VIVA ESPAÑA!

HAVE GUNS, BE FREE

The US Supreme Court has ruled that individual Americans have a constitutional right to bear arms, ending a ban on owning handguns in the capital in its first ruling on gun rights in 70 years.

The court's 5-4 landmark decision -- on whether the right to keep and bear arms is an individual or collective right -- said the city's law violated the second amendment of the US constitution which the justices said guaranteed citizens the right to keep guns at home for self-defense.

"There seems to us no doubt, on the basis of both text and history, that the second amendment conferred an individual right to keep and bear arms," wrote Justice Antonin Scalia in the court's decision.

He added the court took seriously the problem of handgun violence in cities like Washington and said there were "a variety of tools for combating that problem, including some measures regulating handguns."

"The enshrinement of constitutional rights necessarily takes certain policy choices off the table. These include the absolute prohibition of handguns held and used for self-defense in the home," the court ruled.
President George W. Bush welcomed the ruling, saying he strongly agreed with the court's "historic decision," and urged Washington authorities to "swiftly move" to protect their citizens' constitutional rights.

The ruling was a victory for gun rights advocates, but gun control proponents said it would help their cause by endorsing the regulation of firearms.

The high court had never before issued a precise ruling on the interpretation of the second amendment, which states: "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."


Washington, home to the White House and the US administration, has some of the toughest gun control laws in the country.
Private possession of handguns is strictly banned here, and any rifles or shotguns must be kept unloaded in homes or under a trigger lock.

City officials argued the ban, instituted in 1976, was necessary to stem rising gun violence, and that the second amendment protected gun rights for people associated with militias, not individuals.

The case, District of Columbia vs. Heller, was originally brought in 2003 by a federal building guard who carries a handgun on duty and wanted to keep it in his home for self-defense.

In its ruling, the Supreme Court said the right to own guns was "not unlimited" and that its decision did not cast doubt on laws prohibiting convicted federal criminals or mentally-ill patients from keeping guns.

Bans on concealed weapons or on carrying firearms in sensitive places such as schools or government buildings remained legal, it said.
"This gun decision is a breath of fresh air from the US Supreme Court," said Jessica Echard of the conservative group Eagle Forum.

"The majority of Americans see the absurdity of gun control and recognize the valuable self-defense function of guns."

But Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said the ruling made clear that "the constitution allows for reasonable restrictions on access to dangerous weapons."
Washington Mayor Adrian Fenty said the ruling was restricted to handguns in homes and did not prevent the city from strictly regulating or banning other types of firearms.

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama welcomed the decision, saying the court had endorsed "the need for crime-ravaged communities to save their children from the violence that plagues our streets through common-sense, effective safety measures."

But he came under fire from Republican rival John McCain who accused him of changing his position over the years.

"Unlike the elitist view that believes Americans cling to guns out of bitterness, today's ruling recognizes that gun ownership is a fundamental right -- sacred, just as the right to free speech and assembly," McCain said in a statement.

The McCain campaign released a memo setting out how Obama had, in 1996, expressed support for a ban on the manufacture and sale of handguns but by this year, had equivocated on whether the Washington ban was constitutional.

The Supreme Court last took up the issue in 1939, but its ruling then referred to alleged bank robbers and the registration of certain firearms.

BOLIVIA VOTES

GREENS ARE BACK!

With Russell and Havlicek sitting courtside, and Red surely lighting up a victory cigar somewhere, these Boston Celtics returned to glory like the great teams before them.
Dominant in every way.
On a new parquet floor below aging championship banners hung in the rafters two decades back, the Celtics won their 17th NBA title and a first one—at last — for Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen—their Big Three for a new generation.
After 22 long years, the NBA has gone green.
Lifted by ear-splitting chants of “Beat L.A.” early and cries of “Seven-teen” in the closing seconds by their adoring crowd, the Celtics concluded a shocking rebound of a season with a stunning 131-92 blowout over the Los Angeles Lakers in Game 6 on Tuesday night.
“It means so much more because these are the guys, the Havliceks, the Bill Russells, the Cousys,” Pierce said. “These guys started what’s going on with those banners. They don’t hang up any other banners but championship ones.
“And now I’m a part of it.”
With the outcome assured, Boston fans sang into the night as if they were in a pub on nearby Canal Street. They serenaded the newest champs in this city of champs, and taunted Kobe Bryant and his Lakers, who drowned in a green-and-white wave for 48 minutes.
Garnett scored 26 points with 14 rebounds, Allen scored 26 and Pierce, the finals MVP who shook off a sprained right knee sustained in Game 1, added 17 as the Celtics, a 24-win team a year ago, wrapped up their first title since 1986.
Rajon Rondo had 21 points, eight assists, seven rebounds and six steals as the Celtics, who built a 23-point halftime lead and obliterated the Lakers, who were trying to become the first team to overcome a 3-1 deficit in the finals.
They didn’t stand a chance.
Boston’s 39-point win surpassed the NBA record for the biggest margin of victory in a championship clincher; the Celtics beat the Lakers 129-96 in Game 5 of the 1965 NBA finals.
In the final minute, Pierce doused Celtics coach Doc Rivers with red Gatorade. Owner Wyc Grousbeck, who named his group Banner 17 to leave no doubt about his goal, put an unlit cigar in his mouth—a tribute to Auerbach, the patriarch who had a hand in the franchise’s first 16 titles.
Garnett dropped to the parquet and kissed the leprechaun at center court and then found Russell, the Hall of Famer who taught him the Celtic way, for a long embrace.
“I got my own. I got my own,” Garnett said. “I hope we made you proud.”
“You sure did,” Russell said.
Rivers pulled Pierce, Garnett and Allen with 4:01 left and they shared a group hug with their coach, who was nearly run out of town last season. Rivers lost his father at the beginning of this remarkable run, a season no one expected.
By the time Rivers was handed the Larry O’Brien Trophy, it was June 18—his late father’s birthday.
When the game clock reached zeros, Rivers reflected on his dad.
“My first thought was what would my dad say,” Rivers said, “and honestly I started laughing because I thought he would probably say, if you knew my dad, `It’s about time. What have you been waiting for?”’
It’s was Boston’s first title since the passing of Auerbach, whose presence was the only thing missing on this night. Even Auerbach, who died in 2006, got some satisfaction. Led by Rivers, Auerbach’s beloved team denied Lakers coach Phil Jackson from overtaking him with a 10th championship.
The Boston-Los Angeles rivalry, nothing more than black-and-white footage from the 60s and TV highlights of players wearing short shorts in the 80s to young hoops fans, remains tilted toward the Atlantic Ocean. The Celtics are 9-2 against the Lakers in the finals.
Boston missed its first crack at closing out the series in Game 5, but the Celtics didn’t miss on their second swing, running the Lakers out of the gym.
Bryant, the regular season MVP, finished with 22 points on 7-of-22 shooting.
He started 4-of-5 from the field and seemed intent on forcing a Game 7. But he missed seven shots in a row and everywhere he went, L.A.’s No. 24 ran smack into a wall of Boston defense as high as the Green Monster.
“They were definitely the best defense I’ve seen the entire playoffs,” Bryant said. “I’ve seen some pretty stiff ones and this was right up there with them. The goal was to win a championship, it wasn’t to win MVP or anything like that, it was to win a championship.”
Garnett and Allen were All-Stars in other cities, stuck in Minnesota and Seattle, respectively, on teams going nowhere. But brought together in trades last summer by Celtics general manager Danny Ainge, a member of the ‘86 Celtics champions, they joined Pierce and formed an unbreakable bond, a trio as tight as the club’s lucky shamrock logo.
They resisted being called The Big Three, a nickname given to Larry Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish two decades ago.
“This is the reason we came here,” Garnett said. “This is the reason we got together, and Danny made it go down. This is it right now.”
With Garnett scoring 17 points and Pierce adding 10, Boston built a 58-35 halftime lead, and unlike Game 2 when they let the Lakers trim a 24-point lead to two in the fourth quarter before recovering, the Celtics never stopped.
They pushed their lead to 31 in the third, and with Boston still up by 29 after three, plastic sheets started going up in the Celtics’ locker room in preparation for a champagne celebration.
No team had to work harder for a championship than these Celtics, who were playing in their record 26th postseason game after being pushed to seven games by Atlanta and Cleveland before taking care of Detroit in six to win the Eastern Conference title.
They entered Game 6 slowed by injuries as Pierce, Kendrick Perkins (shoulder) and Rondo (ankle) were less than 100 percent. There was also uncertainty surrounding Allen, who stayed behind in Los Angeles following Game 5 after his youngest son became ill and was diagnosed with diabetes. The Celtics needed three planes to get back from L.A. and didn’t get home until late Monday night.
But there were no excuses, and just as they had while winning 66 games during the regular season, the Celtics got plenty of help from their bench as P.J. Brown, James Posey, Leon Powe and rookie Glen “Big Baby” Davis came in and contributed.
It was a group effort by this gang in green, which bonded behind Rivers, who borrowed an African word ubuntu (pronounced Ooh-BOON-too) and roughly means “I am, because we are” in English, as the Celtics’ unifying team motto.
The Celtics gave the Lakers a 12-minute crash course of ubuntu in the second quarter.
Boston outscored Los Angeles 34-19, getting 11 field goals on 11 assists. The Celtics toyed with the Lakers, outworking the Western Conference’s best inside and out and showing the same kind of heart that made Boston the center of pro basketball’s universe in the ’60s.
House and Posey made 3-pointers to put the Celtics ahead by 12 points and baskets by Pierce, Garnett and Rondo put Boston ahead by 18.
In the final minute, Garnett floated in the lane, banked in a one-handed runner and was fouled. His free throw made it 56-35, and after Perkins scored, the Celtics ran to the locker room leading by 23.
On his way off the floor, Garnett screamed, “That’s that.”
And so it was.
Notes
The Lakers had won their previous eight straight Game 6s in the finals. … Since the finals began in 1947, 16 have gone seven games, the most recent in 2005 when San Antonio had to go the distance to beat Detroit. … It was the second biggest margin in finals history behind Chicago’s 96-54 win over Utah in 1998. … The Celtics went 48-7 at home, including 13-1 in the postseason.

NO, BUT YES TO FREEDOM

It took years to negotiate, weighs in at 260 pages, is virtually unreadable — and now could be a dead letter.

Irish voters vetoed a painstakingly drafted treaty Friday that had been designed to streamline the European Union. Politicians from all of Ireland's major parties worked hard to sell the complex, deeply technical document to a confused and suspicious public.

Only Ireland put the treaty before the voters at all. The other 26 members are ratifying it through their parliaments, in part fearful of what happened to its predecessor, an even bigger, more ambitious constitution that French and Dutch voters torpedoed in 2005.

To become law, the treaty must be unanimously approved by all 27 EU nations. But Ireland's constitution requires EU treaties be put to a vote — a risky policy for the EU, whose powerful commissioners are not popularly elected and seem distant from the ordinary European.

The overwhelming majority of Ireland's politicians supported the Treaty of Lisbon, named after the city where the charter was signed by all member governments in December 2007. But they found it impossible to sell.
"If I was ever in charge of producing another treaty, I would say strongly to everyone at the table: Would you put something into it that's a big-ticket item that you can actually sell to people? Because this was full of technical detail," said Mary Hanafin, a government minister charged with drumming up support.

Her boss, Prime Minister Brian Cowen, faces certain embarrassment and possible isolation at an EU summit next week.

This is the second time that Ireland has voted against an EU treaty. The last time, in 2001, Ireland negotiated with EU partners to produce an appendix emphasizing Ireland's independence and staged a vote a year later, this time achieving a "yes" majority.

Such diplomatic maneuverings have fueled voter resentment.

"What part of `no' do they not understand?" asked Declan Ganley, leader of an anti-treaty pressure group, Libertas.

Ganley's campaign emphasized the threat to Ireland's unusually low business tax rates, a major reason why 600 U.S. companies have made their European homes in Ireland rather than France or Germany.

Cowen rued the fact that the government found itself on the defensive because Libertas and other groups opposed to the treaty successfully played on people's fears it would mean a loss of national sovereignty.

Anti-treaty groups from the left and right mobilized "no" voters by claiming the treaty would empower EU chiefs in Brussels, Belgium, to force Ireland to change core policies — including its military neutrality and its ban on abortion as well as low business taxes.
Cowen and opposition leaders insisted that was all nonsense.

But in the towns and villages of Ireland — a country that, since joining the EU 35 years ago, has arguably benefited most from membership because of massive financial aid from wealthy EU partners — people proved receptive to the warnings.

"I like being part of Europe. But I don't want Europe to take away any more of our Irishness," said Dublin taxi driver Ray Kennedy, who like many in the Irish capital complains about the Eastern European job-seekers who have inundated Ireland since the EU's rapid expansion in 2004.

He, like 53.4 percent of voters, rejected the treaty in Thursday's referendum.
Unlike the 2001 treaty rejection, which prevailed on a weak 34.8 percent turnout, this referendum mobilized unprecedented numbers of anti-treaty voters in a 53 percent turnout, high by Irish standards. This increases the difficulty of mounting a second Irish vote, as many EU backers undoubtedly want to do.

Ireland's minister for European affairs, Dick Roche, predicted a second vote would be difficult, if not impossible.

"As far as I'm concerned, this treaty is a dead letter," Roche said, adding that Ireland's voters have "made life very difficult for us going out to Brussels. We are in completely uncharted territory here, a very strange position."

"We need to hear clearly from all our leaders that the Lisbon Treaty cannot be brought back from the dead," said Richard Greene, spokesman for a right-wing Catholic group called Coir, which is Gaelic for "Justice."

Coir plastered Ireland with posters showing three chimpanzees covering their eyes, ears and mouth and the message, "The new EU won't see you, won't hear you, and won't speak for you — vote no."

In capitals across Europe, leaders said ratification should proceed regardless of the Irish vote. Ahead lie painful months of negotiations aimed at somehow overcoming the Irish veto.

"At the European Council, we will want to confer with each other, to hear Prime Minister Cowen's analysis, as well as his ideas on how to address the concerns expressed by those who chose to vote no," EU President Jose Manuel Barroso told reporters in Brussels.

In neighboring Britain, one of eight EU partners yet to ratify the treaty, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said the Irish outcome "needs to be respected and digested" — but should not oblige other countries to postpone their own ratification plans.

"I think it's important that no one tells them what to do next. It's very important the Irish make their own decisions about how to go forward on the basis of a careful analysis of the results," Miliband said.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed that patient diplomacy might eventually turn the Irish "No" to "Yes."

"We would have liked a different outcome, but as good Europeans we now have the task of simply taking the situation as it is and finding a way out, while at the same time respecting the vote of the Irish," she said.