The Truth About Guns

The ignorance of most members of the dead tree media never ceases to amaze. Take, for example, columnist Winston Jones who unleashed this little gem: ”I’m not sure why there’s so much emotion behind the Second Amendment. There’s never been an effort in the United States, that I know about, of the government to take away citizens’ guns. They are regulated so that felons can’t legally possess them” . . .

Some cities have tougher gun laws than others, but nowhere do I see the Second Amendment in danger. … I believe every state should have a gun law that includes gun safety education. Anybody who gets a carry permit should have to demonstrate they know how to safely and properly use their firearms.

Well Win

Because we’re a few months into 2014, the ATF has just released their annual “Annual Firearms Manufacturing And Export Report” for the calendar year…2012. It’s a year late and a dollar short, so we’re lucky that good news can (in this case) wait . . .

So what’s the good news? It’s that the manufacture of AR-15 pattern rifles more than doubled from CY 2011 to CY 2012, to a paper number of over 825,000. I say ‘paper’ number because that 825K doesn’t include any AR-pattern pistols like this PWS MK107.

TTAG and our Facebook page lit up last night when we announced that CNN chat show host and notorious anti-gunner Piers Morgan had retreated from the electronic field of battle. Coming on the heels of the 9th Circuit Court’s dismissal of California’s “good cause” concealed carry permitting provision, you’d be forgiven for thinking gun rights are ascendent. In many way, in many places, they are. In many ways, in many places, they aren’t. The storm clouds are gathering in Connecticut and New York’s SAFE Act is profoundly unsafe The courts have rubber-stamped these and other gun control regimes. And anti-gun pols keep getting voted into power. So what’s more important: cultural victories like

It’s been almost two years since I moved back to Washington from an 11-year hiatus in California. The instant 10% “raise” due to the lack of a state income tax was great, but the real moving present to myself was a suppressor. It took me a couple months to get everything squared away here, then another 10 to actually take possession of my new toy once I wrote that $200 check to the ATF. It’s no exaggeration to say that I then spent the last eight months looking for a .22 LR load that will reliably cycle the action of a semi-automatic rifle and remain subsonic. Despite the scarcity of .22LR these days, I was able to find and test a handful of loads…and none of them worked. They were either too weak to cycle the action, too non-standard to cycle the action, or powerful enough to cycle but therefore reliably supersonic. Enter American Eagle’s “Suppressor” ammo . . .

In the grand tradition of Plaxico Burress, another prominent Big Apple sports figure – Nicks guard Raymond Felton – has been nabbed on a weapons charge. And in the grand tradition of New York media outlets, nypost.com put their vast knowledge of firearms (did you know the FiveseveN is a 28mm handgun?) on display in reporting the incident. “Knicks struggling point guard Raymond Felton allegedly pointed a huge, armor-piercing handgun at his estranged wife during an earlier domestic dispute, sources said. Ariane Raymondo-Felton - who recently filed for divorce – brought Felton’s Belgian-made pistol, an FNH 5.7×28, to the 20th Precinct on the Upper West Side . . . .”

Apparently not everyone loves Raymond. Felton allegedly broke rule number two &#

“A new law meant to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill has so far stopped 55 attempted handgun sales and caused 65 concealed weapon permits to be revoked, the chief of [South Carolina's] State Law Enforcement Division said Friday.” The aforementioned officer Keel also told the AP that the new procedure caused SLED to deny 12 applications for concealed weapon permits. This after Keel’s minions entered

“To lawful gun owners – who I have great deal of respect for – we’re not hurting one of them. For sportsmen, we’re not hurting one. And if it prevents one child or one person from losing their life, we should do it.” N.J. Senate President Stephen Sweeney (D., Gloucester), N.J. Democrats propose limiting capacity of gun magazines [via

The weather in the UK this winter has been devastating, with massive storms and deluges of rain causing widespread flooding across southern England. But in another potentially explosive effect, the storms have torn up the British coastline, in some places setting the beach back by 30-50 feet, or even more. In the process, unexploded ordnance from past conflicts has come to light. According to The Daily Mail, a 100lb Mk XIX Second World War British anti-submarine mine was found by surfers at Watwick Bay, Haverfordwest, while a rare First World War German mine surfaced on a beach near the popular Cornish resort of Newquay.

“The National Football League has implemented a new stadium policy that would ban off-duty police officers from carrying guns into games,” dfw.cbslocal.com reports. “According to the NFL memo, ‘off-duty officers who attempt to bring firearms into an NFL facility will be denied entry.’ But a Texas state law overrides the NFL policy. As long as officers attending the game check in at a specific gate and inform Security where they are sitting – they can have their gun.” So . . . Texas carry law trumps NFL gun ban policy. I wonder if there are any other states where the same is true, which have chosen to capitulate to the almighty dollar. I mean, NFL. I also wonder if any state has

Reader Richard A. writes:

The question of whether to allow guns on state-funded campuses has become quite the divisive issue here in Idaho. Thankfully for those of us who live in Eastern Idaho we have the Idaho State Journal to keep us informed of how dangerous firearms are, especially if they were allowed on campus. Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, most of the media coverage concerning this law has portrayed this bill in a negative manner . . .

I was at a Q&A on Friday in which Governor Otter was in attendance. A “concerned” citizen asked the Governor if he was also concerned that this bill would cause home values in the surrounding area to drop like a rock. Governor Otter responded much more politely than I would have. He informed the oh-so-concerned citizen that the majority of Idaho

Last week, Philly cops arrested teenager Courtland Gilliam and his pal Daron Stinson for videotaped &

Scenario: your best friend loves to have the latest and greatest. Newest iPhone? Bought it – limited edition color, 64 gig model, of course. Aston Martin Cygnet? You think he’d cruise downtown Austin in a Car2Go? Please. So when your buddy said that he had first class plane tickets and an all-access SHOT Show pass, you weren’t surprised. His best friends work for regional distributors and he was able to purchase two of the hottest items there: a GLOCK 42 and a Remington R51. Problem is . . .

he didn’t clear the purchases with his wife who thinks he has “too many” guns. He also had some questionable expenses on his credit card from that Vegas trip. Something about a neighboring entertainment industry convention. His wife is and was, in the words of Stephen Foster, “

I’m toying with the idea of having “Never Again” tattooed on the inside of my right arm. (The Nazis tattooed my aunt’s arm in the same place.) There’s only one question keeping me from getting inked: why advertise? The same question occurs to me re: the gun tat above. I suppose the warning could help if a bad guy’s sneaking up behind you. In that case, the young lady above better hope deterrence is more important than operational security. I’m no tattoo connoisseur – yet – but that looks like a pretty good job: a faithfully rendered logo and elegantly inked lettering in reasonable proportion to each other. Kudos to sbratton, who

By ShootingTheBull410

This is the third part of a three-part series exploring the ballistic performance of the new GLOCK 42. In this segment, I’m comparing the performance of the G42 against a comparably-sized pocket 9mm pistol, the Kahr PM9. Why? Isn’t it a tad silly to compare a .380 against a 9mm? Yes, yes it is. The 9mm is and always has been a significantly more powerful cartridge. So much so, that I consider the .380′s main benefit to be the fact that it provides the opportunity for firearms to be made smaller, lighter, and more-concealable. Given that context . . .

I think a .380 definitely fills a good niche – it’s capable of delivering a decent hit, and the

Last year, Second Amendment supporters struggled to push an omnibus gun reform bill through the Georgia legislature.  There were conflicts between groups that claimed similar aims, the bill stalled and ran out of time in the senate. This year, a similar bill, HB 875, has sailed through the house committee and passed by a more than two to one margin. Here is a list of who voted for or against the bill. It has been assigned to the senate Judiciary Non-Civil Committee, the same committee it where it stalled last year . . .

HB 875 provides for a number of reforms.   A list compiled by the