Arms and the Law

The key appears to be adding a bit of vanadium. Interesting how valued it was -- the steel was made in India (tho I've heard some say Iran), shipped to Syria, and then distributed across the mideast and Europe.

If your reflexes are slow, don't force a burglary victim to open their gun safe.

Cert denied in Peruta, and Justices Thomas and Gorsuch dissent. That case had upheld the California gun law. But cert was also denied in Binderup, with Justices Ginsberg and Sotomayor essentially dissenting (they write that they would grant the petition). That case had struck down the felon possession ban, as applied to a nonviolent felon whose case came long ago.

So there were four votes to take a case, all that is required, but they split between two cases. Rather strange. Thomas and Gorsuch I'd take as serious votes. The other two... maybe symbolic, cast only because they knew it wouldn't make a difference? But why do it without writing an opinion to go with the dissent? Of course the results of denial the two cases are 180 degrees apart, but if the Court really wanted a 2A case the votes were there.

Summed up here. A majority believe that the NRA either has the right amount of influence, or should have more influence.

In line with other surveys of which I have heard, 19% of gun owners believe they are members of the NRA. If that were true, NRA membership would be 10-20 million. Prior surveys have found that many people are not too clear about what makes you a member, and believe that belonging to a gun club or having taken an NRA course is all it takes.

A Canadian sniper in Iraq hits his man at 3,540 meters, or 3,871 yards. This puts him well ahead of the US record, 2,300 meters, or just over 2,500 yards.

Hat tip to Steve Schreiner...

Should Greece complain of American universities' cultural appropriation of philosophy, logic, drama, sciences, speech and rhetoric, architecture, medicine, art, and competitive sports? "You guys didn't invent that, we did!"

His Facebook page tells you all you need to know about him. Of course his political beliefs will be mentioned in the mass media... not at all.

UPDATE: more, on from folks looking at his Twitter feed. "Trump is a traitor. Trump has destroyed our democracy. It's time to destroy Trump & Co." Here's a reported picture of him:

Rumor has it that he was a moderate Bernie Bro but was radicalized by watching CNN and Stephen Colbert....

Over at Bearing Arms, Bob Owens has thoughts about the nominee for the Secretary of the Army, Mark Green. All I need to know is that he believes an armed citizenry is a check and balance on the government, and that therefore citizens should be allowed to own anything the military has, including ships of war.

A view so hardcore that James Madison and Thomas Jefferson would have approved it...

UPDATE: oh, yes, he and his work will be missed. I forgot.

New Jersey Supreme Court holds that Second Amendment protects having a weapon (or at least a machete) inside your house. On top of it, the issue wasn't raised in the trial court, but the New Jersey court finds that it was "plain error" that it can correct anyway.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform has released it; I agree with David Codrea that reports are nice, but how about action?

NSSF is reporting that May 2017 had nearly a million (988,473) NICS background checks processed, an increase of 6.5% over May 2016. The media are apt to treat the great increase in firearm sales over past years as caused by people buying out of fear of confiscation or other limitation. I'd say any such fears are remarkably low just now, yet the sales levels not only are high but increasing. What we're seeing is a long term trend as Americans rediscover their love of guns and shooting. This is catastrophic for the antigun movement.

The U.S. was "created by int'l community in Treaty of Paris in 1783." It's from a professor of history at Harvard, who also chairs their American Studies department, so it must be true.

ISIS accuses Kathy Griffin of cultural appropriation.

David Codrea has notes on the photographer behind the pic of Kathy Griffin holding a bloody fake Trump head. Seems she's had a lot of event cancellations, and the photog just had his exhibition at the Leica Gallery vanish.

Story here. Apparently they got 16,000 files, which is described as 1% of the total (1.6 million permits?)

The FBI has arrested a man (a school security monitor, no less) for threatening the life of U.S. Representative Martha McSally. Local "protests" against her have focused on her support for Donald Trump's proposals, and that support was the motive for his death threats. So much for Tucson's Revive Civility Month.

I wonder how much publicity this would get if political roles were reversed.....

John Lott points out that in 2014, 54% of American counties had zero murders, and 69% had either zero or one murder. In comparison, the 1% of counties with the worst murder rates contributed 37% of the total murders nationwide, and the 5% of counties with the highest murder rates contributed 68% of the murders nationwide.

Is your meth gluten-free? I trust the offer of free testing is tongue-in-cheek.

Clayton Cramer finds a 1775 reference to a firearm "with a Telescope sight." This does push the dating back quite a bit; from what I can find, most sources put the origins of scope sights no earlier than the 1830s.