The United States has more than once rescued those nations who are unwilling or unable to defend themselves.  Unfortunately we have now become the agressor that we once fought against.

My son went hunting the first time at age 4.  He saw up close and personal what happens when a shot is fired.  If people, adults and kids, experienced the same thing possibly they would realise that this is real, not behind a television or movie screen.  Its real blood and the damge isn't something you just shrug off and get up and keep going.  Mandatory gun safety classes in schools unless a parent specifically lets their child opt out?  But, if an accident does happen later the parents are held legally responsible.

there are rants and raves about locking guns up, using trigger guards, anything to make them inaccessable.  One problem!  When you need on in an emergency, you need it then not 5 minutes later.  I recently went on a long trip and I did no go defenseless.  Was I breaking the laws of several states?  Sure I was but if it came to it, I would rather be judged by 12 than carried by 6.

Once again it comes down to personal responsibility,

Leigh

thank you Leigh for that. and right on. Wish I could be as concise as that (too much coffee for one thing).

I support the 2nd amendment 100%.  I own and carry firearms.  I have used my sidearm to protect the life of more than one person.  The police could care less about a T individual in the south.  The Supreme Court has also ruled that the police are not there to protect you (thus why many police forces have removed `To protect' from their cars and other items).

I take my responsibility very seriously and have studied the issues.  When it was time to carry in public I was required (and would have done so even if it was not required) to go through a 12 hour course given by two police officers.

I can make a one use, single shot firearm out of a few newspapers, a magazine, a rubberband, and a nail.  Said setup would even tear up a bullet proof vest in a tight situation.

Criminals are criminals.  They break the law.  Cops cannot be everywhere, which is a good thing because we are not yet a police state.

There have been situations in which armed citizens have risen up against corrupt, local politicians in the modern era.  One that I think should be made into a movie centered around a few returning WWII soldiers to find out that the town was being strong armed for everything, including who could and could not vote.  They broke into the armory, seized weapons, and took down the local gov't and then brought in the feds.  There was another similar situation even more recent but I am not very familiar with that one at all.

The United States of America will not last forever.  We are already sliding from a Representative Republic to a Democracy (mob rule) and from there it is just a quick jump to having a dictator.  This will happen, eventually.  Unlikely to happen in our lifetimes though.

Firearm stories are sensationalised in the media.  Doctors kill more in accidents every year.

Criminals will always find a way to get what they need to continue their chosen career path.  Suicidal people will always find a way to kill themselves.  Constitutional freedoms should never be curtailed.

Oh and I dislike the overuse of the term Nazi.  Once the govt starts rounding up citizens according to race in an effort to allow the United States to fulfill its destiny, we'll talk.  Wiki entry on Nazis, check out the key elements including environmental protections.  I work for an environmental govt agency but I do not subscribe to the National Socialist ideology.

heh. You wouldn't happen to hail from North Carolina, would you, Lost?


Posted at: April 17, 2006, 09:22:54 PM

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and, er-rrm, about the facile use of "Nazi" as a sobriquet in Ermerika:
from that very link you just provided:
"Hitler drew parallels between Lebensraum and the American ethnic cleansing and relocation policies towards the Native Americans, which he saw as key to the success of the U.S. Hitler had always admired the Americans for their treatment of the Native Americans, and considered America to be a shining example of what Germany's ambitions should be. Hitler often compared his Lebensraum policies to the Manifest Destiny policy of the United States, in which the ultimate destiny of the American people was to expand west and defeat the Indians."
So let's talk, Lost

When our forefathers wrote the second admendment, they didn't exactly expect "arms" to include cheap and easy to hide handguns (they didn't exist) nor could they forsee "arms" such as AK-47s, tanks and nuclear weapons in the future. If they could, no doubt the second amendment would be much different. I think we should stick with the spirit of the 2nd amendment and limit our arms to rifles.

Ok folks lets not let this get personal.

Remember you may challenge (not attack) the content of a reply to a  topic but not the person who made it.

Steph

I'm a little baffled as to what person got attacked here, I rilly am...
Now I did take issue with the content of Lost's post; hell I agree with a lot of her post.
But: Amerikan Nazis, what a stretch, lol. RE: "Get back to me and we'll talk" - I like to talk sometimes, how 'bout you? Wouldn't have started such a thread if I did not want to talk about these CRUCIAL issues.
I'm from North Carolina too, how 'bout that.
Peace and Love and UNDERSTANDING, what's so funny about that.


Posted at: April 18, 2006, 07:11:45 AM

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Interesting idea, adherence to the spirit of the Consitution; spirit of an AMENDMENT to the Constitution...
I don't imagine the original drafters of that document imagined quite a range of things that would come to pass 230 yrs down the road. The right-wingers use this argument every time they see change they'd, in Bartleby's riff from Moby Dick, "Prefer Not To"; to wit: A person's right to privacy does not include the right to an abortion, legally.
{They didn't imagine their slaves having the rights of human beings. Et Cetera...}
They may not have imagined drug addicts with little guns in they pockets. I have had one pointed at me more than once.
They may HAVE imagined their republic going so wrong that people might wanna consider armed resistance; Ya think?

Btw I think the San Fran ordinance allows the possession of some types of hunting rifles, however it seems to me that such a solution when a person has entered your house with a, say, little 9mm, IE that solution isn't necessarily 'hand'-y...

Why not just make it illegal for anyone with a felony criminal reccord to have a gun of any kind. Then issue licences to carry fire arms like one has to drive a car just to certify that one has been trained to handle guns safely but not identify what guns are owned, if any.  Then make illegal any guns automatic weapons, tanks, and cannons.   Any one who wants to own them can join the national guard or armed services,  then drop the issue.  If you must shoot at people buy a paint gun and join a club.

Quote from: michelleWhy not just make it illegal for anyone with a felony criminal reccord to have a gun of any kind.

It is already illegal in many if not most states for a felon to have a gun of any kind.

Quote from: michelleThen issue licences to carry fire arms like one has to drive a car just to certify that one has been trained to handle guns safely but not identify what guns are owned, if any.

All but three states presently allow permits to carry a concealed weapon, i.e. hand gun, but to license all guns would be the first step towards confiscation. Believe me the gun grabbers would just love to have all guns registered.

Quote from: michelleThen make illegal any guns automatic weapons, tanks, and cannons. Any one who wants to own them can join the national guard or armed services,  then drop the issue.

Automatic weapons, tanks and cannons are illegal except by special permit for collectors, and then they have to be rendered inoperative for firing. A TS friend in PA (and former Susan's member) owns a WWII tank.

Quote from: michelleIf you must shoot at people buy a paint gun and join a club.

Paint guns would be pretty ineffective against game for hunters which is the biggest use for guns in this country.

I did not say to licence any guns.  Just require safety liciences to own and posses guns to insure that the individual has been trained to care for and handle guns in a legal manner.  The guns themselves would not be registered.  Any individual who was not licenced could not posses a fire arm.   No one would know if an individual actually owned a gun or not.   Licences are required for hunting and so are hunter saftey courses.

Guns serial numbers should be registered to keep track of their usage in a crime and legallity of their origins and manufacture.  Did they enter the US sales market legally.   Individuals have owned pets for thousands of years and there are many laws concerning them.    There are also many laws considering educating and rearing children which is the right of every human being.   Remember the Madison and the other founding fathers stated that just because a right wasn't listed in the Constitution doesn't mean that we lost that right as human beings.   The right to bear arms is right that society has the responsibility to regulate just as we can't yell "fire" in a crowded theater nor do we have the right to libel another individual,  so is the right to bear arms.   Gun usage can be regulated.

Quote from: michelleThe guns themselves would not be registered.

Quote from: michelleGuns serial numbers should be registered to keep track of their usage in a crime and legallity of their origins and manufacture.

Sorry if I sound nit-picky, but by registering the serial number you have registered the gun.

No problem.  My point is that comparing today's administration or people who support the administration Nazis is a stretch and does nothing but water down the word.  That is the sort of thing that will come back and bite us.  Having a close friend who lost a great deal of her family to the National Socialists in Germany, this issue does strike close to home for me.

For the record, I did not find the invite on this subject as an attack against myself.  While I am currently residing in NC, I was not born here.  I am one of those "Yankee invaders". 

Yes, registering the guns or hunters or whatever creates a national registry.  This is something that can be used to round up firearms and their owners anytime the feds feel like it. 

As for the founding fathers and not envisioning current weapons.  No, maybe not.  However, they used the term arms so that the common American citizen who was able to be a part of the citizen militia (which does not include the federalised National Guard) could have upon their person, for personal safety and national security, the type of weapons that would be in common use.

oh hey Lost, I WAS born there. Thought mebbe I recognized one o' my peeps.


Posted at: April 21, 2006, 06:45:25 PM

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and I live with a son of concentration camp survivors.
Peace, out.

It does, I must say, strike me as odd, the objection to registering guns. We are required to register cars here in Canada and it hasn't been used as any kind of weapon except against car thieves and hit and run perpetrators. What on earth could a law abiding person in possession of a legally registered car..or gun...have to fear from registration?

Dennis

Step 1: Register all firearms
Step 2: Pass law against the private ownership of firearms
Step 3: Go through the registry to find the people that have the guns in order to take them away.
Step 4: Now only criminals and police/military have guns.  Self-defense has effectively been abolished.

h

Why do steps 2, 3, 4 necessarily follow from step 1?

1. Register all cars.
2. Pass law against the private ownership of cars.
3. Go through the registry to find the people that have the cars in order to take them away.
4. Now only criminals and taxi drivers have cars. Self-transportation has effectively been abolished.

Doesn't make much sense to me.

Dennis

QuoteWhy do steps 2, 3, 4 necessarily follow from step 1?

1. Register all cars.
2. Pass law against the private ownership of cars.
3. Go through the registry to find the people that have the cars in order to take them away.
4. Now only criminals and taxi drivers have cars. Self-transportation has effectively been abolished.

Doesn't make much sense to me.

It doesn't follow with cars, but then cars are not used for warfare or self-defense either. The Second Amendment is there most importanly to protect the people from their own government, not foriegn invasion or personal protection. Although those can be valid reasons also.

[Link]

Actual shooting revolutions were what the Framers wanted to avoid at all costs. The "devastation and carnage" (Federalist, No. 19) endured by other peoples convinced them that the best way to prevent such disasters in America was not to trust wholly to paper guarantees, but also to rely upon the fact that Americans would continue to keep privately owned firearms. Such arms would act as a quiet but tangible deterrent upon government criminality and despotism and function as a "barrier" (Federalist, No. 46) against governmental acts that might provoke armed rebellion. It was such subtle political considerations— not frontier conditions, hunting pleasures or the Indian threat— that concerned the Framers when they premised the entire American republican form of government upon the understanding contained in the Second Amendment, that the people would always be armed:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed."

The private individual right to own and use arms was thereby guaranteed. "Militia" in colonial parlance did not refer to men in uniform but meant every male in the community capable of carrying arms (as noted by contemporary scholar Don Higginbotham). Hamilton himself spoke of "the whole nation" or "the populations at large" as the militia (Federalist, No. 28). "Arms" in this context were those weapons suitable for use in a one-to-one encounter. Indeed, a proposal to limit the language of the amendment to cover only public defense was soundly defeated in the very first session of the U. S. Senate in September 1789.

A disarmed population is forced to resort to the most desperate measures. The storming of the Bastille, which ushered in the 1789 French Revolution, was motivated by the desire to obtain the gunpowder stored there. Cobblestones and uprooted trees were implements of frustrated French revolutionaries in the early 1830s, as vividly described in "Les Miserables." Likewise in 1989 Beijing, the Chinese students having found nonviolence futile, tore up the sidewalks and trees for ammunition and barricades. The point is not that the demonstrators should have confronted the army with weapons but that if all Chinese citizens kept arms, their rulers would hardly have dared to massacre the demonstrators, to say nothing of the continuing purges and executions taking place now.

Once a population is disarmed, any calamity is possible. The contrived Ukrainian "Harvest of Sorrow" famine of 1932-33 was preceded by the confiscation of civilian-owned rifles. Strict registration requirements, introduced in 1926, provided convenient lists of rifle owners and streamlined seizures by the police.

Who would be left to protect us from a rouge government after confiscation? Criminals and violent gangs don't follow the law or register their guns, and they would be the only ones left armed (besides the rogue government). Not exactly who I want protecting my rights.

And ask yourself this about the criminals and gangs. Which neighborhood will gangs stay out of? One where every home may own one or numerous firearms and are willing to shoot back? Or one with "This is a gun-free neighborhood" signs in the front yard?


Sandi

I think it's as likely that a US Government would take guns away from its citizens as it is that a Canadian Government would take cars away from its citizens.

Dennis

Quote from: DennisI think it's as likely that a US Government would take guns away from its citizens as it is that a Canadian Government would take cars away from its citizens.

Why do you insist on switching apples to oranges. The suject is taking away guns and has absolutely no relation to taking away cars. Also Canada already has taken guns, as have other countries as well as a few states.

New Zealand has had some form of firearms registration since 1921. In 1974, all revolvers lawfully held for personal security were confiscated.

In May of 1995, Canada's Bill C-68 prohibited previously legal and registered small-caliber handguns.

On 10 May 1996, Australia banned most semi-automatic rifles and semi-automatic and pump shotguns. Prior to this law, many Australian states and territories had firearms registration. Owners of these newly outlawed firearms were required to surrender them (with some monetary compensation).

Since 1921, all lawfully-owned handguns in Great Britain are registered with the government, so handgun owners have little choice but to surrender their guns in exchange for payment according to government schedule.

Even in the United States, registration has been used to outlaw and confiscate firearms. In New York City, a registration system enacted in 1967 for long guns, was used in the early 1990s to confiscate lawfully owned semiautomatic rifles and shotguns.

More recently, California revoked a grace period for the registration of certain rifles (SKS Sporters) and declared that any such weapons registered during that period were illegal.

The trick for the gun-grabbers is to take them little by little. This one is to nasty looking, that one is too cheap and available, etc etc.

Reference for the above.


Sandi

No, I agree with you there Jan, it has been used. I just don't see it as likely in the US. Canada and the other countries you listed have never really had guns as a major part of their culture. Gun ownership is fairly uncommon and handguns are especially uncommon.

In the US, you'd be going from a culture where guns are commonly owned to a restricted one. I'm surprised that New York has got away with it, with your constitutionally protected right to bear arms.

Registration has other aspects, like the ability to track where guns that are stolen from law abiding citizens go and assist in forensic aspects. Much like, as I said, when cars are used in or the subject of crimes. That said, the attempt to retroactively register long guns in Canada has been an unmitigated disaster. I don't know that it could even be implemented in a sensible way. I'm just saying that registration per se is not the evil, it's whether or not it's followed up with further actions.

Dennis