Now, it’s been a while since I’ve discussed abortion on the old blog (and for good reason). So, a refresher of my thoughts on it:

I saw the ads flying around town last week and wrote about it here. Joe says:

Callers to Dave Foulk’s show constantly framed their anti-abortion arguments with false language and false arguments, and an eagerness to control human sexuality. When someone calls abortion “killing children” they present a false claim. Children are not aborted. It also isn’t “infanticide”, as both child and infant are lifeforms outside the womb.

I’d like to have heard some of these comments on controlling human sexuality. Because the crazy-ass contingent of the pro-choice crowd often says that abortion is about controlling women or women’s sexuality. Sorry, crazy-ass contingent but that’s bullshit. People who oppose abortion do so because they take issue with killing babies. Period. Now, we can go all day arguing about when exactly a couple of cells become a baby but it’s a largely pointless semantic exercise. No matter how good anyone’s points are on the issue, it’s really a matter of faith for most folks as to exactly when said cells become a human or life or whatever else. And Joe has, obviously, decided where he stands on that. And so have the pro-lifers.

So, when you start implying that people’s opposition to abortion is to control women and sexuality, you lose me.

Of course, the crazy-ass pro-life contingent has issues as well. I don’t like seeing aborted fetuses flying around in the sky. I also don’t like when these bozos go protest at a clinic.

Via insty, comes: When an AK47 Is Not an AK47. The answer for the US press is usually always. But, the article:

The existence of this manual may be a sign that there are some unexpected strategic benefits to American journalists’ chronically deficient grasp of the basic issues they’re supposed to be covering. The AK-47s that you see Third World soldiers brandishing and the AK-47s you can buy in Seattle are completely different weapons. The former are fully automatic weapons, which have been tightly regulated since the National Firearms Act of 1934. The Gun Control of 1968 outlawed importation of foreign-made fully automatic weapons for sale to civilians, and a 1986 amendment to the Firearm Owners Protection Act banned the domestic manufacture of fully automatic weapons for civilians. It is possible for a civilian to legally obtain a fully automatic AK-47, but it is extremely difficult: Before you can even begin to navigate your way through a maze of state and federal regulations, you’ve got to find someone with a weapon either made in the U.S. before 1986 or imported before 1968.

The AK-47s that you can buy at the average gun store are semiautomatic rifles; you only get one shot per trigger-pull. How did the assault weapons ban that was in effect from 1994 to 2004 affect the availability of these? It didn’t, in any meaningful sense. The differences between the rifles that were legal before the ban, during the ban, and now are entirely cosmetic.

I’ve said that hundreds of times.

Seems that violent crime is on the rise in the past year. So, the Feds want to do something about it:

Nationally, violent crime rose 2.2 percent last year, the first increase since 2001

The article concludes with:

However, Justice officials said Monday that even with the recent surge, the overall national violent crime rate remains lower than any year ever measured except for 2004.

Err, if 2005 is greater than 2004 then how can 2004 be the highest? I’m confused.

Update: Oh, and I blame assault weapons. I mean, I see those bullet-hoses out their walking the streets all the time.

Videos of bullets going through stuff, like bottles of water and apples:

Via David.

In response to the article Get the guns out of your homes by Mary Sanchez, Publicola replies: Personally I try to get the guns out of my homes every month if not more often. They like the fresh air & open spaces of the ranges.

I’ve heard it before but never thought much about it. Was Chicago’s Gun Control Ordinance A Secret Plan By Chicago’s Mob?

Enforce existing law:

THE KNEE-JERK response by some to Philly’s soaring murder rate is to demand More Laws.

Others respond by asking: Why don’t we enforce the 20,000 gun laws currently on the books across the nation?

The current buzz is about “straw buyers” and “straw sellers” and how to stop them. “Straw buyers” and “sellers” are people with clean records who buy guns legally, then pirouette to sell them – illegally. Those illegal guns create much of the chaos on our streets.

“The only way you can legally transfer a firearm in the state of Pennsylvania,” says attorney Jon Mirowitz, a recognized authority on gun laws, “is to go through a licensed dealer, and it’s been that way since the 1930s.”

Enforcement of that law should be mandatory. But that cries for common sense, which we know is rare as a game-show host’s sincerity.

I didn’t realize that about Pennsylvania.

The Carnival of Cordite is up for your gun blogging fix.

Oh, he said lawyer. I thought he was being honest about his dishonesty there for a minute.

I use the phrases retard, retarded, passengers on the little bus, Timmah, and a host of other similar insults all the time. In writing and in the real world. I thought, at first, it was unavoidable since (by my guess as affirmed by South Park), roughly 25% of the population is retarded. And, honestly, have you seen yourself drive?

But no more. I’m going to make an effort not to use such language any more since it apparently offends retards.

Update: And for people who need to be told that sort of thing, I don’t mean the physically/mentally disabled. I mean clueless, blathering morons. Of course, if you had to be told that sort of thing, you’re probably the type of retard I mean. And, yes, I know I’ve already used the word again. Sorry ’bout that.

In Britain:

FOURTEEN-YEAR-OLD girl from north-west London stands accused of conspiracy to supply a machine gun capable of firing 1,000 rounds a minute.

The teenager, who cannot be named for legal reasons, is one of four suspects from the area who appeared at High Barnet magistrates’ court charged with gun-related crimes.

She was charged with possessing two revolvers, a Mach-10 machine gun and a second machine pistol.

I think it’s a Mac-10, though.

I said:

If you want to send a message to the Republicans you don’t do that by voting Democrat. If you vote Democrat, you send a message that you like Democrats.

AC disagrees:

At a certain point, if you have been routinely let down and ignored, you have to remind whatever party you identify with that your vote is not a lock. You have to remind them to earn your vote.

Uncle asserts that the way to do this, the only proper way, is to vote third party for if you vote for the Democrat you are voting to affirm them.

I disagree. In most cases, yes, simply voting for the opposite party out of spite is not advisable. But I think in this specific case, things are different. First of all, Corker is an extremely bad candidate and the Republican party has been grossly negligent in their duties both to conservatism and the country.

They deserve the harshest punishment they can get.

I don’t disagree on punishing them.

GLN says:

I reconnected with an acquantance (sic) recently and it turns out he works for the BATFE. We spoke a bit about H.R.5092, but he was not aware of the bureau’s analyisis (sic) of it. He asked what I thought.

I want to open this up and ask you all what you think of BATFE.

My dealings with them is limited but I will say that they were professional and courteous. But I shouldn’t have even had to deal with them. Anyway, give your thoughts and I’d lay off the kitten-stomping, baby-sniping stuff. Not gonna have much effect.

When even the Chicago liberal, statist, populist contingent recognized the gun vote, it’s a good thing:

But our democracy might work a bit better if we recognized that all of us possess values that are worthy of respect: if liberals at least acknowledged that the recreational hunter feels the same way about his gun as they feel about their library books

Don’t get me wrong, Obama is likely as much a gun-grabber as, say, Schumer. But at least he’s not stupid about it.

So, everyone on both sides is all atwitter about the recent bit of gun violence in schools. Here’s what’s up:

In Utah:

Gun class for Utah teachers

Free concealed-weapons session is offered today

More than a dozen teachers and public school employees will spend part of their UEA weekend in a classroom — learning how to use a gun.

Clark Aposhian is offering a free class today to public school employees seeking to get their concealed- weapons permit.

“It is self-defense,” he told the Deseret Morning News on Thursday. “But because teachers and school administrators and custodians are typically surrounded by students all day, any threat to any individual with a firearm would also be a threat to those students.”

The concealed-weapons instructor’s offer was met with opposition from some teachers and union representatives at the Utah Education Association’s conference in Salt Lake City.

The gun banners chime in:

Get the guns out of your homes

Uh, no. More:

More school shootings, and the inevitable commentary on the evening news: “I didn’t think this sort of thing could happen here.”

The heartfelt, but naive belief that murderous rampages “don’t happen here” begs the question: “Where do you think such things happen?”

Labels exist for the places where shootings occur: urban, inner city; all code for where black and Latino people live and yes, far too often die to senseless gun violence.

But one thing urban folks can tell their scared suburban friends right now is that a good part of the horrendous violence in their communities is due to the proliferation of guns.

Really?

Star Tribune on the school violence conference:

Missing from those discussions, however, were two equally important items: federal budget cuts to school safety programs and access to guns.

The Baltimore Sun:

There seems to be a bipartisan conspiracy to ignore the obvious: Gun violence is so high in this country at least in part because there are so many guns so easily available. The United States is home to more than 200 million firearms, with one or more available in at least a third of American households.

Really? See chart above.

And some common sense breaks out.

Remember, the anti-gun forces don’t want to disarm sportsmen and all that. They just want common-sense, err, something or other:

Because they are once again asking the Redskins to stop having a fundraising event for kids. Why? Because it involves safe and legal activities with shotguns. As they point out in their release announcing their hissy fit, they organized protesters last year (some were kids kept out of school that day) and the Redskins still managed to raise lots of money for good causes.

It’s not April:

Cato’s Tim Lynch notes that the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers recently gave Janet frickin’ Reno its “Champion of Justice” award, complete with standing ovation at the accompanying dinner.

Um. NACDL’s motto is “Liberty’s Last Champion.” It has the phrase “criminal defense” in its title.

You’re kidding, right?

Make it funny:

In Brownsville, he [Former “Apprentice” star and Republican candidate for the House of Representatives in Pennsylvania Raj Peter Bhakta] witnessed half a dozen men swim under one of the international bridges “with complete immunity” which in turn prompted him to take the immigration issue to the next level.

Bhakta decided to see if he could get an elephant accompanied by a six-piece mariachi band across the river. . .

“To my surprise, the band played on, the elephants splashed away, and nobody showed up,” Bhakta said of the stunt. “I’m astounded.”

Heartless Libertarian has links to goodies regarding the SCAR.

Right on:

Youngsters in a suburban Fort Worth school district are being taught not to sit there like good boys and girls with their hands folded if a gunman invades the classroom, but to rush him and hit him with everything they got – books, pencils, legs and arms.

“Getting under desks and praying for rescue from professionals is not a recipe for success,” said Robin Browne, a major in the British Army reserve and an instructor for Response Options, the company providing the training to the Burleson schools.

Indeed. Hiding makes you an easy target. When confronted with violence, your response should be one of two things and those two things only:

1 – Run
2 – Attack

Or fight or flight, if you like. That’s it. Nothing else. It’s the natural thing to do or else we wouldn’t be conditioned to have those two responses.

Do not hide. Do not negotiate. Do not try to soothe. Do not comply. Do not try to ‘understand’ the murderous retard shooting up the place. Period. In a school shooting, if you can leave then get out. If not, don’t cower or hide. Fight enough to get out. Or you’re dead. If you attack, you could die. If you cower under a desk, you will die unless the nutjob runs out of ammo before getting to you.

Via insty.

Over at NSH, I posted this bit about Mayors Against Guns and the Joyce Foundation. In the comment section, a guy claiming to be Bob Ricker (Executive Director of the American Hunters and Shooters Association) says:

I’m the Executive Director of the American Hunters and Shooters Association (AHSA)and AHSA has neither fequested nor received funding from the Joyce Foundation. You need to check your facts and not just regurgitate NRA lies!

And there’s a reason why I used the word supposedly. I’ve heard that claim bandied about but never a cite nor a source. Thanks, Bob, for clearing that up. But I notice he didn’t deny being part of an anti-gun group.

The spam filter is killing some comments. Sorry. If your comment gets eaten, you have to let me know soon. I get about 1,500 spam messages per day. If you don’t tell me quickly, they’re gone. Not much I can do about that. So, sorry gat; sorry deb; sorry ed.

It seems that blogspot.com sets it off for some reason.

I’m in business. Like most businesses, we sell stuff. Whenever you buy our stuff, we’ll take payments from you in, generally, any way you choose to get them to us. Check, cash, carrier pigeon, no problem. Hell, if you attached your cash to a brick and threw it through our window, we’d just consider the replacement window a valid business expense. We like getting your money. It’s why we’re here.

Not so with the .gov. I’m trying to pay taxes. Actually, I’m trying to pay estimated taxes. The won’t take my money. We’ve never paid these particular taxes to this particular bureaucracy before. They’re due Monday. Early last month, I filled out their form to authorize wire transfers. Due to a snafu on their end (i.e., Sorry sir, we, err, lost it) that didn’t go through and we’re looking at another 2 weeks. If I write them a check, they want to charge me a 10% penalty as opposed to if it’s just late and the penalty is interest, which is substantially less than 10%. I’m trying to pay you money. Jebus.

Idiots.

Speaking of liberals and guns, meet Blue Girl in a Red State:

And fair warning now, large-ell liberals – don’t argue guns with me, or I’ll challenge your ass to a duel. Gun Control means that you can hit your flippin’ target. Get rid of that Stupid. Fucking.Gun Control. Plank. and people in Holt County, Missouri and Decatur County, Iowa and Dodge County, Kansas come back to the Democratic Party.

Me:

It’s more a testament to the power of party than anything else. The GOP in TN could probably nominate an adulterous, gay atheist who was caught on tape strangling puppies and still keep it within margin of error.

Heh. I crack me up.

People often ask me Hey Uncle, why is your site www.saysuncle.com and not www.sayuncle.com? Here’s why. It’s not worth $2,788 to me.

A while back, Kos did a bit on Libertarian Democrats. I said:

If you read the comments, quite a few of the Kossacks are pro-gun. I found this surprising and interesting. But, and let me be clear, if Kos is getting it, its impact must be growing to the point that it can’t be ignored. Regardless, I salute these types.

Now (via Pro Gun Progressive), Kos is at it again:

The case against the libertarian Republican is so easy to make that I almost feel compelled to stipulate it and move on. It is the case for the libertarian Democrat that has created much discussion and not a small amount of controversy when I first introduced the notion in what was, in reality, a throwaway blog post on Daily Kos on a slow news day in early June 2006.

It is indeed an easy case to make. More:

there’s a whole swath of Americans who are uncomfortable with Republican/conservative efforts to erode our civil liberties while intruding into our bedrooms and churches; they don’t like unaccountable corporations invading their privacy, holding undue control over their economic fortunes, and despoiling our natural surroundings; yet they also don’t appreciate the nanny state, the over-regulation of small businesses, the knee-jerk distrust of the free market, or the meddlesome intrusions into mundane personal matters.

Well, I fixed it for him. We still like us some capitalism. On guns:

There’s a reason libertarians view the Second Amendment as an absolute right—its abolition would limit one of the most effective ages-old tools against governmental tyranny.

Hence, there was (and is) a natural tension between liberals who see government as a benign force for good, and those who can point to plenty of history showing otherwise. And as long as government remained the greatest threat to our personal liberties, this tension was fated to remain.

Indeed. Read it all. You (like me) may not agree with all of it and that’s OK. I don’t believe that liberals will embrace the libertarian sorts because, well, we scare the shit out of them. But they may reach out to us. Whether or not they reach out to us in the way the Republicans did (i.e., when they need our votes and to Hell with us every other day) remains to be seen. And, there is the fact that we don’t like Democrat party favors like Feinstein, Schumer, Pelosi, Kennedy, etc. It will be tough to convince us. But give it a shot.

Update: Drum spells it out:

Should Democrats court the libertarian vote?

Just the votes, please. And he says:

And let’s face it: Democrats just can’t credibly claim to be on their side.

Ayup.

A spoiler, if you haven’t seen it don’t click more.

Read the rest of this entry »

The concealed weapons holder who shot a man in Seattle was apparently homeless:

The shooter, whose last two known addresses were homeless shelters in Seattle and Federal Way, could not be found for comment Tuesday. His last known address is at the Compass Center, a Seattle shelter and social-services facility for the homeless and low-income people, according to public records.

Hardly, despite the cries of some:

The National Rifle Association has a simple agenda in Washington: protecting gun ownership. But it faces a complex challenge this campaign season: supporting Republican control of Congress while staying loyal to Democratic candidates who supported the gun lobby.

“We will endorse regardless of party,” says Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action. “However, gun owners are very concerned and do not want as speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has been consistently vocal against their rights. They understand the significance of these elections.”

That means the NRA, which sits on a campaign war chest of $20 million, is expecting to endorse as many as 60 Democrats in House and Senate elections, about the same number it endorsed in every national election since 2002 and three times the 20 or so Democrats it supported in races during the early 1990s. At the same time, the NRA wants to make sure Republicans keep control of Congress.

They endorsed Democrat Governors Bill Richardson and Phil Bredesen. And, of course, many liberals are right on guns.