Yes indeed, the professor acted like an idiot. (At the same time, she would have been held responsible in a civil suit had Wahlberg shot someone at school and she hadn't notified anyone about his talk. Don't know for sure about college profs, but K-12 teachers are mandated by most states that they are responsible for notifying authorities about anything that might suggest a student is being hurt or planning to hurt others. Of course, owning a gun has nothing to do with planning to hurt others, but a good lawyer could shoot that idea to shit in court.)

However, my main concern is this idea: "During the presentation Wahlberg made the point that if students were permitted to conceal carry guns on campus, the violence could have been stopped earlier in many of these cases."

See, I wonder how many gun owners are qualified to handle hostage situations. And if I were taken hostage, gun to head, in a school-shooting situation, I'm not sure I'd want a 21 year old making decisions about whether or not to "take out" the shooter.

Which is to say: concealed weapons are fine by me, so long as the gun owner is held criminally responsible for anything that happens with the gun. When ten students start shooting, X-Box style, to save us from being shot, I am going to be very angry.

Well, this irritates me:

"They told Wahlberg that they had received a complaint from his professor that his presentation was making students feel 'scared and uncomfortable.'"

Are not students supposed to man up and not feel scared and uncomfortable when their religious convictions and political views are ridiculed by the professors who will grade them and have some measure of control over whether they keep their scholarships (if any) or graduate?

I don't know what motivated this particular individual, but Luther is surely right that some fear of student expression is motivated by worries, justified or not, about potential litigation.

It's often been pointed out that a lawsuit-crazy culture is expensive in terms of its damage to the economy; it is also expensive in terms of personal freedom.

I realise this is kind of tangential, but appealing to state law in defending these folks' right to carry a concealed weapon is one thing (states can, within the bounds of the constitution, pass whatever laws they want), but appealing to the Second Amendment is ridiculous. That amendment reads: "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." Which well-regulated militia are these folks members of? The NRA hardly qualifies, and I wouldn’t think being a “former Marine” does either (even if there is a terminology problem here, since Marines are so adamant about being Marines for life, but topic for another day….).

I'm sure it's just because I'm ignorant of the legal arguments here. Could someone just explain why the words "A well regulated militia" -- which are, after all, the FIRST words of the amendment -- are always irrelevant to people who claim to be "originalists" or "strict constructionalists"? The original intent of the Second Amendment was clearly to protect local militias, and that original intent was, if I am not mistaken, part and parcel of the founding fathers’ belief that a standing army would lead to empire, which as good republicans they abhorred. Again (and I do ask this sincerely), am I missing something here?

jerry-yes, you're missing something. the short answer is the heller decision.

Yeah, I did know about this; it has been hard to miss in the last few months. This is good, though, because it's made me go and read the decision, and now I have even more reason to ask how it is that justices who call themselves strict constructionalists can agree that it turns out that "The militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense." So the militia was, um, kind of everybody? Bet that was hard to regulate!

That stuff dealing with the term militia in the section 2A of the majority decision (it starts on p.22) is ridiculous. The majority seems to agree with this sense that the militia is comprised of all able-bodied men; they call that the "ordinary definition" of the term militia on p.26. But on the same page they say that "the adjective 'well-regulated' implies nothing more than the imposition of proper discipline and training," and I guess I missed where exactly that happens, because getting a firearms license is hardly an imposition of discipline. Indeed, on the previous page they use Webster's definition to support their argument that the militia is, um, kind of everybody, when they say that Webster defines the word as "the able body men organized into companies, regiments and brigades." When does that organisation happen with the DC handgun owners, exactly? Because it is just that sort of organisation that defines a real militia -- Switzerland's, say, where the militia is indeed every able-bodied male, but where every last one of those males is organised into companies, regiments and brigades, brigades whose training schedules are posted at every single post office in the country. I guess I missed those schedules last time I was at a DC post office.

Justice Stevens didn’t buy this kind of ridiculous reasoning, and neither do I, and he is a lot more precise about the amendment’s history in American legislation and jurisprudence, talking about the establishment of legal frameworks for state militias and national guards rather than dredging up the period between the Restoration and the Glorious Revolution as the majority does. I think he's exactly right to say that this isn't a matter of constitutionality, but a matter of the majority's "announcement of a new constitutional right to own and use firearms for private purposes." To me it really does expose the cynicism of the supposed "strict constructionalists" or "originalists."

Anyway, it is good to see that gun ownership proponents do indeed meet the militia argument head-on, however unconvincingly. So thanks for sending me to that, and I will now end this amateurish sidebar.

Jerry, You speak of training. As the son of a former police officer, I can tell you that the official keepers of the police on average have less firearms training that the average permit holding civilian. Most police departments only require that their officers "qualify". This means that once a year they show up at a range and discharge their firearm at a static paper target and "hit" the target. Yes some departments that have larger training budgets offer more advanced classes like the Massod Ayoob Combat classes, but they tend to be the exception not the rule. I know that I have discharged thousands of rounds in combat and speed shooting ranges and that is as a civilian.

the bill of rights doesn't grant rights--it guarantees them. self-defense is a human right. in addition, i would point you to the federalist papers for some ideas about founder intention; however, it seems that you already have your mind made up about the issue. explain why law abiding citizens shouldn't have guns and who you are to decide that? or what government (given that ours is full of lawbreakers on both sides of the aisle) should decide that?

David --- Take the point about training for a firearms license, and I shouldn't understate the difficulty of obtaining one. But as a police officer your mom or dad was also part of an organised, disciplined group, one actually charged to protect the public safety. I don't see how any of that is true of a militia that is defined as basically the whole of the able-bodied (now read licensable, I suppose) general public.

Jason --- I never said law abiding citizens shouldn't have guns, and I was pretty clear that it is state governments that can decide that (lawbreaking legislators notwithstanding, I guess). Indeed, I explicitly conceded the point of defending gun ownership on the basis of state law; as I said, states can pass whatever laws they want within the limits of the constitution, and so let me say even more explicitly that if states want to pass permissive gun laws then that's their prerogative, and people who object to these sorts of state laws can, as with other duly passed state laws, work to get them changed or move to a state with different laws. I just don't see how appealing specifically to the Second Amendment, which is pretty clear about the right to bear arms being about the maintenance of a well-ordered militia, can be used to defend private ownership of handguns. It seems to me that the Supreme Court has usurped the power of state governments to pass their own gun laws, and has in effect legislated from the bench, something that its most "conservative" judges are usually shocked (shocked!) to see liberals doing. I haven't read the Federalist Papers since university, though, so maybe I should have a fresh look.

"Nasty stuff, that -- and a sign that guns are becoming the new frontier in campus-based efforts to curtail students' rights."

This should not be taken as *bad* news, though. Yes, it is the "new frontier", but the reason that it is the new frontier is that the fascistic impulses of many in the educational establishment are under attack, and they are retreating policy by policy, campus by campus. It's a new frontier for those who champion student's rights -- the next ground for conquest. The war against speech codes seems to be going pretty well, all things considered. Campuses have relaxed a lot of their intrusive and ridiculous orientation programs.... we're making progress.

Guns are the new frontier, but it's the good guys who are pushing into it.

At least that's how it looks from my vantage.