posted June 26 2008 10:52 AM                

For your reading pleasure.. Heller vs DC

I probably would have went further...but it's a start.

posted June 26 2008 05:28 PM                

I'm trying to figure out a gentle way of saying that if its the only thing you two agree on, then your stance on gun control is obviously unreasonable and uncharacteristic. 

posted June 27 2008 12:14 PM                

I'm a libertarian....small l.

Scalia is a right winger who professes to be a strict constructionist when it suits him. On the other hand, he has no problem denying habeas to people when it suits his views of what rights government can trample. He has no problem giving the government rights to selectively harass certain people, or invade some people's privacy.  I disagree. The rights belong to everyone.

I agreed that the rights enumerated in the Constitution are inalienable. He just thinks that for some of them.

So yeah, we agree sometimes...but mostly for differing reasons.

posted June 27 2008 12:37 PM                

BB and Scalia don't agree as much as you might think - He is way too much of an idealogue - Every once in a while he comes out with a libertarian view - sadly about as often as Stewart remembers he is/was a Republican <grin>>

I thought that it was going to end up a more a 7/2, not a 5/4 - but once I heard that Scalia wrote it, I understood why. The theory that the disenters stood on makes zero sense to me - the fact that the 2nd is an individual right seemed pretty evident since unless it was, there was zero reason to even have the 2nd admentment. (And I understand that many don't see a reason for it, but thats a different arguement).

Its gonna be interesting to see how this all shakes out over the next decade since it will take at least that long for the effects of this to really be known... I would love for the courts to find that the state needs a compelling interest to limit owning *and* bearing, and that the limits must be the least restrictive to meet that interest, but I doubt that its gonna get to that level of protection. The DC pols have already said "we will have the toughest laws we can" - fully accepting that they ones they already had didn't actually reduce the number of gun deaths (its in their briefs - I didn't make it up).

Its like the Wash Post editorial today - they scream bloody hell when the First admendment is limited, but they are all for limiting the 2nd.

posted June 27 2008 07:50 PM                

I agree with the Post editorial.  Just my two cents from someone who lives in the District.

posted June 27 2008 07:57 PM                

PS.  Without the Fist Amendment, the others are useless.

posted June 28 2008 02:11 PM                

Oh First amendment. For a second I thought Paul had stolen Calvin's log in. 

posted July 02 2008 10:29 AM                

So what's with this fetish to interpret the Constitution as the founders intended? I mean, they don't really care what we do at this point. Shouldn't we be trying to interpret the Constitution in ways that make sense in a modern, post-industrial, electronic world, not some what some agrarian utopians of 225 years ago thought was a good idea?

posted July 03 2008 08:03 AM                

Cause if we stay with what was intended the Constitution is the keel to the ship of state. Its why the principle of stare decisis exists. But looking to intent has also given us "the right to privacy" something that does not exist in the actual words anywhere - but is clearly seen (well, by at least by the majority of folks) to be in the writing.

There is also the concept that if change is needed for something to work in present day, then it should come from the amendment process - for to do otherwise means that the court is now writing the laws, not the people thru its legislative bodies.

posted July 08 2008 09:26 AM                

Here's some more food for thought, http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/06/what-did-the-framers-have-in-mind/?ref=opini on.

posted July 27 2008 02:49 AM                

I like the part where felons are challenging their convictions on the basis of handgun possession.

I have to admit, law has become pure entertainment for me.  Who gives a crap if its followed or not?  Especially when another crooked president can just wave the magic post facto pardon.

posted August 05 2008 12:51 AM                

I like Po's take on it.  We now live in a post law society.  Under Clinton the Republicans knocked the notion of "Rule of Law" on the head.  Under Bush they buried it.

Whether Scalia's logic holds I can't say - I'm not inclined to read him.  Experience has shown me that his is an outcome based jurisprudence (Bush v. Gore springs to mind) and that his arguments are merely justifications for what he wants the law to be.  In this case he believes that the founders decided, in this one place only, to put meaningless fluff in an amendment.

Is he right?  It seems unlikely.  But in any case this faux ancestor worship that comes packaged as "original intent" would be nonsense even if such were the case.  It was Jefferson's "original intent" that we be an agrarian nation and also that we have regular revolutions.  Neither one would have led to the United States we have today.

And, let's be honest. "Original intent" is more respected in the breach than in the observance.  Do you think the original intent was that your correspondence with foreign nationals was subject to warrantless seizure?  That foreign nationals were subject to indefinite detention without trial?  For that matter, how about American citizens being detained on nothing more than the word of the President?

We have more guns than we need.  We have a violent society that is not improved by arming more of our citizens.  Maybe the gun ban in DC wasn't effective, but that seems more likely because its neighbors were more than willing to aid and abet the importation of guns into the city.

It is the job of the government to enable life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  It is not the job of government to make it easier to take all of that away from someone else.

If this comes out without the paragraph breaks - that's not my original intent.

posted August 08 2008 10:16 AM                

I neither an expert in con law nor a Scalia fan but from what I read of his opinion it was a pretty narrow interpretation of the second amenendment.  I think his thinking was that because DC is a federal city the Constitution applies directly to it whereas states may regulate gun ownership.  Seriously, he really threaded the needle on this one.  It was not the victory Wayne LaPierre would have liked or insisted it was.

posted August 09 2008 12:43 PM                

Not having read it I am not qualified to argue the point.  But it seems odd to call it a narrow reading of the second amendment if (as reports and badbill's post indicate) it found an individual right in the second amendment.  While I agree that it seems odd to have only one right that is not and individual right, it also seems odd that the style would be changed for only a single right and that they would include a useless introductory clause.

Frankly, I do agree with SAW that we can't completely ignore the text of the Constitution (well, we can, but then we would be no better than the Bush regime), so I can't even say how I would decide the case.  Since, as you point out, DC is the one place directly under the Federal Government.

Still, there's no arguing this point: a gun is much less dangerous when there's a full mile between you and your neighbor than it is when there's a thin wall between you and your neighbor.  The gun control laws that are perfect for the former can be deadly for the latter.

posted August 11 2008 02:48 PM                

Thantos said: Still, there's no
arguing this point: a gun is much less dangerous when there's a full
mile between you and your neighbor than it is when there's a thin wall
between you and your neighbor.

There is alot of arguement with that point - its a complete failicy - and folks are killed every year because they believe it. They shoot off into the distance without regard to what might be a mile away. And anything shot out of a long gun will easily kill at one mile. Which leads to one of those hard rules that gun owners HAVE to know - Never pull the trigger without knowing whats behind what you are shooting at. If you don't know, don't pull. EVER.

For home defense, they make special rounds - ones that will kill the guy you are aiming at, but if you miss will be stopped with 5/8" of drywall.

posted August 13 2008 03:53 PM                

I am sure the DC gun owners, who care deeply about public safety, all have those rounds.  Sure.