Really? He’s not dead yet.
Dang…I was sure that I read where he had died. Ruins the whole joke. Well, he looks dead.
Well- here in CA, there was a differnt kind of “Assault weapons ban”- one that forbae the possession of certain “assault weapons”, unless one registered them. The registration process was so screwed up that very few were able to register their weapons at first. They then allowed a seond try at registration, which the Courts threw out, leaving in legal limbo those that had sincerely tried to follow the law and get their 'assault weapons" registered. Then, they have changed the definition of what is an “assault weapon” several times, thus those who didn’t have a gun defined as an 'assault weapon" when the law was first passed now have one- with very little way of knowing that your gun has been added to the list. Thus, you wake up one morning a felon, having done nothing at all.
Although few “law abiding citizens’ have actually gone to 'the Big House” for failure to follow this stupid law- many have had their weapons confiscated, had expensive legal bills, and now an arrest record- or even a conviction- all so that some anti-gunners could have a “feel good measure” on the books. Crime was not affected in any way, of course.
The anti-gunners bought off the Police Lobby in an interesting way- they added a codicil that for some reason police and retired police would be exempt from the law. Although i certainly understand why a police officer might need his sidearm after he is retired- if “assault weapons” are so very “evil and dangerous” :rolleyes: why would he have a need for one of them?
Hmmm… I see the anti-gun crowd as being uninformed or childish in a Beavis & Butthead kind of way. Penis comments still? On the SDMB? Sheesse.
My ‘thing’ is this. The people that voted for the AWB didn’t know enough about the guns to make an informed decision about them. They just hate guns. If proposed legislation in anyway restricts gun ownership, they vote for it. ** The AWB was written with them in mind.** It did take a lot of bitching to get people to let the stupid legislation die. The bitching essentially educated people a little bit.
We get loud sometimes, sure. But I don’t think it’s any worse than the anti-gun crowd. If anything, the anti-gun crowd are more vocal. They, after all, are the ones trying to change things. I think the pro-gun folks would be satisfied with no more laws.
If it was written that Police are allowed to have them as part of the equipment in the squad car, I could see some sense to it (from an anti-gun standpoint). But retired officers? WooooWeeee. A case of - ‘Everyone is equal, but some people are more equal than others’.
I used to think that guns belonged only in the hands of our “well-regulated militia” – until I realized that maybe we might someday need a way of protecting ourselves from the government itself.
I hate guns. I know that some people find them to be things of beauty independent of their purpose – just as I appreciate beautiful knives.
I still wouldn’t mind seeing a ban on handguns and ammunition for handguns.
Obviously, I have very mixed feelings. Neither side on gun control issues should be making such chest bumping generalizations.
Sometimes a change in the law is a reasonable accomodation; it is not always a slippery slope. Nowhere should that be more obvious than with gun laws.
I’m thinking that Charlton Heston was unable to keep his promise. He is living, but if anyone lets him near a loaded weapon, that would be negligent. He has Alzeimer’s.
Johnny L.A., I will confess to having a slight penis fixation, however. This has nothing to do with the facts that I support some gun control measures and that I once slept in Charlton Heston’s bedroom.
Why? What good what it do?
The contempt and hostility comes from the fact that it says in clear, unambiguous English that the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. Yet over and over again we see senseless legislation with an eye on removing our rights to do just what the Amendment says.
You heap scorn and contempt on many other people who are denying rights to other classes (and rightfully so) but in our attempt to maintain rights we are called fetishists. That’s pretty much the long and short of it. My weapon is not an extension of my penis. It is what I consider to be my best means of defense. You don’t like it? Fine. But don’t contemptuously sneer at me about my “manhood” and don’t try to disable the means to defend my family. I don’t want to become a victim and I don’t want my family to be victims, either.
(BOLDING IS MINE AND NOT AIRMAN DOORS’)
There you go, I just put back in the words you conveniently took out.
I don’t know why you’re being so disingenuous. Can you even contemplate the idea that the motivation is not to take away your rights, but in the interest of public safety? Even I, a bleeding-heart small-l Canadian liberal thinks that 99.99% of the gun control legislation passed both up here and down there is a foolish, ineffective, useless waste of time and money, but I have a realistic picture of why it is motivated.
That’s what the police are for. This isn’t Mexico (yet), or Bosnia, or Bhagdad.
‘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.’
Who are ‘the people’?
There’s a lot of case law in this country that holds the exact opposite view. Police are not bodyguards, they are investigators. If they get somewhere in time to stop a crime, great, but if not, you’re responsible for protecting yourself.
The people in the well-regulated militia.
Police have a responsibility to protect the public at large, not the individual.
Question: when someone invades my house, will the police be there waiting for the criminal in every instance? Of course not, that’s unreasonable. Police are reactive. I don’t want them to react to the death of my wife or son. I want to prevent the death of my wife or son.
So no, that’s not what the police are for. The police are for justice after the fact. A fat lot of good that does me in the meantime.
But isn’t the public composed of individuals?
What makes you think they’re invading your house to kill you? There is hardly an epidemic of roaming Home Invaders with a lust for blood. More like an occasional crackhead who wants to hock your PS2.
From what I’ve gathered, it’s more likely that a gun in your house will end up killing one of you and yours, than an intruder.
Reactionary urban gun-owners have more in common with the Apocalypse-anticipating nuts who build bomb shelters in their basements, than with ordinary folk with a reasonable worldview that does not involve predators and criminals lurking on every streetcorner. Sure, being alive involves risks, but my opinion is that the risk of having a firearm in the house (that is not intended for procuring food), outweighs the usefulness. If your opinion is different, I can accept that you might have justification for it.
'Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. ’
So ‘the people’ in this case means that only those people involved in petitioning the government are allowed to assemble?
'The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. ’
Who are these ‘people’?
‘The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.’
And which ‘people’ are these?
‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.’
And these?
'The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, elected by the people thereof…
'When vacancies happen in the representation of any State in the Senate, the executive authority of such State shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, That the legislature of any State may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct. ’
Are ‘the people’ here different from other ‘people’?
If the people is used differently in one Amendment from the way it is used in all of the other Amendments, can you point out where the people is defined differently?
Police in the United States have absolutely no affirmative duty to protect an individual citizen from being the victim of a crime. This is why they got away with telling the shop owners whose stores were being looted during the Rodney King riots in L.A. ‘You’re on your own.’
If you remove the sexism from the language, this is every able-bodied person over 18 years of age, as states the U.S. Code.
Someone enters my home in the middle of the night, I am not going to sit around trying to figure out his motivations. If he’s in there, and I didn’t invite him in, he’s a threat to my life.
This is a pretty common refrain from people like Sarah Brady, but it’s just another bullshit scare tactic.
Mo opinion is very different. I don’t sit around and stroke my weapon in the hopes that I get to shoot someone. I am prepared for the possibility that I might have to. And then I have to live with that for the rest of my life. I have a conscience, and that will punish me until the day I die. Nevertheless, it would hurt me even more if something happened to my family because I didn’t have the foresight to gather the means to protect them.
There are not evildoers lurking around every corner. I am aware of that. However, you just never know, and I will not allow myself or my family to be victims if I can prevent it. And yet there are continuous attempts to take that right away from me because guns are “ugly” or because I have to justify “need”. Nobody would question my right to have a computer, yet arguably I can do more general damage with a computer than I could ever do with a weapon. Intent must always be considered. I am not as hardline as some people. I think the “cold, dead fingers” line is unnecessarily inflammatory, but nevertheless I believe that it is my absolute responsibility to take care of my family, so I see why people might say something like that.
We haven’t even addressed the enjoyability factor of an afternoon of shooting because for the purposes of this discussion it’s not particularly relevant, but suffice it to say that there are more reasons than defense to own weapons. Realistically, an M-16 does me no good for defense, so you may ask why I need it. Answer: I don’t. I want it. As a law-abiding citizen I should be permitted to have one, otherwise I can only conclude that there is a presumption of guilt, that I am going to become a criminal using it because I own it, and I find that to be absolutely unconscionable.
That last part gets down to the root of it, I think. Certain guns are banned because there is the assumption that whoever owns one has the intent to kill a lot of people, and that’s just not true, so I find it insufficient justification for banning weapons.
Of course, that’s one man’s opinion. Yours obviously differs, and you’re allowed to disagree. But your disagreement does not allow you the right to deny me the ability to exercise my rights because you don’t understand why I want it. If that were the case I would be allowed to deny you the right to an abortion, and while I’m certain we disagree I would not have the temerity to forbid you to exercise your right to an abortion. That’s the difference between a reasonable person and a zealot.
Listen, dood, I’m not an American (Thank G-d), and so I don’t care or have to care.
I have no beef with people using modern weapons to bring down animals for food, I have no beef with military personnel using weapons against one another (it’s kind of what you sign up for, after all), I have no problem with our law-enforcement officers carrying firearms to protect themselves, since they are routinely put in harm’s way, and are 100% accountable every time they draw their gun (here in Canuckistan, they have to write a special report every time they draw their gun while on duty, whether they end up firing it or not).
It rubs me the wrong way when ordinary, Joe-Blow citizens start running around with machines that serve no other purpose than to rain hot-leaded flesh-shredding death down onto other human beings, and I don’t think that makes me stupid or ignorant. If it was, in fact, the intention of the Founding Fathers that Josephine Average have the Gawd-given right to pack heat that can spit out multitudes of bullets in one minute, then perhaps they didn’t think that particular concept through very thoroughly.