My grandfather on my father’s side was a union organizer.

My grandfather on my mother’s side was in the union.

My wife is in a union.

The unions of my grandfathers’ time were creating a better working environment than existed. They were creating a balance. They did create a balance between speed and profit against health, safety, and wages.

When I was in high school I got a chance to read the longshoreman’s contract. The one thing that got me was that a longshoreman got paid even if he didn’t work. If he was at the hiring hall on time all five days and he did not get at least 40 hours, the difference between the hours he did get and 40 were “made up” to him.

At the time a longshoreman that didn’t work was bringing home more money than my mother as a degree nurse.

The scam part of it was that most jobs were handed out by 0730, 0800 was pushing it. You were “on time” if you were at the hiring hall by 0900.

Now I was never a member of the longshoreman’s union. I was a kid and I might have misunderstood what I read, but that is what I came away with.

Today that is what unions do, they push for higher wages, less work, for example less students per teacher, and better benefits.

But they came into existence because there was not balance. A company had all the power. Striking was difficult and dangerous.

It was possible to be born into a mining town, be down in the mines by the time you were 10, work until you could no longer work, from health issues or crippling injuries, or death. For the entire duration of you work life, you were forever in debt to the company.

On your first day of work they company gave you your gear. They set the prices and every payday you had to pay some of it back, to pay for the equipment they gave you on credit. Your equipment wore out and you had to replace it. On credit.

The company owned the home you lived in, you were paying for it from your paycheck.

The food you purchased at the company store was bought on credit. And you paid for it out of every paycheck.

It wasn’t uncommon for a man to come out of the mines at the end of the week and owe the company more money after paying his entire wages back to the company, than he owed at the start of the week.

Tennessee Ernie Ford brought that story to life:

A modern take:

Back in February of 2019 Miguel posted I made the decision on a Truck Gun & Travel Combo..

His post got me to thinking about the elusive truck gun.

What are the characteristics of a good truck gun for me?

• It has to fit in the truck
• It has to be unobtrusive when in the truck and going to and from the truck
• The weight of the ammunition can’t exceed the my limits
• It can’t be another exotic caliber
• It has to be easy to handle
• It has to be low maintenance
• It has to be accurate at urban ranges
• It has to pack enough punch

Well the PC 9 was mentioned. It meets most of these criteria. It lives in a gun bag that doesn’t look like a gun bag. It looks like an oversized briefcase. It is gray. It doesn’t have any tacticool stuff on the outside. Inside it holds the PC 9 broken down, a pistol an a boat load of magazines. The ammo and mags weigh more than the pistol and rifle combined.

Nobody ever left a fire fight saying “I wish I had less ammo.”

Right now it has just iron sights. I did have a red dot on it, but that got moved to another rifle. It is light, carbine length rifle. It is easy to put round after round in the 10 ring from urban distances. It is ambidextrous.

It has been very reliable. And it fires 9×19.

So the cons. It is a Ruger which to me means that it is overly complex to break down and clean. It is simple blowback so it gets dirty, fast. If you take it down far enough to clean the receiver properly you have springs that want to go that away.
The magazine release is on the left side instead of the right side.

Still it is fun to shoot and it is my truck gun. Being able to sling the bag over my shoulder and walk out of the parking lot and nobody give you a second glance is wonderful. The nosy neighbors know every time I go to the range because it is pretty damn obvious what’s being loaded into the truck. But this? nobody notices.

I’ve had conversations with cops with the bag hanging off my shoulder without them twigging. Of course it does make for a sort of weird dynamic…

I’ve got my EDC on my person. I’ve got the EDC bag which happens to have IFAK and another firearm (and spare mags and boxed ammo), and then I’ve got a bag slung over my shoulder with another pistol plus a rifle. And all I’m doing is driving to work…

The reality is that the EDC bag is also my computer bag. People see me pull my laptop out of it all the time. People have seen me pull my first aid kit out from time to time. At no time has anybody seen the rest of what is in that bag. You can take the laptop in and out without even opening the main compartment where the IFAK+ is stored.

When things are not overly stressful, i.e. before “mostly peaceful protests” became a thing, I didn’t feel the need for a truck gun. So it was just the EDC bag and the EDC on me.

One of the selling points of the PC 9 is that it uses a compatible magazine. Since it takes Glock mags it means that a single magazine can be used in both a side arm or the rifle. The ads talk about taking the mag from your pistol and putting it in your rifle. I don’t see that as happening. But being able to carry spare magazines that fit both is a big win.

So that bag also holds a holster. If it is time to bogie and I have gone to “needing a rifle” mode, I’m going to switch out the .45 on my belt for the Glock in the bag. Yes, I know they shot differently. I practice with both so I hit where I want with both.

It isn’t my go to rifle. Depending on what is going bump in the night determines what I pick up. A LBV with IFAK, 180 rounds of ammo and my ready rifle if it seems to be two legged bumper. Or a 30-30 lever action for something with four legs. This is a rifle with a particular niche and in that niche it does very well.

I am lucky in that I live in these United States. This makes me one of the wealthiest people in the world. The poor of the US are richer than many rich people in other countries.

I remember reading The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and listening to her describe the house in which she was living. While it was old and well built, most people on Section 8 housing allotments would refuse to live in a home that small or that required so much manual labor to keep running.

We are rich.

I grew up in a home that where there were no firearms. My parents, at the time, were not anti-gun, they just didn’t own any. I still got to go hunting. I still got to learn how to handle a shotgun. There are pictures of me as a kid with a good half dozen rabbits from a rabbit hunt I went on with 4 other adults and another boy my age. I was in grade 7, maybe?

The point being, I wasn’t a “gun person.” I wasn’t afraid of them. It was just something that I wasn’t around.

I lived in a home with an actual firearm for about 4 or 5months. I was renting a room from my boss. My parents had moved after I graduated from high school and I was slated to start University in the fall. So I stayed. Shortly after I moved in, my boss showed me the derringer he had attached to the side table next to his TV chair.

He told me the safety rules and told me not to “play with it.”

Of course I did. I had to examine it. But I did treated it as loaded and kept my finger off the trigger and the gun pointed in a safe direction while handling it.

It was scary.

At University there was no firearms. Hell, they had problems with me having a real knife.

The only firearms I handled during that time was when I went on a rescue call for our technical assistant. She had heard somebody prowling around her home and her husband was away. So I drove out to her place. When I got there she meet me holding a M1 Carbine. We talked for a while, made sure that she was ok and I went home.

It wasn’t until right now that I put together what she said about that gun and what I know now and was able to identify it from memory.

After I left the University I went to the range a couple of times with my Mentor. He had a Colt AR-15, a Ruger .22, and a German Mauser that his father had carried in WWII.

He was the person that got me started in gun rights.

During this time I was a working stiff. I got a divorce and lost all of my savings and ended up paying a large part of my income to support my ex.

I was poor. Yet I ate every meal, stayed in a warm home and had a car. I didn’t have money for frivolous things, and firearms fell in that category.

Then I got very lucky and had a big windfall. After paying the US Government their cut, it was still a big windfall.

My 2nd wife then wasted most of the rest. But I came out of it with three motorcycles and some firearms.

The firearms I purchased I purchased because of the ammunition they used.

• 9×19 This was the standard NATO pistol ammunition and was the standard ammunition used by the MSP
• 5.56×45 This was the standard NATO rifle ammunition.
• 7.62×51 NATO. Again, the standard NATO rifle ammunition.
• 7.62×39. This was the standard Soviet/communist block rifle ammunition
• .44Cal Black powder pistol. Just in case I couldn’t find ammo for the pistol.
• ?? Cal Black powder rifle. Again, just in case I couldn’t find ammo for the other 3 rifles

I’m sorry to say that the black powder rifle still sits in my safe. I’ve never shot it. My lady has. She loves it. But I have not.

The pistol I purchased was a used Glock. It had belonged to the MSP. My magazine was loaded with the standard MSP ammo. I also purchased 1000 rounds of 9mm range candy. There are still a couple of 50 round boxes from that purchase kicking around the house.

The rifle I purchased was an AWB era AR-15 heavy barrel by Bushmaster. There were only a couple of manufactures at that time, that is what I decided on. It came with a 5 round mag. I alos purchased a 2000 rounds of of NATO surplus that came in a wooden crate. Some how a couple of 20 round mags and a 30 round mag found their way into my car. I certainly didn’t purchase them during a standard capacity magazine ban.

The second rifle was an AK-47 style with a thumbhole stock. 2000 rounds of Wolf ammo came home with it. Along with a box containing “garbage” that the FFL was throwing out. Said garbage turned out to be 2 thirty round mags and the original furniture for the AK.

The third rifle was a Remington 700 originally with no sights. I didn’t know I needed sights. Don’t all guns come with sights? Later it had a Nikon scope put on it. It is still my deer rifle of choice for long distance shooting.

The AK and AR and the Glock all took three weeks to purchase. Maryland had a 21 day waiting period at that time. I think it was actually a bit longer than 21 days because they sold it as 21 days (three weeks) but they meant 21 business days or four calendar weeks.

In contrast, buying the black powder rifle and pistol took but minutes. Yes, that’s what I want. What do you mean there is no paperwork? Oh great! Thank you, have a great day.

Since that time my purchases have tended to be ammunition centric OR something classic.

The last rifle I purchased was a Henry in 45-70. This was to match the Springfield Trapdoor ammunition.

There is a lever action plus SAA replica in .45Colt. Because I wanted a pistol/rifle combination that used the same ammo.

Same reason I have a PC-9. It is a breakdown rifle that shoots 9mm and uses Glock magazines. Then I had to buy a Glock because I suddenly had a bunch of Glock magazines and no Glock pistols.

Even today, my next firearm purchase is going to be a lever action in .357 Magnum to match my last revolver purchase. Then a SAA in .357 to match the lever action.

I have way to many calibers today. But it feels like they all had a logic to the purchase.

I have a relationship with my LGS. The owner knows me. I’ve been buying firearms from him for about 15 or so years now.

When I walk into the shop I’m greeted by name. All of the workers know me by name as well. They all have a good idea of the types of firearms I’m interested in.

The last time I was in he showed me a Winchester saddle carbine in some long dead caliber. It was absolutely beautiful. It was made in the late 1800’s. And he handed it to me to handle. After taking it out of the display case that says “Not for sale.”

Yep, he has a case of beautiful collectable firearms that he is displaying.

At one point you could buy a cannon from him.

If I decide to purchase a firearm from him, he smiles, takes my cash, hands me a 4473 and a pen and waits for me to finish filling it out. It gets typed into the computer or phoned/faxed in. And then we wait.

There is no chance in hell that he would let me walk out the door with the gun I just purchased without the approval from NICS.

But he is under increasing pressure from the ATF.

Last year when I went in there were a couple of dudes sitting in the middle of the store at a table with the bound books. For the couple of weeks they were there he made very few sales. It was an ATF inspection.

In years past he let them work in the back room. Today they are required to be under constant observation. He caught them taking pictures of his bound books. That is when they were moved out of the backroom.

The number of FFLs that have had their licenses denied or revoked is up 500+% from last year. There are a number of articles and YouTube videos talking about people losing their livelihoods because the ATF inspectors have a zero-tolerance policy. What use to be “hey, you have a paperwork error, please fix it” now seems to be turning into a loss of license.

Keith Ellison, the AG for MN, is doing the same thing. Attacking FFLs.

People are going into Fleet Farm retailers. Filling out the 4473s. Getting “proceed” responses from NICS. Walking out the door with their newly purchased firearm.

Keith is suing four Fleet Farm retailers in civil court because they didn’t go above the requirements of the law.

The state alleges that the company knew it was selling to straw purchasers or should have known because buyers exhibited red flags such as buying many handguns at once, making multiple purchases in short periods of time and purchasing at multiple Fleet Farms stores to evade reporting requirements.

See, the FFL, having used the best resource the state could provide him, didn’t intuit that the purchaser was doing a straw purchase.

It seems that one person, Jerome Horton, Jr, purchased two dozen firearms over four months from 4 different stores. Atleast according to a federal affidavit.

So the dude bought 1 or 2 guns a month from each store (4 * 4 * 1 = 16, 4 * 4 * 2 = 32). I’ve been known to buy more than two guns a month for a couple of months. I certainly haven’t sold them to anybody else.

What we are seeing is an increase of lawfare to attack the Lawful Commerce in Arms. Over and over again we see this happening. Even Mexico is doing it. Suing gun companies because the gun companies sold a legal product legally to people that they were told by the government were legally allowed to own those products.

I’ve been in the fight for gun rights for nearly 30 years. The first time I testified before the Maryland Senate committee on gun control laws my opening was something like “My name is, AWA. I do not own any guns. I do not belong to the NRA. I am here to testify against Bill S.xxx”

That year we went to Annapolis multiple times. We always had something written to submit. We always asked to speak.

The way the Democrat controlled house treated us vs the Republican controlled senate was night and day.

The house committee had metal detectors setup. They were in a sort of auditorium. Nobody was allowed into the auditorium unless they went through the metal detectors.

Except for all of the law enforcement people. These people were going around the detectors and flashing their firearms. Constantly. Rubbing it in our faces that only they were allowed to carry firearms.

When we got into the auditorium the chairman said “There are lots of people that wish to speak. In order to be fair we are not going to hear from any individuals. Each group that has signed up can have one witness testify.”

There were at least a dozen and closer to two dozen gun control groups there. Everything from Handgun Control, Inc to the International Order of Police Chiefs. There was one gun rights organization there, the NRA. They had maybe a dozen people lined up to testify. Each with a different thing to bring to the table.

The NRA was allowed to put one person up to testify.

For the Senate there was a couple of thousand gun rights people gathered outside. The senate committee setup loudspeakers so that the people outside could hear what was being said. When the MSP Colonel showed up to testify in his full uniform the chairman asked if he was representing the Maryland State Police.

“No, I’m here representing the International Order of Police Chiefs”

“Then get out. You are only allowed to wear your uniform when testifying if you are representing the MSP.”

The chief got out. He came back about 10 minutes later in an ill fitting suit. He still had his uniform pants on but he wasn’t in uniform any more.

Regardless, the number of anti gun organizations and people in that committee room greatly outnumbered the gun rights people.

And that was the way of it. And that has been the way of it for many many years.

We were out numbered every time we showed up. The courts were stacked against us. The balancing act of “government interest” vs. “the right of the people to keep and bear arms” always came out in favor of the government.

The number of court opinions that started with “We stipulate for the sake of argument that the 2nd amendment rights of X were infringed. We now move to balancing under intermediate scrutiny. The government has presented compelling arguments that the laws is required, thus we rule that the law is constitutional.”

It wasn’t until 2008 that I saw the first break in the damn. The Heller case did something amazing. For a short period of time there was 100% repropricity in Washington DC. It took about 6 months before they had a new permitting scheme in place. But for that period of time, if you had a CCW or were from a Constitutional Carry state, you could legally carry in DC.

We kept fighting for our rights. The McDonald case erased the “No Issue” states. At least in theory. When you have a “may issue” state like Hawaii that has counties that have no record of every having issued a CCW, it is still a “No Issue” state.

And still the fight for our rights continued. The hope was that a case would make it to the supreme court and we would get a positive ruling.

Then we saw NY pull a fast one. Attempting to moot a case and the court allowed it to happen. THomas said it was well past time for the court to address the second amendment to establish that it was a first class right. The same as every other right guaranteed by the Constitution.

That finally happened last year and the result this year was the Bruen opinion.

“The Court rejects that two-part approach as having one step to many.”

I expected to see the lawsuits. The FPC and GOA keep filing suits, and winning. Thursday a Biden (or Obama) judge in New York put a temporary stay on NY State’s new gun control law(s). It isn’t a full win, but it is a much closer to a win than it would have been 12 months ago.

In Hawaii, they HPD requested comments on the new permitting scheme. More people, not organizations, but average, everyday people showed up to protest. “Shall NOT Be Infringed”.

This is the people no longer knowing they will lose. It is hard to show up and do battle time and time again, knowing the deck is stacked against you. It is hard to call your Senator or Representative and know that they are able to say “Taking away your right to own AR-15s doesn’t infringe on your rights.” without blinking. Wondering if they are lying to themselves or if they truly believe it.

I’m a cynic. I believe that these scum know exactly what lying sacks of shit they are and they don’t care. It is the opinion they were told to have and so they do.

Alec Baldwin killed Halyna Hutchins on the set of the B movie “Rust”.

He drew a single action army revolver from a shoulder holster, pointed it at Halyna, pulled back the hammer and pressed the trigger. The gun fired, killing Halyna and injuring the person behind her.

Alec is claiming that as an actor he is to stupid to understand that you always treat a gun as if it is loaded. That you don’t point it at anything you are not willing to kill/destroy. That you make sure of your target and what is beyond. That you don’t put your finger on the trigger until you are ready to pull the trigger.

He failed all four.

There are internet fablist that will claim that it wasn’t Alec’s responsibility to make sure that the gun was unloaded. That it was the responsibility of other people on set to make sure that the stupid actor never did anything dangerous with the gun.

It turns out that there were a lot of things going wrong on the set. The expectation is that there is no live ammunition on set. You shouldn’t trust this, but that is the expectation. The expectation is that you should be able to visibly verify that a firearm is loaded with inert cartridges or blanks.

The inert cartridges we use are either solid aluminum with a rubber nub where the primer should go, or they are actual shells with a black rubber nub where the primer should go AND an airsoft BB in the case. Shake the case and you can hear the rattle.

Somewhere along the line all of the safety measures failed and Alec was handling a firearm with live ammunition in it. And then he pointed that gun at Halyna and pulled the trigger.

He has since told multiple people that he never pulled the trigger. That the gun just went off. It must have been the hammer just falling.

All of which is highly unlikely to be true. In a rare case of the FBI doing what it is suppose to do, they examined the pistol in question and stated that it was working as designed and could not be fired unless the hammer was pulled back, the trigger was pressed and the hammer was free to fall.

Alec did all of those things, we know this because he shot and killed a woman.

The Hutchins family sued the Alec Baldwin. In multiple interviews Alec claimed that he had no responsibility because it was the production company… Except that Alec was one of the producers.

In the last week or so, the district attorney in the case has stated that he was going to be seeking criminal charges. Hopefully Alec is one of the ones to be charged.

Amazingly Alec and the Hutchins family reached a settlement just before charges are filed. If charges had been filed, and Alec lost in criminal court, the odds of him losing in civil court went way up.

As per normal, the terms of the settlement are undisclosed and unlikely to leak.

And the film will now go forward. With Halyna’s husband as an executive producer. With Alec Baldwin still starring in the movie.

Of course there is the question of whether they will be able to find anybody that is willing to be down range of Alec when he has a gun in his hands.

Google returns multiple hits on alec baldwin settlement

Santa Rosa man arrested on suspicion of possessing loaded ‘ghost gun’

Given this headline some questions leap to mind, such as “why did they suspect him of possessing a loaded gun?” “Why did the suspect it was a ‘ghost gun’?” And maybe the biggest, since when can you be arrested because they suspect you of something?

The image the Santa Rosa police department released shows a glock like firearm with a magazine with at least on full metal jacketed round.

Hmm, that sounds to me like “arrested for having a loaded firearm”, not suspected.

The firearm could very well be an 80% frame that has been finished.

Digging a bit deeper we find that the suspect was arrested after a traffic stop. The old statement that if a cop follows your car long enough he will find a reason to pull you over seems to be in action here. Given that “members” (plural) of the “Special Enforcement Team” did the stop.

The old black and white pulls the car over and six more vehicles appear out of nowhere with flashing lights.

They found the gun in the trunk of the car. They also claim that there was a 30 round extended magazine for the firearm. Of course they only show a standard magazine.

Regardless, diving into any headline with the word “ghost gun” is likely to find more misinformation than reallity.

This dude was likely a bad guy. They had reason to suspect him of carrying something that he was not legally supposed to have at that time and place. So they waited till they could stop him for a traffic violation and in the process searched his vehicle and found a gun.

Maybe if we all had Constitutional Carry this sort of stop would not happen.

I do want bad people arrested, charged, convicted and punished correctly. If you can’t do it correctly, then the police have no business attempting it.

Santa Rosa man arrested on suspicion of possessing loaded ‘ghost gun’

J.Kb. mentioned the Ruger LC Carbine in 5.7×28. There was recently a YouTube review on the LC Carbine. It seems like a nice place between a pistol caliber carbine and a full up “deer rifle” Only $1000.

Somebody else mentioned a lever action in .357 Magnum. $700 for a Rossi and north of $1200 for a Henry, Marlin or Winchester.

Not to mention I want a .50Cal bolt action or semi auto. Call it $2000 to $10,000 depending on make and model.

There is the acres of land I want so I can have a private range.

There is the collage education for my children.

Would it have been so bad for God to have made me a rich man?

Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action — Ian Fleming

New York is well past enemy action. They are in full fledged battle.

We saw it in the “S.A.F.E. Act” where it was so important to pass gun control legislation that it happened in the dead of the night without anybody having a chance to comment. We saw it when they dropped a “regulation” and then the state changed the law to moot a case before the Supreme Court. And we saw it with their post Bruen actions.

At this point my contacts in the reenacting community are reporting that nobody is doing any events in New York. These are smart people with lawyers that read the actual law. Having a flintlock rifle in a public place is a felony is how they are seeing the law.

Part of what NY did was that they made just about anyplace that reenacting events take place “sensitive places.” There are no exceptions in the law for these sorts of people. And since all of these weapons are fully functional, requiring only real shot to be used to make them deadly, they are targeted by the new laws.

Now another group has been caught up in this.

The American Legion and VFW and certain other groups are currently banned from firing the volley gun salute at veterans funerals and other events.

Commander David Riley, of the American Legion Department of New York, said he feels the current state gun laws as they are written right now prohibit traditional veteran ceremonies from taking place.

They may say we won’t be arrested, but we’re not going to take those chances, especially if it’s a religious cemetery and fire a 21-gun salute we can be arrested for that,” said Riley.

The governor’s office replied with:

These laws allow for funerals and other solemn observances to occur with gun salutes, and there should be no concern otherwise,” according to a statement. “We will work with legislators and local law enforcement to ensure these events can proceed and in the meantime, individuals who have lawfully participated in these meaningful salutes at military funerals should continue to do so.

The problem is that the laws, as written, don’t provide these exceptions. The politicians are saying that law enforcement and prosecutors will not enforce these laws so just trust them. And these people are saying “Hell no, we do not trust you.”

Veteran groups fear prosecution due to New York gun laws that might impact ceremonies