Free Republic

(CBS) COMPTON, Calif. - Beginning this weekend, Compton residents can exchange their guns for gifts -- no questions asked -- as part of a city-sponsored endeavor to reduce violence. According to a statement from the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, personnel will collect firearms in the parking lot of the Circuit City/Ralphs Grocery shopping center at Compton Boulevard and Alameda Street. The guns for gifts drive will continue over the next three Saturdays. For every gun turned in, participants will receive a $50 gift card to Circuit City, Ralphs Grocery or Toys "R" Us. "The largest challenge to this program...

THE SUN WAS bright and the air was rife with good intentions, not to mention hip-hop music imploring the 'hood to ``Start Peace." Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino was announcing a gun-buyback program, under which people who turn in guns to police will receive $200 in Target gift cards. The goal is to cut street violence by reducing the number of guns on the streets. I wanted to believe. But as I scrawled notes during Tuesday's press conference at First Parish Church in Dorchester, a man standing nearby offered up this review: ``Good concept. It won't work." He declined to...

West Palm Beach police returned a rare and valuable Japanese rifle accepted in last weekend's gun buy back program to a World War II Navy veteran Friday. Bruno Filippelli, 79, of Delray Beach, said he felt sorry for inconveniencing the police but was happy to have the firearm, which a rare gun collector said could be worth as much as $5,000. The Arisaka Type 99 pressure test rifle, one of only about 50 left from World War II, was set to be melted down and destroyed, along with about 450 other firearms collected by the police last weekend. "I feel...