Been under the weather this week. Nasty chest cold set in last weekend, and the crud is still clearing out. Speaking of clearing out, time to clear out the tabs:
A four year old found a .22 shell casing and took it to school. Got suspended for 7 days.
Court to Chicago: quit dragging your feet on Ezell. The 7th Circuit has been one of the better circuits on gun rights. I don’t think that’s a case of natural inclination, so much as the 7th got overturned in McDonald. Judges don’t like being overturned. We need to overturn some others.
Gun clubs are banning police from using their range in… New Zealand. Reason? The cops were harassing legal gun owners.
NRA is dropping a lot of money to ensure Gorsuch’s confirmation.
Charles C.W. Cooke: “Another Federal Court of Appeals Attacks the Second Amendment.”
Gun sales up. Accidents way down.
You’ll be able to take your firearm more places in Arkansas.
Constitutional Carry on the move in South Carolina. Good. Their reciprocity is awful.
Nevada moving to ban guns in libraries. Why libraries? Why do I have a feeling this is coming about because some of our open carry friends decided to try to educate some library patrons?
Eliminating the “character and reputation” clause in Pennsylvania’s LTC qualifications. This has been the mechanism that hostile jurisdictions have used to deny people LTCs for parking tickets.
Question and Answer: “Why are guns a right in the US while health care is not.”
No guns for vets, you see, because CSGV cares so much about our veterans. It’s not that they hate people owning guns. No… not at all. Where do veterans groups stand on this? Oh yeah. Not with them.
If we have a favorable ruling from the 3rd Circuit on either one of the pending 302 commitment cases, it will help New Jersey as well as Pennsylvania.
Utah is looking to lower its DUI level to 0.05, which is basically have a beer with dinner and go to jail if you’re not a big person. Gun rights groups are fighting as well, because it will lower the threshold for carrying too.
Clayton Cramer: why public opinions surveys should be taken with a large bag of salt. Public opinion surveys tell you want people want to tell pollsters.
Pocket pistol practice doesn’t have to be punishment.
Spring is coming: “20 Hikes in Pennsylvania Everyone Should Take.” I’ve done a few of these.
Question and Answer: “Why are guns a right in the US while health care is not.â€
My answer to this is and has always been:
Both are rights in the U.S. (as Americans understand the concept of “rights”), but neither is provided by the government. The only difference is that one is enshrined and protected in the Constitution, and the other is not.
In both cases, you have the right to purchase whatever product is available to you, for whatever price you decide you can afford. While it is not the government’s responsibility to purchase it for you, it also can’t stop you from purchasing it for yourself.
So, you want health insurance or care? Great. Buy health insurance or care at whatever level you desire and can afford.
You want a gun? Great. Apply for a permit and pay the fees (if necessary), fill out paperwork, submit your fingerprints (if necessary), pass a background check (and pay more fees, if necessary). Then (and only then), purchase from whatever models are allowed by the government in your area, register it with that government (if necessary), and pay whatever taxes or fees are associated with the purchase and/or registration.
Actually, stated that way, which one is a “right” again?
From that Hill column quoting Gorsuch:
Gun possession is often lawful?
And sometimes even protected as a matter of constitutional right?
We were just discussing semantics and language in another thread, so I hope everyone will excuse me for not being terribly encouraged by Gorsuch’s lukewarm expressions of his regard for gun rights.
And the NRA is spending $1 million to hype the guy?
The Hill article broadly identifies Gorsuch as “right leaning,” but I’m not sure what that means other than, that he seems never to have seen a corporatist or authoritarian policy he didn’t like. Is that what the NRA is paying for, or, are they just being team players?
I saw mention earlier today that one of Gorsuch’s decisions was just overturned by the current SCOTUS yesterday (?). But, nothing to do with guns.
So here’s the background on libraries in NV.
– NV CCW law allows a public building to post signs at every entrance that forbid entry.
– Most Clark County libraries are posted in this manner. THis is argueably contrary to state code that requires libraries to be open to the entire public… But its flown thus far.
– A “no gun” sign on a public building in NV prohibits CCW but does not prohibit open carry. Thus open carry is the only legal option in a posted public building, like a library.
– Due to state pre-emption the library can’t prohibit open carry (although they can restrict CCW); despite this, the libraries have adopted regulations prohibiting ALL carry, and have had patrons arrested for OC. The libraries have been sued over this. Some have dropped their illegal policies in response to suits or the threat thereof; some have removed their “no guns” signs (allowing patrons to CCW and thus not scare the horses); others will have to be defeated in court (likely on appeal, with pending litigation). NV is turning blue but the AG and GOV are still republicans.
In the recent election, both houses of NV’s legislature flipped to the Dems. The Dems in Carson City want to throw a bone to the Dems in Clark County, and screw gun owners in the process.
There is some OC drama llaming going on, but OC is really the ONLY legal option to carry in most libraries in Southern NV. So you can’t really fault people for OCing there given that its the only legal option.
Elections have consequences. Most gun people in NV haven’t realized that with a Dem controlled legislature they’re on defense. The GOP owned everything for a few years previously and the only pro-gun stuff that came out was really an end to Clark County’s blue card registration scheme and some slightly enhanced “stand your ground.” Kind of disappointing, but at least there was forward progress. With a dem controlled legislature NV will likely be fending off a mag capacity ban in the next year or two (first by ballot initiative, then by legislature) and maybe even a Cali-style AWB.
Thank you for that in depth report on local conditions.
Elections have consequences. And the People get the government they deserve in a Democracy.
The gun-owning voters of Nevada, if they didn’t already know, are now going to learn very quickly the folly of letting Democrats have power over them.
But so far it doesn’t look like the Democratic Party is learning the folly of supporting Gun-Control, and they seem determined to be THE Party of Gun-Control.
It is not like we are “letting” Democrats have power over us. Except for Clark County, the state is pro-self defense. Unfortunately, Clark County is very large and very Democrat and the Democrat party grows increasingly radical. Plus the Republican party here is really, really stupid. After 2014, they controlled all the branches of government. They celebrated by passing the biggest tax increase in NV history and gave the money to the teachers’ union. So they lost their majority.
“Plus the Republican party here is really, really stupid.”
I know this is anecdotal, and one guy’s opinion, but a friend of mine in NV who is Jewish became very, very involved in the Republican Party a few years ago and found the Christians in it so offensive he left the state party for good. He also opines that the Mormon wing, that is reflective of Utah, drives a lot of other people away.
That’s one guy’s claimed personal experience. While I think it’s safe to say he’ll never be a Democrat, he certainly is no longer a Republican, nor a fellow traveler with them.
Not involved with the party organization but from my perspective the problem is the RINOs. They think that the Democrats operate in good faith.
North Dakota now has Constitutional Carry!
Oh Yeah! One more down, 37 to go…
With regards to the Utah bill, Governor Herbert has said he’s going to sign it and then call a special legislative session to address some of the issues he thinks needs to be resolved. I hope that the issue of drinking and carrying gets addressed; on a local radio show, someone pointed out that the law as it stands doesn’t make any exceptions, even if you’re drinking in your own home.
(Although the person also mentioned that he is unaware of any case, even anecdotally, of someone being arrested for being drunk in their own home and having access to arms.)
Of course, if Governor Herbert really has issues with the law, then I would propose that the proper thing to do would be to veto it, and then to call a special session to address the issues…signing something into law that has problems means that if the legislature can’t resolve those problems in a special session, then a law with problems is now going to be on the books.
“(Although the person also mentioned that he is unaware of any case, even anecdotally, of someone being arrested for being drunk in their own home and having access to arms.)”
I’d bet a divorce attorney could provide a list. And not a short one.
Concerning Arkansas’s desire to expand where one can carry a gun: I really wish those who oppose such expansions would look to States where it’s already to carry in schools, places that serve alcohol, etc. There is plenty of variety in State laws, so it should be easy to find places where it’s legal to carry on-campus, for example, and how deadly those campuses are.
Oh, wait, never mind: the evidence shows that allowing carrying in these “sensitive” places doesn’t have any impact in violence, beyond *maybe* showing that there is *less* violence.