Gilding the Lily

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July's Guns & Ammo magazine features a small blurb in the Shooter's Almanac ''Know Your Gun Laws'' feature on the Emergency Powers Act.

Following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, New Orleans police confiscated firearms from hundreds of law-abiding citizens. Crediting the National Rifle Association protests, the article reports GWB ''signed the Disaster Recovery Personal Protection Act to prohibit federal officials from taking firearms during states of emergency.''

Chris Cox, the NRA's chief lobbyist is quoted as saying, ''No matter what the circumstances, lawful gun owners have the right to possess their firearms in their homes. And if forced to evacuate, they have the right to transport their firearms to a safe place. Nobody has the right to disarm them.''

So, GWB--shootin' buddy of the NRA--has now signed an act prohibiting federal officials from disallowing lawful gun owners the right to keep lawful weapons in their homes during an emergency situation.

Congress and the President took time to pass a law that is superficial and useless, as it is redundant. Presently, the U.S. Constitution and U.S. common law recognize the legitimacy of personal firearms to protect one's castle.

The only legal way to confiscate legal weapons is to declare martial law, and this was not the case in New Orleans. The police, National Guard and imported police simply confiscated weapons, in violation of all legal precedents.

The civil rights of every legal firearms owner that had weapons confiscated were flagrantly violated. [Imagine the consequences which would accrue to a firearms owner who refused to relinquish his legally held weapons at such a time.] Meanwhile in Baghdad, males are still legally carrying automatic weapons on the street.

They do not require an Emergency Powers Act to do this. Does that imply they have more civil rights than U.S. citizens?

Effort and energy was put into the passage of this law, while today, the 3,500th U.S. soldier died in Iraq. The Congress and President should concern themselves with realistic life and death issues, rather than addressing issues that are not issues at all.

The 'Personal Protection Act'' was a pander to the gun lobby and a ruse to raise votes, for no protection was given that the Constitution does not already accord to us as citizens.