With Uncle back from vacation, my “services” are no longer needed. It’s been fun, even if posting was light.

I suppose to counter the PSH of Bryan Miller, NJ.com now has a pro-gun blogger, Scott Bach. You’ve probably heard of him. I have.

Get thee hence.

We’ve played this game once before.

Alleged law-breaker and alleged journalist Steve Bailey (background here) has hit another snag. Seems the gun dealer involved refutes his claim to have engaged in a straw purchase (though Steve, evoking sixth grade playground rules, has since called a do-over):

Gun Week has learned from a source close to the investigation that the columnist and/or his companions at the Lebanon gun show in late 2005 apparently approached more than one dealer with inquiries about buying firearms. The dealer who finally sold them the gun asserted that he was not aware that the buyer was with Bailey—as both Bailey and Rosenthal have alleged—until about three months later, after reading a copy of Bailey’s Nov. 30, 2005 Globe column that circulated around the gun show. He promptly alerted New Hampshire state police to what he thought may have been a crime.

So, Steve, what gives?

Less crime Err, has no real discernible impact on crime whatsoever:

Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy Confirms that Reducing Gun Ownership by Law-Abiding Citizens Does Nothing to Reduce Violence Worldwide

By now, any informed American is familiar with Dr. John R. Lott, Jr.’s famous axiom of “More Guns, Less Crime.” In other words, American jurisdictions that allow law-abiding citizens to exercise their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms are far safer and more crime-free than jurisdictions that enact stringent “gun control” laws.

Very simply, the ability of law-abiding citizens to possess firearms has helped reduce violent crime in America.

Now, a Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy study shows that this is not just an American phenomenon. According to the study, worldwide gun ownership rates do not correlate with higher murder or suicide rates. In fact, many nations with high gun ownership have significantly lower murder and suicide rates.

In their piece entitled Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide? A Review of International and some Domestic Evidence, Don B. Kates and Gary Mauser eviscerate “the mantra that more guns mean more deaths and that fewer guns, therefore, mean fewer deaths.” In so doing, the authors provide fascinating historical insight into astronomical murder rates in the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and they dispel the myths that widespread gun ownership is somehow unique to the United States or that America suffers from the developed world’s highest murder rate.

To the contrary, they establish that Soviet murder rates far exceeded American murder rates, and continue to do so today, despite Russia’s extremely stringent gun prohibitions. By 2004, they show, the Russian murder rate was nearly four times higher than the American rate.

More fundamentally, Dr. Kates and Dr. Mauser demonstrate that other developed nations such as Norway, Finland, Germany, France and Denmark maintain high rates of gun ownership, yet possess murder rates lower than other developed nations in which gun ownership is much more restricted.

First of all, thanks to all the guest bloggers for chipping in. I really enjoyed reading it. And it was a big help. But, what did you think of the variant hive-collective?

There was no better source for pro-gun information than the Brady Blog itself. So, they shut off comments after running some pretty hateful correspondence they had in a series entitled reasoned discourse. None of that stuff actually appeared on the blog, though. Additionally, other anti-gun blogs suffer the similar fates:

Another anti-gun blog starts up called Under Fire. Same situation where pro-gun folks quickly descend what with their facts and all. Activity is limited and comments are temporarily shut off.

Gonzo is a joke with no readers. And they don’t have comments.

Bryan Miller of Ceasefire NJ starts an anti-gun blog. PSH and moonbattery start on the first day, immediately followed by insults and calls for the waaahmbulance. And they are already heavily moderating comments.

In short, the anti-gun blogs are learning a lesson: they’re not effective when people can address their obfuscation, misrepresentations, and can counter their talking points. Propaganda typically fails when challenged. In other words, we’re winning.

And, we discover that one of the Brady Blog Commenters was a board member for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Ownership. In short, we pro-gun guys are kinda kicking their butt.

But they never learn. Seems anti-gunner Robyn Ringler is hard at work crushing dissent by deleting comments here. Robb has screen captures of it here. And here is my comment, which has also gone down the memory hole.

It proves one thing and that is the anti gunners need only echo chambers. When there is actual discourse, they lose quite handily. It’s a beautiful thing. We win, they lose.

Says Robb:

But like vampires, the gun control enthusiasts fear sunlight and their own reflections.

Notice how the Brady Bunch doesn’t allow comments on their blog. Notice how Robyn Ringler has to moderate the comments and doesn’t allow dissent. And take my latest addition to my commenters, Alex who “loves his daughter more than you love your gun”. His blog doesn’t allow comments either. Yet he likes to come here and blather on about how us NRA Zombies are immune to facts when he ignores anything that doesn’t adhere to his stereotype of a “gun nut” (including that pesky fact that I’m not a member of any gun organization. Yet).

The Gun Guys? No comments. The VPC? No blog that I know of. WhereDidTheGunComeFrom.com? At least they allow comments, however I’ve yet to see much in the way of anything worth commenting on. And don’t even try to video tape a Million Mom March meeting.

Most gun controllers thrive on misleading data, bending ‘facts’, appeals to authority (i.e. ivory tower scholars or police chiefs), and above all, the total control of the dialog. Truth and information to them is sunlight to vampires.

We pro-gunners leave our comments open. Feel free to challenge us. Because we’re better.

Seen at DWR:

He’s directed state officials to continue to work toward finding a way to implement the law, and has written a letter to the President urging him to end the “White House Office of National Drug Control Policy’s misguided priority and wasted resources spent to intimidate states trying to implement medical marijuana programs.”

Looks like a new trial in the Kwan case. David Hardy has the ruling and some analysis:

One gets the impression the court was a bit put off by ATF. (1) The raid was without any basis. Defendant had been an NFA dealer, and when he went out of that business, transferred an NFA gun to himself. At trial, the US Attorney conceded that was entirely legal. ATF either didn’t notice the transfer, or claimed it was illegal in some other way. (2) The court cites an ATF advisory letter which clearly suggests that the count upon which defendant was convicted was without basis.

Well, lack of basis has never stopped ATF before.

Looks like round two of Wyoming trying to, you know, use their alleged states’ rights:

The state of Wyoming says the federal agency that enforces gun laws was wrong to reject a state law that seeks to allow people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence charges to regain their firearms rights in the state courts.

Wyoming this week filed its opening brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals in Denver challenging a ruling this May by U.S. District Judge Alan Johnson of Cheyenne.

Johnson ruled against the state’s claim that the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives arbitrarily rejected a 2004 state law that allows people convicted of domestic violence to petition in state court to restore their gun rights.

The federal agency had warned Wyoming that if it continued to allow people with such domestic violence convictions to buy guns, the agency would no longer recognize more than 10,000 concealed carry permits issued by the state as a substitute for federal background checks for firearms purchases.

Speculating about AC’s future.

What games can humans still win? Uhh, poker?

I’ve got to wonder what kind of moron would Tase an adult holding a baby

How to get out of plastic handcuffs. I personally carry a key for the real kind.

Messing with surveillance cameras.

Oddly missing is take cover and return fire.

It’s been fun!

Gonna miss the variant hive-collective 🙂

Thanks Uncle, for the opportunity to put up a few posts. Less that I had hoped, but more than I ever expected. Welcome back.

I leave with a shameless plug for our new venture starting in a week or two: www.aardvarkscrapbooking.com – helping keep our better-halves happy while we are out at the range!

Dave thA

Remember, Junior, we took the monsters to the beach and the sharks ate them.

Thank you for letting me blog here for a bit Uncle. It’s been fun. You have an impressive audience.

Since I hope one of both of my readers here will miss me, I blog occasionally over at Ride Fast.

Thanks for reading people, this has been an interesting ride.

Uncle’s back, so I’m out.

If you liked anything you read here, or just want to know where to find me for whatever reason:  Squeaky Wheel Seeks Grease.

Thanks to Uncle for letting me guest blog, and thanks to his regular readers for “putting up” with me.

I see that SayUncle is back from vacation, so I will bid you all farewell.  It’s been fun blogging for a larger audience than I normally do, and reading all of your comments.  Come over and give me a read from time to time over at Snowflakes in Hell.

We’re back home. Tanned, rested and ready. Well, more like tanned and not so much rested. And ready is relative.

And don’t worry, Andy, I have plenty of ammo (though today I did grab my usual 100 rounds of Winchester White Box at Wal-Mart for $14 instead of the usual $9).

The military is getting the first of the ammunition, and most have dedicated suppliers that ONLY manufacture ammo for them.

The police forces buy from the same places civilians do.

At least, that’s what this article says.

And they’re running low, cutting funding for training classes needed in order for them to qualify and carry certain weapons.

Maybe they should have someone in-house re-packing shells?  It’s an idea, at least.

Those without weapons claiming that the police are the only ones who should have guns need to pay attention to this sort of thing.  If the police can’t get bullets, how are they supposed to protect anyone, least of all themselves?

(H/T to Jesse via email)

The states credit rating is the second worst in the nation, better only than Louisiana. California is the only state that has yet to pass a budget this year. They seem to be on track to surpass the record latest budget, passed on Sept. 5, 2002. The current disagreement hinges on how large the deficit will be and controlling the Attorney General. The GOP people want to keep him from sueing cities over global warmining.

You would think the budget would have their full attention but they are still screwing around with other things, including 15 pending firearms and hunting laws. Not all of these proposed laws are horrible, some are just bad.

I wouldn’t trust someone who can’t balance a checkbook with any technical decisions. No wonder these moonbats think microstamping fired cartridges will work. The proposed law only involves semi-autos, by the way. I assume criminals can’t figure out how to operate a revolver.

Ryan Horsley gives the ATF a lesson in the word “willful”

My new baby:

 It’s a Smith & Wesson 6906. A nice sized 9mm that will be serving as my winter carry gun.  Spotted it at the Range while shooting with Squeeks and Company.

I used to own one of these, about 15 years ago. It was the first gun I actually bought from a gun store (Ft. Bliss Rod & Gun, actually). I really liked it.

There’s a long story about how I was parted from it, but I won’t concern you all with that here. Maybe over at TGB sometime.

Suffice it to say, shooting it was a pleasure. It’s like an old friend moving back into town.

Via Kim Du Toit comes David Codrea’s call to action:

On August 28, activists in cities across America will hold a national day of protest to focus attention on the scourge of illegal gun trafficking.

As I said on KABA Newslink Comments:

I’m going to try and start a blog swarm at WarOnGuns to get gun owners to buy a box of ammo on Aug 28–be nice if gun stores would offer some sort of nominal discount or a door prize (no purchase necessary to enter, just to keep things legal) or some such on that day to encourage this–Tuesdays may typically be slow days anyway, so this would get people in their stores and probably work out to their profit.

It’d be nice unintended consequences for the Bradys if we could demonstrate a few percentage points of sales increases on that day because of this.

(emphasis mine)

So, buy a box and stick it to the Brady Bunch!

John Lott has some links, information and commentary on campus carry here and here.

Coal IS sequestered carbon. God bless them, without liberals our only source of comedy would be comedians.

Over at Progressiveville is a link to WhitesCreek Journal where we learn that the world’s greatest terrorist is not Usama bin Laden but actually Daniel Roling, the CEO of National Coal.

Yep. So says Steve, also known as Whitescreek. He is a middle aged hippie type who really believes coal should be left in the ground because it pollutes the air.

Steve does not say what we should use to generate electricity but I would imagine the usual suspects of solar, wind, and hamsters running on little wheels come to mind.

But wait, there’s more. Steve writes:

Mining coal is about the stupidest thing humans can do. Here we are worrying about climate change caused by atmospheric carbon dioxide, and we’re digging the stuff up out of the ground and burning it straight into our air.

Steve is a pal of Al Gore. Another great comedian.

Yesterday I posted a profile of a gun control advocate, then Joe Huffman found a quote I can’t believe I missed:

“We do baby steps,” he said. “Jan and I had 29 years of the most amazing love affair that somebody could have on the planet. I thank God every day for that. I’d love to be able to take your hand gun. But we’re not going to do that.”

Emphasis mine.  Don’t trust these people any farther than you can throw them.  When they say they aren’t coming after your guns, they are lying.

I am looking for feedback on Glaser Safety Slugs – my interest was sparked by the article I wrote on Home Defense.

You can leave your thoughts here, or in the thread at my blog home at What Would John Wayne Do.

Thanks!

A police officer has a well thought out editorial in the Arizona Republic.

It is due to that reality that I made a promise to myself many years ago: Whatever it requires, no member of this family will become someone’s victim.

He spends some time on the issue of home defense, of being armed to provide for that defense, but the most important thing that on which he focuses is that the police probably won’t make it to your house in time to stop something bad from happening.

The way he states his case isn’t opposed to the police, but rather points out the reality of an emergency situation – the cops aren’t waiting around for 911 calls, they’re out doing their jobs.

Read the whole thing.

A group of legislators in Utah were told, before touring a Chevron refinery, they had to leave their pistols as the door:

Then their tour buses pulled over at the gate to the Chevron refinery and four of their colleagues dramatically filed off to unholster concealed guns.
“It was one of those ‘Only in Utah’ experiences,” said Rep. Roz McGee, who, along with everyone else, watched from the bus.

The four dug out their handguns (one from an ankle holster) and turned them over to National Rifle Association lobbyist Clark Aposhian, who stored them in his car until they finished the tour of the refinery.
Chevron, unlike the Legislature and the University of Utah, does not allow weapons on its premises.

The identities of three of the pistol packers came as no surprise to lawmakers: Rep. Curt Oda, R-Clearfield; Sen. Mark Madsen, R-Lehi, and Rep. Carl Wimmer, R-Herriman.

But several were startled to learn that Sen. Howard Stephenson, R-Draper, president of the lobbying group Utah Taxpayers Association, packed heat.

My big question is, how did they know? I guess these guys are more polite than I would be.

The City of Philadelphia, after 77 years, is giving Holmesburg Fish and Game Protective Association the boot.