District of Columbia v. Heller: Year One

Via Instapundit.

Minister rejects criticism on handgun licence reform

Proposed Irish legislation would ban new handgun licenses except for those needed for Olympic sports.

[Minister for Justice] Ahern said he was determined to stamp out a practice known as “practical shooting”. His department had monitored with concern “competitions in which people shoot their way through multi-stage target courses based on real life combat scenarios, such as a home invasion or a hostage rescue”.

He said: “This activity is one that seeks to glorify and normalise attitudes to high-powered handguns and promote their use and ownership,” he said. Mr Ahern said “practical shooting” was a “highly undesirable” recent development in Irish shooting sports.

And here is why “practical shooting” is not practical:

“It’s simply not in the public interest to tolerate the development of a subculture predicated on a shooting activity which by the liberal standards of the US is regarded as an extreme shooting activity.”

He said any cursory research on the internet showed that these activities were marketed as being at the “extreme end” of handgun ownership and were “anathema to the tradition of Irish sporting clubs”.

Ah. Cursory research on the internet shows that practical shooting is extreme. Might he be a bit selective when conducting research? Perhaps taking folks like the Brady bunch as the experts with the final word?

“Rural Ireland isn’t like rural America of the George Bush Republicans, with a chicken in every pot and a gun under every pillow. We have no such tendencies in this country,” he said.

Nope. No bias there.

How many handguns have been licensed under the current system? 1,800 in the past five years.

Hat tip to the reader who sent this in.

Kopel: Obama administration moves to ban 80% of knives

I hear so often that gun owner worry over increased gun control is silly fear-mongering because Obama hasn’t tried to ban any guns yet. Only backwoods hicks are afraid of such things.

I’m wondering how that squares with the push for knife rules change.

UPDATE: From the comments:

All the general public will know is that in a few months Target will start selling pocket knives without the easy open feature or “thumb stud” and nobody will know why because it hasn’t been talked about on any TV news or newspaper. It’s such a small inconvenience that most people will not even notice and those that do will learn to live with it after a few months. Meanwhile we will lose a little a few more feet off beach of freedom to the sea of bureaucratic control over our lives.

Via the NRA-ILA:

On June 11, the top law enforcement officials of nearly half the states signed a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, expressing their opposition to reinstatement of the federal ban on semi-automatic firearms.

“We share the Obama Administration’s commitment to reducing illegal drugs and violent crime within the United States. We also share your deep concern about drug cartel violence in Mexico. However, we do not believe that restricting law-abiding Americans’ access to certain semi-automatic firearms will resolve any of these problems,” the letter said.

The letter notes congressional opposition to bringing back the ban, and calls for increasing enforcement of existing laws.

We encourage NRA members to let these state officials know we appreciate them standing up to the incessant clamor for gun control that is currently coming from anti-gun groups and their media allies.

The 23 state Attorneys General, in alphabetical order, by state, are:
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Illinois:

Derek Howald of Chillicothe has had his Utah permit for four years. It’s reciprocal (that means it’s a valid permit) in 29 other states.

In Illinois, it’s worthless.

“It’s sad,” Howald said. “I think with the rich heritage of hunting and fishing, especially when you get to central and downstate … you have very pro-Second Amendment people here.”

The divisive statewide issue of concealed carry has gained a lot of attention in the Peoria area in recent weeks after Mayor Jim Ardis said he wants to see Peoria serve as a pilot city for some sort of responsible state law.

Illinois and Wisconsin are the only two states with no form of concealed carry available to regular citizens.

Also, the understatement of the day:

Struggles to get any kind of concealed carry measure adopted in Illinois hits a roadblock every legislative session in Springfield, where the battle over gun rights often boils down to geography.

Downstate lawmakers of both parties tend to oppose gun control, while officials in Chicago tend to support it.

I’m not sure how a “test city” case would work. It seems to me that it would as tough (or maybe even tougher) to get something like that passed than it would be to pass concealed carry for the entire state.

Still, there’s such a huge gap between the sensibilities of Chicago-area politicians and the rest of the state that it might be the only hope at this point. Maybe we’ll see that efforts to get a limited-area approved fail but fire up enough Illinois voters to bring the thing to a vote on the state level. We can only hope.

UPDATE: Say Uncle points out Many Chicagoans Carry Handguns Illegally.

Which is, as he points out, unpossible.

For your enjoyment here are some of the more amusing comments left on the Kalamazoo Gazette article about this past weekend’s Open Carry Picnic in Kalamazoo’s Bronson Park. Offered without comment.

These nut jobs that like to walk around wearing guns to compensate for their lack of abilities elsewhere are to pathetic to even mock. I’m sure you could find a nutty Ron Paul supporter or racist rapture waiting survivalist in the group if you looked a little deeper. Most “2nd amendment advocates” shouldn’t be aloud scissors much less the right to carry their gun around in public.

The 2nd Amendment refers to a “militia,” i.e. military.

There is no need for private citizens to own firearms of anykind. It simply should not be allowed.

Approved hunters can rent rifles from appropriate DNR offices.

I also forgot to mention. If you get a CCW license YOU HAVE TO CARRY IT CONCEALED. With a CCW license you can never carry a gun exposed other than for hunting.

This is just boys wanting to play modern day cowboys.

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Murdoc didn’t even know about this until he read the blogs:

Gun owners show support for open-carry law at picnic in Kalamazoo

It resembled most any Sunday afternoon picnic in Bronson Park. Except most of the people assembled around tables filled with watermelon and grilled goodies had firearms in holsters strapped to their waists.

The Glocks and the Smith & Wessons remained holstered but visible during a three-hour Open Carry Picnic designed to raise public awareness of what organizers called Second Amendment rights in Michigan to openly carry a firearm in most places.

They were high school teachers, college students, computer geeks and housewives with one thing in common. Rather than a cell phone, the leather pouch they wore at their waist contained a gun. The picnic drew about 40 people on a wet afternoon.

Murdoc was actually staying not too far from Kalamazoo this weekend.

Here’s a good news report on the event:

Hat tips to Huffman and Soyer.