Looks like someone in Washington is on trial for shooting someone in a road rage incident, and the prosecutors are using his participation in a shooting competition as evidence against him. This reminds me of a story Bitter tells about cops she knew who were competitive shooters, and could ace their qualifications, but deliberately pulled shots so as to avoid the possibility of a jury questioning why they drilled several bullet holes in Sumdood’s center of mass. Probably not a bad idea in some states, considering I once had a coworker from New Jersey that was upset about that very thing serving on a jury for a police shooting.
Year: 2012
Foreign Shootings
A major tactic of our opponents is to dig through papers finding horror stories involving people misusing guns and pointing to the article, then pointing to us, and shaming us publicly, like we had something to do with it. “If only those crazy gun nut extremists would just support reasonable gun laws, like they have in Europe, these kinds of things wouldn’t happen,” they say. It’s a pretty good sign they are running out of arguments, and it looks like they’ve run out of that argument too.
According to at least one law professor …
… we value free speech a bit much. Personally, this article greatly offends me. Perhaps if we showed our displeasure by rioting and violence, we’d have grounds to ban it by the Professor’s own standard? What good is free speech if you can ban any speech which might offend deeply enough to cause disorder? Under that standard, wouldn’t it have been in the interest of public order to silence Martin Luther King? Malcolm X?
Despite its 18th-century constitutional provenance, the First Amendment did not play a significant role in U.S. law until the second half of the 20th century. The First Amendment did not protect anarchists, socialists, Communists, pacifists, and various other dissenters when the U.S. government cracked down on them, as it regularly did during times of war and stress.
I do not care to repeat the mistakes of the 18th and 19th centuries. One problem I’ve always had with originalism is that perhaps free speech always meant what it’s come to mean in this century, but that the Courts just didn’t take it seriously enough before. There are a lot of things in that old document that judges have been saying “Surely they couldn’t have meant that,” to through the whole history of the republic.
Buying Camo is Child Abuse?
Paul Ryan took a little time out of campaigning in Ohio to pick up some hunting gear for his daughter who wants to get out to the field with him this fall, apparently. She already has her own rifle, so he has truly walked the walk when it comes to passing his shooting sports traditions. And, of course, when it came out that he was buying camo gear for his daughter, some came out screaming child abuse.
I appreciate that they highlighted there was no such “concern” from the these same folks when Obama announced that he was comforted by the fact that his daughters are protected by guns. Yet, apparently, teaching a girl to safely use one of her own is just horrible. Sexism much?
More on Gun Culture 2.0
From Misfires and Light Strikes:
The Gun Culture 1.0 broke down for a number of reasons, including the urbanization of the U.S. and single-parent families becoming the norm, and Gun Culture 2.0 reflects that fact, as well as the fact that in today’s media environment, the deer now have guns.
The deer in this case being us, and the hunters being the media. Bitter grew up in Gun Culture 1.0 in Oklahoma, where they didn’t teach the girls the ways of the gun culture. She was brought into GC 2.0 in Massachusetts by a friend from Colorado, who was also raised in GC 1.0, except she was taught to hunt, and is still primarily a hunter. I’m not entirely certain GC 1.0 vs. GC 2.0 really has to do with how you shoot, or what you shoot (be they pepper poppers or Bambi), so much as your attitudes, and how you understand it and relate to the gun culture. I’ve met people who primarily hunt that I would say are thoroughly GC 2.0, and people who primarily shoot who are thoroughly GC 1.0. I think we need to be very careful about taking attitudes like, “Oh, hunting.. that’s so Gun Culture 1.0” and “Bullseye shooting? That’s so 1970s man. Get with the times!” The biggest drivers of the change involve attitudes, not what you shoot, or what sports you participate in. Much of this cultural shift has come from the concealed carry revolution, which has necessarily come with a whole host of new attitudes, beliefs, and new shooting sports.
For instance, there are often different ideas about gun safety between GC 1.0 and 2.0. GC 1.0 folks are more inclined to believe drawing from holster or moving with a firearm is an activity that is inherently dangerous. This is particularly funny in Pennsylvania, where we’ve had concealed carry for a while, and you hear this attitude from GC 1.0 people who have LTCs and carry! Let me express my GC 2.0 attitude and exclaim, “Dear god, if you ever need your pistol, how the hell do you plan to employ it without blowing a hole in your ass?” Also, again expressing 2.0 sentiments, and having attended both 1.0 and 2.0 matches, I’ve been corrected for minor safety issues at 2.0 matches that no 1.0 match would ever bat an eye over. The 2.0 culture accommodates the fact that they do engage in riskier activities by having absolutely zero tolerance for unsafe gun handling.
There is also a difference in how the two cultures approach their right to keep and bear arms. In GC 1.0 people either gave it little or no thought, or more heavily emphasized resistance to tyrannical government as the primary purpose for keeping and bearing arms. I think they were right. It’s pretty clear from the early debates on the Second Amendment that keeping the people empowered to resist tyranny was its primary purpose. Gun Culture 2.0 tends to focus more on the self-defense aspects of the Second Amendment, or tends to view resistance to tyranny as a subset of the overriding self-defense purpose. While the resistance to tyranny aspect may have been more what was on the founder’s minds, the self-defense aspects resonates more broadly with a modern and more urbanized audience, and particularly resonates much more strongly with women.
But if there’s one trait I would hope for in Gun Culture 2.0 people, it’s tolerance. We define ourselves, I think, by tolerance to people who haven’t traditionally participated in the gun culture, namely women and minorities, but I would also hope for a different kind of tolerance, and that is for people who participate in GC 1.0, and who reciprocate that tolerance to us. Whether you’re 1.0 or 2.0, you’re doing the entire issue a grave disservice if you’re taking a divisive and intolerant attitude towards the people in the other camp. I’ve met plenty of GC 1.0 who think IDPA is recklessly dangerous, and plenty of GC 2.0 people who think hunting is for “Fudds”, and sports like Bullseye shooting is for grouchy old men clinging to the past. I think both 1.0 and 2.0, along with their favored sports and favored guns, can both survive and move forward together into the a new gun culture, let’s call it 3.0, who’s overriding value is tolerance for all things shooty, and that is intolerant only of intolerance.
The Struggle in California
The local San Francisco CBS affiliate has an article on the failure of the bill to greatly expand California’s Assault Weapons ban. Interesting that the Attorney General thinks the regulation that allows for “Bullet Buttons” is bad, but isn’t willing to take any action on the matter. Any change that makes the bullet button illegal is likely going to be challenged in court, and perhaps the AG just doesn’t feel the office has money to spend.
Back at Jacobsen’s factory, he said, “It’s creating a lot of back orders for us. It drives a lot of business our way.â€
We asked the Attorney General about that. Her response, “We would like to hope that these manufacturers would stop trying to get around the intention of the law. We would like to believe that people wouldn’t purchase products from manufacturers that are obviously trying to get around the intention of the law, unfortunately that is not happening.â€
There’s something to be said for pissing off the right people. I guess she really doesn’t like people, you know, complying with the law.
What a difference …
Like The Alcoholic Trying to Get on the Wagon …
… DC is trying to ease up a bit on its gun hating ways, but elements of their political culture just don’t want to see it happen. Phil Mendelson held a meeting to discuss making violating D.C.’s gun laws for non-residents a simple fine. But D.C. Attorney General will have none of it:
“We are opposed because we think it’s unwise to start down a slope where gun offenses and therefore perhaps others wind up on that sort of process,†says Andrew Fois, assistant D.C. attorney general.
Mr. Fois claims that prosecutors can exercise discretion. Does that practically happen? I guess maybe when your case attracts enough press attention. We should be honest about what’s motivating DC on this issue — fear of repercussions from Congress. Congress is already itching to preempt DC City Council on the subject of guns entirely, and the District is trying to avoid that prospect. Problem? We can’t get any such preemption bill through the Senate or White House. At least not easily.
What’s Not an Advantage of Working from Home?
I had figured when I started doing most of my work from home, one advantage would be that I’d get sick less often. You’d always get bouts of stuff going around the office, and maybe 1/3rd of the time something went around, you got it. I figured being home most of the time would mean this wouldn’t happen.
So far that’s not playing out. There’s definitely a cold bug going around the office, and having been there Wednesday and Thursday of last week, I’m battling my second cold bug of the year. That’s about par for the course before I started working from home. Moreover, both my colds have been worse than previous ones I used to get. So I’m not sure working from home means you catch less illnesses from your coworkers. Though, perhaps the workplace isn’t quite the disease vector that grocery stores, restaurants, and other places people frequent are.
Insurrectionist Quote of the Day
I’ve never really wrapped my head around why the Coalition to Stop Gun Ownership Violence feels the need to create a warped and ahistorical version of the Founding Fathers, and then try to pass themselves off as the true guardians of the Founders’ vision. The typical reaction from lefties is why we should pay any heed to what 18th century slaveholders had to say about anything, and is perhaps a more defensible position intellectually than making up your own history. I’ve always liked this quote from Thomas Jefferson, in a 1787 letter to James Madison:
Societies exist under three forms sufficiently distinguishable. 1. Without government, as among our Indians. 2. Under governments wherein the will of every one has a just influence, as is the case in England in a slight degree, and in our states in a great one. 3. Under governments of force: as is the case in all other monarchies and in most of the other republics. To have an idea of the curse of existence under these last, they must be seen. It is a government of wolves over sheep. It is a problem, not clear in my mind, that the 1st. condition is not the best. But I believe it to be inconsistent with any great degree of population. The second state has a great deal of good in it. The mass of mankind under that enjoys a precious degree of liberty and happiness. It has it’s evils too: the principal of which is the turbulence to which it is subject. But weigh this against the oppressions of monarchy, and it becomes nothing. Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem. Even this evil is productive of good. It prevents the degeneracy of government, and nourishes a general attention to the public affairs. I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.
Note the Latin phrase “Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem.” which translates into “I’d rather have a perilous liberty, than a peaceful servitude.” Now, you’d think if CSGV’s vision of the Founders were correct, Madison would have scolded Jefferson’s insurrectionist ideas, but he never did. That’s the real intellectual problem with CSGV’s, quite frankly insane ramblings on history. You have all these founding fathers writing about ideas that were supposedly, in their world, an anathema, yet you never see them arguing with each about it. In CSGV’s world, our Founders overthrew the British crown, and then renounced insurrectionism. Unfortunately for them, the historical record just does not back up their assertions. I will do a series of these quotes, since gun news is slow, laying out the fact that our Founding Fathers were, in fact, most concerned with preserving the right of their people to free themselves from the yoke of tyrannical government.
CSGV often asserts that never in the Constitutional debates did the Founders mention individual self-defense as the core of the right. This is true. The core of the right, from their point of view, was that an armed population would act as a check on the power of the central government. If this version of the Second Amendment were adopted by the Courts, it would have implications that CSGV would no doubt be appalled by, such as protections for machine guns and man-portable weapons like rockets, and anti-tank missiles.