Gun rights essay for high school. Help appreciated

Highball

December 04, 2007 15:20

http://www.rkba.org/comment/cowards.html
http://www.gunowners.org/fs0303.htm

A Nation of Cowards.

This is one of my favorite articles concerning gun Rights...and the reasoning behind it.

Well worth printing out and reading..both yourself and your son.This article will help focus him in the direction he is going.

0

MVP

December 04, 2007 15:22

Thank You Highball

0

Mk 19

December 04, 2007 15:27

Here are a few articals for him to read, Citations are also included:

Bullets and Bunkum: The futility of 'ballistic fingerprinting'. JR. JOHN R. LOTT.
National Review 54.21 (Nov 11, 2002): pNA. From InfoTrac OneFile.
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Full Text :COPYRIGHT 2002 National Review, Inc.
In the wake of the Washington, D.C., sniper attacks, many are viewing ballistic fingerprinting as a magic crime-solving tool. According to the pro-gun-control Brady Campaign, such a system "would have solved [the sniper case] after the first shooting"; a Washington Post columnist calls it a "common-sense measure"; and many politicians are jumping on board, including New York Democratic senator Charles Schumer and Maryland Democratic gubernatorial nominee Kathleen Kennedy Townsend. Unfortunately, the issue is not so simple: By draining resources away from other police activities and making it costly for law-abiding citizens to own guns, ballistic fingerprinting could end up actually increasing crime.
The physics of ballistic fingerprinting are straightforward. When a bullet travels through the barrel of a gun, the friction creates markings on the bullet. If the gun is new, imperfections in the way the barrel is drilled can produce different markings on the bullet; such imperfections are most noticeable in inexpensive guns. (This poses an irony for gun controllers, who push for laws that ban inexpensive guns.) In older guns, the bullets' friction through the barrel can cause more noticeable wear marks that help differentiate between guns. Many other factors influence the particular markings left on the bullets-for instance, how often the gun is cleaned and what brand of cartridge is used.
Precisely because friction causes wear, a gun's ballistic fingerprint changes over time-making it drastically different from such forensic evidence as human fingerprints or DNA. The recording of a child's fingerprints or DNA still allows for identification much later in life; the same is not true of the bullet markings. A ballistic fingerprint is less like a human fingerprint than it is like the tread on a car tire.
Brand-new tires are essentially identical, so new-tire tracks at crime scenes leave investigators with pretty limited information. Unless there happens to be a particular imperfection, only the brand and model of the tire can be identified. Imprints on bullets are similar. When a bullet is fired from a new gun, investigators can typically identify only the type of ammunition and the type of gun. Over time, though, friction causes the tread on tires to wear. It would be easy to take the tire tracks left at a crime scene and match them with a suspected criminal's car; but the more the car is driven after the crime, the harder it is to match the tire tracks left at the scene to the tires when they are eventually found. Similarly, the greatest friction on a gun occurs when the gun is first fired-and that dramatically reduces the usefulness of recording the gun's ballistic fingerprint when it is purchased.
Moreover, ballistic fingerprinting can be thwarted by replacing the gun's barrel-just as criminals can foil tire-matching by simply replacing their tires. In general, the markings on bullets can be altered even more quickly and easily than the tread marks on tires: Scratching part of the inside of a barrel with a nail file would alter the bullet's path down the barrel and thus change the markings. So would putting toothpaste on a bullet before firing it.
Ballistic fingerprinting faces other difficulties. For example, even if the gun was not used much between the time the ballistic fingerprint was originally recorded and the time the crime occurred, police still have to be able to trace the gun from the original owner to the criminal-but only 12 percent of guns used in crime are obtained by the criminal through retail stores or pawn shops. The rest are virtually impossible to trace.
So far only Maryland and New York have started recording the ballistic fingerprints of all new handguns sold. While Maryland's program technically started in January 2001, the cost of implementing the program made it unprofitable for gun makers to sell handguns in the state for the first six months of that year. The state government faced a $1.1 million start-up cost and another $750,000-a-year operating cost. New York's program began in March 2001, with a state start-up expenditure of about $4.5 million. (No estimates are available yet on New York's annual cost.)
In both states, the costs for dealers, gun makers, and prospective gun owners were responsible for reducing handgun sales to law-abiding citizens. And what was the specific benefit? Almost zero. The programs have not helped solve a single violent crime in either state; they have so far been used only to identify two handguns stolen from a Maryland gun shop.
A recent study by the State of California points to further practical difficulties with ballistic fingerprinting. The study tested 790 pistols firing a total of 2,000 rounds. When the cartridges used with a particular gun came from the same manufacturer, computer matching failed 38 percent of the time. When the cartridges came from different manufacturers, the failure rate rose to 62 percent. And this study does not even begin to address problems caused by wear, so the real-world failure rate can be expected to be much higher. The California report warned that "firearms that generate markings on cartridge casings can change with use and can also be readily altered by the users." Further, it warned that the problems of matching would soar dramatically if more guns were included in the sample. The study's verdict: "Computer- matching systems do not provide conclusive results . . . potential candidates [for a match must] be manually reviewed."
While registering guns by their ballistic fingerprints is a relatively new concept, we have had plenty of experience using gun registration in general, and it has come up woefully short. A couple of years ago, I testified before the Hawaii state legislature on a bill to change registration requirements. Hawaii has had both registration and licensing of guns for several decades.
In theory, if a gun is left at the crime scene, licensing and registration will allow the gun to be traced back to its owner. Police have probably spent hundreds of thousands of man-hours administering these laws in Hawaii. But despite this massive effort, there has not been a single case in which police claimed that licensing and registration have been instrumental in identifying a criminal.
The reason is simple. First, criminals very rarely leave their guns at a crime scene, and when they do, it is because the criminals have been killed or seriously wounded. Second-and more important for ballistic fingerprinting-would-be criminals also virtually never get licenses or register their weapons. The guns that are recovered at the scene are not registered.
Good intentions don't necessarily make good laws. What counts is whether the laws actually work, and end up saving lives. On that measure, ballistic fingerprinting-a useless diversion of valuable police resources-fails conspicuously, and it should be opposed by anyone who wants to live in a safer society.

Source Citation: LOTT, JOHN R., JR. "Bullets and Bunkum: The futility of 'ballistic fingerprinting'." National Review 54.21 (Nov 11, 2002): NA. InfoTrac OneFile. Thomson Gale. University of Phoenix. 10 May. 2007
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The Samurai, the Mountie and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies?. Jeremy A. Rabkin.
The American Spectator v26.n8 (August 1993): pp66(3). From InfoTrac OneFile.
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Full Text :COPYRIGHT American Spectator 1993
I once attended a conference on gun-control policy. Most of the participants were earnest scholars, but a few were real gun enthusiasts. At one point, a law professor spoke of the gulf between gun control advocates and "pro-gun forces." He was interrupted by a woman who was clearly a gun enthusiast (proved by the gun-shaped ornament she wore around her neck). "You shouldn't call us pro-gun," she chided. "We are simply pro-choice on guns."
I thought it was a joke. But she didn't laugh. On reflection, I began to think she had a point. Most "choice" advocates in the abortion debate would probably reject the analogy with indignation. Guns are a threat to others, guns actually kill, whereas abortion . . . but it would be in poor taste to dwell on this point. Yet there are many parallels in these debates. Advocates of "choice" on abortion usually deplore emotional moralism and seek to focus attention instead on the practical difficulties of abortion restrictions, on the equity and enforcement problems they would raise, and on the challenge they would present to constitutional rights. On all of these grounds, the case against restrictions on guns is a good deal stronger that the case against restrictions on abortion. Two recent books on the problems of gun control document the "pro-choice" case for guns particularly well.
Gary Kleck begins his book with a "voluntary disclosure notice" affirming that he "is not now, nor has he ever been, a member of, or a contributor to, the National Rifle Association . . . nor has he received funding for research from any such organization." In fact, he is "a member of the American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International USA, and Common Cause, among other politically liberal organizations." Knowing the terms of the debate, Kleck has evidently concluded that one cannot gain a hearing without first displaying appropriate liberal credentials.
Kleck's book reads less like the work of a political liberal, however, than of an academic sociologist--which he also is (at Florida State University). The book is not light reading. But it displays an encyclopedic grasp of the social-science literature on guns and violence, which is by now quite vast: a list of published studies on the subject at the end of this book stretches to almost thirty pages of closely packed print, and Kleck seems to feel compelled to comment on the technical flaws and merits of almost every one of these studies. There are many disputed findings in this literature and much remaining uncertainty, but Kleck compiles impressively extensive evidence on several key points. Taken together, they confirm that in the gun-control debate, the "pro-choice" side really does have strong grounds to protest the simple-minded moralism of its opponents.
It is probably true, for example, that banning legal abortion will not prevent large-scale resort to illegal abortions. But it is certainly true that banning guns will not prevent people from obtaining ready access to guns in underground markets. Kleck shows that strict gun controls in cities like Washington and New York have had no demonstrable effect in constraining criminal use of guns. National controls are not likely to be much more effective when there are already some 200 million guns in private hands in this country. Though ammunition is not nearly so durable as guns, it is much easier to make illicitly, according to Kleck, so that even restrictions on ammunition sales are not likely to have much effect on criminal use of guns.
Similarly, abortion restrictions may drive many women to seek "back-alley abortions" posing serious, sometimes fatal, health hazards. But Kleck demonstrates that gun-control measures are also likely to cost lives. On the one hand, disarming the potential victims of crime may make criminals bolder. Kleck notes in this regard that in Canada and other countries where guns are much less widely held, burglars frequently go after houses even when the residents are at home: in America, where burglars know that homeowners may well be armed, burglars overwhelmingly seek empty houses. Kleck also notes evidence that a very large number of crimes are foiled when the would-be victims turn out to be armed. And surveys of convicted felons find that a solid majority agree that "a criminal is not going to mess around with a victim he knows is armed with a gun."
It is the would-be victims, of course, who are most likely to be disarmed by gun control measures, as criminals are not likely to pay as much attention to gun laws. Yet even if one assumes that gun-control measures will--somehow--also disarm violent criminals, the result may still be more loss of life. While gun wounds are more likely to be fatal than knife wounds, gun crimes less often result in any wound--whether as the result of greater caution around the more dangerous weapon or greater difficulties in aiming.
In the abortion debate, choice advocates insist that no one exercises this choice lightly. Kleck presents extensive evidence that gun owners are generally quite careful with their weapons. Gun accidents and suicides are trumpeted by control advocates, but Kleck shows that gun accidents are actually relatively rare and gun suicides are . . . well, not entered into lightly, either. It is true that guns are the most common and the most reliable instrument of suicide in the United States. But Kleck notes that the suicide rate in the United States is actually very much lower than in countries where guns are not available. And even in the United States, suicide rates are higher in communities where guns are less widely held. Kleck speculates that people who are more aware of nearby suicides, or more tempted by suicide themselves, are more fearful of gun ownership. But it may be that gun ownership is steadying to the nerves.
This sort of cultural speculation is the central concern of David Kopel's book, which is much more readable and in many ways much more fun than Kleck's. Kopel doesn't let himself get bogged down in statistical regressions. He is a lawyer who has worked in the American West, and has a good eye for the telling little fact that gives punch to a wider argument. But The Samurai, the Mountie and the Cowboy remains a well-researched, carefully argued book. And it shows clearly that access to guns is an old and fundamental tradition in America--in a way that abortion clearly is not.
Kopel traces the American fascination with guns to the founding experiences of the nation. He invokes the armed citizen militias fending off British regulars in the Revolution--an experience subsequently enshrined in the Second Amendment to the Constitution. He dwells on the westward pioneers, deploying their guns against dangerous animals, Indians, and cattle rustlers--experiences enshrined in Hollywood film. Along the way, Kopel offers a number of fun facts. For example, he notes that guns were America's first manufacturing export--and at one time the most important, for American guns were the first to be made with interchangeable, precision-tooled parts. American speech is still "loaded with gun metaphors" ("going off half-cocked," "high caliber," "bite the bullet," "straight shooter"--he lists over thirty such phrases whose origins are often forgotten).
"Vigilante justice," the bugaboo of contemporary gun-control advocates, was at one time considered an entirely honorable and necessary adjunct to the ponderous machinery of official justice: in 1890, Kopel reports, there were four U.S. senators and several state governors who boasted of their past service as "vigilantes," protecting their communities against outlaw depredations. Even in the wildest mining towns of the Old West, however, the murder rate was less than in contemporary Washington, D.C., with its strict gun-control laws. Robbery and other crimes were vastly less common in the Old West than in contemporary America. Rape was virtually unheard of and women walked freely through Dodge City and such towns, even at night, without fear of abusive language, let alone physical assault. Historically, an armed population was not seen as a threat to peace and order in America but quite the reverse.
Kopel's book is not simply a collection of historical curiosities. It demonstrates that America's gun culture reflects enduring aspects of its larger political culture. The point is brought out through contrasts with other countries, where civilian gun ownership has been largely suppressed. Kopel argues, with much persuasiveness, that tight governmental control on gun ownership in other countries has reflected the hierarchical, statist character of these societies, even as the prevalence of guns in America reflects its own individualistic and egalitarian culture. In Japan, the peasantry was systematically disarmed in the seventeenth century by a samurai elite that feared the leveling effects of guns on a society where rank was confirmed by elaborate rituals of sword use. Even today, while Japan is quite efficient in keeping guns away from civilians, its gun controls are only one part of a wide network of controls: local police constables monitor neighborhood doings, down to the dating patterns of teenage girls (and do not hesitate to warn the girls when their dating partners are regarded as unsuitable).
The states of continental Europe have long feared to allow their own peoples to have guns, and Kopel argues that this reflects a pattern dating to the efforts of modernizing princes to keep their subjects under control. Even in Britain, Canada, and Australia, with traditionally limited governments, gun ownership has been severely restricted in recent decades, and Kopel traces the ease with which such restrictions have been implemented to greater patterns of deference to state authority. Canada maintained order on the western frontier with "Mounties"--federal mounted police--and never developed anything like the citizen posses or vigilantes of the American West. Other countries do not have to contend with a political force like the National Rifle Association. But neither, Kopel stresses, do they have to contend with anything like the American Civil Liberties Union, and these two facts are closely related.
Kopel reinforces the point by showing that much of the momentum for gun control in twentieth-century America has been motivated by fear that guns would indeed be too equalizing--affording too much self-assurance to political radicals, immigrants in the northern cities, blacks in the South, and others feared by the majority. Kopel's book--sponsored by the libertarian Cato Institute--continually seeks to connect government controls with "repression." He may overdo it at times. For example, Kopel acknowledges that the extreme individualism of American society may be responsible for the extraordinarily high rate of violent crime in contemporary America (though he is quick to note that the pattern extends to violence with knives or other weapons as much as to gun crimes). Yet he seems to take it for granted that little can be done to enhance social controls without infringing constitutional liberties. In the end, he does make a compelling case that an effective campaign to disarm the American people would require levels of police surveillance and intervention beyond anything we have previously accepted.
In contrast to the abortion right proclaimed in Roe v. Wade, the right to bear arms is expressly guaranteed in the Bill of Rights. This has not led judges to question gun-control measures (even when couched as total prohibitions on private gun ownership). Contemporary judges prefer government guarantees of "privacy" and "autonomy" to the effective capacity for self-defense. But judicial decisions, after all, bear only a remote connection to national traditions or to the deeper currents of public sentiment. For all the Court's efforts to safeguard abortion, obstetricians have become increasingly reluctant to perform abortions or to be seen doing so. No one has reported any similar reticence at gun stores.
Jeremy A. Rabkin is an associate professor of government at Cornell University.

Named Works: The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy (Book) Book reviews

Source Citation: Rabkin, Jeremy A. "The Samurai, the Mountie and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies?." The American Spectator 26.n8 (August 1993): 66(3). InfoTrac OneFile. Thomson Gale. University of Phoenix. 10 May. 2007
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Taking aim at the second amendment--again. William P. Hoar.
The New American 22.26 (Dec 25, 2006): p42(2). From InfoTrac OneFile.
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Full Text :COPYRIGHT 2006 American Opinion Publishing, Inc.
ITEM: The New Bedford Standard-Times reported on November 21: "New Bedford Mayor Scott W. Lang told state lawmakers yesterday that if they want to get serious about gun violence, they need to approve tougher laws and come up with more money. Mayor Lang appeared at a Public Safety Committee oversight hearing on youth gun violence.... 'In New Bedford, we regard guns as a weapon of mass destruction,' Mayor Lang told the committee. 'We think they are a weapon of mass destruction throughout our cities and towns throughout the United States.'"
The Massachusetts newspaper continued: "Sen. Jarrett Barrios, D-Cambridge, who co-chairs the committee, is gathering ideas for an omnibus gun-control bill that will be filed next year.... Dan Vice, a staff attorney with the Brady Campaign, which advocates for gun control, said Massachusetts needs to establish a statewide registry of legally owned guns.... 'The good news is Massachusetts has been a model for the nation, but much more can be done,' he said."
ITEM: The New York Times for November 22 commented: "America's confusion about the Second Amendment is now nearly total. An amendment that ensures a collective right to bear arms has been misread in one legislature after another--often in the face of strong public disapproval--as a law guaranteeing an individual's right to carry a weapon in public." Editorializing against legislation that would allow weapons to be carried in national parks, the Times concluded: "If Americans want to feel safer in their national parks, the proper solution is to increase park funding."

CORRECTION: All too many left-wing commentators today equate guns with evil, and are willing to toss aside the clear meaning of the Constitution to justify that point of view. James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, knew better, saying of tyrants: "[They were] afraid to trust the people with arms," and praising "the advantage of being armed, which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation." Of course, it's not just would-be tyrants who fear an armed citizenry: criminals avoid attacking those who can defend themselves. As many as 2.5 million crimes are prevented each year in the United States simply because citizens are armed, according to research by criminologist Gary Kleck of Florida State University.
Even prominent liberal Harvard law Professor Alan Dershowitz has reproached many of his ideological colleagues for trying to distort the Second Amendment. "Foolish liberals who are trying to read the Second Amendment out of the Constitution by claiming that it's not an individual right or that it's too much of a safety hazard," said Dershowitz, "don't see the danger of the big picture." The Harvard professor added, "They're courting disaster by encouraging others to use the same means to eliminate portions of the Constitution they don't like."
A lot of the anti-gun zealots, as noted above, contend public safety is a function of how much tax money is thrown at a problem. Yet, does any honest observer think that the New York Times, for example, relies solely upon the taxpayer-supplied police, rather than armed guards, to protect its property? The arrogance of the New York Times is truly mind-boggling: it makes claims about the meaning of the Constitution that go against the historical record and doesn't even bother to try to validate these assertions. Facts matter, however.
A 93-page report released in 2004 by the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel addressed the many contentions that have been raised in recent years by statists who don't trust an armed citizenry. The general point addressed was "whether the fight secured by the Second Amendment belongs only to the States, only to persons serving in state-organized militia units like the National Guard, or to individuals generally." The Justice study concluded:

Our examination of the original
meaning of the Amendment provides
extensive reasons to conclude that
the Second Amendment secures an
individual right, and no persuasive
basis for either the collective-right or
quasi-collective-right views. The text
of the Amendment's operative clause,
setting out a "fight of the people to
keep and bear Arms," is clear and
is reinforced by the Constitution's
structure. The Amendment's prefatory
clause, properly understood, is
fully consistent with this interpretation.
The broader history of the
Anglo-American fight of individuals
to have and use arms, from England's
Revolution of 1688-1689 to the ratification
of the Second Amendment
a hundred years later, leads to the
same conclusion. Finally, the first
hundred years of interpretations of
the Amendment, and especially the
commentaries and case law in the
pre-Civil War period closest to the
Amendment's ratification, confirm
what the text and history of the Second
Amendment require.
Calling a firearm a "weapon of mass destruction," as the mayor from Massachusetts did in the piece noted above, might be considered droll and wonderfully insightful in certain circles, but it is not a legitimate justification for abrogating the rights of Americans.
Discussing how the presence of armed citizens affects crime rates, in his book More Guns, Less Crime, then-University of Chicago Professor John Lott examined all the multiple-victim public shootings in the United States from 1977 to 1995. The only policy that had a discernible effect on those shootings was when citizens were able to legally carry concealed weapons. Those states that had approved such "right to carry" laws experienced a decline in multiple-victim public shootings by an average of 84 percent.
Indeed, an analysis of the latest FBI crime statistics (for 2005) indicates that the states where there were no right-to-carry laws average 27.8 percent higher violent crime rates than states where citizens can legally carry firearms.
Obviously there are other variables involved, including the preponderance of urban areas in one state compared to another. Yet, is there any doubt that if the numbers were reversed that the haters of the right to keep and bear arms would say this was proof that "gun control" was effective against crime?
As it happens, however, criminals who ignore laws against, say, murder and armed robbery don't mind also flouting prohibitions against gun ownership. Since 1977, as the Washington Times noted not long ago, the District of Columbia has had some of the strictest gun laws in the nation. Yet, between 2000 and 2005, approximately 80 percent of the murders in D.C. were perpetrated with guns. "Overall homicide levels in the District," commented the Times, "are troublingly high and have not been helped by gun control. Which is no wonder: Violent criminals can wield guns confident that they will not get caught, and confident that law-abiding people will not have guns themselves."
Madison was indeed perceptive when he noted, in The Federalist Papers, No. 46, the vital difference between America and Europe, where "the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms" That is a lesson that we cannot afford to forget--for the sake of our security as well as our liberty.

Source Citation: Hoar, William P. "Taking aim at the second amendment--again." The New American 22.26 (Dec 25, 2006): 42(2). InfoTrac OneFile. Thomson Gale. University of Phoenix. 10 May. 2007
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Thomson Gale Document Number:A157097955

Title: Find More Like ThisFeeling Safe Isn't Safe.

Authors: Barone, Michael

Source: U.S. News & World Report; 5/7/2007, Vol. 142 Issue 16, p41-41, 1p
Document Type: Editorial
Subject Terms: *CONSTITUTIONAL law
*EDITORIALS
*FIREARMS -- Law & legislation
*GUN control
*SCHOOL shootings
VIRGINIA Polytechnic Institute & State University
CONCEALED weapons

Geographic Terms: UNITED States

NAICS/Industry Codes:
519110 News Syndicates

Abstract: The author discusses the positive attributes of U.S. concealed-weapons laws in the wake of the Virginia Tech school shootings. Florida passed a law allowing law-abiding citizens with sufficient training to carry concealed weapons. The author claims allowing concealed weapons to be carried has prevented some school shootings. The District of Columbia Court of Appeals ruled a ban on handguns violated the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment.
Full Text Word Count: 753
ISSN: 0041-5537
Accession Number: 24903546
Database: Academic Search Premier

Feeling Safe Isn't Safe
Section: The National Interest
The murders two weeks ago at Virginia Tech naturally set off a cry in the usual quarters-the New York Times, the London-based Economist-for stricter gun control laws. Democratic officeholders didn't chime in, primarily because they believe they were hurt by the issue in 2000 and 2004, but most privately agree.
What most discussions of this issue tend to ignore is that we have two tracks of political debate and two sets of laws on gun control. At the federal level there has been a push for more gun control laws since John Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, and some modest restrictions have been passed. At the state level something entirely different has taken place. In 1987 Florida passed a law allowing citizens who could demonstrate that they were law-abiding and had sufficient training to obtain permits on demand to own and carry concealed weapons. In the succeeding 20 years many other states have passed such laws, so that today you can, if you meet the qualifications, carry concealed weapons in 40 states with 67 percent of the nation's population (including Vermont, with no gun restrictions at all).
When Florida passed its concealed-weapons law, I thought it was a terrible idea. People would start shooting each other over traffic altercations; parking lots would turn into shooting galleries. Not so, it turned out. Only a very, very few concealed-weapons permits have been revoked. There are only rare incidents in which people with concealed-weapons permits have used them unlawfully. Ordinary law-abiding people, it turns out, are pretty trustworthy.
Unfounded fears. I'm not the only one to draw such a conclusion. When she was Michigan's attorney general, Democrat Jennifer Granholm opposed the state's concealed-weapons law, which took effect in 2001. But now, as governor, she's not seeking its repeal. She says that her fears-like those I had about Florida's law 20 years ago-proved to be unfounded. So far as I know, there are no politically serious moves to repeal any state's concealed-weapons laws. In most of the United States, as you go to work, shop at the mall, go to restaurants, and walk around your neighborhood, you do so knowing that some of the people you pass by may be carrying a gun. You may not even think about it. But that's all right. Experience has shown that these people aren't threats.
Virginia has a concealed-weapons law. But Virginia Tech was, by the decree of its administrators, a "gun-free zone." Those with concealed-weapons permits were not allowed to take their guns on campus and were disciplined when they did. A bill was introduced in the House of Delegates to allow permit holders to carry guns on campus. When it was sidetracked, a Virginia Tech administrator hailed the action and said that students, professors, and visitors would now "feel safe" on campus. Tragically, they weren't safe. Virginia Tech's "gun-free zone" was not gun free. In contrast, killers on other campuses were stopped by faculty or bystanders who had concealed-weapons permits and brandished their guns to stop the killing.
We may hear more about gun control at the national level. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled that the District of Columbia's ban on handguns violates the Second Amendment's right "to keep and bear arms." Judge Laurence Silberman's strong opinion argues that this is consistent with the Supreme Court's ruling in a 1939 case upholding a federal law banning sawed-off shotguns; limited regulation is allowed, Silberman wrote, but not a total ban. Somewhere on the road between a law banning possession of nuclear weapons and banning all guns the Second Amendment stands in the way. This is the view as well of the liberal constitutional law scholar Laurence Tribe. The Supreme Court may take the case, which is in conflict with other circuits' rulings.
If it upholds the D.C. decision, there is still room for reasonable gun regulation. The mental health ruling on the Virginia Tech killer surely should have been entered into the instant check database to prevent him from buying guns. The National Rifle Association is working with gun control advocate Rep. Carolyn McCarthy to improve that database. But even as we fine-tune laws to make sure guns don't get into the wrong hands, maybe the opinion elites will realize that in places where gun ownership is widespread, we're safer than in a "gun-free zone."
PHOTO (COLOR): Target practice on a North Carolina firing range
PHOTO (COLOR)
~~~~~~~~
By Michael Barone
________________________________________
Copyright 2007 the U.S. News & World Report, L.P. All rights reserved.

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Authors: Sullivan, Will

Source: U.S. News & World Report; 4/30/2007, Vol. 142 Issue 15, p46-47, 2p, 1c
Document Type: Article
Subject Terms: *GUN control
*SOCIAL pressure
*DANGEROUSLY mentally ill
*MENTALLY ill -- Civil rights
UNITED States. Congress
VIRGINIA Polytechnic Institute & State University

Geographic Terms: UNITED States
VIRGINIA

NAICS/Industry Codes:
921120 Legislative Bodies

Abstract: The article focuses on the gun control controversy in the wake of the shooting at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Gun control activists have been on the defensive since 1994 when passage of an assault weapons ban was widely blamed for sweeping Democratic losses in Congress. Shooter Cho Seung-Hui acquired his guns legally, but critics claim since a judge declared him in "imminent danger to himself..." he should have been added to a database listing the mentally ill.
Full Text Word Count: 904
ISSN: 0041-5537
Accession Number: 24843649
Database: Academic Search Premier

AN UPHILL CLIMB FOR GUN LAWS
Section: Cover Story
Campus Crime
A new debate, perhaps, but the same old politics
Amid the media din that descended on Blacksburg, Va., last week, one voice not known for its reticence was conspicuously absent. On Monday, the National Rifle Association released a short statement offering condolences to the families of the shootings' victims. Then silence.
There was little pressure to speak out. Though some advocates for stricter gun laws expressed hope the shootings would boost their cause, experts are skeptical that gun control is primed for a reversal of its dismal fortunes. As developments during the week failed to produce conclusive evidence that stricter laws would have prevented the tragedy, activists were often more circumspect than strident.
"I've learned not to get too far out on these things," says Josh Horwitz, executive director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. "There are some tragedies that you just can't legislate about, and this may be one of them."
It's a lesson learned through disappointment, as previous incidents have led to plenty of discussion but little lawmaking. Even the horrors of Colorado's Columbine High School shootings, in which two students killed 12 classmates and a teacher before committing suicide, failed to generate changes in federal policy, though Coloradans did pass a measure requiring background checks at gun shows.
Gun control activists have been mainly playing defense since 1994, when passage of an assault weapons ban was widely blamed for sweeping Democratic losses in Congress. A Republican Congress allowed the ban to expire in 2004. The NRA and other gun-rights groups also have successfully pushed a slew of state laws allowing concealed weapons and have curtailed the access of local police departments to gun tracing data maintained by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.
The rollback of restrictions has exasperated some on the front lines. "You have the right to bear arms. You have the right to do a lot of things," says John Timoney, chief of the Miami Police Department. "But it's not an absolute right. There have to be some restrictions."
Attitudes on Capitol Hill, however, showed few signs of changing. California Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she believes "this will reignite the dormant effort" to pass sensible gun regulations." But Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada-no fan of gun control-cautioned against a rush to judgment, and the Democratic presidential candidates said little.
Bearing arms. On the Republican side, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani quietly voiced support for the Second Amendment, while Arizona Sen. John McCain declared that he believes in "no gun control." Filling the vacuum left by the NRA, other gun-rights groups blasted Virginia Tech for banning guns on its campus. "It meant that [students] were helpless little sheep, waiting to die," said Philip Van Cleave, president of the Virginia Citizens Defense League. After the attack, a Republican member of Virginia's House of Delegates renewed his previously unsuccessful call to end bans on firearms at colleges in the state.
Virginia is already notably frosty toward gun regulations, requiring no background check at gun shows and putting few limits on carrying concealed weapons. Both New York City and Washington have long accused the state of being disproportionately responsible for their illegal gun woes. After Republican New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg began suing gun stores, including some in Virginia, for illicit sales, Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine signed a bill in March attempting to thwart the undercover investigations that led to the suits. "There's a reason the NRA's headquarters are in Fairfax," says Saul Cornell, a professor at Ohio State University who has written frequently on gun policy.
But as more information about the weapons used in the attacks came to light, it seemed that keeping guns from Seung Hui Cho would have been difficult. He was a permanent resident of Virginia with no criminal record. He picked up a .22-caliber handgun at JND Pawnbrokers in February and waited the required month to buy a 9-mm pistol at Roanoke Firearms. New production, but not distribution, of the 15-round magazines Cho used for the 9-mm had been prohibited by 1994's assault weapons ban before it expired.
Virginia's system of background checks has also come under scrutiny after revelations that Cho was detained and evaluated for mental illness in 2005. State officials have maintained that, since Cho was never involuntarily committed after the evaluation, he could not have been added to the database listing the mentally ill and other groups barred from purchasing firearms. But Cho does seem to fit ATF guidelines for inclusion, since a judge determined that he presented an "imminent danger to himself as a result of mental illness." If Virginia lawmakers had conformed their standard to the federal law, then Cho's gun purchase would have been prohibited, says Kristen Rand of the Violence Policy Center. Virginia has been a national leader in providing data on commitments of the mentally ill to the FBI database used in background checks.
The shootings may advance legislative efforts to improve reporting of mental illness, but gun control activists want a more fundamental re-evaluation of current law. "At some point, we need to say, '[Gun control] needs to be on the table,'" Horwitz says. So far, though, few seem to think that point is now.
PHOTO (COLOR): Owner John Markell outside a shop where Cho bought a pistol
~~~~~~~~
By Will Sullivan
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Copyright 2007 the U.S. News & World Report, L.P. All rights reserved.

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Guns, the devil and God

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Posted: May 16, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern

The following is excerpted from the blockbuster May edition of WND's monthly Whistleblower magazine - titled "FIREARMS AND FREEDOM: Why the Second Amendment is more important than ever." See special offer below.
"Why don't you pick up that gun and blow your brains out?"
"You could kill a whole lot of people with that gun."
"Why not shoot her right now? That would shut her up!"
These are the sorts of vile mental suggestions many people experience from within their own minds when they see a gun.
That's right. Dark thoughts and impulses, too horrible to dwell upon or even acknowledge, occur to many of us at the mere sight of a firearm or a naked blade. When we see the firearm, we sense the presence of evil - so naturally we assume the gun is its source, when actually the gun's close proximity caused our own buried, angry, violent tendencies to surface for a moment.
Thus, many people who "dislike" or "are afraid of" guns are actually afraid of what they might do if they had a loaded firearm in their hand. And I'm not talking about criminal types here. I'm talking about "nice" people - nice on the outside, and lots of buried and perhaps unrecognized rage inside. Again, the presence of the gun simply causes his or her own dark, angry propensities to "stir a little" deep down inside.
But the reality of all this is too heavy and "negative" for many of us to face, so we instantly and unconsciously project our own buried violence onto the gun - as though an inanimate hunk of metal could somehow be evil.
(Column continues below)

Obviously, a loaded handgun has great potential for destruction and havoc. At the mere squeeze of a trigger there can be murder, suicide, terrorism. Even without pulling the trigger, the gun represents the magic ticket to armed robbery, forcible rape and every other form of coercion. For a person with lots of anger, albeit buried, a gun represents the shortest distance between two points - between the suppressed violent nature within him or her and the maximum expression of that nature. Therefore, the mere sight of a gun excites that dark part of us, causing it to beckon wordlessly, "Use me!"
Let's examine this admittedly scary subject a little more closely.
Have you ever stood close to the edge of a cliff, or out on a balcony of a high building? Did you notice that some "force" almost seemed to want to pull you over the edge? Most of us have experienced something like this phenomenon - a momentary loss of balance, an unexplainable fear, some mysterious pull toward the edge. We have a moment of disorientation and fear, then we pull back to safety.
I've experienced it. Last year after driving five hours to Portland, Ore., to be a guest on Fox News I checked into my hotel room, unpacked, checked over the room, then stepped out onto the balcony. As I approached the railing and looked out at the cityscape and then gazed down several stories to the ground, I noticed a distinct pull, along with a slight disorientation, as though I was losing my balance. I recovered right away and realized I was so tired and frazzled from a long day that my mind was vulnerable to the "pull" of dark forces. So I took the hint and rested a bit, until I had recovered my strength and mental focus.
In this life, the malevolent intelligence we call "evil" is constantly scanning each of us for opportunities to tempt or even destroy us. As the Good Book puts it, "Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour" (1 Peter 5:8 KJV). In critical moments of the sort I'm describing, evil seizes the opportunity to give us a mental "shove." Unfortunately, for some people that "shove" is strong enough - especially after a lifetime of giving in to anger, judgment and despair - to pull them over the edge.
We'll never know how many "suicides," in which people fell off a cliff or a balcony, occurred this way - not because of a premeditated suicide plan, but because they were vulnerable to the opportunistic impulse of evil.
Similarly, how many head-on auto accidents occur every year because someone inexplicably crosses the center line to crash at high speed into another car, having succumbed to a wordless, instantaneous mental suggestion from hell? All in a timeless fraction of a second the message impresses itself on your mind: "Crash your car into that one coming your way. Life sucks. Go out with a major bang! Everyone will be shocked! You have the power! Just do it! Do it now!"
Does this scare you? If so - if this description resonates with you even a little bit - it's only because you have the same problem to some degree. Don't fret. We're all in the same boat. We're all subject to the "dark side" of the force. It's called being "born in sin." But some of us honestly face it, and quietly call out to God for help, and His help comes. Others live in denial - until tragedy and death end it all. (This is the central theme of "Spiderman 3," by the way.)
In any event, this same phenomenon is at work with firearms, because of the potential guns provide for immediate and ultimate destruction. Guns literally bring to the surface of the mind the suppressed potential for violence that exists inside every angry person.
Again, there is more than one way this discomfort around guns can be experienced. A sincere person who is uncomfortable around guns will probably be able to deduce that the problem is within him and not with the inanimate firearm. He's already on the path to getting better.
Unfortunately, many people who hate/fear guns never allow themselves to come face-to-face with the real problem - themselves. No sooner does their own suppressed anger react to the sight or even the thought of a gun, than they turn that angry emotional response into something more "acceptable" - like fear. After all, on the "niceness" scale, fear is a lot nicer than hatred.
The problem is, after our buried anger is effortlessly transformed into "fear of guns," that fear easily turns into false righteousness: "I don't like guns and have no need for them. I'm a peaceful, non-violent person and wouldn't ever shoot anyone for any reason."
Some take this "righteousness" even further: "God protects me; I don't need guns. I have faith he'll never put me in a position where I need to shoot someone." Good thing none of the Bible's Old testament heroes like David or Joshua thought like that. They were required by God to kill many people. Who can say what will be required of us in this journey called life - whether or not we may be called on to defend ourselves or our families from a dangerous enemy?
Of course, there are many angry people who love guns. The world seems to be full of pumped-up jihadists who crave weapons, the bigger and more lethal the better; drug lords who use guns to murder judges and mayors and anyone else who gets in their way; gangbangers who pack heat so they can kill members of rival gangs; and every variety of criminal who, of course, take pains to procure the tools of their illegal trade - guns.
Unlike those who hate/fear guns as a result of unconsciously projecting their own inner violence onto them, angry people who love guns are in love with their own hatred, which they see as righteousness! The Islamic jihadist thinks he's serving Allah by murdering innocents. And predators and psychopaths of every sort love their guns because that's where they get the means to overcome their intended victims.
The God side of guns
Obviously, guns allow evil to be expressed in a multitude of ways, just as any weapon does. Everybody understands this, so there's no need to say much more about it - except that these people need to be stopped.
But what does need to be said, and shouted from the rooftops, is that in the right hands firearms also enable real goodness and virtue to be manifested - right here, right now - by opposing evil and protecting the innocent.
I'm talking now about what I'll call true Americans - not those who criminally prey on others, but also not those whose cowardice or shallowness causes them to appease bullies and to blame inanimate objects for the evil in the world and within themselves.
Whether individually or in a war, the moral imperative to defend ourselves and others is the same. And just as we all share this fundamental and undeniable right to self-defense, it follows that we also share the right to the means of self-defense, or else that supposed right is just a bad joke.
Fortunately for us, the Constitution and Bill of Rights were written and adopted by strong, right-thinking people. And the Second Amendment spells out for all to see the right of Americans to "keep and bear arms," a fundamental right that "shall not be infringed."
Today, according to the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, there are well over 200 million privately owned firearms in the U.S, including more than 65-70 million handguns. Approximately 45 percent of American households have firearms. That means we have 65-80 million American gun-owners, including 30-35 million owners of handguns.
This is a very, very good thing - we don't even realize how good it is. For just as it was true in our founders' day, it's true today that Americans need guns.
If you don't believe me, just consider the Virginia Tech disaster. Imagine Cho Seung-Hui walking into a classroom, threatening people with his guns, making them line up, preparing to shoot them. Now freeze-frame that scene and think for a moment: There isn't anyone or anything in this world that could have stopped Cho in his tracks at that point and averted the hellish slaughter that followed - except a single student or professor with a firearm, and trained to use it.
At the time of this nation's birth, people understood the importance of the armed citizen.
James Madison, who wrote the Second Amendment, said Americans had "the advantage of being armed," whereas in other nations "the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms." Thomas Jefferson said, "No free man shall be debarred the use of arms." Patrick Henry said the "great object is that every man be armed. . Everyone who is able may have a gun." And Thomas Paine said, "Arms . discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property."
But today, many people would like to get rid of the Second Amendment - either by excising it from the Bill of Rights or, more likely, by judicially redefining its meaning as they have with the First Amendment (with the invention of the mythological "separation of church and state").
You see, in today's America the self-reliant, responsible, independent-minded man or woman who carries a gun - the kind of person who is aware, thinks for himself, is skeptical of government, the press and all of society's "experts" - the person not content to be a victim, but willing to take charge of a situation, "get involved," even fight back and stand up for what is right - in other words, a true American - is threatening to society's elitists, experts and politicians who are addicted to power.
As a general rule, it is liberals who tend to oppose private citizens carrying guns around with them. As I said, this is mostly because they're full of suppressed anger and therefore project their own - and others' - evil onto inanimate objects so as to maintain the denial in which they live. After all, you can't possibly believe the illogical and immoral things liberals and leftists espouse unless you're full of trauma and repressed hatred. It takes lots of inner rage to distort reality sufficiently to believe it's OK to kill beautiful little babies in their mothers' wombs or to believe a malevolent chameleon like Hillary Clinton should be elected president of the United States and commander-in-chief of the most powerful military in world history.
This same emotional confusion leads liberals to think guns are the problem, rather than being - in the right hands - the protection from tyranny and predation they truly are.
Do you know what happens when good people carry lethal weapons? Their mentality changes from passive to active, vulnerable to protective, powerless to empowered, dependent to independent. Very simply, they become more responsible - and more capable of doing good.
In fact, they make up the very fabric of a free America. This is the whole concept of the unregulated militia.
When neighbor stands with neighbor
There have always been two parts to the "militia" mentioned in the Second Amendment - the regulated and the unregulated (or the organized and the unorganized) militia.
Various laws throughout U.S. history have defined the organized or regulated militia, for instance the Militia Act of 1792, which specified that males 18 through 44 years of age "shall severally and respectively be enrolled in the militia ."
However, much more important was the founders' and framers' concept of the unorganized or unregulated militia, which they regarded as the ultimate defense of the new nation. This larger and more organic militia consisted of all able-bodied citizens. As Richard Henry Lee, a key founder during the Revolutionary period, explained in 1788: "A militia when properly formed [is] in fact the people themselves ... and include all men capable of bearing arms. ... To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of people always possess arms." Or as George Mason famously and cryptically put it: "I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people, except for a few public officials."
Although the practice of arming oneself is very wholesome - for responsible, mature people, that is - there is one nightmare scenario we need to guard against, because history shows it leads inexorably to tyranny.
That scenario would be for angry, "right-wing, fundamentalist Christians" (more accurately, pseudo-Christian hate groups) to commit acts of terrorism or murder - like the bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City - in the name of freedom. That is exactly what today's would-be totalitarians would secretly relish most, as it would justify their crackdown on "Christian" and "patriot" groups and gun rights across the board.
Timothy McVeigh, who thought he was advancing a patriotic rebellion against oppressive government, achieved precisely the opposite: He discredited everything he thought he was fighting for and caused many people to regard "right-wing patriots" and "militia types" as domestic terrorists.
In fact, the biggest reason President Bill Clinton was asleep at the switch with regard to Islamic terrorism, allowing Osama bin Laden to slip through his fingers even when the terror kingpin was offered on a silver platter, is because it served Clinton's leftist agenda to obsess over "right-wing" extremist organizations rather than the threat of radical Islam. Thus, Clinton disastrously focused the FBI predominantly on "right-wing hate groups" rather than task it with chasing down the many credible leads we had on al-Qaida terror plots against the United States.
If angry, would-be "patriots" engage in violence against the U.S. government as occurred in Oklahoma City, this nation could quickly move toward the suppression of gun rights and much more, all in the guise of protecting the public safety.
It's a very real temptation. Think of it: As government corruption becomes more and more brazen, as judges outlaw the Ten Commandments, as "hate crimes" laws effectively criminalize the Bible, as kindergartners are brainwashed with radical "gay rights" propaganda and so on, pretty soon some group decides it can't take it any more. Its members become so enraged, they conclude it's time to start the next armed revolution. Seeing their nation being raped and envisioning no solution other than violence, they convince themselves they're the modern counterparts of America's revolutionary founders. Training with firearms and explosives and conspiring in secret - all the while quoting Jefferson to each other about "watering the tree of liberty" from time to time with "the blood of patriots and tyrants" - they murder some federal judges or blow up a government office building in an attempt to fight back. But all they succeed in doing is murdering and maiming a bunch of their fellow Americans (or, as McVeigh did in Oklahoma City, massacring a room full of toddlers in daycare - which he later coldly termed "collateral damage").
What would follow would be a massive official crackdown on "domestic terrorists" and a severe assault on freedom in America - not to mention a major distraction from the real war against Islamic jihad.
Amazing what hatred can accomplish, isn't it? Exactly the opposite of what you intended. The dark side of the force is very clever. As the blood-drenched, hate-based French Revolution proved, when "revolutionaries" are full of hate, they're no better than the hateful, corrupt government they try to replace - and maybe worse - ushering in their own "reign of terror."
This is why true, mature Americans - the kind that must be armed - must also be self-controlled, even-tempered, virtuous and noble, not motivated by hatred and revenge. They must also stand together.
In reality, the responsible armed citizen is the strength of America. But there will always be a tension between him and his government - especially today, when the armed citizen is the antithesis of everything our culture, experts, politicians and other "leaders" teach us. In their minds, we're supposed to be helpless victims or incompetent, irresponsible, out-of-control children. We're supposed to need them to provide for us and protect us. If they could have their way, nobody would have guns except the police. But then, that's what's known as a "police state."
What we need is a rebirth of the true American spirit. We need people to take up arms in the spirit of responsibly protecting their family and other innocents, just like in the old days when everyone carried a sword. Every man had to be willing to put his life on the line to protect his loved ones. But you can't do that without your sword - which in today's world is a firearm.
One quote from Jesus we almost never hear cited these days is what He said shortly before being taken into captivity by Roman soldiers to be crucified. It was a dangerous time, and as He spoke to His disciples, He told them to arm themselves.
And he said unto them, When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye any thing? And they said, - Nothing. Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one. For I say unto you, that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me, And he was reckoned among the transgressors: for the things concerning me have an end. And they said, Lord, behold, here are two swords. And he said unto them, It is enough. (Luke 22:35-38 KJV)
The police cannot protect you. Very simply, they're never there when the crime against you and your loved ones is being committed.
Do you want God to protect you? Of course. Then don't tempt Him by saying, "The Lord will protect me, I don't need a gun." That's like the man who says, "A storm is coming, but I don't need an umbrella; God will protect me," all the while ignoring the real protection God has provided for him - the common sense to get an umbrella or come in out of the rain. In dangerous times such as those in which we live today, God clearly speaks to us - both in Scripture and through good old fashioned common sense - about being prepared to protect and defend ourselves, our families and our neighbors.
As Jesus Himself said: "He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one."
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The preceding is excerpted from the blockbuster May edition of WND's monthly Whistleblower magazine - an issue titled "FIREARMS AND FREEDOM: Why the Second Amendment is more important than ever."

SPECIAL OFFER: For a limited time, subscribe, renew or give a gift Whistleblower subscription and we'll also send you, FREE (including shipping), a copy of one of our most popular books, "Shooting Back: The Right and Duty of Self-Defense," by Charl Van Wyk.
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0

Mk 19

December 04, 2007 15:30

Here are a few more:

Gun town U.S.A., revisited - success of Kennesaw, GA's gun ownership requirement law in preventing cri,e
National Review, August 15, 1994 by Luther M. Boggs, Jr.

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In March 1982, responding to the passage of a handgun ban in Morton Grove, Illinois, and the fawning media coverage that accompanied it, the city council of Kennesaw, Georgia, decided to make a statement of its own. With exceptions duly made for convicted felons, the disabled, and those with religious objections, the council passed (unanimously) an ordinance requiring each head of household to own and maintain a gun.
The moment the story hit the wire services, a media invasion swept into Kennesaw, a small city on the northwestern frontier of suburban Atlanta. The telephones of council members began ringing off the hook. CNN called. Today called. The then-mayor, Darvin Purdy, went on Donahue.
The press reacted predictably. The Washington Post issued a mock salute to "the brave little city of Kennesaw, Ga., soon to be pistol-packing capital of the world." In a column titled "Gun Town U.S.A.," Art Buchwald described a place where routine disagreements would be settled in Wild West shootouts. Mayor Purdy declined to talk to the Post about his own guns, claiming that "the caliber of my weapons is a personal matter." In the hands of the Post's reporter, Purdy ended up sounding like Dr. Strangelove's General Ripper, the nut bent on preserving his "precious bodily fluids."
"The national media," recalls Chief of Police Dwaine L. Wilson, "made a big shadoo out of it, [but] most of the people in this area already owned some type of firearm." Actually, the media's amazement rang hollow. The press gang expected as much from the rural South. But it is safe to say they did not expect the results.
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Today Kennesaw is a burgeoning town of more than 11,000, the population having doubled since 1982. Industrial growth has transformed the former bedroom community into a bustling hub of economic activity. The town built a new wing onto city hall in 1988 and this year bought a new garbage truck and a street sweeper. Tax receipts have soared, Mayor J. O. Stephenson notes proudly, even as tax rates have fallen.
Crime just isn't much of a problem in "Gun Town U.S.A." According to state figures, Kennesaw's per-capita crime rate has remained essentially static (and low) since 1983. The most recent homicide, in 1989, was committed with a knife. The last gun homicide, in 1986, involved two young men from out of state who were staying at a local motel. "A little alcohol," Chief Wilson recalls, "had something to do with it. They were daring one another to shoot each other, so one of them did." Aside from that incident, Wilson says, there have been no problems with "anybody shooting anybody," even by accident.
Mayor Stephenson is proud of Kennesaw and its unique gun law. A businessman who runs his own pest-control firm, Stephenson does his mayoring part-time. The mayor thinks the election of Bill Clinton, "a liberal, Ivy Leaguer type," gave gun-control forces a boost. Clinton may hail from a marginally Southern state, Stephenson says, but "he don't fit the mold of most of us down thisaway." Dismissing the Brady law as "a bunch of hogwash," he says waiting periods "just don't work and [only] make it inconvenient for people like me."
Stephenson fears the slippery slope. "Next year, I'll guaran-damn-tee you that there'll be another bill broadening the number [and] kinds of guns you can't own." I ask him if Kennesaw's gun law would work in, say, New York City. "I don't know, but gun control don't work in New York City either."
A third-generation lawman who worked his way up from patrol duty, Chief Wilson looks the part with his close-cropped hair and robust build. He says people, not guns, are the fundamental problem: "People are going to find ways to kill people if that is what they want to do." The chief doubts the worth of gun buybacks, but he is interested, musing dryly that he's got "several old pieces" he could swap for a nice new pair of tennis shoes.
Over at the Shanty House Country Restaurant, manager Judy Turner flashes a smile when asked about the gun law. "We don't have a [crime] problem like they do other places," she says, because would-be crooks "all know we'll have guns."
No one is more enthusiastic about the law than Dent "Wildman" Myers, proprietor of Wildman's Civil War Surplus. With a .45 holstered on each hip and a bandanna tied around his head, Myers looks like Willie Nelson retired from a biker gang. He sells an eclectic mix of books, memorabilia, war wares, and medicinal herbs. (One shelf of books is labeled "Margrat Mitchell.")
As conspiracists and misanthropes go, Myers seems oddly light-hearted, almost jolly. He hates Bill and Hillary and "Zig-Zag" (Governor Zell Miller); doesn't care for gays, blacks, Jews, or immigrants; mistrusts big business and big government; and figures if AIDS doesn't end the world, "race mixing" will. He thinks baseball is fixed and that William Buckley's "bombasticism" may have resulted from something in his childhood. (As for his own bombasticism, he says, "I've got no excuse.") Genuine and colorful yet hardly representative, Myers is the first guy out-of-town reporters want to interview. He fits the bill.

Gun Ownership Mandatory In Kennesaw, Georgia
Crime Rate Plummets
by Chuck Baldwin
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The New American magazine reminds us that March 25th marked the 16th anniversary of Kennesaw, Georgia's ordinance requiring heads of households (with certain exceptions) to keep at least one firearm in their homes.
The city's population grew from around 5,000 in 1980 to 13,000 by 1996 (latest available estimate). Yet there have been only three murders: two with knives (1984 and 1987) and one with a firearm (1997). After the law went into effect in 1982, crime against persons plummeted 74 percent compared to 1981, and fell another 45 percent in 1983 compared to 1982.
And it has stayed impressively low. In addition to nearly non-existent homicide (murders have averaged a mere 0.19 per year), the annual number of armed robberies, residential burglaries, commercial burglaries, and rapes have averaged, respectively, 1.69, 31.63, 19.75, and 2.00 through 1998.
With all the attention that has been heaped upon the lawful possession of firearms lately, you would think that a city that requires gun ownership would be the center of a media feeding frenzy. It isn't. The fact is I can't remember a major media outlet even mentioning Kennesaw. Can you?
The reason is obvious. Kennesaw proves that the presence of firearms actually improves safety and security. This is not the message that the media want us to hear. They want us to believe that guns are evil and are the cause of violence.
The facts tell a different story. What is even more interesting about Kennesaw is that the city's crime rate decreased with the simple knowledge that the entire community was armed. The bad guys didn't force the residents to prove it. Just knowing that residents were armed prompted them to move on to easier targets. Most criminals don't have a death wish.
There have been two occasions in my own family when the presence of a handgun averted potential disaster. In both instances the gun was never aimed at a person and no shot was fired.
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SOURCE: http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a38a75857671c.htm

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VIRGINIA TECH MASSACRE
25 years murder-free in 'Gun Town USA'
Crime rate plummeted after law required firearms for residents

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Posted: April 19, 2007
1:52 p.m. Eastern

c 2007 WorldNetDaily.com

Kennesaw, Ga., City Hall
As the nation debates whether more guns or fewer can prevent tragedies like the Virginia Tech Massacre, a notable anniversary passed last month in a Georgia town that witnessed a dramatic plunge in crime and violence after mandating residents to own firearms.
In March 1982, 25 years ago, the small town of Kennesaw - responding to a handgun ban in Morton Grove, Ill. - unanimously passed an ordinance requiring each head of household to own and maintain a gun. Since then, despite dire predictions of "Wild West" showdowns and increased violence and accidents, not a single resident has been involved in a fatal shooting - as a victim, attacker or defender.
The crime rate initially plummeted for several years after the passage of the ordinance, with the 2005 per capita crime rate actually significantly lower than it was in 1981, the year before passage of the law.
Prior to enactment of the law, Kennesaw had a population of just 5,242 but a crime rate significantly higher (4,332 per 100,000) than the national average (3,899 per 100,000). The latest statistics available - for the year 2005 - show the rate at 2,027 per 100,000. Meanwhile, the population has skyrocketed to 28,189
By comparison, the population of Morton Grove, the first city in Illinois to adopt a gun ban for anyone other than police officers, has actually dropped slightly and stands at 22,202, according to 2005 statistics. More significantly, perhaps, the city's crime rate increased by 15.7 percent immediately after the gun ban, even though the overall crime rate in Cook County rose only 3 percent. Today, by comparison, the township's crime rate stands at 2,268 per 100,000.
This was not what some predicted.
In a column titled "Gun Town USA," Art Buchwald suggested Kennesaw would soon become a place where routine disagreements between neighbors would be settled in shootouts. The Washington Post mocked Kennesaw as "the brave little city . soon to be pistol-packing capital of the world." Phil Donahue invited the mayor on his show.
Reuters, the European news service, today revisited the Kennesaw controversy following the Virginia Tech Massacre.
Police Lt. Craig Graydon said: "When the Kennesaw law was passed in 1982 there was a substantial drop in crime . and we have maintained a really low crime rate since then. We are sure it is one of the lowest (crime) towns in the metro area." Kennesaw is just north of Atlanta.
The Reuters story went on to report: "Since the Virginia Tech shootings, some conservative U.S. talk show hosts have rejected attempts to link the massacre to the availability of guns, arguing that had students been allowed to carry weapons on campus someone might have been able to shoot the killer."
Virginia Tech, like many of the nation's schools and college campuses, is a so-called "gun-free zone," which Second Amendment supporters say invites gun violence - especially from disturbed individuals seeking to kill as many victims as possible.
Cho Seung-Hui murdered 32 and wounded another 15 before turning his gun on himself.

From: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=55288

GREENLEAF, Idaho - After seeing the chaos of Hurricane Katrina, a city councilor in this tiny Idaho town founded by pacifist Quakers came up with a novel idea.

Ordinance 208, passed by the City Council on Tuesday, asks Greenleaf's 862 residents who do not object on religious or other grounds to keep a gun at home in case they are overrun by refugees from disasters like Katrina.

"This is not an 'it'll never happen here kind of thing,'" said Steven Jett, the ordinance's sponsor. "We could get refugees."

In this town about 35 miles west of Boise near the Oregon line - where an estimated 80 percent of the adults already own guns - the proposal hardly caused a stir: It went through weeks of public hearings and drew only mild criticism from the pastor of the town's Quaker meeting house.

But in the six weeks since Jett first introduced the ordinance, national media have flocked to the story.

Jay Leno ribbed Greenleaf in his monologue. Comedy Central's "The Daily Show" telephoned, no doubt to exploit Idaho's reputation as wild woodland where mountain men shop for groceries with a rifle slung over a camouflage jacket.

Jett, whose father died in a hunting accident, said the ordinance is designed to enable residents to protect themselves, but it also gives the city a better platform from which to promote gun safety.

"The fact that Greenleaf supports the Second Amendment, we'll be able to keep the crime rate down," he said.

The thing is, Greenleaf doesn't really have crime. At least as most cities define it. The most violent offense reported in the past two years was a fist fight.

Still, Jett insists, the menace of high crime may be on the horizon.

Greenleaf is on the western fringe of Canyon County, a fast-growing suburb of Boise. As developers turn alfalfa rows into tract housing and hay bales into big box stores, Jett wants newcomers to know that criminals will not be "comfortable" in Greenleaf.

"We don't have a crime problem," he said. "But this area is going to grow and we're going to keep it that way."

Pastor Alan Weinacht originally opposed the ordinance because it conflicted with the Quaker teaching of nonviolence. Based on an unenforced 1982 law in Kennesaw, Ga., it originally require all homeowners to own and "maintain a firearm."

"It made owning a gun a basis of good citizenship," Weinacht said. "I don't know. It just seems we're slipping as a society into a culture of fear."

But then Weinacht, who owns several shotguns and rifles for hunting and target shooting, discussed the law with Jett. Jett softened the language and allowed for personal or religious exemptions.

On Tuesday, Weinacht, one of four residents to attend the council meeting, announced his support. "I want to be a team player," he told the mayor and four council members.

With that, the council approved the ordinance, with Councilor Clovis Strange joking that it had become "gutless."

Mayor Brad Holton, who owns about 25 rifles, laughed at the fact that Greenleaf's gun law had been put the town into the national media spotlight.

"It's been a wild ride," he said.

From: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15751662/
c 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

Here's a thought to warm some of your hearts
From: Ed Chenel, a police officer in Australia

Hi Yanks, I thought you all would like to see the real figures from "Down Under". It has now been 12 months since gun owners in Australia were forced by a new law to surrender 640,381 personal firearms to be destroyed by our own government, a program costing Australia taxpayers more than $500 million dollars.

The first year results are now in: Australia-wide, homicides are up 3.2 percent, Aust ralia-wide, assaults are up 8.6 percent; Australia-wide, armed robberies are up 44 percent (yes,44 percent)!

In the state of Victoria alone, homicides with firearms are now up 300 percent. (Note that while the law-abiding citizens turned them in, the criminals did not! and criminals still possess their guns!)

While figures over the previous 25 years showed a steady decrease in armed robbery with firearms, this has changed drastically upward in the past 12 months, since the criminals now are guaranteed that their prey is unarmed. There has also been a dramatic increase in break-ins and assaults of the elderly.

Australian politicians are at a loss to explain how public safety has decreased, after such monumental effort and expense was expended in successfully ridding "Australian society of guns."

You won't see this on the American evening news or hear your governor or members of the State Assembly disseminating this information.

The Australian experience proves it. Guns in the hands of honest citizens save lives and property and, yes, gun-control laws affect only the law-abiding citizens.

Take note Americans, before it's too late!

Stats From: http://www.law.ecel.uwa.edu.au/crc/stats/Stats96/national.htm

THE BILL OF RIGHTS
Amendments 1-10 of the Constitution
________________________________________
The Conventions of a number of the States having, at the time of adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added, and as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution;
Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two-thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States; all or any of which articles, when ratified by three-fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the said Constitution, namely:
Amendment I
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Amendment II
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Amendment III
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Amendment VI
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Amendment VII
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
Amendment VIII
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Amendment IX
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Amendment X
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
From: http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/funddocs/billeng.htm

0

pickenup

December 04, 2007 18:38

MVP,
Will you share his essay with us when he is done?
Along with his teachers thoughts on it?

Mk 19,
hint;

http://tinyurl.com/

0

ljwrench

December 04, 2007 19:45

Good luck on the paper. 21 years ago I was in an advanced (college prep) English class in high school. I had gotten all A's & B's on reports written about the classics. We finally had a chance to write a paper on whatever we wanted. I chose gun control. I put my heart and sole into that paper. I researched like never before and that was before the internet. I had to do it the hard way and that was going to the library. I KNEW I made my point and had written a concise and well thought out report with FACTS. My english teacher gave me a D-!!!!! Turns out she was a gun-hating liberal. I have never forgave her for that. She ended up retiring from teaching but got elected to the school board. I saw her a few years ago and she had "Gore" and "Kerry" bumper stickers plastered all over the back of her crappy little Honda. Luckily she passed away this year so as to not pollute the school board with any more of her liberal garbage. I hated that woman. Sorry for the rant.

0

ruger270man

December 04, 2007 20:43

check out www.gunfacts.info

tons of great info, with sources.

Also, a good book, though extremely thorough, is "More Guns, Less Crime" by John Lott.

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CapnMidnight

December 04, 2007 21:46

Have your son read Unintened Consequences by John Ross, better yet, you should read it first, then you can answer alot of his questions. I feel this book should be required reading for every gun owner.
For what it's worth.
W.D.

0

tr fox

December 05, 2007 06:26

Usually in a pro/anti gun rights debate or essay, everyone thinks that in order to win they must produce the largest "stack" of facts, dates, events, etc. in order to be successful. In my view and my everyday life when trying to prove my point I try to rely on a minimum of simple, obvious truths .Such as:

For 30 years the lawful citizens of Washington, D.C. have been denied the right to own handguns. Yet for all those 30 years handgun violence continued at a rate equal to, or higher, other cities where there was no handgun ban. Obviously the peaceful, lawful citizens were not committing the handgun violence because they were prevented from even owning a handgun. So the handgun violence can only be attributed to the violent, unlawful criminals. Yet, incredibly, this criminal violence is the very reason the D.C. government offers in their attempt to continue the ban on handguns for lawful citizens. How such a conflict of logic makes any sense is beyond me.

Most gun-banning liberals envision a violence free world if only all guns were banned. Well, you can see from the above that totally banning handguns in D.C. didn't stop or even slow criminal handgun violence. "But wait! the anti-gun liberals will say! The gun ban wasn't enforced strongly enough!" Alright then, let's look at the prison system. ALL GUNS AND WEAPONS ARE BANNED IN PRISONS! Yet each week, somewhere in one of America's prisons, inmates (and sometimes guards) are stabbed, slashed, beaten, raped and killed by the violent criminals in prison. THIS IN SPITE OF THE FACT THAT THERE ARE SEVERAL PRISON GUARDS ONLY A SHOUT AWAY 24/7 (so much for the liberals belief that increasing the number of street police will stop crime). If all guns are banned in society, not only will criminals continue to attacke lawful citizens using criminal guns, but they will also continue to attack using homemade guns, knives, clubs, superior strength, superior numbers (gangs), and on and on. When this happens it is only fair and reaonable to give the peaceful, lawful citizens (the ones who don't want to be a helpless victims anyway) the most effective tool (a gun) with which to defend themselves when the police are not available.

"Guns are dangerous and deadly!" Damn right they are! That is exactly why I want one in my hand if and when one of the above mentioned criminals happens to attack me or my family and the police are not around to save us. Would the gun banning liberals rather I tried to fight off the violent criminals using my cell phone or a twinky?

The above would be the foundation for any pro-gun essay I might write. Hope it gives your son a few ideas.

0

slipgate

December 05, 2007 06:32

I think he should include something about liberal teachers brainwashing students with their jaded, warped views and how dangerous it is to have their one-sided views blasted at children at such a young impresssionable age.

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MVP

December 10, 2007 18:50

quote:Originally posted by pickenup
MVP,
Will you share his essay with us when he is done?
Along with his teachers thoughts on it?

Mk 19,
hint;

http://tinyurl.com/

I was talking to him tonight and he was shareing some good stuff with me that he has dug up. I also asked him if we could post the report here and he said it is a power point presentation so it would be hard to post.

0

MVP

December 10, 2007 18:51

Does anyone have any of that Hitler gun control comparisons or pictures that could be posted?
Or any of the other world leaders who tried gun control?

0

bhale187

December 10, 2007 18:59

http://home.earthlink.net/~boycott_star_banner/Nazi.html

http://www.xmission.com/~ranthon/hitler-and-guns.htm

http://constitutionalistnc.tripod.com/hitler-leftist/id14.html

0

Gun rights essay for high school. Help appreciated

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