My Feinstein Ban, "Oh Shit!" Emergency Letter

Sorry, I wish I had something entertaining, gun porn, or something better to report.  I've also broken my rule of keeping language clean, because this shit is really fucked up.

Contact Your Federal Officials

Read about the gun ban that Feinstein is proposing, on her website.

Feinstein talking about her new bill.

Here's what I e-mailed my congressman, and the president (for all the good that'll do).

I've been working on a more detailed letter, however, time seems to be of the essence, and Senator Feinstein's 2013 "assault weapons" ban would affect far more gun owners than the 1994 Clinton "crime" bill.  The new bill requires grandfathered firearms to be registered with the ATF, and that registration will likely cost the taxpayers, all taxpayers, billions of dollars.  This registration requires fingerprinting and FBI background checks that will tie up local police departments and the FBI for many months.  Canada spent over two billion dollars on their gun registry, before finally admitting that it just wasn't working, and they just gave up on it.

The guns covered by the proposed 2013 ban are NOT machineguns.  Sales of real machineguns have been taxed, registered, and subject to serious FBI background checks since 1934, and further restricted by the manufacture ban of 1986.  The new Feinstein ban would cover ALL pistols of the type carried by police officers, and essentially all other semi-automatic firearms.  Basically every type of rifle, pistol, and shotgun designed since the beginning of the 1900's would be banned from manufacture, and the ownership and sales of existing banned firearms being heavily controlled.

There are times when great expense is justifiable.  This will not be one of them.  The 1994 ban expired in 2004 because "assault weapons" were used in less than 2% of crimes to begin with, and no amount of legislation on these guns will have a significant impact on crime.  A University of Pennsylvania study, commissioned by the National Institute of Justice, wrote of the 1994 Clinton "assault weapon" ban,  “We cannot clearly credit the ban with any of the nation’s recent drop in gun violence. And, indeed, there has been no discernible reduction in the lethality and injuriousness of gun violence.”  Crime rates have actually dropped since the expiration of the 1994 Clinton "Assault Weapon" ban.  The 1994 ban didn't stop the Columbine school shooting, and it didn't stop the North Hollywood bank shootout.  The problem with gun laws is that criminals break laws, by definition, and the gun laws only affect the law-abiding citizen.

Gun owners took note of who voted for the 1994 ban.  Thirty-three of the congressmen that voted for the Clinton ban in 1994 were defeated in the elections of 1994, and 6 more were defeated in 1996.  Bill Clinton and USA Today, to name two, largely blame the NRA advocacy in the wake of the the 1994 ban, for Gore's defeat in the presidential race of 2000.   Don't get yourself defeated in the next election, think of what that means for the rest of your personal agenda and objections to current policy.

Sign the petition to impeach Sen. Feinstein.  We're almost there folks.  Please take 4 minutes and sign it! 

Sign Petition: NBC David Gregory Broke D.C. Gun Law

Sign White House Petition to Press Charges against NBC Meet The Press host David Gregory, for breaking Washington D.C.'s "assault weapon" ban.  He held up, on camera, a 30-round AR-15/M-16 magazine, and stated, "Here is a magazine for ammunition that carries 30 bullets."  Oops!  D.C. gun laws say these magazines are not legal in the district.  It doesn't matter whether you have a firearm that it goes to or not.  Since Gregory is advocating a federal ban on these magazines, I think it's important that we hold him responsible for breaking the D.C. law.  I'm sure that he'd probably rat you out for doing the same, given the opportunity.

Screencap from NBC video (link posted below)

NBC has the episode posted on their website.  He holds up the magazine at about the 9 minute 45 second mark on the video.  You can skip to that point by dragging the triangle underneath the video.

You can read more about it on The Patriot Perspective WordPress page.  David Gregory Violates DC Gun Law On National TV —– Update: CNN’s Don Lemon Admits To Breaking Gun Laws, Too?  The text of the D.C. law is posted there, if you want to read it.

EDIT 12/26/12:  Not even half way there yet.

EDIT, early 12/27/12:  DC Police investigating MSNBC's David Gregory for possessing illegal ammo clip Mwahahaha!!

It seems that NBC asked about the magazine, the police told them it wasn't allowed, but they ignored them and carried on anyway.

I know that there's lots of stupid crimes, I've seen the TV shows and read the reports, but usually they don't involve asking the police beforehand, doing it anyway, announcing it, recording it on video, broadcasting it nationwide, and putting the video on the internet for the whole world to see. THAT is a kind of stupid, the likes of which I have not seen in a very long time!

Mass Shootings in Israeli Schools? Um, no.

Among many good points raised by John Lott recently, he posted this on his blog, referencing a John Fund article:

In 1974, three Arab terrorists broke into an Israeli school and killed 31 children and faculty. Did Israel respond by self-righteously asserting "Firearms have absolutely no place in our schools"?

No. Instead, they armed and trained their teachers and even parent chaperones, with the result that in the past 38 years, terror-beset Israel has not lost a single child within a school. . . . 

Source: Newsmax (Link to Article Below)

. . . Israel with the win.  Isn't that, more or less, what the NRA said the solution was on Friday?

John Lott Website: John Fund summarizes some useful facts on Multiple Victim Public Shootings

Original John Fund article: Everybody crazy 'bout a gun-free zone

Newsmax: A Cure for School Shootings? Reader Says Israel May Have an Answer

Open Letter To Elected Officials

Brought to my attention by hickok45, on YouTube, posted by ammoland.com is a form letter to send to your representatives and senators.  Although I would have focused more on "criminals break laws, by definition," than "let's not give government complete control over our lives," I know that we are all busy to one extent or another, particularly around the holidays, and cutting and pasting the form letter is far better than doing nothing.

Find your elected officials.

If you find what you think is a better letter, please leave a comment with a link.

fxhummel1 Biblical Self Defense Song

Please watch, listen, and share.

Credit to Eric at the Gun Mart Blog for finding it first.

More Tula .223Rem Fail

I was out shooting some more Tula .223 Remington steel-case ammo, and had a couple more failures.  This time it was a stuck case, one of the things I had been warned about with steel-case ammo.  The extractor would not hold onto the rim.  I had an AK-74 cleaning rod with me, but it wasn't long enough to knock the case out.  I have a Colt bolt with the gold extractor spring, black insert, and Crane o-ring installed in this rifle.  The extractor is still completely intact.  I only had 4 30-round magazines through a clean upper, with a clean chamber.  I have never had this problem with brass-case ammo.  I don't know what else to call it but an ammo failure.

I also experienced a fraction-of-a-second hang-fire.  The Geisselle trigger in the lower I was using was installed for shooting 5.45x39mm Russian surplus ammo, and gives the primers a good smack, so that should not have been an issue.  Again, I have to call ammo failure.

Would I buy any more?  Eh, I don't know.  It's about as cheap as you're going to get in this caliber, but it won't run in one of my rifles, and apparently cakes the chamber with carbon fouling.  I guess for shooting cheaper ammo, I will stick to 5.45x39mm, which at least has a tapered shell casing.  The Spike's 5.45x39mm upper has been running well, now that I have the magazines figured out.

At the moment, there is probably none in stock anywhere anyway.  What there is available is likely marked up so high, that you'd have to be a fool to buy it.  Black rifles, lowers, and "high-capacity" magazines have been selling like crazy over the last 7 days, and finding anything in stock at a reasonable price is getting nearly impossible.

On The Radio for About 25 Seconds

I was listening to AM talk radio in the car on the way home, when I hear Steve Martorano, the conservative talk radio station's token liberal, say something along the lines of, "The NRA is a lobbyist group, representing the gun manufacturers."  I couldn't let that stand, without a counterpoint.  The NRA may take money from manufacturers, but the organization's raison d'etre is to represent the millions of American gun owners that pay dues to the NRA to give them a voice in Washington D.C., and as of late, in the UN Arms Trade Treaty conferences. It's not a capitalist organization, whose sole existence is to keep Colt, Rock River, and Kel-Tec in business, which I'm fairly certain is the notion that Mr. Martorano was trying to pass off as truth.

So, I called in.  After waiting on hold for maybe 12 minutes I got put on the air, without a queue or warning I  might add, to express my dissatisfaction.  Martorano tried to make it sound like I misunderstood what he said; that what he meant was that the gun industry indirectly benefits from the actions of the National Rifle Association.  That was about it.  The line just went dead after I said that he was misrepresenting the truth.

So I guess I got maybe 25 seconds of my 15 minutes of fame.

AIM Surplus Magpul UBR Stock Sale $199.95

AIM Suplus Magpul UBR collapsing AR-15 stock

That's my M4 there with UBR.  Compartment doors removed.

Use coupon code "UBRSALE" at checkout to get $50 off the regular price of $249.95.  All the Magpul stuff from AIM comes with free shipping.  I'm not entirely sure if the sale applies to colors other than black.  The link in the newsletter took me to the product page for the black stock.

I think I bought mine 50% off, years ago.  I think the AIM sale price is the cheapest that I've seen them since.  If you can get past the extra weight and the price, they are very nice.

I'm buying a UTAS UTS-15 Shotgun

No.  No, I'm definitely not.

The magazine that's pretty much completely open to the elements is pretty stupid, in full Chauchat style.

Bad.  Very, very bad.  There are other UTAS shotgun videos on YouTube that are kind of similar.  I haven't paid much attention, because I haven't actually seen one of the damn things in person yet.

It actually gets a bit worse.  Some rusting after the shotgun got dumped into the snow in frustration.  Discussion of bad ergonomics, and lack of instructions on how to actually operate the shotgun from UTAS.

Skymall, Repurposed Ammo Can - $110 :)

"Is that. . . ?  It is!  $110!?!  They've got balls, I'll give em that."

Skymall.com - "Repurposed Ammo Can"

So, I'm guessing they bought a pallet of .30cal ammo cans for maybe $3 or $4 each, and sent them out for cleaning and powder coat for a couple bucks each, and then marked them up another $100.

Sorry, I'm trying to finish off my Christmas shopping, and I just had to share.

Illinois Carry Ban Ruled Unconstitutional!

The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that Illinois can not constitutional prevent it's residents from BEARING arms.  Illinois and Washington D.C. are the only states that have absolutely refused to issue carry permits to residents outside the occupation of law enforcement.

Unfortunately, the court is giving the state 180 days to write less-restrictive laws regarding the carry of firearms, so there will be no (legal) concealed or open carry for at least another 6 months.

The Truth About Guns: BREAKING: U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals Strikes Down IL Concealed Carry Ban

Now, I would like to see NJ, MD, CA, and Mass. be forced to actually issue permits, without requiring "good reason" for citizens in good standing to exercise their constitutional rights.  Still lots of work to do on Washington D.C. gun laws.

UPDATE, 6/1/13:  Illinois Will Get Concealed Carry, but. . . 

AGI Video: (Really) Excessive Headspace

This may be of some interest to those of you interested in reloading or gunsmithing.

In this video, Bob Dunlap and Ken Brooks from the American Gunsmithing Institute (AGI) take a Mauser rifle, and shoot some 8mm Mauser military ammo, as they adjust the chamber from 0" over the no-go length, to 0.045" over the no-go length (that's 0.051" total headspace).

I thought it was interesting.  Video is almost 25 minutes.  Video quality is not real good though.

If you've never seen case head separation, you'll see some examples of what it looks like.