Heller May Halt Erosion of RKBA in Hawaii: Ten days ago the U.S. Supreme Court released its landmark Second Amendment decision on District of Columbia v Heller, the Washington, D.C., gun ban case. Hawaii gun laws, among the strictest in the nation, are now subject to scrutiny relative to that decision. Will it have an effect here? Attorney General Mark Bennett has announced he will review Hawaii's gun laws...The decision should make it harder for gun-control advocates in Hawaii to get enough support to pass de facto gun bans and impossibly strict storage laws like the overturned D.C. statutes. Bennett will hopefully look hard at Hawaii's present ban on standard factory magazines for ordinary handguns commonly kept in the home for self-defense... http://starbulletin.com/2008/07/06/editorial/commentary.html --- Women Empowered by Heller: ...Much to feminists' dismay, men and women are different. For better or worse, men tend to be taller, stronger, and weigh more than women. So when it comes to physical confrontation, women don't have the best odds - especially when they are sitting ducks, as they were under D.C.'s gun ban. If nothing else, the ban emboldened criminals with the knowledge that their victims would be unarmed. But not anymore. Now women can finally rest assured that if, God forbid, there is a confrontation in their home, they will have a viable means of self-defense - regardless of the size of the intruder... http://www.townhall.com/columnists/AllisonKasic/2008/07/07/dc_gun_ban_lift_empowers_women --- Richard Mack on Heller: ...Former Graham County Sheriff Richard Mack said he was pleased with the court's decision. The court previously ruled in Mack's favor in 1997 when he challenged the legality of some aspects of the Brady Act. The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on Nov. 30, 1993. The law required chief law enforcement officers to perform background checks on an interim basis on persons buying handguns until the federal government's system was up and running. Mack believed requiring local law enforcement to perform the background checks was unconstitutional. "After fighting and being involved in the gun rights cause, I was so elated the Supreme Court addressed the issue," he said. "It's a little unsettling and a little scary (however), that there are four judges that don't understand the Second Amendment." http://www.eacourier.com/articles/2008/07/06/news/doc486c20d408033800603901.txt --- Mumbo Jumbo from Chicago: ...For years, anti-gun activists and others have whispered that the National Rifle Association, the most powerful gun lobby in the nation and one of the most powerful Washington lobbies on any issue, has really never wanted the Supreme Court to define the Second Amendment. Why? Well, the theory went that a ruling such as the one the court handed down last week in District of Columbia v. Heller could dent the group where it hurts the most: fundraising...And in fact, it wasn't the NRA that filed the lawsuit that brought Washington, D.C.'s gun ban down, it was a group of libertarians, acting on their own with help from the CATO Institute... (Yes, the NRA opposed the original DC lawsuit but has definitely jumped into the saddle in litigation against similar gun bans, particularly those in Chicago and its suburbs. Is this why the Chicago Tribune is blowing this smoke?) http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/07/does_the_gun_ruling_hurt_the_n.html --- A Different Heller: Rep. Dean Heller once explained that as proud as he was to have bagged the giant elk whose head is displayed at his home in Carson City, his greatest hunting prize has been persuading his wife, a one-time USC song leader, to go shooting with him...Gun culture remains strong in much of Nevada, but particularly so in Heller's far-flung district, which includes the entire rural North. Heller, a Republican, has been a fierce advocate of gun owners' rights during his first term in Congress. He was an early signatory to an amicus brief in the recent Supreme Court case overturning the ban on keeping guns at home in the District of Columbia. Last year, he supported legislation that would have done as much. And he supports the Bush administration's proposal to lift a ban on concealed weapons in national parks in some states, including Nevada... http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2008/jul/06/count-these-nevadans-defend-gun-owners-rights/ --- American Fined for Trying to Cross Canada with Handguns: ...The charges were laid on Thursday after Swart attempted to enter Canada with his family en route to a new job in Alaska...Court heard Swart and his family first attempted to cross the border at Regway. Swart told customs officials he had a number of firearms with him, including four rifles, a nine-millimetre semi-automatic handgun with an ammunition clip, a .380-calibre semi-automatic gun with a clip and a .25-calibre semi-automatic handgun with a clip. Even though Swart owns the guns legally in the United States, he was told he couldn't enter Canada with the last three guns as possession of those weapons is regulated here... (The detachable ammunition holders for those pistols are actually magazines.) http://www.canada.com/reginaleaderpost/news/story.html?id=fc0084ac-2aa4-4fa1-80e7-e8356532418d --- Toronto Mayor Calls for More Infringements in US: With 11 murders in Toronto so far this year, Mayor David Miller is once again calling for more action south of the border to stem the flow of illegal U.S. guns into Canada. Miller wants Ottawa to exert diplomatic pressure on Washington to change what he calls "incredibly lax" U.S. gun laws in a number of states. Miller says Canada should make it a national security issue. But Corporal Norm Massie of the RCMP's B.C. border-integrity unit says Canadian and U.S. customs and law-enforcement agencies cooperate closely to try to curb gun smuggling... http://680news.com/news/local/article.jsp?content=20080706_102040_1484 --- Three Injured by Exploding Cannon: For the second consecutive year, metal shrapnel from an exploding cannon struck a Thurston County child during a Fourth of July celebration. A cannon exploded about 10:30 p.m. Friday during an outdoor gathering in the 9200 block of Applegate Loop in Rochester, sending an 11-year-old boy to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle with severe lacerations to his leg and his abdominal area, said Thurston County sheriff's Sgt. Cheryl Stines. Two adults also were injured: a 34-year-old man suffered severe abdominal injuries and a woman in her 30s suffered abdominal and leg injuries, Stines said...The explosion occurred after the cannon had been loaded with smokeless gunpowder and paper towels, Stines said. It's about 1 foot tall, with a base about 2 inches wide, she said. (Granted that reporters are not generally the best source of technical details about firearms, such cannon are usually designed to be fired with black powder, not smokeless powder.) http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/story/405921.html -- Stephen P. Wenger, KE7QBY Firearm safety - It's a matter for education, not legislation. http://www.spw-duf.info .