Since it is the 4th of July why not some good old fashioned firearm news. Something is also buried in the news feed section under NRA-ILA newsflashes. The National Association of Chiefs of Police released its 17th annual survey which includes police chiefs and sheriffs. The survey included topics such as terrorism, gun control, and drug enforcement.

Here is what the survey said about gun control:

Gun Control: With regard to private citizens owning firearms for sport or self-defense, 93.6 percent of the respondents supported civilian gun-ownership rights. Ninety-six percent of the police chiefs and sheriffs believe criminals obtain firearms from illegal sources and 92.2 percent revealed they hadn't arrested anyone for violation of the so-called "waiting period" laws. When asked if citizens concealed-weapons permits would reduce violent crime, 63.1 percent said yes.

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Here's the local part of this. I live in Tulare County (Central California) and when the current sheriff, Bill Wittman, took office he had stated that he was against right to carry or any other concealed handguns by private citizenship.

However when he took the office he did the responsible thing and looked over the statistics. In Tulare county there has never been a violent crime or a crime with a handgun committed by a person who holds a concealed weapons permit. The second statistic that changed his mind was that in areas where there was a higher density of people with CCW (conceal and carry weapon) permits the crime rate for that area actually went down.

So instead of not allowing people to carry a weapon he has continued to issue CCW permits on an as needed basis. To wrap it up I don't think everyone should own a gun but I do think there are much more dangerous things than a firearm, ignorance is one of them.