http://kotaku.com/…

Melissa Batten, 36, a software development engineer in Microsoft’s Xbox division, was murdered by her estranged husband, who then shot himself to death, earlier this week.

Batten, a Harvard-educated lawyer, was a Software Development Engineer in Test for Microsoft, supporting Rare on its 360 titles work. She had worked for Microsoft since 2002, earning credits in Halo 3 and Gears of War as an SDET. Earlier, as a lawyer, she had been a public defender for the Mecklenburg County (Charlotte, N.C.) Public Defender’s Office.

Her husband, Joseph Batten, was also 36. He had also worked for Microsoft but most recently worked for Wizards of the Coast, publisher of hobby games such as Magic: the Gathering. Melissa had obtained a restraining order against her husband on July 21. Another news story describes Joseph Batten as obsessive and verbally abusive, and when she learned he had obtained a handgun, she sought the protection order.

If our society put greater emphasis on self defense and personal responsibility likely these happenings would occur less often. It looks like Washington state has fairly liberal gun laws, if that is in fact where it happened, she could have armed herself in addition to requesting protection. Instead she went with begging the government to protect her… something which the SCOTUS has said the government has no obligation to do.

http://www.wusa9.com/…

District residents can start registering their guns today. But at least one very high profile application was already rejected.

Dick Heller is the man who brought the lawsuit against the District’s 32-year-old ban on handguns. He was among the first in line Thursday morning to apply for a handgun permit.

But when he tried to register his semi-automatic weapon, he says he was rejected. He says his gun has seven bullet clip. Heller says the City Council legislation allows weapons with fewer than eleven bullets in the clip. A spokesman for the DC Police says the gun was a bottom-loading weapon, and according to their interpretation, all bottom-loading guns are outlawed because they are grouped with machine guns.

Besides obtaining paperwork to buy new handguns, residents also can register firearms they’ve had illegally under a 180-day amnesty period.

Though residents will be allowed to begin applying for handgun permits, city officials have said the entire process could take weeks or months.

How very ridiculous. I wonder what the SCOTUS Heller v DC majority’s position on this law? Is this the kind of “reasonable” restrictions they expected?

This is another example of the hugely negative fallout of the Heller case in that they claimed rights can have “reasonable” restrictions. It’s all or nothing. Otherwise it’s a privilege. Even a positivist should be against this interpretation given the reading of the Constitution. Assuming a positivist would be a rule of law type. I suppose you could believe only local government has legitimate rule over an individual but I’m not aware of any ideology which specifically advocates that.

Today, at about 5PM I was asked to have my effects searched by a man in a dark blue uniform who was armed and perceived dangerous.

But like last time I screwed up. My plans have been to say no, ask or say innocently something regarding the yellow line station across the street and go from there. In the least I want to take down the thug’s identification information, snap a few photos and hand out fliers I have printed out from FlexYourRights.org. Maybe walk up to the next 1 station and take it downtown over and over till he threatens to arrest me or actually does.

Sounds easy until you are actually standing there with 3 blue light gangsters staring at you with their hands on their belts… awfully close to pepper spray, a telescoping beating club and a handgun. While at the same time you have dozens upon dozens of people streaming into the station behind you.

This was the first time I’ve seen them setup behind the turnstiles. Normally the are just around the corner, just to the left side or across from them near the help booth and side entrance. So if it wasn’t for the fact that I have an unlimited rides card I would have been out $2.50. Perhaps I need to add that to my script. Asking for my money back.

So in any case all I accomplished was saying no, obviously annoying the thug and having him, after a few seconds of silent contemplation, telling me I had to leave. I said “fine” or maybe nothing at all and proceeded toward the yellow line station across the street. I doubled back in order to take some photos but I couldn’t get a shot through the windows because of the glare and I was not sure I wanted to push it by walking back in and snapping some pics. So I went to the yellow line. Hopped onto the W and went home. The suspected terrorist got away.

It takes most people a reasonable amount of mental perpareness to do what I’m trying to do. Hopefully next time I will be calmer and able to focus on what I need to do.

These were taken around 6:20PM outside the South Ferry terminal. Notice the jackboots, sub machine guns, and big smiles.

The subway photos are from the N/R station also at South Ferry. There was close to 20 NYPD officers in the station. I didn’t checkout the 1 station in the South Ferry terminal.

http://rawstory.com/…

Walt Disney World, backed by the Florida Retail Federation and the Florida Chamber of Commerce, has sparked a row with state lawmakers and the National Rifle Association over Florida’s “Preservation and Protection of the Right to Keep and Bear Arms in Motor Vehicles Act of 2008,” enacted July 1, which allows employees with concealed weapons permits to store their guns in their cars during work hours.

Disney maintains its zero-tolerance policy towards guns, warning that taking a gun onto company property could be grounds for termination. Disney’s Animal Kingdom security guard Edwin Sotomayor, accordingly, was fired on Monday following a Friday suspension; Sotomayor had announced to local media that he would be storing a gun in his car in accordance with the law but in violation of Disney’s policy. He refused to let his employer search the car.

“It seems if you work for Disney,” the NRA said on its website, “you give up not only your Second Amendment rights, but your First Amendment rights as well.”

This is stupid. The 2nd Amendment is derived from general property rights theory. As Anthony Gregory over at LewRockwell.com said of this:

They want to force Disney World to allow weapons on their private property. This is self-defeating. The right to bear arms, like all rights, must be rooted in self-ownership and private property. Otherwise, I could impose my “right” to bear arms on someone else’s land by forcing myself, armed, into someone’s home. That defeats the whole purpose. If you can’t respect someone’s right to keep guns off their private property, it’s hard to get others to respect your right to keep guns on your own. The current situation is intolerable all around: Even under Scalia’s standard, people can’t keep own, and carry any weapons they choose within the bounds of private property, and yet at the same time people can’t forbid weapons on their own property.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/…

The Oasis guitarist said it was a “pity scumbags are taking over our streets”, and claimed video games were partly to blame for violence.

He said: “In my day, status was trying to be somebody, do you know what I mean, not trying to kill somebody?”

The star said knife crime was a problem across the UK, not just in London.

The 41-year-old added: “I was up in Liverpool for a week a couple of weeks ago and even on the news there it’s every single night.

“I don’t even know what Cameron or Gordon Brown are going to do about it. I was watching a documentary on Panorama and another one about kids carrying knives and violence.

“One of the lads, a little lad, made a telling comment.

“The guy said, ‘Do you not think there’s anything better for you in life?’

“And he said, ‘Yeah, there probably is but I’ve never known anything else’.”

Gallagher also revealed that he and partner Sarah McDonald were worried about their children growing up and said they talked about knife crime in bed at night.

“People say it’s through violent video games and I guess that’s got something to do with it.

“If kids are sitting up all night smoking super skunk [cannabis] and they come so desensitised to crime because they’re playing these video games, it’s really, really scary.”

Eighteen teenagers have been murdered in London so far this year.

In response, the capital’s Metropolitan police force have set up a task force of 75 officers, dedicated to fighting knife crime.

My theory? The warfare/welfare state is sucking the responsibility and drive out of these kids and they have nothing to strive for. That is what is leading to the increase in knife crime. That and the ban on guns probably doesn’t help as it makes it easier likely to get a knife to commit your violent crime then a gun. At least for the lower end crime. I’m not claiming guns aren’t still relatively easy to get. In any case… if videogames and pot made kids want to stab people… the USA would have several million of them running around.