First rule of wilderness survival: Have a gun.

via WaPo

A group of seven teens learning survival skills in the Alaskan wilderness were attacked by a grizzly bear with her cub Saturday evening. Four of the teens were injured, two badly.
...
The students were participating a 30-day backpacking course run by NOLS. The course is offered to students 16 and older, according to the school’s Web site , and promises participants will “become a seasoned wilderness traveler, learning how to read a map, navigate off trail, and scan the horizon for grizzly bears, black bears, moose, wolves, and Dall sheep.” The teens were hiking without an instructor because they had reached a point in the course when students set out alone.

Yet they didn't bother to include instruction in carrying and using a firearm for defense against said bears and wolves. Can they really claim this course teaches survival skills when one of the core skills of survival (self-defense) is left out?

Of course, there are those who think it's a crazy idea to carry a gun in the wilderness.

"Common Sense" gun control works?

Surely you've heard the news by now.

Here is a quick summary on Norwegian gun laws:

• Licensing.
• Registration.
• Ban on "Big Boomers".
• Most demonstrate a need in order to own a firearm. Self-defense not accepted.
• Limits on how much ammo an individual can own.
• Safe storage laws.
• Ban on private sales of firearms.
• Ban on carrying for self-defense.
• Mandatory training.
• Ban on automatic weapons.
• Assorted malum prohibitum.

It reads like a Brady/VPC/CSGV wish list, yet it did nothing to stop the blood-thirsty maniac. That's because you can't legislate away crazy. It will be interesting to see if there will be a knee jerk change in Norway's gun laws because of this tragedy. The Fins are already preparing to clamp down in gun owners.

Tax you out of your rights? Yes we can!

Anyone who frequently engages in "reasoned discourse" with gun banners/controllers has seen this one before:

BALTIMORE -- A mayoral candidate's plan to reduce violence in Baltimore includes a "bullet tax" that he said will increase the cost of committing a crime.

Otis Rolley said he would, if elected, propose a $1 per bullet tax on all bullet purchases in the city.
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Right... Because we all know that criminals will never steal ammunition. I mean that would be crime. Not a crime like killing someone, but a real crime. Excuse me while I roll my eyes.

While Mr. Rolley is just your average nanny-state idiot, gun banners/controllers will no doubt support this idea because it supports their agenda of thinning out the number of legal gun owners, therefore thinning out the opposition to their various disarmament schemes.

Bullet taxes, licenses, registration, mandatory training... These are all designed to wage a war of attrition on legal gun ownership. To make the cost of ownership so high that no one will even bother to buy a gun or continue being a gun owner.

And let's not forget this country's dark history when it comes to taxing rights. It was done back then for many of the same reasons gun controllers/banners want to do it now.

Paul Helmke's Greatest Hit's.

Paul Helmke has tipped out the door at the Brady Camp, but he won't be forgotten. If anything, his many lies and moments of general stupidity will provide years worth of ammo for the pro-rights movement.

Here are some of his best one-liners:

"The Brady Campaign is not a gun ban organization." - Paul Helmke

Obviously bull. Assault weapons ban, anyone?

Violence in Mexico has increased since Congress allowed the federal assault weapons ban to expire in 2004. - Paul Helmke

Bull again.

"Families should not have to stare down loaded AK-47's on nature hikes." - Paul Helmke on legalizing park carry

Hoplophobic nonsense.

"People always say there are all these laws on the books. There aren't any laws on the books." - Paul Helmke

Bovine scat.

"Maybe we oughta look at adopting some of the Mexican laws here in the US." - Paul Helmke

And that is just stupid.

This will be Helmke's legacy: A bumbling, anti-gun buffoon not only ignorant of current American law, but Mexican law and the positions of his own organization. A mealy-mouthed train wreck of a man whose career is marked with legislative failure after failure (thankfully).

One thing I will miss about Paul is how funny he was. Not funny like a clown, but funny like a burning car stuck in a tree.

Good-bye, Paul. I knew you entirely too well.

Does age matter?

Reading the VPC's latest piece of agitprop and seeing it mention "that the age of gun owners continues to increase" gave me an idea. I decided to compare the average ages of the last 10 commenters on 3 anti-gun groups' Facebook groups to the average age of the last 10 commenters on the NRA's Facebook group. I would have loved to get the average age of all the members of each group, but that would have taken forever.

The results weren't all too surprising. The Brady Campaign had the oldest commenters with an average age of 55. The CSGV came in second with an average age of 52. The NRA came in 3rd with an average age of 46. And the VPC came in last with an average age of 41.

My conclusion is that even if you assume the average age of gun owners is increasing, there is a high chance they are younger than the average Brady Campaign and CSGV supporter and only slightly older than the average VPC supporter. If I were to increase the sample size, the results would probably move slightly more in favor of the NRA considering one of the youngest people in the sample was both a participant in the VPC's and CSGV's groups. Increasing the sample size would only decrease the weight that individual's age carries (unless there were more who participated in multiple anti-gun groups).

Another conclusion that can be made is that people who actively participate in the gun-debate are old in general. People my age (29) and younger had little to no representation in any of the groups. It appears the gun issue in general, whether pro or anti, is simply not a young person's concern with the anti side being even less of a young person's concern than the pro side.

So what does all this mean? It means the pro-gun side is going to continue winning. Out of all those who are passionate about the gun issue, we're among the youngest and greatest in number.

I just wanted an excuse to make a chart.