awesome package, right now, dammit!  Something tells me this isn’t going to go down well for the Army.

In reverse order, they are: Bergara B-14 Hunter, Weatherby Mark V Accumark, Christensen Mesa, Howa Hogue 1500, Savage Axis, Steyr Pro Hunter, Remington 700, Browning X-Bolt, Ruger American, and coming in at #1, Tikka T3x Lite.

Two quick comments.  First of all, my Tikka is a great bolt action rifle.  It looks like other people think so too.  Second, it’s nice to see low cost, but high quality American-made rifles up in the list, like Ruger American and Savage Axis.

Tyler Yzaguirre:

The United States is a nation built upon individual rights and freedoms.

One in particular that is often fought over is the “right of the people to keep and bear arms,” or more simply put, the right to carry a firearm.

Open carry is the act of publicly carrying a firearm on one’s person in plain sight. The majority of states allow citizens to open carry a firearm without a permit.

Surprisingly, Texas is not one of those states.

Now while this may seem shocking at first, most of these open carry states place burdensome restrictions on the act. These include location restrictions such as high schools and certain cities, state buildings, police stations, and shopping malls. With all these restrictions, open carry isn’t as permissible as it sounds.

The First Amendment has historically been much more difficult to limit than the Second, so extending Freedom of Speech to encompass the open display of firearms needs to be addressed. The case for open carrying being protected under the First Amendment can be made through symbolic speech.

The United States Supreme Court has answered the issue of firearms being protected by the Second Amendment through DC v. Heller (2008) and McDonald v. Chicago (2010). In regards to open carry from a legal perspective, we must look to the state laws rather than the Constitution.

However, there has been no Supreme Court case deciding whether or not the act of open carrying is protected by the First Amendment.

Open carrying a firearm is an action; it is symbolic speech because it is a public statement. As history has shown us, actions and public statements, are protected by the First Amendment under symbolic speech. Examples of this include students in Des Moines wearing armbands to protest the Vietnam War, waving flags that may be seen as offensive and even flag burning.

Symbolic speech relies heavily on the context within which it occurs.

According to Delaware’s leading Open Carry organization, “self-defense is the foremost reason for open carry.”Another leading reason as to why law abiding citizens open carry firearms is for educational purposes.

People want to bring attention to the fact that they have the right to bear arms and that they can legally and safely exercise that right.

Well, this is an interesting perspective indeed.  Since I open carry from time to time and have strongly advocated open carry legislation in my neighboring state of South Carolina, I have addressed the issue of open carry with my readers.

I have said in no uncertain terms that I do not open carry to “make a point.”  I open carry because I hate concealed carry.  It’s uncomfortable and tactically inferior to open carry, and in the summer if I conceal I sweat my weapon, which not only causes rust and corrosion, but makes it a lint-magnet as well.  I have very practical reasons for open carry.

But I have also made it clear that any calls to LEOs because someone openly carries would be a good opportunity for 911 operators to educate the public: “What do you mean he was carrying a gun, ma’am?  Was he brandishing it, holding it, waving it around or threatening someone with it?”  “No?  Okay then, he isn’t violating any law in North Carolina by simply carrying a holstered firearm.”

There is no prima facie reason that open carry cannot be legitimately for the reason of making a statement or for education purposes.  I’ve just never personally taken that stance for myself.  But the author makes a good case for such behavior being protected by the constitution, and I see this as ripe for litigation.

NJ1015.com:

Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg heads to Washington for the day Thursday, waiting to kick-start a 15-year quest to require personalized “smart guns” on the shelves of New Jersey gun retailers.

Such guns would have technology keeping them from being fired by anyone other than the registered owner or, as envisioned in the case of police officers, the officers and their partners. Current New Jersey law requires them to be exclusively sold in New Jersey once they’re viable – which may be unintentionally undercutting their path to the marketplace.

Weinberg was invited by the head of CeaseFire Washington state to attend Thursday’s event in the nation’s capital, featuring a former United States drug czar and the results of a survey on the safety concerns of 400 law enforcement professionals.

“They’re wanting to move toward the child-proof handgun technology, so we’ll hear the results of that survey. We have a panel. Some people who are involved in the research and development will also be there,” Weinberg said.

Yea, I’m sure that’s what they’re wanting – to move to smart guns for the sake of the children.  Just not for them, but for everyone else.

I hope they are successful fielding a “smart gun” for the cops to try out first.  And once all of that money has been spent, I think the cops in New Jersey should keep them.  Forever.

In light of this, I renew my challenge for any designer to use the NRC fault tree handbook and demonstrate that a “smart gun” is as reliable as any other.  If he can do that, I’ll pour ketchup on my hard hat and eat it.

Tag: Smart Guns

The Firearm Blog:

The US Army has released a solicitation for a new 7.62mm infantry rifle to replace the M4. The Interim Combat Service Rifle program, known to be in the works since April of this year, would replace M4 Carbines in use with combat units with a new weapon in the 7.62x51mm caliber. The new solicitation requires companies to submit 7 weapons plus ancillaries for testing, and includes the promise of up to 8 Other Transaction Agreements (OTAs, non-contract transactions), leading to the eventual selection of 1 weapon for a contract of 50,000 units.

The primary justification for the ICSR program are improved ceramic body armors that are resistant to existing forms of small arms ammunition. The logic goes that the Army’s new 5.56mm M855A1 roundcannot penetrate these new armors, and therefore the service must switch to a new round. However, this is misleading, as current 7.62mm M80A1 is incapable of penetrating these body armors either – and specialty tungsten cored ammunition in both 5.56mm and 7.62mm calibers are capable of penetrating armor of this type. The US Army seems to be banking on its yet-undescribed XM1158 ADVAP round to bridge this gap – however Chief Milley himself admitted in testimony to Congress that the ADVAP’s design could be applied to either 7.62mm or 5.56mm ammunition.

So the bolt action sniper rifles aren’t good enough.  They want a semi-automatic in 7.62mm (presumably the NATO round).  And also presumably so that the standard soldier can be as incompetent shooting 7.62mm as she is shooting 5.56mm, while she also has to carry more weight.  Sounds like a plan to me.

Or the Army could actually teach their soldiers to shoot 5.56mm with proper fire control and using fire and maneuver small unit combat tactics, techniques and procedures, sort of like they’re supposed to.  That way, they could let the designated marksmen shoot the long range shots while they conserve their ammunition for a protracted engagement.  Oh, that’s right.  I forgot.  The Army doesn’t have designated marksmen – the Corps does.

A new cartridge and/or a new gun can’t do what poor doctrine doesn’t do.

The Washington Times:

Two armed home invaders entered a Harris County, Texas, home on Monday, but only one lived to talk about it.

Thomas Gilliland of Harris County Sheriff’s Office told reporters this week that a 60-year-old woman exercised her Second Amendment rights to fend off two men. One of the suspects collapsed and died in her front yard shortly after 11:30 a.m. local time.

“It’s the state of Texas — if you’re going to go into someone’s home, you’re going to get shot,” neighbor Cathy Hanks told a local CBS affiliate. “That’s really how we are. That’s just Texas.”

The unidentified suspect who got away was wearing dark clothing and visible red underwear, the station reported. The victim, whose name was not publicized, said he appeared to be around 20-years-old.

“Both were armed with pistols. She confronted both suspects,” said Mr. Gilliland added.

One firearm was found next to the dead suspect’s body.

There must be some mistake.  This is impossible.  It’s impossible to own a gun and actually be safer because of it.  Er … it’s impossible to defend your life without all of that Ninja warrior stress control training.  Er … it’s impossible for old people to defend their lives with a gun.  Er … a gun makes you statistically less safe.

I just can’t believe this.  You mean she was able to do this without going to classes taught by former SpecOps on CQB and room clearing TTPs?

As for the progs among us, they would rather the woman have been raped and killed than to use a gun to defend herself.

New York Upstate:

TABERG, NY – Don Hall was sitting in his living room watching TV with his girlfriend about 9:30 p.m. earlier this year when he was startled by flashing police car lights in his driveway.

Hall met the Oneida County sheriff’s deputies in the driveway, worried that they were bringing bad news about a family member.

Instead, the deputies produced an official document demanding that Hall, a 70-year-old Vietnam veteran who is a retired pipefitter, turn over his guns to them on the spot. On the document Hall said he was described as “mentally defective.”

When Hall told police he’d never had any mental issues, Hall said, deputies told him he must have done something that triggered the order under the New York state’s SAFE Act.

The deputies left that night with six guns – two handguns and four long guns.

Hall, who lives in the Oneida County hamlet of Taberg, hired a lawyer and secured affidavits from local hospitals to prove he hadn’t been recently treated. At one point, he was told he’d have to get some of his guns back from a gun shop.

Eventually, his lawyer convinced a judge that authorities had him confused with someone else who had sought care and that his weapons should never have been seized.

To this day, no one at a hospital or the state and local agencies involved in taking Hall’s guns has admitted to Hall that a mistake was made, explained what happened or apologized. A county judge did acknowledge the mistake and helped him get his guns back.

Hall said the ordeal was frustrating.

“I was guilty until I could prove myself innocent,” Hall said. “They don’t tell you why or what you supposedly did. It was just a bad screw-up.”

Under what legal authority Hall’s guns were confiscated is in disagreement.

Hall and his lawyer said they are convinced his guns were taken as a result of a report under the NY SAFE Act. The New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act was adopted in 2013 after the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in Newton, Conn.

The law includes, among other things, a provision for health providers to report patients that they believe are a risk to harm others or themselves.

The state Office of Mental Health, however, found Hall’s case was reported through a system set up by the federal Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, said James Plastiras, a spokesman for the state mental health office. That law, adopted in 1993, is named after James Brady, who was shot by John Hinckley Jr. during an attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan in 1981.

The federal law includes a provision that requires a hospital or medical facility to report anyone who is involuntarily committed or has been ruled mentally defective by a court or similar legal body.

A hospital reported to the state Office of Mental Health that a person had been involuntarily admitted to a mental facility, Plastiras said. That information was passed onto the FBI for inclusion on the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, he said.

[ … ]

Once the state Office of Mental Health is alerted through either law, the staff checks records held by the state Department of Criminal Justice Services to see if the person has any guns.

Any matches go to the state police to verify that the identity of the person matches the identity of the gun owner. Once confirmed, the state police takes the case to a local judge who issues an order to confiscate the person’s weapons. Local police usually are dispatched to confiscate the weapons.

One thing the state and Hall and his lawyer agree on is the misidentification that lead to Hall’s guns being seized appears to have started when Hall was confused with some other patient at risk.

The day after Hall’s guns were seized in February, he called the gun licensing office in Oneida County. When he told them his guns were wrongly taken, he was told he could attend a hearing in a few weeks.

Instead, Hall called lawyer John Panzone, who advised him to get depositions from every local hospital stating he had not recently been treated. Panzone hoped the affidavits would prove Hall couldn’t be the person initially reported to be at risk.

Hall said he and his girlfriend, Connie Heidenreich, spent the next day visiting three Utica-area hospitals to get the statements.

Hall said the only time he had been a patient at any of the hospitals was four years ago when he had a sleep apnea test at St. Elizabeth’s Hospital.

At St. Elizabeth’s, Hall said a clerk looked up his name and read him a Social Security number. He said it was slightly different than his. “She turned white as a ghost,” Hall recalled.

Panzone believes another patient from Oneida County with Hall’s name was treated at the hospital and flagged for a mental health issue. Somehow that man’s Social Security number got mixed up with Hall’s, thus creating the error, the lawyer said.

The YouTube video of this report can be found here.

First of all, I don’t want to hear another word about how oath-taking LEOs will respect the constitution and refuse to obey unconstitutional orders.  The confiscation order was clearly unconstitutional and immoral and yet the LEOs enforced it upon command.

Second, I don’t care that the person who made the screw-up was a hospital employee.  She was an organ of the state when she made the reporting, and if I had that job I would resign.  When you do things like this you are in effect a government employee.

Third, consider what has happened in this report.  A man who is a war veteran had his weapons confiscated because someone submitted his name as having an admission to a local hospital for a mental malady.  Now listen closely.  Even if this was correct (and we know from the facts of the case that it wasn’t), we’ve already demonstrated conclusively from the reports of mental health professionals that mental illness has no relationship to propensity for violence, and that violent behavior cannot be predicted by mental health professionals because of this.

The case is closed.  There is no longer any debate on this issue.  Moreover, we know from scientific studies that limiting access to firearms of the mentally ill does not reduce suicide deaths.  For some progressives who simply want to worship the totem pole of mental health and behavioristic psychology, and who are well intentioned, they refuse to listen to the science behind their incorrect perceptions of the world.  They want to bow down and worship at the altar of the local witch doctor, or the psychiatrist, as if he knows how to make everything better.

But for most people, they know better than to believe that violence is related to illness rather than moral maladies and evil, and yet they throw out the red herring of mental illness anyway in order to cover over their real intentions, which is yet another gun control and confiscatory scheme.

That’s what happened here.  The SAFE act is anything but safe, because it protects no one and places peaceable, law abiding men in harm’s way.  But there are hundreds like it around the country, where guns cannot be purchased unless LEOs sign off on forms that include mental health information, or send out confiscation orders upon command from their superiors over anything from family problems to alleged abuse by some pissed off spouse.

Those LEOs will confiscate guns just like the LEOs in this report.  Don’t doubt it for one minute.  Be prepared.  And if you believe in God, family and the second amendment, and especially that the second amendment is about amelioration of tyranny, you are in danger of being judged mentally incompetent.  There are thousands of Soldiers and Marines who served faithfully who are in the NICS today because someone said they have PTSD.

Finally, note that every time the government – local, state or federal – involves themselves in a program, they are a fuck-up.  They cannot get anything right, except for running a military, and most of the time they don’t even do that well.  A lot of bad men make it to staff and flag officer level, and if you think we have thinking men running the show at the Pentagon, take a look at the two campaigns of “armed social science” we had in Iraq and Afghanistan, believing that we could force Muslims to accept liberty and freedom with COIN tactics, men who love tyranny and the yoke of oppression more than life itself.

And the progressives want to put the government more fully in charge of your health care.  Think about that for a moment.  Let that wash over you.  Incompetent fools and clowns like the ones described above want to make decisions on health care for your families.

The Firearm Blog:

In addition to being a tasty beverage, Coca-Cola is indeed a good choice for cleaning rust if there are no purpose made cleaners available, thanks to its mild acidity and carbonation. “Every three days I and my gun – I call it “grinder” – every three days, I clean it. If I shot it, if I did not shoot it – does not matter. Gun is sacred,” Yuzkovich said in the video. “What is a gun? It’s not a wife, it’s a lover. The wife will bear with it, the lover – whew, and she is gone. The same is with the guns. We use everything: toothpicks, ear picks, toothbrushes. Reaching everywhere we can. Dirt, everything is cleaned off. Some people said we used sand or something, it’s nonsense.”

Hmm … sounds like a good way to cause acid-induced stress corrosion cracking to me.

Recoil:

The issue is multifaceted. First, there’s the ability and willingness of many production sources, mostly in China, to create knockoffs. This readiness to create counterfeits, though, is bolstered by unscrupulous people here in America willing to knowingly trade in them.

While United States Customs officials and other protection agencies catch millions of fakes destined for American markets, enough slip through to create genuine concern.

[ … ]

Counterfeiters make some convincing copies of Magpul’s popular slings and sights. At first glance, the fakes look just like the real thing. But differences you might not see include the use of inferior polymer materials that may fail unexpectedly …

Liptak explained there actually was a time when Magpul licensed some cheaper components for the airsoft market, intended to make Magpul-branded pieces available for use on airsoft guns at lower prices. These licensed Chinese clones weren’t supposed to create confusion about their lower quality compared to components made for actual combat or law enforcement. But they did.

“We shut that deal down a few years ago. It was potentially confusing in that something from overseas that was marked MAGPUL was actually legitimate,” Liptak said. Now, he added, people are counterfeiting the former PTS products. All real Magpul products are made domestically. This makes it easier for U.S. Customs to stop anything coming into the country.

“An even larger issue, and a safety issue, and something we’ve raised in litigation is that someone may be putting these counterfeit products on a firearm they’re trusting their life to — whether it’s a law enforcement or military firearm or a civilian firearm trusted to defend hearth and home. It’s not going to perform to the same standard as the Magpul product they thought they were getting. Not good,” he declared.

Liptak says most Magpul knockoffs are sold online. Ebay is a common venue. Even Amazon sometimes sells counterfeits. Liptak advises to always check where an item ships from and who’s selling it. Beware some of the purported consumer reviews on online retail sites. Many can be fake fluff.

[ … ]

John Enloe is Aimpoint’s manager of marketing and technical support. An 11-year veteran of the company, many fakes come across his desk, some sent in for warranty work.

“They’re sold all over the internet and at gun shows. It’s startling because there have been times when professionals, people who’ve been overseas in combat, send sights to repair after they’ve used them for a couple weeks, reporting the sight “crapped out.”

Aimpoint military equipment models are the most frequent knockoffs. He said most Aimpoint knockoffs are airsoft toys. The airsoft community likes to call them “military simulators,” Enloe said. Many fakes are products for which Aimpoint has substantial military contracts. These include the COMPM4 optic, the 3X magnifier, and the entire line of micro series optics, mainly because of the popularity with the Special Operations community.

“The companies manufacturing these things are in direct infringement. They’ve got our logos on the products. They’re mainly building them for airsoft toys, and less scrupulous people are importing them into the country, and then trying to pass them off as the real thing to defraud people.” Enloe sees rampant problems at gun shows.

Brad Romines, Trijicon’s export compliance manager, says his company has also seen a noticeable uptick in counterfeits with optics and riflescopes the past few years. They’re even finding counterfeiters selling directly at U.S. tradeshows, including SHOT Show and a major consumer show, the Great American Outdoor Show. Trijicon knockoffs are being sold throughout the European Union, the United States, and even the Middle East, he said. China is almost always the country of origin.

Read the entire article at Recoil.  And be careful what you buy and how you buy it.  I know Amazon has been caught selling fake products before, or more correctly, they put people in contact with companies selling fake products.

I have a problem with this not only because the products are inferior and may fail, but also because it’s intellectual property theft, and China is the master of it.

We all hate paying big prices for things, but if you don’t like it enough, then you’ll design something better for cheaper, and when you do, that intellectual property belongs to you, not China.

Here’s a tip for you – put this on a mental index card and file it away the next time you think about buying an important product from China.  China still doesn’t get the QA process.  They don’t have the culture to sustain such a thing.  The NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) doesn’t allow U.S. nuclear power plants to procure structures, systems or components from China, and for good reason.  Nothing they build can be trusted.

What does that say to you?  Is your own safety any less important to you than the safety of your local nuclear power plant?

Firearms Policy Coalition:

In today’s Wrenn v. District of Columbia decision (a related case, Grace v. District of Columbia, was consolidated with Wrenn on appeal), a lawsuit helmed by civil rights attorney Alan Gura and backed by the Second Amendment Foundation, the Court held in relevant part that D.C.’s “good-reason” handgun carry ban laws were unconstitutional:

Of course, the good-reason law isn’t a “total ban” for the D.C. population as a whole of the right to bear common arms under common circumstances. After all, it allows some D.C. residents—those with a special need—to defend against threats both common to everyone and specific to themselves.

But the ban on ownership struck down in Heller I also made “minor exceptions” for certain sorts of owners, who could then defend their homes to the hilt. 554 U.S. at 570 n.1. That made no difference to constitutional review of the ban, see id., for a simple reason: the point of the Amendment isn’t to ensure that some guns would find their way into D.C., but that guns would be available to each responsible citizen as a rule (i.e., at least to those no more prone to misuse that access than anyone else).

So if Heller I dictates a certain treatment of “total bans” on Second Amendment rights, that treatment must apply to total bans on carrying (or possession) by ordinarily situated individuals covered by the Amendment. 

This point brings into focus the legally decisive fact: the good-reason law is necessarily a total ban on most D.C. residents’ right to carry a gun in the face of ordinary self-defense needs, where these residents are no more dangerous with a gun than the next law-abiding citizen.

We say “necessarily” because the law destroys the ordinarily situated citizen’s right to bear arms not as a side effect of applying other, reasonable regulations (like those upheld in Heller II and Heller III), but by design: it looks precisely for needs “distinguishable” from those of the community.

So we needn’t pause to apply tiers of scrutiny, as if strong enough showings of public benefits could save this destruction of so many commonly situated D.C. residents’ constitutional right to bear common arms for self-defense in any fashion at all.

Bans on the ability of most citizens to exercise an enumerated right would have to flunk any judicial test that was appropriately written and applied, so we strike down the District’s law here apart from any particular balancing test. 

***

So our approach, briefed by all the parties, is also urged by Heller I and coheres with Heller II. It’s narrower than any other basis for decision but not ad hoc.

And it would avoid suggesting what Heller I implicitly denies: that some public benefits could justify preventing people from exercising the law-abiding citizen’s right to bear arms for self-defense given the risk and needs typical of, well, law-abiding citizens. 

We pause to draw together all the pieces of our analysis: At the Second Amendment’s core lies the right of responsible citizens to carry firearms for personal self-defense beyond the home, subject to longstanding restrictions. These traditional limits include, for instance, licensing requirements, but not bans on carrying in urban areas like D.C. or bans on carrying absent a special need for self-defense.

In fact, the Amendment’s core at a minimum shields the typically situated citizen’s ability to carry common arms generally.

The District’s good-reason law is necessarily a total ban on exercises of that constitutional right for most D.C. residents. That’s enough to sink this law under Heller I. 

***

To watch the news for even a week in any major city is to give up any illusions about “the problem of handgun violence in this country.” Heller I, 554 U.S. at 570. The District has understandably sought to fight this scourge with every legal tool at its disposal.

For that long struggle against gun violence, you might see in today’s decision a defeat; you might see the opposite. To say whether it is one or the other is beyond our ken here.

We are bound to leave the District as much space to regulate as the Constitution allows—but no more. Just so, our opinion does little more than trace the boundaries laid in 1791 and flagged in Heller I. And the resulting decision rests on a rule so narrow that good-reason laws seem almost uniquely designed to defy it: that the law-abiding citizen’s right to bear common arms must enable the typical citizen to carry a gun. 

We vacate both orders below and remand with instructions to enter permanent injunctions against enforcement of the District’s good-reason law.

Circuit Judge Karen Henderson dissented, arguing in a footnote that:

Although I assume that the Second Amendment extends to some extent beyond the home, I am certain the core Second Amendment right does not. The application of strict scrutiny—let alone my colleagues’ application of a categorical ban—is, in my view, patently off-base.

I’ve always thought that Scalia left much undone in his Heller decision, and the appeals court is doing his work for him in this ruling.  Perhaps Heller is all he could get the Supremes to agree to.

Unfortunately, however, this won’t be the end of it.  D.C. will come up with something equally unconstitutional, and I’ve noted before that similar federal courts have ruled in favor of “may-carry” laws in states such as New York, Massachusetts and Hawaii.  There is much more to come, and all of this confusion could have been avoided by a more robust Heller decision.

In the mean time, how dark for a person like Henderson, whose world and life view distinguishes between “to some extent” and “core.”  How sad and abusive towards other women who are left defenseless in the face of assault by her vacillation.

Glenn Reynolds also provides some links.