Free Republic

Firearms are not the only tool available to defend against bear attacks. Blades and blunt objects have been effective in a number of recorded cases. Unlike bear spray or firearms, when someone defends against a bear with a blade or a blunt object, it tends to make the news.Traditionally, bears were hunted with spears and dogs. Humans with spears, partnered with dogs, are very difficult for a bear to successfully overcome. Some human and dog casualties result, with dog casualties much more common than humans. Spears give humans a necessary stand-off distance to keep them away from a bear’s teeth...

It is revered as a modern-day musket. It is reviled as a tool for mass killers. The AR-15 wasn’t supposed to be a bestseller. The rugged, powerful weapon was originally designed as a soldiers’ rifle in the late 1950s. “An outstanding weapon with phenomenal lethality,” an internal Pentagon report raved. It soon became standard issue for U.S. troops in the Vietnam War, where the weapon earned a new name: the M16.

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) — It was a terrifying afternoon at a West Philadelphia daycare center. Young children were inside the Munchkins to Masterminds Daycare on West Girard Avenue when armed robbers held up the building and released pepper spray. Staff and toddlers were checked out at the daycare. No one was injured. Police say this was all over an iPad. “It’s just a tragedy that this happened here in our neighborhood,” a woman said. A West Philadelphia daycare was robbed at gunpoint in the middle of the day when toddlers were inside. “Like who would think to do that?” a woman...

Among the bleak, often harrowing images coming to us from Ukraine as it suffers a vicious invasion by Russia, there are images of hope and strength. Pictures of civilians lining-up to receive firearms or forming makeshift assembly lines to assemble Molotov Cocktails, are examples of something that many Liberals simply fail to grasp as a moving force of human nature – acts of self-preservation against those who would take away individual liberty. “The first and strongest desire God planted in men, and wrought into the very principles of their nature, [is] that of self-preservation,” John Locke wrote in 1689. The...

Image at the Capitol, west side, scaffolding, before protestors entered Capitol, about, 1:05 p.m. Courtesy Dean Weingarten Outside of the Capitol on the afternoon of 6 January 2021, after the news had come the Capitol had been entered by protestors, this correspondent was able to interview four people, in two separate pairs, who claimed to have been through the Capitol. There were multiple other people present.This correspondent did not see them entering or leaving the capitol. Here are links to the recordings, and transcripts of the accounts. They are in two segments.It gives a better understanding of the mindset of...

“Assault weapon” under proposed Florida ballot initiative. Courtesy Dean Weingarten The Florida referendum to ban common rifles and shotguns as “assault weapons” has failed to gather enough signatures to appear on the 2020 ballot. From tampabay.com: To make it on the November ballot, organizers had to gather 766,200 verified signatures by today. The organizers fell well short with just 147,304, according to the Secretary of State. 147,304 signatures is a bit more than 19% of the required number.  Signatures are valid for two years.The ban proponents started to gather signatures on 28 November 2018. They have until 27 November 2020,...

President Bolsonaro of Brazil is following President Trump's lead. On January 15, 2019, Jair Bolsonaro kept a prominent campaign promise. He signed a decree modifying the extreme firearms restrictions passed in December of 2003. From voanews.com: Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro has signed a decree making it easier for many Brazilians to own a gun – a measure he says will help people defend themselves. The decree establishes wide categories of people who qualify for gun ownership. Those include people living in rural areas, in urban areas with high levels of homicide, business owners, gun collectors and hunters. In effect,...

The Democrat party has moved considerably to the left for the 2018 midterm elections.  As part of that strategy, they have wholeheartedly embraced gun control as a winning issue. Here is a Democrat strategist explaining their thoughts on July 6th. Opinion from usatoday.com: Since 1994, Democrats have shied away from gun safety believing that this fight is nearly impossible for Democrats to engage in and win because NRA supporters are more organized, energized and monetized. 2018 could finally be the end of 1994 Now, less than 125 days to another midterm election, the times they are a'changing. Obviously, there...

To bring attention to the issue of gun violence, Americans are encouraged to wear orange the weekend of June 1st - 3rd – June 2nd would’ve been Hadiya Pendleton’s 21st birthday U.S. Senators Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) and U.S. Representative Robin Kelly (D-IL) led 14 other Senators and 25 other Representatives to introduce a resolution in the House and Senate establishing the weekend of June 1-3, 2018 as “National Gun Violence Awareness Weekend” and designating June as “National Gun Violence Awareness Month.”  Every day in America, an average of around 300 men, women, and children are shot,...

Lawmakers in the nation’s smallest state are planning a large package of bills in conjunction with gun control activists that could see bans on certain types of semi-automatics and their magazines. Allied with the Rhode Island Coalition Against Gun Violence, Sen. Joshua Miller, D-Cranston, and Rep. Jason Knight, D-Barrington, are introducing proposals in both chambers of the legislature that would add the same types of firearms restrictions seen in neighboring Connecticut and Massachusetts. Knight argued the move is needed to protect public safety in the aftermath of a high-profile school shooting in Florida this week. “It will take a multi-pronged...

Those who campaign for a disarmed population take comfort in persuading themselves that gun ownership is declining in the United States.This is the primary goal, after all. If gun ownership is declining, they can claim they are “winning”.The most commonly cited evidence that gun ownership is declining is the General Social Survey, which shows a gradually declining percentage of households in the United States that tell survey-takers they have guns in the household.But the number of guns sold in the last decade skyrocketed.  At the beginning of 2008, there were about 301 million privately owned guns in the United...

The Texas church shooter who mercilessly shot dead 26 people and injured 24 others was an 'outcast' who 'preached his atheism' online. Former classmates say Devin Patrick Kelley, 26, who stormed First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs in Texas and opened fire on Sunday, was 'creepy', 'crazy' and 'weird'. Patrick Boyce, who attended New Braunfels High School with the killer, told DailyMail.com: 'He had a kid or two, fairly normal, but kinda quiet and lately seemed depressed. 'He was the first atheist I met. He went Air Force after high school, got discharged but I don't know why. 'I was...

It was a heroic private security guard who stopped the mass killing coming from the Mandalay Bay Hotel.In the timeline published yesterday, it was not clear if the security guard was accompanying the police, or ahead of them. Now we know. Undersheriff Kevin McMahill gave a briefing yesterday, 3 October, at 6 p.m. In the briefing, Undersheriff McMahill details when the shooting ended. No more shots were fired at people outside the hotel after 10:19 p.m.The information about the ending of the shooting is given between 3:17 and 5:30 on the video. McMahill releases these facts in remarkable agreement...

Image from fox4kc.com An associate professor of history and American studies has taken a job at a university in a state that bans concealed carry in its classrooms. Jacob S. Dorman has taken the occasion  to let us know that restoring the exercise of Second Amendment rights at public institutions is the reason that he has left Kansas University. From Jacob S. Dorman's open letter: In light of the state of Kansas’ apparent determination to allow the concealed carry of firearms in the classrooms of the University of Kansas, I am writing to tender my resignation effective two weeks...

After nearly four years in the courts, Wisconsin Carry, Inc. won a historic victory for the right to bear arms in Wisconsin. Wisconsin Carry had sued the City of Madison, because the City had refused to remove a rule that had been instituted in 2005 by the City Transit and Parking Commission. The rule forbid the transportation of any weapons on city buses. The case started in 2013. Wisconsin has a strong state constitutional protection for the bearing of arms. Wisconsin Carry did not invoke that protection directly, nor did they cite the Second Amendment.  Wisconsin had passed a...

Tarak Andrew Underiner wanted Ohio college students to have the right to carry guns on campus so they could defend themselves in dangerous situations – say, leaving the library late at night and traveling home alone. Now he’s the first homicide of 2017 in Columbus. The Lantern reports that the Ohio State University campus-carry activist was “found dead from gunshot wounds” at a residence near campus when police responded to a shooting around 12:30 a.m. Thursday. The police report says investigators don’t think the shooting was “random in nature.” Underiner, the treasurer of Buckeyes for Concealed Carry, testified in November...

There is something unhealthy about a city administration that lists destroying valuable property as one of its highest priorities. That is the case with Savannah, Georgia. According to WTOC, Savannah, Georgia has a great many important issues on their plate. After considerable effort, they whittled down their list to their six highest priorities. Bold added.  From wtoc.com: The city has had a lot of issues, but city council members managed to narrow them down to a list of just six items. This list includes addressing the on-going blight issues, dramatic increases to commercial property taxes, improving transparency with the...

Greg Steube was recently elected to the Florida Senate from the Florida House. In the same 2016 election where Donald Trump won Florida, one of the few Republican losses was Senator Miguel Diaz de la Portilla of Miami.  Portillia had been the face of opposition to open carry and campus carry in the Florida legislature.  Greg Steube has been a staunch Second Amendment, and open carry, supporter. Steube has been appointed to Portilla's former chairmanship of the Judiciary Committee. That was where Portilla stymied open carry and campus carry legislation that had strong support. Stuebe recently introduced open carry...

A bizarre lawsuit, filed by the reliably leftist Rev. Michael Pfleger, was dismissed by Cook County judge Franklin Valderrama on February 25th. Other leftist activists had joined Rev. Pfleger in filing the lawsuit against three municipalities outside of Chicago.  From chicagotribune.com: A lawsuit filed by Rev. Michael Pfleger and a group of activists last year that said lax local gun laws in Lincolnwood were to blame when guns sold by the town’s only firearms dealer ended up at Chicago crime scenes has been dismissed by a Cook County judge. The lawsuits tried to make the claim that black people...

When the witch hunt for Walter Palmer began on social media, following the killing of an old, collared lion tagged “Cecil” by humans, many warned that the emotional outburst would result in further loses of lions and lion habitat.This is because trophy hunting is what provides the mechanism to conserve lions in the wild.  This is especially true in Africa, where locals view lions as a pest, and only tolerate them if they bring in desperately needed dollars, marks, or euros. Trophy hunting makes lions valuable.  Social Justice Warriors (SJW) who work to destroy trophy hunting out of ignorance...