Open Carry in DC: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

A federal judge ruled that the ban on citizens carrying handguns in public in the US capital is unconstitutional.

In a 19-page opinion, Judge Frederick Scullin ruled on Saturday that “there is no longer any basis on which this Court can conclude that the District of Columbia’s total ban on the public carrying of ready-to-use handguns outside the home is constitutional under any level of scrutiny.

I take it that in DC one still can’t openly carry assault weapons to shop at Home Deport or stand in line at family fast-food restaurants, so where’s the fun? But while I don’t want to see anybody shot — seriously, not even Darrell Issa — something in me wishes the beltway politicians did have to mingle with random citizens they don’t know personally who are openly armed with big, scary weapons.

Long range, high caliber weapons. Clearly visible. Carried by strangers who may or may not be sane and who may or may not like you. How does that feel, Mr. Big Shot Politician?

One suspects some of them might rethink their positions on 2nd Amendment issues. Or else they will openly display what weenies they really are by writing some kind of special rule that provides open carry can be banned in D.C. but nowhere else.

17 thoughts on “Open Carry in DC: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

  1. First we’ll have to change the name from DC, to DS – District of Somalia.

    This country is nucking futs!

  2. Pingback: Judge issues smackdown gun ruling against Washington » Musings of the Angry Webmaster

  3. And the guys carrying these things are not staffers or other lawyerly lobbyist types. Most of them look like they just got back from summer camp at the Cliven Bundy Ranch and Spa. This’ll do it; get some black men to walk around with open carried weapons, watch how quickly the 2nd Amendment goes from being an absolutist document to being something that can be negotiated.

  4. Well, of course. If you need assault rifles to resist government tyranny, the most logical place to do that is in the capital.

  5. OT, what happens when a state gets behind ACA – College Campuses are Fertile Ground for Promoting Obamacare:

    Much has been made of the need to enroll “young invincibles” under the Affordable Care Act. These are young adults who, according to many, are often uninsured because they think they don’t need insurance. They are also critically important to the success of the ACA. Without their participation, state and national insurance pools in the new marketplaces such as Covered California will be older, sicker and costlier. Insurance premiums will be higher.

    Given this challenge, there is very good news from California. A California State University project has enrolled young adults — specifically, students on CSU campuses — at an impressive rate, and offers a model that can be exported to other university systems…

    …The results surprised even the most optimistic of project organizers. During the open enrollment period of October 2013-April 15, 2014, the number of uninsured students on the 15 campuses dropped from about 25-30% to just 10% — an unprecedented figure for a young, low-income population. Just as startling was the reduction in the percentage of uninsured Latino students, from more than 40% to 13%. And one-third of students reported that at least one family member signed up for insurance…

    …those interested in enrolling large numbers of young and healthy individuals should look to colleges and university systems, especially public systems — including community colleges — with large numbers of low-income students. Rather than being among the hardest groups to enroll, these students may be the low-hanging fruit of enrollment projects.

    Given their ages and lower incomes, many students in these institutions are uninsured. With systemwide and campus support, they are easy to reach in their classrooms and via email. They mostly trust their peers, faculty and university administrators. They talk to each other and to family members (45% of CSU students polled after open enrollment reported discussing insurance with family members), so reaching one reaches many. They are also tech savvy and not intimidated by online enrollment. Most have applied for financial aid and already have the data they need for application purposes.

  6. “public carrying of ready-to-use handguns ”

    Curious language, why not just loaded handguns? I don’t have a problem with this, if us regular folk out here in the heartland have to put up with heavily armed tea-tards in public then I say the tea-tard politicians in DC feel should feel the same intimidation. Why shouldn’t a well-armed patriot be able to get up close and personal to someone like say Ted (Canadian anchor baby) Cruz to offer some face to face small government pro-gun counseling?

  7. Get some black men to walk around with open carried weapons, watch how quickly the 2nd Amendment goes from being an absolutist document to being something that can be negotiated.

    My thought exactly!

  8. I watch the issue of firearms legislation and I marvel at the stupidity of democrats. Three out of four polled by Gallup do not support a ban on guns – all the proposed legislation (that I know of) doesn’t attempt to ban guns. So what? The NRA has successfully bamboozled millions of sane responsible gun owners into thinking that libruls are scheming to take and burn their precious (spoken like Gollum… my precious) guns. Nothing.. and I mean nothing is going to get done on gun reform until the NRA big lie is put to rest.

    The discussion has to define a clear and unequivocal affirmation of individual rights to keep and bear arms for sport and self-defense. The affirmation has to guarantee that there will not be lists of guns and gun-owners maintained for purposes of confiscation. Liberal gun owners (politicians and celebrities) are going to have to come out of the woodwork with pictures of them and their guns. The message has to be – ‘We believe in YOUR rights, because we share your values.” This could take years, and it would not advance the cause of sane regulation one inch – UNTIL mainstream voters are convinced that sane regulation won’t eventually take their guns.

    There’s a conservative counterpoint to this in the issue of immigration reform. The GOP is screwed on the Hispanic vote as long as they are perceived as hostile to non-white voters. The Latino voter is not automatically liberal, but as long as the GOP is perceived as a lynch mob out to drive all dark complexions out of the US, they can’t even START to make progress on issues which conservative Latinos might agree with. Same deal here – the NRA has successfully painted us out as out to confiscate and prohibit. The image has to die in the mind of the moderate shooter before any legislative progress can be made.

    Discredit the NRA noise machine and you can start to ask questions about the issue of capacity (how many rounds can a clip hold) required training (my personal favorite solution) how many rounds can an open-carry weapon legally hold. (IMO, if you can’t hit what you are shooting at in 5 rounds, use the 6th to shoot yourself.) How do you tighten up purchase standards to make it harder to obtain weapons if you should not have them without stepping on the rights of those who can legally own? What about undoing the ‘stand your ground” lunacy?

    But first – you have to put away the big lie. Millions of people who should know better are at least half convinced. Those of us who know it’s crap haven’t identified the big lie as the main obstacle.

  9. I don’t get it with these gun nuts. Seems to me that if I lived in such a threating environment that I needed to walk around with an assault weapon slung over my shoulder than I would just move to a place where the danger level would allow me to conduct my life without the need to be armed.
    Maybe some place like Mayberry or Mt. Pleasant. I’m sure there must be some idyllic little enclave some where in the United States where crime and tyranny haven’t yet taken hold and they can find there the safety they so desperately seek.
    Sometimes I think these gun nuts are like adolescents who are screaming for attention to be recognized as mature adults thinking that the empowerment they feel in displaying a gun somehow gives them a stature that is normally achieved through maturity.
    I remember being in the 7th grade and getting my first big hickey. I was so proud of my hickey that I strutted through the hallways of the school displaying it like a badge of honor. It was a case of… look at me!.. I’m cool, I’m sexually active.. everybody look at me. I’m it, I’m somebody. I see that same emotional dynamic with these gun totting idiots who are employing the same emotional tactic with a gun that I employed with my hickey. Except I was a young male in the 7th grade. What’s their excuse?

    • Sometimes I think these gun nuts are like adolescents who are screaming for attention to be recognized as mature adults thinking that the empowerment they feel in displaying a gun somehow gives them a stature that is normally achieved through maturity.

      Not so much as “mature adults” but as “real white men,” I think. Otherwise, yeah.

  10. Their excuse is that they are threatened by groups coming to power or achieving equality – groups they used to have control of. (Or thought they did) Gay men – vocal women – people of color. The natural order as they see it puts them in control. That control is slipping away so they want to assert themselves as powerful.

    The statement “I could kill you.” is implicit in open carry. What I’d like to see become an implicit counter-threat is an unofficial open-season in federal prisons for white gun offenders. Let it become known that males of color in prison lacking the female companionship which gives them some relief will find it with sweet white males who strutted their stuff with guns. These clowns who crave insurrection should pay a high price in jail. (I admit I am not a nice person.)

  11. Wow, Swami, seventh grade? I don’t think I even knew what a hickey was until much later. I would have chalked it up to a bizarre tetherball accident or something.

    We have open carry here in NC. In twenty years, I have seen only one open person with a gun. It was a semi-automatic and it was outside the city limits. He was ahead of me in line at my favorite Mexican grocery store. He struck up a conversation with me, and seemed to be at least, putting on a non threatening front. But, it was still off putting. I am six feet two and he had a few inches of height on me, and had the look of a professional wrestler. No one in their right mind would single him out as victim material. So, I assume he was just trying to be a goodwill ambassador for open carry, if such a thing exists.

    None of people who run the store found it remarkable. I was one of their first “Anglo” customers and if they have a question about American culture, they’ll ask me about it. Maybe open carry is normal in Mexico.

    I am not a veteran and my gun safety training stopped when I was a Boy Scout. But, I know the important rules and I follow them absolutely whenever I am around a gun. Some of the “second amendment community” people I encounter on line talk about their “training” as if it would prepare them to face an encounter with a mass murder in progress. I can’t see this as anything but, magical thinking.

    When I try to visualize a time when this madness will end, I don’t have much hope for the near term. But, I think laws against “brandishing” which are already in place, hold some promise. I saw a photo of a group of AR-15(?) aficionados demonstrating their Second Amendment rights in Texas. At the head was a woman who held her weapon in kind of a “port arms” position with the muzzle lowered, as a hunter might do. (Some of you that have served in the armed forces, please correct me if I am wrong.) This is a position that is inherently threatening, and meant to be. It is the position of a guard on alert. She should have been cited for “brandishing,” and slapped with a heavy fine.

    Any time a gun is “accidentally” fired in a public place, it should be cited for what it is, reckless endangerment. If the “unintentionally” fired round does some damage, especially to an innocent bystander, the person who fired the round should be personally liable for all damages, even if it takes their last penny.

    I wonder what the Venn diagrams would look like for people who find places like our little town, which IS a lot like “Mayberry,” too threatening to walk through without artillery, and those who refuse to believe that the young people from Guatemala and Honduras could possibly be refugees, fleeing from violence.

  12. Come on, open carry of properly holstered handguns is legal in 45 states if you include California, a rural only open carry state. Moreover, 30 states generally require no license to open carry. Open carry is common in the public square and in public meetings across the USA. Learn more at OpenCarry.org. And carry on!

    • Moreover, 30 states generally require no license to open carry.

      I should compile a list so I know not to go there.

  13. Here’s an interesting take on what people can do when guys with guns walk into an establishment – leave immediately without paying:
    http://crooksandliars.com/2014/07/watch-professors-amazing-idea-dealing-open

    Getting out from a potentially dangerous position is more important than paying your bill.

    I hate to do that to the workers and servers, but if the local governments lack the will, maybe businesses can make them see reason.

    I’d add, let the gun-loons pay for the abandoned food and drink. And remind them ‘the price of liberty is not cheap!’

    Either that, or if I was an owner, I’d send the bill to my town’s politicians, or local state legislator.

  14. “One open person with a gun” — I guess I meant, one person carry a gun openly or something like that. Luckily I am not planning to operate any heavy equipment.

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