WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court's repeal of the ban on handguns in Washington, D.C., may be a boon for a segment of the firearms industry whose last major windfall might have been in the heyday of the Dirty Harry movies: those who make and sell revolvers.
The court ruled that a blanket ban on handguns is unconstitutional, but D.C. Mayor Adrian Fenty and other Washington officials want to keep in place a prohibition on semiautomatic handguns — those in which a bullet clip is inserted into the gun's grip.
Such a ban would continue to outlaw 9-mm and other popular pistols that are legal in most other places around the United States. And it would make the classic six-shooter the only legal handgun in the District.
Just won't give up, will they? Oh, well, I'd still take that matchup. Revolvers feel better in my hand, more natural and comfortable. But I shoot better with the semiautomatics. The point is, though, that I need not be defenseless when someone wants to do me harm. Gun-control zealots are obsessed with rate of fire, but I don't have to be all that fast. Just readier than the thug thinks I am.
Comments
With speed-loaders and moon clips, wheel guns can be reloaded almost as fast as semi-automatics, ... revolvers are highly under-rated.
Rate of fire and reloading speed are meaningless. If your first shot doesn't resolve the issue, his first shot might.
The problem with revolvers is that they tend to get caught when you pull them out. The advantage is that they're very loud.
If you shoot first and miss, the sound might shock the other guy enough that he fails to pull the trigger. Or the sound might encourage someone to call an ambulance to the scene.
They say the biggest reason diaphragms fail as a birth control method is that they're sitting in the bedside stand when she decides to drop in at the convenience store for a cup of coffee. I have a hard enough time trying to remember to bring along my cell phone when I leave the house; given how frequently I find myself in need of a gun, I'd never have a handgun with me.
And in the house, a shotgun makes a much better weapon. Nobody likes to look down that huge bore, you can't miss, the guy is going to be in no condition to fire back after you shoot, and you aren't going to penetrate a wall and kill someone on the other side.
Too bad federal law doesn't permit sawed-off shotguns, which would be better suited for defense of your home.
There was a case in Indianapolis - maybe it was in Broad Ripple? - a couple of decades ago where a cop approached a popular parochial high school teacher at his house about a noisy dog complaint. Things were getting out of hand, the teacher felt, so he asked if he was under arrest, and when the cop said no, so he simply turned around and went into his house, which really POed the cop.
Reinforcements arrived, and the cops forced their way into the house. Something happened, and a cop ended up dead. I don't know whether it was his gun or a cop's, and I don't know if anyone knows who pulled the trigger. I never heard the rest of the story, but at one point, they were charging him with manslaughter. Indiana law, at least at the time, said you're allowed to use lethal force, if needed, to protect your self, your family, or your property, but the prosecutor down their didn't feel like it was self-defense if cops were the home invaders. At the time, I felt sorry for the teacher, and at times (like now), I wonder what every happened in the end.
Nobody should die over a noisy dog complaint. I'm not sure where to draw the line, but that definitely seems a stupid incident.
When it comes to wheel guns, there are only two words:
JERRY MICULEK
...'Nuff said.
;)
B.G.
Thanks for the insight, Harl - but rate of fire and reloading speed do matter - just not as much as accuracy. And I'm disappointed, you only had 9 paragraphs, ...
Trying to limit the right to keep & bear arms to six shooters is no different than trying to limit the right to Revolution-era Brown Bess muskets. The Scalia opinion specifically addresses this sort of scheme when it declares that the Second Amendment may NOt be misinterpreted to permit only outdated arms such as those the Framers possessed. Just because we now have M16s (in place of muskets), Scalia concludes, is no excuse for the courts to extinguish the people's Second Amendment right.
Frankly, it isn't that liberals can't read and comprehend Article II, much less the new Supreme Court decision. They've always known, but hated what they knew to be the proper reading of the uninfringed right of the people to arms.
No surprise a new 67-page step-by-step legal definition of the broad scope of the right hasn't enlightened them. It's not ambiguous; just unwelcome.
So we see why it will STILL be necessary for good Americans (and I use that phrase now with careful precision) to be vigilant against those who will continue to assault and tear away at the nation's foundations and core traditions. They want some other America and some other constitution, not ours.