May 2007 — "FIREARMS AND FREEDOM: Why the Second Amendment is more important than ever"
Although the constitutional "right to keep and bear arms" is often ridiculed as an archaic relic from America's past, the May 2007 issue of WND's acclaimed Whistleblower magazine shows why private gun ownership is actually more crucial to Americans' freedom and security today than at any time in history.
Titled "FIREARMS AND FREEDOM: Why the Second Amendment is more important than ever," this eye-opening and spine-straightening Whistleblower edition documents how the contentious issue of gun rights — considered by many to be the linchpin of all Americans' rights — is dramatically coming to a head:
- The string of horrendous mass murders in "gun-free zones" — at Virginia Tech, and before that the slaughter of Amish schoolgirls in rural Pennsylvania as well as similar massacres at other schools around the nation — has fueled a furious debate over gun control, "gun-free zones" and "lax gun laws."
- Just like the Virginia Tech massacre, most violent crimes cannot be stopped by police, but only by citizens present during the commission of the crime. And research now shows conclusively that armed, law-abiding citizens have a huge impact on deterring and stopping violent criminal acts.
- Meanwhile, with terror attacks up 25 percent worldwide in a year and top U.S. leaders confirming that major, devastating attacks on innocent Americans are inevitable, the armed and observant citizen is now absolutely essential for protecting America's communities from terror attacks.
- Alongside the increased focus on private gun ownership, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., has ruled that the decades-old handgun ban in the nation's capital is unconstitutional and a direct violation of the Second Amendment. That case, in turn, has set the Second Amendment on a direct course to the United States Supreme Court, which has largely avoided the gun issue for decades.
"FIREARMS AND FREEDOM" digs up and reports all the amazing and little-known developments in this debate — and then cuts to the core issues in a powerful and compelling way.
"Only one thing could have stopped the Virginia Tech disaster," says WND managing editor David Kupelian. "Imagine Cho Seung-Hui walking into a classroom, threatening people with his guns, making them line up, preparing to shoot them. Now freeze-frame that scene and think for a moment: There isn't anyone or anything in this world that could have stopped Cho in his tracks at that point and averted the hellish slaughter that followed — except a single student or professor with a firearm, trained to use it effectively and responsibly."
Indeed, this special issue of Whistleblower concludes that a radical re-embrace of the Second Amendment by law-abiding, responsible Americans is exactly what America needs right now.
"After all," said Kupelian, "the next mass attacker might not be armed with a couple of handguns like Cho, but rather, with weapons of mass destruction."
Can individuals really make a difference? What about the police? "In many huge cases — like the Beltway snipers that terrorized Washington, D.C., in 2002 — it's private citizens, not the police, that bring the case to an end," Kupelian said.
But what about the #1 reason America's founders included the right to keep and bear arms in the Bill of Rights — namely, to restrain government? In this modern era, how can private gun ownership have any effect at all on America's vastly bloated government?
"If government realizes there are hundreds of millions of guns in lawful hands throughout the nation," said WND editor Joseph Farah, "you better believe that realization will invisibly restrain government. If you don't like our government now, you don't ever want to find out how bad it would be if the American population were completely disarmed."
"This issue of Whistleblower is about a rebirth of the American spirit," added Kupelian. "It's about responsibility and self-control. It's about reverence and courage and sacrifice. It's about the right and duty to keep and bear arms, because each of us has the right, and the responsibility, to defend ourselves and others from evil."
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