Free Republic

The Illinois Supreme Court has just now released its opinion in Wilson v. County of Cook and it contains ‘slightly’ good news for Second Amendment advocates.

Scandal: Rather than a botched attempt to catch criminals, was the ATF program actually an attempt to advance gun-control efforts by an administration that has blamed Mexican violence on easy access to U.S. weapons? If "Operation Fast and Furious" was merely a botched attempt at law enforcement, why was a supervisor of the operation, David Voth, "jovial, if not, not giddy but just delighted about" marked guns showing up at crime scenes in Mexico, as career Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agent John Dodson told Rep. Darrell Issa's House Oversight Committee? Perhaps because all was going as planned...

WASHINGTON — Republican Senate candidate Carly Fiorina said Tuesday that she opposes a ban on assault weapons and supports a U.S. Supreme Court decision this week affirming a constitutional right to bear arms. In a 45-minute question-and-answer session with reporters here, the former Hewlett-Packard CEO also repeated her backing of Arizona's controversial immigration law and said she would support efforts to repeal the federal health care reform measure. But the fundamental issue in the race against three-term Sen. Barbara Boxer, Fiorina contended, will be whom voters trust more on the economy, and she said the contrast between the two could...

Lets make sure SCUMBAG AWE KNEE is gone first. That SOB laughing-stock made millions with guns and one of his first acts as governator was to ban all 50 cal Barrets which hurt a lot of people with 50’s that shot in clubs by making their guns illegal, just like the UGLY BLACK gun ban did. All through this thread I see people using the term ASSAULT WEAPON BAN. They have been banned unless registered with the FEDS since the 30’s. As a former Vietnam Era veteran that carried an XM16A1E1 select fire, I can tell you there are NO...

The fact that a very small number of perople attending public gatherings recently have been caught on camera carrying firearms, has driven many in the mainstream media to focus on “assault weapons” being brandished at political events. One man was caught on camera in Phoeniz, Arizona by at least one national cable outlet with an AR-15 rifle slung over his shoulder on a strap. The media immediately — and incorrectly — highlighted this as an “assault rifle” being carried outside a building at which President Barack Obama was speaking. While the national media may delight in highlighting such incidents, including...

Much of the talk about the U.S.-Mexico relationship these days centers on the flow of illegal guns south over the border. Fair enough, and long overdue. American weapons, easily bought thanks to woefully lax gun-control laws, are winding up in the arsenal of Mexican drug cartels, who are murdering thousands and destabilizing our southern neighbor. The havoc is spilling over into our border states. But let's not neglect an equally dangerous trend in firearm trafficking - namely, the flow of illegal weapons from America's Southern states north, especially to big cities like New York. As crime has declined in some...

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. -- The way Jay Chambers sees it, the semiautomatic weapons in his firearm collection might be the most promising investment in his financial portfolio. Like many gun enthusiasts, Mr. Chambers, a manager for a door wholesaler here, believes President Barack Obama and the Democrats in Congress soon will reimpose a version of an expired federal ban on the sale of so-called assault weapons. If such a law passes, he figures his collection -- enough guns, ammo magazines and weapon parts to assemble about 30 AK-47s, AR-15s and other semiautomatic rifles -- could triple in value. "A guy could...

MEXICO CITY (AFP) – The Obama administration wants to crack down on the sale of assault weapons that are arming Mexican drug cartels, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in an interview with NBC television. Clinton late Wednesday called letting a previous US ban on the sale of assault weapons expire "a mistake." "I think these assault weapons, these military style weapons, don't belong on anyone's street," said Clinton who pushed for the ban as a New York senator. "During the time period from 1994 to 2004, when the ban was in effect, our police in America were able to...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tossed cold water on the prospect of reinstating the assault weapons ban, highlighting Democrats’ reluctance to take on gun issues. Attorney General Eric Holder raised the prospect Wednesday that the administration would push to bring back the ban. But Pelosi (D-Calif.) indicated on Thursday that he never talked to her. The Speaker gave a flat “no” when asked if she had talked to administration officials about the ban. “On that score, I think we need to enforce the laws we have right now,” Pelosi said at her weekly news conference. “I think it's clear the Bush...

When he said on the campaign trail that he'd protect the second amendment you BELIEVED him?? Seriously, any hunters or gun owners that voted for Obama need a professional check-up from the neck-up. Obama's already working against the second amendment and the people he's appointed are leading the way.

The man arrested at Los Angeles International Airport with a trunk full of guns and nearly 1,000 rounds of ammunition said Saturday that he is a law-abiding weapons enthusiast who had no idea he might be breaking the law. A day after he was arrested for suspicion of felony transportation of an assault rifle, Phillip Dominguez said he's confident he'll be exonerated. "Our Second Amendment rights are being trampled in the name of law enforcement," Dominguez said. "I'm a law-abiding, taxpaying gun enthusiast. I have no felonies - up until now." (cont'd)

Since Assault Weapons Ban Lifted, At Least 163 Dead, 185 Wounded, 15 Police Officers Dead, 23 Wounded To: NATIONAL EDITORS Contact: Peter Hamm of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, +1-202-898-0792 WASHINGTON, Oct. 9 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- In the four years since the federal assault weapons ban expired on September 15, 2004, at least 163 people have been killed and 185 wounded with military-style semiautomatic assault weapons, including at least 38 police officers killed or wounded, according to a report being issued today by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Restrictions on assault weapons, which drew support from Presidents...

BATON ROUGE -- A pro-gun rights House committee Wednesday shot down, 12-1, a bill to impose a statewide ban on assault weapons starting Jan. 1. House Bill 68 by Rep. Cedric Richmond, D-New Orleans, is dead for the session unless he can amend it onto another bill. The only member of the House Committee on the Administration of Criminal Justice who voted against killing the bill was Rep. Roy Burrell, D-Shreveport. Richmond was joined in his presentation by New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin and ranking members of the New Orleans Police Department, who brought confiscated assault weapons and ammunition to...

COLUMBIA, S.C. - When Republican presidential hopeful Fred Thompson walks down the aisles of a gun show Saturday in Charleston, the game he's hunting won't be hard to spot. The former senator and actor is looking to differentiate himself from rivals Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney - and use his appeal as a "country boy from Tennessee" who knows NASCAR and hunting to portray the city slickers as out of step with this early voting state's residents. There is little doubt gun rights are a tough issue for the front of the GOP pack. Former New York Mayor Giuliani has...

The International Association of Chiefs of Police urged Congress to pass `an effective assault weapons ban.' The International Association of Chiefs of Police issued a report Wednesday calling for a ban on assault weapons, arguing it will make officers safer by reducing the ``firepower available to criminals.'' The report hits home this week in South Florida, where law enforcement officials are still reeling from the murder of one of their own. Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez, a former police officer and police director, gets angry when he talks about the fact that the gun used to kill Officer Jose Somohano was...

Miami-Dade Officer Jose Somohano was shot and killed with a Mak-90 assault rifle three years to the day after the federal law prohibiting the sale of such weapons expired. The International Association of Chiefs of Police issued a report at noon Wednesday calling for, among other things, a renewal of the ban, arguing that it helps keep police officers safe by reducing the ``firepower available to criminals.'' The report hits home for South Florida law enforcement officers, who have been facing an increasing number of these guns on the street since the ban expired. Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Alvarez, a former...

MIAMI, Sept. 16 (AP) — Patrol officers here will have the option of carrying assault rifles as they try to combat the rise in the use of similar weapons by criminals, the city’s police chief said Sunday. The chief, John F. Timoney, approved the policy last week, before a Miami-Dade police officer was killed on Thursday in a shootout with a man wielding an assault rifle. “This is something we do not do with any relish,” Chief Timoney said. “We do this reluctantly.” The policy had been under review for about a year after officers began seeing an increase in...

Rudolph W. Giuliani will go before the rank and file of the National Rifle Association on Friday, seeking support for his Republican presidential campaign from a group he once likened to "extremists" for its efforts to repeal the ban on assault weapons. But even as the former New York mayor strives to burnish his Second Amendment credentials at the gathering in Washington, a panel of federal judges in his home town will be hearing arguments on the lawsuit that Giuliani filed seven years ago aimed at punishing the nation's gun manufacturers for violent crimes involving firearms. Announcing the lawsuit in...

An extraordinarily violent day in South Florida -- which began with the shooting of four police officers south of Miami, and ended with the death of the gunman in Pembroke Pines -- brought home a disturbing fact of criminal life: More offenders are taking to the streets with high-powered assault weapons. "You can buy an assault rifle for about $200," said Carlos Baixauli, a special agent with the Miami district office of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. "That gives you a lot of firepower with the flick of a finger."

On the day South Florida mourned a slain police officer, Republican presidential candidate Fred Thompson stopped in Miami and stuck firmly to his guns over what he says is the unnecessary call for limiting the right to bear arms. ''I do not think that abrogating Second Amendment rights is a good idea,'' the Republican said at the Versailles in Little Havana. ''The amount of violence created on the street by these kinds of weapons is very, very small,'' Thompson said. ``It's too bad. It's horrendous. Any kind -- whether it's a knife or an IED [improvised explosive device] or a...