Les has the skinny on SigSauer nomenclature. I thought everybody knew that?

Fodder’s blog is one year old.

The 6th circuit:

It cannot be seriously contended that any reasonable peace officer, or citizen, for that matter, would believe that mild profanity while peacefully advocating a political position could constitute a criminal act

Now, I cuss. A lot. And I don’t do it mildly. I wonder how they define mildly? It looks like I may need to find out since Blount County Mayor Jerry Cunningham is an asshat. If you have a problem with the mayor, he wants you to shut up:

Blount County Mayor Jerry Cunningham is dealing some harsh words these days against what he sees as the county’s version of an insurgency – vocal citizen action groups that he says spout persistent criticism without offering any help or solutions.

Cunningham decries “harbingers of gloom and doom” who harp about taxes and county spending practices but decline invitations to “come in and look at the budget and give constructive ideas.”

I don’t have to have a solution to know that something sucks. And, here’s a proposal, I’ll come in with big fat red Sharpie and take it to the budget for you. Says Linda King of Citizens for Blount County’s Future:

“We look for waste and abuse of money,” she said, “and if he thinks people shouldn’t do that, I have a problem with that.”

Good thing she is since the powers that be are only looking for ways to spend our money.

I’ve noticed this before too:

If a story says “some people” or “some parents” feel one way, but only quote one parent, the reporter’s only found one or two parents who are complaining.

Well, some people think that’s stupid.

That I watched. I caught the Superbowl last night. I noticed what I thought was booing too for a player named Muhammed. Glad to hear they were yelling his nickname Moose.

Also, the commercials sucked just like last year. Well, except that one Bud-light commercial where the couple driving pick up the hitchhiker. That was funny.

The announcers made it a point to note that special legal action or some such was needed to let Tank Johnson play. See, Tank has a habit of getting arrested. He’s been arrested twice: once for assaulting a police officer and once for illegal possession of guns. The announcer pointed out that Tank had 6 unlicensed firearms and 500 rounds of ammo. That’s not a crime in most places but he lives in the city of Chicago. The announcer pointed out the gun crime but not the fact that Tank tried to assault some police officers. Since he’s an important football star, they make special arrangements for him so he can go play football. Isn’t that nice. I wonder if your average Chicagoan could do that? Like you and me, only better.

Anyway, glad the Colts won. Actually, that’s not true. I’m glad Chicago lost. No Superbowl Shuffle this year, eh?

In England, stuff you can’t make up:

Jump up and down and shout to beat street crime

Witnesses to violent street crime should try to ‘distract’ attackers by honking their car horns or even ‘jumping up and down’. That’s according to Labour’s Police Minister.

Active resistance (preferably while armed) is usually the best method. But that’s basically illegal in England.

Tam has what she claims is a poem. I don’t think so since it doesn’t rhyme.

There’s one here by Jeremy M. Burnside:

Guns kill people: Abolition is the only way to stop the madness

Well, if guns are abolished, there will be a lot more people getting killed. Trust me.

On New Year’s Eve, my friend and rowing teammate was killed by a gun in Dunbar. Regardless of who pulled the trigger, I blame the gun.

And I blame cars whenever someone is killed in an accident.

Guns were invented with the specific purpose to kill. People were not.

Actually, humans are designed to kill. Our primary sense is sight, our eyes face forward, and we have teeth designed to eat meat. We (like say lions) are designed to kill, no matter what you may think. But, that’s not relevant here. What is relevant is that what happened to your friend, while tragic and not something I wish on anyone, simply isn’t a good enough excuse to infringe on the rights of people.

Suffering a tragedy doesn’t make one an expert. Policy should not be made my people who have suffered emotionally.

Update: Weird. One of his examples is Peter O. and guns, apparently, made Peter O. evil. Peter O. is Peter Odighizuwa who was the mutant who went on a shooting rampage at the Appalachian Law School. Peter O. was likely stopped by an armed citizen.

The other example he mentioned died in a triple murder suicide.

Thanks to Cam for the tip.

Greg “Lumpy” Lambert, John Griess, and R. Larry Smith gave surprising answers this morning on the “Inside Tennessee” Television program concerning the debacle that occurred Wednesday as 12 term limited government office holders were replaced in a process that has yielded one lawsuit and almost universal citizen outrage.

WBIR’s John Becker asked, “Was the process fair?” Lumpy Lambert, “Yes”. John Griess, “Yes”. R. Larry Smith, “Yes”.

Becker then asked “Did we get the best people possible. The best nominees possible for each District seat? Lumpy Lambert, “I believe so”. John Griess, “It wasn’t a requirement of the Supreme Court that we get the best but that we make appointments and we fulfilled that requirement and obligation”. R. Larry Smith, “I think we could have done better”.

You can see the interview here.

I linked to this post a bit back. Via PGP, the comments have really kicked up. Looks to me like the good guys are representin’, yo.

More shockingly, aired on CNN.

update: I don’t think the law generally supports you going after the bad guys once they retreat.

Hola, Amigos. Been a while since I rapped at ya.

When life gets complicated, it’s always the small, habitual pleasures that slip– things like reading blogs and keeping up with friends I don’t see on a daily basis. And once slipped, it’s these things that don’t get picked up so easily again.

But I need some advice, and I thought the gunnies around here could help. Because I am a lawyer and because I am into guns and because I train in various knife arts, people often ask me what they can carry where. I never have answers because weapons laws are a thicket of overlapping state, local and federal stupidity. My goal in the next couple weeks is to correct that and to answer some simple questions for a friend who has applied for a handgun permit.

To start, I’m looking for a weapons law primer, preferably one centered on NYC and/or the surrounding states. I have the general lay of the land, but I want to have definitive answers when people ask how to get their gun from home to the range and back into storage without committing multiple felonies.

So, what’s the best book in this area?

Well, I personally have always been a fan of either:

or

Update: Kristopher in comments:

Ban genocide prevention devices.

Heh.

Punxsutawney Phil predicts global warming will kill us all. In six weeks.

Bill says it’s not dead yet.

Apparently, the ol’ blog was down last night due to a cut cable or some such. I didn’t notice because I was busy losing at the local satellite hold-em tournament.

The Second has started crawling. That means I get to spend this weekend installing baby gates. He did it last night for the first time. I arrive at day care this morning and tell the teacher that he’s crawling. She says Yeah, he started that this week. So, it wasn’t his first time. Kind of a pitfall of daycare that you may miss a few firsts.

In Nashville, it’s illegal to warm up your car:

Many people start their cars in the morning before a commute to warm it up before they use it, but one man was given a ticket for it, and he said police have gone too far.

Steve Hatfield said he and his business partners were warming up their cars Thursday morning in the parking lot of their Hermitage bar when a Metro police officer, they said, started writing tickets.
Click here to find out more!

“Basically, what they told me was, it’s illegal to warm your car if you’re not in it. And it is a violation, and I do have a ticket stating that,” Hatfield said.

Guys, it’s cold out in the winter. People like toasty cars. I guess Nashville has taken care of its other crime problems.

AC on the loss of the libertarian right:

Now, I’m no libertarian. I believe the ideology of libertarianism to [I assume this should be is – ed] the Marxism of the Right. However, it is an important ideology to study and reach towards with the understanding that submitting yourself entirely to the dogma will result in political, society and moral decay.

Of course, submitting yourself completely to any ideology is generally bad. A little bit of libertarianism is good. Hell, a little bit of communism can be good (roads?). I think the key to where people identify themselves is which particular thing is more important to them. I come down on the side of freedom for the individual taking more of a precedent than, say, the collective we. Hence, I tend to identify myself as libertarianish.

Kills rodents without chemicals.

The SAF has filed a motion to hold Nagin & Riley in contempt.

It has some.

Over at Terry Frank’s, State Senator Jamie Woodson non-explains the retarded anti-free speech bill she tried to slip by with the help of Rep Briley. Briley was either 1) a toadie, 2) incompetent; or 3) a liar. Says the senator:

The bill that Chairman Briley inadvertently filed was a working draft of legislation proposed to me by a third year student at The University of Tennessee College of Law. I received the request in November 2006, prior to the convening of this legislative session. The student’s concerns related to encouraging web-site owners to remove knowingly defamatory statements against individuals from their web-site. This appeared like a reasonable subject of legislative discussion to me.

That is a mockery of our system of law and you should be ashamed. It’s almost like saying yeah, I just throw these out here without reading them. You just take random bills from random people and run them up the flag pole to see who salutes? So, I propose the following bill and any Tennessee reps who want to file it, go for it:

BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF TENNESSEE

Tennessee Code Annotated, section XX, is amended by adding the following language:

Senator Goodson has made a mockery of law through negligence or incompetence. As such, each citizen of the State of Tennessee is entitled to deliver one swift kick to her buttocks.

What? Someone could file it. Her response is utter nonsense or an admission of incompetence.

AC has a round up.

When domain names go bad. My favorite: penisland.net.

And a new category!

I don’t get sweater vests. I’ve never been cold and had my arms stay warm. I guess they’re like shorts for your torso, only you wear stuff under them. So, it’s like wearing shorts over your pants. The only use I see them having is to 1) conceal a gun or 2) carry stuff. And they look gay.

Heh.

Update: Good:

State Rep. Rob Briley has withdrawn his anti-blogger legislation

Update: Says Briley:

It was never my intent to file this legislation. It originated in the Senate and was brought to me by a Senator to see if I would consider filing it. While reviewing a number of bills that I had been asked to review, this particular bill was inadvertently placed among those that I had agreed to and intended to file.

So, you willy-nilly introduce bills by mistake, likely without reading them? I’m glad the process of passing laws that affect us all is such a finely tuned, efficient process with adequate controls.

Original post below
===============

Is that libel?

Update: Aunt B. wants to know why he hates blogs.

Update 2: AC:

I’m not a big one for letter writing activism but you might want to give Big Rob a shout and tell him to take down his bill and apologize.

And, see, I can show restraint. The original title of this post was (foul language warning)

Read the rest of this entry »

I hate it. I hate dealing with the sales guys. I hate dealing with finance guys. Can’t stand it. But we grabbed a Honda Pilot (4WD just in time for the non-snow) mentioned here. We went by to finish up some paperwork and all that. This is the part where my wife became annoyed because my credit score blew hers out of the water. Hers is still great, mind you, but mine is a few points shy of the max. So, the finance guy said we’d get a better rate if I was the applicant.

I don’t know why they call him the Finance Manager since he’s really the Sell You Extended Warranties and Other Shit You Don’t Need Manager. We were, no shit, in this guy’s office for an hour and every few minutes he’d get up and go check on something (his words) while we were left to discuss some piece of junk package he wanted to sell us. The third time he left to go check on something, I looked at the wife and said This guy has 20 minutes to get us out the door or this deal is off. This is taking way too long. I’ve closed on houses faster than this. He came back and was most expeditious this time. I figure they have a microphone in the Sell You Extended Warranties and Other Shit You Don’t Need Manager’s office and he heard me.

Any way, we got the car. And dig it. But one other bit of bad ju-ju: They detailed and cleaned the car for us last night and had it looking quite spiffy. But, in case you haven’t heard, we were supposed to have a blizzard today. So, the Mrs. had the misfortune of being stuck behind a salt truck on her way home after having her brand new car detailed. So, it looks like she’s been off-roading at the beach. Bummer. And, of course, the blizzard never came. Stupid global warming

Seen at Joe’s:

A 80 year old man was shot and killed by undercover police after he told them to leave his property. He brandished a gun and they shot and killed him. Witnesses say the officers never told him they were undercover.

One difference this time is that the police are admitting their error:

Police are now conceding that Singletary was completely innocent. The Jacksonville sheriff describes him in this article as an “honest citizen trying to do good.”

Which means that two undercover officers trespassed onto Singletary’s property. They then invited criminals onto his property to engage in criminal activity with them. Mr. Singletary, recognizing the trespassers as drug dealers, then properly demanded they leave. He brought a gun along to defend himself, not an unreasonable action, given the circumstances. For this, he was shot to death.

As was seen in the Kathryn Johnston case, the blue shield usually comes up with people suddenly becoming tight-lipped. I have to say kudos to the sheriff in this case.

I figured that Biden’s comments about Barrack Hussein Obama would be defended with some righteousness from the lefty blogs. Instead, they came down on him. Good for them. Though some commenters are defending him.

But, here’s an observation: Biden basically said what the media have been pushing for a year or so now. After all, Obama is really a rather mediocre political candidate. His career has not been that long nor has it been particularly stellar. Why the love affair if not due to race, presence, and looks? Take out race, and he’s John Edwards.

Look out, he’s got righteous indignation:

Finally, and again using your reported numbers, there are 408,250 law-abiding, concealed carrying Floridians who have the means to defend themselves and their loved ones (and perhaps you and your loved ones as well) from an attack by an armed criminal. Frankly, I’m much more comforted by that thought than I am by the prospect that all I have to answer a criminal’s armed assault is your paper’s righteous indignation.