Originally Posted by lew Giving guns to everyone doesn't solve crime. However, giving guns to a society that understands property rights and liberty sure as hell does dramatically reduce crime. People will always be people...no matter what rights they have...no matter what liberty levels they have...they will ALWAYS find ways ...
06-28-2008, 02:19 AM
| #21 | ||||
| Friend to all.  Socialist Maryland 
| Originally Posted by lew 
People will always be people...no matter what rights they have...no matter what liberty levels they have...they will ALWAYS find ways and reasons to kill each other and commit crimes with guns.
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06-28-2008, 02:31 AM
| #22 | ||||
| Anti-War, Anti-State, Pro-Free Market  Capitalist
| Originally Posted by Donkey®
I don't disagree. | ||||
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06-28-2008, 08:32 AM
| #23 | ||||
| People's Representative  Socialist Nottingham
| Originally Posted by Ardentfrost The only reason you might have to carry a gun is because of some paranoia about a crazy Joe and needing to "protect" yourself, and like you said living your life scared of crazy Joe is silly.
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06-28-2008, 08:37 AM
| #24 | ||||
| ipsa Scientia Potestas est  Pragmatist North Carolina
| Originally Posted by leviathon I think his point is that if he has the means to defend himself, he doesn't have to live scared.
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06-28-2008, 09:16 AM
| #25 | ||||
| People's Representative Socialist Nottingham
| Originally Posted by motivez Unless crazy Joe has a better weapon, or there are two crazy Joes or crazy Joe is a better shot or etc... There is no point at which you can say that yes, I am 100% safe from any other person.
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06-28-2008, 09:55 AM
| #26 | ||||
| For those about to rock...  libertarian Atlanta, GA
| Originally Posted by leviathon No one is 100% safe from anything. After all, more people die in accidental chair-related deaths every year than they do accidental gun-related deaths. Chairs are fucking dangerous!
I'm not scared of crazy joe, with or without a gun. However, if people around me are allowed to carry guns, then I'm even less scared of crazy joe.
__________________ http://www.corruptapedia.com/ You can call me Aaron Burr the way I drop Hamiltons. | ||||
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06-28-2008, 11:47 AM
| #27 | ||||
| People's Representative Socialist Nottingham
| Originally Posted by Ardentfrost It might be just me but I'd be more scared knowing everyone around me, including crazy Joe, could legally get guns.
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06-28-2008, 11:58 AM
| #28 | ||||
| minor irritant &/or non-entity News Moderator Contrarian Birmingham, UK
| If guns are already widely available then it makes more sense for me to have one. If they arent then it makes sense for me to seek that it stays that way thru the collective effort that is the state, even if I know that such efforts wont be 100% successful. I dont know quite where the tipping point is, all I can say is that it still seems a long way off for me here in the UK & thats despite having lived a fairly dodgy life in a fairly dodgy area. Meanwhile back in Libertarian-world I'm desiging a pocket-money gun that you build out of parts that you buy one a week with 'Hah! Yeah! Death! Ka-pow!' magazine, ..., collect all 36 parts before your classmates do etc. Volume 2 will include the parts required to attach it to your fathers desert-bound dune-buggy, ..., I dont anticipate a volume 3 | ||||
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06-28-2008, 12:20 PM
| #29 | ||||
| People's Representative Socialist Nottingham
| Originally Posted by avsp I know what you mean, and frankly I've got enough problems worrying about knives than knowing everyone I meet could have a gun.
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06-28-2008, 02:17 PM
| #30 | ||||
| For those about to rock... libertarian Atlanta, GA
| Originally Posted by leviathon Your fear of guns is irrational. Crime with guns happens whether guns are legal or not. Plus, when guns are illegal, tons of other things are used as weapons for illegal activities (much more than when guns are legal). Personally, I fear crime, so I want guns to be legal.
Crimes committed with legal guns is INCREDIBLY rare and usually they are crimes of passion (finding your wife in bed with another dude) not premeditated aggression. A town just north of Atlanta has a law that requires all home owners to own a gun. It isn't enforced of course, but the law is on the books. Before the law was created, crime was fairly prevalent. After the law, crime dropped off very quickly and they had a murder last year which was the first in 17 years (and the murder was a crime of passion). There is TONS of other evidence that shows being allowed to own guns prevents crime. Florida and Texas both have great success stories about it. No one is saying you have to own a gun or like guns. But if you want crime to be reduced, statistically, you should want to have the ability to own one. | ||||
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06-28-2008, 02:49 PM
| #31 | ||||
| People's Representative Socialist Nottingham
| Originally Posted by Ardentfrost And yet compare the crime rate, especially gun crime, in America to those of European countries where guns are not legal. I know you'll say it's due to a different culture but surely this is in part created by the legalisation of guns.
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06-28-2008, 04:55 PM
| #32 | ||||
| For those about to rock... libertarian Atlanta, GA
| Originally Posted by leviathon You look at it all wrong. Overall crime rates in European cities are greater than those in American cities with less stringent gun laws. The hard part is finding similar cities in America without the gun laws. Most metropolitan cities in America have relatively strict gun control. Even the city I live in has relatively strict gun laws, even though the state has very loose gun laws.
Gun crime in those cities in Europe are down, true. That's the number people love to tout. However, crime overall is usually higher. Then there's the problem of definition... "what is a violent crime?" There are most certainly cultural differences. That's why you usually have to compare high levels of gun control to low levels of gun control within one country. The US is the easiest country to get stats like that since we have a wide variety of gun control in the country. But even then it's difficult. We have vast cultural differences within the US, even within same states. Last year the safest city in the US was Mission Viejo, CA. CA has some of the strictest gun laws of any state. That supports your case, right? Fourth most dangerous city in the US last year was Oakland, CA. That supports my position, right? I could further support my position there, though, because Oakland has a similar size to Atlanta (where I'm from) with about half a million people living in the city and 5 million living in the metro area (Oakland is about 10-20% smaller, but still, it's similar). Where Oakland is #4 on the most dangerous cities list, Atlanta is #22 with less strict gun laws (still more strict than the rest of the state). And of course the issue no one ever addresses when they're advocating really strict gun laws: how do you fight off an oppressive or invading government? You know who has really strict gun laws? Places like Burma... places with really oppressive governments who WOULD be scared of their population if the population had the means with which to rise up and wrestle back control. And what happens when their populations TRY to protest their government? The government comes out there with their guns and kills people. That shit happened just a few months ago (again). And then you'll come back with "blah blah blah, first world nations don't have that problem because the governments are better and the people have to elect others who would do that sort of thing which won't happen." But there are numerous nations who elected a dictator not knowing he was going to shit on their rules and do horrible things. Milosevic, for instance, rose to power through a series of elections and popularity... then he killed a shit ton of people. Sure, Yugoslavia isn't considered "first world" but they had elections. That is what is supposed to prevent that shit from happening here. I know you're not American, but this country was founded by a bunch of guys who had just used their guns (that they weren't supposed to have) to fight off an oppressive government. They realized the importance of the people reserving the ability to do that again if needed. Other countries can or can't have guns if they want, but we've already seen that American politicians are power hungry and willing to disregard rules to get what they want. It hasn't gotten to the point of needing that last resort, as there is still hope that the next President can undo what has been done, but who's to say we won't have to one day? Anyone who does say that is either happy with the direction of the country, or wanting to take it over themselves. Either way, those people are dangerous and guns are still needed by the people. | ||||
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06-28-2008, 05:45 PM
| #33 | ||||
| Noob libertarian Philadelphia
| Originally Posted by Phantom I am of the opinion that the Bill of Rights stand as unalterable.
Since most of the states ratifying the Constitution demanded a Bill of Rights be added and the original states subsequently ratified this Bill of Rights the concepts embodied in the Amendments are fundamental and thus unchangeable. A second but perhaps even more compelling argument against "scrapping" and rewriting is that the 2nd Amendment does not grant, establish, give or confer anything. Since the citizen's right to arms exists without any reference to the 2nd Amendment the powers of the government to impact the arms of the private citizen could not be expanded by merely changing words . . . words that the right in no way, shape or form depends upon. The 2nd Amendment, even with all the ambiguity you read into it and the profound confusion you claim to suffer when reading it, has but one simple and unambiguous action . . . To redundantly forbid the federal government to exercise powers that it does not possess. | ||||
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06-30-2008, 10:18 AM
| #34 | ||||
| Perpetual Noob Independent
| Originally Posted by Pocono Pete What language supports this conclusion? I always thought any part of the constitution could be amended.
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06-30-2008, 11:04 AM
| #35 | ||||
| For those about to rock... libertarian Atlanta, GA
| Originally Posted by Phantom It can, that's probably why he prefaced it with "it is my opinion"
 The ability to amend the constitution is an important one, and the difficulty in amending it is even more important. | ||||
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06-30-2008, 11:14 AM
| #36 | ||||
| ..... your a worthless poster  Realist
| I read the title and nothing else in this thread. I saw there's a quoted article in the first post and I have a question. Does the author want the amendment changed because he thinks it needs to be more clearly written or because he doesn't like how it was recently interpreted? | ||||
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06-30-2008, 12:23 PM
| #37 | ||||
| Perpetual Noob Independent
| Originally Posted by 7960 I can't read the author's mind, but based on everything I've read of him, he would be happy to have guns outlawed and confiscated. But, he recognizes this doesn't reflect reality and at least at this time in our history Americans generally are in favor of a constitutional right to own guns.
As it stands now, the Heller decision is going to cause tons of litigation before courts find an equilibrium between right to own vs. right to restrict. The purpose of the amendment would be to make a clear line where about the rights to own guns and the ability of government(s) to restrict that right. | ||||
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06-30-2008, 11:15 PM
| #38 | ||||
| Noob libertarian Philadelphia
| Originally Posted by Phantom We are talking about messing with the fundamental principles here. The Bill of Rights stand as redundant prohibitions on the exercise of powers that the government does not possess. The rights embodied and enumerated in the Amendments do not flow from the Amendments; merely changing the words chosen to recognize and secure a right would not create legitimacy to change, condition or violate the right . . . that which was previously prohibited would not be suddenly permitted.
The Bill of Rights stand on a plane above the amendable Constitution; they bind the power of the legislature and the whims of the majority. SCOTUS said: Marbury v Madison pokes a toe into these waters, focusing more on the judiciary interpreting the constitution into what it is not but making some comments on the restrictions on the legislature inherently found in the Constitution. Marbury also endorses the concept that the fundamental principles upon which legitimate constitutional authority rests, are unchangeable. "That the people have an original right to establish, for their future government, such principles as, in their opinion, shall most conduce to their own happiness, is the basis on which the whole American fabric has been erected. The exercise of this original right is a very great exertion; nor can it nor ought it to be frequently repeated. The principles, therefore, so established are deemed fundamental. And as the authority, from which they proceed, is supreme, and can seldom act, they are designed to be permanent.Proposing to amend a provision of the Bill of Rights would be an interesting test for our government and would lead to interesting discussions that's for sure. For now I will remain on the side of the BoR being unamendable simply for the fact that most of them do nothing but secure prohibitions on the exercise of government's power against ideals that existedand were exercised freely by the citizen, before the Constitution was created. Amending a provision of the Bill of Rights to modify a right would be the ultimate ex post facto law . . .  SCOTUS has said: "The first ten amendments to the Constitution, adopted as they were soon after the adoption of the Constitution, are in the nature of a bill of rights, and were adopted in order to quiet the apprehension of many, that without some such declaration of rights the government would assume, and might be held to possess, the power to trespass upon those rights of persons and property which by the Declaration of Independence were affirmed to be unalienable rights."Are you arguing the people can authorize the power and government can legitimately exercise that power to trespass upon inalienable rights? Isn't that absurd? Now to the RKBA / 2nd Amendment specifically . . . The classical republic the framers created has, as a core component, an armed citizenry. The mass of citizens capable of bearing arms and those actually armed (without permission or regulation) stand as the first line of defense of the states and nation. When states ratified the Constitution and Bill of rights they had an understanding of what the provisions meant and the 2nd was always understood to protect an individual right. When each government ratified the admission papers it was a contract. This was the argument of Montana back in February: "Montana officials are warning that if the Supreme Court rules in the D.C. gun ban case that the right to keep and bear arms protects only state-run militias like the National Guard, then the federal government will have breached Montana's statehood contract. . . .I'm not endorsing or defending this tactic, only reporting the "mindset" although I do think it would be illegitimate for the federal government to assume that they could alter the status of a right agreed upon as each state ratified the Constitution or joined the Union. There is a mingled dependence there, binding both state and federal governments in an understanding about the citizen's right to keep and bear arms. SCOTUS has spoken on this directly and explained the concept in PRESSER v. STATE OF ILLINOIS. "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."This is interesting because it says that mandate against states disarming citizens exists without reference to the 2nd Amendment. There is a federally enforceable prohibition on the states acting on the citizen's RKBA that does not flow from the 2nd Amendment! (so "incorporation" is moot) It is interesting too because SCOTUS says this additional protection of the citizen's RKBA exists in two planes. It exists in the "general powers" (those laid out specifically in the Constitution) and in the "prerogative of the general government." That describes a underlying principle of our Constitutional Republic. Because the Constitution promises to the states to forever provide a republican form of government, (Article IV, § 4), a power is thus granted by inference to keep that promise, to secure the continuance of our founding principles. The republican government that the founders embraced and established has as one of its most fundamental components, an armed citizenry ("it is undoubtedly true that all citizens . . ." as SCOTUS puts it). The federal government then, in keeping that republican promise, can not permit any state to act in a un-republican fashion, such as disarming the citizen. Understand also that the principle works both ways; the federal government can not act to disarm the citizens because the states rely on those citizens for their security. As a side note; Presser makes it very clear that the right protected by the 2nd Amendment does not belong to the states, nor does it protect in any way, any state militia powers. If it did, the Court would have applied the 2nd Amendment's scope and restriction on the federal power residing in the prerogative binding state action, not the state's apparent power to require a permit for an armed march by private citizens. | ||||
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