A revisionist take that Michael Bellesiles would appreciate . . . Sorry, NRA: The U.S. was actually founded on gun control
Madison’s intent could not be more obvious: his Second Amendment refers only to state militias. If not, why include that exemption for what we now call “conscientious objectors?”
When Madison’s amendment was rewritten by a joint committee from the House and Senate in 1791, the “religious” exemption was lopped off as too cumbersome in language and too complex to enforce. Thus, the Amendment as it now stands.
But Madison’s original intent remains and is there hiding in plain sight for any Supreme Court Justice who takes the pains to look for it. The gun crowd and their apparatchiks ignore, as well, the very reason the Second Amendment got into the Constitution in the first place: to calm the anti-Federalists’ fears of the establishment of a standing army. The Second Amendment is, in fact, Madison’s (and the Federalists’) response to those who felt threatened that the strong central government, as proposed in the new Constitution, might disarm the state militias. And to miss that connection is to . . . well, miss everything.
A federally licensed dealer sold a firearm to someone who completed the required paperwork and passed the mandated background check, so . . . Retail chain sued for selling guns to Texas church shooter
Relatives of three people killed in the November shooting rampage inside a Texas church are suing a sporting goods chain that sold two firearms to the gunman.
The lawsuit filed Wednesday seeks $25 million in damages. It alleges that Texas-based Academy Sports & Outdoors was negligent in selling an AR-556 rifle to Devin Patrick Kelley. The weapon was used in the Nov. 5 attack.
Figures don’t lie, but liars definitely figure . . . The Science of Selling Gun Control: Picking the Right Data
In a Science Magazine article titled, “Firearms and accidental deaths: Evidence from the aftermath of the Sandy Hook school shooting,” economists Phillip B. Levine and Robin McKnight claim to find a causal link between the spike in gun sales after the Sandy Hook shooting and the number of fatal firearms accidents in the “Post-Sandy Hook Window” running from December 2012 to April 2013.
The real issue with this research is found, as usual, in the methods. Levine and McKnight use an eight-year overall period – 2008 through 2015 – for their analysis. Within these eight years, they build a five-month average to which the post-Sandy Hook period is compared, and ultimately found that the post-Sandy Hook surge in gun sales is linked to 57 additional fatal firearms accidents in the same period.
This overall period includes the year with the lowest number of fatal firearms accidents on record (2015), which continued the long-existing downward trend, but excludes all years before 2008 when fatal accidents were considerably higher. This serves to water down the average, making the number of fatal accidents in the post-Sandy Hook period seem shockingly large.
He’s going there . . . When I Set Up My Classroom Now I Only Think About Which Bookshelf Can Stop a Bullet
I’m going there.
When I started teaching setting up the room was so much fun. What set-up would benefit learning? Where would the bookshelf and the reading table go? How can I make my room their room where they felt at home and happy to learn.
That wonder and fun has been robbed from my profession.
Ask a teacher where the heavy bookshelf goes and it is almost the same answer everywhere. By the door. Where does the reading table go? By the door. Anything big and heavy that would stop a bullet goes by the door. Do you get what I am saying?
Somehow the left always boils it down to the gun, though . . . Why Inequality Predicts Homicide Rates Better Than Any Other Variable
Inequality predicts homicide rates “better than any other variable”, says Martin Daly, professor emeritus of psychology and neuroscience at McMaster University in Ontario and author of Killing the Competition: Economic Inequality and Homicide.
This includes factors like rates of gun ownership (which also rise when inequality does) and cultural traits like placing more emphasis on “honor” (this, too, turns out to be linked with inequality). “About 60 [academic] papers show that a very common result of greater inequality is more violence, usually measured by homicide rates,” says Richard Wilkinson, author of The Spirit Level and co-founder of the Equality Trust.
According to the FBI, just over half of murders in which the precipitating circumstances were known were set off by what is called the “other argument” – not a robbery, a love triangle, drugs, domestic violence or money, but simply the sense that someone had been dissed.
The roots of hoplophobia . . . Why People Are Anti-Gun
Some people assume that antigunners are driven by police state desires or emotional reactions to the latest tragedy. Often, it goes much further back. You probably know that astronaut Mark Kelly is married to Gabby Giffords who was a member of Congress until a psychotic named Loughner shot her among many others. You probably also know both are active gun banners now. I am reading his twin brother Scott Kelley’s Endurance: A Year in Space, a Lifetime of Discovery which I am much enjoying.
Scott describes growing up in New Jersey, the son of a police officer:
Sometimes my father’s cop friends would come over to our house for parties, and when they got drunk they would pull their guns out. Once, my father wanted to show off his new gun to his partner, so they decided to use a wooden sculpture I had just made in school as a target. I had brought it home and showed it proudly to my parents, and I was heartbroken that my dad would blast holes in my artwork. [pp.35-36]
Any guesses how far back his brother’s feelings about guns go?
This won’t last long . . . Local case pokes loophole in domestic violence gun prohibition
North Carolina may be the only state in the nation where a misdemeanor domestic violence conviction doesn’t trigger a lifetime federal ban on owning a gun.
The reason: A local case that went before the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2015, brought by a man now sitting in prison for sex crimes. His attorneys convinced the court there was enough difference between North Carolina’s definition of assault and the one in federal law to throw out a federal gun charge.
SLOW MOTION UZI
What? Cops getting drunk and being irresponsible with guns? That’s impossible! Maybe Kelly needs to rediret his ire where it belongs: his asshole idiot father.
Scot Kelley’s has to be fake news, police officers, being the highly trained and professional people they are, do not get drunk, pull out their guns and shoot statues, especially their child’s art project. This has to be a lie. Support your local Law Enforcement
something something COMIN STRAIGHT FROM THA UNDAGROUND something something
Something somethin DARKSIDE something something something COMPLETE.
I agree completely, you have something there!
—While stating the need for a “well-regulated Militia,” does it at the same time also guarantee the individual citizen the personal right to “keep and bear arms?”—
Why do you not think it’s both? How can one defend the “People” if one cannot defend Oneself?
You’d think a journalist could read. Shame it’s not the case. I also wonder if he used the numbers from 2014 when TN accidentally added 100 accidental deaths to their numbers. It would be convenient.
And that is why I’m not renewing my membership in AAAS..
So, because their idiot dad shot his little sculpture, we should disarm.
Classic case of resentment and anger transference. Dude, my guns are not your dad, we gun owners are not your dad. I’m sorry your dad was an a$$hole, but check your hate; you’re off target
I’d word it slightly differently:
Because an idiot cop shot his little sculpture, everybody who’s not a cop should disarm.
Michael Bellesiles IS A PROVEN LIAR. Regardless FOR ALL OTHER AHOLES LIKE BELLESILES:
NOT hiding in plain sight is the 2nd Paragraph of the Declaration of Independence.
The “Constitution” is only meant to support and preserve amongst ourselves (true U.S. Citizen [F all others, including NOT FROM HERE BELLESILES]) what forms of Liberty we demand from each other, under GOD, and to defend those things and what America is FROM the rest of the POS world.
GO
READ
THE
MF
It starts out with “When” MEANING THAT IT MIGHT HAPPEN AGAIN AT ANY TIME.
And continues with “- – That Whenever” MEANING THAT IT’S AN OPEN ENDED QUESTION AND UP FOR CONTINUED DISCERNMENT
continuing (unabriged). . . “–That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
and Further, later . . . “But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.” https://www.archives.gov/founding-docs/declaration-transcript
THAT MEANS, IF YOUR GOVERNMENT GOES TO SH_T AND DOESN’T UPHOLD WHAT WE, EACH INDIVIDUALLY, HOLD DEAR IN THE DECLARATION (we only try to encompass our mutual warning to each other about how not to F with it in our “Constitution” [and we’re on our 3rd version]) WE VOICE OUR GRIEVANCES AND TELL THEM TO F-OFF AND GO TO THE HOUSE. WHEN THEY DON’T, PEACEABLY, THEN WE F-UP THEM, THEIRS, AND THEIR SH_T WITH WRECKLESS ABANDON —
ACCORDING
TO
THE
DECLARATION
OF
INDEPENDENCE
THAT TAKES “ARMS” UP TO AND INCLUDING
WHATEVER
THE
FU<K
IT
TAKES
AND IT IS BEYOND LOGIC, TO BELIEVE THAT THE DRAFTERS OF OUR REPUBLIC WOULD HAVE YOU ASK THE BROKEN GOVERNMENT, THAT YOU BELIEVED NEEDED TO BE TORN DOWN (and they didn't even know if the one they were forming wouldn't need to be) FOR THE MEANS [PERMISSION TO KEEP AND BEAR "ARMS" AGAINST THEM] TO DO SO.
THAT IS WHAT IS GUARANTEED BY THE 2ND AMENDMENT. IF YOU DON'T THINK SO, YOU STAND THE FU<K BY, AND SOMEONE MIGHT BE ALONG SHORTLY TO CONFIRM AND FIX YOUR F'D UP REASONING.
Michael Bellesiles is only a resent example why I say, just because you have a college degree, and a professor, doesn’t mean you are educated or honest. There are many corrupt professors and teachers you will encounter in ALL levels of education. I encountered these corrupt teachers while getting my degree. There is an active effort to de-educate the population. Students are being distracted by schools that promote sex toy and marijuana activities, and other things that have nothing to do with creating an educated citizen who will pass on the knowledge of liberty to the next generation.
The problem is the three L’s Libertarians Liberals and the Left are easily distracted by dildos and pot. The pot legalization leadership in Californian, Washington State and Colorado, have always been anti-civil rights when it came to civilian gun ownership. And they still are.
I agree with your analysis. IF it is true (self-evidently so) that the individual has a right-to-life; and that this right is unalienable; and, that it implies the right of self-defense, then the individual has a right-to-an effective means to self-defense. IF it is true that sovereignty vests in “the people” then we can ask whether this sovereignty is unalienable. E.g., did the people of the “United Kingdom” alienate their sovereignty to Parliament or the monarchy? Or, did we the People of the United States of America alienate our sovereignty to our Federal government or that of our respective States? (If we did, then to which of these two?) If not, then exactly how is it that we could have alienated our right to the arms “necessary” to “the security of a free state”? Somehow, the incongruity of these principles must be resolved. And, that resolution is to be found in the founding era’s thinking: a “well regulated militia”.
Could a state (i.e., either our Federal government or our respective State governments) render the resolution a nullity by neglecting to “keep up” the institution referred to as “the militia” (which was distinguished from any “select militia”)? No, because the “right” runs to “the People” who were very consistently expected to keep “their own arms”.
The scheme for securing “a free state” was fully thought-out and well understood in the 18’th Century. Wherein does the mistake – if any – lay? Something must give to locate the mistake. Is it that sovereignty is alienable? Or that the “right to life” implies no right to an effective means of self-defense? Or that a state could render the institution of the “militia” a nullity merely by neglecting to keep-it-up? Perhaps the error lies in recognizing the individual’s right to life — that must be IT! After all, what could be more important than the will of the aristocracy? It simply must be that whosoever is in nominal control of the seal of legitimate power may – legitimately – exercise that power by extinguishing the life of any individual who proves himself to be a nuisance? Chairman Mao explained it best: Political power emerges from the barrel of a gun! Where we find the gun we find the effective vesting of power.
Thank you, Progressives, for this exercise. I’ll not go gently into your box-car.
So millions of guns were sold in the months following Sandy Hook and Levine and McKnight think they can link that to 57 accidental deaths. Even if they can, by selectively choosing their steady state baseline, they count *57*, who cares? That would represent a fraction of a percent of the gun related deaths during the same period. Ohh, look at me ma, I’m an economist and I figured out that if I wash the data just right I can show a temporary four tenths of a percent shift in a carefully defined statistic during a brief carefully defined time period.
Next up, genius economist establishes causal link between increased birth rates 8 years ago and last years mother’s day card sales. Whoo-hoo.
Wait a second you mean the 2nd Amendment is just about militias? Well then who is the militia? According to the definition of the time it is the whole of the population (that means errybody) and then we get to the part that states The right OF THE PEOPLE to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT be infringed. See? Should’ve read the whole fuckin thing that first sentence is just a preamble. Basically that amendment translates to modern English as:
In order to keep a well trained properly functioning militia (MILITIA! NOT NATIONAL GUARD OR ARMY THERE’S A DIFFERENCE JACKASS) the people (all those folks with a pulse) shall be able to own whatever weapons they deem necessary for their wants and needs and the government can go fuck themselves if they think they can tell people what they can and cannot own.
That Amendment was written so that us (the citizenry) could maintain parity with our nation’s army. The founders gave us all the ability and responsibility to be the ultimate check on federal power not the other way around. Every US citizen is a sovereign state unto themselves provided they do not harm others and we are ultimately responsible for maintaining and defending our republic and ourselves against all enemies foreign and domestic be they a power drunk government or a 2 bit hood in a dark alley.
Very well said and amen
Seemingly all popularly peddled sides of the actual history of the 2nd Amendment are wrong. Put in the context of the Militia Acts, the reality of militias within the colonies and early states, and the actual words of many of the authors of the Constitution and Bill of Rights: the initial intent was for all free white men to own firearms and other “arms” suitable for militia service. The amendment was meant to ensure that the populace had the ability to defend itself from foreign invaders, slave insurrections, Native American raiders, and if need: the government itself. You could certainly own weapons not deemed suitable for military service, but each man was expected to have at least a serviceable musket, ammunition, etc. Some required swords and other additional arms.
The reality is: many of the mythical “Founders” would probably be far more appalled at our standing armies, wire tapping, mass surveillance, etc. than our possession of firearms. Standing armies in particular were seen as a very significant risk to individual liberty. A Swiss style militia system would have been more akin to what the founders would have liked though likely less of a centralized system than the Swiss have.
Translate that to the modern day even though the founders were largely racists and sexists as were just about everyone in those days, a modern day system based on the original intent but upgraded to current standards would suggest every adult citizen (men and women of all races) should be required to own at least an M4 or equivalent (standard infantry rifle) and ammunition and report for militia training. AKA we should all be members of the national guard and an actual federal army should only be raised in times of war.
Wrong. Guard is still federal. I know technically we’re state. Truth is though we still take orders from the feds but get the added bonus of occasionally getting bossed around by the state governor too. Typically though the state governor signs us over to federal control for anything in another state i.e. hurricane clean up, overseas deployment, BCT/AIT, local states of emergency, and pretty much anything else that ain’t our “normal” 4 weekends a month 52 weeks a year guard stuff.
Understood. State militias, which became state national guard units, used to be mostly under state control and seldom used outside of their home state. IIRC, the Mexican-American War and the Civil War are what really changed that.
“every adult citizen (men and women of all races) should … report for militia training.” – Madison specifically argued that training every able bodied man for militia service was a ridiculous proposition because it would cost too much.
“Why People Are Anti-Gun . . . ”
Because their mom’s episiotomy was screwed up and they came out her a_ _.
Because they serve the ruler of hell.
Because they love and support communism and can’t do tyranny while you have a RTKABA.
Because THERE ARE A WHOLE BUNCH OF GLOBAL-COMMUNISTS OUT THERE THAT ARE GETTING PAID TO PUSH IT, THROUGH THE AUSPICES OF THE UN. All of which, require America, and Americans to be subservient to the POS Global-Communist NWO.http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/development-agenda/
Sounds like was his feelings were hurt when he was a young kid?
OK, got it, daddy may have been an a-hole. But you are a grown up now. Man up, you have hurt feelings, got it!
Now understand, I didn’t shoot your wife, so f**k off and go respectfully speaking, go take care of your wife.
Public forum is not the way is not a win for her dignity. She can practice with family and friends. If you’re retired, and need more money. Do commercials.
BTW: drunk or not maybe dad was trying to teach you to not point a gun at something you don’t want to destroy. It’s not like he killed your dog😮
Perhaps the dog was unavailable at the time.
NOW we know why those Kelly boys are so effed up-daddy did it. Good luck sueing Academy. They did everything right…hey why don’t you try bringing a lawsuit to the the AirForce?!?😖😫😡
The plaintiff’s argument rests on a misunderstanding of federal law with respect to the transfer of long guns. Plaintiffs contend that the rifle should not have been delivered to the shooter, but instead transferred to an FFL in Colorado (the residential address listed on the 4473) for ultimate delivery. they are wrong: a long gun, transferred under the laws of the state of residence, may be delivered in the state in which the firearm is purchased. Only hand guns must be sent to an FFL in the state of residence.
Not quite. Federal law holds that an out of state resident may purchase a long gun in person in another state and take physical possession right then……IF……..such transaction is allowed by both the seller’s state law and the buyer’s state law. Well.
Since 2014, Colorado residents have been allowed to purchase long guns in any other state and take immediate possession. (Previously, they had been restricted only to states contiguous with Colorado.) No problem there.
In Texas, only residents of Texas may purchase long guns and take immediate physical possession. Uh oh……problem.
The church shooter reportedly indicated he was a resident of Colorado on his 4473. That would render him ineligible to purchase the long gun under Texas law and federal law, because federal law’s permisssion is contingent on state law’s allowance.
Now, whether this technicality is enough to prevail in court or to wrest a check out of Academy all remains to be seen. However, there is a legitimate legal argument to make here, assuming the facts as reported thus far are substantially correct.
“In Texas, only residents of Texas may purchase long guns and take immediate physical possession.” Can you give a citation to that law? The term firearm shows up in 93 different chapters of various Texas codes. I only looked in the “Weapons” chapter of the Penal Code, which is where sec. 46.06 (Unlawful Transfer of Weapons) and sec. 46.07 (Interstate Transfer) are located.
Whenever one argues the Militia clause, one need only remind them that the BoR is not a limit upon the People, it is a limit upon the Government. But if you want to go down the Militia rabbit hole, then certainly the People must be equally well armed as any modern army.
What I find most interesting in this whole 2nd Amendment debate is that two states refused to ratify the Bill of Rights unless the re-written 2nd Amendment was not included. The two states? Madison’s own Virginia and New York. Go figure.
Suing the retailer that complied with all legal requirements?
Wouldn’t suing deeper pockets that were in the wrong be the better choice? A.K.A. the Air Force? Granted, that’s my tax money that would go to any settlement and legal costs, but c’mon, if you’re going for deep pockets, don’t waste it on an entity that was not in the wrong.
Glad it’s Texas. Hopefully, the case will be dismissed early, before these misguided idiots are liable for too much of Academy’s legal bills.
To Ed Asner and all Regressives, freedom is slavery, war is peace, ignorance is strength, …
I perfer freedom than armed slavery.
I perfer the bill of rights & the constitution that the lies and disinformation of the NRA or this fake news hate website.
The mythical belief that somehow an untrained citizen with a gun can fulfill their fantasy of being rambo or terminator and fight back against a “bad guy”.
All “bad guys” started off as “good guys”.
The “good guys with guns” ran away from the vegas shooter like the cowards they were while any police and “unarmed sheeple” stayed behind to rescue people while the police went after the killer
The “good guy” with a gun DIDN’T SAVE ANYONE after another “good guy with a gun” snapped and killed innocent people at a chruch in texas.
Your right to kill and oppress does not impede the rights of americans to be free and not live in fear of going to school, work or place of commerce without the fear of today being possibly their last day on earth.
Sorry gun-nuts, You do not have the right to assault or kill someone for believing in climate change.
These types of incidents don’t happen in Europe, Canada, Japan or Australia on a everyday basis.
It’s easier to survive being stabbed or beaten than being shot dead.
The founders did make it clear that they did not like the idea of citizens being armed. Even General Washington himself had a disdain for improvised citizen militias as they ran away from fights after firing one or two shots, we won our freedoms with the help of France, the dutch and Spain.
Armed citizens in the late 1700s and early 1800s were curb-stomped during the whiskey rebellion and the war of 1812.
Willy Lunchmeat posts under yet ANOTHER NAME.
The homicide rates in the UK and Australia rose in the wake of their gun control laws. The fact is that civilian owned guns are used more often to save lives and stop crime than to take lives and commit crime.
Cry some more.
#AntiArguments – responding to the argument the other guys didn’t make, hoping nobody notices.
#GlobalWarming – what you get from torching that many straw men.
All “bad guys” started off as “good guys”. So we should treat everyone like like bad guys?
You know who else besides the ordinary citizens (who may or may not have had guns) didn’t save any lives in Las Vegas or Sutherland, Texas, or the Pulse nightclub, or Sandy Hook? The police.
Plus, with the hundreds to thousands of unarmed black men the police slaughter every year (if we take BLM at their word), we could probably save a lot more lives by taking guns away from the police than by taking them from the average citizen.
How do we know that the armed good guy didn’t save any lives in Sutherland, Texas? Did anyone hear the murderer claim something like “Okay, thats it, I’m done killing for today!”?
Troll
So UnrealUnAmerucan I’m guessing the best part of you ran down mommy’s asscrack to leave you as a brown stain on the car seat. Just a guess but based on your many despicable posts I’m probably in the ballpark.
“Freedom is slavery!” Behold exhibit no.1: “I perfer freedom than armed slavery.” Slaves can be recognized by being disarmed. No one is forcing you to get armed. You can get your all your teeth pulled so you can’t bite anyone for all I care.
“…the rights of americans to be free and not live in fear of going to school,… There is no right to not live in fear. Fear is a subjective feeling. Sorry, we can’t help you there, you should get professional psychiatric help.
Armed people stop violent criminal attacks hundreds of times every day. No fantasy there. Low end estimate by famous gun grabber David Hemenway, a professor of Health Policy at the Harvard School of Public Health, is approximately 55,000–80,000 defensive gun uses each year. More realistic estimates go up to 2 000,000 DGU each year. Why do you feel compulsion to repeatedly lie about it?
Once again, say it with me, the 2nd amendment does not convey the idea that in order to own arms you must be in a militia, it conveys the idea that if we’re going to have effective militias the people need to already own the arms. The militias are made up of people who own guns,
It says “the right of the people”. Madison was a pretty good wordsmith. If he wanted it to say Militia, that’s exactly what it would say. You can take that it out of context or not. The meaning stays the same.
Well, “teach the children well” there has taken a step toward sanity. Baby steps, right.
So, good on him to realize some responsibility for the little lives in his charge, and that bad people sometimes do bad things to kids.
I do wish he’d expand his notion of dangers and solutions, beyond bullets and barriers. Developmentally he seems still bugged by knowing he lives in an imperfect world, that he can only kinda fix at best. Maybe in the next grade, if he passes this one.
” I had brought it home and showed it proudly to my parents, and I was heartbroken that my dad would blast holes in my artwork. ”
So, what’s our conclusion here, that NJ cops are assholes who shouldn’t be trusted with firearms or arrest authority? I think we knew that already.
Or should we conclude that Mark’s dad is almost as big of an asshole as Mark is, and these things can be inherited or nurtured in youth?
Or, all of the above?
“The gun crowd and their apparatchiks”
Apparatchik – “a member of a communist party apparat.”
So the extremely anti-communist (for the most part) gun crowd is communist?
As to the domestic abuse thing: (TLDR: state domestic violence is often not federal domestic violence and Congress, the 4th Circuit, and NICS are stupid).
1) The 4th Circuit is plain wrong in their reasoning because the federal definition of a crime of domestic violence doesn’t have any requirement of any intent.
2) a strict reading of the state and federal laws will often mean that a state crime of domestic violence isn’t a federally qualifying crime of domestic violence. (Federal domestic violence statutes below).
For example, in Texas we have a complicated system in which the court will make a “finding of family violence.” Family violence includes violence against a family or household member by a family or household member. Household means anyone living together, which includes roommates found on a bulletin board or the internet. Family is defined so broadly as to include any blood relatives (even out to cousins the nth degree), any of your spouses’ blood relatives (and I meant for spouse to be plural because some exes count), and any of your blood relatives spouses. So, many crimes in Texas don’t meet the domestic definition of domestic violence.
Also in Texas, a finding of family violence will be attached to many crimes that don’t meet the federal domestic violence definition of violence either because the federal definition is limited to “the use or attempted use of physical force, or the threatened use of a deadly weapon” whereas a Texas family violence finding could be attached to a simple threat of violence.
For a technically correct extreme example under Texas statutes, I could tell my seventh cousin’s husband “shut your mouth before I smack you” and have a misdemeanor conviction for assault family violence in Texas which in no way meets the federal definition for domestic violence, but would probably be reported as such.
And since the element of family in every family violence finding in Texas is not the same thing as the federal element of domestic, an extremely technical reading could result in all misdemeanor family violence cases in Texas not meeting the requirements of 18 U.S.C. § 922(9)(g) even if relationship would qualify because the Texas judge/jury only found, and the state was only required to prove, that the relationship fit the broader Texas definition and not the more narrow federal definition.
Honestly, 18 U.S.C. § 922(9)(g) was written very poorly and should be rewritten or thrown off the books for being unconstitutionally vague. It uses the phrase “an element” and then lists two elements if you read the “ors” as one element and as many as 13 elements if you don’t. That whole thing could be written a lot cleaner and clearer. Additionally the last or is “by a person similarly situated to … .” Is that “in terms so vague that men of common intelligence must necessarily guess at its meaning and differ as to its application?” If the answer is yes, then it is unconstitutionally vague. Hell, I don’t know what “cohabited with the victim as a .. parent” even means. The only time I’ve ever heard or read the term cohabitate when it didn’t mean living together as man and wife while not being man and wife, it was in reference to animals or ideas. If they meant “lived with,” why not just say that? Maybe because even they didn’t know wtf they were talking about? (Admittedly, I am of the opinion that most statutes are unconstitutionally vague).
*****
18 U.S.C. § 922(9)(g) – “who has been convicted in any court of a misdemeanor crime of domestic violence”
18 U.S.C. § 921(33)(A) – “the term “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” means an offense that—
(i) is a misdemeanor under Federal, State, or Tribal law; and
(ii) has, as an element, the use or attempted use of physical force, or the threatened use of a deadly weapon, committed by a current or former spouse, parent, or guardian of the victim, by a person with whom the victim shares a child in common, by a person who is cohabiting with or has cohabited with the victim as a spouse, parent, or guardian, or by a person similarly situated to a spouse, parent, or guardian of the victim.”
I am sooooo very tired of anti-gun leftists making the same tired, convoluted, idiot argument about the 2nd. If “militia” only is their claim, they have absolutely no valid argument against EVERYONE owning the most up to date, current issue, military infantry weapons – because from the Militia Act of 1792, through the current 10 US Code, section 311, through court decisions and common practice, all asserting and allowing that every male between 17 and 45 is REQUIRED to be in the militia and anyone else may choose to be in the militia, with no obligation to state their choice at any time before the militia is called up. If you are a US citizen between 17 and 45 years old it is your duty and responsibility to own a modern firearm, and keep it in working order with plenty of ammo. I know it is not enforced, but it IS the LAW!
I won’t go into the absurdity of the writer’s grossly dishonest claim that the second clause of the Second Amendment does not apply to all citizens.
Inequality predicts homicide rates “better than any other variable”, says Martin Daly, professor emeritus of psychology and neuroscience at McMaster University in Ontario and author of Killing the Competition: Economic Inequality and Homicide.
Really? I bet being a criminal predicts being a victim better. 65% to 85% of homicide victims have a criminal record. Hmm, I wonder if they being criminal when they got burned down?