Free Republic

Marketing experts preach that redefining a market is the best way to win it over. This is why gun control politicos are now making an effort to change their messages, targets and tactics. Over the last twenty years or so, gun control has lost. They lost the constitutional argument. They lost the criminological debate. They lost the support of the general public. My hope was that they would continue doing exactly what they have been doing, because they would continue their losing streak and might eventually become a historical footnote. But they are getting shrewder, as evidenced by a new...

Every time there’s a shooting tragedy, there are more calls for gun control. Let’s examine a few historical facts. By 1910, the National Rifle Association had succeeded in establishing 73 NRA-affiliated high-school rifle clubs. The 1911 second edition of the Boy Scout Handbook made qualification in NRA’s junior marksmanship program a prerequisite for obtaining a BSA merit badge in marksmanship. In 1918, the Winchester Repeating Arms Co. established its own Winchester Junior Rifle Corps. The program grew to 135,000 members by 1925. In New York City, gun clubs were started at Boys, Curtis, Commercial, Manual Training and Stuyvesant high schools....

Perhaps we were too harsh on textbook publishers last week for botching the proper interpretation of the Second Amendment, as even those in charge of the official website of a body sworn to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States" apparently can't be expected to get it right. The official website of the United States Senate features a "Virtual Reference Desk" section on the Constitution which offers an explanation of the Second Amendment that reads, "Whether this provision protects the individual's right to own firearms or whether it deals only with the collective right of the people to...

The Armed Citizen Project, a Houston-based nonprofit providing training and arms to women and others for personal empowerment and self-reliance, has provided arms training to 150 citizens as of this month, mostly women.  The group, headed by Kyle Coplen, has released a video showing their most recent training of 50 women and providing personal stories.

Just as Secretary of State John Kerry signed the controversial U.N. Arms Trade Treaty last week, setting up yet another legislative battle over guns, we interviewed one of the leading women on the issue of gun rights in America. After a home invasion, Washington Times opinion editor Emily Miller navigated the convoluted, bureaucratic process of purchasing and registering a handgun in the nation’s capital. Her experience formed the basis of “Emily Gets Her Gun …But Obama Wants to Take Yours,” a book to help “educate the public on the facts of gun control and gun violence.” She is convinced that...

3D Printing Now Brings You Semiautomatic Pistols (The Better To Scare Control Freaks) J.D. Tuccille|Sep. 26, 2013 2:41 pmIt's not yet ready for prime-time (it has yet to be tested), but 3D printing tinkerers have developed a design for a semiautomatic pistol. In fact, the developer says a full-automatic version would be easier to make with available materials. What a long way we've come, in just a few short months, toward the ultimate goal of rendering gun control laws a complete joke. Well...they were already a joke (though a dangerous one). It's more accurate to say we've come a long...

Gun grabbers have found an issue where they can get almost unanimous consent across the board, including from gun owners. Nobody wants the dangerously insane to have weapons. not even the NRA. So using that bit of light coming in under the edge of the door, they’ve found a point of attack. Since we all agree that the insane shouldn’t have guns, we’ll pass a law to enforce that. And then we’ll start dumbing down the definition of “insane” to include as many people as possible. Because in the end, this was never about helping people. This is about taking...

The NRA's "Friends of NRA" campaign has raised a record breaking amount of money so far this year. "Friends of NRA" is one of the group's grassroots efforts, sponsoring volunteer events and fundraising banquets around the country. According to Richmond's WTVR.com, the program has already raised $51 million, with "more than 200 fundraising events left in 2013." The amount raised in the first eight and a half months of 2013 is already $1 million more than the entire amount raised in 2012. What does this say to gubernatorial candidates like Terry McAuliffe, who openly pledge to put Colorado-like gun controls...

Does the Second Amendment guarantee an individual right to own guns? The Supreme Court has ruled that it does. But you might be confused if you visit the official Senate web page on the Constitution, which says only: "Whether this provision protects the individual's right to own firearms or whether it deals only with the collective right of the people to arm and maintain a militia has long been debated." That particular wording was posted on the Senate website in 2009, based on archived web pages at The Internet Archive. However, that's one year after the Supreme Court ruled: "The...

The United States, the world’s largest arms dealer, has joined more than 90 other nations in signing a treaty that regulates global arms trading, but there is strong resistance in the Senate, which must ratify it. Secretary of State John Kerry, who signed the Arms Trade Treaty on Wednesday, said it was a “significant step” in keeping the world safe and preventing terrorists and others from obtaining conventional weapons. … Addressing U.S. critics of the treaty, the former senator said fears that it would undermine Americans’ constitutional right to keep and bear arms are not grounded in reality. For one,...

The English are an interesting tribe. There is much to like about their country, including the fact that repeatedly elected Margaret Thatcher, one of the world’s best leaders in my lifetime. On the other hand, the United Kingdom has veered sharply to the left in recent decades, and Thatcher must have been very disappointed that her Conservative Party now is but a hollow shell, controlled by statists who actually think people should voluntarily pay extra tax to support wasteful and corrupt government. And the politicians openly pursue Orwellian tax-collection tactics! No wonder the country now faces a very grim...

WASHINGTON – Asserting the Senate’s constitutional role on treaties, U.S. Senator Bob Corker, R-Tenn., ranking member of the Foreign Relations Committee, in a letter today warned the Obama administration against taking any action to implement the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty without Senate advice and consent. “The ATT raises significant legislative and constitutional questions. Any act to implement this treaty, provisionally or otherwise, before the Congress provides its advice and consent would be fundamentally inconsistent with the U.S. Constitution, law, and practice,” said Corker. Full text of the letter is included below and in the attached document. Dear President Obama,...

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry will sign the Arms Trade Treaty regulating the international trade in conventional arms, The diplomats said Kerry would sign the treaty on Wednesday On April 2, the U.N. General Assembly adopted the treaty by a vote of 154 for, including the United States...The no votes were cast by Iran, North Korea and Syria,

Secretary of State John Kerry plans to sign a controversial U.N. treaty on arms regulation on Wednesday, a senior State Department official told Fox News -- despite warnings from lawmakers that the Senate will not ratify the agreement. A State official said the treaty would "reduce the risk that international transfers of conventional arms will be used to carry out the world's worst crimes," while protecting gun rights.

Virginia gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe's (D) website was updated Monday to show his commitment to bring Colorado-like gun control to the commonwealth. In the section titled "Investing in Virginia's Urban Centers," TerryMcAuliffe.com now contains the heading, "Support Common Sense Gun Control Measures." Under that heading, it says McAuliffe "will support mainstream and majority supported gun control measures like universal background checks, limiting the size of magazines, and a return to the 1-gun-per-month rule." The limitation on magazine capacity is a Colorado-like gun control measure that will put law-abiding Virginians at a disadvantage the moment it is enacted. This is because...

A day after President Barack Obama visited the Washington Naval Yard, site of the nation's latest mass shooting, local and federal officials called on citizens across the country to form a coalition large enough to battle the powerful gun lobby. At a roundtable discussion at the Margaret Morton Government Center in Bridgeport on Monday, U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said he and other senators will only be able to take on the gun lobby and pass stronger gun laws if people throughout the nation speak up. "What makes the NRA strong is that they can mobilize tens of thousands of...

At Sunday’s memorial for the victims of the Navy Yard shooting rampage, D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray blamed the tragedy on too many guns in this country. … According the District of Columbia’s 2012 Annual Report (page 25), the homicide rate in the nation’s capital has dropped by 53 percent between 2008 and 2012. …

Once again, President Obama is exploiting the tragic deaths from a mass shooting to push his political agenda to control guns. This time, he escalates the rhetoric by blaming Second Amendment advocates for criminals’ acts. After spending the day on the golf course Saturday, Mr. Obama spoke to the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation dinner about his priorities. Referring to Monday’s tragic shooting at the Washington Navy Yard, along with the mass murders in Newtown and Aurora in 2012, Tucson in 2011 and shootings in Chicago, he said: “As long as there are those who fight to make it as easy...

Henry Porter, a columnist for The Observer, doesn’t think much of America’s Second Amendment. Nor does he care much for America itself, judging by his condescending commentary. His Lordship is very, very concerned about gun violence in America. In fact, he is so concerned that he believes it may be time for the world to “intervene” and save us from ourselves…or something. There is an excellent British descriptive that applies perfectly to Mr. Porter. He’s a twit. The annual toll from firearms in the US is running at 32,000 deaths and climbing, even though the general crime rate is on...

President Barack Obama is using the Sept. 16 Navy Yard shootings to rally his supporters for another uphill charge in November 2014 against Americans’ gun rights.“These [12] families have endured a shattering tragedy,” Obama said in a very sharply written speech during a memorial service held near D.C.‘s Navy Yard for the victims’ families Sunday.The recent rash of mass shootings “ought to be a shock to us all as a nation and as a people. …It ought to lead to some sort of transformation,” said the president, evoking his 2008 promise to begin “fundamentally transforming” the United States of America....