This is one of the reasons why I think SCOTUS will grant "cert" in Washington D.C. v. Heller, the former Parker v. Washington D.C. which D.C. lost. Say your prayers and keep your fingers crossed. Yes, I'm a little superstitious, but I'm optimistic. Souter and Ginsburg have written that the Second Amendment means more than "mere soldiering" in a militia. Only the Let's Roll militia worked six years ago.
Very true, the FAA and the USAF couldn't reorient fast enough to stop the terrorists once they put their plan into motion. The militia was "on the spot", as they always are, and dealt with the terrorists as best they could, and effectively at that. How much better it would have been if the passengers in first class could have just shot the terrorists before they even got close to getting into the cockpit? But of course they were in an unarmed victims zone, even though they refused to be "pure" victims.