Sebastian – Page 836 – Shall Not Be Questioned

Sugarmann is Another One …

… of those gun control advocates who’s keepin’ it classy:

As an advocate who debated gun control supporters, Hain was well aware of the facts presented in opposition to her views. Yet she parried them as irrelevant to her world, in the same way that the concerns of her fellow Pennsylvania soccer moms were dismissed as the intellectual flotsam of the anti-gun mind. To this mindset, gun homicides, unintentional deaths, and suicides were events that happened to other people who lacked the temperament, training, or personal fortitude to own a gun. In essence, Hain, like many of her fellow pro-gun advocates, lacked an ability to think in the abstract: Her gun experience was positive and whatever negative effects others felt from firearms, the gun, and gun owners like herself, were never to blame. Is it too bold to think that if she had survived her husband’s attack by shooting him to death she would have offered his killing as proof of the effectiveness of the self-defense handgun? Based on 25 years in the gun control debate I don’t think so.

Look, Josh, it’s not any secret that I was not a fan of Meleanie’s activism, but I won’t presume to assume what she did and didn’t dismiss, and smear her with all the standard bugaboos anti-gun folks have for pro-gun folks. But you’re right about one thing Josh, if would have been an example of the effectiveness of self-defense had she been able to successfully defend herself against her husband. Because she’d be alive, and her three children would still have a mother. Surely that would not be a tragedy in your world view just because we would get to make a point? Sometimes I wonder.

Horrific

The details of the Hain murder have been released. This is horrible. She was on a video chat at the time she was shot, and the person on the other end witnessed the murder. She was apparently doing dishes in the kitchen. The murder weapons was her husband’s 9mm. Her gun was nowhere near her. She had no opportunity to defend herself. Her husband later killed himself with a shotgun. See this story here for different details.

What a Great Guy

There’s not many anti-gun people I would say I truly despise. Most of them are good Americans with a different opinion about how to deal with the problem of violence, and maybe some phobias to go along with it, but Bryan Miller is not among people I count in that category. A good person’s reaction to someone being killed in a domestic violence incident is not “Well, you know, I was right and she was wrong, clearly.” Â But here’s what Bryan said:

“Ms. Hain’s position was that guns make people safer. I thought at the time that she was incorrect. I’m very sad to say events seem to have sadly shown that I was correct,” Miller said.

Asshole.

New Saturn Ring Discovered

Not normally visible, but it apparently emits infrared. White House has issued a press release saying the hithertofore undiscovered ring was never noticed because it has only appeared since his ascension, and is the celestial manifestation of the big guy’s unimpeachable awesomeness. The White House also noted that the next years Nobel for Physics wasn’t out of the realm of possibility for having created this phenomenon.

Tasteful Guys

The Freedom States Alliance tries to make the point I figured anti-gun groups would try to make. The Brady Campaign deserves kudos for tastefully staying out of it, rather than try to score political points.

But one wonders what political point the Freedom States Alliance is trying to make? Â Scott Hain was a law enforcement officer. He is the kind of person who would have guns even if FSA got their dream of total civilian disarmament. Â Does FSA want to argue that battered spouses of law enforcement officers are better off with no protection at all?

According to forum accounts from people who knew her, Meleanie Hain did indeed understand there was a “danger lurking inside her own home”, but that danger was Scott Hain. There is a lesson here, but it’s not the lesson that FSA is trying to sell by exploiting the Hain murder.

Careful Out There

A Pennsylvania man gets fired from his job for buying a part for his shotgun from a work computer:

When Jackson was searching the Web for a replacementÂ shotgun stock, supervisorÂ Christie Vazquez — who admitted in a subsequent deposition to being “very anti-gun” and had quarreled with him before about politics — noticed what he was doing. Vazquez said she was scared because it was only a few weeks after theÂ Virginia Tech massacre (seeÂ CBS News video), so she promptly reported her colleague’s Web browsing to Planco’s human resources department. Vazquez also informed the HR department that Jackson owned guns and was a member of theÂ National Rifle Association.

You can guess what happened next: according to court documents, the HR representative,Â Jamie Davis, replied that reporting the visits to Mossberg.com and other sites was “the right thing” to do, and ordered the information technology department to investigate Jackson’s Internet activity. After receiving a list of Web sites visited, Davis recommended that Jackson be placed on leave, which the company authorized. Planco disabled Jackson’s front door and computer access and arranged for undercover police to be at the building the next morning.

This is pretty appalling, and shame on Planco for treating people this way. Add that to the list of companies I will never work for or buy anything from.

Liars

Apparently we’re the liars, according to the New York Daily News. Apparently they didn’t bother to research current laws. Apparently they aren’t interested in talking about why we’re not prosecuting this kind of stuff under current laws. Not interested in discussing whether Bloomberg’s investigators broke the gun laws buying guns out of state.

There are liars in this issue, but it’s not us. The Daily News has about as much credibility as the Nobel Prize Committee at this point.

It is Time for Me to Set Higher Goals

I work at a small biotech company, and though we haven’t produced anything yet of note, have had some minor successes, and minor failures, and I’m just an IT guy whose supports researchers, Â I now believe this qualifies me for the Nobel Prize in Medicine. I hope the committee will be contacting me shortly.

Lame Commentary on the Stevens Case

A TV host and columnist, Bonnie Erbe, is upset that the Supreme Court seems willing to come down on the side of the First Amendment in the Stevens case, which had oral arguments earlier this week. She’s upset, because she obviously did not listen to the oral arguments, nor did she bother researching the case before mouthing off about it.

The biggest fear Justice Antonin Scalia registered was that the law could be used to ban hunting videos. When one reads the language of the statute, it seems to say that hunting (or making or selling videos of same) is not the kind of activity it was enacted to ban. Is hunting illegal under federal or state law? Of course not! State law regulates and licenses hunting, but does not make it illegal.

Except hunting certain kinds of animals is illegal in some states and not in others. For instance, Michigan and a few other states ban hunting of morning doves, but which are popular game birds in the South. By plain reading of the statute, it would be illegal to make a hunting video depicting morning dove hunting in Texas, and sell it to someone in Michigan, where dove hunting is illegal. The video doesn’t have to be cruel, it just has to depict someone killing an animal. It would be unlawful to put a dove hunting web site up, because someone in Michigan might read it. If Ms. Erbe had done research, she would have realized this, but it gets better:

My concern regarding Justice Breyerâ€™s question extends beyond the plain language of the law. When he asks whether Congress can just go ahead and pass another law, he underestimates the enormity of such a task. It can take decades to re-enact a law the Supreme Court strikes down willy-nilly.

I’m sorry that Ms. Erbe is upset that we live in a Constitutional Republic that has limits on the power of government, and makes it difficult for Congress to pass laws that touch on important constitutional rights. I really am. Utterly distraught.

When I think of free speech I think of political protest or whistle-blowing or espousing unpopular positions. I donâ€™t think of a constitutional right to make and sell violent, bloody videos of animals maiming and killing each other in a way that is designed to appeal to the lowest human instincts.

So you’re OK with banning nude art then? Certain types of dancing that people find appeal to the lowest human instincts? Depictions of violence in movies and video games? I’m sorry we have a First Amendment that protects these things, but we do. If Ms. Erbe is so upset by this concept of broad protections on freedom of speech and expression, perhaps she should consider relocating to a country where such rights are not taken seriously, like China, Russia, or Canada.

Can You Tell She’s Running for Governor?

Kay Bailey Hutchison plans to file a brief in McDonald. But I don’t mean to be too cynical. This is a vitally important effort, and it will be a tremendous help in showing the political branches are behind the Court ruling in favor of McDonald. Hutchison deserves credit for spearheading the effort.