{"id":982,"date":"2004-12-16T16:20:49","date_gmt":"2004-12-16T21:20:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/000af36.netsolhost.com\/wordpress1\/2004\/12\/16\/virginia_news_g_4\/"},"modified":"2004-12-16T16:20:49","modified_gmt":"2004-12-16T21:20:49","slug":"virginia_news_g_4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/2004\/12\/16\/virginia_news_g_4\/","title":{"rendered":"Virginia News:  Guns at the Capitol"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Gun nuts are trying to overturn <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washtimes.com\/metro\/20041215-102855-9228r.htm \">a ban on bringing guns<\/a> into the Capitol.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Gun-rights advocates want to change a new state regulation approved by senior Virginia lawmakers without fanfare that bars anyone without a concealed-weapons permit from openly carrying weapons into the state Capitol in Richmond. <\/p>\n<p>The restriction, approved by the Joint Rules Committee earlier this spring, went unnoticed by many for months because the measure was not subject to a vote by the full legislature. <\/p>\n<p>Advocates such as the Virginia Citizens Defense League (VCDL) yesterday called the committee&#8217;s action a &#8220;stealth&#8221; change that could lead to a restriction of Second Amendment rights in local jurisdictions such as Fairfax County. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s wrongheaded,&#8221; said Philip Van Cleave, president of VCDL, http:\/\/www.vcdl.org\/static\/index.html<br \/>\nwhich began a lobbying campaign to reverse the ban. &#8220;It&#8217;s one more thing that doesn&#8217;t need to be done against a right we have. They are needlessly impeding that and it&#8217;s wrong. This new ban needs to be rescinded as soon as possible.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>Mr. Van Cleave said people who are forced to leave their guns in their cars when visiting the Capitol will not be safe in Richmond, which has a high crime rate. \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>What are they going to do?  Shoot somebody who looks crosswise at them?<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>In Virginia, a permit is required to conceal a handgun on one&#8217;s person, not to own a handgun or carry it openly. More than 20 states, including West Virginia, Kentucky, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Delaware, have similar open-carry laws. It is illegal to carry handguns openly in Maryland and the District. <\/p>\n<p>Statistics show that permit holders rarely commit violent crimes. \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Yeah.  And I\u2019m sure statistics show that people who don\u2019t carry guns rarely commit crimes.  So?<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Some Republican lawmakers have told VCDL they will consider reversing the ban in the upcoming legislative session, which begins Jan. 12. \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Who wants to bet that one of those lawmakers is Del. Dick Black (R) of Loudoun County?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Gun nuts are trying to overturn a ban on bringing guns into the Capitol. Gun-rights advocates want to change a new state regulation approved by senior Virginia lawmakers without fanfare that bars anyone without a concealed-weapons permit from openly carrying weapons into the state Capitol in Richmond. The restriction, approved by the Joint Rules Committee&hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/2004\/12\/16\/virginia_news_g_4\/\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/982"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/982\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/griendling.com\/wordpress1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}