Dakota Meyer, Bristol Palin's newest fiance, gives instruction on how to accidentally shoot one of your children for breaking a water glass.

"Remember slow is smooth, smooth is fast." And they say this guy is not a philosopher.

All kidding aside I thought Cletus gave some good tips on how to overreact to a noise in the middle of the night.

I mean personally I just stumble around the house stubbing my toes, cursing frequently, and wielding a plastic baseball bat. But then I'm a trained professional.

Of course perhaps Huckleberry has increased the possibility of home invasion by putting his name on products like this.

And taunting ISIS like this.

Source

I think my advice to Tripp would be to try and stay with dad as much as possible, and when staying with mom use the bathroom BEFORE bedtime, use only Dixie cups for late night drinks, and for God's sake stay low.

The myth of gun ownership and home defense.

Courtesy of Politico:  

In 1992, Gary Kleck and Marc Getz, criminologists at Florida State University, conducted a random digit-dial survey to establish the annual number of defensive gun uses in the United States. They surveyed 5,000 individuals, asking them if they had used a firearm in self-defense in the past year and, if so, for what reason and to what effect. Sixty-six incidences of defensive gun use were reported from the sample. The researchers then extrapolated their findings to the entire U.S. population, resulting in an estimate of between 1 million and 2.5 million defensive gun uses per year. 

The claim has since become gospel for gun advocates and is frequently touted by the National Rifle Association, pro-gun scholars such as John Lott and conservative politicians. The argument typically goes something like this: Guns are used defensively “over 2 million times every year—five times more frequently than the 430,000 times guns were used to commit crimes.” Or, as Gun Owners of America states, “firearms are used more than 80 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than to take lives.” Former Republican Sen. Rick Santorum has frequently opined on the benefits of defensive gun use, explaining: “In fact, there are millions of lives that are saved in America every year, or millions of instances like that where gun owners have prevented crimes and stopped things from happening because of having guns at the scene.” 

It may sound reassuring, but is utterly false. In fact, gun owners are far more likely to end up like Theodore Wafer or Eusebio Christian, accidentally shooting an innocent person or seeing their weapons harm a family member, than be heroes warding off criminals.

The article points out a number of ways in which the criminologist misrepresented and extrapolated their data in order to reach such ridiculous numbers.

And then goes on to point out the following:

For example, guns were allegedly used in self-defense in 845,000 burglaries, according to Kleck and Getz. However, from reliable victimization surveys, we know that there were fewer than 1.3 million burglaries where someone was in the home at the time of the crime, and only 33 percent of these had occupants who weren’t sleeping. From surveys on firearm ownership, we also know that 42 percent of U.S. households owned firearms at the time of the survey. Even if burglars only rob houses of gun owners, and those gun owners use their weapons in self-defense every single time they are awake, the 845,000 statistic cited in Kleck and Gertz’s paper is simply mathematically impossible. 

Of course here at IM we have reported on the almost stunning number of times that guns purchased for protection instead killed or badly wounded the owner or a member of their families. 

Some of them are almost humorous, while others are tragically sad.

The facts are that owning a gun does NOT statistically make you safer than a non-gun owner, however it does dramatically increase the possibility that you yourself, or a loved one, will be shot with that firearm.

I have said it before, but it bears repeating, the best deterrent against burglary is a good dog.

And might I add that dogs are MUCH less likely to go off accidentally and take off somebody's finger. I am not saying it doesn't ever happen, just that it is much less likely.

Gun nut, and conservative talk radio host, learns that the dog provides more security than the 2nd Amendment.

So apparently this Tammy Bruce woman had a home invader the other day.

She tweeted the entire thing.

I think my apartment is haunted. Seriously.
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Then her dog, Syd, started to act a little nervous.

Oh great, Syd's now *growling* into the living room! :(
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Hmm, Syd's now barking at *the floor.* There's a basement here. Calling police...
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Cops on the way. Syd's growling at the floor. I sure hope someone's in the basement. The alternative is a shack exorcism...
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Talked to bunch of officers, they're now heading to basement's outside door...
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Syd's barking at the floor again, cops yelling something...
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Oh freaking jeez, SOMEONE'S IN THE BASEMENT FOR SURE!!
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

As it turned out it was a homeless person who found the door unlocked and decided to make himself at home.

There was no indication that he wanted to do either the home owner or the dog any harm, but still it is a frightening situation.

Afterward Tammy Bruce tweeted this.

Tweeps, if you live alone having a firearm is good but it won't warn you about the #jerk in the basement. Yay Syd! pic.twitter.com/NeaDNV9fjP
— Tammy Bruce (@HeyTammyBruce) April 13, 2014

Exactly!  I have little doubt that Bruce had weapons in the house, as she is always going on about gun rights. However her revolver certainly could not have picked up on the fact that there was somebody inside her home, who may have wanted to do her harm. For that she needed Syd.

In fact with her dog, Bruce really did no even NEED to get her gun.

The dog alerted her to the danger. She called the police, The police arrested the vagrant. And nobody had to get shot.

In other words this is the kind of situation that the NRA NEVER wants to see take place.

So the moral of the story is that maybe owning a firearm will make you feel safe in your bed at night, but a good dog will ensure that you ARE safe in your bed at night.

The 2nd Amendment 2.0. If Georgia ordinance passes it would no longer be your 'right" to bear arms, instead it would be your "responsibility" to do so.

Courtesy of Mediaite:  

Could not exercising the right to bear arms mean breaking the law? 

In the north Georgia city of Nelson, that may be the case if a proposed ordinance, requiring every “head of household to own and maintain a firearm,” is passed. The city councilman, Duane Cronic, argued that relying on sheriffs isn’t sufficient. 

“It’s a deterrent ordinance,” he said. “It tells the potential intruder you better think twice.” ]

The proposal is similar to a 1982 law passed in Kennesaw. Supporters of the ordinance cited the city’s location, straddling two counties, arguing that leads to slower response times from officials. 

One police officer patrols Nelson, Georgia for eight hours during the day. That leaves 16 hours overnight when the city is basically unguarded. “When he’s not here we rely on county sheriffs–however it takes a while for them to get here,” said Nelson City Councilman Duane Cronic.

Do these people NOT understand the concept of "freedom?" 

You would think that if the Teabaggers found the idea of laws that restrict the kinds of guns one can own, and that demand those gun owners not be criminals or mentally ill, invasive that they would certainly not want to support laws that would make it illegal not to own one either.

That is your Right Wing logic at work for ya there folks.

By the way let me tell you what results from demanding an increase in the number of weapons in your city. It does NOT reduce the number of burglaries, instead it increases them, because now that the thieves know that easily fenced handguns are in EVERY single home, they know that every break in results in a jackpot for them.

Unless these gun owners are supposed to sit in a chair on their front porch brandishing their weapons 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the thieves only have to bide their time. You have to go to work, and school, and out to eat sometime.

However a good dog, and an alarm system backed up by a reputable company, would make their house one of the least likely to fall prey to the criminal element. Of course it would also be wrong to legally mandate either of those, in case anybody was wondering.

It should come as no suprise that the 'facts" presented by pro-gun advocate, Gayle Trotter, in her testimony before the Senate do not hold up to scrutiny.

Courtesy of Salon:

Gayle Trotter, a senior fellow at the conservative Independent Women’s Forum, made an appearance on Wednesday to pink up the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on gun violence. 

“Guns make women safer,” she testified. “Using a firearm with a magazine holding more than 10 rounds of ammunition, a woman would have a fighting chance even against multiple attackers.” 

But Trotter is wrong about women and guns, dangerously so. Far from making women safer, the presence of firearms in situations of domestic violence (which occur far more frequently than any other crime in the United States, Trotter’s “stranger danger” scenarios be damned) dramatically increases the likelihood a woman will be killed by her abuser. As Amanda Marcotte reported for Slate, the Violence Policy Center conducted research to quantify this point and found that 83 women were killed by an intimate partner for every woman who used a gun in self-defense. 

Trotter added that, “Scary-looking” guns give women “more courage” when “fighting hardened violent criminals.” Here is something else that “scary-looking” guns do to women: Coerce, threaten and intimidate them into remaining in abusive, often deadly, relationships. 

According to a recent study on firearms and intimate partner violence, “Even when guns are not fired at women directly, they are often used as a tool of intimidation to facilitate other types of physical and psychological violence,” with many women reporting that their abusers would “clean” their guns during arguments.

Yeah my BS detector was going insane as I watched this woman's testimony.

You know your Uncle Gryphen used to be self defense instructor back in the day, and this issue of guns came up more than a few times.

So let me tell all of you what I told my classes back then. 

If you want an effective form of home defense, get a dog. It does not even have to be a big dog, just one that will bark it's ass off at the sound of somebody breaking in.

Most burglars obviously don't want to get caught, and the barking of a dog is going to alert the people in the home to wake up and be aware of what is happening. And to call the cops. And, as far as they know, grab a gun.

You don't necessarily have to own a gun to make somebody afraid of getting shot, or even perhaps of having their ball sack ripped off by an angry, defensive animal.

I am an advocate of alarm systems as well. I have one myself.

Really the idea is to prevent a burglary, or home invasion, in the first place. Make it seem challenging, and not worth the effort, and most likely it will never happen.

But I will tell you what WILL attract a burglar. One of those big glass display cases filled with guns, that's what! Having that on display does NOT deter a burglar, that is catnip to a burglar:

Firearms are a favorite target of most burglars. They can be sold on the illegal market or used to commit other crimes. Most people do not properly secure their firearms. 

Unsecured fired arms are a burglars dream. Residents place them in closets, drawers or under beds. The seasoned burglar has seen all this before. They know where the uninformed will hide firearms. 

When the NRA talks about criminals having guns, this is what they are talking about. 

The bad guy does not have to sweat a background check. All he has to do is let the gun enthusiast go through all the paperwork, and then break in and steal the very weapons that he bought to "feel safe."

Happens every day.

You know Fido may not have an extended clip or hollow tip bullets, but he will also never be picked up and used to injure his owner. I'm just saying.