Mark Helmke, senior professional staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, talks about how the U.S. needs to cut carbon emissions and take on a stronger stance on the global warming problem in the the upcoming G8 summit in Hokkaido, Japan. (1:27)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Stuart Taylor, a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution, talks about the recent gun control case held by the Supreme Court. Taylor explains the whole argument of the case came directly from a clause in the Second Amendment, which he quotes. He also says that the whole dispute between anti- and pro-gun people has been the same for many years and deals with this clause of the Second Amendment. (1:09)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Philip Clapp, deputy managing director of the Pew Environment Group, Mark Helmke, senior professional staff member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Jennifer Morgan, director of the Climate and Energy Security Programme at E3G discussed the U.S.’s role in the upcoming G8 summit in Hokkaido, Japan.
Morgan said that the U.S. needs to take the lead on global warming legislation.
Helmke said that Henry Paulson, Secretary of Treasury, is proposing a clean technology fund in which developed nations would help fund clean technology for developing countries through the World Bank.
Clapp said that a treaty on climate legislation could be reached in Copenhagen in 2009, but U.S. legislation might slow it down. Climate legislation might be proposed, debated, but not passed because 67 votes are hard to get, said Clapp.

At a discussion held by the American Meteorological Society on the effects of climate change on transportation, Michael Savonis, Air Quality Team Leader at the Federal Highway Administration, says that 2400 miles of highways in the Gulf Coast Region are at risk of permanent flooding due to climate change. He says that 4000 miles are at risk if smaller roadways are taken into account. He says that this high number is “a very good reason for the transportation world to care about climate change.”(0:41)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

The Brookings Institution held a briefing on U.S. Supreme Court rulings where high-profile cases, such as gun control, Guantanamo Bay detentions, and the death penalty, were discussed. Brookings Fellow Benjamin Wittes moderated the Judicial Issues Forum. Wittes explained that the Supreme Court has experienced a varied last couple of terms making it hard to discern an aggregate pattern from their rulings.
Stuart Taylor, a Nonresident Senior Fellow at The Brookings Institution, talked about the recent gun control case. When dealing with this case, Taylor explained that it was the first time in history that the Supreme Court definitively interpreted the Second Amendment. Taylor said that the Court produced a ruling which struck down the Washington, D.C. gun control law, holding the individual right to bear arms. However, Taylor also explained that this ruling has only limited impact because there aren’t many really tough gun control laws.
Taylor also talked about the Guantanamo Bay case. He explained that this case produced the first decision in which the Supreme Court ever overturned a previous decision made by the President during a time of war. Congress re-established habeas corpus at Guantanamo, but the Court also made it clear that the U.S. government is not holding a single person illegally at the base. Taylor said that even though the decision has been very controversial, the most important part of it is the fact that it didn’t require anyone at the base to walk free. Taylor explained that Congress needs to design a system open enough for the public to know how scary some detainess really are.
Randolph Moss, a partner at WilmerHale, talked about the lethal injection case regarding a prison in Kentucky and the Eighth Amendment. Moss explained that in most states lethal injection is administered with a process of three different drugs. The argument in this case said that this process was not the most humane way. However, Moss said that there was not enough evidence or facts produced to show that the inmate experienced any unnecessary pain.

The American Meteorological Society (AMS) held a discussion on the effects of climate change on Gulf Coast transportation and the New York City water supply. Michael Savonis, the air quality team leader of the Federal Highway Administration, said that those working in transportation are frequently conservative because of the billions of dollars involved, so considerations of investing in climate change preparation are tentative. But, as transportation infrastructure ages, climate change must be considered in building new roads, bridges, railways, and ports. The effects of climate change in the Gulf Coast area include a rise in average temperature between two and four degrees and a 50 percent increase in days with temperatures over 90 degrees. He said that as a result more than 2400 miles of roadways in the Gulf Coast area are at risk of permanent flooding as well as 75 percent of freight and non-freight port facilities. Because of the increase in heat, asphalt wears faster, train rails buckle more, and aircraft performance decreases.
On the topic of New York City’s water system, Cynthia Rosenzweig, the senior research scientist at the National Air and Space Administration Goddard Institute for Space, said that as temperatures increase, water quality goes down and freshwater becomes less available. As sea water levels increase, there is more stress on water treatment plants and more groundwater pollution. She said that changes made in preparation of climate change will not only be in infrastructure, but also in management, insurance, and policy.

Today the Talk Radio News Service will attend a briefing on U.S. Supreme Court rulings at the Brookings Institution in Washington. An event on climate change’s effects on Gulf Coast transportation and waterworks in New York held by the American Meteorological Society will be covered on Capitol Hill. In preparation for the G8 Summit in Hokkaido, Japan, the Washington Bureau will also participate in a conference call discussing the summit’s agenda which includes global warming.

DC v. Heller
“A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
Heller is a security guard at the Federal Judicial Center. He’s licensed to carry a handgun at work. He applied for a permit to take it home, and it was rejected.
DC law has several provisions. You’re not allowed to carry an unregistered handgun, and the law prohibits registration of handguns. You’re also not allowed to carry any guns without a license, and the chief of police can issue licenses. You can own longguns (like shotguns and rifles) and keep them in your home, but you must keep them unloaded and dissembled, or bound by a trigger lock. There’s no exception in the statute allowing you to take the lock off or load it if you want to use it to protect yourself, but the DC government says they wouldn’t prosecute you.
Justice Scalia wrote the majority opinion for 5 Justices: himself, Chief Justice Roberts, and Justices Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito.
The opinion is 64 pages long and spends 56 pages interpreting the amendment before addressing the DC law. The first half of the Second Amendment is read as a preface: it states a purpose but doesn’t limit the amendment’s meaning. This part of the opinion has little support other than saying that this type of construction is common in founding-era documents, and Justice Scalia cites a law review article rather than specific examples. Turning to the “Operative Clause,” Justice Scalia rights that “the people” refers to the normal people: the same ones protected in the 1st, 4th, 9th, 10th, and other amendments.
Justice Scalia reads the 2nd Amendment as protecting two rights: the right to keep arms, and the right to bear arms. He argues that the phrase “to keep and bear arms” was not in common usage, so there is no reason to interpret it as a unitary right. He then turns to historical analysis, finding little support for the proposition that “keep arms” and “bear arms” were only used in military contexts. Therefore, it must be read to mean that average people can possess (“keep”) and carry (“bear”) weapons (“arms”). Further, there was a right in England for Englishmen to be armed (enacted after the Stuart Kings disarmed the populace and packed the militias with their supporters), so the right was preexisting, not new.
The prefatory clause states the purpose of the Amendment. Since the purpose was to make sure people would be able to serve as a militia and the kinds of weapons they would bring would be the ones they owned for home protection, those are the kinds of weapons protected by the Amendment. M-16s and other high-power weapons wouldn’t be useful for home defense and thus would not be expected in a militia. Therefore they would not be protected by the Amendment.
Justice Scalia leaves significant questions unanswered: Does the right only apply against the federal government, or against states, too? Justice Scalia says that the opinion does not allow felons and the mentally ill to possess guns, or allow guns to be taken into sensitive areas like schools, but he does not offer support for those exceptions.
Turning to the DC laws, Justice Scalia says that they prohibit any possession of weapons that would be useful for self defense. Handguns are the weapons most people choose for defense of the home, and DC bans them as a class. Similarly, the restrictions on longguns render them useless for home defense. Thus, the restrictions are unconstitutional.
The challenge did not address the requirement that guns be registered, so that law stands.
Justice Stevens dissents, criticizing the majority’s interpretation of the Second Amendment. He reads it as saying people can have guns only in a military context, since phrases like “bear arms” have often been used when referring to organized state militia.
Justice Breyer takes issue with the invalidation of the DC laws. Under a balancing approach, considering DC’s crime rates and the crime control options available to lawmakers, he says that the DC laws should be allowed to stand. This is similar to the position the Bush Administration took in the case, which was that there is an individual right to possess guns, but that the courts should be more deferential when reviewing the laws.

University of Illinois at Chicago Student President Brett Thurman wonders why companies give credit cards to students who have no annual income, adding that students are ignoring low paying jobs to pay off debt. (0:47)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) says it would benefit American college students to increase financial literacy, to promote personal responsibility, and it to increase enforcement of anti-fraud and deceptive trade practices law. (0:35)

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.