Fish Fear Me

We Can Do Better...

...we have to do better than this:

The U.S. Air Force didn’t report Texas church shooter Devin Kelley’s domestic violence conviction to the FBI -- even though it was required by the Pentagon -- leaving the door open for Kelley to buy weapons, officials said on Monday.

Kelley’s conviction wasn’t submitted to the FBI’s Criminal Justice Investigation Services Division for inclusion in the National Criminal Information Center database that is used to conduct background checks on would-be gun purchasers, Air Force spokesperson Ann Stefanek said.

It would be dismaying enough if that was one-off failure, but it appears the problem is systemic and the Department of Defense has known about it for two years:

The Air Force’s failure to report Texas church shooter Devin Kelley’s domestic violence conviction to the FBI -- a misstep that left the door open for Kelley to buy weapons -- is a systemic issue in its criminal investigations unit, according to a 2015 Pentagon analysis and a former Air Force agent who spoke to Fox News.

The 2015 Department of Defense Inspector General report analyzed a sample of 1,102 convictions, including felonies, handled in the military court system and found the Navy, Air Force and Marines failed to send criminal history or fingerprint data to the FBI in about 30 percent of them.

It's impossible to say for sure what that monster would have done if the system had denied him his weapons purchases. Maybe he would have done something worse. But maybe the alert that he was illegally attempting to buy weapons would have triggered some intervention and 26 people would be alive today. Unfortunately, the problem goes far deeper than the Department of Defense.

There are other issues with felon reporting from state and local governments. Then there are even more issues with the mental health reporting that we've known about for more than a decade since the Virginia Tech shooting. Some progress has been made by groups such as FixNICS, but more needs to be done. One hopeful note is the increase in federal gun crime prosecutions this year.

Executing and enforcing the gun control laws and systems that already exist should be something of a no-brainer and uncontroversial. 

We can, and have to, do better.

Missed It Again

I think Nicholas Kristoff is being mostly sincere in his attempt to bridge the gap between most gun owners and gun control advocates today in the NY Times, but he still falls far short, for reasons that start in the very first paragraph:

FOR those of us who argue in favor of gun safety laws, there are a few inconvenient facts.

The first inconvenient fact is the use of the term "gun safety," which gun owners immediately recognize as a euphemism for "gun control." Sure enough, Kristoff openly espouses the change in language a few paragraphs later:

Let’s also banish the term “gun control”: the better expression is “gun safety.”

No, it's not a better expression, it's a perversion of clear language and more proof of the dishonesty and ill-intent of the gun control crowd. "Gun safety" means the proper handling, maintenance, and storage of firearms. Keeping guns out of the hands of those ineligible to own them is not about gun safety, in all cases it's about gun control. I think Kristoff and other gun control advocates think they are being clever in resorting to euphemism, but it just makes them look like assholes to gun owners who are diligent in practicing real gun safety.

I give Kristoff credit for acknowledging some myths about assault rifles and open/concealed carry, but then he falls right back into "stuck on stupid" mode with universal background checks:

One of the puzzles of American politics is that most voters want gun regulation, but Congress resists. One poll found that 74 percent even of N.R.A. members favor universal background checks to acquire a gun.

It's not a puzzle at all to people who are paying attention, because it all depends on how "universal" is defined. If it is defined in the true sense of the word, one can't sell to or let a close family member borrow a gun without a background check. For most of us that's ridiculous, of course, and so support drops. For many, a background check for non-immediate family seems ridiculous too, so the "not so universal" reality grows. Then there are longtime friends and colleagues that would be required to undergo background checks, and so support drops some more. The truth is there has never been nearly as much support for "universal" backgrounds as gun control advocates claim.

And a note on the dishonesty of that 74 percent number Kristoff cited above. Politifact Wisconsin calls it "True," but notes the number comes from a 2013 Johns Hopkins poll of 2703 adults, of whom 169 self-identified as NRA members. I'm not even going to bother with finding out how the questions were worded, as claiming to know the attitudes of more than 4 million people based on such a ridiculously small sample of non-vetted respondents is essentially a lie.

And one more example of how dishonest gun control advocates often are, and why gun owners don't take them on their for anything. Anything.

At least Kristoff has the courage to bring up youth programs and outreach that might attempt to address the real problem with gun violence, which is mainly among poor and urban teens and young adults. That is progress of a sort.

So nice try, Nick, but overall your hackery and ignorance has done you in once more. Please try again, but next time, if you truly want to try to bridge the gap, talk to someone on the Second Amendment rights side who can tell you where you go off base. And then listen to them.

 

Great Moments In "And They Wonder Why We Won't Let Them Take Our Guns" (continued)

@michaelbd No, pretty easy for me. I take an old-school Jacobin-style line that religion should be stamped out.

— Matt Yglesias (@mattyglesias) August 29, 2013

On And On It Goes

Another mass shooting and the all too predictable aftermath. At times I wonder if Satan sets these lunatics off and then sits back and gleefully munches popcorn while we tear at each other like starved wolves. 

One would have to have a heart of stone not to be touched by watching the grief stricken father of Christopher Martinez, but he's mostly wrong here:

"Why did Chris die?" he screamed. "Chris died because of craven, irresponsible politicians and the NRA. They talk about gun rights. What about Chris' right to live?"

Chris died because a lunatic shot him, but also because the politics of gun control didn't give the lunatic's family, doctors, and law enforcement the tools that might have stopped him, even though they came heart-breakingly close. However, it's not fair to just blame the politicians, because we the people are the ones who are deeply polarized and kind of stuck on stupid here. Our politicians simply reflect that.

I've watched that lunatic's last video and I've read the tail end of his "manifesto" that details his grotesque plans. He was one very sick but determined individual, one who was going to go on a rampage one way or another.

Now, we always seem to assume that if some crazy person was denied access to guns he will simply choose a less deadly method to carry out his plot. Not this guy, he would have gone bigger. I can't prove it, but read what I did if you have the stomach and tell me if you think I'm wrong.

This is an important point that is getting lost in all of the screaming about gun control, but that's what always happens after mass shootings. The gun grabbers hijack the conversation and start screaming about the NRA. The gun rights crowd screams back with arguments that are, sadly, becoming less and less paranoid. And a significant chunk of the public screams "DO SOMETHING," even if they don't know what "SOMETHING" is or if it will make a difference, before they quickly slip back into their normal self-obsessed stupor. The end result is a lot screaming and little or no lessons learned, and consequently no truly effective policies.

Sorry to be so cynical, but that's what is happening again. And it's the reason, in part, that Chris Martinez is dead.

From the Department Of Lies, Damn Lies, And Statistics

Michael Bloomberg is at it again:

Billionaire Michael Bloomberg announced Wednesday that he's pumping $50 million into a new umbrella gun-control group that will include "robust" field staffs in at least a dozen states, including Oregon and Washington.

The former mayor of New York, Bloomberg announced the merging of two organizations he has funded, Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, into an organization called Everytown for Gun Safety.

Of course, the "Get big money out of politics" crowd rose up in outrage over this. Er, any time now. Uh...(crickets chirping). Well, maybe not. Could it be that all of those people complaining about money in politics just hate the big money on the other side?  

Bloomberg's effort is doomed to fail and once again leave gun control advocates frustrated and befuddled, just like Joe Biden's asinine efforts a year ago. And for the same reasons. A quick look at the "Learn" tab of the new website shows why.

The first thing that greeted me there was "Americans are 20 times more likely to be murdered with a gun than people in other developed countries." What a shocking number. No wonder Americans go about their day in mortal terror, zigzagging as they sprint from place to place, desperately praying that they aren't gunned down in cold blood.

Or not. 

As I noted over a year ago, in the wake of the Newtown shooting, a hugely disproportionate amount of gun violence and murder in this country takes place in a very distinct and geographically small set of urban areas around the country. When that's taken into account, the rest of America's homicide rate drops dramatically and in many areas is even less than that of some European nations. For the vast majority of Americans, "20 times more likely" is hysterically false, and many of them realize it.

The flip side, of course, is also true. By mushing all of America together when it comes to gun violence and murder, Bloomberg and friends not only make 99% of America appear to be more violent than it really is, they end up obscuring and downplaying just how ultraviolent those bad neighborhoods really are. "20 times more likely?" A gun murder rate 30 times that of Europe in those areas would be a huge improvement, let alone a rate that is way down with the rest of the nation. How fuzzing all that up could possibly help the people bearing the brunt of gun violence in this country is a mystery to me.

Here's another piece of deceit:

"Surveys show that 92 percent of Americans—including 82 percent of gun owners and 74 percent of NRA members—support criminal background checks for all gun sales."

It's true that the general concept of "universal" background checks polls very well. What Bloomberg and friends won't tell you is that consensus falls apart the minute you start defining "universal" into something meaningful and effective.

"You want to include my family?" Boom, support takes a plunge. "You want to include my next door neighbor?" Boom, support takes a plunge. "You want me to get a background check on my coworker if I loan him one of my shotguns for a few weeks in the fall?" Boom, support plunges. And if you try to win back support by making exceptions, you may have enhanced background checks, but only a liar would call them "universal" anymore.

I could go on and on. Don't even get me started on the utter stupidity behind the effort to ban "assault" weapons.

I think there are a lot of well-meaning people who sincerely want to do something effective about gun violence who get side-tracked by gun banners like Bloomberg(Yes, I think that's his real goal). They buy into the bullshit without really thinking about it and then are baffled and angry when nothing happens. Well, nothing happens, and all that energy is wasted, because the entire effort is founded on falsehoods and deception. This latest from Bloomberg is no exception.

If we want to do something about day-to-day gun violence in America we have to be willing to face up to the social and cultural pathologies at work in the neighborhoods that see the highly disproportionate amount of that violence. Just cutting the gun murder rate in half in those neighborhoods would save thousands of lives each year. But that would be a difficult and painful task and our political elites are clearly not up for it. Half of them are too dishonest to properly define the problem and the other half are scared shitless of being called racists.

If we want to do something about mass killers we need to learn the lessons from their actions and implement policies that might have a chance of actually preventing future killers from carrying out their plans. Instead of that, after Newtown we were greeted with the spectacle of Joe Biden gathering and presenting all sorts of gun control wish lists, none of which would have prevented the Newtown shooting or the next mass shootings down the line. There's no magic bullet here either, but once again our political elites are nowhere close to being up to the task.

It's a free country, so Bloomberg can waste his $50 million if he wants. Apparently there's going to be a Minnesota chapter of Everytown for Gun Safety at some point and I look forward to engaging them down the road, if they'll be open to an honest discussion. Based on the website, I strongly doubt it.

Mike Lupica And The NY Daily News: Synonyms For "Epic Fail"

As bad as it gets sometimes, only rarely do journalism and punditry sink to this level of hysterical foolishness:

Mike Lupica chimed in with this:

Lupica: AR-15 is the rifle for the 'sport' of hunting humans

They call semiautomatics like this sport rifles. You bet. Mostly for the sport of killing innocent people, and killing them fast.

It turns out that reports of the shooter using an AR-15 style rifle were false. According to the FBI he used a shotgun and then took a pistol off of a security officer he shot. There's now a note above Lupica's rant explaining that he wrote it when "reputable law enforcement sources" were saying the shooter used an AR-15. Maybe, but I bet those weren't "official" law enforcement officials who were authorized to speak to the media.

Everybody knows that initial reports are almost always wrong to one extent or another. The prudent thing to do before jumping in with both feet would be to wait for official confirmation. But journalistic malpractice comes easy to close-minded people who are eager to push their agenda. I might cut them some slack if they didn't have a history of deceiving their readers on multiple occasions. 

And to Lupica's point, estimates vary widely, but there are millions of AR-15s or similar variants in the hands of the US public. According to the FBI, in 2012 all rifles combined(meaning tens of millions more) accounted for 322 murders out of 12,765.

"Mostly for the sport of killing innocent people, and killing them fast," eh? No, not even close. 

I'm open to listening to gun control advocates who sincerely want to examine options for helping to end, or at least reduce the likelihood of mass shootings. But people like Lupica and his editors actually lesson the chance of finding common ground when they spew out this sort of ignorance and vitriol.

More: CNN tries to match them with this:

The AR-15 is a semi-automatic rifle, which is vastly different than a shotgun. I've said this before and I'll say it again: If you want to have anything you say in the gun debate dismissed out of hand, make an egregious mistake like the one pictured above and then compound it by refusing to understand why it matters. 

From The Department of "Gee, What Could Go Wrong?"

This, if it actually takes place, is destined for the Stupid and Futile Gesture Hall of Fame:

Libertarian activist and radio host Adam Kokesh is hoping to get 1,000 people to march on Washington on July 4 -- armed with loaded rifles. The plan, launched with a Facebook group today, is to gather on the Virginia side of the Potomac, where gun laws are lax, and then march across the bridge with loaded rifles slung over their shoulders into the District, where openly carrying weapons is generally prohibited.

I hear registration for the march comes with a free shirt:

Kokesh claims this stunt will be an act of civil disobedience and if they meet physical resistance they will simply turn around and go back to Virginia.

Right. Of course, that's assuming that not one of his fellow idiots—and make no mistake, anybody who would participate in this march is an idiot—won't decide to start a war. What do you suppose the odds are on that? 

Kokesh has unintentionally come up with an intelligence test for gun owners and it's a simple pass/fail. I don't have much sympathy for those who fail it, I just hope no cops get hurt in the process.

Why Gun Control Is Failing

It's been two weeks now since various gun control measures went down in flames in the US Senate, prompting President Obama to don his petulance pants and lecture us from the Rose Garden. In that time I've read quite a few pieces by Democrats seeking to explain, in one way or another, how gun control could fail in the wake of the Newtown mass shooting. Some blame the NRA, of course. Some blame Republicans, of course. Some even blame Obama, but not for the reasons I'm going to cite. Pretty much all are long on self-pity and short on self-examination, so here are my criticisms of the pro-gun control side, because they are every bit to blame, if not more, than the NRA and Republicans.(This is a long one, so I'll put most of it below the fold)

Obama's poor leadership

When Obama outsourced the issue to Joe Biden, the probability for meaningful action took an immediate and negative hit. At that moment Obama signalled that it was really going to be business as usual, in other words it was going to be "inside the beltway politics." In the short term that was probably smart politics for Obama personally, but it was also another missed opportunity for him to match the greatness of his office.

He could have taken the role of an honest broker between the two sides and step by step publicly guided the conversation toward what was possible. That would have meant swallowing his own personal preferences for the moment and acting as President of all of these United States to bring both sides together. I suppose many in both party establishments would consider that idea naive, but my gut tells me the less ideological on both sides and independents would have eaten it up. Besides, isn't that the Hope and Change president we've been promised twice now?(I know, I know, that was always phony, but I couldn't resist) 

Biden's Poor Leadership

Many projects fail before they even begin because the problem and/or the scope of the solution are not properly defined from the start. I've seen it countless times over the years to the point where I can smell a looming clusterf*ck from a mile away. As I noted here and here, the problems of overall gun violence and mass killing are related but also distinct, and they have related but also distinct solution sets.

A tightly focused effort on Biden's part might have had a chance, but instead we got what was basically a free for all of gun control wish list items, regardless of how effective they would be in preventing the next mass shooting or daily gun violence on the streets.

To be fair to Biden, the Washington Post back in January noted how Obama had tied his hands somewhat from the start. Still, he wasn't just Obama's puppet on this issue. He fully embraced Obama's strategy of foregone conclusions, emotion over reason, and divisiveness through demonization. That worked in the last general election with the media covering their backs, but as shown in the results two weeks ago, it's a disastrous way to try to govern.

Great Moments In Point/Counterpoint

Point-Jim Carrey, in his latest skit attacking gun owners, the NRA, and Charlton Heston, sings:

"Charlton Heston movies are no longer in demand..."

Counterpoint-ABC's broadcast schedule tonight:

Jim, you ignorant slut. Presumably ABC is expecting some public interest in that Heston classic, first released almost 57 years ago. Meanwhile, you'll be lucky if your "work" isn't forgotten the next Thursday after you kick. Really, Jim, you should keep your fights down in your own weight class. It's sad to see someone so easily owned, and by a dead man at that.

Details On Sandy Hook

Connecticut State's Attorney Stephen J. Sedensky III released some documents and issued a statement regarding the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School last December. It is important to read the statement and not rely solely on the documents because further investigation has proven that some of the stated facts in the warrants issued immediately after the shooting were incorrect. Unfortunately some of that incorrect information is being repeated in news stories today.

For example, here are a couple of corrected items:

Subsequent investigation revealed that shootings took place in two of the classrooms, not three, and that the shooter was not wearing a bullet-proof vest...

The claim that the shooter was wearing a bullet-proof vest has been used by some gun control advocates as evidence that an armed guard, police officer, or other adult with a permit to carry would probably not have been effective in stopping the shooter. There may be other arguments along those lines, but we can rule out a bullet-proof vest in this case. There is a similar issue with the Aurora, CO shooter, but I have not seen anything definitive and with the case still active it may be awhile still on that score.

As far as new information, reports are focusing on the number 30-round magazines and bullets fired, but there may be something more telling in this:

Recovered from the person of the shooter, in addition to more ammunition for the handguns, were three, 30-round magazines for the Bushmaster, each containing 30 rounds. Located in the area of the shootings were six additional 30-round magazines containing 0, 0, 0, 10, 11, and 13 live rounds respectively. One-hundred-and-fifty-four spent .223 casings were recovered from the scene.

That's in addition to one more magazine in the rifle that contained 14 rounds and one round in the chamber.

The numbers don't add up if Lanza walked in with 10 30-round magazines, but any number of reasons could explain that. However that, combined with the partially filled magazines left "in the area" and not on his person, suggests that his rifle jammed at least several times.

That doesn't matter to the victims, of course, but it may be a real world data point in the discussion about the effectiveness of limiting magazine sizes. My experience back in the day with that type of ammunition and rifle was that 30-round magazines were far more likely to jam than the 10 or 20-round ones. We may still want to ban the 30-rounders, but one perverse consequence might be to make it less likely that a mass shooter's weapon would jam in an attack.  

Regardless, we need to continue to get more details about what actually happened at Sandy Hook and that theater in Aurora so we can make informed policies, not ones based on speculation. While we should spare the families and guard legal cases as much as we can, if we can't get the info to learn real lessons from actual events we are not very likely to come up with effective policies to prevent or limit the next one.