The NRA's dreams that District of Columbia v. Heller would result in a free-for-all of gun-toting teens and AK-47 arsenals has so far been soundly rejected. Instead, the NRA's litigation has led to a host of well-reasoned decisions from Republican-appointed judges upholding strong gun laws. While the NRA recently complained in an e-mail to its members that it is facing "a series of Second Amendment disasters," who knew they'd be in cases handpicked and funded by the NRA itself?That's his concluding paragraph to a wonderful article about who's really winning, one of our favorite subjects. Few gun-rights advocates will admit it, but the fact is during the first three years of Obama's term, a time in which the president proved to be anything but the terrible adversary to gun rights the NRA predicted, the pro-gun gains have been minimal to say the least. There are those who admit it.
I offered the following on Baldr's blog:
The gun-rights folks are rightfully worried. if this is what happens with a cooperating (with them) President and a Supreme Court weighed towards their side, they're in big trouble when things change.
Sebastian responded like this:
I don't make any suggestions otherwise. The Second Amendment is one vote on the Supreme Court away from being erased from the Constitution and rendered meaningless. They don't even have to overturn Heller and McDonald, just decide in future cases not to expand the right beyond the ability to have a gun in your home, even though state courts have tended to overwhelmingly reject that notion when interpreting their own RKBA provisions, and is out of line with the text, which states "keep and bear."Being the consummate debater that he is, Sebastian wasn't able to simple agree with my suggestion that his side has made so little progress in these years that the future looks bleak for them, no, he segued the discussion into another area, our calling them paranoid. He says that it is true they've made so little progress that the 2A is "one vote on the Supreme Court away from being erased from the Constitution and rendered meaningless," therefore they're justified in being paranoid.
That's why despite your side's prattling about NRA paranoia in regards to Obama, gun owners are intent on getting him out. If he replaces any of the Heller five, the Second Amendment is finished. You're correct to suggest we're scared. I certainly am. But you can't suggest that, and then out of the other side of your mouth tell us we're nuts for opposing a second term for President Obama. If Kagan turns around and surprises us, I'll eat my words here, but I'm not holding my breath.
Now that's what I call slick debating.
What's your opinion? Is everyone beginning to come together in agreement that, despite all the Wayne-La-Pierre type blustering we often have to put up with, gun irghts are gradually takingg a back seat to sensible gun control laws?
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