The dangers of knife bans

Transocean’s ban on employee knife possession nearly killed several BP drilling rig survivors, by preventing them from cutting the rope that attached the life boat to the drilling rig. Details here, from Towmasters. Some additional details here from the 1:30 p.m. report by the New Orleans Times-Picayune: the life boat was supposed to have a knife in it, but it couldn’t be found in the dark during the chaos. Fortunately, a rescue boat drove up the raft and supplied a knife. For men at sea, and for lots of other laborers, a knife is a basic safety tool. The knife ban is one more piece of evidence that Transocean and BP chose not to follow best practices for safety.

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David B. Kopel is Research Director of the Independence Institute, a public policy research organization in Golden, Colorado, and is an Associate Policy Analyst with the Cato Institute, in Washington.

His latest book, Aiming for Liberty: The Past, Present, And Future of Freedom and Self-Defense, covers topics ranging from the origins of the Washington, DC gun ban to the Heller decision. He discusses the genesis of modern American gun control, the KKK, the true anti-gun agenda and the deceptions and errors used to promote anti-gun laws. He covers the right to self defense from Judeo Christian perspectives. Other chapters explore United Nations and International gun control attempts and failures, law enforcement abuses and solutions, the culture of the right to keep and bear arms and the gun control movement. He concludes his book with a chapter on several prominent American gun owners from Thomas Jefferson to Eleanor Roosevelt.