Free Republic

The New York Times is running an editorial on its front page on Saturday, the first time the paper has done so since 1920, calling for greater regulation on guns in the aftermath of a spate of mass shootings. The editorial, headlined “The Gun Epidemic,” describes it as “a moral outrage and a national disgrace that people can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill with brutal speed and efficiency.” It suggests drastically reducing the number of firearms, and “eliminating some large categories of weapons and ammunition.” “It is not necessary to debate the peculiar wording of the Second Amendment,”...

[Vanity] Hi folks, here is some data pulled from CDC data tables. Number of Deaths Rate per100,000 population Cause of Death 130,557 41.3 Accidents (unintentional injuries) 37,938 12 ~~ Transport accidents 35,369 11.2 ~~ ~~ Motor vehicle accidents 1,000 0.3 ~~ ~~ Other land transport accidents 1,569 0.5 ~~ ~~ Water, air and space, and other and unspecified transport accidents and their sequelae 92,619 29.3 ~~ Nontransport accidents 30,208 9.6 ~~ ~~ Falls 505 0.2 ~~ Accidental discharge of firearms 3,391 1.1 ~~ Accidental drowning and submersion 2,760 0.9 ~~ Accidental exposure to smoke, fire and flames 38,851 12.3 ~~...

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA ET AL. v. HELLER CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT No. 07–290. Argued March 18, 2008—Decided June 26, 2008 District of Columbia law bans handgun possession by making it a crime to carry an unregistered firearm and prohibiting the registration of handguns; provides separately that no person may carry an unlicensed handgun, but authorizes the police chief to issue 1-year licenses; and requires residents to keep lawfully owned firearms unloaded and disassembled or bound by a trigger lock or similar device. Respondent Heller, a D. C. special policeman, applied...

Looking for advise on a firearms purchase. Any advise on any of the three mentioned models?

Possessing files that can be used to 3D print firearms will soon be illegal in New South Wales after new legislation, passed last week by state parliament, comes into effect. Among the provisions of the Firearms and Weapons Prohibition Legislation Amendment Bill 2015 is an amendment to the Weapons Prohibition Act 1998 stating that a person "must not possess a digital blueprint for the manufacture of a firearm on a 3D printer or on an electronic milling machine." The maximum penalty is 14 years' jail. The provision does not apply to any person with a licence to manufacture firearms or...

The growing body count as of this writing is 120 slaughtered in the Bataclan. We'll never know how much that body count could have been reduced if the foolish French allowed their citizens to go armed. Their imprudent gun control laws contributed to unnecessary carnage. Once again, when seconds counted, the police were just too many minutes away.

In President Obama’s hometown of Chicago on Halloween night Saturday, a robbery was thwarted when a concealed carry permit holder with a valid firearm owner’s ID card under Illinois law shot the thug dead. It showed that even in Obama’s Chicago, more guns mean less crime and, in this case, one less career criminal. It also shows that opponents’ fears that concealed carry laws will mean carnage in the streets as garden-variety disputes escalate into a proverbial gunfight at the OK Corral are false. Since the U.S. 7th Court of appeals struck down Illinois’ ban on concealed carry as unconstitutional...

Not even a leeeeetle bit! Wes Siler, who blogs at Indefinitely Wild (part of Gizmodo), can barely contain his glee over footage of Ted Cruz;holding [his] gun backwards:

Illegal homemade and small shop submachine guns are common in Brazil.  High Murder rates in Brazil have legislators considering reforms of Brazil’s strict gun laws.  According to wikipedia: All firearms in Brazil are required to be registered within the state. The minimum age for ownership is 25,[5] and it is generally illegal to carry a gun outside a residence.[6] Brazil only has 6-8 million legal guns, and they are heavily restricted.   Brazil’s  population is over 200 million.    The Homicide rate is 25.2 per 100,000,  six times as high as that in the United States.  Another study puts it at...

Ever get into an argument with an anti-gunner and found yourself for a loss of words as how to refute his arguments? You know he's wrong, but he's rattling off supposed "facts" so quick and spouting bullcrap so damn glib and loud, you just can't get a word in edgewise. If only you had all the facts and arguments available on the tip of your tongue, you'd be able to put him in his place. This document can help! It provides a list of quick comebacks to most anything you can expect an anti-gunner to say.

Austrian citizens are rushing to purchase firearms out of fear and self-defense amid an influx of migrants coming into their country. Nearly all shotguns are sold out because there is no permit required to purchase them, according to arms dealer in Upper Austria. For all other firearms, however, a license is required, which in turn means courses to become licensed are now taking place weekly, instead of every five weeks. Local media say it’s the sheer number of refugees, plus the fear of break-ins, that’s driving the huge increase in demand. And leading the surge, much like in the U.S.,...

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — An Amish resident of central Pennsylvania is challenging the photo identification requirement to purchase a firearm, saying his religious beliefs prevent him from being photographed. Andrew Hertzler argues in a suit filed Friday in U.S. Middle District Court that the requirement violates his religious freedom and his constitutional right to possess a firearm. Hertzler said his beliefs as a member of an Amish community in Lancaster County bar photographs being taken of him, but he was prohibited from buying a gun in June for self-defense purposes.

It is not a novel idea -- the notion that the route to gun control is not by attacking the right to bear arms which the U.S. Supreme Court has declared to be both an individual and a national right, but to use that old standby, regulation, to dry up the supply of bullets. It was that idea that was endorsed by Fox News host Greta Van Susteren when she appeared on ABC’s “This Week”...

THE SUPREME COURT may soon take up a challenge to a Texas abortion law mandating safety standards so strict that abortion providers claim it will force all but a handful of the state's remaining clinics to close. The case, Whole Woman's Health v. Cole, could lead to the court's first significant abortion ruling since 2007. Under the controversial law, signed by Governor Rick Perry two years ago, abortion practitioners must have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital, and abortion clinics must meet the same building and equipment specifications as outpatient surgical centers. Advocates challenging the law argue that such restrictions...

Hillary Clinton, who served an administration that ran thousands of guns to Mexican drug lords under Operation Fast and Furious, is now fast and furiously trying to resurrect a failing campaign by taking aim at so-called gun rights “extremists”. In the wake of the shootings at Umpqua Community College in Oregon, Mrs. Clinton advocated in New Hampshire for a new gun group for “responsible gun owners” apart from the National Rifle Association, which she considers extremist, even though no NRA member has ever been involved in a mass shooting...

Link to the pollSome people seems to think that Lt. Governor Ron Ramsey of Tennessee said something controversial when he suggested that these are troubled times; that Christians are under attack, and that it would be wise for Christians to obtain a concealed carry permit and be willing to defend themselves.  From the timesfreepress.com:“Whether the perpetrators are motivated by aggressive secularism, jihadist extremism or racial supremacy, their targets remain the same: Christians and defenders of the West,” he wrote.“While this is not the time for widespread panic,” Ramsey added, “it is a time to prepare. I would encourage my fellow...

October 3, 2015 Obama's wink and nod on gun confiscation By Thomas Lifson President Obama couldn’t be more eager to change the subject of national news discussion away from the catastrophic failure of his Middle East foreign policy. So the shooting in Roseburg, OR offered an opportunity to gin up his base and re-focus his domestic opponents on playing defense against gun control. By framing his goal as the extremely vague phrase “common sense gun control legislation,” he avoids specifics. And in fact, nobody on his team has yet come up with a concrete suggestion that would have saved the...

He says he used to have a fear of guns. But not anymore if the contents of Jeremy Renner's shopping cart is anything to go by. The 44-year-old was seen with some serious firearms when he left a gun store in Nevada on Monday.

Former Florida Governor Jeb Bush is not a political amateur and has faced questions from many prominent talking heads in the media. Yet in the 2016 he has made multiple gaffes indicating he still might not be ready for prime time, the latest being a question of whether gun ownership is a right guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution.

World War I is often called “the machine gun war” because of the devastating use of automatic weapons such as the Maxim gun. It’s also when some of the drastic developments in machine gun technology occurred. Artillery fire actually killed more men than machine guns, but statistics simply don’t convey the horror of European armies on the Western Front facing automatic fire. For example, during just one day in 1916 at the Battle of the Somme the British lost 21,000 men – many of them killed by Spandau machine guns, the German version of the Maxim.