Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign, recently acknowledged to ABC News that "we've lost the battle on what the Second Amendment means." His statement contradicts years of rhetoric from the organization about how it does not oppose gun ownership.

Now that the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled the Second Amendment means what it says, and that the right "of the people" to keep and bear arms applies to individual citizens regardless of service in a militia, Helmke and crew undoubtedly are feverishly trying to rework their strategies on how best to disarm as many citizens as possible.

That Helmke virtually admitted his group has never embraced the "right" to keep and bear arms —- instead essentially viewing gun ownership as a revocable privilege —- was astonishing. The fact that he viewed this as a battle against his fellow citizens demonstrates just how far afield the anti-gun movement has strayed from mainstream America.

Gun-control fanatics have had the foundation pulled from beneath their house of cards. For years, they have both lived and cultivated a lie about the meaning of the Second Amendment, leaving one justifiably curious about what other deceptions they have fostered in their crusade to disarm American citizens. They have masked their intentions with such terms as "sensible legislation" and "gun safety measure," but the ultimate goal has always been to regulate gun ownership out of existence.

Perhaps their campaign will shift to cities, where they will lobby mayors and city councils to ban firearms, including those carried by legally licensed citizens, from all public property. Thursday's Supreme Court ruling appears to leave that door cracked open.

Maybe gun-control lobbyists will play semantics games with what they hope is a gullible public, suggesting that one needs a reason to exercise a constitutional right, as did Washington CeaseFire President Ralph Fascitelli in a recent guest column published by a Seattle newspaper.

Fascitelli argued that "The question here is not whether individuals have a right to own a gun but whether they have a good reason and what rules and regulations should be applied." After Thursday's ruling, nobody needs to justify, especially to anti-gun zealots, their decision to own a firearm, nor should they accept the notion that this decision must be subject to regulatory suffocation.

In every state there is some sort of "CeaseFire" or "Gun Safety" lobbying group whose definition of safety is total citizen disarmament. That is why anti-gunners are taking the Heller ruling so hard. It is difficult to erase a constitutionally protected civil right.

While the Supreme Court ruling is certainly a defeat for the gun-control lobby, it is a victory for civil rights, and for all Americans, not just those who own firearms. For in an environment where one civil right has been eroded, all civil rights are in peril. Thursday's ruling restores the Second Amendment to its rightful place as a protection for individual citizens.

> Dave Workman is senior editor of Gun Week, a publication owned by the Second Amendment Foundation.

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