Tube City Almanac

October 04, 2007

Happiness is a Warm What?

Category: Mon Valley Miscellany, Politics || By

As you've probably heard by now, on Saturday night a Grover Street resident shot and killed a man who police say was trying to force his way into the house. Another man was seriously wounded.

I've seen several gun enthusiast sites lauding this story as a reason why gun-control laws are a bad idea, and why everyone should arm themselves.

Something similar happened after the Virginia Tech shootings. Anti-gun control advocates said the bloodshed there could have been prevented if more students were packing heat. And when Ronald Taylor went on a shooting rampage in Wilkinsburg back in 2000, Dimitri Vassilaros wrote the same thing in the Tribune-Review.

Now, I'm no gun-control nut. People have a right to own a legal weapon and to defend themselves when necessary. And if someone's going to get hurt, I want it to be a bad guy, not a law-abiding citizen.

But I know a fair number of cops, and I've never had one tell me the biggest crime problem in the United States is "not enough weapons." In fact, even the cops I've known who were gun buffs have told me that our existing gun laws stink, and that enforcing the toothless regulations we do have is almost hopeless because too many cheap weapons are flooding the market.

So I don't know if the lesson to take away from the Grover Street shooting is, "More guns, please."

Seriously. Do you think Virginia Tech's campus would be safer if 18-year-old freshmen were carrying 9-mm pistols? I know some 18-year-olds who I wouldn't trust with plastic forks and knives. Ditto for little old ladies riding the bus in Wilkinsburg.

As a civil libertarian, I believe in the Second Amendment:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.



But I look forward to the day when we can have an honest debate about what the Second Amendment really means.

Lots of things guaranteed by the Bill of Rights are sanely regulated. "Freedom of speech," for instance, doesn't extend to libel, slander or inciting a riot.

And we (mostly) sanely and effectively regulate ownership of lots of things that aren't mentioned in the Constitution or Bill of Rights, like dogs, cats, boats, trains, cars, airplanes, sliced bread, wrapped gum, and hundreds of others.

Each of those things are completely safe when used as intended. We should be able to sanely and effectively regulate things whose only intended purpose is to maim, wound or kill. But the issue has been so corrupted by political lobbying groups, I'm not holding my breath.

In my darkest moments, I wonder why the most fervent gun control opponents seem to be people in rural or semi-suburban areas, far away from city neighborhoods where most gun crimes are being committed.

Are they hoping that enough poor people and minorities will kill each other to reduce their populations?

Or do they just not care because "it's only the (blacks/Hispanics/Asians/crackheads) shooting each other"?

Either way, because of the shooting on Grover Street, there's apparently one less bad guy in the world.

How come I don't feel any safer?






Your Comments are Welcome!

I remember the famous “All in the Family” episode where Archie Bunker advised that we could stop high jackings by “arming all the passengers!”.

To be true to the constitution we could let anyone have any gun they want legally, we could just ban bullets. Problem solved.

You make good pointsabout howwe regulateother thingsthatare innocuous or at least less potentially harmful than guns. We have to remember that the founding fathers lived in a time where they were not a superpower. They were at risk for foreign invasion or re-invasion (see war of 1812) and needed the ability for the general population to rise up and fight. Easier to accomplish with rifles than pitchforks.

I don’t mean to beat this point into the ground,but one should be reminded that when Joe Bendel wrote McKeesport’s Home Rule Charter, he was an outsider to a political machine that took complete advantage of city employees to win elections. When he wrote the political prohibitions on city employees into the charter, he did so to protect them from political hazing and to put elected positions back in the hands of the people and protected from the machine.

I doubt the founding fathers wanted criminals better outfitted than our police and armed service people. When debating laws to see ifthey arebeinginterpreted correctly, we should study their history and the space in time they were written in. Only then can we try to understand their intent and initial purpose.

How many gun crimes are their in England and Canada? They have impoverished neighborhoods as well as we do. They don’t have 16year olds carrying AK-47’s and rich Republicans like Chuck Heston, living in the suburbs and fighting for their right to do just that.

I can go on for days on this issue. I took a big stand when GWB permitted the expiration of the Assault Rifle Ban that was backed decisively by police chiefs across the country. I guess they don’t contribute to campaigns as much as the NRA....

I guess I have a blog post in the works atmy site. As if I didn’t have enough to write about….

Great Post!

-Paul
Paul (URL) - October 04, 2007



Under current PA law, anyone using a firearm in the commission of a crime has an additional 5-year mandatory sentence that can be imposed on them if the courts do their job.
terry - October 04, 2007



The campus cops at Virginia Tech are armed.
Scott Beveridge (URL) - October 04, 2007



Sorry for all of the missing spaces in my post. My laptop spacebarkey (see what I mean) is temperamental.

That and I was suffering from a Council Meeting hang-over this morning (and I didn’t even drink!) contributed to a poorly formatted post. Feel free to edit for readability.

Peace. Out.

-Paul
Paul Shelly (URL) - October 04, 2007



More important, the mere reference to a purpose of the Second Amendment does not alter the fact that an individual right is created. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is stated in the same way as the right to free speech or free press. The statement of a purpose was intended to reaffirm the power of the states and the people against the central government. At the time, many feared the federal government and its national army. Gun ownership was viewed as a deterrent against abuse by the government, which would be less likely to mess with a well-armed populace.

Considering the Framers and their own traditions of hunting and self-defense, it is clear that they would have viewed such ownership as an individual right — consistent with the plain meaning of the amendment.

None of this is easy for someone raised to believe that the Second Amendment was the dividing line between the enlightenment and the dark ages of American culture. Yet, it is time to honestly reconsider this amendment and admit that … here’s the really hard part … the NRA may have been right. This does not mean that Charlton Heston is the new Rosa Parks or that no restrictions can be placed on gun ownership. But it does appear that gun ownership was made a protected right by the Framers and, while we might not celebrate it, it is time that we recognize it.

Jonathan Turley is the Shapiro Professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University and a member of USA TODAY’s board of contributors.
http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2007/10/a-liberals-lame.html
Doug - October 04, 2007



I knew I could count on you, Doug.
Webmaster - October 05, 2007



I knew I could count on you, Doug.
Webmaster – October 05, 2007

Mr. Webmaster,
I want to respond to Paul’s post where he says:

“How many gun crimes are their in England”
Paul there is alot of gun crime in England. The people doing it are criminals. But they are not be prosecuted:

The sleep of reason
David Carr (London) Self defence & security • UK affairs
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I was struck by two contrasting emotions upon reading this editorial in the Telegraph. First, pleasant surprise that views of such obvious common sense have found their expression in a major British news organ but, secondly, dismay that this fact should come as a pleasant surprise at all.

“Since the Government’s “total ban” five years ago, there are more and more guns being used by more and more criminals in more and more crimes. Now, in the wake of Birmingham’s New Year bloodbath, there are calls for the total ban to be made even more total: if the gangs refuse to obey the existing laws, we’ll just pass more laws for them not to obey. According to a UN survey from last month, England and Wales now have the highest crime rate of the world’s 20 leading nations. One can query the methodology of the survey while still recognising the peculiar genius by which British crime policy has wound up with every indicator going haywire – draconian gun control plus vastly increased gun violence plus stratospheric property crime.”

For those of us who knew only too well that this was going to be the result of the absurd and destructive war on self-defence there is a certain amount of satisfaction to be had from having been proved right. But, equally, a mounting despair at the seemingly wilful refusal of most Britons to learn from, or even acknowledge, the evidence that is staring them smack, bang in the face.

Even now, the straightforward truths expressed in this leader would be totally absent from the thoughts of any British journalist and even if that were not so, I suspect none would dare put them into print. We have Mark Steyn to thank for this serice.

“After Dunblane, the police and politicians lapsed into their default position: it’s your fault. We couldn’t do anything about him, so we’ll do something about you. You had your mobile nicked? You must be mad taking it out. Why not just keep it inside nice and safe on the telephone table? Had your car radio pinched? You shouldn’t have left it in the car. House burgled? You should have had laser alarms and window bars installed. You did have laser alarms and window bars but they waited till you were home, kicked the door in and beat you up? You should have an armour-plated door and digital retinal-scan technology. It’s your fault, always. The monumentally useless British police, with greater manpower per capita on higher rates of pay and with far more lavish resources than the Americans, haven’t had an original idea in decades, so they cling ever more fiercely to their core ideology: the best way to deal with criminals is to impose ever greater restrictions and inconveniences on the law-abiding.”

It may seem bizarre these days, but I grew up believing and parrotting the lockstep axiom that the British police ‘are the best in the world’. It is an assertion that may appear obnoxiously arrogant but, considering how things used to be, may be understandable. There was a time when the British police were charged with enforcing laws that were, for the most part, sensible and it was a task to which they devoted their energies with commendable vigour all whilst remaining routinely unarmed and fostering a public perception that they were both honourable and decent.
http://www.samizdata.net/blog/archives/002767.html
Doug - October 05, 2007



And on and on and on…

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jGcaqntz8rVYXF5wQJNcNAnWZHZgD8S568MO2
Karen (URL) - October 08, 2007



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