Here's the one getting the teevee time today --  the "bi-partisan" anti-gun-tafficking bill. (PDF)


At first read it seems to echo what a number of us have been saying for decades: It makes more sense to go after bad guys than to get hysterical about the color of a gun -- or whether you keep your spare ammo in your pocket or a magazine.

Giggle-snort gun report

Multiple layers of fact checking and editorial oversight  at the New York Times:

Correction: February 2, 2013

An earlier version of this article misstated the type of weapon that President Obama fired in a photo released Saturday by the White House. It was a shotgun, not a rifle.

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Some years ago a teacher's wife here went public with an anti-gun rant which included a charitable bone to us blasters. Something very like: "No one wants to take away your pistols for shooting skeet..."

The nice old lady didn't work for the New York Times. But she could have.

H/T Roberta.

Loophole report in, mostly, .22 LR

Scads. Hordes. Gobs. That's a former reporter's finely-honed estimate of the Saturday morning crowd size at the 80-table loophole over in Estherville. You could imagine yourself at Phoenix or Las Vegas, trying to (politely) elbow your way to the tables.

We talked with a number of people who probably never would have acted on a vague urge to "get a gun someday" were it not for the antics of Feinstein, Biden, Schumer,  &  Obama, Inc. I wonder if those clowns really know what they have done?

The psychology may be quite simple. Tell an American citizen he can't do some perfectly innocuous thing and he will grin and do it -- if only to remind the government,  "Who the Hell is in charge around here, anyway?"

We didn't notice much traffic in assaultish-looking rifles Only a few  were there, and they met resistance at the $2,000-plus askings.

But my oh my was it a different story with the Glocks and other hi-cap 9mms made of coal tar and Gorilla Glue. They moved out as fast as dealers could fill out 4473s and call NICS. (Note to Diane: These forms and the calls are how we evade the law and loophole most of our guns.) 

At our three tables, we had no truck with the 21st Century.  Two were resplendent  with the work of Genius Jeff, the gunsmith, who displayed an assortment of Lazarused Marlin lever guns, Winchester .22 pumps, and, especially, Stevens single rifles. 

The third, mine, was resplendent with what the unkind might call junk, leftover (or never wanted in the first place) shooty stuff and other items for field and stream jocks. I often set up that way because (a) it generates interesting conversations and (b) it nearly always yields enough small-denomination Federal Reserve Cartoons to finance some pleasant acquisitions. To wit:

The long drink of water is a hi-cap (16 rounds or  more) Remington Speedmaster, probably from the 60s. Didn't need it, but for an amazingly small amount of FRC "money" and a brick of .22s, I couldn't resist something so pretty.

Miss Short is, of course, a Browning Challenger, Belgian, an early piece but I don't know how early yet. Those waggish gnomes of Herstal like to get together, slurp pilsner to excess, and giggle at one another. "Hey! I'm bored. Let's make our serial numbering system even more obscure."

She joined my arsenal for a very modest dowry, but I'm afraid I stretched a sacred rule: "It is a mortal  sin to sell a gun."  I confess to  venal error. The Colt New Police  (.38 Colt /.38 SW) lives elsewhere. I rationalized the trade  --  I could shoot the Colt only by reloading for yet another caliber. Balderdash! Too many diameters already. The Browning will be shot and shot and shot.  I've coveted one for years.

Hmmm. Lots of .22s moved here lately. At least I'm ready for a gopher apocalypse.

Saturday Wish List

I don't think I'm a compulsive wisher, but sometimes I do get a yen for stuff.

--Like being the first guy at the garage sale to spot the old wood box containing a couple of disassembled GI Colt 1911s and most of an artillery Luger for about five bucks.

--Like having three or four fools linger at my loophole table this weekend -- guys who think that my stratospheric asking prices are really quite fair. And who, of course, are packing enough high-quality trading material to back their judgement. 

-- Like having the damned Super Bowl over. Also the post-game analyses and the extended video of the winner's homie thugs getting drunk, puking, and tipping over cars when the teevee lights go on.