What We Talk About When We Talk About Guns
The Oresteia of Aeschylus is the Greek’s great epic about the founding of the state. The trilogy of plays tells how a blood feud in the house of Agamemnon comes to an end when the gods decree that justice shall now be delivered not through individual vengeance but by governmental process. As Charles Hill writes in Grand Strategies, “This makes the death penalty the foundation stone of civilization, for only when a victim’s kin are convinced that the state will exact justice in response to murder will they entrust that power to the state.”
When a state decides to abolish the death penalty, they are reneging on that original agreement. The progressive argument is, essentially, that the contract was made in former times when people were not so civilized as they are now. Years of life under the rule of law have made us better than we were, and we have moved beyond the savage need to punish murder with murder. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, as Ben Kingsley said when he was pretending to be Gandhi.
The conservative argument — the argument, in this case, for preserving capital punishment — is, no, mankind is ever and always what it was. New technologies may have given us greater powers of imprisonment and reform that make execution necessary in fewer cases, but there is still murder in the world and the wronged heart still demands full recompense. The state must hold to at least the minimum of its Oresteian agreement or lose the right to govern.
But Aeschylus notwithstanding, the delivery of justice after an attack is not the only foundational contract a state makes with its people. In allowing the government to maintain a standing army and police force, we are also agreeing to transfer to the state the duty and immense power of defending us from being attacked in the first place. This is not only a matter of practicality, it’s the only method anyone’s come up with to prevent the Hobbesian war of all against all.
Let us not forget; wanting to own a gun nowadays means that you’re racist because Obama is President, you hate kids because of the Newtown massacre, and you’re obviously responsible for the 80 some people killed by guns every day. All we need are extremely strict gun laws and criminals will be discouraged by that. This way we can be more like those nice European countries. They’re much more cultural and they don’t have any problems, right? Yeah, somehow this doesn’t make me feel any better, but like the Bill Mahers of the world I’m sure I can make it seem that way…
What do you think about a Sig P250 9mm compact for concealed carry?
You’ll be lucky to have a sharp pencil when the socialist libs are through
9mm is a hell of a defensive caliber. It can take down an aggressor 65% of the time with one shot. A well placed shot should be discounted because, under extreme stress, nearly everyone will make a less than well placed shot. If you want only to defend your family and property, a 9mm with at least 12 rounds in the magazine will be more than adequate. Now practice with that gun until you feel you will make a decent first shot with it in any situation. Never point that gun at someone you don’t intend to kill and never plan on firing only a single round with your weapon should you ever have to use it. A 357 magnum with a smaller 125 grain bullet would make the best defensive round, unless the extra recoil is a problem. Best defensive rounds in my opinion based on various perceptions of need. .40 S&W for first shot knockdown, moderate recoil and large capacity magazine. .45 auto for knockdown power, accuracy and ability to bleed out the target in a short time. .357 magnum for penetration, expansion, first shot effectiveness with tolerable recoil, The new .327 Federal Magnum for power, penetration and reduced recoil these velocities will put a lot of energy into a small round and will shred internal organs well enough. But, since the .327 is a very uncommon round, you should be loading your own ammo to consider it. The .357 SIG and the 10mm auto are both excellent rounds delivering power just below that of the .357 with somewhat more manageable recoil. Bigger magnums like the .41 and .44 mag are too big to be handled well by anyone who flinches from the anticipation of the heavy recoil. In other words, if you can’t make that first shot a well placed one, all the extra power in the world won’t make up for that. Don’t forget that a shotgun loaded with a few shells full of large shot will make up for about any inability to make a well placed first shot. As far as these weapons are concerned, home and personal defense are about all they are good for. If you want an offensive weapon to repel a tyrannical government, you will need greater accuracy at longer range and the ability to use excessive force(lots of rounds) at close range. That is where the semi-auto weapons come in and that is the firearm that the Communists running our government fear the most. Those are the weapons our founders meant when they allowed us to have and to bear arms. They never placed restrictions on what armaments we could have because they always knew we would have to be able to carry arms that could defend us against whatever the government would bring to bear on us in any age of weaponry. It won’t be until 50 million or more useful idiots finally figure out who is screwing them that any action against this government could even potentially succeed with even automatic weapons in the hands of all of its citizens. An armed citizenry is the ONLY thing left that the Communists fear. They have their hands on all of the other levers of power in this country and now they think they can remove the Second Amendment right, which has always been our only real protector of our First Amendments rights, in the name of safety and security and they will surely do it to us all if we let them. I am old and I don’t give a damn anymore, so I hope the government doesn’t send anyone to my property, who values his own life and the future of his own family, in order to disarm me. I would hate to mess up a family like that but I will because I will not live the remainder of my as a servant of a tyrannical government. You gotta draw the line somewhere. Please people, rise up and stop this Communist march at the polling booth before there is no chance for a peaceful solution. PS- I don’t give a damn what any of these media, government and other sons of bitches say about me, the founders of our country gave us the only shot in history at having dignified lives in which we could live for the pursuit of our own best interests(similar to the dignity every other animal on this planet is born with) and not for the taxes we can send in to support yet another bloated government, and we have already blown it. If we let them take our Second Amendment rights away, that great experiment will be all over and human beings worldwide will suffer a despair that only our example has ever prevented. These Communists are not progressives, they are regressive and they will completely halt the advance of civilization. Okay, I am tired now.
Let me introduce you to this marvelous typographical invention called the “Paragraph”.
So, I put appropriate indentations of five spaces before each paragraph before my post. PJM removed those in the posting, I presume to save space. So do I have to line skip to get a new paragraph or what? Don’t just cite an intention of introducing me to something and then walk away from your self assigned responsibility to do so. Sheesh. I could apparently use the actual help. No?
Paul, I always just skip a line. It seems to work and produce a noticeable paragraph across multiple commenting platforms. Hope this is helpful.
Eesh, I was addressing Jim Baker. Me stupid.
Paragraph, shmaragraph. Well said Mr Baker.
INDEED! Please, just ignore the grammar police.
Thanks, Jim.
The 9mm is a fine defense caliber using the right modern jacketed hollow point (JHP) round. However, the 45 ACP also comes in a modern JHP variant and is far more lethal than a 9mm. That is a mistake that many people who rely on 9mm make. Any technology that can be applied to a 9mm and also be applied to a 45. It’s a losing battle. To exceed the effectiveness of a 45 JHP you need to move to the higher pressured 9mm JHP +p round. But wait, there is also a +p 45 JHP. It’s a losing battle. Mass and energy transfer are king for simliar velocities so sometimes you can meet the lethality of a 45 with a 9mm for some loads but you will ultimately never be able to beat a 45 with a 9mm for equivalent loads.
And then there is New Jersey where you can only use full metal jacketed rounds and 45 always king.
Wrong! As many a pistol expert will tell you, when all things are equal, magazine capacity is king. The 9mm and the .45 ACP are two routes to the same point, about 450 ft/lbs of muzzle energy. Yes, yes, you can make it go higher or lower, but the 9mm gets there quick with less lead, and the .45 takes it’s time with more. I’ve watched dozens of ballistic gel super slow motion videos of the 9mm versus the .45 ACP using dozens of the different bullet types, from Federal Hydra-Shok to Gold Dot to Cor-Bon, etc. In some cases the 9mm wins, and in some cases the 45 wins, but it’s all fractional differences.
Not according to the Joint Munitions Effectiveness Manual. The 45 is significantly more effective than a 9mm.
Well, maybe you can site me the passage, but let’s look at the numbers for military FMJ rounds.
9mm – 124gr bullet traveling 1200 ft/s produces muzzle energy of 382 ft-lb. In addition, given that recoil is mass*velocity, the 9mm recoil unit is 168000
.45 ACP 230gr bullet traveling at 830 ft/s produces muzzle energy of 352 ft-lb. It’s recoil units equal 190900.
So using military ball ammunition, the 45 has less muzzle energy, more natural recoil, greater drop-off (about 6″ at 50 ft compared to the 9mm 3″), and hods less ammo in the magazine. Am I missing something? Maybe you can explain my error.
OK guys…
The choice of cartridge is the ABSOLUTE LEAST important factor in any hair-splitting between “tactical effectiveness” of 9mm, .45, 10mm, .357 sig, .40 S&W, and .38 special plus “who f*cking cares how many plus signs” P, or whatever other “midsize fighting caliber” reinvention of the wheel anywhere between .30 and .50, that gun makers and gun writers breathlessly push to sell magazines (the kind you read) and guns (that last a hundred years or more) to every chuckle head who thinks they need the ABSOLUTE latest data/gimmick to survive.
Situational awareness, speed of presentation, shot placement in more or less that order, is whats going to save your life. The SPECIFIC cartridge you chose out of that mid-range combat family, comes last.
Pick the gun style/control feature/cartridge combination that allows you to DO THOSE THINGS BEST,
and worry about what it says about your pee-pee later.
I was a hard core 1911 guy for over 20 years, till I finally admitted I couldnt shoot/do immediate action drills with it LEFTY (another story how THAT came to be known)anywhere near as well as I could do with a Glock 9mm.
Speed, accuracy, control? Real world situations, not target range?
Glock 9mm beats 1911, FOR ME, every time.
No matter what the gelatin (or my ego) says I “should” be using.
Worry about shooting BEST, first.
The particular ballistics of cartridge “A” verses “B” wont be the deciding factor in saving your life, believe me.
Your ability to BEST HANDLE the weapon/cartridge combination that WORKS BEST FOR YOU, will.
I went back and check the muzzlle energy data from the manufactures instead of Wikipedia. The 45 ACP fmj has more energy than the 9mm. There is no 124 grain fmj round. That is a hollow point round.
Again,
If I have to decide between “foot-pounds” and “strike-rounds” which do YOU think I’d rather bet my life on?
The gun you can carry is always better than the one you leave at home.
When people argue about which caliber is best, I like to remind them that Ronald Reagan very nearly died from an assassination attempt… with a .22.
Bottom line: find something you’re comfortable shooting AND carrying it. Then do both frequently.
Then wait for New York State to tell you that your magazines are too big. (I wonder if NY realizes that they’re going to force New Yorkers to carry 1911s again. If all you can carry are 7 rounds, why not use the biggest that will fit?)
Jim for president!
For those who have been down the research path and life I have concerning the history of communism in the good ole USA, the first target was to not to go after the army, nor the government. Those things would come in due time as a consequence of infiltrating the culture.
Stalin knew this fact intimately. Why did he think this path neccessary?
Because he knew the people in the USA were armed and would fight back. The culture had to be the primary target for infiltration in order to create the level of chaos neccessary for “change.”
Ladies and Germs:
I present Barack Hussien Obama.
Any questions?
“They never placed restrictions on what armaments we could have because they always knew we would have to be able to carry arms that could defend us against whatever the government would bring to bear on us in any age of weaponry. ”
And that, of course, is no longer the case.
The Government has access to plenty of types of weapons that have been banned for the citizenry. In particular, an Air Force.
And the citizenry is banned from owning antiaircraft weapons.
No army lacking antiaircraft capability has ever defeated a foe who had control of the air. The army just ends up as target practice for the foe’s warplanes. (During the Gulf War, how many Iraqi soldiers were killed by U.S. Air Force bombing, 85,000 at least?)
So please let’s stop the fantasies. The fantasy that a bunch of Americans armed with Bushmasters could hold their own–never mind defeat–against the Air National Guard (especially if it got reinforcements from the Air Force) is just that, a fantasy. They would end up incinerated.
As usual, you are ignorant of the facts. But I give you points for being particularly diligent in your assignment by your betters…
“The Government has access to plenty of types of weapons that have been banned for the citizenry. In particular, an Air Force.”
Funny, you say that as if it is right and appropriate.
You are forgetting another weapon. Psychology. It is rather easy to drop bombs on a foreign city filled with strange people that you’ve been told are terrorists. Even so, people get all sorts of psychological disorders from killing people they believe are dangerous enemies.
It is fairly difficult to drop bombs on people that are more or less like your own family and friends. The Air Force might rule the air but psychological attrition would be high. Read about the estimates of failure to fire or intentional mis-aim in the US Civil War.
Even higher would be attrition on the ground where everyone can see the person they are shooting.
Don’t think that people don’t realize that their .223 AR-15 is not going to make them equal to the military with its AC-130 gunships and infrared scopes and fighter planes. The question is, will the military fire on citizens who are defending the Constitution that the Military swore to defend?
One thing people forget about the military, of which I served for 20 years, it’s an enormous resource hog. If the sh!t really hit the fan to the point where posse comitatus is actually broken, first you would have a splintering of the military because despite the liberal media’s best attempts to portray us otherwise, we are not mind numbed robots. Second, the military is dependent on incoming tax dollars to keep the machine running. If that suddenly dried up because the military was attempting to quell uprising all over the country, those target of said uprising would probably cease to pay their taxes.
Trust me when I tell you the Air Forces uses A LOT of your tax dollars on av gas. An insurgency would actually not have to hold out that long to starve the military and reduce their technological edge. Yes, thousands, if not tens of thousands would die in the early months, but they simply couldn’t sustain putting those planes into the air once all the revenue dried up.
Please go back and read my posting and realize that I fully understand the reality of the situation for the citizens. But, I ask you to go back to the letters of the founding fathers as they discuss the need for an armed citizenry. Don’t read a history novel version, read the actual letters they wrote to each other and draw your own conclusions about what they meant, if you are able to do so.
Concerning the overwhelming force in the hands of the government, and the futility of opposing them, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn had this to say:
“What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand?”
We have indeed come a long way since 1776 — when cannons, and even warships, were in private hands.
We have basically the same military we had when we were fighting in Vietnam. We also had complete control of the air over South Vietnam and to a lesser extent over North Vietnam. We lost that war. We were fighting a technologically inferior enemy and still we lost the war. The US military is impressive fighting in desert terrain where there is next to no cover from the air. We eventually gave up in Iraq and that country is in the throes of a civil war. We didn’t “win” in Afghanistan either and Obama has announced that we will eventually pull out. So effectively the US military lost in Vietnam, lost in Iraq and is losing in Afghanistan. In all these countries we killed a lot of innocent civilians. If the military starts killing innocent civilians here, all popular support for the US government will instantly disappear. So the government will “lose”…
Like how we kicked ass so hard in Viet Nam and Afghanistan?
An armed American populace might be defeatable eventually, but the cost would be far too high.
At the time of the Founding, the term “militia” referred to every adult male capable of carrying a weapon. Every community (county, town) maintained an arsenal, kept locked and under guard, containing a large ammunition store, and sometimes heavier weapons such as light artillery. Every male citizen was expected to respond immediately if the local authorities “called forth the militia”, and to show up with his own personal firearms, loaded and ready to use. The “well-regulated” aspect refers to having standard (“regular”) procedures for calling the militia, sometimes training them, appointing officers, and so on. “Regulating” does not mean “disbanding” or “disarming”.
I find it strange that liberals always decry the existence of a huge standing army, but fail to realize that a fully armed citizenry capable of responding in an instant would make a large standing army unnecessary. Same goes for huge police forces. We should have small professional police forces, and when plenty of extra bodies are needed, there should be a pool of well-prepared citizens capable of being deputized for specific actions, like being called for jury duty, or volunteer firemen. The country was not intended to be “ruled” by an elite class of “experts”, but by the people themselves, no matter how messy that might seem.
Every system can be broken down into various subsystems. Broadly speaking, for weapon systems those are:
- Firepower (offensive subsystem)
- Armor (defensive subsystem)
- Sensors (targeting subsystem)
- Communications (control subsystem)
- Powerplant (mobility subsystem)
Every weapon system, from the ancient Roman phalanx (and its component troops), to a modern carrier battle-group (and its component ships), can be broken down to a collection of those systems. Sometimes, subsystems are combined (to use your air force example, the mobility and defense of an aircraft are both largely determined by its powerplant). Most people see weapon systems as a unitary whole, and then focus on the firepower and armor. Those are awesome systems that are designed to be hard to defeat. But it only takes ONE of those subsystems to go down, to compromise (and often, neutralize) the system as a whole. If you’re trying to hit the other guy where he’s strong instead of where he’s weak, you’re doing it wrong. And as Sun-Tzu pointed out, if he’s strong everywhere, then it stands to reason he’s weak everywhere too.
This discussion happened before:
“They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed?”
Patrick Henry
Spoken as a true American. Thank you Sir, for there are many standing with you!
The JMEM is classified so unless you have a Secret clearance you can’t see it.
It’s not just energy, it’s energy transfer. The bigger slower moving 45 transfers more energy to the body and creates are larger would cavity.
I guess the equalizer is that energy is a combination of mass and velocity. The poor little old 9mm makes up a lot of ground on the 45ACP with a 300ft/sec increase in velocity over the fairly pitiful 850-900 ft/sec speeds of a 45 ACP bullet. Your are correct that the 45ACP will usually create a larger wound channel than a 9mm and allow for more external blood loss, but tissue shock and internal bleeding is not likely to be improved over what a 9mm bullet can do. I referenced what I think are the two best defensive advantages of a 45ACP and because of its external bleed out capability, a well placed shot does not have to be quite as well placed as a 9mm for near maximum effectiveness. But, there is no real substitute for a well placed shot. So, whatever you have, go to the range frequently and practice with it.
If the Dems get their way and a 10-round limit is legislatively imposed for magazines, the theoretical advantages of a 9mm round begins to pale in comparison to the .45, since the 9mm will no longer be able to command a capacity advantage per reload.
Accordingly, assuming you can handle the recoil, the .45 would seem preferable if only in anticipation of such a change.
Ruger implements a “camblock” system to minimize felt recoil in certain models, which might make those models easier to handle than otherwise anticipated.
All your discussion on ammo brought up a memory of what I thought was one of the most perfect rounds available, the Winchester Black Talon.
More that a few years ago we used to take water soaked phone books to the range since ballistic jelly was expensive. Once in a while, like after Easter, we could talk a local grocer into letting us have expired hams.
Anyway, this was how we conducted our own experiments. The Black Talons were just monsters and even better when the bullet was used in a reload. After all a dead criminal cannot sue…..
My only contention with Andrew’s piece is his line “There is, however, some question about whether freedom is, in fact, what the progressives are after.” Freedom is absolutely not what progressives are after. They are after power and control under the guise of altruism.
Amen, brother! There is nothing having to do with freedom in the progressives agenda.
Amen, brother! There is nothing having to do with freedom in the illiberal red regressives’ agenda.
Nice pic of the John Parker statue.
What do you think of the frangible and bismuth-powder rounds?
Should any one need a non-registered, non-tracked gun, the best sources are the coyotes who work for the Mexican drug cartels with whom pres. Obummer, Holder, and the BATFE work hand and hand.
Repeal the 16th and 17th amendments; terminate the Fed and prohibit counterfeiting/scrip/e-currency proliferation by government and/or NGO and/or quango functionaries.
Modify what were originally the first 2 amendments, to restore the requirement of at least one congress-critter for every 30K to 50K citizens (illegal aliens and legal alien residents don’t count), and to over-ride the congress-critters’ corrupt automatic pay raise scheme so that they MUST run for re-election before any raise (for congress-critters, president, judges, cabinet…) can go into effect.
Clarify that babies of tourists, guest-workers, business visitors, exchange visitors — i.e. people with valid visas — and illegal aliens are not eligible for State of USA citizenship, but are free to apply for citizenship subject to the same standards as any non-resident alien or LPR.
Eliminate the Socialist Insecurity Abomination, ObummerDoesn’tCare, Medicare and Medicaid; do not “save” them and thus victimize us yet again.
I am so with you, brother!
The original progressives were staving off red revolution, but the New Left, in its anti-imperialist zeal, brought Leninist ideas into the mainstream, and they are now power. They are sincere in their beliefs that capitalism is evil and that their policies will liberate the common man and woman, including racial minorities. I wrote about that here: http://clarespark.com/2012/07/19/communist-ideas-go-mainstream/. It is a big theme in the writings of David Horowitz as well. To claim that power is an end in itself is wrong-headed, suggesting that those who believe that also believe in the devil and probably identify the demonic with the Jews and the big money.
Unfortunately the average schmuck progressive (take your pick, lawyer, tennis coach, teacher, environmentalista, skid row paid voter, inner city folks paid voter, undocumented illegal paid voter) don’t understand that the progressive powers that be are after power and control of the rest of us. All they see and feel ever so good about is the altruism.
Exceptional, as always.
I would add one thing on this aspect of the topic – When a leftist mocks those who would say they would fight the government should the government become a tyranny, the leftist is stating they would lie down – give their families, their liberty, their labor – without a fight. Their cowardice should be pointed out to them.
Actually, most of them wouldn’t just lie down, they’d be active, eager, and willing participants since they believe they’d be the ones in charge of said tyranny. Their shock is in how anybody could possibly not be willing to live in their utopia.
And they’ll be mighty surprised when, in the course of “normalization”, the very founders of the “utopia” they helped create line them up against a brick wall to be promptly dispatched.
Yes, the facilitators are always the first to go. One of the first and only things the communist have been consistent on. But you have to take note of their logic: once they are in control, would you trust anyone who betrayed their own country? Their purpose has been served. No use for them anymore.
A quick and dirty look on how this construct operates, check out the history of the revolution in Cuba. Castro and his executioners (Think Che) quickly rounded up his supporters for summary conuptance. Same thing happened in the USSR. Well documented cases of people against the wall and on the wrong end of a barrel singing the praises of Lenin.
Indeed! I believe they were referred to as “useful idiots”. It’s becoming apparent that useful idiots don’t learn from history.
To expand a bit on what you have stated, I believe it is inappropriate to argue that we respect the second amendment because it protects our ability to defend ourselves from a tyrannical government. Frankly, that’s a fantasy. We don’t have the benefit of the colonists who were confronted by an identifiable red-coated army. We are, and will be increasingly so, tyrannized by a faceless monolith of bureaucrats, policy wonks, do-gooders, and the eager-to-please that you allude to. The tyranny will spread in ever increasing ways. For example, one day you will be told that charitable deductions for donations to the Boy Scouts are no longer permitted but donations to the equivalent of Acorn are. Or that upon renewal of your license plate you must surrender data from your car’s hard-wired computer that will enable an “excessive use” mileage tax. What will you do? Shoot the grandmotherly DMV clerk? In a few days I will not be surprised to learn that questions regarding firearm ownership will be a part of the next visit to the doctor. Answer truthfully under penalty of perjury and subsequent fines and/or incarceration. Your privacy has just become invaded and you are subject to the next step of governmental tyranny. Are you going to shoot the cute little nurse that handed you the form and said “fill it out”? Without going into detail, here is an actual recently personally experienced form of tyranny that exists presently. Should you have the need to apply for or renew a professional federal license, and you do so via computer, you will be advised before doing so that all information, regardless of how personal, that you enter becomes a part of the government computer network and may be disseminated in any fashion to any agency or entity that the government deems appropriate. But you need the license. It enables your livelihood. Gotcha! Your firearm won’t protect you from that little bit of tyranny. It will only grow worse until your individual liberty is completely snuffed out. Accomplished by millions like the grandmotherly clerk at the DMV. No redcoats to utilize your second amendment rights against. The smiling and pleasant next-door neighbor (mine) who always votes for Democrats and thinks that Obama has been a pretty good president will enable the accomplishment of the much promised “Transformation” without a shot being fired.
Yooper
NRA Life Member
I believe the post by Yooper spells out what has happened and what will continue to happen quite clearly. I have no idea how such incrementally imposed tyranny can be opposed – efforts to do so have so far not been particularly successful or lasting.
I don’t think past incremental-ism guarantees a future of the same. If anything, history teaches that familiarity breeds contempt. The current Resident is clearly familiar with getting his way and over reaches further every day. He now claims “executive powers” to fight the second amendment!
There is no reason to believe the left will not rush head long toward the “finish” line emboldened by the “progress” they’ve made by turning the heat up slowly under the frog.
I just hope the frog still has strong enough legs to jump.
The answer is to go back to the Constitution. Our medical records are now going to be available to all under obamacare?
4th amendment…………?
The problem is that very few people in or out of govt. rely on our constitution to limit govt. and protect our rights.
Even the ACLU is leftist and cherry picks what rights to fight for with little or no over thought.
What this country needs is a fighter who will return us to the constitution and our inalienable rights.
There’s a real contradiction between “going back to the Constitution” and contemplating armed rebellion.
The moment you start insisting that you need guns to defend yourself against the Federal Government, you have left the Constitution way behind.
@sinz54, Nonsense. A tyrannical government is one which has usurped power. It has discarded the Constitution. A violent revolution is all that will ever return us to the rule of law, of Constitutional government.
These people will use whatever force we will allow them to get away with. Force is all they know, the only language they speak. It is all they understand. They would murder us in a heartbeat, if they thought they could. Only killing them will ever remove them, because they do not believe in playing fair. They do not believe in fair elections, or anything else which resembles reciprocal or equitable. You think we can ever get them out via free and fair elections? You’re naive.
They know this about themselves. They hate the 2nd Amendment, because it is all that is stopping them. Now, they are coming for the guns. Obama is going to try it via executive order, as if he has that kind of power over us. He seeks to overturn the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution by Imperial Edict. They will use force to accomplish this. Do not think they won’t. They are coming for our guns. Only force will stop them, nothing else. The Redcoats are coming, again. Well, they are purple shirts, but it’s just a wardrobe change. They still want the guns.
Folks, it is time to form up the militias. Start or join one near you. Prepare for the 2nd American Revolution. There is not much time left.
sinz54, if the federal government continually breaks the Constitution’s Bill of Rights, if they redefine the wording of the Constitution through the courts, if they ignore or selectively enforce parts of the Constitution at their whim, when many of those in government swore to uphold and defend the Constitution, would that not be a significant breach of trust? What if such things continued until the federal government no longer resembles anything mentioned in the Constitution? Would your premise still hold?
Are you saying these words are no longer relevant:
“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Hopefully few people are to the point that they actually think there should be a revolution. But those in government should never get too comfortable.
Sinz54,
“If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude
better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace.
We ask not your counsels or your arms. Crouch down and lick the hands
which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you,
and may posterity forget that you were our countrymen.”
Samuel Adams
Yooper,
I believe that your diagnosis is correct.
And only a political organization that would set such a diagnosis at the center of its own action and propaganda could effectively hope to stop the march of the subversives.
I don’t see any such political force today.
You’re entirely correct, Yooper, and your examples are cogent and to the point, but the daily larger, better equipped, better paid, more invasive feral bureaucracy is authorized to extend and deepen its predations by our elected misrepresentatives, the high oligarchs of the Executive branch, and feral court judges. I concede they don’t wear red coats.
There is a way to combat the gradualism that Yooper speaks of without waiting for some bright line event to trigger a revolution. Protest, lobby, and plan. How did the rational American get to this point? He waited. Sure he voted, but for the most part he waited. What did the other side do? Think 1965 to 1974; the Watts Riot to the end of the Vietnam War – protest and civil disobedience.
At that time the media was left but not batantly so. Our battle will therefore be harder without media support but our conviction should be greater. We should march large and march often on the establishment. We commit to worthy lobbies like the NRA. And donate to organizations that promote our causes – the trial lawyers do.
Finally, continually plan. Every movement and every action however small should coincide with our vector of change. Opportunities to support that which is favorable – exploit. That which is unfavorable – eschew. Don’t spend money to see a Hollywood movie when you know that some fraction of that money ends up paying for gun control propaganda or an actor that uses his celebrity as a bully pulpit.
We can do this. If not lock and load and wait for the Red Coats.
Yopper:
Again the Klaven strikes a nerve. This said, read a coupla of his books with a keen eye on not the content, but the presentation and structure of his little mind F’n stories and why he is damn good at what he does…
There is this little thing called a paragraph. Learn it. Live it.
Thank you, Chuk.
You wrote (not “said” but wrote), “This said, read a coupla of his books with a keen eye on not the content, but the presentation and structure of his little mind F’n stories and why he is damn good at what he does…”
That sentence is such a mess that I wish not to comment upon it.
Anyway.
Thank you.
To defend oneself against a tyrannical government is what the Second Amendment is about. Putting that into practice is very tricky and rather unlikely.
As long as the government infringes on citizen’s rights in very subtle and small ways, nothing is likely to change. If someone, or some group, were to take it upon themselves to attack the government in some manner they will just end up in prison or dead, even if their cause was just and their motives good.
Other than voting and other political means, the only way I see that the ordinary citizens have for defeating a tyrannical government with force requires that there be some extreme polarizing incident that creates immediate momentum for change through large segments of the populace. It would need leaders such as mayors, senators, governors, and generals in its ranks. It would need to be a movement large enough that such things as the Geneva Convention come into play. Otherwise we are back to the prison or death outcome.
I believe what might very well happen would be a series of assassinations of Government officials. A few thousand shooters with good hunting rifles could wreak significant havoc on the political class in this country. Think John Allen Muhammad. Muhammad and his sidekick got caught eventually because they kept it up. If they had done the first shooting and quit, they probably would never have been caught. What if one person were to take out one Senator or one Representative, or some cabinet official, or some Federal Judge, or a Governor, or some talking head news personality and then quit? If several hundred to a couple of thousand did this, the carnage could be quite considerable. Of course, not all would be successful in their attempts, but the chaos would be huge. Frankly, I think this would tear the country apart so I hope and pray that our political class thinks long and hard about pushing people to the point where they feel the need to do something like this. Because I do believe there are people out there who would do this kind of thing.
Yooper,
I believe what you say is true. However, if you cut of the head of a snake does not the whole of it die?
We won’t need to shoot grandma.
I would reformulate the question about progressives as freedom for whom from what? The answer is freedom for chosen groups from want and uncertainty. That this never, ever works and in fact we can watch the Greeks destroying their forests in an attempt to keep warm this winter as a kind of coda for socialism.
But it will be different this time….
The progressive definition of freedom is that they, the progressives, have the freedom (privilege) of doing whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want, with whatever they want.
You have the freedom (privilege) to agree that they have the right to do all of the above. And to pay for their fun out of your own pocket.
That’s it.
It is the philosophy of monarchy, writ large, and shorn of all that pesky business of actually having to prove that their ancestors really were of the nobility. Progressivism is nothing but feudalism with the names changed.
Also, European feudal rulers (as opposed to those elsewhere) generally defined themselves as ruling “by the grace of God”. Far from conferring permission for them to do as they pleased, they, and the Church, held that this limited their behavior to what would not violate the tenets of Christianity. Those in Islam, and points east, claimed to rule in the name of their deities, and thereby defined that their actions carried with them the automatic approval of same.
Progressives, as a rule, define God as a “false construct”. They do not believe in Him. This is all well and good, except that it means that the only brake on their ambitions and actions is their own consciences. If you don’t believe you will ever be judged on your actions by a higher authority, you end up with Anton Szandor LaVay’s formulation; Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
This probably explains why progressives don’t like Christianity or Judaism, but have a schoolboy crush on any philosophy that carries a whiff of incense and the romance of the East with it. It’s less a belief in the philosophy than a yearning to emulate its real-world effects. Those being absolute power for the rulers, and everyone else having the choice of obedience, or death.
They of course believe that they will be the rulers. They wouldn’t like being the ruled in the sort of “Utopia” they envision.
clear ether
eon
The power over Life and Death is a drug to those people.
Bill Ayers and his declaration that at least 25 Million need to die…
But they want more than that. Mere submission will never be enough for these monsters – for monsters are what they truly are.
They demand your applause and adulation. More than that, they demand your soul.
If that seems a tad extreme to some of you folks, then consider this from the venerable Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn:
As Orwell said in 1984, so-called ‘progressives’ wish to hollow us out and fill us with themselves. Those of us whom they haven’t committed to the ghastly abattoirs that have characterized their regimes in the last century, that is. They are ultimately driven by the lust for slaughter and power, for mass murder is both the celebration of their holy sacrament of absolute power and a reflection of their fear and cowardice.
Apply this to the militant atheism that tends to push and push on the left, and you’ve suddenly raised interesting questions on the very nature of God and the Human Spirit itself.
They do not believe in God, but then just what is it they are aiming to defeat and destroy when they “fill you up” with themselves? What is it they are displacing, in their supposed stark disbelief?
“We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.” I guess they have no need of the other pesky hypothesis. Our country should have run from this man and his ilk. But free stuff won the day.
They demand we revere and live in fear of them as though they were gods. In their deepest, darkest, coldest hearts, they know they’re creatures of evil. They believe if they can force us to bow down to them, they’ll become as gods.
In this, as in much else, they’re rock-solid wrong.
So …. a story which ends with a killer being spared the death penalty is supposed to be the foundation of the death penalty?
I don’t think you read the story right. I think the point was to end the cycle of blood-for-blood (and where does it say “government process”?!?) and take the decisions of guilt or innocence out of the hands of the angry and wronged.
I think you’re just imposing your world-view on any piece of text that looks close enough. Does “Siddhartha” support the second amendment as well? How about Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance?
For among other evils which being unarmed brings you, it causes you to be despised, and this is one of those ignominies against which a prince ought to guard himself, as is shown later on. Because there is nothing proportionate between the armed and the unarmed; and it is not reasonable that he who is armed should yield obedience willingly to him who is unarmed, or that the unarmed man should be secure among armed servants. Because, there being in the one disdain and in the other suspicion, it is not possible for them to work well together. And therefore a prince who does not understand the art of war, over and above the other misfortunes already mentioned, cannot be respected by his soldiers, nor can he rely on them. He ought never, therefore, to have out of his thoughts this subject of war, and in peace he should addict himself more to its exercise than in war; this he can do in two ways, the one by action, the other by study.
THE PRINCE
by Nicolo Machiavelli
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1232/1232-h/1232-h.htm
Who is imposing whose world view? Look in a mirror.
Techno is correct. The government doesn’t say “Hey, you can’t kill that guy! That would be Anarchy! We’ll kill him for you…” The government isn’t an extermination service for feudists and vigilantes. There is no implied contract obliging the government to punish a criminal in a way a particular victim FEELS is appropriate. If there were, we wouldn’t say “He got off easy” so often. But that’s the way it goes.
The important thing to remember is – one day it might be YOU in the dock. Would you rather be sentenced by the court or by the guy cousin you shot?
“…whose cousin you shot.”
On the other hand, restating that the main purpose of the giving of the power of punishment to the government in the first place is to prevent blood feud – which tends to end up burning cities to the ground, just ask the medieval Italians! – if the government doesn’t properly punish you for shooting a man’s cousin you just might end up with both: the victim’s cousin waiting for you in ambush after you get out of prison!
Bugs:
“There is no implied contract obliging the government to punish a criminal in a way a particular victim FEELS is appropriate”
I understand the whole of your point to a degree, but a government representing “the people” IS obliged to met out punishments that “the people” at large feel is appropriate.
The problem is, we’re going to kill SOMEBODY, and we know that through statistical analysis how often that occurs. We just have to CHOOSE who they are, and unfortunately, we choose badly.
For instance, we KNOW how many convicted murders will maim and even occasionally kill Prison Guards while serving “life sentences”. We KNOW how many released murders will kill again. The Recent “Fireman Shooter “ is not an anomaly.
Just like we KNOW roughly how many die in swimming pools and by lightning strikes, we KNOW how many “released child molesters” will lead us to the shallow grave of their NEXT little girl, in any given year. It’s a known and predictable event based on historical trends so consistent its “criminal” to allow it to continue.
My point is, based on IMPIRICAL DATA, our government knowingly allows ‘x-number” of its citizens to be maimed, raped and murdered, preferring THEM to die, rather than the monsters proven so likely to do these kinds of things.
So, to me, we DO have an “implied contract” with our government to punish criminals that we, the “victims” feel is appropriate. The citizenry at large is overwhelmingly in favor of Capital Punishment when incontrovertible proof (the Aurora shooting, etc, etc) is not in question.
The problem is, our Government UTTERLY FAILS US at every turn, when it comes to Basic Criminal Justice…. and instead creates more laws to punish the innocent.
Which, to me, is a blatant violation of our most basic “contract”.
Our courts are far from perfect but are some of the best to be found in the history of the world. Although I am very pro law enforcement, I have told people I know to be criminals how to effectively assert their rights. I don’t expect the police to get by on flimsy circumstantial evidence any more than I think someone proven guilty should get “off easy”.
I agree,
Capital Punishment should not be sought in complex, pieced together after the fact “whodunit” theories of murder.
But “The citizenry at large is overwhelmingly in favor of Capital Punishment when incontrovertible proof of actual guilt(the Aurora shooting, etc, etc) is not in question.
But the government exists to serve itself not us, so most of the time we lose.
If we have to change that with occasional “punitive raids” against her agents, offices, and assets to get the message through, then so be it.
Siddhartha was a prince, schooled in the Hindu tradtions in which Krishna urged Prince Arjuna to accept his duty to fight his cousins as a form of karma yoga, without hatred. There is no record of the Buddha having an opinion on any articles in our constitution. I suspect he would have got along famously with Ben Franklin.
I would like to ask a liberal, “Why do the police have guns?” If our country is oh so safe, then why is it that our police officers are so heavily armed? After all, they carry sidearms and in the trunks of their police cars they generally have either shotguns or M-16s, or both. And let’s not eve talk about what police SWAT teams are armed with. So with all this firepower, why is it THEY need to be armed, but the average citizen, who is usually the first person to be attacked by an ARMED criminal, should have no guns and be left defenseless?
This isn’t as crazy as it sounds. Right now, at this very moment, New York State is about to enact some of the harshest gun ownership laws in the country, if not THE harshest. So now it will be even more difficult for average citizens to maintain their freedom under the Second Amendment, while doing nothing to reduce crime. If anything, it will make crime worse. Just look at Chicago, which has some of the toughest gun laws in the country. How is that working out for their murder rate these days?
The only thing stopping the United States from totally degenerating into France is the Second Amendment. Do away with the Second Amendment, and you give away the last vestiges of your God-given freedoms over to the government. In effect, you’re no better that a European style social-welfare state. And even though we are considered oh so “provincial” and terribly “uncivilized” by the Europeans because of our belief in the Second Amendment (something they don’t have, by the way), we still haven’t managed a Hitler or a Mussolini or a Franco or a Stalin, yet. Hmmmm, and what did all those guys have in common? Oh, that’s right, they were able to control an unarmed public. And how did that work out for them and the world in general?
Police carry firearms to protect themselves and each other. ‘Civilians’ are an after-thought. If they are thought about at all.
As for New York… well, maybe all the criminals will migrate there. Living in the mid-west, I can get behind that. Those undocumented non-law-abiding democrat voters can join with the new former Citizens turned criminals that will arise from this legislation.
I think every police station, fire station, hospital and library should have a drop-box for all the firearms that will be turned in by the former-citizens-turned-subjects and the criminals. Kind of like those places that allow a new mother to drop off their newborn kid if they don’t want them anymore. No questions asked.
The next mass shooting brought to you by the New York legislators, in the late, not-so-great State of New York, now known as the Gun Free, Soft Target State.
It’s my understanding that the police only found 2 pistols (maybe 4) in the school but did see .223 brass laying about. So they set about searching for the rifle only to find it in the car. We either had the perp putting the long gun back in the car and then heading back into the school to off himself, OR, we have a second shooter who is free, a missing murder weapon and a false flag operation.
Your understanding is wrong. A little research will show you that all the children were shot with the .223, some as many as 11 times, none less than 3.
Not being snarky, but I would appreciate a link to this. I’ve been trying to find ANY detailed information (for discussions exactly like this), and haven’t been very successful. Last night I was pondering why I couldn’t find a timeline and diagram of the school. Usually there are detailed graphics on this within a few days of a shooting (even if they are wrong). Trayvon/Zimmerman had endless timelines and diagrams and such.
So… if you have some sort of definitive breakdown on what happened there, please post a link. I, too, have “heard” about the rifle being in the car, several magazines of pistol shot being expended, etc.
Liberty, you just don’t ‘get it’ do you.
Chicago doesn’t have the Highest Murder Rate because of ‘Tough Gun Laws.’
Chicago has the Highest Murder Rate because of all the Guns Available in the neighboring states, that won’t enact proper gun legislation, coming into Chicago to be used to commit all those murders.
Why all those guns never stay home, and commit murders in the states where they are sold, because don’t have the strict gun laws, making guns available everywhere, is never explained.
NO dingus ‘captain stupid’,
YOU don’t get it. There are THOUSANDS of guns in florida and crime in the ENTIRE state is lower than chicago.
Why? because there are citizens allowed to carry a gun. the criminals are more afraid of people with guns than police. CRIME IS WAY DOWN THERE.
Illinois is the ONLY state withou a CCW law.
The ACLU in Chicago ALWAYS defend the gangs here from the police who search and grab guns. the aclu slime then get the gangsters OFF the gun charges and they go get some more weapons from holder & obamas ‘fast and furious’ gun sale for criminals and continue to kill eachother and US.
Of course, YOU are going to move to New York where it is now safe, since they just passed even MORE draconian gun laws ‘ without waiting for public debate to slow things up’ per Cuomo and bloomeberg.
He was being ironic, wayno. Sheesh.
Reading comprehension did not work for you.
“YOU don’t get it. There are THOUSANDS of guns in florida and crime in the ENTIRE state is lower than chicago”
Er … I don’t know where you got that factoid from, but it’s dead wrong. If you want to compare crime _rates_, that’s one thing – but to claim that there’s less crime in all of florida than in chicago is just flat-out not true. Go check the UCR statistics, and let’s hear no more of that nonsense.
If you want to compare crime rates, then it’s not all that impressive to compare a city with a whole state – we know that violent crime is higher in cities. Compare chicago with miami, based on 2011 UCR figures, and chicago actually comes out looking pretty good.
Here’s the problem I see with you guys’ line of argument – you keep looking at the worst states/cities with tough gun laws and saying “that’s awful”, but completely ignore the crime rates in states in cities with more liberal gun laws. The crime rates in places like atlanta, memphis, new orleans or houston/dallas are actually not that brilliant.
Again, correlation does not equal causation. Merely comparing gun deaths in one city with gun deaths in another doesn’t tell us anything about the success or failure of gun control. I think the number of shootings probably has more to do with the overall level of crime in any city, since criminals are the ones doing most of the shooting and criminals generally have no trouble getting their hands on guns. Lower levels of gun crime might be caused by more effective policing of certain neighborhoods. Higher levels of gun crime might be caused by an economic downturn or the appearance of a new drug on the street. (We all remember the crack epidemic.)
The city in which I work, Washington DC, was once famously known as the Murder Capitol. At the same time, it had some of the most restrictive gun control laws in the country. A couple of years ago, the gun control laws were relaxed somewhat. Since then, there has been no corresponding rise OR fall in the number of gun deaths. It fluctuates. You have to do some elaborate math and make some very tenuous connections to claim an effect either way.
I think you have to be more specific with your figures. I would say that gun CRIME is tied to the overall crime rate, so don’t bother looking for a connection to gun control laws. Criminals can always get guns, just like druggies can always get drugs and drinkers could always get booze during Prohibition.
Instead, concentrate on other types of gun deaths: suicides, accidental shootings, and uncommon occurrences like school or workplace shootings. I would think that incidents like these are more likely to occur among ordinary, non-criminal citizens who probably obey gun control laws. If, among this cohort, gun deaths (or injuries) occur less frequently under tighter gun control or more frequently under looser gun control, you MIGHT have a correlation AND a cause.
But again, I wouldn’t accept any conclusion unless other factors were discounted.
I know an assistant police chief of a nearby city. He has made sure that everyone in his family is properly trained to defend themselves and if of age, has been licensed to carry concealed guns if they choose.
Because they are charged with the job of putting themselves in harms way for the benefit of people like you. They’re the ones who have no choice but to face down the people the pro-gun lobby has armed through weak regulation. Because they’re the ones who have to (physically, if necessary) enforce the law, which sometimes upsets people who have little to lose.
They’re not just people who sit on the internet and whine about the democrats not respecting the second amendment and kid themselves against rising up against “tyranny” or chinese invaders (sorry – north korean).
And yes, they are the official representatives of The State. And The State does have a responsibility to enforce internal sovereignty, not to mention law and order. Somebody has to ensure that judicial and regulatory decisions are implemented, potentially against the wishes of people who disagree. So yes, in the most heavily armed country on earth, in which 47 police were shot and killed last year, they probably do need to keep guns handy.
Meanwhile, in london, bobbies on the beat continue to get by without a sidearm.
Because they are charged with the job of putting themselves in harms way for the benefit of people like you. They’re the ones who have no choice but to face down the people the pro-gun lobby has armed through weak regulation. Because they’re the ones who have to (physically, if necessary) enforce the law, which sometimes upsets people who have little to lose.
They’re not just people who sit on the internet and whine about the democrats not respecting the second amendment and kid themselves against rising up against “tyranny” or chinese invaders (sorry – north korean).
And yes, they are the official representatives of The State. And The State does have a responsibility to enforce internal sovereignty, not to mention law and order. Somebody has to ensure that judicial and regulatory decisions are implemented, potentially against the wishes of people who disagree. So yes, in the most heavily armed country on earth, in which 47 police were shot and killed last year, they probably do need to keep guns handy.
Meanwhile, in london, bobbies on the beat continue to get by without a sidearm.
Because they are charged with the job of putting themselves in harms way for the benefit of people like you. They’re the ones who have no choice but to face down the people the pro-gun lobby has armed through weak regulation. Because they’re the ones who have to (physically, if necessary) enforce the law, which sometimes upsets people who have little to lose.
They’re not just people who sit on the internet and whine about the democrats not respecting the second amendment and kid themselves against rising up against “tyranny” or chinese invaders (sorry – north korean).
And yes, they are the official representatives of The State. And The State does have a responsibility to enforce internal sovereignty, not to mention law and order. Somebody has to ensure that judicial and regulatory decisions are implemented, potentially against the wishes of people who disagree. So yes, in the most heavily armed country on earth, in which 47 police were shot and killed last year, they probably do need to keep guns handy.
Meanwhile, in london, bobbies on the beat continue to get by without a sidearm.
“Meanwhile, in london, bobbies on the beat continue to get by without a sidearm”
Absolute fantasy.
Been to the UK lately?
Gun crimes have INCREASED since the was ban imposed after the Scotland Nursury shooting.
All homocides are up, and UK cops are finally NOW beginning to carry guns, because they have emboldened thugs to become ARMED thugs with their “gun ban” only the nice folks follow
Everything that you just posted is false.
Check for yourself: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/taxonomy/index.html?nscl=Crime+in+England+and+Wales
That’s because “bobbies” wouldn’t even think of engaging an armed criminal. British police use red cars that are called “armed response units”. They are armed like SWAT operatives with kevlar vests, helmets and MP5s.
define “armed criminal”. The difference is that, in the UK, police aren’t confronted every 10 minutes by a perp with a gun. It changes the dynamic when a taser, some CS spray and a baton are what you need for most armed encounters.
Somebody asked why the US police have to be armed. I explained. The UK comparison is to suggest that it doesn’t have to be that way.
Obama’s stunning hypocrisy is what has people so enraged over this gun control issue. After his diabolical Fast And Furious scheme that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Mexican men, women and children, how dare he get in our faces and babble about “protecting the children”?
because Fast and Furious was to help get OUR guns banned, but he got caught and it backfired, till they set up the newtown tragedy.
Examination of the Newtown tragdy shows NO AR!% at the scene, but lots of .223 cases. That means one of 2 things. either the kid used the ar15, then left the building to put it in the trunk, go back with 4 handguns and continue the slaughter. while there was video of the school are none of it is being released. so the kid was a speed demon, killing all those people with a trip to the parking lot and back or had an accomplice.
———-
George Mason Law School Professor Joyce Lee Malcolm, author of Guns and Violence: The English Experience (Harvard, 2002), explained why Morgan’s position was so silly in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal. In March, 1996, Thomas Hamilton, known to suffer mental illness, shot and killed 16 young children and their teacher in a primary school in the Scottish town of Dunblane, wounding 10 other children and 3 more teachers before killing himself. That resulted in the Firearms Act of 1998, “which instituted a nearly complete ban on handguns. Owners of pistols were required to turn them in. The penalty for illegal possession of a pistol is up to 10 years in prison.”
The results of that law, which would be unconstitutional in the U.S. no matter how many guests Piers Morgan calls stupid on his show, were:
“Within a decade of the handgun ban and the confiscation of handguns from registered owners, crime with handguns had doubled according to British government crime reports. Gun crime, not a serious problem in the past, now is. Armed street gangs have some British police carrying guns for the first time.”
YAY Brits! Now that law is coming to New York!
“because Fast and Furious was to help get OUR guns banned”
So what was operation wide receiver for?
Wide Reciever was an ACTUAL sting operation…
Where guns were TRACKED and ARRESTS were made…
Arrests of the straw-purchasers AND the people who received the guns.
Thats the difference, Troll.
F&F was a gun-dumping operation, with no possibility of arrests.
It was a gun-dump, on purpose, specifically designed to jack-up the body count in mexico so they could blame the availability of “american assault weapons” here, for political purposes.
I’ve yet to hear anyone who participated in it explain how they thought it could possibly work an *actual* law ENFORECEMT operation, when the guns were allowed to “walk”.
No one has yet come forward and said “Well, yeah, now realize where we f’ed up…THIS is what was supposed to occur, and THIS is where it went wrong”
Nobody can explain how it was SUPPOSED to work, because guess what?
It DID work, according to their plan.
Lots of Mexicans got shot, and the Serial Numbers “matched” the walked guns,
just like the hoped all along, to fatten out the “90% lie” they were trying to sell.
So please, if youre paid to argue otherwise on these sites, please explain rationally what PLAUSIBLE law enforcement step, procedure, act or action(s) could have possible occured, after you let a weapon cross the border and go out of your sight or control.
We’re still waiting for answer that from Dear Leader.
Lucky for him a retard massacred a bunch of AMERICAN school kids, huh?
You must be giddy with joy over THAT P.R. coup
“Arrests of the straw-purchasers AND the people who received the guns.”
Plenty of the first, not so many of the second. The difference between the first op and the second op is that the first op stopped interdicting the straw purchasers to see where the guns went, to try to catch the Big Fish. They both led to arrests of actual gun runners, but very very few. And they both led to hundreds of guns being shipped to mexico and never recovered.
There have been many massacres worse than the recent one in Newtown, but it’s been the first one since Obama was re-elected and could go after guns like everyone on the right told us he would, and like he promised repeatedly he wouldn’t.
Also notice that the UN Small Arms Treaty is up to a vote this year, and only the Senate needs to ratify it (the Republican controlled House has no say).
Elections have consequences. I hope everyone is enjoying their Obama-phones and free birth control.
Excellent article.
However, I would point out that the Founding Fathers had multiple reasons for enshrining the 2nd Amendment as they did.
The security of a free state is but one reason for the private citizen to possess arms. An armed population, as the author inferred, isn’t the kind of population that tyranny has an easy time subjugating.
However, just because defense against tyranny was one reason for the 2nd Amendment doesn’t mean it was the only reason.
There is also the matter of natural rights, with which the Founding Fathers were well acquainted.
The most basic natural right is the right to live, and therefore to protect one’s own life.
This holds true whether you are talking about a revolution or a thief in the night who would slit your throat for your wallet – both are hazards to one’s individual life expectancy.
Therefore the individual citizen, in addition to retaining the right to arms as a bulwark against a tyrannical federal government also retained the right to arms as a protection for their own individual lives.
As such, I’d suggest less reliance upon ancient Greek literature and more cogitation upon John Locke and Emerich de Vattel.
Well reasoned. The progs who base any argument on the postulation that we have had our last revolution know nothing about human history. Here, gun grabbing predates the founding of the nation. Reaction to gun grabbing founded it. Government has ever been the predator. We, the prey. But a prey that adapts. A prey with guns. Bring it, progs.
Lets suppose just for arguments sake that I want to to impose a vision of a Utopian Society upon an unwilling population.
One thing in my way is the fact that this population has guns and may resist.
How would I get the population to give up their guns?
One way is to create crimes so heinous, so repulsive, that the population gives up there guns voluntarily.
I’ve seen this general theory espoused on several extremist right wing web sites and I casually brought it up to some of my friends. One response is “oh that’s crazy it could never happen in America”. My thought is really? Why not?
Back in the cold war days when we saw communists under every bed, we considered the impossible and unthinkable. Why not now? What has changed?
Thanks for the history lesson. Let’s write a bit for the last few years. Obama and his cohorts are encouraging the deaths of millions of unborn (some even partially born) infants on a regular basis. Those who are too ignorant to use contraceptives get a second choice–abortion, paid for often by those who oppose it. We can hear the rants against gun control and watch the fools who blame the instrument for the crime, and ignore the truth. Our kids can’t mention God, aren’t taught honor and decency in schools. Our voting majority are ignorant. Our president is a self-serving fool, and those who oppose him too cowardly to kick his butt out of the White House. Until that is done, live with it.
Mr. Klavan, you are spot on. If our government had done its job to protect us we may not be having this conversation on gun control. Murderers have gotten off on technicalities, loop holes, or served only a few years and the victim is always at fault. Our jails and prisons have become big business for cons and there is a lackadasical approach to cracking down on inner city crime. So why should murderers stop their behavior? The left has made every effort to justify why criminal behavior is the result of the law abiding citizens owning guns and they know better than us. Their argument is illogical but they are still trying to convince us that because we have guns crime will escalate.
A curious thing I’ve noticed is that the left has infinitely more concern for the rights of criminals than they do for the rights of the law-abiding. If you’re accused of a crime, they demand that every particular be perfect in how you are handled — or the entire case is voided. If you’re travelling by air (or going to a football game, or just in a place TSA has decided to put a VIPR squad), then, unaccused and innocent, you are bodily searched and any reluctance or insistence on your rights is met with a presumption of guilt.
A law-abiding citizen can be subject to an IRS audit in which they’re presumed guilty; an illegal alien can spend decades defrauding the government without a moment’s concern from law enforcement.
This was mentioned recently in a post on another article re the British police, who (unarmed) seem to be less than willing to pursue armed suspects and would rather persecute unarmed citizens who attempt to protect themselves. The posted suggested that one reason is that there is an unspoken agreement between the government and the criminals: the criminals attack only the average citizen, not the elite, and are used to demoralize the citizenry and keep them in line. Sort of a protection racket scheme.
“The progressive argument is, essentially, that the contract was made in former times when people were not so civilized as they are now.”
Wow, talk about straw-man arguments. The rest of the article is equally bogus.
The reelection of Obama has really sent the wingnuts over the edge.
Actually what you quoted is the exact strawman argument used by gun-control advocates. But it is inherently self-contradictory, in that their argument is;
Like most arguments based on progressive dogmas, the “moral” argument in favor of “gun control” is inherently self-contradictory.
What a shame that logic is no longer taught in our universities. Or at least, is not taught properly.
clear ether
eon
Exacty,
The Progs are always happy to send goons with modern arms to enforce THEIR politics…
“I dont need a gun of my own, because the government LIKES me”
Funny how they dont see how selfishly elitest that is.
Funny how they dont see how selfishly elitest that is.
Or how quickly that situation can turn around. Historically illiterate, all of them.
Oh, is that the “exact argument”? In your dreams. The closest I’ve seen to that argument is that rules promulgated for an 18th century largely rural society of four million might not quite serve in 21st century America. NOTHING about civilized vs uncivilized.
PS – Root 83′s comment is not worth responding to, but let me correct something I said in my initial post. The reelection of Obama has NOT ONLY sent the wingnuts over the edge, it’s also sent them close to sedition. The last time I looked it was against the law to advocate the violent overthrow of the government.
Lemme guess: during the Bush administration, you and your friends were scared shitless because you thought he was about to become a fascist dictator.
Our Loyalties are not to politicians, they are to the Constitution.
“to support and defend The Constitution, against all enemies, foreign and domestic”
You cant openly Violate The Constitution, and expect people to be compelled to accept those violations.
Basically, what part of “shall not be infringed” do you have trouble comprehending?
BTW, my STATE Constitution also has a Bill of Rights…
Put there just in case corrupt A-holes like Obama one day feel its “politically viable”
to ignore the Second Amendment at The Federal level..
It says: “the right of the people to bear arms in defense of themselves or The State SHALL NOT BE QUESTIONED”
It was ratified in the same place (Independence hall) at approximately the same time frame, by some of the very same people who ratified Federal Constitution. There is no “confusion” or “misinterpretation” of their intent, and all argument to the contrary are intentionally, deceitfully false.
If you DISLIKE that fact, and wish to CHANGE the Constitution to reflect YOUR preference, there are means available to do so. Its called a “Constitutional Convention” where you can propose to The People, “fundemantal transformations” to that document which they may (or, may not) agree to.
But THE PEOPLE would have to vote on it….
And thats the rub, isnt it Mr. (Mrs., Ms, whatever) Lefty Elitest Obama fan.
Arbitrary ‘Exectutive Action” based on emotional “I dont care what The Constitution says, I’m angry” impulses are not the way it works
Because it violates the Constitution.
Please read some books and learn how your government is supposed to function.
You are currently a danger to yourself and others with your your ignorant, emotion based theories
Last time I looked it was illegal (and uncontitutional) for the government to instigate violence against its citizens. Looks like you enjoy it. Bit of a sadistic bastard, are you?
So…
Youre saying the police, armed with weapons (now) forbidden to the public at large,
WONT enforce these New Gun Laws that you support?
Do you even understand your own positions?
You must be a College Professor or something.
Its hard to be that stupid today without an Advanced Degree.
So…
Youre saying the police, armed with weapons (now) forbidden to the public at large,
WONT enforce these New Gun Laws that you support?
Do you even understand your own positions?
You must be a College Professor or something.
Its hard to be that stupid today without an Advanced Degree.
What does “rural” vs “urban” have to do with it? The Constitutional provisions are NOT based on a “country lifestyle” but on the relationship between a citizen and his government. The reasons for the 2nd Amendment are (more or less in order):
* to ensure that the army has a ready supply of men familiar with the use of firearms (the stated reason)
* to enable the citizen to protect himself and provide for his family if necessary (hunt)
* to enable the citizens to resist a tyrannical government.
Oh, and BTW what, precisely, do you think that “civilized” means? (hint: “civil” = “city”).
One phrase describes civilization: If it’s not yours, don’t touch it. Upon that single thought were our laws and freedoms based, as well as our mutual cooperation, our economies, and the exchange of ideas. Before you touch that which belongs to another, you must make him a fair exchange, a mutally beneficial exchange. Keeping always in mind that some things are simply not for sale. Among those things are a man’s right to life and freedom from harm.
When you take a man’s weapons, you steal his ability to protect himself against those who would steal from him. At that point, he is no longer free, but is a slave to anyone he meets.
“The supposed quietude of a good man allures the ruffian; while on the other hand, arms like laws discourage and keep the invader and the plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside… Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived the use of them…”
Thomas Paine
http://oll.libertyfund.org/?option=com_staticxt&staticfile=show.php%3Ftitle=1743&Itemid=27
Rabbi:
A simple question: Do the police have obligation to protect you? (Hint: SCOTUS says no. The police protect the general public not a specific individual)
So if the police have no obligation to protect do you believe that people have an inherent right to self defense? If you agree that they do by what means can they protect themselves?
Finally, do you believe that human nature has changed since 1787 and if so how so?
“…rules promulgated for an 18th century largely rural society of four million might not quite serve in 21st century America. NOTHING about civilized vs uncivilized.”
What a bogus thesis. Nice try. Read Klavan’s excellent thoughtful piece again SLOOOOWLY. Maybe the light bulb might go off.
Of course you’d say has nothing to do with the “civilized or not argument.”
You do know the Nazi’s in the mid-20th century were considered by many as running a “civilized” society in which most of its citizens either participated or ignored the horrors being committed in the name of “civilization” on “the other.”
Yup, Nazis were progressive control freaks and our current regime seems bent on similar control measures.
To paraphrase Klavan’s thesis: we may have more toys and stuff, but the core nature alas remains the same and tyranny is just a “door knock” away.
Complain about another’s logical fallacy (quite correctly)…and then use one, yourself (ad hom) in refutation of the other’s fallacy.
“Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American. [] The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people.”
Tench Coxe
Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788.
inalienable
incapable of being alienated, surrendered, or transferred
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
Congress of the United States
begun and held at the City of New-York, on
Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine.
THE Conventions of a number of the States, having at the time of their adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added: And as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government, will best ensure the beneficent ends of its institution.
The constitution was a document restricting the power of government.
The Bill of Rights was a further restiction on the powers of government.
These natural, inalienable rights shall not be infringed.
Once infringed by the government…
“Government, in my humble opinion, should be formed to secure and to enlarge the exercise of the natural rights of its members; and every government, which has not this in view, as its principal object, is not a government of the legitimate kind.”
James Wilson
Lectures on Law, 1791
“That the said Constitution shall never be construed to authorize Congress to infringe the just liberty of the press or the rights of conscience; or to prevent the people of The United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms…”
Samuel Adams
http://www.amazon.com/PROCEEDINGS-COMMONWEALTH-MASSACHUSETTS-Constitution-Legislature/dp/B006LO6O90
Warren,
We can prove the wrong with facts and truth until the Cows Come Home.
They’ll just ignore it, because they’ve been raised in a culture that knows only instant gratification
of the slightest emotional whim.
“But I Want..” is the only “law” of their land, and they’ve been told their opinions are “special” since birth.
Low-information Obamanists are Veruca Salt on Steroids
Arguing with them is like playing chess against a monkey…
You get to checkmate, they eat your queen.
It will be settled one day, with blood.
Not because we want to, but because they forced us to.
I realize that, but some will stop and think.
In any case, I’ve now provided a little extra ‘ammo’ to those who wish to defend their own rights.
Go fuck yourself Hillel. Are you even an American? My apologies for the wording folks, but this one got my last nerve.
Once again we must call a spade a spade.
This entire campaign against guns is to disarm White people, and White people only. Does this administration actually think any Black or Hispanic gangs will turn in their guns? Only White law-abiding citizens will do so – and that is only if the US Military is ordered by Obama to enforce his new anti-gun laws.
Meanwhile, the only guns that would be turned in voluntarily would be junk guns, and probably some found by grandma in the attic that grandad had brought back from a foreign war. That brings up another point…
In my younger days I attended many gun shows and got to know a number of FFL dealers. Without exception, they told me that many gun dealers LOVE these buy-back programs because dealers get to dispose of all the junk guns that they had been forced to take in trade from customers. Dealers said they could never sell these junk guns, and in fact most of them were inoperative, or unsafe to shoot, so whenever a buy-back program was held, dealers sold all their junk guns to friends who then re-sold them to the authorities for a tidy profit. These same FFL dealers usually intercepted people showing up for these buy-back programs and offered to buy any guns they recognized as valuable antiques. One dealer told me that over the years he had bought rare German Lugars and Mauser rifles worth many thousands of dollars to collectors, from these people, while giving them only a few bucks more than the authorities were offering. Good deal indeed.
By the way, the authorities know all about this, and utterly ignore it because politicians get to look good when glowing media reports praise them for “removing all these deadly weapons from the streets”.
You’ve noticed their apparent disregard for the guns in the possession of felons in the murder capitals as well?
Of the 500+ murders in Chicago last year, 16% were taken to prosecution. Another 9% were closed as solved but not prosecutable due to lack of evidence or witnesses willing to testify. The remaining 75% were unsolved. The response from Chicago’s politicians is to focus on appealing the law suits they’ve lost over gun control.
Perhaps the way to deal with “gun violence” is not to disarm the law-abiding, but to deal with the criminals?
Rob,
Their failure to properly address Violent Crime is because of the Political Straight Jacket they forced us into 50 years ago, and its has created enormously bottled up angst within them when it comes to crime.
So much crime, and everyone walking on eggshells dutifully ignoring The Elephant In The Room. Their politics has created a self-contradictory paradox that cannot NOW be acknowledged, as the die has been cast.
Capital Punishment is therefore effectively non-existent for ALL murderers, as a fair and honest implementation of it would quite naturally fall “disproportionately” on Blacks….
“Real” Capital Murder Charges themselves rarely pursued at all for the very same reason…the result is a “catch and release” program of repeat firearms offenders, where everything plea-bargained down from “Attempted Murder” (which is what discharging an illegally owned firearm at a crowded street corner actually IS, isn’t it?) to mere “assault”, as if they punched someone in the nose….
So, to their collective relief, these “mass shootings” remove the “racial aspect” (even when the shooter is a black racist like Colin Ferguson or the DC Sniper) and at last allow escape of that pent-up frustration and guilt brought on by being so “necessarily” soft on (predominantly Black Perpetrator) crime.
It lets loose their bottled–up rage in a “safe” and “politically correct” trajectory against mere OBJECTS, as they can AT LAST can speak forcefully, passionately (instead of weakly and apologetically?) in massive orgasmic relief about the forbidden topic of “crime”.
Racism and Gun Control are in a way, opposite poles…..they are the necesarry counterweights that spin the gyroscope of their Leftist Guidance System…both must exist together in “equal amounts” for their “machine” to stabilize itself.
Remove either, and it instantly crashes.
“The M-16 he hides in the cellar is for the next American Revolution.”
Well then how about artillery, shoulder-fired missiles to bring down aircraft, tactical nuclear weapons?
Actually, (depending on the state) all those things can be legally owned, provided that they are registered with the BATFE.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Firearms_Act#Suppressor_parts.2C_Machine_Gun_Sears.2C_and_other_parts_associated_with_NFA_items
‘Course, if you ask me, the National Firearms Acts of 1934 and 1968, the laws that regulated those weapons, are unconstitutional…
Perhaps, but as a note: “Arms” refers to the weapons that an infantry soldier typically carries – literally, extensions to his arms. These would include spears, swords, knives, pistols, rifles, shotguns. In a militia, these would be provided by the citizen-soldier when mustered. Machine guns, grenades, artillery, etc are more properly “ordnance” and would be supplied by the regiment.
Given the Founder’s knowledge of human nature, I rather think that they would not expect heavy weaponry of the latter kind to necessarily be kept by the individual, but rather by the states in militia armories. I also think that the Founders expected us to fight a tyrannical Federal government not as individuals but as part of a state assembly. Remember, they thought of themselves as primarily citizens of the states, then as citizens of the national government.
I believe Bruce Cockburn was popular among your crowd.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7vCww3j2-w
Never heard of him.
That, and everything you believe.
If you bothered to listen to it.
Which, somehow, I doubt you did.
You did not come hear to Listen, or to Learn.
What you think does not amount to a HillelA of Beans as a result of this obvious fact.
“HillelA
Never heard of him”
You comments here make it painfully obsious to all,
That you’ve “never hear of” a great many things.
If a militia can use them (OK tac-nukes are not defensive, so they’re a moot point) then yes. Just what rock did you slither out from under anyway?
“OK tac-nukes are not defensive, so they’re a moot point.”
Sorry, Schmucko, this is about revolution, not defense. Don’t you read Klavan?
Artillery…too hard to move. Mortars and RPGs and grenade launchers are, on the other hand, the militiaman’s artillery. Any American male should be permitted to own any of these items without penalty. The militia is ALL the people.
See above. Again: balance. Balance between the rights of the individual and the safety of the society, also between the state and federal governments. If you go off of your rocker with a rifle, your neighbor has a chance of stopping you. If you do so with a crew-served machine gun, probably not. On the other hand, these weapons can and are in the State National Guard armories.
Yes, and that reasoning is just the ticket for whittling away our liberties, one piece at a time.
Talk to me about “balance” after you start supporting the rule of law.
I could have sworn, though, that I read somewhere that back in the day artillery pieces were far less regulated, and that any private citizen could own and operate them as late as 1968.
Hmmm. Artillery? Shoulder fired missiles? Tactical Nukes? Last week when I went to Wal-mart and my local sporting goods store, both did not sell those. Nor where they in a special order catalog. Guess I’ll have to go direct to the factories for those items. Ooops. They already have distribution restrictions. I know, surplus! Oops again. All end items like tanks and artillery have to be thoroughly demilitarized (made permanently inoperable) before being turned over to civilians (like for a display outside the local VFW post). Even if I did have a piece of artillery or even a nuke, I have no place to practically park it and their transporter/launchers. And with the insurance, no thanks. Lastly, I don’t have seeral million dollars to buy a Stinger or similar aircraft killing launcher on the INTERNATIONAL arms Black Market. So I guess I’m left with perhaps an old surplus semi-auto M-1, or a semi-auto M-14, or an M-16 civilian manufactured SEMI-AUTOMATIC ONLY knock off to have a little of the elan of having a Nazi and Communist killing weapon. Oh that’s what it’s about — the elan. Nothing practical don’t ya know. Nazis? Communists? They’re all gone never to come again. Aren’t they?
There are far fewer Nazi apologists and sympathizers in the world than there are apologists and sympathizers of the likes of Lenin or Stalin, although it is much easier to be an apologist or sympathizer for Marx and Engels.
The ideas that drove these Enemies of Freedom are still very much alive. Look to the fringes of the Environmentalist movement, with their desire to dictate all human behavior so as to bring all people to their ideas of what is right and good.
Just as an aside, I met a group of English Civil War re-enactors who had made all their own weapons, including field artillery. Nothing near to modern stuff but still up to 16th Century standards, when a lot of foot soldiers died from those hand-made cannons.
Tech never dies. There are anthropologists who have worked out how to make arrow head and spear points from flint and (probably) obsidian. I saw a video on YouTube about someone who figured out how to make a working Atatl.
Bad Ideas (the kind that inspire Mass Murderers and Monstrous Governments) and Weapons are Genies no one can put back in the bottle. Laws against owning weapons only work on the people inclined to obey the law.
I should know. I purchased, used for target practice, left in storage for two years, then sold back to the shop where I bought it a .38 Police Special.
It was really only the fact that I respect the law, and it would have been unnerving and inconvenient for me to to do anything other than obey the law that stopped me from trying to sell it on. Lord knows that there is a black market for guns in both the city where I bought the gun, and the city I moved to.
HillelA:
Take a look at Switzerland and how every citizen is required to be fully armed as a military reservist — even to having full battle kit in their closets at home. Every canton and village actually has heavy weapons and armaments tucked away in barns and sheds across the country, available for quick deployment should the need arise. The country is truly manned by a citizen’s army.
Israel has taken similar positions in making sure that the population is protected if-and-when full battles break out on their streets, as they are surrounded by people who are sworn to their complete annihilation. Pictures of teachers escorting their classes to public historical sites for a class history lesson, are seen shouldering fully automatic battle weapons. It’s expected and accepted because these are the times they live in.
Can’t happen here in America? You should take the time to “trust but verify”, just in case you’re wrong.
Or someday you may find yourself being stopped on the street and told “Your papers are not in order; get in the back of the truck…”
Yep, the Swiss have a WELL-REGULATED militia. As for the Israelis, those out of uniform have a hard time getting a gun permit.
“As for the Israelis, those out of uniform have a hard time getting a gun permit”
Serioulsy?
You aint never BEEN there, have you?
Joe-average citizen has them, and along with the weather reports on the car radio are occasional “news flashes” about suspected terror plots based on the latest intel…and the “official government encouragement” of citizens WITH CCW permits to carry their arms today.
Because they know COPS and SOLDIERS are the LEAST likely targets of terrorists and crazed murderer.
Soft targets… pizza shops, bus stations, SCHOOLS…these are what they go for, and “citizens with arms” are goin to be the first line of defense. No citizens with guns, no defense from crime WHERE and WHEN it happens, its that simple.
Here in America, armed citizens in those places stop more crime, confront more criminals, and SUCESSFULLY use their weapon (without the 65-shot police debacles we hear of all to often?) more often than all the police shootings combined.
Yeah, actual facts are a very tough thing to swallow for frightened leftist weenie/cowards who need a full-blown nanny state to provide their cradle to grave needs.
And theyre a damn difficult thing to ADMIT, when youre a duplicious Commie Elitest seeking the dominion of others.
The only question I have, is which one are YOU?
Yes, a WELL TRAINED militia. With full-on military training.
Oh, did you think that phrase meant, “government controlled” militia?
No, “well regulated” in the language of the Founders meant well trained, as a clockmaker would “regulate” a clock to ensure that it kept good time.
No, sorry, that phrase does NOT mean the federal government gets to regulate the militia.
“Or someday you may find yourself being stopped on the street and told “Your papers are not in order; get in the back of the truck…””
Yes, if the GOPers have their way, everyone who wants to vote and enjoy the full rights of citizenship will have to carry a photo id. When this proviso is met, they’ll no doubt raise the stakes (to continue to suppress the vote) by calling for internal passports like Soviet citizens used to carry.
You need a photo ID to buy a house, a car, a six pack of beer, even [gasp!] a gun. Why should voting be any different?
But seriously,
If brains were gunpowder, your wouldn’t have enough to blow your nose off.
It’s too bad your teachers let you graduate thinking differently.
Still, Life will do what the AFT refused to do for you.
HillelA
“Yes, if the GOPers have their way, everyone who wants to vote and enjoy the full rights of citizenship will have to carry a photo id. When this proviso is met, they’ll no doubt raise the stakes (to continue to suppress the vote) by calling for internal passports like Soviet citizens used to carry”
Damned right you are! 100%
Theirs no telling what those bastards would do, no matter how much power you cede to them, they always up the bar and want more…
Photo ID to vote, what next?
Loyalty Oaths, or “intelligence tests”
Some sinister “registration” of your voting choices based on race or ethnicity?
After “Internal Passports” what next?
Travel restrictions to “inner cities” ( predominantly enforced against African Ameicicans?) to supposedly “fight crime” and “stop drugs”
Then what…
Gulags, re-education camps?
God forbid, EXTERMINATIONS of the “undesireables”…
Based on race, ethnicity, or party affiliation?
When your political enemies consolodate enough power, and their cronies control all the Vital Institutions and Offices, who in heavens name do you have to protect you rights, your freedom, your very LIFE anymore?
Great post about those evil GOP’es my friend…
NO ONE should ever trust them with THAT MUCH POWER..
Its just too dangerous, isnt it?
The Founding Father wrote The Second Amendment for that exact reason.
When your political enemies come after THAT, you know you’d be COMPLETELY POWERLESS TO STOP THEM LATER.
Wouldnt you?
Neither you, nor most of the responses to you, have ever read what the Founders had to say about such matters, have you?
If their intent -written by them in their own words- is completely ignored by such freedom-lovin’ fools as yourself and others, how can any of you hope to keep and maintain The Constitution?
Here’s some more logical thinking: http://frontpagemag.com/2012/dgreenfield/america-doesnt-have-a-gun-problem-it-has-a-gang-problem/
No politician has the courage to attempt ownership of this problem, as of course they helped create it. Here’s the wrap-up:
Lanza and Newtown are comforting aberrations. They allow us to take refuge in the fantasy that homicides in America are the work of the occasional serial killer practicing his dark art in one of those perfect small towns that always show up in murder mysteries or Stephen King novels. They fool us into thinking that there is something American about our murder rate that can be traced to hunting season, patriotism and bad mothers.
But go to Chicago or Baltimore. Go where the killings really happen and the illusion comes apart. There is a war going on in America between gangs of young men who bear an uncanny resemblance to their counterparts in Sierra Leone or El Salvador. They live like them, they fight for control of the streets like them and they kill like them.
America’s horrific murder rate is a result of the transformation of major American cities into Sierra Leone, Somalia, Rwanda and El Salvador. Our murder rate now largely consists of criminals killing criminals. As David Kennedy, the head of the Center for Crime Prevention and Control, put it, “The majority of homicide victims have extensive criminal histories. This is simply the way that the world of criminal homicide works. It’s a fact.”
America is, on a county by county basis, not a violent country, just as it, on a county by county basis, did not vote for Obama. It is being dragged down by broken cities full of broken families whose mayors would like to trash the Bill of Rights for the entire country in the vain hope that national gun control will save their cities, even though gun control is likely to be as much help to Chicago or New Orleans as the War on Drugs.
Obama’s pretense that there needs to be a national conversation about rural American gun owners is a dishonest and cynical ploy that distracts attention from the real problem that he and politicians like him have sat on for generations.
We do not need to have a conversation about the NRA. We need to have a conversation about Chicago.
Damn Straight..
I travel to Europe sometimes on Business. Its amazing how people in Belgium and Norway think their “murder rates” are so low when they have only 3-3 million souls in their whole country.
I point my own County in PA, that has THE SAME POPULATION as Norway, and has an even lower homicide rate despite being full of “bitter clingers” with guns and concealed carry permits
I point out how we have dozens of “Norway’s” and “Sweden’s” and “Lichtenstein’s” we actually have within our boarders in America….peaceful, prosperous enclaves of sucessful, decent hardworking responsible GUN OWNERS that magically, never hurt anyone.
Two million people in your whole COUNTRY?
Sheey-it, I’ll bet we have two million heroin addicts in Philly alone.
Or two million “released” violent felons between there and Trenton.
Violent crime is a “blue enclave” phenomenon, period.
Where Liberals rule, crime is RAMPANT while government is bloated and ineffective and corrupt beyond repair
(Detroit, Chicago, Newark, Trenton etc etc etc)
They own it, they are the source and sustenance of it all.
But Lanza and Newtown are aberrations.
They are one-offs. They do not represent a problem that has an easily identified cause, and thus they are nearly impossible to prevent by any method other than getting rid of these suicidal gun-free zones, and even that is not going to be 100% effective.
They are more spectacular than random killings by the psychos we now call serial killers, and so they seem to be in a different category, but really, they are the same in terms of predictability.
The REAL murder problem is, in contrast, another beast entirely. It is easily understood, and it is almost completely solvable. Not easily, because the cure will take more courage and principled action than Americans can currently muster.
But still, it IS in a completely different category than the mass murders, whether committed serially or all at once.
When we talk about “guns”, we are speaking to our right to protect ourselves and our families from criminals, be it felons or an out of control tyrannical government. We are speaking of legal and legitimate uses of our firearms, protection and hunting, guaranteed by our constitution.
When politicians talk about “guns”, they talk about controlling you in every aspect of your life, regardless of the flowery language they put it their legislation. Their ultimate goal is control and you having no protection from what they or their constituents want to do to you. “Constitution? We don’t need no stinking constitution.”
Great analysis, Mr Klavan.
Sadly, we have a funny (odd) little man as POTUS. If past performance is any measure of what he’ll do going forward, then it is not going to be pretty. Our POTUS, he seems to loathe Americans who are conservative.
My bet it that he is simply relishing this opportunity to stomp on Americans who oppose him and he is going to impose his will in his usual way – shoving it down The People’s throats. Ugh.
PS. Am I the only one that thinks POTUS always sounds like a scolding schoolmarm when he speaks in public? Come on, I can’t be the only one. Soaring rhetoric my foot.
More like a passive-aggressive angsty teen telling what friends he has that “Oh, one day, one day I’m going to make them all pay!”
It’s worse than we think. I heard Ben agree with Piers that an AR 15 was used at Sandy Hook. Wait, I remember the cops reported 4 handguns in the school and the rifle left in the car. Remember the 3 days of conflicting stoies during the 24/7 coverage? So I typed “Sandy Hook Facts” on You Tube to look for a final summaey of what actually happened, avoiding 911 troofer sites. My favorite “victim” is Emilie Parker, who had a funeral, but showed up to sit on Lord Obama’s lap at his photo op. A Sandy Hook Memorial fund was set up on Dec. 13. Tip of a very weird iceberg. Check it out…
Here is the way we should think about gun ownership and the 2nd Amendment. The 2nd amendment doesn’t “give” us the right to own arms. Rather, the right to own arms is a “natural right”, a right that pre-exists any and all governments, including the government of the United States. (Jefferson’s terminoligy for “natural rights” was “unalienable rights” from “The Creator”.) What the 2nd Amendment does is recognize a right that already exists. It doesn’t “give” us that right.
Summary: the right to own arms pre-exists the 2nd Amendment, rather than the reverse.
—Tom Nally, New Orleans
Correct Mr. Nally. The 2d Amendment merely codifies the already God-given right.
Yes, its that god forsaken “charter of negative liberties”….
That awful, out dated abomination (written by meaningless dead white men) that only spells out what the governement CANT DO TO YOU.
In stead of the fresh, hip and enlightened merto-sexual Liberal Rule by Decree Method it was SUPPOSED to be,
but somehow got corrupted until Obama (finally!) came along to fix.
The tyrants’ argument is that their tyranny is good for us, kind of like when doctors used to endorse cigarettes.
Yes, their ideas are all “reasonable” and “common sense”.
I see nothing reasonable about cooperating with tyrants.
The Intolerable Acts angered the American colonists to the point that they finally decided that they’d had enough. Now we are getting our OWN Intolerable Acts. I am beginning to think that this administration WANTS an American Summer.
In that vein, might I remind those of you who are vets or active duty military of your oath of enlistment:
“I, _____, 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.” (Title 10, US Code; Act of 5 May 1960 replacing the wording first adopted in 1789, with amendment effective 5 October 1962).
and for officers:
“I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ 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; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.” (DA Form 71, 1 August 1959, for officers.)
Notice that it DOES NOT say that you will support and defend the President, but the CONSTITUTION. In the days to come, gentlemen…REMEMBER THAT.
Mc Terminal #17- Right on!From day one of president Obama’s tenure I thought that his model for governance was the Chicago intercity solution. One must control the unwashed and unenlightened mass and what works best is the Chicago model. Read Dostoevsky’s novel, the Brothers Karamazov, especially the discussion of the Grand Inquisitor. The problem is freedom. the church has a solution, give up your freedom and we will give you security. The state is Dostoevsky’s church. Give your freedom to us, we will take care of you. Obama does not believe in Locke’s social contract. Afterall those in the Chicago intercity prefer security to freedom, don’t they?
Thomas Jefferson has a most relevant and fitting quote!
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” Thomas Jefferson
Andrew, the hunter does not have an M-16 hiding in his cellar. (Assuming the hunter, a; does not have a federal Firearms Permit, and b; is law abiding) the M-16 is a fully automatic machine gun. Which is illegal for a private citizen to own, without said Federal Firearms Premit. What the hunter can have, in his cellar, (though there is no need to hide it… yet.) is the semi-automatic version of the M-16… the AR-15.
Let’s get something clear. A death sentence is not a penalty. It’s a disposition.
Tyranny can writ small or large, and IMO the human right of individual self-defense is the core of 2A. It is individuals who make up the militia, when a threat requires individuals to act in concert for the defense of all.
“Keep”, “bear” and “arms” are terms of art in law predating 2A by a couple of centuries and before firearms were widely used. In each case, the laws dealt with self-defense at an individual basis, against all predation, small or large.
2A is a problem for modern “progressives” because it speaks to individual rights, choices and liberty rather than the collective (under their guidance, of course) morality they find useful. As mentioned above, it is indeed a regression in thought to monarchy and unchecked central power for an elite, whatever justification they have. Not only that, but an armed citizen saying “no” has some teeth which most progressives are quite worried about. Cowardice seems to abound in modern “progressives”. Those most enthused of disarming others usually have plenty of armed security looking after them.
Sandy Hook is being used as an excuse for AWB’s and other proposals which have little or no bearing on actually having an impact on crime. Given the experiences in the UK, Australia and other places with citizen disarmament, violent crime of every stripe usually rises the more effectively citizens are
disarmed. It is a grave insult to those who died at Sandy Hook that their blood should be danced in this way.
Cuomo’s rallying cry that one doesn’t need a 10 round magazine to shoot deer would be hilarious if it didn’t represent the level of thought and knowledge behind the laws just passed in the NY legislature. Cuomo doesn’t know a basic law in his own state. This is rank deception, incompetence and buffoonery. It may fit his aspiration to find promotion within the monarchy of the political class, but it is a disastrous path to make policy.
Bad ideas travel quickly among the political class, and more laws such as NY’s, even if overturned in court, will create de facto criminals and tend to destroy any remaining faith in government and the rule of law. The “fabric” of our civil society will thin.
Higher marginal tax rates, another feature of modern progressivism, will also incentivize black markets and shady deals, as well as rent-seeking and favors from politicians. The fabric will thin from this, too.
Progressives may think they can control the process of regression and be in charge for the everlasting future. They will not, and having not guarded others’ rights as closely as their own, will find they have none when the winds change. Arrogance is always punished. Time wounds all heals.
Pardon my misspellings:
+At the top, “can” should be “is”
+At the bottom, “heals” should be “heels”.
Thank you,
Harry
“But Aeschylus notwithstanding, the delivery of justice after an attack is not the only foundational contract a state makes with its people. In allowing the government to maintain a standing army and police force, we are also agreeing to TRANSFER TO THE STATE the duty and immense power of DEFENDING US FROM BEING ATTACKED IN THE FIRST PLACE. This is not only a matter of practicality, it’s the ONLY method anyone’s come up with to prevent the Hobbesian war of all against all.”
Excuse me, but where in our founding documents was the duty and power of defending us from being attacked in the first place TRANSFERRED to the state??? We _allowed_ the creation of a standing army to _supplement_ the citizen militia. Nor did we create our first professional police force until a century after the Constitution was ratified.
In establishing police forces we gave state and local governments the power to help us defend themselves, but I challenge you to find a contemporaneous legal document or Constitutional amendment that correspondingly REMOVED from the people the duty and power of defending ourselves from attack.
Given that professional police forces did not even exist until a half way through our history as a nation, it is ludicrous to claim that giving up the duty and authority to defend ourselves is the only way to prevent “the Hobbesian war of all against all.” I fear that the author has been misled by late 19th-century German political philosophy (and we’ve all seen what late 19th century German philosophy lead to).
I prefer to rely on Enlightenment philosopher John Locke, who more accurately spelled out exactly what we have and have not relinquished to the state. He notes that, yes, if someone has stolen from me a fortune in gold, I must rely on the designated authorities for justice. However, he adds that “when a man points his sword at me and demands my purse, that man I may freely kill — though my purse contains but a half-penny.”
There have been no Constitutional amendments relinquishing that latter right, nor will I ever agree to one.
Thanks to Klaven for drawing on his classical education to advise us of the these timeless truths.
Klaven mentions 30-06 for hunting. Soon the lesbians and rednecks from ATF will take those under the admonition that “nobody needs a sniper rifle”.
The most efficient mass murderer in history has been the State – of the totalitarian variety – not any individual.
Individuals kill dozens. The Totalitarian State kills millions.
And the common denominator that identifies these ‘mass murderers’ intent is the disarming of their populations.
Historical basis of 2nd Amendment is warped. Smoothbore muskets and fowlers were all over the Colonies. Rifles, hideously expensive, were only in the frontier areas, not in settled areas, not known north of Philadelphia or in New England, not in Britain or France. Immigrant Central European gunsmiths went to the frontier and a century of glastly market forces transformed the Central Euorpean rifle, an ergonomic horror, into the American flintlock death ray, which could be loaded about as fast as a smoothbore. Unlimited firemarms ownership was necessary for law enforcement, prevention of gang activity and local tyranny. It was also needed to produce rifles and the Mid-Atlantic rustics who could hit things. Rifle-Proficient President Washington said we do not need foreign entanglements. Any aggressor stupid enough to invade will have those invisible rifle folks erupt from wherever they are and reach out and erase them. Note that to this day, rifle Proficiency going into the service and into live-fire still have a death ray effect. We need more Proficiency.
A Kentucky (actually Pennsylvania) long rifle was not as easy to load as a smooth bore musket. It had about 1/3 the rate of fire and was therefore not a suitable mass infantry weapon. The Minie rifle of 1852 developed in France could be load as quickly as a smoothbore and had an effective range of nearly 1000 yards. The US standard infantry rifle in the early days of the Republic was either a copy of the Brown Bess or the French equivalent.
The Militia in the early days of the Republic was largely ineffective because it lacked the training and discpline under fire that regulars had. It was last used in Black Hawk War. The next three wars major wars were fought with regulars and US Volunteers with two years of a draft during the civil war. Since WWI the militia has been reduced to a draft call. The 1903 Militia Act divided the milita into organized (National Guard) or State Militias and rest of us into the unorganized militia. After the First World War the National Guard really became a standing force of US Volunteers. In fact every combat battlion in the States that existed in 1860 trace their lineage back to a Civil War Volunteer regiment
Today every male must register for the unorganized militia at the age of 18 under penalty of law.
By the way, Well Regulated meant well drilled in the manual of arms brought over by Baron von Steuban, i.e,. a militiaman was well drilled if he mastered the Prussian manual of arms. It does not mean controlled by state action.
“well-regulated” means well-maintained, kept in a constant state. It does not mean subject to rules and terms imposed by the federal government. The intent of it is clear in this letter from Jefferson to Madison in Dec 1787 regarding his objections to the Constitution.”
“I will now add what I do not like. First the omission of a bill of rights providing clearly & without the aid of sophisms for freedom of religion, freedom of the press, protection against standing armies, restriction against monopolies, the eternal & unremitting force of the habeas corpus laws, and trials by jury in all matters of fact triable by the laws of the land & not by the law of nations.”
Protection against standing armies.
Respectable hogwash. Respectable because this hogwash may be found in respectable scholarly works, hogwash because it is.
Few modern rifles are effective at that range. Fewer still are the men who can use them effectively at that range.
WWII vets love to harangue about “1000 yard battle rifles”, fondly remembering “many” kills at such ranges with the M-1, but it’s nonsense. Not 1 man in 100 can hit a man at that range with the best SCOPED sniper rifles we have today. Their boasted 1000 yard hits were probably less than half that range, if they happened at all.
1000 yard effective range? With iron sights? And black powder? Through hand-made barrels of dubious metallurgy?
Feh. Tall tales suitable for scholars who’ve never fired a gun, or watched anyone else do so.
Should any one need an illegal gun, best source are the coyotes who work for the Mexican drug cartels that Obama, Holder, and the ATF work hand and hand with.
ps
Brian Terry is still dead and the F.B.I, D.E.A., A.T.F. and Dept. of Justice know the when, how, who, of the dirty deed.
All of them work for Pres. Obama.
Seek the source.
The problem with the death penalty isn’t that times have changed. The problem with the death penalty is that it is administered and imposed by state actors – politicians and their flunkies – which means politics not justice will be the primary factor in its application. We ought to emulate the Roman Republic and forbid the execution of citizens by the government. Self-defense? Not state action.
When I first read about the tragedy in Connecticut, I immediately checked to see if their laws included the death penalty. They don’t. Approximately six months prior it had been abolished in that state. I can only imagine what type of angst and soul searching would have gone on in that state if the mass-murderer of children had managed to be captured alive.
Sorry, but the death penalty has nothing to do with school shootings. The people who do things like that do not care whether they live or die. Their thought process doesn’t include “…and since I live in Connecticut they’ll only be able to give me 25 to life. Yay!”
Execute a school shooter and you get rid of that school shooter. You won’t get rid of the next one.
Bugs, I’ll concede you may indeed be right….
But since its NEVER BEEN TRIED IN MY LIFETIME, I say give it whirl.
See what happens…
Even if I turn out to be wrong on its “deterent effect”, it saves a whole lot of Taxpayers money, and restores faith in the Justice System that today, openly coddles then cynically paroles murderers to KILL AGAIN…
To the eternal anguish of the (original) victims family, while creating whole sets of NEW ones too.
This was posted on TheFiringLine.com, maybe 7 or 8 years ago:
That settles it for me.
(I regret I do not recall the poster’s handle, so I am unable to provide attribution.)
Our Federal Government pays 17 million employees to run our government. The world’s largest retailer, Walmart, employs 1.1 million employees. Simple, abolish the 16th amendment. No more income, thus no more employees other than those necessary. The States could fund the Federal Government.
the 16th did not give authority for the income tax. Congress has had the authority to impose taxes since the Constitution was ratified.
All the 16th did was to authorize a disproportionate tax. In other words, it legalized injustice.
When the Left politicizes the deaths of children to push gun control, doesn’t that seem like the perfect time to bring up the topic of abortion? Do we really “need” 1.2 million babies aborted every year? How about responding to Piers Morgan’s hand-wringing with a vivid description of partial birth abortion and Zero’s voting record on same.
If Lefties were constantly confronted with the reality of 1.2 million dead babies every time they opened their lying holes about gun control, maybe they would shut up for once.
When you get your friends, family and neighbors to grab their guns and head to your state capitol and to D.C., I might believe that you’re serious about the issue. (Yes, I think that abortion is murder.)
The same goes for conservatives who claim that they are appalled at what D.C. and their own state capitols are doing.
Nothing else has worked – not voting, not primaries, not petitions, emails, phone calls, town hall meetings, letters, protests, marches, nothing you’ve tried has stopped the slaughter, or the steady -and rapid- erosion of your rights.
You’ve only got two options remaining to you:
1.) Submit…and shut up.
2.) Fight.
That’s the bottom line.
Shouting about it on the internet isn’t changing much, either, now, is it?
Look Warren, I can see you’re really upset about this. I honestly think you ought to sit down calmly, take a stress pill, and think things over.
Once you’ve had a visit from the black boots (over the grammatically proper use ofuse of a metaphor) get back to me on that, would ya?
“Societies exist under three forms sufficiently distinguishable. 1. Without government, as among our Indians. 2. Under governments wherein the will of every one has a just influence, as is the case in England in a slight degree, and in our states in a great one. 3. Under governments of force: as is the case in all other monarchies and in most of the other republics. To have an idea of the curse of existence under these last, they must be seen. It is a government of wolves over sheep. It is a problem, not clear in my mind, that the 1st. condition is not the best. But I believe it to be inconsistent with any great degree of population. The second state has a great deal of good in it. The mass of mankind under that enjoys a precious degree of liberty and happiness. It has it’s evils too: the principal of which is the turbulence to which it is subject. But weigh this against the oppressions of monarchy, and it becomes nothing. Malo periculosam, libertatem quam quietam servitutem. Even this evil is productive of good. It prevents the degeneracy of government, and nourishes a general attention to the public affairs. I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical.”
Jefferson to James Madison, January 30, 1787
if you read the Founders, you’ll find that I am a mild-mannered and subsurvient citizen, in comparison. Of course, you’ve never read their works…or you would know that.
Again, T. Jefferson.
address to governor dunmore from the house of burgesses1
Monday, June 12, 15 Geo. III., 1775.
“These, my Lord, are our sentiments on this important subject, which we offer only as an individual part of the whole Empire. Final determination we leave to the General Congress, now sitting, before whom we shall lay the papers your Lordship has communicated to us. To their wisdom we commit the improvement of this important advance; if it can be wrought into any good, we were assured they will do it. To them, also, we refer the discovery of that proper method of representing our well-founded grievances, which your Lordship assures us will meet with the attention and regard so justly due to them. For ourselves, we have exhausted every mode of application which our invention could suggest as proper and promising. We have decently remonstrated with Parliament: they have added new injuries to the old. We have wearied our King with applications: he has not deigned to answer us. We have appealed to the native honour and justice of the British Nation. Their efforts in our favour have been hitherto ineffectual. What, then, remains to be done?”
(This was the diplomatic equivalent of a slap in the face. Note the date. Compare with dates of Concord, Lexington, etc. in 1775. What remains to be done, indeed.)
I can cut and paste their words all day long, Gary. They were radicals. …and my words are not the half of what any of the Founders ever said. (I know where to look to find those words, because I’ve read them.)
Is it time to start shooting, yet? Not yet. The gov will fire the first shots.
But you need to harden your heart to face is coming. Gird your loins, and whatever else you SoCons need to do in order to prepare.
War is coming, and from pure spite and incompetence, the gov is doing everything in its power to ensure that it does.
If you think my words are extreme or shocking… These were words to the British Crown.
draft of report on lord north’s motion
j. mss.
[July 25, 1775.]
“This proposition seems to have been held up to the world to deceive them it into a belief that the colonies are unreasonable there was no matter &c.1but and more particularly to lull into fatal security our well affected fellow subjects on that other side the water into a fatal security till time should be given for the operation of those arms which a British minister pronounced would instantaneously reduce the “cowardly” sons of America to unreserved submission. But when the world reflects how inadequate to justice are the vaunted terms offered, when it attends to the rapid & bold succession of injuries which for the space during a course of 11. years have been aimed at these colonies by a wicked administration, when it reviews the pacific & respectful applications complaints expostulations which during that whole time have been made the sole arms we oppose to their usurpations, them, when it considers observes that our complaints were either not heard at all, or were answered with new & accumulated injuries, when it considers recollects that the minister himself declared from the beginning on an former early occasion he would never cease [blank space in copy]2 till America was at his feet, & that an avowed partisan of ministry has more lately denounced against America the dreadful sentence “Delenda est Carthago,” that this was done in the presence of a British senate & being unreproved by them we must considered be taken to be as approved their own sentiment; when it considers the great armaments by sea & land with which they have invaded us by sea & land, & the circumstances of cruelty with which these have commenced & prosecuted hostilities; when these things we say are laid together & attentively considered, can the world be deceived by the artifices of a ministry into an opinion that we are unreasonable, or can it hesitate to believe with us that nothing but our own exertions can may defeat the ministerial sentence of death or submission.”
Warren Bonesteel said:
When you get your friends, family and neighbors to grab their guns and head to your state capitol and to D.C., I might believe that you’re serious about the issue.
Are you “serious”, Warren? Which state capitol did you and your cohorts storm?
Warren Bonesteel said:
You’ve only got two options remaining to you:
1.) Submit…and shut up.
2.) Fight.
By fight, do you mean get “serious”? Like you, the capitol storming hero? Are these really the only two options, or is your logic wanting?
Warren Bonesteel said:
Once you’ve had a visit from the black boots (over the grammatically proper use ofuse of a metaphor) get back to me on that, would ya?
I will Warren, I promise. And I’ll know where to find you: Leading the charge at the state capitol!
Warren Bonesteel said:
if you read the Founders, you’ll find that I am a mild-mannered and subsurvient citizen, in comparison. Of course, you’ve never read their works…or you would know that.
Interesting. And you base this on…what?
Warren Bonesteel said:
I can cut and paste their words all day long, Gary. They were radicals. …and my words are not the half of what any of the Founders ever said. (I know where to look to find those words, because I’ve read them.)
Indeed. You are the cut-and-paste master (among other things…).
Warren Bonesteel said:
Gird your loins, and whatever else you SoCons need to do in order to prepare.
Guffaw! Ok Warren, you’ve had your fun. Put the bottle back in the cabinet. Off to bed with you.
Well, Gary, I’ve offered references and resources to support my position.
You’ve offered obfuscation, fallaciesm defamation, libels and derision, in return.
Lemme make it easy for ya.
http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-contents.html
http://oll.libertyfund.org/
http://www.constitution.org/liberlib.htm
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?subcategory=73
http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/locke/
…all you have to do is read…
Some people preach to the choir. Warren Bonesteel attacks the choir in such a way that they shun him. Genius.
Go away, Warren.
What happened at Sandy Hook? Check out the more recent reorts on You Tube The media narrative is a fantasy. We don’t even know for certain that Adam Lanza was even there. We have yet to see a drop of blood or a spent shell. All we have is a cause celebe for gun confiscation.
i’m a hunter so i got involved fighting gun siezures at a very young age. i watched obama go on t.v. one sunday morn w/ the brady bunch and say he had something new working ‘under the radar’ on gun control. he was being interviewed because he had just lost his most recent gun grab in the u.s.s.c. i wondered what he meant by that. soon enough it became evident.
after much on-line speculation bloggers/commenters finally figured out that obama and holder had sold thousands of what obama now calls assault weapons to murderous mexican drug cartels. people were saying they did it to bump up the number of dead in mexico killed w/ American weapons. that part worked just fine.
we knew that obama and hitlery had been telling lies about the percentage of dead killed by u.s. weapons being +90%, when it was actually around 10-15%. we also knew that the u.n. small arms treaty that hitlery was pushing so hard was on the back burner at that time. it looked a whole lot like they were trying to create a massacre to generate outrage and get the s.a. treaty passed in the senate (full of dem’s). the whole thing backfired on them when border agent Brian Terry and other Americans started getting killed by these weapons.
the idiots in the old media wouldn’t even discuss it. eventually, after months of constantly bringing it up (people here might remember) everywhere we went, fox news picked up on what had happened. issa got on the trail and obama finally cried uncle when issa got too close, and squealed executive privilege. obama’s chance at a gun grab was a dismal failure w/ thousands of their untagged guns killing hundreds, maybe thousands by now. once the news broke, no new numbers of dead were reported. wonder why?
fast forward: time to regroup. now we have a new gun massacre, and obama is right in the middle of it, again, as should be expected. and again he is using whatever sinister tactics seem to work best. if there are questions about who did what and why, join the club. just don’t get too close to obama. he may just shut it all down and scream executive privilege, again. if nothing happened in F & F, as he now claims, then why take the coward’s way out with executive privilege?
wonder how many dead children there are now in mexico? maybe somebody should ask that question, since he now appears ready to use children as a shield against criticism.
As always, in the end the good people suffer at the hands of the unwitting. Too many people just don’t know what to do with liberty, I fear. And I pray every day that human minds could be stronger than they appear to be. Increasingly, I believe that only a peculiar alignment of the planets or a direct act of God, coincides with the opportunity, as it did in the case of our founders, for humanity to try a new path toward prosperity. Just as increasingly, I believe that such an alignment might just never happen again and that most of us could have just lived the best day of the rest of our lives. That would be worth any fight to avoid.
I’m just about ready to agree with you, Jim.
These folks often think my words are extreme. I don’t hold a candle to the Founders’ own words. Then there’s John Locke. You want to talk about a radical. The only surprise with him is that the crown didn’t hang him or assassinate him for what he said.
Then, there’s Hobbes…a radical genius, in his own way.
(Heh. There are a couple of authors here at PJM who don’t like it when I quote the Founders. Another well=known consevative site has banned me for saying less than anyhting the Founders ever said.)
I wonder how many people spouting off on this article voted for Barrack?
My impression is probably 85% are blowing smoke and would cower when the time ever came to stick up for their 2nd amendment rights.
Most people here are pathetic, and reading most spouting’s made me sick to my stomach.
You deserve what you get!!
sinz54 / January 15, 2013 – 3:12 pm
The moment you start insisting that you need guns to defend yourself against the Federal Government, you have left the Constitution way behind.
Thank you, professor (actually adjunct lecturer) Obama.
I suggest you go back study the Constitution you said you were an expert on.
The Constitution…
6 pages
Plain Language.
You dont need a 4 year college degree “studying” it to become a
“constitutional scholar”….
Unless youre looking for ways AROUND IT.
LET’S SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT: 5 COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT GUNS & MASS SHOOTINGS
Following the terrifying events in Newtown, Conn., that left 26 people dead — including 20 children — the nation has turned its attention to the topic of guns and gun … [Read More...]
LET’S SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT: 5 COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS ABOUT GUNS & MASS SHOOTINGS
Following the terrifying events in Newtown, Conn., that left 26 people dead — including 20 children — the nation has turned its attention to the topic of guns and gun … READ MORE: http://bwcentral.org/2013/01/lets-set-the-record-straight-5-common-misconceptions-about-guns-mass-shootings/
“[T]he argument of the progressives is that times and people have changed. Our democratic institutions and traditions are now engraved upon our hearts, they say, and no longer require the elaborate constitutional safeguards the founders provided for us. Civilized by the years, our leaders no longer pose the threat of tyranny”
Albany proved that wrong. Ramming through legislation in the dark of the night that nobody has had time to even read, much less understand the implications of, much less getting input from the people legislators allegedly represent.
And the reason for the emergency? The people are complying with the law! They’re legally buying guns! They don’t like the new restrictions! So the reason to shut out the voters and bypass safeguards is that the voters don’t like what the government is doing? Tyranny is here, now.
“As with the death penalty, the argument of the progressives is that times and people have changed. Our democratic institutions and traditions are now engraved upon our hearts, they say, and no longer require the elaborate constitutional safeguards the founders provided for us. Civilized by the years, our leaders no longer pose the threat of tyranny, and guns only serve to give the anarchic power of death to individual lunatics and rednecks when it should be reserved to the state.”
If we really have changed; there would be no individual lunatics and rednecks that we need to keep guns from. If we really have changed then there is no danger in allowing anyone to keep any arms they they choose.
No we progressives really want to get rid of these rights so that the eggs that get broken when we’re ready to make our omelet are the eggs we want broken. For we cannot really perfect man without changing the system first. And right now we have enough useful idiots to let us do it.
They won’t admit it of course, but IMO the ruling class’s argument is that they have changed. They are so intelligent and enlightened and science-based that they can be entrusted with a degree of power which history warns against. In fact, it’s their moral obligation to reach for such power.
You see, they need the power to govern benighted yahoos who remain genocidal brutes—cf. Howard Zinn’s “history” text—at heart.
Just a clarification for Mr. Klavan,
Caesar may have violated Roman law by marching on Rome with an army, but it was only arguably to end the Republic and was not the first time it had been done in any case. The precedent for illegally marching on Rome to seize power had already been set by Sulla a few decades earlier.
Klavan didn’t say Caesar set the precedent, nor did he care. All you’ve asserted is the usual argumentum tu quoque: “Caesar wasn’t bad because others did it, too!”
Well, friend, comparing two or more wrong will never turn any of them into a right.
Crime is crime.
Ann Althouse had a great insight into the Gun debate (? actually it is a monologue by the MSM):
“It occurred to me, after the Sandy Hook murders, that blaming guns is a secular substitute for blaming the devil. People find it too challenging to figure out why a human being would do this terrible thing and they latch on to the idea that the gun made it happen. Suicide presents a similar challenge, and one way to fathom it is to say: It was the gun. Isn’t it like saying the devil made him do it? The gun/the devil is a great go-to answer, freeing you from wracking your brain about the workings of the human mind.”
h/t Instapundit
http://www.althouse.blogspot.com/2013/01/why-are-gun-death-statistics-inflated.html
Maybe it goes against Humanist’s grain to blame…humans.
Great article. Reminded me of a quote form a fantastic book. In a Canticle for Leibowitz a scientist/academic was berating the head of the post apocalyptic Abbey for holding onto man’s prewar knowledge, which they had preserved for centuries, telling the prior that the knowledge could make the world a better place. The abbey’ prior responded: “It (the world) never was any better, it never will be any better. It will only be richer or poorer, sadder but not wiser, until the very last day”
It goes to the truth that man is an imperfect creature who will always fall prey to his fundamental nature and systems need to be designed with this in mind.
The Commonplace Book of Thomas Jefferson: A Repertory of His Ideas on Government, ed. Gilbert Chinard (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1926),
http://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/laws-forbid-carrying-armsquotation
http://oregonstate.edu/instruct/phl302/texts/hobbes/leviathan-contents.html
http://www.constitution.org/jl/2ndtr02.txt
The Second Treatise of Civil Government
1690
John Locke
CHAP. II.
Of the State of Nature.
(When the Founders refer to ‘Nature’ and to ‘Nature’s God,’ they’re referring to the above linked works by Hobbes and Locke)
The wisdom of the founding fathers is that they also knew the truth of which Mike H speaks. The modern liberal mind, however, is distressed by the knowledge that human nature this side of Eden includes free will and therefore the ability to do evil as well as good. That mind clings desperately to the belief that human nature is malleable and society is perfectible if only the right policies are in place [gun control] and society’s rulers are the “right people”, i.e., Democrats.
I’ve studied studies, looked at formulas, and considered hypotheticals advanced by as many as I could find. Result? Inconclusive.
What convinced me was seeking out those articles and first person stories from defenders or combat personnel who shot a combatant or aggressor, and watched the results. Many reports have filtered back of Israelis shooting Islamists fanatics with 9mm and seeing to their horror that he just keeps coming, oblivious to pain and mortal wounds. Likewise with US troops in Afghanistan.
Confining a defense weapon discussion to handgun efficacy necessarily stipulates that we are referencing a shooting distance from just up close to less than 10 meters. That’s what handguns are for, folks. Otherwise, use a long gun or shotgun. Moreover, in a situation like this, you will probably live or die based on the first shot, which if it doesn’t put the perp in death spiral, should stop, disorient, or move some part of his body off the vector leading to you.
I use the 45, and decided to do that years ago when I read of a policeman responding to a 911 call at a women’s house, where her pit bull had ripped her flesh and she took refuge on the kitchen table with a frying pan. The officer entered through the kitchen door and was immediately greeted with the pit bull’s jaws tighly clenched and gnawing at his ankle (which subsequently was so severely damaged that bone transplants and tendon reattachment were necessary.
The officer pulled his service 9mm and shot the pit bull once. The dog paused, and slowed down his head thrashing on the cop’s ankle, but his vise like grip did not lessen. The cop shot the dog a second time, the dog slacked his jaw’s grip and started to fade, but did not go down. Only a THIRD shot did the mutt finally expire.
A few years ago I watched while a state trooper in Florida-recorded on his car’s cam-shot a stocky man who was intoxicated and advancing toward the officer, in the stomach one time. The man bent over slightly, grunted, and sprung the last 2 feet on the officer, managing to wrap his hands around the trooper’s neck. The officer fired several more times, finally ending the struggle.
The cop who shot the dog, had to go to counseling. He was traumatized by the realization that all the assurances given to him on the lethality of his 9mm was obviously exaggerated. He felt betrayed. He realized that his superiors had put him in harms way without the maximum practical means to preserve his life. I believe his took an early retirement.
Force = speed squared X mass. Would you rather get hit by a really fast fishing rod or a much slower baseball bat?
Mr Klavan,
Small point but important (this is consistently wrong in the media).
No one has an automatic weapon in their basement (you may know this but the media implies, or states, that all the government wants to confiscate are automatic weapons).
The only thing that any American possesses is a semi-automatic weapon (except for a very few, very regulated specialist collectors-a handful of people). Pull the trigger, one bullet comes out. Pull it again, another bullet comes out. No need to work the bolt to load the next bullet with a semi-auto weapon is not a machine gun. Even a revolver requires only one trigger pull for each firing. Many shotguns are semi-automatic. Most pistols are semi-automatic. Semi-automatic guns are not “military” style guns, they are the type of mechanism that most guns have.
AR-15 type weapons are not M-16′s either. The M-16 and the AR-15 are both based on the same design but I don’t think anyone sales M-16′s to the public.
Otherwise, good article.
Great post Mr. Klavan,
I might add a few things:
Firstly, the US has only recently maintained a standing army. Generally, the US has had to raise armies in order to engage in conflict. The founding fathers, paritcularly the anti-federalists, did not trust the idea of standing armies. The fear was that a standing army was too easily turned against the very people it was meant to protect. While a controversial subject, a good example is the American Civil War. The secession of a few southern states should have been handled carerfully to bring them back into the fold, instead President Lincoln raised an army, in the process prompting the secession of several more states. (The issue of Ft Sumter being solely an issue of secession legality – regardless of whether you agree or disagree that it was legal, the fact that it was a question of state vs. federal government cannot be denied.).
The left has little concept of what federal tyranny is. A British professor once told me that shooting someone for breaking into my home would be murder – if only because the criminal’s motives could not be known. She said that the criminal may have only wanted my TV, I countered that he may have been a murderer. They see humans as inherently pure beings, conservatives do not. Simple as that. But, liberal havens are generally urban havens, meaning that the concept of self-determination is alien. The aforementioned professor, for example, did not believe me when I told her that where I am from the police take at least 20 minutes to reach my home. When seconds count, the police are minutes away. If we were to use the ACW example above, Lincoln’s freeing of the slaves would be used as an example of the inherent good of the federal government. The fact that we are the only nation to wage such a war over such an issue would not be considered, nor the lost potential of alternatives such as compensated emancipation. For leftists, they have complete faith in a nanny government’s imposition of morality. The United States is a large nation, it would be particularly stupid to think that micromanagement of its citizens is a good idea.
Lastly, I might point out that, not that long ago, the primary role of the death penalty was two-fold. First, to remove this person from society so that he is no longer a threat (and cannot continue to enjoy the priveledge of life while on the tit of the taxpayer). Second, to make an example of said criminal so that potential like-minded criminals will think about the consequences of their actions. Of course, this doesn’t apply to murder-spree suicides, but it says a great deal about the urban crime referenced in two excellent posts above.
What Andrew Klavin doesnt’ really point out in his article is that the “Rubicon” has been crossed long ago.
>
Citizens are restricted all arms that could possibly match the extreme fire power weaponary that our military has today.
If a hot spot of Constitutional Patriots “flare up” say in northern Idaho, Montana, or even Texas, the FEDS would simply send in local SWAT police backed up by a nearby airwing to suppress the situation. Another “Branch-Devidian” group of “extremists” suppressed by the Dear Leader.
>
Fighting government tyranny with semi-auto weapons is like taking a knife to a gun fight. A small hand full of federal tactical military trained and equiped government storm troopers (SS) can take out hundreds of us Liberty Patriots who still think we have some rights to defend.
>
Our ONLY hope is that OUR military will honor its oath to defend the Constitution against ALL enemies, both foreign and DOMESTIC.
Because…
Our Enemies are NOW Domestic and they aim on disarming us and enslaving us to a NWO of common 3rd world poverty (Agenda 21) with only the very Elite 1% running the World and THEY are hell bent on ruining our beloved home, America.
Re: “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” NONSENSE!
It will deter the criminals from thinking they and only they
have carte blanche to blind everyone else!