Yes, that's how it happened.  Check out this interesting post at Physics Geek Jesus Freak:

I had a brief mini-debate with a couple of co-workers yesterday, one of whom was appalled that people would advance any pro-gun argument in response to the Virginia Tech shootings. Ironically, I - who have never fired or even held a gun - was defending gun rights to two guys who have both fired weapons. They also expressed disbelief over the recent D.C. Circuit decision to overthrow a thirty-year-old gun ban in the District of Columbia.

Fuddites, no doubt.

From KnoxNews:

As states and colleges across the country review their gun policies in light of the tragedy, many in Utah are proud to have the nation's only state law that expressly allows the carrying of concealed weapons at public colleges.

"If government can't protect you, you should have the right to protect yourself," said Republican state Sen. Michael Waddoups.

There are some foolish statements in the article. Like this:

"What happened at Virginia Tech might have been stopped," said Christine Zabawa, a medical researcher at the university. However, she said it is a bad idea to allow guns in dormitories, and fears an accident could happen during a party on campus.

"Alcohol and guns. It's a bad combination," she said.

Well then, Christine, why don't you just ban alcohol, since bans always work so well?

Oda said banning guns on campus might do more harm than good. He said people bent on violence might resort to other, perhaps bloodier methods, such as swords.

"A person that's got skill with a sword in a very big crowd could put a lot more people down with a sword than a gun," he said. "They're silent. You'll have people screaming, but nobody knows what's going on."

Or some psychotic killer might, you know, just ignore the ban and bring a gun anyway. I've heard that kind of thing has happened before.

Via Of Arms and the Law.

Lots of other bloggers have talked about this already, but just in case you haven't seen it yet, I want to point out this opinion piece by one Dan Simpson.  This is yet another example of why there can be no compromise with enemies of freedom.  They can talk about what they call "common-sense gun laws" all they want, but every now and then, one of them slips up and reveals the real agenda.

Although I do believe Simpson is an elitist and a fascist, I don't think he's crazy.  I think he's just abysmally stupid.  This passage, for example:

America's long land and sea borders present another kind of problem. It is easy to imagine mega-gun dealerships installing themselves in Mexico, and perhaps in more remote parts of the Canadian border area, to funnel guns into the United States. That would constitute a problem for American immigration authorities and the U.S. Coast Guard, but not an insurmountable one over time.

There could conceivably also be a rash of score-settling during hunting season as people drew out their weapons, ostensibly to shoot squirrels and deer, and began eliminating various of their perceived two-footed enemies. Given the general nature of hunting weapons and the fact that such killings are frequently time-sensitive, that seems a lesser sort of issue.

The suggestion that hunters would quickly "settle scores" during the brief time they are allowed their weapons is despicable and reveals his own contempt for his fellow humans.  But the first paragraph there reveals his utter stupidity.  Our so-called "authorities" can't stop truckloads of people from illegally crossing the border.  How would they ever stop illegal guns?  Guns can be stashed in places that a person can't, and they don't have to be kept alive.  Like I said, abysmally stupid.

However, this is not to be taken lightly.  This is what they really want.  Read the whole article.

Seen first at The War On Guns.

Technorati Tags: dan+simpson,, rkba,, second+amendment

UPDATE:  I'm bumping this old post back to the top because some other folks have made similar posts lately, and I am adding links to them all from this post.  Scroll to the bottom for the links.  If you have a similar post, let me know and I'll add it, too.

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I've been thinking about this some lately. It has lurking in the back of my mind for a while, and some thoughts were more recently crystallized because of this post at South Park Pundit.

I didn't always carry a gun. I actually only carried a concealed weapon one time previous to having a CHL, and then it was in my vehicle, not on my person. As if that makes any difference to the "authorities." Even after then-Governor Bush signed the law that established legal concealed carry in Texas, I didn't take advantage of it for several years.

I suppose many other people who carry have been asked the same question I have a few times: Why do you want to carry a gun?

My honest answer is: I don't want to carry a gun.

I don't want to do a lot of things. I don't want to hold down a regular job that drains me of all my energy so that by the end of the day, most of the time, all I can do is come home, eat, shower, and go to sleep. I don't want to rely so heavily on gasoline for my well-being. Having grown up in the country where there aren't many decent jobs, I have come to rely heavily on gasoline for commuting to the city where there are better opportunities. Having a family with two small children I have to do whatever I can to provide for them, which means I take the best jobs I can get, even if I hate them, which I usually do. Sure, I could move to the city and use less gas. But then I would also have to pay more for less land, be crowded into higher population densities, and my children would be exposed to a higher rate of drugs, crime and danger than they are now. I prefer to stay where I am.

Which brings me to the gun. I carry it for them. As a father, and as a more or less decent human being with a fairly well-honed conscience, I would be failing them if I didn't do what I had to to provide them with food, clothing, shelter, and protection.

I have heard people say that they are big enough and strong enough to handle anyone who threatens them or their family. Anyone who thinks he or she is big enough and strong enough to use their bare hands against a criminal armed with a gun is a fool. I am neither big nor strong, but I have dedicated myself to their protection, and I will do what I can and what I must, if I am forced to.

It means I must examine a number of guns to find the one that works best for me. It means I must weigh the destructive potential of a caliber against the number of times a given gun is capable of delivering that potential before reloading. It means I must carry different guns to discover which is easiest for me to carry, draw and wield. It means I must learn about different types of ammunition so that I can decide which ones are best able to deliver that potential.

My children already know this. I know they know it because they have both asked me something along the lines of, "If a bad person tried to get me, would you shoot them?" I answer them honestly, "Yes, if I had to, to keep you safe." This has not had the effect of making them paranoid, to my knowledge. On the contrary, it seems to be working for them. My very young son has even gone so far as to say that when he grows up, he will help keep me safe, too.

If something were to happen that abolished the Texas CHL law, I don't think I could go back. I know that their protection is my responsibility, and it's a responsibility that I can't rely on anyone else to provide.

If I lived in my ideal world, I would spend all my time puttering around a large ranch with nothing but a .22 hanging from a gun rack behind the seat of my truck. I would probably not own a handgun at all. Well, maybe a .22 handgun, just because they are so universally useful. But I don't live in my ideal world and I doubt that very many people do.

So when someone asks me why I want to carry a gun, this is my answer. I don't carry because I want to. I carry because it's the right thing to do.

SEE ALSO:
Confessions of a Deathbeast at Hell in a Handbasket.
Why I Carry at What Would John Wayne Do?
Last words on why I carry at When Your Only Tool Is A Hammer.
Why Carry? at Random Ramblings of a Republitarian.
Become Just. One. Person at Joe's Crabby Shack.

If you don't subscribe to The Shooting Wire, you need to go sign up now.  Today's email is full of good information.

First, this:

Here's a fact that is guaranteed to drive anti-gun groups absolutely insane: there is no corollary between the rate of firearms ownership and homicide and violent crime rates.

This might come as a total shock to many reporters, editorial writers and elected officials, but it is the result of a lengthy - and scientific look - at gun ownership and how it does not relate to the incidence of murder and violence by criminologists Prof. Don Kates of the United States and Prof. Gary Mauser of Canada. In fact, their summation is one that will more than likely rock the misconceptions of many: "nations with very stringent anti-gun laws generally have substantially higher murder rates than those which allow guns."

Wow.

The Kates/Mauser report appears in no less than the current issue of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. Entitled "Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide? A Review of International Evidence" is a detailed look at gun ownership and how it, in fact, bears no relation to the incidence of murder and violence.

And in other news, I have mentioned before how some district attorneys have turned vigilante and decided to ignore Texas law.  Shooting Wire has more news on this:

In a report called "Above the Law: How Texas prosecutors are placing their own judgment over that of the Legislature and the law of the land" the American Civil Liberties Union has collaborated with the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition and the Texas State Rifle Association to unveil the actions of some Texas prosecutors who don't care for the clarifications made to Texas' concealed-carry laws. The clarification states, simply, that citizens have the right to carry a legal handgun in a private vehicle.

Some Texas prosecutors didn't like that new law — to the point several directed local police to ignore the statute.

In the joint report, it appears that in at least 13 jurisdictions in Texas, that is, indeed the case. 13 county/district attorneys, including district attorneys for counties in large metropolitan areas like Houston and Fort Worth, have instructed police officers to interrogate Texans unnecessarily, arrest Texans, or take their guns even if they are legally carrying the gun in a car under HB 823 standards.

According to the report, one County Attorney One "advised police officers that it's simply too complicated to try and determine whether a Texan is legally carrying a stowed gun in the car, so officers should arrest for "unlawful carrying" as before and let the prosecutor's office 'sort out the legal niceties.'"

Those are fighting words to the authors of "Above the Law" and they have countered by naming those County Attorneys, citing examples of their having instructed officers to either circumvent or ignore the law, and publishing a guideline of "what to do if you're stopped".

In fact, the law is very simple and clear.  It states that if you are in your car and not otherwise involved in unlawful activity, not otherwise prohibited from possessing a firearm, and not a member of a street gang, you can have a gun concealed in your car.  Period.  I'm sure eventually someone will try to define those of us who believe in self defense as gang members before it's over with.

Finally, this news from Illinois:

As was reported in yesterday's edition of The Outdoor Wire, Pike County, Illinois has fired back at Illinois legislators who seem intent on passing progressively restrictive gun laws. With an economy that's heavily dependent on the hunting industry, Pike County's Commission passed a resolution which has told state legislators Pike will not recognize legislation that infringes on the right to keep and bear arms as is guaranteed under the Second Amendment of the Constitution.

Word of that action is spreading across the United States and other small counties are beginning to discuss their own measures to prevent the usurpation of their rights by legislators they feel are either disconnected or indifferent to their jurisdiction's needs.

Now that's some amazing activism.  Some might go so far as to call it rebellion.

[Senator Chuck Schumer] told O'Reilly on Monday that while he and Rep. McCarthy had previously worked together on this legislation, he now wants Congress to take up HR 297 quickly. "The Brady Law is a reasonable limitation," Schumer said. "Some might disagree with me, but I think certain kinds of licensing and registration is a reasonable limitation. We do it for cars."

Get the picture? First, he wants the Brady Law strengthened with the McCarthy-Dingell-Schumer legislation. Then it's off to pass more gun control -- treating guns like cars, where all gun owners are licensed and where bureaucrats will have a wonderful confiscation list.

In the O'Reilly interview, Schumer showed his hand when he revealed the strategy for this bill. Because it could become such a hot potato -- thanks to your efforts -- Senator Schumer is pushing to get this bill passed by Unanimous Consent in the Senate, which basically means that the bill would get passed WITHOUT A VOTE.

Read the whole thing at the Gun Owners of America website.

Philip van Cleave of VCDL in The Raw Story:

"This is a huge nail in the coffin of gun control," said Philip van Cleave president of the gun rights group Virginia Citizens Defense League.

"They had gun control on campus and it got all those people killed, because nobody could defend themselves," he told AFP.

"You want people to be able to defend themselves -- always," he said.

Van Cleave said the tragedy could give a boost to a years-long effort in Virginia to pass legislation allowing students to carry weapons on campus -- especially since existing laws failed to prevent Cho's murderous rampage.

"Gun control failed. That student under university rules was not to have a gun," Van Cleave said.

He's more optimistic than I am. I hope he's right.

Interesting editorial from Investor's Business Daily:

Bernard Goldberg, in his book "Arrogance" (Warner, 2003), reports how the media reported the tragic events of that day. He notes that Lott did a LexisNexis search and found that only four of 208 news reports mentioned the rescuers had guns. James Eaves-Johnson did his own LexisNexis search for the Daily Iowan (University of Iowa) and found that only two of 88 stories mentioned that armed students subdued the killer and prevented more deaths.

Commentary on how the bias against guns relates to the recent atrocity.

From Oleg Volk.

Follow the link for lots more images on this topic.

Technorati Tags: Virginia+Tech, self+defense

To the commenter from Georgia who spent 4 hours here when you probably should have been teaching, or whatever you do there:

Hincker is "a butcher with immaculate hands."  It is people like him who are partly responsible for those deaths because they work so hard to make sure that everyone is a potential victim.

And let me make one thing perfectly clear:  It  is not people like me who become mass murderers.  It is people like me who may one day save your life from a crazy like that.

To the other commenter:  No, I don't feel better.  And I won't feel better until victimization lunatics like Hincker no longer have the influence to brainwash people like you into thinking that everyone must be a victim.

Charlie Rangel, via the eminently unbiased NPR:

"It's a regional thing, it's a cultural thing and it's a sad thing, but it's some type of cult," Rangel said. "'Don't touch; don't take the gun from my dead, cold hands…' and I don't understand it, but obviously there is a political difference about that."

P.S.  When is someone going to tell him that the emphasis should be on the second syllable of his last name?  I'm about as monolingual as they come, but even I cringe every time I hear some NPR goofball say "Congressman Charlie Wrangle."  (To be really technical, I believe the "g" should also be pronounced softly, like an "h").

I was going to post this this morning, but I got sidetracked.  The old P-22 post is my best regular traffic bringer.  I get search hits for it all the time.  However, I usually get only 50-60 hits per day.  Here is yesterday's traffic report.


The recent incident is causing a lot of people to hunt for info on the P-22.  I'll have to check out StatCounter to see if anyone in particular is looking.

I'm filing this under my Second Amendment category because it pertains to the other posts on this topic.  Normally I'd just file it under "Blogging."

UPDATE:  Hits today from University of Maryland, Hackensack University in New Jersey, North Carolina Research And Education Network, and California Institute Of Technology.

The answer to the hit from North Carolina is 10.  It has a magazine that holds ten cartridges.  The bullet is the projectile.

More than 300 hits today so far, and since I have the free version of StatCounter I get info on only the most recent 100.

People are looking for pictures and information.  For another hit:  the velocity of the .22 is generally not dependent on the gun it is fired from.  It is dependent on barrel length.  Any other gun with the same length barrel will generate the same velocity (in general).

I halfway expect someone to blow a gasket because I posted such a "detailed" article about this gun on my blog.  I'm just watching traffic and trying to brace myself for it.

UPDATE:  186 hits to this post on Wednesday.  An unusually large percentage from outside the U.S.

I haven't ever posted an entire alert from JPFO before, but this time I think it's very important.

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April 18, 2007

JPFO ALERT: Why We Cannot Just Be Quiet and Mourn

In the hours and days just after the mass murder-suicide at Virginia Tech last Monday, many people felt it would be more sensitive and polite if the advocates for gun rights would sit quietly and allow the personal and national mourning to take place without a lot gun policy arguments.

We at JPFO considered the sensitive and polite approach. We certainly feel terrible for the victims and for the families and friends whose lives are shattered by the horrendous crime. The deep evil of the murders makes it all the harder to come to terms with that sickening event. We agree that it would be best if we, as a nation, could gather together with the survivors in national mourning.

But we could not just be sensitive, polite and quiet, for two key reasons. First, we know that the enemies of defense rights always capitalize on strong emotions of the moment to drive their policies.

The Brady Campaign, for example, released a message almost immediately that called for more national "gun control" and said:

"We are building a crescendo of public outcry to ensure that action is taken. We are aggressively rallying support among allies for our solutions."

Those benighted people, who think that making everybody defenseless is a good plan, have already swung into action. Their policy goals ride on strong emotions, not on reason and practicality.

If we stay quiet while the anti-self defense crowd defines the issues and whips up emtions, then we lose. We lose by being absent and by giving the appearance of conceding we are wrong about self-defense. We lose by letting emotional appeals go unchallenged by careful rational thought.

We know also that a bad law driven by high-emotions in Congress and the media will be extremely hard to eliminate later.

A second reason we could not just stay quiet: gun owners have been made to feel guilty for having guns, just because one suicide-murderer misuses a firearm in such an horrific way. In this moment of national focus, many gun owners don't remember some of the key reasons that we have the right to keep and bear arms. Under pressure, many gun owners cannot respond to challenges, and that makes us all look shallow or unprincipled.

Talk host Bill O'Reilly, for example, took to the airwaves the following day to claim that Virginia's gun laws are not strict enough. O'Reilly urged that a 7-day waiting period is necessary, that the instant background check is not enough. A caller to his radio show pointed out the several procedures in Virginia that a buyer must pass through, and said that the 7-day waiting period was not needed.

O'Reilly replied by challenging the man to explain why he couldn't wait 7 days to get a Glock? Why did the man need to take immediate possession?

The caller was unable to answer the question -- because he was feeling defensive and cornered and somehow guilty.

The answers to O'Reilly's challenges are:

(1) a woman who is being stalked should not have to wait 7 days to obtain the means to protect herself from a potentially armed madman,

(2) the police owe no duty to protect individual citizens from criminal attack. Blocking a person from getting defense tools is to cripple the endangered citizen's ability to protect himself or herself,

(3) the suicide-murderer in this case had planned his crime carefully, such that a 7 day waiting period would have had zero effect upon him.

We cannot let the anti-defense people and the ignorant media personalities command the policy discussion while we are sensitively and politely silent. We wish it were otherwise. Innocent lives depend upon the right to keep and bear arms, so we must protect it, even in times of tragedy and grief.

- The Liberty Crew

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From Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership

Head on over to this post at Reformed Chicks Blabbing and respond to the anti-self-defense, anti-second amendment comment left there.

But NO BAD LANGUAGE!  Okay?

UPDATE:  I left one more follow-up comment over there, but I'm finished now.  If anyone else wants to clue him in, have fun.

I don't have anything thought-provoking or profound to say.  I'm filled with sorrow at the loss of these innocent people.  I'm filled with hatred and rage toward those who work so hard to ensure that they were defenseless.

I am filled with utter disgust (plus hatred and rage) at heartless, smarmy bastards like this, who are already slathering themselves with the blood of their victims and gloating because they think they've made a point.

Yeah, I said their victims.  No, they didn't help pull the trigger, but their irrationality regarding the fundamental right of self-defense makes them partly culpable.  In my eyes, they are accessories to mass murder and should be treated as such.

I just don't have the heart to say any more.  I have no way to articulate my anger.

UPDATE:  Read this by Michael Bane.  And this by ChuBlogga!

Everyone has heard about it already.

Michelle Malkin points to Thinking on the Margin, who has a campus map showing how far the murderer walked across the campus, completely unmolested.

Reports are that these two separate mass murders were committed about 2 hours apart.

Two hours!

And nothing happened.

No class cancellations, no campus evacuations, no alerts, no police swarming the campus looking for this guy.  Nothing at all.

So tell us, Larry, where were your "hundreds of highly trained officers armed with high powered rifles encircling the building and protecting" this time?  Especially since they had two hours to prepare for the second onslaught.

Of course the campus was a Psychotic Killer Free-For-All Zone, often erroneously referred to as a "Gun Free Zone" by those who prefer to delude themselves with wishful thinking.

Imagine it, Larry.  If it weren't for evil victimizers such as yourself, one or two well-placed bullets could have saved a lot of lives.

UPDATE:  Interesting update and comments at Shooting the Messenger.

I received a comment for my old blog, on a post about some cops in New Hampshire apparently persecuting someone who was open carrying legally there.  The old post is here (from October 2005).  The commenter left a link to a video, saying, "Here's a video of Abbott Presby's son confronting Penny Dean."  Read the old post to see who he's talking about.

The video is here, titled "Cop's son makes fool of himself at public forum."  I usually use the TechCrunch video download tool to grab videos if I think they're relevant, but this one is too big for my dial-up connection, about 16 megs.  So I'm providing a link for those of you with broadband connections, but I haven't actually watched it myself.

Aghast, I say!  The latest Brady missive:

I'm simply aghast!

In a 2-1 decision in Parker v. District of Columbia, right-wing activist judges on a Federal Appeals Court recently overturned Washington D.C.'s long-standing restrictions on handguns based on their twisted view of the 2nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution while ignoring more than 60 years of precedent — a decision that endangers America's gun laws coast-to-coast.

This case could land before the U.S. Supreme Court within the next 6 months and each month brings a tidal wave of work to fight this terrible decision. Simply put: we need your support today!

Please click here to make a commitment of $5 or more per month. This affordable amount will automatically be charged to your credit card each month — unless you decide to change or cancel your monthly commitment.

Your monthly gift will be a steady source of income that will help us:

Convene well-recognized experts in constitutional law and history to develop the most powerful arguments against the Parker ruling;

Assemble a comprehensive library of books, treatises, articles, court decisions and legal briefs refuting the "individual rights" view of the Second Amendment and make this library available to lawyers nationwide and on the Internet; and

Launch a major public education campaign including full-page ads in major newspapers and a new Brady Gun Law Defense Fund website. We'll also organize lawyers and law professors to write newspaper op-eds and letters to the editor to create a constant drumbeat of criticism of this decision.

This battle — to its very core — is the most important battle we have ever waged. We need your help today — your monthly support — to build a strong Brady Gun Law Defense Fund to save America's gun laws.

[...]

We must prepare for the fight of our lives. Everything we have worked for in the past and everything we’re currently working on could be destroyed by the heinous ruling of right-wing activist judges who choose to ignore more than 60 years of precedent in order to help the gun lobby accomplish in the courts what they’ve been unable to accomplish in Congress.

Emphasis in original, links removed.

I actually like their plan, but not in the way they think.  Like this:




How's that?

Maybe I'm being too optimistic, but I seem to hear some desperation in her voice.

The title may be a redundancy, but anyway, don't miss this guest editorial by Mike Vanderboegh:  You Can't Repeal the Law of Unintended Consequences.  It's a rebuttal to the guy who recently proposed that the Second Amendment should be ditched because it's obsolete.