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AN AMERICAN WARNING
Because you should know!
February 2009 - Posts
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What's going on in the Cherry Creek School District in Colorado? Not long ago, I told you about Marie Morrow, the 17-year-old high school student who was facing expulsion for leaving blocks of wood shaped like rifles in the back of her SUV at school. Marie, who's in the Young Marines, uses the wood to help her in her drill practice. As unbelievable as that story is, this isn't the first time Cherry Creek has made headlines for its inability to recognize a real firearm.
Back in 2002, the school district suspended seven fourth-graders for turning their thumbs and forefingers into the shape of a pistol during a recess game of "army versus aliens." The elementary school principal asked all seven kids about the gun ownership habits of their parents, and eventually the school district ended up in court.
Since the board of education and the superintendent have such a problem telling the difference between a firearm and a block of wood (not to mention a child's hand), I want to help. I'll pay for the board of education and the superintendent to attend a firearms safety course in Colorado. Taking the district to court hasn't helped. Maybe taking them to school will.
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I'm getting fed up with so-called educators who don't seem to have the intelligence or common sense to tell a block of wood from a firearm. The latest example of education idiocy is the case of Marie Morrow, a high school senior in Aurora, Colorado. Marie is a good student who is supposed to attend the Merchant Marine Academy after she graduates high school this spring. But all of that may be in jeopardy after her high school suspended her for having gun-shaped blocks of wood, plastic and duct tape in her SUV.
Keep in mind, these aren't guns we're talking about. These are items that Marie and other members of the Young Marines use when they drill. You couldn't shoot a spitwad from one of these, and yet the school district has suspended Marie for ten days for violating the school's policy on weapons. In fact, the school could expel Marie for her "crime," putting her future in doubt.
The school district says Marie doesn't deserve to be in school today, but it's pretty clear to me that this country could use a lot more Marie Morrows in schools around the country.
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The ACLU has always had an odd view of the Second Amendment. The organization has long held that the Second Amendment does not protect an individual right to keep and bear arms, and after the Supreme Court ruled otherwise, the national ACLU simply said it disagreed and did not see gun control or gun ownership as a civil rights issue.
That position may fly with the ACLU elitists in D.C. and New York, but surprisingly, there are some ACLU members who do see the Second Amendment as a constitutional right worthy of protection. A few years ago, the Texas State Rifle Association and the ACLU of Texas worked together on a piece of pro-gun legislation, and now the ACLU of Wisconsin is stepping up in defense of a teacher suspended for having a picture of herself with a rifle on her Facebook page.
The Wisconsin chapter of the ACLU says, "Absent any evidence that the teacher poses a threat, the district should not overreact to the sight of a gun in one of their employee's hands."
I couldn't agree more, and it's nice to have another ally in our fight to defend the civil liberties of this nation's gun owners.
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When it comes to gun control failures, the corpse is always propped up and repainted like a new Joker -this time, Bill Clinton promoting a resurrected version of his long-dead 1994 semi-auto ban. Addressing the U.S. Conference of Mayors, Clinton let loose with the same saliva-slinging, fist-pounding, make-it-up-as-you-go-along sermonizing that he used to bamboozle Congress to pass the first senseless ban 15 years ago.
He is still spewing the same old tired torrent: "Nobody wants to repeal the Second Amendment, and nobody wants to keep you out of the deer woods, but wouldn't it be nice if your children didn't have to worry about being mowed down by an assault weapon when they turn the corner?"
Well, Mr. Former President who presided over a 47 percent drop in federal gun crime prosecutions, it would be nice if our children didn't have to worry about violent crime in general. It would be nice if leaders like you were capable of attacking gang violence with a rational and effective policy. Instead you feed a ravenous ego with the cheap theater of ignorant fearmongering, the stuff that scares people into supporting gun control idiocies that protect no one -but that pump up your pomposity.
Considering four out of five crimes are committed by gang members, Mr. Clinton, a former president concerned more with safety than with swagger would ask, “Wouldn't it be nice if your children didn't have to worry about becoming a victim of gang violence anywhere, because we crushed them with our resolve?”
The National Institute for Justice said if Clinton's ban were renewed, "the ban's effects on gun violence are likely to be small at best, and perhaps too small for reliable measurement. [These guns] were rarely used in gun crimes even before the ban."
Mr. Clinton, your gun control garbage is already consigned to the trash can of history. Do us all a favor and put a lid on it.
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Did you know that 80 percent of the crime in this country is committed by less than 1 percent of the population?
The FBI says the one million gang members in this country are responsible for four out of five crimes, yet the Obama administration seems to ignore this fact to focus on gun control that has nothing to do with breaking the back of criminal gang violence.
For example: The Obama administration only mentions gangs in the "Urban Policy" portion of its agenda, not in crime and law enforcement. Yet the FBI tells us "Gang migration from urban communities to suburban and rural locations, which began more than two decades ago, is a significant and growing problem in most areas of the country."
It's shocking that this White House limits violent gangs to "Urban Policy" solutions. Its agenda focuses on support for gun control that would do nothing to reduce gang activity, but would erode the Second Amendment rights of every law-abiding American -including history's most sweeping ban on semi-automatic firearms.
The Obama plan seems to ignore the one million gang members who commit 80 percent of the crime in this country, while targeting the 80 million lawful gun owners in the United States. That's not a solution to gang violence, and it's not "Change."
In fact, it's just relying on the same failed policies that have made Chicago one of the most crime-ridden cities in the country.
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A spokeswoman for President Obama has confirmed what the NRA has been saying all along ... that he supports gun control, including sweeping bans on semi-automatic rifles.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution says it received confirmation of Obama's support for gun control laws in an email from spokeswoman Amy Brundage. Of course, the spokeswoman spat out that forked-tongued two-faced doublespeak that's become so familiar- that Obama "believes in the Second Amendment" as well.
Doesn't anyone call a lie a lie any more?
That's like saying you believe in the First Amendment, but it doesn't apply to radio or cable television. We'll get the same argument from those who want to shut down conservative talk radio before long.
It doesn't matter if it's the First or the Second Amendment we're talking about ... there is nothing right or reasonable about rationing constitutional rights, and the NRA will fight until they're restored.
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Gun owners don't expect The New York Times to be fair when reporting on gun issues. But we should demand fairness when the paper defames an individual gun owner.
In an editorial about the new senator from New York, Kirsten Gillibrand, the Times fumes:
"Can she represent a constituency beyond the narrow politics of her district, where she has been a bullet-headed opponent of gun control, proudly basking in the extremist affections of the National Rifle Association?"
The "extremist affections" of the NRA? Let's see who's "extremist."
Last year Rasmussen Reports conducted a poll that found that the approval rating for The New York Times was just 24%. Meanwhile, the NRA's approval rating (according to a 2007 Pew Research poll) was more than twice as high as the NYTimes.
Even in the northeast, the home base of The New York Times, the NRA's public support was a full 18 points higher than that of the paper.
The editors of the Times editorial page need to understand something. There are far more "bullet-headed opponents of gun control" than there are pencil-necked, close-minded, knee-knocking anti-gun editorial writers in America.
The NRA is proud to have the support of those defending the Second Amendment, and we're proud to support them as well.
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When the city of San Francisco tried to ban all handgun ownership a few years ago, the NRA took the city to court and won.
But that didn't mean San Francisco embraced the Second Amendment. They still did everything they could to obstruct law-abiding Americans from exercising their Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
Today the NRA has won another major victory.
San Francisco's Housing Authority has agreed to settle a lawsuit brought by the NRA against their ban on gun possession by all residents in public housing. This blanket denial of Second Amendment rights for lower-income Americans could not survive our challenge, even though a defiant Mayor Gavin Newsome said his ban would be "absolutely defended."
The NRA isn't through in California. We're challenging other gun control laws in the works, and we're assisting other cases working their way through the court system. In the meantime, congratulations to those living under the thumb of the San Francisco Housing Authority, whose constitutional rights are now restored thanks to NRA members like you.
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New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg is still pushing his gun-ban schemes through his Mayors Against Guns group, but now he's got a new target: salt.
That's right. The big cheese of the Big Apple is demanding that manufacturers across the country reduce the amount of salt in foods they produce by 50 percent ... or else.
WCBS-TV in New York says citizens are angry over Bloomberg's Big Brother meddling, and are complaining that New York is City more and more a "nanny state."
I think they're way too late in complaining. Bloomberg's been whacking knuckles like a snooty schoolmarm for years- and gun owners know what it's like to be square in the mayor's crosshairs.
Whatever comes of Bloomberg's anti-salt crusade, don't expect his war on your guns to end. That's why we'll keep fighting his nanny-state nonsense as long as it takes. He'd better not take NRA members worth a grain of salt!
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Two cities face each other across the U.S.-Mexican border.
In one of them, oppressive gun control restricts legal firearm ownership to an elite few approved by the bureaucrats in power. In the other city, the right to keep and bear arms is respected by the constitutions of the nation and the state.
Which city -Juarez, Mexico or El Paso, Texas -resembles a war zone?
Juarez had over 1,500 murders in 2008. That's a homicide rate of more than 100 per 100,000. Just across the border, El Paso's population of 600,000 had just 16 murders in 2008.
American gun control advocates claim that if only we'd pass "common-sense restrictions" like they have in Juarez, our city streets would be safer. That's nonsense! Mexico's gun control laws haven't stopped the drug cartels from turning Juarez into a killing zone.
Meanwhile, El Paso's law-and-order mentality goes hand in hand with legal gun ownership. Of the tens of thousands of gun owners in El Paso, thousands are Right-to-Carry permit holders. And El Paso is one of the safest cities in the nation.
The difference between Juarez and El Paso is as clear as night and day ... because it's as clear as the difference between gun control and crime control.
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