American Defense Enterprises

SCOTus Blog has the write up here.  20 months, to the day, after the Supreme Court decided in Heller v DC that the Second Amendment is an individual right rather than a collective right, arguments will be heard in McDonald v Chicago.

At issue:  does the Fourteenth Amendment provision of “incorporation” apply to states like it does for the  1st, 4th and other amendments.

Here is a copypasta from my post back in October:

Here is the short summary:  The Heller v DC ruling answered the question “is the right to bear arms” an individual or a collective freedom — it is an individual freedom.  So, as far as the Federal Government is concerned, it cannot pass laws that restrict an individual’s right.  But here is the catch:  The Constitution and the Bill of Rights were written and applied to the Federal Government, not the states.   So, in the past, a state could have passed a law that restricted freedom of the press, but, the Federal government could not. — Washington DC is governed by the Federal Government so Heller v DC is the law of DC.

I said that “in the past” a state could pass such laws.  That changed with the 14th Amendment.  As part of the interpretation of  “XIV” is the idea of “incorporation” of certain laws against the states.  Over time, a very clear mandate has come down, for example, that the 1st and 4th Amendment very much apply to state laws, so, these days a state cannot pass a law that violates either of these amendments.

Chicago has a law that says you cannot own a handgun.  The question in McDonald v Chicago is whether the 14th Amendment provides for the incorporation of the 2nd Amendment against the states much like it does the 1st and the 4th.  The answer seems fairly obvious — why would only some amendments be affected and not others? But, it turns out that legally it is a phenomenally complicated matter involving different specific rights provided for by the 14th Amendment and how those rights get applied to state laws — is it a due process issue?  is it a  “privileges and immunities” issue?  What are the history of those issues, etc. etc. etc.   Ug!

Either way… It will probably be an interesting hour..

(from fox news)

Story from EFF here.  Congratulations, under your changemore of the same president, we have been guaranteed the continuation of spying on Americans and the ability of the government to completely abrogate your civil rights just by suggesting you may be a terrorist.

**No, I do not believe that either Bush nor Obama is as bad as Hitler.  Not even close.  I am just pointing out that we were promised change and one thing that seemed to offend Americans was the erosion of civil liberties that occurred under Bush’s watch — enough that posters such as this were made… I am just pointing out, civil liberties haven’t gotten better yet.

The chance to live free and to make our own success are things we are losing (quite possibly have lost).  It seems a strong president with a will to change these things is what we need to reverse these paths — If we have that, it hasn’t been demonstrated yet .  Sadly, the legislature is too obsequious to special interests to ever make a change for the common good just because it is for the common good…

There is a governmental mandated recall on the GSG-5 with the simulated supressors

Apparently (per GunTrustLawyer), “ATF has now determined that this is regulated by the NFA and must be replaced.”  Pretty odd ending for a gun that had to cease production anyway….

Update -  I found the following info that helps explain the recall from m4carbine.net:

“As you are aware, the GCA, 18 USC $ 921 (a) (24), defines ‘firearm silencer’ as follows:

“….any device for silencing, muffling or diminishing the report of a portable firearm, including any combination of parts, designed or redesigned, and intended for use in assembling or fabricating a firearm silencer or firearm muffler, and any part intended only for use in such assembly or fabrication.”

General characteristics of known firearm silencers include:
1 Ported inner tube (bleed holes)
2 Expansion chambers
3 Baffles or washers which create seperate expansion chambers
4 sound dampening material such as foam, steel wool and other materials
5 End Caps
6 Encapsulators

The previously submitted GSG-5SD barrel shroud incorporates a large expansion chamber and integral end caps and, therefore, was classified as a firearm silencer.”

Somebody found that if you take the airport scanner image and do some photoshop trickery, it looks pretty compelling as a nude photo…

Remember, this isnt porn…. This is just what the airport people see every time you consent to go in their penis sizing machine…

May they be cursed with 1,000’s of these:

They delete the images after they are looked at, right?  Not that a cell phone camera wouldnt do the same thing…

Thanks to TheFireArmBlog for this tipoff.  According to the Federal announcement in the blog story, looks like the IRS is buying 60 or so Remington 870 shotguns..

Remind me to file on time this year…

Civil Forfeiture  is the ~legal mechanism by which a government agency can take away your possessions without due process if there is a suspicion that they were used in a crime.  Drugs found in your car?  Police take your car.  Lots of money found that they suspect is illegally obtained, police seize your money.

Here is a great story recently on the ACLU website talking about a recent case and Georgia’s abusive civil forfeiture laws..

Short summary:

• It is just pure cash to the polic — it is one of the reasons  why the war on drugs is fought so fiercely
• Story involves person that just sold a used car, they get stopped for some unspecified reason, cops take the money under suspicion that it was ill-gotten.
• Police ADMIT the money was taken unjustly, but, require the person to file an action to get it back — most people cannot afford the legal fees for such an action, and, frequently it would cost more in legal fees than the possession was worth.
• This is rampant abuse.

Police should NEVER have a monetary incentive to enforce the law.  No fees from tickets, no civil forfeiture, etc.  There is just too much room for evil…

When we receive testimonials like this, it makes all of our efforts worth while.  At the same time, it also makes it clear that the world we are living in is getting scarier, not safer.

> Hi bill,
>
> I hope you remember me, it’s ___. I took your classes for six
> months roughly 3 years ago and the skills you taught me saved my life
> only a few hours ago. I’m driving to LA from Austin and I stopped at a
> bar in ft. Stockton to watch the rest of the bcs championship game. I
> was cornered by two men and at first they were just talking to me, and
> something I said pissed one guy off and his buddy pulled a knife and
> told me to go outside, I did as I was told. The guy I pissed off then
> confronts me and tells me he runs this city and now I “fucked with the
> crazy cricket”. He told his buddy to go inside then he pulled a small
> 9mm semi auto on me and told me some bullshit about being the wrong
> person to mess with or something of that nature. He kept saying that I
> thought he wouldn’t shoot taunting me to provoke him. He then pointed
> it at my head from probably 6 feet away then raised it up higher and
> fired. As soon as he shot I heard the unmistakeable sound of a double
> feed and saw the slide was stuck half back so I tackled him and took
> the gun away. I dropped the mag into my hand and popped the slide to
> clear the second round. I pointed the gun at him and called my brother
> who was inside the bar and we ran to our car. I cleared the gun and
> took the mag and chambered round with me, and left the gun on the
> ground. I honestly believe that if it weren’t for you, I might be not
> be alive or at the very least would have been injured. I cannot thank
> you enough!!! I will be in la for a few weeks ,if you want to call me
> at ___________ or email me back.
>
> Thank you very very much,
> _________________
>

(thanks to TheFirearmBlog for the heads-up!!)

The MP5 is a nice, popular,  little 9mm sub-machine gun from H&K.    Well…. It is hard to buy “assault” type rifles in the US, certainly in California.  ATI has been making a feel-a-like version that is chambered in .22LR – a rimfire, ergo not an “assault” weapon.  As mentioned here, H&K was suing ATI for, effectively, a design copyright breach.  And, as detailed here, they have settled a lawsuit whereby:

• ATI will stop making/importing the GSG-5
• Current stock in the US can be sold up until Jan 31 2010
• ATI will continue to be able to service rifles in the marketplace.

Too bad.  It was a very well-working .22 rifle that was quite suitable for learning the MP5 system.  If you want one… get it now….

I had a conversation with a friend the other day about gun control.  He really liked the idea of banning guns because it would reduce murder.  I tried to point out that there were already laws against murder — still, he insisted, it had to so something…..

This morning I woke up, considering the pending Supreme court case against Chicago (no guns allowed), and that I will probably never visit my friend in New York because of their weird gun licensing issues and I wondered….  In LA, while it wont last, the gun laws are very permissive compared to New York and Chicago.. So..  What is the murder rate in these 3 cities?

I found this nice CBS  story which gave me some numbers for 2008…  I decided to make a table.

Hmm..  My exciting conclusion?  Gun control seems to not be the deciding factor in determining murder rates.

Nothing new here…  Here is a nice story from Gun Owners of America.  Here is a well written summary from that article:

“The reason that European nations with more guns tend to have lower violence is political rather than criminological. Gun ownership generally has no affect on how much violent crime a society has. Violent crime is determined by fundamental economic and sociocultural factors, not the mere availability of just one of an innumerable bevy of potential murder instruments. Politicians in nations with severe crime problems often think that banning guns will be a quick fix. But gun bans don’t work; if anything, they make things worse. They disarm the law-abiding while being ignored by the violent and the criminal. Yet nations with severe violence problems tend to have severe gun laws. By the same token, the murder rates in handgun-banning U.S. cities — New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C. — are far higher than in states like Pennsylvania and Connecticut, where handguns are legal and widely owned.”

Pretty much sums it up…  If you have high crime, restricting law abiding citizens makes things worse.  On the other hand (Consider the 1992 Kansas City experiment), if you focus on enforcing the laws that take guns from criminals — that can work.

DC is an interesting example.  They outlawed new gun ownership in 1976…  Homicide fell for 12 years against the US average — because of the restriction? Perhaps…  Then, perhaps due to drugs, it rapidly became the murder capital of the US.  Gun control reduce crime, or, did it make for a fertile soil for the criminal element to come in?  Here is the example of attempting to restrict law abiding citizens as well as criminals — of course the criminals don’t end up being very restricted in practice.

As seen here (Minnesota Independent)…Turns out that Franken, when reading the 4th amendment to DOJ officials, was just being cute after all.

He, along with Klobuchar (the other MN Senator) voted to extend the Patriot Act, roving wiretaps and all!