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Which Law is Better? A NRA ad suggested that enforcing existing laws is the most productive way to reduce gun crimes. That seemed good advice, unheeded, but good advice nonetheless. Other than immigration and guns are there other areas where our representatives discuss new legislation before enforcing existing legislation. Wouldn't enforcing existing laws be a good first step whilst wrestling with the difficult legislative process leading to improving our laws.

the idea came about during a discussion in a contemporary thread right Here on your Free Republic!

1st Lt. Joshua Jones salutes during the playing of the Iraqi national anthem at the closure ceremony of Joint Security Station Yarmouk in northwest Baghdad, May 16. The JSS is no longer needed due to the improved security in the area. Photo by Sgt. Dustin Roberts, 1st Infantry Division. BAGHDAD — The Government of Iraq (GoI) and U.S. Soldiers shut down Joint Security Station (JSS) Yarmouk in a closure ceremony in northwest Baghdad, May 16. The land was returned to the man who graciously lent it out to serve as part of the JSS for the past several months.In accordance...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 23, 2007 – The latest National Intelligence Estimate indicates the U.S. strategy has improved the security environment in Iraq, but notes that many tough challenges lie ahead, according to a statement released today by White House Deputy Press Secretary Gordon Johndroe. The White House statement follows: “While the February NIE concluded that conditions in Iraq were worsening, today's key judgments clearly show that the military's counterinsurgency strategy, fully operational since mid-summer, has begun to slow the rapidly increasing violence and patterns of that violence we have been seeing in Iraq. This change is a necessary precondition to...

WASHINGTON, July 27, 2007 – Insurgent attacks in Iraq’s Ninewah province have dropped significantly, and if the trend continues, fewer U.S. troops will be needed in the region, an Army commander in the area said today. A sign of the improved security situation in the province is the fact that the province -- which includes Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city -- will transfer to Iraqi provincial control sometime next month, said Army Col. Stephen Twitty, commander of the 1st Cavalry Division’s 4th Brigade, during a briefing with Pentagon reporters via telephone. The Ninewah provincial government has made great strides and can...

WASHINGTON, May 2, 2007 – The ongoing surge of U.S. and Iraqi security forces into Baghdad and parts of western Iraq is designed to tamp down insurgent violence and provide enough time for the fledgling government to sort out pressing political issues, the senior U.S. diplomat in Iraq said yesterday. “Security buys time,” Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker told reporters at a Baghdad news conference. However, he emphasized, any improvement in security must go hand-in-hand with Iraqi government efforts to bring together disaffected elements of the population, namely the Sunnis and Shiites. Crocker previously served in Baghdad as the first...

Paratroopers, riggers, jumpmasters will make more than 3,200 test jumps. FORT BELVOIR, Va., March 26, 2007 – The Program Executive Office Soldier is testing a new parachute system that the Army plans to use to replace the system in use since the 1950s. The new parachutes address increased weight requirements and provide additional safety benefits. Beginning in 2008, all T-10 parachutes in the Army inventory for more than 50 years will be replaced with the Advanced Tactical Parachute System T-11. Although the T-10 is a proven system, today's paratroopers face increased requirements beyond the T-10's design. Paratroopers are required to...

Julianne Fisher, a spokeswoman for the senator, said Johnson will not be present in the first days of the new Congress next week but is continuing to improve. She said he is responsive to directions from his wife but has not yet spoken. It is too soon to tell how long recovery will take, Fisher said. In a statement yesterday, Johnson's doctors said he remains in intensive care at George Washington University Hospital. They have released few new details about Johnson's condition and prognosis since the days after the Dec. 13 surgery to stop bleeding in his brain. Vivek Deshmukh,...

An Iraqi soldier from the 6th Iraqi Army Division assists an Iraqi citizen with a census form as part of Operation Together Forward. The operation is an Iraqi led, combined effort with Coalition forces to secure the city of Baghdad against terrorists activities. BAGHDAD — Iraqi and Coalition forces this week began witnessing the positive results of their efforts to secure Baghdad and improve quality of life here. Since Amaliya Ma’an ila Al-Amam or Operation Together Forward began July 9, combined forces have killed 97 and detained 501 terrorists associated with death squads, and seized more than 59 weapons...

BAGHDAD (June 16, 2006) – A week after the death of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, Iraqi security forces, with the support of the Coalition, have beefed up operations aimed at improving security throughout Iraq. In fact, on June 14, only a week after Al-Zarqawi was eliminated, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki announced a new plan to improve security conditions in Baghdad. During his address, the prime minister emphasized that Iraq’s new constitutionally based, representative government is in charge and providing security. He further noted that he will ensure that Iraq’s security forces are professional, impartial, and continue...

REGULAR meals of mammoth meat helped some early human tribes to expand more quickly than their largely vegetarian contemporaries, according to a genetic study. Human populations in east Asia about 30,000 years ago developed at dramatically different rates, following a pattern that appears to reflect the availability of mammoths and other large game. In the part of the region covering what is now northern China, Mongolia and southern Siberia, vast plains teemed with mammals such as mammoths, mastodons and woolly rhinoceroses and the number of early human beings grew between 34,000 and 20,000 years ago. Further south, where the terrain...

KABUL, Afghanistan, April 13, 2006 – The command surgeon of Combined Forces Command Afghanistan presented the renovated Rabia Balkhi Maternity Hospital to Afghanistan 's minister of public health in a ceremony here April 9. Lailuma, a midwife at the Rabia Balkhi Maternity Hospital in the Afghan capital of Kabul, prepares to weigh a baby in the hospital's renovated nursery here April 9. The U.S. departments of Defense and Health and Human Services invested a combined $10 million into renovations, then presented the hospital to Afghanistan's minister of public health in a formal ceremony April 9. Photo by Staff Sgt....

WASHINGTON, Jan. 12, 2006 – U.S. military members serving in Iraq, Afghanistan and other dangerous locales will soon receive revamped armored vests that provide more side protection, senior officials said here today. The vest changes are designed to prove effective in protecting servicemembers from shrapnel fragments, especially those who man gun turrets atop vehicles, Maj. Gen. Stephen Speakes, the Army's director of force development, said during a teleconference call with military analysts. "What we're seeing, obviously, is continuing evolutions in the nature of the threat that we face," Speakes said. The shrapnel-producing improvised explosive devices and other terrorist weapons encountered...

WASHINGTON, Dec. 13, 2005 – Iraqi security forces are proving their effectiveness against the terrorists trying to topple the country's new democratic government, a senior defense official said in Baghdad today. "We have crossed some threshold with the Iraqi security forces that enables us to leave them behind to be the persistent presence in these towns along the Euphrates River Valley, particularly up in Tal Afar," said the official, speaking on background. Iraqi soldiers and police have made great strides in recent months, the official said. They've also assisted coalition troops, he said, in reducing terrorist presence and influence in...

Frank J. Gaffney is founder and president of the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC. He earned his AM in international studies from John's Hopkins University. A former deputy assistant secretary of defense for international security policy, Mr. Gaffney's articles have appeared in Christian Science Monitor, Los Angeles Times, New Republic, Newsday, New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. He is a contributing editor to National Review Online. Mr. Gaffney addressed the Middle East Forum in Philadelphia on September 22, 2004. The threat of terror is the most direct challenge to the stability of...

Oklahoma oil tops $50 a barrel By Adam WilmothThe Oklahoman Oil coming out of the ground in Oklahoma sold for $50 a barrel for the first time Friday, continuing a rapid run-up that has demolished previous price records. The recent price surge has led to increased gasoline and utility costs, but it also has sparked a boom in Oklahoma's oil patch as producers such as Melvin Moran embrace more expensive technologies in an effort to squeeze out additional oil from existing wells. "At today's prices, if you could increase production by just a barrel a day, you could generate...

Shooters have always enjoyed trying out different rifles and cartridges through trading and borrowing, or simply being called on to sight-in new rifles for their friends. They have been aware of all the new offerings put forth by the manufacturers and eagerly await the various shooting magazines every month just to see what new rifle or cartridge might be announced. They have not been disappointed. But even though this meant reading and dreaming a out all those fine new offerings, the fact remained that most continued shooting the three or four cartridges they had been using for years. Since many...