David Gregory’s Magazinegate: NBC and the DC Police’s Little Coverup

Revisiting a big story.  From Emily Miller at the Washington Times, who has been sending some letters back and forth to DC officials:

…He sent back a Feb. 20 email from Victor Bonett in the attorney general’s office that said, “OAG is withholding the Jan. 9, 2013 letter from Lee Levine and certain responsive emails between OAG and MPD, pursuant to D.C. Official Code Section 2-534(a)(3)(A)(i), (a)(4) and (e).”

Mr. Levine’s letter provided new information, such as that the source of the “high-capacity” magazine. “Meet the Press briefly borrowed the empty magazine from a private citizen who lives outside of the District of Columbia and who ‘Meet the Press’ understood possessed the magazine lawfully,” he wrote.

The NBC lawyer also claimed, “The magazine was immediately returned to its owner following the broadcast.”

However, according to a police “property record” document, a Kay Industries 30-round magazine was recovered from Mr. Gregory (at a redacted address) as part of an active investigation. The document is signed on Jan. 9, two days after Mr. Levine said the magazine had been returned to its owner.

So the mag they claim they borrowed was returned and yet a mag was still seized.  So no matter what NBC’s story, if the DC police seized a mag, that’s all it takes to violate the law.  Mere possession, and that’s it.

Good to see folks with resources, regional proximity, and ability are pursing this.

No matter how it turns out, it’s a splendid case to use for anyone who’s arrested or charged from now on to illustrate a failure of equal application of the law.

Professor Jacobson at Legal Insurrection has a bit more.

David Gregory’s Magazine Gate: Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others; Time for the Million Gun March

Since gun laws are now meaningless if you’re violating them for First Amendment purposes, it’s time for the million gun march on DC.

From Politico, via Drudge:

NBC’s David Gregory is off the hook for showing a high-capacity gun magazine on “Meet the Press” and will not be prosecuted, D.C.’s attorney general announced on Friday.

D.C. attorney general Irvin Nathan on Friday said he would decline to prosecute in the case involving the Sunday show host and any NBC staffers. In a letter to NBC’s attorney Lee Levine, Nathan wrote that after reviewing the matter, his office “has determined to exercise its prosecutorial discretion to decline to bring criminal charges against Mr. Gregory, who has no criminal record, or any other NBC employee based on the events associated” with the broadcast.

Some animals are more equal than others.

The office made its decision “despite the clarity of the violation of this important law, because under all of the circumstances here a prosecution would not promote public safety in the District of Columbia nor serve the best interests of the people of the District to whom this office owes its trust.”

Translation: “We know he broke the law, but f*ck you.”

Nathan noted that his office’s decision in this case was also influenced by “our recognition that the intent of the temporary possession and short display of the magazine was to promote the First Amendment purpose of informing an ongoing public debate about firearms policy in the United States.”

Oh goodie!  You can use the First Amendment to promote destruction of the Second.  Let’s turn that around and see how it works, shall we?

Since there’s now a First Amendment exception to the law, it’s time for a million gun march on DC.

And from NBC:

“We displayed the empty magazine solely for journalistic purposes to help illustrate an important issue for our viewers. We accept the District of Columbia Attorney General’s admonishment, respect his decision and will have no further comment on this matter,” the show stated.

Yeah.  Just like you blew up pickup trucks.  But this hypocrisy was guaranteed to be a win-win, and it still is a win.  Hypocrisy exposed, gun laws meaningless under the David Gregory exception.  There’s now a new exemption to prosecution.

Update: HotAir has more of the letter from the DC AG.

David Gregory’s Magazinegate: Investigation Handed Over To DC Atty. General

From Washington Post:

The decision on whether anyone should be prosecuted after “Meet the Press” host David Gregory appeared to hold a high-capacity ammunition magazine on national television now belongs to the District’s Office of the Attorney General, authorities said Tuesday.

In an e-mail, a spokeswoman for D.C. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said her department has “completed the investigation into this matter, and the case has been presented to the OAG for a determination of the prosecutorial merit of the case.”

WaPo carries water for their fellow journalist with the “appeared to hold”.  That’s like saying “the Hindenberg appeared to go down in flames”.

Ed Morrisey at HotAir provides the same commentary that’s been made here at the Patriot Perspective since pretty much day one:

DC prosecutes people for violating this absurd law, which has done nothing to keep the area out of the top-ranked gun homicide cities, it should be noted.  Either Gregory should be held just as accountable as anyone else in DC for violating the law, or the law should be struck and other prosecutions dropped.  There is no journalistic privilege for violating gun laws, no matter how absurd they are — even if the violation eminently demonstrates the absurdity.

Current TV Anchor Calls For David Gregory To Apologize Over Magazinegate

David Shuster, now former Current TV anchor, as they’re now Al Jazeera, but whatever, he still makes the point that he’s ashamed of David Gregory:

Meet the Press is the oldest and most treasured public affairs show on television. The program’s host, merely by occupying the job, is a leader in broadcast journalism and in the Washington, D.C. community where the show is based.

This is why the ongoing silence of David Gregory and NBC News — following his apparent on-air violation of D.C. gun laws — is so disconcerting. By choosing not to comment, not only is Gregory diminished, but it harms the legacy of Meet the Press and leaves Washington, D.C. police with no opportunity to save face and move on.

Interesting thing to hear coming from the left.

…Washington, D.C. police are now stuck. If they let David Gregory off without getting any acknowledgment from him that he made a mistake, police will be throwing “equal justice under the law” out the window. After all, would an African-American in Southeast D.C. who violated a gun law — and wouldn’t acknowledge it — get a break? Of course not.

Shuster’s probably seen this:

And yet, each day the Gregory investigation continues, D.C. police are wasting more precious resources and time.

I appreciate that NBC counsel have apparently urged David Gregory, his staff, and all executives not to say anything while the investigation continues. But in this case, the narrow interests of a company lawyer undercut the ethical obligations of Meet the Press to journalism and the city of Washington, D.C.

It’s wise of them not to do so.  They were, after all…

Of course, Mike Judge had more subtlety than David Gregory.

There is nothing that prevents David Gregory from showing some respect to those institutions right now by saying something like, “I am sorry that my actions have caused a police investigation. My team and I will cooperate fully with D.C. police and do whatever we can to help resolve this matter.”

For now, however, David Gregory and NBC News offer only silence and “no comment.”

That is what you’re supposed to do when you’re caught red-handed.  Talking to the police only digs a hole deeper.  NBC has good lawyers who know how to not make a situation worse.  An apology, to a detective, is called a confession; and with a HD video of the crime broadcast to millions and subject matter expert across the table, there’s nowhere to go but guilty.

This is unfortunate and hypocritical. Not taking responsibility is what Gregory himself accused the Obama White House of doing in October over Benghazi. Gregory said at the time, “the buck stops with the White House and the president on these matters.”

Mr. Shuster, if your eyes are open to this, expect to see more of these things from your former leftist media heroes.  You didn’t even have to fight Roddy Piper – you put those sunglasses on for yourself.

HT HotAir

David Gregory’s Magazinegate: Last Week’s News

From Dylan Byers at Politico:

Last Friday, NBC’s David Gregory was making headlines as the subject of a D.C. police investigation after having displayed an empty gun magazine on live television. Later that day, NBC announced that Gregory had landed an exclusive interview with President Obama, and the issue more or less went away.

Gregory remains under investigation, a Washington Metropolitan Police Department official today told POLITICO, but the story seems like a distant memory.

Because some animals are more equal than others.

Those who argue that the investigation is ludicrous have a point: Showing an empty gun magazine on television, though illegal in Washington, D.C., was hardly going to harm anyone. As Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren wrote, it’s hard to think of a sillier use of investigative resources.

Except if you have a videotaped confession.  Then it’s a matter of seconds to do the investigation.

But it’s also hard to blame the other side for asking that laws be upheld and applied to all — especially at a time when so many in the media seem to be pushing for more of those laws.

Kudos to Byers for getting the point here.

The Gregory investigation may have started as a “non-story,” but that’s no longer the case. There are some folks on the right who still care about the outcome, and are ready to cite it as precedent if it goes Gregory’s way.

If some animals are more equal than others, expect any attempts at citizen disarmament to go even worse.  And expect Alan Gura to remember it when DC v Heller II makes it to SCOTUS.  Even the ideologically blinded judges will have a difficult time explaining it away.  Even Sotomayor and Kagan won’t be able to dream up some kind of explanation.

Some Media Animals Are More Equal Than Others

There have been a few very, very good column’s on David Gregory’s hypocrisy in the last few days as commentators and columnists finally catch up on the Christmastime news story.  Mark Steyn and Noah Rothman have two of the best.

Mark Steyn has an excellent piece on David Gregory’s Magazinegate.  I recommend it – he hits pretty much all the points needed to illustrate the absurdity and hypocrisy of the media and the law.

…the “dumbest media story of 2012” is actually rather instructive. David Gregory intended to demonstrate what he regards as the absurdity of America’s lax gun laws. Instead, he’s demonstrating the ever greater absurdity of America’s non-lax laws. His investigation, prosecution, and a sentence of 20–30 years with eligibility for parole after ten (assuming Mothers Against High-Capacity Magazines don’t object) would teach a far more useful lesson than whatever he thought he was doing by waving that clip under LaPierre’s nose.

To Howard Kurtz & Co., it’s “obvious” that Gregory didn’t intend to commit a crime. But, in a land choked with laws, “obviousness” is one of the first casualties — and “obviously” innocent citizens have their “obviously” well-intentioned actions criminalized every minute of the day…

Anything involving guns is even less amenable to “obviousness.” A few years ago, Daniel Brown was detained at LAX while connecting to a Minneapolis flight because traces of gunpowder were found on his footwear. His footwear was combat boots. As the name suggests, the combat boots were returning from combat — eight months of it, in Iraq’s bloody and violent al-Anbar province. Above the boots he was wearing the uniform of a staff sergeant in the USMC Reserve Military Police and was accompanied by all 26 members of his unit, also in uniform. Staff Sergeant Brown doesn’t sound like an “obvious” terrorist. But the TSA put him on the no-fly list anyway. If it’s not “obvious” to the government that a serving member of the military has any legitimate reason for being around ammunition, why should it be “obvious” that a TV host has?

–

There are two possible resolutions: Gregory can call in a favor from some Obama consigliere who’ll lean on the cops to disappear the whole thing. If he does that, he’ll be contributing to the remorseless assault on a bedrock principle of free societies — equality before the law. Laws either apply to all of us or none of us. If they apply only to some, they’re not laws but caprices — and all tyranny is capricious.

Or he can embrace the role in which fate has cast him. Sometimes a society becomes too stupid to survive. Eleven-year-old girls fined for rescuing woodpeckers, serving Marines put on the no-fly list, and fifth-generation family cats being ordered into separate compounds with “electric wire” fencing can all testify to how near that point America is. But nothing “raises awareness” like a celebrity spokesman. Step forward, David Gregory! Dare the prosecutor to go for the death penalty — and let’s make your ammo the non-shot heard round the world!

Read the whole column here.

Noah Rothman has this column at Mediaite – Gun Control Debate Exposed the Media’s Bias; David Gregory Exposed Their Hypocrisy:

Gone are the days when it was a news anchors job to report the political position of America’s elected officials. Today, it is acceptable – even commendable – to berate them on camera for holding views with which the anchor disagrees.

While many in the nation’s establishment news media display naked contempt for lawmakers who may differ with them on the necessity of more gun laws, the loathing with which they regard the National Rifle Association is unparalleled.

–

Misplaced priorities are one thing – they are easily exposed and, maybe, just as easily forgiven; the necessities of making compelling television or newspaper copy supported by advertising being what they are. Hypocrisy, on the other hand, should be unforgivable. The “national conversation” has, in a way, been blessed with a glaring example of the media’s hypocrisy in a rather silly incident in which NBC’s Meet the Press anchor David Gregory ran afoul of local gun laws in Washington D.C. when he displayed a high capacity magazine on camera this past Sunday.

Members of the media, on the right and the left, rushed to his defense with a collective eye-roll. Gregory’s infraction is “[n]ow officially the dumbest media story of 2012,” wrote New York University professor Jay Rosenon Twitter. “Dumb, dumb, dumb.” Media critic Jeff Jarvis used “nonstory” twice in one sentence to describe Gregory’s predicament. “A total waste of time,” declared CNN media critic Howard Kurtz when describing the police probe into Gregory’s display of the offending magazine.

“How much time and money is going to be spent (wasted) investigating [Gregory],” asked Fox News Channel hostGreta Van Susteren. “I will bet my right arm David Gregory is not going to go out and commit some crime with that magazine…or that he intended to flaunt the law (if it was against the law.) At worst, it was a stupid TV stunt (and so what!).”

Even the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board went out of their way to attempt to exonerate Gregory’s actions. Their argument is, in essence, his intentions were pure, even if his actions violated the letter of the law. “So here we have a possible indictment that would be entirely nonsensical of a journalist who was trying to embarrass an NRA official over an ammunition ban whose impact would be entirely symbolic,” reads a Thursday WSJ editorial. “It isn’t clear that Mr. Gregory is guilty of anything other than perhaps overzealousness in pursuit of the conventional gun-control wisdom, which is not a crime unless we want to empty newsrooms and fill up jails from coast to coast.”

The media’s argument in favor of treating Gregory differently from any other citizen who does not anchor a popular Sunday news broadcast is, essentially, “come on! Really?”

Yes, really. The media’s defense of Gregory is entirely personal – he is a member of the media simply doing what the media does. Even if this law is applicable to Gregory (a fact which the media seems prepared to debate), this particular infraction should not result in any penalties. At no point has any member of the media asked if Washington D.C.’s law, which is aimed at reducing the glamour of these extended magazines, is absurd. If Gregory was an anonymous reporter producing this clip during a local news broadcast, or even in private, the media’s response to his infraction would probably have been much different. In fact, as a reader of POLITICO’s Dylan Byers points out, there is historical evidence that suggests it was different not long ago.

–

L’affaire de Gregory has exposed an unseemly sense of entitlement in the elite media. If the post-Newtown debate over gun control has shown that the media is somewhat out of touch with average Americans, the Gregory episode has revealed that they do not see themselves as average Americans.

Again, there’s more to read, and I suggest reading the whole column here.

Questions From Washington Post’s Mr. Wemple About David Gregory’s Magazinegate

Mr. Erik Wemple, media writer for the Washington Post, contacted me with a few questions about the David Gregory Magazinegate story.

1) It appears that you are the one who first raised the question of the legality of the magazine that David Gregory brandished on Sunday. Is that your understanding as well?

The Patriot Perspective was the first blog to report it that I know of, yes.

The first place I remember seeing the question raised was on the AR15.com website here, by at first one, then by numerous forum members.  It’s a very large community, with many folks who live throughout the country, dealing with the patchwork of gun laws that alternatingly work and fail across the country.  David Gregory waving around the magazine was brought up slightly earlier in a thread about the David Gregory/Wayne LaPierre interview by other forum members, and there may have been other folks whose ears perked up at that, realizing there was a violation of law.

I read the posts, then I looked up the statute on my own to confirm the exact wording of it.  I found the statute on Handgunlaw.us, then looked up the statute again on Westlaw through links provided by the DC government.  Then I wrote this post (the first place I know of to report it) and I emailed a few other blogs and sites who I thought would be interested in the story.  Sipsey Street Irregulars, one of the blogs who broke the Obama administration ATF’s give-guns-to-the-Mexican-narcoterrorist-cartels scandal Fast and Furious, picked it up.  The next site I saw to pick it up was The Drudge Report, where Matt Drudge is already famous for his incredible nose for news and linked directly.  Professor William Jacobson at Legal Insurrection then went on to double-check DC laws at Westlaw and the story kept on moving.  I’m pretty sure Katie Pavlich was tweeting the post just before it hit Drudge, but I don’t know the timeline on that.

After the story picked up in days that followed, I have seen that there are a couple other places where the question developed independently (mostly gun forums), between the time I posted it originally on The Patriot Perspective and when Drudge picked it up and it hit the wider internet and media.  There may be one that posted right after Meet The Press aired, but I haven’t seen it.

Most folks who deal with firearms, be they sport shooters, 3-gun shooters, hunters, self-defense advocates, hobbyists, industry members or just general Bill of Rights fans are aware of the shipping warnings that accompany advertisements and catalogs of almost every seller of firearms or accessories throughout the US.  Most catalogs, websites, and advertisements will note that there are limited sales or no sales to California, Chicago, and most of the northeast to include Washington D.C., based on various regulations about components – especially magazines and magazine size.  There are probably other people who saw it and asked themselves the same question about legality.  Really, it was only a matter of how much time it took for those aware of the laws to get the info out.

2) Who are you?

I’m a veteran Marine and a fan of the Constitution and Bill of Rights.  I blog under the screen name ShortTimer.

3) Describe, if you could, Patriot Perspective’s approach to gun rights/Second Amendment.

That’s asking for a whole philosophy.  Oleg Volk’s website A Human Right pretty well covers it.

4) Some people are wondering why gun-rights folks are making a big deal over the Gregory thing, given the premise that gun-rights folks by and large want fewer firearms restrictions. What’s your take on that?

It’s an illustration of hypocrisy on many levels by David Gregory’s actions.  David Gregory is vehemently anti-rights, but he went so far as to knowingly and willfully break the very type of laws that he demands more of.  He states that more laws are needed, yet he by his own actions proves that those sufficiently motivated by bad intentions, whether criminals or madmen – can know the consequences and will still break any laws.  Thus it proves the futility of such laws.

If we live in a nation of laws, Gregory will be prosecuted (and possibly his staff will be wrapped up in a conspiracy charge), and the unjust laws that he wants expanded will send him to prison.  There has already been at least one pro-gun lawyer offering to defend Gregory, as the law is a violation of his Second Amendment rights, even though Gregory wants those rights taken away (though seemingly from everyone but privileged people like himself).  It will be his chance to agree that the laws he demands are unjust and absurd, or to be held to account by his own rules.  It will highlight the need to enforce existing gun laws rather than pass new ones, as well as the frivolous nature of most gun laws.

If we live in a nation of men and not laws, where some animals are more equal than others, then Gregory will be given favorable treatment and let go with nothing more than a slap on the wrist.  It will highlight the hypocrisy further, as evidenced by the David Gregory memes already circulating the internet, with pictures of him holding the magazine and captions like “If I were a black teenager, I’d already be in jail”.

It contrasts sharply with the story of 1st Lt. Augustine Kim, a two-tour veteran who was imprisoned by DC for actual innocent, unknowing violations.   Ultimately when Alan Gura takes Heller v DC II up to the Supreme Court, it will be a shining example of government hypocrisy if the law is enforced against poor, little people like Dick Heller but not against the rich, powerful like David Gregory.

5) Are you steeped in gun regulations? What prompted you to wonder about the legality of the magazine Gregory waved around on Sunday?

With the monstrous amount of gun law that exists, I can say I know a little bit, and have learned to navigate some firearms legalese.  There are some aspects I’m familiar with, and others require research.  If you deal with firearms at all, you begin to learn that there are a huge number of regulations surrounding them, and it becomes your responsibility to know them.  As I noted above, if you ever buy anything firearms-related, you run into laws almost immediately.  Some warnings apply to different parts of the country, some to specific states or regions.  When I saw the question first prompted by the internet post, I’d read many times before about DC’s draconian laws, then went to confirm them.  It was easy to see that it was a violation.  David Gregory taped his own confession in high definition in front of a subject matter expert and broadcast it to millions.

6) What lessons, if any, should people be drawing from this story?

Gun laws never stop a determined criminal.  They certainly never deter a madman.  David Gregory’s zealotry in wanting to assault citizens’ rights put him in a position where he wanted to break the law no matter what, and he did.  A successful man of his stature in national media should have had no rational interest in breaking gun laws and getting himself investigated and (by law should be) arrested on a clear cut-and-dried violation of the law, but he did so anyway.

Gregory may think he’s above the law.  If so, that speaks to the arrogance of a man whose children are surrounded by armed guards while he wishes to dictate that the little people should live defenseless, and uses his voice to render our children helpless.  It shows that there are two sets of laws – one set of laws for the Country Class and one for the Ruling Class.  Or else he didn’t even think of the law and was simply so driven by hatred of citizens’ rights that he did it anyway – in which case he proves the madman argument, though to a thankfully nonviolent end.  It shows that no laws deter a madman.

There’s been kind of a leftist backlash against the rule of law in this story, with a call for “reasonable, common sense enforcement”, which right now means “don’t enforce the law and leave David Gregory alone”, but amidst the din of hypocrisy there, there’s the occasional voice that says “he wasn’t going to hurt anyone with it”.  That’s an interesting point to be made from the gun-ban side, because millions upon millions of gun owners every day hurt no one – and is one of the points made by those who are pro-rights.  A very miniscule amount of people abuse the rights they have as Americans and we have the legal system to punish them for it.  Collective punishment for no crime pushed onto millions of individuals by the state because of a reaction to the actions of a madman or a handful of criminals is not why We The People established the government that we have.  Many people are starting to see this.

But as the saying goes, it’s not even really about the guns, it’s about the control.

David Gregory’s Magazinegate – What If He Went To Jail?

Via Yahoo and the Atlantic Wire:

David Gregory is actually under investigation for showing a 30-round magazine to the NRA’s Wayne LaPierre on Meet the Press this weekend, and the prospect of Gregory going to prison is actually making a lot of conservatives very happy. There’s no get-out-jail-free card in this meme, as far as they’re concerned — only a point to be made.

But the most important part is the comments:

Get this. He is not going to jail but if your average American was walking down the street in DC with one of these with no bullets he/she would go to jail if caught.

That is what gun laws are good for, getting innocent people in trouble. Just ask David G. of NBC. We don’t need gun laws. We need good judgment in making only good laws.

They have the evidence on film. If they don’t enforce the law, they should never be allowed to enforce it against anyone else.

He is in the media and he is not on FOX, therefore he is a liberal. And it is a SILLY law that if you have a 30 round magazine unattached to a weapon in DC you must go to jail, if they are not going to enforce the law, then they need to remove it from the books.

David Gregory’s Magazinegate – The ATF Weighs In… Sort Of

From Yahoo News:

Gwendolyn Crump, director of the Office of Communications for the Washington Metropolitan Police Department, told ABC News, “NBC contacted MPD inquiring if they could utilize a high capacity magazine for their segment. NBC was informed that possession of a high capacity magazine is not permissible and their request was denied. This matter is currently being investigated.”

But ABC News has learned from an official at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives that NBC had reached out to the federal agency on Friday for advice before displaying the weaponry.

According to the ATF official, the agency noted that ATF doesn’t enforce D.C. gun laws, but agreed to put the question to a couple of Washington police officers who’ve worked with the agency in the past.

The D.C. officers advised the ATF spokesman that Gregory could display the magazine, provided it was empty, the source said.

This is one of those times when it’s useful to note that cops aren’t lawyers.  Police have a bevy of regulations, rules, laws and ordinances to enforce, and have to have a breadth of knowledge across the whole of their enforceable jurisdiction that often results in thin spots at the periphery.  In short, the cops don’t always know every law.   Here, the DC police who responded to NBC from the department and said no were correct.  Those DC officers who responded to the ATF’s query were incorrect.  The statute is quite clear:

(b) No person in the District shall possess, sell, or transfer any large capacity ammunition feeding device regardless of whether the device is attached to a firearm. For the purposes of this subsection, the term “large capacity ammunition feeding device” means a magazine, belt, drum, feed strip, or similar device that has a capacity of, or that can be readily restored or converted to accept, more than 10 rounds of ammunition. The term “large capacity ammunition feeding device” shall not include an attached tubular device designed to accept, and capable of operating only with, .22 caliber rimfire ammunition.

H/T Durka Durka

And as ATF noted, they don’t enforce DC gun laws.  They don’t have to be aware of them all.

That turned out to be bad advice, as conservative media and gun rights activists were first to note. The ATF official describes this as a “misunderstanding,” and says he hopes DC police will not bring charges.

“Misunderstandings” for the little guy mean they get chained to a bed for months.

Maybe the ATF has learned from the murders of Brian Terry, Jaime Zapata, and now Susana Flores Maria Gamez, that they really should lie low for a while.  Any discussion about gun control that involves the ATF will end up bringing up the ATF’s smuggling of thousands of weapons to Mexico’s narcoterrorist cartels, which isn’t going to help those wanting to eliminate citizens’ rights really make any points other than that government force can’t be trusted.  And of course, there’s still the ongoing investigation and lawsuits to push for disclosure of some 70,000 documents that the ATF and DOJ have been stonewalling on since they started abetting murdering Mexicans and federal agents.

This is another one of those things that happens when you deal with too many regulations and too many agencies.  What is legal according to one can be illegal according to another.  Businesses that deal with city, county, state, and federal rules on commerce run into this all the time.  Firearms owners in states without preemption laws at some level often have to deal with patchwork laws as well, and have to be very aware of the minefield they constantly weave.

David Gregory’s Magazinegate – Politico Reports David Gregory Will Not Be Hosting Meet The Press Next Week

From Dylan Byers at Politico:

NBC’s David Gregory, the subject of a now-popular police investigation, is on vacation and will not host this Sunday’s edition of “Meet The Press.”

…

Gregory’s vacation was scheduled prior to last week’s show, according to NBC. He is scheduled to host the Jan. 5 edition of “Meet the Press.”

Maybe.  That’s a long time for NBC to make decisions until then.