Joe points out that the term gun safety is back. They anti-gunners were big into this term a bit back. It seemed to go away. After all, I’m a gun safety advocate and think everyone should learn the four rules. Yet the press will refer to them as such. And the pro-gun forces will always be called the gun lobby. Remember, it is taken as a fact that the gun lobby is responsible for Zumbo losing his job even though the gun lobby didn’t even issue a presser until the incident was concluded.

Any way, this reminds me a bit back when an alleged gun safety expert was doing an online chat. A reader asked:

I asked if my low SN 1903 would be safe with modern factory ammo.

No answer was given, of course.

Seems we’ll be having dinner with Glenn Beck! Info on the bash here.

Snowflakes in Hell is one year old.

In Michigan:

Six years after new rules made it much easier to get a license to carry concealed weapons, the number of Michiganders legally packing heat has increased more than six-fold.

But dire predictions about increased violence and bloodshed [repeated at length by the press – ed] have largely gone unfulfilled, according to law enforcement officials and, to the extent they can be measured, crime statistics.

The incidence of violent crime in Michigan in the six years since the law went into effect has been, on average, below the rate of the previous six years. The overall incidence of death from firearms, including suicide and accidents, also has declined.

SMLE.

I knew politics was dirty but that’s pretty low.

In Jersey, it looks as though the bill requiring reporting of a theft of guns in some arbitrary amount of time is set to pass. Now, when you’re burgled, you may be victimized twice. Another gun law that only makes life difficult for the law-abiding.

Seems a man is teaching the elderly martial arts with their walking sticks. In other news, the UK plans to ban walking sticks. Meanwhile, this is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen. But I suppose that when you ban effective means of self defense, ineffective ones become a reality.

hostmatters is moving my site to a new server. You shouldn’t notice but if you do, that’s why.

I don’t care who you are, that’s funny.

Via tam.

The NRA’s Chris Cox has written a letter to acting ATF Director Michael Sullivan on ATF abuses. It is here.

DC Gun Case:

We have just received DC’s Merits Brief and Joint Appendix.

Update: In other news, 172 combined pages is a brief?

Update 2: Lots of familiar names quoted, like Kellermann, the VPC, Cornell. Good, those are easily refuted.

I’m not all hip with the newest fashions on Al Gore’s Tubes of Internets. But WTF is Twitter? I mean, other than a site that takes longer to load than my attention span can deal with.

AC compelled me to ask.

Tam:

Yes, you’re reading it right. On CNN this morning more people were interested in who got custody of Britney’s kids than in who got custody of “The Button”.

So, in my truck I got one of those mirrors that automatically gets a few shades darker whenever your dumb ass forgets to dim the brights when you come up on my tail. However, I noticed yesterday it didn’t work when the Sun was blazing away behind me on the drive. Anyone know how these things work?

Just curious.

Update: That was fast. Answer in comments.

All the misinformed assault weapons hysteria in one convenient location! Interesting to me is the author: Robert Spitzer is Distinguished Service Professor of political science at SUNY Cortland and author of “The Politics of Gun Control.”

Ruger has a pistol built on the 10/22 action.

Boy, were my predictions hopes wrong. I actually figured it would be Huckabee then McCain.

I was completely wrong on the Democrat primary. I thought (snark aside) that it would be Clinton, Edwards, Obama.

My thoughts? I hope Iowa isn’t indicative of the rest of the country (though they have a history of predicting eventual winners). Big government liberal v. big government Evangelical liberal doesn’t exactly give me hope. Huckabee is good on guns, though. And Obama is horrid on guns.

The good news is that Iowans voted for not quite the worst candidates. I mean, it could have been Romney and Clinton. Or Giuliani and Clinton. I guess there’s that to be thankful for.

And this time I didn’t make any serious predictions. Usually, in these political contests, I make beer bets. I’m 100% on my bets for political races (I lost one beer to an American Idol prediction) but this year, I could not get a feel for it. Still can’t.

Lee Gaillard says the second amendment is obsolete. It beats relying on the collective rights mythology. Repealing it would be impossible.

Rustmeister has more.

So does Greg.

So, there was a /20~ p@\/1 rally in World of Warcraft. Seriously.

Tam recaps the year in snark. That’s quality snark, right there.

When they are critical of easy access to guns, they really mean any access to guns.

Kevin notes something interesting about the robbery stopped by a CCW holder this week:

Why was this defensive gun use a failure?

Well, if you use the criteria of the anti-gun forces, specifically that of Dr. Arthur Kellermann, a successful defensive gun use must result in a death.

Nobody died.

Buckeye Firearms notes there is no leftist anti-gun media conspiracy. They’re just that stupid.

Kevin has a list.

Pit bull foils home robbery:

A pit bull stopped five people from robbing a home and may have saved his owners life.

Christopher Payne told Bibb County sheriff’s deputies when a group of people tried to rob him his dog Dino attacked and scared off intruders.

120 pounds is awful big for a pit bull.

Robb has one. I doubt that antis would go for it, you know, because it makes sense. But then, where I live, there is no waiting period.

Speaking of house guns, some AOWs grown local.

S&W Model 10.

Sebastian is having a Garand ol’ time.

NRA has done another mailing in Iowa.

R. Neal:

There are people over at Music City Bloggers seriously arguing in comments that the Constitution does not guarantee anyone the right to vote. OK, then.

Then, err, find it in the constitution for me. I’m sure it’s right there beside the right to privacy, near the section that guarantees the right of the state to bear arms, just above the right to free health care for everybody. I’ll spare you the search, the right to vote is not enumerated in the constitution. That is, however, not to say there is no right to vote. Rather, it’s just not an enumerated right:

The Constitution contains many phrases, clauses, and amendments detailing ways people cannot be denied the right to vote. You cannot deny the right to vote because of race or gender. Citizens of Washington DC can vote for President; 18-year-olds can vote; you can vote even if you fail to pay a poll tax. The Constitution also requires that anyone who can vote for the “most numerous branch” of their state legislature can vote for House members and Senate members.

Note that in all of this, though, the Constitution never explicitly ensures the right to vote, as it does the right to speech, for example.

Like privacy, voting is one of those unenumerated rights.

Update: BTW, we require ID for all sorts of things (including civil rights). Why is voting different?

Another update: BTW, here’s an interesting list of things not in the constitution.