for possession of illegal machine gun:

Hector “Big Weasel” Marroquin, 51, was arrested at his home in the 8000 block of 6th Street in Downey, said Susan Raichel, a spokeswoman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

He was charged with the sale of an assault rifle, a machine gun, two pistols and two silencers, Raichel said.

As part of the same investigation, Sylvia Arrellano, 25, was also arrested at a home on Elizabeth Street in Cudahy, and faces the same charges, Raichel said.

Agents raided a junkyard Marroquin owns in the 4000 block of Mason Street in South Gate, and his restaurant, Marroking Seafood and Bar, in the 7000 block of Atlantic Avenue in Cudahy, Raichel said.

At each location, agents found gang photos and writings, she said.

Raichel said the arrests came as part of a nine-month investigation into weapons sales by the 18th Street gang, believed to be the largest in California.

A onetime member of the gang, Marroquin founded the group No Guns in 1996, which purported to work against gang and gun violence in inner-city communities.

But I bet 80% of Americans can’t tell you what current gun laws are.

SOUTH CAROLINA v. US, 199 U.S. 437, 448 (1905):

The Constitution is a written instrument. As such its meaning does not alter. That which it meant when adopted, it means now.

Seen at Sebastian’s:

To assist you and your customers to better understand this provision, ATF is clarifying the Firearms Transaction Record (ATF Form 4473), to make it clear, for example, that any person who has been found by a court, board or other lawful authority to be a danger to self or others is prohibited from purchasing a firearm or ammunition. We will provide you with additional information about this change in the Form 4473 in the near future.

Yeah, ’cause that have stopped Cho.

Well, it also heaps you praises. Thanks for the update. But don’t feel too bad, it is a stated strategy among anti-gun groups to intentionally mislead you. Via Sebastian.

Now, I’m as gun nutty as gun nut can be. But gun laws don’t generally correlate to crime, for good or bad, in any meaningful way. The CDC agrees.

Background here.

Update: And for the record:

I still firmly hold to the existing Supreme Court interpretation of the amendment, which to my understanding does not support the kind of individualized gun rights often advocated by groups like the NRA.

There is no such interpretation. The SCOTUS has not ruled on the issue specifically but has casually referenced the individual right to arms a few times. In US v. Miller, they asked for clarification. Miller then died and the case did not proceed. If the court bought the collective right mythology, it would have asked Is Miller a state? It did not. It asked if the weapon in question (a short barreled shotgun) was suitable for militia use.

I often write about “The Law of Unintended Consequences”. It is surprising that few people consider the possibility that not all decisions from the mind of man work exactly the way intended. That is one reason I have been such a harsh critic of Al Gore. There is an irony that liberals and progressives who constantly howl that religious populism is a very bad thing could follow Al Gore in locked step slobbering obedience. Elmer Gantry had nothing on Al Gore.

Two things Al Gore is bringing for the consideration of the American people are very questionable ideas. But on the front end they seem to make sense. Even conservatives may think that compact fluorescent bulbs and ethanol made from corn are no brainers. Each of these ideas have serious economic and environmental drawbacks. But in the current state of frenzy not everyone is thinking about what the future implications of these ideas will be.

The good news is that a few people are navigating through the fog and considering the full implication of what wide acceptance of compact fluorescent bulbs and ethanol made from corn. Even the folks at KnoxViews. R. Neal is even beginning to see that corn based ethanol doesn’t make either economic or environmental sense.

My told you so piece on CF bulbs was back in March. Rich Hailey expanded on the mercury issue in May after R. Neal at KnoxViews wrote a long piece defending CF bulbs.

So before we think about a new religion maybe we should look under the hood and think whether the old religion is really broken. This is really all about politics. The liberal progressive side of the fence has shown to be incompetent when it comes to National Security. So the Earth First religion is what they have to offer. The simple facts are that without mandatory recycling CF bulbs will cause environmental and health issues which will negate any electricity or cost savings they may have. Corn based ethanol is one of the worst ideas for energy independence.

So why are liberal progressives changing their tune on corn based ethanol? Because the other team has gotten out in front by supporting switchgrass based ethanol which may make economic sense and which will not hurt the environment. In other words, it is CYA time for the liberal progressives.

The good news for the American people is that two questionable ideas are finally getting the full thought process required and maybe we can use our heads and not go on a National fools errand.

One of my longtime friends got hitched. To a foreigner. Trouble is, it’s hard to get them in the country, despite what you may have learned watching sitcoms. I told him to fly her to Mexico and meet her in Texas. He chose the high ground and decided to go legal. He started a blog about it here:

A married couple transversing the strange waters of the immigration process, all the while trying to keep from being eaten by the gigantic, souless shark that is bureaucracy…

Guess the firearms! Via Jeffy Weffy.

Seen on a video here:

Parenting is too hard. Help us MPAA.

Last night, I drove by a local pharmacy that’s close to my house and saw the parking lot full of police cars, an ambulance, and the yellow tape. I thought to myself: Self, someone’s been shot. I was right. Odd occurrence for my town.

I done run everybody off. That means I’m busier than a one-legged cat trying to bury a turd on a frozen pond. In other news, getting up at 3:30 sucks. But there’s still time for some gun porn.

Don’t look now but Tennessee’s reps might do something smart instead of something dumb. For once.

TCPR:

Nearly every proposed private, nonprofit and non-governmental recipient of Gov. Phil Bredesen’s last minute half-billion dollar budget request have ties to the Bredesen administration, according to an examination by the Tennessee Center for Policy Research.

I worked in a prison for a few years. I never met him either but I’m familiar with his work.

Russert falls for anti-gun lies. Shame on Bill Richardson (who has an NRA endorsement) for not correcting Russert. I wonder if he didn’t correct him because he didn’t know any better?

Opening a beer with a sheet of paper. Related, 1,000 ways to open a beer:

I am currently 100% on my beer bets for political contests. I did lose that one to Chris over American Idol, but that’s not political. So, here’s my latest:

I will bet one beer that Obama will not be elected president. I will bet another that he will not get the nomination.

Sean upped the ante:

I will take that bet, and I will raise with a six-pack that Fred Thompson will not be the next President.

I’m not willing to take that one, yet.

The BillingsGazette:

Wyoming will appeal in federal court to try to defend a state law that allows some people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence to regain their right to own firearms.

U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson ruled earlier this month that the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was correct to reject the 2004 Wyoming law.

[snip]

Although states may restore a convict’s right to own guns by expunging a domestic-violence conviction, the federal firearms agency had protested that Wyoming’s law didn’t suffice. The law leaves alive the possibility that state courts could still use the original misdemeanor conviction to enhance the penalty for any subsequent convictions.

The consequences:

The federal firearms agency had warned Wyoming that if it persists in allowing people with misdemeanor violence convictions to buy guns, that the federal government would no longer recognize more than 10,000 concealed-carry permits issued by the state as a substitute for federal background checks for firearms purchases.

There also exists, at the federal level, a means to appeal to have firearms rights restored. However, that program is not and never has been funded.

You can’t spell nanny without authoritarian. Well, you can technically . . . but you see what I’m saying.

Hey, did you know you can get a degree in guns? I already have three suffixes after my name, what’s one more?

Seems whenever those Nashville blog gals get together, there’s cleavage.

Over at Alphecca’s, Sigivald takes me to task on my coverage of libertarians, constitutionalists, gays and gun nuts getting a second glance as potential terrorists:

SaysUncle is dead wrong about his, as he has been (oddly) about all of that series.

Wouldn’t be the first time. But:

Not “groups that make you a terrorist for being in them”, or “groups that have lots of terrorists in them and a few non-terrorists”, but “groups that could include terrorists”.

The most militant gay-rights groups may have a few fringe members who’re willing to use violent intimidation or destruction to influence policy (definitionally terrorism).

Sure. But so does any group. There are militant Democrats and militant Republicans and militant feminists and militant Christians. But those didn’t make the list. Among any group, there are potentially crazy militant factions who would engage in terrorism. No one is questioning that. But singling out particular groups (who historically have been mostly harmless) seems to be more politically based scaremongering than legitimate concern. He concludes with:

I don’t see any particular overreach or threat to civil liberties here; the actual websites, if you bother to read the text and think about what they say rather than applying a hysterical template (as I unfortunately think most of the comments on them have done) are neither particularly inaccurate nor dangerous to the Republic, freedom of association, or any other civil rights.

I don’t disagree. But I still like to know what sorts of people the .gov is keeping tabs on. And, frankly, I don’t like the .gov keeping lists. But then, I’m a bit jaded. You get that way when the federales come to your door and quote your website to you.

Ouch. That hurts to watch. Pull that stock into your shoulder. A friend’s mom once got scope head. She was out firing a rifle (a 300 WinMag, IIRC) and wanted to use the open sights and not the scope. That, of course, put the scope at forehead level. Pulled the trigger and had a nice circular bruise on her noggin.

Here.

Wendy Pitts Reeves wants some from my sheriff.

Amazing. I still have trouble believing it.

All the stupid anti-gun arguments in one convenient place! Complete with cites to anti-gun hacks like Hemenway and Miller.

Update: well, that was fast. In other news, I don’t even have to do my own fisking anymore.

In an update to this, I’m disappointed that I only have an excuse to buy just 15 boxes of ammo.

There’s a site that counters them called The Real Gun Guys. You can follow the money here.

Anti-gunner Robyn Ringler:

The notorious Washington, D.C. sniper-killers used the fifty caliber sniper rifle to kill their victims.

They did? Funny. You may want to tell the MD police since the guys they found had a .223 cal. She did offer a correction.

And her facts get better:

A guy walks into a gun shop to buy a gun. The gun shop’s employee performs a background check. The information from the background check which links the gun to its new owner and its origin (the gun shop) must be destroyed WITHIN 24 HOURS.

[snip]

So, now, a crime is committed with a gun. Any record of where that gun originated has been destroyed. How do we trace it? How do we figure out where it came from? It is impossible to follow the gun’s journey when we destroy the records after ONE DAY.

Really? Well, that’s a shock to those of us that actually, you know, know what we’re talking about:

The NICS check does not, and was never officially intended, to link a gun to it’s owner. That is what Form 4473 is for. The 4473 has been the law of the land since GCA68 was passed (1968). The 4473 is required by law to be retained for 20 years. There has not been any repeal of this records keeping requirement as Ms. Ringler believes. She is confused. But that’s not surprising, bigots confuse and warp the facts to maintain internal consistency with their world view.

Poor anti-gunners imagining laws that aren’t there. But, hey, it’s another reasonable voice, right Gonzo?

And what’s with a newspaper hosting an anti-gun site? What media bias? And what media standards? Since, you know, two seconds of Googling and you could have had the answers right the first time.