The U.S. Supreme Court decision on guns may provide some help for cities, counties and states to control firearms in a unique way. If I understand the decision correctly, it reaffirms the right of individuals to bear arms, while permitting some controls by governmental entities.

It seems strange that the technology of the period of our Constitution would not be taken into consideration of gun control. Therefore, let the state or community pass an ordinance affirming the right to bear arms as long as such arms were equal to the technology of the 18th century. This would include requiring hand-made lead balls and cow horn dispensers of powder. Everybody then could flaunt a single shot muzzle-loading pistol or rifle as he or she might care to do. Any modern weapons would be illegal. Criminals could be arrested more easily just for having such weapons.

DONALD T. LEE
San Marcos

The Union-Tribune showed poor judgment in publishing Steve Breen's editorial cartoon Friday depicting the National Rifle Association practicing an unsafe “shooting into the air” act in celebration of the Supreme Court ruling on individual rights to possess a handgun in the home. The ruling was certainly in keeping with NRA Second Amendment rights and deserving of celebration; however, the NRA is a strong proponent of gun safety and promotes numerous educational programs teaching proper firearm practices. Shooting into the air violates all that the NRA stands for. Shame on the Union-Tribune for publishing an irresponsible depiction of the NRA.

JOHN R. SAVORY
San Diego

So the government can tell me how I can use my cell phone in my car for safety reasons, but it cannot keep me from carrying a loaded gun in my purse. I am now “a well regulated militia” unto myself. I'll get those redcoats!

It will be interesting to watch how this impacts the average 737,000 violent crimes committed annually with handguns. Will we hit 1 million next year?

SYLVIA HAMPTON
San Diego

I was amused to hear elected officials such as Chicago's Mayor Richard Daley as well as our own Sen. Dianne Feinstein express certainty that the Supreme Court's affirmation of an individual right to keep and bear arms would guarantee an increase in gun deaths. By their standard, Vermont and Utah would be among our nation's most violent places. The former having almost no gun laws, and the latter having the most liberal of the remaining 49 states. Why do we continue to elect officials who inhabit realms so far removed from reality?

ROBB MARSHALL
Santee

When the Supreme Court continually breaks down into 5-4 decisions, in four straight decisions, then the court itself should be nullified and designated a strictly political body and previous such decisions should revert to the purview of a vote from Congress or a vote of the people.

We are absolutely in the stone age. It's a crime that we have to be subjected to the tyranny of these pretenders who are mostly out of touch with society. Many may be pleased by this 5-4 decision; I don't see it that way. I see it as a continuing tragedy where the court should be stripped of its authority when it demonstrates an enduring bias that shows no objectivity.

ALBERT HANAMAY
Lemon Grove

What a wonderful day. The four reactionary bomb-throwers appointed to the United States Supreme Court by the Republican Party – Antonin Scalia, Samuel Alito, John Roberts and Clarence Thomas – have taken us back to the good ol' gun-slinging days of the 19th century. In their sanctuary of safety and security, they have made targets of us all.

Now that “Charlie Gun Owner” has an individual right to a gun, will he be able to take his newly acquired AK 47 to church, to his college dorm, to his place of employment, to the ball park, to Disneyland, to the beach? Who is going to inhibit his behavior? Something to think about!

FRANK FERRONE
El Cajon

What bothers me about the latest decision of the Supreme Court is its inconsistency. Two weeks ago, the minority argued against “habeas corpus” for the GuantÁnamo prisoners because “it would cost American lives.” Today the same judges, plus one, invalidated the Washington, D.C., restrictive laws on guns without considering the additional deaths their decision will cause.

Second, the Constitution does not mention guns, but arms. So, for consistency sake, I should be able to purchase all type of arms (bazookas, flame throwers, a couple of hand grenades) to be sure I protect myself and my family. What does the wording “cannot be infringed” mean?

GEORGE DOMINGO
Encinitas

The narrow ruling by the Supreme Court was hardly a relief. The dissenters, including an American Civil Liberties Union lawyer, came very close to judicially repealing the Constitution. Rather than a “living document,” the Constitution is the foundation and backbone of this free country. You must have established rules, and they must be enforced, or the rules are worthless. (Kind of like illegal immigration laws, but that's another issue.)

This ruling shows us just how dangerously close we are to having our country and rule of law plunged into the abyss of Marxism. However, had the vote gone the other way, I'll bet that 80 million legal gun owners would have demonstrated the Founding Fathers' actual intent of the Second Amendment, that We The People will protect our freedom, even from our own government.

LARRY ROSNER
Santee

Eureka! Hallelujah! Finally a victory for common sense. I am definitely confident that our local police departments will be extremely ecstatic and thankful. A gun in every household. The soothsayers will say that we haven't advanced beyond the revolutionary days. Let them. We are God-fearing, pistol-packing vigilantes. They say we should update? Listen, folks, there are solutions to many of the problems that face us, and the courts and lawyers are overwhelmed.

Now, we have an alternative to solve disputes. Some say that America is a violent country. Don't pay attention to statistics, these are induced political propaganda. We do have a constitutional right to keep a loaded handgun, always have. OK, so there are lots of felons and mentally ill people out there who who will now find it easier to get these weapons. But, that's the way the river flows.

Are we sending the world a message? Are we losing our moral center? What we show the world is what we are. Pure and simple. The Supreme Court ruling applied to a law that was pertinent to the time. If we need a loaded gun in every house, what are we really saying about what we think of our own country? It is showing to the world, loud and clear, what we really are. And where our true values lie.

ARIEL MORALES
El Cajon

Assigning blame over foreclosures

Regarding “State suing Countrywide over practices/Lender blamed for foreclosures” (A1, June 26):

While Countrywide should certainly be punished if it broke any laws, I fear that we are forgetting the people who are really responsible for the mortgage crisis: the people who accepted bad mortgages in the first place. It is they who drove home prices to artificial highs, it is they who bear responsibility for their own mistakes, and it is they who should learn the long, hard lesson of foreclosure so it never happens again. While I feel badly for anyone who loses their house to extenuating circumstances, I am happy to buy a foreclosed home from someone who lost it to greed.

TRAVIS CLEVELAND
Coronado

The house across the street from mine was foreclosed upon in February. While the homeowner made repeated efforts with the lender to modify her loan, the lender refused and foreclosed. There were no bidders on the courthouse steps at the trustee's sale, so the lender took it back for the outstanding amount of the mortgage. A week ago, the lender listed the home for sale at a price 25 percent less than the foreclosed loan balance. I don't understand the lender's logic. Why could it not just work with the homeowner to make their existing loan more affordable, rather than foreclosing and then offering the home for sale 25 percent less than the outstanding loan balance? In doing this, the lender is stealing the equity in my home, and further depressing the housing market. I am not a happy camper.

RAY LEONE
Escondido

Upon reading that Attorney General Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown has filed a lawsuit against Countrywide, I shook my head in disbelief that Countrywide is still be blamed for the inability of some California borrows to read the fine print. When I moved my family to Oceanside three years ago, we were offered the same low fixed introductory interest rates on our home loan with the understanding that after the introductory was over, the interest rate would vary according to the market.

I read the documentation and after discussing it, we decided that accepting such a home loan was too risky given the fact that, like all things, the housing market will go up and down. So while the owners across the street from us lost their home for accepting the same risky loan that was offered to us, we have remodeled the inside of our home.

When did California become a nanny state where everyone must be protected from the bogyman, aka legitimate businesses? We have created a new generation of people who, instead of taking responsibility for their own behavior, need big government to hold their hand.

DANIEL A. REINKE
Oceanside

City Attorney's Office addresses leaked memo

Regarding “Protect taxpayers/Open SDG&E lawsuit fees to public scrutiny” (Editorial, June 26):

The pending lawsuit against San Diego Gas & Electric is likely to be a hard-fought battle against a very well-

financed litigation opponent. Moreover, the memo that was illegally leaked and accepted by the Union-Tribune involves proposals – not completed arrangements – with potential attorneys.

The leaking of confidential, attorney-client privileged information for political advantage indicates that the persons involved have no regard for the welfare of this city or its taxpayers.

It is important to note that the City Attorney's Office did not ask for a blank check contingency fee arrangement for any outside counsel that might be hired to provide assistance on the SDG&E lawsuit.

Unfortunately, this added publicity could result in SDG&E seeking a change of venue in order to take the case outside of San Diego County on the grounds that it can't get a fair trial here. This would be financially detrimental to the hundreds of fire victims who may be part of the litigation and would be forced to travel out of the county to attend court hearings.

DON McGRATH
Executive Assistant City Attorney

Advocating micro loans for library funding

Regarding “Library drive advances/Don't give up yet on new downtown information hub” (Editorial, June 15):

I am a library user and a donor to the extent possible on my retirement pension and Social Security. In my view, a donation to build the new San Diego central library is equivalent to making a microloan to over a million people – all at the same time. Microloans have become popular, and rightly so. They change lives one at a time. A donation to build a new central library would change thousands of lives for many, many years.

Children would go to the new library after school when their parents are working. Some of those children would play video games, but one would read about oceans and chemistry experiments and grow up to invent a new way to desalinate the most abundant water resource on this planet. I want to fund that child.

Mothers, exhausted from being caretakers, would sit on the top deck of the new library and meet with other mothers to share ideas in a book group. One of them would write a novel that wins the Nobel Prize for literature. I want to fund that woman.

A recently unemployed man will go to the new library to use the computers to search for a job. As he Googles work environments, he will invent a new system for motivating employees to become more productive. I want to fund that man.

But the San Diego Library Foundation needs larger donations than I can make. Before my donation of several thousand dollars can really do any good, they need just a few maxi-loans from those who have maximized their own potential. With a gift of $20 million, we can achieve our city's dream of having a world-class central library – and give microloans of knowledge and power to every resident of San Diego. I promise my microgift of $2,000 the day the foundation receives yours.

JUDY EBY
San Diego

Hand-held or not, danger is still there

Regarding “Hands Off That Phone” (A1, June 22):

The story made only limited mention of the continuing danger posed by talking on the phone while driving, whether or not one uses a hands-free device. Most of the insurance industry and the best research on the topic have repeatedly identified that the increased accident risk from talking on a cell phone is due to decreased attention, whether or not one is holding the phone.

The “inattention blindness” that makes cell-phone use statistically as dangerous as driving while intoxicated is due to involvement with a conversation with someone not in the car, and the holding of a cell phone is not the real problem. Despite this, most drivers continue to mistakenly believe that use of a hands-free cell-phone use increases safe driving. Stay safe by waiting to make or take that call.

DEBBIE MALCARNE
San Diego

The California cell-phone legislation due to become law is quite typical of politics at work. There exists considerable evidence that any kind of telephone conversation, hand-held or not, is highly distracting to driver attention. This information is not secret. Why do you suppose legislators chose to pass a law that seems remedial, but is not? Politicians have priorities that sometimes coincide with the public interest, and sometimes do not. In this case, it seems the cell-phone lobby, not public safety, prevailed.

FRANK ALMOND
San Diego

Giving to same-sex foes or a charity?

As the groups opposed to same-sex marriage begin their financial recruitment campaigns over the coming months, I'd ask that anyone that would consider contributing to this cause spend a moment thinking about what this money might do for the Red Cross, battered women's shelters, homeless shelters, children's hospitals throughout California, etc. In these challenging economic times, most people are very cautious how they spend their money. Charity is extremely important to many organizations in California that serve the underprivileged. Ask your conscience how you'd rather see your money spent; to assist those who need a helping hand or to add discriminatory language to our state constitution.

JON WEIS
San Diego