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The position was laid out in footnotes of briefs asking the Supreme Court NOT to consider two Second Amendment-based cases.

One was Dr. Tim Emerson's appeal of the 5th Circuit's decision that he had to stand trial for possessing firearms while under a court order issued during a divorce. The second, *Haney v. U.S.*, concerned John Lee Haney, an Oklahoma man convicted of illegally possessing two machine guns.

The Solicitor General, whose official duty is to defend the Constitutionality of Federal laws, wrote: "The current position of the United States ... is that the 2nd Amendment more broadly protects the rights of individuals ... who are not members of any militia ... to possess and bear their own firearms, subject to reasonable restrictions designed to prevent possession by unfit persons or to restrict the possession of types of firearms that are particularly suited to criminal misuse."

Who is an "unfit person" and what type of firearm is "particularly suited to criminal misuse"? Does that mean a handgun, which are used in infinitely more crimes than either "assault rifles" or machine guns?

Although agreeing with the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals "individual right" position in *Emerson* it also agreed that the limited exceptions to that right included denying gun ownership for someone under a domestic violence restraining order issued during a divorce proceeding.

The Justice Department position also implicitly accepted that it was constitutional to restrictively license machine guns which, under the 1939 *Miller* decision would appear to be the most- protected type of firearm, the type gun most used by the military.

If the exception list is that broad, what isn't excepted in the Bush Justice Department's view?

The most shrill screams against the DOJ position were from GunIndustryWatch.org, a branch of the hard left "Alliance for Justice":

"This new interpretation of the Second Amendment puts even the most modest gun restrictions in jeopardy:

"* Brady criminal background checks could be ruled unconstitutional.
"* Laws prohibiting the possession of firearms by convicted felons, fugitives, drug users and addicts, illegal aliens and the mentally ill could be ruled unconstitutional."

It would be nice, but I don't think so.

NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam said the DOJ position is "a step in the right direction," with which I agree.

But on National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation program Thursday, NRA's Trish Gregory praised the decision and said it supported existing gun laws -- which startled even the moderator.

The entire program, which includes an outstanding discussion between UCLA Law Prof. Eugene Volokh (who said DOJ is merely restating the individual right position broadly held prior to the Miller case) and Yale Prof. Akhil Amar. The segments or the entire program may be listened to by going to the archives at www.npr.org.

George Mason University Law Prof. Nelson Lund, who supports a broader interpretation of the Second Amendment, summed up the DOJ position quite nicely: "The decision seems largely symbolic. We don't have any way of knowing whether it's going to have any practical effect at all. If so, it will be quite some time before we see an effect."

 Friend Dr. Tim Wheeler of Doctors for Responsible Gun Ownership will be on tomorrow's CBS "60 Minutes" discussion of whether doctors should tell their patients not to keep guns in their homes.

If "60 Minutes" is up to form, they'll give Tim a few seconds to rebut minutes of "get rid of guns" nonsense.

[Ed. Neal is right.  The theme was "Who care about the facts?  I just hate what those evil guns can do."]

I've never seen a more ridiculous argument against allowing pilots to be armed than Cokie Roberts' spluttering on last weekend's ABC "This Week." Cokie said airplanes were the only place she felt safe "from guns" and sure didn't want them aboard. When George Will tried to refute her hysteria, saying that the pilots would only use their guns to defend the cockpit so they could safely land the plane, she fumed that pilots were only trying to save themselves and the plane, and didn't care if they landed with a plane full of dead people.

Absolutely idiotic.

But the possibility of arming aircrews appears to be shrinking.

 For good information on arming pilots, go to http://WWW.SECURE-SKIES.ORG.

 In general, Democrats are trying to avoid talking about guns -- Sen. Chuck Schumer was almost the only one raising Cain about the DOJ position on the Second Amendment -- but Sen. John McCain (R- Ariz.) and Sen. Joe Lieberman (D-Ct.) say they want to move their gun show bill as an amendment to "an appropriate bill" *this* month.

And to provide the softening-up artillery bombardment, American for Gun Safety is running ads in D.C. and in selected states around the country.

Your Senator should be hearing from you, even if you know he's going to vote wrong. If he's not getting phone calls (and mail and calls to *district* offices) he'll think there's no opposition to McCain-Lieberman.