The Washington Times reports that some veterans are getting letters from the VA offering free gun locks if the veterans will tell them how many guns they have in their home;
“As your partner in healthcare, we are committed to keeping you and your family safe,” states the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Times. “Gun locks have been shown to greatly reduce death and injury caused by firearms in the home. If you own a gun, we hope you will request and use a gun lock.”
The letter said agency officials “hope to reach all our veterans with this offer.” The VA said it will mail the locks to the address provided by a veteran.
One veteran who received the letter said it raises concerns about “a gun registry in disguise.”
I haven’t received any of these letters so I’m thinking that it’s a regional thing, if it exists at all. A few months ago someone started a rumor about VA doctors taking guns from vets. I did everything I could do to get my doctors to ask me about my own guns to see if it was true, none of them took the bait, so I have some doubts that this is a national occurrence.
But, thanks to reader Ohio for the link.
Dear VA Pointynoses:
Thanks for the gun lock offer.
I don’t think I need one, as I rent a gun when I go to the shooting range, and my crossbow is only loaded when I go hunting. And anyway, I keep it in a locker at the hunting club.
Usually, I hunt with my camera, but that’s just me.
Do you guys like pheasant or venison?
Ta-ta, and keep your shoelaces tied.
Ex-PH2
Actually, I like the both of them, Ted Nugent is right, ANIMALS ARE DELICIOUS, and dinner DOES taste better when you’ve caught it or shot it yourself!!
When I get to be a better shot, I hope to have a freezer full of pheasant. It tastes like chicken. The hunting club raises and releases pheasant, ducks and quali.
Did I show you guys my (found) stone arrowheads? Amazing handwork.
aggh! ‘quali’ s/b ‘quail’. My bad.
Ex – I just smoked a couple of pheasants this past weekend.
Yummmmmmmmmmmy !!
OC
Don’t inhale.
I’m a Vet with guns who happens to work for the VA. I ask Vets all the time if they have guns and want a free gun lock. I use them myself! Some people are just paranoid so they should have thought twice about sending out a letter, I suppose.
Truth is: we have a ton of free gun locks and want to give them out. It’s part of the Suicide Prevention programs and if I ever thought it had anything to do with “a gun registry in disguise” I would raise a flag.
Vets always want more free stuff. Here’s more free stuff and some will still complain.
I work at the VA as well, and have never heard of this letter. However, I do know that our VA Police Office does offer free gun locks to those with a license to own guns.
It probably wasn’t a good idea to send a letter given the population it was being sent to. Some will always believe there are hidden motives. It must just be a regional thing.
I work in mental health and we have boxes of these locks laying around. We don’t record who we give them to though.
A license to own guns? I would guess you are in MA, or IL, or one of them type place. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Why do people need guns anyway? Someone just winds up getting hurt.
Sara, you hit the nail on the head there… I think we should ban sharb knives also. I have accidentaly cut myself far more than I ever even came close to shooting myself by accident.(which is never), but those knives vicsiously attacked me with no provocation!!
Paper. Need to ban that too. Have you ever had a paper cut on your finger? Hurts like a SOB!
If it would save just one finger!
Ed – I trust your word, but don’t trust the bureaucracy that you work in and for. Why? Because it’s the government.
I have handguns, rifles and shotguns and I’m being treated by the VA for the last several years for PTSD….this includes medications and psychotherapy.
If you’ve read the article posted here: https://www.azuse.cloud/?p=57466 you’ll understand why I feel like I do.
Let me apologize to Jonn and those of you that read and post here regularly, since the name and email address I used to log-in are fictitious (for anonymity) in case some do-gooder from the government reads my comment wanted to try to have my weapons removed from my home. Who knows what these SOB’s would do!
I don’t think I’m being paranoid, but living in New York causes one to exercise a bit more caution than if living in, say, Montana.
EdUSMCLeg: free gun locks? Nothing to worry about. Our government is completely trustworthy, never breaks its promises, and never exhibits instances of abuse of power by those in charge. They’d never use this as an excuse to start a list of who does and doesn’t have weapons.
Yes, I’m being sarcastic. But I’m only saying the same thing that anyone who’s served a day in the military is thinking right about now. We all know firsthand just how trustworthy government at all levels can be.
EdU – another term for them is “lock up your safety”.
When you have seconds to get your piece it’ll take minutes to unlock it.
OC
Hmmm. Would simply respond, “Why thank you, but I need no locks.” They might follow up with another question or two in an attempt to clarify, by the non-committal responses would continue.
Were I someone whose application was still in the system but needed VA bennies, this would infuriate me. If it’s true, it still honks me off that they would spend time on this instead of doing their jobs.
I’ve seen the same thing at a BATF table at a gun show, they were giving free gun locks away as well. I got myself a few, they come in very handy for securing toolboxes as well!!
I’ve seen a few use them for bike locks. I give them away to Vets all the time.
I have one on my shed.
Maybe they have a secret high powered antannae in them to act as a locator beacon for “The Day of Gun Round Up”.
Since the out front gun registry/confiscation hasn’t worked out for the anti-gunners, they are putting pressure on the AMA/CDC/HMOs to list guns as a healthcare issue and back door it by having them do the heavy lifting and bypassing congress. I have read several news stories over the last few days that show exactly that, so it wouldn’t surprise me if this started to become a trend with the VA, given the new Surgeon General’s own statements on guns, we can expect it to become national.
Standard physical.
Was asked if I owned firearms.
Michigan.
VA is shady as fuck.
See. I knew the letter has to originate in Michigan. It’s so that the County Veteran’s Affairs Directors don’t get their asses shot off while shaking down widows three weeks after their veteran husbands have passed away.
Made a liar out of me when I was asked that question some years ago. It was a private M.D. who readily saw my disgust and disdain when he posed the question. He quickly offered that it was the law. I don’t live in that place any longer.
I just told them it was none of their business.
Up here in Vermont our VA just left the box of locks on a table so help yourself. I took five of them to work with me and had fun doing a full lockdown for coworkers. Fun things like locking lunch boxes to walls, and locking coats to coat racks before lunch time.
P.S Screw HR
Dear VA –
Eat a dick.
Love and kisses,
Me
hahahahaha I think I love you Nicki *grin*
Although I’m tempted, if I ever receive such a letter, to tell them a large random number … like 5831 … just to see if they’ll send me that many gun-locks.
LOL! I was asked in my psych interview for my job whether I owned a gun.
My reply was, “A gun?”
The shrink looked at me blankly. He had no sense of humor. I started listing the handguns, and he just waved at me and said, “OK, I get it.”
Here in MN, a few years ago they did something similar only the wording was do you fell threatened or some such shite. The nurse asked me and I looked at her and said “Well I AM married”.
They never asked me again.
OC
I wonder what would happen if a gun dealer got that letter . . . and answered, truthfully, based on his shop’s current inventory. (smile)
Yeah, no.
Nunya.
You know, as I think about it, if they are just being given away that’s one thing. I’m more than okay with that.
Asking me to fill out paperwork to get them is what puts it over the line for me.
A better way to have handled it would be send a letter indicating locks are available and can be picked at local or satellite locations.
No questions asked.
I live in PA and I got one of these letters about a year or so ago…I’ll have to see if I can find the pictures I took of that letter.
As for Me??? I own no guns, I lost all of them in a tragic boating accident off the coast of NJ about 13 miles offshore…..
Geeez, sorry to hear of this accident. Around here there are plenty of tales about weapons that fell into Lake Erie and washed over the Falls. A tragedy. Although I have been asked the gun question several times at the VA and there is a gun registry in New York State. Coumo is famous for saying “you don’t need ten bullets to kill a deeah”. I feel safer already.
I know of a certified PADI Rescue Diver. He has a high sex drive.
But… can he snarf down a 7 pound block of cheese in one sitting???
Anyone truly concerned about this, should simply remember this. The VA, the agency that cannot even resolve a simple dependents claim in 2 years time, is not going to be able to orchestrate a gun grab…or even execute one for another agency.
This was a local initiative to provide gun locks, only by the head of the Philadelphia VA.
Thanks for the clarification–and your first paragraph is a gem of truth.
Can you say, “Mongolian Cluster Fuck”?
I knew you could
BTW – No Mongolians or fucks were harmed in the making of that statement 🙂
Dear VA,
I have about 500 firearms.
Please send them before the next gun show, as I have a table where I plan to sell “stuff” for $1 each to fund a new gun purchase.
Thanks!
Several questions occurred to me.
1 – Will they work on bicycles and steering wheels in cars?
2 – Will it keep the cat out of the drawer where the cat cookies are hidden?
3 – Can they be used on members of the Idiot Dutch Rudder Gang, individually or as a group?
1 – Bicycles, yes. Steering wheels, no.
2 – No, because cats are shady as frak and pay no attention to Earthly blocks like doors and locks.
3 – It all depends on the type of chain used and the depth it will be submerged to.
If you collect enough, you can make a daisy chain and decorate your Christams tree next year with it!
The VA is a joke.
All the more reason to just fork over the cash to buy your own.
Last I checked, gun shops aren’t required to do a background check on a person buying a lock. YET.
Dear Veteran-
Due to overwhelming demand, we here at your local VA are having to rescind our offer of free gun locks.
We offered them to a Vet at Castle AAArrgh, and he emptied a 3-state supply. Texas took all the rest.
Your Friends at the VA
DHS follows up:
Dear Citizen,
As you may know, we are dedicated to protecting the Homeland from the threat of right-wing radical extremists. Please contact us if you have any information re friends or relatives who
1) speak poorly of Our Dear Leader
2) harbor any anti-Establishment sentiments
3) or, ya know, anything creepy-right-wing in general
If you act TODAY! we will mail you a free brownshirt and armband.
Your friends at DHS.
Dear Fen:
Please tell DHS and the VA to stop making pretend telemarketing calls to my phone. I don’t answer strange numbers, anyway, but I do keep a running tally on how many times they call me, ’cause the numbers show up on my phone bill.
And when you speak to them, please tell them I said ‘go pound sand’. You can quote me on that.
Thanks!
Ex-PH2
FWIW, the VA head shrinker tried to get me to tell her how many guns, what kind and where in my house they were located during my initial OIF/OEF “screening” (think SRP). When I refused to answer, she tried to ask the same questions differently or out of sequence, each time I became more and more agitated. Reminded me of the “R” portion of SERE.
I eventually broke contact and moved to the next station. She accused me of having anger issues stemming from a deployment related trauma (no sh*t there I was, the DFAC ran out of fresh pineapple! it was devastating!) and tried to hand me an antidepressant script as I walked past her office later in the day.
After being called “non-compliant” and having them threaten to not treat my back injury (in hindsight, this would have been preferable to the non-treatment they ended up giving me) because I didn’t get the mental health signature on my in-processing sheet, I returned. Upon further questioning, I made up an absurdly high number purely for shock value. She didn’t even bat an eye. This was, after all, Arkansas.
Take as many as the VA will give you and sell them on Ebay.
I got one in the mail on…Friday or Saturday. They were offering up to 4 free locks in my letter.