******************************
********************
1. VCDL President to speak at Rod and Gun in Quantico on 8/4
******************************
********************
I will be speaking at the Quantico Rod and Gun club on Monday, August 4th at 7:30 PM.
According to the the military base's directives, firearms must be unloaded, encased, and locked out of reach (preferable in a vehicle's trunk). NOTE: magazines must be unloaded, too. (Sheeeesh)
Link for directive is here:
http://tinyurl.com/554p3wDirections to club can be found here:
http://www.qrgc.org/DrivingDirections.htm******************************
********************
2. Female VCDL member is first to register a handgun in DC in 32 years!
******************************
********************
Member Amy McVey makes history. She sent me this email:
--
I went downtown yesterday with my revolver in a blue grocery bag and managed to walk right past the press...I didn't fit the profile!
I thought that the rush would be over by the time I went to police headquarters, but as it turns out, there was no rush! I was it! It was quite comical. I have the "01" property ticket that all the news channels were showing as being unclaimed by midday on Thursday. It has been suggested I put it on e-bay.
So my revolver was the first to be tagged and tested and I came home with the first legal handgun in DC in 32 years. I am one happy camper!
--
We're happy for her, too!
******************************
********************
3. Having toppled DC ban, Heller registers revolver
******************************
********************
Thanks to Julius Chang for the link. He writes:
The Post most likely unintentionally makes the case that law-abiding citizens by definition obey the law and put up with BS licensing and registration restrictions such as DC's. Criminals, on the other hand, continue to get guns with no such delays and hassles. Of course, you won't see such commentary and observation in the anti-gun media.
http://tinyurl.com/5go4clwashingtonpost.comHaving Toppled D.C. Ban, Man Registers Revolver
By Paul Duggan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, July 19, 2008; B01
Relishing a moment of triumph after a successful, long-running legal battle to end the District's handgun ban, Dick A. Heller strode into D.C. police headquarters yesterday with an unloaded revolver and began registering the weapon so he can keep it in his Capitol Hill home for self-defense.
"It's a great day," declared Heller, 66, a hero to gun rights advocates nationwide for his role in District of Columbia v. Heller, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case decided in his favor last month. Wearing a dark blue necktie adorned with the scales of justice, Heller, a security guard, climbed the steps of the police building on Indiana Avenue NW about 9:15 a.m. with his .22-caliber revolver in a bright red satchel.
"Only in America," he said, smiling.
Moments later, at a reception desk set up in the lobby for gun-registration applicants, Heller unzipped the bag for four police officers at the counter and gingerly handed one of them the weapon: a nine-shot Harrington & Richardson "Longhorn" model with a six-inch barrel, designed in the style of an Old West sidearm. [PVC: I hope he plans on getting another revolver that is more powerful than a .22!]
Heller said he owned the revolver "way before the ban was implemented" 32 years ago. Although the 1976 law barred new handgun registrations, residents who owned revolvers before the ban were allowed to keep them in their homes, unloaded and either disassembled or fitted with trigger locks. They could not be used legally even for self-defense.
Back then, rather than participate in what he considered an unconstitutional process, Heller said, he gave the pistol to a friend in Maryland for safekeeping. So yesterday was a homecoming for the old firearm after more than three decades in storage.
"It's one of my favorites," he said of the blue-steel revolver. "It's like the kind Matt Dillon used to use on 'Gunsmoke.' "
Heller was one of six plaintiffs who sued the District in 2006, saying the city's gun control laws violated the Second Amendment. In a 5 to 4 ruling June 26, the Supreme Court held that the Constitution grants individuals the right to own guns for self-defense. Although the majority opinion said that officials may impose reasonable restrictions, it meant the end of the District's handgun ban.
Five of the plaintiffs were dropped from the case for lack of legal standing, leaving Heller as the only named litigant championing gun rights. To libertarians and firearms enthusiasts, he has become an icon, his victory celebrated on T-shirts and bumper stickers.
"My first reaction is we shouldn't have had to be here in the first place," he said when he had finished the registration-application process and the revolver was back in the satchel by his side. But "it's a great feeling to be returning to a state of normalcy when it comes to being able to defend your life in your household."
Yet even as the court ruling forces a shift in policy regarding firearms ownership in the nation's capital, several legal and regulatory obstacles remain for D.C. residents hoping to purchase handguns and keep them loaded.
With few exceptions, it is not yet possible for a Washingtonian to legally obtain a handgun because there are no licensed dealers in the city (although officials expect there will be eventually). Federal law bars a dealer in one state from selling a pistol to a resident of another state unless the gun is shipped to a dealer in the buyer's home jurisdiction, where the purchaser can take delivery.
As a result, although dozens of people have picked up registration-application packets, police said, only five residents, including Heller, have begun the registration process since the city began accepting applications Thursday.
The process is open to gun owners who stored their firearms outside the city while the ban was in effect and to residents who illegally kept revolvers in their homes during the ban and want to register them under an amnesty program.
Of the five applicants so far, police said, only Heller brought in a legal gun from outside the District. The others sought to register revolvers under the amnesty program. Three of those applications are pending. The other was rejected and the gun was confiscated because the applicant had a criminal record, police said.
"It's going to take a while" before the city has a legally well-armed populace, said Dane von Breichenruchardt, president of the Bill of Rights Foundation, a public policy group, as he stood with Heller at police headquarters.
In a statement yesterday, Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) urged city residents not to follow Heller's lead. "Don't buy into the gun culture in our streets by bringing it into our homes with the gun you buy," she said.
Those who eventually opt to arm themselves in the District will face tough restrictions.
For example, the city continues to ban most magazine-loaded semiautomatic pistols, the most popular kind of handgun on the market and commonly carried by police officers. Registrations are limited almost entirely to revolvers, which must be kept unloaded and disabled unless the owner is in reasonable fear of being imminently harmed at home by an attacker.
Arguing that the restrictions violate the court ruling, Heller and others predict more litigation if the city does not ease the regulations. In the meantime, another of Heller's handguns -- a Colt M1911 .45-caliber semiautomatic, the U.S. military's standard-issue sidearm for most of the 20th century -- remains in Maryland.
For now, he is happy that his .22-caliber Longhorn is back home, although he is barred from using it, even in self-defense, while his registration application is pending.
"We've begun the process of helping the District recognize our constitutional rights," he said outside the police building, after he had been fingerprinted, filled out paperwork and passed a firearms-proficiency test. After a background check, police will notify him whether his registration has been approved.
He grinned.
"It's been a long battle."
******************************
********************
4. LTE on new DC gun regs: Keep it simple, stupid
******************************
********************
If the Mayor were being practical and decent, he would do just as Steve suggests in his LTE below. Unfortunately, this is about stripping away the right to self-defense in any way possible:
http://tinyurl.com/67zv2zwashingtontimes.comLETTER TO EDITOR: Firearms simplicity
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Before Mayor Adrian M. Fenty was elected mayor of the District of Columbia, he went on a tour of cities in various states (I presume to learn governance). Well, Mr. Fenty now must exercise governance as he responds to the Supreme Court ruling on gun rights.
As The Washington Times put it in the title of a Wednesday editorial ("Keep it simple on guns"), the mayor should, indeed, keep the process simple. In that vein, Mr. Fenty may want to take a short trip to Virginia. Here is how we buy guns - long guns, handguns (both semiautomatics and revolvers) and "assault weapons" - in the Commonwealth:
Assuming a legal age, a prospective buyer enters a gun store, fills out two forms, one federal and one state. The forms ask for the standard identifying information in addition to a series of questions requiring "yes" or "no" answers. The merchant uses information on the forms to run an FBI National Instant Criminal Background check. If there is disqualifying information on file, the gun purchase will be denied at that time. If the purchase is approved, the buyer pays for the gun and goes home. [PVC: It would have been clearer to say, "goes home WITH THE GUN."]
If he or she is 21, the buyer can strap on the handgun (although it cannot be concealed) and go packing virtually anywhere in the state. If the buyer wishes to conceal the weapon, he or she must apply for a concealed-weapon permit. The fee is $50 dollars. The processing time is about 30 days, and the permit is valid for five years.
The majority of states handle firearms purchases in a fashion similar to Virginia's. There are even two states, Alaska and Vermont, that do not require permits to conceal.
Yes, Mr. Mayor, there is a simple to way acquire firearms.
STEVE A. BROWN
Springfield
******************************
********************
5. Alas, DC Council opts for 'complicated'
******************************
********************
"'We have crafted what I believe to be a model for the nation in terms of complying with the Supreme Court's Second Amendment decision and at the same time protecting our citizens,' interim Attorney General Peter Nickles said."
No, Mr. Nickles -- you are showing the rest of America how to be immature, elitist, childish obstructionists. I hope the DC City Council gets their pants sued off them.
http://tinyurl.com/6r84lgtuscaloosanews.com/DC to vote on gun bill prompted by court ruling
By BRIAN WESTLEY Associated Press Writer
Published: Monday, July 14, 2008 at 6:19 p.m.
The District of Columbia Council planned to vote Tuesday on emergency legislation to allow handguns if they are used only for self-defense in the home and carry fewer than 12 rounds of ammunition.
The legislation announced Monday comes as officials scramble to comply with a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last month striking down the city's 32-year-old ban.
The proposal, which maintains some of the city's strict gun ownership rules and adds more regulations, was immediately criticized by gun rights advocates threatening more legal action.
The nation's capital would still require all legal firearms - including handguns, rifles and shotguns - to be kept in the home unloaded and disassembled, or equipped with trigger locks. There would be an exception for guns used against the "reasonably perceived threat of immediate harm."
The proposed legislation also maintains the city's unusual ban of machine guns, defined as weapons that shoot at least 12 rounds without reloading. That applies to most semiautomatic firearms.
"We have crafted what I believe to be a model for the nation in terms of complying with the Supreme Court's Second Amendment decision and at the same time protecting our citizens," interim Attorney General Peter Nickles said. [PVC: No, you are protecting the criminals in DC. Your "model" would be welcomed in a third-world country and that's about it.]
The National Rifle Association strongly disagreed.
"Clearly, D.C. is doing everything they can to ignore the Supreme Court ruling," said Chris W. Cox, the NRA's chief lobbyist. He said the organization would pursue legal or legislative action to thwart the city's efforts.
The legislation also would require a ballistics test to determine if a handgun is stolen or has been used in a crime. Police Chief Cathy Lanier will limit registration to one handgun per person for the first 90 days to make sure as many people are served as possible. And those who wish to register a handgun must pass written and vision tests.
Residents who already own handguns will be granted six months of amnesty to legally register their weapons, officials said.
The emergency legislation, which has strong support from the council, will remain in effect for 90 days. It adopts many of the regulations proposed earlier this month by D.C. Council member Phil Mendelson.
Mendelson, who is chairman of the committee on public safety and the judiciary, said the council would hold a hearing in September on permanent regulations.
D.C. officials anticipate more legal challenges as they try to maintain the strictest gun regulations possible under the law.
Critics were frustrated that the city plans to keep its ban on firearms capable of carrying 12 rounds or more. Alan Gura, the lawyer who successfully argued against D.C.'s handgun ban before the Supreme Court, has said such a restriction "almost certainly will be challenged."
The NRA's Cox also derided the trigger-lock requirement. "Unless a criminal is calling you before they break into your house, you're going to be left in the same position you were prior to the (Supreme Court) case," he said.
Because the district has no licensed gun shops, residents who wish to purchase handguns will initially have to travel to shops elsewhere, such as Maryland or Virginia. They would have to present the shop with a certified police form authorizing the dealer to ship the weapon to a federally licensed gun dealer in Washington, where the buyer would pick it up.
There is currently only one licensed firearms dealer in D.C. who can handle such a transaction, said Mike Campbell, a spokesman for the Washington field division of the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
"That's a lot to ask one person to do," Campbell said. "He's going to be inundated at the very beginning, I would imagine."
******************************
********************
6. Wash Times: DC's gun law shenanigans
******************************
********************
I have noticed that the press, even the foreign press, is shocked at the hardheadedness of the DC government. It really says something when that much press is on our side.
http://tinyurl.com/5u8qufwashingtontimes.comEDITORIAL: Gun law shenanigans
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Mayor Adrian Fenty yesterday proposed regulations for gun ownership rife with inconsistencies, unenforcable requirements and policies proven to be ineffective. It is clear that the D.C. Council has no intention of taking a reasonable track toward responsible gun ownership. Seemingly, City Hall intends to make it as difficult as possible for law-abiding citizens to own a gun.
Proposals include potential gun owners taking a firearms test. But it is terribly inconsistent and disingenuous to have them do so in order to obtain an application to purchase a gun when the city offers no safety courses. Owning a gun should bring the same responsible requirements as driving a motor vehicle - a written test in tandem with a required operational safety test. But the mayor and the council are working to set residents up to fail from the outset.
Then there is the ballistic imprint. Council members today are scheduled to hold a hearing on the mayor's plan - and they should definitely scrap the ballistic imprint, or gun fingerprinting, requirement. As we said July 9, the Maryland State Police Forensic Sciences Division issued a January 2005 report that said the state's gun fingerprint policy was ineffective in helping solve crimes. It would be foolish for the city to adopt a policy that cost Marylanders more than $2.5 million when it has already been found to be worthless.
Another issue is the registration itself. The council should require a time limit for the D.C. police to issue registrations, rather than leave open the possibility of residents waiting indefinitely to receive them. The worst requirement of the emergency legislation: "The applicant takes his or her completed application to a licensed firearm dealer to take delivery of the pistol. If the dealer is outside the District, the dealer transports the pistol to a licensed dealer in the District to complete the transaction." The hitch? There are no licensed gun dealers in the District.
As for unenforceable requirements: Any notion that the city is going to be able to enforce a requirement that guns in the home be unloaded, under lock and key and with a trigger lock engaged is laughable. It is equally amusing to think of police officers arriving at the home of some resident who happens to shoot an intruder pressing the homeowner as to how they got the drop on the thief when they had to take the gun out of its case and remove the trigger lock with the criminal being unaware. If the resident explains that the gun was loaded and ready to fire, are they going to be prosecuted for being prepared?
This emergency legislation is necessary because the city's handgun laws were among the strictest in the nation and the Supreme Court struck them down. But City Hall remains in anti-gun mode. The council should make the regulations as simple and sensible as possible. The occupants of City Hall must remember that the intent of the legislation is to abide by the Constitution on behalf of law-abiding citizens. The motor-vehicles model isn't perfect (no bureaucracy is); but it is a reasonable place to start.
******************************
********************
7. Heller rally in Chicago!
******************************
********************
Great pictures! Similar activism to VCDL:
http://tinyurl.com/5929yoWe just got back from the Heller rally in downtown Chicago and let me say these are some happy people. I'd estimate the crowd at between 200-300 (and I suck at estimating crowds!) Folks of every size, shape, color and religion were jubilant with the recent Heller decision and looking forward to being able to carry a handgun as a law abiding citizen of Chicago.
******************************
********************
8. No precedent on 2A?
******************************
********************
Member Robert M. Anderson writes:
One of the things people keep repeating, including the two idiots who wrote dissenting opinions, is that this is the "first time the 2nd Amendment has been ruled on by the Supreme Court". This is not entirely accurate and should be addressed.
First, in a 1989 ruling on the use of the phrase "...right of the people..." in relation to a 4th Amendment case, the majority ruling, written by Judge Rehnquist, stated that the phrase "...of the people, as used in the First, SECOND (emphasis mine), Fourth,..." and other Articles of Amendment have ALWAYS been construed as applying to INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS. The Second Amendment was very specifically cited in this ruling.
Secondly, my understanding (it's been - ahem - decades since school, where we were taught that the Second Article of Amendment means exactly what it says, which means the dissenting Judges, older than I am, are actively denying their own educations taught them) is that the Second Amendment was ruled on FOUR TIMES in the 19th century and found to be an INDIVIDUAL right. The only case I remember specifically, and this should be brought up and published, is the Dred Scott Decision. Besides the charge of being an escaped slave, Dred Scott had become a marshal, if memory serves, and so carried a gun.
On this particular charge, his lawyer argued that he was protected by the Second Article of Amendment. Chief Justice Taney, in his undeniably racist majority opinion, addressed this charge and claim SPECIFICALLY. He wrote that the Second Article of Amendment (I don't have this in front of me, so I am paraphrasing, but a paralegal could look it up) DID INDEED CONFER AN INDUSPUTABLE INDIVIDUAL RIGHT FOR A CITIZEN TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS; however, being black, Dred Scott was not a citizen, and so this otherwise unequivocal right did not apply to him.
This needs to be written up as often as possible, just like the 1989 decision that the phrase "...of the people..." as used in ALL of the Articles of Amendment, applies to individuals. I'd love to see this in as many letters to editors as you can manage. (I've tried, but never been published).
******************************
********************
9. Who needs a gun in a restaurant?
******************************
********************
Thanks to David Custer for the link on a shooting in a Virginia restaurant (the Virginia Restaurant Association will undoubtedly deny this ever happened). He writes:
Apparently, no one was armed during the initial confrontation. The offender was escorted out by security (good). The offender left and came back and shot people in the "gun free zone." BAD.
http://tinyurl.com/5wdlbxMSNBC.com
3 Shot Outside Falls Church Restaurant
WRC-TV
updated 3:15 p.m. ET, Mon., July. 14, 2008
FALLS CHURCH, Va. - Three men were shot while standing outside a Falls Church restaurant Saturday night.
A man armed with two handguns approached the front door of El Catrin restaurant at 2930 Patrick Henry Drive just before midnight and fired several rounds, striking the three victims, Fairfax County police said.
Investigators said the shooter got into an argument with another man inside the restaurant and was escorted out by security.
He returned to the parking lot within the next 30 minutes and allegedly shot the victims, police said. The shooter then fled in an unknown vehicle toward Arlington Boulevard.
All three victims were taken to Inova Fairfax Hospital. A 52-year-old Arlington man suffered life-threatening injuries. A 23-year-old from the Falls Church-area and a 25-year-old were also shot.
Police are looking for Vitalino Gomez-Carreto, 23, of no fixed address, who has been charged with malicious wounding in the incident.
Gomez-Carreto is Hispanic, stands about 5 feet 6 inches tall and weighs about 150 pounds. He has black hair and brown eyes.
Anyone with information is asked to contact Crime Solvers by phone at 866-411-TIPS/8477 or e-mail at
www.fairfaxcrimesolvers.org******************************
********************
10. VA-Pilot Ed: With guns, no second chances
******************************
********************
Here we go again. Flash: guns were available long before 1978 and kids could get access to them.
If Roger doesn't believe that he could have a gun and not use it to settle a minor argument, then perhaps he shouldn't own a gun. As for the rest of us who are not challenged that way, leave us alone:
http://tinyurl.com/5ewjokHamptonRoads.com
Did he really just take a swing at me?
It was 30 years ago, spring 1978, and I was leaving the indoor basketball courts at the University of Maryland in suburban D.C. A guy from the other team - which had lost when I'd sunk the winning hoop - approached me as I was leaving the gym.
"You undercut me!" he shouted. "Let's go!" he added, challenging me to a fight.
Good thing it was 1978, and not 2008. Otherwise, my opponent might have had a gun.
That's one of the overwhelming differences between an earlier generation and today's. Before, taunts, threats and fistfights were the worst thing young men faced when they had beefs on the court, on the street, in a club. Nowadays, though, you never know who's packing a gun - or if they're looking to use it.
Confrontations three decades ago never seemed to amount to much. Sore jaws, puffy eyes or wounded feelings were the limit. Not death.
Back then, you could cool off. You still can today, too, but you might be in a holding cell, facing a murder charge and the grieving, revenge-seeking relatives of your victim.
It was the reality of gun violence - and its results - that drew hundreds of people to South Norfolk on Thursday night. Called by top Chesapeake city officials, the meeting at Bethany Baptist Church sought solutions to the current problems of guns, drugs and gangs.
The meeting occurred after two shooting deaths on the same day last week in Chesapeake, within a few miles of each other. At 2:30 a.m. July 1, Lonnie Andrews Jr., 18, was killed near the home where he grew up. Around 1 p.m., Dontrell Whitehurst, 26, was killed.
The killing of Andrews has received more attention because of his age and promising future. Popular with classmates, the recent Oscar Smith High School graduate was headed to Virginia State University on a football scholarship. A 17-year-old male, an Oscar Smith student, has been charged in Andrews' slaying.
Here's where I make all the gun rights people crazy: Despite the few details that have emerged about the case, there's every reason to think that - minus the gun - Lonnie Andrews would be alive today. [PVC - Even more important, minus the perpetrator, Lonnie Andrews would still be alive. It's amazing how people forget that an inanimate object doesn't control a person's actions...it's the person who controls the object.]
("But guns don't kill people; people kill people!" Yeah, but in most cases, the people have guns.)
Chesapeake police have said little so far about the case. They acknowledge that some type of altercation preceded Andrews' death, but it's unclear who it was between, what it was about, and whether that was the motive for the shooting. Andrews had been at a dance at Janelle's Center for the Youth about a half hour before he was shot. Police declined to comment on the gun used in the killing, or whether it had been recovered.
("Criminals won't obey the law, and everybody else will be sitting ducks without their own guns!" activists say. But was the 17-year-old suspect a "criminal" before this incident? Did easy access to a gun lead to a series of events that had only one outcome?)
I don't blame it all on the guns. If we valued life, if we loved each other, if we had proper guidance in the home, we wouldn't so easily end the lives of others. So many social ills are catalysts for violence. But the presence of guns, especially easy-to-tote handguns, makes the situation infinitely worse.
Thirty years ago, walking off a basketball court, I got punched in the face. Thankfully, he didn't have a gun. Thankfully, I didn't have one, either.
Roger Chesley is associate editor of The Virginian-Pilot's editorial page. Reach him at (757) 446-2329 or at roger.
chesley@pilotonline.com.
******************************
********************
11. Belle Isle attacker released early, strikes again
******************************
********************
So they let the guy out of jail after only serving 1/12 of his sentence and he does it again!
A catch-and-release system for criminals - just another reason for you and I to carry a gun at all times and in all places:
inrich.comMan held without bond in Belle Isle assault case
Tuesday, Jul 15, 2008 - 12:08 AM Updated: 07:17 AM
By JOE MACENKA
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER
The man accused of sexually assaulting a 23-year-old female runner on Belle Isle last Wednesday is being held without bond.
A Richmond judge yesterday set a Sept. 5 preliminary hearing for Antonio Lamont "Tony" Allison, 36, of the 600 block of Ratcliffe Avenue in Henrico County.
Allison was arrested Friday on charges of abduction and attempted rape, both felonies. He had gotten out of jail last month after doing time for attacking another woman at Belle Isle, a 65-acre island in the James River just south of downtown Richmond.
Allison had been sentenced in June to serve one month in jail on a misdemeanor charge of sexual battery that occurred in late March. The judge sentenced him to 12 months but suspended all but one month of that.
Between his arrest and sentencing, Allison was behind bars for about six weeks.
In the March attack, he came up behind a woman as she jogged along the river and grabbed her around the waist and buttocks. She pushed back, and he broke away and ran from her. Police arrested him later as he tried to leave on a bridge on the south side of the island.
Contact Joe Macenka at (804) 649-6804 or
jmacenka@timesdispatch.com.
******************************
********************
12. Who needs a gun around insane murderers?
******************************
********************
"Just give criminals what they want and you will be OK."
Not necessarily, especially if they are desperate or, as in this case, insane and simply want to kill you:
inrich.comMan not guilty by reason of insanity in death of elderly Richmond woman
Thursday, Jul 17, 2008 - 06:24 AM Updated: 09:47 AM
The man who stabbed to death an elderly woman who was walking her dog in Richmond has been found not guilty by reason of insanity.
Yesterday, Richmond Circuit Judge Bradley B. Cavedo found Johnny Hughes, 53, not guilty and returned him to Central State Hospital just outside Petersburg, where he's been held since a few days after the stabbing on Oct. 27.
Hughes was due in court yesterday so doctors could give a report on his mental evaluation. Doctors will decide when he should be released.
Hughes told police he said he stabbed Susanne Thompson, 70, because he wanted money. She was out for a morning walk with her dog, Angie, near her home at Heartfields Assisted Living at 501 N. Allen Ave. But after he killed her, Hughes left without taking anything, he said.
In March, a Richmond General District Court judge ruled that Hughes was competent to stand trial for Thompson's killing.
Yesterday, a Circuit Court judge found him not guilty by reason of insanity.
******************************
********************
13. LTE: Who needs an 'assault rifle'?
******************************
********************
Legitimate reason to own a homeland defense rifle? I don't need to have a reason, because Mr. McGowan's premise that they are not protected by the 2A is wrong.
However, they are FUN to shoot, they are relatively inexpensive to shoot, and they can, and will, stop a bad guy.
Perhaps some LTEs on this might be good:
http://tinyurl.com/65ly3einrich.comWho Needs An Assault Rifle?
Editor, Times-Dispatch:
I beg to differ with your assertion in the editorial, "Despair," that gun control would not have prevented the death of Tahliek Taliaferro. Reasonable gun-control measures just might have prevented this tragedy.
It has been reported that Taliaferro was killed by shots from an AK-47 assault rifle or one similar to an AK-47. The recent Supreme Court ruling acknowledged an individual's right to bear arms. It did nor recognize an individual's right to bear assault weapons.
I challenge anyone to tell me any legitimate reason for personal possession of an AK-47 or any other assault-type weapon. Better yet, tell it to the mother of Tahliek Taliaferro.
Kevin M. McGowan. Chesterfield.
******************************
********************
14. How not to buy an AK-47
******************************
********************
Oops, your bias is showing!
You know the slant coming in a story when the reporter calls making a gun COMPLY with the law as "getting around the law."
So, Mr. Falconer, when I replace my overly noisy muffler to make sure that my car is in compliance with Virginia law, all I am really doing is just "getting around the law"?
Words mean something and Mr. Falconer knows it.
http://tinyurl.com/6p4rntMotherJones.com
Semiautomatic for the People
In which a MoJo reporter goes to a gun show, mingles with (yes, slightly) bitter gun owners, and tries to buy an assault weapon.
Bruce Falconer
July 14, 2008
In a warehouse on the outskirts of the rural Shenandoah Valley town of Fishersville, Virginia, it didn't take long to spot what I was looking for. There were plenty of guns lined up neatly on display tables, everything from Civil War-style muskets to handguns to hunting rifles, but I was in the market for something with a bit more firepower. At a table near the entrance, I found it: a Chinese-made mak-90 semiautomatic rifle, a variation of the Russian AK-47 designed to circumvent federal regulations on the import of assault weapons. "It's the same gun," the dealer told me. "They just eliminated the pistol grip, replaced it with a threaded thumb grip, and took off the flash suppressor." This particular model came with a five-round detachable clip, but the dealer assured me it would accept larger magazines, including a 75-round "ammunition drum." He was uncomfortable trading in handguns, he said, explaining that "there's too much controversy about them," but was willing to sell the mak-90 to anyone with a valid ID and $450.
The reemergence of imported assault rifles on the US market signals a dramatic shift in federal firearms policy. By 1998, four years after a federal ban on assault weapons took effect, gun manufacturers had easily managed to bypass the law by making small alterations to their weapons. To close the loophole, the Clinton administration prohibited the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives from granting import permits for 58 types of assault weapons, adding to an import rule first put in place by George H.W. Bush. These included dozens of AK-47 variants and other high-powered semiautomatic rifles that could accept high-capacity magazines originally designed for military use.
But not only did the current Bush administration allow the 1994 assault weapons ban to lapse, it has also, through the atf, permitted gun manufacturers to game the import rules, effectively reopening American borders to foreign assault weapons. While the import ban remains nominally in force, gun importers are now able to easily skirt it by assembling the guns in the US. Describing the manufacturing process at Florida-based Century International Arms Incorporated, a leading importer of foreign assault weapons, an official in the atf's firearms import branch told me "they import the parts" and combine them with US-made materials specifically prohibited by the import ban. That way, technically speaking, the guns "are made in this country," he said. But according to Kristen Rand, the legislative director at the Violence Policy Center, a Washington-based gun control advocacy group, the atf is simply shirking its responsibility. "They've created this Alice in Wonderland world, where if you take it apart and put it back together then it's no longer an import, but the end result is the same," she says. "They just keep making this their own moving target."
Another loophole was created for the sks semiautomatic carbine, developed in 1945 for use by the Soviet army until it was replaced by the more rugged AK-47. The Bush administration reclassified the sks as a "curio," adding it to the atf's list of such weapons, most over 50 years old and considered collectors' items, that are automatically authorized for import. However, the atf reported in 2002 that the sks was "the rifle model most frequently encountered by law enforcement officers" and noted that the guns "are capable of penetrating the type of soft body armor typically worn by law enforcement officers." Since being added to the atf's curios list, the sks has become one of the cheapest assault rifles on the market--less expensive, at between $89 and $250, than most handguns.
Yet even as foreign-made assault weapons are pouring in, information about their importation and use in crime is no longer accessible. The atf maintains databases both of the firearms-import licenses it has granted and of the traces it has conducted on weapons recovered at crime scenes. But in 2003, at the urging of the National Rifle Association, Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) attached a last-minute amendment to a spending bill, prohibiting the agency from publishing import and trace data. ("I wanted to make sure I was fulfilling the needs of my friends who are firearms dealers," Tiahrt told the Washington Post.) The nra's motivation, says Dr. Garen Wintemute, an ER physician and director of the Violence Prevention Research Program at the University of California-Davis, was to prevent atf data from being used against the gun industry in court. "Cities and advocacy organizations were bringing litigation against gun manufacturers for irresponsible marketing and also, in some cases, against individual retailers," he says. "Complete trace data would have helped them in doing that."
In March, however, the Associated Press managed to obtain atf trace data for 2007, which showed a sharp increase in the number of trace requests for weapons, such as the AK-47 and sks, that fire 7.62-by-39-mm rounds--from just 1,140 traces in 1993, the year before the assault-weapons ban was enacted, to 8,547 last year. Already, since the ban's expiration in 2004, the atf has documented an 11 percent rise in the number of traces run on AK-47s and similar weapons--an increase that suggests more AKs are on the streets and are being used to commit crimes.
At the Fishersville gun show, crowd members seemed particularly drawn to the assault weapons on display--hefting them, staring down their barrels, sliding open their metal bolts with a satisfying action-movie click. In addition to the AKs, dealers displayed dozens of AR-15s, a semiautomatic variation of the US military's M-16, as well as a variety of World War II and Cold War-era surplus weapons. At one table, a little boy admired a .50-caliber sniper rifle, capable of downing a jumbo jet, while at another a man held a cheap Romanian AK knockoff to his shoulder. His T-shirt read "'Freedom At Any Cost.'--Randy Weaver, Ruby Ridge, Idaho." The only thing that prevented me from becoming the proud owner of a mak-90 was my Washington, DC, driver's license: The district has the nation's strictest gun rules. (At press time the law was under review by the Supreme Court.) But if I really wanted the mak-90, one dealer pointed out, all I had to do was move to Virginia.
There is, of course, a wide variety of assault weapons on the market. The expiration of the federal ban has essentially thrown the doors wide open--if the gun exists, you can buy it, so long as it is not fully automatic, the only kind of assault weapon still illegal under federal law. But it's the AKs that pose the greatest threat, primarily due to their affordability. Police chiefs in cities across the country are involved in something of an arms race, says Scott Knight, chief of the Chaska, Minnesota, police department and chairman of the Firearms Committee at the International Association of Chiefs of Police. "When I started as a police officer, we had our sidearm, and we had a shotgun in the car. Then we moved from the shotgun to a 9 mm carbine or rifle. And actually, I'm just moving from that 9 mm to an AR-15. The reason is that the officer has been encountering a better-armed offender with alarming regularity...a better-armed, better-equipped, more-ready-to-shoot criminal than in the past."
Nowhere, perhaps, has this been more noticeable (and quantifiable) than in south Florida. Speaking at the National Violent Crime Summit, a gathering of law enforcement executives held in suburban Chicago last September, Miami police chief John Timoney described how AK-47s have become the weapon of choice among violent criminals in his city. "Two or three years ago, we had the lowest homicide rate since 1967 in Miami," he said. "Then the homicides skyrocketed with the availability of AK-47s. And it went from 3 percent of all homicides being committed with AKs, up to 9 percent two years ago, then 18 percent last year, and this year it is around 20 percent. And it's going up...We're being flooded with these AK-47s." Garry McCarthy of the Newark, New Jersey, police department agreed. "We've got a 30 percent reduction in shooting incidents this year, but only a 5 percent reduction in murder," he said. "So it is higher-caliber bullets. I hadn't seen an AK-47 in New York City going back 15 years...In Newark, in our first six or eight months, we recovered about 15 of them. [We have had] running gun battles through the streets."
And if law enforcement is noticing an uptick in AK-style rifles, it may soon confront a smaller, more easily concealable version: the AK pistol. According to Dr. Wintemute, police recently recovered one in Newark. "You can hide such a thing easily in your pant leg, and you can put the magazine somewhere else," he says. "You can be walking around the street with, in essence, a concealable rifle with hundreds of rounds of ammunition, ready to rock." Advertising its Romanian-manufactured AK handgun, Century International Arms Incorporated calls it "a real conversation starter."
Bruce Falconer is a reporter in Mother Jones Washington bureau.
******************************
********************
15. Campfire used as assault weapon -- in National Park
******************************
********************
So violent crimes never happen in National Park lands? Tell that to these two victims of horrible/life-changing attacks.
http://tinyurl.com/586ezvconnectionnewspapers.comCampfire Used as Assault Weapon
Two defendants plead guilty to throwing victims into an open campfire near Mount Vernon trail.
By Ken Moore, Gazette
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Edwin Alexander Chavez Abrego and Antonio Benitez face up to 10 years in federal prison for throwing victims into an open flame of a campfire near the Mount Vernon Trail on March 29, 2008.
The victims were passing by on the trail when they were grabbed, then robbed, assaulted and burned.
Abrego and Benitez pleaded guilty to felony assault resulting in serious bodily injury on Friday, July 11 in U.S. District Court in Alexandria, according to U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg.
U.S. District Court Judge Claude M. Hilton is scheduled to sentence them on Oct. 3, 2008.
Abrego and Benitez forcibly stopped one of the victims as he tried to ride his bicycle near the Mount Vernon Trail by Reagan National Airport and Four Mile Run, which is administered by the U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, according to court documents. Abrego and Benitez took the victim's watch, ring and cash, and pushed and knocked the victim into a campfire, according to Rosenberg and court documents
Before throwing the second victim into a campfire, the defendants punched and kicked the second victim in the face. The defendants caused a blood clot in this victim's brain, which required hospitalization, according to Rosenberg.
"The arrests and convictions of the suspects in this horrendous crime" is a culmination of work and cooperation between U.S. Park Police, Alexandria City Police and Arlington County Police departments, said Sal Lauro, U.S. Park Police Acting Assistant. "The detectives showed compassionate and humane assistance to the victims, ensuring they received appropriate medical care as well as helping them re-establish their lives after such a tragic event."
Abrego and Benitez were also charged with conspiracy to commit assault with intent to rob, assault with intent to rob, robbery, and tampering with a witness or victim, according to indictments filed in U.S. District Court.
Abrego is also known as Jose Francisco Mudia, Jose Francisco Moghia, Jose Francisco Munghia and Jose Francisco Muguia. Benitez is also known as Antonio Calvin Gutierrez, Escorto Hernandez, Kelvin Antonio Gutierrez, Porfillo Gutierrez and Santos Hernandez, according to U.S. District Court documents.
******************************
********************
16. An emergency services mirage in Illinois
******************************
********************
I don't know if I should be laughing at this, or crying.
Member Steve Oster writes:
So last week on my way to a new job in Colorado, I'm driving through the state that gave us BOTH Senator Obama and Mayor Daley. I dutifully (but grudgingly) unloaded and secured my sidearm at Terra Haute before crossing into the People's Republic of Illinois. Sometime later, I stopped at an Illinois rest area to stretch my legs and catch 20 winks.
On my way to the restrooms, I see these blue kiosks in the distance. As I approach, it becomes clear these are emergency call stations, complete with illuminated blue lights (to reassure you that it's just like having a police cruiser at your beck and call). Imagine the relief would-be victims must feel, spying this beacon in the night! Fleeing to its safety, secure in the knowledge that rescue is at hand, if they can just outrun their attacker! "I'm saved! I'm saved!" they're thinking. Imagine their shock upon arriving at this totem pole of security with the following notice:
911 OUT OF ORDER
Please note that this is evidently not a recent, temporary interruption of service. That notice is attached with 4 sheet metal screws!
It is the height of immorality for government to insist that they alone are authorized to defend us, while at the same time accepting no responsibility to do so!
Here are photos of the emergency call stations:
http://www.vcdl.org/images/emergency_kiosk_1.jpghttp://www.vcdl.org/images/emergency_kiosk_2.jpghttp://www.vcdl.org/images/emergency_kiosk_3.jpg******************************
********************
17. When seconds count, UK cops only HOURS away!
******************************
********************
Unlucky Brits: How many stab wounds could someone give you in 12 minutes as you wait for the police to show up. What about in three hours?
Thanks to Jeff Buchanan for the link:
http://tinyurl.com/6ck822thesun.co.ukBy GRAEME WILSON
Deputy Political Editor
Published: 16 Jul 2008
COPS may get three hours to respond to 999s - and THREE DAYS for "less urgent" calls.
The targets, to be unveiled tomorrow, were last night blasted as an insult to crime victims.
They are more than 60 times longer than those now used by some of the UK's biggest forces.
Shadow Home Secretary Dominic Grieve raged: "This shows this is an exhausted Government on its last legs.
"It has neither the vision nor the resolve to design and deliver the much-needed reform our police need.
The targets were in a leaked draft copy of the Government's new Green Paper on Policing.
Under a section on national standards, it says the police must respond appropriately to incidents. This includes telling crime victims when an officer will turn up.
The document says the target should be within three hours if it requires policing intervention, or three days if there is less immediate need for a police presence.
Neighbourhood police units will get 24 HOURS simply to return a phone call from the public.
Currently, the Met aim to respond to 90 per cent of urgent calls in just 12 minutes -- and 90 per cent of non-urgent ones within an hour.
Greater Manchester Police has a ten-minute target for emergency calls and an hour for less urgent ones.
The Green Paper also includes proposals for a new Police Pledge.
Advertisement
This will involve sending every household the names and contact details of their local neighbourhood cops.
Officers will be encouraged to spend 80 per cent of their time out on their patch.
Forces will also be told to publish local priorities, such as tackling drug dealing or stopping gangs loitering.
Last night the Home Office said: We do not comment on leaks.
******************************
********************
18. Greatest minds on gun control
******************************
********************
http://tinyurl.com/622xhnamericanchronicle.comWhat The Great Minds Have Said About Gun Control
Dave Gibson
July 14, 2008
The recent Supreme Court decision which struck-down Washington D.C.'s ban on handguns, also banned localities from interfering with a citizen's right to keep and bear arms.
The Court's 5-4 decision read: "The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home."
The framers of the constitution understood the necessity for American citizens to keep and bear arms. Unfortunately, our society has been so influenced by those on the left, that many of us now believe that we should give up that right...Thus leaving ourselves, our homes, and even our loved-ones at the mercy of the criminals. You see, gun laws only affect the law-abiding.
We constantly hear about the importance of background checks being implemented by gun store owners. However, criminals do not purchase their weapons in legitimate gun shops. It would be cost prohibitive and leave a paper trail, even without background checks. Why would they pay several hundreds of dollars for a gun, when they can buy one on the street for a fraction of the price or simply steal one?
Of course, most of those on the left choose to ignore this fact. Background checks and waiting periods do nothing, except put barriers between American citizens and their ability to defend themselves.
In most states, one needs a permit to carry a concealed weapon. Once again, the only people who observe this law are the law-abiding, thus making this measure useless. A few years ago, Virginia legislators passed a bill which banned citizens from carrying concealed weapons into an establishment which serves alcohol. Even with a concealed-carry permit, it became a felony to enter a bar with a gun which is hidden from plain view...Another piece of legislation giving an upper hand to the criminals.
Laws which prohibit law-abiding citizens from possessing and carrying firearms are not lost on criminals. It is no coincidence that in the 32 years since the District of Columbia placed a ban on the ownership of handguns, the number of crimes to individuals (rape, robbery, murder) soared.
Criminals are also keenly aware of the prospect of an armed citizen and will almost always steer clear of potential victims who may be armed.
In 1982, Kennesaw, GA passed a law which required heads of household to have at least one gun in the house. The burglary rate immediately dropped an astounding 89 percent. Ten years after the law was passed, the burglary rate was still 72 percent less than in 1981.
The idea of gun control and the need to defend one's self is not a new one. Much has been said on the subject, even before guns were invented. The need to protect you and yours is as natural as breathing. Of course, as with all natural instincts, there will be those attempting to legislate it away.
What follows is a small collection of what many of man's greatest minds have said on the right to possess arms:
Cicero :"Civilized people are taught by logic, barbarians, by necessity, communities by tradition; and the lesson inculcated even in wild beasts by nature itself. They learn that they have to defend their own bodies and persons lives from violence of any and every kind by all means within their power."
James Madison, while criticizing the governments of Europe: which "were afraid to trust the people with arms" and argued for "the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over almost every other nation."
Richard Henry Lee (a framer of the Bill of Rights): "To preserve liberty, it is essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms, and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them."
George Orwell: "Rifles, muskets, long-bows and hand-grenades are inherently democratic weapons. A complex weapon makes the strong stronger, while a simple weapon -- so long as there is no answer to it -- gives claws to the weak."
President of the Congress of Racial equality Roy Innis: "To make inexpensive guns impossible to get is to say that you're putting a money test on getting a gun. It's racism in its worst form."
President John F. Kennedy: "Today, we need a nation of Minutemen, citizens who are not only prepared to take arms, but citizens who regard the preservation of freedom as the basic purpose of their daily life and who are willing to consciously work and sacrifice for that freedom."
Mahatma Gandhi: "Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest."
Even Jesus weighed in on the subject, in the Book of Luke: "When I sent you out barefoot without purse or pack, were you ever short of anything?...It is different now, whoever has a purse had better take it with him, and his pack too; and if he has no sword, let him sell his cloak to buy one."
Since people have had the opportunity as well as the need to arm themselves, there have been those attempting to rob them of this right. It was as true in Colonial America as it is today, and just as it was in Hitler's Germany. In 1938, the Nazis enacted a gun-control act, which robbed not only Jews, but all citizens of the right to defend themselves.
In 1942, Hitler made the following statement: "The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to permit the conquered Eastern peoples to have arms. History teaches that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by doing so."
Near the end of World War II, the Japanese leader Tojo once said that the reason Japan never invaded the mainland of the United States was because "there would be a rifle behind every blade of grass." Americans' right to keep and bear arms has served us well. It is also a well known fact that well armed citizens prevent crimes from occurring, and many of those armed citizens have sent thousands of violent criminals on their way to hell."
The fact is, the police cannot be everywhere at once. If you choose not to defend yourself or your family, that is your absurd decision and I wish you luck. However, for those of us who choose to exercise our Second Amendment right...Remember the old adage: "It is better to be judged by twelve than carried by six!"
******************************
********************
19. Petition for non-resident CHPs in Colorado
******************************
********************
A petition asking Colorado to allow non-residents to get CHPs for those who might be interested...
http://tinyurl.com/5vndy9******************************
********************
20. Correction
******************************
********************
Oooops!
Member Scott Kreidler sent us the link for:
http://www.handgunlaw.usand not the Washington Post article link that was attributed to him in the last alert.
******************************
********************
21. Gun shows and events!
******************************
********************
As an all volunteer organization, VCDL depends on YOU to volunteer your time at our area events, where we recruit new activists and keep gun owners informed. No experience necessary; if it's your first time we'll pair you with a veteran volunteer. To find out more about helping at our gun show tables, go to:
http://www2.vcdl.org/cgi-bin/wspd_cgi.sh/vcdl/gs.htmland click on any of the blue links, or contact the coordinator for
the show/event listed below with which you are interested in helping.
Here are the upcoming events with which we need YOUR help:
a. CHANTILLY
http://www.cegunshows.com, July 25-27
Friday, July 25 3:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Saturday, July 26 9:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Sunday, July 27 10:00 a.m. - 1:30 p.m. 1:30 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Contact David Park at
NOVAgunshows@vcdl.org to help in Chantilly.
b. FREDERICKSBURG
http://www.guns-knives.com, August 2-3
Saturday, August 2 9:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Sunday, August 3 10:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. 1:00 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.
Contact Robert Herron at
Fredericksburggunshows@vcdl.org to help
in Fredericksburg.
c. DALE CITY
http://www.olddominionshows.com, August 2-3
Saturday, August 2 9:00 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. 1:00 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Sunday, August 3 9:00 a.m. - 12:30 p.m. 12:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.
