A little more about guns

lexaal · Post by **lexaal** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 6:55 pm

To Poison the debate: a constitution change is easy if there's a good majority to do it.
The 18th amendmend made alcohol illegal(because U.S. beer is in general pisswater-taste). Now alcohol is legal because the constitution was changed.

takingarms1 · Post by **takingarms1** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 8:09 pm

Adept wrote:QUOTE (Adept @ Jan 10 2013, 10:12 AM) I suspect that the reading of the supreme court is more due to partisan politics, and less a honest take on the original intent of the text. If they wanted people to keep guns to protect them from their own government turning tyrannical, I'm pretty sure that would have been worded to make it clear.

You are incorrect and guilty of the same partisan reading you accuse others of. The literal words say, "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" Justice Scalia has argued, how can you read that as anything other than an individual right? The other clause qualifies it, to be sure, but that does not change the meaning of the words "the right of the people"

I'm not saying there's a definitive meaning. I'm saying it is debatable. And there's a long history of jurisprudence and historical narrative that the US Supreme Court has analyzed to back it up. Not to be condescending, but it doesn't sound like you've reviewed any of that.

Just to give you an example, Joseph Story, a very early Supreme Court judge, in his commentaries on the Constitution, said, "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered, as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them." That to me sounds like he is saying one of the primary purposes of the second amendment is to protect the citizen against his government. His commentaries were published in 1847 so that is not a new idea and has no basis in present-day partisan politics.

Vortrog · Post by **Vortrog** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 8:20 pm

QUOTE The current hysteria over "assault weapons" is amusing as well. I guess adding a pistol grip and some black body parts somehow makes a rifle 100000x more deadly... as that is pretty much all an "assault weapon" is to the fear mongers. A real assault weapon must be select fire... and... well those are already illegal.[/quote]

I think the media just renamed select fire as assault weapon. And honestly, when would you use a bolt or lever action weapon as an assault weapon.
Let's just call assault weapons autoloaders annd that fixes the problem with definitions

Adaven · Post by **Adaven** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 9:19 pm

I was surprised when an extended family member mentioned during a holiday gathering that he helped start and was currently the CFO for an arms manufacturer making AR-15 type guns in his small rural town.

I was shocked when he said in only 4 years their gross sales had gone from $100,000 to $9 Million.

djrbk · Post by **djrbk** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 10:11 pm

I'm a competition shooter with the military. It is my belief that semi automatic weapons should be restricted to military/law enforcement personnel. I really hope that the end result of this does not ban the AR 15 as I want one ( it is almost identical to my competition rifle when modded with an elcan scope)

Adept · Post by **Adept** » Thu Jan 10, 2013 10:29 pm

lexaal wrote:QUOTE (lexaal @ Jan 10 2013, 08:55 PM) To Poison the debate: a constitution change is easy if there's a good majority to do it.
The 18th amendmend made alcohol illegal(because U.S. beer is in general pisswater-taste). Now alcohol is legal because the constitution was changed.

Thanks for the reminder Lex. That is a good point.

NightRychune · Post by **NightRychune** » Fri Jan 11, 2013 12:34 am

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-20975608

THERE WILL BE NO SHOOTING IN MY CLASSROOM

takingarms1 · Post by **takingarms1** » Fri Jan 11, 2013 12:42 am

WHAT??

Actually I had a few teachers who could probably pull that off

Adept · Post by **Adept** » Fri Jan 11, 2013 12:59 am

NightRychune wrote:QUOTE (NightRychune @ Jan 11 2013, 02:34 AM) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-20975608

THERE WILL BE NO SHOOTING IN MY CLASSROOM

Awesome!

Camaro · Post by **Camaro** » Fri Jan 11, 2013 3:43 am

djrbk wrote:QUOTE (djrbk @ Jan 10 2013, 12:11 PM) I'm a competition shooter with the military. It is my belief that semi automatic weapons should be restricted to military/law enforcement personnel. I really hope that the end result of this does not ban the AR 15 as I want one ( it is almost identical to my competition rifle when modded with an elcan scope)

Oh so ex-military and ex-law enforcement civilians can have semi-automatic rifles but the rest of us civilians can't? What kind of screwed up law is that?

Besides, do revolvers count as semi-automatic?

Also I really doubt they will implement another "Assault Weapons" ban as it was very unpopular in the 90s and did all of nothing to stop anything from happening. Besides, take the pistol grip off of an AK, slap a monte carlo stock on it and whammo, detachable magazine hunting rifle that doesn't fit the definition of an "assault rifle."

Those are just BS feel good laws that do jack to stop anything and interfere with the rest of us law abiding citizens who want to go to the range with our military style semi-automatic rifles.