Smart ass Ron Conway is banking on your stupidity.

In the 2012 movie Skyfall, James Bond brandishes his trusty sidearm, but with a high-tech twist: There’s a sensor in the grip that reads palm prints so only he can fire it. The souped-up firearm saves the secret agent’s life, and in the real world, similar technology could do the same for thousands. Or so says Ron Conway, an avuncular Silicon Valley billionaire trying to disrupt the gun industry.

Speaking at the International Smart Gun Symposium in San Francisco in February, Conway exuded the cockiness of a man who invested early in Google, Airbnb and Twitter. “The gun companies have chosen to sit on their asses and not innovate,” he said. “Silicon Valley is coming to their rescue.”

Conway isn’t a gun owner, and for most of his life, he never gave much thought to firearms. But after Adam Lanza shot up an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in 2012, killing 26, Conway created a foundation that has given $1 million to inventors. The goal: perfect user-authenticated firearms.

The only problem is politics, not technology.  Ignore the fact that any legitimate fault tree analysis of so-called “smart guns” would find them less reliable due to differences that cannot be overcome with any design change.  Know-it-all Ron Conway knows what you want and is going to drag you kicking and screaming if necessary into the promised land.

On another front, president Barry is going to renew his push for smart guns, and guess whose Ox is getting gored?

While the “smart gun” element of the actions drew little attention earlier this year, critics are gearing up to fight back against the possibility that such guns could be required for government firearms purchases.

A source familiar with the plans said that type of mandate isn’t on tap right now, but critics are still worried the administration is laying the groundwork for such a move. Among the biggest skeptics are cops worried about testing an unproven technology on the streets.

“Police officers in general, federal officers in particular, shouldn’t be asked to be the guinea pigs in evaluating a firearm that nobody’s even seen yet,” said James Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police. “We have some very, very serious questions.”

Uh huh, I’ll bet you do, blue costumed one.  And one recent editorial at the Albany Times-Union believes that a mandate is the only way to go – for all guns.

Of course smart gun technology won’t cure gun violence in America altogether. But if the technology can be made reasonably reliable — as reliable, say, as an ordinary gun is today — it could prevent many such guns from being obtained illegally and used to commit crimes. It could also make it impossible for a child to stumble on to one and accidentally fire it. We’re at a loss to see anything undesirable about either of those outcomes.

The technology takes several forms that share a common feature: making a gun inoperable to anyone who does not know how to disable the security. That might be done with a code or fingerprint, technologies that are already used to safeguard things like computers, cars, homes and offices.

Groups like the National Rifle Association still will no doubt find reasons why smart guns are a bad idea. Limiting future firearms production and sales to smart guns, they’re sure to say, wouldn’t removed from circulation the more than 300 million guns already in the United States that lack smart technology, nor would it stop determined bad guys from hacking smart guns. And if it adds even a small cost to the price of a gun, they’ll insist that’s an infringement on the right to keep and bear arms.

The NRA and the National Shooting Sports Foundation already say the marketplace should decide whether smart gun technology is a good idea or a bad one.

But we all know, as they do, that the marketplace won’t insist on safety, any more than the market was keen on seat belts, motorcycle helmets, smoke detectors, or emission controls in cars or factories.

Ah, it’s literally that simple.  It’s the NRA rather than individual gun owners, it’s a matter of seat belts, smoke detectors and helmets.  It’s all so clear now.

Here’s what I think.  No matter what smart ass Ron Conway says, I don’t think he or any venture capitalist is going to invest any money or time at all in so-called “smart gun technology” because they know they won’t get one dollar back out of it.  Oh how I wish they would.  Oh how I wish someone would invest his life’s earnings in such an endeavor to “make us safe.”  It would be a good object lesson, yes?  But alas, it won’t happen.

And I don’t really believe that president Barry is going to mandate that anyone in any federal agency only use or procure smart guns.  President Barry will be out of office by the time such a mandate would take effect anyway.  President Barry is a lame duck and can’t mandate anything.  At this point he is nothing more than a court jester.

And I think the editors of the Albany Times-Union don’t really understand what they’re demanding.  Question for the editors.  Does the phrase “second amendment remedy” ring any bells for you?  Yea, that one.  Listen to me.  Any time you’re feeling froggy – any time you’re feeling froggy – you give it a whirl and try to mandate that we gun owners only purchase, own or carry “smart guns.”  See how much “safer” that makes you when the second amendment remedies are invoked.

Any time you’re feeling froggy.

Prior: Smart Guns Tag

The Sydney Morning Herald:

Australians now own more guns than before the 1996 Port Arthur massacre, according to new research that shows firearm imports hit a record high in 2014-15.

The surge in gun-buying over the past 16 years, which has seen 1.02 million guns brought into the country, has been largely a “gun swap”, according to Philip Alpers, a University of Sydney public health researcher, gun control expert and founding director of GunPolicy.org.

“The proud claim of some Australians that their country has ‘solved the gun problem’ might only be a temporary illusion,” Associate Professor Alpers will write in The Conversation on Thursday, the 20th anniversary of the massacre.

“The million guns destroyed after Port Arthur have been replaced with 1,026,000 new ones. And the surge only shows upward momentum.”

The chart above tracks the steady rise in legal private gun sales since 1999. (New firearms must be imported since firearms are not manufactured in Australia.)

The spike in 1996-97 represents the buying spree triggered by the firearm laws, as banned rapid-fire firearms were replaced with freshly-imported single-shot firearms.

Gun sales in 2014-15 were the highest on record, swelling six-fold compared with 1999, the GunPolicy.org research shows.

With 104,000 guns added last year, the national arsenal is, for the first time in 20 years, bigger than before the 1996 national buyback.

Population growth over the past 20 years means the rate of private gun ownership remains about 23 per cent lower than before the massacre.

Researchers struggle to explain who is buying all these guns and why.

Associate Professor Alpers believes the surge is most likely driven by gun owners increasing their collections, rather than more Australians buying guns.

He points to figures that show the proportion of Australian households with a gun fell by 75 per cent between 1988 and 2005.

“That suggests the people who are buying the guns are people who already have guns. And that fits into the global pattern … [of] a steady and substantial downward trend over the past 30-40 years,” Associate Professor Alpers said.

Psychologist and self-described gun control critic Samara McPhedran, from Griffith University’s Violence Research and Prevention Program, attributes the boom in firearm sales to the rising popularity of shooting sports among a younger demographic.

“I think what the figures show fundamentally is that people are interested in target shooting and hunting, and that interest seems to be growing over time,” she said.

However, others argue the evidence for this is questionable.

One unintended consequence of the post-Port Arthur gun laws was to boost the wealth and widen the influence of shooting clubs, according to Associate Professor Alpers.

The 1996 laws require gun owners to show they have a genuine reason to own a firearm. The easiest way for people in urban areas to do this is through membership in a gun club, Associate Professor Alpers said.

And not just membership but active participation. In NSW, for example, the firearm licensing regulations require members of target shooting clubs to participate at least four times a year. In Victoria, a licensed handgun owner is required to participate in at least 10 shoots a year. The requirements vary by jurisdiction.

“People who never normally went to gun clubs were now going to gun clubs and shooting ranges because the law obliged them to,” Associate Professor Alpers said.

“So the gun lobby has grown in size, political clout and, certainly, in money … as a side-effect of the post-Port Arthur gun laws.”

Such clubs also play a vital role in politicising gun owners and nurturing future ones, Associate Professor Alpers said.

For example, shooters clubs have called for age restrictions on minors firearm licences to be lifted, so children of all ages will be allowed to use weapons while supervised.

“They do that because they’re convinced … that the next generation should love guns as much as they do. It is one of their highest concerns,” Associate Professor Alpers said.

And it’s a strategy aimed at survival. “The single most reliable indicator of gun ownership is whether your father had a gun,” he said.

On the other hand, the link between Australia’s gun-buying surge and gun violence isn’t clear.

After all, rising gun sales are nothing new. “This isn’t a sudden increase. It’s a consistent pattern that we’ve seen over a number of years,” Dr McPhedran said.

“And despite those increases we’ve seen steady declines in firearm misuse.”

It doesn’t fit the narrative, does it?  In Australia, they tried ever so hard to stamp out gun ownership, crime fell, they falsely attributed it to lack of gun ownership, and we know that it is a false attribution because just as soon as they tried to stamp out guns, gun ownership began to rise again while crime fell.  It’s just a nightmare all around for the progressives.

But another very important note should be taken from this report.  In their efforts to stamp out guns, they accidentally aided gun owners in evangelizing and proselytizing non-gun owners.  This is the second – and perhaps most important – progressive failure.

Reader and commenter Fred is fond of saying this.

1. Find young, first time and new shooters. Make sure they have a good time at the range. Explain how hitler/mao/stalin/etc took the guns and killed millions. Offer to help them learn more about shooting and self defense. Rinse, repeat.
2. Make sure reps at all levels know that control/confiscation will not be
tolerated. I’m not afraid to engage my sheriff, local, state and fed reps. I
tell them exactly where I stand. Rinse, repeat.
3. Track, forward and reply to important legislative activities. (see step 2)
4. I personally do not engage the enemy directly. They are illegitimate. I stay on offense, always.

Just so.  Don’t back down one inch.  Work the people, and do it better than the progressives do.  The true gun confiscators are few and far between.  Few people want to enact meaningless bans of magazines, bans they know will bring massive non-compliance, and those monkeys who did the grabbing also don’t want to have to “watch their six” at night when they take their dog out to piss before bed.  They know we might be there in the dark.  But it may not come to this.  The great middle will ultimately decide whether we have to go to fisticuffs over the progressive wet dream of full-orbed statism.  They are leaning our direction.

This is fertile ground.  Plow it, seed it, fertilize it, water it, reap it.

America Is About To See How Guns Used In Mass Shootings Are Marketed:

When family members and survivors of the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School filed suit against Bushmaster in December 2014, it seemed a lot like a lost cause. After all, a 2005 federal law called the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) was designed to prevent people from holding gun manufacturers accountable for wrongful deaths. Even last week, when a Connecticut judge shot down a motion to dismiss the suit, experts said she was just delaying an inevitable dismissal later down the line.

But then last Tuesday, that same judge, Barbara Bellis, of Connecticut’s Superior Court, issued another ruling that determined the suit would be more than symbolic. Specifically, she said the discovery process could begin immediately and set a tentative trial date for April 3, 2018. A jury hearing the case would be historic, but Katherine Mesner-Hage, an attorney for the plaintiffs, says that getting the gun company to open its books for discovery is arguably just as huge.

That’s because she and her co-council have constructed a creative PLCAA exemption, claiming, in essence, that the gun Adam Lanza used in the Sandy Hook massacre was specifically marketed as a killing machine. As part of discovery, they’ll dig through the gunmaker’s internal company memos and try to prove that the company was negligent.

I spoke to Mesner-Hage about how the gun industry became so protected from civil suits, what she and the other lawyers for the Sandy Hook survivors hope to find in discovery, and how their legal strategy is similar to the one used against Big Tobacco in the 90s.

VICE: What are you hoping to find in discovery that will be such a big deal?
Katherine Mesner-Hage: We’re looking for documents, and we’re looking to depose key people at Remington especially, but also at the distributor and the retail level. We’re asking for internal memos about how to market the AR-15 and how to market specifically the patrolman’s carbine, which is the one that Adam Lanza used.

We want to depose the head of marketing. We want to talk to the people at the company who are making the decisions about marketing. That’s how we build our case, although the marketing speaks for itself on one level. This is our chance to kind of peel back the curtain and see what’s really going on. One of the things about discovery in general is that you don’t know what you’re looking for before you start.

Has any other case against a gun company gotten to the discovery stage since PLCAA was passed? What are the broader implications of this recent decision?
I can’t think of any case that’s gotten to the point in which discovery was open in the post-PLCAA era.

Nothing good can come from this.  As I have said before, the Sandy Hook Families aren’t entitled to that information and the case has no merit.

I know what they’re after.  As I have documented before, the law protects firearms manufacturers, but excepts cases where there is “negligent entrustment.”  I recall thinking as I read this, “this is an oddball exception.”  The reason that it is odd is that firearms manufacturers don’t sell to customers.  They sell to distributors who then sell to stores (some manufacturers sell directly online, but go through a local FFL, e.g., Rock River Arms, LaRue Tactical, etc.).

They are thinking that this exception, the negligent entrustment clause, has not been tested in court and still need fleshing out as to its real definition.  But I don’t agree with lawsuits against gun manufacturers any more than I agree with Tobacco companies being sued over lung cancer.  Evil actions such as was perpetrated that day redound to federal headship in Adam, original sin, and the volitional decision to commit wicked acts.  Marketing has nothing to do with it.

Back in 2005 when I was headed for a professional conference in Chattanooga, Tennessee, I left Charlotte, N.C. that day and headed towards Western North Carolina.  Instead of driving one of those put-put-put cars companies like to put you in, the car rental agency apologized and told me that the only car left on the lot for me that day was a brand new 2005 Ford Mustang GT.  I recalled laughing out loud to the puzzlement of the sales clerk.  Little did she know, I thought.

I drove towards Murphy, N.C., and past the NOC (Nantahala Outdoor Center), and on the curvy roads past all of those TVA dams, curve after curve after curve, in a brand new Ford Mustang GT.  It was a great day, that Sunday, and I exceeded the posted speed limit by a wide margin.  A wide margin.  But I didn’t do anything unsafe, and I didn’t cause additional risk for anyone else on the road.

Or perhaps I’m lying or simply a bad judge of risk.  If I had harmed anything or anyone that day, it wouldn’t have been a great day, and I would have been responsible for it.  Ford’s marketing of its 2005 Mustang GT had nothing whatsoever to do with my decision to exceed the posted speed limit.

And Adam Lanza is in hell for what he did since he didn’t know Jesus Christ as his savior and advocate before the Father.  I’m certain that the parents have bitterness and heartache over what happened.  But they’re taking it out on the wrong person, the wrong company, the wrong workers, the wrong objects.  They are poorly trained, theologically and philosophically, and besides that badly mistaken that marketing carbines to young males is somehow responsible for the deaths of their loved ones (witness Charles Whitman who used a bolt action rifle, the best option for his choice of locations).

These parents are in danger of harm to their own souls with this continued blame of the wrong people.  The lawyers are going to get rich, and the judge is a wicked woman and will receive her just recompense eventually, and perhaps sooner.

Prior:

Judge Barbara Bellis Says Sandy Hook Families’ Lawsuit Against Remington Goes Forward

Judge Barbara Bellis: Update On The Sandy Hook Families’ Lawsuit Of Remington

David Codrea:

I drove down from my home in Ohio to see Mike Vanderboegh this weekend at his home in Alabama. I was able to spend some time with him on Friday night and again on Saturday morning.

His appearance is about what you’d expect for a man who told us a week ago the doctors have given him four weeks to live – there’s no need to dwell on that here. After years of friendship, it was important for me to see him face-to-face, and to show him how much I valued the blessing of knowing him. In fact, grim and sad as the reason for my trip was, I told Mike I not only considered making it one blessing, but two: That there are people in my life I care enough about to make such a trip for, and that I have the means and the capability to do it.

It’s about 12 hours each way (with stops for gas and to get the circulation going again), meaning I had time Friday evening to visit with Mike, and his steadfast wife, Rosey, for a little over an hour. Mike was lying on the couch for the duration. Pain is being managed, such as it can be, with a patch. I kept the visit short, not just because I didn’t want to overdo things for him, but I was also pretty tired. I returned to their house Saturday morning, where they were joined by their loving daughters, there to help with a garage sale. For that, I was happy to see him able to sit in a chair, supervise the goings-on, and engage with people …

We also talked about the transition of his beloved Sipsey Street Irregulars blog to his son Matthew, who is off to a strong start, and I committed to doing what I can to support the continuation of the legacy.

I’m quite jealous of David, but I could have decided to commit the time to do this.  It’s been very hard and busy lately, with pressing issues at work, family business, graduations, an upcoming marriage in the family, sickness with my father, and so on.  I regret not having met him in person, but as I said before, we’ll meet in the new heavens and the new earth as old friends who recognize each other but in bodies that never get sick.

I’ve already exchanged email with Matt, and he sent me a very kind reply, very lengthy and very worthy of a long reply back again.  I have a lot of things to say to him.  I will find the time to do just that.

In Judge Barbara Bellis Says Sandy Hook Families’ Lawsuit Of Remington Goes Forward, we discussed the traitorous actions of Judge Barbara Bellis by blatant, intentional flouting of a federal law that forbids lawsuits against gun manufacturers based on potential criminal actions by users of those guns.  Barbara knows better than the U.S. House and Senate.  CNN has an update of this case.

WSJ:

But the global market was unreliable, too. In 1879, Winchester told his board of directors that business had slumped. The firm’s foreign contracts were completed, leaving it wholly dependent on the expanding but still modest domestic market. Winchester’s international business fell to just 10% of its total sales by the end of the 19th century, and purchases by the U.S. military were minimal during peacetime.

American consumers would have to make up the shortfall, but more modern guns, such as repeaters and revolvers, didn’t just sell themselves. From 1868 to 1880, according to the sales records of Schuyler, Hartley & Graham, the country’s largest gun merchant, settlers in the American West tended to choose less expensive, more durable muskets over the new weapons that could fire multiple shots.

Though some Americans always loved their Winchesters and Colts, many others saw guns as dowdy, practical tools. They would shop for them by perusing advertisements in farm-focused periodicals like the American Agriculturalist or the Rural New Yorker.

As the frontier was settled and U.S. cities grew, fewer Americans even needed guns as tools. By the turn of the 20th century, the industry had embraced the emerging science of marketing. Gun companies began thinking about how to create new demand for their products. In this respect, their business was no different from the stove or soap business.

Having started with customers who needed guns but didn’t especially love them, the industry now focused on those who loved guns but didn’t especially need them. In the late 1800s, gun companies were innovators in advertising, among the first merchandisers to make extensive use of chromolithography, an early technique for producing multicolored print. Their calendars and other promotional materials were works of art, depicting exciting scenes in which gunmen faced off with bandits or beasts.

So the marketing, advertising and exotic guns at high prices are to blame for the American gun culture.  I see.  So the solution to this “problem,” it would seem, it to charge almost nothing for guns, or maybe give them away for free.  Then I would be the only person who wanted them.  I’m good with that.  I could pretend to be Hickok45 touring Bud’s gun shop.

Forget the numerous accounts from media reports you read every month in American Rifleman about people who use gun for self defense.  They just make all of that up.  No, guns are rarely used for self defense.

Personal safety is one of the most-cited reasons to buy a gun. But a new study challenges the assumption that firearms are often used for self defense.

The Violence Policy Center found that a very small proportion of firearm homicides can be attributed to so-called justifiable situations. Just one gun death per every 32 criminal gun killings happened in self-defense scenarios in 2012, the most recent year for which data is available. And, while gun advocates argue that they want a firearm handy in their house in case of an intruder, just 0.1 percent of the justified attacks involved property crimes.

“The [National Rifle Association] has staked its entire agenda on the claim that guns are necessary for self-defense, but this gun industry propaganda has no basis in fact,” Josh Sugarmann, the executive director of VPC, which conducted the review, said in a statement. “Guns are far more likely to be used in a homicide than in a justifiable homicide by a private citizen. In fact, a gun is far more likely to be stolen than used in self-defense.”

In other news, between the years 1992 and 2002, 26 women students were sexually assaulted and were able to end the assault when she deployed her gun.

But concerning Josh Sugarmann’s position that guns aren’t necessary for self defense, he doesn’t really believe that.  He has never argued for disarming the police.

The Rebel:

When it comes to legislation, terminology is everything. Senator Céline Hervieux-Payette introduced Bill S-223 on April 12. This bill proposes to change the categorization of “non-restricted firearm” to “hunting firearm” and “restricted firearm” to “circumscribed firearm.”

A “hunting firearm” will now be defined as:

a firearm — other than a prohibited firearm or a circumscribed firearm — that is prescribed to be a hunting firearm and that

(a) has a smoothbore barrel that is more than 470 mm long,

(b)  has a striated barrel that is more than 470 mm long and that can discharge 22-calibre rimfire ammunition in a semi-automatic manner, or

(c) is designed or adapted to be fired when reduced to a length of less than 660 mm by folding, telescoping or otherwise;

What this seems to imply, is that you will be able to hunt with ONLY shotguns, smoothbore black powder, and .22 rimfire rifles.

You will not be able hunt or possess any center fire rifles for hunting purposes.

All center fire rifles might then be re-categorized as a “circumscribed firearm.”

A “circumscribed firearm” will now be defined as:

(a) a handgun that is not a prohibited firearm,

(b) a firearm — other than a prohibited firearm — that has a barrel equal to or less than 470 mm,

(c) a firearm — other than a prohibited firearm — that is capable of discharging centre-fire ammunition in a semi-automatic manner, or

(d) a firearm that is designed or adapted to be fired when reduced to a length of less than 660 mm by folding, telescoping or otherwise;

This will effectively ban all semi-automatics, as there are also new storage provisions:

17  (1) Subject to subsection (2) and to sections 19 and 20, a prohibited firearm or circumscribed firearm, the holder of the inscription certificate for which is an individual, may be possessed only at a shooting club or a storage facility recorded in the Canadian Firearms Registry.

This means that all firearms, except for “hunting firearms” and 12(6) for a gun collection, will be stored at a central storage facility.

It looks like boy beautiful and his girly followers are feeling their oats.  Okay, so let me explain for my friends up North how this should work.

You don’t face down teams of police on your doorstep.  Ever.  When they arrive, your guns will be gone.  You warmly invite them into your house, and say, “Come on in, I’m honored to have heroes of the community in my humble house.  God bless you for your sacrifice.”

You take them to your gun safe, and there they find the sacrificial gun, that cheap $400 revolver you don’t want, and not much more (a few scattered cartridges, some papers, some scattered odds and ends).  They walk out of the house thinking, “Hey, I’m glad that went so easy and that it’s over with.”

But it’s not over with.  Know who your local police are.  Make sure to let them know in no uncertain terms, without them knowing who you are, that it is all just beginning.  Make your points in the shadows, not in the light of day.  Make it clear to them that you will not tolerate infringements on your God-given rights.

If you don’t know the cops who did it because they are cowards and wore masks, note that their police colleagues supported them and let them do it.  They are all culpable now.  Make your points to all your known community police.  In the shadows.

Make your points until the police no longer want to wage war on otherwise peaceable citizens.  Make your points in the shadows.

That’s how this should go down.  Do you understand?

CNN:

“Well look, North Carolina did something that was very strong, and they’re paying a big price, and there’s a lot of problems,” he said. But he then agreed with a commentator’s argument to “leave it the way it is.”

“You leave it the way it is,” Trump said. “There have been very few complaints the way it is. People go, they use the bathroom that they feel is appropriate. There has been so little trouble, and the problem with what happened in North Carolina is the strife and the economic punishment that they’re taking. So I would say that’s probably the best way.”

What?  Really, what?

What?

North Carolina did something very strong.  Okay, was that good or bad, being strong?    We’re paying a big price, and there’s a lot of problems.  Okay, what are those problems, Donald?

Leave it the way it is.  What way is that, Donald?  The way it was before Charlotte made the decision to do gender neutral bathrooms, or the way it was after the state passed a law against cities doing that on their own?  Which way is it you like, Donald?

So people use the bathroom where they “feel” it’s appropriate.  Is that what you want, Donald?  So is it the Charlotte regulation you like, or something else?  You want gender neutral bathrooms, or not, Donald?

Oh, okay I see, it’s the strife you don’t like.  That means that you’re unwilling to cause strife by your actions, right?  Is that what it means, Donald?  What way is best, Donald?  What do you mean when you say “So I would say that’s probably the best way?”

Listen, I think your tendency to random-speak is causing confusion as to where you stand.  But that’s the way you want it, is it?  You could speak more clearly, but then people would actually know where you stand.  Hey, you know, now that I think about it, your transition from anti-PC to the non-strife candidate didn’t take very long.

It’s always nice to get linked at Survival Blog.

When demons and pit vipers hiss at each other and evil shows its face.  Burn the house down, I say.

This is what happens when you try to get a concealed handgun permit in California.

This is what happens when you try to get a concealed handgun permit in New York.

This is what happens when you live in some parts of Chicago.

Marco Rubio: I’ll endorse whomever wins.  What a weasel.  Pick a side, dude.  We all have.

The unlikable Ted Cruz.  Or not.

VDH on the moral virtue of bombing Japan.  Nuclear weapons = the greatest contribution to world peace of anything in history.

Hillary: “We have too many guns in our homes.”  Uh huh.  Then why don’t you try to come and get them?

80 year old homeowner shoots two intruders.  Wait, I thought that wasn’t supposed to happen?