Guns – Page 1097 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Illinois High Cap Ban At Death’s Door

There doesn’t appear to be any support in the Illinois House for a high capacity magazine ban:

In the midst of a lengthy impasse over the state budget, Blagojevich has called on lawmakers to ban the sale, purchase and possession of gun clips that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition.

But observers on both sides of the divisive issue say there are simply not enough votes to get the measure passed.

Of the 60 votes needed for approval, gun control advocates and gun rights groups agree there are only about 50 solid â€œyesâ€ votes. Not even the billâ€™s sponsor thinks it has enough support.

I continue to be impressed by the effectiveness of the Illinois State Rifle Association. Working in what can only be regarded as a state with demographics that are very hostile to gun rights, they’ve managed to keep any serious gun control proposals at bay for years. National NRA can only do so much without effective state affiliates, and gun owners in Illinois certainly can claim to have one.Â Good show!

DC’s Decision Within a Week

According to Dave Hardy, DC will have it’s decision on whether to appeal Parker vs. DC within a week. If I were a betting man, I’d wager they’ll appeal. Reason? When it comes down to it, Fenty and the DC political establishment can’t afford to be seen as backing down. Fenty has to do what he thinks is best for his city and his constituents, and despite any pressure he might be getting from outside gun control groups, political expedience will demand he appeal.

It may not be the smart thing for the gun control movement to do strategically, and surely Fenty has been under a lot of pressure not to move forward, or to make small changes to DC’s law and fight this battle with a different case on better terms. But he also has to consider that he is not the President of the Brady Campaign, he’s Mayor of Washington DC, and he will have do what he thinks is right for his city, no matter how delusional he may actually be about the effectiveness of the ban.

Of course, I could be totally wrong and he won’t appeal. Time will tell.

ATF OKs Bits of String

You no longer have to worry about spending time in the federal klink for having shoelaces and guns, at least, until they change their mind again.

The Heating Seeking .50 BMG

It slices, it dices, it can julienne your carrots from 50 miles away, and it’s heat seeking too. Not only that, it can cook a deer with a single shot! Mention Patricia Eddington, and we’ll knock 20% off list price!

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

Of course, API rounds are already illegal in New York and New Jersey, and regulated quite strictly at the federal level, but don’t except Assemblywoman Eddington to tell you that.

Here’s the QuickTime for people who can’t view the YouTube.

It amazes me that the media just repeats this nonsense without bothering to do the least bit of fact checking.Â People make fun of Arlen Spector for coming up with his magic bullet theory, but he’s got nothing on the opponents of the .50 BMG.

I Wouldn’t Build that AR

If there’s one thing I’ve learned from other people’s experience with the gun police, it’s don’t wander into gray areas when the state is looking for reasons to put you in jail for being a gun owner:

Hereâ€™s what Iâ€™m wondering.Â Using something like a braided steel fishing leader and some lead split shot, I could conceivably drill small holes in the channel near the base of the mag (where it wonâ€™t interfere with the spring and follower) and securing the thin steel cable there by creating a lead tag of a melted lead split shot.Â Then, run the cable up the mag body inside the channel on the outside of the mag and hang them outside of the lower receiver.Â Close the action and attach lead tags to the steel cables on the outside of the action.Â Now, you have a magazine that can be attached without removing the standard mag release button, but canâ€™t be detached without opening the action.Â The cables and tags wouldnâ€™t get in the way of the operation according to my Mk. I eyeball.Â And there should be no problems with the receiver closing on the cable.

Good idea, bad idea?Â Completely idiotic?Â I mean the idea, not the laws that inspired it – I know theyâ€™re idiotic.

It depends on whether you want to sit in front a jury, explaining all this to them and hoping they understand it, while the prosecutor tries to explain you’re a dangerous extremist who was illegally manufacturing assault weapons in violation of state laws.

The state will surely argue that all it would take is a pair of wire cutters to convert the AR into an assault weapon, and thus it falls into the “readily modifiable” provision, since it doesn’t neatly fit into one of the exceptions.Â It is readily modifiable without taking the action apart, because all you have to do is cut the cable.

New Billboard

Josh Rosenthal, who you all might remember as a board member of the American Hunters and Shooters Association, is putting up a new billboard along the Mass Pike, along with Deval Patrick, The Massachusetts State Police and the Boston Police Department.

Wow!

I’m assuming this was shot using optics, because I can’t even see a bullseye that small at 200 yards with iron sights, let alone 5x that distance.Â That’s about as well as I shoot at 100 yards with optics.Â That’s really impressive.Â I’ve never even had the opportunity to shoot at ranges that far out, let alone get really good at it.

Blagojevich Pushing for Gun Ban

The Illinois Governor has taken time out from the state budget impasse to demand the legislature pass more gun control.Â This seems to be making everyone, including his supporters, pretty unhappy.

But there was something cruelly manipulative Monday about Blagojevich using an appearance with the families of gun violence victims to try to gain advantage in his budget negotiations with Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.

That shouldn’t be surprising.Â Gun control itself is a manipulative issue.Â Without appeals to emotion and concealing or distorting facts, it can’t survive.Â That Blagojevich would do this isn’t any more disgusting than his attempt to dupe the people of Illinois into surrendering their constitutional rights.

Proposed Changes

Pennsylvania is considering some changes in firearms law, it looks like, with the OK from the NRA.Â I’ve been a bit out of the loop for the past few days, as I’ve been in Virginia since last Tuesday, but it looks like the definition change in the term “firearm” (which under PA law typically only means handgun, long guns are largely unregulated) in regards to penalties to crimes committed with a firearm.Â If that’s the case, I have no problems with this.Â If you knock over a liquor store with a shotgun, I don’t see any reason to not charge you as if you had done it with a pistol.Â Of course, I think penalties should be stiff even if you use a butter knife, but politicians will be stupid.

I’ll look for actual language for these bills tomorrow, but I trust Hohenwarter isn’t going to agree to anything that’s going to affect law abiding gun owners.

Jackson Moving to Bay Area

Jesse Jackson is moving his attention whoring campaign to the bay area now.

“We have to look at tighter regulations around sales of guns, where they’re being sold, how they’re being sold, how we’re requiring accountability by those dealers,” Harris said. “We should be looking more seriously at the proliferation of guns in our community, including assault weapons, because there really is no need for an assault weapon in a civil community.”

Jackson is in the Bay Area to raise awareness of gun violence in society at large before a nationwide protest that his civil rights group, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, has scheduled for Aug. 28.

Of course, what the article fails to mention is that California already has the strictest assault weapons ban in the country.Â So if they are having a problem with them in their neighborhoods, wouldn’t that say that the ban is mostly useless?Â At least one person has a clue:

Lorrain Taylor of Hayward, whose twin 22-year-old sons were gunned down in Oakland in February 2000 while working on a car, left the rally skeptical.

“I think we’re not looking at the root of the problem. This sounds very political,” Taylor said. “Closing down the gun shops will not stop the violence. … I don’t think the source is the gun stores. It’s a deep spiritual problem.”

Yep. Jesse Jackson is a cheap attention whore. It’s high time the media stopped paying attention to him.