Eric Holder testified before Congress today for the second time regarding the Fast & Furious disaster. Here's the condensed version:

He's not apologizing to the family of Bryan Terry
The best way to keep illegal guns from flowing southward into Mexico is to further restrict the guns the government bought to ship southward to Mexico.
It's all the fault of the Bush administration.
He didn't know anything about it. His staff kept him in the dark.

The allegations of impropriety began to circulate in April of 2010.  Terry died in December, and despite the widely distributed and …

Just when the media starts to accept that the gun culture is the mainstream, a knuckle-dragging troglodyte like Crockett Keller decides to crash the party. Keller runs a gun shop in Mason, Texas and teaches the state CHL course. In a recent radio advertisement, he set some fairly prejudicial ground rules in his student selection process.

If you are a socialist liberal and/or voted for the current campaigner in chief, please do not take this class. You have already proven that you cannot make a knowledgeable and prudent decision as required under the law.  Also, if you are a non-Christian Arab or Muslim, I will not teach you the class. Once again, with no shame, I am Crockett Keller.

Guess which story is getting more attention?  Give yourself a cupcake if you guessed it was Keller.

You too can be Irony King (or other monarch) of the week by going here and giving your address.  They send you one of these bumper stickers free.  The site says it'll take 4-6 weeks to ship, but that's still plenty of time before the primaries.

In other news, there's a promising verdict from the North Carolina Superior Court (opinion linked at Volokh) upholding a felon's right to keep and bear arms.

Before you flinch at that, bear in mind that one can be punished as a felon for crimes that do little or no real harm to anyone.  Rehabilitation or decades of clean living don't matter:  a felony conviction of any sort is a lifetime ban from owning firearms.  However, if the right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental liberty (as the Supreme Court ruled in McDonald), can felons be denied its exercise forever?  After all, they still have rights to freedom of speech and legal counsel, right?

H.R. 822 now has 245 cosponsors.  I have my reasons for thinking it's the wrong approach, and even if it does get through the Senate, it won't be signed.  That's alright.  I like this one for one very salient reason: it's got folks in certain corners going all kinds of asplodey.

Today's exhibit is from the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV).  They were originally formed in 1975 as the National Coalition to Ban Handguns.  One of the founders was Edward Welles, who also started the Violence Policy Center.  At some point, they decided …

Things might not be what they seem. I have very little to substantiate this at the moment, but some folks with their ears closer to the ground than mine are wondering what Governor Brown might be playing at with the gun-control bills he signed into law this week.

We've got an interesting snippet from a statement he made today:

The governor tried to explain to an audience in Belmont why a bill that bans the open carrying of unloaded handguns and another that makes it easier to carry a concealed weapon were both signed.

“There is a phrase called the coincidence of opposites. I can even say it in Latin—coincidentia oppositorum. It means that apparently antagonistic measures can be melded together in a higher unity.”

This got me thinking.

Today, California Governor Jerry Brown signed AB 144 into law, making open carry of any sort a misdemeanor.

Since 1967, there's been a loophole in § 12031 that allows an unlicensed citizen to carry a handgun, as long as it's visible and unloaded. It's a questionable mode of carry, but at least it's an option when others are not available. Now, Californians don't even have that. Who's to blame? Portantino? Brown? Nope. We are.

For over 40 years, the whole technicality was something of an open secret, but it was never front-page news. That is, until a bunch of pro-gun …

The ATF recently distributed a letter to firearms dealers to remind them that they cannot sell guns to users of marijuana. People are suddenly up in arms about the situation, which I find odd, since this isn't anything new.

Good old Kentucky Blue has been Schedule I since 1970, and the accompanying prohibitions date back to 1968. Having or consuming the stuff is illegal, and those who do so are prohibited under U.S.C. § 922(g) from receiving or possessing a firearm. Thanks to an unpleasant trend in jurisprudence, federal law overrides any state laws …

The Supreme Court has chosen not to hear Williams v. Maryland this term.  Are we screwed, then?

The implications aren't encouraging. The first is that we couldn't get four Justices to take an interest.  The second is that there might have been four, but they didn't think they could convince a fifth to their side.  A loss at the Supreme Court level would essentially end the reach of the 2nd Amendment at the doorstep of one's home.

While Williams was our best overall case, we've still got Masciandaro and Woollard awaiting review.  However, their chances aren't looking too bright …

We know now that the ATF sat by and let straw purchases of weapons happen in Phoenix.  We know they reassured dealers that the weapons would be tracked.  We know that didn't happen, and that those weapons have been used in dozens of homicides.

As of today, we also know that the ATF themselves purchased weapons and sold them to criminals.  Apparently, John Dodson was given authorization and ordered by Supervisor Voth to pick up a few Draco pistols and deliver them to suspects.

I'm not sure why Dodson didn't bring this up during his testimony to Congress back …

News comes that politicians in Boston are looking to curb violent crime by restricting the sale of knives.

There's some precedent for this across the Atlantic. In the United Kingdom, they responded to a high homicide rate by banning guns. Something had to be done.

Then they saw an epidemic of knife crime, so they banned many types of knives. Something had to be done.

Then folks started assaulting each other with pint beer glasses, and something had to be done. They considered mandating plastic glasses.  I am not kidding.

When folks start beating each other with tire irons, rolling pins, …

John Crewdson has an article on Bloomberg in which he laments the progress of H.R. 822.  One implication of the bill is that a New York resident could bypass his own state's requirements by simply getting a non-resident concealed weapon license from Florida, which New York would have to honor.

Apparently, this represents such an existential crisis for Mr. Crewdson that he applied for a Florida license. He details the process in the article, along with the fact that he lied on the application:

I’ve never touched a handgun and I haven’t been to Florida in decades, yet

…

For someone claiming unalloyed fealty to the Constitution, Rick Perry sure does want to tinker with it. He's called for repeal of the 16th and 17th Amendments, and he wants new ones to outlaw abortion and gay marriage.

This guy wants to take our founding document and tailor it to fit his personal whims. That should scare the living daylights out of any American.

Equally strange are his plans for the Supreme Court. He wants rolling term limits for Justices, and he wants to give Congress the power to overrule verdicts by a 2/3 vote. Both ideas are wretched, and both have been tried before.