Saturday, May 30, 2015

Minnesota Woman Pulls Pellet Gun on Muslim Couple

Image result for Nancy Kay KnobleImage result for Nancy Kay Knoble

Local news

The attacker, a “self-appointed watchwoman” named Nancy Kay Knoble, began pounding on the car’s windows and doors, and commanding the Abumayalehs to get out of the vehicle. And that’s when Knoble took out her pellet gun. The couple she was threatening, however, didn’t know the firearm wasn’t a more powerful model.

“She pulled the rifle and said open the window or I’ll shoot you guys,” Adly Abumayaleh tells local news station KARE. Fearful, the Abumayalehs complied. The couple exited the vehicle and, while Knoble held her gun to Adly’s back, the trio approached the house where the Abumayalehs’ son was spending time with friends.

As promised, the Abumayalehs’ child was where they said he would be and Knoble, satisfied that the family was not a threat severe enough to keep holding at gunpoint, “backed off,” according to KARE.

But the Abumayaleh family was shaken. “I thought, I am going to die this night,” Majida says tearfully.

Police arrested Knoble at her home nearby and recovered the crime scene pellet gun.

Why Do Men Carry Guns?

LA Times

Jennifer Carlson says the increasing prevalence of men carrying guns in public in some areas is the result of a "crisis of confidence in the American dream." She writes that "men find in guns a sense of duty, relevance and even dignity." ("Why men feel the need to carry guns," op-ed, May 26)

I am a man. I have been disappointed in my pursuit of the ever-more elusive American dream. I feel at times irrelevant and lacking in purpose. However, I do not carry a gun. Does that make me less of a man or defeatist?

While teaching at a private school in Arizona, I confronted an individual who was openly carrying. I asked him why, and he answered, "Because I can." There was nothing about duty, only disrespect for the decency of most Americans who feel unsafe in the presence of an armed individual.

This isn't because of protection or duty, but unmitigated arrogance and a distorted interpretation of the 2nd Amendment.

Douglas Mitchell, Portland, Ore.

The International Flag of Planet Earth

Friday, May 29, 2015

DC Road Rage Incident - 1 Dead, 1 Wounded

Local news

Gun Violence in Cincinnati at 10-Year High

Local news with video

Kory Watkins Calls for the Death of Those Opposing Open Carry - Guns Dot Com Downplays What He Said

Open carry activist calls for arrest of lawmakers following vote

kory watkins

Where’s The Coverage Of Heroes Who Stop Mass Killings?

Ammoland by John Lott

Heroic citizens stopping someone from killing a large number of people don’t seem to be considered news worthy.

Don’t people want to read about a brave soul risking his life by running towards the sound of gunfire while others run away?  Yet, such stories never get national news coverage by the national mainstream media.

While accidental gunshots get national coverage, few people have any idea how often concealed handgun permit holders stopping mass killings.

The lack of news coverage allows left wing media outlets, such as Mother Jones which should know better, to falsely claim: “In not a single case was [a mass public shooting] stopped by a civilian using a gun.”

The truth is that the more successful these heroes are in preventing people from getting killed, the less media coverage they receive, but the lack of fatalities doesn’t explain the lack of news coverage.  And if the heroes hadn’t been there, the attacks would have been successful and the national mainstream media would have been talking about the attack for days.

It's thoroughly dishonest, as we've come to expect, for John Lott to pretend the lack of coverage of stopped mass killings is because of media bias. It's simply and obviously because there's no proof that something which hasn't happened yet, would have happened.

Having said that, it's also unfair for Mother Jones to imply that no mass shooting has ever been thwarted.

It seems to me that the handful of anecdotal cases cited in the article are just that, a handful of anecdotal cases. The numbers would not add up to much - but of course, no one knows.

North Carolina Students Charged for Senior Prank

Local news with video suggested by George Jefferson with the following remark:

Alarm clocks equal terrorism in America welcome to the police state‏


South Iredell High School was evacuated Tuesday morning after police say a senior prank prompted a bomb search.

Dan Farrell's daughter Shannon Farrell is one of two students arrested.

He said, "I was called by my younger daughter saying my older daughter was taken away by the cops."

Farrell says his daughter told him about the prank to put alarm clocks in the unused locker and have them go off at different times. He said he thought it was harmless.

Troutman Police Chief Matthew Selves said, "We take this pretty seriously."

Seniors Shannon Farrell and Lekia Hall now face a felony charge of hoax by use of a false bomb in a public building, a "Class H" felony and obstruction of justice.

Thursday, May 28, 2015

Virginia 2-Year-old Dies - Still No Charges

Local news

A 2-year-old boy has died from injuries sustained when he accidentally shot himself at a home in Lunenburg Monday morning, according to the sheriff's office.

The boy was shot just before 9:30 a.m. at a somewhat secluded home along Doswell Town Road in Meherrin. His family was visiting from out of town for the Memorial Day holiday when he was left alone in a bedroom. Sheriffs say he reached up, grabbed a loaded handgun off a dresser and pulled the trigger, shooting himself.

He was flown to VCU Medical Center in Richmond in critical condition, but died on Wednesday morning. Officials say the family is cooperating with police and officials haven't said whether any charges will be filed.

Colorado Gun Magazine Ban Goes Unenforced, Good People Don’t Care & Shouldn’t

AK Rifle Magazine

Ammoland

Yesterday, I visited a local gun retailer and purchased several 30-round MagPul AR magazines that were on unrestricted display on store shelves. I asked the clerk about the “law,” and he indicated that it was universally, contemptuously ignored and that nobody cared.

When the law was first signed, retailers simply sold normal-capacity magazines dissembled. The purchaser subsequently put the parts back together and went his merry way.

Today, even that cynical pretense has apparently been discarded!

The problem with stupid, intelligence-insulting “laws,” passed by sleazy politicians who never even read them, is that the universal contempt they invariably generate eventually casts a pall of disrespect over the entire body of law!

When one law is disrespected (and should be), and is thus ignored (and should be) and thus largely unenforced (and should be), because even the authorities generally recognize it is stupid and unbeneficial to anyone, the societal glue that holds together our entire Civilization weakens.

When we can’t respect certain laws, we certainly can’t have any respect for politicians who passed them. Likewise, we can’t respect the electorate who put those politicians into office. Suddenly, our entire Civilization no longer deserves our respect!

Excuse me, but aren't those good reasons to obey laws, even those you don't like? Wouldn't truly patriotic citizens want to sacrifice in order to  protect "the societal glue that holds together our entire Civilization?"

NRA Debuts 2016 Conspiracy: Hillary Clinton Is Coming For Your Guns



Media Matters

Right on cue, the National Rifle Association has unveiled its 2016 presidential election conspiracy theory with the baseless claim that Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is harboring a secret plan to confiscate Americans' firearms. But Clinton has never endorsed such a plan and in fact has defended private citizens' right to own guns.

In a May 11 article published in the NRA's magazine and on its lobbying website, the gun group wrote, "Whether or not she understands the Second Amendment, Hillary Clinton disdains and distrusts that freedom," and claimed Clinton "wants control over every aspect of your right to keep and bear arms -- so she can deny it at will."

Clinton's own recent statements about "the right of people to own guns" meant the NRA was forced to juxtapose a series of old Clinton quotes -- some dating back to the late 1990s -- and hope that its readers would make implausible leaps of logic to buy into the conspiracy theory that a President Hillary Clinton would confiscate firearms. The NRA ran a similar fearmongering campaign about President Obama during the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections that also had zero basis in fact.

Trigger Warning: 10 Shocking Truths About Gun Violence

The Guardian

5 The gun has been behind some of the great advances in medical history

As guns have evolved through the centuries, so too have medical responses to the injuries sustained from them. In the 14th century, gunpowder’s harm caused doctors to believe bullets were contaminants. This led to the practice of burning the wound to rid the body of poison. By the American war of independence (1775-83) surgeons were suggesting that, if a gunshot wound was to be sewn up, a piece of onion was best put inside, and the wound reopened after one or two days.

By the Crimean war of the 1850s, though, Florence Nightingale’s efforts to clean hospitals had a notable impact on patient mortality, which dropped from 52% to 20%. Joseph Lister’s experiments applying carbolic acid to wounds also helped reduce death rates. And Roentgen’s development of the X-ray in 1895 helped pinpoint fabric, bullets and bone fragments. The impact of these discoveries was revolutionary: research into the Spanish-American war in 1898 suggests that 85% of US casualties survived.

Medical innovations in gunshot trauma continues today. Tranexamic acid, used to ease heavy menstrual flow, has also helped save the lives of haemorrhaging gunshot patients. Syringes containing tiny sponges can stem a gunshot wound in seconds.

Concealed Carry Reciprocity


New Mexico op-ed

The National Rifle Association is once again trying to boost the sale of firearms at the expense of our well-being by asking Congress to pass the Constitutional Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act.
If passed, this law would allow those with concealed carry permits to take their firearms across all state lines. The states that boast the weakest concealed carry laws would trump states that have passed stricter laws. (So much for states’ rights.) More concealed carry permits lead to the sale of more handguns. While that may be good for the gun industry, it has a demonstrable negative impact on the safety of our communities.



Here is why: Our laws in New Mexico work. According to the Violence Policy Center their research shows that from 2007 to the present New Mexico has not had one incident of a concealed carry killer. That means there have been zero incidents with a law enforcement officer killed by a concealed carry permit holder, a private citizen, a mass shooting or a murder suicide. Only 12 other states can boast such good statistics. The reason we have such a good track record is because our strict laws on these permit holders are working. In fact, when the NRA lobby tried to weaken our New Mexico laws this last legislative session with five separate bills, our state legislators boldly voted against every one of them.


The numbers from the New Mexico Department of Health confirm a 42 percent rise in concealed carry permits in our state (from 12,000 in June of 2012 to 40,000 in 2014). As of today, at least 10 states issue a permit without first requiring some kind of firearms safety training. At least 10 states issue a permit to people convicted of violent misdemeanors and 19 states will allow people with a demonstrated history of drug or alcohol abuse to carry concealed firearms.


If Congress passes this law, the 1,400 felons to whom Florida issued permits since 2007 and/or the 2,400 felons to whom North Carolina issued permits from 2007 to 2011 would now be welcome to carry firearms in our state.

Wednesday, May 27, 2015

More Fun With Numbers - Gun Deaths Up in Georgia, 44 Other States

AJC

As deaths from gunshot wounds rose steadily in Georgia and most other states, the District of Columbia crafted a narrative-busting success story. Once one of the nation’s most violent jurisdictions, the District reduced firearms deaths by more than half, even as its strict gun-control laws came under attack in Congress and the courts.

An Atlanta Journal-Constitution analysis of government statistics, insurance industry data and reports from state vital-records agencies found that Washington cut gun deaths by 58 percent over the past decade.

Besides D.C., only four states reported fewer gun deaths in 2013 than in 2003, the Journal-Constitution found: New York (down 17 percent), California (down 13 percent), Maryland (down 11 percent) and Illinois (down 3 percent). In New Mexico, the same number of people died from gunshot wounds in 2013 as in 2003.

Nationwide, gun deaths rose by 12 percent; in Georgia, the increase was 8 percent. Maine had the highest rate of increase: 93 percent. In all, nine states recorded increases in gun deaths of at least 25 percent. Those include Utah (up 47 percent) and Oklahoma (up 41 percent).

Where Were the Good Guys With Guns at the Waco Gunfight

Guns dot com

Spend much time reading conversations about guns on the Internet, and you’ll come across a list of rules for a gunfight.  This is often tongue-in-cheek, though there’s a large measure of good advice contained therein.  But we need to add a Rule Zero:  If you know in advance that a gunfight will occur, don’t attend.

Think about that for a minute.  One of the extant rules is that the sooner you finish a gunfight, the less shot you’ll get.  Doesn’t that suggest that if you don’t get involved in the first place, you have a good chance of not getting shot at all?  Now this is not to say that we’re obliged to attempt to outrun a bullet.  Stand Your Ground laws address what happens when the gunfight comes to you.  But the answer to the question asked by gun control proponents is that private citizens aren’t police.  It’s not our job to go somewhere that crime is expected to occur.  We own and carry firearms to protect ourselves and our families, not to act like some comic book character, seeking out trouble in the dark corners of the big city.

Why weren’t we there?  We weren’t there precisely because we aren’t the people gun control advocates accuse us of being.  We aren’t looking for trouble.  We aren’t spoiling for a fight.  We’re just living our lives and working to improve the odds if a fight is imposed on us.

Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Use of the Word "Nigger" on Google as an Indication of Racism

 

For the PLOS ONE paper, researchers looked at searches containing the N-word. People search frequently for it, roughly as often as searches for  "migraine(s)," "economist," "sweater," "Daily Show," and "Lakers." (The authors attempted to control for variants of the N-word not necessarily intended as pejoratives, excluding the "a" version of the word that analysis revealed was often used "in different contexts compared to searches of the term ending in '-er'.")

It's also important to note that not all people searching for the N-word are motivated by racism, and that not all racists search for that word, either. But aggregated over several years and several million searches, the data give a pretty good approximation of where a particular type of racist attitude is the strongest.


Interestingly, on the map above the most concentrated cluster of racist searches happened not in the South, but rather along the spine of the Appalachians running from Georgia all the way up to New York and southern Vermont.

Other hotbeds of racist searches appear in areas of the Gulf Coast, Michigan's Upper Peninsula, and a large portion of Ohio. But the searches get rarer the further West you go. West of Texas, no region falls into the "much more than average" category. This map follows the general contours of a map of racist Tweets made by researchers at Humboldt State University.

Supreme Court Hands Victory To Police Who Use Deadly Force

Think Progress

The U.S. Supreme Court dealt at least a partial blow to police reform advocates Monday, in a ruling that held police officers could not be sued after all for firing gunshots at a severely mentally disabled woman who threatened violence. 

The decision is a loss for plaintiff Teresa Sheehan, who survived the deadly police force, and had won the right to sue in the lower courts. Studies in several cities have found that about half of police shooting victims are mentally ill, and that the mentally ill are disproportionate victims of excessive police force. Sheehan, like many of disabled police shooting victims, was shot in what started as a call to police for help. 

But Monday’s Supreme Court ruling also avoided what could have been a much worse outcome for disability advocates. The justices punted on what was perhaps the most significant question before the U.S. Supreme Court — how federal disabilities protections under the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to this sort of police conduct. Had the justices ruled on that question, advocates warned, the conservative Roberts Court could have made disabilities protections substantially weaker than they are now. “While San Francisco may intend to craft arguments that it believes will limit the damage to individuals’ rights under the ADA, it will have little control over what the Supreme Court does,” disability groups wrote in a letter to San Francisco, urging the city to drop its appeal.
San Francisco didn’t drop its appeal, but the justices heeded its call for a limited ruling, and didn’t rule at all on the question of whether those with disabilities should be treated differently by the police. 

Instead, the justices’ ruling made clearer than ever that under current law, police officers could not have been expected to consider Sheehan’s mental illness when they entered her room at a group home twice, and responded to her violent threats by shooting her six times. “The Fourth Amendment standard is reasonableness, and it is reasonable for police to move quickly if delay ‘would gravely endanger their lives or the lives of others.’,” Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the six-justice majority, noting that they could not weigh in on the relevance of Sheehan’s disability.

Chicago Violence

Think Progress

As of Monday morning, nine people had been shot to death and another 32 wounded in Chicago since the Friday that began Memorial Day weekend.

One of the youngest victims was Jacele Johnson, a four-year-old girl, who was shot while sitting in a car parked outside of a prom celebration in West Englewood as someone drove by firing. Two other children were also shot in the same incident: a 17-year-old boy who was hit in the chest and had a graze wound to the neck, and a 15-year-old girl who suffered a graze wound on her forehead, both of whom were in stable condition. Jacele was taken to a hospital and underwent surgery, and she was upgraded to serious condition Sunday morning. 

The first fatality was a 34-year-old man who was shot in the chest and shoulder while sitting on the front porch of his home in Wicker Park. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. The youngest death was a 15-year-old boy in Bronzeville who was shot along with another 14-year-old struck in the foot in an alley. Other fatalities included a 20-year-old man with multiple gunshot wounds; a 24-year-old man shot in the head; a man between 20 and 30 shot in the face; a 29-year-old woman shot in the chest and leg by a group who were denied entry to a house party; a 35-year-old man shot in the stomach; and a 28-year-old man shot in the head and shoulder.

Critics of gun law reforms argue that the high levels of gun violence in Chicago are proof that regulation doesn’t work, given that the city has relatively strict gun laws. But lax laws surrounding the area, both in the state of Illinois and nearby states, allow guns to flow into the city, which make up the vast majority of those seized by law enforcement. Research has found that localities in states that have weak gun laws tend to suffer higher rates of gun violence than those in states with stricter ones. Overall, more gun ownership has been found to lead to more murders.

How Many Unsolved Homicides are Self Defense?

Ammoland

In a previous essay, I mentioned that we do not know what proportion of unsolved homicides are justified homicides.  The reason is that most homicides are violent criminals killing other violent criminals, and that because a person is a criminal, they are reluctant to report a self defense shooting to police.  From the previous essay:
In the United States, about 37.5% of the homicides are unsolved.   In Chicago in 2013, the number was 75% unsolved.   Most homicides involve criminals killing other criminals.  How many of those would be justifiable if solved is unknowable; but clearly some are.   It is not hard to believe that someone with a criminal record would just walk away from a justifiable killing, if he feared prosecution for gun possession, or simply did not trust the police.    Those are unknown percentages, but if the number is close to the percentages in solved homicides, then Klecks estimate of justifiable homicides increases by 60%.   Instead of 3-7 times the FBI numbers, we get 5 – 11 times the the FBI reported figures, for 2012 clearance rates.
There were 310 justifiable homicides recorded by the FBI UCR in 2012.   So the actual number of justified homicides is likely between 1,500 and 3,000.   As many as 40% of those are unsolved homicides.

What do you think about these numbers, TS?

Nevada Gun Law Changes - Some Good, Some Bad

Las Vegas Review Journal

link provided by George Jefferson with the following remark:

"Nevada Gun law Changing for the better‏"

The Assembly on Friday passed a gun bill that would expand and clarify Nevada’s justifiable homicide law and prevent people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence from possessing firearms.

The Assembly voted on party lines 25-17 on Senate Bill 175.

The bill, which has already passed the Senate, goes to Gov. Brian Sandoval’s desk. The governor’s office didn’t indicate if he will sign the bill.

SB175 would expand the definition of justifiable homicide to include killing someone in defense of an occupied motor vehicle or someone who intends to enter a vehicle to assault a person inside. The bill also would grant civil liability protection to those who use justifiable force.

It would end a handgun registration requirement in Clark County and establish “state control over the regulation of policies concerning firearms.”

Under the bill, anyone convicted of domestic violence, including a misdemeanor offense, could not own a firearm. Doing so would be a felony.

SB175 would also expand the current law recognizing other states that offer concealed carry permits and allowing residents of those states to carry weapons in Nevada. States that require a class, program or training to obtain a permit would be granted reciprocity, expanding the number of such states by about 10.

Assemblywoman Dina Neal, D-North Las Vegas, opposed the measure, saying it’s too subjective and tips the scales in favor of shooters who claim they were afraid.

“How do you determine fear?” Neal said.

In another development, the Assembly introduced a new “campus carry” bill on Friday that would allow permit-holders to carry a concealed weapon on college campuses. Assembly Bill 487 was referred to the Assembly Judiciary Committee.

Just a day earlier, legislators in the Assembly rejected an amendment to SB175 that would have allowed campus carry. The Assembly voted 24-18 Thursday to kill the controversial proposal, with eight Republicans helping defeat it.

Most of the eight Republicans who voted against campus carry Thursday had a change of heart Friday.

Memorial Day - Donovan - The Universal Soldier

For my kind:

Memorial Day - Dr. John the Night Tripper - The Patriotic Flag Waver

For all you jingo boys:

Monday, May 25, 2015

Gun ownership for some felons

Opinion

But should convicted non-violent felons be allowed to own a gun?

This question has found itself on the national stage and will likely be an issue in the 2016 Presidential Election. 

Last year, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul called for the restoration of voting rights for some non-violent felons. This idea has caught on with both parties. However, voting rights legislation will never succeed without some of these folks getting back their right to own guns as well. 

The right to own a firearm is not like the privilege to possess a driver’s license. It is, like the right to vote, a fundamental civil right. 

People convicted of non-violent felonies should not have a Constitutional right removed just because of the stigma associated with a felony conviction. 

There are thousands of examples of people who have been convicted of forgery, theft, and many other non-violent offenses. The vast majority of those cases did not even involve a gun. 

While these are criminal acts and should not be tolerated, the offender does not put our community at risk by keeping a handgun at home for personal protection.



Cleveland Cop Acquitted in Shooting Deaths of 2 Unarmed Suspects

 In this April 9, 2015, file photo, Cleveland police Officer Michael Brelo listens to testimony during his trial in Cleveland.  
In this April 9, 2015, file photo, Cleveland police Officer Michael Brelo listens to testimony during his trial in Cleveland.


Time

A white Cleveland patrolman who fired down through the windshield of a suspect’s car at the end of a 137-shot barrage that left the two unarmed black occupants dead was acquitted Saturday of criminal charges by a judge who said he could not determine the officer alone fired the fatal shots.

Brelo could have been convicted of lesser charges, but O’Donnell determined his actions were justified following the chase, which included reports of shots fired from Russell’s car, because officers perceived a threat.

Thirteen officers fired at the car with Russell and Malissa Williams inside after a 22-mile high-speed chase that involved 62 marked and unmarked cars and reached 100 mph. Brelo was the only officer charged because prosecutors said he waited until the pair was no longer a threat to fire his final 15 rounds.

Russell, 43, and Williams, 30, were each shot more than 20 times. Prosecutors argued they were alive until Brelo’s final salvo but medical examiners for both sides testified they could not determine the order in which the deadly shots were fired.

Sunday, May 24, 2015

Alabama Senate Says Guns in Cars is the Same as Guns in the Home

Concealed Nation

The Alabama Senate passed a new firearms Bill that would allow any gun owner to carry and transport a loaded handgun in their vehicle without the requirement of a concealed carry permit.  Senator Gerald Allen, a Republican from Cottondale, stated that his Bill strengthens the Second Amendment rights of Alabama residents by mirroring the bordering States; none of which require a concealed carry permit for transportation of a handgun within a vehicle.

The Senator references the Castle Doctrine, which states a person’s vehicle is an extension of their home, and therefore should be allowed to carry a handgun in their car without the need of a permit; given a permit is not required for anyone to keep a handgun in their home.

Gerald Allen goes on to state that a person should not be required to purchase a permit and ask for permission to carry a handgun in a vehicle for the purpose of self-defense.  He mentions the fact that a single mom who works in a dangerous part of town may wish to carry a firearm for self-defense; but should not be expected to spend the extra money for a permit to exercise her constitutional right.

Oregon Road Rage Killing Results in 5-Year Prison Sentence

Local news