Militia

I am having a problem following the logic of gun toters explaining why they should bear arms. Here's what I see when I read the Second Amendment: "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. " What is meant by "a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state?" It seems to me that all of you folks should belong to a state-regulated militia and attend militia meetings every Saturday.

On this morning 200 years ago, a plucky Irish immigrant, John O'Neill, matched wits with British Adm. Sir George Cockburn, a veteran sea dog in command of a fleet of 19 vessels that sailed into Havre de Grace during the War of 1812. O'Neill was born in Ireland in 1768 and immigrated to America in 1786. After serving under Gen. Henry "Light-Horse Harry" Lee, helping to put an end to the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania in 1794, he settled in Havre de Grace, then a small Upper Chesapeake Bay village with about 60 wooden houses.

It is clear from the Second Amendment that the actual purpose of ensuring the availability of firearms is to permit the state to maintain a "well regulated militia" - not a loose rabble of gun owners who might decide to form one when they deem it necessary, and certainly not some private militia with its own agenda that may not be consistent with the will of the people. It seems that any attempt at effective gun control is immediately opposed by those purporting to be willing to volunteer as state militia troops.

It is clear from the Second Amendment that the actual purpose of ensuring the availability of firearms is to permit the state to maintain a "well regulated militia" - not a loose rabble of gun owners who might decide to form one when they deem it necessary, and certainly not some private militia with its own agenda that may not be consistent with the will of the people. It seems that any attempt at effective gun control is immediately opposed by those purporting to be willing to volunteer as state militia troops.

The Grand Militia Muster at Historic St. Mary's City Oct. 22-23 brings 17th-century re-enactment units from all over the East Coast. The units, which include groups representing the English Civil War and the James Fort Militia, will show their skills in pike drill, crossbow, swordplay and camp cooking on Governor's Field.Admission is $6.50 for adults; $6 for seniors and students 13 to 18; $3.25 for ages 6 to 12. Historic St. Mary's City is on Route 5 in Southern Maryland. Call (301) 862-0990.

Far from running and hiding, several citizen militia groups across the country are capitalizing on their new-found notoriety, responding to a deluge of calls and letters they claim to have received and encouraging sympathetic Americans to join up.For every few members the militia movement may have lost because of publicity surrounding the Oklahoma City bombing, it has gained twice as many more supporters, militia spokesmen from Montana to Florida contend.People...

When a deadly explosion ripped through a federal building in Oklahoma City on Wednesday, among those to condemn the "savage act of terrorism" was the commander of the Michigan Militia Corps. Yesterday, Brig. Gen. Norman E. Olson and his organization were under attack.The suspects arrested in the Oklahoma City bombing have been linked in media reports to a citizen militia in Michigan. And Mr. Olson's Michigan Militia Corps, among the most vocal and public of the citizen militia groups in the country, has been besieged with telephone calls ever since.

RED LION, Pa. -- WINB is off the air, indirectly another casualty of the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City.The shortwave station in York County, which for years broadcast a mixture of Bible shows, religious evangelism and country music, was shut down by its owner, John H. Norris, who said that the man he hired in January to run it, Jeffrey A. Baker, was giving air time to firebrand militia leaders.Among them were Mark Koernke head of the Michigan Militia, recently taken off the air in Nashville, Tenn.

ATLANTA -- More than 30 of the nation's most radical right-wing militias and an Idaho-based neo-Nazi group with a history of violence have simultaneously launched intelligence-gathering operations aimed at government agencies, civil rights organizations and the media, according to a civil rights organization.The move, coming on the heels of the April 19 Oklahoma City bombing, has alarmed experts who monitor the radical right. They say they fear that a coordinated intelligence network could lay the groundwork for a "jihad"-style campaign of terror directed at individuals and agencies seen as enemies by the groups.

WASHINGTON -- In Northern California, county recorder Karen Mathews was beaten, slashed with a knife and had a gun pressed to her head after she refused to accept bogus legal filings from local tax protesters.In western Montana, municipal Judge Martha Bethel learned someone had planted a pipe bomb in a highway culvert on her route to work after she refused to dismiss traffic tickets against a local militia member.Last month, Judge Bethel said, federal officials told her a contract had been issued "for my murder."

I am having a problem following the logic of gun toters explaining why they should bear arms. Here's what I see when I read the Second Amendment: "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. " What is meant by "a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state?" It seems to me that all of you folks should belong to a state-regulated militia and attend militia meetings every Saturday.

I received a note a couple of days ago from a gentleman concerned about the placement of commas in the various drafts of the Second Amendment. And today, at The New Yorker , Jeffrey Toobin writes that "the text of the amendment is divided into two clauses and is, as a whole, ungrammatical. " Well, The New Yorker may not be the best place to go for instruction on grammar and usage . The Founders (it's a little vexing to have to keep explaining this ) loved Latinate constructions, one of which is the absolute, a phrase modifying a whole clause, often consisting of a noun and a participle.

Weirdest Friday news dump ever. Very late in the day on Oct. 14, the Obama administration released a lot of politically problematic information, including the news that the deficit for 2011 hit $1.3 trillion (the second biggest ever, after 2009) and that it's abandoning the CLASS Act, one of the more expensive and unwieldy appendages of "Obamacare. " One other thing: The White House announced we're putting boots on the ground in sub-Saharan Africa. President Obama notified Congress that he's sending about 100 combat-equipped troops to advise African forces on how best to kill or capture (but hopefully kill)

The violent populist anger over the economy, immigration and opposition to the Obama administration that has been swirling through the country for more than a year suddenly took concrete form last week, when authorities arrested members of a Michigan extremist group who they said were plotting to attack law enforcement officers and incite a right-wing rebellion against the government. In indictments unsealed this week, the government accused the group, a self-styled "Christian militia" calling itself the Hutaree, of conspiring to murder a police officer then kill hundreds of mourners expected to attend the funeral by using improvised explosive devices built from instructions available on the Internet.

BEIRUT, Lebanon -- In one swoop, the Shiite Muslim militia Hezbollah took over a large section of Lebanon's capital yesterday, altering the country's political balance and demonstrating a level of military discipline and efficiency that left the pro-Western government struggling to exert its authority. In a space of 12 hours, the Iranian-backed group dispatched hundreds of heavily armed Shiite fighters into the western half of the capital, routing pro-government Sunni militiamen, destroying opponents' political offices and shutting down media outlets loyal to Prime Minister Fouad Siniora and to Sunni leader Saad Hariri's Future movement.

BAGHDAD -- The U.S. Army said they were militants. Sadr City residents said at least some were civilians, and photographs showed the dust-covered body of at least one child being pulled from a mountain of rubble after yesterday's fighting. Whatever the facts, at least 28 people were dead after the four-hour battle, the latest in a showdown between U.S. and Iraqi forces and Shiite militiamen over recent weeks. Based on the photographs, it appeared that at least one of the dead was a civilian.

"A Force Upon the Plain: The American Militia Movement and the Politics of Hate," by Kenneth S. Stern. Simon & Schuster.303 pages. $24 Richard Nixon once characterized the federal bureaucratic mentality as "nozzle adjusting," i.e. the belief that government has the right and duty to regulate every facet of Americans' lives up to and including reaching into our showers to control the water's flow and temperature.For the past 25 years, the federal nozzle adjusters have spun a cocoon of oppressive, job-killing environmental rules around millions of hapless rednecks who, due to lack of proper breeding, had the bad taste to inhabit the vast inconsequential stretches of open real estate between the East and West coasts.

The apparent link between the two men charged in the bombing in Oklahoma City and paramilitary groups has attracted membership in such organizations rather than discouraged it, a new report by the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith says.The report, "Beyond the Bombing: The Militia Menace Grows," concludes that while some paramilitary groups have lost membership since the April 19 bombing, which killed 167 people, "gains plainly appear to outweigh losses.""Our impression is contrary to what would be the normal response to an act so terrible and horrific: that people would shy away," Abraham H. Foxman, the ADL's national director, said in an interview.

BAGHDAD -- After long treating radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army militia gingerly, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ridiculed him yesterday as a man who asks his followers to fight to the death while he resides in safety in Iran. Al-Sadr, who threatened Saturday to declare a formal end to a cease-fire he announced in August, was also described by U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker as running a weakened military organization. The taunting comments came during an unannounced visit by Rice to the Iraqi capital, in which she praised an ongoing nationwide crackdown against armed militias led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and his government security forces.