WarGamer
WarGamer's JournalGhost guns. A primer.
Seen quite a bit of disinfo out there today.
A few clarifications.
1) What IS a ghost gun?
All guns are assembled with many parts. By law, most of the parts are NOT a gun. For example, a set of wooden grips for your Colt Python is not a gun. Anyone can buy a set of wooden grips.
Right now, barrels, stocks, handgrips, sights, etc... are not legally categorized as GUNS.
For decades, the part of the gun containing the trigger, the part that makes gun go boom has ALWAYS been required to have a serial number and is LEGALLY considered a GUN.
The GCA of 1968 ALLOWS a "80% receiver" to be sold without a serial number, NOT as a gun. The laws were subsequently changed and they WERE considered guns until 2006 when the ATF said "nope, they're not guns".
An 80% receiver is the part of a gun that makes the gun go boom. But it's not able to do that out of the box. It requires machining and assembly to make it work.
2) Ghost guns are already ILLEGAL in many States, like California but the State is FLOODED with them.
Clmaping down on "ghost guns" would simply outlaw the mfg and sale of "80% lowers" but would still allow the untraceable purchase of every other part of a gun.
https://www.lawfareblog.com/legal-landscape-ghost-guns-and-potential-reforms
Democracy vs Anocracy vs Authoritarian Government... the COVID-19 Connection
I called this months ago...
Prepare for the navel gazing about the international COVID-19 response.
I've been reading a bit from the Brookings Institute and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and respected experts are starting to compare the failed responses from developed democracies worldwide and contrasting them with the responses from the "less than Democratic" nations.
They're going to be studying this for decades...
Absolutely fascinating reading that digs into WHY the US and EU struggled with COVID-19
A few tidbits:
"The pandemic is both reopening and intensifying one of the most vital debates of the post-post-Cold War era: that over whether democracy or authoritarianism is best suited to deal with new and unprecedented threats."
"Then there’s the reality that the largest Western democracies (but not East Asian democracies) have suffered the most in terms of total cases and per capita deaths. This has led a growing number of Americans and Europeans to doubt not only their governments, which is only natural, but their own political systems. How, after all, could the world’s oldest, most advanced democracies end up with countless dead from the coronavirus?"
Carnegie take on the US directly:
"In the United States, polarization affects views of legitimacy. Observance of measures such as handwashing broke down along starkly partisan lines as Trump downplayed the virus and offered advice in conflict with that of medical experts. As state governments—which enjoy greater trust levels—step into the breach, they implement widely differing public health approaches that mirror the red-blue electoral map, turning the United States into fifty case studies in governance."
https://carnegieendowment.org/2020/03/31/do-authoritarian-or-democratic-countries-handle-pandemics-better-pub-81404
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/06/16/reopening-the-world-how-the-pandemic-is-reinforcing-authoritarianism/
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/democracy-in-asia/
Trumpist IQ on Display. Jan. 6 Edition.
Something caught my eye when the first images of the Capitol "gallows" were shown...
Other than the rickety construction (Sorry, I'm a garage woodworker) the noose looked funny.
Seriously. If you wanted to make a hangman's knot, wouldn't you google it?
Apparently not.
After being confounded by the daunting task of copying a YouTube video, the constructor of the "gallows" apparently gave up and simply wrapped the rope in circles around a Coke can (or is it a bundled up t-shirt)
How does it feel knowing that 40% of the country has an IQ below that of 3 day leftover Pizza in the frig?
Profile Information
Name: JGender: Male
Hometown: SoCal
Home country: USA
Current location: Socal
Member since: Mon Feb 1, 2021, 09:27 PM
Number of posts: 12,423