Category: Uncategorized

September 18,  2024

1793 – The first cornerstone of the United States Capitol is laid by George Washington.

2010 – At 15:30 hours Eastern Standard Time, Sergeant First Class Ronald A. Grider, assigned to Headquarters and Headquarters Company, United States Army Special Operations Command, dies as a result of wounds suffered earlier in action against enemy forces in Kunduz Province Afghanistan during Operation Enduring Freedom.

 

Gun Controllers Knew the Assault Weapons Ban Failed in 2004 and They Know It Now.

Marking the recent anniversary of the Clinton “assault weapons” ban, I circled back to McWhirter and Elinson’s American Gun: The True Story of the AR-15. The chapter on the halfhearted efforts to renew the expiring 1994 “asault weapon” ban is fascinating.

While the ban probably was never going to be renewed in the 2004 political environment, the book explains that a major reason renewal was DOA was that gun control groups didn’t think the ban had worked…and rightly so. More AR-15s and similar rifles were made during the ban than before it. They were just made in ban-compliant formats.

Police groups which had allied with gun control groups to pass the ban in 1994 didn’t lend their support to a renewal in 2004 because they saw for themselves that the ban didn’t work. Major gun control activists ultimately decided it wasn’t worth using their limited resources and political capital to fight for a renewal.

This is all hilarious in hindsight. Today, gun control activists falsely assert the ban totally worked and so we should enact another one. But they knew that wasn’t true in 2004 and they know it now.

While mass shootings have become all too common, the surge in mass shootings involving rifles really kicked off after 2010, not after 2004. The gun control industry’s arguments also ignore the relative rarity of such shootings before 1994.

Regardless, even if there were a decrease in mass shootings after 1994, it couldn’t have been due to the Clinton ban, because more semi-auto rifles were sold during the ban than before. And in a classic case of unintended consequences, the 1994 “assault weapons” ban is probably what made the AR15 the most popular rifle in the country.

September 11, 2024

2001 – In a series of coordinated attacks, moslem Al Qaeda terrorists hijack  4 passenger jet aircraft and use them to crash into towers 1 & 2 of the World Trade Center in New York City, and the Pentagon, killing 2,977 people. The passengers of the 4th jet, United Airlines Flight 93, attempt to retake it from the hijackers, and succeed in keeping the hijackers from completing their mission to crash it into the Capitol Building in Washington D.C.,  who instead crash it in Pennsylvania.

2011 – The National September 11 Memorial & Museum opens on the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attacks.

2012 – The U.S. diplomatic compound and special mission annex in Benghazi, Libya are attacked, resulting in four deaths; Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, US Foreign Service officer Sean Smith; CIA contractors Tyrone S. Woods and Glen Doherty. Two operational members of 1st SFOD-D, Marine Gunnery Sergeant Tate Jolly and Army Master Sergeant David Halbruner, on a separate mission, volunteer to accompany the relief forces, resulting in them receiving their respective service’s Navy Cross and Distinguished Service Cross for their actions in combat.

2021 – Nationwide ceremonies commemorate the 20th anniversary of the September 11 attacks