Jeff and I will be at SHOT in Orlando this weekend. Looking forward to seeing old friends and new goods. For what it's worth (the jury is out) I'll be sending updates to my new Twitter account. If you're wonding what that is, look it up; I'm not sure myself yet. I'm trying to decide whether it's a fad or a trend. Such things are hard to discern sometimes. Direct messages to me will show up as a text messages on my phone. Until I start getting spammed.
Category Archives: Chris’s Blog
Chris’s Blog
While I do some of the writing chores, my main role is behind the scenes. In particular, look for updates about the web site here. We’ve added several new features recently and there are more to come. Please let me know what you think. You can reach us by following the Contact Us link in the menu.
This is an exciting time for The Firearms Coalition. We’re encouraged by the level of encouragement we’ve received so far. It would seem there’s a need for what we envision The Coalition to be. Help us keep it on the right track.
Chris Knox
Khyber Pass Gun Market
Video sent from a friend. Documentary of the arms markets in the tribal regions on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Gutsy move on the part of the filmmaker to go into this area. He obviously has connections. I'd be scared to death of accidents from sloppy gun handling, nevermind the threat of bad guys. Something goes wrong and find out just how far from home you really are. Click below to watch. I've had problems with the video link disappearng. If you can't see the link, there's also a full-screen version.
A Setback on Holder: Hatch Endorses
Orrin Hatch, the senior Senator from Utah and long-time member of the Judiciary Committee stuck a stinger in us today. According to The Hill, a capital newspaper,
Hatch said that Republicans should try to strike a cooperative tone with President-elect Obama during the first days of his administration.
“I start with the premise that the president deserves the benefit of the doubt. I don’t think politics should be played with the attorney general,” he said.
“I like Barack Obama and want to help him if I can.”
Read the entire article here. If nothing else it's troubling that Senator Hatch would announce a position without even listening to the facts, or even a discussion. If you're in Utah, Senator Hatch needs to hear from you.
Arizona Washington’s Birthday Match
Son Brandon and I are planning to shoot in the upcoming Washington's Birthday Match next month. 
The venerable match has been going on here in Arizona for the past 116 years making it one of if not the oldest continuously run military rifle match in the country.
The match is organized with four-man teams each shooting a relay. Brandon and I are half a team. If you want to squad up with us, I'll take the first two responders. If somebody else wants to put a couple of teams together under the flag of The Firearms Coalition, we'd love to have you. Send me a note via the Contact Us link.
(Gasp!) AHSA a front for Democrats!
As if this were something new…
I received a blog entry in email the other day from Ray Schoenke of American Hunters and Shooters (sic). My mail agent doesn't display graphics unless I tell it to. There are several advantages to that behavior. Some images are offensive and I'd just as soon not have them popping up in my email. But sometimes email contains something called a "web bug" which can be enlightening. A web bug is an invisible graphic character that is hosted from a machine belonging to somebody that is tracking the email. By scanning the logs, the sender can see how often mail is read. It isn't necessarily an invasive thing, just a tracking tool to see how much mail is being opened. But web bugs can reveal interesting things to those who pay attention.
At the bottom of Schoenke's latest missive there appears the following:
Web Bug from http://democracyinaction.com/dia/Trackimage?key=222298036
Going to http://democracyinaction.com/ redirects to http://www.wiredforchange.com/. The wiredforchange.com site features web kits and other online resources, all proudly flying the DLCC (Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee) flag.
As we've said more than once, truly pro-gun Democrats are great for gun rights. Be they "liberal" or "conservative" (the one-dimensional labels are a terrible measure of political position), an assumption that the Second Amendment means what it says, and moreover, that it's a good thing, moves the debate to other matters and lets other policy discussions continue on their merits.
But based on history, there's little to lead anyone to believe that the Democrats as a group have turned pro-gun, or that AHSA is anything more than a tool of the Democratic Party leadership.
Opposition Growing to Holder Nomination
I love it when a plan comes together. We're far too modest (not to mention realistic) to claim that the opposition to the Holder nomination started here, but Brother Jeff saw an opening early and it now appears that no less a political operator than Karl Rove is stepping in. Jeff started talking about opposing Holder during the first week of December. Speaking on Chris Mathews' show, Washington Post writer Ceci Connolly passed along gossip that Rove would be leading the opposition to Holder in the middle of December. The Huffington Post covered Ms. Connolly's tidbit and included a YouTube link here. Gist of the story:
"Word on the street is that Karl Rove is going to be helping lead the fight against Eric Holder when his nomination for Attorney General heads up to the Senate," she said.
Two days earlier, Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Patrick Leahy accused Rove of the same behind-the-scenes shenanigans when his office released a lengthy statement decrying the hypocrisy of the GOP's Holder criticisms.
Jeff has been agitating against the Holder nomination since the rumors of a Holder nomination started flying, back around Thanksgiving, as a way to demonstrate to the Obama Administration — and to the squishy Republicans, for that matter — that gun owners have not hung it up. At the time I thought it was a great idea, but I feared the Republicans were so demoralized that they'd fall on their sword rather than fight. Now it appears that there's some fight left in the Republicans after all.
Hopefully, the NRA will also weigh in to oppose the Holder nomination. We'll be following this one closely.
Mumbai — As Seen From England
Mumbai — A Perspective From England
Long-time friend of my father Derek Bernard periodically sends out his thoughts on gun ownership and the law. He lives in England. It's a relief to know that in Mother England, the torch of liberty is not quite extinguished. American gun owners have only to look to England and Australia to see what can happen to our gun rights.
Derek sends good stuff which I will start posting. If you'd like to receive his updates directly, drop me a line here. With his latest he forwards an op-ed piece written by another English friend of Dad's, Richard Munday. The published version appears was published in the Times of London and appears here. Being the provincial colonist that I am, I had never heard of the Tottenham Outrage, which happened a hundred years ago this January. I was also unaware of just how well-armed Edwardian England was, much less India. It doesn't look like the change is what you'd call progress.
Of course, the Mumbai incident could happen in London. Or Paris. Or New York. Or Boston. But it might have a different outcome in Miami or Atlanta or Phoenix. At least I would hope so.
–Chris Knox
Obama Questions Appointees’ Gun Ownership
A Yahoo! news story indicates that potential Obama Cabinet appointees are being questioned about their gun ownership. According to the story, the questionnaire asks (http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20081120/pl_politico/15835) “Do you or any members of your immediate family own a gun? If so, provide complete ownership and registration information. Has the registration ever lapsed? Please also describe how and by whom it is used and whether it has been the cause of any personal injuries or property damage.”
We have counselled calm but alert watchfulness. It looks like Obama and company intend to give GunVoters something to watch for. The mindset the question reveals is worth exploring. It asks whether the gun — an inanimate piece of pig iron — was the cause of personal injury or property damage.
Get Ready to Party Like It’s 1989
Remember the mass demonstrations of the late 1980's up to the time that Bill Clinton signed his (and Joe Biden's) infamous "assault weapon" ban? The largest demonstration was in Columbus, Ohio on May 20, 1989. Police estimated the crowd at 22,000. In Phoenix crowds were estimated at above 10,000 (wishful recolleciton on my part – Chris) nearly 3,000, this on a mid-June day when the temperature would eventually rise to well above 105. It occurred to me that it would be a good idea to start gearing up for such demonstrations again. Hoping to provide some inspiration, I started digging around the Web for pictures. I am appalled to report that I could find no pictures of any pro-gun demonstration of the late 1980's. None. Zip. Nada. Google couldn't find an image, neither could Yahoo! It's as if Winston of 1984
It's time to get ready for a reprise.
I well remember how uncomfortable gun people seemed to be coming out and marching with signs. They were strangely quiet, for a demonstration. Certainly they were well-mannered. Parks where the demonstrations occurred tended to be cleaner after the demonstration than before. Frankly, demonstrating in the street is not something that gun people take to easily. So let's start preparing the ground.
If you have pictures from one of those demonstrations from the late 1980's and early 1990's, put them on the scanner. Don't have a scanner? Go to the nearest copy store or even to a drug store. Then post those photos to Flickr, Shutterfly, Picasa, PhotoBucket, or wherever you store your pictures, and send me a link. Send a link to every gun blogger you know. Send a link to me. Post it on your favorite forum. Spread 'em around. It's time to kick off the Great Virtual March for Gun Rights of 2008.
The Election
As I write this, John McCain is giving his concession speech. No love lost for him here, but I frankly would rather have seen him in than Barack Obama. But what's done is done. No literate gun owner should have any illusion that Obama has any respect for the Second Amendment. What he does respect, however, is the power of the GunVoter bloc. The Democrats, victims of the wrath of GunVoters from 1994, are wary of the vote of the gun-owning community. Contrast that to the Republicans, who have so often courted the gun vote, but have so seldom delivered on their promises of support for the Second Amendment. We have entered a perilous time for the Second Amendment. We'll know better where we stand when the term starts in January.
It's certain that a reinstatement of the Clinton "assault weapons" ban will be introduced. What happens after that will tell us a great deal about whether the Democrats believe GunVoters still inspire respect. If the bill is consigned to a committee, and languishes there, it means they remember. If, however, the bill comes rolling out of committee and to the floor, we are in for a long hard slog.