Category: Safety

Near everything on the gun grabber’s list of laws and not a one of them actually do anything to stop those bent on mayhem and murder.

Newsom: Second Amendment turning into “suicide pact”

California Gov. Gavin Newsom is lashing out at gun owners, the firearms industry, and even the Founding Fathers as he tries to spin another failure of the state’s gun control laws into an attack on the Second Amendment.

Speaking to CBS News on Monday evening, Newsom claimed that while he has no “ideological opposition” to “responsible” gun owners, at least in theory, the shootings in Monterey Park demand a further crackdown on the right to keep and bear arms.

“Nothing about this is surprising. Everything about this is infuriating,” he told “CBS Evening News” anchor and managing editor Norah O’Donnell on Monday. “The Second Amendment is becoming a suicide pact.”

Newsom clarified that he has “no ideological opposition” against people who “responsibly” own guns and get background checks and training on how to use them.

But he told O’Donnell that current regulations are falling short.

Maybe because the gun control laws Newsom favors are aimed at legal gun owners instead of violent criminals?

Newsom mentioned the role of mental health in mass shootings, but he singled out gun access as a factor exacerbating the problem.

“I’m really proud of the work we’ve done in this space, but we’ve had decades of neglect,” he said. “But respectfully, I will submit that regardless of the challenges it relates to behavioral health, there’s not a country in the world that doesn’t experience behavioral health issues.”

And there’s not a state in the U.S. that regulates and restricts gun ownership to the extent that California does, and yet according to the FBI it was California that had the most most active shooter incidents in 2021. Part of that may simply be an artifact of California’s large population, but it’s also evidence that restricting a constitutional right to self-defense in the name of public safety doesn’t stop committed killers nearly as effectively as it prevents peaceable gun owners from exercising their 2A rights.

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If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no recourse left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual State.
–Alexander Hamilton

*gasp* Horrors!

Can you shoot someone in self-defense inside your home in Missouri?

MISSOURI — Twenty states have castle doctrines while even more have stand-your-ground laws, but what constitutes legal self-defense can still vary across these states.

For Missouri, both the castle doctrine and the stand-your-ground law say the law permits protecting oneself (or a third party, with exceptions) with deadly force should a person feel it is necessary.

Missouri Castle Doctrine Law

The “castle doctrine” is not a defined law that can be invoked, but rather a set of principles that may be incorporated into the defense of one’s self while on owned or leased property, as well as the defense of said property (e.g. vehicles, the home itself) or third parties (family) also present at the time of the threat.

Simply shooting a trespasser on your property can lead to criminal charges since not all trespassers are violent; the resident must be faced with a threat first. According to Missouri Revised Statutes 563.031:

[Protective] force is used against a person who unlawfully enters, remains after unlawfully entering, or attempts to unlawfully enter a dwelling, residence, or vehicle lawfully occupied by such person.

Castle doctrine does protect guests at a home where a break-in occurs, should they act with deadly force. But if a break-in occurs at a residence where you were not invited, you cannot use deadly force against that trespasser under castle doctrine.

Missouri Stand-Your-Ground Law

“Stand-your-ground” laws roughly define how an individual can defend themselves when faced with an imminent threat anywhere else; imminent being a keyword here because even threatening words towards a defending person can lead to a justified homicide.

But words made days or weeks ago cannot be acted upon in a self-defense manner.

Stand-your-ground states do not require the defending actor to retreat or remove themselves from the situation prior to applying defensive force. In contrast, some states like Arkansas, have a “duty to retreat” first while in public before defending.

Recent Developments

Last February, Senate Bill 666, sponsored by US Rep. Eric Burlison, would have strengthened Missouri’s stand-your-ground law by essentially giving shooters acting in self-defense the benefit of the doubt, thereby flipping the burden of proof and forcing police to have probable cause before arresting them.

The military has used 62 grain 5.56mm RRLP  – Reduced Ricochet Limited Penetration –  frangible bullets for both CQB live fire practice on steel targets, and ship boarding operations (where unplanned holes in hulls are a bad thing) for a long time. The ballistic gel tests I’ve seen show the ammo should be quite effective if used for home defense.

Frangible Ammo for Self-Defense and Concealed Carry

 (and the last shall be first….)

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Increased gun sales for minorities due to rational reasons

Gun sales for minorities in the United States have been surging for quite a while now. While the popular image of gun ownership continues to be older white dudes, the reality is very, very different.

More and more gun owners are women and many of those are black or Hispanic.

So why are some of them buying firearms?

Well, here’s why one of them did, and she’s unlikely to be an exception.

Andréa “Muffin” Hudson is an activist for incarcerated individuals, directs two criminal justice nonprofits, and believes prisons do catastrophic harm. She is also a gun owner.

When Hudson, 47, drives around Durham, her G2C 9 mm pistol sits beside her on the passenger seat. She carries it with her everywhere, wearing it like a “fanny pack.” She leaves her gun behind only when she goes to the Durham County Courthouse to pay cash bonds.

Hudson lives with her son, 18, and daughter, 28. Her round cheeks frame her easygoing smile as words flow out, her deep voice suited to the seriousness of her work.

Each room in Hudson’s house has a gun in it. Even the bathroom.

“So if you’re in the bathroom, and somebody breaks in while you’re in the bathroom, you can protect yourself,” she said, laughing. “You know, I watch a lot of movies.”

…

Donald Trump’s presidency inflamed deep-seated racial animosity, lent new muscle and momentum to white nationalists, and stoked the fears of people like Hudson. She bought her first gun in 2017.

“I got it because Trump won, became president, and people were acting erratic,” said Hudson, who is Black. “I was thinking that folks were going to start doing stuff to harm other people. I was thinking about The Walking Dead and Armageddon coming, and I wanted to give us a fighting chance to survive.”

Now, a lot of people would read that and roll their eyes. They’d argue that white supremacy isn’t nearly the threat the media makes it out to be.

Here’s my take: It doesn’t matter.

If you think there’s a potential threat to you and yours, it behooves you to arm yourself and prepare to defend your life and the lives of your family members. That means buying guns.

Yes, it may not be as big of a threat as it feels, but most of us are unlikely to be the victim of a violent crime, either, yet we still carry a firearm.

However, for those like Hudson who do have these concerns, I’d offer a suggestion. If you feel this way, you should start pushing the lawmakers asking for your support to oppose gun control.

After all, if you’re a minority and you’re worried about racial strife, who do you think is most likely to be targeted by gun control? If this is such a racist nation, why wouldn’t black and Hispanic gun owners be the target of anti-gun efforts?

If racism is such a prevalent concern, then why not work to make it impossible for those racists to disarm you and eradicate your ability to defend yourself?

Arming up in response to your concerns over a threat isn’t just rational, it’s smart. Yet you should also be prepared to dig in and fight to preserve the ability for everyone to do the same thing.

ARE YOU PREPARED?
BE READY FOR THESE FIVE CATEGORIES

Where’s the danger? Those who carry a weapon in public are constantly asking this question. We’re always in what Jeff Cooper popularized as Condition Yellow. No threat has been recognized, but we’re actively alert for anything that might come up. Once a potential threat has been identified, we move to Condition Orange and begin planning for an attack. We evaluate the threat, the availability of cover and concealment, look for other threats and evaluate the overall environment in case we need to use lethal force. Condition Orange is a critical stage because you’ve identified the threat and must prepare. I propose some threats are already known to us, but most are not adequately prepared to respond.

Threats come in many forms. We can’t always know where they will come from. When we do, however, we’re always better off if we have already prepared rather than waiting until it is staring us in the eyes. A prepared response is always better than an improvised one. This is especially true when the threat is deadly. Massad Ayoob has an oft-repeated phrase for this: “Know where the threats are most likely to come from and have a proven strategy prepared to counter it.” You can’t prepare for everything, so you’ve got to prioritize.

Learning the most common instances where lethal force was used can give you valuable information about where your focus should be. I was listening to the Armed Attorneys (YouTube) discussing this recently. According to them, civilian uses of force cases (as opposed to law enforcement) overwhelmingly come in five categories:

 

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What the Media Can’t – Or Won’t – Tell Us About Armed Self Defense.

Don’t confuse the news with the truth. The corporate news media is in the business of delivering eyes and ears to their advertisers. That is how they earn their money. The assignment editors, reporters and the copyeditors are not against honesty and proportion, but cash comes first. That means they are biased in their reporting. They must ignore the common but important stories in order to leave room for the shock and outrage that keeps us watching and listening. I study armed defense. Ordinary citizens like us defend ourselves, our family, and innocent strangers every day. You wouldn’t know that from watching the news. This is why the corporate media does such a bad job of reporting.

To be fair, we have our own biases. Most of us think that armed defense looks like something from a John Wick movie or from the Matrix. That couldn’t be further from the truth. I have to describe what ordinary people do because most of us are not even familiar with the terms.

John Wick

Armed defense is when the intended victim of a violent crime uses a firearm to deter or stop the criminal.

That includes something as simple as grandma shouting for an intruder to go away because she has a gun and that she called the police. The police might not classify it as a defensive gun use, but grandma thinks it was. She thinks the home-invasion robber changed his plans because she had her firearm. The criminal thinks grandma’s gun was important too.

Armed defense is when an armed mom is crossing the parking lot late at night. She tells her kids to get back in the car, she turns toward three young men, and puts her her hand into her purse. She yells “Stop!” and the three young men change direction. They get back into their car and drive away.

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Will Phobias About AR-15s Keep Schools From Adopting This Innovative Product?

Time is of the essence in mass public shootings. Civilians and police stop a lot of mass murders by carrying handguns, but sometimes you need a larger round than is available in a traditional handgun. It often simply isn’t practical to carry around a rifle. And school staff might not have time to run to a locker to retrieve the needed gun.

Andrew Pollack, whose 18-year-old daughter, Meadow, died in the 2018 Parkland school mass murder that left 17 people dead, is fighting to give school districts the tools they need. Byrna, a company that makes innovative self-defense tools, has donated eight backpacks containing collapsible AR-15s to Pollack’s “Meadows Movement” nonprofit. These guns fire .223 caliber rifle rounds and are more powerful than traditional handguns.

On January 4th, Pollack will give the backpacks to the Bradford County Sheriff’s Office for use by school resource officers (SROs) and Will Hartley, superintendent of Bradford County Schools.

“The folding rifle is easy to carry throughout the day for a school resource officer inside the bulletproof backpack,” Pollack said. “The seconds to get minutes lost retrieving a rifle from a locker vs. pulling the bulletproof backpack into a vest and having the rifle on hand equates to the number of lives that could have been saved.”

The school superintendent echoes his comments. “I wish more people could have it,” Hartley notes. “Because if someone comes on your campus and they have a long gun, we need to be able to meet their force with the same kind of force.”

Bradford County Schools is smart enough to have multiple layers of protection. Even when school resource officers are in the right place at the right time, they have a tough job. Uniformed guards may as well be holding neon signs saying, “Shoot me first.” Attackers know that once they kill the sheriff’s deputy, they have free rein to go after everybody else.

To prevent that, the Bradford County schools are part of Florida’s Guardian Program. As in nineteen other states, teachers and staff are trained to use guns to protect people. But their guns are concealed. Permit holders make guards’ very difficult job easier. If an attacker tries to kill a school resource officer, he reveals his position and makes himself a target to someone with a concealed handgun. As with concealed handgun permit holders generally, the whole point is that the attacker doesn’t know who else he needs to worry about.

Instead of a sign in front of these schools saying “Gun Free School Zone,” they are replaced with signs warning: “Please be aware that certain staff members at Bradford County Schools can be legally armed and may use whatever force is necessary to protect our students.”

But, unfortunately, there are plenty of schools around the country that haven’t learned the lessons that Bradford County has. And these backpacks, with their built-in bullet-resistant vests and ARs will help protect school resource officers from surprise attacks from behind them and will give them more potent firepower if they get into a firefight with attackers. In literally just a couple of seconds, the bullet-resistant vest can also be put on their front side.

Technically these guns are called AR-pistols rather than AR-15s, but the difference in terms is entirely arbitrary and results from nonsensical government regulations on how to define a rifle. Instead of a stock, an AR-15 pistol usually has a tube, but the two guns are functionally identical.

Pollack so believes in Byrna’s products that he is now their chief public safety officer.

It will be a shame if school districts’ phobias about AR-15s prevent them from taking advantage of this innovative product.

Dr. Lott Testifies Before House Committee
(Gives 3 Basic Facts Everyone Should Know!)

Dr. John Lott Jr., president of the nonprofit Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), testified before the House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security last week for a hearing dedicated to “Examining Uvalde: The Search for Bipartisan Solutions to Gun Violence.”

Dr. Lott delivered a lot of information but he began with three basic facts that everyone should know about gun-related violence in America.

Here they are:

1, Over 92% of violent crimes in America do not involve firearms. The U.S. Department of Justice’s National Crime Victimization Survey for 2020 shows 4,558,150 rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults, and the FBI reports 21,570 murders. Of those, firearms were involved in 350,460 rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults. Adding those numbers up, 7.9% of violent crimes were committed with firearms.

2, While the US media doesn’t give much, if any, coverage to mass public shootings in other countries, mass public shootings per capita are relatively low in the United States compared to the rest of the world. Over the 20 years from 1998 to 2017, the US had less than 1.13% of the world’s share of mass public shooters and 1.77% of its mass public shooting murders. That’s much less than the US’s 4.6% share of the world population. Since 2000, there have been nine mass public school shootings in the US. Germany had only three over that period and Finland had only one, but the United States has four times the population of Germany and sixty times that of Finland. Russia has had four such massacres, but we have 2.3 times its population. On a per capita basis, all three countries have a similar or higher rate compared to that of the US.

3, Like many other mass public shooters, the Buffalo shooter targeted defenseless people. He even wrote in his manifesto: “Attacking in a weapon-restricted area may decrease the chance of civilian backlash. Schools, courts, or areas where CCW are outlawed or prohibited may be good areas of attack. Areas where CCW permits are low may also fit in this category. Areas with strict gun laws are also great places of attack.” The national media refuses to report other explicit statements by attackers explaining why they pick the targets they do. Nor do they report the fact that 94% of mass public shootings occur in places where civilians are banned from having firearms.

If you’ll remember, the ‘joke’ name for Chicago for years has been ‘Chiraq’.
Plus I’m shocked that this unpolitically correct statistic is in the article:
“Black and Hispanic men represented 96% of those who were fatally shot, and 97% of those injured in a shooting…”

Seem Bill Whittle was right: “Maybe it’s the people holding the guns.”

Risk of death by gun violence is higher for men in some U.S. areas than in wartime. 

In some parts of the United States, young men face a higher risk of dying from gun violence than if they’d gone to war in Afghanistan and Iraq, a new study reports.

Young men living in certain high-violence ZIP codes in Chicago and Philadelphia run a greater risk of firearm death than military personnel who served in recent U.S. wars, according to findings published online Dec. 22 in JAMA Network Open.

Young men in Chicago’s most violent ZIP code were more than three times as likely to experience gun-related death compared to soldiers sent to Afghanistan, the researchers found, while those in Philadelphia’s most violent area were nearly twice as likely to be shot to death.

In all ZIP codes studied, young men from minority groups overwhelmingly bear the risk of firearm-related death, the findings showed.

“These results are an urgent wake-up call for understanding, appreciating and responding to the risks and attendant traumas faced by this demographic of young men,” said study leader Brandon del Pozo, an assistant professor of medicine at Brown University’s Warren Alpert Medical School in Providence, R.I.

His team examined shooting data from 2020 and 2021 in four large U.S. cities — Chicago, Los Angeles, New York and Philadelphia.

The investigators zeroed in on shootings involving nearly 130,000 men between 18 and 29 years of age. They grouped them by ZIP code so U.S. Census data could be used to examine demographics in those neighborhoods.

The researchers also compared the cities’ gun violence data with combat-related deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan — from 2001 to 2014 for Afghanistan and 2003 to 2009 in Iraq.

While young men in Chicago and Philadelphia had a much greater risk of firearm death, those in the most violent parts of Los Angeles and New York had a 70% to 91% lower risk than U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, the researchers said.

“We often hear opposing claims about gun violence that fall along partisan lines: One is that big cities are war zones that require a severe crackdown on crime, and the other is that our fears about homicides are greatly exaggerated and don’t require drastic action,” del Pozo said in a university news release.

“We wanted to use data to explore these claims — and it turns out both are wrong,” he continued. “While most city residents are relatively safe from gun violence, the risks are more severe than war for some demographics.”

Black and Hispanic men represented 96% of those who were fatally shot, and 97% of those injured in a shooting, according to the report.

The study authors noted that exposure to combat has been associated with post-traumatic stress disorder and higher rates of homelessness, alcohol use, mental illness and substance use.

“Our findings — which show that young men in some of the communities we studied were subject to annual firearm homicide and violent injury rates in excess of 3.0% and as high as 5.8% — lend support to the hypothesis that beyond the deaths and injuries of firearm violence, ongoing exposure to these violent events and their risks are a significant contributor to other health problems and risk behaviors in many U.S. communities,” the research team concluded.

The health risks are likely even higher for city dwellers because they have a lifetime “tour of duty,” as opposed to a typical year-long posting to a war zone, del Pozo added.

“The findings suggest that urban health strategies should prioritize violence reduction and take a trauma-informed approach to addressing the health needs of these communities,” he said.

Why aren’t stalked women ever told to get a gun for self-defense?
Murder rates decline when people carry concealed handguns

Authorities say Ewen Dewitt murdered 40-year-old Julie Minogue with an ax this month in her Milford, Connecticut, home. Two of her children were home when the murder occurred. Mr. Dewitt, an ex-boyfriend, had been stalking her.

“I’m scared he’s going to kill me,” she told the police. In 2019, she had a protective order issued. Just a week before she was killed, a judge had granted her a full no-contact restraining order.

The case clearly illustrates the limits of protective orders when the stalker is intent on murdering the victim. Suppose the murderer is already facing the possibility of life imprisonment without parole for first-degree murder. How will an additional five years in prison and a $5,000 fine deter such murders?

It is an important problem. Reportedly, 76% of women murdered by someone who had been an intimate partner were stalked.

Violence prevention advocates for women have a long list of changes they recommend. These changes require women to uproot their lives.

Dangerous amounts of heavy metals found in many dark chocolate bars
White House’s Karine Jean-Pierre is proof of ‘Peter Principle’ incompetence
Among the advice: Women should change jobs, their travel routes, the time of day they leave home or work, move in with a friend or family member, change the locks on their home, or do their shopping and other chores with friends or relatives.

A few recommend that women practice martial arts such as judo, jujitsu, karate or boxing.

But the most obvious answer is missing from these lists: Women should get a concealed handgun permit and a firearm.

Men are typically much stronger than women, particularly in the upper body. Unfortunately, real life isn’t like the movies, where one woman can knock out and overpower several well-trained men. Even well-trained women often struggle to defend themselves against larger and stronger men. Men also tend to be faster runners.

A gun represents a much bigger change in a woman’s ability to defend herself. Men can readily hurt women without a gun, and if a woman is already in physical contact with the attacker so that he can take away their gun, they are already in trouble.

The peer-reviewed research by one of us shows that murder rates decline when people carry concealed handguns, whether they are a man or a woman. But a woman carrying a concealed handgun reduces the murder rate for women by about three to four times more than a man doing the same.

And this message is getting across to women. Between 2012 and 2022, in states that provide data by sex, permits for concealed handguns increased 115% more quickly among women than among men. The percentage of women who say that gun ownership protects people from crime has also been growing faster than their male counterparts.

Connecticut and other states could make it much easier for stalked women to defend themselves. Even after taking the required training and applying for a permit, it “generally takes eight weeks to obtain” a permit. And that’s an optimistic estimate by the Connecticut Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection. The Connecticut Citizens Defense League has had to file a lawsuit against three cities where the process regularly takes a year or more.

But even two months may be much too long for a threatened woman. Even women who have proved to a court that they are facing serious threats must wait to get a permit. One solution would be to allow women with court orders of protection to carry a concealed handgun while they are waiting for a permit to be issued.

Many single women with children may also find it difficult to pay $140 for a permit plus added fees for fingerprinting and training.

Connecticut’s concealed handgun permit cost is already almost three times higher than the average in other states. Despite this, 11.3% of adults in Connecticut have a concealed handgun permit — the 12th-highest state. And as crime in Connecticut has soared, the permit-possessing population has increased by 55,000 since 2019. Only 26% of permit holders in Connecticut are women, significantly less than in other states.

The high cost of permits disarms the very people who most need protection, including minorities who live in high-crime urban areas.

Police are important. Protective orders can help. But if we are going to be serious about protecting women like Julie Minogue, we have to let them protect themselves.

More women buying guns to defend themselves: “The world is changing”

Calera, Alabama — At a gun range in the heart of Alabama, Gracie Barhill is getting acquainted with her month-old Smith & Wesson 9 millimeter.

“I’m young. I’m a girl,” she said. “I never know when a threat is going to come.”

The 19-year-old is taking a self-defense firearms course, “Girls, Guns and Gear,” that’s designed for women who are wary of threats.

“It’s absolutely undeniable, the world is changing and they want to be ahead of it,” said Scott Recchio, a firearms instructor at the range.

Last year, one-third of all first-time gun buyers in the U.S. were women, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation. The trade association said there’s been a 77% rise in female gun ownership from 2005 to 2020.

Emma Boutwell, who is also taking the women-only class, said she had never handled a gun until recently.

“I need to know how to defend myself as well,” Boutwell said.

Gun instructor Beverly Alldredge teaches the women marksmanship, gun safety and situational awareness.

Alldredge said that instructing women is different than men because “women listen better than men do.”

“Women are just quicker just to hear and take in what they are being told and applying that,” she said.

Among Black women, the firearm homicide rate has more than tripled since 2010, according to one study. Today, nearly 30% of new women gun owners are Black, according to the 2021 National Firearms Survey.

Nikkita Gordon, who owns the women’s clothing line Cute and Cocky, which is designed to hide a gun fashionably, said she has self-defense plans for both indoor and outdoor scenarios.

“I think most women, specifically women of color, should have these plans,” she said.

Emails Show CDC Removed Defensive Gun Use Stats After Gun-Control Advocates Pressured Officials in Private Meeting

The Center For Disease Control (CDC) deleted a reference to a study it commissioned after a group of gun-control advocates complained it made passing new restrictions more difficult.

The lobbying campaign spanned months and culminated with a private meeting between CDC officials and three advocates last summer, a collection of emails obtained by The Reload show. Introductions from the White House and Senator Dick Durbin’s (D., Ill.) office helped the advocates reach top officials at the agency after their initial attempt to reach out went unanswered. The advocates focused their complaints on the CDC’s description of its review of studies that estimated defensive gun uses (DGU) happen between 60,000 and 2.5 million times per year in the United States–attacking criminologist Gary Kleck’s work establishing the top end of the range.

“[T]hat 2.5 Million number needs to be killed, buried, dug up, killed again and buried again,” Mark Bryant, one of the attendees, wrote to CDC officials after their meeting. “It is highly misleading, is used out of context and I honestly believe it has zero value – even as an outlier point in honest DGU discussions.”

Bryant, who runs the Gun Violence Archive (GVA), argued Kleck’s estimate has been damaging to the political prospects of passing new gun restrictions and should be eliminated from the CDC’s website.

“And while that very small study by Gary Kleck has been debunked repeatedly by everyone from all sides of this issue [even Kleck] it still remains canon by gun rights folks and their supporting politicians and is used as a blunt instrument against gun safety regulations every time there is a state or federal level hearing,” he wrote in the same email. “Put simply, in the time that study has been published as ‘a CDC Study’ gun violence prevention policy has ground to a halt, in no small part because of the misinformation that small study provided.”

Despite initially standing behind the description in the defensive gun use section of its “fast facts” website on gun violence, the CDC backtracked after a previously-undisclosed virtual meeting with the advocates on September 15th, 2021.

“We are planning to update the fact sheet in early 2022 after the release of some new data,” Beth Reimels, Associate Director for Policy, Partnerships, and Strategic Communication at the CDC’s Division of Violence Prevention, said in one email to the three advocates on December 10th. “We will also make some edits to the content we discussed that I think will address the concerns you and other partners have raised.”

The CDC did not respond to a request for comment on the decision, but none of the emails the agency released related to it did not show any attempts to obtain other outside points of view either before or after the meeting with the gun-control advocates. Hannah Bristol of the White House Office of Public Engagement did not respond to a request for comment on her role in the discussions beyond what the emails reveal. Emily Hampsten, Senator Durbin’s Communications Director, told The Reload their office’s only involvement was “simply connecting” “stakeholder organizations” with a federal agency as part of the “basic function of our work.”

The decision to remove a CDC-commissioned report from the agency’s website on gun statistics at the apparent behest of gun-control advocates may further strain its relationship with Congressional overseers, especially pro-gun Republicans who are set to take control of the House next year. The relationship between the two, already frayed over the Coronavirus pandemic, could reach new lows not seen in decades. During the 1990s, Congress put restrictions on CDC funding in response to officials openly working with gun-control groups to try and ban handguns.

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Observations:
“generalized estimating equation estimates”
Translation (even with the statistical word salad definition) it still comes to: There’s actually no way to figure this out, so I’ll make my SWAG look good on paper

John Lott (more guns/less crime) was right, but they couldn’t let that be confirmed, so they kept torturing the statistics hoping for something different, but the best they could come up with was that gun sales don’t have any effect on crime rates.

Legal Firearm Sales at State Level and Rates of Violent Crime, Property Crime, and Homicides

Journal of Surgical Research, Volume 281, January 2023, Pages 143-154

Abstract

Introduction

The effects of firearm sales and legislation on crime and violence are intensely debated, with multiple studies yielding differing results. We hypothesized that increased lawful firearm sales would not be associated with the rates of crime and homicide when studied using a robust statistical method.

Methods

National and state rates of crime and homicide during 1999-2015 were obtained from the United States Department of Justice and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. National Instant Criminal Background Check System background checks were used as a surrogate for lawful firearm sales. A general multiple linear regression model using log event rates was used to assess the effect of firearm sales on crime and homicide rates. Additional modeling was then performed on a state basis using an autoregressive correlation structure with generalized estimating equation estimates for standard errors to adjust for the interdependence of variables year to year within a particular state.

Results

Nationally, all crime rates except the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention–designated firearm homicides decreased as firearm sales increased over the study period. Using a naive national model, increases in firearm sales were associated with significant decreases in multiple crime categories. However, a more robust analysis using generalized estimating equation estimates on state-level data demonstrated increases in firearms sales were not associated with changes in any crime variables examined.

Conclusions

Robust analysis does not identify an association between increased lawful firearm sales and rates of crime or homicide.

Based on this, it is unclear if efforts to limit lawful firearm sales would have any effect on rates of crime, homicide, or injuries from violence committed with firearms.

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Is There Anything We can do to Stop Mass Murderers in the United States?

That question comes to mind since President Biden recently claimed we need to massively disarm honest US citizens in order to stop mass-murderers. Instead of accepting the President’s words at face value, I looked at what the experts say. There are many questions we might ask and lots of facts we can consider. We do many things today to stop violence in the US. There is more we could do, and this is what I found;

  • We stop several thousand violent events every day.
  • The United States is about average in its rate of mass murder.
  • We stop more than half of the attempted mass murderers who attack where honest citizens are allowed to go armed.
  • Most mass murderers go through a predictable process, and we ignored warning signs time after time.
  • We should stop making the murderers into overnight celebrities, but that is hard to do.

A Walmart employee murdered several of his co-workers in Virginia. That happened a few weeks ago. President Biden then commented that,

“[T]he idea we still allow semi automatic weapons to be purchased is sick.  It’s just sick.  It has no, no social redeeming value. Zero. None. Not a single, solitary rationale for it except profit for the gun manufacturers.”

The president’s comment sounds bizarre given what we know. We know that more than 5,000 ordinary US citizens use a firearm to protect themselves from a serious threat every day. Stopping that much assault, robbery, rape and murder every day sounds like an immense socially redeeming value to me. The president obviously disagrees.

That level of armed defense shouldn’t come as news. We’ve seen similar reports for the last few decades. The data is broadly consistent, including a report from the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention that was commissioned by the Obama Administration.

All of us are biased, but we have good reason to be. We think that what we see in the news gives us a representative picture of what is happening in the world overall. It feels that way to us, but in truth there is a lot of news that goes unreported by our local news stations. Our news media covers a mass murder in the US for days but they only cover a mass murder that happened in another country for a few minutes. That distorts our thinking about where violence happens.

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Who In the US Is Objectively Racist? The Left. As the Data Show Definitively.

Joe Biden and the Democrats keep gunning for your guns. Research like this is a major part of their argument. What it shows–definitively–is that it isn’t guns. It’s a particular social pathology enabled by a social psychosis that reached epidemic proportions in 2020. The data are irrefutable.

One graphic tells the tale:

The increase in gun homicides documented in the Emory University study is attributable almost exclusively to one factor: a nearly 60 percent increase in homicide fatalities among black men. Not over a period of many years–but in a little over one year.

And what year was that? 2020. And what happened in 2020? The death of George Floyd, and the subsequent revelation that black lives especially matter.

Yes, but not in the way intended. Not by a long shot. That death and revelation brought in its train myriad consequences. Defund the police. The war on cash bail and the release of numerous criminals. The demoralization of police, who were instructed explicitly and implicitly that arresting black male offenders was a career risk, and the subsequent surrender of the streets to the thugs. And on and on. (The release of many from jail because of COVID didn’t help either.)

This is as close to a natural experiment as can exist in social science. An exogenous shock–the death of one man–leads to a tectonic shift in law enforcement, especially with regards to a particular demographic. The result?: a hyperbolic increase in homicide rates in that demographic. (I note that the previous uptick observable in the chart in 2014 corresponds to the proto-Floyd event, the death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO, which was the catalyst for Black Lives Matter.)

This is as close to a definitive proof of causation as is possible in observational social science.

This is not complicated. We sowed. We reaped. There is no other plausible explanation for the data.

It is sickly ironic–and mainly sick–that so many black lives have been sacrificed on the altar of Black Lives Matter.

But it gave an opportunity for Nancy Pelosi and the like to demonstrate their superiority over us plebs by taking a knee wearing kente cloth, so it was all for the best, right?

The whole ugly spectacle makes me literally nauseous. (And yes, I literally know what it means to say “literally.”) Hell is not hot enough to torture properly all those preening better-thans who have cost more black lives in a couple of years than the KKK did in its entire, horrid, sordid history (which dates to 1866).

But you are the problem you see. You and your icky guns.

No, the real problem is the social psychosis that is modern American leftism, which obsesses over race, and in the name of helping one race is directly responsible for the deaths of thousands of that race.

So tell me: who are objectively the racists here? (See Orwell on “objectively pro-Fascist” if you don’t catch my point.)

If this does not make you incandescent with anger, some serious self-reflection is definitely in order. Unless you are a leftist, in which case that is something of which you are constitutionally incapable.

Just to clarify.
This requirement isn’t for concealed carry. It’s to simply BUY a firearm.
I think this monstrosity isn’t going to make it through the court system, but it does illuminate just how mindless a lot of people are, which isn’t a new thing, as the Framers recognized the malady even back then when they demanded a Bill of Rights.

Measure 114’s live fire training component leaves trainers in limbo

While Oregon’s new voter-approved gun control measure is getting worked out in the courts, there remains uncertainty among local gun shops and firearms instructors in Central Oregon.

Sharon Preston, owner of Ladies of Lead in Redmond — and an instructor who specializes in self-defense training for women — says there are a lot of questions that still have not been answered about the implementation of Measure 114.

Preston says business has been through the roof. But she says she’s had to stop firearm sales, not knowing what is next with the measure. But she says selling guns is only part of what she does.

“Selling guns is a very small portion of my business. I do it as an added value to my clients, so it’s educational based gun sales. But my main focus is always going to be in training,” said Preston.
She’s been forced to find alternatives as 114 is in limbo.

“I’ve heard too many stories in this store from women, locally. The brutality and violence they have been through, survived through. They want a tool that will allow them to live their lives large again, and they’re not going to be able to get on. That’s why I’m switching to crossbows, pepper ball guns, tasers, knives,” Preston said.

Preston’s biggest concern with the measure lies in the required live fire training — meant to prove shooting proficiency. As of now, she says no guidelines have been spelled out as to how the state will facilitate the training courses. And no one knows who will be authorized by the state to lead those courses.

And there are other unanswered questions.

“They don’t know how many rounds we have to shoot, at what distance we have to shoot, at what target we have to shoot. They don’t know what firearm we can use. So there’s so many questions out there,” said Preston.

The next hearing on Measure 114 will be held Tuesday at Circuit Court in Harney County. Those who support the measure will be able to argue against the temporary hold set in place by Judge Robert Raschio.

New study by frustrated anti-gun researcher doesn’t tell the whole story

by Lee Williams

More than 1 million Americans were killed by firearms from 1990 to 2021, and firearm deaths increased markedly during the pandemic, according to a study published Tuesday by the Journal of the American Medical Association network titled: “Trends and Disparities in Firearm Fatalities in the United States, 1990-2021.”

Firearm deaths reached their lowest point in 2004, and then increased more than 45% by 2021 — a 28-year high — the study claims. Black males were most at risk for homicide, and white males over 70 had the highest suicide rates.

The authors analyzed data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and used “key statistics” from the anti-gun group Brady United.

Despite its flaws, such as a reliance on biased statistics and a lack of causal factors, the report has been embraced by the legacy media and has proliferated across the internet.

The authors’ conclusion was rather simple: “This study found marked disparities in firearm fatality rates by demographic group, which increased over the past decade. These findings suggest that public health approaches to reduce firearm violence should consider underlying demographic and geographic trends and differences by intent.”

The study’s lead author, Dr. Eric W. Fleegler of Harvard Medical School’s Department of Pediatrics, has written numerous anti-gun studies and editorials. Gun-rights experts were quick to point out there was a lot missing from his most recent work.

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