Reasonable Gun Control  Support H.R. 648

However, the "Findings" section (remarkably) includes some surprising statistics. These are facts most Second Amendment supporters already know, but it is significant to see them included in an actual congressional bill as supporting documentation:

(1) Police cannot protect, and are not legally liable for failing to protect, individual citizens, as evidenced by the following: (A) The courts have consistently ruled that the police do not have an obligation to protect individuals, only the public in general. (B) Former Florida Attorney General Jim Smith told Florida legislators that police responded to only 200,000 of 700,000 calls for help to Dade County authorities. (C) The United States Department of Justice found that, in 1989, there were 168,881 crimes of violence for which police had not responded within 1 hour.   (2) Citizens frequently must use firearms to defend themselves, as evidenced by the following:   (A) Every year, more than 2,400,000 people in the United States use a gun to defend themselves against criminals  more than 6,500 people a day. In other words, each year, firearms are used 60 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than to take lives. (B) Of the 2,400,000 self-defense cases, more than 192,000 are by women defending themselves against sexual abuse. (C) Of the 2,400,000 times citizens use their guns to defend themselves every year, 92 percent merely brandish their gun or fire a warning shot to scare off their attackers. Less than 8 percent of the time, does a citizen kill or wound his or her attacker.   (3) Law-abiding citizens, seeking only to provide for their families' defense, are routinely prosecuted for brandishing or using a firearm in self-defense. This is NUTS. (4) The courts have granted immunity from prosecution to police officers who use firearms in the line of duty (creating a privileged class). Likewise, law-abiding citizens who use firearms to protect themselves, their families, and their homes against violent felons should not be subject to lawsuits by the violent felons who sought to victimize them. This should be a no-brainer.

H.R. 648 is an artfully crafted bill that even moderates in Congress should be able to embrace. Opponents will find themselves on thin partisan ice.

Some knuckle draggers are going to gripe, Hey, that aint good enough! Well, it is a damn sight better that what we have now. Please remember the gun-grabber crowd hasnt broadened their unconstitutional anti-gun base all at once. They have been fighting (and winning) a war of incrementalism.

Pete Shields, founder of Handgun Control, said in 1976, "We'll take one step at a time, and the first is necessarily  given the political realities  very modest. & Our ultimate goal, total control of hand guns, is going to take time. (http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/paranoid_20000315.html)

We need to support H.R. 648. Call, write and demand that your representative vote for it. This bill is not politics as usual. It is important. It is critical. And in this era of heightened threat, it is desperately needed.

If you are not part of the solution (to get this bill into law), then you become part of the problem.