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Latest newsletter issue, October 21, on the web.

Latest Media Analysis articles

Evaluating Rocky, Post pre-election polling. The papers were right on the President and Senate race, but wrong on almost all the ballot issues. Rocky Mountain News/Denver Post. Nov. 15, 2008.

Election chaos online. The Denver Post's online ballot tool is imperfect, but much than that of the News. Rocky Mountain News/Denver Post. Nov. 1, 2008.

Columnist has his own paranoid style. Rocky Mountain News columnist (and University of Colorado law professor) Paul Campos used the famous essay, "The Paranoid Style in American Politics", by historian Richard Hofstadter as the template for a column criticizing Republicans. Kopel's column suggests that--at least based on the evidence within Campos's column--"the paranoid style" was more accurate as a description of Campos's own approach. Rocky Mountain News/Denver Post. Oct. 18, 2008.

Kopel's Corner weblog. (Reprints of Kopel posts on The Volokh Conspiracy and the Colorado Union of Taxpayers weblog.) Latest entries: False "findings" about gun accidents from the DC City Council. The United Nations vs. the Second Amendment. Lots of stuff on Heller.

Television and Radio

Colorado Inside-Out. Thursdays at 8 pm., Fridays at 5 pm. KBDI channel 12, Denver.

Podcasts & Video

Colorado 2008 election wrap-up. Kopel podcast with Jon Caldara on Colorado's election results, including the defeat of several tax increase ballot issues, and the defeat of Marilyn Musgrave. 7:21. Nov. 17, 2008. MP3.

Interview with Richard Pearson, Executive Director of the Illinois State Rifle Association. Podcast for iVoices.org. Oct. 14, 2008. Pearson has been lobbying on sporting and right to arms issues at the Illinois legislature since 1989. He has more first-hand knowledge of Obama's record on these issues than anyone except Obama himself. In the 20-minutes podcast interview, Pearson suggests that Obama's claim about his supposed support for sportsmen is extremely inaccurate.

What's Wrong with the Patriot Act? Dave Kopel and Cathryn Hazouri (head of the Colorado chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union). Part of the the University of Colorado Denver Student Life office's Anatomy of War series. October 8, 2008. Available in 7 parts on YouTube. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7.

Podcast and  Multimedia archive

Books

The Heller Case: Gun Rights Affirmed! (Bloomfield Press, 2008). With Alan Korwin

Aiming for Liberty (Merril Press, 2009, forthcoming).

Organizations

Research Director of the Independence Institute

Associate Policy Analyst, Cato Institute.

Columnist, Rocky Mountain News/Denver Post.

Editor-in-Chief, Journal on Firearms & Public Policy.

Member, Council of the Editors of Learned Journals.

Peer Reviewer, Trends in Organized Crime, Criminal Justice Policy Review.

Contributing Editor, Information Technology & Telecom News (Heartland Institute)

Contributing Editor, Liberty magazine.

Contributing Editor, Gun Week

Contributing Legal Editor, The Firearms & Outdoor Trade.

Adjunct Professor of Law, New York University, 1998-99. Course syllabus.

Board of Directors, Colorado Union of Taxpayers.

Website manager, MaryLinks.

Background

BV-rated attorney. "CV, BV and AV are registered certification marks of Reed Elsevier Properties Inc., used in accordance with the Martindale-Hubbell certification procedures, standards and policies."
Former Assistant Attorney General, State of Colorado,  Hazardous and solid waste enforcement.

University of Michigan Law School, J.D. magna cum laude. Contributing Editor, Michigan Law Review.

Brown University, B.A. in History with Highest Honors. National Geographic Society Prize for best History thesis.

NRA-certified instructor for Pistol and for Personal Protection. NRA-qualified Distinguished Expert rating for Handgun.

Memberships: Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences (Life member), American Civil Liberties Union, American Society of International Law, International Association of Genocide Scholars, International Sociological Association, Inter-University Seminar on Armed Forces and Society, Mariological Society  of America, associate member. National Council of Editorial Writers, National Rifle Association (Benefactor member), National Society of Newspaper Columnists, Triple Nine Society. Zionist Organization of America.

Some popular older articles:

59 Deceits in Fahrenheit 911.

Latest short articles

Obama and McCain: Stark contrast on gun rights. Denver Post. Nov. 3, 2008.

Gunning for Victory. Second Amendment voter guide. National Review Online. October 30, 2008.

When Obama Wrestles with Heller. Barack Obama is a tremendous threat to the Heller decision. He has an extreme anti-gun record. The persons being named as his potential Supreme Court and Cabinet nominees have established records of anti-rights activism. America's 1st Freedom. October 2008.

FactCheck Flubs Obama Gun Fact Check. The NRA's claims about Obama's anti-gun views are supported by his voting record. The Volokh Conspiracy weblog. Sept. 23, 2008.

Is the Best Defense a Good Book? Part II. The Old Testament and Self-defense. America's 1st Freedom. Sept. 2008.

The Calvinist Connection. Liberty. October 2008. The roots of liberty go deep. They reach to places where modern libertarians might never expect to find them.

Was MLK a Republican or not? Rocky Mountain News. Aug. 29, 2008. Also, the specialized press at the Democratic National Convention, and under-coverage of Obama's ground game advantage.

Text and Twitter your way to victory. Aug. 28. Obama's brilliant use of social networking.

Full Picture of Obama Emerging. Aug. 27. What the media hasn't told you about the socialist, racialist, Barack Obama Sr. Plus bogus claim from Time that older Jewish voters who don't back Obama must be racist.

Kopel on the Heller case. Independence Institute amicus brief, in PDF.

Latest Monographs & Journal articles

Poisoned Milk and the Poisoning of Democracy: Some Cautions about China Trade and Taiwan Sovereignty. Paper presented at the symposium “Taiwan’s New Approach: Opportunities and Challenges for President Ma Ying-jeou’s Government.” International House, University of Chicago, October 24, 2008. PDF.

The Natural Right of Self-defense: Heller's Lesson for the World. Symposium issue on the Heller case. 59 Syracuse Law Review (2009, no. 2, forthcoming).

Pacifist-Aggressives vs. the Second Amendment: An Analysis of Modern Philosophies of Compulsory Non-violence. 3 Charleston Law Review (no. 1, 2008, forthcoming).

Christian Pacifism Before Constantine. Working paper. June 12, 2008. Much recent scholarship on early Christianity has emphasized the diversity of early Christian thought. This Paper presents evidence of diversity on early Christian belief and practice on the issue of pacifism. Notably, the diversity is found within orthodox Christianity itself. The claims of some modern writers that pre-Constantinian orthodox Christians were virtually unanimously pacifist are not correct. In fact, some but not all of the early Patristic writers were pacifists. A significant number of Christians, including saints, served in the Roman army. The Paper discusses the following writers: Justin Martyr, Marcion, Irenaeus, Athenagoras, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Hippolytus, Julius Africanus, Origen, Cyprian, Arnobius, and Lactantius, and also examines other sources of information about the early church.

Taiwan's Presidential Elections: An Analysis of What Happened, and What May Happen Next. Independence Institute Issue Paper. April 2008. PDF. Examining how KMT candidate Ma Ying-Jeou won the election in part because of his strong defense of Taiwan's sovereignty and his appeal to Taiwan's growing national consciousness. The Issue Paper also analyzes the two referenda on UN membership.

"Is There a Relationship between Guns and Freedom? Comparative Results from 59 Nations." 13 Texas Review of Law & Politics (no. 1, 2008, forthcoming). With Carl E. Moody & Howard Nemerov. There are 59 nations for which data about per capita gun ownership are available. This Working Paper examines the relationship between gun density and several measures of freedom and prosperity: the Freedom House ratings of political rights and civil liberty, the Transparency International Perceived Corruption Index, the World Bank Purchasing Power Parity ratings, and the Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom. The data suggest that the relationships between gun ownership rates and these other measures are complex. The data show that (although exceptions can be found) the nations with the highest rates of gun ownership tend to have greater political and civil freedom, greater economic freedom and prosperity, and much less corruption than other nations. The relationship only exists in for high-ownership countries. Countries with medium rates of gun density generally scored no better or worse than countries with the lowest levels of gun rates.

"Evolving Christian attitudes towards personal and national self-defense." Working paper. Nov. 27. Analyzes changes in Christian thought about the use of force, from the 19th to the 21st century. PDF.

"Human Rights and Gun Confiscation." 26 Quinnipiac Law Review 383 (2008). PDF. With Paul Gallant & Joanne D. Eisen. Examines human rights abuses in gun confiscation programs in Kenya and Uganda, and in South Africa's quasi-confiscatory licensing law. Also provides the most complete collection ever presented of international survey data about why people in various countries own guns.

"Dhimmitude and Disarmament." 18 George Mason University Civil Rights Law Journal 305 (2008). PDF.

"The Human Right of Self-Defense." 22 BYU Journal of Public Law 43 (2008). David Kopel, Paul Gallant & Joanne D. Eisen. PDF.

Research Areas

Criminal Justice

Digital Economy

Environment

Health, Education & Welfare

History

International

Media Analysis

Religion

Right to Arms: USA

Right to Arms: International

Terrorism (and Fahrenheit 911)

Waco

Favorite links.

World Languages

Français.

Italiano. Nuovo: Intervista a David B. Kopel.

Español. El Control de Armas en Japón.

Polski /Polish.

Português.

Český /Czech

Magyar /Hungarian. új: Az ENSZ bûntárs volt az izraeli katonák elrablásában.

Pусский/Russian. Почему республиканец Колин Пауэлл поддержал демократа Обаму. 20.10.2008. MP3. Powell endorses Obama.

Deutsch /German. Zur Tragödie von Virginia Tech

Nederlands /Dutch.

Svenska /Swedish.

Dansk /Danish.

繁體中文 /Chinese.

日本語 Full-text Japanese version of this entire website.

Archives

Newspaper and magazine articles, 2001 to the present.

Newspaper and magazine articles, 1986-2000.

Books, law review articles, other scholarly publications.

Kopel's Corner Weblog

"Good legal scholarship was absolutely crucial to this outcome. No justice is capable of producing the historical research and analysis upon which Justice Scalia relied. Brilliant as it was in its execution, his opinion rested on the work of many scholars of the Second Amendment, as I am sure he would be the first to acknowledge. ...

Due to the political orthodoxy among most constitutional law professors, some of the most important and earliest of this scholarship was produced by nonacademics like Don Kates, Stephen Halbrook, David Kopel, Clayton Cramer and others."

Randy E. Barnett, News Flash: The Constitution Means What It Says, Wall Street Journal, June 27, 2008, page A13.

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Great website: JerryKopel.com. My father's essays on Colorado and national politics, based on his 22 years of service as a Colorado State Representative.

To contact Kopel, write "david",  then "@", then "davidkopel.org"

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