Stevens didn't think there was connection between the second amendment and self defense. You do?
"JUSTICE STEVENS: How do you explain the fact that you include self-defense, but only two States, Pennsylvania and Vermont, did refer to self-defense as a permissible justification and all of the others referred to common defense or defense of the State, and in the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution itself there is no reference to self-defense?"
As a matter of fact, Stevens went on and on and Gura had no effective reply.
"The Parker court made no further attempt to determine whether "common use" or "linal descendancy" were absolute requirements."
The Parker court applied a "two-prong Miller test" -- 1) a “reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia” and, 2) arms that are "of the kind in common use”. If that's not an absolute requirement, why refer to it and why use it?
"The scope of "arms", which clearly includes pistols, need not be further addressed by the Heller Court."
No, it need not. But the next "Gura" who appears before the U.S. Supreme Court to defend his client who possessed a machine gun has got his work cut out for him, since the original Gura effectively took away any argument he might use.
Because it is an established principle in law that you don't argue to throw out a precedent like Miller if you don't have to. By showing that pistols are militia weapons and were in common use at the time, the Parker Court completely side-stepped any issues with Miller. The Supreme Court doesn't even have to decide that there is a right to keep and bear arms for self-defense. They only need to agree with Miller that the people, including Heller, have the right to keep and bear arms that have some utility to a militia.
Though you never agreed, many briefs in Heller point out that the Surpeme Court in Miller completely ignored the prosecution's argument that only militia members are protected. Had that really been the case, then the Supreme Court in Miller would never have had a need to address short-barreled shotguns or militia-usefulness. They could have simply stated that the Second Amendment only protects members of a militia.
And yet Kalifornia explicitly states that there is a right to self-defense. But somehow I imagine that that is still insufficient. To you, the right to self-defense without a mention of arms is meaningless. And the right to keep and bear arms, without a mention of self-defense is also meaningless.
If the Supreme Court rules in Heller that there is no fundamental, individual right to self-defense, then we have wasted our time in pushing Heller. But, IF THERE IS SUCH A RIGHT, then no sane person would claim that the right to keep and bear arms does not have as a purpose to permit the exercise of such a right.
As I pointed out before, perhaps in a different thread, "militia" is simply the plural of "self-defense". There is little that is contained in one that is not also contained in the other.