Friday Feedback
Two weeks ago, I wrote last week’s Friday Feedback. I was about to travel to visit my parents for the first time in years to say goodbye. I knew it was going to be hard, I wrote assuming it would be, scheduled it and planned to correct if I was wrong.
It was a hard week.
This week was harder.
That is at a personal level.
At a more 2A level, I have been thinking about where we are today vs. where we were in years past.
I turned 18 and could have purchased an M-16. The tax stamp would have accounted for 25% of my costs, not counting the other hoops. It wasn’t worth it to me. I wasn’t interested in firearms. I was into stereos, music, and knives.
In 1986, it became prohibitively expensive to purchase a machine gun. All because of an amendment to a bill attempting to protect gun owners. I was pleased that we could not travel throughout the states without being at risk for having a gun in the wrong state.
Little did I understand how that wasn’t really true.
Nor did I understand that machine guns would become so expensive.
When I purchased my first firearms, I was surprised to learn how hard it was to get a permit to carry my firearm with me.
Today, every firearm I own has a holster for it OR a sling if it has sling mounts. At the time, most gun stores in my area didn’t even bother to carry holsters. There were a few, but so few people ever carried a handgun that it wasn’t a good use of shelf space.
I remember listening to the horror stories about how people were having their rights stomped on because they had no standing. Only the militia had standing.
What I remember most vividly was the Heller decision. It was the end to this crap about not having standing. It meant that the rollback of all these infringements was just a few months away.
I believed that the courts would do the right thing.
There was that wonderful few weeks when Washington, D.C. was actually a constitutional carry location. The head of the MPD stated that D.C.’s permitting laws had been declared unconstitutional. Until new, constitutional, regulations were put in place, if you were not a prohibited person, you could carry in D.C.
When Bruen came out, I expected a slew of lawsuits designed to attack the infringements that existed. I did not expect the Bruen tantrum response bills.
I knew that some courts would fight. I wasn’t surprised when the Ninth Circuit kicked the GVR’d cases down to the district level for new briefings in light of Bruen.
I was pleasantly surprised when the Fourth Circuit heard their GVR’d case right away. And then they went radio silent for over a year.
But something different is happening this time. The 2A community started politely, they filed their suits and saw where things went. They got their cases to the circuit courts, and we watched the circuit courts uphold infringements of every sort.
I don’t expect the 2A community to go quietly into the night. But I was not expecting the level of ferocious attacks I’ve been seeing.
There are far too many briefs, orders, motions, and opinions coming out that are more impolite than I’d ever expect to see. Courts are being called out on their shit.
We are taking these cases to the Supreme Court, over and over again. And we are being heard. The Circuit courts are scrambling to find something. They know they are twisting the Supreme Court’s words to infringe when that should not be allowed.
There have been too many times when the Circuit courts have modified their behavior, fearing the Supreme Court intervening in their cases.
Are you feeling positive about the course things are taking?
The comments are open, let’s hear your thoughts.