kutulu

In your attempt to shoot down my arguement that assault weapons are poorly defined you only supported it.

Anyways, the arguement that we NEED M60's and rocket launchers in order to defend ourself against an oppressive government is ricockulous. I don't care how many machine guns or conventional explosives the population has, the Amry could smash any real threat to the "oppressive government" if they needed to. The Armed Forces have tanks, missile batteries, artillery, helicopters, fighter jets, bombers, aircraft carriers, battleships, submarines, and a whole mess of other means of disposing of insurgents.

What is too far? Should a militia with the funding be able to maintain it's own air force? We'd surely have to shoot down Air Force jets if we fought back against the oppressive government. They'd also need their own tanks and artillery. Should my neighbor keep a M1-A tank in the garage? How about something more simple like 3 tons of C4?

Look at Iraq. The insurgents have whatever automatic weapons and RPG's they need to arm themselves. They have not brought down the military yet. They are a bug in our ass that causes mayhem and kills people at random but they aren't driving us out of the country. It would be the same situation here if people were trying to fight an "oppressive government"

A stable government needs the ability to destroy insurgents. Right now half of the country doesn't like Bush and thinks he's the biggest theat to national security. They think he's enacting laws that are oppressive. Does that mean the citizens should storm the White House as an attempted coup? I sure as hell don't think so.

We have the proper channels to deal with a President or other govt agency when they cross the lines. In the event that the govt was imposing dictatorship like practices there would be a huge struggle in the military. You wouldn't be able to get the entire military to turn on its neighbors.

I understand your logic. People need the ability to defend themselves if needed. The 2nd Amendment was written with the intent that citizens should be able to overthrow an oppressive govt if needed. However, in the age of modern weaponry where the military gets half of our tax dollars, there is no way to overthrow the govt without heavy involvement from the military and/or other nations that support insurgent ideals.

It's time for the 2nd Amendment to be interpreted in a way that the needed defense is against criminals that threaten the lives of individuals. M60's and RPG's are not needed for that. The chance for collateral damage is way too high.

What kind of scenario are you thinking of?

If you're walking down the street and someone tries to mug you are you going whip out your 9mm or will you need the Uzi?

If there is a home invasion are you going to run to the machine gun trenches in the living room?

Remeber, even Rambo was caught and he was a super-soldier.