The Gun Blogs

Concealed handgun licensees here in the Great State of Texas have been fighting for the right to carry on campus for...quite some time now. As of right now, our best hope is that Governor Perry will attempt to change things during our 2009 legislative session. This is one of the rare times in which I think that meeting every other year is a very bad thing. We're trying to be patient, but...it's getting harder.

With the recent shooting on a college campus in Tyler, Texas, we have no choice but to acknowledge that this type of thing can happen anywhere. Even here in Texas, where more than a quarter million of us are legally licensed to carry our concealed handguns in many public places (except, of course, school).

And then, the University of Texas at Arlington reported that there was an armed robbery on campus. There was also an incident involving a pellet gun.

So: we need concealed carry at Texas schools. Right now, only the criminals have weapons at school. By definition, criminals break laws. You can post all the "No Gun" signs you want, and you can pass all the "No guns at school" laws you want. The criminals are going to ignore all of this. Those of us who follow laws will obey...and by doing so, put ourselves at risk.

This ticks me off because I'm a UT-Arlington student. (I'm taking off this semester, but I'm returning in August.) I have to walk, by myself, across several parking lots. The campus is wide open to anybody who wishes to show up. Cooper Street, which basically runs right down the middle of the school, is a large and public road open to anybody who'd like to drive down it.

And though many of the people who live in the numerous houses near the campus are wonderful, law-abiding citizens...some of them are not. Not every person in the surrounding neighborhood is a good guy or gal. The criminals who live right off campus have very easy, free access to the unarmed students who are in the parking lots and on the streets.

There aren't enough campus police officers to personally escort every student all over the campus. Until or unless we each have armed escorts, we're responsible for protecting ourselves. But right now, legislation and school policies make this difficult. Very difficult.

Because, quite frankly, I have no delusion about what would happen if I were confronted by a criminal armed with a handgun. I have...pepper spray and a folding knife. Oh, yes, those are highly effective against handgun-wielding purse snatchers, rapists, school shooters and other, miscellaneous thugs.

This is not fair. I haven't done anything wrong, but the law puts me at a distinct disadvantage re: my own protection. The State of Texas licensed me to carry a loaded .45 at church, in Wal-Mart, and at the hobby shop. But I cannot carry that same gun to classes. I'm the same law-abiding citizen no matter where I go, but for some reason, I am not worthy of self protection when I'm attempting to better myself through higher education.

The Brady Campaign's "Drop out of school" solution would be a fine idea if it weren't for the fact that I have just as much right to attend college as an anti-gunner's kid does. I earned my seat at UT-Arlington. Wishing to defend and protect myself while I'm occupying that seat does not make me any less worthy of what I worked to earn.

Besides: the anti-gunners still have the right to NOT carry guns. They have a choice. I do not.

The sooner we get campus carry, the happier I'll be.

Is my 'stuff' worth dying for?

Personally, I'd say 'No'. But that doesn't mean I won't shoot you if you try to take it.

You see, for you the value of my 'stuff' is low - just the few dollars you'll be able to pawn it for, or the cheap thrill you get from taking it.

But to me many of those items are precious beyond words, treasured mementos of people, places, and times. That cheap little thing you may take just to laugh at and destroy may be the one and only thing I have left from someone deeply beloved and long gone. That link is worth protecting.

And as to the rest of my 'stuff' you should keep in mind that those are pieces of my life that you're taking. I worked to get those things and no insurance company will ever be able to give me the portion of my life I expended to get something back.

All of that ignores the other, more practical reasons why you're risking your life stealing from me.

You see, I cannot know what your intentions are. You say (now) that you were only going to steal and would never hurt anyone. But you see the problem is that many other thieves are willing to harm my loved ones and I so I have to treat all thieves as dangerous.

Besides, no matter what you intend now, how can I be sure (sure enough to bet my life) that you won't change your mind when confronted?

All in all, the most reasonable thing for me when you try to rob me is to presume that if you're willing to steal you're willing to do additional harm as well and do what I can to protect myself and my loved ones.

Which means I will shoot you.

You don't want to get shot. I hear it's quite painful and, of course, there's a significant risk that you will die.

And I don't think anything I own is worth you risking your life to steal, so please don't put yourself in a position to be killed over something so trivial as my 'stuff'. Get a job and get your own.

Before posting this, I have to apologize. I said I'd cross-post my gun stuff here, and I've been remiss in doing so. I'll do the best I can to get my gun stuff over here. Not like it's hard to do, or anything.

I haven't heard anything more than what was on last night. What's to know? some whack job killed some people.

Now, scores of grieving family and friends wrestle with their emotions and try to figure out what happened, and more importantly, why.

There is no why. Not one that will bring peace of mind. It simply is, and the question now - what do we do to fix it?

Arm everybody? No. That won't work. Face it, most folks don't want to be armed. For whatever reason, they don't think carrying a firearm is necessary. Some folks have no business carrying a gun. Even if they meet the legal requirements, they simply don't have the strength of character necessary to have one.

Ban guns? Yeah, that's been working out well lately. Virtually all of these shootings happened in "gun-free zones". According to the Brady Campaign, Illinois places 9th on their list of best state gun laws. If this doesn't prove once and for all that restrictive gun laws don't work, I don't know what will.

These are the two main courses of action many people call for, neither of which will work. So what to do?

First, we need to get our heads out of the sand and let the people who choose to legally carry a firearm do so. Anywhere and everywhere. Let grown-ups act like grown-ups. We are civilized people, let us enjoy the benefits of being civilized.

To those who don't want to carry firearms I say fine, don't. But be mature enough to understand those who do are as fine a people as you are. They love their families, and love their individual freedom. They won't shoot you if you take their parking spot or grab the last can of wasabi almonds off the store shelf. They know, as you do, it's not worth it. I for one, would hate to have to shoot someone for the simple fact that I don't want to lose my gun to an evidence locker. Not for some piece of crap hoodlum who thinks I might have money.

Will this solve the problem? No. Nothing will ever solve the problem. There has been, and always will be, evil in the world. What else can you call it? We see it every day; women killing their kids, mass shootings, just today a woman's body was found just outside Memphis with no hands, feet, or head. Tell me evil doesn't exist.

Like the saying goes, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." (Edmund Burke).

That's what's going on here. The good guys are doing nothing. They are hiding behind useless laws and the hope that someone else will save them. Someone else being the law, of course. Not Joe or Jane Average who happens to be carrying a gun. They don't have the training uniform. Never mind the fact that Joe or Jane has put more lead downrange in a weekend than some cops do in a year.

We've so castrated our society, we can't do the right thing for fear of getting arrested. Have a beef with a classmate? Don't duke it out in the schoolyard, you might get arrested. Your sister's boyfriend smacking her around? Don't go punch his lights out, you will get arrested. Neighbor's dog getting in your trash/garden/stuff? Don't put some rocksalt in his ass, you'll get sued by the owner and PETA.

We have to get back to the point in our society where men and women who take action for the betterment of those around them are rewarded, not condemned. Let grown-ups act like grown-ups without getting bent out of shape over some imaginary comfort zone. There is no comfort zone, there never has been. Evil is out there. It doesn't want you to think about it. If you think about it, you might be prepared.

That was quite a ramble, wasn't it?

Crossposted at the Alehouse

I must confess, I'm shocked - shocked to see this happening in our country!

Felon convicted of lying to buy a handgun

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) - An Antrim man has been convicted of lying about his past when he filled out forms to buy a handgun.
Prosecutors say 42-year-old Steven Delaurier, who has past felony and misdemeanor domestic violence convictions, lied about his criminal past.
A jury in Concord's federal court found him guilty. He faces a maximum of 10 years in prison when he is sentenced in April.

New Hampshire, you better get your act together. Your criminals should know better than to lie! It's not nice. Maybe you all should try reasoning with them next time.

(crossposted at Rustmeister's Alehouse)

Via Instapundit comes this report out of New Orleans:

The National Rifle Association has hired private investigators to find hundreds of people whose firearms were seized by city police in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, according to court papers filed this week.

The NRA is trying to locate gun owners for a federal lawsuit that the lobbying group filed against Mayor Ray Nagin and Police Superintendent Warren Riley over the city's seizure of firearms after the Aug. 29, 2005, hurricane.

Say what you want about the NRA on some issues, I don't see the more strident gun rights groups doing this. I doubt they have the resources.

Well...I'm giving the MD State Police exactly what they asked for: more documentation.

The ball is in their court.

They wanted additional documentation about threats I've received...and now they have it. Next move is theirs.

Shamalama takes a look at the results of Australia's gun ban.

One year after gun owners were forced to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed, including semi-automatic .22 rifles and shotguns, a program costing the government over $500 million, the results are in.

Not what the Aussie politicians were expecting, methinks.

Go check it out. Cool graphic there, too.

I like BIG GUNS for killin and huntin and just havin fun, kicken it with my homies... yo yo

Working at a gun shop gives me some wonderful oppertunitys to try stuff I otherwish would not have. At time I am very impressed, other times not so much. This time was both, and a learning experince to boot. I took home a brandnew Taurus 650 CIA (carry it anywhere) mine is a .357 magnum, 2' barrel, Double action only. Now I am ussaly a fan of having the option of the single action; however where I to be involved in a gunfight with this gun, I would not be using single action! So I am training myself to shoot double action, as most of the handguns I carry daily are either double action only, or double action first shot. There are rumors that DAO shooting is inaccurate, and diffcult. While it may take more concentration to fire in DA mode this is not a bad thing as it helps us to concentrate more on a consistant trigger squeze.
I like the little 2" revolvers because they tend to be there by my side when not other firearm will quite do the trick. Add to that the performance of the .357 Magnum caliber, and you have yourself a great little combo. I drive a pickup that the desighn of the seats allows me to afix a holster inbetween the drivers seat and the center consul. This is where I prefer to have a revolver. I cannot readily reach my holstered weapon the gun-in-the-seat meathod is wonderful. With the small CIA all I have to do is put the gun in my pocket when I leave the truck, which not only secures the firearm, but also provides me with a great back up gun.
Anyone reading this must note that although these meathods work for me they may not be ideal where you are. I live in Alaska, and it is simply a differant kind of enviroment. We have cold weather, animals, remote wilderness areas, and the usual assortment of drunk, vandals, and criminals. No, the truck never leaves the driveway with out at least one rifle, and one handgun. Here it is dark half of the year so it is impertive that one should learn to shoot a firearm in darkness. I think that this is a must have skill for anyone who takes their personal saftey seriously. If you think about it most crimnals will not attack you in daylight downtown, but add darkness to the picture, and suddenly the other person has concelment.
Constant darkness is one reason why I do not carry full power .357 loads in the Taurus. When testing the gun in darkness the muzzle flash from this little gun was enough to blind me to the loaction of the target for almost 3 seconds. To any of you who have been in a gun fight you will know that three seconds can very well spell life or death. I also know that it is unlikely that an assailant will stop their attack INSTANTLY after my first hit. With that in mind I choose firearms that are able to fire without essesive muzzle blast. So I carry the .38 special +P loads, and a speed loader.
Bullets do not do the shooter any good unless they impact their target. We must test our carry guns first for reliably and second for accuracy. It works. I am not going to tell you that you can hit a gopher at sixhundred meters. I was able to relably hit the head at 25 yrds on a standard size siluette target. long range is not where the real shine is though, its the personla distance shooting that will make or break the gun. I was able with very little practice shoot fist sized groups at 10 yards. These groups where all point of aim.
So on the stevedcross scale of gun testing I would give this little bugger a 6. I would have scored it higher, but there was a problem. This gun willnot work with Cor-bon ammo. I have no ideal why, it just does not work. It works with other ammo of the EXACT same power leval, but not the corbon. Now this is important to remember because had I not tested my ammo I would have been in for a rude supprise had it come time to use it. I will work on this though and let everyone know when I fighure it out. Meanwhile I would advise you not to shoot Corbon in Taurus revolver as I am not the first one to have this problem.
Good luck and stay safe
stevedcross

See what happens when you bring an axe to a (fake) gun fight?

Checking out this story from the Philly area, I read the following:

The Turkish-made handgun, which can be used as both an automatic and semiautomatic weapon, was found on the floor of the SUV along with a bottle of liquor, Lewandowski said. The gun cannot be sold in the United States because it can be used in an automatic mode, he said.

(emphasis mine)

Any idea what this could be?

Gun crime feared 'across Britain'

The fear of gun and knife crime affects people across Britain, not just those in inner-city communities, a poll for think tank Policy Exchange says.

More fallout from Old Blighty "cooking the books" on gun crime in their country. It's all coming back to them. One graph shows:

the number of fatalities and injuries has increased from 864 in 1998-9 to 3,821 in 2005-6

(emphasis mine)

How can this be? Guns are banned there. Guess they need to ban them harder.

After reading this by Ryan at Red's Trading Post, I started poking around here to see what I could see.

Here's the ATF data on TN.

I found it interesting that 31 guns were traced from California. I thought they had laws against that kinda stuff out there....

What I really found interesting was the breakdown on page 8. Similar to what Ryan notes on his post, the numbers don't seem to make sense. Here's what I'm talking about. First here's Tennessee's four largest cities with approximate population numbers:

Memphis 670,000

Nashville 552,000

Knoxville 182,000

Chattanooga 155,000

It's safe to say Memphis and Nashville would have similar firearm recovery numbers, don't you think? Knowing Memphis like I do, I would think its' numbers would be proportionally higher than Nashville. Not even close.

Top Recovery Cities for Firearms with a Tennessee Recovery Jan 1 - Dec 31, 2006

Memphis 406

Nashville 1,354

To add to the head-scratching, here's the other two cities:

Knoxville - 401
Chattanooga - 532

What I see is Memphis, who placed first runner up in the latest Morgan Quitno Most Dangerous US Cities contest (Metro division) has the second-lowest number of guns traced back to it.

I really don't know what to make of that. Is it that Nashville is controlling crime better? It's the number 7 most dangerous city with over 500k people (Memphis is #3).

How can Memphis be only six gun traces away from the bottom?

I can think of better means for personal defense than a hammer...

Mine usually involve projectiles that are four tenths of an inch in diameter.

I didn't use the gun to defend my home per se, but if I hadn't had it, I wouldn't have opened my back door and been able to ID the shooter in this case. A criminal is going to be off the streets because I had my gun for personal protection. Funny how you'll never hear Sarah Brady acknowledge such a thing.

...if this guy was an intruder in my house.

Not a magic solution and I am operating with the benefit of hindsight, but I present my views on how the VA Tech killer might have been stopped. No new legislation in sight on this one.

Well, another shooting at a school. When are people going to learn? Now, everybody's going to be yelling more gun controll and we need better gun laws. ever woundered how a single person can walk into a room and blow away 30 people? What do you think would have happened if he walked into class and shot the teacher and then turned and looked at the class only to see most of the class was pointing a gun at him just before they blew him away. IF YOU WANT MORE GUN CONTROLL, HAVE EVERYONE BUY A GUN AND KEEP IT ON THEM AT ALL.I think the good people who go by the law far out numbers the bad people. Then it would be just a matter of time before all the bad guys are done in. I do know this, You would never hear of anyone killing 30 + people. I know that after they shot one person, SOMEBODY is going to shoot them. Think about it? Woodzman

By woodzman

I'd like to say at the outset that this is not an indictment of any victim's actions at Virginia Tech. Something like this should never happen, and I doubt anyone would know how'd they react when put in a similar situation.

I've already heard the cries of "America's gun culture" as the cause of this. As Nylar so ably points out below, anti-gunners are going to use this incident to advance their agenda of disarmament.

There is a cultural factor to all this. It concerns fight or flight; the most primal reaction to confrontation. Very few at VT managed to do either. Only a handful of people jumped out of windows to avoid being shot. So far, only one has been pointed out as trying to fight back by holding a classroom door closed.

How did this instinct not kick in when those folks knew there was a shooter on the floor? Because they've been taught since early childhood not to resist an attacker. Don't fight back, just give them what they want and they'll go away. Same thing for running away; you might provoke your attacker - don't do it.

Looks like we've managed to do what intellectuals have been wanting for years: we've overcome our most base instincts. We've risen above the animals. Fight or flight is a thing of the past, and we've become a bovine herd. Hooray for smart people!

One problem: there's a substantial segment of our population who haven't done away with their most base instincts. They've harnessed them, embraced them, and have no reservations using them to get what they want. They are predators in every sense of the word. They identify the weak and pounce. If the prey runs or fights, the predator simply employs their own fight or flight instinct. Many times they go off in search of an easier target. Predators don't want to work hard.

There are 60-80 million gun owners in America, depending on who you listen to. There are over 300 million Americans total. That means 20-27% of America owns a gun. Does this mean 73-80% of Americans have lost the will to fight or flee? Once all the facts are in, do the math and see for yourself.

Much of the social history of the Western world over the past three decades has involved replacing what worked with what sounded good.

- Thomas Sowell

UPDATE: Looks like I'm not the only one thinking this way.
(via Alphie)

The thugs and dealers are making community service a dangerous proposition here in Baltimore, and the gun grabbers are doing what they can to make it even more dangerous.

http://progunprogressive.com/?p=323