Archive for the 'Gun Control' Category

Stupid news.

Tom Holland, president of SmartGunz, LLC, today announced pre-sales ordering availability of the company’s 9mm smart gun Sentry® pistol. An initial 10% discounted retail price is being offered for law enforcement and corrections agencies at $2,695.00 (single item purchase, additional quantity discounts provided) while the regular (civilian) retail price is $2,995.00 per unit. Product deliveries are anticipated to begin sometime during 4th quarter 2021. The 9mm Sentry® pistol is the company’s flagship smart gun technology firearm for use in prisoner transfer / transport as well as civilian home defense applications.

The 9 mm Sentry® features SmartGunz’s patent pending lock-out technology that is integrated with an RFID chip contained in a glove worn by the officer / owner. The officer must depress the grip safety on the firearm while wearing an RFID-enabled glove to permit firing. This helps to ensure that each SmartGunz Sentry firearm fires each and every time when it is supposed to AND ONLY when it is supposed to!

“Honey, tell the rapist and murderer to wait.  I need to get my glove on before I have a gun fight with him!  What?  Yea I know it stinks to high heaven – I haven’t washed the thing.  Oh wait!  I left it in the car.  Or not.  I don’t know where it is.”

Hahahahahaha!

Hahahahahaha!

These guys kill me.  For the same price you would spend on a boutique competition gun, you can be unable to respond in the middle of the night.

Hahahahahaha!

Prior: Smart Guns Tag

In this video West Virginia attorney John Bryan details the decision of the Fourth Circuit concerning his client.  It’s a long video, but if you want to read the decision it can be found here.

This case should have been easy and quick.  In U.S. Versus Black, the Fourth Circuit had this to say.

Being a felon in possession of a firearm is not the default status. More importantly, 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. United States v. King, 990 F.2d 1552, 1559 (10th Cir. 1993).

In this West Virginia case, Walker wasn’t a felon, and West Virginia permits open carry of firearms.  But you see, Black was carrying a handgun, and Walker was carrying one of those evil ARs, so the Fourth Circuit had to do something.

Contrary to Walker’s interpretation, the Black decision does not dictate that, in a state like West Virginia where it is legal to openly carry a firearm, the act of openly carrying a firearm can never engender reasonable suspicion.

Keep your eye on the card – now you see it, now you don’t.  Because we say so.

They go on to differentiate between handguns carried in a hip holster and the awful, wicked AR-15, which is certainly the weapon of choice by mass shooters – so says the media.  That eighty people per weekend get shot in Chicago with handguns isn’t really germane.

Nor is it germane that gangs result from the evisceration of the inner city due to fatherless families and financial encouragement to have children out of wedlock, or that Coyote hunting in West Virginia and elsewhere is commonplace and a man walking in the middle of nowhere preparing to hunt Coyotes should be fairly routine stuff to the tyrants in the police force of Putnam County.

[Note: One reason guys hunt Coyotes is because they sit in wait for deer to deliver fawns, and then eat the young, disturbing the deer herd size.  Coyotes are predators.  In groups they will also threaten people.]

What matters is that the Fourth Circuit is out of Richmond and probably reads every major rag published daily by the legacy media.  Having said all of that, the real root of the problem lies somewhere else.

It lies with the folks in Putnam County, and especially with Sheriff Bobby Eggleton.  A group of people will always take on the personality of its leader.  The offending officer in this case was vulgar, obscene, rude and tyrannical, and couldn’t go three words without cursing at Mr. Walker.  I suspect that’s what the Sheriff is like too.

So the Sheriff is to blame, but probably also the County Commissioners, who should be run out of town on a rail for allowing this sort of thing to happen.

Sheriff Bobby Eggleton: beggleton@putnamwv.org

County Commissioner Brian Ellis: bellis@putnamwv.org

County Commissioner Ron Foster: rfoster@putnamwv.org

County Commissioner Andy Skidmore: askidmore@putnamwv.org

Prosecuting Attorney Mark Sorsaia: prosecutingattorney@putnamwv.org

Here it is.

A majority of the Judges of this Court in regular active service has voted for rehearing en banc of this case. Sixth Circuit Rule 35(b) provides as follows: The effect of the granting of a hearing en banc shall be to vacate the previous opinion and judgment of this court, to stay the mandate and to restore the case on the docket sheet as a pending appeal. Accordingly, it is ORDERED, that the previous decision and judgment of this court are vacated, the mandate is stayed, and this case is restored to the docket as a pending appeal.

Short and to the point.  This isn’t over yet.  It shouldn’t be.  It was an awful usurpation of power, and a stupid thing for Trump to do.

Questions.

Let me help the licensed regime journalists with some questions this remarkable outburst gives rise to…

“Mr. President, if you plan to use force against American citizens, can you tell us how many BCTs the American military has currently deployable within the United States?” https://t.co/hgYGwH6Nzt

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) June 23, 2021

“Can you explain how you would employ bombers to hold territory, like a city? What means would you use to identify targets to bomb within the United States? What would the rules of engagement be when using bombers against American citizens?”

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) June 23, 2021

“Have you considered that the military forces of the National Guard in red states, which include aircraft, artillery and infantry, may refuse or even oppose your campaign against American citizens? Would you attack those forces?”

— Kurt Schlichter (@KurtSchlichter) June 23, 2021

And he continues. It’s brutal.

Splendid.  Frankly, to hear a politician speak this way is unseemly, vulgar, uneducated, unbefitting, unrefined, and indecorous.

As for the facts of the matter, I think the following groups might have something to say about this speech: VC, AQI, AQAP, and sandaled Afghan tribesmen wearing pajamas on the mountainsides of the Hindu Kush.  That about covers it – Vietnam to Yemen.

It’s not just the Ninth Circus.  It’s local and state courts too, and even in such states as South Carolina.

A state judge has ruled in favor of the state attorney general’s office over the city of Columbia in a lawsuit about a trio of gun laws the city passed in 2019.

Judge Jocelyn Newman ruled in favor of S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson’s office in the case. Wilson sued the city back in January 2020, initially attempting to have the matter heard before the state Supreme Court. However, the Supreme Court referred the case back to the lower courts. Wilson subsequently took the case to the court of common pleas in April 2020, and both sides have been filing various pleadings and motions ever since.

The three gun ordinances were adopted by the city in 2019. One of them added homemade “ghost guns” to the city’s nuisance ordinance. Another allowed for the seizure of guns from people under an extreme risk protection order. And the third prohibits the possession of guns within 1,000 feet of a school.

Wilson has long argued that, in almost all cases, state laws on guns take precedence in the Palmetto State, and that the regulation of firearms is beyond the reach of a city or county.

The attorney general, in court filings, has cited a section of SC law that says, “no governing body of any county, municipality, or other political subdivision in the state may enact or promulgate any regulation or ordinance that regulates or attempts to regulate: The transfer, ownership, possession, carrying, or transportation of firearms, ammunition, components of firearms or any combination of these things.”

In her ruling, Newman said that the city’s gun laws violate the state’s statutes as they relate to firearms, and are invalid.

“We’ve said for three decades now that state law doesn’t allow cities, towns or counties to regulate firearms, so we appreciate the judge’s ruling,” Wilson said in a release. “These Columbia ordinances clearly violate the state law that prohibits local governments from passing any gun laws or ordinances that regulate the transfer, ownership, or possession of firearms.”

Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin said the city plans to file a motion to reconsider the decision and, if it is denied, the city will appeal.

The case has taken a winding path through court. At one point, Benjamin, an attorney, had planned to argue the case himself if it went to trial. However, that trial never happened, as Newman ultimately granted Wilson’s request for a ruling on pleadings that had been filed with the court.

“I find it somewhat offensive and insulting that the people of Columbia were not offered the opportunity to make its case in court,” Benjamin told The State on Tuesday. “These ordinances are lawful and constitutional and deserve the full attention of our judges and judicial system.”

Wilson, meanwhile, stressed the power the state government has in shaping gun laws across South Carolina.

“The General Assembly, through state law, has reserved for itself the ability to protect its citizens’ Second Amendment rights,” Wilson said. “State law means just that — the law of the entire state. Therefore, the remedy for the city is to convince the Legislature to change the law, not to disregard it. This ruling now provides clear guidance to all local governments on future matters of gun regulation.”

Benjamin, who has been bullish on gun laws, including an effort to ban bump stocks in Columbia, insists the three city gun ordinances in question are necessary.

“The bipartisan effort to prohibit the manufacturing of untraceable ghost guns, to keep guns out of our schools and to secure more red flag laws that have been proven to save lives are important enough to warrant the hard work, attention and focus of the president of the United States, and Senator (Lindsey) Graham on red flag laws, in particular,” the mayor said. “Surely the courts could have heard our arguments.”

What should have taken a single day back in 2019, has now reached a conclusion.

Or maybe not.  They threaten to continue winding this through the courts.

America is divided, and not just between North, South, East and West.  Or just between states.  The division is between rural areas and urban, between one neighborhood and the next.

You can expect to see more of this in the future.  My own opinion of this is that the Mayor of Columbia and his attorneys should be confined to prison for wasting the time and money of the citizens of South Carolina.

But I guess Columbia loves its tyrants.

Fox News.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily blocked a federal district court ruling that would have repealed California’s assault weapons ban.

In a Monday panel decision in Miller v. Bonta, the appellate court put the June 4 order from District Court Judge Roger Benitez old hold as the court awaits the outcome of another case. Benitez had ruled that the ban violated the Second Amendment.

“The district court’s June 4, 2021 order and judgment are stayed pending resolution of Rupp v. Bonta,” the court said. “The stay shall remain in effect until further order of this court.”

The Rupp case, which also deals with the assault weapons ban and has already been briefed before the Ninth Circuit, had also been put on hold as the court handles other Second Amendment cases that could effect it.

You knew that would happen, right?  And you know how the Rupp case will end, right?

The Ninth Circus strikes again.

WSJ.

Texas is renewing a strategy that seeks to circumvent federal gun-control laws, one that lawmakers hope makes its way to the Supreme Court to test longstanding doctrine on gun regulation.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott gathered with Republican lawmakers at the Alamo Thursday to ceremonially sign several gun-related bills passed during the recent legislative session, including one making the open carry of handguns without a license legal, and another allowing state residents to buy Texas-made gun silencers without a federal license.

And when Kansas passed that law, I said beware because Kansas wasn’t serious and had no intention of protecting its citizens from FedGov overreach.

““Passing the bill is a first step,” said Rachel Malone, the Texas director of Gun Owners of America, an advocacy group. She said it could be years before silencers, also known as suppressors, can be bought and sold in Texas, because the measure needs to wend its way through federal courts.”

This is silly and trivial.  It misunderstands the point of nullification, and they may as well hang it up now.  The federal courts will never find in their favor, and the SCOTUS won’t hear the case.  Texans who make use of this law are set up to be hanged out to dry.

Nullification only has teeth if the state is prepare to ignore the rulings of federal courts and send agents of the state to arrest and imprison agents of the FedGov who attempt to enforce the laws which are the subject of nullification.

Ms. Malone has given up the case before it ever becomes a case.  This is nothing more than symbolism.  Call me when a state of really ready to do nullification the right way.

So says the Missouri Justice Department.

The Justice Department is warning Missouri officials that the state can’t ignore federal law, after the governor signed a bill last week that bans police from enforcing federal gun rules.

In a letter sent Wednesday night and obtained by The Associated Press, Justice officials said the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause outweighs the measure that Gov. Mike Parson signed into law Saturday. The new rules penalize local police departments if their officers enforce federal gun laws.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Brian Boynton said the law threatens to disrupt the working relationship between federal and local authorities, they said in the letter, noting that Missouri receives federal grants and technical assistance.

“The public safety of the people of the United States and citizens of Missouri is paramount,” Boynton wrote in the letter.

So let me explain how you know someone knows his own argument to be weak.  They use multiple leaky buckets to try to stem the leaks.  That’s what the acting AG has done here.

First of all, he says simply that you can’t do this, just because.  Federal vs. state, and they win.  But he knows that the state can indeed do this, and the intestinal fortitude will dictate the outcome.  If the governor sends the state police to arrest any agent of the FedGov who tries to enforce federal laws, then he wins.  It doesn’t even appear this bill goes that far – it just prevents agents of the state from enforcing federal laws.

Second, since he knows he loses the first argument, he throws in working relationships and – you guessed it, money.  We don’t want to lose FedGov money.  That’s the real reason, you see, he’s so scared.  Loss of money.

Third, since he knows that he loses the first and second arguments (if liberty is more important than money), he throws the final plea out there.  Consider public safety, which is of course none of his business.  That’s the business of the law makers and governor.

Since he loses on all three accounts, the people of Missouri may safely ignore him.  His staff can’t even craft a letter without giving their hand away.

Dean Weingarten writing at Ammoland.

It was a major piece of legislation, arguably the first time the Federal Government had significantly infringed on the right to keep and bear arms, protected by the Second Amendment.

Attorney General Cummings was asked to testify before the powerful Ways and Means Committee in the House, which was considering the bill.

In the original bill, the focus was on pistols and revolvers, short-barreled shotguns, concealable firearms, silencers, and machine guns. Short barreled rifles were not included.

[ … ]

Representative Harold Knutson, of Minnesota, asks Attorney General Homer Cummings if he may add “rifles” to the bill and raise the barrel length to 18 inches, to protect deer hunting rifles in his home state. Cummings is bewildered by the request. It does not make any sense.  Eventually, Cummings says it is acceptable to him, to gain the approval of Representative Knutson. Cummings needs the votes on the committee to pass the bill. From the hearing:

Mr.KNUTSON. General, would there be any objection, on page 1, line 4, after the word” shotgun” to add the words” or rifle” having a barrel less than 18 inches? The reason I ask that is I happen to come from a section of the State where deer hunting is a very popular pastime in the fall of the year and, of course, I would not like to pass any legislation to forbid or make it impossible for our people to keep arms that would permit them to hunt deer. 

Attorney General CUMMINGS. Well, as long as it is not mentioned at all, it would not interfere at all.

Mr. KNUTSON. It seems to me that an 18 -inch barrel would make this provision stronger than 16 inches, knowing what I do about firearms.

Attorney General CUMMINGS. Well, there is no objection as far as we are concerned to including rifles after the word” shotguns” if you desire.

After this exchange, Representative Knutson fades from the picture. He has a few questions later. On page 87, he makes sure that rifles with barrels over 18 inches are exempted from the bill.

Quinn Otto-Moudry makes the same observation in an article in The Cornell Review examining the NFA hearings, in September of 2020 …

[ … ]

In the remaining transcripts, the focus is on pistols, machine guns, and sawed-off shotguns. Rifles are barely mentioned. Sawed-off shotguns are referred to repeatedly.

The record is clear. Today, we deal with the bizarre regulatory world where short-barreled rifles are tightly regulated and taxed, while pistols with virtually the same capability, only more concealable, are honored and recognized by the Supreme Court as protected by the Second Amendment to the Constitution.

I knew that from reading the transcript (yes, I actually spent the time to read the entire transcript of the awful, ignorant proceeding).  But thanks to Dean for bringing this back up again.

In the main, idiotic prohibition laws created gangsters.  Stupid movies demonized suppressors (which is badly needed today for hearing protection, something OSHA would tell you too).

So in order to respond to the problem they created from prohibition, and in order to be out in front of scary Hollywood movies, they doubled down on stupid and created the NFA.

Handguns are much more devastating than SBRs, suppressors or anything regulated by the NFA, so look for increased attention to pistols to address inner city crime, a problem that Congress created themselves by the evisceration of the inner city family by rendering it fatherless.

Here is the paradigm.  Congress creates problems by doing something stupid, Congress tries to address the problems they create by doing more stupid things, and then Congress doubles down and makes matters worse by compounding their “solutions” (which is a description of the GCA, a compounded problem that exacerbates the stupidity of the NFA).  It’s stupid (the GCA) on top of stupid (the NFA) on top of stupid (prohibition and Hollywood).

At some point we need a year of Jubilee where all laws become null and void so we can throw the bums out and start over.

I repeat myself.  If you hired every gun mechanic working for FN from its Columbia, S.C. factory and put them in office and in the bureaucracy, we’d be much better off than with the elected politicians.  Or if you want to keep your good pistols, then just hire dogs from the local dog park.  We’d still be better off.

News about Nevada.