The Wandering Minstrel

Every citizen in most states has the right to possess a firearm for self-defense in the home and in the campground. It only makes sense to extend this basic right to our National Park System.

Excerpts from an editorial in the Odessa (TX) American Online:

Pursuing safety in national parks

Last week, 47 senators from both parties sent a letter to Interior Secretary Dick Kempthorne asking him to change rules that restrict firearms in national parks and lands managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The letter asks that Kempthorne rescind regulations put in place by Ronald Reagan’s Interior Secretary James Watt that require park visitors to make firearms inaccessible during their visit. Some parks have even more restrictive rules and require firearms be inoperable and cased. (Title 36 of the Code of Federal Regulations has all the rules for parks. You can find the rules pertaining to firearms at www.access.gpo.gov/nara/ cfr/waisidx_01/36cfrv1_01.html. Part 2 contains the pertinent rules on firearms in national parks.)

The senators’ letter asks the rules be relaxed to allow visitors who are legally allowed to own firearms to be able to take them into parks and wildlife refuges and keep them accessible during their visits. The senators believe it’s a matter of consistency in federal firearms regulations. Most other federal lands, such as national forests, allow visitors to carry firearms. “These inconsistencies in firearms regulations are confusing, burdensome and unnecessary,” according to the letter.

The request, signed by 39 GOP senators along with eight Democrats, is spot on. Government regulations should be consistent from agency to agency and should be no more intrusive or limiting than absolutely necessary.

[snip]

In a free society, people should have the liberty to do what they wish without infringing on the legitimate rights of others. If they restrict others’ rights, the state should step in to adjudicate justice. That’s the way textbooks teach freedom. The senators simply want the Interior Department to hew a little closer to that ideal.

Hat tip to NRA-ILA

This is a nice piece. You can click either picture for a close-up view.

Spirit of the American Indian Tribute Revolver

Samuel Colt’s legacy was established with the introduction of the Walker Revolver, the largest handgun ever produced by the Colonel’s legendary company. Today, the Colt Walker is considered one of the most desirable firearms of the Old West era.

It warms the cockles of my black little heart to read editorials like this one from the Pueblo (Colorado) Chieftain:

A ‘Day Better’

EDITORIAL - THE PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN
REP. CORY Gardner is taking another shot at passage of his “Make My Day Better” legislation.

Under Colorado’s current Make My Day Law, people can use deadly force to protect themselves in their own homes. The name of the legislation comes from a famous line from the movie “Dirty Harry.”

Continue Reading »

This is the list of those persons and organizations that have filed “friend of the court” briefs for the defendants (D.C.) in the Heller vs. D.C. case, currently scheduled to be heard by the Supreme Court of the U.S. Sadly, the list includes our own U.S. Department of Justice.

Each of these entities believes that you have no right to defend yourself in your own home.

• Janet Reno, et al. [remember the Waco Massacre? - ed]
• National Network to End Domestic Violence
• American Jewish Committee, et al.
• New York, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Maryland, New Jersey
• Territory of Puerto Rico
• American Bar Association
• Brady Center
• U.S. Department of Justice [see this post - ed]
• 18 Members of Congress
• NAACP Legal Defense Fund
• Criminal Justice Professors
• District Attorneys for Cities of San Francisco, New York
• American Academy of Pediatrics [see this post - ed]
• City of Chicago
• Winkler, Chemerinsky
• American Public Health Association
• Appleseed Center, et al.
• Violence Policy Center
• Anti-Defamation League [see this post - ed]

The founders of the republic intended for all of us to be able to defend ourselves from tyranny of the exact nature advocated by these “friends.”

UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the source for the above information is NRA-ILA and the DC Gun Case Blog, the latter being Heller’s attorneys.

Amazing - mermaid projectile lactation.

Update - There really is more to this fountain.

In a letter to the editors of the Philly Daily News, a veteran police chief inspector tells it like it is.

Politicians, government officials and editorial boards have no business using the recent spate of shootings of police officers as grounds for their anti-gun position. They have no right to call for tougher gun laws “for the sake of those officers.” Not unless they talk to them first and find out how they feel about the issue.

[Image - Chief Inspector Joseph Fox of the Philadelphia Police addressing the news media February 13, 2007.]

Police chiefs should also spend more time with their own troops before they join the chorus. Of course, that might mean going against the media who’ve decided they know more about fighting crime than the cops do.

More gun laws will never be part of the solution until the laws already on the books are enforced with vigor. Unless violators are held accountable and punished to the max, they will continue to violate the law, the old ones and the new ones. What evidence is there to make the anti-gun lobby think differently?

Cops know better than anyone just how poorly the criminal justice system is performing today. They see it every time they risk their lives to take down an armed thug who is back on the street before the ink dries on his arrest paperwork. They keep arresting the same people over and over again, and watch as judges treat them with kid gloves.

Let’s try enforcing the current laws, sentence gun-toters to full prison sentences - and make prisons a place they won’t ever want to go back to.

That’s what cops want to hear when anyone speaks “in their name.”

Just ask them.

Joseph Fox, Chief Inspector (Ret.)

Philadelphia Police Department

I just wonder how many cops out there speak out about the judicial system’s revolving door policies but get no media venue? My guess is the majority of rank and file cops see things the way Chief Fox does.

Emphasis mine. H/T Wayne LaPierre’s Blog

Browsing through the Guns and Hunting website, I found this nice pistol in tribute to the great John Wayne.

John Wayne Tribute .45 Pistol

Wayne Enterprises, in conjunction with America Remembers, has released a limited-edition John Wayne Tribute .45 Pistol. The working, semi-automatic handgun has a polished slide decorated with artwork in 24-karat gold and nickel, along with grip screws, slide stop hammer and magazine catch that are also polished and finished in gold.

Centered on the left side of the slide is a portrait of John Wayne in the role of a Marine officer. To the left of the image is the quote “Courage is Being Scared to Death…But Saddling Up Anyway” scrolled beside a bald eagle. On the right side of the portrait is the quote, “A Man’s Got to Do…What a Man’s Got to Do” and the Marine Corps eagle, globe and anchor logo. The right side of the slide has an image of John Wayne in the role of a Navy officer. Left of the portrait it reads, “Talk Low…Talk Slow and Don’t Talk too Much!” beside the images of the Liberty Bell and Navy anchor symbol. On the right side it reads, “The American Flag…The Best Flag God Gave to Any Country” in front of Old Glory. At the muzzle end is John Wayne’s signature.

Production of this handgun is limited to 3,500 pieces. Contact America Remembers, 10226 Timber Ridge Drive, Ashland, VA 23005; (800) 682-2291; www.americaremembers.com.