[Texas] Kerry pushes for more gun control:
... At Monday's hearing, committee Chairman Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., said he had been shocked to see killings and beheadings "just a stone's throw across the Rio Grande from where we're sitting this morning."
Across the border, thousands of Mexican soldiers patrol Ciudad Juarez, which saw about 2,000 murders in 14 months.
Kerry called for a ban on the imports of assault rifles, such as the AK-47, into the United States. Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., and Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., opposed the idea.
Assault rifles bought in the United States are favorites among cartel gunmen, who find them effective for the urban warfare, William McMahon, deputy assistant director of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, told the committee. ATF agents have traced many guns confiscated in Mexico to purchases in the United States, McMahon said. ...
Gun owners scramble for ammo with nationwide shortage:
Reports from across the country confirm that gun owners seeking to stock up on ammunition are facing the same list of problems: shortages, back orders, elevated prices and a long line of people staring at empty shelves where boxes of bullets used to be.
"Just about everywhere I've been, it's sold out," Darren Lauzon told KMGH-TV in Denver after he failed to find ammunition for his new .45 pistol. "Wal-Mart, Sportsman's, wherever."
...
"We're probably selling ammunition right now at a 200 percent increase over normal sales," said Richard Taylor, manager at the Firing Line in Aurora, Colo.
"We've probably got over 4,000 cases of ammunition on back order currently. But we just don't know when we're going to receive that," Taylor told KMGH. "Y2K was just like a little blip on the radar screen compared to this. I mean, it's just phenomenal."
A Wal-Mart salesman told Ross Kaminsky of Human Events, "We used to get shipments almost every day. Now we only know we'll have it when we see it. I get at least a half-dozen calls a day asking for ammunition, especially for handguns, and when it arrives, the customers buy everything." ...
Pro-gun blogger points out the law of intended consequences:
... But, what are two unintended consequences of contemplated gun control to current and would be new gun owners? First: Investing in guns, magazines, and ammunition is only second to owning gold. Gun prices are not coming down or fluctuating up and down. Putting your money in guns and ammo isn't like "investing" in a shrinking stock market or 401(k). However, you have to currently own or have the cash to buy to benefit.
...
These big gun sales are frightening anti gun groups. One high official in the Brady organization recently said that he wondered what sacrifices to the family were made because of family gun purchases made during the "insane" increases in gun sales. The Bradys all need get a grip on reality, get real jobs, and stop their bottom feeding frenzy. The purchases are part of both financial and personal protection for the family. They are better than money in the bank. Could it be that the Bradys are part of the actual creation of this Brady described "insanity?" Originally, the Bradys "worried" about guns. Now they want to be family financial and mental health counselors. They believe gun owners are insane. The Bradys actually say it for the first time now. ...
Columnist asks: Are you hoarding ammo?:
As I was walking through the ammunition aisle at my local Bass Pro Shops, I muttered to the man standing next to me how disappointingly empty the shelves were. “Not as bad as last week,” he said. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Back in February, Cabelas, a publicly-traded outdoor outfitter saw its stock go up 35% in one day when earnings blew away estimates because of very strong “sales of firearms and related accessories.”
...
It’s not just a couple of stores seeing a run on guns and even more so on ammunition. From local gun shops to WalMart to sporting goods stores, the story is the same: When the store gets a shipment of ammo, particularly .45, 9mm, and .38 handgun ammunition, “people come in and they buy it all.”
The manager of a local gun shop where I’ve been a customer told me that business has doubled since the election. Whereas the typical first time buyer pre-election had generally been a 30- or 40-something male, first time gun buyers now include more younger people, older people, and women than in the past. “They’re buying semi-automatic pistols and shotguns for home defense, as well as ‘concealed weapons’. There’s also a strong interest in ‘black guns’,” military-style rifles, both from people who want to buy them “because they can” as well as others who believe they’ll be able to sell them at higher prices someday soon.
Where politics was rarely mentioned during a gun purchase a year ago, the store manager says at least 60% of his customers mention the Obama administration now.
At Rich Wyatt’s Gunsmoke, “We are getting ‘Prius-driving Obama people’ buying guns because they realize they picked the wrong pony…even though they never admit it.” Just like my local gun shop, Wyatt has “old ladies and young people and liberals” buying guns. He says that while there were spikes in gun buying during the Clinton administration, during the Rodney King riots, and even just before Y2K, he’s never seen anything remotely on this scale.
...
As if the message weren’t clear enough, a sign at a local WalMart said “Due to the increased demand from customers for ammunition, our suppliers are increasing production…” A salesman said that their ammunition supply is now infrequent and unpredictable: “We used to get shipments almost every day. Now we only know we’ll have it when we see it. I get at least a half-dozen calls a day asking for ammunition, especially for handguns, and when it arrives, the customers buy everything.”
Over at Gunsmoke, Rich Wyatt says “Now, it’s not what the ammo costs; it’s ‘do you have it?’”
...
Rich Wyatt’s position is typically none too subtle: “Barack Obama is right about one thing. We are clinging to God and our guns, and I defy him to try to take either one from us.”
As for me, after a day of thinking about the Obama administration and guns, I bought my local WalMart’s last box of .38 caliber ammunition.
Over at Big Hollywood, John Lott says crime shows ignore real sources of crime:
The US Department of Justice released a very important report in January, but it got little attention. The report found that 80 percent of crime in the US was gang related and that the vast majority of that was drug related.
Those of us who have worked with crime data have long understood this problem. For example, 50 percent of counties in the US have zero murders in any given year and another 25 percent have just one murder. Over 70 percent of murders take place in just a little over 3 percent of the counties, but even that exaggerates the picture because anyone who has seen a picture of murders in a major city know how heavily concentrated they are in specific areas within the city. ...
[Arkansas] Open carry bill defeated:
A House committee has rejected a measure that would have allowed people 21 and older to openly carry handguns in holsters.
The House Judiciary Committee on Tuesday rejected the proposal by Rep. Mark Martin of Prairie Grove. Martin argued that dozens of states permit the open carry of weapons, and that lawmakers should trust gun owners to use and display the firearms responsibly. ...
[Tennessee] Bill would allow armed professors:
KNOXVILLE — Handguns could find their way onto Tennessee college campuses — legally — under one of the latest gun bills coming before the General Assembly.
State Rep. Stacey Campfield’s proposal, scheduled for a hearing Wednesday before a House Judiciary subcommittee, would allow any full-time faculty and staff member with a valid permit to bring a handgun onto their public college campus.
“By banning guns on campus you are not banning the criminals,” the Knoxville Republican said Monday. “All you are banning is the people from being able to defend themselves.”
But University of Tennessee officials worry about the effect. ...
[Utah] Newspaper says poll shows residents oppose gun rights bills:
Utah legislators appear to have missed the will of the people on two gun bills that passed this session, giving overwhelming support to both measures while a recent poll of voters shows clear opposition to the changes.
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. sided with the Legislature Monday, signing both new statutes into law.
The two bills, HB357 and SB78, make changes to current gun laws to allow loaded firearms to be carried in vehicles without the necessity of a concealed weapons permit, and require businesses to allow loaded firearms in vehicles parked on their property, or, in lieu of that, provide for secure storage of firearms.
Both bills garnered more than 80-percent approval among Utah legislators. When Utah voters were asked to weigh in on the bills, a much different picture emerged.
A Deseret News-KSL TV poll conducted by Dan Jones & Associates on March 17-18 asked 400 voters for their positions on the statute changes.
On the issue of allowing loaded firearms to be carried in vehicles without a concealed weapons permit (HB357), 60 percent of respondents were somewhat or strongly opposed, while 35 percent were somewhat or strongly in favor.
On guns in cars in parking lots (SB78), 54 percent of voters questioned were somewhat or strongly opposed and 40 percent somewhat or strongly in favor. The margin of error was 5 percent. ...
From GOA, on the effort to repeal the anti-gun National Park Service carry ban:
In March, both the U.S. House and Senate finished up work on a massive, anti-gun $10 billion omnibus federal land bill.
The bill had been held up for over a year in large part due to GOA members fighting for Second Amendment rights on federal land -- YOUR land.
The Second Amendment has been null and void for many years on all land controlled by the National Park Service (NPS). While regulations promulgated in the waning days of the Bush administration partially reversed that gun ban, a federal judge recently blocked those rules from taking effect.
GOA worked closely with pro-gun members of the House and Senate to add a complete repeal of the NPS gun prohibition to the larger land bill. While these efforts delayed passage of the bill, in the end the anti-gun congressional leadership teamed up with "pro-gun" compromisers and passed the measure without protecting the Second Amendment.
In an effort to appease gun owners, language was added to the bill to protect hunting and fishing. But, as GOA pointed out to the Congress, the Founding Fathers did not pledge their lives, fortunes and sacred honor to protect a recreational pastime. [emphasis added]
The final attempt to protect the Second Amendment from NPS bureaucrats came on a procedural vote in the House that would have made in order an amendment, sponsored by pro-gun Reps. Doc Hastings (R-WA) and Rob Bishop (R-UT), to repeal the gun ban. That motion failed by a vote of 242-180.
So now not only does the gun ban remain in place, the new bill greatly expands the total amount of NPS land. Since NPS-controlled parks and trails also include many busy roadways, hundreds of thousands of gun owners can unwittingly find themselves in violation of the gun ban without even knowing they are on federal land.
Representatives Hastings and Bishop, along with Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA), have vowed to continue their efforts to wipe this unconstitutional gun ban from the books. In the Senate, Tom Coburn (R-OK) is also pushing for the repeal of the anti-gun NPS regulations. ...
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