By Chad D. Baus

The Dayton Daily News reported over the weekend that Attorney General Marc Dann authorized his driver, a concealed handgun license (CHL)-holder, to carry his firearm at all times as part of his job duties.

Dann's driver, who the DDN reports obtained his CHL in January, immediately began running into a problem that faces every single one of the more than 100,000 Ohio CHL-holders on a daily basis: there are far too many "no-guns" victim zones in the Buckeye State.

Big City Mayors continue to look for a scapegoat for their crime problem

By Brian S. Stewart

Hillary Clinton is doing her best to tiptoe around the gun issue during her attempts to win rural votes in Pennsylvania. But even a scaled-down-on-gun-control Hillary Clinton means calls for a renewed crackdown on interstate gun “trafficking” and a renewal of an assault weapons ban. In a recent speech on fighting crime she even noted “a direct correlation to illegal gun sales and homicides”. Yet in the eyes of the mainstream media she’s dodging the issue by not explicitly endorsing Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter's array of new gun control laws.

The Boston Globe article has all sorts of little anti-gun sound bites that are spouted off as gospel. A Democratic consultant opines that Clinton doesn’t want to irritate her rural, blue collar constituency, "But I don't know how you talk about homicide in Philadelphia without talking about guns."

I do. Talk about violent crime and those that commit it. Talk about decaying inner cities and the conditions which perpetuate these cycles of violence. Talk about drugs and drug dealers. Talk about gangs. Even if you removed guns, which is impossible, these conditions would still exist. And violent criminals always find ways to be violent criminals.

House Criminal Justice Committee Chairman John White (R-38) has removed Castle Doctrine legislation from this week's hearing agenda. No reason was given in the announcement, but Buckeye Firearms Association has been informed that the reason was a "bill management issue", and that "there will be a hearing in the near future."

SB184 passed the Senate last week with unanimous support.

The House committee has already held three hearings on a House version of Castle Doctrine (HB264), which was introduced by Rep. Lynn Wachtmann.

The committee is still scheduled to have a third hearing and possible vote on Rep. Bruce Goodwin's HB450, legislation that would restore gun rights to members of the armed services or the Ohio National Guard who are between the ages of 18 and 21.

The hearing is open to proponent, opponent and interested party testimony.

Please continue to use our Write to Legislators website feature to contact your legislators about Castle Doctrine and other Emergency Action Items, and encourage your friends and family to do the same.