This ought to surprise nobody. (Another link from Kopel; search for “April 2”.) I’m pleased that Mr Harper had the good sense to shoot at the robbers even though they claimed to be police. If it happens more often, maybe some of the police will speak up about the foolishness of the War On Some Drugs.

Hey, I can dream, can’t I? But more likely they’ll ask for further police-statist legislation to make such violations of the Fourth Amendment safer for the violators.

Someone (forgot who) recounted a conversation with a cop during the siege of Waco: the cop agreed that BATF was in the wrong, but still wanted the Davidians to be smacked down hard, because resistance cannot be tolerated.

A few years ago, Massad Ayoob’s column in one of the gun magazines invited us to weep for the wife and small child of a policeman who was shot dead during a “dynamic entry”, police euphemism for breaking into a home at night to terrorize the occupants. Ayoob (himself a cop) hoped the killer would be sentenced to death. I was delighted to see that the next issue’s letters disagreed with Ayoob in the strongest terms, and later a jury rejected the murder charge: even a trader in contraband (I believe he was convicted on that count) has a right of self-defense.

Dave Kopel wrote on April 7:

The Boston Globe reports that gun sales in Israel are skyrocketing, “particularly since an Israeli shoe salesman used his own weapon to fatally shoot a 46-year-old Palestinian who had opened fire in a Tel Aviv restaurant March 5 and killed three Israelis. The Interior Ministry says applications for licenses have tripled during the past month, overwhelming its staff and forcing it to shift employees from other departments to handle the deluge. The Israeli government, meanwhile, has moved to ease once-tight restrictions on owning a gun . . .” More Guns, Less Terrorism.

This surprised me. I had the impression that a large fraction of Israëlis were already armed.

Sasha Volokh says “Sunday is also Take A Friend Target-Shooting Day” (responding to his brother’s having done so on Tuesday). Hear hear.

In or about 1995-6 I had this conversation:

Seth: “Is Vince there?”
Anton: “He’s not back from church yet.”
Seth: “He goes to church??”
Anton: “He goes to the target range every Sunday.”

Vince was tickled, and ever since he has spoken of “services at the shrine of Saint Ayn,” etc. One day he mentioned this running joke to one of the range safety officers, who said, “Well, the Good Book says you should make a joyful noise unto the Lord!”

The vet says Fluffie is healing nicely. Whew. But she won’t be going outside for awhile: the other cats might tease her for the shaved patch on her butt.

SatireWire | Debate Rages Over Doctor-Assisted Suicide Bombing

L’affaire du Pen provides an occasion to trot out one of my hobbyhorses.

If you mark your ballot as favoring more candidates than can be elected, your ballot will be discarded as ‘spoiled’. Why? What is illogical about saying, “I like candidates A,B,C better than candidates D,E,F”? What is the advantage in throwing that information away? Is it democratic to appoint a large faction’s first choice (no matter how despised by other factions) over everybody’s second choice?

The alternative is called ‘approval voting’. I would propose this: The candidate with the broadest approval is elected; if no candidate has 2/3 approval, the winner has reduced powers and a shorter term; if no candidate has 1/2 approval, think about whether you really want such an officer.

Hey, a blog by a law professor.
I refer of course to Eugene Volokh, who last week hung up a joint shingle with his brother Sasha, a student at Harvard. (Sasha recently made the news by organizing a gun club there, and folks said hm, is he related to Eugene? Now we know.)
I’ll be watching, just as if it did not already take me six weeks to cycle my “sites to watch” list.

E.V.’s remarks on the “I don’t know any people like that” phenomenon remind me of something that happened to me.
On a Sunday in 1996, as I blasted away at a defenseless paper target with my Ruger KP90D, a shell bounced off the wall and was caught behind my glasses, burning off a bit of skin. Next day, of course, a coworker asked what happened; once word got around, another said “I didn’t know they scatter shells about”; another asked what caliber; and yet another said, “I’m thinking of trading in my rifle; what caliber do you think I should use for elk?” —
Five years later, getting ready for a trip to Front Sight, it was the elk guy that I asked to sign for my good moral character.

And of course E.V. says exactly the right thing about nail-clippers on airplanes.