How to protect yourself against rape in Illinois. Blow your whistle, vomit on your attacker or pretend to have AIDS.

What will Larry Trent and his merry band of thugs think of next?


http://www.examiner.com/x-17034-Chicago-Gun-Rights-Examiner~y2009m12d15-Gunbanning-Illinois-town-issues-whistles-to-citizens

While the Illinois State Police have promised a "comprehensive review" of their website, including its advice that women protect themselves from sexual assault by avoiding gun ownership and vomiting on their assailants, last week brought more news of non-serious, symbolic approaches to self-defense in Illinois as the Chicago Tribune reported that Chicago suburb Oak Park had begun issuing whistles to its citizens. In a move that promises to deter the town's notorious armed robbers as thoroughly as loud car alarms deter car thieves, Oak Park police officers waited for returning commuters on train platforms and gave out small whistles engraved with the name of the program's corporate sponsor. Oak Park officials say the whistles will help residents deal with the increasing incidence of armed robbery and street crime in the handgun-free town by allowing them to summon help, if not actually do anything in their own defense.

Certainly a simple canister of pepper spray, a knife, or even a humble flashlight could prove much more useful for self-defense than any whistle even under Illinois and Oak Park law, and the Chicago Gun Rights Examiner heartily recommends any of the three for those of us denied the right to carry a defensive firearm by Illinois law. But the whistles are unlikely to make a bad situation worse, so why are gun owners reacting with derision to Oak Park's newfound dedication to its citizens' safety? To understand, we need to recall the lengths Oak Park has gone to keep its citizens as disarmed as possible for as long as possible.

In the summer of 2008, when the Supreme Court ruled that the U.S. Constitution protects an individual right to keep and bear arms, it set off a scramble in Illinois. It took the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association less than two hours to file a new lawsuit, McDonald v. Chicago, asking that the courts find that states and municipalities are bound to respect that individual right because the 14th Amendment "incorporated" the 2nd Amendment against the states. The plaintiffs in that suit had barely begun their fight in the 7th Circuit court before Illinois cities with bans on guns or handguns started throwing up white flags fashioned from handgun ban repeals; Wilmette, Winnetka, Evanston, and even Morton Grove declined to defend their bans on handguns in light of the Heller ruling and the looming challenge in McDonald. Fighting was clearly a pointless waste of time and money with the writing so clearly on the wall.

Only Chicago Mayor Richard Daley was determined to fight to the end, but he found allies in Oak Park's municipal government by making a classic Chicago deal: Chicago's taxpayers, he told Oak Park officials, would foot the entire legal bill and seek "no contribution" from Oak Park in the event of defeat. That was an important consideration, since Dick Heller's legal team has asked the court to collect $3.5 million in attorney fees from the losing parties in Heller v. D.C., and given Mayor Daley's startling if unheralded admission that Chicago's citizens do have a constitutional right to keep firearms in the home

Of course, it's not Oak Park Police Chief Rick Tanksley's fault that citizens of Oak Park are not allowed to carry much more effective noise makers--for instance, in a caliber between .380 acp and .44 Magnum--under Illinois state law, at least in public. But a town spending other peoples' money to defend a clearly unconstitutional complete ban on handgun ownership, even in the home, is already sending the message that its citizens can't be trusted with the most effective means of self-defense available. Oak Park only adds insult to injury by offering to replace a serious personal choice on self-defense with a completely non-serious gift from on high. Does that seem harsh? If not, it should be rephrased, because harshness is the right response here. A government that will not allow its citizens to purchase the right tool for the job at hand, but expects them to be grateful for the wrong tool because it's provided by the government for "free," is not taking its citizens seriously.