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PARIS, France (AP) -- A new law in France makes it a crime -- punishable by up to five years in prison -- for anyone who is not a professional journalist to film real-world violence and distribute the images on the Internet.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/03/08/france.violence.ap/index.html

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On the AWB:

`(J) A frame or receiver that is identical to, or based substantially on the frame or receiver of, a firearm described in any of subparagraphs (A) through (I) or (L).

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1022

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Samurai Swords to be Banned

The sale of imitation samurai swords could be banned by the end of the year, the Home Office announced today.

Importing or hiring the weapons could also be made illegal following a string of samurai sword attacks in recent years.

Breaching the ban, which is targeted at cheap imitation samurai swords rather than the more expensive genuine collectors' items made by licensed swordsmiths in Japan, would result in up to six months in jail and a £5,000 fine.

Collectors and martial arts enthusiasts owning or using genuine samurai swords would be exepmt from the ban

According to Home Office estimates, there have been at least 80 serious crimes involving the swords in England and Wales over the last four years.

One MP recently warned that they were being used by criminal gangs as the preferred weapon of choice after guns.

Last month, amphetamine addict Hugh Penrose was jailed for at least 19 years for hacking a 21-year-old woman with a samurai sword and then deliberately running her over.
In October, Bradley Moran was jailed for 17 years for murdering another man with a samurai sword following an argument in a nightclub.

It is currently legal to buy samurai swords - which are freely available at martial arts shops and on the internet - provided they are not brandished in a public place.

The Home Office now wants to ban their sale as part of a wider crackdown on knives and bladed weapons.

Carrying a samurai sword in a public place already attracts a maximum jail sentence of four years.

Vernon Coaker, the Home Office minister, said today: "Samurai sword crime is low in volume but high in profile and I recognise it can have a devastating impact.

"Banning the sale, import and hire will take more dangerous weapons out of circulation, making our streets safer.

"We recognise it is the cheap, easily-available samurai swords which are being used in crime and not the genuine, more expensive samurai swords which are of interest to collectors and martial arts enthusiasts."

"It is already illegal to have a samurai sword in a public place but I want to restrict the number of dangerous weapons in circulation to enhance community safety."

The plans are outlined in a consultation paper, Banning Offensive Weapons, published by the Home Office today.

At present there are 17 weapons, including knuckle-dusters and batons, on the Offensive Weapons Order.

The exemptions would be for groups such as the To-ken Society of Great Britain and the British Kendo Association.

Last year, Tory MP James Brokenshire (Hornchurch) said cheap samurai swords were as easy to buy "as purchasing a Lotto ticket.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/03/05/nsamurai105.xml

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You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass. - Japanese Admiral Yamamoto, 1941

When only cops have guns, it's called a "police state". - Claire Wolfe, "101 Things To Do Until The Revolution"

No free man shall ever be de-barred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain their right to keep and bear arms is as a last resort to protect themselves against tyranny in government. - Thomas Jefferson

The said constitution shall never be construed to authorize congress to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms. - Samuel Adams

The great object is that every man be armed. Everyone who is able may have a gun. - Patrick Henry

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No kingdom can be secured otherwise than by arming the people. The possession of arms is the distinction between a freeman and a slave. - "Political Disquisitions", a British republican tract of 1774-1775

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Among the many misdeeds of British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest. - Mohandas Gandhi, An Autobiography, pg 446

Both oligarch and tyrant mistrust the people, and therefore deprive them of arms. -Aristotle

Don't think of it as 'gun control', think of it as 'victim disarmament'. If we make enough laws, we can all be criminals. The possession of arms by the people is the ultimate warrant that government governs only with the consent of the governed. - Jeff Snyder

Americans need never fear their government because of the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation. - James Madison

As the Founding Fathers knew well, a government that does not trust its honest, law-abiding, taxpaying citizens with the means of self-defense is not itself worthy of trust. Laws disarming honest citizens proclaim that the government is the master, not the servant, of the people. - Jeff Snyder

Americans have the right and advantage of being armed - unlike the citizens of other countries whose governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. - James Madison, The Federalist Papers

The people of the various provinces are strictly forbidden to have in their possession any swords, short swords, bows, spears, firearms, or other types of arms. The possession of unnecessary implements makes difficult the collection of taxes and dues and tends to foment uprisings. - Toyotomi Hideyoshi, dictator of Japan, August 1588

One of the ordinary modes, by which tyrants accomplish their purposes without resistance, is, by disarming the people, and making it an offense to keep arms. - Constitutional scholar and Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, 1840

Taking my gun away because I might shoot someone is like cutting my tongue out because I might yell 'Fire!' in a crowded theater. - Peter Venetoklis

To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them. - Richard Henry Lee

...Virtually never are murderers the ordinary, law-abiding people against whom gun bans are aimed. Almost without exception, murderers are extreme aberrants with lifelong histories of crime, substance abuse, psychopathology, mental retardation and/or irrational violence against those around them, as well as other hazardous behavior, e.g., automobile and gun accidents. - Don B. Kates, writing on statistical patterns in gun crime

Every Communist must grasp the truth, 'Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.' - Mao Tse-tung, 1938, inadvertently endorsing the Second Amendment

An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life. - Robert A. Heinlein, "Beyond This Horizon", 1942

I ask, sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them. - George Mason, during Virginia's Convention to Ratify the Constitution (1788)

If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms; never, never, never! - William Pitt (1777)

The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to permit the conquered Eastern peoples to have arms. History teaches that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by doing so. - Adolph Hitler, April 11 1942.

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Firearms have been around for over 400 years, yet it is only in the last 20 years that people have begun shouting "gun control". Why then, only recently, has this become such an issue? Moreover, why are there more mass-murderers than at any other time in our known history? It is not because weapons are more powerful -- 200-year-old muzzleloaders have a much greater force-per-round than today's "assault rifles". It is not because weapons are semi- or fully-automatic -- rapid-fire weapons have been available for most of the last century. It is not due to a lack of laws -- we have more "gun control" laws than ever. It IS, however, because we have chosen to focus on "gun control" instead of crime control or "thug control." It IS because only recently has the public become complacent enough to accept, by inaction, the violence present in our society.' - Kevin Langston, Tuesday, 29 October, 1991

I represent a state where gun control is how steady you hold your rifle. - Sen. Alan Simpson

I didn't see any NRA officials killing babies in Waco... - P. J. O'Rourke

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Court strikes down D.C. handgun law

Story Highlights

• Appeals court cites Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms
• Ruling says framers didn't intend to limit gun possession to militias
• Washington's pitiful excuse for a mayor outraged, vows to take argument higher
• Supreme Court has not addressed issue in nearly 70 years

http://www.cnn.com/2007/LAW/03/09/gun.ban.ruling/index.html

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