The Goat Pen

Interesting point....white guy sprays bullets into a kindergarten and conservatives' biggest concern is that "important freedoms" will be restricted. Terrorist threatens to blow something up and conservatives are willing to compromise on almost any other sacrosanct freedom in order to stop him.

Some freedoms are way more important than others, Doc. Freedom to own a gun? That's #1. Everything else, not so much...

Yes and the freedom to own a gun, any gun, with no restrictions, is important because puter and the shotgun he bought at Wal-Mart will need to fend off the military should the govt decide to impose a tyranny.

What freedom is puter wanting to give up?

My freedom to use heroin...

AlabamAlum wrote:What freedom is puter wanting to give up?

Well not puter specifically but conservatives in general have certainly been happy to "compromise" on the 4th and 5th amendments in the eternal vigil against Terror. And I have heard conservatives calling for organized prayer to be reintroduced into schools as a method of combating school violence. It's really only the 2nd amendment where they can stomach no restrictions, no "compromises", out of this misguided notion that it's all that stands between us and a tyrannical govt.

Those amendments should be held as sacrosanct. But I also believe the 2nd is as well. I don't understand people, from either side, who want amendments and freedoms reduced and weakened.

perhaps the issue is what do you mean by sacrosanct? None of the Amendments are absolute? Can't yell fire in a crowded theater, can't own a nuclear weapon.

No part of the Constitution is sacrosanct. It has rules and procedures built into it that allow for it to be altered and it has been altered and added to since it was first created. The right of the people to govern themselves and change the rules (including the Constitution) is a far more important aspect (IMO) of our way of (self) government than unquestioningly bowing down to every rule written by old white dudes 250 years ago as sacrosanct. And I don't think they wanted people to do that. The Constitution is not the Ten Commandments...

Okay. Jeeze.

Without the 2nd none of the rest matter.

Big Orange Junky wrote:Without the 2nd none of the rest matter.

The 2nd Amendment is not more important than all the other Amendments combined. It's a complete fantasy that the only thing holding tyranny back is some individual gun-owners who enjoy hunting turkey on the weekends or shooting pistols at the range once in a while.

Bed wetters, heh.

"I heartily accept the motto,—“That government is best which governs least;” and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which I also believe,—“That government is best which governs not at all;” and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have. Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient." - Thoreau

Dr. Strangelove wrote:

Big Orange Junky wrote:Without the 2nd none of the rest matter.

The 2nd Amendment is not more important than all the other Amendments combined. It's a complete fantasy that the only thing holding tyranny back is some individual gun-owners who enjoy hunting turkey on the weekends or shooting pistols at the range once in a while.

The 2nd Amendment is not the "...only thing holinding tyranny back..." but it is one of the many things that our country the best country in the world. When a Federal government goes out of its way to tie its own hands such that its legislative branch "...shall make no law...." preventing the ownership of firearms, that government pays its governed people the greatest compliment possible.

Trust.

First, Dr Strangelove trust the people. If this 237 year old experiment in self-government is worth having, it doesn't really work if those who are the self-governed aren't trusted enough to own firearms. And if the standard firearm of the day is an Uzi 9 millimeter, it shouldn't be a "life sentence in prison" if I choose to own one. So already (with our government's outlook on automatic weapons), the trust is withering. It should come as no surprise that (as our leaders trust the people less and less) our nation is going to shit.

Why did you feel the need to put "life sentence in prison" in quotation marks?

Of the 68,720 murders committed between 2007-2011 by using weapons,

were committed using rifles 1,874
by knives 7,273
Bare hands 4,058
Bats, hammers, etc. 2,918

We need to ban knives and bats!

http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/cr ... ta-table-8

hedge wrote:Why did you feel the need to put "life sentence in prison" in quotation marks?

Because the law against individuals owning automatic weapons is a terrible law.

I am a law abiding person. I will follow the law. I will never own a machine gun because my country tells me I am not allowed to, I just don't like that law. So, I put it in quotes. No other reason.

So basically half of the weapons deaths every year are by hand guns. More interesting to me is, why is murder by narcotics considered a "weapons" murder? And how does one go about this?

preventing the ownership of firearms

The Constitution doesn't say firearms. It says arms. And we as a country definitely limit an individual right to keep and bear "any and all" arms