What…
Uh…
That phrase does not make sense. Because of ONE politically-charged word. By dropping that one word into the description, it makes the whole thing a multi-layered lie.
Month: July 2016
Superior Court Rules No Weapons on School Property
Some unfortunate news from Pennsylvania Superior Court. I believe Superior Courts mean this is now law in the entire state, so currently, it is now illegal to carry weapons on school property. The law states:
§ 912. Possession of weapon on school property.
(a) Definition.–Notwithstanding the definition of “weapon” in section 907 (relating to possessing instruments of crime),”weapon” for purposes of this section shall include but not be limited to any knife, cutting instrument, cutting tool, nun-chuck stick, firearm, shotgun, rifle and any other tool, instrument or implement capable of inflicting serious bodily injury.
(b) Offense defined.–A person commits a misdemeanor of the first degree if he possesses a weapon in the buildings of, on the grounds of, or in any conveyance providing transportation to or from any elementary or secondary publicly-funded educational institution, any elementary or secondary private school licensed by the Department of Education or any elementary or secondary parochial school.
(c) Defense.–It shall be a defense that the weapon is possessed and used in conjunction with a lawful supervised school activity or course or is possessed for other lawful purpose.
The Superior Court ruled that “other lawful purpose” needed to have a sanction from the school. In other words, the lunch ladies can have knives in the school, because their purpose is to cook lunch for the kiddies. The janitor can have a screwdriver, but not a student.
Statutes that are vague or unclear are supposed to be interpreted in a light most favorable to the defendant, but this very clear language, which exempts lawful purposes, was read to favor the state. The law already carved out an exception for the lunch ladies when it said “It shall be a defense that the weapon is possessed and used in conjunction with a lawful supervised school activity or course,” but then it went on to create a separate defense, the “other lawful purposes” defense, for the chef dropping his kid off at school on the way to the restaurant with the knives he just got sharpened.
As Josh Prince notes in his article, this appeal was pursued by a pro-se defendant, meaning a guy representing himself. That’s usually an invitation to disaster, as it was here. Nonetheless, the law is clear here, but there is no rule of law. They offer us the illusion, and not even a very good illusion, that there is rule of law, all the while ruling however they damned please.
Some Good News
There’s a fair amount of GOP Congressmen that are defecting from the NRA-backed Coburn style terror watch list proposal, meaning Ryan doesn’t have the votes to pass it. This revolt is being lead by the House Freedom Caucus.
“If the bill becomes law, it will mark a massive expansion of the government’s ability to restrict gun rights on the basis of precrime—a crime not yet committed,†Freedom Caucus member Justin Amash (R-Mich.) posted in a lengthy diatribe on his Facebook page. This bill “is the actualization of dystopian fiction.â€
Added Rep. Dave Brat (R-Va.), another Freedom Caucus member: “If it is a suspected terrorist and we have evidence to that extent, then Logic 101 [suggests] that person should either be in jail or out of the country.â€
And in those two lines, you basically have the “law and order” versus “civil libertarian” division in the GOP. I completely agree that even delaying a sale 72 hours is denying someone due process unconstitutionally. It would seem to me many of the anti-gun Dems want to hold out for a harsher bill, which few Republicans will support. Combine that with the Freedom Caucus opposition to the bill and I don’t see how this passes. Let us hope.
More Evidence Pamela Haag’s Bellesiles Reboot Filled With Holes
This age would seem to be the era of awful reboots in Hollywood, so it would seem fitting that in these times Pamela Haag would reboot an awful Academic book The Gunning of America: Business and the Making of American Gun Culture which is essentially Michael Bellesiles Arming America repackaged.
Clayton Cramer has been looking into this new work and is finding a lot of problems. The latest article of his is a must read, published by the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE). In this article, Clayton refutes Haag’s assertion that the market for firearms in gold rush California was “saturated.”
Colt’s letter (or at least Haag’s characterization of Colt’s letter) is clearly wrong: A strong and vigorous gun culture already existed in California before 1853. Worse, that Haag never questioned the validity of this idea suggests either a gross ignorance of California’s turbulent history during the 1850s or an intentional unwillingness to verify the claim she purports to have found.”
Clayton also found this stunning piece of ignorance:
Throughout her book, Haag uses the word “semiautomatic†to refer to guns that are not. On p.179, she writes, “The family name, which became the rifle name, eventually stood for the genus, becoming a synonym for repeating, semiautomatic rifles.†On p.88, she asserts that “As the semiautomatic ancestor of automatic machine guns, the Henry performed ‘a terrible work of death…’â€[emphasis added]  On p. 204, “Winchester had emerged the preeminent name for semiautomatic rifles.â€
Let me just say if you don’t know that the Henry Rifle and Winchester Rifle were lever-action repeating arms and not semiautomatic rifles, you really don’t have any business writing a book about guns. I suspect the rest of Clayton’s findings won’t reveal so much academic fraud as Bellesiles work, but rather stunning ignorance piled upon ignorance, and an unwillingness to apply any real academic rigor.
I’d expect nothing less from someone who believes in speaking with the dead.
Terror Watch List is a Horrible Issue for Us
I’m not entirely certain what kind of games the Republicans are playing here, but it’s looking like there’s going to be a vote on a House equivalent of the Cornyn bill, which would put a hold on people who are on the watch list for up to 72 hours (the current period allowed by the Brady Act). There’s virtually no chance this is going to end up passing since the Dems are pretty much universal in rejecting this proposal, so it’s dead in the Senate even if the House passes it. I think both sides are playing games trying to make a campaign issue.
As I’ve said before, the problem we have is that this does not fall along traditional party lines. The Republican Party has a healthy co-hort of “law and order” types who fall along the authoritarian side of the political spectrum. This part of the GOP coalition has never had much respect for civil liberties.
I don’t believe the NRA should be supporting this type of bill, since it looks to me like there can’t be any agreement, which means nothing passes. Why not let the Cornyn plan die in that case? What are we going to get in return for having a vote on this? What is the strategy here? Is it just disaster mitigation? Can we not hold the GOP together on this, or is there a real risk of losing GOP votes to a worse bill that might pick up Dem support?
I get that it’s bad optics to support “guns for terrorists,” and that half of the country, more than half of the GOP, and probably an uncomfortable portion of the NRA membership care not a whit about the due process rights and civil liberties of people on the terror watch list. The ACLU opposes using these secret watch lists removing rights from people, as they should, but that’s because your typical ACLU type might be a raging liberal, but they aren’t authoritarians. There’s plenty of authoritarianism on both sides of the aisle, and that’s why I worry about this issue. It’s great for channeling the worst civil liberties instincts of both parties. The Republicans don’t care about civil liberties if it stops terrorists (or at least offers good theater for the public that it does) and Democrats don’t view there are any civil liberties issues when it comes to firearms. In their view it’s not a right: you may only possess arms as a privilege granted by the state.
Happy Independence Day
I hope you all have a great Independence Day. Sadly towns around here that chose to have their fireworks displays today are cancelling because inclement weather is descending upon us.
I went back to the home town yesterday for fireworks. Dude showed up with a sidecar motorcycle with a semi-auto RPK mounted to it. It was too dark to make out the motorcycle model. I wish I could have gotten a picture.
I do have to say that if you’re going to go forth to do some educatin’ of the soccer mommies, it would be awfully nice if you didn’t drive your motorcycle illegally into where the crowd was. But I suppose if you’re going to carry guns at people, you have to go where the people are. At the end of the day, it was too dark for anyone to really notice. Even the cops didn’t notice, or the dude is a known quantity. But you’d think they’d at least want to talk to to him about his parking job, and “hey, can you show me that magazine in your rifle is empty,” if they had. OC is legal in Pennsylvania without a license, but you can’t have a loaded long gun on or in a vehicle with or without a permit.
Brown Vetoes 4 “Gunpocalypse” Bills, Signs 6
The bills Brown signed were the worst of the bills. From the Firearms Policy Coalition:
The bills Brown signed, which will become law on January 1, 2017, are:
- SB 880 (Hall) and AB 1135 (Levine): Bans common and constitutionally protected firearms that have magazine locking devices.
- SB 1235 (de Leon): Now competes with Gavin Newsom’s Safety for All Act/Ammo Ban.
- SB 1446 (Hancock): Confiscation of lawfully acquired, standard capacity ammunition feeding devices.
- AB 1511 (Santiago): Bans the loaning of firearms.
- AB 1695 (Bonta): Makes some non-violent misdemeanors punishable by prohibitions on owning firearms.
The bills Brown vetoed are:
- AB 1673 (Gipson): Redefines “firearms†to include items that are not firearms.
- AB 1674 (Santiago): Bans buying more than one firearm within a 30-day period.
- AB 2607 (Ting): Dramatically expands who can request a Gun Violence Restraining order.
- SB 894 (Jackson): Re-victimizes victims by criminalizing the failure to report lost and stolen firearms.
The only thing that’s going to save California is federal preemption.
NRA Worried Members Aren’t Lining Up Behind Trump?
First NRA ad of the season: