Shooting at the Empire State Building

4 years of positive movement is a baby step compared to the last 80.

you're certainly entitled to your opinion, as wrong as it is.

 

So you don't know what rights would be taken away from you, or at least can't explain what they are or how any proposal here would remove them. Not so much an argument as a paranoid whine. Gotcha.
--- merged: Aug 30, 2012 at 5:04 AM ---

What? What has happened in the last 80 years that upsets you?

 

so you're one of those that want specific and detailed answers to all of your interrogatives, right? are you an engineer? Did you want to know what specifically detailed and outlined rights would be taken away from the PATRIOT ACT as well?

The passage of the NFA to start. there was plenty of historical documentation and debate during the run up to ratification that prompted Blackstone to print "The prohibition is general. No clause in the Constitution could by a rule of construction be conceived to give to Congress a power to disarm the people. Such a flagitious attempt could only be made under some general pretense by a state legislature. But if in blind pursuit of inordinate power, either should attempt it, this amendment may be appealed to as a restraint on both.". But typical of american apathy and low self esteem, a majority of the population let themselves be led astray of the constitutional limits imposed upon the central government and allowed the feds to assume power that they were not given. It just goes on from there.

Now, since it appears that you might be one of those that needs specifically detailed and outlined facts for things, do you need me to list each and every single law and incident in the last 80 years of firearms rights infringement?

 

I just want(ed) some indication of what rights you think are threatened. No, I'm not an engineer.

From what I can gather, you see a requirement to license certain types of weapon (and undergo a background check) as an infringement of your rights. I disagree.

(I am assuming that you are conflating the Gun Control Act with the National Firearms Act)

 

and as I previously stated, ANY infringement is an infringement, no matter how slight, but i'm sure you disagree

should you be licensed to have free speech? should you get a license to have locks on your home? should you take a class and get a license to understand what your rights are under the 5th and 6th Amendments? What rights should require a background check on you before you're allowed to exercise them? Of those rights that you believe require a background check, what limitations or disqualifying conditions would you like to believe make you feel safer so that others have to comply?

 

The right to possess a lethal weapon or items that can put others in danger (explosives, land mines etc.).

I'd like to know that the individual is mentally competent and unlikely to want to use it for criminal purposes. It would help to know that they don't have substance abuse issues and that they don't have a history of violence and an inability to control their anger.

I suspect that you also believe that there should be some limitations, too. Or would you really like to see kids going to school carrying an AK-47 or for a paranoid schizophrenic to carry an MP5 as he strolls around Kroger? Maybe the known wife-beater should be able to pull out his sawn-off shotgun when the bitch fails to have his meal ready when he gets in? I doubt it.

So, it's a matter of degree.

From my perspective, if someone wants a gun for hunting or for competitive shooting, fine. If they want it just because they feel scared and it will make them feel magically more "protected", I'd rather they didn't have one. However, I don't think that is an argument to restrict their right if they wish to own one in the USA. It won't endanger me, but might endanger them and/or their family and I think they are deluded, but it's their choice.

 

Perhaps the majority of the population supported (and continue to support) gun control legislation because banning certain non-essential weapons and requiring guns to be registered is considered sensible and not in violation of the 2nd amendment.

There is no infringement upon the right to bear arms simply because certain weapons are banned from the marketplace for being excessively dangerous to the public. In the absence of a clear indication of what constitutes arms, the Congress and Supreme Court are well within their authority to define it in the public's interest (or in the interest of staunch gun rights advocates, as the case may be)

Nor is the requirement to register firearms an infringement upon the right to own them. It's a bother, but not an infringement.

It's difficult to have a discussion with someone whose primary debating tool is hyperbole, Duane. Too much time becomes devoted to pointing it out.

 

so you're comfortable with ignoring constitutional limits and rights in favor of prior restraint when it concerns rights that you don't really care for. got it.

when you can figure out how to make that work for cops and federal agents, then you can apply it to citizens. Until then, you'll fail.

way too much hyperbole to take seriously.

since the 2nd Amendment isn't about hunting or competition shooting, but to protect freedom from enemies both foreign and domestic, self defense included, I don't think you should have the ability to tell me what kind of weapon I need to serve that purpose.
--- merged: Aug 30, 2012 at 6:34 PM ---

The Second Amendment was to prevent the government from restricting or prohibiting arms of the people necessary to the security of a free state, including enemies foreign and domestic.So I fail to see how the constitution allows that government from ensuring that the people are not as well armed as the government. Therefore, congress and the Supreme Court are wrong, and so are you.

registration leads to confiscation, thus it's an infringement.

if hyperbole is an issue for you, maybe you should refrain from using it.

 

Quite right. Because you live somewhere that has been attacked .... umm.. maybe. Ever?

Fuck me, what would you be like if you had ever actually lived in a war zone? (Yes, I have. Thanks for asking.)

Surround yourself with stuff that projects stuff and feel as safe as you like. Thankfully, you're nowhere near me.

 

Now that their Supreme Leader (the good Dr. Paul, who evidently was at the first constitutional convention in 1878 and knew exactly and unambiguously what the framers meant by each clause of the document) is in the process of fading away in the backwoods of Texas, perhaps they too will go gently into the night.

If not, we round em up and lock em up in those FEMA detention camps where they are free to shoot each other all they want or just bore each other to death with their patriot self-righteousness.

 

I believe Texas has offered to take them all in or maybe it was a dream I had.

"Texas now Home to Libertarian Patriots."
"Texas Secedes from US Federation"
'Mexico invades Texas and claims back all lands North of the Rio Grande and South of Texarcana ("It was always ours anywho," claims Mexican President Felipe Calderon)"
"Libertarian Patriots caught unawares with pants down"
" Massive weapons hoard seized from Alamo by deported Mexican migrant workers"
" Ron Paul and Rick Perry Shot while trying to cross Border into Louisiana"
" More at 11. "

An indication of the range of my fantasies.

 

6 year former combat Marine, thanks though.

 

Fair enough.

However, I am puzzled why, in that case, you believe that removing what few regulations there are around weapon ownership would improve the USA's ability to "protect freedom from enemies, both foreign and domestic" and where you believe the threat is coming from.

 

Haters and paranoid extremists on the far right

 

With friends like these....

 

Self-regulated. What's a couple of consonants?

 

talk about a confusing thread...

I'm most confused with the whole "home defense is stupid" idea.

Or maybe that's not present, there's so much shit to wade through in this thread from both sides that everything is blurred.

I carry, my wife carries and we have home defense options. Big deal.