Monday, November 02, 2009



Man dies after argument at Detroit restaurant: "A man shot Saturday at Bert’s Marketplace, a restaurant in Eastern market, following an argument with another man, died at a local hospital hours later, Detroit police said. Police are trying to determine the dead man’s name, since he had no identification on him. They did not release the name of the man accused in the shooting, pending their investigation. Prosecutors are expected to review the matter today to determine if a warrant will be sought, or if the shooting was in self defense. “The suspect says he was being threatened at the time of the shooting,” Detroit Police spokesman John Roach said today. According to Detroit Police Sgt. Eren Stephens, the incident began at 3:15 p.m. when the men got into an argument. One of the men pulled a knife. The other man then pulled out a handgun and shot the man with the knife, she said. The man had a permit to carry the handgun."


NJ: Court rules Americans have no right to buy guns: "A New Jersey appeals court has concluded that Americans have no Second Amendment right to buy a handgun. In a case decided last week, the superior court upheld a state law saying that nobody may possess ‘any handgun’ without obtaining law enforcement approval and permission in advance. That outcome might seem like something of a surprise, especially after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year in the D.C. v. Heller case that the Second Amendment guarantees ‘the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation.’ But New Jersey Appellate Division Judge Stephen Skillman wrote on behalf of a unanimous three-judge panel that Heller ‘has no impact upon the constitutionality of’ the state law.”


Analyzing the anti-gun mindset: "We all know people who have an irrational bias against guns. Despite all the evidence they are presented with that gun owners are safe and responsible and that guns save more lives in the hands of the good guys than cause harm in the hands of criminals, they still hold on to a strong aversion. Part of this can be caused by conditioning. A person bombarded since childhood with anti-gun messages from parents, teachers, and other role models become conditioned to thinking that guns are bad. That conditioning can be very hard for them to overcome because it has become ingrained into their psyche. These are the types of people who will recoil in horror at the mere sight of a real firearm and might even be physically unable to touch one. Another possible cause of a strong anti-gun bias that also leads to mistrust of gun owners is psychological projection. A person might harbor hidden hostilities and anger issues that they are unable to deal with and subconsciously project those feelings onto others. When these people fervently argue that "gun toting crazies" will get into shootouts over fender benders or shoot their kid's soccer coach what they're really afraid of is that they might do such things if they had a gun. It is no different from the person who has thoughts of cheating on his or her spouse that becomes convinced the other is having an affair."


Court says threats don't justify felon having gun: "The gun possession conviction of a man prohibited by law from having one has been upheld. Danny Dutton, 24, contended that he began receiving threats the day after he shot and killed a violent intruder at his apartment. Because of a 2004 felony conviction for cultivating marijuana, Dutton is prohibited from possessing firearms. He argued, though, that his only realistic option was to carry a gun to protect himself. Being beaten with a metal pipe in your own apartment can change your outlook on likely threat levels. But the police, a U.S. District Court and the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, all of which operate under protection of state-deployed arms, disagreed, and in their guarded wisdom concluded Mr. Dutton did not possess a life worthy of also possessing the means of self-defense. In order to come to this conclusion, they must resort to nothing short of fortune telling, because there are no empirical standards by which they can otherwise reach it. If anything, Dutton would appear to live on the fringes of a higher-risk segment than most. A man--who had already been bludgeoned in his own home--felt he knew his own situation well enough to warrant storing his possessions and changing his appearance. But officials who are not at risk presume to know best how scared he should be."

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