Thank you Sheriff for standing up for our constitution, you have my vote next term.

The same arguments were made in the 1920’s about trying to enact anti-lynching laws in the South. Just because the mountain is high doesn’t mean we shouldn’t climb it.

I’m curios as to how Sheriff D’Agostini would feel about a well regulated militia trying to influence HIS duties.

There is this assumed position that the constitution guarantees the right to have a gun, many of use do not believe that. The constitution also says “All men are created equal” yet we had to fight a civil war to free men and the founders only allowed white, male property owners to vote. Folks times have changed and the use of guns has changed. They should be regulated at least the same as cars. A license, given after a test and a demonstration of mental stability. Say what you want but countries with fewer guns do not have school shootings and other crazies killing one another. What is so sacred about a gun, do your really think you can out shoot the government, have you no knowledge of history? Our only hope for freedom is the courts, ask Miranda

Interesting argument, Mr. Long. Are you actually making the argument that since one set of rights has been routinely denied to certain citizens that it is reasonable to deny other enumerated rights to other citizens because the world has changed? What an odd argument for a student of law to make.

Indeed, the world has changed since early Americans did “out shoot the government” to help create this great country.

I am hardly a gun nut or a legal expert but I can read. I have read the Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights, the Constitution, the Federalist Papers and John Locke’s 2nd Treatise of Government. All of them are quite clearly in support of individual gun ownership rights. In addition, the Supreme Court has ruled in favor of the same rights multiple times.

Although I favor the removal of firearms from inappropriate individuals, that must be done in accordance with existing law without infringing on explicit individual rights.

I am sure that our Founding Fathers had no concept of assault rifles! And it is true that countries that ban them don’t have mass shootings. Isn’t that enough evidence? It saddens me to think that our beautiful country is so violent and selfish that we think of “My” individual rights over the rights of others to be safe and secure. (And my husband has a hunting rifle and a hand gun.)

In addition to wasting taxpayer dollars writing a baseless letter threatening to not enforce federal legislation (if it passes), D’Agostini is 100% wrong on the facts. Classic live-in-your-own-Fox-news bubble statement:

“It is well known and proven with facts, not emotional inference, that gun control of any kind, has no effect on the reduction of crime, anywhere.”

Oh, really? John Howard, former conservative prime minister of Australia, recently wrote an op-ed piece titled, “Australia Banned Assault Weapons, America Can Too,” in which he stated:

“In the 18 years before the 1996 reforms, Australia suffered 13 gun massacres — each with more than four victims — causing a total of 102 deaths. There has not been a single massacre in that category since 1996. (when Australia banned assault weapons). Few Australians would deny that their country is safer today as a consequence of gun control.”

From wikipedia: “According to a 2011 report from the Australian government, “…the number of victims of homicide has been in decline since 1996. In 1996, there were 354 victims and 260 victims in 2010. This is a decrease of 27 percent.” And furthermore, “The proportion of homicide victims killed by offenders using firearms in 2009–10 represented a decrease of 18 percentage points from the peak of 31 percent in 1995–96…”

The U.S. has by far the highest rate of gun ownership per capita, and by far the highest rates of gun deaths. Here’s a good article with plenty of actual facts:
http://thinkprogress.org/security/2012/12/17/1345041/us-guns-international/?mobile=nc

No evidence, Sheriff?

Journalist Nicholas Kristof recently reported this:

“One study, reported in Southern Medical Journal in 2010, found that a gun is 12 times more likely to result in the death of a household member or guest than in the death of an intruder. Another study in 1993 found that gun ownership creates nearly a threefold risk of a homicide in the owner’s household.

“David Hemenway, a public health specialist at Harvard, says that having a gun at home increases the risk of suicide in that household by two to four times.”

Get your facts straight, Sheriff! Rather than wasting your time and our money on erroneous propaganda filled with “emotional inference,” how about letting us know what your plans are to increase protection for our children & other El Dorado County residents in the wake of the slaughter of 20 young children in Newtown, or the 1180 people that have been killed by guns since then, including 122 here in California.