A Geek With Guns

The state is often schizophrenic when it comes to the messages it sends. One hand of the state will tell you to do ‘X’ while the other hand demands that you do ‘Y’ and the joke is that ‘X’ and ‘Y’ are mutually exclusive:

Hidden in weeds in Detroit’s Brightmoor area, Chevilott and his Wayne County crew discovered a loaded, snubnosed revolver as they were mowing the lawn mid-morning on May 3.

“It was damaged, so it could’ve went off. Surprisingly, it didn’t kill the guy on the mower,” Chevilott explained. “It got picked up, so we put [it] in the van, waited [for] police to drive by.”

However, Detroit police never did drive by, so Chevilott finished his work day, drove the gun home and later that same evening turned it into his local police department in Garden City.

He says the cops ran the gun and discovered the weapon had been stolen from St. Clair Shores in 2005.

“They said I did the right thing getting it off the street.”

Obviously Chevilott did a good thing. He found a discarded weapon and turned it over to the police so they could determine if it was stolen and/or used in a crime. Good on Chevilott for performing such a public service. Leaving loaded unsecured weapons lying around is certainly dangerous and we should encourage people to secure them, right? Not according to the Wayne Country Department of Public Services:

However, Chevilott’s superiors at the Department of Public Services had a much different opinion. His foreman, who had knowledge of the situation, was suspended for 30 days, and after 23 years on the job, Chevilott was fired for violating department policies.

According to a Wayne County spokeswoman and the rules, employees aren’t allowed to possess a weapon on work property.

While one hand of the state, the police, encourage people to secure discarded weapons so they will not be a danger the other hand, the Department of Public Services, says doing so will cost you your job. What’s a person to do? We’re often told that we should do the “right thing” but end up being punished for it. Chevilott will probably think twice about securing a discarded weapon since doing so this time cost him his job.

It’s sad that we now live in a society where common sense and decency are discarded for absolute adherence to rules and regulations. You can’t even help a dying man without fear of violating some law and thus facing a lawsuit down the road.

The beauty of the free market is that it doesn’t judge and doesn’t question it merely attempts to fulfill individuals’ desires. While the advocates of gun control continue to claim that gun ownership is on the decline the free market indicates otherwise. Clothing manufacturers better known for serving the needs of business men and women are now catering to those who carry firearms:

Woolrich, a 182-year-old clothing company, describes its new chino pants as an elegant and sturdy fashion statement, with a clean profile and fabric that provides comfort and flexibility.

And they are great for hiding a handgun.

The company has added a second pocket behind the traditional front pocket for a weapon. Or, for those who prefer to pack their gun in a holster, it can be tucked inside the stretchable waistband. The back pockets are also designed to help hide accessories, like a knife and a flashlight.

The chinos, which cost $65, are not for commandos, but rather, the company says, for the fashion-aware gun owner. And Woolrich has competition. Several clothing companies are following suit, building businesses around the sharp rise in people with permits to carry concealed weapons.

It’s not just Woolrich getting in on the action, Under Armour is also joining the game:

Other companies are rushing to meet the demand for concealed-carry clothing. Under Armour, best known for its sports and action gear, will be adding a jacket and a plaid shirt with Velcro pockets for easy gun access.

Kevin Eskridge, senior director for outdoor product and design at the company, said the company had seen demand double in the last year for such clothing from traditional outdoor and sporting goods stores, like Dick’s Sporting Goods and Cabela’s.

Mr. Eskridge said the Under Armour apparel was catching on because of fashion but also because of its features, including moisture-wicking fabric.

So many people now carry firearms that the market is responding to better serve our needs. No longer are we relegated to wearing mall ninja gear (although I happen to like my 5.11 Covert Cargo mall ninja pants and will continue to wear them). Now we can actually walk around and look like normal people. Either way it must really make the gun control crowd angry knowing that carrying a firearm is now so mainstream that companies are outright advertising new products geared towards the carry market.

I wonder how long it will be until the gun control advocates to start protesting clothing manufacturers for catering to us?

You know what are great? Holsters:

There’s a story that has been circulating around the Web for weeks now with a rather gruesome headline: Arizona Man Shoots Himself in Penis. It’s the last thing any firearm owner wants to read about.

Joshua Seto, 27, tried securing his fiance’s pink handgun in the front waistband of his pants while exiting a local convenience store and the gun fired, striking Seto’s penis and continuing through his left thigh. It’s not a pretty picture.

Emphasis mine. That right there was the bad decision that lead to a bad result. If you every consider sliding your gun into your waistband, don’t. It’s just a bad idea that can lead to nothing by injury. Use a holster, it may save your life and the lives of your future children.

The four rules of firearm safety apply to more than traditional powder powered lead launchers:

A New Jersey man is making a quick recovery after accidentally shooting a 4-inch (10cm) nail into his heart.

Dennis Hennis, a 52-year-old self-employed builder, was working on his neighbour’s roof when his nail gun jammed and he tried to clear it.

The nail pierced the right side of his heart and he went into cardiac arrest.

Does the device you’re handling launch dangerous projectiles? If you answered yes then rule two applies, only point the muzzle at things you’re willing to destroy.

The AK vs. AR debate has been heating up after the following video was posted to demonstrate the AR’s inability to operate when a Twinkie is shoved up its magazine well:

Now that the war is renewed I’m just going to raise my middle finger to all the AK and AR fanboys. Why? Because my Winchester 30-30 doesn’t even have a magazine well to put a Twinkie in so it’s obviously superior to both platforms!

Damn kids and your magazines wells and your Twinkies.

Just an update on the request for help received by Erin of Lurking Rhythmically, she not only received enough donations to purchase a carry pistol but had some money left over:

I have been advised by certain knowledgeable people that I should not disclose the exact amount I raised lest I invoke the dread gaze of the IRS, but I do want to say that you folks went far above and beyond what was necessary to help me acquire a carry pistol, a permit, and training. I will be sending out thank-you notes later this week.

I don’t mention this solely because I want to demonstrate the goodwill of the gunny community, but I also want to bring it up as a demonstration of mutual aid succeeding. We’re deluded by the state and its supporters that we individual are unable to help one another, we’re told that the state is necessary to ensure all have what they need. Of course such statements are lies and acts of charity such as the above mentioned prove how well helping one another can work.

Mutual aid happens whenever one person comes to the assistance of another. Donating money to a family who recently lost everything is an act of mutual aid, helping neighbors clean up their property and rebuild after a flood is an act of mutual aid, and helping a person in need obtain the tools necessary for self-defense is mutual aid.

One thing I’ve witnessed as our society moves more towards statism is the reduction of mutual aid. When somebody loses their job but still needs to pay their bills and feed their families they are less likely to be helped by their fellow neighbor, instead they turn to the state and because the state has already stolen money from the populace to fund its welfare system individuals are less inclined to help one another. Its a vicious cycle, individuals refrain from helping one another because they’ve been forcefully stolen from to fund the state’s welfare system, and the state continues to point to the apathy they created as proof that money must be stolen to help those in need. We don’t need to be enslaved to this vicious cycle, we can break free of it, we need only help on another.

Time and time again I witness exceptionally generosity from the gunny community and it makes me absolutely proud to be apart of it.

After getting my taxes done (I don’t wait until the last minute) I was alerted that, once again, I overpaid and therefore will get a return. Most people are overjoyed by receiving a tax return, I’m not. Why? Because getting a tax return indicates that you paid the government more money than you were forced to, you basically gave them a negative interest loan. Yes, I said a negative interest rate loan, not a zero interest rate loan as most people state.

When you give a zero interest rate loan you’re repaid the same purchasing power as you originally loaned out. Inflation, being a hidden form of theft, ensures you receive less purchasing power than you overpaid. Let’s say inflation was at 10% between 2011 and 2012 and you overpaid by $1000.00. Since inflation devalued your money by 10% the purchasing power you received back through your 2012 tax return is only $900.00. Of course inflation was more than 10% between 2011 and 2012 so my example actually paints a rosier picture than that inflicted by reality.

Getting a tax return means you’re getting back less than you overpaid. Inflation is one of the most insidious forms of theft by the state because most people don’t outright see it and therefore forget about it entirely (most people also don’t realize that inflation is caused by state manipulation of the currency and therefore is a form of state theft).

You know what the gun community hasn’t debated? Whether the AK-47 or the AR-15 is a superior platform. Now that we’ve solved the argument about which is better between the 1911 or the Glock, Caleb over at Gun Nuts Media has decided to tackle the AK vs. AR debate and determine once and for all what rifle is better. Actually Caleb takes the common sense approach and just tells people to buy what they like, unfortunately fanboys on both sides of the aisle aren’t happy wich such conclusions and have started debating the finer points of each rifle platform.

Personally I don’t care, I own an AK and two ARs (one in 5.56 and one in .308) and find them both to be great platforms. The fanatical worshipers of each platform have arguments left and right but the most ridiculous one has to be from the pro-AK crowd: that having an AK will be beneficial when the Reds invade the United States because you can pilfer their ammunition and magazines. Why is this argument ridiculous? Because the days of foreign forces possible invading the United States are over. Invasions are expensive, really expensive, and enemies of America are no longer nation states by small groups working from various locations throughout the world. We’re in the fourth generation of warfare and the rules have changed entirely.

Groups wanting to take down the United States aren’t planning invasions, they’re planning on bankrupting the country. Why spend all that money to raise an army, provide logistics, and invade a foreign country when you can build some cheap explosives, bomb a high value civilian structure, and watch the United States go stroming into some country at the cost of trillions? What good is a massive multi-billion dollar aircraft carrier against a fleet of remote controlled speedboats with high explosives attached to them? How is a massive army any good against targets you can’t see because they don’t war identifiable uniforms?

Warfare has changed and we’re not facing an invasion by a military force. China isn’t going to march its army into the United States, devastating our economy is far cheaper and easier. You’re not going to be scavenging ammunition off of dead foreign soldiers (and if you were why not take their gun as well). In this new generation of warfare people should be defending themselves against economic collapse as that is the weapon now wielded by opponents of the United States. Al Qaeda learned how effective slamming a couple of planes into a couple of skyscrapers can be, it stirred the hornests’ nest of the United States military causing a ramping up of the police state at home and the expenditure of trillions abroad.

Technology has effectively made warfare cheap. A behemoth aircraft carrier is filled with some of the most expensive technology on the planet but a fleet of cheap remote controlled speedboats or aircraft and reign destruction down upon the floating fortress. Look what one speedboat did to the USS Cole.

You can debate ergonomics, calibers, and reliability of the AK and AR platforms but stop claiming the utility during a foreign invasion as a cornerstone of AK superiority. That isn’t the threat anymore and even if it were you can guarantee the United States would start drafting civilians into the military and arming them with far more than a semi-automatic knockoff version of a foreign fighting rifle.

In the fight about income tax, payroll tax, and corporate gains tax people often fail to recognize all the other taxes an individual is faced with. Everything from food (in some states) to gasoline is taxed. Some localities have their own special taxes like Minneapolis and its additional taxes on lodging and entertainment [PDF]. Obviously our tax burden isn’t enough so Obama is trying to raise the tax on dividends received by those holding stocks that actually pay dividends:

President Obama’s 2013 budget is the gift that keeps on giving—to government. One buried surprise is his proposal to triple the tax rate on corporate dividends, which believe it or not is higher than in his previous budgets.

Mr. Obama is proposing to raise the dividend tax rate to the higher personal income tax rate of 39.6% that will kick in next year. Add in the planned phase-out of deductions and exemptions, and the rate hits 41%. Then add the 3.8% investment tax surcharge in ObamaCare, and the new dividend tax rate in 2013 would be 44.8%—nearly three times today’s 15% rate.

What laughable is the fact that dividends are taxed differently from income yet most logical people would agree that receiving dividends is a form of income. Another interesting quirk with dividend taxes is that it’s a tax on something that’s already been taxed:

Keep in mind that dividends are paid to shareholders only after the corporation pays taxes on its profits. So assuming a maximum 35% corporate tax rate and a 44.8% dividend tax, the total tax on corporate earnings passed through as dividends would be 64.1%.

The state isn’t happy until it has a big chunk of every dollar that trades hands. You would think entities that have this many different ways of stealing money from people could manage to run profitably instead of at a deficit so staggering that no private entity could ever hope to mirror it.

Are you looking for an expensive, although wickedly cool, means of correcting your poor aim? Worry not for Sandia National Laboratories has you covered:

Sandia National Laboratories have invented a small caliber self guided bullet. The bullet contains an optical sensor, CPU, battery and electromagnetic actuated fins. It is able to track laser designated targets out to 2,000 meters.

Sometimes I feel as though I live in a science fiction universe. Sure we don’t have spaceships, flying cars, or man portable laser cannons but we do have extremely powerful computers that are so small the fit in your pocket, an effective worldwide communication network, and now we have self guided bullets.

When I stop to think about what this bullet entails I’m amazed at the human capacity for engineering awesome stuff. We’ve actually shrunk central processing units, batteries, and optical sensors down to the point that they can all be fitted into a single bullet. How cool is that?

As this technology is new it’s not ready for prime time but if there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that technology only improves over time so I’m sure we’ll have extremely cheap self guided bullets in our future.