The mainstream media considers most facts about guns to be inconvenient to their narratives, so they simply don’t cite or explore them. This political self-censoring prevents them from helping to find or expose what actually could make America even safer. The truth—that Second Amendment freedom works—is just too unpalatable to them.
About a decade ago, for example, an opinion editor with The New York Times actually asked me to write something. I was writing a column for Forbes at the time, and he found what I was reporting interesting. But then his boss must have told him they don’t even talk to people who’re unconstrained by the woke restraints on free inquiry. He sent me one last cryptic message: “I was told not to talk to you.” I thought that was rather honest of him—yes, he is no longer at the Times.
There are a few exceptions to the mainstream media’s censorship on guns. One is when a judge writes a detailed, fact-based Second Amendment opinion in a case they can’t ignore. This puts the mainstream media in a quandary: They have to report on it, but how can they avoid the facts?
Such is the uncomfortable position Judge Roger Benitez, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, once again put the mainstream media in.
Benitez’s recent ruling in Miller v. Bonta, a case that overturned a California ban on popular semi-automatic rifles, was a pro-freedom ruling the mainstream media couldn’t completely ignore. As this was being written, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit had stayed the decision pending decisions in other firearm-related cases.
Regardless, this is such an honest ruling that we thought we’d cut away the mainstream-media’s spin and give you a good taste of what Judge Benitez wrote in Miller v. Bonta.
Like the Swiss Army Knife, the popular AR-15 rifle is a perfect combination of home defense weapon and homeland defense equipment. Good for both home and battle, the AR-15 is the kind of versatile gun that lies at the intersection of the kinds of firearms protected under District of Columbia v. Heller (2008) … . Yet, the State of California makes it a crime to have an AR- 15 type rifle. Therefore, this Court declares the California statutes to be unconstitutional.
For female gun buyers in 2018, after a handgun, a modern rifle was the next most popular choice.
The Supreme Court clearly holds that the Second Amendment protects guns commonly owned by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.
Federal Bureau of Investigation murder statistics do not track assault rifles, but they do show that killing by knife attack is far more common than murder by any kind of rifle. In California, murder by knife occurs seven times more often than murder by rifle. For example, according to F.B.I. statistics for 2019, California saw 252 people murdered with a knife, while 34 people were killed with some type of rifle, not necessarily an AR-15. A Californian is three times more likely to be murdered by an attacker’s bare hands, fists, or feet, than by his rifle.
Without question there is clear evidence that AR-15 rifles are and have been used for self-defense. For example, in one case an AR-15 was used in Florida by a pregnant wife and mother to defend her family from two armed, hooded, and masked home intruders. As soon as the armed intruders entered the back door of her home, they pistol-whipped her husband—fracturing his eye socket and sinus cavity. Then they grabbed the 11-year-old daughter. Before they could do any more harm, the pregnant wife retrieved the family AR-15 from a bedroom and fired, killing one of the attackers while the other fled.
“As we put it, self-defense [is] ‘the central component of the right itself.’” –McDonald
There are probably more modern rifles in circulation than there are Ford F-150 pickup trucks. In 2018, 909,330 Ford F-150s were sold. Twice as many modern rifles were sold the same year. Imagine, every time one passes a new Ford pickup truck, it is a reminder that two new modern rifles have been purchased.
The Heller test is a test that any citizen can understand. Heller asks whether a law bans a firearm that is commonly owned by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes. It is a hardware test.
While the state ought to protect its residents against victimization by a mass shooter, it ought also to protect its residents against victimization by home-invading criminals ... . [T]he State’s litigation stance is more like the view recently expressed by a police chief in Oakland, California: we do not want victims to arm themselves; we want them to be good witnesses. Of course, a dead victim is a lousy witness.
[F]irearms deemed “assault weapons” are fairly ordinary, popular, modern rifles. This is an average case about average guns used in average ways for average purposes.
Plaintiffs do not have to shoulder the burden of proving that they are entitled to enjoy Second Amendment rights. The command of the Amendment is that the right to keep and bear arms “shall not be infringed.”
In 1989, California’s Legislature predicted an assault weapons ban would eliminate or reduce mass shootings. It has not turned out that way ... . If Congress is correct, the national assault weapon ban also did not work.
The Second Amendment “elevates above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms in defense of hearth and home.” –Heller
Nationally, modern rifles are ubiquitous. In 2018 alone (the most recent year with data), 1,954,000 modern rifles were manufactured or imported into the United States. Over the last three decades, 19,797,000 modern rifles have been manufactured or imported into the United States and the numbers have been steadily increasing.
Plaintiffs do not have to shoulder the burden of proving that they are entitled to enjoy Second Amendment rights. The command of the Amendment is that the right to keep and bear arms “shall not be infringed.”
Almost one-half of all rifles (48%) produced in 2018 were modern rifles. That is 664,360 rifles. That same year, 34% of buyers purchased a modern rifle for personal protection, while 36% purchased for target practice or informal shooting, and 29% purchased for hunting.
The modern rifle ban strikes at the acknowledged core of the Second Amendment, which is the right of self-defense in the home. Heller held that the “core” Second Amendment right is for law-abiding citizens to defend hearth and home.
