Author's note: In 1895, H.G. Wells wrote a short story called “The Time Machine".   This story turned out to be eerily prophetic of events that have happened during our lifetimes.  In my opinion, it has special relevance to the question of gun control and gun ownership: The story begins in the home of a brilliant English scientist of the Victorian era.  He announces to his friends that he has built a Time Machine with the object of going into the future to witness the glorious destiny o...

Hi folks, it's Johnny Bullseye, your second amendment history reporter.  Today as a special treat we'll be interviewing Annie Oakley, one of the greatest marksmen that America has ever produced: JB:   Hello Annie. AO: Howdy, Johnny.  Er . . . could we make a mite change in my introduction? JB:  Sure, Annie. AO: Well, pardner, I really like being called  a "Markswoman". (more…)

Why are there so few vocal gun owning doctors? I started my firearms "career" at a late age—46, to be exact. This was shortly after I started my medical career, and I must say that at times I have felt as though I were the proverbial "voice crying in the wilderness". Now, finding DRGO, at least I know that I am not alone. But that leaves the question—why do there seem to be so few of us who are willing to go against the grain and speak up? I have several physician (and other medical...

“Arms discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property... Horrid mischief would ensue were the law-abiding deprived of the use of them.”        — Thomas Paine “Common sense gun laws” is a favorite expression of anti-gun politicians and hoplophobic celebrities.  They use that phrase to make their proposals sound innocuous and to attempt to paint Second Amendment supporters as lacking common sense. But, alas, as Voltaire said, com...

Sometimes the whole is less than the parts.  “How to Prevent Gun Deaths? Where Experts and the Public Agree”, January 10th’s article in The New York Times’ blog The Upshot is a perfect example.  (We do resent the Times’ grabbing that title.  It would have been far better used by a pro-gun blog.) In a series of graphs, the authors depict relative consensus among “dozens of social scientists, lawyers and public health officials” who are “many of the country’s best empirical researchers on g...

A lady of my acquaintance, who is a certified left coaster, triumphantly brought me a copy of a recent Newsweek magazine article celebrating the fact that California now has the strongest anti-gun laws in the country. In this article, California was favorably compared to Mississippi which was castigated as having the weakest anti-gun laws. This nice lady, a retired school teacher, was happily convinced that she was living in the safest of all states. She pointed out to me that the anti-gun o...

Don’t I Get CME Credit for my NRA Training?  I'm kind of not joking. I'm putting in many educational hours toward obtaining my National Rifle Association Basic Pistol Instructor Certification. We're talking a couple of hundred dollars investment, and about 20 hours of educational activity. This is a significant investment of my time and treasure in order to learn the skills needed to teach people how to safely use firearms. (more…)

Due process, the Constitutional protection against government imposing its unconstrained will on individuals, is guaranteed in the Fifth Amendment.  But in Second Amendment issues, it is more the exceptions that remind us of the rule. We’ve discussed the lack of due process in psychiatric record reporting and firearm confiscation before. (See Gun Violence Restraining Orders, Is It Mental Illness or Is It Guns? and Violence and Mental Illness: Treatment Is Good!)  Here is the latest exampl...