[UK Guardian: Gung-ho about guns

dZ · May 15, 2002, 10:49 AM

Gung-ho about guns

Engel in America
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/st...715154,00.html
Matthew Engel
Tuesday May 14, 2002
The Guardian

The most famous of the 27 amendments to the US constitution is probably the fifth, which gives people the right to avoid self-incrimination. Americans plead it regularly, thus effectively incriminating themselves. Journalists are particularly attached to the first, which enshrines freedom of the press, giving them a place in society way above that of raggedy-arsed British hacks, and thus usually too grand to make any worthwhile use of the privilege.

The most bewildering is the second amendment. This is the one that makes Europeans cease thinking of Americans as much-loved cousins and regard them instead as refugees from a distant planet. It reads: "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."

The excess commas are grammatically puzzling, but not nearly as puzzling as the whole sentence. Americans have argued since 1791 what their founding fathers actually meant. You would have thought the federal government had a view, though. It does. It just happens to be different from the one it held this time last week.

For decades, the official Justice Department line was that the first 13 words of the amendment were crucial to its sense, and that the amendment was designed to protect the existence of official militias, eg the individual states' National Guard, and not to allow all-comers to roam the streets packing a rod.

Last week, Ted Olson, the solicitor-general, announced a change of mind. He said the US now believed the amendment "more broadly protects the right of individuals - to possess and bear their own firearms". Olson was speaking for John Ashcroft who has believed this for years, in common with a great many other people who in other countries would be called rightwing extremists. Ashcroft, however, is now the US attorney general, and he first signalled the change a year ago, in a letter to the chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association, the gung-ho gun-carriers. This gives you some idea how business is transacted in George W's Washington.

In the short run, thanks to the checks and balances elsewhere in the constitution, the change does not mean much. But it's possible that there could be a rethink by the supreme court, which last considered the second amendment, and decided it referred to militias, in 1939. The gun lobby has stopped this being translated into meaningful legislation, but the ruling has so far stopped complete mayhem. This president would love to pack the court with more rightwingers to add to the five who gifted him the presidency. And if the Republicans regain the Senate in November he may get his way. Then even the current inadequate patchwork of state gun control laws could be rendered illegal.

This Ashcroft is an unusual cove. He is a strict Pentecostalist, a sect that believes in exorcism, speaking in tongues, and, in some cases, handling poisonous snakes as a test of belief, which must be good practice for Washington politics. His old Senate colleagues disliked him so much that they nearly rejected him as attorney general.

But his popularity now outstrips that of any senator. He has used his department as a battering ram against terrorism, leading the charge with rasping denunciations of suspects and critics alike as traitors. Guardian readers offended by this might consider whether it makes political sense in the current American climate to err on the side of harshness or kindness in the matter of locking up dodgy-looking Arab males.

His gun policy is harder to fathom. Ashcroft may be a biblical fundamentalist, but he has a very different view of the constitution. Arguably, he has bent it enough since September 11, but the New Yorker noted recently that in six years as a senator he sponsored seven constitutional amendments which he wanted to add to the 17 passed in the previous two centuries, including bans on flag-burning and abortion, plus a plan to make the amendment process much easier.

So why is he so stuck on an interpretation of a 1791 law that even the Reagan administration rejected? Dunno. The traditional liberal theory of the second amendment is that the early Americans were conveying their distaste for professional armies, and aiming to protect the infant state by use of the armed citizen.

Professor Carl Bogus (sic) of the University of California has come up with a new and well-received thesis: that James Madison wrote it to reassure the whites of Virginia, who were desperate to retain their militia to avoid the possibility of a slave insurrection, and were scared the new federal Congress might help the slaves. If Bogus is right, Ashcroft is in pretty vile company - and wrong.

matthew.engel@guardian.co.uk

'01 GSR · May 15, 2002, 11:08 AM

Yellow journalism from a Red newspaper.

Not even a hint of objectivity.

They even stoop to ad hominem attacks on Ashcroft's religious beliefs, which they further calumnize with comparisons to such beliefs as snake handling, which it is all but certain that he does not hold.

HankB · May 15, 2002, 11:10 AM

Matthew Engel wrote:

Quote:

The most bewildering is the second amendment. This is the one that makes Europeans cease thinking of Americans as much-loved cousins and regard them instead as refugees from a distant planet.

Perhaps not quite distant enough.

A good response to Eurothought in general was formulated a couple of hundred years ago:

Quote:

"If you love wealth more than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, depart from us in peace. We ask not your counsel nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you. May your chains rest lightly upon you and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen." --Samuel Adams

KSFreeman · May 15, 2002, 11:53 AM

Hmmm, what about "7. That Subjects which are Protestants, may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Condition, and as are allowed by Law." Gee, wonder if that sounds familiar to the Euroweenies?

The stuff about militias is completely untrue and Leftist precatory language. The Supreme Court has always held that the Second Amendment applies to individuals. The Miller test (from the 1939 case) is weaponcentric, i.e. does the weapon at issue have a militree use? If so, then it is protected.

Everything else they scribble is just silly. We saved these people three (3) times. That should be enough.

**Mike Irwin** · May 15, 2002, 11:58 AM

I love it when I can actually watch a European's mind melt.

MK11 · May 15, 2002, 12:11 PM

Weren't some of the earliest gun laws actually designed by Klu Klux Klan sympathizers to keep guns out of the hands of blacks? I think it was something dealing with early "Saturday night special" laws.

Perhaps someone more eloquent and knowledgable than myself could respond to this chump? Be sure to include a line like, "Since dissenting opinions are rarely tolerated by a Marxist rag such as yours, I doubt this will response will ever be published."

'01 GSR · May 15, 2002, 02:48 PM

Is it Matthew Engle, or Friederich Engles?

ExpatGator · May 15, 2002, 03:34 PM

I just finished blasting off an email to this PusBag. It is incomprehensible that the country renowned for grit and determination is now owned, ruled and populated (with some exceptions) by Pantywaists such as this.

agricola · May 15, 2002, 04:26 PM

"They even stoop to ad hominem attacks"

"what did you say Mr. Pot?" = Mr Kettle

'01 GSR · May 15, 2002, 05:04 PM

Quote:

"They even stoop to ad hominem attacks"
"what did you say Mr. Pot?" = Mr Kettle

But then I'm not a journalist, so I needn't maintain my objectivity on this or any other issue. I can be as damned opinionated as I want.

Now stick a leek in it.

KSFreeman · May 15, 2002, 05:31 PM

MK11, "gun control" started way before Nate's ghosts of the Confederacy started to drift about the South in tobacco-stained bedsheets. It actually started in jolly old Ingerland with the Hanks. Can't have those commoners owning firearms that pierce the armour of the nobility, now can we. Not cricket, old boy.

The first "gun laws" in America required people to own firearms. Slaves and freed blacks were long prohibited from owning firearms. Ownership of firearms was mentioned in Chief Justice Bubba's parade of horribles in Dred Scott.

"Gun control" is merely people control. Some Leftists admit and are proud to control people. Others sling to chimera like "the children" or "safety" or "crime."

May 15, 2002, 10:49 AM	#1
dZ Senior Member Join Date: May 31, 1999 Location: the Fetid Swamp, DC Posts: 7,565	[UK Guardian: Gung-ho about guns Gung-ho about guns Engel in America http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/st...715154,00.html Matthew Engel Tuesday May 14, 2002 The Guardian The most famous of the 27 amendments to the US constitution is probably the fifth, which gives people the right to avoid self-incrimination. Americans plead it regularly, thus effectively incriminating themselves. Journalists are particularly attached to the first, which enshrines freedom of the press, giving them a place in society way above that of raggedy-arsed British hacks, and thus usually too grand to make any worthwhile use of the privilege. The most bewildering is the second amendment. This is the one that makes Europeans cease thinking of Americans as much-loved cousins and regard them instead as refugees from a distant planet. It reads: "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." The excess commas are grammatically puzzling, but not nearly as puzzling as the whole sentence. Americans have argued since 1791 what their founding fathers actually meant. You would have thought the federal government had a view, though. It does. It just happens to be different from the one it held this time last week. For decades, the official Justice Department line was that the first 13 words of the amendment were crucial to its sense, and that the amendment was designed to protect the existence of official militias, eg the individual states' National Guard, and not to allow all-comers to roam the streets packing a rod. Last week, Ted Olson, the solicitor-general, announced a change of mind. He said the US now believed the amendment "more broadly protects the right of individuals - to possess and bear their own firearms". Olson was speaking for John Ashcroft who has believed this for years, in common with a great many other people who in other countries would be called rightwing extremists. Ashcroft, however, is now the US attorney general, and he first signalled the change a year ago, in a letter to the chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association, the gung-ho gun-carriers. This gives you some idea how business is transacted in George W's Washington. In the short run, thanks to the checks and balances elsewhere in the constitution, the change does not mean much. But it's possible that there could be a rethink by the supreme court, which last considered the second amendment, and decided it referred to militias, in 1939. The gun lobby has stopped this being translated into meaningful legislation, but the ruling has so far stopped complete mayhem. This president would love to pack the court with more rightwingers to add to the five who gifted him the presidency. And if the Republicans regain the Senate in November he may get his way. Then even the current inadequate patchwork of state gun control laws could be rendered illegal. This Ashcroft is an unusual cove. He is a strict Pentecostalist, a sect that believes in exorcism, speaking in tongues, and, in some cases, handling poisonous snakes as a test of belief, which must be good practice for Washington politics. His old Senate colleagues disliked him so much that they nearly rejected him as attorney general. But his popularity now outstrips that of any senator. He has used his department as a battering ram against terrorism, leading the charge with rasping denunciations of suspects and critics alike as traitors. Guardian readers offended by this might consider whether it makes political sense in the current American climate to err on the side of harshness or kindness in the matter of locking up dodgy-looking Arab males. His gun policy is harder to fathom. Ashcroft may be a biblical fundamentalist, but he has a very different view of the constitution. Arguably, he has bent it enough since September 11, but the New Yorker noted recently that in six years as a senator he sponsored seven constitutional amendments which he wanted to add to the 17 passed in the previous two centuries, including bans on flag-burning and abortion, plus a plan to make the amendment process much easier. So why is he so stuck on an interpretation of a 1791 law that even the Reagan administration rejected? Dunno. The traditional liberal theory of the second amendment is that the early Americans were conveying their distaste for professional armies, and aiming to protect the infant state by use of the armed citizen. Professor Carl Bogus (sic) of the University of California has come up with a new and well-received thesis: that James Madison wrote it to reassure the whites of Virginia, who were desperate to retain their militia to avoid the possibility of a slave insurrection, and were scared the new federal Congress might help the slaves. If Bogus is right, Ashcroft is in pretty vile company - and wrong. matthew.engel@guardian.co.uk __________________ "O tell the Lacedomecians to damn the torpedoes." BOTR, Chapter V: Some Monsters

May 15, 2002, 11:53 AM	#4
KSFreeman Senior Member Join Date: June 9, 2001 Location: Lafayette, Indiana--American-occupied America Posts: 5,404	Hmmm, what about "7. That Subjects which are Protestants, may have Arms for their Defence suitable to their Condition, and as are allowed by Law." Gee, wonder if that sounds familiar to the Euroweenies? The stuff about militias is completely untrue and Leftist precatory language. The Supreme Court has always held that the Second Amendment applies to individuals. The Miller test (from the 1939 case) is weaponcentric, i.e. does the weapon at issue have a militree use? If so, then it is protected. Everything else they scribble is just silly. We saved these people three (3) times. That should be enough. __________________ "Arguments of policy must give way to a constitutional command." Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 602 (1980).

May 15, 2002, 11:58 AM	#5
Mike Irwin Staff Join Date: April 13, 2000 Location: Northern Virginia Posts: 21,782	I love it when I can actually watch a European's mind melt. __________________ Coworkers. A convenient source of food in a post apocalyptic world.

May 15, 2002, 03:34 PM	#8
ExpatGator Member Join Date: April 21, 2002 Location: Missouri Posts: 30	Pantywaist Brit I just finished blasting off an email to this PusBag. It is incomprehensible that the country renowned for grit and determination is now owned, ruled and populated (with some exceptions) by Pantywaists such as this. __________________ Under Communism man controls man. Under Democracy the reverse is true. (Anon.)

May 15, 2002, 04:26 PM	#9
agricola Senior Member Join Date: April 1, 2002 Location: cymru Posts: 941	"They even stoop to ad hominem attacks" "what did you say Mr. Pot?" = Mr Kettle __________________ pete wylie: " I've never had a fight in me life. But after 40 years of living as a half-decent human being I gained a criminal record for doing my Joe Pesci thing. But it was Joe Pesci played by Michael Crawford."

May 15, 2002, 11:08 AM	#2
'01 GSR Senior Member Join Date: April 16, 2002 Posts: 168	Yellow journalism from a Red newspaper. Not even a hint of objectivity. They even stoop to ad hominem attacks on Ashcroft's religious beliefs, which they further calumnize with comparisons to such beliefs as snake handling, which it is all but certain that he does not hold.

May 15, 2002, 12:11 PM	#6
MK11 Senior Member Join Date: April 26, 2001 Posts: 407	Weren't some of the earliest gun laws actually designed by Klu Klux Klan sympathizers to keep guns out of the hands of blacks? I think it was something dealing with early "Saturday night special" laws. Perhaps someone more eloquent and knowledgable than myself could respond to this chump? Be sure to include a line like, "Since dissenting opinions are rarely tolerated by a Marxist rag such as yours, I doubt this will response will ever be published."

May 15, 2002, 02:48 PM	#7
'01 GSR Senior Member Join Date: April 16, 2002 Posts: 168	Is it Matthew Engle, or Friederich Engles?

May 15, 2002, 05:31 PM	#11
KSFreeman Senior Member Join Date: June 9, 2001 Location: Lafayette, Indiana--American-occupied America Posts: 5,404	MK11, "gun control" started way before Nate's ghosts of the Confederacy started to drift about the South in tobacco-stained bedsheets. It actually started in jolly old Ingerland with the Hanks. Can't have those commoners owning firearms that pierce the armour of the nobility, now can we. Not cricket, old boy. The first "gun laws" in America required people to own firearms. Slaves and freed blacks were long prohibited from owning firearms. Ownership of firearms was mentioned in Chief Justice Bubba's parade of horribles in Dred Scott. "Gun control" is merely people control. Some Leftists admit and are proud to control people. Others sling to chimera like "the children" or "safety" or "crime." __________________ "Arguments of policy must give way to a constitutional command." Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 602 (1980).