Like any local branch of the National Rifle Association (NRA), the District of Columbia Firearms Association (DCFA) produces a newsletter, holds an annual dinner, and runs a course on gun safety. The only thing it lacks is bang-bang. Handguns have been banned in D.C. since 1976, which makes the DCFA gun-safety course a bit theoretical, according to Richard Atkinson, president of the 2,000-member group and an NRA board member. “It’s kind of hard to teach people to buy a gun when you can’t buy a gun,” he says. Scratching that itchy trigger finger in the District is pretty tough, but not impossible; DCFA members can train with air rifles at the NRA’s basement range. Sometimes Atkinson live-fires his Smith & Wesson revolver in the basement (it remains legal because it was registered before the ’76 ban). Popguns and an aged six-shooter do not an NRA chapter make, however, so the DCFA is calling for a referendum on restoring the right to bear arms in the city. But in what might be an unfortunate choice of metaphor, Atkinson says the D.C. Council is still “dead set” against lifting the ban.