Sebastian notes another line item that says we can use non-lethal firearms to introduce folks to shooting. So, after they tell us not to show human shaped targets they suggest non-lethals like airsoft and paintball which are sports where instead of shooting human shaped targets you shoot actual humans?
Bitter is liveblogging the NSSF webcast. She notes regrettably that there is no clarification that NSSF is not embracing these action items as is. One of those action items was this:
Public acceptance of rifles and shotguns is greater than acceptance of handguns, the latter having some negative connotations for some individuals in American society.
Action Item 163. Efforts to promote acceptance of shooting sports should focus on rifles and shotguns
My Google-fu is mightier than your Google-fu.
That took, what, 23 minutes?
In all fairness, it does help that I have ‘an audience’.
HR 6310 will allow the firearms and ammunition industry to pay the FAET on a quarterly basis, the same payment schedule as every other industry that supports conservation. Currently firearms and ammunition manufacturers must pay the FAET bi-weekly. This payment schedule forces many manufacturers to borrow money to ensure on-time payment, and industry members spend thousands of man-hours administering the necessary paperwork to successfully complete the bi-weekly payments — monies that are due long before manufacturers are paid by their customers. This legislation will not lower the amount of conservation dollars collected by the tax.
Personally, I don’t care for the tax. IIRC, it’s 11% (and 10% on handguns). And, in TN, add 9.25% for sales tax and quite a bit of your purchase price is taxes. And the other $0.10 per box of ammo. Anyway, gun owners pay a lot of taxes.
But I’d think the hunter sorts would like the fact that the ammo and weapons I buy to not hunt with are funding their hobby.
Also, one reason why building your own EBR is cheaper: no tax on parts.
Now, what stands out to me is the jump from 2005 to 2006. With people supporting self-defense as one of the top reasons to own a gun, my guess is Katrina. Thank you, New Orleans.
This is one of the dumbest things I’ve seen:
Thousands of parents could face a choice: volunteer at your child’s school or pay a $100 fine.
A bill introduced in the Ohio legislature would require parents to donate at least 13 hours of time to their school district each year or pay the price. And, if parents failed to pay up, the fine could be deducted from their state income tax refunds.
How many tax dollars go to schools? And it’s never enough. Ever.
Seen at the Volokh conspiracy:
The Poker Players Association has an urgent action item:
Tuesday, the House Financial Services Committee will review a bill, H.R. 5767, that would block the implementation of UIGEA regulations. In order to get this bill out of Committee on onto the House Floor, we need your help. We need you to contact the committee and express your support for H.R. 5767, as well as the King amendment which will refine the bill language. PPA strongly supports H.R. 5767 and the King amendment, but this important bill and amendment won’t pass without your help!
Call or Fax the House Financial Services Committee* Democrats’ Committee Office:* Ph: (202) 225-4247 – FAX: (202) 225-6952 Republicans’ Committee Office:* Ph: (202) 225-7502 – FAX: (202) 226-4301
So, there was a bit in the paper yesterday athat said: Applications for concealed handgun permits triple in a year. And now the article doesn’t even mention that. It is here and mentions they are slightly down.
The original article that other reports are based on (still not corrected) said: Applications for Tennessee carry permits statewide have skyrocketed over the last five years, increasing from 237 in 2003 to 195,251 in 2007. Applications more than tripled between 2006 and 2007, records show.
Wow, that would be quite an increase. And our local Merchant of Death tried to clue them in:
That’s right, a near thousandfold increase in applications. Hm. I doubt it. The Channel 8 guy did too, and didn’t run the story at all, in fear it might be wrong.
I clued Channel 6 onto this information, before they did the interview. Newschick didn’t particularly care, figured she’d still do the interview. Same questions, same deal. Only, when they got back to the studio, all of the “find out why carry permit holder numbers in Tennessee are SKYROCKETING!” audio they did was fairly useless, since the real numbers actually show a decrease in permit applications, regardless of whether or not we’re seeing an increase in them here in our store. Exactly the opposite of what they originally wanted to talk about. Suspect that trucated their useable video a bit, too.
Alright, pay attention. This one is important.
One of the epic battles we gun rights people face that is far more damaging than anything The Brady Campaign To Prevent Gun Ownership can ever do is the fighting amongst ourselves. You’ve heard it before. We call hit hunters v. shooters; fudds v. gun nuts; or, as Bob Ricker says, self-defense whackos v. sportsmen. We all seemed to unite after the Jim Zumbo incident. After all, the industry got it pretty quickly. And hats off to them for that.
But this divide can quickly come back to haunt us. And this weekend, that could have happened. Michael Bane:
These items Jim references are here, buried deep in the back of the omnibus “The Future of Hunting and the Shooting Sports,” prepared by NSSF and Response Management, produced under a grant from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service:
PAGE 235
Public acceptance of rifles and shotguns is greater than acceptance of handguns, the latter having some negative connotations for some individuals in American society.Action Item 163. Efforts to promote acceptance of shooting sports should focus on rifles and shotguns.
Now, if you wanna know what keeps a gun blogger up late at night, this is it. This report marginalizes the shooter/handgunner demographic by that rather poorly thought out action item. As I’ve noted before, hunting is on the decline but gun sales are up. People are buying defensive weapons (handguns and evil black rifles, specifically).
And, frankly, the math supports my contention. Check out bitter’s lengthy piece on fear and the shooting sports.
And this fear of handguns thing is grossly overstated. In fact, there is quite often positive coverage of the shooting sports in the press (see here, here and here for very recent and real examples). When educated, folks in the press can highlight these sports and do so positively. Industry should embrace GSSF, SASS, IDPA and USPSA and promote them.
Being the shooter type, that really concerned me that an industry study would conclude that marginalizing the fastest growing demographic was a possible action item. This mentality could quickly get the Zumbo juices flowing again pit us against our allies. Jim Shepherd agrees:
Shooters – especially those who primarily shoot handguns feel they’ve been consistently ignored. So too, I’m hearing, are some of the manufacturers who see their dollars going into a pot where they don’t feel they’re getting equitable shares.
So, there’s an undercurrent of tension that most of those in attendance will do everything possible to either downplay or minimize.
But the stage is set- and the Survey itself has contributed to the tension with its long litany of suggested action items.
Bottom line, if the survey of “recruitment and retention strategies” is endorsed or adopted as written, the damage will be certain. It will also be obvious very quickly, due to the fact that the “blogosphere” is already chattering about the report.
In short, the natives are restless. They’re not revolting -yet, but they’re getting tired of the status quo.
Indeed. And Bane notes:
The L’affaire du Zumbo sent a message to the industry that the tail — the huge part of the culture involved in sports shooting and self-defense issues — was now officially wagging the dog — the hunting side of the industry. That’s something we in the tail have known for a long time…we buy the lion’s share of the guns and ammo, pay the lion’s share of the federal excise tax and face the lion’s share of the heat from our enemies.
Bitter notes: So did someone throw a pot shot? I have to say, I think they did. At best, it was careless and a result of internal biases.
So, after I got all this info this weekend, I was a bit concerned. I decided to go straight to the source. I emailed someone at NSSF and the replied pretty quickly that they wanted me to call them. So, I did. NSSF’s Rep stated that the they do not endorse these action items. That the firm that did the study (Responsive Management) generated 196 action items. Obviously, some of them are unacceptable. The concern among some folks is that NSSF put their name on it. And NSSF was clear to me that they did not endorse these action items and that one of the goals of this week’s summit was to go through these list of action items and formulate a plan.
And I’m with Bitter on this one and hope that tomorrow’s session includes a very thorough condemnation of this line item.
Not today.
It’s like they’re teasing us or something.
Odds are opinion is written by Scalia. That’s a positive.
Could be today. In the next few minutes. ScotusBlog is swamped and connection is spotty. Alternate route here.
Someone in the press points out the obvious: Criminals tend to ignore wishful ‘Gun Free Zones’
Really? Who knew?
Names changed to protect the, well, fine people
In the early 1990s, I knew this girl who we’ll call Allison. Two things about Allison were that she was 1) smoking hot and 2) queer as a football bat. Seriously, we’d go to the mall and ogle chicks together. She was very nice, smart, fun to hang out with, and just generally good people.
She had another lesbian friend who we’ll call Tammy. Now, Tammy and Allison were not a couple. That always surprised me because, honestly, how many lesbians can there be on a Baptist college campus in Jefferson City, Tennessee? I’m guessing that market was pretty small. But I digress.
This ain’t a post about that. It’s a post about this. When your average person met Allison, they’d never know she was queer as a plaid rabbit. She was just a regular college chick who happened to be hot.
Now, her friend Tammy was different. Within a few minutes of meeting her, you’d know she was queer as fish feet. Because she’d tell you. Over and over. She’d even remind people who already knew. And she’d up in your face asking you if you had a problem with it and why it made you uncomfortable. It was quite annoying. To the point folks stopped asking her to come around.
I get that same vibe from a lot of open carry activists some time. Seriously, don’t interrupt someone’s dinner to make your point. All you’re doing is pissing those folks off. And you’re scaring the white people.
Whether your issue is gay, gun owner, your race, your religion, or hobby; people don’t like you in their face.
Update: In comments, Chris says:
these people had cooperation of the restaurant including that they had microphones and a sound system… that is no different than the golden corral hosting the lions club… now if one guy stands up at the olive garden and spouts that he has a gun, that is a problem… but the incident where the people raised their hands was pre-planned and even featured local politicians as speakers…
Did not know that.
Ya know, I’m not surprised when some nitwit thinks banning handguns is a good idea. I am surprised, however, when such a nitwit is in my state:
Current laws on possession of handguns by juveniles are fine and appear to be enforced, from my vantage point in Juvenile Court. But as we all know, handguns continue to be available to Nashville kids. Something more needs to be done.
The current laws are not curing the problem. They are a Band-Aid. Kids are still carrying handguns, still being charged with robberies using handguns, and kids are still being injured by handguns.
The most practical and effective method for handgun control is also the easiest to describe: Ban handguns.
Couple things: I don’t think you know what practical or effective means. I’d also lay 5:1 you couldn’t tell me what current gun laws are.
Whenever a place has lots of gun crime, their local politicos are quick to posture and subsequently pass laws that only affect the people not committing the gun crime in the first place. In New Jersey, there’s a push for a one gun a month bill. Scott Bach tells us why that bill is a bad idea:
A New Jersey Court recently pronounced: “There is no rational relationship between restricting the number of guns that a licensed gun dealer and a licensed gun owner can transact per month and the frequency of illegal gun possession and crime.”
In so holding, the Court voided a local ordinance that rationed firearms specifically to law abiding citizens pre-certified by the State as having no criminal or mental health record after passing a 13-point background investigation.
Trying to reduce gun crime by rationing firearms to law abiding citizens is a little like trying to reduce stabbings by rationing steak knives to restaurant goers, which is why the Court found the ordinance to be irrational. The criminal misuse of any lawful product is not a function of the number of units sold to honest citizens; it’s a function of how effectively society deals with those who misuse them
Despite judicial recognition of the fallacy of gun rationing, gun ban extremist group CeaseFire NJ, embarrassed by its loss at the local level, is now pushing for passage of statewide gun rationing in the form of Assembly Bill A339, misleadingly citing statistics to buoy their latest whopper — that handguns bought by law abiding citizens from New Jersey licensed dealers are significantly involved in crime and illegal trafficking.
I do not think it means what you think it means.
This one left me speechless. However, it did not leave Bruce speechless:
A Lakeville man says he feels violated after two police officers woke him up at 3 a.m. to tell him his door was unlocked.
Their surprise visit was part of a public service campaign to remind residents to secure their homes to prevent thefts. Usually, officers just leave notices on doors.
But they went further in Troy Molde’s case on Thursday. Police entered the house where four children under 7 were having a sleepover, and then went upstairs to Molde’s bedroom.
The source of Toronto’s illegal guns is Chicago? That’s odd because guns are banned in Chicago too.
Remember, I do this to entertain me, not you.
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