fox files

While the use of firearms in violent crimes is at the forefront, we neglected to confront the cause of violence we are now experiencing.

Over the last 60 years, our society has abandoned its customs, morals, traditions and self-restraint to limit bad behavior, including criminality. Many of our politicians, clergy and educators avoid condemning the worst among us and the atrocities committed.

It has become commonplace for teachers to be threatened with violence, or actually to suffer it. Much of our “art” is little more than filth that in many circles is celebrated and defended. Much of this is aimed directly at our children.

Our language too has become debased. Terrorist acts and other criminal mass murders are now commonly referred to as “tragedies” when in fact they are atrocities. Those committing such violence are referred to as “extremists,” “militants;” “depressed,” “angry” or other euphemisms.

Moreover, when the responsible parties are caught, they are rarely ever executed.

Does anybody remember Nicholas Cruz? For 20 months since he murdered over a score of students at Douglas High School in Florida, he’s been provided with “three hots and a cot” at taxpayer expense. Why has he not been executed?

We have become inured to behavior our parents and grandparents would never have tolerated. Our violence problem is not caused by guns — it’s cultural degeneration and deviancy. These are incredibly complex issues, and not amenable to any “quick fixes.” However, until those matters are addressed and dealt with, the past is but a prelude to the future. It will not be affected by limiting the rights of the citizenry, limiting the kinds of firearms it can own or the number of cartridges they can hold. Such proposals come from fools or charlatans and will do nothing to cure this nation.

Now, sit back and give THAT some thought and ponderance.

If a political party with significant power abandons the rule of law, proceeding headlong down a path with no Constitution, no due process and brute force thinly disguised as court decisions — is this why America’s public is armed?

Back in Colonial times, the public understood the only deterrent to a government run amok was power in the hands of the people:

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government. —Thomas Jefferson

To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them. — George Mason

Okay, so we’re well armed, at least the half of us who understand these things. The other half, unfortunately, collectively cloistered in a single political party, is clueless. They have reached a point, whipped on by their “democratically elected leaders” where they’ve been convinced they must vote us out of our rights.

They can’t legitimately confiscate property we already own, but this doesn’t seem to matter in present presidential debates. An entire party’s worth of candidates don’t see it, or ask each other — they have actually put it in their platform. A full palette of prohibited acts have become their goals — ex post facto laws — taking without compensation, warrantless searches and seizures and even total bans on firearms. It’s as if the Constitution does not exist.

The so-called “news” media doesn’t question it either, not even a little. If there ever was a third rail of politics, it’s no longer Social Security, at least not with millennials cheering skateboarders onto a stage. It is guns —and not just keeping and bearing them. It’s the disarming, sub-arming and confiscation part. The part no reporter will address. Not because they don’t care — they care deeply. They want you disarmed as much as these campaigning pols. They won’t touch it out of electrified fear.

One candidate after another has a more ambitious plan to outlaw, confiscate and ban the best firearms we own. The types police prefer because they’re the best.

America, we have reached a tipping point. We have reached the point the Founders armed us for, and only we the armed seem to notice. It’s because we’re old enough to have been educated before socialism overtook and overwhelmed the education system.

Lazy Us

America has gotten so opulent, comfortable and frankly lazy, the idea of using the front end of guns for their intended purpose — defense of freedom against a confiscatory, unconstitutional, radicalized government seems virtually unthinkable. Candidates don’t fear our arms. They’re proudly — proudly! —promising to confiscate, well, virtually everything that launches lead. Ask what they believe is protected, they stammer. Some believe and have said the Constitution protects muzzleloaders, from the time the document was written.

They say this into microphones that spread speech worldwide instantly. When the Constitution was written, speech traveled as far as you could throw your voice from a soapbox, and no farther. The irony is lost on them.

Their hatred — yes hatred — of you and your guns knows no bounds. The days of denying it have ended. They are out of the closet. Some do hate guns in a ‘hopelophobic’ way, like arachnophobes hate spiders and ‘aquaphobes’ fear water. It’s just blind medical hatred, and subject to cure, but medical magicians have their heads firmly up where the sun don’t shine. They are “in denial,” the left’s favorite phrase for everyone but themselves.

But others hate you for the root cause — you represent freedom. The firearm in your hands is power, just like guns in their alphabet-soup agencies is power. Sure, power comes from the barrel of a pen, and they have those, but hard power comes from the barrel of a gun. They know this. They want yours which, just coincidentally, will leave you powerless. It will make their tyrannical leadership more secure. They understand it like the communist Chinese leadership understands it. And like every dictatorship that rules (“leads”) a nation of people who are disarmed.

It Is Not Allowed

So at what point does the muzzle of your gun protect your gun from tyranny? When one of these socialist-dictator types (running as “green” candidates but actually outspoken virtual commie red ones) decides you can’t keep a decent rifle you already own, and assaults it with “a bill”? Do you file a letter or pro-test? Do you wait for an official vote?. Go to courts they run, with judges they pay, and lawyers — yours and theirs —licensed by them, and learn, as Lenny Bruce poignantly noted, “In the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls”? They’re coming for your guns, loudly, proudly, in the open, now, and on center stage. Do you really expect to get the kind of fair treatment the Central Park Five got?

It is beyond comprehension; ambitious candidates of an entire party are campaigning on things the Constitution bans, and getting cheering support.

I certainly don’t advocate violence, but on the other hand, like my armed countrymen, I vigorously support self-defense and am prepared to act if desperate immediate proximate criminal trouble were to arise, God forbid. I’ve been through intensive training, classes, reading, et, el for decades. I’ve completed tons of course training on the subject — so far.

What I haven’t done is considered the dire threat politicians present to the nation, when they stoke the flames of revolution by doing precisely what the British did that got us there those many years ago. They have announced they’re coming for our guns. It is not subtle. It is not limited. It is not allowed.

Spread this word if you value your freedoms for you, your children, grandchildren and generations to follow.

 

UN Human Rights Ruling Says “Climate Refugees” Cannot be Returned back to Their Home Country — US Must Open Its Borders to All Central Americans

The United Nations ruled that “climate refugees” cannot be returned back to their home countries. This ruling forces the United States to allow all Central Americans into our country.

Literally, anyone can claim the new refugee status.

This will essentially open US borders for good.

Now the left has combined open borders with junk science to create climate refugees.

 

Democrats and the media were PREDICTING that the anti-tyranny rally at the steps of the Virginia capitol would end in violence because it supported firearm rights.

But their sick and twisted claims were crushed. It was a peaceful collection of patriots voicing their genuine concerns about Ralph “Blackface” Northam’s assault on our God-given rights.

Gun Owners of America was at the rally. Its Senior Vice President Erich Pratt spoke to gun owners from in front of the Capitol building. But even more so, he addressed listeners who would later listen to his talk on YouTube.

He called on Americans nationwide to vote gun-grabbers out of office. And he announced that GOA is endorsing Nick Freitas—a NO COMPROMISE pro-2A champion and Army veteran—who is running for Congress in a Virginia district bought by Pelosi in 2018.

NOW PLEASE READ THIS LAST PARAGRAPH VERY, VERY CAREFULLY AND FULLY UNDERSTAND IT.

No matter where you live, Nick Freitas will represent you if he’s elected to Congress. As a member of the state House of Delegates, Freitas is the chief co-sponsor of Constitutional Carry. He is an outspoken advocate for gun rights and will be one of the most hard-core champions for the Second Amendment.

DO NOT FORGET THAT NAME WHEN YOU ALL VOTE!

Think about this. Politicians, specifically career-type politicians, live for one sole purpose and one purpose only. To place their thumbprints into history, thereby leaving their so-called legacies, and they do that by continuously creating and passing laws. Their entire lives are spent doing this one thing. Law after law after law after law after law and on and on it goes infinitum.

And for the most part, who are the ones ‘suffering’ through all of this legislation? You guessed it. Us. The masses. The populace. The citizenry.

This is not to say that there are not many laws that are well intentioned and work, but society is so now burdened with laws, they are being passed without much thought given them anymore.

As an example. Vaping. Once something, anything, a topic gets in view of a politician to become noticed, it never fails; red flags will instantly go up to ‘protect us from ourselves’.

Anything that becomes popular, the public raves about, suddenly becomes favored, et, el, the government will always but always stick its nose in it. Every time. Never fails. That’s the legacy thumbprint at work.

Vaping uses two FDA approved ingredients; Propylene Glycol and Vegetable Glycerin plus a drop of flavoring which is also FDA approved. In fact, these ingredients have been used in food and other products for decades now.

As for nicotine, there does NOT have to be any in vaping. It is there by user choice ONLY.

And nicotine by itself, other than being an addictive substance, is not harmful unless handled in large quantities with bare hands.

Now all of a sudden, vaping is square in their targets. Why? Just like false reports made to fit a political agenda, politicians quickly jump on the bandwagon believing everything negative said, failing to realize that there is much misinformation and untruths processed as such. Again. It fits their thumbprint legacy.

Ever heard of MyPurMist vapor units sold at Walgreens and all other pharmaceuticals?

They are vaporizing units that create steam to help the pulmonary and respiratory systems and aid in better breathing during sickness.

It is a VAPE product. It produces moisture and steam using the SAME GODDAMNED TECHNOLOGY AS VAPING PRODUCTS, BUT NO ONE HAS EVER SAID A STINKING WORD ABOUT IT.

So once again, I ask, why the sudden attention to vaping?

Answer: History, Legacy and Thumbprints. That’s why.

When social justice warriors and the like try to shove something down our collective throats, it’s usually sold to us under the labels of “compassion,” and we’re told that it’s “for the children.”

Certainly, the push for gun bans is nearly always sold to us as being a push to protect the children from such horrible things as school shootings (never mind that these same people tend to be the ones insisting that you send your kids to their sitting duck target range… alias… their gun- free zones for easy targets… alias… their schools instead of allowing options for education to parents).

So, here is the problem with the school shooting information which anti-gunners keep putting out there to push for more and more gun control: it’s bogus. That’s right, the statistics that they use are deceiving. 

IN REALITY, DESPITE A TIDAL WAVE OF MISLEADING PROPAGANDA, THE NUMBER OF SCHOOL SHOOTINGS HAS FALLEN SHARPLY OVER THE PAST 30 YEARS.

BUT ANTI-GUN ACTIVISTS IN GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA HAVE DONE THEIR BEST TO PERSUADE PEOPLE OTHERWISE.

LAST YEAR, THE FEDERAL EDUCATION DEPARTMENT REPORTED THAT “NEARLY 240 SCHOOLS … REPORTED AT LEAST 1 INCIDENT INVOLVING A SCHOOL-RELATED SHOOTING” IN THE 2015-16 SCHOOL YEAR. 

NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO INVESTIGATED AND FOUND THAT THE FEDS HAD EXAGGERATED SCHOOL SHOOTINGS BY TWENTYFOLD; NPR COULD CONFIRM ONLY 11 INCIDENTS.

CLEVELAND WAS CREDITED WITH 37 SHOOTING INCIDENTS WHEN IN REALITY IT WAS SIMPLY A REPORT OF 37 SCHOOLS THAT NOTED “POSSESSION OF A KNIFE OR A FIREARM.” 

IN DEKALB COUNTY, GEORGIA, “A TOY CAP GUN FIRED ON A SCHOOL BUS” COUNTED AS A SCHOOL SHOOTING. 

ONE SCHOOL SYSTEM WAS LISTED AS A SHOOTING LOCALE FOR AN INCIDENT INVOLVING A PAIR OF SCISSORS. 

NPR NOTED, “MOST OF THE SCHOOL LEADERS NPR REACHED HAD LITTLE IDEA OF HOW SHOOTINGS GOT RECORDED FOR THEIR SCHOOLS. 

FOR EXAMPLE, THE FEDERAL CIVIL RIGHTS DATA COLLECTION REPORTS 26 SHOOTINGS WITHIN THE VENTURA UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. 

ASSISTANT SUPERINTENDENT JEFF DAVIS SAID ‘I THINK SOMEONE PUSHED THE WRONG BUTTON’. THE OUTGOING SUPERINTENDENT, JOE RICHARDS, ‘HAS BEEN HERE FOR ALMOST 30 YEARS AND HE DOESN’T REMEMBER ANY SHOOTING,’ DAVIS ADDED.”

EVEN THE LEFTIST NEWS SITE VOX NOTED, “THE RISK OF A CHILD GETTING KILLED BY SOMEONE ELSE AT SCHOOL IN 2011, THE LAST YEAR FOR WHICH THERE’S FINAL DATA, WAS ABOUT 1 IN 5 MILLION.” 

VOX AGAIN: THE RATE OF “SERIOUS VIOLENT VICTIMIZATION” AMONG STUDENTS — RAPE, SEXUAL ASSAULT, ROBBERY, OR AGGRAVATED ASSAULT — WAS ABOUT 1 IN 1,000 IN 2011, DOWN FROM 1 IN 100 IN 1995. 

IN 1995, 10% OF STUDENTS WERE VICTIMS OF SOME KIND OF CRIME AT SCHOOL; IN 2011, JUST 4% WERE.”

NORTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY CRIMINOLOGIST JAMES ALAN FOX OBSERVED, “WE OVER-OBSESS ABOUT SCHOOL SHOOTINGS. SURVEYS SHOW THE MAJORITY OF STUDENTS ARE AFRAID THERE WILL BE A MASS SHOOTING AT THEIR SCHOOL. THESE ARE RARE EVENTS. SCARY THOUGH THEY MAY BE, TRAGIC THOUGH THEY ARE, WE SHOULDN’T OVER-RESPOND.”

Think about these statistics. Anti-gunners and their lapdogs in the mainstream media are pushing an anti-gun narrative using school shootings as one of their primary reasons for gun control, but we don’t ever hear them talking about teaching your kids how to defend themselves, about how to teach them situational awareness so that they can stay out of many dangerous situations. And those are much more likely to be situations which our kids will need to deal with.

Let’s be honest here: anti-gunners and the mainstream media are simply about their narrative and not about the truth, and THE WORLD NEEDS TO BE WOKEN TO THIS!

The royal family is in crisis mode and the scheming Meghan Markle, who refused to meet with President and First Lady Trump during their most recent visit in June, and her woke husband, are being blamed by many for their selfish actions.

Prince Andrew was fired over his relationship with serial pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

Harry and Meghan are leaving the royal family without even so much as giving Queen Elizabeth II the courtesy of discussing his plans before announcing them on Instagram.

The Daily Mail reports – Prince Charles and Prince William were among senior royals set to meet today to discuss the fallout, amid reports they were both left ‘incandescent with rage’ after learning about the couple’s announcement 10 minutes before it was published on their Instagram page.

Royal sources this morning even claimed Prince Harry had ignored crystal-clear orders from the Queen on the subject after she instructed him not to make an announcement about his future plans at this time.

A senior royal source said the Queen and her family were ‘deeply disappointed’ by the news, while another said the royals were ‘shocked, saddened and downright furious’ at the couple.

A senior source told The Sun: ‘Their statement was not cleared with anyone. It breaks all protocol. This is a declaration of war on the family.

‘There is fury over how they’ve done this without any thought for the implications for the institution. The Queen is deeply upset. The Prince of Wales and Duke of Cambridge are incandescent with rage.

Piers Morgan, who has never been a fan of the “super-woke” Harry and Meghan couple, is offering some advice to Queen Elizabeth II, who he claims will go down in history as “one of the greatest, if not THE greatest, monarchs.”

Fire the leeching couple who blindsided the queen with their decision to leave the Royal family and instead, live the life of the Kardashians in North America, off the backs of British taxpayers.

Piers mocks the soon-to-be-former royal couple for suggesting that once they’re safely ensconced in their taxpayer-funded mansion in Canada, that the progressive couple will have the ability to tell the press to only write positive stories about them. Piers reminds them that no one, not even woke celebrity wanna-be’s have that kind of power.

“If they want to be the new Kardashians, they’ll get treated like the new Kardashians.”

In his brutal piece on the Obama bestie-couple, Piers tells the queen, who Harry and Meghan disgraced when they blindsided them with their decision to leave, to fire them.

The Daily Mail – Indeed, if I were Her Majesty the Queen, I would unceremoniously strip Harry and Meghan of all their titles with immediate effect and despatch them back into civilian life.

These two deluded clowns announced yesterday they were quitting life as senior royals.

In a series of staggeringly pompous statements on their gleaming new Hollywood-style website, they laid down the law to the Queen and to the rest of us about exactly how things are supposedly going to work from this moment on.

To summarise, they want to stop being ‘senior royals’ with all the tedious duty that entails.

And instead, they now want to be a ‘progressive’ force within ‘the institution’.

In other words, they want to be super-woke celebrities (with all the outrageous ‘Do as we say not as we do’ hectoring hypocrisy they’ve already brought to that status) who get to keep all the trappings of royal life without any of the hard, boring bits and the right to cash in on their status however they choose.

So, they want the glitz, the glamour, the splendor and the stupendous wealth….they just don’t want to have to actually earn it.

What a pathetic joke.

In their lengthy list of pronouncements, Harry and Meghan say they will now be spending much of their time in North America, where they’ve just been lounging on their lazy backsides for six weeks ‘much-needed holiday’ – a holiday from what, exactly? – at a multi-millionaire’s waterside mansion in Canada.

The £10million property where Meghan and Harry spent six weeks over Christmas and New Year

And they’re going to seek to be ‘financially independent’.

It’s only when you read the details of this ‘independence’ that you realize what it actually means is they want to live off Harry’s dad’s money, from Prince Charles and his Duchy of Cornwall – which he only possesses by right of being the Queen’s heir.

They have also informed us they intend to continue living for free, when they grace the UK with their esteemed presence, at Frogmore Cottage, their palatial home in Windsor that was gifted to them by the Queen and which has been refurbished to their specifications at a cost to the taxpayer of millions of pounds.

Despite stepping back as frontline royals, Harry and Meghan have decided to keep Frogmore Cottage.

The public paid £2.4million to fund a renovation of the Grade II-listed property near Windsor Castle. And the couple announced last night they wanted to keep it so they would have ‘a place to call home in the United Kingdom’.

It was decided taxpayers would help Harry and Meghan pay for Frogmore after the newlyweds eschewed their home on the grounds of Kensington Palace, wanting a place of their own.

Oh, and they expect to continue having royal protection too wherever they choose to live and travel – at further vast expense to the taxpayer.

Harry, Meghan, and Archie are understood to have up to six permanent Metropolitan Police bodyguards, funded by the taxpayer. The officers (pictured) are estimated to earn more than £100,000 a year including overtime.

And they’ll want all the other stuff that goes with that like VIP royal travel of course.

We all know there’s nothing these two fearless eco-warriors like more than stomping down their giant hypocritical carbon footprint one private jet at a time!

To put it bluntly, she’s an unsavory manipulative social-climbing piece of work who has inveigled her way into Prince Harry’s heart and used his blind love as a platform to now destroy everything he once held so dear.

She’s caused a tremendous rift between Harry and William.

She’s ruined Harry’s reputation with the public as a hugely popular fun, carefree soul, turning him into a miserable-looking, a virtue-signalling laughing stock.

And now she’s ripped him away from his beloved grandmother, the Queen.

None of this has surprised me.

Meghan’s been doing this kind of stuff all her adult life.

She’s disowned 99 percent of her own family.

She’s ditched and ghosted numerous old friends.

She got rid of her ex-husband when she tasted TV stardom.

And the former Deal or No Deal suitcase girl has done all this with barely a glance back to her past.

Nothing said more about Me-Me-Meghan than her wedding day when she plonked newly-acquired A-list celebrity friends like Oprah Winfrey and George Clooney up the front where most brides usually put their family.

Must be nice to be able to wield such power and lifestyle without having to put in the work for it. Nice gig Meghan.

THIS MOVEMENT HAS THE HUGE POTENTIAL TO BECOME SOMETHING BIG, POWERFUL AND LIFE-CHANGING!

A growing movement in Virginia is declaring cities and counties “Second Amendment sanctuaries.”

A little backstory:

Virginia Gov. Northam is proposing gun legislation that failed last summer.

This time, however, with Democrats dominating the Virginia Senate and the House of Delegates…

The worm is turning for the wannabe gun grabbers.

The laws would…

• Ban assault weapons, silencers, high-capacity magazines and other “dangerous weapons.”
• Require background checks on all gun transactions.
• Reinstate the law — repealed in 2012 — allowing no more than one handgun purchase a month.
• Allow municipalities to enact “ordinances that are stricter than state law.” Among the examples they cite: rules banning guns in libraries or municipal buildings.
• Require lost or stolen guns to be reported to authorities within one day.
• Allow law enforcement to “temporarily separate a person from firearms if the person exhibits dangerous behavior that presents an immediate threat to self or others.”
• Prohibit the subjects of protective orders from possessing guns.
• Toughen punishment for allowing access of a loaded, “unsecured” firearm to someone 18 or younger.

According to many gun advocates, the laws would make millions of Virginians ‘insta-felons’.

While the grandfather clause would allow gun owners to keep the blacklisted guns and accessories, “with the requirement,” says spokeswoman Alena Yarmosky, “that they register their weapons before the end of a designated grace period.”

Registration, says DJ Spiker, the NRA’s state director for Virginia, North Carolina, and South Carolina, is the “first step to confiscation.”

2nd Amendment Sanctuaries

According to the Virginia Citizens Defense League, a gun-rights organization, over 100 counties, towns, and cities in Virginia have vowed not to enforce any unconstitutional gun laws.

Each sanctuary has promised not to enforce gun control laws that the Democratic-controlled General Assembly may enforce.

Scott H. Jenkins, the sheriff of Culpeper County, has taken it a step further.

He’s offered to deputize thousands of Culpeper County residents, so they can skirt any future gun restrictions.

He said he could deputize 5,000 concealed gun permit holders, and maybe 1,000 more.

Tazewell County is pondering forming a militia that would allow residents to avoid any new regulations.

Democrats are unfazed.

Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring issued a warning that the sanctuaries are bags of hot air: “It is my opinion,” he hedged, “that these resolutions have no legal effect.”

Even so, police, veterans, and residents are joining the militias, signing up to become deputies, and requesting to live in a sanctuary town.

It’s clear, as Molly Carter of Ammo.com outlines below, that the mainstream media has a bias against gun ownership in America.

The Washington Post called the 2nd Amendment sanctuary trends “disturbing.”

What’s not as clear, for this reason, is the positive impact of gun ownership in the States.

Jose Nino, for example, wrote a riveting article for Ammo.com on how the violence in the “Wild West” is entirely overblown…

The Wild West, with precisely ZERO federally mandated gun laws, wasn’t as wild as Hollyweird makes it out to be.

He writes:

“Advocates of gun rights and other facets of limited government would be wise to closely examine the history of the American Frontier and restore it to its proper place. The United States is currently in a narrative war of sorts, where advocates of Progressivism will distort historical events to advance their agenda.”

Today, however, we turn to Molly Carter to outline the largely unseen positive impact of gun ownership.

While mass media makes a killing on reporting mass shootings…

The facts tell a different story about gun owners.

Read on.

American Gun Ownership: The Positive Impacts of Law-Abiding Citizens Owning Firearms

It’s no secret that mainstream press coverage of gun ownership in the United States tends to be in favor of gun control – especially when those reporting on the topic are not firearm owners themselves. Journalists focus on how many people are killed by guns, how many children get their hands on improperly stored firearms, and how many deranged individuals go on shooting sprees.

This anti-gun news bias is widespread among the “urban elite” who have very little personal experience with guns and yet write for influential newspapers like The New York Times, Washington Post, etc. Despite this bias, law-abiding private citizens owning guns does have positive impacts on American society that often go unreported – many of which are significant.

Criminals and the Armed Citizen

Perhaps the most notable impact of gun ownership on American society is how it influences the behavior of criminals.

The fact is, criminals fear armed citizens more than they do the police. There’s many reasons for this, but here are the most prominent:

• Police are rarely onsite during a crime.
• Police are bound by policy and procedures and are trained to only use their firearms if it’s absolutely necessary.
• Civilians are also less trained.

In a research study sponsored by the United States Department of Justice, James Wright and Peter Rossi interviewed over 1,800 incarcerated felons, asking how they felt about civilians and gun ownership. Thirty-three percent of these criminals admitted to being scared off, shot at, wounded, or captured by a gun-owning victim. Sixty-nine percent of them knew at least one other criminal who had similar experiences. Nearly 80 percent of felons also claimed that they intentionally avoid victims and homes that they believe may be armed.

This shows that at least one in three criminals has been deterred because of an armed citizen and that four out five avoid victimizing people that have guns.

Law-Abiding Gun Owners & Defensive Gun Use

Advocates of civilian disarmament tend to scoff at the capabilities of everyday gun owners. Many believe that guns in the hands of normal people are crimes waiting to happen. However, thanks to the research of individuals such as John Lott, we now have evidence showing that gun owners are some of the most law-abiding segments of the American population.

Lott drew the example of concealed license holders when compared to law enforcement:

“Concealed-handgun permit holders are also much more law-abiding than the rest of the population. In fact, they are convicted at an even lower rate than police officers. According to a study in Police Quarterly, from 2005 to 2007, police committed 703 crimes annually on average. Of those, there were 113 firearms violations on average.

With 683,396 full-time law enforcement employees nationwide in 2006, we can infer that there were about 102 crimes by police per 100,000 officers. Among the U.S. population as a whole, the crime rate was 37 times higher than the police crime rate over those years – 3,813 per 100,000 people.”

Not only are gun owners very law-abiding, they are also quite capable of defending themselves against criminals. Criminologists Dr. Gary Kleck and Dr. Marc Gertz carried out a study that found 2.2 to 2.5 million cases of defensive gun use (DGU). Around 1.5 to 1.9 million of these cases involved handguns. There is reason to believe that DGU numbers completely overshadow the criminal use cases of guns.

However, in today’s era of outrage politics, many incidents of DGU go under the radar because of their lack of shock appeal that does not make for good headlines.

A Sense of Security

Most people realize that law enforcement cannot be everywhere, yet so many rely on nothing but a 911 call to protect both their home and those inside it. For those who live in remote areas, it can take an hour or more for first responders to arrive after an emergency call, but in most cases, even five minutes is too long. But when a homeowner is armed and trained, the sense of security increases.

Thanks to modern psychology, we know that people need this sense of security in order to grow and develop into healthy adults. Not surprisingly, privately owned guns provide that. Sixty-three percent of Americans now believe that having a gun in the house increases safety. While some may dismiss the importance of feeling secure and safe or claim that another person’s desire for safety makes them feel unsafe, it is by far the most basic of human needs. And without it, people are left feeling frightened, angry, and defensive – often unable to reach, or even focus on, higher goals.

Gun Ownership and Public Safety

Concerning public safety, the media often portrays guns as the primary problem – stating things like, “Guns kill people” or “Guns are not the answer.” But gun control and restrictions are also not the answer. Whenever a community, city, state, or country has imposed a ban on guns, regardless if it was all guns or simply handguns, it has experienced an increase in murder rates. In 1997, Wales and England saw a nearly 50 percent increase in homicides immediately after implementing a ban on handguns.

Gun control advocates promote the idea that more gun policies and regulations make Americans safer, but it’s naive to believe that any type of law will stop someone set on murder or other criminal activity. The individuals that engage in these types of criminal behaviors do not obey laws and are therefore rarely impacted by policies and procedures. But these implemented gun control laws do impact the law-abiding citizens who are only trying to protect themselves and those they care about.

The fact is, widespread gun ownership does reduce crime. Here are some of the ways:

Home and Business Protection

Every year, one million American home and business owners utilize a privately owned firearm to protect their property and lives. And when it comes to protection, resisting a crime with a gun is the safest route for victims. It’s associated with lower rates of both victim injury and crime completion than any other victim action.

American criminals are also less likely to burglarize an occupied home due to fear of the homeowner being armed. In England, where only around four percent of the general population legally own a handgun due to heavy restrictions, 59 percent of homes are occupied when the burglar breaks in, compared to approximately 28 percent in the U.S. Even if the homeowner did own a gun, he or she would have to unlock it from its safe, then unlock another safe where the ammunition is kept, then load the weapon before self-defense would be possible. In 2009, 13 years after the country’s handgun ban began, its handgun crime levels had nearly doubled.

Public Shootings

After personal and home protection, the biggest impact of gun ownership on American society is mass shootings. Since 1950, all but just over one percent of mass public shootings occurred in gun-free zones. That means perpetrators are likely to know they’re safe and could intentionally be choosing these places to act out their massacres.

Also, immediately after right to carry concealed laws are put in place, the amount of mass public shootings fall dramatically. Not only does their frequency fall, but because people have the ability to carry firearms, they therefore can stop the perpetrator – limiting the impact of violence and destruction. Within the last two decades, this has happened numerous times across the country, including at a middle school dance in Edinboro, Pennsylvania and the Trolley Square Mall in Salt Lake City, Utah.

What’s more, when police were interviewed regarding their position on gun control legislation, around 90 percent stated they believed that during an active shooter incident, having well-trained, armed citizens present would decrease the casualties. More than 28 percent agreed that more permissive carry concealed policies would be beneficial to the public, especially when it comes to large-scale public shootings.

For the counter-argument that states an armed civilian is likely to increase the causalities of a mass shooter incident, there is a risk of this – just as there is an increased risk any time police are involved in a shoot-out. But remember, if there’s an armed shooter, things are already bad. And without interference, things are going to get worse. While the philosophy for protection during one of these situations is always run, hide, fight, if you’re fighting for your life, having a gun on your side is more beneficial than anything else.

The Exponential Impact

Because criminals fear citizens with firearms, gun ownership does have a dampening effect on crime. Not only is it a deterrent, but every time an intruder is shot, injured, or captured by a civilian, he or she is less likely to commit another crime.

Consider this: In 1966, 2,500 women in Orlando, Florida, went through a specific, highly publicized handgun training. Without anything else happening, the prevalence of rapes fell substantially from almost 36 rapes per 100,000 women to four. Other crimes, such as home burglaries, also fell – demonstrating that the private ownership of guns does deter crimes.

Protecting Constitutional Rights

In 2014, America saw a switch in how people thought about gun control. For the first time since gun control became an issue, more Americans believed that protecting gun rights was more important than controlling gun ownership, 52 to 46 percent.

That’s important because according to the U.S. Constitution, the right to bear arms is an inalienable right and an inherent part of the right to life. Once this right is violated by either another individual or the state, the ability to protect oneself from danger and even tyranny is impeded on. And when that happens, the ability of private citizens to protect the Constitution and the rights it enshrines for all Americans is threatened.

Having the ability to forcefully fight back against a tyrannical leader with guns – not just words – is what gave the colonists the ability to overthrow British control of the American colonies. Without guns, we would not have become the United States of America. The Founding Fathers understood this and wanted to ensure that future generations of Americans could defend themselves against all threats both foreign and domestic.

Restraining the Power of Government

It may seem ridiculous to think that in today’s world, citizens could rise up against the government simply because of privately owned guns. Yet the argument stands that citizens having guns does restrain the power of government. History has shown that when gun restrictions and bans are implemented, it leads to tyranny.

Here are a few examples:

• 1911: In Turkey, the Ottoman Empire killed 1.5 million Armenians.
• 1929: Soviet Union implemented gun control, and after 20 years, killed over 20 million dissidents.
• 1935: After 17 years of gun control laws, 20 million dissidents were killed in China.
• 1938: Nazi Germany enacted gun control laws for Jews and by 1945, had murdered 13 million Jewish people.
• 1956: In just two years after gun control laws were enacted, one million people were killed in Cambodia.
• 1964: In a nine-year span after gun control, Guatemala killed over 100,000 Mayan Indians.
• 1970: In Uganda, 300,000 Christians were killed after gun control was implemented.
• 1994: The government of Rwanda disarmed the Tutsi people, and executed almost one million of them.

What has the 20th Century shown us about gun control? That an unarmed country is not a safe country. That when citizens don’t have the right to bear arms, governments can and do grow too large and become a threat to their people. That in the 20th Century, governments murdered four times as many people as those that were killed in all the world’s wars during that same time period. That millions more people were killed by their own governments than by criminals.

Truth Behind the Anti-Gun Rhetoric

Arguments in support of the anti-gun campaign can seem strong. After all, they talk about gun control saving the lives of children, stopping school shootings, and putting an end to terrorist attacks. But the fact is, this is just rhetoric and much of it is exaggerated and skewed.

Here’s the truth behind the most common anti-gun arguments, especially when it comes to individual and public safety.

Suicide

Yes, civilian-owned guns often play a role in suicides. And yes, gun control policies do seem to lower the prevalence of gun suicides. But gun control does not impact the number of people who commit suicide nor the total number that occur.

Research shows that when guns are not available, those intent on hurting themselves find other, just as fatal ways to do it. More gun regulation does not lessen these numbers.

43 to One

A favorite statistic used by those in favor of gun control is that when a person has a gun in the home, he or she is 43 times more likely to shoot and kill a family member than an intruder. This statistic is based off of one study done in Seattle in 1986. Shooting of a family member included firearm murders, suicides, and fatal accidents and was compared to court-ruled justifiable homicides.

Of these 43 deaths, most were suicides. As already discussed, gun restrictions do not impact the number of suicides. Eliminate these deaths from the numbers, and it drops to 2.39 deaths to one.*

Now, of those 2.39 family deaths, some are accidents and some are murders. Just like the absence of guns doesn’t reduce the risk of suicide, when someone is bent on murder, chances are he or she is going to follow through regardless if it’s with a firearm, a knife, poison, or other means.

Lastly, these are deaths compared to deaths, and when discussing self-defense and protecting both yourself and home, it often doesn’t lead to death. Wielding a firearm alone is enough to turn many criminals away. And many who use a firearm in self-defense shoot to injure, not kill. The study also didn’t account for those cases when a homeowner was acquitted on grounds of self-defense. Therefore, this number represents the number of dead criminals, not those that were captured or deterred.

So what does this mean for America? It means that guns and the law-abiding citizens who carry them make and keep it a safer country. It means when a criminal knows you’re carrying a firearm, you’re less likely to become a victim. It means that there are positive benefits of gun ownership for Americans and that gun legislation is not the best way to safer streets.

BAM!

Those within the gun-control movement who like to blithely ask, “What’s the worst that could happen?” should look no further than what happened to Stephen Nichols.

In September, Nichols, an 84-year-old Korean War veteran and retired police officer, was summarily fired from his job as a school crossing guard in Tisbury, Mass. Worse still, Nichols’ guns and firearms license (which he had held since 1958) were seized from him under Massachusetts’ broad “red-flag” law.

Nichols’ crime? He was overheard worrying in a diner that the local school’s resource officer was routinely abandoning his post to go buy coffee and that this might lead someone to take advantage and “shoot up the school.”

Critics of “red-flag” laws have long argued that to introduce subjective criteria into the regulation of the Second Amendment is to guarantee abuse. And so it has come to pass. That a much-beloved, 84-year-old veteran would be stripped of his job and deprived of his Second Amendment rights simply because a server at a diner misheard his conversation and rushed stupidly to judgment is appalling in and of itself. But that the whole process was conducted without anything even resembling due process is frightening.

When confronting Nichols, the local police department confirmed that it had no intention of charging him, even as it stripped him of his constitutional rights. Having been informed of his punishment, he was not asked to fill out any paperwork or given receipts for either his guns or his license. So casual was the process that, having been instructed on the spot to relinquish his firearms license, he simply took it out of his wallet and handed it over.

Thanks to some overwhelming pushback from the community in Tisbury, Nichols has been reinstated as a school crossing guard. But he has not been given back his guns, and he has not been given back his firearms license. As this was being written, Nichols was wholly unsure of the status of the confiscation.

How could he be otherwise? He has not been arrested, he has not been charged and he has most certainly not been convicted of anything. The misunderstanding that led to him losing his job has been cleared up, in no small part because his community made it abundantly clear just how much he is valued, and yet that clearing up has had absolutely no effect on the government.

If there is a process in place for the restoration of Nichols’ civil rights, he is unaware of it.

In the most-recent interview Nichols gave, he said he believed he will be told to sell his guns. He said he would do so with the help of his son, who manages a firearms store. If he is correct—if that is, indeed, what he is being forced to do—then he is being punished for the rest of his life based on nothing more than an ugly misunderstanding.

If that is the case, who among us is safe? If an elderly man who has spent his life protecting others—first as a soldier and then as a police officer—can have his words twisted so dramatically that the government summarily seizes his guns, what chance do any of us have?

Asked why he had criticized the resource officer in the first place, Nichols told the Martha’s Vineyard Times that his view has always been that “if you’re on guard duty, you stay there.” That’s excellent advice for everyone, including those who wish to preserve the integrity of America’s Constitution.

Remember this and never, ever forget it.

If the government can do this to this man, it can do it to you for that and other reasons too, just as they currently do by forcing DCSF into homes and breaking up innocent families.

Just think about that for a moment. It’ll send shivers down
your spine, and if it doesn’t, you’re just plain spineless then.

What The Mainstream Media Won’t Tell You About Violent Crime, is that
Annually, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) publishes national data on the prevalence of crimes of all types. Recently, the FBI’s “2018 Crime Statistics” revealed that, yet again, violent crime in America has declined.

Unfortunately, the mainstream media, in its never-ending quest to promote more gun control, gave this data little to no coverage. Why not? Given their biases, it doesn’t feel cynical to say they don’t want to let people know about this wonderful fact because it runs counter to their narrative that America is an increasingly violent place.

If the mainstream media were to truly examine the numbers and then print what they found, they would have to explain how the FBI’s 2018 statistics mostly show a 30-year decline in violent crimes. A decline, it should be noted, that coincided with a huge increase in the number of civilian-owned firearms and with the expiration of the “assault-weapons” ban. Many in the media told us in 2004, when the Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 sunset, that ending this gun ban would cause the homicide rate to go up.

Data gathered by the FBI tells a different story: “The [2018] violent crime rate fell 3.9% when compared with the 2017 rate; the property crime rate declined 6.9%… The estimated number of three violent crime offenses [murder, nonnegligent manslaughter and aggravated assault decreased when compared with estimates from 2017…. Murder and nonnegligent manslaughter offenses fell 6.2%, and the estimated volume of aggravated assault offenses decreased 0.4%

Violent-crime rates in America hit a low point in 2014, according to the FBI-the lowest since 1970. The violent-crime rate in 2018, by comparison, represented the third-lowest rate since 1970.

To the extent the mainstream media even dealt with the FBI statistics, based on a search of 20 major media outlets, they briefly noted the general decline and then talked about places where violent-crime rates were higher than average—they did this, however, without noting that these areas tend to have the strictest gun-control laws.

Some media outlets opted to focus on the one category where the numbers are up: rape. But these articles didn’t then mention that gun rights also empower women. What a missed opportunity. They could have interviewed victims who have since armed themselves or firearms instructors who teach women how to protect themselves. But again, that wouldn’t fit their narrative.

Meanwhile, another very interesting statistic was circulating among the gun community, though as always, the mainstream media ignored it. According to Dr. John Lott and the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), “The number of concealed handgun permits has increased for the third year in a row. The figure now stands at over 18.66 million, a 304% increase since 2007. It’s also an 8% increase over the number of permits we counted a year ago in 2018.”

And the actual numbers are even higher because we don’t have precise data regarding how many people lawfully carry firearms in 16 states. And why is that you ask? Well, I’m very glad that you asked. It’s because those 16 states have some form of ‘Constitutional’ carry.

Constitutional carry means anyone who is normally allowed to carry a weapon because they have no criminal background or felonious history can do so without any application to the state for licensure and granting. It’s their God-Given and Constitutionally backed right to carry if they so wish, and that is exactly how it should be in all 50 states and the way our smart Forefathers meant it to be. PERIOD!

So, the FBI data proves that violent crimes are down, and the CPRC data shows the number of concealed-carry permit holders is increasing fast. Does this mean that the increase in people carrying concealed is making America safer? The mainstream media won’t even entertain that question. Why, you ask again? Well happy you once more asked. It’s because they fear doing so because it ultimately wouldn’t fit their bottom dollar line narrative(s). That’s why.

Scientifically speaking, there are many factors at work here. These include various crime-prevention programs, local economic conditions and a host of other sociological and legal factors that can affect violent-crime rates. Still, it is dishonest of the media to ignore the fact that more people are carrying.

Unfortunately, we don’t often see honest analysis of gun-related issues from the mainstream media. They prefer to push the provably false narrative that violent crime is plaguing America because of the availability of firearms. They like this storyline because they want people to believe we need more gun-control laws.

Another constituency that was silent on the new FBI findings were, surprisingly, <- (not) the gun-control groups. An internet search of the websites for the Brady Campaign, Everytown for Gun Safety and Moms Demand Action found no reference to the FBI crime report and no mention that violent crimes are in a steady decline. Actually, all three websites made rather sensationalist claims about violent-crime increases.

Perhaps that’s not shocking; after all, if these groups admitted the truth about the decline in violent crime, their reason for being would dry up, as would, one suspects, their fundraising efforts as well.

1. The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing. (Albert Einstein)
2. All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent (Thomas Jefferson)
3. Softest on the people who need discipline, hardest on people who need compassion (Unknown)
4. He who does not oppose evil, commands it to be done (Leonardo Da Vinci)
5. What you allow, you encourage (Carrie Heinze-Musgrove)
6. Your silence is consent (Plato)
7. If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. (Desmond Tutu)
8. Silence in the face of injustice is complicity with the oppressor (Ginette Sagan)
9. Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. (Martin Luther King Jr)
10. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere (Martin Luther King Jr)
11. In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends (Martin Luther King Jr)
12. There are times when silence becomes an accomplice to injustice (Ayaan Hirsi Ali)
13. I chose to defend human rights because I cannot maintain my silence in the face of injustice (Chen Guangcheng)

“If you buy into the full-scary narratives promoted by either the political left or the political right,” says Scott Adams in his book Loserthink, “you’re probably experiencing loserthink.”

I’m going to talk about two unconventional ways to get informed in the age of “fake news.”

1] Spotting loserthink

2] Getting skin in the game.

First things first:

Loserthink 101

Loserthink is the phrase Adams’ uses in his book to describe the many ways humans engage in unproductive thinking.

Unproductive thinking, says Adams, is how we accidentally build mental prisons for ourselves.

We do so by mimicking arguments we hear from pundits…

Making bad assumptions about why things happened…

Believing we can manage events in the present to fix the past (and not seeing how paths and opportunities to successfully fix most problems)

Believing someone only because they are an expert, and for no other reason… And on.

Adams asserts that by giving specific unproductive ways of thinking a name — loserthink — it makes them easier to spot and control.

The idea that naming something gives you power over it is nothing new.

The famous Greek philosopher Socrates reminds us that if we want to understand something, we must first give it a name.

Only then can we begin to differentiate it from what it isn’t and move accordingly.

Adams puts it plainly: “If you have a negative word for something, it will be easier to avoid than if you don’t.”

That said, spotting loserthink is all the more important in an age that capitalizes on all forms of unproductive thinking.

The goal is to replace loserthink with more useful ways of looking at the world.

The mainstream media, which have become masters of capitalizing on unproductive thinking, is the easiest place to begin.

Rather than taking the news at face value: “A more useful way to think of the political news,” says Adams, “is that nearly every major story is exaggerated to the point of falsehood, with the intention of scaring the public.” It’s what sells and it’s what creates the bottom line in dollars.

Therefore, news is NOT news, but rather ENTERTAINMENT.

There can not be honest news and reporting from ANYTHING that is funded by the almighty dollar at the bottom line. NOTHING.

It’s easy to forget, but the doom and gloom press is not a reflection of the world.

The mainstream map no longer even tries to show the territory. 

Rather, the current state of the media is a reflection of the way news has changed.

The technological change that fully “broke the news,” says Adams, is our ability to measure audience reaction to every headline.

“Once you can reliably measure the income potential of different approaches to the news,” he writes, “the people who manage the news have to do what works for profitability or else they are abandoning their responsibilities to shareholders.”

ONCE AGAIN. A BUSINESS (ENTERTAINMENT) FUNDING THE BOTTOM LINE WITH THE ALMIGHTY DOLLAR. PERIOD, AND PERIOD AGAIN DAMMIT!

Thus, there’s been a slow creep from presenting the facts (once known as journalism) to outright manipulating people’s brains to garner more views.

But if we are aware of this, we can shield ourselves from its influence.