Yes my right to own a gun is more important than dead children.

This week being the anniversary of Sandy Hook, all the shame on us articles are coming out from the usual rags such as the Huffington Post and others like it. I think its a good time to reflect on how important the second amendment really is. The second amendment gives teeth to the rest of the constitution. Not only is the second amendment arguably the most important piece of law created in the history of man, it is also the shield upon which all other rights are built. Everything about America was founded on the barrel of a gun and the tip of a sword.

Sandy Hook while a tragic and terrible event is nothing compared to the Democide that has occurred in the last century and we all have to keep our eye on the bigger picture. Governments have killed over 200 MILLION people in the last 100 years (1900-2000). That is roughly 54,794 people a day murdered by their own government. Governments are far better and more efficient killers than gun owners could ever be. America has the unique status of being one of the only countries in the world were gun rights are mandated by LAW. Its part of what makes us unique and one of the greatest powers the world has ever seen. America is the Roman Republic of the 20th and 21st Centuries. A thousand years from now when this country is a shadow of its former glory they will look back on these years and will idolize how our constitution created one of the greatest nations to ever impact this earth. Democrats, liberals, socialist, and any other manner of collectivist seek to undermine what we have built. Their jealousy and control freak mentality cant stand the simple idea that governments for the people, and by the people, should trust their own citizens.

Gun control is nothing more than the first step by those who seek to dominate and control a free people and we should do everything in our power to fight that. The democrats blame the NRA for gun violence? They really should just say what they really think. They blame the Constitution and those who support it. Make no mistake this is a direct attack on you, your family, and my family individual free will. The NRA is nothing more than millions of Americans who want nothing more than to exercise their second amendment right to buy and own whatever firearm they choose free from government infringement. Sure the Gun companies support it? Why wouldn't they? Both the members and the companies have the same vested interest. So remember, a whole mountain of dead children can not and will not change the fact that our Freedom is not a collective right. You have the individual right to own a firearm or not. And nobody has the right to tell you otherwise.

 

But let's say the government wants you dead, do you think a gun is going to stop them from killing you? They have bigger guns and ways to find you. If the government wants you dead you're likely going to get dead.

 

America the roman republic, that will do me. The arrogance, lack of historical knowledge combined with self importance is astounding.

 

Assuming of course that an american government which had so turned upon its populace as to hunt them like dogs for exercising their rights (keeping and bearing being an enumerated individual right) would act as a single group and not have a decent portion of itself at war with itself, how exactly is it that they would FIND me? See Nam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya etc. You hide within the population and do (*)(*)(*)(*)ed up horrible (*)(*)(*)(*) in lightning raids and other asymmetric warfare tactics. There are 300+ million guns in 100+ million hands. That we KNOW of. Looking at the american revolution (which was finally kicked off by... you guessed it gun confiscation) about a quarter of the populace joined in. A quarter of 100million is 25million. That's a lot of bullets going in one direction, but spread throughout a continent. How exactly is the now split armed forces and police (who are killing each other some for being against dear leader and some for being against the constitution) going to effectively police 25 million guys with on average 3 guns a piece? And that's just baseline and doesn't even count all the munitions said split forces would turn over or that said 25 million would capture or steal.

I mean honestly man have you thought the math through?

 

This is another NRA conspiracy theory misusing patriotism to fool the gullible.

Fights over taxes in 1765

The boston Tea Party stuff happens in 1768

The British had already declared Masachussetts to be in rebellion in Feb 1775, in April 1775, with war on the agenda , as a tactic of war (not the spark thats started it) you already have the british declaring masachussetts in a state of rebellion, General Gage sends mean to try and flog their weapons... then the obvious happens.

 

Hi sparky. I hold a major in philosophy (political and religious) and a minor in Poli Sci with a concentration on American government and interaction with the world.
It wasn't a shooting war ie a significant amount of the population was not willing to risk open rebellion, until the ability to resist (and indeed the duty of every English man to be armed for possible defense of the king and country) was to be shorn from them. That was the spark that led to true revolution by a significant portion of the populace. Not a bunch of drunk city boys and malcontents dressing like Indians and dumping taxed goods in the harbor.
Until that point it was a very small percentage of people willing to engage in seditious conspiracy, not open rebellion. King George did the exact thing one should not do and attempted to punish all his subjects for the misdeeds of the few. People tend to take a dim view of that when they can fight back.

 

Why did the federal government back away from the Bundy ranch simply because some protesters were armed if they had absolutely no hope of victory in the confrontation?

 

Yes you have the right to own a gun, but at the time the constitution was written men used muskets.

 

I am not arguing whether the english or the patriots were right or wrong in either tactics or morality.

I am just saying the the english did not try to confiscate weapons to punish people and then accidently start a war. They were already at war and the attempt to confiscate was a tactic, they thought would assist them.

 

Optics.

 

Its not arrogance if its true. Spend a lifetime defending something other than yourself and you might have 1/10 the understanding.

 

Arrogance and truth can co exist.

In any event, in this case they do not.

America, has been the largest economy for some time, put a man on the moon, and has achieved extraordinary achievements for a nation. However, as an empire, its strength is nowhere near that of the roman empire at its peak, or a whole bunch of other ancient empires. Just look at the known world map of the time and see how much of the populus, rome had control of (or the persians, if you like that empire). America, by comparison has perhaps a bit more then a third of a continent.

Look at population, its only the third most populus nation(those ancient empires were pretty much most of the world population by comparison) with about 320m people in a world of 7B roughly 4.5%.

Its economy is the largest maybe a third of the world economy, soon to be overtaken by china, again those ancient empires would have had the vast majority of trade / economy under their control.

Your nation is a proud strong one, unfortunately it has people like yourself with an exaggerated sense of your nations place in history, but thats just it, its a nation. Not even an empire.

 

America was never intended to be an Empire. In fact, "Empire" is anathema to the principles that this Nation were founded upon. In this, America is the First. You miss that entirely.

 

I agree, it was not me who compared a nation to an empire, I like you were just pointing out the comparison was incorrect. Bordering on pathetic.

 

If you believe that your government, an organization of people, is somehow superior to yourself, you merely exist at their whim.

Americans do not share that viewpoint.

 

It is not constitutional for America to be a world empire. We have plenty of power to be a Roman Empire, but it is not who we are.

 

Thank you for your post.

The situation has changed with McDonald v. Chicago (2010) - the right to keep and bear arms has been determined to be an individual rather than collective right. It has been incorporated on the states via the due process clause of the 14th amendment. Being an individual right, it is subject to the strict scrutiny test which applies to government transgressions of other fundamental rights (free speech, free association, etc).

Now, I'm no fan of taking SCOTUS' opinion for granted. They often make absolutely horrible rulings. US v. Miller (1939) is the perfect example of that. So I don't think that SCOTUS ruling in favour of individual gun rights makes it necessarily so. I do however think that there is a very strong basis for such a ruling. It's curious, because the left often throws their hands in the air and say "there's nothing we can do! SCOTUS has ruled in this fashion!". It'll be interesting to see how they weasel out of this.

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The ACLU wrote after Heller v. DC (2008?) that:

"Given the reference to "a well regulated Militia" and "the security of a free State," the ACLU has long taken the position that the Second Amendment protects a collective right rather than an individual right. For seven decades, the Supreme Court's 1939 decision in United States v. Miller was widely understood to have endorsed that view. This position is currently under review and is being updated by the ACLU National Board in light of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in D.C. v. Heller in 2008."

What utter nonsense. They frequently hide behind the "we just defend the constitution, man!" defence, yet when it comes to a fundamental right they dislike, they're all opposed.

Some state branches are filing 2ndA lawsuits, which is promising, but the national chapter is still blatantly hypocritical.


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Never give up the 2nd amendment. Never budge an inch, never concede. Fight all laws which try to punish the criminal few with onerous restrictions on the innocent many. Once a right goes it rarely comes back - McDonald v. Chicago is a once in a blue moon reversal of state authority. Be thankful and defend it in the coming years.

 

Neither am I. I'm informing you that what happened was the populace was not in revolt until George thought it would be a great idea to confiscate the arms of citizens not in revolt. There was a seditious conspiracy, a group truly dedicated to independence. They were a tiny fraction. They had no real support. The brits had dealt with rebellion before. Them declaring "rebellion" does not make the entire populace in revolt nor were the brits interested in making war upon the populace at large. They were there to put down some inbred colonial farmers and merchants who'd gotten uppity, not make war on the colony as a whole. They got more then they bargained for when they tried to take the right and sacred duty (as it was held in the law of the time) of every citizen to be armed to defend the homeland/king in case of, as Turkish Jason Statham's character in "Snatch" is wont to say "ze germans" (really the Spanish and french). It was a sacred trust of liege to vassal and vassal to liege. These were freeholders, men who did not have any lord but the king. It was seen as a terrible betrayal of the entire order of things. That's what sparked the revolution. A willful destruction of the most basic relationship between vassal and liege, that of your men standing ready and ABLE to defend your interests, because of the actions of some malcontents miles away in what was a much larger world.

 

I understand and appreciate your position. But for reasons I have already mentioned I disagree with it.

To apply the but for test, had General Gage, sent the 700 men into the country side, with specific instructions to burn and pillage the rebellion or "inbred colonial farmers" as you call them, with no specific orders regarding an aim to seize weapons, I am still of the opinion that America continues to agitate and fight back.

IMO the war had already started (but you disagree)
You say the war started when the fighting really heated up, even accepting that point, imo it is still likely to heat up even if they are not sent in to take weapons (if they are just sent in to put down locals instead).

It is a side note in history that people try to use towards a gun rights argument that imo is just weak.

 

You are either over estimating the power of america as against the rest of the world or you underestimating the power the roman empire had against the rest of the world.

 

The rebellion was in Boston not in the countryside. The cities. The cities where people had time for such leisurely pastimes as seditious conspiracy. A few farmers were in on it, mostly along the coast (a number of the original agitators being smugglers/merchants). But that was it. Had gage simply rooted out the seditious and treated the rest of the citizenry as loyal subjects of the crown we'd be sipping tea right now instead of pounding black coffee. Thank God that man was a totalitarian (*)(*)(*)(*)head and so was his boss.

 

My comparison to the Roman REPUBLIC is not based on Conquest, it is based on the power and gravitas that America projects around the world. Of that this not any doubt. If you think any country is worth 1 of any American Marine than you are sadly mistaken. American military power would steam roll any 3 countries if we so choose. Because we are benevolent we do not. You severely underestimate our power.

 

My rights are more important than dead anyone.

 

It's possible that nukes have limited any one country from becoming a single world power. But, I would argue that the U.S. Could control more land and people than the Roman Empire.

 

Why so arrogant.

You confuse benevolence with practicality.

All the people on this forum think that the American Military would have a hard time disarming / taking control of its own nation. Thats right, most on this forum (I am not one of them), most of them on your side of the gun discussion believe that the american military with all its marines etc etc, would have a hard time and ultimately fail in taking control of its own people.

For the record if the USA declared war on russia / china / britian, they would never take control of the three countries, they couldnt even knock over vietnam.... the best shot they have would be dropping some nukes but they would me nuked back and everyone would be dead.

Rome could and did take over the world.

America has tried and failed to take over the world, their current strategy rests with building / retaining economic relationships. Because quite frankly their control of the world is easing and it isn't coming back any time soon.