Junaid M. Afeef of the Institute for Social Policy Understanding. Some random snippets:

In the Fight Against Terrorism, Some Rights Must Be Repealed

Then the terrorists win.

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What is a right? Some folks address it:

The right in my garage

Kevin on what is a right?

Natural rights.

I’m not one to wax philosophic about, well, anything. As such, my definition of a right for all intents and purposes are those enumerated in law. I think the more important issue is the justification by the government for regulating something.

Head has part two up.

Someone should get fired, arrested and prosecuted:

The police document said Wheeler was handcuffed to a hospital bed and then secured with leather straps after he refused to urinate in a cup. When medical staff tried to insert a catheter to get the sample, Wheeler refused.

At one point, police officer Peter Linnenkamp noted that he jumped on the bed with his knees on Wheeler’s chest to restrain him. Then, when Wheeler still refused to let the catheter be inserted, Linnenkamp said he twice used his Taser gun, which sends 50,000 volts into a target.

Another local judge refused to jail an elderly man convicted of selling guns without a permit.

If you ever sell a computer that has illegal stuff on it, wipe the hard drive clean first:

A Maryville man was arrested Tuesday on a charge of sexual exploitation of a minor and may face additional charges regarding child pornography found on a computer he sold to another individual.

Not here, here.

GOA has a piece on proposed CCW national reciprocity:

Rep. John Hostettler (R-IN) will soon be reintroducing his national reciprocity bill that protects the right of citizens to carry their firearms into other states.

Hostettler’s language has a huge advantage over other reciprocity-type bills in that it does not punish states for being too pro-gun. His bill would not penalize citizens from states like Alaska and Vermont, because his proposal doesn’t require a citizen to first get a permit to enjoy reciprocity in another state.

Boy, California will be mad.

Another CCW to be issued in Tennessee. Excellent!

Commies for Tenncare. Via SKooBie.

Any of my Tennessee readers know the street value of 42.5 grams of marijuana in Knoxville? Actually, can someone translate that into some useful measure for me too (such as joints)?

I’m not up on drug values since I don’t do drugs but I am thinking of heading down to the local Tennessee Department of Revenue office and buying some of those Unauthorized Substance Tax stamps. You can read the silly tax FAQ at the DOR site here. I’ve talked about Tennessee’s tax on illegal drugs before.

I read the law and it doesn’t make it a crime to possess the stamps and no drugs. Wonder if I could buy them and get a refund? Of course, it’s probably a crime to falsify a tax document. I may just pick up a form and see.

Thanks to Marc for the inspiration.

Update: Thanks to hellbent, I learned that’s about $200 of cheap stuff and a whole lotta joints.

Update 2: A reader obtained a copy of the form you’re supposed to fill out to pay your tax on illegal drugs. Here’s a copy of the form.

I think there would be broad public support for a National Do Not Mail Registry. I should also point out what I do with junk mail:

Each time I get a credit card application or some other variety of junk mail that has a postage paid return envelope, I take all contents of the envelope and I rip them to shreds. I then place the shreds into the postage paid return envelope (which will be paid by the company sending me the junk mail), attach a note that says Please Recycle and place it in the mail box.

Every time someone sends me junk mail with a return envelope, it costs them 26 to 37 cents. I encourage everyone to do the same. If all 300 million of us did it, we could bankrupt the junkmail (sic) industry.

Heh! I sicced myself.

Gunner reports that the list may not be, well, a list:

“Really not a list at all” is the words from Transportation Security Administration spokesman Nico Melendez. Only problem is that GOA(Government accountability office) and other law enforcement agencies disagree with him.

So while the no fly list reminds me of the famous McCarthy black lists I guess the best way to describe the selectee list is “McCarthy lite”

Also, last night on CBS, they reported that there were 50,000 people on the list.

And Denise notes civil liberties hypocrisy from the left.

If you want to crack down on underage drinking, what do you do? Well, if you’re a dumb ass, you arrest designated drivers and charge them with furnishing a place for minors to drink.

Regarding my AK, reader Robert writes:

It’s really just a big, robust pistol.

Yup.

CCRKBA reports:

Sen. Lautenberg announced that he will introduce legislation requiring the National Instant Check System (NICS) to retain records of gun purchases by suspected terrorists for at least ten years.

Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty. Wasn’t one of the Kennedys on that same watch list? I’m just, you know, saying.

This looks like a first step toward maintaining a gun registry, by the way.

Head has the first part of his series on how to build your own AK-74M. Excellent. I need more tools.

Jeff has the latest edition focusing on the Canadian drug shooting that went very badly.

This time, in Cali:

The lawsuit had originally been dismissed by California Superior Court Judge Vincent P. DiFiglia in March 2003. The lawsuits, filed by Berkeley, Compton, Inglewood, Los Angeles, Sacramento, San Francisco, and West Hollywood, and the counties of San Mateo and Alameda, alleged that gun makers engaged in unfair trade practices and that resulted in criminal misuse of firearms, causing a “public nuisance.” The First Appellate District, Division One, in the Court of Appeals of the State of California upheld the dismissal.

It claims another victim! Nice AK!

A Congressional study reveals that people on terrorist watch lists can still buy guns, legally:

People suspected of being members of terrorist groups are not automatically barred from legally buying a gun, and the new investigation, conducted by congressional officials at the Government Accountability Office (GAO), indicated that people with clear links to terrorist groups had taken advantage of this gap on a regular basis.

Since Sept. 11, 2001, law enforcement officials have voiced increasing concern about the prospect of having a terrorist walk into a gun shop, legally buying an assault rifle or other type of weapon.

Do they mean real assault weapons or the look-alike weapons that anti-gunners are trying to get banned? The former may be difficult as they are already regulated under the 1934 NFA and require a sign off from local law enforcement to acquire. More:

At least 44 times between February and June 2004, people regarded by the FBI as known or suspected members of terrorist groups sought permission to buy or carry guns, the GAO found.

In all but nine cases, the FBI or state authorities who handled the requests allowed the gun applications to proceed because a check of the would-be buyer found no automatic disqualification, like being a felon, an illegal immigrant or a person deemed “mentally defective,” the report found.

In the four months after the formal study ended, authorities received another 14 gun applications from terror suspects, and all but two of those were cleared to proceed, the investigation found. In all, officials approved 47 of 58 gun applications from terror suspects over a nine-month period last year, the GAO found.

The gun buyers came up as positive matches on a classified internal FBI watch list that includes thousands of high-risk terrorist suspects, many of them being monitored, trailed or sought for questioning as part of continuing terrorism investigations, officials said.

Maybe if the list wasn’t classified, it could be included as part of the National Instant Check System. Still, I don’t see the point. There are criteria for the background check and they dictate essentially that the purchaser be a law-abiding citizen. As long as these folks fit that bill, the system won’t stop them.

Update (and bumped): People who don’t know anything about gun laws respond:

The LeftCoaster:

Why The National Rifle Association Is Al Qaeda’s Best Friend

Looking for a potent issue in next year’s midterms? How about this one? Because of the NRA’s efforts to weaken gun control laws, and the White House and GOP support for such efforts under the pretense that the privacy rights of gun owners are more important than the government’s right to maintain records, known terror suspects have been largely successful since 9/11 in obtaining guns and assault weapons.

Actually, the NICS system has been in place since 1994 (with the support of the NRA, who were willing to concede the 1994 ban to get the NICS passed). The law has not been weakened. Apparently, largely successful means (let’s see, 44 minus 9) 35 times. The fact a person is on a watch list doesn’t mean they’re actually, you know, a terrorist or that they’ve broken a law. He continues with this bit of intellectual wizardry:

The NRA and their GOP supporters in the House and Senate have no defense for this one. The NRA and the GOP are making it easy for terrorists to acquire assault weapons here at home, plain and simple, and the FBI says they are hindered in fighting terrorism. That is the only sound bite Democrats need between now and next year to destroy vulnerable Republicans who have accepted large campaign contributions from the NRA.

How so? Sounds to me like the ATF and FBI aren’t talking. Isn’t increasing agency communication what the Department of Homeland Security was supposed to do? These terrorists aren’t necessarily terrorists. They’re people whose names appear on some list. They do not meet the criteria to be disqualified from purchasing a gun.

Next up, this genius:

Just to recap: Today, a man with clear ties to terrorism can stroll into a gun shop and buy a semi-automatic assault weapon or – if he’d rather, an easily concealable Five-seveN “cop-killing gun.” In most states, he can carry that firearm, loaded, into a restaurant or bar, although in Alaska and Arizona, he won’t be allowed to have a drink. But until he opens fire, he still won’t have broken the law.

There is no such thing as a semi-automatic assault weapon. The 5 7 is not a cop killing gun (to date, I think it’s killed exactly zero cops) and it is not armor piercing, despite the lies of anti gun groups. Ask the ATF. Most states regulate the carrying of arms where alcohol is served. This person is correct that until someone actually breaks the law, they haven’t broken the law.

More here.

It’s true. You may notice the (currently empty) ad spot over there on the right. I long held that I would not pimp for money on this site but have since had the capitalist in me take over. The fact is that this site costs me about $300 per year to keep up and running. I’m just defraying the costs a little and do not entertain any notion that I’m going to make major bucks selling ad space. Any additional money will go to either 1) contributing to causes I deem worthy or 2) buying guns and stuff. Also, it’s an experiment. I want to see how much a third tier blog can make in ads.

Additionally, Henry at Blogads informed me that they were looking into the idea of networking blog ads. For example, they’d create a gun rights network and an advertiser could purchase ads in bulk that would appear on gun blogs. Sounds good to me.

Oh and to get things started (and to see if you’ve read this far) the first three people to email me with the word Blogads in the subject line get a one week ad for free.

Update: One left. Act now. Void where prohibited. Offer ends soon.

Update: All gone now.

They mention blogs. Not any local ones, mind you. Rather, they just print an AP feed about getting fired for blogging. Don’t they realize three of the more popular Tennessee blogs originate in Blount County? They could do a story on us.

Blake reports on a few gun bills proposed in Tennessee. One would allow people not drinking to carry their handguns in establishments that serve alcohol. While I’m lukewarm on this bill, it is a start. My problem with this approach is that you shouldn’t be packing heat while drunk anywhere. It’s just not a good idea. I would extend that to say, in general, if you’re drunk any where, you shouldn’t be carrying. I think packing heat while drunk should be illegal. I think if officer friendly can pull you over for drunk driving, he should be able to also cite you for drunk packing. Conversely, if you’re not drunk in a bar and have a single beer or glass of wine, you shouldn’t go to jail if you happen to strapped.

The second bill, which I wholeheartedly support, would exempt handgun carry permit holders from the background check when purchasing a firearm. At a gun show a few weeks back, me and some friends got together and bought some AR15 kits (about five of them). We also picked up some receivers there. We had to pay an additional $10 per background check. Also, that day there were apparently three gun shows in the state (that’s what the guy we were getting our receivers from said) so the instant check system was significantly less than instant. We had to stand around for a couple of hours while the checks went through. I’m pretty sure we all had carry permits and that would have saved us $10 per check and two hours’ time.

Also, since the background check is the primary reason transfers must go through a dealer, I’d like to see a law exempting CCW permit holders from that requirement. If the state trusts me to carry a gun, it should trust me to buy one too.

I’ve yammered about Tennessee’s stupid new law requiring those that deal in illegal drugs to buy a tax stamp before. It serves only as a tax on stupid people or as another crime to charge someone with in the ever expanding war on drugs. Surprising to no one, is the fact that drug dealers aren’t buying the tax stamps:

In fact, officials said nobody involved with illegal drugs or unstamped liquor has yet taken time to get the required stamps on packages used for their products.

“We haven’t had anybody to date,” said Al Laney, director of revenue enforcement in the Tennessee Department of Revenue. “To tell you the truth, we don’t expect anybody to (ask for a stamp). But we have to afford the taxpayer the opportunity to voluntarily pay.”

Tennessee has long had some odd rules for nudey bars. For example, a bar with naked dancers can’t sell alcohol. Bars get around this by either having the dancers wear see-through pasties on their nipples and thongs. Or they just let their patrons bring in beverages and they charge you price per bottle that you bring in (PSA: if in Tennessee, it’s expensive to take in beer). Now, it’s going to get a bit more odd:

The Tennessee Film Commission is hoping that a plan to tax strip club patrons will raise millions of dollars to lure Hollywood producers to the state to make their blockbuster hits.

So, the tax is to subsidize the making of movies? We want to actually tax regular Joes to pay money to a high dollar industry? No thanks:

”That is awfully dangerous territory,” said Ben Cunningham with Tennessee Tax Revolt, a public interest group. Cunningham is cool on the idea because the money would be raised from a $2 cover charge for every person walking into either an adult bookstore or strip club. In essence, he said, that’s a predatory tax that’s tapping one industry to help support another.

Amnesty Internation: Women should arm themselves. Well, paraphrased, of course:

The activists noted there were an estimated 650 million guns in circulation around the world — almost all in the hands of men.

“Given that they are almost never the buyers, owners or users of small arms, (women) suffer disproportionately from armed violence,” said Denise Searle of Amnesty International, one of the groups releasing the report.

In other words, they suffer because they can’t shoot back. Of course, that is not the point of the piece. It’s point is that the world should crack down on small arms proliferation through gun control:

Gun control activists said on Monday the world was awash in small arms, fuelling violence, and called for global cooperation and stricter limits on the trade.

“You can’t control international arms proliferation, especially small arms proliferation, without international cooperation,” said Brian Wood, Amnesty International’s arms and security trade research manager. “We want tough action.”

And what is this tough action?

Gun control campaigners hoped the report would give fresh impetus to moves to impose more regulation on the world trade in small arms, although they noted progress to date has been slow.

A 2001 U.N. action programme on the trade has yielded few results, but campaigners hope a review meeting in 2006 will push improvements such as a world arms trade registry, written arms shipment permits and better policing.

I’m antsy about registering with my own government. Registering with some sort of world body is out of the question. And we see the careful manipulation of statistics:

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Michael Silence reports that City Councilman Steve Hall is calling for legislation to outlaw such revenue measures err cameras.

Tennessee is looking at getting more politically oriented license plates:

Tennesseans are not done fighting culture wars on their back bumpers.

Even after a federal court struck down an anti-abortion license plate last year, there are new proposals this session at the state Capitol to create plates for God and gun-owners.

Some Democrats have proposed a “One Nation Under God” plate that “embodies both the rich and diverse religious heritage and the democratic form of government of this state and nation,” according to the bill.

On the other side of the aisle, Republicans want a license plate for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, a religious group that has chapters in high schools and colleges.

Another bill would let members of the National Rifle Association buy a special plate, with proceeds going to hunter and gun safety programs run by the state. The design of the license plate would be worked out in “consultation with the executive director of the National Rifle Association,” the bill reads.

Also from the article, I learned that Tennessee actually has an official state amphibian.