There is no gun show loophole. There is no private sale loophole. It is already illegal to knowingly sell a gun to a federally prohibited person. There are too many classes of federally prohibited persons as it is. If you can't legally buy a gun to protect yourself, why are you allowed any other freedom? Getting rid of the "private sale loophole" basically imposes a fee on me to transfer a firearm to a friend or family member, while those already in the business of selling guns illegally will continue to do so unabated. No thanks.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
March 17, 2011
February 14, 2011
Government scientists predictably attribute benefits of cutting white flour to magical properties of "roughage"
So the government commissions an observational study and they control for a few variables, but notice that it doesn't control for intake of white bread or sugar. Be assured that it's not the higher intake of fiber that is lengthening life in this study, it is the decrease in consumption of white bread. Fiber consumption almost certainly has a directly negative linear correlation to white bread consumption. Control for the intake of refined carbohydrates, and the benefit will vanish entirely. Fiber is overrated.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Who would have guessed?
Pentagon Fingered as a Source of Narco-Firepower in Mexico
Of course the ATF and the DOJ will continue to scapegoat the rights of Americans in order to cover for their own incompetence and the further the efforts of the Brady Campaign and zealots like Josh Sugarmann and the VPC to make private gun ownership as big of a hassle as possible. They don't have to take guns away if they can just make them unpopular.
Of course the ATF and the DOJ will continue to scapegoat the rights of Americans in order to cover for their own incompetence and the further the efforts of the Brady Campaign and zealots like Josh Sugarmann and the VPC to make private gun ownership as big of a hassle as possible. They don't have to take guns away if they can just make them unpopular.
February 13, 2011
Where do the Mexican drug lords really get their guns?
Mexico's Gun Supply and the 90 Percent Myth
Politicians love to claim that the United States is the primary gun supplier of the Mexican drug cartels. Of course, this is likely only true if you count all of the guns that the United States government has distributed to corrupt authoritarian regimes over the decades, with those guns making their way from corrupt officials onto the black market and into the hands of the rich drug barons who need ever-increasing firepower to protect their trade.
Of course, the source of this figure is that that ATF was given thousands of guns to trace, and of those successfully traced, approximately 90% were traced to the US. But why submit guns to the ATF for tracing if there aren't indications that they come from the US? So, the 80% of seized guns that are not traced are hard to account for. You have to assume that they are not submitted because there isn't an indication that they could be traced. After all, you don't submit thousands of guns for tracing to conduct a statistical study (you certainly wouldn't need that large of a sample size), they're submitted to aid in investigations. If submitting gun serial numbers to the ATF would be a waste of time, they won't be sent.
Inclinations to use this "iron river of guns" flowing into Mexico to put stricter requirements on gun shows and stricter reporting requirements on gun dealers is just a ruse to soften them up for more and more intrusions until finally there's a huge unwieldy registry that can be used to go after undesirables. Laws are often simply tools to be used by the powerful against those who might upset the balance. Simply outlaw everything so that everyone is a federal criminal, then you can just make an example of those who speak out too much to make everyone else fall in line.
It has now become quite common to hear U.S. officials confidently assert that 90 percent of the weapons used by the Mexican drug cartels come from the United States. However, a close examination of the dynamics of the cartel wars in Mexico — and of how the oft-echoed 90 percent number was reached — clearly demonstrates that the number is more political rhetoric than empirical fact.
Politicians love to claim that the United States is the primary gun supplier of the Mexican drug cartels. Of course, this is likely only true if you count all of the guns that the United States government has distributed to corrupt authoritarian regimes over the decades, with those guns making their way from corrupt officials onto the black market and into the hands of the rich drug barons who need ever-increasing firepower to protect their trade.
Of course, the source of this figure is that that ATF was given thousands of guns to trace, and of those successfully traced, approximately 90% were traced to the US. But why submit guns to the ATF for tracing if there aren't indications that they come from the US? So, the 80% of seized guns that are not traced are hard to account for. You have to assume that they are not submitted because there isn't an indication that they could be traced. After all, you don't submit thousands of guns for tracing to conduct a statistical study (you certainly wouldn't need that large of a sample size), they're submitted to aid in investigations. If submitting gun serial numbers to the ATF would be a waste of time, they won't be sent.
Inclinations to use this "iron river of guns" flowing into Mexico to put stricter requirements on gun shows and stricter reporting requirements on gun dealers is just a ruse to soften them up for more and more intrusions until finally there's a huge unwieldy registry that can be used to go after undesirables. Laws are often simply tools to be used by the powerful against those who might upset the balance. Simply outlaw everything so that everyone is a federal criminal, then you can just make an example of those who speak out too much to make everyone else fall in line.
Lawrence O'Donnell gets upset at Wayne LaPierre
I don't always like Wayne LaPierre, but he sure knows how to get under the skin of anti-gunners, even if he does side with them from time to time.
Lawrence O'Donnell doesn't really seem to have any clue what he's talking about in this clip. How can the DOJ release a credible study about the decline in "assault weapon" murders during any time period in any state and actually attribute any cause to it? The "assault weapons" ban didn't ban any sort of functionality for any weapon. It banned the new manufacture of "high capacity" magazines and of semi-automatic rifles with certain other peripheral features that did not affect the firing capability of any of the rifles that would be produced during the time of effect of the ban. The ban was enacted in the midst of a rapid decline in the nationwide murder rate, thus attributing the contemporary decline of a certain sub-class of murders to a certain inconsequential law is absurd. Likewise, these same "high capacity" magazines were still legal to sell and trade so long as they had been manufactured before 1994.
And what is there to gain from banning high capacity magazines with a grandfather clause? Nothing. What is there to lose from banning high capacity magazines without a grandfather clause? Everything.
February 12, 2011
The Real Purpose of a Gun
"The real purpose of a gun in our culture is violence."
Shouldn't we disarm the police, then?
If you believe people shouldn't own guns because they should trust only in God, do you also believe people should refuse to wear seatbelts?
Shouldn't we disarm the police, then?
If you believe people shouldn't own guns because they should trust only in God, do you also believe people should refuse to wear seatbelts?
February 11, 2011
Calorie counting is a Sham
Weight Gain: How Food Actually Puts on Pounds
If if were all about cutting calories, people would have done it by now. But it's not so simple to cut calories, is it?
If metabolism is the primary driver of energy expenditure, shouldn't scientists be looking more into what effects your diet has on metabolism rather than simply telling people over and over again to "eat less?" Your body tells you how much it wants you to eat, and you have to give your body the right fuel so that it doesn't think that it needs more all the time. If you shovel nothing but crap into your mouth, but you just eat less of it, your body is going to want more food and your metabolism will slow down when it doesn't get it. You won't lose weight, you'll just feel miserable.
People need to eat the right foods, eat as much as their body needs, and then use the energy that they have to do the things that they want to do and practice doing the things they want to be able to do. Don't exercise just for the sake of exercising.
If if were all about cutting calories, people would have done it by now. But it's not so simple to cut calories, is it?
If metabolism is the primary driver of energy expenditure, shouldn't scientists be looking more into what effects your diet has on metabolism rather than simply telling people over and over again to "eat less?" Your body tells you how much it wants you to eat, and you have to give your body the right fuel so that it doesn't think that it needs more all the time. If you shovel nothing but crap into your mouth, but you just eat less of it, your body is going to want more food and your metabolism will slow down when it doesn't get it. You won't lose weight, you'll just feel miserable.
People need to eat the right foods, eat as much as their body needs, and then use the energy that they have to do the things that they want to do and practice doing the things they want to be able to do. Don't exercise just for the sake of exercising.
God, or guns?
God Not Guns
If your Christian faith says that you should rely on God instead of your own gun to protect you, shouldn't it also tell you that you should rely on God and not the government to protect you? Why does the Reverend ignore the more pressing question of "God or government?"
February 10, 2011
The Gun Show "Loophole"
Close the gun show loophole says the Boston Globe, in response to gun shows in Arizona following the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords.
Those who trade firearms amongst friends and family, who under any closing of this "loophole" would be breaking federal law if they didn't run through the FBI any private transfer to even a close family member. We shouldn't criminalize actions with only the slightest potential to lead to any tragedy. Anyone who knowingly transfers a firearm to a prohibited person is already committing a federal crime. The Tucson shooter was NOT a prohibited person, and using him as an excuse to crack down on legal private sales is despicable. Bloomberg's goons need to stay in New York where they belong. Requiring background checks for all private transfers is nothing but a scheme to shut down the lawful private transfer of firearms. It would have no impact whatsoever on the dissemination of crime guns.
Ask yourself, how many guns used in a crime are used by someone already convicted of a felony? Of those, how many obtained a firearm through a private transaction? Of those, how many are obtained from someone who has any regard for the law regarding the private transfer of firearms? And of those, how many could not have found a firearm from someone not inclined to follow the law? Consider how small this number likely is, and THAT is how small the problem of the gun show "loophole" is. A complete triviality.
Those who trade firearms amongst friends and family, who under any closing of this "loophole" would be breaking federal law if they didn't run through the FBI any private transfer to even a close family member. We shouldn't criminalize actions with only the slightest potential to lead to any tragedy. Anyone who knowingly transfers a firearm to a prohibited person is already committing a federal crime. The Tucson shooter was NOT a prohibited person, and using him as an excuse to crack down on legal private sales is despicable. Bloomberg's goons need to stay in New York where they belong. Requiring background checks for all private transfers is nothing but a scheme to shut down the lawful private transfer of firearms. It would have no impact whatsoever on the dissemination of crime guns.
Ask yourself, how many guns used in a crime are used by someone already convicted of a felony? Of those, how many obtained a firearm through a private transaction? Of those, how many are obtained from someone who has any regard for the law regarding the private transfer of firearms? And of those, how many could not have found a firearm from someone not inclined to follow the law? Consider how small this number likely is, and THAT is how small the problem of the gun show "loophole" is. A complete triviality.
Wal-Mart cutting everything.
Wal-Mart Slashing Salt, Sugar, Fat AND Prices
AND reimbursement to producers, and wages to employees!
Why not cut the protein content, too? After all, we need more and more macronutrient-deficient foods to stuff our faces with. Better off stuffing yourself on leaves all day than eating a square meal now and then, am I right?
AND reimbursement to producers, and wages to employees!
Why not cut the protein content, too? After all, we need more and more macronutrient-deficient foods to stuff our faces with. Better off stuffing yourself on leaves all day than eating a square meal now and then, am I right?
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