#BanTheBox: What could go wrong?

From The Governor's Twitter:

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Today I signed a law to #BanTheBox because everyone in #IL deserves a second chance when it comes to getting a job http://t.co/Ub1DGghchG
— Governor Pat Quinn (@GovernorQuinn) July 19, 2014

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Everyone in Illinois deserves a second chance when it comes to getting a job . . . and employers have no right to know (well, to ask, really) whether a job applicant has ever been convicted of a crime.

Look, I'm sympathetic to people who would like to turn things around after they've paid their debt, especially in a society where we've felonized so many things that most of us can't go more than a few days without committing one felony or other. But as Matt said the other day, the most reliable indicator of future criminal behavior is past criminal behavior. I can't see solving the problem of too few jobs for ex-cons by trying to force employers to hire more of them against their wills . . . . and I question whether this will do anything except lead more employers to be quicker to listen to "gut feelings" about applicants. How accurate will those gut feelings, as influenced by personal attitudes about race, sex, and appearance, be? Are we setting ex-cons up to get more opportunities at the expense of employers, or are we setting up law-abiding people to be judged too risky by employers who aren't allowed to ask about their histories?

A "major victory" for gun control in Illinois? Let's think that one through.

SecondCityCop has a link to the Chicago Sun-Times' giddy piece on yesterday's defeat of concealed carry in Illinois, "Conceal-Carry bill fails in House," in which the Sun-Times' Springfield Bureau Chief, Dave McKinney, calls the vote a "major win" for gun control advocates.

SCC made several great points about the article, but those are their points and I'll let you read them over there. What interested me about the article was the assertion of "a big win." I don't see it.

Let's think about where gun control advocates in Illinois used to be and where they are today. I remember a very different situation until recently. Years ago, Mayor Daley's staff would write an annual package of 10-12 severe gun control bills--one-gun-a-month, state permits for gun shops to be granted or withheld on a whim, bans on everything from "assault weapons" to .50 caliber rifles to shotguns, bans on manufacturing "assault weapons" that would have prohibited Armalite and Les Baer from even manufacturing AR-15 rifles for the military or police . . . and would have made it a felony for a police officer or a serviceman to possess his issued M4 or M16 rifle in Illinois, even on duty (that law did allow for an "affirmative defense," at least.) Gun rights advocates spent every spring and fall scrambling to defend against all these bills and often 20-30 "minor" bills. Victories for gun rights consisted of language cleverly slipped into ostensibly anti-gun bills.

Then came a different spirit. The NRA and the ISRA and Guns Save Life and the Second Amendment Sisters and CORE and the new kid, Illinoiscarry.com, began to work together and coordinate their efforts more and more. There were turf battles and misunderstandings, but people were beginning to see results, too. The annual "lobby day" was rechristened "IGOLD" and exploded, growing into an annual event in which thousands of Illinois gun owners flood into the capitol building in Springfield and lobby for their rights en masse. Then came Heller v. D.C., and too quickly to be believed, McDonald v. Chicago. It's hard for a lot of people, I think, to really call up memories of what it was like in those not-so-long-ago days, but I remember it. It was depressing. We celebrated when we had years where we didn't lose any rights; keeping the status quo was a major win for us.

Now, let's look at 2011. What has changed in the past few years? Well, we're no longer playing defense. Our side is the one demanding change now; a year in which we have to settle for the status quo is "a big win" for gun control. If we don't engineer an overwhelming victory against long odds, creating a supermajority in both the House and the Senate and then overriding a veto, it's perceived as a loss. The expectations have changed massively; people now expect David to dominate Goliath and make him like it. And what does it look like from their point of view? Luckily, I've made a list:

• First, the roles are reversed: the anti-gun side has been reduced to playing defense, and they're giddy about stopping right-to-carry legislation they used to laugh off without thinking much of it.
• Second, have you noticed what you're not hearing out of Illinois this year? No assault weapons bans, no magazine bans? They were running all those bills this year, too . . . . but they came too close to losing on RTC and decided to let them all go by the wayside so that they could spend all their time stopping RTC.
• Third . . . what did it take to make that "big win" happen? It doesn't seem like Governor Quinn's threat of a veto actually did very much, despite the hype. Legislators are talking instead about personal phone calls from Mayor Daley, who frankly still has the power to "lobby" legislators by threatening the state jobs, city jobs, county jobs, patronage and other perks they hold so dear. Of course, Daley has 10 days left as Mayor of Chicago, so unless Rahm is just as powerful from the start as Daley is after 22 years as Mayor, that's the last time they can play that particular trump.
• Fourth and finally, when the dust settles, they may very well have stopped the bill from becoming law. But we won everything but the big prize: we changed the status quo, showed that RTC is a real issue in Illinois and that it's closer to passage than anyone believed, and we're going to end up with a list of every legislator who didn't vote for the bill, along with video footage of quite a few standing up on the floor of the House telling lies in the floor debate. They're like desperate criminals who've managed to retreat into the bank vault they were trying to cut open. We can't get them immediately, but they have nowhere to go, no idea what to do, and they left their tools out here for us to use. It's a matter of time.

On the one hand, excuses don't pay the bills, and it's true that we failed to win the war yesterday. On the other hand, we've won a lot of battles this year that not everyone recognizes, and it cost the other side dearly to get that "big win" in this one battle. Governor Quinn and Speaker Madigan have thrown away whatever good will they had remaining from downstate Democrat legislators after dragging them along on civil unions, the end of the death penalty in Illinois, and a massive income tax increase (full disclosure: I'm personally all for gay marriage and taking the power of life and death out of the hands of Illinois courts, but those issues are going to be poison pills forced down the throats of those Democrat legislators from downstate districts.) Several members of the Black Caucus, especially Rep. Monique Davis, have thrown away a chance to show that they're not completely in thrall to the Democratic leadership, and some very good organizers on Chicago's south side have taken notice. They held on, but they're in big trouble.

Snuffy Pfleger suspended again? I'll believe it when I see it--again.

So the good monsignor Michael "Snuffy" Pfleger has apparently been suspended by Cardinal George . . . again. Second City Cop dared to go there with a post entitled "You're Pfired!" That kind of punning takes . . . . well, it certainly takes something.

Personally, I find that I haven't really changed my outlook since the last time Cardinal George suspended Snuffy; back in 2008 I wondered, "Seriously, Cardinal George, what does it take?"

The list hasn't changed much, because Pfleger hasn't changed much:

"Theoretically, is there an act Pfleger could commit that would shame the Catholic church and the archdiocese of Chicago enough that they'd decide to cut him loose?

• We know injecting the church into elections, thus at least theoretically jeopardizing their tax-exempt status in any just world, isn't enough.
• We know that praising bigots like Louis Farrakhan from the pulpit isn't enough.
• We know that publicly lying repeatedly in his official capacity as a priest isn't enough.
• We know that threatening to "snuff out" John Riggio wasn't enough.

So, just for my own idle curiosity, what would it take? Does he actually have to start assaulting people physicall--or would that be tolerated, too?"

It remains to be seen whether mentioning that you won't take a job in a high school is on that list, too. We'll see whether this suspension is any more "permanent" than the last one.

Second City Cop hits the "Only Ones" attitude between the eyes

Hmm . . . . Second City Cop hit a nerve with the President of the Fraternal Order of Police, and it looks like they're going to bicker in public for a bit. That would normally be something I might read about with interest, but wouldn't make the front page here . . . except that the issue they've decided to debate about is right-to-carry. Specifically, SCC noted a few days ago that the Fop is nearly the lone holdout among major law enforcement organizations. The political appointees in charge of the Chicago Police Department are opposed to the Family and Personal Protection Act, of course, and the political appointee in charge of the Illinois State Police is unlikely to go beyond keeping the ISP quiet and staying neutral on the issue, but there are four other major law enforcement organizations in this state, and they're all in favor. Why, SCC wondered, doesn't the FOP poll its members and, if they're in favor, come out in favor of right-to-carry?

FOP President Mike Shields responded that the Chicago FOP is neutral (which I hadn't realized. . . I've always considered them to be opposed to RTC, but maybe that's my mistake?) and that he saw no reason to lose focus on pensions and money and the like. The FOP, after all, is a labor union before it's anything else.

SCC isn't buying that, but I'll let them explain why:

What better way to start making a name for yourself than uniting behind something that's already legal in 48 other states and tracks with the Constitution of the FOP in being good Americans. Oh wait, you've already decided the police are better than the citizens we serve. We quote:

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"Chicago Police Officers already have that right"
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That certainly seems to run contrary to the FOP Constitution. We aren't better than the citizens we serve. We are entrusted with certain duties and privileges to ensure domestic tranquility and help preserve the rights of all citizens. Driving a wedge between the public and the police will serve to undermine your stated agenda to protect benefits, wages and pensions by alienating those whose support we need to pass legislation, but we suppose you missed that.

Well said! The rest is worth reading, especially if you find the swirling currents of Chicago PD internal politics as interesting as I do. Read the whole thing.

Linky: If the Cook County State's Attorney Pokes Her Head Out Today, Spring Is On the Way

More on today's anti-gun Chicago press conference from John Boch at The Truth About Guns.

Cook County States Attorney Anita Alvarez Press Conference: A Defining Moment?

All the major control organizations gun are gathering tomorrow (Tuesday) in Illinois. They’ll meet-up with gun violence victims and local gun control advocates like Father ”Snuffy” Pfleger—who earned his nickname by calling for the “snuffing out” of the owner of a Chicago-area gun shop. They’ll head over to the office of Cook County State Attorney Anita Alvarez. The subsequent press conference will have one collective goal: to prevent Land of Lincoln legislators from enacting a law that would give citizens the right to carry a concealed firearm . . . . The Violence Policy Center, The Brady Campaign Against Gun Violence, the Mayors Against Illegal Guns—the entire gun control movement know that this could well be do-or-die for their cause. Alvarez’s press conference reveals their desperate rush into the breach, hoping to keep concealed carry from passing one more time. At least until the next time . . . .

Interestingly, the time and place of the conference were finally released Monday, at least to invitees:

We have a confirmed location for the Press Conference against HB 148 which would allow the concealed carrying of handguns. The Violence Policy Center will be releasing National data regarding crimes committed by Concealed Carry Permit
holders and we will be calling for lawmakers to oppose this legislation.

The press conference is scheduled for Tuesday, March 28th at 10:00 AM at the Blue Room of the James R. Thomspon Center, 100 W. Randolph.

Please let me know if you are able to attend this important press conference.
Thanks.

Perhaps more interestingly, members of Illinois Carry who contacted Alvarez's office were told that SA Alvarez is not scheduled to appear at any press events today at all. Of course, there was no public information on the press conference itself at all until Monday morning, so we'll all have to wait and see how accurate that is; but it's always possible that Alvarez never intended to appear. It's also entirely possible that either she or the organizers decided that it wasn't ideal for either to have her take a leading role, since she's so far out of the mainstream. None of the groups involved, with the possible exception of the Violence Policy Center, ever willingly admit that they do or have work to "ban guns," after all, and SA Alvarez has not always been as indirect as that:



(As we all marvel at SA Alvarez's honesty in the moment, we should all take a moment to thank Kurt Hofmann, St. Louis Gun Rights Examiner, for uploading that video to Youtube and ensuring that we can always remind people of exactly what we're facing.)

Anti-gunners getting desperate in Illinois? Rumors and facts. . .

Rumor has it that the national anti-gun groups are making desperate phone calls behind the scenes and finding their usual allies in the Illinois state capitol in a state of confusion. One insider says "nobody is talking to each other." One big reason for the confusion is probably this year's campaign to pass HB0148/SB0082, shall-issue right-to-carry bills titled the "Family and Personal Protection Act." The bills on the IL General Assembly website are not the final versions, by the way, so be warned if you're going there to read up.

Anyway, we've been over my optimism about this before, so suffice it to say that I honestly think this may be the year Illinois gets shall-issue right-to-carry. Groups like the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Ownership apparently agree, because the day after thousands of gun owners flooded the state capitol for IGOLD, they hired Chris Carr from a Blagojevich-connected Chicago firm to lobby in Illinois. Obviously, none of that is rumor; it's public record. The question is, what do they think their lobbyist can say to Governor Quinn, Speaker Madigan or President Cullerton that will counteract the facts on the ground?

Yesterday, The Truth About Guns posted up a video of Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez in the infamous Chicago television appearance in which she told the host: "I believe there should be a law that says no one should have guns." That was Robert Farago's response to another sign of desperation: the rumor is that the Illinois Council Against Handgun Existence and other Illinois groups went looking for a politician willing to stand in front of the microphones for them at a major press conference early this week (Tuesday morning?) and Ms. Alvarez was the best they could find. Given the fact that every one of these groups denies that they want to ban guns, the fact that they feel obliged to go with Alvarez as their point-person on this would seem to imply that they couldn't get, for instance, House Speaker Michael Madigan, Senate President John Cullerton, or Governor Pat Quinn to be the face of resistance to right-to-carry in Illinois.

What do you suppose we should read into that?

Priceless!

SecondCityCop got a letter from a reader who was in Springfield to watch HB0148 pass out of the House committee on Tuesday:

First, the city brought the same tired old group: the mayor's aide, [...], a tired old doctor, a bishop and the CPD supe. Imagine, their surprise when the people who were for concealed carry brought in the reps from the Chicago police sergeant's organization AND the Chicago police chiefs association AND the Illinois sheriff's organization and some more guys like that. I hear that the mayor's office called the chief's org after the vote and threatened to withdraw from the assn because the chief spoke on their side!

There's more and it's excellent, but you'll have to click the link if you want to read the whole thing.

Requests and Dedications: Is it OK for the state police to give the AP a list of all legal gun owners in Illinois?

If you read Roberta X (and if you don't, you should) then you've already seen several of my words on the latest anti-gun hijinks in Illinois (Roberta took them right out of my mouth.)

I've still got a few left that she didn't think of, though, and Keith asked in comments, "Are you going to address the FOID thing?" so I suppose I have an excuse.

First, consider the problem. Essentially, the Attorney General of Illinois, Lisa Madigan, has issued a letter to the Illinois State Police directing them to release a list of the names (but not home addresses) of everyone who holds a FOID card in Illinois. The FOID card is not a carry permit, but a license to possess, own, or transfer a firearm or ammunition. Outside narrow exceptions, an Illinois citizen needs a FOID card just to possess a single round of loaded ammunition. The ISP is fighting this order by asking for an official opinion from the AG and seems ready to take the issue to court. Several bills currently in the legislature, including HB 0007, would prohibit the release of such a list in the future. In practical terms, this doesn't affect me personally, because I'm out and proud and on all the troublemaker lists you can be on in this state. I can easily imagine a lot of others, especially the two-thirds of the population who live in Chicagoland, worrying about their jobs and their relatively harassment-free lives going away in some situations. Some of my other friends who try to "fly under the radar" as gun owners in their neighborhoods to avoid taking chances with thieves are now imagining their names in the newspapers as "gun owners." Chances are, though, that HB 0007 is going to would pass with a large majority after the firestorm they've created here, if it hadn't mysteriously been bottled up in a committee. Few people seem to realize that the Illinois Legislature is dominated by votes ranging from pro-gun to moderate on guns. Year after year, the other side introduces packages of anti-gun bills which go down to defeat, and most pro-gun bills short of repealing the FOID or creating right-to-carry pass.

If all that's true (and I think it still surprises even a lot of Illinois gun-rights activists to look at the legislature that way) then why doesn't right-to-carry pass? The answer is that Illinois has nearly all-powerful legislative leaders. Mike Madigan rules the House with an iron fist, and John Cullerton inherited a near-dictatorship in the Senate from Emil Jones. Right-to-carry would pass the Illinois House and Senate in a heartbeat without that power; Cullerton, like Jones before him, bottles up RTC bills in unfriendly committees and prevents floor votes entirely. Mike Madigan simply rules that RTC would affect home rule (another quirk of Illinois is that we have thousands of home-rule cities; it's not just Chicago) and therefore require SUPER majorities. In other words, everyone including Madigan knows, whether they acknowledge it or not, that there are clear pro-gun majorities in both houses of the Illinois legislature. Illinois readers will probably recall that the Attorney General mentioned above is Lisa Madigan, the daughter of the aforementioned Mike Madigan.

Now we consider one more question: why now? Why did Lisa Madigan decide that now is the time to make a push to join the ranks of the newspapers and state governments that have been pilloried over the years for publishing lists of CCW holders nationwide? I tend to agree with Thirdpower at Days of Our Trailers: this is a case of "Wagging the Madigan." The idea here is almost certainly to create a new controversy over gun control, one where the other side has at least some of the initiative. That's necessary because shall-issue right-to-carry legislation is gaining ground every day; Madigan's super-majority strategy could be overwhelmed this year by simply meeting his requirement, and some sources have been reporting rumors that Cullerton and even Governor Quinn have been feeling a lot of pressure to move. RTC is clearly coming in Illinois, so their three choices are to jump on the bandwagon, get run over by the bandwagon, or set the old warehouse district on fire and hope everybody has to jump off the bandwagon to pass buckets. It seems they chose the third. The problem for them is that this is an obnoxious and dangerous strategy that's already pissing off all the wrong people. They may be able to do some harm with it to a lot of innocent folks who didn't volunteer to be game pieces, but I don't believe they themselves have that much to gain. RTC is not going away, if that's what they were hoping. It's a genuine grassroots movement with no rent-a-crowds or astroturf involved . . . . just distracting the public and waiting for the furor to die down is not going to work. I attended the funeral a couple of months ago of a man who fought like a lion for RTC; we called him "Ol' Coach," but his real name was Gene Martin. Gene's fear was that he wouldn't live to see RTC pass, and his frustration came out in angry words from time to time. He was right, as it turns out, but if anyone thinks his friends will move on to something else if they wave a few distractions around, they've misjudged.

Tomorrow, at 2 p.m., there will be a committee hearing on shall-issue right-to-carry (The Family and Personal Protection Act, HB0148) at the Illinois state capitol. The bill will pass out of the committee; the important thing tomorrow will be the testimony and the press coverage. I've already been contacted by local TV news about this, so I know at least some are paying attention. Will they drop that attention to rush off and get quotes from Lisa Madigan about her Wag-the-Madigan scheme? I doubt it.

Then, on Thursday at 10:30 a.m. in the Prairie Capital Convention Center in Springfield, the doors will open for IGOLD. Thousands of gun owners will take the day off work and pay their way to the capital to spend the day marching, demonstrating, and meeting with their legislators. We will rally in the Convention Center, and we will march across town (the streets are closed by the Springfield Police.) We will meet and rally again in front of the capitol . . . . but we will also pour into the capitol by the thousands and meet individually with our representatives.

The problem, if you're Lisa Madigan or Mike Madigan or John Cullerton or Pat Quinn, is how to create a big enough distraction to stop a bandwagon that big. Ignoring the problem for the past few years has not made it go away. These people are hearing footsteps; shall-issue right-to-carry is coming. The only thing they really control in this fight now is how long it takes and how much credit or blame they get when the shouting is over.

Since I'm Posting Again, Let's Watch Mike Huckabee Bow Out Gracelessly

I once had a very uncomfortable couple of minutes in an ambulance late at night. It wasn't that time on the backboard--that happened in the morning--but the time that I gave my honest thoughts on Mike Huckabee's campaign for President. Frankly, I was not complimentary. It turned out that my partner that night knows Governor Huckabee as "Brother Mike." Brother Mike was his pastor in Arkansas, and he has lots of folksy memories of church and church camp and the time he gave Brother Mike's son an attitude adjustment by slamming him down on a pool table.

Oops.

And speaking of oops . . . .

According to Michael Shear in the New York Times, Brother Mike Huckabee picked this week to wonder on air whether Barack Obama was really born in Hawaii. He doubled down on this strategy by mentioning that President Obama grew up in Kenya. The chief drawback of that approach was that it isn't true, and even the birthiest Birthers don't actually allege that it's true, so it was probably just misspoken.

In any case, maybe I'll get to see whether one of my pet theories pans out. Although I was far from the first or only to propose it, I believe it's likely that President Obama decided long ago that the Birth Certificate Controversy (tm) hurt its proponents more than it hurt him. I believe he has deliberately refused to settle the matter definitively by releasing his long-form birth certificate or any other evidence (which I believe do exist and can be released whenever he chooses.) I believe that he's doing all this in order to keep the controversy as high as possible and tempt prospective political challengers to try to use it. And I believe that when the controversy cools or when big enough Republican fish have taken the bait and committed themselves to the Way of the Birther, the President plans to pull the rug out very publicly.

In short, anyone who is still talking about the President's birth certificate is being given enough rope to hang himself, and Brother Mike has just stuck his neck into the noose. It's all fun and games until the President opens the trap door.

Mayor Daley Pleads In Vain for Gun Control Questions at Chicago Press Conference

(Sorry, the video absolutely refuses to embed for some reason. It's worth clicking, believe me.)

This was edited down to a short bit of Mayor Daley appealing "Just one question?!? Please?" in the report that went out on air. But this raw excerpt shows so much more: Mayor Daley is holding a joint press conference with Representative Mike Quigley, D-Chicago 5th, the heir to the throne previously warmed by the butts of Rahm Emanuel, Rod Blagojevich and Dan "Rosty" Rostenkowski. The duo were presenting a petition demanding that Congress "Fix Gun Checks" by requiring background checks on every single firearm purchase nationwide . . . in other words, the complete prohibition of private sales. But that's not the really interesting part, nor is it Rep. Quigley's charming talking point, "With a 30-round clip, you're hunting people and that's all there is to it!"

No, the interesting part was Mayor Daley's near-meltdown as he realized that the reporters present didn't care about his anti-gun initiative and had really only shown up to pepper him with questions about their new leader, Lord Mayor Twinkletoes. He began asking for questions "about gun violence," then asking more forcefully, and ended up nearly pleading for someone, anyone, to tee up a gun control softball like the old days. Finally one reporter offered to ask a question about guns, and Da Mare was visibly relieved.

And then the reporter asked what he thought about the momentum in favor of right-to-carry legislation in Illinois this year.

Da Mare lost it at that point and went Full Daley. The furious squeaking of serial rhetorical questions was a sight to behold. It could not be clearer that Da Mare has no idea where the public is on this issue.

In case anyone wonders, I now present my own answers to Da Mare's rhetorical questions:

"Do you think in your community somebody should carry a concealed weapon?"
Yes.

"To your synagogue?"
If we had one, sure.

"To your daughter's school?"
Yes.

"Should they go to a park?"
Everybody should go to a park. Parks are nice.

"All out there, can anybody carry a gun where you live?"
No, but it's coming, and you and yours don't have enough dirty tricks left to stop it.

"Do you think that's the right thing to do?"
Yes, it is.

"Do you think America should be proud?"
Yes, I do.

"Welcome to America, carry a gun?"
Yes, although I don't mind if you want to limit that to law-abiding residents for now.

"I mean, if this should, you should be outraged about this!"
I thank you for your opinion.

"You're a journalist, you're a reporter!"
Well, one dabbles . . . sweet of you to say, though.

"You have a right to write anything!"
That's true. For instance, mustache ice cream is shorty-sicle elephant parade!

"This ought to be a headline, i-i-i-i-i-in your newspaper, asking people to appeal for common-sense gun laws."
On the Opinion page, of course. Right? I mean . . . that's what you meant, right, sir?

"I mean, not Mayor Daley, not Mayor Daley, this is their fight behind me, this is not Mayor Daley's fight, or Representative Quigley's . . . . . ."
That's the thing, Mayor. You are shedding allies for a reason; this is increasingly your fight. The public doesn't see this issue your way anymore, and you don't have the grip you once had on government or, clearly, media to steer public opinion for you. You would have to do a lot better than these tantrums from now on . . . . if you stay in the game.

There's only one way to "make the Constitution relevant to modern society," Professor!

Over at the Chicago Gun Rights Examiner, I notice that Professor Emeritus of History at Northwestern University, Dr. Thomas William Heyck (who specializes in the study of "radical" British politicians of the last two centuries) seems poised to propose an amendment to Article V of the Constitution of these United States. His might read:

"The law professors of the United States, whenever a majority of celebrities, actors, lobbyists, and pundits shall deem it necessary, shall propose new nuances and understandings of the words in this Constitution, which shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by word or implication by a minority of Justices of the Supreme Court. Should two minorities of Justices with conflicting interpretations emerge, the Chief Justice shall contact Dr. Thomas William Heyck, Professor Emeritus of History at Northwestern University, by whatever means he or she considers best; and Dr. Heyck shall settle the issue by fiat."

Read the whole thing and tell your friends, OK?

And if you want other viewpoints, check out Sebastian's take on the same op-ed over at Snowflakes in Hell, or visit IllinoisCarry.org and talk it over.

Right-to-Carry Town Hall Meeting . . . in Chicago!

Tomorrow night, the UTATU Collective (a student service group at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago) will host a Right-to-Carry informational town-hall meeting at the Carruthers Center for Inner-City Studies near the corner of Oakwood and Langley, just a few blocks off the lake on the south side of Chicago.

That's right, Chicago. And the night after that, there'll be an identical meeting in Elmhurst, IL--one of the most putatively anti-gun of the Chicago suburbs.

All the recent focus on McDonald v. Chicago has tended to take some focus off the very real political changes in Illinois regarding right-to-carry. Five or ten years ago I would have laughed at the idea of putting on a meeting like this one. Tomorrow I expect it to be packed.

I'm planning to make the drive; I've laid in a supply of audiobooks so I can take off after work tomorrow, zoom up to Chicago listening to Pale Horse Coming by Stephen Hunter and then slog back home listening to The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark by the late, great Carl Sagan. Thursday morning is going to suck. There was a time when I could drive eight hours in a night, roll into home at one or two in the morning, and be raring to go in the morning . . . . but that was before I got old.

Overheard in a bar . . .

. . . . down the street from the Illinois Capitol in Springfield:

Veteran Politico: "Okay, tell me how you win Mcdonald. How do you lay out the argument that wins Mcdonald for you?"
Chicago City Attorney: "Honestly? I don't see any way."

Hearing a Chicago attorney admit they're likely to lose McDonald v. Chicago in a big way is like hearing your wife say she loves you. Sure, it's nothing new, and maybe she thinks it should go without saying, but it's still nice to hear it out loud.

IL Gubernatorial primary election goes crazy, punches horse, drinks aftershave

Seriously, it's crazy here. Crazy awesome.

The short version: There were two mildly anti-gun Democrats running for Governor of IL, and they tore each other up, ending up about 7,000 votes apart. Their race is probably over, but it was fun while it lasted, featuring Democrat gems like accusations of racism from both sides over the Dan Hynes ad that featured former Chicago Mayor Harold Washington explaining why he fired Governor Quinn from Chicago city government in the 1980s. Why is that racist? Well, it's old video! Harold Washington is dead!
Still not racist? Well, Harold Washington was black, and it's either racist to feature a dead black man in your commercial (even if he was a unique authority on your opponent and no one disputes that his comments are being used in context) or it's racist to criticize a commercial with a dead black man in it . . . . depending on which side you want to win.
Anyway, the spectacle last night was fantastic, with Quinn declaring victory at about the same time Quinn was vowing to fight on "until tomorrow," perhaps unaware that it had already been "tomorrow" for about half an hour by that time.

In the GOP race, everyone knew that it would come down to a showdown between Kirk Dillard, Andy McKenna and Jim Ryan (Dillard is the only pro-gun candidate in that troika.) Fiery Tea Party newcomer Adam Andrzejewski (An-jee-EFF-ski) was considered a possible spoiler, having lots and lots of Facebook fans and having gotten a late mention from Rush Limbaugh himself (tranquilizers be upon him.) But someone forgot to tell Bill Brady, the only candidate other than Dillard with a pro-gun voting record (arguably a stronger record than Dillard's, but not by much.) At the moment, as the candidates are sitting down to the GOP's "Unity Breakfast," Brady and Dillard are locked in a virtual tie for first place. With 97 precincts still unreported, Brady holds a lead of 503 votes. It's anybody's ball game, and a recount is almost guaranteed, but for Illinois gun owners this is a battle between a great candidate and a splendid candidate.

Cook 911 from CA69, we are 10-76 to City Hall at this time . . . .

. . . . for a report of a burst forehead vein in the Mayor's Office . . . . . (no, I've never run in Chicago, I have no idea whether they're dispatched by 911 or their hospitals or the CFD or what, nor do I know whether any of them have the call sign "CA69.")

So, Daley's had kind of a weird week. Despite Tamara's lack of confidence in Shortshanks' clout, he threw enough weight to get President Obama to fly to Denmark in an unprecedented Presidential lobbying campaign for the Chicago Olympics. Yay Shortshanks.

But now the Supreme Court is stepping in to decide whether the 2nd Amendment should be incorporated to apply against the states and local governments, such as Chicago and Illinois, and most legal experts predict that this is like having Michael Jordan offer to settle your bet that no one can dunk from the free-throw line. You're not just about to lose, you're about to become the sad part of a highlight reel.

Supreme Court will decide whether 2nd Amendment protects Chicago gun rights

The Chicago Gun Rights Examiner has weighed in, of course, and I'm working on talking to the plaintiffs in the case, though of course they have to take their lawyers' advice as regards public statements.

Run, Roland, Run!

Roland Burris (D-Blagojevich) explains why he voted in favor of ACORN's federal funding (one of only 7 Senators to do so, along with Dick Durbin (D-Daley household.) Whatever you think of his vote in favor of underage prostitution's tax advantages, you have to admire his steadfast refusal to break into an actual sprint on camera.


Heeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoeheeltoe . . . . ! Maybe there's room for a racewalk championship on that tombstone.

Tomorrow . . . Chicago

It's dark out there, but it's time to go clean out my car so I can drive to Chicago in the morning. I'll be heading out at about 4:00 a.m. to make it in time to get started at the 2nd Amendment Legal Symposium 2009, sponsored by the NRA Foundation and the Federalist Society of Chicago.

If you're near enough and you get the urge to stop in, click on that link for all the details, but here's the important one to remember: everything from breakfast to admission to materials is free, so just register and show up and you're good to go.

Chicago GRE: Arne Duncan has a record of exploiting school children

Although I disagree with those who are urging parents to keep their kids home tomorrow, I can't help but notice that they're being labeled as paranoid racists by Obama supporters, who seem to take it for granted that of course President Obama* would never indoctrinate or exploit school children to advance his political agenda--the thought itself is monstrous! But President Obama chose a Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, with a history of organizing massive (and massively expensive) political rallies of Chicago public school students paid for with Chicago public school funds. I cannot for the life of me understand why this record hasn't become a bigger part of the public debate over the proposed speech to school students, unless people simply don't realize it exists.

In June 2008, for instance, the Chicago public school district used over 1200 buses and drivers to bus a reported 30,000 students from all over the city to Soldier Field, where they were allowed to watch a free performance by area musicians like rapper "Ben One." The catch? The performance was part of a political rally. The students had to sit through speeches by Arne Duncan, Richard Daley and Jesse Jackson, and these weren't innocuous pep talks about staying in school.

The man who was in charge of that mess is now the head of education for the federal government, and there's nothing particularly paranoid or racist about pointing it out. Click the big blue button to read the whole thing, and if you like it, please take a moment to pass it on or vote on Digg, Windycitizen.com or Reddit.

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Meanwhile, David Codrea, Gun Rights Examiner, asks "Can ATF be reformed?"
He's not talking about recycling transmission fluid, but questioning the wisdom of an effort to "reform" the BATFE by legislation. I would add the question: "If the ATF can't be reformed, but it can't be abolished at present, is it worth it to pursue partial reforms, even knowing they won't really solve the problem? David's last piece covered the return of Carolyn McCarthy's "No Fly, No Buy" bill, which would bar anyone placed on the naughty list by the government from purchasing firearms. That's a big step to take based on a list you can be placed on without due process or even a reason given!

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* Seeing the President of the United States referred to as "Mr. Obama" or "Mr. Bush" in the press irritates me. Maybe it says in some style manual that the President is referred to as "Mister," but screw that.

In all the furor over Obama's school speech, why is nobody talking about this?

This is just a short note; I'll do a full Chicago Gun Rights Examiner piece on this tonight after the Sangamon County Rifle Association meets.

I've been pretty quiet about Obama's address to students. On the one hand, I do think a lot of people are investing way too much fury and emotion in this, because Obama now realizes that people don't trust him to talk to school kids, and I'm guessing he'll deliver a completely apolitical speech that will leave everyone who panicked looking silly.But I've been surprised at what I haven't heard anyone talk about: Arne Duncan, Barack Obama's Secretary of Education, and Chicago. If you wanted a reason to be worried about Barack Obama addressing schoolchildren in school, Arne Duncan would be the best one. Duncan spent years as the Superintendent of Chicago public schools, and I talked about his record of using Chicago public school students, buses, money and school days to hold political rallies and stump for legislation, both in Chicago and Springfield:

Use . . . your children well
"As a school teacher, I wanted to write an angry rant about this, but what can I say that would embarrass people who haven't resigned after finding out that 49% of their students drop out before graduation? Arne Duncan is a fool, but he doesn't seem to mind being a fool. He appears to have embraced his inner fool, if you will. Chicago's schools have been giving kids the day off from school on the condition that they accept a free bus ride to an anti-gun protest (and protest on the desired side, of course) for years. Now they're going to bus them down to Springfield, on a school day, for the same purpose. . . . "

I can't believe this hasn't been widely discussed--if people were calling me a paranoid, crazy racist for thinking Barack Obama might try to score political points using school children, I'd want to know their opinion of Obama's Secretary of Education using his district budget to pay for busing students 175 miles to the state capital to demand money for his schools . . . to say nothing of gun control laws. I couldn't believe people weren't outraged at the time . . . but that's where we are, I suppose.

"The Chicago Way: Students are political pawns"
Well, they did it. They bused in CPS students--the original article said 1,200 district buses would be used--to fill Soldier Field. They hired a rapper from Chicago (Ben One--never heard of him) and painted empty chairs to sit at midfield and stand for the 26 "CPS students" who've been killed this year, because as everyone knows, those people were killed by a lack of state funds and state-level gun control. Then they lined up Mayor Daley, Jesse Jackson, and the all the usual suspects (including Arne Duncan, the CPS Superintendent) and let them harangue the captive audience.
In this case, the students have the power to come together and speak out--but only as long as they stay on Daley's carefully-scripted message. More state money for a district that spends money hiring rappers for rallies for more state money. More gun-control laws to cure violence in the city with the strictest gun control laws in the nation (well, after Heller v. D.C. is decided) and the highest rates of violence to go with it.
Go along with this program, use your political power in approved ways, and you get a free bus ride to Soldier Field to listen to minor music stars--as long as you look respectful during the political harangues.

It just doesn't make sense to me that nobody seems to be making this connection.

Help Pro-Gun Activists at the African Festival in Chicago

Illinois Carry is at it again, this time going back into Chicago to spread a pro-gun message at the African Festival of the Arts in Washington Park. The idea here is to get past the gun show and the NRA banquet and start talking to people who aren't getting this message anywhere else. It's a direct challenge to Da Mayor, the Tribune, and the 6 O'Clock News.

If you like the idea of breaking stereotypes, there are two easy ways to help. First, if you live in the Chicago area, consider volunteering your own time to talk to people this weekend; local Chicago grassroots activists have stepped up to take over more and more of the local Chicago events, but more are always welcome. If you can't make it, or you simply live too far away, Illinois Carry is still accepting donations to pay for printing and booth rental. Unlike anti-gun groups who can count on the Joyce Foundation for easy money, pro-gun groups in Illinois operate on shoestring budgets, so donations are always welcome.

I'm not kidding about the donations, folks. There's no one making a salary at Illinois Carry; all the group's projects are funded by passing a hat in its forums. If you can spare a few dollars, you can have a big impact. These local Chicago projects are beginning to be taken over from the usual Illinois Carry suspects by local Chicago activists working in their own neighborhoods. In short, we may be seeing the beginning of a movement.

Meanwhile:

• David Codrea fails to be happy that the most important woman in the world, Kate Gosselin, shot a gun on a TV show: Gunning for Jon & Kate Plus 8
• Daniel White reports on a case in which a felon had his gun rights restored--twice:
  Court restores gun rights to felon, some worry about precedent set
• Dave Workman takes on the thorny issue of restoring rights in general: Should felons' gun rights be restored . . . ever?
• Gene German continues to document gun rights on the march in Wisconsin: Illegal local ordinances defeated
  

More from Gun Rights Examiners

Atlanta: Ed Stone | Austin: Howard Nemerov | Boston: Ron Bokleman | Charlotte: Paul Valone | Chicago: Don Gwinn | Cleveland: Daniel White | DC: Mike Stollenwerk | Denver: Dan Bidstrup | Grand Rapids: Skip Coryel | Los Angeles: John Longenecker | Minneapolis: John Pierce | National: David Codrea | Seattle: Dave Workman | St. Louis: Kurt Hofmann | Wisconsin: Gene German