Rosie O'Donnell's "Gun Control"

There are many remote areas of the country that do not have adequate law enforcement personnel, and citizens are required to defend themselves. Yet a former congressman, Major Owens, tried to pass a resolution dissolving the Second Amendment. Gun control advocates like Rosie O'Donnell, who by the way hypocritically makes sure her bodyguards are armed, said on a recent "View" telecast that the right to bear arms "is not really a right."
Well, let's just clarify that, Rosie.

The Second Amendment reads:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

What many control advocates forget is that comma after the word state. They would like us to think that it refers only to a militia. The comma makes it very clear that it is the right of the people to keep and bear arms.

It certainly was the right of Margaret Johnson to bear arms in September, when a mugger tried to rob the wheelchair-bound Harlem resident. She drew the pistol she was carrying and shot him in his elbow. Ms. Johnson, who has a gun carry permit, was on her way to a shooting range when she was attacked. Statistics from the National Safety Council show that firearms are used more than 80 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than to take lives.

Armed vs. Unarmed Cities
D.C. is among the major U.S. cities with the highest percentage of people being killed by firearms, despite having one of the strictest gun-control laws in the country. A recent Metropolitan Police Department report on homicides from 2001 to 2005 states that 901 of 1,126 homicide victims, or about 80 percent, were fatally shot. "It's a problem," Chief Charles H. Ramsey said. "It may be something that's with us for a while." Firearms last year alone were used to commit 157 of the District's 196 homicides, or about 80 percent. That percentage has remained relatively consistent since 2001, when a five-year low of 78.4 percent of homicides were committed using guns. FBI crime statistics for 2005 show 10,100 of the country's 14,860 homicide victims, or 68 percent, were killed by guns. The District's percentage of gun homicides is comparable to those in other big cities, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. In 2004, the last year for which comprehensive statistics were available, the 79.3 percent of homicides involving guns in the District was higher than the 61.1 percent in New York. Chicago reported 75.2 percent, and Baltimore had 77.5 percent. Atlanta had a significantly lower percentage of gun homicides than the District, 73.2 percent, despite less-restrictive gun laws. In Georgia, gun owners are not required to obtain a license or a permit, there is no waiting period to buy a handgun and no background check for second-party sales