A few days ago, I argued that the right to bear arms protected minorities from persecution. Hardly an original thought. But one well worth repeating. And not as uncontroversial as it seems. For we now have a Florida preacher set on burning the Koran, and every media report going (and there are thousands) points out that Pastor Terry Jones says he’s packing heat. Today’s tampabay.com: ”Inside, Jones, 58, remained behind his plain desk, most of his face masked by a thick, sculpted gray mustache that rose almost to his sideburns. If he was armed, the gun wasn’t showing. Behind him on the wall was a gun range target. Next to it was a head of death in a Middle Eastern headdress. The target’s bull’s-eye focused on the figure’s chest.” What’s wrong with this picture?

For one thing, journalists John Barry and John Pendergraft forgot to mention that Death is wielding an AK-47 [see: above]. Obviously, most Americans would be hugely offended if an American Islamic religious leader displayed a poster of Death in an American Army uniform with a target on his chest. As odious as it sounds. wouldn’t that poster be protected under the First Amendment right to free speech?

Maybe it shouldn’t be. Perhaps there’s some law against treason or sedition that would outlaw it. But Jones’ book burning is hardly equivalent to this theoretic anti-American soldier poster. The mustachioed Gainesville resident’s not encouraging his flocklet to “target” Muslims. As far as we know, Jones isn’t calling for an anti-Muslim jihad—I mean crusade. He’s burning a book for Christ’s sake. Literally.

Not only are books so 2000 and late, but they’re not sentient beings. If ever there was an example of acceptable free speech and doing what you please on your own property (like, say, building a mosque), burning a book is it. Unless of course, it violates some EPA rule. Anyway, guns.

Jones has made no secret of the fact that he’ll be armed at the book burning. TTAG contacted reporter John Barry on the firearms front. Barry told us that the two associate pastors named in his article were both wearing .40 caliber pistols in hip holsters. Open carry, then. Well, wouldn’t you?

The FBI and Gainesville police have asked him not to allow crowds on the lawn. Whoever comes will be kept near the street, about 30 yards from the burning. Sapp said they have no idea what kind of crowd to expect. “It could be five, it could be 5,000,” he said.

While the police presence at the book burning will be significant, the odds of violence are high. In fact, one wonders if Pastor Jones would have embarked on this idea if he didn’t have access to, and knowledge of, firearms.

I’m sure there will be those who will say that’s a bad thing. And if Pastor Jones had real faith, he’d go into this Koran burning deal unarmed. But he does have faith: in a country founded on the free expression of ideas, no matter how unpalatable they may be to mainstream society. A country with a Second Amendment right to bear arms to help guarantee the First.

That said, Jones seems a little . . . off. And we don’t know his opinion on his constitutional right to bear arms—other than the fact that he and his congregation have no qualms about exercising it. And the free speech issue is hardly cut and dried.

The Supreme Court famously ruled that free speech doesn’t mean you can shout fire in a crowded movie house. Pardon the pun, but this demonstration is the a textbook definition of incendiary. But Florida law is clear: a hate crime has to be a crime.As of this writing, burning a book is not a crime.

The main difference between the movie house exclamation and Jones’ book burning: the movie house crowd is a captive audience. If you don’t like Jone’s anti-Islamic message, you don’t have to watch. Just as we don’t have to watch every time a Middle Eastern demonstrator burns the President of the United States in effigy. But we do. As we should.

Real Action Paintball have just released this AK47 Krinkov T68 Paintball Gun. Here’s the press release 411, via rap4.com:

This AK47 is the most widely used assault rifle in the world; we’ve taken its classic lines and melded them with the powerhouse T68 internals to create the T68 AK47 for scenario paintball and military training. The T68 AK47 is designed as the “opposing force” weapon to enhance military combat training, and for when you just want to play a bad guy for the weekend.

The T68 AK47 Krinkov features the same inherent reliability and durability of our T68 line, by virtue of being made almost completely of metal. It weighs 6.4 lbs with an overall length of 35 inches, and to replicate the real deal, pistol grip and handguard are made of wood – the T68 AK47 is made to take a beating.

The T68 AK47 can be powered by CO2 or compressed air and it is compatible with any size air tank or cylinder. The T68 AK47 shoots standard .68 caliber paintballs and uses a standard hopper. It has an adjustable velocity range of 200-400 fps, with a maximum range of 300 feet and effective range at 150 feet.

With these features, the T68 AK47 Krinkov is an outstanding paintball marker for scenario players and for those you need reliable and durable gear; and best of all, the T68 AK47 is the best combat training simulations tool for OpFor.

“After almost two decades of reporting on youth gun violence, [the Children Defense Fund's] latest installment of Protect Children Not Guns 2010 makes clear that our national obsession with guns continues to result in the senseless and unnecessary loss of young lives. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that a total of 3,042 children and teens died by gunfire in 2007—a number nearly equal to the total number of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq and four times the number of American combat fatalities in Afghanistan to date. Another 17,523 children and teens suffered non-fatal gun injuries in 2007 and the emotional aftermath that follows. In each case it was a gun that ended or changed a young life forever.” Whoa. Hold on there. And teens?

Most American gun crimes are gang-related. As you might imagine, teenagers in urban areas are particularly prone to gang violence. Combining teenage gunfire-related deaths with children’s begs the question: is a 17-year-old gang banger’s death from a drive-by the same as the death of a six-year-old from a negligent discharge? As far as the CDF is concerned, yes. As far as their stats are concerned, yes again.

To their credit, the CDF’s first group of stats breaks down America’s 2007 gun fatalities into three types: homicide, suicide and accidental/unknown. Exactly 683 of those 3,042 children and teens who died from gunfire died by their own hand.

Presumably (and I know this is the subject of debate), those children would have killed themselves in some other way if guns hadn’t been available. If you pull suicides out of the equation, that leaves you with 2359 deaths, an unspecified number of which are gang-related.

Given the CDF’s focus on the prevention of firearms accidents though legal restrictions, you can understand their decision to keep accidental firearms deaths in the mix. But it should be noted that 198 children died from the negligent discharge of a firearm (or “unidentified”) in 2007. According to the CDC, 688 children drowned in the same year.

The number of 2007 gun homicides: 2161. An unspecified number of which are gang related.

The CDF’s subsequent arguments, statistics and analysis makes no distinction between children and teens; homicides and suicides and accidents. The “report” constantly conflates children with teens, and lumps all gun deaths together. Which inflates the overall figures for “gun violence” and creates an entirely mistaken impression that Americans are slaughtering their children by the thousands.

The CDF asserts that “sensible” gun control laws are the answer. States that have “sensible” gun laws have lower rates of death by gunfire. Except for Washington, DC. The nation’s capitol clocked in with America’s highest firearms-related childhood death rate: 23.7 per 100,000 children and teens. That’s seven times higher than the next most deadly state, New Mexico.

Note: during 2007, Washington, DC residents were banned from owning handguns.

The CDF report goes on and on and on. If you’re looking for all your gun control bullet points in one chart-packed document, here it is. If you’re looking for ground-breaking research or new ideas for curbing gang violence, forget it.

At the end of her Huffington Post piece announcing the “study,” CDF Prez Marian Wright Edelman asks “What is it going to take for adults in America to stand up and say enough to the violence that is terrorizing and killing our children?”

Answer: destroy the argument that says yes, children and teens die from gunfire, but we need firearms to protect our children. And to protect the freedom that we want our children to enjoy.

That’s where gun control advocates need to focus their fire: on the deeply held belief that we need guns. Only they can’t win that argument, and they know it. Not because American gun owners are pig-ignorant rednecks who cling to their guns and their religion, despite the carnage around them.

Again, American gun owners turn their back on gun control because they consider their right to bear arms vital to their personal safety and security, and the preservation of liberty.

“No enemy without poses as great a threat as the gun enemy within,” Edelman concludes.

If only that were true. And as long as the CDF thinks that way, theirs is a lost cause.

Adam Deciccio from the American Firearms School reckons the new Chiappa Rhino’s trigger is a bit . . . funky. On the [more] positive side, he says the gun reduces muzzle flip and felt recoil. After firing it again, I still can’t group for toffee. Maybe it’s the sights. Or my trigger control. Or the fact that 357 cartridges make a LOT of noise, which makes me flinch. Anyway, the short-barreled Rhino one big, ugly, bad-ass belly gun. And I would really like to test the 4″ version.

The media mavens at ABC need to spend a little time here at TTAG, or simply trolling the net for what are called facts. Seems The Mayors Against Illegal Guns waved a new study on the weapons used in Mexico’s OOC drug war under their journalistic snout and they forgot to ask themselves if the report was, well, bullshit. “A shocking new report obtained by ABC News says that as many as three out of four guns used in crimes in Mexico can be traced to gun stores just across the border in the U.S. The numbers bolster complaints by Mexican officials that the country’s unprecedented bloodshed – 28,000 people have died in drug-cartel violence since 2006 – is being fueled both by the U.S. appetite for drugs, and by American weapons.” Yes, it’s our fault. And here’s proof! . . .

“We can say that there is enormous violence in Mexico and most of the killing is done with guns and most of the guns used in the killing are originally from gun dealers in the United States,” said Arkado Gerney, one of the report’s authors.

The study, based on Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) data and prepared by the advocacy group Mayors Against Illegal Guns, shows that three out of four guns used in crimes in Mexico and submitted for tracing were sold in the four U.S. states that border Mexico.

I bolded that text, obviously. But I’m far from the only person who noticed that this stat, which has been bouncing around all summer, is based on guns surrendered to the U.S. for tracing by Mexico. The survey sample does NOT include all the weapons that weren’t submitted to the ATF by our neighbors to the south.

Nor does it include all the weapons that the drug lords and their thugs are using that have not been confiscated. Or were confiscated and sold back to the drug lords and their minions. In fact, how many guns are we talking about?

According to the report, from 2006 through 2009, 19,000 guns used in crimes in Mexico were traced to an original sale at a US gun dealer, and the bulk of the guns came from Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California. Texas supplied four in ten of those weapons, and the other three border states provided an additional one third.

Is that for real? Are they saying that Mexico sent the ATF 19,000 guns in the last three years for tracing? I find that number highly suspect—unless some of these guns were confiscated by the crate load.

I know! Let’s click on the link to the report inside the ABC News story and see what they’re on about. For some strange reason, ABC News doesn’t link to the Mayors Against Illegal Guns or the report.

Click here to download the study in question from TTAG. Uh-oh. It’s worse than I thought!

The issue brief, which examines previously unavailable ATF data about guns recovered in Mexico and traced back to the U.S, finds that roughly 75% of the U.S. crime guns recovered in Mexico [bolding mine] originate from the four border states – with roughly 40% originating from Texas alone.

When controlling for population, three of the four border states – Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico – supply guns recovered in Mexico at a rate three times greater than the rate of the fourth border state, California. In addition, the time between the original sale of guns at U.S. gun dealers and the recovery of those guns at Mexican crime scenes is decreasing – a sign of ever more sophisticated gun trafficking.

Again, let’s be clear. This is a study of a sample of recovered guns FROM THE U.S. Not the total population of recovered guns. Here’s commentator Van Dyke’s gotcha:

I’m shocked that ABC completely missed ten minutes of fact-checking that shows this MAIG report is bull.

From a footnote of the very report discussed in the news piece:

>In addition, it is important to note that although trace data is the best available information for evaluating gun trafficking patterns, there are limitations to this data. Specifically, traced firearms do not represent all crime guns, as not all guns used in crimes are recovered, and not every recovered crime gun is traced. In addition, not all efforts to trace guns are successful. ATF cannot trace guns that were neither manufactured in nor imported through the U.S., but that affects only a small share of guns submitted from Mexico.21

That “21″ indicates a footnoted citation for the footnote. An lengthy report by the GAO. You actually read it and you get this gem calling for clarification from the DHS:

DHS officials believe that the 87 percent statistic is misleading as the reference should include the number of weapons that could not be traced (i.e. out of approximately 30,000 weapons seized in Mexico, approximately 4,000 could be traced and 87 percent of those — 3,480 — originated in the United States.) Numerous problems with the data collection and sample population render this assertion as unreliable.

So you have 3,480 out of 30,000. Looks like a famous 10%.

Here’s another question: if the ATF knows so much about all these American guns wending their way from Mexican border states to the drug lords, why don’t they find the gun runners and arrest them?

Truth be told, Mexican drug lords can afford to pay 10 times over the odds for their weapons. Maybe even a hundred times. Anyone want to guess how many guns are coming in to Mexico from Eastern Europe? Mayors? ATF? Anyone?