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0:30

if you're a part of that, well, welcome. Settle

0:32

in. It's kind of like a bunch

0:34

of us sitting around a campfire and telling stories,

0:36

visiting, maybe doing a little bit

0:38

of mutual education. We learn a few things. We

0:40

share some info. And of course, you could be

0:42

a part of that too. If you want to

0:45

join into the conversation, give me a call, 866-TALK-GUN

0:49

or TOM-TALK-GUN. We have an awful

0:51

lot of things to talk about

0:53

today. We have stories

0:55

about Second Amendment. We have stories about

0:57

court cases. We have stories about goofballs

1:01

who think they're on our side who are misusing

1:03

guns and doing it wrong and screwing up and

1:06

defensive gun uses that are not. Things

1:10

that point out a lack of training, the need

1:12

for training. And yet I've

1:15

got one trainer

1:17

who says, yeah, yeah, I think everybody should be

1:19

required to have training before you can have a

1:21

gun. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We'll have

1:23

that conversation as well. There

1:26

are so many things going on. And of course, as you know,

1:28

we have state after state after

1:30

state has been passing constitutional

1:33

carry. What's interesting is

1:35

that at the same time, murder

1:38

rates are going down. We've

1:40

had no identifiable mass shootings this

1:42

year. So murder rates

1:45

are going down, crime with guns is going

1:47

down, and yet more and more people throughout

1:49

the country can carry guns for

1:51

personal protection without a

1:53

government-issued permit who

1:56

would have thunk it. Well, I tell you, one guy who would have

1:58

thunk it joins us right now. is

2:01

a Louisiana state representative, actually state senator

2:03

now, I believe. Hey, Blake, how you

2:05

doing? Hey, Tom, how you doing

2:07

this afternoon? I'm good. So

2:09

I'm confused. I just went to your website. It's

2:11

just Blake, me, guess, state Senate. You were a

2:14

representative of your center now. Yeah, they

2:16

gave me a promotion. I've been worked hard on the

2:19

campaign trail last year and I served nine years in

2:21

the House of Representatives. And now I was elected to

2:23

the state Senate. So we're doing great. That's

2:26

the whole no good deed goes unpunished,

2:28

right? Well,

2:30

yeah, we've been very busy. I've forgotten that

2:32

I'm a state senator because I've been so

2:34

busy passing constitutional carry and working on crime

2:36

bills and in the regular session working on

2:38

second amendment, this anti-discrimination, things like

2:41

that. And we've been, we've been busy. So I've

2:43

almost forgot I'm in my new role. Well,

2:45

you know, of course you got the crawfish cup,

2:48

this big tournament, this big mass shoot going on

2:50

right now in Louisiana. And you should be down

2:52

there shooting because you're a top level competitive shooter.

2:54

But instead you're having to work in the legislature

2:57

and protect the second amendment. We appreciate it. But

2:59

I'm sorry you can't go to the shooting, man. Well,

3:03

we'll have plenty enough time to shoot a little

3:05

bit later in the year. But Louisiana has been

3:07

very busy. When I third session, we did one

3:09

to redistrict when we did one for crime prevention.

3:11

Now we're in a regular session and we may

3:14

do a constitutional convention about the summertime under

3:16

our new governor. We ought to get a little break and I'll get

3:18

out in the range and I'll fire a few. Maybe

3:20

I'll get a few tens of thousands around them before the end of the

3:22

year if I start during the summer. I

3:25

like the way you think. All right. First of

3:27

all, you passed constitutional care. You got it through

3:29

the House. You got it through the Senate.

3:32

Jeff Landry, our new governor there,

3:35

signed it. How were you

3:37

able to get that done this year? Well,

3:41

it's been a long time coming. We've been working on it for

3:43

a number of years. The biggest advantage

3:46

that we have was getting Jeff Landry elected

3:48

as governor. Jeff and I are close friends.

3:51

We had talked about the idea of

3:53

Constitution carry it as him as an

3:55

attorney general, where his position he previously

3:57

served. And when he became

3:59

a... as governor, we

4:01

already sort of had a roadmap in place

4:04

and one we could get there. I thought

4:06

he'd make his way to the regular session,

4:08

but on the campaign trail, I thought of

4:10

the idea of this being a crime preventive

4:12

measure for his crime session that he was

4:14

campaigning on and he liked the idea and

4:16

he, he, he included it in his call

4:18

for the special session on crime. And

4:21

not only did he include constitutional carry, but

4:23

he also included the civil immunity from

4:25

lawsuits for self-defense shooting. But that was one of

4:27

the biggest advantages we had. We also had some

4:30

time under the last governor who

4:32

vetoed constitutional carry, John Bel Edwards.

4:34

We had got some time with

4:36

the legislature, legislators, and

4:39

we were able to hear out some

4:41

of their concerns and address their concerns

4:43

either by providing information or other bits

4:45

of legislation that helped

4:47

incentivize training. We also got opportunity

4:49

to see data from other states

4:51

and in particularly every Southern state

4:53

had constitutional carry except for Louisiana.

4:55

So why not Louisiana? I think

4:57

that the timing was perfect. The

4:59

stars along it, not only can we pass constitutional

5:01

carry, but we pass with the

5:04

NRA is telling me probably the top

5:06

five strongest constitutional carry purest pieces of

5:08

legislation in the entire nation. Well,

5:12

you know, one of the things I'd like for you just

5:14

to touch on is that you've been doing this a long

5:16

time. You've been pushing this and I have

5:19

seen so many people on our side get frustrated and

5:22

say, we know we got to have it all. We've

5:24

got to have a no compromise. You know, I don't

5:26

want to build it. It only gives us part of

5:28

what we need realistically. And I'm

5:30

not specifically about the constitutes to carry, but just

5:32

realistically in terms of getting things done in politics,

5:37

it actually is not necessarily a bad idea to

5:39

take what you can get and then want to

5:41

come back for more later. Is it? Yeah,

5:44

this depends what type of environment you're in.

5:46

You know, the previous legislation in Louisiana, and

5:49

I use church carry for the perfect example,

5:51

you had to pass legislation with a ton

5:53

of safeguards and a ton of extras that,

5:55

you know, pure second amendment advocates didn't really

5:57

care for, but throughout the years where you

6:00

You can prove that the other side,

6:02

the opposition side, their fears were unwarranted.

6:04

You can start peeling off like the

6:06

extra tactical training and the extra requirements.

6:10

And eventually you peel back enough and you get

6:12

a piece of legislation five or 10 years later

6:14

that looks kind of like the pure

6:16

version you wanted in the first place. The

6:19

advantage that I had going into this session was not

6:21

only am I an expert in shooting, but I was

6:23

an expert on the issue. And I had a lot

6:25

of credibility among the legislature as well as the governor.

6:28

And I was able to get it on the front end and learn

6:30

from other States. And we had

6:32

a super, we have a super majority in the

6:34

house and the Senate, and we had a new

6:36

Republican governor in this honeymoon phase, which

6:38

I have a great relationship with. I mean,

6:40

like I mentioned earlier, the stars aligned and

6:42

I said, we are going to

6:44

get a pure version. So we got a

6:46

version that's 18 years and older.

6:49

We got a version, um, with

6:51

our law of the training requirements or anything else

6:53

that they try to water the bill down. We

6:55

said, look, we're going to, we actually had a

6:57

narrative of the last decade. We're going to have

7:00

a consistent, um, set of rules

7:02

in Louisiana as it deals to gun restrictions

7:04

or gun laws and

7:06

wherever, wherever the law is in street port, it's going to

7:08

be the same in your own. It's going

7:10

to be the same in your Iberia to be the

7:13

same in late Charles. And we

7:15

did the same thing with constitutional carry.

7:17

We just changed the eligibility. We said, look, 18

7:20

years, 18 years or older,

7:22

law, bond and citizen, not prohibited from carrying

7:24

on the state of federal law, but everything

7:26

else will be the same. All the gum

7:28

restricted areas for concealed carry will be the

7:30

same. Um, the duty to inform and

7:32

you know, you can be under the influence of drugs

7:34

or alcohol when you're carrying a firearm. It all be

7:36

the same cause it's all on the existing law. So

7:38

we'll have one particular set of rules.

7:40

And then, you know, we had to get over that

7:43

training. People wanted the training requirement.

7:45

I said, no, we want training, not

7:47

a training requirement. I said,

7:49

we encourage as gun owners and as members

7:51

of the gun industry, we encourage responsible gun

7:53

ownership. We also

7:55

encourage the government providing free

7:58

training resources for us. want

8:00

if you don't want to require a training

8:03

requirement in order to exercise your second amendment

8:05

rights. That should be a voluntary act that

8:07

an individual does on his own. So we,

8:10

the governor and I got together and we came up

8:12

with SB 2, which is the first statute in the

8:14

nation that gives a civil immunity

8:16

for a self-defense justified shooting, but it

8:18

only applies to those who have either

8:21

been in the military or law enforcement

8:23

or who have a concealed carry permit.

8:25

So those are the way of incentivizing

8:27

people to go get the training. But look, if you don't want

8:29

to get the training, not, not a

8:31

big deal. You can still carry a firearm. You

8:34

just won't get this extra benefit of civil immunity

8:36

in the statute under the law. Okay.

8:38

So to get, to get the civil immunity, you

8:41

have to have the carry permit because that gets

8:43

you the training and it's your way of saying,

8:45

Hey, we're not going to require it, but we

8:47

think it's a good idea. So we're going to

8:50

offer this incentive and encourage people to do it

8:52

without the government telling you you must. That's a

8:54

great way to approach that. We're

8:56

going to, we're going to hold it out with a carry.

8:58

We're not going to force the government. I'm going to force

9:01

you to get things, but we're going to give you some

9:03

extra incentives to do things like that. And look, if you

9:05

look at my past legislation, I've also had was the author

9:07

of the Louisiana Firearm Safety Awareness Act. I found out that

9:10

state police was collecting a lot of extra money

9:12

and I can still carry permit fees and

9:14

they were using it to operate their

9:16

general budget. So I told them to

9:18

go and create a curriculum that's very

9:20

similar to the concealed carry permit curriculum,

9:22

put it online, put it in a

9:24

video format, put it free of charge

9:26

for all citizens. So if we got

9:28

to a situation where we have constitutional

9:30

carry, all these resources are online. We

9:32

also have legislation that deals with the

9:34

Eddie Eagle program for children and shows

9:36

accident prevention and up to

9:38

age appropriate, um, elementary kids, you know,

9:40

it teaches stop, don't touch, run away, call an

9:43

adult. It teaches that if you,

9:45

if they run across a firearm unexpectedly, because

9:47

we want to focus on where we really

9:49

have injuries. Look, the most of the statistics

9:51

will show firearm deaths, suicide accidents

9:53

are getting violence. Well, I can tell

9:56

you we're going to, we, we've passed

9:58

legislation and deals with suicide. my prevention,

10:00

it's in the Louisiana Farm Safety Awareness

10:02

Act. We're passing acts and prevention, um,

10:05

curriculums at a young age, elementary schools.

10:07

And for the gang violence, we're

10:10

doing two things. We're going to properly fund

10:12

our law enforcement. We're going to take back

10:14

New Orleans and we're going to, we pass

10:17

things like constitutional carry to give law-abiding citizens

10:19

the right to defend themselves, not only across

10:21

the Louisiana, but also in New Orleans where

10:23

we're seeing courjacking and murder rates at some

10:25

of the highest levels in the past, uh,

10:28

in recent years. All right.

10:30

Hold on a second here, Blake. We're talking about Blake

10:32

Meeguez. I want to take a quick break here. When

10:34

we come back on, you mentioned New Orleans and New

10:36

Orleans is trying that trick that a lot of places

10:38

around the country are over there. So we're just going

10:40

to declare most of the

10:42

city to be gun free.

10:44

That way we can just flip the

10:47

bird at the whole constitutional carry or

10:49

carry permit deal. We'll just say most

10:51

of the city is gun free. We're

10:54

going to see how well that's going

10:56

to play out. We're talking with Blake

10:58

Meeguez, state Senator from Louisiana. Gun talk

11:01

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12:54

right, here's the deal. It's not very often you find,

12:56

well, actually, it's never. Don't

12:58

forget often, it's never that

13:01

you find an elected politician, a

13:03

state senator who's also a USPSA

13:05

grandmaster and was a competitor on

13:07

the show Top Shot. But that's Blake Miguez, who

13:10

we're talking with right now. Blake, do people still

13:12

come up to you and say, I saw you

13:14

on that Top Shot show. You'll

13:18

get a lot of young folks like that are shooting

13:20

the sport, say, you know, I got in the shooting

13:22

because I saw you on Top Shot. And that warms

13:24

my heart because we're able to

13:27

advocate in a very positive manner for pistol

13:29

shooting, which I still compete in. Remember, Tom,

13:31

I'm a former world and national champion, USPSA,

13:34

IPSA pistol shooter. And I

13:37

was just in Thailand not but two years ago.

13:39

And our USA shooting team, we got a

13:41

silver medal and our place fit in the world.

13:43

So I'm still balancing both. I

13:46

spent a lot more time at the Capitol. I'm

13:48

not currently a world champion, but I'm not

13:50

too far from the top. So I like to still

13:52

get out there and far a lot of rounds down

13:54

range, but I'm not at the Capitol. Well,

13:57

I wanted to get that out so people understood who

13:59

is talking right now. Now, so I mentioned we've

14:01

got New Orleans is coming in and saying,

14:03

okay, you pass these new laws in Louisiana,

14:05

but we really hate them. And

14:08

the New Orleans police

14:10

department supervisor, superintendent, the chief of

14:12

police in New Orleans is saying,

14:14

yeah, but that just makes life

14:16

really dangerous in New Orleans. As

14:18

though the gang members, and here's

14:20

my take on it, Blake. I

14:23

think what she's saying is, you know, if we

14:25

could just label most of

14:27

New Orleans to be gun free,

14:30

these gang members who are killing each

14:32

other in great numbers will suddenly start

14:35

behaving, put down their guns, and we

14:37

won't have a problem anymore. Is that

14:39

the kind of idiocy that you're being

14:41

told right down there?

14:43

Yeah. How'd that

14:45

work out in Chicago? It's

14:47

very clear. Gun free zones

14:49

don't work because simply the fact is criminals

14:52

don't follow the law. It's only law abiding

14:54

citizens who follow the law. So every time

14:56

you pass a restriction, you pass some kind

14:58

of gun law. It

15:00

just restricts law abiding citizens. So what we want

15:02

to do is we want to put law abiding

15:04

citizens on an equal footing to these violent crimes.

15:06

And the folks that are out there committing the

15:08

crimes are not permanent holders. They're not

15:10

guys at the local range. They're criminals,

15:13

they're thugs, they're gangs, they're conducting violent

15:15

crime on innocent people. And

15:17

like I said, gun zones don't work. But if you

15:19

look at New Orleans, I can tell

15:21

you that most of the city, probably

15:23

60 or 70% of the city, is

15:26

already a firearm free zone based on

15:28

the federal law that restricts carrying

15:31

a firearm within a thousand foot of

15:33

a school. And if you

15:35

look at the map, they posted online, that's about

15:37

60 or 70% of the city. But

15:41

the federal law provides an exception

15:43

if you have a concealed carry

15:45

permit. And years back, I had

15:47

changed the law to allow concealed carry permit

15:49

holder to carry within the thousand foot zone

15:52

on public property, just right up to

15:54

the property line. So concealed carry permit

15:56

holders can carry within thousand

15:58

foot of a school. New Orleans, but the

16:01

constitutional carry folks won't be able to. So

16:04

I just don't understand their thought process, how

16:06

taking guns on a law by the citizens'

16:08

hands are going to help. I think what

16:10

they enjoy doing, and which is crazy coming

16:13

from Democrat politicians in these

16:15

big cities, is I think they really enjoy

16:17

the stop frisk. They just, if they see

16:19

a bulge in someone and they're carrying a

16:21

firearm, they automatically assume they're a violent criminal.

16:24

They disarm them and they side them. And

16:26

that's their way of fighting crime. But as

16:28

we know, New Orleans has some

16:30

of the most violent criminal statistics and that

16:33

hasn't been working. I mean, nothing's going to

16:35

stop these gangs from shooting

16:37

each other up unless you fully fund

16:39

your police departments. You send a strong

16:41

message that when you arrest folks, you're

16:43

actually going to prosecute them. Remember New

16:45

Orleans also has one of the George

16:47

Soros district attorneys, and they

16:49

don't like to prosecute violent crime. I

16:52

mean, they rather send them to a

16:54

gun as counsel. That just doesn't send

16:56

the right message. And I think their

16:58

real problems are in other places, but

17:00

again, they're anti-gun. They don't believe in

17:02

the second amendment. So they always point

17:05

the finger at the gun, and they

17:07

always forget about the actual violent criminals

17:09

who we need to hold accountable. Well,

17:12

it's not different from other parts of

17:14

the country. And you have the same gun

17:17

control groups coming in and handing

17:19

out these kind of bills like

17:21

you're seeing in the legislature, the

17:23

same kind of restrictions on gun

17:25

rights, and they'll get somebody to

17:27

introduce it. And you're seeing

17:29

the same thing now. So where are

17:32

you right now? I know this measure

17:34

got tabled right now for making much

17:36

of New Orleans gun free, but it's going to

17:38

come back, isn't it? Yeah,

17:40

I think it got deferred temporarily for

17:43

a week. It's going to come back up

17:45

and the potential in the House Criminal Justice

17:47

Committee. And it'll get debated further. And it's

17:49

really important that the second

17:51

amendment law abiding citizens and advocates

17:54

across our state continue showing up at the

17:56

Capitol to oppose this legislation because there are

17:58

a lot of new in

18:00

the House, and those members haven't

18:02

heard the whole, the testimony

18:04

about how important our Second Amendment rights are,

18:06

and they don't understand these issues to the

18:08

same detail that some of us do. So

18:10

it's always important to go testify. We also

18:13

have some women gun rights

18:15

groups that are now starting to testify to sort

18:17

of create a balance to the,

18:20

you know, the inequity that you have from

18:22

the mother's demand action, which is an anti-gun,

18:25

Michael Bloomberg funded group. And

18:28

we got to get the real facts out there. We

18:30

got to remind people how important the Second Amendment is.

18:32

We got to remind folks why

18:34

we have a Second Amendment. It's to defend

18:36

ourselves. And I love ones that also provide

18:38

security for our nation. And without it, we

18:40

wouldn't have any of the other amendments. And

18:42

I think once you get that testimony out

18:44

and you get some of the great gun

18:46

groups like the Louisiana Shooting Association, or the

18:48

NRA, or a long list of other groups

18:50

show up, they actually make a difference. And

18:52

we have a Republican super majority. There should

18:54

be no reason why any anti-gun bills

18:56

become law, but we just got to do our

18:59

part. We got to go out there and oppose

19:01

these pieces of legislation when they get offered. You

19:04

made a good point. You got new legislators.

19:08

They don't know. And they're being told

19:10

many times that, well, the people want

19:12

this. The majority of the people want

19:15

these kinds of gun control, or they

19:17

call them gun reforms or gun safety.

19:19

They reinvent the terms, but they're being

19:21

told this. So we have

19:24

to show up every time. We have to

19:26

be there in numbers. So when they look

19:28

out and they see all these people out

19:30

there who are saying, no, you cannot be

19:32

passing these kinds of restrictions on law abiding

19:34

gun owners. You got to

19:36

deal with the criminals who are not going

19:39

to obey the gun laws. If we're not

19:41

there, then you basically are giving the field

19:43

to the gun banners. Exactly.

19:46

You got to go out there and you we've got

19:48

to say our piece. We've got to have that on

19:51

testimony, but look, that's the anti-gun bills. I hope that

19:53

with the advocate support will kill those pieces

19:55

of legislation. But we've got some great program

19:58

bills in the process. I've got some

20:00

cleanup legislation and some language for the

20:02

constitutional carry bill with a strengthen our

20:04

second I'm a right team and further

20:07

allowing us to carry in the restaurants

20:09

that serve alcohol But most

20:11

of their sales are from food and

20:13

not alcohol sort of like your normal

20:15

TGI Friday's or Ruby Tuesday's or One

20:18

of those type of restaurants where we bring our families to we want

20:20

to be able to carry our Far arms

20:22

in those places as well And we

20:24

also have some legislation to clean up the immunity

20:26

statue We mentioned earlier where if you would use

20:28

a shotgun or a rifle or some other firearm

20:30

You would get the same civil immunity under

20:33

the law We also have

20:35

some legislation that deals with banning

20:37

the MCC codes Which are the

20:39

banking codes that specifically list firearms

20:41

or ammunition When

20:43

you run in your credit card that stops these

20:46

net these credit card networks are these big

20:48

banks from Basically stopping you from

20:50

using your credit card to purchase firearms or

20:53

ammunition or to track who has

20:55

firearms or ammunition And then we

20:57

also have the find Act which is the firearm Anti-discrimination

21:00

Act which basically says if one

21:02

of these large banks decides to

21:04

discriminate against the firearm ministry For

21:06

the sheer fact that they are

21:09

selling firearms or ammunition Then

21:11

they won't get the opportunity to bid on

21:13

any state contracts. So let's free

21:15

market if they want to Basically

21:18

discriminate against our citizens and

21:21

try to extinguish their Second Amendment rights We're not gonna

21:23

allow them to do it without taxpayer dollars We've

21:26

got a bunch of great croc gun bills in the process

21:29

Sounds good Blake meek. Yes. Thank you for what you

21:31

do. I appreciate everything and I hope that you Are

21:34

able to get out to the range and like you say just

21:36

expand a few tens of thousands of

21:38

rounds this year, man Well,

21:40

I promise you once we get done with this

21:42

this session and I'm done fighting for our citizens

21:45

Second Amendment rights I'll get out there and we

21:47

get some rounds down range. Look, I'm still actively

21:49

trying to qualify for the USA shooting team We

21:51

have our world competition in South Africa next year

21:53

and I hope to be a member of the

21:55

team Good be a good

21:57

luck. Thanks so much. Like appreciate that. Alrighty

22:00

that's Hawk Gun looking for your

22:02

razor force. What have you been shooting?

22:04

What have you been buying? And what

22:06

are you taking a look at online?

22:09

Red Dops, lasers, pistols,

22:11

shotgun, long range rifles.

22:13

And I'm actually buying

22:15

high end .22M buyer

22:17

ammo right now. Just

22:24

a little bit I'll have a history lesson

22:26

for you. You've heard of the shot heard

22:28

around the world, Lexington Concord. But

22:30

a day after that there was

22:32

an incident in Virginia. It's called

22:34

the Gunpowder Incident. And

22:37

it was part of why and how

22:39

we ended up with the Second Amendment.

22:42

It's gun and arms

22:44

confiscation for your

22:46

own good, they said.

22:49

Gee, that sounds familiar. All right,

22:51

I've never eight six six talk

22:53

gun, a Tom talk gun. Carl

22:55

called you. Carl, I understand you

22:57

just went to the Range Rate

22:59

Studios AR or Carbing class before

23:01

you give us the range report. I got

23:03

a question for you. Okay. First of all

23:06

is how much experience or explain your experience

23:08

with ARs before you went to the class,

23:10

please? None. None?

23:16

None. I, the closest thing

23:18

I've ever had to an AR is a

23:20

1022. So

23:24

did you bring your own AR? Did you use

23:26

one there? I went out and bought a PC, Ruger

23:33

PC 39 millimeter.

23:36

So it's pistol caliber and

23:39

brought it over there. I figured,

23:42

you know, I really need

23:44

a pistol class. But I and I

23:46

tried to get in that Taurus class

23:49

and I just, I was

23:51

probably one day too late. And so,

23:53

I I

24:00

thought, well, I'll take the next class because

24:02

I, again, I've been listening to your show.

24:05

I believe what you say, training

24:08

is important. And

24:11

when I got there, Chris and his

24:14

crew, and he's got

24:16

quite a crew, they're

24:18

all great guys. We

24:21

had a great time. It was raining in

24:23

the morning, so it pretty much

24:25

eliminated any morning shooting.

24:28

But in the afternoon, we got out there and did

24:30

some shooting. But I've

24:32

got a lot to work on here at home.

24:35

That's why I only went for the basic

24:37

class. Chris and everyone

24:40

else encouraged me to stay,

24:42

but I had already told my boss I'd be

24:45

back. Okay. So

24:47

you took the one-day class

24:49

before, they have a

24:51

two-day class, but they have a day before that.

24:53

That's kind of the real basic how to handle

24:56

it, what to do with it. So is that

24:58

the one you took, the one-day class before the

25:00

AR class? Yes, the one-day

25:02

class. Okay. It

25:05

was great. I

25:08

told him, I'll be back. I

25:11

really wanted to get down

25:13

there and see what

25:15

was going on and understand

25:20

everything because there's

25:25

a lot to learn. Everything's a new

25:27

experience, and I ain't getting

25:30

any younger. Well,

25:33

let me ask you this, because people

25:35

who grew up, like if you've been in the military

25:37

in the last 15, 20 years, you know

25:39

about ARs, you know about M4s, you know how

25:41

they work, you're comfortable with them. But

25:43

if you don't have that background, for people

25:46

who have not shot ARs much or at

25:48

all, there are actually a

25:50

bunch more controls and buttons and things

25:52

to do with it that seem foreign

25:54

to you. You

25:57

only did one day. At the end of the

25:59

day, did you feel somewhat comfortable

26:01

with your gun? Well,

26:03

yeah, it was like going

26:06

to a class

26:08

where, you know, the

26:10

way I looked at it is I have a

26:12

lot of homework. I need

26:14

to be working with my gun, you

26:16

know, basically in, you

26:18

know, ammo aside, you know,

26:21

indoors just basically working

26:23

with the sling. Chris

26:25

and the people there

26:28

set it up, set the sling up

26:30

where it would be most efficient and

26:32

showed me how to make

26:34

it most efficient. He

26:37

moved the loading knob from

26:39

the right side of the gun to the

26:41

left side of the gun and

26:45

then we got it sighted in

26:47

because basically I only had shot

26:49

that gun once before I

26:51

went out to the class. And

26:54

it's a nice gun and it's

26:56

a great class. Like

26:59

I said, I'll be back. Are

27:02

you happy? Are

27:06

you happy with that gun after shooting it

27:08

for a day? Yes, yes.

27:11

I can start off, you

27:14

know, with the 9mm and, you know,

27:16

at the same time I went

27:18

on to Brunel's and now I'm getting

27:21

all kinds of information from them and

27:23

I'm thinking to myself, I'm

27:25

thinking to myself, you know, I

27:28

could build one of these. Yes,

27:30

you can. Yeah, yes, you can.

27:32

We got a lot of videos

27:34

about that. I want to compliment

27:37

Hannah, the secretary there at Range

27:39

Ready. And I met your son

27:42

too. Oh good,

27:44

good. Yeah, Hannah. I told him,

27:46

I told him, you sound like

27:49

a gun kid, like you're 28,

27:52

29. I said, I don't think you are. That's

27:54

me. I'm sucking on the helium over here.

27:56

That's what works for me. So there you

27:58

go. Hey, look, congratulations. on getting your training

28:01

started and you understand now that's just a start.

28:03

You got to come back, but I'm glad you

28:05

enjoyed it. Yeah. Hannah Bonanno has relight to call

28:07

her more than a secretary. She's, I think she's

28:10

the person that actually runs that operation and keeps

28:12

everything going. Carl, thank you so much for your

28:14

call. I appreciate that. It's really

28:16

good to get those firsthand reports, especially

28:19

from somebody who just bought a gun, never had any training,

28:21

didn't know how to run it, walks over or goes over

28:23

there, walks in the door and says, I don't know what

28:25

to do with this thing. At the end of the day,

28:27

he's going, oh, okay, I got it. Yeah. This is, this

28:29

is good. And it opens the door

28:31

and you go on. Oh, wow. I really need a

28:34

lot more training. I mean, that's, that's

28:36

what happens to so many people. It's like they go, they

28:39

learn a lot. They enjoy the

28:41

hack out of it. But at the

28:43

end of your thinking, I need more

28:45

of this. And you know what? It's

28:47

more than that. It's I want more

28:49

of this because this is really fun.

28:52

I mean, I am learning and getting

28:54

better and mastering my, my tools and

28:56

learning how to do this stuff and

28:59

it's just a hoot and they make it a fun

29:01

experience over there. So there you go. All

29:03

right. Eight six six. Talk down or talk

29:05

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today at sigsour.com. What

31:04

do you just know it? Just

31:07

as we're about to go on the air,

31:09

I get a text from my friend and neighbor

31:13

and it's a picture. That's a couple of pictures of

31:16

him holding an almost

31:18

five pound small mouth

31:20

bass. If you know anything

31:23

about small mouth, that's a big bass, especially

31:25

up here in Idaho where the water is cold and the

31:27

growing seasons are kind of short. I

31:30

said, wow, is that like a small mouth? Is that like

31:32

almost five pounds? He says, yeah, I caught

31:34

it out there just straight out in the lake, straight out

31:36

from your house. Thanks, Brad.

31:38

Because you know that I've got to be here

31:40

on the air. Appreciate the heck out of that.

31:43

All right, couple of stories here. One is very

31:45

old and one is just brand new. Let's start

31:48

with the old one. The year is

31:50

1775. That makes

31:52

it kind of old. We talked about 249 years ago. Actually

31:57

next year will be the 250th anniversary. anniversary

32:00

of Lexington and Concord, the shower heard

32:02

around the world. That happened on April

32:05

the 19th, 1775. Well,

32:07

on the next day. And

32:10

here, oh, let's back up a little bit.

32:13

You probably know, but

32:15

in case you don't, Lexington

32:18

and Concord, the

32:20

start of the American Revolution was

32:22

about gun control. The

32:25

British troops were coming to take the

32:27

arms, the powder, and

32:30

the ball from the

32:32

colonists, the colonials. Well,

32:35

the next day, and there's a story that I did

32:37

not know about. Actually, I just picked it up from

32:39

James Woods, the actor, posted this

32:41

on X. You can follow

32:43

me on X. I am at Gun Talk there.

32:45

It's called the Gunpowder Incident. It was in Virginia.

32:47

And what's

32:50

interesting is that 249 years

32:52

ago, what the government, in

32:56

this case, the British government was saying, sounds

32:59

very familiar to what

33:01

the gun control advocates say today.

33:04

And that is, it was

33:08

right after, a few days after Patrick Henry

33:10

gave his give me liberty

33:12

or give me death speech. And

33:15

the governor of

33:17

Virginia, and that was

33:20

put in place, of course, he was put in place by

33:22

the British government, decided

33:24

that they better pick

33:27

up the powder that the colonists

33:29

have. And the gunpowder is

33:31

being stored in a central magazine in

33:34

town, all in one place. And

33:37

the colonists heard about it, and

33:40

they posted guards for about a week.

33:43

And finally, they got tired of it and thought, yeah,

33:45

okay, those rumors we heard, those are not true. And

33:47

they left. And as soon

33:49

as they left, guarding the powder

33:51

magazine, the governor sent in 20

33:54

Royal Marines from a nearby British

33:56

ship in the middle of

33:58

the night. to

34:00

steal the gunpowder.

34:04

They got 15 partial

34:06

barrels of gunpowder and

34:08

sneaked it out and

34:11

took it to a ship, stole it. The

34:14

governor, creating a

34:16

crisis—this is going to

34:18

sound very familiar—basically told

34:20

the colonists, it's for your

34:22

own safety. It's

34:26

for your own good, because

34:28

we have news of a possible

34:31

slave revolt. Pick

34:34

whatever group you want to pick. At that time, they

34:36

were going with slaves. Because

34:39

you will be safer if

34:41

you don't have any way to

34:43

protect yourself. Huh?

34:47

It didn't make any more sense 249 years ago than it does today.

34:53

But it will also show you that

34:55

the government always

34:58

is willing to strip you of the

35:00

means of you staying alive. The

35:04

government's always willing to take

35:07

your guns and ammo, and governments

35:10

around the world always

35:12

precede tyranny with

35:16

gun confiscation. It

35:18

was true then, it is true today. This

35:22

is kind of interesting, just an interesting

35:24

little point. Next year

35:26

will be 250 years, where they call

35:28

it the semi-centennial—I'll have to go look

35:30

it up, but there's going to be

35:32

a lot of news about that. And

35:35

then in 1926, of course, that will

35:37

be 250 years since 1776. There

35:40

will be lots of big celebrations. You'll get

35:43

tired of hearing all about it then as

35:45

well. Okay,

35:47

let's grab James. He's in Missouri on line

35:49

5. Hey James, you're on gun

35:51

talk. What's up? Well,

35:53

sir, I was just curious. We've

35:56

got wind of Senate Bill here in Missouri,

35:58

Senate Bill 726. It

36:00

hasn't passed yet. It's

36:02

still, I guess, in committee or debate or whatever,

36:05

but it has to do with homeschooling. It has

36:07

to do with school choice, portability of funds, et

36:09

cetera, which is really appealing to a lot of

36:11

people and a lot of constituents

36:13

of the representatives.

36:15

However, they seem to have

36:17

interjected a clause

36:21

sometime while it was

36:23

being written or processed, and

36:27

it involves redefining a

36:29

homeschool address location as

36:31

school property, which would

36:35

prevent the possession

36:37

of firearms on that property.

36:39

Now, I don't know the exact particulars, but

36:42

it's been said, I homeschool my kids,

36:45

and I have guns, and I teach them

36:47

guns. And we have hunter

36:49

safety courses in the house, and I take

36:51

them out to our back pasture on about

36:54

600 acres, and we go and we shoot.

36:57

And they learn all about that,

37:00

how to handle guns, how to

37:02

properly respect, respect guns, considering all

37:04

guns are always loaded. That's

37:08

how you view a gun. All guns are

37:10

always loaded. You handle them very respectfully and

37:12

very carefully. But this bill

37:14

would automatically make me a felon

37:17

if it passes. And

37:21

I've sent it to

37:23

our homeschool group, and they've got some

37:26

illegal people involved in that, and

37:28

they're looking over it, and they're starting

37:30

to get opposed to this. So I'm

37:32

thinking the language is really kind of

37:35

tricky, but I'm not

37:37

exactly sure. I kind of read over it.

37:39

I'm not a legal guy. I don't speak

37:41

that legalese court language stuff. Yeah,

37:44

I understand. But James, let me jump in here,

37:46

because here's what has to

37:48

happen. You got to get the gun rights groups

37:50

involved, whether it's the state or the organization or

37:52

other gun rights groups in the state. They've got

37:55

to get involved and go to the legislature

37:57

and get that part. If it's in there, first you've

37:59

got to verify. it's actually there because

38:01

you don't want to work off of rumors. But if

38:03

it's in there, they got to go in and remove

38:06

that from this bill. If they're otherwise, if it's a

38:08

good bill and you just want that part taken out,

38:10

you just get it taken out. It

38:12

only happens with

38:14

pressure. Pressure is what makes

38:17

things happen in politics. It's

38:19

pure numbers. If they look out there and

38:21

say, Oh wow, the people don't

38:23

want this or people will vote against

38:25

me if I vote for this, then

38:27

things happen and things change. And

38:30

what I'm saying about that, look, I appreciate

38:32

your call. What I say about this is

38:35

we have to all get involved in

38:37

politics. Here's the deal.

38:40

Here's the simple equation. We cannot win

38:42

in the courts if we

38:44

do not win elections, because after

38:46

you lose the elections, after a while,

38:48

you've lost the courts as

38:50

well in terms of who gets elected, who

38:53

gets appointed. Elections matter. And if we're

38:55

sitting on our rear end or sitting

38:57

on our hands and we're not voting

38:59

and winning, we are basically are going

39:01

to lose the second amendment. Why

39:10

do I harp on training all the time? Why

39:12

do I harp on these stories out of the

39:14

dues? Because you need to learn this. We need

39:16

to know these things. We need to do it

39:19

right. And there are a lot of ways to

39:21

do it wrong, especially if you don't have any

39:23

training and your head gets full with the junk,

39:26

trying to choose my words carefully, that

39:28

gets put in there from other

39:31

sources, two stories. Michigan

39:33

man charged with felony assault after

39:37

drawing gun supposedly in

39:40

self-defense. Guy is walking up to

39:43

the self checkout counter or stand

39:47

at the grocery store, bumps into

39:49

another guy, words are exchanged. And

39:51

our supposedly good guy pulls a

39:53

gun out. Doesn't

39:56

point it at the other guy just pulls out, shows it

39:58

to him and then walk walks

40:00

away with the gun at

40:02

his side, supposedly the good guy

40:04

in this, he's

40:08

been charged with felony assault.

40:13

People say, well, he shouldn't be charged.

40:15

No, he shouldn't have pulled his gun.

40:20

He bumps into a guy. The

40:22

guy probably said something nasty to him. And

40:25

you know what the response should be? Oh,

40:28

I am so sorry. I didn't see you

40:31

there. Here you go ahead. I'll wait my

40:33

turn. End of

40:36

problem. Oh,

40:38

no, we got to get all puffed up.

40:41

We got to pull out our gun. And

40:44

now the supposed good guy, cause I'm not going to

40:46

call him a good guy because he screwed this one

40:48

up. As far as I'm concerned, he's

40:51

being charged with a felony. This is a

40:53

serious deal. This is where

40:55

training and thinking about this stuff, listening to gun

40:57

talk and sitting in your chair at

40:59

home and saying, what would I do if, what would

41:01

I do then? How would I handle that? Can

41:04

I check my ego and say,

41:08

I'm sure, sorry, you go ahead. I'll

41:11

wait my turn. Even

41:13

if apologize, even if you're sure

41:16

you didn't do anything wrong. Because

41:19

you know, there's a gun there. You

41:21

brought it with you. Let's

41:24

try not to have the gun involved

41:27

in these types of things. If there's any way

41:29

possible. And then we've got a

41:31

story out of Ohio. This is tragic. Any

41:34

one year old man gets the

41:36

scam call of a son or grandson

41:39

has been arrested. These bail

41:41

money, blah, blah, blah. It's just a common

41:43

deal. And these scammers then

41:45

call Uber and send

41:47

this hapless Uber driver,

41:49

this 61 year old woman to this

41:52

guy's house to pick up a parcel.

41:54

The guy thinks that she, the Uber

41:56

driver is involved in this scam. There's

41:59

a picture. dash cam, a

42:01

picture of this man, 81 year old man

42:03

holding a single action revolver, 22 rimfire on

42:06

this woman who's an Uber driver who has no idea

42:09

what's going on. He eventually

42:11

shoots her three times because he

42:13

thinks she's involved in robbing him.

42:16

He kills her. He

42:20

killed her. He

42:23

wasn't in any danger. He

42:25

was mad. He was scared. He was

42:28

frustrated. He thought he was being robbed and thought

42:30

she was involved. It wouldn't tell him where the other

42:32

people were. And so

42:34

he shoots her because she's getting back in her

42:36

car and saying, I'm out of here. You're crazy.

42:42

When can you use your gun in self

42:45

defense? If

42:48

you don't have any training, it's

42:50

very likely that the answer

42:52

you just came up with in your head is

42:55

wrong. And

42:57

if in fact it is wrong, you

43:00

are setting yourself up to go to

43:02

prison for a good part of your

43:04

life or to

43:06

lose all the money you have and

43:08

to lose your home and to lose

43:11

your car and to lose your marriage

43:14

because you didn't get the information you

43:16

needed. If you have a gun,

43:19

whether you carry it or keep it in your home,

43:21

if you have a gun for self defense and

43:23

you don't know the answers to these questions, you are

43:25

putting yourself at grave risk as

43:28

these people have done.