Archive for the 'Firearms' Category

David Codrea:

Voters chose to allow authorities to seize firearms at domestic investigations (Yes: 5,579 / No: 2,066), ban firearms from establishments that serve liquor (Yes: 5,194 / No: 2,517), and require firearms in the home to be locked up (Yes: 4,351 / No: 2,971) …

Remember when I said this?  “In order to prevent local hicks, ne’er-do-wells and criminals from acting out their Napoleon fantasies upon other men, association with the state means that – assuming robust gun rights laws already exist – local municipalities and townships shouldn’t be able to preempt state laws.”

David’s article is first of all about preemption.  It’s an odious thing when local yokels (who are usually elected in elections that aren’t well attended and who are usually unknown until they act out their Napoleon fantasies upon others) presume to tell their townships what to do about everything under the sun.  Totalitarianism doesn’t just happen inside the beltway.  The second thing I’ll observe is that if you have a gun and keep it locked up, it is nothing more than a locked up paperweight.  You certainly don’t have it for protection.

Kurt Hofmann:

“I’m not sure why people need body armor unless they are planning something untoward,” Anderson said. “And I’m not sure why an individual citizen would require a .50-caliber rifle.

And I’m not sure why someone would presume to legislate anything at all about body armor unless they were planning something untoward.  What do you have in mind, buddy?  Making sure we are defenseless against SWAT raids?

So someone is calling Mike Vanderboegh an insurrectionist.  I’ve been called far worse than that, but the really bad thing is that he didn’t link Mike and send traffic his direction.  Bad, bad form.  Sebastian has panned my stuff without linking me before.  Again, bad form.

See Mike on S&W.  It’s also because they make great stuff.  I mean really, really great stuff.  I just wished they lived down South.  Because, you know, of the North and everything.  And what they believe up there in those parts.

Pray for Mike and his health.  I have.  Mike’s got to stay healthy.  God has too much work for him to do.

Finally, Uncle links someone who is unimpressed with 1911s.  Meh.  I’m unimpressed and I would indeed choose to carry a 1911 for self defense.  I just put 150 rounds through my new S&W 1911 with no failures at all.  And Uncle is right.  I can shoot this one better than my polymer frame pistols because of its slim profile.

WND:

Senator Larry Martin was responsible for heading the effort to kill the legislative efforts in support of open carry in South Carolina.  During this effort, he said the following.

“If the 2nd amendment has been as you interpret it, why hasn’t SC law reflected that for the last 140 years? I’m sorry but you are describing an ‘unlimited’ right that has never been the case with the 2nd Amendment. My view of the 2nd Amendment has always been the right to own guns and keep them in our homes, business, and property and not to wear a gun whenever to wherever I pleased.”

Take careful note what Martin is saying.  Rather than just speaking to the issue of open carry, he is expanding his objection to carrying at all in public places.  This places him squarely in the same camp as politicians in New York, California and New Jersey.

Almost all of the judicial committee is to blame according to this commenter.

Martin, Larry A., Chairman, Rankin, Luke A., Hutto, C. Bradley, Malloy, Gerald, Sheheen, Vincent A., Campsen, George E. “Chip”, III, Massey, A. Shane, Bright, Lee, Coleman, Creighton B., Martin, Shane R., Scott, John L., Jr., Gregory, Chauncey K., Allen, Karl B., Bennett, Sean, Corbin, Thomas D. “Tom”, Hembree, Greg, Johnson, Kevin L., McElveen, J. Thomas, III, Shealy, Katrina Frye, Thurmond, Paul, Turner, Ross, Young, Tom, Jr., Kimpson, Marlon E.

According to an email from my SC state Senator (Tom Corbin), only he, Shane Martin , Lee Bright , and Kevin Bryant. voted in favor of SB115. If you go to that page, under “Senate Standing Committees” and select “Judiciary” it will open the above, each name with a hyperlink to that senator’s district information.  According to Corbin, there were 4 votes in favor, 17 against; there are 23 members of the Judiciary Committee, so 2 did not vote at all.

But Senator Martin is chairman of this committee and bears additional responsibility.  It’s important to know who Larry Martin is and to what he is committed.

Larry Martin is a transplant from the democratic party.

The biggest change in the Legislature and in state politics since the late 1970’s has been the rise of the Republican Party. Some Republicans today question the sincerity of party switchers like me that began their involvement in politics in the 1970s as Democrats. But, that was practically the only game in town when I began.

Martin’s goal wasn’t to bring a committed conservative world and life view into the political sphere of influence.  It was to be involved in politics, and in order to continue to do that he had to switch party affiliations.  He has brought his progressive views to bear on the proposed gun law.  He is recorded as saying “You can carry a weapon openly if this bill is adopted and I’m offended by that.”

He has also advocated the preservation of gun free zones such as schools, and he was apparently willing to lie to preserve the status quo in South Carolina.

Senator Martin says if the CWP laws are repealed in South Carolina, it will mean that citizens cannot lawfully carry weapons into other states where reciprocity laws apply.

This is demonstrably false, and Martin knows it.  First of all, if Martin is opposed to guns outside the home as his comments indicate, the entire basis for his argument (i.e., that he wants to preserve the ability of South Carolinians to carry outside the home in other states) is a smokescreen and red herring.  He wants to hide his true feelings and he is offering up a sacrificial reason to keep things as they are.

Fortunately it isn’t necessary to sacrifice anything.  South Carolina could still maintain a permitting process in order to ensure reciprocity, or alternatively citizens could obtain permits in states that do ensure reciprocity in a majority of the other states (such as Utah).

But if he has ignored his constituency, liberal blogs have given him props for his strong stand against guns.  Martin has also ensured, to the best of his ability, continued secrecy in issues of money.

State senators have rejected a proposal requiring elected officials in South Carolina to disclose on ethics forms how much their employers pay them.

The Senate swiftly killed the proposed amendment without debate. Sen. Vincent Sheheen attempted Wednesday to add it to an ethics reform bill that senators tentatively approved last week. It requires officeholders to disclose their sources of income but not the amounts.

Sheheen told colleagues voters deserve to know whether they’re being paid $100 or substantially more.

The Camden Democrat who’s making another run for governor in 2014 noted he’s released 13 years of tax returns, and it didn’t hurt.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Larry Martin said he objected because he believes private businesses would no longer employ or do business with legislators if their exact pay was exposed.

Thus has Martin made it possible for South Carolina to “remain the only state in America where lawmakers can be paid under the table by companies seeking taxpayer-funded business.

Efforts to expose these shady deals had been pushed by S.C. Rep. Kirkman Finlay (R-Columbia), who wanted lawmakers to disclose “the source, amount and type of all income received by any public official from a nonpublic source for the preceding calendar year, as indicated by any and all wage or earnings reporting documents issued to the public official.”

Every voting constituency has politicians for whom they are embarrassed and who they regret ensconcing in office.  For Pickens, South Carolina, and even for the entire upstate region, Larry Martin is surely a particularly odious presence in politics.

Martin doesn’t come up for election again until 2016.  But it’s time for Martin to feel pressure from gun owners, and it’s time that his influence and power begins to wane.  He is a holdover from establishment republicanism (actually, democrat turned republican), a crony who wants to enjoy the privileges of his rotary club membership, membership on boards of directors, and policy-making authority, without regard to the wishes of the voters.  It’s time for him to go.

Let me speak for one moment to the issue of open carry.  As I have noted before, North Carolina is a traditional open carry state.  All of the bad things that are supposed to happen when a state becomes open carry simply do not obtain.  They don’t happen.  Some people choose to open carry, some do not.  I choose to under certain conditions (e.g., when I am in the sun in summertime conditions and I would otherwise sweat my gun with IWB carry).

I was at Palmetto State Armory this weekend and one worker there with whom I discussed open carry talked about the fact that if a criminal is casing an establishment and you are openly carrying, you’re the first he goes after.  To which I said, “or he decides not to do it all all.”  “That’s a chance you take,” he said.

Actually, no it’s not.  There is no statistical evidence to demonstrate that open carriers get shot more than concealed carriers.  This is all simply a choice that people make, and that they have a right to make.  Larry Martin should have no latitude to restrict that right, and he certainly has no right to tell anyone that guns belong in the home.  That’s a bigoted, prejudiced, elitist position that has no place among the good people of South Carolina.

David Codrea:

The attack, “one of the deadliest … in China in recent years,” resulted in several attackers, reportedly wearing uniforms, being shot by police, but not until after they’d managed to kill and injure so many defenseless people at the station.

I know someone who was once a member of the Hong Kong symphony, and he told me that when a violent crime is committed in the far east, more often than not they use something like knives, or at other times acid.  People who are disfigured in their face are usually a victim of acid attacks on the streets.  Bullets, acid, machete, whatever.  It’s all the same.  It kills, and self defense is God’s expectation.

Kurt Hofmann:

“Americans for Responsible Solutions,” the anti-gun group headlined by former U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and her husband Mark Kelly, is in a tizzy …

They are part of the offended and entitled class.  Why shouldn’t they be in a tizzy?  They’re better than everyone else, they have a right to have guns, and we don’t.

Chris Muir picks up Mike’s list of senator’s names and addresses.  Mike has done an outstanding job with this, and this is a huge feather in his cap.  He has inspired me to take on communist Senator Larry Martin from Pickens, S.C., although I suspect I will be far less successful than Mike.  Mike spent some time shooting.  So did I.  I’ll show you.  Finally, look at the results of Mike’s handiwork!

Victor Davis Hanson observes:

In short, Obama will always poll around 45 percent. That core support is his lasting legacy. In a mere five years, by the vast expansion of federal spending, by the demonizing rhetoric of his partisan bully pulpit, and by executive orders and bizarre appointments, Obama has so divided the nation that he has created a permanent constituency that will never care as much about what he does as it cares about what he says and represents.

For elite rich liberals, whose money and privilege exempt them from the consequences of Obama’s policies, and their own ideology, he will always be their totem. He is iconic of their own progressivism and proof of their racial liberalism, and thus allows them to go on enjoying their privilege, without guilt and without worrying too much about how they got it or whether they might lose it.

For the vast new millions on federal disability insurance, food stamps, and other entitlements, Obama is their lifeline to government support.

These are pregnant paragraphs indeed, but perhaps Hanson doesn’t want to consider where his own observations take us.  The problem has exacerbated under Obama to be sure, but the real problem runs far deeper than him or his cronies.

Obama is the leader du jour of the elitist collectivists, and they have specific designs for the hard workers in America (here referred to as middle class).

“The best short credo of liberalism came from the pen of the once canonical left-wing literary historian Vernon Parrington in the late 1920s. ‘Rid society of the dictatorship of the middle class,’” a motto that Sacramento has internalized to a man.

But for much of the entitlement state, the middle class is necessary for their own existence.  Corporations rely on the wealth of the middle class in order to hire illegal aliens to do work.  They don’t pay them enough to provide for their medical care, so the middle class provides it in insurance premiums thus ensuring that when the aliens show up at the emergency rooms all across America for treatment, the hospitals don’t go bankrupt.  Food stamps, welfare and other forms of government handouts rely on the wealth of the middle class.  Thus having low paid workers in America from foreign countries is a form of corporate welfare.  It enriches the executives and board members.

Members of boards of directors sit on multiple boards, voting policy into action, traveling from one board meeting to another, and ensuring that their friends receive membership on some influential board as well.  They travel in the same circles, ride on the same yachts, fly on the same chartered jets and drink the same expensive wine as the politicians.  The politicians ensure that the corporate welfare continues by implementing policy to support it at the national level.

But if there is an entitled class in the upper echelon of society who requires redistribution of middle class wealth, the inner cities of Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, New York, Houston and Atlanta grow no produce, make no product, and exist by funneling wealth from the suburbs and rural areas of America to their own coffers.  As much as one half of America pays no federal income taxes, and yet this (i.e., welfare and food stamps) is referred to as “slavery” by well intentioned people who want to see the impoverished become self supporting.

Slavery it is not, when food, medical care, housing and education is handed to you for free, while you have the opportunity to work yourself out of the inner city into a better future.  The slaves are the ones who suffer taxation – theft by the power of a badge and gun – in order to fund all of those benefits.

Finally, there are those who work to ensure that the system continues unabated – the police and all manner of federal law enforcement agencies.  While the police typically see themselves as sacrificing for the sake of the people, the effete, entitled, elitist sophisticates see them as Neanderthals.  Brutish and evil, but a necessary evil if the state is to function to maintain two classes of people.  Oftentimes – though not always – the police do their bidding.  The ridiculous war on drugs has few supporters within the elite establishment, but it has served to militarize the police, and that’s a positive thing to them.  SWAT teams may make people think about the likeness of America to Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union, but the elite don’t want any hint of rebellion among the ranks.  Better to overdo things and make sure than to honor the rights of the ordinary folk.

So it’s a collection of bastard groups that has designs on the middle class, and its allies sometimes agree on very little.  These groups (and many more I haven’t named) have only one thing in common: The wealth and subjugation of the middle class.  This is such a strong bond that it unites people who would otherwise hate each other.

Take careful note that the problem doesn’t just reside within the beltway of Washington, D.C.  The federal Leviathan would be powerless without the will of the people, without the agents and police to keep them in power, without the judges to sign their arrest and home-invasion warrants, without the money coming in from the workers like you and me, and without willing dupes in the counties and states who implement their laws.

You see, workers for the NSA, DOJ, DEA, EPA, DOE, and ATF, local, county, state and federal police, workers for all manner of state and county agencies, tax agents for the state and federal government, government accountants and lawyers, DHS workers, child welfare and other meddling agents, and on and on the list goes, all require your wealth and need for the host to stay alive.  They are empowered by the collective, and yet they need the collective to survive.  No one should be surprised over the notion that one half of the country is collectivist.

The totalitarians are among us.  That’s why after watching New York and Connecticut implode over gun confiscations and new gun laws, as strange as it may sound, Alabama has folks just like them.  So does South Carolina.  But also just like parasitical beings, the parasites are unconcerned about the potential death of the host.

With multiplication of the parasites the host cannot survive, but that doesn’t stop the parasites.  First comes the draining of resources, but usually soon comes disabling of the host defenses.  Gun control is an easy way to ensure compliance with the parasites while the middle class is drained dry.

Eventually the host becomes very sick and perishes.  Confiscations of IRAs and 401Ks (and nationalization of other forms of wealth) are inevitable.  That the parasites no longer have a host isn’t in the calculus.  Parasites have no conscience and do not plan ahead.  But we can and should plan ahead and see the current sickness for what it is.  It is an existential battle for life as we know it.  The parasites – the totalitarians and their allies – are among us, and the host has precious little time left.

UPDATE: See Senator Larry Martin, South Carolina, for one of our local totalitarians.

One person thinks they know the mind of Jesus concerning weapons.  “Guns are only allowed in bars if the person carrying the weapon doesn’t drink. Jesus and the disciples didn’t carry in church because no one else did.”

This is what happens when idiots write letters.  Guns didn’t exist in the time of Jesus, but swords did, and Jesus told his disciples to carry them.  As for church, I think his ninja use of the whip (Matthew 21:12) was enough to convince most people of his seriousness.  And just to emphasize the point concerning people who refuse to consider their role in protecting the little ones, I said:

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.

Those who want to worship hippie Jesus should move to the corner of Haight and Ashbury – and stop writing idiot letters.

Religious Herald:

Nearly 200 interfaith religious leaders — including at least a dozen Baptists — took out a full-page ad in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution Feb. 26 to oppose a bill in the Georgia legislature which would lift restrictions on guns in houses of worship and bars.

So in other words, nearly 200 “pastors” in the Atlanta area believe that God answers to the state.  This is a precursor to a new featured article I have coming (but is not yet ripe).  The totalitarians are among us.  They don’t live inside the beltway, they mooch off of hard workers, they cast their lot with the state, they worship the collective, and they live near and around you.  You know them.

To this article on Chuck Hagel, one commenter says “Hey Chuck, why don’t you have three more scotches and pass out on it, maybe you will change your mind if you can remember what you said yesterday.”  It appears that Chuck is a well known Washington drunk.  Another commenter says “If a grenade happened to be tossed in a room with Chuck Hagel and myself, I would have to do the right thing and push him on top of it.”  It would be a fitting end, no?

Kurt Hofmann:

I’m beginning to wonder whether we have any idea about what’s at stake when we give civilians the right to walk around with a gun.

No, that’s not Kurt.  Kurt is quoting someone who allegedly sells guns, and if he feels this way, he is violating his conscience and sinning against God and man.  On top of that he is a hypocrite and thug trying to make money doing things he thinks is bad.  He is nothing more than a whore.

David Codrea:

In the wake of public unrest where the government used deadly force against protestors, the Ukrainian Gun Owners Association has proposed an amendment to the nation’s constitution …

Finish reading the proposal at David’s place.  And there you have it.  The difference between free men and slaves.

Mike Vanderboegh has crafted an open letter to the tyrants in Connecticut responsible for the obscene gun law, and this is well worth the read.  Mike has also published a list of the names of all legislators who voted for the Connecticut gun law along with their addresses, and Mike has published their list of email addresses here.  Visit Mike’s site, take a few minutes and do what you know needs to be done.

But I have a few words for Mike, and then a few for the communists in Connecticut.  Mike says the following.

Indeed we are all His sons and daughters, and I am grateful for Paul’s prayerful reminder to me of Who I serve. However, you may conclude from my opening that I am struggling with that “diplomacy” part …

It’s okay Mike.  Cease your struggling.  While I do admire and respect you so very much, I disagree profoundly on this point.  We are most certainly not all sons and daughters of God.  The fact that we are all made in His image only heightens their guilt and highlights the distinction.

People tend to remember what they want to hear.  So for example, at Christmas people remember this: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace …,” and that’s about it.  What the passage really says is this: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men with whom He is pleased.”  Jesus also said to the Pharisees “You are of your father the devil” (John 8:44).

And God is not pleased with the men and women of Connecticut who voted in favor this this law.  God hates totalitarians of all stripes, all persuasions, in every form and manifestation and at all times in history.  Notice that I didn’t say He hates totalitarianism but loves totalitarians.  He does not.  He hates them both.  Satan is a totalitarian.

Speaking of totalitarians, David tells us once again what it looks like.  It means putting the lives of animals above humans who are made in God’s image.  We’ve seen this before, haven’t we?

So I’m not saying what I would and wouldn’t do to help my brothers in Connecticut, and this post isn’t dedicated to outlining my actions or lack thereof.  That would be stupid.  But here is one thing I can start with.  And this prayer applies to Senator Larry Martin of Pickens, Bobby Timmons of Alabama, and the legislators of Connecticut.

“Oh Lord, the last time I prayed an imprecatory prayer it was against Arlen Specter who was soon diagnosed with cancer, so I do this with much thought and trepidation.  All of the legislators who have voted the recent gun laws into effect in Connecticut have voted to inhibit man’s ability to defend and protect himself and his little ones.

Thus they have offended the Almighty, the most high God, the only sovereign and only potentate.  You have said that it would be better for a millstone to be hung around their necks.  So I pray that you would visit your wrath on them and their families to suffer for the sake of the little ones.

Teach them to obey your laws, teach them the value of human life, teach them that it is their duty both to defend their own little ones and help men and women to do the same.  If they refuse to learn, bring condemnation upon them, bring their means and ends to complete ruination, and inflict them with the reputation forever of being haters of God and haters of children.

Let their progeny remember and think of their lives for generations to come, throughout the lives of the children’s children’s children, and let them remember that their predecessors were evil men and women who would rule with a harsh hand and bitter tongue.

Bring the designs of their lives to naught, bring their aims to nothing, and bring their power down low where it is once again possible in Connecticut to defend families as God designed.

Amen.”

Times-Herald:

Because of ongoing difficulties getting enough ammunition for their .40-caliber service weapons, the Senoia Police Department will be trading them in for new 9mm pistols.

The Senoia City Council approved the trade-in and purchase of the new Glocks at Monday’s city council meeting.

“Over the past year we have had serious … difficulties finding .40-caliber ammunition,” said Senoia Police Chief Jason Edens. “We have been experiencing anything from six to eight months lead time” on getting their full order of both practice ammunition and “duty” ammo.

“It’s not obtainable by any department, not just ours,” Edens told the council.

Edens, and Councilman Jeff Fisher, said that the shortage of 40-caliber bullets is caused by the U.S. Military’s switch to the round.

“They are providing it to the military first… everybody else is second,” Fisher said.

Edens said he has done a lot of research, and there has been extensive testing done with the 9mm round. “It is performing as well as, if not better than, a .40-cal,” he said. It’s also up to 20 percent cheaper and “it is readily available, which is just very important to us.”

There are other advantages, as well. The .40-caliber magazine holds 15 rounds, while the 9mm holds 17. The 9mm bullets aren’t that much smaller than the .40-caliber, but there is less recoil with the 9mm, making it more user friendly. Plus, “we want to build a firearms program that concentrates on precision and accuracy with the shots, as opposed to just having a big chunk of lead,” Edens said.

The newer generation Glocks have a changeable back strap piece that can be customized for the size of the user’s hand.

Edens added that one of his officers, Lt. Jason Ercole, attended Glock’s Armorer School in the fall and can now do maintenance and repairs on the weapons.

The SPD will be trading in 14 used .40-caliber pistols and getting 16 new 9mm pistols. Glock will pay $300 for each trade-in, for a total cost of $2,434 for the new guns.

The military doesn’t use .40 S&W ammunition.  When looking for handgun ammunition, I can always find .22 WMR, .38., .357 Magnum, .40 and .45 (all of which I shoot and need).  I can never find 9 mm ammunition and that’s a good thing because I don’t shoot 9 mm.  The chief has his story backwards.

It sounds to me like the department just wants new firearms and is making up a story to support it.  Unfortunately, the city council is stupid enough to believe them.

You can’t make this stuff up.

He was a Doraville police officer, until a tip led to an investigation and ultimately his dismissal.

“One of our officers was trying to sell an automatic weapon,” says Doraville Police Officer Gene Callaway.

Callaway tells WSB Officer Woodrow Mann had been with the department since 2008.  His attempted sale was discovered following a tip to the police.

“That led to an inquiry and we found that he was trying to sell a Class 3 weapon, which is a fully automatic weapon,” says Callaway.

When Doraville received the tip they contacted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

“Because the weapon had not been delivered,” Callaway says, “it didn’t meet their threshold for a crime.”

Mann was dismissed from the Doraville police department.  He can appeal his firing.

So let’s leave aside for a moment the issue of the NFA and the Hughes amendment (and Gun Control Act) being obscene abominations.  How does this cop get off trying to sell a class 3 weapon and not be charged with a crime?  Simply because he didn’t actually complete the sell because the ATF caught him?

Okay, so I said let’s leave behind the issue of the NFA, GCA and Hughes amendment being obscene abominations.  I lied.  I didn’t really mean it.  You know what I wouldn’t do if I had a class 3 weapon?  Sell it.  Point it at women and children like SWAT teams do.  Terrorize others with it for no good reason.  Keep it laying about unsecured.  You know.  Bad things.  Things like the police do with automatic weapons.

So tell me again how we’re not qualified to have them and can’t be trusted with such firepower.  Let’s hear it.

Reported by Mike Vanderboegh a while back, open carry is defeated in South Carolina.

A bill that would allow South Carolinians to carry guns openly or concealed without first receiving the State’s sanction through a permit was killed by Republicans. It failed to advance out of the State’s Judiciary Committee — despite a large Republican majority — under strong opposition from Republican Senator Larry Martin.

The bill is called Constitutional Carry. Backers say its premise is based on the fact that the 2^nd Amendment is the only permit needed to carry a weapon.

Understanding the Republican statist position opposing the bill requires following tortured logic. It was best described by Martin himself in response to a constituent who asked him to vote to advance the bill, as reported by BenSwan.com.

“If the 2nd amendment has been as you interpret it, why hasn’t SC law reflected that for the last 140 years? I’m sorry but you are describing an ‘unlimited’ right that has never been the case with the 2nd Amendment. My view of the 2nd Amendment has always been the right to own guns and keep them in our homes, business, and property and not to wear a gun whenever to wherever I pleased.”

He just thinks that because he is a communist.  Comments at Mike’s place seem to indicate that it was the tourism lobby in Charleston that defeated the bill.  I make no claims to knowing the real story behind the bill’s demise.  But one thing is certain – Senator Larry Martin of Pickens is either the ring leader or a stooge and tool.  In any case, he is now the target.

Gregory Smith observes “South Carolina has a pro-gun governor and an anti-gun Senate. This defeat is shameful, this is the work of self-hating Southerners, scalawags that would rather kiss the carpetbaggers than pass pro-gun laws … I believe there’s gonna be political hell in South Carolina. I want to know who are the 17 bastards that voted against the 2nd Amendment, are any of them Republican? If so then it’s time to excommunicate them from public office.”

I think the retribution needs to be greater than that.  Mr. Martin needs to feel uncomfortable even being out in public.  He has now declared himself to be an enemy of the people.  And oh, by the way, as to the LEOs who helped to kill the bill, you are also an enemy of the people.

The Week:

Or, as one member of the range put it, “When it comes to gun laws, there’s the whole country, and then there’s New York.” While that may be a slight exaggeration, New York is indeed the polar opposite of lax states like Utah, Alaska, and Arizona, and is arguably the toughest in the country to own a gun. Here, no one is actually entitled to possess a firearm, at least not until the police give the go-ahead.

“Your right can never be taken away from you,” continued Leung, “but your privilege can be revoked at any given time. The NYPD is the licensing entity. They can add any kinds of stipulations they want. And they don’t have to explain why.”

It makes sense to keep guns on a short leash, Leung acknowledges, because “you want people to realize this is not a toy …

As we were talking, a middle-aged man in a grey suit who was carrying a black plastic case sat down at the table next to us. He unlocked it, removed a 9mm Beretta and nonchalantly placed the pistol on the table. Then he took out a box of bullets and started loading them into a magazine, one by one.

First a comment about putting a “box of bullets” on the table and filling his magazine.  They weren’t “bullets,” they were cartridges.  Second, this is extremely bad form.  No magazines get loaded until on range, with weapons pointed downrange.  This is true of everywhere I shoot, many places.  They have no concept of range safety.

Second, this range owner is a sad testimony to the mentality of pitiful New Yorkers who unwisely rely on the police for protection they cannot (and have no intention to) provide.  The police have usurped God’s authority, who commands the ability of self defense and defense of the little ones.

If the police have usurped God’s authority, the people have abdicated their responsibility and duty before the Almighty.  They will answer for that one awful day, along with collectivists who put them in that position to begin with.  Evil with the one doesn’t obviate the other.  I’m sorry for my New York readers who are good, honest folk and who don’t live in NYC.  But if you’re like this range owner, you deserve everything you get.

Hell will freeze over before I ever abdicate my God-given rights to own guns to a cop or judge.  Oh, and since I haven’t mentioned it in a few weeks, to Remington, Kimber and any other gun manufacturer in the empire state: why are you still there?

What will it take with you?  My most recent rifle purchase was a Winchester Model 70 rather than a Remington 700.  My Model 70 will be made right down the road from me in Columbia, S.C.