February 2012 – Page 5 – Shall Not Be Questioned

More Homemade AR-15 Lowers

Jason sent this link along to me yesterday, which shows another AR-15 lower design that someone came up with. Looks pretty simple, and definitely wouldn’t take all that much machining. The only thing that concerns me about deviating seriously from the standard AR design is whether an argument could be made it’s readily convertible to an M16 receiver. I believe AR-15 lowers have some extra metal in them to prevent insertion of a drop-in auto sear (DIAS). They also have the advantage of having been reviewed by ATF. I’ve heard ATF frowns on designs where conversion is just a matter of drilling a new hole. But I also believe (correct me if I’m wrong) that once you drill the holes for the AR-15 trigger group, being that they’re differently sized pins, it essentially won’t hold an M16 trigger group anymore, so that really no modern AR design can really be construed to be readily convertible. I’m wondering whether there should be any concern about a design that hasn’t been submitted to ATF in order to make a determination. Any comments?

I should also note that this is only a concern for people, like you and me, who don’t want to break the law. Criminals wouldn’t have any such compunction.

Shooting Injuries

Caleb notes that you can get a bone spur on your finger if you do it too much. I was always told I’d go blind.

Next Steps in Canadian Gun Control Reform

The Canadian Shooting Sports Association is looking at some next steps, following up on their victory over the long gun registry. They’re now looking at licensing reform. Whether another step has any legs or not is entirely dependent on Canadian gun owners, but this doesn’t offer much hope, from a dealer in Canada:

Back in Sudbury, Ramakko said he hears very few complaints about gun licences. He expects the conversation at the gun counter will now turn from politics back to hunting.

If that happens, then the registry repeal is just a one time thing, and will quite possibly be reversed the next time the Tory’s are out of power.

We’re From the Government, And We’re Here to Help

Joe Huffman has a rather amusing tale of his struggle to get his explosives license renewed. The punchline here is:

So the bottom line is that if I remove the doors from the shed I can store 18,000 pounds of explosives. If I put the doors on I can only store 50 pounds.Â It doesn’t have to make sense. It’s just a government rule.

Makes sense to me!

Some Other Improvements in Virginia

Everyone knows about the gun rationing repeal, which is great news. But some other more minor improvements are moving in the Old Dominion. One bill to provide civil immunity for people who defend themselves, another to prevent localities from operating gun buybacks not authorized by ordinance, and also requires guns obtained from buybacks be sold to FFLs, and destroyed only if they cannot be sold. The third establishes a more definitive fine structure ($25) for someone who can’t produce a permit upon request. Looks like a vote could happen also on a bill to eliminate the fingerprint requirement.

I’m particularly interested in the bill on buybacks. Personally, I don’t have a problem with a program that gets guns out of the hands of people that don’t really want them. What I have a problem with are when folks dump valuable historical pieces on a Â buyback, only to have a piece of history destroyed. This way, FFLs will get dibs on buyback guns. The junk will still get destroyed, and I’m fine with that, but dealers will have an opportunity to rescue anything of value. That seems to be the kind of common sense reform I can get behind.

A Look at the Brady Scores

Since Brady released its new scores, I’ve been meaning to go back and redo my spreadsheet to see if there’s still no correlation. Fortunately, Barron Barnett saved me the time. The answer is that, no, there is still no correlation between Brady scores and violent crime. What’s also good news is that Brady scores, in general, are declining. I still think Pennsylvania’s score of 26 out of 100 is embarrassingly high.

The Insurrectionist Meme: Quotes out of Context

Miguel finds our opponents in a lie of omission this President’s Day. It is an unfortunate thing for our opponents that this supposed “insurrectionist meme” didn’t come to life with the NRA in the 1970s, but came to life at the founding of our nation, and has been part of the American landscape ever since. As much as they might enjoy sticking their head in the sand, this nation was forged through violent revolution, so it ought not be that remarkably surprising that revolutionist rhetoric has been part and parcel of our political culture.

More “Myths” of the “Gun Lobby”

I guess the mainstream media can be included in “gun lobby” now:

Statistics show the number of women buying firearms has grown exponentially over the past decade or so.

Weekly Tab Clearing

I meant to do this yesterday, but we were busy making a prime rib dinner for our collective parentage. I figured I’d start doing a tab clearing every weekend, since I let a lot of interesting posts go that I just never get around to making a post about before they get stale. So here we go:

The FBI notes that paying for coffee in cash is a sign of a terrorist. Thirdpower notes that certain books, model rocketry, or interest in paintball are also indicators.

Dr. Helen has now moved over to PJ Media.

Clayton Cramer has an interesting bit on the use of knives in crime.

In Philly, an argument over dog crap results in a shooting. The shooter was an LTC holder. Charges are being files, but that doesn’t mean this isn’t self-defense, as we remember the case of Gerald Ung, which was clearly self-defense, and yet the city prosecuted anyway.

Clayton Cramer notices that an Indian Nation is suing an alcohol company for alcoholism among the tribe, which sounds an awful lot like suing gun manufacturers over high crime.

Larry Keane of NSSF gets an opinion piece printed int he Washington Post regarding the demise of Virginia’s gun rationing scheme.

Robb has a new toy to play with.

Uncle thinks the reason states like Virginia don’t want to pass permit privacy is because the GOP likes to use the database for political purposes. This is probably true. I know the GOP in Pennsylvania would love to get their hands on such a list (because some have asked) but it’s private data here already.

We Owe Much to Jeff Cooper

New Jovian Thunderbolt has some interesting blast from the past videos, one of them is this one:

So at the time, even the FBI was teaching point shooting with one hand. The Modern Technique of the Pistol put an end to all this nonsense. It’s almost hard to believe anyone used to think shooting using this method was a good idea.

Jovian Thunderbolt has another good video on offensive driving, so be sure to follow his link.