Deseret News:

A Duchesne man whose rifle exploded on a hunting trip and sent shrapnel into his face is suing the gun company for negligence.

Jesse Tatman is suing the company that makes the rifle, Savage Arms, as well as The Sports Authority — formerly Gart Sports — for liability, breach of warranties and negligence.

Tatman bought the rifle in January 2003 and hunted in the 2003 season during which the 300 Remington Ultra Magnum worked flawlessly, according to a lawsuit filed in 4th District Court on Oct. 20.

However, during a deer hunting trip in Daggett County on Oct. 22, 2004, when he aimed at a deer and pulled the trigger, “the gun exploded and disintegrated into dozens of pieces, sending debris as far as fifty feet away, and into (Tatman’s) face,” according to the lawsuit.

Tatman’s nose was bleeding and he had several pieces of “gun stock lodged in his face,” according to the suit.

My initial guess is faulty ammo (either reloads or an oops from some factory ammo). But we’ll see.

Bitter is spreading some. By the way, I dig the video. I mean, who knew firing automatic weapons made breasts do that.

Update: Link fixed. Sorry to have denied you a view of jiggly bits.

The Cleveland Plain Squealer (who supported the idea that lists of concealed carry holders be available to the public, i.e., they supported state-sponsored lists of people to rob to get guns) once supported local preemption. Now, they’ve suddenly changed their minds for no reason anyone can figure out.

A lot of the supposed grassroots anti-gun organizations are not grassroots at all. Rather, they are a variety of different shells that operate under the same management. Like the Gun Guys, Freedom States Alliance and others.

Over at Front Sight Press, there’s some info on them.

Also, Georgia Packing keeps a pretty detailed list of them too.

Know your enemy and all.

Another case of a criminal claiming to be police (in this case FBI) and breaking into a house. This time, the criminal shot a man. It’s hard to tell them apart.

Phil has more on the WA ban.

But here’s a knife that is also a gun.

During England’s recent knife amnesty, a variety of homemade cutting and puncturing weapons were turned in. I wonder how many weren’t turned in.

We are pleased that the owners’ have been responsible and handed them in. We would urge anyone who has home-made weapons to take the same route and surrender them at one of the designated police stations.” Tackling knife culture is paramount to the safety of our communities. People who carry bladed weapons run the risk of that weapon being used on them, or inflicting serious injury on others. It also carries a jail sentence of up to four years. The total number of weapons surrendered in Staffordshire during the amnesty, which has now been running for four weeks, has reached 1,420.

Via Street Use, which has some nifty pictures.

There are over 280 videos on YouTube that show how to pick locks. Any locks. A Google search for “bump key” will yield over 1,750,000 results.

The worst part of the bump key phenomena is that insurance companies will not pay a claim because this technique leaves no trace of forced entry.

Let me recommend some items and ideas for your home safety:

1.) A real door lock from Mastercraft.

2.) Anti-intruder device from Glock.

3.) A good professionally monitored alarm system.

4.) Sleep with a cell phone next to your bed.

5.) A dog, any dog that will bark.

6.) A keyless deadbolt.

7.) Neighborhood watch program.

8.) Insured by Smith and Wesson door sticker.

Any other good ideas on how to protect your home?

Les Jones has more on this and a video demonstration you should look at.

A sentence of 55 years for selling three 8 ounce bags of weed to an undercover cop is upheld by the Supreme Court. And he had a handgun that was never brandished. Interesting:

Four former attorneys general and 145 former prosecutors and judges wrote in support of a lighter sentence for Angelos. Even the sentencing judge, U.S. District Judge Paul Cassell, an appointee of President Bush, called the sentence “unjust, cruel and irrational.“ But he said the law left him no choice.

Just doing your job, huh?

Via Les, how to defeat most conventional locks. Rather frightening, really.

Whenever your husband is looking for something, he will invariably ask you where it is. When he does this and you tell him, please observe the following rule: Start big, work small. That is to say, start with room first then place in the room. Examples follow:

Husband: Honey, have you seen my watchamacallit?

Wrong way: It’s in the box, in the drawer, under the toaster oven in the kitchen.

See, the problem with that way is when you say box, I’m thinking of all the boxes I have. I have no idea which box or which drawer you’re talking about until you get to toaster oven. Then, when I finally figure out you were talking about the kitchen, I’ve forgotten the whole thing about the box and the drawer.

Right Way: In the kitchen, in the drawer under the toaster oven, there’s a box.

See, I can visualize it. You say kitchen, I visualize my kitchen instead of all the boxes I have. Then, I know where the drawers are.

It’s pretty cool. I will be reviewing a 6.8 SPC AR Upper Receiver made by Ko-tonics (that’s a link to some info and pics of their upper). Here’s their homepage.

Carnaby has more details and there are other bloggers involved.

As part of this deal, I’m sure Tim at Ko-tonics wants me to send him some traffic his way so go check their product out. I’m looking forward to it as I’ve pondered getting a 6.8 for a while.

If you look real hard, there is an AR in the picture. Nice abs. And 5.56 Nato is not high powered. I mean, if I call the press on it, I have to call bloggers out too.

USCitizen tells us to be careful what kind of lists you put your name on. Good advice.

Joe says there might be one in WA. Must be something in the water lately.

Tam talks about the great Republican send off.

But guns are banned in DC!

Charles asks Anybody support the War on Drugs?

Yes. Politicians who want to look tough on crime, police departments that want funding, and the existence of an entire agency of the fed.gov rely on the war on drugs.

Insty:

WHEN ARE GUNS NOT NEWS? When they’re used to stop a crime rather than commit one.

I admit, I’ve not seen the film Innocents Betrayed but I know its basic theme and it is that many atrocities followed gun control. Willy E. Gutman non-gets it and non-sums it up with:

Such inference, made post priori, is fallacious in that it assumes that one event is caused by another merely because it follows it.

No one assumes any such thing. They assume that because one thing happened, that another thing was possible. You’ve changed the argument.

Failing to consider factors such as counter evidence – think Masada, think the Warsaw Ghetto, think Waco, Texas – the film does not convincingly explain how people would have resisted their tormentors had they possessed firearms

Err, you what guns do, right? I mean, it’s not a secret. As opposed to running or complying, you would be able to shoot back.

All it does is postulate that “disarmament is necessary to make possible the mass murder of helpless citizens” – ergo, that citizens should resist gun control and arm themselves.

Well, yeah, because that’s rather the point. Or this quote:

There is no doubt in my mind that millions of lives could have been saved if the people had not been “brainwashed” about gun ownership and they had been well armed. Hitler’s thugs and goons were not very brave when confronted by a gun. Gun haters always want to forget the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, which is a perfect example of how a ragtag, half starved group of Jews took up 10 handguns and made asses out of the Nazi’s.

— Theodore Haas, former prisoner of the infamous Dachau prisoner concentration camp

Cook County (Chicago), Illinois has passed a ban on weapons that look like assault weapons. It’s a rather stupid law that now adds muzzle brakes to the list of evil features. So, your Browning you use for deer with a vented muzzle device is an assault weapon you can get at Wal-Mart. And it seems to have an SKS provision as the magazine requirements don’t require them to be detachable.

Two state supreme courts ruled that citizens have a constitutional right to keep and bear arms. Kentucky and Washington.

Seems the myth of the collective rights model is losing its influence.

George Carlin:

Here is more of the distorted language of political persuasion. Conservatives oppose gun control. Liberals know control is a negative word, so they call it gun safety.

Indeed.

Seen here:

I’m a law-abiding guy and got nothing to hide. Still, caution should be exercised when dealing with the police. So, here are my rules for dealing with the police:

Keep your mouth shut.

The answer is always no. No, I do not consent to a search. No, you may not come in. Business with the police should be done on the front porch, unless they have a warrant. And here’s why.

The wife just called and said So, where’s the secret bank account?

Heh.

I love you.

And judging by comments, I should apparently try one of those pumpkin spice lattes.

You may recall when I wrote that YouTube would be a new quantum shift in the body politic and that the danger would be that anything said in public would be available almost instantaneously and would have a shelf life of forever. If you thought politicians were cryptic before you ain’t seen nothing yet. There will be no more John F. Kerry bungled jokes. The affect on comedians may be catastrophic.

But wait, there is something that makes YouTube pale in comparison. New Federal rules that go into effect today and that were approved by the United States Supreme Court in April will require, U.S. companies to keep track of all the e-mails, instant messages and other electronic documents generated by their employees.

Reasonable people will ask why. The answer is legal discovery which is used by both sides in court cases. This single ruling will tragically and dramatically change both the way America does business but will also create liability in the computer technology industry where no liability existed before.

Read the rest of this entry »

The National Shooting Sports Foundation is challenging The Alliance of Mayor’s Against Guns:

U.S. mayors, who have pledged to reduce the criminal use of firearms, continue to ignore the firearm industry’s offer of assistance and cooperation. Instead, the leaders of the mayors’ effort seem more interested in media events than real progress, according to officials of the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF).

That assessment came after an Oct. 5 press conference in Boston, where New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Boston Mayor Thomas Menino announced the expansion of their mayoral coalition against illegal guns. NSSF officials called the press conference “political grandstanding.”

Lawrence Keane, NSSF senior vice president and general counsel, challenged the coalition members to engage in a constructive dialogue with the firearm industry to advance the goal shared by all Americans of reducing the criminal acquisition and misuse of firearms.

The mayors’ coalition is an outgrowth of a national summit on illegal guns cohosted by Mayors Bloomberg and Menino in April. Mayor Bloomberg rebuffed NSSF’s request to attend the summit.

“Unfortunately, the firearms industry was not permitted to educate this budding coalition about the various programs we have developed with law enforcement that are working to reduce criminal misuse of firearms, as well as reduce firearm accidents,” Keane said.

Keane also expressed disappointment in Mayor Menino’s failure to follow through on a pledge to form a cooperative relationship with the industry after ordering his lawsuit against the industry dismissed in 2002. At the time, Boston acknowledged in a court filing that “members of the industry … are genuinely concerned with and are committed to the safe, legal and responsible sale and distribution and use of their products.”

The city said it believed “that through cooperation and communication (Boston and the firearm industry) … can reduce the criminal acquisition of firearms.” Repeated letters from NSSF to Boston officials, as recently as last October, have gone unanswered, according to Keane.

“Members of the firearms industry remain as committed today to working with mayors toward our shared goal of reducing crimes committed with firearms as we did when Boston dropped its lawsuit, and as we were when Mayor Bloomberg put politics ahead of cooperation,” Keane said.

Based on a number of successful programs, Keane said the industry is challenging every member of the mayors’ coalition against illegal guns, “many of whom we have worked with in the past on firearm safety programs, to take the high road and engage with us in a constructive dialogue.”

This approach, Keane points out, will advance the goal of reducing the number of firearms that fall into the hands of criminals.

“The path forward remains one of cooperation and communication, not publicity stunts and overheated rhetoric,” Keane said.

You’ve got to be kidding:

Drivers could be paying their share of the state’s highway improvements based on how far they’re driving, under an idea being floated by some state legislators.

The system would work something like this: You pull up to a gas station, and a transmitter in your car tells the pump how far you’ve driven since you last filled your tank. The state charges you pennies for each mile you’ve traveled instead of the usual 21.4 cents per gallon you’ve been paying with every fill-up.

Members of the Senate Transportation Committee have been informally discussing the possibility of a “user fee” system, in which a Global Positioning System device would transmit your mileage to a gas pump and charge accordingly.

If you happen to be walking down the street and see a member of the Senate Transportation Committee, please kick him in the balls and tell him Uncle said that was ’cause you’re fucking stupid. If it happens to be a woman, the shin will do. Equal rights, and all. More:

“Gas tax revenues are static, and they don’t necessarily increase with the transportation needs that have to be met,” said Sen. Mark Norris, R-Collierville, chairman of the Senate Transportation Committee. “We need to look at more forward-thinking concepts … like doing away with the gas tax and going to a user-driven system.”

Mr. Norris, I propose instead we place a transmitter on legislators to measure how much time their head spends up their ass. Then, we tax them based on that amount of time. It seems you can just go ahead and sign over your wealth to the state. Here’s the deal, sparky:

People don’t like taxes. And people damn sure don’t like transmitters telling big brother where they are or how much they drive. It’s not forward-thinking, it’s creepy big-brother nonsense and it cannot stand. More still:

The state Department of Transportation faces a projected shortfall of about $2 billion in the next 10 years. Meanwhile, its take from the gas tax — 21.4 cents per gallon on regular and 18.4 cents on diesel — has been the same since 1989.

With that and the fed tax, Tennessee drivers pay about $0.40 per gallon in taxes. Remember that next time some lame politician is attacking big oil for jacking up gas prices.

Via MKS.

Update: Terry points out Mr. Norris, despite my prior complaint, is actually not retarded.

Seen at gunner’s:

Right after taping ‘The Tonight Show’, Snoop was arrested for being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm, possessing cocaine, transporting marijuana and having a false compartment in his vehicle.