Why does Australia need a strong defence (self-defence)? We are isolated from the Northern hemisphere. In the case of a major nuclear or biological war, we are the last post. If we can't defend ourselves we will suffer the same fate as the Aborigines. We will be forced to move aside or die! We are resource rich and one of the few countries left in the world without massive overpopulation. We live in a politicially unstable part of the world. Why wouldn't Indonesia encourage a few million of their starving people to take over land we don't use? The World doesn't like 'White' people. The British gave everyone a pretty bad deal in the past and the Americans arn't exactly popular either. Just look to Africa to see what happens when you are 'White' and you are disarmed. What is the best form of defence? A small government, and armed citizens. Armed citizens fight better than any paid soldier. Armed citizens don't require a large government nor excessive taxes. Armed citizens are less likely to surrender. A large professional army costs a lot of money and tends to encourage conflict, as how else can you justify their existance? An armed State is a polite and honest one. Small, polite and honest States tend not to upset their neighbours (can't afford to be Peace Keepers or take sides)and so they generally don't have to worry about terrorists or suppressed States taking revenge. Regardless of what the control tool of the elite preaches (religion) you only live on the Earth in your current form once. Your life is the most precious thing you own. Don't rely on 'Big Brother' to protect you from violent criminals or desperate refugees. Your Government is only as strong as its economy and in most cases this makes it quite weak and thus you quite vunerable. What do we support? We support widespread ownership of firearms especially in urban areas by law abiding-educated-adults for the purpose of self defence. The self defence is both personal, property and country. We believe that a person's home is their castle. We believe that the State cannot protect anybody and that if it could no-one would wish to live in such a society. We believe that large government and large defence spending, actually encourages military conflict and terrorism. We believe that individuals are happier when they can take care of themselves. We believe that bad laws must be changed not ignored. IN SUMMARY WE SUPPORT: SMALL GOVERNMENT, LOW TAXATION, A STRONG FAIR AND INDEPENDENT LEGAL SYSTEM AND THE IMPORTANCE OF EACH AND EVERY INDIVIDUAL.	"An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is not overcome by fleeing from it." Col. Jeff Cooper, USArmy Ret. Who frames legislation to water down your rights to self-defence? Who is the first to surrender if they can save their own skins and jobs doing so? Who handed the Nazis the gun registers of the defeated European States? Who continually looks to keep society focused on minor issues, so as to cover up the appalling state of our economy, and the excessive amount of taxation that workers have to pay? Who has the most to lose if society is free, government is small and taxation is low? Who wants to treat citizens like a farmer treats his animals? THE ANSWER IS BUREAUCRATS. Who is responsible for the defence of our country? THE ANSWER IS YOU. Notwithstanding that you have delegated to our leaders, ultimately you are responsible, and it is your wife and daughters that are raped if your political masters fail you. Who is more trust worthy, Politicians or Bureaucrats? The answer is Politicians, as at least you know they are about self interest and they have to be accountable amoungst themselves. In addition, our short parliament terms tends to keep them in line. Unlike Politicians, Bureaucrats are the unknown, faceless individuals, influencing the political process, writing legislation and basically dedicating their lives to push their own agenda. They have the benefit of time and limited accountability. It is the Bureaucrats, who have taken so much power from the middle class, and they are the individuals happy to serve any ruling elites, be they Labor, Liberal, Nazi, Communist or Business. They do not see defence as a big issue, because ultimately, they can mould society regardless of who gives the orders. However, they are threatened by a free society, as they are increasly exposed, as they sit in Canberra on $100,000 plus salaries while the rest of the country, especially the bush slides into depression. The Bureaucrats know that if ordinary citizens decide that they are better to pay less tax and look after themselves then their days are numbered. We support the US system. Bureaucrats get elected like politicians and tax is minimal. The result is a society with freedom of speech and the right to bear arms. If you want to support freedom and gun ownership rights, the best thing you can do is to push for low taxation. Don't think Big Brother or the 'Grandma' State is going to protect you - it is going to have enough problems protecting itself as its slides towards bankruptcy. Remember what happened in Rome. The circuses, welfare and political system bankrupted the State. When the State could no longer afford the Legions, the 'Party' continued, but not for long!
SOMETHING TO READ AND THINK ABOUT Home truths to a deaf Congress Father of Columbine H.S. shooting victim, Rachel Scott shocks Congress with what they didn't want to hear -- the real cause of the shooting. ====================== Guess our national leaders didn't expect this. On Thursday, Darrell Scott, the father of Rachel Scott, a victim of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton, Colorado, was invited to address the House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee. What he said to our national leaders during this special session of Congress was painfully truthful. They were not prepared for what he had to say, nor was it received well. It needs to be heard by every parent, every teacher, every politician, every sociologist, every psychologist, and every so-called expert. These courageous words spoken by Darrell Scott are powerful, penetrating, and deeply personal. There is no doubt that God sent this man as a voice crying in the wilderness. The following is a portion of the transcript: "Since the dawn of creation there has been both good & evil in the hearts of men and women. We all contain the seeds of kindness or the seeds of violence. The death of my wonderful daughter, Rachel Joy Scott, and the deaths of that heroic teacher, and the other eleven children who died just not be in vain. Their blood cries out for answers. The first recorded act of violence was when Cain slew his brother Abel out in the field. The villain was not the club he used. Neither was it the NCA, the National Club Association. The true killer was Cain, and the reason for the murder could only be found in Cain's heart. In the days that followed the Columbine tragedy, I was amazed at how quickly fingers began to be pointed at groups such as the NRA. I am not a member of the NRA. I am not a hunter. I do not even own a gun. I am not here to represent or defend the NRA - because I don't believe that they are responsible for my daughter's death. Therefore, I do not believe that they need to be defended. If I believed they had anything to do with Rachel's murder, I would be their strongest opponent. I am here today to declare that Columbine was not just a tragedy - it was a spiritual event that should be forcing us to look at where the real blame lies! Much of the blame lies here in this room. Much of the blame lies behind the pointing fingers of the accusers themselves. I wrote a poem just four nights ago that expresses my feelings best. This was written way before I knew I would be speaking here today: "Your laws ignore our deepest needs, Your words are empty air. You've stripped away our heritage, You've outlawed simple prayer. Now gunshots fill our classrooms, And precious children die. You seek for answers everywhere, And ask the question "Why?" You regulate restrictive laws, Through legislative creed. And yet you fail to understand, That God is what we need!" Men and women are three-part beings. We all consist of body, soul, and spirit. When we refuse to acknowledge a third part of our make-up, we create a void that allows evil, prejudice, and hatred to rush in and wreak havoc. Spiritual presences were present within our educational systems for most of our nation's history. Many of our major colleges began as theological seminaries. This is a historical fact. What has happened to us as a nation? We have refused to honor God, and in so doing, we open the doors to hatred and violence. And when something as terrible as Columbine's tragedy occurs - politicians immediately look for a scapegoat such as the NRA. They immediately seek to pass more restrictive laws that contribute to erode away our personal and private liberties. We do not need more restrictive laws. Eric and Dylan would not have been stopped by metal detectors. No amount of gun laws can stop someone who spends months planning this type of massacre. The real villain lies within our own hearts. Political posturing and restrictive legislation are not the answers. The young people of our nation hold the key. There is a spiritual awakening taking place that will not be squelched! We do not need more religion. We do not need more gaudy television evangelists spewing out verbal religious garbage. We do not need more million dollar church buildings built while people with basic needs are being ignored. We do need a change of heart and a humble acknowledgment that this nation was founded on the principle of simple trust in God! As my son, Craig, lay under that table in the school library and saw his two friends murdered before his very eyes, he did not hesitate to pray in school. I defy any law or politician to deny him that right! I challenge every young person in America, and around the world, to realize that on April 20, 1999, at Columbine High School, prayer was brought back to our schools. Do not let the many prayers offered by those students be in vain. Dare to move into the new millennium with a sacred disregard for legislation that violates your God-given right to communicate with Him. To those of you who would point your finger at the NRA - I give to you a sincere challenge. Dare to examine your own heart before casting the first stone! My daughter's death will not be in vain! The young people of this country will not allow that to happen!" GUN CONTROL'S TWISTED OUTCOME Restricting firearms has helped make England more crime-ridden than the U.S. By Joyce Lee Malcolm On a June evening two years ago, Dan Rather made many stiff British upper lips quiver by reporting that England had a crime problem and that, apart from murder, "theirs is worse than ours." The response was swift and sharp. "Have a Nice Daydream," The Mirror, a London daily, shot back, reporting: "Britain reacted with fury and disbelief last night to claims by American newsmen that crime and violence are worse here than in the US." But sandwiched between the article’s battery of official denials -- "totally misleading," "a huge over-simplification," "astounding and outrageous" -- and a compilation of lurid crimes from "the wild west culture on the other side of the Atlantic where every other car is carrying a gun," The Mirror conceded that the CBS anchorman was correct. Except for murder and rape, it admitted, "Britain has overtaken the US for all major crimes." In the two years since Dan Rather was so roundly rebuked, violence in England has gotten markedly worse. Over the course of a few days in the summer of 2001, gun-toting men burst into an English court and freed two defendants; a shooting outside a London nightclub left five women and three men wounded; and two men were machine-gunned to death in a residential neighborhood of north London. And on New Year’s Day this year a 19-year-old girl walking on a main street in east London was shot in the head by a thief who wanted her mobile phone. London police are now looking to New York City police for advice. None of this was supposed to happen in the country whose stringent gun laws and 1997 ban on handguns have been hailed as the "gold standard" of gun control. For the better part of a century, British governments have pursued a strategy for domestic safety that a 1992 Economist article characterized as requiring "a restraint on personal liberty that seems, in most civilised countries, essential to the happiness of others," a policy the magazine found at odds with "America’s Vigilante Values." The safety of English people has been staked on the thesis that fewer private guns means less crime. The government believes that any weapons in the hands of men and women, however law-abiding, pose a danger, and that disarming them lessens the chance that criminals will get or use weapons. The results -- the toughest firearm restrictions of any democracy -- are credited by the world’s gun control advocates with producing a low rate of violent crime. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Lewis Powell reflected this conventional wisdom when, in a 1988 speech to the American Bar Association, he attributed England’s low rates of violent crime to the fact that "private ownership of guns is strictly controlled." In reality, the English approach has not reduced violent crime. Instead it has left law-abiding citizens at the mercy of criminals who are confident that their victims have neither the means nor the legal right to resist them. Imitating this model would be a public safety disaster for the United States. The illusion that the English government had protected its citizens by disarming them seemed credible because few realized the country had an astonishingly low level of armed crime even before guns were restricted. A government study for the years 1890-92, for example, found only three handgun homicides, an average of one a year, in a population of 30 million. In 1904 there were only four armed robberies in London, then the largest city in the world. A hundred years and many gun laws later, the BBC reported that England’s firearms restrictions "seem to have had little impact in the criminal underworld." Guns are virtually outlawed, and, as the old slogan predicted, only outlaws have guns. Worse, they are increasingly ready to use them. Nearly five centuries of growing civility ended in 1954. Violent crime has been climbing ever since. Last December, London’s Evening Standard reported that armed crime, with banned handguns the weapon of choice, was "rocketing." In the two years following the 1997 handgun ban, the use of handguns in crime rose by 40 percent, and the upward trend has continued. From April to November 2001, the number of people robbed at gunpoint in London rose 53 percent. Gun crime is just part of an increasingly lawless environment. From 1991 to 1995, crimes against the person in England’s inner cities increased 91 percent. And in the four years from 1997 to 2001, the rate of violent crime more than doubled. Your chances of being mugged in London are now six times greater than in New York. England’s rates of assault, robbery, and burglary are far higher than America’s, and 53 percent of English burglaries occur while occupants are at home, compared with 13 percent in the U.S., where burglars admit to fearing armed homeowners more than the police. In a United Nations study of crime in 18 developed nations published in July, England and Wales led the Western world’s crime league, with nearly 55 crimes per 100 people. This sea change in English crime followed a sea change in government policies. Gun regulations have been part of a more general disarmament based on the proposition that people don’t need to protect themselves because society will protect them. It also will protect their neighbors: Police advise those who witness a crime to "walk on by" and let the professionals handle it. This is a reversal of centuries of common law that not only permitted but expected individuals to defend themselves, their families, and their neighbors when other help was not available. It was a legal tradition passed on to Americans. Personal security was ranked first among an individual’s rights by William Blackstone, the great 18th-century exponent of the common law. It was a right, he argued, that no government could take away, since no government could protect the individual in his moment of need. A century later Blackstone’s illustrious successor, A.V. Dicey, cautioned, "discourage self-help and loyal subjects become the slaves of ruffians." But modern English governments have put public order ahead of the individual’s right to personal safety. First the government clamped down on private possession of guns; then it forbade people to carry any article that might be used for self-defense; finally, the vigor of that self-defense was to be judged by what, in hindsight, seemed "reasonable in the circumstances." The 1920 Firearms Act was the first serious British restriction on guns. Although crime was low in England in 1920, the government feared massive labor disruption and a Bolshevik revolution. In the circumstances, permitting the people to remain armed must have seemed an unnecessary risk. And so the new policy of disarming the public began. The Firearms Act required a would-be gun owner to obtain a certificate from the local chief of police, who was charged with determining whether the applicant had a good reason for possessing a weapon and was fit to do so. All very sensible. Parliament was assured that the intention was to keep weapons out of the hands of criminals and other dangerous persons. Yet from the start the law’s enforcement was far more restrictive, and Home Office instructions to police -- classified until 1989 -- periodically narrowed the criteria. At first police were instructed that it would be a good reason to have a revolver if a person "lives in a solitary house, where protection against thieves and burglars is essential, or has been exposed to definite threats to life on account of his performance of some public duty." By 1937 police were to discourage applications to possess firearms for house or personal protection. In 1964 they were told "it should hardly ever be necessary to anyone to possess a firearm for the protection of his house or person" and that "this principle should hold good even in the case of banks and firms who desire to protect valuables or large quantities of money." In 1969 police were informed "it should never be necessary for anyone to possess a firearm for the protection of his house or person." These changes were made without public knowledge or debate. Their enforcement has consumed hundreds of thousands of police hours. Finally, in 1997 handguns were banned. Proposed exemptions for handicapped shooters and the British Olympic team were rejected. Even more sweeping was the 1953 Prevention of Crime Act, which made it illegal to carry in a public place any article "made, adapted, or intended" for an offensive purpose "without lawful authority or excuse." Carrying something to protect yourself was branded antisocial. Any item carried for possible defense automatically became an offensive weapon. Police were given extensive power to stop and search everyone. Individuals found with offensive items were guilty until proven innocent. During the debate over the Prevention of Crime Act in the House of Commons, a member from Northern Ireland told his colleagues of a woman employed by Parliament who had to cross a lonely heath on her route home and had armed herself with a knitting needle. A month earlier, she had driven off a youth who tried to snatch her handbag by jabbing him "on a tender part of his body." Was it to be an offense to carry a knitting needle? The attorney general assured the M.P. that the woman might be found to have a reasonable excuse but added that the public should be discouraged "from going about with offensive weapons in their pockets; it is the duty of society to protect them." Another M.P. pointed out that while "society ought to undertake the defense of its members, nevertheless one has to remember that there are many places where society cannot get, or cannot get there in time. On those occasions a man has to defend himself and those whom he is escorting. It is not very much consolation that society will come forward a great deal later, pick up the bits, and punish the violent offender." In the House of Lords, Lord Saltoun argued: "The object of a weapon was to assist weakness to cope with strength and it is this ability that the bill was framed to destroy. I do not think any government has the right, though they may very well have the power, to deprive people for whom they are responsible of the right to defend themselves." But he added: "Unless there is not only a right but also a fundamental willingness amongst the people to defend themselves, no police force, however large, can do it." That willingness was further undermined by a broad revision of criminal law in 1967 that altered the legal standard for self-defense. Now everything turns on what seems to be "reasonable" force against an assailant, considered after the fact. As Glanville Williams notes in his Textbook of Criminal Law, that requirement is "now stated in such mitigated terms as to cast doubt on whether it [self-defense] still forms part of the law." The original common law standard was similar to what still prevails in the U.S. Americans are free to carry articles for their protection, and in 33 states law-abiding citizens may carry concealed guns. Americans may defend themselves with deadly force if they believe that an attacker is about to kill or seriously injure them, or to prevent a violent crime. Our courts are mindful that, as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes observed, "detached reflection cannot be demanded in the presence of an upraised knife." But English courts have interpreted the 1953 act strictly and zealously. Among articles found illegally carried with offensive intentions are a sandbag, a pickaxe handle, a stone, and a drum of pepper. "Any article is capable of being an offensive weapon," concede the authors of Smith and Hogan Criminal Law, a popular legal text, although they add that if the article is unlikely to cause an injury the onus of proving intent to do so would be "very heavy." The 1967 act has not been helpful to those obliged to defend themselves either. Granville Williams points out: "For some reason that is not clear, the courts occasionally seem to regard the scandal of the killing of a robber as of greater moment than the safety of the robber’s victim in respect of his person and property." A sampling of cases illustrates the impact of these measures: • In 1973 a young man running on a road at night was stopped by the police and found to be carrying a length of steel, a cycle chain, and a metal clock weight. He explained that a gang of youths had been after him. At his hearing it was found he had been threatened and had previously notified the police. The justices agreed he had a valid reason to carry the weapons. Indeed, 16 days later he was attacked and beaten so badly he was hospitalized. But the prosecutor appealed the ruling, and the appellate judges insisted that carrying a weapon must be related to an imminent and immediate threat. They sent the case back to the lower court with directions to convict. • In 1987 two men assaulted Eric Butler, a 56-year-old British Petroleum executive, in a London subway car, trying to strangle him and smashing his head against the door. No one came to his aid. He later testified, "My air supply was being cut off, my eyes became blurred, and I feared for my life." In desperation he unsheathed an ornamental sword blade in his walking stick and slashed at one of his attackers, stabbing the man in the stomach. The assailants were charged with wounding. Butler was tried and convicted of carrying an offensive weapon. • In 1994 an English homeowner, armed with a toy gun, managed to detain two burglars who had broken into his house while he called the police. When the officers arrived, they arrested the homeowner for using an imitation gun to threaten or intimidate. In a similar incident the following year, when an elderly woman fired a toy cap pistol to drive off a group of youths who were threatening her, she was arrested for putting someone in fear. Now the police are pressing Parliament to make imitation guns illegal. • In 1999 Tony Martin, a 55-year-old Norfolk farmer living alone in a shabby farmhouse, awakened to the sound of breaking glass as two burglars, both with long criminal records, burst into his home. He had been robbed six times before, and his village, like 70 percent of rural English communities, had no police presence. He sneaked downstairs with a shotgun and shot at the intruders. Martin received life in prison for killing one burglar, 10 years for wounding the second, and a year for having an unregistered shotgun. The wounded burglar, having served 18 months of a three-year sentence, is now free and has been granted £5,000 of legal assistance to sue Martin. The failure of English policy to produce a safer society is clear, but what of British jibes about "America’s vigilante values" and our much higher murder rate? Historically, America has had a high homicide rate and England a low one. In a comparison of New York and London over a 200-year period, during most of which both populations had unrestricted access to firearms, historian Eric Monkkonen found New York’s homicide rate consistently about five times London’s. Monkkonen pointed out that even without guns, "the United States would still be out of step, just as it has been for two hundred years." Legal historian Richard Maxwell Brown has argued that Americans have more homicides because English law insists an individual should retreat when attacked, whereas Americans believe they have the right to stand their ground and kill in self-defense. Americans do have more latitude to protect themselves, in keeping with traditional common law standards, but that would have had less significance before England’s more restrictive policy was established in 1967. The murder rates of the U.S. and U.K. are also affected by differences in the way each counts homicides. The FBI asks police to list every homicide as murder, even if the case isn’t subsequently prosecuted or proceeds on a lesser charge, making the U.S. numbers as high as possible. By contrast, the English police "massage down" the homicide statistics, tracking each case through the courts and removing it if it is reduced to a lesser charge or determined to be an accident or self-defense, making the English numbers as low as possible. The London-based Office of Health Economics, after a careful international study, found that while "one reason often given for the high numbers of murders and manslaughters in the United States is the easy availability of firearms...the strong correlation with racial and socio-economic variables suggests that the underlying determinants of the homicide rate are related to particular cultural factors." Cultural differences and more-permissive legal standards notwithstanding, the English rate of violent crime has been soaring since 1991. Over the same period, America’s has been falling dramatically. In 1999 The Boston Globe reported that the American murder rate, which had fluctuated by about 20 percent between 1974 and 1991, was "in startling free-fall." We have had nine consecutive years of sharply declining violent crime. As a result the English and American murder rates are converging. In 1981 the American rate was 8.7 times the English rate, in 1995 it was 5.7 times the English rate, and the latest study puts it at 3.5 times. Preliminary figures for the U.S. this year show an increase, although of less than 1 percent, in the overall number of violent crimes, with homicide increases in certain cities, which criminologists attribute to gang violence, the poor economy, and the release from prison of many offenders. Yet Americans still enjoy a substantially lower rate of violent crime than England, without the "restraint on personal liberty" English governments have seen as necessary. Rather than permit individuals more scope to defend themselves, Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government plans to combat crime by extending those "restraints on personal liberty": removing the prohibition against double jeopardy so people can be tried twice for the same crime, making hearsay evidence admissible in court, and letting jurors know of a suspect’s previous crimes. This is a cautionary tale. America’s founders, like their English forebears, regarded personal security as first of the three primary rights of mankind. That was the main reason for including a right for individuals to be armed in the U.S. Constitution. Not everyone needs to avail himself or herself of that right. It is a dangerous right. But leaving personal protection to the police is also dangerous. The English government has effectively abolished the right of Englishmen, confirmed in their 1689 Bill of Rights, to "have arms for their defence," insisting upon a monopoly of force it can succeed in imposing only on law-abiding citizens. It has come perilously close to depriving its people of the ability to protect themselves at all, and the result is a more, not less, dangerous society. Despite the English tendency to decry America’s "vigilante values," English policy makers would do well to consider a return to these crucial common law values, which stood them so well in the past. Joyce Lee Malcolm, a professor of history at Bentley College and a senior adviser to the MIT Security Studies Program, is the author of Guns and Violence: The English Experience, published in May by Harvard University Press
Low-intensity terrorism Joseph Farah © 2002 WorldNetDaily.com U.S. intelligence agencies received reports last week suggesting Islamic terrorists are targeting American schools for attack, according to a report in the Washington Times. The reports indicate the targeting includes plans to attack "all levels of educational institutions in the United States, ranging from elementary schools to colleges and universities." Why would terrorists attack schools? It's obvious. · Because they are there. · Because nothing like attacks on schools terrifies American parents more. · Because schools, in recent years, have boastfully become "gun-free zones," meaning there is no defense to such attacks. I warned about this vulnerability some time ago – last May, in fact. I scoffed at the idea that the future of terrorist attacks in America would resemble those in Israel. Many years ago, terrorists tried to execute more conventional attacks in the Jewish state. They armed themselves with automatic weapons and stormed cafes and crowded plazas. But they were unsuccessful at creating the kind of human carnage they desired. Why? Because so many people in Israel are armed. When terrorists began shooting in public places, they themselves were shot down by ordinary citizens – or, in some cases, by Uzi-armed soldiers. Sometimes they were killed before they got a shot off. The terrorists began looking for other methods. The suicide bombing attack is a method that works in a country where armed citizens are everywhere. There are no undefended schools in Israel. There are no undefended synagogues. There are no undefended buses or plazas or cafes or discotheques. Armed civilians are everywhere. This has not been true in America for a long time. America long ago caved in to the political pressure to disarm. Now there are entire cities – including the nation's capital – where it is illegal to carry a firearm. This was supposedly a plan to make people safer. Of course, it has not. Crime – especially violent crime – is rampant in the very cities and states that have the most restrictive gun-control policies. If, indeed, the recent attacks in suburban Washington turn out to be the work of terrorists, it won't be a coincidence that they chose Maryland rather than Virginia to try their shooting spree. Maryland is hostile to the idea of law-abiding citizens carrying or even owning firearms. Virginia less so. The terrorists are smart. They know they will not have to kill themselves with bombs strapped onto their bodies to wreak havoc on American cities. They will be much more effective, unfortunately, with automatic weapons – or even single shot rifles aimed with precision. They can kill far more people spraying gunfire in crowded public places safe from return fire than they could with a single bomb. And, with this approach, they can often live another day to terrorize the American public again and again. That was my prediction. That's why I believe you will not see the Israel-style suicide bombings take place in America – at least not on any large scale. It's unnecessary. It's inefficient. And there are better ways to kill in a society stripped of its entire notion of self-defense and self-reliance. Even in light of the most serious attack on America in history, the government still amazingly opposes arming even most airline pilots to defend themselves, their crews, their passengers and their craft. The American government simply doesn't trust its own people to defend themselves – even in the most extraordinary circumstances. It's worth repeating that the Federal Aviation Administration banned firearms in the cockpits in July 2001 – just two months before the Sept. 11 hijackings. Had the FAA instead required pilots to be trained in the use of firearms and encouraged to carry them, I believe the tragedies of that date could have been averted. · Now the airliners are gun-free zones. In other words, they are safe for terrorists. · Our schools are also gun-free zones. In other words, they are safe for terrorists. · Our shopping malls are, in many jurisdictions, gun-free zones. In other words, they are safe for terrorists. · Our major city streets are, in many jurisdictions, gun-free zones. In other words, they are safe for terrorists. In America, we have ensured that terrorists don't have to blow themselves up to kill lots of people. They don't have to die to commit mass murder and mayhem. We have determined that the government and only the government can defend us. The possession of firearms is a fundamental American civil right. And it is now more important from a practical standpoint than ever before.	THE NEXT TIME A "BALI BOMB" GOES OFF, ASK WHY SO MUCH MONEY WAS WASTED ON GUN REGISTRATION INSTEAD OF HOME DEFENCE. Cost of gun registration By Special Correspondent - The Chronicle-Journal August 31, 2002 With summer waning, Northwestern Ontario hunters are starting to think about unlocking the gun cabinet and oiling up the long arms. But this fall will mark the last season that Canadians can legally hunt with unregistered firearms. Under Bill C-68 — the controversial Firearms Act — the Canadian government will consider all gun owners who do not register their firearms by the end of this year to be criminals. With that in mind, I expect the feds will be receiving a mountain of gun registration applications some time about Dec. 31. The tidal wave of paperwork will certainly create more chaos at the already overwhelmed Canadian Firearms Centre. What’s going to be really interesting, however, is how the government will handle what looks like an epidemic of non-compliance. There has been very little in the news this year about gun owners who failed to license themselves last year being thrown into jail. You have to wonder what will happen if those same people decide not to register their guns. Recently, Garry Breitkreuz, the rabidly anti-Bill C -68 Member of Parliament for Yorkton-Melville, supplied the media with clippings gleaned from several Canadian newspapers. Breitkreuz sees Bill C-68 as a fatally flawed legislation and has spent the last couple of years documenting the sins of a bill he calls a “fiasco.” What the articles in the media package indicate is that C-68 is creating a defiance of law that’s rarely seen in Canada. An article from the Prince George Free Press, dated Jan. 7, 2001, quotes a man who is openly defying the government over bill C-68. “Come and get me,” says Phil Hewkins. “I’m not going to hide. I’m not going to bury my guns.” Breitkreuz says he checked with Mr. Hewkins this summer and found that the RCMP had yet to pay him a call. Yet Mr. Hewkin is knowingly in possession of firearms contrary to Section 91 of the Criminal Code and could face 10 years in jail if the RCMP ever does follow through. In a more recent article from the Edmonton Sun (March 20, 2002), the non-compliance of a First Nations group to Bill C-68 is the focus. “We’re talking about a law that violates our fundamental treaty rights to hunt or bear arms,” says Greg Ahenakew, Vice Chief of the Federation of Saskatchewan Indian Nations. “Treaty law is basic law and it comes before the Firearms Act. This is an unjust law passed without our consent.” In hopes of having Bill C-68 repealed, Breitkreuz has made 267 requests under the Access to Information Act. Here are just a few of the things he’s found out about the ongoing gun registration: • As of March 23, 2002, the Justice Department has registered 3,308,514 firearms. Every one without the owner’s name on them. • The RCMP report a 132 per cent error rate in gun registry as of July 2001. Most of the errors are in the description of the firearms. • The Department of Justice reports there are 222,911 guns in the registry with the same make and serial number. They have also lost track of 38,629 firearm licence holders. • Last year, the department lost track of 89,820 firearms declared at the border by foreign visitors. • The RCMP reports 156 known breaches of their computer system known as CPIC since 1995. And what’s been the cost of gun registration so far? As of April 24, 2002, registering just over four million firearms will have cost $978,260,000. (AUD $1.3 Billion) Thunder Bay freelance writer Gord THEY TOOK YOUR GUNS YET CRIMINALS STILL GET THEM EASILY "Guns too easy to obtain": Judge October 4 2002A Supreme Court Judge yesterday criticised the ready availability of firearms, which he said continued to cause the needless loss of young lives. Justice Roderick Howie made his remarks while jailing a man for a maximum 24 years for the "senseless killing" of a man who had made a lurid slur at his aunt. Kirstain Katarzynski, 33, shot dead 22-year-old Benjamin Hillier outside the Collingwood Hotel, at Liverpool, in April last year. Katarzynski bought the gun for $350 from a man he met at the hotel that night, the court heard.
The Sniper and the Gun Controllers - Thomas Sowell It was perhaps inevitable that the recent sniper killings in the Washington area suburbs would be seized upon by advocates of gun control. Like so much in the agenda of the political left, gun control arguments would collapse like a house of cards if people just stopped to think through what is being said, instead of being swept along by emotional rhetoric. Start with the very name "gun control." Do gun control laws actually control guns? Why would someone who is obviously willing to repeatedly break the laws against murder be unwilling to break gun control laws? Gun control laws do not control people who are in the business of breaking laws. Gun control simply disarms their potential victims, making crime a safer occupation, and hence one that can be indulged in more widely by more people. Gun control laws would no more have stopped the current sniper than they stop innumerable other gun crimes in places with some of the strongest gun control laws in the country. Even the latest nostrum of the gun controllers — ballistic "fingerprinting" of each gun that is sold — already exists in Maryland, where this orgy of murder began. There is no record of anyone ever having been convicted of any crime as a result of this procedure. People who know something about guns — which many gun controllers do not — have pointed out how easy it is to change a gun's ballistic "fingerprint." But the real bottom line is that this law has no track record of working. If you are going to look at the record, then empirical studies have already shown that allowing law-abiding citizens to own and carry concealed weapons tends to produce less violence, not more. Some communities have gone the opposite direction on gun control — requiring each homeowner to have a firearm in the house — and this has led to fewer burglaries in such communities. In the Falls Church sniper killing, the sniper might have been spotted by some people on the scene as he shot an innocent woman in a shopping mall. If we had an armed citizenry, do you doubt they would have shot him dead on the spot? Killings seldom start where someone else is known in advance to be carrying a gun. Have you ever heard of one of these supposedly "senseless" killers opening fire on a gathering of members of the National Rifle Association? They always seem to have better sense than to do that. While many members of the public are swept along by the emotional rhetoric of the gun control advocates, we need to also look at the dishonest arguments and bogus statistics used by those advocates to try to promote their agenda. There are, for example, their widely publicized statistics on how many "children" die from guns each year. To get these numbers, gun control advocates include young people whose ages reach up above the legal age of 18 for adulthood. That way, the killings between teenage criminal gangs get counted as "children" killed by firearms, as if they were toddlers who found a loaded gun in the house. Gun control laws might reduce the much smaller number of genuine children killed in genuine accidents. That would have to be weighed against the lives saved when widespread gun ownership reduces violent crime. But we need honest numbers, and this the gun control crusaders clearly do not intend to provide. Other misleading statistics used by gun control advocates include statistics on lower murder rates in selected countries with strong gun control laws, as compared to murder rates in the United States. What these advocates studiously avoid mentioning are higher murder rates than ours in other countries that also have strong gun control laws (Brazil, Russia) — or lower murder rates in some countries, such as Israel, where guns are more widely available than in the United States. Guns are not the problem. People are the problem. Weapons matter primarily when the wrong people have them and the right people don't. It is the imbalance in weapons that creates the danger. This is not rocket science. We should not even have needed the studies that have shown gun control laws don't work. What we really need to do is stop and think. Thomas Sowell is a nationally syndicated columnist.
LIKE CLOCKWORK By Graham Strachan It’s all coming together like clockwork, this New World Order which is ‘nothing but a conspiracy theory’. In the second edition of my book '22 Steps to Global Tyranny’ (released May 2001) I wrote (p.87) that in order to confiscate the remaining privately-owned firearms in the Australian community, “….another mass shooting will occur, this time possibly in a school.” Well, almost right – Monash University, but right on cue. A 36-year-old Asian, Huan Yun Xiang, who had licences for seven handguns, allegedly killed two students and wounded five others [The Australian, 25 October 2002]. Immediately Australia’s programmed politicians sprang into action, prodded from behind by the appropriate bureaucrats, to perform their function – tightening the totalitarian vise on the law-abiding citizens of Australia. The Big Lie is that they are doing it to ‘protect the Australian people’. The truth is Australian governments are doing it because they have committed themselves to do it under international argeements originally signed at the United Nations. The ultimate goal of those agreements was expressed in the report of the UN Commission on Global Governance entitled ‘Our Global Neighborhood’: to control the manufacture, sale and distribution of all firearms worldwide. Shortly after the report was released in 1995, the United Nations helped to organize a coalition of NGOs (non-government organizations) called IANSA (International Action Network on Small Arms) to promote the UN’s goals around the world. A conference entitled ‘The United Nations Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All its Aspects’ was held in New York during July 2001, with the purpose of advancing the development of an international treaty to control the availability of small arms including handguns [WorldNetDaily 5 July 2001]. Australian bureaucrats have been boastful of their role in advancing the programme from the very beginning. The usual lies are already being trotted out by the usual suspects. Victoria’s spokesman for the civilian disarmament crowd, Tim Costello, reportedly stated on the ABC that it was only by a quirk that handguns were left off the 1996 agenda after Port Arthur. In fact handguns were not considered a problem then as they were well regulated by police. It is only since then that the international drive against handguns began. Costello also stated that most of the handguns used in unlawful acts started off as legal firearms. My information is that most firearms used by criminals are smuggled into Australia with illicit drugs [Andrew MacGregor, by e-mail]. But this has nothing to do with protecting the public. As I also wrote in ’22 Steps’ (p.87), “Patriots, and nationalists opposed to the globalisation of their country, not gun-toting criminals, are the real target of civilian disarmament.” Nobody is to be in a position to challenge the authority of the world government or its subsidiary branch office in Canberra as the reality of the global gulag starts to dawn on the world’s population. It is well to keep in mind that during the twentieth century over 56-million people (some estimates put the figure at around 100 million) were murdered by governments. In all cases the victims were first disarmed. For example:- · In 1911, Turkey established gun control. Subsequently, from 1915 to 1917, 1.5-million Armenians, deprived of the means to defend themselves, were rounded up and killed. · The Soviet Union established gun control in 1929. Then from 1929 to 1953, approximately 20-millon dissidents -- again, deprived of the means to defend themselves -- were rounded up and killed. · In 1938 Germany established gun control. From 1939 to 1945 over 13-million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, mentally ill, union leaders, Catholics and others, unable to fire a shot in protest, were rounded up and killed. · In 1935 China established gun control. Subsequently, between 1948 and 1952, over 20-million dissidents, again deprived of the tools for self defense, were rounded up and killed. · Cambodia introduced gun control in 1956. In just two years (1975-1977) over one million ‘educated’ people were rounded up and killed. · Guatemala introduced gun control in 1964. From 1964 to 1981, over 100,000 Mayan Indians were rounded up and killed as a result of their inability to defend themselves. · Uganda got gun control in 1970. Over the next nine years over 300,000 Christians were rounded up and killed. · In Rwanda, despite reports that the Hutus were planning to exterminate the Tutsis, a UN ‘peacekeeping’ force in the country disarmed the Tutsis. More than half a million died in the subsequent slaughter. But that would never happen in Australia? It is significant that within four years of the last gun ‘buyback’ scheme, the Howard government through its infamous ‘Shoot To Kill Bill’ made it legal for the military to shoot and kill now legally-disarmed Australian citizens. No government is to be trusted, least of all a government that does that. Australians will again be told the lie that this ‘gun buyback’ will ‘reduce crime’. It will not, for the simple reason that law-abiding citizens don’t use guns to commit crime, and people intending to do so will not surrender their guns. The lie will be told that guns are the worst killers of both children and adults. In fact guns, kill far fewer Americans annually than other unrelated causes. One fact Australians will not be told is that when law-abiding citizens have easy access to firearms for self-protection, crime goes down significantly, and vice versa. Even people who do not own a gun benefit, through the perception by potential criminals that they might be armed and ready to defend themselves. Firearm confiscation programmes (buy-back schemes), by disarming law abiding gun owners, remove one of the most effective deterrants to crime, which always increases. Independent crime researcher John R. Lott of Yale University has proven year after year that concealed carry laws - the right to carry concealed handguns - are the second most important factor - behind more police - that has helped reduce America’s violent crime rate. The literature confirming this is massive and detailed, and the evidence overwhelming. I may give some of it in a subsequent article. Australia’s Howard government is a dangerous government, with a decidedly totalitarian bent. What’s that? It’s the Hegelian mindset that the state is mummy and daddy, and all the citizens are little children craving guidance, protection and control. Of course mummy and daddy have lots of willing helpers who make profitable careers bullying the kids around. It’s only a matter of time before Australian police and military start kicking down doors at 4 am ‘looking for terrorists’. I fully expect to be targeted for writing this article. And to think Australia used to be called the ‘Lucky Country’. [Graham Strachan’s books are available from www.grahamstrachan.com ]	PLEASE THINK ABOUT THE FOLLOWING Why were handguns NOT banned after Port Arthur? Because it would have been too obvious to shooters that the proposed (and now implemented) gun registration would later be used against them. Why do you have to fight for handguns? Because the Antis divide us all to conquer each of us. They pick on firearms one small group at a time and they lie to your face to achieve their aims. GUEST WHAT? REBECCA IS BACK OR IS SHE? In November 2002 she writes in the SMH "The Prime Minister should seize this moment to insist on a ban on all semi-automatic firearms for civilians". She also writes that she believes Howard is not going far enough and that Olympics or not, all semi-automatics should be banned. [even .22s] WELCOME BACK REBECCA, SORRY BUT WE DIDN'T MISS YOU! We believe that her supporters want all guns banned - they are just smart enough to go one step at a time. Wake up shooters , they are after all of us! A STRONG ARMY IS NOT ABOUT DEFENCE! War is Just a Racket By a former US Major General www.wagingpeace.org War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses. I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we'll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag. I wouldn't go to war again as I have done to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket. There isn't a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang is blind to. It has its "finger men" to point out enemies, its "muscle men" to destroy enemies, its "brain men" to plan war preparations, and a "Big Boss" Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism. It may seem odd for me, a military man, to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty-three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle-man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service. The record of racketeering is long:- · I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. · I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. · I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. · I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 . · I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. · In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested. During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents. © 2002 by Nuclear Age Peace Foundation. Please email us if you have any comments, questions, suggestions or insults.