Pro-Gun Means Proactive - Browning gun safes

Browning gun safes

Project Homesafe works wonders, though some gun owners just don't get it.

By Tom Gresham

Can someone tell me why there is a small but highly vocal opposition among gun owners to giving away firearms safety kits? Project Homesafe is the brainchild of the National Shooting Sports Foundation. It works like this: A big, brightly painted truck rolls into town with a lot of media hoopla. The mayor, police chief or even the state attorney general shows up, and the firearms safety kits are given out for free. The kits contain basic gun-safety info, along with a cable lock. This lock can be used on most types of guns.

A small gaggle of Internet grumps sees this as some sort of conspiracy to require them to lock up their guns. One wonders if they have bothered to review the material being distributed. If you want to see it yourself, visit projecthomesafe.org on the Internet.

What's behind Project Homesafe? Flashback to three years ago when cities were filing suit against gunmakers in a highly orchestrated (by Handgun Control, now the Brady Campaign) assault designed to cripple or destroy the firearms industry.



Mayors of cities were being pressured to "do something." HCI and its cronies thought the gun companies would settle, like the tobacco companies did. They figured wrong because gun companies have done nothing wrong. The firearms industry saw a way to continue its century-old practice of distributing gun safety information and combine that with a program that gives the mayors a way to "do something" that actually helps reduce firearms accidents.

I have long held that the battle for gun rights will not be won or lost in Congress but in the supermarket, the PTA meeting, the Little League bleachers and anywhere the public gathers. The public, based on its impression and opinion of gun owners and the firearms industry, will eventually decide our future.

We have a choice to make. We can be seen as simply shouting "No, No, No!" to every offer to "do something" about firearms accidents, or we can get in front of the issue, take ownership of the solution, actually do something worthwhile and get credit for being the responsible parties we have always been.

Project Homesafe simply says that you should practice safe gun handling and safe gun storage. Each gun owner has to analyze his situation and decide what is appropriate. Certainly, if there is a need for a personal-security firearm to be available quickly, you'll want to keep it with you or have it stored where you can get it when needed. That doesn't remove the obligation to keep it out of unauthorized hands. Any of several quick-opening gun boxes or safes will work.

Project Homesafe must be a good thing because the gun control forces absolutely hate it. They hate that the media likes the program and that we gun owners get favorable publicity for putting millions of dollars into this gun safety program, and they hate it because they know Project Homesafe vividly exposes the fact that the gun-control groups have no firearms safety programs.

The Truth Hurts Unfortunately, gun owners do dumb things. One report included a handgun discharging in a home when it was "hidden" in a stove, forgotten, and then the stove was turned on. Several news reports show gun owners chasing crooks down the street, shooting at them, only to be arrested. One more time: Shoot only in self-defense. When the threat is gone (the bad guy gives up or runs away), you no longer have legal justification to shoot. Let it go. Call the police.

You can be, and some have been, charged and convicted of a felony if you misuse your gun this way. A felony conviction means you can no longer own guns.