Those who live in glass houses...
Posted: Fri Jun 27, 2003 6:36 pm
There are those from Great Britain who show their true colors by bashing the U.S., our laws, our country, our Constitution, our government, and our President all while claiming the high moral ground. These same people show their true Totalitarian colors when they reveal that they are part of the elite group in Great Britain that places their jackboots squarely on the neck of any subject who would dare exercise the ability to defend themselves all while discussing their own personal martial arts prowess.
But the fact is that they live in a society where the State is soverign, and where individual citizens status hasn't advanced significantly since the days of the serfs. They must accept their Prime Ministers, who call elections whenever and as often as they want. They must accept the "stealth taxes" and coercion and arrogance of unchecked power.
They must live with the idea that they live at the convenience and discretion of the Crown. But we don't have to conclude that such a society which denies the God-given right to self-preservation is morally superior. Great Britain may be the birthplace of the Magna Carta, but the U.S. is the only nation that had the guts and good sense to say "Hell NO" to the idea that Rights are imparted to the people at the government's whim, not the other way around. THANK GOD.
Since handguns were banned in 1997, rounded up and sent off to the smelters, gun crime has soared. Violent uses of firearms has increased an average of of 11 percent per year for the past six years straight!
Yet there are those who will spend their time bashing the U.S. and will take offense when the truth about Great Britain is told. Here is another article that was just published which tells the truth about crime and punishment in Great Britian.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cap Gun Criminals
by Dr. Paul Gallant & Dr. Joanne Eisen
In spite of foolish gun laws, British 'subjects' are finding that self-reliance just may save their lives.
The headlines are all too familiar: "Gun Crime Soars By 35 Percent," "Handgun Crime Rises By 46 Percent," "Murder Rate At Highest Level," "Shootings Part Of City's Violent Trend." They tell, in a nutshell, the story of what's happening in Great Britain today.
The murder rate in Britain has reached its highest level since record-keeping began there 100 years ago. As Mark Steyn pointed out in the January 5, 2003, Telegraph, "...America's traditionally high and England and Wales' traditionally low murder rates are remorselessly converging. In 1981 the U.S. rate was nine times higher than the English. By 1995 it was six times. Last year, it was down to 3.5. Given that U.S. statistics, unlike the British ones, include manslaughter and other lesser charges, the real rate is much closer. New York has just recorded the lowest murder rate since the 19th century. I'll bet that in the next two years London's murder rate overtakes it."
But it is more than the attempted creation of a gun-free island that has spurred the dizzying metamorphosis of a once-peaceful people into a culture of victims. It is the message of guaranteed safety to the criminal class.
Aside from the civilian prohibition of the best tool for self-defense, British criminals have little reason to fear their victims. Britian's Telegraph reported that the government was proposing to afford criminals greater success "in suing members of the public who injure them," especially "if the injury is much more serious than the illegality."
Nor do criminals have reason to fear Britain's criminal justice system. Early this year, the Telegraph disclosed that "police were ordered not to bother investigating crimes such as burglary, vandalism, and assaults unless evidence pointing to the culprits is easily available. Under new guidlines, officers have been informed that only 'serious' crimes such as murder, rape or so-called hate crimes should be investigated as a matter of course. In all other cases, unless there is immediate and compelling evidence, such as fingerprints or DNA material, the crime will be listed for no further action."
Soon after the new U.K. crime statistics were announced in January, another round of "tough" antigun shenanigans designed to placate the public was launched. Some proposals from the "Gun Crime Summit" held in London in early January included banning imitation guns, air guns, cap guns, water pistols, and replica guns that can fire blanks.
There is some dissent about the proposed ban on toy guns. Antigun activist and author Peter Squire stated: "I don't want to ban the use of {replica weapons}, and I don't want to deprive people of the fun they can have. But I think they should be kept out of the home and under lock and key in shooting clubs."
Toy-gun shooting clubs?!?! We're not making this up, folks - it appears that Squire's "reasonable compromise" with gun owners is "safe storage" laws for toy guns and water pistols.
While even the government admits that the police haven't the time to catch real criminals, they apparently have plenty of time on their hands to raid shops that sell still-legal replica guns, even before the law has been finalized! In one day alone, 1,700 such toys were confiscated from ONE chain store!
There will be mandatory five-year sentences for anyone in possession of an illegal gun; there is currently a six-month minimum sentence for possession of an illegal firearm. (Ed note: remember that private ownership of firearms in the U.K. is for all intents and purposes completely banned. Therefore, these "illegal" guns spoken of will include the afforementioned toys!) There will be a new national database of lawfully held firearms. And there are proposals for new measures to provide witnesses to shootings "greater protections" against intimidation and reprisals "to encourage more cooperation with police and help tackle soaring gun crime" as well as the instigation of police-manned roadblocks in south London to intercept illegal guns.
In addition to proclaiming its intent to get really, really, really tough on crime now, the British government has trotted out its old standby: the vaunted, venerable crime-fixer, the gun "amnesty" program. The latest amnesty, scheduled to run from March 31 through April 30 of this year, was designed to "...cut back on soaring firearms crime and beat Britain's burgeoning gang culture."
It is worth recalling that a firearm amnesty followed he 1996 shooting by Thomas Hamilton at Dunblane Primary School in Scotland, when Great Britain implemented its total ban on private handgun possession.
More thatn 60,000 firearms were handed in then, but both firearm-related crime and non-firearm-related crime kept rising despite the removal of those firearms from the social fabric.
In announcing the latest amnesty, Home Office minister Bob Ainsworth declared: "This amnesty provides an opportunity for people to get rid of an illegal weapon... Taking guns off our street will save lives and cut crime."
To profess that criminals will voluntarily surrender their hard-earned handguns manufactured in eastern Europe, some 10 million of which were recently reported to have been illegally imported into Great Britain, is beyond naive. We continue to be amazed at the chutzpah of those who do.
Through foolish social policy that totally ignores human nature, the British government has created a climate in which criminals have been empowered and emboldened. That, in turn, lead to an unprecedented rise in crime throughout the U.K. An embarassed government has been forced to disquise the true level of crime, and a clear pattern of massaging down the crime statistics continues.
For example, "forceful theft of car keys from a person to enable a car to be stolen" is now being recorded as "the taking of a vehicle without the owner's consent." What this means to the theif (if ever convicted, let alone apprehended in the first place) is the difference between a possible lifetime jail sentence and a fine and/or a maximum of six months in jail.
So far the British government hasn't found a way to disarm criminals (nor has any other government of social theorist); instead, it targets the only people it can hope to control: the nonviolent segment of British subjects. The resulthas not been the creation of the peaceful, gun-free, harmonious society that British subjects were promised but a society of disarmed victims, preyed upon at will by a government-protected and well-armed criminal class.
But that may be changing. Although victims are suffering the consequences of fools, they themselves are not fooled.While tghe British government's arsenal of crime-fighting tools doesn't include citizen self-defense, what has emerged is that British subjects and their politicians have drastically different ideas about how to cope.
Rueters recently reported on the findings of a telephone survey of 1,000 Britons: "Guns feature alongside baseball bats and hammers among the arsenal kept by almost one in 10 worried householders." While 44 percent of respondents said they slept with a blunt instrument such as a baseball bat handy, 10 percent of women in the survey stated they keep a gun nearby (maybe even one of those 10 million illegally imported guns).
The report further noted: "Sixty percent of respondents believe people have the right to take the law into their own hands, and nearly half would be prepared to kill in other to protect their family." In short, Brits have reached the breaking point and are willing to risk even the fate that befell Tony Martin. Martin was the farmer who shot intruders and was sentenced, at first, to life in prison; the sentence was reduced on appeal to five years. (Ed note: Mainly because of public outcry.) Martin has become a cause celebre and recieved more than 7,500 Christmas cards in his jail cell.
Martin was denied early parole, partially on the basis of death threats made against him by friends of the criminal he killed and partially because of his lack of remorse. The British police admit they cannot protect Martin. When he is released, he will not have the required tools to protect himself.
All the laws in the world cannnot extinguish that reflex lying deep within the human spirit. Despite Martin's treatment by authorities, the principle of self-defense and protection of one's loved ones is alive and well in the U.K. While we are watching the change in Great Britain from a culture of lawful firearm ownership to one where firearm ownership has become almost illegal, we may also be witness to a new, burgeoning culture of self-defense.
But the fact is that they live in a society where the State is soverign, and where individual citizens status hasn't advanced significantly since the days of the serfs. They must accept their Prime Ministers, who call elections whenever and as often as they want. They must accept the "stealth taxes" and coercion and arrogance of unchecked power.
They must live with the idea that they live at the convenience and discretion of the Crown. But we don't have to conclude that such a society which denies the God-given right to self-preservation is morally superior. Great Britain may be the birthplace of the Magna Carta, but the U.S. is the only nation that had the guts and good sense to say "Hell NO" to the idea that Rights are imparted to the people at the government's whim, not the other way around. THANK GOD.
Since handguns were banned in 1997, rounded up and sent off to the smelters, gun crime has soared. Violent uses of firearms has increased an average of of 11 percent per year for the past six years straight!
Yet there are those who will spend their time bashing the U.S. and will take offense when the truth about Great Britain is told. Here is another article that was just published which tells the truth about crime and punishment in Great Britian.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cap Gun Criminals
by Dr. Paul Gallant & Dr. Joanne Eisen
In spite of foolish gun laws, British 'subjects' are finding that self-reliance just may save their lives.
The headlines are all too familiar: "Gun Crime Soars By 35 Percent," "Handgun Crime Rises By 46 Percent," "Murder Rate At Highest Level," "Shootings Part Of City's Violent Trend." They tell, in a nutshell, the story of what's happening in Great Britain today.
The murder rate in Britain has reached its highest level since record-keeping began there 100 years ago. As Mark Steyn pointed out in the January 5, 2003, Telegraph, "...America's traditionally high and England and Wales' traditionally low murder rates are remorselessly converging. In 1981 the U.S. rate was nine times higher than the English. By 1995 it was six times. Last year, it was down to 3.5. Given that U.S. statistics, unlike the British ones, include manslaughter and other lesser charges, the real rate is much closer. New York has just recorded the lowest murder rate since the 19th century. I'll bet that in the next two years London's murder rate overtakes it."
But it is more than the attempted creation of a gun-free island that has spurred the dizzying metamorphosis of a once-peaceful people into a culture of victims. It is the message of guaranteed safety to the criminal class.
Aside from the civilian prohibition of the best tool for self-defense, British criminals have little reason to fear their victims. Britian's Telegraph reported that the government was proposing to afford criminals greater success "in suing members of the public who injure them," especially "if the injury is much more serious than the illegality."
Nor do criminals have reason to fear Britain's criminal justice system. Early this year, the Telegraph disclosed that "police were ordered not to bother investigating crimes such as burglary, vandalism, and assaults unless evidence pointing to the culprits is easily available. Under new guidlines, officers have been informed that only 'serious' crimes such as murder, rape or so-called hate crimes should be investigated as a matter of course. In all other cases, unless there is immediate and compelling evidence, such as fingerprints or DNA material, the crime will be listed for no further action."
Soon after the new U.K. crime statistics were announced in January, another round of "tough" antigun shenanigans designed to placate the public was launched. Some proposals from the "Gun Crime Summit" held in London in early January included banning imitation guns, air guns, cap guns, water pistols, and replica guns that can fire blanks.
There is some dissent about the proposed ban on toy guns. Antigun activist and author Peter Squire stated: "I don't want to ban the use of {replica weapons}, and I don't want to deprive people of the fun they can have. But I think they should be kept out of the home and under lock and key in shooting clubs."
Toy-gun shooting clubs?!?! We're not making this up, folks - it appears that Squire's "reasonable compromise" with gun owners is "safe storage" laws for toy guns and water pistols.
While even the government admits that the police haven't the time to catch real criminals, they apparently have plenty of time on their hands to raid shops that sell still-legal replica guns, even before the law has been finalized! In one day alone, 1,700 such toys were confiscated from ONE chain store!
There will be mandatory five-year sentences for anyone in possession of an illegal gun; there is currently a six-month minimum sentence for possession of an illegal firearm. (Ed note: remember that private ownership of firearms in the U.K. is for all intents and purposes completely banned. Therefore, these "illegal" guns spoken of will include the afforementioned toys!) There will be a new national database of lawfully held firearms. And there are proposals for new measures to provide witnesses to shootings "greater protections" against intimidation and reprisals "to encourage more cooperation with police and help tackle soaring gun crime" as well as the instigation of police-manned roadblocks in south London to intercept illegal guns.
In addition to proclaiming its intent to get really, really, really tough on crime now, the British government has trotted out its old standby: the vaunted, venerable crime-fixer, the gun "amnesty" program. The latest amnesty, scheduled to run from March 31 through April 30 of this year, was designed to "...cut back on soaring firearms crime and beat Britain's burgeoning gang culture."
It is worth recalling that a firearm amnesty followed he 1996 shooting by Thomas Hamilton at Dunblane Primary School in Scotland, when Great Britain implemented its total ban on private handgun possession.
More thatn 60,000 firearms were handed in then, but both firearm-related crime and non-firearm-related crime kept rising despite the removal of those firearms from the social fabric.
In announcing the latest amnesty, Home Office minister Bob Ainsworth declared: "This amnesty provides an opportunity for people to get rid of an illegal weapon... Taking guns off our street will save lives and cut crime."
To profess that criminals will voluntarily surrender their hard-earned handguns manufactured in eastern Europe, some 10 million of which were recently reported to have been illegally imported into Great Britain, is beyond naive. We continue to be amazed at the chutzpah of those who do.
Through foolish social policy that totally ignores human nature, the British government has created a climate in which criminals have been empowered and emboldened. That, in turn, lead to an unprecedented rise in crime throughout the U.K. An embarassed government has been forced to disquise the true level of crime, and a clear pattern of massaging down the crime statistics continues.
For example, "forceful theft of car keys from a person to enable a car to be stolen" is now being recorded as "the taking of a vehicle without the owner's consent." What this means to the theif (if ever convicted, let alone apprehended in the first place) is the difference between a possible lifetime jail sentence and a fine and/or a maximum of six months in jail.
So far the British government hasn't found a way to disarm criminals (nor has any other government of social theorist); instead, it targets the only people it can hope to control: the nonviolent segment of British subjects. The resulthas not been the creation of the peaceful, gun-free, harmonious society that British subjects were promised but a society of disarmed victims, preyed upon at will by a government-protected and well-armed criminal class.
But that may be changing. Although victims are suffering the consequences of fools, they themselves are not fooled.While tghe British government's arsenal of crime-fighting tools doesn't include citizen self-defense, what has emerged is that British subjects and their politicians have drastically different ideas about how to cope.
Rueters recently reported on the findings of a telephone survey of 1,000 Britons: "Guns feature alongside baseball bats and hammers among the arsenal kept by almost one in 10 worried householders." While 44 percent of respondents said they slept with a blunt instrument such as a baseball bat handy, 10 percent of women in the survey stated they keep a gun nearby (maybe even one of those 10 million illegally imported guns).
The report further noted: "Sixty percent of respondents believe people have the right to take the law into their own hands, and nearly half would be prepared to kill in other to protect their family." In short, Brits have reached the breaking point and are willing to risk even the fate that befell Tony Martin. Martin was the farmer who shot intruders and was sentenced, at first, to life in prison; the sentence was reduced on appeal to five years. (Ed note: Mainly because of public outcry.) Martin has become a cause celebre and recieved more than 7,500 Christmas cards in his jail cell.
Martin was denied early parole, partially on the basis of death threats made against him by friends of the criminal he killed and partially because of his lack of remorse. The British police admit they cannot protect Martin. When he is released, he will not have the required tools to protect himself.
All the laws in the world cannnot extinguish that reflex lying deep within the human spirit. Despite Martin's treatment by authorities, the principle of self-defense and protection of one's loved ones is alive and well in the U.K. While we are watching the change in Great Britain from a culture of lawful firearm ownership to one where firearm ownership has become almost illegal, we may also be witness to a new, burgeoning culture of self-defense.
