This time in the Hartford Courant. Let me ask you folks this: Do you think Barack Obama’s EPA is going to work cooperatively with shooting ranges to help ranges minimize their environmental impact? Or do you think Obama’s EPA will use lead contamination as an excuse to shut ranges down? Think about that come November.
Category: Guns
More Trouble for Blue Trail
Blue Trail is the last public outdoor range in Connecticuit. It would be a horrible loss to the shooting community to lose it. After bringing in experts to verify that the houses that claimed to be hit could not have been, it would seem that developer Pat DiNatale is taking up a new approach: lead.
What’s most curious to me is that the picture presented here looks nothing at all like lead corrosion. In fact, elemental lead is highly corrosion resistant. Even strong acids don’t have a large effect on lead. In addition, oxides of lead are usually white, bright yellow or bright red/orange. The picture above looks more like corrosion of iron or steel than lead. Lead is not very soluble in water. Most of the environmental concerns for lead contamination revolve around the use of lead oxides in things like paints, and lead salts. Elemental lead is not really very hazardous, and lead contamination from shooting ranges has never been shown to pose a serious hazard.
Why We Don’t License Rights
If there had to be a textbook case, it would look something like this.
New Sheriff in Town
Orange County California has a new sheriff. What is one of her first acts?
“The good-cause threshold you have to meet has gone up,” Nighswonger said. “The prior sheriff had more of a right-to-carry philosophy. Some of the things that were considered good cause won’t be now.”
Orange County has now gone from, essentially, right to carry, to right denied, unless you can convince the Sheriff to allow you to exercise your right to self-defense. Hopefully she’ll deem you worthy.
Oh, and it looks like she has a blog. No comments though.
US Wins Gold in Double Trap
Walton Eller, a Texan, has won the gold medal in Men’s Double Trap in Beijing. Silver was Italian Police Officer Francesco D’Aniello. Bronze goes to China’s Hu Binyuan. Italians seem to be pretty dominant in the shotgun sports. But be all those fine expensive shotguns.
Evanston Effectively Drops Gun Ban
Evanston, IL has modified its gun ban to be in line with the Heller ruling:
The National Rifle Association sued Evanston and other Illinois communities with gun bans after the court ruled in June that a gun ban in Washington, D.C., is unconstitutional.
In response the city’s legal staff drafted a new ordinance that would let most residents keep guns in their homes, but ban possession of most guns by minors and of all guns by narcotics addicts, mental patients, the mentally retarded and persons under 21 years of age with criminal records.
That’s probably good enough to get the lawsuit dropped. Hat tip to Carl in Chicago.
Justice Kennedy on Heller: A Must View
Orin Kerr points out a video by Justice Kennedy that mentions the Heller decision as a great teaching decision (38 minutes in). Professor Kerr opines:
In particular, Justice Kennedy appears to suggest around the 40-minute mark that he will take a living constitutionalist approach to the Second Amendment that may point to more gun rights under the Second Amendment than an originalist approach would provide.
I believe I read a few weeks ago that Alan Gura was not quite so worried about Justice Kennedy as he was about others. This would indicate that was good judgement. I wouldn’t bet the farm on it, but it would seem that Justice Kennedy might not be the vote we have to be concerned might waver.
Federal Court Upholds Lautenberg
If the federal courts are going to keep casually dismissing any serious analysis that would seem to be required by Heller, my initial optimisms that this case will be anything more than a limited, obscure ruling a la Lopez, is beginning to wane.
UPDATE: On the bright side, at least they do seem to be deciding that strict liability for Felon-in-Posession might be unconstitutional. That’s good news.
Philadelphia Begins Enforcement Today
Philadelphia will begin enforcing its law requiring victims of theft to report their stolen firearms to police or face jail time and a hefty fine. This law is probably illegal under Pennsylvania’s preemption statute, but someone has to be charged before they will have standing to raise that challenge in court.
Atlanta Airport Injunction Denied
A federal judge has denied a preliminary injunction in the case of GeorgiaCarry.org and Atlanta-Hartfield International Airport. This doesn’t mean they lost the case, just that the judge doesn’t view that they are substantially likely to win. I see a few problems with this line of reasoning.
- One is that the TSA doesn’t currently prohibit guns in the non-sterile area of the airports
- Two, the TSA doesn’t appear to have any unilateral authority to do so.
- Three, there’s no law in Georgia making carrying a firearm in an airport a crime.
So I tend to think they have a strong likelihood of winning their case, but this goes to show how hazardous it is to depend on the federal courts for enforcement of gun rights.
UPDATE: The federal judge in question is a notoriously liberal Carter appointee. So take that for what it’s worth.