Law School Conservative

Sometimes I think there's something in the drinking water in Washington, D.C., that turns ordinary people into fools.  How else do you explain the reaction to a recent column by Jonathan Turley in the Washington Post?

Turley's column basically said that kids will be kids, boys will be boys, and at some point little boys will point a stick or a finger or a toy and say, "bang bang." In most places around the country, this is a harmless fact of life and a normal part of growing up. But in the D.C. area, you'd think Turley was feeding his kids martinis and cigars! 

Turley's column was so controversial that he had an online chat about it.  A typical comment from a D.C. resident said that in 2007, toy guns "are not a part of childhood... for you to force them on your kids... will only make them outsiders in their peer group. I cannot fathom why a parent would handicap their kids like that and make them seem weird to their friends."

Turley also quoted emails that attacked his family, shown in pictures in the Post article.  He wrote, "One attacked my kids as 'listless and joyless.' Another seriously informed me that I had defective DNA and explained how this diagnosis was made. Another insisted that I was not only a bad father, but with four kids, I was destroying the planet."

And this outcry is all over a father letting his kid play Army with his friends!  The truth is, there's nothing wrong with children playing cops and robbers or pretending to be cowboys... as long as they're taught the difference between a toy gun and the real thing. 

That's why I'm so proud of the NRA's Eddie Eagle GunSafe program, which has taught almost 20 million kids not to touch real guns.  It's sad that so many parents would rather keep their kids in the dark.

It didn't make the newspapers or the network news here, but one of the loudest voices for England and Scotland's handgun ban has admitted it's been a dismal failure.

Ian Bell worked long and hard to make sure the ban passed a decade ago.  But writing in Scotland's Sunday Herald, he says, "My idea didn't work... guns have become commonplace, so commonplace that every would-be terrorist worth his salt must be armed to the teeth. Bans have failed utterly."

What Bell says is true.  Guns have become common, at least among the criminals in England.  Gun crime has doubled since the ban took effect.  But guns aren't common among the law-abiding.  In fact, they've disappeared, leaving ordinary Britons helpless against criminals.

It's good that Ian Bell's admitted the ban's been a failure.  But I notice he never called for an end to the ban.  Admitting failure's a good first step, but it does nothing if you don't take the next step of righting a wrong.

England banned handgun ownership ten years ago.  Today London is reaping the bloody harvest of unbridled crime we predicted all along, with rates of violent crime that make the U.S. look like Disneyland.

Fearless criminals know residents are defenseless, so the attacks escalate without mercy and without pause.  Each day brings new reports of more murders, more robberies, more assaults — and fewer arrests. 

It's a huge story, so profound and so vindicating of the NRA that you'll never see it in mainstream media.

According to the British government, the violent crime rate in the London area is 3,400 per 100,000.  The violent crime rate in Washington, D.C., one of our most crime-ridden cities, is 1,459 per 100,000. 

That's right.  London, England, has more than twice the violent crime of our own crime capital. 

What's worse, the British government's reaction would be comical if the consequences weren't so horrible.

Prime Minister Tony Blair is denying that there's a problem.  While the Conservative Party leader, David Cameron, says London's most recent murder is evidence that British society is "broken," Blair says, "This tragedy is not a metaphor for the state of British society, still less for the state of British youth today, the huge majority of whom, including in this part of London, are responsible, law-abiding people."

Blair just doesn't get it.  Of course the vast majority of British subjects are law-abiding people.  But they're also helpless victims.  The decade-long gun ban has only made things worse.  Plus, most criminals get off with incredibly light sentences.

While London's law-abiding keep seeing the same released thugs on the streets, Tony Blair and company keep making the same excuses.  Their failed policies are costing countless lives. 

Every day Blair spends in denial, society breaks down a little more.  How long before it can't be fixed at any cost?

I saw an armed citizen story the other day that made me cringe.  Don't get me wrong, I'm proud when Americans use their Second Amendment right not to be some criminal's victim.  But it's a last resort.

A woman in Darlington, South Carolina, walked into her living room the other night and saw a strange man there.  As he pushed the coffee table out of the way so he could move towards her, she ran to her bedroom and retrieved her pistol.  After shouting at the man that she had a gun, he fled the home.

Police say the man probably gained access through an unlocked patio door.  That's the part of the story I don't like.  If you're going to protect yourself, it requires more than a gun.  You need to take sensible steps to keep yourself safe as well.  Now maybe this guy would've broken a window or kicked in a door, but he didn't have to.  He was able to quickly and quietly enter the home and gain the element of surprise. 

When it comes to self-protection, don't forget the little things.  A locked door may mean the difference between owning a gun and having to use it.

What is New York Governor Eliot Spitzer thinking?  He's nominated a Manhattan liberal named Pete Grannis to run the state's Department of Environmental Conservation!  How on earth is a guy who lives in the Big Apple going to make wise decisions about big game?  The bottom line is this:  He's not.

Pete Grannis is a gun-banning, anti-hunting politician. But Governor Spitzer thinks he should be in charge of hunting, fishing and trapping in New York.  The New York State Rifle and Pistol Association says Grannis has been a longtime advocate for more gun-control laws, and has been honored by animal rights extremists.  Hunters should be asking themselves and their representatives, "What would this do to hunting in New York state?"

I've heard rumblings that the New York State Senate might oppose the nomination of Pete Grannis because of his record on sportsmen's issues.  It wouldn't be the first time a state legislature has rejected an anti-hunting official, but then again, several have been appointed around the country.  

Not only do sportsmen have to worry about anti-hunting legislation, but we've got to watch out for anti-hunting regulations coming from our state wildlife agencies as well.  The anti-s are using camouflage more and more, so we've got to stay vigilant to keep our hunting heritage intact.

It's been 25 years since Kennesaw, Georgia, passed an ordinance requiring households to have firearms and ammunition at the ready.  The shootouts and spiraling crime predicted by anti-gunners hasn't happened, and most of the town's residents feel pretty safe.

The mayor of Kennesaw, Leonard Church, says there's no reason to get rid of the ordinance, and he's right.  Why would you want to get rid of something the local police call a "crime prevention program"?

Kennesaw's grown a lot in the past 25 years, but the crime rate remains low.  The Atlanta Journal Constitution says crime rates per capita have plunged since the law took effect, even while the town's population has climbed from about 5,000 to 30,000. 

Any time some anti-gun idiot tells you that more guns equal more crime, you tell 'em about Kennesaw, Georgia.  Twenty-five years later the residents are still proving the gun banners wrong.

USA Today is practicing journalistic fraud, and we've got to expose their deceit.  They ran a front-page article claiming that police departments were having to upgrade their "firepower" because the Clinton Gun Ban has expired.

The paper quoted a spokesman for the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), who said his "informal survey" of 20 police departments reveals they've upgraded their firearms because the ban expired. 

Since when is hearsay considered journalism? When money's talking. 

The IACP has taken more than $500,000 from the anti-gun Joyce Foundation in the past year alone. The IACP's stated agenda includes renewal of the Clinton Gun Ban. The IACP is also on the record in support of a three-day waiting period before you can purchase a handgun. The IACP opposes national reciprocity for Right-to-Carry licenses. The IACP is hosting an anti-gun summit in April.  But USA Today told readers none of this.

USA Today makes sure to bury any opposing view in the last paragraph of the story.  There, a spokesman with Sigarms says some police are upgrading their firearms because of incidents like 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina - not because the Clinton Gun Ban expired. 

There's a big difference between upgrading an arsenal because a gun ban expired, and since a gun ban expired.  USA Today knows it, but blurs it.

The facts haven't changed: Those rifles were banned for purely cosmetic features.  They're involved in less than 2 percent of all gun crime anyway. Twenty times more murders are committed with knives, clubs and hands than with the banned guns.

The fact also hasn't changed that USA Today despises your firearm freedoms. It's no coincidence they ran this non-story on the front page only days after Rep. Carolyn McCarthy introduced a new semi-auto gun ban in Congress.

If USA Today wants to editorialize for gun bans, fine.  But it belongs on the editorial page, not the front page.

About a month ago, I told you about Willie Hancox-because the media wouldn't have.  The 84-year-old Memphis resident is confined to a wheelchair, but that didn't stop him from defending himself when a robber tried to attack him in his home.  Willie shot and wounded the attacker and saved his life in the process. 

I thought about Willie the other day when I read the story of Linda Friday.  Linda's ex-husband Christopher had racked up a history of violence against her.  But when he tried to strangle her with an electrical cord, Linda knew she was in a fight for her life. 

You might think Christopher Friday would have the upper hand, because he's younger than his ex-wife, and he's got full use of his limbs.  Linda is a paraplegic, confined to a wheelchair.  But Linda is also a gun owner, and as her ex-husband was choking the life from her, she managed to get her gun. 

Christopher Friday was shot and killed in self-defense.  Linda Friday is alive today because she owned a gun.  As she said, "It was either my life or his; I had to choose, and I did."  She didn't want to be forced to make that decision. Nobody does.  But with no other choice, she chose to defend herself. 

Being disabled doesn't mean you have to be a victim, and Linda Friday is living proof of that.