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Stand Your Ground changes easier on Fla. shooting suspects New York Daily News Shooting suspects in Florida might have a better chance to avoid prosecution because of a new Republican-backed measure on the Sunshine State's controversial Stand Your Ground law. The Florida House of Representatives passed an NRA-endorsed bill ...

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Stand Your Ground changes easier on Fla. shooting suspects - New York Daily News

A critic of the states stand your ground law Wednesday said a change to the law now moving through the Legislature will make it easier for people to murder other human beings.

Lawmakers now are considering shifting the burden to prosecutors, making them disprove a claim of self-defense. Sen. Perry Thurston, a Fort Lauderdale Democrat, called that making a bad law worse.

He appeared with several fellow Democrats at a morning press conference in the Capitol.

The stand your ground law, enacted in 2005, allows people who are attacked to counter deadly force with deadly force in self-defense without any requirement that they flee.

The House onTuesday amended a Senate measure(SB 128) to change the burden of proofto overcomeself-defense to clear and convincing evidence, a lower threshold than the Senates beyond a reasonable doubt.

But lowering the burden wont help the bill, Thurston told reporters, because the problem is with the burdens shifting: Essentially forcing prosecutors to prove a negative.

Rep. Kamia Brown, an Orlando Democrat, added thatthe move willincentivize domestic abusers to finish the job.

Why not go all the way there wont be anyone around to dispute a stand your ground defense, she said.

And Rep. Bobby DuBose, anotherFort LauderdaleDemocrat, said it will embolden gang members to pick on the competition with impunity under the cover of a stand your ground defense.

Specifically, the Senate billsponsored by Fleming Island Republican Rob Bradleywould requireprosecutors to showthat a defendant is not immune from prosecution.

Its in reaction toa state Supreme Court decision that put the onus on the defendant to show self-defense under the stand your ground law.

The House is scheduled to vote on the amendedbill later Wednesday, sending it back to the Senate.

A Periscope video of the press conference can be viewed below:

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Democrats decry change to 'stand your ground' law - Florida Politics - Florida Politics (blog)

COLUMBIA AVirginia militiaman with a long gun. A 21st century white couple carrying assault weapons in a Starbucks. A black man open carrying arifle in Dallas before being wrongly identified as the suspect whogunned down Dallas police officers last summer.

The images illustrate a topic Saul Cornell has dedicated his life to understanding: the legal carrying and display of guns in the U.S. under the Second Amendment.

He knows the topic is controversial.

"The interesting thing about the Second Amendment is everyones got an opinion on it," Cornell told a packed house of nearly 100 people in Mumford Hall on Wednesday. "I came to the subject of the Second Amendment not because of any great involvement with gun issues. I came to it out of my interest in the way history gets used by legal scholars and courts."

"Theres a complicated history and a very complicated contemporary reality between firearms and issues of race in America," Cornell said.

He explained how black Americans are disproportionately affected by gun violence, saying that African American men are less likely to be shot if they joined the military rather than remaining civilians.

Many of our gun laws, Cornell said, originated in the Antebellum South, which permitted open carrying of guns in public.

Cornell spoke at the last spring public lecture sponsored by the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy, an academic center at MU that emphasizes U.S. Constitutional study, early American history and its relevance today.

He said guns have evolved since adopting the Second Amendment, which means Americans need evolved gun laws.

A Virginia militiaman carrying a long gun couldn't kill as many people as the white couple with assault weapons. Why, then, don't lawmakers enact more regulatory gun legislation parallel to new technology, Cornell asked.

He discussed the differences between the way Americans perceive a white couple and a black man open carrying: the couple celebrated exercising their rights, while police wrongly identified the black man in Dallas as a shooting suspect.

Cornell ended Wednesdays talk by comparing the number of gun-related deaths to car accident deaths in the U.S. He said gun deaths are rising, and the numbers are nearly equal.

"There are more gun stores out there than supermarkets," he said. "That's pretty ridiculous to me."

Traci Wilson-Kleekamp, the president of local activism group Race Matters, Friends, attended the lecture.

"It sounds like you're sort of tip-toeing around this thing on race," Wilson-Kleekamp said. "If you can, be explicit about this connection between slavery and today and our issues with guns."

Cornell said that the South is historically a more violent region, and expressly racial laws originated there.

"People are not aware of how these deep-seeded cultural forms influence their behavior," he said.

He cited a study in which white people often falsely identified guns in pictures with black faces, and simply saw other objects in pictures with white faces.

"It's a deeply, culturally-embedded kind of suspicion, and that makes it harder to extirpate," Cornell said. "Until we recognize it, we can't really move forward."

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Second Amendment historian connects race and gun rights - Columbia Missourian

National security and intelligence community journalist Michael Best reported on Thursday that he just got the documents from the Secret Service regarding threats against Hillary Clinton, and they indicate that the Secret Service did see threats against Clinton seemingly as a result of Trumps comment about second amendment people.

Secret Service documents indicate they did see threats against Hillary Clinton seemingly as a result of Trumps 2nd Amendment people comment, Best writes on Twitter, adding, DHS reaction to Trumps 2nd Amendment people comments: YIKES!'

On August 9th, 2016, Donald Trump suggested his supporters might shoot Clinton if she got to pick a Supreme Court judge, By the way, if she (Hillary Clinton) gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do folks. Although, the Second Amendment people maybe there is. I dont know.

On July 20th, CNN reported that the Secret Service was investigating a Trump adviser after he called for Clintons execution on the radio. Trump adviser Al Baldasaro told a radio host that Clinton should be put in the firing line and shot for treason.

Donald Trump didnt distance himself from Baldarsaro.

Days later, Trump made his second amendment people comment about Clinton getting to fill the Supreme Court seat that Republicans stole from President Barack Obama. Trump supporters and Republicans have tried to pretend his comment wasnt an incitement to violence, but the Secret Service says they did see threats seemingly as a result of Trumps comment.

On the day when Senate Republicans are changing the filibuster rule so they can confirm an extremist to the Supreme Court who was nominated by a president who is under investigation for possible collusion with Russia, the Secret Service confirmed that Trumps call for second amendment people to shoot Clinton if she got to nominate a Supreme Court justice seemingly resulted in threats against her.

Republicans have become radical jihadists inciting violence to get their way, so after not even waiting the average period of time to get Gorusch confirmed, they flipped out and voted to change the Senate rules an act they admitted would ruin the senate. This is the modern day Republican Party. They have become the reactionary hot headed destroyers they chide the far left for being in the 60s.

Republicans arent here for the law and order theyre here to violate laws and norms until they get their way. If they dont get what they want, second amendment people might have to fix it for them.

And if that doesnt work, theyll just change the rules to fit their extremist pick for a seat they already violated precedent to steal from the Democratic president.

With the major victim/persecution complex that colors the Right these days, if the shoe had been on the other foot with these comments, we never would have heard the end of it. There would be investigations into investigations, and leaks and so many more leaks, and conservative journalists illegally recording people to prove how horrible Democrats were. And the press would breathlessly report on the drama, the victimization, the persecution.

If the shoe were on the other foot, elected Democrats would be saying Trump should be shot for treason for all of the Russian connections, since Republicans said that over Clintons hyped up email scandal when she wasnt even found guilty of anything. But Democrats dont roll that way. The Democratic President, Barack Obama, was careful and responsible with his rhetoric.

When it came down to actually inciting violence against his Democratic opponent, Trump supporters and the entire Republican Party enabled and supported Donald Trump. If they werent under a fast gathering cloud of sweeping Russian smoke, this would be a new low for the Republican Party.

As it is, facing possible treason and obstruction of justice accusations, inciting threats against a rival is to be expected. Its how dictators do things.

did Donald Trump incite violence, did donald trump threaten Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, second amendment people

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Secret Service Says Trump's Second Amendment People Comment Led to Threats Against Clinton - PoliticusUSA

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He referenced the Second Amendment while talking about collegiate sports, contending that NCAA basketball players ought to be paid. In fact, Redick jumped from announcing the end of amateurism in collegiate sports to declaring the end of a Second Amendment that protects 21st century firearms.

According to the Los Angeles Times, Redick said:

The idea of amateurism, it doesnt exist anymore. And so if youre going to do what youre doing, then you just need that complete overhaul. Its got to be something radical. Its not just, Oh, lets just pay every player $5,000. It really requires something really radical. And maybe thats getting rid of college athletics as we know it.

He paraphrased a Thomas Jefferson quote to segue to guns, saying, I go back to the Thomas Jefferson quote Im going to butcher it, but its something weve all read. You wouldnt expect a little boy to wear the pea coat he wore as a boy as a grown man. You need to change with the times.

Redick then addressed gun control, saying laws should evolve in the same way he wants to see collegiate sports evolve. He said:

Laws should reflect that [change], rules, regulations, especially as we know more. Gun control. I dont want to get political, but gun control. Thats something that should evolve as technology evolves. When the 2nd Amendment was created, we had to worry about bears, people lived on the frontier and it took a minute to load a muzzle. I think laws should reflect where we are with guns.

Ironicallyjust one day before Redick made these commentsIndependent Institutes Dave Kopel wrote that gun control arguments framed around musket arguments show a lack of historical knowledge. Writing in The Washington Post, Kopel said:

Gun-control advocates often argue that gun-control laws must be more restrictive than the original meaning of the Second Amendment would allow, because modern firearms are so different from the firearms of the late 18th century. This argument is based on ignorance of the history of firearms. It is true that in 1791 the most common firearms were handguns or long guns that had to be reloaded after every shot. But it is not true that repeating arms, which can fire multiple times without reloading, were unimagined in 1791. To the contrary, repeating arms long predate the 1606 founding of the first English colony in America. As of 1791, repeating arms were available but expensive.

Kopels historical observation helps the reader better understand the Supreme Courts majority opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008). In that opinion, late Justice Antonin Scalia pointed to judicial precedent to show the Second Amendment protects guns in common use at any given time. In other words, at all times the Second Amendment protects the guns commonly owned and used by law-abiding citizens. This means protection for the very 21st century firearms J.J. Redick believes justify more gun control.

AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.

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LA Clippers JJ Redick: Second Amendment Should 'Evolve' to Allow ... - Breitbart News