By Chad Love

The hills of Wyoming will be alive with the sound of...silence. Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead signed a bill allowing the use of suppressed guns for all hunting.

From this story in the Casper Star-Tribune:
Gov. Matt Mead signed a bill into law that will allow the use silencers on firearms for all types of hunting. Mead signed the bill on Monday and the law will go into effect in July. The federal government regulates silencers and 39 states allow civilian ownership of them.

By Chad Love

Here you go, guys. She wants a ring. You want a new gun. Buy her the ring. Get the gun. Everyone lives happily ever after...

From this story in USA Today:

A Georgia jewelry store owner has come up with a new way to sell diamonds, WSB-TV reports. Give away free guns with each purchase. "A lot of our customers are hunters, and it just seemed like a great thing to do," Mike Geller, who owns two D. Geller and Son Jewelers, told the station. "It's unbelievable! There's websites that got a million hits about it." Customers who purchase diamonds worth $2,499 or more from the Cobb County stores get free hunting rifles.

By Chad Love

Gun auctions are one of the most important fund-raising aspects of all those annual conservation group banquets so many of us attend every year. Virtually every chapter of virtually every hunter-based conservation group out there uses the banquet gun auctions to raise money for chapter projects. And since nothing gets the bids going hot and heavy like actually seeing the gun you're bidding on, it makes sense for those groups to be able to have the actual guns there at the banquet, right?

Apparently not if you live in New Jersey. Thanks to Jersey's gun-control laws, guns that are being auctioned at a banquet cannot actually be displayed at the banquet. Why? Duh! Because everyone knows that Ruffed Grouse Society or Ducks Unlimited chapter banquets are one of the leading sources of guns used in crime.

By Chad Love

Is the National Rifle Association's power on the wane? Please don't beat the messenger, but that seems to be the thrust of a recent blog post from the Economist that argues the NRA's influence on national elections is mostly an illusion and that it's also on the wrong side of changing demographic shifts that in the future will further erode its influence.

"...Paul Waldman, of the American Prospect, has recently argued that the NRA's dominance is a myth. He has looked closely at the figures and writes, “Despite what the NRA has long claimed, it neither delivered Congress to the Republican party in 1994 nor delivered the White House to George W. Bush in 2000.” He also argues that NRA money has no impact on congressional elections, as it spreads its money over so many races, and that NRA endorsements are “almost meaningless” as most go to incumbent Republicans with little chance of losing.