 Minuteman Monthly Newsletter Issue 90 January 2009 |
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Welcome to this issue of the Minuteman Monthly Newsletter. This is the monthly communication from my Web site at www.SaveTheGuns.com. Thank you for reading this month's issue and for passing it on to a friend. Happy New Year! I want to wish you all a very happy and prosperous 2009! Have you ever found yourself in a heated discussion about gun control, violent crime and how gun control laws don't work? Of course you have, that's part of the reason you're here. Whether the discussion involves an uninformed co-worker or your wife's crazy leftist uncle, the gun control discussion almost always involves the following question... Okay smart guy, how do criminals get the guns they use to and why doesn't gun control seem to be working? The subject of how felons actually obtain the guns they use to commit violent crimes with should play a prominent role in all discussions about gun control, but the truth on this issue is rarely proclaimed. Read on... SaveTheGuns.com Quotes of the Month "Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth."
"Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men,
but a right that belongs to us by the laws of G-d and nature."
"On Election Day, we helped deliver a strong victory for President-Elect Barack Obama and Vice-President-Elect Joe Biden. They will be two of the most powerful allies we have ever had."
"The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name of "liberalism," they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened."
"He who dares not offend cannot be honest."
"The most odious (detestable) of all oppressions are those which mask as justice."
"The road to tyranny, we must never forget,
begins with the destruction of the truth."
"He who does not bellow out the truth when he knows the truth
makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers."
"He who sees the truth, let him proclaim it, without asking who is for it or
who is against it." SaveTheGuns.com Gun Safety Tip of the Month Please contribute this month if you have not done so before. More than 90,000 children have learned something about gun safety from my Web site. Please contribute when you can so I can reach another 90,000 in the future. In my many years of shooting, there are some minor injuries that are fairly common to new shooters. One thing we REALLY want to avoid is have a brand new shooter come away from his/her first experience with an injury of any kind. Here are four very common minor but troublesome injuries that typically happen to new shooters. Please help them avoid these...
Please do what you can to keep new shooters injury free. Factoid of the Month The Factoid of the Month is a new feature beginning in 2009. I hope you find it useful and worth your time. Americans use about seven billion (7,000,000,000) rounds of ammunition in the United States each year from rifles, shotguns and handguns for target practice, competition, self defense and hunting. That is enough ammunition used each and every year for every American, young and old to fire twenty three (23) rounds of ammunition each. The current worldwide population is about 6.87 billion people. That means that Americans shoot at least one cartridge for every human being on Earth each and every year. That really kind of makes the 180 accidental deaths of children under 18 years old each year seem kind of small in comparison doesn't it?
NRA Membership Recruiter Corner http://membership.nrahq.org/default.asp?campaignid=XR017807 This link above will take you directly to the checkout page at the National Rifle Association to make it easy for you to renew your current membership, give an NRA membership to a friend or family member or join the fight for the first time. Using my link will save you TEN BUCKS ($10.00) on a one year membership. The normal one year membership is $35.00, but it's only $25.00 through my special link above. A 10% discount to the services of LifeLock Identity Protection Services to protect against identity theft has recently been added to membership in the National Rifle Association. SaveTheGuns.com is one of thousands of NRA Membership Recruiters across America. As an NRA Recruiter, I'm officially a subcontractor for the National Rifle Association of America and not an employee. I make a small commission whenever you join, renew or give an NRA Membership as a gift. Please use the link above for all your NRA Membership needs. If your NRA Membership expires within ten weeks, I encourage you to renew your membership early using my convenient link that lands right on the appropriate page at the National Rifle Association. I have written a Web page with more information on membership in the National Rifle Association. It has a list of benefits as well as membership options and prices. For your convenience the above NRA Membership link is there as well. http://www.savetheguns.com/nra_membership.htm P.S. Remember, my link goes directly to the NRA Membership check out page. Using my special link is a lot more convenient than trying to find the page yourself. As of this issue of the Minuteman Monthly Newsletter, I've recruited 493 NRA Members through this link. 329 NRA Members recruited in 2008 alone! I stand in 7th place in the United States for Independent NRA Recruiters as of this issue. WON'T YOU HELP ME INCREASE THIS NUMBER FOR 2009? LET'S SHOOT FOR RECRUITING 350 NRA MEMBERS FOR THIS COMING YEAR. I KNOW WE CAN DO IT! Please use my convenient links for all your NRA membership needs and pass it around to others. http://membership.nrahq.org/default.asp?campaignid=XR017807 Contributions to SaveTheGuns.com Please consider a contribution of any amount. My Amazon.com Paypage has been discontinued, but I hope to soon offer another option for using a credit card or debit card to make online contributions easy, intuitive and completely safe. If you have used the Amazon.com paypage in the past for voluntary contributions, I apologize for the temporary inconvenience, but I hope to have an easy option for contributing with a credit card soon. I will soon have both the new Amazon.com Payments method of securely contributing by credit card, as well as my new account with PayPal. Many of you will remember me having difficulty with PayPal before, but we have since straightened out some of the problems.
To write me a personal check, it's easy! Write out a personal check made payable to Marc H. Richardson. Sign it and put it into a stamped envelope addressed to: Marc H. Richardson My contributors have kept this informative Web site going for more than eight years. Become a contributor today... please? Active contributors are the only thing keeping www.SaveTheGuns.com online. Thank you very much for your support in 2009! E-mail me with suggestions or comments Item of the Month This is the Minuteman Monthly Item of the Month. This month, I would like to point you to my online store powered by Amazon.com: My categories include airsoft, books, clothing, electronics, emergency supplies, firearm accessories, holsters, hunting gear, knives, magazines, military surplus, optics, paintball, reloading, safety, security and self defense products as well. What a great way to spend the cash you just got for Christmas huh? I would also like to take this opportunity to pass this link on to you: This link is to one of the best books ever written on the subject of the Second Amendment and what the Founding Fathers thought about it. It is called The Founders' Second Amendment. Heller News Here is a link to the NRA's political action arm called the Institute for Legislative Action or NRA-ILA. They have created a special page for District of Columbia v Heller updates. From the following Web page, you can visit a link to hear the oral arguments in the case, read all of the Amicus Curiae Briefs, download the opinion of the court and much more. Download and save the transcript of the oral arguments in the Heller case with the URL below. http://www.supremecourtus.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/07-290.pdf Once the Obama Administration gets its hands on the power to launch gun control efforts, you'll likely hear many pro-gunners pointing at the Heller case. Have your own copy of the Heller case ready and also have your own copy of the Heller Opinion here: http://www.nraila.org/media/PDFs/HellerOpinion.pdf Both the oral arguments and the opinion are in pdf format. President-Elect Obama News In just three weeks, the United States of America will have a brand new President. On January 20th, President-Elect Barack Obama will become President Obama. Law abiding gun owners in the United States will have to deal with a President who has been decidedly unfriendly to law abiding gun owners in the past. Although his rhetoric seems to portray him as one who would support and defend the Second Amendment, his past votes and his quotes concerning firearms prior to running for U.S. President do not demonstrate someone who supports our right to keep and bear arms. A President Obama says he supports the Second Amendment, but also supports 'common-sense gun safety measures'. What exactly he means by 'common-sense gun safety measures' is up to vigorous debate. He has indicated that law-abiding firearm owners have nothing to fear from an Obama Administration. I would whole-heartedly disagree. I think lawful, honest, decent and upstanding Americans who have chosen to exercise their rights under the Second Amendment have very much to fear. I believe his 'common-sense' measures will include mandatory use of trigger-locks, thereby rendering personally owned firearms virtually useless for self defense. President-Elect Obama has never supported concealed carry and would be happy to curtail and restrict this constitutional right whenever he is able. I also believe that he would be VERY happy to gleefully sign a semi-auto ban that is even more onerous than the 1994 Clinton-Reno semi-auto ban and magazine limitation. I think we will also see 'ammunition accountability' legislation make it to the federal level and I think we could also see the end of private person-to-person (PtP) firearms sales come to an end without a background check first. Stay informed and stay united and we will prevail. It would be great to have ten percent (10%) of America's law abiding gun owners in the National Rifle Association, but that means that every current NRA member would have to send one (1) friend here to sign up. Did you get that? If every current NRA member would send one (1), just one person to sign up for membership in the NRA, we could get 10% of all gun owners in the fight. That would be HUGE! http://membership.nrahq.org/default.asp?campaignid=XR017807 The NRA Needs You Now! If we are to effectively combat gun control laws for the next four years, we need your participation. see www.NRAILA.org/obama for more info on Barack Obama Minuteman Monthly Newsletter Aiming Point Whenever I get into a heated discussion about gun control, violent crime and criminal misuse of firearms one point in the conversation almost always addresses where violent criminal thugs actually obtain their firearms. When you have a discussion with a friend, family member or acquaintance about gun control, it is so very important to be truthful and accurate. There is so much misinformation on the issue of guns, gun control and violent crime floating around, that I believe the most important thing you can possibly do is to be accurate. Of course we all know that violent crime committed with firearms is a problem in the United States. The United States ranks 8th in the world in terms of murders committed with firearms per capita. Americans murder other Americans using firearms at a rate of 27.9 firearm related murders per million citizens. Looking closely at these approximately 8,000+ murders each year by thugs wielding firearms, the question often arises, how they got them? Shouldn't the sources that convicted felons actually use to obtain their firearms be well known? Why are these very important facts almost unknown? Why are these facts often buried? Mayors, State Legislators, Congressmen and Governors who are tasked with the duty of trying to control acts of violent crime, but who are totally ignorant of the facts, typically will lash out at guns and gun owners seeing only the firearm as a cause of violence. Elected officials who don't have a clue what they're talking about like Mayor Daley of Chicago or Mayor Nutter of Philadelphia, will typically lash out at both firearms and law abiding gun owners in any direction. It's rather pathetic and frustrating for me to watch them point an ignorant finger of accusation at law abiding gun owners as the source of their lack of ability to control the actions of armed violent criminals. This approach is of course pathetically stupid and is the stuff of hare-brained fools and ignorant buffoons. But their near total lack of knowledge of this subject can be cured. Hey firearms have been around since about the year 1245-1250. Guns have played a role in humanity for about 760 years, they're not going anywhere. The real question is who will own and use them in the future, but I digress... What is your response when you're in a discussion about gun control and the subject of where criminals get their guns comes up? What do you say? Do you say "They steal them!". Do you even worse just shrug your shoulders? Here's the truth, as plain as I can make it. These statistics come from the United States Department of Justice's Bureau of Justice Statistics. http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/fuo.pdf This study is fifteen pages long and I cannot possibly include all the different statistics in this one issue of the Minuteman Monthly Newsletter. So I have decided to use current inmates in State prisons who are in prison and were in possession of a firearm during their current offense, who were recidivist offenders. Unfortunately this particular set of statistics was done for 1997 and is almost twelve years old, but it likely has not changed very much. If you're following along in the study, I'm using Table 9.
So to briefly recap the actual sources of firearms that were used during the commission of a crime by recidivist felons in State prison, 42.4% of them got their guns off the street or some other illegal source. 39.2% of them obtained the guns they used from their friends or family members, who presumably knew they were already felons. 11.4% of the convicted felons in State prisons bought or traded for the gun they used in some type of retail outlet and the remaining 6.9% were either unknown or did not comprise a source category that was high enough to be listed. So let's see here:
Since all gun control laws are obeyed by honest, decent and law abiding gun owners and the sales of new firearms made by law abiding gun owners are controlled at licensed retailers, that means that 88.5% of the guns actually used during the commission of a crime come from a source that is completely untouched by gun control legislation or comes from an unknown source, which is presumably also outside of the reach of gun control. The main reason why 25,000+ gun control laws since the Sullivan Act of 1911, have not curtailed the incidence of violent crime committed with firearms is not a simple one. It's a rather complex question to answer that could take up an entire book to completely lay out. But there are a few simple truths that we can point at:
JOIN THE NRA AND FORWARD THIS ON TO YOUR NON-NRA FRIENDS AND FAMILY. http://membership.nrahq.org/default.asp?campaignid=XR017807 Closing Comments Thank you for taking the time out of your day to read the Minuteman Monthly Newsletter. I encourage you to pass it on. You may use this newsletter as you see fit. You may post it, blog it, print it, forward it and publish it. The only thing I ask is that somewhere in your material, make sure the URL www.SaveTheGuns.com appears prominently. Thanks,
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