I heard this and thought about my father. USN Retired.

One of the lines that strongly reminded me of Dad was the line about quitting smoking. Around 1973 dad decided he wasn’t going to smoke anymore. He was smoking 1.5 packs per day. He stopped.

Never smoked another cig. after that.

Of all of the people that are close to me I think my parents are the only parents that weren’t messed up in some way. I’ve heard so many stories from people I care about of bad childhoods.

My parents have always supported me. They were able to give me a drive to succeed and a “can do” attitude.

Delaware has some of the strictest gun laws. They are up there with NJ and Maryland, seeing as they are right there.

The short version:

Judge Maryellen Noreika, a federal judge, issued an injunction barring its “ghost gun” ban. She left some parts in place.

The Attorney General had attempted to have the case dismissed, which would have left the ban in place. Instead of dismissing the judge did a little research and then issued the injunction.

While declining to issue a permanent injunction, Noreika said that the plaintiffs are likely to succeed in their arguments that a ban on possessing homemade guns violates the Second Amendment, and that the prohibition on manufacturing untraceable firearms is also likely unconstitutional.

This is a big win for us. This is a lower level Federal Judge applying the Bruen opinion the correct way.

An injunction is issued only if the law would unduly burden a person’s rights AND if the person would likely win in court. If the law was not causing undue burden no injunction. The case can then go to trial where it might win.

This is important because it explains why only part of the law was injoined.

The ban does not allow people to sell “ghost guns”. The judge left this in place. She stated that since there are many other sources for those parts and guns with serial numbers. Thus it is not an undue burden.

She also allowed the ban on blocking 3D printer files that are ready to print firearms. This really doesn’t make any sense as anybody that works with 3D printing knows it never is “click and print” There is much more that goes into it. She did make it clear that instructions on 3D printing guns is allowed and it seems that non functional print files (STL files) can be transferred. So it could be that you could send the STL files and then send a patch file. This would technically (IANAL) be acceptable.

When this case gets to court it should be another win for us. These cases are tearing down so many of the gun right infringer’s gun control building blocks. It is good to see.

It is also good to see it happening so rapidly. It seems that as soon as the cases are hitting the courts they are getting positive reviews.

All of which is good for us.
Judge bars enforcement of Delaware ‘ghost gun’ restrictions

I’m sitting at my computer around 2300 doing some work when a message comes in from my wife

“I hear something outside”

This is as meaningful as just about all of her urgent messages. It could have been anything from a car revving its engine to an intruder trying to break in.

“What do you hear?”

“Like an animal rustling”

Ok. This is could be a real threat. It could be anything from a squirrel up to a bear. It could be trying to get at the chickens or the feed. Or it could be a big cat. Worse, it could be a two legged intruder.

I stand up and grab the Winchester ’94 the not weapon weapons light and head to the porch. A quick scan from inside the house shows no movement.

I step out the door and immediately hear something scampering into the mess that lives on the porch. The rifle comes up and I’m looking for the criter.

I poke here and there and I hear it again. It moves to the corner of the porch where the screen is damaged and it can get out. It is a racoon.

“It is a racoon. Do you want it dead?”

“Um….”

There is a three minute discussion before she decides that yes, it should be a dead racoon. Stupid critter hasn’t moved.

“It is going to be loud.”

“Ok”

I pull back the hammer, line up a clean shot. From where I am there is nothing behind the critter for 200 yards at least. The rifle is pointing down so the entire ground is the backstop. If I were to miss the round would go another 10 yards max before it was in the dirt.

Yes, the gun is loaded.
Yes, I want to destroy what I’m pointing at.
I have identified my target and what is beyond it.
Booger hook to the bang stick, and I press the trigger backwards.

There is a very loud bang and the racoon is gone.

Did I miss? I move it off the porch and around the corner. I can see where it went through the tear in the screen. No sounds, no blood trail. Shit, Shit, Shit.

Still looking. Then I spot it. It is dead dead dead. That 30-30 Winchester had pushed that damn critter off the porch. It was dead before it hit the ground.

Good timing, I go put stuff away. My daughter is the one that deals with dead animals. She collects pelts and bones and such. And she has people that buy them from her.

She is pounding down the stairs and shows up ready to go investigate. We head outside.

I move around and shine my light on the racoon.

“is it dead?”

Looking at the pile of fur and bones and looking to see if it is moving. No movement. No change in position since I checked 3 minutes ago.

“It is dead.”

“It just MOVED!”

“It is dead, it didn’t move.”

“Its looking at me!”

I look at her and where she is looking. Following her line of sight there is a second racoon . She can’t see the dead one, it is blocked from her sight by a plant. She can see a very live and very big racoon.

“There’s another racoon out here! Do you want it dead too?”

“Ummmmm.”

Child and I go inside where we go have a conference with wife.

“Do you want it dead?”

It takes wife another 5 minutes to work out if she wants it dead or not. In the end she says “Yes, I want it dead.”

Well the position of that racoon means that I have a backstop but not as good. It is the foundation of the house. I do NOT want to punch a 30-30 through a racoon and into the foundation. It will cause damage. I decide to drop down to a .22LR

So I grab the .22 bolt action then spend a couple of long minutes searching for the magazine. I know it is right here on my desk…. Find it and put it into the rifle.

Daughter and I head back out. I’m hoping the second racoon has left. Nope he’s still there staring at us with his beady little black eyes.

I again confirm with wife that she wants it dead. Line up the shot and press the trigger.

Nice clean break and the critter take the shot.

AND IS STILL FUCKING MOVING!

Grrr!

It starts to move along the foundation so I move to the corner of the house. Line up the second shot. It is definatently wounded. I can see it is limping. I line up the shot and press the trigger. Another good hit.

It scrambles along the foundation and cuts across the yard to the shed. Daughter and I are following.

“It doesn’t look bad. I hate .22”

“It’s bleeding.”

“huh?” I am such a smart dude. “I don’t see any blood”.

“There is a huge blood trail here.”

I go back and sure enough there is a big arse blood trail. I hear the ‘coon scampering so I turn back to follow him. He’s on the wood pile. I line up one more time and press the trigger.

It goes into death throws instantly and shortly after it stops moving.

---

AAR

There is a huge difference in the stopping power of 30-30 v. .22lr.

Racoon are harder to kill then they look. It take better shot placement for a quick one shot kill than I delivered.

The o-light worked great as a hand held weapons light

The .22 left a lot more blood.

This should take care of the critter problem we’ve been having recently.

From one of our readers, a Pistolero.

“The consensus is that no more than five to ten people in a hundred who die by gunfire in Los Angeles are any loss to society. These people fight small wars amongst themselves. It would seem a valid social service to keep them well-supplied with ammunition.” Colonel Jeff Cooper. Thought of this when I read this morning Startlegram story of the murder conviction of a gangbanger who managed to shoot one of his own side in the head during a firefight on East Berry.

Fort Worth gunman sentenced to 15 years for murder in 2019 shooting caught on video

End Quote

A Fort Worth gunman was sentenced on Tuesday to 15 years in prison in the shooting death of a man in a business parking lot that was captured on video in 2019.

As part of a plea agreement, Damorian Allen, 30, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to murder as a Tarrant County jury was deliberating toward a verdict in the May 21, 2019, killing of 28-year-old Tony Austin.

From the article we know that the animals are of a protected class because they don’t give race or physical description. Even when describing the crime. We know the make and model of the cars, the type of license plates but from the written description the asshole could have been a Amish man getting a ride.

Regardless, our reader’s comment indicates this was bad people shooting at other bad people. None of the people in the two cars that were involved were good people and a number of them ended up in jail, likely not for the first time.

In 1934 the first federal gun control law was passed. It was stupid and broken from the first day. The gist was that because bad people were using machine guns to kill other bad people and sometimes good people (or cops) got hurt the federal government needed to stop the proliferation of guns.

The method picked was to make the cost of machine guns to expensive for people to afford. The debates in congress explicitly mentioned that taxing gun transfers was the only possible way to create a law that would pass constitutional review. Originally they wanted to apply the NFA to pistols but that was cut from the final bill.

In the end they put machine guns, short barreled shotguns, silencers, and pistol like rifles (Short barreled rifles).

Of course this did not do anything for anybody. The law was not enforced as it was. If somebody was caught with an NFA item that wasn’t registered they were just required to send in their $200 and register the item.

It wasn’t until 1936 that it was actually used. In this case a moonshiner by the name of Miller was caught at a supply cache which the ATF thought was a working still. Since they couldn’t arrest Miller for having a bunch of sugar they used the new NFA to charge him with possession of a sawed off shotgun.

It went to court. The entire NFA was ruled unconstitutional by the lower court. That should have been the end of the NFA. It wasn’t. The government appealed it all the way to the supreme court where the government argued unopposed. They made such wild claims as “A shotgun isn’t a weapon that would be used by the militia thus it is not protected by the second amendment.”

Yep, in 1936 the government was arguing that only “military style weapons” were covered by the second amendment. And the argument regarding shotguns was false. The military used shotguns in WW I and many other conflicts and they continue to be used.

The next federal gun control laws came in 1968. This defined a class of people that were prohibited from owning guns and made it illegal for those prohibited people to possess a firearm. In addition, it created the FFL system. This was all in response to people buying guns by mail. Congress claimed that forcing people to buy firearms from FFLs would keep bad people from getting firearms.

In 1986 the gun control act of 1968 was passed which made it illegal to add machineguns to the NFA.

In 1998 the Brady Law went into effect. This is the start of 4473s and “Instant Background Checks”.

It was going to go through but the NRA got it amended such that the government was required to create an instant background check. The requirement was that the check should come back fast enough that a person could still purchase a firearm on the same day. They required the “proceed if not denied” within 3 days. All of this kept the federal government from abusing the background checks into a de facto multi month waiting period.

If we don’t tell the FFL to proceed for 6 to 12 months then we having created a waiting period, it just takes that long.

Originally there was no system in place for an instant check so the federal government was given a limited amount of time to create the instant check. During the period from the passing of the Brady Law and the creation of NICS there was a 5 day waiting period for purchase of firearms. Again, no deny within 5 days and the sale could proceed.

There were also provisions about how long FFLs had to keep transfer records and what happened to those records if the FFL went out of business. One of the big requirements was no federal gun registry was permitted.

All of that gets us to the actual subject of this article.

A company is proposing that the NICS system be privatized. The argument they are making is that they already do a better job of background checks than the government thus they are especially suited to provide the same service for the purchase of firearms.

Because the states are not required to report to NICS they don’t. But this private company can get the information the federal government can’t. Of course they have a scare number.

According to the FBI, 43 states had met the requirements for collecting crime data according to the agency’s specifications as of Oct. 31, 2020. That means just 86% of the country is adequately covering its bases when it comes to screening gun buyers. That leaves plenty of room for the wrong person to wield a firearm.

Of course they don’t tell you why the FBI believes that 7 states aren’t meeting reporting requirements. Just that only 86% do.

According to them, using an “expert source”, a reporter for PBS:

Martha Bellisle wrote she believes the FBI’s background check database should, in theory, have “a definitive list of people who are prohibited from having guns.” This would include convicts, people who’d been committed to a mental institution, dishonorably discharged military members, drug addicts and more.

Hmmm, that’s interesting “and more” Bellisle isn’t interested in just keeping prohibited people from purchasing firearms, she wants more. Maybe it is that person that looked at her and scared her. Or that doesn’t have a high enough social credit score.

Having just spent a number of paragraphs telling us it is the states not reporting which is an issue, they bring up the church shooting in Charleston. There the shooter was able to purchase the firearm he used because the federal government (the military) didn’t report that he was convicted.

Their proposed solution?

While many government agencies stick with the NICS process, given the choice, many companies elect to partner with a private background screening vendor. That’s because the private sector is generally faster, more accurate, more comprehensive and more customizable.

While the FBI has access to database information, so do private screening companies.

The go on to imply that they would require drug testing as well.

Given all the evidence above, it’s clear that there are better methods of handling background checks than relying on the federal government. Screening buyers through the private sector could prevent needless, gun-related deaths, which means it’s certainly worth a try.

Of interest is that the only outside references are to the people that wrote/sponsored the article.

Utah company proposes solution that could help decrease gun violence in the U.S.

The other day there was a blog posting regarding a requirement in a budget bill that all new cars manufactured after some date have “remote engine immobilisers.” Most new cars already have engine immobilisers. The idea being that even if you put the key in the ignition and turn it, nothing will happen.

It requires that your key talk to the car and tell it that you are indeed authorized to use the car. It means that you can give somebody a “regular” key and they can use it to physically unlock your car but even if that key were to fit they can’t start the car.

This stops thieves from just forcing the lock or otherwise bypassing the ignition switch. There are stories of older car locks being bypassed by the thief jamming a big screwdriver into the keyhole and then forcing the cylinder to rotate. Just shearing all the pins that keep that cylinder from rotating.

Remote engine immobilization takes this to a new level. With this you can turn off the engine remotely. A kill switch.

Some OnStar vehicles have this. The police can call OnStar and have them disable a stolen vehicle at will. A very powerful way of catching car thieves. There are aftermarket versions of this as well.

Unfortunately it comes with a bit of extra. Who is authorized to kill your car? Will all police cars come with devices so they can kill the engine of any car they want? Will it become standard operating procedure for a cop to kill the engine of any car he stops?

Will Mayor Pete be able to kill any car that is drives to much in a given period of time?

Will M.A.D.D. get a law passed that immobilises your engine anytime you stop at a place that serves alcohol? And then you are required to blow to get your car to start again?

Will your voter registration be linked to your car. If there is “right wing extremest” in the area do all cars belonging to the wrong sorts of people get disabled?

In the Dresden Files novels, the main character drives a VW Bug. He drives it because as a wizard the more technically advanced something is, they more likely it is to break when he is near. The Bug has no electronics. It is dirt simple.

There might be a new call for “dumb” cars.

Kia and Hyundai drivers might want to take extra precautions to deter car thieves

There is a skill that everybody that carries and even those that don’t need to acquire.

Situational Awareness

My wife doesn’t have it at all. She has no ability to anticipate, to notice, to plan for what will happen.

On the other side there are the people that look at every trip into the city as a threat to their lives (I’m looking in a mirror) and plan for any possible event.

Situational awareness is more than pre planning. It is the ability to notice things and put together a gestalt that tells you “Here Be Dragons”.

Did you notice that little man sitting with his back to the wall sipping a drink? Did you notice that guy that is obviously right handed but never carries anything in his right hand? Did you notice that couple getting noisy in the back corner?

How about the two dudes that might not be friends with stiff bodies?

Did you notice the car that shouldn’t be on the street? Did you notice the van with the wrong public utilities symbol on it? Did you notice that the girl you are dancing with is to hot to be single?

Is she crazy? Is she trouble on two legs?

Or is she taken?

There is the saying that shows up over and over again “Not In My Back Yard”. This is the call of everybody that has to deal with something they don’t like showing up in their neighborhood. Be it a new gun store or a new Whole Foods store, somebody doesn’t want it there.

One of the greatest contribution to clean energy has been pipelines. The ability to move vast amounts of liquid long distances safely is wonderful. And ever pipeline built in my lifetime has had some large group of people screaming NIMBY!!!

The first time I heard and understood was with the Alaska Pipeline. Environmentalists were very concerned over the pipeline. It was going to destroy the tundra. It was going to damage the pristine Alaskan great outdoors. It was going to cause massive kills of the migratory herd animals.

It was Bad with a capital B!

The first thing that we found when we started using it is that the animals love it. There has been no negative outcomes from the pipeline amongst the herd animals nor in the hunters. They put in some underpasses along the way and the animals found and use them. Easy.

There was a huge concern about “what if there is a leak?” Well the pipeline is inspected constantly. If there are any signs of leakage it is dealt with as soon as it is spotted. The control systems can tell when the pipe starts to leak, even before any signs are noticed.

And here is the big one, IF there is a leak, it will be contained. We know where the pipeline is and it was built to contain spills. And if there is a spill, it is still much more likely to be small in comparison to other spills.

If you want to think about scary spills, just take a look at a freight train pulling 100+ tanker cars.

Each one of those tankers can hold up 31,000 gallons, or more. Derailments are much more common than pipeline leaks. Tankers hauled by trucks contain less but are even more likely to be in accidents.

The people yelling NIMBY don’t care. They run by emotion. One of my friends was talking about how horrible it was that the new county jail was built where it was. It was an eyesore. It was bringing down the value of homes around the jail.

Talking to her a few years later she was telling me how they couldn’t even tell the jail was there. It took about 5 years for the trees and shrubs to grow in. You can no longer see the jail from the road and you can only tell it is there if you know to look for the sign out by the road.

Some locals were protesting a pipeline carrying natural gas that could have come through our town. THey were very upset. Lots and lots of NIMBYs yelling. I was asked what I would do if that pipeline came through our yard? If it comes through our yard I don’t care. I’ll get paid for the damage done to the yard. It will grow back and I’ll get some small amount of income for a while. Not a big deal.

If it happened to come through my house I would be surprised. The people that build these things don’t want to have to pay thousands of dollars for a house they are going to destroy when they can just go past a few yards away.

Part of the problem NIMBYs have is that they have seen local government not care. If the plans call for that sewer line to go right through your new screened in three season porch they just do it. And you don’t get your money’s worth and what the pay for it. They normally aren’t willing to move that sewer line 5 foot that away to avoid your porch. And they will bluntly tell you that they had an easement that allows them to do so.

There is another type of NIMBY though. These are the people that are perfectly willing to tell you that you must accept “IT” in your backyard and showing how righteous they are because they would be perfectly willing to accept “IT” in their back yard. You are a horrible person for not wanting “IT” in your town. If you only had the good hearts they have you would just do it.

They can say these things because they never have to even think of “IT” showing up in their backyard. You saw this in the 70’s when the people that lived in DC set the federal speed limit at 55MPH. It really doesn’t make all that much difference in rush hour traffic if the speed limit is 55 or 75, it is still going to take them about the same amount of time to get to and from work.

They don’t care that when somebody is driving through the bad lands of the southwest that 20 MPH difference is the difference between a day trip and an overnight.

When the good people along our southern border complain about the hordes of illegal aliens coming across they are told they are horrible people. Ranchers talk about having to repair fences constantly, because the illegals are cutting them on a near nightly basis. They tell of having anything that isn’t nailed down stolen.

They only thing they hear from DC is “RACIST!!!” How hateful you must be to not be opening your homes to these tired and down trodden.

The Governors of Florida and Texas started sending illegals to sanctuary cities on the east coast and midwest. And the cries of NIMBY reached to the heavens.

For months people had been tracking government flights that were taking illegals to different parts of the country and pushing them into the local communities. Exposing these flights was “RACIST” and made those doing the exposing horrible people.

But a few busses into DC, NYC, Chicago and now Martha’s Vineyard and suddenly it is the bussing and flying that is horrible. Not the releasing those illegals into a community. It was just to much of a strain on the local communities. Chicago shipped theirs out to the ‘burbs. The people of Martha’s Vineyard had the governor call out the national guard to move the illegals off the island. Some 125 NG troops were used to remove 50 illegals.

There are a few of these sanctuary cities and towns around here. I don’t want illegals flooding the area, but it would be nice to see just one bus load show up at one of these enclave of elitist leftists…