PERSONAL SECURITY By Jim Grover THE RAPE OF YOUR RIGHTS Guns & Ammo April 1994 A different kind of attacker threatens your security more and more every day Those of you who follow this column and my other scratching in Handguns magazine know that I am a moderate man. My approach to most things is mainline and steady. However, recent events have pushed me to the point of feeling a need to speak my mind on this whole gun-control issue. I am not a gun-lobby expert as is our eminent Neil Knox nor have I devoted my life to upholding the Second Amendment, as I have been out of the country for great periods over the last 12 years. I am just a man who owns guns, uses them in his profession and who appreciates the camaraderie and challenge of the shooting sports. I also greatly resent any government effort to reduce, minimize or alter any of the unalienable rights assured to me by our forefathers--rights that I have fought for against foreign and domestic foes, rights that I have lost dear friends over... dead, defending this great country's charter. This is truly a compelling issue. Recently, I was in the Middle East, and the men I was deployed with were all military and government men. We have all been involved in the "low-intensity conflicts" and other skirmishes our country finds necessary for the last 15 years. We were watching CNN and were completely outraged that our Commander in Chief (hopefully, Commander in Brief!) allowed a personal visit to the Hattori family of Japan to deliver 1.5 million signatures on a petition by the people of Japan to ban handguns in America...our country. There is no way to document in this brief column the rush of pure outrage this caused among us. They said they presented the petition because they "love the United States!" These foreigners have enjoyed the benefits of our protection since World War II, at no expense to them, and are fighting trade agreements with us, and they're telling my president they want my guns! Anyone who has been to Japan knows how "gun crazy" they are. They sell life-size replicas of all guns; they sell air shotguns; they sell models of guns. What about all the real guns they produce in their country and sell to the United States? A friend and I were sitting around his garage the other day. He was restoring a Model 12 Winchester to a replica of the one he carried in Vietnam, two tours in Vietnam. He has welts across his stomach where NVA AK-47 rounds tore him open. While he was serving his country, my president was evading serving his. Anyway, he raised a good point. Let's say there are three groups in the United States: group A, group B and group C. Statistically, group A commits 75 percent of all handgun violence. Why is group A allowed to have handguns at all? Why do we consider penalizing groups B and C when, clearly, group A is the largest contributor (by far) of this treachery? Enough of letting the felons back on the street. Enough of the lax immigration laws that allow mentally unstable people into the country. Enough of the inefficient criminal-justice system. Enough already! Don't believe the thinly veiled ploy that guns are the evil thing in this society. Only a simpleton would agree to that. It is the inability for us to handle the criminal element that is to blame here, not my gun or your gun or anyone else's gun. I always read the "Armed Citizen" column in the American Rifleman publication of the NRA. This column discusses those incidents where armed citizens successfully avoided being killed, robbed and/or raped by using firearms, legally, to defend themselves. In newspapers, I never see the same coverage given to an armed, honest citizen shooting a bad guy as I do the bad guy shooting anyone--ever. The bad guy always, always gets the print. Why is that? I suggest to you the American public has no idea how many times legally owned firearms are used to prevent victimization. Why has the success of the concealed laws in Florida gone unheralded? As for the police administrators who rushed to the president's side a few days after the New York Commuter shooting, let's be realistic. I have worked with the police community for years decades, in fact. The vast majority of policemen, average everyday policemen, agree they cannot stem crime alone. They cannot prevent good citizens from being victimized. I'll let you in on a big revelation, too. Policemen and women own personal guns as well. Guess what? You won't if the current administration's direction remains unaltered! Your guns are in as much jeopardy as anyone's. I can't remember being this angry for a long time. My dad (who is an excellent shot and also a moderate man) recently bought a .38 revolver and a .22 rifle. He is 60-plus years old. His comment to me was, "It's not so much that I'm for or against guns. It's the fact that the government is toying with the base document this country is founded on. I resent that." As he should. This country is terribly broken. If you and I don't move the middle-of-the-road people by using moderate, common sense tactics (don't scare them away), if we don't convince women gun owners and users to use their collective voice on this issue, we will lose our right. We will lose something that we believe in. We will lose a sport. We will lose protection. We will lose our heritage. Recently, I saw a beheading in the Middle East. The two convicts were drug smugglers. To view the execution, 4,000 people showed up! It was over within seconds. The bodies were hoisted up on poles and publicly displayed for three days. Do you think with that specter of sure capital punishment crime would run as rampant as it does here in America? The criminal-justice system today is a joke. All Janet Reno's rhetoric, all that I hear from the sociologists, the media, the left, the police administrators and the corrections officials denies the plain truth, "Get tough or the tough will get you." It's plain and simple. You don't have to like it, but it's the fact. I'm still waiting for some smart citizen to bring a police department to court for having the logo "to protect and serve" on its car doors after they have been victimized. It is a misnomer, a joke on us. They cannot protect us. The "serve" should be expanded to read "to serve the public by taking reports after the crime has been committed." Folks, I have rambled enough. I still feel empty though because you know this. We need to reach out. We need to sign up our wives and children to the NRA for their voting power; one membership per household is not enough. We need to write (handwritten) letters to our congressmen and senators. We need to write the president. We need to seek the coverage that Handgun Control, Inc. gets. We need to be activists in the true sense of the word. We need to voice what things we want done to stem violence on the street (like fixing a completely broken criminal justice system). It is truly a fight, no less important than one you may find yourself in on a darkened street with two thugs facing you. The ill-informed, non-gunning public must be wooed, not badgered. Those who are adamantly opposed to guns are the enemy. Those people who want to change our inalienable rights are the enemy. Wear your NRA support proudly. Debate wisely in every venue. Be informed about your politicians, their beliefs and how they vote. Be an American!