Category: Gun Rights

There’s a lot of interesting talk in the comments of my Alan Gura report about how one defines good ideas, bad ideas, and who gets to decide this? I think it would be unfair to suggest the old Justice Potter Stewart, “I know it when I see it” approach, because every good idea is someone else’s bad idea. If there wasn’t a certain amount of relativity here, there would not be conflict. Suggesting one’s ideas are the right ideas, and someone else’s are the wrong ones, just because that’s clearly the case, is intellectually shallow. So how do we find truth, to the extent that it exists?

Conflict actually offers a way to separate good ideas from bad. That’s why Freedom of Speech is the first right in our society. Ideas are debated in the court of public opinion, which, at least ideally, allows good ideas to prevail over bad ones. But in order to separate good ideas from bad, you need to have some kind of framework. Otherwise you just have conflict for conflict’s sake, which advances nothing. That framework needs to be effectiveness, or “Do your ideas work?” In that framework, ideas that work and further a movement’s goals are good ideas, and ideas that don’t work, or don’t further a movement’s goals are bad ones. Having your ideas work is what lends them credibility, ultimately. Let’s just take a look at this example from the comments:

Sebastian, I understand your point, but how are we to judge what is a “good idea” vs. what is a “bad idea”? As I recall, Heller was roundly condemned (at one point) by the NRA as a bad idea, and it’s turned out to be a shining victory.

At one time I thought Parker was a bad idea, because I felt the chances of it winning were slim, and that it would create negative precedent to overcome. But Alan Gura was willing to go around on blogs and make the case for it, and the victories racked up built up his position, and weakened NRA’s position. I’d not agree with NRA today if they were still against a three branch strategy for the Second Amendment. Alan Gura’s ideas prevailed because he convinced people they were good ideas, and then created a track record of those ideas working to advance the movement.

I will take the example of Gary Gorski that I used in the previous post, who has his own ideas on how to conduct Second Amendment litigation. He’s responsible for the infamous Silveira case, which reenforced the collective rights view in the 9th Circuit. He’s also been a passionate advocate against Alan Gura’s strategy, and has even attacked Alan Gura personally. One can pretty easily conclude that Alan Gura’s ideas are good, and Gorski’s are bad, because Alan Gura’s ideas have a track record of winning and Gorski’s do not.

It is ultimately through argument and persuasion that we try to separate the wheat from the chaff, but any idea or strategy that is advanced eventually must be able to meet the hard cold test of succeeding in reality, and ideas which can’t answer basic challenges, deal with fundamental questions of practical implementation, or which fail when put into practice, have to be considered bad ideas and pushed aside as ineffective. I can’t think of any other way you keep a movement progressing forward.

It was probably intended that if MAIG were ever attacked by the NRA, they’d cry foul and claim it as evidence that the NRA were out looking to arm criminals with the illegal guns they are supposedly against.  We’re seeing that already.

From Tallahassee:

“To keep illegal guns out of the hands of criminals and terrorists and that is the fundamental objective of this organization,” says Marks. Marks says the American Hunters and Shooters Association supports the mayors group and sent out letters this week claiming “the NRA has been sending false information about what Mayors Against Illegal Guns stands for” and says “to take them head on.”

And we know that AHSA is a gun control group disguised as a pro-gun group.  MAIG is an organization that’s dedicated to keeping guns out of the hands of criminals and terrorists by ensuring that they stay out of the hands of law abiding people too.

Modesto California, where the Bee is doing its level best to carry the water for Bloomberg:

Last week, he and three other California mayors — also under attack by the NRA — resigned from MAIG. His name and photo are gone from its Web site.

“I support the police and I also support Second Amendment rights,” Ridenour said. “Originally, (the mayors) were talking about illegal guns.”

They say they still are. The NRA claims they never were.

They talk about illegal guns.  Their policy proposals have nothing to do with illegal guns, or locking up the people who use them or traffic in them.

From Vineland, New Jersey:

“People that obtain guns illegally or carry guns illegally, that’s what I’m against,” Romano said. “I don’t want people to think I’m against legal guns. I’m not.”

He has made that clear to the dozen or so local NRA members who have contacted him since receiving the NRA’s mailing last week.

It takes more than showing off your judge to convince me.  MAIG isn’t just against illegal carry, they are against legal carry too, as demonstrated by the policies they support.  They are also not supporting policies of getting tough on traffickers, only restricting legal sales.

From Orlando Beach, Florida:

“The National Rife Association is basically trying to make mayors look like they are against all guns,” Costello said. “And that’s absolutely not true.”

It is true, unfortunately.  They advocate the same policies as the Brady Campaign, pretty much across the board.

There are more out there if you look.  The gauntlet has now been thrown down.  What are we going to do about it?  It’s time to start writing Letters to the Editor, and writing letters to the mayors in your area to make sure they are not confused.  We have to let people know about what MAIG is really up to.  Don’t let them get away with painting themselves as going after criminal gun use.  They are a gun control group cleverly concealed, and people need to know about it if we’re going to win this.

The Senate voted for Amtrak to allow firearms to be transported aboard trains as checked baggage, in the same manner as they are permitted on aircraft.  Amtrak is complaining they don’t have the manpower, but I don’t see what manpower they need.  Last time I took Amtrak, they didn’t exactly have elaborate security measures.  Most of what goes on in a train station is even more security theater than you see at airports.

UPDATE: Helmke:

Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said he “doesn’t have problems with people transporting guns on trains so long as steps are taken to make sure they’re secured and properly stowed.”

I guess this one was a little too reasonable for them to oppose.  It would be hard to argue against, considering security concerns are much higher on planes, and you can transport firearms on planes in checked baggage.

This from the Yakima Herald in Yakima, Washington:

So he signed a pledge, as have more than 450 other mayors from 40 states across the nation, to find ways to keep illegal guns out of the hands of criminals, the mentally ill and juveniles.

Nothing wrong with that, right?

Not so fast. The National Rifle Association says the Mayors Against Illegal Guns, the nonpartisan group that Yakima’s mayor joined, is nothing more than another thinly veiled attempt to limit gun ownership — this time by trying to regulate private gun shows out of existence.

Except the Yakima Herald doesn’t seem to realize what a snow job Bloomberg has pulled over on these mayors.  His group has very little to do with illegal guns, and that’s apparent just looking at their issues list to anyone reasonably well researched in gun control policy. Lautenberg’s gun show bill, which they support, goes way farther than just regulating private sales, and is aimed solely at making gun shows, or any place where firearms are transferred, so legally risky as to effectively put them out of business.   That’s not even mentioning their support for eliminating your right to bear arms based on your presence on a secret government list with no due-process or recourse through the court system.

Gun owners need to call these mayors to task for supporting this nonsense.  Don’t let them get away with just repeating Bloomberg’s snow job.  Point out to your mayor exactly what they are doing in his or her name.   Definitely don’t be these guys:

“It’s like talking to a stone wall,” he said.

He’d prefer Brenner not be in the mayors’ group, he said, “but you know . . . that’s only one opinion.”

Ron Scheeler, an NRA member from Springettsbury Township, said he received the card, too, but didn’t call.

The retired state police commander said he still has a permit to carry a gun.

“I believe I have a right to do this,” he said. “I also believe people have a right to state their point of view also.”

These guys are why we lose.  Elected officials have a right to an opinion, but they don’t have a right to represent their opinions on behalf of your town, nor do they have a right to continue to serve in the capacity as mayor.  If your town has a MAIG mayor, make life difficult for them.  All it takes is a few squeaky wheels.

The City of Pittsburgh seems to be backing off the assault weapons ban issue.

Probably the main highlight of the Gun Blogger Rendezvous IV was being able to spend some time talking with Alan Gura, the attorney who argued and won the Heller case before the Supreme Court of the United States. When I say we owe Alan Gura a lot, it’s an understatement. He put together a case, and took it forward, when a lot of folks, including me, thought it was a tremendously risky proposition. Even in the early days of Parker, you could find him on blogs making the argument for taking his case forward. It was his arguments on blogs that eventually convinced me taking Parker (later to become Heller) forward was the right thing to do. Alan gave us an overview of what convinced them the time was right — hat there was a circuit split the Court would want to resolve, and that at some point, someone is going to take a case forward. They decided it would be best to build a solid case, and go with it, which is what they did.

One thing that made me feel good is the confidence Alan displays about winning on the most serious stuff. We asked him about really everything from incorporation to assault weapons bans, and he feels Heller offers enough language to make a winning case for every one of those things. He’s currently pursuing cases challenging the California handgun roster, bans on concealed carry in Washington DC, in addition to the incorporation suits he has on the table.

He briefly went into the concealed carry issue, and basically explained what were the legal options left open to us by Heller, and by what’s traditionally been the case in American law. In the legal theory he presented, the government is permitted to regulate the manner in which someone carries a firearm, but it may not outright prohibit citizens from carrying a gun for self-protection. His goal with the DC case (Palmer) is just to get a ruling that the District of Columbia may not outright prohibit the bearing of arms. What form of law the District enacts to comply with the decision is something for another day, but the goal is to get the ruling that carrying of firearms for self-protection is covered under the Second Amendment, with the government only able to regulate the manner of carry. He seems confident that he can prevail on this issue.

The final topic we got into was what he thought the biggest threats to the Second Amendment were, and what we, as bloggers, could do about it. His response was that he did not feel that the biggest threat to the Second Amendment came from groups like the Brady Campaign, VPC, or the now defunct Second Amendment Research Center run by Saul Cornell. He believes the biggest threat to the Second Amendment comes from our own extremists and lunatics, and that the biggest way we could contribute as bloggers is in confronting that cancer within our community. Just as an example in the legal world, he brought up the example of Gary Gorski, who was the attorney who famously brought us the disastrous Silveira case, and who continues to bring bad cases forward, and recently has been screwing up concealed carry cases in California, finally culminating in Gorski calling Gura “nothing more than an officious meddler.”

The best a Second Amendment activists can really do is shrug a lot of nonsense off, but it’s a huge distraction, and you can see in the example above what potential for damage there is from supposed members of our own community. I don’t stand up to these lunatics because I like the attention, traffic or because I run out of things to talk about. I do it because in my dealings with effective people, every one of them has felt discouraged by the endless amount of pooh flung in their direction by egomaniacs and lunatics who delight in doing so. I agree with Alan that we are our own worst enemies, and I will continue to stand up for what is effective, and argue against that which is not. It meant a lot to me to hear something like that coming from someone as credible as Alan Gura.

Highlights of GBR IV:

• Steel Challenge is a hell of a lot of fun.  Out of 20 shooters, I think my rank was 6.  I had an advantage shooting rimfire, but I was still pretty happy with my results having never shot Steel Challenge before.
• Alan Gura beating me in an iPhone light saber fight.
• “Molly has a cyclic rate of 238 rounds per minute.”
• Getting my ass whipped in Steel Challenge by a 13 year old girl.

More shortly

The headline says a man with a gun was trying to enter the Capitol during Obama’s speech. But reading the article indicates there’s a little more to the story that shows he actually was not a threat at all.

A man with a shotgun was arrested on Wednesday night by U.S. Capitol Police while attempting to gain access to Capitol grounds as President Barack Obama began to deliver his speech to a joint session on healthcare.

Capitol Police stopped Joshua Bowman, 28, of Falls Church, Va., at approximately 8 p.m. on Wednesday night several blocks away from the Capitol as he made a “failed attempt to gain access to [a Capitol] barricade,” a spokeswoman said.

After consenting to an administrative search of his vehicle, a shotgun in its case with ammunition was found in the vehicle’s trunk. He was transported to Capitol Police headquarters where he was processed and charged with carrying an unregistered firearm and possessing unregistered ammunition.

For those of you who don’t know, these barricades are erected in the middle of some streets that, according to a map, look like they should be open to traffic. They are blocks from the actual Capitol building because they are posted around the Congressional office buildings that surround the Capitol.

It seems to me that someone up to no good would not keep his shotgun cased in the trunk and consent to a search. If there were no nefarious reasons for him to be there, then I do hope that he fights like hell because it sounds as though he was traveling in a manner legal by FOPA standards. Anyone who has driven in DC can tell you how easy it is to get lost in that city and end up near monuments and buildings you never expected to be near. If this man was following the law but ended up lost, he should not be prosecuted for this unregistered bullshit.

A federal court in New Mexico rules in favor of a man suing police for a violation of his civil rights. Not a Second Amendment case, but still good news. It only takes a few of these for authorities to get the message.