[QuickTidal]

blackzoid, on 19 December 2012 - 02:09 PM, said:

Yes, but by many people's definition (liberterians and such) they would not be considered "free" countries.

Yes Canada and the UK, and Australia aren't "free"

Nope, not at all.

Wow. Just wow.

[Primateus]

QuickTidal, on 19 December 2012 - 02:23 PM, said:

blackzoid, on 19 December 2012 - 02:09 PM, said:

Yes, but by many people's definition (liberterians and such) they would not be considered "free" countries.

Yes Canada and the UK, and Australia aren't "free"

Nope, not at all.

Wow. Just wow.

Which is one of the reasons I always, most of the time anyway (though probably sometimes unfairly so) just stop listening when people proclaim they're hardcore libertarians.

[D'rek]

worrywort, on 19 December 2012 - 07:00 AM, said:

I assume your reply included responses to me for some odd reason but I can't see the colors red or green. Could you repost using blue?

And to those of you who have decided not to post your dissertation for all to read as if that constitutes conversation, it appears that the most popular "gun control" notion being floated in the House is banning high-capacity magazines...what do you think? Decent first step in the right direction? A drop in the pond? Any chance in hell of passing either way?

I'll say drop in the pond as far as actually preventing more mass shootings goes, because there's {a} a lot of high-capacity magazines still out there that won't disappear overnight, {b} reloading doesn't take that long, {c} in many of the recent mass shootings, the killers have brought multiple guns, and {d} a "mass shooting" equals 4 or more deaths, which is not a lot.

However, it will be a good first step (if it passes) in that {a} it sets a precedent for more steps to be taken in the right direction, and {b} it's not something that when the next US mass shooting happens the critics can pounce upon easily - either the killer will have had low-capacity clips and you can argue it would have been worse if he had high-capacity, or he will have still had high-capacity magazines and it was too soon for this magazine capacity law to have made an effect yet.

[Morgoth]

When that is said, it is pretty much impossible to prevent all mass shootings unless you completely ban all guns, see Norway for an example. Yet, one should always work to make such events as unlikely as possible.

[QuickTidal]

^^This.

[blackzoid]

QuickTidal, on 19 December 2012 - 02:23 PM, said:

blackzoid, on 19 December 2012 - 02:09 PM, said:

Yes, but by many people's definition (liberterians and such) they would not be considered "free" countries.

Yes Canada and the UK, and Australia aren't "free"

Nope, not at all.

Wow. Just wow.

QT
Are you getting all worked up over what I stated? I never said *I* don't consider them free countries. Just that many liberterians would not. Total "freedom" is an extreme darwinist winner-take-all philosophy. You do realise this right?
Everybody else?

[QuickTidal]

blackzoid, on 19 December 2012 - 03:12 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 19 December 2012 - 02:23 PM, said:

blackzoid, on 19 December 2012 - 02:09 PM, said:

Yes, but by many people's definition (liberterians and such) they would not be considered "free" countries.

Yes Canada and the UK, and Australia aren't "free"

Nope, not at all.

Wow. Just wow.

QT
Are you getting all worked up over what I stated? I never said *I* don't consider them free countries. Just that many liberterians would not. Total "freedom" is an extreme darwinist winner-take-all philosophy. You do realise this right?
Everybody else?

Not worked up at all actually. You'll have to try harder Blackazoid.

....and I was simply stating that such a libertarian stance is stupid. You made the statement, I replied to it. This is how a forum works! Yay!

You'll notice I didn't point my finger at you, just your statement and what a ludicrous stance it is.

[blackzoid]

Ok

[worry]

How can we tell if you pointed your finger at him though? You never mentioned your finger. For all we know you could be pointing at us left and right. That said, my sense is you're a man of your word. But we can't just notice these things before you say them.

[Malaclypse]

I saw a thread on another forum, lotsa american gun nuts in attendance, and the title was something like ' If guns aren't the problem WTF is wrong with Americans?'

and it's a good question.

[worry]

That seems plenty reasonable, BK, but reasonable doesn't seem to be the trend in some states' reading of the 2nd, I'm sure you'd agree. It'd be one thing if the NRA was a fringe group, but it's as mainstream (and apparently more powerful) as just about any other lobby/interest group in the nation...and its advocacy goals are as extreme as can be.

So what about people who aren't unhinged, but still see using guns as the solution to a problem? Mental illness might be a factor in some mass shootings, but we shouldn't let that be a diversion from the majority of shootings that have nothing to do with mental illness. I'm not comfortable trusting "regular" people to carry most types of firearms willy nilly (or at all, above a certain class), especially without extensive training in use AND the law. The process should be AT LEAST as rigorous as a driving test. Competency shouldn't be limited to proper technique, etiquette, and basic personal safety in firing range conditions. And I think reasonable people would agree that doesn't infringe on the 2nd Amendment. Meanwhile, in many states extreme NRA-style gun advocates have been getting their way with the broadest possible (and inherently unreasonable) reading of the 2nd Amendment, which is essentially Wild West rules. And this institutionalized antipathy to oversight is plenty responsible for "regular" people going cowboy, even while we agree that individuals should be held accountable for their actions.
http://www.tampabay....service/1266589

[worry]

BTW, that was more of a transition from your post and the "unhinged" thing to a wider issue for general purposes, not like a challenge to your specific post or anything.

[worry]

You never know, I could sneak up behind you out of nowhere and deliver a life-altering megapost before you even know what's happening. You'd leave a different man. Others would leave a different gender all together. A third thing might happen as well.

[Gnaw]

Briar King, on 19 December 2012 - 11:55 PM, said:

Nice link....thats fucked up. I dont know if Ive ever even heard of the Stand Your Ground Law. Its probably discussed in the concealed weapon class. I havent take Louisiana's class yet but my neighboor has. I ll ask him about that. That dudes life clearly wasnt in danger so hopefully the victim gets justice.

That's the law George Zimmerman is standing behind in the Trayvon Martin shooting. It will most likely keep him from going to jail over the actual shooting. Zimmerman will go to jail though. He has a replacement passport. Said he lost the first one. But when forced to turn in his passport for bail, he used the first one.

So he either lied on the application for the replacement. Felony. Or he intentionally turned in the old passport to the court. Felony. Or he intentionally did not turn in the old passport when he "found" it. Felony. Or combinations thereof.


The StP case has very interesting implications if it gets widely reported.

Edit: hit add reply when meant post preview. I've got to go dig up a couple of books before clarifying that comment.

This post has been edited by Gnaw: 20 December 2012 - 07:21 PM

[Obdigore]

I'm honestly quite sick of people saying it is their 'right' to have guns. No, it isn't. Until 2008 you had no right to firearms unless you were part of a state militia, its just that no one questioned it. There is a reason the 1994 AWB law wasn't unconstitutional.

Take a seat and sit right there, I'm going to tell you a quick history lesson of a douchebag called Scalia.

In the beginning (of the US, clearly) there were a couple of pretty douchy guys that we call the founding fathers who pretty much didn't want to pay taxes to England anymore, especially if they had no representatives in parliment. These guys had just finished fighting a war against one of the largest empires the world had ever seen, the British. Armed with those experiences (and the experiences of being monied white males, because fuck women and niggers, right?) they decided to form a country, with a two government system. This system was about states controlling things inside their states and the federal government which would control things that effect the nation as a whole. To do this, they started deciding what powers would be granted to the federal government, and leave everything else up to the states. With me so far? Here is where it gets exciting.

As the greatest danger to liberty is from large standing armies, it is best to prevent them by an effectual provision for a good militia. - James Madison
Standing armies are inconsistent with [a people's] freedom and subversive of their quiet. - Thomas Jefferson
What, sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty. - Elbridge Gerry

And so, distrustful of standing armies and of large a powerful federal government, these men argued about, then added the Second Amendment to the constitution. Oddly it was ratified in two different forms. Congress passed this

Quote

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

and the states agreed to, and was signed into law by big TJ (Thomas Jefferson) this

Quote

A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

And so, we have a second amendment to our constitution, that limits the power of the Federal Government in that it cannot prevent the states from raising and arming militias for national defense. In fact, that is how lawmakers and both state, federal, and the supreme courts saw it for hundreds of years. I bring your attention to United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542, 553 (1875) during which the supreme court decided that the second amendment

Quote

“has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government,”

. This was followed up by Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252, 265 (1886), where the decision was that the second amendment

Quote

is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the National government, and not upon that of the States.

Lets move forward 40 years to a different decision, by all different supreme court justices, in United States v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939). There the case was about the National Firearms Act being unconstitutional because Miller wanted to transport sawed off shotguns across state lines. The decision there was

Quote

in the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a [sawed-off] shotgun . . . has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument.

So far we have the founding fathers saying the states being allowed to raise militias in the time of need is what they wanted, and that they wanted no standing armies. They added the second amendment that ensured that the federal government would not remove the rights of the states to raise militias if or when they felt the need. Note, please, that nowhere, so far, has there been any suggestion that you can own a fucking howitzer or an AR-15 .223 with a 100 round drum. Also note that the second amendment has never been incorporated into states rights using the fourteenth, because it is clear to everyone that the states should still have the right to not allow firearms should they so choose, and as long as the federal government does not remove the rights of the states to raise militias, they have not violated the second amendment.

And then we come to judicial activison and the originalism idiocy that he espouses.

In the case of Parker v. District of Columbia (PDF), 478 F.3d 370 (D.C. App. 2007), Parker was fighting against an effectual handgun ban within the limits of the District of Columbia. Scalia and the majority ruled that states or city governments, somehow in 2008, after over 200 years of it not being so, the second amendment now applies to state and city laws, instead of just federal. Meanwhile even Scalia had to admit that

Quote

the right to keep and bear arms is subject to regulation, such as concealed weapons prohibitions, limits on the rights of felons and the mentally ill, laws forbidding the carrying of weapons in certain locations, laws imposing conditions on commercial sales, and prohibitions on the carrying of dangerous and unusual weapons. It stated that this was not an exhaustive list of the regulatory measures that would be presumptively permissible under the Second Amendment.

So, despite the sudden fucking about-face in 2008, for well over 200 years the Second Amendment only guaranteed the rights for states to raise and arm militias should they so choose, in order that the US as a nation not have a standing army, suddenly now the Second Amendment is a giant fucking individual right that it never was before and even Scalia admits that regulation is ok, unless it gets to him then he is going to do his best to strike it down.

As a US citizen, you cannot have a nuclear weapon, most explosives, any kind of Tank, Aircraft, or Boat that has armaments and ammunition, but for some reason you can own a fucking M249 SAW with 300 round ammo drums should you so choose. It is a disgrace to logic and our political system that judicial activision like this exists and that the NRA has so much power it can have the CDC's budget cut if the CDC tries to figure out the root causes of gun violence.

Now, for you chuckleheads that think, for some shiny fucking reason, that you have a god given personal right to own whatever the fuck you want. Why do you think that? Where in any federal or state law do you have any kind of right to own whatever the fuck you want, and why the hell are you not petitioning the government to have your own nuclear warhead, aircraft carrier, or howitzer (for hunting deer).

Edit -> And, for shits and giggles, I want you to explain how the 'states rights!' crowd now think that the second amendment which was never incorporated via the 14th NOR ever applied to state laws is suddenly binding upon state and city legislatures. The entire fucking point of the amendment was to prevent the federal government from being able to stop the states from raising militias, and now the amendment is being used to stop cities or states (California) from banning weapons they find they don't want in their state. And the 'states rights!' people are supporting them in this. Not because they like states rights! but because they are giant fucking jokes of wasted logic and idiocy. States Rights to discriminate! Federal rights! to have guns to kill me some mexicans. It is fucking bullshit and I wish our school system was better.

This post has been edited by Obdigore: 20 December 2012 - 04:54 AM

[worry]

I only have one bugaboo with that post, and it's that you don't have to be a Citizen for much of the Bill of Rights to apply to you, including the 2nd, you only have to be anyone within US jurisdiction. Only where it specifies Citizenship (such as voting rights) is that limit established. So technically any finding re: the 2nd applies to citizens, resident aliens, undocumented aliens, guest workers, exchange students, and so on down the line. That said, there are other limits established at various levels of government that give Citizens advantages, like registration requirements or other documentation that might require a social security number, things like that. But of course, that just speaks to the arbitrariness of how the 2nd has been interpreted in recent times, as well as the fact that even fundamental rights have some reasonable curtailments (shouting FIRE in a theater, the most famous example).

[Shinrei]

I'll let Penn answer your last post, Obdigore.

[Obdigore]

Shinrei, on 20 December 2012 - 11:30 AM, said:

I'll let Penn answer your last post, Obdigore.

Yes, link a youtube message of a comedian/magician that I've seen multiple times before when people have no reasonable response to actual facts, but seem to think that hoping and wishing will change history and facts.

[Shinrei]

Your post, Obdi, is hardly objective. The wording "The People" is specific. The rights of the people to have arms in the event that the states want to raise militias is what this means. It doesn't mean the states stockpile weapons to give to people to raise the militias, but that the PEOPLE keep them.

Found this interesting:

Quote

But this is not a State's right; it is a People's Right which they may claim in both their collective and individual capacities. In an age when the sense of community is strained and in many cases absent, the idea of citizens viewing themselves as a part of the people may seem out of place. But our founding documents often speak of actions and rights that belong to the people collectively. The Declaration of Independence, for example, speaks of the right that the people have to "alter or abolish" a government that becomes destructive of its proper ends, namely, securing their inalienable rights. The 1st Amendment to the Constitution declares that the people have the right "peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances." In each of these cases it is a people's right, but the exercise of that right requires action by individuals composing the people. So with the right to keep and bear arms. It is a right of the people, but it is a right that an individual must be permitted to exercise in order for it to be effective.

If the 2nd Amendment were read as merely granting states the right to maintain a militia, it would contradict Art. I, Section 10, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution, which forbids the states from keeping "troops, or ships of war in time of peace," "without the consent of the Congress." But the right guaranteed by the 2nd Amendment goes beyond merely what is necessary for a State to form a militia when needed. As a People's Right, necessary aspects of it exist regardless of whether Congress gives its consent for states to keep troops in time of peace or not. Congress could prevent a state from forming a militia, but this would not affect the right of the people to remain armed, and to be ready whenever the State called upon them to join a militia, or to protect their liberties in other ways contemplated by the Founders.

from here: http://eyler.freeser...rs/jefpco29.htm

Here is the part where I think you and others have a point about the warping of the idea of the 2nd Amendment:

Quote

The right to "keep and bear arms" as guaranteed by the 2nd Amendment is related to and a part of the right of the people to defend themselves when necessary, both collectively and individually. It is not an absolute personal right because there are no absolute rights. As Jefferson wrote:

"All natural rights may be abridged or modified in their exercise by law." --Thomas Jefferson: Official Opinion, 1790.

The right to keep and bear arms is a right which the people must be free to exercise in order to accomplish a specific purpose. If the Amendment was intended to make the right to bear arms a personal right in any and all cases, it could easily have used "person" instead of "the people" just as it did in the 5th Amendment when referring to the rights of individuals, and have had the 2nd Amendment read, "no person shall be denied the right to keep and bear arms." This, indeed, would be similar to the wording that Jefferson used in his proposed draft of the Virginia Constitution:

"No freeman shall be debarred the use of arms (within his own lands or tenements)." --Thomas Jefferson: Draft Va. Constitution with (his note) added, 1776.

Of course, Jefferson added the note (which is usually omitted by gun proponents) "within his own lands or tenements" in his final draft. As a personal right, some such limitation would be reasonable, and to limit a personal right to one's own lands or tenements would serve two purposes: it would guarantee the right to own the arms for possible use in a militia, and it would allow free and reasonable use to the individual for all legitimate purposes. If the 2nd Amendment were a personal right, then anyone and everyone could "keep and bear arms" indiscriminately. But when Congress stated the right to bear arms as a people's right, it implied that the people could themselves put in place some control over the exercise of this right in order to fulfil their own purposes. Congress was fully able to distinguish between people and a person when identifying rights, and did so on many occasions. But they made this a People's Right, incorporating into it the purpose that would be associated with the people's exercise thereof and leaving the possibility of other limitations that would not defeat the stated purpose.

So yeah, I suppose that means that if they individual state of, say, NY wants to ban guns. I suppose they can, constitutionally if the people are so inclined. But you can't force Texas to do it too.

But since the federal government has already created their army that they are not supposed to have....how does THAT change things???

[Obdigore]

Yea keep quoting opinion pieces at me instead of actual law and previous supreme court decisions, that will work well for your argument. What Thomas Jefferson said isn't law, beyond what is written down and argued as law. What any of the framers said isn't law, beyond what they eventually settled on and had ratified by the states and congress. Acting like their opinion pieces matter when discussing points of law is silly.

Of course you are ignoring the thing that I find most disgusting, that Scalia and 4 other supreme court justices have said that the second amendment IS binding on state and city level laws as well.