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Should Black Americans Trust Cops After Prof. Gates Arrest?
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Mark A. Taff
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Consider the historical backdrop. Counting just the years since the abolition of slavery, ...where state and local officials (North and South, and most obviously including the police) systematically deprived them of their rights. That included the right to vote, the right to acquire and use property, and the right to keep and bear arms for self-defense. ...
...over the past three decades, federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies have waged a costly and disastrous war on drugs that has savaged America's black neighborhoods and imprisoned a staggering number of black men. As Reason's Radley Balko has documented, the drug war has produced hyper-militarized police departments and thuggishly violent police officers. |
The Seinfeld Hearings
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Mark A. Taff
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Supreme Court confirmation hearings do not have to be about either results or nothing. They could be about clauses, not cases. Instead of asking nominees how they would decide particular cases, ask them to explain what they think the various clauses of the Constitution mean. Does the Second Amendment protect an individual right to arms? What was the original meaning of the Privileges or Immunities Clause of the 14th Amendment? (Hint: It included an individual right to arms.) Does the 14th Amendment "incorporate" the Bill of Rights and, if so, how and why? Does the Ninth Amendment protect judicially enforceable unenumerated rights? Does the Necessary and Proper Clause delegate unlimited discretion to Congress? |
Americans use a gun in self defense every 13 seconds
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Mark A. Taff
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Americans use a gun in self defense once every 13 seconds, according to a peer-reviewed study.
* The National Self Defense Survey, as conducted by Florida State University criminologists in 1994, indicates that Americans use guns in self defense 2,500,000 times per year, which is once every 13 seconds.
* In about 30% of the defensive gun uses, the would-be victim believes that the gun “almost certainly” or “probably” saved a life.
* In more than 1/2 of the self defense gun uses, the would-be victim was under attack by 2 or more criminals, making a firearm the only viable means of self defense for most people. |
Right to Self-Defense Ambivalence Renders Sotomayor Supreme Court Nomination an Outrage, says Gun Law Expert
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Mark A. Taff
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"The nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court is an outrage," says gun rights expert John M. Snyder. "The United States Senate should not confirm the nomination"
Snyder noted that Sotomayor said "I don't know" if an individual citizen of the United States has a right to self-defense. ... She said this in response to questioning by Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma.
Sen. Coburn, a medical doctor, asked Sotomayor: "Do you have a personal opinion, or can you give me your opinion, of whether or not I personally, as an individual citizen, have a right to self-defense?"
Sotomayor's response was, "I --- as I said, I don't know" |
A confirmation conversion
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Mark A. Taff
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At the hearings, which were praised for their substance and respectful tone, we looked closely at the record:
...
-- Her 2009 Second Amendment decision would give states the power to ban firearms.
These rulings have three things in common. Each was contrary to the Constitution. Each was decided in a brief opinion, short on analysis. And each was consistent with liberal political thought.
I don't believe that Judge Sotomayor has the deep-rooted convictions necessary to resist the siren call of judicial activism. She has evoked its mantra too often. As someone who cares deeply about our great heritage of law, I must withhold my consent. |
IL: Police Applaud Armed Self-Defense in Chicago
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Mark A. Taff
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If today's headline surprised you, then you might be missing one salient fact:
The armed citizen who shot three men who allegedly attacked him and his companion with a baseball bat and a pistol was a Markham police officer, and so was his companion. Since the people who defended their lives with a handgun were what National Gun Rights Examiner David Codrea might call "Only Ones," it was politically safe even for high-ranking "exempt" members of the Chicago and Markham police departments to praise their courage and decisiveness , and no one felt obligated to make the standard political statements that always seem to follow any incident where a plain old citizen defends herself from a robber, a rapist, murderer or mugger: |
Senate rejection of right to carry concealed firearms across state lines a misguided attempt to limit self-defense rights
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Mark A. Taff
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Alan Gottlieb [Founder, Second Amendment Foundation]: "Nearly all states allow qualified law-abiding citizens to carry guns for self-defense, but a few states arbitrarily reject the basic human right of self-defense by refusing to issue ordinary people gun carry permits. Of course, violent criminals in the impacted states continue to carry guns without police permission.
Many carry licensing systems are being abused by some officials who are hostile to self-defense rights. The police can regulate the carrying of guns, and that includes preventing dangerous people from being armed. Complete deprivation of the right to bear arms, however, is not an option under our Constitution. |
Second Amendment reciprocity?
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Mark A. Taff
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However, I draw your attention to another amendment, this one added by Sen. John Thune (R-SD), authorizing interstate reciprocity of concealed-carry permit holders cross state lines with their weapons. Thune's amendment was stripped from the legislation even after mustering 58 votes for and 39 votes against.
Yes, that is a strong majority in favor, but still two votes short of the 60-vote threshold needed to block a promised filibuster by Chuck Schumer (D-NY). (In today's milquetoast Senate, just the threat of a filibuster is treated as an actual filibuster.)
Deplorably, two Republican senators voted against Thune's measure: Richard Lugar of Indiana and George Voinovich of neighboring Ohio. |
Arm the Senate!
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Mark A. Taff
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Isn't it time to dismantle the metal detectors, send the guards at the doors away and allow Americans to exercise their Second Amendment rights by being free to carry their firearms into the nation's Capitol?
I've been studying the deep thoughts of senators who regularly express their undying loyalty to the National Rifle Association, and I have decided that they should practice what they preach. They tell us that the best defense against crime is an armed citizenry and that laws restricting guns do nothing to stop violence.
If they believe that, why don't they live by it? |
NV: NRA loses a round in the Senate, thanks Reid anyway
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Mark A. Taff
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The first time Sen. Harry Reid won the National Rifle Association’s endorsement for his Senate campaign was 2004. That was the same year the colleague whom Reid would replace as Democratic leader in the Senate, Tom Daschle of South Dakota, lost his own race, in part because of opposition from gun owners.
Reid had never been an antagonist of the Second Amendment rights group. An elected official from the West, he always had a healthy appreciation for gun owners’ rights.
But after watching the Democratic Party’s electoral losses on gun issues over the years, he became a reliable proponent of the gun rights agenda. |
NJ: Don't retreat on gun control
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Todd Vandermyde
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As Jersey City Officer Marc DiNardo lay in critical condition after last week's shootout, Mayor Jerramiah Healy made a personal plea to President Obama to help win passage of federal legislation to stem the flow of illegal weapons to his and other cities.
After DiNardo's death yesterday morning, Healy and others praised him as a hero -- and asked, again, why we can't reduce the number of dangerous weapons on our streets.
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Praxis: And the M-4 Carbine goes rolling along.
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Mike Vanderboegh
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Things I don't like about McNamara's rifle and the 5.56mm round it chambers:
The system, to put it bluntly, craps where it eats. This is the principal cause of over forty years of weapons malfunctions from South Vietnam to Iraq. Men have died because of it, when their finely tuned and equisitely fitting actions became fouled with a combination of burnt powder and environmental detritus -- mud or sand -- and turned them from full-auto rifles into single shots, or worse, clubs. My son so distrusted the M-4 he was issued during OIF-1 that he tried to get his 101st superiors to let him carry an AK-47. Request denied. He settled for an M-4 with an M-203 40mm grenade launcher slung underneath. He KNEW the M-203 would work.
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NY: Report: Bush mulled sending troops into Buffalo
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Larry
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The Bush administration in 2002 considered sending U.S. troops into a Buffalo, N.Y., suburb to arrest a group of terror suspects in what would have been a nearly unprecedented use of military power, The New York Times reported.
Vice President Dick Cheney and several other Bush advisers at the time strongly urged that the military be used to apprehend men who were suspected of plotting with al Qaida, who later became known as the Lackawanna Six, the Times reported on its Web site Friday night. It cited former administration officials who spoke on condition of anonymity. |
LA: Mystery substance sickens La. cops; 18 quarantined
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FULL STORY BELOW:
A mystery substance found in a truck that authorities believe was hauling narcotics has sickened numerous law enforcement officers in Louisiana, and at least 18 have been quarantined as a precaution.
Roberto Bryan Jr., a spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration, says 18 DEA agents, Louisiana State Police troopers and Jefferson Parish Sheriff's deputies have been quarantined at East Jefferson General Hospital until the substance is identified.
State police Lt. Doug Cain says several officers were overcome with nausea and dizziness as they searched a suspicious 18-wheeler that had been taken to police headquarters. Officers found several bricks of white powder among the truck's cargo of limes. |
NY: Mayors' gun law letter way off
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New York State Rifle & Pistol Association
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I have to protest the concealed gun law letter by several Upstate mayors on the July 22 Readers Page. It's borderline hysterical in tone, shamelessly inaccurate and totally misleading. What the amendment does is to allow a law-abiding gun owner who has met the requirements for a carry permit in his home state to be authorized to carry a firearm for protection in any other state that issues such permits, subject to the laws of the state in which the firearm is being carried. The states would still have the authority to regulate the time, place and manner in which handguns are carried. |
Slaughter at McDonald's changed how police operate
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Larry
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When James Huberty walked into a McDonald's restaurant 25 years ago this month, he knew he was going to kill somebody. He probably didn't know his murderous rampage would change how police departments work.
Police help a wounded customer out of a California McDonald's where a man killed 21 people in 1984.
At 3:40 p.m. on July 18, 1984, Huberty carried a long-barreled Uzi semiautomatic rifle, a pump-action shotgun and a handgun into a McDonald's in San Ysidro, an enclave of San Diego, California. |
ID: Police Sodomize Man with Taser
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Larry
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OK, this police taser business has gone way too fraking far. Now, Boise officers put a taser inside a suspect's anus—who was already handcuffed—and fired it. Here's a tape. (Warning: Strong audio violence).
Cop: Do you feel this?
Suspect: Yes, sir.
Cop: Do you feel that? That's my …
Suspect: Okay
Cop: … Taser up your ass.
Suspect: Okay
Cop: So don't move.
Suspect: I'm trying not to. I can't breathe. |
NY: Dodging a bullet
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New York State Rifle & Pistol Association
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New York long ago decided that not every person who thinks it would be neat to pack some heat should get a gun permit in this state. New Yorkers who like it that way can breathe a little easier after the U.S. Senate rejected an amendment to a defense bill that would have allowed untold numbers of people to legally come here with concealed weapons. |
Specter helps defeat gun rights bill
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todd vandermyde
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It was one of the most significant gun control events in recent decades, and Pennsylvania's switcheroo senator cast one of the two deciding votes.
Legislation that would have given gun permits almost the same status as drivers licenses -- a gun permit in one state would allow a person to carry a concealed weapon in most other states --was narrowly defeated on Wednesday in the U.S. Senate.
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"People who live in grass houses shouldn't throw lawnmowers." SPLC cockroaches toy with Lou Dobbs' lightswitch.
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Mike Vanderboegh
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Dear Mr. Dobbs,
As you well know by now, Ricky Cohen of the inappropriately named Southern "Poverty" Law Center has demanded that CNN remove you from the air, by means of a perfect jeremiad of a letter which is shot through with the same conflations, elisions, half-truths, deliberately sloppy logic and guilt-by-associations that have long characterized the SPLC trademark.
My first thought upon reading it was that it must be fund-raising time again. . . . Yet one wonders why the well-paid Mr. Cohen, who possesses a mind crafty enough to serially shake down gullible folks of their hard-earned money, would violate Mark Twain's famous dictum: "Never pick a fight with someone who buys ink by the gallon."
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Americans' right to carry
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Todd Vandermyde
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States offer a hodgepodge of concealed-handgun rules that prevent citizens from protecting themselves when traveling from one state to another. Sen. John Thune, South Dakota Republican, introduced an amendment to the defense authorization bill that would have fixed this problem by granting reciprocity for gun permits across state lines. In a 58-39 vote on Wednesday, supporters fell two short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster. This was a victory of fear over facts. |
Gun-Shy
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todd vandermyde
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How do you outgun the NRA? Very, very carefully.
Mark Pryor knows all about that. The Democratic senator from pro-gun Arkansas was nowhere to be seen on the Senate floor during Wednesday's showdown over a proposal, championed by the National Rifle Association, that would have gutted state gun-control laws across the nation.
After a morning of angry speeches, a vote was called at high noon. Toward the end of the vote, Pryor entered the chamber through the back door, took a few steps inside, flashed a thumbs-down to the clerk, and retreated as fast and furtively as somebody dodging gunfire.
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