Maybe it's the Guns...

It was that gun loon heaven, Switzerland, that led the drive to ban absinthe after Jean Lanfray killed his family.  Maurice Zolotow, in a 1971 article, provides this account of the murders:

"On August 28 1905, Jean Lanfray, a vineyard worker and day laborer in the little village of Commugny, Switzerland, awoke at 4.30 in the morning. He began his day with his usual eye opener: a shot of absinthe, to which he added three parts of water. Before the day was over, Lanfray would commit a series of horrible murders and, ultimately, he would bring about the downfall of a $100,000,000 industry. Lanfray was a tough, burly peasant. He weighed 180 pounds. He was almost six feet tall and was in robust health. He was a Frenchman by birth He had served his three years of military service with the Chasseurs Alpins regiment of the French Army. There he had learned two things: how to kill and how to drink absinthe.

At that time, absinthe was the best-selling before-dinner drink in much of the civilized world. It was - and is - an anise-flavored liquor of high alcoholic strength, preferably 136 proof. It is made by steeping various herbs in neutral grape spirits for eight days  and then redistilling the concoction. Among the 15 herbs in absinthe are the dried flowers and leaves of wormwood, a plant that grows about three feet high and is botanically related to our South-Western sagebrush. The German word for wormwood is Wermut, or vermouth; there are small amounts of wormwood oil in vermouth. The Latin for wormwood is Artemisia absinthium, and its oil is known as absinthol, hence the name of this elixir. For many years, a considerable number of French physicians and biologists had regarded the wormwood plant as deadly poisonous.

On what was to be a most eventful day in the history of drinking, Lanfray, 31, got dressed . He lived with his wife and two children on the second floor of a farmhouse. His parents and his brother, Paul, lived downstairs. Lanfray had a second absinthe and water. He wiped his lips. He told his wife to wax his boots while he went about his chores, as he planned to go mushroom hunting in the woods the next morning. His wife grumbled something or other. During the past year, the couple had been constantly quarreling - about money, about her in-laws, about his drinking habits.

"Don't forget to wax my boots," Lanfray repeated. "And make it good, you hear?"

He went to the barn and watered the cows and let them out into the pasture. He returned and had some coffee and bread. The children - Rose, four and a half, and Blanche, one and a half  - were still asleep. Lanfray went downstairs. He joined his father and brother. The three Lanfrays then began walking to the vineyards near the village where they were employed. En route, they passed the local auberge and Jean, a man who could not go very long without slaking his awesome thirst, went in. It was about 5:30 A.M. (a Swiss law- enforcement official, as we shall see, compiled a meticulous record of Lanfrey's alcoholic intake that fatal day) and our man had, first, a creme de menthe with water, and then a cognac and soda. He worked until noon. He had brought bread, cheese and sausage for lunch. With the food, he downed two or three glasses of chambertin . (This was not the famous Burgundian chambertin so prized by wine experts but a local homemade wine made from the district's pinot noir grapes and known in the patois as piquette.) Jean Lanfray's piquette was celebrated for being the strongest in the area. Lanfray could have paraphrased Will Rogers' famous remark about men and said that he had never met a drink he didn't like.

At three P.M., he took a wine break - two more glasses of his piquette. At 4:15, he accepted another glass of red wine offered by a neighbor. At 4:30, the day's work over, Lanfray, his father and his brother dropped into a cafe and he had a cup of black coffee laced with brandy. Later, when the police and psychiatrists delved into his behavior pattern, they found that he drank every day two to two and a half liters of vin ordinaire and two to two and a half liters of the stronger piquette - about six quarts in all. Besides this, he consumed several brandies and cordials plus one or two absinthes a day.

It was then about five P.M. Jean Lanfray and his father went home. There, they each polished off a liter of piquette. Jean's wife was in a bad mood. Besides having two small children to look after, she had to clean the house, cook the meals and help out with the farm chores. She asked her husband to milk the cows. They had a herd of 20 and sold the milk to a local creamery. Lanfray, having put in a hard day of drinking and digging, was not up to milking cows. He ordered his wife to go to hell and milk the cows herself. Then he demanded hot coffee. She put the coffeepot on the stove. She did not say anything. In those days, women who knew what was good for them didn't get sassy with their husbands. Lanfray laced the coffee with a healthy slug of marc, a powerful brandy he made himself. His wife went outside. Sometime later, she returned and said she was going to take the milk to the creamery. Her husband complained that the coffee had not been hot enough. She shrugged. Suddenly, he noticed his boots under the sink - unwaxed. He gave her a further piece of his mind. His father started to leave, not wanting any part of this family quarrel. He said goodbye to his daughter-in-law. She shrugged insolently. Lanfray fils shouted that she should behave more politely to the old man. She shrugged again. He was enraged. He began yelling. And then she yelled back.

"Shut up!" he barked.
She lost her temper: "I'd like to see you make me!"

You would, would you?" he snarled. He went and got his old Vetterli rifle, a long-barreled (33.2 inches), bolt-action repeater that took a magazine of 12 cartridges.

"Don't do anything foolish," the old man pleaded.
"You stay out of this, Poppa, unless you want trouble yourself!"

Lanfray raised his Vetterli, took aim and shot his wife in the head. She fell and died almost instantly. The old man ran out, shouting, "Au secours, secours!"  The oldest daughter ran into the room. She screamed. Jean shot her in the chest. She fell, mortally wounded. Next, he went to the cradle where little Blanche was sleeping. He killed the infant. Then he set out to take his own life. He held out the rifle and tried to aim it at his head, but it was too long. He got a string and tied it to the trigger, passed it behind the trigger bar, then held the free end of the string with one hand and the rifle by the barrel with the other hand. He was thus able to draw a bead on his own head, but he missed his brain; the bullet lodged in his lower jaw. Bleeding profusely, Lanfray tucked the corpse of his youngest girl under his arm. He went into the barn. He lay down on the ground and fell into a deep sleep, where the police found him and took him into custody. He was "dazed and incoherent," according to their account. He was taken first to the hospital in nearby Nyon, where the bullet was removed from his jaw. He fell asleep again at once. Later, he was taken to see his three victims in their coffins. Nurse Marie Blaser said that the murderer wept and moaned over and over, "It is not me who did this. Tell me, O God, please tell me that I have not done this. I loved my wife and children so much." Lanfray insisted he did not remember anything about the murders.

On September 3, 1905, a Sunday, the citizens of Commugny held a mass meeting in the schoolhouse. The villagers, horrified by the crime, learned after an autopsy on Mme. Lanfray that she was four months pregnant with a male fetus. The community had to find a scapegoat. Absinthe became that scapegoat.

At the meeting, speaker after speaker denounced the liquor. "Absinthe," declaimed the mayor, "is the principal cause of a series of bloody crimes in our country." The citizens voted to petition the local legislature to ban absinthe in their canton of Vaud. Within a few days, 82,000 people signed—including women, who did not then have the right to vote."

These days, it's pretty much accepted that Jean Lanfray only had a couple of glasses of absinthe during his binge.

OTH, he did use a gun to kill his family: not any other weapon.

More on the Swiss Shooting

Further to Laci's  post

A longtime employee opened fire at a wood-processing company in central Switzerland on Wednesday, leaving three people dead, including the assailant, in the country's second multiple-fatality shooting in two months, police said.

Still, there have been several high-profile incidents over the years, including the killing of 14 people at a city council meeting in Zug, not far from Lucerne, in 2001. And in early January, a 33-year-old man killed three women and wounded two men in a southern Swiss village.

This post is in response to the comment left by Retired Mustang to Laci's post entitled "Breaking News--Another Swiss Mass Shooting" 

"Another" one? How many were there previously?

You see, this is one of the common pro-gun tricks,  ask a seemingly legitimate question which implies that the person was lying or making things up.

As I often say, if these gun-rights folks really had a good argument they wouldn't have to resort to so many shabby tricks.

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Breaking News--Another Swiss Mass Shooting

 From the BBC

Three people have been killed and seven injured during a shooting at a factory in the town of Menznau. Shooting broke out in the canteen at the Kronospan wood processing plant at around 09:00 (08:00 GMT).

According to the Geneva-based Small Arms Survey, Switzerland ranks third in terms of gun ownership, behind the United States and Yemen. there are more domestic homicides and suicides with a firearm in Switzerland than virtually anywhere else in Europe except Finland.

Sound familiar?

The Third Man - Cuckoo Clock Speech against Democracy, Peace & Brotherly Love

Stick to William Tell and the myth of the Universal Military, the reality is mush more depressing.

Switzerland conquered?

I know the image is of William Tell, the expert marksman with the crossbow who saved Switzerland from foreign invaders, but were the Swiss ever conquered?

Yep! More than once for that matter:

The Old Swiss Confederacy had acquired a reputation of invincibility during these earlier wars, but expansion of the federation suffered a setback in 1515 with the Swiss defeat in the Battle of Marignano. This ended the so-called "heroic" epoch of Swiss history

But the Swiss didn't just fight furreners:

The success of Zwingli's Reformation in some cantons led to inter-cantonal religious conflicts in 1529 and 1531 (Wars of Kappel). It was not until more than one hundred years after these internal wars that, in 1648, under the Peace of Westphalia, European countries recognized Switzerland's independence from the Holy Roman Empire and its neutrality.

Still, that didn't stop 'em fighting each other:

During the Early Modern period of Swiss history, the growing authoritarianism of the patriciate families combined with a financial crisis in the wake of the Thirty Years' War led to the Swiss peasant war of 1653. In the background to this struggle, the conflict between Catholic and Protestant cantons persisted, erupting in further violence at the Battles of Villmergen in 1656 and 1712.

But, the ultimate humiliation occurred during the Napoleonic era.

In 1798, the revolutionary French government conquered Switzerland and imposed a new unified constitution. This centralised the government of the country and effectively abolished the cantons and Mülhausen and Valtellina valley separated from Switzerland. The new regime, known as the Helvetic Republic, was highly unpopular. It had been imposed by a foreign invading army and destroyed centuries of tradition, making Switzerland nothing more than a French satellite state. The fierce French suppression of the Nidwalden Revolt in September 1798 was an example of the oppressive presence of the French Army and the local population's resistance to the occupation.

When war broke out between France and its rivals, Russian and Austrian forces invaded Switzerland. The Swiss refused to fight alongside the French in the name of the Helvetic Republic. In 1803 Napoleon organised a meeting of the leading Swiss politicians from both sides in Paris. The result was the Act of Mediation which largely restored Swiss autonomy and introduced a Confederation of 19 cantons. Henceforth much of Swiss politics would concern balancing the cantons' tradition of self-rule with the need for a central government.

In 1815 the Congress of Vienna fully re-established Swiss independence and the European powers agreed to permanently recognise Swiss neutrality. Swiss troops still served foreign governments until 1860 when they fought in the Siege of Gaeta. The treaty also allowed Switzerland to increase its territory, with the admission of the cantons of Valais, Neuchâtel and Geneva. Switzerland's borders have not changed since.

Guess having all those guns didn't help keep the peace!

Joseph Chalmers On Switzerland

Thomas Paine's Common Sense did not go without criticism; however, Joseph Chalmers', a Maryland Tory, response has been neglected with the passage of time.

Thomas Paine, in Common Sense says:

Where there are no distinctions there can be no superiority, perfect equality affords no temptation. The republics of Europe are all (and we may say always) in peace. Holland and Switzerland are without wars, foreign or domestic; monarchical governments, it is true, are never long at rest: the crown itself is a temptation to enterprising ruffians at home; and that degree of pride and insolence ever attendant on regal authority swells into a rupture with foreign powers, in instances where a republican government, by being formed on more natural principles, would negotiate the mistake.

Interesting that Switzerland is seen as a Shangri-la without war and that modern minds have taken that belief and attributed it to them being an armed nation.

Chalmer's response:

the rugged and incult deserts of Switzerland preclude not ambition, sedition, and anarchy. Her bleak and barren mountains do not so effectually secure precarious liberty, as daily vending her sons to the adjoining nations, particularly to France, by whom the Thirteen Cantons could be subjected in as many days, did that court meditate so senseless and delusive an object. Nugatory indeed, if we confider, that France derives more substantial advantage from the present state of Switzerland, than if she exhausted herself to maintain numerous battalions to bridle the Can tons. ' A moment, let us suppose, that our author's asserverations of Holland and Switzerland are as real as delusive: his inferences do not flow from his premises; for their superior advantages do not arise from their popular government, but from circumstances of peculiar local felicity, obliging the princes of Europe to defend them from the omnipotent land force, if I may so speak, of France. After impotently attacking our sovereign and the Constitution, he contradicts the voice of all mankind, by declaring, that America " would have flourished as much, and probably much more, had no European power taken any notice of her."

Likewise, it was most likely that the advantage of having a neutral Switzerland was far more beneficial to German interests than any actual attempt at unification.

Could the "Cheese eating" French ever conquer Switzerland? Stay tuned for the next exciting post on this topic.

Swiss Nazi Sympathies

What if the real reason Hitler didn't invade Switzerland wasn't that it was well armed, but that he really didn't have any need to invade?

I tried to get Dog Gone to address the issue of Nazi symapthisers in Switzerland, but she didn't think they were that important. Unfortunately, like most of Europe, Switzerland had its fascist movement, in this case the Schweizerischer Vaterländischer Verband (Swiss Patriotic Federation or SVV, French: Fédération patriotique suisse, Italian: Federazione patriottica svizzera) was a right wing organisation influential in Swiss politics before World War II.

Wikipedia discussess the SVV:

The SVV was set up in 1918 by Dr. Eugen Bircher to oppose 'international emigration', which in effect became anti-Semitism, with the group holding The Protocols of the Elders of Zion as fact, alongside a similar work Aufklärung zur Flüchtlingsfrage (Shedding Light on the Refugee Question).[2] Bircher's position as a colonel in the Swiss Army was such that he was able to bring many high ranking officers in to the SVV, with Henri Guisan amongst those to join up.[2] Although not specifically Nazi in its outlook it did nonetheless seek to maintain cordial relations with Nazi Germany.[2]

Effectively open in its existence its membership was largely a closely guarded secret and as such the group became influential in driving government policy.[2] Its influence was such that it was the only organisation with Nazi sympathies that was not closed down by the Swiss Federal Council in 1945.[2] It was not dissolved until after it got caught up in a bribery scandal in 1948.

High-ranking officers within the Swiss Army had pro-Nazi sympathies: Such as General Henri Guisan, Colonel Arthur Fonjallaz and Colonel Eugen Bircher. General Guisan being the commander of the Swiss military.

There was a Swiss Nazi movement which was quite small, numbering only a few thousand. The party was temporarily banned in 1936 to prevent disturbances after the assassination of Landesgruppenleiter Wilhelm Gustloff of the Swiss Nazi Party by a Jewish student. Many Swiss were quite sympathetic to the racial agenda of the National Socialists. There were a variety of indigenous fascist parties in Switzerland, such as the Nationale Front and the Eidgenössische Soziale Arbeiter-Partei. Additionally, the Auslandsorganisation der NSDAP (Foreign Organization of the Nazi Party) was active in Switzerland, exploiting attitudes that were "anti-Jewish, anti-Free Mason, anti-Marxist, anti-pacifist, anti-democratic, and anti-liberal." And despite the paucity of support for the idea of joining Hitler's Reich, there were many Swiss who envisioned some kind of role for Switzerland in the Nazi New Order.

Also, Attempts by SVV to affect an Anschluss with Germany failed miserably, largely as a result of Switzerland's multicultural heritage, strong sense of national identity, and long tradition of direct democracy and civil liberties.

But, that didn't mean the Swiss were totally neutral, Donald Waters wrote a book on Swiss neutrality called "Hitler's Secret Ally". The Swiss bolstered the Nazi regime in many ways, ways that can be summarized by the following categories: border policies, opportunities for trade, and financial transactions. Behavior in all of these categories was either immoral or amoral, but Switzerland's closing of escape routes over its border is probably the most troubling. Because the Swiss feared that the appearance of "softness" with respect to its borders adjoining Nazi Germany would be an incentive for Hitler to attack (to undertake "Operation Tannenbaum"), they were highly vigilant in guarding against those attempting to cross those borders into Switzerland without the appropriate visas--in particular Jews.

Switzerland's pretend neutrality was useful to the Third Reich in that it could be used for trade and as a route for off loading its booty onto the world market. Because of the Germans' need for foreign currency and their hostility toward modern art, they were eager to dispatch impressionist and expressionist paintings to Switzerland. Perhaps the most disturbing aspect of German-Swiss art trafficking involved works looted from French Jews by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (this was a plundering unit, under the leadership of the Nazi "philosopher" Alfred Rosenberg, that stole cultural property from "enemies" of National Socialism throughout occupied Europe.

But, it was far more important that Switzerland was also Germany's banker for its stolen gold. a December 10, 1941 report from the British embassy in Washington to the U.S. Treasury Department noted that "every leading member of the governing groups in all the Axis countries have funds in Switzerland. Some have fortunes." A Nazi official responsible for foreign exchanges estimated after the war that German assets worth 15 billion Reichsmarks entered Switzerland.

So, why did Germany need to invade Switzerland when it was pretty much on the side of the Germans?

See also:

• Co-Opting Nazi Germany: Neutrality in Europe During World War II
• Switzerland's Role in World War II

Swiss Guns under attack.

Switzerland is the best analogy to what the "gun culture" should be in that both were supposed to have universal amateur militaries (i.e., a militia system), yet the US has forgotten the true purpose of the Second Amendment which was to ensure the existance of that system. The Swiss have gone through a modernisation of their military. Almost two centuries have passed since Switzerland last fought in a war, yet the country's gun ownership rate remains the highest in Europe.

The Local, Switzerland's English Newpaper, has an article about Swiss questioning of their gun culture.

Every year, more than 300 people die in Switzerland in gun-related incidents. In many ways, the figure is quite low, when one considers the country has about 2.5 million weapons in private hands — giving it the highest per capita rate of gun ownership in Europe, and the fourth highest in the world.

In the last two months of 2011, however, shots rang out with alarming frequency in a country where around 30 percent of all households keep guns and rifles in their cabinets.

In early November, a 23-year-old man killed his girlfriend using his army assault rifle in the village of Saint-Leonard. The vicious crime sparked fervent debate about the lax monitoring of repeat offenders.

After that, the tragic tales began to tumble in thick and fast: Victim shot dead by stranger at Geneva shopping centre; Young man killed in accidental shooting; Evicted tenant kills neighbour with hunting rifle.

But in a country that cherishes its centuries-old firearms tradition, gun control is a touchy subject.

“The Swiss have this romantic idea of their culture, in the sense that they have to have the means to protect their independence, and everyone is like a citizen soldier,” explains Philip Jaffé, a Geneva-based psychologist who often works with the police in forensic crime investigations.

Interestingly enough, despite the Swiss attitude toward guns, their attitude toward gun violence is drastically different from the US.

The recent spate of killings has prompted Swiss politicians to rekindle the gun debate, and a parliamentary security commission is currently working on potential changes to the law.

“Every death is one too many, and every weapon that is lying around, whether controlled or not, is a potential danger,” says Christophe Barbey, political secretary of the Group for a Switzerland without Weapons (GSoA).

“How many deaths do we need before we change things,” he asks.

Amusingly enough, unlike the US, the Swiss demonstrate a more rational attitude toward firearms.

Experts agree that a surplus of army-issue guns is the most pressing problem, and many feel they should be kept in barracks. Every adult male must complete 260 days of military service before the age of 34, during which period he keeps his pistol or assault rifle at home.

“There is no strategic necessity anymore for soldiers to keep their weapons at home”, says Barbey. “Those times are over,” he adds.

After they are discharged, soldiers are entitled to keep the weapon for the rest of their lives for a small fee. Some 1.5 million of the estimated 2.5 million weapons in the country belong to, or have belonged to, the army.

All of the experts consulted for this article say Switzerland should institute a national gun register to replace the 26 cantonal registers.

The head of the Swiss Agency for Crime Prevention, Martin Boess, also stresses the need for improved information exchange procedures between social services, police, the judiciary, and the army. This would enable the authorities “to see what kind of people are in possession of weapons.”

I find it interesting that the Swiss, who are closer to the meaning of the "right to keep and bear arms" can express these sentiments without being labelled anti-freedom.

It's not anti-freedom, it's being sensible.

Swiss Guns

Normally, the Swiss are fairly law abiding, but in this case the service rifle was owned by a man who had several previous convictions for threatening behaviour and property damage before he shot his girlfriend in the head with his army assault rifle.

The Swiss have been debating the propriety of keeping the service rifles in the home for some time. There was a referendum held earlier this year about changing the law that resulted in a rejection of proposals to change the current laws.

"If the police have any doubts about how dangerous an individual is, there must be zero tolerance,” said police inspector and Swiss National Party national councillor Yvan Perrin to newspaper Le Matin.

"It's very simple: when someone is involved in a [criminal] case, the police have to determine whether this person is fit to own a gun. Then they must communicate their decision both to justice officials and the army," he said.

Denis Froidevaux, vice president of the Swiss Association of Military Officers, expressed a similar sentiment, saying people convicted on threat charges should not be allowed to possess firearms, “even if it’s just as a precaution.” But he said the decision should be made by justice officials rather than the police.

"This case raises questions about state responsibility”, criminologist Martin Killias told the newspaper, wondering if authorities have not been “negligent.” “Switzerland is too soft when it comes to weapons,” he said.

While the militia tradition still exists in Switzerland (unlike the US) and there is a similar attitude towards their guns to the US, the attitude there is much more pragmatic:

The issue of trust is key to the debate. “The Swiss system is based on trust,” so “someone who violates the law should not be rewarded with trust and, therefore, should be deprived of his [army] weapon,” said Liberal Party national councillor Isabel Morat.

The problem for inspector Perrin is that “there is still a taboo around army weapons.” And he added: “They say that every good solider should keep one at home, but above all, it is a weapon that can kill, let’s not forget that.”

Got that? but above all, it is a weapon that can kill, let’s not forget that.

More on Swiss Guns

From the Wall Street Journal.

Switzerland in 2008 had a rate of 0.7 murders per 100,000 people, compared to 1.4 for France, 1.2 for England & Wales and 5.2 for the U.S.

Just these few statistics are enough to construct just about any kind of structure you want.  Some folks love to do that and pretend that their conclusions are the only right ones.

One thing I'll say is this, Switzerland has seven times fewer murders than the U.S., per capita, and still they're concerned about the problem.  What does that say about the pro-gun fanatics in the States who fight tooth and nail against any and every attempt to restrict guns?

What's your opinion?  Please leave a comment.

Swiss Guns in the Home

via Laci.

The Swiss government has already cast its vote, stating that things are fine the way they are.

The people’s initiative, launched by the centre-left Social Democratic Party – Sommaruga’s own party – as well as pacifist and doctors’ organisations, will be put to a nationwide vote on February 13, 2011.

What's the big deal? Why are folks trying to change a long standing tradition?

According to the committee which launched the initiative, around 2.3 million weapons are in circulation in Switzerland, of which 1.7 million are current or old army-issue rifles and pistols. It claims army weapons are responsible for around 300 deaths a year.

What's your opinion? Is there really another secret agenda? Are these folks intent on removing basic human rights from their fellows? I mean, it can't be to save the 300 lives, a number that is practically negligible compared to the total number of guns.

What's your opinion? Please leave a comment.

John Lott on the Swiss Gun Debate

John Lott published a post on the Swiss gun debate which includes a wonderful video which can be viewed here courtesy of the World Radio Switzerland site.

The main protagonist of the video is a Swiss man who explains the law in his country under which young men are required to do military service and keep their rifles at home after being discharged. He describes a moving experience he'd had while visiting one of the Jewish holocaust sites, after which he became more convinced than ever of the need for an armed citizenry in order to prevent tyrannical government actions against them. He sounded amazingly like many American gun owners, same rationale, same world view.

I wondered if in spite of the estimated 500,000 men who keep their military rifles at home, if the passionate ones, the ones who participate in the shooting event shown in the video, for example, are actually a small percentage. I think that's probably the case, just like it is in the U.S., a small but very vocal minority.

The opposing view was presented by a man active in an organization called Group for Switzerland Without an Army. He said they have studies that show the connection between the readily available firearms in Swiss homes and the acts of abuse of those firearms, referring to the 300 or so deaths per year, many by suicide. He goes on to say gun availability is not the only factor, but it is a significant one.

It is fascinating that they have the exact same discussion over there that we have here.

What I didn't understand is Professor Lott's comment, "Someone should really do some serious research on the questions raised here." Is that to say the Swiss studies are not serious? Is that to say the fact that Swiss guns in homes do far more harm that good is not as important as being prepared for fighting against the government if that becomes necessary?

What's your opinion? Is it realistic to think that armed citizens could prevent government abuse if the government really wanted to abuse? I really don't think so. I call this type of thinking, grandiose victimism. It's a fantasy in which one imagines oneself bravely fighting against overwhelming odds, perhaps winning like the fabled American colonists did against the British oppressors, but more likely losing, but going down in a wonderful blaze of glory. What's your opinion?

Please leave a comment.

Switzerland to Banish Guns from Homes

In beautiful Switzerland they're preparing for a referendum concerning the famous gun laws. Service in the militia is compulsory for men aged between 19 and 31 and in between call-ups they store their weapons at home. CNN reports.

A coalition led by the country's Social Democrat party and the Greens has collected nearly 120,000 signatures to force a national referendum on whether the weapons should be stored at military bases.

The coalition of 74 groups says the weapons are involved in too many suicides and murders in the country and tighter controls are needed.

Switzerland's armed forces consist of just a few thousand permanent full-time staff, with the rest essentially a militia.

Perhaps it would be easier to discuss this issue using another country as the backdrop. I found it very interesting that the Swiss coalition behind this initiative seems to think the availability of guns causes an increase in suicide and murder rates. I guess the Brady Campaign and I aren't the only ones singing this song. What do you think about that?

Another interesting aspect of this story is that in 2007 the law changed, banning the storage of ammunition in homes. Doesn't that beg the question of how, if there's no ammunition allowed, do so many people use these weapons to commit suicide and murder? I guess the miscreants had some ammo left over from before the 2007 law, or perhaps bullets aren't that hard to come by. What do you think?

Removal of the right of part-time soldiers to keep their weapons at home is not the end of it. The dreaded registration of all guns is what the coalition is really after.

Green lawmaker Josef Lang said more than 1.5 million unused weapons were kept in Swiss homes.

Lang said their presence "at the heart" of the population could not be justified.

He said a national register had to be created to keep track of the weapons, something police had long been seeking.

Lang said the weapons had to be "banished" from homes.

Is "banished" the same as "banned?" Maybe that's our problem in America, we're using the wrong term for what to many people is a common sense operation. Josef Lang says quite simply, keeping all those guns in homes "could not be justified."

What's your opinion? Is the Swiss move to "banish" guns from homes some sinister movement akin to treason, as David Codrea says? Do the Swiss lawmakers who are striving to make these changes motivated by anything other than what they say, to reduce suicide and murder? What do you think?

Using Heroin in Switzerland

The International Herald Tribune reports on the new Swiss law which makes their heroin program permanent. Oddly, marijuana decriminalization was denied.

The world's most comprehensive legalized heroin program has become permanent, with overwhelming approval from Swiss voters.

The heroin program, started in 1994, is offered in 23 centers across Switzerland. It has helped eliminate scenes of large groups of drug users injecting drugs openly in parks that marred Swiss cities in the 1980s and 1990s and is credited with reducing crime and improving the health and daily lives of addicts.

Sixty-eight percent of the 2.26 million Swiss voters casting ballots Sunday approved making the heroin program permanent.

By contrast, around 63.2 percent of voters voted against the marijuana proposal, which was based on a separate citizens' initiative to decriminalize the consumption of marijuana and growing the plant for personal use.

The article explains that 1,300 addicts who have been approved for the program can visit one of the centers twice a day to receive the carefully measured dose of heroin produced by a government-approved laboratory.

Doesn't that defeat the purpose of being an addict? I mean, what addict would be satisfied with a "carefully measured dose?" This makes me seriously doubt the government's claims that crime has diminished as a result of the program. I would expect these 1,300 for the most part to take the government handout and augment it in their usual way, hustling, dealing, committing crimes. What do you think?

At the same time, a law to decriminalize marijuana was denied. To me, the Swiss have got it backwards. The laws to decriminalize really do some good in my opinion.

So how do we figure these Swiss? I'm a little bit baffled. Isn't Switzerland the place where many people are armed? Isn't it there where bearing arms is more than a right; it's a requirement? So why do they have such a crime problem that needs to be addressed with this heroin program? Wouldn't the armed citizenry have long ago put an end to the problem?

What do you think?