The war over Montgomery County, Maryland’s “gun-free zones” continues, but opponents have won a key battle in their fight to exercise their Second Amendment rights. On Thursday a federal judge granted an injunction against the county’s ban on concealed carry in houses of worship, though for now his ruling applies only to the plaintiffs who sued over the prohibition. The injunction means Rabbi J. Menashe Shapiro and other members of the Silver Spring Jewish Center can now lawfully carry on the premises of the synagogue, but U.S. District Judge Deborah K. Chasanow declined to extend…
Officer Candidate School (OCS), or Officer Training School (OTS) as it is known in the Air Force, is the commissioning route generally geared toward college graduates who are entering the U.S. military outside of the military service academies, the (ROTC), or direct commissioning programs. Each branch offers its own version of this program: the Navy, Army, Marine Corps, Air Force / Space Force and Coast Guard. These programs range from 8.5 to 13 weeks and prepare candidates to lead through military training, leadership development and physical conditioning. Graduates are commissioned as officers and continue specialized training in their respective fields,…
WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Two incidents along Ukraine’s borders with Poland and Moldova this week are a preview of potential intensified Russian provocations at Ukraine’s border crossing points with Europe, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said. Two people died when Russian drones hit the Starokozache border crossing between Ukraine and Moldova on Tuesday night while a “direct threat” to a Polish-Ukrainian crossing point on Wednesday night was only avoided thanks to cooperation between Warsaw and Kyiv, Tusk said on Thursday. He gave no further details of the incident, nor did he present evidence of Russian involvement. Tusk said he received…
Suppressors are now legal for some of us, not for others, and a whole confusing mess now exists that many people want no part of. Believe me, I get it. What we’ve needed is clarification from the ATF about what’s happening. And it seems the ATF has issued an open letter to FFLs… clarifying nothing about that.But it’s still good news. The rules deal with suppressors and the repair or changing of the caliber it can fire. As it has long stood, doing any of those things was pretty much the same as making a…
Three days after the Sept. 11 attacks, Mark Olsen walked past cars piled on top of one another near the World Trade Center. Some were taxis. One of the most haunting images he recalls? Headlights still burning bright through the fog of rubble. The New Jersey Air National Guard technical sergeant had crossed the Hudson River on a state police boat that morning, carrying rolls of film and deciding for himself what to photograph. He wanted to reach Ground Zero, but he kept finding things along the way that needed to be recorded. Damaged taxis and other vehicles are piled…
A new survey of thousands of veterans finds overwhelming opposition to a controversial section of the comprehensive Take Care of America’s Veterans Act (TCAVA) that is currently stalled in Congress. Disabled American Veterans, or DAV, published a new survey on Thursday of more than 4,200 veterans, their family members, caregivers and survivors showing that while 93% indicate they want veterans’ earned benefits protected, another 71% vehemently oppose the omnibus TCAVA unless a provision known as Section 108 is rescinded. “The general finding was people were opposed to TCAVA once they learned more about it,” Jim Marszalek, executive director of DAV’s…
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“Reacher” has never pretended to be a documentary about life in the Army. Jack Reacher, played by Alan Ritchson, is a former Army major who wanders the country with almost no possessions, routinely outsmarts law enforcement and has an uncanny ability to find himself surrounded by people who need to be punched. Season 3 didn’t have a lot to do with his military background. Season 2, however, was full of little plot details that enriched the story. Based on the 2007 novel written by Lee Child, “Bad Luck and Trouble”, the season reignited Reacher with the rest of his old…
Navigating military homebuyer benefits can feel overwhelming with complex eligibility rules and changing requirements. A VA home loan offers powerful advantages like zero-down financing, lower interest rates, and no monthly private mortgage insurance, making it one of the most valuable resources for eligible service members, veterans, and surviving spouses. However, knowing whether you qualify, how entitlement works, and what properties are eligible can quickly raise crucial questions. This comprehensive FAQ guide breaks down everything you need to know, including service guidelines, divorce impact, and using your benefits multiple times, so you can confidently secure your dream home. Key Takeaways VA…
Although there are dozens of active Arleigh Burke-class guided missile destroyers in the U.S. Navy’s fleet, there’s something special about the USS Kidd. It doesn’t have any secret technology or weapons (that we know of), and its capabilities are the same as any other of its class. The standout feature that tends to capture the attention of even the most landlubberly civilian is the massive Jolly Roger that the Kidd is often seen flying from its mast. The USS Kidd’s pirate flag, the infamous skull and crossbones that hearkens back to the Golden Age of Piracy that spanned the 17th…
The Bondi Beach terrorist attack was just that, a terrorist attack. Had guns been denied these monsters, they’d have used something else. Yet because guns were denied to everyone else, the attackers had free rein to carry out their atrocity. These are simple facts. So what was the Australian government’s response?More gun control. More than that, though, they want to limit how many guns people can have, even if they’re willing to jump through all of the hoops.It seems Tasmania has better things to do.There will not be a cap on the number of guns a…
If you are seeking a job in the military or law enforcement professions, you likely will see an entrance exam that requires you to score well in sit- ups, curl- ups or crunches. All are abdominal exercises with different hand placements that test core strength and endurance and can be a challenging exercise to improve if you are not getting your repetitions in each week. Here is an email from someone who has improved in push-ups and pull-ups but needs help with the last PT element of the Air Force physical ability and stamina test (PAST) for pararescue jumpers (PJ)…
The onslaught of amicus briefs in the Viramontes case created a bonanza of solid rhetoric. One penned by attorney Daniel Schmutter takes a head-on approach to issues with flawed logic. The combined cases of Viramontes v. Cook County and Grant v. Higgins are about to upend the gun control movement’s modern approach to subverting rights. It’s not a foregone conclusion that the Roberts Supreme Court will abolish the practice of hardware bans, but it is looking pretty good. Bearing Arms has been covering the swell of amicus briefs that have been filed. A brief by acclaimed New…
ADEN, Yemen (AP) — The Iran-backed Houthi rebel group on Thursday took over Yemen’s port city of Mokha, an area vital to controlling shipping through the Red Sea, Houthi and Yemeni officials said. Mokha is about 80 kilometers (50 miles) from the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a waterway that connects the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden and through which about 12% of the world’s goods are typically shipped. The Bab el-Mandeb’s importance to global oil supplies has grown since shipping through the nearby Strait of Hormuz has been impeded by Iran during its war with the United States and…
When I first got into guns, I was one of those who suffered from the Dunning-Kruger Effect in a pretty serious way. I’m a quick learner, so I hit that point pretty quickly, but I did manage to get out of it a bit quicker than the norm. Or some would say I’ve never made it out. …Fair enough.Anyway, there were some discussions on forums in various places where the subject of revolvers as defensive guns came up, and I believed that semiautos are great and should absolutely be people’s first choice. I wasn’t afraid to…
When actor John Wayne visited American soldiers in Vietnam in the summer of 1966, he was warmly welcomed. As he spoke to groups and individuals, he was presented gifts and letters from American and South Vietnamese troops alike. This was not the case during his USO tours in 1942 and ’43. According to author Garry Wills’ 1998 book, “John Wayne’s America: the Politics of Celebrity,” the actor received a chorus of boos when he walked onto the USO stages in Australia and the Pacific Islands. Those audiences were filled with combat veterans. Wayne, in his mid-30s, was not one of…
You can’t go to the Hard Deck, the bar featured in “Top Gun: Maverick,” in real life because it doesn’t actually exist. The good news is that there’s a place both exactly like it and even better at the same time. While former naval aviator Capt. Brian Ferguson was working as a technical adviser for the production of “Top Gun: Maverick,” he decided to take the film’s director and producers to a real Navy hangout and explain the camaraderie behind sharing a drink and sea stories with other pilots. The place he took them was the I-Bar on Naval Station…
Yes, many of us want the ATF abolished. Yes, Robert Cekada is the first ATF director who doesn’t suck, at least as far as I can remember, and he’s doing a lot of good things. However, I still want him out of a job. Why?Because as good as he’s been, there’s nothing to stop the next guy in that role from not just undoing everything, but making things worse. That’s why it needs to be abolished, in my mind.Yet there are more reasons, and I saw this piece when it was shared by Lee Williams…
You can’t keep a good man down, especially when that man participated in Operation Overlord on June 6, 1944. British World War II veteran Bernard Jordan was a former Royal Navy officer who used to tell people “what he did during the war was nothing unusual, and only what many thousands of others did for their country,” according to his nursing home staff. What he did at age 89 was nothing short of extraordinary. After being denied a trip to return to Normandy for the 70th anniversary of the event with the Royal British Legion, the elderly veteran took it…
Did Texas Democrat James Talarico just have his “Beto” moment? Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke famously declared that “hell yes” he was coming for AR-15s and other semi-automatic rifles during his brief run for president in 2019. O’Rourke tried backing away from those comments during his gubernatorial campaign in 2022, but his embrace of a gun ban was one of the reasons why Greg Abbott trounced him by more than ten points that year. Texans don’t take kindly to politicians who want to stomp on their Second Amendment rights, and Talarico has made it clear that’s exactly…
