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Digging Out!
(Manassas, Virginia 14 Feb 2010) The Knox Family Headquarters in the Virginia hills was socked in with the same storm that blanketed Washington. We got almost 3 feet with drifts piling to almost 4' in some places. Our electricity went out Friday night and didn't come back until Monday evening. No power meant no water (electric pump on the well,) and no heat (propane furnace, but electric fan.) The driveway is about a half-mile long and was impassable even in my 4x4 farm truck. Many trees came down and a couple of them took out the phone lines.
The storm demonstrated for us a few basics of preparedness. We have a small generator for emergencies like this to keep the water pump running and the heater fan blowing, but we haven't had need of it in years and it wasn't until the power went out that we learned that the carberator was completely shot, making the generator useless. We also had backup plans for drinking water though - a good supply of bottled water in the storage shed... Frozen solid. Thankfully we were well stocked on food and I remembered to pick up a couple of cans of kerosene so we could run our portable heaters and the gas stove-tops worked for cooking and melting snow.
All in all we came through the adventure without a lot of difficulty. It could have been much worse, but it also could have been much better with a little better preperation. From the business side, the phone lines being down was the biggest problem - that and the demands on my time trying to get things dug out. At this moment the phone company has still not made it out here to fix the broken line. They say they expect to make it by early March. Luckily they left some of their cable out here when they replaced that line a few years ago and I was able to go out and splice a section in to get us back on-line.
Now, along with trying to get caught up from two weeks on the road and a week in a snow drift, I am trying to get our emergency preperations into better shape. Meanwhile my wife has decided that the "someday" move back to Arizona needs to happen someday pretty durned soon.
I apologize for the delays in getting news posted and requests fulfilled. Now that we are back to regular operations those things should all be caught up in pretty short order. If you did not receive something you asked for, please give us a couple of days and then ping us to make sure your request wasn't lost in the mess.
As always, we thank you for your continued support.
Jeff
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Here are the Headlines and News Notes. Longer columns follow.
The Iowa Controversy - Continued
(An End to the Lautenberg Amendment?
The Federal Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit recently declared that the infamous Lautenberg Amendment, barring possession of firearms from anyone ever convicted of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence, is a violation of Second Amendment rights.
That’s good news, but don’t fire up the band just yet... (Read More)Anyone who does not hold an FFL and sells a firearm to someone he doesn’t know well is incurring a certain amount of liability. And, a bit of bad judgment could cause trouble not just for the seller, but for the rest of the gun owning community as well. There is no question that individuals have the right to buy, sell, and trade firearms between themselves without government infringement. But there are laws on the books and failing to know and follow them is just asking for trouble... (Read More)
Mike Bloomberg and his Mayors Against Illegal Guns (MAIG) caused quite a stir in the gun rights community recently when they released a poll declaring that gun owners and NRA members support the group’s gun control agenda. The poll was conducted by Frank Lutz’s company “Word Doctors.” The media gleefully reported the poll as indisputable fact while NRA and others cried “Foul,” pointing out flaws in the pollster’s methodology and challenging the results... (Read More)
(**NOTE: Please click on title or "Read More" below to see full story with updates.)
It's been a long time since we have had serious issues with NRA actions, but their proposed concealed carry legislation for Iowa is simply bad and we're taking exception... (Read More)
Giving Thanks – At An Appleseed Shoot
Thanksgiving is a time for reflection on our blessings, including the blessings of liberty and on the sacrifices our forebears made for us. With that in mind, son Brandon and I wrapped up our Thanksgiving observations slung into battle rifles on the firing line at the beautiful, newly remodeled and re-christened Joe Foss Shooting Complex near Buckeye, Arizona. As I concentrated on sight picture, breathing and trigger control, I was truly thankful... (Read More)The day of the little Mom & Pop gun shop seem to be waning. Even small shops these days are sophisticated, computerized, professionally managed businesses, but those small shops are becoming harder to find. Faced with competition from the internet and mega-retailers like Wal-Mart, Cabelas and Bass Pro Shops, small, dedicated gun shops are finding it more and more difficult to compete. Throw in the added pressure of more frequent and more adversarial oversight by ATF, increased pressure from community zoning boards and taxing authorities, and major shortages in all sorts of guns and ammunition keeping dealer’s shelves bare for months in the midst of the worst recession in decades and it’s easy to understand why a lot of shops are struggling... (Read More)
There has been a close association between sexually transmitted diseases and the military for as long as the two have existed, but the focus of this article is not Venereal Disease, but a different kind of VD that has shocked the military community and the nation. The VD which currently plagues the military and puts our soldiers at grave risk is the policy of Victim Disarmament which has been increasingly prevalent even as laws in the civilian world have been moving in the opposite direction... (Read More)
How does it make you feel when you start to walk into a business and see a "No Guns" sign prominently posted? Are you angry? Offended? Indifferent? How do you react? Do you just turn around and take your business elsewhere? Complain to the management? Just ignore it and go on with your business? The members of the Virginia Citizens Defense League take "No Guns" signs as personally offensive and they let their offense be known... (Read More)
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