Free Republic

In a departure from its long-time complacence over illegal signs, the city recently fined a gun show promoter $4,600 for illegally tacking more than 40 posters around town. The move spurred complaints of selective and politically motivated enforcement, but city staff said it was just part of a new, "stepped up" effort. Gilroy's zoning laws bar "any off-site advertising signs" that are not on the same physical site as the business they are advertising. This includes those ubiquitous, rectangular, neon green, orange and red signs stapled to phone poles, fences and facades, often on properties lacking on-site supervision. The small,...

Among comments to my last piece, “Lautenberg gun show bill as bad as expected,” several were from well-meaning gun owners who honestly questioned why S. 843 – ostensibly submitted to close the “gun show loophole” – is really so bad. A typical and knowledgeable comment went like this: “I am a very pro-gun person. I own a couple of rifles and I will never support any [‘assault weapon’ ban]. I don't even support the ‘86 [McClure-Volkmer] automatic ban. But background checks should be required for any and every sale. If that means transferring it at the dealer, then fine. "But...

Today and tomorrow, theres a pretty cool gun show going on here in Kansas City. I was thinking of buying an AR-15, but there are apparently a lot of options. What is the difference, CMMG, DPMS, Olympic, Bushmaster, Colt? Is there anything specific I should look for while comparing these? I was thinking of the .223 chambered variant because there is at least some of that ammo available here. CMMG, DPMS and Olympic are about the same, right at a grand.. Bushmaster is about 1200-1400 and Colt is just straight out of my price range, 1600-2000. Any helpful advice on...

   Sales of guns, ammo still high by: KELLY BOSTIAN World Outdoors WriterFriday, March 13, 2009 3/13/2009 11:16:57 AM Correction: This story originally reported the wrong years when comparing the number of permit applications. The cutline incorrectly identified the .40 and .45 caliber bullets. The story and cutline have been corrected. Related Story: Liberals told to leave: An instructor for a hunter safety course orders Obama voters to get out of his class. Four months after the election of President Barack Obama, firearms and ammunition sales in Tulsa remain at a fever pitch. Popular self-protection ammunition is often sold...

A retired St. Paul police officer was wounded Saturday when a pistol belonging to an off-duty Minneapolis police officer accidentally discharged at a gun show. Both men were working security at the Minneapolis Gun Show at the Minneapolis Convention Center when the accident happened about 1:15 p.m., said Minneapolis police spokesman Sgt. Jesse Garcia. The semi-automatic pistol went off when the holster got caught on a chair that the Minneapolis officer was either leaning back on or getting off of, Garcia said. One bullet hit the floor and fragmented pieces struck the retired officer in the leg and hand, Garcia...

A Minnesota man is okay after being hit by bullet fragments after a security guard's gun accidentally discharged. The shooting has been ruled an accident, but it did involve an off-duty Minneapolis police officer. He was working as a security guard at the gun show, when police say his gun holster got caught and his gun went off. The bullet from his gun ricocheted off the floor and hit a retired St. Paul officer in the leg. Police say the retired officer was not working at the event and was there as a spectator. He was treated on the scene...

I just talked about the "gun show loophole" myth yesterday, and now we're seeing such a bill in Minnesota. Gun control advocates are taking another stab at changing a state law that allows people to buy handguns and assault rifles without a background check from unlicensed dealers. One problem right from the get-go is that these "unlicensed dealers" aren't dealers at all, any more than someone who sells his used car is a car dealer, or someone who puts his house on the market is a real estate agent. A similar bill got nowhere in the legislature last year, but...

Should Virginia law require background checks for firearms sales at gun shows? Yes. Close the gun show loophole, with no exceptions. Yes, but exempt antique guns and purchases by concealed handgun permit holders. No. Only licensed gun dealers should be required to perform background checks.

This last Sunday my wife and I went to a local gun show. It was the first one we had attended, and we quite enjoyed ourselves. What made it more fun was that we went with some friends who are knowledgable about guns. Now when I say that they are "knowledgable" about guns, that's like saying that Rush Limbaugh knows a little something about radio. Or at least that's how I perceive them, because they have lots of guns including several class 3 weapons, of which one is a .50 caliber machine gun. So, yeah, they know a little something...

PELHAM — The Massachusetts police chief who is facing involuntary manslaughter charges in connection with the accidental shooting death of an 8-year-old boy at a gun show has resigned. Pelham Chief Edward Fleury’s resignation was accepted on Monday by the Board of Selectmen, three months after 8-year-old Christopher Bizilj shot himself in the head with an Uzi during a Westfield gun fair. Fleury’s company, COP Firearms & Training, sponsored the event. He has pleaded not guilty.

A week before Minnesota’s firearm deer season I visited my 86-year-old father. He regaled me with an entertaining stream of tales from his 70 years as a deer hunter in the north woods. He lamented his failing eyesight and then rose from his ancient recliner and went to the closet where he keeps his guns. He took out a battered old case and handed it me. “I want you to have this.” A week before Minnesota’s firearm deer season I visited my 86-year-old father. He regaled me with an entertaining stream of tales from his 70 years as a deer...

Earlier this month, the Virginia State Crime Commission danced back from an opportunity to help reduce crime. It declined — let's hope temporarily — to recommend that the General Assembly close the gun-show loophole. Loophole? Gun-rights advocates never tire of arguing that there's no such thing. There is indeed. Federal and state law require that people buying guns from licensed dealers undergo background checks. It's the front line in the effort to make sure that those whom the state and nation believe shouldn't own guns — convicted felons, the mentally ill, abusive spouses, for example — can't buy them. But...

My husband and I have never attended a gun show before, but we are going to one tomorrow. We would like to buy one or two guns from private parties, along with ammunition. How can we be sure we are paying a fair price? If we buy from an individual and pay cash, is there any way to make sure the gun is of good quality and that we're not getting ripped off? My husband already owns two guns and has had small arms training, but we've just never been to a gun show. Any advice would be appreciated.

FORT WORTH — Gun shows are practically a Texas tradition. But now the issue of weapons sold at those shows has become a high caliber controversy in a Tarrant County state senate race. Since the early 1970s, the City of Fort Worth has leased facilities like the Will Rogers Memorial Center for gun shows. While serving on the city council in 2000, Wendy Davis proposed limiting who could sell guns at these shows. That controversy is now following her into the state Senate race. "She has a proven record of attempting to pass what we consider to be bad regulations,"...

Unregulated gun shows decrease homicide rates, according to results of a study announced Wednesday by the University of Michigan's Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy. The study, which compares gun shows that are heavily regulated to prevent private sales of firearms without government permission in California, with gun shows in Texas, where private sellers are freely able to transfer firearms. In heavily regulated California, no effect on homicides or suicides was found, except that about four suicides per year changed the method of suicide to firearms from something else. In Texas, the study found that the availability of gun...

Clive Crook's blog: I went to my first gun show recently - part of my ongoing remedial education in American cultural literacy, which my (American) wife has lately taken in hand - and I have been turning the experience over in my mind these past few days. As a Brit, of course, I was conditioned to expect that the first time I saw an unholstered pistol would be when a mugger stuck one in my face. That is how it works in a civilised country. So for me it was passing strange to see many hundreds of pistols - not...

Hartford police officers recovered about 400 illegally acquired firearms last year. Those weapons didn't pop up out of thin air. People who owned or had access to legal firearms either lost them or sold them to convicted criminals, the mentally ill and other people who were unauthorized to own guns. Many violent urban crimes and college campus shootings could be prevented if Congress would pass laws to impose foolproof methods of stopping legal guns from getting into the wrong hands. Unfortunately, efforts to pass such laws are often thwarted by the powerful National Rifle Association gun lobby on grounds that...

The Cow Palace has hosted some of the biggest musical acts in the past half-century, from the Beatles in 1964 to Metallica in 2004, and it was at the Daly City venue that John F. Kennedy gave his 1960 speech that first outlined his idea for the Peace Corps. Though it is one of the Bay Area's historic venues for concerts and events, the Cow Palace may soon go the way of other old structures - like New York's Polo Grounds and San Francisco's Playland at the Beach- that are torn down to make way for redevelopment. State Sen. Leland...

LADSON, S.C., Nov. 24 — Joe McCormick, a burly man over six feet tall, a World War II-era Mauser rifle at his side, said he was frightened. “Giuliani scares me,” Mr. McCormick said of Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination. “What does a mayor of New York know about guns?” Fred D. Thompson, who was about 30 yards away — just past the “Confederate Cutlery” collection of knives, fingering an M-1 rifle at the Land of Sky Gun Show here Saturday — was more his kind of candidate. Mr....

LADSON, S.C. (AP) — White House hopeful Fred Thompson called his trip down an aisle of rifles, shotguns and pistols at a gun show "a day in paradise," while criticizing his leading opponents for past positions on gun control and abortion. Talking to reporters later, Thompson singled out former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Giuliani "never met a gun-control bill he didn't like until he started to run for president and now I understand he very much approves of the Supreme Court taking jurisdiction of this Washington, D.C., case which most Second Amendment advocates...