“I think it was something personal.”

Man fatally shot, another injured in Bonne Terre Friday

An investigation is underway after a man was fatally shot and another man was “slashed and cut” early Friday morning in Bonne Terre.

According to Bonne Terre Police Chief Doug Calvert, officers were dispatched to a residence on South Long Street just before 12:30 a.m. in reference to a stabbing/gunshot situation in progress.

A male subject in his mid-30s, who has now been identified as Nick Wann, had reportedly been shot in the chest.

Calvert said Wann reportedly entered the residence and “slashed and cut” a man at the residence, also believed to be in his mid-30s. Officers believe the injured man then retrieved a handgun and shot Wann. The two men knew each other.

When officers arrived on the scene, CPR was being performed on the man who had been shot; however, he was unable to be revived and pronounced dead on the scene by the St. Francois County Coroner’s Office.

The detective and three officers with the Bonne Terre Police Department processed the scene. An autopsy was performed Friday afternoon.

The man at the residence was transported to the hospital to be treated for the cut. Details of his condition were not available.

The chief said no other individuals were injured. The weapons used in the incident have been recovered and secured as evidence. A report will be turned over to the prosecuting attorney’s office after the case is concluded.

Turbiaux Le Protector Palm Pistol

Photo Courtesy Cody Firearms Museum

Over the past few years, smaller and more concealable guns have hit the market — even a gun that simulates the size, shape, and appearance of a smartphone. Whether that’s a good idea or not isn’t for this historian to judge … yet. The idea of concealment in all shapes and sizes isn’t new. Back in the 1800s, many curios items came onto the market, including firearms like the Palm Protector Pistol.

This pistol is a revolver with a small barrel that fits between your fingers, kind of like parents tell their kids to do with their car keys. Instead of the cartridges being arranged in parallel around the cylinder’s axis, they were placed like spokes in a wagon wheel, much like earlier vertical turret revolvers. To fire, a shooter simply squeezes the gun. The design was first patented and sold in France in the early 1880s as the Turbiaux le Protector, but it soon saw production in the United States. Marketed by the Minneapolis Firearms Company as the Protector, it was manufactured in Springfield, Massachusetts. We don’t know of any FBI ballistic gelatin tests, but 32 Extra Short was a centerfire cartridge that made Volcanic Repeating Arms Company’s Rocket Ball ammunition look, well, still not great. Although, before we get too judgmental about the cartridge’s energy, Smith & Wesson got going thanks to sales of its number-one revolver that was chambered in the black powder 22 Short cartridge.

Peter Finnegan, who licensed the design, closed the Minneapolis Firearms Company and created the Chicago Fire Arms Company to sell a slightly different version of the guns. The manufacturing this time was done by the Ames Sword Company. Finnegan intended to have 15,000 ready by the Chicago World’s Fair, but Ames didn’t meet the deadline and a lawsuit ensued. The guns sold into the early 1900s.

Original French guns were 10-shot .22-caliber pieces, while most of the later American ones were .32 caliber, although some .41-caliber examples are reported. Originally, the guns were considered curio and relics but have since moved into the antique category under U.S. law.

TURBIAUX LE PROTECTOR (THE PROTECTOR)

  • Date: ca 1882
  • Caliber: 32 Extra Short
  • Dimensions: The size of a pocket watch
  • Action Type: Revolving
  • Options: Option for pearl side plate, usually nickel finished

This doesn’t mean to race down to the store, buy mass quantities and eat it like it was candy. Although you just know some idjit will do that and then try and blame Trump for it.

Northwestern Univ.: Vitamin D appears to play role in COVID-19 mortality rates.

After studying global data from the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, researchers have discovered a strong correlation between severe vitamin D deficiency and mortality rates.

Led by Northwestern University, the research team conducted a statistical analysis of data from hospitals and clinics across China, France, Germany, Italy, Iran, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States.

The researchers noted that patients from countries with high COVID-19 mortality rates, such as Italy, Spain and the UK, had lower levels of vitamin D compared to patients in countries that were not as severely affected.

This does not mean that everyone — especially those without a known deficiency — needs to start hoarding supplements, the researchers caution.

“While I think it is important for people to know that vitamin D deficiency might play a role in mortality, we don’t need to push vitamin D on everybody,” said Northwestern’s Vadim Backman, who led the research. “This needs further study, and I hope our work will stimulate interest in this area. The data also may illuminate the mechanism of mortality, which, if proven, could lead to new therapeutic targets.”……….

Backman and his team were inspired to examine vitamin D levels after noticing unexplained differences in COVID-19 mortality rates from country to country. Some people hypothesized that differences in healthcare quality, age distributions in population, testing rates or different strains of the coronavirus might be responsible. But Backman remained skeptical.

“None of these factors appears to play a significant role,” Backman said. “The healthcare system in northern Italy is one of the best in the world. Differences in mortality exist even if one looks across the same age group. And, while the restrictions on testing do indeed vary, the disparities in mortality still exist even when we looked at countries or populations for which similar testing rates apply.

“Instead, we saw a significant correlation with vitamin D deficiency,” he said.

By analyzing publicly available patient data from around the globe, Backman and his team discovered a strong correlation between vitamin D levels and cytokine storm — a hyperinflammatory condition caused by an overactive immune system — as well as a correlation between vitamin D deficiency and mortality.

“Cytokine storm can severely damage lungs and lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome and death in patients,” Daneshkhah said. “This is what seems to kill a majority of COVID-19 patients, not the destruction of the lungs by the virus itself. It is the complications from the misdirected fire from the immune system.”

This is exactly where Backman believes vitamin D plays a major role. Not only does vitamin D enhance our innate immune systems, it also prevents our immune systems from becoming dangerously overactive. This means that having healthy levels of vitamin D could protect patients against severe complications, including death, from COVID-19.

“Our analysis shows that it might be as high as cutting the mortality rate in half,” Backman said. “It will not prevent a patient from contracting the virus, but it may reduce complications and prevent death in those who are infected.”……………

Backman is careful to note that people should not take excessive doses of vitamin D, which might come with negative side effects. He said the subject needs much more research to know how vitamin D could be used most effectively to protect against COVID-19 complications.

Selecting a Personal-Defense Handgun: Size and Fit.

Selecting a personal-defense handgun is a very subjective endeavor. We may see a certain write-up in one of the gun magazines and think that that is just the gun for us. So we go plunk down our hard-earned cash only to find out that the gun is far from ideal. This is not necessarily the fault of a particular gun so much as it is a case of a gun that just doesn’t suit us.

As a young shooter, I was really impressed with the writings of Elmer Keith. And I quickly decided that a double-action .44 Mag. was just about the only handgun that a fellow would ever need. When I finally got the cash and took home that big DA .44, you can imagine my disappointment when I discovered that I just didn’t shoot it very well at all. The distance between the face of the trigger and the backstrap was just too long to fit my hand size. I tried all different kinds and sizes of grips, but that didn’t help. Because I couldn’t hold the revolver properly, that .44 Mag. cartridge just really beat my hand up. I know that was the case because I continue to enjoy the .44 Mag. cartridge, but in a single-action revolver, which fits my hand much better.

In order to shoot the handgun quickly and accurately, it must fit the shooter’s hand. When it does, the shooting grip feels comfortable and natural. It is this good fit that translates into quick, accurate shooting.

When a defensive shooter sets out to purchase a new handgun, this business of proper fit should be uppermost in mind. If one is not knowledgeable about handguns, it’s a good idea to take someone along who has plenty of experience so they can make sure that only quality guns are being considered. While one might have their heart set on the latest double-stacked auto, they may find that the single-stack version fits better. That experienced helper can also advise when a gun’s fit might be improved by changing to a different size of stock.

When considering a defensive revolver, there are a number of different sized stocks that can change the fit of the gun. If a 1911 might be the choice, there are long triggers and short triggers, thick stocks and thin stocks, all of which make a difference. In striker-fired pistols, the prominent companies have been good about making essentially the same gun in a double-stack version or single-stack. Many have different grip panels or backstraps to better fit the pistol to the individual’s hand.

We are blessed to live in a time when so many good defensive handguns are available for us to choose from. When making your selection, it is a good idea to choose from the best quality guns that you can possibly afford. And, among those guns, be sure to choose the one that fits your hand the best. You will find that you feel more secure with it because your grip feels comfortable and natural, more importantly, you can shoot it quickly and accurately.

This is not an article from the Babylon Bee.

Arizona: Muslim Students Threaten to Kill Prof for Suggesting Islam Is Violent.

This will teach those Islamophobes that Islam is a religion of peace: a professor is facing death threats for suggesting otherwise. Nicholas Damask, Ph.D., has taught political science at Scottsdale Community College in Arizona for 24 years. But now he is facing a barrage of threats, and his family, including his 9-year-old grandson and 85-year-old parents, is in hiding, while College officials are demanding that he apologize – all for the crime of speaking the truth about the motivating ideology behind the threat of Islamic jihad worldwide.

Damask, who has an MA in International Relations from American University in Washington, D.C., and a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Cincinnati, says he is “to my knowledge, the only tenured political science faculty currently teaching in Arizona to write a doctoral dissertation on terrorism.” He has taught Scottsdale Community College’s World Politics for each of the 24 years he has worked at the school.

Professor Damask’s troubles began during the current Spring semester, when a student took exception to three quiz questions. The questions were:

  • Who do terrorists strive to emulate? A. Mohammed
  • Where is terrorism encouraged in Islamic doctrine and law? A. The Medina verses [i.e., the portion of the Qur’an traditionally understood as having been revealed later in Muhammad’s prophetic career]
  • Terrorism is _______ in Islam. A. justified within the context of jihad.

Damask explained: “All quiz questions on each of my quizzes, including the ones in question here, are carefully sourced to the reading material. On this quiz, questions were sourced to the Qur’an, the hadiths, and the sira (biography) of Mohammed, and other reputable source material.” And indeed, the three questions reflect basic facts that are readily established by reference to Islamic texts and teachings and numerous statements of terrorists themselves.

Despite this, the student emailed Damask to complain that he was “offended” by these questions, as they were “in distaste of Islam.” Damask recounted: “Until this point, notably, the student had expressed no reservations about the course material and indeed he said he enjoyed the course.”

Damask sent two lengthy emails to the student responding to his complaints, but to no avail. A social media campaign began against Damask on the College’s Instagram account. Damask notes: “An unrelated school post about a school contest was hijacked, with supporters of the student posting angry, threatening, inflammatory and derogatory messages about the quiz, the school, and myself.”

At this point, College officials should have defended Professor Damask and the principle of free inquiry, but that would require a sane academic environment. Scottsdale Community College officials, Damask said, “stepped in to assert on a new Instagram post that the student was correct and that I was wrong – with no due process and actually no complaint even being filed – and that he would receive full credit for all the quiz questions related to Islam and terrorism.”

On May 1, Damask had a conference call with Kathleen Iudicello, Scottsdale Community College’s Dean of Instruction, and Eric Sells, the College’s Public Relations Marketing Manager. Damask recalls: “I was not offered to write any part of the school’s response, and there was no discussion of academic freedom or whether the College was even supportive of me to teach about Islamic terrorism. The very first point I made with them on the call (and virtually the only input I had) is that I insisted that the College’s release was to have no mention of any actions to be required to be taken by me personally, I was very clear about that.”

Predictably, Iudicello and Sells ignored that. They issued an apology to the student and to the “Islamic community,” and stated on the College’s Instagram page that Damask would be “required” to apologize to the student for the quiz questions, as the questions were “inappropriate” and “inaccurate,” and would be permanently removed from Damask’s exams.

Damask also had three phone calls with Iudicello, who gave him a bracing introduction into today’s academic funhouse world, where if someone is offended by the truth, it’s the truth that has to be deep-sixed. “During one call with Iudicello,” Damask recounts, “she stated that my quiz questions were ‘Islamophobic,’ that before continuing to have any further class content on Islamic terrorism I would likely need to meet with an Islamic religious leader to go over the content, and that I would likely need to take a class (perhaps at Arizona State) taught by a Muslim before teaching about Islamic terrorism.”

“The irony here,” says Damask, “is that literally during this phone call, I and my wife were tossing socks and jammies and our nine-year-old grandson’s toys into a suitcase to get the hell out of the house because of the death threats made by Islamic commenters on the College’s Instagram page.”

Rethinking Hoosier ‘deplorables’

Coming from the Bronx, I was acquainted with riding the subway or bus or navigating the busy and often treacherous streets of New York.

There I learned to survive in the city, but I knew nothing of hunting, fishing or surviving in nature. Coastal elites have disdain for those schooled in such things.

They assume that food, water and other necessities and amenities just appear. They lack awareness of the complex grids, structures and platforms that maintain their comforts. Or the sources of the electricity that powers their computers and air-conditioning, or of the gasoline that fuels their cars.

They do not appreciate those who make these daily, secular miracles possible, the commonplace wonders of modern, electronic civilization.

But my neighbors in Indiana hunt. They can survive in the forest, hills, lakes and rivers here. They understand the world of nature, its vicissitudes and even barbarism.

Appreciating its transcendent beauty and cadences, they also accept its fierce cruelties. They do not worship nature; they seek reconciliation with it that they may endure and protect their loved ones. They admire the natural world, its towering majesty and microscopic complexity, but they do not hold it on a pedestal, pristine, viewed from a distance.

Theirs is a realistic appraisal of nature and what is required to survive.

Many Hoosiers preserve food. Some steam or pressure can. Or dehydrate, pickle, freeze-dry, smoke, or salt items. Knowing how to farm, they cope with caterpillars, aphids, and cutworms; and guard against hedgehogs, fungi and lack of rain.

Some have gas tanks and generators. They have water filters, propane stoves, purifying tablets, first-aid kits, pick-up trucks, drills, hammers and wrenches. They can repair a car, a machine, or a leaking pipe. And yes, they also know how to install Wi-Fi, use computers, navigate the internet, and operate smartphones.

They have guns and ammunition. Well-trained, many are veterans, serving in the national guard or law enforcement, and are defenders of the Second Amendment. They have shotguns, bolt-action rifles, AR-10s, and other semi-automatics. They own handguns and an array of shells, including expanding, home-defense rounds.

Many have night vision, tree stands, bows, arrows, camouflage, trail cameras, scents, GPS devices and two-way radios. They hunt duck, quail and deer. Floating down a river or walking the fields, they recognize the rhythms of the animals they track and fish, their migration and trail patterns, all driven by the weather, mating seasons and food sources.

In a pandemic, a time of plague, with the economy crumbling, hospitals closing, streets emptied of life, perhaps the rootless cosmopolitans may want to reconsider their contempt.

What is certain is that our elites, in the media, academia, and elsewhere, cloistered in liberal ghettos, among fellow members of the chattering class, would not survive without the welders, assembly line workers and equipment operators, those whom they refer to as hicks, rubes and deplorables who cling to their guns and Bibles.

Maybe they should thank them.

Dr. Richard Moss is a surgeon practicing in Jasper. Contact him at richardmossmd.com or Richard Moss, M.D. on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Louisiana: House Committee to Hear Pro-Second Amendment Bills Next Week

Next Wednesday at 1:00pm, the House Administration of Criminal Justice Committee is scheduled to hear four pro-gun bills that will benefit law-abiding gun owners in the Sportsman’s Paradise.

House Bill 746 allows those who lawfully possess a firearm to carry concealed for self-defense during a mandatory evacuation under a declared state of emergency or disaster.

House Bill 781 establishes that firearms and ammunition manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, suppliers, and retailers are “Essential Businesses” that shall not be prohibited from conducting business during a declared disaster or emergency.  HB 781 further prevents law-abiding gun owners’ rights from being infringed during proclaimed curfews.

House Bill 140 prevents local authorities and municipalities from imposing restrictions to prohibit the possession of a firearm.  Preemption legislation is designed to stop municipalities from creating a patchwork of different laws that turn a law-abiding citizen into a criminal for simply crossing a jurisdictional line.

House Bill 334 authorizes a concealed handgun permit holder to carry a concealed handgun in a church, synagogue, mosque, or other similar place of worship.

Gun legislation added to massive public safety bill

Debate on a public safety omnibus bill that reached the [Missouri] House floor Tuesday focused heavily on gun legislation, as lawmakers proposed amendments that focus on preserving Second Amendment rights and eliminating many “gun-free zones” in Missouri.

As the penultimate week of the 2020 legislative session ramped up, lawmakers continued the end-of-session trend of adding as many amendments to bills as possible in the hopes that some of their legislation will become law.

Along with the gun amendments, many other changes to Senate Bill 600, a public safety omnibus bill, were proposed. These amendments covered a wide range of topics, including reducing Fentanyl trafficking, permitting EMTs in Missouri to honor out-of-state Do Not Resuscitate orders, allowing Missourians to kill feral hogs and more. But the proposed gun legislation sparked the most heated debate among lawmakers.

Second Amendment Preservation Act

A bill known as the Second Amendment Preservation Act, which had a whopping 86 co-sponsors, was the fourth amendment proposed to the public safety bill. The bill didn’t make it to the floor on its own, but Rep. Jered Taylor, R-Republic, said the omnibus public safety bill was “the perfect vehicle” to get it made into law.

“This bill is a pro-law enforcement bill that protects law enforcement by not requiring them to enforce federal gun laws,” Taylor said. “They still could be enforced by federal agents; we just wouldn’t be doing it on a state level.”

Rep. Lane Roberts, R-Joplin, was one of two Republicans who said they have strong support for the Second Amendment with hesitations about the bill, which also proposed penalties for police officers who decide to enforce federal gun laws.

“You will note that (the bill) creates an untenable position for police officers. It creates a conflict with their oath of office, and it essentially throws them under the bus and makes them the whipping children for this issue,” Roberts said.

Roberts also took issue with the penalties officers can face if they uphold federal gun laws.

“They can be civilly sued. They can be personally liable. They lose their license. They can be prohibited from being a police officer for the rest of their natural-born days,” Roberts said. “What has that got to do with protection of the Second Amendment?”

He also noted that asking local law enforcement not to enforce federal laws could create tensions with the federal agencies Missourians rely on and need to cooperate with.

Taylor responded by pointing out that he had dozens of co-sponsors on the bill and that current and former law enforcement officers have testified in support of the bill in the past.

“You know, the guys on the streets — the ones who are actually enforcing the laws — who would be forced to be the ones to go do the knocking and the seizure of AR-15s and AK-47s,” Taylor said. “They’re the ones that I’m trying to protect. And they’re the ones that say, ‘Absolutely, we need this.’”

Rep. Sara Walsh, R-Ashland, spoke in strong support of the bill, saying constituents have come up to her in the grocery store asking her to support it.

As the debate on the Second Amendment Preservation Act amendment came to a close, Rep. Tony Lovasco, R-O’Fallon, added an amendment to the amendment that legalized the possession of brass knuckles. As a whole, the new amendment was adopted.

Eliminating gun-free zones

Taylor also proposed an amendment to the public safety bill that would eliminate many of Missouri’s “gun-free zones,” or allow private property owners to determine whether to allow guns on the premises.

Gun-free zones are areas where firearms are prohibited with or without a permit. The bill would remove some areas from that category, including churches, bars and amusement parks. Those institutions could decide their own policies.

Taylor said mass shootings often happen in gun-free zones because people know they can carry out an attack without being stopped in a rapid fashion.

“There’s not going to be anyone there to be able to defend themselves or their family if the need were to arise,” Taylor said. He added that it takes law enforcement time to respond and said the gun-free zones make people “easy targets.”

The debate on the amendment was heated at times, but, ultimately, the elimination of gun-free zones amendment was also adopted into the public safety omnibus bill.

Bladen man shoots at suspects who tried to rob him

BLADEN, Neb. (KSNB) Authorities say a Bladen man shot at multiple suspects who broke into his home late Tuesday night.

The suspects who beat and tried to rob the man are still at large.

The state patrol said the suspects broke into the man’s home just before midnight late Tuesday May 5. The suspects beat the man and stole multiple firearms and ammunition. The patrol said the victim fired multiple shots at the suspects as they were leaving the home, after which they dropped most of the stolen property. The stolen firearms were recovered and returned to the victim. The patrol said only some ammunition was still missing as of Thursday afternoon. A patrol spokesperson did not have information about the kind of gun used by the victim to shoot at the suspects.

The patrol said the victim suffered minor injuries during the incident. A spokesperson at Mary Lanning Hospital said the victim was treated and released.

Local4 will not release the victim’s name in order to protect his identity

It’s not clear what injuries were suffered by the suspects. A state patrol spokesperson did not have information about the number of suspects other than to say it was more than one.

The Webster County Sheriff’s office has turned the case over to the state patrol which is still investigating the case.

Neighbors rush to intervene, shoots attacker brutally beating of 86-year-old

BARTOW COUNTY, Ga – Neighbors were forced to intervene in an attack and shoot a man who was brutally beating an 86-year-old Bartow County man with a metal pipe.

Those neighbors, a father and his son, said they didn’t know the 86 year old, they just knew they had to help.

Pauline Gravely has lived next door to 86-year-old Calvin Lee on Floral Drive in Bartow County for almost six decades. She can’t say enough good things about him.

“Just a fantastic person. He and his wife, I just loved them both,” said Gravley.

Gravely said Wednesday evening, a man who lives in the area, knocked on Calvin Lee’s door.

“He pulled him out of his house and started beating him,” said Gravley.

hat’s when the neighbors heard Lee’s wife scream for help and came running.

“Grabbed his gun, came down, tried to intervene and stop the fight,” said Gravley.

Those neighbors say the attacker turned on them. He punched one in the jaw and tried to take the gun away from the other. That’s when they fired two shots, hitting the attacker.

“I think all this was so useless, so awful,” said Gravley.

Both Calvin Lee and the attacker were rushed to the hospital.

Newport homeowner shoots man who was trying to break in

NEWPORT, Maine (WABI) – Police say a Newport man was shot Thursday morning while trying to break into a home in that town.

Officers were called to Hill Avenue around 1:30 a.m.

The homeowner reported a man was trying to come through a bedroom window then started banging on the outside of the home with a hammer type tool.

Police say the 22-year-old man never got inside and was shot in the shoulder by the homeowner before police arrived.

They say the man then went to his own home.

He is not being identified yet.

Police say he’s being treated at a hospital.

Police tell us charges will likely be filed against the suspect but not against the homeowner.

Maryland Governor Vetoes Ban on Private Rifle, Shotgun Sales

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) vetoed legislation Thursday that would have banned the private sale of rifles and shotguns throughout the state……..

Together, SB 208 and HB 4 would have criminalized not only sales, but also actions “such as loans and gifts between friends, neighbors, or fellow hunters.”The two bills would have also resulted in a scenario in which law-abiding long gun owners would have had to pay a fee to the state — to cover the cost of paperwork — in order to sell a gun to a neighbor or a lifelong friend.

Hogan released a statement with his veto wherein he stressed that he had shown openness to signing legislation that promised to help curtail the burgeoning violence in Baltimore and specifically called for the passage of Violent Firearm Offenders Act of 2020, the Witness Intimidation Prevention Act, and the Judicial Transparency Act.

He noted that the Senate acted on his request, but the House did not. Instead, an ad hoc approach to crime was taken, and that approach included the gun controls contained in SB 208 and HB 4.

As suggested by a comment:

America the Wuss – From Rugged Pioneers to Cowering Sheep
What happened to the American spirit?

On the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe, the paramount question becomes: What happened to the American people?

Is this the nation whose soldiers braved withering fire wading ashore on Omaha Beach, that produced the Battling Bastards of Bastogne — whose Marines raised the flag over Mt. Suribachi on Iwo Jima after a month of brutal fighting?

What happened to the American spirit? We’ve gone from the nation of rugged individualism and the pioneer spirit to shutdowns, social distancing, and face masks. Citizens who are treated like children meekly obey.

The battle cry of America the Wuss (“People are dying”) has drowned out “Give me liberty or give me death!”

Where totalitarians have failed, a triumvirate of the political left, fake news and medical bureaucrats have succeeded in subjugating the American people and ruining the U.S. economy.

Many Americans want to live in a bubble, avoiding contact with anything that might threaten their comfortable existence. Their fear makes them easy to stampede.

In reality, safety is an illusion. Step out your front door and you risk your life. As of May 3, 67,595 had died from the coronavirus in the United States.

In 2018, 647,457 Americans died of heart disease, 599,108 of cancer, 169,936 from accidents of all kinds (including roughly 40,000 highway fatalities), 55,672 from influenza and pneumonia and 47,173 from suicide.

To stay safe, don’t smoke or drink, don’t get too excited, get in a car or climb a ladder, stay indoors, lose weight, avoid human contact during flu season and don’t get depressed. Try not to think about Fingers Biden as president.

Despite the initial hype (first one million would die, then 500,000, then less then 100,000), the coronavirus turns out not to be more contagious or lethal than a really bad flu. The probability of dying from COVID-19 in the United States is 1.5 out of 10,000. Not bad odds.

In Sweden without a draconian shutdown regime, the probability of death from the coronavirus rises slightly to 2.0 out of 10,000. In the United States, the risk for healthy individuals under 55 is probably 1.5 in 100,000.

COVID-19 isn’t the first time a flock of squawking Chicken Littles, feathers flying in all directions, has tried to terrify us with dire warnings of impending doom, just the most successful…..

Overpopulation – In “The Population Bomb” (1969) Paul Ehrlich predicted worldwide starvation in the 1970s, due to population growth outstripping food production and the depletion of natural resources.

Nuclear War – In 1947, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists created the Doomsday Clock, which was supposed to show how close we were to planetary annihilation, due to stockpiles of nuclear weapons among other factors.

Man-Made Climate Change – Due to burning fossil fuels, the ozone layer is shrinking. Soon, sea-levels will rise to unimagined heights, polar bears on surfboards wearing Hawaiian shirts will glide by the island of Manhattan (if it isn’t under water) and they’ll be growing tropical fruit in Antarctica.

And now we have a lockdown going into its sixth week, so Dr. Fauci can do nightly briefings and Democratic governors can be little Caesars. And when it’s all over, they’ll present themselves as saviors. If It weren’t for social distancing and the lockdown, you’d all be dead, the Michigan Dominatrix and New York’s Il Duce will tell voters. If you object, they’ll label you anti-science.

Add to the current death toll civil liberties, representative government and all of the economic gains since the end of the last recession.

Earlier generations of Americans wouldn’t have stood for it. Tar and feathers would been in short supply.

The Shutdown Is The Largest Infringement Of Rights In A Century
Right now all of us have decisions to make about how much freedom is too much freedom.

On the national lockdown loosening in some states and stubbornly persisting in others, Americans are very much of two minds. For some, including most of the media, it is an inconvenience, but a righteous one that saves lives. For others, often with smaller megaphones, it is a powerfully destructive force economically and socially. But we should be able to agree that, whether justified or not, the lockdown has been a massive infringement on Americans’ basic rights.

At least since women received the right to vote there has been no time when so many Americans have had so many basic rights limited by the government. Yes, millions have been drafted, during World War II the entire country was made to ration goods, and there have been horrible incidents like Japanese internment. But never have the vast majority of Americans — hundreds of millions of people — had so many rights stripped for so extended a time with no end in sight.

Let’s look down the list of rights that are currently being denied by the state to the vast majority of Americans. Most may not leave their houses except for essential travel. Most may not operate their businesses. Most may not attend church or host even small gatherings in their homes. Most may not receive even potentially life-saving medical procedures such as cancer screenings. Whether one supports or opposes the lockdown, this deprivation of rights in unprecedented in modern American history.

America was founded on the principle that God gives us inalienable rights, specifically to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. State-imposed shutdowns of basic medical services threaten life. Restrictions on travel and what we may do in our homes threaten liberty. Banning all gatherings such as church, entertainment, social gatherings, and sports threatens happiness. The lockdown hits the trifecta.

Those in favor of the state-mandated restriction of rights argue that it is only temporary and is needed because of the grave medical emergency we face. Even though many, including Attorney General William Barr, have expressed serious doubts as to whether a pandemic supersedes the Constitution, let’s stipulate for the sake of argument that it does and see where this idea takes us.

The first thing to note is that this unprecedented attack on basic rights is open ended. Many believe that at least some of these restrictions must stay in place until the Chinese virus is no longer with us. This may never happen. Will “the new normal” be one in which we sacrifice freedom for safety? And if so, what is the limiting principle?

For that matter, what constitutes a public health crisis sufficiently deadly to “temporarily” suspend people’s rights? In 2017, about 40,000 people were killed in incidents involving guns. To date, about 70,000 people have died from coronavirus. These figures are not wildly different. If the state may take such drastic measures to deny Americans rights during the pandemic, why couldn’t tens of thousands of gun-related deaths qualify as a public health crisis that supersedes the Second Amendment and leads to gun confiscation? Where is the line between these causes of death?

What about free speech? Surely nobody would suggest that this most basic and precious liberty be a casualty of the Chinese pandemic — or would they? In The Atlantic, Jack Goldsmith and Adam Keane Woods have this to say” “In the great debate of the past two decades about freedom versus control of the [Internet] network, China was largely right and the United States was largely wrong. Significant monitoring and speech control are inevitable components of a mature and flourishing Internet, and governments must play a large role in these practices to ensure that the Internet is compatible with a society’s norms and values.” Yikes!

The longer this lockdown goes on, the more accustomed Americans become to a deprivation of their God-given rights by the state in the name of saving lives, and the flimsier the parchment of the Constitution becomes. Governments always have “good reasons” for denying rights. Nobody ever says, “I just want to be an awful fascist.” There’s always a threat, usually a very serious one, that supposedly justifies such illiberal actions.

Beyond the death, sickness, economic ruin, and inconvenience of this crisis, we must also be jealously guarding the rights protected by our founding. We do this not merely to defend the liberties that have been bequeathed to us, but protect them for those to whom we must pass them.

These are not esoteric, ivory tower constitutional questions; they literally strike at the birthright of every American. They must not be waived away under the pretense of an emergency situation. The government does not grant us rights, it protects them. Right now, all of us have decisions to make about how much freedom is too much freedom. On this question, we must never err on the side of caution, but always on the side of liberty.

Laws concerning possession are a form of ‘prior restraint’ and as we have seen, are useless. It’s not what you’ve got that should matter, it’s what you do with what you’ve got that should.

MISSOURI HOUSE PASSES AMENDMENT LEGALIZING BRASS KNUCKLES

Lawmakers approved an amendment to a current law that if passed by Senate and signed into law, would legalize knuckles, more commonly known as ‘brass knuckles’.

The amendment that was passed is part of a larger Public Safety bill, that will be voted on by the House Chamber in the future.

It was first introduced in January by Republican Representative Tony Lovasco.

Documents from the House Session on May 5 says if signed into law, people with concealed carry permits, a valid concealed carry endorsement issued before August 28, 2013, or a concealed carry endorsement or permit issues by another state in their name can legally carry knuckles, with similar exceptions to those who are permitted to carry a firearm.

KTTS News reached out to Rep. Lovasco and this was his response.

The measure was added as an amendment during the perfection process of an omnibus “public safety” bill (SB 600). My amendment removes criminal penalties for possession of “knuckles”, and regulates the carry of them in a similar way to concealed firearms.

The amendment was accepted by the House, however SB 600 as a whole has not yet received a final vote from the chamber.

As to why I offered the amendment, I did so because it’s absurd to me that the mere possession of a piece of metal with some holes in it could result in criminal charges. There are plenty of existing statues that properly prohibit the inappropriate use of these products, and banning them entirely is unproductive and outside the proper role of government.

Regarding the timing, I brought it up during a discussion on another amendment dealing with federal gun laws and the place that personal defense has within the “public safety” category the bill was ostensibly about. Unfortunately, the omnibus SB 600 also contains measures contrary to criminal justice reform and limited government principles and that I cannot support. My effort to add decriminalization of knuckles to the bill was an effort to minimally improve a very troubled piece of legislation.”
–Rep. Tony Lovasco, District 64

Two errr Three, yes Three For Texas.

Store clerk opens fire on robbery suspects, killing one
A second suspect ran from the scene while two others drove away in a dark-colored BMW.

HOUSTON — A clerk shot and killed at least one suspect when a group of alleged robbers forced their way into a store along Highway 90 in northeast Houston overnight.

This happened around 1:30 a.m. Wednesday at the Exxon gas station located on Maxey Road.

Houston police are reviewing the incident caught on surveillance video. Investigators said four suspects tried to force their way into the store which was locked.

The clerk was in a plexiglass pod when he was approached by the robbers, police said.

The clerk, fearing for his life, opened fire on the suspects, wounding and killing one of the men, police said. A second suspect ran from the scene while two others drove away in a dark-colored BMW.

Police confirmed that a man was found not far from the scene with a gunshot wound but would not confirm whether or not it was the suspect who ran from the scene. The man was transported to a local hospital.

The clerk was not injured in the incident.

Man shoots, kills suspect in shootout during attempted robbery on Pleasure Island
The suspect attempted to rob a couple several miles from where he was fatally shot in a second robbery attempt.

PORT ARTHUR, Texas — Two attempted robberies several miles apart ended in a shootout with an intended victim that left the suspect dead in the street along a Pleasure Island highway Tuesday evening.

Port Arthur Police officers were sent to report a robbery in progress just after 6:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Island Grocery in the 1900 block of South Highway 82 on Pleasure Island, according to a news release from the Port Arthur Police Department.

As officers headed to the store near the foot of the MLK Bridge, they were told that the suspect had left and was last seen driving east along Highway 82, the release said.

Officers spoke to a man and woman at the Island Grocery who told them a man armed with a rifle had attempted to steal their car, police said.

While speaking to the man and woman officers were informed of a shooting about three to four miles away along South Highway 82.

Officers then headed to the scene of the shooting where they found the suspect dead in the street, according to the release.

The suspect was identified by Port Arthur Police as 25-year-old, Leon Jones III, a resident of Opelousas, Louisiana.

Jones, still armed with the rifle, had attempted to rob a man and woman, who were crabbing, at gunpoint police said.

At some point after Jones demanded money and property from the two, the man was able to get to his car and grab his handgun.

The two men then got into a shootout and Jones was shot several times and died at the scene, police said.

The woman at the scene of the shooting was treated by medics on the scene for minor injuries she received during the shooting, police said.

Jones was driving a car that had been stolen in Louisiana, according to police.

Port Arthur Police are continuing to investigate the shooting.

Man, 24, fatally shot by ex after breaking into her home

SAN ANTONIO – A 33-year-old woman opened fire on her ex-boyfriend moments after he broke into her home Wednesday night, San Antonio police said.

The man, who was 24 years old, died following the shooting at the home in the 10300 block of Lynx Crossing, according to police. He has not been identified.

According to police, the woman was in the bathroom when she heard the man walking up the stairs and went to grab her shotgun. Moments later, she opened fire on her ex as he entered the bathroom.

He was transported to University Hospital, where he later died.

Police said that the woman had changed the locks to her home and that the man had been texting her all day.

Before the shooting, he was waiting for her when she arrived at her home. She told him to leave and he complied, police said.

He allegedly returned, forced a window open and entered the home as the woman was in the bathroom.

No one else was in the home.

The woman is not expected to face charges, police said.

Felon Lives Matter

Cutting violent felons loose while simultaneously disarming law-abiding citizens sounds like an over-the-top BabylonBee parody. It’s actually a fairly standard leftist fantasy, and I can only imagine their frisson at seeing it come true. Leapfrog compassion* for the incarcerated dovetails nicely with the cops’ preference to bust up lemonade stands rather than confront dangerous criminals.

This phenomenon is well-understood as anarcho-tyranny, but we feel like a snappier moniker is needed. This is not quite a Darwin Award, since the murderous toll of such policies is never paid by those enacting them. So yeah, anarcho-tyranny. Oh, and pitchforks.

* As in: leaping right over the gated community walls.

Just to point out the gun control script that leaked a while back.
It’s all about how they should use emotion and manipulate terminology and facts
Again, apply Sun Tzu advice:
“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”

Just a few significant parts of this. Peruse the whole file at your convenience.

PREVENTING GUN VIOLENCE THROUGH EFFECTIVE MESSAGING

POWERFUL FACTS AND IMAGES
1. Alarming facts open the door to action. And powerful stories put feeling and emotional energy behind those facts.

2. It’s not helpful to try to drown your audience in a flurry of facts and statistics. It is far more effective to zero in on a handful of simple facts that are both compelling and memorable.

3. Here are some of the facts that met that test in the research:

There are no background checks or ID requirements in most states for private sales, including private sales at gun shows.

There are virtually no restrictions on the type of weapons available for purchase in America, including assault weapons and ammunition magazines that store up to 100 bullets and can shoot 20 rounds in 10 seconds.

Police and law enforcement officers are more at risk, due to the availability and power of new weapons.
Reinforcing example: Police forces in places like Chicago and Miami are outfitting officers with assault weapons so that they aren’t outgunned by criminals.

4. It’s not just about words. Powerful and emotionally-engaging images are vitally important reinforcers of strong messages. For example, intimidating images of military-style weapons help bring to life the point that we are dealing with a different situation than in earlier times.

OVERALL MESSAGING GUIDANCE
KEY MESSAGING PRINCIPLES

#1: ALWAYS FOCUS ON EMOTIONAL AND VALUE-DRIVEN
ARGUMENTS ABOUT GUN VIOLENCE, NOT THE POLITICAL
FOOD FIGHT IN WASHINGTON OR WONKY STATISTICS.
It’s critical that you ground your messaging around gun violence prevention by making that emotional connection. Don’t skip past emotional arguments and lapse into a passionless public policy voice. And don’t make the gun violence debate seem as if it is a political “food fight” between two interest groups.
There is a reason why the NRA falls silent at times of high-profile gun violence incidents. The last thing they want is an American conversation centered on the terrible toll that gun violence takes on people’s lives.

#2: TELL STORIES WITH IMAGES AND FEELINGS.
Our first task is to draw a vivid portrait and make an emotional connection. We should rely on emotionally powerful language, feelings and images to bring home the terrible impact of gun violence. Compelling facts should be used to back up that emotional narrative, not as a substitute for it.
WARNING: Don’t break the power and undermine the value of emotionally powerful images and feelings by appearing squeamish or apologetic in presenting them

#3: CLAIM MORAL AUTHORITY AND THE MANTLE OF FREEDOM.
We should emphasize that one fundamental freedom every American should have is the freedom to be safe in our homes and neighborhoods – freedom to live our lives without the constant threat of gun violence hanging over our heads.
The NRA likes to talk about its work as the defense of American freedom. Recognize that, depending on the audience, both sides of the debate have the opportunity to claim moral authority. But, don’t yield that ground. Fight for it by emphasizing that a reckless disregard for the gun violence that plagues so many people’s lives is morally bankrupt and doesn’t have anything to do with protecting freedom.

#4: EMPHASIZE THAT EXTRAORDINARILY DANGEROUS, MILITARY-STYLE WEAPONS ARE NOW WITHIN EASY REACH ACROSS AMERICA.
We have to make clear to people that this isn’t a conversation about your grandfather’s hunting rifle. The fact that military-style assault weapons and high-capacity magazines are routinely available to people in most states is alarming – and surprising – news to many Americans.

#5: EMPHASIZE THAT AMERICA HAS WEAK GUN LAWS AND DON’T ASSUME THAT PEOPLE KNOW THAT.
It is important to emphasize that current laws allow easy access to guns for criminals, mentally unstable people, and even terrorists. Generally speaking, the public makes the assumption that our nation’s gun laws are much stronger than is actually the case.
The truth is, it is far worse than most people think. And when they learn what is really true about our gun laws, it raises serious concerns.

#6: CHALLENGE THE NRA ON YOUR TERMS, NOT THEIRS.
We will discuss the NRA in more detail in the next section. But, at the very outset, it is important to emphasize two critical points:
•
Whether to spend much time talking about the NRA depends upon whether we are talking to our base (where an NRA focus is often worthwhile) or broader audiences (where an NRA focus is far less likely to be helpful).
•
Even with the base, we need to always connect our comments to the NRA’s role in exposing people to needless violence.
Simply “taking on” the NRA as if “defeating the NRA” is our mission never serves our interests. Pointing out the direct link between laws the NRA promotes or blocks and the tragic human impact of gun violence is almost always more effective.
It’s effective to emphasize that the vast majority of NRA members are law-abiding gun owners who agree with common sense laws to keep dangerous weapons out of the hands of dangerous people—the NRA’s officials and lobbyists are the problem.

A new one by Charles C.W. Cooke, editor of National Review.

 

Freedom Is An Issue That Stirs Voters

The American gun-control movement has long insisted that public opinion is firmly on its side, and that its aims are thwarted not by their political unpopularity but by the obstinacy of a handful of over-powerful players. What happened in Virginia at the beginning of this year demonstrates once again that this claim of public support is flatly untrue.

By now, we are well-accustomed to hearing that “Republicans!” or “the NRA!” or “extremists!” have hijacked our elections and set about destroying the prospect of meaningful “gun-safety” reforms in the United States. But, if that is true, what should we make of Virginia’s failure to push through the gun ban that the governor and others had so confidently promised?

Certainly, one cannot blame the Republican party, which fared so poorly during the last set of state elections that the Democrats were left in charge of every branch of state government. Nor can one blame the country’s pro-Second Amendment advocacy groups, which, as usual, were outspent in the state. And one cannot claim with a straight face that the Democrats did not care enough about the issue, given that they campaigned on imposing new restrictions, promised after they won that they would impose new restrictions and, at the first opportunity, tried to impose new restrictions. Could it be, perhaps, that when push comes to shove, limiting the right to keep and bear arms is a losing proposition in America?

The scale of the reaction in Virginia suggests the answer is “yes.” Gov. Ralph Northam and the Democratic legislature insisted they were going to prohibit the sale of the most-commonly owned rifle in the United States and ban and confiscate standard-capacity magazines. In return, the people of Virginia insisted they were going to do no such thing. Six cities and 91 out of the state’s 95 counties passed resolutions declaring themselves Second Amendment “sanctuaries.” In Richmond, NRA-ILA organized lobby day, where more than 2000 members met with lawmakers to voice their opposition to new gun laws. A week later a rally against the proposals drew more than 22,000 peaceful protestors. And the letters and phone calls flew in by the day. Eventually, the legislature backed down—first by pretending to water down the proposals in a number of entirely meaningless and wholly unconvincing ways, and then by pulling bills before they got out of committee.

At the heart of the gun-control movement lies a terrible misconception as to who American gun-owners are—a misconception that explains a great deal about our debates over the Second Amendment and helps to explicate what happened in Virginia. In the gun-control activists’ imagination, meaningful support for the right to keep and bear arms is a fringe phenomenon, present only among society’s oddballs and outliers, and gun owners are a small, rural, homogeneous and dangerous minority.

In reality, that support exists across the spectrum. Why? Because gun owners are half of the country. Electricians are gun owners. Bankers are gun owners. Teachers are gun owners. Stay-at-home moms are gun owners. Your neighbors are gun owners. They may be quiet about it most of the time, but, when the government tries to strip them of their elementary rights in the name of protecting them, they will break that silence in an instant and stand up to say “no.” In Virginia, it looked for a while as if all the chips had fallen in the wrong place. For the first time in decades, the Democrat Party not only controlled the entire State government, but it seemed determined to use its power to infringe upon the Second Amendment. The game was up, we were told.

And then, it lost its central attempt at a gun ban and possible confiscation.

What happened? You happened. I happened. “We the People” happened. Not today, Virginia.

Bubble-Wrapped Americans: How the U.S. Became Obsessed With Physical and Emotional Safety

It’s a common refrain: We have bubble-wrapped the world. Americans in particular are obsessed with “safety.” The simplest way to get any law passed in America, be it a zoning law or a sweeping reform of the intelligence community, is to invoke a simple sentence: “A kid might get hurt.”

Almost no one is opposed to reasonable efforts at making the world a safer place. But the operating word here is “reasonable.” Banning lawn darts, for example, rather than just telling people that they can be dangerous when used by unsupervised children, is a perfect example of a craving for safety gone too far.

Beyond the realm of legislation, this has begun to infect our very culture. Think of things like “trigger warnings” and “safe spaces.” These are part of broader cultural trends in search of a kind of “emotional safety” – a purported right to never be disturbed or offended by anything. This is by no means confined to the sphere of academia, but is also in our popular culture, both in “extremely online” and more mainstream variants.

Why are Americans so obsessed with safety? What is the endgame of those who would bubble wrap the world, both physically and emotionally? Perhaps most importantly, what can we do to turn back the tide and reclaim our culture of self-reliance, mental toughness, and giving one another the benefit of the doubt so that we don’t “bankrupt ourselves in the vain search for absolute security,” as President Dwight D. Eisenhower warned us about?

Suspected car burglar dies after shootout with homeowner

SAN ANTONIO – A suspected car burglar is dead after getting into a shootout with the car owner early Tuesday morning.

The shooting took place just before 3 a.m. at a home on Deely Place near S. Flores Street on the South Side.

Police said the homeowner saw a man allegedly breaking into his vehicle. After being confronted by the homeowner, the suspect pulled a gun on him. The homeowner pulled out his own gun and shots were exchanged.

The suspect ran off, but his body was found by a police K-9 in nearby Bellaire Park where he bled to death.