Don't count on law enforcement to protect you

The following article reminds me of the saying, "a gun in the hand is worth more than a cop on the phone" (this is in reference to dialing 911). Notice how the guy in the article called his armed relatives instead of the police for help.

For Middle-Class Pakistanis, a Gun Is a Must-Have Accessory

With Kidnappings and Violence on the Rise, Demand for Weapons Permits Grows

By PETER WONACOTT
WSJ.com

LAHORE, Pakistan -- After escaping kidnappers who chained him to a bed for 25 days, Mohammad Javed Afridi pressed Pakistani law enforcement for swift justice. The police offered him something else: temporary permits for four automatic assault rifles.
[Mohammad Javed Afridi]

Mohammad Javed Afridi

Since Mr. Afridi's ordeal ended in mid-October, police in his hometown of Peshawar, in northwestern Pakistan, haven't made an arrest in his case. They raided the kidnappers' hide-out, but the captors got away, a senior Peshawar police official says.

So the cops allowed Mr. Afridi to arm himself against future abductions. The 35-year-old journalist now carries an AK-47 to work and back home to his wife and five children. Relatives rotate duty as his bodyguards. If his car is again stopped by armed men on a dark road, Mr. Afridi vows to shoot first.

"I'm not going through that again," he said in an interview in this city in northeastern Pakistan.

Guns have long been part of Pakistan's traditional culture, especially in the rugged northwestern part of the country. Handed down through generations, rifles have been used for hunting and for firing celebratory fusillades. Now, however, modern assault rifles and handguns have come into vogue among middle-class Pakistanis, and gun registration has jumped.

This proliferation reflects many urbanites' dwindling faith that the country's new civilian government can protect them. Over the past year, Pakistan has endured the assassination of popular political leader Benazir Bhutto, a spreading Islamist insurgency and the bombing of Islamabad's Marriott Hotel. November's deadly terror attacks in Mumbai, allegedly carried out by 10 Pakistani militants trained here, further frayed nerves.

But more than heightened terrorist threats, many Pakistanis fear the surge in violent kidnappings, extortions and robberies that target those who look like they might have money. The 11,758 murders recorded in the first 11 months of 2008 were the highest in Pakistan in at least a decade, say Islamabad police, who compile nationwide crime statistics.

"People buy weapons because they're insecure," said a senior Interior Ministry official. "No need denying it."

Arms licenses are issued by numerous Pakistani agencies. Local authorities and police hand out permits for weapons that can be used only within their states. The Interior Ministry licenses nonautomatic weapons that can be carried across borders between Pakistan's states. The prime minister's office gives clearance for automatic assault weapons that can be used throughout the country.

Firearm licenses issued by the Interior Ministry rose sharply in 2008. Licenses for 12-gauge pump-action shotguns, used by private security guards and also duck hunters, more than doubled over 2007, according to ministry figures compiled through year's end. Over the same period, the ministry granted 47% more licenses for 30-bore pistols and 53% more for 9mm handguns.
[Pakistani police in July with arms and ammunitions seized in Karachi. Rising violence has prompted many middle-class families in Pakistan to seek weapons permits.] AFP/Getty Images

Pakistani police in July with arms and ammunitions seized in Karachi. Rising violence has prompted many middle-class families in Pakistan to seek weapons permits.

The ministry's chief spokesman didn't respond to requests for comment about the surge in gun licenses.

Some middle-class Pakistanis have appealed to politicians for help in obtaining licenses. On a recent morning at the Interior Ministry's Arms License Issuance Center in Islamabad, a scrum of applicants waved papers in clerks' impassive faces. One man carried a letter from a member of Pakistan's National Assembly, the country's top lawmaking body, asking that officials facilitate shotgun and pistol licenses for nine of his supporters.

Others say the government isn't doing enough to get arms in the hands of those who need them. "Criminals don't have licenses, so why do we need to get a license?" asked Tariq Rana, who on a recent day was buying an illegal 12-gauge shotgun after he was robbed of his cellphone, watch and cash the night before. "I couldn't get an arms license because I don't know any politicians."

Many licensed arms are sold in the military city of Rawalpindi, a half hour outside Islamabad. Down the street from the city's Liaquat National Bagh -- the park where Pakistan's first prime minister was assassinated a half-century ago and where Ms. Bhutto was killed last December -- small arms shops, their walls lined with shotguns and long-barreled pistols, are scattered amid mom-and-pop stores.

"A gun can be your friend," said one gun-shopper, Sifarish Khan. A few years ago, the government clerk was shot in the hand by his brother-in-law after an argument. He shows off a scar in the webbing between his fingers. Having a gun, he says, is like having loyal defenders at his side. "More bullets, more friends," he says.

Weapons purchased legally in the Rawalpindi shops are typically 10 times as expensive as those readily available on the black market in Northwest Frontier Province and its capital, Peshawar, a historical hub for weapon smuggling from Afghanistan. But urban Pakistanis tend to shun the illegal arms bazaars in an area known for tribal codes, bandits and Islamic insurgents.

Islamabad-based lawyer Muhammad Ali Saif, who comes from the country's northwest, says he wants an assault rifle for protection when he goes home on visits. He's no stranger to firearms. In the early 1980s, Mr. Saif says he was shot in the stomach fighting invading Soviet soldiers in Afghanistan. Mr. Saif has since publicly criticized his former Taliban comrades, however, and defended unpopular former President Pervez Musharraf in several court cases. The prominent lawyer says he won't feel secure until he's toting a weapon that matches those carried by potential assailants.

Mr. Saif submitted his AK-47 application to the prime minister's office eight months ago, and continues to wait for approval. He says the licensing process has become too politicized. "The AK-47 is a sign of privilege and prestige, which the government wants to confine to top-level officials," he said.

The prime minister's office didn't respond to requests for comment.

Meanwhile, Mr. Afridi, the journalist, is trying to get over the kidnapping that spurred a desire to carry his own weapon.

On the evening of Sept. 24, Mr. Afridi was driving home from his job as a reporter for a national newspaper. On the road, a group of young men motioned him to stop his Toyota. When he didn't, they fired a bullet that went in the passenger-side window and exited near his head. Instinctively, he braked. The men piled into his car, he said, and pressed a pistol to his temple.

The gang took Mr. Afridi to an abandoned house outside of Peshawar. They demanded a $100,000 ransom from his family, but gradually reduced the price for his release.

As negotiations dragged on for weeks, his guards relaxed. They gave Mr. Afridi scissors to trim his moustache. Eventually, he used the scissors to pick the lock that chained him to his bed. On Oct. 18, Mr. Afridi escaped out a window, leaving clothing and a sleeping cap lumped in the bed to fool his guards.

Mr. Afridi determined where he was and telephoned for help -- not to police, but to heavily armed relatives. Guns and revenge, he notes, are both part of the Afridi clan's tribal culture.

Mr. Afridi later used a map from Google Earth to direct police to the hideout, but they failed to find his kidnappers there. The senior superintendent of police in Peshawar, Kashif Alam, said the suspects escaped to a neighboring tribal region beyond their jurisdiction. Treating the episode as "a special case," Mr. Alam added, police gave Mr. Afridi four one-year permits to carry assault weapons.

The licenses were sufficient to arm a few cousins and an uncle. Now when he goes out on interviews, Mr. Afridi says, at least one of his relatives waits in the car for him, a Kalashnikov on his lap.

His family already had the assault weapons, he said, so it was only a matter of receiving clearance to carry them. "I don't even like guns," Mr. Afridi said. But he added: "We've become targets. Every wealthy person in Pakistan is a target."
—Waseem Ahmed Qadri in Islamabad and Khalid Kheshgi in Peshawar contributed to this article.

Write to Peter Wonacott at peter.wonacott@wsj.com

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Guns & Ammo...

For your consideration...

Buy, Buy, Buy
by Michael Gaddy
LewRockwell.com

Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe. The supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any band of regular troops that can be, on any pretence, raised in the United States. A military force, at the command of Congress, can execute no laws, but such as the people perceive to be just and constitutional; for they will possess the power, and jealousy will instantly inspire the inclination, to resist the execution of a law which appears to them unjust and oppressive.

~ Noah Webster

While we stumble along economically with bailouts, buyouts, and poor sales in almost all sectors, two products in America are seeing dramatic increases in sales: guns and ammo. People who never owned a gun before are buying; people are buying multiples of military style weapons and ammo is being bought by the case instead of by the box.

Many explain this away as folks simply worried that Obama will move to ban certain firearms, especially those referred to by the ignorant as "assault weapons," I believe the motivation to buy firearms and ammunition goes much deeper.

More and more Americans are becoming increasingly aware of the storm that is brewing on the horizon, a storm driven by the possibility of a complete economic collapse.

The more astute are reading the handwriting on the wall: military combat units being assigned for stateside duty to quell domestic disturbances, a militarization of law enforcement, and the fear of what will happen when the state is no longer able to provide monthly checks to the millions currently living on government handouts labeled as "entitlements."

A strong possibility exists, when the checks stop, those who no longer have will seek to forcibly take from those who do. The scenes from New Orleans after Katrina have not disappeared from the public memory.

Regardless, legislation has been pre-planned and is now in place to be implemented just as soon as we have another tragedy involving a criminal idiot with guns.

Most are unaware that Congressional representative, Carolyn McCarthy from New York, introduced H.R. 1022 in February 2007. This draconian, unconstitutional piece of socialist baloney would ban a multitude of firearms currently available, including the Ruger 10/22, one of the most popular .22 caliber rifles on the market. .22 caliber rifles are commonly used for small game hunting, plinking and target practice; none are in use either in the military or law enforcement as the caliber is considered too small and underpowered for use on targets larger than small game or predators; a fact that somehow escaped the intelligence of Ms. McCarthy. Proof positive that politicians don’t really care what type of weapon you have; it is the simple fact they do not want you to have any weapon at all.

Representative McCarthy’s husband Dennis was shot and killed by Colin Ferguson on the Long Island Railroad in December of 1993. Her son, Kevin, was also seriously injured.

The logic that has escaped Ms. McCarthy is: if her husband had possessed a weapon, he could have possibly saved his life and the lives of others that fateful day. Instead, those who were prohibited by the laws of the state from protecting themselves were hopelessly slaughtered and maimed by a madman who cared not about those laws, and thanks to the liberal laws of New York, is still breathing good air.

Ms. McCarthy won election to congress based on her anti-gun position. Ironic, is it not, that one can be elected to congress by proposing laws contrary to the constitution and then take an oath pledging to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic…"

McCarthy reportedly was inspired to run for congress because her predecessor, Congressman Dan Frisa, supported the Constitution and voted against an assault weapons bill. Leave it up to New Yorkers to defeat those who support the constitution and elect those who seek to destroy it.

Comrade McCarthy displayed her true colors when she filed a lawsuit against the Olin Corporation, makers of the ammunition used by Ferguson, but never filed suit against Ferguson himself. Obviously, McCarthy sought to profit from the death of her husband and the injuries to her son by accusing the manufacturers of an inanimate object of the crimes. Of course the company who manufactured this inanimate object had much "deeper pockets" than Mr. Ferguson, the person who actually loaded the ammunition into a firearm and pulled the trigger, killing six people and wounding nineteen. Thank goodness her frivolous lawsuit failed.

Americans are purchasing firearms and ammunition in record numbers, not because they believe 2009 will offer unusually good duck hunting, but because they fear the fallout from the coming economic storm and the state’s reaction to that fallout.

The larger question is: how many of those who have gone out and purchased firearms and ammo will actually use them? I believe a large number would bring those weapons to bear against criminals who would steal and threaten their families and property, but, how many would use them against the criminal state as it moves to seize their weapons, as was done in New Orleans, when the next "emergency" occurs, be it an economic meltdown or terrorist attack?

Rest assured, there will be a great majority who will not stand against tyranny. Those who have "gone along to get along" and those who have continually voted for the "lesser of two evils" will capitulate and surrender their weapons, as cowards normally do. They will rue the day they failed to support those who stood for liberty such as Ron Paul. Remember, they were offered liberty, but chose instead to support the status quo, because, in their eyes, liberty could not be elected.

Those among us who are afraid to be free will surrender their guns, their families, and their freedom to tyranny. Do not place your freedom or trust in their hands or depend on them to cover your six.

January 5, 2009

Michael Gaddy, an Army veteran of Vietnam, Grenada, and Beirut, lives in the Four Corners area of the American Southwest.

Copyright © 2009 LewRockwell.com

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Gun Sales Up - Got Yours?

From the Washington Post:

Gun Sales Thriving In Uncertain Times

By Fredrick Kunkle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, October 27, 2008; A01

Americans have cut back on buying cars, furniture and clothes in a tough economy, but there's one consumer item that's still enjoying healthy sales: guns. Purchases of firearms and ammunition have risen 8 to 10 percent this year, according to state and federal data.

Several variables drive sales, but many dealers, buyers and experts attribute the increase in part to concerns about the economy and fears that if Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois wins the presidency, he will join with fellow Democrats in Congress to enact new gun controls. Obama has said that he believes in an individual right to bear arms but that he also supports "common-sense safety measures."

"Even though [Obama] has a lot going for him, he's not very pro-gun," said Paul Pluff, a spokesman for Massachusetts-based Smith & Wesson, which has reported higher sales. Gun enthusiasts are "going to go out and get [firearms] while they still can."

Gun purchases have also been climbing because of the worsening economy, which fuels fears of crime and civil disorder, industry sources and specialists said.

"Generally, we know that hard economic times always result in firearm sales," said James M. Purtilo of Silver Spring, who publishes the Tripwire Newsletter.

Gary Kleck, a researcher at Florida State University's College of Criminology and Criminal Justice whose work was cited in the District's recent Supreme Court gun-control case, said that although there are no scientific studies linking gun sales and economic conditions, people often buy firearms during periods of uncertainty. People often buy weapons because of concerns about personal safety or government actions to limit access to firearms, causing spikes in sales, Kleck said.

Industry experts and law enforcement officials point to several examples over the years. In 1994, there was a rush to buy guns when President Bill Clinton pushed for a ban on military-style semiautomatic rifles. Handgun sales jumped last year after the massacre at Virginia Tech as some worried about personal protection and others feared sweeping restrictions on handguns, pushing applications for concealed gun permits in Virginia alone up 60 percent. People also rushed to buy guns after the 1992 riots in Los Angeles and the breakdown of order in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

Bob Leyshion, who visited a gun shop in Manassas recently, said the economic crisis and Obama's lead in the polls were on his mind.

"People are preparing for catastrophe right now," said Leyshion, 55, of Nokesville. "It's insurance. With the stock market crash and people out of work, and the illegal aliens in this area, the probability of civil disorder is very high."

Gun owners haven't been especially thrilled about the prospect of Sen. John McCain in the White House. They see the Arizona Republican as less of a threat than Obama, but they are still angry over McCain's support for certain gun-control measures in the past, such as requiring purchasers at gun shows to undergo background checks.

Gun owners said McCain's moose-hunting running mate, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, is far more likely to champion Second Amendment rights.

"The industry and sportsmen have not been in love with McCain, but the selection of Palin wiped that all away," said Anthony Aeschliman, a spokesman for the National Shooting Sports Foundation.

More than three dozen interviews with gun dealers and buyers in Virginia and Maryland and with experts nationwide indicated that the increase in gun sales appears to be driven predominantly by concerns about the presidential election and the economy.

Gun buyers were more likely to say they were responding to the political situation than to the economy, and all but three people said they feared that Obama would restrict gun rights. Two who indicated that they would support Obama anyway said their concerns about the economy and health care outweighed those about gun rights.

Most buyers who emphasized the economy said they thought the worsening situation could lead to an increase in crime and jeopardize their safety. A few said they were buying guns as an investment.

"Look at the political situation and the financial situation," said Fred Russell, owner of Russell's Gun Emporium in Hagerstown, Md. "It's common sense. People are scared."

Brad, 42, and Margaret Marcus, 47, who were at a Fairfax County shooting range recently with their two children for weekly target practice, said they sped up the purchase of two semiautomatic rifles that had been banned during the Clinton administration because they feared they could become illegal again if Obama wins. The couple, who run an online retailing business from their Ashburn home, said they viewed Obama's remarks about protecting the Second Amendment as campaign trail "pandering."

"I think right now people are scared Obama is going to take their rights away," said Margaret Marcus, who was carrying a Glock 19 9mm semiautomatic pistol under a blue jean jacket embroidered with "Winnie the Pooh" characters. "He's definitely anti-gun, despite what you see in the mainstream media."

Law enforcement and industry data and anecdotal reports show that guns are selling well this year. In 2008, there were 8.4 million background checks from Jan. 1 to Sept. 28, compared with 7.7 million in the same period last year, a 9 percent increase, according to the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System.

The increase is also notable because it follows a heavy year for gun purchases, which industry officials and experts link to the Virginia Tech shootings in April 2007 and a burgeoning housing market crisis. NICS checks show a 20 percent increase in April 2007, compared with the previous year.

This year's jump is a continuation of a trend that began in 2006, about the time the housing bubble popped in parts of the nation, and remained steady last year as the political season began to take shape and the housing crisis grew. It is also a bigger jump than the average annual increases of about 5 percent or less typical since instant background checks began in 1998.

Federal tax data also show that quarterly excise taxes collected on sales of firearms and ammunition have increased about 10 percent this year, compared with last year, according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation.

Gunmakers see the same trend. "We're ahead of last year," said Pluff, of Smith & Wesson. "There's a few things that drive the market, and one of them is political elections."

On a recent weekend, a crowd of lookers and buyers milled around in the Virginia Arms Co. in Manassas. Some were shopping for large-capacity magazines, or clips, that attach to firearms and hold additional rounds of ammo. Those were banned during the Clinton administration and became legal again when the ban expired.

"I'm looking for gun clips because I got the funny feeling that prices are going to rise, or they're going to be banned," said Wayne Heglar, 48, who lives in Aldie and builds custom motorcycles. Heglar said he also planned to stock up on ammo.

"When the Democrats are in office, it seems like anti-gunners come out of the woodwork," Heglar said. He said he expected Obama to use tax law to restrict gun ownership. "A bullet will be a luxury," he said.

At Clark Brothers Gun Shop in Warrenton, a sign over the door says: "Experts Agree . . . Gun Control Works!" Underneath are photos of Hitler, Stalin, Fidel Castro and Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi. There are also posters that criticize Obama's record on guns.

Steve Clark, the shop's owner, said customers have been buying weapons they fear would be restricted and that have been before, such as Colt AR-15s, semiautomatic rifles that go for $1,100.

"What I hear a lot is fear that Barack will win the election and tax everything to the point that you can't afford anything," said salesman Eugene Proko, 51.

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