Notice that the victim had a gun in his lap, obviously also ready to fire if necessary. The safety was on so he didn’t get the chance. I suppose one could say that is self defense on the part of the shooter. It’s getting a little murky here, though. What if the victim didn’t have a gun in his lap? Would it still be self defense? Under Florida law, people are allowed to shoot someone if they feel threatened and say it is self defense. It relies on what the shooter says. And, according to someone opposed to this law which passed unanimously (with an NRA representative standing next to Governor Bush as he signed the law) juries used to decide who was guilty or innocent. Now the shooter him or herself gets to decide.
What makes this even worse is that a year ago, the shooter was charged with aggravated battery and shooting a gun in a public place. Charges were dropped last October. There must be more to this case than we are seeing in the article. Why did this man still have a concealed weapons permit? The charges last year should have been enough to revoke his license. So, before knowing all of the particulars, I am wondering if this is actually a case for “enforcing the laws already on the books.” In this case, it goes both ways. One law says that the shooter goes free with no consequences for murdering another human being in cold blood. The other says that the shooter had some gun charges against him and was still able to legally carry. Hmmm.
japete
August 16, 2010
Shoot First everybody!
[I’ve been following japete’s blog, Common Gunsense, (as is usual for me all links to anti-rights websites have the “nofollow” attribute set) for several months. Her writing is a blend of a personal diary morning the loss of her sister and an almost solo gun control activist.
I find it interesting to observe how her mind works. There are the simplifications she makes:
There is a lot of support out there. Those of us in the “silent majority” must be making more noise about preventing senseless gun violence. We know we are right. Our language must be simple. It is, actually, a black and white issue but we tend to make it too nuanced. This morning, as I was getting dressed to spend another day at the convention, I looked at the clothes I chose. I am wearing black pants and a black and white tee shirt that says on both front and back, “Minnesotans Against Being Shot”. My shoes are black and white sneakers. So I thought of the nature of our arguments. Either you want to prevent gun injuries and deaths or you don’t. It is simple. Let’s keep it that way.
There is her dismissal as “nonsense” of arguments of others without any apparent examination of the issue:
United States Senator Charles Grassley ( R-Iowa) appeared to be wanting Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan to admit that the rights “guaranteed” in the Second Amendment was written before the Constitution. How is this possible? What Senator Grassley seemed to believe, and wanted Kagan and the rest of us to believe, was that the right to bear arms was actually created by God. No kidding. Here is a video of the Kagan hearings yesterday featuring Grassley’s questioning. Nonsense.
In the QOTD we still another item of interest. She states things as facts which are not true. For example, she apparently believes the only thing required for someone to not be charged in a shooting death is for the shooter to recite the magic phrases “I felt threatened” and “It was self defense” and the prosecutor walks away from the case. Physical evidence and witnesses supporting the validity of the self-defense claim have been dropped from her reality.
These sort of things apparently enable her to remain internally, and to a certain extent externally, consistent and maintain her belief system.
From this alternated reality base she goes on to reach the conclusions that 1) Accusations (charges) which were never proven (charges were dropped) should be sufficient to punish someone (revoke a concealed carry license); and 2) Legal self defense is cold blooded murder.
I can only conclude that grief can be powerful enough to severely warp the thinking process.
If you leave comments on her blog please be gentle. I almost feel as if I am intruding simply by reading her posts. If she wasn’t an activist for infringing upon the rights of others I would never point her out to others. But as it is I think there is a lot to be learned from her about the mechanism used to warp reality into something which matches the desired conclusions.–Joe]
