To be clear, this was only the hearing; now they'll chew on it for a while. The questioning certainly suggests the court will overturn the ban, but the eventual ruling does not always follow the questioning pattern.

Canada has a higher rate of gun ownership than the US but a far lower rate of firearm-related murder and assault, so there appear to be cultural issues involved rather than it being a simple matter of legality.

Between the gun problem and healthcare crisis and the incessant need to go around invading other countries and the mess that is our political sphere, I suggest that we follow the Republican model and outsource our entire government to be run by the Canadians. Couldn't be worse, eh?

Somehow, John McCain just has to make an issue out of that.

http://www.pinkpistols.org/

speed reading kills, kids! don't blog and talk on the phone at the same time, or you too could suffer the shame and embarrassment of sloppy blogging.

vastleft, that is hilarious
I hope the DC ban stays, but if it goes the gun debate will be transformed in this country. All of a sudden NY and Mass will have to care about those crazy people in fly over land.

and frankly I could get behind an overturn of the DC ban.
The Swiss/Israeli system (Everybody has a gun at home, everybody has to show up and train with it regularly, everybody knows everybody has a gun) seems to me to be a good one.

Bringiton makes an interesting point. I haven't done the research but didn't the UK ban handgun possession following a fairly horrible incident with a Scots school in about 1992/93? How is that working out for the Brits/Irish/Scots, the Ozzies and the Canadians?

And y'know, if armed gays get bashed less, and armed women get raped/murdered less, and we become a nation forced to behave as though any stupidity we rendered might get us shot, is there a downside there?

I refer those who remember to the Marty Robbins classic, "Big Iron," and the Jimmy Dean song, "Big Bad John."

But for those who detest handguns, there are other sorts of arms. Swords. Knives. A sock full of marbles makes a nice, hard-to-detect cosh. Put your average keyring on a neckchain, and it's almost as good a weapon as a bolo. Slings and slingshots are effective and silent, as are bows and arrows; and ammunition is cheaper than bullets for both those weapons.

The Ginsu-imitation "Klingon paring knife" in my camp box is probably a parole violation in most places, and the length of leather-wrapped pipe under the truck seat is the same, but they're staying right where they're at, thank you very much. Both my boys carry "Trooper's lights," the 18''-long 6x D-Cell Maglites that can blind you, or beat you down, in their vehicles. Yes, they were gifts from mom, because the kids go to college and unsavory things happen sometimes, and a good flashlight is a handy thing to have.

The average mother's daily purse is a pretty effective substitute for a mace, lacking spikes (well, usually; some of the avant-guard fashionistas' purses I've seen look like they were made to crack open armor); and the older the mom or the more kids she's carrying around the required stuff to support, the likelier said purse is to produce blunt-force trauma.

Back in the day, a $2-pistol was ... well, as apt to blow up in the user's face as put a bullet five feet downrange. I'm not sure if that's still the case. I'm all for an armed populace, PROVIDED that same populace is aware of the danger of messing with the neighbor(s) and properly trained in the use and storage and maintenance of said firearms (similar, I think, to the familiarity with use, storage and maintenance of cars you need to own one).

You need not be Matthew Quigley to own a firearm, but you ought to know how to use a firearm as effectively, whether or not it's one you favor.

I've been on this soapbox before.

The 2nd Amendment is no less -- and not much more, really -- important than any other Amendment. Seeing the disrepair Nos. 1 and 4 and 5 are in courtesy of the current administration, I'd just as soon No. 2 got a boost.

If you really, really, really want to take the guns away from all the law-abiding folk (such as CD or me), what does that tell all the non-law abiding folk they can expect in the way of resistance to their predations?

Canada has a lot of guns, but heavily regulates handguns, which is one of the reasons why it has fewer gun deaths. Most gun deaths in the U.S. are from handguns. Unlike most countries, the U.S. fucking loves handguns.

As for D.C., it's easy to judge its handgun ban now that its crime rate is down, but D.C. had a terrible crime problem in the 1980s and early 1990s and a lot of people died because of cheap and easy handguns. They don't call them Saturday Night specials for nothing. D.C.'s biggest problem is that it's an island in the middle of a sea of handguns, so its ban was not as successful as it might have been. Anyway, it wasn't crazy to think that folks didn't have much need for handguns in a major metropolitan city. Most people buy guns and never practice shooting them as if the gun will magically protect them. Most of the time all they're doing is leaving a loaded handgun in a desk drawer for the burgler to find just as they walk in the door.

And for those who want to protect their homes, shotguns are the best choice. Hard to miss the target and when you miss, you don't have to worry as much about the bullet going through your apartment wall and killing your neighbor's kid.

As for the idea of handguns being useful because we can all arm ourselves to protect ourselves walking around our fair cities, personally that's not a society I want to live in. I expect my society to be one where I don't have to kill my neighbor to be safe walking down the street. Not to mention the number of crazy and stupid people running around who are the last people I want walking around with a gun in their belt, thinking they're Clint Eastwood.

So other than target practice and sports shooting, there's not much use for handguns and cheap handguns aren't even useful for that. The only thing the cheap ones, which flooded D.C. and other cities in the 1980s, are good for is killing people.

Now, let me be clear, I don't necessarily have a problem with gun ownership, including handguns, and I don't believe outright bans are the most effective policies to prevent gun violence. But this country is incredibly stupid about guns and striking down the D.C. gun ban isn't going to make us any smarter.

there are plenty of communities in which people are armed, and there isn't a great deal of gun violence. so it can be done. i learned it on the street and in the hood: gun violence happens because the police make it happen. i'm jaded by my chicago PD experience, but it's clear to me that the "shooting wars" between "gangs" never seem to be free of some shooting cops somewhere in the mix.

further, i look at the IL death row. 50% of them were innocent, and you know who makes it to death row easiest? cop killers. if you're unlucky enough to live in a precinct where the cops are corrupt (boystown, some south side communities, etc) you may find out the hard way that people who shoot at cops, including little old ladies who did no wrong but the cops break down your door and come blasting in, sometimes even killing you or your family, well... let's just say some of us have no patience for that whole "gang wars are responsible for urban gun deaths."

Why did the evening news show a black woman as someone who filed the suit?

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/03/1...

Are they blackwashing this story, so the topic's black-on-black crime, instead of the more radical issue of armed gays?

We can admit that we're killers ... but we're not going to kill today. That's all it takes! Knowing that we're not going to kill today! ~ Captain James T. Kirk, Stardate 3193.0

startrib

Dick Anthony Heller, 66, a security guard, sued the District of Colombia after it rejected his application to keep a handgun at his home for protection in the same Capitol Hill neighborhood as the court. He was one of six D.C. residents who were recruited to file a 2003 lawsuit. Tactically, each represented a distinct facet of the district's population. They included a gay man worried about defending himself and an activist threatened by drug dealers. Heller is the only one remaining on the case.

however, that's not what i read the other day, which i first came across at pageoneQ. that story had more details and an interview with the gay man in question.

thanks for the CBS catch. why, indeed, did they show the black person's hand?

i think you all know why.

Misplaced fears and mistaken solutions, the American approach to problems. In the UK the recent rise in (non-IRA) gun-related crime has caused the police force to start carrying weapons, and along the US border Canadians are experiencing a similar rapid rise in gun-related crime and deaths. In the US, contrary to conventional wisdom, gun-related deaths are substantially down from 15 years ago.

Deaths by firearms get all the attention, but they are not the worst problem. There are now around 10-11K firearm related deaths per year, compared to 40-45K motor vehicle related deaths annually. We would be better served to outlaw cars.

As well, killings by strangers are what make the news but account for only 14% of all homicides. Who you should really fear are people you know, since over 50% of murders occur at the hands of spouse/lover (11%), other family (8%), and acquaintances/friends (32%).

The root causes of homicide, including those by firearms, rests predominantly with poverty, with economic desperation, absence of employment opportunity, inadequate education, and all the many socioeconomic equitability things that our society does a terrible job of addressing. Better we should work on the root causes of violent crime rather than trying to put a patch on one symptom that, as BDBlue points out, is unlikely to stick.

[Note on shotguns as home defense: Load with birdshot only; you can reach around a corner and fill a room with lead, but the shot won’t penetrate walls and hurt someone unintentionally.]

PS: CD, Chicago is not typical of all of America, thank goodness. I take issue with the notion that police corruption is a major contributor to gun violence, even on the street. Can you show me some data to back up that claim?

i'm sorry my life, and lives of my lovers, friends and family members, isn't available for blog posting in the form of links that satisfy the likes of you. honestly, i wish i could "post proof." i can, but then you'd see me in the Barbie hat, and that would be bad.

like i said. i know cops. i know judges. i've fucked them, been part of the family, been part of the process. that's all i have. and, my experience in the military and intel communities. but what do i know- most of those groups hate and reject me. despite my qualifications as a winger, which are not insignificant.

cops/intel/ops people are good people. except when they are not. and most excepting when money is involved. if the operative words were "scientists for Big Pharma" or "religious hucksters for more donations," you wouldn't be arguing with me, would you love? so too in this case. mostly white cops from the 'burbs hating on mostly brown/black young men from the cities, hating on each other, one more empowered than the other by the state? if that's radical to you, you're...silly.

bottom line: don't blame poor people for the corruption of the rich and powerful. that's not hard to understand, even for you.

once again, my heart is so warmed by our exchange. Must run, R/L, but perhaps later I'll reply.

You have me at a disadvantage on the judge-fucking, I'll give you that one.

cops fear most - even if the people in the house are ready to kill each other (or actively trying already), both sides will likely turn on the interloping officers.

Just experience. Mine, but only once; my sergeant's and coworkers', many times over. But that was 30 years ago, give or take, and thankfully, these days I am not a first responder.

CD: I believe that it's not the rich who are as corruptible as it is the folks caught somewhere in-between ...

but you go to bed and don't worry about that, mk?

i love you as i always have.

... observations like this:

You have me at a disadvantage on the judge-fucking, I’ll give you that one.

Makes it all worth it, I say.

i don't know why except i'm jealous a moderate centrist like him gets to live in SF and i don't. /pout/

anyway, i guess if i sound harsh on cops, it's because i really do love the good ones. i guess i don't say that enough. most really are pretty decent, most really do try hard to do a good job, it's like any other industry today that's been corrupted by Bushism. the bad people get all the rewards, the good people get fired and blacklisted, and new bad people are filling the higher ranks every day. i feel sorry for those who must operate in such a reality.

still, i guess i can sum it up like this: if you're poor, brown, black, notwhite and/or gay, since Clinton and before, cops generally have treated you according to Bushist standards and you don't really have any "rights." now, that standard is spreading to white kids and protest moms and disappeared americans and "terrorists." to which i can only plead: listen to me, i'm trying to warn you. it *can* happen to you.

No problem with saucy, and no need for apology on my account so long as there’s room here for the inevitable sloppy slosh-back.

VL, deeply sorry if I lowered the tenor and quality of remarks here at Corrente, I’ll try ever so hard not to do it again. I will fail, but I will try. If nothing else can be said in my favor, my management of ellipses at least should get me…something.

It is vaguely annoying having my POV dismissed as invalid because of my skin color, gender and sexual preferences; can’t quite put my finger on why that bothers me but it does. Ah, well, being condescendingly dismissed as ignorant, ill-informed and foolish because I’m a white middle aged straight male is after all no more than I’m due, and probably well deserved. I should expect no better, and who do I think I am to complain?

As to the “moderate centrist” crack, like an epithet hurled by an angry teenager just before slamming the door, best to just let it hang in the air until it falls clanging from its own weight.

Goat-fucking, now, that's different.....

[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.

"But if you fuck one judge, they never let you forget it."

And CD, if that judge was Catherine Crier, I'm going to get very, very jealous.

consent for codifying what the Second Amendment means in this era -- a dumb show illustrating that even the Negroes are afraid of their own kind (without saying a *damn* about the lack of opportunities and representation in a part of the country still treated like a plantation with Congress as the overseers), so let those in the sewer have guns, so they'll kill each other and *have done*.

If it were only those who are threatened by rampaging crime, and those who we can formally say are dis-served by the cops, thus getting tacit permission to form militias, then I'd have no problem with neighborhoods creating private armories -- the Panthers wielding legal long guns certainly got law enforcement's attention, ne?

But we know the folks who are astroturfing the SCOTUS to death about this aren't those 'representative' plaintiffs who've mostly backed away from this suit -- they are the usual suspects backed by the NRA, and allies of the racist and homophobic militia groups who probably can't stop laughing because they're using the niggers and queers to make their arguments, because these groups, in the name of profit and hate, have supported the corruption of our law enforcement to the extent that citizens of all types are desperate to protect themselves?

I know, run-on sentences. But if the NRA gave a good goddamn about neighborhoods and crime, they'd sponsor local gun ranges, help poor neighborhoods obtain liability insurance for community gun ranges, hold affordable classes in permit acquisition and firearm safety, and be the first to complain to police about illegal gun sellers, who threaten the good name of responsible gun sellers everywhere. And they'd be in the forefront in making sure anyone in this society subject to potential hate crimes would learn about their personal protection options, using guns or not. But that's just crazy talk, innit?