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To: Lane3 who wrote (12481)	5/8/2002 12:31:55 PM
From: Tom Clarke	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 21057

Few people can elucidate the historical roots of the Middle East troubles better than Tom Friedman, but as a journalist he's still stuck in old think. His much chortled over column that suggest we all fly naked as a way to help shorten airport check-in time was cribbed from Jeff Jarvis' weblog. The idea was, anyway. So apparently he reads that which he heaps scorn upon. Rather than criticize Arab media, (like shooting fish in a barrel) I wish Friedman and other media types would tout the small independent Iranian TV station that broadcasts from Los Angeles. It's run by an Iranian exile and is critical of the present regime. He also has guests on who were celebrities in Iran before the ayatollahs took over. There are Iranian versions of Frank Sinatra and Milton Berle who are still popular there with those who remember them. The station is popular with younger people, too. The government succeeded for awhile in blocking his signal, but he's switched satellite companies and as far as I know he beams in there unimpeded now. It's sad that US corporations still advertise on Al-Jazeera but ignore this guy's TV station.

To: Lane3 who wrote (12481)	5/8/2002 3:46:21 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Respond to of 21057

Justice Dept. backs 'right to bear arms' May 7, 2002 Posted: 7:53 PM EDT (2353 GMT) cnn.com WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Bush administration has told the Supreme Court for the first time that it believes the Constitution protects an individual's right to possess guns, reversing the government's longstanding interpretation of the Second Amendment. At the same time, Justice Department lawyers said the high court need not test that principle now. "The current position of the United States ... is that the Second Amendment more broadly protects the rights of individuals, including persons who are not members of any militia or engaged in active military service or training, to possess and bear their own firearms," Solicitor General Theodore Olson wrote in two court filings this week. That right, however, is "subject to reasonable restrictions designed to prevent possession by unfit persons or to restrict the possession of types of firearms that are particularly suited to crimi nal misuse." Olson, the administration's top Supreme Court lawyer, was reflecting the view of Attorney General John Ashcroft that the Second Amendment confers the right to "keep and bear arms" to private citizens, and not merely to the "well-regulated militia" mentioned in the amendment's text. Ashcroft caused a stir when he expressed a similar statement in a letter to the National Rifle Association last year. "While some have argued that the Second Amendment guarantees only a 'collective' right of the states to maintain militias, I believe the amendment's plain meaning and original intent prove otherwise," Ashcroft wrote. Critics accused him of kowtowing to the NRA and of undermining federal prosecutors by endorsing a legal view 180 degrees from what has been official Justice Department policy for some 40 years. At the time it was not clear whether Ashcroft was expressing his personal view, or stating a new policy position for the federal government. That question was mostly answered last November, when Ashcroft sent a letter to federal prosecutors praising an appeals court decision that found "the Second Amendment does protect individual rights," but noting that those rights could be subject to "limited, narrowly tailored specific exceptions." The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of appeals went on to reject arguments from Texas physician Timothy Emerson that a 1994 federal gun law was unconstitutional. The law was intended to deny guns to people under restraining orders. "In my view, the Emerson opinion, and the balance is strikes, generally reflect the correct understanding of the Second Amendment," Ashcroft told prosecutors. Emerson appealed to the Supreme Court, putting the Justice Department in an awkward position. Although the government won its case in the lower court by using the old interpretation of the Second Amendment, Ashcroft had switched gears by the time the case reached the high court. Olson's court filing Monday urged the high court not to get involved, and acknowledged the policy change in a lengthy footnote. Olson also attached Ashcroft's letter to prosecutors. Olson made the same notation in a separate case involving a man convicted of owning two machine guns in violation of federal law. In that case, the government also won a lower court decision endorsing a federal gun control law. "This action is proof positive that the worst fears about Attorney General Ashcroft have come true -- his extreme ideology on guns has now become government policy," said Michael D. Barnes, president of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, which promotes gun control. Barnes noted that other federal appeals courts and the Supreme Court have not found the same protection for individual gun ownership that the 5th Circuit asserted in Emerson. The Supreme Court last ruled on the scope of the Second Amendment in 1939. The amendment protects only those rights that have "some reasonable relationship to the preservation of efficiency of a well regulated militia," the high court said then. The cases are Emerson v. United States, 01-8780 and Haney v. United States, 01-8272.