Gun Rights – Page 56 – A Geek With Guns

Count the Anti-Gun Memes

Articles written by anti-gunners usually bore me. Instead of bringing up new arguments and solutions to the problem they perceive they continue regurgitating the same bullshit over and over again. Let’s play a game, I’m going to call it Count the Memes. The idea is simple, to count the number of anti-gun memes mentioned in an average anti-gun article. In this pose I will point out the meme, give a brief explanation about each meme when it first occurs, and keep a running score of the memes dropped in the article. The contestent today is this article titled Silencing the Guns:

That was not, however, the first bipartisan moment related to the attack on Gabby Giffords, nor would it be the last. In 2004, Congress let the assault weapons ban Bill Clinton had passed “sunset” despite overwhelming public support.

“Assault” weapon ban + 1

“Assault” weapon ban points are awarded for mentions of the “assault” weapon ban as a mechanism that would prevent crimes involved criminal uses of firearms.

Total Memes So Far
“Assault weapon ban: 1

That law limited the number of rounds of ammunition a shooter could fire before having to reload, and letting it die an untimely death allowed a mentally ill young man in Tucson to purchase a handgun with a 33-round magazine. Had the assault weapons ban remained in place, he may well have been able to shoot the congresswoman, but he would not have been able to empty his clip, killing 6 people and wounding 13 others, before being tackled to the ground.

Ignorance of gun law + 1

Ignorance of gun law points are awarded when an article incorrectly states what a law legally defined.

Total Memes So Far
“Assault weapon ban: 1
Ignorance of gun laws: 1

But on neither that national day of mourning nor on any day since has the president or the members of Congress, who are either too frightened or too corrupted by the National Rifle Association, honored Giffords or the memory of those who died in that massacre in Tucson in the most appropriate way: with a return to common sense, like reestablishing the assault weapons ban that might have saved their lives.

The evil NRA + 1.

The evil NRA points are awarded for instances where the National Rifle Association (NRA) is mentioned with some kind of clandestine power or other undue influence. This point gets awarded often as anti-gunners like to mention the NRA as some kind of powerful puppet-master that has total control over our government and people.

“Assault” weapon ban + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 2
Ignorance of gun laws: 1
The evil NRA: 1

Later in January, Representative Carolyn McCarthy and Senator Frank Lautenberg proposed legislation to outlaw high-capacity magazines; it has gone nowhere.

High capacity magazines/clips + 1

High capacity magazines/clips is awarded whenever an article mentions standard capacity magazines. The award contains the verbiage magazines/clips because most anti-gunners are too stupid to realize there is a difference between the two.

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 2
Ignorance of gun laws: 1
The evil NRA: 1
High capacity magazines/clips: 1

The first President Bush, unlike his swaggering son (who advocated the demise of a ban on assault weapons whose sole purpose is to hunt humans) showed political courage by publicly quitting the N.R.A. in disgust in 1995 when it began advocating ideas like its contention that citizens need military-style assault weapons to protect themselves against our own government (members, for example, of the National Guard).

Insurrectionist + 1

Insurrectionist points are awarded whenever an article mentions militias, insurrectionists, or other anti-government individuals or groups in a manner meant to strike fear into readers.

“Assault” weapon ban + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 1
The evil NRA: 1
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1

One of them, of course, is Florida’s “stand your ground” law, which discourages de-escalation of potential firefights in public with predictable results, like the shooting death in Sanford, Fla., of Trayvon Martin.

Ignorance of gun laws + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 1
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1

If an assassination attempt on one of their own did not move members of Congress to ask whether the N.R.A. has a little too much sway in their chambers, a few dead and wounded teenagers, medical patients, and their family members were not going to unlock their safeties.

The evil NRA + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 2
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1

Most have clearly made the risk assessment that they have more to fear from the N.R.A. than they do from an occasional sniper.

The evil NRA + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 3
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1

In the 2010 election cycle, the N.R.A. spent over $7 million in independent expenditure campaigns for and against specific candidates, and it has a remarkable record of success at taking out candidates and elected officials with the misfortune of being caught in its crosshairs.

The evil NRA + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 4
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1

Last year alone guns killed or wounded another 100,000 Americans; roughly 30,000 of them died.

Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides + 1

Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides points are awarded whenever an article mentions statistics involving firearm related incidents without differentiation between the number of suicides, accidents, self-defense cases, and homicides. Anti-gunners purposely avoid differentiation to make their case look stronger by using artificially inflated numbers.

We don’t know exactly how many have been killed in the fighting in Libya, Egypt and Syria, but our elected officials have had far less trouble calling for the ouster of Middle Eastern leaders than the leadership of the N.R.A.

The evil NRA + 1

In contrast, everyone but the lunatic fringe in America supports gun safety laws — such as eliminating the gun-show loophole that allows the sale of military-grade weapons without background checks, and has led to the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans as well as Mexicans, whose drug cartels find the loophole extremely helpful.

Demonizing gun owners + 1

Demonizing gun owners points are awarded whenever an article attempts to demonize gun owners in a general sense. Usually this is done by stating gun owners are uncivilized rednecks from or by questioning the size of a gun owner’s penis.

Gun-show loophole + 1

Gun-show loophole points area awarded whenever an article makes mentioned of the fictional gun-show loophole. When anti-gunners state gun-show loopholes they really mean the legal ability of two individuals to perform trade between one another without government involvement.

Military-style weapons + 1

Military-style weapons points are awarded whenever an article arbitrarily states a firearm is military in nature. This award is based on ignorance as bolt-action rifles are based on military weaponry but generally never mentioned as such.

Background checks + 1

Background checks ponts are awarded whenever an article makes references to background checks. Statements regarding background checks are usually made in an attempt to make gun owners seem unreasonable. That is to say most people accept background checks as a good thing and therefore people opposing background checks are seen as ignorant, extremist, or simply evil. It’s related to the demonizing gun owners category although happens with enough frequency to merit its own category.

Ignorance of gun-related events + 1

Ignorance of gun-related events is awarded whenever an article makes a statement regarding a gun-related event without actually knowing what happened. In the case of Mexican drug cartels getting firearms, they were given those guns by the United States government through a smuggling operation called Fast and Furious, not a loophole in any existing firearm law.

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 4
High capacity magazines/clips: 1
Insurrectionist: 1
Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides: 1
Demonizing gun owners: 1
Gun-show loophole: 1
Military-style weapons: 1
Background checks: 1
Ignorance of gun-related events: 1

In national testing, we’ve found that a simple, non-equivocating statement focusing on that point of intersection — law-abiding — beats the toughest “they want to take away your guns” message we can fire at it. It leads every demographic group other than those who stockpile weapons to support common-sense gun safety laws.

Special side note: it’s interesting to see an article admit that anti-gunners use the manipulation of language to persuade people to support gun control. Usually they aren’t so brazen as to outright state such a fact.

Offered a message that speaks to their ambivalence, people readily recognize that a 33-round clip makes it virtually impossible to tackle a shooter until he has had time to kill 15 or 16 people.

High capacity magazines/clips + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 4
High capacity magazines/clips: 2
Insurrectionist: 1
Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides: 1
Demonizing gun owners: 1
Gun-show loophole: 1
Military-style weapons: 1
Background checks: 1
Ignorance of gun-related events: 1

hey understand that allowing people to purchase military-style weapons at gun shows without a background check renders gun safety laws meaningless.

Military-style weapons + 1
Gun-show loophole + 1
Background checks + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 4
High capacity magazines/clips: 2
Insurrectionist: 1
Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides: 1
Demonizing gun owners: 1
Gun-show loophole: 2
Military-style weapons: 2
Background checks: 2
Ignorance of gun-related events: 1

Beginning with a statement of principle both makes clear the speaker’s intent and inoculates against all the slippery-slope arguments used by the N.R.A. and the elected officials in its employ or fearful of its power: “My view on guns reflects one simple principle: that our gun laws should guarantee the rights and freedoms of all law-abiding Americans. That’s why I stand with the majority who believe in the right of law-abiding citizens to own guns to hunt or protect their families. And that’s why I stand with the majority who believe they have the right to send their kids to school and see them return home safely at night.”

The evil NRA + 1

Total Memes So Far
“Assault” weapon ban: 3
Ignorance of gun laws: 2
The evil NRA: 5
High capacity magazines/clips: 2
Insurrectionist: 1
Not differentiating between suicides, accidents, self-defense, and homicides: 1
Demonizing gun owners: 1
Gun-show loophole: 2
Military-style weapons: 2
Background checks: 2
Ignorance of gun-related events: 1

This shouldn’t be an issue of left or right. Grocery stores in Tucson, where Gabby Giffords was shot (and where my mother-in-law shops — she just happened to be out of town that Saturday), are not hotbeds of “socialism.” I don’t know the party affiliations of the fallen teenagers in Chardon or the staff members, patients or families in Pittsburgh, but I suspect they ranged across the political spectrum.

Pretending to relate to a gun-related event + 1

Pretending to relate to a gun-related event points are awarded whenever an article author tries to tie themselves with a gun-related event in an attempt to generate sympathy from readers. It usually involves a mention of the author’s mother’s friend’s uncle’s cousin’s former roommate living within 100 miles of where the gun-related event occurred.

In the end this article composed of 14 paragraphs had 23 memes with zero citations to backup any made claims. Overall I feel the meme score for this article was fairly average. In the future I would advise the author to work harder to get insurrectionist points and pretending to relate to a gun-related event points. Focusing on the evil NRA points is common and makes it difficult to distinguish one article from another.

Unfortunately the predictability of anti-gun articles make them a bore to read. All I do anymore is count the memes as they never contain original material, research, or information. As you can see the meme counts can get pretty high in short articles meaning this would make a very harsh drinking game. Now that I think about it I believe I’ll begin writing drinking game rules for this.

New Yorks’ War on the Poor Continues

First the city of New York banned donating food to the poor:

Outlawed are food donations to homeless shelters because the city can’t assess their salt, fat and fiber content, reports CBS 2’s Marcia Kramer.

Glenn Richter arrived at a West Side synagogue on Monday to collect surplus bagels — fresh nutritious bagels — to donate to the poor. However, under a new edict from Bloomberg’s food police he can no longer donate the food to city homeless shelters.

Now a New York court has rule that a $340 fee to obtain a permit to carry is perfectly fine:

A New York judge says it’s Constitutional for the city to charge an application fee for a handgun permit.

Federal Judge John Koeltl (KOH’-tuhl) Monday rejected a lawsuit brought by guns rights advocates including the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association and the Second Amendment Foundation. They sued last year, saying a $340 handgun license fee every three years is unconstitutional because it burdens a basic right.

The judge says there’s no evidence the fee has stopped anyone from exercising their rights. He says the city showed the fee helps cover administrative costs.

From the evidence I have at hand it appears as though New York wants all the poor people to go somewhere else. What does that city have against those with little means? Are they just not valuable because they can’t make major campaign contributions to Bloomberg’s reelection campaign? Do city officials think they’ll reduce crime by making life more miserable for the poor? After all somebody who doesn’t have the means to purchase food or legal permission to defend themselves obviously has the means to move out of the city right? It’s not like moving costs money or anything, you just rent a U-Haul… wait that’s not free.

Either way it’s becoming obvious that New York is becoming more hostile towards the downtrodden every day. I wonder when they’ll start rounding up people who make less than an arbitrarily selected amount of money every year and place them in designated ghettos.

Obviously Gun Sales are Down

Paul “Gun Sales are Down” Helmke has been trying to convince people that, well, gun sales in the United States are down:

Washington, D.C. — At the NRA’s national convention in Pittsburgh this week, look for the speakers, presidential hopefuls and ardent supporters to rally around the fairy tale that America is a gun-loving country. But don’t believe it.

Gun ownership in the nation is at the lowest level ever recorded by the General Social Survey, according to an analysis issued Tuesday by the Violence Policy Center. The National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago has been surveying the American public on gun ownership since the early 1970s. Far from representing the mainstream sentiment of Americans, the NRA’s gun-in-every-home-and-hollow mantra is resonating with fewer and fewer of us.

Apparently nobody told Ruger:

Gun shop owners around the nation told FoxNews.com that sales, brisk ever since President Obama was elected, have spiked upward in recent months. And manufacturers are having so much trouble keeping up with the demand that one, Sturm, Ruger & Co., can’t keep up with demand. The Southport, Conn.-based company has had to suspend new orders after taking orders for more than 1 million guns in the first three months of the year. Smith & Wesson sales are way up, as well.

I wonder what else differs between reality and the anti-gunner’s fantasy land. We already know in anti-gunner fantasy land everybody with a gun is a murderer, gun sales continue to decline, and a militia lurks around every corner, but I wonder if basic things like gravity, thermodynamics, and the general theory of relativity exist there.

The ATF Let Main Gunwalker Suspect Walk

Fast and Furious is the gift that keeps on giving. Not only did the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) arm Mexican drug cartels, only did a border patrol agent get murdered by one of those guns, but the ATF even arrested one of the main suspects they were supposedly looking for and let him go:

The prime suspect in the botched gun trafficking investigation known as “Fast and Furious” — Manuel Acosta — was taken into custody and might have been stopped from trafficking weapons to Mexico’s killer drug cartel early on. But the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) let him go, according to new documents obtained by CBS News.

An ATF “Report of Investigation” obtained by CBS News shows Border Patrol agents stopped Acosta’s truck on May 29, 2010. Inspectors said they found illegal materials including an “AK type, high capacity drum magazine loaded with 74 rounds of 7.62 ammunition underneath the spare tire.” They also noted ledgers including a “list of firearms such as an AR15 short and a Bushmaster” and a “reference about money given to ‘killer.'”

A copy of the report can be found here [PDF]. Let me just start by saying the ATF obviously does some stellar work. I guess when you set up an operation to advance gun control in the United States the last thing you want to do is actually stop the gun running.

The Fast and Furious rabbit hole gets deeper and deeper with each passing day. While I’m generally not one to attribute malice when stupidity and incompetence can explain a scenario, the case of Fast and Furious is looking more like purposeful action on behalf of the ATF than pure bureaucratic incompetence. The very fact that evidence exists showing Fast and Furious was about gun control and that the ATF had, but set free, one of the primary gun smugglers seems like an awfully large coincidence. Of course I will close by stating my cynicism which does make me bias.

Speaking of Gun Control

If you thought the guy in France was entirely unaware of gun control laws then you’ve seen nothing, apparently quite a few people are unaware of Chicago’s strict gun control laws:

Five people were killed and at least 12 other people wounded in shootings Saturday night and Sunday morning across the city.

[…]

Police have impounded the car and found a gun that may have been used in the shootings.

The evening attacks follow the fatal shooting of a 6-year-old girl and the wounding of four other people in Chicago within an hour Saturday afternoon, and 16 shootings, including the slaying of a 42-year-old man, overnight Friday and early Saturday morning.

You know things are bad when the story says “In other shootings:” instead of “In other news.” Chicago is basically the anti-gunner’s idea of paradise, a land where almost no firearm is legal to possess. If the gun control advocates were correct you would think Chicago would enjoy a dramatically lower number of shootings than other areas in the country but quite the opposite is true. Yet states that have enacted laws that make it easier (or in some cases possible at all) for citizens to legally arm themselves the changes in violent crime rates have been neutral to positive. In other words more guns doesn’t seem to lead to more crime but less guns certainly isn’t looking good on the violent crime rate maps.

From the Land of Gun Control

One of the failures of gun control is that many people are unaware of the laws put into place that prohibit the possession of firearms:

One of the biggest manhunts in recent French history is under way after four people were shot dead at a Jewish school in Toulouse.

Police have linked the attack to two shootings last week in which three soldiers of North African descent died.

The same gun and the same stolen scooter were used in all three attacks, sources close to the investigation say.

According to the anti-gunners banning firearms will prevent violent crimes such as the ones mentioned above. The story states that the attacker has two handguns in his possession:

A 17-year-old boy was seriously hurt. Initially, the killer used a 9mm gun, but when it jammed, he switched to a .45 calibre weapon.

According to French firearm laws:

Firearms there are divided into different classes, numbered 1,4,5,6,7 and 8.

[…]

The fourth category comprises what are called defence firearms, and includes any revolver and pistol, centrefire or rimfire, of a non-military calibre, short rifles having a total length of less than 80cm or a barrel length of less than 45cm, semi-automatic rifles with more than three shots capacity, repeater rifles with a magazine capacity of more than ten shots, riot guns with over five-shot capacity, semi-automatic or repeating military lookalikes, and disguised arms such as pen guns.

[…]

Another important fact should be noted. In France, on a firearm certificate renewable each five years, the private citizen is allowed to have one fourth category handgun with fifty cartridges for home defence, pursuant to a police background check. This can be in any non-military calibre from .22 to .44 Magnum. The handgun cannot be moved outside the house. Sometimes a second handgun is allowed for a secondary house.

It seems the attacker is either entirely ignorant of the fact that it’s illegal for him to possess two handguns and any handgun that is of a military caliber. The 9mm is considered a military caliber under French laws and I’m guessing the .45 is as well (although I’m not entirely sure as France hasn’t issued any firearms in .45 that I’m aware of). So either the anti-gunners are full of shit and prohibitions against owning firearms doesn’t deter criminals or criminals are simply unaware of the fact that they’re breaking gun control laws. Either way gun control doesn’t work and trying to further it is foolhardy at best.

Eric Holder Advocated Brainwashing Americans to Make Them Think Negatively About Firearms

Eric “let’s give guns to the violent Mexican drug cartels and use it to justify more gun control in America” Holder has a long history of lies, slander, and generally opposing the right of people to keep and bear arms. It turns out Holder was advocating the brainwashing of Americans to make them think negatively about firearms:

Breitbart.com has uncovered video from 1995 of then-U.S. Attorney Eric Holder announcing a public campaign to “really brainwash people into thinking about guns in a vastly different way.”
Holder was addressing the Woman’s National Democratic Club. In his remarks, broadcast by CSPAN 2, he explained that he intended to use anti-smoking campaigns as his model to “change the hearts and minds of people in Washington, DC” about guns.

“What we need to do is change the way in which people think about guns, especially young people, and make it something that’s not cool, that it’s not acceptable, it’s not hip to carry a gun anymore, in the way in which we changed our attitudes about cigarettes.”

Holder added that he had asked advertising agencies in the nation’s capital to assist by making anti-gun ads rather than commercials “that make me buy things that I don’t really need.” He had also approached local newspapers and television stations, he said, asking them to devote prime space and time, respectively, to his anti-gun campaign.

Don’t just take Breitbart’s word for it, they also provided the video of Holder saying these things.

Holder has been a gun control fanatic for ages and it’s not surprising that he was entirely complacent with Operation Fast and Furious. His desire to push the gun control agenda ended with people being murdered by guns given to violent Mexican drug cartels by the United States government. The state will go to any length it can get away with to disarm the populace. After all a disarmed populace is a far more easy populace to bring tyranny upon.

The State Won’t Protect You but They May Apologize

The rampage in Norway last year that left 77 people dead demonstrated the need for the right to carry a firearm for self-defense. Police took over an hour to respond and during that time people at the Labor Party youth camp were entirely helpless because Norway doesn’t allow its citizens the right to self-defense. 77 people may be dead, and the police may have taken over an hour to actually get off their asses and do their job, but people of Norway can taken solace in the fact that the police are apologized:

Norwegian police have admitted for the first time that they could have responded faster to a massacre at a youth camp last July.

Anders Behring Breivik opened fire on young activists gathered on Utoeya island last summer, killing 69 people.

The police, distracted by a bomb Breivik had set off in Oslo and hampered by technical failures, arrived an hour after his killing spree began.

State Police Director Oystein Maeland apologised on behalf of the police.

“Every minute was one minute too long,” he said.

“It is a burden to know that lives could have been saved if the gunman had been arrested earlier.”

Lives could also have been saved had one or more people at the youth camp been armed. When seconds matter the police are only an hour away.

That Sounds Familiar

We’re going to play a game, it’s call guess what device I’m talking about. This device, at one time and possibly still today, required a buyer to get permission from the police to buy, required a fingerprint of the device be submitted to the police if the purchase was approved, had to be surrendered to the police if the previous permission is revoked, couldn’t be purchased by convicted criminals, and the police were to be notified within 24 hours of the device being lost or stolen. What do you think the device is?

If you guessed a firearm you’re incorrect. The correct answer is a typewriter:

Romanians now must seek police permission for owning a potentially dangerous weapon — the typewriter.

[…]

Under new procedures:
–Typewriter owners must submit written applications to police for permission to keep or buy a machine, then wait for an answer.
–If the application is approved, the owner must submit a type sample of numbers and letters for registration with authorities.
–If the license is withdrawn, owners must sell their machines within 10 days to a state-run shop. Private sale is forbidden, but the owner is allowed on appeal.
–Typewriters will be denied to people who have a criminal record or pose “a danger to the public order or state security.”
–Police must be notified within 24 hours of the loss or theft of a typewriter, and their rental or use outside the registered owner’s home is forbidden.
–Penalty for failure to comply with the law is $240 and confiscation of offenders’ typewriters.

This was printed in The Telegraph on April 30^th, 1983. Reading through it I was able to check every single bullet point off when I replaced the word ‘typewriter’ with ‘firearm’ and applied the list to what gun control advocates have been demanding. It seems obvious to me that the gun control crowd has been pilfering communist regimes for ideas on laws that they should push regarding firearm control.

Just like communist regimes of the past, current advocates of controlling tools desire power. The communists hoped to oppress all criticism by making it illegal to criticize communist and controlling means of producing written material. Gun control advocates hope to cement the state’s power to rule over our lives by disarming the people. Deep down inside gun control advocates fear individual liberty and demand the state be allowed to control the lives of every man, woman, and child. In the state’s absolute control the gun control advocates can absolve themselves of responsibility for their personal defense by gaining a scapegoat, an entity to blame, when they are subjected to crimes of violence. Instead of saying “I fought and lost” they want to say “The police never arrive, I couldn’t do anything, it’s not my fault, the police were supposed to protect me.”

The gun control advocates’ willingness to surrender all of our rights to comfort themselves is the thing I find most disgusting about them.

Maryland’s May Issue Carry Permit Process Ruled Unconstitutional

The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and Alan Gura won another court victory, this time in Maryland:

BELLEVUE, WA – A federal court ruling in Maryland, that the Second Amendment right to bear arms extends beyond the home and that citizens may not be required to offer a “good and substantial reason” for obtaining a concealed carry permit, is a huge victory, the Second Amendment Foundation said today.

Ruling in the case of Woollard v. Sheridan – a case brought by SAF in July 2010 on behalf of Maryland resident Raymond Woollard, who was denied his carry permit renewal – the U.S. District Court for Maryland ruled that “The Court finds that the right to bear arms is not limited to the home.”

The ruling can be found here [PDF]:

IV. CONCLUSION

The Court finds that Maryland‘s requirement of a “good and substantial reason” for issuance of a handgun permit is insufficiently tailored to the State‘s interest in public safety and crime prevention. The law impermissibly infringes the right to keep and bear arms, guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The Court will, by separate Order of even date, GRANT Woollard‘s Motion for Summary Judgment and DENY Defendants‘ Motion for Summary Judgment.

You know who’s a sad panda? The Brady Campaign [PDF] (I grabbed a copy of their case docket just in case they decide to toss this one down the memory hole). Apparently they had a vested interest in this case (page 70):

Woollard v. Sheridan (U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland)

The Brady Center is assisting the State of Maryland in this case, brought by the Second Amendment Foundation and Raymond Woollard, challenging the validity of Maryland’s handgun permit process. The named defendants include the Secretary and Superintendent of the Maryland State Police, Terrence Sheridan, and three members of Maryland’s Handgun Permit Review Board.

To qualify for a handgun carry permit in Maryland, an applicant must establish that he or she is an adult; has not been convicted of a felony or misdemeanor for which a term of over 1 year imprisonment has been imposed; has not been convicted of drug crimes; is not an alcoholic or drug addict; and has not exhibited a propensity for violence or instability that may render the applicant’s possession of a handgun dangerous. Additionally, the Superintendent of the State must determine that the applicant “has good and substantial reason to wear, carry, or transport a handgun, such as a finding that the permit is necessary as a reasonable precaution against apprehended danger.”

Plaintiffs contend that the State cannot require handgun permit applicants to prove the above, as it deals with “the exercise of fundamental constitutional rights, including the right to keep and bear arms.” They allege this violates the Second and Fourteenth Amendments. Plaintiffs are asking for permanent injunctive relief against the enforcement of the provisions regulating handgun permits.

On March 22, 2011, the Brady Center filed an amicus brief in the case arguing for dismissal of the lawsuit.

Too bad, so sad. SAF is proving to be the unstoppable behemoth of the litigation world and Alan Gura is their super weapon. I wonder how the Brady Campaign feels right now knowing they have been entirely ineffective at stopping those of us who believe in the right to keep and bear arms from advancing.

Either way this ruling is big. It not only abolishes Maryland’s ability to issue permits on a willy nilly basis but also sets a precedence, which will allow people in other “may issue” states to challenge such barriers between their right to carry a means of self-defense. I wonder who the next violator of the Second Amendment will be to fall before the might of SAF.