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Terry’s Tidbits

Terry Gray

In my email from Wave 3 News:

Disregard Previous Breaking News.

The Cano Affair

          The Illegal alien mother of the slain four year old in Louisville wants to bury her son in Guatemala and then return here.  She has had a warrant out for her arrest and deportation for eleven years.

          LMPD White has signed paperwork stating that Ms. Cano is important to the murder investigation and that she should be allowed to return to the U.S.  What is the importance of Cano’s presence in this investigation?  She saw nothing and knows nothing about her son’s disappearance and subsequent murder.  Her help is not needed.

          Ms. Cano stated that she no longer trusts this country with her well being.  I say that is all the more reason to stay in Guatemala.  The bigger reason to stay is that she is not supposed to be here.  Yes, her son’s death was a tragedy, but how does that affect her status in this country?  She is here illegally, and returning to Guatemala should not be her option.  Neither should coming back to the U.S.

          Mainstream media brought in psychologists familiar with Guatemalan culture to explain why the boy was roaming the streets alone.  It was explained that in Guatemala, the community looks after the kids.  Ms. Cano has been here for eleven years and her son was born here.  She had plenty of time to learn our country and our culture.  She didn’t, and her son is dead.  Our communities don’t raise all the kids in the community.  Parents are responsible for their children.  This is but one reason, a very small reason, why “immigrants” must assimilate.  They must adjust to our way of life and not consider themselves as mere guests.  Cano is neither an immigrant nor guest.  She is an illegal invader.

          I don’t remember hearing where she works, but I’m assuming it was Churchill Downs.  Why isn’t Churchill being investigated for employing an illegal alien?  This has never been brought up.  I think it is important.  How many illegals are employed at Churchill Downs, and why isn’t it being investigated?  If she wasn’t employed at Churchill Downs, where was she employed and why aren’t they being investigated?

          The whole idea of Cano freely traveling to Guatemala and then freely returning to the U.S. is ludicrous.   What is going through the minds of our officials?  If she must return to the U.S. as part of the investigation, she should be placed under house arrest until the investigation is over and then deported. 

D.C. Gun Ban

          This is one of the most important second amendment decisions of the past fifty years.  It could pave the way for our second amendment right to keep and bear arms to take its place along side the other amendments in the Bill of Rights.  The second amendment has been a stepchild next to the other nine amendments, and it may now get its full status as an inalienable right.

          In 1976, Washington D.C. enacted a ban on handguns in the district.  Rifles and shotguns, not part of the ban, had to be kept unloaded and disassembled.  (Wait Mr. Home Invader, I have to assemble and load my gun.  Can you come back in a few minutes?)  Exempted from the handgun ban were police officers, guards, and those who had registered their handguns previous to the ban.

          Several law suits over the ensuing years since 1976 were defeated or thrown out of court without being heard.  It seemed that the D.C. handgun ban was here to stay.

          The suit that finally brought the D.C. gun ban to the front burner was Parker v. District of Columbia.  However, in March 2004, U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan dismissed the Parker case.  This wasn’t the end of Parker however.

          In March of this year the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit overturned the Parker case saying that the at least one of the plaintiffs was legally able to bring suit because he had applied for a hand gun registration and was denied.  In the past, attempts to overturn the ban had been fueled by those who had been charged with breaking the law.  The courts refused to consider repealing the law simply because they viewed the attempts as methods of defense for those having ignored the law.  Parker was different however.  It wasn’t a criminal bringing suit.

The D.C. Circuit has four criteria to consider when looking at the case and the law.

1.     If the plaintiffs had a legal standing to challenge the law.

2.     If they did have standing, did the second amendment protect their rights as individuals?

3.     If the second amendment did protect individual rights, did it apply to D.C.?

4.     If D.C.’s laws violated the second amendment guarantee of the right to bear arms. ^1.

Criterion one had already been established by overturning Parker v. District of

Columbia.

          Criterion two was and is the mother lode of decisions.  This is the decision that could once and for all establish that the second amendment pertains to individuals and not government-sponsored militias, opening the way for more pro-gun legislation and the repeal of many anti-gun laws.

          The D.C. Circuit used common sense in this decision, much to the chagrin of D.C.’s attorneys.  The court found that because the other provisions of the Bill of Rights protect individuals, “…the Second Amendment would be an inexplicable aberration if it were not read to protect individual rights as well.”  The courts also encouraged a much ignored reasoning behind our Bill of Rights when it said the right to arms also, “…was not created by government, but rather preserved by it.”  They understand the term “inalienable.”

          In arguing that the second amendment pertained to weapons of the past and not the weapons of today, D.C.’s attorneys made a fatal mistake.  The common sense of the Circuit’s panel prevailed when comparing the second amendment with the first amendment.  As the first amendment, when written, protected printing presses it also protects the communications of today – like email and telephones.

          D.C. argued “possess and carry” pertained to state maintenance of militias.  The D.C. Circuit called the argument “outlandish”.  The court stated that “keeping” arms clearly “implies ownership or possession of a functioning weapon by an individual for private use”. ^1.

          D.C. Circuit Judge Karen Henderson dissented.  She stated that the District of Columbia was not a state and therefore the Bill of Rights did not apply.  However, it was established long ago that those citizens residing in the District were protected by the Bill of Rights.  The majority on the D.C. Circuit argued that the Bill of Rights did not protect citizens by state but rather the whole country.  The District of Columbia has long demanded to be treated as a state in every way, when it is beneficial and convenient for them.  Obviously this was not one of the times when they considered it convenient or beneficial.

          With all four criteria satisfied, the court ruled for the plaintiff, thereby repealing the handgun ban.  This decision is only the decision of a federal court.  It is likely, and I hope it happens, that it goes to the Supreme Court.  If the Supreme Court sides with the D.C. Circuit, then it will once and for all be established that the second amendment pertains to individuals and not government established militias.  When this happens, laws like the Lautenberg Gun Ban will likely be challenged and repealed.

          The likelihood that the ruling will go to the Supreme Court is good.  D.C.’s Mayor Adrian Fenty intends to fight the ruling and the only avenue he has is the Supreme Court.  Fenty said that the decision “flies in the face of laws that have helped decrease gun violence” in the city.  The Mayor is obviously blinded by his liberalism.  The city’s gun violence had been on the decrease since before the D.C. gun ban.  Since the ban, gun violence in the city has tripled.  D.C. has consistently been in the highest of any major U.S. city.

          The Brady Campaign called the repeal “judicial activism at its worst.”  The Violence Policy Center screamed that the decision “may mark the beginning of a long, national nightmare from which we will never recover as a nation.” ^1.

                Let me explain a nightmare.  A nightmare is when an armed home invasion takes place and a family is killed because they have no means of protecting themselves.  A nightmare is when a woman is raped and killed in a parking lot because some liberal group says she doesn’t have the right to carry a weapon for self protection.  A nightmare is the government growing too big for its britches and the general population having no recourse to taking our country back.  A nightmare is genocide of millions of innocent citizens, a scenario supported by historic fact.  Genocide after disarming a society often happens, and the disarmament is often part of the genocide plan.

          The second amendment guarantees us the right to self-protection by means of keeping and bearing arms.  When we lose that right, we are at the mercy of the government and those who will do us harm.  Losing that right in the face of a government turned bad is not only tantamount to losing all of our other rights, it is tantamount to losing our lives.

^1.  Cox, C. W. (2007, May). Landmark Decision: Federal Appeals Court Strikes Down District of Columbia Handgun Ban. American Hunter, [35(5)], 14-16.

So what is the Lautenberg Gun Ban?

It is the most insidious gun grab in American History.  It disarms for life anyone convicted of domestic violence, and domestic violence takes many forms.  It was passed in 1996 as an amendment to Omnibus Consolidated Appropriation Act of 1997.  The amendment was mostly unread by Senators and Congressmen and those who did read it were coerced into signing it and did so out of fear of losing appropriations for their states.  It should have never been hidden inside of an appropriations bill that was sure to pass.

          Not only is the Lautenberg Gun Ban for life; it is retroactive.  If you smacked your husband or wife in 1930, as of 1996 you can no longer own a gun.  If you yelled at your son in 1995 you can no longer own a gun.  Domestic Violence is a misdemeanor.  One doesn’t have to use a gun in a domestic violence charge in order to be banned from owning a gun after conviction.

          A person convicted of fighting with a neighbor can still own a gun.  A person convicted of threatening a stranger with a gun or knife can still own a gun.  No misdemeanor in American law bans those convicted of breaking it from owning a gun - except Lautenberg.  If convicted of domestic violence with a knife, the person convicted can still own a knife.  A person convicted of DUI manslaughter may, after serving his sentence, once again be allowed to drive.  Child molesters are not subject to losing their rights or receiving punishments retroactively.  Lautenberg is the only misdemeanor conviction that removes the right of a person to keep and bear arms – retroactively and forever.

          Let’s hope that repealing the D.C. Handgun Ban will open the door for fair legislation when it comes to the second amendment rights of Americans.      

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