Saturday, August 1, 2015

Gun Control "Study" Misses the Mark Badly on Lawful Self-Defense

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Gun Control "Study" Misses the Mark Badly on Lawful Self-Defense

Friday, July 31, 2015

Likely as a response to the growing number of American’s who have come to realize that having a firearm makes them safer, a blogger at the washingtonpost.com recently reported on a “study ” by an anti-gun professor that attempts to discredit the utility of carrying a firearm for self-defense by placing participants into simulated self-defense scenarios. The “study” was notably prepared for the anti-gun group National Gun Victims Action Council.

The thrust of the Post article is a not-so-veiled attempt to convince readers that carry permit holders are unprepared for most self-defense encounters. However, the “study” doesn’t actually show this at all. The “study” didn’t limit the participants to concealed carry permit holders. Therefore, the conclusions in the study can’t be applied to people who have actually made the decision to carry a gun for self-defense.

Perhaps the most interesting finding, given the “study’s” consistent recommendation of extensive training for carry permit holders, is that there was no statistical evidence that training improved participants’ accuracy during the simulated encounters, largely due to the fact that the scenarios were so badly designed. But even without any evidence, the authors of the “study” press on, which is not uncommon among anti-gun fanatics trying to advance their cause.

Self-defense simulations are not needed to determine if lawfully armed citizens can defend themselves from criminal attacks. Armed citizens defend themselves and others on a daily basis. Just a few examples from this month show that armed citizens are able to consistently make the correct split-second decisions in real-life encounters with violent attack. On July 3, a Milwaukee clothing storeowner used an AR-15 to repel three armed men who had already crashed a van through the front of his store. In Georgia, an Army veteran ended an armed robbery with accurate fire from his lawfully carried pistol. In perhaps the best example, only days after Kansas’ permitless carry law took effect, an armed citizen carrying under the new provision foiled an armed robbery without firing a shot.

With over 11 million armed citizens with carry permits and many more carrying where no permit is required, criminals are more and more likely to be confronted by a lawfully armed citizen, which can only lead to more Americans understanding the societal benefits of having “a good guy with a gun” when and where you need them most.

Famed Law Professor, Defense Attorney Latest to Suggest Second Amendment Needs to Go

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Famed Law Professor, Defense Attorney Latest to Suggest Second Amendment Needs to Go

Friday, July 31, 2015

The legal profession is full of blowhards, egomaniacs, hypocrites, and elitists, but even so, rarely are all those qualities present in a single individual to the same degree as in Alan Dershowitz. At age 28, Dershowitz became the youngest full professor of law in history with his appointment at Harvard. And, yes, it went to his head. He has written that he “does not hide behind the distorting shield of false humility” and has even suggested things might have gone differently for Jesus if he had been there to represent him. When not busy indoctrinating impressionable law students in his own particular brand of politics, Prof. Dershowitz has advocated on behalf of various celebrity clients, including in highly-publicized cases involving allegations of murderous domestic violence.

Despite his reputation in some circles as a civil rights champion, Dershowitz is no fan of the Second Amendment. He has advocated for a variety of gun controls, including banning all semi-automatic firearms. As he said on the (since cancelled) Piers Morgan show, “If I could ban 100 percent of guns without violating the Constitution, I would do that ….” In the same appearance, he called the idea that guns have a role in protecting liberty “a myth.” Nevertheless, at least at one point, he was willing to go on record as admitting the Second Amendment protects an “individual right to ownership of guns,” although subject to regulation.

Nevertheless, Dershowitz (who admitted in 2003 that he's never held a pistol) on Monday claimed America’s “experiment” with private ownership of firearms “has failed miserably.” During an appearance on Newsmax TV, he went on to say, “If I could write the Bill of Rights over again, I would skip amendment number two. We’re the only country in the world that puts in our Constitution the right to bear arms.”

Even though Dershowitz is famed for his expansive readings of other provisions of the Bill of Rights, he would have no problem regulating the Second Amendment into oblivion. “What is needed,” he said, “is some very tough legislation on both the federal and state level to make it much, much harder to get guns and to create a presumption against gun ownership instead of a presumption in favor of gun ownership ….”

Although perhaps the most obnoxious, Dershowitz is by no means the first legal prima donna to suggest rewriting the Bill of Rights to eliminate the Second Amendment. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has publicly suggested that a “future, wiser court” could revisit the landmark Heller decision, which recognized a private right to arms under the Second Amendment. Later, in a televised appearance from Cairo, Egypt, Justice Ginsburg remarked that she “would not look to the U.S. Constitution, if I were drafting a constitution in the year 2012.”

More recently, another dissenter from the Heller case, former U.S. Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, wrote an entire book about how he would refashion the U.S. Constitution to his liking. Among his suggestions is limiting “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” in the Second Amendment with the phrase, “when serving in the militia.”

While we at the NRA don’t think much of their constitutional scholarship, we can at least credit these influential legal thinkers for their candor and for illustrating the true philosophical underpinnings of the gun control movement. No matter how else they may couch their rhetoric – most recently as “gun safety” proponents, gun control advocates simply hate guns and do not trust the American people to have them. It should surprise no one that the legal elites among them are perfectly willing to repeal or judicially nullify the Second Amendment entirely.

The next U.S. president could appoint perhaps three or even four Supreme Court justices to a bench where the Heller and McDonald decisions currently survive by one vote. The importance of who makes those appointments should not be lost on those who value the right to keep and bear arms. Whatever else can be said of his tendency towards incessant bloviation, that’s one lesson from Prof. Dershowitz we all should heed.

Take Two Losses and Call Me in the Morning: Florida Court Again Sides With Patient Privacy, Hands Nosy Doctors Second Defeat

APPEARS IN Legal & Legislation News

Take Two Losses and Call Me in the Morning: Florida Court Again Sides With Patient Privacy, Hands Nosy Doctors Second Defeat

Friday, July 31, 2015

Anti-gun doctors may need to get their own blood pressure checked after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit again upheld Florida’s Firearm Owners’ Privacy Act.

As we reported last summer, the law was passed after an escalating series of events in which patients were harassed or denied access to services because they refused to be interrogated by their doctors about their ownership of firearms. A group of Florida doctors committed to the idea of haranguing patients for exercising their Second Amendment rights sued, claiming a First Amendment right to grill patients about firearm ownership, even where it isn’t relevant to the patient’s care.

Unsurprisingly, the appellate court upheld the law last July, stating: “The essence of the Act is simple: medical practitioners should not record information or inquire about patients’ firearm-ownership status when doing so is not necessary to providing the patient with good medical care.” Far from a ban on doctors’ expressing their views about firearms or other public policy or medical issues, the court held, the Act merely “protects a patient’s ability to receive effective medical treatment without compromising the patient’s privacy with regard to matters unrelated to healthcare.”

It’s no secret that the medical establishment has long been hostile toward the private ownership of firearms. No less a doctor than President Obama’s pick for U.S. Surgeon General has engaged in anti-gun activism. Even WebMD.com, a common online source for medical information, counsels parents to “to avoid keeping guns and firearms in the home,” and only provides recommendations for “secure” storage when purging the home of firearms altogether “is not possible.” This history, as well as outright discrimination against patients who refused to discuss their gun ownership, formed the backdrop for Florida’s law.

It’s also no surprise that the plaintiffs and other gun control advocates were not happy with the loss the Eleventh Circuit handed to them back in 2014. “Censorship in Your Doctor’s Office,” huffed the New York Times. A Florida physician’s group called the decision “egregious” and “dangerous” and claimed it would silence “life-saving conversations.”

In any case, the panel of judges that issued the original opinion decided on their own initiative to revisit their original analysis. The results of that reconsideration were issued on Tuesday, in a revised 77-page opinion. Spoiler alert: the doctors still lose and patient privacy still wins.

Whereas the original opinion characterized the regulated behavior more as conduct – i.e., medical practice – rather than pure speech, the revised opinion delves more deeply into the First Amendment claims raised by the plaintiffs. Finding that inquiries into gun ownership, entries about gun ownership in medical records, and even verbal “harassment” of gun owners are all forms of “speech” protected by the First Amendment, the court then considers the seriousness of the regulatory intrusion and level of scrutiny to be applied to it.

The court observes, “All regulations of speech are not created equal in the eyes of the First Amendment.” Here, the court characterizes the regulated expression as “professional speech.” It then finds the government has a freer hand to regulate in this context because of “the authority—duty, even—of States to regulate the practice of professions to ‘shield the public against the untrustworthy, the incompetent, or the irresponsible.’” In this case, “The State made the commonsense determination that inquiry about firearm ownership, a topic which many of its citizens find highly private, falls outside the bounds of good medical care to the extent the physician knows such inquiry to be entirely irrelevant to the medical care or safety of a patient or any person.” The court therefore determines that “intermediate scrutiny” is the proper standard for evaluating the law.

The court identifies the state’s interests in enacting the law as “protecting the public by regulating the medical profession so as to safeguard patient privacy,” which it finds “substantial” enough to satisfy intermediate scrutiny. It then goes on to find that the law’s requirements have a “direct and material” relationship to alleviating those harms. Citing the legislative record of complaints against physicians, and the limited nature of the restrictions imposed by the law, the court determines “’simple common sense’ furnishes ample support for the legislature’s decision.” “The State need not point to peer-reviewed studies or conduct extensive surveys,” the opinion states, “to establish that proscribing highly intrusive speech that physicians themselves do not believe to be relevant or necessary directly advances the State’s interest in protecting its citizens from harmful or ineffective professional practices and safeguarding their privacy.”

We certainly agree, and we credit the Court for its thorough, well-reasoned opinion. Whether it’s the final word in the case, however, remains to be seen. One of the three judges hearing the case filed a lengthy dissent, echoing the familiar refrain that doctors’ must be free to address the “public health problem” posed by firearms according to their own beliefs. The plaintiffs still have the options of petitioning the full roster of Eleventh Circuit judges to hear the case en banc or to appeal directly to the Supreme Court.

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Florida Wollschlaeger v. Governor State of Florida

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Friday, July 31, 2015

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Man shoots down drone hovering over house

William Merideth, drone shooter. WDRB-TV screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET

We need to talk anti-aircraft weaponry.

More and more so-called enthusiasts are sending drones into the sky. This means that more and more normal humans are becoming enthusiastic about shooting them out of the sky.

Especially, as in the case of William H. Merideth, the drone is hovering over your house.

Merideth, 47, lives in Hillview, Kentucky. As WDRB-TV reports, a neighbor heard gunshots and called the police. Merideth allegedly told the police that a drone was hovering over his house, where his teen daughter (he has two) was sunbathing. So he pulled out his gun and gave it a merry death.

The drone's owner, police say, said he was flying it to take pictures of a neighboring house.

However, Merideth told WRDB: "Well, I came out and it was down by the neighbor's house, about 10 feet off the ground, looking under their canopy that they've got under their back yard. I went and got my shotgun and I said, 'I'm not going to do anything unless it's directly over my property.'"

And then it allegedly was.

Merideth explained: "I didn't shoot across the road, I didn't shoot across my neighbor's fences, I shot directly into the air."

He says that shortly after the shooting, he received a visit from four men who claimed to be responsible for the drone and explaining that it cost $1,800.

Merideth says he stood his ground: "I had my 40 mm Glock on me and they started toward me and I told them, 'If you cross my sidewalk, there's gonna be another shooting.'"

There appears not to have been another shooting. However, Merideth was arrested for wanton endangerment and criminal mischief. There is, apparently, a local ordinance that says you can't shoot a gun off in the city, but the police charged him under a Kentucky Revised Statute.

Shocking Find Made By Archeaologists

I have contacted both the Hillview Police Department and the FAA to ask for their view on proceedings. I will update, should I hear.

The FAA's recommendations include not flying above 400 feet and "Don't fly near people or stadiums." The FAA adds: "You could be fined for endangering people or other aircraft."

For his part, Merideth says he will sue the drone's owners. He told WRDB: "You know, when you're in your own property, within a six-foot privacy fence, you have the expectation of privacy. We don't know if he was looking at the girls. We don't know if he was looking for something to steal. To me, it was the same as trespassing."

It is, indeed, hard to know whether things that buzz in the sky have positive or negative intentions. Amateur drones disrupted efforts to fight recent California wildfires to such a degree that there's now a $75,000 reward for anyone who identifies those responsible. A Southern California lawmaker has created a bill that would make it legal for the authorities to shoot these drones out of the sky.

The CZ 858 cal. 7.69 x 39 mm is a semiautomatic rifle designed for sport shooting

CZ 858 TACTICAL

The CZ 858 cal. 7.69 x 39 mm is a semiautomatic rifle designed for sport shooting.

Technical Data

Caliber (rate of twist)	7.62 x 39 (9,4")
Magazine Capacity	30
Stock	steel pressed wood
Trigger mechanism operation	non-adjustable
Sights	fixed
Overall length	845 mm
Barrel length	390 mm
Height	255 mm
Width	57 mm
Weight	2,91 kg
Barrel	broached with chrom-plated bore

The CZ 858 cal. 7.69 x 39 mm is a semiautomatic rifle designed for sport shooting. The weapon comes with two magazines and cleaning kit. The rifle with fixed wood stock version. Available with fixed or folding stock.

Sporting rifles

CZ 805 BREN S1

CZ 858 TACTICAL

PISTOL SHOOTING TIPS

Tip: Trigger Pull Technique

“Pulling the trigger” is the action the operator performs to discharge a firearm. While very simple in concept, it creates problems for most shooters, even experienced ones.

“Pulling the trigger” is the action the operator performs to discharge a firearm. While very simple in concept, it creates problems for most shooters, even experienced ones.
Let me give you the basics first:

Hold the gun firmly with your proper grip
Align the sights on the target
Place the center of the first pad of your trigger finger on the trigger
Begin pressing the trigger rearward, smoothly, without moving anything else (or while moving everything else as little as possible)
Once you have created enough pressure on the trigger, it will move (sometimes imperceptibly) until the striker, firing pin or hammer in the gun is activated and starts the ignition process, firing the gun.

Several things happen in the gun to cause it to fire. The part you control is pulling the trigger. If done correctly, nothing moves, not your hands or the sight picture and the pistol fires a round exactly where you intended.
However, if you “jerk” or “flinch” before or at the instant you fire the gun, the shot will most probably head somewhere other than where intended.
In my experience, a good trigger pull is one of, if not the most important aspect of shooting well.
Serious shooters spend many, many hours perfecting their trigger pulling. Top marksmen can pull the trigger so well they never move the gun out of alignment.
New shooters have a tendency to pull the trigger in an abrupt manner that can move the gun quickly out of alignment and cause the shot to miss.
The old adage of “aim and squeeze the trigger slowly” is a perfect place to start for the new shooter.

Tip: Shooting Stance

To a great degree, how you stand may be dictated by your physical condition and surroundings.

To a great degree, how you stand may be dictated by your physical condition and surroundings. However there are a few key points you should try to address when developing your shooting stance.
We feel most comfortable when standing with equal weight on both feet and with our weight more on the heels than the balls of the feet. This is how our musculature is designed to hold our weight, with the joints more or less fully extended, or locked. This requires the least amount of muscle to keep us upright. However, this is NOT the optimal position for controlling and quickly shooting a hand gun.

Arm Position:

Arms should be fully extended when possible, but not necessarily locked out. Shoulders should be relaxed, not up around your ears.

Leg and Foot Position:

Front-to-back: Strong-hand side leg is rearward of other leg about 12 – 18 inches . The amount varies depending on each shooters level of balance, weight and strength.
Side-to-side: Typically, a hip-width distance between each foot is comfortable and stable.
Knees can be bent or locked, although I usually bend mine a little.

Body Position:

Your torso should lean forward slightly with no more than a small amount of bending forward at the waist. NEVER bend backwards at waist, hip or shoulder area. Shoulders should always be forward of the hips.

Balance:

Your weight needs to have a forward bias to counteract the kick of the gun. The idea is to get in a position that allows you to be active against the rearward force of the gun firing (recoil). This will enable you to control the gun properly and quickly return it from muzzle rise and recoil to the position back on target. The gun should never push you back so much that you become off-balance. If this happens, you need to move your balance and body position forward.

Grip:

Hold the gun tightly – tighter than you might think. This is, in my experience, the most common problem with new shooters. Grip is covered in detail in a separate blog.

Tip: Sight Alignment

By definition, a sight is a device used to assist aligning or the aiming of firearms, and is typically composed of two components, front and rear aiming pieces that have to be lined up.

By definition, a sight is a device used to assist aligning or the aiming of firearms, and is typically composed of two components, front and rear aiming pieces that have to be lined up.
Very simply put, the sights indicate where the gun is pointed. They are what we use to aim the gun.
The sights are comprised of the little post on the front of the slide (front sight) and the notched blade (rear sight) on the rear of the slide. There are many different kinds of sights, but the iron sights on all Springfield Armory® pistols are “post and notch” and therefore align the same.
Sights come in several sizes, shapes and colors; Some are all black, others have fiber optic tubes, painted dots or even inserts that glow in the dark. Most shooters quickly begin to favor one type of sight over another and their gun choice may actually be determined based on the sights.

Aligning The Sights:

Properly aligning the sights on the target gives you the orientation or exact location / position the gun will shoot the bullet when fired. Many shooters refer to this a the “sight picture”.
So, how do you create the perfect sight picture?

Properly grip the gun and hold it at arms length.
Visually align the front sight post in the rear sight notch.
The top of the rear and front sights should be on the same plane or level.
The gap of light between the sides of the front sight and inside vertical edge of the rear notch should be equal.
Once you have aligned the sights with each other, place the sights on the target where you want the impact of the bullet to go. You are now ready to shoot!

Adjusting The Sights:

Our guns’ sights are typically regulated so the bullet will impact at the top of the front sight, with proper sight alignment. Many pistol models come with sights that can be adjusted to change the point of impact.

HUNTIN-N-SHOOTIN

Saturday, August 1, 2015