Guns as Gospel? NYT describes of Dick Metcalf as a hero

The byline of Dick Metcalf, one of the country’s pre-eminent gun journalists, has gone missing. It has been removed from Guns & Ammo magazine, where his widely-read column once ran on the back page. He no longer stars on a popular television show about firearms. Gun companies have stopped flying him around the world and sending him the latest weapons to review.

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In late October, Mr. Metcalf wrote a column that the magazine titled “Let’s Talk Limits,” which debated gun laws. “The fact is,” wrote Mr. Metcalf, who has taught history at Cornell and Yale, “all constitutional rights are regulated, always have been, and need to be.”

The backlash was swift, and fierce. Readers threatened to cancel their subscriptions. Death threats poured in by email. His television program was pulled from the air.

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I’ve been vanished, disappeared,” Mr. Metcalf, 67, said in an interview last month ...

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He knows that the odds of returning seamlessly to his old career are slim. When people ask him what’s next, he shows them a photograph taken shortly after InterMedia dismissed him. In it, he holds a gun, and a sign that reads “Will Hunt For Food.”

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