Last week, Joseph Salazar, a Colorado State legislator and member of the
Salazar must have missed the 1996 study from the CDC that found over 600,000 attempted violent crimes were thwarted by the intended victim presenting a firearm. The sight of the weapon was enough to stop the assailants without a shot being fired or a person being harmed (except in the cases the assailant received some "prison love" upon incarceration). The study was concluded in 1996 and was the last one the CDC conducted on gun control effectiveness and benefits of gun ownership before their budget was cut the $2.6 million the studies cost. Their studies were also found to be subjective, slanted in favor or promoting more infringements of the Second Amendment. (That a federal agency mandated to track and prevent disease would study gun violence makes no sense).
In response to the revelations on facts debunking Salazar's advice that originated from the University of Colorado - Colorado Springs's rape and violent crime prevention guidelines, several
Individuals such as Miss Marcotte need to return to elementary school and learn that words really do have set, defined meanings. A rape attempt is an attack on your life. Armed robbery is a threat to your life. Proportionate force used to defend yourself and prevent those crimes is legally authorized. it is more than just "acceptable". It is your natural right. What it is not is "murder". The intended victim will most likely not go to jail.
Still getting deluded with wingnuts suggesting the cure for rape is for victims to shoot and go to jail for murder. #losttheirminds
— Amanda Marcotte (@AmandaMarcotte) February 21, 2013
(It is also laughable that Miss Marcotte used the intra-service nickname, "wingnuts", that military members use for those serving in the US Air Force).
Yesterday, the American Bar Association's Section on Litigation held a panel discussion on the Second Amendment and recent suggestions to infringe upon it. The rhetoric used was "gun violence prevention measures". Let's call a spade a spade. It's an attempt to disarm or at least weaken the level of defensive capabilities of the average, individual American citizen.
Among the Panel Members were David Kopel of the CATO Institute who was cited in both the Heller and McDonald US Supreme Court decisions that upheld the individual right to own and carry firearms without infringement.
Countering him, mostly, was Ladd Everitt from the Center to Stop Gun Violence.
The other two panel members were Nick Johnson, author of Firearms Law, and Huffington Post contributor Adam Winkler.
During the call, the identity of some respondents' identities became muddled. Some of the statements attributed to Everitt may have been made by Winkler and vice versa. The same may have occurred with statements made by Kopel and Johnson.
An interesting fact about Ladd is that he was the Chief of Policy Development for the Air Force Association. That rings of irony since members of the US Air Force take an oath to support and defend the US Constitution against all enemies. The Second Amendment is part of the US Constitution.
The debate became rather heated towards the end. Mr. Koepel challenged Ladd with questions requesting clarification of principles. Ladd refused to answer the questions because he "didn't want to be trapped" into admitting his real goal is to disarm US Citizens and repeal the Second Amendment.
In the opening question to the panel, Ladd made some suggestions that teetered on common sense.
The question asked why allowing pilots on private air carriers (such as Delta or American Airlines) to carry firearms to defend the plane is acceptable while allowing teachers and school administrators to do the same is reprehensible.
Ladd stated that the firearms for pilots are a "last defense". The security measures at the airports are the "first defense". This suggests that students arriving at government schools should be treated as though they are criminals arriving for incarceration. He thinks that kids need to be subjected to full body scans and strip searches by armed police stationed at the schools. It's bad enough that kids have to walk the halls with their hands clasped behind their backs as though they are criminals walking the halls of a prison. The schools call this "hallway hands".
Armed guards and some amount of screening may help prevent future violent crimes. However, those measures cannot be so invasive that they breach the individual natural rights of Life, Liberty and Property our country was founded upon. Knowledge that school faculties include an unknown number of trained and armed personnel makes the school a hard target. That is a deterrent that serves much better than treating kids as though they are entering a concentration camp.
Ladd used this question to segue into the subject of universal background checks. He blames private individual to private individual sales as a culprit because individuals don't conduct the background checks that licensed gun dealers do. Private automobile owners don't check driving records and insurance records when selling a car, either. Cars are not directly guaranteed by the US Constitution. Guns are. This is where his rhetoric fails, utterly and completely.
Ladd also stated that facts about "gun free zones" are misleading. He claims that more crimes occur in places where guns are allowed. First of all, the second amendment guarantees that guns can be carried on one's own property and in all public places. Only a private property owner has the right to ban guns on his or her legally owned property. Guns are not "allowed" in places. They are banned from places.
Ladd later made a ridiculous and baseless claim that the National Rifle Association "legalized the black market for guns". His claim is that because the NRA supported the Second Amendment and the Fourth Amendment in allowing private citizens to dispense, sell, or transfer their constitutionally protected private property, that they created the "black market". He claims that the "black market" is private person to person sales. It's a simple mislabeling. The "black market" consists of illegally imported guns, stolen weapons, and altered firearms that had their serial numbers removed. That same "black market" also consists of firearms constructed in private workshops. They are commonly called "zip guns". Joey Biden selling me one of his double-barreled 12-gauge shotguns is not the "black market".
Ladd blames Indiana for the crime in Chicago. This is probably because he loves the national socialism and Marxism that unions support. Mitch Daniels and his fellow conservatives reformed Indiana, conducted sweeping school choice legislation, balanced the state's budget, and passed right to work legislation. In addition, Indiana is currently working to make automatic payroll deductions by labor unions illegal.
He also blamed the crime in Chicago on poverty. He even used a typical Obama catch-phrase "let me be perfectly clear". His perfect plan is to ban guns and disarm private citizens, and tax prosperous people into poverty in order to enslave people to the government by making them dependent upon the government for basic needs instead of being self-sufficient. He claims doing this will eliminate the "black market" and eliminate the need for criminals to buy guns and shoot people.
Among his reasoning that contained more holes than all the Swiss Cheese in Wisconsin, Ladd stated that Justice Ruth Ginsberg is not "very left-wing or a radical progressive". Ladd must have somehow missed Justice Ginsberg's statements that she has no respect for the US Constitution and that it needs to be scrapped and replaced with one that guarantees a government controlled "living wage", health care, and other so-called "social justice" rights that amount to limiting prosperity and making success illegal. This just lends to paint the character of this proponent of tyranny.
In rebuttal, David Kopel cited many things. Among them were the 51+ studies that show that fewer restrictions on Second Amendment rights leads to decreased crime, especially violent crime. Koepel cited the Heller and McDonald decisions that state that the Second Amendment is intended to support the natural right of Life by protecting a means of self-defense.
Adam Winkler attempted to counter this by falsely stating that the Second Amendment was always intended to protect certain groups, not individuals. He claims that interpretation was "the truth" until the Heller decision by citing a 1939 Supreme Court decision. That decision was made by the same court that allowed Social Security and "the New Deal" to be falsely proclaimed as "constitutional". That court didn't support individual rights. Winkler and Ladd also somehow ignored Federalist 46. The Second Amendment was established as a means for individuals to protect themselves from tyranny. Violent crimes are a form of tyranny.
Kopel also rebuked the background check rhetoric. He stated that any reform legislation must focus on individual people, not groups. He cautioned against lumping people into groups and giving cookie-cutter restrictions to their liberties, including Second Amendment guarantees. He claimed that background cheks won't stop truly insane or mentally unbalanced monsters from acquiring a tool with which to commit murders. That tool may shift from firearms to hammers. But these criminals will still kill. the background check won't stop that.
Kopel stated that there needs a better process for judicial review of pertinent mental health cases. The decisions to infringe upon rights should not be left to police nor to health care providers. It should be left to a judge to weigh all of the information and make an informed decision based upon clearly defined guidelines. These decisions need to be reviewed regularly as some conditions are temporary. In any case, a person's right to keep and bear should not be decided by a gun dealer, a database, a bureaucrat, a cop, or a doctor. This makes perfect sense and conforms to the US Constitution.
As more facts and data join the debate, so do the desperate emotional pleas of those wishing to violate and repeal the Second Amendment. It is more than just mud that is being slung. You may want to invest in some hip-waders and nose plugs.
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