Posted on 09/11/2007 9:52:52 AM PDT by JZelle
Over the past 30 years, I've been paid to write almost two million words, every one of which, sooner or later, came back to the issue of guns and gun-ownership. Naturally, I've thought about the issue a lot, and it has always determined the way I vote.
People accuse me of being a single-issue writer, a single- issue thinker, and a single- issue voter, but it isn't true. What I've chosen, in a world where there's never enough time and energy, is to focus on the one political issue which most clearly and unmistakably demonstrates what any politician—or political philosophy—is made of, right down to the creamy liquid center.
Make no mistake: all politicians—even those ostensibly on the side of guns and gun ownership—hate the issue and anyone, like me, who insists on bringing it up. They hate it because it's an X-ray machine. It's a Vulcan mind-meld. It's the ultimate test to which any politician—or political philosophy—can be put.
If a politician isn't perfectly comfortable with the idea of his average constituent, any man, woman, or responsible child, walking into a hardware store and paying cash—for any rifle, shotgun, handgun, machinegun, anything—without producing ID or signing one scrap of paper, he isn't your friend no matter what he tells you.
If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.
What his attitude—toward your ownership and use of weapons—conveys is his real attitude about you. And if he doesn't trust you, then why in the name of John Moses Browning should you trust him?
(Excerpt) Read more at lneilsmith.org ...
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bttt
No elected official should ever be out of rifle range of their constituents.
It’s amazing how so many on the Left can’t understand the meaning of the Second Amendment; especially when our Founders wrote so much about it! Jefferson put it so well: “...when any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it...”
BTW, for those who may think they were referring to people’s right to hunt, the term “ARMS” is only used in a military sense (one does not bear arms against a deer in the woods!)
He sure likes the adjective “infantile”. He used it a lot.
Anyway, he seems to be pushing the edge of kookville prety hard to me. I am all for gun rights but as much as I may get flamed for it, I don’t think the constitution protects your right to own a suitcase nuke.
I do believe your unhindered ownership of rifles, shotguns handguns and a whole lot more is protected.
I love it. Extremely well said.
BATFE and Secret Service are interested in speaking with you.
Classic El Neil.
If he isn't genuinely enthusiastic about [you] his average constituent stuffing that weapon into a purse or pocket or tucking it under a coat and walking home without asking anybody's permission, he's a four-flusher, no matter what he claims.
"-- he seems to be pushing the edge of kookville prety hard to me. I am all for gun rights but as much as I may get flamed for it, I don't think the constitution protects your right to own a suitcase nuke.
I do believe your unhindered ownership of rifles, shotguns handguns and a whole lot more is protected.
You're "pushing the edge of kookville" by comparing possession of a "suitcase nuke" to owning and carrying arms.
Why? -- You claim "I am all for gun rights, but", -- but what, [besides nukes] -?
How about jet fighter planes and 2000 pound bombs? It's not unreasonable to expect that our Founders could not anticipate every technological development.
But our Founders did foresee the need to amend the Constitution from time to time.
YOU don't get to change the clear meaning of the Constitution just because the Founders didn't anticipate a new development.
Tench Coxe wrote at the time of "the unlimited power of the sword". Our Founders envisioned no limits on the people's right to be armed. You may certainly make the argument that they should have. You may make the argument that they would if they knew of today's developments.
But it is outright nonsense to claim that the Constitution empowers the federal government to disarm the people in any way whatever. That is not what the Founders said and it is not what they meant.
While you mull this over, keep in mind that any enemy who is dedicated to your destruction will recognize no limits whatever on the force they will use against YOU.
Our government, in its misguided attempt to deny machine guns to the Branch Davidians, used machine guns, armored vehicles, pyrotechnic grenades, and poisonous gas.
“BTW, for those who may think they were referring to people’s right to hunt, the term “ARMS” is only used in a military sense (one does not bear arms against a deer in the woods!)”
Bingo. I’ve used that fact to stammer a few anti-gun folks. They then say it referred to something else, militias, etc.
When they do that, openly question their quickness to shift the meaning. “No, you JUST SAID it was about hunting, now it about militias. 10 seconds ago you were CONVINCED it was hunting. What’s it going to mean after lunch?”
A guy left my cube red-faced over that one. Ahh, a good day that was. ;)
Well, there were cannons, I wonder if there was anything written that would have mentioned those as specific arms “of the people”. Although they may have been too expensive for typical private ownership. However, perhaps some of the private sailing ships had cannon? Where there cannon on our side of the fight at Lexington? If there were - then I would imagine cannon WERE included in our rights. And a cannon back then would be comparable to a 2000 lb bomb today.
I was talking to my kids about how the 2nd Amendment is to protect us from the government, but obviously we would have a difficult time fighting a revolution against it. But, if conditions got so bad - perhaps the State National Guard could be used against the govt? (I’m thinking of some evil dictator that somehow “took over” - I imagine if it got bad enough several governors could band their Guard units together to fight).
Bump.
Gang bangers, violent felons, child molesters are not my freinds, and my friends wouldn't let them get their hands on a gun. Psychotics could be my friend, but I'm not going to let them get their hands on a gun, and my friends won't give them guns either. Then there's that enemy of the US to consider...
There were cannon in the days of the Founding Fathers. Were those included (either implicitly or explicitly) in the discussion of the “arms” we could keep and bear? Just curious.
Any decision that you make that is good for our country is the right decision. There is no Plan B.
No, he should be out on the rifle range with them.
Now if the anti-gun nuts say it’s about the militia, explain to them what the Founders meant by the term. They certainly did not mean the States’ armies (National Guards).
Unknown to many people today, “The Virginia Declaration of Rights” of 12 June 1776, is the immediate forerunner of the Constitution’s Bill of Rights over a decade later. In fact, it was the Virginia legislature’s refusal to ratify the Constitution unless these rights were incorporated that guaranteed that we have those first 10 amendments.
This is how that document referred to the Militia:
“That a well regulated Militia, COMPOSED OF THE BODY OF THE PEOPLE, trained to Arms, is the proper, natural, and safe Defense of a free State; that standing Armies, in Time of Peace, should be avoided as dangerous to Liberty; and that , in all Cases, that the Military should be under strict Subordination to, and governed by, the Civil Power.”
(my emphasis).
In other words, Universal Service of able-bodied males over age 16! How the Leftists would freak about that!
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