I’m flattered. Are you suggesting I become president? Respectfully, I’ll have to decline.
Another shooting took place yesterday in Dayton, OH
- Thread starter largemouth
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Just as the Constitution doesn't speak about the right to clean air, it doesn't talk about civilization (or does it, for all I know). The Magna Carta and the US Constitution are arguably the two most civilizing acts from the last 1000 years. The entire purpose of the US Constitution was to create a civilization for We the People.
At this point, yes, because no gunlover is proposing anything amounting to actual effective control or reduction of guns and guncontrol opponents are once again deflecting to blaming mental illness for mass shootings and offering the red herrings of enhanced background checks and red flag laws. None of these show any promise of eliminating or even reducing mass shootings, because virtually none of the mass shooters we know about have truly acted crazy or irrational beforehand.
The gunlover lobby has made clear that they will oppose anything proposed by people they call Democrats, leftists or socialists. So, unfortunately, the only proposals likely to go anywhere are those weak measures proposed by the gunlovers.
I wonder if this whole debate serves Republicans more than Democrats. We need gun reform but the topic should maybe be domestic terrorism. Moscow Mitch will happily defend gun rights to his dying day but he won't like be accused of supporting domestic terrorism.
Moscow Mitch is soft on domestic terrorism
Doormat Donald is soft on domestic terrorism
Along with real background checks for everyone, and red flag laws to keep those with mental health issues including making threats of murder? Sure. Not one law fixes things.
I'd prefer, though, to work on a good definition of an assault weapon and ban them, without the loopholes of the 1994-2004 assault weapons ban. Stopping law-abiding people from having fun on a gun range seems a small price to pay, since these weapons have no other legit non-battlefield use. They should be categorized with hand grenades and missile launchers, as mass people-killers.
Hmmmm, let's see: stopping law-abiding people from having fun on a gun range vs. stopping law-abiding people from getting shot in a public place. Yes, a small price to pay.
I think it may be a trap to offer to define an "assault weapon" because it would take too long. -- there seem to be several varieties, each with variants. The gun lobby seeks to slow walk any and all gun reform, and seeking to reach agreement on such a definition would either fail or take too long.
Well, by all means, show me where I’m wrong, Goat.
He’s making an argument that isn’t supported by the text of what we are discussing and defending it only by saying “well, it’s obvious.” One would think a former constitutional law professor from Butler university could do better than that.
And you, well, the next meaningful contribution you make to any of these 2A threads will be the first, as far as I can tell.
You’ve gotten pretty good at taking potshots and running away, though.
Those are as specific as I can make them, without seeing what the exact law would be.
Generally speaking, I would probably support anything that makes it tougher for criminals or the mentally ill to obtain weapons.
Also, generally speaking, I would probably oppose anything that makes it harder for law abiding citizens to obtain weapons.
That’s the only logically consistent position one can take, unless the ultimate goal is the complete ban of firearms.
Oh Shooter, you have much to learn.
Republican suggests ‘lack of thoughts and prayers’ the biggest factor behind mass shootings
Mike Huckabee suggests mass shootings in America are due to a lack of moral compass rather than access to assault-style weaponry
A “lack of thought and prayers is probably the single biggest factor” behind an increase in mass shootings across the United States, according to the former Republican governor of Arkansas.
Mike Huckabee, who served as the Arkansas governor from 1996 to 2007, and whose daughter Sarah Huckabee Sanders served as Donald Trump’s former White House press secretary until earlier this year, described the recent shootings as “mindless violence” after gunmen left nearly 31 dead in reportedly unconnected attacks over the weekend in El Paso, Texas and Dayton, Ohio.
“Despite all those who are denouncing the idea of prayers for the victims (do a Google search for ‘Thoughts and prayers are not enough’ and see how many hits you get), I will continue to pray for the victims and their families and for an end to this mindless violence, and I hope you will, too,” Mr Huckabee wrote.
“In fact,” he added, “amid all the finger-pointing and blame-laying and repulsive attempts to turn these tragedies to political advantage before the bodies are even cold, I would posit that the lack of thought and prayers is probably the single biggest factor in what is behind them.”
Or we go down the Sean The Genius Hannity's route:
Sean Hannity proposes giant police state to combat mass shootings.
You can ban nipples on TV but apparently its impossible to ban assault weapons that are, of course, designed to shoot multiple deers and birds at one go.
Sean Hannity proposes giant police state to combat mass shootings.
You can ban nipples on TV but apparently its impossible to ban assault weapons that are, of course, designed to shoot multiple deers and birds at one go.
Disagree with pretty much all of this. Democrats, like Stuffshot, have made it clear they want to eliminate all guns. Given that’s their stance, I won’t compromise. I’m not giving up my M4. In fact, I just purchases a new red dot (offset) for my “assault rifle”.
Don’t Democrats constantly say not to blame all Muslims and the entire religion of Islam for the actions of a few crazies? Weird how that’s not their stance with guns. Pretty much the opposite.
Nope. Keep pumping a gun ban and the like. I’m positive it’ll help in 2020.
No, you don't get it. In trying again to get through to you, I'll start not from the beginning but from the end of the story -- with McDonald v. Chicago (2010), where for the first time the Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment applied to the states. Justice Alito's plurality opinion helpfully lays out the history you can't seem to grasp:
The Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, originally applied only to the Federal Government. In Barron ex rel. Tiernan v. Mayor of Baltimore, 7 Pet. 243 (1833), the Court, in an opinion by Chief Justice Marshall, explained that this question was “of great importance” but “not of much difficulty.” In less than four pages, the Court firmly rejected the proposition that the first eight Amendments operate as limitations on the States, holding that they apply only to the Federal Government.
. . . [In 1876], the Court decided Cruikshank[.] . . . In that case, the Court reviewed convictions stemming from the infamous Colfax Massacre in Louisiana on Easter Sunday 1873. Dozens of blacks, many unarmed, were slaughtered by a rival band of armed white men. Cruikshank himself allegedly marched unarmed African-American prisoners through the streets and then had them summarily executed. Ninety-seven men were indicted for participating in the massacre, but only nine went to trial. Six of the nine were acquitted of all charges; the remaining three were acquitted of murder but convicted under the Enforcement Act of 1870, for banding and conspiring together to deprive their victims of various constitutional rights, including the right to bear arms.
The Court reversed all of the convictions, including those relating to the deprivation of the victims’ right to bear arms. The Court wrote that the right of bearing arms for a lawful purpose “is not a right granted by the Constitution” and is not “in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence.” “The second amendment,” the Court continued, “declares that it shall not be infringed; but this … means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress.” “Our later decisions in Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 265 (1886), and Miller v. Texas, 153 U. S. 535, 538 (1894), reaffirmed that the Second Amendment applies only to the Federal Government.”
So there is Justice Alito confirming that the Second Amendment had never applied to the states. Cruikshank said it didn't apply to the states. Presser said it didn't apply to the states. Miller said it didn't apply to the states. Even Heller didn't apply the Second Amendment to the states, because the District of Columbia is not a state and is instead controlled by the federal government. Thus, the Second Amendment never applied to the states until McDonald made it so in 2010.. . . [In 1876], the Court decided Cruikshank[.] . . . In that case, the Court reviewed convictions stemming from the infamous Colfax Massacre in Louisiana on Easter Sunday 1873. Dozens of blacks, many unarmed, were slaughtered by a rival band of armed white men. Cruikshank himself allegedly marched unarmed African-American prisoners through the streets and then had them summarily executed. Ninety-seven men were indicted for participating in the massacre, but only nine went to trial. Six of the nine were acquitted of all charges; the remaining three were acquitted of murder but convicted under the Enforcement Act of 1870, for banding and conspiring together to deprive their victims of various constitutional rights, including the right to bear arms.
The Court reversed all of the convictions, including those relating to the deprivation of the victims’ right to bear arms. The Court wrote that the right of bearing arms for a lawful purpose “is not a right granted by the Constitution” and is not “in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence.” “The second amendment,” the Court continued, “declares that it shall not be infringed; but this … means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress.” “Our later decisions in Presser v. Illinois, 116 U. S. 252, 265 (1886), and Miller v. Texas, 153 U. S. 535, 538 (1894), reaffirmed that the Second Amendment applies only to the Federal Government.”
This means that when Presser was decided in 1886, the Second Amendment didn't apply to the states. Since you're mulishly insisting that Presser says otherwise, here's where Presser says you're wrong:
We think it clear that the sections under consideration, which only forbid bodies of men to associate together as military organizations, or to drill or parade with arms in cities and towns unless authorized by law, do not infringe the right of the people to keep and bear arms. But a conclusive answer to the contention that this amendment prohibits the legislation in question lies in the fact that the amendment is a limitation only upon the power of Congress and the national government, and not upon that of the state. It was so held by this Court in the case of United States v. Cruikshank, in which THE CHIEF JUSTICE, in delivering the judgment of the Court, said that the right of the people to keep and bear arms
"is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second Amendment declares that it shall not be infringed, but this, as has been seen, means no more than that it shall not be infringed by Congress. This is one of the amendments that has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government[.]"
I hope that you are by now coming to glimpse the possibility that I've been correctly explaining to you that when Presser was decided in 1886, the Second Amendment didn't apply to the states. Are you there yet?
In any event, this seems to create a paradox for you, given your lack of subject matter knowledge: If the Second Amendment didn't apply to the states, how could the Presser Court have said this?
It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserved military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the states, and, in view of this prerogative of the general government, as well as of its general powers, the states cannot, even laying the constitutional provision in question out of view, prohibit the people from keeping and bearing arms so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government.
The answer, as I've pointlessly tried to explain to you, is that the Framers believed in "natural law":
Natural law is law that is held to exist independently of the positive law of a given political order, society or nation-state. As determined by nature, the law of nature is implied to be objective and universal; it exists independently of human understanding, and of the positive law of a given state, political order, legislature or society at large. Historically, natural law refers to the use of reason to analyze human nature to deduce binding rules of moral behavior from nature's or God's creation of reality and mankind.
Under the theory of natural law, all people have natural rights:
Natural and legal rights are two types of rights. Natural rights are those that are not dependent on the laws or customs of any particular culture or government, and so are universal and inalienable (they cannot be repealed by human laws, though one can forfeit their enforcement through one's actions, such as by violating someone else's rights.) Legal rights are those bestowed onto a person by a given legal system (they can be modified, repealed, and restrained by human laws).
These natural rights are the "unalienable rights" that Jefferson wrote about in the Declaration of Independence. The Framers believed that we all have these natural rights, whether they're written down in a constitution or not. Any government that denies these natural rights is illegitimate and should be overthrown. That's why we had our Revolution.
This is why the Presser Court could imagine that a state could somehow infringe on a right to bear arms, even though the Second Amendment didn't apply to the states. It was possible because of natural rights. That's why we have the Ninth Amendment -- so people wouldn't suffer from your misconception that the Bill of Rights is an exhaustive list of all the rights we enjoy.
Now, I think natural law is a bit silly. In fact, the only right anyone enjoys in a state of nature is the freedom to be clubbed over the head for a handful of acorns. Without a government to protect them, no one enjoys any rights at all. Nevertheless, you can't understand what the early Supreme Court cases are talking about if you don't understand the theory of natural rights.
So, for over two centuries the Second Amendment never protected an individual right unrelated to well regulated state militias. It only safeguarded the states' well regulated militias. After state militias withered away the Second Amendment became a dead letter. Not until Heller did the Second Amendment limit the power of the federal government, except to prohibit its interference with state militias. Not until McDonald did the Second Amendment limit the power of state governments to regulate firearms. These are not merely my opinions. They are legal and historical facts.
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Does it really piss you off that you can't walk into a store and buy hand grenades? They were banned a long time ago, and the only logical reason to ban them was as a ruse to get to a complete ban of firearms, right?
Why are fully automatic machine guns banned? Oh, the horrors!
Sometimes a specific plan is really not part of a slippery slope. I got my first gun for Christmas when I was 7. I don't want to take hunting and shooting sport weapons away from anybody.
But I can't imagine a scenario where I am squirrel hunting and need to fire off 40 rounds in 20 seconds, any more than I would go after them with hand grenades or missile launchers.
Would it really bother you if nobody could buy or own machines intended to kill humans on a massive scale? Why? Does everything have to be a slippery slope?
You're too kind. Without making any claims about the quality of my classes, I enjoyed the experience very much. The students were great, and when I talked, they took notes. I can't imagine anyone doubting I'd enjoy that.You seem to have a fairly comprehensive knowledge of the US Constitution (which I already knew of course). I'm embarrassed I don't take more time to get my knowledge up to snuff and I thank you for sharing.
I also apologize for my fellow Americans who pose as your foils. Then again, that's always been an effective literary technique and I admire your talent in weaving it skillfully into the discussion.
Aside: I actually have your foils on Ignore but am able to thoroughly follow your train of thought. Kudos for that too. I'll wager both your classes were superlative.
Your "not in the summary" stuff is killing me. I am literally laughing out loud.
Rock has repeatedly explained to you in detail why you are wrong, including with specific references to the case you are incorrectly interpreting.
I'm not doing any of that because Rock's already covered well enough that I couldn't possibly add anything, and also because, unlike Rock, I've long since lost the patience to try to have actual conversations with you.
But don't kid yourself. Rock's not the one that looks like a fool in this thread. People are actually laughing at you.
So in Texas on September 1, places of worship will not be able to bar guns. What happened to freedom of religion? If one belongs to a pacifist religion that takes beating swords into plowshares literally, they still must allow armed people inside.
Gun ownership has become its own religion.
Gun ownership has become its own religion.
Easy answer. Crazy people who go on mass shootings typically pick places where guns aren’t allowed aka gun free zones.
No. They’re not always gun free zones. I probably shouldn’t have said “typically” and something more along the lines of often.
So for that you can force someone to act against their religion? For example, Quakers are pacifists. You suggest your right to go the their church to do armed battle for them supersedes their right to not have you their to do battle for them?
Your response is ridiculous. Being able to carry in church is not forcing anyone to do anything. People aren’t going to church with their AR’s waiting to do battle. You know that, too.
Wrong, you are forcing them to let your gun into their church. Should you be allowed to carry a gun into my house even if I don't want you to have one?
Trump already up hate tweeting this morning , on the day he goes to try to console these communities. He truly should not go to El Paso. Just pouring salt into the wounds. I wonder what it would feel like to literally never take a single moment to self reflect. He’s going to have much to atone for at the end of his life. I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes.
Correct.
The Preamble is pretty clear. The government's job is to, among other things, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, and to promote the general Welfare,
It's the government's duty to protect us. The 2nd Amendment is no longer in tune with The Constitution's purpose and the amendment's original intent.
The Preamble is pretty clear. The government's job is to, among other things, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, and to promote the general Welfare,
It's the government's duty to protect us. The 2nd Amendment is no longer in tune with The Constitution's purpose and the amendment's original intent.
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Are your friends crack dealers? Why on earth would you need to bring a gun into your friends' homes without their knowledge?
Yup. I carry at all times, excluding where I'm not allowed by law. I want to make sure I can protect my family if ever necessary. Do you think if ever I find myself and family in danger, I can ask the bad guy to just leave us alone and he'll listen? Maybe I can ask him if I can give him a hug he'll go away peacefully. Lol.
Since, as conservatives often point out, your odds of being dying by gun are less than driving. I assume you do not let your family get into a car?
Every statistic in the world shows you are much more likely to be a victim if you own a gun than if you don’t. You shoot yourself , you get overpowered, you shoot a member of your family.
I guess I just don't get the logic around the need to have a murdering tool that increases you and your family's odds of being shot just to be prepared for something that will likely never happen to you.
Can you imagine the uproar from the other side if Obama had misspoke and asked for prayers for Toledo, ala T.rump?
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