Shall Not Be Questioned – Page 754 – The right of the citizens to bear arms in defense of themselves and the State …

Gun Shop Restrictions

It looks like some anti-gunners are seizing upon Obama’s (old) platform of banning gun stores in any area you might actually visit. Obama’s idea – banning them within 5 miles of schools or parks – would have effectively shut down just about every gun store in most parts of the country. Here in Pennsylvania, one group appears to be testing the waters on the idea, taking it even further:

CeaseFire PA sent their own questionnaires to candidates earlier this year to test the waters for rather extreme policies â€“ including closing down gun stores within an arbitrary, undefined distance of any school, daycare center, park, or residential area.

That would shut down every shop in Pennsylvania, I can pretty much guarantee it. Turns out some anti-gun parents in Wisconsin are pushing a similar agenda now that a gun store is opening near an elementary school. Because we all know that when a gun store opens near a school, elementary school thugs will get their hands on an uzi and start robbing the younger kids of their milk money – or something.

The City of West Allis is considering limiting where gun dealers can open up shop. It all started with a controversial store right across the street from an elementary school.

During a December 7th meeting the City of West Allis considered where gun businesses and shooting ranges can and cannot set up shop. …

Parents of students collected more than 800 signatures to prevent the business from opening there, but city leaders say the location does not violate any laws.

The proposed ordinance won’t affect current gun shops including Shorty’s. They all will be grandfathered in.

The proposed ordinance will shrink the area gun sellers could operate out of, putting future retailers and shooting ranges in more industrial sections labeled in blue.

I don’t understand the irrational fear of these folks about gun dealers near schools. Their kids can’t buy guns. There won’t guns disposed of on the street when customers come in to buy new ones. I had my first experience with this form of crazy in college when a gun shop opened up about a mile from campus. An alum came in ranting about how things were going to hell in a handbasket because a gun store was nearby. I couldn’t wrap my head around why that was bad then, and I still don’t get it today.

Transparency, Government, and Gun Rights

Thanks to David Post for pointing to these excellent thoughts on the Wikileaks scandal, because I think it has a useful concept that also speaks to some recent happenings in the gun rights movement here in Pennsylvania:

On the other hand, human systems canâ€™t stand pure transparency. For negotiation to work, peopleâ€™s stated positions have to change, but change is seen, almost universally, as weakness. People trying to come to consensus must be able to privately voice opinions they would publicly abjure, and may later abandon. Wikileaks plainly damages those abilities. (If Aaron Badyâ€™s analysis is correct, it is the damage and not the oversight that Wikileaks is designed to create.*)

And so we have a tension between two requirements for democratic statecraft, one that canâ€™t be resolved, but can be brought to an acceptable equilibrium. Indeed, like the virtues of equality vs. liberty, or popular will vs. fundamental rights, it has to be brought into such an equilibrium for democratic statecraft not to be wrecked either by too much secrecy or too much transparency.

So how does this relate to the gun rights movement? Because it explains why it’s not really possible for NRA, or any other group that may be in a position to know legislatively sensitive information, to share that information with grassroots activists who aren’t made privy to it. I think the root of much of the tension is that negotiation and dealings happen behind closed doors, and there’s not enough trust that the people who are in the smoked filled room will do the right things.

There’s always the argument that perhaps there ought to be more transparency in the process, and I think there is merit to the argument that NRA hasn’t been transparent enough in what it’s doing when lobbying legislatures. But it can’t be perfectly transparent. There will be some point where John Hohenwarter goes into the smoke filled room, and you’re stuck having to live with whatever comes out of that process. There might be times when it’s someone else headed into the smoked filled room to negotiate on our behalf. But it’s going to be someone, and can’t be everyone. And that someone is going to keep his cards very close to his chest, if he or she is a smart negotiator.

That’s one reason I’m not sure what cooperation between pro-gun groups in Pennsylvania is really going to look like. Not all groups are going to be on equal footing in the minds of the elected officials who control access to the smoke filled room, which means not all groups will have the same information. Not all of that information will be of a nature that can be shared broadly without risking compromising the overall legislative agenda. If the first requirement for harmony is for everyone to be on equal footing, information and access wise, that’s a non-starter out of the gate.

So I suppose it comes down to who you trust? Do I trust John Hohenwarter of NRA? Do I trust Kim Stolfer of FOAC? Do I trust Dan Pehrson of PAFOA? I would trust any of them to do the best they could for gun owners behind closed doors, because I think they all sincerely care about the issue, and have the best interests of our movement at heart. That’s really all I can ask for. I don’t expect a poker player to win every hand at poker, and I don’t expect a lobbyist to win every vote in a legislative battle either. Obviously, someone visibly incompetent at playing would be another matter, but I don’t think we have anyone who fits that bill in Pennsylvania.

Assessing the Impact of Heller and McDonald

Ilya Somin agrees with Josh Blackman that the impact is going to be pretty limited. When looking short term, I tend to agree with that. I believe what will end up happening legally is that the status quo is largely frozen into place, with some of the very restrictive jurisdictions forced to relax their rules to a large degree. But in the end, I still think having a gun and carrying one in New York City will be more of a pain in the ass than doing the same in Phoenix. The judiciary will give them more leeway than we would like. However, the question becomes, if they can’t too seriously and substantively interfere with the right to the point of near destruction, will they bother? How will that alter the political dynamic? How will the next generation of federal judges look at the Second Amendment?

In the end, the Brady Campaign is right. It largely does take the extremes off the table. What they don’t realize is that’s far worse news for them than it is for us. It’s incumbent on us to expand the Heller majority. We’ve already missed two important opportunities for that. I agree with Professor Somin’s assessment that the two decisions we have speaks to the Heller/McDonald coalition of five justices to have breaking points.

Fred Madden Throws A Rotten Bone

You remember Fred Madden? The New Jersey State Senator who rolled over for Governor Corzine to bring one-gun-a-month to the Garden State? Well, apparently he’s come up with a considerably less than ideal solution that doesn’t even begin to make up for it. Fred Madden is up for re-election in 2011. Gun owners in New Jersey need to show they can target an unseat someone like Madden. You only need a few heads on a pike before the politicians there start listening.

More Class from the Other Side

Josh Horwitz is now comparing James D’Cruz to Dylan Klebold. The fact that each of these stories shows new quotes which we have not yet seen is a good sign our opponents are all sharing the information on James’ Facebook:

The best case scenario here is that D’Cruz is strikingly immature and incapable of handling the serious responsibilities that come with gun ownership. The worst case scenario is that he’s a ticking time bomb in need of psychiatric care. In either case, he’s a poster boy for why we should prevent handgun sales to those under 21 years of age.

So he’s strikingly immature because he likes to quote movies and books? D’Cruz’s only gaffe here is that he either didn’t realize, or wasn’t coached, that being a plaintiff in a high profile civil rights case was going to put him under the microscope of unscrupulous people who would take anything they could out of context to smear him. I will grant, it is probably is something beyond the comprehension of someone under thirty, just how treacherous a game politics can be.

The notion that James Madison drafted the Second Amendment to guarantee the right of violence-obsessed teenagers to buy handguns and carry them in public–divorced from any type of civic or military duty–is asinine.

Well, good thing James is preparing for a career in our nation’s military then eh? Or did you miss the picture of him in that snappy JROTC uniform that was right next to the one in his Halloween costume that you guys cribbed?

Everything Old is New Again

Tam talks about this phenomenon as it relates to the gun world.

EZ-Pass Unintended Consequences

So we were told that the EZ-Pass system would make things more efficient, and with fewer toll workers to pay, more of your toll dollars could go to road maintenance. But one problem with EZ pass is that it hides costs from the consumer:

When Tolls Increase …

… on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in January, drivers aren’t going to see the new fares on their tickets, our friends at the Patriot-News report this morning.

The argument for snookering drivers?

Tolls are increasing 3 percent a year, so PTC officials say they’ll save money by not printing up a new batch of tickets every year. Besides that, about two-thirds of Turnpike drivers use EZ-Pass, and thus, probably neither know nor care how much they’re paying anyway.

When I paid with the ticket on the PA Turnpike every day, I knew exactly what the tolls were for pretty much all the exists out to Reading, because I forked over the change with ticket every day. Now with Z-Pass, I couldn’t honestly tell you what the tolls are on the PA Turnpike. This is going to give transportation authorities a lot more leeway in boosting tolls, since a majority of people will hardly notice. Sure, you can look, but it takes effort to find out.

This isn’t very libertarian of me, but I tend to disfavor tolls as a means for paying for roads. It’s not practical to toll every road, and for those of us who have to take toll roads, we pay for our road with the toll, while our tax dollars pay for the roads everyone else gets to drive on. To me roads are a public resource, and funding them with tax dollars is my preferred way to pay for them.

A Date Which Will Live in Infamy

If a picture is worth a thousand words, here are a few thousand in remembrance of today.

Shooting in New York City

From Forbes, at the only range left in Manhattan:

Part of the West Side’s appeal is the thrill of the forbidden–firing a weapon in New York City, which has some of the toughest gun laws in the country. “That restriction makes it more desirable,” says Leung, who has been co-owner since 1994, along with Bob Derrig, 71, a former dispatcher for an alarm company. The range also teaches self-defense courses and sells survival-kit “go bags.”

I think we’re going to change that, as well as ensure that Mr. Leung gets some competition.

Another Newspaper Company Signs with Righthaven

This time it’s Media News Group, which means these papers here are now on the black list. I will be removing all links to these papers. If they want to live in the dark, they are welcome. I have no intention of helping drive traffic and Google-fu to their site.