Free Republic

DURHAM, N.C. (AP) — Grocery store chain Kroger is getting a push from a group of mothers to ban guns from its stores, including Harris Teeter locations. Moms Demand Action on Thursday delivered more than 72,000 petitions to Harris Teeter's Matthews headquarters. They want the company to ban openly carried guns, even in jurisdictions where "open carry" is legal.

For those of you in Oregon, this is of special importance for you. Anti-gun extremists brag about how many people are denied gun purchases under the current system but never talk about how many of those people are denied with no justification because of an inept bureaucracy. The State Police’s own figures show that almost all “denials” are unjustified. Forcing me to run a background check on a friend or loved one before I give them a firearm will do nothing to prevent felons from obtaining weapons. It is clear that the entire purpose of this kind of bill is...

A federal judge is weighing a request to hold the District in contempt of court for enacting new gun laws that are so restrictive as to be out of compliance with his order to allow for firearms to be carried publicly in the city. During a hearing Thursday, U.S. District Judge Frederick J. Scullin Jr. asked the city and the plaintiffs fighting the regulations for additional filings on whether the city should be considered in contempt of his order that officials develop a licensing scheme “consistent with constitutional standards enabling people to exercise their Second Amendment right to bear arms.”

After the recent shooting on campus in Florida, Florida Carry quickly made the case that the campus was a "gun free" or "defenseless victim" zone, and that removing the prohibition on legal guns would make campus safer.  From new4jax.com: Friday said several lawsuits are pending against Florida universities that refuse to allow students the right to carry weapons in class. In states like Idaho, Colorado, Utah, Oregon and Kansas, Friday said, school shooting statistics are remarkably lower than the rest of the nation. "Every state that allows law-abiding students to carry guns on campus, every one of those schools...

"...In interviews with the Tampa Bay Times on Friday, May's friends described their frustrations over the past three months with the area's mental health care system, one that couldn't save May despite desperate pleas from loved ones who watched him dissolve into paranoia before their eyes...... Six months into his job as a prosecutor in the Dona Ana County District Attorney's Office in New Mexico, May couldn't concentrate. The 31-year-old had become so distractible, he told his friends, that he had decided to see a psychologist. He emerged from the appointment with prescriptions for an antidepressant and an attention deficit...

If you cannot effectively fight back immediately, escaping and fighting back may be the next best thing.  The best chance to fight back and prevail is usually before you are put under restraint.   That does not mean that you have no chance after that point.   Your assailants may be sloppy or overconfident.  You many be able to seize an opportunity.  Getting away should be more important than revenge.   If you manage to escape, try not to give yourself up to allies of your assailants, as happened recently in Syria. Washington State had two home invasions recently.  The first,...

If we had any doubts that Ben Carson was running for president, I’m pretty sure they can be laid to rest now. A person who planned on either continuing their work as a neurosurgeon, going into the ministry or just retiring wouldn’t be hosting a conference call ahead of a trip to Iowa to assure everyone that he’s on board with Second Amendment rights. The confusion and accusations arose from a 2013 interview that Carson did with Glenn Beck where he was asked about who should be able to own a semi-automatic rifle. “It depends on where you live,” Carson...

I teach students to make a decision about being put under restraint before they get into a deadly force situation.   By restraint, I mean that the aggressor/attacker is attempting something, or commanding you to do something, that significantly reduces your options for resistance.  One of the simplest of these is for someone to aim a gun at you from a vehicle, and order you to get into the car.  It is almost always better to run for cover at that point.  Criminals do not want to move you somewhere for your benefit. Other examples are: they are going to...

Adam Lanza had always been a child in need of help. At age 3, he was referred to special education after he began to exhibit oddly repetitive behaviors and couldn't socialize like most kids. By fourth grade, he had been diagnosed with anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder and autism. Yet year after year — as psychiatrists insisted that Lanza should be on treatment and strict medication — his mother Nancy refused to follow through on the requests. She chalked up her son's behavior to a presumed superior intelligence, seeing him as a gifted student, despite testing done by experts showing he...

A rookie New York City police officer shot and killed an unarmed 28-year-old man in a darkened stairwell in Brooklyn late Thursday night, according to the police. Police Commissioner William J. Bratton said that the victim, Akai Gurley, was “a total innocent” and called the shooting “an unfortunate accident.” He was not engaged in any activity other than trying to walk down the stairs, Mr. Bratton said. Mayor Bill de Blasio was also quick to offer his condolences to Mr. Gurley’s family. “This is a tragedy,” he said. The officer who shot Mr. Gurley, Peter Liang, has been on the...

Throughout November, The Huffington Post UK is featuring its Beyond Belief series, chronicling those who've taken on faith to create a force for change."You’re the anti-Christ, you will be destroyed,” screamed an incensed heckler during a speech by Barack Obama in June this year. It was not the first time Obama had heard this very pointed line, nor was he the first President to hear it. Anti-Obama rallies are often decorated with signs or t-shirts carrying overtly religious messages, whether it’s likening him to the Devil, demanding that Christian prayers be returned to schools or suggesting that America has a...

The Department of Justice's top communications official plotted to squash a reporter who aggressively covered the agency's ill-fated Operation Fast and Furious gun scandal in 2011, previously secret emails show. The emails, between the DOJ's then-communications chief Tracy Schmaler and White House press flack Eric Schultz, are a rare look inside the Obama administration's press control machine. They were released Thursday while the nation was preoccupied with President Barack Obama's immigration policy announcement, as the result of a long-languishing Freedom Of Information Act lawsuit filed by the center-right watchdog group Judicial Watch. In one message, Schmaler told Schultz that CBS...

Judicial Watch is looking to crowdsource the huge pile of documents finally delivered by the Obama Administration in response to their Freedom of Information Act lawsuit on Operation Fast and Furious. (In the unlikely event the mainstream media decides not to embargo this story, I don’t want to catch any of you claiming that it was a FOIA request. The request got ignored by the Most Transparent Administration In History, so they had to file a lawsuit. The document production is occurring under the stern gaze of a federal judge.) Here’s a little taste of what has already been discovered,...

One of the documents provides smoking gun proof that the Obama White House and the Eric Holder Justice Department colluded to get CBS News to block reporter Sharyl Attkisson. Attkisson was one of the few mainstream media reporters who paid any attention to the deadly gun-running scandal. In an email dated October 4, 2011, Attorney General Holder’s top press aide, Tracy Schmaler, called Attkisson “out of control.” Schmaler told White House Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz that he intended to call CBS news anchor Bob Schieffer to get the network to stop Attkisson. Schultz replied, “Good. Her piece was really...

The roiling turbulence in Ferguson has boiled over and spread to other cities around the nation. That showed up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin this week, when community activists grew angry with their police force over an incident that happened last April. Officer Christopher Manney shot an African American man who took the policeman’s baton and attacked him with it. The man was mentally ill and died as a result of the encounter, and while Officer Manney was dismissed from the PD, he was never charged with a crime. Reporters were grilling the current police chief this week as he was in...

Adam Lanza’s childhood was filled with “crippling” mental health issues ― some of which which his mother ignored, preferring to “accommodate and appease” the would-be Sandy Hook school shooter, a new report said. Connecticut’s Office of the Child Advocate outlined missed opportunities to treat Lanza’s mental health and behavioral issues in a new 114-page report. However, the authors of the detailed report did not say whether more effective treatment could have prevented the 2012 tragedy. The 20-year-old gunned down 20 children and six staffers at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown. Conn. in December 2012 after he killed his mother,...

In Platform I Shore, LLC v. Village of Lincolnwood, 2014 IL App (1st) 133923, the First District Appellate Court held that a shooting range was a permitted use under the plain and unambiguous language of the Village's zoning ordinance. This case illustrates that regardless of whether a particular activity is unpopular, zoning officials must act in a reasonable and non-arbitrary manner when ruling upon zoning applications. . . . . The First District Appellate Court held that the plain language of the Lincolnwood Zoning Ordinance was unambiguous. The court noted that it was undisputed that the plaintiff's property was located...

Today, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission voted unanimously to repeal the 57 year old prohibition on the use of firearm suppressors for taking deer, gray squirrels, rabbits, wild turkeys, quail, and crows. Following the passage of the new regulation, the Commission then voted unanimously to authorize an Executive Order to allow the measure to take effect immediately. Minutes later, Executive Order # EO 14-32 was signed, making hunting with suppressors for all animals in the state legal, effective immediately. The new regulation amends 68A-12.002 General Methods of Taking Game; Prohibitions by striking “silencer equipped” from the language.

Duncan faces 25-years-to-life on gang conspiracy charges brought against him this week, according to the Los Angeles Times. Prosecutors will reportedly look to prove that the album art "willfully promotes, furthers, or assists in any felonious criminal conduct by members of that gang." "That gang" refers to the San Diego Lincoln Park gang, of which Duncan is a member, according to San Diego police. According to the Times, at least 15 Lincoln Park gang members have been charged in a recent string of shootings in the city. Yet Duncan's attorney, Brian Watkins, told the paper that his client is innocent and the evidence against...

Has the use of the word "teenager" by the old media given criminal teens a sense of immunity?   You see it again and again. Trayvon Martin is constantly referred to as a teenager, as though that somehow absolved him of his crimes. Most male children, who are brought up in intact families, do not become predatory creatures in their teens.   But for those who do not have strong, moral, male role models in their lives, especially if this is the default position in their community, predation is a common role. In a home invasion in Georgia, the homeowner grabbed...