The GVP Report - February 21, 2012
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 Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence issues the 2011 Brady State Scorecard Rankings. CA, NJ, MA, NY and CT rank at the top with the strongest gun laws while AZ, AK and UT rank at the bottom.
Campaign to Keep Guns Off Campus marks the 4th anniversary of the shooting at Northern Illinois University and reminds us that such events are rare and that colleges are among the safest environments for college students.
Violence Policy Center releases the update of the Concealed Carry Killers on-line resource that shows at least 391 people, including 11 police officers, have been killed by citizens legally allowed to carry concealed handguns.
14-year-old Hunter Mack, of Walpole, New Hampshire, shot himself in the face in the crowded cafeteria of the Walpole Elementary School,
 where he is in the 8th grade. A student at the school reported seeing the shotgun. "It looked like a Camo 12-Guage. It blended in with his clothes perfectly. He had it under his shirt and he was wearing all camo today and everything, so it blended in perfectly." Another student commented, "Nobody really noticed the gun until one of my friends asked what it was for and Hunter said, 'I'm making things better' and then he shot himself." Hunter had told friends he was depressed lately. He is currently in a medically induced coma after having surgery for significant facial injuries. Police are not saying where Hunter got the gun. |
 Rossen Reports: Anyone Can Buy Guns, No Questions Asked. Within 12 hours this reporter bought 8 guns, assault rifles, handguns, even a .50-caliber sniper rifle, with no criminal background check, no questions asked. The guns were found through ads on the Internet.
Christian Science Monitor, How Starbucks Became the Darling of American Gun Owners, the National Gun Victims Council has called for a boycott of Starbucks for allowing customers to openly carry guns. Gun-rights advocates have responded with a "buycott."
You Can Now Carry Your Gun at the Florida State Fair. After a new FL law that declared all local gun ordinances void and complaints by a gun-rights group, the State Fair Authority was forced to change its policy banning guns at the fair.
The New Hampshire Senate rejected several controversial pro-gun bills. "We spent a grand total of 6 minutes on 5 bills because we want to focus on the issues that are important to the NH people," said the Senate president. The Virginia Senate also rejected a bill that would have allowed guns on college campuses.
Greensboro, NC News & Record, Concealed Weapon Permits Higher Among Legislators, reports that 19% of NC state legislators have ccw permits, compared to 2.6% of the general NC population, and all but one of them voted in favor of last year's omnibus gun rights bill.
 Washington Post, Killings in Line of Duty Haunt Police Officers, interviews D.C. area police who have fatally shot suspects in justified incidents and speak of the torment after. Cops shooting bad guys might be the mainstay of tv dramas but in real life its rare, and the emotional toll can last forever.
ATF Busts Real Housewives Buying Guns for Cartels. Police arrested 22 people, mostly young housewives and older moms, charged with buying guns to be smuggled to Mexican drug cartels. More than 200 guns, including AK-47s and .50-caliber sniper rifles, were seized.
The Propaganda Professor, Estimating Defensive Gun Uses Reasonably, uses real numbers rather than survey results to try and estimate the number of annual defensive gun uses.
 Spocko, My Firedoglake, Want Guns With Your Grande at Starbucks?, offers specific local actions that can be taken around the open carry Starbucks issue including guiding police response, setting up negative press for open carriers, and creating financial pressure outside of a boycott using an insurance angle.
Mike Williams, Richmond, VA Times-Dispatch, A Step Backward on Guns, notes that the repeal of Virginia's one-handgun-a-month law would complete the gutting of a measure that was a documented success before state lawmakers began chipping away at it.
Rekha Basu, Des Moines, Iowa Register, Gun Bill Shoots Holes in Building a Civil Society, looks at the "shoot first" bill before the Iowa legislature and notes that under this bill, the other person's actual intent wouldn't even matter, as long as you felt threatened you could shoot away.
Monica Yant Kinney, Philadelphia Inquirer, PA Bill Preventing Local Gun Crackdowns Would Be Travesty, writes that tax dollars are being spent to fund legislation seemingly written by, and for, an interest group with the sole goal of launching costly and frivolous lawsuits against local governments.
John Pickens, Anthony Daykin, G.T. Fowler, The Arizona Republic, Guns on Campus Will Lead to More Danger. Three police chiefs at three AZ state universities firmly oppose allowing guns on campuses and explain why.
Paul Waldman, Think Progress & The American Prospect, The Myth of NRA Dominance Part I: The NRA's Ineffective Spending, reports that NRA contributions to candidates have virtually no impact on the outcome of Congressional races, nor does the NRA's endorsement.
Local Designers Raising Funds for "Art Not Arrests" Anti-Violence Project. A Brooklyn group is raising money for an art installation and free summer art classes for kids. Any remaining funds will go to community organizations that work against gun violence.
NRA Grassroots Alert, Vol. 19, No. 7, scroll down to see updates on state legislation being pushed by the gun lobby.
Media Matters, NRA Spokesman Ted Nugent's Top 10 Inflammatory Comments, looks at Nugent's vicious and extreme rhetoric.
Transcript of Wayne LaPierre's recent speech at CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference). PolitiFactCheck's Truth-O-Meter says LaPierre's claim that "Obama endorsed a total ban on the manufacture, sale and possession of all handguns" is Mostly False.
American Trigger Sports Network launches a new series "Stop the Threat", a panel discussion on why you should carry a loaded gun with you wherever you go.
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Tuesday, February 21, 2012
The Convenience of the Internet Without the Bother of a Background Check
The Convenience of the Internet Without the Bother of a Background Check
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Fuzzy Numbers
Fuzzy Numbers
The GVP Report - February 7, 2012 |
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Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence has named Daniel Gross as the new organization President. Gross is the co-founder of the Center to Prevent Youth Violence and became involved in the issue in 1997 after his brother was shot in the head.
Steve Gunn, Gun Violence Prevention Center of Utah, testified against a bill allowing open carry of guns, "people are threatened by seeing somebody with a gun and police officers should have a way to address those concerns." Violence Policy Center new report, Black Homicide Victimization in the U.S.: An Analysis of 2009 Homicide Data, shows that Missouri leads the nation for the second year in a row.
36-year-old Turama Stitts shot four people in his Kokomo, Indiana neighborhood. Stitts acted alone and picked his targets at random. The four victims ranged in age from forty to sixty-four. They were all shot in the head. Two died and two are still in the hospital, one in critical condition. It was reported that Stitts was off his medication and had been acting strange for a few days. He told police the victims were trying to kill him. A witness told police he was talking with Stitts when Stitts turned and shot another man in the head. Many people in the neighborhood knew all four victims and Stitts. Knowing the random nature of the shootings they knew it could have been them. |
Reuters, Fuzzy Numbers on Guns, questions the conventional wisdom that gun sales have increased dramatically since Obama's election. According to FBI spokesperson, "An increase in the number of NICS transactions should not be used to indicate an increase in the number of firearms sold." Appearing on Meet the Press, Mayor Bloomberg said "You'd think that if a Congresswoman got shot in the head, that would change Congress' views" on guns. He lamented that not only has Congress failed to strengthen background checks but they are working to weaken gun laws.
Now that Wisconsin allows the carrying of loaded, hidden guns in public, state Assembly Speaker Pro Tem Bill Kramer admits that he's been carrying a concealed weapon during floor sessions and added he's not the only lawmaker carrying a gun in the chamber. A new CDC study reports that Gang Deaths Often Involve Youth and Guns, Not Drugs. Click here to read study. Paul Barrett, author of Glock: The Rise of America's Gun is interviewed about his new book on Democracy Now. Said Barrett. "This is everyone's gun. It really has redefined the handgun market in the United States." Upcoming Congressional Briefing, February 22, Reducing Gun Violence: Lessons from Research and Practice will feature leading firearms experts from criminology, economics, and public health who will discuss findings and policy implications of current research on gun violence.
Mulnomah County, Oregon Youth and Gang Violence Steering Committee, Stop Blaming the Victims: The Facts on Youth Violence, "These are complex issues but we must realize that violence must be unlearned and can be prevented." Victoria Bekiempis, Village Voice, Shoot! Gunslingers Raise Money for Susan G. Komen for the Cure with Assault Rifles, asks about the Smith & Wesson handgun with the breast cancer Awareness Ribbon on the slide and their connection to the Komen Foundation.
The Salt Lake Tribune editorial, Guns in The Open, writes "it's not a good idea to walk around with a handgun openly displayed. Nor is it a good idea for the state to encourage that." A bill that would prevent cities from banning the open carry of guns recently passed a Utah House committee. Art on Issues, Gunfire Deaths in Children vs Pro-Life: A Political Double Standard, discusses the double standard of legislating to protect the "unborn" while opposing legislation to protect those already born from the documented risk of gun death and injury. Dave Perry, Aurora Sentinel, Ready, Aim and Fire the Gun Nuts at the Colorado State Capitol. After attending a hearing on doing away with Colorado's concealed weapon permit law Perry concludes, "Those who want to let just about everyone carry a gun anywhere they damned well please are as stupid and obtuse as the notion itself." Aurora Dreyling, The Indiana Statesman, Guns Can Stay in Homes, Not on Campus, speaks out against a bill that would allow guns on campus. "Imagine if we allowed those same, rash college students to carry guns all over campus." Kenneth Quinnell, Florida Progressive Coalition Blog, Your Guide to Pro-Gun Argumentation, offers a quick and comprehensive guide to the most common arguments presented by the pro-gun debaters.
Media Matters reports on NRA Fundraiser Using JFK and the Challenger Disaster Anniversary. This follows last year's fundraising emails that referenced the tenth anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. A Kansas legislator who has introduced a bill to allow guns on campus said he has no plans to clarify a 2010 law change that removed the ability to deny a ccw permit renewal to a person "suffering a physical infirmity which prevents the safe handling of a weapon." Under current law a person who clearly has a physical condition that makes it impossible to safely hand a gun, such as blindness, can't be denied a concealed weapons permit. George Irizarry, of Hazelton, PA is on a mission to educate people that PA allows those over 21 to carry guns openly without a permit. Irizarry carries a gun, sometimes two at once, around town. Many people have called police after seeing him, to report a man with a gun. "I don't do it because I want the attention," said Izirarry. "I want the awareness." |
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