Tag: gun control

A Farewell to J. Joseph Curran, Jr.

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So U.S. District Judge Benson E. Legg has overturned Maryland’s “May Issue” concealed-carry permit system, stating, on the heels of D.C. v Heller and Chicago v McDonald:

…the Court finds that the right to bear arms is not limited to the home.

—

…the regulation at issue is a rationing system. It aims, as Defendants concede, simply to reduce the total number of firearms carried outside of the home by limiting the privilege to those who can demonstrate “good reason” beyond a general desire for self-defense. In support of this limitation, Defendants list numerous reasons why handguns pose a threat to public safety in general and why curbing their proliferation is desirable.

—

Maryland’s goal of minimizing the proliferation of handguns among those who do not have a demonstrated need for them, is not a permissible method of preventing crime or ensuring public safety; it burdens the right too broadly. Those who drafted and ratified the Second Amendment surely knew that the right they were enshrining carried a risk of misuse, and states have considerable latitude to channel the exercise of the right in ways that will minimize that risk. States may not, however, seek to reduce the danger by means of widespread curtailment of the right itself.

—

At bottom, this case rests on a simple proposition: If the Government wishes to burden a right guaranteed by the Constitution, it may do so provided that it can show a satisfactory justification and a sufficiently adapted method. The showing, however, is always the Government’s to make. A citizen may not be required to offer a “good and substantial reason” why he should be permitted to exercise his rights. The right’s existence is all the reason he needs.

Compare and contrast with former Maryland Attorney General J. Joseph Curran’s 1999 manifesto A Farewell to Arms:

The time is now. We must get serious – no more band-aids, no more excuses. The moral fiber of our society will be measured by our response. The problem is not just guns in the wrong hands or a failure to enforce laws already on the books.

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For me, therefore, the answer is easy. I have added up the costs, and they outweigh the benefits. As a grandfather, I am ready to say enough children have died. In short, I believe that we should no longer allow unrestricted handgun ownership.

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Thus, our public policy goal should be to restrict the sale and possession of all handguns to those who can demonstrate a legitimate law enforcement purpose or can guarantee that the use of such guns will be limited to participation in a regulated sporting activity. Handgun ownership that advances reasonable law enforcement purposes must be permitted. Individuals with a professional need to have a licensed gun – law enforcement officers, gun collectors, some business owners and certain other professional groups – will continue to keep handguns on business premises or for use on the job. The rest of us, (the rest of you he means) however, must give them up.

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In the long run, we must go the last mile. These limits must be reflected in the laws by which we govern ourselves. The law must embody the public policy goal of ridding our homes and communities of handguns through restrictive handgun licensing. Handgun ownership which advances reasonable law enforcement purposes can and must continue, but the costs of allowing the rest of us to own handguns are too great. We should endure those costs no longer.

Bear in mind, this was the published opinion of a sitting state Attorney General.

And it was wiped out by the simple statement, “A citizen may not be required to offer a ‘good and substantial reason’ why he should be permitted to exercise his rights. The right’s existence is all the reason he needs.”

Take that, J.J.

Good riddance.

Busy

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Sorry about the lack of content. I’ve been a bit busy recently, and when I do get home blogging has not been high on the list of “things I want to do.” I’ve had some nibbles from people wanting to go shooting (one of them being my niece), so I may be doing a range trip for that soon. My next Bowling Pin match is three weeks away, and I need to build some new tables, or at least one.

I did manage to get a chance to eat lunch in a sit-down restaurant today. I went to the local Cheesecake Factory, which as far as I can tell is never slow. I ate at the bar, since I was by myself and didn’t want to wait for a table. While sitting at the bar, I noticed a sign propped up on one of the shelves, kind of off to the side. It was partially obscured by glare from a nearby window, but I could see it had the international “NO” symbol – circle with a slash – on it, but it was black. When the light changed, I saw it said “No Firearms Allowed pursuant to A.R.S. section 4-229” with the “NO” symbol over a pistol.

After lunch (I’d already ordered, and I wasn’t carrying. I prefer to remain employed) I talked to the manager about it. I noted that while I normally do not patronize establishments that don’t want me, the sign was not conspicuous and that had I not been sitting at the bar I’d have never seen it. He stated that he thought that the placement of the sign was per company policy, but he understood my concern. While there’s a “No Smoking” notice on the front door, there is no “No Firearms” sign, and anyone coming in would not know that the establishment doesn’t want its customers to be armed. When I got home, I checked the regulations:

4-229. Licenses; Handguns; Posting of Notice
A. A person with a permit issued pursuant to section 13-3112 may carry a concealed handgun on the premises of a licensee who is an on-sale retailer unless the licensee posts a sign that clearly prohibits the possession of weapons on the licensed premises. The sign shall conform to the following requirements:

1. Be posted in a conspicuous location (It wasn’t.) accessible to the general public and immediately adjacent to the liquor license posted on the licensed premises. (It was.)

2. Contain a pictogram that shows a firearm within a red circle and a diagonal red line across the firearm. (It was a black & white photocopy. The circle with diagonal was black, not red.)

3. Contain the words, “no firearms allowed pursuant to A.R.S. section 4-229”.
B. A person shall not carry a firearm on the licensed premises of an on-sale retailer if the licensee has posted the notice prescribed in subsection A of this section.
C. It is an affirmative defense to a violation of subsection B of this section if:

1. The person was not informed of the notice prescribed in subsection A of this section before the violation. (I wasn’t.)

2. Any one or more of the following apply:

(a) At the time of the violation the notice prescribed in subsection A of this section had fallen down.

(b) At the time of the violation the person was not a resident of this state.

(c) The licensee had posted the notice prescribed in subsection A of this section not more than thirty days before the violation.

So the sign was posted next to the liquor license, but it failed the “conspicuous location” requirement, and it didn’t have the mandated red circle-with-a-slash symbol, so it was an improper sign. As I explained to the manager, they can certainly invite anyone open carrying to leave, but no one carrying concealed would have any way of knowing that it was company policy to prohibit firearms on the premises, the Cheesecake Factory would have no way to know they were carrying, and they were not in compliance with the law anyway.

He thanked me for my input and said he’d be contacting Corporate. I harbor no illusions that this Cheesecake Factory in particular or the chain overall is going to change their policy (so I don’t intend to eat there again), but if they’re going to make a stupid decision, they ought to at least follow the damned law.

Just Lay Back and Think of England

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The fallout of Weer’d’s “Do More Than Just Light a Candle” counterprotest is still pattering down all around. One piece I ran across today comes from the Florida Progressive Coalition Blog, Gun Free Zone Blog Celebrates Gun Violence.

No, I don’t think so.

I left a comment there, but it hasn’t been approved, nor do I expect it to be, but I do want to comment publicly on one point made by the author, Kenneth Quinnell. He is attempting to fisk the post I Lit My Candle For… from the blog Gun Free Zone. Here’s the particular portion I want to highlight from the whole thing:

Quote of the Day by Brigid: “but tomorrow is the day the Brady Bunch plan a light a candle to stop gun violence (that’s what I’m going to pull out when some potential gangbanger rapist confronts me in a parking lot, a f’ing candle.”)

First off, the chances of a “gangbanger rapist” attacking Brigid are almost nonexistent. Second off, pulling out the gun might help her, but statistically it’s more likely to increase her chances of dying.

Now the comment I attempted to leave was along the lines of ‘…pulling out the gun might help her, but statistically it’s more likely to increase her chances of dying.” Really? Got a citation to back that up? With a URL? Because I do and it disagrees with your assertion.

But the point I want to make here is a bit stronger.

Mr. Qusling, er, Quinnell blithely asserts that Brigid – and by extension, any woman – is statistically more likely to die if she attempts to defend herself from a rapist with a firearm.

The inference being that she should instead “lay back and think of England,” and she might not get killed.

A more textbook example of 

“Gun Control: The theory that a woman found dead in an alley, raped and strangled with her own panty hose, is somehow morally superior to a woman explaining to police how her attacker got that fatal bullet wound.”

could not be found.

Let’s let Oleg Volk have a say:

And finally:

To quote AGirlandHerGun from Monday:

You, you who hate guns, you gave me nothing.

No hope.

No tools.

All that was offered me was a life of fear, of resentment, of bitterness, of dependance…

The gun community has offered me hope and strength, and courage.

They have taught me to have belief in myself.

Lie back and think of England?

Fuck THAT!

Guns and the “Alternative Media,” Part II

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The local alt.weekly‘s latest edition was dedicated to memorializing the first anniversary of the January 8 rampage shooting here in Tucson that left six dead and thirteen wounded, including Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords, the primary target of the attack. Surprisingly, there wasn’t a whole lot said about gun control other than in the context of keeping guns out of the hands of nutcases, but they couldn’t let the entire issue go out without at least one philippic on the topic.

It’s been a while.  Let us fisk:

Guns Galore: After Jan. 8, the firearms race didn’t miss a beat – by Tim Vanderpool

Scott Zike makes black holsters for pistols, assault rifles and any other manner of weapon in between. And he’s selling them with a vengeance on this gray December morning, his inventory dangling overhead like so many dead crows.

Someone makes holsters for assault rifles? Wouldn’t they be difficult on the draw?

His decidedly niche market became even more specialized over the past year. “One thing that happened was that people wanted my large magazine pouches because they wanted to use the 33-round mags,” he says. “So I was making the large pouches to fit over those extreme mags.”

Wow. How many people did Vanderpool have to interview before he came up with one who would call the 33-round Glock magazine “extreme”? Or did he? (I keep picturing exploding GM gas tanks and typeset Air National Guard memos….)

He links this blossoming demand directly to the Jan. 8 shootings. That mass carnage was due in no small part to the fact that alleged shooter Jared Lee Loughner fitted his Glock pistol with a high-capacity, 33-round magazine.

Yes, Loughner couldn’t possibly have killed and injured so many people with two seventeen round magazines. Or four ten round magazines.

Or a Ryder truck loaded with fertilizer and diesel fuel.

Rather than dampening gun sales, the Safeway shootings have apparently heightened paranoia that new gun restrictions would soon follow. For gun enthusiasts, the logical impulse is to buy what you can, while you can.

That perspective is not baseless. For instance, the oversized magazines that expedited Jared Loughner’s rampage and plumped up Scott Zike’s bottom line were outlawed as part of federal assault-weapons ban in 1994—although that prohibition was allowed to expire in 2004 under the watch of then-President George W. Bush.

Let’s examine this one, disregarding the fact that the law prohibited the manufacture of new magazines of more than 10-round capacity and had no effect (except in price) on existing stock.

The Democratic Party’s 2000 National Platform included this gun control plank:

Democrats passed the Brady Law and the Assault Weapons Ban. We increased federal, state, and local gun crime prosecution by 22 percent since 1992. Now gun crime is down by 35 percent. Now we must do even more. We need mandatory child safety locks. We should require a photo license I.D., a background check, and a gun safety test to buy a new handgun. We support more federal gun prosecutors and giving states and communities another 10,000 prosecutors to fight gun crime.

Their 2004 platform included this:

We will protect Americans’ Second Amendment right to own firearms, and we will keep guns out of the hands of criminals and terrorists by fighting gun crime, reauthorizing the assault weapons ban, and closing the gun show loophole, as President Bush proposed and failed to do.

The language was almost unchanged in the 2008 Platform.

Now from 1994 through 2005 the Republicans controlled both houses of Congress, but Democrats took back the House and Senate in 2006. Bush had promised to sign a renewal of the ban if it was presented to him. President Obama has also stated a desire to reinstate the ban.

The Democrat-controlled Congress failed to present either President with such legislation.

But it’s Bush’s fault.

Just wanted to make that clear.

“Anyone who wants a gun for any type of purpose can go to a gun show, knowing there will not even be the semblance of a gun check,” says Elliot Glicksman, a prominent Tucson attorney who specializes in representing crime victims.

Which is, of course, complete bullshit. Yes, you can do a private-party sale where there can be no background check, as individuals don’t have access to the system by law, but if you buy a gun from a licensed dealer, you go through the same background check as if you were in a gun shop.  And you can do a private party sale anywhere, not just at a gun show.

And he knows this.

He should also be aware of the fact that gun shows represent a tiny portion of the source of guns used in crime. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics:

Inmates serving time in state prisons during 1997 said they obtained their guns from the following sources in percentages:

Purchased from a retail store 8.3 percent
Purchased at a pawn shop 3.8
Purchased at a flea market 1.0
Purchased in a gun show 0.7
Obtained from friends or family 39.6
Got on the street/illegal source 39.2

The percentage of inmates who bought their guns from a retail store fell from 21 percent in 1991, when the last such survey was conducted to 14 percent in 1997. At the same time the percentage who obtained their firearms from family or friends rose from 34 percent in 1991 to 40 percent in 1997.

Less than one percent. I guess that “gun show loophole” really is a big problem. And the Tucson shooter got his Glock from a the gun department of a Sportsman’s Warehouse.  He underwent that background check, for all the good it did.

But facts don’t matter much when you’re talking about “gun control.”

Glicksman’s caseload is grim testimony to the extent of gun violence. “I deal with this stuff all the time,” he says, “and to me, it seems unbelievable that we live in a place where people really believe there should be no limit on who gets guns and what kind of guns they get.”

Yeah, we think everyone should be able to buy a belt-fed from a vending machine. In elementary school.  Hyperbole much?

Other reform advocates have personally felt the impacts of gun violence. It was 30 years ago that Susan Agrillo’s sister was gunned down in Chicago during a botched mugging. Now a prosecutor with the Tucson City Attorney’s Office, Agrillo spent years working toward even minimal firearms control.

She says her efforts were blocked at nearly every step by the National Rifle Association. “They have a lot of money, a lot of lobbyists, and they influence our legislators.”

Good. That’s what me and about four million other people pay them to do.

To Agrillo, the NRA’s clout overshadows public sentiment. “Most people want reasonable gun control,” she says, “and that’s been the case since I started doing this 30 years ago.”

Sure they do. Until you tell them what you have in mind, whereupon they respond “Not THAT!” because what you consider “reasonable” and what “most people” consider reasonable are not congruent. You’ll note that, 30 years on and after all the “reasonable gun control” the anti-gunners could ask for, Chicago is still one of the most dangerous cities for gun violence in the country. How’s that gun control working out for you, Ms. Agrillo?

Judging from the December Tucson gun show, that’s also likely to be the case for years to come. On this day, NRA volunteers are out in full force, renewing memberships and hustling raffle tickets for a $400, .40-caliber Taurus handgun.

Among those volunteers is Jim Coniglio, a retired electrical engineer, a weapons instructor and an NRA lifer. “When you have very strict gun controls such as in Washington, D.C., and New York City,” he says, “there’s more crime there with criminals having guns and people being defenseless.”

Chicago being a prime case.

From that perspective, growing gun sales since Jan. 8 should surprise no one. “I think on Black Friday after Thanksgiving, they even set a record with gun sales to women,” Coniglio says.

To him, the logic driving that trend is a no-brainer. “Would you prefer to call 911—and wait for an hour, and maybe a cop will show up—as your wife is being attacked by some guy?”

You’ll note that the author, Tim Vanderpool, didn’t bother to answer that question.

Sarah McKinley answered it for him on New Year’s Eve.

The massacre in the Safeway parking lot here in Tucson last year was a tragedy, no doubt about it. But the father of nine year-old victim Christina-Taylor Green was right when he said:

This shouldn’t happen in this country, or anywhere else, but in a free society we’re going to be subject to people like this. I prefer this to the alternative.

Guns and the “Alternative Media,” Part I

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Say Uncle linked today to a piece at TheAlternatePress.com, Women and Guns by one Kristen Houghton, a self-described hoplophobe:

I am afraid of guns; they scare me to death. Even in movies or on TV, the sight and sound of the gun being fired makes me tense up.

Not an auspicious place to start.

She’s also self-admittedly, not too tightly tethered to reality:

Regardless of the statement put out by gun owners that “Guns don’t kill people, people do”, I still feel that if criminals were unable to get their hands on guns no one would get killed.

(My emphasis.) As if guns are the only way people get killed criminally. About a third of homicide victims here would object to that, if they could. And in what world could criminals not get guns? Hell, our own government has been supplying them to drug cartels in Mexico!

But she is paying some attention:

To me, guns equal damage or death but I may be one of the few women who feels that way. More women than ever are buying handguns. Sales have increased steadily, nearly doubling in the last decade. Almost five million more women now own guns than was the case less than ten years ago.

Tell that to the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. They think it’s propaganda.

While a whistle, a can of mace, or even a Taser are all items that are recommended by mainstream media as ways for women to protect themselves, they don’t always work. Nor does acting passively when confronted by a rapist. If your attacker is bigger, stronger and playing on your fear, none of these are going to be of much help. Guns eliminate the strength difference between the attacker and the potential victim. This makes it much harder for the strong to prey upon the weak.

Perhaps she’s not so disconnected from reality after all.

It doesn’t take much common sense to figure out that nothing makes a criminal run away faster than seeing a determined woman holding a loaded gun pointing right at him.

She’s beginning to sound like one of us.

I may not like it but society has very likely made women and guns a necessity. Even I see the reasoning behind knowing how to protect yourself with a firearm.

Here I’m going to object a bit. I’ve pointed this out before, but overall, violent crime is at historic lows in this country. It began declining in 1992 and has kept declining even through last year. Society hasn’t “made women and guns a necessity,” women have finally begun to recognize that individuals are responsible for their own safety, and this is a good thing. She needs to get together with AGirlandHerGun and compare notes.

She says she’s going to take a self-protection class and learn to shoot.  I hope she does, but without a paradigm shift like AGirlandHerGun has gone through, I don’t think it will help her.  She’s going in with too much fear and too many prejudices.  I’d also suggest some correspondence with Abigale Kohn and Emily Yoffe.

“OK, That Was Awesome!”

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This is what terrifies them – the smile:

Those are screenshots from this CBS News piece about the increasing number of female shooters in the U.S. – up 47% since 2001, according to the piece.  The shooter is CBS’s Katrina Szish, and I suspect that was her first experience with a firearm.

It probably won’t be her last.

That’s the smile you get from a new shooter – Every. Single. Time.

The anti’s are terrified of that – the realization that shooting is fun. Or as the interview subjects put it, exciting, empowering, relaxing.

Also from the piece:

Katrina Szish, CBS: “A lot of people would not expect shooting to be a sport that women would be interested in. And a lot of people would say guns are masculine.”

Lesa Ellanson, NRA certified shooting instructor: “It would depend on how you define femininity. I think a capable woman is the most feminine expression of power that there is.”

Which reminded me of this post from quite a while back. Unfortunately, it’s so old the links are broken, and the comments are gone, but I agree whole-heartedly with another subject of the CBS interview, Jill Kargman:

“I always dress up. I’m very traditional feminine in certain ways. But when I’m shooting a gun, I guess I feel empowered, and empowerment is sexy.”

Damned straight.