Webb's aide arrested for carrying firearm.

The news is pretty much all over the place so anyone who’s reading up on current events is already aware that Virginia Senator Jim Webb’s aide, Phillip Thompson, was arrested by Capitol Police on Monday. The aide was apparently carrying Senator Webb’s pistol into the Senate office building while Webb was parking his car.

An aide to Sen. Jim Webb was arrested Monday when he entered a Senate office building with a loaded pistol belonging to the senator.

Capitol Police spokeswoman Sgt. Kimberly Schneider said the aide was charged with carrying a pistol without a license and possessing an unregistered firearm and unregistered ammunition.

Sen. James Webb, D-Va., gestures during an address at the National Press Club in Washington, Thursday, March 22, 2007. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

The office of Webb, D-Va., identified the aide as Phillip Thompson and said he was “a former Marine, a long-term friend and trusted employee of the senator.”

A congressional official briefed on the incident said Webb gave the gun to Thompson when the assistant drove him to an airport earlier in the day. Thompson, upon entering the Senate building, forgot he was carrying the weapon.

“To our knowledge, this incident was an oversight,” Webb’s office said in a statement. It said it had no other details.

I’m sure it was an oversight. Thompson put the bag with the gun in it onto the belt leading into an x-ray machine that was designed specifically to detect such events. If the aide was trying to sneak it past, he surely would have been far more sly than that.

One wonders 2 things, though. First, is it common practice to allow Congressmen to carry concealed firearms into and out of DC? This raises the question of why these guys are permitted to do so when the residents of DC aren’t allowed to have pistols in their own homes, let alone carrying them concealed on the streets. The US Court of Appeals in DC has overturned the DC ban but it’s still on life support as the City Council searches for ways to keep their populace unarmed and defenseless against…

Against whom? Perhaps we should ask Senator Webb why he feels the need to carry a weapon into DC for himself. What are you defending yourself against, Senator? And why is that threat any more significant for you than for anyone living in DC?

Of course, it might not have anything to do with specific threats. Webb could just be carrying the firearm because that little document known as the Constitution of the United States explicitly says his right to do so cannot be infringed upon. One must then ask why the Senator is to be accorded the protection to his rights when residents of DC are not. Perhaps the Senator will be willing to extend the protections he so enjoys (both that of his firearm and the right to keep and bear it) to DC residents if and when the issue comes before him in chambers? Just asking.

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