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AN AMERICAN WARNING
Because you should know!
March 2008 - Posts
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Oklahoma's major newspaper, The Oklahoman, calls a bill that would extend Right to Carry (for some) onto college campuses a knee jerk reaction to mass killings like those at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University. But like most media outlets, it's The Oklahoman that's offering a knee-jerk reaction: one that simply says, "Guns are bad."
Following The Oklahoman's logic that "in the case of a shooting, law enforcement would have a tough time figuring out the bad guys from the good guys," the paper should oppose ALL forms of Right to Carry. That means the paper should be opposed to the more than 60,000 Oklahoma residents who are RTC holders. And it means they think the Oklahomans who defended themselves and others should have been required to leave their guns at home.
The argument The Oklahoman makes against extending Right to Carry is the same argument gun control advocates make against Right to Carry laws in general. But we know, from ten years of experience in Oklahoma (and longer in other states), that Right to Carry holders and law enforcement are not at odds with one another. They support each other.
The bill in Oklahoma wouldn't change the requirements on who can get a Right to Carry license. In fact, the bill doesn't even go as far as legislation introduced in other states. In the Oklahoma bill, only those with 72 hours of law enforcement training or active duty and honorably discharged military veterans would be allowed to carry on campus. Yet even this modest step forward is too much for the editorial board of the paper.
You can't help but wonder why the paper has more faith that a madman won't target an Oklahoma campus than faith that a trained gun owner might be able to make a difference.
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The District of Columbia is embarking on one of the most ill-conceived "public safety" plans I've ever heard of. They're asking residents to voluntarily open their homes up to searches for illegally possessed firearms, and as you can imagine, the plan is drawing a lot of heat.
But it's not just gun owners complaining this time. The ACLU is complaining, and the executive director of the National Black Police Association says he won't let officers in to search his home.
Besides the Big Brother mentality behind this initiative, Mayor Adrian Fenty and Chief Cathy Lanier should think about the danger this could pose to officers. And frankly, given their hope that the parents of young gang members will call D.C. police and ask that officers search their homes for guns, they should think about the message they send when they announce that anybody found with an illegally possessed gun won't be prosecuted.
It's another example of politicians targeting the gun instead of the violent criminal. It's not going to reduce violent crime. It's only going to tell criminals they can get away with violating the law, while putting officers at increased risk and encouraging an atmosphere of government intervention at all times, in all places.
This plan should be scrapped before it can cause any damage. And the politicians and politically appointed police chief should get back to doing what works: locking up violent criminals and taking them off of the streets.
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In the coming weeks, the U.S. Department of the Interior will announce proposed changes to the rules that bar the carrying and transporting of firearms in national parks. This comes after nearly five years of efforts by NRA-ILA and others to get rid of the rules that prevent law-abiding Right-to-Carry holders and gun owners from having to disarm and store their firearms in an inaccessible part of their vehicle.
Some opponents of the change say that you don't need access to a firearm in a national park. But these people ignore the fact that park rangers are wearing protective vests and carry semi-automatic rifles for self-defense from predators of the two- and four-legged variety. Heck, back in 2003 the media quoted David Barma, the chief spokesman for the National Park System, as saying, "The most [visitors] used to worry about is running into a grizzly bear. Now there is the specter of violence by a masked alien toting an AK-47."
But now the media ignores the recent up-tick in violent crime in our national parks. And they ignore the fact that many parts of the national park system are, by their very nature, remote and rugged wilderness areas, where help isn't just a phone call away.
I'm glad that Congress isn't ignoring these facts, and I'm very pleased the Department of the Interior is now keeping these facts in mind as they revise and update the rules for our national park system.
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Canadian journalist Lorne Gunter is taking gun-banners to task for proposing a handgun ban in Canada. And he makes a great point about these gun-control schemes, saying, "Activity is confused with achievement."
How true that is. Just look at the "gun buybacks" that cities promote on a regular basis. Sure, there's activity. But what's the achievement? Every study done on these "buybacks" says they don't work to lower crime, nor do they do anything to make homes safer. Still, politicians love these made-for-media events. They guarantee that the politicians behind the "buybacks" will get face time on television and in the local newspaper. But that's the only thing "buybacks" achieve.
It's easy to confuse action with achievement. But the goal of all Americans, on both sides of the gun-control issue, should be a reduction in violent crime while maintaining liberty and freedom for the law-abiding. And every gun-control proposal should be looked at through the dual lenses of liberty and common sense. But we should reject schemes that are action that achieves nothing, or worse, action that achieve more crime and less freedom.
So the next time you hear some goofy plan to restrict gun ownership, ask yourself what it would really achieve. I think you'll find that the answer is "not much to nothing at all."
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I still can't believe Claude Willoughby is gone. The oldest NRA member passed away on Sunday, March 9, at the age of 102. Those of you who've attended the NRA Annual Meetings in years past remember Claude. For years now, he's been honored as the oldest member in attendance. We didn't see him in St. Louis last year because his son was ill and couldn't take him, but we were all looking forward to seeing him in Louisville in May.
Claude's devotion to the Second Amendment was legendary. I remember back in 2002 at the Annual Meetings when Claude took time to challenge us in that election year.
"We did half a job last election, so we must do more next election," he said. I have a feeling I know what Claude would tell us this year. He'd tell us that as gun owners, we must do more this time around as well. We have to get involved. We have to make calls. We have to support pro-gun candidates and we have to speak out against the anti-gunners running for office. We can't rest. We can't do half the job.
I'm going to miss Claude Willoughby, and the prayers of NRA staff and members go out to the Willoughby family. But hopefully they can take comfort in the fact that he'll continue to be an inspiration to me and thousands of other NRA members who take his words to heart.
"We must do more."
We won't let you down, Claude.
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I was at the Supreme Court today, and based on what I heard, I have every expectation that the Court will soon restore the Second Amendment to the District of Columbia.
Everything I saw in court shows the District's ban on functional firearms is out of sync with American history. The arguments today clearly indicated the Second Amendment is an individual, and not a collective, right. The District's attorneys spent their time swimming upstream against the U.S. Constitution.
In Washington, D.C., the law is simple. Once a gun becomes usable, it becomes illegal. That means when your window breaks at 2 a.m. and you're facing an armed criminal heading towards your bedroom, the politicians in D.C. want you to just call 911 and pray help arrives before it's too late.
That's why the District's law isn't just unconstitutional, it's unreasonable. The D.C. Gun Ban has been on the books for decades and hasn't increased public safety. In fact, the crime rate has skyrocketed. When you couple the gun ban with the District's revolving-door criminal justice system, it's open season on honest people.
The District seeks the supremacy of the government. The NRA believes that individual freedom is of the utmost importance in our country. The idea that the government can protect you from all harm is a fantasy. Even the beat cops, the law enforcement officers who risk their lives every day, will tell you that.
This case is ultimately about the good people in society, and what rights they have to protect themselves against those who ignore our laws. It's about whether the good people will have their God-given right of self defense returned to them. And after what we've seen today, I'm confident the Second Amendment will soon return to the District.
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The veto of two self-defense bills by Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has infuriated many gun owners in the state. Kaine campaigned as a guy who wouldn't sign gun-control legislation, and would respect the rights of gun owners. But the veto of these two bills shows us that Kaine's support for gun owners seems to only come out when it's politically expedient.
Take, for example, Kaine's displeasure with the fact that Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell signed on to the amicus brief that 30 other state Attorneys General supported in opposition to D.C.'s gun ban. Kaine isn't willing to say that D.C.'s ban on firearms in the home is unconstitutional, because (in the words of his spokesman) he's not the "governor of D.C."
That has to be one of the dumbest arguments I've heard lately. A lots of folks have given their opinion on the D.C. gun case, and most of them don't live in the District of Columbia. With an issue that could affect every American, it's no surprise there's interest from around the country. But when a politician tries to straddle the fence between his pro-gun constituency and party leaders who are anti-gun, it's no surprise to hear the ridiculous stated with a straight face.
Tim Kaine doesn't support allowing restaurant owners to decide for themselves if they want to allow Right-to-Carry. He doesn't support common-sense measures like allowing legal gun owners to lock their firearms away in their car, rather than having to display them in the open. And he's not telling us whether he thinks it's okay for the government to ban firearms in the home.
I don't know about Kaine's aspirations for higher office, but I do know gun owners won't forget these positions the next time they have a chance to vote.
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Yet another new study shows that ballistic fingerprinting doesn't work the way the gun-banners claimed it would. Doubts about the validity of the science, combined with problems in real-world implementation, mean that for the foreseeable future, we probably won't be hearing the anti-gunners clamoring for this new piece of gun control.
Instead, expect to hear a lot of talk about "microstamping." The authors of the study on ballistic fingerprinting mentioned microstamping as an alternative. But they never got into the real-world problems with that technology, either.
From the additional cost to the easily defeated stamp itself, microstamping is another illusion of "gun safety." The problems with microstamping are numerous and not easily corrected, but that won't stop gun-controllers from trying to pass microstamping laws around the country.
The other day I saw a story from Massachusetts. It seems criminals are increasingly having surgery to try and remove their fingerprints. If they're going through this much trouble, do you really think they're going to legally purchase a firearm that could be tied back to them? Give me a break. They'll continue to acquire their firearms illegally. Meanwhile, an honest gun owner who tries to replace a firing pin on his handgun may inadvertently become a criminal by removing the microstamped part.
We're all for helping law enforcement. But that means real help, not pie-in-the-sky proposals that will only drain law-enforcement dollars instead of truly helping the cops on the street.
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In my last blog, I talked about the importance of having a real discussion on the issue of Right-to-Carry on campuses across this country. Instead of having that honest debate, people like Paul Helmke and Peter Hamm of the Brady Campaign seem intent on talking about anything but the real issue.
They accuse groups like Students for Concealed Carry on Campus of being "funded by the gun industry," instead of simply recognizing that this is an issue that is important to tens of thousands of students and faculty. And their arguments against Right-to-Carry on campus are just straw men that collapse with ease.
They say that allowing Right-to-Carry on college campuses would lead to alcohol-fueled bloodshed. But they ignore the fact that there are many young adults who are already gun owners and Right-to-Carry holders across the country. They're serving in our military, they're serving as law enforcement officers, and yes, there are many who are just responsible gun owners. These young men and women are already gun owners of legal drinking age, and they're not causing mayhem. There's simply no reason to believe that extending Right-to-Carry to campuses would cause these responsible adults to act irresponsibly.
The gun-control crowd also likes to say that when a madman is shooting into a crowd of students and faculty, the presence of an armed citizen would actually make things worse, not better. This is a ridiculous argument. At Trolley Square Mall, at New Life Church, at Appalachian Law School, and on and on, the presence of gun owners—whether they were off-duty officers, volunteer security guards, or simply students—didn't lead to more violence, but to less.
That's because these Instant Responders can always do what First Responders can never do: Immediately stop attacks on innocent people.
Finally, the Brady Campaign and others say they don't want our schools to look like prisons. With Right-to-Carry, they wouldn't. They would look just like our restaurants, our grocery stores, our bookstores, and every other place that people lawfully exercise their Right to Carry. And I'd much rather our campuses look like that than continuing to look like slaughterhouses.
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In Virginia, the state legislature recently voted to extend the Right-to-Carry into restaurants that serve alcohol. Frankly, it wasn't a controversial vote. Both chambers passed the bill easily, with very little opposition. And that's how it should be. Virginians have been exercising their Right to Carry for years now, and fears of "blood in the streets" have, of course, not come true.
So why is there such controversy over extending the Right-to-Carry onto school campuses? The fact of the matter is, we're not changing the requirements of who can exercise their Right to Carry. We're merely expanding where RTC holders can exercise that right.
There are millions of RTC holders in this country. You drive next to them, you shop with them, you see them every day. They're your dentist or your pastor, your boss or your star employee. They're everywhere. And the reason you may not know that is because they're not the problem.
They're already carrying in your church, the grocery store, and the public library. They're with you at your favorite restaurant or your local bookstore. And the reason you never think about it is because they're not the problem.
The problem is that there is evil in this world, people who want to prey on the innocent and defenseless.
The gun-control crowd has also flamed the fears with their embarrassingly weak arguments against extending the Right to Carry. They have played on emotion at the expense of logic and reason. And in my next blog, I'll take their arguments apart one by one. The discussion over extending Right-to-Carry is too important, and knee-jerk calls for more gun control serve no purpose but to avoid the issue.
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I'll give the mainstream media this: They're consistent. They're consistently ignoring Barack Obama's statements that he "supports" the Second Amendment, and they're also consistently ignoring Senator Obama's repeated calls for the kind of gun control that would spell the end of the Second Amendment as we know it.
Back in 1999, Obama called for a laundry list of gun control, including a 500 percent increase in taxes on firearms and ammunition. He called for bans of affordable handguns. He called for mandated "smart gun" technology. He demanded that FFLs not be allowed to maintain their business within five miles of a school or a park. In short, he wanted to regulate the Second Amendment out of existence.
To my knowledge, not one reporter has asked Obama about the positions he took back then. Nor have they asked him about the position he's taking now, "supporting" the Second Amendment in speeches while refusing to sign on to the congressional amicus brief opposing the District of Columbia's gun ban. Fifty-five of his fellow senators signed on to that brief, but Obama still pretends the issue is about "local control," not constitutional rights.
When the mainstream media refuses to ask a presidential frontrunner about his position on an issue, you can't help but wonder why. When the issue is the Second Amendment, it can't be because the press doesn't like what Obama has to say. Maybe it's just that they don't want you to hear it.
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I know the gun-control crowd likes to pretend they're on the side of law and order. And they love to paint gun owners as somehow on the side of criminals. But what they and their cohorts in the mainstream media never tell you is that their gun-control laws actually give criminals the upper hand.
Keep that in mind as I tell you about Keith Ingram, a Right-to-Carry holder from Tennessee. Early one recent morning, he woke up to the sounds of his cousin, who lives next door, begging for help. A man had broken into her home and was holding her sister. The two females, one aged 22 and one aged 12, had both been tied up by a convicted sex offender and attempted rapist who had broken into their home. One of the females was able to escape and run for help. She found her cousin.
Keith Ingram went next door armed with his pistol. When 44-year-old David Fleming attempted to attack Ingram, the gun owner defended himself. Fleming, the convicted sex offender, was killed. His two intended victims should be okay.
I'd like all those in favor of the D.C. gun ban to travel to Brighton, Tennessee, and look those two females in the eye. I'd like them to explain to that 12-year-old girl that, gosh, they're really happy she's okay, but they don't think her cousin should have had that firearm in his home.
And then I'd like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to talk to the more than 1,500 rape victims in Washington, D.C., since 2000. I'd like the senators to explain how they can claim to support the Second Amendment while continuing to insist that these victims remain disarmed and helpless. Not only can you not depend on yourself in D.C., you can't even hope for help from a neighbor. D.C.'s gun ban has emboldened criminals, who know that in the dark of night they have the upper hand over an unarmed citizenry.
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