U.S. Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Muskogee, told a Tulsa radio station that he is working with some Senate Democrats on legislation that would require background checks for people buying a gun — the idea being to keep weapons out of the hands of convicted criminals and the mentally ill. That news, of course, has excited the easily […]
firearms
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Bearing arms
Credit: Shannon Cornman But that wasn’t all. Miles Hall, owner of H&H Shooting Sports Complex in Oklahoma City, said public demand for firearms, ammunition and gun safes came quickly following the news. The rush to buy guns was partly provoked by comments from President Barack Obama, who hinted at renewed guncontrol policies at a Dec. […]
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Gun crazy
Credit: Brad Gregg Got to run by the grocery store for eggs and toilet paper? Bring that .45! Ordering a no-fat mocha frappuccino? Do it with a .44! After enduring an obscenely long period of anti-Second Amendment fascism in our fair state, the estimated 141,000 Oklahomans with a concealed-carry permit can now breathe easy and […]
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LETTERS
Oklahoma Gazette provides an open forum for the discussion of all points of view in its Letters to the Editor section. The Gazette reserves the right to edit letters for length and clarity. Letters can be mailed, faxed, emailed to pbacharach@okgazette. com or sent online at okgazette.com, but include a city of residence and contact […]
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LETTERS
Oklahoma Gazette provides an open forum for the discussion of all points of view in its Letters to the Editor section. The Gazette reserves the right to edit letters for length and clarity. Letters can be mailed, faxed, emailed to pbacharach@okgazette. com or sent online at okgazette.com, but include a city of residence and contact […]
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Bad traffic
Zule Farms in Lexington Credit: Mark Hancock The evidence that Mexican drug cartels are doing business in Oklahoma appears overwhelming, and while the state has not seen levels of cartel-fueled violence even close to that occurring in Mexico, the Sooner State does play an unfortunate role in the madness. Situated almost squarely in the middle […]
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Open carry is an embarrassment
Robin Meyers In almost every column I wrote, there was a singular refrain: Beware the triumph of the Christian right in the halls of power. Beware the lawmaker whose intolerance masquerades as faith, and whose fundamental distrust of women creates laws designed to shame them rather than to protect them. Don’t say that you weren’t […]
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Lines of fire
Bryan Wells Mark Hancock One allows residents of states that don’t require permits for concealed handguns to keep their arms in Oklahoma. Another alters the Oklahoma Riot Control and Prevention Act to prohibit state officials from seizing guns during a state of emergency. But the biggest and most talked-about gun bill will allow license-holders to […]
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Careful where you point that
With no means of immediately identifying at a distance whether a person has a valid concealed carry permit (authorizing an open carry), anyone can open carry without being questioned. So how long before criminals become audacious enough to wear their firearms openly? From a legal standpoint, there are almost no circumstances where a private citizen […]
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Locked, loaded and legal
Jerome Ersland, before his life sentence for a shooting death Mark Hancock There are nearly 125,000 active concealed-weapons licenses in the state, 24,018 of which were approved last year. Gun legislation is ever-present. The most prominent such bill from the current session would allow people with a concealed weapon license to carry their guns openly. […]