THE LOS ANGELES TIMES EMBARRASSES ITSELF with this dumb and hysterical editorial on the Justice Department and the Second Amendment. The title is a giveaway (“Ashcroft’s gunslinger style”) and the whole thing simply piles one cliche on top of another. The editorialist can’t decide whether to savage Ashcroft simply for being Ashcroft, or to argue with his Second Amendment position, so the piece is an incoherent mixture of unsupported ranting on both subjects. You’d never know from reading the Times editorial that Ashcroft’s view is shared by lots of leading constitutional scholars, that the Supreme Court has repeatedly treated the Second Amendment as an individual right, or that the Framers thought individual gun ownership was important. The L.. A. Times editorial board should read Eugene Volokh’s oped from yesterday’s Wall Street Journal. And they should note that Volokh provides footnotes, while all the Times provides is sputtering vituperation.