Snowflakes in Hell

… of their own farts.

Our golden, trend-setting state of California, already leading the way on issues ranging from global warming to high-tech computers, is poised to push - or drag - the nation along on another worthy journey.It’s about sensible gun control legislation Californians can live with, it’s not a knee-jerk reaction to the horrors of Virginia Tech, and it’s about time.

Last week, the Assembly, in an effort to curb deadly gun violence, voted to require all new semi-automatic pistols sold in the state to automatically stamp information on shell casings that could help police track down violent criminals - making California the first state to take advantage of the kind of technology no criminal would like.

Seriously, can you get any closer to the self-satisfied crap that Trey Parker and Matt Stone so aptly made fun of on the South Park episode “Smug Alert”?

What a pity that independent studies have shown that the marking that will be so hated by criminals can be easily removed with common household tools.   Much easier than removing serial numbers, something criminals already regularly do.

And California - where we’re about more than sunshine and good times - will once again have led the way down a wise path.

Please!  This guy needs a swift kick in the nuts.

Clearly we need to renew the federal ban on assault legs.

It seems to me these people need to be loaned a few brain cells:

“What we want is to bring just some basic common sense to gun laws. It’s crazy you don’t need any registration, you don’t need any permits.  If you have a hand gun, you can get a permit to carry it concealed. That makes no sense.”

Yeah, because common sense says that the drug dealers killing each other on the streets of Philadelphia bother to get gun permits from the police and would bother with registration and licensing.   Do you people listen to the crap you’re saying?   I’m pretty sure it’s not our gun laws that don’t make any sense.

Apparently State Representative Tim Solobay (D-Washington County), who either is, at best, looking to score cheap political points off people’s ignorance, or, at worst, has never taken a basic economics course, wants to set up a board for regulating the price of gasoline, just like the one that ensures residents of the Keystone State pay too much for milk.

Dairy farmers are a powerful interest group in the commonwealth, and the state sets minimum prices for milk.  Presumably the gas board would set maximum prices for gas.   Maximum gas prices create shortages, since it will force gas out of the state, where refiners will be able to sell it at a higher profit.

If Representative Solobay manages to bring gas lines to the Keystone State, I’ll be saying a hearty goodbye and screw you, and will move to Arizona.  Seriously, the Democrats here are really starting to scare me.

Bitter and I attended a gun show yesterday at the Philadelphia National Guard Armory off Southampton road in the northeast part of the city.  Only a 400 table show, so I wasn’t expecting much, but I didn’t really find anything that caught my eye.

The only prize for the day, and since it’s been a while since I’ve been to a gun show, perhaps this isn’t much of a find, one table had Polish made Kalashnikov magazines that were pristine and unissued.  I have several magazines for both AKs, but these don’t even have so much as a ding on them.  I also picked up some targets and some jerky, but other than that, nothing really to catch my fancy.  No good deals on ammo either.

Bitter, who is always on the look out for bad PR, found some at the show, and I think intends to blog about it later.  I don’t quite have the eye she does, so I didn’t notice.  I’ll let her tell the story, but say that I do think we need to be cognizant of the fact that the media loves to show up at gun shows to report on how crazy people are at gun shows, but I also think when they are out to get you, they will always find stuff.

Next weekend is one of the big shows in Harrisburg.  Hopefully I can find some decent ammo deals there.

Dr. Helen mentions a book that looks like it’s worth a read. Nanny State: How Food Fascists, Teetotaling Do-Gooders, Priggish Moralists, and other Boneheaded Bureaucrats are Turning America into a Nation of Children.

In so many ways, the state has become the babysitter and infantilizer of all of us, even adults and the most depressing part to me is that we are allowing it, bit by bit, every time we give the state more and more authority in the form of petty laws that control the lives of countless citizens in ways that take away personal autonomy while at the same time, doing little to prevent or severely punish those who are truly violent.

I’ve often wondered why we tolerate so much intrusion into the country’s daily life from the political class.   I’m not a “golden age” libertarian, that is one who believes we’re fallen from some imagined time when government stayed out of people’s lives, and we had more freedom, but I do think there are two main factors at work today that contribute the country having such distasteful political leadership.

1. The elevation of democracy above liberty as an ideal of government.
2. Less involvement in political parties by people with healthy motivations.

It’s been said that Democracy is three wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for lunch.  Somewhere along the line we’ve gone from believing that the purpose of government is to protect liberty, to the purpose of government is to do the will of the people.  In the past, this type of government wasn’t possible, because it was hard to gauge public opinion.  Now with polls, and various other mechanisms, politicians see “Most people favor bans on smoking in restaurants.” and exploit that for political gain.  I don’t think people have ever been particularly committed to liberty, but polling lets the politicians know exactly what they can get away with.

The second factor is obvious any time you step into the voting booth on a general election day.  Since I first voted for George H.W. Bush over Bill Clinton in the 1992 election (my first election where I was over 18), I have never once pulled the lever for someone I really felt I was excited about and that I felt represented me.  Why?  I think because most people who want smaller government and more autonomy don’t really have the time to participate in politics on the party level, or vote in primaries.  A very small percentage of people are deciding who we get to vote for.  There’s no doubt many of them are activists who want to get something out of government.   Interest group politics are as old as the Republic, but I wonder today who the are the constituency that stands for liberty?   Sure, there are groups, think tanks, and what have you, but that doesn’t seem to be translating into leadership that can carry that banner.

… when they pry it from my cold dead hands:

Russia says it suffers major losses from the counterfeit manufacture of Kalashnikov assault rifles in Bulgaria. The armies of 47 countries use the AK-47 assault rifle, known as the Kalashnikov after its designer, Mikhail Kalashnikov.

About 100 million AK-47s and modified versions are believed to circulate around the world, but many of them are produced illegally.

Bulgaria’s Arsenal, whose license to produce Kalashnikov rifles expired a long time ago, displayed a wide range of counterfeit rifles at the DSA 2006 arms show in Malaysia.

Ivanov said earlier that the annual sales of unlicensed small arms on the international market totaled about $2 billion, with counterfeit Kalashnikov assault rifles accounting for 80-90% of the volume.

They are demanding a halt to all “illegal” AK-47 manufacturing. I suspect this won’t have much impact. I think the Russians are just enjoying being uppity these days. The article concludes we haven’t signed any intellectual property agreements with Russia.

via Slashdot