The Truth About Guns

Surprising virtually no one, Sen. Leland Yee of California pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to all charges related to his arrest as part of a corruption and organized crime investigation. He faces a gun trafficking charge and multiple counts of “depriving the public of honest services.” He remains employed by the California Senate, but is suspended with pay. In a related story, Tony Serra, the attorney for one of Yee’s co-conspirators, Raymond “Shrimp Boy” Chow, said Tuesday that the FBI was guilty of racism and entrapment in their prosecution of his client. Serra said, “We will put the government rightfully on trial” for their actions in

The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) reports that a mountain lion attacked a golf course worker – from behind – in Palm Springs. (Press release after the jump.) The worker “was able to seek refuge by positioning himself behind a large iron gate. The CDFW investigated, couldn’t find evidence to support his story and concluded that “no further action will be taken” because “lions can [only] be taken if they become an imminent threat to public safety.” They advise residents to “be cautious.” We advise residents to pack heat whilst loping around the links (or anywhere else). Note: attacking mountain lions don’t need a large caliber ballistic remed

Des Moines, Iowa – (Ammoland.com)- Now that spring is upon us – really, it is! – shooters in the less temperate regions of the U.S. are dusting off their range bags, digging out the shootin’ irons, and heading out to the nearest range to brush up their skills. If you’re looking to improve your shooting, or just keep an accurate record of your and your guns’ performance, you need to know how to measure shot groups. The easiest and most commonly used method of measuring shot groups is the “center-to-center” method . . .

This means simply finding the distance between the centers of the bullet holes farthest apart on the target.

Finding the center-to-center measurement is done best with a caliper. Since we don’t usually require an ultra-precise, ten-thousandths-of-an-inch measurement for group size, an inexpensive caliper like the Lyman dial caliper (Brownells #

I’ve heard some stupid sh*t in my life, but this is truly amazing. I know: I should be a bit more decorous leading into this post, so that readers of a more gentle disposition than your humble correspondent can watch Mr. Uygur hoist himself by his own rhetorical petard. But The Young Turks host’s “thought experiment” on guns is all but completely incoherent. He asks us to imagine someone in a room with three guns. And . . . that’s it. In his opinion, that person is in more danger than he would be if he was in the room with no guns. Which tells us  . . .

That Mr. Uygur is batsh*t crazy. Clearly, he believes that guns have some kind of magical, evil property. (Lord of the Rings much?) That they can shoot themselves or somehow seduce non-violent folks into going crazy shooting themselves or someone else. Not to go all anecdotal, but I’ve been alone in a room with dozens of guns and walked away wit

OIA gun arrests rarely end with convictions, the orlandosentinel.com headline proclaims, adding Gun arrests dismissed almost every time a defendant says, ‘I forgot,’ records show. Although the story doesn’t actually come out and say “Hang ‘em high!”, scribe Henry Pierson Curtis’s incredulous tone tells you that the paper’s editor is unhappy with the fact that Orlando International Airport gives forgetful gun owners a pass

My letter to Congress, read today at Texas Senate committee on Constitutional Carry. It is now public record.

To my friends, fellow Texans, brothers in arms, members of the committee, and everyone within the sound of my voice, greetings.

My name is First Lieutenant Patrick Cook of the 49th Transportation Battalion, Fort Hood, Texas, and this past Wednesday I found myself trapped in an enclosed room with fourteen of my fellow Soldiers, one of whom was barricading the door against a madman with a .45 pistol when he was fatally shot. Through what I can only describe as a miracle, he somehow found enough strength to continue pushing against that door until the shooter gave up and went elsewhere, at which time he collapsed. Nearly a week later, I can still taste his blood in my mouth from when I and my comrades breat

When it comes to gun control meme generation, Moms Demand Action for Guns Sense in America (a wholly owned subsidiary of Michael Bloomberg’s Mayors Against Illegal Guns) is number one with a bullet. Luckily enough (for gun rights advocates), Shannon Watts’ mob has anti-gun agitprop ADD; their shotgun approach to rabble-rousing ensures that no one message finds its target. Perhaps that’s why the ex-Monsanto media maven’s memes are getting memer. I mean, meaner. In fact, I’m surprised the coffin isn’t child-sized. Funnily enough (I suppose), a gun rights guy familiar with our It Should Have Been A DGU feature could simply change the header to read . . .

SHOCK AT DAILY TOLL OF GUN CONTROL LAWS. Which reminds me: are you familiar with the

By JAS

A very close friend of mine is an attorney living in Puerto Rico. He loves to shoot and has a multitude of expensive rifles, shotguns and pistols. A little local background first. In Puerto Rico, every single firearm and every ammunition transaction must be registered. Firearms and ammunition can only be purchased by holders of a target shooting license, with or without a concealed carry permit. Hunting licenses are a separate matter. You still must have a target license in order to have a concealed carry permit.  The target license is where all the firearms are registered.  The target license also lists the guns you decide to carry separately . . .

You can only buy ammunition in a caliber or gauge fitting one of your registered guns. Applications for target shooting licenses take anywhere from six months to a year. Concealed carry permits can only be issued by a judge. You have to hire an attorn

Paul M. Barrett of Bloomberg Business Week has posted an interesting screed on Georgia’s (presumptive) new gun law, How to Understand Georgia’s ‘Guns Everywhere’ Law: Four Blunt Points[1]. As is customary, he starts out with a little hyperventilation: “Georgia appears poised to enact a so-called guns-everywhere law, making it easier for firearm permit holders to take their weapons into bars, churches, and even airports.“ OMG! You mean that GA is going to join

You shoulder a mop. Your turn! You know you’re a gun nut when . . . [NOTE: it's OK for The People of the Gun to use the term "gun nut" in the same sense that it's OK for black African Americans to use the "n word" when playing the dozens. Whatever that means.]

Tyler Kee is in the process of reviewing a Ruger 22/45 Lite. And while the gun is fun in and of itself, we realized something incredibly important this past weekend: adding a silencer makes the gun about 100 times more fun to shoot. Even something as relatively big and unwieldy as an AAC Ti-Rant 9mm silencer, designed to be used on centerfire handgun ammunition, works amazingly well and damn near eliminates the sound of the gun firing. To illustrate just how quiet the can makes the gun, we recorded shooting CCI Subsonic loads, Federal Suppressor Ready subsonic loads, and Winchester full velocity ammo. Shhhhhhh!

Ares Armor sells EP Armory 80% lower receivers. Well, they sold them. We reported that Ares Armor was raided by the ATF (even after a restraining order was issued against such action) for selling these lowers, and at the time there wasn’t much information available about the reason why the ATF believes that these lowers actually meet the legal definition of a firearm. Now, thanks to one of our buddies, we’ve gotten our hands on the actual letter from the ATF on the subject and it answers a lot of the questions that we’ve been having. . .

It turns out that the ATF believes the

This is one of those stories that I checked the date on, and no, it’s not an April Fool’s joke. Veronica and Betty’s redheaded boy toy Archie Andrews will die from a gunshot wound in July’s LIFE WITH ARCHIE #36,. The guy whose band topped the charts with Sugar Sugar will meet his Maker via gunfire, ending the “flash forward” series and proving that no, there isn’t life after High School. At least not for Archie, who buys the farm saving a pal from a bad guy. No word on whether or not Mayors Against Illegal Guns will include Mr. Andrews in their roll call of victims of “gun violence.” Archie Comics Publisher/Co-CEO Jon Goldwater’s statement after the jump . . .

“Authorities have a suspect in custody after almost two dozen students were stabbed at a high school outside Pittsburgh Wednesday morning. The number of injured keeps climbing: initial reports said five to six students at Franklin Regional High School were injured, then that grew to 10. Now CBS Pittsburgh reports that 20 students sustained various degrees of injuries in the stabbing. Four were seriously injured.” The attack took place at Franklin Regional High School in Murrysville, Pennsylvania. As someone once said, the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun (or a knife) is a good guy with a gun. Of course, as we all know, our schools are sterile, gun free zones where, with the occasional exception of a resource officer, guns aren’t allowed. Kinda like our military bases

“I appreciate New Yorkers cherish their guns, but we also cherish our marriages, our children, our houses, our cars, ours dogs, and yet all these things have to be registered and are subject to regulation. And we do that because it’s necessary to protect public health safety and welfare. That’s true of our marriages, and our homes, and our children, it’s true of our guns.” – Chair of the Assembly Health Committee Richard Gottfried (D-Manhattan) quoted in Lawmakers pushing for further gun restrictions [via legislativegazette.com]

About a year ago, outdoor retailer Gander Mountain launched several stores with a new concept. Instead of their typical wide variety of outdoor equipment and clothing, the half dozen new stores would be 30,000 square feet of nothing but guns, gun accessories and gun-related gear. However, with the falloff in gun sales over the past few months, they are backing off that idea, and remodeling at least some of the firearms supercenters to a new “flex” retail concept, bringing back in camping, fishing, boating and seasonal gear, most recently in the grand-reopening of the store in Grandville, Michigan. This follows a similar relaunch of their store in Toledo, Ohio . . .

and will presumably continue throughout the remainder of the new concept stores. The former guns-only stores will still have a heavier focus on guns than a standard Gander Mountain, but clearly there does not yet seem to be a need for the gun

We’ve already posted on the confrontation between Utah cattle rancher (and melon grower) Cliven Bundy and the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Yesterday, Mr. Bundy declared a range war. So far . . . nothing. But reports coming out of the area – including intel from former TTAG contributor and talk show host Bryan Hyde – speak of a huge BLM presence outside the Bundy Ranch. The BLM’s deployed at least 100 agents to round-up Mr Bundy’s cattle from federal lands and ship them off to auction. The feds have called in sharpshooters (not snipers) to aid in their rustling court-sanctioned financial recovery operation. I’m sorry, but that’s insane on all sorts of levels. There are more than a

Following the shooting at Ft. Hood a couple days ago, the Texas Senate Committee on Agricultural Affairs and Homeland Security decided to hold a hearing — even though they were out of session for the year — on the topic of open carry. The usual characters showed up, from anti-gun Austin residents and Moms Demand Action radicals to people like CJ Grisham, whose testimony was sliced out into this YouTube video. The full 8 hour video from the session is available here, but if you listen to any one argument, this would be the one.

The voters of Louisiana approved an amendment to the state constitution strengthening the state’s gun rights back in 2012 with 73 percent of the vote. It also added the requirement that the court use the strongest level of judicial review, strict scrutiny, when reviewing Second Amendment cases. There’s a good discussion of the history behind the Louisiana amendment at the Volokh Conspiracy, by David Kopel. Following enactment of the amendment, courts have upheld bans on the possession of handguns by minors without parental approval and by felons on probation. The case that came up for oral arguments

A TTAG reader forwarded the following:

INTERIM GUIDANCE FOR PRIVATELY OWNED FIREARMS POLICY ABOARD MARINE CORPS INSTALLATIONS

Date Signed: 4/03/2014

MARADMINS Active Number: 176/14

R 031603Z APR 14

UNCLASSIFIED/

MARADMIN 176/14

MSGID/GENADMIN,USMTF,2007/CMC WASHINGTON DC DMCS(UC)/F002//

SUBJ/INTERIM GUIDANCE FOR PRIVATELY OWNED FIREARMS POLICY ABOARD MARINE CORPS INSTALLATIONS// . . .

REF/A/DOC/USD(I) WASHINGTON DC/17APR2012//

REF/B/DOC/CMC WASHINGTON DC PPO PS/05JUN2009//

REF/C/DOC/COMUSFFC AND COMMARFORCOM/31OCT2013//

NARR/REFERENCE

(A) IS DOD MANUAL 5100.76, PHYSICAL SECURITY OF SENSITIVE CONVENTIONAL ARMS, AMMUNITION, AND EXPLOSIVES.  REFERENCE (B) IS MCO 5530.14A, MARINE CO