Concealed Carry in Maine

Kennebec Journal

If you want a concealed-weapons permit from the Maine State Police, be ready to wait three or four months. There’s a 2,500-application backlog.

As gun sales nationwide and in Maine have skyrocketed in recent years, so has permit demand, said Lt. Scott Ireland, who runs the state police’s licensing division, which handles permit applications for more than 300 small, rural municipalities, along with unorganized territories and townships. Larger cities and towns handle their own.

With 100 to 150 applications coming to Ireland’s office daily, the four employees tasked with handling them — only one working on it full time — are stretched.

In 2008, Barack Obama was elected president. The Maine State Police issued 3,912 permits that year, Ireland said. In 2009, Obama took office. it issued 5,706 — nearly a 46 percent increase. And in 2012, the year of the president’s re-election, it issued 7,574. With that backlog, Ireland said, 2013 will be another record year.

Stop Taking Their Money

Wayne La Pierre on the State of the Union Speech

Wayne continues to teach by example. One of the most commonly used tricks of the pro-gun argument is to accuse the other side of that which they themselves are guilty of.  He said the president "displayed a level of public deception that simply cannot be ignored."  But Wayne is the master at this.

One deceptive item that he mentions quite frequently is that so few failed background checks end up in a prosecution for attempting to buy a gun illegally.  This is supposed to represent some kind of failure of the system, but what he overlooks is that every one of those people DID NOT GET THE GUN. At least they did not get the gun from that dealer.  They were forced to seek other sources or to simply do without.

In other words, the system works regardless of whether those folks are arrested for ATTEMPTING to buy a gun. It works because they were STOPPED from buying one.

Another deception, and for me the biggest one, is the "criminals won't submit to background checks therefore it can never be universal" nonsense.  Jon Stewart ridiculed it best.  This is based on the falsehood that all pro-gun folks like to perpetuate, that only already-convicted criminals do bad things with guns.  It also glosses over the fact that the success of the background check system in stopping millions of prohibited persons from buying guns every year would be improved drastically if background checks were required for private sales thereby eliminating one of the other major sources of guns for prohibited persons.

On TTAG, the sycophantic followers of Robert Farago are all ready to throw Wayne out of the boat.  That's simply because that's the tack Robert took after Sandy Hook, certainly not because they agree with anything I've had to say about the man.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Lawful Minnesota Gun Owner Goes Berserk

USA Today

A Minnesota man accused of standing in the street and firing at passing cars — killing a 9-year-old boy — had roughly 200 rounds of ammunition stuffed into his jacket pocket, a backpack and the fanny pack he was wearing when arrested, prosecutors said Wednesday.

Nhan Lap Tran, 34, was charged Wednesday with second-degree murder and other counts in Monday's shootings in the St. Paul suburb of Oakdale. Fourth-grader Devin Aryal died in the shootings, and his mother and another woman were wounded. Two other motorists escaped as they were being fired upon, according to the criminal complaint.

Blade Runner Oscar Pistorius Charged with Murder

Domestic Double Murder in North Carolina

Local news reports

The Robeson County Sheriff's Office is investigating a shooting Wednesday that left two people dead and two others injured, Sheriff Kenneth Sealey said.

Sealey said an unidentified woman called 911 at 5:30 p.m. and said her husband was threatening to shoot her. A few minutes later, the same woman called back and said shots had been fired, Sealey said.

When deputies arrived at the home, at 12156 N.C. 211 about two miles east of Red Springs, they found two women dead from gunshot wounds.

Two men also were injured, he said. One was taken to Southeastern Regional Medical Center in Lumberton. He was expected to be taken to Chapel Hill for treatment of his injuries, Sealey said. Information about the men's injuries was not available.

The shooting remains under investigation but appears to be a domestic incident, Sealey said.

Let me guess, another lawful gun owner who just got fed up.

What do you think?  Please leave a comment.

California Man, Everett Basham, Arrested for Threatening Sen. Leland Lee

  SF Gate

Yee received a threat via e-mail four weeks ago that referred to his efforts to strengthen California's assault weapons ban. He did not say whether it came from Basham, citing a request from the CHP not to divulge details of the investigation.

Keigwin said the threat "was very specific on what the individual wanted to do."

The allegations came as a surprise to Basham's neighbors, who described him as an eccentric and reclusive engineer. Several tall antennas rise from his roof, and surveillance cameras are installed on the property.

Next-door neighbor Phillip Jamison called Basham a "quiet guy that we always thought that someday we'd see on TV. That was the inside joke. His was clearly not the best-kept house in the neighborhood. The antennas and all that stuff always bothered people."

Just another freedom-loving, rights-protecting patriot standing up for what's right. Someone's got to do it.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.