2008, Year Of The Second Amendment?: OK - perhaps the title is a bit overly dramatic, but District of Columbia v. Heller gives me reason for optimism. Without wanting to count my chickens before they hatch, I have some confidence that the Supreme Court will indeed find that the Second Amendment means what it says, and that the government cannot ban gun ownership. http://armedandsafe.blogspot.com/2008/01/2008-year-of-second-amendment.html DC Officials Must File Heller Briefs This Week: City officials must file legal briefs with the U.S. Supreme Court this week on why justices should not overturn the city's 30-year-old ban on handguns in homes, News4's Tom Sherwood reported. Acting D.C. Attorney General Peter Nickles will file the city's formal brief on Friday, kicking off the 2008 defense of the law that was challenged successfully in a lower court last year...The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments on the case in March, and a decision is expected in early summer. http://www.nbc4.com/news/14957534/detail.html --- Give Law-Abiding Tennessee Gun Owners A Break: With the turn of the new year, criminals using guns in the commission of a felony will receive drastically tougher criminal sentencing in Tennessee. The new "Crooks with Guns" law is a victory for law enforcement officers and regular citizens alike. Now, so-called conservatives from both parties in the Tennessee General Assembly should turn some of their energy and attention on the issue of gun laws to drawing down some of the financial drain government regulation causes law-abiding gun owners. The math is pretty simple. In order for a Tennessee resident to legally own and carry a firearm for self-defense purposes, state government exacts somewhere in the neighborhood of $200 to $300 in fees, taxes and charges... http://www.nashvillecitypaper.com/news.php?viewStory=58388 --- NBC Commentator Mocks Republican Hunters: On Sunday's The Chris Matthews Show, the host used one of Mike Huckabee's Iowa photo-ops as an excuse to launch into an elitist attack on Republicans and hunters. "Who made killing small animals the test of Republican manhood?" Matthews challenged at the top of his show. Over a clip of a vintage Looney Tunes cartoon, Matthews further upped the ante: "Who declared war on Bugs Bunny?!" (An awful lot of Americans seem to believe that meat is manufactured in the same factories that make the styrofoam trays in which they buy it.) http://newsbusters.org/blogs/rich-noyes/2007/12/31/chris-matthews-gop-candidates-want-kill-bugs-bunny --- New York Agency Shifts to "Green" Training Ammo: The state Department of Environmental Conservation is reducing its negative impact on the environment by giving up lead-based bullets used for firearms training in favor of less harmful "green" ammunition, Commissioner Alexander "Pete" Grannis announced Monday. (If the bullets incorporate tungsten, future generations may get a lesson in unintended consequences.) http://www.pressconnects.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008801010324 --- Oops, Wrong House: A teen shot and killed a home intruder Sunday night, stopping a theft in progress and sending the intruder's accomplices scurrying, said Sheriff Martin Pace. Found dead in front of a mobile home in South Warren County was Jonathan Bruce, 21, 3341 Sunnybrook Drive in Jackson, said Coroner Doug Huskey. Bruce had been shot once with a .410 shotgun and had stumbled out of the mobile home, Pace said. http://www.vicksburgpost.com/articles/2007/12/31/news/news02.txt --- Rule One, Rule Two, Rule Three Reminder: Two men trying to trace a loaded .357-caliber Magnum as a pattern for a tattoo accidentally shot themselves, the Otero County Sheriff's Department said Monday. Robert Glasser and Joey Acosta, both 22, were treated at a hospital in El Paso, Texas, after the shooting Thursday evening in nearby Chaparral. Authorities said Glasser was struck in the hand when the gun accidentally went off, and Acosta was hit in the left arm. Their injuries were not life-threatening, authorities said. (Rule One: All firearms are always loaded. Rule Two: Never let the muzzle cross anything you're not prepared to shoot. Rule Three: Keep your finger [and other objects] out of the trigger guard until your sights are on the target and you're prepared to fire.) http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,319338,00.html --- Up Is Not A Safe Direction: Someone shooting off a gun to welcome in the new year wounded a 5-year-old Tucson girl after the bullet came through the roof of her bedroom, Tucson Police said. The bullet came from "celebratory gunfire," said Sgt. Fabian Pacheco, a TPD spokesman. In a second incident, another bullet came through the roof of a kitchen in a house, but did not hit anyone, he said. (One of the biggest safety issues I have with students is muzzles turning upward as the gun moves back and forth between holster and sighting plane.) http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/hourlyupdate/218765.php --- Location, Location, Location: For years I have argued in favor of carrying the same guns, in the same locations, day in and day out. It appears that I am not the only one who feels that this is important. (This is a lesson I learned from an old friend, who almost learned the hard way the risks of transitioning between a belt holster and a shoulder holster.) http://www.stoppingpower.net/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=14627 --- Sudden-Jihad Syndrome Poses Domestic Risk: Sympathy for al Qaeda has produced "sudden jihad syndrome" in domestic terror cells unaffiliated with foreign terrorists and people seeking to carry out attacks in the U.S., a law-enforcement intelligence analysis says. The Dec. 6 report by the Texas Public Safety Department's Bureau of Information Analysis warns officials not to dismiss individual or homegrown terror cells as "wannabes," saying they pose a credible threat to homeland security. http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080102/NATION/203823370/1001 --- From AzCDL: Warm up those keyboards. The 2008 Legislative session is about to get underway. On January 7th, the Legislature starts working on the budget. On January 14th, they start working on a flood of new bills. AzCDL has been busy working behind the scenes since the 2007 session ended. We have been drafting legislative proposals, and meeting with potential sponsors to turn our proposals into bills. We have also been approached by legislators wanting support for their bills by AzCDL's powerful and proven citizen lobbying machine (You!). We are expecting a number of pro-rights bills to be filed. Some of the bills that we expect to be filed are reactions to recent headlines. Others are steps in our continued efforts to restore the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (RKBA) in Arizona (http://www.azcdl.org/html/our_goals.html). If they are all filed, this will be a very challenging year and we will need every ounce of support you can muster. We can only be successful with your involvement. Stay tuned! As relevant legislation is introduced, we will keep you up to date via these Alerts: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AZCDL_Alerts/ (Feel free to share these Alerts with other pro-rights activists) These alerts are a project of the Arizona Citizens Defense League (AzCDL), an all volunteer, non-profit, non-partisan grassroots organization. Join today! AzCDL - Protecting Your Freedom http://www.azcdl.org/html/join_us_.html Copyright © 2008 Arizona Citizens Defense League, Inc., all rights reserved. -- Stephen P. Wenger, KE7QBY Firearm safety - It's a matter for education, not legislation. http://www.spw-duf.info .