It is often said that “guns don't kill people. People kill people.” The same can be said of grenades, pipe bombs, arsenic-laced Wheaties, and the Rubik's Cube, all of which should be made legal and widely available right away.
Keep that in mind as you try to understand the shameless hypocrisy oozing out of Washington before and after the Supreme Court's recent decision to obliterate the District of Columbia's ban against hand guns.
For years, lower courts told us the Second Amendment guaranteed we could possess guns “in a well-regulated militia.” The fact that we no longer rely on militia for our national defense seemed to make the amendment obsolete (just like the Third Amendment, which says you can't be forced to allow the Second New Jersey Regiment to crash in your living room, even if they don't have a Designated Driver).
Conservatives tend to want to read the framers' intentions exactly as written (think of the last time a Republican reminded you that the phrase “separation of church and state” does not appear in the constitution). Except in Amendment number two, that is. They'd like to conveniently spill some white-out on that whole militia phrase.
Meanwhile, Liberals have generally insisted on interpreting the the constitution more actively (see abortion, free speech, and everything else), but suddenly become sticklers for precise wording and original intent when the topic turns to gun control.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: demented turkeys have hijacked our dominant political ideologies.
For now, Justices Scalia, Roberts, Thomas, Kennedy, and Alito are telling us the constitution needs to roll with the times. I hope they stay in that mood when and if they have to rule on the Patriot Act (see Amendment #4).
So what does this unprecedented boost to the Second Amendment mean for you and me?
Well, for one thing, I can still shoot you, but all the laws that might have prevented me from doing it hastily, accidentally, or with a semi-automatic rifle of some sort are now on shaky ground.
In fact, all laws governing weaponry are at risk. Don't be surprised if I park a tank next door, point the turret in the direction of your house, and set up a lawn chair on top so I can stare and laugh for a few hours. Nothing illegal about that.
(Special note to the paranoid: I'm not actually talking about YOU, just the general “you.” Please put away the Uzi. Thank you.)
Meanwhile, if you live in a ghetto (you don't, but let's pretend for a minute), your life won't change at all. The D.C. handgun law didn't do much to prevent Our Nation's Capital from leading the world in per-capita murders for the last 30 years or so. It's no secret that gun laws are enforced about as well as the speed limit. You can thank NRA lobbyists for that.
Still, shouldn't our laws reflect the kind of society we're trying to live in? I'll always remember the words of the late Molly Ivins: “I remain pro-knife. You have to catch someone in order to stab him. Knives don't ricochet, and people are seldom killed while cleaning their knives. A better deal.”
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
Friday, July 4, 2008
Liberty? Just Us.
I am very thankful to live in New England, where we remain connected to our historical values of individual freedom. We are therefore not likely to let our government fine someone for having an inadequate lawn.
That's what happened to Anne Hartridge of Sacramento, California. Because a neighbor complained that Hartridge's lawn wasn't green enough, she now owes the city $746.
In the immortal words of Dave Barry, I am Not Making This Up.
It's all straight from the July 2 Sacramento Bee. The newspaper notes that Hartridge said she decided to stop watering her lawn after the governor declared a statewide drought. It seemed like a sensible decision at the time.
But a city ordinance requires front yards to be “irrigated, landscaped, and maintained.”
I can't imagine living in a place where people care that much about their surrounding aesthetics. Do you realize there are neighborhoods in this country that you can't live in unless you agree to keep your house painted a certain color?
There are even places where you can't even allow your inner artist to craft a decent exhibit of old cars on blocks, partially obscured by weeds, (admission: one hubcap) without some snooty bozo complaining.
I'd like to write to Ms. Hartridge and invite her to come live on my street. I piled a bunch of firewood on my lawn for a couple of months, creating a giant dead hole in the grass right next to my driveway. Nobody breathed a word.
Likewise, when a passing dump truck inadvertently carved a couple of ruts in my yard, I shrugged it off.
And when I set up that nude fortune-telling booth and lemonade stand on my front porch, the police issued only a half-hearted warning.
Ah, Maine. The Way Life Should Be, where the Code Enforcement Officer only works one day a week because the rest of the time he is the Fire Chief, Assessor, First Selectman, town Librarian, Second Selectman, and Public Works Director.
We're not like New Mexico, for example, where an appeals court recently refused to let a man change his name.
It was a simple, harmless request. The new name would have been “F--- Censorship.”
The judge said the name was “obscene, offensive and would not comport with common decency,” reports The Associated Press.
Whatever. For now, the man will have to live with his current name, which is Variable. Before he got his name changed to Variable, it was Snaphappy Fishsuit Mokiligon.
I have no choice but to reiterate -- I Am Still Not Making This Up.
Thankfully, in Maine, we pretty much let people do whatever they want, as long as they're not Native American.
Are you an out-of-state corporation that wants to build a giant, gaudy casino on the banks of the Penobscot? Go right ahead.
Are you a tribe that wants to install some slot machines on your own little reservation? Uh, not so fast.
So the Passamaquoddies and the Penobscots get the shaft, but the rest of
us enjoy copious personal liberties, unless we want to buy beer or cigarettes, in which case we will have to sacrifice half our weekly income after the new taxes are enacted.
So the next time you get ready to host a raging party and play heavy metal hair band music loud enough to crack foundations in the next county over, take a few moments to appreciate the fact that you live in a place where you don't have to conform to your neighbor's warped sense of decency and good taste.
That's what happened to Anne Hartridge of Sacramento, California. Because a neighbor complained that Hartridge's lawn wasn't green enough, she now owes the city $746.
In the immortal words of Dave Barry, I am Not Making This Up.
It's all straight from the July 2 Sacramento Bee. The newspaper notes that Hartridge said she decided to stop watering her lawn after the governor declared a statewide drought. It seemed like a sensible decision at the time.
But a city ordinance requires front yards to be “irrigated, landscaped, and maintained.”
I can't imagine living in a place where people care that much about their surrounding aesthetics. Do you realize there are neighborhoods in this country that you can't live in unless you agree to keep your house painted a certain color?
There are even places where you can't even allow your inner artist to craft a decent exhibit of old cars on blocks, partially obscured by weeds, (admission: one hubcap) without some snooty bozo complaining.
I'd like to write to Ms. Hartridge and invite her to come live on my street. I piled a bunch of firewood on my lawn for a couple of months, creating a giant dead hole in the grass right next to my driveway. Nobody breathed a word.
Likewise, when a passing dump truck inadvertently carved a couple of ruts in my yard, I shrugged it off.
And when I set up that nude fortune-telling booth and lemonade stand on my front porch, the police issued only a half-hearted warning.
Ah, Maine. The Way Life Should Be, where the Code Enforcement Officer only works one day a week because the rest of the time he is the Fire Chief, Assessor, First Selectman, town Librarian, Second Selectman, and Public Works Director.
We're not like New Mexico, for example, where an appeals court recently refused to let a man change his name.
It was a simple, harmless request. The new name would have been “F--- Censorship.”
The judge said the name was “obscene, offensive and would not comport with common decency,” reports The Associated Press.
Whatever. For now, the man will have to live with his current name, which is Variable. Before he got his name changed to Variable, it was Snaphappy Fishsuit Mokiligon.
I have no choice but to reiterate -- I Am Still Not Making This Up.
Thankfully, in Maine, we pretty much let people do whatever they want, as long as they're not Native American.
Are you an out-of-state corporation that wants to build a giant, gaudy casino on the banks of the Penobscot? Go right ahead.
Are you a tribe that wants to install some slot machines on your own little reservation? Uh, not so fast.
So the Passamaquoddies and the Penobscots get the shaft, but the rest of
us enjoy copious personal liberties, unless we want to buy beer or cigarettes, in which case we will have to sacrifice half our weekly income after the new taxes are enacted.
So the next time you get ready to host a raging party and play heavy metal hair band music loud enough to crack foundations in the next county over, take a few moments to appreciate the fact that you live in a place where you don't have to conform to your neighbor's warped sense of decency and good taste.
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