A man, who has planned to ambush and assassinate police officers, is not going to be deterred by laws. It didn't matter whether there was an open carry law or not, but I want to address this point made by Charles C.W. Cooke at National Review:
'2) Because this was legal, it would have been difficult for the police to stop him before he committed his crime.'
Actually, it would not have been difficult for police to stop him at all. According to reports about the 911 call, Long was not only brandishing a weapon, he was wearing a mask.
While LA is an 'open-carry state', it does prohibit the wearing of masks in public (with an obvious exception for Mardi Gras activities). This law was originally passed because of the Ku Klux Klan.
If anyone should claim that the police had no right to make contact with Long because he was 'just exercising his Second Amendment and state rights', well, the mask law clearly gave law enforcement the right to stop and question him, at the very least. Punishment for violating LA Rev Stat § 14:313 ranges from 6 months to 3 years, which means that it can be a felony.
So, any police officer could have made a stop and arrest if one had espied him prior to the shooting. No officer had that 'opportunity'...not that it would have likely prevented Baton Rouge. He most certainly would have shot the investigating officer. After all, that was his entire mission.
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