Shall Not Be Questioned

Is Anyone Running NRA?

Chris Cox is suspended. I thought he was hired by the Board, so who is suspending him?

The palace intrigue at the National Rifle Association deepened on Thursday as the gun group suspended its second-in-command and top lobbyist, accusing him of complicity in the recent failed coup against its chief executive, Wayne LaPierre.

This isn’t a good thing to be happening out in the New York Times. Up until now ILA seemed relatively un-embroiled in the struggle with Ackerman-McQueen.

We’re going to pay a price for this, without a doubt.

I don’t get this notion that the suppressor made any difference in the latest lunatic mass shooting incident. Any of you who have been near a gun being fired without any hearing protection know it is loud enough to be disorienting. It could be positively debilitating to someone unused to something that loud. A suppressed firearm is just loud. If you gave me a choice as to whether to face down a mass shooter with or without a suppressed firearm, I’d take “with” any day of the week.

Why would I complain if a mass shooter thought enough to spare my hearing while I prepared to return fire? Awfully considerate of him.

75th Anniversary of D-Day

My grandfather’s first cousin, so also my cousin, was killed during Operation Overlord 75 years ago. I never knew about him because my grandfather did not talk about the war much. My grandfather would not see a battlefield until 24 December, 1944. His cousin Bill was dropped into Normandy on D-Day and was actually killed on the 8th of June, 1944. The headstone is wrong. His Date of Birth is also wrong, being 1921 and not 1930.

He was originally buried in France. There is still a memorial to the men who died with him near the spot where he fell. He was reinterred in the US into what is now a defunct cemetery in Philadelphia, which is being slowly brought back to life by a small number of dedicated volunteers.

Interesting Question: Are We Medicating People into Active Shooters?

Study on whether psychotropic drugs increase the risk of psychosis. I’ve heard it suggested that even if the drugs don’t increase the risk of psychosis in and of themselves, they help people who do develop psychosis stay at a high enough functioning level to be able to plan and execute mass murders.

It’s an interesting question for researchers to explore. I tend to blame the media environment for encouraging mass killers. If you ask me what the independent variable is, I would offer that up. If the 24×7 cable news cycle wasn’t enough, social media might just have made it worse.

The big issue those who want to blame gun access is that gun access in this country has never been more restricted, and school shootings were unheard of in the era when kids took guns to school as a matter of routine, and guns were far more readily accessible to kids.

You Cannot be Stopped for Carrying a Gun in PA

Pretty good decision from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in regards to whether you can be stopped if the police spot you carrying a gun. I’m hoping this also dissuades the folks who seem to think maybe the Supreme Court is up for revisiting Ortiz. I feel better that they are not after seeing this.

Don’t Entrust Your Business to Cloud Providers

This goes double if you’re in the gun business. I should say, you should never entrust any critical business function to the cloud. We use some cloud services, but if they disappeared tomorrow they could be replaced quickly without great pain.

Salesforce.com doesn’t want retailers using its e-commerce technology to sell automatic and semiautomatic firearms.
The software giant recently changed its acceptable-use policy to prohibit its customers from selling a range of weapons and some gun parts, including “magazines capable of accepting more than 10 rounds” and “multi-burst trigger devices.”

They cut off Camping World. Hopefully Camping World does the right thing and tells SalesForce to go to hell. If they cave, I’ll never shop there.

This is a big reason I keep our club on QuickBooks Desktop, despite them having a cloud version. I could not replace QuickBooks easily. But at least with the Desktop software, they can’t cut me off.

SalesForce is a shitty company anyway with a shitty product. To be honest, even before this, I never would have done business with them.

I’m Hearing the Right Things

NRA is commenting on the Ack-Mac terminating NRA as a client:

Andrew Arulanandam, managing director of NRA Public Affairs, added in his own statement that changes are coming to the NRAâ€™s communications strategy. â€œThe NRA is eager to return the focus of its messaging to our core mission, the Second Amendment and our steadfast fight to protect Americaâ€™s constitutional freedoms,â€ he said.
Whatever changes are coming to the NRA, they do not appear to include a retreat from politics. â€œWe have an opportunity to elevate our brand, communicate with a broader community of gun owners, and press the advantage in the upcoming 2020 elections,â€ Arulanandam said.

They have to do this. Ack-Mac’s messaging threw NRA in wholly with the right. Some were pointing out the Brewer is a big Dem donor. Maybe they are viewing that as a feature and not a bug. At some point the Dems are going to be back in power. Ack-Mac’s messaging has completely alienated moderate and left-of-center gun owners, and pro-gun Democrats are a critically endangered species, nearing total extinction. This absolutely has to be reversed.

It’s increasingly looking to me like the Brewer firm are Ack-Mac’s replacement. I care about results. If I see good results; if NRA does indeed return to it’s core mission and jettisons the Angry Dana strategy, I don’t really care if the CEO of the firm donates to Dems. I don’t vet all my vendors for ideological purity, and I don’t expect NRA to do so either. What matters are results.

In-Ear Hearing Protection

Now that I’m helping run an action steel program, I’m finding that being on the line all day wearing electronic earmuffs in hot weather is awful. I’d like to be able to wear a hat that offers more shade than a ball cap. I’m looking at electronic plugs, but it looks like anything decent is ridiculously expensive. Walker has the Razor line, which would be fine, but they don’t look to be binaural, which is a deal breaker for me.

I know there are mechanical earplugs which are open for conversation normally, but close in response to loud impulse, however I have no idea if they are actually any good. I know people who swear by them. But earplugs aren’t exactly something you want to ask your shooting buddy “Hey, can I try that?”

I’m curious how much these work, and whether they hush conversation too much. The thing I like about electronic muffs is that I can’t tell I’m muffed unless I’m trying to hear someone over a lot of gunfire. I’ll even forget I have them on in winter.

Anyone have any recommendations?

Ack-Mac Fires NRA as a Client

John Richardson has the story. Of course, this could also be exactly what NRA wanted, and Ack-Mac is just bending to the pressure and trying to spin this in public to maintain the narrative that they are the real victim here, if only for the sake of not scaring off their other clients.

I doubt either party really wants to take this to court, and have it become public, because I doubt either party will come out looking good. I expect this matter to settle.