Archive for the 'Firearms' Category

New Hampshire Union Leader:

The state Senate, as expected, voted along party lines, 13-10, on Thursday to approve a bill that would make it easier to legally carry a concealed weapon in New Hampshire.

Senate Bill 12 to eliminate the state’s permit requirement for concealed carry was endorsed in a 3-2 vote of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Jan. 10.

State Sen. Bette Lasky, D-Nashua, said the change will make New Hampshire residents less safe by removing the authority of police chiefs to pick and choose which residents will be allowed to carry a concealed handgun. Current law allows police chiefs to determine if someone is “suitable” for a concealed carry permit.”

SB 12 will revoke a process that has worked well in our state for more than a century,” said Lasky. “It’s a process that balances the Second Amendment rights of our citizens with local control of law enforcement to ensure that potentially dangerous people are not allowed to carry concealed weapons.”

New Hampshire is one of 31 states that give law enforcement the power to deny a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

[ … ]

D’Allesandro said the state’s police chiefs oppose the change …

I’m sure they do oppose constitutional carry.  It destroys a revenue stream from which they can buy brand new Dodge Chargers, Comms gear and top of the line AR-15s.

“Pick and choose.”  Remember that folks.  That’s what the progressives want to do.  They want to pick and choose the special people.  You may not be on that list.  As for the criminal, he’s not worried one way or the other.

WBIR.com:

A Tennessee lawmaker is hoping to loosen Tennessee’s gun carry laws.

State Rep. Micah Van Huss, a Republican from Jonesborough, has introduced a bill to eliminate the need for a permit to open carry a handgun.

Under the law, you would still need a permit to carry a concealed handgun, but if you wear the gun openly, you would not need a permit.

House Bill 40 would amend the state’s weapon laws for open carry to bring Tennessee in line with several other states.

Several lawmakers who spoke with Tri-Cities NBC-affiliate WCYB said they support the proposal.

“Tennessee has eight bordering states, I think seven of them allow what’s called open carry,” said state Senator Jon Lundberg, for Tennessee’s 1st District. “Has it changed the dynamics in Virginia and North Carolina, not really.”

The bill has been introduced twice and was rejected both times. If approved, Tennessee would join the other 29 states that don’t require these permits.

“This is one that people are passionate about, they’re either for it very strongly or against it very strongly,” said Lundberg. “So you will see those kind of passions come out this time around.”

Right now, the bill is still in the early stages and doesn’t have a senate sponsor yet.

Well, it needs a sponsor, and it needs to be passed this time around.  Frankly, I thought that Tennessee was already a gold star open carry state like my own state of North Carolina.

Tennessee needs to join the ranks of states that recognize God-given rights like this one.  Anyway, Tennessee can show the way to Texans, who have permitted open carry, and who are flirting with constitutional carry if only the awful Lieutenant Governor will get out of the way.

David Codrea:

“The submachine gun was a Heckler & Koch MP5 10mm,” the report elaborates. “An ammunition magazine for the weapon was also taken. Officials did not say how the weapon was secured.”

I want to know that information.  I was shopping at Lowes several months ago and happened upon a smaller town chief LEO who was looking for a case for a patrol rifle.  I suggested several brands (which wouldn’t have been able to be located at Lowes), or shopping on Amazon.

Either way, it goes to show that putting your patrol rifle – or in this case an NFA weapon – inside a secure case, bolted to the floor of the vehicle, is the least a LEO can do to secure his weapons.

But we can’t be trusted with machineguns, because laws are for little people, not LEOs.

Des Moines Register:

Iowa would eliminate a prohibition on possession of machine guns, as well as short-barreled rifles and short-barreled shotguns, under a bill introduced by state Sen. Jason Schultz.

Schultz, a Republican from Schleswig in northwest Iowa, told The Des Moines Register Thursday he simply wants to make Iowa law no stricter on firearms possession than federal law. Senate File 108 would permit Iowans to obtain machine guns and the other specified firearms after undergoing an extensive federal background check, filling out paperwork and obtaining a tax stamp.

“I haven’t heard anything but support” from firearms groups and individual law enforcement officers, Schultz said. Under current Iowa law, a person who possesses a machine gun, short-barreled rifle or short-barreled shotgun can be charged with a Class D felony, punishable by up to five years in prison.

The legislation would be consistent, Schultz said, with a bill signed by Gov. Terry Branstad last year that allows Iowans to legally obtain a firearms suppressor, which reduces the amount of noise and visible muzzle flash generated by firing a weapon.

It’s ridiculous to have a law against something like an SBR anyway.  Readers in Iowa need to go to the mattresses on this one.  The governor is apparently lukewarm, and he needs to be persuaded to get on board.

Of course this doesn’t remove these items from the NFA list, which will take federal action and therefore all of us together.  But it takes Iowa one step closer to removing the laws that infringe on their rights.

AlabamaNews.net:

Wednesday, January 18, Senator Gerald Allen (R-Tuscaloosa) pre-filed legislation in the Alabama State Senate to allow Alabamians to lawfully carry guns without a permit. Allen’s permit less carry proposal would remove a needless restriction on Alabamians’ Second Amendment rights and make it easier for citizens to protect and defend their families and property.

“Alabama should be leading the way on constitutional gun rights. More than ten states across the country already allow their citizens to carry guns without a permit. It’s time we give our citizens the right to bear arms without first seeking the government’s permission,” Allen said. “We already allow open carry without a permit, and there is no logical reason for continuing to require a permit for concealed carry.”

Under Allen’s proposal, the requirement for a permit would be repealed, but Alabamians could still apply for a pistol permit in order to carry a gun in states that have reciprocity laws with Alabama. Currently, Alabama conceal-carry permit holders can carry guns in Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee, and Florida, among other states, due to state reciprocity laws. A pistol permit holder would also retain the benefit of foregoing a background check when purchasing firearms.

“You will still need a permit if you’re going to legally carry a gun in other states, so I anticipate that a large majority of gun owners in Alabama will continue to purchase a permit from their local sheriff,” Allen remarked. “My goal is to remove unnecessary burdens on law-abiding citizens who own and carry guns, since most criminals and thugs don’t bother applying for a permit anyways.”

It’s good to see Alabama joining the ranks of states where legislators are sponsoring constitutional carry bills.  Be aware that the “Boss Hogg” sheriffs and sheriff’s association in Alabama will fight this since it potentially infringes on a constant stream of dollars to the coffers of law enforcement to buy their nice Dodge Chargers, comms gear and machine guns.

But if there is to be infringement, it’s better that it be with the state sheriffs rather than with the people who have constitutionally guaranteed rights.

We know it’s working out just fine.  That’s not what we learn from this most recent report.  The cited article is from “Everything Lubbock,” and what we learn from their LEOs is important and interesting.

Assistant Chief Jon Caspell with Lubbock Police recalls similar “buzz” about the law and questions for the police department.

“There really was a lot of talk about it and the potential it might have, but really we haven’t seen hardly impact at all,” Caspell said.

Both Caspell and Palmer said they really haven’t seen people around Lubbock excercising their right to open carry.

“Even walking around in public and teaching in classes  I really don’t see anyone really carrying that way,” Palmer said.

[ … ]

Palmer explained some insight he shares with his students:

“I also explain how disadvantageous it can be if you give away the fact that you’re carrying a gun to a potential bad guy, they already see you as a threat first rather than being able to be reactionary and maybe stopping something from happening,” Palmer said.

Another facet of the Open Carry law is that law enforcement can ask people they see openly carrying to show their license.

Assistant Chief Caspell said to his knowledge, everyone LPD has checked  with willingly hands over their paperwork .

“We don’t have any reports that we’ve had any difficulty for the most part, the type of person–generally speaking– that wants to open carry is someone that wants to enforce the law. They understand what the law is therefor the reasons behind it,” Caspell said.

Caspell said he can’t speak for other Texas cities, but he believes in Lubbock, the law has been implemented smoothly.

“Lubbock seems to be more of a gun-friendly community and because of that culture here we just haven’t seen a whole lot of problems. Maybe that phrase, “in like a lion, out like a whisper,” might be a good phrase here,” Caspell said.

He added that just because someone is openly carrying in a holster doesn’t mean they are licensed. Caspell encourages anyone who is suspicious of another person they see carrying a weapon to give police a call.

There are three aspects of this report that deserve comment.  First of all, I don’t advocate open carry any more than concealed carry.  I advocate carrying the way you feel the most comfortable and tactically suited to the situation.  But if there are never any open carriers, then this right will be seen as a permission that is rarely used.  That’s not a good outcome.

Second, I’ve stated before that you get to hide the fact that you’re carrying a gun to a perpetrator is the most hideously awful argument against open carry I can conceive.  It’s tactically absurd, inasmuch as if the perpetrator intends to perpetrate a crime, he’s going to regardless of whether you have a gun.  You will still have an opportunity to prevent it, and it’s more likely that you’ll be the first to engage the perpetrator.

That’s not a bad outcome unless you wish to see women and children perish before you do.  “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13).  I’m not knocking concealed carriers as cowards.  Much of the time I’m a concealed carrier.  I’m knocking those who knock open carry for the reason that a concealed carrier gets to wait to engage.  I don’t carry a weapon in order to wait to engage.  You don’t hear LEOs making the argument that openly carrying their weapon is a tactical disadvantage.  Let’s don’t look stupid by making that argument for ourselves.

Finally, this attitude by the chief LEO is disturbing and possibly illegal.  He has actually gone on record advocating that people call the police for a response when no law is being broken, or at least, when no one can demonstrate prima facie that a law is being broken.  I must remind LEOs reading this article once again that the Fourth Circuit had to slap down the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department over stopping someone for openly carrying a weapon and actually arresting him for something else.

“… where a state permits individuals to openly carry firearms, the exercise of this right, without more, cannot justify an investigatory detention.  Permitting such a justification would eviscerate Fourth Amendment protections for lawfully armed individuals in those states.”

It simply could not be clearer.  Moreover, every stop must be a so-called Terry Stop, regardless of what Texas state law says.  In this way I see the Texas law as unconstitutional.  LEOs should not, and do not, have the right to stop merely to ask for identification unless they have good reason to believe that a law is being violated.  So says the Fourth Circuit and the Supreme Court of the United States.  I said all of this before the Texas state legislature passed this bill, and they didn’t listen to me.  I would like to see this challenged in federal court, but before we ever get to that, I’d like to see constitutional carry in Texas in order to make this moot.  If Texas delays, as I suspect they will, then someone should challenge this in federal court.

City Pages:

The first is “permitless carry,” granting anyone in Minnesota the right to carry a gun wherever they go. The gun lobby prefers to call it “constitutional carry,” and it would invalidate all state laws on carrying or possession of weapons in public.

The second is “stand your ground,” which has two prongs. In your own home, you can shoot to kill in order to prevent a felony — such the stealing of a TV or the writing of a bad check. Anywhere else, you can shoot to kill if you feel like you’re being personally threatened. You don’t have to try to run away first. And you won’t have to prove that you had a solid reason to be afraid in the first place.

These gun bills (HF188 and HF238) were both introduced in the Minnesota House on Thursday, signed by a litany of Republican authors. They do not yet have Senate versions, but the Senate too is controlled by Republicans this year so it’s may be a matter of time.

So here’s how it currently works in Minnesota.

In order to carry a gun, you have to get a permit from your county. They’ll check if you can legally have a gun — that you haven’t gotten that right revoked because you were convicted of a felony or because you beat up your spouse. Then you have to take a class and pass a range test. After that, you can walk around with that gun on your hip.

Minnesota also allows you to kill in self-defense. Obviously, if someone’s threatening your life, you aren’t expected to just lay down. But you do have to prove that you at least tried to get away, that killing was your last resort, and that any reasonable person in your position would have done the same thing.

“This is huge,” says The Rev. Nancy Nord Bence, executive director of gun control organization Protect Minnesota. “Yes, it’s bad that now you could shoot someone if you think they’re going to steal your TV in your house. That’s terrible. But the part we have to really pay attention to is this completely changes our understanding of how we prove self-defense in this state and what self-defense means.”

[ … ]

“Look at the fear of immigrants we have in this state,” Nord Bence says. “You have been told that we have to worry about these Somali immigrants because they’re terrorists, and now you see a guy who looks like a terrorist, and you have no duty to retreat before using deadly force, and the presumption of innocence is with the shooter. … It’s going to lead to a wholesale arming of communities that feel threatened by this because if you were, say, a Somali immigrant in St. Cloud right now with all of the racial tension that’s going on, this bill is reason for you to be afraid.”

Then the author (or editor) gives us this picture.

The caption reads “Please make make sure it’s not just a woman looking for her lost dog.”

I think the major problem with this discussion is that it assumes that situations of self defense can be neatly pigeonholed and bifurcated into those in which the person or persons intend to do you harm, and those in which they are in your home unannounced and uninvited but only intend to walk away with your television set.

You don’t know which situation it is if someone is in your home unannounced and uninvited, and if you claim you do you’re naïve.  You simply don’t know the intentions of the heart, and moreover you don’t know how the situation will evolve.  You cannot sit down and eat dinner while the perpetrator steals your television, only to find out later that he intended all along to rape your wife and beat you to death and burn you to a crisp with gasoline.

Furthermore, that’s my problem with LEOs who recommend that you simply sit still and allow perpetrators to wave guns around while they rob an establishment.  If you do, the breaths you take may be your last, and if you have a weapon, you’d better consider using it.  Not only may the perpetrator shoot you intentionally, he may do it negligently while he’s waving the gun around if he has no trigger discipline.

Finally, go and read the article the author uses to illustrate the point on shooting people looking for dogs.  The person who was looking for her dog didn’t break and enter, and it’s illegal to kill people for trespassing and I’m sure it will be under the new law.  In the picture shown above, the girl holding the shotgun had better be prepared to shoot, while deliberate with her judgment if it could be a family member who happens to have a key.  She better know who has keys and who doesn’t, as well as their typical schedules.

In every possible way, the articles linked here and the opinions they convey are tactically stupid.  The only real problem I see here is that Benelli M4 may knock that little girl for a couple of loops.  You’d better pack that buttstock into your shoulder, little miss.  You’re sporting the same gun the U.S. Marines used for room clearing in Now Zad, Afghanistan.

This is rich.

When Kai Kloepfer points his .40 caliber handgun, it fires like any other weapon. But when someone else gives it a try, it doesn’t work. It’s the first firearm with same built-in security as many smartphones.

If the gun is picked up by an authorized user, a sensor recognizes the fingerprint and it will fire.

Guns that only work for their owners used to be the stuff of movies, like James Bond’s gun in “Skyfall,” but Kloepfer thinks he has the technology to make them a reality, reports CBS News correspondent Tony Dokoupil.

“I think this could be huge. I think it could really be the future of firearms,” Kloepfer said.

He’s the founder of BioFire, a start-up still headquartered in his parent’s house in Boulder, Colorado. Now a freshman at MIT, Kloepfer started work on his gun as part of a science project when he was 15 years old.

“There’d be days when I’d sit down … I’d look up 14 hours later. I hadn’t moved from the spot. I hadn’t thought about anything else,” Kloepfer said.

He realized he couldn’t stop mass shootings, but he thought he could still save lives.

After all, in one year alone, nearly 600 people died in firearm accidents. There were thousands more suicides, many committed with guns that do not belong to the victim.

“Why did it take four and a half years to put a fingerprint reader on the side of a gun?” Dokoupil asked him.

“Well, it’s not as simple of a process as you might imagine,” Kloepfer said. “It’s also not something anybody has ever done before.”

Kloepfer’s weapon doesn’t only lock like a smart phone – it charges like one.

The invention has won him some deep-pocketed allies.

“Kai is the Mark Zuckerberg of guns,” Ron Conway said.

Conway was an early investor in Google and Facebook, and now he’s a putting his money behind Kloepfer’s smart gun.

“What Kai has done is used all of the latest technology available us to innovate a truly authenticated gun. You couldn’t do this five years ago,” Conway said.

But a push for similar guns misfired memorably in the late 1990s. A Colt prototype failed in a major demonstration, and Smith & Wesson dropped its smart gun program after resulting boycotts nearly bankrupted the company.

“What has changed from then until now to make it possible to make a smart gun like the one you’re working on?” Dokoupil asked.

“I would argue pretty much everything,” Kloepfer said.

Well, almost everything.

“Good intentions don’t necessarily make good inventions,” said Stephen Sanetti, president of the National Shooting Sports Foundation. They’re the main trade group for companies that make and sell guns.

Sanetti expressed concern about the reliability of any firearm that depends on battery power.

“The firearm has to work. And a firearm is not the same as a cell phone,” Sanetti said. “The consequences of a cell phone not working are inconvenience. The consequences of a firearm not working could be someone’s life.”

Kloepfer said his gun is “relatively reliable.”

How many of you want a gun, a more expensive gun I might add, that is “relatively reliable?”

So young engineer (I’m so sorry, I’m an engineer and I hate that you’re getting ready to throw your career away on something like this, but apparently there is no one around who can counsel you any better).  Here is what you need to do.

… let’s talk yet again about smart gun technology.  I am a registered professional engineer, and I spend all day analyzing things and performing calculations.  Let’s not speak in broad generalities and murky platitudes (such as “good enough”).  That doesn’t work with me.  By education, training and experience, I reject such things out of hand.  Perform a fault tree analysis of smart guns.  Use highly respected guidance like the NRC fault tree handbook.

Assess the reliability of one of my semi-automatic handguns as the first state point, and then add smart gun technology to it, and assess it again.  Compare the state points.  Then do that again with a revolver.  Be honest.  Assign a failure probability of greater than zero (0) to the smart technology, because you know that each additional electronic and mechanical component has a failure probability of greater than zero.

Get a PE to seal the work to demonstrate thorough and independent review.  If you can prove that so-called “smart guns” are as reliable as my guns, I’ll pour ketchup on my hard hat, eat it, and post video for everyone to see.  If you lose, you buy me the gun of my choice.  No one will take the challenge because you will lose that challenge.  I’ll win.  Case closed.  End of discussion.

Unless you can design a gun that has a delta of precisely zero (0) greater failure probability, is as light, aesthetically pleasing, no more weighty or roomy, and just a cheap as classic guns, there is no market for your toy.

Sorry.  And actually, there wouldn’t be any market anyway even if it met all of those stipulations because the government or a perpetrator (perhaps I’m being redundant) might be able to use the electronic features to turn the gun off when they wanted to.

But I don’t want to be too negative on this, because I want to see companies go bankrupt funding the research.  So carry on.

News from Florida:

Last week’s shooting at the Fort Lauderdale airport hasn’t put a dent in Sen. Greg Steube’s plan to allow concealed weapons permit holders to carry their firearms in airports. In fact, it’s only strengthened his resolve to pass the legislation, which he says is desperately needed to prevent future mass shootings in the Sunshine State.

“The situation at the airport further puts a big spotlight on the fact that gun free zones and laws that prevent law abiding citizens to carry.. the only person that protects is the criminal,” Steube told Sunshine State News Wednesday.

Steube’s proposal, SB 140, would lift some “gun free” zones in Florida where carrying firearms is prohibited, even for concealed carry permit holders.

If passed, the bill would allow Florida’s 1.7 million CCW permit holders to openly carry their firearms. The more sweeping part of the measure, however, would eliminate gun-free zones in places like secondary schools, local centers and government meeting areas.

Airports are also included.

Since last week’s shooting which left five dead and six wounded, Steube’s phone has been ringing off the hook. On Tuesday, the day the bill was supposed to be heard in the Senate Judiciary Committee, his district office received 120 calls alone.

He doesn’t understand why there’s such a resistance to CCW permit holders carrying their firearms around since they have to undergo background checks.  Statistically speaking, permit holders follow the letter of the law.

A 2015 report found CCW permit holders committed crimes at a much lower rate than police officers did. A Police Quarterly study from 2005 to 2007 saw an average of 103 crimes by police per 100,000 officers.

Well, all of that is true, but notice that the argument he uses to persuade others is based on data rather than fundamental and properly basic rights.  Very well.  Remember what we’ve discussed – incrementalism.  A bill doesn’t have to be perfect to get my support.  We can go for constitutional carry later.  One step at a time.

As for the airport shooting, someone remarked to me that things like this make our argument harder.  I disagree.  It makes our argument crystal clear.  As to how the shooter got a gun in the airport, he did so legally, just like a perpetrator can do it on virtually any street corner or grocery store in America.

Imagine this being on a street corner and someone asking, “just exactly how did this person come to have a gun to begin with?”  This is a stupid question, of course.  It’s likely he bought it.  If not, he stole it.  What does it matter?  Criminals intent on crime don’t care how they prepare for perpetration of their crime.

The only defense against this is to allow others (law abiding men and women) to carry weapons, openly and concealed.  Make your choice.  Don’t dictate how a man carries his weapon.  People who do that piss me off.  Word. They should drop their pink panties and put on big boy shorts.  Grow up and leave everyone alone instead of trying to be mommy.

How a man carries his weapon is analogous to what color he paints his car.  It’s his business, not yours.

Letter from a reader.

Greetings Herschel, I have been fascinated by the Garand rifle for sixty years, ever since I was handed one in ROTC and taught its operation and care.  I have since been able to acquire two of them, a 1942 Springfield Armory one I am in the process of back-dating to its original form, and  Korean War era rifle from International Harvester. Sixty years ago we were told that Mr. Garand was an employee of the United States Government, and that he developed his rifle “on the clock.”  The patents, and any royalties, were not his to assign.  I don’t know where Click magazine got its information, but I tend to believe the story as I heard it. I get nervous about disagreeing with Sgt. Emery, who has “been there and done that,” but in what you quoted, I think he is wrong.  Let me explain. The U.S. Rifle, caliber .30, M1 was designed to fire a specific cartridge (Ball M2 or AP M2), which used a powder of medium burning rate, usually IMR4895 or IMR4064. Slower powders will get much more performance out of the .30-06 cartridge, but the higher pressure at the M1’s gas port will quickly beat the operating rod out of spec. The rifle won’t “blow up,” but it will quickly become a manually operated bolt action, and eventually become useless, if fed improperly.  People like Hornady sell ammunition loaded to Ball M2 spec specifically for use in Garand rifles. The newer cartridge used in the M14 rifle fired the same bullet (150 grains) at the same velocity (2750 ft/s), and did so by using different powder and pressure.  The round of the M14 is smaller than that of the M1, but the punch is identical. Even in civilian use, the .30-06 (7.62×63) surpasses the .308 Winchester (7.62×51) only slightly until bullets heavier than 180 bullets are used, after which the difference becomes noticeable.  But in military usage, the M14 is the equal ballistically of the M1, because of the latter’s need to limit pressure at its gas port. Although I disagree with Sgt. Emery on this one point, I would still consider it an honor to buy him a beer. Thanks for your blog, Herschel, and best wishes for a Happy New Year,

[Name redacted because I never know if readers are okay with me publishing names]

(and please be careful when you walk in the park)

Thank you sir.  I’m circumspect.