Parents of Pentagon shooter warned authorities

[Spoonman]

Source: Yahoo News

San Benito County Sheriff Curtis Hill told the AP the parents of John Patrick Bedell filed a missing persons report and were worried about his mental stability. After reading an e-mail from their son to an acquaintance, the parents told deputies they were worried that he had purchased a gun.

Hill said that Bedell has been on the department's radar since 2003, when deputies found him walking along the side of the road. They wrote him up as a "5150" — police code for crazy — and took him to his parents house.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100305/ap_on_re_us/us_pentagon_metro_shooting

[winyanstaz]

1. Yet another warning ignored...

sheesh!:mad:

[Mithreal]

5. Time to give up more of our civil liberties.

[winyanstaz]

8. I think your correct...

I think they let some of this stuff happen just as an excuse to take more freedom away.

[Mithreal]

10. Not saying they did, that would be to an extreme.

What I am saying is that the neocons and neolibs won't pass up the opportunity to screw us.

[24601]

67. Well, Maybe he was put on the no fly list?.... n/t

[Ian David]

2. Wow. Yet ANOTHER terrorist the Bush administration failed to stop. n/t

[Lagomorph]

80. Time to play catch up, there....

you're a little behind the ball.

[wuushew]

3. How did a loony get a handgun?

somebody dropped the ball and or broke the law.

[slackmaster]

4. There's no evidence he was declared incompetent or committed involuntarily

It does say he's been diagnosed as bipolar, and he's been in in-patient psych facilities four times, but none of that disqualifies a person from buying a firearm.

[Rapier09]

6. Lovely way of doing things

I see the system is functioning just fine.

[slackmaster]

7. I'm OK with a system that requires some kind of judicial action to take away a person's civil rights

That way there is always an avenue of appeal, in case a mistake is made.

[MindandSoul]

41. How about the civil rights of the people who are shot by those crazies???

Who will protect them?

[slackmaster]

42. The part of the system that identifies crazies and adjudicates them as incompetent

That part needs to be beefed up.

[fascisthunter]

84. see... to gun enthusiasts, they don't count

and their sacrifice is only their lives for the sake of those who want guns. Quite a sacrifice society has to make for them... now what exactly do they sacrifice in return?

[onehandle]

9. I love how some DUers run to the defense of the precious gun in these situations.

All Hail Guns!

[Mithreal]

11. Usually the same ones too.

[onehandle]

15. DU has become 'Gungeon Underground.' nt

[Mithreal]

17. Tripping over themselves to protect the rights of guns.

[24601]

68. Yes, God (oops) forbid it EVER be seen as defending the United

States Constitution. Guess it's only those parts we agree with and fuck the rest.

[aikoaiko]

101. "Tripping over themselves to protect the rights of all Americans"

Fixed it for you.

[Abq_Sarah]

56. Riiiight

Well, I don't see firearms owners trying to prohibit anyone else from exercising a constitutionally protected right. I'd rather stand with them than the prohibitionists.

[slackmaster]

21. People who are interested in and/or knowledgable about a subject tend to post on that subject

Amazing, isn't it?

[Mithreal]

23. They obviously don't know enough about the other civil liberties.

Yeah, I am sure that is it. I would say it is more about where their passion lies.

People may vent about why guns are in the hands of people who shouldn't have them, but you know, no one but a repuke would take away your guns.

[slackmaster]

24. If you have a constructive suggestion for preventing people like the shooter in this subject...

...from acquiring a firearm, I'd be interested in seeing it.

But I doubt that has anything to do with your reasons for responding in this thread.

[Mithreal]

25. You doubt? That's amusing. I like discussion. You sure caught me.

What don't you understand about my comments? Dems will never take away your guns no matter how much some liberals vent. What is unclear to you?

[slackmaster]

28. Where did I say anything about anyone taking guns away from anyone?

:crazy:

[Mithreal]

30. Roll your eyes all you want.

[slackmaster]

33. If you don't answer the question, we're going to have to gag you

:nuke:

[Mithreal]

35. What other reason do posters who focus only on gun stories have to post

if not wrt their second amendment right to bear arms? I would like to know. You are the one who claims some form of expertise.

[slackmaster]

36. BAILIFF! GAG HIM!

[Mithreal]

44. Does that work, you know, to get people to stfu?

Sorry, don't understand the joke.

[slackmaster]

47. Then answer my question

If you can.

[Mithreal]

50. Answer mine first. You claim expertise, let's see it.

[slackmaster]

52. I've had a Federal Firearms License for over four years

Knowing the law is a condition of having the license. I've also been actively involved in firearm-related politics for a lot longer than that.

Where did I ever say anything about anyone taking guns away from anyone?

[Mithreal]

53. I never said you did. I asked if there was more to the whole gun rights issue than

government taking away your guns.

[slackmaster]

54. How was I supposed to divine that out of reply #25?

:crazy:

But to answer your question, of course there's more to it. You ought to read up on the subject.

[Mithreal]

58. Rolling the eyes must be a comfort. Don't worry, your guns are safe.

[slackmaster]

61. I've never said my guns weren't safe

:dunce:

[Mithreal]

62. Good. You know I like your perseverance. Never will answer my question though will you?

[slackmaster]

63. What question?

When are you going to answer mine?

Will you ever admit that you made a bad assumption?

[Mithreal]

65. The assumption that some gun owners are passionate about their guns

and must respond to every gun story because they worry government wants to regulate or take them away? You mean that assumption?

I answered your questions, I just want to know what gets all you gun nuts worried if not our government regulating or taking away your guns? You say, of course, I should read more. All you have for me is rolling the eyes and giving my posts a dunce cap. Yeah, yeah, you know the laws, you collect guns, wtf ever. Great advocate you are. I am actually open to hearing what you have to say and you gave nothing. Unless your next post has some substance I am done discussing this with you in this thread, waste of my damn time.

Edit to add I read on and see you posted some substance elsewhere, will read it, but damn if you couldn't answer my question.

[slackmaster]

69. That assumption is simplistic and incomplete, but at least I understand your query now

I just want to know what gets all you gun nuts worried if not our government regulating or taking away your guns?

Let me make one thing clear: I'm not worried about that. They're already regulated, and I don't believe any government in the foreseeable future would be so foolish as to attempt a blanket confiscation.

The reasons I participate in firearm-related discussions on DU are that I don't want to see my party lose power because either the party itself, or a few vocal idealogues within it, espouse policies on firearm-related issues that alienate large numbers of voters; and that I have a personal stake in preserving the value of my gun collection.

Edit to add I read on and see you posted some substance elsewhere, will read it, but damn if you couldn't answer my question.

Your question was not obvious from the way you initially phrased it. You presented it in a manner that appeared to me to be hostile and demeaning - Saying to me that Democrats aren't going to take my guns seemed to say you assumed that A) I am not a Democrat and B) I am worried about that happening to me personally.

The state of California did in fact ordered blanket surrender of a narrow class of rifles in 2000, because the owners had missed a deadline to register them. That is probably not enforceable because the same state agency had previously told the owners of those rifles that they didn't need to be registered. That was the result of an innocent but stupid error by the state, and a lawsuit that had been filed by a pressure group that makes no secret of its desire to ban guns.

Police confiscated numerous personal firearms in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, and legal action was required to get the city to start returning them to their rightful owners.

To say that nobody is ever going to attempt to confiscate peoples' weapons is flat-out wrong, but again, that is not my concern. I do care about the integrity of my personal collection, because I have a substantial portion of my retirement savings invested in collectible firearms. I do work against any proposed change in the law that would result in a recurring expense for the "privilege" of keeping my property. I oppose any federal adoption of cockamamie schemes like my state's "assault weapons" ban that would prevent me from ever realizing the value of my collection, because it would render weapons ineligible for resale.

I have a personal stake in the issue of the availability of firearms. I personally care about firearm safety, and recognize that one good way to prevent legislation that neuters my party or devalues my collection, is to do everything possible to reduce firearm-related accidents and criminal misuse of firearms.

The Democratic Party got its ass handed to it on a platter in the elections of 1994, and one reason, certainly not the only one, was that our representatives in Congress embraced, by the thinnest of margins, the failed 10-year experiment known as the "assault weapons" ban, which attempted to ban some of the most popular and useful sporting firearms, without any resulting benefit in public safety. I really don't want to see that kind of idiotic crap happen again.

I hope that helps.

[Mithreal]

75. Yes

[safeinOhio]

66. To be constructive here....

I can see no violation of the Second in requiring mandatory background checks on all private sales of handguns or registration of all handguns. As handguns, compared to long guns are easily concealed and are used more often in crime.
I would hope the press does its' job and follows up on where the gun used in this crime came from.

[slackmaster]

70. Given that the shooter was a California resident with no disqualifying traits,

He probably walked into a sporting goods store, paid for a handgun, passed the background check, and picked up the gun after the mandatory 10-day waiting period.

Then he illegally drove it into the District of Columbia, and misused it.

[safeinOhio]

73. or stopped at a near by state gun show.

I'd really like to see better follow up on every handgun used in a crime and make it published.

[slackmaster]

76. Either way, he was not legally disqualified from buying a firearm in general

But if he bought the handgun, used, from a private party outside of California, that act would have been illegal.

But check the stories that have come out. It appears that he did buy the weapon in California, and legally.

The hole in the system is that his mental problems did not result in him A) being taken care of properly OR B) being adjudicated as mentally incompetent, and that fact reported to the FBI so that he would have failed the background check.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

27. How about making gun ownership more like voting or driving--a widespread PRIVILEGE

but not a RIGHT?

Courts recogniaed no bogus "right" for individuals to own guns until two years ago, when the Bush v. Gore tilted USSC handed down their laughable DC v Heller decision.

If buying a gun required a license (as does driving a car), and if psychological assessment and several hours of training were required to get such a license, and if there were procedures for revoking or suspending such licenses upon domestic violence arrests and other interventions, wouldn't we all be safer? Without any harm to evidently responsible gun-owners like yourself?

[slackmaster]

29. That's just not true - Owning a gun has always been an individual right

Courts recogniaed no bogus "right" for individuals to own guns until two years ago, when the Bush v. Gore tilted USSC handed down their laughable DC v Heller decision.

That's very far from the truth. You're parroting gun banner propaganda.

If buying a gun required a license (as does driving a car), and if psychological assessment and several hours of training were required to get such a license, and if there were procedures for revoking or suspending such licenses upon domestic violence arrests and other interventions, wouldn't we all be safer? Without any harm to evidently responsible gun-owners like yourself?

That would be OK with me, but you'd have to repeal the Second Amendment first.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

31. "That wd be OK with me, but you'd have 2 repeal the 2nd Amdt first"--A more positive response

than I expected.

[slackmaster]

38. The states can probably do pretty much everything in your list now, and some have done most

I particularly like the idea of actively disarming people who have DV convictions, ROs, or other disqualifying events. I believe only Connecticut has that now. It would create more work for local police, but a lot of people who are supposedly protected by restraining orders have been murdered.

The federal government doesn't have the authority to require a license to buy a firearm in general. Certain types of firearms, e.g. machine guns and short-barrelled shotguns, are under strict federal regulation now under the National Firearms Act of 1934. That's basically regulation on interstate commerce of war materials.

The power to regulate interstate commerce has been pushed pretty far already. The practical problem with trying to strictly regulate ordinary sporting and personal defense weapons is political. Push for that, and you instantly alienate tens of millions of potential voters.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

43. Unfortunately, the Bush-v-Gore-tilted USSC likely will rule shortly against the state laws

you cite favorably.

At least that's my understanding of the McDonald v Chicago case--whatever gun regulation DC was prevented from having under federal law in DC v Heller (2008), states and localities would be prevented from having after a favorable USSC ruling in McDonald v Chicago (2010).

Unfortunately, thanks to Bush v. Gore, jurisprudence seems to be moving in the opposite direction from SANE and sound public policy.

[slackmaster]

49. The Chicago case is about an UNREASONABLE restriction

Reasonable ones are OK.

[Paladin]

71. What Qualifies As A "Reasonable" Restriction, As Far As You're Concerned?

The gun militancy movement seems to pay lip service to the notion of "reasonable" gun restrictions, but there don't seem to be many (if any) restrictions that the movement in fact finds reasonable. The more honest members of DU's gun militant contingent admit that the steady stream of public shooting incidents are an acceptable trade-off for having easy access to as many and varied a selection of firearms as their hearts desire.......

[slackmaster]

72. The provisions of the Gun Control Act seem reasonable to me, also the Brady Act checks

I agree that people who have been convicted of violent misdemeanors, and people who are under restraining orders for domestic situations, should not be permitted to acquire firearms.

I don't have a problem with the federal registration and registration of machine guns and destructive devices.

But prohibiting honest citizens from keeping ordinary pistols, rifles, and shotguns in their own homes does not strike me as reasonable.

I think better mental health care might have identified and flagged the shooter in this DC incident, and may even have prevented him from getting a gun. Or even better, it might have prevented him from going off the deep end by keeping him properly medicated and monitored. That's not really gun control, but it would be a whole lot more effective than any conceivable gun restriction.

Thanks for asking. Please tell me what you think is reasonable.

[Paladin]

85. My Notion Of "Reasonable" Is Very Close To Yours. (n/t)

[DissedByBush]

109. What restrictions to free speech do you see as reasonable?

Think of them.

Now think about how high the bar is that you set. Pretty high? I hope so.

Could a person be arrested for whipping a crowd of white supremacists into a frenzy so they riot and start killing minorities? That's the accepted "imminent lawless action" standard.

"Fire" in a crowded theater? The "clear and present danger" standard.

Notice that it must be that person who is inciting imminent lawlessness or the clear and present (immediate) danger at that time.

It would apply the same way to guns.

A person can't wave his gun around in a mall yelling he's going to kill everyone. Saying that's illegal is a reasonable restriction.

Handing out weapons to a bunch of white supremacists just before the above speech knowing they intend illegal violence and that many of them are violent felons? Restriction would be reasonable.

But saying you can't have a gun because other people might do illegal things with their guns is definitely unreasonable and unconstitutional.

It's like saying you can't have freedom of speech because of how the above white supremacist used it to start a riot.

[hack89]

79. Look at the state constitutions

many recognize the right for individual to own guns. The issue is much more than just the Federal Constitution and the Supreme Court.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

81. Do you have a link?

Which states impose loose gun regulation possibly appropriate for rural areas on millions of people in crowded, homicide-afflicted urban areas, where nuts with guns easily can find crowds on whom to launch senseless, high-casualty attacks?

[hack89]

82. Here is an excellent discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=118x299683

nice hyperbole by the way - you do understand that as gun ownership has skyrocketed, violent crime has decline to historic low, don't you?

[ProgressiveEconomist]

86. Thanks 4 that Gungeon link. On the spurious correlation you cite between trends in vioent crime

and trends in gun ownership: There are unanswered accusations of scientific fraud against the "More Guns, Less Crime" argument, and a much more plausible explanation for the decline in violent crime since the 1990s:

From http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=fake-mistake-replicate :

"In Freakonomics, Levitt proffered his own theory for the source of the 1990s crime decline--Roe v. Wade. According to Levitt, children born into impoverished and adverse environments are more likely to land in jail as adults. After Roe v. Wade, millions of poor single women had abortions instead of future potential criminals; 20 years later the set of potential offenders had shrunk, along with the crime rate.

Levitt employed a comparative statistical analysis to show that the five states that legalized abortion at least two years before Roe v. Wade witnessed a crime decline earlier than the other 45 states. Further, those states with the highest abortion rates in the 1970s experienced the greatest fall in crime in the 1990s. One factor that Levitt dismissed is Lott's, in a single -passage in the middle of a 30-page chapter: "Lott's admittedly intriguing hypothesis doesn't seem to be true. When other scholars have tried to replicate his results, they found that right-to-carry laws simply don't bring down crime." ...

I asked Levitt what he meant by "replicate."... Did he mean to imply that Lott falsified his results? "No, I did not." In fact, others have accused Lott of falsifying his data..."

[hack89]

87. Do you question the quotes from the state Constitutions?

or do you simply don't want to accept what they say?

I don't believe that more guns means less crime - it can't be proven. It can be proven that more guns do not mean more crime.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

88. I'd rather see a refereed Law Review article--I don't know whether that Gungeon thread

is accurate.

And it dowes not address my main concern--state-level gun laws FORCING loose gun restrictions on urban municipalities, where the police want FEWER guns in the hands of citizens, where they can be stolen by violent youth gangs, used against police in domestic violence situations, spray hundreds of rounds from psychotic gun-wielders into random crowds in seconds, etc.

[hack89]

89. Making cities respect civil rights is not a bad thing?

what other civil liberties can they dispense with to make you feel safe? You really believe that the police have your civil rights in mind - ask them what they think about the Miranda act or no-warrant searches. You must have loved the Patriot Act.

[ProgressiveEconomist]

90. The "right" you refer to only came into being 2 yrs ago, in a parody of a decision from

a Bush v Gore-tilted USSC. And it costs tens of thousands of lives every year. See http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=103x521632 .

[hack89]

93. What about all those state constitutions?

especially those that were written the same time as the Federal Constitution? Can't argue that those rights are only 2 years old. You do realize that states can give their citizens more rights than the Federal government and the Federal government can't infringe on then as long as they are not in conflict with the US Constitution.

You link to a Brady bunch editorial - not exactly a unbiased, scholarly POV you must agree.

Why can't we combat gun violence by legalizing drugs, rigorously prosecuting gun crime and expanding mental health coverage? Why is the only option to take guns away from millions who will never pose a threat to anyone?

[ProgressiveEconomist]

94. 'Why ... take away guns from millions who will never pose a threat' That's not my

position--see post #27.

Why force easily-armed psychotics and youth gangs on millions of people who don't want to live with thousands of unscreened, untrained, gun-wielding neighbors?

I'd like to see guns licensed everywhere, taken away everywhere from people who are impaired, and banned in areas--mainly cities--where elected officials and police pass local laws against them.

People who want to have guns can choose to live where regulations are relatively lax, and people who want to be free from intimidation by gun-wielding neighbors can choose to live in havens where gun licenses are hard to get.

Law enforcement everywhere nneds to know who has guns so they can be taken away as part of domestic violence interventions, issuances of restraining orders, diagnoses of psychosis, etc.

And state consititutions say lots of crazy things that nobody's paid much attention to--until this month's McDonald v Chicago case in the Bush v. Gore-tilted USSC.

[X_Digger]

95. And you call yourself progressive?

You say you don't want to "take away guns from millions who will never pose a threat" yet in the next breath, you say- "banned in areas--mainly cities--where elected officials and police pass local laws against them."

Does the cognitive dissonance hurt?

Here, I think you misspoke.. you said:

"People who want to have guns can choose to live where regulations are relatively lax, and people who want to be free from intimidation by gun-wielding neighbors can choose to live in havens where gun licenses are hard to get."

How about..

"People who want to have free speech can choose to live where regulations are relatively lax, and people who want to be free from intimidation by politically active neighbors can choose to live in havens where free speech licenses are hard to get."

Are you okay with cities and localities creating enclaves where other rights are infringed via prior restraint?

[friendly_iconoclast]

96. Here's another example of the USSC's 'extremist' views on rights:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boumediene_v._Bush


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=91425261

The same " Bush v. Gore-tilted USSC" also gave *this* decision:

June 12, 2008


The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have a constitutional right to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts.

In a 5-4 ruling, the court also said the Bush administration's system for classifying detainees as enemy combatants does not meet basic legal standards.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the majority, said, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times." He was joined by the court's four more liberal justices, Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter and John Paul Stevens.

This is the third time the justices have told President Bush that his plan for handling foreign terrorists violates the Constitution. This time, the president had Congress on his side. In 2006, the Republican-controlled Congress passed a law called the Military Commissions Act. It closed the courthouse doors to Guantanamo detainees and set up a new system for terrorism trials at the camp in Cuba....

Don't they realize that the people who want to violate the Constitution only do it to keep us safe?

Great minds think alike, no?

[TPaine7]

103. "The 'right' you refer to only came into being 2 yrs ago"

I believe you are misinformed. (In saying that, I am assuming you are not dishonest.)

The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms most certainly did not come into existence 2 yrs ago. Nor was the "Bush v Gore-tilted USSC" the first to recognize the right. For example, the very first time the full Court mentioned the right to keep and bear arms, it called it a right "of person"--an individual right:

For example, no one, we presume, will contend that Congress can make any law in a Territory respecting the establishment of religion, or the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people of the Territory peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for the redress of grievances.

Nor can Congress deny to the people the right to keep and bear arms, nor the right to trial by jury, nor compel any one to be a witness against himself in a criminal proceeding.

These powers, and others, in relation to rights of person, which it is not necessary here to enumerate, are, in express and positive terms, denied to the General Government; and the rights of private property have been guarded with equal care. Thus the rights of property are united with the rights of person, and placed on the same ground by the fifth amendment to the Constitution, which provides that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, and property, without due process of law. And an act of Congress which deprives a citizen of the United States of his liberty or property, merely because he came himself or brought his property into a particular Territory of the United States, and who had committed no offence against the laws, could hardly be dignified with the name of due process of law.

Source: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=60&invol=393

The Court, in the same case, made clear that individual citizens had the right to travel freely in every state in the union and to keep and carry arms wherever they went:

For if they <African Americans>were so received, and entitled to the privileges and immunities of citizens, it would exempt them from the operation of the special laws and from the police <60 U.S. 393, 417> regulations which they considered to be necessary for their own safety. It would give to persons of the negro race, who were recognised as citizens in any one State of the Union, the right to enter every other State whenever they pleased, singly or in companies, without pass or passport, and without obstruction, to sojourn there as long as they pleased, to go where they pleased at every hour of the day or night without molestation, unless they committed some violation of law for which a white man would be punished; and it would give them the full liberty of speech in public and in private upon all subjects upon which its own citizens might speak; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went. And all of this would be done in the face of the subject race of the same color, both free and slaves, and inevitably producing discontent and insubordination among them, and endangering the peace and safety of the State.

In Cruikshank, the Court said that the people's right to keep and bear arms for legal purposes in no way depends on the Constitution:

The right there specified <in the Second Amendment> is that of "bearing arms for a lawful purpose." This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence.

Source: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=CASE&court=US&vol=92&page=542

The Second Amendment itself references the people's right--not the militia's right or the state's right--as already existing.

Now even thought the Supreme Court had said, in the infamous Dred Scott case quoted above, that citizens of one state could travel freely in every state and carry guns everywhere they went, it changed its tune when it was no longer possible to pretend that blacks were not citizens.

The {S}econd {A}mendment declares that it shall not be infringed; but this, as has been seen, means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress. This is one of the amendments that has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government, leaving the people to look for their protection against any violation by their fellow-citizens of the rights it recognizes, to {local authorities}.

In other words, while the Court recognized a personal, pre-existing right, it now said that the right was only protected against national government violation. The freed slaves had to depend on Southern states to enforce their rights against the KKK.

This was the best strategy the Supreme Court could find to protect southern racists, screw over the former slaves and still maintain a veneer of apparent respect for the Constitution. (When you have studied the subject as I have, it is eerily similar to the way the Brady Campaign, the VPC and other organizations try to protect gun control while maintaining a thin veneer of apparent respect for the Constitution.)

To appreciate how thin and transparent the veneer was, it is only necessary to know the history of the Fourteenth Amendment--the one the Court was intentionally defying. There is no doubt that the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment meant to protect the right to keep and bear arms AGAINST THE STATES. They echoed the "privileges or immunities" language of Dred Scott to overrule it explicitly.

Dred Scott:

For if they <African Americans>were so received, and entitled to the privileges and immunities of citizens, it would exempt them from the operation of the special laws and from the police <60 U.S. 393, 417> regulations which they considered to be necessary for their own safety. It would give to persons of the negro race, who were recognised as citizens in any one State of the Union, the right to enter every other State whenever they pleased, singly or in companies, without pass or passport, and without obstruction, to sojourn there as long as they pleased, to go where they pleased at every hour of the day or night without molestation, unless they committed some violation of law for which a white man would be punished; and it would give them the full liberty of speech in public and in private upon all subjects upon which its own citizens might speak; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went.

Fourteenth Amendment

Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

Now there are people who will blow smoke to the effect that the Fourteenth Amendment was never intended to make the Bill of Rights to apply against the states or to allow Congress to enforce the first eight Amendments against the states. Among those disagreeing with that were the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment. For example, here is how the Amendment was introduced on the floor of the Senate:

“{The Fourteenth Amendment's} first clause, {which} I regard as very important . . . relates to the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States . . . . To these privileges and immunities, whatever they may be—for they are not and cannot be fully defined in their entire extent and precise nature—to these should be added the personal rights guaranteed and secured by the first eight amendments of the Constitution; such as the freedom of speech and of the press; the right of people peaceably to assemble and petition the Government for a redress of grievances, a right appertaining to each and all of the people; the right to keep and bear arms. . . .

…{T}hese guarantees . . . stand simply as a bill of rights in the Constitution … {and} States are not restrained from violating the principles embraced in them …. The great object of the first section of this amendment is, therefore, to restrain the power of the States and compel them at all times to respect these great fundamental guarantees.”—Senator Jacob Howard introducing the Fourteenth Amendment to the Senate, quoted by Yale Professor Amar. Akhil Reed Amar, The Bill of Rights, Creation and Reconstruction (Harrisonburg, VA: R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company, 1998), 185-6 (emphases supplied).

Two points on that last quote:

1) According to some of the guys who actually wrote the Constitution, the Second Amendment right was one that the states could be compelled to respect. It is ridiculous to force an entity to respect it's own rights. I daresay that no governmental entity in the history of the world has ever needed to be compelled to respect its own rights. It follows then, that ACCORDING TO THE AUTHORS OF THE CONSTITUTION, the Second Amendment does not protect a right of the states.

2) The right to keep and bear arms that the Framers meant to protect was a right appertaining to each and all of the people--a personal, individual right.

The individual right to keep and bear arms has been mentioned many times in Supreme Court opinions and even quoted directly many times. Usually, the Court has only quoted the operative portion, the part that says what must not be done:

Of the twenty-nine U.S. Supreme Court opinions (including Miller) which have quoted the Second Amendment, twenty three contain only a partial quote. This quoting pattern suggests that, generally speaking, Supreme Court justices have not considered the "purpose clause" at the beginning of the Second Amendment to be essential to the meaning of the main clause.

Source: David B Kopel, et. al., Supreme Court Gun Cases, (Phoenix, AZ: Bloomfield Press, 2004), 83.

It is a canon of legal interpretation that if a law, amendment or constitution has a preamble or purpose clause, that clause only limits the operative clause(s) if the operative clause(s) is (are) unclear. This was so in the time of the founding and it is still the case today.

"The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" is not unclear.

It is not possible for an honest, informed and intelligent person to say what you said. Assuming that you are intelligent and honest, I must conclude that you are misinformed. It is perilous to depend on the media for technical or detailed information--stuff that requires sophisticated thinking--ON ANY SUBJECT WHATSOEVER. At least that has been my experience, and certainly not only on this subject.

I have read over and over again in "reputable" media sources that "the Supreme Courts said for the first time that the Second Amendment protects (or even worse, creates) an individual right." This is false. It may be an intentional lie, a parroting of Brady propaganda or simply a result of speaking on subjects in which they lack even the slightest competence--but it is false nonetheless.

Unfortunately, good, decent people like you swallow the false "facts" and use them as premises in your thinking.

The Heller Court's decision was in harmony with things the Court has said repeatedly throughout its history. It was not a departure from legitimate Court precedent (though it did depart from the transparently racist foundations of American gun control).

The right of individuals to keep and bear arms--unrelated to militia service or state authority--definitely did not come into existence two years ago. You have been misinformed.

[TPaine7]

108. Your concerns are backwards from those on which America is based.

"...FORCING loose gun restrictions on urban municipalities, where the police want FEWER guns..."

The correct approach would be protecting individuals' rights and controlling municipal governments and police forces to ensure that they are securing and respecting individual rights.

With all due respect, worrying about what police want regarding constitutional civil rights is low on the list of priorities. It's analogous to concerning oneself with what corporations want in terms of regulation.

Police want their efforts to be easier, more efficient and more effective. But those desires are VERY secondary to citizens' rights.

Corporations want to maximize profits, but their desires are VERY secondary to clean air and water.

FORCING loose enough gun restrictions on urban municipalities that they actually comply with the Constitution is the duty of Congress and the Supreme Court.

[burrfoot]

113. You've got a point there, but here's the thing-

it's not really whether guns contributed to the decrease in violent crimes that matters. The fact that these two things happened at the same time means that more guns do not equal more crime, which actually does matter quite a lot.

[Callisto32]

105. And we all know that the following are great things to base civil rights upon:

Geography.

Relative population density.


....oh wait...

[PavePusher]

98. Ah, Civil Rights by Geography.

Didn't we try that once?

FAIL.

[PavePusher]

97. How about you register all your books and papers...

and get a permit to write letters and post on the internet?


Certainly we'd all be safer, and with no harm to those who like to read or write?

Besides, surely you have nothing to hide.... right?

[oneshooter]

100. Driving a car requires no license,

as long as you are not on public roadways. You do not need a drivers license to own a vehicle. I bought my first vehicle in the U.S. without even being in the country!!

How about if psychological assessment and several hours of training were required in order to vote. Another "privilege". OH and don't forget this "and if there were procedures for revoking or suspending such licenses upon domestic violence arrests and other interventions" also to be applied to voting?

The computer and itenetz that you use, even the phone service, are not covered by the BOR, as they have not been declared so by SCOTUS. Therefore they are "privileges" and can be licensed, and restricted, by the city and state.

What you are stating as "privileges" can be applied to the entire BOR, a VERY slippery slope.

Oneshooter
Armed and Livin in Texas

[Euromutt]

106. According to the materials I had to study to be naturalized...

...voting is a right. In fact, it's described as the most important right U.S. citizens possess. So you might want to revise that particular notion.

As far as requiring prospective firearm owners to demonstrate some degree of competence in firearm safety, and possibly a psych screening, before they can acquire a firearm, well, I'm personally not opposed to that idea in the abstract. The problem is that whenever that kind of scheme has been introduced in the past, there is almost invariably some sheriff or police chief (or city council who hires and fires the police chief) with an anti-private-ownership-of-firearms agenda who abuses the rules to create a de facto gun ban, by making it exorbitantly difficult to navigate the licensing process. And because of those people, I oppose the idea in practice.

You'll find that a lot of gun control measures that seem perfectly reasonable on their face are opposed by gun rights activists primarily because those measures have been perverted in the past, or someone has let slip the intent to pervert them if adopted.

[DissedByBush]

107. Congratulations

I always applaud someone who's gone through the time, trouble and effort to gain US citizenship.

Always a welcome with open arms.

[slackmaster]

13. Nobody has actually done that, onehandle

Nice try.

[Abq_Sarah]

14. And I love how other DUers

Immediately call for guns to be abolished because a crazy used one. Can you imagine applying the same standard to our precious cars?

[apnu]

16. Hey I could get behind that. Bicycles for everybody!

:woohoo:

[Abq_Sarah]

19. Eh...

I'll take a horse instead.

[one-eyed fat man]

111. horse problems

We have had an influx of yuppie "gentlemen farmers' move here out of Louisville and they are filling the letter to the editor page with complaints about the Amish "exhaust" getting on their Lincoln Navigators. And suing everyone in sight because their realtor didn't tell them they bought their 6 acres next to a hog farm.

When you see an Escalade with "farm plates" it's a damn good bet that it's not owned by a real farmer!

[hack89]

78. They run to the defense of civil rights.

knee jerk, emotional appeals for safety gave us the Patriot Act - once burned....

[cutlassmama]

26. Correct.

[alarimer]

83. It should have disqualified him.

Gun laws are far too lax in this country.

[quiller4]

77. Nope. You can be crazy as a loon and not be a banned person

if you have never been deemed incompetent by a court of law or involuntarily committed for psychiatric treatment.

[Bennyboy]

12. Oh PLEASE>.......

C'mon here. "told the authorities" means they called the cops. I bet that happens at least ten times a night. The cops blew them off. Even the FBI would blow them off. They must get tens of thousands of warnings about specific people every day. That's the point. We can spend all the money you can, spy on everyone, but at some point you are going to have to have one person being spied on, one person doing the spying and someone spying on them.

This guy was within his rights till the second he crashed that plane and there was NOT ONE FUCKING THING that should have been done until that time.

GOD HELP US if someone can "Tell the authorities" on a family member and that person has his or her rights taken away.

[apnu]

18. Plane? We're not talking about the 9/11 attack or the IRS guy.

This is a totally different dude who drove from CA to DC with two 9mm handguns and tons of ammo. Walked into the foyer of the Pentagon and started shooting cops at point blank range.

[Bennyboy]

34. The point is still the same.....

Where are you gonna care about this guy? Should we start investigating people for thoughts? On someone's word?

Certainly not until he starts pulling the trigger. Like I say, they get this type of info, usually from a family member, all day long.


I know, I have been there.

[TPaine7]

104. You're right. People do not realize that perfect safety exists only in the grave...

assuming no afterlife. If there is an afterlife, even the safety of the dead is debatable.

If we insist that government-supplied safety approaches perfection, our quality of life will approach the quality of life of the deceased--zero. We would be "safer" if police could conduct unreasonable searches and seizures and torture suspects. We would be safer if we had no privacy as privacy is a shield for criminals. We would be safer under Bush/Cheney than under a constitutional Chief Executive.

"Give me liberty or give me death" expresses the best of American ideals. It is better to die than to live in a "safe" police state.

[Chemisse]

37. Just what I was thinking

It all sounds so ominous in hindsight, but in reality, it's not easy to prevent these things from happening. Even if you suspect someone is capable of violence, you can't just lock them up. We don't have laws for 'could maybe be violent sometime'.

[apnu]

20. This tells me we aren't spending our $$ in the right place.

Get out of our Iraq and Afghanistan, close all non-US bases and take those TRILLIONS of dollars saved and put that into better funding for our civil workers so they can do their jobs and not let mental patients fall through the cracks like this.

Jesus H. Christ, how hard is that?

I'll answer my own question, too hard for the jellyfish in DC, that's how hard it is. Any other human being on the other hand...

[Mithreal]

22. +1 But we already control the oil and gas within our borders.

:thumbsup: for truth

[True_Blue]

32. Yet another angry gun-toting person with a "history of mental illness"

Anyone with a "history of mental illness" should not be allowed to easily obtain firearms.

[Merchant Marine]

39. I'll agree, as soon as you define "History" and "Mental Illness"

[True_Blue]

46. A mental disorder that makes them a danger to him/her self & others

He was written up as 5150 by a police officer - "Section 5150 is a section of the California Welfare and Institutions Code (specifically, the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act or "LPS") which allows a qualified officer or clinician to involuntarily confine a person deemed to have a mental disorder that makes them a danger to him or her self, and/or others and/or gravely disabled." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5150_%28Involuntary_psychiatric_hold%29

I have no problem with mentally stable, law-abiding citizens owning guns, but too many mentally unstable people are allowed to buy guns far too easily in this country.

[Euromutt]

110. That's already the law, but you still need a judge to sign off on it

The Gun Control Act of 1968 already makes in an offense for someone who has been adjudicated "mentally defective" to possess a firearm, or to knowingly transfer a firearm to such a person. But it has to be by court order; the say-so of some patrol cop is not sufficient to permanently strip someone of a freedom, nor should it be.

[WriteDown]

40. Or knives, or axes, or fertilizer, or even rope or chain for that matter...

We need to be protected from these people. They probably should be isolated once they're identified.

[True_Blue]

48. Not as easy to mow down a crowd of innocent people with knives, axes, ropes or chains

Now fertilizer is a different story.

[WriteDown]

51. I don't want them hurting anyone...

Even one human life is too much.

[PavePusher]

99. You are correct...

If we give up all our Rights, we'll have much better safety.


Ri-i-i-ight.......

[one-eyed fat man]

112. they used to do that.................

lock away people in insane asylums on the say so of their next of kin. Welcome to the age of enlightenment. Hope your mother-in-law never thinks you're eccentric.

If a person is that much of threat that they need to be locked up involuntarily a judge and due process needs to make that determination. When that determination is made, their right to own a gun goes with it. That is the law as it is now.

So where between the unsubstantiated accusation by a vindictive family member and due process do you want the line drawn if it affects your liberty?

[depakid]

45. The legacy of gun proliferation- two more cops shot

What's the running total for the past year or so?

15? 20? 30?

[Merchant Marine]

57. They're fine

His 9mm didn't even penetrate their vests. Their chief described the wounds as "grazes".

Their .40S&W return fire put him down permanently, though.

What you're failing to recognize is that armed, trained individuals put down another deranged fool out for a killing spree. There was a firefight, the pentagon cops fired a "high" number of rounds (Likely 30+ if we assume two magdumps out of .40 cal glocks) and no bystanders were injured.

[depakid]

74. Only because the guy had poor aim

Otherwise your bravado would sound even more ridiculous than it already does.

[EFerrari]

59. I don't know. Too many. n/t

[Pavulon]

60. Please spare that shit.

this has nothing more to do with gun control than than it does with the systematic destruction of the aboriginal people of australia by the settlers. That topic is pretty much done here.

[AlphaCentauri]

55. Medical Marijuana didn't do any good on this guy n/t

[Kievan Rus]

64. Yet another wingnut goes off...the April '09 DHS report was right

[Dreamer Tatum]

91. Um...are you under the impression the guy was a RWer?

Sorry, that's wrong.

[No Elephants]

92. ZZZZZZZzzzzzzz. From the headline, one would have assumed this threadd

would have been about the warning. Was it clear? Was enough done about it? Etc.


But, noooooo.


No matter what the headline is, if a gun is involved anywhere in the story, the thread turns to the same old, same old.

[aikoaiko]

102. In every state there are laws for involuntary commitment which...

..if successful would have blocked Bedell from acquiring a gun from a FFL after the fact.

As with most shootings of this nature, mental illness treatment before hand may have gone a long way toward preventing the tragedy.