Customer Reviews

Handguns and Freedom: ...Their Care and Maintenance

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4 star:		(1)
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Joe Pierre has put together a good overview of important issues relating to handguns. Ranging from tips in picking the right gun to shooting pointers to a brief discussion of gun control issues, the work summarizes several topics without delving to deeply into any. The book even includes a glossary of gun terms which novice and moderate users should find beneficial.

The book's usefulness will depend greatly upon various readers' needs. Those new to gun ownership will find it easy-to-read and readily understandable. Those with some, but not much experience will likely pick up a couple of bits of helpful information, but may find a more detailed treatise on a specialized subject more advantageous. Little will be gleaned by the experienced shooter for whom this book is obviously not intended.

A curious appendix features several liberty-themed quotes. Many are extracted from antiquity. If you're a quote collector (like me) you'll find this section a delightful bonus. Otherwise it may be seen as extraneous and desultory.

An unanticipated lagniappe is a series of drawings the appear throughout the pages--all were done by Mr. Pierre himself.

At less than 150 pages Mr. Pierre's works accomplishes what he seems to have set out to achieve. He's created a readable synopsis of an salient handgun-related topics. While no aspect of handguns is painstakingly appraised here, this volume provides a very good first step for anyone wishing to explore the intriguing and at times controversial subject of handguns and their correlation to personal freedom

Unlike a number of purely academic works where the author becomes preoccupied with a narrow slice of dry legal or statistical support for gun ownership, Joe Pierre provides a positive professional, technical and cultural overview of firearms use and ownership. There are chapters that define the dynamics of the current gun ownership debate, there are also very practical passages covering firearm selection, pros and cons of various designs, right to self defense, Constitutional assurances, and even basic firearm maintenance.

While the book draws heavily on the author's personal experience and exposures, there is a good deal of reference material that I found enlightening, such as Senator Thomas Dodd's interpretation and subsequent use, of the Nazi Weapons Law as his basis for the Gun Control Act of 1968. Joe Pierre did a great job of offering a life time accumulation of firearm related knowledge in a form that could be shared by the rest of us. A valuable effort on the part of the author and greatly appreciated.

Finally, a book with a reasoned regard for the second amendment. Joe Pierre fills this slim volume with an encyclopedia of experience and practical information on handguns. Mr. Pierre not only provides photos and detailed descriptions in clear, conversational language, he makes a persistently logical and appealing argument for responsible gun ownership.

For years, my husband has urged me to carry a handgun and to keep guns in our home 'for protection.' For years, I acquiesced but with the fear that I would be harmed by my own weapon. If ignorance is at the heart of fear, then Joe Pierre has taken me lightyears into the arena of comfort with gun ownership, for myself and for any responsible owner. I stress responsible, as does Mr. Pierre. He repeatedly, but with engaging wit and illustrations, emphasizes the obligations of safety and care in handling a personal weapon.

I found this book to be surprisingly convincing in its informative and personable dialogue with the reader. It is also a magnificent reference to the Bill of Rights, and an inspiring motive to citizenship. There should be a place for this tiny little text, packed with common sense, clear explanations, and great humor, in the social studies curriculum of all high school students. It offers a worthy sanctuary of readable, useful, and objective information against shifting politics and unreliable media content that forms so much of our cultural backdrop.

Handguns And Freedom by Joe Pierre is both a practical guide to selecting a handgun for self-defense (and using it responsibly), and a sharply announced wake-up-call arguing persuasively for the importance of preserving the second amendment and taking a stand against overzealous gun control efforts. An astutely written and passionate combination of basic primer and heartfelt oratory, Handguns And Freedom is very highly recommended reading for all gun owners and gun policy advocates.

When I purchased my first firearm some years ago, I knew virtually nothing about guns, or how to handle them. I didn't even know the basics, the cardinal rules of gun safety, and when I went to apply for my pistol permit at the Sheriff's office, they had no idea, either, where I could go for basic firearm instruction. All I knew (and fortunately I knew THAT much) was that you don't point guns at people, and you keep your finger off the trigger until you are ready to shoot.

Joe Pierre's "Handguns and Freedom: Their Care and Maintenance" would have been an excellent book for me to own back then, before I purchased my first gun, and, indeed, it is an excellent book for me to own now. The book's focus is split, as the title suggests, between practical handgun selection and shooting, and the politics of gun ownership and gun control.

For a novice handgunner, the shooting instruction will prove invaluable. I've been target shooting for a number of years, not many, but enough to be familiar with and comfortable shooting handguns. Recently, though, I noticed my aim drifting. And not just a little-a lot. Instead of getting better, I was getting worse! I had no idea why, all of a sudden, I couldn't hit something the size of a tractor trailer from 6 feet away! Joe Pierre's book, however, provides exercises that reveal to the "barrel dipper" the source of his problem, and the means to remedy the problem. Had I read his book when I began shooting, I would have practiced these techniques (which include dry-firing, to notice how at the moment of trigger break the barrel dips off to the side) from the very beginning, and would now, undoubtedly, be having far less trouble disabusing myself of the bad habits I have developed over the years.

Joe Pierre loves his guns, and he loves talking about them. There is a chapter on individual handguns, and he strolls among them like a collector showing you his goodies, telling you a little bit about this one, a little bit about that one, how this one is favored in westerns, and how that one, immortalized by Dirty Harry, really is too heavy to carry around all day...it is an informal look at a range of weapons, peppered with practical information that someone making his first purchase (or his 5th) is bound to find useful.

Mr. Pierre makes no attempt to hide the fact that he is a happy (gun totin') member of what the harpy-half of the Billery Monster once hilariously lamented as the "vast right-wing conspiracy." He loves talking gun control. He has chapters devoted especially to the politics of gun control, and the media's treatment of the subject, although, really, the politics of gun ownership creeps into virtually all the subjects in the book. He aims his discussion, I think, at a narrow audience: those of us who are already inclined to regard his argument with sympathy, and not be put off by terms like "liberal" (which, yes, IS a filthy word), "elite media," or "gun-control fanatics." It is not, therefore, what I would consider vigorous argumentation, although such arguments can successfully be made, since the fact ARE on our side...But perhaps Mr. Pierre is wise in his choice of audience. There is no dissuading an ideologue, no matter how sound your logic, or how irrefutable your facts. (I am fairly well-versed in the facts and statistics of gun crime, and have no problem refuting the gun-banners' superficial, largely emotional understanding of the issue. When presented with a calm and reasoned argument they can't refute, they typically become abusive; one even paused, regarded me, and shamelessly declared, "You don't think those facts MEAN anything to me, do you?" Well, silly me, yeah, I thought they might.) No...Mr. Pierre's purpose here is less to convert or disprove the opposition than it is to show gun owners that we have cause for concern, that there IS an army of the night out there, immune to reason, immune to notions of Constitutionality, for whom all truth must first be purified in an alembic of left-wing social ideology. It doesn't matter, for instance, as Mr. Pierre points out, that parts of the country that permit liberal (and here I'm using the word in its non-filthy sense!) carry of concealed weapons-places like Florida-have enjoyed a greater reduction in violent crime than, say, New York City, or Los Angeles, where gun control is a government-enforced religion. It doesn't matter, for instance, that the gun control whackos who were rending their shirts and weeping over the "immanent" shoot-outs in the street when Florida was getting ready to pass its shall-issue concealed carry law-it doesn't matter that these shoot-outs not only didn't occur, but that crime decreased. It doesn't matter that time and again the methodology of gun control advocates is shown to be faulty, or brazenly dishonest (look at Michael Bellesiles-would that all liars should meet with his fate).

Mr. Pierre includes a chapter on field stripping and cleaning a 1911-style semi-automatic pistol, and a Colt revolver. If you own these guns, you might find this chapter useful. I'm not very familiar with revolvers, but I know there can be considerable differences among semi-autos, so, really, the best source of information on maintaining your particular gun will be the manual that comes with it. Pierre's chapter on the subject, though, is useful in that it details the tools you should have, and you can, therefore, assemble them before your first gun purchase.

Someone new to handguns and the issues surrounding them, I think this book is extremely handy. Buy it. And get a copy for a friend.

Well read, well spoken, and writing from experience, Joe Pierre places all
that and more in his book, Handguns And Freedom. As a life-long gun owner,
as well as a veteran of the United States Navy, Mr. Pierre presents
the handguns themselves in a familiar and respectful fashion. This
is not a book for someone looking for tales of irresponsibility, the
lessons learned for handling these deadly tools safely are never far
from his mind. His acknowledgements for this book are not to the makers
of these devices, no matter how well crafted. They are, as he puts it,
"to all my shooting instructors and companions".

It is the very fact that handguns can and are safely and responsibly
handled every day by millions of people that is at the heart of his
lesson. Using his own photographs and drawings, he reflects his words
with images of the issues he is discussing, and of biting satire, his
meanings made doubly clear.

A veteran also of the Oregon State Department of Corrections, Mr. Pierre
has spent years working with the violent criminals that are alleged to
be the targets of every variety of gun control. Yet, he points out, it is
these anti-social elements who have nothing to fear from the prohibition
of the lawful carrying of arms. Only the citizen, with everything to lose,
is backed into a corner by the ever tighter web of legalities. Rather
than rely on anecdotes, it is obvious that Mr. Pierre did his homework
first. He has read the court cases and laws that he discusses, a far cry
from the rote parroting of the party line that comes out of the American
"free" press.

Practice is interlaced with philosophy. Mr. Pierre brings together the
control of the tool and the self control of the individual. Personal
freedom cannot exist without personal responsibility. When that
responsibility is taken away, when choice is replaced by dependence,
self control suffers. It is obvious why the big Eastern cities of America
were always far more "wild" than the Wild West ever was, and why firearms,
handguns in particular, are potent symbols of political liberty.

Also provided is a generous index, bibliography and glossary, in addition
to quotations from many sources. Having been involved with firearms
arguments for several years myself, I am glad to see that Mr. Pierre
expanded many of the most common quotes to include their contexts
as well. Another example of the benefits of his actually reading the
source material.

With Handguns And Liberty, Mr. Pierre brings to these issues a personal
touch that cannot be ignored.

Curt Howland
12/25/2002

Finally, a book with a reasoned regard for the second amendment. Joe Pierre fills this slim volume with an encyclopedia of experience and practical information on handguns. Mr. Pierre not only provides photos and detailed descriptions in clear, conversational language, he makes a persistently logical and appealing argument for responsible gun ownership. For years, my husband has urged me to carry a handgun and to keep guns in our home 'for protection.' For years, I acquiesced but with the fear that I would be harmed by my own weapon. If ignorance is at the heart of fear, then Joe Pierre has taken me lightyears into the arena of comfort with gun ownership, for myself and for any responsible owner. I stress responsible, as does Mr. Pierre. He repeatedly, but with engaging wit and illustrations, emphasizes the obligations of safety and care in handling a personal weapon. I found this book to be surprisingly convincing in its informative and personable dialogue with the reader. It is also a magnificent reference to the Bill of Rights, and an inspiring motive to citizenship. There should be a place for this tiny little text, packed with common sense, clear explanations, and great humor, in the social studies curriculum of all high school students. It offers a worthy sanctuary of readable, useful, and objective information against shifting politics and unreliable media content that forms so much of our cultural backdrop.

At first blush, I assumed that the author was unable to stick to either technical OR political points within chapters that I believed should be one or the other.

However, as I thought about it, it dawned on me that Joe was trying to demonstrate how inter-related both technical and political issues are for the subject of guns. He was making a subtle point worth acknowledging.

"Handguns and Freedom" is an excellent text for technical aspects of firearms. Joe explains his points in terms that a novice or beginner should enjoy and understand with little difficulty. His political points are also well made, both reasoned out and polite. Joe does not lose his audience with reams of paper dedicated to his political philosphy. He makes his points without dawdling or repeating himself.

Mr. Pierre has an excellent book here. I'd recommend it to anybody that's starting out learning about firearms. This book would be an ideal primer for a child just learning about his (or her) first rifle.

For those "Blame America First" proponents of gun-control leading to confiscation and eventual loss of Freedom, this book isn't for you!

For those of us who appreciate the Freedom our forefathers faught and died for, it's a good read.

The book deals in well-written and easily readable instructions on gun handling, safety and maintenance, including exceptional graphics and photos by the author, in addition to some deep feelings about what our Freedom means to us and why it should be preserved at all costs.

I recommend it to all but, in truth, only real Americans will appreciate it.

...and there's not a single word about Glocks, SIGs or H&Ks.

C'mon!!! There's more to handguns than revolvers and Colt 1911s, but you'd never know it from this book.