The debate about whether gun ownership really is a right protected by the U.S. Constitution was finally settled today. The Supreme Court overturned a 32-year-old ban on handguns in Washington, D.C., and in doing so judged that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to own guns that isn’t tied to “a well-regulated militia.
“The decision is big, though how far-reaching is still unclear. The National Rifle Association plans to challenge gun control laws in other cities. Some people are concerned that the ruling could lead to the removal of other gun restrictions, though Justice Antonin Scalia said the ruling shouldn’t “cast doubt on long-standing prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons or the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings.”
“If an American first lady, or would-be first lady, described herself as a ‘tamer of men’ and had a ‘man-eating’ past filled with naked pictures, Mick Jagger and Eric Clapton, sultry prone CD covers, breaking up marriages, bragging that she believes in polygamy rather than monogamy, and having a son with a married philosopher whose father she’d had an affair with, it would take more than an appearance on ‘The View’ to sweeten her image,” columnist Maureen Dowd wrote about French first lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. Yet Sarkozy’s third wife is charming not only the French public and world leaders such as President Bush, but also helping raise Sarkozy’s low approval ratings. Said one political observer: “He has stopped behaving like a twit since the marriage.”
How low is world public opinion of President Bush? Former Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Hu Jintao are more trusted than Bush to “do the right thing regarding world affairs,†according to an international survey coordinated by the Project on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland. Not that authoritarian leaders Putin and Hu rated high in trustworthiness; they just scored better than Bush.
Three years ago, the Federal Emergency Management Agency drew widespread scorn for its disastrous response to Hurricane Katrina. But agency seems to have learned from that debacle. In recent days, Midwestern flood victims along the Mississippi have been praising FEMA workers for their quick response time and on-the-spot assistance.
This time around, FEMA really does seem to be doing a heckuva job — proof that government can work and benefit citizens when it’s led with competence and accountability.
Kansas isn’t among the 18 states where Barack Obama’s warm and fuzzy ad “Country I Love†is running, but the state plays a role. Obama talks of being raised by a single mom and his Butler County-bred grandparents, who “taught me values straight from the Kansas heartland where they grew up — accountability and self-reliance, love of country, working hard without making excuses, treating your neighbor as you’d like to be treated.â€
The debate about whether gun ownership really is a right protected by the U.S. Constitution was finally settled today. The Supreme Court overturned a 32-year-old ban on handguns in Washington, D.C., and in doing so judged that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual right to own guns that isn’t tied to “a well-regulated militia.
