Humans will have a right to have a gun when they can manufacture bullets from their rear ends. Until then, it isnt a right.

I am sure some dunce will say old people should have guns too--no matter if their hands shake so badly they fire and hit someone by mistake.
You just got to love the child like naivety of gun nuts when it comes to human nature and perfection.

Gun nuts are just nuts. Give everyone a personal nuke and someone will press the trigger, just like Chuck Heston did in Beneath the Planet of the Apes.

Domestic weapon laws are part of the larger picture...the military industrial media complex, that seeks to maximize global sales of weapons, war materiel, and the stories that perpetuate the trade. Although NRA propaganda touts constitutional rights and personal protection, they are just another member of this complex who seek to maximize weapons sales. They don't care who buys the weapons or who the buyers use the weapons against.

This is a situation in which, IMHO, we as progressives need to swallow a little of our own medicine.

Take abortion, for instance. I would be willing to venture that most 'pro-choicers', such as myself, aren't actually 'pro-abortion.' I detest abortion. But the fact is that making it illegal won't stop it. We all know that. If we drive it into the back alleys and warehouses by illegitimizing it, we're only hurting the women we care about. Many people would make similar arguments about marijuana.

I believe a similar situation revolves around firearms. I don't own fireams, though I do keep some of my martial arts equipment near the bed (if someone busts in with a gun, what I'm carrying isn't going to make me any safer, and I'd rather not give someone a gun if they don't already have one.) Guns are not going away, scream and howl about it as we may. I much prefer ownership be public and traceable instead of handing it over to gangs and criminal circles to control any more than they do now.

I'm still waiting to hear what the five Catholics (who also happen to be the four and a half conservatives) on the Supreme Court--Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, Alito, plus Kennedy--will say about the D.C. handgun ban case currently awaiting decision and opinion there. Will they encourage the Rambo legislatures? And if so, by what degree?

kelmer above also makes an excellent point above about the naivete of some people who don't have all that nuch experience with guns yet suddenly decide to get one.
The ladies now being sold the "designer accessory" models with the pink handle grips, for instance, are excellent examples.

They have NO IDEA WHATSOEVER how easy it is to make a judgment or handling error with one of these things and land themselves in prison---not to mention get someone else (maybe even children) hurt or killed.

I have served in the Marine Corps for five years now to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies both foreign and domestic.

Allow me to quote Thomas Jefferson "The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government." "Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes ... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man."

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." -Benjamin Franklin

Were I a firefighter in GA, I would now refuse to put-out any car-fire (as illustrated on CSI-Vegas, recently, a loaded pistol can shoot-you when it gets 'hot').
[They can stand-back and 'hose' one re: any worry of gas-tank explosion...but, a .45 could kill a fireman ANYWHERE within 'hose/water-reach' of even a closed-vehicle...even one with a simple dashboard/firewall electrical-fire, or dropped-cigarette carpet-fire]

So so so so so so so so so true. The cost of living in this deluded fantasy is far far far far too high. The defence the gun nuts hide behind all depends on the supposition that you can't undo the damage (guns everywhere) so you may as well make it worse, and live to be a hero. Nice to see some numbers!

Anyone got some stats to add about the number of accidental gun deaths one could factor into the price being paid for this delusional shot at heroism?

Does the suicide rate increase amongst those who can perform the act with the press of a button?

The number one leading killer for people aged 1-34 is Death By Car. Death by Firearm doesn't even rank in the top ten, and the FBI reports that more than 60% of ALL deaths by firearm were suicides.

So where's the "make cars safer" outrage? 140 killed EVERYDAY on the roads, 3 million-plus injured every year, two billion dollars worth of medical care, insurance and lost labor.

As opposed to 5 gun murders per 100,000 people, with ninety percent of said gun murders either criminal v. criminal, or one-off heat of passion shootings.

If "we" are truly concerned about real safety, let's start with the biggest senseless killers - safer vehicles, better training and educations, etc. - and work our down to guns...

I've seen enough people firing pistols to know that one oldish me with a 12 gauge double barrel shotgun would be more than a match for anyone wandering about the house with a handgun, even without my glasses on.
On the street, all they have to do is drive 70 feet with me and they'll hand over the gun and flee...
You could load a double barrel shotgun with as much speed as cocking an automatic, so the reality is toys for the thick, rather than self defense.

Imagine what the Virginia Tech incident would have been like with more firearms. People looking to shoot the shooter would have been interpreted as the shooter by other people looking for the shooter. It would have become a campus-wide sniper hunt and almost impossible to determine how the whole shootout began.
"It's not the bullet that kills you … it's the hole."

David Daniel - calling themselves Catholics does not make them so. What they stand for is in direct contradiction of the Gospels and the social justice teachings of the Church. I doubt very much that Jesus would have been packing. Yeah, He's the guy who said,"Love your enemies, pray for those who mistreat you, if someone takes your stuff don't ask for it back, go sell all you have and give the money to the poor, do to others what you would have them do to you, etc." Hmmmm, doesn't sound like a neocon, sure doesn't sound like a gun nut. I grow weary of the hypocrisy of those "gentlemen."

Personally, I think we should honor the original intent of the Founders.

You get to own whatever arms you wish to bear...

as long as they're all muzzle-loading unrifled black powder weapons.

Let me clarify it for you- many of us do know very well that the reason the amendment says 'a well regulated militia,' is because it is a realization that since a state will have a militia, the people will also be able to have arms. Sort of an insurance policy against tyranny if you will. Remember, when government is scared of the people, we have liberty, but when people are scared of the government... well, now that is tyranny.

Basically, if an Infantry Squad uses it, it's your right to own it. Some day when we switch to phasers, it's your right to buy one. But for today, if you want an M16, it's your right.

Yes, one has the right to bear arms … in a militia. The place guns were historically kept for the militia was in the local armory. The second amendment says nothing about citizens having the right to bear arms at home or to buy arms on the open market.
The presence or absence of tyranny has never been conditioned by the presence or absence of arms. The purpose of the second amendment was to make the appointment of a professional military by the federal government unnecessary. Another amendment to the Constitution that would have explicitly forbidden the formation of a federal military was rejected by the framers. Democracies of the ancient world were always overthrown by their own professional military organizations.

Guns are among those dubious entitlements that constitute a tough dilemma. We can't very well ask the nations of the world to put away their nukes if we aren't willing to put away our pistols. But we're also living in a world where lethal force is the primary currency both of power and self defense. Orderly societies are regulated by cops with Glocks, or lacking cops, by armed clansmen. Countries know the same thing individuals do - that if you put down your weapons you're going to become somebody's slave.

There is no viable middle ground for gun regulation. If you're going to pack a gun in your car, what is the point in having it unloaded, or locked in a case, or otherwise unusable? Why not carve one out of soap and put that under the seat instead? We either have the right to defend ourselves with lethal force, or we don't. With that right comes the responsibility not to become predators ourselves, though occasionally some fruitcake goes on a rampage. Do we want outlaws to be the only people with guns? Or for that matter should it only be the police? We can't un-invent them. We can't rewind human nature and start over as a race of peaceful hamsters.

I've heard all these arguments a hundred times, and we just go around and around with them. I was raised in Montana and got my first gun for Christmas when I was 12. I got tired of shooting small animals when I was 17 and never did it again. Like many Americans I think of my gun - my loaded gun - as my entitlement to defend my life and my home from predation if circumstances allow it. I have no reason for this. I just grew up that way. You have the right to disarm yourself if you feel safer or more responsible doing so. But you don't have the right to disarm me.

It would be nice if we did not possess the power of death. Most of us don't want it. It isn't as simple as taking your pistol back to K-Mart. It is more like a primordial fall from grace. When John Lennon comes back to life and mankind discovers its mythical peace and harmony I suppose all the guns and warheads will rust away. But murder is alive and well in the Congo, sometimes with no better tools than rocks and machetes.

to whosetruth,

The reason I have mentioned in the past (and plan to continue doing so) that the most conservative wing of our Supreme Court is composed of five Catholics, is not to make fun of religion or voice any kind of prejudice. Rather, it is precisely for the issue you have raised.

We're going to have all these guys a long time and, because of their conservatism, they're going to ramrod (on 5-4 decisions) or otherwise contribute to many bad policy rulings. I am hoping that when those bad decisions become associated with the fact they happen to be a Catholic bloc, that good peaceful Catholics and other Christians will rise up in editorial opinion against them (just as you did.)

More than one Supreme Court Justice has started out conservative and shifted to "moderate" as the years go by.
You can't get rid of lifetime judges--we can only hope to mold them with public opinion. And that's what citizens can do every time the Catholic "majority" (which never should have been appointed that way) tilts a case badly.
It could take years to decades for this to have effect, but it's the only option there is now that they're there.

Class Act, wow. Well, just know that people like me and lots of other righteous individuals will give our lives so you can keep your right to spout at the mouth and we can keep our right to keep and bear arms.

I still think that the NRA and its supporters show their IQs in a rabid fashion. I firmly believe that they think the right to bear arms is all about rolling their shirt sleeves up to the shoulder - in other words its all about the right to 'bare arms'. They are just confused.

In Ontario, we have something better than the right to bear arms - we have the right to bare breasts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_nudity_places_in_North_America#Ontario

Most of the rest of the world thinks your gun laws are crazy. Here in Europe we have a lot less guns (it's not legal to have hand guns like you can, and most illegal guns are smuggled in from the former Soviet block) and a lot less deaths from guns per capita (Gee! What a surprise!). Maybe slaughtering each other by the million in the first half of last century (the wars for empire - WWI & WWII) convinced people here that all those weapons aren't such a great thing. Your country is still trying to be an empire and also has a huge violence fixation. Wonder how much pain you will have to go through before you get smart and walk away from it?

Then again, you don't see much real war pain do you? You just export it to others (The US military has killed over 10 million people since WWII). Maybe shooting each other one at a time gets rid of some of your collective guilt at murdering all those millions in mass in countries far away from your shores? So, i guess as a society you aren't just crazy, you are also sick (as in mentally ill), but if you look at it from any sort of rational perspective you could say the same thing about humanity as a whole. War, starvation, abuse, destruction - it just keeps going on and on and on and on and on ....

In Toronto, (which is in Ontario), our mayor has a petition he wants to send to our Prime Minister asking him to ban handguns. http://www.toronto.ca/handgunban/index.htm Our Prime Minister will certainly not take this seriously. We got some nice low murder rates here for such a huge city. But the endless tide of guns is taking its toll, more and more every year. The more legal ways there are to get these things out of factories, there more there will be kicking around. And they just don't wear out, the way cars do.

Copenhagen:
In fact, if history is any indicator, your people willing to give up their lives will eventually impose a self-righteous tyranny against those who "spout off at the mouth." The near universal availability of arms in the ancient world did nothing to stem the rise of tyrants.

Arm the Affluent! That's what I think about the conceal and carry laws. They and their Blackwater guards will sometimes have to leave their gated communities and venture into our increasingly lawless cities where, due to budget cuts, there will be fewer and fewer taxpayer-supplied cops to secure their passage through the hordes (many newly evicted) trying to survive the latest economic crisis foisted upon them by the elites.

Many gun owner's sense of masculinity is tied to thier love of firearms. Without the gun they cannot feel like "real men." This is strange because one who is truly brave will not feel the need to own a gun. Guns bring power and security to people who are frightened to death of the world around them.

I wonder, just how much faster BushCo's facist adventure would be advancing if there were fewer or no armed masses in the US?

GottaGetOffTheGrid:

Thomas Jefferson would have agreed with you. "The beauty of the second amendment is that it will not be needed until they try to take it."

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: I will support strong gun control laws when they start being proposed as universal; no exeptions for Neanderthals with shiney pieces of tin pin to their chests.

Problem is, you never ever hear any gun control advocates proposing that ALL gun be removed, just the ones from the citizens. I guess people believe that the police will protect us, but that's an insane assumption if you stop to consider how members of the police force are chosen.

Wanting to disarm the citizenry BEFORE you disarm the governing bodies is a recipe for utter totalitarianism. No thank you.

I guess I'm way off the mark on that masculinity thing. People are going to need guns to protect themselves from Republicans.

Daniel David - thank you for your response. The idea that any of these clowns from Bush on down have the brazen effrontory to claim the mantle of Christianity makes me nauseous. I am an inveterate "letter to the editor" writer and my level of outrage grows every time our "Christian" president or our "Catholic" SC justices speak as if they had some kind of moral authority...

Copenhagen: The marines do not defend the constitution, they cooperate in violating it. The marines fight for the interest of the wealthy and their companies. I do believe ,though, that disarming the population will make it much harder to resist excesses of power that are already evident. Disarming the population seems dangerous to me. I agree with Jefferson. Gun control does not lead to a more peaceful society. Some of the most peaceful societies have no gun control at all. Peace comes from the attitudes of the people. There is such a thing as responsible gun ownership. Americans will suffer violence in their communities with or without gun control, the violence comes from the attitudes of the American people who still think they are in the wild west. If guns are outlawed, the blackmarket will become a billions dollar market in guns, and the killing will continue unabated. You cannot legislate attitude, this comes from education and a good system of values which are lacking in the US. This is a country dedicated to violence and aggressiveness. Spend one hour surfing tv channels and notice how much violence there is. In am so tired of seeing things blowing up and horrible acts shown in graphic detail. I don't watch much TV at all, but when I do I am very impressed by the abundance of violence. This is were the problem lies. I will not be surprised if the American public backs gladiator shows sometime soon, we are already close to it with these no rules fights on tv. At least pro-wrestling is fake, but there are other combats that are not fake and quite disgusting. Gladiators are just a matter of time.

Lizard: I agree with most of what you said except for the Marine part.

I, (name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. (So help me God.)

You hit on an extraordinarly touchy subject. The best way I am able to deal with these questions and issues is by sticking to what I believe to be right/proper/moral like a needle to the pole. I have honor, and am not willing to give it up.

lizard - A few years ago they had a reality mini-series called, I think, "The Battle for Baghdad" or was it "Desert Storm?" There were cameras mounted on real tanks and although real human beings got blown to real smithereens, they edited out the closeups. I didn't watch any of it. Since there was no plot it was pretty much just snuff porn. But I believe gladiatorial tv is already here.

Copenhagen - Reading your oath I can't help but see the real possibility of conflicting imperatives. I don't question your love of honor, but your compass must be jumping back and forth between poles about now.

If the fantasy of stopping a burgler with a gun is appealing, and the fantasy of stopping a spree shooter with a gun is tempting, what is the fantasy of fending off one's own government and police force with one's own personal arsenal?

Seriously, paint a picture for us, how do you see that playing out? In my world, the day when we feel the need to defend ourselves against the government and the police force with our own firearms is the day we'll wish we'd found harder for social justice, not fought harder for the right to win an arms race against any and all comers.

Seriously again, you think that if that fight gets rolling, you're gonna win?

It is not a fantasy, it is like wearing a seat belt. Do you fantasize about what it would be like to get in a wreck? I know I don't. I do wear a seat belt, and I do own firearms. I don't dream about crashing- I actually drive about 5 under for gas mileage and safety. I also don't fantasize about war. I hate war with a passion, I've been there twice. It is however my right and duty to keep and bear arms.

Big_Money just posted such a profound sentence that it bears repeating: "In my world, the day when we feel the need to defend ourselves against the government and the police force with our own firearms is the day we'll wish we'd fought harder for social justice, not fought harder for the right to win an arms race against any and all comers."

Hilarious! We're probably the best armed nation in the world. AND we have a government run by tyrants.

To understand the history of the 2nd Amendment, you have to understand some of the fundamental concepts of democracy as defined by the people who had just fought a long a bloody war to obtain it.

The key bit of this is that they did not want the government to have a monopoly on force. They wanted neither a well-armed and permanent police force, nor a permanent standing army. They viewed, correctly in my mind, both as essential threats to their liberty. We've lost that idea along the way, and today's near-police state prison-industrial complex and the military-industrial complex show the dangers of which they were afraid.

The society they created then worked differently. There was a sheriff, but he and maybe his few deputies didn't have the power or the force to act directly. When they needed to use force, they'd call out a 'militia' or a 'posse' of armed citizens.

What this did was keep a very democratic check on the use of force by the police. If the community thought the sheriff was out of control, they could restrict his ability to use force simply by not showing up when he tried to call for a posse. This meant that the citizens in the community always had a veto on the use of force by the police.

The same for the military. There was either no standing army, or a very small standing army. In times of national crisis, there would be callups of the militia and calls for volunteers to come serve the country. Again, this gave the citizens of the country essentially a veto power. If the country thought that a war was illegal or pointless or bad policy, then the call for militia or volunteers would be met by non-participation.

The key part to understand when looking at the second amendment is that the entire design of the society at that time was to keep the ability to use force in the hands of the citizens and not in the hands of the government. Thus, the existence of the 2nd amendment where citizens can keep and bear arms for use in these militias.

Me, while this would need some adjustment for a modern age, to me I'd still like to see us move back to something closer to this system. What I see around me in police forces and the pentagon using the monopoly on force that they've acquired scares me more than my fellow citizens do.

Lizard: I agree with most of what you said except for the Marine part.

I, (name), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. (So help me God.)

You hit on an extraordinarly touchy subject. The best way I am able to deal with these questions and issues is by sticking to what I believe to be right/proper/moral like a needle to the pole. I have honor, and am not willing to give it up.
-----------------

However, the Nuremberg judgements that 'following orders' is not an excuse is still a part of the US military. As far as I know, it is still a part of the military system that a soldier does not, and should not, obey an unlawful order. I'm not sure if the above is a direct quote, but I'd expect to see the word 'lawful' in front of the word 'orders' where it appears.

Of course, this is very difficult to do in practice, and the military has prosecuted the one officer I know of who declared that the orders to participate in the Iraq war were unlawful orders and thus ones that he should not obey.

But in a society of laws instead of a society ruled by the whims of individuals, this is a crucial point. No one has the authority to give an unlawful order and expect it to be carried out.

PS .. the above is also the logical counter to the constant BS put out by this administration about the powers of a commander-in-chief.

The President may be the commander-in-chief. But, he does not have the authority under the constitution to unilaterally make the law. Laws are made by Congress, not the President. And no officer, not even the commander-in-chief has the authority to give and unlawful order.

This is the logical counter to the contents of Mr. Yoo's memos. The President does not have the powers Mr. Yoo claims because the President does not have the power to give an unlawful order.

Those who have obeyed these unlawful orders are fully subject to prosecution for their crimes. And if we were still a nation of laws, then saying that they were following orders would not be a valid defense, since actions like spying on Americans, military ops on domestic soil, and torture are all clearly illegal acts.

Trying to get an Anti Gun Rights person to understand self defense is something next to impossible.
Let them dial 911 and wait however long they need to. Me I prefer to know that should the need arise I can and am willing to defend myself. Just because I keep a fire extinguisher loaded and in my house does not mean that I want to start a fire. But like you I wear a safety belt in my car. Do I go around looking for an accident to get into? Do you with your safety belt on try to have an accident? If you prefer being a victim just because some nut case decides they want to rob you that is your right. Stay away from my right to defend myself. Please do not insult me with your emotional cries of "Rambo." Leave that for the movies where you can find your safety, I'll keep my safety in my holster. . . . .

One more thought . . . . Show me where criminals obey the laws that are passed about guns. After all are not criminals just that, people that do not obey the law. So you pass a gun law and what do you have . . . . . law abiding citizens not breaking the law and unarmed. The criminals of course go on being criminals and will have all the guns they want and need.
Welcome to the real world!!

Mendo chuck, You should get a motorcycle helmet and wear it everywhere you go. Ya never know when something heavy might fall from the sky and hit you on the head. and do not worry about appearing ridiculous; helmets are very macho

Really . . . .
That's the best you can do . . . . .

Guns do not make you a killer. I think killing makes you a killer. You can kill someone with a baseball bat or a car, but no one is trying to ban you from driving to the ball game.

Grow up . . . . .

COMarc:

This is why I made my needle to the pole comment. The UCMJ is what says we are obligated to obey lawful orders. If I am ordered to go to Iraq, and Afghanistan, which I was, I went. I would say I just had to do my best with what was handed to me. I was always a moral upstanding man, and would open my mouth if I found something to be objectionable or inhumane. 100% of the Officers and SNCOs who I worked for both times were of same mold. While they may or may not have approved of the reasoning behind the war, they were humane individuals trying to do the best they knew how in a sticky situation. I do not know anything about the prison camps as I was in the infantry, and we had nothing to do with that. Marines in the infantry are for the most part good American boys trying to do the best that they know how.

I also agree with you about the meaning of the second amendment, and what was intended.

Mendo Chuck: You hit the nail squarely on the head.

Mendo - Your safety belt is a very different thing. It cannot go off accidentally. It cannot be used to harm people should it ever get stolen. It is not inherently capable of causing any harm. Your chances of being injured by a seat belt do not skyrocket when you become an owner of one. No innocent bystander was ever killed as a result of a seat belt.

As far as criminals don't respect the law with regards to guns, the one law they respect is supply and demand. In countries where it is difficult to get guns, there are fewer guns, and there is less gun crime. Go ahead, say it isn't so, but go get some stats on gun crime in Japan vs in the US. Even compare Canada to the US. We have tighter gun control laws - we have way less gun crime.

This is what stands in the way of us "understanding" your idea of "self defense" - we see it is very dangerous, which statistics support, and delusional, which is just our opinion, I suppose.