But one element of the cluster-f— was of special interest.
“They called me at 1 p.m., on Tuesday, and apologized for not telling me, saying they were not comfortable having too many people know about the raid before it happened. They were hitting several gun shops as part of an annual thing.” [emphasis added]
Judge: You want a warrant to raid an FFL? Let’s see your probable cause.
ATF: It’s May again.
Judge: Ah. Right. -signs paperwork- Have fun.
I want to see the warrant, probable cause affidavit, and the judge’s name.
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You probably heard that the Buffalo chumbucket is a right-wing white supremacist. From what I’ve heard, I’m willing to buy the white supremacist part, but right-wing?
“I would prefer to call myself a populist. But you can call me an ethno-nationalist eco-fascist national socialist if you want, I wouldn’t disagree with you.” He also repeatedly attacks capitalists, and rejected the conservative label because, he wrote, “conservativism is corporatism in disguise, I want no part of it.”
An eco-fascist national socialist? Doesn’t sound very right-wing.
Of course, reports have it that he used an evil AR-15 assault weapon.
The UK Independent reports on Sunday morning the New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) announced the gun was acquired legally.
ABC 7 indicated the attacker used a rifle which was purchased at a store in Broome County, New York.
A lawful, commercial purchase (not a private sale) in New York means the weapon was NY SAFE compliant; that is, not an assault weapon. Reports do claim he had noncompliant magazines holding more than 10 rounds.
Interesting that some asshole was able to lawfully purchase that gun…
…considering that, as is becoming all too common, he was previously known to authorities. It seems that he threatened to kill people at his high school, and was “Baker Acted*” less than a year ago.
But no seems to have thought of using New York’s “red flag” law to supposedly keep him disarmed while he wandered the streets unsuperised. Thus, he could still lawfully purchase his murder weapon.
Where are we at?
Assault weapon ban didn’t work.
“High capacity” magazine ban didn’t work.
Red flag law didn’t work.
And since the red flag law didn’t work, neither did the point-of-sale NICS background check.
Clearly this calls for more gun control that won’t work. And maybe some more censorship laws… that won’t work either.
* Technically, “Baker Act” refers to the Florida law allowing people to be taken in for a mental health evaluation, but every state — including New York — has the equivalent. I find it helpful to use the general term “Baker Act” for them all.
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Witold Pilecki volunteered to be imprisoned in Auschwitz. Not to find out what was going on in the camp. He knew; some of it, at least. He went to gather proof to be presented to the Allies. He volunteered to go into a death camp to try to help those imprisoned there. They smuggled in radio parts and built a transmitter in the camp and broadcast intel about camp activities.
Thank you for the reminder, DD. I’ve been known to forget my own birthday (it took a reminder this year).
On Wednesday, I heard about an incident on Lufthansa flight 401, a Boeing 747-8 that flew from JFK to Frankfurt, that was almost too hard to believe. Allegedly, Lufthansa refused to allow any of the Jews from that flight onto their connecting flight to Budapest, while non-Jews were free to continue on their journeys. Two dozen armed police officers ensured that no Jews boarded the flight or caused issues at the gate.
YouTube just removed our video showing a Lufthansa supervisor blaming problems on #TheJews due to it "violating our hate speech policy".
Apparently the excuse Lufthansa is using to refuse to honor the tickets bought by the Jews is…masks.
While US carriers have dropped mask requirements, rules in airports and on foreign carriers can be confusing. For example, you don’t need to wear a mask on KLM planes to their Amsterdam hub, but you do need to wear it in the Amsterdam airport. You do need a mask on Lufthansa planes to their Frankfurt hub, but you don’t need to wear a mask in the Frankfurt airport.
Lufthansa flights from JFK and Newark to Frankfurt on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, were filled with Jews, mostly Hasidic.
….
Lufthansa requires surgical masks or N95s to be worn on flights, and handed out 3 ply masks to everyone who didn’t have a mask or only had a cloth mask at boarding.
Hope they get sued for pulmonary damage making people wear those things on long flights
Microplastic fibres were found deep in the lower lungs of living human beings in almost every person sampled in a recent UK study.
The study from Great Britain discovered microplastic particles — present in many COVID-19 masks — in the lung tissue of 11 out of 13 patients undergoing surgery.
Polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) were the most prevalent substances present in the lungs.
The microscopic plastic fragments and fibres were discovered by scientists at Hull York Medical School in the UK. Some of the filaments were two millimetres long in patients undergoing surgery whose lung tissue they sampled.
The plastic dust and microscopic debris comprises the same plastics used to manufacture the ubiquitous surgical masks worn by hundreds of millions of people around the world as mandated by governments in an attempt to halt the spread of COVID-19.
But back to our story.
They told me that there was zero mask enforcement in first class and that one of the first class flight attendants was not wearing her own mask for most of the flight. Passengers in first class didn’t wear masks for most of the flight and weren’t asked to.
From talking to several passengers in economy, it seems like there were a couple of isolated masking issues in economy class, both among some visibly Hasidic Jews as well as non-Jews. It’s a shame that they flouted the rules, but it’s unclear why those few passengers weren’t singled out for punishment as would happen on most airlines in the world.
….
David Landau told me that at 7:20am they finally started boarding, but this was no typical boarding. The gate agent was paging individuals by name to come up and board the flight. He recalled that the paged individuals that were able to board were not visibly Jewish, but he recalled that a Rosen was paged and he saw that he didn’t make it onto the flight.
….
Yitzy tried asking the Lufthansa agent if being Jewish made him part of “the group from NYC,” but police kept them away from the Lufthansa agents, while saying that they were just there to enforce what Lufthansa tells them to do. It seemed to him that Lufthansa was using the police to shy away from answering passengers’ questions.
Ahhh, the old “Just following orders” canard. The good Germans.
But Lufthansa has now (in their opinion) made everything all okie dokie.
They apologized to the Rabbi of Berlin and the employee that perpetrated this modern day example of anti-semitism has been suspended. No idea for how long, not fired. Just suspended.
Lufthansa’s head office reached out to him to setup the video chat. I asked the Rabbi why he thought the airline called him, instead of a Rabbi in Frankfurt, home of the incident and the airline’s base. He wasn’t positive, but notes that Berlin is the capital city and that he has worked with the federal government and companies in the past when similar cases about anti-Semitism have surfaced.
Rabbi Teichtal said that the CEO’s apologies sounded genuine and personal, a far cry from the generic “apology” that was published by the airline yesterday which ignored anti-Semitism and merely “regretted the circumstances.” That non-apology also referred to the passengers on the flight as a group, when in fact there were many passengers who booked their own travel and were also denied boarding to Budapest.
Yeah, I’m guessing he has worked with the German authorities on anti-semitism as he himself has been attacked more than once in Berlin.
Lufthansa refused to book the Jews on other flights, banned them from the airlines for 24 hours, wouldn’t refund their money and then blamed them for the problems. The original link I gave has a lot of videos shot by the passengers asking why they can’t continue their flight.
Passenger: Just the Jewish people on that flight?
Lufthansa: Do you want to discuss with me or no? Do you want to listen to me?
Passenger: I’m like shocked beyond, never in my adult life. I’ve never heard this.
Lufthansa: If you want to do it like this, Jewish people who were the mess, who made the problems.
So yeah Lufthansa, calling the Rabbi in Berlin (when the incident took place in Frankfurt) not refunding money, not personally calling every passenger you stole money from and traumatized totally makes it cool beans. /sarcasm.
As Jack Posobiec says, “Know what part of the movie you’re in”.
On April 1, 1933, a general boycott against German Jews was declared, in which SA members stood outside Jewish-owned stores and businesses in order to prevent customers from entering.
Covid, like hitler used health, has made nazis out of teachers, flight attendants, shop keepers and torn families apart thanks to the medical lies and attempted tyranny by the left in not just America but world wide. We don’t have to turn a blind eye again.
The big news in American human/civil rights today is JONES vs. BONTA, overturning the California ban on long guns for 10-20 year-olds.
To hear from a lot of “news” outlets this morning, the Ninth Circuit ruled against the ban. Most headlines read that way, and many even continue that into the reports themselves. A few correctly point out that the ruling came from a three judge panel of the Ninth, rather than the whole circuit. That’s pretty important, for reasons beyond the obvious option for appeal.
The good news is that the panel correctly applied strict scrutiny.
It must be justified by a compelling governmental interest.
The law or policy must be narrowly tailored to achieve that goal or interest.
The law or policy must be the least restrictive means for achieving that interest: there must not be a less restrictive way to effectively achieve the compelling government interest.
The law in question broke down into two parts. One forbade any long guns to those 18-20yo unless they have a hunting license. Because the court found that it was not unnecessarily broad — allowing the hunting license exception — it used intermediate scrutiny on that part, and allowed it to stand.
The second part in question banned 18-20yos possessing semiautomatic centerfire rifles, hunting license or not. While the first part would allow those with hunting licenses to possess pump shotguns, single shot rifles, or bolt-actions, semiautomatics were right out; essentially with no exceptions (other than for police or military). Coupled with the existing prohibition on sales of any handgun to those under 21, this amounted to a near total revocation of Second Amendment rights for young adults. The panel found that to be overly broad under strict scrutiny.
Third, the district court erred by applying intermediate scrutiny, rather than strict scrutiny, to the semiautomatic centerfire rifle ban. Strict scrutiny applied because the law on its face banned almost all young adults from having semiautomatic rifles. The main difference between this ban and the long gun regulation was the exceptions. The long gun regulation has a readily available exception, at least on its face—young adults can get hunting licenses. The semiautomatic rifle ban has no such exception: the only young adults who can buy semiautomatic rifles are some law enforcement officers and active-duty military servicemembers. The panel held that California’s ban was a severe burden on the core Second Amendment right of selfdefense in the home. Even applying intermediate scrutiny, the ban, prohibiting commerce in semiautomatic rifles for all young adults except those in the police or military, regulated more conduct than was necessary to achieve its goal and therefore failed the reasonable fit test.
As a matter of routine, when California loses a case at the panel level, it appeals to the Ninth en banc; the whole circuit. That is where things could get very interesting, thanks to Judge Stein’s dissent in this case.
Dissenting in part, Judge Stein stated that while the majority was correct to apply intermediate scrutiny to the long gun regulation to affirm the district court’s denial of the preliminary injunction, it erred in applying strict scrutiny to and reversing the district court with respect to the semiautomatic centerfire rifle regulation. On that basis, Judge Stein concurred with the majority’s holding and reasoning with respect to the long gun regulation and dissented from its holding and reasoning with respect to the semiautomatic rifle regulation. Judge Stein stated that by neglecting consideration of either the disproportionate perpetration of violent crime by, or the relatively immature and variable cognitive development among, adults under age 21, the majority opinion failed to conduct a legal analysis that comported with the corpus of precedent within this Circuit and elsewhere.
Oh. My. How will the en banc Ninth deal with Stein’s assertion that 18-20yos are too criminal and/or too mentally defective to enjoy enumerated rights, while struggling to reject the panel’s decision that they do have some rights?
If, as I expect, the Ninth takes up this case en banc the weasel-worded side-stepping around Stein’s dissent will be amazing. If they roll with Stein’s position, they open up several cans of worms.
Too immature to have a rifle? Too immature to vote.
Too immature to have a rifle? Too immature for free speech. (OK, they’ll probably like that one.)
Too immature to have a rifle? Too immature for an abortion.
Too immature to have a rifle? Too immature for a car.
Work your way throught the Bill of Rights and consider what else young adults might be to immature to enjoy.
If the Ninth decides intermediate scrutiny should be applied, and accepts Stein’s assertion that young adults are du jure criminals and mentally deficient, California’s red flag law could also come into play.
As bad as no-due process confiscations based on — even anonymous — accusations of potential future crime are, imagine red flag hearings based on Stein’s bizarre idea.
NOW: “Judge, Mr. Smith has been angry and acting erratically. Hid did this and this and this. He has guns. Please take them.”
STEIN’s FUTURE: “Judge, Mr. Smith is 18 and has a bolt-action hunting rifle. Please take it. No, he has not been angry or erratic, but under JONES v. BONTA, he’s a criminal and mentally deficient by default, by reason of age.”
That’ll go over well with younger voters. If they can still vote.
Previous age limits for firearms have survived intermediate scrutiny in the past because they’ve been somewhat narrowly tailored. Young adults were prohibited from purchasing handguns because those tend to be used more often in crimes than long guns. (That’s still a bit wide for my taste, and courts are beginning to agree with me.)
Outright bans for individuals — as opposed to entire demographic classes — were narrowly tailored because they required convictions of those specific individuals for serious crimes, or judicial findings of mental incompetence specific to those individuals.
Will the Ninth — like Stein — be willing to chuck that in favor of wholesale bans for entire demographic classes?
…disproportionate perpetration of violent crime by…
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You might think that headline is the big news. Not really. We already know red flag laws don’t work.
The news here is that Garen Wintemute, the victim-disarmament advocate who previously couldn’t find data he could not twist, finally hit a brick wall. And worse.
Firearm Violence Following the Implementation of California’s Gun Violence Restraining Order Law
VROs were not associated with reduced population-level rates of firearm violence in San Diego County, but this may change as the number of orders increases over time; the association between GVROs and firearm violence at the individual level cannot be inferred from our findings and should be the subject of future studies.
Wintemute is notable for crappy “studies” using bogus tools like synthetic controls (imaginary populations, because real populations wouldn’t support his predetermined “results”), tossing out most of the inconvenient data (because two-thirds of the subjects declined to kill themselves), and using personally identifiable data obtained through legally dubious means (so dubious that California tried to pass a bill to legalize it). He has also violated privacy rules with covert surveillance.
This paper was another example of a synthetic control; an artificial “San Diego.”
To estimate the association between GVRO implementation and firearm violence in San Diego, we used the synthetic control method, a quasi-experimental comparative case study design.
This was a particularly egregious example. To the extent that synthetic controls have any value, you build one by using data from populations (other California counties, in this case) with conditions and populations similar to the variable you wish to examine, except for the variable in question. That is, when studying the effects of a red flag law on a county, you would make up an imaginary comparison county from places that don’t have a red flag law.
All California counties were subject to the same statewide red flag law.
Properly, if you want to see the effects on San Diego County of the red flag law, you simply do a temporal analysis of per capita homicides and suicides in San Diego prior to law passage and after implementation. Wintemute didn’t need a synthetic San Diego to come to a conclusion; he already had real San Diegos without a red flag law (pre-2016) and with a red flag law (post-2016). You use a synthetic control when you don’t expect real world data to support your preculsion.
For example, one year after Florida passed a red flag law, homicides and suicides went up. That was especially nasty, because for two years prior to passage both rates had been declining.
Two years after the Florida law’s passage, and homicide and suicide rates were still increasing.
[Side Note: To anyone with an operational brain, this was… a no-brainer, so to speak. You have a potentially violent –to self or others — person. You piss him off, or depress him, off by stealing his property without due process. Then you simply leave him loose on the streets. WTH did they expect to happen?!]
The violent crime trend reversed post-Red Flag, to increase.
Suicide Rate per 100,000
2013: 12.9
2014: 12.5 (down)
2015: 12.0 (down) 2016: 12.0 (no change) Red Flag Passes
2017: 12.3 (up)
2018: 12.86 (UP!)
The suicide rate trend reversed post-Red Flag, to increase.
Such a surprise. Not.
Wintemute et al went with a synthetic control — showing no effect of the Red Flag law to hide the fact that no only did it have an effect, but it appeared to make things worse.
* Sorry; I had to go with Violent Crime Rate, which includes homicides, because multiple fast searches didn’t turn up homicide rates broken out separately. There’s only so much I can do without funding.
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Yes, I’m a bit late getting this up, what can I say? How about Yom HaAtzmaut Samach? Happy Independence Day? Yes, the 5th of Iyar, this year May 5th marks a 74 year old beautiful Israel. Ok, so today is really the 5th of Iyar, but Yom HaZikaron (Memorial Day) and Yom HaAtzmaut will be moved if they are going to conflict with Shabbat.
I listened to a podcast I really enjoy from Leah Aharoni on Israel Newstalk Radio. She combines the Torah portion for the week and then views news of the week through the lens of what she covered from the Torah.
In this weeks version she covered some amazing facts about Israel,
They have been able to grow fresh dates from 6th century date seeds found at Masada.
Israel is the only country to revive dead language, Hebrew. For more on that you can read about Eliezer Ben-Yehuda
The Israeli post office has a special letters to G-d department. The letters addressed to G-d are placed in cracks in Western Wall. I guess the Israeli post office isn’t tracking their citizens on social media so they have time for meaningful activity.
They were the first country with medical clowning group, and it was the first to go into covid wards to spread cheer and encourage patients and probably staff as well.
In 2007 “Good deeds day” was started by Shari Arison in Israel, and 7,000 participated. Two years ago 4 million participated world wide.
Israel recycles 90% of waste water, it is then used for agriculture.
Leah described some kind of cool sock, it sounded like she was saying “Poolies”maybe “Pulies”? Which are socks made from recycled plastics. But I couldn’t find them to give you a link.
The cows in Israel produce more milk per cow than any other country.
Due to Bamba, a heavenly treat, like a Cheeto only made with peanuts, few children have peanut allergies. Because children begin to eat Bamba from 7-8 mo old. I’m convinced Bamba is a gift from Heaven.
The women in Israel have more children per woman than any other OECD ( Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) country. And the number of children is going up even as more women are entering into the work force and higher education.
If you want to listen to the whole excellent show, it is here
And I think this last one may explain why the globalists were so determined to use Israel as a test lab for the experimental gene therapy injections.
I guess if you’re a globalist you don’t want a group of people trying to show the world a decent moral way to live according to the directions of the creator then you’d want to cut down on the number of them. That is a bridge too far for the globalist control. They think they are G-d.
Israel was re-born 74 years ago, in the same place that G-d led us when we left behind the slavery of Egypt. But the thing about slavery is you have to remain vigilant. Just because you leave one brand of slavery behind doesn’t mean another brand won’t try to sneak in and seize control. I think that is what is happening in Israel and America right now.
The day after Israel declared Independence, she was attacked in her own little home.
“I was sitting in the car with my friend and we were eating cholent,” Dovid said. “The terrorists, carrying huge axes, came on both sides of the car. My friend threw his boiling hot cholent on one of the terrorists and he got burned and stopped in his tracks. Meanwhile, I grabbed the end of his ax and I managed to push him away. He flew three steps back. And then the second terrorist tried to hit my friend again but my friend pushed him back and they fled.”
Assault cholent/hamim? Excuse me sir, do you have a license for that assault cholent/hamim? I seem to remember another column I did where boiling cholent/hamim was used by some Yeshiva students to fight off barbaric muslims as they tried to break into the Yeshiva. It is a very sad state of affairs when your government is more worried about the criminal muslims rights being protected than the innocent cholent/hamim eating victim. To translate that from Israeli into American, the rights of Antifa over the innocent driver trying to get to work.
I think that both America and Israel are under attack from within by their own governments. Someone signed that order in Israel to force those injections. In America we know about the demented troll at the NIH and the demented puppet in the white house. But the leadership of neither country wants it’s people to live in a land whole and healthy based on the G-d’s law. And for those that have sat still on the sidelines, thinking that “It can’t get that bad, we have a Constitution and a Bill of Rights”, I guess we as a people are going to have to decide how much it matters to us. U.S. There is always work involved, but going forward we need to know, we can never let the left near the levers of power. Had the left wing General Moshe Dayan not thrown the miraculous gift of the Temple Mount back in G-d’s face after he gave it to us, Israelis would be celebrating Yom HaAtzmaut on the Temple Mount today. Because this land? It is ours.
I recently wrote elsewhere about the odd way Dims like to interpret rights, specifically abortion. Regardless of whether you’re pro-abortion of pro-life, you should find ROE v. WADE to be really bad pseudo-constitutional law.
Somehow, the 1973 Supreme Court waded through the Fourteenth Amendment — written to ensure equal rights for freed Blacks post-Civil War — and found a right to abortion. Rationally, you might have expected them to look to the Ninth Amendment.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Right there; an acknowledgement of rights not otherwise mentioned.
The SCOTUS leak strongly suggests that SCOTUS may be about ready to toss ROE v. WADE, and the Left is panicking. They’re screaming that ROE v. WADE is “settled law” and may not reviewed by SCOTUS again.
Either way, gun owners should rejoice… and consider this in terms of the Second Amendment.
It’s common for the Left to now grudgingly admit the existence of the right to keep and bears arms, But that’s just muskets, not “assault weapons,” “high capacity” magazines, or [insert Lefty bugaboo of the moment].
Scenario 1: ROE v. WADE stands.
My right to “high capacity” (i.e.- normal) magazines is protected by the 14A, just like it protects abortion.
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.
Equal protection. If any person can have standard capacity mags, so can I. Or are they going to says police and military aren’t people?
This has the added benefit of imploding lefty heads when you invoke the infamous Dred Scott decision; all free men have a right to be armed. But being terrified of armed, freed Blacks (who might hold a bit of a grudge over past slavery), they ruled against Scott’s free status.
If SCOTUS can’t revisit ROE v. WADE and toss it, Then Dred Scott — with all the nasty implications for Blacks today — should still be “settled law.”
Somehow, I doubt that will endear Dims to Black voters this Fall.
Scenario 2: ROE v. WADE overturned.
This could go two ways (or a bit of both). Pro-abortion advocates could simply turn to the states, or they could suddenly take cognizance of the Ninth Amendment and start arguing for that abortion protection. They’ll still be whining about “settled law.”
So. Do. We. My right to that pile of 30-rounders is protected by the Ninth Amendment; it’s an unenumerated right.
And hey; we can still make heads implode with the all-free-citizens-may be armed 14A/Dred Scott argument. We will be the sane people saying Blacks are free and due all the same rights, while the Left will be in the position of pissing off their voters by claiming the opposite.
The Second Amendment rights movement has suffered what I consider to be some grievous losses the last few years. We lost Brad Alpert in 2019 who’s Second Amendment activity went way back to 1966. We lost his beloved wife Jo Ann just a few weeks ago. She was a Southern Second Amendment powerhouse in her own right. They were some of the smartest people I ever met, and many a time a visit to see them would sooth my troubled heart, soul or both. Not to mention they were a great source of inspiration.
I’m not on FakeBook much at all anymore, but a quick check in showed me we lost a another stalwart on the 15th of April.
And then last night I got a phone call from an old friend, going way back to 2004. January 22nd of 2004 to be precise. I was a young(er) country gal who had traveled to the state capitol to attend a hearing for a court case against Missouri’s concealed carry law. I was going to write my first column for a grassroots Missouri Second Amendment rights group. I didn’t know anyone. I was going because I didn’t have to work that day, and I wanted to see it, and write about it. And it became what I consider to be a life shaping event. I met some amazing people that day, people I had only heard of in Second Amendment rights group meetings. People that had been instrumental in getting concealed carry passed in the state of Missouri. One of those people was John Ross, the author of Unintended Consequences. It is a big book, it combines history with his modern day story line and while I haven’t read it for a few years, in some ways I think it’s prophetic. As I recall it’s towards the beginning there is a part that takes place in the Warsaw ghetto. I was hooked. Part of it does have some pretty graphic scenes, just a warning up front. But it’s a once you read it, you’ll never forget it. I remember when it came out he, and his ex-wife were harassed by alphabet soup agencies, but the book still went on sale.
My phone call last night was from my friend Michael Meyer (who despite never getting me a Clydesdale, I still adore) telling me John had passed on. I didn’t even know he had been working on his next book. Who knows what that might have been like. Michael said everyone was in shock. I get it, I am as well. I told Michael it’s because we never expect our legends to die. I guess some people have been looking on the net for that original column I did, about meeting them all. So I’m sharing some pictures with you from that day, the lunch at Madison’s and Michael generously shared some really good pictures of John with me.
I was in the presence of Warrior Angels that day, I still aspire to become one, and to inspire others to become one as well. Because I stand on the shoulders of giants.
In the Presence of Warrior Angels
I was lucky enough to be able to attend the Missouri Supreme Court (MOSC) hearing on the 22nd of January. It was an amazing experience for us. We found out by attending the WMSA meeting the night before that we needed to be there around 10 AM, rather than the 2 PM we had planned on. There would be tickets given out to enter the hearing. So I got up bright and early so I could leave on time. If you have never had to wake up chickens to feed them, it is pretty funny.
After an uneventful journey, I arrived around 9:40 AM found a parking spot in a 2 hour parking meter lot and got all set. I knew what the building looked like from internet hunting. I had ever been to the MOSC. I went in and passed through the metal detectors. Seemed an unnecessary step to me, as there was a big sign on the door to the effect of no weapons beyond this point. All criminals will certainly obey that sign, so why both with the metal detector? Then the intrepid Marshal went through my purse, more or less. Now that is bravery! We all left our cell phones on a table along with everyone else’s. I was told we couldn’t take our camera upstairs, so I asked the Marshal if I could take a photo by the beautiful marble stairway. He said sure. I started to take the photo, and a very nice gentleman, who turned out to be John Gordon, came up and offered to take a photo. Then tongue in cheek (at least I think it was) he asked which side we were on. I told him, VERY pro. He smiled and said as long as I was on the right side and laughed. John took the photo. Afterwards we met Tom Mendenhall, both were from Columbia. There were another group of men standing around, mostly in suits, I wondered which side they were on. While we were waiting for the tickets to be given out I amused myself by trying to figure out which side folks were on according to how they dressed and acted. After a while a line formed, we asked Carl, the guard behind the desk, by this time we were on a first name basis with Carl, if we should get in line. He softly laughed and said he didn’t know why folks were forming the line, that the tickets would be given out in order of arrival, and the Marshal knew the order of the arrival. Shortly after 10 AM, out he came and proceeded to pass out tickets. As we walked outside Dennis told me he had traded tickets with the gentleman that was walking out with us, so he could sit with his friends. I asked if we were still sitting together, he said we were. The gentleman then introduced himself. Tim Oliver. I lunged across Dennis and yelped TIM OLIVER?? THE Tim Oliver? He laughed and said yes. He told us he had a table reserved at Madison’s for lunch, we should come. Now we are in a strange city, we don’t know anyone, and this nice man invites us to join his group. We asked if he was sure there would be enough room for us. He said sure. He told us where it was, so we set out to move our car and find the place. We found it. It turned out, it was across from the parking garage. We went in and began our meeting of Warrior Angels. It was the most amazing thing, we ended up having lunch with Tim Oliver, Greg Jeffery, Tom Mendenhall and John Gordon on one side of the table. On the other was Dennis, Mike Meyer, John Ross (Author of Unintended Consequences, which if you haven’t read it, wow, you should!) and C. Michael Gamble. These are men who have labored long and hard in the fight for our Second Amendment Rights. They are intelligent, informed and generous of nature. They allowed two folks from the country who were pretty much alone in the city to be a part of their group and within 5 minutes we felt at home, we were among our own kind. Then it was back to the MOSC. We were front row center, I sat next to John Gordon, who secured press packets for us. When the lawyers filed in, Tim, who sat on the other side of Dennis, told us who the players were. Bert Newman opened for the bad guys (no bias in reporting here folks!). His argument hinged on the statement in the Missouri constitution that Article 1 section 23 which stated “but this shall not justify the wearing of concealed weapons” meant that it couldn’t be done. One of the justices pointed out then it would apply to law officers, process servers and the like. Mr. Newman felt this applied only to citizens, not to law enforcement or the like which he said are “the state”. That law officers, process servers and the like have much more extensive training, regulation & requirements. There was a long discussion about rights under the first clause of Article 1 section 23, rights to promote personal security-guaranteed by the first clause, the right to defend their person or property. Mr. Newman feels that our law enforcement officials are promoting personal security by protecting the citizens of the state in a manner that is consistent with the first clause of Article 1 section 23. So as I understand that, Mr. Newman feels that our right to defend ourselves is taken care of by law enforcement officers. While I listen to this, I am remembering the part in Missouri Weapons and Self-Defense Law by K. Jamison, that the police do NOT have a duty to protect the individual, just society as a whole, and am thinking, oh, this isn’t good. Then came one of the most entertaining portions of the show. I believe it was Judge Benton, that ask Mr. Newman, so your definition of the word justify is sanction? What definition do you give us of the word justify? Faster than a speeding bullet, Mr. Newman whipped a pair of black patent tap shoes out of his briefcase and tied them on. He began to dance at a rapid speed. He started with the last phrase means accept, then went into the intent of the founders is so clear, looking back to the mischief to be remedied, spirit of the times, 1875 havoc, civil war…. The Justice re-asked the question of what justify meant, and where did he get the definition. With his feet furiously flying, Mr. Newman launched into another diatribe, included in his points, meaning of “does not justify” is a ban on concealed weapons, means can’t have. In the back of my head I am hearing this raspy voice saying “it depends on what your definition of the word is, is”…Finally after another Justice asked a time or two, Mr. Newman finally stated that the word justify meant “allow”. Mr. Newman then took off his tap shoes and Mr. Miller, the other bad guy (for simplicity in reporting) got up to present the Hancock portion of the argument. Judge Benton pointed out that the Sheriff may charge up to $100, or may not charge anything. That there may be a Sheriff that has said he will do it for free, as part of his running platform. Mr. Miller kept insisting that for judicial economy, that instead of having 114 counties come before the Supreme Court asking for relief from this unfunded mandate, it should just be ruled on now. One Justice pointed out that some counties have said they will not need any additional personnel, they already have the process in place for fingerprints, and basically, it won’t be any big deal. Obviously, this was not the Jackson County Sheriff. Mr. Miller’s point is that although the Sheriffs may charge up to $100, that the way the law is written prohibits the Sheriffs from using the money to pay for cost of processing the applications. Huh, where do these people get this stuff?
Then the mighty Paul Wilson from the Attorney General’s office (One of the good guys) came up to bat. Justice Wolf wanted to know if the money goes to the Sheriff’s fund for training, would the County be compensated for other expenses. Mr. Wilson replied that there was no way to know what other expenses there might be. He said that there is no way the legislature would draft the law, allow the Sheriffs to charge up to $100 and then say they could not use it to pay the expenses. One of the Justices asked “what if we struck the restriction to training and equipment? Then they could use the money as they see fit.” Mr. Wilson replied they could, or they could acknowledge the next section in the law which requires a sheriff to reimburse a local police chief any reasonable expenses meant that these categories were not to be exclusive to other expenses. He stated that the legislature had acted rationally in providing funds. When asked how could he say that in a county like St. Louis that it will not result in increase work load, Mr. Wilson replied they can’t, they have no way of knowing if 1 person, or 100,001 people will apply. He pointed out that the legislature will likely give a law against cross burning this year, and that will result in increased work for detectives. He asked if it was to be suggested that the law would violate the Hancock Amendment. He stated that is work they do, they capture criminals and bring them to the prosecutors. That these duties are part and parcel of what they do. Mr. Wilson stated that if a county doesn’t want to oblige someone who wants a concealed carry license, the county would raise the Hancock issue, they would have to prove, which they have not, that it is an unfunded mandate. That county would then need to come before the MOSC to be excused from complying. BUT if the court did choose to do that, it would not be preventing any other county from complying with the law.
Then it was back to Dancin’ Bert Newman for his final argument which is banning concealed carry promotes personal safety.
Mr. Miller’s final say was if they didn’t decide now on the Hancock issue (before there is any data to base a decision on mind you) that they would have to decide the issue 114 times. Just then a little Red chicken ran across the court room, something about the sky falling….I think. And with that the arguments closed.
What can I say, Mr. Brooks didn’t look too happy. It was the most amazing day, meeting these wonderful men, they truly are Warrior Angels, and to be present when history is being made!
Lunch at Madison’s
A gathering of Warrior Angels at the Missouri Supreme CourtThe late, very great John Ross
Jews. Guns. No compromise. No surrender.
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