If this article is any indication, anti-gun activists in the Philadelphia area are getting assistance from the other side of the country, in the form of Oakland's current Mayor, better known as former Berkeley Congressman Ron Dellums (than which there are few Americans further to the left):

"Crime and violence is at an epidemic level in this country," Dellums, 71, said at a news conference. "It has reached a crisis level here in Oakland."

Oakland's problem indeed is severe. The ethnically diverse city recorded 148 killings last year, up from 94 the year before. Its rate of 37 homicides for every 100,000 residents was about one-third higher than the rate in Philadelphia, where 406 people were killed last year.

Dellums, moving to reorganize the police department and beef up prevention programs, has tried to cast Oakland's local carnage in a national context.

"If Philadelphia is facing the same problems that Oakland is facing - that New York, and Chicago and Los Angeles are facing - what does that say?" Dellums asked in an interview in his City Hall office, five blocks from the intersection where Bailey was gunned down. "This is a national epidemic."

Never mind that. Dellums declares (along with a host of urban mayors) that there is an epidemic, and that they have an opportunity to make it a presidential campaign issue!

For Dellums, who pushed an urban agenda as a leader of the Congressional Black Caucus, the increase in violent crime is an opportunity to organize America's mayors to use their clout to influence the presidential campaign.

"You know, we talk about war and peace in an international context, but there's a war going on domestically in every city in America," he said.

The solution, claims Dellums, is saturation with federal money -- in Oakland and everywhere.

"If you saturate us with resources, let us show what can be done if you really focus on the issues of urban life in a very direct, and focused, and profound way," he said. "Not only can we solve the problems of Oakland, but we can show the way on how to deal with these issues in America."

Dellums, a former head of the House Armed Services Committee who once flirted with the idea of running for president, now faces perhaps the biggest political challenge of his career.

There is no shortage of weaponry, despite gun laws in California that are more strict than Pennsylvania's.

Dellums said about half of Oakland's crimes were committed by people returning from prison. He called for more efforts to prepare ex-offenders for reentry as a generation of people who were locked up during the early 1990s nears release.

"We went through this tough period: 'Jail them. Put them away for 10 years, 15 years.' Well, eventually people come out," Dellums said. "What happens to them? They start to contribute to crime and violence."

Conveniently left out of many of these discussions is Washington DC, home to the most draconian gun laws in the United States, and where guns are virtually illegal. Recently, city officials there claimed that the "handgun ban has saved countless lives." Calling that contention "a howler," NRO's David Freddoso replied:

Countless lives? D.C. is consistently at the top of the U.S. murder rate rankings. Was the gun ban saving "countless lives" in 1991, when the rate peaked at 80 murders per 100,000 people? Would the number have otherwise been even higher? Is it still saving "countless lives" when our murder rate for 2005, at its 20-year low, was still five times that of New York City?

But the activists claim that "gun control will work" anyway. This is getting so tired that it's beginning to remind me of the claim that socialism can be made to work this time -- if only the right people are put in charge.

For the last week, I tried to ignore the Jesse Jackson "lie-in" campaign co-sponsored by the Million Brady Mom amalgamation. Yes, it has been written up in the Inquirer, but I figured it wasn't newsworthy and I didn't want to subject readers of this blog to several more blog posts about anti-gun bias.

Something about the Dellums piece, though, immediately followed by a glowing writeup glorifying anti-gun activists, made me feel a bit oversaturated.

If these people plan to saturate me with resources, the least I can do is saturate back, even if it's just a little.

Yesterday's "Bridging the violence gap" attempted to make some gun control activists meeting in a local house look like a major movement:

It could have been a gathering for a political candidate - the 100 or so people crowded into the Roxborough living room one night last week, sipping wine and listening to speakers.

Instead, party-planner Pam Yaller had brought this group of suburban mothers, city teachers and doctors, fellow Quakers, friends, and acquaintances to her home for an urgent purpose.

While the article didn't stress this at the beginning, eventually it became clear that the Pennsylvania president of the Million Mom March was a principle organizer of the gathering:

The gathering stemmed from a chance encounter in June when Yaller, the mother of boys, ages 9 and 12, attended an interfaith peace march in Germantown and, in line for the bathroom, met Barbara Montgomery, president of the Pennsylvania Million Mom March, an anti-gun-violence group.

Then she read about the killing of 14-year-old Tykeem Law, who was shot to death on his bike in South Philadelphia on July 14 when he wouldn't get out of the way fast enough for a motorist.

"I remember carrying his picture around for a couple days," Yaller said.

What this meeting was about, of course, is gun control (and of course the Million Mom March):

Montgomery also suggested that they write letters to legislators advocating tougher gun laws.

Some planned to join Montgomery's group, which advocates for tougher gun laws and preaches against violence.

Some got out checkbooks.

As for Yaller, she said her Upper Dublin Quaker meeting plans to do a "God not Guns" event as an outgrowth of the meeting.

"I'm up for anything to crash down the divide in the city," she said. "It can be as simple as buying a school uniform for a kid."

Last week, Montgomery demonstrated in front of a Philadelphia gun store, in a nationally-organized event orchestrated by Jesse Jackson and timed to coincide with the 44th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I have a dream speech":

Before the rally, Barbara Montgomery, president of the Million Mom March in Pennsylvania and representative of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, said protests were being held coast to coast.

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence with its network of Million Mom March Chapters is joining activists across the country in support of Reverend Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow PUSH Coalition's national day of protest on Tuesday, August 28 -- on the anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's 1963 March On Washington.

More than 20 local events are being organized in communities throughout the nation that will highlight the daily loss of life in America from weak gun laws that allow dangerous people like the Virginia Tech killer to access firearms and the illegal gun trafficking that provides a rich supply of guns for criminals.

[...]

-- In Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 32 individuals will lie down to honor the murder victims of Virginia Tech and lament the ease of access to guns in America. The demonstration will be at 6 PM at Schoolhouse Lane and Vaux Street. It will be followed by a forum on gun violence at the home of a local activist Pam Yaller. Contact Barbara Montgomery....

I'll say this for the Pennsylvania Million Mom March president. She has an impressive background as a musician and producer, including being the Music Director for Richard Simmons, and many other things. Her anti-gun activism, she says, began in Vietnam, where "she spent her formative years, "witnessing man's inhumanity to man. "

"Man's inhumanity to man"? Considering what the Khmer Rouge did to a disarmed population, I find myself aghast that anyone who had lived in the area could support gun control.

Whether I'm aghast or not, she and her group recently targeted the home of Senator Arlen Specter by lying down on to represent "victims" not of criminals, but of guns:

Million Mom March member Barbara Montgomery, who organized the "lie-in," said they were acting as part of a National Day of Protest Against Illegal Guns.

"There's 32 of us to represent the number of murders by handguns in this country every day," Montgomery said. "If you counted suicide and accidents, we'd have 83 people out here."

ROXBOROUGH. A large gathering of advocates for stronger gun control in Pennsylvania will hold a rally and "lie-in" this evening near Sen. Arlen Specter's home, a local organizer with Million Mom March said yesterday.

"We need to continue to get more awareness about the nightmares of gun violence," said Million Mom March member Barbara Montgomery. "Sen. Specter certainly has not been supportive of any gun legislation we're supporting on a national level."

The rally will take place at 6 p.m. at School House Lane and Vaux Street, followed by a "Stop the Madness" meeting at 597 Hermit Ave., Montgomery said.

Other groups will hold similar rallies, Montgomery said, to show unity to federal and state legislators with the power to introduce new gun control legislation.

"We're talking about illegal handguns and assault weapons," she said. "We don't have an assault weapon ban in Pennsylvania and we don't have one on a national level."

Other local chapters of national groups like the NAACP and the Nation of Islam will also take part in the rally tonight, Montgomery said. The city's local anti-violence organization, Men United for a Better Philadelphia, will also join the rally.

"The reason for [today] is it's the anniversary of Martin Luther King's March on Washington [34 years ago]," Montgomery said. "Of course, every day, we should have a day of protest against illegal guns."

Look, I don't always agree with Arlen Specter. But the fact that these people are targeting him right in his home neighborhood for not being supportive makes me feel supportive. Of him.

I realize I have no hope of changing the minds of people who are so hopelessly obsessed with gun control that they must engage in die-ins and think they should be protesting every day. Such people are more than activists; their behavior verges on outright fanaticism, and I honestly wonder what makes them tick. I mean, I feel pretty strongly about the Second Amendment, but I'm not about to go around nagging people and playing dead in order to make my point.

That said, I do write this blog, and I think that if these people are so pissed at Arlen Specter that they're targeting him this way, Second Amendment supporters might want to put a call in to his office (or use the contact form), and offer a few words of friendly support. (I just did.) His record is generally good on the Second Amendment issue ("opposes most gun control, voting against the Brady Bill, background checks at gun shows, the ban on assault weapons, and trigger locks for handguns"), but the GOA has criticized him for waffling and abstaining. Whether he's likely to be intimidated by a couple of dozen activists lying down near his house, I don't know.

But I think this post is about as saturated as I can get for one day.

One of the reasons I can't stand activists is that they force me to act like one. This can create vicious cycles of activism. And I'm not an activist! I didn't want to call Arlen Specter's office just now. For that matter, I didn't even want to write this blog post.

The activists made me do it! They saturated me with their "resources"!

And they want to use the federal government to saturate all of us....