Guns – Page 1080 – Shall Not Be Questioned

The Quantico Marine Base Experience

I’ve never had the opportunity to shoot at a military base before, so I wasn’t about the pass up the opportunity when Bitter’s work invited me along for their range trip.Â I didn’t know much about what was going on other than to bring lots of guns and ammo, so I did.Â They had some instructors there for us which brought along a lot of their own guns, so it didn’t turn out we needed mine a whole lot.Â They even brought an AK-74, which was good, because for some reason mine was jamming (bad magazine I think).

Bitter was grateful I was willing to come out.Â I mean, it’s just so difficult to go out to a range on a beautiful summer day to teach a bunch of abundantly cute young chicks, many of whom have never shot a gun before, how to shoot.Â Sacrifices we must all make in order to grow the shooting sports, I know.Â I had a few people, even a few of the women, shoot the PSL. Â I think they were a bit beyond 100 meters though, because the round was dropping a bit with the scope dialed into 100 meters, but the little reactive steel silhouette targets got hit just fine if you put the caret on the scope on top of the target’s “head” as a little hat.Â Bent it right over when it hit.

It was mostly plinking, but I was enjoying shooting the steel targets with rifle and pistol.Â I might have to get into silhouette shooting on a more regular basis!

Anyway, the Marines have some really nice facilities that are open to civilians.Â You have to be invited by the Quantico Shooting Club, however.Â But if you ever have a chance to go, I would highly recommend it.Â Sadly, they don’t turn on the pop up targets for civilians so you can see how you would qualify as a military rifleman, but it’s a nice place to shoot, nonetheless.

Buy Some Ammo Day

August 28th, to coincide with the Brady and Jesse Jackson protests. I could use some 5.45x39mm to take to the GBR 2007. David has the details.

I don’t know if Red’s has 5.45x39mm non-corrosive, but if he does I’ll surely buy more than five boxes.Â If not, I buy a lot of other calibers too. Â Buy some ammo from Red’s that day.

A True Gun Nut

You know your a gun nut when your realtor tells you that you need to remove some “clutter” from your fridge, in order not to scare potential buyers.

Last night I had one of those gun nut moments as I moved an empty PSL magazine and a Soviet PSO-1 scope from my table to make room for the laptop. Â BTW, if anyone knows how to make fine adjustments on that scope for zeroing, I’d be most appreciative.Â The manual for it is in Cyrillic.

More Evidence It’s Not Just Criminals

The VPC is bragging in this editorial about putting gun dealers out of business:

Tougher laws and stricter enforcement cost nearly 200,000 U.S. gun dealers their licenses since the mid-1990s, a new study shows.

Led by remarkably sharp declines in states including California, Florida and Washington, the number of federally licensed firearms dealers fell 79 percent nationwide since 1994. In that year, Congress adopted new gun-control measures that still spark fiery debate.

â€œThe sharp drop in gun dealers is one of the most important, and little noticed, victories in the effort to reduce firearms violence in America,â€ declared Marty Langley, a policy analyst with the Violence Policy Center.

What the VPC is not telling you is that most of those licensed dealers were collectors who obtained Type 01 FFLs for their own purposes.Â During the Clinton Administration, a decision was made to put “kitchen table” dealers out of business.Â They were portrayed as people who sold guns to criminals, when in reality, they were collectors who bought guns for themselves, and sold a few here and there to friends and family. Â Sure, I won’t deny there were some bad apples in the bushel, but by in large, getting a type 01 FFL was a way to save money if you were into collecting firearms.

Clinton shut that down by directing the ATF not to issue dealer licenses to anyone who wasn’t zoned as a business.Â That’s where most of the reduction came from.Â After that, the only option for people like me was a type 03 FFL, which only applies for certain firearms.Â For firearms that are not C&R, I still have to go through a type 01 or type 02 FFL.

The government has been making it increasingly difficult to operateÂ business selling firearms.Â This certainly makes folks at the VPC, and most other gun controllers ecstatic.

Just remember though, they only want to target criminals, and illegal guns. Â It’s not about destroying the shooting culture in this country or anything, so that a political climate can be created to destroy the second amendment.Â If you think that, clearly you’re just a paranoid militant.

City of Philadelphia Terminating Club Lease

The City of Philadelphia appears to be terminating the lease of Holmesburg Fish and Game Protective Association, which is a shooting club in the Northeast:

On Wednesday August 1st the City of Philadelphia notified the Holmesburg Fish & Game Protective Association that it was terminating our lease and that we must vacate the premises and remove all personal property by December 31, 2007. The notice was hand-delivered to the club by several uniformed representatives of a city agency.

Remember this folks, when they tell you that they have no desire to target legal gun owners. It is a lie. The only object of the anti-gunners is the end of gun ownership in the United States. If there’s anyone who doubts that at this point, they aren’t paying enough attention.

Profile of a Gun Control Advocate

It’s often said that a conservative is a liberal who’s just been mugged. It’s probably just as often that someone who’s been affected by violence turns into an outspoken and hard working activist for gun control. I know of few people who are truly passionate about the issue who haven’t been personally affected. It’s not surprising, really. We’re passionate about stopping them because we also have a personal stake in the outcome as shooters.

The Ventura County Reporter has a profile of Tim Heyne, who has been spreading gun control ordinances throughout Southern California:

That black day occurred on Memorial Day in 2005. Heyne and his wife, Jan, were with Heyneâ€™s best friend, Steve Mazin, when Mazinâ€™s neighbor, who held a grudge, approached the trio and shot them all. Mazin and Jan were killed. Heyne was left for dead with three bullets to the chest, but he survived and eventually recovered. All this, despite the fact that Mazin had a restraining order.

Mazin’s neighbor, as someone who had a restraining order on them, was not legally able to possess or purchase a firearm.

â€œGun control is an incendiary term which the opposition likes to use because it sounds very condescending,â€ he said. â€œIt speaks to the Second Amendment. What we are about is having sensible, responsible and accountable gun laws to keep the public safe.â€

The group Heyne refers to as â€œweâ€ is the Brady Center headquartered in Washington, D.C. Heyne organized the Ventura County chapter, ignoring the warnings from seasoned gun control advocates that it was the Wild West of gun ownership. In recognition of this feat, the Brady Center will be honoring Heyne for his work on gun control issues in November.

California is the wild west of Gun Ownership? Maybe in 1883, but California’s shooting community has been taking a beating since 1989, and isn’t wielding a whole lot of political power these days. I’m all for having “sensible, responsible and accountable laws that keep the public safe”. But gun control doesn’t do that. Mr. Heyne is a shining example of its failure, as the federal and state laws that disarm people subject to a restraining order did not stop someone that was intent on murder. Is it so crazy to suggest that an honest man with a gun could have?

UPDATE: Joe Huffman has a telling quote as well.

Cool Izhmash Video

Here’s a pretty cool marketing video put out by Izhmash Arsenal in Russia. It covers the complete Kalashnikov line, the SVD, AN-94 and Bizon submachine gun.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXKXtM3hFQE[/youtube]

Range Shortages

Dave Hardy talks about the problem of finding a place to shoot.Â We have this problem here in Pennsylvania too, at least if you’re new to shooting and are looking for a place to shoot outdoors.Â The Pennsylvania Game Commissions has, in the past few years, closed down most of the rifle ranges in Southeastern Pennsylvania, and a few more in other parts of the state.Â I expect they will never reopen.

It makes me wonder what’s happened to all that Pittman-Robertson money we pay every time we buy a rifle or ammo.

E-Tracing Your Guns in NJ

Corzine is bragging about New Jersey being set up with ATF’s eTrace system:

E-trace is a nationwide database maintained by the ATF that lists a firearm’s first purchaser, date of purchase and the retailer from which it was purchased. The information is compiled from police records of gun purchases provided by local departments, but until today was only accessible by the ATF and the police department that provided it.

Can someone explain to me how this isn’t a registry? How do they have this data if the NICS records are being properly destroyed as they are required to be under the law?

UPDATE: Dave Hardy thinks the reporter doesn’t know what he/she is talking about.Â I can easily buy that.Â When have they ever on this issue?

More Infringement

Apparently the PICS system will be down Sept 2nd through the 6th.Â I think if the government needs to take these systems down for maintenance, that’s fine.Â But during that period when the system is down sales can proceed without the check, and the check can be done later when the system comes back online.Â I’ll bet if that were the law, the Pennsylvania State Police would suddenly find they can do maintenance a lot more quickly, or invest in a system that could stay up.Â Â When was the last time you heard of Amazon.com going down for maintenance?Â And they are storing a lot more data than PICS.