Since “Christian nation” propagandist David Barton’s book about Thomas Jefferson has been debunked, it seems the Texas-based “historian” has set his sights on a new cause: defending the Second Amendment. But just like Barton’s assertions about Jefferson, his latest claims reek of fiction.

Back in January, Barton was on Glenn Beck’s radio show. The conversation focused on guns, and Barton told three stories that range from very difficult to believe to patently false in his attempt to defend gun ownership.

First, Barton claimed that the National Rifle Association (NRA) was founded, in part, to arm freed slaves so they could defend themselves against the KKK.

Warren Throckmorton, a professor at conservative Grove City College in Pennsylvania who has exposed Barton before, was quick to question that assertion. Throckmorton pointed out that the NRA’s own website makes no mention of former slaves or the Klan. Instead, it says the group was founded mainly to “‘promote and encourage rifle shooting on a scientific basis.’”

https://www.au.org/blogs/wall-of-separation/very-old-barton-christian-nation-propagandist-channels-louis-l-amour-s

Alaska, Louisiana, Montana, Alabama, and Wyoming Have Highest Gun Death Rates

Washington, DC--States with higher gun ownership rates and weak gun laws have the highest rates of gun death according to a new analysis by the Violence Policy Center (VPC) of 2010 national data (the most recent available) from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.

The analysis reveals that the five states with the highest per capita gun death rates were Alaska, Louisiana, Montana, Alabama, and Wyoming. Each of these states had a per capita gun death rate far exceeding the national per capita gun death rate for the 50 states of 10.25 per 100,000 for 2010. Each state has lax gun laws and higher gun ownership rates. By contrast, states with strong gun laws and low rates of gun ownership had far lower rates of firearm-related death. Ranking last in the nation for gun death was Hawaii, followed by Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, and New York. (See rankings below for top and bottom five states. See http://www.vpc.org/fadeathchart13.htm for a ranking of all 50 states.)

http://www.vpc.org/press/1302gundeath.htm

ROYAL OAK — Target Sports is no longer selling a shooting target that depicts a skeleton with a long beard wearing a turban and robe and carrying an AK-47.

The director of a Muslim civil rights groups said he confronted the store owner after he learned about the product in a complaint from a constituent.

“I decided to pay the shop a visit and I saw the target on a wall and purchased two copies,” said Dawud Walid, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) of Michigan.

Walid said he then introduced himself to the owner, Ray Jihad, and talked about how the target could incite violence.

http://www.macombdaily.com/article/20130208/NEWS01/130209581/royal-oak-gun-shop-halts-sale-of-muslim-targets

LANSDOWNE, Va. -- Even as she acknowledged that passing a new assault weapons ban would be a challenge, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-San Francisco) called on Congress to consider the “boldest possible package” to reduce gun violence in the “small window” that has opened for action.

An assault weapons ban was one of 15 proposals in a plan issued Thursday by a Gun Violence Prevention Task Force led by Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), which mirrored a similar report from a White House panel led by Vice President Joe Biden.

The Democratic leader, speaking to reporters during a House Democratic issues conference at a golf resort outside Washington, said she endorsed each of the principles of the report. When pressed specifically on the assault weapons ban, she questioned the “justification” for such a weapon.

“I think we have to try to have the boldest possible package that reduces gun violence. And I don’t think we should try to find the slowest route right now. I think we should move as boldly as possible and see where we come out, rather than throwing in the towel on something that has no justification,” she said.

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-pelosi-boldest-possible-gun-legislation-20130207,0,6085487.story

SACRAMENTO, Calif. Weeks after New York enacted the nation's toughest gun laws, California lawmakers said Thursday they want their state to do even more in response to recent mass shootings, particularly the Connecticut school massacre.

Democrats who control the state Legislature revealed 10 proposals that they said would make California the most restrictive state for possessing firearms.

They were joined at a Capitol news conference by San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, along with several police chiefs.

"California has always been a leader on the issue of gun safety," Villaraigosa said. "New York has stepped up and stepped forward. California needs to answer the call."

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57568322/calif-lawmakers-seek-toughest-gun-laws-in-nation/

PHILADELPHIA — In a darkened classroom, 15 eighth graders gasped as a photograph appeared on the screen in front of them. It showed a dead man whose jaw had been destroyed by a shotgun blast, leaving the lower half of his face a shapeless, bloody mess.

Next came a picture of the bullet-perforated legs of someone who had been shot with an AK-47 assault rifle, and then one of the bloated abdomen of a gunshot victim with internal injuries so grievous that the patient had to be fitted with a colostomy bag to replace intestines that can no longer function normally.

These are among about 500 gunshot victims who are treated each year at Temple University Hospital, an institution in the heart of impoverished, crime-ridden North Philadelphia. While President Obama and Congressional leaders debate legislation intended to prevent mass killings like the elementary school shooting in Newtown, Conn., the hospital is trying to slow the rate of street killings by helping teenagers understand the realities of gun violence.

The unusual program, called Cradle to Grave, brings in youths from across Philadelphia in the hope that an unflinching look at the effects that guns have in their community will deter young people from reaching for a gun to settle personal scores, and will help them recognize that gun violence is not the glamorous business sometimes depicted in television shows and rap music.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/07/us/07philly.html?hpw&_r=0

The moment that most deserves to be remembered from Sunday's thrilling Super Bowl came before the game, when Jennifer Hudson joined students from Sandy Hook Elementary School in singing “America the Beautiful.”

It was a heart-rending elegy for the fallen — and a stirring call to action.

The brave students, in khakis and white polo shirts, survived the unspeakable massacre in Newtown, Conn., that left 20 of their schoolmates dead, riddled with bullets from an assault rifle fired by a madman. Hudson, the acclaimed recording artist and Oscar-winning actress, lost her mother, brother and nephew to Chicago's endemic gun violence in 2008 when a troubled relative went on a murderous rampage; she had to identify all three bodies at the morgue.

The performance brought tears to the eyes of some of the players — and, surely, many television viewers. It was a reminder that life goes on, but also that we must not lose sight of unfinished business: reducing the awful toll that barely regulated, insufficiently monitored commerce in powerful weapons takes on innocent victims, day after day after day.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/commentary/article/Pro-gun-lobby-overplaying-hand-4253505.php#ixzz2KDHqABSK

As President Obama stakes out a gun safety position previously held by Ronald Reagan, and endorsed as constitutional by Antonin Scalia, today's loudest conservative voices are comparing the Reagan/Scalia/Obama position to Hitler and threatening responses that go as far as impeachment, nullification, violent resistance and secession. It's all rather head-spinning, to say the least.

But the elite US media treats it as perfectly normal. And in one sense they're right: for decades now, it's been the norm for conservatives to switch gears and reinvent themselves in crazy ways, rather than deal soberly with the policy failures their previous lock-step thinking has created.

The Tea Party brand of so-called "constitutional conservatism" was born out of the ashes of the George W Bush brand of so-called "compassionate conservatism", which in turn was born out of the ashes of the Newt Gingrich/Dick Armey brand of "impeach Clinton conservatism", which in turn was born out of the ashes of... well, you get the idea.

For a political philosophy that supposedly worships eternal values, hallowed traditions and continuity, rather than abrupt change, conservatism of late seems to tear through costume changes like a drag queen on steroids.

http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/02/20132371127714836.html

ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - Congress is considering ways to toughen the penalties for people who help convicted felons get guns by lying on their paperwork.

Trista Frederick is a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. She says in St. Louis, many of the guns which end up in the hands of felons committing crimes on the street were purchased illegally by “straw parties” who claimed the gun they were purchasing was for themselves.

“Straw purchasing is a significant problem in the St. Louis area and is a major contributing factor to the cycle of violence that occurs in St. Louis,” Frederick said. “Unfortunately, we can’t say with any accuracy the number of firearms that are straw purchased because the violations often go undetected by law enforcement and the industry. It’s often not until a firearm is used in a crime that the straw purchase is discovered.

Both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives are considering plans to raise the penalty for straw purchasing a gun from the current ten years in prison to thirty.

http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2013/02/06/straw-purchases-contributing-to-st-louis-gun-violence/

AUGUSTA — A new coalition is backing legislation that would require background checks for private gun sales, ban high-capacity magazines and prevent people who are seriously mentally ill from buying guns.

The group, “Coalition for a Safer Maine – No More Newtowns!," was launched today at a State House press conference.

Former Lewiston Mayor Larry Gilbert, and former U.S. Attorney Paula Silsby are serving as co-chairs. Others include South Portland Police Chief Ed Googins, and Robert McAfee, a retired surgeon and past president of the Maine Medical Association and the American Medical Association.

The Maine Council of Churches and the Maine Citizens Against Handgun Violence has also joined the group.

http://www.kjonline.com/news/Maine-coalition-to-back-laws-limiting-gun-violence.html