NoGodBlog.com

Ah... 1st!

Obvious answer. Outlaw guns, and only the criminals will have guns.

Everyone in Iraq carries weapons and it's an Amish paradise.

Geez, does anyone study the Middle Ages anymore? God wasn't the only thing they had everywhere, they also had weapons. Almost everyone in the Dark Ages carried the small arms of the era (knives, axes, cutting tools) and the end result was a murder rate that put Baltimore to shame.

Poor Hobbes, nobody gets pass his amusing phraseology.

I think you are jumping the gun a bit. The SCOTUS just heard oral arguments today. Decision on this case (DC's handgun ban) is expected by June.

hoodlum:
everyone has cars too. sooooo

Why did this even need to be heard by the SCOTUS? Doesn't the Second Amendment apply in the District too?

Cars, smokes and McDonald's kill more people on their own than all gun assaults do.

If you ban one, you need to ban all the others with a higher mortality rate to at least stay logically consistent.

I say this as a non gun owner.

No, the energy of a small explosion being mostly transferred and concentrated into the momentum of a small aerodynamic bit of metal that is designed to kill things on impact has many practical and constructive uses, such as .... shooting animals for food, killing terrorists, aiming toward the center of a target of concentric circles to see how accurate and precise you can aim, science experiments having to do with aerodynamics and conservation of momentum, shooting clay saucers out of the air, and of course the testing of certain shields or armors.

Of course many of these things have been replaced with computer simulations, shooter video games, commercialized farms and slaughterhouses. However, there is nothing like the feel of shooting a real gun or killing a real animal or doing a real experiment, so I say they shouldn't be outlawed unless democratic consensus deems it necessary.

Sure you can have your gun, Dave. You just can't have any bullets. :-)

This ruling is expected by the end of June...

Depending on how the Supreme Court does rule...we may only have 49 states...

http://www.progunleaders.org/

Sadly, the second amendment is unclear on the gun issue. People on both sides think otherwise, of course.

The fact remains, guns and bombs are for one thing and one thing only: to kill, usually people. I think Gandhi got it right.

RIP Arthur C. Clarke

I once owned a small .22 as well. I was also once a competitive cyclist. I carried the weapon with me when I was training because of interactions that I (and many of my training buddies) had with very aggressive motorists. I ultimately sold the weapon because it gave me a false sense of security.

IMO we should make it a lot tougher for people to get guns and cars.

Smokes and McDonald's kill voluntary participants. Nobody goes out and conducts a drive by with a Snack-Wrap or murders their wife and kids with a pack of smokes. Hell, even most people killed by cars are people fully informed of the risks of driving and do so anyway.

As for Montana, they talk hard, but let see how long they survive without the hardworking people of the blue states their idiot asses like to mock subsidizing their lifestyle http://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2004/09/red_states_feed.html

As a resident of Baltimore and Maryland, I can tell all Montana and the other Johnny Come Lately States that if you do not like rules of the Union you can leave.

Looking at Bush/Cheney/Neocon actions around the world, the new slogan should be:

Guns don't kill people, Republicans kill people.

Last time I looked, there were about 30,000 gun deaths per year in the U.S. About 17,000 were suicides and 12,000 homicides.

Certainly that is far less than the approximately 40,000 car deaths per year, but people don't often go out to kill someone else with their cars.

Keeping a gun at home increases your chance of getting killed by a gun.

"FACT: While handguns account for only one-third of all firearms owned in the United States, they account for more than two-thirds of all firearm-related deaths each year. A gun in the home is 4 times more likely to be involved in an unintentional shooting, 7 times more likely to be used to commit a criminal assault or homicide, and 11 times more likely to be used to attempt or commit suicide than to be used in self-defense.
-A Kellerman, et al. Journal of Trauma, August 1998; Kellerman AL, Lee RK, Mercy JA, et al. "The Epidemiological Basis for the Prevention of Firearm Injuries." Annu.Rev Public Health. 1991; 12:17-40.)

FACT: A gun in the home increases the risk of homicide of a household member by 3 times and the risk of suicide by 5 times compared to homes where no gun is present.
-Kellerman AL, Rivara FP, Somes G, et al. "Suicide in the Home in Relation to Gun Ownership." NEJM. 1992; 327(7):467-472)"

http://www.ichv.org/Statistics.htm

So, even if you consider the numbers to be small, you are increasing your risk by keeping a gun at home.

OT:
Loved his books and movies.

In a CNN interview when Clarke was asked if he believed in God, he replied, "I do not believe in God, but I do not disbelieve in her either."

Great quote.

There are many others but this was a favorite.

"It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God - but to create him."

Now back to topic.

Guns are not just for killing. I like archery also. I like all sorts of target practice. Have never shot a living thing and don’t plan to. Having the skill to hit a target does not make a killer.

Accidents at home are plain stupidity. Why punish everyone because some idiot has a loaded gun in the house with kids.

For the record, I do not have a gun.

I do not own a gun and never have....however If I ever felt the need to own one due to a threat ...then I would own one regardless of the legality.....

If I were living in Iraq....I'm guessing I would own a gun and would want to be a member of a group that had many guns....

The second amendment is pretty fuzzy on it's specifics. The modern world is very different from that of our ancestors. The right to bear arms was intended to keep the government from running over you. Even with a lot of guns you stand NO chance of confronting the U.S. military, face it. The chances of the U.S. military assaulting you in your home is also very small. Our forefathers lived in a world where governments commonly did attack the citizens. I applaud the intention to put an end to that practice.

That said, I own a shotgun, and keep it loaded. I did get attacked by a gang in November. They only wanted to cause harm, they had no need of my money. I had three broken ribs and my right lung collapsed. I was, according to doctors, in danger of loosing my life. The total cost of this attack is about 15-20 thousand dollars. The police showed no interest in finding the gang, or putting them is jail. I was told by other officers to kill them if ever in that situation again, to fight as if my life depended on it.

This is a very complicated issue. There is no black/white dichotomy here. I do know many people with guns that would never pass a psychological exam. I have been shot at once, had guns pulled on me at least three times. I think there should be some tests involved to get guns. There is no reason sane and safe people can't get them. To bad sane and safe people are a minority.

Don't own a gun but have no problem with legal gun owners.

On a funny note watch the Chris Rock standup where he says the solution is not removing guns but raising the price of bullets to $5000 a piece. Won't be drivebys at $5000 a shot.

Comment from: alexatheist

Why did this even need to be heard by the SCOTUS? Doesn't the Second Amendment apply in the District too?

Apparently it does not. You wouldn't want a bunch of pi$$ed off regular citizens storming 1600 Pennsylvannia Ave. - or would you?

Comment from: Hoodlum [Member]

Smokes and McDonald's kill voluntary participants.

Well - except for those non-smokers who get cancer from secondhand smoke...

Nobody goes out and conducts a drive by with a Snack-Wrap or murders their wife and kids with a pack of smokes. Hell, even most people killed by cars are people fully informed of the risks of driving and do so anyway.

Well - except for those people that the Republican't trucker tried to mow down when they were saying not nice things about the Republican't messiah.

Guns are like pretty much every other tool - very useful in the right hands, but very dangerous in the wrong ones. Plus, if guns are outlawed everywhere, not only will only outlaws have them, but resourceful people will find a way to jury-rig something to replace them.

Despite the rabid caterwauling from the usual religiously insane idiot here in this comments thread, somehow I'm not at all worried about the Supreme Court redrawing state boundaries.

Then again, they already threw out a federal election and installed the Republican't who lost the election in the White House. So the Republican't activist judges on the Supreme Court could pretty much do anything...

I'm an unusual bird in that I'm generally pretty liberal, but I'm a moderate on gun issues. I think there's some truth in both side's arguments on gun control.

On the one hand, cities and states with strong gun control (D.C., for example) do not have lower rates of gun crimes, in fact they often have higher rates of gun crimes. Hardened criminals in areas of strong gun control are not less likely to possess and use firearms, only law-abiding citizens.

On the other hand, availability of firearms greatly enables impulse crime. With a gun available, it is much easier to enact a moment-of-passion assault, and it is much more likely that the result will be lethal. This means that some people who might have been on the border before may become criminals because they have an easier way of committing a passion crime. The use of firearms in suicides is evidence of an analogous effect.

As another point, statistics generally show that people who have gone to great extents to possess firearms legally and show responsible usage (concealed-carry permittees who have taken extensive competency tests) commit firearms crimes at extremely low rates relative to the general populace.

Finally, I do think philosophically that people should have a right to defend themselves. The police can try to stop extended crimes (like a hostage situation), but they are powerless to protect a citizen who is under an assault that may last all of 30 seconds. There's no way the police could respond quickly enough to help someone in that situation, and I think it's morally bankrupt to tell people they aren't allowed to protect themselves.

At the same time, having a gun in the home is statistically correlated with accidents in a way that is clearly causative. I have little sympathy with a gun owner who hurts himself, but strong sympathy for innocents and bystanders (kids, etc.) and I do think it is appropriate for the law to try to protect them.

For these reasons combined I generally think firearms should be legal (including CCW) but should have extensive licensing and competency testing requirements, similar to but probably exceeding those for driving. Therefore I generally support child-protective measures, though I would like to see better data on the general effectiveness of such laws.

Furthermore, I think more study should be done into the actual effects of legal intervention, and our guiding principle should be enacting laws that actually make it possible for people to defend themselves while minimizing criminal use of guns. Sadly nearly all studies on the effects of firearm laws have been done by people with both an agenda and a predetermined conclusion ... on both sides. This means that we sadly do not actually know with any accuracy what the effects of our own laws are, meaning our firearm policies are driven almost entirely by emotion and irrational decision-making.

As with any other matter of public policy, I think our decision making should be guided by the practical efficacy of the laws. People have a tendency to pass laws against things that frighten or disgust them, without any rational effort to analyze whether or not the law would actually achieve the desired effect. We see this in the war on drugs, billion-dollar "save the children from sexual predators" policies (the same money could save far more kids by providing healthcare), and in gun control legislation. I'd like, for once, to see some rationality in our policies, dammit.

Outlawing guns is, again, not addressing the real issue, but rather attempting to fix a problem by addressing the symptom.

The real problem is America's culture of fear. Too many paranoid, irrational people running around with guns. We need to address the bogyman complex in this country, not so much guns.

I agree with DVan.

Gun crime is a social issue and (I believe) only society can fix it. Until we give up our obsession with violence, revenge, toughness, paranoia, etc., we're going to have to live with gun crimes.

There's a reason there are plenty of other countries out there with wildly varying levels of gun control that still end up with less gun crime than America. Guns aren't the problem, Americans are.

What:

I was also once a competitive cyclist. I carried the weapon with me when I was training because of interactions that I (and many of my training buddies) had with very aggressive motorists.

I have the same effing problem, except I carry a 4" blade in my jersey pocket.

Hoodlum:

Smokes and McDonald's kill voluntary participants. Nobody goes out and conducts a drive by with a Snack-Wrap or murders their wife and kids with a pack of smokes. Hell, even most people killed by cars are people fully informed of the risks of driving and do so anyway.

The simple fact of the matter is that people are afraid of guns, even though they kill less people than cars. This is 100% irrational. You ask someone why guns should be banned and they start citing death stats like bernarda did. If we were truly interested in preventing deaths, we would start with the largest causes of death first.

Gun bans are nothing but an emotional reaction.

If guns were illegal, we would never have had Red Dawn.

Wolverines!

Ahhh, the old gun control canard raises it's head again. I think that you need to look toward countries (Like Australia) that have tighter gun control than the US to look at whether it is successful or not. For what it's worth Hand Guns and Assault weapons should be outlawed and an amnesty period implemented where the government will buy back said now illegal weapons. They did this in Australia and it worked really well. Sure Criminals will still have access to said weapons in the beginning but as the guns are found and destroyed it becomes harder and harder to get them. And in the meantime if you need protection stick a shotgun in someones face and see how they go.

Anadrol,
Only problem is that Americans and Australians are very different people in their attitudes and approach to life and what works there won't necessarily translate well here. Also, Australia doesn't have the problem of minority violence that we do in America so not having a gun there isn't as dangerous a proposition as not arming yourself here.

Second amendment? That's the one about a well regulated militia being necessary for the security of a free state, isn't it?

Second hand smoke is to cigarettes as bullets are to guns.

It seems that the pro-gun lobby always forgets the "well regulated" part of the second amendment.

The fact is that this was one of the poorest amendments to the Constitution. Not because of what it guarantees but because its lack of clarity. This lack of clarity has become more stark as weapons have become more lethal. Nobody of sound mind thinks that militias should have access to 99% of the weaponry available today.

Second Amendment--I don't think it protects an individual's rigth to own a gun.

The Law should provide a means for sane, well adjusted individuals to own guns if they want to.

The Law should also regulate gun ownership. Even though people who break the law will still get guns, at least they HAVE TO break the law to do it. That means they could get caught, and if caught they can be charged, jailed, interrogated, etc. You will at least slow gun violence, but probably will not eliminate it.

anadrol:

For what it's worth Hand Guns and Assault weapons should be outlawed

and:

nd in the meantime if you need protection stick a shotgun in someones face and see how they go.

Aren't very consistent. Assault weapons are already illegal (no full autos). Again, I ask why you want to regulate something that has less chance of occuring to you than dying in a plane crash?

LOL, guns are already well regulated by law. Waiting periods & background checks anyone?

What:

Nobody of sound mind thinks that governments should have access to 99% of the weaponry available today.

There, fixed it for ya.

mx,

last time I checked a shotgun was neither an assault weapon or a handgun so where is the inconsistency? Also I think you got mixed up between planes and cars.

I know about a million people who own automatic weapons so either the regulations are working and need to be tougher or people can indeed own fully auto weapons (Michigan BTW).

Alex actually we do have a minority violence problem their called Aboriginals.

I live in the US and I don't feel like I need to own a gun to protect myself, that's just a cop out.

whoops, regulations aren't working

Comment from: mdetrano

The Law should provide a means for sane, well adjusted individuals to own guns if they want to.

Who decides what constitutes a sane, well adjusted individual? Would belief in an unseen, unproveable Invisible Sky Fairy disqualify you from owning a gun? A refusal to believe in any occult pagan superstitions (i.e. an atheist)? Unsurety as to whether any of the religious fairy tales are correct, but a belief that there's something out there (i.e. agnosticism)? Voting for anyone but a Republican't?

I wish there was a sure fire test, acceptable to all elements of society, that would eliminate the potential for a judgement call here. But I don'y see that happening any time soon...

anadrol,
Please explain how shotguns & rifles are less dangerous than handguns & "assault" weapons.

Handguns can be easily concealed shotguns cannot.

Handguns can have magazines with 15 shots shotguns have 1 or 2 shots.

If you can't see the difference between a gun that can shoot dozens of rounds without reloading vs a one or two shot gun then I can't help you.

Look at a 50cal assault rifle. It can virtually cut you in half, please tell me you see a difference between this and a .22 hunting rifle.

MXracer

There, fixed it for ya.

Are you saying that neither governments nor idividuals nor "militias" should be able to possess that 99% of weaponry? I think not. So what was the point of your "fixed" version of my post?

anadrol:

Handguns can be easily concealed shotguns cannot.

Handguns can have magazines with 15 shots shotguns have 1 or 2 shots.

You have never been around guns. A sawed shotgun barrel is no harder to conceal than a handgun, and *most* pump style or semi auto shotguns can hold 5 shells + 1 in the chamber. If you modify, you can typically get 2 more shells.

The difference between a full auto and a rifle is that an intelligent person who has a reasonably steady finger only needs one shot. Either way, somebody's dead.

what:

Are you saying that neither governments nor idividuals nor "militias" should be able to possess that 99% of weaponry

Exactly. Do you think the PLF should be able to possess hydrogen bombs?

MXracer

So just to be clear. Are you saying that the US government should not be able to possess grenades, missiles of all types, tanks, aircraft carriers, fighter jets etc? And nor should citizens?

mxracer, from my post above, "While handguns account for only one-third of all firearms owned in the United States, they account for more than two-thirds of all firearm-related deaths each year."

Why that is so, I don't know, but that's the way it is.

Does Prada make a purse for shotguns?
Does anyone?

mx,

A sawed shotgun barrel is no harder to conceal than a handgun

Bollicks, a sawed off shottie is still a lot bulkier than a hand gun at a minumum your still talking 2 1/2 feet in length for a working gun.

and *most* pump style or semi auto shotguns can hold 5 shells + 1 in the chamber

Semi auto shotties fall into the category of an assault weapon, I was talking single and double barrel shotguns as being legal. Plus sawing the barrel is already illegal.

The difference between a full auto and a rifle is that an intelligent person who has a reasonably steady finger only needs one shot. Either way, somebody's dead

Yep and if he can just blow away people until his magazine is empty vs having to reload between shots many more people are dead other than just one.

Let me ask you a question, What is the point of having such a gun in the first place, do you need to over compensate for the lack of something else? And like you said, if you are a hunter of any merit then just one shot will do so don't give me the semi-auto shotguns are used for hunting spiel.

Correction: DC's ban on owning a handgun. DC does not have a flat-out ban on gun ownership.

You have never been around guns

Ahhh, yes I have, I grew up with shotguns in the house for duck hunting. Correction, I've never been around illegal guns.

as an athiest in mississippi- yeah i want my right to a gun- i NEED my right to a gun really

dog'smycopilot,

I live in MS too. Not much danger of OUR legislature banning any guns!

anadrol;
I've got to go with mxracer on this one.

You may have indeed seen a shotgun or two in your life, but you don't really know enough about "guns" to be blabbing the bullshit you are.

You don't seem to understand the difference between the terms "auto"(machine gun) and "semi-auto"(reloads each time you release the trigger). Don't worry, you're not the only one that makes that mistake. The MSM loves to use the terms interchangeably (and incorrectly) which only serves to keep the uneducated in fear.

You also make the assumption that only single barrel/single shot (or double barrel/single shot per barrel) are legal as opposed to semi-auto. Both (single load and semi-auto) are legal. And, yes indeed, semi-auto shotguns are used for hunting - most often in regards to (you guessed it) ducks and other waterfowl.

Now, just to throw a monkey wrench into the mix: All of the states that have allowed concealed weapons carry have shown a corresponding drop in crime! Fact is that Switzerland (where guns are mandated in many, many houses) has had the lowest crime rate in the world.

Switzerland also has mandatory military service (which is something I've always thought should be a policy here in the US). The lower crime rate may not necessarily be caused by the higher gun per capita ratio, but rather the greater discipline and social cohesiveness resulting from military service. I do think that restricting gun ownership is merely treating the symptoms of the underlying problem which causes murder: our society's attitude toward violence. It may be easier to restrict guns rather than change our society, but a change is better in the long run.

The 2nd amendment was written to ensure a BALANCE OF POWER. The framers did not want our goverment to have more fire power than the people, what they thought was necessary to keep the government in line.

Kinda gotta sgree with them.

Hey 666, yes I know the difference between an auto and semi auto weapon. Doesn't diminish the problem of being able to fire the gun a lot before having to reload.

Using semi-autos for duck hunting is a cop out, I used to use an old side by side shottie and got just as many ducks as someone using a semi auto 5 shot.

What do you know about guns that makes your bullshit any different to mine?

I didn't make an assumption that semi auto guns are illegal I said that they should be illegal same as they are in Australia.

Show me the numbers on the concealed weapons just cause you say so doesn't make it so.

And finally, Why do you feel the need to own a gun that's function is to obviously kill multiple people and goes way beyond what is necessary for personal protection.

Show me some numbers on successful use of a firearm for personal protection, I'll bet it doesn't occur very often.

cry4turtles,

How the hell are the people meant to match the firepower of the US Military? The second amendment is well beyond even being possible the way you interpret it. It is nonsensical and as much a fairytale as belief in Santa.

anadrol;

Show me some numbers on successful use of a firearm for personal protection, I'll bet it doesn't occur very often.

Computer's timing out. That's a start. Plenty more if you even bother to do some homework on your own.

anadrol;

http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdguse.html

666,

All of the states that have allowed concealed weapons carry have shown a corresponding drop in crime!

First off, that page doesn't address the issue of concealed carry laws, so it doesn't support your claim.

But I'll help you out. In 1998, there was a study claiming the same thing you are claiming by a guy named John Lott. It was a pretty well respected study (from what the Internet tells me), but there have been at least a few claims that it suffers from flaws.

There's a pretty good review of Lott's findings here, but it's a long paper. If you just want the conclusion skip to page 21:
http://tinyurl.com/yrtr8j

The conclusion of that paper is that Lott failed to take into account the crack epidemic of the 1980's and that a number of the more recent observations have drawn the opposite conclusion such as the lack of an increase in crimes committed against younger people who are allow to carry vs. older folk who are. If Lott's conclusion was correct, then we would expect to see more crimes against those who obviously cannot carry (since the possibility that someone is carrying is supposed to be a deterrent).

Nobody has proven that concealed carry laws have lowered crime (unless there's another study that I'm not aware of). Furthermore, the only data we have so far is in states that are more rural, so we can't draw any conclusions about urban areas. The jury is still out on this one.

Sorry, let me clarify the bit about the crack epidemic.

The crack epidemic hit only urban areas and caused a noticeable increase in the number of homicides. The concealed carry laws occurred only in heavily republican states.

If you look at the data, the country's average homicides rises during the crack epidemic. At the same time, the republican states enacted concealed carry laws and over the first few years the homicide rate in concealed carry states stayed relatively constant. But because the national average was rising, it appeared that the concealed carry laws were protecting those states that enacted them. But it seems more likely that they simply didn't have to deal with the crack epidemic.

This serves only to point out the problem studying things like this. There are so many factors involved that it becomes very difficult to objectively study.

Nobody has proven that concealed carry laws have lowered crime

Maybe not, but sure did make me less of a victim (against a stalker). I wouldn't trade my handgun for a million $ (well maybe for a cool mil., but then I'd buy a new one!)

cry4turtles

The 2nd amendment was written to ensure a BALANCE OF POWER. The framers did not want our goverment to have more fire power than the people, what they thought was necessary to keep the government in line.

Kinda gotta sgree with them.

Me too, but that horse is out of the barn now. The military has massively more firepower than even the best-possible local militia could ever have. Having a gun, or even a bunch of guns, in the house isn't going to protect you from the government anymore.

alatham;
The site I provided was in reference to

Show me some numbers on successful use of a firearm for personal protection, I'll bet it doesn't occur very often.

which I thought that I had made clear by highlighting the statement.

Your response

First off, that page doesn't address the issue of concealed carry laws, so it doesn't support your claim.

is a different issue. It was referring to how often firearms were successfully used for personal protection. Try to keep up.

I have this strange feeling you might also argue that the following site is biased.

http://www.nraila.org/Issues/FactSheets/Read.aspx?ID=83

However the studies they show have been accepted (even by the naysayers).

http://www.nraila.org/media/misc/fables.html

I would urge you to read the whole following article (I know it's long, but it addresses a number of concerns).

http://www.nraila.org/media/misc/falsepromise.htm

Since this topic seems to have nothing to do with atheism per se, I'm wondering why it keeps cropping up on this site.

If you (or others) want to keep harping on the subject, at least do some more research.

I have limited time (and access to the 'net). bye for now

Me too, but that horse is out of the barn now. The military has massively more firepower than even the best-possible local militia could ever have. Having a gun, or even a bunch of guns, in the house isn't going to protect you from the government anymore.

The guns aren't there to protect the people from the government. The guns are there to keep the government afraid of the people.

Guerrilla warfare.

666,

My mistake about the link, but Anadrol did ask you specifically about concealed carry shortly before then. I think you can understand my confusion.

I also was not trying to say you're wrong. I'm undecided about gun control, I live in Chicago where gun control laws are pretty stringent. Gun crime is definitely a problem here, but the laws have been on the books for so long that it's impossible to say if they actually work. Until our gang problem is reduced, I'd bet the laws don't make much difference.

Also, I would indeed say that the NRA is biased, but I'm not averse to reading their thoughts. I don't have time to get to that article now, but I'll read through it later if I remember.

AOL,

The guns are there to keep the government afraid of the people.

Well, the guberment may be afraid of the societal problems that might occur as a result of wide spread civil disobedience but, surely the guberment of the United States is well aware that it is only a question of how much force is appropriate to squash whatever civilian problems might arise.

Theoretically, the citizens could potentially surprise the guberment with a well planned and sudden surprise attack. If the initial attack didn't work the citizens would have no hope using legal weapons.

Isn't the whole idea behind democracy that the populace ultimately controls the government?

I realize that's a bit idealistic, but at the very least we do have the first amendment right to petition the government. Surely that's more effective than enacting the second coming of David Koresh?

How the hell are the people meant to match the firepower of the US Military? The second amendment is well beyond even being possible the way you interpret it. It is nonsensical and as much a fairytale as belief in Santa.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who interprets it that way. I would've had refrences years ago, but I'm not a member of that organization anymore (NRA). They got way too right-wing for me.

Anyway, how do YOU (anadrol) interpret the 2nd amendment? Do you think the framers were specifically concerned about bunny-hunting? Competitive target practice? Or perhaps they witnessed enough tyranny to know that unarmed citizens are sittin' ducks?

And yes, I am aware that the gov't has enough fire power to disintegrate my neighborhood, and that my pee-shooter would barely be a pimple on their asses. But don't write off community militias. If necessary, I'm sure they could be a formidable force. But not if we're disarmed. At the very least, we would die fighting. It's better than total submission into who knows what?

"Give me freedom, or give me death!"

Or perhaps some out there think that our gov't would never do such a thing (tyranny). It's 2008, it just couldn't happen here, now. For that idea, I will refer you to a quote from Korn's "Evolution":

"Take a look around. Nothing much has changed."

cry4turtles,

I would say that the framers of the second amendment had no idea of the power of the weapons that would be developed. Back then a well organized militia could very well take on the government and probably win since the technological weapons gap between militia and government would have been small.

Back then the amendment was relevant but now it makes no sense at all, a relic of a bygone era really.

So to answer your question, yes I agree the popular interpretation but given the times it makes no sense anymore.

666, at the moment I don't have time to look at your info but thanks for the site. I will get round to it, as living in Australia most of my life under strict gun laws and then moving here is an interesting paradigm shift for me.

But if you take the emotional aspect of gun control/ownership out of the equation can you honesty say that owning hand guns or assault weapons or any cache of weapons
that goes beyond mere self defense is useful given the current strength of the US Military.

Give me freedom, or give me death

Common now don't be so dramatic, If anything were to occur I would be moving to another country pretty quick. As your well aware you only get one shot at life so I find it hard to imagine you would throw it away so haphazardly.

As your well aware you only get one shot at life so I find it hard to imagine you would throw it away so haphazardly.

It's a good thing veterans (both historical and contemporary) don't feel that way.

Of all the things people die for, freedom is the most deserving.

Would you say that about the war today? Do you really think they are fighting for our freedom?? When someone comes and invades the country I live in I'll be the first to help out in the war effort. Taking the fight into another country on bad intel is another matter entirely.

Why are you even mentioning Iraq?

Is it this?

If anything were to occur I would be moving to another country pretty quick.

Or this?

When someone comes and invades the country I live in I'll be the first to help out in the war effort.

Hmn?