Free Republic

Diaz Escalates Allegations  by Sean Oberle Diaz Escalates Allegations VPC Exec Claims to Have Information That Shows 1980s Transfer of .50s Was Outside Government-Sponsored Legal Channels, But Balks When Challenged to Produce It by Sean Oberle Analysis@KeepAndBearArms.com January 18, 2001 LINKS TO SUBSECTIONS Why I Stand By My Statement Diaz Tries To Flip the Burden of Proof to Guilty-Until-Proven-Innocent Does Diaz Actually Have the Information He Claims To Have? Diaz’s Allegation of Al Qaeda Connection Is Insufficiently Established Even Those Who Agree With VPC Will Be Disturbed By Its Behavior Email Exchanges Between Sean Oberle & Tom Diaz Tom Diaz, ...

Excerpts...The FBI considers Irvine one of the nation's safest cities, a master-planned community where nagging issues range from lawn maintenance to the early morning howl of leaf blowers.But there's a new debate in town: gun control.The proposal already has raised the ire of anti-gun-control lobbies.LINK to full article.LINK to feedback page.

Trooper's gun accidentally fires during drug search HAZLETON - A state trooper's handgun accidentally discharged during a drug-related search at a South Laurel Street residence Thursday evening. Cpl. Brian Tobin said troopers and Hazleton police executed the raid at 140 S. Laurel St. at 5:50 p.m. Thursday. While entering the home, a troopers gun fired. No one was in the room where the gun went off and no one was injured. Tobin did not identify the trooper, the residents, or what was found inside the residence. State police internal affairs will investigate the incident, he said.

>Illinois needs concealed carry law In the last 30 years, U.S. handgun ownership has doubled and the number of homicides has declined for every major population group except urban African-American men. Gun-grabbers and editorial writers may jump on that as a reason for more confiscatory legislation, but they ignore a crucial point: Gun ownership is far less common among urban African-Americans than their European counterparts. Because of the sensitivity of racial profiling, we have not seen a breakdown of statistics concerning the racial makeup of Chicago's murder victims vs. perpetrator vs. type of weapon used. Until we as a society ...

Concealed carry not the answer Thursday, January 10, 2002 On Jan. 1, your Public Forum published a letter titled, "Illinois needs concealed-carry law." I would like to respond to that letter because the last thing Illinois or any other state needs is a concealed-carry law. I realize that some misguided states have enacted conceal-carry laws to satisfy a minority of their citizens. Those states have ignored the right of the rest of their citizens, and visitors to their states, to go about their daily lives without being exposed to the potential danger of bullets fired by people carrying legally ...

Frustrated residents look for ways to end violence in Charleston BY JASON HARDINOf The Post and Courier Staff      Levi Frazier and his wife Ruth are tired of hearing the news - 14 killings in the city of Charleston last year, many not too far from their home on the peninsula. It makes them nervous and a little afraid.     "It's not right," he said. "There's no call for people to be killing one another."     The retired couple joined some 200 Charleston residents, police officers, politicians, preachers, students and neighborhood leaders to discuss solutions to crime - in the wake ...

Press Release Gun Owners' Action League 37 Pierce Street / P.O. Box 567 Northboro, MA  01532 staff@goal.org A Special Investigation by Gun Owners' Action League Click Here to View: The Full Report - The Press Release - The Speech by Michael D. Yacino - GOAL.org Press Release FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE       January 8, 2002 “REGULATORY FRAUD” Gun Owners’ Action League (GOAL) released a 38-page report today denouncing the Massachusetts Attorney General’s regulations on handguns as “Regulatory Fraud.” The report is based on a review of public records from the Attorney General’s office by GOAL staff.             The report documents that ...

The 2002 Alexander Hamilton Second Amendment Student Writing Competition The Violence Policy Center (VPC), a national non-profit educational organization that conducts research and public education on firearms violence and works to develop policies to reduce gun-related death and injury, announces the 2002 Alexander Hamilton Second Amendment Student Writing Competition for student scholarship relating to the contemporary debate over the meaning of the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The prize for the winning entry is $3,000. The VPC will work to assist the winner in publishing his or her article in an appropriate journal. The prize is named for ...

Bread delivery truck driver shoots holdup man Wednesday, January 9, 2002 BY GLENN SMITHOf The Post and Courier Staff      A bread vendor shot and killed an 18-year-old man who tried to rob him Tuesday morning as he made a delivery to a Harris Teeter supermarket on James Island, Charleston police said.     Police said Jay Baldwin Wrenn, a former Hanahan police officer, grabbed a gun from his pickup truck and shot the robber twice in the chest. The robber claimed to have a gun, but police found only a pair of pliers in the man's jacket, police Chief Reuben ...

Suit charges system failed to stop murder Monday, January 7, 2002 BY ARLIE PORTEROf The Post and Courier Staff      Patricia Lee McAllister told police that she feared her ex-boyfriend, J.C. Lawrence, was going to kill her.     Lawrence was in jail on charges of kidnapping her. A judge reduced his bond. The next day, Lawrence walked out of jail.     Five days later, Patricia McAllister, 38, was dead.     On Aug. 23, 2000, Lawrence went to McAllister's home in Ladson and shot and killed her ex-husband, Jerry McAllister, who was visiting. Lawrence then shot Patricia McAllister, doused her with gasoline and ...

Stop the violence    Yes, as City Councilman Wendell Gilliard said, "The plea is out." ("Help police stem violence." Post and Courier editorial, Dec. 24)     Even in great communities like Chicago, with a long history of draconian laws, city fathers plead for a means to reverse the internecine homicide rate as Chicago is awarded the title "Number One in Murder." (Chicago Tribune, Dec. 2, by E. Ferkenhoff).     Chicago leads even Charleston, having long ago "embraced community policing - building relationships with citizens and neighborhood groups through regular meetings with beat officers." Or is this a different plan than Councilman Gilliard's "proven ...

Congress should immediately plug security hole: Nation's seaports Congress should immediately plug security hole: Nation's seaports Thursday, December 20, 2001BY SEN. ERNEST F. HOLLINGS      Following its work on airline security, Congress must now turn its immediate attention to a potentially greater threat: the security vulnerabilities at our nation's seaports. Currently, there is no unified federal plan to oversee or review seaport security. While most Americans are familiar with the intense security measures at our air and land borders, most do not realize that our seaports are equivalent international borders without the same level of protection.     The U.S. Coast ...

>Terrorism and Guns Ashcroft’s “coddling” of gun owners. By Dave Kopel , of the Independence Institute, and Glenn Reynolds, of InstaPundit. December 17, 2001 9:20 a.m.   ttorney General John Ashcroft has come under fire for what Boston Globe columnist Tom Oliphant calls "coddling" gun owners. Oliphant's attack was the latest round in the concerted assault on Ashcroft's Second Amendment positions, which started this spring when Ashcroft announced his view (since supported by the recent U.S. Court of Appeals decision in United States v. Emerson) that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to arms. Ashcroft's stance was consistent with ...

The number of people requesting pistol permit applications has skyrocketed since the Sept. 11 attacks, as Capital Region residents reached for guns to help fight off a new sense of vulnerability.Pistol permit clerks in Albany, Schenectady, Rensselaer and Saratoga counties were swamped with application requests. And a monthly handgun safety course required for pistol permit applicants in Saratoga County was filled to overflowing. Local gun dealers report seeing scores of new customers checking out their stocks. "It's not much of a mystery,'' said Gary Hobbs, an Albany psychologist. "What's going on is people obviously identify with their countrymen who have ...

Armed Females of America - Article Archive          "To my mind it is wholly irresponsible to go into the world incapable of preventing violence, injury, crime, and death. How feeble is the mindset to accept defenselessness. How unnatural. How cheap. How cowardly. How pathetic." --Ted Nugent           FOREWARD: "Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we transgress them at once." Mohandas Gandhi AN ACT OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCESTANLEY FOR U.S. SENATE By RICK STANLEY(DENVER) At 12:15 pm today, December 15, 2001, Rick Stanley, Libertarian candidate for U.S. Senate, was arrested by the ...

S.C. gun permit requests double since 9-11 Monday, December 17, 2001 Associated Press      GREENVILLE - The number of South Carolinians applying for gun permits has doubled since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, a state agency reports.     In November, the State Law Enforcement Division received 1,013 new applications for concealed weapons permits.     That was four times as many as last year. So far in December, SLED has received 976 applications, up from 406 received the same period last year.     David Blanton, owner of Top Gun Shooting range in Boiling Springs, says he's noticed an enrollment increase in his gun training ...

Wednesday December 12 8:44 AM ET Journalists Armed with Rubber Bullet Guns Journalists Armed with Rubber Bullet Guns KIEV (Reuters) - Ukraine's Interior Ministry said on Wednesday it would allow journalists reporting on politics, crime and corruption to carry guns that fire rubber bullets, in a response to a wave of attacks on reporters.``We did this in a bid to improve the safety of journalists, some of whom are working under continual threat,'' a ministry spokesman told Reuters.Ukraine has come under fire from the West for its patchy record on human rights and press freedom. Around 18 journalists, many of ...

NEW YORK (December 12, 2001 6:15 a.m. EST) - From his position near Tora Bora, Afghanistan, Fox News Channel correspondent Geraldo Rivera seemed more agitated by a question about carrying a gun than by the mortar rounds that just exploded nearby. "I refuse to address that issue," said Rivera, speaking into a satellite phone. "It's been blown way out of proportion. It makes me sound like a tabloid talk show host goes to war. It's so unfair." Yet Rivera's decision to bring a gun into a war zone where eight journalists have been killed has raised questions about whether ...

<p>"There are many firearms courses available to the public in the USA, ranging from 1 day to 2 weeks or more. These courses are good but expensive. Some of them are only meant for security personnel, but generally they will teach anyone. It is also better to attend these courses in pairs or by yourself, no more. Do not make public announcements when going on such a course. Find one, book your place, go there, learn, come back home and keep [it] to yourself."</p>

<p>WASHINGTON — For Americans, it's a jarring sight: Uniformed soldiers, armed and dangerous, patrolling the train stations of New York, the bridges of San Francisco Bay and the streets of dozens of cities in between.</p> <p>It's a sight common in much of the rest of the world, but one that American leaders as far back as the Founding Fathers have scrupulously tried to avoid except in disaster areas and desolate stretches of the U.S.-Mexican border.</p>